#<- for reach. im gen conflicted.

[cursezoroark]

because i feel like i need a refresher on rejuv's story again i feel the need to finally do renegade its just im soooo so hesitant on being mean but i don't want to skip to terajuma......... if anyone has a way to sorta keyhole that please please lmk.

[crypticemerald]

I've got nothing to post right now so have my oc, hes part of a subdivision of smaller iterators (in the sense of robot-like creatures) able to think of themselves (but are mobile) aka Operators :D

more rambling about Operators below :)

Operators serve as a way to persue small tasks between closeby groups, created during gen 2 of Iterators they serve as a ''fix it all'' having a set manual encoded in them which provides them with the necessary tools to fend for themselves and geolocate closeby structures which provide energy.

Being off the strings for them it means that they function off few neurons which they carry inside their body (which keeps them alive and stores some necessary stuff + recently given commands + records important events during their travels from one facility to the other). They recharge via a chargeble battery installed in their system by connecting it to anything remotely mechanical, such as shelters, karma gates (which they are able to access unless theyre karmically imbalanced or arent given permission to), communication stations/arrays and so on.

They do not have a great memory, they work on a limited one when off-field and when they reach the closest iterator they will connect to their structure, offering a scan of their can and offering to solve any issues they are able to fix within it, but most important they will empty their memory (think of outside storage) in order to recieve a new command/order/task. Their main purpose is to serve under the rules of the ancients and help with upkeeping iterator groups local to them or following their orders which may change from anything such as pearl collection, transferring data, rearranging faulty memory conflux structures, eliminate any threatening bodies to their host iterator can and so on!

[cough, if they find mobile rot even if their host iterator tells them not to kill it they will go on the violent route to eliminate the rot or mold]

Greatly respectful of ancients and senior iterators they will greatly follow orders given by seniors and other iterators, doing small tasks for them and serving low range messenger/support friend if you will. They are shorter than most iterators (with my guy being shorter than five pebbles) but more resistant and resilient than the mid iterator puppet plus a lot stronger!

Usually theres anywhere between none to five in groups, depending on their size and how old they are.

IDK they have some sort of weapon which they probably either carry around or its part of their design, mine has claws.

Their main rules are:

-follow iterator wishes

-ensue their safety

-dont mess with the enviroment (less prone to violence towards organic creatures)

ABOUT MY OC TE HEE

Ordinary Maintenances is under Chronicler of Methologies (an archivist iterator which belongs to @nemofil and they work under pearl collection duty most of the time, why most of the time?

Scavengers think of Ordinary Maintenance as a very very shiny object, so they trade him around until he menages to actually get up and leave their premises which is sadly not that successful. Seeing as Chronicler is quite a pacifist and feel bad about Scavenger he will often do nothing (not as he can do it) about it, leaving often time OM being traded around for shiny stuff.

Im not sure how i wanna kill them off but oh well, hes quite the resistant one, surviving through an iterator attacking them, being a chewtoy sometimes on sundays, and witnessing some pretty violent scav conflicts hes quite the silliest :)

stay in pieces chronicler, may you be loved by him as yk bros do (/j)

[narzissenkreuz-ordo]

im not gonna go into too much detail since its my business that doesnt need to aired out in the open

but this weekend was absolutely worst case scenario. i was no contact with my father for 3 years before he contacted us shortly after my mom's cancer surgery and because me and my sibling were both so vulnerable we decided to give it one last chance.

I made a mistaking thinking things would be different, he has his fair share of trauma and one of the first things he said to us on the phone a few months ago that no matter what he loves us and supports us with 'living our lives they way we want' and that was not the case at all

he brought his new wife and step daughter with him ( i realize now that he guilt tripped me into letting them come even when i said it should just be us) and i'm pretty sure they have NO idea about our baggage

he just acted like nothing had happened the past 3 years. we didnt have a conversation lasting more than a minute at a time. his new normal family didnt even talk to us or try to get to know us, i still dont even know what his wife's job is or his step daughter's college major is

they made me cry on the ferry to seattle yesterday, trying to convince me and brother to just get odd jobs or find work online rather than go through with disability benefits and at that point i just mentally clocked out. once we were out of the car in seattle i decided to stay at a near by cafe so they could go to tourist-y stuff (i do not do good in big crowds) and i just ended up ubering to the ferry terminal and went home on my own. And i have not talked to them since, he know i was upset and feeling sick and didn't even send me a text asking how he was doing. instead he dropped my sibling back home in the afternoon, didn't even take him out to eat, and then sent us pictures of the drinks he got at this local cider place that me and griffin were dying to try out. he was 20 minutes away and went out with his new family and took pictures to shows. i repeat. he was 20 minutes away from my house.

so i cut my losses and ended up writing a long ass letter last night. i wasnt mean, calling him a horrible person or calling him names. just how i felt so utterly unimportant to him and had no idea why he even reached out to us again, i told him i felt like he played a horrible cruel joke on me and brother

and thats that i guess. i was absolutely appalled by his step daughter and wife. I have never met such a group of entitled people before, the two of them are 1st gen ukrainian immigrants. They were absolutely disgusted that there were public needle disposal stations and pro-palestinian signage in the area. I cannot believe that they experienced the horror and pain of the current on-going conflict of their home on such a personal level yet roll their eyes at the current genocide happening in gaza. 'im glad the college protesting fad isn't popular on tiktok anymore' 'no one talks about ukraine anymore because of this' like. absolutely abhorrent.

so yippee i guess i have my final closure!!!!! theres no more second chances (this was like, the 10th chance at this point the past 20 years lol)

ok i realize i went into Too much detail but i feel better posting this thank god

[thevoidbunny]

For the last post of 2024, I present: The Tierlist

WAIT WAIT WAIT HEAR ME OUT—

So. I guess im staring from the lowest tier.

Not Played: Never owned a Gameboy/Gameboy Advanced. Skipped Diamond and Pearl since I already had Platinum, and Black 2 was too expensive to play without an emulator, which leads me to-

Didn't finish: Technically I played the opening of W2, but my laptop sucks as an emulator, so I didn't even make it out the first town. As for Let's Go Eevee, it wasn't due to the catching method, Kanto is just mid.

Worse Than Predecessors: I also didn't finish these two, but I hold these two with more contempt because unlike the previous two, I actually got close to the end with both of these.

BDSP is a “faithful” remake of Diamond/Pearl, and that's the big issue. I know this has probably been talked about to death, but GF should've gone a HGSS route and incorporate Platinum into the story, especially since that's the Sinnoh game. I'm thankful about The Grand Underground and the improvements from the previous gens were kept, but it's just not enough. Compared to ORAS, this is just an awful remaster that keeps the bad and none of the good. And you're paying 60 dollars, when the original DS games—yes, even Platinum—can be found between $20 and $50. I received Platinum alongside SP, and I enjoyed playing Platinum way more than SP.

As for Ultra Sun—while being visually prettier and having Zossie—it didn't need to exist. Would've been just fine as DLC, or even a sequel, but instead they decided to rewrite the story so Lusamine's good actually, which ruins Lillie's arc. Exggecutor Island? Lillie confronting her mother? Nehilgo Lusamine? Nah, let's sideline her and go fight Necrozma! And to top it all off, they still didn't add a skip cutscene button. Dropped once I reached the elite four.

Nemona Save: The only saving grace of this game is Nemona. The graphics are shit, the lighting is shit, everything either looks washed out or eye-searing neon (looking at you AREA ZERO). The game is… fun, but that's because it's a pokemon game, the premise of going out and befriending monsters will always be fun. The story is honestly alright too, it's just sad that it’s in such a sloppily put together game. I wasn't even play this one, the only reason I did was because I got it as a gift. Didn't get the DLC either, no point in putting more money towards a game that I feel ambivalent towards at best.

Cutscene Hell: I have conflicting feelings towards SuMo. I did enjoy playing the game, and I love Lillie's arc, but the cutscenes. Whoever decided that the game should have as many as it does without a skip button needs to be fired. I tried replaying Moon during a blackout, and I didn’t even make it to the first Kahuna. It’s even worse a second time because I've already done these tutorials damn it let me play!!!

5/10: the most controversial of the placements, I'm sure, but let me explain. White was my second ever pokemon game, I have loads of fond memories with the game. I even enjoyed my replay of Black! It just… many pokemon fans treat Gen 5 with such reverence, I feel uncomfortable even mentioning my issues with the games. For example, bane of my existence, Audino Grinding. Got a new team member? Are you under-leveled for the next gym? Hope you’re ready to run back and forth until shaking grass appears, which ends up taking longer than it does to KO the Audino! And you better hope you’ve leveled high enough, or else you’re going back to the grass! Gen 4 also has this issue with level grinding, but that doesn’t excuse the issue, it just makes it worse. Now, uh, this is the other part I'm hesitant talking about, because I know these characters are very beloved. I don't like BW Cheren, Bianca, or N. Let me explain. From a story point, Cheren questioning his strength and Bianca being unsure about her place in the world through the game, and then getting to see their characters fulfilled in the sequels is really cool. From a gameplay standpoint? You get Cheren going "what is my strength, how do I get strong?" every time you meet up and Bianca doesn't do anything until N's Castle. They get better in the second games from what I've seen in pokemas and secondhand, but still. And N, as cool as his character is, never gets the chance to really show why liberating pokemon is needed. Like I get Ghetsis is manipulating him, pokemon and humans are in a symbiotic relationship, yada yada, but that doesn't mean to discard the dilemma entirely. Why can't we see N doing more than talking about his goals? Maybe we meet him in a shelter for abused pokemon, or N calling out a cruel trainer, or even calling us out if our pokemon’s friendship is too low. Obviously, Gamefreak doesn’t actually want people to consider N may be right, since Team Plasma gives up the ghost almost immediately. Which. Sucks. IDK, I've got more thoughts, but this section is long enough already.

Good, But Could Be Better: Alpha Sapphire was my first exposure to the Hoenn region, and it did a damn good job. The main story, the redesigns, the DexNav, it's overall fun. The only reason it's not higher is some minor issues of mine. Mainly the "let's address the multiverse with Zinna" and—not to be IGN—the water routes. After playing the Alola games and surfing around the whole island with no loading screens, said screens get really noticeable in ORAS. Which is a shame considering how many surfing areas are in Hoenn. As for the whole multiverse thing, that was not needed. At all. Why would you take a story that's about the balance of the Earth, Sea, and Sky, and then stable on the multiverse. We could've had another reason why Zinna needed to summon Rayquaza than "we need to explain why mega evolution and fairy types weren't in the previous games." And I would've not had to listen to people hating in the Delta Episode and Zinna because they broke the timeline or whatever.

Amazing Games: Ironically, both games are in Sinnoh. Platinum deserves its reputation as one of the best pokemon games. I had always been hesitant from how much people gas up the game, but they were right. I'm sure I don't need to explain why it's such a good game, you've heard it a million times before. What I want to add is why it's not in S or S+ tier. See, while this game is great, it's held back when considering all the QOL improvements in the newer games. Like, TMs being limited sucks when trying to play around with team members, especially if it's one per savefile. Move reminders also don't include TM moves, which I unfortunately learned when I replaced Steel Wing with Close Combat on my Staraptor. Then there's The Grind TM, another annoying issue when trying to play around with members. You want to train up a new member? Okay, first go get a pokemon with the Compound Eyes ability, use the Thief TM (That's one per save so make it count), then spend forever to get a 5% Chansey, use Thief and then hope it's a Lucky Egg. "Oh but what about EXP share?" that only works if you have one pokemon that needs to get leveled up. If you're trying to keep a team all evenly leveled, it's not as effective. Plus, the Lucky Egg gives 1.5x the exp, so less time running around hunting for Chansey to slay. Though, I will admit, some of this may be Skill IssueTM considering this was all based off my first playthrough. But really, if Platinum had a remaster that gave it the better movepools of later games, reusable/easily available TMs, and the exp share of Gen 6, it would be perfect.

Legends Arceus was a surprise, but a welcomed one. I love getting to just run around and catch pokemon to my heart's content. I'm not randomly dragged into the story, I can do it at my own pace. There's no random battles that interrupt my adventuring. And it's never been easier to get shiny pokemon! It's just. There's really no point in replaying. I mean, since the main point is catching pokemon, there are no gyms to switch up team members, and the Noble Pokemon can be defeated without ever needing to battle. Even after 2 years, I still haven't replayed the game, since I can just do massive mass outbreaks whenever I get the urge to run through Hisui. S, Replaying Constantly: oh boy. SWSH is really the black sheep of the Pokemon series. Getting saddled with the infamous Dexit controversy, a story that really needed more polish, and the wrath of a fanbase that had grown increasingly angry at Gamefreak over the years, SWSH got the shortest stick imaginable. So, why is it this high? Simple. Ease of replaying, and the DLC. "Easy replaying? But the beginning takes forever!" Every pokemon game has a slow start. From going to Sangem Town to deliver a map, to us needing to get a Wooloo out of the dark forest. It only feels longer because, unfortunately, we can't really button mash out. (Did I mention they didn't add a true cutscene skip in this game?) But once you're out the starting town, you can immediately enter the Wild Area, The Isle of Armor, and The Crowned Tundra! I've had multiple playthroughs where I ignore the main quest and just run around the DLC areas. Which are so pretty, it shows what we could've had if this game spent longer in the oven. Are the game's completely carried by their DLC? Yes. Should this have been in the main game for the price we paid? Also Yes. But that doesn't mean I don't have gripes about the story (I could write a whole essay about it.) But in terms of gameplay, I will be replaying for the 50th time. (I, uh, kinda went SWSH crazy during COVID.) X is my favorite 3D pokemon game. Best customization options, the introduction of Pokemon Amie/Hyper Training/PPS, skating, chain fishing, shared EXP, reusable TMs, MEGA EVOLUTIONS- Can the game get super easy at times? Yes, especially if you use all every gift pokemon you get. But am I gonna complain when I can get a trenchcoat dress and pet my MVP Vivillon, no! Aside from the nonexsistant story and incomplete threads (Seriously, what did that sign mean??) There's a lot of details put into the game. Lumiose city has so much stuff I didn't even know about until reading about it on bulbapedia. Berry mutations are a thing. Parfum Palace has a protrait of young AZ. You can make so much money from the Battle Chateau ie the building Trevor introduces to you and then we all forget about. It's so AGGHH PLAY X RIGHT NOW

Obvious Pick is Obvious: Be honest, is anyone surpirsed? I will be frank and say SoulSliver was my first pokemon game. I fell in love with the Johto region, and can firmly say had I not recieved the game for my birthday, I wouldn't be the pokemon fan I am today. Gamefreak put their whole pussy into this game. Incorpoating elements of Crystal into the remake, adding walking pokemon, the sick ass cutscene where Lugia/Ho-oh appear after being summoned, making an exclusive safari zone, Voltorb Flip- Look I don't need to explain why its so great. Aside from issues carried over from Gen 4 and the OG games (Limited TMs, HMs required for progress, odd level curve where the 5-6-7th gym are all around the same level while the 8th is higher leveled) This is THE pokemon game. Honestly the best one to introduce a newcomer with, granted you find one for a decent price (Or emulate with a decent computer)

Also LYRA BEST PROTAG FIGHT ME

[neims-skeleton-obsession]

I’ve just had a long conversation with my friend about some quality Skulduggery angst and I know how much you like that

It started with thinking about a crossover with The Last Of Us. Valkyrie gets infected, and unluckily enough, getting bitten in the only places she doesn’t have armour means you turn in 5-15 minutes. Skulduggery gets the zombie somewhere no one can find and kill her, and goes on a bloody rampage - threatening anyone who might be able to cure her and killing them when they insist it’s not possible

Of course, this means he’d turn into a sort of dark mirror of what Joel and Ellie could become (I say, with only baseline knowledge of TLOU; my friend is a fan of it). He would find them because they’re the reason there’s no vaccine

The vaccine would have meant Ellie died, and a lot of people were killed to save her. Skulduggery would do the exact same thing for Valkyrie. He would understand that, I think. It would not stop him from trying to figure out how to make the vaccine himself

And then there’s part 2, where it morphed into any kind of zombie apocalypse with the same setup, but as part of a dimension-hopping plotline where the duo we know meet this version of themselves. It could become a rescue mission, where Skulduggery needs to get Valkyrie back from this broken version of himself who desperately wants his friend back

Maybe they talk - the zombie apocalypse Skulduggery and our Valkyrie - about their respective stories. Maybe he just listens about how much better things could have been, in a better world. She sees the zombie, of course. She knows that’s the only thing separating this Skulduggery from the one she knows

And when our Skulduggery arrives, he might find the other standing, as still as a statue, in silence. He goes over, sees a lone zombie shambling around in a container area which they overlook. The other only says “Valkyrie.” and that’s all the explanation required. They stand together a while in silence, watching what’s left of her

There are no hard feelings when our duo leaves. Only a horrible feeling of tragedy and sorrow that lingers around them all

So yeah! Skulduggery angst :)

IM SO SORRY I KEPT NOT GETTING ROUND TO RESPONDING TO THIS

I know fuck all about last of us BUT. my god I love this /gen

Skug would absolutely fall apart in this situation I think. Both skugs. I think it would be a lot of quiet (and not-so-quiet) mourning- I don’t think there’d be much talking between the Skeles as you said. Like, mostly just standing or sitting together in collective, silent, grief

But I also think there would be points were alt skug just- snaps? And the other lets it happen. He knows, he’s been there. He’s not going to interfere- just make sure no-one (especially our Val) is actually hurt. He’s there to offer.. comfort, if you could call it that, when it’s all over.

Valkyrie is… confused, for the most part. She sees this version of herself that is barely her- it’s lost it’s grip on most of its humanity by the time they reach it- but she also sees that this other skug, her skug too, can still see it as Valkyrie. She starts to see it as well, after a little bit. Maybe she thinks about how that could have been her if the events of sow had gone just a bit differently. Maybe she recognises some part of herself in its eyes.

Either way, I think she’d be conflicted as fuck about it. Wouldn’t want to harm it- for both skugs’ sakes- but wouldn’t be entirely comfortable around it, either.

Tl;dr i fucken love this and oh god I’m experiencing feelings /pos /pos /pos

And thank you for the ask!!!!!! And angst!!!! God shit!!! Apologies for the wait chfhducbdhcb

[not-souleaterpost]

For a next gen era fic, do you think you need to make the next gen as relatively low level in fighting capacity as Soul Eater's Three meisters were? I had an idea for such a story, but one thing i don't plan to feature is any particular rise in power for the cast(heroes and villains alike). Most of the crew is about as strong as they can be(with all the weapons being Death Scythes), with only one character in particular not being all that spectacular.

I dont know, i know the progress of getting stronger over time is baked into soul Eater's DNA as most Shonen series, but the fact is i think the original explored characters seeking strength as part of their journey well enough that doing it for the next gen is just retreading all ground.

Im way more interesting having the fights be more like the fight pre baba yaga's defeat, with a lot of interpersonal clashes where there are objectives at stake, rather than the fighting for fighting's sake that the manga became later down the line.

That way i can also use the fights to set up interpersonal rivalries between the kids and the witches they will be fighting, ala Black Star and Mifune.

Thoughts on this approach?

Thanks for the question, sorry for only answering it know, I only try to go on here once a week so I don't waste all my time scrolling social media lol.

But back to your question:

I think one reason why Shonen has this power escalation thing, especially in the "new gens surpassing the old ones" (besides obvious reasons like marketing lol) is because one does have the hope that ones children will live in a better world than you, that they will break circles of generational trauma and shit, like that old Nas song "born in correction, he'll be my resurection"

Ofcourse one can simply say that the fact that they dont have to fight that much and can focus on other more important things hence not being so powerful IS the better world the previous gen fought for.

Guess the only problem is that in battle shonen fights and powerlevels kinda define charachter, and thats why non fighters feel useless. (But more controversially I think its partly because not many writters have that inate talent of someone like Toriyama, the DBZ guy, who for example made Bulma a charachter who was interesting and relevant without ever having to fight but eh, dont wanna derail the post lol)

Ofcourse this is a kinda trivial problem, because nobody forces one to stick to the formula of the original work, and I think kinda subverting or evolving it further is more interesting than a simple retread.

But even something that seems to be repeating the same shit can work, like the next gen having the same flaws, or remixed ones, and dealing with the seemingly inescapable cycle of it - the fact that they cant even reach the heights of their parents being one additional problem and question they have to answer for themselves and the world:

Could even be like another type of Madness, entropy, for a charachter going crazy feeling that they are just a worse version of their glorious ancestors, and then thinking that their parents were too, so they're children or the next generations in the future will be even worse or something, leading to a conflict that resolves this contradiction, maybe by showing that the next gen has some novel talent.

And so we go back to the strength thing - I think ofourse it could work, but I think it would be intersting by exploring new applications of the abilitys, like maybe they are not nearly as strong, but more usefull for more problems? Maybe they get spread to a larger population so people dont require some single institution in the middle of Nevada to deal with everyones problems lol.

Maybe even it leads to a world where Kishineggs are a rarity and that is what the next gen accomplishes without doing shit youtubers overanalyze for "Could X beat Superman videos"?

I dunno, maybe I accidentally revealed some ideas from my own Next Gen concept (that Im not sure I'm ever getting to cause I have more than enough on my plate with SE Post, and not sure if I want to spend my whole life doing derivative work lol, but maybe it will materialize someday...) but I think in the end it is very possible to make a story without having charachter strengths baloon like that Macey parade or how its callled.

So yeah go for it, I think you have a good enough understanding of Soul Eater and general "shonen" stories to not fuck up that aspect, or even if you do - its a valuable experience anyways lol. Then I only will say good luck and hope to see it be realised in the future!

Oh and a little side thing - I think its prudent to have the old cast be usefull and not just disapear to not "overshadow" the new one, and thats a way to keep the powers down by knowing what treshold not to cross, and there one can even play with the idea of strength, like to spoil one of my plotpoints, I had an whole arc for an adult BlackStar who is the officially strongest by some rank (idk why they are ranked, lets just say commercialization or new mass media lol), but is kinda unhappy, first because a mysterious second ranked individual gets all the shine but also because he kinda having matured realises that he got alienated from most of his old circle, being alone while many of them had familys and settled down. Basically it would start from there and non of the next gen kids would prolly come close to his strength, atleast physically but idk if my idea comes of good in words, but if it feels like lame "charachter bashing" - Yeah...Sorry

[thermodynamic-comedian]

just re-watched asoue netflix finale episode.

you guys don't even want to read this, i am about to be so weird about this series.

ouugghhhh the. them finally driving in the fact that neither side of the schism is free of sin <2 hehe, sudden new perspective that changes the moral and ethical implications of everything that's happened in the series before *twirls hair and kicks feet* <222

olaf just being casually objectified. good. as he should. im happy. im happy he got put in that cage too btw. he is sooo pathetic and unwell and dramatic in this episode btw. if u even care.

klaus has grown up so much holy fuck. looking back at the first episodes and comparing him in them to him in this??? even his voice is so different oh my god. the boy really grew up. damn.

honestly i don't blame violet for wanting to stay on the island at first. she's been through so much, she's had to actively protect her siblings for so long, i don't blame her for being drawn to what seems like a happier, safer place.

i wish we would've seen sunny all grown up and stuff. see her be like an older sister to bea ii. might have to make a teenager/young adult sunny design. i think she'd be a culinary arts major. i also like to think later on in life she reached out to fernald and they're still friends and occasionally meet up and play card games whenever fernald's not at sea with his family :)

"you hurt people." "and people hurt me." actually losing my mind rn. that wasn't an accusation, and that wasn't an apology. that wasn't a judgement, and that wasn't an excuse. it's just two statements, both equally true. and they're both acknowledging things that they clearly haven't shared with each other before: kit's acknowledging how her feelings for olaf are in conflict with her morals, and olaf's acknowledging that his actions directly mirror the way he's been treated, specifically because he was unable to break that cycle. kit's admitting that she is not fine with what olaf's done to other people, and olaf's admitting that he's not fine with what's been done to him. it's not an emotional scene because they're in love; it's an emotional scene because of the lives they've lived.

hey do you guys think lemony ever tried to explain the complicated and could've-been-solved-with-polyamory mess that is sugar bowl gen's romantic subplots to bea ii. like was lemony ever just like "oh btw, i was in love with the woman you were named after, but she married this other guy. and they were the parents of the people that raised you. and also your mother used to date a criminal, who also used to date another criminal....and also my brother at some point probably. oh and my brother was also in love with this one librarian, and another one of our friends probably. oh and that other criminal? she also had a husband, who is now dating just some guy named charles i guess," and bea ii is just sitting there sipping root beer thinking "what the fuck man. i ain't never joining vfd this shit is wild."

[ssamie]

one. new beginnings 

oikawa tooru x fem langa!reader

(hq x sk8 the infinity)

warnings: spelling mistakes, 2k+ words, u have langa’s blue hair sorry 

gen masterlist.            “snow” masterlist.

"eh?! what do you mean you're moving?!" reki shrieked out in surprise, accidentally tripping over his feet and landing on the ground

the distant sounds of cars honking and the few civilians chattering filled the air. it was almost dark and they had just gotten off work and were on their way home. 

y/n sighed and picked up his skateboard, nodding her head lightly with a frown. "yeah.. my mom said we have to move soon" she said. "but.. why?" reki frowned as he stood up to meet eyes with her.

"well, my mom got a better paying job there so she said we should just move, i guess" she replied, her tone laced with guilt. "oh.." reki muttered. he kicked his feet on the ground, looking down as y/n peers at him with a guilty frown.

"im sorry reki" she whispered with a soft whimper "i guess i should've told you a lot sooner.." she said

reki looked up at her and shook his head. "no, no! it's fine, don't worry.." he reassured with a shaky smile "um..where exactly will you be moving to?" reki asked her 

"miyagi" she answered quietly, sheepishly kicking her feet back and forth, causing the rumbling sound of the wheels hitting the pavement to fill the tense air. 

"wow uh.." reki chuckled in surprise "that's really far.." he muttered. he then cleared his throat and shot her a shaky grin "well, atleast it snows over there!" he exclaimed. "maybe you can try snowboarding again" reki said, though it didn't seem to fill her with much comfort 

"i heard there's a good amount of snow when you're deep in the mountains! you can even-" 

"reki.." she cut him off with a soft whimper of his name 

reki stopped and looked at her with a sad sigh. he pursed his lips and finally dropped the enthusiastic façade. "i don't wanna leave okinawa" she admitted with a pained sigh. "i don't wanna leave you" 

".. a-and the others too ofcourse" she continued with a nervous chuckle "not just you.." 

"i don't want you to leave too" reki chuckled as he wiped the tears brimming his eyes 

he lightly punched her shoulder and took his board from her hands. "agh! you're gonna make me cry, you know!" he exclaimed. y/n smiled and let out a soft laugh "sorry, sorry" she said 

reki pouted and hesitantly brought her into his arms, nibbling on his bottom lip and letting out a sigh as he squeezed her tight. "i'll really miss you, y/n" reki said. 

she blinked repeatedly in shock and flusteredly wrapped her arms around him as well. "um-i-i'll miss you too reki.." she stammered out as she tried to fight off the heat that was rushing to her cheeks 

suddenly, reki pulled away, much to her distaste, and fixed his stance. "let's skate together before you leave, yeah?" reki mused "just for tonight.. then we'll continue when you get back" reki smiled 

"yeah. let's skate" she replied with a fond smile 

the pair skated home, taking their usual route and doing some tricks here and there. though their usual chatter and banter was not present, and all there was, was silence that seemed to weight down on both of their chests with varying emotions. 

they stopped at the block separating their houses, right under the street light where they always meet up with each other. 

reki looked back at her and smiled. "well, this is where we part" he chuckled ."yeah.. i guess so.." y/n muttered back with a frown 

reki sighed and nudged her with his elbow. "cmon, don't be like that" he said "its not like we'll never see each other again!" reki exclaimed with a laugh, though even he wasnt able to convince or reassure himself. 

"you're just moving, no big deal! we have one more day to spend together and our friends and visit S" reki explained in a comforting tone 

y/n sighed in distress and crouched down on the ground. she kept her board in place with her feet and stared at it with furrowed brows. "i guess you're right" she said. "but i really don't want to leave. im completely fine here in okinawa with you and the others." 

"i wanna keep skating with you and go to hotsprings together and eat bentos and keep working at dope sketch!" she exclaimed with a look of affliction 

reki frowned and sat down beside her, resting his chin on his hands and nodding along. "yeah, i wanna keep doing that too" he said "but we can't really do anything about it anymore" 

"unless you wanna try begging your mom or something" reki joked with a laugh as he nudged her with his shoulder. "but it's not like that would work-... y/n?" reki sweat dropped as he looked at her only to be met with a look of determination and sparkling eyes. 

"you're so smart, reki!" she praised "that's a great idea, we should do that! you're so amazing" 

reki chuckled and cheekily grinned at her "ah shucks, you flatter me too much!" he giggled 

"but were not gonna actually do that, right?" reki asked with a soft chuckle

".. right?" 

"WE BEG YOU!" they simultaneously exclaimed as they got down on their hands and knees to bow 

"w-what?! kids, what are you doing??" nanako exclaimed with a nervous smile as she tried to get them to stand up 

"PLEASE! DON'T TAKE Y/N AWAY!" reki cried out as he wrapped his arms around her in a bone crushing hold. "please!" y/n followed up with a determined look in her eyes as she stares at her mother expectantly 

y/n loosely wrapped her arms around reki's waist and pouted "please, mom?" she pleaded as she accentuated her 'puppy eyes'. "please, hasegawa-san?" reki pleaded as well as he gave her his 'puppy eyes' for the extra cute effect 

nanako seemed conflicted as she stares at their cutesy expressions with a look of dread. "what do i do?! they're too.. too cute!!" she cried to herself "help me, oliver !!!" 

she then composed herself and cleared her throat. "well, im really sorry kids" she said "but my desicion is final." she stated with a determined huff "im doing this so we can earn more-" 

she cut herself off as she caught sight of the two teens sulking and holding ecah other while a dark gloomily aura loomed over them. "ah well- i-" nanako stammered as she shakily reached her hand out to them with a guilty smile 

she then sighed and let her arms hang by her sides. "im sorry, y/n, reki. but we need to move so i can earn more money and y/n won't have to work for me anymore" she explained "plus, i've already purchased the house so there's really no going back now" 

"but im okay with working at dope sketch.." y/n muttered with a frown 

"i know, but.." nanako smiled nervously "look at it this way! you'll go to a new school and make some friends! we can even try snowboarding during winter, won't you love that?" 

y/n briefly glanced at reki and sighed. "sure.." she mumbled 

nanako smiled and gently patted them both on the head. "you should hang out with your friends before we leave" she said "you'll regret wasting your time here, yknow?" nanako mused 

reki and y/n nodded and went to put on their shoes. they grabbed their boards, and hastily skated to joe's restaurant 

"ah jeez.." nanako muttered to herself as she watched them skate away. "teenagers are so hard to handle!!" 

"help me oliver!!!" 

"guys, we have something to say!" reki exclaimed as he abruptly slammed his hand down on the table, effectively gaining all of their attention. 

"y/n is-" 

"what is it you slime?" miya sneered as he continued sipping on his drink 

"your girlfriend?" they all simultaneously said with a bored tone as they continued on eating their meals 

"..." reki and y/n blinked and looked at each other in confusion. "what?" reki asked cluelessly "no that's not-" 

"well its kinda obvious" shadow said with a chuckle "yeah, we kind of saw it coming" miya agreed 

"what? no seriously, that's not what-" reki was once again cut off by joe who playfully punched him in the shoulder and grinned. "damn, didn't know you had it in you to ask her out" joe laughed "and i didn't think y/n would ever confe-" 

"I'M MOVING TO MIYAGI!" she immediately cut him off, mainly to prevent joe's big mouth from spilling anything, and just to get it out of the way. 

"WHAT?!" they all collectively exclaimed 

"are you serious? that's pretty far away" shadow said with furrowed brows "yeah... what about S?" miya asked with a small frown 

"i'll have to quit" y/n says as she steals a fry from cherry's plate "i'll go one last time later." 

"miyagi.." cherry mumbled as he swats her hand away from his food. "where in miyagi will you be staying?" he asked. "i don't know" she answered with a shrug. "but im going to a school named aoba johsai i think." 

"carla, tell me about that school." almost immediately, carla had responded. "okay master" it said. 

"aoba johsai, also known as seijoh, is a private school located at miyagi prefecture. they are mostly known for their performance in volleyball, having competed in numerous tournaments and had made a name for themselves through the sport and successfully deemed themselves as a powerhouse school. "

"volleyball?" y/n hummed in curiosity "how do you play that?" she asked cherry. "i wouldn't know." he replied "though it's a sport where you play with a team. why? would you like to join?" he asked 

"probably not" y/n shrugged 

"oi, rookie! are you really moving?" joe asked with a small frown "S would get boring without you, yknow?" 

"i am" she replied "and i think S would be fine with you guys and reki in it" 

reki looked at her and smiled. the redhead slung his arm around her shoulders and picked up his board "how bout we have a beef one last time before you go?" reki suggested "we could all go against each other. just for the fun of it." 

"sure, but you'll lose, just so you know" joe boasted as he flexed his biceps. "hah?! just cus you're bigger and more muscular doesn't mean you'll win!" reki whined 

"yeah!" y/n agreed with a huff "reki has gotten better and much faster! and he knows more tricks now. he even did a snowboarding trick and-" 

miya quickly cut her off before she could go on a full rant about the redhead. "let's just go" miya groaned out as he grabbed his board. "man, are you sure you're not together" shadow sweat dropped as he followed miya and dragged them both out of the restaurant 

"we're not!" reki exclaimed with a laugh "why would you even think that would happen? we're just best friends" 

"right.. best friends" y/n agreed 

shadow sweat dropped as he turned to look at her, only to be met with her teary eyes and her quivering smile, looking like she’s on the verge of crying her eyes out like a child. 

"are you okay?" shadow muttered sheepishly as he watched her hastily wipe her eyes and pout like a child "yes" she replied with a huff 

"oh, is that so?" miya cooed with a cat-like grin as he stalked closer to her side "i mean it makes sense" he said "the heroine shouldn't be with a slime, after all" 

shadow deadpanned as he watched miya slyly lock their arms together with a grin "so who should she be with? you?" he scoffed "ofcourse!" miya wholeheartedly agreed. "im the hero so the heroine should be with me!" 

shadow sweat dropped as he watched miya hug her arm and look at them with a smug cat-like smirk. "dude, aren't you like thirteen?" shadow deadpanned 

y/n smiled and patted his head with a soft laugh "yup, you're right" she agreed jokingly, her smile widening as miya's face exploded into bright shades of red. "i-it doesn't mean i like you though!" he shrieked out "im just saying that we would be compatible!!" 

"i see." she muttered "japanese people are so hard to decipher" 

cherry and joe came out of the restaurant and got on their boards, urging them to do the same. "cmon, let's go there before too many people arrive" joe said as he stretched his arms 

"last one to arrive buys everyone boba!!" reki announced as he skated away, pulling y/n along as he does so 

"ha?! oi! unfair you should've counted!!" shadow exclaimed before hastily catching up to them "hmp, as if i'll lose to any of you slimes." miya muttered as he sped up 

"oh please. you all make me pay anyways." cherry mumbled with a sigh as he got on carla and calmly caught up to them 

"well you got the most cash" joe shrugged with a grin 

"shut up you gorilla." 

"i'll really miss their banters." y/n mumbled as she looked back to watch joe and cherry hit  each other with their board. "hey, it's not like we can't visit you" reki laughed 

"would you visit me reki?" she asked with a hopeful gleam in her eyes. "it would be strange not being with you.." 

"of course! i'll visit you like every week!" reki reassured with a wide grin 

"heh, as if you got the cash for that" shadow sneered from beside him. 

"i-im gonna save up, then i'll visit you every week!" reki cleared his throat with a nervous laugh 

her smile widened as she stared at reki in admiration and pure glee. 

"okay, im counting on it!"

im making miya have a cute little puppy crush on u cus why not lol, yall won't end up together tho that's weird 🤨‼️

[peanut-in-the-goal]

could u write something like remus is out running errands or something and he gets recognized by an nhl fan who’s homophobic and shitty and he goes home and sirius comforts him and it’s cute and fluffy

I KIND OF WENT ON A RANT IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS IM SO SORRY

ALSO I LOST SPEAKING PRIVILEGES WITH @kielemarie because of this. IM SORRY MARIE PLEASE ANSWER MY ASKS

@candy--floss--kid you asked to be tagged when i finished so here ya go

@lumosinlove thank you for this fandom that is sweater weather

also here’s the last thing I wrote because I'm proud of it please I thrive on validation

---

Remus was walking down one of the aisles in the store, looking for a baking mix. He figured that he’d finally take up the challenge of teaching Sirius how to bake. 

He found a simple recipe. Yellow cupcake mix, how could he mess it up? Remus thought to himself. He placed it in the cart before he felt someone forcefully slam into his shoulder. 

He stumbled, his hand immediately going to his scar from Grayback. He looked up slowly, dreading who he might see. 

His eyes locked with the dark green ones in front of him. The tall man’s eyes matched the Slytherin Jersey he wore. Riddle was in bold letters on the back. Which was bad, but not the worst thing that could have happened.

He allowed himself to breathe, it’s not Fenrir, he let the relief of it wash over him. 

“Sorry,” Remus said. He knew it wasn’t his fault but didn’t want to start any drama or conflict when there was no need for it. Especially with a Snakes fan,

He tried to just walk away. He had everything he needed for just a lazy day at home, but the man stepped in front of him. 

Remus looked up confused. Leo has told him about Karen’s doing this sort of stuff. Something that Gen Z came up with or whatever, but he wasn’t sure if he entirely grasped the concept. Suddenly the man started laughing. A deep menacing, laugh that had no humor behind it. 

His eyes were hard as he stared at Remus. 

“It’s not right you know.” He said. His voice was deep and loud, everyone else in the aisle turning to look. “You’re just a bunch of sinners.”

Remus realized what he was referring to in a heartbeat. He was taken aback at first, he knew people felt this way but he had yet to have anyone come and say it to his face so plainly.

He took a step back moving the cart to go around the man, “Excuse me,” he gritted out. He started pushing the cart before a hand reached out and grabbed it.

Remus raked a hand through his hair, sighing he looked up at the man. The green-eyed man was smirking at him, holding onto the front of the cart. The letters stood out in the harsh lighting of the store, glimmering every time he moved.

ALWAYS, PURE, HOCKEY.

The words were printed underneath the symbol, the green snake. It made him sick, he felt bad for all the people who were drafted to that team, stuck without a chance of escaping on their own.

The queasiness in his stomach turned into anger. He used that.

“Was there something you wanted?” Remus asked, generally annoyed now. 

“I want you to know that it’s not fucking right.” The man stepped closer, Remus stayed where he was. 

“Noted, now if you don’t mind I think I’m going to go home to my boyfriend.”

One of the people next to him snorted and tried to hide their laughter at the affronted look on the green-eyed man's face. 

“How can you even look at yourself in the mirror?” The man sniped. 

“Easily, knowing that a homophobic git who can’t keep their nose in their own business isn’t looking back.”

More people laughed, Remus smirked. The man seemed to be getting angrier and angrier, which was just fine. 

“You’re broken.” The man pursed his lips.

“How original.”

Remus pushes the cart again, managing to make the man dislodge his fingers. He started towards the checkout, wanting to get out of there as soon as he could. 

It wasn’t his first time he heard these things. That was all he heard when he was in the media and the pictures had just come out. But Sirius had suffered through most of the face to face stuff, while Remus saw all of it online.

It didn’t make the impact of the words any easier.

It disgusted him that people still thought this way, that they didn’t like that he was able to find love with someone that wasn’t accepted. So what, oh no, they have the same genitals, obviously, it isn’t right. Fuck them for thinking that, honestly. 

It’s sad that they’re so limited to that type of mindset. Where only one thing is right and everything else is wrong in their eyes.

He huffed, walking down the aisle with his head held high. 

Stand your ground, don’t let him win. You got this.

The man followed him, yelling slurs from where he was trailing behind him. 

Don’t let him see, it’s okay. Just a little longer than you can go home to Sirius and everything will be alright.

He finally makes it to the front of the store, but of course, there’s a line. He stands waiting for self check out, it’s the shortest.

“It’s disgusting.”

“You’re disgusting.” Remus didn’t even raise his head to look at the idiot.

Just ignore it, don’t give him the time of day. Keep your head up.

“How am I disgusting?”

“You’re limiting people to only live by your standards and your viewpoints on what’s normal rather than letting them be happy and live how they want. It’s gross really, that you’re so closed-minded about these things for fucks sake.“

“I’m saying what’s right!” The man spluttered.

“How is it right? How is any of that right?” Remus snapped his head up to look at him, his eyes were hard. “You’re telling me that I’m not allowed to live my life or be happy because it doesn’t see fit to you?” He shook his head in outrage.

The man opened his mouth to speak but Reus didn’t let him.

“Ever hear of John Locke. Our three natural rights that we’re all born with? One of them being the Pursuit of Happiness. I’m not hurting you am I? Me happening to like other men does not affect you, it affects me. It makes me happy and you’re really going to come out here and fucking tell me that I’m not allowed to be happy?”

“Well…”

“Well, what?”

The man was at a loss for words, scrambling to grab onto anything to say but he couldn’t.

“It’s still not right.” He said gruffly.

“Yeah, you said that already.”

The man glared at him before huffing and walking away. Remus sighed in relief. 

He walked up to the check out that had just opened, swiping his items before getting a bag and rushing out of the store. 

Some people smiled at him in encouragement, but he was so drained and just wanted to be home at the moment.

He threw the bag in the passenger seat, climbing into the car to drive. He sat there for a minute.

In for four, hold for six, out for eight. Repeat. It’s okay.

He shuffled his playlist, smiling softly and humming along to the tune of Free Fallin by Tom Petty. He was definitely free falling when he fell in love with Sirius.

The drive home was short, luckily they lived close by.

He pulled up into the driveway and quickly scrambled out of the car. His chest felt tight and there was a lump forming in his throat. He jiggled the key in the lock, difficult because of how shaky his hands were.

Finally, he heard a soft click and stepped inside.

“Baby?” Remus called through the house, his voice cracked slightly. He could hear the dull noise of the TV in the other room, then some shuffling, before Sirius’ goofy grin popped around the corner. Slowly, it morphed to one of concern.

“Re?” Sirius took in his red face, and trembling lips, before pulling him into a hug. Remus sagged against him, letting Sirius support his weight and dropping his head against his shoulder.

“Vas tu bien, mon Loup?” Remus nodded his head slowly against Sirius’ neck because though he might not actually be okay, he felt safe in Sirius’ arms. He held on tighter when Sirius went to let go.

“Mon loup? What’s wrong?” Sirius asked. He pulled back just enough to be able to look at his face. 

Remus stuttered for a moment.”There uh…” Sirius rubbed his side soothingly. “There was this idiot at the store, h-he said it wasn’t right?” His voice came out as a question. He bit his lip hard against the tears welling up.

God, why did he feel like crying? It’s not like he hasn’t heard all of this before because he has. But having someone saying it to his face like that in the middle of a store where he’d never had problems before was like a punch in the gut. Was this how it was going to be from now on?

Was he going to get stopped on the streets or in the stores and restaurants just because he was gay? Because he chose love over being what everyone else wanted him to be?

As long as he got Sirius it would be worth it in the end. It had to be.

“Wasn’t right?” Sirius furrowed his brow. “Oh.” The realization dawned on his face.

“No, no, Remus, non.  He’s wrong, He—”

“I know.” Remus looked at him. “I know. Just… Is this how it’s going to be from now on? Are people always going to look at us like we’re different j-just because we love each other?”

Sirius made a sad almost whine like noise. “I’m sorry Re…”

Remus sighed, dropping his forehead to rest against Sirius’s shoulder again. “At least I have you.” His words were muffled but Sirius still understood.

He smiled softly at his boyfriend. “I could say the same thing. Come on.”

Sirius led Remus back to their living room, the TV playing some cooking show that started when Sirius’ had ended. Sirius sat on the couch, pulling Remus to lay down with him.

“Has it always been this bad for you?” Remus murmured, his eyes were already shut. He cuddled further into Sirius.

“I guess. I don’t know, I stopped listening to that stuff, they’re all wrong anyway.” He grabbed the blanket that was hanging over the couch and draped it over them both.

“I’m sorry, I love you.” Sirius pressed a kiss to the top of Remus’ hairs.

“I love you too,” but Remus was already softly snoring away.

---

Remus’s eyes fluttered open sometime later. He was curled on the couch with Sirius. It was dark outside, the stars shining through the leaves of the tree that stood outside their window.

He shifted to rub at his eyes, yawning.

“You’re cute.” 

Remus snorted. “I just woke up.”

“You’re still cute.” Sirius laughed softly, brushing some stray strands of hair from Remus’ face.

Remus yawned again. “What time is it?”

Sirius grabbed his attention phone from where it was laying next to him. “7:30, you’ve been asleep for a while.”

Remus huffed, sitting up all the way. 

“I was going to teach you how to bake a cake,” he pouted. 

“I know how to bake a cake!” Sirius exasperated, “I also stand by my statement of you’re cute.”

Remus huffed out a laugh.  He stood up, “I’m sure you do.”

“I do! Celeste taught me.”

“She taught you or she tried to teach you, there’s a difference.” Remus raised his eyebrow,

“Fine, she tried.” 

“Then I will conquer the impossible.” He said it boldly, standing up at the same time, making them both laugh. 

“I’m not impossible.” 

“Teaching you is,” Remus smirked, tugging Sirius’ hand to make him get off the couch.

He felt so much lighter now. Being around Sirius tended to have that effect on him. He made him forget what he was worried about, and made him feel safe and loved. The man from the store was still in the back of his mind nagging at him but at this moment that didn’t matter. Nothing matters except the two of them. And wasn’t that wonderful?

“I am not impossible to teach,” Sirius whined. Remus laughed, walking into the kitchen.

“Yes, you are baby,” Remus shook his head fondly, looking for the bag from the shop. He didn’t see it. “I think I left the stuff in the car, I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll get it!” Sirius grabbed the keys before Remus could, a dopey grin on his face.

“Must everything be a competition?” There was no bite behind his words, watching Sirius fling the door open. The cold air from outside drifted into the heated house, Remus shivered.

The door shut and Sirius was back in front of him, bag in hand.

“Ready to show you that I can learn!”

“Did you lock the door?” Sirius hesitated for a moment. Remus had to bite back a laugh, “I’ll go lock it,” he pressed a kiss to Sirius’ cheek.

“Now we’re ready,” He pressed a kiss to Sirius’ cold nose this time.

He took out what he bought, vanilla extract, a boxes of cake mix, sugar, and sprinkles.

“Okay so…” He held one of the boxes, reading the recipe on the back. “Can you preheat the oven to 350 degrees, baby?” He asked. Sirius looked at him before walking over to the oven. “Or, do you want me to do it?” 

“I can do it.” Remus laughed.

“Sorry.” Sirius batted Remus’s hands away. “Okay, what’s next?”

“Uh, we have to make the batter. Can you get the eggs out please?”

“Mhm,” he got the eggs from the refrigerator, placing them gently on the island. 

“Alright wait, we need 3 eggs, ½ a cup of oil, a cup of water, and this.” He held up the mix for emphasis. 

“That’s it?”

“Yep,” he smiled at Sirius. He owed one heck of a lot to that idiot. His idiot.

“Easy,” Sirius dragged out his words and laughed.

“See you say that now, but something has to go wrong I swear.”

Sirius grumbled as he went to crack the eggs into the bowl for the electric mixer. Remus laughed again, going back to reading the instructions, making sure that they were doing it right.

“Oops.” Remus snapped his head up.

“Oops? What do you mean oops?” He leaned over to look at the bowl. Half an eggshell laid on its side in a bowl, on top of the already broken up egg.

“Told you something would go wrong,” Remus laughed, carefully picking it out to throw away.

They worked on making the batter, Remus telling Sirius what to do. Finally, everything was in the bowl and they just had to mix it.

“Okay, you can turn on the — hey wait!” 

Sirius pulled the little switch on the side of the mixer. All the way.

 “No! Sius don’t.” But it was too late, the powder from the cake mix flew everywhere. Finally Remus was able to hit the switch back, turning it off.

They looked around, but the mix had covered the counter tops and ground in a sheet of what looked like dust. 

A startled laugh came from him, Sirius following right after. Their shoulders shook with mirth.

“Well that was a bust.”

“And we still haven’t even started on the frosting yet.”

[thisweekingundamwing]

This Week in Gundam Wing 23-29 May 2021

I’m so on the ball with this lately... >_> Sorry. Here’s this week’s roundup! May 23rd - 29th!

Remember to give your content creators some love! Be sure to join in on the events at the bottom! And remember to send in any new works you see or make next week!

~Mod Hel

Fanfiction/Snippets/AU Ideas:

@bobo-is-tha-bomb

The Preventer Calendar https://archiveofourown.org/works/31561295

Gen, Reader, Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei, Zechs Merquise, OC - Character

Mature, No Archive Warnings Apply, Humor, Partial Nudity, Reader-Insert, Nudity, A teeny hint of TrowaxReader, Rating because of some gratuitous nudity on Trowa's side

Twelve models, twelve shoots, twelve different locations in the Ardennes, and all of it in two fucking days. Because Preventer couldn’t spare you their agents any longer than that.

Why had you agreed to do this project again?

It's all for the arts.

boxofhatebrains

Helping Hand https://archiveofourown.org/works/31620146

M/M, Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Explicit, No Archive Warnings Apply, Light Angst, Comfort/Angst, Minor Injuries, Implied/Referenced Blow Jobs, Not Gundam Wing: Frozen Teardrop Compliant, after series, Flirting, Not Beta Read, slight reference to Episode Zero, Swearing

Duo realizes that Heero comes around whenever he damn well feels like it. They’ve been in contact for the last seven years after the Mariemaia incident, but generally at Heero’s own whim. Duo stays in the same place, it’s Heero who gravitates.

This time is no different.

@duointherain

Silent Menace https://duointherain.tumblr.com/post/652120818915115009/fic-silent-menace-11

1x2x1

Warnings: Mute Duo. Drugged and injured Heero.

Une always had the dark side of the job. She’d let others give out goodness, but bad news she owned herself. Duo had come to the conclusion that she was trying to take responsibility, trying to be a decent person. He could vibe with that.

@lifeaftermeteor

Touched by the Stars (Ch. 7) https://archiveofourown.org/works/26314657/chapters/77885468

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell, Chang Wufei/Heero Yuy, Trowa Barton/Chang Wufei, Chang Wufei/Quatre Raberba Winner

Explicit, Choose Not To Use Archive Warnings, thar be porn, Dubious Consent, Aliens, Alien Abduction, Alternate Universe, mention of MPREG, everyone takes a turn with Wufei, alien anatomy and interesting dicks, Tentacles, Monster Boys, Slime, Double Cocks, Cum Inflation, Knotting, Oral, multiple dicks, Xeno, Spitroasting, Oviposition, Body Modification, Polyamory, Unbirthing, Triple Penetration, Cervical Penetration

University instructor Chang Wufei didn't even believe in aliens, much less intentionally attract their attention. But that doesn't mean much when they decided he'd be the ideal final mate for their group and scoop him off of the planet to take home to their queen. Enjoying him on the trip there, of course. 

@noirangetrois

Of the Sea (Ch. 10) https://archiveofourown.org/works/12749670/chapters/78205124

M/M, Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Mature, No Archive Warnings Apply, fairytale my way, Meroctopus!Dorothy, Slow Burn, Multi POV, POV Third Person Limited, merman au, MerMay, Fantasy Politics, mentions of abuse, Unnatural November

Heero Yuy will soon be reaching the age of majority, at which time he will ascend the throne of Wingaria. Before such time, he must needs choose a bride. But what if there are no good choices? What if someone else has captured his heart?

The Story of Wrong (Ch. 8) https://archiveofourown.org/works/13849020/chapters/77856332

M/M, Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Explicit, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Duo POV, Angst, Drama, Tragedy, Spoilers, very dark, Heero and Duo don’t die, I promise, Yaoi, slowburn, Mental Instability, Mental Health Issues, Mental Breakdown, If those are in any way an issue for you then go ahead and skip this, Eventual Smut, VERY eventual, this is mostly canon-compliant but I’ve changed a couple things here and there

Duo recounts his experiences during the war in order to explain… well, why he was wrong.

simulacraryn

love me like (tomorrow we’re) stardust https://archiveofourown.org/works/31458119/chapters/77811359

M/F, Treize Khushrenada/Lady Une

Treize Khushrenada, Lady Une, Original Characters, Hot Dog (gundam wing)

Explicit, Choose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Angst, Near Death Experiences, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, unredeemable villain, Sex, Smut, consent is fucking sexy, Spoiler: He wore the Astro Suit at last!, Newtypes (Gundam Wing), no predators or prey here, intact brains

The World Nation would face off against the White Fang to bring about an end to all conflict between the Colonies and Earth. The plan had called for the bitter end of the last bastion of the old regime, Treize Khushrenada. However, as with every play on the stage of war, the actors have chosen to adlib. Effectively throwing the course of history off the rails, the director finds himself faced with a new road to choose.

@zaganthi

Jiu Jie https://archiveofourown.org/works/31413956

M/M, M/F, Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner; Treize Khushrenada/Quatre Raberba Winner; Treize Khushrenada/Duo Maxwell; Duo Maxwell/Hilde Schbeiker

Explicit, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Relationship Negotiation; Polyamorous Character; Quatre Raberba’s Uchuu no Kokoro | Space Heart; Aged-Up Character(s); Newtypes (Gundam Wing); Past Relationship(s); Jealousy; Awkward Flirting; Bathing/Washing; Cuddling & Snuggling; Museums; talking about feelings; Psychic Bond; Dealing with exes; Ex Sex; Colonists exploring earth

Hilde waved goodbye as she left and Duo went to look for Treize and Quatre. What the hell was wrong with him. His body seemed to be saying yes but his mind was definitely not in that space at all. What the everlasting hell was going on. He wanted to see her again but why?

Treize passed him a picture of tree frogs, apparently feeling the confusion as Duo half jogged through the aquarium to catch back up. What the hell. Just what the hell.

It took him a while to get there, but the moment he got close, Quatre saw him, beamed a happy smile and the link opened up with a rush and he was surrounded again in emotional warmth. It was addictive and a relief, and there wasn’t, there wasn’t any recrimination from either of them. Just run off and see an old flame, it’s cool, we’ll be here when you get back vibes.

Lebensmüde https://archiveofourown.org/works/31413278

M/M, Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner; Treize Khushrenada/Quatre Raberba Winner; Treize Khushrenada/Duo Maxwell

Explicit, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Aged-Up Character(s); Quatre Raberba’s Uchuu no Kokoro | Space Heart; Newtypes (Gundam Wing); Preventers (Gundam Wing); Cameos; Therapy; Aftermath of Torture; Aftermath of Violence; Rape Aftermath; Physical Disability; Gratuitous Smut; Psychic Bond; Psychic Abilities; Domestic; Injury Recovery

Treize remembered the discussion of gunpowder residue on his head; it was one of the things John had been livid about after everything, and unable to explain any more than Treize had at the time. Seeing it written down… was something else. Treize closed the book over his finger, gently tapping it on his thigh as he looked up at Quatre.

“The first hot chocolate of the season,” Quatre said sitting down next to him, comfort flowing over the link. “I really wanted something sweet.” He paused. “I can feel something is…oh.” He noticed the book in Treize’s hand.

“Adding to the list of things we need to probably talk about,” he said quietly, contemplating it as he reached with his other hand to take the cocoa. “Have you written everything up?”

Fanart/Crafts/Photo Manips:

@2pcbart

https://archiveofourown.org/works/31618103

Recollect - Trowa/WuFei, comic style

@alphaikaros

https://alphaikaros.tumblr.com/post/651358650733150208/little-angry-boi

WuFei Chang, fanart

@bettertasting

https://bettertasting.tumblr.com/post/652303436314017792/something-spicy-for-the-dash-im-really-digging

Heero/Duo, fanart, nsfw

@bobo-is-tha-bomb

https://bobo-is-tha-bomb.tumblr.com/post/652089738925359104/%F0%9D%98%9B%F0%9D%98%A9%F0%9D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%B4-%F0%9D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%B4-%F0%9D%98%97%F0%9D%98%B3%F0%9D%98%A6%F0%9D%98%B7%F0%9D%98%A6%F0%9D%98%AF%F0%9D%98%B5%F0%9D%98%A6%F0%9D%98%B3-%F0%9D%98%9E%F0%9D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%AF%F0%9D%98%A5-%F0%9D%98%A4%F0%9D%98%A2%F0%9D%98%AD%F0%9D%98%AD%F0%9D%98%AA%F0%9D%98%AF%F0%9D%98%A8-zechs-merquise

Tallgeese, gunpla

https://bobo-is-tha-bomb.tumblr.com/post/652448694036316160/sd-wing-gundam-ew

Wing, gunpla

@judaru

https://judaru.tumblr.com/post/651257960922857472/im-20-years-late-but-ive-been-reading-a-lot-of

Duo Maxwell, fanart

@keiko1183

https://keiko1183.tumblr.com/post/652327422940807168/completed-with-pencils-might-be-doing-the-acrylics

Trowa/Quatre, fanart

@not-so-dead-fandoms

https://not-so-dead-fandoms.tumblr.com/post/651085636504272896/mermay-01

Heero Yuy, fanart

https://not-so-dead-fandoms.tumblr.com/post/651494132071661568/mermay-02-duo-as-a-betta-fish-merlad

Duo Maxwell, fanart

https://not-so-dead-fandoms.tumblr.com/post/652283083819810816/mermay-03-of-course-i-made-trowa-a-clownfish

Trowa Barton, fanart

@pineappleglazedham

https://pineappleglazedham.tumblr.com/post/651759824584966144

Trieze/Une, fanart, fanfiction, playlist

Photosets/Gifsets/Screenshots/Manga Pages:

@clair-audients

https://clair-audients.tumblr.com/post/652114120696594432

Wing & Altron, gif

@disturbed02girl

https://disturbed02girl.tumblr.com/post/617456995130294273/thoughtful-quatre-thursday

Quatre, manga page

@meggie-stardust

https://meggie-stardust.tumblr.com/post/652350439669547008/same-energy

Epyon is an icon.

Fandom Discourse:

@bobo-is-tha-bomb

https://bobo-is-tha-bomb.tumblr.com/post/651423437954433024/a-homage-to-the-reader-insert

Reader Insert Homage

@cuteciboulette

https://cuteciboulette.tumblr.com/post/652076342033170432/shinigamis-coming-to-town-d-duo-just

Duo Maxwell, doujinshi

Quotes:

@incorrectgundamwingquotes

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/652102805897805825/in-the-groupchat-trowa-why-tf-do-we-have-20

Trowa & WuFei

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/652356366558806016/heero-yeah-but-as-far-as-plans-go-this-is-not-a

Heero & Quatre

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/651830976331251712/duo-gesturing-to-heero-dont-worry-weve-got-an

Duo, Heero, & WuFei

Calendar Events:

@gundamzine

Rhythm Generation 2021

Meet the Mods: https://gundamzine.tumblr.com/post/636708854145613824/come-on-over-a-meet-your-2021-zine-mod-team-head

Check out the blog for the Zine schedule!

@gundam-wing-pride

Gundam Wing Pride 2k21 https://gundam-wing-pride.tumblr.com/post/648237909672083456/incoming-transmission-faq

A Beautiful Rainbow of Prompts https://gundam-wing-pride.tumblr.com/post/649898271517573120/a-beautiful-rainbow-of-prompts

@gwartserver

Month of WuFei https://gwartserver.tumblr.com/post/649995521569767424/month-of-wufei

Shooting Stars (online convention) https://gwartserver.tumblr.com/post/650013463432888320/once-upon-a-time-lifeaftermeteor-and-myself

@gwcocktailfriday

Cocktail Fridays!

Post responses on Friday, during Happy Hour between 3 & 5 pm in your own timezone.

Here’s the prompt for Friday, !

In need of Summer/Fall(Autumn) prompts!

(I’ll um... fix these when I have time to find more prompts.)

@gwlemonyshenanigans

May 23rd’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/651999227800600576/may-23rd-submission

May 24th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652131130827571200/may-24th-submissions

May 25th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652252350922342400/may-25th-submissions

May 26th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652312096032342016/may-26th-submissions

May 27th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652433653693136896/may-27th-submissions

May 28th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652434486286548992/may-28th-submission

May 29th’s Submissions https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652648408588353536/may-29th-submissions

Friday Spotlight! https://gwlemonyshenanigans.tumblr.com/post/652439213602684928/the-lastspotlight-friday

@oztober-rust

Welcome to Oztober Rust

We’re an up and coming Gundam Wing event with a slight twist! This page is still a work in progress, but you’re welcome to join us over on discord and get a feel for the event.

Have discord, will fan. https://oztober-rust.tumblr.com/post/647568110262566912/i-see-a-nice-and-steady-following-we-do-have-a

@seasons-of-gundamwing

Summer Event Voting https://seasons-of-gundamwing.tumblr.com/post/646220556727877633/seasons-of-gundamwing-okay-wingers-its-time-to

@thisweekingundamevents

Events Calendar https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/644080386309275648/events-calendar-update

If you are hosting an event currently, or are planning on one, hit us up with links and dates! We’ll add them to the Calendar and reblog your notices to get the word out!

[phoebehalliwell]

I was wondering if you had a piece of writing advice for me? I've been working on kind of. A general outline of how I'd like to write a spin-off series about the next gen and I'm brainstorming an arc, but I feel like it's obvious that it would end with the character surviving and I don't really know how to fix it beyond ACTUALLY killing them off, but then I have to find a way to revive them which is. A whole mess, tbh, and not what I want, so I was wondering if you have any advice?

Okay so i did get a lil lost here in the question imma answer to the best of my ability but if i totally missed the eight ball here u can also message me thru the messaging feature But Okay so what i got here is it's a it's like you've got a protagonist and the issue is it's like Too Obvious that they're not gonna die, which kinda blows. like if u put them in positions of peril the audience yeah whatever 🙄 they'll be fine they're not gonna die and that sorta uh. ruins the suspense. & we don't want that. so ur proposing an alternative where u do kill em off like ha! gotcha! but then u wanna supernatural it and bring them back bc they are well like ur lead and u need them back. so i'm gonna ramble. listen there's this whole thing about "subverting expectations" that got everyone's head stuck up their own asses for the past couple years where you're supposed to have this like Gotcha! but like. u don't need to subvert expectations. a good story shouldn't be predictable, but there should be like. a lil trail of breadcrumbs that'll all add up in the end bc that's what feels rewarding. so to kill or not to kill. first off, just wanna say, don't like. like uhh everyone read divergent spoilers for divergent 3 tris dies as we all know but it's like. it's such a bad death. i still make fun of it to this day. tris needs to complete this super important task, but it will expose her to the death serum. now, tris logics that she's immune to every other serum, she's probably gonna be immune to the death serum. the counterargument is that it's a death serum it could literally just be like normal garden variety poison. so that's our set up; tris might die. what's our payoff? she goes, get death serumed, almost dies, then fights it off! and then an evil doctor rolls in and shoots her point blank killing her. it sucks. so what im basically saying is Don't Do That. there's no satisfaction, no pay off, in escaping the death we were prepared for only to die stupid not 90 seconds later. it sucks. so don't so that if you're gonna kill off your lead character. but you don't have to kill off your lead character! sometimes there r other ways to build suspense even if your audience knows the lead will not die. you can have them have to choose between two shitty options; what part of their moral code will your character be forced to forsake in order to save the day? if that's too much of like, a downer or a moral quandary you can also oceans eight it in which there's never really any major conflict or ethical dilemma as much as there's just a really sick ass heist. if your character's adventure is so well adventurous with a bunch of fun twist and clever saves your audience doesn't even really need to worry whether they'll live or die bc their attention is focused on how are they gonna get out of this one and what could possibly be next. for that specific type of story, reverse engineering is gonna be ur right hand man i would definitely recommend thinking about the most batshit way to solve something and then keep adding on issues that eliminate every other logics option (e.g. the character has to climb up the bookcase to reach the chandelier to swing across it to the window to break out. why can't they use the door? it's locked. why can't they pick the lock? it's magic. why do they have to climb the bookcase? can't use anything for a ladder et cetera et cetera). but back to murder. more specifically, revival. advantages of this being charmed: people die and come to life all the die the sisters even have a catalogue of how many times they've died on the wiki. the revival usually involves some time travel, so u could do that. but it's also charmed and in charmed we have magic, so we could use that to bring the protagonist back from the dead, we just need to establish that first so it doesn't feel like a retcon. since ur already mapping this story out (mad props btw) u know how it's gonna end u know how they're gonna die. so, my recommendation would be to place your deus ex machina early on in the story and something super small and inconsequential. it's best to put it in a collection of evidence we think is just you adding flavor or worldbuilding or whatever. the later you add it, the more the audience is looking for clues and foreshadowing, the easier it is to pick up on, but if you keep your breadcrumbs super tiny, they can slip by almost unnoticed until you need them at the end. so this is a lot of text i hope ive answered your question in my ramblings but once again feel free to message me or send in another ask if i indeed Did Not Answer The Question

[thorsstorms]

Abroad Pt. 7

Summary: Being the Hemsworth Kids’ Nanny, you were vowed to keep it strictly professional for their sake, but do the stolen glances go unnoticed between you both?

Word count: 4.1k

Warnings: little anxiety. smut, oral (f recieving) +18!!

A/N:  The California wildfires were so so devastating and scary. You can google for more videos of people trying to escape the fires and it serious makes my heart race watching it. Miley and Liam losing their home breaks my heart, the interview she did afterwards, she tried to stay calm and upbeat but you could tell underneath it freaks her out. 

Masterlist

You sat waiting on the bleachers at your brothers college baseball game, waiting on the call. Your parents were tucked down in front of you in their stadium chairs. You watched patiently as the sun sunk lower in the sky. You could see your brother pull his sunglasses off his hat and shield his eyes out in center field.

The clock read 8:40PM. It’s almost 7 PM, his time, and he still hadn’t texted at least. Impatience grew quietly and your leg started to bounce anxiously. Staring at the clock on your phone, tapping it every now and then to keep it alive.

He had been texting you briefly this morning telling you that they were all getting freaked out as the wildfires grew closer, they were packing their things and keeping it all in the garage incase they needed a quick out. You told him to be careful and don’t take any chances, but of course he blows it off with a smile saying not to worry.

Cheering ripped you out of your gaze. You looked up just in time to see a ball bounce off the left field fence and your brother rounding second. You gazed out as he settled at third, wondering how they were already at the top of another inning. You watched as he looked towards you, tipping his helmet in acknowledgement, he knew you weren’t watching. Great.

8:45PM. You walked down the stands after Ty and two others came home, most likely sealing their win. You pressed the facetime button and waited. Facetime unavailable? You clicked the call button and it went straight to voicemail. Okay his phone is dead, they were probably out all day getting things situated. One of the kids probably drained it. You continued making excuses for him. After all, you did have a tendency to worry about what always turns out to be not a problem. You pushed down the uneasy feeling, ready to ride out the rest of this game.

“Did he answer?” Your dad asked as you settled behind him again. Of course he knew everything. It was a superpower of his, or any father really.

“No, I’ll try again later, I don’t wanna miss the game,” you turned your phone on full volume and set it down next to you. But not without sending Miley a text asking what was going on.

9:37PM. You were back home and just cancelled on your ice cream date with your closest cousin. This feeling wasn’t shaking and it almost made you physically sick.

“He hasn’t called, Ty. And she hasn’t even read the text!” Ty, still in his uniform, just got home and was standing in the doorway to the guest room while you were sat on the bed with a death grip on the phone.

“Im sure they are OK, you said it yourself this morning that they were keeping any eye on it,” though he tried, his words were not soothing. He stood awkwardly in the doorway and you sat silently on the bed. There was nothing you could do about it. You didn’t have Liam’s number, and who’s to say that he would answer either?

“Let’s just look at the news, they’ve been covering the fires LIVE for weeks now.” You followed him to the living room where he turned on CNN. They had another phone video from a family inside the car trying to evacuate. Flames and debris were scattering across the road and you could hear the panic in their voices as they drove through it.  

“Ty, I don’t want to watch this,” you mumbled, but not making an effort to look away. You read the story headline at the bottom of the screen referencing Malibu homes being helpless. Another mumbled ‘oh my god’ escaped your lips as you stared with panicked features at the television screen.

Suddenly, you had a lightbulb moment, there was one more number you could try. Gen! She was in the city, safe from the fires, and you knew that for sure. Immediately after clicking her name, she answered on the first ring.

“Gen! What is going on!”

“Can you get ahold of Chris?”

“Can you send me Liam’s number? I don’t have it.”

“(Y/N) I don’t know he hasn’t responded all day. I didnt even think about calling Liam,” she scolded herself over the phone. You yapped at her to quickly send it to you. As soon as the contact came through you were calling.

No answer. You shook your head to yourself, staring at the call log.

“Ty, something is wrong. When my flight lands tomorrow, I’m going to be stranded at the airport because not one of them grabbed a damn phone charger! Their house is probably burning up right now, if it isn’t yet, it’s about to be.” You knew you sounded crazy. You probably looked crazy too.

“(Y/N) chill out, he is a grown ass man and hopefully smart enough to leave when he should. Or better yet, they are probably out at a bar drinking a damn beer, perfectly fine.” You rolled your eyes at your father. You knew sure as hell they couldn’t go to a bar, but your father didn’t have to think about those things.

You went to bed that night with little to no sleep. Forever staring silently at your phone sitting still on the bed side table for most of the night, ready to answer it within a second if it rang. It didn’t.

8AM. Your flight didn’t leave until 1PM and you were ready to leave the house at 8AM. The conflict you had between wanting to rush back versus spend as much of these last few hours with your family almost tore you in half. Regardless, you knew you weren’t leaving till 1PM.

9AM. You were seated at the breakfast bar in your grandmother's house. The entire family came for a breakfast to tell you goodbye with no idea how long it would be till you came back. You shoved around a single, half eaten pancake, hardly able to rack up an appetite. You tried their phones again this morning. Nothing. You sat numbly, sending small smiles and ‘I’ll miss you too’’s around to everyone.

11AM. Even though it was early for your small airport, you sat anxiously in the correct terminal. The people surrounding you were boarding a flight before yours. Even some netflix wasn’t able to catch your attention as you watched the clocks and randomly tried one of their phone numbers again. Gen was going to meet you at the baggage claim when you landed. You at least had the knowledge to call her for backup so you weren’t stranded. You could figure this out and locate them together. One could only hope that Chris remembered what time your flight landed.

12:35PM. You sat in your assigned seat after boarding the flight. Without making an effort to pull out headphones and get comfortable, you stared at the lock screen while the flight attendants went through the safety motions in the isle. It was a picture that Miley sent you the day after you left. She snuck a picture of Chris laying between your legs, his arms wrapped around your waist, using you as his pillow. You were both passed out on her couch. When you asked her why, she just sent a shrugging emoji saying it was ‘too cute’. You smiled slightly at the photo. She was right, it is cute.

1:30PM was when you landed in LAX. The time change saving you a few. Taking your phone off airplane mode, the notifications could not come in fast enough. That’s because there weren’t any. A text from your mother saying don’t wait so long to come back, and to let them know how things play out. But honestly, if someone could let you know how things were going to play out, that would be great. You pulled your back pack over your shoulders and speed walked through the crowd to the baggage claim. Your eyes scanned the crowds for Gen, looking for her against everyone else but didn’t spy her anywhere. You turned towards the carousel keeping an eye out for your bag, all while double checking your call log and text messages. Still nothing.

After a couple minutes, your bag finally started to come around towards you. You glanced one more time around you for Gen but came up empty. You sighed and started to walk closer to your bag. Just as you were stepping closer, a hand reached it and grabbed the handle, hauling it off the belt.

“Hey, that one’s mine,” your heart sank, confrontation is the worst thing in the world, but the second you saw who was grabbing it, your breath was taken away. Chris’s eyes were full of humor, he had to know it scared you that your bag would be taken.

“Oh my god!” You lunged your arms over his shoulders, knocking his hat off in the process. His familiarity flooded your sense and you felt yourself let go of so much weight that had been lingering around. “Your phone. You are here,” you mumbled incoherently into his shoulder as you tried to swallow tears of relief that pricked at the back of your eyes. You felt his grip tighten and your feet hitch off the ground.

“I’m here, I know! I’m sorry,” feeling him shaking from laughing. You could feel your body warm in his embrace against the cold airport air. Squeezing around his shoulders reminding you he was actually here, no more waiting and worrying. Your feet hit the ground when you pulled back reluctantly, keeping your fingers locked behind his neck, grounding your senses.

“Don’t laugh! I was so worried,” a stray tear escaped and he quickly wiped it away and pulled your face to his. Rightfully so, you missed him so much, and you let him know. He kissed you rushed, putting his apology into it. Your hands rested down his chest, against his shirt as he pulled away too soon.

“I knew you would be.” He spoke quietly, scanning your eyes, making sure you were okay. A small smile was all he needed. He pulled you in again for a quick kiss before picking up his hat and throwing it back on. You giggled out an apology while he put it on. He grabbed the handle of the suitcase and your hand in his. He quickly scanned his surroundings, you too, but everyone seemed to be minding their own business. It seemed a little too good to be true but you didn’t dwell on it. You both quickly walked towards the doors to the parking lot while you fired a million questions that he had trouble keeping up with.

You got your answers, sure enough, as he drove. You didn’t know where you were going, but he seemed like he did. Having the energy to ask where you both were headed escaped your mind as you thought about Miley and Liam losing their house and all their belongings. Sadness filled your heart for her, a tornado took your home when you were younger as well, but you were maybe 8 years old, and were able to rebuild and find some belongings around the area. You pulled into a driveway of a mid sized home, that you came to figure was your place to stay till you leave town. You caught Liams truck in the driveway. Chris parked the car and gave your hand a squeeze.

“It will all turn out,” he said while you both opened the doors.

Inside you were attacked by the kids, giving each of them a squeeze. You hugged them close, missing them just as much as their father.

“You can’t leave for that long ever again,” India whispered into your ear. “Papa missed you too much.”

You whispered right back before letting her go, “I’ll try my best.” She pulled away shyly and walked across the room to a couch where she was seated on a tablet before you came in. You scanned the room and spotted Miley sitting at a dining room table ignoring everyone else in the house. She sat still with her back to you with a phone pressed to her ear.

Chris shut the door loudly behind you making you jump a bit in your spot. He pressed a kiss to your temple and walked past you, disappearing into a hallway, suitcase and backpack pulling along with him.

At the door closing, she finally turned around and saw you. You walked over the boys at your feet and met her in the dining room, crushing her in a hug.  After talking for a while, you got the gist that she was able to figure things out. She laughed about going to the store to buy a new phone charger for everyone, somehow finding humor in all the missed calls and texts from you to her. You glanced at the table she was sitting at and spotted, along with hers, one other phone plugged in charging as well. She caught you eyeing them on the table.

“Guess chargers weren’t that important to us,” she laughed awkwardly.

“I’m just happy everyone is okay.” It was the truth. She was still shaken, you can see that visually. It probably hasn’t manifested fully yet. After chatting a bit more and seeing Liam out on the back patio on hold with his insurance, you followed after Chris, finding him after he disappeared in the hallway. The master of the house was cute, and perfect for you both. Your suitcase was half empty on the bed as he was hanging up a shirt in the closet, next to his unpacked suitcase.

“You don’t have to do that,” you said, watching him from the doorway.

“We are going to be here for two weeks (Y/N), I want to,” okay, can’t argue with that. The bed looked so inviting after a sleepless and anxiety filled night. You climbed and laid across it, resting your head on your folded hands, sighing.

“I need a nap,” you mumbled, closing your eyes. Chris abandoned his station in the closet and crossed the room. The bed dipped beside you and he pulled you closer, pushing his arm under your head. His other hand ran across your back, he kissed your forehead lightly.

“You are so nice,” you giggled quietly. “Nice to cuddle.”

“Nice huh?” You didn’t open your eyes, but you could hear the smile in his voice. The 10 seconds of quiet you received came to a halt when you both heard one of the boys scream for him across the house. Peaking one eye open, not wanting to move, you saw Chris throw a hand over his face in annoyance. You watched his face closely as he rolled on his back and stared at the ceiling fan.

“Papa!” Tristan yelled again. You rolled your eyes at his laziness and started to pull off the bed.

“I’ll go see what he wants, make him stop yelling.” Chris didn’t make a move to stop you, but his head followed you around the bed and watched you out the door, disappear around the hallway corner.

After about 30 minutes, you figured out the tv and put on a movie for the kids, sitting with them until the calm down. They sat silently while you were in the kitchen with miley, and when you returned to the living room, they were all three asleep. Guess they didn’t get much sleep last night either. You whispered to Miley that they were all asleep in there and that you were going to try to take a nap as well. A suggestive wink and wave of her hands was all you needed to round to corner and head back to the bed.

When you walked back in the room, Chris was breathing evenly and laying still on the bed. You quietly shut the door behind you and took off your shoes, next to where Chris kicked his off. He looked so inviting to cuddle up to but you were trying so hard not to wake him up. The throw on the end of the bed looked soft and was going to have to do because he was laying on top of all the covers. You returned to your spot and slid between his arms. He adjusted slightly, pushing you closer with a hand on your back. A lazy and quick kiss pressed to your forehead was brief and he was out like a light again, probably didn’t fully wake up in the first place. You nestled quietly and felt a weight lift off your shoulders. It was a relief to be back in his arms, all is as right as it can be.

11PM. You woke up cold, as always. Except it was dark out and there was no reason for him to leave you hanging. Its startled you slightly when you could tell the sun was down from the closed blinds on the window. You searched your pockets for your phone. You felt like it was a trick being played on you when you saw that it was past 11PM. You stilled and tried to listen beyond the bedroom door for any sign of life but it was dead quiet. You slid off the bed and flipped on the light, digging through drawers for pajamas, turning up with leggings and a baseball t-shirt of your brothers.

You creaked open the bedroom door and still didn’t hear anything. The house was still, the upstairs lights turned on, the kids were probably asleep up there. You continued till you saw movement out the back windows. Peering through the back door you spotted the three sitting on the patio furniture. Just talking, it seemed. You watched as Liam sat back and slid a hand down his face, probably stressing out. A habit they both have in common, you learned. You pushed the door open and all eyes turned to you.

“Hey, did we wake you up?” Chris asked, craning his neck around the back of his seat. You shook your head and made your way towards him.

“I woke up because I was cold. You always disappear,” you hughed, messing up his hair with your fingers. The other two let out a low ‘ooooo’ and he turned back to them to flip them off.

“Even when I am around your always still cold,” he complained. Just on time and breeze caught you and you shivered slightly. It wasn’t even the slightest bit chilly, he was right.

“My point!” he pointed up at you laughing, the other two joining in.

“Yea, yea. I’m going back to bed.” They all three followed you in after you told them what time it was. Miley and Liam trudged up the stairs while Chris followed you to the room.

11:20PM. You were snuggled into the covers while he turned the lights off, the lamp on, and the fan on, smirking at you. He started to strip his clothes down to his boxers, and you got to smirk while watching him. He crawled in next to you, and boy was he a sight to look at. You could stare all day. You missed him enough that you did so, shamelessly, though he wasn’t allowed to say anything because he does the same thing.

An arm slid underneath you, he pulled you to him and laid his head on your chest like you were a pillow. Fingers automatically finding themselves at the nape of his neck, and the other resting on his arm. You sighed as goosebumps covered your arms because they were now above the warmth of the blanket. Your fingers rubbed down his spine and and pressed against his muscles and he hummed in appreciation. Of course, now you were wide awake after sleeping so long. You waited patiently until you thought his breathing evened out, to stop moving your hands. He shrugged his shoulders like a needy child when your movements stilled.

“I was so worried Chris,” you whispered.

“I know, I’m sorry.” He lifted his head and found your lips in the moon lit darkness and placed a chaste kiss. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” You could see his eyes and feel his body still against yours.

“You, what?” He lowered his head pressing a kiss to your jaw lightly flowing lower to your neck.

“I love you,” you said slowly, feeling foreign coming out of your mouth. His lips left your neck, cold in his absence. Though he wasn’t gone for long, a slow and hard kiss pressed against your lips, eyes falling closed to the darkened room. He kissed you slowly, drawing his tongue in and showing his love for you endlessly. It was sweet, slow, and sensual in its own way. His stubble ran across your skin, leaving a tickle in its wake that you loved so much. When he pulled away, he kissed across your neck, leaving you to catch your breath. One hand was gripped softly behind your neck, giving himself more room while the other squeezed harder around your waist. He took his sweet time feeling you out, sliding your annoying in-the-way shirt off and paying attention to your chest that was rising and falling under his touch. You gasped as he payed attention to your nipples that grew hard quickly against the cold air and his fingertips.

“Say it again,” he demanded across your skin. Trying to grasp yourself to reality from his assault, you murmured ‘I love you’.

His hands flooded to your leggings and easily slid them under you and down your legs. Goosebumps rose across your skin and he ran his hands up your legs, finding home on your waist against underwear that hadn’t come off.

“Just take them off,” you told him breathlessly. You expected to see him fight off a smirk against your eager tone but there was no reaction except for lust flooding his features. As soon as they slipped past your ankles his hands where under your knees, carving a spot for him. He laid open mouth kisses down the inside of your thighs, making you humm in frustration.

“Love, do you even know how long you made me hold out?” He squeezed the back of your thighs playfully. “Let me enjoy this.” He settled himself lower against the bed and you could feel your heels rest against his back, your legs over his shoulders as he traced around where you wanted him most. You were almost shaking with anticipation, feeling his hot breath over you.

You licked a hot strip up your center, flicking your clit with his tongue. Your hips shuttered under his fingertips. You forcefully closed your mouth in attempt to silence yourself as he licked around your clit and held your hips down from moving. His hands eventually found yours and pulled one away from covering your mouth, intertwining his fingers with yours. His tongue dipped around and circled your entrance, and you gasped at the new feeling. He pulled up and bit playfully on the inside of your thigh.

“Let me hear you,” his voice broke your trance. Your own hands ghosted his as he ran his up your abdomen, his fingertips feeling hot over your skin, while sinking back down towards your heat, assaulting you with his tongue. He was treating you so good, adding fingers, one after another, stretching you for him. You came quickly on his tongue, not really giving you a choice, complying.

“Are you, enjoying it yet?” you asked breathlessly as he kissed up your abdomen. He grazed his teeth over your nipple, pulling a shocked noise from you.

“I am,” he said quickly, sucking a love bite at the base of your neck, giving you a moment to breathe normally again.

“I love you,” you said again, it spilling out as if against your will. Chris pulled off the bed and disappeared into the closet, emerging again with a foil pack in his fingers. You watched him with a small smile on your face, not missing his outline in the black boxers he was wearing. He looked at you as he crossed the room, on a sex high with your hair spread across the sheets and a love drunk smile. He was the lucky one here.

“I hope you don’t always move that slow,” you teased as he took his time padding across the room.

“That’s all up to you, beautiful,” he crawled up next to you pulled you close, kissing you deeply, lighting another fire inside you, though it never seemed to dim. You were the lucky one here.

Taglist: @keithseabrook27 @odinson-barnes @jonsnowisthesexiestbastard 

@weekendswithnewtmas @innerpaperexpertcloud @toomanyflowerboys @thefashioncomplex @basmaraafat

A/N: Going to try and get the next chapter up before April 26th! we need a little promo tour in this. What happens when the reader meets Evans? lmao.

[thesassysausage]

Unpopular opinion: Mass Effect Andromeda

Totally unpopular opinion but im in a venting mood so this seems like a healthy venting topic. Mass Effect Andromeda was not the best game in the world (so far no unpopular opinion yet). The story had a lot of rehashing, the decisions seemed...well dull and with out any real impact, and the animation in parts was, for lack of a better descriptor, putty (no emotion, play dough faced people).

I overlook much of this, however, because overlord EA put a team that had never done a game of that scale before in a studio ill equipped to make a game of thaf scale, and then pressured poor bioware into speeding up production and releasing a game they KNEW was not ready. I sympathize, Ive submitted many a paper that was rushed and the results were less than stellar.

My unpopular opinion is that the game was met with resistance because of nostalgia and comparison to its 3 part predecessor. Comparisons to character development was also made when context was different. Mass Effect 1 had character development born from a collected desire around some aspect of getting after Saren (or in Wrex case cuz thats where the action will be. Love that Krogan). In Andromeda character development is based around being in a completely different galaxy and needing to solve the colonizing problems (including why the planets arent as nice as they were 600 years ago). The first situation has a more "we need to work together cuz time is limited" vibe, so for better or worse you had to at least somewhat get along and even conflict added to how we players bonded to a chatacter (like I gave no shits about Chakwas until the 2nd game, now I love that sassy doctor). Andromeda doesnt have as much urgency to me. The arks are sustaining some life, and efforts are being made to make things better, albeit slowly. So I didnt bond with characters as readily as the original trilogy ones, but I think if they had more games to expand on would make me want to die for some of them (mostly Peebee).

The story of Andromeda also was kind of meh, like it had a lot of rehashing to the original trilogy but man could the concept hold a shit ton of potential.

Now on to my biiiiiiig complaints about its reception. Ive heard 2 big criticisms that I feel detracted from the game and stopped people from getting more enjoyment out of Andromeda.

Critivism 1) ThErEs noT EveN MaSs EfFeCt TeChnoLoGy, derpy derp derp

Alright, people need to know their lore. MASS EFFECT RELAYS ARE NOT THE ONLY TECH USING THE MASS EFFECT PRINCIPLES. Mass Effect it brough on using Element Zero and reduces an objects mass so faster than light travel is possible (this is a basic, very basic, description of the tech). FTL engines use mass effect but more importantly BIOTICS ARE A DIRECT FUCKING RESULT OF THE GOD DAMN MASS EFFECT AND USAGE OF ELEMENT ZERO! So although mass effect relays are not in the game much of the tech is based on the basic technology that runs them, so yall can chill.

Criticism 2) "We only see like 2 new aliens in a whole new galaxy? Thats ridiculous"

So first I have to say: LMFAO! DID YOU EVEN PAY ATTENTION TO THE GAME?! Thr game does not span the entire Andromeda galaxy, the game takes place in the Helius cluster which is a small part of the Andromeda Galaxy. Star Clusters are areas where there are multiple stars in relatively close proximity. We, in real life, actually live in a star cluster so you can imagine how relative "close" means considering that the nearest star would need a generational ship to reach. Also our galaxy has around 150 star clusters...so mass effect Andromeda literally starts in a very small spec of space in the entire Andromeda galaxy. More of Andromeda may have been explored in later games but we may never know now.

I think Mass Effect Andromeda would have been a decent start to a new series and would be better in replay after the series was finished because we'd know more about that galaxy and things would make more sense.

Honestly Im hoping a sequel is made for next gen consoles because the added power could allow a lot of new features like space combat, colony management, dynamic decision consequences, and sooo much more. Plus if the lack of relays is an issues then Id like to remind people that studies were done on mass effect relays and there were canon efforts to replicate them. If an AI was given 600 years to analyze data and compile simulations or a recreation, im prettg sure it could.

[patriotsnet]

How Many Republicans Are In America

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/how-many-republicans-are-in-america/

How Many Republicans Are In America

Democrats Return The Favor: Republicans Uninformed Or Self

Rep. Schiff: Only Question Is How Many In GOP Will Support Impeachment | Morning Joe | MSNBC

The 429 Democratic voters in our sample returned the favor and raised many of the same themes. Democrats inferred that Republicans must be VERY ill-informed, or that Fox news told me to vote for Republicans.;;Or that Republicans are uneducated and misguided people guided by what the media is feeding them.

Many also attributed votes to individual self-interest whereas GOP voters feel Democrats want free stuff, many Democrats believe Republicans think that I got mine and dont want the libs to take it away, or that some day I will be rich and then I can get the benefits that rich people get now.

Many used the question to express their anger and outrage at the other side.;;Rather than really try to take the position of their opponents, they said things like, I like a dictatorial system of Government, Im a racist, I hate non-whites.;

Where Do Trump And Biden Stand On Key Issues

Reuters: Brian Snyder/AP: Julio Cortez

The key issues grappling the country can be broken down into five main categories: coronavirus, health care, foreign policy, immigration and criminal justice.

This year, a big focus of the election has been the coronavirus pandemic, which could be a deciding factor in how people vote, as the countryâs contentious healthcare system struggles to cope.

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Donald Trump: Impeached In 2019 And 2021

On October 9, 2019 in Washington, D.C., President Trump answers questions on a pending impeachment inquiry.

On September 24, 2019, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump regarding his alleged efforts to pressure the President of Ukraine to investigate possible wrongdoings by his political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden.

The decision to authorize the impeachment inquiry came after a leaked whistleblower complaint detailed a July phone conversation between Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky in which Trump allegedly tied Ukrainian military aid to personal political favors. The White House later released a reconstructed transcript of the phone call, which many Democrats argued demonstrated that Trump had violated the Constitution.

On December 18, 2019, President Trump became the third U.S. president in history to be impeached as the House of Representatives voted nearly along party lines to impeach him over abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. No Republicans voted in favor of either article of impeachment, while three Democrats voted against one or both.;On February 5, 2020, the Senate voted largely along party lines to acquit Trump on both charges.

Don’t Miss: When Did The Political Parties Switch Platforms

How Is Senate Majority Chosen

The Senate Republican and Democratic floor leaders are elected by the members of their party in the Senate at the beginning of each Congress. Depending on which party is in power, one serves as majority leader and the other as minority leader. The leaders serve as spokespersons for their partys positions on issues.

The Institute Of Politics At Harvard University

A national poll of Americas 18-to-29 year olds released today by the Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School shows that despite the state of our politics, hope for America among young people is rising dramatically, especially among people of color. As more young Americans are likely to be politically engaged than they were a decade ago, they overwhelmingly approve of the job President Biden is doing, favor progressive policies, and have faith in their fellow Americans.

In the March 9-22 survey of 2,513 young Americans, the Harvard Youth Poll looked at views regarding the Biden administrations first 100 days, the future of the Republican Party, mental health, and the impacts of social media.

As millennials and Gen Z become the largest voting bloc, their values and participation provide hope for the future and also a sense of urgency that our country must address the pressing issues that concern them, said , Director, Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School.

What we see in this years Harvard Youth Poll is how great the power of politics really is, said John Della Volpe, the Director of Polling at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics. With a new president and the temperature of politics turned down after the election, young Americans are more hopeful, more politically active, and they have more faith in their fellow Americans.

Top findings of this survey, the 41st in a biannual series, include the following:

Recommended Reading: Are There More Rich Republicans Or Democrats

Do The Parties Have To Negotiate On The Rules

No. With Harris vote, Democrats could threaten to ram through a Democratic-written organizational plan that severely disadvantages the Republicans.

But Democrats may prefer negotiation to a solely Democratic plan because they may not be able to keep their own caucus in line to enact that option. Theres a long history of bipartisan gangs of institutional-minded senators who sought to play a role in shaping how the chambers rules are formed, and those senators would not support a Democratic-only plan.

Before there can be a vote No. 51, there must be votes 50, 49 and 48, said Richard Cohen, chief author of the Almanac of American Politics and a longtime congressional correspondent. Democratic senators who might have reservations about supporting the most liberal proposals, such as Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly of Arizona, wont want to be taken for granted by others in the Democratic conference.

Also Check: What Is The Principle Of Republicanism

Other Presidents Threatened With Impeachment

A significant number of U.S. presidents have faced calls for impeachment, including five of the past six Republican presidents. But few of those accusations were taken seriously by Congress.

There were even rumblings about impeaching the nation’s first president, George Washington, by those who opposed his policies. Those calls, however, did not reach the point of becoming formal resolutions or charges.;

John Tyler was the first president to face impeachment charges. Nicknamed His Accidency for assuming the presidency after William Henry Harrison died after just 30 days in office, Tyler was wildly unpopular with his own Whig party. A House representative from Virginia submitted a petition for Tylers impeachment, but it was never taken up by the House for a vote.

Between 1932 and 1933, a congressman introduced two impeachment resolutions against;Herbert Hoover. Both were eventually tabled by large margins.;

More recently, both Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush were the subject of impeachment resolutions submitted by Henry B. Gonzales, a Democratic representative from Texas, but none of the resolutions were taken up for a vote in the House Judiciary Committee.

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A Plurality Believe History Will Judge Trump As A The Worst President Ever; Less Than A Quarter Of Young Americans Want Trump To Play A Key Role In The Future Of Republican Politics; Young Republicans Are Divided

Thirty percent of young Americans believe that history will judge Donald Trump as the worst president ever. Overall, 26% give the 45th president positive marks , while 54% give Trump negative marks ; 11% believe he will go down as an average president.

Twenty-two percent of young Americans surveyed agree with the statement, I want Donald Trump to play a key role in the future of Republican politics, 58% disagreed, and 19% neither agreed nor disagreed. Among young Republicans, 56% agreed while 22% disagreed, and 21% were neutral. Only 61% of those who voted for Trump in the 2020 general indicated their desire for him to remain active in the GOP.

If they had to choose, 42% of young Republicans consider themselves supporters of the Republican party, and not Donald Trump. A quarter indicated they are Trump supporters first, 24% said they support both.

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Election Results : Veto

Republicans on track to keep U.S. Senate majority

See also: State government trifectas

Two state legislatures saw changes in their veto-proof majority statusâtypically when one party controls either three-fifths or two-thirds of both chambersâas a result of the 2020 elections. Democrats gained veto-proof majorities in Delaware and New York, bringing the number of state legislatures with a veto-proof majority in both chambers to 24: 16 held by Republicans and eight held by Democrats.

Forty-four states held regularly-scheduled state legislative elections on November 3. Heading into the election, there were 22 state legislatures where one party had a veto-proof majority in both chambers; 16 held by Republicans and six held by Democrats. Twenty of those states held legislative elections in 2020.

The veto override power can play a role in conflicts between state legislatures and governors. Conflict can occur when legislatures vote to override gubernatorial vetoes or in court cases related to vetoes and the override power.

Although it has the potential to create conflict, the veto override power is rarely used. According to political scientists Peverill Squire and Gary Moncrief in 2010, only about five percent of vetoes are overridden.

Changes in state legislative veto-proof majorites State

The laws largely focus on tightening voter ID requirements, purging voter rolls and restricting absentee and mail-in ballots.

Texas

Also Check: How Many States Are Republican

How Many Us Presidents Have Faced Impeachment

Only three U.S. presidents have been formally impeached by CongressAndrew Johnson, Bill Clinton and Donald Trump. One of those presidents, Donald Trump, was impeached twice during his single term. No U.S. president has ever been removed from office through impeachment.

In addition to Johnson, Clinton and Trump, only one other U.S. president has faced formal impeachment inquiries in the House of Representatives: Richard Nixon. Many other presidents have been threatened with impeachment by political foes without gaining any real traction in Congress.;

The framers of the Constitution intentionally made it difficult for Congress to remove a sitting president. The impeachment process starts in the House of Representatives with a formal impeachment inquiry. If the House Judiciary Committee finds sufficient grounds, its members write and pass articles of impeachment, which then go to the full House for a vote.

A simple majority in the House is all thats needed to formally impeach a president. But that doesnt mean he or she is out of a job. The final stage is the Senate impeachment trial. Only if two-thirds of the Senate find the president guilty of the crimes laid out in the articles of impeachment is the POTUS removed from office.

Although Congress has impeached and removed eight federal officialsall federal judgesno president has ever been found guilty during a Senate impeachment trial. Andrew Johnson came awfully close, though; he barely escaped a guilty verdict .

Are Canadian Senators Appointed For Life

Unlike the Members of Parliament in the House of Commons, the 105 senators are appointed by the Governor General on the advice of the prime minister. Senators originally held their seats for life; however, under the British North America Act, 1965, members may not sit in the Senate after reaching the age of 75.

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% Of Delta Variant Cases Are In The Non

CBS News reported, The Delta variant now accounts for more than half of the new coronavirus cases in the United States 52%. Almost all of the new cases 99.7% are among people who have not been vaccinatedThe effort comes as cases are rising in 26 states. Hospitalization rates are up in 17 states 27% in Florida, almost exclusively among the unvaccinated.

States like Florida, Mississippi, Utah, and Kentucky are already being hit hard. All of those states voted for Donald Trump.

Biden Administration: Heres Who Has Been Named So Far

Return of the bipartisan gangs

After months of stalemate over the size and scope of a coronavirus relief package in the closing weeks of the last Congress, a group of centrists from both parties, led by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, unveiled a $900 billion compromise plan that became the basis for the legislation that ultimately was approved by the House and Senate and signed by President Trump.

Manchin has said he hopes that model can translate into efforts in 2021.

Other Republican moderates such as Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska who helped on the COVID-19 aid package could also serve as powerful players if they decide to work across the aisle.

Progressives push for Senate rule changes

Liberal Democrats have pressed to get rid of the legislative filibuster so that they can pass major health care or environmental bills with a simple majority.

Biden has sidestepped questions about whether he supports doing away with keeping the 60-vote threshold, but several top Senate Democrats have signaled they back changing a rule that many of them once insisted was essential to the institution. There will be intense pressure on Biden and Democratic leaders to show they can pass some bills with GOP support, but if Senate Republicans stay largely unified to thwart the new administrations agenda, calls to eliminate the filibuster will increase.

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Poring Over Party Registration

This is not the best of times for the Democratic Party. No White House; no Senate; no House of Representatives; and a clear minority of governorships and state legislatures in their possession. Yet the Democrats approach this falls midterm elections with an advantage in one key aspect of the political process their strength in states where voters register by party.

Altogether, there are 31 states with party registration; in the others, such as Virginia, voters register without reference to party. Among the party registration states are some of the nations most populous: California, New York, Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Arizona, and Massachusetts.

The basic facts: In 19 states and the District, there are more registered Democrats than Republicans. In 12 states, there are more registered Republicans than Democrats. In aggregate, 40% of all voters in party registration states are Democrats, 29% are Republicans, and 28% are independents. Nationally, the Democratic advantage in the party registration states approaches 12 million.

Still, Republican Donald Trump found a route to victory in 2016 that went through the party registration states. He scored a near sweep of those where there were more Republicans than Democrats, winning 11 of the 12, while also taking six of the 19 states where there were more Democrats than Republicans a group that included the pivotal battleground states of Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania.

Argument No : Biden Is Responsible For This

Republicans have an opportunity to turn Americas longest war into something Democrats own. They are saying and probably will be saying for a long time that Biden owns the fall of Afghanistan.

Biden defends himself by saying that the 20-year war came under four presidents, two of them Republican. George W. Bush started it , and Biden said it was Trump who negotiated a peace deal with the Taliban that Biden argues left it stronger.

But Biden was the president who decided to officially end the war, Republicans counter. Heres the top House Republican, Rep. Kevin McCarthy , saying that whats happening falls squarely on shoulders.

Trump, who is considering a 2024 challenge to Biden, said in a statement that Biden surrendered to the Taliban.

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List Of Republican Presidents

The Republican Party is one of the two most successful political parties in the United States . Since 1868 to date, the presidency has been shared between the two major political parties. There have been 19 Republican presidents in the United States. Here are some of the Republican presidents in the history of the United States.

Which Party Is The Party Of The 1 Percent

How Evangelicals became Republicans

First, both parties receive substantial support. Much of it comes from registered voters who make $100K+ annually. However, Democrats actually come out ahead when it comes to fundraising for campaigns. In many cases, Democrats have been able to raise twice as much in private political contributions. But what about outside of politicians? Does that mean Democrats are the wealthier party? Which American families are wealthier? Republicans or Democrats?

Honestly, it is probably Republicans. When it comes down to it, the richest families in America tend to donate to Republican candidates. Forbes reported out of the 50 richest families in the United States, 28 donate to Republican candidates. Another seven donate to Democrats. Additionally, 15 of the richest families in the U.S. donate to both parties.

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Personnel Mail And Office Expenses

House members are eligible for a Members Representational Allowance to support them in their official and representational duties to their district. The MRA is calculated based on three components: one for personnel, one for official office expenses and one for official or franked mail. The personnel allowance is the same for all members; the office and mail allowances vary based on the members districts distance from Washington, D.C., the cost of office space in the members district, and the number of non-business addresses in their district. These three components are used to calculate a single MRA that can fund any expenseâeven though each component is calculated individually, the franking allowance can be used to pay for personnel expenses if the member so chooses. In 2011 this allowance averaged $1.4 million per member, and ranged from $1.35 to $1.67 million.

The Personnel allowance was $944,671 per member in 2010. Each member may employ no more than 18 permanent employees. Members employees salary is capped at $168,411 as of 2009.

Republicans Are Stopping Biden By Not Getting Vaccinated They Are Wiping Themselves Out

The Republican refusal to get vaccinated is not going to politically stop President Biden or put Donald Trump back into office. If anything, an ongoing pandemic crisis will give Biden even more motivation to push for the implementation of his agenda.

When Republicans cheer for not getting vaccinated, they are rooting for more death among their own.; Donald Trump sowed these seeds with his COVID disinformation, and the Delta variant is poised to wipe out Republicans who have chosen to listen to Trump instead of science.

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[rnainframe]

Scribbles - Fallout OC drabble

Context: Zed is currently undressed and all uncovered due to Wes helping them get all cleaned up after an injury that left them in sleep mode. They stay covered up due to insecurity and fear involving people knowing they’re a Synth, but they’re at risk of getting into a state of disrepair if they don’t get cleaned up. This is after Wes is all done with that. 

This is also Gen II Zed, so they can’t directly talk and rely more heavily on their notepad to communicate. They’re having some issues believing nice things Wes is saying about them due to past stuff.

Zed is conflicted. Confused. Does Wes really mean all that? All those kind words? Compliments? The most words they know that can describe them have all come from raiders and bandits, but they weren't very nice words at all.... but they've heard those the most. Those have to be the true ones. Even... even if Wes seems genuine, and sweet, and kind, and...

Zed sits back, lost in thought. They're having a moment. What if Wes is lying, saying all those nice things? What if Wes wants to hurt them? What if they're being tricked. They start to tremble again, barely able to hide it just enough to not disturb Wes cleaning his other arm. If they move or slip up, it could... it could get them hurt. Wes could hurt them. 

They can't let Wes know they're thinking this. 

They slowly reach for their notepad, scribbling in it while shielding the view from Wes. He'll be able to see it in a little bit. Just... not yet. Not until it's done.

They set the pad aside, hurriedly putting the shirt on and going back to the scribbling, going through several pages. After a while, they flip back to the first one and slide the pad over to Wes, turning their back and wrapping their sheet tighter around theirself, as if they're afraid of seeing Wes's reaction. 

It's several drawings, showing stuff Zed has gone through. A lot easier than just writing it down. 

Page 1 - Them with their 'mother', in a more outdated version of the Institute's Synth uniform. The 'mother' is an Institute scientist that looks a bit like Eliza. The next drawing shows them venturing out of the Institute together, likely so their 'mother' can show them how the outside world is. It's likely before the Institute became more secretive and reclusive, especially since -

Page 2 - A group of mean, scribbly people pulling Zed away from their 'mother', who is being grabbed by the scribbly people. Raiders. It's a bit shakier than the other drawings. Then showing Zed being mistreated and generally harmed by the raiders.

Page 3 - Various quick drawings of them wandering alone and afraid, in various outfits as previous ones get worn down or prove to not hide their identity as an older model of Synth. Each one is more concealing than the last, building up to their current outfit that they have. 

Page 4 - Them meeting Wes. They look happy in the drawings, but then there's a drawing of them looking scared, with thought bubbles showing small drawings of stuff from before. 

Page 5 - [ Im scared ] [ can I trust you ] [ please dont hurt me ] [ Ill be a good synth ] By the time he reaches the last page, if he looks over at Zed, they're curled up in the sheet, trembling, as close to crying as they physically can manage. Scared synth has robot PTSD. Probably had some flashbacks caused by them not being bundled up. Poor guy.

[hmhteen]

HMH Teen Teaser: YOUR ONE AND ONLY by Adrianne Finlay!

 It’s time for another teaser from us at HMH Teen! This one’s super fun: well, if you find dystopian societies where humans are extinct and society is now ruled by nine types of clones...fun. Even more fun? You can take our quiz to see which kind of clone you are by clicking here! 

YOUR ONE AND ONLY by Adrianne Finlay is a debut with something for everyone: it has a bit of sci-fi, romance, action, and even thriller! We have the first two chapters for you below, so scroll down to learn more.

Chapter One

ALTHEA

Althea-310 waited for class to begin, sitting in a neat row with her nine sisters. They’d spent the morning on their

floor of the Althea dorm twisting bright ribbons into their hair, and all ten of them had a different color winding through oth- erwise identical dark curls. Althea-310 had chosen lavender. Al- thea-316 had wanted lavender, so they’d agreed to draw sticks, but Althea-316 still scowled three seats away with her blue rib- bon, even though it had all been fair and she didn’t have any reason to sulk like that. As the sisters casually communed while waiting for class to start and their emotions mingled together, Althea-316’s resentment threaded through them all like a far- away hum. A Gen-290 Althea had admonished them for invit- ing the conflict into their group, but Althea-310 overheard the older woman comment a few moments later how she’d secretly laughed about it all.

“They should use white, like our generation did,” she’d said. “It’d be so much simpler. I guess it’s something Altheas have to learn on their own. I just thought the Gen-310s would have it figured out by the time they were fifteen. We certainly knew better.”

Althea-310 didn’t care what Altheas were supposed to learn. She liked the way the silky colors fell down her sisters’ backs, a rainbow in an otherwise boring classroom. Anyway, she felt pretty. Lavender really was nicer than blue.

The sisters’ nine faces all turned in Althea’s direction as they sensed the pride coming from her, and Althea-311 gave a small shake of her head, a silent warning. Althea clasped her hands to- gether and focused on tamping the feeling down. It would only make things worse with Althea-316, and there were other things to worry about today besides ribbons.

Vispera’s town council had told the class there would be a test. They were to expect a visitor, someone who was part of a new research experiment that would make the three commu- nities better. Though Althea had a hard time imagining that Vispera, or even the other two communities, could be any better than they were now.

A Gen-290 Samuel walked in brusquely and put his books on the desk up front. It was Samuel-299, who wasn’t actually a teacher, but a Council member and also a doctor at the clinic. So the experiment to make the community better was something medical. That was odd, however, since genetic modification meant that, in three hundred years, no one in Vispera had ever had so much as a cold.

The Samuel’s gaze passed quickly over the ten Carson broth- ers in the back, their feet spread lazily in front of them, taking up as much room as possible. The younger versions of himself, the Gen-310 Samuels, filled the middle row. Then he took in the front row of Altheas, their posture straight and hands folded on their desks. He shook his head at the different colored ribbons in their hair, smiling absently.

“You Altheas,” he said. “Always up to something.” He fiddled with his books, acting strangely nervous for a Samuel. “I know the Council talked to you some about what we’re doing today,” he said, perching on the edge of the desk. “You need to meet someone. He’s going to be part of our class from now on, part of our community, and if things go well, you’ll see a lot more of him. Now, understand, you’ll find him . . . different. But I expect you all to behave and be polite.”

Althea had no idea who the Samuel would want them to meet. And what about the test? Althea had spent last night with her friend Nyla-313 quizzing each other on history, so a medical test would be a disaster.

Althea liked working with Nyla-313. Nyla was learning in the labs how to engineer clever little oranges spliced with wild seeds so they tasted of cinnamon, and she would bring her experi- ments to Althea for their study sessions. Also, the Nylas never teased Althea about the scar on her wrist, and Nyla-313 often told her she shouldn’t bother hiding it. But while Althea enjoyed the colored ribbons, she didn’t like her scar. When it wasn’t cov- ered, the eyes of those in the community landed on the smooth line of white skin circling her wrist, and she hated how they’d inevitably say, “Oh, Althea-310,” as if all they needed to know about her was that she was the sister born with the defect, the one who’d needed a replacement hand grown separately in a limb tank. She used to wonder why she hadn’t been eliminated once it was discovered. It must have been apparent while she floated in the tanks, months before she was born. But it would have shown up too late to start creating another Althea. It had happened before, usually through accidental death, that a mod- el’s generation had only nine people instead of ten, but it caused a lot of discontent, even some disruption. That must have been the reason she hadn’t been eliminated.

Now all the studying they’d done would be for nothing. This was all very unusual; they never strayed from the curriculum. Maybe Samuel-299 had brought in someone from one of the other communities, maybe from Copan or even all the way from Crooked Falls. Maybe even an Althea. Althea had always won- dered how the Altheas in Crooked Falls might be different. Was their penmanship as elegant as the Vispera Altheas’? Did they cut their hair shoulder-length, like the Altheas in Copan? Maybe there was another Althea out there who was born with a defec- tive right hand and also had a scar like the one around her wrist.

But it couldn’t be an Althea from Crooked Falls, of course. The Samuel had said him. It was probably just another Samuel, then. Althea sighed, realizing the ribbons were probably going to be the only real excitement of the day.

Samuel-299 paused at the door before stepping out, his brow creased, his voice plaintive. “Remember, just . . . be kind.”

When Samuel-299 returned, a boy entered behind him. On seeing him, the row of Samuels collectively sucked in a breath. A Carson huffed an incredulous laugh. Every Althea reached a trembling hand for the hand of the sister next to her until their fingers wove together in an unbroken sequence. Althea com- muned with them, feeling their emotions as she felt her own. Every sister and brother communed in small, subtle ways all the time when they were close together, as did everyone in Vispera, but in moments of stress or fear, it was important to seek a strengthened connection through touch. Her sisters’ collective effort to calm one another coursed through her like liquid. It was warm, seeming to fill her limbs. She exhaled as, little by little, the shared anxiety eased.

The boy fidgeted miserably. He ran his fingers through his hair, then pushed his hands into his pockets. Althea tried to fig- ure out his age. She thought he was probably fifteen, like the rest of them. He looked scared, but no one stroked him or tried to comfort him, no one held his hand to commune, not like the brothers and sisters did for one another.

His eyes glanced from student to student, quick and nervous. He looked like he might be somewhat intelligent, but it was hard to tell. Even if he is, she thought, he’s still so strange. He’s not one of us. Not at all. He was like no one else.

Althea had seen so many faces. She’d seen all the nine faces of the nine models of Homo factus, at all different ages. She’d seen these faces in Vispera as well as on a school trip to Copan. They were the same faces she’d see in Crooked Falls as well. There was nothing beyond the walls of the communities but an empty, overgrown wasteland left by a long gone civilization. The faces in the three communities were the only faces that existed anywhere in the whole world, the only ones that had existed for over three hundred years.

The picture on the wall on the far side of the classroom showed these nine faces in a painting an early Inga had rendered based on a photo of the Original Nine. They were the human scientists who’d founded Vispera, using their genes to create the nine models. They stood on the steps of what was now Remem- brance Hall in two rows, serious and self-assured. Their hands rested on one another’s shoulders, and they gazed out at the students in the classroom as if glimpsing the future, hopeful and confident about the new world they were building. The same painting hung in every classroom, and the very first version re- sided in Remembrance Hall.

There were the Samuels, with their dark skin, even darker eyes, and their sharp, angular jaws. They radiated compassion in their thoughtful expressions, which helped when they treated a scraped knee or broken bone. Every model had a specified set of skills and a role within the community, and the Samuels were the doctors, nurses, and caretakers. The Altheas were historians, of course, which meant they kept records and preserved the history of Vispera.

The Nylas, the scientists, had eyes as dark as the Samuels’, but with a life and humor in them that the Samuels didn’t have. The Nylas’ eyes reminded Althea of a black stone on the shore, still wet from salt water and shining with hidden colors. The Ingas, the community’s artists, were tall and broad shouldered, as im- posing as statues, but with light, creamy brown hair that would start turning white in their fortieth year, at about the same age the Carsons’ faces softened and widened, right along with their waists. Not like they were now, in class. As young men the Car- sons were sleek and flat-stomached. Though whatever age the Carsons were, they always strode through the town Commons like it belonged to them. They were the engineers, and they thought that made them more important than the other models.

The Hassans, the ecologists, carried themselves gracefully, like leaves floating over rippling river water, and their small, agile fingers could tinker with a threshing machine so adeptly you’d think they were talking to it and telling it in which direction to move. The Hassans were the complete opposite of the Viktors with their brooding foreheads and hulking shoulders. The Viktors were the philosophers, which meant they were always ready to lay a thick hand on the arm of anyone who broke even the smallest rule. They kept the community safe and regulated.

The Meis and the Kates were a study in contrast, too. Althea admired the Meis’ sense of style, which went far beyond colored ribbons. As theologians, they loved the rituals of the community and always knew how to put the final touches on a ceremony, something that would keep it familiar and comforting, while still offering a new element, like when they hung a glittering chandelier from a balsa tree. They had delicate limbs, and al- ways dressed with careful thought and precision, never forget- ting to include something shiny in their matching dresses. If they wore a ribbon in their perfectly straight hair, it would always be something shimmering. The mathematician Kates, on the other hand, shunned anything sparkly, preferring instead their serious, demure outfits that went along with their turned-down mouths and sloped brown eyes that always made them look somehow disapproving. Or at least that’s how they often looked at the Altheas, who were too unpredictable to ever please the Kates, especially the older ones.

These were the faces Althea knew. She’d known them her en- tire life, and knew them at every age, and in every mood. Sure, sometimes an accident or slight genetic nuance would alter a familiar face — the tiny freckle on Inga-313’s ear, or the little indentation on Viktor-318’s collarbone from when he broke it in a wrestling match. And of course, Althea’s own scarred wrist. These faces were her whole world. They were the whole world.

She’d never seen a face like this boy’s.

And his eyes. Something was wrong with them. The eyes of the nine models were all brown, though they varied in the range of shades. This boy’s were almost colorless, watery and cold, an odd bluish-gray. How could eyes be gray?

Althea shook herself, shivering at the ghostly translucent color, but at the same time realizing it was not simply what he looked like that was disturbing. She also felt nothing from him. It certainly looked as though he was nervous in front of the class, but the only indications of fear were what she could see — his shuffling feet and shaky hands, the way he blinked nervously. Emotions that strong should have been radiating off him like a fever, infecting the whole class. Instead, he was isolated, a soli- tary figment as cold as the stone wall that surrounded the town.

Everyone in class was rustling and shifting in their chairs. They felt the bone-chilling detachment from the boy as well.

“What’s wrong with its face?” Carson-315 asked.

Althea had wondered the same thing, but couldn’t imagine asking the question herself. The boy’s ears brightened red, which meant he had heard and understood Carson-315.

“Nothing’s wrong with his face,” Samuel-299 said. “He’s sim- ply different.”

“Different from what?” a Samuel asked, Samuel-317.

“From the nine models.” Samuel-299 nodded to the painting on the wall. “He’s human, like they were.”

“So he’s not Homo factus,” a Carson said, grimacing. “No. Like I said, he’s human — Homo sapiens.” “Where are his brothers?” Althea-316 asked.

“He has no brothers — he’s alone.”

Alone. The word struck Althea’s ears, its awful power tight- ening her chest. She leaned back, trying to put distance between herself and the strangeness of this boy.

“Why would we bother making a human? What good is it?” Carson-317 said.

Samuel-299  rubbed  his  mouth as if realizing this situation— whatever it was — should be going better. He took a breath. “The Council has been conducting an experiment. Humans were a great people. It’s because of them that life continued through us.”

Althea noticed that the Samuel hadn’t actually answered the question. He hadn’t said what the Council’s experiment was for. He was hiding something.

“They couldn’t have been that great,” Samuel-314 said. “I mean, they’re dead.”

The Carsons cracked up at that. Carson-310 slapped Sam- uel-310 on the shoulder, and then all the Carsons copied the same action nine more times, right down the row of Samuels. Samuel-299 watched them mimic each other, one by one, a strange look on his face.

“They’re extinct,” Samuel-299 finally said. “Humans repro- duced genetic lines that shouldn’t have been allowed to con- tinue. Their mistakes are what caused the Slow Plague.”

It was hard to imagine what it was like when humans covered the planet. Althea pictured a world overrun by an unrestrained population, reproducing like animals, their genes mingling un- predictably and disastrously. The communities now were en- tirely regulated and controlled. Her people maintained the same three communities with populations that never rose above nine hundred. There were ten generations of each of the nine models, and a new generation born every decade. But before Vispera, every face was unique, and there were millions of them. To Althea, it sounded horrible, like thousands of insects crawling in a thousand directions.

A Carson nodded his chin at the boy. “So is he going to get sick and die like they did?”

The strange boy looked up at Samuel-299 as if waiting for him to say something that would make the others stop looking at him with suspicious glints in their eyes, like they didn’t know whether they should laugh at him or actually be angry that he was contaminating their classroom. The Samuel rested a hand on the boy’s shoulder and said, “He’s healthy so far. His lack of abnormality is one of the reasons we chose his genetic material from the Sample Room.”

The boy’s shoulders turned in, deflating under the Samuel’s hand. Althea thought perhaps he wasn’t happy with the way the Samuel was talking about him.

“All of you,” Samuel-299 said, “come from the Originals who lived here back when the humans called it Costa Rica. Our ge- netic lines are refined and perfected. Where humans relied on natural selection, we have technology and science. That’s what makes us fundamentally singular from humans. We have no mu- tations, no genetic outliers, no mistakes or abnormalities. We all work together, communing and cooperating. Jack, on the other hand . . . genetically, his cells were never altered. He’s an exact copy of a human boy who lived in the twenty-first century. And that makes him different. But while he may be different in some ways, in many other ways he’s just like you.”

“Does it talk?” Carson-312 said.

“Yes.” Samuel-299 pierced Carson-312 with a stare. “He talks.” Samuel-299 turned to the boy, hovering over him, his body rigid and impatient. “Go ahead, say hello. Introduce your- self.”

They waited while the boy shuffled his feet.

“My name . . . my name is . . .” He spoke uncertainly, but then stopped as if making a decision. He straightened his shoul- ders to stand with more assurance. “I’m Jack.”

One of Althea’s sisters giggled. “Jack?” she said. “That’s not a name. There’s not even a number after it. What generation is he supposed to be?”

“Maybe he’s Jack Zero,” a Samuel said, and everyone laughed. “Hey, Jack!” one of the boys called. Almost immediately a chorus of calls followed, with the name being shouted by ev- eryone in the classroom. They shouted as if testing the name out, though the more it was said, the more they took delight in jeering at the boy. His name did sound strange, Althea had to admit. Foreign and unfamiliar. Her fingers slid unconsciously to her wrist. She didn’t join in the shouting.

“Please, everyone,” Samuel-299 said. “That’s enough.” Jack’s chest rose and fell, and then rose again.

“Sam,” the boy said, which was odd, because he was talking to Samuel-299. Nobody called any of the Samuels Sam. It seemed disrespectful, though Althea couldn’t say why exactly.

Samuel-299 looked at him sharply. “Jack? Are you all right?” Jack wiped his nose with the back of his hand. His breath wheezed. Carson-318 snorted laughter, repeating the name Jack, mimicking the concerned way Samuel-299 had said it, though

the man was too focused to hear. “Is it an attack?”

The boy nodded. Althea couldn’t figure out what the problem was. He seemed to be having trouble breathing. Sensing some- thing wrong, the class went silent until the only sound in the room was the whistle of air being sucked into the boy’s lungs. As she watched him struggle to breathe, the seconds moved so slowly that Althea imagined for a moment she could see them shimmering the air like heat.

Jack fumbled in his pocket, producing a plastic tube gripped in his palm. Samuel-299 touched his back.

“It’s okay,” he said to Jack. “Calm down.”

Jack put the tube in his mouth, pressed down, and sucked in. It looked like something he’d done many times before. A tension seemed to release from Samuel-299 as Jack’s breathing eased.

“What was that?” a younger Samuel asked.

 Samuel-299’s eyes closed briefly before he looked up, reluc- tant to talk about what had just happened. “He uses that device, an inhaler, for a condition called asthma. It makes it hard for him to breathe sometimes, that’s all.”

“That’s all?” Carson-317 said, distaste showing on his face. “He’s sick. What if we catch it?”

“You can’t catch it.”

“You said he wasn’t abnormal. That looked pretty abnormal to me,” Carson-314 said.

“He’s not abnormal. He’s human, and in humans a certain amount of abnormality is, well . . . normal.”

The Carsons looked disgusted at the Samuel’s response. Samuel-299 braced his hands on the desk and seemed to come to a decision. “You know, let’s continue this after lunch, shall we?”

“It’s too early for lunch,” someone said.

“Nevertheless, we’ll have a break,” Samuel-299 said dryly.

“Everyone should go outside. Maybe you can all get to know Jack a little better.”

As Althea stood with the others, her pencil bag fell from her desk, spilling its contents. Her sisters were already at the door, so she quickly bent to gather her things. She found herself at eye level with the top of her desk, and there was Jack right in front of her, holding out one of her pencils. She froze, and then real- ized it was rude to stare at him. Still he waited, his hand steady and patient. She reached to take the pencil, and her sleeve rode up to reveal the scar.

One of the Carsons strode past. “Need a hand?” he snickered, as if proud of a joke she’d heard a million times before.

Althea grabbed the pencil and tugged her sleeve down. Her eyes met Jack’s, and his head tilted questioningly. Up close, his eyes startled her yet again with their pale gray.

Altheas were an observant model, so even though Jack seemed unable to commune, Althea could see in his face that he was cu- rious, and also lonely. The other eight models relied exclusively on communing to understand the emotions of others. They would never notice the way his eyes dipped down to her hand holding the pencil, or the way he sucked his lip against his teeth.

He gave her a tentative smile. Two of his bottom teeth over- lapped just a tiny bit, a distracting imperfection none of her own people had. A carved bead hung at the base of his neck on a leather string. As with everything else about the boy, this was strange too. None of the four boys in the community wore neck- laces.

“Thank you,” she murmured, clutching the pencil and allow- ing herself to smile back.

A remaining Carson bumped into her, and then a sister returned to grab her arm and hurry her along with the rest of them. When she glanced back, she saw Jack still watching her.

Outside, the students milled about the schoolyard, unsure of what to do. The brick school was on the edge of town, bor- dered on one side by the stone wall that surrounded Vispera, safeguarding it from the jungle outside, the wild animals and poisonous plants. Jack leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest. Everyone else had clustered as far from him as possible, their feet kicking up dust from the rust-colored gravel of the yard.

The usual games and sports didn’t feel right. Activities were supposed to happen after lunch, and Jack was making everyone nervous. Althea saw her own worry mirrored in the faces of her sisters. They huddled together, their hands lightly touching hair and arms and backs. The Carsons and Samuels were in their own clusters, and then the Carsons all laughed simultaneously. They passed the Altheas and sauntered toward Jack, who pushed himself away from the wall as they came near.

Carson-312 smirked. “That’s Samuel-299 who brought you, isn’t it? He’s on the Council.” He looked Jack up and down. “What’d the Council do, make a hairless monkey? Isn’t that all a human is, a bald monkey?”

“You’re humans, too,” Jack said. “You’re clones of the Origi- nals, and they were human.”

The Samuels crowded Althea and her sisters as they gathered to watch while keeping a safe distance from Jack.

Carson-312 smirked, then casually picked up a handful of gravel from the ground, jostling it in his palm as he moved closer to Jack. “He’s not very smart, is he? He just called us clones.”

Jack licked his lips uncertainly. “Isn’t that what you are?” 

A young Samuel came forward. “Don’t you know anything? We don’t say clone. We’re Homo factus.” He straightened as if proud of the title. “We’re the self-made man.”

“You,” Carson-317 said, looking Jack up and down, “you’re just some defective experiment of the Council. You’re an acci- dent.”

The boy couldn’t be an accident. The Council didn’t make mistakes.

“I’m not an accident,” Jack said, clearly wishing he could of- fer more of a rationale for his existence.

“Yeah?” said another Carson. “So you want to tell us what we need a monkey-boy for, then?”

Althea could tell that Jack was trying. He wanted the other boys, and the Altheas too, to accept him. The Carsons especially were being mean, but Jack looked hopeful, as if somehow things would still be okay. Althea kept quiet. The Altheas weren’t in- volved in this, and there was something wrong with the boy, something much worse than a replaced hand. Whatever asthma really was, it was obviously a disease her people had spent gen- erations eradicating. Her people didn’t suffer from disease. That Jack had a thing like asthma was terrifying. Despite what the Samuel said, human illness was contagious. It was what had killed them all. It was better to keep her distance, as the rest of her sisters were doing.

Jack’s eyes flickered between the  Carsons. He looked to the Samuels for help, searching for a friendly face. While they wouldn’t join in with the Carsons, not with an elder Samuel right inside, they also wouldn’t try to stop them. A few of Al- thea’s sisters chewed their nails.

Carson-312 flicked a pebble at Jack’s  shoulder.  “Well, monkey-boy?” he said. “If you’re not an accident, what the hell are you?”

“I . . . I don’t . . .” Jack struggled, not knowing what answer to give.

“You’re not one of us,” Carson-311 said. 

Carson-312 flicked another pebble, hitting Jack’s arm. “You don’t belong here.”

A third pebble immediately followed, this one striking his shoulder again. Jack backed away, his tongue pressing his teeth. The boys sniggered, and now the Samuels joined in. More of the Carsons took up handfuls of gravel.

Jack closed his eyes and pulled an unsteady breath into his chest. “Stop it,” he said, his voice thin and strained. His fingers reached into his pocket, seeking the inhaler he’d used inside. It was the asthma again. The Samuel had called it an attack, as if the boy’s own body were assaulting him just as much as the Car- sons seemed ready to do. Althea shuddered. Jack finally got the inhaler out but then dropped it in the dirt. He fell to his knees, his hands scrambling for it frantically, panic etched on his face.

All ten Carsons grinned at once.

Althea’s sisters stood like her, watching. They were feeling what she was — fear, and also disgust. Carsons were confronta- tional. They were engineers, but also leaders. They liked being in charge, even in Vispera, where the only hierarchy was age and decisions were made by consensus. Still, the community celebrated the Carsons’ sense of leadership as much as it did the Nylas’ work in the labs or the Ingas’ paintings. The com- munity taught the young people that they should think of the differences in the models as the various organs of the body, each with its own role, but working together for the good of the whole.

This, however, was the bad side of the Carsons.

As much as Althea didn’t like what the Carsons and Samuels were doing, it was painfully clear to everyone that Jack wasn’t Homo factus. He did mostly look like all of them, but that only made the blankness they felt from him more terrible. Everyone’s emotions were so strong. In one moment of communing, Al- thea could most palpably feel her sisters’ sick fear. Under that, she sensed the uneasy, excited tension of the Samuels, and then the current of gleeful anger emanating from the Carsons. Like everyone else, she felt nothing from the boy. As if he were an animal. As if he were dead.

Jack’s shoulders hunched forward. Another Carson threw a pebble at his forehead. The pebbles weren’t large enough to cause more than a brief sting, but Jack’s eyes darted from face to face as if he feared what might come next.

Althea peered toward the window of their classroom. Where was the Samuel? And then she saw him. He was watching the students through a window. He was frowning and taking notes. Why didn’t he do something?

It occurred to her then that this was the test the Council had planned. It wasn’t on history or science, or anything they’d stud- ied for. The test was how they acted today, with this boy the Council had thrust upon them. And perhaps they were watching Jack as well, to see how he would fit in. But surely Samuel-299 wouldn’t let things go too far. Althea didn’t like the sneers grow- ing on the Carsons’ faces.

“Look at you,” Carson-312 said, taking a step forward. “You think you’re not an accident? You’re so defective you can’t even breathe  right.”

Jack flinched as another pebble hit him. He clutched the re- trieved inhaler close to his chest, and the students closed in.

Althea didn’t know what to do. Her sisters didn’t know what to do. They met each other’s eyes, silently communing with the same feeling. This had to stop.

Althea-313 said, far too softly, “Quit it, you guys.”

It was as if she’d said nothing. The boys paid no attention. The Carsons continued throwing the pebbles while Car-

son-318 tore a narrow switch from a nearby patch of brush and handed it to Carson-312, who whipped it back and forth, testing its heft. It hissed as it cut the air. Standing over Jack, Carson-312 snapped it against Jack’s arm, leaving a thin welt. The brothers continued to jeer and gather more pebbles. Carson-312 swung again, striking Jack’s back.

Althea couldn’t see Jack’s face, but his limbs tightened with each snap of the switch, and she saw his shivering, barely con- tained control. There was a rigidity in his muscles, like his entire body was a spring straining for release.

He was using all his will to hold himself back. He was still hoping they’d stop.

It was too much to watch. Althea broke away from her sisters and grabbed Carson-312’s arm as it rose up again. His elbow hit her eye, and she fell to the ground. Her sisters ran to her, closing her in their protective circle, touching her face.

Althea cupped her aching eye. Her sisters held their own eyes, feeling the burgeoning pain themselves. Carson-312 hadn’t even paused, had probably hardly noticed her near him. The whip slashed across Jack’s back until specks of red dotted the fabric of his shirt like a string of beads. Carson-312 licked his lips and aimed for those lines of red, a glint in his eye. He’s enjoy- ing it, Althea thought. Seeing Jack recoil at the targeted strikes, Carson-312 quickened his swings. Breathless with exertion, he muttered, “Go back to whatever lab they’ve been keeping you in, human. You don’t belong here.”

As the switch came down once again, Jack’s hand shot out and caught it. It sliced into the flesh of his palm as he yanked it from Carson-312. He launched himself off the wall, a yell wrenched from his throat, and flew at Carson-312 faster than Althea thought possible. Jack tackled him to the ground and straddled his chest, striking him over and over. The other Car- sons didn’t dare touch him, even to protect their own brother. They’d never seen such fury.

Jack slammed his fist into Carson-312’s face, and blood poured from his nose. Jack’s wild hits landed again and again. The Carson brothers began to collapse on the ground, moan- ing and clutching their heads, the sound and pain of the blows echoing in their own skulls. One of Althea’s sisters clutched her stomach, and at the same time, Althea felt sick too, all the Alth- eas did.

The class looked on in horror as Jack pummeled Carson-312 until his face was swollen and bloody. Only a few moments had passed, but to Althea it felt like an eternity before Samuel-299 finally ran outside. He hauled Jack off Carson-312. Jack fought, heedless and wild, as Samuel-299 dragged him across the yard and through the school doors.

The class stood silent and motionless, like a held breath, the only sound in the yard Carson-312’s wet, snuffling moans. Al- thea felt everyone’s anger and alarm slowly recede like a tide.

The Carsons gathered around Carson-312, ghosts of his pain stirring in their own bodies.

A couple of them pressed their white shirts to Carson-312’s face, and the cotton bloomed red. Eventually, the Samuels came and took Carson-312 away to the clinic. By the time the stu- dents filed back into the school, Jack was nowhere to be seen, and a Hassan was at the front of the room.

Once more the faces in the painting of the Original Nine stared down at Althea and the rest of the class, their expressions as placid and confident as ever, as if nothing at all had happened. 

Chapter Two

JACK

 Two Years Later

Jack sat in the grass on the steep side of the hill, knocking a ball against the side of the white-boarded cottage. He heard Sam’s heavy breathing from climbing the steep rise, and he didn’t need to turn around to know he’d find the man standing over him, wearing his white lab coat and disapproving frown. “You shouldn’t be here,” Sam finally said.

“I should be dead,” Jack said. Although if he thought about it, that wasn’t really true. It wasn’t that he should be dead, but that he should never have been born. He should be extinct, like all the other humans.

High on the slope, Jack could see the entire wall encircling the town, six feet high and broad enough to walk on; a dou- ble-winged gate of wrought iron faced Blue River. Within, the school sat on one end, where the Gen-320 children played in the gravel-covered yard, the same one where, two years  ago, he’d attacked the Carson; next to that was the cluster of labs where the clones conducted their experiments and grew the new Gens in their tanks. On the other end stood the stout line of nine dorms, one building for every model, a separate room inside for every Gen, each with its own row of ten beds. In the middle of the dorms was the dining hall, a circular, two-story building of limestone quarried from the distant cliffs. All the clones gath- ered there for meals at wooden banquet tables, at least when they weren’t outside celebrating one of their seemingly incessant rituals. In the center of everything stood Remembrance Hall and the Commons, an expanse of lawn around a large kapok tree where the clones held their ceremonies and parties. Sometimes Jack watched at night from a distance while they danced and lights twinkled in the lanky branches of the huge tree.

Beyond the wall at the foot of the cottage’s hill, the lawn dipped down to the banks of Blue River, which flowed north until it disappeared, swallowed by dense jungle. On the far side, fields of corn, barley, and wild rice, dotted by the lingering shadow of summer clouds, stretched all the way to the Novo- mundo Mountains. Novomundo, the New World Mountains. They’d been named by scientists, years before Jack was born, and the world they’d made was no longer new.

Jack had spent his whole life isolated from the clones his own age, and when he’d finally been allowed to join them, it’d been a disaster. The Council never let him go back to school. Now he spent his days living in the tiny bedroom they’d built for him in the labs, occasionally performing some task in the clinic for Sam, like rolling bandages or folding linens. They would never let him forget what had happened, or that it had all been his fault.

Jack hadn’t spoken for several moments, so Sam sighed and sat next to him in the grass. He watched Jack throw the ball. Again and again, he caught and threw, and Sam waited.

If that’s how Sam wanted this to go, that was fine. Jack plucked the ball out of the air once more.

For some reason, Sam couldn’t catch a ball if his life depended on it. Jack had tried to figure out why Sam had such a hard time. He simply couldn’t get the rhythms down, and he missed every throw. Inga-296 had given Jack the ball when he was little. Jack couldn’t remember exactly when, but he must have been about five years old.

“It’s called a baseball,” she’d said. “Young people from your time, they played with it.” She held it out, smiling. “Who knows, maybe your original did.”

Jack had looked up a description of baseball in one of the books that filled the little cottage he and Sam and Inga-296 had shared back then, before Sam brought Jack to live in the labs in town. Before she died. The book said you needed nine people to make a team, so now he just tossed the ball at the side of the house. If the clones ever wanted to play, even with their lousy coordination, they already had their nine models. They wouldn’t include him.

Sam stopped watching the ball. He frowned at Jack while Jack ignored him, each trying to outlast the other. Sam finally heaved a breath and gave in.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” he said. “It’s not safe outside the wall. You need to come home.”

“This is my home.” Jack felt familiar resentment welling in his veins.

“This hasn’t been your home for years. Your home is in Vispera.”

Jack tossed the ball. “You should have told me.” “My brother told you.”

“You should have told me. You act like you’re all the same person, but you’re not. You’re different from them.”

Sam bristled. “I’m not different from them. They’re Samuels, and I’m a Samuel.”

“They’re Samuels. You’re Sam. Don’t send them to me thinking I can’t tell the difference. They don’t care about me. They wouldn’t care if I died.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

Jack knew Sam didn’t really believe they’d care, but he let the man lie to him.

“I’m sorry, Jack. The Council won’t budge.” “You’re on the Council. Did you even try?” “Of course I did.”

“It’s that fat Carson, isn’t it? He thinks I’m a freak, and the others listen to him.”

“It’s all of them. They think it’d be disruptive.”

It wasn’t fair. He was turning seventeen, just like the Gen- 310s, and he should be in the Declaration with them. He’d had as much of an education sitting in the labs as they had at school. More, he’d guess. It was just like last year, when they wouldn’t let him participate in the Gen’s first Pairing Ceremony. He’d wanted to, desperately, but the Council had said no, citing that disastrous day at the school.

That night, when everyone had Paired for the first time except him, he’d watched their celebration hidden in the branches of a tall tree. They’d danced and eaten colorful foods he’d never seen before. The girls wore gauzy dresses, and the boys wore the cer- emonial robes tied with leather belts, and in the evening they’d all chosen their partner for the first Pairing and then spent the rest of the evening laughing together and talking. Jack wasn’t even allowed to sit at the table with the Gens in the Commons for their meal. Sam would bring him potatoes and carrots from the dining halls, or rice and lentils, and sometimes Sam would stay and eat with him, but mostly he was alone. For Jack, those nights were the worst. And it would all happen again tonight after the Declaration. They would eat and dance and laugh, they would Declare and let the community know what apprentice- ship they’d chosen, and then they’d Pair in the evening.

The laughter of the children in the schoolyard carried up the hill on a breeze. Usually they romped on climbing ropes, swings, and slides that the Ingas had made for them, but today they played a game. The children stood in a row with their fisted hands extended, while a single girl walked down the line and cupped their hands in her own one by one. Jack had seen this game before. Sam had told him it was called Button. One child would hold a button in his hand, and the rest would pretend they also had a button. The finder had to guess who actually had it. When Jack had first seen it, he’d thought the point of the game was to keep the secret of having the button, but he’d been wrong. He slowly figured out that the child wanted to be found out. If they played the game well, everyone would know where the button was. It was a way for them to practice communing, not just with their siblings, which seemed to come easily to them, but with the other children in their Gen.

The laughter stopped as abruptly as it’d started, and even from a distance Jack could tell that smiles had spread across their faces as if they’d all heard the same joke at the same time, though nothing had been said. There were no words in this game. Another eruption of laughter ran through the group in eerie unison.

Sam had once tried to describe communing to Jack. He’d had difficulty finding the right words, like describing colors to some- one who’d never seen them. He said communing was like a mur- muring, a sort of whisper of emotions passing from one clone to another when they touched or were close. They didn’t know each other’s thoughts, but they sensed each other’s feelings.

Jack couldn’t commune, of course. He could never play their strange, silent games, and maybe they’d never let him participate in their rituals and ceremonies. But why shouldn’t he be in the Declaration? It only happened once, and then they could send him back to his room in the labs and forget again that he ever existed. What harm would it do to let him be part of the com- munity in this small way? He hadn’t asked to exist. He’d heard the Council talk. They called him an experiment, like one of their genetically modified cows. They called him a de-extinction project, and maybe they called him an accident, but they had created him.

Earlier that morning, the jagged cliffs in the distance had been covered in gray mist, now burned away. They’d looked like pre- historic beasts hiding under the earth. Jack wondered, as he al- ways did, what lay beyond those hills.

“I could leave,” Jack said. “Grab supplies, go to the jungle. Nobody would care anyway.”

“You can’t leave.” “Why not?”

“Because,” Sam said, puffing out his cheeks, “you would die in the jungle. You can’t survive out there alone. I’ve kept you safe here because Inga-296 asked me to. I’m not going to stop now. She said we needed you.”

“That’s a joke, Sam. No one here needs me.”

 Sam’s eyes lingered on the baseball that had fallen idle in Jack’s hands. “I know you come here because of the Inga. I know you miss her.”

Jack touched the bead around his neck. He was surprised Sam had mentioned her. Inga-296 had called herself Jack’s mother, even though mothers didn’t exist in Vispera. Jack hadn’t cried about her in years, not since he was little, because early on he’d sensed too keenly Sam’s discomfort with Jack’s emotions at losing her. It was one of the many things that kept Jack apart from everyone else. The clones didn’t miss anyone. They saw themselves as the countless iterations that they were. A part of a whole. Replaceable. But Inga, his mother, had been different from anyone else in Vispera. She’d been different from the other Ingas. She had loved him.

“Of course I miss her. She was my mother.”

“Yes, your mother.” Jack noticed how the word mother rolled in Sam’s mouth, foreign and strange. Not unpleasant, just some- thing to work his tongue around, like a sour candy. “I didn’t agree with her using that term, but she’d taken charge of the ex- periment, so I didn’t argue. Now I think perhaps I should have.” Sam spoke more to himself than to Jack. “And maybe it was a mistake for her to give you all those books.”

Sam was talking about the human books. The ones Sam never read. Jack had learned about humans by reading those books, and one of the things he’d learned was how, even though the humans couldn’t commune, they still cared about each other.

Maybe it would never be enough to tell Sam how he felt and Sam was capable of caring about someone only if emotions em- anated from them like a cloud of reeking smoke.

Deep down, even Jack sometimes wished his mother hadn’t given him the books. According to Sam, she’d been the one who wanted to raise him in the cottage on the edge of the jungle, outside the walls of Vispera. She’d wanted to raise him the way his original might have been, the way a human boy would have been raised in human times — with a home, parents, with human books and games and his own bedroom instead of a line of beds in a dorm. She’d raised him to give him some sense of who he was as a human, when really all he wanted was to be like every- one else and have friends his own age. Sometimes he resented all the ways his mother had made him different. And then, in the process, she’d made herself different too, and that had ended in the worst possible way.

“I’m sorry you won’t be part of the ceremony, Jack. But listen, I do have good news. The Council has agreed to let you have an apprenticeship. We’ll meet with you after the ceremony, and they’ll let you Declare.”

“Declare an apprenticeship?” Jack hadn’t considered this possibility that they might let him have a job in town, serve some useful purpose. He stood. “I’ll show them my music,” he said, thinking of the instrument Sam had given him years ago that was tucked away in the lab.

It’s a guitar, Sam had said back then. At least, that’s what the catalogue in the Tunnels called it. As a child, Jack had built a crude wooden box with strings pulled across the top, trying to mimic the sound of the human recordings his mother had given him. Once Sam had figured out what he was trying to do, he’d brought Jack the guitar from the Tunnels. From the beginning, Jack had been entranced.

“I can tell them how it works,” Jack said. “I’ll explain the history and play for them.”

“That’s a bad idea,” Sam said, eyeing him worriedly. “They won’t understand. I don’t even understand it, and I’ve been lis- tening to you play for years.”

Jack had learned a long time ago that the guitar mystified the clones. He played it sometimes in his room during the day as the lab workers outside the door peered into their micro- scopes. They’d cast him sideways glances, grumbling under their breaths, but the resonant sounds and the strings under his fin- gers soothed him. Sometimes playing his guitar was the only thing that made him feel sane, the only thing that made him feel like he could keep trying for another day.

In the beginning, watching Sam’s reaction to the sound, it had taken a while before Jack understood. The clones actually couldn’t hear the music. No, that wasn’t right. They could hear it, but they couldn’t hear it. They called it noise and compared it to the drone of insects outside in the forest. Once or twice, as if they felt like they should research the question, the clones in the lab had asked him why he sat on his bed for hours, making that racket on a hollow piece of wood. How could he explain that, from the first time he’d held an instrument and strummed his fingers over it, he’d felt the pulse of the strings like it was his own beating heart?

When Jack realized the clones couldn’t hear music, he’d grasped for the first time how different he was from them. He’d always known they communed with each other and he couldn’t, but somehow, their inability to hear music made him feel even more of an outsider. He’d put the guitar away then. But now, with an apprenticeship, it could be different.

“Don’t you see?” Jack said. “I’ll teach them, really help them understand. I’ll show the Council what I can contribute to the community.”

“No, I’ve already thought about this. You’ll Declare an ap- prenticeship in the clinic, work with me. You’ll learn medicine, something useful.”

“The clinic?” Jack said.

“Of course.” Sam stood, done with the conversation. “Just be ready. You’ll talk to the Council tomorrow, after the ceremony’s done.”

Jack chewed the inside of his lip, thinking.

“Don’t look so worried. This is a good thing. And I’ll be there to help. It’ll all be fine.”

Sam walked down the hill, back toward town. Jack’s gaze followed the man’s path until he reached the school, where something had happened in the children’s game. They’d clus- tered together, their hands resting on each other’s shoulders, and seemed to collectively sigh into each other as if they were one body. Then, just like that, they broke apart and ran across the field, as sudden and synchronized as a flight of birds.

The next day, Jack sat in the chairs facing the outdoor stage in the Commons, waiting for the ceremony to end so he could make his presentation to the Council.

The Gen-310s had each Declared already. The Meis would apprentice in the kitchens, working on the menus for the din- ing hall and telling the Hassans, who had Declared as live- stock managers and field planners, what food they would need and what to cook. The Viktors, as always, were order keepers. They’d never Declared anything else. The Carsons would work with the Kates and Nylas in the labs, monitoring the tanks, re- searching genetics, and preparing for the next Gen to be born in three years. The Samuels, as always, Declared as doctors. The Ingas would be designers, keeping the open spaces in town man- icured and beautiful, and the dorms comfortable and clean. The Altheas Declared as record keepers.

They carried on with the ceremony as if everyone didn’t al- ready know what the models would Declare, as if the commu- nity hadn’t gone through the exact same motions of the Decla- ration every ten years. Samuels never worked in the kitchens, as far as Jack knew. But it didn’t matter. Every ten years, they played out the ritual.

With the Declaration over, the Gen was performing the dance now. Jack would speak with the Council when it was done. His guitar lay next to him on the ground, and he tapped his foot nervously. He’d thought about making graphs and charts, but had decided in the end to just play for them, and talk to them about the history of music, about how it was a vestige of human history. For some reason, it had been forgotten, but they could get it back again. Jack would help. He had a skill, an ability, and it wasn’t new or strange. It was old, had been around for millennia. It was simply waiting to be picked up and dusted off.

Sam still thought he was going to Declare to work in the clinic. He wouldn’t be happy about this, but Jack didn’t want to work in the clinic. He had to show them that they didn’t need to be afraid or repulsed, or think he was strange for offering some- thing like music to them. It could make them better. He could make them better by giving them back something they’d lost.

Jack wiped damp hands across his pants. He felt the inhaler tucked in his pocket and took a deep breath in and out, search- ing for any telltale signs that his lungs were going to betray him. He watched the dance. The Gen-310s traded partners and moved silently across the stage, their performance punctuated only by the sound of their tapping, shuffling feet and the birds in the distant trees.

The clones had many dances. The Pairing dance, for one, and the dances for the Binding Ceremony, or the Yielding Ceremony. The one being performed now wasn’t particular for the Decla- ration, it was simply a dance of contentment, meant to express a kind of pleasure or happiness that things were as they should be, and as the Original Nine intended. The Carsons grasped the Altheas and moved in quick, sure steps, holding the girls’ hands with a certain confident authority.

Jack pushed down his dislike for the Carsons. He had to learn. He had to get along with them if the Council was finally going to allow him to have a real purpose in the community. He’d made a mistake when he was fifteen, fighting with the Car- son-312, and the Carsons had spent the past two years making sure he didn’t forget it. They taunted him, tripped him on his way through town, or acted as if he was invisible, knocking into him as they walked past.

They weren’t all like that, though.

Jack searched through the ten Altheas, looking for the 310. The Altheas were graceful as they danced. They moved with a fluid ease that left their dresses flowing behind their legs like birds’ wings. They were pretty, with their long dark hair and smooth limbs. He liked the way their mouths turned down in a flat, serious line when they were thinking hard about something.

He always remembered Althea-310 from that day at school. She’d been the only clone that whole day who’d looked at him and smiled. He’d search for her anytime he walked through town. He’d see her, sometimes with one of the Nylas, or he’d pick her out from her group of sisters by searching for the scar on her wrist. She never spoke to him. He’d tried a few times to talk to her, but she always scurried off or was pulled away by her sisters. There were times, though, he was sure of it, when he caught her staring at him, and there was something in her eyes. It wasn’t pity. It was something else, something better. Like maybe she understood him.

The Altheas’ long sleeves covered their arms and the scar that would be on her wrist, and as they swirled together in the dance, it was impossible to tell which one was her.

Jack kept watching, though, and as he did, his foot tapped to their movements. It was a struggle for them, learning these dances. It reminded Jack of Sam trying to figure out the rhythm of catching and throwing a baseball. None of it came naturally to them, and their only hope of learning the intricate moves was through rote practice, memorization, or careful counting in their heads. Dances for the clones were an exercise in mathematics as much as anything. Jack never let on how different it was for him, the way he could hear music in his head pulsing steadily in time to the steps.

He picked up his guitar, getting ready for the end of the dance and to speak to the Council. He was second-guessing whether he should actually play for them. They wouldn’t enjoy the music, after all. Maybe he would just show them the instrument and introduce the concept. He would Declare as a teacher, perhaps, rather than a musician, but he would teach them music.

His fingers brushed the strings absently as his eyes lingered on the dark hair of the Altheas all spinning with the other clones. The pad of his palm thumped lightly against the wood, and he strummed the strings again. Slowly, he picked up the movement of the dance, and without thinking about it at all, he plucked the strings in time until a soft melody only he could hear synced with the dance.

It was several moments before he realized a hush had spread across the crowd, and the dance he’d been lost in came to a confused, disjointed halt. A Mei bumped into a Carson, who had stopped suddenly. They all stared at him. Not just the Gen- 310s onstage, but the entire audience of all the other Gens in Vispera. The 290s, 280s, the old 240s at the food table, even the little 320s. And the line of Council members, seated in the front row, who’d twisted around to see what was going on. And they weren’t just staring. They were glaring, their eyes cold and resentful. The last reverberations of the guitar faded away as his fingers stilled, and the echo was loud enough for him to un- derstand that he’d been playing much louder than he intended. They’d heard him. He hadn’t meant to play at all. He’d assaulted their ears with a noise that to them sounded like no more than wasps droning in the roof of a barn, and he’d done it without thinking. He’d just ruined everything.

It was such a stupid mistake.

Jack saw Sam in the line of Council members. The man met Jack’s gaze, and the only thing Jack could see in his eyes was disappointment. Jack’s throat burned.

They could hear it if they tried.

The rebellious thought crept its way into his mind, and he forced it away. That kind of thinking wasn’t going to help.

His mother, at the end, had heard it. Her eyes had shone with the understanding. It was right before she’d run away, taking him with her, that she’d first heard it.

Carson-312 jumped down from the stage, a furious crease be- tween his eyebrows. Jack could tell it was the 312 by the patch in his eyebrow where the hair had never grown back after Jack’s fist had split his skin. Before Jack could stop him, he’d wrenched the guitar away.

“What’s wrong with you? Why are you even here?” Carson said, raising the instrument out of Jack’s reach.

It stung that Carson’s questions were the same ones Jack asked himself every day.

“Give it back,” Jack said.

Adrenaline pulsed through him, but he tamped it down. The Council, and Sam, were watching. Jack refused to give them a reason to punish him. After that day in school, they’d locked him in the labs for a long time. He wouldn’t let them lock him away again. He knew they’d spent days back then discussing whether they were going to let their experiment continue. Jack had been too scared to ask Sam what terminating their de-extinction proj- ect would mean for him. He clenched his fists against his side and stayed seated, waiting.

“Give it back,” Jack repeated.

Carson’s eyebrows rose with Jack’s words, and Jack realized he’d made yet another mistake. He shouldn’t have let Carson see how much the guitar meant to him. Carson grinned and moved closer. Jack stood and backed away until his legs hit the chairs behind him. Maybe if he played nice, Carson would quit squeez- ing the neck of his guitar, knocking the strings out of tune.

The Declaration was in disarray. Most of the remaining Gen-310s were still onstage, though the dance had ended. The audi- ence had begun to disperse, not really clear on what was hap- pening and confused by the interruption caused by Jack. A small cluster nearby still watched the two boys, including the Council members. Jack was on display. They wanted to see how this con- frontation would play out, and Jack would bear the brunt of anything that went wrong.

“Are they letting you Declare, monkey-boy?” Carson said, bumping the guitar against his hand. “What are you Declaring as, town freak?”

“I’m Declaring as a teacher,” Jack said, his gaze flicking from Carson to the guitar.

Carson pulled at one of the strings. It gave a sharp twang. “What’s that got to do with this thing? I mean, does it do some- thing?”

“Give it back, and I’ll show you.”

“Why, so you can attack me with it? We all know you’re vio- lent. Do you think I’m stupid?”

“I don’t know. Are you?”

Carson tilted his head, that cool grin widening. In the corner of his eye, Jack saw Sam stand from his seat, but the man didn’t move forward or speak.

Jack shook his head. He was clearly the stupid one, insulting a Carson in front of everybody. Why couldn’t he just keep his mouth shut?

“Listen,” he said, taking a breath, his voice low. “It’s nothing. It plays music, that’s all. Just . . . give it back, okay?”

“Okay,” Carson said. “Come get it.”

The onlookers murmured when Jack reached for the guitar and Carson brusquely pulled it away. He drew Jack close, and Jack felt the other boy’s breath as he snarled, “You want to hit me, don’t you?”

Jack pressed his lips together, stifling the desire to do just that. It was exactly what Carson wanted, for Jack to lose control in front of everyone.

“It’s okay,” Carson said, pushing Jack back and suddenly feigning friendliness. “I’ll give it back, for real this time. But lis- ten, tell me what it’s called first.”

“Why?” 

“Don’t be so suspicious. I really want to know.” “It’s a guitar,” Jack said curtly. “It’s called a guitar.”

Jack watched Carson while, as if in slow motion, he dropped the guitar on the ground at Jack’s feet.

“You shouldn’t have ruined our dance, monkey-boy. Say goodbye to your guitar.” And with that, Carson smashed his foot into the base of the instrument, splintering the wood into frag- ments. Jack yelled incoherently as Carson crushed the remnants with the heel of his shoe.

The Council was watching. Sam was watching. The Altheas’ brown eyes were on him, too. The Meis, the Hassans, all of them were watching now. None of that mattered as the anger exploded in Jack’s chest. He rushed at Carson. Immediately, two Viktors and a Hassan grabbed his arms. They must have been behind him the whole time, waiting for him to do exactly this. Before he had a chance to connect with Carson or even realize what was happening, he was on his back, the breath knocked out of him. They pinned his hands, then hauled him up again. His limbs shook with unreleased energy.

“Good job, teacher,” Carson said, his mouth twitching up. “I think we learned everything we need to know from you.”

One of the Viktors twisted Jack’s arm, steering him away from the snickering Carson and the stage.

“Sam!” Jack called into the crowd. “Sam, where are you?” Jack searched across the Commons. Countless dark heads

mingled in the crowd, at least twenty different Samuels, any of which could have been Sam. It was impossible to tell. Sam had abandoned him. Again.

The Viktors escorted him back to his room in the labs, locking the door behind them. The usual punishment for bad behavior.

Jack had grown a lot in the past two years. He was taller than the Viktors, taller in fact than all the models. He was stron- ger than them, too. There were times Jack would look at them and be struck by how delicate the clones were. Thin and nar- row-chested. It didn’t matter, however. They controlled every situation, every move he made.

When Sam came by that night and unlocked the door, Jack wanted to scream at him, tackle him to the ground and hit him the way he’d wanted to hit Carson, hit him until that desolate expression left his face. Instead he said, “You left,” and hated the sorry plea in his voice. “You just left.”

Sam sat in a chair, crossing his ankle over his knee. Jack’s room in the labs was nothing like his room in the cottage. It was a small, sectioned-off corner of the building, with linoleum floors and white-tiled walls. It was as sterile as the larger sec- tions, where banks of fluorescent lights swung over rows of marble-topped desks fitted with gas spigots and sinks. He had a narrow bed, a small chair and desk, and a doored-off bathroom. The lab workers could see him through the small window in the door that led out into the hall. They didn’t bother him much. He sometimes watched them working in the daytime, and then at night the bright lights were turned off, and everything was silent and dark.

“I’m sorry,” Sam said with a heavy sigh.

 “They locked me in. You told me after last time they wouldn’t do that again.”

“Not everything is in my control.”

“You’re afraid of them. You’re afraid of the Council.”

“I’m on the Council. I have to consider the needs of the com- munity. I can’t just worry about one boy.”

“What am I even doing here? I can’t figure out the point of your experiment. Why the hell was I born, Sam?”

“You have so much potential, Jack, but you certainly weren’t born so you could disrupt the entire community.”

Jack’s heart sank even as pinpricks of anger pierced him. “My mother, she used to call you my father.”

“The Inga wanted to give you something human. Fathers are something humans had. I never had one — none of us do. I’ve done the best I could.”

Sam used to read to him, before Inga died. Not from the nov- els that Jack liked, the ones Sam called human, but from the histories, his physiology books, and the books that had taught him to be a doctor. The clones didn’t get sick, but he’d read to Jack about setting a limb and treating a concussion or infected wound. When they’d all lived in the cottage, Jack remembered Sam sitting in the creased leather chair studying textbooks and psych manuals, discussing with Inga how humans lived their day-to-day lives. Occasionally Sam would see something in the books and then abruptly declare some new activity, like reading aloud together or throwing a ball outside. Jack still remembered Sam dressed in his lab coat and black shoes, chasing after the balls Jack threw.

“It must have been tough, pretending to care for the sake of your experiment.” Jack heard the venom in his own voice. “Act- ing human, like some kind of animal.”

“I care about you, Jack. More . . . more than I should. It has been difficult. My brothers don’t understand. It’s put distance between us, and you don’t know how hard that’s been.”

“So what now?” 

“The Council will meet about what happened. I don’t know what their decision will be for your apprenticeship. Why did you have to bring the guitar, Jack? What were you thinking?”

“You’re not even going to stick up for me, are you? You’ll abandon me like always. Like you did today.”

“I have to do what’s best for Vispera.”

“So go, Sam. Go away and leave me alone.” “Please, listen —”

Jack didn’t want to be mad anymore. Instead his voice was almost gentle when he said, “You can stop trying to be a father. You’re not very good at it, and I don’t need one anymore.”

Jack thought he saw something in Sam’s eyes, but he turned away too quickly to see what it was. He looked up only when the lab door closed and the sound of the latch, this time un- locked, rang through the room.

Later that night, Jack lay sleepless on his bed in the dark, his eyes sore and his head aching. Light from flickering lanterns out- side shone through the tiny window above the bed, mottling the floor of his room. Distant voices floated in with the pattering of rain over the wide jungle trees.

With the Declaration over, the Gen would be holding their monthly Pairing Ceremony now. He could picture the girls in the circle of the Commons, each choosing her partner. In his mind he saw a girl with dark curls walking down the path to the Pairing tents, teasing and playful, hand in hand with a boy who couldn’t possibly grasp how much it meant for her to take him in her arms, their bodies lost in a pile of quilts and tapestries.

Jack curled into himself, burying his head under a pillow in an effort to block out the soft laughter of the strolling couples outside.

***

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