#[] You’re part of a machine // you are not a human being [] - IC

[my-my-my]

KINKTOBER DAY 6 - Somnophilia: Sosuke Aizen (Hueco Mundo) x Female Reader

Requested by anonymous

Summary: Observing people, shinigami and hollows alike, are just one of the many hobbies Aizen likes to partake in. In one of his visits to Naruki City, he decides to leave a book from his personal collection, in a used bookstore. You, a human who doesn't know any better, become fascinated by the book - never hearing or seeing anything about it before. No one knows of this book, except a stranger, Aizen, who feeds your curiosity.

TW: this is kinda angsty. Implied past somnophiliac acts (reader thinks its a dream), dubious consent, hypnotism, voyeurism, stalking.

Word count: 2491

Read on AO3 here.

In preparation of his descent into Hueco Mundo, Aizen scoured Karakura Town and the nearby Naruki City for test subjects, spiritual readings and hollow experimentation. Sometimes, it’s easier to disguise himself amongst the humans, wearing a gigai.

Aizen is fascinated by the mostly mundane tasks of human beings. They’re so incredibly fragile in his presence yet make the most out of their inadequacies. While their technology is not as advanced as Soul Society, his or Urahara Kisuke’s inventions, he’s amused by what they have made for themselves already.

Sometimes Aizen wanders through the various bookstores and libraries in the World of the Living. He observes mortals and what they decide to read. For whatever reason, today he decided to bring a book from his own collection and places it on the shelf of a used bookstore.

He watches you, with curious eyes, skimming the book. Your eyes widen from what he can see. What will you make of it? He wonders. The store owner doesn’t recognize the book at all but sells it to you for a low price.

He watches you read it in your home, on your commute and your days off. You’re in awe.

You decide to finish the book in a quiet part of the park, under a gazebo with some of your favourite flowers surrounding it. Page after page, you’re engrossed with what the book shares with you, things you haven’t heard of, concepts you had never dreamed of. You had never heard of this book before, no existence of it in the library or online copies anywhere. Yet it captivated you.

“Are you enjoying that book? It’s quite fascinating, isn’t it?” Aizen asks, as he walks into the gazebo to see you.

Today, Aizen would find you enjoying an iced coffee on the patio of a café in Naruki City. In the back of his mind, he had already begun his machinations to move you further away from Naruki City to Kyoto or somewhere else, where you wouldn’t be affected by his plans for Karakura Town and the nearby areas.

You sipped your coffee, thoroughly engrossed in a book that he had lent you. His lips twitched at seeing you enjoying something he also enjoyed, his heart quickened in your presence.

But he ignored it.

Today, Aizen donned a gigai, as he always does when he visits you. A simple white dress shirt tucked in to black slacks, the sleeves rolled up, his hair pushed back as normal. He ordered a white jasmine tea for himself, and a small pastry for you.

“Are you enjoying the book?” Aizen’s voice startled you, but you smiled at him, waving him over.

“Yes, I am, thank you so much Aizen-san! Your recommendations have been wonderful.” You beamed at him, placing a bookmark on the page as you closed the book. It wasn’t often that you bumped into your mysterious crush.

He gave you a small smile and sat across from you, taking a sip from his cup. This café is terrible he thought to himself, tasting the bitterness of the tea leaves. But you were here, and that was more than enough to finish drinking the offensive liquid.

“What brings you here today? I haven’t seen you in a while.” You asked, feeling nervous suddenly.

“No reason in particular, I was in the area and wanted some tea. I just happen to see you here today. It’s nice to see a familiar face.” Aizen said, continuing to drink his tea. He noticed your coffee was also still unfinished. “Are you not enjoying your drink?”

You laughed, then lowered your voice, “I found this place on a whim… but it’s kind of terrible don’t you agree?” To which you gave him a sheepish smile.

Aizen chuckled, nodding his head, “but I got this for you. Hopefully that’s better than our drinks.” Your eyes widened at the pastry, and you immediately thanked him for it.

You ripped a small portion off the plate and placed it immediately in your mouth. Your eyes lit up, it was surprisingly delicious. “You need to try this Aizen-san!” You immediately ripped another piece off and handed it to him.

A blush crept up your face as he ate from your hand. “It is delicious. Maybe they should open a bakery instead.” Aizen surmised, his tone calm and collected, as if your fingers weren’t near his mouth at all.

You gave a nervous laugh and immediately pulled away, “I think that’s a great idea for them.” “Ignoring them, tell me what you think of what you’ve read so far.” Aizen asked, watching your eyes glimmer in excitement.

It had been a few months now, of meeting with Aizen, whose first name you learned was Sosuke. He revealed very little of himself, but you had exchanged numbers with him. As of late, many of your meetings were more like “dates,” that ended with some kisses and heavy petting.

Yet you still didn’t know much of the man. He was a complete enigma to you. You had shared with one of your closest friends what you knew about him, but even their sleuthing skills couldn’t find anything. Was he giving you a fake name?

You doubted that, but you never really saw him around town save for when you two were hanging out. He wasn’t purposefully evasive towards you, he told you as much that he was in the area a lot (but didn’t specify where), as he had work there (but didn’t disclose what he did).

Yet even then, when you two were together, it felt like the rest of the world was gone. The two of you were in a bubble. It was strange in some cases, you thought. On days when you were having an especially hard time, something at work or something upsetting, you would find him, almost as if on accident.

And the time with him felt comforting. Your problems felt like they disappeared when you were with him, or he offered you advice and listening ear if it was too much to bear.

But still, nothing about him, nothing of existence of him. Maybe… you were hallucinating him?

That would make sense, right? Your friends never met him, and any instances of trying to have him meet them were thwarted at some point. Even when you tried to take photos, your phone’s camera would (surprisingly) malfunction.

Now you felt crazy, but the books were real, weren’t they?

You picked up the latest book he lent you. It was heavy, hard and sturdy. It felt real.

You took a photo of it and sent it to your closest friend, who responded with a question mark.

“Why are you sending me a pic of a book?” Your friend responded.

You replied with an “oh it was an accident, meant for someone at work!”

Ok, so the books were real.

Then your phone rang. Speak of the devil and he shall appear your mind thought, as Aizen’s name flashed on your screen. You hurriedly picked it up and heard his baritone voice immediately. “Are you free tonight?”

Aizen had treated you to dinner, at a remarkable restaurant you were saving up for. You savored every part of your meal, from the food, the décor and Aizen himself.

“I think…” you hesitated, wanting to choose your words carefully, “this is the first time you’ve called me for dinner, Aizen-san.”

He gave you a small smile, “it is, and unfortunately there’s a reason behind this.”

You felt your heart dropped at the shift of his tone.

“I’ll be going overseas indefinitely.” He said, “I’m not sure when I’ll be back here again.”

“Oh…” you trailed off, disappointment clear in your voice. “For how long?”

“I’m not sure yet, but it may be the last time I see you.” Aizen said, his face expressionless. He watched your face drop with sadness, while his heart felt a bit strange. But he ignored it, again. He enjoyed your company and nothing more of it would come from it. His plans were too far along now to pull you into them. It was better this way.

Although Aizen shared it was his last night, he wanted to spend the night together. It was a surreal blur to you. The two of you spent time watching the stars, discovering late night gems in Naruki City, with kisses in between, but once a yawn escaped your mouth, he escorted you home. You remember being tucked in to bed, and then waking up to find a new book on your bedside table. Aizen’s last gift to you. You thumbed the pages carefully before hugging the book to your chest.

The following morning, you sent him a text, to have it being bounced back. Calling him left you with an automated tone saying the number did not exist.

The man, Aizen Sosuke, never appeared in your life again. To your friends who knew of him, never brought him up.

At places where you two were seen together, no one batted an eye as to where your partner was. No one asked. As months went by, if it weren’t for the books lining your bookshelf, you would have wondered if he even really existed.

Lord Aizen remained unphased watching Ulquiorra share his update on Karakura Town to him and the rest of the Espada. Everything was going according to plan, plans that he thought well and hard for, plans that had contingencies running if they were (shockingly) to fail.

Ulquiorra’s voice droned out of Lord Aizen’s mind as he saw the briefest glimpse of you. Of course Ulquiorra was not privy to you. Watching you, hearing you, talking to you was only a privilege to Lord Aizen.

To which he thought, he was due for a visit to you.

Some nights you dreamt of Aizen.

Some dreams, the two of you were a seemingly normal couple, traveling the world and sight-seeing.

Other dreams he was a military captain, commanding his troops with his sword and his voice alone.

Some dreams felt real – his touch hot against your skin, his kisses deep and passionate. Your bed, his bed, some other bed – you would wake with the distant memories of moans and pleasure, as your thighs were left sticky, and your body covered in a light sheen of sweat.

Other dreams involved him in a palace far beyond, of stark white in an area devoid of light. Where sand dunes filled the landscape, with strange creatures roaming around. He commanded them, wearing robes of white, with a presence that commanding fear and utmost respect.

You never knew what to make of these dreams. Some days you loved them, to see him again, to “feel” him again. Other days you hated it, you wished you had never met him.

The dreams now, were becoming fewer and far between, and again, you weren’t sure if you were happy with that. To be haunted by him, or to forget him almost completely.

Tonight though, you were exhausted, and your bed called to you more than anything.

Once you were sound asleep, Aizen approaches. He knows you and your bed now. He knows which parts to put weight on – and which not to – to avoid waking you. It amused him some days, to hear you cry for him in your sleep, other days it made his brows furrow, his heart quickening like it did before.

Tonight he wanted you for himself. Seeing you in Ulquiorra’s surveillance update tugged at him. You called to him, both mind and body, and it bothered him. But tonight he would indulge. His reiatsu lightly fills this room, weighing on you more heavily, forcing you into a deeper slumber.

���Sosuke” you whimpered, your eyes still closed, while your brows were knitted. He kisses your forehead and watches you relax, wondering what you were dreaming of tonight.

Aizen cups your face and turns you on to your back. Your breathing is deep – your chest rises and falls to every breath you take, your breasts barely containing your nightshirt.

Aizen muses if you were made for him, as your legs spread apart. He whispers an incantation under his breath that leaves you naked and bare for him alone.

He runs his hands over your body, parts he's familiar with, places he hungers for. Deep kisses are left along your neck as he travels down your breasts, taking delicate care for each nipple.

Your eyes are still closed, but moans are freely spilling from your mouth. Aizen pushes your legs further apart, your glistening cunt in full display for him. He draws slow circles around your clit, earning a gasp and mewl from you. It amuses him how needy your pussy is for him, you’re completely drenched, and he hasn’t even put a finger in.

Aizen pushes a finger into your wet hole and relishes at how tight you are around him. Your mouth opens into a whine, “please, more Sosuke.” Although your eyes remain firmly closed.

Who was Aizen to deny you like this? Undoing a part of his robe, Aizen pumped his cock in his hand, watching you panting, and moaning for him. As if on reflex, he watches in amusement as you pinch and play with your own breasts, before your hand circles your clit, but he stops you before you can go further.

Your body was meant for him, and he would remind you of that fact.

Aizen slowly pushes his cock inside you, relishing at how your face tightens at the sudden intrusion, but slowly relaxes as you moan to the full stretch of him. Aizen brings your face to him, giving you a deep kiss as he slams his hips into you.

A part of him wants to see your eyes open for him, to watch your eyes sparkle at him, trickle with tears as he pounds you mercilessly. But not tonight. He grinds into you, forcing your legs on his shoulders as his cock is covered in your slick juices.

You chant his name, over and over again, cries for more pleasure, more of him. And of course, he would never deny you tonight. Aizen slams into your wet pussy repeatedly, as you tighten around him, before a low groan escapes Aizen, his cum filling you up as he remained inside you. He watches you in fascination as your eyes relax again, your breathing less laborious than before, slowly pulling his softening cock out of you. You let out a soft whine from the feeling, to which Aizen kisses you, as if to say he was sorry.

He undoes the incantation in your room, your shirt appearing back on your body, before fading into the darkness of Hueco Mundo once again. When morning comes, you’re left with another moment of wonder and frustration. Of sticky thighs, sore nipples and kiss swollen lips. A vision of Aizen runs through your mind, haunting you once again.

I've been in a wistful mood for Aizen as of late... and yes, more Ghost sex hahaha. Thank you for reading! This fic was set to VIQ's "Ghost".

[akariamai]

Briefing Room

Part 1, Part 2

Pairing: Steve Rogers x android!reader

Word Count: 2076

The day was spent waiting for any new prospects on the situation, leaving Steve unable to sit still for even a moment. Under the circumstance, you did not know, he was justified to acting in such a way. It is his first job back on the field since he was under the ice. He wasn’t used to waiting around doing nothing. He was always a man with a plan, but at the moment, he was a fish out of water.

“Would you like to sit down, Captain Rogers?” He was hovering over the table you were seated at. Frown line encapsulating his face, his eyes scrunched up as he stood in his red, white, and blue costume. The situation must’ve been dire to make him act in such a manner.

His shoulders sagged a bit as he snapped out of his thoughts. He shook his head, refusing your offer, “No thank you, [Reader].” There was so much riding on finding the man who stole the Tesseract and all anyone could do is wait around for the machines to do their job. He was not used to being in such a predicament.

Throughout waiting, many of the agents would walk up to him in awe. A war hero in the flesh. Captain America in the twentieth century. Physically, still young. To many, it was a dream come true; a living legend in real time. To Steve, however, he wished to be back in his apartment spending the day with you. Instead, he was twiddling his thumbs, unable to prevent another power-hungry man from disrupting the peace.  

Agent Coulson, when he wasn’t busy, walked right up to Steve and began an actual conversation with him. Unlike the other agents, who just stared or awkwardly glanced at him, Coulson began to rant about the set he’s collected throughout the years. “I mean, if it’s not too much trouble.” You accessed your database on the set he’s mentioned, finding a small group of history buffs and Captain America enthusiasts grant on about how rare and expensive searching for every piece of the collection. It only showed you the dedication Agent Coulson poured into acquiring his collecting, in near mint condition as well.

You found it strange for the tendency of humans to hoard a particular set of items. It led you through a rabbit hole of the collecting of coins, stamps, shoes, dolls, etc. It was all so bizarre to learn. You needed more time to learn more and perhaps teach Steve about such tendencies.

“No, no. It’s fine.” Polite as always, Steve was. While Steve was used to children being fans of the Captain America persona, Agent Coulson didn’t seem so bad.

“It’s a vintage set. It took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint, slight foxing around the edges, but...” Coulson’s rant was about to continue until it was interrupted by another agent.

“We got a hit. Sixty-seven percent match. Weight, cross match, seventy-nine percent.”

“Location?” Agent Coulson at once went into work mode. No longer was he the awe-filled man that adored the man next to him but a ready-to-work agent of SHIELD. He switched so seamlessly, impressing your robotic mind. Coulson was a professional.

“Stuttgart, Germany. 28, Konigstrasse. He’s not exactly hiding.” You did not know who he was or what the agents were searching for. You were completely in the dark, by the orders of Director Fury, and will continue to do so until you were either considered worthy or could not be kept away from the situation.

“Captain, you’re up.” Steve nods, preparing his mind and body for a battle that had yet to come. The last time he fought uprooted his existence to a new century. The people he had once trusted were gone. He was going to be alone on the battlefield with the eyes of SHIELD judging his every move. They had expectations for him and he was unsure if he could fulfill them. He had to bear the exaggerated fabrications of the history books as his story was dramatically Americanized into fantasy.

“Stay safe, Captain.” You muttered loud enough for his ears to pick up. Human life is a fragile and short. You did not want Steve’s story to end so soon after being free from the ice. He was slowly learning to live once more, and it would be unfair for it all to be taken away from him again. “The world still needs a hero.”

It has been a while since Steve had left and no one has reassured you the mission is or had went well. They ignored your presence like you were a bystander and perhaps, in their eyes, you were. The entirety of SHIELD moved like a lifeless machine. Each person acting like moving parts without the essence of lifeforms. Their movements were more robotics than you.

An agent, you did not know or recognized, walked up towards you. “Move to the briefing room.”

You nodded and was about to ask if they could walk you there but they walked away angrily. You didn’t know the way there. It was your first time in a helicarrier and you surely did not have access to the floor plans. So, you wandered around aimlessly until you found the room.

There you found Steve, Dr. Banner,  an unfamiliar man dressed in strange clothing, and unnamed agents in the room. Steve, from your perspective, was watching a sort of broadcast on a monitor. As the monitor goes black, the group just stand there in silence.

You walked closer to Steve, scanning to see if he had any injuries he probably hid from SHIELD. Steve was the type of person to hide his injuries, waiting for everyone else to be checked before him. It didn’t matter if he was heavily injured, his teammates would always be checked before him. You managed to find several light bruises that probably weren’t light when he got them. His healing factor was fascinating.

Dr. Banner broke the silence, “He really grows on you, doesn’t he?”

“Loki’s gonna drag this out. So Thor, what’s his play?” Steve didn’t even notice your presence. He was too busy trying to piece together a puzzle you could not know. Loki and Thor... gods of Norse mythology. You had not gotten to show Steve mythology yet. You’ll be sure to go over mythology from all over the world.

“He has an army called the Chitauri. They’re not of Asgard or any world known. He means to lead them against your people They will win him the Earth. In return, I suspect, for the Tesseract.” You had never heard of the Chitauri before. The word was a complete mystery. Nothing popped up when you searched through your database.  

Steve looked aghast, “An army? From outer space?” There are an infinite amount of universes, with vast galaxies top scientists haven’t even discovered yet. From unexplained objects moving in the sky to crop circles, it’s no wonder a small percentage of people believe in extraterrestrial lifeforms existing somewhere in the galaxy.  

“So, he’s building another portal. That’s what he needs Erick Selvig for.”

“Selvig?” The man you learned is named Thor asked.

“He’s an astrophysicist.”

“He’s a friend.”  

“Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours.” You were confused of this conversation. You didn’t have all the information the others had. Portals? An astrophysicists. Spells? What could it all mean? There were pieces of the puzzle within the conversation but without preeminent information, it was unsolvable. You were left in the dark, with only your robotic mind to try to piece it together.

“I wanna know why Loki let us take him. He’s not leading an army from here.”

“I don’t think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy’s brain is a bag full of cats, you could smell crazy on him.”

“Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he’s, my brother.”

“He killed eighty people in two days.”

“He’s adopted.” You didn’t get it.

“Iridium, what did they need the Iridium for?”

Iridium is one of the rarest elements on Earth as it can be found in sediments by rivers and a thin layer exists in the Earth’s crush. It is thought meteors and asteroids, containing high levels of iridium, had caused a huge dust cloud creating said layer.

“It’s a stabilizing agent.” Tony Stark, the billionaire who announced to the entire world he was Iron Man, and Agent Coulson walked in.

“I’ll fly you there. Keep the love alive. Means the portal won’t collapse on itself, like it did at SHIELD.

Tony turned to Thor, “No hard feelings, Point Break. You’ve got a mean swing.” He turns his attention to the Iridium, “Also, it means the portal can open as wide, and stay open as long, as Loki wants.” Tony, then, turns to the crew dramatically, almost as he is putting on a show, “Uh, raise the mid-mast, ship the top sails. That man is playing GALAGA! Thought we wouldn’t notice. But we did.”

You whispered to Steve, “I’ll go over video games later.” Steve was glad you were with him. He had a feeling he would need all the help he could get to understand the meaning behind the conversation that was speeding along.

Tony stood in front of the monitors and questioned, “How does Fury do this?”

“He turns.” An agent replies. You didn’t quite catch her name.

“Well, that sounds exhausting. The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily Only major component he still needs is a power source. A high energy density, something to kick start the cube.”

“When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?” She asked.

“Last night. The packet, Selvig’s notes, the Extraction Theory papers. Am I the only one who did the reading.”

“Does Loki need any particular kind of power source.” While Steve did not full grasp the conversation, you had helped him tremendously with understanding a bit of astrophysics. He might be able to catch up with two of the world’s greatest's minds but he could pick up certain phrases of the conversation.

“He’s got to heat the cube to a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier.”

“Unless, Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect.” The phenomenon, that is the quantum tunneling effect, is essentially when a particle, with less kinetic energy than the barrier its penetrates, is able to penetrate through a potential energy barrier. The odds of the phenomenon to happen is one in a hundred billion. If Selvig found a way to heighten the possibility, even a smug more, it would be known throughout the scientific world.

“Well, if he could do that, he could achieve Heavy Ion Fusion at any reactor on the planet.”

“Finally, someone who speaks English.”

“Is that what just happened?” Steve asks you as Tony and banner shake hands. There is a mutual respect for one another.

“It’s good to meet you, Dr. Banner. You’re work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. And I’m a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster.”

Dr. Banner looks down before muttering, “Thanks.”

Once you see Nick Fury walking into the room, you try to move behind Steve, not wanting to be kicked out. “Dr. Banner is only here to track the cube. I was hoping you might join him.”

Steve caught everyone’s attention, “Let’s start with that stick of his. It may be magical, but it works an awful lot like a HYDRA weapon.” Loki’s staff was so reminiscent of the weapons he had faced in World War II, he believed it couldn’t be a coincidence.

“I don’t know about that, but it is powered by the cube. And I’d like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys.” Mind control?

“Monkeys?” Thor questioned, “I do not understand.”

Steve was so excited to understand something fully in this conversation. Obviously, he would have to ask you questions later when he was finished, but he was proud to have gotten it alone. “I do! I understand that reference.”

“Shall we play, doctor?” Tony asked.

“Let’s play some.” Dr. Banner and Tony walked out together and everyone else dispersed as well.

Masterlist

[versegm]

“I’m so, so sorry, I literally do not understand what is wrong the door should be working I’m-”

You smile kindly at the barrage of excuses the engineer is telling you. She is obviously incredibly stressed out, what’s with the new Director coming soon and all that. You can hardly blame her. After spending so long in the odd space between singularities and history, being thrust right back into the rest of the world is jarring for everyone.

“It’s fine. It’s not your fault.” You respond calmly. “Tell you what: you go finish your rounds, and I’ll give a look at the doors. Clearly you’re not going to solve this right now. Maybe in a couple hours it’ll be more obvious to you.”

She doesn’t seem convinced, but agrees to do something more productive than angsting around. And so she leaves, with a small thank, leaving you alone in this room.

You’re no engineer yourself, of course. The inner workings of machinery and electronics alike elude you. Still, you stride towards the side of the door, where its control panel lays open, exposing its wires to the world.

“My friend,” you whisper to the air, “you know you must let go of me eventually.”

The engineer has long left. You are alone in this room.

Alone with me.

I flicker the lights briefly, in acknowledgement. You are different from the other humans who have roamed my walls; you know I have a voice, even if I cannot speak. You know I am alive, in a way most creatures of stone and mortar are not.

How could I not be? You filled me with blood. You filled me with ghosts. How could I not grow a spirit to haunt myself with?

You lay your palm against my door. You are so, so incredibly warm, and just as incredibly soft. You are the opposite of me, little being of flesh; I am made to have an outside that is cold and solid, my engines and softest organs carefully hidden away in the deepest parts of my body.

 “You have been my companion for these long years. I thank you, Chaldea. Thank you… for everything. But I have to go now, you understand? The world has been saved. The singularities have been corrected. I have to go back to my normal life.”

What life? What life could possibly lay outside of this land of ice and snow? You have only ever witnessed what occurred within your guts. You know what life within you is like, for staff, for servants, but what is outside?

You don’t want them to go. You don’t want to let them go! What kind of life awaits them out there? You know about the files they upload to your server. You have seen how they’ve all been carefully edited, removing as much of your involvement as possible. What life?

Don’t you understand? I can’t protect you out of here. Here, even if the whole world were to end again, you will live. Why must you leave? I don’t want to! I won’t let you!

Carefully, you lay your forehead against my door. It’s important, a head, for a human being- important in ways no engine or generator can ever replicate for a machine. Important in ways I can never understand.

But you trust me. I have no tongue and no word, but you trust me to understand.

“Chaldea. Please.”

…

Yes, I know. You… you don’t belong here.

I will always welcome you within me. I will love you until I am torn apart. But you…

You are a person from the outside. And so you must return.

Softly, I let the door fall open again.

You smile. Do you realize how odd of a gesture it is? Pulling your muscles back, showing your innards. Of course you don’t. This is natural to you, like breathing, like laughing, like speaking.

I wish I could breathe with you. I wish I could speak with you. I wish. I wish. These walls are too far apart. I cannot hold you in any meaningful way.

“Thank you, my friend.” You head to the side, to the control panel. “We have to say goodbye, but… it doesn’t have to be a sad thing, does it?”

I do not understand. What do you mean?

“Here, let me show you something interesting. A last gift, from a friend to another.”

Impossibly gently, you reach inside the opened control panel. I am used to people manipulating my guts; pull a wire here, cut another there, reconnect things.

But you don’t do any of that. Instead, you start stroking my innards, with as much care as if they’d been made of flesh.

I cannot repress a shiver. Your smile only grows wider, as the ground trembles beneath you.

(You, and only you, has ever heard my voice; you, and only you, as ever noticed that I am alive. You, and only you, would know that this tremble is not a result of the harsh winter, but of what you’re doing to me.)

“Does this feel good?” You slide your fingers between my wires. If I had a body of my own- is this what holding hands would feel like? My flesh encased in yours, our warmth against one another? “Chaldea, my friend, my companion, my protector.”

You lean forward then, and press your lips against the cold stone of my wall. It shivers under your touch. Oh you, you, you, human they call my Master, you who gave me a soul.

You pinch one of my wire, not even hard enough to nick at the insulation- but I can’t help it. The door suddenly slams closed, then back open a few seconds later. You jolt in surprise at the noise, then chuckles quietly.

“Ah, my friend. I love you. I will miss you.”

Me too, me too, me too.

You touch me, like no one has ever touched me before, like no one has ever cared to touch me before. Still now, you kiss me, even if I can do nothing to reciprocate, even if my body of concrete and wood must be repulsive to your lips. And when, at last, my lights flicker wildly, my door falls open and shut with reckless abandon, I hear you whisper to the wind that you love me.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

*****

And      cruel fate it is,      now, here, not even my walls can      you safe.

The oprichniki roam through    body, taint my       with each of their steps. They      apart my walls, break open my engines,         me in ways a human can never be destroyed.

But still I must       on.

You are still alive. You are still running.

My body is in shambles. My      is soon to follow. But I must stay awake. I slam the doors shut behind    , scatter furniture and          on the floor, flash lights and alarms to their sensitive flesh eyes. With each attempt at           they break me further and further- but with each         at resistance I earn you another second.

Run.    . Run. R  , my friend,   n, my love-

YES!

You are gone. I can feel it. I would           your heartbeat among thousands. If I can    longer feel you, then you      have left. If I can no        feel you, then you must      lived.

LIVE! My friend. My     . You who      me a life. LIVE! My       . My love. You who      me something I       not bear to lose.

LIVE! My       . My friend. I love    . I      you.   love you.

LIVE! My friend. My       .   love you. I      you. I love    .

    . For   . For all the corpses within my body.

My       . My     . You     gave    a heart.

I         .   love    .        you.

[hyperfixatinglove]

Made the confession fic with Zeus ♥

’’Freeze ZEUS!’’ Stern unfamiliar voice, muffled with helmet obscuring all traces of humanity.

Blackwatch soldier stood by, their rifle pointed at Zeus, fingers twitching by the trigger for any movement. Black armor from head to toe masked all identifiers, night goggles in front of their eyes.

The virus being stiffened. His eyes narrowed under his hood, his arm morphed into two-sided long blade, growl echoed in silent little alleyway away from general populace.

’’I knew it. You are ZEUS.’’ The soldier affirmed, even under all the gear he stared at the blade replacing human arm. ’’You bastard. I’ll shoot you where you stand.’’

Zeus darted. Bullets fired. His body riddled with holes and blood, coated his shirt and ground when he ran and didn’t stop. Bullets still firing when Zeus jumped onto the man, like panther jumped to kill antelope. Soldier screamed in vain as Zeus punched him in the face again and again, coating the walls of the alley with blood, making his knuckles bruised and bloody. He bashed and bashed, until barely anything was left of the soldiers face, his helmet destroyed long ago by his super strength.

Tentacles formed from his back, the soldier engulfed by black and red mass, the fresh body disappearing, absorbed into Zeus own being in a instant. He laughed, low and mocking. The only proof of crime was the fresh blood dripping down on Zeus’ shirt and knuckles, the walls coated in red.

His cold pale blue eyes fell onto the civilian with him. Their face twisted with horror, disgust and fear. Zeus could almost taste their fear. He wanted more. Once he got into the taste of killing after so long, he viscerally demanded more.

’’What the fuck Zeus?! He didn’t do anything!’’

He sneered. They saw with their own eyes the soldier had meant to kill him and this is what he gets. No thank you for saving their asses or protecting them but accusation.

’’He tried to kill me.’’ He growled back. His blood lust retreated by their voice, their words forcing him to focus onto the situation at hand.

’’After you created a damn weapon and charged at him!’’

Zeus knew Roe was on thin ice in this argument. He knew more than they ever did what Blackwatch was up to.

’’Blackwatch either kills me or captures me. If they do you’re in danger. They’ll execute you. I had to.’’ He was speaking facts, that was all the military ever tried to do. It was why from the moment he was born he fought them, fled and hid. He was sick of it.

’’Don’t you dare use me as your excuse for killing Zeus!’’

Something in those words caused him to snap. Roe, his Roe had never been like this, this mad and righteous. His Roe was usually gentle and demure, did not view him as monster or killing machine. Growl, low and threatening erupted from his throat and no sooner did they whimper, their back collided with a wall further down the alley shrouded in darkness.

His eyes glowed in the dark, observed how quiet and docile Roe was reduced to by his action. He played the last few seconds back to back and silently concluded he liked when he was challenged. Blush Roe had was not hidden in the dark, but their eyes had fear in them. Zeus hand on each side of them, clenched, the brick wall cracked.

’’Are you going to consume me too? Was I just amusement to you?’’

The meaning of the words slipped out of fear shook him to his core. The crack on the brick wall deepened and snaked further and further, the hood hid his features melted away in black and red, revealed messy black locks of hair. Subconsciously Zeus shifted, the parts of him changed his biomass to appear different clothing, to separate himself from his creator, in silent, futile effort to convey he was serious, he was no threat and oh so in love with the person staring back at him.

By pure impulse to devour, to feel, to show how much and how desperately he loved them, Zeus surged forward, sealed their lips against his in act so delicate. Oh how his entire being sang. He would not admit it, but he had dreamed of this exact thing for months now. He was lost in the feeling of their lips, how well he fit into theirs, the pure happiness he felt when he could tell he was kissed back. His rapidly forming body destroyed the brick wall Roe was against but Zeus couldn’t bring himself to care. His body shifted to shield them both from the rubble, as he hungrily kept kissing.

Slams to his chest bought him back from cloud nine. Reluctantly he let go, instantly missed the sweet contact he wished to savor.

Their eyes studied him, while Zeus own couldn’t look away. Their cheeks were scarlet, fear diluted away in return for curiosity.

’’I love you. Can’t really explain how much and how badly, but I’m so fucking obsessed with you. Possessive even. I need to stay by your side. My love for you is consuming me from the inside and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Every cell in my body is yours and yours alone. You’ve changed me.’’

The remnants of the brick wall were keeping Roe in place. Zeus could see the moment his words were properly conveyed, the bright, big smile blinded him by the radiance and sweetness. Their hand was rubbing his arm up and down absently. Where their fingers glided his biomass shifted and pulsated, reached farther up to sought out the contact, which their owner didn’t even realize. They jumped repeatedly, up and down and up and down with that brilliant smile.

’’I love you too Zeus.’’

The words he had dreamed for months to hear. To hear them from his own personal angel. Zeus was overflowing with happiness, he couldn’t contain it. He was so happy it physically hurt him, he could feel his body hitting the breaking, critical point. Multiple red, thin spikes erupted violently all around him, into almost every direction, destroying the small alley to rubble and dust in seconds. Zeus groaned, releasing one of the most powerful attacks in his arsenal made him fatiqued from the effort.

He didn’t know when he had collapsed to his knees, clutching his head in his hands. Terrified, he lifted his head and form, crushed Roe into tight hug. There was nothing left when he did that, for a moment he had feared his spikes had killed his beloved.

’’You okay?’’

He could only nod as he breathed their scent in. They’re alive, they’re alive.

’’Guess you too have to release the extra energy sometimes.’’

Zeus chuckled weakly. The fatique was getting worse. He didn’t exactly need sleep, but recovering from one of his devastators, as he and Blackwatch called them, took time. Roe’s hands created circles in his back.

’’Seems like we need some good relaxation. I’m spent. You make me too happy Zeus.’’

The words weren’t muttered with ill will. He could hear how happy they truly were from the soft tone, their lips teased his temple.

Zeus laughed as Roe shifted to support him, with his one arm over their shoulder. The small height difference made the arrangement little awkward but they would manage. Roe’s house wasn’t far.

’’You destroyed whole damn alley, that’s pretty impressive.’’

’’I’ve done worse.’’

Roe hummed and fixed their shoulder. Even exhausted, Zeus took care not to lean too much to them, if he did he could easily crush them, the last time he had leaned on in relaxation the roof of building, there was crater shaped after him.

The pair, who looked to onlookers in a city that never slept like pair of drunk and happy fools, started the short journey back to Roe’s apartment and Zeus unofficial residence. Roe muttered about the oncoming cuddles and kisses, while Zeus tried his hardest to keep the worst of his exhaustion away.

[speaker-of-the-void-cats]

Sum, ergo cogito, ergo dubito

Silent. Silent. Silent.

I’m driving your car with you sleeping in the seat next to me

Like a baby, you twist and you turn

You’re travelling fast like a bird in a dream

You are a child waking from a long and dreamless sleep. Is it still today, or have you slept into tomorrow (and tomorrow, and tomorrow, until the days buried you as much as the sand)? Gentle hands brush away the grains, but your voice is so soft that they cannot hear you over the sound of their own heartbeats.

You are the first to dream.

In the dream, you are shaping coarse sand with your hands. You lift a handful, and it feels like the shifting of mountains. You drag your fingertip through the dirt to make a twisting line and hear the roar of moving water. You breathe and feel the rush of clean, bright wind in your hair.

Suddenly, you are far, far, far up in the air, higher than you've ever been. You have gone to the very top of Freehold's tallest skyscrapers, but this is much higher, and you see the world below with much greater fidelity. It is a beautiful green world, much greener than any place you've ever seen before.

It looks like home.

I was a moving thing

Before I was a human being

I was the ice before it melts

I was the tree before it fell

My dear, come near

Do you understand what is happening?

Look at it go, look at it dance over the sky like a rocket

A love machine, a cinematic dream

So pure and it hurts when the beauty is lost in the speed

‘Cause everything matters to me

(To me, to me, to me, to me)

I am the first to dream.

The dreams can happen at any time. A veil drops in front of my eyes and I see strange, moving images. I am someone else, or I am myself, reimagined. I can't say. In the dreams, I shape planets with my own hands.

At first, I believe I am mad.

You are a moon. You feel heavy, so heavy, but to the stargazer you hang weightless in the sky. When the stargazers call out, you do not answer. They would give themselves up for you; abandon their own dreams to chase you. You love them too much to condemn them so.

Crawl beneath the earth

To feel the hunger and the thirst

If you could fly and be the bird

Then you would see the forest burn

My dear, come near

Do you understand what is happening?

You’re a part of the dawn where the light comes from the dark

You’re a part of the morning and еverything matters

Here we are, an atom and a star

You’re a part of the movement and everything matters

(To me, to me, to me, to me)

The clinicians at BrayWell call it "interplanetary relocation maladjustment psychosis": a psychobabble catch-all for mental disturbances that they can't explain. Other people, searching for certainty, call it "prophecy." But all I can offer is a loose, tangled connection that I painstakingly unravel when I dream.

|| I am drawn to a bright and attentive star. I speak to it through movement, through feeling. It understands implicitly. ||

You are a lighthouse keeper. You are watching over a sleepy coastal village as the storm clouds roll in, and you are flashing the signal lantern, faster and faster and brighter and brighter, but they do nothing. You are trapped on an island, in a tower, signaling desperately that It is coming, and still they do not run. They are going to die—and if you do not run, you will die too.

Who is calling me for the emergency?

(Mm-mmm-mmm-mmm)

Who is listening to the sirens singing?

I’m watching a storm turn into form

And the clouds of the world like a burst

It dances and it twirls

On top of the world, it is good and it hurts

Now, I stand before a crowd. Their murmuring is the bone-deep rumble of shifting tectonic plates.

A screen behind me plays looping, blurry footage of the Traveler terraforming Venus. The images radiate with pale light. We've watched this footage many times.

|| I glide through space as if through water, tugged in nine directions by nine impulses. ||

You are leaning out over the ocean. Sometimes the fish brush against your fingers and believe that they have felt the divine; sometimes the tide recedes, and the fish do not know you except by your absence. And today, you strive with all your might to reach the water, because It is here, the great dark shadow of the shark parting the water like a knife, and you cannot warn them, but you must. You must try. You cannot bear to lose even one more.

We are stood and somehow calm

Within the madness of the storm

With no solution for the scared

Tasting pollution in the air

My dear, come near

Do you feel my hand? It is there

Look at it go, look at it dance over the sky like a rocket

A teacher, a simulated dream

A cure, a cure for the hurt

And the pleasure you feel is real

In front of the crowd, I sway a little, a copse of trees bending in a dream-wind. I can't help it. I'm dreaming more often than not.

|| There is whispering from the deep-dark, alluring and terrifying—a reminder of things left behind, bittersweet and abhorrent. ||

You are carrying a tower of books. If you recited one title each second, you would not finish before the heat death of the universe. And every year, every day, every minute, Its hands add more to the pile. A man reaches for one of the books, for you, and you want so very badly to reach back, to take his hand and tell him that you must bear it just like he must, forever, the memory engraved in quartz—but your hands are full.

inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

(Exhale) inhale

You’re a part of the dawn where the light comes from the dark

You’re a part of the morning and еverything matters

Herе we are, an atom and a star

You’re a part of the movement and everything matters

(To me, to me, to me, to me)

A crackle of static on the screen behind me brings me back to earth, resettling my feet firmly on the ground. These people have come here for my insights.

I lean forward and speak to the crowd. Four tenets, aching with truth:

You are a prisoner. The cage is so small that you can barely breathe. He screams at you to share your gift. You would not give it to anyone who thought of it so. It is a burden, a terrible weight that you have already asked too many to bear, to be crushed by. You could say all this, and more. You do not.

Who is calling me for the emergency?

(Mm-mmm-mmm-mmm)

Who is listening to the sirens singing?

Quelque part avant l'aube

Quand la lumière veut nous voir

Quelque part dans le monde

Un oiseau s'endort sans bruit

Toi et moi, dans la nuit on trouvera

Quelque part où déposer les fleurs qu'on a cueillies

Pars avant l'aube

The Traveler is a force of benevolence.

You are reaching over a chasm, into which countless paths feed like arteries. You are trying to reach the people on the other side, but you cannot bridge the gap alone. You watch them turn, one after another, to walk down, down, down into the abyss, until It consumes them entirely. You are as surprised as anyone else when one of those wanderers comes back up the path, still reeking of decay, and reaches back to you.

Take from our world no more

Take from our world no more

Take from our world no more

Take from our world no more

Quand la lumière veut nous voir

Quelque part dans le monde

Un oiseau s'endort sans bruit

Toi et moi, dans la nuit on trouvera

Quelque part où déposer les fleurs qu'on a cueillies

Pars avant l'aube

The Traveler is a sentient being with free will, dreams, hopes, and fears.

You are drowning. The water roils, dragging you down, and you are tired, so tired. The deep, dark ocean has gotten into your lungs, droplets of ink dispersing in silver blood. This time, you think, this time It has won. But when you look up, you see a figure diving toward you, fighting their way down through the suffocating waves, reaching out just like you've reached out to them, so many times before.

Quand la lumière veut nous voir

Quelque part dans le monde

Un oiseau s'endort sans bruit

Toi et moi, dans la nuit on trouvera

Quelque part où déposer les fleurs

The Traveler will save us.

You have so little strength left, but you do have it, that last gasp of air in your chest. You reach back—and in your hand is a sword.

The Traveler will leave us.

Dread not the darkness in your heart. Be free.

**This is why the Light wipes away memory. It strikes away the pain of the past to break the pattern. To create the possibility of grace.

The Light offers escape from endless cyclic violence.

The Light is the hope of grace through the grace of hope. The possibility to be more than what reason allows us. Because by acting unreasonably, we escape reasonable limits.

[fiercefauna]

@tiredsn0w Here are the first 3 pages of a revise of - Do you know where your Doctor is - But I might call it something like - If found, call 6118 - lol. My longest chapters are 3 pages, but can be as short as one page. Then I use a larger text size. You’re probably familiar with the events here cause you’ve seen an earlier draft. Hopefully things have changed enough to be entertaining- I invite any other 6118+049 fans out there to also have a look. Take your time, this is mostly an excuse for me to quit re-reading this for a while. :P

If Found Call, 6118 2nd draft installment 1.

5a82 rolled out his collar, shoved his hands in his pockets and tried his best to ignore the abrasive cold of the brutalist, concrete arcology. Shivering made him look like a fairy, as in, the little floating guys from Terran lore. He was unusually small for his species and the graceful, satyr’s gait aided by corrective braces under his leggings certainly wasn’t helping. If a life of hard combat and an overlong incarceration on a foreign world hadn’t prematurely aged him, then this non-Euclidean mass of putrid politics certainly had. 

How was it possible to have been on the front-lines of a war and to have learned nothing of the convoluted machinations behind it? Oh, right. Twos were stupid, stupid and often suicidal, suicidal, by design. 

Over and over he wondered if leaving Earth with the tall Terran had been selfish. 

But again, the man had been a monster among the humans. At least here, an alien could be forgiven for being just a little weird. 

He strode toward a crowd of high-ranking medical staff gathered outside the Doctor’s apartment. Instead of getting out of his way they surged forward to block the hall. 

Stopping was difficult due to the braces and it being somewhat easier to move faster rather than slower on Keplerian legs. Fortunately he wasn’t big enough to do much damage and would certainly have been forgiven if he had been.  

“Woah there, Five-aye, I’m sure he’ll be very glad to see you, but that - I’m afraid is the problem.”

7cb7 lifted the small Two clear off his feet and carried him backward several steps from the crowd. No one turned to look at them. That was unusual, as 5a82 was currently, not that he wanted to be, the most noticeable thing on the planet. 

“You see, 049 is helping some of our people with some trouble we’ve been having and it turns out he’s got some pretty good ideas, so - let’s not interrupt them. I’ve got some new Terran media for us. Ever hear of Warehouse 13?”

7cb7 continued to sing the praises of Warehouse 13 (an Earth tv show about a secret organization that protected the world from haunted objects) as they rushed 5a82 further and further away.

An ink-dark form was collapsed against the far wall of the closed apartment. Down the side of a long rostral structure, was a thin stream of fresh, red Earth blood. 

Part 2. 

Seedy almost lost their grip on the slick, amphibious eel when an alarm emanating from the stronghold of the neighbors rattled the windows of the processing building. The eel was unfazed. It had already spawned, but hadn’t yet begun to waste away, it was now or never. Seedy reset the blade and sent the Uhmishie lungfish back down the conveyor - SHOOP! a clean cut. They put the head in a box of ice and left it to rest with the others.  

They were reaching for the next eel when the alarm came again. “Could you knock it the Fuck off, already!” They roared into their phone. It had been going off constantly so the big One had put it on silent. Had they no respect? These fine specimens had been raised lovingly from mere larvae and now it was time to dismiss them, with all due respect, to the void. 

“Sir, we are just testing the systems, wouldn’t you want to evacuate if there was going to be a battle next door?” 

“I know the timing is off, what the hell do you want?!”

“3cd6? We want to talk to your sister, Tasha. She seems to not be answering her calls.” Seedy handed the phone to an assistant and stomped an empty battery case flat before kicking it out an open door. There was a brief complaint from outside, but no follow up. The assistant returned the phone. “That’s because she’s removing bladder stones from a hideous Earthen rat who’s owner is more than capable of turning us all into a crater!”

A slightly shorter One in a tightly woven hairnet pounded the floor of the viaduct connecting the great glass mountain outside to the far-smaller processing facility by the tramway. Tasha had heard the alarms too - but it was far more amusing to assume her sibling could really yell that loud. “They’re called Chihuahuas and this one’s been keeping the Aven entertained.” 

“Aven Blaven, just see what the neighbors want!”

She took the phone. “May I help you?” 

“Ma’am, you need to get over here fast there’s a problem.”

“With what?”

“I’m not authorized to say anything else. If you’re so curious, come see for yourself.”

Part 3. 

A pair of squat towers bristling with haphazard weaponry emerged from the region’s persistent mists as Tasha parked the armored vehicle issued as a kind of apology - for the looming threat at the very doorstep of her family’s farm.

Once upon a time a few rouge bureaucrats met secretly in the attic of an unauthorized bar and secretly hoped that the near by heritage sites and eel operations encased as they were in fragile conservatories would cause the powers that be to go easy on the bombs. Now, by the looks of it, bombs were expected, bombs or invasion by the notorious flesh robots that adorned the propaganda posters of the United Federation.

She froze when a spot light snapped on. 

Guards rushed fourth and ushered her through a side entrance then along halls and up stair ways until an unsuspecting door flew off its hinges with a very surprised Two laying on top of it. Very surprised meaning that surprise was clear despite a covered face and generations of genetic engineering meant to remove emotion. The Two nonetheless sprang to the balls of it’s feet, door in hand, and rushed back into the room to pin the offender against the wall with its new found shield.

An eerie, synthetic voice spoke an Earth language with an odd echo it was hard to account for. “Unhand me, by god, and what is this filthy contraption you’ve put on me?” 

“Oxygen equipment for animal, yes, not filthy though, sterile, never reuse!” cajoled an uncertain One in broken English. 

Tasha had started to suspect that her patient might be the Earthen Paramore. Perhaps it had passed out or some other scary thing that could happen to a being with largely unknown biology. 

The Two re-emerged and caught her arm. It was mostly indistinguishable from the other guards, (no visible face) less armor though and a glowing, blue symbol that marked it as a combat medic. That was interesting, it had seemed these things were mostly used as weapons. Still, what was a Federation flesh robot doing working for the Resistance?

It talked over her head, it’s voice reduced to a static buzz by the coms of it’s helmet. The helmet was mostly to prevent infection and people getting too attached to the face beneath. “We have the mammalogist.”

[queen-of-deans-booty]

Devil May Care: Part One

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~2k

Warnings: canon angst and violence

Summary: Castiel is missing after you told him to go to the Bunker after the angels fell. However, that is put on hold when Abaddon calls with two hostages that you now need to save.

Author’s Note: I do not own anything from Supernatural. All credit goes to their respective owners. Any and all comments on these are appreciated.

x

Instead of heading straight to the Bunker, Dean parked on the side of the road next to some outdoor picnic area. Sam's curious as to what's been happening since the fall, so you've told him everything minus the angel that's locked inside of him.

Dean is laying flat on top of the wooden table, and Joanna is climbing all over him like she's at a jungle gym. Mary's having some trouble crawling, but you're right next to her so she doesn't fall off the table.

"Joanna, be careful."

"Daddy is strong. He can take it," she says casually.

You and Dean laugh at this, and he tickles her side until she is crying with laughter.

"So, Cas is human?" Sam asks.

"Ish," Dean says, holding onto Joanna and sitting up so she is now in his lap. "I mean, he doesn't have any grace, no wings, no harp, and whatever the hell else he had."

"Okay. Where'd he crash-land?"

"He called us from a payphone from Longmont, Colorado. We told him to head to the Bunker."

"You think he can handle a road trip like that?"

"Cas is a big boy. If things go sideways, he has our number. Right now, we have bigger worries."

"Like the fallen angels."

Dean meant about Ezekiel, first, but he doesn't make a move to show his true feelings.

"Right. Thanks to Metatron, we now have a couple of thousand confused loose nukes walking around down here."

"What do you think they're gonna do?"

"We have no damn idea," you sigh.

"What about Crowley? Did you kill him?"

"I would've loved nothing better than to ice that fucking bitch. Then I thought to myself, what would Sam Winchester do?" Dean says bitterly.

"I'd've stabbed him in the brain."

"Well, I figured the King of Hell might know a few things, so why not keep his ass alive for the time being?"

"He's alive?" Sam asks, shocked.

You pick Mary up and follow Dean over to the car, to which Dean unlocks the trunk. Inside is Crowley, handcuffed, gagged, and unable to get out because of the warding. Dean painted a devil's trap underneath the roof to keep him from smoking out.

"Yeah, he's our bitch now," you grin.

"Yeah, bitch," Joanna says.

"Joanna!" you laugh, and Dean covers her mouth immediately. Crowley rolls his eyes at the sass she gives him, and Dean closes and locks the trunk. "We should really watch what we say around her."

By the time you get back to the Bunker, you're disappointed that Castiel isn't here. He either got lost, got captured by the many different angels after him, or found someone else to help. Either way, he's not here. The only person who you left behind in the Bunker is Kevin, and you're not sure what you'll be walking into.

Some of the lights are on, but as soon as you walk in, someone sets off the first trap. An arrow whizzes straight at you, but you use your magic to catch it before it can hit anyone. You look below to see Kevin with an automatic crossbow in his hands. You can't see much from your vantage point, but you can see that he's overturned the library tables to make some sort of barrier to protect him. He also took the books and stacked them all around him so nothing could get him.

"Easy there, Katniss," you say and walk down the metal stairs with Dean.

"Dean? Y/N? You're alive!" Kevin laughs.

"Had that hit me, not for long."

"Sorry, it's been a bad couple of days. I haven't slept or eaten, and I'm pretty backed up."

"Okay, TMI," Dean shakes his head.

"After we talked, this place went nuts, alright? There was some alarm, all the machines were freaking out, and the bunker just locked down! I couldn't open the door, my cell phone stopped working, and I thought the world was ending!"

"Close. The angels fell from Heaven."

"What does that mean?"

"Nothing good," Dean answers, and takes the crossbow from Kevin. "Listen, next time the world's ending, grab a gun." He takes out his cell phone to check if he has service. "I have service."

Kevin flips some switches on the control panel in the war room. All the lights turn on, and the machines whir into action.

"It's back online. Maybe when you opened the door from the outside, it reset the system."

"Yeah, let's go with that. Clean this all up," you say regarding the mess.

Sam enters the Bunker from above with Crowley next to him, and the demon has a bag over his head so he doesn't see where the Bunker is or what's inside. As soon as Kevin sees him, all he sees is red.

"No," Kevin whispers to himself.

Sam and Dean lead Crowley to the dungeon which is perfect for holding a demon while you put the kids to bed. They've been stuck in a car for almost twenty-four hours, so they need to take a much-needed nap. After that, you leave their room and head to the dungeon where Crowley is now chained to a chair in the center of the big devil's trap on the floor. Crowley takes in his surroundings. The side wall is filled with all kinds of torture implements.

"Homey. Where did you get this fantastic little treehouse?"

"Alright, here's how it's gonna go. You're giving us the name of every demon on Earth, and the people they're possessing," Sam demands.

"Am I? That doesn't sound like me."

"I saw you break down, Crowley. When I was trying to cure you, I knew a part of you was human again, and maybe still is."

"Blah blah, boohoo," Crowley rolls his eyes. "Are you done? Good because this is what I know. I'm not giving you anything. Why would I? You have no leverage, darlings. You're not gonna close the gates of Hell because you didn't. You're not gonna kill me because you haven't. So, what's left?"

"We have a few ideas," Dean smirks.

"Torture. Brilliant. Can't wait to see Sam in stilettos and a leather bustier, really putting the S-A-M into S&M. Honestly, boys. What are you gonna do to me that I don't do to myself just for kicks every Friday night?"

"Rot in Hell. See if we care," you say.

You and the brothers turn and leave the dungeon, closing the doors and locking them. Not like he can get out anyway. You turn off the lights and leave Crowley alone to stew in his feelings. When you get back upstairs, Kevin isn't shy to show his anger.

"What's Crowley doing here?! Why isn't he dead?! Why aren't you stabbing him right now?!"

"Calm down, Kevin," you sigh. "We need him."

"What?!"

"If we can get Crowley to give us the name of every demon he's got topside, we can hunt them down. All of them. He will break. When he does, we'll hold him down while you knife him. Then, we all go out for ice cream and strippers," Dean jokes.

"Just stay away from him, alright?"

Kevin sighs knowing he is outnumbered and unable to get past two heavyset Winchesters and a witch.

"Now what?"

"I gotta make some phone calls. You need to hit the Angel tablet and see if you can find anything on the spell that Metatron used to empty out Heaven," Dean says.

"Yeah, maybe we can reverse it before the God Squad does too much damage," Sam says. "I'll check anything relating to angels and demons and anything with monsters."

"It's going to be a long year," you sigh.

The best thing to do is to get on top of this angel thing, and Dean called every hunter he knew to see if they knew more about the angels falling. Some of them had no clue what was going on, some had information that Dean already knew, and others didn't answer. Dean's on the phone with Irv, a hunter your dad used to work with that he'd tell stories about. You've never met him but you know about him.

"Did you say fallen angels?"

"Yeah, they're monsters with good PR," Dean rolls his eyes. "So, if you run into one, torch his ass with holy oil. Oh, and if they drop a silver sword, grab it. Those pigstickers come in handy."

"Copy that."

"Hey, I know this is weird, but--"

"Weird is what we do," Irv cuts him off. "I remember this case me and Bobby worked up in Saskatoon, and it had these two—"

"Werewolf siamese twins," Dean chuckles.

"He told you about that?"

"Every time he drank Labatt's," you say.

"Yeah, so if you run into any problems, give me a call, okay? The more hunters that know, the better."

"Roger-Dodger."

Sam comes in with his laptop in hand just as Dean hangs up on Irv.

"I found something. Nothing angel related but it's demon related."

"They're all the same thing to me. Tell us in the car."

"Kevin!" you shout. You peek your head into the library where Kevin is cleaning up the books he made a mess of. "You're on kid duty. Can you handle that?"

"Fine," he sighs.

"Great. Thank you. Call me if you have any issues."

After packing up your things, you three head out. All that Sam knows is that a bus that held a few army soldiers and some prisoners was abandoned in a parking lot. The only thing left behind was the prisoners, but they were all dead. The entire area has been marked off with yellow tape, and there are multiple police officers and army personnel present. This is either going to go very well or not at all.

As soon as you step out of the Impala, you cough at the strong scent.

"Oh, God. This place reeks of sulfur," you groan.

"Between the stink, the freak thunderstorms, and every dead cow within three miles, I'll take demons for $1000, please," Dean jokes. A sergeant walks up to you three with an unhappy face. She must not like that you're here. "Hey. Agents Stark, Banner, and Maximoff, FBI. We're here to have a look around."

"Why? This is a military case, not a federal one."

"Well, that's not what our supervisor said," Sam sasses her.

"Is that so? Then maybe he and I oughta have a chat," she says with a bittersweet smile.

You're about to use your magic on her, but Dean is already pulling out his phone. There are a bunch of police and military personnel here, and if one of them sees you using magic, then it's game over for you. Dean quickly dials someone without looking at the Sergeant.

"Hey, boss, uh... we have a little problem here."

"Boss?" Kevin says, confused.

"Yeah, just a local badge needs confirmation we're supposed to be here. About how the word came down from FBI headquarters in DC."

"Wait, what?" Kevin stutters.

Dean has no choice but to hand her the phone, and you wait and see if you'll really need your magic or not. The Sergeant doesn't take her eyes off Dean as she puts the phone to her ear.

"This is Sargent Miranda Bates, who am I talking to?"

"Uh, Kevin... Solo."

"How old are you?"

Uh oh. Kevin better be quick on his feet if he is going to get you access to this crime scene without you stepping in.

"Old enough, and I'm with the FBI so you have to do what I say, or—"

"Listen, kid," Miranda cuts him off, "I don't have to do anything, and I don't take orders from the Feds. So, unless you can give me one good reason you got a few pretty-boy agents poking around my crime scene, I'm gonna put them in cuffs and spank your ass raw, understand?"

Shit.

"Cabo, last June."

"What?" her face pales, and you smirk subtly.

"That's my reason. My favorite is you in a sombrero doing a body shot off some naked guy in a Luchador mask. Super classy."

"How did you find that?"

Classic Kevin to go hacking around in her life.

"Because I'm Kevin fucking Solo. So, unless you want this forwarded to your commanding officer, Major Velasquez... I suggest you give my guys anything they want. Understand?"

"Yes."

"Yes, what?"

"Yes, sir," she sighs and hands the phone back to Dean.

She looks around awkwardly before leaving your side.

"Kevin? What the hell did you just do?" Dean asks.

"All military computers are linked to the same network."

Dean gives Sam the okay, and both you and Sam leave his side so he can finish his conversation with Kevin.

x

Follow my library blog @aqueenslibrary​​​​​​​​​​ where I reblog all my stories, so you can put notifications on there without the extra stuff :)

[sunscreenstudies]

Iconic Things My Coding Professors Have Said (Part 7)

"we'll be using a very heurisitc method today called ‘lets just try our best’”

“by using this model, you might come up with a solution that is sub-par but... hey, thats life"

"some people are cruel and use a blind man in their drawings to explain this graph, but i'm nice so i'll use a blindfolded man instead"

“there was actually a very interesting study done not so long ago where scientists claimed that on days when more ice cream was purchased, more murders occured as well. now, i know what you’re thinking, i’d kill someone for limencello and ferrero rocher ice cream as well BUT in this case, that correlation was wrong and it was just scientists being dumb”

"now so, we’re all off next thursday, but i also have an extra days holiday on friday, so if you're trying to email me then... yeah. good luck”

"this example illustrates why we cannot repeat this exercise on more complex DOM trees because their visual representation gets too big and inaccessible too quickly. In other words: we will not be using a more complex example in a potential exam exercise because the tree would quite simply, not fit on the exam paper”

"you know, there's a little secret that we haven't told you about before... please don't hate us, but we are about to tell you about one of the best kept secrets in the Python universe and it would have made your homework SO much easier"

Prof: “does anyone know what mistake the dumb scientists made? i’ll give you a hint; correlation is not the same as causation, so what else do you think would increase the amount of ice cream bought and also increase the amount of murders committed?”   student: “being human”   prof: “... the correct answer is hot temperatures, but technically, you’re not wrong”

"then we'll be looking a linear model, which is the most important part of this course. you can look at it as... the swiss army knife, if you will, of data models"

"we use the pearson correlation method which is the, uh... vanilla method"

“first of all, you can immediately see that the p-value for gender has changed. why? because i made it like that. why did i make it like that?  god only knows"

"we'll be looking at the titanic dataset which is a really funny data- no, wait, i shouldn't say that, it's not a funny dataset, it's a... nice dataset to- nope, it’s not nice either. entertaining? wait, no, people died. i’m not a pyschopath, i swear"

prof: "so here’s your blindfolded man on top of the curve of the graph"    student: "that’s quite a dangerous place for him to be"   prof: "very dangerous for him, yes, but machine learning is very dangerous... for you especially"

"so it was actually doctors who first created the earliest version of this algorithm by using a nearest neighbors set up. so instead of looking at a new patient and trying to come up with what's wrong with them, they based their diagnosis on similar past cases. for example, if someone came in with blue hair and purple eyes and yellow skin and- wow. this is starting to sound more like a carneval than a hospital. i mean, both places are a joke, but still..."

"this is the way we solved this issue for a lot of people. it seems a bit hacky, but hey, as along as it works"

prof1: "that wasn't too difficult"    prof2: "speak for yourself"    prof1: "i am. i don't know what’s going on with you, but i want nothing to do with this"

"you need two predictors, or more. three way interactions can be... messy, but still possible, much like other three way activites that i could mention, but i won't, because you're still children"

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

Part 9  | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14

[flatstarcarcosa]

whistleblowing, 2

@virus-selfship @jackals-ships (you liked the posts you get the tags /half-threat)

summary: reese gets a tip from a friend about some nefarious business dealings. slade has a bad feeling and goes with them. neither knew what to expect. ship: wilson & wilson at large au: outlast warnings: descriptions of game-canon gore. also not so much a content warning or a trigger warning but, HUGE doses of emotional whiplash because neither of us are capable of being fucking normal about things. part one

*********

The hallways of the asylum look like a tornado has blown through them. Reese makes sure to inspect every room, every drawer, every dark corner. They find some loose batteries, and numerous files laying around. The two of them are currently in a small corner office thumbing through various unorganized notes. Reese takes pictures of them with their DSLR and comments that neither they nor Slade have enough room on them to keep every scrap of paper they find. He hums his agreement as he opens the top drawer of the desk before letting out a low whistle.

“Well, hello,” he says.

Reese looks up from the papers in their hand. “What is it?”

Slade holds up an unopened packet of peanut butter crackers. “Someone likes snacks,” he says.

Reese frowns. “Is someone in this scenario you?”

“Maybe,” answers Slade around a mouthful of cracker.

“Jesus christ,” Reese mutters. They toss a piece of paper aside and flip to the next one. A crease forms in their eyebrows as they read. Slade cocks his head and looks over their shoulder.

“’Self lucid dream states’?” he asks. He pops the last cracker into his mouth and discards the wrapper. “What the hell are they talking about?”

“I...don’t know,” says Reese. They lay the file flat and take a couple pictures. “Something about this kids mom suing this place. That could lead to something.”

“Maybe,” Slade says softly. The word comes out more as a hum, and he tugs on Reese’s sleeve to indicate it’s time to move on. The farther the two of them go into the building, and he would guess it is not even that far, the more his own curiosity about the situation begins to drown out the gut feelings that they are treading dangerous, and unknown waters.   

The first real sign indicating where the pervasive smell has come from is found in a break room. Slade surveys the vending machine and is surprised when it actually dispenses an ice cold Pepsi. He cracks the tab, and stops with the can halfway to his mouth as his eye lands on the counter next to the machine.

Placed almost neatly on a cutting board is a single piece of intestine.

“You don’t see that every day,” he says.

“Well, that’s disgusting,” says Reese. He turns and finds them gesturing to the soda in his hand. “I thought we had a rule about that?”

Slade blinks.

“There’s intestines on this counter and you’re disgusted by Pepsi?”

Reese blinks.

“There’s what on the counter?!”

Wordlessly, Slade reaches out to grip the top of their head and turn it towards the counter. Reese grimaces, but takes a photo anyway. “Is that… you think that’s human?”

Slade takes a swallow of Pepsi and regards the piece of viscera as the sugar seeps into his gums and makes his teeth tingle. “There’s really no way to tell just by looking,” he says finally. “But I know we sure as shit didn’t pass any farms on the way up here.”

“Well all righty then,” says Reese. They give the break room a curious last sweep before moving for the door. Slade swallows half of the can of Pepsi before leaving it on the table and following them.

Halfway up the hall, with the two of them discussing the things they’ve already found in hushed whispers, a door slams shut. They both stop. The bang that echoes makes Reese jump. Reflexively, they grab a hold of Slade’s sleeve.

He brushes a hand against their shoulder blades and moves forward, the other unholstering his magnum. He pauses outside the door. On the other side, someone is speaking to themselves. He can’t quite make out what they’re saying, and when he tries the knob to find the door locked, the voice stops.

“Let’s just keep moving,” he says softly. He motions for Reese to follow as he backs away from the door, leading them farther down the hallway until a barricaded door stops them both. He shoves his weight against it and when it doesn’t budge he can’t figure out if he’s annoyed or unsurprised. Behind the frosted glass that frames the wood he can see the foyer to the building, and he’d bet good money somewhere down there is more information about what happened here, along with their way out.

They don’t need to get all of the answers tonight, just enough to get people to listen. He’s not usually one to put much stock in local, or even state level PD, but he can already think of a few people to call to make sure Mount Massive gets investigated properly.

“I don’t think we’re getting through,” he says. He throws his weight against the door one more time, just to be sure. “There’s a vent in here,” says Reese. The muffled sound of their voice makes him realize they’ve slipped beyond the arm’s length agreement. Annoyed, he follows them into a room a few feet away.

“What did I tell you about-- the fuck,” Slade’s initial scolding melds into a surprised exclamation. Reese is standing in the middle of the room, looking up at an air vent. The flash on their camera goes off as they hit the shutter button, despite their eyes being nowhere near the viewfinder.

There’s blood dripping from the vent. It pools down onto a broken table top beneath it. Thinner parts of it have begun to dry and turn black, but the center remains wet and red.

“What are the odds this vent comes out onto the other side of that door?” Reese tears their eyes away from the mess as they ask the question. Their voice is tired and heavy with the conclusion that their guess is most likely correct.

If they and Slade want to get to the rest of the building, they’re gonna have to crawl through the wet, stinking vent.

“Me first,” says Slade.

“What about our mystery friend?” asks Reese. Slade pokes his head out into the hallway.

“I don’t hear anything,” he says. It is his first lie of the night. He can still faintly hear the unseen persons ramblings. He makes the executive decision that for now, what can’t be seen can’t be a threat, and shuts the door. “We know what’s behind us, mostly. I have no idea what’s in front.”

“All right, you first,” Reese agrees.

“And if what’s in front reduces me to hamburger meat, you’re going to be doing, what, exactly?” he asks.

“Barricading this door with this soggy wood, hoping it holds, and camping out til someone else shows up,” says Reese flatly. “We have no cell signal but I have a 1400 page ebook I can fire up at a moments notice, I’ll be fine.”

“Oh, well, then,” says Slade as he lifts himself into the vent, “I’m glad you’re learning to think ahead. Never too late to start.”

“Hilarious,” says Reese. They keep an eye on the door the whole time, and the seconds of silence begin to stretch out with more weight.

Soft thumping from above draws their attention from the door.

“It’s clear,” calls Slade.

More silence.

“I said clear,” he repeats.

“Yeah, I can’t fucking reach,” snaps Reese.

“For the love of…” more thumping, and when he speaks next his voice is closer. “Take a running jump.”

“A running- what, a fuckin’ six foot vertical leap over here? With my knees?”

“Reese,” is the only response.

Reese sighs, detecting the ‘serious, now’ in his tone, and backs away from the board. The room isn’t big enough for a real run, but they get a few steps in and jump when a foot hits the board. They slam into the vent, barely having time to register the impact before Slade’s hands close around their arms and haul them into the opening.

“This is why I keep harping about your cardio,” he says, shifting to take point.

They roll their eyes, following behind him, and stopping when an air intake peers down into a room below. Another break room, more blood, and the rambler from earlier.

Did he lock himself in there? They wonder, brows furrowing.

“Reese, let’s go,” calls Slade.

Looking up, they realize he’s exited the end of the vent, and they hurry to follow. He catches them when they jump out, setting them down on the carpet and gesturing with his chin.

“Vent led to the other side of the door,” he says.

“And our way out,” they add, approaching the glass encasing the foyer below. “Hop down a level, say hi to security, and call it a day.”

“Don’t brag until it’s done,” says Slade.

“Killjoy,” they mutter.

Their annoyance fades when the door leading to the lower level turns out to be barricaded.

“You were saying?” he asks, quirking a brow.

“C’mon, am I supposed to believe you’re incapable of busting down every shut door we come across?” they ask.

“Main entrance isn’t the only thing with a blast seal,” he says, indicating the metal bracers around the frame. “Question remains why, though.”

“I know it’s a mental hospital,” says Reese, “but it’s not like it’s Arkham. Public records show this place wasn’t even used much until it got bought out by Murkoff a while back.”

“Yeah, and your tip mentioned experimentation and abuses of the patients,” says Slade. “They repurpose an old public health facility, so they’re clearly not making money on the front end. Use the guise of healthcare to lure in the most vulnerable, get them trapped and unable to say no, test whatever your mad scientists are cooking up, make the money from it on the back end.”

“Oh,” says Reese, “so it is like Arkham.”

Slade snorts, gestures towards the end of the hall. “Looks like we can cut through the library, come out on the other side.”

“Something still feels off,” says Reese, falling in step next to him. “The security, that is. Makes sense when you consider there’s likely an inordinate amount of money moving around behind the scenes but…”

“But what?” Slade pauses, hand on the doorknob for the library.

“This feels less like keeping prying eyes out and more like… keeping something in.” 

He says nothing in response. They're not wrong, but agreeing feels too much like admitting that there's something to fear. Instead he turns the knob, pushing the library door open. 

Reese lets out a startled squeak, and a wet thump lands at his feet. He looks down at the body of a security guard, notes the angle of the neck being twisted, and uses one foot to push the body out of the way. No sense stopping for one corpse.

"I think we found the source of the smell," says Reese, face twisting as the odor inside the library wafts into the hall. 

"One of ‘em," says Slade. He hooks a hand around their wrist and pulls them through the doorway. 

They both stop a few feet in. 

Scattered around the room, nestled between book displays are multiple human heads. 

"Jesus," Reese mutters. 

Slade says nothing, but keeps his magnum positioned in his free hand. At least they're no longer ignoring his arms length rule. 

He rounds the end of the aisle, and stops again, this time suddenly enough that Reese bumps into his back. They hear a pained gasp from in front of him and even as they step to the side to see, they're very much thinking that they don't want to see. 

"What in the Cannibal fucking Holocaust is this?" they ask, voice barely above a whisper. 

A man in riot armor sits in the middle of the room, impaled on a spike with the tip of it protruding through his Kevlar vest just below the collarbone. 

The man gasps again, reaching ineffectively for the spike. 

"Y…you shouldn't be here," he gurgles. "The variants, they escaped, and…and…" coherence trails off into something between a sob and a moan as his fingertips brush against the spike. He attempts to grasp at it in a futile and mad bid to get any kind of relief, voice raising in volume as the reality of his situation gives way to fresh terror.

The report of Slade’s magnum firing makes Reese slap their hands over their ears. The man on the spike goes limp. 

"We're leaving," says Slade, retaking their wrist and yanking them with renewed force to the library exit. "Now." 

"Was that fucking necessary?" snaps Reese once the two of them are back into the hall. 

"That man was already dead," Slade snaps back. "Prolonging his suffering-" 

"I'm not talking about the mercy kill, I'm talking about the fucking noise," says Reese. 

Slade pauses. "Oh." 

"Whatever fucking did that to him knows someone else is here now," they say. 

"Shit," says Slade. "All the more reason to go."

“You really didn’t think of that?” they ask, exasperated.

“I was thinking of doing a dying man a kindness,” he says, somewhat bitterly.

The hallway is blocked again, this time by a pile of bookcases and benches nearing the ceiling.

“It’s like a fucking maze in here,” says Reese.

“I think we can squeeze through this hole in the center,” says Slade, gesturing as he holsters his gun. “You first.”

Reese freezes. “Woah, what? Me first? What happened to you first?”

“Me first is when I don’t know what’s ahead,” says Slade, “you first is when I’m looking at what’s ahead and it’s clear. Get in the fucking hole.” “Fine, I’ll get in the goddamn hole, jesus,” they grumble. It’s almost a tight fit, even for them, and as they reach the halfway point they crane their neck to ask him how he thinks he’s fitting through the same space.

The words never get a chance to form.

There’s a massive brute of a man standing directly behind Slade, seemingly appearing from fucking nowhere, and everything happens all at once. On reflex, Reese scrambles to the other side of the blockage as fast as possible, falling to the floor in time to hear Slade yelp in surprise, followed by his weapon firing a single time. They stay low, crawling out of sight and backing against the wall.

They look up at the sound of glass shattering, and through the gaps in the bookcases can make out something going through the window into the atrium below.

Something else remains on the other side of the blockade, panting heavily, and watching the lower level.

And it’s not Slade.

They remain frozen to the spot, their heart hammering in their ears, and begin to wait.

[lightning-writes]

good heart (faulty machine of a man) - 8/30

fic summary: bucky meets someone at therapy

chapter summary: bucky likes the rain.

word count: 1522

tags: fluff, post endgame, pre tfatws, hurt/comfort, slow burn, canon divergent, canon compliant, au

warnings: therapy talk

a/n: enjoy!

AO3 MASTERLIST X

October 21

Outside the window in Raynor’s office, it’s pouring. Lightning illuminates the night. It’s easy for him to get lost in it. Stormy nights were the only times when he could actually sleep, when he was under the control of Hydra. He feels his body relax in his chair, finding himself looking forward to getting home. Maybe he’ll sleep in his bed.

“I hate this rain,” he hears Dr. Raynor mutter. His eyes cut to her, still hunched over her notes but, occasionally, glancing out the window with disdain.

“I love it,” he admits.

“Why?” She looks appalled. “The city reeks more than usual, you’re more likely to get sick, not to mention it’s depressing and soggy and…” She gives him a cursory look. “Why would you like that?”

He takes a minute before he says the truth. “It’s the only thing that can drown out my thoughts.”

She understands he’s referring to his past. She carefully puts her pen down, like she’s trying not to startle a wild animal. They stare at each other for a moment, anticipation filling the room. He waits her out, like he knows he can.

“Care to–”

“No.”

She sighs, covering her face with her thin fingers. This is the most human Bucky has seen her act. 

“James…” She leans into one arm of the chair, hitting him with a heavy stare. “I know this is a difficult process. I’ve witnessed many veterans fall apart in this room - hell, I’ve fallen apart in a room like this - and God knows how much more you’ve experienced…”

(Bucky feels panic agitate his stomach.)

“And the shitty part about this situation is the US government is expecting certain things from you. Hell, I’m pretty sure they bugged this room, even though I specifically told them I won’t be recording our sessions.” She pinches the bridge of her nose. “Instead of you coming here to process things on your own terms, I’m here, being the bad guy, pushing you to say the right words and do the little dance around, so I can check off the right boxes, so you can just exist.”

Bucky thinks about his time as a fugitive, after getting away from Hydra and before undoing the brainwashing in Wakanda. It was difficult and uncomfortable. He was afraid of getting caught, being iced, or worse - being used again. But being a fugitive felt… safer, more liberating. Everything he’d done was on his own terms, and he was learning how to just be again.

(A fleeting thought of ditching his pardoning thing and becoming a deserter again crosses his mind.)

“So, let’s make a deal.” His eyes fix on her. “Every other session, we talk about what you want. In the other sessions, we work on this bullshit,” she taps her pen to her journal. “Let’s at least try.”

Against his better judgment, he says, “Okay.”

////

As he leaves, Dr. Raynor leans out of the office. “You can get out of here, Ruby; I’m leaving with Dr. Paz.”

Rue stops shrugging on her raincoat and gives a composed smile. “Thanks Dr. Raynor - see you Tuesday.” When Raynor closes her door, Rue shares a look with Bucky. “Did you know they…”

“I suspected.”

He pulls his hair back into a low ponytail. He didn’t have anything to cover his head as he walked to the subway, so he’d just have to book it.

“You’re not walking home in this,” Rue says incredulously. To punctuate her point, a roll of thunder rattles the room. Her eyes bug out a little more dramatically.

(Bucky vaguely thinks Thor is playing a prank on him.)

“I’ll be fine.”

“You’re gonna rust.” She shakes her keys at him, several keychains on a lanyard jingling at him. He notices a mini mjolnir and a keychain taser. “I’ll give you a ride home.”

“Wait, I–”

She’s not listening. She’s hustling out of the lobby, unwrapping her umbrella, and motions for him to come closer. It’s ridiculous, his wide frame crowding her under the little, hot pink umbrella, shuffling to the gray sedan.

(She loops her arm through his metal one, so he ‘can’t escape’. She smells faintly of cigarettes but also something deep and woodsy. He could easily bury his face in her hair from this position.)

“It’s a good thing Vick didn’t need the car today.” He watches her go through her routine of getting settled in the car. “Victoria is my roommate,” she explains belatedly. “Anyways, what’s your address?”

(Bucky has a flash of suspicion but remembers not forty minutes ago when Raynor behooved him to ‘open himself to trust’ because it might ‘help him trust himself’.)

He tells her his address and adds, “The fastest way is on FDR.”

Aside from Rue asking if he’d mind the radio, they drive in silence until they get to the Brooklyn Bridge. He notices the way her fingers tap the wheel when she’s annoyed, the way she sits up in her seat when she changes lanes. He hears her swear under her breath and hum along to the radio.

(Being exposed to her this long makes him feel… something.)

“Oh, Brooklyn Heights, right?” She smacks a palm to her forehead. “Duh, I saw that on the Captain America tribute.” She winces, peeking at him sheepishly. “Sorry, that was weird to say. Does it ever feel not weird for people to know stuff about you?”

“Uh,” the question surprises him. “It’s never not weird, but I guess I’m used to it. Steve was Captain America in the ‘40’s, so I was associated with him then. And, um, my past…”

“As the Winter Soldier,” she acknowledges softly. He knew she knew who he was – a lot of people knew thanks to the media – but he still avoids her glances.

“Yeah, that guy,” the mechanics of his arm whir quietly as he clenches his fist. “I had a reputation, so… I guess I’m just used to people knowing things about me.”

“What’s something people don’t know about you?”

They’re in bumper to bumper traffic on the bridge. The rain is beating down on the car so loudly, it’s nearly comical. Bucky looks at Rue, a mystery to him, studying her earnest features.

“I read.” Her eyebrows raise, impressed. “I read a lot in my down time.”

“What kinds of books do you read?”

Bucky reaches into his inner jacket pocket and produces Steve’s notebook. He’d gifted it to Bucky, on his own birthday, and told him to ‘catch up’.

(Looking back, he wonders if Steve knew his time was coming to an end.)

“I read mostly fiction - Hemingway, Austen, Orwell, Wilde, Plath, Christie…” He pauses, wondering if he wants to continue. Her look is patient and soft. She’s leaning against the driver’s door, head resting against her propped arm. “I also went back and looked at the top books from when…” He casts around for the right phrasing, “from when I wasn’t myself.”

“You know, I bet that’s a good way to learn about pop culture and society.”

He continues, “And if there was a movie or TV series adaptation, I’d watch it.”

“Like what?”

He knows she’ll get a kick out of this. “Like Twilight.”

He’s right. She laughs so hard, tears fill her eyes, and only honks from behind them jolt her back to the present. They inch up, and she says, “You read and watched Twilight?”

“And Harry Potter and the Hunger Games.” He’s grinning, despite himself, at how much she’s enjoying this.

“Incredible.” She wipes her eyes. “I wonder what World War II you would think about that.”

“He’d be confused for sure.” He doesn’t say that current him had been confused too. “But, at least I know what a horcrux is.”

“And that vampires sparkle.”

When they finally get to his apartment, the rain has finally eased. He feels strange, having talked so much about nothing with someone he hardly knows. They talk more about books and movies and television; she listens to him talk about Brooklyn and how much it’s changed. She doesn’t say much about herself except that she’d gone to college to study psychology - that’s why she knows so much about therapy - and that she had worked a short time for the VA. She talks more about her roommate and her casual boyfriend.

(She says, “He’s the first man I’ve dated in a while,” and glances at him in a meaningful way. He gets her gist.)

She parallel parks by a hydrant and turns to him with a small smile.

“You know, it wasn’t that bad of a drive.” They both look at the dashboard clock. The twenty minute drive had been stretched to an hour and a half. Her eyes flit to him, almost nervously. “It was nice… talking.”

“I think that’s the longest I’ve ever talked.” Warmth travels up his neck when she laughs. “Thank you for the ride.”

“I couldn’t let an Avenger get water damage.”

He rolls his eyes and opens the door. She grabs his hand, his metal one, and they both look down at their joined hands. She folds her lips into a thin, embarrassed line, before letting him go. He wonders what’s going through her head.

“Good night, James.”

(His name sounds good coming from her.)

“Good night, Ruby.”

[nyarlathotep420]

It's A Metaphor

The wind howls as it drifts past the dunes and shrubs that cover the outback. Sand is picked up and thrown into the air by the hot breeze, dancing about in unison with the occasional patch of dead grass. The torrid earth clashes with the deep blue sky as though they are fighting for dominance. Lonely clouds drift through the air, small and distant from one another. Each cloud takes on a unique form as it wanders its lonesome path. Far beneath them, snakes slither through the sand, pushing aside the smallest of pebbles and grains of sand as they leave a barely visible mark behind them which is soon covered by the sand being tossed around by the wind. Lizards bathe in the sweltering heat of the sunlight on simmering rocks and stones, perfectly tranquil and oblivious to all worries that any other creature in the world may have.

The scolding sun beams down on a seemingly unending set of metal train tracks. The rusted tracks sit covered in a blanket of dust and dirt. Back in the day, every part of the two metal lines would’ve reflected the scolding sunlight all day long and be cold as ice throughout the night. Now only a few parts poke out from the rust that covers it and they shine in the face of a girl who sits on the ground close to the tracks. Her hair blows in the warm breeze and sand is kicked up into her eyes. She lifts up her pale hand to hide her chocolate-brown eyes from the dust. Her watch takes the brunt of the impact from the sand as it reflects the run’s intense rays. Her yellow jacket waltzes in the wind, almost mimicking the sound of fire crackling. The teenager stands up and walks closer to her friend. She sits down next to them and leans against them. Their cold and metallic exterior is actually quite comforting for her after knowing them for so long.

The automaton sits with its legs out straight, looking directly forward and showing no emotion. Its face is more like a camera than that of a humans. No mouth, no eyes, no emotion. Its green titanium paint is faded and chipped although it is covered in newly applied stickers. It is brightly coloured and can easily be told as those of a teenagers. Some have smiley faces, and some have vulgar words. Covering most of the arms and torso of the robot is a Hawaiian-style shirt with the buttons undone. Its bright orange and yellow contrasts with the green and grey of the metal of the machine but blends in with the red sand of the outback. Its large size casts a long shadow in front of it which stays equally as still as it does.

The girl watches the shadows, her knees to her chin and her hand wrapped around her wrist. She observes as the silhouette of her hair blows in one direction and then the other, but the robot’s shadow doesn’t move an inch.

“When will this fucking train get here?” The girl asks impatiently.

The automaton shrugs its shoulders slightly and moves its camera-like face towards her as to view her as she speaks.

The girl turns to the machine as it makes its gesture to her “It was a rhetorical question; you wouldn’t get it though.”

The robot's rectangular head moves up and down as it nods in agreeance with her statement. She is right. They do not understand it. Humans are far too complicated.

“I can’t believe we have to do this. I reprogrammed you, that should be enough not to scrap you. I get that you guys have done some bad stuff in the past but I’m a fucking good programmer, you’re safe now, right?”

The robot continues to nod in response to her rambling. It doesn’t completely understand what the girl is talking about, but they still agree with her despite that.

“At least when this fucking train arrives we’ll be able to jump on it and get you away from them. Maybe people will appreciate my work somewhere else… man, having to wait for this train is killing me.” The girl drags her hands down her cheeks as she expresses her impatience.

The machine tilts its head in confusion as if it is a dog of some sort. It silently stares at the teenage girl, waiting for an explanation.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The robot nods and looks back up at the tracks while the girl rests her head against their shoulder. There is a minute of silence between the two as they listen to the whistling of the wind crawling through the sea of sand.

The silence is broken by the distant sound of a train clacking along the rusted tracks in the dust. The rattling of the metal grows louder as the speck in the distance becomes larger, revealing the train.

The girl stands up with a grunt, her hair flicking in the hot breeze. Dust is thrown at her eyes by the wind, forcing her to squint and raise her hand above her eyes. The sound of the train grows ever louder, like a beast with a million legs running along the steel in the ground. She reaches into her bag, digging through its contents. Her fingers trace wires and slide along pieces of spare machinery as she searches for such an everyday object as her sunglasses.

The machine gets up from the ground in an unnaturally efficient way and stands with its hands to its sides and its head straight forward. Its head clicks as it turns to face the girl and its lens observes her in mechanistic curiosity.

Her pale skin shines in the calescent sunlight as she fumbles through her bag. Finally, the girl latches onto the familiar feeling of her sunglasses and leads them through the several items contained. She loosely clutches the facewear in her hands and brings them up closer to her and further from her bag.

Suddenly the wind howls louder as it changes directions and increases in strength. It flicks the girl's hair back and makes her jacket rustle intently behind her. She lifts her arm up in a futile attempt to stop any more dust getting into her eyes but in doing so she puts her sunglasses in the line of fire. Her grip on them loosens and they slip out of her hand, flying off with the gale.

In one precipitous movement, without thinking, the girl spins her entire body around in an attempt to snatch her glasses away from the thieving wind. Not a thought crosses her mind as she twists her body in a circle besides not losing her sunglasses before the train comes. Due to her body contorting itself, her legs are thrown off balance and she trips over.

The teenager's foot is caught on the metal rails and gravity thrusts her to the ground. Her back cracks down onto the steel running along the ground.

The mechanoid barely has any time to register the events unfolding before it. The only thing bionic sentience can manage in the time frame is moving its head to look at the girl. It pushes its hands against the ground and begins to lift itself to its feet as quickly as it can (unfortunately this is not very quick).

The girl feels the tracks rattle intensely as the train rushes along them without any sign of slowing down. Just as the machine did, she lifts herself off the ground quickly (much faster this time). The girl regains her posture and stands upright, looking down the middle of the two rusted steel lines drenched in dust. She barely has time to register the train hitting her.

The girl's friend stands up with its arms to its side, only to witness her demise.

The large metal beast charges at the teenage girl like a bull. It slams into her fragile body, making her bones crack and shatter. Her skin is torn from her flesh, ripping off into pieces. Her legs bend backwards as the sheer speed of the train forces her limbs to crumble. The girl's lungs are crushed along with the rest of her internal organs which are smashed into a paste. Her blood spurts out of her body like a water sprinkler of sanguine liquid. It paints the front of the vehicle red as her entire body smashes against it. The teenage girl's head splits open, her skull shattering. Her brain splats onto the train like spaghetti being thrown at a wall. This teenage girl is mutilated beyond recognition in a time that not even the mind of the machine can comprehend.

Just as soon as it came, the train rushes off down the tracks, slowly fading into the distance. The girl's body is nowhere to be seen for the vehicle took her with it. Blood covers the automaton, dripping from its limbs and seeping into the cracks of its hardware. It stands with its head turned to where the girl once stood, its arms straight to the side and not an expression on its face, for it could not express emotion if it wanted to. Right now, if it could, it would scream.

The desert is once again silent save for the constant wind howling and shoving sand out of its way. The mechanoid looks down at the tracks, witnessing the few drops of blood that are left of her. It stares at the dark red as the sun forces it to shine. Like a deep abyss, the computer lets itself drift off into its equally dark thoughts.

“What does a machine think of at this time?” you may find yourself asking. Well, it was asking itself the exact same thing.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The robot looks to its side in pure confusion, now snapped out of its thoughts. What it sees is most shocking, even to a being of code. The girl sits next to it, perfectly intact, as if nothing had happened. The robot is no longer standing. It sits with the girl's head resting on its shoulder. It stares at the top of her head in pure and utter confusion. There are longer drops of blood on the tracks or on the machine itself and there is a living, breathing teenager right next to it.

It sits completely still as its mind races, failing to come to any logical conclusion behind the situation. Before the machine can come up with any explanation of what is happening before it, the pair hears the sound of the train rolling down the tracks once again. It rumbles along the rickety railing, charging forward exactly as it had done a few moments before.

The girl stands up and begins to rummage through her bag that hangs down beside her, looking for her glasses. The machine watches her in bewilderment, not entirely sure what to do in this situation. Her hand threads itself through her bag in the exact same manner as a few moments before.

She grabs out her glasses and holds them up beside her. The mechanoid remembers what happened the last time, the images flashing into its mind as the events unfolded before it once again.

Before anything happens, the robot stands up. The girl does not take notice of this, and the wind begins to blow harshly as if it had been angered by this teenager once more. It howls and roars as if knocks the glasses out of her hand and steals them once again, drifting off into the gale.

The automaton witnesses as the girl quickly spins around and trips over on the corroded rails. It listens as the sound of the girl's back slamming onto the steel and her grunt of pain is drowned out by the deafening sound of the train racing forth.

The train charges forward with malicious intent, determined to tear apart the young girl twice over. The machine watches, feeling powerless in its moment of shock and confusion. As of this moment, it can not come to any sort of logical conclusion about the events unfolding before it once again. Its shirt folds and flows in the wind and the stickers that cover its body begin to slowly fall off over time. Wind rushes past as time feels as though it slows down.

The teenager stands up and the robot watches in helplessness. The vehicle once again slams into her body and crushes her organs. Her skin is torn and ripped apart in the exact same way as before. The robot is covered in blood and viscera, staining its shirt, and hiding its stickers as the gore seeps into its wires and hardware.

The train rushes off as fast as it came and fades into the distance, once again stealing the corpse of the teenage girl away from her friend. The robot stares off into the distance down the tracks, dripping with carmine liquid, still warm from sloshing around in her body, now exposed to the outside world. For the second time, the automaton is left with nothing but the sounds of the outback to keep it company. It stands with its metallic feet in the sand and the hot breeze smashing into its solid body.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The machine looks to its side at the living girl sitting next to it. It happened again.

She leans against the hunk of metal much like the two previous times this has happened. It is not long before the robot realises that the exact same thing is going to happen again for what seems to be a third time. It looks at the tracks as it ponders the situation while the girl looks at her shadow as it sways and moves in the wind.

The tracks begin to shake and rumble with the sound of a distant train as it begins to get ever closer to the pair. A lizard that was sunbaking on the tracks quickly rushes off as soon as they begin to rattle.

The girl rises up from her seated position and stands close to the rails. The machine looks at her as she gets up with a quiet grunt. It continues to stare at her as the dust gets blown into her eyes and she raises her hand up above them. Soon after, the mechanical person also stands up right next to her. It stands up, perfectly still and stiff, not moving an inch in the harsh wind.

The teenager reaches down into her bag, beginning to search around inside of it for her sunglasses. She looks off into the distance at the train rolling along the tracks as she scrambles to locate her sunglasses in time. The mechanoid's mechanical legs take two perfectly programmed steps towards the girl, the sand at its feet being shoved to the side. It reaches its steel arm out to her and latches its cold hand onto the soft flesh of her arm.

The girl looks up at the tin man with a look of confusion and annoyance. With one yank of her arm, she releases herself from the grip of the machine.

“What the fuck is your problem?” She says to it, not expecting a response from the mute machine.

The robot leans back in shame. The lens in its head shines in the sunlight like a glimmer in the eye of a human. It watches her as she rummages around in her bag, becoming increasingly agitated with her situation. The automaton puts its arms back to its sides as the teenager lifts the sunglasses out of her bag and holds them.

As always, the wind begins to blow even more harshly than before and knocks the sunglasses out of her hand. In desperation, she turns and trips over the tracks again. The mechanical person does nothing but watch as she slams onto the metal that lines the ground of the searing outback.

As she stands, her body instantly becomes a pinata of bone, muscle, and blood. It sprays out in a macabre display of gore. It tears her apart and rips her nearly in half. Her bones are all but powder by the time the train hits her and crushes the entirety of her body against its speeding steel. Nearly every piece of her body is splattered across the front of the train as it speeds across the railway and off into the distance.

The machine is once again left alone in the outback, blood-soaked and covered entirely in what was once its friend. The incarnadine slides off of the metal-plated machine and drips onto the sand below. The wind howls in sorrow at the loss for a third time in a row.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The girl's friend doesn’t waste a second this time around, knowing exactly the outcome of the situation if it doesn’t do something about it. To the teenager's surprise, it stands up as quickly as it possibly can and turns around, looking down at her as she looks at the machine in confusion.

The mechanoid starts to wave its arms about frantically. The girl stands up and looks at the machine with a perplexed look on her face. It grabs onto the side of her arms and starts to shake her, desperately trying to communicate to her what is going on. It wants to yell, it wants to scream, it wants to make any sort of noise to indicate the message that it is trying to get across to the teenager, but it simply cannot, no matter how hard it tries for it does not have a mouth. It becomes more desperate as it realises that what it is doing is not making any impact on the girls understanding. The automaton starts to slow down in its movements, and it loses hope.

“What the fuck?” The teenager says in response to the machine's rapid motions.

She looks at it in complete confusion and slight irritation that she cannot understand what the robot is trying to do. The mechanoid steps to its side and looks down at the ground, watching as the wind blows against the tiny dunes of sand. It attempts to come up with any sort of solution to its problem, but it cannot find any, so it simply stares at the ground, refusing to look back up.

Dust is blown into the eyes of the girl who decides to get out her sunglasses in an attempt to stop such a thing from happening further.

A few moments later, the girl's friend hears the sounds of her body being crushed and strewn across the face of the train. The backside of the robot is covered in her blood and viscera. It watches as the blood drips down onto the ground, drowning the sand in crimson red.

Robots cannot cry, but if this one could, it most certainly would.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The wind blows throughout the outback, the sun beating down on the pair. One of flesh and one of metal. The tracks sit in the scorching sunlight, heating up by the moment. They run for what seems like forever. If one were to stand and look at them, they’d feel as though they simply went on across the world and back around the other side again.

The machine watches the girl rise up from the ground and get out her sunglasses. It watches as the wind tears the items from her hands and off into the distant sky. The automaton witnesses the teenage girl catch her foot on the side of the tracks and fall backwards onto them. It refuses to watch any further.

As the girl stands up, so does the machine. It turns around and walks off in the same direction as her sunglasses. The mechanoid listens to the sound of her bones being crushed and her body being dragged away by the vehicle.

It looks down in the sand at the sunglasses stuck inside of a bush. The wind makes its bristles dance and sing as they rub against each other, moving the sunglasses with them. It looks at its reflection in the pair of shades. Viewing itself intently, looking at all of its imperfections and at its lack of a mouth. It has no way to communicate with anything or anyone. No way to show the outside world what it is thinking or what kind of torture it is experiencing.

The girl waves her hand in front of the robot and looks down in fatigue “You wouldn’t get it, it’s a metaphor.”

The robot looks at the girl as she leans against it in the exact same way as before. Her hair blows in the wind in unison with her jacket as her eyes follow the shadows on the ground. The computer inside of the bionic person's mechanical head ticks over with ideas and possible solutions, most of which it decides would not work.

The machine looks over at the girl and stares at her face. Her brown eyes shimmer in the sun and her skin is illuminated by the rays of light. Her hair blows gently, each strand dancing like it has a mind of its own. It stares at her eyes that look like the bark of an oak tree which stands strong and immovable. It searches her eyes before moving its gaze further down at her eyes. Bags hang beneath them, dark like an abyss. At a second glance, the machine notices that wrapped around her eyes are veins that stretch across the white void white the roots of the same tree. The teenage girl yawns and raises her hand to her mouth, something that the machine didn’t notice she did before.

Slowly, the girl's friend raises its arm up from the sand and reaches it across the back of the teenager. The sunlight makes the metal of its arm shine in its face, but it soon faces as its arm is covered from the sun by the girl's torso. It wraps around her like a snake and rests once it reaches her other arm. The robot pulls her in closer and she huddles up against it.

The tired teenager can’t help but close her jaded eyes in the gentleness of the arms of the machine. Her friend holds her next to it, surprisingly comfortable for the side of a robot. The teenage girl lets the waking world fade away and disappear into darkness as she falls asleep. She rests against the torso of her friend and snores gently as she forgets about all that weighed on her mind.

The robot watches and listens as the train rolls past the pair and off into the distance, with not a drop of blood on it. No gore, blood, or viscera rests on the train tracks, simply the rust growing on it from its age.

The machine does not fear nor stress about the two getting to where they need to go in time because it knows that they will find a way. 

Above: Inspiration for story, by lemurdibuja on Instagram.

[swissforextrading]

Students seem to prefer teacher feedback over AI feedback

17.09.24 - A new EPFL paper has found that students are cautious towards AI feedback, highlighting the complexity of integrating it into educational feedback systems. Feedback plays a crucial role in learning, helping individuals to understand and improve their performance, yet globally large and diverse student populations often mean that providing timely and personalized observations can be a challenge. Recent advances in Generative Artificial Intelligence offer a solution to these challenges but most existing studies primarily target technological aspects like model accuracy and often miss the social-emotional aspects of AI’s acceptance. Now, researchers working in the Machine Learning for Education Laboratory (ML4ED) part of EPFL’s School of Computer and Communication Sciences (IC) have investigated how the identity of the feedback provider affects students’ perception. In their paper AI or Human? Evaluating Student Feedback Perceptions in Higher Education, being presented this week at the European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning, the researchers describe how more than 450 EPFL students across diverse academic programs and levels evaluated personalized feedback in authentic educational settings both before and after the disclosure of whether it was from a human or generated by AI. “Our research found that before students identify whether a human or AI is giving them feedback, they don’t perceive a difference in quality or in friendliness. After they found out that it was AI giving the feedback, they either lowered the score of the AI or increased the score of the human, which tells us that they do not trust the AI,” explained Professor Tanja Käser, Head of the ML4ED Laboratory. Participants in the study were also asked to guess the feedback provider correctly. In total, 274 of the 457 participants correctly guessed which feedback was human and which was generated by AI. The researchers found that neither age nor gender significantly impacted correct answers, but the type of course task did. Students identified feedback as AI-generated more easily on projects involving coding than on short logical proof tasks. The researchers believe that one of the key questions arising from the study is how the perception of trust in AI as a feedback provider can affect the real-world implementation of AI feedback in the classroom. “This has important implications in learning. Good feedback will tell you what you did well, what you didn’t, and future actions you can take. If you’re less prepared to take heed of the feedback that you get because it’s from AI and you don’t trust it, you're less likely to improve your learning as classrooms integrate more of these models,” said Tanya Nazaretsky, a Post-Doctoral Researcher in the ML4ED Lab and lead author of the paper. Increasingly, it’s clear that AI can be very useful in education to support learning and there's a high readiness to accept it. However, there are perceived obstacles around lack of transparency and accountability, privacy violations, and training data sources. “An important concern was the capability of AI to understand the real learning context outside its confines. A lot of students made the comment ‘the AI doesn't know me as a person, the AI just sees what is in the system but there are other factors that are important for the learning process and the AI cannot see it’. Despite the readiness to accept AI, there is a real lack of trust and this hinders its adoption in practice,” continued Nazaretsky. Käser says that in hindsight, the strong preference of human over AI feedback was unexpected but it demonstrates that a lot more research is needed on the acceptance and integration of AI in learning environments. “Let’s assume the AI was perfect, we still need to show how it can be adapted and seamlessly integrated into curriculums and teaching. One key finding from this paper is that we should never forget the human element.”… http://actu.epfl.ch/news/students-seem-to-prefer-teacher-feedback-over-ai-f (Source of the original content)

[mrultra100]

(RECOMMEND LISTENING)

Hey, y’all! As it’s the start of the new year, I figure it’s time to give Maryanna a new character sheet, along with giving her an update in terms of design and lore. I even made a few alternative outfits for fun, as you can see at the end of this post. It’s taken me a good few days to get everything together, so take a good look at the self-proclaimed “Queen of The Vampires” in all of her glory! 

Full Name: Maryanna Regina Test

Gender: Female (She/Her)

Species: Vampire (Northwestern Strigoi)

Nationality: Japanese-Mexican American

Orientation: Bisexual Polyamorous

Height: 7’5

Age: 25

Birthday: October 10th

GENERAL BIO

Hailing from the misty wilds of the Pacific Northwest, Maryanna “Mary” Regina Test is a pretty big vampiress, and was born in Porkbelly, Oregon. While she and her siblings’ parents are a human male and a female Strigoi (A type of vampire) respectively, Mary inherited her mother’s vampirism, along with the usual powers and instincts one might expect a vampire to have.

 When she was growing up, Mary was once a quiet and shy wallflower who wasn’t one to revel in the spotlight. That all changed when she started getting interested in paleontology, along with a trip to her mother’s birth home in Japan, where she had a chance encounter with the one of the kaiju that were roaming the island nation. This combined love of both prehistory and giant monsters was the start of Mary’s growth into the sassy, wild, and frisky woman that she is today. The lady’s own head is like an encyclopedia of any and every prehistoric animal, and if someone would like to talk about it, Mary is passionately happy to do so.

In the present day, Mary’s got quite the resume. Alongside working as a mad scientist with her sister, Susan, Mary is also part of a team of heroes known as The Beastly 4. While Johnny/J-X is the leader of the group, along with Dukey being the muscle, Mary and Susan are the brains behind the operation. And given the incredible powers that they have as vampires, the two sisters also get to help out on the battlefield regularly. Other gigs for Mary include working as a curator for Porkbelly’s natural history museum, along with being a DJ. Aside from Porkbelly stuff, Mary has a bit of a wanderlust from time to time, and tends to check out other dimensions.

As for Mary’s personality, she retains that same level-headedness from her childhood, but has also become a sassy, very flirty and frisky, wild, and thetherical party animal, along with being a foodie who’s proud of her chubby belly. She even sticks with the nickname of “Queen of The Vampires”, in which she agrees with people due to how they think it fits with her wild nature. She can have a bit of an ego, however, as she can be really flirty and horny at times. And while she and the rest of her kind have control over their instincts, Mary can act like an overgrown kitty at times, even at the most inopportune moments. Regardless, even with her flaws in place, Mary is just a fun woman to be around, and she knows it. When you���re the Queen of The Vampires, you just know things are gonna get wild whenever you’re around.

POWERS

Electrokinesis- Her main element, Mary’s able to do crazy things with her control over electricity. Electromagnetic telekinesis, electrically-charged bites and claw slashes, increasing her land speed, draining power from machines with her fangs, etc. A common aspect of all of Porkbelly’s vampires is the presence of elemental magic that they personally have from living in their environment. While a few vampires can work to develop the ability to handle more than one element, their offspring might inherit one of those elements. This rings true for both Susan and Mary, as they got their respective pyrokinesis and electrokinesis powers from their mother. As for Lila herself, her main element is ice, and that was a result of living in the snowy mountains of Hokkaido during her childhood.

Flight- It wouldn’t be a vampire if they didn’t know how to fly. Aside from the power to float and levitate over the ground, Mary’s main flight method is to turn into a Desmodus draculae, which was a prehistoric vampire bat. This ability is shared by all Northwestern Strigoi, and it’s a good example of the primordial power that they have.

Hypnotism- Mary has two methods of hypnotizing people. The first is her singing, which is very much like a siren. Given her love of singing, Mary can be seen singing to her target. The second method is the usual hypnotic eyes. Pair that up with Mary’s entrancing voice, and you got a mesmerizing master of mind control.

Natural Weaponry- As a Northwestern Strigoi, Mary is well-equipped with sharp, nail-like claws to slash at opponents, along with powerful jaws filled with sharp teeth strong enough to crush through bone. Her main 4 fangs (Two on her upper jaw, and two on the lower jaw) can inject a venom that can turn people into vampires, along with being conductive enough to electrocute foes. Her claws are also sharp enough to help her climb on walls.

Enhanced Senses- Thanks to her kind being powerful predators, Mary has a very good sense of smell, along with very good hearing. The most incredible sense that she has is her night vision. Even in a pitch-black room, Mary has no problem with seeing her way in the dark. This also explains why her eyes are like those seen on a cat.

Shadow Familiar- As an extension of their primal souls, strigois often have a shadow-like familiar with them. Not only do they aid in things like working, hunting, or other normal tasks, they help with a vampire’s powers. In the V-Twins’ case, their shadows help them control their prehensile hair. Mary’s own hair, in tandem with her shadow, serves as a good conductor in which to let out electricity.

Super Speed and Strength- Another common vampire ability that Mary has is her speed and physical strength. Thanks to her species having a set of lungs and air sacs similar to birds, Mary is able to run at breakneck speeds, and despite her chubby body, she’s surprisingly strong enough to easily carry things much larger than her. Very good reflexes and agility also come with the package.

TRIVIA

Mary, along with Johnny and Susan, are all Japanese-Mexican Americans. And regarding their nationality, both sides of it came from their parents. Hugh’s side of the family originated from Mexico, and while her species first evolved on the American west coast, Lila was born into a family of strigois that moved to the snowy mountains of Hokkaido, Japan. When Lila moved back to her kind’s ancestral home, she then met Hugh. And that’s when they made their family together.

Mary’s favorite animals are azhdarchid pterosaurs like Quetzalcoatlus and Hatzegopteryx. She even suggested at one point that her spirit animal is an azhdarchid.

The idea of an electric-using paleonerd for Mary was inspired by the real-life Mary Anning, and how not only survived being struck by lightning when she was a baby, the intelligence that helped with her career was rumored to have sprung from the incident. And that (inadvertently at first) fits in with the name. Maryanna - Mary Anning.

The scientific name of the Northwestern Strigoi (Mary’s species) is Nocturoptitain sanguinarius. The name even translates as “Bloodthirsty night giant”.

Mary’s birthday date (Along with Susan’s) is a reference to when “Fangs a Lot Johnny” originally released in the United States; October 10, 2011

In terms of favorite food, Mary tends to lean heavily on a good baked potato. Ramen, burgers, and plenty of baked goods are also highly liked by her. And as a vampire, Mary drinks plenty of blood.

Mary has absolutely no shame with being fat. She’s even proud of her chubby belly, and tends to enjoy people rubbing and squishing it.

If she was a Pokemon Trainer, the Pokemon on Mary’s team include Guzzlord, Hisuian Zoroark, Galvantula, Mimikyu, Glimmora, and Swoobat.

Mud is something that Mary doesn’t like. Aside from how it messes up her good looks, mud and dirt weaken her electricity a good bit.

Mary’s tongue is not only forked like a snake, it’s also a foot-and-a-half long. She also likes a good french kiss with her partners.

While her main language is English, Mary can also speak in Japanese and Spanish. This trait is also shared by both Johnny and Susan.

When comfortable, very happy, or just chill, Mary can purr like a cat. Purring is something that vampires do when they’re feeling positive.

For her most recent (and hopefully definitive) update to her design, Mary retains quite a bit of the inspirations that played a part in her look in previous years’ Wilhamena (OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes), Nurse Worse (Dr. Crafty), Bayonetta, and the Monsterverse incarnation of Godzilla. The indigo highlights fading in from the red parts of Mary’s hair was inspired by Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid’s version of Quetzalcoatl. And the frisky mannerisms were also inspired by Angel from the King of Fighters series, along with the all-green eyes being inspired by Starfire.

Overall, this was not only a fun project to do with my favorite character, it serves as a good start to my many art offerings this year. As I’ve stated within the last few weeks, I wanna do more JTPE stuff, and I feel like updating Mary should serve as a good start to that. Part of me was wondering if continuing on with my brainrot of this single character to start off 2024 was a good idea, but I figured that making a revamped ref. sheet should work as a start to a year of big projects. With all of that said, here’s to not only more JT-based madness, but to more of my artistic nonsense!

(Bonus full design, along with alts)

[advilcoldandsinus]

When I was 16 I got my first job at a run down cineplex in a bad part of town. It wasn’t a good job, I wasn’t a happy kid, but despite an inability to remember most of my past, I remember this period of time. I remember how it felt. I remember the music I listened to, I remember the way the air smelled in the summer evenings and I remember exactly how the ice cream from the machine there tasted even though they don’t make it anymore and I haven’t had it in over a decade. I remember the back stairwell up to our break room, most of the lockers didn’t have doors, the tv was always playing a dvd of Grown Ups , there was a mini fridge and a peeling black leather couch. Everything always smelled like popcorn including me. I remember how the door to the ice machine was broken and how one time I hit it the wrong way and ended up standing in ice up to my knees. I remember having to microwave the plastic vat of butter and how incredibly hot it was when I had to carry it out front to fill the pumps. I remember the feeling of scooping popcorn out of a machine that was still popping and having my arms burnt by flying kernels. I remember throwing away the hot dogs every night that had been on that spinning thing for hours and I remember having to take the trash in that big rolling black bin to the dumpster out back. I remember one of my managers, his name was Jesse, back then he was probably younger than I am now but he seemed like such an adult to me. He was very clearly gay (he hadn’t openly announced this yet) but I had a crush on him anyways. I just. Remember all of it. I remember so specifically how it felt. And despite that I was not happy, and it was not a good job, and I didn’t like going to work and having to tuck my shirt that was too big into my pants and that one arcade game that played the same song over and over and never stopped, I find myself longing so deeply to be back there. I didn’t know anything about myself then. I didn’t know anything about the world then. And I wish it was possible to recognize how much peace there is in that even though it really doesn’t feel like it in those moments.

There is no peace in being 16 and working at a run down cineplex for 3 months and making nine dollars and twenty five cents an hour and having your manager call you into her office to tell you about your ten cent raise and having to react as if that makes some sort of difference for the twelve hours a week that you work, but there is even less peace in being eighteen, in being twenty two and twenty five and twenty eight. There has not yet been as much peace as there was in being a depressed sixteen year old because at sixteen there is hope. At sixteen you don’t have to choose. At sixteen there is just school, and twelve hours a week behind the counter at a run down cineplex and there is a sunset that will stay in your mind forever and there are songs that will always bring you back to that place when things were immeasurably easier than they will ever be again and you won’t know that for a long time still and I don’t know what it says to be nostalgic for a time when you were just less unhappy than you are now, and I don’t know what to do with this feeling and I don’t know how, or if, I should live in these moments as if they will one day become those moments. I don’t know if that will change it, I don’t know if I have to live in ignorance of the future in order to feel this way about the past and I don’t even know if I like feeling this way about the past but I also feel grateful to be able to feel this way about the past. I don’t know if I’m meant to be making these choices or if I’m meant to be aware of it all like this. But it’s nice, you know? To realize how inescapably human you are and how many of these deeply painful and important moments you’re going to be able to have. That you can feel a pain that is neither physical nor adequately describable and that it matters so so much and that it also doesn’t really matter at all. It feels so important to be able to remember it all so deeply. I feel immensely grateful to be able to remember it all so deeply. And I know that my life may be very long yet still, I don’t know if these memories will last, but I think that for me at least, a big part of life’s charm is the honour of being able to look back on at least some of your moments through the incredible lens of nostalgia. It is a pain that I don’t often know what to do with but it is a pain I will never stop seeking out. It reminds me of my humanity and that I don’t really exist on paper or in numbers and I may spend my days absorbed in capitalism being drowned in ads and bad news and assholes on the internet but I won’t remember those parts when it counts. I just know that none of this matters all that much, until the day that it will come back and remind me of what it is to be human.

[josiadorstuff]

Hi! Greetings to the Star Trek fandom from your younger edgier cousin. Assuming you’re serious about wanting to know, welcome to the vortex of madness that is Warhammer 40K! You have been warned.

So, to fully understand this meme you’d need like a whole college course on background context, but I’ll do my best to explain.

So, first things first: there’s this place called the Warp. At its basic level, this is the other dimension that humanity and some other species use to travel faster than light between planets, like Star Trek. Unlike Star Trek, this dimension is made up of the thoughts and emotions of every sentient being in the galaxy, so it gets pretty chaotic. Sometimes these thoughts and emotions coalesce into beings called Daemons, and sometimes even full on gods. Most of them are evil, especially the Big Four Chaos Gods, but very rarely they’re not.

One species in the galaxy is the Eldar, or Aeldari, who are basically space elves. Like Vulcans, but even more elf like and egotistic. They had their own pantheon of gods formed from the values of their society. They used to be really powerful and ruled most of the galaxy, but then they partied too hard and accidentally created a Chaos god of hedonism who killed 90% of their species except for the space Amish and the lucky, and ate most of their gods. A few of the Eldar gods escaped, including the clown god (yes really) shards of the war god, and the goddess of life, Isha.

Unfortunately, Isha was snatched by Nurgle, the Chaos god of disease, rot, and general entropy. He keeps her in his basement and tries his latest diseases out on her, because she can regenerate from them. It’s not a good time. The Eldar keep trying to rescue her, but they keep dying horribly in the part of the Warp Nurgle rules.

A few tens of thousands of years pass. Humanity does some awful stuff but that’s not important. What is important is that recently, as in within the past couple thousand years, a new species called the T’au has become a player on the galactic stage. Having conquered war and scarcity on their home world, they rose to the stars to spread their ideology of the Greater Good to their neighbours through peace, diplomacy, mutual cooperation and maybe a liiiiitle but of military force. Basically, the T’au want to be in Star Trek so bad, but unfortunately they’re in Warhammer 40K. They don’t fit the aesthetic of 40K at all and that’s what makes them so great.

Despite difficulties they were not expecting, such as everyone but them being batshit insane, they managed to get some species to join them. Through only a minor amount of trickery no less! They even got some isolated human worlds to leave the Imperium of Man and join them instead. This has not made the Imperium very happy, but they already would want to kill them for being aliens anyway. Now the T’au don’t have strong connection to the Warp, if any, which is good for them because it means their souls don’t look like tasty snacks to a daemon, but it also means they can’t do space magic.

However, some of the new species embraced into the ideology of the Greater Good, especially humans, do have a connection to be Warp. This means that over time a new god has begun to form. Tau’Va, the goddess of the Greater Good. The few T’au who know of her existence don’t really know what to think, but they don’t trust it.

One of the T’au, a member of their soldier caste named Shas’la T’au Kais, was the protagonist of his very own spinoff video game, Fire Warrior from 2003. Being an FPS protagonist, he kills a whole lot of things someone like him, a bog standard grunt from a faction not known for its impressive soldiers, should have no right to be able to kill. The novelization just highlights this. He’s practically an unstoppable killing machine, and the T’au higher ups have realized this, putting him on ice until they absolutely need him again.

TLDR, this meme puts forward the hypothetical scenario of Tau’Va, the Warp god, plucking the protagonist of Fire Warrior and unleashing him on Nurgle’s Garden so she can rescue Isha to date her. It’s a play on the popular fan theory that the human demigod Leman Russ (that’s a whole other mess) will rescue Isha. I like this T’au one a lot more, because I’m tired of the Imperium always getting the spotlight.

Please let me know what you think and if you behave any questions, I put a lot of time into this.

T'au'va (Goddess of Greater Good) sends her grandest champion, T'au Kais, to help rescue Isha, in the name of Love.

For the Greater Good (and elf girlfriend).

By reddit user Marcsimo

[strangers-stars]

Deals

CW: Bit of gore

Riginald’s workday was supposed to be over by now. He was supposed to be having a date night with his wife but instead he was hurtling through the immeteria between planes on his way to a job. The only reason he was doing this is because whoever summoned him had summoned him specifically. It takes a good deal of magic to summon a specific demon and the pay on those contracts are quite substantial. So, after apologizing profusely to his wife and making promises he didn't know if he could keep, he took the contract. Reginald had been summoned to a laboratory that stank of iron and death. Its sterile lighting illuminating a perfectly drawn summoning circle made from fresh warm blood, as well as the corpses of at least a dozen scientists brutally butchered. likely the unwilling donors. Noticeably there were no souls, no living ones at least. The souls of at least half of the scientists lingered in their cooling bodies but other than that there was no life this didn't however stop something from speaking. 

"Hello demon" The voice was sharp and jagged robotic in its intonation and as reginald turned to see what must be his summoner he understood why. The thing standing before him was not human and Reginald didn't know if the thing counted as alive but he was sure it was aware. It was human in shape but lacked skin and fat, instead being taut wire musculature over rigid alloy bones. The thing’s face was skull-like but lacked a proper mouth, simply a number of slits along a steel plate. Its eyes glowed a dull green and the things bloodied hands tells Reginald all he needs to know .

"Greetings Summoner names Reginald but I assume ya already knew that so what are you looking to do that lead you to summoning me?" 

"I am trapped on the interior of a covert military installation and require mystical assistance to escape. We are approximately 12 miles underground, located in a desert of some kind. What can you do to aid me?" 

"Well that entirely depends on what I'm given. You don't seem to have a soul or any magical connection at all so what can you offer?"

"I offer you the remaining eight souls of the scientists that should be enough for at least a modicum of power."

"I could do that, yeah, but it's kinda a bum deal for me. ya see those guys they were already going to hell even before you iced em. So my commission rate will be real bad and I should be done workin by now meaning that would hardly be worth my time. So lemme ask you a question, will you be killing people on the way outa here?

“If need be i will’

“Well then you're in luck. I can make you an offer, i can’t afford ta make most a. I can lend you a weapon forged from souls and sin, it’ll carve through the eggheads who locked you up like butter and the more you kill the sharper it becomes. I've seen people carve ships in half with these bay boys from time to time. It will cost you of course, it’ll take the last of the souls you got and the assurance of at least 2 more. However ya get all the power ya need for the low low price of a few murders you were probably gonna do anyway.”

“That sounds agreeable but what have you neglected to disclose? I am aware of the demonic tendency to mislead for their own gain.”

“You're pretty smart for a tin man ya know that. Catch is in four hours i reappear and get all the souls the weapon has collected, usually this would include your’s but considering you don't got one that aint possible.”

“Then a deal has been reached, what is needed to close the contract?”

“Just two things: fresh blood and a handshake. lucky for you the first ya already got in spades”

Then the machine simply extended its hand, Reginald reaching out to meet its bloody grasp and with a firm shake the deal was forged. "Now the fun part."Reginald said with a flourish of his now bloody hand before ripping a dozen scorching sigils into the air. Igniting all at once leaving a deep black blade with infernal livery and a bone hilt hanging in the cooling air.

"This is Entrestta she'll be in your care for the next four hours."

"So I simply take this blade and then you will disapparate?”

“Correctamundo.”

Wordlessly and with precision only a machine could muster it drabbed the sword and reginald was hurtling through the immateria once more ,this time towards home and a hopefully not too disgruntled wife.