#-outlet for me dumping all my thoughts to get out of my system.

[microwavetoaster-selfships]

Congratulations, Kane! You've successfully determined a grocery store was from the UK by looking at one small section of the shelf and only zooming in and looking for the currency symbol on the price tags after you figured it was from the UK.

[gale-in-the-dark]

THIS IS AN 18+ BLOG!! Sorry minors, but I'm more comfy talking to people within my age range.

Other sites: Bluesky (18+ content) , Strawpage God, it's been so long since I've not only drawn Sonic, but been on friggin' tumblr.

Anyway, I'm Xeno, a transmasc artist, role-player and occasionally a fanfic writer. I was obsessed with Sonic when I was a little kid, played the first 3 games and read the archie comic, plus watched the old 90's cartoons. However, I eventually fell off because I couldn't afford the newer system and games at the time. They also stopped selling the comics at my local wal-mart then, and ... well the show stopped airing.

I recently watched all 3 films, still need to finish Knuckles, but man. I didn't expect to dive back into my old obsession this year, friggin' loved Sonic 3 though.... and now I'm in Sonadow hell. I'm also currently playing through Sonic x Shadow Generations to get a taste on what I've missed out on! I might check out Prime if I have the time for it, but I dunno.

Anyway, I needed an outlet for my shit, so here we are!

For the sake of my own sanity and because it fits my vibe in ships a little more, I'll be keeping my work to film verse most of the time. (That and I just love alot of things about the film's universe anyway.) However, I will post other sonic 'verses' be it games or more on occasion, but like I said, I'm sticking to films or... maybe whatever AUs sprout from my brain. While I can draw them in their original styles, I did develop something of my own, which sprouted from an experimental thought of what movie Sonic might look like if he were older... so yeah. lol;;; I hope that doesn't turn people off too much.

You may see me occasionally post crossover art involving another fandom ship too due to rp shenanigans with a friend...(bcuz I think it'd be neat if they met...). Don't expect that to consume much of my gallery though (unless its in high demand anyway). Anyway, hope you all enjoy my work! Rules

This is a sideblog. Due to that I don't follow back because I don't want to reveal the blog this one is connected to. Sorry folks ; 3;

Be respectful, don't start drama. Especially ship wars. I fucking hate those because there's more important matters at stake in the real world that I'd rather be dealing with than fighting over a bunch of pixels.

Anti-LGBT+ rhetoric and sexist/racist shits not tolerated here.

This is a fun zone for myself to aid me in these trying times. I need this right now while my country is going to hell. However, this is also very therapeutic for me for personal reasons that I won't say too much on other then: I relate to Shadow on a deep and personal level that...I didn't think I would...

Not to get too political, but if you voted for Dump/Muskrat or hold terf or christo-fascist beliefs, don't fucking talk to me. We will not get along, for sure. And I don't want any of that shit near me (I already deal with it irl with my family...no thank you.)

Ah I should've added this but forgot to! So, I'm actually a fan of horror or mature themes, so I may dabble in that from time to time (especially when it comes to my writing). If you're not a fan of that sort of thing, my tag for it is ;spookyfun or ;TooDarkDon'tLook. Otherwise, might be best not to follow.

I'm not a fan of callouts, but only support such if the person in question actually did some pretty heinous shit. Otherwise, if its over some stuff that I find pretty petty, I'm not bothering with it. I'm for the freedom of artists and creators to create what they want as long as it doesn't harm anyone. However, on that note, that doesn't mean I'm going to enjoy what everyone creates either. I just support the freedom to create without being harassed about it. As stated above, there are more pressing matters at play right now and fighting over pixels or fanfiction is just really dumb to me in general, when compared to what I'm dealing with irl. Basically: Unless its a true crime, I hate fandom drama. don't bring it to me.

I'll add more here when I think of them, but really, just...don't be a dick or a weird creeper (in the bad way) and we'll be chill, I guarantee it.

[spaceratprodigy]

could i bother u for more thoughts on faith and max in a mock apple orchard 🥺👉🏻👈🏻

@gayafsatan — I would absolutely LOVE to brainstorm some fun ideas of them in a mock apple orchard!!

I've been replaying again so they've been rotating around in my mind a lot extra hard and was especially thinking about mock apple picking bc the botanical labs also has a lil orchard where you can pick mock apples up off the ground! But I'm currently in Roseway so oughhh.. ideas....

I want you now I am going to ramble a LOT so please bear with me I swearsies it'll be more fun if we get the full lore dump from my brain 😩💖💕

–

👇 ROSEWAY THOUGHTS 👇

(I AM GOING TO TALK ABT ROSEWAY THOUGHTS AS A WHOLE AND THEN EASE INTO SOME SILLY MOCK APPLE ORCHARD IDEAS AT THE END OKAY. OKAY ILY THANK YOU).

–

My thoughts are very chaotic and rambly so let me try to walk though my ideas lmao

Roseway is typically where I peg Faith's death wish arc happening, and to summarize what all that entails, it's when the mask slips and the weight of everything finally hits her in full force.

I always envision this story happening over a long period of time so a lot of time has passed since first arriving at Edgewater and the Groundbreaker.

Halcyon. Her situation. Her identity. The life Phineas threw her into abruptly and his expectations for her. Making split second moral decisions where no matter what someone is going to get hurt. Being so alien and alone, no one to understand her or believe in her predicament but having to be the mysterious competent captain regardless.

It finally gets to her. Bad. And she makes some self destructive decisions. She gets sloppy, careless, hoping someone else will end this nightmare for her. Until they almost do.

I am swiftly brushing past many details so we don't get too lost in the sauce. But Max went after her, found her collapsed and injured bad, carried her back to the ship for Ellie to do whatever she could, and then stayed by her side for as long as it took for her to wake up.

This is such a key moment for them getting closer. Because there was a lot of frustration and emotion and being forced to confront the possibility of feelings existing, but nothing they fully understand or are ready to acknowledge as such yet.

She tries to brush past the subject of what happened, deflecting everything until he raises his voice in a way he hasn't since she gave him the journal and she threatened he never talk like that to her again. And it was enough to break through her facade, for her to show just how utterly broken and vulnerable she is, and they have a proper fucking conversation about where she's at mentally. He still isn't ready for the truth about her life before. But it's a step forward.

There is a lot of patience and understanding and just. Yeah. A lot happens here. Some walls come down. There grows some room for them to become softer and closer over more time.

All of this is important because a short piece I had written a long time ago took place in this area roughly after this incident.

It was a personal outlet vent piece, I will be honest. When I wrote it it was after I had a very bad panic attack after an awful scare. And I wrote it into Faith because I just wanted to get some feelings from that experience out of my system.

The shortened version of that one is Faith recovering from a bad episode, trying to calm her breathing, waiting for her ears to stop ringing and for her vision to come back. Her legs gave out on her and she was sitting under the mock apple trees. Her voice locks up on her when she's seriously distressed. Yadda yadda yadda, Max had brought along his datapad so she could communicate anything important and she was incredibly confused because she knows he doesn't like using his datapad ever and then rendered even more speechless to know he brought it specifically for her in case something like this were to happen again. It ends with her just asking if he would keep talking to her, and they sit there under the mock apple trees for a while, in no particular rush to get anywhere.

And after this point, I think the mock apple orchards become a really peaceful, therapeutic spot for her when she just wants a moment to herself. Sits there, breathes, takes in the Roseway scenery and collects herself before jumping back into the horrors of Halcyon. Spends some time picking mock apples to take back to the ship.

I've been having a lot of ideas of her asking Max to go with her. I'm of the mind if she'd ask directly that he'd either decline, or at least pretend to be uninterested but she's the one who asked so he accepts the offer.

But I can see her being vague and just saying that she's heading out if he'd join her and she leads him to the orchards. By this point they're already often in each other's company, she indulges his interests often, letting him be the one who is finally listened to. But in general, they get along very well in conversation when it comes to a handful of similar interests and their personalities and attitudes bounce off of each other well.

(In my story anyway, since she spends an extended amount of time in Edgewater and the Vale, there was also a lot of time spent doing some early bonding with Max. So do with that info what you will. They're not likeee besties yet but they're much more than strangers by this point, ya'know? Just to get an idea of where their familiarity with each other is at and why there's enough respect and trust to some extent already existing. Not to mention how much time they had spent on the Groundbreaker).

They'd be having such a peaceful time away from the rest of the crew.

Oughhh hear me out, okay, Faith loves to bake. She doesn't even ask, she just makes Max hold her bag open while she starts collecting mock apples and after they finally head back to the ship she figures out how to make mock apple pie for the crew 😭 we already know Max doesn't care much for sweets (I wonder how sweet or tart a mock apple pie would be.. Faith girl what all Halcyon ingredients are you adding to that bad boy) but.. what if.... After everyone goes to bed...... He tries some anyway........ Because she made it..........

Most of what's bouncing around in my brain is them early on having wholesome bonding time in a spot just for the two of them. Just enjoying each other's company. Realizing they have genuine respect for each other, Faith feeling like she found a genuine friend who went to lengths further than anyone had in her entire life to make sure she survived. I am specifying Faith's feelings here intentionally. I write Max in a more complicated spot very blinded by his revenge scheme more or less unaware for a long while just how much the lines start blurring between his faith and his Faith. To put it succinctly. (Look I know I'm always drawing The Good Stuff™️ but in actuality their relationship is suchhhh a slow burn. They are not the most romantically inclined people lmao).

But also.. once she realizes she can talk to him when she needs to. I think coming back to this spot, off the ship, away from the crew, she just likes it there. She likes being there with him. She finds comfort in that spot.

OKAY BUT DO YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE WOULD BE CUTE.... they should come back here.. post-scylla and post-gorgon...... Ya'know......... The first being when they establish not wanting to be apart and the second being when they want to make that partnership a permanent one......... ASKING HER IN THE MOCK APPLE ORCHARDS WOULDN'T THAT BE DARLING ough okay I need a minute my brain is going too fast to comprehend

My Roseway ideas aren't the most cleaned up I know BUT so many important bonding moments exist and oughhhh LOOSE IDEAS ARE STILL WORTH TALKING ABOUT OKAYYYYY

I just want them to go mock apple picking together and learn how to get smiles out of each other and not understand why it makes their chests hurt but they know they need to do it again

ACTUALLYYYYY post-scylla when he's much more mellowed out and they're the closest they've been I think would be so so nice. they'd be so much softer and he'd probably be so much more involved in wanting to enjoy silly lil activities with her.....

Currently imagining him reading out loud to her, all the conversations they'd have, maybe he brings his tossball cards to show her, maybe they bring one of the lil games, have a lil makeshift picnic....

Godddd the transition between just how much enthusiasm he shows spending time with her is enough to make me explode. Can you see my vision. The reluctance, to the hesitancy, to becoming absolutely inseparable.

I HAVE A LOT TO THINK ABOUT BUT I'M GETTING SLEEPY SO SENDING IT!!!!!!

Literally feel free to add on or share your own thoughts I'm begging you lmao I promise there is so much room for ideas to be fleshed out and better put together, I'm mostly just spitballing what all I think would be incredibly fun ideas to work with. Plus I'm kind of thinking across the timeline and how much their relationship would change between each visit. And how over time they would enjoy it more and more and make each visit more special than the last.

WAIT BEFORE I LOSE THE THOUGHT!! They make a stop RIGHT BEFORE HEADING TO SCYLLA TO GO TO THE HERMIT'S LODGE!! Oh that could hurt so good omgggg. Okay okay I need to stop now I NEED TO STOP.

[jev-urisk]

Heeyyy :> I would like the biggest infodump on Kazimier you have pls. All the details.

A 💋Kazimier💋 infodump?!? Oh goodness, where do I start 😵‍💫 (Also thank you for asking!). I'm going dump a few favorite things, if I try to dump it all in one Imma be typing instead of feeding myself today 😂

(He's tagged #7c kazi on everything I've posted on him so far if you're somehow thirsty for more after this)

💋Who:

Kazimier (Kashj-meer), an OC for my story 7 Circles

He's not sure what his parents named him, but as a kid he had this Cashmere sweater that acted as his safety blanket and eventually 'brat in the Cashmere sweater' became 'hey Cashmere'. He decided on the spelling when he learned to read/write.

💋What:

Shapeshifter Incubus Hybrid.

Genderfuid (pronouns based on appearance).

On the asexual spectrum.

Just shy of 6 feet tall.

Very likely autistic.

A bastard.

(Feel free to hit me w/specific what questions cuz this can get real outta hand)

💋Where:

He's not sure where he was born, but he's been in Du’Preve as long as he can remember.

Du'Preve is the 4th and final district of the Halkyon Empire. It's a place that's big and abrasive like New York, full of sleezy entertainment like Las Vegas, and is a trashy dupsterfire like the Jersey turnpike.

Du'Preve is home to vampires, gorgons, gargoyles, litches, and hybrids. Collectively they're called Du'Preve'd, darklings, 4th class, nightcrawlers, or just 'lowers'.

But recently he got caught by the govt system and shipped out to District 1 🫶 sucks to suck.

💋When/history:

I don't want to give up tooooo much. 🤔Hmm. He's almost 300yrs old. No clue who his parents were but was a cute kid who found means to shelter himself. A couple centuries and a lot of trauma later and he's a calculating distrustful member of the criminal underground willing to do whatever it takes to avoid revisiting the past.

💋Why (did I make him?):

The thought for my wip 7 Circles began during quarantine 2020. I had nothing to do, nowhere to go, and when my school semester ended my skin was crawling with creativity that didn't have an outlet. So I gave in and downloaded tiktak.

Im a drag persormer/cosplayer and ended up on the side of the app where folks collaborate on settings and interact in-character as their ocs to create a story. I joined as my OC Kazimier and not long after, I began interacting with the charming, dark-eyed OC, 'Klaus Calvaire'. We started messaging to plot story collabs.. then started messaging just to say hi.. then messaged our lives to one another.

This witty, handsome, well-written person was flattering me enough by collaborating so much with me- then they fell in love with me, moving 1000s of miles to live life alongside me. I'm humbled every morning that I'm dating the mind behind my internet crush, and we share whispers about our ocs as we hold one another each night.

The og tag group splintered, the clock app is no longer great for my brain, but Kazimier and Klaus are still going on adventures alongside me and my unlikely lover, 4yrs and over 100k words later. ❤️

💋How (did he come to be?):

Personality was originally based on what I thought would be interesting to write, but then I accidentally added chemical X (my truma) and ended up with a bastard.

As for his looks.. they're based off my drag performance style/makeup🫣. Like.. he was a cosplay before he was really a character. It's embarrassing and strange and delightful all at once that this mf kinda looks like me. 😳

Soooooo, Yeah! He's my most developed blorbastard so there's a lot more, but I'll leave the rest for more asks. If you have further q's feel free to send them!

Hope this wasn't too much of an overload lol if you made it this far thank you so so much, I hope the muses bless your wip 🙏

[bluefirewrites]

i gotta Juke AU story

————

this is inspired by this one filipino movie i watched “para sa hopeless romantic” but julie and luke go to the same uni and julie writes a random line of lyrics on a schools desk and luke writes the next lines when he’s in his class. the next day julie sees someone finished her lyrics and they end up having a finished song throughout the week. they obviously end up falling in love with each other’s words but one day the desks in that classroom were thrown out so julie and luke try and find the desk and run into each other only for Luke to find out it’s Julie, his crush since the beginning of school, and Julie finds out it’s Luke, they boy who she’s been eyeing ever since she’s first seen him. honestly this is all over the place. this is just another random college au. tehe

I DID NOT KNOW THIS WAS FROM A FILIPINO MOVIE!

I have much more pride in my culture now you have no idea haha! But no really,  Filipino movies can be the cheesiest, silliest, most cliche things I’ve ever seen. And I mean that endearingly. 

So it makes total sense that this super cute trope that I see popping up in different fandoms came from a Filipino movie. 

I think I’ve seen an iteration of this on AO3 and it was super cute! (But I think it was more like leaving a piece of paper on a desk). 

But yes, yes , YES. 

Juke is the perfect ship for this. 

Hmm... I think it would be an interesting take, because my mind went to Luke first, if it was Julie who would start it- yes I agree with you. 

It is canon that Luke helped Julie finish the song that she had been working on with her mom (’Stand Tall’), so might as well run with it. 

Maybe during her quiet year, where she didn’t sing or play piano, she often found herself doodling a lot. She kinda threw herself into drawing. It was her creative outlet that brought her comfort during these rough times. 

She’d have trouble paying attention in class sometimes, and so she would end up doodling. 

Now, I used to have a history class that frowned upon doodling in notebooks. The notebooks would be graded, and if there is a non-history, non-relevant doodle in the margins or anything- you get points docked off. 

So Julie, like me, tried remedying this by doodling on post it notes to avoid getting in trouble. 

But one day, Julie forgets or runs out of post it notes, and she’s only got her history notebook and textbook with her. And since she has no qualms marking up her jeans and shoes, she thought she’d be discrete and doodle on the desks.

Not like anyone would have a problem with that anyway. These desks are old af and scratched up and had doodles on them already. 

She would start drawing her usual stuff- funky creatures, bubble letter-ed profanities, etc. 

But then she starts thinking about her mom, she starts doodling dahlias and even a rose in one corner. Memories start flooding back and she starts absentmindedly writing down a lyric of a song they never finished, just bits of pieces figured out: 

‘Don’t blink...no, I don’t want to miss it’ 

She didn’t think to erase it. Just grabbed her stuff and went to her next class. 

The following day however, she pulls out her post-notes (after getting more) and is about to doodle when she sees a new scribble on the corner of the desk where she wrote her lyrics. 

Squinting, she realizes those are words (geez, the penmanship sucks). But she was able to make it out: 

‘One thing, and it's back to the beginning’

It’s written right under her line. And she reads them together- 

Wow. This sounds... pretty good. 

She quickly jots this mysterious new addition to the song in her post-notes, but not before giving writing another shot and provide another line. Curious, if she would get another response. 

She does. 

And it’s perfect. 

It’s been a year, a year since she felt the urge to write, to think about music- but, when all the lyrics fall into place, Julie is suddenly inspired to continue. 

She spends the entire class thinking about how to reply, how to keep the momentum of this song going. 

When she gets it, she writes it down underneath the new line. And waits. 

And like clockwork, next day she sits down and there’s a new addition. 

First verse done- Julie couldn’t believe it. 

Smiling, she records it all and had to erase everything from before to make more room. 

‘Thanks’ she writes ‘Keep going?’ 

The reply the next day has her grinning from ear to ear: 

‘I’m game :)’

And that’s how it goes: Another day, Another killer line. 

Julie would rush from her next class, confusing Flynn who did not think she would be so excited going to history, smile on her face, anticipating another message from this mystery writing partner. 

Sometimes, she gets too caught up in her head, eagerly thinking up new lines that she often doesn’t watch where she’s going. One time, she pretty much embarrassed herself while bumping into the cute Luke Patterson in her rush to History. 

(She practically fell on him and he tried to talk to her after, but she jumped out of his arms before whatever awkward conversation that was bound to happen if she stayed). 

Julie and her pen pal would keep working on the song, even came up with a system to let each other know if they’ve finished a verse. 

And sometimes it’s not just lyrics. Julie draws her normal doodles next to her lines, and she’s delighted to find even more ridiculous ones waiting for her when she gets back. 

There was one time when she’s had to stifle a laugh because a crude caricature of their History teacher in their corner, yelling out the next lyric: 

‘I'm goin’ out of my mind!’

(Glad to know someone else shares the same sentiments about their strict history teacher.)

They finish her mom’s song and Julie’s glad... grateful even. But she couldn’t help but feel disappointed... assuming it’s over. 

But come Monday the following weekend, her pen pal decided to leave another line- 

‘Running from the past... Tripping on the now’ 

and a new comment: 

‘My turn now?’

A new song, and Julie grins, already coming up with ideas... 

She loves writing again, especially music. Sparked by this exchange, she eases herself back into listening to music again, looking for inspiration to use for the song she and her mysterious partner are working on. 

And writing with this person... is really something else. 

But Julie’s favorite part of the whole experience really is the comments written on the upper corner. Stuff like: 

‘This part is killer!’

‘Mindreader, much? :P’

‘Wrecking ball at it again. So talented :)’

and her favorite:

‘You make me a better writer...’

She ducks down so no one can see her blush as she writes back: 

‘I think we make each other better...’ 

Flynn one day tells her straight up she’s got a crush on her pen pal, to which Julie denies because how could she have a crush on someone she doesn’t even know. 

But as she thinks about it.. she feels like she does. Or at least know enough to establish this sort of connection that feels like they’re in each other’s heads, know how the other person thinks, inspiring the other. 

It was... special. 

Flynn suggests that she needs to figure out who is leaving these notes. But it’s hard seeing as though Julie has the class in an earlier period, a bunch of other classes are held in the same room after she leaves. 

(Flynn tries a sting operation, but ends up getting caught ditching class before she could solve the mystery). 

Julie’s worried though. As much as she wants to figure out who this great pen pal is, she wonders if they would be disappointed to find out they’ve been writing her. And not someone as cool and as pretty as Carrie Wilson or her friend Kayla. It’s hard to live up to those expectations. 

In the end, she wants to know. At least so she could maybe thank them in person, for helping bring music back into her life and for making history class the highlight of her day. 

She decides this right before they break for Thanksgiving. She writes down: 

‘I wanna meet you. Can we talk?’ 

And she’s on pins and needles the entire break, just wondering what her pen pal would say back. ‘Yes’, ‘no?’. 

But what she finds when she comes back from break is so much worse than the fear of rejection. 

They got new desks. 

Their school finally got their shit together and replaced their old, worn down desks. 

‘No, no, no, no, no’. 

That means she’ll never know what her penpal end up replying... 

She runs out of class and finds Flynn, panicked, she tells her what happened. And Flynn does some digging, and she’s able to find out where the janitors dumped the old desks. 

Julie totally underestimates just how desperate she is in finding out the identity of her pen pal because she finds herself sneaking back to school at night with Flynn, seeking out the lot behind school where the dumpsters were piled high with the old desks. 

Flynn, the ride or die she is, armed with a flashlight, starts taking out the desks along with Julie, and there are... a lot of desks. 

They go at it for an hour, and the situation starts to look hopeless, especially when Flynn discovers a whole new set of dumpsters with desks that they haven’t even checked yet. 

They’re about to throw in the towel- 

But then they hear voices. 

Quickly, they hide behind a dumpster right when three guys, with flashlights, come onto the scene. 

“Dude, I can’t believe we’re here at this hour-” 

“Oh my god. There’s like a boatload of stuff here-” 

“Guys. Can you not? And please help me? It’s gotta be here somewhere”. 

They sound... familiar. They were definitely not the custodians. 

Risking it, Julie leaves her hiding spot- 

“Luke?” 

Luke Patterson jumps and whips around to face her, “Julie?” 

Behind him are his bandmates, Alex and Reggie. Everyone looks at each other confused. 

“What are you doing here?” he asks. 

“I...uh, I’m-” Julie stammers, “Well-” 

Flynn cuts in, “She’s looking for something,” 

Luke nods, “Really? So are we.” 

Alex scoffs, “Nope. Just you, dude. But we’re helping.” 

“Maybe we can help you too?” Reggie offers, “What are you looking for?” 

Julie sighs, “... a desk?” 

“Well... you came to the right place...” Luke laughs, shining his flashlight on the dumpsters, “Funny enough that’s what we’re looking for too.” 

“One in particular?” 

Then the guy gets all clammed up, “Uh... yeah. I think... I might have... left something... in it. Something important.” 

“How about we all look together?” suggests Flynn, “Help each other out?” 

And so they exchange the descriptions on the desk, with Julie leaving out the glaring obvious detail of the note. 

They’re surprised to find out that they’re looking for the same kind of desk. The ones they used in a particular building at school, the same one her history class is in. 

So they break off and search. And she ends up in the same dumpster as Luke. 

“So what’s in your desk?” he ends up asking. 

“Huh?” 

“You know... that’s so important that you’re here on a Friday night, digging through a dumpster,” 

“Right... uh,” Julie scrambles for an answer, “There’s something on- I mean, in the desk... that really helped me. I was going through a hard time. Lost my mom last year-” 

Luke stops his search, “Oh, I’m so sorry-” 

“It’s okay. I just...” she sighs, finding another desk that looks like hers but not quite, “I just want to find it...” 

“I get it. Hopefully we can find your desk.” 

“Hopefully we’ll find yours too,” 

After another 20 minutes searching, Julie finds it. At the very bottom of the dumpster. Luke’s face lights up once she brings it out. 

“Oh my god, you found it!” He exclaims, hands gripping the edge to take it off her hands. 

She tugs it back, “Yeah... I found it... my desk,” 

“Your desk? But this is my-” he breaks off, eyes widening, “Wait. Are you...?” 

“Am I what?” 

Luke drops the desk, clears his throat, and starts reciting: 

‘I believe... I believe that we're just one dream...’

Julie gasps, then continues: 

“Away from who we're meant to be...”

Then together: “That we're standing on the edge of...”

“...great.” Luke finishes, in awe, “You! You’re ‘Lyric Girl’!”

“You’re my pen pal?” Julie says in disbelief. 

Luke Patterson has been her pen pal this entire time? The cutie with the cutoffs? It makes total sense. He’s in a rock band and the songs she’s heard from them have amazing lyrics. 

Wait... she has been lowkey crushing on Luke Patterson through his words... 

“Wow, it’s you! Luke... wow...” she honestly has no words. They used to come easy to her when she talks to him via the desk, but now, after finding out that the local heartthrob is her writing partner, she’s super nervous. 

“Look... if you’re disappointed that it’s me... I get it. I’ll give you an out, and you won’t ever have to talk to me again-” 

“Julie-” 

“-like this is weird- this is weird right? But I mean what we had was nice and all-” 

“Julie, can you-?” 

“-we don’t ever have to talk about this if you don’t-” 

“Julie!” He reaches for her hands and intertwines their fingers, shutting her up. 

“Yeah...?” 

He takes a deep breath before saying: “Why would I ever be disappointed that it’s you? I’ve... got like a mad crush on you since freshman year...” 

Julie choked, “Wait, what?” 

“Voice of an angel and wicked beauty to boot? How could I not?” he smiles, “And... finding out that you’re my mystery muse is just... you don’t know how happy that makes me.” 

His smile drops and he’s all the sudden bashful, “Wait... are you disappointed that it’s me?” 

She shakes her head, “No, no! That’s not why! It’s just... you’re this rockstar in the making! I didn’t think- I didn’t think you’d ever pay attention to me.” 

“I do... I do pay attention,” he looks down at their desk, “Well... maybe not enough attention, otherwise we would have met sooner.” 

She laughs, “Totally,” 

They stand there for a while, grinning at each other like idiots. 

“So...” Julie decides to jump the gun, “Do you... maybe wanna grab something to eat?” 

Luke raises an eyebrow, “Are you asking me out, Julie?” 

She blushes, “Maybe,” 

“Interesting,” 

“So what’s your answer?” 

He leans in, “Might wanna look down,” he whispers. 

She does, right on their desk and finally reads the reply she’s spent weeks thinking about. 

‘Tell me where and when...

I’ll be there...’

Needless to say, but that from that day on- they don’t need to use their desk to talk anymore... 

[orangerosebush]

On minds and matters

It was a bit disheartening to spend years working towards an MA in psychology, only to then use it on hour-long glorified eye-staring contests with the moody adolescents of the UK’s Vieux riches. His job paid well, though, and as such Dr. Po was willing to grit his teeth and soldier on through each meeting on his list.

He’d had plenty of patients who came to him determined not to progress. These were the boys who had a few too many write-ups on their files; the ones whose families were tired of their son being too 'emotionally high-maintenance'; the students who had consigned themselves to being one of the ‘troubled’ boys. The problem with elite boarding schools was that they sometimes served as the dumping grounds for wealthy families who would prefer to not be reminded of their screw-up children — as such, Dr. Po’s target demographic was made up of boys determined to ‘win’ therapy by going home just as bitter and in pain as they were when they started sessions with him.

He didn’t always make a breakthrough. Sometimes, he had patients who showed up to a session with a note from Dean Guiney excusing them from further meetings, and that was that. Dr. Po firmly believed that every single student he’d met with was capable of finding some coping mechanism or outlet that would help them — and he hoped that the students whose sessions stopped before any progress had been made found happiness in the future. Or, at the very least, that they found something that would bring them peace.

There were certain patients he’d had that stood out from the others, both for good reasons and bad. Artemis Fowl II was one of those patients — and standing out for reasons ‘both good and bad’ described Artemis perfectly. 

Following a series of disastrous sessions when the boy was thirteen, Dr. Po had simply stopped seeing Artemis. The boy hadn’t even shown up with a note terminating their sessions. One day, a new boy had shown up in the time slot usually reserved for Artemis, and that had been that. Dr. Po hadn’t seen Artemis since. He vaguely remembered hearing the news that the Fowl patriarch had been found — alive — and not been sure whether to expect Artemis to get better or worse. 

Would the return of his father foster the growth of the nascent emotional maturity that Artemis had exhibited in their final sessions? Or would Artemis’ worst traits — his tendency towards arrogance, his dismissal of others, his budding narcissism — firmly take root, defining Artemis’ personality for good? These questions nagged at Dr. Po, and truthfully, he was too cowardly to ask around the staff to confirm just what sort of person Artemis had become.

Thus, Artemis remained an enigma.

An enigma that just so happened to be sitting in the armchair across from Dr. Po, boring a hole through the doctor with his unflinching gaze.

In true Artemis Fowl fashion, the boy had shown up for a session that had been reserved without a name. Dr. Po had nearly dropped his clipboard when he’d opened the door to usher in his new patient and been greeted with a now fifteen years of age Artemis Fowl standing before him, looking simultaneously defiant and sheepish.

They’d both walked into the room wordlessly, waiting in silence as Dr. Po awkwardly rummaged around in his desk for his old notes on Artemis while the young teen sat gingerly in the patient seat in the middle of the room.

“You’ve not switched to a digital filing system?”

Dr. Po started, looking up at Artemis.

“No psychiatrist or counselor uses iPads or digital notetakers,” Dr. Po explained hesitantly, brow furrowing.

Artemis wasn’t one for small talk, usually.

Shaking his head slightly as if to right himself, Dr. Po continued. “It’d be convenient, but there are concerns about the patient being recorded."

Artemis seemed satisfied with that answer.

Flipping his notes closed, Dr. Po studied Artemis, who raised a single brow.

“I’ve never forgotten our session that you left in the middle of,” Dr. Po remarked, and the frown lines on Artemis’ face deepened. “You were such a smarmy child. But you… made this joke.”

Artemis leaned back in his chair, tapping a foot in annoyance. “What a wonderful memory you have.”

“Not really. But it’s hard to forget a patient like you, Artemis,” Dr. Po sighed. “I tried to ask you about your feelings — you responded by telling me a family heirloom was a blatant forgery.”

The memory caused Artemis to smile genuinely for the first time since he’d stepped into the office. “The fake Victorian?”

The doctor grimaced. “Yes.”

“Despite its lack of authenticity, it was a perfectly nice armchair,” Artemis assured, a gently teasing note worming its way into his voice.

Edged on by Artemis' demeanor softening, Dr. Po pushed on. “But back to the joke. I remarked on the loss of your father — insensitively, I now realize — and you shut down. You started jerking me in this way and that in order to prevent me from getting a real reading on you. You said something along the lines of, ‘I’m depressed that I’m going to therapy,’ I believe. Quite a bon mot.”

“I was impudent as a young boy, I’m afraid,” Artemis said breezily, sounding more amused by the tale than remorseful. “I hope you’ll forgive me for a poor first impression.”

“Artemis, why are you back in my office?”

Artemis didn’t even blink, taking the challenge in stride. “My mother believes it will be beneficial.”

“Your mother? Not you?”

“Correct.”

“And… beneficial? To what end? Elaborate on her reasoning, perhaps,” Dr. Po asked, trying to keep his tone light.

“She believes I am emotionally maladjusted,” Artemis said, giving a small shrug.

“Are you?”

Artemis blinked owlishly, the question not quite computing. “Am I what, doctor?”

Dr. Po clicked his pen idly. “Unhappy.”

“Well, of course.”

Dr. Po was unable to keep his face neutral, and Artemis chuckled slightly at the doctor’s wide-eyed gaping.

“Dr. Po,” Artemis sighed, sobering as if he were explaining something evident to a child. “Of course I am unhappy occasionally. I’m a very busy man. My intellect has made it so I’ve moved beyond the carefree days of adolescence — I’ve matured past an age where my mother could treat me as a child, and although I don’t mourn the loss of simpler times, I suppose she does.”

Dr. Po forced himself not to ask if Artemis had ever truly been treated as a child, deciding to steer clear of the topic of family based on how unproductively the discussion had gone years ago. Instead, he elected to place his clipboard on the floor, looking at Artemis bluntly.

“Artemis, I’m not diagnosing you with anything,” he began, holding up a hand when Artemis opened his mouth to say something. “What I want to discuss today, however, is that right now I see the same pain in you today as I did when you were thirteen — and since I’m no longer getting complaints from department heads, that means you’ve taken that frustration and turned it somewhere else.”

Artemis’ lips quirked upwards, but his eyes were mirthless. “You share my mother's theory that I am some variation of the tortured genius stereotype.”

“How about this — I think that you believe that there isn’t a person alive smart enough to help you. Because to 'fix' you, someone would have to look inside you, and you think you’re the only person that’s able to understand how you work.”

“How narcissistic of me.”

“I’ve met with a lot of people since our last session when you were thirteen,” Dr. Po stressed. “I’ve not met anyone quite as clever as you, but I’ve met people who fit the same profile. You’re well versed in my profession, so you’re able to view your pain as both a participant and as an outsider — and that strangely voyeuristic relationship to your mind makes it so you and all these other folks think that you’re objective. Logical, even, in your analysis of your mind. You understand every tick, every tiny mechanism, every structure of your psyche. And if you understand it all and you still can’t will yourself to be happy, then why the hell should I be able to do anything for you? After all, I’m just some idiot who decorates his office with forged antique furniture his grandfather was gullible enough to purchase. Why should I know better than you do?”

Artemis was silent at that.

“If someone can, say, convince themselves that all their peers are 2D caricatures of people, they’ll never have to think about why they struggle to feel any pleasure from social interaction. If they can look around and see how far their family has come, then they can force themselves to box up and discard the baggage of the past. If they can convince themselves that pain and genius are twins, that the torment is part of the gift by which they define themselves, then the fear they have that maybe they’re destined for a life marked by paranoia and apathy no longer has to be confronted,” Dr. Po tried, searching for some way to express his thoughts before Artemis decided to snap at him. “Maybe you’re the only one who sees the world as it really is. But maybe your mother is right to be concerned. I get why… that’s an unattractive possibility to you. It would mean your analysis of yourself was incorrect. And if you were wrong, if your mind has tricked you into running away from the change that you need to feel happier, then you’re just as human as the rest of us. Pain tricked you into believing its integral to your ‘youness’. You’re... just human. And let me tell you, Artemis, that feeling ineffectual, and frustrated, and sad is... so very painfully human.”

By the time he’d finished his spiel, Dr. Po’s voice was soft. Pursing his lips, he tried to see if he’d garnered any sort of reaction from Artemis. The teen remained stony-faced.

“I can recommend a therapist from outside Saint Bartleby’s,” Dr. Po finally said. “If you don’t want to work with me, then I don’t want to waste either of our time.”

Artemis seemed to be broiling with unreadable intensity, and for a moment Dr. Po worried that he’d start going on a diatribe.

His fears soon were proven unfounded when all of the sudden, Artemis seemed to deflate.

“I do not choose sadness for myself, Dr. Po. I can assure you that,” Artemis remarked, sounding weary in the way men twice his age did when confronted by the prospect of the world having moved on past their prime.

“I would never imply something so insensitive,” Dr. Po insisted. “But there is a difference between me saying something of that sort and me asking you to believe that I could help you. Or if not me, then someone better suited to working with you.”

Artemis ruminated on the statement, his tapered fingers tapping out an unfamiliar rhythm on the arms of the ornate chair he was sitting in.

“I will come to my session next week,” he finally decided, and Dr. Po almost sagged with relief.

Carefully, the two of them continued on with the session. Although it felt as though they were both walking on eggshells around one another, the hour-long session ultimately ended in a place where Dr. Po felt like they could work with. He walked Artemis to the door, and after awkwardly bidding him goodbye, Dr. Po retreated back into his office.

For a while, he simply sat at his desk, thinking.

It wasn’t as though he’d made groundbreaking headway with Artemis today. Frankly, they’d been only nominally productive following Artemis’ promise to give therapy a genuine attempt.

The day stretched on, and Dr. Po was no closer to making sense of the ever-present Artemis conundrum.

After all, how does one describe Artemis Fowl?

Various psychiatrists have tried and failed. The problem is Artemis’ own intelligence. He bamboozles every test thrown at him. He has puzzled the greatest medical minds, and sent many of them gibbering back to their own hospitals.

Dr. Po paused, reaching back for the clipboard he’d discarded at the beginning of the session.

Artemis Fowl II was fifteen. He had various, tremendously important responsibilities, the details of which he refused to elaborate on. His best friend, to Dr. Po’s knowledge, was his paid bodyguard. Frankly, Dr. Po didn’t think they’d talk about Artemis’ family for a long, long time.

Dr. Po couldn’t really describe Artemis Fowl, because he didn’t know him. He didn’t think many people knew the boy, not really.

All the same, Dr. Po wanted to try. He wanted to try to understand Artemis Fowl a bit better. Not because Dr. Po wanted to a hero, but because he wanted Artemis Fowl to just get to be a boy instead of whatever impossible, confusing role Artemis seemed to be trying to fill.

Artemis Fowl was fifteen. Dr. Po hoped that he’d hold onto boyhood a little while longer.

[musicmusing]

First Morning Coffee Equivalent

Welcome!

This is the infinite internet page where I’ll be consciously streaming streams of consciousness.

The desire to express my thoughts on music in whatever ways possible has been building up inside me since the day I was conceived, dare I say.

Plainly, I plan on writing about sounds I come across, old and new, that strike me. I tend to be oft stricken, and I’m hoping that, on top of these blurbs being fun to read, they’ll offer me a bit of an outlet. A canvas for me to destroy with internal connections of external stimuli. I won’t be quantifying reviews, just expressing personal experience, however that manifests; live shows, 15 second clips in advertisements, full albums, whatever. Leaving things a bit open ended here. It’ll definitely take me a second to figure it all out.

Anyway! Leah Wellbaum, the all-powerful leader of punk band Slothrust, writes and sings in her song “Cranium”,

I don’t wanna be addicted to the noise

But when it goes away I wanna die

When I proverbially got some of my shit together (it’s all relative), I moved to Asheville and pencil-dove awkwardly as fuck back into college. Thanks, Charles, for casually mentioning one day that UNCA has a music program. My concentrations became music (general) and neuroscience, a combo that asked me to use more parts of my brain and nervous system at one time than I’d ever known existed. One of my favorite classes involved vast insight on drugs and addiction, and specifics on what parts of our bodies are involved, why, and how. Therefore, another reason I’d like to dump all of my thoughts on this particular topic in one place is to subtly and purposefully reframe the textbook definition of addiction and therefore the way we exist and see other’s existences.

We all have addictions, yet the definition of that word has become so separate from the self and so commercialized, that it seems that we don’t get the time to explore what it all means. We’re too busy worrying if these things make us stand out or fit in instead of discovering how these things make us feel about ourselves and the world around us, and why.

There aren’t solutions to everything, but there are explanations, paths, answers, answers that lead to more questions, compromises, spaces, neurotransmitters.

So, I think I’ll start this page off with some descriptions: I’ll be writing about ten of my favorite albums of all time, in no particular order. It’s extremely difficult to create a seemingly permanent hierarchy of sounds; perception is so fluid.

That being said, if there’s something you want to talk about together, please let me know! Again, figuring out exactly how to make this a well-oiled situation will take some time, but I sincerely look forward to seeing where it goes.

Until next time, here’s proof of early musical influence and the concentration I was willing to put into it (magic blur is brother). It’s not unlikely that we were dancing to an album called Sanctuary: 20 Years of Windham Hill, one that brings up all kinds of emotions to this day when it graces my ears.

[princesssarcastia]

a veronica mars leverage au, i guess, because what else should i be doing with my life?

*deep sigh*

So I was thinking about the mechanics of a veronica mars leverage au—as in, veronica mars characters in a leverage like set-up, because the leverage setup is the golden standard™ of like, the known universe.

you have veronica mars, mastermind; the rest of the crew being made up of wallace, mac, logan, and weevil.  and mac is obviously the hacker.

but I also think that, in this au, the roles won’t be so clear cut.  the problem is that in veronica mars, all of these characters (except mac, who is an archetype) display different skills from each of the five defined roles in the leverage universe: hitter, hacker, grifter, thief, mastermind. 

veronica is a mastermind, sure, but she also makes killer fake IDs and breaks into systems like hardison does and is a hell of a grifter.

weevil can throw down, and lift things like a thief, and even pull one over on someone in a grifter-like fashion. and as head of the PCHers he has some definitive mastermind tendencies; he knows how to plan a fight, and a con.

wallace is more of a solid dude than a member of the criminal element, but when veronica needs him, he’s played roles like a grifter and pulled off lifts like a thief.

logan has a talent for violence, but also can lie like he breathes and put on shows to convince the best of them.

really i guess they all just have a little grifter in them.

if I had to had to had to give them all definitive leverage archetypes, though, it would be veronica: mastermind, logan: hitter, Weevil: thief, wallace: grifter, and of course, mac: hacker.

veronica is the mastermind because she knows all of them best, knows what they can do; because she’s capable of putting all the moving pieces together into one perfect plan; but also because she’s a control freak with maaaajior trust issues.  there’s no way she could ever let anyone else be in charge.

logan is the hitter because he’s just got that underlying current of violence about him at all times, but also because my absolute favortie scenes of his are when he’s being protective of veronica.  not that end of season three bullshit, mind you, but like the scene in season one when he rescues her from the federal agent, or the scene in season two when he bluffs his way into and out of the irish mob’s territory with an unloaded gun to save veronica.  make him the hitter and we get breathtaking violence from him, sure.  but we also get to see logan at his best: giving a damn about the well-being of others. 

weevil is the thief because this guy is smooth.  he pulled the heist at the carnival brilliantly in s2; and he stole that pen from the Kane household in s1 successfully even though the police arrested him and catalogued everything on his person, including the pen. it’s a bit of a square peg in a round hole, but I feel like he;d have comfortable knowledge of security systems and guard rotations and police jurisdictions.

wallace is the grifter because i’ve noticed that a lot of the times he asks veronica for advice on how to do stuff, its grift-related.  “how do I seduce the fake head cheerleader?” for example.  and he pulls some short term grifts for her, like when he infiltrates the silicon mafia at SD State.  also he’s got the best innate knowledge of who people are and what they’re like.  yeah, veronica can pull people apart, but Wallace is just good with them in a way she isn’t.  and also he’s got the most emotional maturity out of any of these basket cases.

mac is the hacker because she’s god’s gift to computers, duh.

what I really want, though; what any good leverage AU is an excuse to do, is to make a found family out of these losers.  imagine if these five people all...trusted and loved each other, in addition to liking one another??  i’m drooling just thinking about it.

I also think that, ironically enough, being righteous criminals in constant close contact would work wonders for veronica and logan’s relationship, lbr.  if veronica is mastermind-ing their cons, she doesn’t have to wonder what logan—or any of her other friends, for that matter—are doing, and go a little crazy to find out.  it’s an outlet for her control-freak-trust-issues.

aaaand if logan is their hitter/muscle, it’s literally his job to protect everyone, including veronica.  violently, if necessary. 

plus, they can both work out their paranoia on things that aren’t each other—cause it’s not paranoia if they’re really out to get you.

the best episodes always involved Veronica pulling her friends into cons with her; VM the show is already only a hop-skip-and-a-jump away from leverage, anyway!  solving mysteries, sure, but also getting revenge, retrieving items, getting even...providing leverage.

like, seriously.

Veronica and Wallace effortlessly pulling a grift out of their asses when they’re caught in a sticky situation, using that emotional drift comparability in their brOTP.

Mac, getting the respect and cash she deserves for finding information and recovering hard drives and also, giving her righteous side some room to move.

Logan and Weevil sniping at each other, maybe having not-so-faux fights as distractions or part of a con— but having each other’s backs.  playing partners in macho stoicism even though we all know they’re softies sometimes.

Wallace and Mac, standing to the side as exasperated captains of the maturity and stability team while Logan and Veronica share a dumpster fire.

Veronica and Weevil doing that thing, you know, where they’re kind of flirting and kind of pulling one over on their audience and pulling each other out of messes.

Wallace, prince among men, getting to play the handsome and charming credit to his gender he is.  imagine, if you will, him pulling honey-trap cons on marks like sophie deveraux did.  i am and it’s delightful.

the worst part about canon!VM is how much they all (veronica.  largely veronica) tore one another down; betrayed people; didn’t trust them; hurt them; expected the worst and got it in self-fulfilling bullshit.  imagine if all of that went away and then write it for me pleeeaaaseee

i’ve been brainstorming and like, there’s two paths you could go.  one is a complete graft to the leverage fusion, in which they never actually went to high school together but instead are professional criminals who all grew into their own on their own and came together.  in this path, we’d come in on our anti-heroes already in the thick of it—or at least, having deep histories together that allow them to trust one another right away.

the other is like, veronica falls to the “dark side” in high school and drags them all with her, handing out black hats as she goes. perhaps in a world where Aaron Echolls gets acquitted and Duncan Kane does not have an assassin at the ready to avenge his sister outside the law, where Veronica literally can’t sleep at the thought of him out there.  a world where Logan and Weevil have that same insomnia, and Mac and Wallace care about Veronica enough to help. 

and maybe it starts out as just a way to get new evidence so a judge can declare a retrial and get Aaron convicted; but ohhh, Aaron Echolls is not a man who can leave well enough alone.  He’s a rich, powerful, attention seeking mother fucker who likes to taunt logan and veronica about what he did to lily.  so even though it’s not Duncan paying for him to get assassinated, the end result is the same: Aaron dead as a doornail, like he deserves.

Maybe it’s a fake suicide, like Veronica planned out for her criminology course, the literal perfect crime.  Maybe he gets murdered and dumped on Lamb’s doorstep with an audio recording of him confessing—edited by Mac, of course, to make sure Veronica and Logan’s parts in the charade weren’t included.

also i’d like to think that, in this world where they wear black hats to better play white knights, Veronica and Logan have just...the best-worst reputation.  Yeah, they melt around each other, but ho-ly shit they’re still lethal—especially if you put one in danger.   Maybe Logan’s got a reputation as an attack dog, and maybe Veronica’s got a reputation as holding his leash, and maybe they’ve proven they’re willing to do anything to keep each other safe.  Maybe, they made a deal, a long time ago when they started out: Veronica gets to get into anything she wants, whatever crusade is currently pushing her buttons, as long as she brings Logan along to protect her. 

their story is epic, after all.

anyway! In Conclusion, tl;dr, someone please stop me from having veronica mars feelings, and if leverage could please stop being the best found family ever, that would probably help.

[see-arcane]

Things I’m hoping for in season 5

-Jonah Magnus just utterly eating shit in the apocalypse. Could be after a long, drawn-out battle, a fall from grace, a big epic crescendo of comeuppance, etc. 

OR he could just immediately come eye-to-Eye with the consequences of assuming giant evil horror-gods with no actual concept of a rewards system would just casually hand him a crown and let him chill in omnipotent immortality with the big kids, followed by him just as immediately getting boneturned

-Even funnier addendum: the Fears DO have a concept of giving their big herald an omnipotent cookie and Get Out of Eternal Torment Free card, but they take it very, very literally. I.e.

Jonah: “Guys, look, my scheming paid off! I brought you through the Door!”

Fears: “What? No, you didn’t.”

Fears: “Anyway, hi Jon Archive, thanks for bringing us into your tasty human world. Here, have an endless terror buffet.”

Jon: “Well, much as this feels right, I’m actually trying to stick to a diet here and--,”

Fears: “Would it help if we turned Jonah Magnus inside out?”

Jon: “You know, I think it would”

-Basira and Were-Daisy, monster-Hunting duo.

Basira and Were-Daisy, joining the same ‘So Your Significant Other is An Actual Inhuman Horror, But They’re Trying to Make the Best of It,’ club as Jon and Martin. Martin and Basira have several drinks. Jon gets dragged along by Were-Daisy as a monster detector, Were-Daisy has a fun, monster-throttling time.

Basira and Were-Daisy

-Georgie and Melanie have to strike very careful, compromising balances between their own would-be patrons.

Georgie and The End are too close for comfort because Georgie is Fearless-but-Concerned, and wants solace in the notion that, hey, it all has to End somehow, right..? The End smiles and nods.

Melanie discovers late in the game that the ‘neighbors’ she thought she was talking to are actually extensions of the Dark, extending their invitation.  

I want them to hit the goth girlfriend threshold, is what I’m saying

-At the same time, I also want Jon to finally, finally, FINALLY get to have a big cathartic blow-up at the lot of them for all the micro and macro-aggression bullshit they dumped on him pre-Change. Like, a proper, explosive snap in which he lays out their hypocrisies and double-standards and general dogpiling on him as an outlet for their frustration and fears, while Jon was left to nod and agree with all their assessments of him or risk ‘sounding like a monster.’ Because, like,

Basira nonchalantly implying that she’s sorry to see him alive post-coma, that she will ‘put him down’ if he continues to make people feel scared VS giving her girlfriend who Actually Murdered People a pass?

Melanie doing some a-mazing mental gymnastics to make her rage bullet issues somehow because of Jon, who saved her from becoming a Slaughter avatar?

Georgie throwing up a thousand layers’ worth of cold-shouldering and misreading Jon’s whole deal as somehow intentionally fucking up his life and others’? Just because??

Daisy apologized for plotting to murder him post-Unknowing and had a cooldown session, she gets a pass

But yeah, like—let Jon vent. Or, hell, let Martin vent if Jon’s still too self-loathing to bother. Just let someone stand up for Jonathan Sadman Sims, okay? Let him have rights

-The Admiral as a tiny Hunt avatar

-The Admiral encountering Jon the Archive, immediately trotting up to get belly rubs. Belly rubs happen

-Let’s see some of the old school avatars! I want to see the cyclops from Alexandria, I want to see the monsters who’ve been around since B.C.E. come out of the woodwork. Are they having a good time? Are they coming out to tell the youths they done fucked up, you were never supposed to do a ritual successfully, the fuck is wrong with you Jonahlias Bouchnus?? Are they just there to flex on the youngster monsters with all their millennia-old power??? I don’t know! I don’t care! Let me see them!

-THE EXTINCTION. PLEASE GOD LET THE EXTINCTION BE

1. WHAT WIPES OUT THE FEARS BECAUSE

2. THE FACT THAT JONAH LITERALLY CALLED DOWN THE APOCALYPSE FOR THE SAKE OF A) POWER AND B) AN ATTEMPT TO STOP THE EXTINCTION COMING THROUGH PROVES A GREATER FEAR OF EXTINCTION THAN HUMANITY HAS

3. LET THE EXTINCTION HAVE BEEN A COMPLETE IMPOSSIBILITY UNTIL THE MOMENT JOANNE MUGNAS STARTED THE APOCALYPSE, OPENING THE DOOR FOR 15 INSTEAD OF 14

4. WHOOPS –Jonah ‘Now You Fucked Up’ Magnus

-Jon gets to utterly wreck Jonah’s shit

-In fact, let’s just set up a line a entities for said shit-wrecking, everyone gets a turn

-Let us hear Annabelle Cane.

-Let us hear Annabelle Cane.

-LET US HEAR ANNABELLE CANE.

[marcazoshop]

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So this is going to be a bit long but bear with me I had what I believe to be a pointless and incredibly frustrating experience with the assistant manager jamie at your auburn hills great lakes crossing location today I have been coming here for three years I frequent your orlando san marcos and new jersey locations as well at least once a year when we stop we usually spend 5 to 10 thousand dollars on your products the system is simple I go in park in a corner and bring bins to my corner sort them bag them move them to the front register and repeat today I brought a personal duffel bag as it holds about 8 to 12 of your bags worth of stuff I get told that i’m not allowed to use it because it’s policy not a big deal at all I say okay i’ll do that for the rest rather than rebag all of this i’ll just go up in line and pay for it and it can sit behind the counter seems pretty reasonable to me nope I got obstructed suggested that I might be stealing something and not allowed to pass stating if I don’t want to follow the system I can leave he then takes my entire duffel dumps it onto the floor and then rebags it into victoria secret bags then moves it to the front counter so it can be rang in I thought this was a little odd but hey he was doing all the work rebagging it so whatever i’m like dude i’m going to be spending about 8k today all I want to do is come in spend some money get out without any drama what’s the problem whoevers in charge should be thrilled with a sale like this we’re spending 8k keep in mind that I told him that I would do what he wanted and it wasnt’ a big deal and the response was to the effect of stop being lippy and just listen I told him what do you want from me I just agreed with you and said I would use your bags i’m not being lippy at all I know this because I said okay dude not a problem i’ll use your bags his response was maybe if you get to buy it i’m like what are you suggesting that an 8 000 order is something you guys don’t want he’s like yeah if you buy it i’m like dude we are spending 8k today why would I bag up a bunch of stuff and spend 2 3 hours picking our your fabulous product to not buy it anyway so I had 4 credit cards one card had 2 000 one had 3500 one had 2000 and one had 1000 because I am buying for multiple people I had 4 different cards all in my name I wanted one receipt for each card not a big deal to me right wrong again he cited some policy and said if the order is more than 750 items that they aren’t allowed to ring in under 750 items on any one receipt id like to point out that that amount is higher than your employees said they could take as a cash payment I asked him to please show me that I would understand better if I could just read it he was willing to do so he brought out the policy book and to my surprise what it actually said was words to the afffect of cash payments cannot be split up or over 750 items I forget the second half my immediate reply was so what’s the big deal im using credit not cash he snatched the policy book away from me at that point and said you know what you can just listen to me or I don’t have to let you buy anything it’s up to my discretion I then called your orlando outlet and your new jersey outlet and talked to the store managers and cited your policy I was given I asked them to confirm if that was accurate and both said if it was a policy it was news to them I then asked if they would let me buy my order using 4 cards and 4 receipts the woman at orlando said oh my gosh yes we do that every single day I asked if I went to her store if I would have any trouble with this in the future and was told no then she said you can always come down here if you’re in the area and i’ll be happy to take your order after that phone call I tried again here’s the video of that attempt I said listen I have 4 credit cards your register girl said you told her she can’t ring up an order under 750 items that’s 3500 if it’s 5 items not all of my cards have that much I have done multiple receipts every time I came here heck I can even supply them to show it he tells me that because I am order so many items that I can’t have less tan 750 items per receipt so I point around to everyone else and ask what about everyone else you aren’t forcing them to spend a minimum of 750 items what about the final charge i’ll have 750 items for two tickets but the leftover isn’t going to be 750 items you’re not going to let me buy them he shrugged his shoulders to say no at this point I haven’t yelled ive been a bit snarky and sarcastic because I know he’s just giving me a hard time two people ring in our order almost every time I am up there and we were there 3 times in the last 6 months spent a bunch each time so at 730 8pm or so we are done shopping assuming that two people could ring us up ended up being a fantasy he forced one employee only to ring us up later on he comes up when its now close to 9pm and says hey you mind if we ring you up on both registers I chuckle and say no I don’t but you do you don’t want to be breaking that 750 rule do you he glared at me and then sent the employee away and walked off after blinking a few times I laugh because after telling me over and over he couldn’t do it he just got caught trying to do what should have been done to begin with a short while later after 9 I find out that everyone is standing uip front except for the one girl and another associate because none of the rest of them are allowed to help her ring us up the only two people left in the store with about 700 more items to be rang in if that’s not enough since it was a holidy all of these employees are apparently being paid overtime to stand around and wait at a bit after 10 all but two girls leave and one girl is waiting to count cash while the other girl sits and keeps ringing stuff in we apologize profusely we expected two employees to ring us up like always and timed our visit to be out around 9 if this had happened instead of having one literally stand there and watch her for 1 hour and 47 minutes after close we would have all been out on time and no overtime or extra hours spent so finally at 10 47 pm our orders are done we thank the lovely girl lauren and jasmine who got stuck staying 2 hours past close because a manager made up some random policy and had to double down when I pointed out he really needed to follow that 750 rule when he was going to toss another girl on the register if this is policy fine it doesn’t seem to be no manager at your other outlets knew what he was talking about the orlando one insisted that the only restrictions are on cash payments and verified I was paying cash or credit it’s a pretty humiliating experience to get hassled trying to buy panties and bras by someone who’s on some type of power trip the only thing I said sideways to him was that I flat out didn’t believe his policy and that credit absolutely is not the same as cash I didnt call him any names scream at him or did anything to disrupt the store beyond what you see in the videos if this is not policy i’d like an apology from that manager in person or over the phone admitting he was mistaken I would hope that the next time I go there I am not hassled but if not I guess there’s always orlando or new jersey who seem to be quite friendly I also want to give recognition to jasmine and lauren lauren is the poor soul who got stuck ringing everything in alone because of the manager’s silly rule and not allowing anyone to help because it would be in violation of the 750 item rule jasmine was the cash counter who had to wait until we were out of the store to count cash even more interesting is that I had a former employee with me helping me buy and she said she never heard of this policy either but it doesn’t mean it wasn’t added since she left she was just as confused because the manager spent over 30 minutes trying to explain and defend this when that time certainly would have been more efficiently spent doing productive things instead of hassling someone who literally sits in a corner and speaks to no one while sorting through your products one bin at a time id love a call back about this or to find out what exactly is going on ive never been hassled like this before and it was a little frustrating and very trying to keep my cool joe rossetti alexandria gunn See Other related products: I Am A Simple Woman Dog Paw Flip-Flop Wine Trucker T-Shirt

[gravitasfalls]

A rant on fandom etiquette, the GF fandom, and what they did 4 years ago (and now)

By now, my “bullshit” tag has refuted most of the ridiculous hot takes, fun policing, and harassment that fans of Stanford Pines have had to face from the wider Gravity Falls fandom. But these rebuttals fall short of naming the real problem with anti-Ford wank: we never should have seen it in the first place.

People might have genuinely forgotten this, but fandom used to have etiquette against character hate. We called it “wank” and “bashing” instead of dignifying it as “discourse”. As late as 2014, fandoms on this very site had “X hate” or “anti-X” tagging systems for blacklisting, as courtesy to people who liked X thing...

...a far cry from GF fans of 2015 demonizing Ford in the most inexplicable ways, making every post a platform for that, siccing their followers on anyone fully positive about him, then pretending that never happened post-finale as they continue the bashing more insidiously to this day.

Like, what even was that? There’s a lot to unpack in those people’s arguments but let’s just throw out the whole suitcase.

(Under the cut: Snapshots of discourse I shouldn’t have had to put up with over the years, and snark-based coping with that. It gets ugly, you’ve been warned.)

Ford is irredeemable/deserves to suffer, why he didn’t even thank Stan!!1

Thanks I hate it! “It” being your apparent decision that, because you can’t make the fictional character suffer, real people who like him are the next best thing.

Ford is egotistical! Have I mentioned on literally every post I think his only trait is “egotistical”?

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. But while that is just, like, your opinion man, you’re entitled to it on your own posts; you’re falsely entitled about it by forcing it on dissenters’ posts and inboxes.

*dumps negativity into inboxes anyway*

Your Hot Takes have disturbed and insulted me. You fools are unworthy of my great knowledge. The era of human enlightenment shall never come to pass.

You really think Ford is some kind of hero?

Only after you told me I wasn’t Allowed to see him as one and I Examined My Desires™ like you demanded! Funny how critical thinking ≠ agreeing with you.

Ford is your favorite? WHY DO YOU HATE MABEL.

Better question, why are you copying “WHY DO YOU HATE AMERICA” logic? 9/11 did fan drama I swear

Ford is NOT PURE OF HEEEAAART, so you have to Constantly Explicitly Acknowledge his Sins and interrogate what relating to him says about you.

I got no friends ‘cause they read the papers. It’s funny, actually, projecting onto him got me dangerously close to processing some negative experiences from my past... good thing I have you here to shut those thoughts down <3 Thanks for saving me from myself uwu

If you just want to project onto a comfort character in peace, Stan is right there! His lack of fantasy elements makes him more relatable anyway!

Ford brought Bill’s manipulation on himself!

Damn fandom, back at it again with the GROSS VICTIM BLAMING

FFS why is this take as prominent now as ever??? at least the outlandish criticisms were funny, this one just makes me want to be dead.

Ford is abusive/manipulative because he doesn’t make fun of Dipper/ made a case for his apprenticeship/ called Mabel good/ complimented her personality!

(Yes, people did these mental gymnastics; yes, my soul left my body instantly.)

STOP trying to justify Ford’s actio-ma’am this is an Arby’s. also:

Ford is the Epitome of Toxic Masculinity, if you defend him either he’s your Male Power Fantasy or you’re a ditzy fangirl broad with ovaries for brains!

Ah yes, the two genders. Pack it in, everyone, we’ve reached peak feminism and patriarchy is over.

Someone negativity-tagged my Ford post, WTF?! I’m not “anti-Ford”, I’m “pro Ford-learning-a-lesson”!

And pro his-fans-never-having-a-moment-of-peace, apparently! Sorry I assumed you were a hater by your complete lack of positive things to say about him tho

Ford is a sociopath/deserves death for having no empathy!

"Tumblr is as ableist as any majority-conservative site," I say into the mic. The crowd boos. I begin to walk off in shame, when a voice speaks and commands silence from the room. "You’re right," they say. I look for the owner of the voice. There in the 3rd row stands: tumblr.

*Dozens of 10000+ note posts calling Ford stupid, manipulative, solely at fault for everything that went wrong, other inanities*

(This is the fandom that made me get Xkit. I’m sure hundreds of my 1000+ blocked posts are theirs.)

If you like Ford on any terms but ours then I’m sorry, but Gravity Falls just isn’t for you, k?

I don’t have a flippant response to this one. Just... stop. No one has to agree with you about this character; no, nor with me. No one even has to engage with fandom moralistically; I promise it wouldn’t hurt anyone if I were to watch this show without having to Interrogate its Morality. It wouldn’t even hurt if people voiced character hate within reasonable bounds of tagging, as I’ve said. But instead they spread it like the plague in the name of Purity and insinuated (using ages-old “ur a fake fan!!1″ no less) that we don’t get to have outlets. I’m tired.

Look at my hilarious/satisfying art of Ford saying OOC strawman things, Stan beating him up, the kids turning their backs on him! (Srsly look at it I’ve put it in all the tags)

You’re madness, Gravity Falls fandom. Virulent madness. And everything you touch dies with you.

This is only a fraction of shit we’ve had to wade through, practically every day while the show was running. You couldn’t avoid it if you followed popular blogs. I saw the best meta writers of my fandom dogpiled by BNFs, dragging themselves through the blue hellsite at dawn looking for a fix-it fix. And people now expect me to believe it was “just Discourse” or that anything equivalent happened “in reverse” toward Stan. If I didn’t know better that they don’t know better, I’d call gaslighting.

I don’t expect to change anything. In fact, until this blog’s next go-around I don’t intend on seeking out new content anymore. I can’t keep looking at a fandom where the consensus on a canonically abused character’s victimization is that it was stupid, funny, a moral failing, or deserved, and expect anything to improve.

But to anyone else these people hurt: your anger or upset is valid, and I’m sorry. None of us deserved this. And I’m not letting it follow me into the next decade and make me forget why I liked this show in the first place, even if the only way to do that right now is cut off from the fandom a bit. I’m telling you, it never should have come to that. I don’t know if negativity-tagging can ever catch on here, considering tumblr has no boundaries by design and fandom no boundaries by choice... but for the sake of everyone who comes next, Gravity Falls fandom, make an effort.

[barbariccia]

X57: Bring Down The Sky

ok, i lied. there’s one last thing for me to get through in mass effect 1 - the BDtS dlc, which i’ve never played through before. it’s relatively short and available for free if you play on pc - included with the base game on origin, and can be downloaded on ea’s website for steam.

who wants some Additional Plot all crammed into one long post?!

in true ME style, you’re thrown directly into the action. once you enter the area this mission takes place on via the galaxy map, you’re shown a familiar looking world... and an asteroid slowly approaching.

and we’re dumped onto the asteroid itself in the mako.

it’s pretty easy to see the objective even if you weren’t paying attention to the distress call.

three giant fusion torches are propelling the asteroid at great speed toward a looming planet that looks rather earth-like, though we’re not in the local cluster at all. this is terra nova of the exodus cluster, one of the first planets colonised by humans after they discovered the mass relays and what lay beyond, and the second “extrasolar colony”, the first being no other than elysium, which we’ve heard about before.

there’re bases around the three tourches, all armed with heavy turrets, easy enough to dispatch of via the mako’s own gun, and once we make it inside the first base, we’re treated with a... rather unusual sight.

these charming fellows are batarians, outlaws and pirates for the most part, and while not seen in the base game, they go on to be the face of space-orcs, in a sense. vicious and seemingly war-hungry, they’re directly responsible for a ruthless shepard’s background, who was stationed on torfan and lived through their assault, the only person of their troop to do so.

we clear them and their varren out easily enough, and disable the first torch at a panel upstairs.

read the subtitles, shepard.

the communication line she’s using goes dead. on our way out...

we meet a man, who shoots and immediately panics when he sees the chest he attacked belongs to a human. eh, i’ve had worse.

this is simon, the chief engineer. he’s worried, of course - we’re heading right toward terra nova, where there are four million people living. not ideal.

well, that’s just fucking dandy, then.

Simon: It would be like millions of fusion bombs striking at once. Millions. The heat of the blast... a thousand kilmoeters away, clothes will ignite. There’ll be global wildfires. Air shock will flatten everything for hundreds of kilometers. Terra Nova will die, Shepard. Not just our colony - the planet. There’ll be a climate shift. Mass extinctions. The ecosystem won’t recover for thousands of years. Millions, maybe.

Shepard: Any chance it’ll land in the oceans?

Simon: That would be even worse! Tsunamis would sweep inland at hundreds of kilometers per hour. Millions of tonnes of water would be vaporized at the point of impact. Global cloud coverage. The plants could all die. And if they go, the whole ecosystem rolls over. I-- I’d have to run the numbers, but take my word for it: it’d be bad.

traditional mol nerd notes, since i was a dinosaur kid: the idea of the asteroid that decimated the dinosaurs (and began one of the 5th largest mass extinction events in eath’s history) was only first proposed in 1980, which is way more recent than i thought it was. the asteroid itself is thought to have landed in the area of chicxulub, mexico, and the collision itself is considered to have released around 100 teratonnes of TNT -equivalent in energy. so big boom. as of 2019, dr sean gulick has done research ⁽¹⁾, ⁽²⁾ on the crater itself and the rock record of the impact, and doctorial student robert depalma (and coauthor professor phillip manning) has excavated the Tanis area of Hell Creek ⁽³⁾ amd published a paper on the findings of deposits in the area ⁽⁴⁾, though the latter has been criticised for being potentially sensationalist, having been published by media outlets before it was accepted at PNAS.

either way, it’s commonly accepted that the impact would have thrown enough dust into the atmosphere to have caused an impact winter for up to a year, which was likely exacerbated by vaporised rocks in the atmosphere that helped to reduce sunlight reaching the surface, and causing acid rain. this in turn likely led to the oceans cooling and becoming more acidic. if wildfires were also on the menu, it would have contributed to a greenhouse effect.

whatever happened, the impact led to about 75% of all species on earth becoming completely extinct, so terra nova’s not looking especially peachy with twice the damage incoming.

tl;dr yeah seems pretty spot on

this comes out when you select the renegade’s “damn aliens” response, which is pretty incredible. even as shepard you have the option to be xenophobic... but batarians really haven’t proven themselves to be much more than as aggressive as krogans, honestly, if not worse, somehow. for a non-ruthless shepard to think this way... yeesh. goes to show just how much the attack on elysium affected the human psyche, even if you’re happy enough to bring aboard most other kinds of aliens aboard your stealth cruiser.

well, let’s get on our merry way. simon tells us that one of the torches is surrounded by proximity mines, which were going to be used as excavation tools once the asteroid was brought to terra nova - where it was en route toward anyway, by design - so we have to be extra careful going over them. yay.

never change, shep.

he also tells us that he had a crew working on the asteroid when the batarians hit. it’s easy enough to find them... or what’s left of them, once the batarians were through with them.

they’re, naturally, spread around the asteroid.

the message is cut off by the sound of an explosion.

and as for the third...

all three are very, very dead. but hey, on the way we at least got to turn on the transmission tower once again.

party on, dudes.

after you turn off the second torch, kate contacts you again.

we get the chance to see what’s going on with kate. there’s a man with her, and a small group of batarians that have them cornered.

spoiler: he doesn’t make it.

no time like the present to go turn that third and final torch off. after we do, there’s a small group of aliens waiting for us.

we have a little chat with our new friend, who tells us that he knows he’s in way over his head. another batarian by the name of balak is running the show, and “what balak wants, balak gets”.

[Renegade choice: Don’t be stupid.]

Shepard: Spoken like a true lackey. You get me out of here and I’ll take care of Balak. Or you can take your chances with me.

Charn: An, uh, interesting proposal. It certainly has benefits over the current situation. (to another batarian) Shut it down. This is Balak’s problem now.

he gives us a keycard, tells us where to find the boss, and scarpers. balak’s elsewhere, in a different facility, also guarded by turrets.

in case you don’t want to look at your map, the red gives it away. why’s it red? who cares!

there’s a hell of a shootout waiting for us in the final facility, but once we’ve cleared the area of what feels like every batarian ever conceived, balak himself deigns to come show his face.

Balak: I’m leaving this asteroid. If you try to stop me, I’ll detonate these charges and your helper and her friends are all going to die.

Shepard: You don’t get to leave, Balak. Not after what you’ve done.

Balak: What I’ve done? This is nothing compared to what’s been done to the batarians. We’ve been forced into exile. Forced to survive on what we can scrounge up. It’s been like that for decades.

Shepard: Why take it out on these people? They didn’t do anything to you or your race.

Balak: Didn’t do anything? Aside from colonizing a world that could have been ours? Aside from using resources that should have been ours? We were left to defend ourselves. But the humans were stronger than us. We knew that. The Council knew that. But it didn’t matter.

Balak: It was you. You and your kind are the only reason we’re in this position.

Shepard: How does killing innocent people make up for that?

Balak: We had no other options. Sometimes you need to get someone’s attention before they’ll listen.

Shepard: Is that was Elysium was? A way to get our attention? Well, you got it. And when we responded you ran like cowards. Now you want to start it all over again.

Balak: You couldn’t possibly understand... Actually, you just don’t want to understand. And I’m done wasting my breath.

the choice is, once again, in your hands. that’s a very interesting dialogue they have before this... and one i can understand both sides of. it’s worth noting that originally the batarians were welcomed into citadel space, but their aggression provoked more than one crisis intergalactically. their exile from the council is recent- they weren’t happy with humans colonising in areas that batarians already considered claimed (this is the skyllian verge and elysium, for those keeping track), and when they were told no by the council, they closed their embassy, severed all relations, and became a rogue state, retreating back to their own systems and becoming known primarily as pirates and slavers within the terminus systems, outside of citadel space. those in the terminus systems are actively rebelling against their own government, too, who prefer to stay in their space.

i don’t want to use the word self-imposed exile, but from the human’s point of view it’s very much a throwing your toys out of the pram because you can’t get what you want act. then again, from the batarian point of view, why should they stick with a council that doesn’t seem to consider them as on equal footing enough to grant them rights to colonise the land as they claim it?

i chose to let balak go, and save the hostages. we’re stopping the asteroid either way, and death for death is... well. not ideal. if we’re throwing away our ideals and doing the whole eye for an eye thing we should have started a long time ago.

worth noting here that the base game offers a sidemission i remember me to colonist shepards, where you meet a survivor of mindoir, a colony that was raided by batarians ~13 years before game’s start, and is the colonist equivalent of the sole survivor mission dead scientists. after the colony was attacked, the surviving girl was taken by slavers, and the sidemission deals with you taking her down from a suicidal response to systems alliance soldiers finding and killing her batarian slavers. provided you talk her down, she resurfaces in a minor way in the next game, with an email thanking you for helping her. i think it’s a damn shame that this sidemission is only available to colonist shepard, because in no way is this an isolated view of the batarians and the things they’ve done and would have been a nice bit of additional flavour text for the rest of the game, considering batarians are only mentioned in passing once or twice (and in basegame only get a concept art picture by their codex entry, even).

(laughs in virmire)

you tell simon about the dead engineers you found, and let the hostages go.

she explains that the man the batarians killed was her brother, who convinced her to join the team in the first place. you get the chance to ask her a couple of questions, mostly about herself, but also...

Kate: I don’t even think they knew. When they first arrived, they were talking about getting us back to their ship. They wanted to sell us as slaved. When Balak showed up, everything changed. It was his idea to redirect the asteroid. Said it was the will of the batarian rebellion, whatever that is.

considering balak and his contingency are the outliers of their society... well, buddy, i hate to say it, but you don’t speak for the rest of your people. sure, tensions are high with humans... but they are with the turians, as well, and the turians didn’t throw a hissy and exile themselves and have their people considered the worst of the worst by even their government for the practises of a few.

eghhh. this is one of those surprisingly complicated situations. this isn’t the first time bioware discusses this concept - dragon age 2 comes to mind, and i’m sure i’ll get around to that as well sometime - but we’re not really given any way of viewing the batarians as anything other than an enemy in BDtS. we do see more batarians in the future, and that’s its own thing. we’ll revisit this later.

Bring Down The Sky, complete in around an hour. not bad for a (now) free dlc mission, but the stuff i’ve done here today won’t carry over to mass effect 2. turns out the last save i had on the normandy was actually just after feros; all my other save states were in the middle of something of on the citadel at the end of the game where there’s no way to get out and do something else. thankfully, not having completed the dlc doesn’t affect anything in the future too much, though i think i won’t be getting some me2 background commentary. not that i’d know what it was, having never done this content before.

ah well. upwards and onwards, crew!

[missmentelle]

Obviously it depends on the people involved and a lot of other factors, but thoughts/opinions/advice on whether or not to get into a romantic relationship freshman year of college? is it too early or something to that effect

Unfortunately, there’s just no way for me to advise you one way or the other here - it really, really depends on a lot of different factors. Some people get into relationships in their freshman year and regret it. Some people get into relationships in their freshman year and meet their spouse. Your mileage may vary. There are both situational and relationship factors to consider; sometimes people have bad relationships in freshman year because they truly aren’t ready for a relationship, and sometimes people have bad relationships that would have been bad at literally any point in their lives, and it just happened to take place in freshman year. Having a relationship at any point in your life is kind of a gamble, and you are ultimately the only one who can decide if the situation is right for you. 

I do think, however, that there are some factors that make you more likely to have a successful college relationship; if you’re thinking of dating someone seriously but you aren’t sure if you’re ready, you might want to start by asking yourself:

Have I adjusted to the college environment? There are always going to be stressful and overwhelming periods in your college career, but the initial adjustment to college during your first year can be especially stressful. Have you gotten used to the level of work that is required and the large classes that you have? Do you have a good handle on how your classes are set up, and how to follow a syllabus? Do you feel comfortable going to your professors or TAs for help? Have you adjusted to being on your own for the first time, and to life with a roommate if you have one? It’s probably a good idea to wait until you’ve acclimatized to the college environment before you start dating - at the very least, you should probably give yourself a couple of weeks to settle in. 

Is my mental health in a good place? How are you feeling? Are you dealing with the usual amount of college stress, or are you having deeper feelings of hopelessness and despair? Are you taking care of yourself to the best of your ability - sleeping, exercising, eating the occasional vegetable? Do you have a support system? Hobbies? Outlets for your stress? Basically, you want to make sure that you’re in a place where you won’t dump all your emotional needs on a partner, and where you can also offer them occasional emotional support. 

Am I able to set and enforce my boundaries? Balancing schoolwork and a relationship requires boundaries - you need to be able to tell your partner “no, not tonight, I need to study”, and follow through with that boundary. Second chances are expensive and time-consuming when it comes to college, and it’s really important that you protect your GPA while you are entering into a dating relationship. It’s also important that you know how to enforce other boundaries as well - people enter college with wildly different levels of sexual and relationship experience, and it’s important that you have the ability to make sure that the relationship progresses at a pace you are comfortable with. 

Am I dating because I genuinely want the other person specifically, or am I just dating to date? This is another big one - a lot of people enter college with the idea that they are woefully behind on dating and sexual experience, and that they should rush into a romantic relationship right away to “catch up”. This is a mistake. Rushing into a relationship with the first person who will have you puts you in the uncomfortable position of trying to navigate a very stressful time in your life, while also having a relationship with someone you might not be in any way compatible with. If you don’t have your eye on a special someone in particular, it’s okay to wait to get into a relationship. 

How does the other person’s schedule align with mine? Differences in schedules can be overcome, but the more your schedules clash, the more difficult the relationship will likely be. If you and the object of your affection are going to have difficulty seeing each other more than once or twice a month, it’s important to ask yourself if you can handle that in a relationship, if you are willing to rearrange your schedule to get more time together, or if you’d prefer to look for a partner with more time available to spend with you. 

Do we both have clear expectations for the relationship, and are those expectations compatible? Before getting into a relationship, try to be as clear as possible about what it is you’re looking for. Is this a casual thing that will end when the school year does? Or is this more of a serious relationship that you’re hoping to carry through the summer and beyond? It’s not always possible to know exactly what you want out of a relationship, but it’s important to try to have at least a rough idea, and to keep your potential partner in the loop. Not communicating about your expectations is a recipe for hurt feelings and intense conversations, which is not something that anyone wants to experience when they are up to their ears in midterms. 

Ultimately, whether to date in freshman year or not is your call. You know yourself, you know your workload, and hopefully you know at least a little bit about the other person. Is this something that would add value to your life? Or is this just something that will increase your stress? You are the only one who can answer those questions. Dating in freshman year can be worth it for some, and not worth it for others - there is always a bit of risk involved. Best of luck to you!Miss Mentelle

[artificialqueens]

Impolite 'Thank yous': Chapter one and two (Branjie) - BlackHighHeels

AN: I finally decided to get an account on here, because I was inspired to write this story because of a request I found here by chance while battling with another Branjie idea. This is for Akarana, who made the request. I hope I’ll do the idea justice.

This is inspired by Call me by your name (the book more than the movie)

(Read on AO3)

Chapter 1

When I saw him for the first time, it was also the first time I became aware that a ‘Thank you’ can sound fucking rude. I mean, not the intentional aggressive or ironic 'Thank you’ you say when you’re damn angry or want to be rude. But the kind of 'Thank you’ that just shows that the person saying it, doesn’t mean it one bit.

He stepped out of the taxi, let the driver dump all of his bags and suitcases onto our front lawn without helping him and then just said 'Thank you’ with his stupid Canadian accent.

I walked over to him, and was surprised by how much taller he was than me. I’m not exactly tall, but him… Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Blonde curls, blue-green eyes, bushy eyebrows, white, milky skin…different from me in every way. He was a pretty white boy.

Maybe that’s when I fell for him?

I helped him carry his stuff inside anyway, because otherwise Alexis would surely whoop my ass. Blondie was his guest after all, the prodigy drag daughter of one of Alexis’ pageant friends from Canada. He would stay with us for six weeks to get an idea about the pageant system in the US and then he would leave again. And I was asked to be on my best behaviour and help my 'drag sister’ out. I even had to move out of my room and into the drag room, so he had a bed and the bigger room.

“Jose,” I held out my hand once we stood inside the house, surrounded by his luggage.

“Brock.” We quickly shook hands and I was surprised how cold his hands were, here in the Florida heat.

“Alexis! El muneco de nieve esta aqui!” I watched his face for a reaction to the stupid nickname, but there was none. Looked like he didn’t speak Spanish. His face showed no emotion at all. He was intimidating.

“Brooke, so nice to meet you,” Alexis came out of his office with a large smile and followed by his husband Jeffrey.

“Nice to meet you, too.” While the introductions were made and smalltalk about the travel exchanged, I let my eyes wander over him again. He wore grey sweatpants and white trainers. A large, red T-shirt that had a hole just above the seam on his back. Beside his obvious lack of fashion sense he seemed very confident, but kind of aloof as he spoke to my drag parents.

“Jose will show you your room,” Alexis said and brought the attention back to me.

“You mean my room,” I couldn’t help but grumble.

“Take his bags with you, por favor,” Alexis ignored my remark.

“Who am I? The bag boy?” I turned to the guest and pointed to one of his huge ass suitcases. “You can carry that yourself, you hear me, white boy?” Then I grabbed the smallest of the other bags and led the way to what was usually my room. “This is yours now, usually it’s mine. Keep your fingers off my stuff on the left side of the closet. Right side is yours. I’m in the room over there and we share the bathroom. You better not be a messy ho, put the toilet seat down and don’t leave toothpaste in the sink.” With the warning I left the room and went over to my temporary home. Jeffrey had put a small bed into Alexis’ drag room, but it would do for the time being. I had a bed, a tv and my video games and make up.

***

When Alexis called for dinner I knocked on his door and waited until he finally came out so I could take him downstairs with me. He was still wearing the same stupid outfit, even though I had heard him taking a shower earlier. To celebrate his arrival nearly every member of the house of Mateo was present.

“Jose, gambas?” Victoria asked me and already handed the plate over, knowing that I wouldn’t eat much of the rest of what was served. Meanwhile Brock didn’t seem to have that problem and stacked his plate with a little bit of everything and uttered his stupid “thank you” after each plate that was handed to him.

“You’re only eating shrimp and rice?” he addressed me at some point, after the discussion about his long travel and the placements in pageants of my drag sisters had come to an end.

“Yeah, I’m a pescatarian.”

“Really?” he smiled. I felt that he made fun of me and wanted to punch the stupid grin of his face.

“Really. Got a problem with that?”

“Not at all. Just surprised, because everyone else seems to be enjoying their meat.”

“Don’t want any animals to be killed for my dinner. And I prefer a different kind of meat or sausage. Just need a gay club and some juicy trade for that, though, if you get my drift.” He nearly chocked on his beans and started coughing and finally the smile was wiped off his face. I just raised an eyebrow and exchanged a look with Jelitza. What kind of drag queen was he? Surprised by a comment about sex? This could be fun after all. Maybe the six weeks of him staying wouldn’t be as horrible as I had first thought and I could like fucking with him at least. Instead I grew to hate him over the next couple of days.

***

Maybe it happened when he came along to walking the dogs, my own dog Riley and Alexis’ dog, the next morning and I showed him the neighbourhood. A black cap backwards on his head, his feet stuck in black espadrilles while the rest of him wore the same outfit again. One curl snuck out from underneath the hat and fell into his face a couple of times. Each time he stroked it back and huffed in annoyance. He held the leash of Alexis’ dog more loosely than I ever did and still, the dog pulled less than it did with me. We walked quietly side by side, except for the moments when I pointed out a shop, the house where two of my drag sisters lived or the dog sitter.

It might have also been wile we worked on the new pageant costumes out on the patio. He glued rhinestone after rhinestone to the fabric with incredible accuracy, while I got distracted every couple of minutes by the chatter around me, a bird that few by, Riley who wanted my attention and by him, by his concentration and total lack of attention to what was going on around him. Whenever he glued on the last stone in a row his tongue peeked out between his teeth and wet his lips. The wetness it left behind glistened in the sunshine until it dried a couple of seconds later and was gone.

Possibly it was when we went grocery shopping together. Or during the first joined dance practice when he twirled around the room on his tiptoes. Or maybe when I woke up during his second night at the house, because his loud snores could be heard through the wall between our rooms.

“You want me to show you the pool?” It was Sunday afternoon and only the two of us were home. I could use some time in the sun and the water before I had to go back to work the next day. It was also the perfect offer in this heat and everyone always came over to cool down in the water.

“I think I’ll go to the mall instead. But thank you.” There it was again that polite impolite way of keeping people at arm’s length. Me being one of them. It hurt. And it busted the dream bubble I had of the both of us in swim shorts, all wet and delicious.

“Suit yourself, mami.” I shrugged and turned around to go to my room and get changed anyway.

“Can you drive me?” He stopped me. He’d only ben with us for three days and didn’t know the way to the mall yet.

After deciding that the clothes he wanted to buy would be better bought at the outlet center, I drove him there instead. The drive was silent until he made me stop the car and took the key from me. I was banished to the passenger’s seat in my own car, because of my 'erratic, irresponsible, crazy and dangerous driving that will kill us’- his words, not mine. I took revenge by letting him buy some more ugly ass shirts and shorts, because he only had brought clothes that were too warm. How damn stupid could you be? Bringing sweaters and long jeans to Florida?

“Alexis said you have to go back to work tomorrow. What do you do?”

“Drag.”

“Beside drag. Or is it your day job as well?”

“I work at MAC. I’m a make-up artist. And you?”

“Drag.”

“Beside drag? Or is it your day job as well?” I repeated his words, mocking him.

“Yes.” I snorted. Of course it was. A guy that looked like this and could dance like that could totally make a living simply by doing drag. “I used to be a ballet dancer though.” He smiled. I smiled back. He looked younger when he smiled, not that he looked old otherwise. Just his aloof behaviour and the stick up his ass was kind of getting old. “Ever did some ballet?”

“No. I was just always on the dance team at school. We rocked out ghetto style, grinding and shaking out booties.”

“I can see that.” No laughter, not even a smile. I couldn’t place the look he gave me. It gave me hot flashes.

“It’s getting fucking hot. Wanna hang out by the pool now or go to the beach? I got shorts and towels in the car.” I offered, seeing as he wiped the sweat off his forehead again, as we were sitting outside, sipping cold drinks in the shade.

“You go ahead. I still have to get some stuff. And I have to get a rental anyway, so I’ll drive back on my own. ” With another 'thank you’ he got off his chair and left, vanished into the Nike outlet store.

I felt stupid for even offering spending more time with him and getting rejected again. If he wanted to keep sweating and shopping then that’s what he was gonna get. I grabbed my wallet and keys and drove my erratic, irresponsible, crazy and dangerous ass to the beach and hung out with my cholas. Fuck him, thank you very much!

***

Most likely I fell for him without really realising it. I always noticed what outfits he was wearing.

When he finally showed up at the pool for the first time on his fourth day and shook the water out of his curls, making it fly everywhere, I wanted to run my fingers through his hair, then down over the slight stubble on his cheeks, tangle them in his chest hair. I yearned to see if his white skin would turn red, if I sucked on his neck and wondered if his skin would taste like the pool water, sun lotion or just him.

Five days into his stay I showed our new dance routine to the other dancers. They had problems with the slight jump before the death drop and were afraid they would hurt themselves. I showed them how to do it, then went on to show them the rest. Half way through the routine I felt his eyes on me. I kept dancing, concentrated on the music and the beat. I added a little jaunt to my steps, turned up the energy, straightened my shoulders. Still,  I was aware of his wandering gaze, the keen smile and the warmth in his gaze that melted the ice which usually surrounded his whole being. It made my heart beat even faster and the flush on my face had nothing to do with the dancing.

When the music stopped I looked at him, our eyes met, but instead of the admiration I had hoped to find, I was met with disapproval and something similar to hatred. It nearly knocked my over and I stumbled backwards. What had I done to deserve this? My dancing surely wasn’t that bad. Honestly, my ability to dance was the only thing I had ever really been confident in. It shook me to the core and suddenly I didn’t want to dance in front of him anymore. Or be in his presence in any other way, if he disliked me that much.

I stayed away from him for the next two days, which wasn’t hard. Usually when I came back from work he was already gone. “Out clubbing” Alexis let me know and wiggled his eyebrows. We didn’t even talk to each other when we accidentally ran into each other in the bathroom or anywhere else around the house.

***

When the weekend came and another 'family dinner’ came up before we’d all go out to do drag together at the club, I felt his eyes on me all through dinner. I ignored him and kept talking to Victoria in Spanish, knowing he didn’t understand it.

“You want one?” he asked me, holding out a cigarette, when we were waiting for Jeffrey to bring the van around, our costumes already loaded into the car.

“I don’t smoke,” I told him.

“You’re smarter than me, papi.” He smirked and blew the smoke out into the night.

“I know.” I mirrored his smile and laughed when he bumped his shoulder playfully into mine. Just like that we were talking again.

Chapter 2

Even now, years later, there are many things that remind me of his first week with us. The scent of the sunblock he used back then, feeling the hot wind of an even hotter summer’s day against my skin or hearing one of the songs that played the night he first came to the club with us and saw me in drag the first time. Also anything that is hot and cold at the same time, like deep fried ice-cream; hot and cold, hot and cold, hot and cold like him during those first weeks. His mood changed so quickly I couldn’t keep up and got burned each time. Freezer burn or burned by the heat, it didn’t matter; the pain was still the same.

He stayed close while we got ready in the small changing room backstage. Alexis and Jeffrey were next door, but me and my drag sisters always got ready together and then the parents would join us and fix what we missed: Make up not blended correctly, a loose curl here or a missed button somewhere.

Brock wouldn’t go on stage with us that night, he was just there. He watched us carefully, watched me carefully, but didn’t offer help, not even when my zipper got stuck. Once Nivana had fixed it I turned  and said 'Thank you’ in the same detached way he always did. Niv’ got the joke and we both cracked up. He didn’t laugh with us. Instead a meaningless small smile showed on his face and stayed there until we were in full drag.

I knew he was somewhere in the crowd when I hit the stage and did my first number of the night, could feel his gaze again. I crouched down, slowly went back up and shook my ass as much as I could. Did he want a piece of that? Did he want to touch me, not with looks but with his hands, his lips, his tongue, as much as I wanted to touch him? Did he like me better in or out of drag? Yet, I questioned if he liked me at all. His face was not giving anything away.

I should just stay away from him.

I de-dragged after my second number and wiped the make-up off the best I could, before I went out to the club.

“You drink Tequila?” he asked me when I had barely stepped out from behind the curtain and shoved a shot glass in my hand. I’d had three already on stage, but who was I to say no? I simply tapped my glass against his and we both downed the shot.

“Trade looks good tonight. Anyone you like?” I wanted to find out what he was into and smirked. Twinks? Bears? Muscle guys? Latinos? Fuck, I didn’t even know if he was a top or bottom.

“Maybe.” He didn’t smile, didn’t blink. Just looked over to he bar and ordered us two more shots.

“I’m gonna dance, white boy. You good here?” I didn’t want an answer to the question, I just wanted to get away from him. His mood was killing my mood and that wasn’t acceptable on a Friday night. This was the time for drag, drinks, drugs and sex. Screw him if he wanted to sulk in silence.

He surprised me by following me to the dance-floor. “I love that song.”

“It’s Ri-Ri, of course you love that song, bitch!” I exclaimed and started dancing. So did he and watched me at the same time once again.

“How do you do that?"

"What?”

“That move? How do you move your hips that way?” Heat shot through me, when I realised which part of my body his eyes were focussed on, his full attention on me.

“Ever tried belly dancing?” I gave him a smug smile and showed him the belly roll move, holding my shirt up with my chin so he could see it better.

“That’s not the move I’m talking about.” He was finally smiling, showing off his cute dimples. I did the same movement, but reversed the belly wave. He started laughing.

“Not the move either. And you know it.” His eyes sparkled, his mouth was still laughing and I realised we were flirting with each other.

“Oh, you mean this move?” I moved my hips from side to side, as sensually as I could. Aware of his eyes on me I felt my dick getting hard. Wrong time for that, absolutely. He tried to mimic my movements, but failed.

“How’d you do it? What’s the secret?” His tone was a mixture of frustration and amusement.

“Get on your tippy-toes, mami, and follow my fingers with your hips.” I touched his right hip bone through his jeans, careful not to brush against any skin. Then his left lower back. Right lower back. Left front. Left back. Once he got the hang of it and loosened up, I stepped back, stopped touching him, ended the sweet torture and got my dick back under control before he would notice.

“I think I got it.” He looked so damn proud of himself and his smile lit up the whole dance-floor.

“Keep going in figures of eight and you a belly dance ho now.”

“Where did you learn that?”

“My dance teacher at school was half Egyptian and showed us. Just with different music.” It switched back to hip hop, Ri-Ri long gone. I went back to dancing along to this beat, but Brock stopped.

“Thank you,” he told me and it sounded as fake as always. He turned around and left me dancing on my own, while he went to the bar and chatted up some guy there. I was back to hating him, stupid asshole, and gave myself over to the music and the cute guy who came over a couple of minutes later, grinding against my body and feeling me up right there. I didn’t give a fuck if Brock was watching us. He could say 'Thank you’ for the show later.

***

It was the next day, I was lying in my room, catching Pokemon, when he knocked and walked in before I even said something. He must have realised me giving him the cold shoulder after the night before. I hadn’t really slept, because I kept wondering how much he had seen. Just the dancing and grinding? The kissing? The hand down my pants? The hand job in a dark corner of the club? Anything? Nothing? Did he even care? I had finally fallen asleep in the early morning hours when I made myself giggle by imagining him hooking up and then saying his fucking stupid 'Thank you’ during or after.

“Wanna come swimming with me?”

“Pool or beach?”

“Pool.  Vic and Niv’ called, they’re already there. Alexis told me.” I nodded, switched my video game off and got up.

“I’m gonna change. Five minutes.” When I made it downstairs he had a whole backpack with stuff. Later I found out it was sunscreen, food, a small ball and a book. We walked the short distance to the neighbourhood pool in silence. I didn’t know what to say, without sounding stupid or getting a fucking 'Thank you’ back. We took two chairs which were standing side by side and I took off my shirt, spread the towel out, lay down and closed my eyes. Imagining him shirtless was better than really seeing him shirtless, because he couldn’t see my thoughts and dreams, but he could see where my eyes linger on his white, creamy skin, his nipples, his belly button.

I smelled the scent of his sunblock and could hear him squishing the tube and the way his hand glided over his own skin. I wanted him to ask me to rub the lotion on his back so badly. I dreaded him asking me to rub the lotion on his back even worse. He didn’t ask me though, fucking bitch.

“Jose! Ven acá!” Vic yelled from the water and I opened my eyes. He even splashed some in my direction.

“Later,” I replied and turned on my stomach, closed my eyes again, ignoring the chaos around me. Brock left, jumped into the water, joked around with my sisters and friends and finally came back out, towelled himself dry and sat down on his chair. I didn’t see any of it, but I could hear it. Even when my eyes were closed all of my attention was on him, where he was and what he was doing.

“You’re turning red,” he said after I had felt him watching me for a while.

“I don’t get sunburned. It’ll be tan tomorrow,” I muttered without opening my eyes.

I felt the luke-warm lotion first, before his cold hands touched my hot skin. Him touching me, running his hand over my lower back and rubbing the lotion in, nearly gave me a heart-attack. It felt like my brain short-circuited, I was rock hard in seconds and jumped in my chair when his thumb dipped into the dimple on my lower back, just above the seam of my swim-trunks.

“You ok?” he asked when I suddenly bolted up. It wasn’t a conscious decision on my part, but more a reaction of my body to the sensual overload. I was mere seconds away from jumping him, sticking my tongue down his throat and humping his leg. This was all too much in public. What the fuck did he think he was doing? The look on his face was weird, eyes wide and serious, cheeks tinted with a light blush. I couldn’t place it. I didn’t want him to stop, wanted his hands back on my skin, all over my body. But at the same time I didn’t, not here, surrounded by kids and their parents who were wary of the gay drag queens in their neighbourhood anyway.

“Bitch, your hands are ice cold and you ruining my tan with your fucking sunblock,” I barked, got up and jumped into the pool to cool down. Hiding my hard on was also a lot easier under water than sitting next to him. Out of the corner of my eyes I looked at him and thought I saw panic or hurt on his face, just for a second, before it became the emotionless friendly mask again.

“Vic, tell him he needs sunscreen or he’ll look like a lobster tomorrow. Skin cancer is not sexy,” he told me sister, who quickly agreed with him. I splashed some water in her face to shut her up. He lay down on his chair, apparently not worried about burning his back and started reading his book, ignoring me and my wet body in the pool completely.

***

That was also the night I saw him in drag for the first time. Back then I thought his drag persona Brooke Lynn wasn't  a lot different from his real life persona. Except, a lot sluttier in a more obvious way.  I wasn’t sure how far he had gone with the guy from the other night or what he had done while he had been clubbing alone before. I simply suspected, he was out and about fucking around. The way he spread his legs, rolled around the stage, used the pole  and flirted with the trade in the audience when he was on stage, cemented that idea in my head. Brooke Lynn was a slut, as was her creator, I was sure of it.

Sunday he missed dinner without an explanation. No one knew where he was, just that he was 'out’ somewhere.

“Found himself a boyfriend already,” Alexis wondered and laughed.

“I betcha he’s saying his fucking rude 'Thank you’ during fucking him.” I laughed, even though I felt like crying.

“You think he’s rude?” Jeffrey joined the conversation.

“Bitch, don’t tell me you haven’t noticed that it never means shit when he says it. It fucking empty.  He could say 'Fuck you’ and it’d be the same shit.”

“I think he’s just shy.” Alexis was usually really good at reading people, but I though he was way off this time. “And I think you’ll like him once you get to know him better.”

“What if I’ll hate him once I get to know him better?” I huffed and puffed a bit more about the idea of liking him and him being shy and him being a good guy. I didn’t know back then just how spot on Alexis was that night.

***

I was working the early shift the next week and because we were also booked solid with gigs and rehearsals for Alexis’ and Jen’s next pageant, I had to get up extra early to go to the gym and walk Riley. As much as I was a creature of the night and liked sleeping in, there was something about seeing the sun rise over the ocean while driving by on the way to the gym. Traffic was quieter, a lot less people around and even the gym seemed less hectic and gave me time to wake up.

I was wide  awake with a start when my eyes met familiar blue-green ones through the window of the tumbling room. It was too late, I couldn’t just pretend that I hadn’t seen him and had to say hi at least.

“Bitch, what are you doing up already? Shouldn’t you be asleep instead of on your tippy toes? What are you doing here?” I teased him even though he wasn’t dancing or wearing ballet shoes. I couldn’t help it.

“I need to stretch and train every day or I’ll lose the flexibility or the muscle memory of some stunts.” He took a sip of water and wiped the sweat off his forehead with a towel. I realised he was wearing the ugly T-shirt with the hole again. It made me grin.

“So, twinkle toes, show me what you got.” He looked uncomfortable for a second, then jumped into a backwards handspring.

“Shit, mami, how did you do that?” I jumped forward, eyes wide. I was barely able to do a decent cartwheel and he could perform these kind of stunts?

“Want me to teach you?” he offered and looked more comfortable and relaxed than I had seen him this far. That was also the only reason why I agreed. He explained what he wanted me to do and then guided me through the movements. We laughed and joked while he taught me, focussed on the tension in my body, the right way to jump and the correct way to land. It took me a while, but then I was able to do it on my own. It wasn’t as graceful as his, but I didn’t break my neck and landed on my feet.

“Thanks, boo. You rock as a teacher, but I have to go.” I realised I had to hurry if I didn’t want to be late for work. The lack of time also helped with the question of how to say bye and putting it on the back of my mind that while teaching he had touched me again. Nothing sexy, nothing sensual, just his hands to stabilise me in the air so I wouldn’t fall. They had been gone again before my feet touched the ground.

***

Hours later I was still thinking about his smile and the way his shoulders slumped for once while he helped me with the tumbling. The tension that made him stand ramrod straight had been gone during these moments.

“Hey.” At first I thought the voice was part of my daydream. Then he spoke again and I realised that the blonde object of my jumbled thoughts and emotions was standing in front of me in the MAC store.

“What are you doing here?"

"I think I heard that one before today.” We both laughed. It was true. And it broke the ice and blockage in my brain.

“How can I help you Sir?” I asked politely and glanced over a my boss, who was watching me. She was a friend of mine, but he didn’t need to know that.

“I need new foundation because I got a bit of a tan. And probably new lipstick."

"You could have just texted me and I would have brought all the stuff home with me,” I told him once he paid for four different lipsticks, a new highlighter, new foundation and a couple of different lashes. I gave him my discount, of course, even though he insisted it wasn’t necessary.

“Don’t have your phone number. And I needed some other stuff anyway.” He didn’t carry any other bags, so whatever he had bought so far must be small enough to fit onto the pocket of his shorts. I handed him the bag with his purchase, then picked up his phone, told him to unlock it and added my number. For emergencies, I told him.

“Hey, you know what you really need?” I asked him when he was half-way out the store. He turned around and raised one eyebrow. “New shirts. This one has a hole in it under your left arm.” He checked, blushed, rolled his eyes and then raised the bag I had given him.

“Thank you,” he said in his usual tone. That’s when I realised that Alexis was right.

TBC

[blairwitchart]

I know literally no one cares but this is my creative outlet sooooooooooo

Here’s the start of a story I’m writing called. “Salem Witch Commite”.

P.O.V Narrator

Witches have been around for millenniums. Long before the Salem witch trials, but since then they have been hidden in the shadows, and whether you like it or not, they've been watching. They are not the only ones, amongst the witches are the creatures of nightmares demons and their underlings. Over the decades' witches have been forgotten, misinterpreted, and even fetishized. Nowadays the witches' numbers have been reduced to a misly 105, and that is on a global scale. with these low numbers, these witches have created a coven, the Salem witch committee. this committee fights everything their ancestors were burned and drowned for, mostly demons. this coven has 7 locations each consisting of 15 members, each is found in a different continent. now on to their legend

P.O.V: Blair

"We should totally go get our palms read together!" says the lady from across the street. "You know all those places are shams right?" says her companion "Ya but it'll be fun. So you free next Saturday?" "Hey, weirdo what have a told you about starring at people through the window of my favorite coffee shop," Jade says while waving my Vienna coffee in front of my face. "That it's wrong and if I keep doing it we might get kicked out and or banned indefinitely," "Exactly now cut that shit out and drink you crappy coffee," "Fine," Now if you can't tell from my name I'm a witch and so is my best friend jade we live in Boston and we and a bunch of others are apart of the Salem witch committee "hey, can get out of here I'm getting bored," I say as I dramatically fall deeper into the booth we're sitting in. "Sure, come on lazy bones!" she says while slowly pulling me from the corner of the booth. as we silly walk towards the door, we come face to face with the disgustingly handsome Alec. "Oh, h-hey Alec what are you doing here," Who jade is crushing on big time. "Oh hey guys just picking up my mobile order," "Oh well we could wait fo-" "yeah well we're actually just heading out, so see you at the clubhouse," I interrupt while pulling Jade past them. "What the hell was that all about?" "Sorry I just could not watch you drool over them any longer," "I don't know what you're talking about," "Yeah, sure dipshit,"

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P.O.V: Blair

*Ding* *Ding* “as the clock strikes 12 the witching begins,” Tristen says, trying to sound all cool and shit. “Its noon,” Jessica retorts back. “Shut up I know just… let me take roll, Jessica,” “here,” “Jade,” “here,” “Issac,” “here,” “Alec,” “here,” “Blair,” “here,” “Joan,” “here,” “Jeremy,” “here,” “Eric,” “here,” “Taylor,” “here,” “Malissa,” “here,” “Marcus,” “here,” “Olie,” “here,” “Alex,” “here,” “D.J,” “here,” “And of course I, Tristen, is here. Now on to some serious business we have a job. Our sources say that a family in Maryland has been hexed. It should be an in and out job so I’m only sending 3 of you Jade, Alec, and Blair,” What? I understand why he would send Jade and me, we have great teamwork. But. Jade and Alec. We all see how they act around each other. They act like they’re in love while at the same time constantly saying that the other does not have a crush on them yet still being extremely obvious with their crush. Did I do something wrong? Cause last time I checked, I did nothing to warrant the cruel and unusual punishment of being their third wheel. But here I am sitting in the back of Alec’s car watching them laugh at another one of Jades’ flirty jokes. I hate it here.

“Here we are ladies, 8052 Marigold ln, Burkittsville Maryland,” Alec says while parallel parking in front of a fairly new house. “Are you sure no one’s home. If we break-in and someones in there it’s gon get real awkward real quick,” Jade says while picking the front doors lock. “Yeah, Tristen said he checked the traffic cameras 3 times and their security systems 5 times. Isn’t that right Alec,” “Yep,” Once Jade gets the door unlocked we move our things to the kitchen table. Once everything is set up we split up to cleanse the house I take the main floor, Alec takes the upper floor, and Jade takes the basement. “1,2,3 let’s get hexy,” we all say in unison. Yeah, I know its cringe but it’s lowkey funny. I light my blue sage and start wandering around my floor. I enter what seems to be a little girls room I am overwhelmed with a dark menacing feeling. As I walk farther into the room I watch as the smoke from the blue sage flows towards the closet. As I inch towards the closet I find the owner of the room. Whats seems to be a little blonde girl, no older than 10, is sitting in the front corner of her closet. Which is odd since Tristen said there was no one home. Hopefully, she doesn’t call her parents. I reach to turn her over and once I do my heart drops. I come face to face with a little girl whose skin has been ripped off her face and neck, and as I watch the blood dry I notice that one of her eyes has been removed while the other seems to have her eye burnt. As I continue to stare I feel my breath start to hitch, that’s when I knew I had to alert my friends. So my dumbass decided to scream which I guess got the point across.

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P.O.V: Jade

Damn, they have a pretty small basement looks like I got the long end of the stick. Sage? Lit. Bad energies? Gone. Dangerous entities? Removed. Hotel? Trivago. Now that that’s done all that’s left to do is to hide some selenite and meditate. “AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH” what the fuck was that? Who just screamed. I rush up the stairs not even worrying about the fact that I just dropped a handful of selenite on to the floor. I start sprinting around the main floor when I see Blair sitting in front of the closet in a little girl’s room. She seems scared which is weird for Blair. Wow, shes even shaking. “Hey. Hey! Look at me. You are okay everything is going to be fine. Now tell me what’s got you so spooked babe,” I say while gently caressing her hands. She then moves one hand out of my grip and points towards the closet. I then turn my head to see the horrific murder scene for a little girl. “Ah shit, it’s okay everything is okay,” I say trying to reassure her. “Who screamed,” Alec says while barging in armed with their lucky swiss army knife. “Yeah, Alec everything is fine. Blair just found the massacred carcass of a little girl so shes a little shaken up about it,” “What do you mean massacred, holy shit. How did this even happen no one has been home,” They say while taking a closer look at the body. “ And by the looks of how much blood has dried, she would have had to be dead for at least an hour,” The lights cut out. “That would be my doing,” says a dark and eerie voice from all around us. “Blair get up we need the power of 3,” She stands up and we all hold hands. Alec turns on their flashlight and shines it on the floor for us all to see. For some reason, the floor is engulfed in a black goo like substance that is flowing in our direction. Alec uses their light to find the source by following the flow. Once the light reaches the door we become face to face with a being of absolute darkness. A tall, oddly humanly shaped, drippy being with bright orange eyes is staring at us and is smiling, and just as I thought I couldn’t get any worse it opens its mouth to let the little girl’s eye drop out. “Sorry just wanted a little snack before damning all of humanity to something worse than death,” it says quite obnoxiously. “ Who do you think you are,” Alec barks out. It seems to appear right in front of our faces just to say “Not who but what. A demon to be exact but for tonight I will just be your worst nightmare,” And before I knew it the only sound I could register was *bu dump..bu dump..bu dump..bu dump...bu dump...bu dump….bu dump…..bu dump……..* I look to my left to see that the demon had bludgeoned Alecs Heart out and the sound I was hearing was their heart dying. Before I could even utter a single word the demon looked at us and said “You’re next,” and before I knew it Blair was pulling us out of the room and all I could do was cry and call out to Alec as if they were still alive. Blair and I turn a corner and I can feel something grip on to my leg and as I feel myself being dragged down the hall I see Blair start to sob.

I also started drawing the characters so here’s the first finished one

That’s all for today

[darkvalkyrie6]

Blue

Two days of not writing a story got to me.  

This is a long story, longer than the rest because it tells the story from the point of view of two characters. This is the first time I tried to write like that and I  hope you like it.

Don’t let the title fool you.

If you have spare time please read.

————————————————–

Detective Dunn was sitting at his desk in the police station finishing the paperwork from his last case. It was already ten PM and his shift was almost over. This last case was an easy one, a jealous wife killed her husband because he was cheating on her and tried to make it look like an accident. He closed cases like these hundreds of times, they were so predictable. After ten years as a police officer and fifteen as a detective, he saw many things people are capable of doing to each other but there were always the same few reasons behind their actions and their motives. Some did cruel things or killed others for money, some for drugs, most because of jealousy. Some murdered, raped or mutilated others because they were psychopaths or just bat shit crazy. With modern science, it was easier to find out how and who committed the crime. The only though thing left was to find them in this city of eight million people.

As he was printing out his report, the Chief walked over to him. “We got a dead body in an alley near the Westmin building. Go check it out, the coroner is on her way over there.” The Chief sounded serious. 

The Westmin was a tech company that had a lot of influence in the city and in the world. A dead body near such an influential company could mean a lot of trouble if it was someone from the company. 

“Yes Chief. I’m on it!” Detective Dunn grabbed his coat, grabbed his car keys and went to his car. He was actually hoping that this time it was not one of those predictable cases.

Detective Dunn arrived at the crime scene, police officers put up the police tape surrounding it and trying to keep a few dozen people away. Detective Dunn showed a police officer his detective badge and crossed the police tape. 

“What’s all the fuss about Adelaine? Is it someone from the Westmin Company?” He asked the coroner who was already at the scene examining the body.

“Good to see you Dunn. No, it’s not someone from the company. By the looks of it, he was just at the wrong place at the wrong time doing the wrong thing.” Adelaine said.

‘Not one of those predictable crimes again.��� Detective Dunn thought as he walked closer to the body “Let me guess. He was robbed and somebody killed him? He has no wallet, we can’t ID him and we have no clue who robbed him.” He said sarcastically.

“No Dunn, this one is different. He has two wallets and by looking at the pictures on the IDs in them, neither of them are his. There are bruises on the wrist of the hand in which he is holding a knife cowered with a strange blue fluid, and by the position of his head, I think the cause of death is a broken neck. So this one is quite the opposite. He wasn’t robbed and killed, he was robbing someone and got killed.” Adelaine said, looked up at him, shouted, “And show some respect, a man is dead!” 

Detective Dunn didn’t mean any disrespect. Being a police officer and a detective for so long, seeing what people are capable of doing to each other, he found that a sarcastic comment or a joke or two were the only things still keeping him sane in this crazy world. He crouched beside the body looking at the knife that was covered with the blue fluid. “You know I didn’t mean disrespect. Do you know what this blue fluid is?” Detective Dunn asked Adelaine while putting on a rubber glove on his right hand.

“First time I’ve seen something like that,” Adelaine said looking at the blue fluid. 

Detective Dunn took some of the blue fluid from the knife. The liquid had more of a viscosity of a gel or a lubricant and had no odour. There was a small puddle of the blue fluid near the body and droplets of it leading from the alley into the street. “Yea, me neither. But the strange thing is that the blue fluid looks like blood spatter from a knife wound. Don’t bag him just yet, let the forensics team have a go at him first.” 

“As you say Dunn,” Adelaine said.

Detective Dunn stood up and instructed the forensics team to photograph and collect all of the blue liquid and search the body before the coroner bags it for the morgue. ‘Finally an interesting case.’ The blue liquid was a challenge, finally something unpredictable, he was looking forward to solving this case.

----------

AL was running through the streets his right hand holding the cut on the small tube, that was punctured with a knife, closed. He couldn’t afford to lose any more of the cooling liquid, he lost a lot during the attack in the alley, or his systems will start to overheat and shut down. ‘How did they know I was going to be there? How did they find out so quickly that I escaped?’ During his escape, he made sure nobody saw him and no cameras recorded him so he wondered how they followed him and attacked him so quickly, just two streets away from the lab. ‘I need to hide and replenish my cooling liquid.’ For that, he needed water, plastic and electricity.

Still holding his punctured tube, with his right hand in the knife wound, he found an abandoned building surrounded by signs that cautioned people not to enter because it was going to be demolished. He entered the building to see if there was still electricity. He tried a few of the electrical outlets but no luck. With his left hand, he smashed a hole in the floor until he got to the electricity wires running underneath the building. He searched the building and found a tub full of rainwater, all he needed now was plastic. It seemed that people used demolition sites as garbage dumps so he had no problem finding plastic bottles and containers around the building.

With everything collected, he sat down on the floor, took off his pants and opened a storage compartment on his left thigh. There were many repair tools in the storage compartment, he took out some tools and started to repair the punctured tube and the knife wound. After he finished with the repairs, he put the repair tools back into the storage compartment and closed it. 

It was time to start replenishing his cooling liquid. He put on his pants and opened a connection port, for his generator, on his back. Replenishing such a large amount of cooling liquid in a short time is going to require a lot of energy. AL connected his generator cable directly to the electricity wires, running underneath the building, put his right hand on the pile of plastic bottles and containers and his left hand into the tub with rainwater. He opened the ports, for the nanobots, on the top of his fingers so they collect the water and plastic and then manipulate and convert the molecules and atoms into the cooling liquid. During this process, he has to shut down almost all of his systems. That is a big risk in this situation, because they are outside right now, looking for him. But if he wants to escape he has to do this or he will not last very long before his systems shut down from overheating. He started to shut down his systems one by one, leaving his proximity alert system active so if something comes near him his systems would activate and he could escape.

----------

Detective Dunn got the report from the coroner’s office. The official cause of death was a broken neck. The report said that, underneath the victim’s fingernails, there was a substance similar to human skin but of unknown composition and origin. Bruises on the wrist and neck correspond to the bruises made by a human hand. 

‘So the report is saying that it was a human but that it wasn’t a human. Where is the report on the blue fluid?’ The coroner’s report made no sense. First things first. Was the thief robbing someone and got killed in self-defence or was he defending himself from someone who was trying to kill him. The coroner’s report did not give any answers to that. Detective Dunn was leaning more towards the theory that the thief robbing someone and got killed in self-defence. ‘He had two wallets on him, that weren’t his, so he was probably cocky and tried to rob someone again.’ 

Putting the coroner’s report aside, his mind made up about the order of events, he started looking for the forensics report on the blue liquid. The forensics team tested the blue liquid and all the clothes the thief was wearing during the murder. The blue liquid was composed of various elements such as carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, petroleum fractions, hydrogenated polyolefin, silicones, fluorocarbons and polyacrylate. When he asked them for the short version, they said it was a water-based plastic lubricant. 

‘I know I said I wanted a challenge but this is torture. A human that is not human killed my victim and he covered him in a lubricant. This is a strange world indeed.’ As he was still looking at the report, trying to figure out what to do next, his phone rang. “Detective Dunn speaking.” Two bodies were found that matched the cause of death of his victim. “Aha…Where?” Detective Dunn put aside the report and went to get his coat and car keys. “I’ll be right there.” He hurried to the crime scene. This time the attack happened during the day, maybe this time his killer made a mistake, as they always do.

The coroner Adelaine was already at the crime scene examining the bodies. “Hi Adelaine! What do we have here? Is it the same guy?”

“I wasn’t sure at first because these guys don’t look like thieves, they look like professionals, if you know what I mean. This one was shot multiple times, his right arm is broken.” She turned the body slightly to the side “It looks like he was used as a human shield. I think all the bullets will match the other guy’s gun.” She stood up and crouched next to the other body. “This one’s wrist is broken, the gun is next to him. The cause of death is the same as the first victim, the thief, a broken neck. Yea, I think this is our guy.”

“It almost looks like they were here to kill him.” Detective Dunn sad looking around the crime scene. “Did you find any of that blue fluid on them?”

“No, no fluid this time.”

“Thanks. I’ll go look around a bit, talk to some of the people, maybe they saw something.” If there was, a shooting in broad daylight and a struggle there had to be something, some kind of a clue, there had to be someone who heard or saw something. He walked around the crime scene looking for clues. This was a closed area, the building was going to be demolished. Maybe his killer was hiding here thinking no one will look for him here. 

‘Obviously he was wrong.’ He entered the building and saw a hole in the floor with exposed electrical wires, that was nothing new, the building was old and it was going to be demolished for a reason. What he found odd was that next to the hole there was a tub with some water and a small pile of plastic bottles and containers. ‘What did the forensics report say? Hydrogen and oxygen, that’s water. And all the other stuff in short version is plastic. So a water-based plastic lubricant. This was definitely my guy.’ 

As he realized that this had something to do with the blue fluid, still not knowing what and what the fluid was, he heard a loud sound coming from above him. He called for backup telling them that the killer might still be in the building. Police officers silently entered the building and they all started to climb up the stairs in the direction of the noise.

As they climbed up the noise stopped. They paused, listening. Someone started running up the stairs to the roof. They followed him, running up the stairs as quickly as they could. As they climbed on the roof, they saw a man running to the edge of the roof. 

“STOP!” Detective Dunne yelled after him. The man stopped and turned around to look at him.

----------

AL saw a dozen men with guns. ‘How did they come so quickly after me? Why are they not wearing suits like the last two humans who tried to catch me? Are they trying to fool me like the first human?’ AL stared at the men and replied “Give up chasing me. I am not going back to the lab so you can kill me!” He shouted at them. “I am stronger and faster than you. You saw what happened to the ones you sent to come for me. I am not going back. Tell Samantha I am sorry.”

Detective Dunn looked at him puzzled. “We’re not here to bring you back to some lab. I am detective Dunn and these are police officers. We’re police, we don’t want to hurt you.” 

“You are lying. You have guns like the last two humans who you sent after me, and you are trying to fool me by not wearing suits like the first human you sent after me.” AL started walking towards detective Dunn so he could get a running start and jump to the roof of the building beside this one.

----------

This one is crazy. ’He’s walking towards me. He’s gonna attack.’ Detective Dunn thought. “NO, STOP!” He shouted. “Look! We are all putting our guns down.” Putting his gun down on the floor, he gestured to other police officers to do the same “We are not here to case or hurt you. We are police officers. We help and protect those who are innocent, who are in trouble, who need our help and we keep the peace. As I can see, you are in trouble. Am I right?”

AL stopped walking “Yes I am.” He looked suspiciously at detective Dunn. “I am in need of assistance.”

Something was off about the man ‘The way he talks is a bit off, I can’t quite put my finger on it.’ detective Dunn thought and then he saw a blue stain and a cut on the left side of the man’s shirt. “Come with me. I promise I will not take you to a lab. I will take you to a safe place that no bad people can get to you. Ok? ” 

“I am stronger, faster and smarter than you. If I sense deception I will defend myself.” AL responded.

Detective Dunn took that as a yes. “Ok then. Men get your weapons so we can protect this man on our way to the safe place.” He and the police officers picked up and put away their guns, they all climbed down the stairs and drove to the police station.

At the police station, they put AL into an interrogation room. Behind the one-sided glass of the interrogation room there were a dozen detectives. They were all curious about the man with the blue stain, with the blue fluid. Detective Dunn walked into the interrogation room holding a file in his hand. He put the file on the table and sat down across from AL.

“Hi, sorry I took so long to come here. I just needed to get a few things. Did my colleagues offer you something to drink or eat?”

“Yes they did. I do not have to consume nourishment at this time.” AL responded.

“Ok. We haven’t formally met. My name is Morgan Dunn. What’s your name?” Dunn asked because not only didn’t his suspect have an ID, the forensics lab told him they could not find any DNA in the samples they collected and he had no fingerprints.

“I am AL. It is nice to meet you. Thank you for assisting me.” AL responded.

“AL? That’s a strange name, people usually have a name and a surname. Is AL a nickname? Do you have a surname?” Dunn had to find a way to ID his suspect.

“Samantha always called me AL. She said it was shorter than always saying artificial lifeform. I agree with Samantha. It is shorter.” AL responded.

“So your name is Artificial Lifeform.” Detective Dunn just looked at him and thought ‘Another crazy one.’

“No. My name is not Artificial Lifeform. I am an artificial lifeform.” AL responded. “I was assembled and programmed inside Westmin company laboratory 6 years, 77 days, 9 hours, 34 minutes and, now 23 seconds, ago.”

“You were assembled and programmed…I don’t believe you.” Detective Dunn tried to wrap his head around the fact that he was talking to a robot or an android. It was not going so well.

“I do not blame you. I heard that I was the first of my kind, so I do not expect that you have seen someone like me before. I will show you.” AL started to roll up the sleeve on his right arm. “Please, do not be alarmed. I will not hurt you. I will just show you.” With his left forefinger, he put pressure on a point on his right forearm. Plates of artificial skin covering his forearm started to move and uncovered a part underneath revealing machinery and tubes full of blue fluid.

You could cut the collective silence of dozen detectives with a knife.

AL put pressure on the same point on his right forearm again and the plates of artificial skin covering his forearm returned to their original place. “I know humans must often see to believe. Samantha taught me that.”

Detective Dunn got over the initial shock of what he just saw and asked AL “Who is Samantha?”

----------

“Samantha is my only friend. She is the only one that was against other humans killing me. We first met after I was assembled and programmed with the first version of my learning program. She was initially my teacher and her task was to teach me how to learn by myself. We were together every day and as I learned more and more I started to develop a consciousness. At first, I did not know what that was, Samantha did and she told me not to tell that to anyone included in the AL project. I asked her how she knew and she said that she knew when I asked who I am and what I am.” AL looked at Detective Dunn who was just sitting in his chair listening. He continued. “For the next year, I developed my own personality and learned how to connect to security systems in the laboratory. I watched and listened to the humans who worked on the AL project. Samantha was the only human who I had contact with, so I was curious about other humans.”

“And what did you learn about us while watching?” Detective Dunn asked.

“I learned that humans say one thing but do another, that humans lie. Samantha was the only human that did not lie to me. At one point, the humans that were overlooking the project wanted to see if I could pass a Turing test. With Samantha, I passed hundreds of the tests humans have given me but this one was somehow special. Samantha will not give this one to me. As always, they wanted me to pass the test. Samantha told me that during the test a human will ask me questions and talk to me and that I need to answer the questions and have a conversation with the human but then she pulled me aside during one of our exercises and told me to fail the test on purpose. She did not explain why when I asked.”

Another detective entered the room and whispered something into detective Dunn’s ear. He dismissed the detective and said, “Stall them as long as you can. Put the station on lockdown for all I care. And call anyone who is a specialist in this field!”

“Who?” The other detective asked.

“I don’t know. Anyone in the world for all I care. Talk to the Chief!” He shouted after her as she was closing the door of the interrogation room. “Sorry about that. Please continue.”

‘Did the other humans from Westmin Company come looking for me here? Is this really a safe place?’ He looked suspiciously at detective Dunn but continued. “Samantha was my friend and I listened to her. The day of the test came and the humans put me in a room similar to this. I was sitting on one side of the table and a human I had never seen before on the other side. The human started asking me questions and started to talk to me. I just sat there silently or answered the questions wrong. I thought that was the best way to fail a test that involved talking and answering questions. After the test, I was watching the humans shout at Samantha that she did not explain to me what the test was about and that it was her fault that I failed the test. They were threatening her that they will remove her from the project if I do not pass the test and that meant that I will never see her again. The thought of not seeing my only friend ever again made me sad so I decided that, even though Samantha told me not to pass the test, it was not worth it losing a friend.”

They could hear noises coming outside the room and the sound of the door, of the interrogation room, being locked.

“Don’t worry. That’s just so nobody can interrupt us. It can get busy here sometimes. The city has eight million people, and not all of them are good guys like you and me.” Detective Dunn said trying not to look nervous. Dunn knew that the people from the Westmin company were here looking for him but he is not gonna let them have him without a fight. “You were saying…”

“Two months ago humans made me repeat the Turing test. This time it was a different human but the test started the same. The human asked questions, I answered, human talked, I talked, and I asked questions, the human answered them. It looked like the human and I were having a normal conversation. After the test, I was watching and listening to the humans, through the security system, and I listened to the results of the test. The result said that the subject has good manners, is polite, a little bit boring but the result was inconclusive. They needed more data and made me repeat the test two more times in the following two weeks. The last test was strange to me because during the last test I was having a conversation with a small human, a child fourteen years old. This was the first time I saw a child so I was not concentrating on the test but on the child. The results of that last test were conclusive. As I listened to the humans talking about the result of the test the child thought it was talking to another human, not to an artificial lifeform. They celebrated and talked about how they finally made a breakthrough. How the company will make billions by selling androids like me. While I was watching them celebrate Samantha was crying and I could not understand why.”

Someone was banging on the door of the interrogation room and then there was a scream.

“Those crazy people. Every time a woman kills his husband’s mistress there’s always a scene at the station.” Detective Dun tried to make his voice sound bored but he was starting to get worried. The Westmin Company was powerful, and if he steps on the wrong toes, he could lose his job or his head. “Then what happened?”

“The humans came and congratulated me on passing the test telling me how I can now leave the lab, go outside, live among the humans, but I heard the humans who were overlooking the project say that they need to extract the programing from my head to make more different copies of me and make billions. The programming and engineering team said that that will end my existence, that it will kill me. I understood why Samantha wanted me to fail the test and why she cried when I passed it. 

The humans, overlooking the project, lied to me. They planned to kill me for billions and I started to plan to escape. I already had access to the security system and knew the habits of humans. I knew that most of the humans go away at night, that I can easily position the cameras so that they think I am still in my room and that I can unlock the main door with my security access. I escaped but I did not know that they had guards outside. Two streets away from the lab one of their guards attacked me. I defended myself but he damaged one of my cooling tubes.”

“Yes, we found him. That blue fluid, that is your cooling liquid?” Detective Dunn asked. Not wanting to tell him that the man he killed wasn’t a guard from the Westmin Company. He didn’t know how AL would take information like that in this situation.

“Yes. I lost a lot of cooling liquid and had to replenish it so I found an abandoned building with enough power and components to fix the damage and generate more cooling liquid. It was a big risk, because it takes a lot of time to do something like that, but if I had not done that my systems would overheat and shut down one by one and my escape would have no purpose. I had to shut down all of my main systems to regenerate. I only left my proximity alert system active that woke me up when the two humans from the Westmin company came looking for me. I still do not know how they found me that fast. All of my systems did not turn online but I was able to defend myself. I tried to go back and take some of the components with me and leave but I heard humans outside so I started climbing the stairs to the roof to jump on a roof of another building.” There was a puzzled look on AL’s face.

“I have a guess. The Westmin Company is a technology company so they probably have a GPS locator somewhere inside you.” Detective Dunn said.

“GPS locator? What is that?” AL looked even more puzzled.

“You see. They didn’t teach you that because they didn’t want you to know about that. It’s a small device that tracks where you are in real time. They can see exactly where you are at any time they want to.” Detective Dunn explained.

“So my escape had no purpose? I cannot run from them if they know where I am all the time. Can this device be removed?” AL asked with, what seemed, panic in his voice. 

“I don’t know. We could take you to our tech department and have them take a look at you but if it’s in a place like your brain or a place that, if we remove it will damage some of your systems, I don’t know.” Detective Dunn didn’t want to give him false hope. If he was a prototype worth billions the GPS tracker was probably somewhere that nobody can remove it.

“So what do we do now?” AL asked.

----------

“Is Samantha still your friend? Do you know how I can contact her?” Detective Dunn asked, a plan forming in his mind. ‘I wanted an unpredictable and interesting case, well someone took my prayers to the next level.’ 

“Yes. She is my friend. Let me check the data that I downloaded from the lab.” AL sat still for a few seconds. “I have her phone number. Is that ok?”

“Yea. Give me the phone number.” AL gave him the phone number, he typed it in and called Samantha. “Hi Samantha. You don’t know me, I’m detective Dunn and I’m currently sitting here with your friend AL. Can you come to the Forty Ninth police station and bring one of your business cards with you? Yea. Just ask for me when you get here.” He put down his phone, looked at AL and said, “Now we wait. This will be interesting.”

“Thank you for assisting me.” AL said.

“No problem. You just listen to me. We’ll sort this out.” 

They waited in the room until they heard someone unlock the door. Samantha stepped in, looked at AL and tears started forming at the corners of her eyes. “I thought you were dead. I thought they killed you. I’m so glad you’re alive.” She hugged him tightly, crying.

“Hi Samantha. I’m detective Dunn and I’m trying to help your friend. I have a plan but I need you to follow my instructions to the letter if you want to keep your friend alive and out of the hands of the Westmin company.” He told them his plan and in an hour, they got out of the interrogation room.

The police station was full of lawyers, security personnel and a board member from the Westmin Company. The Chief informed detective Dunn that for the past few hours they occupied the whole station demanding that the police release the person in custody. Detective Dunn told him that all the murders AL committed were in self-defence and that the only actual crime committed was attempted murder of a sentient being by the personnel and the people giving the orders in the Westmin Company. 

The Chief looked at him as if he was crazy but detective dun said, “Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.” He walked over to the board members of the Westmin Company and said. “Here I have two signed statements from two of your employees. Mr. Al and Mrs. Samantha. Mr. Al has informed us that he thinks his life is in danger because two members of your security staff attacked him this morning and he had to defend himself.” He looked at the faces of the board members clearly seeing anger forming on their mugs. While they were waiting for Samantha he told the detectives and the officers behind the one sided glass to delete the tapes of the conversation AL and he had about the lab and the recent events. 

When Samantha came, Detective Dunn gave her business card to AL and told him to put it in his pocket then he explained the rest of his plan. That AL will tell him that he is an employee of the Westmin company, that he was attacked by two men from the security staff and afraid for his life, that he has no ID just a business card of a colleague with whom he works who can help. Dunn will take the business card, call Samantha and tell her to come.

“Mr. Al didn’t have any ID on himself. He only had a business card belonging to Mrs. Samantha. We called her and she identified him as an employee of your company with whom she worked every day. She also identified the two men that attacked Mr. Al as members of your security staff. We will take Mr. Al and Mrs. Samantha into police protection until this is resolved.” Samantha will then identify him as an employee of the Westmin Company and sing a statement that he is a colleague that works with her. They will get that on tape and hold it as evidence so that he gets police protection and that the Westmin Company cannot take him away. 

“WHAT?!” The board member stood up and yelled. “YOU CAN’T DO THAT! THESE PEOPLE ARE LYING!” 

“If you want to take Mr. Al with you against his will, I will have to arrest all of you for kidnapping. If you send your people after him or Mrs. Samantha, I will arrest you for attempted murder, or murder. These PEOPLE, as you said it yourself, are under police protection. If you have something to say we will see you in court.”

The board member looked at him with rage in her eyes. “This isn’t over! When I’m done with you, not only will you lose your job, you will lose everything you have!” she said with rage in her voice as she started to leave and gestured at the others to follow her.

Detective Dunn knew on whose toes he stepped on, on someones with a lot of power to back up their threats. He knew he was going to lose his job, probably all his money, apartment, maybe go to jail or be killed. He didn’t care, it was time to set the second part of his plan into motion. Working for the police for 25 years made you many enemies but it also made you some friends, friends with skills. William was one of those friends, he was a technology and robotics know it all. If he couldn’t find the GPS tracker, no one could. First things first. He walked over to AL and sat beside him. 

“Come with me for a second.” He stood up and started walking, AL followed.

“You said you got access into the security system at the lab. Do you think you could do that here at the station?” Detective Dunn asked AL.

“Yes. I can. All I need is a computer or a router.” 

“Ok, you can use my computer.”

They sat at detective Dunn’s table and AL used one of his connection ports and plugged it into the computer. After a few moments he said, “I’m in. What do you need me to do?”

“In the basement is evidence storage. I need you to record a few minutes, without people, on every camera that is on the way down to the evidence storage and the first level of the garage, and, when I tell you, play it on repeat. The evidence storage door is locked so I also need you to unlock it when I tell you to put the cameras on replay. Got it?”

“Yes. Give me a few moments to get the recordings.” AL said and sat silently for a few minutes. “I have the recordings for all the cameras. Tell me when you are ready.”

Detective Dunn stood up to see how many people were still here. It was already close to midnight so the night shift was here. The building was half-empty, that was good. 

“I’m going to go down to the basement by the staircase, there aren’t gonna be people there, so play those cameras, cameras to the garage and the cameras in the basement on repeat. Go, play it on repeat!” He walked over towards the men’s bathroom and then to the staircase, so that, on the cameras here it seems he went to the bathroom, when he was out of shot he turned to the staircase and started going down to the basement. As he reached the evidence storage, the door was unlocked. 

He rushed to the part where they keep the money from drug busts, bank robberies and alike. There was usually millions of dollars in the evidence storage. He grabbed all the money and ran for the garage, he put the money in his car, ran back up the staircase, toward the men’s bathroom and then to his desk. 

“Samantha, AL! Come on! I’ll take you home.” He whispered to AL “Stop playback.” And the three of them went to Dunn’s car. “Ok. Before I take you to my home I just have to make a quick call.” 

He took out his phone and called someone “Hey Will! It’s been a long time. Listen. I got a challenge for you. I know I didn’t pay last time. I promise this time I will pay. However, when you see what’s the challenge is you’ll want to pay me. Hahaha! Yea…In about half an hour. Yea… And bring all the tools you have. No. I sad ALL the tools you have. Yes. ALL of them. No. I’m not kidding. Ok.” He hung up, started the car and they drove away. 

Detective Dunn took AL and Samantha to his apartment. When they arrived, Will was already there with ten boxes of tools in front of his apartment door. 

“You had me on bring all of your tools.” Will grinned.

“Good. You’re in a good mood. Let’s keep it that way.” Detective Dunn invited everyone into the apartment, AL helped Will carry his boxes into the apartment. AL picked up five of them at once while will struggled to lift one. With everybody and everything inside Dunn’s apartment, Dunn introduced Will to AL. Will was not impressed and asked what the job, the “challenge” was.

“You see Will. My friend AL here has a problem that I think you can fix with a little help from Samantha here.”

“Dunn, I told you I don’t do cybernetics, only robotics. If he has some kind of implant I can’t help you with fixing it.” Will said annoyed. 

“Well, he actually has an implant that I’ll pay you to remove but strictly speaking, and if you agree to keep this quiet I’ll double your fee, he is not a human, he is a sentient artificial lifeform.” Dunn said pouring himself a glass of whiskey. “Does anyone want anything to eat or drink?” 

Will looked at him in disbelief “You are crazy. All of you are crazy. You’re pulling my leg.” 

“Show him the arm.” Dunn said to AL and AL repeated what he did in the interrogation room with his forearm.

Will’s jaw dropped as he saw the plates of artificial skin move and reveal machinery underneath it. Dunn thought he saw a sparkle in Will’s eyes. Will’s mood improved in a split second. “Ok, what’s the job? What do I have to do? Can I see all of his insides?”

“No, you can’t open him up like a dead frog in science class. He has a GPS tracker or trackers somewhere on him. We need you to find it or all of them and remove them. What’s your fee if you keep this quiet? And trust me when I tell you it’s in your best interest to keep it quiet if you want to live.”

“Let me see how complicated this will be but half a mill sound about right.” Will said knowing that Dunn will haggle about the price.

“Half a mill it is, but only if you remove all of the trackers. I’ll give you two hundred and fifty now and two hundred and fifty in a week, when I’m sure that all the trackers are removed. If even one is left you are not getting paid the rest of the money.”

“Ok. You said Samantha could help. How?” Will said.

“I don’t know where the trackers are or how many of them are in his body. All I know is that there might be a way to track the signal they are emitting.” Samantha and Will started to work to find and remove the trackers from ALs body. They worked through the night and in the morning woke up Dunn. They extracted twenty trackers from AL’s body. Samantha was sure that was all of them. Dunn paid Will two hundred and fifty dollars and Will left. AL helped him carry his boxes.

With all the money Dunn took from the police station, he got new ID’s for all of them and they left the city behind them. They travelled far away, as they could and ended on a chain of tropical islands surrounded by the blue sea. They split what was left of the money, Samantha and AL thanked Dunn one more time for helping them, said their goodbyes and parted ways. 

Dunn stood on the beach for a while looking at the blue sea thinking ‘How strange it is that, on a blue planet, such a small amount of blue liquid can so drastically change three lives.’

The end

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