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just-a-ghost00 · 17 days ago

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All I want for Christmas…

Ever wondered is someone was desperately wishing to kiss you under the mistletoe? Well, here is your chance to find out. This reading is mainly meant for singles, whether you have someone in mind or not. But of course nothing forbids you from reading this PAC if you’re already in a relationship with someone, especially if this person is not by your side currently and you want to see if they miss you as much as you do.

Group 1

Overall energy | 10 of swords rx, knight of cups, 7 of wands

You may be in a no contact situation with the person we are talking about. This is someone that has a hard time moving on from their past but that also could have a hard time accepting the situation you are currently in. It feels like there has been a disconnect between you and/or you have conflicting views about the connection. Despite this misunderstanding and possible argument, this person holds a lot of affection for you and wishes to express their feelings for you. This is a person that feels grateful for your presence in their life because you came in at a time when they were struggling and supported them in this difficult cycle. You could be feeling the same towards this person. This is someone that, despite the disconnect, still wishes to fight for the connection and prove they care about you. They may be attached to you and the support you were providing them with.

Physical traits | 5 of wands, 8 of swords, 9 of swords, queen of cups rx

This is someone that may be a bit out of shape. They look stressed out and tired. So they may have eye bags, grey hairs. They may lose their hair often. They have long hair. They could have bad eyesight so they may wear glasses or contact lenses. They may squint their eyes a lot. They look wary or constantly on their guards. They may hunch their back a lot or have a slumped position. They may look sleepy or like their mind is elsewhere. Their eyes are glossy, watery. They could be petite. They have a very discreet style. This person doesn't put a lot of effort into their appearance. They wear very practical and simple clothes. Dull colors. They have an appearance that doesn't stand out that much. Like they blend in the crowds. They may wear a lot of skirts and dresses. I'm picking up on modest wear, old school fashion. A bit of a gloomy vibe. The type of wear that people would have worn to Church a long time ago. They look like they are not comfortable in their skin. So maybe they wear clothes that don't fit them or don't reflect their true style/essence.

Confirmation signs | Queen of wands, ace of cups, Judgement, Queen of pentacles, The Magician

This could be someone that is of the same gender as you are. This could resonate with you if you are a member of or an ally of the LGBTQIA+ community. This could be someone that you confessed to but rejected you in the past. In terms of zodiac signs, we have Leo, Taurus, Gemini that are coming up, as well as Scorpio and maybe a bit of Libra. This could be someone that is trying to manifest you. This could be a person that you met through dating apps. This could be someone that you met either during the Summer or Fall of any year. The numbers 1, 6 and 20 can be significant. So if we take those as possible dates or time frames, we have January 6 / June 1, the 20th of any month, the years 2001/2006/2020. This person can be of the same age as you or if there's an age gap, the gap is quite small. This can be a person that is a bit of a smooth talker.

Group 2

Overall energy | 10 of wands, 3 of swords, 6 of cups

This is a person that is going through a difficult phase in their life. They could be a childhood/teenage years friend of yours. This person has a lot of weight on their shoulders. They may be doing a job that asks of them a lot of sacrifice and sense of responsibility. They could be a single parent. This could be someone that you recently broke up with. Again, I get a no contact vibe from this group. This person is feeling extremely sad. This may be because they feel betrayed in the situation or deeply affected by the fact that things didn't work out between you despite their genuine feelings. This is a person that possibly viewed you as a soulmate and they are now reminiscing about the past when it comes to you. They miss you dearly and I feel like they are defeated. If you know this person, you may not suspect that they are so affected by whatever happened. This may be a person that tends to wear masks as to hide their vulnerability, especially in front of the people they like.

Physical traits | 8 of cups, 5 of cups, 6 of pentacles rx, ace of wands

I get sad boy/ girl energy from this person. They have a rather round face, watery puppy eyes. An upside down smile or some sort of happy/unhappy frown. They look very soft and fragile. Like a doll. Their skin is very pale. Like they don't see the light of day kind of feeling as they spend most of their time indoors, crying over the loss of your connection. They may be a bit out of shape especially around the face. They could have puffy eyes, puffy cheeks. They body looks tense, agitated. They appear as clumsy, messy, hasty. If they have bangs, they could let it grow to the point where it hides their eyes. Kind of an emo vibe, if that is still a thing. Again, this is a person that wears rather dull colored clothes. Clothes that are oversized and kinda make them look like a ghost. Long sleeved shirts and t-shirts, hoodies, stuff like that. I get also a bit of a neglected but trendy look. Like, even if this person isn't at their best, they still kinda want to look good. Like "sappy is the new sexy" kind of vibe. I also get a siren vibe from them. So they may enhance their eyes specifically. Like wearing big glasses or putting a lot of eyeliner, long eyelashes, wearing color changing contacts. With the ace of wands, I feel like there may be little details in their appearance that may give people the idea that they can burst any time. Kinda like they're on edge. Also, this person could be particularly tall and skinny.

Confirmation signs | 6 of wands, Empress, 7 of cups, King of cups, Magician

In terms of zodiac signs, we have Leo, Taurus, Scorpio, Gemini, Pisces. For numbers, we have 6/3/7/1. So this could relate to the months of June, July, March and January. This could also relate to dates such as the 6th, 3rd, 7th or 1st of any month. We have dates like June 3, March 6, July 1, January 7, March 7, July 3, June 7, July 6, June 1, January 6, January 3, March 1. This person could be older than you or have a higher status. This is a person that despite their current emotional state, is pretty successful academically, professionally, financially. You could have met this person at a party or celebration of some sort. This could be someone that is flirty, entertains several relationships and/or has several projects they are working on on the side. They are a good manifestor. You could have felt like this person was a wish come true for you when you met them. They may own a pet for some, like a little bird. They could like horses. This person could live at a distance from you.

Group 3

Overall energy | 9 of pentacles, 10 of pentacles, 3 of pentacles, 10 of wands, 3 of cups

When it comes to zodiac signs, the cards highlight Earth signs, especially Taurus, as well as Leo and Pisces. The numbers 3 and 10 seem to be significant. So those could pertain to the months of March and October, or the 3rd / 10th of any month. We have the energy here of someone that is very busy with their work and material aspects of their life. This could be someone that you know through work/school. For some of you, this person can be a friend. Either this person has a secret crush on you or vice versa. For some of you this is a friendship that is bordering on becoming a romantic connection. They could come from a well established family. This is someone that is dealing with a lot of responsibilities, either because they are living alone (especially if they're a student) or because they are a single parent for some. This is a person that is very hardworking and may currently spend most of their time either stuck at home or working. They like to relieve stress by spending time with a few friends they trust or connecting with their siblings. This person could be a teacher.

Physical traits | Temperance, 6 of swords, Devil, Hermit, Fool

First of all, I have to point out that pretty much all cards are major arcanas. So there's something to this person's vibe and aura that is just huge. No matter their body shape or look, this person remains imposing and impressive to a lot of people. They always leave a strong impression, whether people like them or not. They have long hair that are likely to be dark. They appear as very feminine in nature. So either this person is a woman or could identify as such. They have soft but striking features. They could have a bit of a tanned skin. They could be hispanic or North African, Mediterranean overall. This person could have eyesight issues. Their body structure is quite balanced. I feel like this person blends well in a crowd, they tend to be discreet but if you take time to look at them you can be struck by their beauty. This is a person that has a very natural beauty. They barely wear makeup, they have never undergone any aesthetical surgery, they have no tattoo nor piercings. Yet, they are extremely sensual in nature. They may have a bit of a naive look. Like their head is constantly in the clouds. This could be someone that tends to look at their feet or up in the air, but never directly at people. They give off a bit of a loner vibe. I feel like their fashion style is very simple but it looks very good on them and adds to their allure. This person is charming by default just because of their energy. This is a person that may look very basic on the outside but is incredibly attractive and beautiful on the inside, because of their mentality and the values they cultivate. They may wear their headphones/earphones quite a lot.

Confirmation signs | 6 of pentacles, Justice, 7 of swords, 8 of pentacles, White Numen

Zodiac signs : Taurus again, Scorpio and Libra. Numbers 6, 7, 8, 9 could be pertaining to months from June to September. Possible dates could include June 7, July 6, August 9, September 8 among other possibilities. This is a person that you may interact with through social media. You may not know this person very well. Meaning, you've never met in person. This is someone that you could stalk and/or someone that stalks you. You may have had a disagreement with this person. They are currently focused on their work and this may be one of the reasons you are not in contact with them. This could be someone that you have common passions with or work on similar projects with. This person is generous. They may have given you money or they frequently donate to charity. They could work for the government. This is someone that is constantly on the go.

#just-a-ghost #pick a card #pac reading #tarot reading #love pac #christmas themed pac

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half-dead-ham · 14 days ago

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Tim Drake's I.E.F Ch.1

To all those new to this fic, Hi! Welcome! I'm sure you'll have fun with this since I'll be posting/updating the old update posts all at once. It's a lot, but if I don't do this now I probably won't later, so bare with me, will you?

[Ao3 chapter] [Masterpost] [Chapter 2]

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Getting shot isn't the best way to start a friendship, but at least nobody died, right?

Gotham is dark.

And big.

And haunted.

It would seem like the worst place for Danny to hide, considering just how many vengeful and sad ghosts there are. And yet, here he is, on his third month here after escaping leaving Amity Park after an unexpected and, frankly, embarrassing reveal of his secret to his parents.

Needless to say, they did not take it well.

Silently cringing at the images of the inside of ecto-proof cages and Fenton blasters running through his head, he floats on his front invisibly about his current interest in lazy circles as they perch on the edge of a rooftop. Red Robin, the first bat he encountered during his stay, and second favourite Gotham vigilante, (his first being Red Hood) was currently working on a case that revolved around a string of break-ins to large electronic stores around Gotham's commercial district. The contents of what was stolen didn't seem to have any pattern, but none of the security systems at previous stores were able to even glimpse at the thief.

Red Robin, hearing rumors through his contacts of the electronic store across the street from them being the next target, had decided to stake out the place in hopes of a clue. The security feed was currently being patched through onto Red Robin's wrist computer as the bird watched silently for any signs of movement. A slight distortion caught Danny's eye and he lowered himself over Red Robin's shoulder to get a better look. Red Robin shivered at the sudden chill, but didn't look around like the first dozen times Danny had hovered into his personal space.

It was weird, the lack of reaction. At the beginning, about a month beforehand was when Danny had first taken interest in the vigilante. He was bored of staying in the decrepit old building he'd started squatting in after the first few nights of paranoia fueled isolation. Figuring the best way to settle his nerves was a midnight patrol, he took off flying in a lazy pattern, first around his new house(not his home, not without them) and then around the rest of the district.

He was just about to head back when he came upon police lights outside a small computer repair shop and curiosity, reluctantly, got the better of him. Danny, invisibly and intangibly as to not be detected, floated cautiously through the roof of the shop to see what had happened. He was not expecting to see Red Robin surrounded by four officers all huddled together watching—glaring—at the monitor displaying the shop's security footage.

Seeing that A. There wasn't anything really bad about the place, like a body or any particularly fresh ghosts, and B. That his second favourite Gotham hero was on the scene had instantly made Danny much less cautious and much more curious. He waited for the officers to focus their attention elsewhere in the store and floated closer to have a look at what the hero, who was currently rewinding the tape, was so baffled about. Red Robin had just hit play when Danny came close enough for his shoulder to accidentally brush the side of Red Robin's head in a momentary lapse of his intangibly, sending the vigilante bounding to his feet in a defensive position, searching for anything close.

Danny, in the split second between his accidental tangibility and Red Robin's reaction, had instinctively moved back and reasserted his powers for good measure. The video played behind Red Robin as he tensely searched the dingy narrow shop for anything that could have caused the cold chill and light brush to the back of his head, but even with the high tech sensors in his lenses he couldn't pick up anything that close to him, just him and the now three other officers in the building. His body slowly uncoiled, the fight bleeding out of him as he watched the officers inspect a particularly interesting piece of wiring near the entrance. 'Like a snake' Danny mused, before silently berating himself for almost getting caught by a bat.

Man, that would've been embarrassing.

Danny was lucky he hadn't thought to switch to thermal viewing, or he would have noticed the massive cold spot just above him to his left.

After that night Danny kept going for patrols around his squat house, and subsequently kept running into Red Robin in his case to find the ghost(ha) thieves. After the seventh time he figured it would be more interesting to just start out searching for the vigilante instead of running into him after the police lights directed him to a crime scene.

An alarm from the store across the street had Danny refocusing on Red Robin's wrist computer. There hadn't been movement on the cam footage, but as Red Robin rose from his crouch Danny noticed one of the camera views where an empty display that had previously held a line of 60 inch flat screens not five minutes before. Rising and hopping off the cornice Red Robin toggled the button on his comm with an exasperated groan.

"Oracle, it's RR," he paused and a woman's voice could vaguely be heard, "So you couldn't see anything either?" He groaned again, louder as he took a few more steps away from the roof ledge. "What kind of tech could hide someone from all the cameras in there?" Another pause, this time from both ends.

"You think it's a meta?" Red murmured, almost to himself. "That could be why we didn't even see the goods getting moved," Oracle was saying something he couldn't make out, then "I'll try, but I don't know how much I'll find even if I can see them." Danny tuned out their conversation after that as another sound caught Danny's attention at the back side of the building. Red Robin was too focused on his conversation to notice or hear, but to Danny the hushed tones were both loud and suspicious.

As he got closer to the edge, the tones became voices, all three deep and rough. He peered over the rear cornice to the alley below, and spotted three men dressed in all black loading the freshly stolen TV screens into the back of a nondescript white van. Two of the men were making their way to the front doors of the vehicle and were wearing large gaudy white belts and were shouting at the third arranging the monitors in the back. The half-ghost only had time to think 'well they don't look suspicious at all' before the first one got to the driver's side door and yanked it open. Belatedly realizing that they were probably the thieves the pacing hero behind him was looking for, Danny made a split second decision and dove for Red Robin's utility belt.

Among the few gadgets Danny had seen Red Robin use, the tracking bug was stored in an easily accessible front pocket at the birds front. Rather than trying to be stealthy for the sake of him not being found out, Danny quickly made a downward sweeping motion with his hand to grab the tracking device intangibly out of the pouch. Only half noticing the full body chill he gave Red Robin on the process, he dashed back to the van of whose driver had just keyed the ignition and stuck the tracker to it's undercarriage in time for it to peel out of the alley back doors only just closing on the turn with a lot 'slam!' and into the dead side street away from the electronic store.

As he watched the van go, he hoped that tracker had an automatic 'on' function or he would be down one piece of mysteriously missing bat-tech and up one very suspicious bat.

Flying worriedly back up to where he had left said bat, he was greeted with his slightly panicked conversation with the person(s?) on the other end of his comm. "-I am not hallucinating! I just felt something go through me and nothing's here! I'm- no I'm not coming down with something Dick! "

Something in the way he said that made Danny pretty sure he wasn't meant to hear that. Vigilantes and their secret identities, right? (was his name really Dick? Or was that just an insult? It felt like a name when he said it…)

"I swear something has been stalking me for the last month and none of you will believe me!"

The half-ghost flinched, realizing that yeah, he maybe hadn't been as sneaky as he'd thought in hanging (haunting?) around the vigilante, but after the first few reactions to his ghostly presence he'd thought Red Robin had choked him up to being some regular Gotham chill or something, only shivering before going back to what he'd been doing previously. Before anyone, present or otherwise, could say anything else, Red Robin's wrist computer beeped and pulled up a map showing the location of the -thankfully operational- moving tracker.

A small "What?" was the only thing to accompany the deep frown as Red Robin lifted his gloved arm showing the tracker, before reaching into the pouch that previously held said tracker and pulling out empty air. Somehow deepening his frown, the bird looked around the empty rooftop, scanning for seemingly anything, before moving his hand back to his comm to speak.

"Guys, I think I got a lead," he stated wearily. He was met with a few seconds of dead air before a flurry of voices spoke one after another in a cacophony Danny could barely even start to decipher before Red Robin spoke over them.

"Something took my tracker. I don't know what has it but it's heading to the docks, I'm going to see where it's headed and maybe find some clues about either who took it, or. that tech."

A distinctly male voice replied this time, and Danny could vaguely make out something about the tracker leading to a trap. Danny really didn't think about what he'd do after setting the tracking device, just that his core urged him to help. Internally groaning at his lack of planning yet again, he was surprised to hear Red Robin's reply.

"I don't think it's a trap. If what I think happened, then that thing that's stalking me might just have given me the lead I need to bust this case open. And yes I know you guys still don't believe me about the thing, but I've seen and felt too many things over the past month not to think something's keeping tabs on me." He started to make hand gestures around halfway through his rant, ending off with a grumble at the notion of invisible teens' currently unknown presence. He heard one more voice speaking up in a cautious tone before the vigilante raised his hand again to the comm. With a reassuring sounding "will do" he switched off his comms and headed to the fire escape off the side of the building and to his bike parked a few streets over.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The docks, Danny thought, were both more haunted and quieter than Amity's, and that somehow made them even creepier.

While keeping up with Red Robin's ninja-like movements through the maze of Gotham's harbour he had spotted no less than fifteen ghosts of various power levels and forms, ranging from the usual blobs to some very concerning looking business men in drenched suits.

Coming up on the location of the tracker Danny placed on the thieves van, they came to a warehouse that was a lot less dead than the ones beside it. Creeping up to an adjacent roof Danny could spot three guards, likely armed if their postures were anything to go by. Red Robin surveyed the perimeter before finding an open window on the second floor. He studied the opening for a few minutes to confirm whether or not there was anyone in the room, then pulled out his grapple and shot it at the overhang of the building just above it, sailing through the small hole with practiced grace.

'Most of the batclan could probably take flight really easily… A bat that could actually fly, now that would be terrifying.' The intrusive thought couldn't escape Danny as he floated through the wall behind the bird, watching as he took a roll and came up in -from what the half-ghost could tell- a perfect defensive crouch. Red Robin checked the room for any cameras before creeping over to the doorway, the door itself having most likely been lost to vagrants a long time ago. With no one in the corridor -though with the other doorways having actual doors it was hard to tell- the vigilante stalked towards the open end, presumably where the office portion ends and the warehouse properly 'begins'.

Red Robin stopped just short of where the office hallway met a grated catwalk that overlooked about two thirds of the warehouse below. Though it must not have been originally, the office space was held aloft by solid yet bare I-beams that jutted from the concrete below. Remnants of walls in the form of gypsum dust and water stains were all that proved the existence of a previously blocked off section to a now open space. The open space, of course, held pallets and pallets of stolen electrical equipment; TV's, computers, stereo systems, just to name a few that Danny could see. Along the wall to his right he could see the van he'd tagged with Red Robins tracer, along with two other vehicles of similar make to the one they followed. The first van currently had its rear doors wide open as four men in all black unloaded the monitors into a waiting palette for… storage? It was hard for Danny to say, but by the way the vigilante slightly below him gasped -silently, he noted absently- they had found the mother-load.

There were more guys than just the ones unloading the van, obviously. They seemed to keep in groups, but in total there were maybe thirty of them, the ghost boy guessed. All of them had some small firearm on them, about half some visible melee weapon, and all had the same Bad Guy™ wardrobe of black long sleeves and pants.

A good few had those garish white belts on, Danny had noticed due to the fact they stick out like the belt on his HAZMAT, though for different reasons. The goons that wore them didn't unload the goods with the ones who didn't have them, suggesting they had a different job in this operation.

Red Robin was taking all this in just as much as he was, watching the men at work as they catalogued the new additions to a collection that clearly went further than just the department store robberies. 'Maybe they break into houses too?' Danny had to assume that because how else would you get a literal mound of cellphones and tablets without some good ol' B&E?

You can't, that's how.

Both Danny and Red Robin were too captivated by the floor below they weren't paying attention to the floor they were on. Specifically, they didn't notice the goon slip out from one of the offices they had neglected to check beforehand. He didn't see them—really just Red Robin, Danny was still invisible—immediately, but as the bird didn't turn around immediately the thug took the chance to take out his weapon—a short lead pipe in this case—and slunk towards the bird and ghost duo as silently his black converse could.

Danny heard a scuff a second before the guy behind them took a swing—straight at the back of Red Robin's head. Thank the ancients so did he, swivelling on the ball of his left foot and kicking out with his right, sweeping the thugs legs and sending him face first into the catwalk grate with his momentum. As he landed though, he let go of his pipe.

Which fell to the floor below.

Which in turn alerted everyone to what was happening just above their heads.

Danny metaphorically held his breath (not literally, he didn't need to breathe as a ghost) as, as one, the entire warehouse snapped to look in the direction of the loud clang! and eventually the bird in the rafters. Many rushed to unholster their firearms before shooting at the vigilante.

Red Robin cursed and sprinted back the way he came, into the vacant room and back out the window to the opposing roof with his grapple. Behind them shouting and more gunshots could be heard, leaving Danny's ears ringing as the mob of thugs spilled out of the warehouse in pursuit of the rooftop runner.

Danny had to resist the urge to put up a shield to aid the bird in his escape, his core screaming at him protect protect protect! As bullets whizzed by them in the leaps Red Robin took between corrugated rooftops. He deflected as many as he could without being obvious, but due to that a few found their marks, the first one in Red Robin's upper right arm, another grazing his left cheek to the bridge of his nose, and the final one getting through his body armour and through his lower left side, exiting through his chest.

The last bullet made Red Robin yelp in pain, losing focus of his landing position and slipping on a slick spot on the next roof. His legs went out from under him and though he tried to find something, anything to hold onto, the strain had his right arm weakening, and with a look of terror, he fell.

Protect protect protect protect protect pr̵̟̬̬͕̼̜̪̞̊̓͗̊͌͆͠͝ͅo̷̦̟̥̠͉̘͕͛̎͛͝ͅṱ̷̼͔̘̩̆ě̴̗̱͍̤̣̻̯̹̇̍̄c̶̡̤͔̫̍͋́͐̀͂̕͝��̲t̵͚̟͓̔͐̏͊̈́̕ ̶̘͈͙̻̦̫̱͑̂p̴̧̩͚̝̲͓̜̰͑̅́̉̈́͛͝r̵̨̛̘̕ǒ̷̧̰̟͖͓̳̘̮̓̊̈́͗̉t̵̢͙̝̰͍̗̪̀͛ͅḛ̵͖͎̭̹̾́̀͋͘ç̵̭̭̫̥̭͎͚̯͌̌̀̾ṯ̵̤̪̟̙̹̂̓́̊͛̐̓͘̕͜ ̵͙͈̟͆̀̍̆p̸̡̛̙͎̖̭̐̆̈́̇̏ṙ̸̘̗̪͖̂̽̉́̕o̶̝̬̔̅̈́͑̃t̷̨̧̛̖̘̩̩͇̺̀̔͋̈́́̄̈́͝ȅ̴̞̗͗̂͂͂̉̚c̶̛̥̹̃̃̓̐̽ṯ̶͎̈́͂̈͐̎́͒͝!̶̥̇̄̈̓̈́͗̀͝͠

Before he knew what he was doing, Danny dove for Red Robin, catching him by the wrist not five feet from the very hard, very solid, concrete pavement below them. He lowered the vigilante down gently, his legs not supporting him due to shock of not going splat. (or possibly due to trauma and blood loss.) Danny only let go when Red Robin was firmly sitting on the ground, back to the adjacent wall and unharmed -other injuries notwithstanding- and turned to the rapidly approaching thunder of footsteps as the goons came running at them.

Dropping his invisibility, Danny put a shield around the prone teen behind him. Better not to have him get worse due to some stray bullets while he was being protected.

Why wasn't he taking the injured vigilante and getting the hell outta dodge to somewhere safe? Well that's because he was angry. He was angry they hurt something that was his. They would pay for hurting something he was protecting.

And so, as the mob of goons came at the two teens, Danny, for lack of a better term, unfolded.

A multitude of eyes and teeth and claws came gnashing and snarling outwards in a cloud of frozen shadow at the gang, causing many to panic and either shoot or flee. Some of the ones shooting shot the ones trying to get away, and the buildup of panic and screams and fear had Danny cackling in static echos as he gouged and disarmed and covered the mob in his nebulous mass. He never injured enough to kill, but enough to make sure that if they weren't carried away that they'd need a while to recover.

As the stars that were his teeth and nails stopped flashing in blows delivered Danny adjusted himself back to his usual state, teeth only slightly sharp and claws firmly under the white of his HAZMAT gloves. Satisfied at seeing no man left behind was a code the thugs stood by, Danny turned back to the glowing dome that housed his vigilante.

(No, not his, he can't own someone.)

Red Robin was still in the same spot, which is good. He was also unconscious, which is less good. Gingerly, Danny put two fingers to the bird's neck, looking for and finding a pulse that while strong, was erratic and fast. He would bleed out without immediate attention, and it would be a bad idea to try and carry him to the nearest hospital for multiple reasons. Cursing, he took off his left glove and wrapped it under Red Robin's armpit, knotting it tight for a makeshift tourniquet. Trying to assess a chest wound with only the surface knowledge he knows from patching himself up would be disastrous, so from the small interdimensional space that held his possessions while in ghost form he pulled out his to-go med kit. Thankfully he hasn't needed it all that much since he got to Gotham, leaving much of the more heavy duty supplies for cases of emergency—cases like these. He takes the antibacterial spray and applies a generous amount to both the entry and exit wound, then seals both with his ghostly ice and wraps his torso in bandages. Debating on whether or not it was better to dress the cut on the fainted teens face, the need to respect his privacy won out and applied some gauze with a hint of frost to keep it on and to prevent infection.

While not entirely satisfied with his handywork he knows the ice mixed with the spray will kill anything off except the bird himself, he focuses on the hard part.

Telling the bats.

He knows he has to. But the fear of them trying to look into him has him hesitating. His core thrums loud in his chest, urging him to help, protect your human, protect and the fear recedes for a moment. Before it can come back Danny pulls Red Robin's comm out of his ear and holds it over his own. Taking a fortifying breath he technically doesn't need he pressed the button on the earpiece and breathed out a nervous "H-hello?"

"RR, status report." The female voice he recognized as hearing before, Oracle, comes over the comm instantly.

"Uhhh, bird down?" He hadn't seen a code used for when a bat needs immediate assistance. He could've at least tried to sound more confident.

"... Who are you and how did you get Red Robins' communicator?" Anand that just sent her on high alert, great going Fenton.

Ignoring the question and putting a little more bravado in his voice he states "listen, Red Robin has been shot and needs medical assistance. I've patched him up but he's unconscious and might be in shock. One of you bats needs to get down to the docks and help him."

The line was dead for a moment before another voice—was it Dick—came on the line to answer.

"I'm on route to the docks now, tell me where he is and we'll see what happens to you."

Relief flooded through Danny despite the thinly veiled threat and he quickly rattled off their coordinates, noting in between which warehouses they were in before turning off the comm and placing it in its original position.

He stayed to make sure Red Robin was safe until he heard the silent hum of Nightwing's electric motorbike. Turning invisible he watched the older vigilante rush to check over Red Robin's wounds, make a comment into his comms, then turned his head to search for the one who patched him up.

Giving up quickly he picked up his fainted younger bridal style and carried him over to his bike, placing him on the front with him just behind him to secure him. Then they were off, speeding to Danny didn't know where, probably the bat cave? He was about to head home when the thrum from his core gave him pause. It still needed to know Red Robin was safe, still calling to protect, even if there was no danger. Trying to ignore it would just make the thrum turn to a burn, so reluctantly Danny sped off to follow Nightwing and his (no, not his) Red Robin.

'This is going to end either very well, or very badly…' Was all he could think.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Next][Ao3]

#ham writes #dpxdc #dp x dc #danny phantom #dp x dc crossover #batman #danny fenton #tim drake #chapter fic #chapter 1

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scam-alerts · 9 days ago

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🚨Scammer Alert🚨 + 🔎Scam Exam(ination)🔍

Scam account: @muralmagicsworld (banned)

Accounts also running this scam: @craftpatch

(Note: There are probably a lot of scammers running this scam. This post is mainly talking about the blog that I managed to find and document with my own two eyes.)

1- Type of Scam this account is performing: Muse Scam

The muse scam is a variant of the fake check scam in which the scammer will contact the victim over social media and claim to want to use their image for an art project. The scammer will often use a stolen social media account to increase their credibility. They will offer a generous sum of money and offer to pay via check, and the victim is instructed to send money to the scammer for “materials” via an irreversible method. The victim is under the illusion that the funds cleared when the bank makes the money available thanks to current regulations. Usually the fake check deposit will be reversed in a few weeks, but it can also take several months.

If you do not have the funds to cover the amount, your balance will go negative. Your bank will usually charge a fee for depositing a bad check, and your account may be closed depending on the severity of the scam. source (reddit)

Additional info about the muse scam. (from malwarebytes)

2 - How I know this user is performing a scam.

Part 1: The request. (on a post made by a bot no less... lol)

Part 2: The blog an their posts.

The blog's earliest post was made on November 11th 2024

Using google lense (the photo icon you can use to look up an image on the internet) I was able to find these images linked to a youtube channel and an instagram account made by an artist known as Andreas Liss.

The woman in the first instagram post's name is credited, by the original artist, to be the lovely Anastasia Dmitrieva.

Where as the scammer... well.. They decided to call her... Jennifer.

-----

Final words: The muse scam is quite common and it's recently migrated from instagram to tumblr. If you are someone who posts pictures of yourself or your animals, always remember this: If someone tells you they're feeling 'inspired' and they'll draw you or your pet but you have to 'pay for art supplies' and they're willing to send you a $1000+ 'check/money order' and 'you can keep the rest' because they're feeling 'oh so generous'?

It is and always will be a scam.

Other helpful guides on spotting scams. (by @kyra45)

-----

Disclaimer: This post is only meant to serve as documentation and reference material so that others know: why this person is a scammer, and to provide more information about the scam they are running. I do not, in any way, endorse harassment or mass reporting these users. Only report posts related to asks, comments, or messages if you GET them or ones like them. Thank you.

#scam #scam alert #scams #muralmagicsworld #art scam #muse scam #instagram scam #mural scam #commission scam

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aventurineswife · 24 days ago

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TYYY, im the anon who requested avgin reader <33

i was thinking maybe part 2, where aventurine remembers that he promised to marry reader (an aventurine fan being delusional in its finest after some lovely angst), he would remember the promise because his past self told him that he would marry reader when he's older, and maybe he tries to find us but we already leave penacony

he looks for us for a while, but doesn't find us, until he comes across us again, but we have different colored eyes (contacts(im imagining every avgin has their own very unique eyes)). he tells us that he is sorry, but he had to leave kakavasha behind in order to become aventurine, AND WE MAKE OUT

jkjk

but he wants us to starts over and be friends again, and then eventually we start dating

i love being delusional over fictional men (especially aventurine)

End of Beginning | Part 2

Summary: Driven by a forgotten promise he made to you in your youth, Aventurine searches for you, only to discover you have also changed.

Tags: Aventurine x Reader, Slow Burn, Second Chance Romance, Angst with a Happy Ending, Reunited Lovers, Childhood Friends to Strangers to Lovers, Emotional Repression, Confession in the Rain, Friends to Lovers.

Warnings: Emotional Pain and Past Trauma, Identity Struggles, Themes of Loss and Separation, Mild Language.

A/N: OMG HIII!! 🤭I LOVED YOUR PREVIOUS REQ AND YOU'RE SO REAL FOR THAT LMAOO!! ANYWAYS, I HOPE YOU LOVE THIS ONE 🫶💖🥰

(Part 1)

The rain came down like a forgotten melody, blurring the neon lights of Penacony's streets into hazy streaks of color. Aventurine stood beneath an awning, absentmindedly watching the downpour, his hand resting in his pocket, fingers brushing against a small object: a chipped, red gemstone you’d given him back on Sigonia-IV, long before everything had changed.

It had started with a memory—half-formed, distant but persistent. "When I’m older," his voice from another time had echoed faintly, "I’ll marry you." He hadn’t thought of that promise in years, but it lingered now, blooming in the spaces between his fabricated smiles and rehearsed confidence. In the midst of high-stakes deals and risky wagers, a part of him had begun yearning for something more honest, something only you could have given him.

And so, he had started looking. But you had already left Penacony, slipping away just as he arrived at places where he was certain he’d find you. Weeks turned into months, yet his search continued, propelled by a restless ache he couldn’t deny. Each dead-end only amplified the memory of you—your laughter, the way you’d said his real name, Kakavasha, as if it held his entire world within it.

Finally, he found himself in a quiet place far from the bustling cities, the perfect setting for chance reunions. He spotted you standing beneath a flickering streetlight, your silhouette softened by the drizzle. But when you turned to face him, he froze, heart hammering as he took in your unfamiliar gaze—your eyes were different, colored lenses casting your unique Avgin irises into another shade.

Still, he could tell it was you. He took a step forward, and you blinked in recognition, guarded but unable to disguise the glint of emotion in your expression.

“Kakavasha...” you murmured, almost like a question, but he could hear the hope hidden in your voice.

He clenched his jaw, glancing down as he felt the weight of that name settle into him. “I... I’m sorry,” he began, voice barely rising above the rainfall. “I had to leave Kakavasha behind to become Aventurine.”

The words hung between you both, fragile but resolute. You studied him, looking for a hint of the boy you once knew, the one who had promised forever. He took another step, so close now that he could see the light rain gathering in your hair, feel the warmth of your presence. “I remember... that I once told you I’d marry you one day,” he confessed softly, almost afraid to voice it aloud. “That’s why I’ve been looking for you.”

“Why didn’t you stay?” The hurt in your voice was undeniable, woven with both sorrow and defiance. “Why did you let go of everything we had?”

Aventurine closed his eyes, breathing through the ache. “I had to,” he said quietly, “to survive, to become someone who could protect you, in a way I couldn’t before.” He looked up at you, eyes revealing the struggle beneath his poised exterior. “But I want to try again, to be... someone you can trust. Let’s start over. As friends, if that’s what you want.”

The words opened a wound, yet there was something in his gaze—vulnerable and raw—that made you want to believe him. The rain picked up, pouring harder now, drenching you both in a cloak of silver. He lifted his hand, hesitated, then let it fall, as if afraid he no longer had the right to reach for you.

And then, standing under the rain, words escaped you, unbidden but true. “Then let’s start over.” Your voice was a whisper, but it was enough.

Aventurine’s eyes softened, a flicker of hope sparking within them. He stepped back, nodded, and offered a small smile that, for the first time in years, felt genuine. Neither of you moved to leave; instead, you lingered, drenched and laughing softly under the storm, sharing a tentative glance that promised more than any words could convey.

As the rain poured down, you both knew this was only the beginning—of something fragile, yet unbreakable.

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copperbezel · 3 months ago

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Zephyr Slip

At the end of last year, before I'd begun working on Bit Cobalt, I ran into some paleoart of Austroraptor, a dromaeosaur (raptor) from Argentina. Austroraptor is one of the largest dromaeosaurs, with a long, narrow, Big Bird snoot, conical teeth that probably point to fishing, and small forelimbs, as well as leg proportions that hint at a runner. Much of the paleoart I saw depicted Austroraptor in waterbird colors, which gave it a soft and friendly appearance, immediately my new favorite dinosaur.

So I drew an Austroraptor and then a robotic one, adding a quail topknot or ahoge feather, and started to think about making a transforming figure that would change from this animal into a humanoid robot. But a transformation from cute robot girl to cute robot girl, except one of them is a dinosaur, seemed a bit redundant, and there would be compromises in both directions that would detract rather than add.

But a couple of months later, I saw a particular motor scooter and something clicked, and the game was on. I love motor scooters, and they're a fantastic accessory for other figures on the shelf. I went through two foamcore prototypes to nail down the transformation, making it as simple and sturdy as I could manage and making sure both modes would scale well with other 1/12 scale figures.

I also started collecting some reference images for details I could nab and integrate, and to nail down the scaling of the scooter.

After I had something that worked, I drew up some concept art for both modes and started modeling. I was able to streamline the design a couple of steps further in the 3D model, and then it was all carving up shapes, fine tuning, etc. Probably the longest phase of modeling was after I had my model roughed out into shape, but needed to build the joints, firm up the edges, define all the contact surfaces, and apply subdivision surfaces. I found it useful to rig the model and set a couple of animation steps in Blender for the two modes so I could simply page back and forth between them.

I had to set the design on the back burner while I worked out the kinks with my 3D printer and built my last couple of projects. Then I made a test print to identify any trouble spots, and after a couple of tweaks to get the feel right, it was time to print and finish the real thing. Zephyr Slip is the first thing I've printed in "color", and thanks to some dyes I need to experiment with more, she won't be the last. That means a much more durable finish for parts that have to slide against one another or clip into place. I did add a gloss coat to some surfaces of the black elements, but it shouldn't show chipping much. (Unlike the kickstand, thanks to my terrible decision to paint its feet.)

Like my previous figures, Zephyr's eyes (and console) are just printed gloss paper under a coat of gloss varnish, and her headlights and taillights have some clear resin poured in over the paint and cured into place for lenses. Cutting plastic windows like the ones on my Vertigo GT for the lower headlights didn't have the same effect, so they got the same clear resin treatment. The decal designs themselves were made in Blender, because I've given up on Inkscape's interface, but I think they came out okay.

The joints are almost exclusively 3mm ABS rods, although her hip joints are Kotobukiya Hexa Gear joints, which gave me a sturdy pin and hinge in a compact package and without visible pegs. I'm looking into options to make the pegs show less while being easy to remove for the construction and painting process. Despite some care with the tolerances, I did have to widen some peg holes and mush some pegs during assembly to get her pose well and snap together tight into either mode. But everything does clip solidly into place, resulting in a really playable figure.

As my first fully transforming figure and also my largest, Zephyr Slip is definitely the biggest figure project I've tackled so far, and I'm extremely happy with the results. Posability is probably her weakest area, but she can pounce and emote, and with her solid handfeel and satisfyingly snappy transformation, I'm happy with the design.

Paleontologically, I've followed most of the proportions of the real animal, although her torso should be a little bit longer, and her tail half again as long. She should also have visible first fingers, and I'm playing into the paleoart meme of bare snouts on dromaeosaurs that shouldn't have them. The proportion of thigh to shin is exaggerated, and the tail should have some left-right sway even if it's inflexible in the vertical axis. But it pleases me that she is both a roughly accurately scaled Austroraptor, and also a fairly realistically scaled scooter (if a bit chunky).

As always, due credit to @aprilpowered and Workbenchmaniac for support and feedback along the way, as well as Nemocyte (Tumblr | Twitter), whose feedback helped me to work out (among other things) the articulation needs of a theropod figure, something I'd never had to think about before.

#3d printing #3d modeling #action figures #transformers #robot girl #dinosaurs #austroraptor #dromaeosaur #1:12 scale #motor scooter

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forwntrx · 1 year ago

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GIRLS LIKE GIRLS ┊͙˚. 08. COMFORTABLE

𑁍┊come here (written portion)

the camera crew adjusted their lenses, preparing for the upcoming podcast. another promotion, another day. you looked up from your phone to your best friend. she’s heavily engaged in conversation with aeri, her eyes went from her phone to the girl speaking. she was waiting for you.

you can't just keep her waiting.

you swiveled up from your chair, touched jimin’s shoulders in greeting (she eyes you suspiciously) as you rounded over to the other side, and stopped in front of minjeong.

the moment your eyes caught hers, a small smile played on her lips.

“you love me,” she teased.

aeri quickly realized what’s going on, and swiveled her chair over to jimin. she would not be another one of your third wheels.

deciding her seat looked the most comfortable, you settled onto minjeong's lap. if only you could see the way her face flushes.

“more than just love. a whole lot of love,” you squeezed her into a hug, and you saw the camera flicker. your stans were gonna go insane. really, there had been nothing wrong with you two. not that you knew of.

sometimes you spent more time with your other friends. minjeong was understanding. it was never a problem.

she knew in the end, you'd come back to her.

minjeong’s smile widened, and she pulled you in closer. she rested her head against your back, and released a deep breath you didn’t know she was holding.

“comfortable?” she asked.

“always.” you said.

𑁍┊masterlist －previous — next

winter and yn have moments that the fandom call a "drought" where they have limited contact for days maybe weeks. this means no pics taken by winter and sitting on opposite sides during promos. this current drought was 1 month and 3 days. they call them an old married couple where they have to take time away from each other sometimes

fans call yn 'turbulent' which is true in some ways, more than not

𑁍┊a/n: winter agenda begins ,, my loveeeee

𑁍┊ taglist: CLOSED! @aeongiies @runawaymazola @wintersgff @winieter @luvjanexx @justme-idle @sewiouslyz @lcv3lies @yerisdumbass @nasyu-kookies @kchwnsgf @jeindall777 @dr-wholehearted @thoughtfulqueenlady @yunalvrrr @juhyunsthirdwife @haerinfangs @awkwardtoafault @idk-idc-rn @unforgiven-000-hotline @dream-chasers-things @pandafuriosa60 @1r3n31ty

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transraptortrainer · 6 months ago

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I'll speak to specifically the trauma of them losing Brooklynn to a dinosaur !!

Kenji obviously became extremely avoidant which I think was perpetuated by a lot of trauma he experienced just dealing with the dad stuff. It's not easy for him to talk about his feelings or address them directly, and I think he knew he'd be hurtful to Darius - someone he really cares about - if he saw him again after Brooklynn's funeral, which is why he dropped contact with him and the others. He didn't want to hurt his brother but he needed space and a lot of time to heal from what had happened. That being said I don't think he would've ever broken that silence if it wasn't for Darius showing up on his door.

Darius isolated, and as he's always done, he blamed himself. Darius has suffered from survivor's guilt even since his father passed. It's never been easy for him to move on or forgive himself. But he also became a bit obsessive, and knowing that there was originally this plot for Darius to just hate dinosaurs because of the event was passed around in early screenings of season 1 is soo much but it really indicates how much Brooklynn's death meant to him. He couldn't view dinosaurs through the same passionate lense he always did. I think that is extremely representative of his feelings.

Similarly to Darius, Ben also became obsessive in a different kind of way...? Idk if anyone's noticed that his anxiety has kinda evolved into a what appears to me as a kind of paranoia disorder , which. Same queen I get it. He even went as far as to consider his friend Sammy may have been involved! He admits he had to rule out all possibilities which I can only imagine made him feel incredibly guilty. I think he also had to detach, probably mostly because the event caused a split in his friend group. He's become extremely self-reliant but his disorders are manifesting in fun and interesting new ways LOL.

Sammy copes through keeping busy. Obviously. I wouldn't be surprised if this is somehow related to the fact her family decided to end contact with her. But btw can we talk about how much that must've been the straw that broke the camel's back? We know family is the most important thing in the world to Sammy. Not only did she lose her family, but her camp fam haven't been together in 6 months and it's broken her heart. But she keeps busy. She cooks, she cleans, she cares for bumpy. She tries to do anything but think about what's happened to her.

For yaz.. well she's the only one actively receiving therapy. So she's coping. I would bet she thought about quitting therapy and school to support Sammy after everything happened but Sammy refused to let this happen. Yaz is very pragmatic and probably fell into a mindset once or twice that something like this was only bound to happen eventually...Yasmina seemed maybe the least effected by the loss and I think that's probably entirely because she was actively speaking about the trauma and working through it with a support group on the island. Love you girl.....

#mail #jwct #chaos theory #thank you for questions i loveee talking too much

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beemynumberone · 5 months ago

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Heartbreaker

-> a rendition of how Oikawa Tooru and gf!reader broke up

-> angst, written mainly as a recount from reader’s POV

-> inspired by Majorie by Taylor Swift (the regret of losing someone you didn’t treasure enough, but mainly the angst tho)

-> constructive feedback is always appreciated!

Writer’s note: Hi! I am writing these scenarios to placate my active imagination and hopefully make someone’s day/night. I do not intend to hurt anyone/anything through this fic.

Thank you for picking up my story and happy reading!

Part 2

my haikyuu masterlist

Chapter 1:

Oikawa wore contact lenses

Sure, he had good looking features. But it was the face of someone who had worn glasses the whole of his life.

That was maybe his first red flag.

And it was probably my first mistake.

I had a manageable, low degree that let me wear light, delicate frames. But for our upcoming dance competition, we had to wear contact lenses for aesthetic purposes.

And there I was, eyelids held wide open by my two fingers and on another finger sat that stupid transparent bowl.

Tears pooled in the crevices of my eye socket. My finger shook. The fluid in the lens rattled. I was terrified. I hadn’t remembered the feeling of having my eyeball poked and I was not going to reminisce now.

Taking a deep breath, I let my eye relax and tried again. The school grounds were empty at this time of day. As the captain of the school dance team, I had to come earlier than the rest for our full dress rehearsal, to mark attendance and get the place ready. So much for sisterhood.

Footsteps headed in my direction.

“Hi! Do you need help?”

I turned back. That voice was unmistakable. Light, airy and like he didn’t have a care in the world. All 6 feet of Oikawa Tooru came into my view. Dressed in his trademark cyan practice shirt and white shorts, he took up all the space between us. The trees rustled. Not to be gross but that whiff of deodorant (or body soap I didn’t know or care) smelled heavenly.

Peering down at my phone camera and the open contact lens case, Oikawa set his duffle bag down and sat beside me.

“Here. Let me help you. I know wearing contact lenses is really difficult when you first start out, I have first-hand experience with it.”

And as if dancing to his tune, I let my guard down and gave him permission to touch my eye, something I didn’t even trust myself with.

“Look up for me please.” I gazed at his chocolate brown eyes and braced for impact.

Twenty seconds later, I had two cups suctioned onto my eyeballs and a clearer vision. How I was going to take them out I didn’t know. But I did know that I was eternally grateful to Oikawa for helping me.

“Now that I’ve helped you with your contacts, could you please help me convince the security guard to unlock the indoor court?”

Oikawa pleaded, giving me puppy eyes that made me want to run to the guard and get the keys, and slap him at the same time.

Yep, maybe I wasn’t that grateful after all.

Chapter 2:

Oikawa was a presence to be reckoned with. He occupied space. A foot in the door and people would start talking. It was hard not to care and I, a strong independent hopeless romantic cared very much deep down.

Every night from then I replayed that moment like my favourite movie. The softness of Oikawa’s voice and how tenderly he handled me, calloused fingers grazing my cheek to hold me (and my sanity) in place while he attempted the impossible.

I wasn’t going to lie to myself. I was infatuated with him.

Whenever I passed by him in the hallways, I searched for the same warmth in the corner of my eye and prayed that he would give me a semblance of a sign that he remembered our encounter.

Surely he must have thought it was something.

Chapter 3:

My hope was fading. It had been a month since the dance competition and still no sign. We had won gold much to my dance members’ delight. But as I stepped onto the stage to present the trophy over to the principal, the only eyes I searched for were his. When he gave a thumbs up back, my credulous heart pounded. The corners of my lips pulled high and the rest of the ceremony went by in a blur.

Walking back to class, I overheard the pink haired guy say something about volleyball practice being postponed to next Monday.

“But that’s our rest day!” Oikawa retorted. “Coach must be out of his mind!”

“Coach knows best.” His spiky haired friend replied, patting him on the back. That was Hajime Iwaizumi. He shared a math class with me. Surprisingly, he was quite a chill guy without Oikawa by his side.

As I went home, I contemplated my choices. Did I really want to get to know Oikawa more? Was I ready to risk realising that he was not the person he seemed and that everything that happened was a dream after all?

As luck would have had it, I didn’t need to choose. Math was our first period for the day. And as I entered the classroom early as always (old habits die hard), I had the wonderful opportunity to see Oikawa and Iwaizumi bicker… over what to put on my desk?

Iwaizumi, being the pragmatist, was arguing that Oikawa should put a probiotic milk drink “to show that you care for her”. While Oikawa was arguing that a letter would be better to show his true feelings and why was Iwaizumi suddenly interested in his personal life?

“You never make the first move ‘kawa. Why now?”

My eyes widened and my brain struggled to compute his words. Was this confession happening now? What was it that I rehearsed everyday in the shower in case he did confess?

“Oh hi y/n! We were just talking about you.” Iwaizumi looked over at me frozen in the doorway.

Oikawa shooed his friend out of the classroom. He pushed a drink and a small pink envelope into my hands. Looks like he decided on giving me both items.

Long story short, we started dating. It was arguably the best time of my life. I had dance practice on Tuesday and Thursday, Tooru had volleyball on Wednesday and Fridays, and sometimes on weekends, if the guard was nice enough. So we made it work. On Mondays after school we hung out and on the weekends we would gym. How clever of us mere teenagers to organise our time productively.

I loved the times we spent laughing and feeding ducks at the park, challenging each other in the gym, bantering at the convenience store. And our best memories made, in my opinion, were the times spent cycling on the deserted lit up roads at one in the morning. As we paddled away for an hour or two, I didn’t remember to treasure the peace that encompassed our quiet heartfelt conversations.

-> Emotionally invested? Here’s Part 2

#haikyuu #hq #hq x reader #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu x y/n #oikawa x reader #oikawa x y/n #oikawa tooru #haikyuu oikawa #hq oikawa #haikyuu angst #hq angst #oikawa angst

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aziraphales-library · 1 year ago

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Hello! got any recommendations for some first kiss fics based on the trailers? sort of like what people think will happen in s2? preferably no smut!

Hi! Here are some first kiss fics published just before series two was released...

The Memories that Show us the Power of Love by eveningdreamer (T)

Cautiously Crowley stepped forward and looked closer. He gasped as he saw himself. But he looked different; with long hair and dark robes. He was grinning and tapping the angel on the shoulder like they were old friends. Crowley felt a wave of strange emotions. He felt… sentiment? For this moment he could not remember? Crowley's memories are taken away by Hell, and he has been sent to retrieve Gabriel from Aziraphale's shop. Can Aziraphale bring them and Crowley back? Perhaps he just has to show Crowley what he is missing.

Not Ever by GhoulishBastard (T)

Crowley is seen living in his Bentley for the following months as he no longer owns the flat he once had. In refusing to move into Aziraphale's bookshop due to the retired demons own self-loathing and embarrassment, we are met with a rather distant and bored Crowley. Upon stopping by the bookshop for his occasional check in, Crowley is led to share a little more about himself with his angel friend, who is once again requesting him to stay.

Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered by grntair3 (NR)

"Isn't this the one about the fish?" came Crowley’s voice. Aziraphale turned, eyes meeting Crowley's through his lenses before moving on to take in the rest of him. He was wearing a suit he'd never seen before–crisp, black on black pinstripe trousers with a matching jacket that was left undone, accompanied by a buttoned mesh black shirt underneath. Through it Aziraphale could see the smooth skin of his slim frame, from just above his navel to his Adam’s apple. Around his neck lay a thin, rope-like black tie, which only brought more attention to his visible clavicle. Aziraphale felt a rush run over him. "Sorry... what was that?" (aka, Aziraphale throws The Ball)

In Other Words (Baby, Kiss Me) by asparkofgoodness (M)

“You’ll stab your eye if you keep on like that.” “I’ll be- oops!” He rubbed at a stray mark with his ring finger, then continued. “I am very out of practice, I’m afraid. Ouch!” “Just,” Crowley huffed as he plucked the pencil from his hand, “let me. C’mere.” Aziraphale did as he was told, turning away from the mirror and watching with widening eyes as Crowley stepped in close. Oh, my. The mirrors’ bulbs bathed half of his angled features in soft light. Always, Crowley was always gorgeous, but something about this suit — the wide plane of the shoulders, perhaps, or the way the vertical stripes led one’s eyes down the length of his body — and the cut of the hat across his brow… Aziraphale could hardly manage a coherent thought. The buzz of the audience reminded him: show. Soon. Right. ----- Crowley pops into the dressing room before Aziraphale's magic show to wish him luck.

1:57AM at A.Z. FELL AND CO. by Lupe1987 (T)

crowley and aziraphale get plastered. they get drunk and make bad decisions. aziraphale turns out to be strikingly poetic when he's drunk.

All i want is nothing more than you Lightofonesoul (G)

It a fanfiction about a scene in the opening and that dinner in '41 (that it's in my head) + an addiction 👀 "He met his eyes and again that small pout made him raise his snake eyes to heaven, and to God who had decided to put in his way a creature so extremely... adorable. Again, he found himself doing what his friend wanted. He lifted his left foot, resting it on the towel, and the angel started to look at it. “Mmmh yes, you seem ok.” He said absorbed and then took to turn his foot, here and there to saw if he was really healed. Crowley had said nothing, tried not to move and not look at him, to not to concentrate on his delicate and pleasant touch. To not wander his mind on that contact and that closeness by the one he had wanted for centuries. "Aziraphale usually interrupted those moments of intimacy, as if he snapped his fingers to raise an invisible barrier between them. Crowley looked away for a moment, turning his head to the side and drinking the wine in silence, to give him time to do what he had always done, to save himself from temptation, but that evening it did not happen."

- Mod D

#good omens #ineffable husbands #first kiss #kissing #good omens s2 #mod d

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ingravinoveritas · 1 year ago

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(Putting this in a separate post because I sort of scattered my thoughts across two different posts last night.)

So by now we've all probably seen the Ask that Neil answered saying that the kissing scene in GO 2 required only one take. There were a couple of things that came to my mind when I read this, and perhaps the most immediate was that the OP asked how many times the scene had to be filmed, and that means the scene entire--the confession, the pleading, everything--not necessarily just the kiss itself. To that end, I wonder how Neil was answering--i.e., referring to the entire scene, or just the kiss. Because as it stands, the question (and answer) are a bit ambiguous/confusing, and lend themselves to greater discussion.

Assuming that this is all true, however, and that the kiss/scene was filmed in one take (though I'm not sure I believe this was actually the case, given the multitude of camera angles and other cinematographic necessities), I'd like to share a few thoughts. I keep seeing people say that Michael and David are actors, consummate professionals, and how could one underestimate their abilities so as to think they would need more than one take. The thing is, we do know that they are actors. Two of the finest this world has ever seen, even. But it is also abundantly clear that if the kiss was achieved in one take, it was not simply because they are actors, but because it was Michael and David. Together.

To stand across from someone and give/react to such an emotional performance involves so much intimacy and trust, in a way not many of us can understand. If we draw a comparison to OFMD, Rhys Darby and Taika Waititi talked about their kiss in season 1 being awkward, even though they have been friends for a long time. Michael and David, by contrast, have been close friends (if not more) for only a few years, yet there was not a moment's hesitation in that kiss. David, who was nearly blind in that scene from the combination of contact lenses and sunglasses, found his way to Michael's lips with a practiced ease, an approach borne of both skill and familiarity. And Michael trusted David so fully in that moment--trusted him enough to be vulnerable, to let himself be kissed and give up control to David.

The gasp when their mouths met. The hands coming to rest on David's back. The way Michael seemingly leans up partway through, leans into David while expertly conveying the myriad of emotions Aziraphale is experiencing. Could it all have been done in one take? Perhaps. But that still doesn't mean there wasn't more to it. The accumulation of so much that had built between Michael and David over the intervening years between season 1 and season 2, further adding to their already incredible on-screen chemistry. All there for us to see, to make us want more. To make us ache.

Whatever the case may be--whether the kiss truly was accomplished in one take, or was the result of countless rehearsals between Michael and David in the days/weeks/months beforehand (be it at the S2 table read, while working on scene blocking, or the two of them "rehearsing" on their own) we are beyond fortunate to have witnessed something so precious and rare. And hopefully we'll soon get to hear Michael and David themselves telling us all about what it was like...

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istandonsnowpiles · 8 months ago

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March

The month is coming to an end. I'm yearning for warm days. My month in photography has been... interesting.

This month I picked up two new pieces of gear & rented one more:

Fujifilm 70-300mm f/4-5.6

My first super telephoto lens. It's been wild. I've always enjoyed telephoto photography, but the lenses are... large. This is a nice compromise lens. It's a bit slow, but it's long as hell & fits in my smallest camera bag. Love it. Here's some photos from it.

Kolari Vision IR Chrome Lite Filter

I've had a fairly busted full spectrum converted X-E1 for a while. I dunno why it took me so long to pick up an IR Chrome filter for it. IR Chrome is the whole reason I want an full spectrum camera.

My X-E1's electronic contacts don't work, so I can't use it with most of my lenses. I've landed on using a 7Artisans 35mm f/1.4 lens (only $60!) on it. The image quality isn't great, but it's been good to learn on.

IR photography gets better in the summer thanks to all the foliage. It's a bit blah right now. So, expect more of this soon.

Sony RX100 VII rental

I haven't rented much camera gear. I wanted to try something low stakes first. This month I headed to Pittsburgh for a PWHL hockey game. I couldn't bring my usual cameras into the arena. So, I decided a small RX100 would be a good pick. I rented it for the weekend and got some great pics. I don't really like the camera that much, so I wouldn't get it again. I definitely am gonna look into other compact cameras though.

Continuing to learn the X-T5

I picked up a Fuji X-T5 after using an X-T2 (and X-H1) for a long time. I've been loving the image quality of the camera and the IBIS. The photos look phenomenal. There's a learning curve to every camera & I knew the X-T2 like the back of my hand. With the X-T5 as my main camera, I'm sure it won't take long to be second nature.

Film

I'm currently trying to shoot through a box of Portra 400. 5 rolls in my Nikon F3. I've gotten through 2 1/2 rolls. Only one has been developed, but I still need to scan them. I haven't ever tried hard to learn a specific film before. Now that I have a solid film camera, though, it seems like the right time to do it.

And that's what I've been up to this month in the world of photography

#photography #my life #march

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everett-fornow · 3 months ago

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Henris and Thatcher warm-up oneshot

I wrote this over a couple days and can't think of anything else to add to it but it was still a very good exercise to play around with their hate-y friendship thing

hope you enjoy it!!!!

A melancholy sigh washed over Henris as he laid on the carpet of the communal apartment atop the bar. It was quiet up there that particular night so no one was there to witness his usual pity party shenanigans. His favourite leatherback sketchbook sat at his fingertips, flat on the floor. He ran his fingers across the subtle indented pattern on the front cover, thinking of his purpose, what he wanted to be, what he wanted to do…and what he was. He rolled onto his back with another sigh.

“I should’ve been an artist..” he muttered to himself. He wished the dream he had of painting his days away and living peacefully were as alive as they were when he dropped out of high school and bought a canvas with his dads money. He wished that leatherback sketchbook beside him would beckon and beg for him to draw in it at least once a day but alas it sat still, as depressed, purposeless and worthless as its owner.

A set of footsteps could be heard ascending the stairs to the apartment, making Henris scramble to his feet and sit on the couch. Rule no.1 of a leader, never let your guard down. His eyes would join with the lense filtered pupils of their medic, Dr Thatcher. Perhaps he was trying too hard to look natural and was staring too intently because yes, she did notice.

“What’s with the look?” she asked “is there something in my hair?” she continued across the room, removing a book from the shelf.

“No,” Henris replied sharply “you were just in my line of sight, okay? Not everythings gotta be about you”

“Well aren't you just a ray of sunshine tonight.” Thatcher sarcastically rebutted “and for future reference it’s ‘not everything has to be about you’ ” she laughed and muttered, “goodness, sometimes I swear you didn’t even attend elementary..”

Henris frowned. He hadn’t.

“Anyways, what are you doing up here all alone? I thought you would’ve been spending time wi- ooh what’s that??” she interrupted her own thoughts as she noticed the sketchbook on the carpet, reaching for it. Henris had grabbed it out of her reach before she even had a chance of snatching it up.

“NO” Henris loudly commanded, “this isn’t for you to look through, missy, so don’t even think about it!”

Thatcher scoffed “aww, what is it? Your diawy?? Adorable” she sat down on the couch now behind henris with a smug sigh “y’know, for a grown man you’re awfully childish over things like, what is that, a sketchbook?” she stated as she observed the book he was holding to his chest closer, recognising the paper as that of drawing paper “I mean really, get over yourself. You can’t be all confident and powerful but get all fussy about a few drawings…” they held tense eye contact for some time after she finished, before Henris huffed and threw the book at her.

“Fine.” he caved. “you’re lucky I tolerate you” he continued to fester as she flicked through the pages of his sketchbook, feeling like parts were being gouged out of his dignity with every page she turned. God, she was good at getting him to cave. Too good.

“Wow…these are really good” she murmured in awe “when did you do these?”

“Just like…over the months or so…” he really didn’t like people knowing about his hobbies, especially someone as inclined to tease him as thatcher. He couldn’t tell if she really did like his art or not, her face and tone was unreadable to him. “It passes the time, gives me something to do…”

“I didn't know you were such a good artist..” she complimented as she studied the sketches on the page. Henris sighed with agitation at this, used to her constant berating and mean-spirited comments towards him and thinking this was yet another elaborate joke to hurt his feelings about something he's passionate about.

“You don't have to be such an ass all the time, Riley” he snapped, just wanting to be left alone at this point. She looked up at him, confused and a little hurt.

“I'm being serious”

“Really?”

“Yeah! These are really good!” She assured “I'm not taking the piss, I just like your art. Where did you do lessons?”

“Oh, no, I didn't take any type of special lessons or such” He brushed off “I mainly learned art in school and off one of the maids who lived with us” great, now he was opening up about his childhood. “I used to think about trying to make a living off of it but..y'know..”

“Yeahh” Thatcher laughed “would be quite the career change if you tried again nowadays” they both laughed together at this, thinking of the prospect of an underground crime organisation getting found out because their ringleader wanted to express himself. “Can you imagine-” Henris started, already laughing “can you imagine the cops being called on an art show??” they both cracked up in hysterics at this. they have a weird sense of humour that only the two of them really get y'know?

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supercorpkid · 2 years ago

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Where do we go now?

Final part.

Supergirl, Baby Danvers, Lena Luthor x Reader, Kara Danvers x B!D, Alex Danvers x B!D

Word Count: 3500.

Part 1.

They are working hard to bring Kara back. You’ll give them that. They’ve been running around the Tower tirelessly for days. You try and help here and there, but you’re not usually much of a help and with all of this, you’re basically a worthless sack of nothing.

Which is a hard thing to feel, especially in this situation. Knowing that you can’t do anything to bring your sister back, to save her from the nightmare she must be living, the nightmare you all have been living without her around.

“You’re not useless.” It’s what therapist Kelly tells you to repeat to yourself like a mantra. But it’s easy for her to say when she just got a new suit and a cool hero name.

So you stay in the Tower, walking around the place like a damn ghost. Seeing Kara everywhere, but at the same time nowhere around.

Alex finally takes pity on you and tells you to go help out in the lab, because Brainy could use some extra pair of hands, and you have those and are eager to be at service. But it’s not Brainy you find, once you make your way there.

Lena is working with something huge, you’re not even sure what it is, when your eyes meet through the lenses of the device.

And it’s like you’re back there, in front of her apartment, months ago. Mouth agape and unable to move. Shocked and terrified; life looking as horrible as it could get. A chain of apologies wanting to leave your mouth in a rush. Sorry for lying, sorry for breaking your heart, sorry for deceiving your trust, sorry for loving you, sorry, sorry, sorry…

Lena raises her head, looking at you. Face etched with sorrow. Doe-eyed, and so, so soft. She doesn’t even have to say it, because her face says it all. But the thing is, there’s too much to be said, to be sorted, to be apologized for. You know it, and Lena obviously knows it too.

“Oh.” It’s what leaves your mouth, when you make sense of why you’re here. To help Brainy, even though he is nowhere to be found. “Wrong lab, I guess.”

You take a step back, without breaking eye contact and Lena raises her hand to stop you. But nothing comes out of her mouth. She just looks like she wants to say something, and you don’t know what it is that is stopping her.

So you keep walking backwards, ready to leave, “Wait. Y/N, please, stay.”

“I should be helping Brainy with some sort of –”

Lena points at the device, and you agree with your head slowly, convinced. So you make your way closer.

“What’s that?”

"Phantom trapper. I feel like we might need it once we go out there or something.” She looks down, toying with the machine again. Then looks up to you. “I could use your help.”

“I’m not good at –” you point at what she’s doing, but your mouth keeps going anyway. "Anything."

“Actually I think –” She licks her lips. Moment stretching out so thin between the two of you, anyone would be able to cut the tension with a knife. “you would be perfect for this.”

It’s funny how all of a sudden she looks exactly like your Lena. Like that Lena who asked you a million questions and in so little time got to know all of you. She looks like the Lena you would tell all your secrets, except how desperately much you love her. No, that one you would just leave between the lines.

But she’s not your Lena, is she? She never once was yours and you got a broken heart to show for that.

You blink your thoughts away, giving her a sad smile. “Ok, so, um, what do I do?”

She explains what she’s doing, merging a DEO protogun and L Corp’s portal energy, and you pretend you’re following, though you have basically no idea what she’s talking about. But at least you know how to use a screwdriver and that’s what she needs you to do, while she does the actual science thing behind it.

“Um, ah.” Lena tries. She’s been trying to talk to you for the longest time but keeps stopping herself when you raise your big eyes at her. “How – How are you?”

You blink at her. Waiting for the rest. How does she think you are, when your sister is missing and she hates the shit out of you?

“Well, Lena, I’ve been better.” It’s mumbled out of your mouth, without second thought, face going back to the machine in front of you, so you don’t have to look at her while admitting. “There was a time where my sister was home and my best friend didn’t hate me.”

“She doesn’t – I don’t hate you.” She says, voice strangled inside her chest, as you finish what has been asked of you.

You haven’t seen Lena in months since her (valid) outburst with you. Since she said she hates you, and called you a lying monster. And no matter how much time has passed and how many things have happened ever since, that’s how you still feel around her. You feel like a monster.

You stare at each other for a few seconds. The moment is tension-filled, electrified, all wrong. Everything feels wrong and you don’t know if things will ever feel right.

“I’m not gonna say that I’ve never hated you.” Lena sits on the chair next to yours, and breathes out. “Because at that moment, I did. I hated you for breaking my heart. It took me more time than it should’ve to realize exactly why I was so mad at you, specifically.”

You swallow deep. Eyes filled with tears, heart squeezed in anticipation.

You weren’t always the most honest person, you admit. Little white lies, always trying to make people feel better, to make yourself feel better. But you never once told Lena a single lie, except the ones involving Supergirl. And it’s fair that she felt betrayed by that, but it hurts you even more to know that it was out of your control all along.

“I felt betrayed by your sister because she was my best friend and lied to me, and sure, I was mad at all of our friends for lying to me too. But you – Y/N, the reason why I was so mad at you is because it felt like heartbreak. Felt like I was being lied to by my person. I know we were never – “ She bites her tongue and you nod.

“We were never.” You agree.

Were never, will never. All the same now.

Lena’s hand makes way to your face, but then something shifts inside her, just like that. And you can see it in her eyes that something changed, you just don’t know what. So her hand never really reaches you, though you can still feel the ghost touch and the burning sensation of almost feeling her again.

“And we will get your sister back. I promise.”

You can’t hold the tear to fall, but you’re quick to clean it.

“I just miss her.”

As to an explanation to why you’re crying, though it isn’t the only reason and you guess she’ll never know all of the other ones that involve her.

“I miss her too.” Lena confesses, swallows deep right after, searching your face for anger, because she thinks it’s her fault your sister is gone. But you’re sure that even if she never went along with Lex’s plans, he would’ve found a way to do what he did.

So you just nod at her, understanding. Tears falling silently, regardless of the fact that you get it. It doesn’t stop hurting just because she’s hurting too.

“Hey,” she finally pulls you closer, your head resting on her chest like it just belongs there. “You can cry, my love.”

And it’s so unfair that she can just use the pet name again after so many months with dead silence from her end and make your heart almost burst inside you from happiness, either way.

“Lena.” It’s a whine out of your mouth, and you wonder if she gets all that is inside it, if she had the faintest idea of what you’re trying to convey with that only. But you don’t know, because you keep crying and crying, face buried in the crook of her neck, while she runs her fingers through your hair, gently.

“I know, little —“ she leaves it like that, but you look at her with pleading eyes, and she smiles, understanding you perfectly. “You’re fine, little one. It’s going to be alright, I promise.”

So of course you believe her. Even though she is a liar, and you’re a liar, and all that you two have done so far is lie about your feelings and keep secrets from each other.

You let go of her, wiping the tears from your face, and force a sad little smile. “Thanks, Lena.” You tap on the device in front of you. “Ok, I’ve exhausted my abilities on this, so I’ll go check on Brainy.”

“Yeah, ok. Sure, yeah.” Lena says, looking like she doesn’t want to let you go. But she does. Because not letting you leave would involve being honest and that’s something none of you can do, apparently.

When you wake up the next day. Wait, actually to wake up, you would need to have fallen asleep, which you haven’t done an inch of. While you repeated the whole interaction you had with Lena the day before.

My love. Her love. We were never. Might never.

But when you do get out of the bed, in a jump scare from Alex yelling at you that some phantoms went loose and you have to get out from the Tower immediately, you still meet them and hear bits of their meeting.

“I may already have a fix for that, I couldn’t sleep last night so —“ Lena starts and you two share a look, because she wants you to know you’re the reason she wasn’t able to. And you think she can see it on your face that you haven’t either.

The rest of the meeting is lost with you inside your thoughts. You only come back from it when Kelly tells you she is giving you a ride home, so they know you’re safe.

You don’t want to be home alone, worried sick about what’s happening to them. So you go back to Kara’s apartment, because even though she is not there, some of her still is.

And it’s unsurprisingly unsettling to be inside Kara’s apartment with no idea whether she is ever coming back. No idea of what’s happening out there with your family, friends, and Lena. So you walk around, thoughts consuming all your energy and what’s left of your sanity.

When Alex picks you up days later, they have a way to get Kara’s location and are going into the phantom zone to find her. She tries to convince you not to go along, telling you it’s dangerous and they all might get lost there, for God knows how long. But if everyone is in the phantom zone, then what the hell would you be doing on Earth alone?

“Are you sure you want to come with us? I know you want to be there when we rescue Kara, but stepping into a new dimension isn’t something you –” Alex rethinks her next words very carefully before adding, “signed up for.”

“Signed up for? Are you serious right now, Alexandra Danvers?” You give her a harsh look and she rolls her eyes at the use of her entire name. “Our sister is out there! So you either take me with you or I’ll find a way to go without you.”

So there’s no arguing, no matter how much she tries to.

“Alright, pack up, little rascal. We’re gonna save our sister!”

And afterwards, you think your sister is actually happy you’re there. Rescuing Kara without her little sister around would’ve felt wrong, no matter how protective of you she is.

So you stick around the back, while everyone takes position in the ship and gets ready to go follow Kara into the depths of the universe.

J’onn mentions that phantoms might try to get inside your minds, making you all very weak by showing you your worst fears. You think you’re currently living them, so you are probably safe with that, at least.

Then something goes wrong, Alex yells for you to follow Lena so you’re not alone and no matter how reluctant you are with being alone with her, in the middle of the chaos and you understanding shit about it, you just follow orders.

You step into the elevator with her, she nods apprehensively at you, somehow trying to ease your mind. When the elevator stops she murmurs, “stay behind me, ok?”

And then she’s just gone.

“Lena?” You ask, looking around. You couldn’t have missed her, she was just in front of you. How could she have disappeared? “LENA?”

She appears in front of you, a heavy coat you don’t remember she was wearing a few minutes ago.

“Y/N.” Your name is said with so much disdain it burns a hole through your heart and you flinch. “What?” Her long finger goes to your face, under your chin, and she raises your head so you can look her directly in the eye, “you thought I could love you?”

“What —“

“Oh no,” her eyes burning green into yours. “Oh you poor thing,” she cleans a tear that leaves your eye. “You actually thought I felt something for you, didn’t you? What part of I hate you got lost in that little dumb head of yours?”

“You’re being mean.” It’s what you can say after swallowing the lump on your throat.

“No, you stupid little girl. You’re weak, and immature. I guess that’s why you fooled yourself. I couldn’t even love Kara, the mightiest of heroes. What chance did you have?” Lena’s hands tight around your face, holding it so strongly it hurts your jaw. “When will you finally understand that I do not, cannot, will not love you.”

What? That sounds exactly like something you’ve thought before.

You only realize that when her hand tightens around your neck and you start losing your breath.

“You’re not —“ you’re lifted from the floor by the neck. Gasping desperately for air, while trying to kick and push the image from your mind. “my Lena!”

You get up from the chair you were on, look around to see yourself still in the command room.

“J’onn?” Alex asks, voice small filled with fear.

And you look around to see everyone waking up together from some sort of trance.

“This is real. You are free of the phantom’s powers. You did it. You all did it.”

But there’s no time to celebrate this win. Not when you’re almost there and everyone starts running around and Lena just pulls up a fucking yellow sunlight blast to recharge Kara’s powers and so on, and before you even realize what just happened,

“Kara?”

Your sister rushes to the door, inside Alex’s embrace.

She’s here! Kara is actually here!

“Brainy get us out of here.” You hear J’onn’s voice and breathe out knowing you are all safe and heading back home.

Kara’s eyes lock into yours, on the other side of the room. “Get in here, little one.”

And your heart almost stops when you hear her voice, but you run into her embrace and breathe her in. Kara is here. God, she is here. This is all you could have asked for.

Kara is found. Saved. Rescued. Home.

Well, she goes to her home, not yours, by the way.

“When did you move in?” Kara asks when you and Alex take her home.

“I — I didn’t.”

She looks around. Her apartment should look empty, lifeless, dusty. But it doesn’t. It looks lived. You left some clothes by the couch, and there’s food on the counter, dishes on the sink, the bedsheets are messy. You look up to her, an embarrassed look on your face.

But Kara pulls you in and kisses the crown of your head. “I hope you’re staying while I’m here, as well. I could use your company.”

“Yeah, sure.”

And you should be happy. You should be thrilled. Because Kara has escaped the inescapable, and Lena is back on the team and around, completely forgiven, returned to her rightful role of being Kara’s best friend.

But something is still off whenever you see her. There’s still things over your heads. Things you shouldn’t have said, things you should have, secrets kept from each other, and feelings, oh, the feelings!

So when you can finally come to life, you just don’t. You still walk around the Tower like a ghost, like something’s missing though everything is already here. Broken and blue, hiding in the background, hoping for someone to notice you, but also praying that no one does.

“I thought I saw you around.” You hear Lena’s voice behind your back, and your heart still beats fast in anticipation. She sits next to you on the floor. “You ok?”

“Yeah, I’m – Sure.” You agree with a forced smile, and she gives you a soft one in return.

“You’ve been hiding.” She says, sure. And there’s no way you can deny it when you have been hiding and you know she has noticed. “So, I’m sorry, but I don’t believe you’re actually ok.”

You bite the inside of your mouth. Holding the tears and the words inside.

“Kara is back.” Lena points out and you agree with your head. “And I am –”

“You are –?”

“Here.” Lena scootches closer. Rests her head on your shoulder, and takes a deep breath there. Her breath is hot on your neck, giving you goosebumps. “I’m here. By your side. And I never should have left.”

“But you did. Because I lied, because I’m a lying mons –” The word is cut short when her lips touch your neck, soft and sweet.

“You’re not.” Lena whispers next to your ear. Warming up not just the place, but your entire body. “I’ve missed you.”

You close your eyes hard, trying to hold back all that you’re feeling. All the emotions that seem to be trying to get out of your control.

“You said –”

“Some mean things when I was blinded by anger.” Lena finally raises her head, searching for your eyes and encouraging you to do the same. “I’m sorry. I should’ve led with that.”

“I’m sorry too.” You try, because you have tried to apologize before and that didn’t go well.

“I know. I know. And we can spend our whole lives apologizing for what we did back then, or we can just let it go. Move forward. Be honest this time around.” She pleads gently. And you agree with your head because she is right. What good can come from revisiting all the mean things she said to you? All the lies you’ve told her about your sister’s real identity? When she is here, and knows all that and still chooses to stick around.

“I’ll go first.” Lena whispers again, while her hands envelop yours. It’s sweaty and shaking, so you know she is nervous. “I know I said we were never.” You look down on your tangled up hands, then back at her eyes. “But I wanted to. I –” She takes a deep breath before confessing. “I want to.”

“When Kara was just gone, just like that –” She swallows the tears, but you can’t hold yours back. You never could. “I just kept thinking how I never told her what she meant to me. And then I thought of you, and how I didn’t want a single day to go by without me telling you how I truly feel about you.” Lena cleans your tears, and her touch is so good, so real, you lean into it without a second thought. “I’ve been in love with you for years now.”

“I’ve been in love with you for years.” You whisper back, small and under your breath, but so desperately honest you’re sure she can tell.

Lena pulls your face closer, kissing your tears, then your eyes, your forehead, temple, cheek.

“Lena.” In a plead whisper and this time you know she understands all that you mean by chanting her name alone.

“I’m here.” She promises, another kiss on your cheek to clean your tear. “And I’m never leaving you again.”

It’s you that cut the distance between your mouths. A soaring kiss you’ve been meaning to share with her for the longest time. Tasting her lips as you’ve always needed to do. Easing her mind like you should’ve done in months, years, íons ago.

“Where do we go now?”

“Now,” Lena punctuates with a peck on your lips. “Now we move forward.”

#baby danvers #supergirl #supergirl fanfiction #lena luthor #lena x reader #kara zor el #kara danvers #alex danvers #canon divergent au

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mariacallous · 9 months ago

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Shortly before noon on Aug. 19, 2023, a Russian cruise missile sliced past the golden onion domes and squat apartment blocks of the Chernihiv skyline in northern Ukraine. The Iskander-K missile slammed into its target: the city’s drama theater, which was hosting a meeting of drone manufacturers at the time of the attack. More than 140 people were injured and seven killed. The youngest, 6-year-old Sofia Golynska, had been playing in a nearby park.

Fragments of the missile recovered by the Ukrainian armed forces and analyzed by Ukrainian researchers found numerous components made by U.S. manufacturers in the missile’s onboard navigation system, which enabled it to reach its target with devastating precision. In December, Ukraine’s state anti-corruption agency released an online database of the thousands of foreign-made components recovered from Russian weapons so far.

Russia’s struggle to produce the advanced semiconductors, electrical components, and machine tools needed to fuel its defense industrial base predates the current war and has left it reliant on imports even amid its estrangement from the West. So when Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, major manufacturing countries from North America, Europe, and East Asia swiftly imposed export controls on a broad swath of items deemed critical for the Russian arms industry.

Russia quickly became the world’s most sanctioned country: Some 16,000 people and companies were subject to a patchwork of international sanctions and export control orders imposed by a coalition of 39 countries. Export restrictions were painted with such a broad brush that sunglasses, contact lenses, and false teeth were also swept up in the prohibitions. Even items manufactured overseas by foreign companies are prohibited from being sold to Russia if they are made with U.S. tools or software, under a regulation known as the foreign direct product rule.

But as the war reaches its two-year anniversary, export controls have failed to stem the flow of advanced electronics and machinery making their way into Russia as new and convoluted supply chains have been forged through third countries such as Kazakhstan, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates, which are not party to the export control efforts. An investigation by Nikkei Asia found a tenfold increase in the export of semiconductors from China and Hong Kong to Russia in the immediate aftermath of the war—the majority of them from U.S. manufacturers.

“Life finds a way,” said a senior U.S. intelligence official, quoting the movie Jurassic Park. The official spoke on background to discuss Russia’s evasion of export controls.

Some of the weapons and components analyzed by investigators were likely stockpiled before the war. But widely available Russian trade data reveals a brisk business in imports. More than $1 billion worth of advanced semiconductors from U.S. and European manufacturers made their way into the country last year, according to classified Russian customs service data obtained by Bloomberg. A recent report by the Kyiv School of Economics found that imports of components considered critical for the battlefield had dipped by just 10 percent during the first 10 months of 2023, compared with prewar levels.

This has created a Kafkaesque scenario, the report notes, in which the Ukrainian army is doing battle with Western weapons against a Russian arsenal that also runs on Western components.

It is an obvious problem, well documented by numerous think tank and media reports, but one without an easy solution. Tracking illicit trade in items such as semiconductors is an exponentially greater challenge than monitoring shipments of conventional weapons. Around 1 trillion chips are produced every year. Found in credit cards, toasters, tanks, missile systems, and much, much more, they power the global economy as well as the Russian military. Cutting Russia out of the global supply chain for semiconductors is easier said than done.

“Both Russia and China, and basically all militaries, are using a large number of consumer electronic components in their systems,” said Chris Miller, the author of Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology. “All of the world’s militaries rely on the same supply chain, which is the supply chain that primarily services consumer electronics.”

Export controls were once neatly tailored to keep specific items, such as nuclear technology, out of the hands of rogue states and terrorist groups. But as Washington vies for technological supremacy with Beijing while also seeking to contain Russia and Iran, it has increasingly used these trade restrictions to advance broader U.S. strategic objectives. For instance, the Biden administration has placed wide-ranging prohibitions on the export of advanced chips to China.

“At no point in history have export controls been more central to our collective security than right now,” Matthew Axelrod, the assistant secretary for export enforcement at the U.S. Commerce Department, said in a speech last September. U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has described export controls as “a new strategic asset in the U.S. and allied toolkit.”

Russia’s ability to defy these restrictions doesn’t just have implications for the war in Ukraine. It also raises significant questions about the challenge ahead vis-à-vis China.

“The technological question becomes a key part of this story and whether or not we can restrict it from our adversaries,” said James Byrne, the director of open-source intelligence and analysis at the Royal United Services Institute, a British think tank.

In the Russian city of Izhevsk, home to the factory that manufactures Kalashnikov rifles, shopping malls are being converted into drone factories amid a surge in defense spending that has helped the country’s economy weather its Western estrangement. Arms manufacturers have been urged to work around the clock to feed the Russian war machine, while defense is set to account for one-third of the state budget this year.

“We have developed a concept to convert shopping centers—which, before the start of the SMO [special military operation], sold mainly the products of Western brands—to factories for assembly lines of types of domestic drones,” Alexander Zakharov, the chief designer of the Zala Aero drone company, said at a closed event in August 2022, according to the Russian business newspaper Vedomosti. “Special military operation” is what the Russian government calls its war on Ukraine. Zala Aero is a subsidiary of the Kalashnikov Concern that, along with Zakharov, was sanctioned by the United States last November.

Defense companies have bought at least three shopping malls in Izhevsk to be repurposed for the manufacture of drones, according to local media, including Lancet attack drones, which the British defense ministry described as one of the most effective new weapons that Russia introduced to the battlefield last year. Lancets, which cost about $35,000 to produce, wreaked havoc during Ukraine’s offensive last year and have been captured on video striking valuable Ukrainian tanks and parked MiG fighter jets.

Like a lot of Russia’s weapons systems, Lancets are filled with Western components. An analysis of images of the drones published in December by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security found that they contained several parts from U.S., Swiss, and Czech manufacturers, including image processing and analytical components that play a pivotal role in enabling the drones to reach their targets on the battlefield.

“The recurring appearance of these Western products in Russian drone systems shows a keen dependence on them for key capabilities in the drone systems,” the report notes. Lancets are not the only drones found to contain Western components. Almost all of the electronic components in the Iranian Shahed-136 drones, which Russia is now manufacturing with Iranian help to use in Ukraine, are of Western origin, a separate analysis published in November concluded.

Early in the war, the Royal United Services Institute analyzed 27 Russian military systems, including cruise missiles, electronic warfare complexes, and communications systems, and found that they contained at least 450 foreign-made components, revealing Russia’s dependence on imports.

One of the principal ways that Russia has evaded Western export controls has been through transshipment via third countries such as Turkey, the UAE, and neighboring states once part of the Soviet Union. Bloomberg reported last November that amid mounting Western pressure, the UAE had agreed to restrict the export of sensitive goods to Russia and that Turkey was considering a similar move. Kazakh officials announced a ban on the export of certain battlefield goods to Russia in October.

Suspected transshipment is often revealed by striking changes in trade patterns before and after the invasion. The Maldives, an island chain in the Indian Ocean that has no domestic semiconductor industry, shipped almost $54 million worth of U.S.-made semiconductors to Russia in the year after the invasion of Ukraine, Nikkei Asia reported last July.

Semiconductor supply chains often span several countries, with chips designed in one country and manufactured in another before being sold to a series of downstream distributors around the world. That makes it difficult for companies to know the ultimate end user of their products. This may seem odd—until you realize that this is the case for many everyday products that are sold around the world. “When Coca-Cola sells Coca-Cola, it doesn’t know where every bottle goes, and they don’t have systems to track where every bottle goes,” said Kevin Wolf, a former assistant secretary for export administration at the U.S. Commerce Department.

While a coalition of 39 countries, including the world’s major manufacturers of advanced electronics, imposed export restrictions on Russia, much of the rest of the world continues to trade freely with Moscow. Components manufactured in coalition countries will often begin their journey to Moscow’s weapons factories through a series of entirely legal transactions before ending up with a final distributor that takes them across the border into Russia. “It starts off as licit trade and ends up as illicit trade,” said a second senior U.S. intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The further items move down the supply chain, the less insight governments and companies have into their ultimate destination, although sudden changes in behavior of importers can offer a red flag. In his speech last September, Axelrod, the assistant secretary, used the example of a beauty salon that suddenly starts to import electronic components.

But the Grand Canyon of loopholes is China, which has stood by Moscow since the invasion. In the first days of the war, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo warned that Washington could shut down Chinese companies that ignored semiconductor export controls placed on Russia. Last October, 42 Chinese companies were added to export control lists—severely undercutting their ability to do business with U.S. companies—for supplying Russian defense manufacturers with U.S. chips.

But as the Biden administration carefully calibrates its China policy in a bid to keep a lid on escalating tensions, it has held off from taking Beijing to task. “I think the biggest issue is that we—the West—have been unwilling to put pressure on China that would get China to start enforcing some of these rules itself,” said Miller, the author of Chip Wars.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) said: “Due to the restrictions imposed by the United States and key allies and partners, Russia has been left with no choice but to spend more, lower its ambitions for high-tech weaponry, build alliances with other international pariah states, and develop nefarious trade networks to covertly obtain the technologies it needs.

“We are deeply concerned regarding [Chinese] support for Russia’s defense industrial base. BIS has acted to add over 100 [China]-based entities to the Entity List for supporting Russia’s military industrial base and related activities.”

Export controls have typically focused on keeping specific U.S.-made goods out of the hands of adversaries, while economic and financial sanctions have served broader foreign-policy objectives of isolating rogue states and cauterizing the financing of terrorist groups and drug cartels. The use of sanctions as a national security tool grew in wake of the 9/11 attacks; in the intervening decades, companies, government agencies, and financial institutions have built up a wealth of experience in sanctions compliance. By contrast, the use of export controls for strategic ends is relatively novel, and compliance expertise is still in its infancy.

“It used to be that people like me could keep export controls and sanctions in one person’s head. The level of complexity for each area of law is so intense. I don’t know anyone who is truly an export control and sanctions expert,” Wolf said.

Export controls, experts say, are at best speed bumps designed to make it harder for Russia’s defense industrial base to procure Western components. They create “extra friction and pressure on the Russian economy,” said Daniel Fried, who as the State Department coordinator for sanctions policy helped craft U.S. sanctions on Russia after its annexation of Crimea in 2014. Russia is now paying 80 percent more to import semiconductors than it did before the war, according to forthcoming research by Miller, and the components it is able to acquire are often of dubious quality.

But although it may be more cumbersome and expensive, it’s a cost that Moscow has been willing to bear in its war on Ukraine.

Western components—and lots of them—will continue to be found in the weapons Russia uses on Ukraine’s battlefields for the duration of the war. “This problem is as old as export controls are,” said Jasper Helder, an expert on export controls and sanctions with the law firm Akin Gump. But there are ways to further plug the gaps.

Steeper penalties could incentivize U.S. companies to take a more proactive role in ensuring their products don’t wind up in the hands of the Russian military, said Elina Ribakova, a nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “At the moment, they’re not truly motivated,” she said.

Companies that run afoul of sanctions and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a U.S. federal law that prohibits the payment of bribes, have been fined billions of dollars. Settlements of export control violations are often an order of magnitude smaller, according to recently published research.

In a speech last month, Axelrod said the United States would begin issuing steeper penalties for export control violations. “Build one case against one of the companies extremely well, put out a multibillion-dollar fine negotiation, and watch everybody else fall in line,” Ribakova said.

And then there’s the question of resources. BIS has an annual budget of just $200 million. “That’s like the cost of a few fighter jets. Come on,” said Raimondo, speaking at the Reagan National Defense Forum last December.

The agency’s core budget for export control has, adjusted for inflation, remained flat since 2010, while its workload has surged. Between 2014 and 2022, the volume of U.S. exports subject to licensing scrutiny increased by 126 percent, according to an agency spokesperson. A 2022 study of export control enforcement by the Center for Strategic and International Studies recommended a budget increase of $45 million annually, describing it as “one of the best opportunities available anywhere in U.S. national security.”

When it comes to enforcement, the bureau has about 150 officers across the country who work with law enforcement and conduct outreach to companies. The Commerce Department has also established a task force with the Justice Department to keep advanced technologies out of the hands of Russia, China, and Iran. “The U.S. has the most robust export enforcement on the planet,” Wolf said.

But compared with other law enforcement and national security agencies, the bureau’s budgets have not kept pace with its expanding mission. The Department of Homeland Security has more investigators in the city of Tampa, Florida, than BIS does across the entire country, Axelrod noted in his January speech.

On the other side, you have Russia, which is extremely motivated to acquire the critical technologies it needs to continue to prosecute its war. The Kremlin has tasked its intelligence agencies with finding ways around sanctions and export controls, U.S. Treasury Undersecretary Brian Nelson said in a speech last year. “We are not talking about a profit-seeking firm looking for efficiencies,” the second senior U.S. intelligence official said. “There will be supply if there is sufficient demand.”

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