#Guess what pandemic is over

[holdtightposts]

Who would have predicted this?

Oh, that’s right. Everyone who just let dumbass trump do whatever he wanted like assassinate Soleimani without first gathering all the members of congress to evaluate the situation like the president IS SUPPOSED TO DO WHEN THEY MAKE A DECISION THAT COULD RESULT IN ALL OUT WAR.

Another fact, trump didn’t have actual concrete evidence that Soleimani was going to attack the US Embassies in the Middle East. When asked about the possibilities of the attacks, he stated it "probably could have been.” Also, let’s not forget why he actually moved forward with the assassination and that is because he claimed that Soleimani was "saying bad things about our country.” REALLY?! Because of shit talking?! You risk war and the lives of everyone in the US because of a few mean words? In case you’re unaware, EVERY COUNTRY FUCKING HATES AMERICA. What a fucking baby.

Not many people know who Qasem Soleimani is and why it was such a huge deal that he was assassinated without congress approval. So I’m going to lay it on as simple as I can.

He’s basically Danzo Shimura, the konohakagure, in the Naruto Shippuden series.

The second in command. The one who does what needs to be done no matter how dirty his hands get. The one that runs the Anbu Black Ops and the secret Root division. He has more kills and political influence than the Hokage. He basically dictates what will happen even though he reports in to the Hokage.

Almost everyone who has very little knowledge and facts are comparing his death to Osama Bin Laden.

Killing Soleimani is the same as killing the vice president of the united states. It is an act of war. What’s worse, we’ve known about him and his dirty deeds for decades. Multiple presidents and congress knew but continued to let him do whatever he wanted because the repercussions of killing him are far worse and the first thing that I thought about when I heard he was assassinated, not just killed but ASSASSINATED, is this line from Captain America The Winter Soldier.

Because that is legit what he and the Qod Force, his covert ops units, specialise in. So, when they finally attack on american soil, it won’t be with missiles, suicide packs, or anything big and flashy that draws attention. It’ll be exactly like what Bucky says.

So to sum it up:

Soleimani is more powerful than the president of Iran.

Is responsible for many successful assassinations, terrorism, and uncoventional warfare that Iran supports in mulitple countries, including america.

To call him just a terrorist is the biggest understatement ever. Yes, he was an evil man and killing him is not like killing just another terrorist. Again, killing him is an act of war that the Supreme Leader of Iran has already vowed “HARSH REVENGE.”

The US is not ready and has not engaged in this level of assassinations in decades. Iran will not respond with traditional warfare. They will most likely carry out operations ALL OVER THE GLOBE. US embassies across the world are no longer safe. Soldiers overseas and in the states are no longer safe. Even civilians are in danger. Soleimani and the Qod are responsible for killing hundreds of US soldiers at the very minimum, maybe even more. And for those of you thinking “only hundreds doesn’t sound like a lot,” first of all, what the fuck is wrong with you. Second, you have to remember, they are a covert kill squad. Those soldiers would never have seen it coming. They weren’t killed in a gun fight. They were assassinated.

And if you think Iran is just another third world country, you are mistaken. They have developed cities, like us. They have access to internet and social media, like us. THEY LOOK LIKE US. Lose whatever racist interpretation you have of Iranians and just think about how fucking scary that is to be killed swiftly by someone who you thought was just another stranger walking down the same street as you, dressed like you, talks like you, and looks like you and people you know. And just like every other country overseas, have more knowledge about america and american history than the average americans have. So when they do attack, we won’t even see it coming.

[wuxian-vs-wangji]

Every time Prapai gives Sky medicine, he's narcoleptic inside 5 minutes.

[overcaffeinated-aro]

I got an email from my grandpa today and all the draft responses I’ve been working on in my head sound like an 18th century letter that’s going to have to travel for months to reach him.

pandemic year 5 really has me feeling like me and a very small handful of people I know are living on an entirely different plane of existence than everyone else

[falloutdilf]

life moves on and gets immeasurably better and then u miss it anyway

[confinesofmy]

my littlest cousin is very sick with some sort of upper respiratory for like the 20th time in his very short little life. 😢 it's so hard not to mentally backseat parent in a situation like this. at least his mom is always quick with the doctor's visits, that makes me feel better at least.

[homosexual-fanfiction]

in celebration of the fic ALMOST being done here's a piece of the scrapped outline from 2019 that still makes me laugh

[pepprs]

also cringefail double vent posting over things that are not actually that big of a deal once again lol but i am so fucking miserable today in ways i don’t even know how to articulate. i need to move out. i know exactly where i want to live but they raised rent $300 and i can’t afford that but i want to live by myself so badly but my parents are adamant that i can’t bc i can’t drive and im a “diminutive inexperienced young woman” and i want to punch something. i read half of the drivers manual and cried reading it which is fucking stupid bc it s just the drivers manual. but i want to move out so bad. i hate sharing a room with my sister and im not getting the new room anymore bc we don’t have money to finish it up bc my mom is still sick and no one knows what’s wrong with her and she has to get all these tests. i never have a space i can go to that’s just quiet. i don’t want noise. i don’t want to block out noise with more noise. i want QUIET. i don’t want to be afraid to go into rooms or hear noises i don’t want to hear. and i don’t want to be living here for the three extra months it’ll take me to ng et my permit. im just done. i don’t want to live here!!! and things at work suck and are exhausting and draining and so unbearably overwhelming and i feel terribly lonely and disconnected from everyone and small and scared and i don’t have energy to fix any of it or explain what’s going on or ask for help or get a therapist or whatever. and i keep pulling muscles in my neck. and i want to go to sleep!!!!!!

[galariangengar]

💭

[pa-pa-plasma]

so my dad's phone got stolen the other day from his work truck & he explained what happened cuz he saw the security footage, and he didnt have any other way of calling or texting anyone so he naturally radioed his supervisor to tell him to do it, but his supervisor didnt text, just left a voicemail which is stupid, so i decided to text my dad's phone aka the thief this:

and apparently it was TOO effective because today (edit: March 16th, 2022, roughly 2 days later). the man showed up to the desk sobbing so hard no one could understand him. He returned the phone and barely got out that he stole it before leaving

Suffice it to say, I believe I put a grown man off of stealing for the rest of his life. If you're out there random man, I'm sorry I traumatized you. I was bluffing. We had no idea who you were, even with the cameras, and I'm not even sure if you would actually go to jail for taking some oldass phone from an unlocked truck. Thank you for cleaning the phone I guess. My dad barely recognized it.

[yaseraphine]

pick a card 3 - something you need to hear right now.

Last day where the Sun is in Scorpio. First day where the Sun enters Sagittarius.

The month of November is always a tough month for everyone. This pick a card is aimed to give some guidance through these dark times. Scorpio energy can be sometimes overwhelmingly intense and gloomy, but it holds great power. Use this energy to die peacefully, and shed your old skin. Like a phoenix, we will all rise from our ashes.

Words of encouragement, healing messages and a tiny bit of reality checks are what this reading will bring you. Hope it resonates.

Pile 1 

The World, 2 of Wands, Knight of Wands, Page of Swords, 10 of Swords (Rx), Queen of Pentacles (Rx?)

Top of the deck : 8 of Cups

Bottom of the deck : 2 of Swords

Life path 7 / Life path 11

“You don’t drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying there.”

“Do what makes you fucking happy”

additional quote : “Do what makes your soul shine <3”

Right off the bat, there is a sense of urgency in walking away from something and making a firm decision. I think you have been in denial about something in your life, avoiding it by trying to live a “normal life”. You’ve been focusing on your day to day tasks as a distraction but something has been at the back of your mind for a while now. And when I say for a while, I mean at least two years, or one year. It is something that you have, overtime, subconsciously suppressed because at the time this thing, career, job, creative endeavor,.. was important to you, but you did not have (or thought you didn’t have) enough knowledge and resources to take methodical practical steps towards it. I am picking up that this might have been something that happened slightly before or during the pandemic (2019/2020). The World fell out of the deck, and this card indicates the completion of a cycle, an ending. After it, the 2 of Wands fell, which indicates future planning, progress, decision and discovery. I feel like the message you need to hear is that now is the perfect time to start this project of yours, or at least plan the practical actions you need to take over the course of the next few months to accomplish it. Don’t overthink over certain details and possible technical issues. There is a fire inside of you that you consistently turned off, thinking and hoping that the embers would eventually die out. The problem you are currently facing is that they never did. You might have an Aries North node. Being assertive and independent doesn’t come easy to you. Starting projects and following your instincts without second guessing yourself is hard. You tried to manage your truest and deepest desires but I feel like this past year, the desire to let it all out, probably influenced by the Lunar nodes being in the sign of Aries and Libra, urging you to just go for it, intensified to the point of suffocation. 

Your spirit guides are urging you to take this leap of faith, to walk confidently towards that goal like The Fool, without worrying if you run the risk of falling from a ravine in the process.

They’re telling you to start slow, to take a step by step approach while still keeping a strong mindset. You will come out victorious only if you’re able to keep pushing through the obstacles. What awaits you is a slow and steady marathon and growth. You can do it !

Oracle cards from the Green With Oracle pulled for you : 

16 - Memory / Rosemary => Leo energy

“Deeper levels of connection with people, concepts and plans are all areas that Rosemary works with. You are reminded to ensure you are in touch with your inner wisdom, paying heed to the past, and have cleared what needs to be released. Listen to your intuition as it is calling to you at present, but be wary of gossip or becoming tactless or too forceful.”

5 - Grounding / Potato => Virgo energy

“Explore the deepest, innermost areas of yourself and situations, as potatoes indicate energies that are calling you to look again at what you may have once missed and will help to bring stability. If you are looking for an answer, try pulling back a little to let things settle on their own first. Challenges at the moment may include ignorance, self-centeredness and forgetfulness, so make sure you are compassionate and focused.

You are called to use all the knowledge you acquired overtime to finally take action. You’re currently ending a cycle. You have enough wisdom to make a plan that will lead you closer and closer to tangible success. Trust your intuition and inner guidance. Don’t make rash decisions, but be decisive.

Just realized these two cards have the same message in the guide book ! This is a crazy coincidence. I used it many times and never paid attention. I didn’t even know two cards could have the same message. This is crazy lol.  Let me share the quote with you : 

 “When the world wearies and society fails to satisfy, there is always the garden”

Pile 2 

2 of cups, 3 of Pentacles, Queen of Wands, Ace of Wands, The Star, 2 of Swords, Page of Pentacles 10 of Pentacles

“The same light you see in others is shining within you too.”

(there are a lot of references to light, stars,shining,;. throughout the reading. Are you drawn to space ? or the galaxy ? You’re probably a huge astrology, and/or astronomy nerd. You are probably also a huge dreamer. Maybe drawn to the idea of being a starseed. You might have strong aquarius placements, or a populated 11th house. Pluto finally going in Aquarius this week is going to grant you so much luck and recognition ! You are about to step into your power for the next 20 years. Like a rocket, you are about to fly towards the stars. Are you ready for the take off ?  

“Don’t let the ugliness of others kill the beauty in you”

Something you need to hear is that you are about to be blessed by the universe ! Shooting Star by XG just started playing !

“Babe, if I give it my all, will it pay off?

Workin' overtime, no days off

All these shootin' stars in the dark (Yeah)

All these shootin' stars in the dark, make a wish (Yeah)

Takin' off from the ground, it's amazin'

So outta this world, I'm in space

Now I'm goin' up, headin' to the stars

Wouldn't trade it out for another life, no

Yeah, we ridin', ridin', ridin' on up (Woo)

So shinin', shinin', shinin' for sure

Ooh, ah, I'm lookin' so lavish (Shinin', shinin', yeah)

Ooh, ah, put in work like it's a habit (I'm lookin' so lavish)

It's a big move, every day's like a dream

Makin' big moves as I should 'cause I'm a queen (Ooh)

Ooh, ah, I'm lookin' so lavish

Ooh, ah, yeah, I bet you can't imagine (Oh yeah)”

You are shining on your way towards the stars. You are currently in your Queen of Wands and Ace of Wands energy, (Million Dollar Baby just started playing, you’re really sure of yourself and goal oriented right now).

You are bursting with confidence and assertiveness. You are determined towards your goals. You are in a “work hard, play hard” type of energy. If it’s not currently happening, you are about to have a huge burst of popularity on whatever you’re currently working on. Could be any project, a youtube channel, a business : there are a few people that are well respected in the industry you're aiming for that are eyeing you right now and that are about to offer you a contract/ a deal/ a collaboration. They have been probably on a hunt for someone like you for a while now and they were probably starting to lose hope until they came across your page/work/profile. They see you as a Star, you’re unique and like The Star in the tarot, you represent hope and faith to them/to their business/ association/school/company. They see your raw potential and they are going to help you refine it. 

Right now, you’re probably more focused on your work/ career/ school and nurturing your friendships, going out. You’re basically active in your social circles and this is benefiting you a lot ! 

An additional message you need to know is that you’re attracting a soulmate! It’s not necessarily a romantic soulmate, could be a friendship, a mentor.. Whatever the nature of this relationship is, it is going to fill you up with even more joy and hope! Your spirit guides are so proud of you and of all the work you have been putting in lately. Even though it was hard, you stayed patient and worked diligently towards your goals and desired reality. You did a lot of shadow work, tried your best to let go of the limiting beliefs that were holding you back. The Universe wants to tell you they are about to reward you.

Oracle card from the Green With Oracle pulled for you : 

40 - Positivity / Marigold : Leo energy (again you are shining and radiating confidence! Your solar plexus chakra and sacral chakra might be in overdrive currently! You are the main character in the play that is your life.)

 “A better understanding is indicated and a reason to be more optimistic about outcomes and the roads to get there. There are opportunities for nurturing encounters and a general aura of happiness pervades. Marigolds help us focus on the positive aspects of even the most difficult events. Your inner child may need to come out for a play, and be sure to take creative invitations. Be wary of not having all the facts and of emotional blockages.”

Pile 3

TW : this pile is a bit sad and angsty.

Before I pulled any cards for you, I already felt your energy overlapping in Pile 2’s reading. Your energy was really intense, deep and melancholic. Sad songs started playing, which completely contradicted pile 2’s energy (which was overwhelmingly positive). You are probably going through a really tough period right now and your soul is desperately crying for help, praying for a hand to come and save you. You have been having really painful realizations regarding your past, especially your childhood. You’ve recently realized that the child inside of you was buried alive. You’ve recently realized that you lost your essence. While growing up, you accommodated to the world around you, what people expected of you, what was “normal”, what was acceptable. By bowing down to other people’s expectations, you let your true self die slowly. You’ve been on autopilot for a while now, completely numb and empty. There is a bit of mirroring between this pile and pile 1 of suppressing one's authentic self and desires. 

Right now, you feel that your heart has been almost rotting inside. You lost all of your passion and your spark of life. But, don’t worry, what you need to hear now is that this painful realization is what is going to set you free. It is the first step towards a really deeply healing period where you are going to reconnect with your inner child. I heard : “The truth will set you free, but first, it will piss you off”. Did you read my last reading by any chance ? I am getting the energy that you chose pile 2 and 3, both or just one, or that you would resonate with those two piles for some reason. Don’t hesitate to check it out, you might find some comforting messages I heard ! 

Now, let me pull some cards for you. I don’t know why, but I felt drawn to use different decks than the ones I used for the first two piles. So, your pile will have different messages (no message from the Green Witch oracle for you)

 [took a little break before going to your pile. You probably need to slow down on your day to day tasks. I know it’s really hard in the productivity obsessed capitalist world we live in, and it is a huge privilege to be able to have enough time and energy to spiritually reconnect with ourselves, but this is what your spirit guides are urging you to do. You’ve got this.]

For you, I used the Occult Tarot and the Heavenly Bodies Astrology deck.

I only pulled 2 cards, one per deck (it was supposed to be like that but more cards sneaked in while shuffling haha) I feel like you need just a simple check up.

Cardinal - Instigation, Bravery and A pioneering spirit => your lost spark and childlike innocence will soon be reignited by a deep healing period. A new beginning is coming for you, but it will take some hibernating time before it comes. 

Sagittarius - Optimism, Exploration and Freedom

Trine - Angelic Support, Harmony and Perfect Flow

Reconnect to your higher self and spiritual side. Disconnect from the direct, yet understandable, dissatisfaction you feel towards life. Your embers that were slowly dying will relive, just trust the process, enter the deepest parts of yourself and keep exploring with positivity : your angels will guide you. There is a team of spirit guides and angels that are proud of your progress. Even if you don’t see it, they do and they want to tell you : There is light at the end of the tunnel, keep on walking.

The Hermit and the Ace of Swords :  The truth about your past came out, now is the time to meditate on those realizations and integrate them. Alchemize the pain in wisdom. You are about to come out stronger than ever. Isolate yourself, or at least try to keep your peace and have a lot of alone time (without completely stopping socializing altogether, humans are social creatures, connecting with people is important for our wellbeing) to ponder, analyze, decrypt all the patterns that you’ve been repeating. Reconnect with your inner child, look at photos of yourself when you were younger, delve deep into your childhood and childhood wounds. Maybe try to find what your attachment style is, anything that stems from your childhood that has been making you stuck in a rut these past years. Maybe, if you can, try to heal the relationship you had with your parents/parent or primary caregiver. Try to understand the nature of you guys’ relationship to see how it affects your self worth now. You've got this, trust me.

here is a link to my ko-fi.

[pitviperofdoom]

High School Time Travelers, Part 2

It's finally here! Follow up to this story.

***

“So. Spill. What the fuck is going on with you and Angelique?”

Raph fidgeted uncomfortably, and something within Erin roared out in protest at that. They were in her room, surrounded by her clutter and band posters and the stuff he kept at her house to keep his mom from throwing it away. He wasn’t supposed to be uncomfortable here.

Eventually, he took a deep breath. “I time-traveled last night.”

“I’m serious—”

“So am I,” he said wearily. “I woke up in a house I haven’t set foot in for years, across the hall from someone I promised myself I’d never talk to again. It happened, and if you’re stuck on that part then this conversation can’t continue.”

Erin got up and paced her room, kicking aside her backpack, nearly knocking over the guitar stand in the corner. “What the fuck.”

“That’s what I said.”

“What the fuck, Raph.”

“I didn’t mean to!”

The absurdity hit her instantly—he didn’t mean to time travel, as if they were talking about him forgetting his homework or getting in Monica Dillon’s way during passing period. She wanted to laugh.

But then she remembered some of the weird things Angelique had said—about friendships imploding, about college, about shit not mattering in high school, all with the easy certainty of experience.

“Prove it,” she said. “Can you do that thing where you predict what I’m about to say?”

“I’m not stuck in a time loop, dumbass, yesterday I was thirty-three!” Raph snapped. “I had to go through math class trying to pretend I still remembered my teacher’s name!”

“Okay, okay, Jesus.” Erin held up her hands placatingly. “There’s gotta be something.”

Raph sighed, rubbing his forehead. “I dunno. Anything meaningful and unchangeable I can remember won’t happen for a while, so if you’re willing to wait for the Trump presidency or the global pandemic, there’s that.”

“The what.”

“Wait, who’s president right now? It’s still Bush, right?”

Erin pulled a face.

“Next one’s Barack Obama, he’s gonna do two terms,” Raph informed her. “First black president.”

“Oh, huh. Cool,” Erin said faintly.

“Let’s see, what else, um… Balloon Boy? Has Balloon Boy happened yet?”

“No, what the fuck is Balloon Boy?”

Raph brightened. “Yeah, so at some point this family is gonna release like, a homemade weather balloon? Or something? And there’s gonna be this huge panic because they think their son is stuck inside it, but then it turns out he was fine and hiding in the basement the whole time and it was a hoax.”

“Okay, I’ll keep an eye out for that I guess?” Erin sat down again. “You’re seriously not fucking with me right now?”

“I mean, if you want, we could forget this conversation ever happened,” Raph offered. “Continue with our normal lives, while I keep under-reacting to devastating world events.”

“Christ, I don’t know.” Erin pressed her palms into her eyes. After a moment, she lifted her head again. “Wait a minute, we’re getting off track. What does this have to do with Angelique?”

Raph’s silence could not have been louder.

“Raph,” Erin said, a little desperately.

“First you have to promise you won’t be mad,” said Raph.

“Did you sleep with her in the—” Erin paused to do some arithmetic in her head. “—eighteen years between then and now?!”

“She’s my wife,” Raph blurted out.

Moments later, Erin’s mother knocked politely on the bedroom door. “Everything okay in there?” she asked. “That’s an awful lot of screaming for a Tuesday night.”

Erin continued howling into her pillow. “She’s fine, Mrs. Yokota!” Raph called. “We’re looking at—uh—creepypastas!”

“Creepy what?”

“Uh—crap, are they still called that?—like, ghost stories and stuff!”

Placated, she left them to it. Eventually Erin recovered enough to lie back and stare listlessly at the ceiling.

“Dude.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“What the fuck is your life?” Erin demanded. “How did that even happen?”

“We ran into each other at—so my friend Hazel got roped into being in their college roommate’s bridal party and dragged me along for moral support, and Angelique was in the same friend group but with like six degrees of separation from us,” Raph explained. “It took half the reception for her to recognize me because at that point I’d been on T for a few years, but the second she realized we went to the same high school she turned fishbelly-white, pulled me aside, and apologized for how much of a bitch she was back then. It was really awkward.”

Back then, he called it, even though for Erin it was still right now. “And you married her?”

“Like eight years later, yeah.” Raph ran his hand through his hair, not quite hiding the small smile that stole over his face. “She really turned over a new leaf.”

Erin was silent for a while, mulling over this new information, combining it with what she already had from that afternoon.

“Is your name still Raphael?” she asked. “She sounded really surprised about it. And I know you said you were just taking the name on a trial run, but you really seemed to like it. Not that there’s—you know,” she added. “I know that—just because I picked it, I knew you might not… you know. It’s fine, I was just wondering. If I should call you something else.”

“I did—I do like it,” Raph assured her. “But, uh, some stuff happened. My dad found me.”

Erin’s eyebrows shot upward. “Wait, really? What’d he have to say for himself?”

“That Mom ghosted him when she got pregnant because her side guy had more money.”

“Dude, fuck your mom.”

“Don’t fuck my mom, she’ll ghost you for money, weren’t you listening?”

Erin burst out snickering. “Fuck, sorry, this isn’t funny.”

“It will be in eighteen years,” Raph said with a wry smile. “Hindsight. Anyway, he found me in—he’s gonna find me in two years unless I reach out first. He’s a good guy. My stepmom’s pretty cool, too. And I have sisters? So that’s awesome. And yeah, he had this friend who passed away when he was younger, and he always wanted to name his son after him, but then Mom disappeared and he only ended up having daughters, so when he found me, it kind of worked out.” He hesitated. “I’m Damian. Damian Raphael Harker.”

“That’s such a cool name,” Erin sighed.

Raph—Damian—tilted his head back to grin at her. “Yours is cool, too.”

“Shut up,” she said fondly.

“No, seriously,” he said emphatically. “Your name is unspeakably cool.”

There was something odd in his tone, sticking up and catching like a loose nail. It bothered her, the same way something Angelique said earlier had bothered her.

“Hey, Ra—Damian?” Erin said cautiously. “Earlier, when Angelique sat down with us, she didn’t recognize me.”

“She does, don’t worry.”

“No, she didn’t,” Erin pressed. “It took her a second to realize who I was, and she stopped herself from saying why.”

Suddenly Damian looked deeply uncomfortable. “I, uh.”

She took a deep breath. “Was I dead in your time?”

“Wh-no! No no no no, of course not!” Damian looked horrified. “We played Pathfinder like last week, you’re not dead.”

“What’s Path—no, never mind. Something’s clearly up. If we just played whatever-that-is last week, and Angelique is your wife, then why didn’t she know who I was?”

“Uh…” Damian’s hands had worked their way deep into his sleeves. “You look different, that’s all. You kind of reinvented yourself in college.”

“Oh,” Erin said, momentarily relieved. Then— “Wait.”

“What?’

“Damian. You’d—” She hesitated. “If I was a guy, you’d tell me, right?’

“Oh my God,” Damian mumbled into his be-sweatered hands.

“Damian.”

“You’re... not...”

“You’d tell me, right?”

“See, I don’t know if I would!” Damian answered, in a strained high-pitched tone. “That’s—look. If you were a guy, that’s something you’d have to work out for yourself!”

“Damian, I swear to God.”

“I can’t crack your egg for you, that’s like violating the Prime Directive!”

Erin seized a pillow and started to buffet him with it. “You are such a nerd!”

“It’s your personal journey, you can’t use me to cheat!” Damian cackled, fending her off with a plush horse.

***

“Yeah I’ll get the banana split.” Angie bounced on the balls of her feet, eyes raking over the array of toppings. “Can you put caramel and chocolate sauce on it? And Heath bar pieces, chopped strawberries, and M&Ms.”

“Yeah, sure thing.”

It took all of her self-control not to press her nose against the glass as she watched them make it. Some small part of her balked at the sight of three huge scoops of ice cream and all the toppings, but she quieted it. She had a second shot at being a teenager, and that meant never taking her garbage disposal stomach and body made of rubber bands for granted ever again.

She hummed absently to herself, only to pause halfway through the tune. How did it go again? She tried repeating the first half, only to get stuck at the same spot. Oh, this was going to bug the crap out of her. It wasn’t like she could look it up, not when the song wouldn’t come out for almost ten years—

Her phone vibrated in her purse, and she checked it absentmindedly, zeroing in for a moment on the DAD displayed on the screen. After a moment, she put it back without answering. If it was that important, he could text.

Sure enough, her phone gave a short buzz. New text message—he hadn’t even bothered to leave a voicemail.

DADI need you to talk to your brother.

Angie checked her banana split’s progress with a glance, and replied.

lol why

DADHe’s not listening to me. We both know the courts favor the mother so if we’re going to beat her I need both of you on your A game.

Angie ground her teeth until her jaw creaked.

what do you need me to do

DADJust coach him on how to talk about her. You’re a smart lady, I know you can do it. He’s always getting scuffed up at practice, just have him say the bruises came from her. Throw in a drinking problem if you have to, just keep your stories straight.

why father dearest i’m surprised at youyou want me to lie under oath?

DADJust talk to him, will you? Keep your stories straight, don’t get too outlandish, and we’ll get out of this with everything we want. You’ll never have to hear the word no again, I promise.

ok daddy ill do my best!

DADGood girl. You’re the smartest girl I know. Smarter than your mom, smarter than her bitch lawyer. Love you!

“Order up!”

Angie brought her banana split to the table with the clearest view of the door. It took her a moment to decide how to begin, then nearly a full minute balancing equal parts ice cream, banana, and toppings in a single spoonful. She managed it in the end.

Mood lifted, she unlocked her phone again and made a call. “Heeeey, Anika.”

“Need I remind you that phone calls are billable,” her mother’s lawyer said dryly.

“Yeah, I’ll be quick, I have some incriminating text messages I think you’ll be interested in?”

The sound of rustling papers paused. “Go on…?”

“Dad just told me to lie to the judge,” Angie explained, twirling a thin ribbon of caramel around her spoon. “And to coach Eric to lie to the judge. I took screenshots.”

Anika cursed softly under her breath. “Thank you for telling me. Send them to your mom, okay? Thank you.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

The bell above the ice cream parlor door jingled, and Angie perked up as both Damian (Raph?) and Erin walked in. She waved them over, grinning when both pairs of eyes widened at her treat.

“That thing’s half the size of your head,” Erin pointed out.

“Sure is, you guys came just in time.” Angie nudged it across the table, along with the two extra spoons. “If we split it, I’ll have enough room for a milkshake chaser.”

“You’re a monster,” Damian said delightedly. “Oh shit, are those Heath bars?” He dug in without waiting for an answer.

“They’re peanut butter cups,” she said solemnly, once he’d taken a bite and could probably tell they weren’t. “I added them just to hurt you.” Damian rolled his eyes and dug his spoon back in.

Erin stared at her, probably still baffled by the gentle banter, but at least she looked more curious than infuriated, like instead of being suspicious she simply didn’t know what to make of Angie.

“So, you guys talked?” Angie asked carefully. “Are we… all good?”

“I think so,” Damian replied, shooting a cautious glance at Erin.

“You’re on thin ice,” Erin informed her as she helped herself to the chocolate scoop.

“Fair.” Angie didn’t remember Erin putting up quite as much of a fight, but then, it had been years when they’d reconnected before. This time around, it was still fresh.

“The ice cream helps,” Erin added, slightly muffled by the spoon in her mouth.

“Noted.” Angie paused, weighed her options, and shrugged. No harm no foul, probably. “Hey, you’re a musician, right?”

Erin swallowed. “Yeah, why?”

“And not just a performer, but you write music too, right?”

“Yeeaaah?” Erin squinted suspiciously. Beside her, Damian shot Angie a warning glare.

“If I give you half a tune, could you resolve it?”

Erin was staring at her like she’d grown a second head. “Probably.”

“Great!” Angie hummed the earworm from earlier. “How would the next part go?”

Erin repeated it to herself, nodding along. After a moment, she said, “Probably like—”

And sure enough, there it was. The rest of the chorus’s tune came rushing back to Angie’s memory, and she breathed a sigh of relief. 

“Thanks! That was driving me nuts.” Angie returned to her banana split, ignoring Damian’s growing scowl.

Later, when Erin was in the bathroom and  Angelique was standing in line to order her promised milkshake, Damian dug his elbow into her side. “You’re not as slick as you think you are,” he muttered.

“What?” Angie said innocently. “I didn’t give anything away.”

“You just taught her half the chorus of a song she’s eight years away from writing!”

“I’ve planted a seed,” Angie insisted. “I’ve created a stable time loop.”

“That is not what you did and you know it.” Damian pursed his lips, clearly trying to stay annoyed with her. “I barely avoided spoiling her transition, and that’s after she asked me to my face.”

Angie grinned. “So you haven’t told her she’s a genderfluid punk rocker yet?”

“No. Because she’s not a genderfluid punk rocker yet.”

“And now, when she becomes one,” Angie said with a smile, “she’s going to look back on this day and laugh.”

[veradune]

Ohhhhh my god I think I've actually turned a corner in the decluttering process (I might even be able to handle the dolls and the lineup of busted hiking boots at this rate???)

...although now I have to go for family easter stuff prayer circle I don't lose all momentum

Update on 48 hour apartment purge: so it's extending for the rest of the long weekend at this rate and I managed to snap a hole in the bathroom sink pipe while trying to get the accursed pop-up drain aligned so it would actually, maybe, stop the sink 🙃

I love having to frantically empty a wet cabinet at 2am (why did I start fussing with it thennnn)

[creature-wizard]

Back when antivaxxers first started getting vocal about refusing to get COVID shots, there were a number of people who were gleefully cackling over the idea of right wing assholes getting sick and biting it.

Then other people stepped up. And they pointed out that people needed to stop doing this, because it wouldn't be the right wing assholes who got hurt the most.

Rather, because of systemic racism, it would be racial minorities, like Black and Indigenous people, who would suffer the most.

Guess what?

They were right.

They. Were. Right.

This is why I am not impressed with self-proclaimed leftists gleefully imagining the white assholes they hate getting punished under a second Trump term.

Buddy. Those white assholes won't suffer nearly as much as you think. I learned that lesson hard when the COVID pandemic hit in 2020, and I'm not about to forget it now.

The people who would be hurt by a second Trump term the most are the marginalized people these so-called leftists claim they want to protect.

[alicenpai]

edgeworth family & summer 🍉

i needed to go through an old file in my 2021 folder, and i stumbled upon this drawing. 2021 was an incredibly arduous year & resulted in a lot of art block, so i have a lot of unfinished drawings from then. the fact that i finished/drew anything at all is a feat honestly (and you guys should be proud too if you drew anything at all during the early months of the pandemic...!)

i quite like the look of jeluto's csp brush here to achieve a blocky effect...

i dont know what is UP with the bleed border here, did i plan to print this in a book? especially with how close greg's face is to the gutter??? *avgn voice* what was i thinking

the one time i ACTUALLY tried a bg and it backfired on me bc i never finished. im sorry to my 1st year layout teacher who gave me a 1 on 1 personal pep talk *dexter voice* i have failed you 😭😭 i think this drawing had a lot of potential, i just wouldn't go back to it bc it's 3 years old now. backgrounds are tough because i never really know how to approach them. do i line it? do i keep it a sketch and just paint over/under the sketch layer? do i lineless it?

i guess it depends. much to think about... i definitely want to challenge myself whenever i can, but not overwhelm myself with the need to "improve". gotta remember that art should be fun ♥.

[uhyeahnoabsolutelynot]

list of what i personally consider to be joel’s biggest “i forgot that i keep insisting i’m not your dad” moments:

-“well now i have to see it” / “i don’t want you to” just the tone in which he says this and the thing of being like i’m not going to stop this from happening but i’m going to make my disapproval known, very dad

-his face softening and posture opening up a little in ep1 when she’s like “but you know where to go? so we’re gonna be okay” because even though he’s pissed to be babysitting and thinks she’s more trouble than she’s worth, he is not immune to scared little kid

-also ep1, all of his annoyed eyerolling at ellie instantly respecting/listening to tess and not him

-the Single Silent Nod of Capitulation™️

-becoming increasingly able to sense when ellie is about to ask for a gun from a mile away

-becoming increasingly able to sense when ellie is about to ask him to explain something he doesn’t know jackshit about

-saying under his breath “just wait goddamn it” while jogging after her

-loud coffee slurp in response to being told it’s gross

-also, assuming a 14 y/o who grew up in military school would like coffee

-dad infodumping infused with mild griping (i.e. pre-pandemic air travel, gasoline, how fedra cleared the highways)

-“lookit”

-oH i ThouGht yOu weNt tO ScHooL

-“you’re gonna break your neck”/“slow down”/“what did i just say”

-impatiently telling someone to straighten up is very dad

-the white lie about everyone loving contractors and contractors being cool obv

-doing the “is there anything bad in here” / “just you” bit not once but twice. he really does cycle through the same like 6 weak-ass jokes

-asking someone else to navigate while driving and then stressing them out for not navigating well enough for his liking

-being able to guess her favorite astronaut, i am weeping

-laying down 3 ground rules and then pretty much immediately and continually letting ellie get away with breaking 2 out of 3

-starting to look over at her in surprise when she says “i don’t want to talk about it” because it’s the first time that’s happened and he can tell he’s touched on something that really bothers her, and you see him having to wrestle with the dad impulse to be concerned

-when ellie tries to get him not to go after the sniper; impatiently being like ugh come on that guy is not gonna shoot me he literally sucks (pedro’s read of this line always makes me laugh)

-and of course also the follow-up, when he sees he’s going to have to do better than that to convince her that everything will be fine and his tone softens and he asks her to trust him. the “no questions, just do it” to “do you trust me” pipeline bro, fuucckkk

-the wyoming scenes when they’re nearing jackson and joel’s losing his cool a little and acting kinda grumpy and agitated really remind me of when you have to run errands with your parent while they’re in a bad mood

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 9: Some Days He Feels Like Dying]

A/N: Below are your guesses...let's see how you did!!! 🥰😘

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon™️, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes.

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “Extraordinary Girl” by Green Day.

Word count: 8.3k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🥰

Let’s go back to the beginning of the end of the world.

On the big-screen tv in the Liberty Center at Saratoga Springs, Wolf Blitzer is saying: “We are receiving confirmation of additional outbreaks of the so-called Florida Fever, the first cases of which here in the U.S. were reported in Miami a little over one week ago. Concern is now growing nationally, especially as the modes of transmission, symptoms, and treatment options remain unclear. Let’s go across the country to Natasha Chen for the latest information. Natasha?”

“Hi, Wolf. I’m here outside the UC San Diego Medical Center where early this morning, two individuals suspected to be suffering from the illness were admitted. I’ve been informed by hospital staff that both patients are currently in stable condition, but there is still so much confusion and conflicting information regarding this ‘Florida Fever,’ and of course that uncertainty is leading to fear, rumors, and honestly a bit of hysteria. Even how to refer to the sickness is controversial, with no official name having been decided upon by scientists. Cases in Australia are known as Ragepox, the U.K. has dubbed it the 21st Century Sweat after a mysterious disease from the 1500s, and Russia is calling it the Ukrainian Flu while Ukraine has opted for the Russian Red Rot, inspired by the skin lesions that some patients experience.”

“Can you tell us what we do know, Natasha? Are doctors classifying this illness as a virus, or as a bacterial infection more akin to tuberculosis or meningitis?”

“At this time, what I’m hearing is that doctors are fairly certain it’s a virus, as patients do not seem to respond to antibiotics when they’ve been explored as a potential treatment. But there’s truly very little information at this early stage, and I think we’re all being reminded of those first days of the Covid-19 pandemic, when no one really knew how to best to avoid contracting the virus or what the long-term effects would be both nationally and globally.”

“There are absolutely some similarities, Natasha, which I’m sure is contributing to the unease surrounding the situation. What precautions are doctors currently recommending?”

“Wolf, doctors are urging the public not to panic, and to exercise common sense measures like avoiding crowded spaces, sanitizing surfaces, and staying home if they’re feeling unwell. Suspected cases of the illness should be reported to primary physicians or local hospitals. Typical symptoms appear to include headaches, fever, gastrointestinal upset, skin discoloration and blistering, and unusual bleeding, as well as behavioral changes, particularly disorientation, aggression, and even violence in some patients…”

“That ain’t what it is,” Rio says. He jabs his index finger at the tv from where he sits on the couch beside you. “Snowflake wasn’t sick, he was dead. He was motherfucking dead, flatline, code blue, crossed the rainbow bridge, he was gone. He was dead and then he woke back up, and he wasn’t a person anymore. He was…something else.”

“Dumbass, people don’t come back from the dead,” Mike says from the ping pong table. People are milling around pretending to play pool, darts, chess, poker, Monopoly, Uno, Parcheesi, but really you’re all here for the same reason. You want to know what’s happening.

Rio turns to you. “Wasn’t Snowflake dead?”

“He definitely seemed dead,” you reply, knees tucked to your chest and still watching the tv. Wolf Blitzer’s voice is calm, but his pale blue eyes have a manic sort of light to them, too large and too rattled.

“Man, fuck Florida,” says Desmond, a utilitiesman born and raised Trenton, New Jersey. “Nothing but psychos and alligators. Saw them off of Georgia and just let them float away.”

“What was that?” Tyler replies combatively. He’s from a trailer park in Tallahassee.

“Ty, why do you care? You’d be fine. You’re already up here. You can stay.”

“They’re lying,” Rio mutters, meaning Wolf and Natasha on CNN. “When the corpsmen called the hospital, they said to be prepared to restrain Snowflake and that he might try to bite us. Why aren’t they warning people about that?!���

Kayleigh, a steelworker from Oklahoma City, looses a frenetic sort of laugh. “Because there’s no non-panic-inducing way to say: Hey, go buy some duct tape and bungee cords to tie up your loved ones, because they might try to fucking eat you.”

Rio doesn’t frown often, but he is now; he slips his phone out of the pocket of his camo pants and types out a WhatsApp message to Sophie. You only know her from photos and quick hellos via video chat, a sweet diminutive woman with white-blonde hair and blue eyes that seem to fill up half her face, as fragile as Rio is overwhelming. She likes baking and romance novels and elephants; whenever Rio finds elephant-themed souveners, he ships them home to Oregon for her, refrigerator magnets and wallets and scarves and snow globes. Sophie wears a lot of long flowing skirts and hand-knit sweaters, and offers strange suggestions when she and Rio discuss baby names: Sage, Fox, Laurel, Coral, Juniper, Karma, Rune, Otter. Otter?! Rio had exclaimed. Babe, if you name our kid Otter, even I’M gonna have to bully them.

“I’m telling Sophie to stay with my parents,” Rio says to you. “They’ve gotten super weird with all the off-the-grid stuff, but they have years’ worth of supplies and grow most of their own food now, and they’re thirty miles from the nearest town. And no one knows how to defend themselves like doomsday preppers.”

“Good idea,” you reply, watching the tv. Now Wolf Blitzer is talking about tornadoes in the Midwest, and you could almost believe the world is normal again.

A few days later all major social media platforms begin censoring content related to the so-called Florida Fever, and then the internet goes down completely, and then the power turns off and on and off again, and finally quits like a car driven to its last mile. The combat units are moved out of Saratoga Springs—never to be heard from again—and the construction projects paused indefinitely, and one of the master-at-arms that Rio is friends with (Rio has a lot of friends, surely you aren’t so remarkable) relays information that he shouldn’t: tales of planned missions, impossible plagues, overrun cities, innumerable deserters in every branch of the U.S. military.

“Hey,” Rio whispers, shaking you awake one night, moonlight streaming through the windows and the pops of distant gunfire you aren’t supposed to ask about. “If I leave, will you come with me?”

It’s a big commitment; it could be a lifetime. You fear he might just be trying not to hurt your feelings. “I don’t want to slow you down.”

“No, you don’t get it,” Rio says. “I’m not leaving without you. Are you going to Oregon by choice, or should I tie you up and throw you in the back of the Humvee?”

~~~~~~~~~~

It’s a young one, maybe a teenager, little buds for horns and only weighing a few hundred pounds. This is good; if it was any heavier, Cregan and Rio wouldn’t be able to drag it back to the ranch. You’re still in Red Desert, Wyoming, and the bison are grazing just off I-80, an asphalt artery that cuts through an endless steppe of sand-colored rocks and tall grass. They gaze lazily in your direction with bulbous dark eyes, perpetually chewing, not terribly intelligent. The Colt pistols of the men who found you at the RV had been loaded with 9mm bullets, the same caliber your Berettas take; there weren’t many, but enough to fill both of your clips, something that feels like winning the lottery. You are lying on the rocky, dusty soil and lining up the shot. If you miss, the herd will scatter, and you’ll watch dinner vanish beneath a blue sky—pale like Aemond’s eye, a weak shallow blue—and rough white scars of cirrostratus clouds.

“Feels kind of wrong to kill a baby,” you murmur. Daeron, Luke, Baela, Helaena, and Ice are back at the house. Aemond, Rio, Cregan, Rhaena, and Aegon are here on the ground with you; Aegon insisted upon being brought along, and Rio agreed to carry him. Aegon had never seen American bison outside of the Oregon Trail computer game, those pixelated brown blobs migrating across the screen no more material than unicorns or faeries or basilisks.

“If the baby didn’t want to get killed, it shouldn’t be made of steak,” Aegon points out. He’s on a lot of Vicodin, the only narcotic Aemond could find back in Ogallala, Nebraska.

“No pressure, Chips,” Rio says, chewing on a long blade of little bluestem grass. “If you miss we’re just going to have to eat each other like the Donner Party.”

Aegon wrinkles his nose in confusion. “The what?”

“She won’t miss,” Aemond says, and Rio snickers to himself and gives you a quick wink that no one else notices.

“I don’t think one 9mm bullet will do it,” Cregan mutters. “Cows got thick skulls, I figure bison are the same way. You’ll have to hit it a few times, and before it can take off and disappear on us.”

Aemond casts him a patronizing glance. “And you’ve killed a lot of cows?”

“Oh yeah. Worked in a slaughterhouse for a while before I got hired by the power company. Hated it, went home and could still smell the blood and brains on myself no matter how many times I showered. Couldn’t get out of there fast enough.”

Aemond looks like he regrets asking. Rhaena frowns worriedly at the bison. “Will they charge if someone shoots at them?”

Cregan shrugs. “Probably not.”

“Probably?!”

You squeeze the trigger five times in quick succession, hit the calf thrice, tiny puffs of scarlet mist that spring from its woolly head. It flops over as the rest of the herd jolts into a gallop, kicking up dust and fleeing across the steppe.

“Yes!” Rio booms as everyone applauds. “We’re in business! We’re having ribeyes tonight! Cregan, my good sir, I take mine medium rare.”

“You’re getting well done,” Aemond tells him. “Everyone is. Just in case the bison has parasites.”

Rio groans. “You’re ruining my life, man.” Then he and Cregan trot over to grab the baby bison, each of them taking one of its back hooves.

“So,” Aegon says dreamily. “Now that Rio is preoccupied, who would like to assist me in returning my disgusting, debilitated body to the ranch? Anyone? Anyone?”

Rhaena turns to you. “When we have more bullets, could you give me shooting lessons?”

“Sure,” you reply, a bit startled. “Really? You’re interested?”

“Well…” Rhaena hesitates. “Baela’s always been the brave one. At home, at school, when we were shopping, even when restaurants would mess up my order, Baela would do the talking and make sure I was alright…and I would literally hide behind her waiting for her to solve all my problems. And now…with the baby, with Jace…it’s been really different being the one to help her for a change, and I don’t think I’m very good at it yet. But Baela deserves to have people to lean on, just like I’ve always had her. And…when I stabbed that guy in the RV…I kind of liked it.” She titters nervously when she sees the shock on your face. “No, not like that! Not the killing part, or the gushing blood, that was all super gross. But the fact that I helped protect Baela and Luke? The fact that I wasn’t useless in that situation? That was a good feeling. Baela is clever, and she’s courageous and caring and funny, and she’s always been better than me at everything, and I never minded because she…she was like my own personal superhero, you know? But now I feel like I need to start learning how to do things myself so I can help her. Even if Baela is still better at everything, and probably always will be.”

Aegon grins toothily and pushes his neon green plastic sunglasses up the bridge of his nose. “I know how you feel. It’s pretty impossible to look heroic next to Aemond.”

“Stop,” Aemond says, but he’s smiling, and a bloom of bashful pink blood appears in his cheeks.

“You already took over the driving,” you tell Rhaena encouragingly. “That was a big help.”

“Yeah,” Rhaena replies, a bit pensive. “Let’s hope I can keep that going.” Between the gas Aemond found in Ogallala and what was siphoned from the would-be attackers’ GMC Yukon, you got enough fuel in the Tahoe to take it halfway across Wyoming; but now the gauge is not just at but venturing below the E, and it can’t have more than five or ten miles left. That might not even get you to the next ranch, let alone a proper town. You need a working vehicle. There are nearly a thousand miles between here and Odessa, Oregon.

Aegon is pawing at Aemond like a cat. “Come on, hero. Help me up.”

~~~~~~~~~~

“This is why we’re friends,” Rio tells you as he shovels forkfuls of bison steak into his mouth, juice dribbling down his chin. Cregan gutted the bison and butchered it, then you helped him cook the steaks—not very uniform in size and shape, yet no one is complaining—on a pan heated in the woodstove. You fed the fire with books you found in the house, mostly religious in nature. “You convince me not to commit suicide when we’re stranded on a transmission tower, you share your Cheddar Whales, you’re good at shooting things…”

“How did you two become friends?” Baela asks. You are all arranged around the dining room table; there are just enough chairs for everyone. Ice lies beneath it mauling on bison bones that Cregan set aside for her. The room is illuminated by flashlights. Baela looks great: in good spirits, glowing, alert, wearing a loose cotton dress that Helaena found in an upstairs closet for her. Baela napped most of the day, something she rarely allows herself to indulge in, and the benefits are evident.

Rio says nonchalantly: “I talked to everybody and she barely talked at all. So of course I had to investigate and figure out what that was about. Turns out she’s kind of cool. You know the Wheel of Fortune game at arcades where there’s like a hundred little lights in a circle you have to press the button when the one that says Spin Zone lights up? She’s a freak, she can hit it almost every time. Can’t sink a basketball or sing karaoke to save her life, but you know, we all have flaws.”

Aegon looks up from his map, which he is scrutinizing as he eats his bison steak. “Do you realize that if we could just stop at gas stations like back when everything was normal, we’d be in Odessa or the Bay Area in fifteen hours? Literally less than one day. Fucking unreal. And yet here we are trapped in yee-haw country, freaky giant animals, no civilization but Jesus billboards everywhere, hell on earth.” He holds up a palm. “No offense, Cregan. You’re okay.”

Cregan smiles mildly. “None taken, Fried Foot. You know you’re a little well done yourself these days.”

“That’s ableist,” Aegon replies.

“We’ll find gas tomorrow,” Aemond says. He sounds confident because he has to; he’s not allowed to panic, to give up. He’s seated at the head of the table like a patriarch. His steak is the smallest and the most ragged. He wouldn’t accept any of the others.

You ask Baela: “Have you decided what to name the baby?”

“Kind of.” She rests both hands on her belly, a globe like a full moon. Helaena glances over at Baela, frowning and preoccupied. “If it’s a boy, I’m going to name it after Jace. We had already picked out Theodore…and Teddy for short, isn’t that cute? But now…I’d want him to have that connection to his father. The baby won’t have any pictures of him, or videos, or memories, or papers he wrote in school, or ties or rings or cufflinks, or…anything. But he could have Jace’s name.”

The rest of you nod, eyes downcast and feeling terribly sorry for her. “I really like that idea,” Luke says quietly.

Now Baela is thinking, her gaze traveling around the room as she chews on a cube of streak. “I’m not sure what I’d call a girl. Maybe something naturey like Violet, Rosemary, Ivy, Indigo, Fern…”

“You should name it Otter,” you say, and you and Rio erupt into raucous laughter. Aemond smiles as he watches you.

Baela is grinning uncertainly, trying not to be insensitive. Perhaps people named their kids stuff like Otter where you came from. “Um, sorry, what?!”

“That was one of the baby names on Sophie’s list,” Rio clarifies. “I vetoed it. Or at least…I think she agreed to cross it off…? Oh my God, imagine I finally get to Odessa only to find out my firstborn child has been named Otter.”

“You’d have to turn right back around,” you say. “Total abandonment would be the only honorable choice. We’d have to start over someplace else. I’ve heard Texas is nice.”

Aegon snorts. “You can’t live in Texas. They don’t even have legal weed there.”

Rhaena squints at him. “I don’t really think that’s a concern anymore, Aegon.”

Aegon smacks his forehead theatrically. “Oh no, I forgot about the apocalypse again!”

“So Cregan,” Baela says. “You were planning to vote for Trump.”

Everyone at the table groans. “No politics,” Aemond says.

“They’re all dead now, so it doesn’t matter,” Rhaena adds. “Biden, Kamala, that insane Kennedy brain worm dude, Trump…”

Aegon says: “If I was a zombie, I wouldn’t eat Trump.”

“I just found that interesting,” Baela continues, looking at Cregan like she’s expecting him to explain himself. Rhaena and Luke exchange a nervous glance. Daeron reaches under the table to pet Ice; you can hear her tail thumping cheerfully against the hardwood floor.

“I was a Trump voter, yeah,” Cregan replies between bites of steak. Aemond is studying him uneasily, but Cregan’s baritone voice is calm. “That doesn’t mean I approved of a lot of the things he did and said. I’m not a monster, I don’t believe in mocking people or all that January 6th stuff. But he was good for the economy. Back when Trump was president, groceries were more affordable, and houses were cheaper, and more companies were hiring. If I had tried to move out of my parents’ place in 2023 instead of 2019, there’s no way I could have done it. And I really needed to get out of there. A lot of people feel that they don’t have the luxury of voting for the nicest candidate, or the candidate they agree with on social issues. Something abstract like climate change isn’t even on the radar. They have to vote for their basic necessities.”

You and Rio understand what he means, you’ve both met plenty of people with the same perspective; everybody else seems shellshocked.

“But I don’t want y’all to think that I’m…” Cregan looks around the table, his eyes catching—interestingly—on Helaena, who observes him with a fully present attentiveness that you’ve learned is rare for her. “You know, like a sexist or a racist or that I hate foreigners or anything. Because I’ve never felt that way, and now I’m very happy to have found you guys, and I respect the hell out of you. And I want to be allowed to stay.”

“You can stay, Cregan,” Helaena reassures him.

“Yeah,” Rio says. “Especially since we’d probably starve without you.”

Cregan beams, clearly grateful, and there are chuckles and the tension breaks; and Baela is placidly skating her palm over the arc of her belly, and now that you’ve eaten all you can, Rio is spearing the remaining chunks of your steak with his fork and gobbling them down. He doesn’t ask before he does this; he knows you don’t mind. You’ve never understood why he’s given you so much over the past nearly five years. You are eternally offering him atonement.

Suddenly, Baela asks you: “What would you name a baby girl?”

You have to think about this before you answer. “Well, if you’re looking for something related to plants…I had a friend when I was growing up named Briar, and I always thought that was pretty.”

“Briar,” Baela echoes, intrigued.

“It means bramble, like a thorny shrub where blackberries grow. I remember her telling me that her mama wanted it to be a reminder that people go through rough patches and that life gets hard sometimes, but you have to keep going, and eventually you’ll find your way out.”

“Briar,” Baela repeats. “Yeah, that’s kind of neat. I’ll add it to the list!”

“And you’d have the same first initial,” Rhaena says. “Baela and Briar. Isn’t that adorable?”

Baela smiles. “And a few Rs thrown in there too. For Rhaena.”

Rio turns to Aegon. “Hey Honey Bun, if you had to name your kid after a plant, what would you name it?”

Aegon says without hesitation: “Marijuana.”

Now it’s an hour later, and Aemond is examining Aegon’s burned leg on the living room floor, Helaena holding a flashlight and you and Rio standing by for moral support. Underneath the bandages is a wasteland of red, weeping flesh…and yet there are spots where the skin seems to be hardening into white islands of scar tissue. Rhaena and Luke are keeping watch by the windows, Baela is passed out in one of the bedrooms, Cregan is showing Daeron how to put his wavy blonde hair up in a man bun.

Aemond points to a blackish patch on the top of Aegon’s foot, only a few inches from his ankle. “I have to debride this part here,” he says like an apology.

Aegon is afraid to ask. “What does debride mean?”

“It means I have to cut it out.”

“Cut it?!”

“It’s getting infected. I have to remove it or it will spread to the rest of the foot and you could get sepsis. I might even have to amputate the whole leg.”

“Okay, cut the dead stuff off,” Aegon swiftly agrees.

Aemond doesn’t have any more injectable morphine. He gives Aegon as much Vicodin as he dares and then begins working, carving away layers of dark disease with his scalpel and scrubbing the area with disinfectant. Aegon clutches your hand, squeezing so hard it feels like your bones might crunch, shrapnel-like splinters of marrow-stained organic glass beneath your skin. Rio has Aegon’s pink Sony Walkman—once owned by Ava—and takes one earbud while giving Aegon the other. They sing along to Sean Paul songs together, laughing as tears stream down Aegon’s sunburned cheeks:

“Well, woman, the way the time cold, I wanna be keepin’ you warm

I got the right temperature fi shelter you from the storm

Oh Lord, gal, I got the right tactics to turn you on

And girl, I wanna be the papa, you can be the mom…”

Now you’re curled up in bed, your arms crossed over your belly as you struggle to fall asleep. Aemond comes to bed late now; each night he waits until Baela is sleeping and then teaches Rhaena about childbirth and recovery: what to expect, what could go wrong. She is a good student, borrowing Helaena’s spider notebook to take notes and asking detailed questions. She wants to know everything she can so she can help when Baela goes into labor.

At last, the bedroom door opens. Out in the living room you can hear Rio asking: “Do you have Wagon Wheel? I love that song.”

Aegon scoffs. “No, of course I don’t have Wagon Wheel. Shut up and listen to your Enrique Iglesias.”

“You are so racist, man…”

Aemond sees that you’re in agony, rummages around in his medical kit, and gives you an oval-shaped white pill to wash down with the can of orange Sunkist on the nightstand; Helaena found a case of it in the pantry. “Why didn’t you tell me it was this bad?”

“I didn’t want to take any Vicodin from Aegon or Baela. They’ll need it more than me.”

“Your pain is as real as anyone else’s.” Aemond’s weight shifts the mattress as he crawls into bed beside you, his arm settling protectively around your waist, his hand covering yours where it rests on your lower belly. “If the Tahoe runs out of gas, will you be okay to walk tomorrow?”

“Don’t worry about me. I had three periods during basic training, I honestly thought I might die. After that I can power through just about anything.”

“I’ve noticed.” You feel the soft smile on Aemond’s lips as he kisses your temple. “Do you want quiet, or do you want to talk?”

“Talking would be a nice distraction.”

Aemond wastes no time. “Do you like kids?”

“Well, since birth control doesn’t exist anymore, I’d hope everybody does.”

Again, he is smiling; you can hear it in his voice. “Okay, but do you intend to have your own?”

“Yeah, I always envisioned myself having kids. I wanted a normal family and figured I’d have to make one myself, DIY it, you know? I don’t think the plan has changed. Gotta repopulate the earth somehow.”

“I wouldn’t try to sway your decision one way or the other. It’s a burden you should only have to endure if you actively choose it. But if you want to have children one day, I’d help you.”

You giggle in the dim orange glow of a single flashlight. “How self-sacrificial.”

“No,” Aemond says, laughing. “Not like, the making them. I mean, I’d help with that too, that aspect would be fun. But I was talking about the delivery, and recovery, and taking care of a newborn. I don’t know everything, but I know a lot. I could help you get through it. So that’s an option I want you to be aware of, if…you know.” Now he pauses. “If you trust me.”

“I trust you.”

“Sometimes I don’t know if you should,” Aemond murmurs; or at least that’s what you think he says as you lose consciousness, plummeting into sleep as if falling from a great height.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Tahoe runs out of gas just east of Tipton—not a city, not a town, just a collection of service roads linking sprawling ranches to I-80, the only continuous route across southern Wyoming—and Rhaena guides the SUV as it coasts to a halt on the shoulder of the highway. You hike about a mile to the nearest ranch house: Luke carrying the siphoning hose and empty gas can in case you can find fuel, Rio carrying Aegon on his back, Baela walking slowly and with great effort, Ice panting as she lopes across the dusty earth. You can’t spot any cattle or horses behind the endless strings of barbed wire fencing. Perhaps they are in a different pasture, or escaped or were stolen, or died of thirst without being tended to, or were consumed by a wandering hoard of zombies, never sleeping and always hungry. The house at the end of the dirt driveway is modest, old, and painted white. The front door is open; the screen door bangs in the wind.

“Rock Springs is the next real town,” Aegon says when Rio drops him to the ground, reading his map.

“And how far is that?” Rio asks.

Aegon deflates. “About fifty miles.”

“Great,” Rhaena says. “What’s the plan, to fly there?”

“Yeah, start flapping your wings, little bird. You’re light enough, you can make it.”

“No car in the driveway,” you tell Aemond. “Nobody home, maybe?”

He’s scrutinizing the house, his blue eye narrow. “Maybe.”

A thought occurs to Aegon. “Do you think ranchers have golf clubs?” he asks hopefully.

“No,” Aemond snaps. Rio is now on the front porch and pounding the butt of his unloaded Remington shotgun against the doorframe to see if anyone appears. Daeron is nocking one of his makeshift arrows as he trots around the perimeter with his compound bow.

Luke, peering through his binoculars, points to a large cylindrical aluminum structure about a hundred yards from the house, by a small red barn. “What’s that thing?”

“It’s a grain bin,” Cregan says. “Full of feed for cattle.” Ice whimpers at his feet, and he twirls his axe in his large, calloused hands. “Are we clearing the house or not? Something’s in there.”

“We are,” Aemond answers tonelessly. “Luke, Rhaena, stay out here with Aegon and watch for trouble. Daeron, you too.”

“Got it.”

“Baela—”

“Can I go inside?” she asks. “Please, Aemond. I’m so sick of sitting around feeling useless and exhausted. I want to help. I want to do something, I’m going insane.”

“Fine,” Aemond agrees. “It should be an easy one.”

It is easy, but it’s not pleasant. The house smells like dark, sickening decay. In the living room are the skeletal remains of two bodies, both children judging by the size; the maroon-stained bones are notched with indents from gnashing teeth. Cregan shadows Helaena as she searches through closets and drawers. She takes no clothing—it would have absorbed the stench of death—but fills her burlap messenger bag with matches, lighters, batteries, pills. She gives you a bottle of Advil before you can ask her for it.

“Thanks,” you say, a bit startled, as you tuck it away in your backpack.

It is not until Ice leads you to the final room, the bedroom at the rear of the house, that you hear the familiar, blood-chilling hissing and moaning of a zombie. It is in the closet, and emerges one limb at a time: one arm and then another, one leg long like a spider’s, streaked with a thick soup of rotting organs that spills from a gaping hole in her belly like the mouth of a mineshaft. Something has happened to its other leg; it is missing, and the corpse that was once a thirties-something woman—a soccer mom, perhaps, with a minivan and propensity to make meatloaf and fish sticks—drags itself across the fawn-colored carpet towards you, slow and pathetic. Ice growls and barks. Rio raises his Remington.

“Wait,” Baela says. Her hammer is in her right hand. “Can I do it?”

“Of course, be my guest,” Rio says; though you can tell he’s slightly disappointed. He loves clubbing things.

Baela approaches the yowling zombie—jaws snapping, claws swiping—and grimaces down at it, this one of millions of monsters that ended the world, that killed Jace and stole all the rest of her life from her too, all those normal things she was supposed to have, all those strings of fate that the plague cut through like a razor and sent floating aimlessly out into the void of the universe. Then with a scream, Baela swings her hammer and a catastrophic impact crater appears in the side of the zombie’s skull, and it crumples to the floor, its mindless brains spilling out onto the carpet.

“Nothing good?” Aegon asks when you reappear in the driveway, popping a Vicodin into his mouth.

“No,” Aemond replies grimly. “No gas, no bullets, no food, nothing to drink.”

“I knew it would be lean pickings once we got out here,” Cregan says, and Aemond looks like he could kill him.

“Well, fortunately, Luke might have some good news for us,” Aegon says with a grin.

Aemond perks up. “Really? What?”

“I saw a truck out there,” Luke says, using his binoculars to gesture to the grain bin. “It’s parked between the barn and the grain thing, I can just see the very front of it sticking out. And if there’s a truck, there might be gas.”

Aemond ruffles Luke’s fluffy dark hair. “Good job, kid.” And Luke lights up like how cities used to look at night, back when the power was on: Washington D.C., Key West, Corpus Christi, Chinhae. Rio stoops down so Aegon can hop on his back, and all of you trek together across the field.

“Nothing,” Cregan announces as he squeezes the little pump on the siphoning hose after opening the gas cap of the ancient Chevy Silverado and threading the hose inside. “Not a drop.”

“Fucking fantastic,” Aegon sighs from where he’s slumped on the ground. His eyes are glazed; he’s pretty stoned. He gazes pitifully up at you; you pat his shoulder sympathetically. You and Rio have already checked the barn, dilapidated but perfectly devoid of zombies. The roof has caved in; one of the two front doors are missing. “What now?!”

“We can go back to the interstate and walk until we find the next ranch,” you say, looking absentmindedly at the grain bin. It’s much larger up close, and rusty in spots. A ladder runs up one side to allow access to the roof. Ice isn’t whining or nudging anyone’s hands, but she’s sniffing the air as if she’s detected something interesting, unfamiliar.

“Yeah,” Luke replies miserably. “We can walk another five or ten miles and then maybe find a safe place to spend the night.”

Rhaena shades her eyes as she peers up at the sky. “It’s past noon already. Maybe we should just stay here.”

Rio barks out a sardonic laugh. “In a house with no supplies and that reeks of dead people?”

“Cregan, go kill us something to eat,” Aegon commands.

He chuckles in his deep, gruff voice. “It’s Miss Chips who is good at the killing, I’m just the authority on butchering at the moment.”

Aemond is watching Ice, his forehead furrowed. “What’s she doing?”

Cregan whistles. “Hey, princess, you okay?” Ice ignores him, still sniffing, her grey ears straight up in the air. Then it appears from behind the barn: a tiny brown creature, a baby bear.

“Aww, it’s so fuzzy!” Aegon squeals, stretching his arm out to pet it. Rio yanks him away; everyone else is backing up towards the grain bin. A second bear cub has now arrived, padding clumsily along, large cartoonish eyes and a little pink tongue poking out from its muzzle.

“Don’t touch them!” Aemond shouts to everyone. “Get away from them! If there are cubs, there’s probably—”

And around the barn comes the mother, a grizzly bear of 400 pounds. She bares her teeth and snarls, saliva dripping in long gluey strings. Ice is barking viciously; Aegon is shrieking and scrambling onto Rio’s back.

“Baela!” Aemond says because she’s closest to him, urging her towards the ladder of the grain bin. She gets the idea and begins climbing. Then Aemond reaches for you. “Come on, you next!”

“Rhaena, go,” you say instead, and she clambers up the ladder after Baela. Cregan is brandishing his axe; Rio has his Remington in his hands, Aegon still clinging to his back like a baby opossum to its mother. Now Helaena is climbing up the ladder, and Daeron nocks an arrow. You whip one of your M9s out of its holster, aim for the bear’s head, and pull the trigger.

Your bullet hits its skull, Daeron’s arrow pierces its chest; and the mother bear does not die but roars and rises up onto her back feet—taller than Rio, taller than Cregan—and then drops back down and charges towards you and the grain bin. Cregan blocks the way, swinging his axe. The bear reluctantly pauses, testing him with swipes of her claws that he evades. Rio is just a few steps behind Cregan, waving his Remington around hostilely. Aegon is screaming and holding on for dear life.

“Don’t shoot!” Cregan yells. “9mm isn’t big enough, you’ll just make her more angry!”

Aemond finally gets a grip on your wrist and drags you to the ladder. You obey and climb until your feet are several rungs off the ground, then you turn to see what’s going on below. Aemond, Luke, and Daeron are at the bottom of the ladder, their backs to you. Cregan is still wielding his axe.

“Fuck off, Mama Bear!” he bellows, standing as tall as possible and swinging his axe above his head. Rio follows Cregan’s lead and holds his Remington aloft. Ice is barking; the baby bears are fleeing in terror. Aegon is sobbing hysterically and saying he’s going to die. “You don’t want us and we don’t want you! Go on! Go get your babies! I’ll put this blade right between your eyes if you don’t change your stupid mind right quick!”

The bear pounds the earth with her front feet and growls, a beastly subterranean rumble, but she seems to be losing her nerve. The rungs of the ladder creak and groan; you see rust like blood-hued moss around the bolts.

“Get out of here!” Cregan shouts. “Go, you hairy old bitch! Go back to your babies!”

The bear glances back to see her cubs vanish behind the barn. Her mouth is open and panting, spittle gleaming on her pointed teeth; her black eyes are uncertain. As you hold onto the ladder with one hand, you have your M9 aimed at the bear’s left eye, just in case. Aemond is watching Cregan; on his scarred face a sharp severity, fascination and resentment and fear.

“Go on,” Cregan says firmly. “Leave us alone. You belong in the mountains, not down here. Go eat something that’s already dead, a nice easy dinner. You don’t want us. We’ll fight you.”

The grizzly bear shakes her head—flopping ears, shaggy fur filthy with dust and pieces of grass—and whirls, lumbering off to find her cubs. When she rounds the barn, Cregan waits a few long, tense, silent minutes and then turns to the grain bin.

“Alright y’all, we oughta hurry up and leave. I don’t think she’ll come back, but she might.”

From the top of the ladder, approximately forty feet off the ground, Baela begins to laugh. “Did that really just happen?! That was insane! Cregan, buddy, you can vote for whoever you want to. You and I are cool forever.”

He smiles up at her, wincing in the bright afternoon light. “I’m very glad to hear it, ma’am.”

Rio sets Aegon down on the ground and stretches his back; it must be hurting him. Aemond is taking your hand and helping you off the ladder, and you are reminded of the transmission tower where he found you in Catawissa, Pennsylvania, one of those middle-of-nowhere places like Tipton, Wyoming. As Helaena climbs down, you go to Rio and—with as much force as you can manage—knead the small of his back with the heel of your hand like you know helps him.

“You okay?”

He sighs loudly, relieved. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. Oh, wow, that’s good. Harder…oh yeah…”

There is a snapping sound, metal squealing as it breaks, and by the time you turn to look she’s already falling: her cotton dress billowing around her, her arms wheeling helplessly. It happens too quickly for her to scream—for her to understand what is going on and what it means—but there is a stunned gasp and then she hits the ground, and you hear a muffled crunch of bone—skull?? spine??—and she is completely, unnaturally still as she lies on her back, no pain, no words, nothing.

“Baela!” Rhaena shrieks, and she rushes down the ladder and runs to her sister. You are all gathering around Baela, petrified to move her—to make it worse—but pleading for her to wake up, examining her with terrified eyes. Baela’s own eyes, dark and glassy and serene, are open only a sliver like obsidian crescent moons. Aemond is asking Helaena for a flashlight and then prying them wide, checking Baela’s pupils.

“There’s no reflex,” he says numbly.

“What does that mean?!” Rhaena cries. “Aemond? Aemond?!”

“She’s…she’s…” He’s in denial; he’s in shock. He’s feeling for a pulse on her carotid, he’s digging his fingernails into her forearm to try to get her to respond to pain.

“Aemond?” you say softly.

“She’s gone,” he tells you, like he doesn’t believe it, like he’s waiting to wake up.

“The baby,” Rhaena says. “Try to save the baby.” And then, when Aemond doesn’t immediately understand, she grabs his backpack and begins ripping it off so he can get the medical kit inside. “The baby, Aemond!”

Now he knows what he has to do. He pulls the scalpel out of his kit as Rhaena moves Baela’s sundress to expose her belly. She was wearing biker shorts beneath, lavender, cute, something you might have picked out in a store. In less than a minute they will be soaked with blood. Cregan leads Daeron away, and he’s telling him that they need to keep watch in case the grizzly bear returns, but you think it is an act of mercy more than anything else. Ice goes with them. Helaena, her face pale and grave, is shining the flashlight on Baela’s belly, just beneath her navel.

“Aegon?” Aemond says.

“What? What do you need?”

“I need people to help hold open the incision once I make it. I have to be able to see the amniotic sac so I can cut the membrane without harming the baby.”

“I get it, I’m here, I’ll help.”

Aemond presses the blade of the scalpel to Baela’s skin and draws a semicircle from the top of one hip to the other. There is blood, but it is slow-moving and thick and dark; it is the blood of a dead woman, not a living one. Immediately, Aegon hooks his fingers under layers of fat, skin, and muscle, and opens the wound as much as he can. You and Rio reach in too, and you do this without thinking, without allowing yourself to feel the horror of it until the work is done.

“I can’t see,” Aemond is murmuring. Rhaena gets another flashlight and helps Helaena illuminate the area. Luke is on his knees with both hands clamped over his mouth, his eyes glistening with dread and disbelief. Aemond is slicing, pausing to probe around with his fingers, cutting again. Then his arm plunges into Baela’s abdomen up to his elbow and, with some difficulty, pulls out the gore-covered baby by its feet, a girl, large and limp and silent.

Rhaena sobs, equal parts grief and joy, a smile appearing on her face. “Is she okay? Aemond? Is she…why isn’t she crying? Aemond?!”

Rio yanks off his shirt and uses it to wipe blood and gelatinous clumps away from the baby’s eyes, mouth, and nostrils. Then Aemond takes the shirt and wraps the baby in it, warming her, rubbing her lifeless little limbs. When she does not stir, Aemond lays her on the earth and begins CPR: compressions with two fingers on her tiny heart, two breaths down the airway she’s never used. There are no sounds except his efforts. There is no crying when the baby wakes, because she never does.

Enough, you are thinking, as if from very far away: an island in the Indian Ocean, the Appalachian mountains in eastern Kentucky. Enough, enough, enough.

Aemond stops trying to revive the baby. He picks her up and holds her against him, and no one says anything. There is only the barrenness of the Wyoming steppe, an anemic blue sky, tall dry grass that bows in the breeze, black vultures that are landing atop the barn and the grain bin.

Aegon jolts out of his paralysis and reaches for his brother with bloodied hands. “Aemond, hey, Aemond, listen to me, it wasn’t your fault. Okay? Are you listening? Aemond, man, you did everything you could. You gave them a chance. You didn’t give up.”

But Aemond doesn’t respond; he only kneels there beside Baela’s butchered body, her dead baby girl in his arms.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Alys?” he calls, seeing that she never came back to bed. He is lying on his stomach, tangled in red sheets damp with sweat. It’s hot, too hot, and there is no humming of the air conditioning. When Aemond picks up his iPhone from the nightstand, it’s still plugged in but only at 87% battery. The power must have gone out.

He gets up, rubs the damp skin by his temple—headache, dehydration—and lifts open the nearest window. It’s odd: there is shouting, distant and indistinct, like the sound of a carnival or a concert. There are car alarms too, and sirens, and horns blaring, all too far away for him to see. It must be because of the power outage, traffic signals thrown into chaos, neighbors relaying the latest information back and forth. That’s the only logical explanation.

“Alys?” Aemond says again, groggy but with increasing curiosity, concern, guilt.

She started to feel sick last night, a pulsing in her skull and chills and powerful nausea. The possibility of it being the so-called Florida Fever barely registered in his mind. Alys gets migraines, and tofu is a migraine trigger, and he took her to a Thai restaurant (maybe he should have known better) and the curry Alys ordered ended up having tofu in it, and by the time she paid the check (as Alys always did) she was swallowing an Imitrex from the box in her snakeskin purse. She said she was going to lie down in the guest bedroom for a while so she wouldn’t wake him if she spent the next few hours dashing to and from the bathroom, a likely outcome, and if he was honest with himself about it, Aemond would admit he was relieved.

He shuffles to the bedroom door—black boxers, bare feet, century-old hardwood floors—and opens it. Now he can hear thudding, like someone tenderizing meat with a mallet. “Alys? Baby, you feeling okay?” There is no answer, only that rhythmic hammering. He realizes that it is coming from the guest bedroom, a door at the end of a long hallway still fuzzy through his half-awake eyes.

It had never felt right, but it had felt good: good in the body when she touched him, good in the soul when she told him he did something right. But lately—especially here, in the vast creaking historic house she shares with her husband and her children, who are presently sailing in Cape Cod—Aemond cannot shake the feeling that this entanglement is a surrender rather than an aspiration, something he fell into and now rests at the bottom of like a swimming pool or the sea, the cold weight of it threatening to pour into his lungs and drown him.

“Alys?” Aemond says, now with profound and inexplicable dread. Outside an ambulance or police car zooms by, sirens blaring. The pounding on the door of the guest bedroom grows faster.

I want to go home, Aemond thinks suddenly. At home, in the Federal-style townhouse his parents rented for him (Criston picked it out, a safe and quiet neighborhood in Beacon Hill, and Viserys paid), Daeron is visiting from California and watching golf tournaments with Aegon on the living room couch, pretending to be interested when Aegon describes the different types of clubs. Helaena, pursuing an Entomology PhD, is researching the Mediterranean mantis, clicking around on her MacBook Pro from the garden in the backyard. Jace and Luke live there too, and so Baela and Rhaena have all but officially moved in, keeping their apartment in Seaport only to have somewhere to retreat to when the Targaryen chaos becomes too much…and so the baby can have its own room. Baela bought a crib, a changing table, a rocking chair, a dresser, and about a million unisex onesies, mostly space-themed. Baela is studying Aeronautics and Astronautics, after all. Maybe one day she’ll work for NASA and fly rockets to the moon.

The door is rattling on its hinges. Aemond’s hand closes around the knob. On the other side is something terrible, and he knows this. But he cannot just leave her. Aemond is not someone who abandons people; he is not someone who turns away from responsibilities.

He opens the door of the guest bedroom, and immediately she is staggering towards him, limp dripping hair and naked like she was interrupted mid-shower: blood bubbling from her gaping mouth and the whites of teeth peeking through the crimson, necrotic skin hanging in strips from her fingers, eyes misty like steam on a mirror.

“Alys, stop! Alys! What’s wrong with you?!”

She’s alive but she’s dead. She’s yowling and clawing at him, but her flesh is the rotting swampland of a corpse. He’s pushing her away; his palms sink into her, places he once noticed and then fantasized about and then at last—euphorically, ashamedly—touched, held, borrowed but never kept. She’s trying to bite him. She’s trying to kill him. None of this is possible, and yet it’s true.

Aemond flings her away, and the woman who was once Alys stumbles backwards and down the staircase, sick wet thumps all the way to the ground floor, bones splitting through dissolving grey skin, organs sloshing around until they spill out. He can hear her still hissing, flailing, trying to get up again.

Without thinking—slipping seamlessly into what he learned during his psych rotation is called automatic action—Aemond races down the steps and grabs her by the skull, cracks it against the antique hardwood floor she once extoled the value of as he fucked her on it: shipped east from Oregon and laid in 1912, the year the Titanic sank. When she lurches up to try to bite him, he slams her head against the floor again and again until she is still.

Then Aemond kneels there alone for a long time, sirens shrieking outside, far-off strangers screaming for help, putrid black blood clotting on his hands.