#I suspect it will become very public and turn into a big scandal

[anewbeginningagain]

.

[kayla1993-world]

Anyone who cares about freedom of expression in Canada was given a glaring example this week of how unfree speech could become. This is when the Trudeau government’s internet censorship bill becomes law in the coming days or weeks. In September that year, I came into possession of a confidential internal email from Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) Chair Richard Wex outlining how he and the Trudeau government intended to greatly increase the number of refugees admitted to Canada, essentially by making the definition of a refugee so broad that almost no one ending up on Canadian soil could be turned down. Wex and the IRB insisted my column contained “serious errors of fact” that risked “undermining public confidence in the independence … (and) integrity of the refugee determination system.” My column contained interpretations of what the board was doing that Wex and the government didn’t like. That’s my job. For instance, I said the changes were being made to rapidly increase Canada’s annual refugee intake without parliamentary approval. The IRB, meanwhile, insisted its rule changes were purely innocent – merely attempts to make the refugee determination process more inclusive. You could argue my interpretation was wrong and the IRB’s was right, but that’s a matter of opinion, not a matter of fact versus misinformation. But that’s the way “progressives” – and especially “progressives” in the Trudeau government – are. In their minds, their version of events is the divine gospel. Anyone who disagrees is a bigot, a fool or an insurrectionist bent on destroying our country. So when my Sun editors refused to change my column to satisfy the IRB’s demands, an unnamed “director of communications” from the board approached Facebook and Twitter. He insisted those social-media platforms “remove/unpublish” any links to my piece because it constituted dangerous misinformation. Thankfully, both tech giants refused to do as the government demanded. The column stayed online and we became aware of the IRB’s spike efforts last week. This was when the Liberals included it in a list of nearly 200 attempts to control social media content between 2020 and this year. This week, when asked by Ottawa investigative newsletter Blacklock’s Reporter whether he or his staff were behind the effort to yank my column, Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino (who was immigration minister at the time), answered emphatically that neither he nor his political staff knew of the censorship attempt. Thankfully, Big Tech companies did not bend to Trudeau government pressure in 2021. But I suspect the outcome would have been very different if Bill C-11 had been in place back then. Very soon, the Trudeau government’s internet censorship legislation will become the law of the land. At this point the Liberals will not have to rely on social media giants to do their dirty work for them (i.e. controlling what you post and read online). Instead, once C-11 is passed, the Liberals will be able to hand over complaints like the one against my column to a group of their own appointees who share the same ideological biases. They worry as much as the government that people with differing opinions must be silenced because they threaten our institutions. The Liberals’ bill will empower the CRTC and a commissioner of internet safety to order the removal of legal content that government appointees deem a threat to Canada’s “social cohesion.” Put my alleged dustup with the Liberal censorship commissars aside, what do you think the chances are the truth about Liberal scandals such as SNC-Lavalin, the WE Charities and Chinese interference in our elections will get full coverage once the Liberals control the internet? After all, each effort to expose these scandals was initially labelled misinformation.

[shades-of-stony]

Royalty Stony AUs

A King for Christmas by iam93percentstardust

Summary: In 1867, Tony Stark flees New York after refusing to marry the alpha his parents chose for him. His money runs out in the small kingdom of Dacia, ruled over by King Steven of the Rogers line. Somehow, and he’s not entirely sure how, he ends up accepting the position of nanny to the king’s four children: Harley, Peter, Sarah, and Morgan.

Tony bonds with the children easily but their father is harder to get to know. Steve is still grieving his wife’s death four years earlier. His continued mourning has turned the once bright halls into dark and somber shadows of their former glory. Tony isn’t entirely certain what he can do but he knows that he has to do something or else the whole country, so attuned to their leader, will sink into despair. He begins by reconciling the king with his young children.

Meanwhile, the children have decided that it’s high time their father fall in love again—and Tony is the obvious choice. They concoct elaborate plans to force the two together, hardly realizing that Steve and Tony are falling in love, not through their shenanigans but through the quiet moments they share bonding over the love they have for the children.

A Higher Form of War by sabremc

Summary: Tony is a King with a surprising number of people out to kill him. Steve and the rest of the Avengers are fighting for Pierce's rebellion and end up with Tony as their prisoner. Oops.

Basically one of those bodice-ripping romance novels I don't read (ahem) but with far more gay.

rearrange my heart (to fit your smile) by starklystar

Summary: "You dare," Howard's chair makes an ugly noise as it scrapes against the stone floors, the chatter of the room shifting into hushed whispers and stolen glances. "I am your father and your King!"

"My King is my husband," Tony tips his chin up, defiant. "And I refuse to hear you suggest that my husband has been anything other than good to me."

Next to him, he feels Steve's shoulders stiffen in surprise.

Howard's fist slams loud on the table. "Your husband does not even love you!"

Tony jerks back, burned. He knows that. Knows that Steve did not marry him for love – does not need any reminder of the cold truth, of what he desperately yearns for and can't even hope to have – but the harshness of Howard's words was scalding, and Tony can't afford for this to go any further.

----------

Or, King Steven marries Prince Tony, Tony is pretty sure he shouldn't panic when he falls in love with his own husband, and Steve tries his very best not to cause diplomatic crises.

Keyword: try

Fealty by  Lasenby_Heathcote and Robin_tCJ

Summary: Steve Rogers is Lord of America, and was gifted his corner of the kingdom of Starkland after amazing acts of heroism in the war against Hydra. A long, brutal winter forces Steve to go to King Howard for aid, and Howard agrees – under the condition that Steve bond with his Omega son, Tony. Steve agrees, of course, for the good of his people. Prince Tony is a trained Omega Consort – an Omega of status sent to a prestigious academy to become the perfect Consort Mate to high-status Alphas throughout the kingdom. At this academy they learn diplomacy, negotiation, proper manners, and, of course, the various ways to pleasure their Alphas.

I will wait by Shellhead616

Summary: Prince Stark was to marry a Prince he never met, for money he never wanted, to reign over a realm his father didn’t care for. But the Prince did care for his people. So he ran away, accidentally joined a group of misfits calling themselves the “Avengers”, with their fierce leader “The Captain". Although, when he discovers the secret the Captain has been keeping, everything changes.

one day by mvrcredi

Summary: One day.

One day Prince Steven would be king. One day he would have all the qualities to be an even better king than his father.

And maybe, one day, Tony would be his husband.

(But maybe, before that one day, Steven should reveal his secret to the man.)

My Loyalty to You by Hazein, Shi_Toyu

Summary: The Israelite nation has gone to war, Howard is acting erratic, and it’s everything Tony can do to argue with the war council to find the most advantageous strategies for their men. Then Thanos strides out of the enemy ranks and issues a challenge unlike any Tony has ever heard. If an Israelite can defeat him in one-on-one combat, their entire army will surrender. Too bad Thanos is twice the size of any man they have. Enter Steve Rogers, local sheppard and the king’s newest harp player, who claims he can fell this giant with nothing but a sling and a stone.

Whether he can manage it or not, Tony is just trying to figure out how you get to looking like that by tending sheep...

Arranged by NotEvenCloseToStraight

Summary: Royalty AU-- Howard arranges a match between Tony and Steve, but when Tony tries to run away with Tiberius instead, Steve goes after his betrothed and brings him home. Things are difficult between the couple at first, but an impulsive kiss leads to softer moments, and finally the arranged pair find happiness together.

Knight of Wands by  Sineala

Summary: Steve has reigned as king for ten years, and in a few days peace will finally come to his kingdom. Representatives of the Kree Empire are soon to arrive for the negotiations that will end the war between them once and for all. Steve is looking forward to settling down, with his hand-picked Avengers at his side -- led, of course, by the masked knight Iron Man -- and also his trusted advisors, the most beloved of whom is Tony, his court magician, the most powerful mage in all the land.

But when Steve's life is endangered, Tony makes the greatest sacrifice of all to protect his king, a sacrifice far greater than his life. And when Tony disappears under mysterious circumstances, Steve learns that even his closest friends keep secrets that he could never have suspected.

Chasing Daydreams by comecatchmeifyoucan

Summary: “Promise you’ll be there?” He mumbled into Steve’s chest.

“Of course.”

“Good.” Tony separated from Steve but his hand was still gently gripping the blond’s wrist. “Because the party only starts when I arrive, and I’m obviously not going if you won’t be there.”

Steve felt the brunet’s hand slip down to graze his, and he let it linger there for a second before it was suddenly pulled away from him. He could only hope that he had hidden his disappointment well.

Fortunately, Tony didn’t seem to notice Steve’s abrupt drop in mood.

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

After years of pining for the brunet, Steve was finally going to get his chance to confess his feelings for Tony. If only he could find him in the crowd of masked-people first...

Luckily, when his hopeless crush is nowhere to be found, Steve meets a beautiful stranger to keep him company throughout the night.

heavy is the crown by theappleppielifestyle

Summary: “Why did you pick me? As a match. Howard forced you to marry, but you had - there were other options. Many of them.”

“Maybe I wanted to help you,” Tony says. “To help - anyone, for once. Your people needed it.”

Oh, Steve thinks dully. So it wasn’t about him at all. It’s - a comfort, in some ways. In others, it’s… less so.

“And-” Tony hesitates. "Everyone said you were kind. I thought… if I had to marry, I’d prefer to marry someone kind.”

(Or, Arranged Marriage AU.)

WIP:

The Crown- the stony au nobody asked for by Jo_StClaire

Summary: Tony is the sole Omega prince of Angsold, who falls in love with the Alpha Army Captain of a neighboring nation. When his father, King Howard, suddenly falls ill and passes, Tony's life is thrown out of wack when he becomes a reigning monarch at 25. Follow Tony through the struggles of being a newly-wedded Omega as well as a leader of a nation. He must learn to balance his love for his people with his love for his husband Steve. (Loosely Based off of the Netflix series The Crown)

No More, No Less by ABrighterDarkness

Summary: His father had been discussing it again, amongst his advisers. He was barely eighteen , what did he need of a wife at eighteen? Frankly, he was already tired of hearing about it. Tired of meeting the daughters of the various men that were deemed important enough. None of them had caught his attention in the least and he suspected that they never would. Not when his daydreams already consisted of intelligent brown eyes, rich brown curls and a wickedly charming grin.

Protea by Anonymous

Summary: After witnessing the injustice done onto his parents, Steve Rogers sneaks into the Ferrite Royal Palace to try and find answers. Fate decides to saddle him with solving shady scandals while unknowingly becoming involved with the nation’s omegan king, Anthony.

And deal with all the baggage and drama that comes along with it.

Or…

A Concubine!Steve AU

they're both princes in this one by vapaad

Summary: Steve Rogers is the first son of the United States The entire nation sees him as America’s golden boy. Handsome, smart, charming, and overall perfection– Steve is an icon to the youths of America. But Steve, well he has one little issue. He thinks Prince Anthony, yes the british prince, is a big jerk. Arrogant and an overall asshole.

So when an encounter between the two results in chaos, Steve and Anthony “call me Tony” are thrusted into a PR stint of being best friends. But soon enough, they both come to the realization that they want more, and there, bloomed a secret relationship between the first son of the united states, and the prince of England.

tell me i'm your national anthem by oopshidaisy for chasingconstellations

Summary: Red, White & Royal Blue AU. Tony Stark is the unwilling First Son of the United States, whose rivalry with beloved Prince Steve threatens UK/US relations. After an international incident involving a wedding cake, Steve and Tony are forced to fake a friendship for the public eye - a fake friendship that evolves into something real, and dangerous.

[esamastation]

Somehow it leaks into the press that Cloud Strife is the bastard son of Late President ShinRa. Unrelated, the news is Vincent Valentine being the biological father of General Sephiroth also makes it into the news.

It begins with a news article.

It's nothing too shocking, at first. Old ShinRa scandals are gil-a-dozen now, with investigative reporters digging them up on particularly boring news cycles to shock and horrify the masses with all the terrible things that had been going on right under their noses. This week it's detail on all the cloning business, all about Jenova, the SOLDIER project, mako. That week it's about the countless people died in various human trials, be they medicine, materia or weapons. That week it's the waste of resources, how much money was wasted on useless, ridiculous projects for no other reason than because ShinRa had the money to spend.

There's always something new and thrilling to be dug up in the grave of ShinRa to entertain the masses and so it's become kind of mundane. You can only shock and awe people with the crimes of a select group of people so many times in a row before it becomes, more or less… mundane. And this article had seemed more of the same.

Affairs, Bastards and Coverups – the numerous scandals of the ShinRa Elite!

Cloud scanned the first lines of the article and then dismissed it. Some reporter has compiled months worth of data and stolen documents concerning the personal lives of the Shinra family the various heads of department – and it turned out that they were living it up in the lap of luxury, cheating on their spouses, having secret love children, covering them up with money and non-disclosure forms, oh my. It's nothing new – everyone knew the President had mistresses and bastards in every ShinRa town, and it's not surprising the others followed suit.

At least it wasn't yet another secret ShinRa super weapon about to kill them all, Cloud thinks, moves to throw the whole paper aside, when sub header further down the article catches his eye. At first he doesn't quite understand it – he sees his name in the papers plenty, and maybe it's a mistake, maybe it's something unrelated – maybe he misread… but no.

Cloud Strife – or is it Cloud Shinra?

Then, then he stops to read it the article in full – and what do you know, it does have some surprises after all. And not, it turns out, just for him.

-

Vincent announces his arrival by grinding gravel under his metal heel – and by pressing a cool beer can against Cloud's shoulder in silent offering.

Ah, Cloud thinks, and accepts it. "You knew?"

"Suspected it," Vincent agrees and sits beside him on the cliff, overlooking Edge and the Ruins of Midgar. He's holding the paper in hand. "There's a family resemblance."

Cloud hums and opens the can, reaching the paper. It's open on the Article, of course it is – Vincent has even highlighted sections of it. "Family resemblance," Cloud repeats, running a thumb over the underlines – pressed in hard with a ballpoint pen. "I don't know – definitely didn't inherit the old bastard's chin."

Vincent hums. "You and Rufus. There was also another Shinra bastard in company employment with files left – Lazard Deusericus. You all have very similar features."

Cloud frowns a little at that, trying to remember – but if he ever met Lazard, it's not coming to him. Zack might've known the guy, but… most of those memories were faded now. "Well," he says and turns the page to the second section of the article – dedicated entirely to the family drama of Professor Hojo, and the Child Stolen – Sephiroth.

How the reporter had found out so much about Vincent, Cloud has no idea, but they had his whole career as a Turk down – right down to his disappearance under mysterious circumstances in Nibelheim, and his resurface as one of the Heroes who Saved the Planet, decades later.

Of course, Cloud's crew has been in the public eye long enough that none of their lives are secret anymore – everything that could be found out about them had been by this point, and that included the mystery of Vincent Valentine, as well as Nanaki's history and Yuffie's royal heritage. So maybe it's not that big of a surprise, that people figured out the rest of it.

They hadn't done enough try to hide their histories, Cloud muses. They hadn't realised that it might be something they should do – not until it was too late.

"You don't seem surprised either," Vincent points out, glancing at the paper, and the picture of young Sephiroth on it.

"You ever see Sephiroth standing beside Hojo? Definitely no family resemblance there," Cloud muses, giving him a look. "Sephiroth was always too pretty to be Hojo's kid."

Vincent looks away, blowing out a slow breath into his scarf. Cloud takes a drink of the beer and then reads the pertinent lines again.

Really, what's most surprising about the whole damned thing is how surprising it still manages to be. None of this really matters anymore. ShinRa family is all but gone, Rufus is pretty much powerless, Sephiroth is trice-over-dead, even Hojo is properly back in his grave, and none of this actually affects anything anymore. They all had some suspicion, before, they all had some theories, so it's not a shock. Except that it is and it does affect things.

"The things we could've done," Cloud mutters wryly, shaking his head. "If only we'd known."

"Hmph," Vincent answers and relaxes a little. "It likely wouldn't have changed things. Not unless we had known… years before."

"Yeah, and even then I doubt ShinRa would've much cared, considering how those assholes went about dealing with their bastards," Cloud says and drops the paper in between them. "I probably would've gotten shot – and you did get shot."

"I did get shot," Vincent agrees. "I suppose it makes more sense now. Why he didn't… really, kill me."

Cloud grimaces at that and takes another drink. Yeah – Hojo could get rid of obstacles without qualms and not think about it twice, but what he did to Vincent, oh, that was personal wasn't it? It was probably revenge – and not just for loving the woman Hojo had wanted, but being the father of the son Hojo had coveted. And how like Hojo, to have a loose end of that magnitude, and then just… drop it, when it stopped entertaining him.

Maybe it'd been the same with Cloud – and Zack. They got their taste of Hojo's personal interest for daring to kill Sephiroth, and then Hojo dropped them too and moved onto whatever else interested him. It's been years now, and Cloud dares to think he's mostly over it, but thinking about it now… Had Hojo known about his relation to the Shinra family – had he cared? Had it made the whole thing that much more fun for the asshole, did he get some sadistic delight in tearing into his boss' progeny?

"Yeah," Cloud muses and lets out a quiet, smothered belch. "I don't know about you, but I really could've done without this knowledge."

Vincent hums in answer. "Truth is neither good or bad. It simply is," he says. "It is always better to know, than to wallow in ignorance."

Cloud makes a face and glances at him. "Speaking of wallowing, how personally are you taking this?" he asks then, looking him up and down. Vincent has the tendency of drowning in guilt and blaming himself, and this, as little as it changes things, as much as it morbidly just amuses Cloud…

Finding you're the bastard son of a dead rich guy is one thing – finding out you had a son and were part of killing said son, several times now, that's something else.

Vincent looks down and says nothing for a long, windswept moment. "Very," he says finally and shakes his head. "How else can I take it?"

"You must've suspected," Cloud says and then grimaces – shouldn't have said that.

"Well," Vincent answers, his voice dipping lower, almost inaudible. "I must have."

Cloud sighs and then reaches one hand over, rubbing it up and down along Vincent’s tense back, fingers snagging on belts through the ragged cape. "I'm sorry, Vincent," he says. "Really, sincerely sorry."

Vincent says nothing, but he doesn't move away from the touch, which for him is the same as leaning into someone's shoulder and wailing out in grief. Cloud lowers the can he's holding and then releases a sigh. The whole thing blows, really, and it changes nothing – just another scandal for people to be entertained by. Another horror to add into their ever growing collection.

But it's something to imagine it – if Vincent had known, if he could've done something about it. Half of the whole mess was the hellish upbringing Sephiroth got in Hojo's hands – if something had interrupted that, if someone, anyone, would've interfered, then maybe, just maybe... Cloud's relation probably wouldn't have mattered much, he was just one ShinRa bastard among many, but if Sephiroth got an actual loving upbringing… who knows.

Maybe the guy wouldn’t have gone megalomaniacal world ending monster on all of them. Who knows.

-

tentatively dipping my toes in the waters of ff7... it’s been a while, i don’t even know if i know how to write these guys anymore

[charming-mage]

Exposed by the Media Prompts Part 2

I didn’t expect that much Exposed by the Media prompts. I thought the well was dry. I was wrong. Should’ve known not to underestimate the internet and reality TV shows.

Exposed by the Media Prompts Part 1

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Lies in the Media is a Different Beast: Adrien grew up in the media spotlight. He knows it’s usually not a good idea to confront the rumors in the tabloids. It gives the rumors some credibility. When he sees Lila confront a rumor that bothers her a bit too much, he doesn’t stop her. Confronting a lie in the media needs a different method than someone lying in your personal life. Just because he’s doing the high road doesn��t mean he’s going to stop her from committing a crucial mistake.

Civilian Friends Are Okay Now: It’s well known Ladybug won’t make friends in her hero persona. She’ll be friendly and kind, but with a polite distance. People accepted it after a while. This changes after Lila’s interview on the Ladyblog. People assume Ladybug changed her mind about it since there’s no retraction article.  Civilians become more pushy and want to have more personal relations. From regular people to higher ranking citizens. (ex. No more formality, more personal rapport, friendship, or even the start of an epic romance.) A few uncomfortable situations and angry citizens forces Ladybug to address this.

Total Drama Island: The Miraculous users find out one of the prizes in a new season of the Total Drama Island reality TV show is an important Miraculous artifact. It could be anything from a Miraculous to a secret Guardian book. The heroes and villains are forced to participate as none of them found the item in time. Marinette and Adrien go in their civilian selves while Hawkmoth sends in Lila. Lila tries hard to hide her true self, but the contestants do find out.

Forgot to Log Out: Lila forgets to log out of her social media accounts in the school library. She gets distracted by something and clicks on minimize instead of the close tab on her browser. Since Lila didn’t log out of her session and the next person who gets the computer didn’t bother to do so either, her tabs are still there. The person is a noisy gossip and scrolls through them. They are intrigued by what they find. They decide to take screenshots and uploads them to the school website forum page. For the drama of course. (This is based on my experience when I was in high school and the library in my city. It was common to just close the browser and not bother to log out. The next person only logged out if they needed something from their own account. It’s not worth it to log in and out just for some internet searching.)

Dear Abby: Marinette, needing advice from a third party about Lila’s lying, sends an email to the Dear Abby column. (Or France’s equivalent.) She figures since Abby has no connection to either her or Lila, the writer can give her unbiased advice. She does her best to make the details as vague as possible so everyone in her life (including Lila) can have privacy. Her message is replied to and included in an article weeks later. Her request and Abby’s reply becomes popular amongst readers. Marinette did make a mistake, though. One of the examples she gives about “Lemon” is unique enough that someone eventually finds an interview on the Ladybug suspiciously similar to the lie. Marinette stopped watching new Lila interviews because it enraged her too much. She doesn’t want to deal with Lila after school hours as well. So she’s not aware Lila also mentioned it in an interview. Dear Abby readers dig through the interviews and discover nothing but lies. The Dear Abby column and the Ladybug drama gets big enough to be covered by the media.

Real Life Works Differently Than Fiction : A few classmates end up in a situation like Lila tells in her stories. Believing in Lila, they do what Lila claimed she did thinking it would work out the same. It doesn’t turn out so well. They get scolded by involved parties not to do that again. A reporter on the scene interviews them. It comes out why they did it. Lila’s lies are exposed as the fiction they are.

Tsurugi Influence: Kagami’s status as Adrien’s girlfriend makes Lila switch targets. Marinette is in the back burner until Lila deals with her new love rival. Her plans to deal with Kagami backfires and brings media attention. Lila was too used to love rivals not doing any major action towards her. The wrath of the Tsurugi family is brought upon her. She realizes afterwards how influential and powerful the family is.

Adrien’s Phone is Stolen Again: And this time the phone thief is caught. Lila steals Adrien’s phone to post social media posts an hour later gushing about Lila/or talking about in her a positive light. By the time Adrien finds out, he can’t take back what “he” said without controversy. Which Mr. Agreste would not like. That’s Lila’s plan anyway. The problem is that Lila makes these posts while Adrien is on a surprise live interview. (Which she is unaware of.) The interviewer asks Adrien about the new posts while Adrien is clearly not on his phone/laptop. On a hunch, a quick search by Adrien leads to the discovery that his phone was stolen. The model confirms it’s his personal account and not a media team behind it. The content of the posts make Lila the main suspect.

You Can’t Delete Me Now : Lila gets in a controversy. She starts deleting comments and defending herself. Gabriel is busy in a meeting and doesn’t find out in time to stop her. Commenters get so mad at her, one of them gets the bright idea to hold up signs resembling post/comment/ or tweet. Somewhere in their message includes a line saying, “You can’t delete me now.” The idea catches on and it becomes a trend to walk around in public or near photo shoots holding signs with their comments. Everyone includes the now famous phrase in their sign.

Lila’s Wild Ride: Lila manages to steal the monkey miraculous. However, she learns the hard way why the Guardian needs to think carefully when matching someone with a miraculous. (Lila is not good at using the monkey miraculous’ power. At all.) Xuppu easily figures out what happened and makes sure to give Lila a very memorable time. The wilder it is the better. A live news crew captures footage of Ladybug furious “that lying Lila Rossi” stole a miraculous. Chat Noir is worried they’ll see a new Hawkmoth ally soon. There’s more chaos as the criminal underworld, opportunistic people, and die hard Ladybug fans enter the scene. Meanwhile, the French government is not pleased with the Italian government. An Italian diplomat’s daughter stealing a Miraculous from Ladybug herself looks very bad for relations. Looks like a secret operation that got exposed to the more paranoid members.

Hell’s Kitchen: Gordon Ramsey hosts an amateur cooking competition. An older Lila Rossi is one of the competitors. Ramsey doesn’t like her food. (or the drama she starts. And sabotaging the other competitor’s food.) Sadly for him, her cooking is barely better than the worst ones so she is able to scrap on to the next round. The execs love her for the drama. When the season airs, the contestants notice the footage was edited to make Lila look innocent. They get hate from Hell’s Kitchen fans about their meanness and most of them do what they can to defend themselves. People become interested in what Lila is like in real life. The only requirement for the prompt is for Lila to be an adult. Ramsey would not let lose on a minor.

Collaboration Gone Wrong: The Gabriel brand does a collaboration with a brand outside the fashion industry. It could be anything as long as it gets the other brand to be on the same set as Gabriel staff. Gabriel decides to give Lila bigger roles starting with this. Lila is beyond happy. A bump in the road appears when an intern around her age pulls her aside and asks her to stop lying. Lila doesn’t of course and secretly does her best to ruin the credibility of the intern before they get the idea to tell someone else. Unbeknownst to the Gabriel model, the intern is a close relative of the collaboration company’s CEO. The intern just doesn’t advertise that fact. Doesn’t want special treatment. Heads start rolling when the CEO finds out what Gabriel’s muse has done to their beloved family member. Permanently damaging a profitable business relationship is the least of Gabriel’s worries when the media gets wind of the scandal.

[ibijau]

a prompt (a/b/o, bc i like how you write it): the sunshot campaign has just ended, and nie huaisang is looking forward to a future in which he can devote himself to wooing lan xichen. the match would be a little scandalous—it’s rare for an alpha to marry in, as nie huaisang intends to—but alpha-beta pairs are perfectly normal, and lan qiren is certainly more accepting of his first nephew’s crush than of lan wangji’s. less than three weeks into peacetime, however, nie huaisang’s plans hit a massive snag: jin zixuan has presented as an omega, removing him from the jin line of succession (and nie huaisang cannot help but be a little offended by that, on da-ge’s behalf—omegas can lead just as well as anyone else! the jin succession tradition is just stupid). but that’s the way things are in the jin sect, and so madame jin is scrambling to put together a marriage to get her son out of lanling before the worst happens... and the top two candidates on her list just so happen to be lan xichen and nie huaisang himself.

hello and welcome to: I like that prompt a little too much and got carried away, so now it’s 8K long. Also on AO3

warning for some mentions of rape toward the end of the story

Nie Huaisang’s plan starts when, at the tender age of eleven, he is introduced to the boy who doesn’t yet go by the name of Lan Xichen and is about to become his brother’s closest friend. Nie Huaisang, young as he is, decides that this is his true love, and of course he must ensure Lan Huan and him have the most perfect future possible together. He learns about Gusu Lan, reads as many books as he can, educates himself in the four arts, and even makes a vague effort to somewhat improve his cultivation, all so he can be the perfect spouse for a future sect leader.

A little after turning fourteen, Lan Xichen presents as a beta. It is a small deviation from Nie Huaisang’s plan, who was firmly expecting his beloved to be an alpha, but that is no big problem. Lan Xichen is Lan Xichen, he is the most perfect person in the world. Details don’t matter too much.

Another deviation from Nie Huaisang’s plan occurs when, a few days short of his own fourteenth birthday, he presents as an alpha. That, of course, is an absolute disaster. Nie Huaisang doesn’t want to be an alpha. Qinghe Nie is full of those, and he isn’t too impressed with them. He is on the brink of a complete meltdown when he figures that if his brother can be an omega who has all the qualities of an alpha, then surely he can be an alpha living the easy going life of an omega, including marrying into another sect. 

Of course Nie Mingjue isn’t very happy that Nie Huaisang refuses to behave like a proper alpha, like a proper Nie, but he can hardly make an arguments against that choice without undermining his own position, so it doesn’t matter. Nie Huaisang cheerfully goes back to planning his happy future, researching cases of an alpha marrying into another sect. There are more of those than he would have expected to find, and though it is mostly alpha marrying other alphas, Nie Huaisang now knows he can rest on a precedent to argue his case.

With all this settled, the hardest part of his plan begins: seducing Lan Xichen.

It is easy enough to be sent to the Cloud Recesses to study there. A little too easy, really. Nie Huaisang suspects that his brother wanted him to go there anyway just to have some peace, and in hopes Lan Qiren might straighten him out a bit. Nie Huaisang doesn’t mind though, since it gives him a chance to be close to the love of his life. He also doesn’t mind his dreadful grades which give him a good excuse to spend time with Lan Xichen, begging him to help. Lan Xichen, generous and kind and patient and perfect in nearly every aspect, as well as eager to be a good friend to Nie Mingjue, even by proxy, of course agrees and allows Nie Huaisang to spend far more time in his room than is probably reasonable.

It would be a little scandalous really, but when Lan Qiren once tries to raise the issue in front of his nephew, Lan Xichen just laughs gently.

“Huaisang is nothing more than a little brother to me,” he says. “How could anyone think any different?”

It is a hard blow to Nie Huaisang’s fragile teenage ego, and a new setback to his perfect plan. At the same time, he has been in the Cloud Recesses for almost half a year by now, and has already guessed that this is how Lan Xichen sees him. Two years of difference won’t mean much once they are adults and married, but right now it is a pretty big gap.

Having accepted this, Nie Huaisang changes his plan again, but not his goal. If all Lan Xichen needs from him at the moment is a less stuck up little brother than the real one, Nie Huaisang will be happy to provide. He likes making Lan Xichen laugh anyway, and it’s obvious that Lan Xichen enjoys having someone to guide and teach in a way Lan Wangji won’t allow.

He can be patient, when he needs to be.

He can also be exactly as stupid as the situation calls for. It’s easy as anything to completely fail his exams. Lan Qiren almost has a qi deviation on the spot after reading Nie Huaisang’s final test, and Nie Mingjue is furious, but he can deal with that just fine, as long as he gets to come back another year in the Cloud Recesses and make sure nobody else can seduce the love of his life before puberty fully hits and gives him his fair chance.

-

That second year in the Cloud Recesses proves to be a test of Nie Huaisang’s determination in ways he hadn’t expected.

In his defence, the world has many more pretty boys than he ever realised.

Lan Wangji, heinous little bitch that he is, got hit hard by puberty in the short time that Nie Huaisang went home. He’s suddenly a head taller than Nie Huaisang, and looking every bit the alpha that he is even though he’s a year younger. Nie Huaisang is devoured with envy because just two months ago, Lan Wangji was just a baby, but suddenly he is very, very handsome.

Then, there’s the other guest disciples as well. Most are pretty decent looking, but some stand out from the crowd. Jiang Cheng has a bone structure to kill for, sharp eyes, and his rare smile is as radiant as sunshine on the lingering snows of spring. And everywhere he goes, Wei Wuxian follows, tall and more graceful than any boy of fifteen has any right to be. They make a stunning pair of alphas, really, to the point that it worries Nie Huaisang when the three of them strike a friendship of sorts. First, because there’s a few times when he finds himself wondering what it’d be like to kiss one of them, which is an awful betrayal of his one true love Lan Xichen. Second, because his looks are already inadequate to begin with, so hanging out with those two only makes him look even plainer by contrast.

What Nie Huaisang needs, he decides after a few weeks, is someone less pretty than him to spend time with, so he’ll look somewhat handsome next to them. And so, after some brief consideration, his great plan changes again to adapt to this new situation.

Nie Huaisang becomes friends with Jin Zixuan.

Well, saying they’re friends might be pushing it. Instead, Nie Huaisang forcibly spends time with Jin Zixuan, when Wei Wuxian is being punished by Lan Wangji, Jiang Cheng is studying, and Lan Xichen is too busy as well. It’s rather clear that Jin Zixuan isn’t very enthusiastic to have company. Quite frankly, Nie Huaisang wouldn’t have picked him as a companion either, if he’d had a choice. Jin Zixuan is haughty, has no conversation, no humour, a bad personality, and is just all around boring. He is also tragically baby faced, hasn’t even presented yet, and has nothing to recommend him except for the fact that his father is sect leader. It is practically a charity case. Indeed, when Lan Xichen hears that Nie Huaisang has been trying to become friends with Jin Zixuan, he congratulates him on it.

“I think he is a rather lonely person, isn’t he?” Lan Xichen remarks. “I’m glad you’re trying to help him. Hopefully you’ll help him relax a little.”

“Like I do with you, Xichen-gege?” Nie Huaisang boldly asks.

Lan Xichen laughs a little awkwardly, and Nie Huaisang could swear there’s a spot of colour on the older boy’s cheeks.

“I suppose I do relax when I’m with you. Are you thinking of replacing me, now that you’ve found a friend more your age?”

“Of course not,” Nie Huaisang earnestly promises. “Xichen-gege will always be the most important person for me!”

Lan Xichen smiles gently at him. “You are a good boy, and I’m sure your brother will be proud of you. I know I am.”

Hearing this, Nie Huaisang nearly faints from happiness. Just for this, it’s worth it to put up with Jin Zixuan.

But in fairness, as weeks pass, Nie Huaisang finds it a little easier to be around Jin Zixuan. The other boy mellows a bit, like a wild beast being slowly tamed. And once Wei Wuxian leaves, Jin Zixuan suddenly isn’t so prickly anymore, now that nobody is constantly taunting him and picking fights with him. He even has a sense of humour, when you know how to spot it. The first time Nie Huaisang bursts out laughing over a muttered remark Jin Zixuan made, it’s hard to say who is most surprised.

Besides, Jin Zixuan is one of the few people Nie Huaisang has met who doesn’t judge him for not striving to be a perfect alpha. Just like Lan Xichen, Jin Zixuan is surprisingly accepting of Nie Huaisang’s peculiarities.

“I prefer someone like you over some alphas who act right in public, then do everything wrong in private,” Jin Zixuan says with open disdain one day, as they walk in a garden of the Cloud Recesses.

It is a beautiful summer day, and the school year is almost over, which makes Nie Huaisang rather sad. He had planned to stay another year, still to make sure that nobody else makes a move on Lan Xichen, but he’s starting to think it will be lonely without the other friends he’s made.

“Well, I’m hardly much of an alpha in private too,” Nie Huaisang argues.

Jin Zixuan shrugs. “Not in the typical way. But you’re very protective of the people you care about, right? And you like to make people feel included. Like me and Lan gongzi… even Lan er-gongzi, when he lets you. You really don’t like when people seem lonely, do you?”

A little embarrassed to have such kind motives assigned to his actions, Nie Huaisang doesn’t reply right away. He pretends to inspect some gentians near Jin Zixuan’s feet, admiring how the deep blue of the petals contrasts rather beautifully against the gold of Jin robes.

He can’t explain that he’s always around Lan Xichen because he’s madly in love with this perfect boy, or that if he’s nice to Lan Wangji, it’s mostly just because they’re going to be in-laws someday. Above all else, he absolutely can’t tell Jin Zixuan why he decided to start spending time with him, mostly because he’s changed his mind so much since then. Jin Zixuan really isn’t boring after all, and he’s not quite so plain after all. Even if his face is still a little too round and soft for his age, there are signs here and there of what a handsome alpha he will be one day. Out of everyone he's met this year, Jin Zixuan is Nie Huaisang's favourite new friend.

“Jin-gongzi is giving me too much credit,” Nie Huaisang says at last. “I just wanted a friend less annoying than Wei-xiong, and you happened to be there.”

“Is that why you only call me gongzi, when you’re never this formal with others?” Jin Zixuan asks, sounding… not quite hurt, he has too much self control for that, but still…

Well, still a little bit hurt, actually.

“I know how your sect likes formality,” Nie Huaisang explains. “I just don’t want to disrespect you.”

“The Lan too are very formal, but you call Lan Xichen ‘gege’ all the time.”

“Oh that’s different, that’s just because he’s my da-ge’s friend!” Nie Huaisang lies. “We’re close enough the two of us, so it’s fine to call him like that.” An idea hits him, and he leans toward Jin Zixuan with a wicked grin. “If you’re so jealous though, I can call you Jin-didi. Would that work for you?”

In an instant, Jin Zixuan’s face turns a bright red and he splutters in anger. Nie Huaisang can’t help laughing at that cute reaction.

“Who says I’m jealous?” Jin Zixuan explodes. “What’s there to be jealous about?”

Nie Huaisang pokes him in the ribs, still laughing. “Jin-didi, it’s fine to have a crush on an older boy, it’s normal! I understand, I really do! Thank you, Jin-didi, for entrusting your heart to me!”

“Stop calling me that!” Jin Zixuan shouts, so mortified that he’s nearly crying.

“Jin-didi! Don’t worry, this Nie-gege doesn’t mind at all. It happens, it’s because you’re probably going to present as an alpha soon, and so you’re looking for role models around you. I am so flattered, Jin-didi. It will pass though, everyone grows out of it, don’t worry.”

Jin Zixuan’s face is so red that he looks sunburned, and the dot of cinnabar on his forehead looks almost pale compared to his face.

“You’re so stupid,” Jin Zixuan hisses, shoving Nie Huaisang to the side and stomping away. “I don’t know why I even put up with you, you’re even more annoying than Wei Wuxian!”

Nie Huaisang is too breathless from laughter to stop him from leaving. It’s for the best anyway, Jin Zixuan looked like he might pick up a fight with him for offending his dignity like this, and Nie Huaisang doesn’t feel like being punched in the face.

Still, from that day on, he makes sure to call Jin Zixuan ‘didi’ every chance he gets, just because he makes such funny faces.

-

Nie Huaisang passes his exams at the end of the year, because Lan Xichen told him that Nie Mingjue really doesn’t want him to be away from home this long again, not when the Wens have been acting up lately. For a second, Lan Xichen seems a little sad when Nie Huaisang promises to do his best, but it must just have been a trick of the light. When Nie Huaisang blinks, Lan Xichen’s expression is warm and polite and slightly impersonal, as always.

It’s fine anyway, Nie Huaisang figures. They’re sure to meet again soon. And when they’re married, Nie Huaisang will be able to stay in the Cloud Recesses for good, and they’ll be happy, and Nie Mingjue’s paranoia won’t ruin all his plans anymore.

-

It turns out that Nie Mingjue’s paranoia was, in fact, justified all along.

That’s not such a big surprise, Nie Huaisang must admit. Others tend to think his brother is stupid, but he knows better. Nie Mingjue might be a big brute, but he’s a clever one who understands politics better than anyone would suspect. He doesn’t care to play the game, but he knows the rules and he watches the moves made by others. For years and years he’s tried to warn others of the troubles he’s guessed were coming, but no one listened.

Well, they’re going to listen now, Nie Huaisang figures as he makes his way to Nightless City to serve as hostage with other disciples of Qinghe Nie. It’s kind of hard to ignore when every young master or mistress from every sect in the country is being held and re-educated by Wen Ruohan’s minions.

The whole time they’re there, Nie Huaisang tries to play it cool, like none of this affects him. He’s somewhat lucky because the Wen don’t seem to realise that he’s an alpha, and so they barely pay attention to him, while they endlessly bother Jiang Cheng, Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji and even poor Jin Zixuan who hasn’t even presented yet. These four get harassed daily about this and that. Their attitude is too rebellious, or too tame for proper alphas. They try too hard, or not hard enough. They’re too skilled and clever, or else they’re playing stupid and clearly trying to mock Qishan Wen.

In fairness, all of these accusations are absolutely true when it comes to Wei Wuxian. But even if he were to behave properly, Nie Huaisang suspects the Wen would find some fault with him.

Nie Huaisang watches all that and tries to stay out of it. The most he can do, anyway, is to offer the medicine he secretly brought with him (his brother insisted, and he was right as always) and to share his portion of food with his friends whenever they’re denied a meal. At least, when they accept. Jiang Cheng does sometimes, unless his pride gets in his way. Wei Wuxian usually refuses and boasts that he’s been wanting to practice inedia for a while anyway. Lan Wangji isn’t so loud about it, but does the same. Poor Jin Zixuan, though… even when he’s given his own portion of food he always seems hungry, so the days when he must do without are particularly hard on him. He still tries to refuse when Nie Huaisang wants to share, but in his case, Nie Huaisang doesn’t hesitate to insist.

“You’re going to present soon, aren’t you?” he whispers, pushing his bowl of bland, watery congee toward Jin Zixuan who nods miserably. Nie Huaisang remembers the horrible hunger he felt for a few weeks before presenting, when his body was hard at work preparing for the big changes that were coming. Even with all the food he could ask for he’d been starving, so he can’t imagine how much Jin Zixuan must be suffering. “You have to eat, Jin-didi,” he orders. “Please, eat something, or else your Nie-gege will be sad.”

It says a lot about Jin Zixuan’s state that he doesn’t even object to being called this way. Nie Huaisang lets Jin Zixuan have both of his meals that day, explaining that he actually has snacks hidden along with his medicine.

It’s not his best lie, but it does the trick that time, and the following ones as well.

After a week of this, Nie Huaisang is starting to feel a little unwell. His golden core just isn’t very strong, and cannot sustain him through inedia the way it would for others. He’s always known this, there’s just something not quite right with his meridian which means cultivation doesn’t come easy for him. Usually it doesn’t bother him, but after eating so little for several days, of course there’s side effects… but someone has to take care of Jin Zixuan, right?

It’s almost a relief when they’re told one morning that everyone is going on a Night Hunt. It’s not the first one Wen Chao took them on, and while it’s unpleasant to fight creatures without weapons, at least they’ve always been given better rations.

In the end, good rations feel like a poor trade for what happens on that Night Hunt. Nie Huaisang has never been so terrified in his life, except when he was eleven and his father lost his mind… although this is worse, so much worse. His father wounded some people, but he didn’t kill anyone the way that false Xuanwu does, slaughtering anyone it can grab before they manage a daring escape, thanks to Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian. Nie Huaisang, who is a fairly decent swimmer, ends up helping Jin Zixuan through the underwater passage, since the other boy is starting to look really unwell. He hasn’t been hurt, thankfully, but it’s clear he’s close to presenting. He must have only a few days left at best, or more likely a few hours.

Maybe that’s why even after they’re safely out of the cave, Jin Zixuan won’t let go of Nie Huaisang’s hand, why he leans so heavily against his side. Nie Huaisang allows it all. He probably should hand Jin Zixuan over to the Jin disciples present, but if they were trustworthy, Jin Zixuan would already have gone to them for comfort, wouldn’t he?

“It’s okay, Jin-didi,” Nie Huaisang tells the other boy while putting his free hand on Jin Zixuan’s forehead. He’s burning, and this is really the worst time and the worst place to be presenting, but it’s going to happen anyway. “I’m here with you. We’re going to get you home, and then you’ll be safe, right?”

Jin Zixuan nods weakly. “Thank you, Nie-gege,” he whispers, and Nie Huaisang’s heart does somersaults in his chest at being called that. It makes him want to keep Jin Zixuan close, to really protect him from anyone that might hurt him.

It’s a stupid idea, of course. Jin Zixuan is about to present, and when that’s over, when he’s an alpha, he’s never going to need anyone’s protection again. What’s happening here won’t last very long.

Nie Huaisang figures it’s fine to enjoy this while it’s there. He’s sure Lan Xichen, if he’s still alive, will understand that even an alpha as weak and pathetic as him needs to feel protective here and there.

-

It takes a long, long while to go home on foot. By the time Nie Huaisang and the other Nie disciples reach Qinghe, a war has been declared against the Wen because they’ve attacked the Lotus Piers and annihilated the entirety of Yunmeng Jiang. Nie Huaisang cries upon hearing this, because Jiang Cheng was fine when he last saw him, because it’s unfair that Wei Wuxian was rescued from that cave only to die like this anyway.

He cries also because Nie Mingjue is going to risk his life, because there’s still no news from Lan Xichen.

He cries because he won’t even be able to help his brother, and is to be sent to the Cloud Recesses where he’s less likely to be captured and used as a hostage again.

He cries because that’s all he’s good for, apparently.

-

Lan Xichen is alive.

Nie Huaisang cries when Lan Qiren tells him, and then doesn’t shed a single tear again and sets to work to be of some use in this war they’re fighting. The husband of a sect leader must be a useful person after all. Lan Xichen will have to deal with so many responsibilities, much earlier than he ever should have to, so Nie Huaisang needs to step up his game and become someone worthy of his future husband. He might be lazy, and spoiled, and a little useless, but Nie Huaisang is also very stubborn when he wants something, and what he wants is Lan Xichen, the most perfect person in the world.

Lan Xichen who smiles with the warmth of a tender spring afternoon, who is always calm and collected, who smells of gentian and pine trees. Lan Xichen who never has a hair out of place. Lan Xichen who always knows what to do, what to say, no matter the situation.

Lan Xichen who looks utterly broken when he comes to visit the Cloud Recesses, three months into the war.

Perhaps to others he doesn’t look so bad. The Lan disciples who are with Nie Huaisang when Lan Xichen arrives don’t comment on it. But Nie Huaisang has been observing Lan Xichen for years at this point, and he can instantly tell that something is wrong. It shows in the way the beta carries himself, how his eyes glance over things as if he cannot see what’s around him, the slight twitch at the corner of his lips when he smiles. Nie Huaisang’s heart aches to see his beloved in such a state. He hates the Wen more than ever, if such a thing is possible, for having hurt Lan Xichen this way.

Because there is so much to do, because Lan Xichen has so many responsibilities now, it seems at first that Nie Huaisang won’t have a moment alone with him. He tries to be fine with that. A sect leader’s husband must know that sometimes he comes second to the sect in question. But the hollowness in Lan Xichen’s eyes haunts him too much. That night, close to the hour for curfew, Nie Huaisang decides that he must offer some distraction to the love of his life, perhaps even some comfort, should Lan Xichen be inclined to allow it.

It’s risky to be out and about at that hour. Even at such a time, the Lan are strict with their rules, and Nie Huaisang knows he will be scolded, or even punished, if he is caught. To avoid that he doesn’t knock on the front door of Lan Qiren’s house, where he knows Lan Xichen is also living for the time being, and instead comes in through the back. He will be in so much trouble if he’s spotted, but love comes before rules. Soon enough he’s inside a private garden, knocking on the door of the only room where a candle still burns.

To Nie Huaisang’s relief, it is indeed Lan Xichen who opens that door for him.

To his horror, Lan Xichen looks even worse than before, his eyes red from crying.

“Huaisang, what are you doing here?” Lan Xichen asks, trying to quickly regain his composure.

“I thought I’d come see you, Xichen-gege. You looked like you might need a friend.”

Lan Xichen takes in a sharp breath, like he’s trying not to sob. He manages to keep his face impassive, but two tears still drop on his cheeks, leaving a shiny trail behind. If Nie Huaisang didn’t have such excellent manners, he would lunge forward to kiss away those tears.

“I’m not sure I’m fit for company,” Lan Xichen says in a voice that trembles a little. “I find myself in a rather emotional state at the moment.”

“Then you definitely need a friend,” Nie Huaisang replied. “I offer myself, if you’ll have me.”

A few more tears escape Lan Xichen’s reddened eyes, which he tries to wipe away quickly, like a child just starting to learn he’s not supposed to cry in public. Nie Huaisang braces himself for rejection, but Lan Xichen instead pinches the hem of his sleeve and pulls him inside.

“You’ll be in trouble if someone sees you,” he explains. “How unreasonable, Huaisang… didn’t you realise that people might talk, seeing an alpha roaming around at night?”

Of all the things Nie Huaisang has thought about before coming here, that particular detail hasn’t occurred to him. People often forget he’s an alpha, and so does he, most of the time. Outside of his ruts, he might as well be a beta, and he’s convinced people who meet him must think that’s the case. But of course the Lans know better.

“Xichen-gege, I don’t want to cause you trouble or start gossip against you,” Nie Huaisang says. “I wanted to see if I could make you smile, that’s all. If you think I should leave, just say so and I’ll stop bothering you.”

“That might be…” Lan Xichen starts, before choking on his words. “Maybe you should… This is… it is…”

More tears drop on Lan Xichen's cheeks and he gasps in an alarming fashion, trying to stop himself from breaking down into sobs. Nie Huaisang’s heart clenches painfully at the sight. He takes one of Lan Xichen’s hands in his, trying to offer him comfort. Immediately Lan Xichen starts crying in earnest, falling to his knees. Nie Huaisang follows him, sitting on the floor near him, patting his hand, his shoulder even when the sobs get too heavy.

They stay like this a long while, sitting on the floor of that bare room which doesn’t really belong to Lan Xichen and only serves as a reminder of everything that he has lost. Nie Huaisang can’t find any words of comfort to offer, because he knows how empty those would feel. All he has to give is his presence, and his patience.

It is well past curfew when Lan Xichen finally calms down enough to sit a little straighter.

“How disappointed you must be, seeing me so weak,” Lan Xichen says, quickly drying his tears with the fabric of his inner robes. “I’m not the person you think I am, in the end.”

“You are that person and more,” Nie Huaisang sincerely replies. He squeezes Lan Xichen’s hand in his, barely refraining the impulse to kiss it. Seeing Lan Xichen like this, imperfect, angry and hurt, only makes Nie Huaisang love him more. How could he not, when Lan Xichen is giving him this trust? “Xichen-gege, I like everything about you, the good and the bad. I like you when you are calm in front of everything, and I like you when you can’t be strong anymore.”

Lan Xichen sighs and tilts his head, trying to smile but not quite managing it. “Huaisang…”

“I do, I really do!” Nie Huaisang insists. “I just wish I could help you more. I wish I could give you strength when yours runs out. I wish I had the power to protect you against those who would harm you. You make me wish I could be more than I am, so I could stand at your side and be of use to you.”

Lan Xichen smiles, and brings his trembling free hand to touch the alpha’s cheek.

“And I’m glad you are exactly the way you are,” Lan Xichen says with unbearable tenderness. “You are as I want you to be, as I want to see you at my side.”

Nie Huaisang’s heart is racing at those words, and he feels his face flush.

“Xichen-gege, I don’t think you and I mean quite the same thing here.”

“I think we do. I wasn’t sure what to think of this,” Lan Xichen admits, gently cupping the side of Nie Huaisang’s head, who must resist the impulse to close his eyes and lean into that touch. “I thought you only liked the image I try to give, and that you would be disappointed when you’d learn who I really am. But you’re seeing me now, and… you still like me?”

“More than ever,” Nie Huaisang whispers.

Lan Xichen smiles at him, beautiful like dawn after a cold and dark winter night.

“Then when this is over, let’s see how we can deal with this,” Lan Xichen says. “I know there’s precedent for such situations, though it will be unconventional. I fear you’ll have to marry into Gusu Lan, if this is to happen. Could you bear with that?”

Nie Huaisang nods, laughing and crying at once, delighted beyond words to realise that Lan Xichen too has made plans. He knew they were well suited for each other, he knew it all along, and finally he’s proven right.

Finally, he’s going to be happy.

-

The Sunshot Campaign ends, and sooner than everyone expected. Wei Wuxian’s new techniques are to thank for that… or to blame, depending who’s talking. Not everybody is fond of what Wei Wuxian has done during the war. Still, he’s a hero, one of many. Of the young masters of great sects in their generation, only Nie Huaisang and Jin Zixuan haven’t gained a title for their glorious deeds.

In fact, when Nie Huaisang asks around, it appears that Jin Zixuan didn’t contribute at all to the war, in any way. He wasn’t among those who fought, which isn’t such a surprise when Jin Guangshan barely wanted his sect involved at all. But Jin Zixuan wasn’t on the back front either, and that’s strange. Nie Huaisang knows his friend isn't a coward like him, and must have wanted to contribute in some fashion. Jin Guanshan will have tried to stop him, but Jin Zixuan is exactly the sort of person who would run away and join another sect's troupes to do his part in fighting the Wen. 

Nie Huaisang becomes truly concerned when he learns that while Jin Zixuan has been absent from the war, one of Jin Guangshan's bastards has seen his status elevated and been given a title. Jin Ziyao, Lianfang-zun, is the first out of many bastards that Jin Guangshan has ever seen fit to legitimise. 

Suddenly, Nie Huaisang becomes terrified for his friend. Jin Zixuan looked so unwell that day after they escaped the cave. If his group stumbled upon the Wen, if he was wounded or worse… 

Jin Zixuan is absent from the banquet held in Jinlin Tai to celebrate the end of the war. It is noticed and gossiped about, especially since Jin Guangshan brought not only Jin Ziyao, but also another of his bastards, a mere child who rumour says he might legitimise as well. Worse still, Madam Jin is somewhat polite to both of her husband's bastards, when she's been known to never even allow anyone to mention his infidelities before her. 

Sick with worry, Nie Huaisang cannot eat or drink anything and quickly excuses himself from the celebration. He takes refuge on a platform that overhangs above elegant gardens, leaning over a railing to admire the sight. He hoped that being alone would give him a chance to calm down, but it only makes things worse. Jin Zixuan used to say he'd make Nie Huaisang visit the gardens of Jinlin Tai someday and show the peacocks from up close, but that might never happen now, because he might be… 

Nie Huaisang bursts into tears. 

He shouldn't have let Jin Zixuan go with the Jin that day, he should have kept him close and protected him, so nothing could happen to him. There is no safer place in the world than with a group of Nie, and Nie Huaisang knows even a pitiful alpha like him would have sprung into action if the situation called for it. 

He knows that for Jin Zixuan's sake, he would have easily torn Wen Chao's throat with his bare teeth, if it had come to that. 

Nie Huaisang is still crying when Lan Xichen finds him and silently wraps his arms around him. It helps a bit, if only because it reminds Nie Huaisang that things aren't entirely awful, that even if something happened to Jin Zixuan, he won’t have to face his grief alone. They’ve talked to Nie Mingjue who grumbled mightily against his brother leaving Qinghe Nie, but that was never an argument he could have won, not when Nie Huaisang has prepared for it half his life. Once Lan Xichen’s mourning period is over, they will be married, exactly as Nie Huaisang planned.

“What has you so upset?” Lan Xichen asks, pulling his fiancé closer, enveloping him into the long layers of his robes until Nie Huaisang feels like a chick under its brooding mother.

“I’m worried about Zixuan. Nobody has seen him since the start of the war, nobody knows anything, and he isn’t here tonight…”

Lan Xichen stiffens somewhat, and for a brief moment he loses control of himself enough that Nie Huaisang can smell him, the scent of gentians and pine lingering even after Lan Xichen returns to his usual restraint.

“You’ve become very close to him, haven’t you?” Lan Xichen asks. “I don’t think you’ve asked about anyone else as much as him during the whole campaign.”

“I got news from the others all the time,” Nie Huaisang says. “But Zixuan… and he was in a concerning state last I saw him. I just feel like I should have done more for him. What if he’s…”

“He’s not dead. Ziyao would know, and he would have told me. I’ve asked on your behalf.”

Nie Huaisang smiles, and snuggles closer to the beta.

“Thank you. But what’s the matter with him then?”

Lan Xichen shrugs slightly. “Ziyao doesn’t know,” he admits. “Nobody in Jinlin Tai seems to know, except for Jin zongzhu and Jin furen. She’s the only one who gets to see him, along with a handful of servants loyal to her. Ziyao has heard that his brother might have been cursed, or fell sick somehow, but in the end he’s not really sure.”

“Poor Zixuan, he must be so bored,” Nie Huaisang sighs. He knows his friend is used to a certain isolation, but that’s different from being truly alone. He knows also that Jin Zixuan, when given the chance, isn’t someone who enjoys being on his own anyway, and that he’s an active person who likes to practice martial arts, go on Night Hunts, or even just walk around town and check shops. This situation must be a torture for him. “Do you think they’d let me see him if I asked? Or at least write to him maybe? I’m just so worried...”

Lan Xichen tenses, his scent flaring once again. Before Nie Huaisang can ask about that, he hears approaching footsteps. Since it is highly inappropriate for them to be in such an intimate position in public, and when they’re not even formally engaged, they quickly pull apart to look at the newcomer. Nie Huaisang expected his brother, or Lan Wangji perhaps.

Instead, they find themselves in front of Madam Jin. They promptly bow to her, and exchange a worried glance. She isn’t exactly known for looking kindly at couples who misbehave in her home, and her expression can best be described as cold and angry.

“Do you really wish to see my son, Nie gongzi?” she asks, startling Nie Huaisang who can only nod in answer. “Then follow me. He’ll be glad to have a visit. Lan gongzi may come as well. This might concern him as well.”

Again, the two young men trade glances, surprised by that sudden invitation. Neither of them protests, least of all Nie Huaisang who is only too happy to follow her. Lan Xichen, after some hesitation, does the same. All three of them walk in silence in the labyrinth that is Jinlin Tai until they reach a rather isolated house guarded by two fierce looking betas who have their hands on their swords as soon as they see someone approaching, and don’t let go until they recognise Madam Jin.

“Keep an eye out,” she orders the guards as the three of them go inside. “He’s been drinking, and his rut is coming close.”

The guards nod, and firmly close the door behind Madam Jin and her guests. Nie Huaisang, initially delighted to see his friend again, starts getting worried.

“Is there something wrong with Zi… with Jin gongzi?” he asks. “Why are you locking him up this way? Is he dangerous?”

“There is danger in Jinling Tai,” Madam Jin replies, leading them ahead. She knocks on a door, using an odd rhythm. “Until a better solution can be found, this is the only way I can protect my son.”

The door opens, revealing Jin Zixuan, sword in hand. Only, there’s something off about him, something that Nie Huaisang can’t quite put his finger on. Maybe it’s his clothes, which hang a little oddly and aren’t quite the cut and fabric one would expect on an alpha. Or it is the slight fear in his eyes when he opens the door, quickly replaced by defiance when he sees who is there with his mother, as if he expects Nie Huaisang and Lan Xichen to say something unpleasant. And then there’s a smell in the air, fear mixed with notes of flowers.

“Oh,” Lan Xichen says, before pinching his lips so he keeps his realisation for himself.

Jin Zixuan glares at him, then at his mother.

“I told you not to do it!” he says.

“What choice do I have?” Madam Jin replies, pushing her way into her son’s room. “This is the only way.”

After some hesitation, Nie Huaisang follows her inside. Lan Xichen does the same with a certain reluctance, and when they all sit, he does so a little closer to Nie Huaisang than is probably proper, but Nie Huaisang is too stunned by the situation to think much of it.

“I have brought you here to make a request,” Madam Jin announces, while her mortified son hides his face in his hands. “I need help in protecting my son, and after long consideration, I have come to the conclusion that the two of you are the best possible choice.”

“Mother, please, don’t!” Jin Zixuan begs, only for his mother to silence him with a gesture.

“At the start of the war, my son presented,” Madam Jin continues, ignoring the interruption. “Sadly for everyone involved, he presented as an omega.”

Nie Huaisang gasps, and stares at Jin Zixuan who looks like he might start crying. It puzzles Nie Huaisang at first, because there’s nothing bad about being an omega… or at least, not when in Qinghe Nie. Other sects have their own opinions on that, of course. He’s heard people here and there say that it is shameful and unnatural that Qinghe Nie’s leader is an omega, even one that looks and acts like an alpha, but that’s just because people are jealous of Nie Mingjue. All those petty, self-satisfied alpha just can’t stand that someone of a gender they think inferior can be so much better than they will ever be.

Of course, there’s also the fact that in most sects, only an alpha can become sect leader. Even Lan Xichen isn’t nearly as respected as he deserves to be after his brave actions during the war, and that’s not just a matter of age. Still, at least he’s a beta, and from a somewhat reasonable sect. Lanling Jin isn’t so open minded. In fact, everyone says that part of the problem between Jin Guangshan and his wife is that she’s also an alpha, when he is of the opinion that same gender couples shouldn’t be allowed to exist. He was forced into that union by his own father, everyone knows it, and only because Madam Jin's parents paid a high dowry to have her married into such a glorious sect.

"As an omega, my son cannot inherit his father's title," Madam Jin confirms. "He also wasn't allowed to take part in the war, since it would have been improper for him to be in mixed company. Alphas cannot be trusted on a battlefield… Or outside of it, as the case might be." She glances at Jin Zixuan, who looks ready to faint from sheer humiliation, then continues. "To be quite blunt, I have come to feel that Jinlin Tai is not a safe place for my son, and now that the war is over, I am seeking a way to protect him from harm."

"You want to marry him off," Lan Xichen says, his voice oddly cold in spite of his polite smile. "And I suppose you already have something in mind?" 

"If I could, I would have sent him to Yunmeng Jiang," Madam Jin says. "But he has never gotten along with Jiang Wanyin, and my husband won't allow him to marry another omega as that would be improper, so Jiang Yanli is out of the question. So is Nie Mingjue, for the same reason. My husband doesn't want Zixuan to be sent to a sect too small, as he would find it humiliating. I do not want to send my son to a spouse too much older than him, as I fear for his safety. That leaves me very little choice."

Nie Huaisang frowns. He knows Jin Zixuan is more than capable of gutting even an older cultivator if they try to force him into something he doesn't want. He isn't ranked third on that list of bachelors just for his looks. Being an omega doesn't change how competent Jin Zixuan is, and Nie Huaisang has half a mind to say so. 

He doesn't, but only because it suddenly hits him why Lan Xichen and him have been brought here. 

"You want one of us to marry him?" he asks, while next to him Lan Xichen stiffens. 

"You are the best choices," Madam Jin confirms. "My husband would probably prefer Lan zongzhu, but I personally hope you will consider this, Nie gongzi. After all, my son and you are already friends, so it would make things easier." 

"Mother, stop this!" Jin Zixuan hisses between clenched teeth. "This is too… This is unnecessary."

Unsure what to think, Nie Huaisang looks up to Lan Xichen, hoping he will be the one to explain the situation. But Lan Xichen, his face pale and tight, won't look at him, or at the Jin for that matter. It falls to Nie Huaisang to handle this. 

"Jin Furen, I am honoured you would think of me, and I am sure Lan zongzhu feels the same," he says. "But the fact is… Well, the truth is…" 

"They're in love," Jin Zixuan hisses. "I told you it wouldn't work, mother."

Nie Huaisang looks at his friend in surprise, but Jin Zixuan refuses to look at him. More than ever, he seems ready to cry. Madam Jin, for her part, isn't impressed by this new information. 

"Love is nice and well," she says, "but there are other things to consider. Your family would certainly prefer this strong political alliance." 

"My brother and his uncle have already given their blessing," Nie Huaisang admits. "It's not a bad match either, politically speaking." 

"But you won't have children," Madam Jin points out.

"There is a precedent for this," Lan Xichen coldly says. "Although Gusu Lan favours fidelity to one's spouse, it can be allowed to take a concubine in specific cases, such as the impossibility of having children."

"Then why not take my son as your second spouse? Or as the first one even, and have each other's company on the side? Zixuan will allow it."

Both Nie Huaisang and Lan Xichen stare at Madam Jin, shocked that she would say such a thing. Her stance on her husband's affairs is well known, and she is merciless toward adulterous couples. Nie Huaisang wants to ask her why she doesn't ask for her husband's help if she's so desperate to protect her son against threats to his virtue.

He keeps that question to himself, because the answer occurs to him, and he doesn't like it. 

It is well known that Jin Guangshan is an alpha of great sexual appetite even in a normal state. It is rumoured, also, that he becomes terrifying when in rut, willing to take any omega or woman who crosses his path, willing or not. People say he might have fathered Jin Zixun with his own cousin, though since the poor omega was recently married, Jin Guangshan never had to recognise the child. 

Jinlin Tai is not a good place to raise an omega these days, as Jin Zixuan knows. He told Nie Huaisang as much, back when they were studying in Gusu. 

And perhaps there’s more alpha in Nie Huaisang than he realised, because the idea of Jin Zixuan being in such danger, in the place where he should be safest, fills him with a rage like nothing he’s rarely felt before. The only thing that can compare is the burning wrath that overcame him when he first heard that the Cloud Recesses had been burned, that Lan Xichen was missing. If he could, Nie Huaisang would grab Jin Zixuan this instant and fly with him to QInghe, were nobody will care that he’s an omega, where he’ll live free of fear because the rules of Qinghe Nie are very clear on how to deal with a rapist, regardless of sex, gender, and rank. It is tempting to accept Madam Jin’s demand, just to protect her son, except…

Except Lan Xichen is sitting right next to Nie Huaisang, and while his face is showing nothing, the smell of his anger is getting stronger with each passing moment. If the Lan rarely have a second spouse, let alone concubines of any sorts, Lan Xichen once explained, it is because their cultivation method tends to make them more possessive toward their cultivation partner. That’s the reason they are so careful in choosing such a partner, Lan Xichen confided when they started talking about getting married.

At that time, Nie Huaisang had easily promised that he would remain faithful no matter what, happy to finally have the affection of his favourite person in the world, happy to know that his love and patience would be rewarded, confident that there is nobody else in the world he could ever want.

Now though, he isn’t so sure what to do anymore. Marrying Lan Xichen is all he’s wanted for years and years, the culmination of a carefully crafted plan to ensure both of their happiness. But to abandon Jin Zixuan to his fate would be a crime, something against which his very soul rebels.

Between his dearest friend and the love of his life, Nie Huaisang has to choose, and risk losing someone either way. 

[sometimestxt]

Five Times Loid and Yor Almost Kiss, and One Time They Actually Do

Fandom: SPY x FAMILY Pairings / Characters: Loid x Yor / Loid, Yor, Yuri, Frankie, Anya, Henry Henderson Summary: Or, the Forgers try their best to maintain the farce.

Word Count: 4,321 Read on ao3.

-

0001

Despite his recent demotion from housemaster to simple homeroom teacher, Henry Henderson was wholly dedicated to the success of Eden Academy. As such, he made an effort to continue his customary patrols around campus grounds to ensure that everything was in proper and elegant condition.

Henderson paused during his rounds as he spotted a familiar couple standing outside of the main building, alongside housemaster Murdoch Swan.

The Forgers, he quickly realized.

Henderson moved swiftly, finding a hiding place within earshot around the corner of the building. It was not a particularly regal action, he knew, but the teacher was curious as to how the Forgers would handle Swan this time.

“What brings you here?” he heard Swan sneer.

“We’re dropping off documents for our daughter’s enrollment,” came Mr Forger’s calm response.

“Oh, your daughter. The one who cried at the littlest thing—truly, a disgrace to Eden Academy.”

Henderson glanced around the corner at those words. He saw the way Ms Forger’s hands clenched and unclenched into fists, yet she remained silent. It had become increasingly obvious to Henderson that Swan was simply trying to rile up the couple as he prattled off more rude remarks—most likely in an attempt to cause a big enough scene to justify rescinding their daughter’s acceptance into the academy.

How inelegant.

The Forgers, however, seemed to be taking his comments in stride. They evidently had enough elegance to pick up on Swan’s scheming.

“And Ms Forger, it must be so difficult knowing that your daughter will always prefer her first mother over you,” Swan continued, his voice dripping in contempt. “The way she still cries over her.”

Henderson felt the sudden urge to punch Swan in the face once more.

“Master Swan,” Mr Forger cut in, steely, “we really must be on our way.”

Swan ignored his interjection, choosing to direct his attention to his wife instead. “Does your husband prefer her as well? He won’t even hold your hand—won’t even kiss you, will he?”

Swan laughed, a harsh sound.

“It’s really none of your business,” Ms Forger gritted out.

He laughed again. “Why won’t he just kiss you then? Then I won’t make it any more of my business.”

At that, Mr Forger took a step closer to his wife. His arm moved and he cupped her cheek with his right hand, then tilted her chin up towards him. He leaned in, close.

Henderson couldn’t stop the scandalized gasp that escaped his lips. Such a public display of affection, on school grounds? How inelegant!

Surely he couldn’t be wrong about the Forgers. They had proved themselves wonderfully on the day of their application interview, after all. He was willing to watch this through to the end, to give them the benefit of the doubt yet again. Surely they wouldn’t disappoint.

When Mr Forger pulled back, he raised his hand to display something. A handkerchief, Henderson quickly deduced. On it, a streak of ruby red marked the pure white of the fabric.

“Sorry, Yor, I had noticed that your lipstick smudged,” he apologized, tone soft. He elegantly pocketed the handkerchief, then turned to face Swan once again.

Though he couldn’t see his face clearly, Henderson was almost certain Mr Forger was shooting daggers at Swan with his eyes. His voice was cold as he stated, “I have no obligation to make my wife uncomfortable to appease you.”

Swan sputtered indignantly in response.

“Now, we really must be going.” Mr Forger ended the conversation there, grabbing his wife’s hand as they swiftly walked away.

Henderson couldn’t help the smile that formed on his lips as he watched the couple depart.

Truly, the Forgers were the embodiment of elegance.

0010

If there was one thing that Yuri was certain about his sister, it was that she deserved the world. And so much more, to be completely honest.

She had, after all, done everything for him when they were children. She had worked hard to maintain normality in their fragmented family after everything had fallen apart. She picked up the pieces when they had nothing more than each other and their broken smiles. She was, frankly, everything he had, the only person who could still allow him to feel something as simplistic as childish joy—something he had since long thrown away for her.

Loid Forger, Yuri pointedly decided, was not the world. Sure, the man seemed to be smart, well-articulated, and well put together. Sure, he was also a talented cook, and he probably made a good amount of money too based off of their living space, and perhaps he was devilishly handsome as well (in a completely objective way; Yuri was objective like that)—but he was not good enough for Yor.

Yuri couldn’t help glaring at his sister’s husband as he sat in the living room of their shared home, nursing a bottle of wine. He was here to evaluate the man’s worthiness; likely a fruitless endeavor, because he settled on his conclusion within seconds.

His sister was incredibly kind and despite her monstrous strength, a delicate woman! She deserved someone who would look after and protect her, someone who had her best interests in mind, someone who would move heaven and earth for her. Loid struck him more as the type who would move just one or the other, not both. In his completely objective opinion.

Drunkenly, he demanded to see some intimacy between the couple, to prove that it was real. To prove that she was really, truly happy. It made perfect sense in his inebriated stupor.

Yuri quietly observed as the two sat near each other, whispering soft words to one another. They leaned in, their faces moving in for a kiss. Their lips were close, almost touching. He was filled with dread as he watched his sister—his family—being taken away from him in front of his very eyes.

He wasn’t ready, he realized. He was still just a little boy in a broken home clinging so dearly to his older sister

But the fact that she had been so clearly smitten with her husband, hurtling her own brother across their living room as he darted forward to pull them apart, just so she could kiss Loid, had his own world turning upside down. It became apparent that he hadn’t properly considered the extent of Yor’s feelings.

Maybe he wasn’t ready yet, but she was.

Nobody would be good enough for his sister, he knew.

He tainted his hands in blood for her, after all; gave up a life of innocence for her to live one of normalcy and happiness following their crooked childhood.

Maybe if Loid could give her even a semblance of the happy family that they were, that she so deserved, he would allow it.

Until then, he would continue to dye himself in red to protect her everyday life.

0011

“And that was all I was able to figure out, given the timing,” Frankie stated. Twilight was quiet, a contemplative look on his face. As they stood together in silence, outside a cafe in the city’s core downtown, the everyday bustle of the lunchtime rush continued around them. Sometimes it was easiest to hide in the open, when you could see everyone yet no one at the same time.

“Man, I thought you’d be more concerned, to be honest,” Frankie eventually remarked.

“Give me a moment. I’m just thinking. They’ve been stretching me thin with all this work lately, but I couldn’t turn down this project either,” Twilight answered. “Have you considered looking into—”

“—Loid?” a familiar voice interrupted. The two men stopped and turned towards the sound of the voice.

Frankie saw the way his friend’s entire posture flipped in a second and how his mouth quirked upwards into a fake smile at the sight of his fake wife. As expected of a high-class agent like Twilight.

“Hello, Yor,” Twilight greeted. “I wasn’t expecting to see you around here.”

“I was just passing by; my boss sent me on an errand,” she explained, an amicable (genuine, Frankie noted) smile on her face. She turned to Frankie next, the smile still on her lips. “Thank you for always lending us a hand with Anya.”

He cracked a grin. “No worries. Loid’s one of my best friends; I’m more than happy to lend him a helping hand. And Anya’s a lovely little girl too, so it’s always a pleasure.”

Twilight wasn’t the only one who could pull off a fake persona at the drop of a hat, he mused to himself.

“I’m happy to hear that,” Yor beamed. “Anyway, it was good seeing you again, but I should probably get going now.”

Twilight tipped his hat at her and Frankie noticed him say something, but he didn't hear what. Then he saw her lean in close, so close it almost looked like a kiss—until she turned her face away at the last second and instead, whispered something in her fake husband’s ear. Her own ears were flushed red as she pulled away and bid them both a quick goodbye before hurrying off.

Once she was out of earshot, Frankie turned to look at Twilight, an eyebrow raised questioningly as he asked, “What was all that about?”

“She told me that she likes cheese,” he deadpanned, evidently unfazed by her impromptu declaration.

“How romantic,” he snorted. “That was a terrible attempt at a goodbye kiss.”

“I suspect she’s become more conscious about how we’re perceived as a married couple due to some recent events, but actions like these aren’t necessary. Not that we need to prove anything to you, anyway.” He frowned. “Besides, I’m not trying to bring feelings into this—”

“You never do,” Frankie interjected.

“—But she might.”

He blinked. “And why would you care if she does?”

The spy took a second longer to reply than usual, but it was still a noticeable enough second for Frankie—”I don’t.”

“Oh, that’s a cold way to treat your wife,” he said wryly, then straightened up. “Well, that’s how it should be anyway—but just a heads up, acting like shy schoolkids as a supposedly married couple doesn’t do much for you guys.”

“I’m well aware, but she’s not trained for this.” Twilight let out a sigh; Frankie knew that partnering up with outsiders had been a pain point for the agent since the very start of the mission.

“Then is it really so bad if she feels something a little real for you? Isn’t that good for the story?” he inquired. “That’s how it’s always been for your other… ‘relationships.’”

“… No, you’re right; it’s all one-sided. It normally wouldn’t be a problem.” He raised a hand to his chin, a thoughtful expression on his face. “It’d certainly be more convincing, at the very least.”

Normally, Frankie wanted to repeat, but didn't.

He let out a sigh, reaching out to place a hand on Twilight’s shoulder. The agent moved, shrugging him off almost immediately. Frankie continued, “Well, you can’t say I didn’t say anything.”

“I know what I’m doing and how to approach this,” Twilight said, voice steely, “and I’ll see this through to the very end.”

“I’m not doubting your capabilities, y’know,” Frankie replied, and left it at that.

Yet there was a part of him that still wondered.

0100

Yor entered the apartment at four in the morning as quietly as she could. She was thankful for the fact that she and Loid had separate bedrooms; it made slipping in and out of their home during the night so much easier for her job.

She tiptoed through the living room but abruptly stopped once she noticed Loid, fast asleep on their couch. She frowned.

Long hours again with his patients, she realized, belatedly remembering that he had yet to return home by the time she left for her own work—belatedly remembering how she had tucked Anya into bed earlier that evening and assured her that Loid would be back soon.

Again, it made things so much easier for her like this.

Still, she couldn’t help but admire how hard he worked for his clients—for Anya. It reminded her a bit of herself when she was younger, working herself to literal bone and blood for Yuri.

Her feet moved on their own, leading her further into the living room until she was squatted next to her sleeping partner. She watched the soft rise and fall of his chest, listened to his quiet breaths. He must have been exhausted if he couldn’t even make it to his bedroom. Their couch wasn’t nearly long enough for him to be comfortable; his feet were propped up awkwardly at the other end, and that atrocious sleeping posture would probably lead to a sore neck in the morning.

In the silence of the night, Yor found herself studying his features. It wasn’t often she had this opportunity; after all, their entire marriage wasn’t real. There was no reason to ever get so personal like this, not unless they were keeping up appearances in public.

There were bags under his eyes and his hair was unkempt, she noted, nothing like how it usually was during the day. He was fatigued, no doubt about it. Despite everything, Yor found herself smiling.

He was a good father to Anya. He worked tirelessly for his daughter, she could tell.

Yor wanted to do her best for Anya, too. She knew how hard it could be to lose a mother—to have a family of just one other. Even if it was for only a while, she wanted to give Anya a happy family. She wanted Anya to live the happy, normal life she never really had; the happy, normal life she worked so hard to give to Yuri.

A happy family with a happily in love mother and father.

She shifted slightly, her head tilting forward.

Loid stirred in his sleep then and she felt her breath catch in her throat.

Suddenly, she was acutely aware of how close she had gotten to him. She felt her face warm as she swiftly pulled away, almost stumbling on her feet.

Oh, no.

No, no, no.

She was tired too—tired because it was four in the morning, tired because she just expended all of her energy on her latest assignment. She evidently wasn’t thinking clearly, and she definitely hadn’t just been leaning in to leave a kiss on his lips, not while he was asleep. And if she had been, it was only because she was tired from work!

Yor straightened her back.

Right. Her mission was done. She needed to go clean up now, needed to scrub off the dried blood from her hands before the sun rose. She hurried to her bedroom, quickly discarded her bloodied clothes and washed up before crawling into bed.

She tried not to dwell too much on what had almost just happened, tried not to think about what it would have felt like.

It wasn’t long until her exhaustion took over and she drifted to sleep, dreaming of a simple happy family.

0101

“Thanks for coming again, Loid,” said Yor as the couple walked into her latest corporate party.

“Of course,” was his simple reply.

“Honestly, it’s not like Yuri is watching over us this time, so I don’t think you needed to come for this one,” she murmured, voice low.

“If I hadn’t come, people would talk,” he answered in a similarly low tone. “They’d ask questions.”

Yor pursed her lips in contemplation. “Well, it’s probably fine for you to miss out on one or two of these parties. You’ve been pulling long hours at work, after all.”

“These aren’t frequent enough that it’d be something to worry about,” he dismissed with a wave of his hand, briefly recalling the first work party they had attended together as part of their original arrangement. “It’s better to just avoid any questions outright if we can. It was my slip up in the first place, after all.”

She let out a light laugh. “I guess you’re right. You’ve really thought this through, Loid.”

He blinked. “Of course I have. Besides, it’s only fair I keep up my end of our agreement. You spend more time with Anya than I do at these kinds of events.”

He didn’t want a repeat of what had occurred with Yuri. No more questions, just a perfect couple. A perfect family.

“I like spending time with Anya,” she hummed.

His lips quirked upwards into a small smile. “Well, I’m glad to hear that.”

“Anyway, let’s try to enjoy ourselves!” Yor beamed. The couple made their way around the party, exchanging greetings with each of Yor’s coworkers. Simple small talk was shared, and Twilight spoke vaguely of work as a psychiatrist. When Camilla arrived, she threw around a few pointed remarks before trotting off with her boyfriend in a huff. Time passed quickly despite all of the mundane conversations; he was accustomed to attending meaningless parties for the sake of his missions.

With the party now in full swing, Twilight made note of how the dance floor was filling up. Upon inspection, it appeared to be occupied primarily by couples in romantic relationships—so the next move was clear.

“Yor, would you like to dance?” he asked, holding up his hand to her.

A light blush dusted her cheeks at the suggestion. Still, she grasped his hand in hers. “I’m not much of a dancer, though.”

Twilight politely excused themselves from the small group of partygoers they had been speaking to. He offered Yor a reassuring smile as he led her onto the dance floor, saying, “Just follow my lead.”

She nodded and gave him an unsure smile of her own in return.

She was surprisingly good on her feet, however, able to match each of his steps. He, of course, had perfected multiple types of ballroom dancing over the years—from the waltz to the foxtrot to the quickstep. A good leader was key to ballroom dancing, but it was still imperative that the partner could skillfully follow.

Yor did as much, following every move with precision throughout the entire song.

On the final beat, Twilight leaned in close, his cheek pressed next to hers. He could feel her breath on his neck, warm.

This was when he would normally sweep his date off their feet, seduce them away into the quiet of the night and whisper sweet nothings into their ear until they started whispering everything—secrets, speculations, carefully concealed truths.

But this was Yor—his partner, unlike every other woman he used as a necessary pawn—so instead, he strategically angled their faces in such a way that he knew would make it look as though they were kissing. Yor let out a squeak as he shifted their posture, but still maintained the position.

After counting to five, they separated.

Twilight flashed her his most perfect smile—people were watching, after all—and she mumbled something incoherent in response, her face still glowing a soft pink.

He thought back to Frankie, thought about feelings. What feelings? There was nothing to worry about.

He was an expert.

And Yor was—

“—Wow,” she breathed, “wow. You’re a really good dancer, Loid.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “The waltz isn’t very difficult.”

“Still! It was impressive,” she reiterated. As if to prove her point, a coworker approached the two to compliment them on their dance. Soon they were dragged into another group conversation, and the rest of the night continued without a hitch.

Another successful task accomplished, Twilight concluded as they left the venue together, arm in arm; they were the perfect couple.

0110

“Becky told me that boys have cooties,” Anya declared as she and Yor sat at the dinner table, waiting for Loid to finish plating. Loid had pointedly removed Yor from any and all duties pertaining to dinner despite her protests and sulking, citing her most recent kitchen disaster as reason enough.

Loid let out a noncommittal grunt in response as he moved all of the food onto the table.

“She said that boys are stinky, too,” Anya continued as Loid pulled up a seat next to her and across from Yor. “Mama, is that why you don’t wanna kiss Papa? Because he’s stinky? Cooties?”

He coughed.

“Eh? Oh, no. No, Papa isn’t stinky!” Yor waved her hands around animatedly as though that somehow helped her point. Loid gave her a weary look.

Anya made a face. “Well, Papa and Mama still haven’t kissed yet! Is it cooties, then?”

“No, Anya, it’s not cooties.” He sighed.

“That’s what someone with cooties would say,” she huffed.

Yor let out a soft laugh and he sighed again.

“I’m not gonna do my homework until Papa and Mama kiss!” Anya suddenly exclaimed.

At that proclamation, something seemed to switch on within Loid. His back straightened and it was almost as though he was on high alert. “Anya. Anya, you need to do your homework. If you don’t, you’ll fall behind in class. We can’t have you falling behind in class, Anya.”

She pouted in response and defiantly shook her head.

“Anya,” he started, voice stern.

Yor coughed into her fist then, drawing his attention.

Her voice was low as she asked, “Well, should we…? I mean, it’s important for Anya to do her work. And it’s just… just a kiss. It’s something we should be able to do.”

Her cheeks flushed at the very suggestion.

He frowned. “We shouldn’t spoil her by following through with these kinds of silly demands.”

Yor paused as though she wanted to say something about his remark. She didn’t.

Eventually, she spoke, “You’re right. But Anya’s really pouting there.”

She tilted her head to the little girl in question, her cheeks puffed in rebellion.

“She can pout as much as she wants, but we don’t need to do this. She’ll drop it eventually, like she always does,” he reiterated.

A pause. His brow furrowed as though he was deep in thought. “Probably.”

He looked back at Anya then and saw her reaching across the table, her hands gesturing towards him.

“It’s rude to have your arms on the table, Anya,” he instinctively reprimanded.

“But this is important, Papa,” she stated confidently. She clenched and unclenched her hands in an opening motion, trying to get Loid to do the same. He eventually complied, opening up his fist. On his palm, Anya confidently traced the shape of a circle, then pressed her index finger into his skin a couple of times over.

“There, now you’re safe! Becky taught me how to do a cootie shoot, too. So Mama doesn’t need to worry anymore.” She pulled back, looking especially proud of herself.

“Wow, Anya! That’s amazing!” Yor clapped her hands together in praise.

She beamed, “Now Mama and Papa can kiss.”

Loid let out another sigh. He opened his mouth to speak again, but was promptly interrupted by a familiar theme song blaring loudly from the television in the living room. Anya whipped her head around at the sound, her eyes wide.

“Anya, you haven’t eaten dinner yet,” Loid reminded, his tone exasperated.

“Nooo, I don’t want to miss Spy Wars,” she whined in response.

He gave her a look.

“I’ll do my homework, Papa, I promise! After Spy Wars!”

Again, something seemed to switch on within Loid. He stood up from his seat then and moved to scoop Anya up into his arms. “Only for tonight. Then you’re doing your homework after dinner. No complaints, and no more cootie shots.”

“Promise!” Anya nodded her head rapidly, all worries about cooties and stinky boys suddenly forgotten.

He exchanged a glance with Yor then; she smiled knowingly.

Loid sighed for the umpteenth time that evening as he headed into the living room with Anya.

After Spy Wars, dinner, and another valiant attempt at fractions, Anya was tucked snugly into bed.

Standing in the hallway, their home felt a lot quieter now that Anya was asleep. Sometimes she truly felt like the life of their makeshift family, loud and playful and full of energy.

But the quiet was important, too. They needed their rest—deserved it, given how hectic it had been earlier in the evening.

Loid opened his mouth then, ready to wish Yor a good night.

“I don’t think you’re stinky, Loid,” Yor suddenly declared before he could speak.

He closed his mouth. Opened it again. “I don’t think you’re stinky either?”

“Good! I mean, thank you! I mean, that’s not what I actually mean!” she exclaimed.

He cocked an eyebrow. “What are you talking about, Yor?”

“I… I don’t think you’re stinky, and I don’t think you have cooties either,” she repeated.

He nodded his head, encouraging her to continue.

“So, this is…,” she trailed off, her cheeks warming. “This is… just how it is.”

She took a step closer, then another, until they stood almost touching.

“Yor, I really don’t know what you—”

Grabbing the collar of his shirt, she pulled him down towards her. Her mouth pressed against his, a gentle, brief kiss. Her lips were soft and she smelled sweet, Loid noticed with startling realization. His hand twitched, almost moving to rest on her hip until he consciously stopped himself.

Releasing her grip on his shirt, she took a step back. Her face was completely red and her eyes were directed at the floor with sudden interest.

He blinked once, twice.

Before he could say a word, Yor stuttered a high-pitched “good night!” and abruptly rushed into her bedroom, slamming the door behind her with almost enough force to rip it off its hinges.

He stood there.

Looked at her bedroom door, then his.

Stood a bit longer.

The hardwood under his feet felt different as he eventually made his way into his own room.

That night as he laid in bed, he speculated over the 28 possible explanations for her actions.

[tastingmellow]

A scandal with congress Chris Evans. The public thinks he cheating on his wife (poc) but him and his wife is just trying to keep things spicy between them so she cos plays a lot.

Ooooh, I don’t write for the actual people so I’m gonna use Steve, hope that’s alright! But I love this idea!

———————

Bucky’s nose flared at the article that was sent to his office. “What the fuck...” he grunted out while he stomped his way towards Steve’s office. Steve was currently looking over a bill that would make it easier for law enforcement to be prosecuted for a crime. Bucky knew Steve probably wanted as much peace as possible but this was some shit that needed to be addressed, immediately.

As Bucky neared Steve’s office he saw you coming into view. The quick clacking of your stilettos slowed as you came to a stop, noticing Bucky’s face being a little too bright red. “You alright there, Buck?” You ask, your hand coming to rest on his forehead. Bucky sighed and pulled you into a hug, tightly squeezing you.

Your eyebrows furrowed and you awkwardly patted his back as he released you. You were just as close to Bucky as Steve was. When you and Steve had met through college it had been through Bucky whom you’d met through a frat party when he collapsed on your shoulder on the couch and wouldn’t budge until morning. It wasn’t a stretch to say you were nearly as much as a best friend as Steve. Which is why he was so angry.

“Come with me, Y/N. You really need to hear this.” He spoke as he tugged open the large oak doors to Steve’s office. Just as you suspected, Steve sat in his chair looking over multiple documents while soft jazz played in the background. You followed Bucky inside, still very confused.

“Steve, is there something you want to tell your wife.” Bucky spoke, anger and tension evident in his posture. Your eyes flickered to Steve as he looked up at you. His eyes raked over your attire before meeting your eyes again. “Love the new dress, honey.” You smiled and walked over, kissing his cheek.

“Thank you, baby.” You giggles as he pulled you into his lap. You crossed your legs as Bucky huffed, adjusting his stance before slamming the magazine down in front of you and your husband. Your head tilted to the side as you picked up the article. In big, bold letters it read “Congressman Rogers Spotted with Mystery Woman Outside of Ritz Carlton.”

You blinked at the title, your eyes falling to said mystery woman. You squinted slightly before bursting out into laughter. You showed Steve the article and he laughed loudly. Bucky stared at the two of you, mouth agape.

“Oh, Bucky. Sit.” You said, still giggling at the article.

—————————

“Congressman Rogers! Would you care to comment on the recent photos of you spotted with a woman that’s clearly not your wife?” A reporter called out amongst the chaos of flashing cameras and others calling out his name. Steve glanced up while the crowd fell quiet. You stood off to the side, a smirk on your lips as you tried your hardest not to giggle.

Steve playfully glared at you before looking back to the reporter. “I would like to. Let the record show that I’ve never and will never step out of my marriage and cheat on my wife. I’m happily married to the love of my life, a wonderful woman who loves me as Steve. Not as Congressman Rogers. I will never disrespect her or our bond. She is everything I have ever wished for and more.”

Your eyes softened as you stared at the man in front of you. His hand slowly extended towards you and you stepped closer, wrapping your arms around his. He placed a gentle peck on your lips then your forehead before turning back to the crowd.

“If that is true Congressman, what explanation do you have for those photos?” Inquired another reporter.

“Congressman Rogers and I enjoy keeping things fresh in our marriage. We take risks and we try new things.” You spoke confidently as the crowd murmured.

“Mrs. Rogers, are you implying that you and your husband let others into your...bedroom?” A young man spoke out, tentative but blunt.

“No, I’m simply telling you that we try new things. Sometimes those things include giving into your fantasies and being someone else. However, please do not let that distract you from the crisis that is black people dying or being abused by those with a badge. Congressman Rogers and I have been working to bring justice to the most recent victims of police brutality while also shedding light on the police reform that needs to happen. Do not let gossip distract you from the true issue in this country. Racism and the abuse of power.” You smile to yourself as the crowd becomes restless, people throwing out questions and the flashing of cameras becoming more rapid. “I think my wife said it beautifully, this concludes our conference. Enjoy your evenings and thank you for your time.” Steve slowly ushered you down the steps of the podium and back into your home.

“I think that went rather well, don’t you?” You giggles to yourself while Steve pulled you closer to him. “I do, think that gave them enough. Probably gonna be all over Twitter before the day’s out.” Steve spoke and you chuckled as you made your way into your room.

——————

Sure enough, about 2 hours later “Congressman Rogers” was trending on Twitter. Clips of the press conference, specifically you addressing the pictures, spread like wildfire. You were on gossip websites within the hour, news outlets were covering it.

People were losing their minds over it.

“MinnieMarsh1: Not only did Y/N Rogers tell y’all she a freak, she told y’all to focus. No choice but to Stan. Iconic.”

“therogersstanaccount: Love how Rogers let his wife address the photos. Also, I told y’all they were ‘adventurous’.”

“queendom34: I bet money Y/N is the top. You can’t convince me otherwise.”

“smokingtree: She’s a woke freak and he’s standing with her to fight racism. The only political couple I fw.”

You glanced at the tv In front of you, chuckling at the clip of you speaking on you and your husband’s endeavors. Strong arms wrapped around your chest and you sighed, melting into him. “Well, looks like you started something serious.”

You giggled, biting your lip as Steve grabbed your chin, slowly turning your head before placing a gentle kiss on your lips. You sighed gently as his tongue slid over your bottom lip. Your lips parted, allowing him in as you deepened the kiss. Steve slowly pulled away as you bit your lip. “You’re a demon, I swear.”

You laughed at his comment. “Well, in that case...trying leather tonight?” Steve groaned, biting his lip as you stood from the couch, dragging him back to your shared room for a long, loud night.

[royallyprincesslilly]

Title: Rumor Has It {11}

Chris Evans x Famous Reader Uriah “Riah” Tyler-Evans

Warning: Plot, Cursing, Angst, Slight embellishment of actual real-world media

Word Count: 3.2K

Summary: You and Chris have been married for four years after a whirlwind romance. You are both happy and trying to navigate marriage in the public eye while balancing your successful careers. In the entertainment industry, not everything is as it seems, the flash of a camera lens impairs vision. As scandal and flashing lights put a strain on your once fairytale marriage is it possible your Hollywood marriage can stand the test of the rumor mill?

**Inspired by a video seen of Chris and his co-star Ana De Armas on their press tour for Knives Out at TIFF where she kept touching his chest and face standing about five inches apart.

**NOTE: A WORK OF FICTION. NOT CREATED TO GARNER HATE OF ANY SORT.

**Loosley Edited/Proofread**

**Interactive**

Thank you guys for reading!!!! If you enjoyed this please LIKE, COMMENT, REBLOG. 😊 ❤❤

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

 You were reeling. You didn’t know if you were more furious or hurt. After everything, after the last few weeks, therapy, the revelations, the openness between you, your tears, and struggle this was where you were. Lost. Confused.

 After sitting in your office or almost an hour after the end of your FaceTime call with Chris examining the screen record of Chris’ background and the one from Ana’s picture you’d gone through every single scenario. You’d even branched out to scenarios of those scenarios and at the end of it all you’d settled on was something wasn’t right. Everything pointed to your husband being a liar, your husband playing both angles when in fact he as a low-down dirty asshole. You were reluctant to believe it especially with all you’d been through together in therapy. The emotions he’d expressed couldn’t have been faked. Only an actual sociopathic psychopath could have faked it. that possibility had you wondering if your husband was a sociopathic psychopath.

 This new light on the situation didn’t help you keep focus for the day. Concentration was pointless, working was pointless. Every couple of minutes you were thinking about it again. wondering where they were right now if they were together if they were laughing together about how easy it all had been. Needless to say, you were now looking at “platonic” actions in a whole new light. You now looked at the video of them together at TIFF differently, you looked at the interviews they did together and the body language differently. You even looked at the times they’d been together when you called him while he was filming. Your insecurities were at an all-time high.

 Those insecurities are what had you on a private jet bound for San Diego, two days before your scheduled trip to LA that was supposed to have you meet up with Chris. You’d followed your gut, insecurities, and fears here because you had a feeling something was up, and you refused to sit around and ignore it any longer. You’d played the dutiful wife, the wife who played the trust card. You’d played the faithful and devoted wife who did everything in her power to save and strengthen her marriage. It was time to play a different card, the stealth wife. You were going to get to the bottom of this one way or another.

“Hello?”

 “I hope you’re not just going to roll over on this one.” Your mother’s voice resonated and you sighed out in the backseat of the chauffeured truck.

 “Mama, for goodness sake,” you began before she cut you off.

 “What would be for goodness’s sake is you putting both of them in their place, especially her. A man can be as faithful as Jesus but there will always be snakes and Jezebels slithering through the garden of Eden.”

 You rolled your eyes. You didn’t have the time or patience to listen to her scripture riddles. “Mama, I don’t have time for this.”

 “Do you have time for a divorce?” You almost fell out. She had the uncanny ability to take it from zero to two hundred in two seconds. This was not different. Still, she had a point.

 “I will take care of it. I’m in San Diego now and I’m going to confront Chris.”

 “Take a beat, I say confront her first.”

 “What?”

 “Yes, both parties are equally complicit but sit with her, get a feel for her. You’ll be able to tell her intentions within the first two minutes. I’m not saying go and beat her ass off the bat. It’s what I would do, but there are ways to be tactful in a situation like this,” she suggested.

 You had thought to go to her and rip out her hair then give her a nice souvenir in the form of a face scar to be used as a reminder to stay away from your husband. You’d also thought to play devil’s advocate and go behind enemy lines and assess the situation from her side. You’d left both options open and decided to go to the horse first. Hearing your mother’s thoughts, you decided to go with her plan. You’d go see the snake, Jezebel, first.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Almost an hour later, you were sitting in a hotel room in front of a set table with an assortment of foods before you.  Your mind was racing but you felt strangely calm as if you were slowly gliding through the air in zero gravity. It would have been peaceful, but your heart felt heavy.

 “Uriah?” Her accent was very clear. You also heard her shock and confusion. When you turned to her she had a smile on her face. She was a pretty woman. There was no lying about it. You could see why men would fall for her and her big hazel eyes, striking bone structure, plump bottom lip, and exotic accent. Thinking about that you saw what would draw him in.

 You smiled widely and stood. “Ana. How are you?” She returned your smile and stepped to you with her arms out. Once before you, she threw her arms around you hugging you. It was unexpected and your first red flag.

 “I’m so good. How are you? Oh my goodness I love this outfit you look amazing.” She was being overly friendly. This was a sign she was overcompensating for something. You played her game and carried in with small talk.

 After a few minutes, the two of you sat down across from each other. “Chris didn’t mention you were here.”

 “I know. He doesn’t know. I wanted it to be a surprise. So please don’t tell him.”

 “Oh, that’s so sweet—so romantic.” Her smile slipped for a moment. You didn’t miss it. She smiled again and straightened her back coming back to being the picture of friendliness.

 “I wanted to have a bit of lunch together just us girls. It’s been such a long time since we chatted. I just wanted to catch up.” You knew it was believable. You were not an amateur actress.

 “That sounds nice.”

 “I remember a few things Chris mentioned that you liked. Cucumber sandwiches, dragon rolls, and that salsa from your country that you said you couldn’t live without. I hope it’s the right brand.”

 Ana’s eyes roamed over the food on the table with a huge smile on her face. “Wow, he told you about all this?”

 You nodded and sipped your tea, “He did. He talks about you a lot. I can see he likes you.” Ana looked at you and studied you as if she were searching for something. You suspected what she was searching for. You kept your cool.

 “Yeah, we’re good friends. He’s a great man. You married a keeper.” You slowly nodded and took up one of the California Rolls before you. It was one of the two sushi products you would touch. From your example, Ana did the same and made a plate with a little of everything.

 The two of you ate in silence for a few minutes. After some quiet, you chatted about the business, upcoming projects, silly stories floating around Hollywood, fashion, makeup, and travel. It all seemed normal. If you didn’t have the fact in the back of your mind that she was fucking your husband then it was possible to become friends. In another life, the two of you may have become friends. You may have been good friends.

 As you spoke about trivial things, you formulated the right path to go. You couldn’t be too direct, and you couldn’t be too passive. You had to find a way to ride the line between the two.

 “I hope everything is okay with your family. I heard the break Chris took was because of a family emergency,” Ana led a little over an hour into brunch.

 “Yes, it was. We went through some things that had the power to break us. It was important we took the time. I wasn’t sure we still felt the same way about each other anymore.” It was true. Sometimes you had to reveal something personal to open the gates. Ana’s hand reached out for yours and rested on top in a reassuring way.

 “I’m sorry. I had no idea. Do you want to talk about it?”

 “No, no need. I want to distract myself. How are things with you? Anyone in your life that makes this crazy life of fame better?”

 She remained quiet for a little while then toyed with the straw in her Fiji water bottle. Her eyes didn’t go back to yours though. “Things are okay. They could definitely be better. I never realized how much fame could be so lonely. You have millions of people watching you all the time. Tens of them around you but still you can feel--.”

 “Alone?”

 Ana looked to you and nodded with a melancholic smile. “Yeah. I don’t expect you to understand. You have Chris.”

 “He’s been pulling away for some time. It may just be our workload and our maybe we’re not the same people anymore. We might have outgrown each other. I understand.” It was a stretch but in the light of new details maybe it wasn’t. Ana watched you and you tapped into your actress side and played up everything you felt a little over two months ago.

 “Oh Uriah, I’m sorry. Do you think--.” Ana paused looked down timidly then bit her bottom lip before she spoke again. “Do you think he’s having an affair?”

 Bingo, you thought. Nothing you’d said since this brunch began had any path to eluding about an affair. The fact that she brought it up was suspicious. “Do you think he is? You’re with him a lot more than I am these days.”

Ana looked at you. you felt the air in the room change, her eyes got slightly darker. “How would I know that?”

 You shrugged and took up a beignet. You loved that the powdered sugar just melted in your mouth.

 “Wait, are you insinuating I’m having an affair with Chris?”

 “I never said that Ana. Why would I even say that?”

 Ana straightened her sitting position and held her head higher. You knew what was coming and you loathed it. Either you’d slipped somewhere, or she was seriously on edge about the topic.

 “Oh, I see. You asked me here under false pretenses to play nice and sugar me up hoping to get me to spill something. You told me some sad story about your marriage hoping it would give you the optic of the sad victim so I could feel sorry for you. Wow. These questions weren’t you being a friend or a decent person. You were trying to find out of I’m having an affair with Chris. I can’t believe this!” She sprang to her feet and walked away from the table.

 “You’re overreacting, Ana. I never accused you of anything. All I wanted to do was catch up with you.”

 “Bullshit!” She rolled her eyes, turned her back to you then looked at you again.

 “By you coming to me like this it shows how scared you are. Do you feel threatened by me, Uriah? Worried that Chris likes me more than you? Scared that our connection is better than yours?” She was trying to get to you, you could tell. You refused to play this game.

 “Look, Ana, I’m not here to play games with you.”

 “No, you’re here to see how much of a threat I am for your marriage. What you should be thinking about is do you actually have a marriage still?” She didn’t give you a chance to reply before she walked out the door slamming it behind her.

 “This bitch!” She just moved her next chess piece—the knight.

 ~~~~~~~~

When you got to Chris’ room that evening you were even angrier than you were at brunch with Ana. You should have thrown her out the fucking window instead of playing nice with her. Yes, a tactical approach was the best but a show of dominance and violence was always a good move. You hadn’t made one misstep. You didn’t take the con too far, you weren’t too passive or direct. She had always been on edge. She probably was suspicious from the moment she walked in. You knew better than anyone a guilty conscience would always see a threat even where there was none. You were a threat though. You knew now she wasn’t as innocent as she pretended to be. That made you wonder just what the fuck was going on.

 According to Chris’ assistant, he was busy doing some last-minute interviews and events for Knives Out. You took advantage of the quiet and time alone by thoroughly scanning his room, especially where the backgrounds of his facetime call and her image looked identical. There was no mistaking it in person. They were the same. After you roamed around the room wondering just what the walls would say if they could talk. Would they tell you all their sorted secrets about your husband and a particularly hazel-eyed co-star? Would they speak of his fidelity and boringness or would they speak about his betrayal?

 When you’d thought yourself weary, you moved on to ways to relax which included taking a long bath and feasting on room service. It was a good distraction but that was all it was—a distraction. One that you knew would end as soon as Chris got back. You would have to address the literal elephant in the room the picture.

 You were so distracted by the view from the living room window and your tumultuous thoughts and feelings that you almost didn’t hear when the door opened, and Chris walked in.

 “Uriah.” You looked to see him standing there dressed in perfect business casual wear with his hair perfectly tousled. You would never think he was unattractive. For a few moments, his eyes left your face and roamed over your robe-clad body and down your exposed leg. As he scanned you, he walked more into the room.

 “Hi.”

“You’re not supposed to be here in San Diego. I thought we were meeting in LA.

 “I know, I just—wanted to be here.”

 Chris sighed and sat in a seat across from you. you found it a little strange that he hadn’t seen you in a week and he hadn’t come over to greet you or initiate contact. As you were going to bring it up, Chris began speaking again.

 “Checking up on me?” His words rubbed you the wrong way. Turning around to face him you crossed your legs not caring that they were fully exposed.

 “Should I be checking on you? I wasn’t aware you needed checking up on.”

 He kept eye contact with you. You could see the tight clench in his jaw and the straight line of his lips. He was annoyed.

 “Did you lure Ana to lunch and accuse her of having an affair with me?”

 Closing your eyes, you sighed and cracked your neck. You’d just jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. The bitch had tattled and moved her second chess piece at the same time.

 “Don’t lie to me Uriah,” Chris warned through tightly clenched jaws.

 “I did not accuse her of anything.”

 “So, you did lure her to lunch and treated her like a homewrecker and threatened my career and name in the industry?”

 “Are you kidding me, Chris?”

 “Are you kidding me, Uriah?!” He sprang to his feet like a firework shell shooting into the air. You could feel the anger coming off of him.

 “I cannot believe you would do this! Why would you do this?”

 “Me? Why would I do this? Why would you do this?”

 “What are you talking about? What have I done Uriah?” You got off the couch and made your way to your purse for your phone. If he wanted to play the fool you would enlighten him. once you found the picture you shoved it in his face.

 “What the fuck is that?” You watched him as he scanned the post then rolled his eyes.

 “It’s a post.”

 “No shit it’s a post. Did you send her that sweater?”

 “So what? I wasn’t going to wear it, she liked it so I gave it away.”

 “And this?” You pointed to the background of the picture and then went to the still of his facetime call.

 “What about this? Why does your background which is here, identically match hers?”

 Chris looked at you like you were bat shit crazy as if he had no idea who you were.

 “Don’t look at me like I’m crazy. What the fuck is this?”

 He didn’t speak, he just stared at you.

 “I’ve suppressed the urge to ask the question because of everything we’ve been through these last months but come on Chris. I can only be so complacent.”

 “Ask the question, Uriah. I dare you.” It was another warning. You flared your nose and hesitated. You knew if you asked it you’d be right back where you were before therapy. The hurt on his face was evident. He looked as if he were holding back tears.

 “Ask it!”

 “Why do your backgrounds match?”

 “They are hotel rooms, I’m sure they are all identical.”

 “Bullshit!” You walked away from him and to the window.

“Did you come here to confront her--to confront me?” You clenched your jaw and fought back your tears.

 “I wanted to see where your head was and the opportunity arose to see where hers was too,” you explained.

 “Satisfied? Was her denial enough?”

 “She didn’t deny anything. She threw her cockiness around instead. Did she tell you that when she came running to you to get sympathy and create an even bigger wedge between us?”

 “This isn’t about her Uriah. This is about you. I thought you trusted me. I thought we’d moved past this and had turned a page and were moving forward. I thought we were stronger.”

 “I thought so too. I really tried not to come here with this. I debated it but Chris how can I look past this? If you were me, what would you have done?”

 “I wouldn’t come here accusing you or your costar or fucking!”

 “For the first half of our marriage you accused me of fucking Christiano! I just need you to explain this to me.”

 “I have nothing to explain. This wasn’t my room. She wasn’t here.”

 “So, she wasn’t in here dressed like that with you? You weren’t fucking her before this was taken?”

 He didn’t speak right away. He looked disappointed. He sighed and walked away facing his back to you.

 “I don’t think we’ll ever get past this.  The last two months were a waste of time. I thought we could move forward and be stronger because of the pain and the struggle but I don’t think we can.” He turned back to you in time for you to see a tear roll down his cheek.

 “I never lied to you. I’m not playing you either. That picture was not taken here. She’s never been in here.” He dropped his head and wiped his tears away. “I don’t think I should be here either.”

 He didn’t give you enough time to speak, he just walked out the door leaving you alone. You didn’t know what to think or believe at this point. You knew you weren’t crazy. You also knew that this bitch had shown her full hand. 

~~~~~~~~~

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[mikrowrites]

Beautiful People

Armitage Hux x Reader, Kylo Ren x Reader

Hi! I'd like to request a Hux x Reader in a modern AU where the reader is dating Kylo Ren because of status and for public appearances. And in comes Hux and the reader has feelings for him and he feels the same way but they have to keep it secret otherwise it's a scandal that'll ruin everyone. Also Kylo knows but doesn't want to let the reader go because he's an asshole. Thank youuuuuuu

A/N: I’m so excited about this story, it’s so unlike anything I’ve ever written! I hope you all enjoy! xx

Warnings: angst, toxic relationships, adult situations, sexual references, language, those who love Kylo should not read this it hurt to write him like this oof

Y/N carefully picked up a diamond earring, rubbing it between her index and middle fingers. After a beat she lifted it up, looking into her vanity mirror as she placed on her ear, the other following suit, letting her arms fall to her sides.

She studied her own face in the mirror, to her elegantly styled hair to her perfectly done makeup. Y/N pursed her ruby red lips, her gaze hardening.

She hated the person in the mirror.

Y/N L/N was born into a prominent family, the only child of two political powerhouses. Her childhood had been that of a princess’s, perhaps even of an heir. Fitting, due to Y/N’s inevitable future of continuing her parent’s legacies.

So here she sat, wearing diamond jewelry in a $10k dollar dress, in a penthouse flat. Y/N let her eyes flicker away from her reflection to the opening of the door behind her. She turned, inhaling softly.

“You look beautiful.” Kylo Ren murmured, stepping into the large room. He wore an expensive black tuxedo, his raven hair slicked back and his shoes definitely red bottoms.

“You don’t mean that.” Y/N curtly replied, still planted onto her vanity stool.

Kylo clicked his tongue. “You are.”

Y/N scoffed, standing and walking to her closet, opening the door and stepping inside the walk-in, searching for a clutch. “What would you like me to say? You look dashing and handsome?

“Thank you, I tried.” Kylo responded, infuriating her further.

Y/N finally found the clutch she was looking for walking out and briskly passing Kylo. She paused at the door, turning with a tight smile.

“If you bring home your slut tonight, please be quieter this time.”

The circumstances of Kylo and Y/N meeting were very much prepared. Kylo himself arose from European royalty, but instead chose to leave for America, becoming a citizen and changing his name as a teen and anticipating the world of politics. His distant uncle Sentor Snoke took him under his wing, bringing him up into the desired plane. Y/N’s father found an arrangement of Y/N and Kylo beneficial on many fronts, as much of a 21st Century arranged romance as you could get.

They had know each other for years, since their early twenties when they met during both of their studies at Harvard. Kylo and Y/N were actually friends once, unloading griefs upon each other, Y/N about her stifling parents and Kylo on his past dreams. He once wanted to be an Air Force pilot, once wanted to be an artist.

But as they were arranged, they grew cold, and as Y/N dreaded this appearance-cast relationship, she suspected Kylo did as well, though he tried, sometimes.

The car ride to the benefit was incurabley long with traffic, a thick silence hanging between Kylo and Y/N. The city noises were only apparent, Y/N casting her gaze out the shaded windows.

“Are you going to be like this all night?” Kylo finally spoke up.

“Don’t worry your pretty little head,” Y/N mumbled, still gazing at the city lights, “I’ll be a good little girl for us tonight.”

Kylo sighed. “We should announce an engagement soon. Call a tabloid or two and tip them off. Would be good press.”

Y/N turned to look at him with full eyes, casting her gaze down. “Trapped with each other forever.”

“You make it sound like prison.” Kylo growled, “We can come and go as we please. Put on a show for the idiots.”

Y/N finally met his eyes, biting her cheek. “Give me a few weeks, if you could be oh-so-kind.”

Kylo rolled his eyes as the car pulled up to the venue, the sounds of cameras flashing and paparazzi flooding the night. Y/N exhaled loudly, staring ahead. “Let’s give them a show.”

Armitage Hux was not an obscenely wealthy man. His father was big money, and Hux, he delved into politics to appease his father, climbing the ranks.

The benefit gala was a horrid idea in his opinion, too much frill and preening of celebrity-level politicians, who reeked of corruption and pretentiousness. But Hux went along with it, agreeing to help sponsor and put in an appearance.

Hux dreaded that his life would be married to politics, maybe a wife who was as money sick as everyone else, maybe one day he’d become as ugly as them all and become unbothered by the people he encountered.

He made his way past paparazzi, into the venue where he breathed a bit, walking up to a man in a crisp and ornate Air Force uniform. “I don’t like this idea.”

“Oh come on,” Commander Poe Dameron chuckled, clapping Hux’s back. “A little party never killed nobody.”

“Never say never.” Hux groaned, the Guatemalan-American raising an eyebrow.

“Look, I hate this arrangement too. But Princess Organa needs information, sometimes you have to play dirty.” He smirked.

Hux despised working with the royalty. In fact, he wanted nothing to do with them. But when the offer to bring down Kylo Ren showed itself, Hux couldn’t refuse. He hated that man, his arrogance and disgusting holier than thou complex. So he became a “spy”, if you will.

“So long as the dirt stays off my hands.” Hux spat, walking away from Poe.

Y/N walked down the carpet with Kylo, smiling at the paparazzi as they shouted praises and controversies. She hated this part the most, but Y/N had a remarkable and unreavealing smile.

Inside the venue Y/N and Kylo relaxed a bit, but they still knew the motions of the parts they had to play. Kylo, a ruthless politician and Y/N, a loving girlfriend.

Y/N was standing next to Kylo as he introduced himself and was speaking with someone prominent as she found herself scanning over the room. Her eyes gazed over every person until they suddenly stopped, zeroing in on someone.

Hux stood with a flute of champagne, forcing smiles at pretentious billionaires until he felt a stare embedding into him. He turned, his eyes meeting that of a beautiful girl’s. Not just any beautiful girl, Kylo Ren’s girlfriend.

Hux nodded, Y/N smiling back. He read her expression, it was clear she’d rather be anywhere else. But what could Hux do about that? His heart did not race, his cheeks reddening, a cold sweat breaking out, absolutely not... right?

How could one pretty girl reduce Hux to this? A taken girl, by his enemy! He turned away from the girl, but still felt her gaze on him unwavering. She always held that affect upon him.

Y/N’s smile widened a bit as the red-head turned, still observing him intently. Kylo leaned near her ear, speaking in a deep voice. “Remember what you promised? Be a good girl.”

“Yes, your highness.” Y/N hissed through an unsuspecting smile, feeling Kylo tense at the hated nickname.

He grasped her wrist tight, Y/N gasping in surprise as Kylo pulled her close to him, his breath warm on her face. “Never fucking call me that again.” He then kissed her softly on the cheek, turning away to greet another wealthy businessman.

Y/N smiled sweetly, muttering about using the bathroom as she walked away, rubbing her wrist as she weaves through the crowd.

Hux pulled her aside once in the hallway, Y/N quickly pushing him against the wall. She grasped the man’s suit, ravenously pressing her lips against his. The man, grasped her shoulders, pulling her back. “Missed me that much, sweetheart?”

Y/N smirked. “I like a handsome man in a suit.”

“Obviously.” Hux smiled tightly, tucking a loose piece of hair behind her ear. “You look ravishing.”

“Armitage Hux, such a charmer.” Y/N chuckled. “We should just walk out there arm and arm, give the cameras something to squawk about.”

Hux’s smile dropped slowly, resting his forehead on Y/N’s, sighing. “We can’t.” he whispered.

“No, you’re right.” She mumbled, closing her eyes. “Just... hold me a bit longer.”

Hux wrapped his arms around her, his hand clutching the back of Y/N’s head.

“I’ll hold you as long as you wish, my dear.”

Y/N and Hux had met years and years prior, before she had even met Kylo. She was seventeen, visiting Dublin with her family when she encountered him. Hux was graduated from highschool, enjoying a gap year of foreign policy and preparation to embark to America.

They immediately clicked, becoming good friends and having weekly lunches at a local New York Dinner. They were close for a few years, until the letter from Harvard came and she flew away. Where she met Kylo and the whole mess began.

Whatever was happening between Y/N and Hux, call it an affair or call it a relationship, had been continual over five years.

Y/N suspected Kylo knew, but with unknown women weekly in their spare bedroom, she felt as though it never really mattered.

Hours later Y/N was climbing into the black SUV again, Kylo sitting across from her. The city lights blurred outside the window, a light drizzle of rainfall fogging the windows.

The two were silent. Y/N rested her chin in her hand, staring out the window, as Kylo stared comprehensively at the woman before him.

“You saw him.”

Y/N turned to him, raising an eyebrow.

Kylo scoffed, sitting back. “Didn’t you?”

She leaned forwards as the car pulled up to the apartments, the girl narrowing her eyebrows.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Y/N stepped out of the SUV, Kylo following as she stepped into the private elevator, pressing their floor number and swiping her keycard.

Kylo suddenly grabbed both sides of her face, kissing her deeply. Y/N raggedly gasped in shock, stumbling back as he pushed her up against the wall. She squirmed under his grip, finally breaking away and elbowing his chest, Y/N retreating back. Kylo licked his lips, chuckling as he turned to look at the elevator door as it chimed open.

He turned to look at her. “You’re mine. It’d be better for you not to forget that.”

Y/N’s lips parted, watching as Kylo walked out of the elevator and into their flat. He slammed their bedroom door behind him, the girl finally wandering into the penthouse. She unclasped her shoes, removing them and tossing them on the floor. Her dress hugged her body, but to Y/N it felt like it was suffocating her.

She sat on their plush couch, running her fingers across the fabric as her breath began to catch in her throat, Y/N gasping for air as tears began to trail down her cheeks. A broken sob escaped her lips as she began to rip pins out of her hair, her Y/H/C locks spilling out.

She knew Kylo could hear her despair. Could hear Y/N cry and sob and fall apart. But he never emerged to comfort her.

Y/N woke the next morning on the couch, still wearing the dress she used to love so much. She sat up, rubbing her head and catching her reflection in a wall-hanging mirror. Mascara tracked down her face, her hair a mess. After changing into a different shirt and shorts from the outside closet and cleaning her face Y/N sighed, standing and walking to the kitchen.

She carefully pulled a glass from the cabinet, turning on the faucet to fill it with water.

“Oh!”

Y/N whipped her head around. A young girl stood in the living room, her dark hair loose around her shoulders and a dress shirt, Kylo’s red dress shirt from the night before, covering her body.

“Hello.” Y/N softly replied, turning to switch off the faucet, taking a sip of water as she turned. “Would you like a glass of water? Something stronger?”

The girl’s mouth opened and closed, her features contorting into confusion. After a couple tense seconds she spoke. “Why... what’s...”

Y/N leaned across the counter, smiling softly at the girl. “What’s your name?”

She hesitated for a moment. “Rey.”

“Rey,” Y/N sat her glass down, interlacing her fingers. “I’m not stupid. I know you’ve been fucking Kylo for a while now. And honestly, I could care less. But here’s the thing,” She pushed away from the counter, approaching Rey. “you’re in dangerous water, Rey. This tiny world, this life. It’s not glamorous. And the last thing I want is for him to hurt you.”

Rey exhaled deeply, leaning against the back of the couch. “I’m... I’m sorry.” She pushed some hair behind her ear. “Kylo... he’s always been so kind to me. He told me, that you and him—“

“We’re simply a game.” Y/N smiled. “A game we can afford to loose.”

Rey left soon after, Y/N sitting in the living room going over several pieces of finance paperwork for her father’s firm. Kylo finally emerged from the bedroom, Y/N not skipping a beat as her eyes remained glued to the paper. “Rey is a sweet girl.”

Kylo’s face hardened. “Hux is an... interesting man.”

Y/N looked up, the papers falling down onto her lap. “Kylo, what are we doing? We both love different people, maybe we should just call it—“

“No.” Kylo frowned. “Terminating this relationship for other people would ruin us. All of us.”

“What’s the point anymore?” Y/N countered. “You’re powerful, I’m just a mantelpiece, and Rey would make a great—“

“You aren’t listening!” Kylo shouted, interrupting her. “I sacrificed everything to be here. I refuse to do that again.”

Y/N stood, the papers tumbling and fluttering out of her lap and onto the hardwood floor. “Why can’t you just let me go? We never loved each other, Snoke manipulated you into this relationship, into this role!”

“You always blame everything on Snoke, too scared to admit your faults.” Kylo spat.

“My faults?” Y/N yelled. “Mine? You are so fucking toxic, Kylo! You’re a fucking hazardous chemical!”

The slap echoed throughout the room, Y/N stumbling back and clutching the arm of a chair, reached her hand up to her cheek. She shakily looked up at Kylo, her eyes reflecting fear. She always thought of Kylo being all bark, no bite.

Y/N never thought he’d hurt her like this.

“Fuck. You.” She seethed, standing and shoving past Kylo, grabbing her coat and keys as she walked into the elevator, glaring at Kylo as the doors closed.

An hour later Hux answered a knock at his door, only to meet Y/N with sunglasses adorned on her face, her hood up. “Hey Armi.”

“Hey Y/N/N.” Hux responded, gesturing for her to come in. “To what do I owe the pleasure.”

“I want to leave. Somewhere far away from here, from politics and Kylo and the people. I want to disappear, and I want you to come with me.” Y/N insisted in a level voice. She removed her sunglasses and hood, Hux’s eyes widening at her bruised face.

He raised his hand up, carefully running his thumb over the bruise on her cheek before rushing to his freezer, returning and handing Y/N a frozen vegetable bag. “He... did he do this to you?”

“I can’t live like this anymore, Armitage.” Y/N pleaded, the girl pressing the bag against her cheek. “Remember when we went on that holiday to Greece?”

Hux’s face softened. “The one where you publicly fed birds whole gyros?”

Y/N smiled. “Yeah. That one. Let’s go back, let’s go and forget all of this. Please.”

Hux sat on his couch, Y/N settling down next to him. “It’d ruin us. Destroy our reputations, hurt any of our chances.”

“We’d be crazy to reveal such a scandal.” Y/N mused.

Hux reached over to pick up his laptop, flipping it open.

“When do you want to leave?”

[fallenhero-rebirth]

Hi! :-) I'm pretty bad at reading between the lines and understanding subtext, especially since English isn't my first language, so I thought it'd be easier to ask: when did The Big One happen? Was the world previous to that 'normal' (similar to ours)? What exactly did they do to MC at the farm? What, exactly, is a regene? Sorry for so many Q's, lol. I really love Fallen Hero but I feel like I'm missing a lot of information, or maybe not all of it has been published yet. Gr8 work! 🖤

The world before that was not entirely like ours, it diverged around 1900 or so. If our world focused a lot on the space race, atomic power, atomic bombs, getting to the moon, flight, satellites and things like that, the FH world focused a lot more on medical tech and what we would call cyborg tech. It’s behind on things like cellphones and the internet (think mid nineties for that) and we never went to the moon. Putting the new and updated timeline below.

A ReGene is a vat-grown body implanted with an artificial intelligence mind. They tend to be boosted in various ways, and subject to intense modifications since they have no rights, they tend to be used for experimental new technologies. If they die, they just grow more.

What the MC did at the Farm is spoilers.

History of the Fallen Hero world.

1945: World War II ends, but the technological arms race continues. The United States and the Soviet Union both 'recruit' available German and Japanese scientists, taking full advantage of what they learned from the more unconscionable experiments during the war.

1951: The Korean War very nearly turns nuclear when the first Chinese Type 52 bipedal tanks help push the UN forces out of the mountains and nearly out of the country. Though clumsy and slow, they prove to be useful in the mountainous terrain, leading to an upswing in the power armor industry.

1955: The Soviet Union announces that it has successfully created the first functional, cybernetic limb replacement. This is widely considered the start of the Cyber Race.

1957: The Soviet Union manages to successfully interface man and machine, leading to a quantum leap in power armor technology as bipedal movement patterns become a lot more organic.

1960's: The US repeatedly releases new versions of its power armor suits as the Vietnam war rages, the lighter, more maneuverable armors being more suitable for the terrain. Various upgrades for soldiers are becoming more and more common, and the nickname 'Mods' is coined for those changed by the cybernetic implants.

1968: The first so-called 'Masked Heroes' appear in public, Modded veterans from the Vietnam war angered by their treatment at the hands of the government and the public. Very soon afterwards, new villains also take to the stage, and the police find it increasingly difficult to deal with disturbed people who have military training and equipment.

1971: A metabolic diet pill launched without proper product testing turns out to have uncommon and dangerous side effects. Though most users die or are crippled, a certain lucky few develop powers hitherto unseen in humans. The pill is quickly nicknamed the 'Hero Drug' and though it is pulled off the market, use and research continues. People who have gained powers are nicknamed 'Boosts' in the media.

1976: The Hero Drug is declared an illegal narcotic, banned after causing the deaths of untold thousands of people. Still, the lure is too strong, and research moves underground and behind securely-locked corporate doors.

1979: Wei Chen, who will later be known to the public as Marshal Steel, is born.

1980: The Year of Hell. The Big One hits the West Coast, and the San Andreas fault causes a massive earthquake to strike Los Angeles, which triggers the Cascadia subduction zone a few days later. The massive earthquake and resulting tsunami throws the whole West Coast into disarray with more than 150,000 estimated dead and missing. As if this was not enough, three months later the Mammoth Lake volcanic system reawakens, and the resulting eruption destroys any hope of quickly salvaging the west.

1980-1990: Aftershocks ravage the West Coast, halting any rebuilding effort. Little by little rebuilding turns to evacuation, all efforts being put into getting the Midwest back on its feet to regain a stable food supply. Food riots are common and several armed uprisings against the increasingly-authoritarian government are struck down by the military.

1981: The US government is nearly paralyzed by refugees as well as the rain of ash covering most of the Midwest. President Clark declares martial law.

1982: ${ortega_name} Ortega, also known as Charge, is born.

1984: Los Angeles is renamed 'Los Diablos' in 'The Angels of Los Diablos,' a famous documentary about the rescue efforts.

1986: The GeniTech corporation patents the creation of lab-grown stem cell organs, revolutionizing the transplant industry.

Late 80s: Estimated birth of ${name} ${surname}, later known as Sidestep.

Early 90s: Fed up with the suffocating yoke of the federal government and martial law, more and more people start moving back into the ruins of the west, starting the recolonization. A disproportionate amount of these people are Enhanced heroes and villains, both Mods and Boosts fleeing government control.

1992: In an effort to increase private industry investments, the West Coast is declared a free economic zone, where there will only be the bare minimum of federal government oversight. No taxes. No regulations.

1992: The GeniTech corporation patents whole-body stem cell clones, allowing for large-scale harvesting of replacement organs. Following a tumultuous debate about the ethics involved, GeniTech is one of the first companies to move their corporate headquarters to Los Diablos to escape regulation.

1993: The Re-Gene project is first revealed in a New York Times article, claiming it dates back to the seventies with the goal of making androids for use in war. The author, Tim Mazetti, was killed in a traffic accident soon afterwards. The future Ranger, Lady Argent, is born.

1996: Los Diablos is up and running: the first Mayor is elected, and it is starting to look more and more like a functional city. With the huge changes to the coastline, large tracts of the South Bay are abandoned and the city shuffles inland. The future Ranger, Herald, is born. Chen drops out of high school.

1997: Appalled at the lack of law and order in the free economic zone, or the FEZ as people call it, the newly-elected President Ross creates the Marshal system. Recruiting some of the most famous masked heroes of the region, he funds the 'Rangers' initiative in order to stem the worst excesses of the Enhanced populace. Chen joins the army, gets a boyfriend. Mount Hood is one of the founding members of the Los Diablos Rangers, as is Sentinel.

1998: Chen is deployed overseas, SE Asia. Sentinel joins the Rangers.

1999: A breakthrough in energy technology leads to the first plasma reactors, leading to ever more compact cybernetics. Hollow Ground self-declares as the kingpin of Los Diablos. Chen's boyfriend is killed. Chen has an accident with an IED and loses his hands. His body proves to handle mods well, so apart from his hands the army invests in an access port for armor interface as well. Ortega has their accident and is used as a test subject for their cutting edge electrical mods and spinal column. Chen and Ortega meet in the hospital during rehab. Mount Hood becomes Marshal Hood of the Rangers.

2000: Intent on regaining lost influence, the US flexes its muscles in the Middle East. This leads to a series of proxy wars with the ailing Soviet Union. Chen gets deployed there, now piloting an armored suit instead of a helicopter. The first known sighting of a Re-Gene on the battlefield. Chen sees Re-Genes on the battlefield. Ortega debuts as Charge, sponsored by a military subcontractor because they want to see how the mods perform.

2001: Steel is sick of the army and what they are doing abroad. He has racked up enough commendations that he's considered a suitable candidate for the Rangers, equipped with a new, shiny armor. Meets up with Ortega again when they are both in for surgery upgrades, and Chen talks him into signing up for the Rangers. Ortega's father dies.

2002: Ortega joins the Rangers. Sentinel officially starts to transition, there's a lot of controversy that Hood shuts down. Sentinel is not fired.

2004: A huge scandal rocks the Re-Gene project after its operatives are suspected of human rights abuses in another proxy war in Panama. It is never brought to court as the Re-Genes themselves are androids with artificial minds, but the scandal moves the project back underground where it has remained ever since.

2005: The Special Directive is formed, rumored to be a black-ops strike team of Re-Genes, deployed against anyone deemed dangerous enough by the government.

2006: Anathema joins the Rangers. The Rangers team up with the Special Directive for a mission. It does not go frictionless.

2007: Ortega is promoted to Marshal after the death of Marshal Hood at the hands of Hollow Ground. Sunstream joins the Rangers.

2008: Sidestep debuts as a vigilante. Charge and Sidestep meet for the first time.

2009: Psychopathor is the villain headliner of that year until finally put to a stop by the Rangers and Sidestep. Dr. Mortum and the Vitruvian are active as villains, but not high key threats enough to be a target for the Rangers.

2010: The Catastrofiend goes on a year long rampage, tearing through the Marshal before disappearing again, a pattern that will be repeated over the years. Ashfall works closely with the Rangers, becoming another associate.

2011: Los Diablos is hit by the Nanosurge, a runaway nano-weapon devouring all flesh before it is contained by an alliance of heroes led by the Rangers. Sidestep plays a vital part in its defeat. Herald takes the hero drug and survives the boosting process. Psychopathor escapes. Sunstream quits the Rangers and disappears soon afterwards.

2012: The Void is looking to expand their Santa Ana territory into Los Diablos, and the Rangers strike back, leading to a final showdown in the southeast deserts.  Herald moves to Los Diablos. Dr. Mortum retires from active villain life, focusing on research.

2013: The Heartbreak incident occurs. Sidestep and Anathema are believed to be killed in action. Ortega retires as Marshal and hero, replaced by Steel. Sentinel and Herald meet.

2014: Ortega returns from retirement, joining the Rangers once more as Charge. Steel loses both his legs when he's nearly crushed under a building in the battle against the Catastrofiend that has resurfaced. The Catastrofiend gets securely locked up. Herald gets his first sponsorship (and name) as a corporate hero. Herald debits as a vigilante under a different name.

2015: Lady Argent debuts as a vigilante in San Francisco. Herald gets hired as a corporate hero, and gets his hero name.

2016: Lady Argent joins the Rangers. Steel nearly gets assassinated, losing an arm in the process. Sentinel retires. The Catastrofiend escapes, but disappears after a mercifully short rampage.

2017: The MC returns to Los Diablos under an assumed identity.

2018: Herald joins the Rangers.

2020: The events of Rebirth.

2021: The events of Retribution (the next book)

[haich-slash-cee]

Is the print publishing world picking up online/fandom terms? How they are using them? How do we feel about this?

So this is... attention-getting, for folks who like to follow publishing and meta stuff.

https://twitter.com/sapphicxrey/status/1215065948677443584

https://twitter.com/TorDotComPub/status/1233391556750647299

(2nd tweet -- TW, mentions of non-con)

Are we seeing the beginnings of book publishers directly borrowing from online/fandom culture in promoting their books? How do we feel about these examples?

More below cut.

Exhibit #1: screenshots of Bonds of Brass promo from Jan 8 2020. (Which is probably going to have reactions of “haha, cute” at most.)

Transcript of blurb: 

“If you like... 

forbidden romances, “there’s only one bed”, cityships, weaponized umbrellas, powersuits, secret princes, best friends, best friends PINING, fake dating between PINING best friends, tactical streaking, the minivan of starships, cigar-chomping cyborg ladies, scary empress moms, galactic-level bisexual disasters, LEGACY (WHAT IS A LEGACY?), rooftop hopping, golden trios, rumblin’ drums, bootleg fireworks, BIG SPACE BATTLES PEW PEW, a surprisingly functional public transit system, mob trouble, one hell of a pilot, the inherent DRAMA of empire, a nice interlude in a river, smoking a joint that’s been on the floor, sick stunts, slick grifts, hiding in a dumpster, or any combination of the above,

 Then you might like 

BONDS OF BRASS”

The Twitter responses seem to be generally enthusiastic. (And also, “FinnPoe! FinnPoe!”)

Personally, I’m intrigued from a meta-view of “oh so that’s definitely pulling from online world and fanfiction world, interesting. I wonder how much fanfiction culture is starting to influence print book culture and promotion.” Maybe I’ve got some questions like, “Ok so moneymaking companies such as Penguin are now using culture developed by the not-moneymaking-world of fanfiction? How do we feel about this?” Anyway, the book looks cute, I’m interested enough and I might get it from the library.

I suspect many people’s reactions are along the lines of “hm, interesting”, “sounds like a lark”, or “haha they’re using AO3 tags as promo”, etc. 

Exhibit #2, screenshots of DOCILE promo, from Feb 28 2020 (today is March 1 2020), and screenshots of Twitter responses so far:

(*CW, non-con discussion)

Tweet transcript:

“DOCILE by @KMSzpara:  

-Dubcon/Noncon 

-Dramatic Trillionaire Content 

-BDSM and then some more BDSM and then a lot more BDSM

 -Hurt/comfort and hurt/no comfort

 -Cinnamon roll of steel 

-The most scandalous kink: love 

-Courtroom, bedroom, & Preakness drama

[Tor book website link]”

So this is getting mixed reactions on Twitter. All dozen or so reactions, so far. Here’s text transcripts and bio info from repliers, below. I’m being a little obsessive, mostly to show that there’s a mix of queer, book-ish people in the replies (including the author).)

Noncon is nonconsentual sex, rape. Even in fandom it's a content tag, not a promotional term. I can't imagine being a rape survivor and seeing this come across my TL. -- @WriteSomeGood [queer rainbow] [Cis queer homemaker, aspiring author, maker of incredible cinnamon buns. She/her] [has a Tumblr page]

I’m not a survivor but it was an instant “no thank you” from me. And I was sincerely looking forward to this prior to. This is the most immediately off-putting marketing push I’ve seen for a book in a long damn time. -- @AGAWilmot [Author, editor, artist. Co-EIC of @anathemaspec. @SFU alum. The Death Scene Artist/W&W 2018. Ace/enby. They/them. Horror is my comfort food.]

Whichever intern wrote this tweet, deserves a full time job. With benefits. -- @simeontsanev [Aspiring writer, post-aspiring musician, and overall geek  He/Him /[queer rainbow]/ To the world we dream about, and the one we live in now! http://simeontsanev.com]

Idk why everyone thinks it’s always an intern writing copy and not a team comprised of extremely skilled social media experts, editors, publicists and marketers, and their assistants  I worked on those tags with my editor and a good friend!! -- @KMSzpara [Kellan. [queer rainbow]  Speculative fiction writer. Queer agenda.  Hugo & Nebula finalist.  DOCILE 3/3/20 from Tor Dot Com Publishing.  He/him.  Rep @suddenlyjen] *The author, bio page and twitter page.

this is CUTE! -- @MSSciarappa  [queer rainbow] I do books. he/him.

I am Extremely Ready for this content thank u -- @JessicaBCooper [Journo ☽ Writer of faerie, villain fuckery & cruel desires ☽ Lestat & Loki's love child ☽ Aleksander Morozova's side-hoe ☽ Rep'd by Kate Testerman @ktliterary]

I’m listening -- @MerynLobb [Government worker. Weightlifter. Nihilist. Aspiring cult leader. Avid user of words, often bad ones. #AMM R6 Mentee. she/her]

Soon! Soon!! -- @castrophony [Geek. Gamer. Cosplayer. Bibliophile. Scientist. She/Her.]

[happy reaction gif] -- @TorDotComPub [Providing a home for writers to tell SFF stories in exactly the number of words they choose. All our titles are available globally in print and DRM-free ebook.]

[throwing stuff in dumpster, unhappy reaction gif] -- @cursedgravy  [name's xavi, im a transman and i like to daydream about making content] 

For more context, here’s the blurb from the author website. Below is the blurb from the publisher’s site:

“Docile

K.M. Szpara

K. M. Szpara's Docile is a science fiction parable about love and sex, wealth and debt, abuse and power, a challenging tour de force that at turns seduces and startles.

There is no consent under capitalism.

To be a Docile is to be kept, body and soul, for the uses of the owner of your contract. To be a Docile is to forget, to disappear, to hide inside your body from the horrors of your service. To be a Docile is to sell yourself to pay your parents' debts and buy your children's future.

Elisha Wilder’s family has been ruined by debt, handed down to them from previous generations. His mother never recovered from the Dociline she took during her term as a Docile, so when Elisha decides to try and erase the family’s debt himself, he swears he will never take the drug that took his mother from him.

Too bad his contract has been purchased by Alexander Bishop III, whose ultra-rich family is the brains (and money) behind Dociline and the entire Office of Debt Resolution. When Elisha refuses Dociline, Alex refuses to believe that his family’s crowning achievement could have any negative side effects—and is determined to turn Elisha into the perfect Docile without it.

Content warning: Docile contains forthright depictions and discussions of rape and sexual abuse.”

So that’s a lot of info and reactions.

Personally: at first glance, I absently skimmed the tweet and “hurt/comfort” popped out, and I was like “What? Mainstream publishing is cool with this now? I was wondering if ‘hurt/comfort’ would one day become commonly used in publishing [related post]. But this is way sooner than I thought.” And then I read the rest of of the tweet and thought, “Wait, what?” 

And then I started reading through the tweet replies and thought, “OK, at the risk of getting a bunch of Tumblr drama, I want to bring this to the whump community and see how people feel."

As for myself, one of my squicks is non-con, and I’m not really interested in hurt/no comfort. So just from the tweet, I know the book is not for me. The official blurbs confirmed that. In this sense, this is like skimming Ao3 tags on a fic and saying “pass” on a story.

However, I have questions about the specific promotion of the book. So the official blurbs are pretty standard. What about that tweet, which Tor (and the author, who helped put it together) put out? Because I think an official publisher’s Tweet comes with different context than Ao3 tags.

First, the different internet spaces. You can filter tags on Ao3 and Tumblr. I know you can mute words on Twitter, but is that the same thing? Also, would people be expecting these tags on Twitter? Compared to Ao3 or Tumblr or Tumblr Whump spaces?

Within the Tumblr Whump community, from what I’ve browsed, the community attitude (guidelines?) seem to be “Write and discuss what you want. Be sure to tag it, use content warnings, or otherwise clearly communicate if you have things that may be triggering. Respect people’s squicks/triggers. Walk away from what you don’t like.” Like, tumblr whump has a very specific culture of trying to balance discourse/stories about potentially very dark stuff, but also wanting to make sure the IRL people and Tumblr users are okay. There’s always posts going around about how to do this, are we doing this in the right way, ethics, so on. Also -- and people can correct me -- the whump tumblr space might be where tags are content warnings for people to stay away, and also what people might actively look for. So if any space is going to discuss if this promotional tweet checks out, I feel like it’s this space. 

Also, to note again, Tor Tweets are in the money-official-publisher-world, not unpaid-tumblr-people or unpaid-fanfiction-fandom-world.

Maybe I just want to ask, “Hey those first two tweet responses, does they have a point? Tor using ‘noncon’ as official promotion? On Twitter?” I mean, I’ve previously written, “The CW and TW tags that Ao3 writers use, I really wish those were used with published books as well.” But somehow, the Tor tweet was not quite what I was expecting. Maybe for reasons similar to that first tweet response. (I guess one could debate if a tweet is really promotion or just information... you know what someone can correct me, but I’m gonna say that a Tor.com tweet is promotion, compared to information like Ao3, and that tweet was there for promotion.)

Those tags operate within specific Ao3 and Tumblr cultures and infrastructure. I don’t hang around Twitter for whump stuff, IDK what the culture is. Anyway, does dropping these tags into a promotional tweet from Tor.... translate?

The tweet is evidently gathering the people who are there for it, and the people who aren’t there for it are quickly realizing that they are not there for it. But personally, the Tor website blurb does a better job at that, using writing that I’d expect from a publisher for communicating fictional non-con situations. (Maybe the blurb content warnings are what I wanted more of, when I said I wished for CW and TW in books.)

Anyway, there’s no huge drama about that Docile book promo on Twitter, as far as I can tell. So this is a niche thing, right now. But. The promo for Bonds of Brass and for Docile might be the beginnings of a trend of well-known book publishers borrowing from online writing / fandom culture and terminology in order to promote or categorize their books. These two promos might set a precedent or have other significance.

So if anyone has discourse on the tweets or potential future trends... 

[scrambledgegs]

Too Late the Hero

    It was Harvey Dent who uttered the famous lines, “You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” A foreshadowing statement, as Dent later on personifies his very words when he goes on to become Two Face in the “The Dark Knight” Batman movies.

     This statement cannot be any truer, and we all can recount both real-life and fictional characters who easily represent this notion. The true-to-life “villains” we know of today may have actually started out as idealists, heroes, or savior-like archetypes that we used to looked up to – and looked past whatever side blemishes they also possessed in order to justify their actions. I think the best contemporary example of this – is the person whom Filipinos notoriously love to discuss nowadays – the person that needs no introduction, President Duterte.

About to Croak?

     President Duterte has recently been the talk of the town all the more when rumors circulated that he may have contracted COVID-19, while other rumors pointedly said that he was already on his deathbed. To augment such rumors, it was said that he may have allegedly even flown to Singapore to have himself checked. His office was quick to quash any such news by posting proof of life photos of the President, where he is seen to be eating a meal with the first family in Davao. Well, one thing we can all agree on however, is that he did not look his best. 

     The more significant and underlying message in this recent raucous is that, the general consensus on social media is that many had their fingers crossed for a new President. It looks like Duterte’s star power is quickly fading.

RUDY and RODY

   I was reminded of a conversation that a friend and I had around three weeks ago. During our usual, light political banter, I suddenly remembered how my parents used to compare President Duterte to American political icon, “Rudy” Giuliani. Quite serendipitously (and as though Netflix read my phone messages or possibly my mind), minutes later, I came across a new Netflix documentary entitled “Fear City: New York vs. The Mafia” where Giuliani is documented to have played a significant role in.

     This true crime documentary examines the rise and fall of organized crime in New York in the 1970s to early 1980s. It narrates the dark tale of how the Big Apple once transformed into the playground of underbelly operations of The Mafia – composed of the five major Italian-American crime families and their sophisticated network of ruthless henchmen. Law enforcers could not put a stop to their rings of crime, or even implicate them, and others that dared come close, found themselves or their loved ones in a rather, messy situation. These crime families of Italian descent were basically your true-to-life gangsters from which The Godfather Trilogy was based on.

 Batman, Robin and Commissioner Gordon in Gotham City

     Bringing down the Mob back then was a feat everyone thought impossible. Nevertheless, joint forces between the FBI and Giuliani (then U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York; 1983 -1989), and his handpicked team of prosecutors were able to do so – and with much required grit and tenacity. Giuliani especially, was credited to be the single piece of rice that tipped the scale in this momentous moment in the history of criminal justice. After which, Giuliani’s political career began to skyrocket. Despite losing his first election in 1989, he eventually gets elected Mayor of New York in 1993, and then reelected in 1997 to hold the position until 2001.

    During his term as Mayor of New York, Giuliani’s most popular platform was his “toughness on crime.” Such that, the gentrification, revitalization and “clean-up” of New York and significant decrease in crime rates during those heyday years are largely attributed to him. His appointment of NYPD Chief of Police, Bill Bratton also proved effective, and is often the popular topic of business case studies today. Bratton did not resort to brute force alone. In fact, he was said to be data-driven, resourceful and efficient. His non-traditional, out-of-the-box thinking, many would agree, had indeed brought about real, lasting positive change in New York.

    Giuliani was also known for making popular what is known as the “perp walk”, wherein he would orchestrate public arrests, worthy of media frenzies and major headlines, of high-profile suspects, usually of white-collar crimes. The nature of these arrests garnered some criticism of course, but it was not enough then to tarnish his image and push him far away from the good graces of the American people, especially New Yorkers. He is also highly commended for his post-9/11 (2001) disaster responses and was even knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for these tremendous efforts. He was even named TIME magazine's Person of the Year in 2001.

 Fall from Grace   

    However, fast forward years later to now 2020, many of Giuliani’s constituents and longtime supporters who once held “America’s Mayor” of the highest esteem, often say that the Rudy Giuliani of the past is long gone. Embroiled in various controversies and investigations, not to mention issues that involve being President Trump’s current legal adviser, he has said to have become the very type of white-collar “perps” he used to round up and arrest. It is quite unfortunate, isn’t it, these kind of tragic hero to zero stories. Time is not on his side now, but who knows if there is still a chance for a comeback.

 Rudy Giuliani’s story sounds very familiar.

Rody

    Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, in Davao, Philippines to be exact, during the same time that Rudy Giuliani was rising to fame, there lived and breathed another Mayor with a very similar tough guy image – Rodrigo “Rody” Duterte. An attorney as well, he also began his career in the prosecutor’s office.

Photo taken from The New York Times: Rodrigo Duterte posing with an Uzi submachine gun in 1994, when he was mayor of Davao City in the Philippines.

 Duterte Harry

    Duterte “made his bones” by allegedly taking crime into his own hands. Before assuming the Presidency, he was known as the gun-toting, smart-talkin’, fearless and tough Mayor who cleaned up Davao which back then, was supposedly a war-torn region due to the emergence of the New People’s Army (NPA) post Marcos-regime. People nodded in approval because he produced “quick” results.

    If Rudy Giuliani had his Chief of Police, Bill Bratton and the NYPD, Rody Duterte had a comparable squad as well. With the help of his elite unit of police enforcers, coined as the “Davao Death Squad” (DDS), they were able to arrest crime suspects, such as alleged (but non-convicted) drug dealers and petty thieves and parade them throughout the streets, for behold, all to know and see. This sounds like the Filipino version of a perp walk. In extreme cases, sometimes suspects were allegedly found dead in alleys or eskinitas, their bloody bodies mutilated.

     Yet, it could be said that quite a number of Davaoenos, as well as Filipinos beyond the Mindanao region, supported this kind of vigilante method because they felt safer, and they felt that finally, the wheels of justice were turning. To simplify this narrative by using a fictional analogy again, it is the same train of thought on why we have a great admiration for Batman and the like.

     Many believed this was what the Philippines truly needed - a “strongman” to discipline the country, which to be fair, is an idea that can understandably seem like the right and sound solution, given the Philippines’s web of problems. Not many are willing to further dissect, assess and accept what is truly needed to lead the Philippines. Duterte’s notoriety thus gained much popularity, and his savior persona spread like wildfire throughout the country, propelling him to the Presidential seat in 2016.

One-Trick Pony in a Small Pond

    Four years later, come 2020, and here we are, amidst a terrible pandemic with no signs of turning the tide in favor of a victory. I’ve heard one too many times, friends and colleagues say how they despise being a Filipino, and are looking for opportunities to leave and start a new life elsewhere immediately. I can’t say I blame them.

     The once highly respected and beloved Davao Mayor has become the Philippines’s Public enemy number one, for reasons we all know today such as, but not limited to:

Militaristic and shotgun approaches instead of “comprehensive, scientific and systematic policies” to mitigate the pandemic  (Read: Lives vs Livelihood Tradeoff?, August 5, 2020)

Lack of economic and fiscal planning and No transparency on stimulus packages and foreign loans (Read: A Perfect Storm, May 22, 2020)

Preferential treatment towards those in positions of power and unequal application of the law (Read: On lockdown and pushed over the edge, April 30, 2020)

Playing Russian Roulette on community quarantine implementations

Deflecting faults and shortcomings through the “Pasaway citizen” narrative

Demeaning local government leaders/efforts when they come up with their own local initiatives

Putting China’s interests ahead of the Philippines (Read: From Ugly Duckling to Black Swan, April 3, 2020)

And some of the more specific controversies that we can’t help but feel overwhelming emotions for:

Trial of Maria Ressa and his attack on free press and journalism

Shutdown of ABS-CBN which includes 11,000 employees to lose their jobs during a time like this

Inaction of recent PhilHealth scandal

  Perhaps si Mayor should have stayed as Mayor, or perhaps evolved to a different role beyond public service, instead of eyeing gargantuan tasks too big for him to handle. He may have been “effective” as Davao’s Mayor, but running a country is a whole different ballgame.

     It was in fact, the late Miriam Santiago, during the final 2016 Presidential debate held in Dagupan, Pangasinan (April 24, 2016) who pointed out, “We are not choosing a manager, administrator, etc. We are choosing the next President of the Philippines for the next 6 years.“ She even went on to enumerate three minimum criteria that a President must have in his or her arsenal in order to effectively lead, such as “1) Academic Excellence; 2) Professional Excellence, and 3) Moral Integrity” – all of which majority Filipinos flippantly shrugged off as useless qualities. I agreed with her which is why I voted for Mar Roxas. Maybe those who voted for Duterte regret this decision now, and hopefully see the wisdom behind Santiago’s statements.

     As I’ve said many times over, Duterte peddled a dream that the Philippines can only be great again with an “iron-fisted” leader, and sadly but quite expectedly, our misinformed voters ate it all up - hook, line and sinker. (Read: ORAS NA, April 26, 2016).

    I’d like to believe that Duterte perhaps started out as an idealist, with the genuine desire to carve out change where he thought he could. However, somewhere along the way, he lost himself and what he stood for when he let his ego get in the way. I think he himself now knows, but cannot admit to the public, that a one-trick pony has no business leading a highly complex, difficult and problematic country such as the Philippines.

More Analogies in 2020: The Year of the Rat led by the Pied Piper

    Other than Duterte, three other political personalities that will forever be remembered as the shameful faces of the COVID-19 situation in the Philippines are Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque, Speaker of the House Allan Peter Cayetano and the ever-infamous, Department of Health Secretary Francisco Duque. I surmise history will not be so kind to them, and their roles and decisions in this crisis will continue to be told on, even when “this is all over.”

Infestation of Rats

    These three loyal lackeys of Duterte can be likened to the rats in the children’s fairy tale of the Pied Piper who is no less than Duterte. Roque, Cayetano and Duque seem like educated and smart people, leaving no other explanation for their horrible decisions, except that they have long sold their souls to Duterte, and are in too deep to back out now. They’ve let themselves fall under some kind of spell. A consolation in the story of the Pied Piper, is that the entranced rats follow the Pied Piper’s hypnotizing music to their eventual demise and drown at sea. The Pied Piper however, just leaves them there and walks on. Seems like a foreboding scenario, figuratively speaking.

      It would be best if the story ended there. However, we find that the Pied Piper, like our very own version, is a vengeful one, and will stop at nothing until he has accomplished a personal vendetta towards whomever crosses him. In our Pied Pier’s skewed view, he feels that his opponents have gravely wronged him, or have been incredibly ungrateful for all the “work” he has achieved. His next plan of action is to hit them where it hurts the most – by getting to the children or those “most vulnerable and without a voice”. Seizing the power of his position, he is able to demonize multitudes through his filthy words, terrorizing laws and drug wars. (Read: Dead Kids, February 20, 2020).

     In so many dark metaphors, in the dead of the night, while everyone cluelessly sleeps, the Pied Piper plays his hypnotizing song that “vulnerable communities” are uncontrollably drawn to, forced to follow, or fooled into blindly following, until they all disappear without a trace, possibly never to be found again.

Light at the end of a Long Tunnel    

    However, I think our Pied Piper may have made a costly miscalculation. He may have robbed the country blind and killed countless lives (directly and indirectly), while we ignorantly slept, but he has ignited a fire. He has seemed to awoken a sleeping giant – a sleeping giant, unified in anger against this administration and what it stands for. Is Change Coming?

[daesungindistress]

Not to keep talking about him, but you said he’s regarded as the worst k-celebrity? That’s weird that they deem him worst than his “friends”. Maybe because his shit is STILL dragging on months later?

The molka stuff was only a small part of a much larger scandal. The reason there’s still so much discourse about it among VIPs is because, based on my observations at the time, his presence in the molka chats is what prompted most fans to drop him (and many of them stopped paying attention after that). His remaining fans know this and are focusing so much of their fight on that in an effort to reverse the narrative and regain support for him. It’s a complete waste of time though; they’re running circles around themselves trying to disprove something Seungri himself already admitted to ages ago. “Those messages aren’t my entire life,” he said when asked why he didn’t reprimand JJY for the illegal videos he shared in the chats. He was there, he saw, he knew.

(What’s funny is they can’t even keep their own stories straight; I’ve had anons in my inbox the last few days trying to erase his presence in the chats with “It wasn’t Seungri, it was Lee Jonghyun!” and “It wasn’t Seungri, it was another Lee Seunghyun!” And not a peep about his Chosun interview. It sure is funny watching them trip over themselves trying to get it right when the answer has been right there in front of them all along.)

I think about this sometimes… how for those who weren’t in the fandom back then and/or weren’t following along, much of Seungri’s role in the Burning Sun controversy is going to be lost to time. New fans will take an interest in Big Bang and join the fandom and no doubt they’ll ask, “What happened to Seungri?” And there’s just no way to sum it all up cleanly and concisely. There’s too much. It would be nice to see someone put together a timeline of events, but I have a feeling the only people possessing that kind of dedication to the case nowadays are the fans still committed to defending him. No thanks.

Anyway, just for funsies, here’s a list of as many allegations as I can think of off the top of my head, with explanations that I tried (and failed ofc) to keep condensed. Just various things for anyone who’s new here…

- The alleged drugging and sexual assault of women by wealthy clients in the VIP room at the club Burning Sun. Burning Sun was widely known as Seungri’s club as he had spent the better part of the prior year (2018) promoting it, calling it his, DJ-ing there, etc… proudly boasting throughout his solo promotions about how, unlike most celebrities, he doesn’t just loan out his name and face, he manages his businesses himself. Because of this, no matter how hard he backpedaled when the news about Burning Sun broke, insisting that he wasn’t responsible for the day-to-day operations of the club and didn’t have a clue about what was happening there, there was no separating himself from it completely. He was in too deep already. Worse, media got their hands on some club documents and found that he did in fact have part-ownership of the club – he was one of its investors and was even listed as the executive director. Granted, the percentage of shares he held was a very small one, but he really should have been forthcoming with that info from the start because this is what began the narrative that painted him as a liar. Or should I say he outed himself as one.

- Widespread corruption within the police force. Not just with regards to Burning Sun but many bars and clubs throughout the Gangnam area. It was suspected that local police had arrangements with the clubs to look the other way and often neglected to investigate crimes being reported on their premises. Minors entering the clubs, drug use, sexual violence, etc. This leads to…

- Police collusion… i.e., suspicions of having friends in high places. Seungri was in a chat with friends in which they discussed Choi Jonghoon having a DUI covered up and kept quiet, the news suppressed. Not even his own agency knew. Seungri said, “Don’t think that it’ll be covered up the next time you drink and drive. [Name redacted] hyung used his own money to keep them from telling.” His “Korean law is shit, that’s why I love it” comment in another chat didn’t earn him any brownie points with the public either.

- More on bribing the police: Seungri and his business partner Yoo Insuk had connections with a high-ranking police official, one referred to in the chats as “police chief”. This turned out to be Superintendent Yoon, who was suspected of alerting them to violations related to his other club, Monkey Museum, and helping them avoid prosecution for it. Seungri had registered the business as a general restaurant but began operating the business outside the limits of an ordinary restaurant (installing a stage, dance floor, etc) despite being aware that it could become a legal issue down the road. He was suspected to have done so for the purpose of paying lower taxes.

This is where the Food & Sanitation Act charge comes in. Not especially major in itself, the bigger issue was Seungri suggesting in the chats that they could just bribe the police if there was ever a crackdown.

Superintendent Yoon had meals and went on golf outings with Seungri & Yoo Insuk. They said that he paid for his portion every time, however it was found that SR & Yoo had in fact treated him on a few occasions. Big Bang concert tickets were also given as gifts. However, it was determined that the value of what they gave him didn’t quite meet the threshold to be considered a crime, so bribery charges were dropped… on a technicality. Superintendent Yoon is currently being detained on abuse of power charges related to another case.

- Financial crimes, i.e., embezzlement of Burning Sun funds (together with Yoo Insuk, totaling almost a million dollars) and embezzlement of funds from Monkey Museum to pay the attorney’s fees for a DJ accused of sexual assault.

- Prostitution mediation, i.e., arranging sex workers for foreign investors of his 2015 startup Yuri Holdings. He was investigated for 2 instances of this occurring in late 2015 (Club Arena and the “Seung-tsby” Christmas Party), and another at his big birthday bash in the Philippines in 2017. Charges related to the Philippines party were dropped as it couldn’t “legally be seen as prostitution” but I personally think the evidence presented is substantial enough to warrant suspicion.

- Soliciting prostitution for himself. At first he claimed it was “someone he knew before” and said he hadn’t paid her for sex, but police were able to trace payment records back to the establishment where she worked. He reportedly admitted to the charge at his arrest warrant hearing in May.

- Molka (spycam), i.e., secretly filmed photos and videos of women in sexual situations, taken by Seungri’s friends and business partners and shared in a group chat in which he was present. Questions were raised about why he didn’t at least reprimand them. It was later discovered that not only were the victims filmed without their consent, many of them had been drugged and raped… and some were even used against the women as blackmail.

- Instigating the destruction of evidence by advising his friends to change their phones when these chats were released to the public. Reportedly, of the phones handed to police, all but one were new / wiped clean.

- Here’s something I’ll forever be curious about: it was reported that Seungri had been using Burning Sun funds to pay his YGE-appointed manager a separate salary (in addition to his regular salary from the agency) without informing the company. And it was no small amount. I’m not sure why he did this or why, exactly, it’s a problem, but apparently it’s a big no-no because when YGE learned of it Seungri’s manager was promptly let go.

- Gambling. This first came up back in the spring when a chat was released that showed Seungri talking about money he’d won through gambling and telling a business acquaintance he could win big too. In response to this, Seungri said he was only “bluffing”, that he hadn’t really won any money through gambling… Well, months later he was formally called in for questioning on suspicions of habitual gambling and illegal currency exchange transactions. The currency exchange suspicions were dropped in the end, the gambling charge he reportedly admitted to. As for that chat? I think it’s safe to say he wasn’t bluffing that day.

- There was also that gross chat that appeared to show him offering women to a business acquaintance? The man was traveling and asked for a woman, and Seungri responded with photos of a few women, detailed descriptions of their personalities, and price. Pretty sure this is where the trafficking accusations you still see floating around occasionally come from. His explanation for that was essentially “It wasn’t what it looked like.” He said it was about travel companions, not sex, and they never went through with it. IDK what to make of it, but let’s be honest, that was going to reflect badly on him no matter how he spun it.

- Things got really wild when speculation about him having connections to the Chinese triad (organized crime) started up due to his business relationship with a powerful woman known as Madam Lin. She was one of his investors and according to police statements, is believed to have aided in helping him embezzle funds from Burning Sun. Korean police summoned her for questioning and requested her cooperation multiple times to no avail.

…I’ll stop there, but just keep in mind there is more, suspicions that didn’t seem to lead anywhere in the end but that dealt blow after blow after blow to what little was left of his reputation. The whole thing became mind-boggling. I think it’s easier for us as IVIPs to forget the fervor that swept the nation as this scandal erupted because we weren’t really there for it, not in the same way as Koreans who must have seen it plastered across every major news station day in and day out for months… people who saw their fellow citizens protesting in the streets against the atrocities reported at Burning Sun and the corruption in the police force that failed to prevent it. And yes… in a way, it’s still dragging on. Seungri was known for having connections everywhere, even where you’d least expect it; here that reputation of his worked against him as the floodgates opened and he became the connecting piece for all the nasty that came pouring out. And you know what they say: the bigger they are, the harder they fall. He wanted to be famous. Now he’s infamous.

[rockandrollstorytime]

Rock and Roll Storytime #5: Brian Jones and His Five(?) Children

While I will absolutely admit to being infatuated with dead rock stars, that doesn’t mean I’m going to give them a pass for everything they’ve ever done. Take for example, Brian Jones. While I think he is quite cute and an extraordinarily talented musician, there’s the fact that he was also abusive towards women, and he was never really involved in the lives of any of the multiple children he sired.

Hell, he was so bad in regards to having responsible sex, we don’t even know how many children he had for sure.

What I’m going to do with this is tell you how his five confirmed children came into the world and maybe even talk about some of the speculated ones this time. 

Confirmed:

1. Barry David Corbett (aka Simon): So, let’s face it, Brian started out young, being just seventeen when he got his then girlfriend, Valerie Corbett pregnant (sources vary as to whether she was fourteen or seventeen when this happened). What’s important to remember is that the adults of Brian’s generation heavily disapproved of teenage pregnancy (some of it owing to how we used to be a lot more religious), and if Call the Midwife is anything to go by (great show by the way), it was usually the parents who would determine whether a teenage mother was able to keep her unborn child. Most often, it seems, the child would be given up for adoption, though it seems that sometimes, a shotgun wedding would be initiated, and in rarer cases, the grandparents would bring the child up under the impression that the mother was actually an older sister, whilst they posed as the biological parents (think Jack Nicholson). Reportedly, Brian encouraged Valerie to get an abortion, which, mind you was illegal at the time, but she refused. She gave birth to little Barry on May 29, 1960, and he was subsequently adopted out and renamed Simon. Reportedly, he eventually found out that Brian was his father in 2004, and by then, he was married with two kids of his own.

2. Unknown (Known as Belinda or Carol depending on the source): within months of getting Valerie pregnant, Brian was at it again. In this instance, he met a woman only known as Angelique at a dance and the two had a one-night-stand. As it turns out, the 23-year-old was married and had been going through a rough patch with her husband. When she turned up pregnant, she and her husband ultimately decided to keep the baby, and on August 4, 1960, Brian’s only known daughter was born. According to Bill Wyman, Brian never knew about his eldest daughter’s birth, and in a similar vein, the subject of Brian Jones was taboo in Belinda’s household, given the pain it caused both her parents (which is also the reason we don’t know her real name). Bill’s book Stone Alone, states that she realized that her father wasn’t her biological father when she was six, and that she realized Brian was her father when she was fifteen after her brother brought home a Rolling Stones record (Through the Past Darkly, Big Hits Vol. 2). In talking to Belinda, Bill also discovered that she had temporal lobe epilepsy, which to the pair of them, explained Brian’s hypochondriac tendencies, as well as some of his behaviors (for instance, Bill said that in about a minute, Brian would go from being fully engaged in a conversation to being completely disengaged). While the truth of the matter is, we’ll never know for sure whether or not Brian had epilepsy (because we knew jackshit about mental health back in the day), I personally think it’s an interesting explanation for Brian’s health problems, and that theory might even shine a light on what might have happened the night he drowned.

3. Julian Mark Andrews: Surely, Brian was living the “Sex, drugs, and rock and roll” lifestyle well before he became a rock star. After returning to Cheltenham after the scandal that was him getting Valerie pregnant, Brian began dating 15-year-old Pat Andrews. When she was sixteen, she fell pregnant with his child, and by her own admission, she was so naive about childbirth that she didn’t even realize she was pregnant until her sister marched her into the doctor’s office. On October 22, 1961, she gave birth to Julian Mark, named after Julian “Cannonball” Adderley. By all accounts, on the day Mark was born, Brian sold four of his records (his most prized possessions) in order to buy flowers for Pat and clothes for his newborn son. He was even involved in their lives for a while, but sadly, this arrangement wouldn’t last. For one thing, Brian was very promiscuous, and he was never good at the whole “fidelity” thing. Another possible explanation is that one time, when Pat and Mark came to spend a day with Brian after he became famous, his manager, Andrew Loog Oldham, started bitching about how Brian shouldn’t be seen as a “family man” (even though Bill Wyman was married and had a young son). Apparently, Andrew wanted to market Brian as a hot young bachelor that the fangirls would have no qualms squeeing over. In either case, Brian soon cut all ties with Pat. In addition, according to Paul Trynka, Mick Jagger once made a drunken pass at Pat (she rejected his advances), and Mick apparently bragged to Brian that they’d had a drunken fling. According to Pat, Brian never gave her a chance to explain her side of the story, and that was around the time Brian cut all ties. In 1966, she sued Brian for child support, and when Brian failed to show up to court, the very pissed-off judge awarded Pat the maximum sum allowed at the time: £2.50 a week for Mark as well as another  £78 to cover Pat’s court costs and confinement expenses. After Brian’s death though, the payments stopped coming in. On a side-note: Laura Jackson’s book states that Mark has no memories of his father.

4. Julian Brian Lawrence Leitch: Before anyone says anything, yes Brian has two sons named Julian, and allegedly, he wanted all of his sons to be named after Cannonball Adderley. In 1964, Brian had been dating a 17-year-old Linda Lawrence for two years. She subsequently gave birth to his third son on July 23, 1964. Reportedly, he was involved for a brief while whilst he lived with Linda and her parents, but then he was kicked out after it became clear that he had no intentions of marrying Linda. She came forward against Brian with a paternity suit in 1965, and ultimately, she received a £1,000 settlement. In October 1970, she married Brian’s friend and fellow musician Donovan Leitch (simply known as Donovan in most parts) who later taught Julian to play guitar. For the curious, there are clips of him online singing “Sympathy for the Devil,” and he later became the father of Joolz Leitch Jones, who like his father, grandfather, and step-grandfather, is a musician.

5. Paul Molloy (John Maynard): This one is an utter doozy even when you take into account the usual low standards surrounding any given rock star and his/her children. This story starts with Brian dating 19-year-old Dawn Molloy on and off again throughout 1964 (while he was still seeing Linda, mind you), and her eventually becoming pregnant. At around this time, Brian was ordered by Andrew to never contact her again. Subsequently, Andrew, in a case of severely misguided damage control, essentially coerced Dawn into signing a non-disclosure agreement, which stated that the matter was now closed and she would never go to the public or press about the child being Brian’s (the whole thing was witnessed by Mick Jagger). In exchange for her silence, she would be awarded £700. Her parents were not supportive of her during her pregnancy, and she was sent to a home for unmarried, expectant mothers, where, on March 24, 1965, she gave birth to Paul. Soon after, she was forced to give up her son for adoption, and told that she would never be able to see him again (those of you who’ve seen the film Philomena or Call the Midwife will probably get an idea of what I’ve been describing). Paul was renamed John, and while he did know that he was adopted, he did, at least, know he was loved. Some thirty years later, John, having married and had three kids of his own, went looking for his birth family, and was eventually able to find his birth mother and information about his late birth father. Mother and son have both spoken about their experiences since; Dawn wrote a book entitled Not Fade Away, and John spoke to the Daily Mail, where he said of Brian, “First, I'd probably hit him for what he did to Dawn. Then I'd brush him down and ask him if he wanted a coffee. I'd like to chat with him. To get to know him and for him to get to know me. He'd like me, I know he would. I'd want him to be proud of me. To be honest, I'd just want him to be my dad.”

Unconfirmed/Rumored:

-Marlon Richards: For a while, people suspected that Marlon was actually Brian’s son for a while because when he was little, he was blond and had a cherubic face, though I could argue that this came more from his mother, Anita Pallenberg. Even if I could already dispute the idea that Marlon is Brian’s son, given how Brian and Anita’s relationship came to a legendarily messy finish in 1967, there’s also the fact that Marlon grew up to look exactly like Keith. Still, figured I might as well debunk this old rumor.

-Timmy Faithless: This one comes straight from Australian tabloids in which it is claimed his mother, Loriann (the article will make sure you remember she was a Satanist, which doesn’t matter to me, but whatever), conceived after a Melbourne concert. As with anything in the tabloids though, I tend to doubt the veracity of such claims (it might help if we had Brian’s DNA on file, but last I checked, police don’t really have a good reason to dig up Brian’s skeleton).

-Anna Wohlin claimed to have been carrying Brian’s child, but miscarried shortly after his death, likely due to the high stress and duress caused by the situation. However, I personally think she’s a bit of an unreliable witness, so I’ll just leave that to conjecture.

-Barbara Wolf: In 2019, she came out of the woodworks to allege that Brian was her father and that he was murdered by Frank Thorogood (she is not the only one of Brian’s children to believe he was murdered). Once again though, considering this story seems to have originated in a tabloid, I’ll just sit over here being my highly skeptical self.

-David Lars “Cannonball” Brandstone: Claimed to be writing a book about his dad set for release in 2008. Once again though, I find myself sorely doubting his claims about Brian (some of the details he gives in his interview are a bit... suspect to say the least).

If there’s anything to be taken away from what you just read, it’s that sometimes, people are going to be irresponsible as hell when it comes to... relations. As someone who has experienced something similar to what Brian’s children went through (teenage mother, absent father), I can certainly say that, while I respect Brian’s musical ability, I simply cannot condone his behavior in any of these cases. I know that it was a different time, but still, the fact that he got so many women pregnant and subsequently abandoned them is simply inexcusable.

Thank god for contraception and better sex ed. 

Sources: Brian Jones: The Making of the Rolling Stones by Paul Trynka Brian Jones: The Untold Life and Mysterious Death of a Legend by Laura Jackson 27: A History of the 27 Club through the Lives of Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, and Amy Winehouse by Howard Sounes Stone Alone by Bill Wyman https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1353783/Being-Brian-Joness-son-greatest-thing-happened-me.html http://www.angelfire.com/rock3/sixtiesfish/kidsweb/kids.html https://iorr.org/talk/read.php?1,2325726,2325735 http://www.angelfire.com/rock3/sixtiesfish/brianjones_son.html https://ultimateclassicrock.com/the-rolling-stones-children/ https://www.earcandymag.com/foundationstonebook-2.htm https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/daughter-rolling-stones-wild-child-17479033 https://born-late.blogspot.com/2011/09/legend-of-girl-child-linda.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Jones#Early_life_and_children https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8OANZg8_iE

[mysterious-prophetess]

Top Five Academic and Publishing Scandals of the last Decade

So, I’ve seen people do stuff like this, a round up of sorts and the 2010′s were an insane decade to be alive.

So, I thought I’d compile my personal favorite publishing and academic scandals

Note: This will concern only things that were actually published or a scandal to do with Academia. The Rose Christo incident with the infamous fanfic didn’t have the biography make it to print so it’s right here as a Dishonorable Mention. No sources, because this was a home-grown tumblr disaster (much like Dashcon). 

So, 

#5 That Book that Used Scammy Tactics to Become a Best Seller Before Anyone Ever Even Read It.

Remember that time when Handbook for Mortals used shady tactics to make it look like it was selling better in pre-sales than it actually was? I barely remembered it, but then as I was adding in our Dishonorable Mention, I suddenly had the thought of “remember that...” so here it is at #5 since this book was actually published, and it was allegedly terrible. It has 3 stars on Amazon, but with its past, I can’t even trust that.

I didn’t read it. I had, and still have, better things to do than to read subpar fantasy that tried to be the next Hunger Games/Harry Potter/Divergent. 

It turns out, if you have wealthy enough collaborators, or people who know how to game the system by which the NYT Bestsellers’ List operates, you too can buy and cheat your way onto that list with a terribly written book like these guys.

What’s even more ridiculous was there were already talks of a movie version and this unknown writer turned out to be, surprise, an actress too! And guess who’d be playing her own main character in the movie? The author! So, once this was unraveled as being a bulk-book-buying-cheat-tactic-to-get-on-the-NY Times-Bestseller-List, they lost their rank and were completely off the list. The movie is also toast, I think, since it would have come out in 2018. We’re now in 2020.

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#4: That time Bethesda Plagiarized Dungeons and Dragons.

That’s right folks. Bethesda, who cannot catch a break after their hilariously disastrous launch of their ongoing garbage fire, Fallout 76, were in trouble whenever they released a TTRPG module for an Elder Scrolls game that was suspiciously like a previously released Dungeons and Dragons adventure...because it was very much ripped off from the D&D book.  

There were articles highlighting just how they did this and how blatant it was. 

Some articles would do a side-by-side of huge chunks of the text and, yikes, that’s some obvious copy-pasting.

Suffice to say, they yanked this e-book down ASAP. (x) (xx) (xxx) (xxxx)

#3 That Time a Youtuber Turned Professional Games Media Editor Plagiarized for Most of His Career and Only Got Caught After He Plagiarized the Wrong Person on a Very Public Platform

So, yeah. There was a review last year for a game called Dead Cells (published by Motion Twin). On July 24, 2018 a smaller Youtube channel called Boomstick gaming would upload their review to the game. Then August 6th, IGN’s Nintendo editor would post “his” review up and Deadite from Boomstick Gaming, who was actually a fan of IGN, noticed a lot of eerie similarities between the reviews. He did a side-by-side video comparison (here) and it looks like a case of barely even changing the words around after copying someone else’s homework. As an English major, this is a clear-cut case of plagiarism. IGN agreed too, as did most of the internet. This reviewer had fans who still believe in him even after he’s been proven a plagiarist but, no accounting for taste am I right? And this would have been the end of it....had he just accepted his fate and just slunk off into the dark recesses of the internet. 

But, then he had to provoke both Jason Schrier of Kotaku AND the Internet in a now deleted non-apology video to “looking as hard as you’re able, you won’t find anything.”

Yeah. That didn’t end well for him. So, people went digging and found a shitton of evidence he was a serial plagiarist. No shock to me, because plagiarism is never something a plagiarist ever does just “once.” He’d ripped off his fellow IGN reviewers as well as forum posts and articles from other publications. He also plagiarized a resume template. Now, when you use one of those, you’re SUPPOSED to mimic the style, put place your own information, right? Well, he didn’t even do that.

Link to YongYea, a youtuber who covered the topic in depth. He has his videos on the topic in a playlist. (x)

#2 The Professor Who P-Hacked His Results to Pieces

Now if you don’t know or remember who Professor Brian Wansink is, he’s a former faculty member at Cornell who rose to fame with his papers on nutrition and people’s eating habits. I’m still not entirely sure how a guy whose degrees were not in nutrition OR psychology ended up being the face of this field that seemed to have a lot more to do with nutrition and psychology, but here we are. His degrees were, in fact, a B.S. in business administration from Wayne State College, an M.A. in  journalism and mass communication from Drake University, and a PhD in Marketing-Consumer behavior- from Stanford. In a move that one might call pure hubris or just complete and total social ignorance, he made a blog post that started to bring eyes on his work. Thanks to the efforts of other scientists (Like the Skeptical Scientist) and Heathers and Brown as well as the computer programs GRIM and GRIMMER, it was found the man who was cited over 200,000 times was a fraud. As of now 17 papers have been retracted and 15 have been corrected. He is no longer employed at all by Cornell, resigning a disgrace to his field and his former place of work.

The only reason he managed to get so big was he was able to make his so-called science digestible for the masses and able to give his works palatable titles. Ok, I’m done with the food puns. He was a superstar (even worked with the previous first lady on her health initiatives), which is why his fall is also meteoric. This is why you don’t torture your data into false positives, folks. Also, he’d target science journals that weren’t as prestigious and therefore wouldn’t have as rigorous a peer-editing process, allegedly. 

His actions have brought thousands of papers into jeopardy and destabilized his whole entire field because nothing he did was reproducible and that’s already a huge problem in science. 

(x) (xx) (xxx) (xxxx) (X) (XX)

And.... now for the worst Academic Scandal of the 2010′s....

#1 The College Admission’s Scandal

Because despite Wasink’s damage to his field (because now there are literally thousands of papers who cited him in jeopardy), and two separate cases of Plagiarists on this list, I really can’t help but feel this has to be one of the biggest College/Academia scandals of ALL TIME. Sure, it’s old news now but I’m recapping it because that’s what this list is for. So, A bunch of wealthy people who wanted their children to go to prestigious universities wanted a guarantee that just buying a new wing for the library/science buildings/etc wouldn’t get them. You know, the normal way the super rich buy their children’s ways into schools. Instead, they went to this guy Singer whose group masqueraded as a charity (and that’s what got their asses nailed) and facilitated bribery, cheating, and deception. They caught one of these parents who’d gotten their children in with Singer’s plans for a different crime, and he offered to squeal on Singer and his plot for leniency with his other charges.

Singer’s plan usually involved bribing coaches to get these undeserving students recruited for sports teams (and therefore displacing an actual athlete who should have gotten their spot) as well as having people alter SAT scores and other deceptive actions. 

It’s unknown if, at this time, any of these children of the 34 charged parents, actually managed to graduate with degrees from any of these institutions. However, those that had any of these students have to now decide what to do with them since these admissions are now verifiably fraudulent. Some are going to whole-sale kick them out or “cancel their admission” and others aren’t speaking up, and one has already decided the student gets to stay. Because they might not have known what their parents did, and its possible for the ones whose parents DIDN’T have them fake athleticism to not know what their mom and dad did. Hell, even most of the fake athletes might not have known thanks to reports of photo shopping their faces onto uniformed bodies. I do not know if any of these children were in on what their parents did, thought I suspect some might have been, but that’s merely speculation on my part. At the end of the day, it’s up to each affected university to carry out what they wish to do next.

The fact they made donations to a fake charity (and therefore skirted the tax man) are the reason they’re REALLY in deep shit. You don’t deny the IRS its money or the IRS will come for your blood. Just ask the ghost of Al Capone. 

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So those are my top 5 Publishing and Academic Scandals of the past Decade.