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snowdice · 4 years ago

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Finding the Time to Study Fic 2 [Day 34]

Here is my starting post for today’s study break stories session. See this post for more details and feel free to send me asks to keep me going! It’s been a lot of fun so far! I will reblog this post with the story as I write them today. I’ll be constantly looking for ideas of times and places for Janus to have missions, so feel free to send in any you can think of at any point!

If you are a new follower or just don’t want all of these posts clogging your dash, please feel free to block the tag “study break stories” as all posts and voting about it will go there. You can still see the finished product of the story even if you are blocking that tag as I will not tag the edited chapters with “study break stories” but with the tag “folds in paper.” See edited chapters below. None edited chapters are under the cut.

My Masterpost Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

I also have a playlist on youtube (because Spotify didn’t have one of the songs I wanted). It’s short, and not really for serious listening, but I had fun with it.

Just going to be casually researching today since I finally have my head above water when it comes to school! Yay!

Chapter 13

The room stopped shaking after a moment. “Ow,” Pat said. He seemed a bit stunned but was still moving at least. He carefully maneuvered himself into a seating position. “Ouch. Owie.” He reached up to poke his own nose. “Ow!” Janus slapped his hand away when he got there. A bit of blood was already trickling from his nose and there was a small cut over his eye, but it wasn’t bleeding too much.

Janus pushed him so he was leaning slightly forward and produced a pack of time appropriate tissues from his pocket. He pulled one out of the package and offered it to him.

He took it and pressed it up against his nose to try to stop the bleeding. He seemed mostly alright though Janus imagined he’d have plenty of bruises down the line. The power in the museum flickered and Janus looked up. Now that he was listening, he could hear people panicking in and out of the museum.

“We should probably get off of the stairs,” he suggested.

“Yeah,” Pat agreed. Janus helped him to his feet, and they climbed back up the steps. Janus looked around and found an employees only sign a few feet away. Usually he’d not risk that as it could get him into trouble he didn’t want to be in, but considering the earthquake that had just happened, he could probably play it off as panic.

He ushered Pat into a small room and found a chair and table. He had Pat sit in the chair and pulled out another one of the tissues to dab at the blood coming from the cut over his eyes. “Here,” he said. “Hold that there. I’m going to go see if there are any bandages about.”

Pat took the tissue with the hand not already holding one to his nose. “Thanks,” he said.

Janus nodded and got to his feet. The lights flickered once again but didn’t stay off for now. He didn’t know how long that would last.

He couldn’t see anything that might hold bandages in this room, but there was a second door. “I’ll be right back,” he told Pat, exiting through it.

The lights flickered once more as the door closed behind him and he cursed. When they came back up Janus’s eyes immediately fell on a man. They both froze.

“Remus!” Janus hissed the second their eyes met. “What are you doing here?”

Remus blinked at him for a moment. “Hi. Janus,” he said. “I… come to France for… tea sometimes?”

“There isn’t any tea back here.”

“So, there isn’t…” he said. There was a moment of silence. “Uh, so I actually cannot talk to you right now.”

“What do you mean?” Janus asked. Remus grimaced in a way Janus had never seen from him before. It immediately set off alarm bells in Janus’s head. “Oh my god,” Janus said. “Oh my god. You’re not from the same time as me.”

“Oh, you have no idea,” Remus mumbled.

“Holy shit, you’re looping?!”

“It’s… not looping if I wasn’t here the first time.”

“Remus, we spend more than 12 hours a day together most of the time. The only thing worse than this is if I looped back to this time myself.”

“…Yeah. Anyway, I need to leave now.”

“Please do.”

He turned to go, but then stopped. “Oh, and,” he reached into his pocket and tossed something at Janus. Janus caught it.

It was Band-Aids.

“Oh, shit,” Janus spat at the clear use of foreknowledge. “I hate this. I hate you. I’m going to kill you the next time you see me.”

“Sure, Jan.”

“Go.”

He did, slipping into the next room while Janus took a deep breath and then turned back to the door behind him. He schooled his face before Pat looked up. “I found some Band-Aids.”

Pat nodded and Janus came over to squat next to him.

Janus opened the box and Pat looked down. His eyes lit up with sudden joy so intense that Janus felt like he’d just gotten a punch to the gut. “Kitty Band-Aids!” he exclaimed. Janus bothered to actually look at the design on the container, only to note the cartoon cats on the front. Pat was almost vibrating off his seat. “Look they’re all so cute!” He grabbed the container from him to inspect the different designs printed on the back with glee even as a bit of blood was still trickling from his nose.

Janus took the box back gently and guided the wad of bloody Kleenexes back to his nose.

“Which would you like?” Janus asked.

“Oh, they are all so cute,” Pat cooed. “Um, how about that one!” he pointed. “Or that one! Or that one!”

“Pat you only have one cut.”

“But they’re all so cute!” Pat said, tongue tucking into his cheek. He contemplated the box again. “Let’s do the black one,” he finally settled on.

Janus selected one of the Band-Aids with a black cat wrapped around a pink ball of yarn and staring back at them with wide green eyes. The think looked like it had partaken in one two many doses of catnip, but Janus didn’t mention that.

Instead, he just carefully unstuck the backing from the Band-Aid and motioned for Pat to remove the tissue from his forehead. He smiled at Janus as he drew back.

Janus cleared his throat. “How’s the nose.”

“It’s slowing down,” Pat replied. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Janus replied. They met eyes for a second before Pat looked away back at the box of Band-Aids.

“Oh,” Pat said. “There’s a grey one. I didn’t notice.” He pointed to it. “I should have used that one.”

“Do you like grey cats?” Janus asked.

“I like all kitties,” he said, “but one of my roommates loves grey cats. He had one when he was a kid and thinks of them as good omens. Seeing one always brightens up his day.”

“A friend of mine has a grey cat,” Janus said. “She’s much more tolerable than him.”

Pat laughed a bit. “Don’t be mean,” he said.

“Oh, he deserves it, don’t worry.” Janus considered him for a moment. “Here,” he said, pulling out one of the Band-Aids with the grey cat on it. It did, actually, look a lot like Diesel Fuel.

“But I don’t…”

Janus just shrugged and stuck it on his cheek where there was no wound. Pat giggled and touched it with a finger. Janus stood back up.

“Can I have another tissue?” Pat asked.

“Sure.” Janus handed a tissue over to him and he crumpled up the bloody ones in his hand.

“I think I’m good to keep going,” Pat said, putting the new tissue under his nose. “The nose will stop soon.”

Pat got out his iPhone and directed him back out of the room. They checked the second floor and didn’t find anything and so went to the third floor. The second they arrived in the room that Pat’s phone was directing them too, Janus knew that it must be right. There was a strange, distorted whirling sound and the entire room was shaking slightly like they were standing next to a railroad track.

“I’m guessing this is it,” Pat said.

Janus nodded and looked over his shoulder at the screen. They both cautiously walked towards where the little dot was on the phone.

“Is that it?” Pat asked, pointing at a small device on the center column in the room. Janus reached forward to flip the switch on it. The whirling stopped and the room settled. Janus’s time piece vibrated as it came back online. They waited for a few moments. “I assumed… time distortions would be more…”

“They are,” Janus said. “This one is artificial.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s a simulation,” Janus said. “It causes similar symptoms to a time distortion, but it’s not actually fracturing time at all.”

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Pat asked.

“I don’t know,” Janus said. He took the piece of tech of the wall and carefully stored it in his pocket, “but someone’s trying to get our attention.”

Chapter 14

Janus didn’t feel comfortable leaving France 2027 just yet, still weirded out by the strange turn of events. So, he and Pat ended up sticking around for a couple of hours. They looked through the art museum for a bit, but Janus was having trouble focusing on the pieces, and Pat eventually suggested they get some air. Janus agreed considering the museum would close for the night soon anyway.

They wandered around the downtown for a bit. The people seemed to jump back from the strange weather and earthquake that afternoon rather quickly, and there were plenty still about to blend into.

Pat was snapping photos every so often like a tourist which Janus shook his head at but allowed because even with the outdated phone it almost made them blend in even more. It also might stop any questions about Pat’s weird way of speaking French. They could just say he was an overeager tourist who watched too many old movies.

“Ooo!” Pat said. “We should get crepes.”

“Why?”

“You can’t go to France and not eat crepes.”

“I assure you, you can,” Janus said dryly.

Pat shot a pout at him and the next thing he knew he was in a small crepe shop.

For Janus, choosing something was easy. He just ordered the first thing he found on the menu which seemed to be a standard one with ham and eggs. Pat on the other hand seemed to be struggling greatly, and Janus had to gently push him to the side to let some other customers order first.

“What should I get!?” Pat asked. “They all look so good! I could do strawberry preserves or maple syrup or just sugar!”

“Or you could get one that is actually food,” Janus suggested mildly. “I don’t think you need any more sugar judging by how you are acting.”

Pat rolled his eyes. “You sound like Lo.”

Janus made a note of the name ‘Lo’ even though it surely was a nickname.

“But, since you’re insisting, I’ll get something healthy. I’ll have the strawberry one. That’s a fruit!”

“It comes with a cream cheese filling,” Janus pointed out.

“And it’s fruit!”

Janus shook his head and stepped up to the counter. “One ham and cheese and one strawberry preserve, please,” he said to the cashier as he was not allowing Pat to order in French and accidently say something stupid. He forked over some euros.

“You don’t have to pay for me,” Pat protested when he saw that.

Janus glanced back at him. “I was afraid you’d try to pay in francs,” he said dryly.

It looked like Pat was about to stick his tongue out at him, remembered that Janus had criticized him for that earlier, and then just scrunched up his face in displeasure as though that was any less childish.

They waited for their crepes to be finished and then went to eat them outside near a water fountain.

“I can pay you back for the crepe,” Pat said after they sat down. “I do actually have euros.”

Janus waved him off. “It wasn’t that expensive.”

Pat hummed. “Well, in that case. I insist on paying for a wish for you.” Janus raised an eyebrow. “In the fountain!” Pat clarified.

Pat set aside his crepe to dig in his pocket for a couple of coins. “Here!” he said handing one over.

Janus glanced over at the fountain. “No.”

“Oh, come on,” Pat beseeched. “You have to want something. I’ll even throw it in for you, but you have to make a wish first!”

“No.”

“Please!”

Janus sighed. “Fine.” He popped the rest of his crepe in his mouth. “I wish for a crepe,” he said after swallowing.

“You just had a crepe, silly.”

“But I liked it, so I want another one.”

“We can go back and get you another crepe.”

“Ah, but I’m not hungry anymore.”

Pat crossed his arms. “You’re just being difficult on purpose.”

“Not me,” Janus said putting hand over his heart. “I would never do something like that.”

Pat glared at him, but then snatched the coin out of his hand. “Fine!” he said. “One crepe wish coming right up.” He hopped up with the two coins and darted over to the water fountain. Janus turned to watch him go but then happened to catch sight of something out of the corner of his eyes.

Pat’s phone.

He didn’t pause in his movement, completing the turn, but as he watched Pat close his eyes, presumably to focus on his own wish, Janus snuck a hand out and grabbed the phone without looking. He slipped it into his own pocket.

Pat came back over after throwing both coins in the fountain and didn’t even seem to notice that his phone was missing, picking up his crepe to take another bite. Just to make sure, though Janus decided to distract him. “What do you think of your crepe?” Janus asked.

“I like it! It’s sweet, but not too sweet. There was a crepe place across the street from my apartment in college, but they always put a bit too much sugar in the dough, I think. I’d still eat them, but these are much better.”

Janus nodded and kept up the light conversation until Pat was finished.

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“Well,” he said then, getting to his feet. “It seems that nothing else is going to happen regarding the time distortion. I should be getting back.”

Pat hummed. “I should too. It’s movie night!”

“I probably should arrest you,” Janus noted.

“In the middle of all of these people?” Pat asked mildly.

“Touché,” Janus said.

Pat gasped and pointed at him. “Pun!” he said. Janus blinked at him. “Because we’re in France! That’s French!”

“…Goodbye Pat,” Janus said, turning to walk away from him.

“Goodbye… wait I still don’t know your name!”

Janus stopped to look back at him for a moment. “Like I said,” he replied. “Elvis.”

“Fine,” Pat said. “Au revoir, mon chéri.”

“You never stop, do you?” Janus asked.

Pat giggled. “Considering I don’t know what you mean, I imagine I’m just getting started.”

Janus actually left then, walking off towards the alley he’d first arrived in. In some ways, the mission had been a bust, but in others it had gone very well.

He felt for the weight of the phone in his pocket before pulling up the display screen on his timepiece to go back to the TPI.

It had gone very well indeed.

Chapter 15

The first thing Janus had done when he’d returned to the TPI was hand over the timebomb to Khalid who sent it to forensics. Within the hour, forensics got back to them that it was the same timebomb as 2999 and that it had never exploded, but simply been diffused. Which meant, blessings on blessings, everyone got to go home that night.

Not that Janus went home, no, he ended up falling asleep on his desk somewhere between 3 and 4am, but at least he wasn’t sharing his space with anyone. He’d been trying to hack the cell phone all night to see if it had anything he could use, but he honestly had no idea what he was doing. All it seemed he could do was play some annoying song over and over again about never giving someone up. At around 2am, he’d finally broken and sent off an email, though, he’d continued to try to mess with it after that.

He got woken up by Lena coming into the office at 7am, and noticed he already had an email response asking when Janus wanted to come in.

“Now?” he sent back.

“…Do you sleep?” was the immediate response. “And yes.”

His wrist buzzed as an appointment in 5 seconds downloaded to his timepiece. He selected the coordinates and landed at Cultural Outreach. The receptionist blinked up at him and then back down at the screen on his desk. “Oh!” he said. “I didn’t see this appointment. I think Professor Eran is in his office.”

He didn’t stand to escort Janus this time, so Janus went ahead and went down the hall to Virgil’s office himself.

He knocked on the door and while he was waiting for Virgil to open it, the infernal contraption once again started to play the same stupid song.

“I didn’t even touch you!” he spat, getting it out and tapping on the screen.

“Jonas Brothers dude again?” Virgil asked causally upon opening the door.

Janus shoved it at him. “Make it stop.”

Virgil took it and fiddled with it for a few moments before it stopped with the song. “Oh my gosh,” he said scrolling through something on the screen.

“What.”

“What maniac sets a custom alarm for every 30-60 minutes for a week that just plays ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’? Oh, and one ‘It’s Not Unusual’ on Saturday. He’s mixing memes at an alarming rate.”

“Can you. Just. Make it not happen. Anymore?”

Virgil smirked at him. “Maybe.” He turned around to go back into his office.

“Virgil,” Janus growled following him in.

Virgil just laughed. “What do you want to know about it?” he asked. “Just a fair warning… the song means he… likely was aware someone would steal it.”

“Of course, he was,” Janus groaned.

“But I’m sure we can still get something out of it.” Virgil started tapping at the screen again. “Okay, let’s see. It’s an iPhone 5, and someone jailbroke it.”

“What does that mean?”

“Tampered with it so they could install non-company approved software,” Virgil explained.

“Well I figured that since he was using Google Maps to track time distortions,” Janus grumbled.

“I think I have something,” Virgil said to himself while digging through his desk. “Ah ha!” He held up some sort of cord. “This will let me hook it up to my integrator.” He slotted the cord into the bottom of the iPhone and then crawled under his desk to fiddle around with some other things. “There we go,” Virgil said popping back up. “It might take a few minutes. Running the program any faster might overheat the phone.”

Janus nodded and sat back to wait. Virgil grabbed the phone and started to play around with it a bit even as it uploaded all of its information to his computer.

“Weird,” Virgil said after a moment.

“What?” Janus asked, sitting up straighter.

“There are exactly two contacts. Fewer than I’d anticipate for a regular phone from the 2010s. More than I would expect from one clearly not being used as a phone.

Virgil glanced to the side, and it must have finished the download because he unhooked it from the computer. “I have a 21st century phone network adapter,” Virgil said. “It transfers call back to whatever date the phone says. Do you want to try calling one?”

“It’s worth a shot,” Janus replied.

Virgil dug back into his desk for a small device that he plugged into the same port he’d plugged the earlier cord. “Okay, which contact do you want to try first?” he asked. “One has ‘Ro’ with a crown, red heart, and a gold star emoji. The other has “Lo” with a book, blue heart, and Milky Way emoji.”

“He mentioned a Lo,” Janus said. “So, try him first.”

Virgil nodded. “I’ll put it on speaker.” He pressed some buttons before setting the phone on the desk between them.

The phone rang three times before with a bit of a crackle, it was answered. “Salutations,” a voice said, voice sounding a bit scratchy as though he had only just gotten up.

Virgil motioned with his head for Janus to speak. “Are you ‘Lo’?” he asked.

The man hummed. “To some people.”

Janus… didn’t quite know what to say to that, or even what questions he should ask.

“I’m assuming you’re the man that stole my associate’s phone.”

“Your associate?” Janus fished.

The man made an amused hum. “I believe you were calling him ‘Pat’ on your last adventure.” Janus could hear something being placed down on the other end of the phone. Before Janus could respond, he heard what sounded like an old keyboard being typed on. “Now,” Lo said. “I have to admit, I am surprised you were willing to oblige me so thoroughly by plugging the phone into your system. Let’s see…”

The screen on Virgil’s lit up bright blue all of a sudden. “…shit,” said Virgil.

“Well,” Lo said, “it seems you were clever enough not to plug it into the TPI system, which is disappointing, but…”

There was more clicking on the other end. “Hmm, interesting music tastes for the 4000s,” he said.

“I’m an anthropologist,” Virgil spoke up.

“Ah, yes, I can see that,” Lo replied. “Virgil Eran, senior professor at Silver Mountain University, a vetted member of the Cultural Outreach program, and searched the phrase ‘How to eat sushi without making a cultural blunder and making everyone hate you and losing your job because what kind of shit anthropologist doesn’t know how to eat raw fish right’ which you then shortened to ‘How to eat sushi’ and proceeded to search 52 times in the last 48 hours.”

Virgil went a bit scarlet around the ears. “Dude, did you really have to out me like that?” he hissed at the phone.

“My apologies,” Lo responded. “From my personal experience, don’t dip the rice parts in soy sauce, and don’t add too much wasabi. Overall, most people will be understanding of mistakes, and you will certainly not be fired or ostracized for handling food incorrectly. As long as you are not acting intentionally disrespectful, and I image you will not be considering your clear anxiety over whatever outing you are planning to attend, you will be fine.”

“Okay,” Virgil said. “Good point, but counterpoint, what if you’re wrong and everyone hates me forever?”

“Is it the lunch meeting today at 11:30am?” Lo asked, “because I can see that a Professor Boris Laden has attended the event multiple years in a row. Considering he is a philosophy instructor, has no Japanese heritage that I can see, and I have found a photo of last year’s event wherein he has placed his chopsticks vertically in his rice, and he has yet to be fired or ostracized, I would postulate that your fears are unfounded.”

“Yeah but… okay, I really don’t have an argument for that one, except maybe I’m a piece of shit and everyone is looking for a reason to hate me.”

“Considering your many impressive accolades in your field, I would argue that ‘a piece of shit’ is not a good descriptor of you. Not to mention the fact that you are often a highly requested member for different committees in your department and outside of it.”

“Oh, but is that because people like me or because I’m an anxious mess and make sure events go off without a hitch?”

“From experience, disorder with people you enjoy the company of is far more tolerable than order with people you do not. Which explains my current living situation and the lack of finished dishes in my sink. Therefore, I would assume the former.”

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“A lot of assumptions,” Virgil commented, but he was smiling slightly.

“Assumptions based on data,” Lo argued back lightly.

“You really came in here, hacked into my computer and smacked my anxiety in the face, huh?”

“Glad to have helped.”

“Y-”

“Are the two of you finished?” Janus interrupted, finally getting sick of the two of them.

“Not nearly,” Lo said. “I have gained access to an entire network of a very large university and will be sorting through the data for a long time.”

“Ugh, right,” Virgil groaned, “and you got access through my integrator.”

“I doubt they’ll be able to trace it back to you if you don’t tell them.”

“Nice try,” Virgil said dryly, “but not likely. I’m telling them about you immediately so they can work to kick you out.”

Lo laughed. “Fair enough, but I’ve already gotten plenty of information at this point. Including the fact that you work with the TPI and scheduled an appointment with an Agent Janus Picani this morning set to start a few minutes before this phone call. So, hello Janus.”

“Bastard,” Janus shot back.

“And goodbye Professor Eran. It was a pleasure.” He hung up.

Virgil sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “This is going to be fun to explain to both of our bosses.”

Arc II What We Do to Each Other

Chapter 16:

As it would turn out, Janus and Virgil did not get in trouble for hooking up the old phone to Virgil’s integrator, mostly because it wasn’t really a mistake on their part. The phone cleared all virus checks that the tech people both from the university and the TPI ran on it. The phone should have been clean and should not have caused an issue.

In fact, they were still trying to pin down the code on the general university server. They could tell that something was mucking about on the system but what or how was a mystery. This also meant that there was no telling what information had been compromised and considering how many things Silver Mountain had its hands in, that was… a bit worrying.

Another worrying thing was there was suddenly more activity of late at the TPI. There were more time distortions popping up every day. Usually they would be few and far in between. There had been 3 total recorded the year before, but over 12 in the last week. Some of them were fake like the one Janus had investigated, but some of them were real. It painted a distressing picture and also was a drain on their resources. Khalid was actually looking to advertise positions to hire new recruits which was something she rarely did as she liked to keep appointments to the TPI in house.

They’d even loosed the number of field agents needed for each mission and Janus and Remus had been splitting up just to get everything done. Today, he and Remus had thankfully only two missions scheduled for the day.

“Are we going together or separate today?” Janus asked Remus.

“Think they’ll burn me at the stake for being a witch if I go alone to either of them?” Remus asked.

“I don’t know. Probably. I think we’re getting a bit late into the 1700s for that in Cuba, but I have no idea about Mesopotamia.”

“Let’s just go together. I did not like almost drowning yesterday because I was the only stranger in town when the weather was going wonky.”

“Surely it isn’t because you opened your mouth. Ever.” Janus said dryly.

“How was I supposed to know he was the local clergyman’s son?”

Janus rolled his eyes. “On second thought,” he said, pushing a button on his desk to choose Cuba as he next mission, and standing up. “I don’t want you coming with me.” Yet, he did not protest when Remus also signed up for the Cuba mission and he waited for him by the office door before going to talk to Rhi.

Rhi was a bit frazzled when which meant quite a bit as she was usually incredibly put together. Remus didn’t even seem inclined to tease her today.

“Okay,” she said once they’d closed the door behind them. She flipped through some documents on her desk. “Picani and Clockson. Camaguey Cuba 1755. Do you know Cuba?”

“Uh,” Janus said. “Yeah?”

“Like you’re reading the things, right? I don’t have to babysit you, right? You got it? The Seven Year War was happening, but it won’t affect you much as it hasn’t really hit Cuba. It’s the middle of the Camaguey Carnival. Everyone will be everywhere and there will be chaos so as long as you don’t really fuck up you should be fine. Um…apparent races.” She looked up at them and studied them each for a moment as thought looking at them for the first time despite having known them for years. “It’ll work. Go to costuming.”

“Shouldn’t we…” Janus said, “sign things?”

“…Yep,” she said, fiddling with her desktop and then sending documents over to their side to sign.

Janus and Remus both did before sending them back.

“Great. Good.” She stood and grabbed some things from behind her. “You can go.” She sat back down as they took their things and Janus noticed a message pop up on her desk. She looked up at Remus looking exhausted. “What?” she asked.

“Just open it,” Remus said.

Rhi tapped it and a photo opened.

“I got her a new mouse toy!” Remus said happily as Rhi looked at the picture of Diesel Fuel attacking a cloth mouse.

“That is… appreciated Agent Clockson,” Rhi said. “Now get out.”

They did, leaving to get their costumes on and checked. Costuming was just as busy and frazzled as Rhi had been and they actually had to wait for decon because there’d been a mix up with the agents leaving before them. They landed in Cuba without issue. Janus could already hear the festival in full swing outside the small building they’d were in. Remy was standing there with a very not time appropriate mug of coffee.

“Sue me,” Remy said when Janus raised an eyebrow at it. “Please just… get in and out without causing trouble. Seriously. I don’t want to have to deal with that on top of everything else.”

“We’ll do our best,” Janus assured.

Remy pulled his sunglasses down to look at him. He looked exhausted. “God please do more than your best.”

Janus nodded tightly. “We’ll be in and out,” he said, already glancing at his timepiece. It had been disguised as a golden bracelet which made it a bit harder to actually use, but wrist watches wouldn’t be invented for more than a century, so they’d have to make do. “The time distortion, if that’s what it is, should be in the middle of town. Let’s go.”

He and Remus exited the building onto the packed city street.

Janus was immediately bombarded with all types of sights, sounds, and smells. There were many colorful articles of clothing and costumes as people went every which way along the street talking to other members of their community, playing instruments, and dancing. There was the sound of people speaking Spanish, still mostly almost pure Castilian Spanish with perhaps a bit of influence from Taino as the Haitian revolution had yet to push the Creole language over to Cuba. People must have been hard at work cooking different dishes for the carnival as many different spices wafted through the air. It was sticky hot considering it was the middle of June in the tropics and Janus was immediately sweating despite the temperature appropriate clothing he’d been outfitted with.

He glanced around their immediate area, just scoping out the crowds. His eyes were immediately drawn to one person near them.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he said out loud when he saw Pat. Remus looked in the direction Janus was.

Even if Janus didn’t recognize him the moment he laid eyes on him, he probably still would have ended up staring as he was the only person in the area who clearly did not know how to do the dance he was attempting.

Remus snorted and Janus shook his head in secondhand embarrassment. “Well, would you look whose boyfriend’s here,” he said to Janus. Make that firsthand embarrassment. “Has anyone told him the Mambo wasn’t invented until the 1900s and also that’s not how you do it?”

Chapter 17

Pat stopped dancing the moment he saw Janus approaching him, but he still bobbed cheerfully ( and unrhythmically) to the music. “Hi Janus,” he said pleasantly.

“You just have to rub it in, huh?”

There was a flash of confusion across his face, but then he smiled. “Well, I know where in our relationship you are. How was France?”

“You’re a bastard.”

“You stole the phone,” he laughed.

“You stole the bomb,” Janus countered, “and you wanted me to steal the phone. You booby trapped it.”

“No,” Pat correct, putting a finger up. “We have security on my phone because in high school I once forgot it in the school locker room and long story short, the three of us ended up in a lake. So, then Lo made sure I always had some sort of tracker on it. When I started time traveling, he updated it and when I met you we updated it again in case there was ever an opportunity like that. Lo calls it using our weaknesses to our advantage.”

“He’s a bastard too,” Janus growled.

Pat just laughed.

“Is someone talking about me?” Remus asked, stepping over to them. Janus rolled his eyes.

“Oh,” Pat said, blinking at Janus’s partner for a moment. “Remus.” He hesitated slightly. “How are you doing?”

“Me?” Remus asked. “Uh, I’m doing good. A little stressed out with work, but fine.”

“Good,” Pat said with just a little too much heartfulness to it.

“What?” Janus asked, eyes narrowed at Pat. “What is that?”

“What is what?” Pat asked. He met Janus’s eyes briefly and it made panic surge up Janus’s spine because the look Pat was sending him wasn’t one that said he was playing dumb. It was a warning.

Oh, Janus did not like this. That look told Janus Pat had some foreknowledge that he absolutely could not tell Janus about without messing up the timeline spectacularly. This was why this mess the two of them were mixed up in was so bad, but it seemed Janus did not have much of a choice when it came to Pat.

Despite how bad of an idea he knew it was, he still wanted to push, because whatever Pat was hiding could be very, very bad and it had to do with Remus. There were so many reasons Pat could be acting like that around Remus, but the worst ones were definitely the ones on his mind. Death, injury, illness. They were all possible especially in their line of work and especially with how time was being screwed with right now. And Pat knew. He knew exactly what the answer was, and oh did Janus want to push.

Experience knowing what worse things could come out of having foreknowledge made Janus bite his tongue.

“So, what are you two doing here,” Pat asked, and Janus unhappily let him change the subject.

“Oh, like you don’t know,” Janus replied.

“I don’t know,” Pat said innocently.

“There’s another time distortion,” Janus said, “and while you didn’t know what it was the last time I saw you, I’m pretty sure you do now.”

“Oh, I didn’t know there was a time distortion here. I can help you if you like,” he offered sweetly.

“Oh, yeah, sure. Then why are you here?”

“I wanted to see if I could find the Flying Dutchman,” Pat told him.

“And so you went to Camaguey?”

“Uh huh.”

“One of the farthest places from the ocean in Cuba?”

“Is it?”

“I don’t trust you.”

Pat just shrugged. “Well, if you don’t want my help finding the time distortion, I’ll just be on my way then.”

“Wait,” he said when Pat went to turn away. Pat paused. Janus turned to Remus. “Remus, do you think he’s bullshitting me so I let him wander off and do whatever the hell he’s doing, or do you think he’s bullshitting me into letting him come with us.”

“Hmm,” Remus said, looking Pat up and down. Janus could immediately tell he wasn’t going to get any helpful answer. “Well, if we’re going with the how much do I get to see his, admittedly very sexy, ass criteria.” Janus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Letting him leave now means instant gratification and a nice full image when he turns away. However, letting him go with us means many more opportunities to get a glimpse, but they’d probably just be glimpses. So, yeah that’s a tough call.”

“You didn’t even bother to give me an actual hidden suggestion with that bullshit,” Janus groaned. He glanced at Pat only to see him hiding his very red face in his hands. Janus blinked. “Oh,” he said. “You got him, Remus.” Janus was surprised. He’d expected a bit more tenacity for someone with Pat’s personality. Of course, Janus was used to Remus, so that perhaps had some effect. Pat made a muffled distressed sound behind his hands and Janus raised an eyebrow. “You really got him.”

Pat flapped one hand around while still using the other to completely hide his face. “It’s just. His face. Saying that. Is weird.”

Janus could not say that he didn’t feel a slight spark of joy at seeing Pat flustered. After all, Pat’s weapon of choice had often been flirting with Janus in the past. However, he still smacked Remus on the shoulder when it looked like he was about to continue with something likely far more inappropriate. “We are here for a reason,” he reminded. He turned to consider Pat and squinted at him. “You’re coming with us, I’ve decided. I don’t want to let you out of my sights. Don’t,” he said empathically turning to Remus as the man opened his mouth once more.

Pat had mostly recovered, though his cheeks were just a bit pink still. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll go with you. Where do we start?”

Janus glanced at his timepiece. “It’s not showing up on our trackers yet.”

“It messed with your tracker last time,” Pat pointed out.

“I know,” Janus said. “Which means it could be another fake one or whatever is causing it hasn’t started yet. If things start going wrong, but it still doesn’t show on our radar, it’s almost certainly a fake one, but some of the fake ones haven’t blocked our technology.”

“Here, I can check,” Pat said.

“Please don’t pull out an iPhone,” Janus begged.

Pat stuck out his tongue at him, and then smiled. He reached for the bracelet on his wrist and twisted it back and forth a few times before pressing his palms together. He glanced around them quickly to make sure no one around them was watching and then peeled apart his palms like he was miming reading a book.

“What the fuck is that, and how do I get one?” Remus asked immediately. It was innocuous, whatever it was. If someone from this time caught a glimpse of the display, they’d likely assume it was a trick of the light, but staring right at it, Janus could tell it was a map of the surrounding areas with a softly glowing blue light marking their current location. Janus could see no screen or origin of a hologram. It looked like the image was drawn onto the man’s palms, but as he watched, the image shifted to zoom out.

“There doesn’t seem to be anything major yet,” Pat said wiggling his fingers a bit. The display changed slightly to some sort of colorful overlay Janus did not understand. Pat hummed. “Did you two come from that building recently?” he asked nodding at it.

“Yes,” Janus replied. “How do you know?”

“There’s sometimes a slight temperature change when people time travel,” Pat explained. “I can read it on here.” He tilted his head. “There also seems to be a big enough temperature change in a church a few blocks away that could indicate time travel. Want to check it out?”

“We might as well,” Janus agreed.

“And if it’s nothing, we can get drunk on the communion wine!”

“He’s going to get immediately struck by lightning,” Janus said.

Chapter 18

“If we see anyone,” Janus said as they entered the church. “You keep your mouth shut. Do you understand me? Remus, do you understand me?”

Remus immediately turned to Pat. “You know, I didn’t grow up Catholic,” he said to Pat who looked at him in confusion. “So the first time I ever entered a Catholic church, you can’t blame me for being a little confused about the whole cabinet thing with a wall between them. After all, everyone was singing about glory to god and what not. So I…”

Janus slapped him. “This is why you were almost burned at the stake yesterday.”

“Excuse you,” Remus said, putting his hand over his heart. “I was almost drowned.”

“You were almost drowned?” Pat asked, his voice seeming legitimately distressed.

Remus shrugged a smile on his face that caused a Pavlovian migraine to start up behind Janus’s eyes. “It’s one of the hazards of the jobs, and really it would have all been worth it if I’d actually gotten to drown in that man’s…”

“We’re in a church!” Janus cut him off switching from Spanish to Swahili in the hopes that no random passersby would be able to understand him in this time and place. “Don’t talk about lewd sex things. Don’t talk about sex at all. It’s a Catholic church!”

Remus continued to speak in Spanish with no regard for anything. “But not talking about lewd sex things takes away 3/4ths of my personality,” he pouted.

“More like 9/10th,” Janus grumbled, “and the other 1/10th is just normal stupid.”

“Hey, you shouldn’t be mean,” Pat scolded, in fucking English for some reason, “but Remus, honey, you probably shouldn’t be saying things like that right now.”

“No, no, he has a point,” Remus said switching to English.

“He’s my partner, I have the right to call him stupid,” Janus insisted.

“And I love you too!” Remus said in Greek because he was really, truly, stupid.

Pat looked between the two, but then seemed to accept it, dropping the concerned expression for a slightly amused one. “If you say so.”

“Can I… help you?” A voice asked. All three of them whipped around to see a young boy looking at them and seeming very confused. Which was fair considering that to his ears, they’d just been speaking nonsense.

“We’re here to pray!” Remus claimed, then he turned to wink at Pat and said under his breath in Swahili, “to that ass.” Pat went immediately bright red again, which was doubtlessly Remus’s aim. Janus subtlety stepped on his foot while smiling at the boy.

“Oh,” the boy said. “Okay.” Thankfully, he didn’t seem interested in questioning the random strangers in front of him further. “I’m going to go back to the celebration now.”

Janus smiled at him. “Have fun,” he said. He waited for the boy to leave through the front door before slapping Remus on the back of the head.

“Ow!” he whined sounding far too pained for how hard Janus had actually hit him.

Janus rolled his eyes. “Let’s just start investigating,” he said.

“Sure, sure, you never let me have any fun,” Remus said, pulling up his wrist and spinning the golden bracelets on his arm. “Hmm…” he said.

“What?” asked Pat.

“Either I put on the wrong jewelry this morning… or my timepiece isn’t working.”

“Well, then I’m guessing we’re in the right place,” Janus said. He turned to Pat. “Your stuff still working?”

Pat brought up whatever device was on his hands. “Yeah,” he said, “and it looks like something is just starting.” Just as he said it, there was a violent crash of thunder.

“Well,” Janus said. “We should probably find the source and soon. Which way?”

Patton glanced around himself and then motioned with his wrist. Suddenly there was a 3D display of the church in front of them.

Janus could see immediately where the problem had to originate. There was a swirling mass of some sort of energy centered at the top of the bell tower of the church. As he watched, he saw the picture of the church glitch out a bit. He had a bad feeling about that.

“Is there something wrong with your display?” he asked, or more hoped.

Pat shook his head slowly. “I don’t think so…” The room seemed to shift suddenly underneath their feet. It felt a bit like time travel, but also wrong. The picture on the display flickered harder, part of the building fracturing and dissolving before appearing back in place. The room settled after a moment, but Janus’s stomach did not.

“Whatever is going on,” Janus said, “We need to stop it right now.”

Pat nodded. “The quickest way up would be that way,” Pat said pointing. The display closed as he did.

“Then, let’s go,” Janus said.

The world was eerily calm as they all started off in the direction Patton had pointed out. In fact, it was almost too quiet.

“Where’s the nearest window?” Janus asked when they came out on the second floor.

Pat glanced at his hand. “There should be a couple a few feet that way.” Janus nodded and left them standing there. When he glanced out of the first window he came to, it appeared to be night. Yet, when he walked to the next window, he saw daylight.

26606

“Time is fracturing,” Janus informed them. “We need to be careful.” This time distortion was much more intense than any of the other ones the agency had been tracking down over the last few months. It had also come on much faster. Usually there was some time between when the time distortion began and it started having extreme effects on the environment. He was suddenly very glad that he and Remus had not split up today. He was even glad for Pat’s company, no matter how aggravating he may be sometimes. Not to mention, he was glad for the man’s technology that seemed to circumvent whatever was blocking Janus and Remus’s timepieces.

He backed away from the windows and returned to the others.

“Whatever you do,” Janus said. “Don’t let anyone be in a room alone.”

“I know what time fractures are this time,” Pat promised.

“It was as much for the idiot as it was for you,” Janus said.

“You accidently bring a bubonic plague infested rat to 900BC one time and you never live it down.”

“I’d say I should put a leash on you, but you’d twist it into something disgusting.”

“Probably,” Remus agreed.

“Where next?” Janus asked, ignoring him.

“That way,” Pat said.

They walked together to the door he’d indicated. “Please don’t be bullshit,” Janus prayed. He opened the door and immediately got bowled over by a stream of salt water.

#not writing #study break stories

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melsie-sims · 4 years ago

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This challenge was originally created by Melsie-Sims on January 11th, 2021. Please use the #Among Us Challenge tag to share your progress! This challenge is inspired by the Human Enough Challenge by the wonderful @squeamishsims! It’s meant to be a longer challenge spanning at least two generations so buckle up!

To take part you will need Get to Work installed, as your main character will be an alien sim. Other useful (but not mandatory) packs include: City Living, Parenthood, Strangerville and University. Your challenge can be as story-driven as you wish, or not at all. The rules definitely allow some creative freedom.

In the Among Us Challenge, your alien sim starts out on an empty residential lot of your choosing. The general premise is that their rocket ship crashed on Earth and they are now stranded, without the ability to communicate with their home-world.

With their rocket ship completely destroyed, they must adapt to their strange new surroundings and blend in with the townies. No one can know there is an alien among them.

Create an Alien in CAS and make them a Young Adult.

Their human disguise can have as many outfits as you’d like. Your alien’s natural form is only allowed to wear the alien bodysuit from Get to Work. Please use it for every outfit category. If you have custom content for alien suits feel free to use them.

You have the choice between five aspirations: Friend of the World, Renaissance Sim, Soulmate, Successful Lineage or The Curator. Choose wisely because you’ll have to complete the aspiration for the challenge!

You must have aging on, but feel free to play on either Normal or Long lifespan. You can even edit your lifespan using MCCC if you’d like.

Start off on an empty lot. You can choose one from any world, but please be aware that you cannot move lots for the duration of the challenge.

Go into build mode and purchase the rocket ship (Steampunk Flyamajig) for 5,000 simoleons. It’s the only item you’re allowed to start with.

Once you’ve done that, use the cheat “money 0”. Oh yes, it’s that kind of challenge. You’ll have to make money by any means possible... but no cheating!

Now you’re good to go!

Your alien cannot start rebuilding their rocket ship until they have 10,000 simoleons, handiness level 5, logic level 3 and programming level 3. It might take a while so they better make themselves comfortable... They’re stuck on this planet, they have no way to communicate with Sixam and they don’t have the parts to fix their damaged ship. It isn’t ideal, but their only option is to try and make a life for themselves here until they can go home.

Your alien sim cannot wear their disguise and may only use mean interactions with other sims until they reach charisma level 3. They just crash landed on a strange planet. They don’t know anything about the inhabitants. They are confused and scared. They must figure out the language and culture of Sims before they can properly assimilate.

Your alien sim can only eat quick meals until they’ve reached either gardening level 2 or fishing level 2. The quick meals are meant to be dehydrated food packets native to Sixam, which your alien scavenged from their ship. They don’t know if the food on this planet will be harmful to them. They must do research to find out.

If another sim sees your alien without their disguise, you must either erase their memory... or kill them. It’s your choice which of the two options you pick. Regardless, your alien’s identity must remain safe at all costs.

Your sim may reveal their alien identity to another sim without any consequences once they’ve become Good Friends with them. Be careful, if the relationship bar goes down too much they may become a threat to your alien’s safety. If the relationship goes below the Good Friends range, your alien will have to eliminate them. They’ve known your alien’s secret for too long. Their memory can no longer be modified without doing serious psychological damage.

Please note, the above rule is actually from SqueamishSims’ Human Enough Challenge. I just loved it too much not to include it here!

Your alien sim can travel to lots in their own world, but if they want to go somewhere else they will have to pay 50 simoleons per visit. They don’t have the means to travel around! They must purchase a bus ticket or pay someone for a lift if they want to travel to other worlds.

Your alien can change out of their space suit and wear regular clothes when they’ve made their first 1,000 simoleons and reached level 3 of logic. At this point, feel free to give your alien a makeover. You can change outfits whenever you want after that without any limitations.

Your alien cannot have walls or floors anywhere on their lot until they’ve reached handiness level 3 and paid a property tax fee of 5,000 simoleons. They can only have one room to start off with. Your alien is starting from nothing and building from the ground up. They don’t have access to a contractor and need to learn about sims architecture.

For every extra room (i.e. a bathroom or a bedroom) your sim must pay 1,000 simoleons. Please subtract from your household funds using the “money #” cheat. Home-owning is expensive! Your alien sim is learning that the hard way!

Your alien cannot use romance interactions until they’re at charisma level 5 and they have three Good Friends. At this point, your alien sim is probably still under the impression that they’ll be flying back home very soon. They’re hesitant to pursue a relationship with a human if it isn’t meant to last...

Your alien can also be part of clubs when they’ve reached charisma level 5 and made three Good Friends. At least one of those friends must be part of the club your alien wishes to create/join. These sims know your alien inside and out and would protect them with their lives. They’re good people to have around.

Your sim cannot have a proper job until they reach charisma level 6 as well as handiness level 3 and logic level 3. This includes part-time jobs, odd jobs and freelance gigs. If your alien hardly has any social skills, how are they supposed to know how the economy works?

Your alien can only get engaged/married once they’ve reached charisma level 8, logic level 5, rocket science level 3 and have three separate rooms in their house (see above for the house-building rules). Your alien is beginning to realize this might be a bit more permanent than they originally thought. They’re finally allowing themselves to fall in love and imagine the possibility of settling down.

Bonus: If you have City Living, your alien must attend the Romance Festival to learn more about the odd social construct that is marriage.

Have your spouse join either the scientist, secret agent, tech guru, astronaut, politician or military career. They’ve made it their mission in life to protect your alien sim and help keep their secret safe from potential foes. However, the new job comes at a cost.

Your alien sim is now on the government’s radar. They have a chance of getting imprisoned by scientists or S.I.M.S. agents! If your alien sim encounters a scientist, secret agent, politician or military staff you must imprison them in a 4x6 cell on your lot. Inside you may place the cheapest toilet, refrigerator, single bed and sink. They must remain there until their spouse has paid 10,000 simoleons for your alien’s safe return... and murdered the abductor(s) responsible. As this particular rule is a bit more dramatic, it’s totally OPTIONAL!

Your alien sim has to have charisma level 9, rocket science level 5, parenting level 3 and cooking level 3 before they/their partner can become pregnant. They must also have a proper kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom and nursery/toddler room. They must be on level 3 of their chosen career. Making a baby is the easy part. Being a parent is hard work, and your alien sim needs to be prepared!

If you have risky woohoo enabled and your alien and/or their partner becomes pregnant before meeting the requirements, please deduct 5,000 simoleons from your household funds. If you don’t have enough, sell items in your home until you’ve paid off your debt. Welcome to parenthood!

At least one child must be conceived in the rocket ship. You can’t have a challenge focusing on aliens without some rocket ship woohoo! Come on now!

Have your alien return to Sixam with their offspring, but only for a visit. They’ve spent such a long time on another planet and have built so many good relationships. They’ve decided they want to stay.

Note: Your alien may have to return to Sixam a few times to obtain collectibles as those are part of the challenge.

To complete the challenge, one of your alien’s children must be a Young Adult. You can age up your toddlers when all of their skills are at level 3. You can age up your children and teens when they have an A in school.

Bonus: Send one of your alien sim’s children to university so that they can get a proper human education. It’s not actually part of the challenge. You’ll just have bragging rights.

You can use reward potions and traits, including the Potion of Youth. You can use lot traits. Once you’ve unlocked the ability to join clubs, you can benefit from their bonuses. Is the challenge too hard? Are you struggling? Hahaha good!

Have fun! Feel free to @ me if you’re posting this challenge on Tumblr or making a YouTube series, I’d love to see it! You can follow me on Twitter or support me on Ko-Fi if you’d like. No pressure!

You’ve completed the challenge when...

Your alien has maxed out three different skills. One of them must be rocket science.

Your alien has at least 5 Good Friends, not including their children. Their spouse does count toward the total! Pets do not count!

They’ve completed their aspiration.

They’ve “repaired” their rocket ship.

They’ve been married and had offspring. At least one child must be conceived in the rocket ship.

They have a home worth 60,000 simoleons.

They have a top secret alien lab in their basement.

In the alien lab you must have at least one fang flower, one glow orb, one quill fruit, one unidentified fruit object, one blutonium, one solarium, one crandestine and one nitelite.

One of the children of your alien has grown into a young adult and visited Sixam to learn about their parent’s world.

If your alien passes away before completing all of the objectives, it’s up to their offspring to complete the rest of the challenge.

#sims 4 #ts4 #sims 4 challenge #sims 4 get to work #sims 4 alien #sims 4 among us challenge #among us challenge #melsie #among us info

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lift-for-dead · 3 years ago

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So you want to lift from Michaels... (repost)

As a (finally) former Replenishment Associate/Sales Associate/Head Cashier of the highest shrink Michael’s Arts & Crafts in our district, here is everything you need to know and probably more:

Our store didn’t even have towers.

If our Instax Mini’s (which are locked up) or film (which are behind little red locks that you can use a magnet on) were source tagged, nothing would beep.

Choose your time of day wisely.

Of course, weekend nights are a lot busier and our store in particular, for whatever reason, was always understaffed. There would be 1 Framer, 1-2 SA, 1 Cashier, 1 MOD. Mid-day always has the most associates.

I recommend the morning: it’s slow, we’re trying to get our own projects done, we’re probably still sleepy.

I do not recommend before closing, as all of the employees are running around the store trying to get shit done so we can go home.

Our Copic markers are at the front in the queue line and our Prismacolor stuff is in our Fine Arts section, both of which are heavily monitored. This brings me to:

Our cameras (that actually record and can be rewound in store) don’t pan around and zoom.

Sections recorded: entrance, front registers, jewelry, fine art, receiving (”the back”/employees only), stickers, cash office.

No one is actively watching the camera monitors. If we’re bored and lazy, we will sit and watch, and it’s somehow hypnotizing.

I recommend concealing while walking along the outermost walls of the store, basket aisle, clearance aisle, seasonal, and if you’re ballsy- the classroom.

Don’t go to the bathroom, at least ours is next to the frame shop, aka someone gon’ see you walk in with merch.

We find empty boxes all the time. We don’t ever look more into it.

The empty box goes in receiving to get damaged out and thrown away. Ditch em in the clearance aisles if they’re too bulky.

No designated LP person. I used to joke with customers that I was LP and I don’t feel like tackling you today, but really. In all of the time I was there, we had ONE LP guy come in to creep on us and customers.

I’ve sat in the office and watched a woman rip pegs off the wall, dump a wall of strung beads into her bag, and leave the store in less than 2 minutes. We were more impressed than anything tbh.

We cannot confront you, even if we watched you put it in your bag.

We can only customer service you to death and be mildly passive aggressive.

We won’t chase you down, but the MOD will fill out a report if you were seen on camera.

***If you are caught on camera, a screen cap of you and description of the incident will be emailed to every store in the district.

Park farther away y’all.

Our parking lot was shared with four other stores (the “mall” was an outdoor shopping center)

When I first started working there, my manager told me to park within 8 spots from the front because that was the limit of the cameras.

Returns/Exchanges

So you lifted something from a different store and Michaels carries the exact same one…

If you return something without a receipt, we will give you the lowest price the item has been in the past 90 days, in store credit.

We also need a valid driver’s license so the (national) system will track how often you do non-receipted returns.

If you go up to the register with random, high value items in a non-receipted return transaction (like one expensive brush, one expensive tube of paint, and a pair of jewelry pliers all at once), we have to call an MOD.

If your total refund for a non-receipted return purchase is over $100, the system will prompt for a manager override.

Cash and debit receipted return transactions will be refunded as cash. I had a coworker who would keep these receipts from people who wanted them thrown out, do the return himself, and pocket the cash. [reposter’s note: how? I don’t understand what op is saying here]

If, for whatever reason, you have a fake traveler’s check, try cashing it in here.

Because we do them so infrequently, I had a manager take it for me, and it turned out she took an apparently fake traveler’s check and didn’t even know.

However, pls don’t use counterfeit bills here. If we get too many in X amount of time, the Operations Manager will get fired.

So you actually want to buy something?

Still apprehensive to conceal in your bag? We are supposed to look to make sure you’ve got all of the items out of the buggy, we are supposed to look inside baskets and boxes, and underneath the liner of baskets. Conceal little items underneath your bag, that is sitting in the child seat of the cart.

50% one regular priced item (with exclusions): 400100719008 is the barcode number. You can ask the cashier to type this in, in “item entry.” It will always work, regardless of what coupon is out that week,

Our employee discount is 30% off your purchase, including sale items (with exclusions): 400100451588.

Is the line too long and the framing counter is open? Be really nice and you can check out there.

Pls be nice to the cashier and don’t ask to make eight separate transactions for eight of the same coupon with the same method of payment. While lifting doesn’t directly affect my paycheck, this coupon policy abuse shit does. if the store doesn’t meet projected goals, we get less hours, which means I have less money to put in my gas tank.

Am I missing something? Ask!

Cheers to my first post after creeping the community for a week, but lifting for like 8 years. Be safe shrimps.

disreputable-cat

amazing

also why does nobody else share employee discount coupon codes, cmon ladies, get your shit together

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simminglena · 5 years ago

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🌈 RAINBOW BERRY! LEGACY CHALLENGE

– I love berry Sims! You too? I know, right...? Aren’t they just so cute?

I’ve been considering for a good while whether to do a Berry Challenge or not, but while @lilsimsie already shared her Not So Berry Legacy Challenge with us, I couldn’t click with it for some reason. So, I’ve decided to create my OWN version. It will be a mix of the Not So Berry with the original Legacy Challenge and choose some new rules for my own Rainbow Berry! Legacy Challenge (´｡• ◡ •｡`)ﾉﾞ ♡

If you want to join me in this adventure, buckle up, my friend! Here’s what you need to know (= •ㅅ• =)

NOTE: In order to fully enjoy the Challenge, you must own ALL PACKS! Also, YOU WILL NEED BERRY SKINTONES! You can find some here:

• Noodle’s 16 Pastel Skin Colors • SimplySimblr’s 25 Shades of Berries • Noodle’s 64 Berry Skin Colors • TheSimsperience’s 63 Custom Skin Colors

» The Basics:

You will be playing with your Sims up to the 10th Generation. The perk of this Challenge is that each Generation will be represented by a signature color, wherever applicable. However, it is possible to choose whether their hair/eyes/clothes match their signature color (and skintone) or not.

» Rules:

▪ Cheats are not allowed. The only exception is for the FreeRealEstate cheat when you move into your first home.

▪ Your starter Sim must be created using random genetics. NOTE: It is possible to tweak him/her, as long as none of the game’s presets is used. Keep in mind that some of your Sims’ traits, aspirations and careers must be randomly chosen by a Scenario Generator.

▪ The first born will always be the heir for the next generation unless otherwise stated.

▪ Every generation must complete both the Career and Aspiration unless otherwise stated.

▪ Lifespan must be set to Normal. Don’t forget to always keep track of your Sims’ aging!

In case you wish to share your Berry homes on the Gallery, or just wish to share your progress with the Challenge, feel free to do so by using the #RainbowBerryLegacy tag!

Generations list under the cut!

» The Generations:

There are 10 Generations: » CORAL (Red) » PUMPKIN (Orange) » CITRUS (Yellow) » JADE (Green) » MINT (Aqua) » INDIGO (Blue) » PLUM (Purple) » LILY (Lilac) » BERRY (Pink) » ASH (Gray)

BONUS! » EBONY & IVORY (Black & White)

Each Generation has a list of goals you must achieve before passing over to the next one. Never forget your trustworthy Scenario Generator, because you will need to use it several times through your Challenge.

🌈 Generation #1: CORAL

Gender: x // Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x // Career: x

You are a fiery yet fun-loving young Sim with a liking for clubs and nightlife. You rarely make plans, and if you have to, you're most likely going to mess them up in order to follow your instinct. But you never give up, whatever result you get from your – sometimes reckless – decisions.

REQUIREMENT: Hot-headed trait.

» GOALS:

Get invited to a Club and become their leader;

Adopt a large dog;

Maximize Mischief and Dancing skills;

Have at least 5 lovers;

Get married and have one child after reaching the Adult phase.

🌈 Generation #2: PUMPKIN

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x

You're almost never seen without a bright, wide smile plastered on your face, and if you’re gloomy, it’s most likely because your batch of cookies didn’t turn out the way you wanted. Your heart belongs to the kitchen – and your furry minions – and your mission is to make your neighborhood a little happier everyday with your bakery. As you always say: Good Food is Good Mood.

REQUIREMENT: Goofball trait.

» GOALS:

Adopt at least 3 red cats;

Maximize Cooking and Baking skills;

Unlock and learn all recipes;

Run a bakery;

Find love, marry and have 3 children before Elder phase

The first Male will be the heir for next Generation.

🌈 Generation #3: CITRUS

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x

You are full of energy, with a big thing for gyms and good looks. You may be a bit narcissistic, but when it comes to your skills you’re so fond of yourself that you like to share your progress and enthusiasm all over the Social Networks. You're quite scatterbrained and perhaps a bit selfish, but overall, you’re a good noodle.

REQUIREMENT: Active trait.

» GOALS:

Social Media career;

Maximize Fitness and Videogaming skills;

Complete the Snow Globe and Postcards collection;

Propose to a childhood friend but leave her at the altar;

Get married to another sim and have at least 2 children before reaching the Adult phase.

The first Female will be the heir for next Generation.

🌈 Generation #4: JADE

Age: Young Adult // 1 trait: x // Aspiration: x // Career: x

You must have been some kind of Flower Fairy in your past life. Everything concerning nature and its creatures is mesmerizing to you, to the point that you adore even the smallest flower and wish to live in extreme harmony with each living being surrounding you.

REQUIREMENTS: Loves Outdoors and Vegetarian traits.

» GOALS:

Maximize Gardening, Fishing and Herbalism skills;

Own a Cowplant;

Join the Garden Gnomes Club and become their leader;

Complete Insect, Fish and Frog collections;

Marry a coworker and have one child before Elder stage.

🌈 Generation #5: MINT

Age: Young Adult // Traits: x // Aspiration: x

You don’t quite share your mother’s interests. You believe in balance and good health. Your main focus – quite literally – is on human beings and the wondrous way the human body works, both physically and mentally. You’re extremely dedicated to your job... although you really enjoy your moments of relax.

REQUIREMENT: Doctor career.

» GOALS:

Maximize Logic and Wellness skills;

Meditate and do Yoga at least twice a week;

Adopt a cat or a small dog;

Have 3 failed relationships before finding love with a Veterinary;

Never have children, but adopt a child before Elder stage.

🌈 Generation #6: INDIGO

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x

Justice. There’s nothing that excites you more than investigate and solve crimes in order to punish those criminals. But your heart is a soft one, and at times one must consider and evaluate different paths before making their choice... heart or career? In your case, definitely heart.

REQUIREMENT: Good trait, Detective career.

» GOALS:

Maximize Logic and Charisma skills;

Adopt a large dog;

Find love with a Criminal before level 7 of your career;

Quit career at level 7 and move to a different scenario;

Marry in secret and have four children.

The first Male will be the heir for next Generation.

🌈 Generation #7: PLUM

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x

Your brains crawl with questions. Quite literally. Why do we breathe oxygen? How many stars are beyond our sight? What’s Sixam, and what wonders does it hide? Your curiosity is what pushes you forward, and you’re determined to find the answer to all of your doubts!

REQUIREMENT: Genius trait, Scientist career.

» GOALS:

Maximize Logic and Rocket Science skills;

Build a Rocket Ship;

Complete Alien, Geodes, Elements, Crystals and Space Rocks collections;

Have a relationship on the job before falling in love with an Alien;

Have two children before reaching the Adult phase.

🌈 Generation #8: LILY

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x // Career: x

There’s a gift in each of us, and deep within you there’s a star. Your truest passion lies in music, and you wish to make a living out of it. You may be a little frivolous, but you know what you want, and you know how to get it... don’t you?

REQUIREMENT: Music Lover trait.

» GOALS:

Maximize Singing and Guitar skills;

Write at least 25 songs and earn at least 50.000§ by singing;

Become a World Famous Celebrity;

Have an affair with an Actor;

Have 3 children from 3 different relationships.

🌈 Generation #9: BERRY

Age: Young Adult // 2 traits: x // Aspiration: x // Career: x

You may be born in the spotlight, but celebrity life is not all fun and games. Fun, however, are the many many colors that surround you as you paint. Creativity is your best form of expression... maybe you could also make a few extra simoleons out of it?

REQUIREMENT: Creative trait.

» GOALS:

Maximize Painting and Photography skills;

DIY — where possible — your own furniture and decorations;

Earn at least 50.000§ by painting;

Marry a Snob sim;

Divorce, remarry and have at least two children.

The first Female will be the heir of next Generation.

🌈 Generation #10: ASH

Age: Young Adult // 1 trait: x // Career: x

Life is boring. So boring. Nobody is up to your standards, and the only places you find interesting are inside the books you read. In fact, you wish to belong somewhere else. Humans are ephemeral, empty shells. You want to become superior and immortal... like those mysterious creatures in your favourite books.

REQUIREMENT: Bookworm trait, Bestselling Author aspiration.

» GOALS:

Become a Vampire;

Maximize Writing and Vampire Lore skills;

Write at least 25 books and earn at least 50.000§ by writing;

Unlock all your Vampire Powers and become Grand Master;

Entice and marry Count Vladislaus;

BONUS: Have TWINS – you may cheat for this one!

🌈 BONUS Generation: EBONY & IVORY

Age: Toddler RANDOMIZE TRAITS + ASPIRATION FOR ONE TWIN, THEN CHOOSE THE OPPOSITES FOR THE OTHER.

You two are the complete opposite of each other. To you, everything the other does is utterly nonsensical, and just gets on your nerves. And yet, how is it that you two just cannot have your own lives? Will this curse ever end? Maybe adulthood will finally let you part your ways... or reconcile with each other.

REQUIREMENT: The twins cannot part until the challenge is over.

» GOALS:

Maximize at least 3 skills;

Mess with each other until Teen phase;

One sibling must steal the other’s lover at least once;

Get the same part-time job during Teen phase;

Share the same room until Young Adult phase.

Will the siblings finally part? Will they reconcile? Choose your own ending!

Thanks for reading this far! It may be cheesy and predictable at times, but I had a lot of fun writing this Challenge, so I’m excited to share it with you!

I hope you’ll enjoy playing it as much as I do! So, good luck, and Happy Simming! ヽ(°´∀`°)ﾉ♪ .･:☆

NOTE: REPOSTED, UPDATED FOR GET FAMOUS.

#The Sims 4 #TS4 #Sims4Challenge #S4Challenge #Legacy Challenge #RainbowBerryLegacy

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seenashwrite · 6 years ago

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Cards Against Supernatural: Sunday March 10th

◄ SUNDAY MARCH 10th, 8:00/8:15 P.M.-ish* CST ►

(* As always, this is not precisely when the game starts - we take a little time for everybody to get logged in & settled in chat, so feel free to come & hang out at Discord while you wait!)

* DON’T FORGET - We did the ol’ “spring forward”, if you haven’t adjusted your clocks yet! *

If you see this? You’re invited. ALL SPN Family members who are at least 18 years & older are welcome!

💡 IF THIS WILL BE YOUR FIRST GAME WITH US, YOU NEED TO MAKE SURE IT’S GONNA BE YOUR JAM & VISIT CASPN HEADQUARTERS 💡

—> This is a mobile-friendly page and contains tons of need-to-knows —> This is NON-NEGOTIABLE FOR NEW PLAYERS

🌟 Post with link will go up closer to start of game 🌟

—> Make sure you are ready to go at Discord prior to game time so all you have to do is click-n’-chat! —> At the game site and on Discord (if you do not already have one), make sure you use your Tumblr name or a variation thereof so we know who you are - this prevents unnecessary confusion. 😁

🃏 Find out ways you can contribute to the decks, the most recent CASPN updates, quick tips for players, & how to join the tag list below 🃏

YOU CAN HELP MAKE THIS GAME BETTER!

Anytime you spot a great quote - and it will probably be on a gif! - that you think may work as a question/answer, shoot it my way and I’ll see if I can work it in.

Please include the season & episode number so I know which deck to put it in. FYI: We do not need any from seasons 3, 5, or 6 - those decks are complete or near completion.

UPDATES

On Dramatic Fic Readings…

If you’re a vet, you know we’ve been having a blast with these, closing out our games with a dramatic reading of a Fic Wreck by yours truly.

For our purposes, to be a Fic Wreck Dramatic Reading candidate, it means:

Features a heinously out-of-character Dean and/or Sam –> this is the core characteristic & is non-negotiable

No smut/kinks/Wincest/ABO –> this is non-negotiable

In the 500-800 word range or less (so, a Drabble or modest One-Shot - we’ve made exception for truly horrid things in the 1K range, as well are series that we’ll split up over subsequent game nights)

Can be on Tumblr or from an outside site (FF.net, AO3, Wattpad, et al)

If on Tumblr, preferably at least a year old/not currently circulating on all our dashes with great fervor

Preferably not anyone’s BFF or whatever - and NEVER someone in our group, though y’all are certainly welcome to volunteer any of your own short fics if you just want to hear it read aloud in my crazy voices

Preferably features an immature/annoying/etc. “Y/N”

Preferably has an inexplicably high note/reblog/kudos/etc. count for what it is, which is a wreck

Preferably has a plot that is objectively ridiculous and/or plot points that are crazy confusing

On Skribblio…

This is a free online version of Pictionary that allows the host to input custom words - so we’ve been trying our hands at SPN-based drawings before CASPN starts, and it has been hilarious. If you have any ideas for words that are realistically draw-a-ble, feel free to shoot me an Ask with your suggestion. There will be a special chat set up for Skribblio separate from the CASPN chat, so if you decide to play, make sure you’re in the right chat. I believe the room limit is eight, otherwise you can jump in on the game even if it’s already in progress. Head over to the site (linked above) and get yourself set up ahead of time (your cookies will do the remembering from there on out). Recommend you use a mouse if you don’t have a pad/stylus - and be aware that the stylus will typically make a straight line “streak” across your drawing when you lift it from the pad, so I honestly think mouse will be better. * WE DON’T DO THIS EVERY SUNDAY, ONLY SOMETIMES! *

VERY IMPORTANT REGARDING VOICE CHAT

If you are going to participate in the voice chat over at Discord *PLEASE* make sure you are in a quiet place, and if you are unable to do so, kindly mute yourself and just listen until you are able.

Also, kindly mute yourself if you need to speak to someone on the phone/someone who is with you in person, and mute yourself if your environment becomes noisy - it happens! No worries! Just jump back in when that’s done/when it’s your turn to read

Have this set up and ready to go prior to game start, and ensure all other apps/messaging on your device of choice are muted.

If you are in voice chat just so you can listen because you can’t/don’t choose to read aloud, that of course is fine, but you need to have yourself muted, please, and communicate via chat that you need myself or someone else to read your hand.

TIPS & TRICKS FOR IN-GAME FAQs

(A kind reminder: most everything I/veteran players are asked in chat during games is covered at CASPN Headquarters)

Should your mic go out/no one can hear you in Discord, same thing applies as it does when you get duplicate cards/can’t choose a card over in the game - REFRESH! Just refresh the browser page for Discord, and give it a second, and it should remedy itself.

🏷️ Tag Me In The Future, Nash! 🏷️

TO BE TAGGED, YOU *MUST* SEND AN ASK! I will not tag you any other way, nor will I tag you if you’ve never played with us before. Them’s the breaks.

I AM UNABLE TO TAG ON THE DAY OF GAMES, suggest you look out for the post, come try the game on for size & if you enjoy it, kindly send an ask stating you’d like to be tagged after you know you like it & are able to participate in future games

IF YOU HAVE CHANGED YOUR NAME, it is YOUR responsibility to send me an ask - I will not track you down or assume you want to stay tagged

FOR THOSE WITH SETTINGS THAT PREVENT TAGGING, you do not have to follow me in order to participate, however I will not follow you just so I can tag you - I am following some CASPN players, however it is only when I find their content of interest or I was already following them prior to the original deck’s conception - if you want to be in the know about the game dates/times, I suggest you (a) follow me and/or #CASPN which is unique to the weekly games I run, or (b) make a side blog with standard settings that is purely for the purpose of being on this tag list (ex: “CASPN-[your handle])

Tag team, back again…

@impandagrl @salt-n-burn-em-all @princessofthefandomrealm @gryffindorable713 @rozadolphin @abbessolute @ohio-cnk-80q3 @a-screaming-ghost @ferferelli @ericaprice2008 @butiaintgonnaloveem @bumbleball13 @idreamofhazel @winchesterprincessbride @bemyqueenofdarkness @revwinchester @growningupgeek @ultimatecin73 @blackcherrywhiskey

* The Cannot Tags! *

It either (1) looks like the blog under this name is inactive, (2) you’ve changed your name and not told me, or (3) there’s a setting on YOUR end that prevents it.

None presently as the list has been purged/updated as of 11/11/18

NOTE: THE LIST IS NEARING TIME TO BE PURGED AGAIN, RE: PEOPLE WHO HAVEN’T SHOWN UP FOR ROUGHLY A MONTH, JUST FYI

❓ WHY AM I NOT TAGGED? you may ask ❓

Reminder: I’m taking roll at games so I can keep up maintenance on the tag list - if you aren’t participating often [read: approx. every 6 wks/6 games] & you haven’t let me know to move you to my “Hiatus” list, then you won’t be tagged on posts, but I’ll keep you on the CASPN tags page, listed at the bottom under the time frame you were removed.

It is possible I made a mistake if I get busy and neglect to c/p the roster frequently throughout the game - all you have to do is speak up. The biggest issue I have with keeping up is when you use some rando name in game that neither I nor any of the other players recognize. If you want to stay on the tags, you need to use a name I’ll know. Otherwise, I couldn’t care less, call yourself whatever strikes your fancy! :)

Want to be back on “active” status? Want to be removed altogether? No problem! Kindly communicate your wishes with me via Ask.

#CASPN #Cards Against Humanity #Cards Against Supernatural #Sunday nights #during season 14 #Queueby Dooby Doo #Dad's on a blog post and #he hasn't been queued in a few days

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rosesisupposes · 6 years ago

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Destined, part 9

aka An Unexpected Reminder, aka Crashing into the Passt aka Sorry, Didn't Ssee You There

Character Tags: Virgil/Anixety ; Patton/Creativity ; Patton/Morality ; Logan/Logic ; Remy/Sleep ; Dante/Deceit

Chapter Pairings: Slight Anxceit

Chapter Warnings: descriptions of violence, Deceit,

Reader Tags: @residentanchor @royally-anxious @sanderssidesfanblog @bewarethegrammarpolice

Summary: After centuries of acting as an oracle to heroes, quest-seekers, and villains alike, Virgil just wants to live as a normal, modern human. For someone who can see infinite probabilities, you’d think he’d know better.

<<Chapter 8 | Masterlist | Chapter 10>>

Read on Ao3

Virgil left coffee shop distracted, thinking about his new friends. There are some things you don’t need to be a Sage to predict, he thought. Even if Logan and Patton apparently both had managed to be entirely unaware of the other’s feelings. He didn’t want to push Patton, especially when the baker was so convinced of Logan’s lack of regard - but if the scientist were to make the first move, wouldn’t they both be that much happier?

Absentmindedly looking up at the clouds as he planned, he entirely forgot to look where he was walking.

“Ow!”

He crashed straight into a well-dressed man walking in the opposite direction and fell hard on his rear.

“Wha- I’m so sorry – are you hurt?” Virgil stammered, looking up into mostly brown eyes. Was that a trick of the light, or were those golden streaks?

“Not at all- barely felt a thing,” the stranger said breezily. “Here, let me asssist you.”

Before Virgil can react, the stranger pulled him up by both hands. Skin met skin, and Virgil’s power sprang to life without his bidding. A rush of possibilities flooded his brain, laced with the thrill and fright of familiarity. Shocked, Virgil pulled his hands back the minute he got to his feet.

“Um, sorry again, hope you’re alright, uh, have a good one,” he said, stumbling over his words and feet as he quickly walked on, pulling up his hood. It was him. The sorcerer, the one whose destiny he wished he could have never been part of. He was here, and Virgil had just seen his fate.

Somewhere behind him he heard an exclamation of surprise and confusion. But he couldn’t risk turning around. He had immediately recognized a fellow magic being on contact - what if the sorcerer had done the same?

Too distracted to sort through the choices on the street, he practically sprinted home. Reaching his apartment building, he checked the street and confirmed that there were no visible sorcerers anywhere near. He slipped inside, threw down wallet and keys, and immediately began to meditate on the couch.

Breathe in for four counts. Hold for seven. Out for eight. Four... Seven... Eight...

He concentrated on the possibilities he’d seen. They were tangled threads thanks to how unprepared he’d been, and it had been a while since he’d used his power. But the visions never lied, couldn’t lie, no matter how rusty he got. He shuddered. The sorcerer did not mean well for this world. So many of his choices’ outcomes were desolate, hopeless, and horrific.

So why did Roman keep appearing in them?

Flashback to: 1500s CE, a rocky island in the northwest

Zephyr was really regretting coming out of retirement.

When his last body had finally aged to the point of death, he’d thought fondly of the only destinies he’d given in that lifetime. Maybe he could leave the woods for the next lifetime, and practice his power again.

It had taken all of one destiny before he remembered why he’d hidden himself deep in the Harz in the first place.

The view was nice, at least. He’d watched the world from the ether, looked north and west, and found this beautiful grotto on a rocky shore. When he stepped out from behind the stone outcroppings concealing the entrance, he could see up the rolling foothills into the highlands beyond. This country felt just a bit more accepting of magic folk - the fae were still widely respected, and despite their dwindling numbers, the local humans were fiercely proud of ‘their’ dragons. When he felt the urge, Zephyr could find others who understood just a bit better what life was like with magic running in your blood.

He sighed, and brushed his white-blond hair out of his eyes. A futile effort with the sea breeze coming from this direction, but he tried all the same. His hair in this form was longer than it had been in several lifetimes. He’d considered coming back as a she or they this time, but ultimately, he was what felt the most true. Just as no matter his form, he was most attracted to masculine or masculine-presenting humans, fairies, or any other humanoid race. Some things, like his magic, were apparently innate.

It was cold today, as it usually was, but at least it wasn’t as snowy as that shack on White Mountain. That had been his worst idea ever. Yes, it was great branding to be the wise old man hidden among snowy peaks, but the yetis had been such a bother, always trying to destroy his shack or harass his Seekers. Here in the highlands, at least, he could communicate with all the magical creatures he encountered in feelings and thought if not words.

Not that he had much, recently. Being a new Sage was always a struggle. Building up a reputation in order to get more Seekers to find you took years. He sighed and walked through an apparent wall of rock into his home. Years of rumor-spreading and self-promotion was stressful. He hoped it paid off soon.

No sooner had the thought passed through his mind than a call on the beach summoned his attention.

He let the enchantment on the rocks fall as the caller entered the grotto.

The dark-haired man’s face was lit by a magelight in the palm of his hand. Sparkling yellow flames lit a face that Zephyr could have sworn he’d seen carved on a marble statue back in the day. Dark brown eyes revealed a flashing streak of gold as the stranger straightened. Black hair, perfectly coiffed in a jaunty wave, flopped gently above cheekbones that could slice a feather in midair. His dark cloak was pushed back to reveal a black tunic elegantly embroidered in gold.

Ohhh, I am in trouble.

He stood to greet the beautiful man, calling out “Welcome, Seeker. I am the Sage Zephyr.”

“Greetings, Sage Zephyr. I am Dante the Golden,” the man replied with a crooked smile.

Well, this has been a nice life, Zephyr thought deliriously. Bit on the short side, it having been only about 20 years, but at least Zephyr was dying happy, slain by the most elegant man he’d ever seen in his lives. Either that, or several centuries of solitude had really gotten to him.

The sorcerer, or maybe wizard (Zephyr had never bothered to learn the difference: they were men who did magic) let the flames in his hand fade, and draped his cloak on a dry stone. He let Zephyr gesture him to a seat by the Sage’s stone bench while tea brewed on enchanted fire.

“I must say, I’m very impressed by the hospitality. One always hears of the quests undertaken to learn one’s destiny - they never mention the charming host,” Dante said with a casual smile.

If he kept beaming that delicious smile, Zephyr was going to lie and tell him his destiny was to stay in this grotto and smile at him for the rest of his days. Maybe this was just nerves about his first divining in several centuries. He’d try to focus on that, regardless. Being coherent was definitely a requirement to be a functional Sage.

“I’m heartbroken to hear my efforts have been wasted. Though perhaps it is my brethren darkening our collective reputation,” Zephyr managed to reply.

“Speaking of your brethren - can I ask about Sage magic? It’s rather a fascination of mine, well, one of them anyway,” the sorcerer said, accepting a mug of hot tea.

“That does depend on what you would like to know. By our Law, there are some secrets we must keep.”

“That’s just it, actually,” Dante said, eyes lighting up. “The Sages’ Law. From what my research has told me, the Law is not like most laws of magic, in that it is not a physical limitation on the very bounds of ability itself, but rather a custom. A code of conduct of sorts, binding only so far as each Sage chooses to be bound.”

Zephyr nodded, pale hair falling across paler eyes. “Yes, that’s largely true. In the moment, there is little that can stop any individual Sage from flouting our conventions. However, we are all of single kin or race, and there are internal ways of enforcing the rules. If a rule-breaker is particularly unlucky, one of our number may be observing them from the ether and be able to intervene before they even attempt to flout the Law. The luckiest miscreant may get away with it for some short number of years. There is no fleeing entirely from justice. Sooner or later, each of us will return to the ether, and once there, the collective power of all Sages is absolute over any individual.”

“That is fascinating. Is there a discrete list of what can or cannot be done with the power of the ether?” the sorcerer asked eagerly. “Are there any absolute rules?”

“Only the invocation is absolute. After the fall of Delphi, when the Law was made, those words were imbued with the very force of the ether itself. To refuse such a request,” Zephyr shuddered, “even I am not sure the exact punishment, but it is surely terrible.”

Dante pondered this for a moment. “I wish there was history stretching back to the first Sage. Records I have found barely reach back to the third century. But I suppose I can understand wanting to keep some secrets safe. Thank you, Zephyr, for indulging me. May I interrupt this with my own invocation?”

There was that smile again. Zephyr had never been so taken with someone so quickly. “Of course. You are the Seeker, after all.”

The elegant man cleared this throat and spoke. “Sage, I entreat you, tell me my destiny.”

“Seeker, to know your destiny is to be bound by it. Are you prepared to risk your future?”

“I am.”

“Then give me your hands, and prepare to be bound.”

Zephyr clasped both the man’s hands, half-expecting to feeling a jolt of attraction.

Suddenly, he smells the acrid scent of burning hair and meat over the familiar tang of seawater. Screams fill his ears. His vision is filled with a dark night, lit up with flames. Houses and castles alike are burning. And there is Dante, above it all, soaring through the air. He is suspended in flight by the very power of heat. The Golden is an appropriate moniker, bedecked as the sorcerer is in the precious metal, lit up by the blaze that has made his enemies melt below his feet. A slim and twisted rod, coated in a metallic substance that shifts colors under his slim hands, guides blasts of power to engulf the few remaining structures. Dante curls his lip in triumph over the last rebellion against his absolute rule.

Cassandra’s mercy. The man was as twisted inside as he was beautiful without.

But there was a future without darkness. Zephyr also saw a near miss, defeat at the hands of an unassuming fire sprite. And the turning point? Ah. The theft of a magic staff, brought to an ancient stone altar - one dedicated to the old gods of the fire sprites. Accidental timing, and just a hint of gumption, and the crisis could be averted.

“When the wood lays with stone, the world will turn to Flame,”he intoned, opening his eyes.

The sorcerer’s beautiful lips curved into a predatory, triumphant grin. He couldn’t hear the capital letter. But Zephyr knew. He just hoped it would be enough.

#aka hiss hiss motherfather #destined #fanfic #writing #tw deceit #fantasy au #modern fantasy au #the plot she thiccens

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bastardtravel · 6 years ago

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August 11, 2018. Manchester, New Hampshire.

After seven hours on the road, pausing only to explore an Old Ones cult site, storm a terrible castle, and eat distressingly dry corned beef at a Greek diner that still advertised one of their menu items as “Michael Jackson’s favorite grinder”, we were in dire need of respite.

Establishing a forward operating base was our first priority. For my part, I can sleep anywhere. My bonfire days in the Frozen North frequently necessitated pitching a $10 K-Mart tent over gravel, then drinking bottom-shelf whiskey until you didn’t realize you were sleeping in a puddle of rainwater and broken glass. That’s not a knack you lose. It’s like riding a bike. The Girl was always more discerning, and became doubly so after our experience in Phoenix with the inept criminal front halfway house hotel. We agreed that she can veto any of the lodgings I book. Sometimes, late at night, I’ll hold a flashlight under my chin and tell her spoOoOoky stories about hostels in Ireland.

She insisted on the airport Super 8. I was hoping to stay in a quaint deep woods motel called “Unsmiling Jed’s Sleepaway”, attached to sister business “Unsmiling Jed’s Discount Plastic Surgery Silo and Chili Kitchen”.

If I can’t protect it, I don’t deserve to have it. That goes double for life.

A friendly foreign woman checked us in at the Super 8, then proceeded into utter bafflement when I asked for a first aid kid. I chewed myself up pretty good climbing Bancroft’s Castle, and I’d spent the last half hour bleeding into an oily dog blanket to avoid ruining my upholstery. I’m pretty sure that’s how plagues start.

There were no band-aids here, or antiseptics, or possibly medicine as a concept. There was a three gallon tub of hand sanitizer. I thanked her for the offer but gently declined.

We went up to the third floor. The hallways were lined with people sitting on the carpet outside their rooms, shouting and smoking cigarettes. The room itself was clean and the air conditioning worked. All my boxes were checked. The bathroom reeked of weed, which some would interpret as a bonus. I scrubbed my wounds raw in the sink, tucked away the precious cargo of wine and peaches, and set out to investigate downtown Manchester.

Streetlight technology has not yet made its way to Manchester, so we spent twenty minutes missing exits in ocean-floor darkness. It looked worryingly like Wilkes-Barre, which is not where one would choose to vacation, were one sane.

Downtown erupted from nowhere like graphic pop-in on a video game running at its lowest resolution. One second you’re in leatherface country, with nothing breaking the abyssal darkness but the occasional half-broken Jiffy Lube sign. The next, you’re on vibrant neon market strip, replete with hipsters and the homeless.

We knew we had hit downtown proper when we passed by the “craft grilled cheese bistro”.

only programmers will understand!!!! like and reblog if u get it

Since I am an adult man, grilled cheese cannot be dinner. Both “gastropubs” we tried, despite their bitchin Greek mythology names, offered generic terrible burgers and a draft list that consisted of Coors Light.

“I’m so hungry,” the Girl told me. “I’m gonna die.”

“We all will,” I assured her. “Soon.”

Yelp claimed there was a brewery five blocks away. We walked off the only lit street, into absolute, encompassing blackness. It would’ve been spooky if I didn’t always kind of hope some Putty Patrol mook would lunge at me from the dark while I’m far away from home, having told no one where I’m going and left no paper trail.

There were no incidents. No one was murdered in self-defense. No one knows what we did last summer. The Stark Brewing Company was in the basement of a grim looking office complex, and it was vacant save for two other wanderers.

We sat at the bar and ordered a flight and an imperial stout. I was pushing for finding an actual restaurant, but the Girl ordered “Penne with vodka sauce”, which was not the right color, flavor, or texture to be anything but penne bolognese. The Girl didn’t seem to mind. I ate a pulled pork sandwich.

The beers were warm, but I didn’t care. It didn’t matter what the beers were, so long as they were beers. And not Coors Light. The brewery themed all of their beers off of dogs, for some reason, which I believe to be the ideal business model. According to the bartenders, the brewery had been open for 25 years, but hadn’t yet received their big boom. I was outraged. The beers were excellent, and would probably be even better if they weren’t room temperature, and the taps were not only named for specific dogs, but also provided pictures.

To say nothing of the bathroom, which was covered in sharpie beer lore.

The bartender and waitresses swore a lot more than you would normally expect in this context. The Girl maintains they were swearing at us. I disagreed.

“They were swearing <i>with</i> us,” I mansplained.

“We weren’t swearing,” she countered.

“But if we HAD been.”

As I’ve grown larger and more sinuous, I’ve tried to cut back on how often I cuss at strangers. Cultural relativism is the understanding that not everyone grew up among the coalcrackers, and good-natured oaths like “how the hell are you” or using the fuck-word as a conversational placeholder, while subjectively soothing, can set off fight-or-flight in the small, soft, and bourgeoisie.

I try to maintain direct proportionality between my barbarism and my well-heeledness. Neither the wait staff nor the other two customers shared my bond, and the middle-aged guy on my right proceeded to tell me how his hometown of Denver, Colorado is the greatest fuckin’ city in America, next to maybe Southern California. Which is not a city.

We talked about our homes and travels for a while, then I got my pulled pork sandwich and they left. The sandwich was slightly warmer than the beer, which beat the alternative.

An armada of children came into the bar.

“Oh, shit,” the woman tending bar said. They were visibly teenagers, and on the wrong side of it. They had that gangly awkwardness you get around fourteen or fifteen, and if they were trying to play it off, they were woefully bad at it. There were also nearly twenty of them. It looked like a field trip.

People in their twenties don’t travel in packs of more than six. It’s hard to transport a throng, unless you have a party bus, and why do you have a party bus when you’re twenty-eight? You’re twenty-eight and party buses have always been sad. Get a job. Also, it’s hard to get that many adults to agree on something.

It can be done. You can say, “Hey, adults, you want to do some drugs?” And in a sufficiently sized crowd, you’ll manage to pull twenty or so who will follow you to your house or whatever. This is called an “afterparty”. It doesn’t go to bars at 9pm.

Have you felt out the social zeitgeist recently? Look at a random handful of current memes and it’ll be pretty clear that most adults consider socialization to be a required burden, like paying emotional taxes. “Going out” is the price of living in a civilized society. You’re not going to scare up twenty people, then put them in a party bus, then take them to an abandoned bar half a mile outside of where the actual nightlife is.

“Hey, we’re just about to close,” the bartender said.

A reedy blonde in a top that seemed to consist mostly of straps screeched, “But your WEBSITE said you were open til ONE!”

Screeched.

The bar fell silent. Well, more silent. The Girl and I traded looks, her horror for my delight.

“Uhhhhhh,” the bartender said, but with excellent elocution, as though that were the word she had deliberately chosen. “Okay.”

They sat the itinerant mall food court in an enormous corner table, whereupon they requested shots.

The waitress who had sworn at/with us the least came back to the bar and said, “You guys said you were from Pennsylvania, right?”

We nodded.

“Can I see one of your licenses quick?”

She compared mine against the obviously fake ID one of the tweens had given her. After a moment she said, “Yeah, you can see, the font is different. And the picture looks like it’s photoshopped.”

“Yeah, no one’s license picture ever looks this good,” the Girl said, studying the fake ID.

“Except mine,” I added. They ignored me. I didn’t take it personally.

The waitresses disappeared into the back. Five minutes later, the only dude working at the place was gendered into being the bad cop. He sulked over to the teens.

“You guys gotta leave,” he said. “We know your ID’s fake. We’re not trying to get fined. You gotta go.”

For maximum accuracy, imagine this said in Toby’s voice from the Office. Shamefaced, the flash mob of children dispersed.

We paid for our room temperature beers and left the poor, foul-mouthed brewery to close at 9:30 on a Friday. The Girl and I accidentally stalked the battalion of teens through the street, but only because we were all moving back toward the only lights in the city, not unlike moths. They turned a corner and vanished, presumably to find an arcade or laser tag or some sort of large carousel.

The Girl and I followed the sounds of some obnoxious bros announcing, “It’s like a fahkin sketchy ally, dewd”.

It was, in fact, the least sketchy alley I’d ever been in. Cat Alley was the best lit venue in all of New Hampshire. It was clean and well-maintained, and it was covered less in graffiti and more in an outdoor art gallery dedicated to cats.

There were more, but they didn’t all warrant a picture.

Portland Pie Co loomed from the endless darkness like a beacon in the night, hearkening back to those days lost in Maine during the Great Lobster Drought of 2017. We split a bourbon barrel ale which did me in. It was bedtime.

On the way back, toward the end of the main drag, a man made of pure light rode by blasting EZ-Listenin from his Tron bicycle, also made of pure light.

I can’t prove he wasn’t Jesus.

Heartened, we returned to the hotel, where no one was smoking or yelling in the hallway anymore. Excellent.

Next stop, Portsmouth.

Love,

The Bastard

Into the Abyss August 11, 2018. Manchester, New Hampshire. After seven hours on the road, pausing only to explore an Old Ones cult site, storm a terrible castle, and eat distressingly dry corned beef at a Greek diner that still advertised one of their menu items as "Michael Jackson's favorite grinder", we were in dire need of respite.

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seenashwrite · 6 years ago

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Cards Against Supernatural: Sunday February 17th

◄ SUNDAY FEBRUARY 17th, 8:00/8:15 P.M.-ish* CST ►

(* As always, this is not precisely when the game starts - we take a little time for everybody to get logged in & settled in chat, so feel free to come & hang out at Discord while you wait!)

💖 THE VALENTINE’S DECK WILL BE IN PLAY ALL MONTH LONG!! 💖

If you see this? You’re invited. ALL SPN Family members who are at least 18 years & older are welcome!

💡 IF THIS WILL BE YOUR FIRST GAME WITH US, YOU NEED TO MAKE SURE IT’S GONNA BE YOUR JAM & VISIT CASPN HEADQUARTERS 💡

—> This is a mobile-friendly page and contains tons of need-to-knows —> This is NON-NEGOTIABLE FOR NEW PLAYERS

🌟 Post with links will go up closer to start of game 🌟

🃏 Find out ways you can contribute to the decks, the most recent CASPN updates, quick tips for players, & how to join the tag list below 🃏

YOU CAN HELP MAKE THIS GAME BETTER!

Anytime you spot a great quote - and it will probably be on a gif! - that you think may work as a question/answer, shoot it my way and I’ll see if I can work it in.

Please include the season & episode number so I know which deck to put it in. FYI: We do not need any from seasons 3, 5, or 6 - those decks are complete or near completion.

UPDATES

On Dramatic Fic Readings…

If you’re a vet, you know we’ve been having a blast with these, closing out our games with a dramatic reading of a Fic Wreck by yours truly.

For our purposes, to be a Fic Wreck Dramatic Reading candidate, it means:

Features a heinously out-of-character Dean and/or Sam –> this is the core characteristic & is non-negotiable

No smut/kinks/Wincest/ABO –> this is non-negotiable

Can be on Tumblr or from an outside site (FF.net, AO3, Wattpad, et al)

If on Tumblr, preferably at least a year old/not currently circulating on all our dashes with great fervor

Preferably features an immature/annoying/etc. “Y/N”

Preferably has an inexplicably high note/reblog/kudos/etc. count for what it is, which is a wreck

Preferably has a plot that is objectively ridiculous and/or plot points that are crazy confusing

On Skribblio…

VERY IMPORTANT REGARDING VOICE CHAT

If you are going to participate in the voice chat over at Discord *PLEASE* make sure you are in a quiet place, and if you are unable to do so, kindly mute yourself and just listen until you are able.

Have this set up and ready to go prior to game start, and ensure all other apps/messaging on your device of choice are muted.

TIPS & TRICKS FOR IN-GAME FAQs

(A kind reminder: most everything I/veteran players are asked in chat during games is covered at CASPN Headquarters)

🏷️ Tag Me In The Future, Nash! 🏷️

TO BE TAGGED, YOU *MUST* SEND AN ASK! I will not tag you any other way, nor will I tag you if you’ve never played with us before. Them’s the breaks.

IF YOU HAVE CHANGED YOUR NAME, it is YOUR responsibility to send me an ask - I will not track you down or assume you want to stay tagged

Tag team, back again…

@impandagrl @salt-n-burn-em-all @princessofthefandomrealm @gryffindorable713 @rozadolphin @abbessolute @ohio-cnk-80q3 @a-screaming-ghost @ferferelli @ericaprice2008 @butiaintgonnaloveem @bumbleball13 @idreamofhazel @blackcherrywhiskey @winchesterprincessbride @bemyqueenofdarkness @revwinchester @growningupgeek @ultimatecin73

* The Cannot Tags! *

It either (1) looks like the blog under this name is inactive, (2) you’ve changed your name and not told me, or (3) there’s a setting on YOUR end that prevents it.

None presently as the list has been purged/updated as of 11/11/18

❓ WHY AM I NOT TAGGED? you may ask ❓

Want to be back on “active” status? Want to be removed altogether? No problem! Kindly communicate your wishes with me via Ask.

#CASPN #Cards Against Humanity #Cards Against Supernatural #Sunday nights #during season 14 #Queueby Dooby Doo #Dad's on a blog post and #he hasn't been queued in a few days

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grandwarlordradha · 7 years ago

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JOHANN STUFF

tagged by @odric-master-swagtician for mtg fanwalker character stuff i dont have the energy to finish all the questions so ill come back and finish this later (?) (also uh someone copy paste the wizards copyright policy somewhere for me to add onto this)

Character Name: Johann Gottschalk Age: 25 Appearance: here, on the right (art by hazoretspartyfavors) 1. What do you know about this character now that s/he doesn’t know? HEY DIPSHIT YOU’RE WORKING FOR A DEMON 2. What is this character’s greatest flaw? His dependency. His reliance on faith was a pretty poor coping mechanism for the death of his family, and only fueled an (unsuccessful) campaign to kill the monsters of Innistrad. This let him easily be manipulated by a demon masquerading as a remnant of Avacyn, and well...yeah. 3. What do you know about this character that s/he would never admit? The dorky kid he trained with as cathars is going to end up saving his life. 4. What is this character’s greatest asset? His preparedness. Years of isolation and fervent hatred for the monster races of Innistrad allowed him to cook up a bunch of different tools and strategies to kill them. 5. If this character could choose a different identity, who would s/he be? Honestly? A baker. 6. What music does this character sing to when no one else is around? He really, earnestly loves Kaladeshi party songs from his time there after his first planeswalk. He keeps sheet music of them around. 7. In what or whom does this character have the greatest faith? He still holds faith in Avacyn after her death, which led to his manipulation by the demon Süldrum. After he was saved from that sordid mess with @odric-master-swagtician ‘s Ian, and the two slew the demon, he shifted over to the ‘save those who cannot save themselves’ side of things more than ‘kill all monsters’ than he was previously. 8. What is this character’s favorite movie? What the hell is a movie?

9. Does this character have a favorite article of clothing? Favorite shoes? Whatever keeps him alive is his current favorite. He’s very much practicality over aesthetics. 10. Does this character have a vice? Name it. Johann, at least to start, is a bit of a legend amongst the Innistradi for being a brutal, wrathful slayer of the monstrous. His black-and-white morality tends to view humanity = good and monsters = evil, despite the dramatic irony of a vampire creating the angel he worshipped. This smooths out over time, but he still has a subconscious cruel streak towards his foes. 11. Name this character’s favorite person (living or dead. By default, Johann doesn’t stick around too many other people, so it’d probably be Ian, since he saved his life and all. 12. What is this character’s secret wish? He wants everyone good, Innistradi or off-plane, to be safe. Mainly so his work can be done and he can live some semblance of a normal life. 13. What is this character’s proudest achievement? Felling the demon Süldrum alongside Ian, destroying an offshoot of the Skirsdag known as the Eclipse in the process. The event slightly reversed the negative opinion people had of him once news spread. 14. Describe this character’s most embarrassing moment. Pick any moment in the prank wars Ian and Johann had in their cathar training youth, basically. 15. What is this character’s deepest regret? His entire time as an unwitting servant of the demon Süldrum. The demon posed as Avacyn, and commanded him to exterminate the monsters of Innistrad, as well as those throughout the Multiverse. Many of them were simply enemies of Süldrum he wanted eliminated, with Johann none the wiser. It took the intervention of Ian, a near duel to the death between the two, and their combined efforts to end the demon’s machinations and his hold on Johann. 16. What is this character’s greatest fear? Nonserious: His ichthyophobia. The guy fucking hates fish despite being raised in Nephalia as the son of a fisherman. Serious: The possibility that if he wasn’t stopped, Johann would’ve murdered plenty of innocent people under Süldrum’s command. 17. Describe this character’s most devastating moment. The combined shock of his loss to Ian--who he’d soundly bested for years in their cathar training, as well as the revelation that ‘Avacyn’ was actually a Skirsdag demon manipulating him was a supremely humbling moment. 18. What is this character’s greatest achievement? See #13 (?) 19. What is this character’s greatest hope? See #12(?) 20. Does this character have an obsession? Name it. His mission to (previously) exterminate monsters, or (currently) safeguard the meek and innocent. 21. What is this character’s greatest disappointment? See #17 22. What is this character’s worst nightmare? Well shit, the guy saw his family’s corpses after they were killed by a Markov neonate. What more do you want? 23. Whom does this character most wish to please? Why? Honestly? The common folk. He doesn’t stick around in too many people’s lives for long, so he hopes the impression he makes is a good and inspiring one. 24. Describe this character’s mother. Lorelei Gottschalk was a housewife, but was far more crass than one would expect from that position. Her foul-mouth, take-no-shit attitude, and feisty nature won over Sergei, and the two settled down in Nephalia to raise a family by the sea. Johann learned to cook from her, and if it wasn’t for her own ingenuity in the kitchen, he may never have learned how to be as handy with tools or food as he is today. 25. Describe this character’s father. Sergei Gottschalk was a fisherman on the coast of Nephalia, and one of the pillars of his community bringing home most of the food for it’s people. While he would frequently have to go out on lengthy trips, he would always make sure to spend time with his family once he was back home. He’d often joke Avacyn was ‘testing’ him by giving him a son with a fear of fish who usually refused to eat it, but was always good-hearted and patient with his son. Johann’s fondest memory with his father was on his tenth birthday, when they were practicing fishing and he ‘miraculously’ (read: his father planted) caught a silvered necklace of Avacyn’s collar. He still has it to this day. 26. If s/he had to choose, with whom would this character prefer to live? His mother, if only because living on a fishing ship for a majority of his life would kill the man. 27. Where does this character fall in birth order? What effect does this have? Only child. 28. Describe this character’s siblings or other close relatives. None to speak of, really. 29. Describe this character’s bedroom. Include three cherished items. Most of Johann’s life is spent nomadically, but he does have a storage attic he rents out in Kaladesh he rents out and occasionally visits during times of rest. 1. His silvered Avacyn’s collar necklace (See #25) 2. Daybreak, his separating customized sword. 3. Morbid, but he keeps the pulled teeth of the neonate that killed his family in a glass container. It reminds him of his duty and what can happen when he’s not there to protect people. 30. What is this character’s birth date? How does this character manifest traits of his/her astrological sign? Johann was born on the (Innistradi equivalent?) of May 14th, making him a Taurus. Tauruses are: Independent, persistent, and stubborn. (sounds good to me) 31. If this character had to live in seclusion for six months, what items would s/he bring? Most of his life is done in seclusion, so...this is kind of just ‘default’ Johann? He’d bring all his survival gear and weapons. 32. Why is this character angry? BRO HE FAMILY DEAD AND MOST OF HIS ADULT LIFE IS A LIE 33. What calms this character? Safety and quiet easily transitions him from battles for survival or protection back into a calm mindset. 34. Describe a recurring dream or nightmare this character might have. 35. List the choices (not circumstances) that led this character to his/her current predicament.

36. List the circumstances over which this character has no control.

37. What wakes this character in the middle of the night? Any noises or bumps in the night get him jumpy, given his lifestyle as a monster hunter. He rarely wakes up from nightmares in the middle of the night.

38. How would a stranger describe this character? Cold, brutal, and overzealous. 39. What does this character resolve to do differently every morning?

40. Who depends on this character? Why?

41. If this character knew s/he had exactly one month to live, what would s/he do? 42. How would a dear friend or relative describe this character? Bull-headed, tenacious, and loyal. 43. What is this character’s most noticeable physical attribute? His facial tattoo in the symbol of Avacyn’s collar, a relic of his time as a near-mad zealot working under Süldrum. If he could, he’d get it removed in a heartbeat, though it has some sentimental value for what it used to represent. 44. What is this character hiding from him/herself? Nothing comes to mind. Johann is (mostly) aware of his flaws and regrets. 45. Write one additional thing about your character.

Johann’s color identity is firmly W/B, with a bit of an equal pull towards R or U for a third color.

#consulate creations #johann gottschalk #fanwalkers #consulate content

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thranduilsperkybutt · 7 years ago

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ThranduilsPerkyButt’s 8,000 Follower Challenge

Oh my gosh, darlings! We’ve reached 8,000 followers! Out of this world, I know! I never expected to get this many followers, but here you all are, and I cannot express the warmth it brings to my heart to know that you enjoyed my stories enough to follow me. Thank you, truly! I’ve been kind of obsessed with challenges as of late, so I decided to try out making my own challenge, maybe, and see how it goes. It’s my first ever one that I’ve made myself, so I get if no one wants to write the prompts lol, but hopefully some of you do!

| Rules & How to Sign Up |

You don’t have to be following me, but that would be rad if you were. :)

You can write anything! Smut, crack, fluff, angst, smangst, smluff, flangst, etc.! Whatever! I just wanna’ read it! And, in the true spirit of my multifandom blog, you can write from any fandom you want as long as it is a fandom from my fandom’s list (found here), and any character(s) you’d like from that fandom!

Only reader inserts, please! There must be a “reader” character (A.K.A. “you” or “Y/N”). No OCs. Sorry!

You can choose multiple prompts, because I’m going to let the prompts be open. That means they’re all free game for everyone! Feel free to use them as you see fit!

You can change the prompt’s pronouns (he/she/we/they/etc) to fit your fic, but nothing else can change! The prompt has to be included in your fic in some way.

See a prompt you like? Great! If you want to join, send me an ask that includes the prompt(s) you’ve chosen so I’ll know what list(s) to put you on. I won’t be accepting people any other way than through my ask box! You don’t have to tell me what character/fandom you’re writing for, but you can if you want!

Please include the character/fandom above your fic when you post it, as well as any and all warnings that could be associated with your fic. If it is over 500 words, please add a -keep reading- cut!

Be sure to tag me (@thranduilsperkybutt) in the fic as well as mentioning the prompt(s) and that this is for TPB’s 8,000 Follower Challenge.

Tag your fic with #thranduilsperkybutt and #tpb8000followerschallenge

If I don’t ❤︎like❤︎ your fic within 24 hours, feel free to send me a link via IM because most likely I didn’t see it! I wanna’ read all of these and give credit where credit’s due! My like will show up as my main blog (megmeg-chan) liking your post! When I reblog it on TPB, I will unlike it. (I will also reblog it on my main & include it in a masterlist I’ll make when the challenge officially closes.)

The deadline for all fics to be in is two months from now on January 1, 2018, so you should have plenty of time! If you need an extension, please message me! I’m pretty lenient, so we can totally work something out!

---------

Alright, then! There are 30 quote-like prompts beneath the cut! They’re pretty random and I just wrote up whatever came to mind that I thought could possibly inspire cool fics. I will reblog your fic if you choose to write one, as well as make a masterlist for all of the fics once the deadline comes.

| Prompts |

1. “I’m in love with you! Why are you acting like that’s a crime?”

2. “Maybe if you didn’t eat everything you came across, we wouldn't be in this mess!”

3. “If there’s one thing I know, it’s that you shouldn’t stick your hand anywhere that you can’t see. This isn’t an Indiana Jones movie and I’m not sticking my hand in there!”

4. “Are you going to help me bury this body or what? You were all ‘ride or die’ before.”

5. “Did you do any work while I was gone? Or were you just sitting here playing Fallout 4 all day?”

6. “Yeah, he tried to take over the world, but I’d still be down if he asked.”

7. "I can’t believe that this is happening. I thought I was gonna’ be a virgin forever!”

8. “For once, I’m not completely terrified of letting you take the lead on this. Either I’m getting used to your shenanigans or I’ve completely given up trying to stop you.”

9. “You spent $300 dollars on movie tickets in one weekend? What?”

10. “Why is there a life-sized cardboard cutout of Gordon Ramsay in your kitchen?”

11. “I leave it with you for one day and my computer is whirring so loud that it sounds like it’s going to explode. Please don’t tell me you went on any shady pornsites.”

12. “If you play that song one more time I am going to throw your phone out the window and the aux cord with it!”

13. “Look, Professor, I know the paper was supposed to be due today, but you see, it’s a long story...”

14. “I love coming over to your house. I mean, your dog is so welcoming.”

15. “Netflix and chill? More like Netflix and fuck my brains out.”

16. “You get me and that kind of scares me, to be honest.”

17. “Hey, I know I’m calling you late, but I’ve had a bad night that resulted in me actually considering eating at Denny’s and I need you to pick me up.”

18. “Did you seriously just say ‘your mom’ as a comeback? In 2017?”

19. “I really hope my future soul mate is doing great right now, because someday I’m gonna’ need someone to help me emotionally get through that shit you just pulled.”

20. “You... found my tumblr.”

21. “You can’t just go around bashing people’s heads in when things don’t go your way! You’re going to run out of people at some point!”

22. “I tried so hard to keep myself from falling for you. At the beginning, I even told myself, ‘You are not going to fall for him,’ but here I am, madly in love with you and regretting every minute of it, because you’re completely incapable of feeling the same for me.”

23. “Don’t just say you love me. I’ve had people say that to me before, and you know what? People lie. Show me that you love me.”

24. "Let’s get out of here. Go someplace else that’s far away, okay?”

25. “Can we never speak of this again?”

26. “If there’s one thing I learned from tonight, it’s to never trust you with the keys to my car again.”

27. "I don’t want to be anywhere other than right here, right now, with you.”

28. “How’s my favorite customer? You getting the usual?”

29. “Alright, that’s it! You’re taking a break. Put down the textbook, I’m going to show you something.”

30. “You don’t even realize how you sound right now, do you?”

I hoped you liked some or at least one of them, darling! (^.^”) Let me know if you want any!! <3 xx

#writing challenge #tpb8000followerchallenge #8000 follower mark #posts by me #Followers appreciation

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muhamedshafaan · 4 years ago

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On-Page SEO Techniques

What is On-Page SEO?

On-page SEO (sometimes referred to as ‘on-site SEO’), is the process of optimizing the content of a webpage for search engines. The ultimate goal of on-page SEO is to speak the ‘search engines’ language’ and help search engine crawlers understand the meaning and context of your pages.

In addition, it is called ‘on-page’ because any optimization changes made to a webpage contribute to a better user experience.

On-Page SEO Techniques For Higher Rankings

1. Publish High-Quality Content

Original content (articles, text, images, videos, presentations, infographics, comments, etc.) – No copies or rewrites of existing articles.

Content exclusive for your website – Even if it’s your own content, if you have already published it on another website then it’s not good for your site (unless you specify the canonical tag correctly).

Content that includes text elements – Write text to accompany your non-text content. For example, if you post videos on your website try to add a text description as well. If you add images try to describe in words what the image is all about.

Content that is useful – Don’t publish content for the sake of publishing. Before hitting the publish button make sure that what goes live adds value to your website and readers.

Content that is well researched – Users don’t want to read quickly prepared posts and neither do search engines. Long articles are proven to rank better than short articles.

Unbiased content – If you are writing about a certain topic or answering a question make sure that what you write is justified and covers both sites of a story.

Content that satisfies search intent – Besides the above characteristics, you need to make sure that your content satisfies the search intent. Before publishing any type of content on your website you need to understand what type of content users want to see for a given search query.

2. Optimize Page Titles and Meta Descriptions

When search engines ‘read’ your pages, among other things, they check the page title and the description of a page.

They do so because they need to understand what the page is all about and then based on other factors (off-page SEO, domain authority, competition, etc.), they will rank your page (for various keywords) in a position in their index.

Page Titles

Each page must have a unique title that will help both search engines and users understand what the page is about.

The most important page title optimization tips are:

Add keywords to the beginning of your page titles – When possible add your target keywords to the beginning of your page title. This helps search engines understand right from the beginning what keywords the page is targeting.

That does not mean you should cross the line and start doing keyword stuffing. If you cannot have a keyword at the beginning then it’s not the end of the world. Just make sure that your target keyword is part of the title.

Write short and descriptive titles – A page title doesn’t have to be very long. The general recommendation is to keep it below 60 characters because this is the average amount of characters displayed by Google in the search results.

Include numbers and power words – Having numbers in the title as well as power words like “Ultimate, actionable, amazing, checklist, etc.”, make titles more interesting and this increases their CTR (Click Through Rate).

No need to include your domain in the title – There is no need to include your domain name in the title because this is added automatically by Google. You can make use of the 60 characters to provide an accurate description of the page.

An exception to this rule is when you have a strong brand that people can easily recognize, in this case, you can consider having your domain in the title.

Meta Descriptions

The page description is shown in the search engine results page (SERPS). It has to be descriptive, up to 200 characters, and unique for each page.

It’s your opportunity to advertise your page and convince users to click your link and visit your website rather than selecting one of the other links.

It should be noted that Google does not always show the custom meta description, but many times they use an automated description if they believe is more useful for the searcher.

The most important meta description optimization tips are:

Avoid auto-generated descriptions – Even though Google may not use your description, it’s always a best practice to avoid using auto-generated descriptions that sometimes don’t make sense.

Add your target keyword(s) in the description – Google still highlights the search terms both in the title and description so adding your target keywords, makes descriptions more relevant and appealing to the searcher.

3. Optimize Page Content

Before publishing a piece of content (whether this is text, images, audio, or video), the first step is to do your keyword research.

This is necessary to find out what search terms users are typing in the search box and create content that can satisfy their intent.

Once you decide on your target keywords, you should create a list of related keywords (also called LSI keywords), longtail keywords, and use them in your titles, descriptions, headings, and page content.

Google suggest

When you start typing a query in Google search, you are presented with a list of possible phrases to use in your search. These are great keyword candidates to mention in your content.