#In my defense in that time I lost my social security card and had several meltdowns over it

[theres-whump-in-that-nebula]

It’s been awhile since I’ve last read Corelli’s Mandolin. Now that it’s winter it just feels wrong because it’s such a summer book.

[remywrites5]

Hello! Humble prompt suggestion.. I can't seem to stop imagining Harry and Draco out to dinner with a group of friends, not dating (but wanting to). Then accidentally acting all couply and getting each other to try each others dishes and being so wrapped up in each other♡

           Harry was more than a little alarmed when Draco and Hermione of all people became friends. They worked together down in the Department of Mysteries as Unspeakables and apparently that kind of work fostered camaraderie. Since the war had ended and Voldemort had been destroyed, Harry didn’t exactly want to say things had gotten better. It just seemed that the pure blood wizards kept their bigoted nonsense to themselves because spouting it out in Wizard society made them look like part of the losing side.

           Draco had mellowed out a bit since school, even Harry could admit that. The uptight pure blood sneering wannabe heir of Slytherin was not exactly gone but less obnoxious. Now that they weren’t at school and worked in completely different areas of the ministry, there really was no reason for them to continue their rivalry. There was nothing to compete over anymore and it made Draco slightly less nasty towards Harry.

           Didn’t mean Draco wasn’t still a prick from time to time.

           “Potter, what the fuck is this?”

           Harry glanced up to see Draco poking at the coffee pot that Harry kept in his office. “It’s called a coffee pot, Malfoy. It makes a pot of coffee so I don’t have to go anywhere to get some, I can stay in the comfort of my own office.”

           Draco wrinkled his nose at it. “I would have thought you’d enjoy venturing out to socialize considering everyone here basically worships the ground you walk on.”

           Harry rolled his eyes and turned away from Draco. “Yeah well sometimes I just want to be left alone,” Harry said pointedly.

           Draco didn’t seem to get the message and walked over to the desk, leaning against the edge of it and crossing his arms over his chest. “I don’t understand why you bother with all that Muggle stuff.”

           “I grew up on Muggle stuff,” Harry responded, absentmindedly jotting down a few notes for the case he was working on. He risked a glance up at Draco, who was staring at him in a funny kind of way.

           “I just can’t imagine not growing up with magic,” Draco said looking slightly aghast at the idea. ‘I got my first broomstick when I was six.”

           “Well we couldn’t all live such charmed lives, Malfoy,” Harry said, ignoring the pit in his stomach as he thought about his childhood. In moments of weakness or self-pity, Harry would wonder how different his life might have been if his parents had lived and he’d known about magic all along. Still, it didn’t do to dwell on what ifs.

           Draco snorted. “Ah yes, a charmed life has been mine,” he said snippily.        

           Harry sighed heavily. “Did you want something, Draco, or did you just come up here to annoy me?”

           “I was curious to what the savior’s office looked like,” Draco confessed with a nonchalant shrug. “Somehow I thought it’d be nicer.”

           “I’m not the savior anymore, I’m just Harry,” he responded, putting his quill down and leaning back in his chair.

           “You’ll never be just anything, Harry,” Draco said, putting his hands on the armrests of Harry’s chair, effectively caging Harry into his seat. Harry was alarmed for a moment as Draco got uncomfortably close, his shoulders tensing. He thought for a moment Malfoy was going to attack him or hex him. Instead Draco’s grey eyes bore into Harry’s as they stared each other down.

           The air was rife with tension for a moment until Harry broke it by clearing his throat. Draco quickly straightened up, releasing Harry from his hold. “Malfoy?” Harry said uncertainly.

           “See you around, Potter,” Draco said, turning on his heel and heading for the door. He gave a dismissive wave with his back still turned.

           Well that was odd, Harry thought as he stared at where Malfoy’s retreating form had been only moments ago.

                                                           ***

           There had been several more awkward run-ins with Draco. For whatever reason, the ex-death eater seemed to think he had an open invitation into Harry’s office. He would drop by unannounced and give unsolicited advice on pretty much any subject. He would critique Harry’s robes, the way he held his quill, the fact that his glasses had a scratch on the lens. In fact it seemed no subject was too trivial for Malfoy to comment on.

           Sometimes he would actually be helpful, like giving insight into some of Harry’s cases. Draco knew a lot about dark wizards and the darker side of magic and sometimes he was a valuable resource. But of course Harry would never tell Malfoy that. He didn’t need Draco’s head getting any bigger.

           “So Granger has invited me to dinner tonight,” Draco said casually as he rifled through the papers on Harry’s desk looking for anything interesting.

           “You still can’t call her Hermione?” Harry teased, batting Draco’s hand away.

           “You still call me Malfoy,” Draco shot back accusingly, shoving his hands in the pockets of his robe.

           “Only sometimes,” Harry said defensively. He took a moment to consider it. Maybe he had a point. “Fine, I’ll work on it.”

           Draco’s lips began curling into a smile that Harry could only describe as devious. “How about we make a bet, Pot- Harry,” he corrected quickly. “First person to call the other by their last name loses.”

           Harry cocked his head to the side and considered it. “And what does the winner get?”

           Draco shrugged. “Whatever they want.”

           “Within reason,” Harry amended. “Loser gets the right to veto and make the winner chose something else.”

           “One veto.”

           “Two.”

           “Very well,” Draco said, holding his hand out for Harry to shake on it. “If you need that much of a security blanket then fine. You’re clearly scared of what I’ll do to you once I win.”

           Harry shook Draco’s hand a little harder than was strictly necessary. “We’ll see about that.”

                                                                       ***

           Harry sat down at the table with Hermione, Ron and Draco, thinking just how novel it was that the four of them were spending time together willingly. Ron looked a bit like he had just eaten a boogey flavored bean but he didn’t say anything rude to Draco. Harry knew Hermione had warned Ron to be on his best behavior. He knew this because Hermione had barged into his office an hour before the end of the day and given him a similar threatening speech.

           In truth, Harry hadn’t really needed it. Over the course of Draco stopping by his office, Harry now considered them something akin to friends. He certainly never thought he’d have a playful friendship with Draco where they made silly bets over dinner. Novel indeed.

           Draco picked up his menu and began to peruse it. “What do you think you’re going to get, Harry?” Draco asked him when there was a lull in the conversation.

           “Since when do you call him Harry?” Ron asked sourly.

           Draco glanced over at Harry and winked. “Since recently,” he responded vaguely, ignoring the fact that Ron was staring daggers at him.

           Harry picked up his own menu and skimmed it quickly.  They were at some French restaurant and Harry didn’t know how to pronounce half the things on the menu. “I’ll probably just get a steak or something,” he said with a shrug.

           Draco hummed as if that choice were acceptable. “I was thinking perhaps the duck confit.”

           Harry laughed. “I have no idea what that is. Do you speak French?”

           “Oui,” Draco said with a smug smirk. “I learned French from my mother at a young age. Learning French was a Black family tradition. I’m sure Sirius knew French as well.”

           “I’m not sure,” Harry said, furrowing his brow. It was still maddening how little he knew about his godfather and how few moments they’d had together. “I don’t think he ever mentioned it. Sirius was hardly a typical Black.”

           “That is true,” Draco said, taking a sip of his water. “Sorry for your loss. I feel as though I’ll never be done apologizing to your for the people my family stole from you.”

           “You don’t have to apologize to me for the actions of other people,” Harry said, placing his hand lightly on top of Draco’s.

           “And what about my own actions?” Draco asked, his eyes searing as he looked over at Harry.

           Harry laced his fingers through Draco’s and gave his hand a small reassuring squeeze before pulling away. “I already forgave those,” Harry explained with a shrug. “That’s why we’re able to be friends now, Draco.”

           “Friends?” Draco repeated softly, looking down at the hand Harry had been holding moments ago.

           Harry laughed quietly, not wanting to offend Draco. “Yeah, friends.”

                                                                       ***

           By the time their food had come, Hermione and Ron were deep in conversation about the wedding plans, with Harry chipping in as needed. For the most part though, Harry kept up conversation with Draco, reminiscing about old Quidditch matches and keeping away from heavy subjects like Draco’s family or the war.

           “You’ve got to try this,” Draco said, holding his fork halfway between them in offering.

           Harry made a face in response.

           Draco rolled his eyes. “Live a little, Harry.”

           Harry huffed and leaned forward, taking the fork into his mouth and tasting the bite of duck on it. The food practically melted in Harry’s mouth and he couldn’t hold back to moan that escaped. “Oh fuck, Malfoy that’s incredible.”

           Draco licked his lips and then they curled into a devilish smile.

           “What?” Harry asked self-consciously. He could feel his cheeks going red in embarrassment. He had no idea why Draco was looking at him like that.

           “You lost the bet,” Draco said triumphantly. “You just called me Malfoy.”

           “Oh shit,” Harry said, carding his fingers through his messy hair. “So, what are you going to do with me?”

           “You’ll see,” Draco said, his eyes glinting with mischief. “It’ll have to wait until after dinner.”

           “Can’t wait,” Harry grumbled unhappily, pouting slightly at having lost.

                                                           ***

           Harry didn’t live too far from the restaurant so instead of disapparating home he decided to walk. It was a little disconcerting to have Draco as his companion on the way home. He wasn’t entirely sure he wanted Draco to know where he lived. Not that he thought Draco would spill it to the Dailey Prophet or anything, but Harry in general was careful giving out his address.

           “So what happened with you and the Weasley girl?” Draco asked in a way that wasn’t entirely polite but wasn’t rude either.

           “Ginny,” Harry said, hip checking Malfoy lightly. “You know her name is Ginny.”

           “Yes her,” Draco sneered. “What happened?”

           Harry sighed. “We tried the whole long distance thing for a while but it just didn’t pan out. We’re still good friends but she’s got her life and I’ve got mine and they feel very separate, you know?”

           “I feel that way about a lot of the friends I had at school,” Draco confessed. “I hardly see most of them anymore. I suppose you grow up and you grow apart. It’s inevitable.”

           They fell into a companionable silence for the next few blocks. Harry couldn’t help wondering what Draco’s old school friends would think if they could see him now, hanging out with Harry Potter of all people. Harry had certainly never imagined he would enjoy the pleasure of Draco’s company.

           “So how long are you going to keep me in suspense?” Harry asked when they arrived at his front door. “Or did you need the time to come up with a good enough punishment?”

           Draco raised an eyebrow at him. “What makes you think it’ll be a punishment?”

           Harry grinned good-naturedly. “Because it’s you?”

           “Well,” Draco began, taking a step towards Harry. “You may consider it a punishment but for me it’s fulfilling a childhood fantasy.”

           Harry swallowed around the lump that had formed in his throat. “And what would that be?”

           “I want to spend the night at Harry Potter’s house.”

           “Oh,” Harry said, laughing a little in relief. “You want to have a sleepover? That’s something you wanted?”

           Draco huffed. “Yes obviously.”

           “Obviously,” Harry echoed dumbly, still trying to rationalize the information he’d just been given.

           “Everyone wanted to be your friend, Harry,” Draco said as if annoyed to have to fill Harry in on this fact. “You were famous before even coming to Hogwarts. I knew you were going to be in my year. I used to imagine the things we would do together once we became friends. I would rehearse what I would say to you when we finally met.”

           One side of Harry’s mouth twitched with the want to smile. “You probably should have practiced that a bit more, mate. From what I remember you came off like a right prick.”

           Draco glowered at him. “I was an eleven year old boy trying to impress you. I feel like my whole life has been trying to impress you. Even if the things I did horrified you at least you would take notice of me.”

           Harry blinked a few times behind his glasses. “Draco, it wasn’t as if I ignored you. You made that nearly impossible with all the shite you pulled.”

           Draco took another step forward and cupped Harry’s face in his hand. “Even after all this time I still feel like that eleven year old who desperately wants to call Harry Potter his friend.”

           Harry smiled. “You are my friend. You don’t have to try so bloody hard.”

           Draco grinned in response. “Yes I do.”

           “Why?”

           “Because now I have to figure out how to get you to fall in love with me,” Draco explained softly, letting his thumb brush over Harry’s cheekbone. “I can only hope it won’t take quite as long because I’m losing patience by the minute.”

           Harry felt his heart begin to race at Draco’s admission. “Then you should probably kiss me sooner rather than later.”

           Draco’s eyes widened in surprise. “You would let me do that?”

           Harry nodded. “Go on then.”

           “Don’t do me any favors…”  

           “For fuck’s sake, Draco,” Harry growled, grabbing the front of Draco’s robes and kissing him furiously. His lips were hard and insistent as he coaxed Draco’s tongue into his mouth. It was deep and consuming and Harry felt the moment Draco gave himself over to it. Draco was still touching Harry’s cheek, the gentleness of it a stark contrast to the fervent kisses.

           “Harry…” Draco whispered, his voice sounding broken.

           “Come inside,” Harry requested gently. “You can spend the night and we’ll work on that whole falling in love business.” Harry licked his lips and smiled knowingly. “It shouldn’t take long at all.”

[hufflepuff-ravenclaw-reviews]

Proven Innocent Season 1 Episode 13

Unlike with the previous episode, this one solely focuses on Madeline's case. However, there's still one tiny subplot about Bodie and his girlfriend and the nephew, so let's get that over with before we jump into the trial, shall we?

Bodie is at home alone with the kid when a social service worker shows up. She wants to do a basic inspection of the house, and to do a general welfare check on the kid. However, the agent isn't exactly thrilled to see Bodie's collection of nunchucks and swords out in the open, even if they are displayed. (He's frequently shown using them throughout the series.)

Later, the girlfriend is obviously upset over this. Mainly because, as she very well knows, that the birth mother is usually given custody back of the kid. Bodie is quick to assure her that they'll continue to work to get her full custody of the kid, but if it does happen, that they will keep a close eye on the birth mother so that when she does eventually fuck up again, they'll be there to take the child back.

Even later, and it's clear that they've lost the case to keep custody of the kid. The kid in question is depressed over the entire thing, and clearly doesn't want to go back to his mother. (Being with his aunt is probably the most stable that he's been for a long time.) Bodie reassures him that they'll still do things like going to the park and various sportsball games. He then sends the kid from the room to “get your backpack”, which gives the girlfriend a moment to cry without her nephew seeing her break down.

And now, the part that you actually care about... Easy is insanely confident that they won't have to do much to disprove that Madeline isn't the killer... because the case is strong. However, the only wild card in play right now is Levi. Nobody knows what Bellows might have said to Levi during the time that he was being held “in protective custody”. However, Easy is quick to tell her that whatever Levi says, he will take care of it.

In court, following the boring technical witnesses about finding the lantern and matching it to the evidence found on Rosemary, we get to Heather on the stand. She goes to say that she saw Madeline carrying the lantern, and heading in the direction where Rosemary had gone. However, Easy is quick to point out that she never followed Madeline, and never saw Rosemary and Madeline together after this moment. Ergo, she can't possibly know if Madeline killed Rosemary simply because Madeline was carrying a lamp. However, the judge doesn't exactly like the way that Easy is “badgering” Heather, and won't let in Heather's previous court appearances where she'd been slapped with perjury charges.

Later, Bodie goes to get Linda, however, she's mysteriously up and left. The guy at the coffee shop/bar where she worked says that she got a package, quit, and that was the last anybody saw of her. Bodie looks at the security camera, and finds the company that delivered the package is one of those shifty shipping companies that you use like when you want to blackmail somebody. Violet comes over as Bodie's saying this and says that Sarah is also now refusing to testify.

They go talk to her, and she says that the blackmail in question is a sex tape. It never featured Robbie, but only just Sarah and some of the other girls. The person who sent it to her said that if she testifies on Madeline's behalf, then the tape will go public.

Easy claims witness tampering, and seems to think that Heather is behind it. However, as he's saying all of this to the judge (with Bellows and Heather also there), Heather denies it. When Madeline gives a vague explanation as to what the blackmail material is, Heather looks horrified; Madeline notices this. We'll get back to it in a moment.

Bellows calls Levi to the stand. However, for literally every single question Bellows asks Levi, he says “I don't know.” However, when Bellows brings up evidence/court record from the first trial, Levi then says “Those are your words, not mine.” Finally, the judge tells Levi that he has to answer or be found in contempt. Levi is more than happy to be thrown into jail if it means getting away from Bellows and whatever he's forcing Levi to do. (And honestly, I'm surprised he didn't say anything about being held against his will, but whatever.)

Madeline later goes to visit him, and Levi mentions that this might have been his plan all along. You're my little sister and all that. However, he says that Madeline had been walking around acting all drugged that night. Madeline says that she was missing three hours of time, and it's possible that she had been slipped something. However, if there's one thing that he's 100% certain of is that she did not kill Rosemary.

Madeline expresses how horrible that their case has gone very quickly. Easy gives her a pep talk, and says that it's not the slam dunk that he thought that it would be, but he's still got this. He then brings the discussion around to the idea that Heather is the one who murdered Rosemary. However, despite initial feelings that Heather might have done it, Madeline has now changed her mind.

Later, Madeline is at home, watching political TV about the attorney general race. Heather comes over, and says that she got a sex tape, too. She reconfirms about what Linda and Sarah had already told them about the cult, and adds in her own feelings to the mix. But then she adds in a key piece of evidence: that Robbie had wanted Madeline right before Rosemary had died. The two of them had gotten in a fight over this, with Rosemary refusing to let Heather near Madeline... or Robbie. She goes on to say that she doesn't know who the actual killer is, and that she'd thought that Madeline HAD killed Rosemary.

But that sex tape changed everything. She wants to testify, but as Madeline is quick to point out, a flip-flopping witness like that does not make the jury think that she's credible. She goes on to say that Toby (their friend from high school who killed himself several episodes earlier), had been Robbie's right-hand man. He'd told Heather that Robbie had died in some fire shortly after he'd left their little cult. So she'd thought that Robbie was dead this entire time. But now she's not sure.

Madeline looks up this fire, where fourteen other people had been killed. A death certificate was issued for the guy, but there's no records of his body 1) being recovered and 2) being sent back to the USA for burial. Toby, the only person who might have had any idea how much Robbie had done in regards to Rosemary's death, is obviously now dead as well.

Bodie and Violet go talk to his sister, who still has Toby's things. As they're looking through Toby's stuff, Bodie finds some tapes hidden in the back of a filing cabinet. They think that it might be more sex tapes, so they watch them and are shocked at what they see.

At trial, Easy stands up and calls Rosemary to the stand. Everybody is horrified over this, and for two seconds, I wonder if Rosemary might have faked her death. But no. What was found on the tape was a discussion between Rosemary and Toby (the owner of the camera). Toby had secretly recorded the conversation, and you have no idea how important that it is right now. See, Toby was telling Rosemary that Robbie really wanted Madeline. However, Rosemary asked for that date rape drug, and said that it was for the sake Madeline. However, Rosemary is insistent that Madeline be kept out of this bullshit. The drug isn't to GIVE to Madeline, but to some other guy so that Robbie can't get to Madeline.

Finally, it's time for closing arguments. Bellows says that all of this is an absurd waste of time, and beyond the stretch of the imagination. Madeline takes over her own defense (which is given to her, no question, because she's still got her law license, and the judge knows her) to give closing arguments on her own behalf. She says that Rosemary was her friend, who was so full of love and life, and Robbie took it away. He took it away because Rosemary was trying to protect Madeline.

Three days pass. Madeline goes to Bellows's office, where she meets Bellows's political sugar daddy. The daddy leaves and Madeline goes to talk with Bellows in his office. First she asks him if he would have retried the case if he wasn't running for office. He agrees, because it's the case that wouldn't let him go. Then, she tells him that she forgives him. Following her conversation with Heather, I think that she's on a track of forgiving the people who've hurt her.

As Madeline is leaving, Bellows attempts to give Madeline another deal, this time of manslaughter, but since she's innocent, she refuses.

The jury finally comes back with a verdict of not guilty. Because were you surprised by that? After the tape of Rosemary saying that she didn't want Robbie touching Madeline?

But, the story's not over, I'm afraid. Because Robbie's still out there, but with some new name. Bodie was able to find some files, and figured out who he is now. Madeline hesitates for a moment, afraid to even so much as look at a picture of the man. Finally, she does, and she's horrified at what she sees.

She goes to Bellows's office, where she puts two photos on his desk: one of the infamous cult leader Robbie... and one of him now. Surprise! It's the political sugar daddy. Bellows says that he knew as of that morning; obviously he'd been doing his own digging, since it's literally his fucking job. He apologizes to Madeline over what happened, but she says that she'd already forgiven him.

Bellows meets up with Robbie at this cliff, where Madeline's body was found at the bottom. They're standing at the top, and I don't think that I have to tell you that at least one of them will find themselves at the bottom. By force.

Bellows confronts Robbie over what he'd done, not only to Rosemary, but to have drugged and raped lord knows how many girls. Robbie... takes it exactly as how you might imagine a cult leader would act. He's smug. Over-confident. After he murdered Rosemary, he turned the drugs he made to rape girls into medical drugs that have helped people. He sees him murdering Rosemary as “acceptable losses” in order to have helped those people. As you might imagine, Bellows is horrified and disgusted over the entire thing.

Oh, and seeing as how Robbie has donated millions towards Bellows's campaign, as well as the fact that he pushed Bellows to retrying Madeline, everything would point to Bellows's having been in the know of Robbie's identity this entire time. So Bellows can't really do anything without finding himself in a lot of hot water.

And then, when I thought that Bellows would reveal that he'd been wearing a wire... He pushed Robbie over the edge of the cliff, where he went splat. I can't say that the world will miss one psychotic pedophile rapist.

Bellows then makes a press conference, where he says that Robbie was identified as having been his political donor the entire time. However, this is where the truth starts to pull away: he goes on to say that when he went to arrest Robbie, he decided to kill himself... in the same spot where he'd killed Rosemary.

Back at the office, the legal team watches this unfolding on TV. They express disbelief that Robbie would have killed himself, and offer up the other victims. However, Madeline suggests that Bellows himself did it.

With that, the series unfortunately comes to a close. And I am sad that it was canceled, but at the same time, I feel like the actual story of Madeline's trial as well as Rosemary's murder was a nicely contained, one-season story. I'm not quite sure where the series would have gone past this other than to just do a case du jour like on Law & Order.

There were a few dangling threads, like the Cinderhella case who was secretly guilty... and if Bodie and his girlfriend would get custody of the kid back. But we determined who Rosemary's actual killer was and proved to the entire world that Madeline didn't kill her.

(And now my only issue is trying to find something else to watch...)

[pinchevaquerx]

Once Upon A Time In The West

disclaimer: this is so heavily hc based it’s unreal. This will all be canon for my Jesse unless you request otherwise during out RP, or if we’re already RPing something different. Also: yes- I am this horribly cliche (you’ll see what I mean). Yes- I did have to make him suffer this much (trust me, some drafts were even worse). And yes- I have spent far too much time thinking about this man. There IS a tl;dr at the end, don’t worry!

if you are at all concerned by the tags, feel free to message me and I can either give you a better heads up on what they’re for or give you a summary with those parts taken out!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

In the year 2034, before the Omnic Crisis began, the American government replaced social security numbers with social security chips. The idea was a simple one: if people had their personal ID number implanted on a chip at birth, then identification would never be a problem again. No more unnamed bodies, no forging identities with fake cards, no codes or pins or keys needed to unlock high security features. Everything the government needed to know about everyone was in their chip. 

Jesse was never given one. 

His parents were repeat offenders for drug addiction, and going to the hospital for a delivery while high would have landed them another strike. So Jesse was born at home, never went to the hospital, and thus never received a SSC.

The back roads of Santa Fe were Jesse’s playground. He was allowed to roam, doing as he pleased, so long as he never let adults question him. Naturally, this means he didn’t talk to many people as a small, dirty child who spoke a broken mix of English and Spanish running around on their own worried most adults. 

However, there was one woman just a few streets over, one Ms. McCree, who Jesse adored. For meals, instead of returning home where’d have to scavenge for scraps, he knocked on her door and offered whatever treasures he’d found that day in exchange for food. It was Ms. McCree who introduced Jesse to Westerns and encouraged his love of them.

The one thing Jesse did get from his parents were his survival skills. They knew how to sneak and steal, how to bribe or charm others into giving them just enough to get by, and ( most importantly ) how to shoot. Jesse was a natural at aiming, and his love of westerns only pushed him to practice until he was a crack shot. 

Alias Jesse James

As rough as things were, they quickly got worse. Jesse’s mother grew sick, deteriorating so quickly that there was no time for her to get treatment. After she passed, Jesse’s father lost what little control he had. His drinking grew to be as bad as his drug addiction. Instead of shooting for a hobby, Jesse began to consider it for self-defense. For a while, it was enough to throw things and hide. If he couldn’t find a good spot outdoors, Ms. McCree’s house was always open to him.

It only took a year before his father borrowed money from the wrong people. The Deadlock Gang had been around since before the Omnic Crisis, but during the war is when they really took off. Now, they had near sole control of the Four Corners and their reach was spreading. 

When Jesse was eleven, Deadlock stormed their house. His father was as inebriated as always, so Jesse took matters into his own hands. Recklessly cocky in the way only a child who’d raised himself on too many westerns could be, Jesse grabbed his gun and squared off against the intruders.

Every member was at least ten years older and twice as heavy as the kid. They didn’t take Jesse as a threat, but one member noticed the steady way Jesse held his gun, even if he had poor form. After commenting on this, Jesse’s dad jumped on the opportunity. 

With a mix of confusion and anger, Jesse listened as his dad charmed the ringleader. His father had explained his lack of a chip, how he could slip into places without setting off any of their alarms because of it, how no one would suspect a kid if they did see him, how Jess was already skilled at doing this. An agreement was reached, and in the end Jesse had more or less been sold off to Deadlock to repay the debts. 

Jesse, having avoided his parents as much as possible growing up, never learned his last name. So when Winchester, the current leader of Deadlock, asked for his name upon arrival, Jesse confidently declared himself “Jesse James”. 

The Wild Bunch

Working with Deadlock taught Jesse many things very, very quickly. Despite his usefulness, no one was willing to go out of their way to help him. Jesse had to keep up or get left behind. As good a shot as he’d been before, being placed in situations where he either shot or got shot made him better.

They used him for everything from stealing to carrying messages to smuggling at the start. Once Winchester realized how much more he could do, Jesse suddenly became their ‘secret weapon’. He was sent on jobs as their sharpshooter. Sent to deals as the negotiator. Sent to contacts as the charmer. If Winchester needed it done, Jesse was his man. 

The first time he killed a man he was fourteen. 

It wasn’t for Deadlock, not really. Jesse had done his best to take people down but not out with his bullets, much to the ire of the gang. It did benefit them in the end, though, which meant Jesse didn’t have to reveal the real reason for his first fatal shot. 

During a face off with a rival gang, Jesse found a young kid trying to sneak away in all the chaos. They were younger than he’d been at first, and it infuriated him to see someone else treated that way. To be forced to work for a gang to survive as a kid. Winchester had clearly said to kill anyone they saw, but Jesse refused to even raise his gun at them. Instead, he offered his assistance in getting them out. Just as they were almost in the clear, a member of the other gang showed up. Jesse didn’t even have to think about it before he shot the man square in the forehead. 

The kid got away... and Jesse became a killer. 

After that, it got easier and easier to kill. Winchester was always pleased with the results and Jesse had so many nightmares there wasn’t any time left in the night for more. It was shortly after that when he first pulled of a perfect Deadeye, killing six targets within a matter of seconds.

Doing this caused him a massive headache, with the symptoms getting worse if he did it too frequently. However, Deadlock’s Deadeye gained an infamous reputation and helped the gang expand their territory even more.

Once other gangs realized their secret weapon was a scrawny kid, Jesse became an easy target. Deadlock didn’t want to lose him, but they weren’t willing to do much to help him out. During a botched job, Jesse ended up in enemy hands. He was with them for almost a week, getting tortured for information he wasn’t supposed to know. It’d have been so easy for him to give it all up, but he had a strong, misplaced sense of loyalty for his gang. Finally, Deadlock came to save him only because they needed Jesse for another job. Winchester made sure he knew, not wanting the kid to think he was more important than he was. 

In the end, Jesse was left with several new scars, PTSD he didn’t understand, and severe disillusionment. At sixteen, he finally stopped waiting for the day Deadlock would fully accept him as one of their own. His naive loyalty was shattered, yet he knew he still needed the gang. He no longer worked to gain their favor, instead doing his job in order to survive.

Hang ‘Em High

When Jesse was seventeen years old, Deadlock had finally grown large enough to catch the interest of Blackwatch. They had progressed from their small territory to all over the States and down into Central America. Now they dealt in nearly every area of smuggling: high grade weapons, drugs, tech, information, people... if someone wanted it moved, they’d do it.

Deadlock hadn’t expected the sting, had never assumed someone would dare to attack them on their own turf, and were vastly under prepared. Jesse had been sent out with a few others to hold the attackers back, while the higher ranking members gathered their supplies and tried to run. Both Jesse and Winchester knew the others who’d been sent along were canon fodder, so Jesse didn’t even blink as they were picked off easily. 

Jesse, for his part, was prepared to do whatever it took to survive this encounter. It had been his driving force his entire life, and some unknown gang with a goth aesthetic wasn’t about to change that. 

The Overwatch symbol one of them wore on his sleeve was enough, though. Changing his aim slightly, Jesse stopped making head shots and made sure the rest of his hits weren’t lethal. Killing other gangs was nothing, they were criminals and all around awful people, just as bad or worse than Jesse himself. Overwatch, though, was full of heroes. Despite being his enemy, Jesse couldn’t bring himself to kill a hero, someone who was out there doing good in the world, saving innocents from people like himself. 

Without Jesse’s shooting to keep Blackwatch stalled, Deadlock wasn’t able to get away. Before anyone knew it, most of Deadlock was either dead or captured, with only a few managing to slip away. Jesse had played up his age, played up the innocent look he knew he could fake, and got himself caught instead of killed. 

Man Without A Star

Jesse was kept in lock up for roughly 30 hours before being dragged into an interrogation room. The first agent treated him with kid gloves, which irritated Jesse enough that he immediately dropped the act. Only one person had ever been allowed to talk to him like a child, and that was before he’d been forced to grow up. 

The first agent walked out in frustration, yelling how Jesse wasn’t a ‘kid in the wrong place at the wrong time’ after all as the door shut behind him. Proud, Jesse promised himself he’d kick the second agent out even faster. This time, the man left after ten minutes with a bloody nose. He’d gone for the bad cop role, getting up close to yell in Jesse’s face, and had gotten headbutted for his efforts. 

The third man that walked through the doors didn’t just change the game, he ended it entirely. Gabriel Reyes was both everything and nothing like Jesse had expected. His mere presence demanded a respect that Jesse didn’t know how to give. 

Their conversation was quick, to the point, and heavily one-sided. Jesse wasn’t treated like a child or a criminal. Reyes laid out the facts at first, with no hints giving his thoughts away. Ballistics had come back from Jesse’s gun, revealing much more than Jesse knew was possible. He was linked to several impressive shootouts from the past three years, proving he was the Deadeye they’d had their eyes on. The majority of wounds he landed on the Blackwatch agents weren’t fatal, and based on the perfect head shots from before, it was intentional.

There was no doubt that there was enough evidence to send Jesse to a maximum security prison for the rest of his life, regardless of his age. After all that, when Jesse’s head was down, Reyes made his offer: Blackwatch or prison. Neither sounded great, but a gilded cage was better than a maximum security one. 

This time, he gave the name “Jesse McCree”.

The Good Old Boys

The first few years were the hardest. Jesse had rarely slept as much as he should and never ate as much as he needed. Thus, he was all skin and bones with only enough muscle to get by. Reyes became his personal trainer, working Jesse harder than he’d ever worked in his life. The military like routine was awful, but the results came quickly. 

Not even a year after joining, Jesse hit a growth spurt, his form finally filling out to match his gangly limbs. While he now had three meals a day, the nightmares still plagued him enough that sleep was rare. Once he was allowed on missions, though, they exhausted him enough that he’d pass out the second debrief was done. 

Emotionally, things moved much slower. 

Jesse had never trusted anyone else before. The closest he got to caring about anyone had been Ms. McCree, and even then had been it based more on survival than companionship. The concept of team mates and watching someone else’s back were foreign to him. At least once a week, Jesse was given a reprimand for fighting with fellow agents. 

Seven months after joining, things hadn’t improved. However, that was when Fareeha Amari came to stay with her mother. She hadn’t heard anything about Jesse before seeing him, but immediately grew attached as he was the only person even close to her age. The twelve year old girl managed to do what no else had, and gained Jesse’s trust and friendship. 

Thanks for her efforts, it wasn’t long before Jesse’s trust extended to the entire Strike Team. None of them became as important to him as Ana or Gabe, though. Once he opened up to them, Jesse trailed after the pair like a puppy. While Ana became his greatest mentor, Gabe eventually grew to be more like a father figure. 

At first, he hated everyone who wore the blue of Overwatch, but especially Jack Morrison. On the surface, he was the perfect poster boy, a shining example of the law. He seemed to be an amalgamation of everything Jesse hated about authority. It was only after he grew to trust Gabe and Ana, who in turn trusted Jack, that he began to change his mind. They got off to a rough start, with him often seeing just how far he could push before he got in trouble. But, eventually, Jack became another person Jesse considered family.

True Grit

By the time Jesse was twenty-six, he had improved enough to be one of Blackwatch’s best agents. It was around then that Talon grew more powerful, and soon began to directly attack Overwatch. On a mission to take them out, the Second-in-Command was killed while saving his team. Following the loss, Gabe promoted Jesse to take his place, stating he had been next in line for a while and this was just a bit sooner than planned. 

When Genji Shimada joined their ranks, a part of Jesse assumed he’d be able to reach past his walls like Fareeha had done for him before. As a result, Genji ended up shoehorned into being Jesse’s partner, as it turned out they worked perfectly together. While Genji never grew past his hate during his time in Blackwatch, Jesse still formed a deep attachment to the man. In his mind, he’d care enough about their friendship for the both of them, and that’d be fine. 

Good things never last forever, and while Blackwatch wasn’t exactly good, they sure weren’t as bad as Talon. But somehow, despite their best efforts, Talon managed to infiltrate Blackwatch right under their noses. Important files went missing, agents disappeared, missions went wrong. 

Things really came to a head the last three years of Overwatch’s existence. Blackwatch was exposed, putting them on an indefinite hiatus, which let Talon take the lead in their struggle. Amelié Lacroix was kidnapped and Gerard was murdered in his own bed. Everything was falling apart, to the point Jesse wasn’t sure who he could trust anymore. 

The final straw was Ana’s death. Jesse only lasted another three weeks after the mission before he realized he couldn’t take it anymore. Fareeha had left for the military, Genji had left for peace, Angela was working at Oasis most of the time, and Gabe was just as distrustful as Jesse himself. The only person he had left had been Ana. 

So, with his mind made up, Jesse left an informal resignation letter (that was closer to an apology) on Gabe’s desk before sneaking out one day. Jesse was thirty years old, not formally recognized as a person as Blackwatch had never created a birth certificate for him, and had no plans. 

Three months later, Watchpoint: Zürich blew up, killing the rest of the closest thing he’d ever had to a family.

Lonely Are The Brave

Falling back on the survival instincts that got him through his early childhood, Jesse traveled the world as an outlaw. No one could trace who placed the first bounty on his head, but his gut told him Talon managed it somehow. After that, the price kept racking up. 

There were some things he fully deserved the blame for: some robberies, breaking and entering chargers, a few bar fights, a couple assassination jobs... nothing that would amount to $60,000,000 however. Most of the time he was used as a scape goat. Governments couldn’t pin crimes on an organization they didn’t know was there, after all. 

Jesse spent most of his time investigating Talon. He did research, exchanged favors, raided bases, and questioned agents. Everything he’d learned in Blackwatch was put to use, though it was much slower without a team to provide support. However, following Talon around meant he was usually in the wrong place at the wrong time, making him an easy target for the law. 

Just after the news of the explosion reached him was the worst. In order to cope with the loss, he drank himself into a stupor, loosing several weeks to a blackout binge. For the next month he was in and out of lucidity, staying mostly sober just long enough to get to a new town before drinking some more. Without meaning to, he made his way back to his roots in New Mexico.

It was there that Jesse stumbled across the ruins of Deadlock, working to rebuild themselves to their former glory. Not caring if he made it to the next day or not, Jesse charged in with gun blazing. It’s no surprise that he was overpowered and caught. 

After several days of torture, Jesse was visited by none other than Winchester himself. Since the Blackwatch sting he’d been working to rebuild his gang, refusing to go down without more of a fight. After seeing Jesse on the news when Blackwatch was exposed, he realized their Deadeye had turned traitor. 

Traitors, he said, didn’t deserve to wear the mark of those they betrayed. 

Deep in Deadlock Gorge, where no one could hear his screams, Winchester used a power saw to remove the arm with the Deadlock tattoo that Jesse had gotten as a teenager. After, they dumped him out in the gorge, leaving him to his fate and assuming he’d never make it. 

But Jesse, at his core, is a survivor. He managed to get himself to one of his old Blackwatch contacts, a back alley doctor in New Mexico, who patched him up enough that he’d live. After that, he cashed in a few favors down in Dorado to get a prosthetic arm. It wasn’t the sleekest, but it did what he needed it to. And for a bit of petty payback, he had a skull grafted on the forearm. 

High Noon

Six years of being on the run had pulled Jesse back into his shell. The few people he would still consider trusting were lost to the wind, none of them having been contacted since before he left Blackwatch. He had contacts, those who owed him favors, and those who paid him for jobs, but no allies. No friends.

However, despite himself, Jesse missed his found family. So he kept the old Blackwatch communicator, though he never expected to use it. 

The drinking problem he’d gotten rid of in Blackwatch had come back with a vengeance. Jesse wandered the world mostly aimless, wanting to take out Talon while also not caring if they took him out first. He was only alive due to a mix of stubborn pride and sheer dumb luck. It was only in the heat of the a showdown that he’d decide someone wasn’t worthy to take him out, that they needed to be put in their place. His will to live was weak, but his willingness to give up was entirely nonexistent. 

Then he received Winston’s Recall notice. The video was inspiring on it’s own, but the sight of an old friend meant more to him. Because it had been Winston, instead of some nobody agent he didn’t know, Jesse actually considered responding. He spent three days thinking about it before making up his mind. 

Talon had infiltrated Overwatch once, and while he wanted to trust Winston, trust anyone else who responded to the Recall, he wouldn’t allow himself to be a part of that again. His job was to stop Talon, and no matter how long it took on his own, he was determined to do it. If, after he’d dealt with the terrorists, Overwatch was still around, he’d reconsider. 

But... if they both had the same goal of stopping Talon, well. He wouldn’t hate it if they happened to run into each other while chasing down the same bad guy.

TL;DR

Jesse grew up in Santa Fe with drug addicted, neglectful parents. His mother died when he was young, driving his father to alcoholism and abuse. After borrowing money from the Deadlock Gang, and being unable to pay it back, his father sold Jesse to Deadlock at age eleven. At fourteen he made his first kill in order to save another kid trying to escape from a rival gang. Blackwatch took down Deadlock when he was seventeen, and his skill interested Reyes enough to offer him a job. Blackwatch whipped him into shape and also managed to help him open up emotionally... at least until Talon managed to infiltrate and tear Overwatch down from the inside. When he was twenty-six he was promoted to Second-in-Command of Blackwatch. Ana’s death was the final straw that made him leave at age thirty. Shortly after that, Deadlock caught him and cut off his arm, causing him to get a prosthetic. Jesse refused to answer the Recall notice, but is going to continue fighting Talon on his own. 

[dipulb3]

More than a second lady: How Gisele Fetterman came to serve Pennsylvania's neediest

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/more-than-a-second-lady-how-gisele-fetterman-came-to-serve-pennsylvanias-neediest/

More than a second lady: How Gisele Fetterman came to serve Pennsylvania's neediest

A former undocumented immigrant who became a citizen and used her platform to help all manner of Pennsylvanians, she is far more than a figurehead or a lieutenant governor’s spouse.

That anyone would be called the n-word during a quick trip to the grocery store for golden kiwis is unsettling — all the more so once you learn what Fetterman overcame simply to give back to others.

The mother of three was at a grocery store in Braddock, a PIttsburgh suburb, Sunday evening when a woman recognized her and began haranguing her, saying she didn’t belong, calling her a thief and referring to her as the n-word that Lt. Gov. John Fetterman married, she told Appradab.

Gisele Fetterman’s family fled the violence of Rio de Janeiro in 1990 and grew up poor in New York City. Her mother told her and her brother to, “Be invisible,” and she has regularly shared childhood anecdotes of looking over her shoulder and fearing every knock at the door.

“So even though I’m 38 and I’m second lady and I have a family and career, I was immediately again a scared 9-year-old undocumented little girl at that grocery line,” she said of Sunday’s encounter.

“It was a hard reminder for me that it doesn’t matter what I’ve overcome, what I’ve achieved, that to some I will always be viewed as inferior simply because I was not born in this country,” she said.

Fetterman’s record runs deep. She has spent most of her adult life in the United States helping others, whether they’re impoverished, immigrants, LGBT, minorities, imprisoned or hungry. She’s also spoken out on the importance of wearing masks and participating in the Census.

She’s lighthearted, preferring the titular acronym, SLOP, over Second Lady of Pennsylvania, which she feels is “stuffy” — and is one of the foremost purveyors of positivity on social media, once quoting Rumi: “Even if from the sky, poison befalls all, I’m still sweetness wrapped in sweetness wrapped in sweetness.”

She told a writer this month she would never seek public office because “politics is mean and I am not.”

Here are some snapshots of what she’s achieved and overcome:

Her marriage was born of caring

In 2007, she read about the Rust Belt town of Braddock and learned that steel from Braddock and other communities was used in the Brooklyn Bridge, one of her favorite landmarks.

Fetterman had had her green card for a few years, and though only in her mid-20s, she was already an activist, focusing on nutrition and food equity. She wrote then-Mayor John Fetterman to find out more about the town, whose declining population numbered around 2,000 at the time, and his efforts to improve his community. After he wrote back, she began visiting Braddock.

“Of course he fell in love with me,” she told a women’s luncheon earlier this year, the Times Leader in Wilkes-Barre reported.

They were married in 2009, the same year she earned US citizenship. Since then she’s used her platforms as a naturalized American and second lady to help others.

She opened a free store for low-income families

On their fourth wedding anniversary, John Fetterman asked his wife what she wanted as a gift and she told him, “I want a shipping container.” He didn’t ask why, she told the Under the Radar entertainment blog earlier this month.

Gisele Fetterman had local artists paint the container, spruced up an abandoned lot and began doling out household goods, baby items and bicycles to those in need.

The store’s motto is “Because the best things in life are free.” It has spread to several locations and served hundreds of clients.

“We dream of a community built on relationships based on mutual aid and cooperation,” Free Store 15104’s website says. “We use the distribution of free items as a catalyst for change. We encourage recycling and reuse as a means to counteract excessive waste and consumption. We aim to eradicate food and clothing insecurity.”

She helped develop a clever way to fight hunger

412 Food Rescue, which she co-founded, sends volunteers to retailers who have surplus food that risks going bad and delivers it to nonprofits that serve the hungry.

“With the help of 2 trucks, 1 van, and thousands of volunteers, we are able to rescue perfectly good but unsellable food that would otherwise be wasted and redirect it to people who need it,” the nonprofit’s website says.

Based on the premise that it would take only one-third of the nation’s discarded food to feed its hungry population, it also strives to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from food waste, which the organization says is almost double that of aviation and the iron-and-steel industry combined.

The Pittsburgh City Paper cited both the Free Store and 412 Food Rescue in naming Fetterman 2017’s best activist.

The Fettermans opened the ‘The People’s Pool’

When John Fetterman took office, the couple opted not to move to the 2,400-square-foot state residence in Fort Indiantown Gap, instead opting to live in a remodeled car dealership in Braddock. Fetterman told Pittsburgh magazine this year that it was “not appropriate” to live in a taxpayer-funded mansion with staff. Plus, he said, Braddock is home.

As a result, the property’s 30-by-40-foot swimming pool was going unused, so Gisele Fetterman opened it up to nonprofits and summer camps and instituted a program to teach water safety because federal statistics show African American kids have a 3 times greater risk of drowning than do White chlidren.

“We can have a direct role in changing those statistics,” she said. “Swimming comes with a painful legacy of racial segregation. If my children can swim in that pool, so should every child in Pennsylvania.”

She came to Antwon Rose’s defense

After an East Pittsburgh police officer fatally shot Antwon Rose during a 2018 traffic stop, Fettermen revealed that the “very goofy” 17-year-old volunteered at Free Store 15104 and appeared in one of her husband’s campaign commercials. She also spoke at the teen’s funeral.

“He looked you in the eyes and gave anyone speaking to him total attention and respect,” she said in her tribute. “He would look at you with his big sweet smile, and you would feel, deep in your heart, that this was someone who would make the world better.”

“Antwon’s death shakes my heart, it rattles my faith that things will ever get better or that injustices will ever end. Slowly, too slowly, things will get brighter, even though they’re now so dark,” she said.

A jury cleared the officer who shot Antwon of all counts the following year.

She does little things, too

In addition to tackling major issues like hunger and inequality, she knows smaller improvements can make big differences in a community, as demonstrated by her Braddock Bench Building project, which created places to sit at public bus stops — using repurposed materials from homes slated for demolition, of course.

She also sought to brighten Braddock’s primary thoroughfare with uplifting signs, such as “Eat More Vegetables,” “Believe in Yourself,” “More Hugs Needed,” “Follow Your Dreams,” “Be Kind Always” and “Hug a Tree.”

“The signs you see along the streets are always so negative — ‘Don’t park here,’ ‘Don’t loiter there,'” she told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “We wanted to counter those with signs spreading cheer and kindness, signs with uplifting messages.”

The Fettermans spent $1,000 of their own money on the signs, the paper reported.

Inclusion is a major thrust of her work

For Good PGH, which Fetterman co-founded, drives numerous initiatives in the Braddock community.

Under the group’s umbrella, the Helping Out Our People coalition, made up of families in the Woodland Hills School District who lost a child to gun violence, mentors young people in hopes of “disrupting the disease of violence.”

The Foster Good program provides foster kids with unique suitcases rehabilitated by artists, Green Initiatives works to counter Braddock’s blight, Girl Code Woodland Hills introduces high school juniors to businesswomen in greater Pittsburgh, the Hollander Project serves as an incubator for “women-powered businesses” and Hello Hijab makes tiny Muslim headscarves for Barbies and other dolls to promote inclusion and fight stigmas.

Last year, Rodef Shalom, a Jewish congregation, made Fetterman the first woman to receive its 2020 Pursuer of Peace award, citing For Good PGH’s work.

She’s an unapologetic advocate for immigrants

The Fettermans submitted a joint op-ed to several newspapers in August, recounting how Gisele “and her family lived in constant fear that they would be discovered and lose their shot at the American Dream.”

“No child should have to live with that kind of stress,” they wrote. “They deserve to feel secure in the knowledge that they can do normal things like go to school and play sports without living in constant fear that they will lose their family.”

In a 2019 editorial for the Tribune-Review, Gisele Fetterman, a Dreamer herself, wrote that she’ll always be grateful for her mother’s courage and how she took jobs cleaning houses and checking coats to support her family.

“She was routinely paid less than she was supposed to be, if she got paid at all, and she was even assaulted while at work,” Fetterman wrote. “She never complained — she just did what she had to do for her children.

The Brazilian immigrant also recalled how, at 8 years old, she broke her nose playing kickball and her family couldn’t afford medical care, but stories from her native Rio convinced her just how lucky she was to escape the violence.

“When I look in the mirror and I see my broken nose,” she wrote, “I am reminded of how much worse it could have been, and how grateful I am to have had the opportunity to grow up in the U.S.”

Today, she tears up when she hears the National Anthem and gets “super excited to vote,” and she geeked out upon being called for jury duty, she said.

“I wasn’t chosen for a jury, probably because I was so visibly excited to be there that the lawyers thought I was crazy, but for me, that was the sign that I truly belonged, and that I could come out of the shadows,” she wrote.

Appradab’s John Berman contributed to this report.

[sarahlwlee]

31 Stories in 31 Days: Name

What is this? As part of celebrating Asian American & Pacific Islander Heritage Month (May), I am writing a story every day about my experiences as a Chinese Malaysian immigrant in America. My friends and family have provided numerous one-word prompts to help me create these stories. Today’s word prompt was contributed by Meg B. and the word is “Name”. Thank you Meg for your contribution and thank you everyone who stopped by to read my story today.

I was born in Malaysia with the name “Sarah Lee Ling Wei”. On my birth records, it’s only “Lee Ling Wei”. The name “Sarah” was considered a nickname growing up and my mother was concerned that I wouldn’t like my selected English name. She left it out of my birth records so that one day if I truly didn’t like it, I would choose a different English name for myself. According to my mother, this happened to my older sister where my mother gave her the English name Elaine, but she chose Hannah as her preferred English name when she was older.

Little did she know, nor I, how much the name Sarah would become a significant part of my identity.

Throughout my schooling years, I have always introduced myself as Sarah Lee Ling Wei. My teachers would make a note in brackets on the class registrar that my name included “Sarah”, even though it wasn’t officially on my birth records. Every time when a new teacher would read the class roster for attendance, I would say, “Teacher, my name is Sarah Lee Ling Wei and I’m present.” I am sure those teachers were annoyed at some point due to my obstinate behavior of getting my name right when all they had on record is my Chinese name.

When I was 14, I was baptized in a Lutheran church and they provided me with a baptism certificate that included my English name. I was so elated to have a piece of document that had my whole name and I kept it in a bright neon orange plastic binder to ensure it was kept in pristine condition. This document became critical when I joined an American transfer college degree program in Malaysia.

During my first semester in college, I failed my first 100-level class in Computer Information Systems (CIS). I remember viewing my results online at a computer lab in college and feeling shocked as well as owning my failure -- that I deserved this grade. I have never failed a class or test before, neither was I an A student in all my years of schooling, but somehow in that moment I gave in to my inner doubts and told myself I wasn’t cut out for college. After viewing the results, I drove to the nearest movie theatre to catch an international movie and cried in the theatre by myself.

I knew eventually I would have to drive home and tell my mother the bad news. When I got home my face was red and swollen from crying and my mom asked me, “What’s wrong, Sarah? Why are you crying?” I tearfully told her that I had failed my CIS class and that I wasn’t cut out for college. She sternly said to me, “Sarah this can’t be right. You poured all those late nights into building that website for your group project -- you did the whole thing. Also, you’re good at computers, how could you have failed?”

My mother, who has always come to my defense whenever she perceived some sort of injustice has occurred to me, took the car keys from my hand and told me to get in the car. She drove me to the college and asked me where is my CIS professor’s office located at. I walked my mother to my professor’s office and feared the potential retaliation from this professor. Every time my mother intervened with a teacher as about my studies or well-being as a child, it has been my unfortunate track record that those teachers end up hating me and finding ways to make my life a living hell. You can imagine my trepidation as we walked to my professor’s office.

My mother knocked on the door and the professor stepped out to talk to my mother, while my face was still puffed up red from crying. My professor was puzzled by how I looked and asked my mother, “What’s wrong? Why is Sarah crying?” My mother calmly explained to the professor what had happened and inquired why she had given me a failing grade. To my professors shock and surprise, she said, “Sarah didn’t fail. In fact, she was the only student in class who understood the material and mastered it quickly. I didn’t give her a failing grade.”

The professor looked up the class registrar on her computer to find my grades and she couldn’t find my name. What we found out was the name on record is “Lee Ling Wei” and she couldn’t remember anyone in class with this name. Thus, she gave a failing grade to a student’s name she didn’t recognize. After the professor figured out what had transpired, she immediately fixed the grade to an A and apologized to me for the distress she had caused. She continued to speak highly of my academic performance to my mother and as both of them continued to talk about me, my mother called me a silly girl for not double checking with the professor.

It was a huge relief that I didn’t fail the class, but it was also a turning point for me that I couldn’t continue existing on paper as “Lee Ling Wei”. So from that day onwards I researched the process for changing your name legally and of course similar to most bureaucracy it wasn’t an easy process. You had to show proof as to why you were changing your name. A few of the examples of proof included marriage certificate, adoption papers and as I read through the complete list, there was only one option that I would qualify to show as proof -- a religious certificate. In this case, a baptism certificate that illustrated my complete name “Sarah Lee Ling Wei.”

I wrote a statement, had it notarized, filled out a lot of paper work, waited in several lines, swore before a judge that the information I provided is true, and paid a lot of fees for every paper work I had to file -- until finally I received an official letter in the mail that the government had officially approved my legal name change. With that letter I was able to show proof at the Identification Card department to produce a new MyKad (a Malaysian government issued form of identification) and subsequently took my new MyKad to the Passport department to issue a new passport with my new legally changed name.

Ever since then, I never had to worry about my name being incorrect or being misidentified as someone else. This was a defining moment for me because it shaped my character to never accept a fate that wasn’t created by me.

When I completed the Malaysian portion of the American transfer degree program, I was ready to take on the next chapter of my education in Kalamazoo, Michigan. I had all my immigration paper work with my correct name and I had a student visa reflecting the same. It was a very exciting time for me -- traveling overseas and to be away from home for more than just a couple of weeks.

Arriving in Kalamazoo was quite an experience. I remember the first time I set foot on Western Michigan University’s (WMU) campus and feeling so lost. Part of our itinerary when we arrived in Kalamazoo was to figure out our living accommodation at the dorms and attending the international student orientation. The international student orientation was filled with Bronco spirit and it was awkward. International students like me who didn’t know the fight song were in quiet observation because we just didn’t know the culture and practices that many other WMU college students have become accustom to.

In addition to experiencing a different campus cultural experience, we were also provided a letter from the Offices of International Student Services to apply for a Social Security card. We also had to apply for a Bronco Card and also a Michigan Identification Card in order to access a variety of benefits on campus. At this point I felt comfortable navigating bureaucracy and paper work to ensure my name was legal and also that I was on legal standing in this country.

I filled out all the paper work for a Social Security card, had money on hand to pay the application fees as well as this letter to prove that I was a student at WMU who might be applying for employment on campus. The paper work part was easy, what I didn’t anticipate was the interview with the Social Security staff who was processing my paper work. First of, they were confused about which part of my name was my last name when they looked at my passport. I told them it’s Lee. Then they asked me which part of my name is my first name. I told them my English first name is Sarah and my Chinese first name is Ling Wei, all of that is part of my first name. At this point, I thought to myself that they were clearly not reading the paper work I had filled out because it was laid out very clearly on paper.

What came next defined the rest of my existence in America of how I talk about myself. The Social Security staff person who was processing my paper work was baffled by my explanation regarding my name. He then explained to me that he is going to hyphenate my Chinese name (Ling-Wei) and my Chinese name is now my middle name. I had never heard of a middle name before and that wasn’t what I was raised to understand as my identity or how identify myself. I didn’t know how to respond at the time and just nodded in agreement thinking to myself, “If this is the only way I am going to get my social security card, then my name has to be listed this way.” This is how my name on my current official documents are listed, “Sarah Ling-Wei Lee.”

A part of my identity changed due to this act of simplification. However, I didn’t think very much of it at the time because I knew who I was and the order of how my name was just the nature of different naming conventions and cultural systems. Reflecting back on this experience, I realize I had changed the way of how I introduce myself to people over the last 17 years in Kalamazoo. More specifically, I have dropped my Chinese name completely, or now my middle name, from conversation and leveraging the levity of a renowned baked good called “Sara Lee” as part of my introduction spiel. Anything else would be a pronunciation or hearing test for the recipient and there is nothing worst than having someone butcher your name in public.

Today, I am extremely comfortable with just Sarah Lee and it doesn’t diminish my pride for my Chinese name or my identity, even though not many people call me by that name in America. My mother from time to time calls me by my full name, especially if she is upset with me. She enjoys regaling me of how I got my Chinese name. I was born during the first Uber Cup badminton competition in Kuala Lumpur and it was featured on the television that my mother was watching after she gave birth to me in the hospital. The renowned women’s badminton player at the time was Li Lingwei and I was named after her that year. Unfortunately, I can’t play badminton well for the life of me but I can hit a birdie from time to time.

If you would like to read more stories about my lived experiences as a Chinese Malaysian immigrant living in America, check out the full list of “31 Stories” project I did in celebration of Asian American Pacific Islander month in May 2020.

[emilyplaysotome]

Part 50 - An Ending

Down the Voltage Rabbit Hole is an ongoing story about our MC, who could easily be anyone in voltage fandom. She woke up in hospital bed only to discover that she’d somehow been transported Voltage universe.

This is the last chapter, so please use the link to the masterpost below to read from the start:

http://emilyplaysotome.tumblr.com/post/159383977157/down-the-voltage-rabbit-hole-master-post

Part 50 - An Ending

I made us all some tea with the hope that should Leon still have his powers, the time spent in this world would dull them. I was concerned that he’d take us back against our will, seeing as how he’d come on a mission from the king and had always been difficult to reason with.

Seeing him and Zyglavis together made me realize how much happier Zyg appeared these days, and as I went about my business preparing the tea, I couldn’t help but smile at how much I’d seen him change during our time together.

Back in the otome world, he always seemed to be bogged down with his responsibilities as Chief Minister of Punishments. 

However since he’d changed careers and left his life as a God behind him, he suddenly had an ample amount of free time outside of work, and we found ourselves spending the bulk of our down time together. In this world, I was the one who would occasionally bring work home and when that happened, he would step out of the apartment and visit a local bartender he’d befriended in our neighborhood.

Outside of Ricky (the bartender), he’d also made a handful of friends at work, and for the first time in his life it appeared that his friendships revolved around shared interests and not status. 

During the past few months, he’d opened up about his life in the Heavens and admitted to having internalized much of the frustration that came with being a God in a position of power. He’d felt that Gods and Goddesses often approached him for the wrong reasons (putting his prestige over who he was as an individual), and told me that for the first time in his life he felt free.

In the Heavens, Chief Minister Zyglavis was known as a serious, anti-social sort of man, which he claimed was a byproduct of spending the past several hundred years around social climbers. With a smile he’d noted that he liked how humans got to know him as simply “Zyg” and nothing more. 

The frustration and trepidation he once felt upon being approached was no longer there. The people in my world didn’t see him as an all powerful God - they just saw him as a guy who loved chocolate, books, science, and all of his other random interests.

Considering the fact that I loved him for who he was, it made me happy to see him fitting into this world without any problems. 

I’d lost sight of how uptight he’d been back in the otome world, but as he sat next to Leon the memories of his old persona as a stuffy, quickly irritable, and stoic God returned. Seeing him in that defensive posture for the first time in months hurt my heart, and I silently vowed to do everything in my power to resolve this situation as quickly as I could.

For the most part, Leon chided Zyglavis for not attempting to return after the king had made it clear that he had not intended for Zyglavis to go with me. Zyg, as he always did, had a short fuse around Leon and argued that shortly after arriving in this world, he’d lost his powers and that there was nothing he could do from that point on.

“You can’t possibly be happier here,” Leon said as I set the tea down before them. “This hovel of an apartment is far too small for two people, let alone a God of your stature.”

“I don’t care about my status,” Zyglavis said. “This is my home and I would appreciate you not being so rude.”

Leon laughed heartily, and as I sat to join them I attempted to break the tension by asking, “If the king wanted us to return, why did he wait so long send you here?”

“Truthfully he was going to be magnanimous and let it go, but as time went on our world began to fall into chaos.”

“How so?”

Leon sighed, and with the snap of his fingers my living room turned into a theater of sorts. Zyglavis and I were shown several scenes in which Jin and Soryu were introduced to their proper MC but failed to move on.

“I’m sorry but my heart belongs to someone else,” they’d each said to the girl who stood in front of them. “She’s different. No one can replace her and I just can’t stop wishing that we’ll be together one day...”

Leon snapped his feelings and I felt a few of those old feelings come racing back. With that said, I tried to keep my cool upon seeing Zyglavis’ irritated expression, clearly displeased by having my exes paraded around in front of him.

“They’re not the only ones,” Leon said. “I can’t explain it, but they won’t stop wishing. Not only do I still have a headache, but the energy in our world...something is off. The balance that was once there is broken and we need you to fix it.”

“I don’t know how though…”

Leon glared at me and snapped, “You managed to get yourself and him home - I think you can put the same effort into making things right.”

“I’d appreciate it if you would not speak to my fiancé that way,” Zyglavis said harshly.

“As far as I’m concerned you’re just as culpable Minister Ponytail.”

Zyglavis scoffed, “I can’t expect you to understand, seeing as how you don’t love anyone other than yourself.”

“Says the man who needed my help in physically expressing it…”

"I forgot how arrogant you are!"

"And I forgot how uptight you are! It's a wonder you managed to find yourself a woman."

"Why you!"

“Guys!” I yelled, breaking up the escalating argument.

“I’m sorry my love...I got carried away.”

Leon scoffed at Zyglavis’ words, and Zyg ignored him, putting his arm around me protectively.

“Leon, you’re not taking her from me. And we’re not going back. I’m sorry but that’s final. Just wipe their memory and things should be fine.”

“You really don’t understand a thing, do you?”

Leon glared at us both and snapped his fingers. What happened after that moment, was something I was truly unprepared for.

Toshizo Hijikata stood in my living room, looking incredibly confused, filling my studio apartment with that earthy smell of his. 

Upon seeing me his eyes widened, and he smiled at me in a way that made it clear he remembered it all as vividly as I had. He came towards me, unconcerned that Zyglavis had his arm around me and pulled me up from the couch and into his arms.

“I thought I’d lost you…”

A lump formed in my throat as I remembered our last moments together before Leon had plucked me out of the Bakumatsu period and placed me back in modern day Tokyo.

“You...remember me?”

“How could I ever forget?”

“I’m sorry I just left you like that.”

Before Hijikata could say anything else, I felt Zyglavis pull me out of his embrace and with a possessive glare demanded that Leon to send him back. Leon snapped his fingers and I felt myself reach out towards the spot where Hijikata once stood. I’d done it on impulse and quickly saw that the action had caused a hurt look to form on Zyglavis’ face.

“Naomi…”

“I’m sorry, I just…”

“Do you understand now, Minister Ponytail? They do not forget her.”

Leon stayed with us late into the night arguing with Zyglavis over what should be done, and I found myself preparing the groceries I’d bought for the three of us. Being in our world was beginning to take its toll on Leon, and he found himself feeling hungry for the first time in his life.

“How is it?” I asked Leon, who tentatively took a bite of pasta dish I’d made.

Upon realizing he’d be joining us, I quickly ran out and grabbed some pre-made chicken meatballs which I figured would help stretch my groceries from a dinner for two to a dinner for three. Seeing as how I knew they were Leon’s favorite, I figured that making them might help him relax, allowing us to enjoy a peaceful meal together.

“Not bad.”

“There’s plenty more if you want seconds.”

“Mmm.”

“If his highness is so worried, why doesn’t he just use his own powers?” Zyglavis asked, unconcerned with pleasantries and clearly wanting Leon out of our hair as soon as possible.

“I can’t say. He’s tasked me with this and demanded that I bring you back or not return.”

“What do you mean...not return?” I quietly asked.

Leon took a out rumpled social security card, in addition to an ID and Passport, and tossed them on the table.

“Exactly that. He sent me here with these papers, a lifetime supply of money, and told me that if I cannot convince you to return, my penance will be living as a human until the Goldfish’s demise. At that point I figure he’ll come for both of us and...it won’t be pretty.”

Zyglavis sighed with recognition and muttered, “That man does love his games.”

“I suppose the only silver lining of this shitty situation is that ever since I came to this world my head has been freed from those damned wishes!”

Leon scoffed and continued to wolf down his food, soon holding his plate out towards me and demanding seconds. I fetched him another helping and upon returning to the table, Zyglavis encouraged me to show Leon the games on my phone. 

Even though there was a tangible animosity between the two of them, Zyglavis knew how difficult the king could be as much as anyone, and felt that we owed it to Leon to paint the full picture as far as what was really going on.

At first he was resistant towards the idea that the world he left was an offshoot of something created in this one, and to say that Leon was humbled upon seeing his own route in Star Crossed Myth would be the understatement of the century. As much as he didn’t want to believe it, the truth became obvious to him after seeing he was “offline” considering the fact that he was here.

He requested that I show him all the apps that had been riddled with bugs since my return, and he soon let me know that every man who was offline had been one to fill his head with wishes.

“Before you came here,” I noted. “Zyglavis was a selectable character in these games. But now...he’s gone.”

I pulled up the Voltage Facebook page and showed Leon a public post, explaining that they were having a hard time fixing the problematic apps. 

The post explained that Star Crossed Myth was back up and running, though they were unable to get Zyglavis back online. As a result, they’d credited all users $20 worth of stories in the app, and removed him completely - both as a main character in addition to a supporting one.

The post went on to say that they would be looking into doing the same with Kissed by the Baddest Bidder, Era of Samurai: Code of Love, Her Love in the Force, and Metro PD: Close to You. It apologized again for any inconvenience and noted that should the stories remain offline users would be credited in full (plus additional) as an apology.

“I don’t understand this,” Leon finally said, completely void of his usual bravado. “But you need to return. You need to figure out how to get these working again.”

Zyg managed to convince Leon to give us time alone to talk everything over.

I’d hoped that Leon would be returning to his world for the night, but instead I learned that he was staying nearby at a hotel. The king had made it clear that he was not to return empty handed, and not wanting to disobey the king, he grabbed the key card off our foyer table and let us know that he’d allow us one last night together in order to make the proper arrangements before returning with him tomorrow.

After he’d left, I couldn’t help but start crying seeing as how I couldn’t fathom a scenario in which we got out of having to go back with Leon. My life with Zyglavis had been so peaceful and I wasn’t ready for it to end.

It was obvious that Leon was still prepared to use brute force and take us against our will, despite the fact that he now understood the magnitude of the problem. This was not as simple as forcing these men to forget or move on and he now understood that their existence was tied to this world through the games that they inhabited.

Zyglavis held me in his arms and rubbed my back until my sobs quieted, and in a quiet voice admitted that he too was uneasy about the whole thing. 

He’d hated seeing me with Hijikata but knew that if we were to return not only would he be forced to know that I was back in the lives of my exes but it was unlikely that the king would allow him to come back to my world and the life that we’d built together (should we even succeed in fixing things).

“I have an idea,” he finally said. “But I feel bad...it involves being a bit underhanded.”

“Zyg…”

“I just don’t see any other way.”

As he outlined his plan to me, I felt sick to my stomach knowing that what we were about to do would put into motion the very thing I’d done my best to avoid. However, the longer we spoke, the harder it was to find another way and before bed we both found ourselves making arrangements to stay home from work in order to properly execute our plan.

From there we went about our usual nightly ritual, but when I came out of the bathroom seeing Zyglavis in his underwear and sleeping shirt sparked something in me that had faded a bit with time.

The idea that the happiness we took for granted was on the brink of being stolen away hurt my heart, and I found myself aggressively kissing Zyglavis, wanting to be as close to him as possible. Naturally he reciprocated, feeling the same way I did, and with our Friday free from work we mustered all of the passion we had for each other late into the night.

Neither of us slept well, unsure as to the ramifications of Zyglavis’ imperfect plan. As promised, Leon buzzed our intercom precisely at 10 A.M. and with a grumpy expression let us know that we’d be returning shortly.

“Wait,” Zyglavis said stoically. “Naomi and I have talked and we do not believe your story.”

“Excuse me?”

“We have both experienced how duplicitous the king is and agree that this is a ruse meant to force me back into my old role as Chief Minister of Punishments.”

“And you say I’m arrogant...”

“I don’t believe that was the Hijikata I knew,” I said, further egging Leon on. “And I don’t believe that Namba, Hiroshi, or Soryu is as stuck on me as you claim. It just feels like another trick.”

“How foolish!” Leon barked, his anger clearly growing by the second.

“It’s not foolish. It’s logical. Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me.”

I watched Leon closely as Zyglavis’ words further antagonized him. His eyebrow twitched slightly until he finally let out an annoyed sigh.

“Fine! Don’t believe me? Well...see for yourself.”

With that, he summoned Jin Namba, followed by Soryu Oh, Hiroshi Kirisawa, and finally Toshizo Hijikata.

It's important to note that with each snap of his fingers I heard the same odd fizzling sound I'd previously heard and just as we’d planned, my studio apartment was soon full of every ex I'd had (other than Shun, who had managed to move on) in the otome world.

"Leon...do you understand what you’ve just done?" I asked, waiting for him to realize what Zyglavis and I had been banking on.

"Oh, I'm sorry is this awkward for you?" Leon asked sarcastically.

“You really don’t understand a thing, do you?” Zyglavis asked, throwing Leon’s own words back at him with a smirk.

“What are you yammering about?”

“Your powers...can you send them back?"

Zyglavis looked triumphant even though my heart sank as I grappled with what we had done in the name of preserving our own happiness.

Leon scoffed, arrogant as ever, but when he snapped his fingers...nothing happened.

“No! No! This can’t be!”

Zyglavis sighed, and in a quiet voice said, “I’m sorry...I just didn’t see another way.”

“You idiot!” Leon shouted, grabbing Zyglavis by the collar and pushing him up against the wall. “You realize that we’re all stuck here now? That the king told me…”

“Don’t return without them, yes. I know. I’m sorry.”

Leon socked Zyglavis as hard as he could and I ran over to Zyg’s side who rubbed his bruised face.

“I deserve that...but I wasn’t about to lose her which would have happened if we’d returned.”

“If you’d just returned...”

“I couldn’t have fixed this,” I said. “At least with them here they’ll do what they did with Zyg and I hope that order will be restored.”

I brought Zyglavis and Leon ice packs for their injuries (Leon’s hand and Zyglavis’ face). Both were starting to swell and the two men pouted on the couch as my exes were still unconscious from their journey to this world.

Unlike yesterday, as Leon’s powers had begun to weaken, more physical strain had been put on each man. 

When Leon had summoned them, they’d arrived unintelligible and woozy before passing out on the spot. At the moment the four men were lying in various places around my apartment, and while they slept Zyglavis and I outlined the plan we’d cooked up last night for Leon.

Considering that Leon had been sent here with a lifetime supply of money, we tasked him with caring for the group until they all got on their feet. 

At first he resisted, but ultimately took responsibility for the fact that his carelessness had resulted in them all being trapped in this world.

After much back and forth he agreed to see to it that they were properly cared for and admitted to having more than enough cash in which to do so. I’d come up with a few careers I thought each man might be able to find fulfillment in and had started pulling together information from various job sites.

For Hijikata, he would need to wrap his head around the technological advances in this world, but would require a job that didn’t rely on the tech he’d eventually come to learn. 

I’d remembered how lovingly he tended to his cowhide plants and suggested that Leon help him look into a career in landscaping. At the moment there were several openings in the tri-state area, but I thought he’d want to hold off in applying until he’d properly acclimated to his new life here.

Out of all of the men, being from the 1850s gave him the clearest disadvantage, however I had faith that he’d be able to overcome this rather quickly with the help of Leon and the others. I also promised to spend my Saturdays helping him get up to speed as well, figuring that under my tutelage he would be motivated to step up his game.

Hiroshi Kirisawa was a motorcyclist enthusiast, and I’d found a few listings that I thought might help him in his new life as a mechanic. 

On top of that, I’d done a marketing job a few years back for a man who built custom motorcycles, and had reached out to him with the hope that Hiroshi might be able to come on as an apprentice of sorts. He’d let me know that my timing was perfect, and that Hiroshi sounded like a great fit for an assistant. 

I had no doubt that his positive attitude, and solid leadership skills would result in Hiroshi prospering should he want this new career.

Before leaving otome-ville, I’d heard that Soryu Oh had gotten into crossfit, and seeing him after all this time it was clear that he’d made substantial physical gains as a result. 

When I’d known him he’d possessed that perfect otome body, but now he was a specimen to say the least. It would be easy for him to get a job as a personal trainer and crossfit instructor, and having remembered that Meg’s ex before Noah had been a trainer, I’d reached out to him and got Soryu an interview in a few days’ time.

Of the everyone, Namba was the hardest to reinvent, and as a result I’d struggled to figure out what new career might work for him. 

With that said, from his otome route I’d remembered that he was amazing with the elderly. His maturity, patience, and respect for his elders made him a great fit for a career in elder care. 

I’d found a few classes online that he’d need to take before he was able to work at a nursing home or an assisted living community, but I had faith that he’d be excited to take it on seeing as how he loved to help others.

“I have to say Goldfish...I underestimated you,” Leon finally admitted quietly.

“How so?”

“Truthfully, I thought you were one of those women who just chased attention...but now I see that you’re different. You really cared about each of them, didn’t you?”

Zyglavis pursed his lips, expressing his displeasure to the room but I still had to nod in response to Leon’s question. 

For the first time in our history together, Leon offered me a genuinely warm smile and said, “You really are quite lucky Zyglavis.”

Rather than accept the compliment, Zyg glared at him and snapped back, “Stay away from her Leon.”

Leon laughed, “Afraid of a little competition?”

With that, and almost as if it were on cue, the men in the room began to wake up.

Namba was the first to stir. 

He groaned slightly, holding his head, and sat up from where he’d been laid out on the floor. I’d place a pillow under his head, and before opening his eyes he’d taken a deep breath. He happened to spot me first, and blinking his eyes with an incredulous look on his face asked, “Little Bird?”

“Long time no see Namba,” I said, kneeling down beside him. “How do you feel?”

“Like hell, which doesn’t make sense seeing as how you’ve still got the face of an angel.”

It was obvious that he was over the moon to see me again, and even though it was clear he was in a fair amount of pain, he couldn’t help but give me a wink and flash me a toothy smile.

“Such a cheeseball.”

“What can I say...I’m an old fart.”

He reached up to touch my cheek, to which Zyglavis pulled me away from him. 

As the room began to come into focus, Jin recognized Zyglavis who held me close. Upon realizing who he was, Jin let out a wry chuckle, almost as if he’d been brought back to our night in the hotel room, and he let out a groan as he stood up.

“So...this is your place huh?”

“Yeah, I’m sure you’ve got a lot of questions but we’ll answer what we can once everyone else is awake.”

Hiroshi woke up next, followed by Soryu, and finally Hijikata. 

Once the initial shock of seeing me subsided, Leon, Zyg and I did our best to explain the situation to the men. I started by offering my sincerest apologies, before Leon stepped in to explain exactly what had happened.

Just as I’d done with Zyglavis and Leon, I showed the men their apps and watched as they struggled with understanding that their existence had been born from a game in my world. From there Zyglavis shared the theory we’d come up with - that by bringing them here, we’d allowed their existence to be removed from their world, thereby restoring order. 

I had expected them to be furious with us, however even though we explained that they might be trapped in this world forever, none of them seemed to care. It was just as Leon said, as they appeared to be too caught up in the fact that their wish to see me again had come true.

I could tell that Zyglavis was actively holding himself back best he could as I spoke with each of them, continuing to apologize profusely for what we’d done.

“Please don’t apologize,” Hiroshi said with a soft expression. “I know you weren’t ready for something serious before, but now that we’re in your world I hope you’ll consider me.”

“I’m just happy that I got the chance to see you again,” Soryu said bashfully. “I’ve completed my anger management program and have cut ties with the Ice Dragons. I’m a new man, and I’m ready to make a new life for myself. I want to win you back.”

“I’m the same way Little Bird  - my feelings for you have only grown in the time we’ve been apart. I can’t help but feel that meeting you again is fate, and that I’m the one you’re really meant to be with.”

“If she’s meant to be with anyone it’s me,” Hijikata said with a fierce glare. “I’ve traversed time to be with you. That’s how strong my feelings are…”

“You all have seemed to forgotten the fact that she has already chosen me!” Zyglavis finally barked, his jealousy getting the better of him.

“Enough!” Leon said with an eye roll. “You can all fight over this woman another time. Right now we need to focus on starting your new lives here.”

Leon’s words somehow managed to persuade the group, and within the next few minutes they began to head over to the Air BnB Zyglavis and I had booked for them last night.

It was a large, affordable space in Bushwick which would easily house 5 grown men for the foreseeable future. They each had their own, fully furnished rooms which came with all the necessary amenities required for living and working in this city. 

As difficult as the next few weeks (and months) would be for them, I found myself feeling certain that Zyglavis and I had done what was best for both worlds. Now that these men were here, I was positive that the otome-world could move forward, and that five lucky New York women might be able to meet their otome man in shining armor like I had.

Zyglavis and I stood in our studio apartment, which felt silent now that Leon and the others had left. 

As I’d expected, he took me in his arms and held me close. I reciprocated his embrace and gave him a squeeze of my own, hoping that the physical gesture would help calm his frazzled nerves.

“I can deal with having four more rivals,” he finally muttered, “but I couldn’t have dealt with losing you.”

“You know we’ll have to help them get settled,” I said. “It’s the right thing to do.”

“I know.”

“At some point I’ll probably be alone with each of them again, but I’ll need you to trust me.”

“It’s them I don’t trust.”

“Still…”

Zyglavis pulled back so he could kiss me and as his lips aggressively crashed into mine, I felt all the apprehension and jealousy that he was feeling. 

He hadn’t kissed me like that in months - since before we’d arrived in my apartment, and my heart hurt a bit thinking about everything that might come to pass now that these men were loose in my world. There was no telling what the future held, and truthfully, seeing them caused a few old feelings to come rushing back.

While it was clear that Zyglavis was in an emotional state similar to the one he’d been in before I’d made my final decision, doubt was beginning to creep in for me as well. 

There were two men specifically whose presence in this world made me question if I’d run away from their affections prematurely, and as much as I loved Zyglavis, the fact that this doubt had even been able to crop up again filled me with worry. I did my best to tuck these feelings away in the recesses of my heart. 

In order to make amends for the confusion that threatened to overtake me, I found myself reciprocating Zyglavis’ love just as aggressively. That day I gave myself to the man I’d promised to marry again and again, in the hopes that I would be able to reclaim my conviction in our relationship.

We had both done something unforgivable, and it had been in the name of preserving our life together. In the months and years to come, I would need to do my best not to be rattled by the otome men who were designed to win my affections.

After all, I’d fought like hell to win this game and damn it, I was determined to live happily ever after.

After 50 chapters, our story finally comes to an end.

I hope you’re all satisfied even though I love ending on non-endings seeing as how life is always a bit messy. While this definitely leaves the door open for a sequel, at the moment I have no plans to continue this story.

I want to thank everyone who has been commenting and sharing as the weeks have gone on. It has meant a lot to me to see the positive reaction this story has gotten, and seeing as how I think this will be my first and last fan fiction, I appreciate you guys sticking with me.

I started writing this after I’d hit a wall with my IRL writing and wanted to write something free of stress. I’d forgotten how much fun the process can be and creating this was a great reminder as to why I love writing. I’m ready to return to my original characters and I hope one day my work will have a fandom as awesome as this one.

Thank you guys for reminding me what it means to create for fun. Thank you for reminding me that my words can bring joy to others. If you’ve discovered this story after the fact and it’s made you smile...please don’t hesitate to let me know. 

I have no idea where I’ll be when you find it, but hearing that my work has made you happy only encourages me and I hope you’ll consider sending me (or anyone else whose work brought you a joy for that matter) a note letting them know.

Finally, in falling down this rabbit hole I’ve met many talented writers. While creating within this voltage world has been a lot of fun I selfishly hope I see you guys create your own characters and original stories. 

There’s a ton of talent in this community and I’d love to see what your original stories look like.

If you’ve enjoyed the story, please show your support by sharing it with a friend or buying me a coffee!

Thanks for reading :)

Naomi’s IRL Apartment

IRL Zyglavis - David Chiang

IRL Leon - Jon Kortajarena

IRL Hijikata - Daisuke Ueda

IRL Soryu - Daniel Liu

IRL Hiroshi - Hideo Muraoka

IRL Namba - Hiroyuki Sanada

[reedusdixonfictionaddiction]

The Summer in Georgia

Chapter 35. Please!

When Thursday afternoon rolled around, Isabella was still in bed. Her nerves were still a mess and her only defense against her falling apart was sleep. She understood why Daryl had done, what he’d done and her heart bled for him carrying that guilt around his whole life about his mother, but the truth was, she was still angry with him. Maybe not angry, but resentful. Not only had he risked her mental health and subsequently her physical health, but she was humiliated that she was seen at her worst by Rick and to top that off, Hershel, a man she barely knew, was brought into it. She could just imagine what Maggie and Glenn thought about her, not to mention Hershel. She was however, thankful that he came to examine her, so she didn’t have to go to the emergency room. She had to send him a ‘thank you’ card, she thought.

She was very frustrated with Daryl, this was the second time in a week that he’d caused her undo stress and this last time was almost more than she could handle. She probably would have kicked him out if he hadn’t broken down in front of her over the death of his mother. So, she let him stay. Most of the time he was there though, was spent sleeping. Which helped her to recover and also, not to kill him.

When Daryl woke up Thursday morning, he got up and fixed Isabella some breakfast. Rick was at work, so he didn’t have to face him and get the ‘What the hell, were you thinking’ look from him. He brought the bed tray into her bedroom as she was just waking up. She sat up and yawned.

“Why are you still here?” She asked.

“I… I wanted to take care of ya’. How are ya’ feelin’?” He asked, putting the tray down in front of her.

“Oh! I feel ok, I guess. You don’t need to stay and take care of me. I’m sure you have things to do.” She said, picking up a piece of toast.

“Nah! I took the week off, remember? We were gonna’ go campin’. Besides I like takin’ care of you.”

Isabella rolled her eyes and that made Daryl feel awkward.

“Why’d ya’ roll yer eyes? Ya’ don’t believe me?”

“No, I believe you. That statement is ironic, though. Don’t you think?” Isabella asked.

“How?” Daryl asked.

“Well, I’m feeling bad because of you and now you want to take care of me. You could’ve just not taken my medication and we could have avoided all of this. That would have been better than taking care of me. You know, not putting me in the situation you put me in?”

Daryl just stood there silently. He thought that things had been forgiven the day before. He thought she understood why he’d taken the pills in the first place. What he didn’t realize was that understanding his motive and forgiving it were two different things. He was puzzled.

“I told ya’ I was sorry. I thought ya’ understood why I took ‘em. Ya’ said, ya’ did. Why ya’ still mad?” He said confused.

“I do understand and I’m so sorry for what you went through with your mom. I really am, but in your eyes, all you see is you trying to save my life. When in actuality, you put my life at risk. What you did was serious, medication like that is not something you mess around with. I forgive you, I really do, but I’m still angry with you and a little disillusioned, to tell the truth. I trusted you and for the second time in a week, you hurt me.” Isabella explained.

Daryl swallowed hard. “I know and I feel like shit for what I put ya’ through, both times, but if ya’ understand then why are ya’ mad at me?” Daryl asked.

“Never mind, Daryl. You don’t get it and I don’t want to explain it to you. Things will get back to normal, I just need time to recover. Just because I’m a little angry, doesn’t mean I don’t still want to be with you, because I do. I kind of just need a little distance from you right now. I’m sorry.”

“Fine, I’ll leave. Ya’ done with the food?” He said, grabbing the tray from her. She hadn’t even finished eating.

Daryl left without even saying ‘goodbye’. Isabella wasn’t upset. He was immature and couldn’t get it through his head why she was being the way she was. At that moment, feeling the way she did, she didn’t care. So, she went back to sleep.

Isabella got up around 4:30 pm and took a bath. She called Rick to see if he was coming home for dinner, because she wanted to cook for him. He told her, if she was cooking then he most definitely was coming home and that he’d be there around 7:30. So, she defrosted some pork chops, made some glaze and heated up the broiler.

Daryl didn’t know what to do. He was supposed to be camping. That was the only reason he’d taken the week off and it was already Thursday and he hadn’t done anything. He went home and showered and although, he knew Rick was still mad at him, he headed to the station to see what he was up to. When he got there, Charlie completely gave him the cold shoulder. ‘Fuck him!’ Daryl thought. When he entered Rick’s office, Rick had his face resting in his hands. Daryl knocked and Rick looked up surprised, like his mind had been somewhere else. He had a sullen look on his face.

“What’s wrong? Ya’ look like ya’ lost yer best friend.” He asked Rick.

Rick shook his head and gathered together some loose papers and put them back into a folder, he closed the file that was on his desk and covered it with a pad of paper.

“Nothing. Nothing’s wrong. What are you doing here?” Rick asked him.

“Nothin’, I was bored, so I thought I’d come and bug ya’. Ya’ want me ta’ leave? That seems ta’ be the trend for the day.” Daryl said.

“What’s that mean?” Rick asked.

“Nothin’. What’s wrong with ya’? Ya’ look upset. Don’t tell me yer still pissed at me too.”

Just then Charlie popped his head into Rick’s office door, he completely ignored Daryl.

“Rick, some guy wants to talk to you about a downed speed limit sign on highway 4.” Charlie said.

“Ok, I’ll be out in a minute.” He told Charlie. “Daryl, give me a sec., I’ll be right back.”

Daryl nodded and sat down. Jenner came into the office and told Daryl he needed a piece of paper, so Daryl got up and handed him the pad of paper from Rick’s desk. When he picked it up, he saw Isabella’s name. He handed the tablet to Jenner and then grabbed the file. He was about to open it when Rick came back in.

“What are you doing? Give that to me.” Rick said, reaching for the file.

“Why’s it got Isabella’s name on it? Is this the stuff you were waitin’ for, so ya’ could pay her?”

“Sort of. Now give it to me.” He said, grabbing the file.

“What’s wrong with ya’? Why ya’ tryin’ to hide it from me? What’s in there?”

“There’s personal information in it, some things that you don’t have the authority to read. Things that I don’t have the authority to read.” Rick explained.

Daryl lunged for the file. “What’s in it? Ain’t just her social security number and shit? What else is in there? Let me see it.”

Rick pulled the file back. “Ok, I’ll explain. I contacted her college, thinking they would have the info I needed, but they put me in contact with the scholarship board, who in turn put me in contact with a woman that, I thought worked in vital records. Well, I called her several times requesting Isabella’s information. She never called me back, so the last time I called, I left a message stating who I was and what I needed and then I faxed her a formal request from the county with all the info I thought she’d need to send it to me. Address, phone number and so on. Well, today it came. Only it wasn’t just her vital records.” Rick said.

“Well, what was it? Yer killin’ me here.” Daryl snapped.

“It was her complete welfare file from Child Protective Services. Everything from the time before her parents died until last year.” Rick said, looking down and sighing.

“Everything? Like what kinda’ shit’s in there? Is it bad?” Daryl asked and then he lunged for the file again. “Let me see it.” He said angrily.

“I can’t show it to you, Daryl. It’s personal information, information that I shouldn’t even know about. I will tell you though, there’s a lot of bad in it.”

“Does it say how her parents died? Was she abused. Does it say anything about the thunderstorms and nightmares? Tell me what it says. I have a right ta’ know, Rick!”

“No, you don’t have a right to know unless she tells you herself. I read it and I’m speechless, I wish I didn’t know what was in there, but I do. How her parents died is in there and judging by what she went through when she was four, I understand her fear of the weather and what causes her nightmares. I will tell you this, Daryl. Don’t fuck with her emotions anymore. She doesn’t need any more grief.” Rick told him.

Jenner came into the office and told Rick that there had been a shooting outside a liquor store and he needed to come. Rick put the file in his file cabinet and told Daryl they’d finish talking later, he also asked him to call Isabella and tell her he wouldn’t be home for dinner, because of what happened. Daryl followed Rick out of the office and shut the door behind him. Charlie told Rick he was ready to go and they headed out the door. Daryl had to use the bathroom, so he stayed behind. When he came out of the bathroom he looked around. There were no deputies left in the station, just the dispatcher and a few receptionists. He knew he shouldn’t do it, but he had to know what was in that file, so he snuck into Rick’s office and took the file out of the cabinet. He stuck it down the front of his pants and walked out. He figured Rick would be gone most of the night, he could read it and then put it back without him knowing it.

When he got to his truck, he called Isabella and let her know that Rick wouldn’t be home for dinner and he’d probably be out late. She didn’t sound very happy about being alone, so he asked if he could come over and stay with her. She did want to see him and she didn’t want the food to go to waste, so she said, ‘yes’. Daryl put the file under the blanket in the backseat and headed over. Once she fell asleep he’d look through it. Before he headed over to Rick’s he stopped by the market and bought some Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio, Pistachio. He hoped it would be a peace offering.

Isabella was in a much better mood when Daryl got there. When he walked through the door, she ran up to him and hugged him tight. He sighed a sigh of relief and squeezed her so tight, she gasped for air. They both laughed, he gave her the ice cream which made her smile. God, he loved her smile. She told him to wash his hands and then she set dinner out for the two of them. After they ate, Daryl went into the living room to watch TV, while Isabella made up a plate for Rick and finished cleaning up. When she came out to join Daryl, he was chewing the skin off his thumb and spitting it out into the air.

“What are you doing?” Isabella asked. “Don’t you know that’s bad for you?”

“I ain’t bitin’ my nails, just my thumb. Can’t help it, I’ve always done it.” He smiled.

Isabella smiled back, sat down and curled up next to him. He put his arm around her and she snuggled into to him. He told her ‘Forrest Gump’ was on and it was one of his favorite movies. They’d watched about 10 minutes before she sat up and started kissing his ear. Forrest who? He thought. She moved from his ear to his mouth, starting with small kisses that turned into bigger ones, then she parted his lips with her tongue to search for his. Daryl pushed her gently down on the sofa, she spread her legs for him and he got between them and laid down on top of her. Isabella was wearing a strapless top and a frilly little mini shirt, which was all too convenient for Daryl. He pulled her top down and took her breast into his mouth. She sighed and dug her nails into his back, which made him bite her nipple. She moaned and grabbed a fist full of his hair. This was going to be the night, she thought.  

He ran his hand down her ribcage, over her hip and slipped it under her skirt. His fingers snuck up under the back of her panties and squeezed her beautiful behind, letting his fingers linger ever so close to her wetness. She gasped and bit into his shoulder. Making him growl. He let go of her breast and attacked her neck, sucking and biting from her collarbone all the way up to her ear. When he got to her ear, he ran his tongue along the edge, gently sucking on the lobe, before whispering ‘I’m gonna’ make ya’ feel real good.’’ into it. A chill went down her spine and she whimpered a quiet ‘Ok!’ back to him. He needed friction, so he pressed himself into her. She bucked her hips, giving him the contact he craved. Suddenly, Isabella pushed him off her and rolled out from underneath him, once she was free, she ran her hand down his body and brazenly grabbed at his dick through his jeans. Daryl grunted into her neck and reached down and unzipped his pants, then glided her hand into his jeans. He was rock hard and she loved the feel of him, she put her hand down into his Calvin Klein’s and grasped on to it, running her hand up and down his length.

Daryl grunted again, before grabbing ahold of her breast and running his tongue lightly across her nipple, sending her through the roof. She was on fire down there and she needed his touch. His hand was still up under her skirt and every time he grasped her behind, his fingers got a little bit closer and he could feel the heat radiating from her core.

“Touch me!” She purred, giving his dick a little squeeze, which sent Daryl into a heated frenzy.

Isabella let go of his dick and grabbed a hand full of his hair, lifting his head up. She crashed her lips into his, wet and wild, then she’d teasingly pull away, he’d lunge for her, trying to catch her mouth, but she’d pull away again. She was toying with him and it was driving him crazy. She finally let him catch her, she kissed him hard, then she’d bite his lower lip. Sometimes a little too hard, but he got off on the pain. Isabella climbed on top of him and straddled him, grinding herself against his hardness. This made him shudder and groan with frustration. Then just when he got going, she climbed off and down went her hand gripping his rock-hard dick again, this time grazing her thumb over his slit and coyly playing with his precum. Daryl couldn’t control himself any longer. He kissed her hard, swirling his tongue around hers, while pulling up her skirt and shoving his hand between her legs. She was desperate for him to touch her, she craved his contact. He ran his fingers over her panties, she was soaking wet. She whimpered and wriggled in anticipation, which drove Daryl crazy. He felt like he could explode with the slightest bit of friction.

“Please!” She begged, as he slipped his hand down into her panties and into her wetness. “Oh, God! Daryl, please. I need you.” She panted.

“Shhhh, rabbit. Be patient, you’ll get there.” Daryl teased. “Say it one more time for me, rabbit.”

“Please, please, please!” She pleaded.

He ran his thumb over her clit and she almost screamed, she dug her nails into his arms and cried, “Yes!” This made him smile, he loved that he could get her going like this. It was time he paid her back for the mind-blowing blow job she’d given him the other night. He gently rubbed in circles over that sensitive area, trying to remember what he’d learned on that website. He then took his middle finger and slowly entered her, making her arch her back and cry out in ecstasy. She was on fire and he knew it wouldn’t take much to send her over the edge. Isabella put her hand on top of his guiding it in and out of her.

“Fuck yeah!” Daryl growled. “Come on, baby. Cum for me.”

His thumb was still massaging her clit, she was close and she began to squirm underneath him, thrusting into his hand. Isabella grabbed a handful of his hair and pulled, just as she came. Shockwaves rippled through her body, causing her to tremble with pleasure. Her body tensed and she bit down into his shoulder.

“Oh, my God!” She screamed. “Yes, oh my God. Daryl, yes!” She rode out her orgasm, writhing in delight and then her body went limp.

Isabella lay there panting, trying to catch her breath.

“Was it good?” A totally turned on Daryl asked her.

“Oh, God yes! Thank you so much! My legs feel like wet noodles, I have no strength.” She laughed.

Just then the front door opened and Rick came in.

“Hey, you guys here?” He hollered.

“Uh… yeah. Don’t come out here, give us a minute.” Daryl said in a panic.

Isabella giggled which made him laugh. She pulled up her top and pulled down her skirt. He tucked his still hard dick into his pants and zipped up quickly.

“Please don’t tell me you’re doing what I think you’re doing.” Rick said.

“Nah! It’s all good, we’re good now. Ya’ can come in.” Daryl laughed.

Rick walked hesitantly into the living room to find them both sitting there with smiles on their faces. Isabella’s hair was a mess and Daryl reached out and tried to get it to lay down. This made Rick laugh and shake his head.

“You know, there is a bedroom back there for this kind of thing? Just sayin’.”

They looked at each other and snickered.

“Are you hungry, Rick? I made a plate for you.” Isabella asked.

“I’m starving. Thank you, sweetheart.” He answered.

Isabella got up to heat up his food.

“I guess you guys kissed and made up or I guess you did something and made up. Right?” Rick whispered to Daryl.

“Yeah! I guess ya’ could say that.” Daryl chuckled. “Yer back earlier than I thought you’d be. What happened anyway?”

“Some drunk guy, got into a fight with a woman over a parking space. He called her a few choice words, so she took out her pistol and shot him. She hit him in the shoulder, so he’ll be all right, but she’s looking at some hard time. Over a fucking parking space. People never cease to amaze me. Yeah, I thought I’d be out half the night, but Chris took charge and let me go. I’m glad too, because I’m tired as hell.” Rick explained. “I haven’t been able to sleep since that meeting with Lori, you know?” Daryl shook his head in understanding. “I just want to eat and go to bed. Then you guys can get back to whatever you were doing before I came in.” He winked at Daryl.

Daryl smiled. Isabella called Rick into the kitchen. His eyes lit up, when he saw what she’d made. He took off his gun and laid it on the counter, then sat down at the island to eat.

Isabella grabbed a spoon and the ice cream out of the freezer and returned to the living room to join Daryl. She gave him a sly little smile. Daryl was feeling very good about himself for what he had done. The website really paid off. They shared the ice cream, Isabella spoon fed it to Daryl while he continued watching the rest of ‘Forrest Gump’ and Rick went up to bed. Isabella cuddled into Daryl’s chest and eventually fell asleep. He was disappointed because he wanted to fool around some more, he was definitely going to have blue balls. He picked her up and carried her quietly into the bedroom and laid her in her bed. He covered her up and kissed her softly on the cheek, then he turned off the main light, leaving the closet light on for her. He left the room and shut the door behind him. He headed straight out to his truck to get the file that Rick didn’t want him to see. He was going to find out what was in it, he was going to find out everything. He just had to be quiet, as not to wake her or Rick up. He sat on the sofa in the dimly lit living room and opened the file and began to read.

After three hours of thumbing through papers and skimming over paragraphs, Daryl closed the folder. He sat there in the dark and thought about his rabbit and the hell that she’d been through. It made him sick, thinking of her being subjected to such horrible things. It was clear to him why she chose not to remember her childhood. It was clear to him why thunderstorms were such a big deal and it was clear to him that if it was the last thing, he did, he was going to fuck her brother up. He could understand why she had bad dreams. The stuff he read in her file was going to give him nightmares.

[bountyofbeads]

The Intelligence Fallout From Trump’s Withdrawal in Syria

The chaotic withdrawal from Syria will severely weaken U.S. efforts in the country—and could also be a boost for Russia and Iran.

Mike Giglio | Published October 18, 2019 6:00 AM ET | The Atlantic | Posted October 18, 2019 |

This version of the forever war in Iraq and Syria was built around the work done by local U.S. allies. The fight against ISIS was America’s, but it was also being fought by Syrians, Kurds, and Iraqis—a U.S. strategy known as “by, with, and through.” It meant that local troops carried out ground fighting in battles drawn up by American war planners. It meant that they received arms, training, and logistical support from the U.S. military and were backed by U.S. air strikes. Crucially, it also meant that they were getting help from special-operations forces, the U.S. military’s most elite units, who work in the shadows around the world to carry out difficult and sensitive missions.

Perhaps the best-known unit is SEAL Team Six, which carried out the Osama bin Laden raid in 2011. But task forces made up of SEALs and other officially classified units such as the Delta Force have carried out the dangerous work of hunting terrorists and breaking up insurgent networks since America’s forever wars began. Often, they work on their own; but sometimes, as in the war against ISIS, they work with local counterterrorism units specially trained for the task. In the “by, with, and through” strategy, these special-operations forces, along with the better-known U.S. Army Special Forces, or Green Berets, served as a force multiplier—a relatively small number of American troops who made the war effort by local forces far more deadly.

These partnerships have proved invaluable in the war against ISIS. At the same time, they have also opened a small hole in the secrecy that typically shrouds the special-operations community—by giving the local partners who work with these forces a rare and up-close view of who they are and how they do their jobs.

In Syria, elite U.S. troops among the 1,000 American personnel in the country worked closely with Kurdish counterterrorism units while regular Kurdish fighters carried out most of the ground operations against ISIS. The U.S. partnership with the Kurds grew as America armed and trained them and later merged them with Arab groups under an umbrella militia called the Syrian Democratic Forces. The SDF spearheaded the fight against ISIS in Syria, rolling back its most important strongholds. It has said that it lost more than 10,000 soldiers in that fight.

U.S. military officials wasted no opportunity to laud the SDF’s prowess. So President Donald Trump’s announcement of a hasty and ill-planned withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria to allow for a Turkish onslaught left everyone—allies, lawmakers, defense officials, but most significantly the Kurdish-led forces themselves—stunned. Fearing for its existence in the face of an invasion from NATO-allied Turkey, which considers it an enemy, the SDF has rushed to strike a deal with the Iran- and Russia-backed Bashar al-Assad regime. While the details of this arrangement remain in flux, one possibility is for SDF forces to be folded into the Syrian state, following negotiations to which they suddenly bring very little leverage. As a result, the same Kurdish counterterrorism units that have worked with U.S. special-operations forces and intelligence may suddenly find themselves working with—or at the mercy of—the Syrian government. This raises a vexing counterintelligence question for America: Might these units be forced to spill their secrets to some of America’s foremost global adversaries, in Assad, Russia, and Iran?

Eric L. Robinson, a former U.S. intelligence official who worked on anti-ISIS strategy at the National Counterterrorism Center, calls the fact that the SDF was forced to seek Assad’s protection in Syria a counterintelligence “nightmare.” He worried, in a Twitter post this week, that “given years of SDF exposure” to U.S. special-operations forces and intelligence, it would “be forced to give up TTPs [tactics, techniques, and procedures], names, locations, etc. What a coup for the Russian intelligence services—five years of history regarding the elite forces of NATO.”

Robinson, who was a senior civilian in the United States Special Operations Command until last year, also noted that the same elite troops who served in Syria also work around the world on America’s most sensitive national-security missions. They’re “from the same community that relieves an embassy under siege, identifies [North Korean] mobile missile capacity, rescues hostages, or defends Tallinn from [a] Russian invasion,” he wrote.

“We’re now five years into a relationship that has metastasized from a handful of basically cellphone connections between American special-operations forces and [Kurdish soldiers] into a robust operation,” Robinson told me by phone.

Along the way, Robinson said, the Kurds “got a close look at the way Americans fight war, and [it was] an extraordinary chance to observe segments of the American military within special operations that are not necessarily covert or clandestine but do try to keep a low profile.”

“Whether [the Kurds] like it or not, they are exposed to the way the United States conducts unconventional warfare,” he added. “Whether you’re talking about communications infrastructure or response times for medevac or response times for aviations support, that stuff is all interesting.” Robinson worries that any potential deal between the Kurds and Assad will include “not just speaking with Syrian intelligence officers but Russians and Iranians,” he told me. “It’s going to turn out that, all of a sudden, the ways that elite American counterterrorism forces operate are known to the opposition.”

The chaotic nature of the U.S. withdrawal from Syria—following a snap decision by Trump during a phone call with the Turkish president earlier this month—is unnerving those who have been involved in all levels of the fight against ISIS.

Brett McGurk, the former senior U.S. diplomat who helped to arrange and then oversee the partnership between the U.S. military and the Kurds, told me by email: “The chain of reaction from Trump’s call with [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan to a predictably catastrophic situation on the ground led to abrupt abandonment of military posts and relationships that had been built over years.” (McGurk declined to comment on the specifics of potential intelligence ramifications.) “None of these issues were thought through or prepared, no consequences considered. It’s a disaster.”

Several news outlets have reported that U.S. troops who worked with the Kurds in Syria are “heartbroken” and “ashamed,” while senior administration officials were reportedly left scrambling to deal with the ramifications of Trump’s decision. As they made their retreat in Syria, U.S. troops were reportedly fired on by Turkish-backed fighters. U.S. fighter jets later launched air strikes to destroy ammunition that American forces left behind amid the chaos.

“We’re running out of appendages in which to shoot ourselves,” Brian Katz, a former CIA official who recently took a post as a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told me. “Understanding how the U.S. military, special-operations, and intelligence community operates is going to be very valuable for Russia and Iran—if not in Syria now, then wherever we’ll be competing and fighting in the coming years. They’ll have a playbook for how we operate.”

A U.S. military official with experience on special-forces missions pushed back against the idea that Kurdish counterterrorism units will reveal sensitive information. “It’s not a huge concern if they go and play ball with somebody else, because the relationship that we have at the tactical level endures over time,” he told me on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the issue publicly. He added that “there’s a counterintelligence risk whenever you work with a partner force,” and the U.S. military is accustomed to mitigating it.

I asked whether he was concerned about the identities of special-operations forces being exposed. “I would say that’s by and large an individual’s responsibility,” he said. “I look about 15 years older and like a wild man when I have my beard [in the field], and I’m assuming that the majority of these guys are probably in similar fashion. There are ways that guys protect their identities when they’re down-range. It’s not like we’re giving our Social Security cards and bank information to the [Kurds].”

A spokesman for the U.S. military, Commander Sean Robertson, declined to comment on the issue in detail. “We take information security and operational security seriously. It is integral to our partnerships, and we plan for it regularly,” he said in an emailed statement.

The Kurdish militants who partnered with the U.S. military in Syria hail from the YPG—an offshoot of a separatist group, the PKK, that has waged a decades-long insurgency in southeastern Turkey and is labeled a terrorist group by the U.S. State Department. The U.S. relationship with the YPG was controversial from the start, and a major source of friction between America and Turkey.

While regular YPG forces carried out various ground offensives, its specialized counterterrorism units worked with U.S. special-operations forces to disrupt ISIS networks and target its leadership, Nicholas Heras, a fellow at the Center for a New American Security who briefs the U.S. military on Syria, told me. That work continued even after the demise of ISIS’s so-called territorial caliphate; in fact, it became arguably even more important, as ISIS returned to its roots as an underground insurgency. YPG counterterrorism forces worked with U.S. troops to capture the Tabqa Dam from ISIS, Heras said, and conducted “other discreet operations to capture and kill ISIS targets.”

Heras traveled to SDF-held Syria this summer and met with Kurdish commanders who oversaw the YPG’s counterterrorism units. He learned how they worked not just with U.S. intelligence and special-operations forces, but also with those from Britain and France. “This was a major line of effort that was quietly being done to improve the capabilities of the SDF and prevent the reemergence of ISIS,” he said. “It means U.S. special-operations forces considered certain elements of the YPG to be so trustworthy that they can go on these sensitive missions.”

Heras stressed that it’s still unclear what will become of the YPG and its counterterrorism units under a deal with Assad, though he noted that integration into the Syrian security forces is one likely possibility. Even setting aside the potential counterintelligence risk that would come with the YPG switching sides, he added, the U.S. will suffer a major intelligence setback with the loss of a crucial partner.

“This kind of hasty withdrawal creates a collapse in our intelligence collection on ISIS,” Katz, the former CIA official, told me. “People sometimes think there’s this magical intelligence button that the military and intelligence community hits—boom, start collection now. But building an accurate and active intelligence picture of a terrorist group, and one as savvy and sophisticated as ISIS, is a tedious and years-long enterprise.”

All of that is now at risk of being lost. “It’s human intelligence that gives the U.S. government its best ability to understand the strategic plans and intentions of terrorist groups—not only their movements on the ground, but their plotting of extremist attacks,” Katz said. “And human intelligence requires proximity and access and trust and building relationships with sources on the ground.”

Another ramification for the U.S. intelligence community is the potential for mass escapes of ISIS prisoners. The SDF holds thousands of suspected ISIS militants, including many foreign fighters, in its territory. Some prison breaks have already been reported, and the fate of the prisoners who remain in SDF hands is uncertain. Heras, the Center for a New American Security expert, told me that the possibilities are grim: More could escape, or all could be handed over to the Assad regime, which could torture and execute them, or perhaps seek to co-opt them, as it did in sending jihadists against U.S. troops during the Iraq War.

Regardless, U.S. investigators will likely lose access to a vital source of information about ISIS. One former U.S. military officer who worked at senior levels of the anti-ISIS campaign told me he doubted that U.S. investigators had managed to interview all the ISIS prisoners, especially those captured more recently. “We’ll lose out on interrogations that didn’t happen and on follow-on interrogations that won’t happen,” he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue. “The historical knowledge that’s resident there would take years to get through. And that’s knowledge that we’re probably not going to have access to.”

Anne Speckhard, who directs the International Center for the Study of Violent Extremism, has interviewed dozens of the suspected ISIS prisoners held in SDF prisons. She told me that many had turned against ISIS and were powerful voices in persuading others not to join militant groups. “Most of the people that we interviewed got disillusioned by ISIS—and got disillusioned because they felt ISIS is un-Islamic, corrupt, and really brutal,” she said. “We’re just losing a gold mine of data.”

[bentonpena]

Even the tech expert from 'Mr. Robot' can’t figure out this iPhone hack

Even the tech expert from 'Mr. Robot' can’t figure out this iPhone hack https://engt.co/2oHr514

If your dad were the technical advisor for the realistic hacks on Mr. Robot and he lovingly micromanaged your gadgets, you'd probably feel pretty badass about the security of your personal devices. So when one of Marc Rogers' kids had their iPhone pickpocketed at San Francisco Pride this year, things took an unexpected turn when tech-savvy thieves pulled off hacking tricks that had Rogers beside himself with curiosity and fascination. And concern. Lots of concern.

"Since this was my kid we are talking about, the phone was up to date and had a strong password and FaceID enabled, and activation lock was turned on," Rogers told Engadget via email. The teen noticed the phone missing within 10 minutes of its theft and immediately began security protocols. "As soon as the phone was found to be missing it was switched to Lost Mode and later a wipe command was sent to it," he explained.

Since that's exactly what you're supposed to do, that should have been the end of it. A loss to be sure, and a pain to start over with a new iPhone. Except Rogers noticed that neither the Lost Mode activation or wipe command went through, leading him to "believe the phone has been immediately powered down or placed in a bag that blocked signals. That and the fact that it never resurfaced told me that whoever stole it knew what they were doing and had done this before."

Most likely, the iPhone was powered down immediately and placed in a radio frequency-blocking bag (also called a Faraday Bag or RFID bag), a foil-lined sleeve or even an empty potato chip bag. This step interferes with Activation Lock, Find My iPhone, and Remote Wipe. In fact, after anti-theft "kill switch" features were introduced, iPhone theft rate dropped by 40 percent in San Francisco and 25 percent in New York within 12 months. London saw its iPhone thefts reduced by half.

The blocked signals didn't surprise Rogers; understanding digital crime is his job, after all. He explained in a post on Dark Reading what usually happens to a stolen iPhone after that:

The devices are then powered up only when thieves are positive no signal can reach or inspect them. If the phone is out of date and a software vulnerability exists, they hack the phone and wipe it clean to be resold. If the phone is up to date but not valuable enough to resell, it is either junked or sold for parts. This can easily happen on both older and newer models of phones.

But what happened to his kid's phone next surprised him. Within a few days, the teen "started getting these highly targeted messages using information they had apparently managed to extract." That information included the child's correct Apple ID, its associated email address, "they knew the phone number associated with it even though the SIM card had been killed," and the attackers "sent a range of different messages trying several different social engineering tactics" to try and trick Rogers's kid into clicking on tainted links.

The messages, sent by SMS/iMessage, were made to look like they came from Apple. Yet Rogers noticed they "rotated through a range of different mobile numbers, possibly to avoid detection." The attackers also rotated through a variety of iCloud addresses in order to prevent the victim from ignoring or blocking any of the messages.

Even though Rogers reported the messages as "junk" (this is what Apple advises), the messages came in a relentless flood. "At one point, more than 10 messages per day came in at all hours," he wrote.

He did some online digging and discovered what others are experiencing at the hands of similar attackers. "Apple forums are full of users asking for help after clicking on similar phishing emails. After which their phone is almost instantly deleted from their account, never to be seen again." If the target clicked on one of the links, Rogers explained, "they were immediately redirected to a fake Find My iPhone page that attempted to harvest their AppleID and password, as shown below, taken from fake Apple servers." From there, he wrote for Dark Reading:

If the target entered their AppleID credentials into the site, the phone would have been quickly deleted from their account. And often, the first moment targets know this has happened is when the missing device disappears from the list of devices trackable through Find My iPhone.

Sometimes, for good measure, the thief will hijack the target's AppleID, changing email addresses and contact information to exploit the account further."

Rogers was taken aback by the accuracy and automation of the attacks. "This is the first time I have seen spear-phishing used as a technique like this to bypass anti-theft technology used by consumers," he said. "The attacks appear to have been around since 2017 but steadily getting more sophisticated and more targeted."

He added that "normally this kind of very personal spear-phishing is something you associate with high-value targets like the directors of companies, however now it is being used against ordinary smartphone users. We have clearly reached a point where tools are readily available to do this."

So what seems like a basic iPhone theft at first glance is pretty serious and has implications of a bad privacy or security bleed happening somewhere. "All smartphone manufacturers and the mobile carriers need to find out how the attackers are harvesting personal information from their victims with nothing but a locked stolen phone," Rogers told Engadget. "Clearly they have found a route they can leverage to extract key pieces of information, likely through a multi-step process. A thief should not be able to extract the victim's contact information from a locked stolen device."

"This information exposure could have bigger ramifications than just spear-phishing."

While the attack method is somewhat of a mystery, it comes to light at the same time as a newly revealed bootrom exploit for iPhones, called checkm8. It, by the way, requires physical access to a victim's iPhone -- exactly the scenario for pickpockets and phone-snatches. Right now what is known about the checkm8 attack is that it jailbreaks iPhones, which could allow an attacker to revert the operating system to an unpatched version, could be used to undermine iCloud account locks (used for remote security actions like wipes), and more.

What's key here is that since Marc Rogers saw what happened with his kid's stolen iPhone, the world has found out that there's a whole new way to crack iPhones. And being told that attackers must have physical access to the phone is no longer a reassurance.

Personally, I'm inclined to believe we live in a terrible timeline in which privacy is burning, security is a smoking husk of good ideas and all companies hoarding our personal information are big fat thieves and liars. Maybe I'm not wrong! Or maybe I'm just feeling a little dour after finding out about the evolution of attacks on the people most at-risk to be exploited and have their lives torn apart. Namely, people who aren't up to date on all the latest security-savvy. Or, what hackers call "normal people." And companies seem to want to think of as "reputation risks when anyone finds out bad things are happening."

So like usual, we need to think a step ahead of the latest security measures. According to Rogers, that means being extremely cautious about text messages (and tell your friends and family too). "Don't trust messages with links in them, go to the site manually without clicking," he advised Engadget. "Keep your phone up to date and make sure you use all the security features available in your device. Finally, make sure all your accounts that support multi-factor authentication have it enabled. It's a good, simple defense against phishing attacks."

Yep, trust no one. Got it.

Images: Koren Shadmi (iPhone Illustration); Getty (iPhone/iCloud, Back Pocket, San Francisco Pride)

Tech via Engadget https://engt.co/2N4ekI3 September 30, 2019 at 01:06PM

[kawaiifunhologram-blog]

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Changing car insurance beneficiaries during a divorce?

IS IT TRUE THAT MY SOON-TO-BE EX HUSBAND CAN'T CHANGE OUR CAR INSURANCE POLICY UNTIL OUR DIVORCE IS FINAL??? I NEED HELP WITH THIS... IT SAYS THAT HE CANT MAKE ANY CHANGES TO IT IN THE SUMMONS THAT WAS GIVEN TO HIM BUT I WANT TO KNOW HOW LNG UNTIL HE CAN CHANGE IT BECAUSE HE IS TRYING TO CHANGE IT NOW

18 want car insurance?

right looked online all compare sites give sh*t results, i got quoted 14k for a suzuki alto 23k for a fiat cinciquento (whatever its called) ive rang i kube and got quoted 9k for the suzuki alto thats with the curfew, passed my test on the 22nd of march 2011, wheres good for cheap insurance, ill have curfew if needs be so please shed some light""

What is the cheapest insurance company for georgia drivers under 18?

What is the cheapest insurance company for georgia drivers under 18?

""Hit and run accident, should insurance pay for my auto damage?

Here is my situation that I'm confused about. About a week ago I went to church and parked my car. Next thing I know is that someone was driving stolen (Yukon) car and has hit the ...show more

Cost for insurance license?

What is the total cost for obtaining a insurance license in California? Taking into consideration the exam, background check fees, etc? PLEASE..answer if you truly know. And tell me other essential information that I should know such as the time that it takes to finish the courses.""

How much does does watercraft rental insurance cost?

I want to start a watercraft rental company, but I want to know how much insurance costs are going to be before I start it. If there are any companys out there who already have a watercraft rental business, or any agents that can answer my question that would be great. I plan on having about 4 or 5 jet ski's, 2 jet boats, 1 ski boat, 2 jon boats, 2 sail boats 1 pontoon boat, and 5 canoes, and 5 kayaks. So if anyone can help with this please let me know, thanks!""

Question about how much you think my insurance will be??! please help?

I'm 17. I just got my license. I will be put on my grandmas insurace. She has one car. We plan to share that till I can get my own. the car is a 1995 sc400 lexus. how much do you think its going to be a month?!

Why are insurance rates so high?

I am 18 and drive and old 1990 Geo Tracker. I have never been pulled over, given a ticket, warning, or fix-it ticket. I have been driving for 4 years (since I was 14 with a school permit) and even then I didn't get pulled over. Why are insurance rates for me so unbelievable?""

Does anyone know where you can buy individual medical insurance? Epileptic reasons!?

Insurance expired.

Is car insurance any cheaper for a pensioner if he do'snt work?

I am 67 and just finished working, when I renew my car insurance in a month's time, should I expect it to make a difference to the premium.

How do I find out how much the annual income of the CEO of State farm insurance is?

I was hit by a car by one of State Farm Insurance insured. Their first offer was $4 thousand dollars. Now that we are close to going to court the offer is up to $45 thousand. The problem with such a small settelment is I am having sever back pain. I would also like to know if anyone has been in the same situation. I know that they cheated a lot of people when Katrina hit and they were really slow at paying off with the fires out west. My case is finally going to be heard June 2nd after almost 5 years of dickering with them. These ATT will use anything to win a case. They are trying to say that because I was wounded in Vietnam it is left over from that. If anyone has any input please contact me. Thank you Lonney D.

How much is the insurance payment in New York State for a 1997 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo? In General.?

I live in New York State and i plan on buying a 1997 jeep grand Cherokee Laredo for maybe $1000. I've looked on the quotes on auto insurance and none of them helped me. Plus i am 17 years old and the vehicle would have to go under my parents name.

Whats a cheap insurance?

I'm 18 and live near garland just liability

Auto insurance question in Michigan?

i am making monthly payments on a brand new 2008 colbot that i got in dec 2007. I have shopped around for cheaper full coverage auto insurance, that what i already have. I can't seem to find no car insurance cheaper than what i have. My car insurance is more than my car payment. I have talked to a few insurance companies and we went over different things that could make it cheaper. But, they can't beat the price that i already have. My credit isn't the best, but shouldn't a car payment be more than insurance? Anyone have any ideas where and how i could get a cheaper car insurance policy?""

Why did my insurance go up for switching cars?

I have liability insurance in the state of California. The company is multi state. Recently I switched the vehicle I have on the policy from a 2005 pontiac GTO to a 1995 lincoln town car. I am wondering why my monthly actually went up, vs going down. When I spoke with a representative they explained to me that the GTO is a level 21 and the town car is a level 26 . Was this true? I hardly understand how a 1995 4 door sedan is more costly than a 2005 400hp 2 door. I have had no accidents or tickets hit my record, in all, it only went up $15, but I'm still at a loss about why it went up. Thanks.""

I need affordable and reliable health insurance. 23 yrs old.?

hi I am a 23 year old foreign student currently studying in the US in a student visa..I am thinking about getting an affordable health insurance that covers emergencies and any sudden diseases that might occur in future.. also may be a yearly doctor visit etc.. i do not need dental.. i just want to make sure i am covered in case of emergency.. i am just a student and do not have a stable job so i cant afford a lot.. i have heard about medicare and medicaid but they are not for foreign nationals.. i have also heard about blue cross blue shield i was thinking about going with them but what do you guys think?? and what should be the monthly price?? thank you in advance .. no advertisements or spam please!!

Insurance to drive?

I'm a college student and I have student health insurance. I just got my permit and I was wondering which insurance I need to get to drive??

""Where can I find affordable dental insurance, that I can use immediatleywith no waiting period?

Im in the state of VIRGINIA :)

How much would my insurance be for a mustang 1994 & 17 yr old.?

Would i have to get my own insurance or have my parents put my car on there insurance since its gonna be in there name b/c i only have a permit

Do I really need travelers insurance?

We are taking a trip from Oregon to Cancun Mexico soon and am wondering if I should purchase travelers insurance. We are going to purchase airline tickets directly from Delta Airlines and also from our chosen hotel. I'm thinking that if there are any problems, the airline and hotel would take care of it. What are your thoughts?""

Insurance Cost?

I'm 18 and I have a 3.0+ GPA and I'm a male. I'm looking to get a new 2007 Honda Accord two door manual transmission. I live in California in the L.A. area. Does anyone know the price range of my insurance?

""Has anyone heard of this company Affordable Health & Benefits, LLC.?""

I'm looking to get health, dental, and vision insurance. I looked online at a couple sites and found this one. It looks really good but I'm a little worried it might be a scam ...show more""

Insurance quotes for a 2006 Mitsubishi Eclipse ??

i'm 16 and i need to know where i can go online to get a quote, without people calling me. i just want to know how much it's gonna be every 6 months or every month, etc. online .... THANK YOU ALL !!!!""

Whos got the cheapest auto rates on insurance right now?

Whos got the cheapest auto rates on insurance right now?

I'm trying to get rental insurance?

I'm getting rental insurance well trying to but I had a doubt my Heath insurance is in my mothers name and not mine so she pays it so say I get rental insurance under my name would it mess up or even kick me off her insurance plan if I did get the insurance in my name

How much is my car insurance?

Im 17 i want a vw golf mk4 tdi, it will cost me for the car 800-1600, i wanna no how much is the car insurance""

Car insurance that covers young people driving other cars?

I'm looking to buy car insurance as my renewal is due on the 30th of Nov, Does anyone know of any insurance companies that will let you drive other people's cars with the owners permission? I'm 20 at the moment and I'm aware that most insurers will only cover 25+ for this benefit but I want to know if there are any companies that offer this to younger people under 21, also if anyone knows of any companies that cover over 21 year olds this will also be helpful as I'm turning 21 during the course of the policy can anyone help me with this?""

What is the cheapest car insurance company for a first time driver?

I'm trying to find the cheapest insurance for a first time driver (just got my G2 and I'm 18) in Mississauga or the GTA basically. I'm probably not getting a new car so something from like 2003 (maybe a 2002 beetle).

Isn't the expected value of health insurance for a healthy purpose going to be highly negative?

And so, it might be unwise for a healthy person to purchase health insurance on the individual open market? First, we have the insurance companies as a profit-taking industry. They exist to make money. So obviously they take in more premiums than they pay out for medical expenses. Right off the bat, we have a negative expected value for the buyers of health insurance. In other words, you should expect that the premiums you pay to the health insurance company will be more than the benefits you get back, on average. But on top of that, for a HEALTHY person, the difference would be even greater. Since your risk is grouped together with the risk of more unhealthy people (obese, smokers, etc), you're basically subsidizing their insurance. So the difference between your premiums and the expected benefits you get back is even more. It seems like a very fit, health-conscious person is really taking it on the chin by buying health insurance in the individual market. Maybe they'd often be better off by just building up a health savings account and self-insuring?""

What exactly does car insurance cover?

If I left my car out in the rain with the sunroof and stuff open and my car suffered water damage because of it, would I be screwed? Or would the insurance help pay for the damages or just compensate me for a new car?""

How much to lease a car (WITH insurance)?

How much is it to lease an economic car (in Canada please), with insurance calculated into the mix? I am willing to pay 4-500 altogether, is this enough? Practical examples from people who lease their car, with how much they pay, etc, would be most helpful. (I am a recent graduate at the verge of starting an entry-level position). I am looking into VW golf and honda civic (hatchback).""

Car insurance......Anyone else's gone up this year?

I'm still driving the same car and living at the same address, and I also took off 2 other named drivers from my policy to try to minimise the cost but it's still gone up by about 60 pounds......""

I'm 17 - Insurance on a 1985 Corvette? - Please help!?!?!?

Hey all - i have a quick question.. I want to know how much insurance would be if i get a 1985 Corvette - - i am 17 years old - i am a male - i live in New York - i have VERY good grades (i heard you can get discounts if so) And just to get everyone off my back now (lol) -.... I AM going to be paying for the CAR as WELL as the insurance.. i just worked my butt off this year and managed to save up around 10k for a car / insurance - so please dont state how i am just spoiled using my parents money and etc. I am responsible and i DONT need to read about how its a fast car and what not. This has been my favorite car for years now and i want to have it not to race, show off, impress others.. but just to collect it as a goal that i have had and use it as a daily car to get to school and work! I dont need sites where i can get quotes, because i already know all that gibberish (lol) - i just want a close estimate of how much it can be for full insurance on a 1985 corvette if i am 17, male, in NY, with very good grades. Thanks so MUCH in advance!""

Where to get the best price on event insurance?

Ive been throwing events for awhile now and just recently had a close call in damages to the property so i was wondering if anyone knew of something like a Event insurance company that covers Arizona events?

What is my insurance going to cost?

I'm going to get my license when i turn 18 (yes the day I turn 18) and I was just now thinking abt insurance. I've never really thought about it before. So can those who have been through the getting insurance thing help me? Here's some things to add up: 1. First time driver (litterly just got license and vehicle) 2. Did not do a drivers ed at a high school (heard it costs more if u don't take it) 3. Going to drive a big 4x4 diesel truck 4. I'm a male And that's abt it I guess. Idk what insurance company I'll be using. Probably my moms insurance company. But I don't know what it is. Also. The insurance will not be under her name (if she can even do that) because I'll be an 18 year old adult. How much is insurance going to cost every month? Thanks

Is car insurance any cheaper for a pensioner if he do'snt work?

I am 67 and just finished working, when I renew my car insurance in a month's time, should I expect it to make a difference to the premium.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-am-19-own-1978-camaro-michigan-what-would-cheapest-insurance-bruce"

[qxwshelly915-blog]

Staying in Early Roman Times.

Agriculture is actually certainly not a lost art, however have to be actually identified as being one from those that arrived at a higher progression in the distant past and thereafter declined, and also has certainly not however recovered its ancient prestige. Even with several religious masters coming from ancient times, like the Buddha, providing their input to take mankind away from the dirt, humans have mainly continued to be sunk in it. Under these scenarios, arrive the compensatory information coming from around fatality expertises (NDEs) that could improve humankind from the unfavorable state this locates itself in. If you adored this article and you also would like to acquire more info about yellow pages uk search by name, silnyifab2017.pl, i implore you to visit our own web-page. If folks are actually eager to launch themselves off the nearsighted scenery they store located on their social as well as theological conditioning, the messages can easily aid just. 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Having said that in Australia where the early and the early branch from humankind appeared the Aboriginal folks do not possess any knowledge about the never-ceasing doubles, the misconceptions shared through a ton of cultures were originated from the north when the mankind stretched from Africa nearly 75000 years back. Kumalak is actually a primal geomantic approach from ancient fortune telling which was originated in Kazakhstan that stretching over back over thousands of centuries. The Britain Publication, the final publication in The Kolbrin Holy book, mentions that Joseph of Arimathea, excellent uncle to Jesus Christ, took the Egyptian Scrolls with him when he delivered the friends and family of Jesus from Judea to Britain. If you don't have a clue along with effective ways to begin from it, after that attempt checking out the tips listed below. And also lastly, laser printers compiled these significances and published them, leaving them for us in contemporary times. 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If you desire to discover Chinese foreign language, then technique this gently as well as extensively as a bridge to certainly not just communication through this stunning heritage, but find out Mandarin language to enjoy the historic past as well as methods from their world also. What I actually liked regarding this book was its own emphasis on human rights as well as exactly how previous as well as current laws assist or even injure constitutionals rights. Around the exact same time (c. 1800 BC), Egyptian revered writings, including The Book of the Dead, produce this crystal clear that effective passage to the afterlife depended upon a life-time file of humanitarian acts to the suffering. My investigation library for this job has developed to over 60 necessary publications, and this manual earned its method near the top. This recommended that the common method from offering as well as begging meals from the dining table has been taking place given that ancient opportunities. 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[bitcoinegoldrush]

The Satoshi Revolution – Chapter 5: Privacy, Anonymity, and Pseudonymity (Part 1)

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The Satoshi Revolution: A Revolution of Rising Expectations. Section 2 : The Moral Imperative of Privacy Chapter 5: Implementing Crypto Privacy by Wendy McElroy

Privacy, Anonymity, and Pseudonymity (Chapter 5, Part 1)

It is often said that there is a tradeoff between privacy and security…. Security is defined as the state of being free from danger or threat. One threat is assault. How is one made free from assault by being assaulted at an airport?…. How is one made free from the threat of being harassed or charged with a crime by the State by the State’s knowing every move you make, every statement you make, and every financial transaction you make? I say that your security is going DOWN, not up. The State can fend off terrorists by the ordinary methods of policing if it had a mind to. It doesn’t. It prefers to expand into a totalitarian monster. — Mike Rozeff

Privacy will determine the future of cryptocurrencies. Will they continue to enhance individual freedom, or will they become a government tool of social control?

Privacy is a human need, which is why the battle over its control is so intense. Constant surveillance makes it difficult or impossible for individuals to forge intimate family and romantic bonds, to create, to vote their conscience, to sexually explore, to discover who they are politically and religiously, to experiment with drugs, or to dissent without danger. Personal privacy is also the greatest barrier to government power, which rests on government knowledge.

“Only criminals need to fear government surveillance” is a common response to the defense of privacy. But every peaceful person is a criminal with something to hide. Why? They have exceeded the speed limit, taken an illegal drug, smuggled cheap booze or cigarettes across a border, made “unauthorized” additions to a house, fibbed to a customs official, understated their income on a tax form, or violated one of the tens of thousands of other laws that criminalize harmless behavior. Government makes criminals of us all. As Ayn Rand explained, “The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.” Thus, all individuals are under control.

The assault on privacy also harms society as a whole. Consider freedom of speech. I remember being in a restaurant when a relative went on a post-9/11 rant about how the U.S. was beginning to feel like Cuba, from which he escaped. His wife tried to silence him, declaring in an adamant whisper, “You can’t say those things in public.” She was nervous as she glanced around to see who could have heard. Surveillance and informants make people reluctant to express opinions that could be used against them in a legal or political manner. Property can be seized, families destroyed, and prison ensue. Why would anyone speak out if his children could lose a parent as a result?

The killing of free speech is one of many political repercussions of destroying privacy. Privacy is a key characteristic that distinguishes a totalitarian, Kafka-esque society from a free one. Can you shut your front door and be safe from invasion? Everyone agrees that criminals should not break through your locks and treat your body and possessions as their own. Why are government agents entitled to do the same thing? They are nothing more than the for-hire workers of an employer whose authority comes because enough people give the employer a thumbs up to invade and steal. They are criminals sanctioned by consensus.

Until recently, many incursions on privacy have been prevented for no other reason than they were difficult to enforce. And, then, technology arrived. Even with its notorious incompetence, government is now able to surveil as never before, and many people have grown afraid or complacent, as the mass frisking at airports proves.

The government assault on privacy benefits from a Big Lie: namely, privacy is now impossible because government surveillance is omnipotent, omniscient. Resistance is futile. Privacy is so last century. Balderdash. First of all, technology has always empowered the individual more than it has the government. Second, there is a world of difference between “difficult” and “impossible.” Privacy is  certainly more difficult in the 21st century, which only means it takes work. Individuals need to assert actively what they once could take for granted in order to end the ongoing rape of their data.

What Should You Do?

No one answer exists. How to handle personal information is up to the lifestyle and goals of each individual.

Before answering, however, some distinctions are useful: privacy versus anonymity, for example. Privacy is the ability to keep personal data or activities to yourself; you close the door while using the washroom, for example; the activity is not shameful but neither is it for the world to see. Anonymity is when your activities are transparent to the world but the fact that you are the one acting is not. Rick Falkvinge, founder of the first Pirate Party, elaborated, “The typical example would be if you want to blow the whistle on abuse of power or other forms of crime in your organization without risking career and social standing in that group, which is why we typically have strong laws that protect sources of the free press. You could also post such data anonymously online through a VPN, the TOR anonymizing network, or both. This is the analog equivalent of the anonymous tip-off letter, which has been seen as a staple diet in our checks and balances.”

Another distinction: there are two types of data — private and public. If data is private – for example, if it is kept behind closed doors or within a limited circle of personal transmissions–then it can remain private. If data is publicly displayed, however, the practical ability to control it is lost. If I discuss my sex life on a public bus, for example, I have no business denouncing a blabby eavesdropper who passes on my experiences. Unfortunately, a great deal of personal data becomes public through no fault of the person it describes. Government vigorously mines information on everyone from birth, and well-meaning parents register children for everything from medical care to government entitlements.

Happily, cryptocurrency transfers are the data under discussion; they combine the best aspects of private and public data. They are protected by encryption and anonymity or pseudonymity, while remaining transparent. This is a new expression of data that needs to be protected in new ways, both from government and from malicious hackers.

The most effective tactics may well be technological, but this article does not address them. The tactics change constantly and quickly in response to government or hacking threats. And, frankly, although some tactics are simple, like spreading assets over a number of wallets, understanding other tactics requires a technological sophistication that I do not possess.

Instead, the article points to variations on privacy strategies that have been used for decades, if not for centuries. Pick and choose, but it may be best to use them all because the regulatory wolves are circling. Here is a sampling:

Obfuscate or “hide in plain sight.” One way for a person to preserve privacy is to be so inconspicuous or subtle that he is almost unnoticeable. Blend in, or become invisible. Sometimes obfuscation involves participating in so much noise that an eavesdropper cannot distinguish your signal from any other. An example might be sending only modest payments across the blockchain so the transactions join with hundreds of thousands of similar others, all of which are of scant interest because of the small amounts. Other times, obfuscation means masking activity through mixers or tumblers that further anonymize transactions. The anonymization carries a risk, however. It can constitute a red flag to eavesdroppers.

Avoid Centralized Exchanges and Other Data Sharing Centers. If a person wants government to have his financial data, then he should just mail it in an envelope to the government. Of course, signing up with an exchange, like Coinbase, saves a stamp. Centralized exchanges are now an arm of the government. Moreover, they carry their own risks, including bankruptcy or other reasons for withholding funds. Nevertheless, there are good reasons for using exchanges; they permit futures trading and other Wall Street niceties, for example. But decentralized exchanges are preferable; exchanges outside the U.S. or other crypto-hostile nations are preferable, as are ones that do claim jurisdiction over private keys. Even then, wealth should be moved in and out as quickly as possible, without allowing the third party to control it for longer than necessary.

Find Discreet Ways to Cash Out. The crypto veteran Kai Sedgwick wrote,

“Bitcoin transactions are semi-anonymous: every transaction on the blockchain is broadcast publicly and visible for all eternity, but the owner of each wallet is unknown. Tying addresses to real-world identities is now relatively easy for the powers-that-be, because everyone has to cash out somewhere, and that usually involves linking bitcoin addresses to bank accounts.” Don’t. As much as possible, deal with people one-on-one. Seek venues that exchange crypto for gift cards to stores you regularly use, such as grocery stores. Be inventive in avoiding the banks and centralized exchanges; they are the “trusted third parties” that Bitcoin was designed to obsolete.

Use a Privacy Currency. Dozens and dozens of private currencies exist, with several being solid. Although most of them use different techniques to preserve privacy, anonymity is a theme. The founder of Zcash explained the philosophy behind that particular privacy currency. “We believe that privacy strengthens social ties and social institutions, protects societies against their enemies, and helps societies to be more peaceful and more prosperous…. A robust tradition of privacy is a common feature in rich and peaceful societies, and a lack of privacy is often found in struggling and failing societies.”

Zip It on Public Forums. Public forums, like Facebook or Twitter, are monitored and mined by government and corporations. They are collection points for data, even if a person tries to post anonymously. If social media is necessary for professional reasons, then use it to the bare minimum. Never post anything on social media that you wouldn’t put on the front page of the New York Times, and that includes crypto forums.

Be Careful in Writing Down Information. Do not write down your private keys, for example, without having a secure, undisclosed place to store them.

Conclusion

The government is coming for crypto, which means it is coming for users. Its front line attack will be an attempt to eliminate privacy; it realizes privacy is the backbone of cryptocurrency as a freedom tool, even when users do not. Now it the time for heightened vigilance. To paraphrase the comedienne Lily Tomlin, “No matter how paranoid I get, it is never enough to keep up.”

[To be continued next week.]

Reprints of this article should credit bitcoin.com and include a link back to the original links to all previous chapters

Wendy McElroy has agreed to ”live-publish” her new book The Satoshi Revolution exclusively with Bitcoin.com. Every Saturday you’ll find another installment in a series of posts planned to conclude after about 18 months. Altogether they’ll make up her new book ”The Satoshi Revolution”. Read it here first.

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The post The Satoshi Revolution – Chapter 5: Privacy, Anonymity, and Pseudonymity (Part 1) appeared first on Bitcoin E-Gold Rush.

[mycorrectviews]

Report from Israel:  Political Suicide and Genteel Racism

Twilight of the Netanyahu Era?

Corruption has already brought down one Israeli prime minister, and a minor infringement of foreign currency regulations by his wife brought down another.  Netanyahu, now Israel’s longest serving PM, is knee deep in no less than three major corruption scandals, and his wife will soon be charged in a fourth.  The law, apparently, does not oblige him to resign until convicted, though legal opinions are mixed. Ehud Olmert, his corrupt predecessor, threw in the towel when he was indicted (Bibi is not there yet), but his public standing had already crashed as a result of the Second Lebanon War, and a well-orchestrated,  mendacious, right wing campaign to paint it as a military failure of epic proportions. Bibi’s Teflon, opinion polls show, has barely been scratched – yet. Things could change if one of his coalition partners – fearing the ubiquitous stench of misconduct -- forces his hand, as Ehud Barak did to Olmert.  Meanwhile Likud ministers are closing ranks – at least publicly.  The time may come when they, too, decide it is time to give someone else a chance.  Problem is, the alternative could be worse.  Defense Minister Lieberman, for instance, (I still cannot grasp why such a Putinesque xenophobe got that job) has his eyes on the top spot.  (He’d have to merge his party with the Likud – not an impossible scenario).  Forty-one years ago, Yitzhak Rabin left the prime minister’s office, taking responsibility for a US bank account his wife had maintained from the time he served as ambassador in Washington, in violation of foreign currency regulations that were later rescinded.  Rabin, to be sure, was a man of integrity.  Bibi doesn’t know the meaning of the word. 

Labor Commits Suicide

Last month the Labor Party elected a wealthy businessman to replace the hapless Isaac Hertzog. Avi Gabbay came out of nowhere, joining the party just a few months before the primaries.  His CV includes a six-year stint as CEO of a telecommunications firm, after which he helped form a new party with Finance Minister Kachlon, serving briefly as environment minister under Netanyahu.  Gabbay seems like a decent guy (he’s the first Labor leader I’ve never met since coming to Israel 30 years ago).  He’s an articulate self-starter, intelligent, and went through the school of hard knocks, having grown up in a poor, Jerusalem family.  Gabby, however, is not a candidate for prime minister, no matter what he or his party says.  He’s the candidate of an opposition party competing with other opposition parties to be the largest opposition party.  Gabbay has not served a day on the Knesset Security and Foreign Affairs Committee, a mandatory rite of passage for any pol aspiring to national leadership. He’s never served in the security cabinet, never run a major, government institution of any kind.  Every idiot junior government minister from the Likud has more security credentials than him.  Gabbaywon the Labor primaries running on the “I’m new, try me” ticket.  When the novelty wears off, allot of people will be banging their heads against the wall, saying, “What was I thinking?”  New elections, after all, may not be far off. 

 Genteel Racism and the Tragedy of Israeli Socialism

I met Amir Peretz in 1988.  At the time he was the up and coming mayor of Sderot, his Stalinesque mustache reminiscent of Israel’s t Zionist pioneers, a firebrand socialist with a grasp of working class sensibilities.  I asked him to speak to the Labor Young Guard in Bat Yam in the middle of a municipal election campaign.  He didn’t hesitate and came up to help, only to find me and four other guys in the room (OK, I was new in the country and didn’t know how to market it). Years later, after the Lebanon war and subsequent rounds of fighting in Gaza, I accompanied him on visits to bereaved families who had lost their sons in battle.  As a former defense minister, Peretz makes it is business to visit every such home.  No press, no bells and whistles, just a condolence call and a chance for the family to shed a tear as they share the details of what happened with someone who knows every battalion, every IDF deployment.  His energy and commitment are boundless. 

Amir shatters the great divide in Israeli politics, the divide between Mizrachim, descendants of Jews from North Africa and the Middle East, and Ashkenazim, whose parents or grandparents came from Europe.  A stubborn socio-economic divide separates the groups by every empirical measure, from education and family income to life expectancy.  Nine times out of ten, a company will choose a CV with the name Abromowitz over Abuoutbul.  During the mass immigration of the 1950’s and 60’s, Mizrachim were settled in remote locations in the country’s geographic periphery, establishing a demographic presence that secured the country’s borders.  These development towns, as they are known, were plagued by drugs, unemployment and a sense of grievance against the Labor establishment, not least of all the kibbutzim – usually the closest symbol of Ashkenazic privilege they knew.  Borrowing terminology from the US, a seminal Mizrachi protest movement that emerged in an inner city Jerusalem neighborhood called itself the Black Panthers.  By 1977, Israel’s North African immigration came into its own, helping sweep Menahem Begin and the Likud to power.  And just as the right embraced the Mizrachim, the Israeli left embraced the Palestinians, so that the ethnic identification between Ashkenazim and Labor extended to the idea of peace itself.  It is this politics of identity that has defined Israeli politics to this day. 

 In 1983, when the Likud was taking control of development towns, one after another, Peretz won the election in Sderot on the Labor ticket.  Born in Morocco, Peretz was severely wounded in in the army and, after extensive rehab, worked as a farmer before entering politics.  He quickly branded himself as a leader of the Labor’s left wing, championing a Palestinian state long before party stalwarts would even consider the idea.  His career took him from municipal leadership to head the Histadrut labor federation and, ultimately, to the position of defense minister and deputy prime minister. His political achievements include a higher minimum wage, mandatory pension and the Iron Dome anti-missile system that has literally changed the strategic balance of power between Israel and the terrorist organizations that surround it. 

 In 2006, as the head of the Labor Party, Peretz faced a catastrophic party split, with Shimon Peres and other top leaders bolting to Arik Sharon’s new Kadima party, and a brief lived pensioner’s party siphoning off support from that traditionally Labor voting demographic.  Labor, however, won the development towns and, together with Kadima, was able to form a peace coalition.  Amir chose the defense portfolio and, in an historic first, brought about the appointment of a Moslem Arab as a government minister. That government was brought low by Hezbollah missiles and Olmert’s corruption.  The war itself granted Israel over a decade of quiet on the northern border, but the public imagination remembers it as a colossal failure.  Rumblings against Peretz began on the center left.  Why did he chose the Defense Ministry to begin with?  One Labor voter told me “the problem with Peretz is he doesn’t know when a job is beyond his competence.”  What, indeed, did that guy from you know where think he was doing in a job held by the likes of Ashkenazi giants such as Ben Gurion, Moshe Dayan, Arik Sharon and Ehud Barak?  During one visit to the front, a journalist got a photo op of Peretz looking at the horizon through binoculars.  Peretz obliged, but didn’t bother to take the lens covers off.  The unfortunate photo of Peretz looking through the covered binoculars reappeared mercilessly in the paper, electronic and social media.  As if to say, “what do you expect from a….”  That’s when I figured it out. 

 Peretz took some time off from public affairs to recallibrate, teaching for while in boarding school for underprivileged youth before planning his comeback.  In 2011 he ran again for party leadership, contending against the briefly serving Shelly Yehimovitch.  The voting breakdown showed a classic black-white fault line.  76% of Tel Aviv primary voters chose Shelly.  80% of voters in southern development towns went for Amir.  And the kibbutzim?  85% for Shelly.   The Labor Party won’t release a breakdown of the 2017 primaries, but my guess is the figures would be similar.

 I tried to figure out where the antagonism to Peretz comes from in discussions with people from my in-laws’ kibbutz, located adjacent to Sderot.  Folks here grew up with Peretz, and many to this day work with his articulate and charismatic wife, Ahlama.  And it was Peretz who, against opposition from the experts, insisted on developing the Iron Dome missile defense system that has transformed the kibbutz from a target for Gazan rocketeers to a flourishing community.  The response I got from one acquaintance was that “Amir seems too ethnic,” an answer as unfair as it is bizarre.  Unfair because never in his entire career has Peretz played the ethnic card or trumpeted his North African background.  Like Bayard Rustin’s famous essay, Amir thinks Israeli politics must move from race to class.  Bizarre because Avi Gabby, too, is the son of Moroccan immigrants (the latter point is a cause for some celebration.  For the first time in history, both front-runners in a Labor Party primary were Mizrachim).  The explanation, however, is apparent when you see the two in action.  Peretz wears an open shirt collar.  Gabbaysports an expensive suit and tie, befitting a telecommunications boss.  Peretz speaks with pathos, raising his voice for dramatic effect, betraying emotion (you know, that’s how those people speak. . .).  Gabbayspeaks quickly like a hi-tech executive.  Peretz’ walks with an uneven gait that betrays his military wounds. When Gabbaywalks through the door, he seems like your rich cousin. 

 Avi Gabbaymay indeed increase Labor’s share of the vote in the next election, but it will be at the expense of another, centrist opposition party, resulting in no net gain for the center left.  Peretz might have lost Tel Aviv voters to Yair Lapid's centrist list, for instance, but he would have attracted new voters from development towns, potentially bringing about a paradigm shift like he did in 2006, paving the way for a center left coalition.  No politician in Israel, aside from Bibi, is more qualified to serve as Prime Minister than Amir Peretz.  He’s been a mayor and a Histadrut boss, a defense minister and deputy prime minister (and environment minister along the way).  He’s a guy who has both fought in wars and led wars, a true working class leader and an authentic representative of the pioneering, Labor Zionist tradition.  Instead, Labor voters chose someone “new.”  And less “ethnic.” I’m beating my head against the wall already.

 Get Back to Where You Once Belonged

 Several Years ago I managed the organization behind several of Israel’s bilingual schools, Hand in Hand. After a few years running my own business, I’ve now taken on the management of Hagar, an organization that runs the bilingual Arab Jewish school and community of families in Beer Sheba.  A fascinating organization bringing together not only Jews from different backgrounds but a diverse group of Arabs from the urbanized north as well as Bedouins from the south. It’s a place where children live and learn together, celebrate the holidays of Islam, Christianity and Judaism, learn about the tragedy of the Palestinian Naqba along with the Jewish national story of holocaust and rebirth.  And, like so many social change organizations, it’s in desperate need of funds. Unlike the liberal Tel Aviv bubble, Beer Sheba is a more right wing town.  “Like Sinatra sings it,”If we can make it here we’ll make it anywhere.”  It will be tough, but I’m ready for the challenge.  The way I see it, I can’t solve the Israeli Palestinian conflict, but I can help promote shared citizenship within Israel.  Wish me luck, comrades.

[brianlichtig]

6 tips to help tech freelancers build a client base

In its third annual Freelancing in America survey (conducted in partnership with the Freelancers Union), Upwork polled 6,002 working U.S. adults, over 2,500 of whom identified themselves as freelancers. The 2016 survey revealed that the number of freelancers in the U.S. has increased by two million since 2014, jumping to 55 million workers, or 35 percent of the workforce. And it's no wonder, when you consider the benefits freelancing offers such as the opportunity to make your own hours and be your own boss.

Luckily, finding freelance work is easier than ever -- 77 percent of freelancers in the survey noted that technology has made freelancing easier and more profitable, and 66 percent said the amount of business they found online increased in 2016. But building a reliable base of freelance clients who keep coming back for more work takes time and effort.

Maintain a professional presence online and off

Travis Flastad has worked as a freelancer for more than 10 years, building simulators and training aids for the Department of Defense. He finds that, as a freelancer, it's important to have business cards, a website and social media networks set up to identify yourself as a professional. It not only helps you land more business, but maintaining a professional image can even help you secure "a competitive rate," he says.

He even suggests having "someone you trust who doesn't fully understand what you do" look over your business materials to see if it helps them get a better idea of what you offer. That way, you can have an unbiased look at how you get your message across, and anything they don't understand, you know you'll need to clarify.

"I've been building my services for 10 years, but the best feedback I sometimes get is when a trusted colleague tells me they don't exactly comprehend a new service," says Falstad.

[ Related story: 8 tools to run your freelance business in the gig economy ]

Network and build relationships

Just as you need to view yourself like a business, you also need to network and build relationships like a business owner. As a freelancer, you have a lot of competition, but if you work on building solid relationships with your clients, they'll be more likely to keep coming back to you.

Your focus should be on turning "a one-off assignment into a repeat one," says Monica Mizzi, editor of FreelanceWriting.com. Don't expect clients to automatically come back to you for more work -- you might have to be the one to follow up. While she admits it's cliché advice, Mizzi says freelancers need to be "confident, assertive and compelling in order to convince a client to work with you again."

Just as you would with any other job, make it clear why you think you're the best fit to work on future assignments. Make sure you sell yourself to the client by emphasizing your unique set of skills and how excited you are at the potential to work on future projects. "If they say no, you really haven't lost anything. But if they say yes, you could land yourself a job for the long haul," says Mizzi.

Connect with other freelancers

When building your network as a freelancer, don't focus on only potential clients. You should also build connections with other freelancers in your industry. It's not only a great way to get keyed in to new freelancing gigs, but if you can't finish a project for a client, it looks more professional if you can pass the opportunity off to another trusted freelancer. In fact, Mizzi says that in her experience, some of the best freelancing gigs she's landed have come from other freelancers in her network.

"I have had several freelancing jobs passed on to me from other freelancers who weren't able to complete the assignment at the time. It looks more professional when you're unable to complete an assignment to find a trusted replacement, rather than to reject an offer for work outright," she says.

[ Related story: 8 websites that help you build your freelance career ]

Specialize on specific skills

With a growing demand for specialized technical skills, more businesses are turning to freelancers to fill those needs on new projects and initiatives. If there's a certain skills gap in the industry, you can jump in and fill that role for businesses who can't find that skill internally or in potential candidates.

"As more business moves online, local talent pools can't keep up, resulting in jobs taking multiple months to fill. At the same time, there are many skilled freelancers living outside of these cities also looking for work," says Rich Pearson, senior vice president of Marketing and Categories at Upwork.

Focusing on specific skills can also help you find communities or industries where your skills are needed the most. Instead of targeting across the board, if you use this focused approach, Falstad says it becomes easier to land new clients and build a reputation.

"I worked in the music industry for years and relate it to how a band typically finds success. Every person you meet who is active in the space and understands your offering is like a fan. It is worth the time to cultivate those relationships and be sure they understand you and know what you offer. Then, when they hear of a need, you will be at the top of their list and they will be happy to make the referral," he says.

Over communicate

As a freelancer, you won't have the advantage of being in-office or having an established relationship with your new clients. That means you should over communicate to save everyone's time; you don't want to find yourself spending hours revising your hard work because you didn't understand their corporate culture.

"Clarify everything by asking questions. It is always better to ask 10 questions and get the job done right, than spend 100 hours working on something that isn't what was asked for," says Pearson.

Consider a test project before you sign on for a long-term project, says Pearson. It's a great way to make sure you and the potential client are a good fit, before too much time or money is invested.

Interview your clients

When you ditched the corporate treadmill, you might have thought your days of interviewing were over. Unfortunately, even as a freelancer, you still have to go through interviews, but the process is a little different. You'll be interviewing the client just as much as they'll be interviewing you. Because you want every client to fit in with your growing portfolio of work, so it's important to weed out projects that aren't a good fit early on.

"Make sure you understand what they're looking for. If you get a feeling that it's not going to be the right match, don't take the project. A work relationship needs to be a fit from both sides so including an initial interview process that helps both parties make an informed decision is critical," says Pearson.

Interviewing new clients can also give you more insight into what type of project they will need, and how you should bill them for your time. Falstad says you might find that with some clients, an hourly approach is best, while for others, you might want to charge a flat fixed rate. In some cases, if you can sense a client will be high-maintenance, you might want to up your fee from the get go. Whereas with clients who are easy to work with and offer flexibility, you might want to charge them a lower rate.

"I always remind people to be up front with pricing and make it clear when payment is expected to begin. It is worth the time to acquire sample agreements so you're ready to fire off a work-for-hire agreement when the time comes and not have to scramble," he says.

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from CIO http://www.cio.com/article/3154043/relationship-building-networking/6-tips-to-help-tech-freelancers-build-a-client-base.html#tk.rss_all Baltimore IT Support