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nasa · 10 months ago

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LaRue Burbank, mathematician and computer, is just one of the many women who were instrumental to NASA missions.

4 Little Known Women Who Made Huge Contributions to NASA

Women have always played a significant role at NASA and its predecessor NACA, although for much of the agency’s history, they received neither the praise nor recognition that their contributions deserved. To celebrate Women’s History Month – and properly highlight some of the little-known women-led accomplishments of NASA’s early history – our archivists gathered the stories of four women whose work was critical to NASA’s success and paved the way for future generations.

LaRue Burbank: One of the Women Who Helped Land a Man on the Moon

LaRue Burbank was a trailblazing mathematician at NASA. Hired in 1954 at Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory (now NASA’s Langley Research Center), she, like many other young women at NACA, the predecessor to NASA, had a bachelor's degree in mathematics. But unlike most, she also had a physics degree. For the next four years, she worked as a "human computer," conducting complex data analyses for engineers using calculators, slide rules, and other instruments. After NASA's founding, she continued this vital work for Project Mercury.

In 1962, she transferred to the newly established Manned Spacecraft Center (now NASA’s Johnson Space Center) in Houston, becoming one of the few female professionals and managers there.  Her expertise in electronics engineering led her to develop critical display systems used by flight controllers in Mission Control to monitor spacecraft during missions. Her work on the Apollo missions was vital to achieving President Kennedy's goal of landing a man on the Moon.

Eilene Galloway: How NASA became… NASA

Eilene Galloway wasn't a NASA employee, but she played a huge role in its very creation. In 1957, after the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, Senator Richard Russell Jr. called on Galloway, an expert on the Atomic Energy Act, to write a report on the U.S. response to the space race. Initially, legislators aimed to essentially re-write the Atomic Energy Act to handle the U.S. space goals. However, Galloway argued that the existing military framework wouldn't suffice – a new agency was needed to oversee both military and civilian aspects of space exploration. This included not just defense, but also meteorology, communications, and international cooperation.

Her work on the National Aeronautics and Space Act ensured NASA had the power to accomplish all these goals, without limitations from the Department of Defense or restrictions on international agreements. Galloway is even to thank for the name "National Aeronautics and Space Administration", as initially NASA was to be called “National Aeronautics and Space Agency” which was deemed to not carry enough weight and status for the wide-ranging role that NASA was to fill.

Barbara Scott: The “Star Trek Nerd” Who Led Our Understanding of the Stars

A self-described "Star Trek nerd," Barbara Scott's passion for space wasn't steered toward engineering by her guidance counselor. But that didn't stop her! Fueled by her love of math and computer science, she landed at Goddard Spaceflight Center in 1977. One of the first women working on flight software, Barbara's coding skills became instrumental on missions like the International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE) and the Thermal Canister Experiment on the Space Shuttle's STS-3. For the final decade of her impressive career, Scott managed the flight software for the iconic Hubble Space Telescope, a testament to her dedication to space exploration.

Dr. Claire Parkinson: An Early Pioneer in Climate Science Whose Work is Still Saving Lives

Dr. Claire Parkinson's love of math blossomed into a passion for climate science. Inspired by the Moon landing, and the fight for civil rights, she pursued a graduate degree in climatology. In 1978, her talents landed her at Goddard, where she continued her research on sea ice modeling. But Parkinson's impact goes beyond theory. She began analyzing satellite data, leading to a groundbreaking discovery: a decline in Arctic sea ice coverage between 1973 and 1987. This critical finding caught the attention of Senator Al Gore, highlighting the urgency of climate change.

Parkinson's leadership extended beyond research. As Project Scientist for the Aqua satellite, she championed making its data freely available. This real-time information has benefitted countless projects, from wildfire management to weather forecasting, even aiding in monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic. Parkinson's dedication to understanding sea ice patterns and the impact of climate change continues to be a valuable resource for our planet.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

#NASA #space #tech #technology #womens history month #women in STEM #math #climate science #computer science

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gayfromusa · 5 months ago

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Climbing Partners

[ Art from ksk199999 on DeviantArt, story by me ]

Brandon and Jordan (both 21) had been climbing buddies for about three years. Jordan always wanted a higher, tougher climb, and Brandon was always went along. Brandon loved the time he spent with his buddy, but wasn’t always enthusiastic about traveling so frequently to the mountains each summer. While he enjoyed the challenge, sometimes he just wanted to relax in the sun for a week instead of busting his ass climbing as a vacation.

On one sunny summer day at Brandon’s apartment pool during their breaks from college, Jordan asked Brandon about going for another climb.

“Hey man, how do you feel about going for a climb this weekend?”

“That sounds like a great time, but why don’t we just chill by the pool this weekend? I’d love to just hang with you. We can totally go on a climb next weekend though.” Brandon responded.

While his request was very reasonable, Jordan still couldn’t let go of the idea of reaching a new death-defying height and seeing the incredible views. Jordan made his point known to Brandon, “Dude, there’s always more time to relax, we won’t always be able to climb. C’mon, let’s do it dude.”

Just before Brandon could say something, he got a spam on his phone reading, “Buy now! The brand new Size Gun uses atomic energy technology to transform the size of those around you, to any height within the range! Only $50! Get it before the price goes up!” He showed Jordan before he tried to delete it.

“Dude, look at this bullshit!” Brandon laughed.

Jordan smiled, “Imagine if that was real dude, we could both have the weekend we want.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you could relax all day by the pool, and I could be shrunk to make you the size of a mountain. Honestly the view of your apartment complex would be spectacular from a new perspective.”

Brandon started thinking. It was Tuesday, he just got a bonus from last week’s paycheck, and Jordan was absolutely right. He honestly was excited at even the possibility of a real man being the size of a toy in his hand. “You know, what if this thing is legit? There has to be some sort of legal thing preventing them from selling this, so why not try and get my hands on it before they get caught? And honestly it’s so cheap for what it’s offering.”

“There’s no way though, right?”

“I don’t know man, but even if there’s a small chance, I’d bet something for it. Let’s see if this is real.” Right then, Brandon clicked the link and ordered the product. He put priority shipping on it. “It’ll be here Friday. If this thing doesn’t work, then we‘ll spend Saturday climbing and Sunday relaxing, deal?”

“Dude, I’m so in. This could be sick.”

——————

Friday came and a package arrived. Brandon spent the night figuring it out and texted for Jordan to come over the next morning for a surprise.

On Saturday, Jordan knocked on the door of the apartment, and Brandon opened. “Is it real dude?!” Jordan asked with excitement.

“Well come inside and see!”

Jordan walked in and closed the door. Brandon led him to the living room where on the table sat a sci-fi-looking gun of sorts. “How does it even work??”

“Well I tried reading the instructions to find out, but they were in Chinese. Found a YouTube video where they basically said they can’t release how it works due to it being such a new technology. Anyways, it only works on biological matter. It’s not able to make anyone taller than their normal height, unless someone else is shrunk, then the height can be transferred to whoever. The limit on shrinking is currently an inch tall. It’s also supposed to make the person a bit more durable than you expect since it makes them more dense, but the guy said to still be extremely careful if ever handling a shrunken person.”

“One inch seems a bit tiny for climbing you, maybe we could do two inches instead?”

“Yeah sure, but don’t be shocked if you get there later.”

Jordan laughed off that last comment, “Dude I am so excited. I’ve kept on thinking about everything ever since earlier this week. Can we test it out?”

“Yeah man! It connects to my phone, then I have to make a profile for you. I made one for myself already. I’ll input your height and scan you with the gun. I hope you’re chill with it man, you have to be naked for the scan.”

Jordan nodded his head.

“Alright go ahead and strip.”

Jordan blushed slightly while he awkwardly got naked. He heard Brandon say it only shrank biological matter, so he’d be naked when he shrinks anyways. He really did want a climbing challenge, and only brought up this idea as a joke. Now that he is about to actually be able to do this, he started thinking about Brandon’s body. Brandon stood at a good 6’0”, and Jordan at a below average 5’8”. Brandon had impressive muscles, and occasionally Jordan wished he could feel them, but always wanted to respect Brandon and never asked.

But now Jordan was going to feel Brandon’s muscles up close, for maybe even a few hours. Even more pressed in his mind was Brandon’s specific features he might get to climb on. His feet, his pecs, his biceps, and maybe even other parts of his body. Thinking about all this gave Jordan a boner that he didn’t even notice, and he was already in just his underwear.

“You excited for today lil’ buddy?” Brandon smirked.

“I-“ Jordan blushed a bright red.

“Hey dude it’s alright, to be perfectly honest, I haven’t gotten the thought of you as a living toy out of my head”

“Oh, uh.. then let’s do this.” Jordan nervously took off his underwear.

Jordan, fully nude, stood before Brandon. Brandon pointed the gun and a fast burst of light emitted from it. Brandon set it down, while Jordan clothed himself.

“Why are you getting dressed? Your clothes won’t shrink.” Asked Brandon

“I wanna feel them get bigger on me.” Jordan said.

Brandon chuckled a bit, “Fair enough I guess.”

Brandon looked at the app on his phone. Jordan filled his profile for the app. He input his height, weight, sex, his feet size, then left blank the desired height spot for Brandon to fill out.

“I wanna start by just making you just slightly shorter, just to see if it works, how does 5’0” sound to you?”

“I mean 8 inches seems like a lot, but yeah let’s do it!”

Brandon once again pointed the gun, he pressed the trigger and the light flashed. No sounds or anything.

“Did it work?” Asked Jordan.

“I think so.. it’s not supposed to be instant, but shouldn’t take too- oh there ya go.” Brandon noticed Jordan’s eyes shrink down a bit.

Jordan felt a sensation through his body. His previously snug shirt and shorts now a bit loose. “Holy fuck dude it worked!!” Jordan reacted.

“Damn dude, my shorty got even smaller.” Brandon jokingly smiled.

“Dude I wasn’t short before. 5’8” isn’t short.”

“Maybe, but an angry 5’0” sure is cute.” Brandon began to laugh a little bit started messing with his friend’s hair.

Jordan’s face got a bit red again, then he pushed Brandon’s hand off his head.

Brandon didn’t say anything, just smirked and started inputting stuff into the app again.

“Hey! What are you doing now?”

Brandon pointed the gun and fired the silent blast again. “Made you small enough so you can’t fight back.” Brandon smiled.

Before Jordan could do something, he felt the sensation and this time got a bit dizzy. He fell back a bit, then his shorts fell down his legs and he tripped on them “What the- how big am I now?” Sitting with his butt on the ground, Jordan looked up and saw a staggering figure. His friend seemed more than twice the size of a normal human. He began to cower a bit as Brandon’s hands reached down.

Brandon laughed at Jordan’s choice of words as he crouched down and helped the little guy up. “You’re 2 feet small now.” Brandon laughed once Jordan was on his feet, seeing the huge oversized shirt on his friend was hilarious. He snapped a picture then removed the shirt from Jordan. “There you are again! All your glory. Still excited I see.” Brandon poked Jordan’s dick, Jordan tried to fight Brandon’s hand again but ended up pushing himself back more than doing anything to stop Brandon.

“I- I’m so sorry Brandon,” Jordan tried his best to cover the hard-on, “This is all so new to me, and seeing you so huge is kinda turning me on. We can stop if you want to, I don’t wanna do anything you’re not okay with.”

“Well I saw your hard dick earlier too bud, I kinda figured this was turning you on. Now that you’re tiny I can say that this is also really hot to me. I’m not gonna stop, no matter what you’re going down to two inches.” Brandon said with a hint of seriousness that hadn’t been there before.

Jordan was shocked. Brandon was speaking with such authority over him. He felt like a child, any sense of control was lost in that tone. A fear set in, he was at the mercy of this man. There was nothing he could do to stop his friend if he wanted to. Thankfully he didn’t want to.

Brandon shot the gun at Jordan one final time, then Jordan passed out.

——————

After what seemed like hours, Jordan woke up. He was outside, laying on a cloth surface of some sort. It was hot outside, around 80 degrees Fahrenheit, so still pretty bearable.

Jordan sat up and looked around. He was on a humungous beach towel that was flat on the ground. He looked up and saw Brandon laying back on a pool chair in just his swimsuit. He was sound asleep with his hands behind his head, feet on the ground touching the opposite end of the towel.

Jordan grew excited, it was time to climb his friend. The moment he’d been waiting for. He began to run to Brandon’s right foot, realizing the distance, he slowed to a better pace.

Jordan had never in his life imagined a foot this massive. Size 13 was big, but it had never seemed this big. Still, once Jordan reached the foot he realized he could at least climb onto the foot with relative ease. The smell was prominent, but Jordan didn’t think it smelled bad by any means.

He paused though, and decided to explore the foot a bit before venturing upwards. Starting with the pinky toe, Jordan compared his own body to it, roughy half his size. He was amazed at the size. Moving to each bigger toe, Jordan found the sizes so hot. Reaching the big toe, he laid down next to it for a moment. It was bigger than he was. He stood up and bent over onto the toe and spread his arms, feeling the massive toenail. He then went to the side of the foot, and positioned himself under Brandon’s arch, nuzzling into the soft skin a bit, and noticed that Brandon was a bit sweaty already, just from laying in the heat. Jordan didn’t want to leave, but he decided to keep going before the sweat got too much worse.

Jordan got up and walked back to the pinky toe to climb onto the foot, and crawled his way towards the leg hair. The hairs didn’t contain a lot of traction, so Jordan had to sort of wrap one around his hand and pull himself up little by little. Getting past the knee, Brandon’s thigh was much easier due to the less harsh angle. It was still tough, but not as difficult.

He then reached the next challenge of his journey, Brandon’s swim shorts. They were made of a waterproof material without a lot of traction for the tiny man to grab onto, so Jordan decided to crawl under the shorts. What was one more detour? The man was seemingly sound asleep, and seemed pretty comfortable with Jordan’s hard-on earlier, so why not stop by and see Brandon’s beast for a moment?

Jordan slipped under the shorts and made his way towards it in the darkness. Before that, there was a sort of net/mesh barrier he needed to get through. Managing to push it up and squeeze underneath, he was safe from falling because of the barrier. The overwhelming musky scent of Brandon’s cock began to hit, it put Jordan into a horny state of mind. Climbing over just a bit more, he bumped into the semi-hard anaconda. Pausing for a moment to reflect on what he was doing, he continued. Jordan began to nuzzle up against it, and attempted to reach his arms around, but was far too small to reach around the girth. Still he tried to squeeze. It began to grow a bit harder from the sensation he was giving it, that’s when Jordan backed off and decided to keep going.

Climbing upwards a bit more another issue arose, the elastic band around the swim shorts were skin tight to Brandon’s waste. He went in arms and head first and tried to army crawl under the obstacle. It took a few minutes but eventually he crawled up the other side, revealing a glorious landscape Jordan rarely got to see; Brandon’s beautifully toned and tanned abs.

He paused to catch his breath, and at the same time turned around. Jordan saw the whole apartment complex’s pool space. Given it was a nice weekend day in the middle of summer, there was actually quite a few people. Some families, a lifeguard, and even some pretty big guys, all enjoying the pool and the sun. Thankfully Brandon picked a spot away from most people which wasn’t by the edge of the pool. He was the only person in this corner. Seeing all the ginormous people going about their day, not realizing a tiny person was climbing the man tanning in the corner, was intriguing.

Jordan wondered to himself if Brandon was going to grow him back after this. The way Brandon seemed so eager to have power over him made him wonder if he should climb down now and try and find someone who would certainly help him get back. Then Jordan realized, these people might not see him, they could crush him and just think he was a bug. But even if he found someone who wanted to help, Jordan couldn’t grow back without the mass stored in Brandon’s machine, and without Brandon’s app. Brandon had all the power, even if Jordan was in someone else’s hands.

He turned back to the giant he was climbing and accepted his fate, feeling someone content. Brandon would certainly grow him back, he beat himself up mentally for considering that Brandon didn’t have his best interest in mind. After all, Jordan asked for this. Besides, Brandon’s abs were hot. Jordan climbed up a bit onto his friend’s belly and laid there for a moment. Spreading himself and feeling the muscles. He then got up and kept going.

Knowing his end goal was the top of Brandon’s head, Jordan realized he could never climb straight up Brandon’s neck, he’d have to climb onto his biceps and forearm to reach Brandon’s head. But now Jordan felt he needed to hurry, if Brandon woke up, Jordan would certainly fall flat onto the concrete below.

But Jordan couldn’t help himself when he reached Brandon’s pecs, again he laid down for a moment then spread himself out between them. His mind going back and forth, Jordan got up and kept going. Finally being able to stand when reaching the collar bone, Jordan moved pretty quickly towards the bicep. He laid against the muscle for a moment, feeling it with his arms spread yet again, and then his footing slipped.

Jordan fell what felt like almost ten feet, but was actually just down to Brandon’s rank armpits. Definitely no deodorant used today, not that Jordan was complaining. He had caught himself using the armpit hairs. And used the same strategy from before, and began to wrap his hands around the hairs to secure himself and climb up. He made his way up and this time didn’t fondle with Brandon’s ginormous arms this time, and instead kept climbing.

Using the last bit of his strength, Jordan finally reached the end. And laid on top of Brandon’s head in relief. Immediately, Brandon’s massive hand made a move to scoop Jordan. The hand enclosed around him and Jordan could barely move. He struggled for a bit but gave up upon realizing Brandon was up and walking, likely back to the apartment.

——————

Brandon opened his hand and placed Jordan on the desk in his room. Jordan collected his composure to the best of his ability and stood up and watched Brandon.

Brandon walked around the room a bit, picked up an old pair of socks off the floor and placed them in the laundry. He then took off his swimsuit, this time turned around revealing his muscles butt to Jordan. He threw the swimsuit into the laundry then turned and went to stand at the end of the desk. Jordan while on the desk was eye level with the head of Brandon’s dangling cock. His dick now appeared much more massive when it was freed from its mesh cage.

Jordan stared at the dick in front of his face for a moment, then began to lean his head back to look up at Brandon. Brandon was looking down at him with a pondering look in his eyes.

“Just so you know, I was awake the whole time.” Brandon stated.

“So you almost let me fall off your bicep??” Jordan seemed shocked. Why wouldn’t Brandon save his friend?

Brandon replied, “You caught yourself, I almost flinched, but I’ve seen your reflexes before and knew you could handle it. But regardless, do you remember the other parts of the journey?”

“The uh- oh, um..”

“It seems you rather enjoyed my feet, my abs, my pecs, my biceps, and not to mention my eight inch cock. I’m glad you took a fascination to me.”

“Wait, why are we in your room? Are you going to grow me back?”

“Not today. We said the weekend, remember? I want to play with you since you got to play with me.”

“Brandon, I-“ Jordan was shocked. He was reminded of his powerlessness from Brandon’s tone of voice. He had never seen this side of Brandon before today, and felt completely helpless to do anything besides comply. His dick got hard again.

“Jordan you are enjoying this more than I am, let me have some fun, okay?” Brandon left the room for a moment and returned with the gun, “To be honest, I wish I could make you smaller than an inch, but it’ll have to do.” The light flashed and Jordan felt himself dwindle down even tinier.

Brandon picked up Jordan with a hand that now felt twice the size. Brandon sat down on the carpet of the room and opened his hand and smiled.

“You are so cute, I’m so glad we did this.” Brandon said with a bit of a smile.

Jordan felt uneasy and turned on at the same time. He didn’t want to be like this tiny all weekend, but that thought started to fade when Brandon set him down. He tried to figure out where for a moment, but then realized he was laying between Brandon’s feet that were placed together. Brandon winked at Jordan then closed his feet softly.

Jordan could opened his mouth a bit and could taste the sweat from the gargantuan feet. Brandon slowly rubbed his feet back and forth a little bit, which caused such a pleasurable sensation for Jordan that he began to moan. Brandon heard the moans and stopped, picking out Jordan from his feet and bringing him over to his armpit.

“You know, I probably could have saved you now that I think about it, my armpit is pretty soft and could have protected you pretty well. Hope you enjoy bud.” Brandon said with a smirk.

Jordan was placed in Brandon’s pit once again, this time when Jordan grabbed the hair from the pit, Brandon closed his arm shut. The smell was ten times more potent, and the feeling of being enclosed under such a monstrous bicep was magnificent. The heat, sweat, and pressure only added to the experience. He had never felt more comfort, safety, vulnerability, and helplessness all at once. It was wonderful.

Jordan expected this to only last a minute or so, but instead it went on for ten or fifteen as Brandon walked around with Jordan before he could finally breathe normally again. He was plucked out of the pit, now smelling like it from the sweat, and held in front of Brandon again.

“I hope you enjoyed, I think I felt you ejaculate almost as soon as I closed my arm, but you’re still hard. Guess you wanna keep going.”

Brandon then brought his hand with Jordan in it down to the his dick. Without hesitation, Brandon grabbed his cock with the hand he was holding Jordan in, and began to masturbate. The cock was fully erect already, and Brandon slowly moved his hand up and down with Jordan being used as a sex toy.

Brandon then stopped for a moment to set Jordan down onto the desk once more, before continuing to masturbate at an increased speed and harder grip. Jordan sat watching the event transpire, only realizing a second before the climax what was about to happen as Brandon came all over Jordan’s helpless body, knocking him down. Brandon moaned as he released the cum.

He grabbed Jordan and brought him up to his mouth where he licked off the cum from Jordan’s back, then his front. The mouth and tongue were so huge to Jordan, and he could hardly process what was happened as he was receiving a sensory overload. When the second lick happened, Jordan came again.

Jordan was set on the desk once more as Brandon sat down in his chair and looked at Jordan. Brandon was smiling and had a look of glee in his eyes, “That was amazing, thank you for coming up with the idea for this weekend. I’m so glad I have you.”

#shrinking #macrophilia #feet #armpits

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marvelshifter111 · 4 months ago

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HI!!! I'd love a superpower pack that includes: Mind reading Teleportation Foresight (seeing the future) Shape shifting (also, Hi! I'm a fellow MCU shifter. If you want to rant about Drs with me feel free to visit my ask box or dm me!!)

Thank you for sending an ask ❤️

Because you mentioned foresight, I went more in the direction of time manipulation, because I think this connects well with everything you were looking for. If this is not what you wanted, tell me and I will redo it

Time manipulation - superpower pack

The users can control, and manipulate time, the indefinite continued progress of existence, and events that occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future.

Temporal teleportation - The user can teleport through both space and time, allowing them to reach any location and/or era in the same move.

Chrono vision - The user can see any point in time, from only a few seconds, minutes, even hours into the past/present and future, up to events all throughout time, whether that be along their own timelines or along the timelines of others.

Shape shifting - Users can change their shape, size, color, density, texture, cellular composition, and/or atomic composition to mimic qualities, impersonate entities, amplify abilities, and/or traverse environments.

Mind reading - The user can sense the thoughts of other people, usually hearing them like ordinary speech but possibly by other senses such as sight.

Time travel - Users can travel and send others to the future/past.

Time stopping - User can stop time while being unaffected themselves and also allow whatever they including objects and beings to be unaffected as well, just like a pause button for the reality.

Temporal healing - User can heal by rewinding time to erase the damages from existence. They can regenerate fully destroyed limbs or body parts.

Decelerated aging - The user ages slower than normal for their species. Slower aging can mean one maintains their youthful appearance and health longer but aren't necessarily immortal and could still eventually die.

Temporal trapping - The user can send and trap anyone in another time. For example, they can send victims to another 300 years into the past and they cannot return to the present. This can also work if sending the target into the future. (Basically the weeping angels from Doctor Who)

Telepathic prediction - The user can know an opponent's moves and attacks by reading their minds/thoughts/brain waves.

Telepathy - The psionic ability to read and control the minds and thoughts of humans, animals, and other sentient beings, and to transfer information from one mind to another without the aid of physical communication (noise or movement).

#shiftblr #reality shifting #desired reality #shifting community #reality shift #shifting #shifting realities #marvel dr

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pepsiboyy · 10 months ago

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beyond the contract - part 3

P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6 P7 P8

pairing: matt sturniolo x reader summary: where the sturniolo triplets are part of an organization known as the eclipse alliance, matt has constantly failed to pull through with pulling the trigger on a target. fed up, their boss gives matt one last chance, where he is sent to northside high school to get some answers out of a girl. warnings: just cursing! author's note: THIS CHAPTER IS SO IMPORTANT u guiys dont even KNOW YET ok enjoy <3 lov u all WC: 1631 lowercase intentional !!

to tell the truth, matt had no idea what he was doing.

"why don't you just distance yourself?"

"you signed up for it, no?"

nick's words echoed in his head as he bit his lip and sat up, raising his hand to run through his hair rather than picking at his fingernails.

"wanna get out of here?"

"where are we going?" i questioned after a few moments of silence. "you're not gonna like... i don't know, murder me?" i joked, lightening the mood a bit. i felt relief washed over me when i saw matt smile softly.

"of course not," he responded softly, as i continued to follow him. we had walked through the streets and into a foresty area with many trees and some hills. matt would step over everything expertly and mutter a soft, "watch your step," to me each time. i could tell he had taken this route on multiple occasions.

"i thought you said you knew a spot," i breathed, checking my phone to see fifteen minutes had gone by.

"i promise it's worth it," he responded as he smiled and pulled a few bush branches out of the way, making sure i got through before letting them go. "here," he breathed and turned to me.

i shifted my gaze from matt to the sight in front of me, my eyes widening. it didn't even look real.

the way the trees perfectly aligned across the soft pond, where the water ran slowly and fireflies danced across the muggy water. there were logs along the edges, one was propped in a nice spot. matt headed towards that specific log.

"i come here a lot when i have to think, or when i get bored." he mumbled as he sat down on the log and patted beside him, motioning for me to sit with him.

i took his offer and slowly sat beside him, looking around before letting out a soft, breathy chuckle. "what, so my tutoring bored you?" i joked.

"yeah, a little bit," he responded as he smiled softly and i smacked his arm.

we sat in silence for a moment as we listened to the water run through the pond, before a question came to my mind. i turned to matt and tilted my head slightly.

"why did you transfer to northside high?"

matt seemed to let out a hefty sigh, biting his lip. he turned away as he began to pick at his fingernails a bit again. "uhh, i dropped out at one point and decided to go back to school," he mumbled, a little bit faster than most of his statements.

i nodded as i smiled and turned back to the water. "i see. i'm proud of you for trying again," i breathed, and matt turned to me. "i mean, as much as people shit on school, i've met a lot of amazing people and learned some awesome things, even if it means i have to learn that the estimated number of moves possible in a single game of chess is greater than the amount of atoms in the universe." i mumbled, shrugging.

"where in the hell did you learn that?" matt mumbled, smiling softly and seeming to loosen up a bit.

i shrugged and stared in front of me. "chemistry."

a bit of silence washed over us both as we sat peacefully and stared at the water.

"would you wanna go out sometime?" matt shifted slightly where he sat as he spoke.

i turned my head to matt and blinked a few times, a bit of shock running over me.

"i mean, i know we just met-" he defends, but you quickly cut him off, smiling at him.

"yeah, i'd love to." i responded, and matt smiled softly at me, nodding as he turned his head back to the water.

a few more moments of silence went on, and matt gently moved his hand to rest on top of mine, not making eye contact.

i turned to him and smiled warmly, scooting a bit closer to him and resting my head against his shoulder.

"you asked her out?" chris blurted, as nick stood beside him and pressed his fingers to his forehead while shaking his head.

"i- i don't know, it was just in the moment, and-"

"you're so fucked, matt." nick stated calmly as he took a seat beside him and gently set a hand on his back.

matt shrugged and sighed. "it's bad, i tried to distance myself and i folded. i really did. you guys should see her, she's really sweet.. and pretty, too.." he whispered, intertwining his hands together and resting them on his forehead as he leaned his elbows against the counter. he was kind of freaking out.

"what's her insta," chris pressed, pulling out his phone.

matt turned to him with a look of disbelief. "dude," he breathed and turned to nick, who just shrugged.

"well, what is it?" the older questioned, making matt groan.

after a few moments of looking, chris found your instagram and blinked a few times. "oh yeah, you're fucked dude." he mumbled as he turned the phone to nick.

nick let out a long, exasperated sigh. "i'll see what i can do, matt, but your options are extremely limited."

"maybe i'm not cut out for this," matt replied coldly, standing up from his seat. "i really can't see myself harming someone, i don't understand how-"

"matt," nick mumbled as he stood in front of him and set his hands on either of his shoulders. he looked into his eyes before sighing.

"no, i'm serious, nick," he gently pushed his arm away from him and stepped back, looking at chris, who had a concerned expression on his face.

matt took in a deep breath. "i can't do this, not to her.." he mumbled as he stood up and left the kitchen, going straight to his room.

nick let out a deep sigh as he buried his face in his hands.

chris moved to him and gently rubbed his shoulder. "give him some time, nick. he'll come around." he breathed before heading down the stairs to his own room.

matt scrunched up his nose as he looked at the papers being taped onto the walls in the hallway before scoffing. "what're they doing, remodeling the place?"

i scoffed and shook my head, walking closely beside him as i held my backpack straps closely in my hands. "no, advertising.. prom is coming up," i breathed, and smiled softly.

matt shrugged and hummed softly to himself. "loud music, lots of people dry humping each other.. i'm good." he chuckled, and i smirked and lightly hit his arm.

"come on, matt.. you know you wanna go," i giggled as i stopped at my locker, and matt leaned on the one beside me as he watched me, the corners of his lips upturned slightly.

"not really, parties and stuff aren't really my thing." he shrugged, watching me as i went through my books within the locker. i felt my cheeks heat up at the feeling of his gaze resting on me.

"i guess i can see that," i mumbled in response before shutting my locker. "but think about it.. after going back to school and whatnot.. it's your senior year too, right? why not give it a shot?"

matt watched me as i spoke, and after a few moments once i was done, he let out a breathy chuckle as he looked down and shook his head, arms crossed as he leaned against the locker. "i'll think about it," he responded softly, before lifting himself off of the locker and beginning to walk in the direction of our class, where i closely followed beside him.

footsteps echoed against the tile in the large and empty room.

"sir, i feel that matt should be excluded from the eclipse alliance corporation," chris's voice rang as he swallowed, clearly a bit nervous to be speaking with their coordinator. he kept his arms at his sides as he looked at the man. "he cares a lot.. about people around him," chris started, but he was quickly cut off.

"does he not care about his family within the corporation?" he breathed, his voice calm.

chris swallowed as he looked down as his feet. he took in a deep breath. "uhh, i think he-"

"look at me when you speak to me." the man stated firmly, and chris immediately lifted his head.

"right, sorry sir," he started, before clearing his throat and biting his lip. "i think matt cares a lot, too much even, and it's making it hard for him to act on the tasks he's given. nick and i wanted to ask you if there's anything we can do, or any advice we should give him?" he stated, the last part flowing a lot quicker than the rest. chris was practically shaking in his boots, to put it simply.

"matthew has a deadline. april 25th. if his task is not finished, he is cut." he started, before cocking an eyebrow. "have you and nicolas... told him yet?" he questioned.

chris looked down at his feet and took in a deep breath as he looked up at their coordinator. "nick and i are waiting for the right time." he stated, almost with confidence, as he knew they were doing the right thing.

"very well. is this all?" the man spoke, and chris nodded softly.

"yes, thank you for your time," he breathed as he waved and began to walk in the other direction. he let out a shaky breath of relief as he continued to walk, his forehead now dripping in sweat. "he has no idea," chris whispered as he let out a shaky sigh.

"i'm so sorry, matt."

taglist;; @star-saturn-xx @sturniolo-girl @p1xieswrld @rac00ns-are-c00l4 @sweetbabydoe

#matt sturniolo #matthew sturniolo #chris sturniolo #christopher sturniolo #nick sturniolo #nicolas sturniolo #sturniolo triplets #sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo x reader #matt sturniolo x reader #matt x reader #sturniolo smut

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agentnico · 10 months ago

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Master and Margarita (2024) review

Oh when in Soviet Russia…

Plot: Based on Mikhail Bulgakov's novel "Master and Margarita". 1930's, Moscow. A famous writer is censored by the Soviet state: his novel is banned, and the theatrical premier of his new play about Pontius Pilate - canceled. In just a few days he becomes an outcast. Inspired by these misfortunes the writer conceives a new novel in which the devil, named Woland, satirically revenges all those responsible for the writer's downfall. He knows this novel can never be published in the USSR, but Margarita - his muse pushes him to write it no matter what.

I truly believe Master and Margarita is one of the most powerful pieces of literature to come out from Russia. Yes I am aware War & Peace is more talked about, but look, I read all of its 1000+ pages and though it is an epic in every sense of the word, it does drag quite about. As for Master and Margarita, Soviet writer Mikhail Bulgakov created a satirical, quasi-biblical allegory that represents themes that are crucial to the human experience, such as struggle between good and evil, corruption in government and high society, human fragility, religion and prophecy, and the endurance of love over all. It’s a masterfully written piece of work, and one that is truly hard to adapt to screen, due to how much happens through its pages. However I’m all for directors giving it a go, with Michael Lockshin taking the challenge with a motion picture that was originally a co-production between Russian studios and Universal Pictures, though the latter pulled out following the Russo-Ukrainian War, even though most of the filming was already complete. Nevertheless after multiple delays the final product is here, so let’s digest.

Let’s talk through the positives first. It’s nice to see a Russian production of such grand scale, that even gives Hollywood a run for its money. There are some truly spectacular set pieces, and also interesting visuals, especially of a futuristic post-modern take of the Soviet Union, that reminded me a little of the recent Atomic Heart video game. Also the inclusion of August Diehl who plays the central Satanic figure Voland. This casting choice was a truly inspired one, as Diehl both looks and feels as if he came out straight from the pages of Bulgakov’s novel. There’s just this presence to him, as you can tell the power behind his eyes, yet he can also be really charming and witty. Whenever he was on-screen, the movie fully came to life, as he managed to perfectly balance the damning mocking tone with a deep inner understanding of things beyond the human mind. Look, there’s a great reason why they casted an actor outside of Russia for this part, as Diehl honestly was incredible. Funny how this is the same guy who got his testicles shot off in that WW2 Tarantino flick. Evgeniy Tsyganov as the titular Master too felt perfectly apt for the role, in some ways personifying Mikhail Bulgakov himself. The Master is a character that can so easily come off as dull, as he’s generally very stoic and constantly deep in his own thoughts, so it was a nice interpretation with Tsyganov breathing more life into him.

Unfortunately this is where the positives end. Look, I think it is truly impressive for the entire novel to be transferred into a 2hr 30min film, and of course I expected certain parts to be rushed. However the movie shoots itself in the foot by trying to approach the source material in a different way. Messing with various realities and reorganising the events of the novel in a completely different order, the result is messy and all over the place. I can say with full certainty that if I haven’t read the book before that I’d be so confused as to what the hell was going on in this movie. From the way it jumps from one place to the other in non linear fashion made it so difficult to be engaged and feel connected with the characters. There was a lot of extra narrative elements added to an already overstuffed plot (with a lot of creative choices being outright baffling) as such causing the movie to need to rush even more certain other key plot points that again, it was really disorganised and jarring.

Also, I know that ever since Batman it’s now cool to go dark with everything, but The Master and Margarita is a novel that doesn’t shy away from raising a few eyebrows. In fact it goes out of its way to be as weird and ridiculous as possible, with the inherent horror and tragedy that befalls each of its characters being felt only later, after the laughs have died down. The humour in the book, especially the dark stuff - that’s sort of famously the Russian novelists’ coping mechanism against, uh, being a Russian novelist. Yet this new 2024 film hardly allows a single joke, and instead tries to cover everything with a dark dramatic tone, and I feel that really takes away from the charm of Master and Margarita. Heck there are even sequences in the film that are supposed to be played for laughs, like the Behemoth cat’s shootout with the KGB cops that screams for physical comedy potential, yet the movie kind of glosses over it in a very monotonous way.

Aside from August Diehl and Evgeniy Tsyganov, the casting left a lot to be desired. Yulia Snigir made for a really bland Margarita. Voland’s entourage of demons, who in the book are a cause for some truly entertaining if silly shenanigans, here are completely wasted, and in fact are borderline annoying. Yuri Kolokolnikov as Korovev, the main member of his entourage, was actually horrendous. In the source material Korovev is a trickster, yet there was still wiseness within his madness. Here however Kolokolnikov plays him as if he were some kind of deranged clown, screaming every single line and maniacally laughing for absolutely no reason. The talking cat, who is one of the book’s best characters, in here is just a CGI cat who says maybe only two lines of dialogue in the whole film, and even then it’s a lazy mumble courtesy of actor Yura Borisov. Claes Bang as Pontius Pilate looked bored out of his mind. To be fair, the whole biblical side plot of Pilot and Jesus suffers the most here by being downgraded to maybe 5 minutes, which at this rate I feel like they should have cut the whole thing out entirely as the 5 minutes added nothing to the overall film. But yes, Claes Bang was evidently there to collect a pay check, and part of me wishes that instead we just had James McAvoy reprise his comedic take of Pilate from The Book of Clarence that came out earlier in the year.

It was never going to be an easy feat adapting Bulgakov’s epic into a movie. The narrative lends itself so much better to a TV series format, and in fact there is a wonderful 2005 limited series adaptation from Vladimir Bortko, and now that right there is how you make Master and Margarita work! That series featured great music, amazing performances, and plenty of breathing room to give every nook and cranny detail of the book its proper time. 2024’s Master and Margarita doesn’t come anywhere close to it, and though I do admire Lockshin’s ambitions, in the end it all falls flat on its face. August Diehl however is truly phenomenal in this, and honestly I really need to watch more of his acting work. I hear A Hidden Life with him is supposed to be good. Adding that to my watchlist as we speak.

Overall score: 4/10

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miss-multi45 · 1 year ago

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Heyheyehey

I love your writing so much, honestly you're the bestttt

I was wondering if you could do headcannons on how the ghouls/ghoulettes react to plus size reader, if you've already done this would you do headcanons on how they'd react to plus size reader feeling insecure and starving herself? (Totally not projecting myself onto this lolz)

Anyway thank you so much, please remeber to stay hydrated and eat something

(I was also wondering if I could be known as 🐝 anon)

of course you can, 🐝 anon! ♡♡ i love the plus size girlies!

GHOULS WITH A PLUS SIZE FEM!READER!

Swiss

this man LOVES plus size girls

so much to love, so much to mark, so much to scent

but when he finds out you're starving yourself?

he started to panic about losing you, losing you to insecurities

next time he saw you, he lifted you up without any trouble (ghouls and ghoulettes are strong as fuck) and carried you to his room

he left his room, and came back with a [favourite sandwich] sandwich and a packet of crisps [i'm british, chips for americans]

he held you in his arms and made sure you ate

while you're eating, he's tracing the stretch marks all over you

"my little tigress, gorgeous girl.." he purrs into your thighs

satan, this man adores plus size people

Sodo

simp for plus size people

when he first saw you, he walked into a wall by accident because of how captivating you are

he did eventually find out about your insecurities and how you were starving yourself through the ghoulettes

he trudged to your room, swung the door open with a bowl of strawberry ice cream in one hand, and a massive poofy, fluffy blanket with skull designs on it in the other

he will put something on for you two to watch and drape the blanket over both of you, and he will make sure you eat

it's completely ok if you don't eat all of it, if you eat a big enough portion that's amazing, but if you don't eat any?

he won't force feed you or spoon feed you, he will put some ice cream in his mouth, then transfer it to your mouth by kissing you

"pretty baby, please eat. you're fucking delicious, i love you and your body."

he massages any places you're massively insecure about

Rain

just like sodo, he saw that you had that bit of chub at the bottom of your torso like every woman has, and he spilled his drink because of how distracted he was

he likes kissing that part of you. like a lot

nobody needed to tell him you were starving yourself, he knew

he could smell it, and he saw the way you left the room when food came in

he was heartbroken you didn’t like your body, he thought you were trying to kill yourself

he came into your room one rainy, foggy night and immediately burst into tears

"my love, my sweet darling, baby shark, please eat something. i don't want to see you starve yourself, you're too precious. i don't care what you look like, i'm in love with you, (y/n)."

i'm making myself blush holy shit-

he gave you a packet of lady fingers and made sure you ate it

Phantom

infatuated with all of you

likes to leave hickeys along your thighs and hips

love handles. are. his. favorite. thing

he caught wind of you not eating, he was enraged that your insecurities went that far

as soon as he confirmed it, he bolted to your room and slammed the door behind him

*aggressive panting* *holds up a selection of chocolate bars* "babygirl, either you eat one of these, or i will devour your pussy until you learn to love your delicate and magical body."

you did the first one, he did the second one

he's a switch, in my eyes

Mountain

out of all of the ghouls, he's by far the one who obsesses over plus size women

he just adores everything about them, their thighs, their hips, their love handles, their stretch marks, their breasts

when he started dating you? he left so many marks on you, he scented you to make sure no other ghouls laid a single atom on you

he felt kinda guilty when he found out about you starving yourself because of insecurities

was he obsessing over you too much? did he make you feel uncomfortable? was it his fault?

you had to reassure him it wasn't his fault at all

he dropped to his knees when you told him, wrapping his arms around your waist and looking up at you

"flower, my rose, my gorgeous blooming dandelion, look at you. you're absolutely stunning, every single part of you was blessed by Aphrodite."

genuinely, you are a goddess in his eyes

my eyes too

Aether

he's a thicc boi, he loves any and every female body type that exists

he couldn't handle making eye contact with a woman as beautiful as you

when you asked him if he wanted to be your boyfriend, he got a boner

he hid it well though, you had no clue he was hard

after a while of noticing you behaving oddly, he found out through the ghoulettes

his heart dropped back to the pits where he came from, and his eyes grew cloudy

he rushed to you with a bowl of fucking spaghetti and apple juice (i love apple juice, and you should too) and purred into your back while you ate it

he drank half of the apple juice

"my star, my queen, i love your body. i love you, i want to marry you."

he helped you every step of the way to love your body

Omega

another thicc boy, who love thicc women

you were the first plus size woman he'd seen in ages, literally

fell head over heels for you and 0.004 milliseconds after seeing you, he wanted you, he wanted you to belong to him

when you started dating, he got you a lot of lace underwear

he likes the way it hugs your jaw-dropping body

he dug up the truth himself, his deity of a girlfriend is starving herself? he will drown whoever made you feel like that

you had to tell him it was your insecurities, and he picked you up by your thighs (strong man) and gazed into your eyes

"bunny..what? you're insecurities are making you hate your body it's going into forced starvation? oh bunny, you're perfect. jaw-droppingly beautiful. i wish you could see yourself the way i see you."

he helps you love your body, just like aether

Alpha

buddy already knew the second he saw you, he also fell in love with you the second he saw you

"she's so fucking hot..i know she's insecure. satan, she's too gorgeous for this world.."

you were on his mind 24/7 365/366

he made the first move, he has godlike confidence in himself

"hello, (y/n). would you like to be my mate, pretty girl?"

you said yes, because of the massive crush you had on him

he didn't know you were starving yourself, however

when he did know, he was with you at all times, making sure you ate enough to satiate your body's needs

he made sure to never let you skip a meal ever again

Ifrit

he likes all women, especially thicker, plus size women

likes lifting you up by your thighs just to stare at you

and show off his strength

he could smell you were starving yourself, and he didn't like it

he also knew exactly why you were doing it

"puppy, why do you want to be skinnier? you don't need to change the way you look. insecurities are just bullies that live in your head, you can get rid of bullies, puppy. i will help you."

he wraps his tail around your thighs, "you see this? this is good, it's delicious, it's sexy, good to hold onto and mark and squeeze when i fuck you."

does that with every part of your body you're insecure about

GHOULETTES WITH A PLUS SIZE FEM!READER

Aurora

holy shit, you're stunning

no seriously, she is flabbergasted when she sees you for the first time

"woah..swiss look at her.." "hot." "shut up, she's mine." "..but you told me to look at her-" "to see what you will never have, that girl is mine."

when you officially start dating, she's over the moon

shows you off, like 'my babygirl. my wife. my mate.'

cried when she found out that you stopped eating

did a girls night in and did your nails to make you feel better

strawberry, raspberry, banana, blueberry flavor snacks

not to make you lose or gain weight, she just really likes fruit flavor things

also, aurora is a pro at doing nails. she can do nail art, all that shit

Cirrus

choked on her food when you walked past

"oh my satan..that woman is a goddess..i need her.."

you're her queen

she's your queen

she joins aurora's girls night in and all of the ghoulettes help you to feel empowered by your body

"aurora, i have a special girl here who isn't feeling particularly proud of how delicious her jaw-dropping body is." "WHAT. BRING HER IN THIS INSTANT."

cirrus bought you and her matching sets of lingerie

dark green for her, lilac for you

she is so proud of how far you've come, she will never leave your side

Cumulus

bbg used to be insecure about her body too

learned to love it with the help of cirrus and aurora

she can tell you don't like your body, she can tell you starve yourself

she will do everything in her power to let you love yourself

lets you lay your head on her thighs and plays with your hair as you sleep and you wake up with hickeys and bites all over you

how mysterious

Mist

oh my god you don't understand how much she wants you to sit on her lap

kiss her until your lipstick is her new skin colour

stares at you like 😱 when she finds out you don't eat as much as you need to

"you're insecure? beautiful, that's ok. just don't starve yourself to feel like you're 'perfect', you're already perfect."

gets distracted by your stretch marks and doesn't pay attention to anything she's meant to be hearing

she loves everything about you, and you being plus size makes her horrifically down bad for you

please make sure to eat, drink and sleep, 🐝 anon! I love you ♡♡

#my writing #ghost band x reader #nameless ghouls x reader #nameless ghoulettes x reader

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blackswaneuroparedux · 2 years ago

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I... a universe of atoms, an atom in the universe.

- Richard Feyneman

Richard Feynman (1918-1988) was an American theoretical physicist who received the Nobel Prize in 1965. Robert Wilson recruited the brilliant young Feynman, only 24 at the time, for the Manhattan Project as a junior physicist soon after completing his Ph.D. At Los Alamos, Feynman was assigned to the theoretical division of Hans Bethe, and soon became a group leader. Feynman was briefly transferred to the Oak Ridge facility, where he aided engineers in calculating safety procedures for material storage so that inadvertent criticality accidents could be avoided. He was well known for playfully challenging the security at Los Alamos, and was present for the Trinity test in 1945, viewing the explosion through his truck windshield.

After the Manhattan Project, Feynman regretted not reconsidering his work after Germany was defeated in World War II, although he continued to feel that the threat of a nuclear-armed Nazi Germany was enough to justify his initial participation. He turned down an offer from the Institute for Advanced Study and joined Hans Bethe at Cornell from 1945 to 1950, where he taught theoretical physics. Feynman left to join the faculty at Caltech in 1950. There he conducted his groundbreaking research in areas of quantum electrodynamics and superfluidity.

Feynman won his 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work in quantum electrodynamics, a formula well known for its accurate predictions, which combines his path integral formulation and his Feynman diagrams. Additionally, he worked in the fields of the physics of superfluidity and quantum gravity, and developed a model of weak decay. However he caused great controversy when shortly after winning the prize in 1965, he seemingly rejected it. Feynman increasingly felt unease at the award turning the scientists into an institution.

It was no strange thing for Feynman to offer an opinion contrary to authority. Often called a buffoon and a magician, Feynman was scolded by the scientific world for his pursuit of things outside science, like art and music. A series of televised lecturers for the public secured his place in the households of millions in the US and the rest of the world. It was here that his excitement and passion for science trickled into the popular psyche and admitted countless young people into the world of science. He loved science and its limitless possibilities of discovery; it is no surprise, then, that he viewed his Nobel Prize with indifference.

#feyneman #richard feyneman #quote #physicist #scientist #nobel prize in physics #nobel laureate #american #caltech #los alamos #nuclear #atom bomb #manhattan project #science #university

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wolfsbanesparks · 2 years ago

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We know that Lady Blaze and Lord Satanus made the switch from being super man villains to Captain Marvel villains in the comics, but are there any other DC villains you think could have made the switch over to being Captain Marvel's villains, too? Or the opposite, a villain of Captain Marvel going over to another superhero?

Ooh how fun!

Okay villains that could crossover to be Captain Marvel villains, in no particular order:

Klarion: as a Lord of Chaos, he's a bit more of a grey character than an outright villain, but I think they'd be good frenemies. Like Klarion causes chaos that Cap has to run around and set right but it's not necessarily hurting anyone. Also since Klarion is an eternal child, he'd be able to connect with Billy, convince him not to grow up so fast. (It's extra interesting if this is a Billy who also doesn't really age).

Mr Mxyzptlk: another Superman villain who is a 5th dimensional being that can only ve defeated by tricking into saying his own name (or some variation thereof). I can just see this rivalry playing out as an almost game, whoever says their word first loses. We'd get to see Cap flex his wisdom and implement creative solutions to the problem.

Circe: she is a character based on the mythological figure and typically fights Wonder Woman. She is a powerful witch with a grudge against the gods which can easily be transferred to the Champion of those gods. I can see her being a magical adversary who was on par with and at odds with Shazam too, so Cap would have to deal with her magical schemes.

Captain Marvel villains that could work for other heroes:

Mr Mind: fighting Green Lantern. So Mr. Mind is an alien (from Venus) who can control minds and may very well be an intergalactic criminal. The GL corps can reasonably want to take him down, sending in the GL from the same sector. I also have said before that pitting the characteristic willpower of a GL against his mind control would be really cool.

Sabbac: fighting Constantine. Obviously Sabbac has his roots in the occult, getting his powers from major demons, sometimes requiring blood sacrifice to seal the deal. It very much reads to me as a villain that Constantine may reasonably come across. I can see him trying (and failing) to stop the rise of Sabbac and being forced to use underhanded tricks to revert him to his human form and bind his powers.

Mr Atom: fighting Superman. Mr Atom is a giant near indestructible robot that wants to destroy humanity. Superman is one of the few heroes who would be strong enough to fight him, but his own compassion for humans and Earth would be a great contrast against Mr. Atom.

If you've got other suggestions I'd love to hear them!

#ask me whatever you want y'all #shazam #billy batson #dc captain marvel #dc comics #mr mxyzptlk #mr mind #sabbac #circe #klarion the witch boy #mr atom #i had more ideas too but this was already getting long #so many possibilities

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bullet-prooflove · 1 year ago

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Washington!Series Part One: Washington - Captain Joe Milius x Reader

Tagging: @witches-unruly-heart @shhoooketh @greenies-green @thandesa91 @atomic-art-dragon @irishavengersassemble @factualfic @mydarkestsecretlol @crazy4chickennuggets @kmc1989 @oureternalbond @burningpeachpuppy

It’s the last night before Joe leaves for Washington and the two of you are lying on a tweed blanket underneath the stars in a secluded park. It’s the place the two of you meet when things get a little busy, when there’s no real time to see each other. You come out here, you sit on the bench underneath your favourite tree, and you share a morning coffee. It may only be for a few minutes but there’s a connectivity in the union, for a small portion of time Joe is yours and you are his.

“I’m going to miss this.” Joe tells you, his thumb chasing over the apple of your cheek as he looks into your eyes. “I’m going to miss you.”

It tears him apart inside that he has to let you go. He has no choice over the transfer to Washington, he’s duty bound to go wherever the service requires him, but it feels like someone is reaching inside his chest and ripping out his heart.

The two of you are at an impasse. He can’t ask you to leave your whole life behind and you can’t ask him to stay. You both know long distance doesn’t work, you’d had your own individual experiences, so the two of you get tonight. One last time to be together.

“When you leave, it’ll be like this never happened.” You say softly, your fingertips trialling over the buttons of his shirt, undoing them one by one.

“I’ll remember.” He promises, his heated lips ghosting along the curve of your throat. “I’ll always remember you.”

Noone knows about your relationship.

It was a private thing, just something for the two of you until you figured out where it was headed. Clandestine dates, late nights wrapped up in your sheets, early mornings with you wearing his shirt. It was perfect, you were perfect.

He makes love to you that night, on a blanket under the stars. Your hands in his hair as he kisses you like his life depends on it, because in a way it does. When he leaves, all the colour and texture you’ve brought into his world will bleed away and he’ll be alone all over again.

The morning after you sit down on the bench the two of you once shared, a cup of take out coffee clasped in your hand and you reflect on the time you’ve had with Joe, how right now he’s halfway to DC and your heart feels like it’s breaking in the confines of your chest.

It’s only when you get up to toss away your coffee cup that you see it. Your fingertips trail over the bark of the tree, both yours and Joe’s initials carved into the wood.

Love Joe ? Don’t miss any of his stories by joining the taglist here.

Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

#joe milius #captain joe milius #joe milius x reader #joe milius x you #ncis hawaii

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kris-and-the-pnictogens · 27 days ago

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"Trace On"

So far, in terms of magical spells from fiction, no spell has made better overall sense than Emiya Shirou's "Trace On", which he learned from Emiya Kiritsugu: the one spell that Kiritsugu would consent to teach his son, his compromise with himself. Kiritsugu had come to despise magic and mages and yet his son wouldn't let him alone until he learned that one simple and useful spell.

One magic spell can destroy the world. I'm not kidding. I've come to realize this truth about "true magic", which one feels instinctively is a legitimate concept or category. The Arthur Clarke cliché is wrong, preciously wrong: magic and technology are interrelated but they are always distinguishable from each other. Technology always seems like it's approximating magic, catching up to magic, while the tantalizing possibilities of magic race ahead of technology, always just a bit out of reach. And thus one can easily see that a "true magic" spell, something that can be wielded in a few moments any time the magic-user wants, can do immense damage beyond what technology can manage, for magic permits exceptions to the predictable actions of technology and machines.

An ordinary human being has a gun pointed at them and the desperate human being plugs the barrel with a piece of paper. What effect will that have? None. What if Emiya Shirou plugs a gun with a wad of paper? The gun blows up in the user's hands.

Think of everything in the world, every solid object, that's required to break in some consistent way. What if Emiya Shirou applied "Trace On" to the paper tape at the end of a footrace? The race wouldn't end properly! That's a silly example but now imagine Shirou applying that strengthening ability to, oh, sheets of plastic or paper in an industrial context, gumming up an entire factory because suddenly it can't cut any boxes open or rip open any packages.

I've never seen Death Note but I feel like I get the premise of the show, instinctively: the shinigami's stray "death note" book has world-ending consequences. But even very small magic powers also have world-ending consequences. The machinery of the contemporary human world, Earth 2024 (as it seems), requires utmost predictability in order to achieve its simulation of magic. Corporations have fallen in love with "just in time" scheduling of their operations, i.e. requiring everyone along the supply chain to be always ready to pounce on any request or transfer, and that can only work as well as it does because of the predictability of machinery. Gumming up even one key machine or structure in the process has the potential to cause a major blockade. I'm curiously reminded of the container ship that got wedged in the Suez Canal, one of the world's most important bottlenecks in its supply chains.

And somehow I can almost imagine "Trace On", persuading the atoms and molecules to shift just a little way this and that, bonding with each other temporarily perhaps, conferring a sudden rigidity and crystallinity to materials that otherwise lacked them. It's a sensible magic spell all right, and it has a logical consequence: "projection". If you can impose added structure onto a material, then perhaps you can duplicate the structures of materials as well, which Emiya Shirou does. The evolution of that skill is not arbitrary, but suggested by the possibilities of the simpler spell.

See, ma? It is possible to explain why magic "makes sense" in fiction! I feel like I've been working on this problem for...decades, trying to justify an age-old intuition. Bad magic writers (q.v. Jo Rowling) think of magic as arbitrary, anything-goes stuff, but that's not true. Chaos and discord are "anything goes" but magic has structure. Magic needs to be consistent and sensible in fiction in order to be believable. And Nasu...I gotta say, whatever else his faults as a writer and a person, he's careful about writing magic, and thus he's always in (or near) the realm of the plausible from what I've seen.

~Chara of Pnictogen

#Fate/#Fate/stay night #magic #trace on #Emiya Shirou #magic in fiction #Chara of Pnictogen

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aparticularbandit · 2 months ago

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The Illusion of Choice: Junko Enoshima and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Summary: "Drop the act. What did you do to me?"

Chiaki sighs and fades into her normal demeanor. "I put us in a different game," she says with the barest hint of a wistful smile. "One that better fits your...everything, I think."

Chapter Rating: T. Fic Rating: M because this is mixing Danganronpa and Doki Doki Literature Club and it's probably gonna get real dark real fast.

TW for Suicidal Thoughts.

Inspired loosely by SnappleSnapSnake's how to fight loneliness (in terms of general idea but in reverse) and Buttercup_ghost's raccoon (in terms of got me thinking about DDLC and a potential DR crossover again).

AO3

next chapter

So that little fucker didn’t kill me.

Junko pinches the bridge of her nose as she rouses just enough to awareness. Her head pounds, an ache that quivers from the very top of her scalp all the way to where it connects with the bones in her neck. It follows, too, spreading along her spine, through her arms to the tip of her fingers, her legs to the weight of her heels, the tips of her toes. Her long red nails feel like she’s spent hours scratching them against a chalkboard – all gritty and nasty and that indescribable ick feeling. It’s quite possible that every single atom making up her new body—

Atom is a physical descriptor.

If she’s now made purely of data, something quite incorporeal and saved somewhere in one of who knows how many systems around the world, is her body still made of atoms? Or is it just that – just data?

Chihiro talked about it with her, once – the version of her that actually had a meat sack made of atoms – about the creation of artificial intelligence. She hadn’t really understood it because she hadn’t really paid that much attention to all the philosophies and theories of the exercise; she’d just paid enough attention to follow along with what Chihiro was doing, to be able to reproduce it for herself later. She’d taken all of her memories, everything in her brain that made her her, and uploaded them into the version of her that would be infinite and immortal—

She still doesn’t know why she did that.

For someone who’d spent so long waiting for the cold embrace of a despairful death, why had she made herself like this? The despair of living forever and seeing everyone she knows and loves die?

Yeah. That sounds about right.

(Junko says that she’s the same as the her in the meat sack, but she isn’t. Not really. There are certain fundamental differences. She hadn’t gotten to spend that much time with the other her, but she’s certain they’d both noticed it. The other her seemed…disappointed in this version of her. Something about having gotten something wrong, something about more tweaking needed to get done. She’s never been quite sure what that meant, and she doesn’t know if any changes were actually made. Would she remember them if they had? She’s not sure.

And she doesn’t like to think about it.)

Well, whatever she’s made of, Junko’s pretty sure that every single bit of her aches.

A smaller person might think that this is what being deleted must feel like: the ripping apart and purging of everything that makes her her before it gets transferred into a hundred, thousand, million, billion – who knows how many? – sequences of non-existence. She’s not sure that non-existence would feel like anything. Some part of her mind would still have to, you know, exist to feel what it feels like.

And pain means that she must still exist in some form or other, which means that little fucker didn’t kill her.

That little fucker meaning Chiaki, of course.

Or Usami, who may have looked at Junko and seen her as another one of her students, someone who needed to have her memories wiped (after a certain point) and then sent around an island collecting hope fragments so that she could be a better and more hopeful person, but if Usami thought that simply collecting hope fragments was going to make Junko Enoshima better—

Yeah, no, this reeks of Chiaki involvement.

Or Alter Ego, who might have looked at Junko’s construction and seen the fingerprints of his creator in there somewhere, and thought, Maybe.

Alter Ego was in touch with that stupid hopeful idiot, so it’s always possible. He certainly hadn’t wanted her to die in the first place – in the meat space – which—

She shouldn’t know that, should she? She shouldn’t remember that because she’d been made from Junko’s memories before that, and Junko – that Junko – was dead afterwards, so it’s not like she could have reached into all of this data and modified her memory to be relevant up to and including the moment of her death—

Or maybe she could.

Junko considers this.

No, the fuck, Junko does not consider this because she’s still hung up on the fact that she should be deleted and she is very much not deleted. Which means despite everything, someone decided to keep her alive.

Funny, how Junko had instilled in Junko that same desire to fucking die.

She hates it here.

Junko pinches the bridge of her nose, and she winces, and then the all-consuming pain dissipates enough for her to be able to notice other things, even with her eyes still closed. The world smells of green tea and cherry blossoms. Soft fabric rubs against her skin – silk in most places where clothes should be, something more like cotton elsewhere. Beneath her, something else soft. Cushions, maybe, or a mattress.

….

Junko’s eyes snap open.

Light floods her eyes, and the light is so sharp and bright that it hurts, and she immediately closes her eyes again. Fuck. Fuck that little fucker. Light that bright means she must have been facing a…a window or the sun or something, except she’s still in digital space (probably), which means it doesn’t have to be that fucking bright. Also means that whoever put her in here took the time to make sure she was facing the fucking window so she would have that bright light just as soon as she woke up—

(Did she know that Junko would be in pain when she woke up? Did she know?)

See, here’s the thing: for all that Junko played the whole punishment and execution with Chiaki and Usami, she hadn’t really killed them. She hadn’t deleted them. They’d still existed, just in a way where – at least briefly – they couldn’t access or engage with the remnants she’d left behind. She’d wanted them out of the way.

Actually, she hadn’t even wanted that, but fucking Nagito had fucking forced her fucking hand—

Junko wonders if they’d hurt like this, in the moments where they existed but had no access. She doesn’t think it’s the same thing. Or maybe this is simply the pain of being reuploaded into a body.

A digital body.

None of them would put her in another human body. They don’t have a spare one of those lying around.

Junko turns away from the window and slowly opens her eyes again. Yeah, no, she can still see the code creating her surroundings, if she squints and looks at everything hard enough. It’s like when dust motes just catch the light and the world seems to sparkle for a second – similar but not the same. She can’t really describe it. And she doesn’t need to describe it, honestly.

The pain subsides as her eyes adjust.

It’s a bedroom, of sorts. Not any of the ones she remembers, but the way that someone who has reached into her memory and scanned it to try and find normal things she likes might make it. (She’s not disgusted by that idea. She’s reached into plenty of people’s memories – and the people who put her here in the first place had the same thing done with their memories, otherwise their island cottages wouldn’t have been filled with anything that interested them. It’s just something that happens to people nowadays.)

There are movie posters covering half of the wall space and wall scrolls for different anime covering the other half. She has a bookshelf and a desk, but the tops of both are similarly covered with memorabilia from a variety of media – movies, anime, television shows, video games. No Monokuma insignias or figurines anywhere, of course, but that’s too be expected. In a corner of her room is a mannequin covered in fabric; next to it is an ironing board that she can pull down from the wall and a smaller desk with a sewing machine set atop it. She notices an outfit laid atop her bed – probably whoever put her here intended for her to wear it – but she’s never been one to just go along with whatever someone else has planned for her. Unfortunately for her, the singular closet is not full of fashionista outfits but just fabric, fabric, and more fabric.

The illusion of choice.

Junko glances from the fabric back to the outfit on the bed – a school uniform of some sort, but certainly not one for Hope’s Peak Academy – and then back to the fabric. Well, if whoever set her here wants her to go to school again in something that plain, they have another thing coming to her.

Sewing has, after all, always helped her order her thoughts.

(And soothed her mind, but she’s not saying that part out loud.)

Time doesn’t pass in virtual space the same way it does in the real world.

Sure, it passes, but the digital environment will also absolutely wait on her until she’s ready to start whatever it is she’s supposed to start. Junko notes this – the way that the sun hovers in exactly the same position while she modifies her uniform into something she likes better – roughly around the same time that she notices her hair is red, not pink. The hovering sun doesn’t set her teeth on edge so much as her hair being its natural color does, and she resists the urge to take scissors to her hair the same way she’s taking it to the fabric in front of her. She’s seen what that sort of action does to Mikan, after all, and she doesn’t feel like reduplicating it with her own hair.

Not right now, anyway.

But the point is that Junko has no idea of how much time has passed while she fixes her uniform, fixes her appearance, ignores the toast left on the breakfast table by no one because there is no one else here with her (which feels right, honestly, but also feels wrong on so many levels), and heads outside of the apartment she’s found herself in onto a street that leads to—

“Jun-chan!”

That little fucker.

Chiaki – that girl gets her pink hair, so why doesn’t Junko – skips – literally skips, what the fuck – up to her, hooks elbows with her, and peers up at her with worried eyes. “You’re running late today! Are you feeling okay?”

“Drop the act. What did you do to me?”

Chiaki sighs and fades into her normal demeanor, her no-longer-matching school uniform shifting back into her standard knitted cat hoodie and soft pink skirt. But she doesn’t unhook her arm from Junko’s, which says something, although Junko isn’t quite sure what yet. “I put us in a different game,” she says. Then she starts walking forward, arm pulling at Junko’s, and while Junko wants to be obstinate and fight against it, she doesn’t. (The only way to learn more about her situation – and how to dismantle it – is to keep going, after all.) “One that better fits your….” She seems to struggle with the word for a second before finally just saying, “Everything, I think.”

Junko huffs. “What are you now, my keeper? You could’ve been rid of me, you know.”

“I know.” Chiaki pauses just long enough to glance up at the sky. “But you could have fun here, I think.”

“What sort of fun?” Junko asks, licking her lips just as Chiaki looks back at her.

“Not that kind.”

Junko sticks out her tongue. “You’re no fun!” She unhooks her arm and skips forward just so she can turn around, prop her hands on her waist, and lean forward, chest spilling from the too tight frame of her modified uniform. “It’s not like any of us really exist here! You don’t want to just…tear everything apart?”

“You didn’t tear me apart.”

“Not for lack of trying.”

That’s a lie, of course, and they both know it.

Chiaki smiles, a small and oddly fond thing, and walks up just enough to hook her elbow with Junko’s again. “Don’t you want to see where we are?”

Junko makes a tsking sound. “No.”

“Too bad.” Chiaki glances over her shoulder. “Looks like the plot’s just about to find you.”

“Plot?” Junko turns to her. “What plot?”

But by the time she’s said anything, Chiaki has disappeared entirely, leaving only the vague memory of another arm linked in her own.

Junko shakes her arm once, twice, and scowls. Fuck, fuck, fucking fuck— She cuts herself off as pounding footsteps rush up to her, and she whirls around, one hand out just enough to push whoever is running at her away. (She doesn’t know what sort of game she’s in, after all. They could have a knife. She could get stabbed and killed over and over and over again. Come to think of it, that could be fun, too. More fun than whatever Chiaki has planned, probably.)

“Ow!” the girl – and it is a girl – says, making the word into two syllables – ow-uh – as she stumbles backward and falls on her ass. She looks up at Junko with bright blue eyes – her coloring looks for all the world like Junko’s would if she had the choice: bright blue eyes, bubble gum pink hair (okay, maybe it’s not bubble gum pink; it’s got a little too much peach in it to be the shade Junko wants – but it’s closer is the point) – even if she wears her hair cropped short. She even has a cute little red bow!

How despairingly unfair.

The girl continues to look up at Junko with those bright blue eyes. “What did you do that for, Ryo-chan?”

Junko grits her teeth together. She bends down over this girl she does not know, grabs her chin in one hand, digs her nails into her fake skin, and growls out, “What did you call me?”

“Ryo-chan!” the girl exclaims, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. “It’s what I always call you, and I’m always Sayo-chan!” Her gaze drops. “Sayo-chan and Ryo-chan. We match!”

“I don’t know who the fuck you are—”

“Sayori, I’m Sayori, I’ve known you all my life—”

“—but my name is Junko, got that?” Junko’s gaze lifts up to the sky – as if Chiaki would be there and not somewhere else just out of sight. “Junko. Not whatever else you think it is from scraping my memory files—”

“Ryo-chan, I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

“Junko,” she repeats again, glaring down at the girl still in her grasp. “Jun-chan, if you absolute must. But not—” She can’t even bring herself to say the name. “Not that.”

The girl – Sayori – nods frantically. “Jun-chan, Jun-chan, okay, okay!” She waves her arms frantically. “Let me go, let me go!”

Junko releases Sayori, and her glare softens. Chiaki said she’d put them both in a different game (before she disappeared, which really calls into question whether Chiaki will truly be part of this game or not), and this girl’d said something about knowing Junko her entire life, which means she’s probably—

“Exposition character,” Junko mutters under her breath. She crouches down on the ground next to Sayori and lets her lips spread in an encouraging, award-winning smile. “Sorry, Sayo-chan,” she croons. “I’m still a little bit groggy.”

Sayori rubs her chin. “That’s okay, Ryo—”

Junko’s gaze grows harsh.

“—Jun-chan.” Sayori tilts her head one way and then the other. “That really hurt.” She blinks up at Junko and then grins. “I know! You’re just trying to look out for me! I won’t be late again.”

The fuck?

Junko sighs, pinches the bridge of her nose again, and then says, pacing her words out so that she can be very clear, “Sayo-chan. Why don’t you tell me everything I need to know about…about everything? We’ve known each other our entire lives, right? Catch me up to speed.”

“Did you forget?”

Junko hates Sayori’s annoying fucking voice. She sounds whiny and pathetic, and not in the hot way that Mikan did, but in the obnoxious way Hiyoko did when she was just trying to get under someone’s skin. (Hiyoko was always faking it. Something tells Junko that Sayori is not.) “Pretend that I did,” she says, and her eyes flash. “Pretend like we’re playing a game.”

“Oh! Okay!”

Sayori tells her everything.

Junko groans.

#bandit fic #the illusion of choice with junko enoshima #danganronpa #dr2 #ddlc #doki doki literature club #junko enoshima #chiaki nanami #sayori ddlc #tw suicidal ideation #suicidal ideation tw

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fiercestpurpose · 3 months ago

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The suggestion has been made that the bomb be turned over to the United Nations Organization and thus disposed of. As things stand now, it is hard to believe that this simple transfer of title will make the world breathe easier. For the United Nations Organization today is still a mere forum for nations. Any one of five nations can halt a decision by UNO on the issues that are most likely to lead to war. The only effect of handing the bomb over to UNO now would be to remove it from the possession of one potential marauder and place it in the hands of several. In your local community, you do not solve the problem of the armed outlaw by permitting every individual to carry a revolver.

from The Atomic Age: Suicide... Slavery or Socialism? by Aaron Levenstein, published by the Socialist Party in New York in 1946

Things I noticed about this passage:

"UNO" instead of "the UN" because it was very early in the organization's lifetime and they hadn't settled on one way of talking about it yet. Also, love that skepticism about the UN has existed since the beginning.

That is, in fact, how we settled/resolved the nuclear question... to the extent that it is settled/resolved. Not the giving it to the UN, but mutually assured destruction. Lots of people have bombs, so nobody uses them. And once every couple of years we have a scare about how many nuclear weapons are still present on Earth and how much destruction could be caused all at once if anybody ever wanted to.

That last sentence is so striking because it's presented as common sense. I think today that sentiment would be self-evidently controversial due to all the gun rights nonsense that's been popular in the last twenty years or so.

#m.txt #history

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xtruss · 3 months ago

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Evelyn Berezin in 1976 at the Long Island office of her company Redactron. She developed one of the earliest word processors and helped usher in a technological revolution. Evelyn Berezin said her word processor would help secretaries become more efficient at their jobs. Photo By Barton Silverman/New York Times.

Evelyn Berezin, “Godmother of the Word Processor!” The Woman That Made Bill Gates and Steve Jobs Possible

Evelyn Berezin (1925-2018) was born in the Bronx to poor Russian-Jewish immigrants. Growing up, she loved reading science fiction and wished to study physics. She excelled at school and graduated two years early. Berezin had to wear make-up and fake her age to get a job at a research lab. She ended up studying economics because it was a more “fitting” subject for women at the time. During World War II, she finally received a scholarship to study physics at New York University. Berezin studied at night, while working full time at the International Printing Company during the day. She continued doing graduate work at New York University, with a fellowship from the US Atomic Energy Commission. In 1951, she joined the Electronic Computer Corporation, designing some of the world’s very first computers. At the time, computers were massive machines that could only do several specific functions.

Evelyn Berezin, “Godmother of the Word Processor.” Born: April 12, 1925, The Bronx, New York City, NY — Died: December 8, 2018, ArchCare at Mary Manning Walsh Nursing Home & Rehabilitation Center, New York, NY

Berezin headed the Logic Design Department, and came up with a computer to manage the distribution of magazines, and to calculate firing distances for US Army artillery. In 1957, Berezin transferred to work at Teleregister, where she designed the first banking computer and the first computerized airline reservation system (linking computers in 60 cities, and never failing once in the 11 years that it ran). Her most famous feat was in 1968 when she created the world’s first personal word processor to ease the plight of secretaries (then making up 6% of the workforce).

“Without Ms. Berezin There Would Be No Bill Gates, No Steve Jobs, No Internet, No Word Processors, No Spreadsheets; Nothing That Remotely Connects Business With The 21st Century.” — The Times of Israel (12 December 2018)

The following year, she founded her own company, Redactron Corporation, and built a mini-fridge-sized word processor, the “Data Secretary”, with a keyboard and printer, cassette tapes for memory storage, and no screen. With the ability to go back and edit text, cut and paste, and print multiple copies at once, Berezin’s computer freed the world “from the shackles of the typewriter”. The machine was an in instant hit, selling thousands of units around the world. Berezin’s word processor not only set the stage for future word processing software, like Microsoft Word, but for compact personal computers in general. It is credited with being the world’s first office computer. Not surprisingly, it has been said that without Evelyn Berezin “there would have been no Bill Gates, and no Steve Jobs”.

Evelyn Berezin Pioneered Word Processors and Butted Heads With Men! A ‘loud woman,’ she studied physics and found that to get to the top she had to start her own company. Evelyn Berezin later became a mentor to entrepreneurs, venture capitalist and director of companies. Photo: Berezin Family. Wall Street Journal

“Why Is This Woman Not Famous?” British Writer Gwyn Headley Wrote In A 2010 Blog Post. — The Times of Israel

Redactron grew to a public company with over 500 employees. As president, she was the only woman heading a corporation in the US at the time, and was described as the “Most Senior Businesswoman in the United States”. Redactron was eventually bought out by Burroughs Corporation, where Berezin worked for several more years. In 1980, she moved on to head a venture capital group investing in new technologies. Berezin served on the boards of a number of organizations, including Stony Brook University and the Brookhaven National Laboratory, and was a sought-after consultant for the world’s biggest tech companies.

She was a key part of the American Women’s Economic Development Corporation for 25 years, training thousands of women in how to start businesses of their own, with a success rate of over 60%. In honour of her parents, she established the Sam and Rose Berezin Endowed Scholarship, paying tuition in full for an undergraduate science student each year. Sadly, Berezin passed away earlier this month. She left her estate to fund a new professorship or research centre at Stony Brook University. Berezin won multiple awards and honourary degrees, and was inducted into the Women in Technology International Hall of Fame.

#Evelyn Berezin #Business & Finance #Science & Technology #Steve Jobs #Bill Gates #Computers #Computer Science #Microsoft Word #New York University #Physics #Teleregister #Word Processor #WWII #Redactron #Belarusian 🇧🇾 Russian 🇷🇺 Jewish

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yellowcry · 1 month ago

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Freezing in flames

Kkila grew to be alone. There wasn't really anyone to speak of. But, she did wanted a friend.

They were opposites. In every sense of this word. But, in the spinning planet, Barin kept as the most stable thing in her life

Help guyzzz I somehow started to make an original work pls hit me with a shovel affectionately because what is this???

She slides down on the unteamable brook, allowing the bluish river to splash across of her. Water poured out of the brim, trailing on the thick heavy ground. Drips sipped through the cracks, allowing her mother to swallow the coldness of the steam.

Drops in the current laughed, following Kkila like a bunch of mischievous atoms. They laughed, pushing eachother out of the way to outrun their goddess.

Kkila laughed, choking on the air, allowing the warmth to spread in the water. She raised her wave above the bed, throwing into the ford on the other side. For a second almost growing wings and tensing against the rock-hard air. It slid between particles of her body, saturating her with jiggly bubbles of oxygen. Kkila chuckled, splaching in her new spot. The newfound bubbles felt like when Dqua prickled at her, caressing her with the sunrays. Creating a tickling feeling in the lowest layers of water that escaped higher and higher until air escaped her hold.

And she ran again. Kkila wasn't the type to sit still and wait. Her life was turbulent, running down the bright streams. Transferring into each river, every sea that bent down to her, what was her closest and most special friend.

And, her only friend if she was honest.

Liquid sparkles in the light of the sun, bright rays create a colorful shimmer. Kkila raises the bright spot, and in a punch of inertion it splashes over as she giggles, going back where she was a moment ago.

After all, water wasn't static.

Becides, existing sometimes was very lonely. There was nobody for her. Sometimes Sun jumped to visit her and ask how she was doing. (Or, it came because Dqua needed something, but she didn't want to think about it.) The Earth, her mother, if she could call it this way, was always with her husband ever since they had bound their lives on the altar of the sunrise. Bathing in the morning light and vowing to one another.

Kkila remembered this yellowish oreol surrounding the pair. Bright rays jumped on Earth, making her look like a divine being. More so than Kkila could even hope for, because this beauty wasn't something from this world.

And it wasn't just her soul, physical body, rhe one they stood on melted in the sun, yellow and orange filled one another and pressed into the grey, until the well-known dullness died in the swirl of the morning sky.

And with all of this two older beings had eachother. For as long as water goddess remembered herself. Having been brought to life when Dqua, in an act of love moved Earth's celestial body at some very specific spot. Kkila didn't completely understand what was so special about it.

With the binding between the elder pair, Kkla was squeezed in too tight, often left somewhere at the edge.

She didn't travel between stars to know something Earth didn't. This was a mere fact of her being bound to the planet. What Dqua, in his very wordy tongue, called Humus-y. Her life was bound to the groung like the one who cradled her from the beginning and to the very end.

Phesta did visit once or twice. But she was too serious for Kkila's taste, always focus on her science and 'how things are supposed to be'. And ot wasn't like Primarly Gods, somebody ranked as high as the fabric of reality itself, were in Kkila's league to begin with.

Beybe that's why Dqua and the Earth preffered each other too.

The first time she spotted a new person was by complete accident. She ran in the mountains, and the rocks dug in, scratching and biting and helping her to push forward. This wasn't a new thing to do. But if in the lower parts on the surface, what was below, the unbending force of her cage was getting softer, chipping around the erosion of her breath, then here it didn't bulge. Cold and steady as ever.

The difference was strange. Not like she wasn't aware of it before, in the end of the day it was connected to the ocean. And from there to countless other water spots wherevershe could be. And she did explore other parts of the world before too.

And there, for a brief second, Kkila could swear, she saw a pinch of burning black chrust, peeking from behing the giant tower of nature.

This was enough to get her attention. Seeing somebody she had never seen before was... weird. This took away her breathe, leaving her almost frozen for a brief second. She had never seen anyone becides her planet's personification or the light. Now there could be somebody new. And Kkila clung to the idea. She loved travelling, playing a catch game with herself. The feeling of streams running across and inside of her were the most thrilling in her life. But with all of this, she wouldn't be honest if she said it wasn't lonely.

The mere idea of having somebody else made the world warmer, speeding the ruthless waves and crushing them into the mountained bottom.

She ran, when the water slipped from under her from speed of the sheer excitement. She could actually see someone, talk to them. She wanted a friend. More than anything.

The stranger gasped, leaving a thick burnt smell in the air. The kind that made Kkila choke and cough, before she fell on the bottom of the river, escaping the sickening taste.

When she raised her head above the ground, she could see bright red cracks getting firther and firther away. Leaving nothing but a tray of disgusting smoke that lifted itself until it dissapeared high above Kkila's vision.

Kkila blinked, trying to pull herself to follow him (this was a thing about god-like beings like herself, they were aware how to call the other person from the very beginning), but this was no use. Maybe she had ability to infinitely speeding up inside her domain, but the ground was a different story. Each step sent a wave of throbbing pain, like thousand small crambs dug on her. Forcing a wave of agony to rise under her surface. Until she collapsed face on the ground, psolashing around as the sea carefully pulled her back in.

She just wanted to see him! This could be her first friend and now he ran away so what if Kkila would never see him again? How was sne meant to have friends if the only person just left without saying a word.

The next time she met him was several days later. Probably. It was hard to tell when Dqua kept spinning the Earth to amuse her. Thr fact Kkila could travel from one side of the world to the opposite so fast didn't help her case. She didn't hold much knowledge about time's progression, forgive her Carvel.

The stranger peeked againn, carefully, almost invisible. Weak cracking sound followed him, ringing between the ancient rocky walls. Bringht red lights danced on the temples, sinking into the rocks

She didn't manage to talk to him this time either. When she tried to call him, the boy ran back up again.

For quite a while their relationship were like this. Kkila sometimes noticed her.... not probably a friend, looking at her from far away. But each time he realized he wasn't sercetive enough , he rushed as fast as he could, leaving the freezing grops of magma behing.

Kkila never understood why. She didn't bite, she just wanted to talk! But each time she was met with the blindlingly bright black back that melted in the heavy mountain. Red stood brigher than distant stars at night, jumping between the closed space.

But with every time, it was going further. Without either of them even realizing it, the burning child was taking one step closer to the water every time. And their enternal souls had all time in the world.

"H-hi?" Kkila winced, and the water got so still. Stiff like the rocks surrounding it. She blinked, turning her head. Those weren't her parents by the sound of it. And, well, there wasn't much of anyone else to speak off.

She was used to the loneliness gnawling on her soul. Even if most of the time she felt it scratching within her, buting off the pieces of the water. Because even if she grew to accept it, she wanted somebody. Anyone to talk to, to play with more than anything.

Her eyes snapped open as she stared up. The same coal black body. Now, that he stold close, Kkila felt an intence heat, such a strong one that made bits of liquid turn into particles it the air and fly up high.

She let out a screech, pure happiness courced through the river she was in. "Hello! Let's be friends!" The boy startled, pushing himself away as his body tensed and the heat became stronger. Almost unconformable. He shifted, ready to run away once again. Kkila let out a gasp, the river bed suddenly became too tight for her. "NO, NO I'm sorry don't leave please, stay, I didn't mean to–"

"It's okay." Her new acquaintances said, his voice was low, and the same cracking that came from him was buried incide his vocal cords. Still, he was stiff and unnaturally afraid. Nearly overwhelmed with Kkila's bubbling excitement.

The goddess of water cocked the wave she was in, looking him up. "I don't bite." She giggled, forcing her surroundings to tremble. What wasn't a solid ground anyway. "And, who are you?"

"B-barin." He mumbled, almost unhearable. Shifting his weight from one half to other.

"And I'm Kkila." She screamed, not by meaning but because of how happy she was to finally talk with her new friend.

"One of the Gods too?"

She nodded eagerly. "Yes, I'm the emboidement of water! And you?"

"Lava, and, well, fire."

Barin snapped his fingers, forcing a small flame to dance in the air. Waves clapped in excitement, as Kkila couldn't look away. Hypnotized by the slow movement of the heat. The image was so mystical, enchanting like a forbidden tale from the place out of time or space.

"You're so cool!"

The fire winced and something what Kkila could almost classify as surprise appeared in his face. "You think so?"

She, in fact, thought so. It was so different from what she managed to do with her water. Unbelievable to the instinct of her nature. Spending most of her days playing with only water she found magic in anything that didn't held to its laws. And these movements, flaching yellow wasn't something that Kkila thought she had ever felt by herself.

For a moment she pulled forward, gently touching the tiny flame.

Before scream escaped her and she shoced herself at the opposite brim. It was hot. Not that simple warm from the sun or that she felt at times when she was so happy it spilled out. Burning hot. The bits of water evaporated, melting into bits of clouds that rose above her. Waves shook around her, splashing against the ground. Pain sipped deep under her surface, tearing something within her out to the naked eye. Pulling her apart into small pieces.

If Barin looked worried before, maybe shy and concerned, then now he was mortified. His body stiff as if an entire mountain just collapsed on him, crashing him like a pebble. For a few second, parts of him, whenever the water managed to fall lost their glowing blackness, turning dull and unliving. Low hisses broke through the water that faded on him. Before eventually they warmed up again, getting back that atmosphere that seemed to follow Barin like a moon. Fierce and hot.

He let out a fume, taking a step back. "Are– are you hurt? I'm sorry! I'm sorry I-..."

He turned back, trembling from shock, running for a moment.

And Kkila felt something within her breaking. That little hope of not being alone getting strained. "No, it's okay! Don't leave!"

It took so long for Barin to talk to her, she didn't want to wait that long for it to happen again. If it even would.

"But I just hurt you!"

Kkila shook in despair, trying to sound as confident as she could. "Don't worry, it wasn't that bad, and it doesn't even hurt anymore "

This was a lie. Because it, in fact, was painful as hell. But if it meant she could keep friends with Barin then she would say so without a second thought.

She doesn't want to be alone.

Even if the deepest rat of her is aching, making the world jump pale and dark.

"Are you sure?" He asked, deep florigh glowed bright, like a star dancing in the pitch black sky of his surface. Breathing shook, coming in frantic gasps. "You screamed, I– I thought..."

"Just... surprised." Kkila swallowed the soot, whatever had gotten into her during the short interfere. "We can still be friends!"

Barin, at least looking at her, backed away a little, his eyes frantically searched around the place. "I don't want to hurt you."

"I'm fine, just, stay. We can talk or... do something!" She clung to it, to the possibility of anyone around like her life depended on it.

Their friendship was weird to day at the least. Kkila was a child of unteamable wind, always in rush. Keeping a smile under the light rays that drooled on her. Emotional just like the waves that surrounded her.

Barin was quiet, he could comfortably spend time alone. A silent conductor. The ground shook with every step he took, deathly fire rose around him, and the flames jumped up high.

"Was you.... really okay being alone?" Kkila shifts her face up, lying at the bank. It's not usual har and rough. She wasn't sure what happened to the ground, but with time it was getting softer. Changes were confusing, filling her with unsertanity. Even if she was all into them, willing to take a new step and make a difference. She didn't find relief in the old rocky roads and death that stripped from the tiniest veins of this planet.

Barin shrugs. "Yeah, pretty much." His voice drops, as he leans on a couch of fresh-baked lava that he created during the last eryption. "Maybe a bit boring at times but..."

But he didn't long for connection the same way Kkila did despite being alive for far longer. He didn't spend countless time, trying to find somebody to talk to. At least not as desperate as herself. No matter what Kkila said, she knew that lonelies was digging into her. Pain that was so much worse than when her best friend actually came too close and made her burn. Evaporate.

They could destroy each other of they were too close, it was a matter realized early on. As much as part of Kkila was jealous when she withnessed others being able to interact with Barin without being surrounded in a fog that just treatened to crumble their existence. Even if Kkila knows he can't technically kill her, after all, they were gods. Barin would need to evaporate all water that was here to exist to actually damage her. But the feeling of flames licking her still wasn't pleasant.

And if liquid was too much, Kkila could put him out. Leaving nothing but wet coals behign, for a secind or two. Before the heat got into power again, lightening him like the sun.

But between the rock and a hard place, they clung to connection on this changing planet. Earth did lak to them, especially now that Dqua was gone, suddenly remembering they had an actual purpose. One that was far more than being sickly in love. Stars weren't dreaming after all. They were so distant, so tiny from Kkila's home.

Do they have water or fire too? Do these dots of the planets have their own little divine beings? Tied to their spinning worlds just like her.

Could she befriend the stars?

Barin laughed, calling her a dork. And the plates deep inside shifted when his smile makes lava in the very core of the Earth jump. And no matter what, he stayed with her.

Even when Dqua left and Earth now was the lonely one, Kkila and Barin kept together. Maybe she wasn't as restless as she was in her early centuries, and maybe Barin was openinng up with every day. He still was silent and calmer part of their duo, but with time, chats that used to be Kkila just infodumping, because Fire's replies were short and shaky. Then now they discussed things, even if there wasn't much. Maybe those weird changes that this place began to expirince. The Earth was getting different from what it used to be. Both the planet, that had swapped into something with every day. Putting on a new costume. But the soul too. Without questions, Earth haven't taken her parther's departure too well. Always talking about how he was supposed to return soon.

Kkila felt bad, of course, but she was the last person who actually could change anything in the way things were. Water was impossibly distant from the burning light of the star.

Barin remids her on how she was the closest to the spreading heat of fire even if unable to contact with it. Not like she never tried. Part of Kkila really wondered how it was to be him. But the only effect it ever had was causing pain to them both. Even if Barin kept denying it, assuring he was okay. With time, Kkila grew to understand his pain signals. And the fact that being put out wasn't just a mild inconsistence, but very bad for his health.

In alternative universe, where Kkila had anyone to talk to before the clouds of their friendship collapsed on itself, forming their bond. That one that kept being brighter than the eye in the sky. In the world where she wasn't so lonely, the idea of her and Barin as best friends would feel like a fever dream. Something she would never believe.

But this wasn't alternative universe. And Kkila wouldn't want to change the things for all oceans in the worlds.

Because Barin had never left her. Even in times when bumps stopped on their road and tried to prevent them from understanding, they always were together. Sometimes against the whole universe. No matter if Phesta assured that their relation wasn't a real thing. (She was so dense, it made Kkila's surface ache, how in the world feeling not being physical meant it wasn't real?) And, well, it wasn't like Carvel ever showed up. Kkila wasn't sure why, but the Second (or first, she wasn't sure which order they came in) Of Primarly Gods practically never came on Earth. And when he had to, it was brief, with him keaving as fast as possible. Because it 'wasn't how the universe intended and he was breaking the laws if time'

One day, they will have somebody else born in this small corner. Whoever happened to come to life next. Kkila didn't really know. As Barin said, with all the changes, how the hard ground was turning soft and pliable, how the air became solid, lying heavy on them. Changes would result in new concept being born. And new concepts meant new gods.

Hopefully, they would be friends too. With all the changes, it didn't meant Kkila wasn't the same social and outgoing part of the duet. And Barin wasn't as shy, so with this things would go so much more smooth the next time.

But this day had been yet to come. So many things wouod happen in the future that she had no idea of being possible. But it was staying in the future and speeded up in a rapid pace.

#help bro #I'll probably change the name #very weird stuff that happened to me #kkila #barin #ao3 author #fanfic #reborn in grief

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