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dcxdpdabbles · 6 months ago

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Die with a Smile

For @anonymous-existences who asked for a "Die with a Smile" by Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga using Spirt Halloween ship. Hope you like it!

Danny remembers being alive, but it was a distant memory as if he had woken from a wonderful dream. He could recall no scents or tastes from his time being flesh and bone, but he remembered sights and sometimes, if he was lucky a few sounds.

The sound of his sister singing. His father's laughter. His mother's humming. His best friend's fingers tap on his keyboard. His other best friend's plants when the water of her watering can fell over their leaves.

Danny held all the sounds dear to his heart, even if he could not remember their names or voices. Just their faces, smiles, and the warmth in their eyes before the car accident. Danny had been a Halfa from the age of fourteen, but twenty years later, he had died in a collision caused by a drunk driver, turning into a complete ghost.

Like all his previous adversaries, Danny could no longer return to the human world willy-nilly. He had reformed after he died in the Zone, becoming one of its citizens, anchored to the Realms between Death and Life.

He needed a gateway made by a mortal who willingly invited him through. All natural portals were nice, but it was a one-way. Anyone could pass through them to the Realms, not vice versa.

His parents had unknowingly created an open invitation when they stabilized their portal, allowing ghosts to run a rampage in the city. Danny doesn't remember why they had made it, but he wishes it was still there so he could see them again.

So that he could feel the deep love so evident in the glimpses and flashes of their faces that ran through his mind. He couldn't find his way back, so he spent years looking. He was one of the few ghosts that had no anchored haunt. Danny spends all eternity flying through the Realms in search of the love that he had once felt.

He lost count of how long ago that was. But along the way, he picked up other various wonders.

A bag that opens to his pocket of cosmos is flung over his shoulder. A long cloak that protected him from the scorching heat, freezing blizzards, howling winds, and drowning rain. A glimmering book that recorded his adventures in the consultations. And many new friends who have been in the Realms for so long they had developed their own culture and given birth to generations that knew nothing of the mortal realm.

Danny's ghost's name had also faded from his mind, knowing he used to answer something when he was fourteen. He is grateful that his birth name stays with him, even if he does not know his surname.

He now went as the Wander. Always searching for something he did not know if he could hold, let alone own. Wander grew in power, for his death had brought along all the ectoplasm of his Halfa days, and while his travels were relatively peaceful, there were times he needed to fight his way through.

He has never been defeated.

That was Danny's experience now. Wander, find adventure, find friends, find new incredible sights, become saddened that the new things didn't match the love he set on a pedestal, and wander again.

Over and over. Never lingering for too long. Never belonging.

Just lost in the endless void of the Realms.

Then, Danny had run into him.

A human had fallen through a portal caused by unnatural means. It was due to being attacked by a monstrous tyrant that was threatening his world. Omega Beam radiation polluted the portal, and for a second, Danny had thought he had finally found a stable way into the human world.

But alas, when he approached it, an invisible force kept him from leaving the Realms. Its constant flickering and electrical crackles mocked him, even if the scene behind the portal depicted a broken world.

Danny wanted nothing more than to fly through the human world, feel all those fantastic emotions, and live again. He pushed and pushed against the force field; however, there was no open invitation. He could not pass through the portal.

The human that fell after being pushed by the sudden explosion could. Danny had caught him and nursed him back to health, and when he awakened, he was struck dumb by those intense, intelligent eyes.

Batman was the name the human gave him, and for a few months, that was what Danny called him. The way to his home, an Earth called Gotham, had closed as soon as the omega beams had vanished. Batman was beside himself, attempting to find another portal.

As the man was living without means of flight between islands, Danny offered to take him to a few natural portals. He warned him that even if he could enter said portals, there was no guarantee he would be back when he vanished.

Portals bend time and space. They may appear in the same spot, but it was also a gamble of when that would be. Batman had no care, taking Danny's offer, and the two went off on a new adventure.

The broken pieces of an endless city was the connection between the Realms and Batman's Gotham. It took some time before Batman admitted that the city they traveled through - as, for some reason, the city bounds stopped Danny's flight - was his beloved city. It was an exact duplicated, over and over again as time moved on in the mortal world; this one copied every new development without removing the old one.

It merely expanded right next to the old building. The natural portals across the range were unstable, lasting only a few seconds before Batman was forced to throw himself back into the Realm or he got stuck at the wrong time.

Batman left a clue at every stop the portal gave him, claiming one of his children would notice and help find a way to bring him home. Danny wasn't so sure, but if the human found comfort in the thought, he would not be the one to burst his bubble.

As for Danny, the familiar emptiness that came with the urge to move on never showed itself. He found comfort in the footsteps of Batman. He found glee in the laughter around the small fires they make in the destroyed streets, void of any color.

Danny had forgotten most colors, so used to the Grey's, blacks, whites and dark purples of the Realms but the way Batman spoke of it made him think back to the reds blues yellows and greens he had not realized he missed.

Slowly, his journal filled itself with nothing but the mortal he had found.

Batman survived on what little they could find in the broken streets of his colorless home. He seemed disgruntled by the silence of the repeating streets, the obvious signs of violence that never quite healed in his city.

After a while, Danny realized he felt whole again. As if a part of his soul had been returned. Batman did not bring him back to life, but he made him feel alive.

Danny informed him it meant the land was cursed, but that only earned him a cold glare and a sharp bite of beef jerky from a gas station with its window smashed in. Their travels continued, with Danny dreaming of the five sounds he could recall of his loved ones- he did not need food anymore as a ghost, but he did need sleep. His core required recharge- realizing a new sound had been added.

The sound of Batman's soft taps as he marched on, searching for a way home.

Danny created a new constellation for him. He named it the Lost Vengence. It seemed right, even if Batman rarely spoke.

A few months of them together, Batman had wandered into an air that exploded with green grass. He grasped for his belt, but whatever he was searching for wasn't there, and he fell to his knees screaming.

Danny, who hadn't breathed it in, had rushed him over to a crumbled hospital, strapping the human down and panicking over his state. He was no doctor, but if he left Batman alone to get help, leaving the area that didn't allow him to fly would take far too long, and Batman would die.

Already, his heart was beating too fast for a human. Danny had ripped off his strange mask, trying to get him out of the clothes covered in the green goo, but it didn't do much. All that was left was a human- a handsome human- screaming his head off.

Eventually, Danny realized that his journal may have the answer. He could not always remember what he recorded, but if he asked it to, it would pull up records of adventures he may have forgotten.

There was a method of passing on his healing that Frostbite once shared with him long before his death. He pressed his hands over Batman's chest, not with his palms but with his soul, and prayed the human would accept it.

A few minutes later, Danny's ectoplasm had sunk through the skin and cleaned out the effects of the strange grass. Batman slumped against the metal table, breathing heavily and sweating profoundly, but he stared up at Danny as if he were bestowing an angel.

Since ectoplasm was purely emotional, no words had to be shared between them to know Danny had wanted to save him more than anything. Had felt the way Batman made him feel complete.

"My name is Bruce Wayne," Batman had told him later that night while the pair looked through a mall that seemed to have been flooded. The water splashed against their mid-calfs, slowly picking their way through the new clothes that Bruce could wear.

His soft smile filled up to his core, and neither mentioned the way the distance between them closed or the fingers that laced together,but Danny knew he had found it.

What he had been searching for all these years.

Bruce would sometimes stop them in the nicer parts of his city- places that merely went out of business instead of being broken down- and treat him to the few things he had forgotten of the human world.

An ice cream parlor had been stripped clean, but the owners had left one fringe with three tubs of ice cream. As time was frozen, it was good to eat, and Danny realized that while he did not need food, he did enjoy it. Bruce was sensitive to the weather that changed every few hundred miles.

In the parts with ice and snow, he curled up on Danny's chest, protected by the cloak that expanded to cover them. In the fires, he was carried on Danny's back, the fabric of the cloak protecting him from burning while Danny's hair flickers snowflakes for him to breathe.

Other times, he merely liked holding hands because he, too, felt whole with Danny.

Then they came upon a part of town that belonged to Bruce's third youngest son. He called it the Nest, and a date and time was carved on the wall. His son had found a way to stabilize a portal, and he planned to pull Bruce back home.

The boy thought Bruce was trapped in the past, but his rescue would still work. Bruce could finally return to the humans.

He understood. Danny had lived his life. Now, it was time for Bruce to finish his.

"Will you go? Would you leave me?" Danny knew the answer to his questions the second he looked into Bruce's eyes. It cracked something deep inside, but he was not angry or feeling betrayed.

"I'm sorry," Bruce whispers, tracing his hand on the curve of Danny's cheek. The ghost leans on it, wishing, not for the first time that he had the sensation of touch again. He only gets brief impressions of something against him, but Danny can not feel the texture of Bruce's clauses.

The warmth of his skin.

"Don't be. This was the best part of my existence in a long time. You were everything that I had forgotten about love."

He knew humans were warm. He remembers a tiny moment when his sister's fingers in his hair comforted him.

But he could not remember what their warmth felt like.

Bruce's face crumbled before it softened. "I'm not gone yet. We have a few hours."

"Just three," Danny whispered, looking at the numbers on Bruce's watch. He had set a countdown to when Tim would activate the machine- the portal- that only called Bruce home. Since the boy did not know it wasn't a time issue but a different reality, he had unintentionally made it with only Bruce in mind.

The force keeping all ghosts like Danny in the Realms wouldn't let him enter.

"I know how I want to spend them." Bruce found a record player broken in the movie theater beside his son's shining new hideout. Apparently, it was the one that had been abandoned in Bruce's youth.

It played a lovely old, slow dance from the forties that echoed through the dusted room, surrounding them in its soft, wistful melody. Bruce guided Danny to the center of the stage- the only place not covered in dust or supplies- and carefully bent him into an elegant dip.

At that moment, Danny and Bruce were all that existed in the broken-ended city of Gotham's past.

A smile blooms on Danny's face, twirling around the man who caught him and guided him, saying without words how much he adored Danny. The unsaid words between them meant nothing in the face of their world ending, but their smiles made up for it.

Danny's book had fallen open at one point, his collected stars and cosmos flying out to surround the pair as they swayed and slowly danced. He felt the thumping of Bruce's heart against his chest, pressing closer to record the feeling in his core and soul.

Song after song. Step, spin, sway, dip, intelligent eyes that watched him with the same amount of wishful longing and bright, loving smile.

"I could die again," Danny told him, hands on Bruce's shoulders and the human hands on his hip.

"I am," Bruce whispered back as his clock started beeping. They had ten seconds left. "I want you to remember me with a smile."

"Of course." Danny leaned back only far enough that when he pushed his face against Bruce's, their lips sealed in a burst of incredible, indescribable sensations. All at once, it's like sounds, feelings, tastes, and sights rush back at him, making him feel as if life was being breathed back into him, only for it to vanish as Bruce's body slowly fades away.

He leans back after his hands pass through Bruce's body, no longer anchored enough in the Realms to hold, and gives him the brightest smile he can muster. Neither mentions the tears rolling down their faces as he whispers.

"The party is over, and our time on this Earth is through, but I'll love you. For all eternity. I always do when I think of those who are still alive." Danny watches him fade away in soft, gentle sparks that he would later gather and shift into stardust.

He places them in Gotham's skies so Bruce can have a tiny part of him, even though he cannot see it. Danny turns around and marches back towards the realms.

The Wander must find a new purpose.

#dcxdpdabbles #dcxdp crossover #Die with a Smile #Part 1 #spirt halloween ship #TW: Main charater death #Danny misses his human side #Bruce fell in love but he has a life to live #They were only meant a little while #slight angst #bittersweet ending?#Tim brings Bruce home #Danny is unaware he's an Accient since he can effect the living world even if he can't travel to it

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mswyrr · 10 months ago

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I'm very glad to hear your child's school has moved to protect kids and staff like that 💜 and I hope many more schools do so. I'm aware of various states and municipalities where there's growing traction on this issue and it gives me hope. Thank you for sharing @sunburnt-in-inaka

#covid tag #public health #it's about covid but also flu and rvs and all airborne illnesses as well as allergies and protecting kids from smoke due to climate change #hepa protects people from other pollutants as well - from cars and industry

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reasonsforhope · 1 year ago

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"Clothing tags, travel cards, hotel room key cards, parcel labels … a whole host of components in supply chains of everything from cars to clothes. What do they have in common? RFID tags.

Every RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tag contains a microchip and a tiny metal strip of an antenna. A cool 18bn of these are made – and disposed of – each year. And with demands for product traceability increasing, ironically in part because of concerns for the social and environmental health of the supply chain, that’s set to soar.

And guess where most of these tags end up? Yup, landfill – adding to the burgeoning volumes of e-waste polluting our soils, rivers and skies. It’s a sorry tale, but it’s one in which two young graduates of Imperial College London and Royal College of Art are putting a great big green twist. Under the name of PulpaTronics, Chloe So and Barna Soma Biro reckon they’ve hit on a beguilingly simple sounding solution: make the tags out of paper. No plastic, no chips, no metal strips. Just paper, pure and … simple … ? Well, not quite, as we shall see.

The apparent simplicity is achieved by some pretty cutting-edge technical innovation, aimed at stripping away both the metal antennae and the chips. If you can get rid of those, as Biro explains, you solve the e-waste problem at a stroke. But getting rid of things isn’t the typical approach to technical solutions, he adds. “I read a paper in Nature that set out how humans have a bias for solving problems through addition – by adding something new, rather than removing complexity, even if that’s the best approach.”

And adding stuff to a world already stuffed, as it were, can create more problems than it solves. “So that became one of the guiding principles of PulpaTronics”, he says: stripping things down “to the bare minimum, where they are still functional, but have as low an environmental impact as possible”.

...how did they achieve this magical simplification? The answer lies in lasers: these turn the paper into a conductive material, Biro explains, printing a pattern on the surface that can be ‘read’ by a scanner, rather like a QR code. It sounds like frontier technology, but it works, and PulpaTronics have patents pending to protect it.

The resulting tag comes in two forms: in one, there is still a microchip, so that it can be read by existing scanners of the sort common within retailers, for example. The more advanced version does away with the chip altogether. This will need a different kind of scanner, currently in development, which PulpaTronics envisages issuing licences for others to manufacture.

Crucially, the cost of both versions is significantly cheaper than existing RFID kit – making this a highly viable proposition. Then there are the carbon savings: up to 70% for the chipless version – so a no-brainer from a sustainability viewpoint too. All the same, industry interest was slow to start with but when PulpaTronics won a coveted Dezeen magazine award in late 2023, it snowballed, says So. Big brands such as UPS, DHL, Marks & Spencer and Decathlon came calling. “We were just bombarded.” Brands were fascinated by the innovation, she says, but even more by the price point, “because, like any business, they knew that green products can’t come with a premium”."

-via Positive.News, April 29, 2024

Note: I know it's still in the very early stages, but this is such a relief to see in the context of the environmental and human rights catastrophes associated with lithium mining and mining for rare earth metals, and the way that EVs and other green infrastructure are massively increasing the demand for those materials.

I'll take a future with paper-based, more humane alternatives for sure! Fingers crossed this keeps developing and develops well (and quickly).

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s1ut-4-rafe · 3 months ago

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ALWAYS BEEN YOU | Drew Starkey

MASTERLIST (One Shot)

Pairing - Drew Starkey x HighSchool Sweetheart! Reader

Summary - Years ago, the reader and Drew Starkey were high school sweethearts, convinced forever was yours. But when he left to chase his dreams as an actor, life pulled you apart. Now, he's back in town to visit family, and the last thing either of you expected was to cross paths again.

Word Count - 3628

Content - Fluff, high school sweethearts, second chance, reunion, soft angst, sfw

It’s was a crisp spring morning in Hickory, North Carolina, the kind of day when the air smells like fresh beginnings and the sun’s warmth dances through the trees. A perfect morning for a walk, and you couldn’t help but smile as you stepped into your favorite local café.

The scent of roasted beans and cinnamon lingered in the air as you waited for your order, your fingers drumming idly against the countertop. It was a simple routine—one you’d done countless times before.

With your drink in hand, you pushed the door open, stepping back into the crisp morning air. The first sip was perfect, rich and smooth, the warmth seeping through you as you started down the familiar path.

You’d been walking this same path for years now, and it never lost its magic. It felt as though nature itself was waking up from a long, sleepy winter, just like you used to feel every time you walked through these park gates, years ago.

Spring was always your favorite time of year, when everything felt new again. The birds were chirping, the trees were budding, and the flowers that had laid dormant for so long were now in full bloom. It was the kind of place that made you feel grounded, at peace with everything around you.

As your boots crunched against the gravel path, you couldn’t help but let your mind wander back to the days when this park was so much more than just a peaceful place to walk. It was your place, where you and Drew used to come together after school, your laughter echoing through the trees and the distant sounds of the creek flowing gently beside you.

You remembered it so clearly: how he’d always walk with you, never wanting to leave your side. How the air between you always felt charged, even back then. Before he had his car, you’d take the bus together every day, sitting side by side, talking about everything and nothing at the same time. The world felt so big and full of possibility back then, but also so small, because you and Drew had each other. It was simple. It was perfect.

The two of you were inseparable in high school, always finding a way to be together. Whether it was lunch in the courtyard or late-night phone calls until you both fell asleep, you never imagined life without him. He lived just a few streets over, and that made it all the easier. You’d talk about your dreams, his dreams, where you’d both go when graduation came. And you were so sure then, so certain that nothing could ever tear you apart.

But of course, life had a different plan.

After graduation, Drew left for Los Angeles to chase his dream of becoming an actor, which was something you both had always talked about. He promised to visit when he could, but it was clear that life was pulling you in different directions.

While Drew was headed west, you found yourself on the other side of the world, stepping onto a new college campus that felt both thrilling and overwhelming. You had gotten into your dream school, a prestigious marine biology program, and for the first time, you truly felt like you were where you were meant to be. The ocean had always been your love, and now you were diving into it—literally.

You studied everything from coral reefs to ocean pollution, learning about how the oceans were changing and how humans were affecting the sea life you had always been so passionate about protecting. It wasn’t just about books and classrooms; you worked on real-world projects, traveling to remote areas to help protect endangered sea creatures, and even working with conservation groups to create plans to help restore the oceans.

Every day felt like an adventure, whether you were diving in the middle of the ocean or figuring out new ways to fight for the world’s waters. It was hard being so far away from home and from Drew, but this was your dream. And it was unfolding in ways you had never imagined.

That summer before you left, you and Drew sat on this very path, beneath the same oak trees, and talked for hours about your relationship. You had no idea when you went to meet him there that it would be the last time you'd sit together, side by side, in that park. The last time you'd have easy, carefree conversations. The goodbye you shared was mutual, but that didn't make it any less painful. Both of you understood what was at stake—chasing your dreams and finding who you were meant to be.

The text messages and occasional calls faded over time, until they eventually stopped altogether. You never expected to lose him, but somewhere along the way, it happened anyway.

And now, here you are, standing in the same park, and life had changed so much since those days, yet the park remained the same, unchanging.

You took another sip of your coffee, smiling softly to yourself, as a breeze danced through the trees. Sometimes, you couldn’t help but wonder if things would’ve been different if Drew had stayed. But then again, that’s the funny thing about life is it never really lets you know what would have happened.

With a sigh, you decided it was time to get a few things from the grocery store before heading back home. You tucked your hands into the pockets of your jacket and turned toward the street, making your way toward the small, family-owned store near the edge of town.

The bell above the grocery store door jingled softly as you stepped inside, a scent of fresh produce and baked goods greeting you. It was the small-town market you’d grown up with, the kind where everyone knew everyone’s name—or at least their face.

You grabbed a basket, moving through the aisles distractedly, your thoughts still swirling around your walk in the park. You weren’t sure how long you’d been walking around aimlessly when you turned the corner to grab a carton of eggs and saw the last person you’d expect to see standing there.

Drew.

For a moment, time seemed to freeze. He was really there, standing just a few feet away, casually browsing through the shelves, his dark hair slightly longer than it had been the last time you saw him. His features were still strikingly familiar, strong jaw, those same blue eyes you’d gotten lost in too many times to count, but now there was a certain air about him, like life had marked him in ways you couldn't quite understand.

He hadn’t seen you yet, and you wondered for a second if you should just turn around and make a quick exit. But the pull was too strong. You couldn’t avoid it forever.

You took a step forward, and that's when he turned, his eyes locking onto yours with the same recognition, a flicker of surprise crossing his face. The world felt a little too small, a little too still, as the moment hung between you.

"Hey," he said, his voice low but warm, as if he were still unsure of how to approach this unexpected encounter.

"Hey," you replied, your voice a little softer than usual, like the weight of so many unspoken things was pressing on your chest.

For a few seconds, neither of you spoke. The noise of the store faded into the background as you both tried to adjust to the reality of seeing each other again after so many years. It was like you were both teenagers again, but now you were adults, with different lives and different paths. Awkwardness lingered in the air, but the chemistry that you two shared hadn’t disappeared. It was still there and as strong as ever.

Drew shifted, scratching the back of his neck with a nervous chuckle. "I, uh, didn't expect to run into you here."

You laughed softly, shaking your head. "I didn't either, to be honest."

There was another beat of silence, but it wasn’t uncomfortable now. It was just... natural. After all this time, it felt like you were both trying to piece together the puzzle of who you were now, who you had been, and how it all fit.

Finally, Drew spoke again, a little more at ease now. "Well, I’m in town visiting my family for a bit," he explained, his cart full of groceries. "I’m actually just picking up some things for them... but, uh, I was wondering—"

He paused for a second, his gaze drifting away from yours for a split second before locking back onto you, searching your face as if asking for permission.

"Would you like to catch up tonight? Maybe grab a drink or just walk around? I mean... I’m sure we both have a lot to talk about."

Your heart skipped. There was a hopeful glint in his eyes, and even though you both knew how much time had passed, how much had changed, it felt like the past was right there between you. The idea of catching up, of talking about everything and nothing, was tempting.

You nodded, a small smile tugging at your lips. "Yeah, I’d like that. Where should we meet?"

Drew’s smile widened, and for the briefest moment, everything felt like it used to—easy, comfortable, like no time had passed at all.

"How about our spot?" he suggested. "Our bench at the park. 5 o'clock sound good?"

"Perfect," you said. The words felt light, easy, like a promise.

He gave you one last look, and you could see something in his eyes—something that had always been there, even if it had faded a little over time. You both had been part of each other's lives once, and maybe, just maybe, tonight could help you figure out where you stood now.

"See you then," Drew said with a soft smile before turning to grab a few more things from the shelves, his footsteps fading as you made your way to the checkout.

As you paid for your items, a mix of excitement and nerves swirled in your stomach. This was unexpected, yes, but it also felt like something you didn’t want to miss. Drew was back in town. And maybe, just maybe, this was the chance to figure out what had never quite been finished between the two of you.

After the unexpected encounter at the store, you needed to ground yourself. The afternoon stretched out before you, and nothing was pressing on your schedule. You figured the best thing to do was to take a moment to breathe and ease your mind before meeting Drew later.

Back in your apartment, you slipped off your shoes and went to the kitchen to put the kettle on for some tea. You couldn’t help but smile a little, the warm cup of tea filling your hands as you watched the sunlight peek through the curtains.

It had been such a long time since you’d felt this level of quiet peace, like things were settled for just a moment. It was so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day, in the responsibilities that came with work and adulting, but today felt different. Maybe it was the reminder of simpler times or the unexpectedness of seeing Drew, but everything felt a little... lighter.

You spent the next few hours doing small things around the apartment, organizing old books, folding laundry, and listening to music softly in the background. You didn’t want to dive too deep into thoughts of the past yet. There was enough space in your mind for the present, for this new chapter you had built for yourself, and for today’s unexpected reunion. But it didn’t stop your mind from drifting now and then.

As the day wore on, you started to feel a quiet sense of anticipation, a tinge of excitement that you couldn’t quite place. After a light dinner, you started to get ready to leave. It was still a little before five when you grabbed your jacket and checked the time. There was no rush; just enough time to get to the park and breathe in the fresh air. You didn’t want to overthink this; just enjoy the moment of finally seeing him again.

The walk to the park was peaceful. The streets were quieter than usual, the soft murmur of the town around you giving way to the sound of your footsteps. The park came into view as you rounded the corner, there was a comforting familiarity to it all—the park, the bench, even the light rustle of the trees overhead.

When you finally reached the bench, you spotted Drew sitting there. He looked the same in many ways, but older too. It was the kind of look that made you realize just how much time had passed, how much had changed. Yet, there was something about him still that was so familiar. You hesitated for a moment, taking in the sight of him sitting there, just as he used to.

He looked up as you approached, his eyes lighting up with surprise and recognition. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "Hey," he said, standing up as you reached the bench. "I’m glad you came."

You returned the smile, settling onto the bench beside him. "I am, too."

The moment hung between you two, just a little heavy with unspoken words. You shifted slightly, the same old chemistry between you both still there, but also... different. There was an awkwardness, a distance that couldn’t be ignored. You weren’t sure what to say, and neither was he. For a few moments, the quiet of the park surrounded you—soft winds rustling the leaves, birds calling in the distance.

"So," Drew finally broke the silence, his voice lighter now. "Remember that day we went to the beach and I ended up with that ridiculous sunburn?"

You laughed at the memory, the sound of it filling the air between you two. "How could I forget? You were miserable for days. And you wouldn’t let me hear the end of it."

He grinned, clearly amused by the memory. "I deserved it. I was stupid enough to ignore your warnings about sunscreen." His smile faded slightly, like he was lost in thought for a moment. "But, you know, even that day felt... perfect. Everything about it felt right. The whole time, I knew I never wanted it to end."

You nodded, your heart stirring with the memory of those simpler days. The carefree summers, the laughter, the little moments when you and Drew felt like you were the only two people in the world. It almost felt like no time had passed at all, but the truth was undeniable: so much had changed, so much had shifted in the time between then and now.

Drew cleared his throat softly, looking over at you. "Do you ever wonder how things might’ve been if we hadn’t... gone in different directions?"

The question hung there, unspoken for so long, yet now was finally asked aloud. You looked away for a moment, taking a deep breath. "Sometimes," you admitted quietly. "I mean, it’s hard not to. I don’t know if things would’ve worked out, but I guess we’ll never know."

A moment of silence passed between you two before you looked at him again, your gaze a little more searching. You couldn’t stop the question that had been nagging at you since he left—since everything fell apart so suddenly. "Why did you really leave, Drew? You promised you’d visit. The calls, the texts... everything just stopped. Why didn’t you come back like you said you would?"

Drew’s expression shifted, and for a brief moment, his face became a little guarded. But then, his eyes softened, his gaze locking with yours as he took a deep breath. "I didn’t know how to handle it," he said quietly, his voice thick with regret.

"I thought that it was the right thing to do, for both of us. I thought you deserved more than what I could give you at the time, I was never around. I didn’t want to drag you into my world, into all that uncertainty. But that was the wrong choice. I should’ve kept in touch. I should’ve made the effort. I wasn’t... I wasn’t strong enough to stay."

He ran a hand through his hair, looking down for a moment, like he was trying to find the right words. "The truth is, I never got over you. I tried to move on with other people, but it was never the same. No matter who I was with, it didn’t feel right. You were always there. You were always in my head."

Your heart skipped a beat at his words. It was everything you’d wanted to hear, but now that it was said, everything felt even more complicated than before. You wanted to say something, but the words felt stuck in your throat.

Without thinking, you leaned in, pressing your lips to his in a soft, hesitant kiss. It was slow, lingering, like neither of you wanted to rush through it, not now, not after everything that had been said.

When you pulled back, your eyes locked onto Drew’s. The air between you felt heavier now, as though the kiss had opened up something neither of you were sure how to deal with. You could feel the tension, the unspoken words, and the feelings you both had buried deep over the years. There was so much left unsaid, so much left unresolved. But one thing was for sure now, whatever had been between you two, it was still there.

He looked at you, his expression soft but uncertain. "So... what now?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper, as if he wasn’t sure how to navigate this space between you both.

You took a deep breath, trying to steady your racing heart. "I don’t know," you said honestly, a slight smile tugging at the corners of your lips. "I guess... we take this one step at a time?"

Drew gave a small, nervous laugh, the sound of it almost as familiar as the way he used to laugh when he was caught off guard. He rubbed the back of his neck, clearly unsure but clearly wanting to be near you. "I know I’ve made a mess of things. But... I don’t want to mess this up again." His gaze softened, his voice earnest now. "I’ve missed you, Y/N, more than I ever thought I would."

The sincerity in his voice made your chest tighten. You could feel it too—the ache of missed opportunities, the gap that had formed between you over the years.

You looked out at the park for a moment, the peaceful surroundings a sharp contrast to the emotions swirling between you two. "I never stopped thinking about you either, Drew," you admitted softly. "I just... I had to keep going. I couldn’t keep waiting for you to come back. But really, I don’t know what happens next."

He nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving yours. "Look, I’m not asking for everything to be the same as it was before. I just want to be in your life again. Even if it’s a little messy at first. I want the chance to make things right... If you’ll let me."

You took another deep breath, the weight of his words settling in your chest. You didn’t have all the answers, and you couldn’t predict where this would go, but one thing was for certain: this moment felt like the beginning of something new. Something raw. Something real.

You reached out, your hand brushing his. It wasn’t a grand gesture, but it felt like enough. It felt like a promise.

"I want to see where this goes," you said, your voice steady but gentle.

Drew smiled, his whole face lighting up with a quiet relief. "That sounds perfect."

There was a moment of silence between you two, the kind that was full of unspoken understanding. And then, Drew spoke again, his voice firm but filled with determination.

"I’m not leaving anytime soon," he said, his gaze locking with yours. "I came back to visit, but... I think I need more time here. I want to figure things out with you. To make up for all the years we lost." His eyes softened with vulnerability.

The weight of his words settled in your chest, and you couldn’t help but smile, a mixture of relief and hope swirling inside you. This wasn’t just about him staying in town for a few extra days—he was making a choice, a commitment, to be present and to see where this could go.

"Are you sure? I mean…can you do that?" you asked, your voice a little breathless, both surprised and touched by his determination.

Drew nodded, his smile widening. "I’m sure, and yes, I can. I’m not ready to walk away from you again, not without giving this everything I’ve got."

The way he looked at you made your heart flutter, a mixture of hope and warmth blooming in your chest. You weren’t sure what the future would hold, but for the first time in a long while, you felt like you could face it.

"Okay," you said, a soft laugh escaping your lips. "Let’s see where this goes, then."

Drew grinned, his hand tightening around yours just a little, as if anchoring both of you to this moment. The park, the breeze, the way the evening light bathed everything in a soft glow—it all felt right. Like a new beginning, though neither of you could know what that would look like yet.

But you were willing to find out. Together.

#obx #rafe cameron #rafe fanfiction #rafe x reader #rafe outer banks #rafe cameron x y/n #rafe cameron x you #rafe imagine #rafe cameron fluff #rafe cameron one shot #rafe cameron x female reader #rafe obx #obx fanfic #obx oneshots #rafe cameron x reader #outer banks fanfiction

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dandelionsresilience · 5 months ago

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Dandelion News - February 8-14

(I’m finally starting to get better from having had pneumonia for 2+ weeks, hopefully next week’s news should be on time)

Like these weekly compilations? Tip me at $kaybarr1735 or check out my Dandelion Doodles!

1. Solar-powered device captures carbon dioxide from air to make sustainable fuel

“[The] solar-powered reactor could be used to make fuel to power cars and planes[.… It] does not require fossil-fuel-based power, or the transport and storage of carbon dioxide, but instead converts atmospheric CO2 into something useful using sunlight.”

2. How artificial light can boost coral reef recovery

“UZELA is [an autonomous submersible] designed to attract zooplankton […] by emitting specific wavelengths of light. [… In a ”six-month testing period,” it] significantly increased local zooplankton density and boosted the feeding rates of both healthy and bleached coral.”

3. Next-gen solar cells now fully recyclable with water-based method

“The recycled solar cell has the same efficiency as the original one. The solar cell is made of perovskite and the main solvent is water. […] They are not only relatively inexpensive and easy to manufacture but also lightweight, flexible and transparent.”

4. Green walls cool cities and create urban habitats

“The researchers measured a cooling effect of up to 0.6–0.7 degrees Celsius [… which] could help combat the urban heat island phenomenon. […] The researchers [also] found that plant-covered facades hosted over 100 animal species, including insects, spiders, and birds.”

5. Major cause of honeybee mortality can be easily reduced

“If treatment occurs too soon, it may not fully eliminate the mites, allowing them to rebound before the season ends. […] Similar to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, mites that survive mistimed or improperly applied treatments become more resistant to future applications.”

6. Uganda community group restores shea groves and livelihoods

“As part of a larger effort to restore Uganda’s shea parklands, the cooperative has successfully rehabilitated more than 500 hectares (1,240 acres) of degraded land, integrating shea trees (Vitellaria paradoxa) and other native species with maize and sunflower crops.”

7. Senate Renews Commitment to the Great Lakes

“The [Act] represents the most significant federal investment in the health of the Great Lakes, addressing critical challenges such as pollution, invasive species, and habitat restoration. The Great Lakes […] hold 20 percent of the world’s surface freshwater[….]”

8. Earth Gets Its Largest Protected Tropical Forest Reserve

“The Kivu-Kinshasa Green Corridor will […] protect 108,000 square kilometres of primary forest and support 60 million people who depend on the forest for food, energy and jobs. […] Through this approach, the DRC is empowering local communities to protect the forest while fostering economic growth.”

9. Australia’s Rarest Bird of Prey Spotted in Central Australia After 30 Years

“Dr. Henderson’s finding is an encouraging sign of the health of the sanctuary’s ecosystems as well as the bird’s continued migration into new areas. This bird’s presence in the sanctuary is particularly significant as it is the first confirmed sighting in the region since the mid-1990s.”

10. Australian company wins contract to design “hydrogen ready” high speed ferry

“The ferry, the Horizon X, will have capacity for 1,650 passengers and 450 cars, and will be able to travel at a speed of up to 35 knots. […] The ship will also have a specially-designed propulsion system arrangement that repurposes exhaust from the engine to help propel the vessel, in theory reducing its emissions.”

February 1-7 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

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henneseyhoe · 9 months ago

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What A Woman Wants; Fun

JoeyBada$$ X BLACK!FEM!Reader

WARNINGS: Basically pwp, Strangers sex(don’t be her, this is crazy lmao), Mentions of intoxication (the reg shit), Daddy kink(surprise, surprise), Public sex, Bathroom sex(kinda?), No protection (WRAP IT BEFORE YA SMACK IT), Dirty talk cause yeah, Unedited (girl im tired, sorry)

SUMMARY: What’s the point of going out if you can’t have fun?

1 | 2 | ? |

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She honestly had no business being out this late, especially downtown. But, she was a sucker for pretty lights and good music, she needed an excuse to wear a sexy dress with heels way too tall and she wanted to score free drinks, which she successfully did with the bat of her long eyelashes, successfully pulling in anyone that looked her way like a cheetah ready to pounce on its prey.

One of them were for sure to be her victim tonight, and she knew exactly who by the time she was sipsy and on the dance floor.

Bodies crowded all around her, moving to the beats of soca and dancehall music bumping through speakers loud enough to almost damage hearing. The air was nearly polluted with weed smoke.

All she focused on was moving her hips to the rhythm and giving the man behind her a show better than he had seen in all his years of living even if it was just a simple whine of her waist, she was gonna make it look as sexy as it could be as her mini dress rode up the cup of her ass with every swirl. She didn’t care.

“No panties?”

He asks as his hands trail up the front of her thighs, breath warm against the neck he had riddled hickeys on seconds ago. His voice was deep, a new york accent prevalent all throughout that made her pussy scream fuck me till the sun up, or at least till I tell you to fuck off.

She shakes her head slowly and licks her lips, her crimped curls falling into her face as she continued to whine up against him, pulling him closer behind her by the back of his neck.

He didn’t even have to ask, really. He knew the feeling of pussy in his lap when he felt it, clothed or not.

“I was hoping later tonight i’d get this dress ripped off and fucked like I deserved to be”

He let out a low moan from her forwardness, his heart skipping a beat behind his rib cage and his hands gripping hard on her waist to help control the fluidness of her movements. She could just feel his hard dick against her ass, twitching underneath the restricting true religion jeans at each word she devilishly spoke to him.

As they danced, there were moans leaving their mouths that only they could hear, thumping in her core that only she could feel. His breathing against her ear had her hot with arousal, a large hand with fingers decorated with jewelry coming up to wrap around her throat and grip to keep her grinding just in the right place. She whimpers softly as her dancing stutters, the girl feeling a nudge at her entrance from his erection.

“Keep doing that shit imma have to fuck you right in the middle of this club, ma” He spoke against her ear again, pressing harder against her. Without any other thought, she nodded needly as if he had asked her instead, earning a smack to her ass that would have made her almost stumble forward if it wasn’t for him holding her back against his chest.

“Outside. Now”

There was bass in his voice, just enough to make her quickly break away from him to follow instructions.

He watched every single step, her dress repeating rolling up the curve of her ass on each click of the six inchers her feet were screaming to get out of, but she would just have to ignore it for the night. Making it to the bathroom in the heels wasn’t even the hard part, it was actually staying up right in them when getting pounded standing up.

Fucking in a bathroom hallway wasn’t ideal, but they couldn’t wait to get to her apartment, his, or even his car.

One leg lifted and held up on his shoulder with her back against a wall, his hands gripped onto her waist to keep her in place as her hands grabbed a hold of his biceps. Thank god for flexibility gained by her stretching that morning.

She heard the sound of his chains clanking against his chest and felt the cold material of them against her leg with every movement in, the feeling of cool metal on her skin being just enough to add onto her pleasure.

“Give it to me!”

She begged breathlessly and he gladly obliged, slightly bending his knees to hit that secret spot that had her toes curling into her shoes. At any point anyone could walk out and see them. See her bent and surrendering to him. He wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Say my name, ma”

She didn’t even know the niggas name, but her immediate response was—

“DADDY!”

And he happily accepted it. The tip of his dick effortlessly found her gspot in no time and he wasted nothing to continue to press up against it, leaving her a babbling mess. It was like he had broken free a dam, pussy responding to his beck and call by soaking him and pulling him deeper.

He curses under his breath, praising her on how good she was taking him with no prep beforehand.

“You’re so fucking deep!”

Her tummy swirled when she felt the tip of him sit at the button of her belly button, her eyes widening.

“That’s how you like it, right? Lemme know, baby, I wanna make this pussy get right”

He moans, his lips brushing against hers just before he pecks them once to get his fix.

“Yes! Yes! Fuck!”

He made her forget she had free will to cover her mouth as she did truly wonder about the volume of her voice right now even with music playing, but she was too caught up in the strokes he was delivering, a sudden slow swirl of his hips to reposition himself followed by a hard press into her that filled her to the brim taking all of her breath away. He could listen to her whimpering like that for hours.

“I know, baby, I know. Let that shit out, I wanna feel that pussy cum for me”

He encouraged her, a lopsided grin growing on his face as he watched her completely lose it. He himself couldn’t even contain a manageable volume, but he also didn’t care like she did. He was gonna make his noise regardless. Let her know that pussy was good.

“When we done imma need that number, ma. You call me whenever, aight?” He spoke in between doing his damage, his eyes now focusing on where they met.

She moans in agreement since that was all she could really do without her voice breaking. He understood because he could feel the choking squeeze of her walls, her cream sticking to his balls and making the clapping sound way more apparent. He could feel that ribbon in his lower stomach slowly, but surely begin to tighten and his love sounds started to get more fluent.

“Pretty ass face, good fuckin’ pussy. You deserved some dick tonight, ma”

“You hear that shit? Wet ass pussy”

“Let daddy get you that nut, baby, wet that dick up”

The sounds of his deep voice set off throbbing in her clit and she only needed one more thing to push her over the edge again, and he supplied exactly what was needed.

He looks into her eyes with intention to break her and lets go of one side of her hip, bringing his thumb to her mouth and allowing her to suck. She did so proudly, bobbing her head and humming out moans until he pulled out and pressed the pad of his thumb against her aching clit, rubbing small circles.

“Oh- Oh shit! I’m-“

She shuttered before her knee buckled and her head flew back, thankfully a few inches away from a wall so she didn’t hurt herself. He caught her and made sure she stayed up right, still playing with her clit as his hips bucked and stuttered in sync with hers, his own release triggered by the tightening of her warm walls. There was no pulling out from then, He would have just had to make sure he bought her a pill the next morning.

✮✮✮✮

💌~ i deadass can’t tell if i like this or not and it’s bugging me 💀 hopefully yall fw it tho. Had to go back to my roots with an og rq cause nobody like answering me apparently! (apart from the two babes that did, love yall down <3)

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olowan-waphiya · 11 months ago

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1 hr (gas) lawn mower use = driving 300 miles from LA to Vegas

1 hr (gas) leaf blower use = driving 1100 miles from LA to Denver

This is because while gas efficiency has improved leaps and bounds for cars, the motors used in lawn mowers and leaf blowers have not changed much in the last 50 years. leaf blowers also blast other forms of particulate matter around, adding immensely to air pollution.

as long as they arent in the walkway, feel free to leave the leaves as they are free compost and protection for insects.

procrastinate mowing as long as you can—use an electric one if you must (many cities are starting to do rebates or replacements). and you can similarly leave the grass clippings as compost.

#greenhouse gas emissions #mowing #mowing lawns #leaf blowers #environment #environmentalism #climate change #climate crisis

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theyhavetakenovermylife · 6 months ago

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Your First Date (Fluff)

DVR!Turtles x reader

A/N: I decided it was time to get the TMNT Summer Shorts up on my masterlist, so I’m just going to start out with this one. Hope you’ll enjoy💚

Warnings: None💚

Leonardo:

You and Leo’s first date was a small and calm affair. It was nice, cozy and intimate, and nothing like you had ever experienced before. This was the kind of stuff you only expected to happen in movies, and that you might have been a few years too late for it. But then Leo came in, and showed you how a good old date was still possible.

You and Leo’s date took place on the roof of your apartment building, one nice summer night. With a small blanket Leo had borrowed from the lair without anybody noticing, along with you favorite kind of pizza and drinks, Leo had set a small corner for the two of you, where you could eat and talk in peace, while watching the people and cars pass on the street below, or lean back to watch whatever stars you could see, despite the light pollution, making it pretty much impossible to see.

Though it was in the middle of the summer, midnight could get a bit chilly. That was when Leo wrapped his arms around you, and held you close, as the two of you talked about all of the small things you had thought about. No worries about responsibilities, or what unpredictable things the next day might bring. Only you and Leo, enjoying a nice and peaceful evening together, with nothing but the city as background noise.

Raphael:

Some people might do something small, and maybe very predictable for their first date. A picnic, a dinner, maybe watching a few movies together. You know, something easy for two nervous people, that are still getting to know their knew dynamic. But not Raphael. He was not in for all the predictable stuff, nor was he any bit nervous, and neither did he want you to be nervous. He wanted your first date to be something special. Something unforgettable, and much better and much more memorable than any other date you had ever had with anybody else.

So for your first date, Raph took you wall climbing. Fucking wall climbing. And it was also there that you learned that the lair had a wall for climbing, in the far back. And you could not lie, it was one of the best dates you’ve ever had, with you and Raph laughing and enjoying your time together.

Raph would stand below, pulling the robe that helped you along the wall, and slowly lower you to the floor, in case you lost your footing, before making a show out of acting like he caught you in the most dramatic manner. It had the two of you throwing back your heads in laughter, at one point falling over on the mat, just laughing hysterically.

Donatello:

You and Donnie’s first date was in the lair, a day where Donnie had managed to get his family out, so you and him could have the place to yourself. Donnie had set up what could only be described as a large home cinema, with a large projection of the movie you were watching, onto a blank wall, while the two of you were getting cozy and comfortable on the large and soft couch that had been standing in the lair for ages.

Now, you and Donnie did not watch any romantic movies, that would give him an excuse to wrap an arm around you and kiss you, nor did you watch any horror movies, so you could hide against Donnie, seeking him for protection. No, you decided to watch comedies instead. Specifically Monty Python. You started out with Monty Python’s the Holy Grail, before watching a few episodes of Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

It didn’t take long before you and Donnie was flat on the couch with laughter, giggling at all the bad and crude jokes, before continuing the joke between the two of you, to the point where neither of you could breath probably, due to how much you were laughing.

At the end of your date, you and Donnie were so tired from all the laughing, that you ended up spending the night to get some rest.

Michelangelo:

Mikey, who couldn’t sit down for more than ten minutes at the time, did not want to have - what he liked to call - a “sit down date”. Not only because he simply just couldn’t, but also because he didn’t think it was fair to you. How would you feel if you expected to sit down with Mikey for a long period of time, and he was just bouncing off the walls? Not good. Therefore Mikey decided it would be good to take you out, and make sure that you kept moving. His solution was to take you walking through a secluded area of Central Park at night, where you could do whatever the vibe told you to.

It was amazing weather, as you and Mikey made your way through the park, talking and laughing under the midnight sky. It didn’t take long before the two of you found a small playground, where you started to play around together. Sliding down the slides with your arms around each other, swinging each other on the swings, and climbing the monkey bars so you could sit together on the top.

And even as the few visible stars above you started to disappear behind dark clouds, you and Mikey still enjoyed the time together. And even as the sky opened up above you, sending down hard rain, you and Mikey just grabbed each other's hands, and started dancing around together.

#tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #tmnt x reader #tmnt don vs raph #tmnt don vs raph x reader #tmnt dvr #tmnt dvr x reader #tmnt leo x reader #tmnt leonardo x reader #tmnt raph x reader #tmnt raphael x reader #tmnt donnie x reader #tmnt donatello x reader #tmnt mikey x reader #tmnt michelangelo x reader

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savage-daughter-of-nikitie · 2 months ago

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"A day in the Life of Sue Republican.

Sue gets up at 6 a.m. and fills her coffeepot with water to prepare her morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards.

With her first swallow of coffee, she takes her daily medication. Her medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to insure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of her medications are paid for by her employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Sue gets it too.

She prepares her morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Sue's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the shower, Sue reaches for her shampoo. Her bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for her right to know what she was putting on her body and how much it contained.

Sue dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air she breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for laws to stop industries from polluting our air.

She walks to the subway station for her government-subsidized ride to work. It saves her considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Sue begins her work day. She has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Sue's employer pays these standards because Sue's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.

If Sue is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, she'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think she should lose her home because of her temporary misfortune.

It's noon and Sue needs to make a bank deposit so she can pay some bills. Sue's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Sue's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Sue has to pay her Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and her below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Sue and the government would be better off if she was educated and earned more money over her lifetime.

Sue is home from work. She plans to visit her father this evening at his farm home in the country. She gets in her car for the drive. Her car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards.

She arrives at her childhood home. Her generation was the third to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans. The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

She is happy to see her father, who is now retired. Her father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Sue wouldn't have to.

Sue gets back in her car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Sue enjoys throughout her day. Sue agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm self-made and believe everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."

Original source unknown

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rjzimmerman · 4 months ago

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This is a long post, but not nearly as long as it should be in order for you to fully grasp what these "pronouncements" from the EPA mean. Essentially, if all the repeals described in this article happen (highly unlikely, although not impossible), all the hard work put into these policies and rules by a lot of people and the billions of dollars of research money spent on supporting them will be a big giant waste.

Excerpt from this New York Times story:

In a barrage of pronouncements on Wednesday the Trump administration said it would repeal dozens of the nation’s most significant environmental regulations, including limits on pollution from tailpipes and smokestacks, protections for wetlands, and the legal basis that allows it to regulate the greenhouse gases that are heating the planet.

But beyond that, Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, reframed the purpose of the E.P.A. In a two-minute-and-18-second video posted to X, Mr. Zeldin boasted about the changes and said his agency’s mission is to “lower the cost of buying a car, heating a home and running a business.”

“From the campaign trail to Day 1 and beyond, President Trump has delivered on his promise to unleash energy dominance and lower the cost of living,” Mr. Zeldin said. “We at E.P.A. will do our part to power the great American comeback.”

Nowhere in the video did he refer to protecting the environment or public health, twin tenets that have guided the agency since its founding in 1970.

Mr. Zeldin said the E.P.A. would unwind more than two dozen protections against air and water pollution. It would overturn limits on soot from smokestacks that have been linked to respiratory problems in humans and premature deaths as well as restrictions on emissions of mercury, a neurotoxin. It would get rid of the “good neighbor rule” that requires states to address their own pollution when it’s carried by winds into neighboring states. And it would eliminate enforcement efforts that prioritize the protection of poor and minority communities.

In addition, when the agency creates environmental policy, it would no longer consider the costs to society from wildfires, droughts, storms and other disasters that might be made worse by pollution connected to that policy, Mr. Zeldin said.

In perhaps its most consequential act, the agency said it would work to erase the E.P.A.’s legal authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by reconsidering decades of science that show global warming is endangering humanity. In his video, Mr. Zeldin derisively referred to that legal underpinning as “the holy grail of the climate change religion.”

Mr. Zeldin called Wednesday’s actions “the largest deregulatory announcement in U.S. history.” He added, “today the green new scam ends, as the E.P.A. does its part to usher in a golden age of American success.”

The announcements do not carry the force of law. In almost every case, the E.P.A. would have to undergo a lengthy process of public comment and develop environmental and economic justifications for the change.

By midafternoon, the agency had counted 31 pronouncements that were designed, Mr. Zeldin said, to “unleash American energy.”

Some of the most significant policy changes Mr. Zeldin said he planned include:

Rolling back restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Currently the E.P.A. requires existing coal-burning power plants and new gas plants built in the United States to cut their greenhouse-gas emissions by 90 percent by 2039.

Rewriting tailpipe pollution standards that were designed to ensure that the majority of new passenger cars and light trucks sold in the United States are all-electric or hybrids by 2032.

Easing limits on mercury emissions from power plants, as well as restrictions on soot and haze from burning coal. A Biden-era rule had aimed to slash by 70 percent emissions from coal-burning power plants of mercury, which has been linked to developmental damage in children.

Greatly reducing the “social cost” of carbon, an economic estimate of the damage caused by each additional ton of carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere. That figure plays a significant role in weighing the costs and benefits of regulating industries.

Perhaps the most significant move, though, is an effort to revise a 2009 legal opinion known as the E.P.A. “endangerment finding” which concluded that rising greenhouse gas emissions are a danger to public health. The finding gives the agency the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Eliminating it would make it virtually impossible for the E.P.A. to curb climate pollution from automobiles, factories, power plants or oil and gas wells.

#EPA #trump #greenhouse gas emissions #renewable energy #electric vehicles #envirnmental regulations #climate change

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2bitz-star · 2 months ago

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Finally got around to finishing this! I actually ended up quite liking a few of the AUs and I may expand on them in the future / make art of them! If you have any comments or headcannons on any of them, PLEASE SHARE, it would make me incredibly happy!!!! Alright, here we go..!

Triple Point

Around 60 years into the future, the Earth caves in on itself through pollution, global warming, erratic weather events, and disease. Worst of all, a parasite reminiscent of a zombie virus. Stone, an ex-soldier who went AWOL a few years after the breakout hit, meets Robotnik, a hermit who has lived in a bunker for most of his life anyway, meet in an underground bar, each looking for something. Robotnik, a safehouse, and Stone, a way to get to his rumored safehouse— an old CDC HQ taken over by survivors from the military and made a safe haven, passed through word of mouth in the army. Robotnik quickly lies to Stone that he has a working car and can bring him there as long as Stone allows him into the safehouse with his ex-military status.

They manage to pick up a few other survivors on the way, one of which is related to Robotnik. Stone gets bit protecting Robotnik and Gerald convinces Robotnik to leave him behind for their safety. Robotnik eventually dies to the rest of the group.

Extra details: Robotnik and Stone get drunk off of hospital isopropyl and kiss. Stone ends up hiding his bite for longer than he wanted and gets shot by Gerald.

Stolen Goods

On Curos, an alternate version of Earth, society is heavily restricted and in the middle ages. Both witches and humans exist, and witches hide among the humans. Bounty hunters are hired to kill both witches and criminals, as well as preserve witch blood to be used for magic. Robotnik is a witch, using his magic to create multitudes of familiars (like the drones) to scope out areas and sic on people he doesn’t like, and stealing artifacts to create his own wooden machines. He’s well known as a criminal and a witch. Stone is a bounty hunter hired and trained by the government to hunt down witches, and eventually finds Robotnik and attempts to kill him. Robotnik is able to blackmail him with Stone’s forged documents (accusing criminals of higher crimes so he would be paid more) and forces Stone to work with him.

Extra details: Robotnik is missing a leg and replaces it with magic. His magic is colored red. Overuse of magic can cause the user to pass out, which happens often— and Stone is always there to help him out when it happens.

Stone wears a bounty hunter’s mask, so Robotnik doesn’t even see his face until much later in the story. Stone also has a small supply of witch blood and knows just a few spells.

Wolfriders

In an alternate dimension, there are forest spirit wolves. They get pretty large, up to twenty feet tall in extreme cases. These wolves have three forms, their typical form (which vary in appearance from regular wolves to dire/maned wolves, demonic teeth, antlers/horns, snake tails, etc.), their small form, which makes them look like regular wolves and the proper size, as well as a human form (which most people don’t know exist). These wolves protect the people from supernatural evils like titans, witches, demons, etc. As the wolves continue to kill off these evils, there slowly becomes less use for the wolves, and when humans become relatively safe, they begin to hunt the wolves for sport. These wolves have the ability to connect with certain people called “riders”, and when the wolf and the rider bond, they develop matching glowing markings that appear on the rider when riding the wolf. A wolf with a rider becomes more prized to kill, as well with antlers, horns or teeth because of the markings, and more precious to have their head hanging up on your wall.

Robotnik comes from a line of riders, genetically bred to be more and more in control of the wolf than the last. They’re one of the only families that knows of the wolves’ human forms, and pass down the wolves and their litters as servants. They’re raised in captivity and because of this don’t bond naturally with their riders, and instead just serve them without a bond. When Robotnik is given his first wolf, he’s able to chase it off back to the forest. This continues to happen to every wolf he’s given, until eventually in his older years he’s gifted Stone. Although Robotnik tries to scare him off, they end up bonding naturally (with red and purple markings) in an incident where Stone protects him.

Extra details: When apart, Stone has purple markings. When he’s with Robotnik, they turn red, which isn’t something that typically happens. Robotnik doesn’t have any markings when he’s away from Stone.

Stone has both goat horns and sharper teeth, and strange markings, which attracts a lot of attention to them. Stone tries his best to stay in his human form for Robotnik but they often run away a lot together for him to be in his original form. And yes, he runs as fast as he can and takes Robotnik on rides trust ♥️

Commandeer

In the far future the Earth runs out of space on the surface for the population to live, so a layer of metal is built in the atmosphere where most people live as there’s more space. It’s so far above the Earth’s surface that most everybody has never even seen a plant. Macro, a robotics corporation first but had many subsections that form monopolies over food, weapons, etc, have many different lines of models for companions, servants, soldiers, etc. One of the soldier models is Stone. Macro is basically a corporate government of sorts, and over time the people began to fight back, and now Macro and a rebel force are engaged in war. Stone is sent out with a battalion and gets caught in an explosion, ripping off his leg and leaving him shut down in the middle of the battle feed. The RCs (remote controlled robots) are considered expendable, and therefore Stone is left behind. The rebels end up winning the battle, and Robotnik finds the old robot and decides it's worth cleaning up and repairing. With his leg repaired with rebel technology, Stone figures he must make himself useful to avoid being thrown out again.

Extra details: There are multiple models of Stone but this Stone is unique in particular due to his upbringing and being one of the first of his model. He was subject to a lot of testing as one of the first.

Robotnik reveals to Stone his plan in leading the rebellion is not just to overthrow Macro but also to take over the world. He promises that he’ll bring Stone to the surface of the Earth when that happens.

Stone has an obsession with living organisms(like plants) as a robot and believes himself to be a “fake”. He thinks Robotnik is fascinating just for being a human (and Robotnik wishes he were a robot). He’s under the impression that he’s fooling Robotnik into thinking that he’s a person, but Robotnik eventually convinces him that just because he isn’t living doesn’t mean he’s not real.

Stone has an opportunity to return to Macro during an attack on base. He turns down the opportunity by shooting the man in the face 🫶

Unholy

Elgatine originated from a small gold bracelet that was dropped from the god Enjorlas, the goddess of treasure, and into the valley beneath where Elgatine now is. The demon lord Zang Affol stole the bracelet and used it to raise the earth between the valley into the sky to escape the underworld. A band of “heroes” (as the legends call them) fought Zang Affol away from the sun and banished him back to the underworld, where he still lives today. The heroes formed the royal regime, and one was nicknamed “The Old King” by the future generations, as he was the first to take rule. In the future, the Temple was raised out of fear for Zang Affol returning. The Temple raises guardians of Elgatine, as demons leak out from the underworld often and attempt to hurt the people of Elgatine. Disciples of the Temple are trained in the temple and center their entire lives around becoming a guardian.

Stone, a gargoyle (one of the more holy creatures) was dropped off as a child to the temple and raised there, becoming one of their top disciples. When he’s much older, he runs into Robotnik, a shopkeep who happens to have frequent incidents with demons in his shop. Stone exorcises a demon hound for him, and returns to the temple, but can’t stop thinking about the shopkeep. He sells old artifacts and machines he’s made to keep afloat. Stone keeps getting called back due to the strange incidents, and he finds out much later on that the man he was falling in love with was a demon hiding in Elgatine. He ends up betraying the Temple in the end with Robotnik.

Extra details: For Temple disciples, hair is very important. When losing a battle your hair is cut, and Stone’s hair goes down to his waist. He typically keeps it braided. Robotnik is a cambion with wings that match Stone’s. Stone has a large scar up the side of his face and a missing horn (a crack from his gargoyle form).

Also, there’s an annual festival held by the temple (centered around the killing of demons and the celebration of their independence from Zang Affol). The tradition is for a disciple to ask a friend to come and Stone asks Robotnik, who can’t help but come for Stone— even though he can’t step foot inside the temple. The evening consists of him making excuses for why he can’t meet Stone’s elders or doesn’t want to participate in kid’s plays about killing demons.

Lucidity

Heaven and Hell want to bridge the gap between demon and angels, and decide that a project between their governments would be the best idea. Robotnik, a heaven-born angel (born and did not die), is sent down to the fifth circle of Hell and Stone, a death-born demon, is chosen to guide him through Hell.

Stone gets wrongly accused of a crime when they return to Heaven together to continue work on the project, and Robotnik decides to defend him. As per his punishment (for a crime he did not commit), he’s sentenced to a year on Earth. Robotnik is sent with him for defending Stone. This is Stone’s first time back on Earth since his life, as demons aren’t allowed to travel. Robotnik grapples with Heaven’s betrayal (of sending him to Earth) and how Stone could be so calm with being wrongly accused.

Extra Details: Robotnik is somehow even MORE of a repressed freak in this AU and because Stone grew up around zero censorship he’s a lot more comfortable making comments around Robotnik… heh…

The Aviary

In a more technologically advanced medieval setting, the sun is considered a god. The sun decides that humanity is due a new symbol and creates Stone, a man with giant wings who bleeds and cries gold. Because of this, he quickly becomes very sought after. He grows up believing that a life in captivity is normal, being passed around and bought by wealthy people, kings and queens, gamblers, hunters, etc. He’s treated as a pet, a servant, or even in some cases an experiment or a source of wealth. He’s broken free a few times but is never in the sky for long, which is where he feels the safest and at home. In present time, Stone is in the center of a table on an airship, when Robotnik (a pirate) waltzes in and bets on him. He ends up winning with Stone’s help, looking at people’s cards, and Stone believes he’s just going to be like the rest of his handlers. However, Robotnik brings him back to his own gargantuan airship titled “The Nest”, where he has his own worker bees and is determined to make Stone one of them (when in reality, he just saw Stone shivering and pathetic and decided on a spur of the moment to steal him).

Extra details: They have the obligatory scene of Stone spreading his wings and flying again, he picks up Robotnik and makes him fly with him and pretends to drop him hundreds of miles in the air.

Stone has light blue wings that blend in with the sky. He also refuses to let Robotnik touch his wings until much later. He’s also scared that Robotnik will find out that he bleeds gold and will take advantage of that as a pirate.

Robotnik refuses to send Stone out on missions the first few times as he says he’s “convinced he will fly away if given the chance”. Later on, he just flat out denies him the missions because he doesn’t want him to get hurt.

Sleep Forever

A more episodic format, Stone works at a cafe underneath someone else (and hates it) and Robotnik frequently goes there to annoy him. One night as Stone is closing, he goes into the back to retrieve something. Robotnik follows him under the guise of “keeping him safe” (he doesn’t want to be alone in the dark) and they are locked in the back room together. They have a run in with a ghost and make it out in the morning when one of Stone’s co-workers opens the door.

They face various monsters and such over the “show”, like giant spiders, shapeshifters, sirens, gorgons, secret cults and love potions (😜), body swaps and groundhog days, and everything else in your typical supernatural show that they can fix by the end of the episode.

Extra details: In one episode Stone gets possessed by an ancient demon or some shit and Robotnik doesn’t even notice 😭 It’s a turning point in their relationship as the series progresses when Robotnik realizes he has to put effort into the relationship as well or it’s not going to last.

White Space

Robotnik is the god of time. Every hair on his head represents a human life, and he has very little care for humans despite his job literally being to give them visions of the future to avoid their fates. He can see through the past, present, and future in each eye (a third on his forehead). Stone is the god of nature, but his goals clash with Robotnik’s, as he takes great pride in creating natural disasters to kill as many humans as he can.

There are multiple other gods created by the Universe inhabiting the Whitespace, Robotnik the Universe’s favorite and under the most pressure to please. So, in the beginning, Stone is his enemy. Robotnik makes no attempt to socialize whilst Stone is beloved by most of the other gods. Eventually, Stone is able to get him to crack a bit, having him tell Stone about his creations and projects. And even past that, thousands of millenia later, they become friends.

All the gods are immortal. If they’re injured beyond repair, they can “die”, living in the Blackspace for a while before returning in a new body. Stone is the first to find out he is mortal. As a god of nature, humans are slowly killing the earth and therefore Stone. He hides it for a while but it slips out eventually after one of Stone’s later deaths, physical scars appearing on his body. When Robotnik finds out, he directly defies the universe, planning to kill all humans just to save Stone.

Extra details: Gods can visit the Earth. Stone often sits in one of Robotnik’s temples to calm himself down or hang out.

Stone has a vast and silly wardrobe in this AU. He’s much more concerned with his appearance, wanting to seem more “godly” than he is (an insecurity stemming from his mortality). He regularly wears makeup, while Robotnik couldn’t care less.

While Robotnik still had long hair, he allowed Stone to take care of it. Stone ended up knotting it on purpose sometimes out of spite for humans. Eventually Robotnik cuts off all of his hair in defiance to the Universe.

The Summoning

Stone is a demon from a different realm, sneaking into the human realm for resources that sell for quite a lot in the demon realm— those resources being misery and evil. Robotnik, a human being kept captive to work on a government controlled project, stumbles across Stone. Stone gets attacked by other officials in the project, fighting well but getting badly hurt. Robotnik, curious about the strange creature, helps him away and follows him back to the demon realm. Once Stone is back in working order, he frantically tries to get Robotnik to go back, as he can’t disguise himself as human forever and demons can be dangerous. However, Robotnik feels more at home in the demon realm as he ever had in the human one. He feels more understood and refuses to go back to the human realm, and Stone takes Robotnik as his responsibility.

Extra details: Stone is a satyr-type demon, complete with a tail and goat horns hehe!!

Stone gives Robotnik a hood with a cape to disguise himself that he used to have as a kid, so it has a tail covering as well as horns (so they’re matching).

Stone is on the poorer side of the demon realm and was put into an underground fighting ring as a kid. He escaped when he was older, but it was the only way he could reliably make money (through people placing bets on him, etc) and ended up returning but prefers not to tell people about it because of shame. He has to leave to go to “work” at night and makes Robotnik promise to stay at home, but Robotnik becomes concerned when Stone comes back home every morning with bruises and cuts. He eventually finds out, makes Stone quit (getting them into a fair bit of trouble), and they move into the city. They make money off of Robotnik’s inventions instead as he began selling them while Stone was busy.

They also have a heart to heart scene when Stone asks Robotnik why he’s so willing to stay in a world that wants to kill him. Robotnik tells him the world at home was much the same, except there he didn’t have anyone who cared about him.

Strange Fixation

TW on this one for sensitive topics:

In a regular office setting, Robotnik is Stone’s boss but barely even knows of him. Stone is obsessed with his boss to an abnormal degree. He draws him in his sketchpad, ignores his work to stare, writes his name on post-it notes and sticks it to his wall, and dedicates himself to the work so everything is done well for Robotnik (often neglecting himself). He takes stalker-ish photos of Robotnik, and eventually Robotnik begins to catch on— but he’s a little into it.

Robotnik plays with him a lot once he realizes what’s going on, but doesn’t know the full extent of it. Stone doesn’t let him come over to his house even after a few dates and seeing Robotnik’s. Once Robotnik finds out about Stone’s self-harming habits “because of him”, he basically rushes Stone back to his house to take care of him, and finds the insane scrawling of everything about him all over Stone’s house. He’s decided Stone is a challenge for him to fix and it isn’t too bad to have someone drooling over every little move he makes.

Bonfire

Taking place while the two are teens, Ivo is sent to a summer camp to get out of the orphanage. He’s a huge germaphobe and hates anything related to touching grass. He refuses to let anyone near him, let alone touch him, and barely speaks, but he’s condemned to a cabin filled with bunk beds for the summer. Stone has been going to the same summer camp since he was old enough to go, and is scarily optimistic and cheery. The second he sees Ivo, he’s determined to make him his friend just like everybody else in the camp. He’s just a little harder to get through.

Ivo slowly starts to enjoy Stone’s presence, considering he’s always there. Stone gets him to try new experiences, shows him the quietest places in the woods where they can get some peace, listens to him talk about everything he’d rather be doing, and chases off the kids who are mean to him. Ivo eventually realizes that Stone only hangs out with him, though, despite Stone insisting that he’s friends with everyone here. Even the camp counselors don’t seem to like them. It’s just a prank when Stone is left alone to pick up after the teenagers smoking and drinking outside of the campgrounds, it’s a game that he has to play when campers try to aim at him with rocks, and the reason no one wants to talk to him isn’t because of his eccentricities but because it’s an “inside joke” that Ivo wouldn’t get. It’s clear to Ivo that even though Stone might be delusional, his “relationships” with the other campers are important to him, so when he’s caught snuggling up to Stone against a tree in the middle of the night, a photo passed around and accused to be gay, he doesn’t understand why Stone doesn’t care that everyone else is bullying them. He tries to distance himself from Stone to stop the rumors, but it only seems to make things worse. When Stone confronts Ivo about avoiding him, Ivo yells at Stone to just be realistic for once, and to accept the fact that they will never be good enough for other people, so it’s best to stop hanging out altogether. Obviously, Stone doesn’t take this well, and all his enjoyment for summer camp is sapped out of him.

They make up in the end, but it takes a while. Ivo just has to understand Stone’s point of view, that he doesn't care what other people think, as long as they’re together.

Extra details: Stone’s worst fear in this AU is Ivo not coming back to camp. He knows he was forced there against his will, and he knows that he would not come back if he doesn't have the “best summer ever”. So he tries his hardest to make Ivo see what makes camp so special for him. Ivo’s just extremely negative about everything.

Stone is not his name in this AU. He’s nicknamed that by the other campers because they all throw stones at him as an annual tradition LOL. He takes the nickname in pride, though, and makes sure everyone calls him it.

Rose Colored Evening

Robotnik and Stone are sent out on a data retrieval mission, arriving by car. Stone gets shot and then dies, trying to tell Robotnik something but failing to before dying. Robotnik wakes up again in the car, convinced he had a bad dream. However, things are the exact same as in his dream, and although he tries to change the outcome, Stone dies once more and doesn’t finish what he is trying to say due to Robotnik repeatedly cutting him off because he’s “going to live”. He wakes up yet again in the car and it doesn’t take long for him to realize he’s stuck in a time loop. He finds out that the loop is not triggered by him dying, but Stone, and changes his objective to protecting Stone. He believes that in making sure Stone lives until the end of the mission, he can escape from the loop. He’s sorely mistaken when they finally complete the mission without any casualties, but Robotnik wakes up again in the car before the mission.

It turns out, the solution is straight out of a crappy romcom. He has to listen to Stone’s final confession, that being that he loves Robotnik. Upon hearing it that last time, he’s able to save Stone, abandoning the mission and escaping the loop (as well as reciprocating his feelings).

Enemies Today, Friends Tomorrow

Superhero AU! Some people are just born with powers in this world, and the second the government catches wind of it, a child with powers is trained to become a superhero. This happens to Stone at a very early age, not having much contact with his family and growing up to be a leader of his team. Stone has technopathy, the power to talk to technology (as well as the ability to teleport through anything with a screen, in this AU specifically). He has support items because of this, like gloves with claws.

Robotnik also has powers, but was able to hide them until he grew older and avoided being “drafted”. He became a villain without anyone noticing who he really was, and no ties back to any family or anyone who could rat him out. He uses his robots to help him, however his power is telekinesis, which is very handy when building his creations.

Stone and Robotnik fight quite a lot, and Stone gets very close to killing him multiple times (but is held back by his team whenever they are together). He’s unable to get Robotnik’s robots to do anything as they are very resistant, although overtime they warm up to Stone and do more of what he asks them to.

Robotnik, needing a job, finds a position as a social media manager with alright enough pay for one of the hero teams. Of course it’s Stone’s, and he gets hired for the position without Stone realizing it’s his arch-enemy. They become very close in the workspace, and Stone is much kinder to Robotnik when he’s not fighting a villain version of himself. Robotnik starts valuing their relationship and begins to fear for when Stone finds out that he is the same man that Stone fights all the time.

Extra details: People already shipped Stone + Robotnik as superhero and villain, but the “unnamed social media manager” becomes part of the picture when he steals the spotlight on their twitter page.

Robotnik knows that the router will tell Stone everything that is accessed on the wifi, so he repeatedly opens up fanfictions of them to annoy him.

Stone will most likely escape the government’s leash and become villains with Robotnik by the end heh 😋👍

RE: Bunker

Here’s a quicker one, I just really like this Resident Evil AU and wanted to include it. Robotnik and Stone are married in this universe, Stone’s father working for Umbrella Corporation. Stone gets a letter from his father and goes to visit him based on a “family emergency” (which is what he tells Robotnik) and goes missing. Robotnik tears up everything trying to find him, but to no such luck. Eventually he is just convinced Stone is dead and gives up on searching for him a few years later.

During the T-virus pandemic (world-wide as in the novelization), Robotnik gets a tip from an unknown source about an island off the coast of Central America. When he goes there, he finds a bunker underground that goes on for miles and turns out to be home to many experiments from Umbrella Corporation, a project long forgotten at this point. He gets locked down in the bunker away from all civilization, and eventually finds Stone, who’s convinced he’s been turned into a monster (and has been experimented on and gone halfway insane as well as physically modified). There’s no set ending yet, but I’d like to think they fell in love a second time heh 😙

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