#Shroud: Miles get me to ER

[deviant3lover]

Alternatively, Shroud tries to eat Step’s mind only to puke seconds later because of how nasty it is.

Shroud tries to eat Sidestep mind but it's like biting into apple only to realise it's plastic.

[interstellargatorskinboots1812]

Tapped Into Your Mind & Soul Chapter 5

WARNINGS: It’s an Alfie fic, so obviously SWEARING.

As always, i am a complete comment whore so PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE drop me a line to let me know what you think of the story so far.

All Things are Subject to Decay and Change

Alfie's red Bentley barges it's way through London- a city of vibrant smog which is helping Arabella feel at ease.  There is plenty of beauty to her in the soot-hazed stone of the passing buildings and even the Londoners who hunch by with sour faces and their misery reflected in the colour of the sky.

She is glad of the car's padded seats which absorb each of his sharp turns and brutal stops.

'It's like a circus round here', she comments with optimism, pushing her head further out of the window. Miles upon miles littered with curiosities - street artists providing depictions of escape on the cold pavement, costermongers shouting their trade and yards of train advertisements pasted onto lampposts in every colour. Alluring as the sound of jazz and the sight of the Charleston might be, London shrouds itself in so much more potential for her than flappers and frivolity. His irked voice snaps her from her thoughts.

'It's fuckin' 'orrible, too many animals in this circus'.

His knuckles are white from his grip on the wheel, intense focus directed to the trams and wagons weaving ahead of them. The car agitates over the metal tramlines, as a brown Hovis truck cuts in front of the car, coercing Alfie to slam on the breaks.

'Oh fucking hell!'. His tone is booming as  he reaches into his pocket , pulling out a pistol to aim at the offending driver. Arabella's mouth slowly drops open, capturing his arm and pulling the gun under the dashboard, obscuring it from view. With narrow eyes she quickly looks around to scan the area.

'Have you lost your mind, Alfie?'

'Treacle, these idiots, they only understand one language.'

'Well, lets not have you arrested on my first night in London, eh?'

A small grunt emits from his throat. He yanks his hand easily from her grip and stashes his gun back into his coat pocket.

'Suit yourself,' he grumbles. The car has been overtook now on more than one occasion, another headache to add to his list. Still, best not to piss her off on her first night  and so he turns his eyes back to the road ahead and daydreams of shooting the bollocks off the Hovis driver.

Twisting an unstrung strand of hair repetitively around her finger, she can't help but think about where they are going. It's going to be her new home for the foreseeable future and given the volatile looking environment of his work place, Arabella isn't holding out hope.

Moments later, the noise level begins to filter away as if they have turned down a road that is miles from any civilisation. Thriving with colourful flora within well tended gardens, regency era town houses stand majestically at three stories and with the fanciest of facades. A short and  stoutly older woman canters down the pavement, before turning right into one of the houses and desperately trying to manipulate two heavy shopping bags in order to open her gate. Alfie slows the car down to a stop and beeps his horn, making the poor woman almost jump to the moon, she briskly turns around.

'Oh, vey Alfie! Are you trying to bring me closer to God?' Alfie opens the car door and takes the bags from her hands, opening her cast iron gate with ease.

'What did I tell you Mrs Goldman, mhm? No lifting and carrying these heavy bags, eh? Ishmael can take you to the market and bring you back.'

'Ah Alfie that poor lad does everything, I don't need him helping me as well. I ask God not for a lighter burden but for broader shoulders'. She simpers at him with a twinkle behind her brown eyes that Arabella did not observe before the lady spoke with Alfie.

'Worryin' about you yeh, will be the death of me! Now, tell me that landlord of yours 'as sorted that broken light fixture?'

'He's getting round to it'.

'So, that'll be a no then?' Alfie furrows his brow, making it crease with line after line and tilts his head to the side. 'You need me to have a word with him?'

Mrs Goldman chuckles earnestly before pinching his cheek between her thumb and forefinger.

'Don't be a Schmuck Alfie, the last time you did that my rent went up to pay for his hospital bill. Now, who is this beauty you're sharing your car with hmm?'' Looking around Alfie's broad shoulders, her gaze falls on Arabella who feels rather sheepish under her matriarch stare. Sighing, he pinches the tension from the bridge of his nose. The last thing he needs is for Mrs Goldman to start shooting her mouth off at her knitting circle and have the whole of the Jewish community gossiping before he has had time to formulate how he can position Arabella into his life.

'It should be fuckin' noted right, that nothing gets past you'.

Catching Alfie unawares, she uses her now free hand to provide a sharp whack to the back of his head, making his eyes scrunch. Arabella's eyebrows curve upwards as she swallows down the urge to laugh.

'This is Arabella Shelby, the sister of one of my close business associates. She's going to be staying with me until she gets settled in London'.

So, that's how he plans to play this. Arabella exits the car.

'Nice to meet you Mrs. . . erm...'

'Goldman, dear'. She shakes Arabella's hand, her light touch and weak grip showing just how delicate she is. Alfie was right, she shouldn't have been carrying those bags.

'Please accept my apologies for Mr Solomons lack of manners, I assure you dear, he does possess them somewhere'. She sends her a wink.

'I'll let you know when the search party I've sent out, actually find them.'

This tickles the grey haired lady who stomps her foot letting out a huge guffaw and patting Arabella on the arm.

'I like her Alfie, she is sharp of tongue as well as looks'. She flashes him a knowing smile, one that makes him shift from foot to foot. Much as he likes Mrs Goldman, he can muster no interest in her insinuating words.

'Right, well as much as I'd like to stand here as if i'm fuckin' not and be insulted, we have to get going. Miss Shelby here 'as 'ad a rather eventful day so, goodbye Mrs Goldman'.

She throws a harried glance at Alfie before returning a polite smile at Arabella.

'Now my dear, just you remember that I am but five doors down and that makes us neighbours. Should this  Mazik get to you, just pop on to my door and i'll make sure you're always greeted with a cup of tea and a listening ear.'

Alfie knew that her words served only to aggravate him. He places a hand on Arabella's arm to lead her back to the car and curses his poor decision making for stopping here in the first place.

'Lovely to meet you Mrs Goldman, I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot more of one another'. Alfie's gentle push to the car, turns into a shove.

'I'm sure we will my dear, and it's Nelly to you.'

Alfie watches to make sure Mrs Goldman enters her house safely.

'Sister of a close business associate? Dread to think how you'll introduce me to people when I'm your wife.'

'Arabella, that woman has a mouth wider than the Thames, best to give her as little detail as possible and save her choking on gossip'.

Crossing her arm over her waist and tucking it in at her elbow, she turns toward her window. With a roll of his eyes, he starts up the car. They don't have to travel far before the vehicle is once again stationary. Straightening  up in her seat, she observes the building in front of her.  All of the houses on the street were identical in their architecture, stressed in uniformity – this one however,  was built with a desire for individuality.  

'There ya go, look. Home, sweet-fucking-home'. He walks around the car to help her out. She is mesmerised by the grand blossom tree that pushes the house into almost obscurity due to it's size, looming over the black front door. Pale pink pieces that have been wooed from the tree by the spring winds, gather under her feet, a reminder of life's fickleness. Concealing herself behind Alfie, her cautious spirit holds an inner negotiation with her resilience as they walk up a black and white tiled pathway.  Inside the warmth of the house engulfs them both along with a nauseating charcoal smell. Her foot suddenly slides on something slippy on the marble floor. Bending down she picks up a folded piece of paper that is lay in the doorway. Alfie's name is written on it in the scrawled handwriting.

'Alright now, let's have a look and see if your suitcase has been dropped off... what's that?'

'You tell me, it's got your name on it.'

The blithe and animated Alfie Solomons she is getting to know  is barely recognisable now as an ashen and turbulent man stands across from her, a wrathful look in his blue-green eyes. Frantically he grapples the paper from her hands and faces away from her to peek at the contents.

'Must be something awfully important'. She says, standing on tiptoes to see over his shoulders. The note buckles into pieces as he folds it in his fist, harshly.

'Who's asking you?' his quick-tempered reply takes her by surprise and she narrows her eyes at him, making him clear his throat.

'It's a betting tip if you must know. As an occasional bookmaker, I do need to keep a sharp eye out for the fastest horses'.

He stashes the note into his deep pocket. They both stand facing one another, Alfie towering over her by a good few inches. Neither of them speaking, just eyes setting fire to the other pair. The door at the end of the hall bursts open and commotion on four paws comes bounding excitedly towards his owner.  

'Oh, 'ere he is look, the behemoth with a wagging tale. Ello mate, did you miss me?' Placing his hand onto his right hip, Alfie slowly bends down to fuss and stroke the solid bulk of his bull mastiff.

His incensed constitution replaced with playful humour by his four-legged friend. As if sensing the presence of a stranger, his dog bolts into an alert position and begins to bark anxiously and warningly at Arabella. Alfie prepares himself to calm down his probably panicked fiancé. He's not expecting the hand that comes to his elbow, pushing him aside as she crouches in front of the slobbering beast, offering her hand to smell.

'Hello, you. I've heard so much about you, don't you know?' She strokes her hand roughly over the top of the dog's head, which he immediately cocks and begins to excitedly wag his tail.  'See, your gruff and tough owner here is a huge softy when it comes to you, he doesn't shut up about you'. Alfie watches on as  she undauntedly makes a fuss, not caring about the amount of froth being drooled onto what looks like an expensive, if not gaudy, coat.

'Well, his name is Cyril and he's supposed to be an all powerful and protective breed, but I will acknowledge that it appears I was fuckin' lied to about that'. He crinkles his forehead as he watches Cyril gracelessly roll onto his back so Arabella can rub at his belly.

'Well I think he's just perfect., i'm sure we'll get on like a house on fire.

'Let's see if you're still saying that when he's all over you at five in the morning because he wants to go out for a piss'.

Arabella looks up at him and shakes her head. 'I can see Cyril here holds all the power in this house'.

'Oh yeh? An how do you work that out?'

She pushes herself up to standing and offers him a condescending smile. 'Because Alfie, power lies in loyalty and I can see how dyed-in-the-wool you are with him'.

'That so? Well, lets see where my loyalty gets him tomorrow when Edna sees these muddy paw prints on her mopped floor'.

'Edna?'

He scratches Cyril behind his ears as he steps closer to her.

'My maid. Lovely woman she is, reminds me of me Mother. You'll meet her tomorrow. Now, do you wanna see your new home?'

****************************************

Arabella piano-plays her fingertips on the dark walnut dressing table, listening to the rain outside as it pelts the windows and drips from the alien roof. She could float half way to heaven as she kicks off her slippers and the plush carpet hugs at her swollen feet. Alfie has spent some of the evening showing her around his impressive home. A big house, one she dreamed of owning as a child with it's polished wooden floors and graceful bannisters. Nothing like her Small Heath dwellings. Is it possible she is beginning to get homesick for a place she isn't even sure exists? One with love and where her soul is understood. However, when he had shown her the fully plumbed copper bath tub, she was ready to say 'i- do'  post haste.

Alfie is steadfast becoming a curious paradox – his abode is a beautiful palace, gleaming with a spotless silence. It's king, all the same is harsh and unpredictable with a flare of intelligence and good looks. Although she is hasten to admit it, he intrigues her.

Until Tommy sorts  the delivery of the rest of her things, all of her is compacted into the small suitcase that she pulls from the bed to put away She puts on her nightie, a soft cream silk slip – although well worn, still immaculate.  After an argument with Alfie regarding sleeping arrangements, they finally agreed that they should be adult enough to share a bed to make their relationship more realistic to his house staff. Standing in front of the floor length, mirror she watches as his mother's locket swings off her neck like a stranger. She pats the soft garment over her stomach - full from a delicious stew his maid had prepared, which she enjoyed alone. Alfie has secreted himself in his downstairs office and she has not seen sight nor sound of him all night..

The sound of smashing glass makes her jump, she can hear the thundering voice of Alfie barking out words she can't make out. Whatever the furore is, it's emanating from the upstairs landing. She quickly steps out of the room and sees the bathroom door ajar. Inside Alfie is desperately trying to wrestle Cyril inside a large fluffy towel. The floor around him is immersed in water and Alfie's shirt is saturated.

'Cyril, keep-the-fuck-still'. His fractious tone echoes off the bathroom tiles as he battles against his dog.

'Alfie, do you need some help?'

'No we've got this under control, ain't we boy'. As Cyril succumbs to submission, allowing his master to begin to towel dry his fur, Alfie looks up to acknowledge Arabella, his eyes immediately give her a once over and he feels the inside of his throat dry up as he spots her legs. Cyril takes advantage of his master's distraction and bounds his way out of the towel, bouncing his head off the copper bath in the process, before galloping his way to Arabella.

'Cyril! Ya daft, mad cunt! Get back 'ere now!' Taking not a ounce of notice, Cyril jumps frenziedly onto Arabella, wet paws pushing away at her.

'Get off 'er now ya demented lad! CYRIL! Fuck sake!'

Uncontrollable barks bite their way back at Alfie who is now tugging at his dog's paws, trying to gain purchase to pull him off her, flattened and trapped as she is against the wall.

'Fuckin' hell Cyril, what are you playing at, get off. . . stop trying to wrestle . . .CYRIL! I'm warning y. . . '

'SIT!' Her voice is loud and stern as she points to the floor with a free hand. Cyril obeys and sits down, Arabella following him to the ground, untwisting the towel from  around Alfie's fisted hands and slowly patting down Cyril's blubbery body. The dog sits calmly, with his head held up majestically as if he is content in being obedient for her.

'Right fuckin' turncoat ya are Cyril. Get one whiff of a woman and you forget about me, eh?' He folds his arms and leans against the door frame, watching as Arabella softly finishes drying.

'It's all in the tone, Alfie. You have to be stern not erratic'. She stands up smugly in front of him.

'S'at so?' He looks her up and down once more, only this time he notices just how wet Cyril has made her and he swallows hard. The light fabric of her night dress is now translucent and he can make out the shape of her ample breasts and the enticing colouring of her nipples. The quick glance he gets before looking away is like a blow to his chest. Her body is certainly holding his interest but he knows he can't take any more of her in. He does not want to look at all, but this was unavoidable.

Clearing his throat and picking up the towel from Cyril, he gestures to her chest.

'You might need this, to erm cover . . . ' She looks down and immediately covers her chest with her arms, taking the towel from him to dry off.

'I'm sorry about Cyril, he can be a right lunatic when he wants to be.'

'They're just tits, Alfie', she says as she notices how he has turned his body away from her.

'No, they're not just tits- they're yours and it's not up to my maniacal dog to expose them because he can't keep bloody still'. He moves past her into the bedroom and reappearing a few seconds later.

'You can wear this if you like, whilst you dry that off. I promise it's clean'. He hands her one of his white shirts which she gladly accepts.

'You're nothing like I thought you would be, Alfie'.

'Yeh?' He moves closer to her. 'That's because, right, true power lies in the unexpected'. They both stare at the other, as if taking notes, before he breaks the chain and walks away toward the staircase.

'Cyril, come on', he pats his leg and Cyril follows, leaving her flustered on the landing. Was it possible that Solomons possessed a more human side that contradicts his reputation? She turns away from the stairs and hurries into the bathroom to change. Closing the door, she notices Alfie's black wool coat hanging from the hook. The coat he placed his secretive letter in earlier. An uneasy feeling washes over her, she always respects privacy, to her far too many people can't live in silence for fear of missing applause from an audience who don't even care. She has to see what has him so vexed though -  if she wants to be ahead of him and her brother then she has to do some necessary digging. Before she can talk herself out of it, she plunges her hand into his pocket and pulls out the piece of paper. As she turns it over she can see that this is not the same note. This is a pink betting slip- after further rummaging, she realises he has moved the note elsewhere.

'Fuck' she says, annoyed. One final glance and she sees what looks like a phone number on the back.. She leaves the bathroom in a hurry, her hand concealing the slip.

TAG LIST: @clintbartoris  @gameofpot @doomwhathouwilt @lokigirlszendaya @inkinterrupted @misselsbells06 @sunshineyourethebesttime​ 

[miraculousluvbug]

WINGLESS | Ch. 6

***New to Wingless? Start at Chapter 1!

CH. SUMMARY: After learning Hawk Moth's identity, Lila inserts herself into Gabriel's inner circle so she can destroy Ladybug-- er, get Ladybug's earrings. Ha-ha-ha. Ha.

Lila toed the cement beneath her as she restlessly awaited the assistant’s arrival. Gabriel had used an earpiece to communicate to her, Lila assumed. But the waiting was painfully awkward. Neither party made any attempt to fill the silence. The absurdity of the situation sat on their chests like an overweight feline unwilling to move.

As the sun dipped out of golden hour, the mansion shrouded the garden in shadow. Lila squinted her eyes to try and make out the details of Adrien’s mother’s statue, but the effort was fruitless. Wouldn’t a billionaire have, like, lamps or something? Maybe he didn’t have lamps because he hardly left the walls of his office.

Lila’s lips twitched into a smirk, but she quickly smothered it.

There was a sudden scuffling of shoes against the garden stones from behind Lila. She observed wordlessly from the corner of her eye as the looming and brooding Gabriel Agreste flew to the assistant’s side at an inhuman speed and held his arms out to support her silently, his fingers never quite making contact with the body he seemed desperate to protect.

Huh. A weakness. Hawk Moth had a weakness.

Lila filed that tidbit away should she need it for later.

“You were quite cryptic over the phone, sir,” the assistant started.

“I suppose I was, Nathalie. What needed to be said was . . . not phone appropriate.”

“Sir?”

Knowing Gabriel was Hawk Moth seemed to have tipped a domino in Lila’s brain. It was like there was a blanket over her eyes and it had been ripped away. On several occasions, a blue-skinned bird lady aided and abetted Hawk Moth. Lila had wondered who would possibly be close enough to the villain to be looped into his plans.

The connection was easy to make.

Lila folded her arms across her chest and cocked her head to the side, looking Nathalie up and down. When she had finagled her way into the Agreste mansion with a despicable limited edition Ladybug figurine, discovering the identities of Paris’s most wanted duo was not only low on her list of possibilities; it was nowhere near the friggin’ list.

But Dio was it the single most delectable turn of events.

“Let me guess. You were Mayura.”

Nathalie, who had been wholly oblivious to Lila’s presence, sucked in a breath, head spinning to meet the eyes of Adrien’s conniving classmate. Nathalie opened her mouth, probably to protest Lila’s statement, but the words died on her tongue. The only sounds came from the crickets chirping into the encroaching night air.

“She knows,” Gabriel explained.

“She . . . she knows?” Nathalie repeated.

Gabriel nodded. Nathalie’s gaze fell to the grass sprouting in between the garden stones. As the trio stood, the occasional butterfly fluttered around Gabriel like they knew they were kindred.

“You don’t need to be worried about . . . What’s the phrase?” Lila rested a finger on her chin. “Ah, right. Me spilling the fagioli. I don’t know the French word.”

“Beans,” Nathalie supplied.

“You know Italian?” he asked. Then softly to himself, “My Emilie knew Italian.”

Nathalie ducked her head at Gabriel’s attention before straightening her posture and jutting out her chin. If Lila hadn’t seen the woman shuffle over to this spot as if she were going to faint any moment, she might have never known there was anything amiss.

“So you . . . what? Want to be an ally?”

“Multilingual and smart,” Lila teased.

Something dark flickered in Nathalie’s eyes. Much darker than Lila would have ever given her credit for. “You’d do better to watch your tone with me, Mademoiselle Rossi.” She spat Lila’s name like one might an unforeseen chunk of raw garlic.

Ah, so this was how Nathalie wanted to play this. Lila’s fingers tingled in anticipation. She was a flexible actress, best known for her improv skills and dedication to her roles. If a performance was what the assistant wanted, then Lila was eager to put on a show.

“Why, Mademoiselle Nathalie--” Lila started, turning her back on the pair.

“Sancoeur.”

Lila rolled her eyes but proceeded to pump her tone full of sickeningly sweet syrup. “Right. Mademoiselle Sancoeur, it would be my pleasure to get the Ladybug Miraculous for Monsieur Agreste.”

“And Chat Noir’s.”

Lila plastered a fake smile on her face and turned on her heel. “Hm?”

Nathalie arched an eyebrow, unimpressed. “You loathe Ladybug, don’t you, Mademoiselle Rossi?”

“That’s no secret.”

“You want more than to take her Miraculous.”

It wasn’t a question. Lila held eye contact with Nathalie, unflinching. Eventually, she spoke. “I want to humiliate her. Like she humiliated me,” Lila growled. I want to destroy her.

The assistant chose not to expand on this statement, but Lila could tell she sensed a much more sinister motivation. She must have been weighing the pros and cons, her mind running a mile a minute to predict what including Lila might entail. Lila had to agree: she was a wildcard. Her loyalties teetered like a see-saw, ever-changing to suit her needs. She knew this. And Nathalie knew this.

Lila’s eyes bore into Nathalie’s, challenging her to refuse.

“I admit,” Nathalie began after a beat of consideration, removing her tablet from the crook of her arm, “you might make a valuable asset.”

Gabriel, who had been quietly observing the interaction between his assistant and the girl, folded his arms behind his back. “Yes, even now, while I’m untransformed, your contempt for the bug is palpable.”

“She’s a cockroach,” Lila sneered, her lips upturned in a grimace and her hand clenched tightly into a fist.

Lila’s enthusiasm amused Gabriel greatly. His shoulders shook as he chuckled, but the sound was hollow. “That is something we agree on. No matter how many times I pursue her, she manages to outsmart me.”

Lila bit her tongue. She wanted to say It’s easy to outsmart a man whose password is “password,” but she didn’t. She honestly deserved an award for that caliber of commitment.

“While you are very clever, you’ve been playing an elementary partita, Monsieur Agreste.”

Gabriel’s eyes hesitantly shifted to Nathalie.

“Game, match, etcetera,” she clarified. Ironically, a meager little ladybird flitted to Gabriel’s shoulders then. He scrunched his nose at it.

“And though it’s been a rousing game of tag--” Lila paused purposefully as Gabriel, without breaking eye contact, lifted a palm and allowed the dotted beetle to crawl onto his fingers before proceeding to wordlessly pass it to Nathalie. Lila cleared her throat. “I’m here to up the stakes.”

With her mouth set into a thin line, Nathalie bent over and shook her finger until the thing lost its grip and fell to the concrete. In the process, her shirt rode up to reveal a compelling pale scar the length of a thumb running up her side. Lila arched an eyebrow. Nathalie hastily covered it.

“What exactly are you implying, Mademoiselle Rossi?”

Gabriel peered at Lila over the bridge of his nose, daring her to challenge his legacy as Hawk Moth.

But Lila was not an expert manipulator for nothing. She knew how to read people, and, more importantly, she knew how to please them.

She knew how to play them.

“You’re a proper gentleman, Monsieur.”

Flattery. She would begin with flattery.

With one hand, she twirled one of her pigtails. Men and boys alike often found intelligent girls not only intimidating but emasculating. She wasn’t sure if Gabriel would take too kindly to a sixteen year old picking at all the holes in his plans, holding a magnifying glass to his inadequacies.

But she always loved creating fire with glass as a child.

She particularly enjoyed setting unsuspecting ants aflame.

“Getting your hands dirty is beneath you. There’s no doubt your plans are always cunning.”

She nearly gagged at the sound of those words leaving her throat as she slowly approached the designer and his assistant, calculating each step before taking it. No, she really didn’t believe his plans were cunning. It seemed like he akumatized anyone, chucking strategy to the wind. Imbecille.

“Your akumas, they’re always dressed so well--” it took a colossal amount of willpower for Lila not to look away then, a classic sign of lying “--and their powers are always a genius play on words--” double gag “--but unless you’re willing to play in the mud . . .”

Crunch.

The young vixen made a spectacle of rotating her toes back and forth as she squashed the ladybug the duo had so gingerly set on the stone. She relished in the sensation of a dainty beetle beneath her boot, imagining in vivid detail that it was the heroine’s skull instead.

When she lifted her foot, the two adults barely spared a glance at the result. Lila smirked.

“I’m willing to make a mess, sir,” Lila asserted, peering up at Gabriel through her bangs. She twirled and danced on the balls of her feet. “I would be a brilliant addition! I’ve wanted to wipe that smile off Ladybug’s face since I met her.”

For the first time since the beginning of their conversation, Gabriel’s lips tilted into a smile. He looked . . . almost proud. Lila lapped it up like a woman lost in the desert being given a bottle cap of water.

“Your family is from Italy, Lila?”

Lila tilted her head, confused by the abrupt detour in conversation. “. . . Yes.”

“How would you feel about an impromptu family visit?”

Nathalie’s eyes widened. She whipped her head around to stare down her boss so fast she was nearly overcome by dizziness. “You can’t really want--”

Gabriel held up a hand, instantly silencing his assistant. She searched his eyes for any remnants of humanity. Was there any left? Did it slip through her fingers on her watch? Gabriel couldn’t possibly want-- They were children, for God’s sakes!

But like an avalanche, his mask crumbled, and swept away with it was any morsel of decency.

“I do want, Nathalie. I’ve grown bored of this back-and-forth business with those two meddling infants. They hold onto those Miraculous so firmly, as if they could possibly know, possibly fathom--”

He didn’t finish his statement, closing his eyes and rolling his neck. Lila delighted in Gabriel’s sudden slip of conduct as his shoulders hunched all the way to his ears and he grinded his teeth. She hadn’t pictured him to be capable of such an erupting volcano of emotion. She often wondered if he was capable of emotion at all.

“Hand me the tablet, Nathalie.”

Nathalie gripped the tablet until her fingers turned white, but the resolve she saw in Gabriel loosened her own. Grudgingly, she passed him the device.

“There are some items I’d like you to procure for me, items that I surmise you’ll be quite pleased to have in your arsenal.”

Whatever these items were, they seemed to have Nathalie on the edge of her seat.

It was suddenly imperative that Lila find out what could have ruffled Mayura’s pretty feathers.

“Sir, you won’t be disappointed.”

Gabriel eyed Lila a moment before affirming, “I don’t believe I will.”

The final remnants of the golden hour neglected the garden, blanketing its visitors in a foreboding shadow like it was them and then it was the rest of the world. Perhaps this is why they missed the piercing green eyes surveying the trio scrupulously from a neighboring building.

So jealousy was a green-eyed monster.

No one mentioned it also wore black leather.

-----

I hope you're enjoying my little fic as much as I'm enjoying writing it! 🥰 There's still so much to uncover in this story so buckle up. Follow me for updates and check out my Instagram where I post art!

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[dancingboba]

Promise

Request from @shondideaira-blog (thank you for sending this, sorry it took a while, but hope you enjoy it!). A one-shot where instead of Mona, Ellie got shot by Jason at the final chapters of the book.

Colt x MC

Warnings: Angst, Gunshot, Swearing

Wordcount: 2166

Summary: Ellie gets shot and Colt goes through a whirlwind of emotions.

He moved the same time as Mona did, leaping from his position and willing his legs to pick up as much as speed as humanly possible to get to her.

It all happened within a span of a few seconds as Mona tackled Jason from the side and knocked him onto the ground. The stretch of distance between him and her, all of a sudden, felt like miles longer and everything played out in slow motion in front of his eyes as Jason wrestled his arm away from Mona and hooked a finger around the trigger, squeezing a deafening bang that made his heart stop.

He swore he could even see the bullet shooting out from the barrel, its cone-shaped head slicing and whizzing through the air before it pierced through her skin and flesh. 

“Ellie!”

This can’t be fucking happening. 

The universe couldn’t possibly be this unfair and cruel to him. He had barely recovered from the horrors of witnessing her car crashing and tumbling airborne until it slammed down onto the asphalt upside down. Now this...it was all too much.

By the time he reached her, she had collapsed onto the ground, hand clutching at her abdomen where a red stain was quickly spreading through her shirt. 

“C-Colt...I...he...” her eyes were wide in shock, panting and gasping in pain.

“Fuck. Fuck, Ellie, you got shot.” he immediately dropped to his knees beside her and pressed his hand over her wound, a wave of nausea hitting him as her blood seeped through the gaps between his fingers, slicking all over the back of his hand. 

For the first time since his Pops died, revenge wasn’t the first thing on his mind. No matter how much rage was boiling inside of him, the rapid rounds of gun shots behind him faded into mere background noises as he focused on her. She’s all that mattered to him, nothing else.

A knot twisted painfully in the pit of his stomach as he stared at the pretty face that unknowingly stole his heart now marked with scars and bruises, the usual smiley face replaced with a look of terror, the stretch of smooth skin he used to place his lips and fingers now tainted with a hole gushing out red.

“You’re going to be okay, El. You’re going to be okay.” he mumbled, words that were meant to comfort her but needed for himself as reassurance either.

Judging by the sound of skidding tires and the empty click of the gun, Jason had escaped. Part of him wished Mona managed to shoot him dead, ideally a slow excruciating pain as payback for everything he’s done. 

“Oh my god. Sweetie, are you okay?” Ximena came bursting through the building doors, followed by Toby, both rushing to her side to check on her. Meanwhile, Logan was explaining to Mona the rest of the plan when the wail of sirens cut through the air.

“The cops are almost here. Go guys, go!” Ellie said weakly, her breathing growing heavy and laborous.

He brushed a strand of hair away from her face, trying his best to stay calm. “Fuck the cops. We need to get you to the hospital.”

“I’ll distract them.” Logan volunteered, both Toby and Ximena immediately chimed in to help as well, ensuring all routes would be covered so that the route to the hospital would be clear without any cops tailing.

“Take my car,” Mona offered at last, her arm outstretched towards him with her car keys dangling in between her fingers. “Go take her safely to the hospital. I’ll get your bike there.”

He hesitated for a second, eyeing at Mona dubiously, the image of her chasing down Ellie’s car alongside with the Brotherhood still burning behind his eyes, the betrayal still stinging him.

“Come on, we don’t have time to waste!” Mona urged, as if reading his mind. “I get you don’t trust me but you know I care about her too!” 

He knew she’s right. 

He snatched the keys off her hand and tossed her his keys in exchange without further questions, scooping Ellie into his arms and carried her into Mona’s car, slamming down hard at the accelerator and sped through the city.

“I’m going to kill him...no, all of them.”

“Colt—”

“He. Fucking. Shot. You.” he bellowed, rage and pain dripping from his every word, knuckles turning white as he tightened his grip at the steering wheel, clenching so hard that he thought, for a split-second, that he might have caused a dent if that’s even possible.

“Colt.” Ellie rested her free hand on his shoulder, and miraculously, the anger instantly dissipated, the fists clenched on the wheel immediately relaxed a little, the comfortable touch of her hand on him somehow anchored him from the growing self-destructive rage. 

How funny, he thought, that she was the one calming him when he should be the one comforting her.

He took a couple of deep breaths and squeezed her hand, lifting it to his lips to press a gentle kiss at the back of her hand. “Hang in there, El. You’re going to make it.”

***

She insisted in walking into the ER herself, refusing to put him into any risk of getting caught. He tried to argue, but he knew from the stubbornness and determination in her eyes that he won’t win this one no matter how hard he tried. 

So he could only reassure her (and himself) one last time that everything’s going to be okay, giving her one last desperate kiss, before watching her limp towards the hospital until her petite frame disappeared behind the sliding doors.

His hands shook the entire time, a tornado of emotions eating him up on the inside that’s becoming too overwhelming to bear. 

The familiar sound of his Cavalieri Novanta approached, a soothing rumble saving him from drowning deeper into a blackhole of emotions. As promised, Mona had brought his motorcycle to the hospital for him.

“How is she?”

"She wouldn’t let me go in with her.”

“That’s probably smart.” Mona hummed and climbed off his bike. “You were going to take the bullet for her.”

“She’d be worth it.” he replied, hands stuffed deep into his pockets and eyes staring down at his feet, hoping to hide any trace of distraught on his face. “I was still too fucking late though.”

“He said he wouldn’t hurt her...” she trailed off. Colt glanced up and wondered if that’s guilt he caught in her eyes. 

"Well yeah, you shouldn’t have trusted that prick.” he bumped past her shoulder to get to his bike.

“Hey, Kaneko?” he paused for one moment and turned over his shoulder to acknowledge her. “Always watch your back.” 

He nodded in response and slipped his visor down, gunning his bike away into the night with a roar.

The exhilarating feeling of speed coursing through his body helped a little in distracting his emotions. It was late enough in the dead of the night for him to gun down the road freely, turning up his engine to maximize his horsepower and pushing his bike to its speed limits. 

Frustration seeped in. He wondered if things could’ve gone differently, if there was anything he could’ve done differently to save her or prevented any of this to happen in the first place. 

Eventually, he slowed down to an uphill viewpoint at Ladera Heights, the quiet residential street dimly illuminated by a few street lamps in front of his eyes.

He wasn’t alone.

Logan was there too, shrouded in the shadows behind a tree, eyes trained at one particular house surrounded by flashing cop lights.

“You’re still here.”

“Had to make sure that bastard get taken away.” Logan replied and a silent understanding passed between the two. “Is she okay?”

“Yeah.” 

“She’ll live.”

“I know.”

Just then, the doors of the house swung open, with Jason being dragged out of the house in handcuffs by FBI agents.

Colt clenched his fists at his sides, trying to contain the loathe and fury that were rapidly building inside of him. That man had been responsible for hurting all the people he ever cared about, responsible for all the nightmares that he knew would come haunting him for years to come.

Detective Wheeler stepped outside of the house a minute later, phone pressed onto his ear. The distressed expression on his face could only mean he’d received the news of his daughter from the hospital.

It was damn satisfying to watch Detective Wheeler throwing a solid punch at Jason as soon as he got off the phone, hitting him square at the jaw, and again, drawing blood from the corner of his mouth.

Serves him right.

For one moment, they shared a smirk with each other, him and Logan, that one rare occasion where they actually agreed on something. 

Logan left first, but he stayed and watched until each flashing red and blue faded into the darkness. 

This one’s for you, Pops. And he’d never hurt you ever again, El.

***

Sneaking into the hospital was easier than he anticipated. He waited till he saw Detective Wheeler leave the hospital, making sure there’re no cops stationing around before he went in.

It took him a minute to locate her room but once he found her, the sight of her lying peacefully on the hospital bed sent him a wave of relief.

She’s fine, she’s alive.

He slipped into the room and quietly pulled a chair next to her bed, taking her hand into his, gently stroking the smooth skin of the back of her hand with his thumb.

“Colt?”

“Shit. Sorry, did I wake you?”

She propped herself up, briefly wincing, and glanced nervously around the room. “What are you doing here? What if the FBI —”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about me. How are you feeling?”

“Weird.” she admitted. “But they took the bullet out and the doctors said everything looks good after the operation so I should be out soon.”

“Good.” He slid next to her on the hospital bed, eager to feel her physically close to him, seeking for the reassurance that she’s truly fine and okay.

A comfortable silence stretched between them, simply enjoying each other’s presence, and his whirlwind of emotions finally settled in.

“You could’ve died,” he croaked suddenly, breaking the silence in the room, voice broken as he buried his head into the crook of her neck. “I love you, El. I fucking love you and I don’t know what I would do if...if you...”

“Hey, it’s okay, I’m okay now.” 

“You’re all I have left, Ellie.” He pulled back to look at her, gazing deep into her eyes and baring all of his vulnerabilities in front of her.

“I promise I’m not going anywhere.” she said softly, doe eyes staring into his with sincerity before closing in the distance between them, capturing his lips with hers, pouring all her love and promise through the intimacy of their mouths moving against each other.

He’d learnt every single curve of her lips by heart, familiar with every sensation she pulled from him every time her lips touched his. But of course she still managed to surprise him. This kiss? It was stirring the rawest emotions and drawing a whole different level of intimacy that had him breaking down every last of his walls. Once again, he wondered what on earth had she done to him, reaching into the depths of his heart that he didn’t know existed himself. 

When they broke away for air, his eyes were glossy from the pooling tears despite he’s not one who easily shed a tear, leave alone for a girl. But Ellie’s special, a girl who’d continuously done wonders to him. If he were going to cry for a girl, for anyone, it’s going to be for her.

“How are you supposed to keep your promise when you’re leaving LA as soon as you get out of here?” he asked half-jokingly, in attempt to distract himself enough to prevent his tears from falling.

“Knew you’d say that.” his lips tugged into a smirk at the way she rolled her eyes, the familiar feeling of their banter making his heart bloom. She playfully bumped her shoulder against his, “we’ll work something out. I promise.”

The possibilities of their future together played out in his mind. There’s no easy path for them, but he realized he would fight with all his efforts to be with her, moving mountains for her if need to because she’s all he’s got. She’s home, his anchor, his better half, and he needed her like she’s oxygen.

She squeezed his hand, eyes soft filled with affection. “We’ll make it work.” she said determinedly. “It’s you and me against the world, right?”

The knots finally untwisted in him. For the first time all night, things finally somewhat felt right. He looked at her amorously, a genuine smile slowly stretching across his features. “Yeah, you’re damn right.”

[gatheringfiki]

The following ficlet was written by @i-am-still-bb​ based on this photoset.

Fili/Kili, Teen.

You can also read this story on AO3.

If you’ve enjoyed this story, please leave a comment either in replies or on AO3. :)

—

What the Winter Snows Gave Me

“Well,” Fili plants his hands on his knees and shoves himself to his feet, “I should get going.”

Dis looks up from her knitting, her eyes flicking to the dark windows, “Must you go? It is so dark.”

“We only have light for a few hours a day now, Amad,” Fili says gently. “I am used to making my way in the dark. Besides, it’s only been a few days since the full moon. There will be more than enough light.”

“You could still stay,” Dis protests.

“Dis, just let him go,” Thorin rumbles. 

Dis’ turns to her brother and scowls. “He could stay.”

“Amad, I have to check my traplines in the morning. I cannot stay.”

She starts to protest once more, but Fili interrupts, “If I stay I won’t get started until late and then I may be caught working in the dark, and that is not something that I want. There have been fresh wolf signs around the line and near my cabin for weeks. He’s on his own and I don’t want to get caught in the dark between a starving wolf and his dinner.”

Dis’ eyes go wide, but she says nothing else. She watches as Fili’s gathers everything together and stows things in his pack. 

“Thanks for everything, Amad.” Fili gives his mother a hug and kisses her cheek.

“Be careful.”

“I will,” he smiles softly.

The miles between Ered Luin and his cabin do not bother Fili. They allow him a level of privacy that would not be afforded to him if he were living side-by-side with his family and “the company” as Thorin called them. Even in the dark with the moonlight turning the world into grayscale he knows his way along these trails, but tonight his ears are peels for crunching snow that is not caused by his own boots and he watches for tracks in the newly fallen snow. He has not seen the wolf; he is not sure whether it is desperate enough to try to turn him into its dinner. His gloved fingers are loosely wrapped around his rifle, but he is ready to pull it to his shoulder in an instant. The night is silent. The snows are deep and more of it keeps falling, filling in his footprints as soon as he steps away.

His shoulders relax as he approaches his cabin. A thin trail of smoke from the banked embers emerges from the chimney that is shroud in snow. Nothing has been distrubed. He smiles. He cannot help it when he sees his home, his place, it always warms the coldest corners of his heart. 

He fumbles in the pockets of his coat for his key. He had learned the hard way that leaving his cabin unlocked was a bad idea; he had returned from trapping to find a black bear rummaging through his belongings.

As he approaches the door, with key in hand, he freezes. In the corner provided by his woodpile and his cabin there is something large and dark and breathing. The shadows of the trees and his cabin and the grayscale of the moon make it impossible to determine what the shape could be. Fili slowly raises his rifle; taking care not to make any noise; regretting the fact that he had not taken care with his movements until it might be too late.. A flick of a finger disengages the safety with a soft, metallic, click. He runs over what it could be—lynx, wolf, coyote, sheep, black bear that woke from hibernation far to early. His heart pounds, but he forces himself to breathe slowly and steadily. He shifts closer, careful to leave an exit route for whatever it might be; cursing the noise of the new snow. 

He takes a deep breath. Every muscle tensed in case he needs to move quickly. And prodes the lump with the barrel of his gun, “Hey bear! Get out of here!”

The lump rustles.

Fili pulls the butt of his rifle to his shoulder. His finger twitches for the trigger, but he keeps it off, for the moment.

His mouth falls open when the dark lump’s head lifts and large, brown eyes look at him. 

Not a bear.

Fili lowers his gun. “Are you okay?” He holds his hand out and the man flinches away moving deeper into the woodpile.

“Hey,” he says most softly. He extends his hand slowly, palm up; the same way that he would approach a wild animal. “I’m not going to hurt you. Are you hurt?”

The man does not answer. He just stares, wild-eyed, at Fili’s hand.

Fili steps back slinging his rifle over his shoulder. He pulls his key out once again and unlocks the door, all while keeping one eye on his unexpected guest. Fili holds the door open, “Come inside, we’ll get you warmed up.”

When the man does not move Fili entered the door himself, quickly moving through the lean-to that he uses for storage to the second door. Once inside he drops his bag and hastily stokes the fire and lights a few lanterns. When he steps outside again the man is standing near the door and peering in. He jumps back when Fili emerges, ducking through the low door.

“You can go in,” Fili gestures to the interior of the cabin when is now glowing warmly.

Brown eyes look from Fili to the door and back again.

“It’s okay,” Fili assures him. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’ll be right there; I need to get some snow to melt first.” With that Fili turns the corner of the cabin and grabs a large metal tub from the wall and begins filling it with snow. When he comes to the front of the cabin he is pleased to find that his unexpected guest is no longer loitering by the woodpile. 

Fili pulls the door shut behind and carefully latches it; he does not see the man jump at the sound.

“Let’s get you warmed up,” Fili says cheerfully placing the tub on top of the large cast-iron stove that he had moved out here via sledge when he first built the cabin. He transfers some of the snow into a kettle, and then grabs a fur from his bed and drapes it over the man’s shoulders, “I’m surprised that you’re not frozen through.” He gestures for him to sit on the chair closest to the stove. He shuffles forward—Fili notices that he is not wearing proper shoes, rather he has rags bound around his feet—and sits in a chair; curling close to the black stove. 

Fili checks on the snow and then busies himself with pulling things out of his pack and storing them away. He has a tin of candied oranges, a new sweater and shirt, ammunition for his rifle, a new knife; all of which he carefully puts away onto shelves or in a trunk. He removes his own outer layer of clothing; hanging his heavy waxed cotton coat and furs on pegs by the door.

He notices that he is being watched. Wide brown eyes follow him as he moves around the small cabin. 

Fili is careful not to stare even though he wants to learn more about the man; he does not want to make him more uncomfortable. The man is curled towards the fire, but he is far from relaxed. He seems poised to run at a moment’s notice. He flinches away violently when Fili approaches the stove to check the progress of the melting snow.

Seeing this, Fili stops and holds his hands out. “It’s okay. I just need to check this,” he gestures to the basin. 

The man seems to relax the smallest amount.

The snow has melted into water and Fili dips his fingers in to check the temperature. It is warm, but not hot. He pulls the basin from the stove and places it on the ground and stirs the water with his bare hand. He grabs a few flannel rags and pulls a stool close to the tub and the stranger.

“We need to get you warmed up and cleaned off. I don’t know how long you were out there, but we can hope that there is no long lasting damage.” Fili takes hold of the stranger’s foot and holds it firmly and begins unwrapping the rags that bind his feet.

Fili inspects the man’s bare feet. “Only a bit of frostnip here,” he gestures to the persistent redness on his toes. “That’ll go away fairly quickly here, with no lasting pain or discomfort once they are warmed.” Fili starts to lower the man’s bare foot into the basin, but as soon as the water touches the frost-nipped toes he violently jerks his foot away. The movement jostles the basin and some of the water sloshes out onto Fili’s pants.

“Woah,” Fili says gently spreading his hands. “It’ll be uncomfortable, maybe even painful, but it needs to be done. I promise,” he carefully takes the man’s foot in hand, “it’ll be okay.”

This time the man allows his foot to be placed in the basin of warm water; he flinches and scowls, but he does not jerk away.

Fili’s inspection of the other foot reveals the same symptoms. 

“I’ll need to see your hands next,” Fili holds out a hand and nods to the man’s hands which have remained secreted away inside his clothing.

He shifts slightly and pulls out his hands and shows them to Fili. Fili gingerly turns one hand over and then the other. The skin on the fingertips has taken on a distinctly white color, but there are no blisters, and it does not extend to the palms. 

“This is a bit worse,” Fili explains, even though he is unsure if the man even understands Khuzdul. “Your fingers are actually frostbitten. They’ll hurt more and they’ll take more time to heal.

“I’ll work on warming one hand, but I’m going to need you to do something for me. Take this,” Fili dampens one of flannel rags and demonstrates, “and press it to your ears, cheeks, and nose. It will help warm them.” The man’s face shows the red marks of frostnip.

Fili hands the rag over and his guest does as he was shown. Fili takes his free hand and holds it between his own; warming it the best he can. The man watches nervously; his eyes are wide and every muscle is tense. After several minutes, when the man’s hands are no longer quite so icy to the touch, Fili has him switch hands. This continues until Fili is sure that the man’s appendages have been thoroughly warmed.

While doing this Fili does not speak, but he does inspect the man further. Long, dark brown hair hangs limply in his face, his clothes seem to be made up mostly of cloth that has been wrapped around his body and secured with a belt. Fili doubts that the man’s “clothes” will withstand being washed.

“That’s really all we can do for now. The rest is mainly waiting and staying warm.”

The man tries to hand the flannel rag back.

Fili shakes his head. “No. You may want to use that to wash,” Fili mimes the action to make sure that he is understood.

The man nods slowly and begins removing his wrappings. 

Fili turns away to give him some privacy. He goes to the end of his bed and opens the chest there and begins rummaging around for clothes that may fit his guest. Having pulled out some items he looks over his shoulder to check his progress. The man is hunched over, looking beaten. Fili is surprised but not entirely to see how thin the man is. Fili could count the bones of his spine if he desired. What does startle him is the 5 red scars running down his left side. Their spacing and their curvature reveals the perpetrator; a grizzly. Fili considers the man with a bit of awe, to tangle with a grizzly and survive is no small feat. The scars are healed, but they are still angry and red, evidence that not long had passed since they were received.

Fili looks away not wishing to invade the meagre privacy that he can offer. He locates some food and tea; black for himself, but willowbark for his guest to help with pain.

This time when Fili turns the man is laboriously wrapping himself again. “You don’t need to do that.”

The man pauses and looks up; he seems to shrink away from Fili’s gaze.

“I have these,” Fili scoops up the pile of clothes he had gathered. “They won’t fit well, but they’re clean and they should be a good sight warmer than what you’ve been wearing.”

The man accepts them. His carefully makes sure that his fingers do not come close to Fili’s. The thick woolen pants are too short and the waist too large, but the undershirt and the grey sweater, which Fili had received several Yuletides before from his mother, manage to reach the man’s wrists because the shoulders are too broad. The socks have seen better days. They bear the marks of darning from both Dis and from Fili, but they fit as well as can be expected, and are tall enough that the bottom of the pants can be tucked in to them.

The man wraps his arms protectively around his chest and carefully sits down again.

Fili pulls the kettle from the stove and fills two mugs; handing one to the man who accepts it wrapping his trembling fingers around the dark ceramic.

“The tea should help with the pain,” Fili explains, “in your fingers.” Fili fills his own mug. He fills a plate with pieces of hard bread, dried meat, and some of the candied fruit that his mother had just given him. “I can make something more substantive tomorrow, but for now, this should help.”

The man is clearly hungry, but he holds himself back and eats slowly; his eyes flick to Fili every so often.

Fili drinks his tea slowly and tries not to stare. He is solving possible problems; food, clothing, boots, sleeping arrangements. He stands. At least one of these is easy to solve.

Fili pulls the trundle bed from beneath his bed and navigates it into the opposite corner. He had built the trundle in case his mother, Thorin, or anyone else needed to use it. It is smaller, and less well-maintained, and it fits into the corner that is further from the stove. He rummages around again among his belongings to locate his spare quilts and furs. 

“You can sleep here,” Fili indicates the larger bed that is closer to the fire before preparing himself for bed and banking the fire in the stove. He crawls beneath the blanket and tries to relax. He can feel the ropes from the frame clearly. He shifts roughly on to his side and adds cutting pine boughs to his list of things to do the next day.

When Fili wakes the next morning he is momentarily confused by the fact that everything is on the wrong side of the room, but then he remembers. He groans as he rises to his feet; he stretches his shoulders and pulls on the socks that he had kicked off in his sleep.

He notices that the man is watching him from within the depths of his own blankets.

“Good morning.”

There is no response.

Fili stokes the fire before emptying to left over water from the kettle into a saucepan that he places on the stovetop. He dumps in dried fruit and oats and starts absently stirring them while yawning. 

Kili rises from his bed, fully dressed in the clothes that Fili had given him the night before. He holds out his hand to the spoon and nods.

“Oh, it’s fine.”

Kili shakes his head and looks pointedly at the spoon.

Fili lets go of the spoon and steps back.

Kili takes his places and starts stirring.

Fili drops onto the low trundle bed and yawns, pressing the back of his hand to his mouth.

Fili looks up from his work and considers his guest for a moment.

“I’ll need something to call you.”

Kili looks up, but his expression does not reveal much.

“Your name would be best, but if I can’t get that something else will have to do.” Fili leans heavily on the work table with his hands spread wide.

The man brushes his dark hair from his eyes and watches Fili as he thinks.

Fili thinks for several moments. “How about,” he says slowly, “ ‘Little Fox,’ eh?”

Kili just blinks at Fili. The slightest smile tugs at his lips, but Fili does not see it.

Fili looks pleased with himself, “Yeah. I think that’ll work. I think it suits you pretty well. You’ve got those eyes, and your behave a bit like one as well.”

Later that evening Fili relaxes in his chair and opens his book and starts reading. He pauses for a sip of tea and looks up at “Little Fox” who is seated in the opposite chair staring at the fire through the grates in the stove with his knees drawn up to his chest. 

Fili shifts in his seat, “I could read aloud if you’d like.” 

Kili nods slightly and goes back to watching the fire. 

Fili clears his throat and starts reading.

A few nights later Fili starts reading and Kili is pacing from the stove to the door and back. He continues this way while Fili reads. His stockinged feet shuffling quietly on the wooden floors. Fili does not blame him for this behavior. He has been cooped up in the cabin for several days because Fili’s spare boots do not even come close to fitting him.

Kili pauses when he passes by Fili and reaches out to touch Fili’s hair. 

Fili pauses and their eyes meet for a moment before Fili starts reading again.

Kili works his fingers deeper into Fili’s hair and begins working out any knots. He eventually moves on to the Fili’s braids. He removes their fastenings, smooths the hair, and beginnings rebraiding them before fastening them again. Fili leans in to the touch and fights the urge to close his eyes.

Fili pushes the front door open with his shoulder, “Hello? Amad?”

Dis’ reddened face appears around the doorway. “Fili! What are you doing here?” She wraps him into a hug. “We just saw you. Is something wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong, Amad,” Fili assures her while pressing his forehead to hers. “But I do have an odd request.”

“What is it?”

Fili explains about his unexpected guest. “My spare boots are far too small and I wondered if Thorin or someone else might have an old pair that they would be willing to part with.”

Dis nods. “I think Thorin has an old pair that no longer fit around the calves. They’re in decent shape, but I don’t know where they would be. I’ll have to ask him—”

“Ask me what?” Thorin asks from where he has appeared from the back of the house. His forge was off the back of the house and he must have come in for a break or a drink.

Dis turns to her brother, “Where are those old boots of yours? The ones that squeeze your legs.”

“Under my bed, I’d imagine. Why?”

Dis mumbles something about messy men under her breath and disappears up the stairs to the bedrooms.

Thorin frowns. “Did something happen to yours?” He looks at Fili’s boots trying to spot some defect.

Fili shakes his head. “They’re not for me.”

“Who then?”

“When I made it home after Yule there was a man sheltering on my porch. I’ve been able to make do with the spare things I had, but he didn’t have any boots when I found him and mine don’t fit him.”

Thorin’s expression darkens. “Who is he?”

Fili shrugs and watches the stairs for his mother’s return. “He doesn’t speak. He reminds me of a fox so I’ve been calling him that.”

“How do you know that he isn’t working for our enemy?”

Fili resists the urge to roll his eyes, which he knows will only anger his uncle further. “He hasn’t even looked at me crossly. And if he was there to ‘bring an end to the line of Durin’ he’s had ample opportunity while I’ve been asleep.”

Thorin’s neck turns red.

That is when Dis reappears carrying a pair of large boots.

“You’ve got boots now so you can join me.”

Kili’s face lights up with a wide grin.

Fili pulls together everything that they might need and hands some of the tools over to Kili who quickly stows them away. The eager smile on his face makes Fili excited for this foray into the forest in a way that has not been for a long time.

The woods are quiet and he can hear Kili following along behind him by the crunch and rustle of the icy snow. They’ve been at it for a few hours, working in silence. The traps are mostly empty. Fili sometimes adjusts their position before resetting them and covering them once more.

The silence is suddenly too loud. It takes him a moment to figure out that he can no longer hear another’s footsteps. He turns. 

Kili is standing in the snow and not moving anything but his hand which he is forcefully opening and closing. His eyes, the only part of his face that is visible, is crinkled with pain.

Fili quickly walks back. “Are you okay?” he asks before realizing that this was a pretty stupid question to ask. “Here, let me take a look,” Fili says pulling of his mittens and stuffing them in a pocket.

Fili takes one of Kili’s hands in his own and pulls of the glove and tucks it away. “Shit,” he says softly seeing that Kili’s fingers are red again. “We should have waited longer,” he mumbles.

Thinking quickly he releases Kili’s hand and began unbuttoning his own coat, pulling up his dark orange sweater, and untucking his shirt.. Kili tugs down his scarf and watches in confusion. “Give me your hands,” Fili says holding his own out.

Kili pulls off his remaining glove and slowly complies. Fili snatches Kili’s hands in his own and stuffs them, his hands and Kili’s, underneath his shirt into his armpits; inadvertently tugging Kili closer. Fili hisses in discomfort when their cold fingers touch his warm skin. He curls towards Kili in an effort to protect his exposed stomach from the wind that has picked up. Suddenly he is struck by how incredibly intimate this is and is very aware of the closeness of their bodies. He shakes his head to dispel those thoughts.

Fili looks up into Kili’s face—his eyes are wide with surprise, “Okay, yeah?”

Kili nods and licks his lips. 

Fili watches entranced before forcing himself to look away.

The days were getting longer and today the sun was shining brightly and the winds were mild. Kili had shed his hat and scarf and his scruffy coat that was too big was open. He sits on a stool just outside the door to the cabin. He is peeling and cutting away the bad parts of some root vegetables for dinner that night. Fili had left when the sun came up and was not expected back for several hours. 

“Hello the house!”

Kili’s head snaps up. In the weeks that he had been here he had not seen anyone else. 

Two tall men are approaching. One has long hair while the other is bald with a large mustache and tattoos. Neither of them look very happy and they are speaking quietly to one another.

Kili stands nervously and raises a hand in greeting.

Kili looks to the woods; hoping that he will see Fili’s golden hair glinting in the sun as he makes his way back to the cabin. 

Fili is whistling to himself when he hears the shouting. He quickened his pace. When he breaks into the clearing surrounding the cabin he freezes momentarily, his mouth open, dropping the two rabbits that he had gotten that day.

Thorin is shouting. “Who are you? What do you want with us?” He has Kili’s shirt crumpled in his fists as he repeatedly shoved the smaller man against the outer wall of the cabin. Thorin’s face is red and Kili’s face is turned away as he pushes uselessly at Thorin’s bulk. Dwalin stands a few paces back with his arms crossed.

Fili does not remember crossing the clearing. All he remembers is breaking Thorin’s hold on Kili and pushing Thorin backwards. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he shouts. 

Fili positions himself between the two when Thorin rushes back in; his eyes wild, “I’m here to figure out what this whelp,” he points a finger at Kili, “wants with you and what he’s planning.”

“Are you crazy?” Fili takes a step forward. “He’s done nothing. He’s not threatening your precious bloodline.”

“You’re that bloodline, boy,” Thorin says in a low, dangerous voice.

Fili is about to take a step forward, his hands already raised to force Thorin back when he feels tentative fingers on his shoulder. He glances back and see Kili cowering behind him with wide eyes and a darkening bruise on his cheek. Fili gives Kili’s hand a reassuring squeeze.

“I think you should leave,” Fili says tightly. He refuses to look at his uncle.

Fili pauses his work and roughly rubs his eyes with his wrist. He looks down at the net that he has been working on all evening. He had been avoiding thinking about that afternoon’s encounter with Thorin. He knew that neither Thorin nor Dwalin were comfortable with this arrangement, but he cannot explain it, he feels incredibly protective of younger man.

He leans forward with his elbows on his knees and he considers his sleeping guest. “What am I going to do with you?” he sighs.

He goes back to working on repairing the net and does not notice that he is being watched by half-lidded brown eyes.

Fili drops his load onto the porch in front of the cabin; whistling as he does. The sky was clear and perfect, the temperatures warm enough that he was not rushing his way along the line to get home before his toes froze solid. The days were getting longer. It was a good day and he had been whistling off and on throughout the day knowing full well that it may scare off animals and he may find nothing but empty traps in a few days.

He keeps whistling as he goes about his work of preparing the animals. Kili peeks out through the door. Fili smiles, “Come help.”

He disappears back inside for a few moments and when he reappears he has wrapped himself in his coat, but his dark hair is flying loose in the light breeze.

Fili hands over a knife and the pair of them work side-by-side. After a few minutes of silence, Fili starts to whistle once more. He stops when Little Fox starts humming along.

Fili stares at him, but he just smiles and resumes humming.

That night, long after Kili had fallen asleep Fili sits awake. Initially he had been watching the fire, but once Kili’s breath had evened out Fili found himself watching the other man as he slept. His dark hair is splayed across his pillow and he has the blankets tucked tightly beneath his chin. 

Singing reaches him before he can even see the cabin through the trunks of white birch trees and thick trunked pines. He frowns. This is certainly better than the yelling he had returned to a few weeks before, but possibly more confusing. 

He enters the clearing to find only Kili who is busy moving wood from the larger woodpile in the woods to that by the door. He is singing softly while he works.

“You can speak?” Fili says with surprise.

Kili looks a little ashamed and nods averting his eyes.

“I’m not going to make you talk if you don’t want to, but it would be nice to know your name so I can stop calling you ‘Little Fox.’”

He clears his throat; his voice is rough from disuse. “It’s Kili… Killian Durin.”

Fili smiles warmly and sticks his hand out, “Nice to finally get your name Kili Durin.”

Fili startles awake in the darkness of the cabin. The banked fire had long since died down, and everything is quiet. He shifts and fluffs his pillow before noticing that Kili is standing over his bed.

“What’s wrong?” Fili asks and starts to sit up rubbing his eyes.

Kili shakes his head. He places a hand on Fili’s shoulder and gently pushes him back down into his mattress. 

Fili frowns in confusion and opens his mouth to ask a question only for Kili to put a finger to his lips and shake his head again.

Once Fili is laying down Kili pulls back the blankets and crawls in next to Fili. Fili stiffens, but Kili just puts his arm around Fili’s waist and closes his eyes. After several long moments Fili rolls onto his side with his back facing Kili. Kili shifts closer—his nose in Fili’s hair—and tightens his hold on Fili’s waist.

Fili forces himself to relax, but he is too acutely aware of Kili’s presence, Kili’s weight against his back, Kili’s warmth, to relax entirely. He takes a deep breath and wraps his fingers around Kili’s which rest on his stomach.

Kili hums softly and presses closer.

Fili lies awake in his bed listening to the pop of the embers in the stove. And he waits. He stretches languidly beneath his blankets and curls his toes in his socks. Everything is going fuzzy around the edges and sleep is pulling him under when he hears stockinged feet on the wooden floor and the edge of his bed dips. But it does not pull him entirely from the warm cocoon that was enveloping him where everything is soft and warm. 

Kili worms his way beneath the blankets and slots himself next to Fili.

“Hey,” Fili huffs rolling onto his side to face Kili. They are so close that their noses almost touch. Fili’s heart is in his mouth.

Kili hums under his breath and squirms around until he is comfortable. Fili allows his limbs to be moved and manipulated until Kili finally settles. He has one leg between Fili’s legs and Fili’s leg is curled around his calf, and one arm is around Fili’s waist and the other trapped between their bodies.

Fili shifts a little closer; one arm beneath curled beneath his head. He rests his free arm on Kili’s hip. Kili’s shirt has ridden up and Fili strokes the bare skin absently with his thumb.

“You’re warm,” Fili mumbles dropping his face to Kili’s shoulder. After several long moments where he hovered on the edge of sleep he looks up to see Kili’s face, his nose brushing against Kili’s. 

Kili gently squeezes Fili’s waist. “Fee,” he breathes. 

Fili’s breath hitches. They are so close that he can almost taste his name on Kili’s lips. Kili’s breath caresses his cheek, his neck. Fili raises his hand from Kili’s waist and touches Kili’s cheek; his thumb skimming his cheek from the corner of his lips to his ear.. Fili slides his hand back and tangles it in Kili’s dark hair. He gently pulls Kili into a kiss; barely a brush of lips, but with it Fili knows that he will not be able to stop after a single kiss. Kili makes a small noise that has Fili dragging him back down into a deeper kiss. A kiss that is warm and slow. 

Kili shifts so that he lays partially on top of Fili and the kiss continues with Fili’s fingers in his hair and his arm around Fili’s waist. When they separate Kili rests his head on Fili’s shoulder and within moments Fili is asleep his fingers still wrapped in Kili’s unruly hair. Kili works his hand underneath Fili’s shirt so his hand can rest on Fili’s bare stomach. He can feel him breath and he falls asleep listening to Fili’s heartbeat. 

Kili ducks through the low door and drops the firewood he was carrying next to the stove. He stands, puts his hands into his lower back, and stretches.

Fili sees the exact moment that Kili notices.

“What happened to the bed?” he looks at Fili.

“Well,” Fili says slowly standing up, “You weren’t really using this one and it is more comfortable after all.”

Kili’s cheeks flush a deep red that reaches his ears. “Oh.”

Fili steps closer to Kili; fingers trailing up Kili’s arm. “Plus, its bigger,” he says softly. He smiles at the shiver that runs through Kili’s body.

Kili swallows forcefully, “Maybe we should test it out, just to make sure?”

“You’d like that wouldn’t you?” Fili tugs Kili close and they tumble onto the bed.

“Yes,” Kili laughs from his position beneath Fili.

“Hmm,” Fili hums kissing Kili’s neck and gently pushing his thigh between Kili’s legs.

Kili whines with his whole body.

“We should probably get back to work,” Fili says pressing a kiss beneath Kili’s ear before pushing himself off the bed and disappearing out the door.

Kili drops his head back on the blankets and takes a deep, calming breath before he tries to stand.

These not entirely chaste encounters continue until one warm summer night. Darkness never completely comes anymore than blankets and furs were shed long ago. Fili had even stopped wearing socks to bed in favor of sleeping in his undershirt. He climbs into bed and pulls the light blanket over them both.

As soon as the blanket and Fili settle into the bed Kili’s hands start pushing up Fili’s shirt.

“Kili?” 

Kili does not respond, but allows his fingers to continue their journey. Fili gasps Kili’s name when Kili’s fingers wrap around him.

Shortly after Kili’s shirt lay discarded on the ground and Fili struggles to keep his mind on the task at hand. His fingers trace the things that so entrance him; things illuminated by the midnight sun. He touches the soft curves of Kili’s body, the sharp planes of his face, his hip bones, with reverence.

“Hello the house!”

Fili smiles; rising from his seat. “It’s alright, its my mother,” he says when he sees Kili’s look of apprehension. “I’m sure she’d love to meet you.”

“Okay,” Kili says rising uncertainly and following Fili around the cabin to greet the visitors.

“Amad!” Fili greets his mother and wraps her into a tight hug. “Salmon run already?”

“Everything’s pointing to an early winter, so yes,” she smiles. She pulls back, and you must be Little Fox,” she says cheerfully.

“It’s actually Kili,” Kili says awkwardly when Dis pulls him into a hug as well.

Dis beams at him, “So it is!”

Thorin is hanging back. He raises a hand in greeting when he notices Fili looking at him. 

“Do you have to move on right away, or can you stay a while?”

Dis looks at Thorin, who nods. “We can stay a while.”

Dis does not miss a thing. She sees how her son’s face softens when he looks at Kili and she sees how Kili finds small excuses to touch or be near Fili.

Before they leave Dis pulls Kili aside. “Can I measure your feet?”

Kili’s eyebrows shoot up, “Why?” He looks over his shoulder for Fili.

“Oh, it’s nothing weird, sweetheart. I just want to know how big your feet are so I can make you some socks for Yule.”

[5am-the-foxing-hour]

Nightmare

Me writing a thing from the nightmare i had? more likely than you think.

Warnings: none that i can think off

Characters: Sympathetic Deceit, Thomas, The others are mentioned.

General Fanfic Tag list: @ebony-wolf, @nashiraneko,  @secretlyanxiouspersona, @i-sold-my-soul-to-thefandom, @rabbitsartcorner,@punsterterry,  @sleepyssnail,  @nightmaresides, @virgilswritings, @ninja-girl2846, @ninjago2020, @starryfirefliesbloggo, @grace–the-fangirl, @sympatheticdeceit, @cookiethedevil, @askthesnake

The computer before him was the only source of light in the room, smoke or mist swirled around making everything blurry and confusing as the weird symbols kept changing on the computer screen. Deceit tapped away on the keyboard, he wasn’t sure what he was doing, what the scenario was nor what was planned. but all the confusion died down and he felt himself freeze when a big hand suddenly grabbed around his mouth and forced his writs together and he was pulled back, the computer vanishing but the dull greenish light still hung in the air lighting up the room.

Deceit stiffened, nostrils flaring from his breaths.

the person behind him was shrouded in shadows without any characteristics to help Deceit know who it could be that his brain decided to put in that role. but to no avail.

Deceit gave away a growl he was not gonna let this shadow get it’s way and started to fight back the best he could, kicking the shins and hunching forward to make the shadow have trouble keeping a hold of his face.

in the end, Deceit wasn’t sure how long he kept fighting until he got free and with a hard kick to the head the shadow fell to the side, Deceit didn’t wait to see how it fell before he forced his eyes open.

Deceit jolted into wakefulness, breath rapid and heart beating a mile a minute, he sat up with a jerk, pulling Sir. Slithers close, the old stuffed yellow snake plushie, that had been longer than him once, now looked back at him with worn green glass eyes with scratches and dents, the fabric was matted at places but it still brought him comfort after all the years he’d had the snake.

Deceit hugged it close as he stared at the door, as if daring someone to barge into his room. it was locked he knew. and mostly to himself he started to chant that no one was able to get in. but his anxiety was fried and his paranoia on high alert.

Deceit took a shaky breath as he listened. his room was dark, the only source of light being the fairy lights he had hanging along one wall. he strained his ears to listen and slowly the sound of snores echoed down the hall from one of the side’s rooms, from the best of his knowledge, it was Roman’s. Deceit, exhaled and lied down again, trying to calm his panicking heart to try and sleep again, before he closed his eyes he sent a look to the clock next to his bed to see it show that it was 3 am. Deceit gave away an exhausted sigh before he tried to sleep. but he couldn't calm down, and the nightmare returned again and again, each time he closed his eyes and was just about to actually fall asleep.

Deceit sat up and pulled the blanket around him as he hugged the snake close tried and frustrated at himself.

Maybe he could go and bother Patton, the moral side used to keep his door open and ready to cuddle is any of them had a bad dream or something. He grimaced and shook his head. no! he couldn’t show weakness like that! he had a reputation to uphold, and also... it wasn’t like that offer applied to him.

His self deprecating thoughts screeched to a halt when he felt a sudden tug, he blinked and sat up straighter, before another tug pulled at him, and at the third one he appeared on the side of Thomas bed. to find the bedside lamp on and the host sitting up, looking just as terrible as Deceit felt.

  “Hey.” Thomas said with a tired smile.

  “What?” was all Deceit managed to squeak out, he was not ready to meet Thomas, he was in his loose pyjamas, revealing that he had scales on more places than just his face. And it was then he realised he was still hugging Sir. Slithers!

  “You feeling okay?” Thomas asked making Deceit return his attention to the host.

  “No? why?” Deceit still didn’t know why he was there, and wanted nothing more than to crawl back to his room to hide.

  “Well, whatever nightmare you guys ends up having, i have it too.” Thomas explained. “And you were the only one who i could feel was awake, so...” Thomas shrugged and gave him a sheepish smile. “I did what i use to do with the others.”

  “And what’s that? summoning them here and do what?” Deceit asked with a slight tense tone, as he squinted at the human.

  “Well, it depends, mostly just cuddles, Logan did say that bodily contact with someone you trust can help to fight nightmares off, or something like that.”

Thomas shuffled down the bed a bit until he was lying down again and looked up at Deceit who hadn’t moved since he got there.

  “Come ‘ere.” Thomas said with a smile as he opened his arms.

Deceit swayed forward, before he sat back again, not moving, he sent a harder squint at Thomas who huffed lightly before he let his arms fall back to the bed and then patted the mattress.

  “Just lie down, you noodle, you’re just as exhausted as i am after that nightmare.” Thomas said as he reached back and turned off the light.

The bedroom got washed over in the darkness of the night, the only light coming from a gap between the drapes before the window.

Deceit contemplated it before he slowly and hesitantly lied down on the bed. If Virgil found him like this he would most likely get kicked to the moon.

Silence stretched out and Deceit wasn’t sure if Thomas had fallen back asleep or not. but as the minutes dragged by the warmth that Thomas radiated got more noticeable compared to the slight chill of the room.

Deceit slowly shuffled closer, and closer and hesitated just before his head would reach Thomas’s chest.

A small yelp left him when Thomas suddenly pulled him close and soon Deceit found himself covered by the blanket and held close, his head resting on Thomas’s shoulder. Deceit blinked rapidly body growing stiff all over again.

  “Sleep.” Thomas mumbled as he moved one hand to start to card through the unruly curls on top of Deceit's head.

The warmth and closeness made Deceit extremely sleepy, but it was the fingers in his hair that tipped him over and he relaxed into a sleep.

He missed how Thomas sent him a glance before smiling as he caught sight of the blep, and felt more than heard the purr like noise Deceit gave away. 

  “Good night, my slimy boi.” Thomas mumbled.

Silence fell yet again over the bedroom, and in the mind palace the fairy lights dimmed down as Thomas yet again fell asleep.

[dustedmagazine]

Dust, Volume 5, Number 7

Cy Dune’s Seth Olinsky

It’s summer time finally, and who wants to be bothered with 3000-word essays on the obscure but worthy? Not us, we want shorter reviews for longer days. We’ve got cannonballs to do off lake piers, carbonized meat to ingest, cold brews to drink. So that we can get back to all that, we deliver a robust Dust with the usual mix of garage rockers, Chicago improv’ers, acoustic finger-pickers, up and comers and lately revived-ers.  We hope you enjoy it, sitting out there on your deck or fire escape or stoop...and don’t forget the sun screen.  Contributors this time include Andrew Forell, Ben Remsen, Justin Cober-Lake, Jennifer Kelly, Isaac Olson, Bill Meyer and Jonathan Shaw.    

Martin Brandlmayr — Vive Les Fantômes (Thrill Jockey)

Austrian drummer/composer Martin Brandlmayr’s award winning radio opera Vive Les Fantômes (Long live the Ghosts) combines spoken word and jazz samples with experimental electronics and percussion to create a dialogue across time and genres between Brandlmayr and some of his influences including Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, Billie Holiday, Jacques Derrida and Hitchcock’s Vertigo. Snatches of live music - a trumpet tuning up, a piano run – emerge between Brandlmayr’s understated free drumming, subtle electronics and the occasional bracing burst of noise. Monk talks sound, Miles issues instructions, and Derrida answers the telephone to speak with an unheard interlocutor. Over an engaging 53 minutes samples repeat in various juxtapositions to create relationships and emphasize their mutability. The spectral voices of long gone cultural giants speak of human frailty and the strength of the creative act. Vive Les Fantômes poignantly addresses memory and mortality. The piece closes on Derrida speaking for the first time in English “OK, I’ll be very glad to meet you. Goodbye.” Et Fin.

Andrew Forell

Burial — Claustro/State Forest (Hyperdub) 

Claustro / State Forest by Burial

William Bevan AKA Burial changed the face of electronica with the release of his eponymous debut album in 2006. His take on dubstep, jungle and ambient continues to influence producers, and his releases are highly anticipated. This first release since 2017 distills the elements that have enthralled and intrigued since the debut. A-side “Claustro” returns to Burial’s roots in jungle and rave. Vinyl crackle coats a four-to-the-floor shuffle and a vocal sample repeats in glorious swells of billowing, cloud-like sounds. It’s exhilarating albeit tinged with Burial’s signature yearning melancholy before it drops, dissolves into twinkling stars “Are you ready?” repeats and then “This song goes out to that boy.” before it kicks back in with an almost cheesy refrain “I got my eye on you, tonight.” which in turn fades back to crackle. “State Forest” is a completely different beast. A rich ambient narrative rich in atmospherics, found sounds and keening waves of synths creeping through a desolate landscape of shadow and dread. The funereal pace unfolds with miniscule details — broken twigs underfoot, drips of rain, quiet exhalations — then sudden silence. Burial places the listener in this environment, observant if not omnipotent or omnipresent, like the narrator of a classic Antinovel. Yet “State Forest” is not alienating or discursive. It shows rather than explains — a direct experience like a Beckett tale. It is his most effective piece of music since “Come Down to Us” and its obliqueness is the key to its power.  

Andrew Forell

Cy Dune — Desert (Lightning)

Akron/Family blended so many influences during their ten-year run that they avoided easy classification. With the collaborative nature of the group and its members switching instruments, it was hard to know what came from who, or whether the whole thing was just a bit of folky synergy. Then the band split up, and the years passed. Dana Janssen created Dana Buoy, an unexpected electropop duo more suited for clubs than for Akron/Family's wildernesses. Seth Olinsky, after a couple quick release years ago, emerges now as Cy Dune, with a sound much more in line with the Akron/Family aesthetic.

On Desert, Olinksy's songwriting and guitar playing provide the center of the album, but only to set up the weirdness that surrounds them. The bluesy stomp of “When You Pass Me” puts Cy Dune in the roots tradition, but the jazz influences remain strong enough that it's no surprise that bassist William Parker shows up. “Desert 2” offers chamber oddity, more a sketch than a song, but then “Desert 3” steps into the garage for some rock. Across this short album, Olinsky crams in a five-year hiatus's worth of ideas. The freak-folk of “It Is the Is” closes with some dissonance, a hint of a jazz, and a happy reminder that Cy Dune's desert archives are only beginning to open up.

Justin Cober-Lake

  Angharad Davies / Rie Nakajima / Alice Purton — Dethick (Another Timbre)

What is a score? Sometimes it is a series of staffs marked on lined paper. Sometimes it is a set of images, which may be followed according to varying degrees of specificity. Sometimes it mandates a piece of music down to the smallest detail, sometimes it offers suggestions, and sometimes it gets ignored. It’s common enough for improvisers to select partners based on their musical personalities rather than the instruments they play, so one might say that the selection is a compositional act. In this situation violinist Angharad Davies, cellist Alice Purton and sound artist Rie Nakajima (she plays kinetic devices and found objects) chose to play together for a couple days in a small church in Dethick, England. The choice to play together, the instruments they brought, the chapel’s accouterments and acoustics — that’s the score. The CD’s ten pieces sound like artifacts of a search for possibilities. How close to the language of chamber music, the shared vernacular of the two string players should they hew? How do things sound when you shake them? What does this organ sound like? What will these stone walls and stained glass windows do to the sounds? And what will one player do in the face of each other’s actions? Decisions in the face of puzzlement; that’s how these three women played this score.

Bill Meyer

 Dehd — Water

Water by DEHD

Dehd’s Water is spare and sharp, with ambling jangles of prickly guitar, a thud of bass, a shattering clank of snare on the upbeats. The Chicagoan trio — that’s Jason Balla (of Ne-Hi and Earring), Emily Kempf (of Vail and ex- of Lala Lala) and Eric McGrady — situate their songs within the tradition of scrubbed bare garage clangor, albeit with a rockabilly-ish twang sometimes flaring in the guitar lines. The one lavish, elaborate element is vocals, which twine and descant and swirl around each other, though never with undue precision. “Wild,” which leads off the disc, conjoins their various cracked and yearning voices in complicated points and counterparts, sometimes in lush, romantic sustained notes, others in percussive, time-keeping chants. “Lucky” starts in single-voiced sincerity and erupts into massive, girl-group sha-la-la-las (though some of them sung by men). Balla and Kempf recorded these songs while breaking up as a couple; they currently tour them as exes, which must lend the tunes a bit of extra ragged edge. Perhaps that’s why songs like “On My Side” are so fetching, sung with shredded hurt and blistered melody, but reaching for sweetness and finding it.

Jennifer Kelly

 DJ Lag and Okzharp — Steamrooms EP (Hyperdub)

Steam Rooms EP by DJ Lag and OKZharp

Durban-based South African Gqom producer DJ Lag teams with London’s Okzharp on the raw, percussion-heavy EP Steamrooms, their first collaboration for Hyperdub. The word Gqom, an onomatopoeia based on the Zulu word for ricochet, is said to mimic the sound of hitting a drum. Steamrooms contains none of the joyful lightness one expects from South African house. This is strictly a woozy, dangerous, disorientating amalgamation of heavy militaristic drums, Zulu chants and stabbing synths tempered somewhat by Okzharp’s grimy London influence. The effect is late-night sweaty club as the drugs are wearing off ad euphoria slips into something sinister and unhinged, but it’s undeniably exciting. I can’t go on; I must go on. Steamrooms’ four tracks exhort you to move till you drop. “Nyusa” encapsulates the atmosphere, shrouded in hiss, a funky unadorned synth riff clangs over an exhausted chant from a breathless dancer and drums thud beneath. The end of the night if not the world.

Andrew Forell

  Fetid — Steeping Corporeal Mess (20 Buck Spin)

Steeping Corporeal Mess by Fetid

This new record from Seattle death metal band Fetid may be the essential corrective to our national imaginary’s notion of that city as a monolithic site of liberal social policy, coffee “drinks” with lots of soy and greenwashed, vaguely cosmopolitan modes of cultural production. How many of us remember that Sir Mix-a-Lot, he of boundless enthusiasm for humanity’s anterior, is a Seattle native? Fetid share his interest in the undersides of bodies, and of things. There’s a decidedly intestinal — if not rectal — vibe to the unpleasant cover art for Steeping Corporeal Mess, and songs like “Dripping Subtepidity” and “Reeking Within” indicate a willingness to palpate beneath the Pacific Northwest’s famously moist terrain, to squish and squelch away in its rot and lukewarm organic goo. For a certain kind of listener, this may be the most fun you’ll have with a record this spring. For sure it’ll make you remember why David Lynch chose Washington state for Twin Peaks: who can forget the scene when Agent Cooper slides his long tweezers under Laura Palmer’s fingernail, to pull out a letter “R”? Or how long he has to dig around under there for it?

 Jonathan Shaw

 The French Tips — It's the Tips (Self Released)

It's the Tips by The French Tips

First: if The French Tips come to town, go. They recently toured with fellow Boiseans Built to Spill and blew them off the stage. As for the self-titled, self-released souvenir I took home: it’s got three great songs, (the first three, conveniently) five that are never worse than good, no duds and a lot of potential. It’s an excellent EP padded into honorable debut. The French Tips’ sound is indebted to, among others, Sleater-Kinney and Savages, but their guileless commitment to community, manifested in onstage instrument switches, shared vocal duties, their embrace of disco beats and a fat, confident, bottom end warms up their post-punk sonics considerably. The disco influence is as much spiritual as it is rhythmic: despite their righteous skronk und drang, despite oceanic guitar and bass which rage and release, surge and ebb, flash and hide, this is dance music, music to help you exorcise the bullshit. The French Tips is a bit green, but should they wish to pursue it, this is a band that deserves a record deal. Thesis statement: “Me and my witches about to burn it down”. I hope they do.

Isaac Olson  

 Friendship — Undercurrent (Southern Lord)

Undercurrent by Friendship

In this period of endless sub-sub-genres and hybrid forms in heavy music, it’s refreshing to hear a band with a sound that’s so straightforward. Friendship play hardcore: fast, vicious, intense songs that establish a riff and stick with it. Song titles say a lot: “Punishment,” “Lack,” “Garbage,” “Wrecker.” And so on. They’re succinct. There’s usually a breakdown section. There’s a bunch of d-beat songs. If you average the track lengths, you get almost exactly two minutes. It’s all really loud. They probably play really loud when you see them live. They can probably clear the room pretty quickly. It’s sort of fun that these guys call their band “Friendship.” It’s a good record to play when the neighbors put on Fox News. It’s a good way to say, “I don’t want to be your friend.”

Jonathan Shaw

Froth — Duress (Wichita)

Duress by Froth

It’s been a million years, it seems, since we were captivated by the “Yanni/Laurel” debate, a single murmured phrase that sounded like different things to different people. It was like that baked late-night meandering discussion about whether what I see as red is the same as yours come to life, and it vanished into the ravenous maw of internet culture. Except that Froth, an L.A. band currently on its fourth album, made a song about it, “Laurel,” full of clashing guitars and slow unspooling anarchy and whispery narratives. It could be the softest heavy rocker ever or the loudest twee fuzzed bedroom pop, depending on how you hear it. There’s a constant buzz at the bottom of all Froth’s songs, broken more often than not, by a reach for radiant melody. Froth makes an altogether engaging racket that borrows sleepily from Teenaged Fanclubs, in a fuzz-needled daze from MBV. “77,” the second single throws off the anorak for a denatured krautish groove, while “John Peel Slowly,” an instrumental, sketches a dream-landscape with loose-stringed bass, piano and space noises. Make your own sense of it, though. What you hear is largely up to you.

Jennifer Kelly

 Burton Greene / Damon Smith / Ra Kalam Bob Moses — Life’s Intense Mystery CD (Astral Spirits)

Life's Intense Mystery by Greene / Smith / Moses

If you can translate words into vectors, the name of this album tells you a lot about the forces at work. While pianist Burton Greene and drummer Ra Kalam Bob Moses were born over a decade apart, both were touched by the 1960s’ cosmic spirit. And when you put Patty Waters’ preferred pianist on the same stage with Weasel Walter’s most enduring bassist, intensity is on the agenda. But if you had to boil this music down to one image, it would be the symbol for yin and yang. Opposing forces often complement each other. When the pianist mugs a bit on “Kid Play,” the bass goes with the ferocity of a bull that just figured out that the fight is rigged; and when Moses and Smith dance light and lithe on “Perc-Waves,” Greene deploys some more percussion that asserts an unbudging center of gravity. And if you want to ignore all the metaphors, you can just let yourself fall into the force of this music’s mercurial flow.

Bill Meyer

 Invasive Species — Adapter (Baggage Claim)

Adapter by Invasive Species

You know the story; the drummer takes his solo, and the audience heads out for a beer or a piss. Invasive Species’ LP suggests that the problem isn’t drum music, it’s just that you’ve been listening to the wrong drummers and maybe there aren’t enough of them. Kevin Corcoran and Jon Bafus have been playing together for nine years, performing mostly within the city limits of Sacramento, California. Separately, their affiliations range encompass prog bands, Asian fusion ambient music and improvised exchanges with members of the ROVA Saxophone Quartet. Together, they play music that is concerned less with genre than with the possibilities of two augmented drum kits. Grooves collide and mesh, textures interweave and pull tight, meters multiply and never do these combinations seem designed to show off either musician’s prodigious chops. Rather, they show what a marvelous brain massage intuitively organized beats can provide.

Bill Meyer

  Tyler Keen / Jacob Wick — S-T (Silt Editions)

 Tyler Keen and Jacob Wick may employ different means, but their sounds make sense embedded on either side of a short strip of tape. Both men make noise that gets more complicated the closer you listen to it, and neither particularly needs volume to get noisy. Keen starts out with a blast, but once that subsides unintelligible walkie-talkie chatter, sputtering static, and the sounds of a cassette being snapped into a player pass before your ears. This is restless stuff, paced for the days when you haven’t been able to refill your Adderall RX and can’t be bothered to wait. Wick plays trumpet, probably muted by things they don’t tell you about in jazz school and definitely filtered through the sounds of room and non-invisible recording gear. Fueled by circular breathing that sustains a rarely broken stream of air, Wick’s horn rasps and hisses. Imagine that the sounds of a moth made of steel wool masticating its way through a warehouse full of old army blankets have been transmitted down a gutter and thence onto tape, and you just might imagine the sounds of Wick’s side of this cassette.

This is the second release by Silt Editions, a label with no web footprint aside from an email address (silteditions@gmail.com). At press time, there were still a few copies in various distributors’ stocks. Happy hunting.

Bill Meyer

  Rob Noyes — “You Are Tired” / “Nightmare Study” (Market Square Records)

You Are Tired b/w Nightmare Study by Rob Noyes

There’s no one way to do things, but the 45 rpm single seems tailor-made for playing late at night. “Just one more,” you tell yourself, fishing old records from the shelf and sitting companionably alongside the memories they conjure out of the commingling of sound, mind and the sensate experience of dust transferring from the sleeve to your fingers. “Well, maybe another one.” Rob Noyes is on to your game, and the tune on A-side of the Massachusetts-based 12-string guitar player’s latest record sees through your self-delusion and tells you like it really is. The chiming melody is as ingratiating as a late-night tug on the arm from a loved one. “Aren’t you going to come to bed?” But you’re on a roll, so you flip the record, expecting to hear another cantering tune. That’s when Noyes pulls you down the rabbit hole and into a state of consciousness that the sleep-deprived know only too well. Noyes has mastered a technique that makes him sound like a tape playing backwards even though he’s actually strumming in real time. It’s a neat trick, but it serves a function beyond showing Noyes’ imagination and technical acumen. By plunging the listener into a state of blurry disorientation, it confronts them with the next-day consequences of playing records late into the night.

Bill Meyer

  Pelican — Nighttime Stories (Southern Lord)

Nighttime Stories by Pelican

Pelican’s sixth full-length starts in a pensive mode, an acoustic guitar ushering in “WST.” The guitar belonged to guitarist Dallas Thomas’ lately deceased father, and it sets a somber tone. Death haunts these bludgeoning, moody grooves, giving Nighttime Stories a heaviness that can’t be ascribed purely to guitar tone. Later, in the crushing stomp of “Cold Hope,” Pelican grinds relentlessly, the drums scattershot volleys of explosive angst. “Arteries of Blacktop” is likewise weighted and slow, a massive bass churn slugging it out with viscous sheets of amplified guitar sheen. Yet there’s a great deal of epic, serene gorgeousness, too — in the minor key strumming of “Full Moon, Black Water,” the mathy, knotty acrobatic riffs of “Abyssal Plain,” the slow building drone of “It Stared at Me.” The album title commemorates a friend of the band, Jody Minnoch, who died unexpectedly of heart problems in 2014; he’d meant to use the phrase for a Tusk album, but passed before he could do so. The title track glowers with volcanic life force. Hip deep in mourning and existential query, it celebrates a muscular, triumphant still-here-ness.

Jennifer Kelly

 Spiral Wave Nomads — Spiral Wave Nomads (Feeding Tube / Twin Lakes)

Spiral Wave Nomads by Spiral Wave Nomads

Spiral Wave Nomads is a two man, two state band. Eric Hardiman (guitars, bass, sitar) lives in upstate New York, and drummer Michael Kiefer lives in Connecticut. This means that distances must be traveled if the two of them are to meet face to face, which is how substantial parts of this LP of cosmic instrumentals was made. And what better thing to do as you cross the verdant hills of the Northeastern USA than jam some tunes? Drifting alone to these ascending guitar lines and undulating percussive surges, it’s easy to imagine one or the other Nomad rounding some valley road and flashing on Popol Vuh’s Aguirre. “Was that a fly fisherman standing in the river, or did I see some conquistador on a raft, hollering at the monkeys?” Drift and drive a little longer and they might marvel at the play of striating light across the clouds and associating to some past pleasantly dreamy experiences involving a CD player loaded with Neu and Jimi Hendrix. All of which is a fanciful way to say that these guys sound like they have done their space rock homework, and they put their knowledge to good use on this LP. So don’t throw away the download code; you might want to program your own rural adventure with these tones.

Bill Meyer 

 Chad Taylor — Myths and Morals (Eyes & Ears)

Myths and Morals by Chad Taylor

One day at the end of last summer, Chad Taylor showed what it takes to be an MVP. Over the course of one long, humid Sunday afternoon on a semi-shaded stage at the Chicago Jazz Festival, he played three consecutive sets with three different bands. He sustained the set-length dynamics of Jaime Branch’s Fly or Die, swung muscularly with the Jason Stein Quartet, and managed the mercurial flow of the Eric Revis Quartet. He might have soaked through a shirt, but he never dropped a beat, nor did he ever seem less than tuned in to the particular requirements of those three quite different ensembles.

Myths and Morals most closely corresponds to another of Taylor’s projects, the Chicago Underground Duo. While his equipment is restricted to drum kit and mbira (thumb piano), his compositional imagination is wide open. These pieces may tarry for a moment on some texture or pattern, but for the most part they are studies in constant development. Precision and restraint yield surprise and mystery; the music is so involving and complete that it’s easy to forget that you’re listening to solo percussion.

Bill Meyer

 Chris Welcome and His Orchestra — Beyond All Things (Gauci Music) 

Beyond All Things by Chris Welcome & His Orchestra

A free jazz octet might sound like caviar soup: too much of an indulgent thing. Chris Welcome makes it work here, harnessing the noisy tendencies of this roomful of younger New York players with some light-touch compositional structure and a willingness to swing. In under half an hour, we go from a free-time fanfare highlighting the gestural playing of trumpeter Jaimie Branch and tenorist Sam Weinberg through to a medium-firm groove laid down by bassist Shayna Dulberger and drummer Mike Pride, over which cornetist Kirk Knuffke blows with a coolness so confident that it sounds like the swing feel of the composition was summoned by his playing, not the other way around. Minutes later, that groove gets harder and altoist Anthony Ware delivers a fiery solo while the rest of the horns chatter in the background like they’re doing avant-garde Dixieland (an approach perhaps being alluded to by the appellation “and His Orchestra”). Welcome himself mostly hides behind the sonic bushes, his heavily effected guitar and synthesizer offering eerie interjections and a short woozy solo halfway through the piece. He’s a virtuoso guitarist, but here he gets to be a virtuoso organizer, savvy enough to know the amount of organization called for.

Ben Remsen

[ittookthelightforever]

Fire and the Thud - Chapter 1

Hi, 

I got this idea to write Alex as a Prince and here it is, by popular demand (Hi Sarah *waves like a grade school kid at a school play*) my new chaptered fic. Bare in mind that I am a person who binge reads Sarah J. Maas novels, sooooo… I hope y’all like it! 

Love, Lina.

Alex wakes up much too early for his liking and tries to roll over in an attempt to fall back to sleep, but he is met with a warm, solid body, “Hmmmm… Mi…” Miles moans and pulls Alex into his arms, “Go back to sleep, love, it’s too earleh.” Alex places a kiss to the soft skin of his chest, “Babeh, if me mum gets wind that you slept in me room again she’ll put yeh in the next ship to the continent, and I just can’t bare the thought.” To emphasize his point Alex lays a trail of kisses up Miles’ neck and scruffy jaw.

“Well, tha’s no way to get me out of ‘ere. Plus, I bet the Queen has more important things to worry about.” Alex scoffs, burying his face on the pillow beneath Miles’ head, “Oh love, ‘m sorreh, I-I forgot.” Miles runs his fingers through Alex’s soft hair, coaxing the boy to look at him, “She’s out there, practically rounding up every girl in the kingdom trying to find a solution to this goddamned curse, Mi.”

Miles wraps his arms around him, drawing soothing patterns on his naked back, “I’m sorreh you ‘ave to go through this, love. I’d take your place if I could.” Alex nods, sighing, even if he could he’d never let anyone take his place.

--//--//--//--//--//--//--

On the other side of the island Charlotte had been working non-stop for hours, churning out breakfast for all the guests at the inn and some stragglers from the nearby port. Charlotte is as ordinary as it gets, she has spent most of her life working at the kitchen at the uncle’s inn after her mother had put her in a ship to Balaclava and disappeared. The 20 year old woman had been saving to move back to the continent on her 21st birthday, in search of her mother or a greater purpose, dreaming of a life where she’d have control of her own fate.

The influx of people from the continent had gotten higher and higher as they neared Prince Alexander’s birthday and with only a few weeks to the big ball her uncle had been talking of extending kitchen hours to serve those who arrived between midnight, when they closed, and the next morning. The prospect brought chills down Charlotte’s spine as she was already worn thin as it was working from 6am to midnight.

“Charlotte?! Charlotte, come here!” The young girl wipes her hands on a rag and walks out of the kitchen, towards the dining hall from where her aunt’s booming voice was coming, “Yes aunty?” Standing next to her aunt was a member of the royal guard, high-ranking from the looks of his uniform, “What can I help you with, sir?” Charlotte notices her aunt is practically shaking with giddiness from having such an important person in their midst, “Miss, your royal highness, her majesty Queen Penelope has requested that you be taken to the castle to aid in the preparations of his royal highness, his majesty Prince Alexander’s 21st birthday.”

Charlotte wrings her dry hands nervously, while her aunt frowned slightly, “May I inquire why, sir?” The guard seems to be getting impatient, “His majesty Prince Alexander recalled a meal he has had brought to him from here once, some sort of sweet bun, and desires to have it served at his ball.” Charlotte can immediately recall what bun he is talking about, it’s an specialty of hers, but she has to hold back a scoff at the fact that the prince is so entitled that he’d send someone to get her just for that, “I see sir, but you’ll understand that lending my head cook to her majesty will bring me great misfortune.”

The guard grunts, pulling a bag from his pocket, “This should more than make up for your losses, m’am. Shall we, miss?” Charlotte looks back and forth between her aunt and the guard a couple of times, “Uh, c-can I get my things?” The guard gives a curt nod, clearly annoyed by how long this was taking. Charlotte quickly makes her way downstairs to her room in the basement.

Ever since she’d arrived to live with her aunt and uncle in the island Charlotte had occupied the dank basement room, where it got much too warm and stuffy during the summer, and freezing and drafty in the winter. As fast as she could Charlotte gathered her few possessions in a burlap sack, - a woolen dress, identical to the one she was wearing; her winter cape, nightgown and a few hygiene items; and the book her mother had given her before she boarded the ship that brought her to the island, the last gift she’d ever received.

Holding the sack close to her Charlotte bids her aunt and uncle goodbye and follows the guard outside, he leads them to two tied up horses, “Can yeh ride?” Charlotte regards the large brown horse in front of her, patting her dense fur, “Yes…” Her voice trails off and he doesn’t wait for further confirmation, mounting his own mare. Charlotte follows suit, reminiscing about a time when riding had been pleasurable nearly daily activity to her.

It was a two days trip to High Green, the capital, and the guard set out a quick and steady pace to their journey, “Will you tell me your name or shall I just refer to you as guard until we arrive to the capital?” He gives her a sideways glance, truly regarding her for the first time that morning, “I am Captain Matthew J. Helders, the third.” Charlotte holds back a laugh at his seriousness, “Nice to meet you, Capt. Helders. I am Charlotte Sirius.” He grunts in response and she readies herself for a very long and quiet two days. “Your uncle and aunt, they seemed quite…” She is surprised by his willingness to talk about this particular subject, but doesn’t back down.

“Greedy? Selfish? Very pleased by the amount of coin her majesty was willing to pay for my services, of which I won’t see a penny? Well, yeah, that pretty much sums them up.” Charlotte looks ahead at the horizon to keep any emotion away, “If they are so awful why didn’t you leave?” She can’t hold back a bark of laughter this time, “No disrespect, sir. I don’t know how it is in the capital, but in the hellhole we just left the sight of a penniless girl wondering about gathers more trouble than it’s worth.” Matthew isquiet for a few moments, “Maybeh this is yehr chance then.” He glances at her, the ghost of a smile on his lips and she lets a small smile through.

--//--

They ride until the sun sets, stopping at a side forrest as Matthew deems it better to stop to rest and resume their journey the next day. Matthew leads them to a shrouded area, unpacking a couple of small tents and a dry meal of hard cheese, cured meat and bread. The pair sits around a small fire, “Weh’ll reach a town tomorrow where weh should be able to ‘ave a ‘ot meal.” Charlotte is barely paying any attention to him as she regards the skies, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen the stars.

Because of her heavy hours and windowless room it had been years since Charlotte had had the opportunity to lay back and stargaze, as she used to do almost every night with her mother. “Miss Sirius?” She is brought back to reality by Matthew calling her name, “Oh, I’m sorry. Please, do call me Charlotte.” He nods offering his waterskien, “Would yeh like sum more water?” She gives him small smile and takes the skien from him, gingerly sipping the water, “You seem very young to be a captain.” Matthew ponders her question, throwing more wood into the fire.

“My father is one of the King’s counselors and he thought I needed some… Direction, so he had me join the royal guard at 15 and… I guess I was very good at it.” She raises her eyebrows mocking him, “Impressive.” He grins, showing off his dimples, “I fink we’ll get along vereh well, Charlotte.” She takes another sip of water and hands the skien back to him, “I have to agree, Matthew.” Charlotte stops mid-laughter, feeling something tug at her heart, “T-There’s something wrong.” Matthew gets up, reaching for his sword. “Did yeh ‘ear anyfing?” Charlotte instinctively reached out for her sack before also getting up, “I-I, I don’t know. I just felt something weird.”

Matthew brings her behind his large frame and Charlotte can’t help but grip the back of his uniform. They hear some leaves rustling and soon after something jumps out of the trees, grabbing Charlotte from behind. She screams, trying to get away from the person’s strong grip, “Who are yeh?!” The man just hisses at Matthew, trying to hold onto Charlotte. A second man appears with a sword, but he is no match for Matthew’s agile moves and is soon on the ground, “What do yeh want?”

Instead of answering the man pulls a dagger from his pocket and presses it to Charlotte’s throat, “Charlotte, duck right!” The young woman doesn’t hesitate, bowing right and away from the dagger, leaving room for Matthew to strike and kill the man holding him. Charlotte falls to the ground under the weight of the man and Matthew quickly pulls the two apart, holding a Charlotte as she trembled, “W-Who were them?” He analyses the man’s clothes for a moment, “They… They were men from the Continent’s armeh… But tha’ doesn’t make sense.”

Charlotte doesn’t want to sit in that place for a second longer, getting up and brushing the dirt from her dress, “We have to go, it isn’t safe here.” Matthew gets up, sheathing his sword, “I agree, but it’s too dark to ride.” She shakes her head, gathering their things, “No, it isn’t. The Moon shall be our guide.” Charlotte looks up, her eyes locked on the bright full moon, and Matthew is convinced by the certainty in her voice, helping her pack and in minutes they are back on their horses, headed for the capital.

[the-bark-is-worse]

HumaniTea - Rivetra

Chapter 5- Of Nightmares and Reality

Read Previous Chapters of HumaniTea Here on AO3

The fruits of their hard work finally came to light. What was once an abandoned ale house in disrepair was now transformed into a warm, inviting tea shop. It was refreshing to Levi and Petra to see it now, with tables and chairs out, cloths and toppers set. Even the shelves were stocked, with each cubby containing a canister of tea leaves, ready for serving or distributing. 

But it was not just the attention of Levi and Petra that the shop seemed to grab, as each day that brought the opening of the shop closer, more and more townsfolk and merchants began to stop by, peeking into the windows, and talking amongst each other about it. Even a trip to the market was not had without hearing some sort of buzz about 'HumaniTea,' the first shop of its kind to appear in Trost. Surely, there were other tea shops, a handful to be found in different parts of the district; but they were simply merchants, sellers of the leaves, not preparers. Should one desire a cup of tea, the only place that would serve it was the pub, and even then the quality of their black tea was quite lacking (in Levi's opinion.)

 "Captain, all the ceramics have been washed and stacked away," Petra spoke, stepping through the doorway that connected the shop's kitchen to the back of the counter.

 Levi spared a side glance to her, silent as he finished writing in a leather bound notebook.

 "Good," he said after a moment, making a quick notation before continuing, "and the silverware?"

 "Spick and span."

 "Serving trays?"

 "You can see them shining a mile away!"

 "And the Ass For?"

 "The- hmm?" the young woman blinked, caught off guard by his questioning. Her brows furrowed in confusion, Petra scratching her neck, eyes searching the storefront as though it would help her recall him mentioning it before.

 "Er...what's an ‘Ass For’?"

 Levi set down the pencil, closing the book before turning to her. His face was stoic, as usual, lips pressed together in a fine line as though all interest in the conversation had been lost. He kept his gaze locked with hers, and after a few, painfully long moments, his lips parted.

 "For taking a shit, of course."

 Her eyes widened slightly, his response taking just as long to process in her mind as it did for him to say it. 

 And suddenly, it clicked.

 A chortle erupted from her, perhaps less so due to the joke itself and more so from the deadpan expression on his face upon delivery, a staple in the man's sense of dry humor.

She could not fight the urge to smile, and as she finally settled from her giggles, he had turned away to take care of something else, as though the exchange had never happened.

"I think we're just about ready to get this shit show on the road," he said, reaching out to a tea canister in one of the cubbies, giving it a slight turn so that its label was in line with the others. 

 Petra nodded, though remained silent as she watched him, his hand resting on his chin as his gaze flickered over the other canisters.  

 "We'll take the day tomorrow to rest, and open the following day," he deemed the other tea canisters in good order, turning to Petra again and continuing, "besides, a storm's supposed to pass through. I can't imagine anyone would want to go out in that shit."

 The two retired to their flat above the shop for the rest of the evening. Despite the lengthening days as warmer weather approached, the sky grew dark as grey clouds covered the sun.

They kept supper simple, lightly conversing over their meal though unbothered by the bouts of silence that seemed to fall over them. It was not that they had nothing to talk about, but rather the weariness of a tiring day of work hanging over them. Sleep was something Petra looked forward to, and though he did not get much of it, something Levi would welcome kindly.

 It was not long after supper, clean up, and a bit of reading did Petra bid her captain a good night, careful to close any windows that were open to prevent rain from coming in once the storm started. 

 She stifled a yawn as she changed into her night clothes, gazing out to the dimly lit streets as the oil lamps flickered in the wind. She could only hope it would not rain all of tomorrow, eager to have one more afternoon on the town before opening up shop. Petra yawned again, crawling into bed and falling fast asleep.

 Lightning flashed, and with it came an ear piercing scream. 

Levi jolted from the chair he slept in, eyes wide and alert now as he quickly followed the 'no's' and pleading coming from the main bedroom.

 "Petra-" he called out to the young woman as he entered, gaze landing on the sight of her standing in the corner, grasping what looked to be a broom handle, holding it to defend herself.

 "Captain-We-we're under attack!" she said, her voice shaky, on edge, as though terrified for her very life.

 Levi took a step forward, the young woman gripping the handle of the broom tighter.

 "Petra- it's a storm-"

 Another bolt of lightning burst across the sky, a loud roll of thunder sounding, their flat seeming as though it was shaking from the reverberation. 

 Fear completely overcame her features, tears streaming down her cheeks as she tried, and failed, to back even further into the corner to brace herself for the oncoming 'attack.'

 "Captain- what are your orders?!"

 "Petra-" he said to her again, crossing the room towards her, her voice sounding again in panic before he could continue to speak.

"Captain, your orders?!"

"Petra, you’re safe; there’s no danger."

"Captain, please- they're coming- they-"

Both hands clamped down onto her shoulders, Levi forcing her to look away from the stormy window and at him.

"Petra Ral- stand down!"

 Her eyes were confused, pleading, glossy as tears continued to fill them.

"C-captain-" her voice was breaking, the young woman continuously trying to look past him to the outside world. But he kept her still, his voice firm as he spoke to her.

"I need you to calm down. And stop looking out the damn window. 

He kept his eyes focused on hers, to give her some reality to grasp onto and come to surface from this fit she was drowning in.

Her breath was shaky, heart erratic, eyes closing shut tightly as another flash of lightning brightened the room. 

“Petra…” he spoke again, the commanding tone now replaced with one more gentler, one only reserved for the woman before him. “The threat of titans is gone…you were with me when Erwin declared our freedom, when the last of them were taken down…”

She took in a long, deep breath, holding it a moment before exhaling. Slowly she nodded her head, trying to pull herself together.

Levi loosened his grip of her shoulders in favor of bringing a hand to her back, leading her towards the bed. He sat her down before moving towards the window to pull it shut and draw the curtains, his best attempt at shutting out the storm outside.

“Stay…”

A brow quirking, he turned towards her, Petra now in thee bed, clutching one of the pillows to her chest, “…please, don’t leave.”

He looked her over, expression hard to read though mostly shadowed by the darkness of the room. He stood there a few moments, the floor creaking when he finally moved. Without a word, he sat on the bed, back against the headboard.

“Try to get some sleep…I promise I won’t leave…”

Petra nodded, returning the pillow behind her. Shifting on the bed and without any thought, she grabbed onto him, burying her face into his side to shut the rest of the world out.

A sigh escaped his nose, attempting to relax though unable to shake thee feeling her felt in the pit of his gut. He scratched the back of his neck, glancing down to the woman before putting his arm around her.

Petra's eyes peeled open in the early hours of the morning, heavy with fatigue, a dull ache in her head making itself known. She blinked her eyes a few times with the hope of shaking off her grogginess, as well as to help her eyes adjust to the darkness as dawn had yet to break. But it was a glance to the side that seemed to aid the most in her effort to wake. 

 Her breath hitched at the sight of the man beside her, and it was then she had realized the weight of his hand resting atop her.

She didn't say anything, she didn't move him, she didn't bother trying to wake him up; after all, why would she? 

The memories of the night before, though clouded, began to become visible through the shroud of her dissociation. She could not help the embarrassment that started to well in her chest, the ridiculousness of her actions, screams, beliefs that in their free world, in the world they fought so hard to have, that their enemy had returned. 

 "How do you feel?"

Petra gasped, eyes darting to Levi who stared right back at her as though he had not been asleep just moments ago.

She swallowed, averting her gaze to the blanket on the bed, covering her but tucked underneath him.

"I-...I'm so ashamed from how I behaved, and to make you have stayed in here-"

"You didn't make me do anything, Petra."

He shifted on the bed, sitting up and bringing his legs over the edge, his back facing her.

Petra opened her mouth to speak again, but he continued before she could say anything, on purpose she might have thought if he had been facing her…or perhaps he just knew her well enough.

"And there's no reason to feel ashamed, we all have our shitty demons."

He stood, drawing the window’s curtain aside, the beginning glow of dawn entering the room.

“Thank you…” she whispered, tears stinging the corners of her eyes, though she did not allow them to fall.

Standing there silently, he looked out the window, as though contemplating her gratitude. Levi turned from the window, making his way towards the door.

“Get dressed; the bakery will be opening soon.”

She hummed in response, pulling the covers off to get ready for the day. In all honesty, she had no desire to even get out of the bed, still drained from the night before. But despite it being their day off before the opening of the shop, there were a handful of household errands needed to be done, and she knew he had no plans of leaving her by herself.

And besides, she supposed she could use the fresh air, in hopes to help her relax before the big day.

[theshapeshifter100]

Guess What? I’m Not a Robot RC Ch7

Word Count: 2,472

Chapter Warnings: at gunpoint, some inappropriate behaviour as a distraction

Masterlist

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4.45PM Wednesday 10th November 2038

Alex had stopped the truck half a mile from the back of the compound, and the group was gathered outside the vehicle as dusk fell. Lucas stood on top of the truck with his binoculars, getting a better idea of what they were dealing with.

“Cherry picker kinda portable surveillance tower, can’t see who’s in there. Drones. Guards milling about. There’s an low outer fence with some trucks inside and more guards. Shouldn’t be too hard to slip in though... Oh holy shit.”

“What?” Allison asked and Lucas lowered his binoculars, swallowing.

“They, they seem to have, portable, disassembling machines. Which explains the android parts in the truck beds.”

“This far out, there must be a portable power source,” Nathan added, looking paler than usual. “If we disconnect that-”

“We stop those machines,” Ivy picked up, “and create one hell of a distraction.”

“Someone’s going to need to take out the drones,” Allison added. In response Julia pulled out a handgun, and Alex’s eyes widened.

“Where the hell did you get that?!”

“Our friend who used to drive this truck,” a dangerous glitter sparkled in Julia’s eyes. “There should be enough rounds to take down the drones.”

Alex leaned back a little. “When did you get so scary?”

“When the world turned to shit. What are we going to do about the surveillance picker?”

“I got it,” Oscar offered. “I can get in there and knock ‘em about a bit.”

“They’re wearing body armour and most likely have assault rifles,” Julia reminded. “You could get shot.”

“They won’t shoot in such a confined space. I’ll be fine.”

“Alright,” Alex sighed, easily taking command. “Julia’s on drones, Oscar’s on the picker. Lucas, how many machines are there?”

“Three,” Lucas was looking back through the binoculars. “Each one with their own power supply by the looks of it.”

“Alright, three people take the machines, just in case.”

“I’ll take one,” Allison volunteered. “I’m pretty small.”

“Same,” Lucas added.

“We need you on observation for now,” Alex contradicted. “Since you know how it all looks now. I’ll join you on generators. Megan? You’re pretty tiny.”

“Fine,” Megan sighed, feeling snakes in her belly. “That leaves Nathan, Maggie and Ivy.”

“I can take out the floodlights,” Nathan offered.

“They’re guarded,” Lucas responded, and Megan passed Nathan her taser.

“We’ll distract the guys down there,” Ivy nodded towards the guards. “Act like drunk students. We’ve got experience in that.”

“Guys,” Allison sounded nervous. “We’re not fighters, we’re not strategists, what are we doing?”

“Being awesome,” Alex responded solidly. “Lives are on the line, don’t chicken out now.”

Allison smirked. “I can’t believe you’re the one telling me that.”

“Enough talking,” Ivy squared her shoulders and took off her hat, revealing her pan flag hair. “Let’s do this.”

4.52PM Wednesday 10th

They got halfway to the barriers before splitting up to different directions. Allison, Alex and Megan went more towards the back of the compound, not crossing the barrier yet and watching the guards. Oscar, Nathan and Julia went to the side where the guard picker was; Nathan would split when the generators were dealt with and Julia would start shooting once the first floodlight was down.

Ivy and Maggie got into character, having dumped their bulkier clothes in a furrow. They started giggling and shoving each other, staggering towards the barrier and daring each other to climb over it.

Maggie did a good job ‘drunkenly’ climbing over the chest high barrier, lying on top of it and falling off. She landed on her back in the snow, giggling as Ivy joined her, and this finally got the attention of a soldier.

“Hey! You’re trespassing!” they stormed over. “Get out of here!”

“What’s the big deal handsome?” Ivy slurred “S jus’ a big ol’ empty field. Dis is the only interestin’ thing ‘ere!”

“Yeah,” Maggie staggered to her feet, “Whatcha hidin’ out here?”

“Ladies, I suggest you move along,” seeing that they were drunk the soldier took a different approach. “Nothing to see here.”

“Nothin’? Don’t look like nothin’, do it babe?” Ivy giggled at Maggie before returning her attention to the soldier, “C’mon, whatcha hidin’?” Ivy lightly shoved the solider.

“Ma’am, back off.”

“Aw, is big bad soldier scared of little old me?” Ivy batted her eyelashes, and could hear some of the other guards laughing. “C’mon, let’s get the whole gang together, have some fun! I’m freezin’ my tits off out here!”

The solider looked around as more guards appeared to watch the show. “Bastards,” he muttered before going back to the girls. “Ladies, please leave the premises or I will have to use force.”

“Oh force, kinky,” Ivy waggled her eyebrows, “Ain’t done that before, ‘ave we babe?”

“Nah,” Maggie grinned deliriously. “Might be worth tryin’ though.”

All professionalism went out the window as the guards laughed harder.

Back with the truck Lucas spoke into the radio.

“PO and Rainbow are successful, move in. Over.”

Alex easily got over the barrier; while Megan and Allison had to help each other give their height. Once over they ducked and followed the shadows of the rumbling trucks. Megan tried not to think about the android corpses and parts in those trucks, and followed the other two.

They identified the three compounds, and in a short, hushed conversation, designated who would go where.  Megan got the middle, Allison on her left and Alex on her right.

They moved as another truck rumbled past, covering their mad sprint to the disassembling pods.

Megan pressed her back to the rear of the pod, out of sight of the main compound for now.

Her radio crackled, and she could just hear it over the humming of machinery.

“Mostly drones in the main area now, with some guards at the back. Poison Oak and Rainbow3 are putting on, quite a show. Over.”

“Focus Tudor,” Alex hissed. “NI, Biker chick, have you got a small floodlight by your generator?”

Both Allison and Megan responded with an affirmative.

“I’ll take mine out first, then you guys go, then we unplug the machines. Okay? Over.”

“No better ideas here,” Allison deferred. “Awaiting your signal. Over.”

Megan angled herself so that she could pull out the cord to the floodlights pretty quickly, and waited for Alex.

There was a sudden loss of light from behind her and Megan moved, trying not to give herself too much time to think. The plug took a few goes to pull out, but it was out, and her whole area went dim.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to adjust, but once they had she turned her attention to the main generator cables. She probably couldn’t turn it off, so pulling the connection cables between it and the disassembling machines seemed like the best idea. The only problem was there was about three of them and each one was twice as thick as her arm.

Megan looked closer at where the wires connected to the generator, and not seeing much, felt around. It seemed like there was some kind of catch holding the wire in place, so people couldn’t just yank it out. Perhaps this was supposed to be a two man job?

She considered asking for help, but there was no one else free, so she did the only logical thing. She held up the catch with one hand, grabbed the wire with other, braced one foot against the generator and pulled.

“C’mon,” she grunted, feeling it shift a little. “C’mon!”

The wire suddenly gave and she fell on her back in the snow from the recoil. She sat up and got back to her feet. One down, two to go.

In the other two sections the machines stopped humming, leaving only the buzzing of the generators, and Megan’s machine.

So if more androids die, it’s kinda your fault.

Megan gritted her teeth and channelled her frustration at both herself and the voice into this next wire. Now was not the time to get caught up in her own head.

Ironically, she was so caught up in what she was doing, she didn’t see the solider walking over, assault rifle pointing right at her.

4.55PM Wednesday 10th

It had been nearly half an hour by now, Paul was just over halfway through the compound. Over halfway closer to death.

He tried not to let it bother him, but there was little less he could think about. He was tempted to try Callum’s trick to talk to other androids, but what would he say? ‘Hi, we’re all about to die, great time to get to know each other!’

Yeah, didn’t seem like a good idea.

Then, one of the floodlights went out.

Not a big one, but the one next to the disassembling machine in the compound to his right. Seconds later the other two went out.

The guards, the one in here anyway, went to the right compound to investigate, presumably because that’s where it started. Before they got there two of the disassembling machines died.

If Paul needed to breathe it would be catching in his throat. Was this real? This was happening? Actually, what was happening?

Paul squinted at the space between his sections machine and the generator, noticing that there other androids doing the same. Other deviants perhaps?

In the gap was a small, stocky figure, fiddling with the generator wires, with two thick wires on the ground. They shrouded in shadow and dressed entirely in black, but Paul caught an escaped wisp of red hair.

No.

Paul reeled back and nearly bumped into the android behind him. Mumbling an apology, he began to step out of line to get a better look. A hum was heard overhead and Paul stepped back into line to avoid the drone’s spotlight.

Paul took a second to gather himself, to calm down. If he drew attention to her, then...

A guard was prowling down the ranks, gun ready and pointed at Megan. Because who else was it going to be at this point?

The soldier was already past him, on the other side of the column to his right, but Paul still took a second to gather this courage. He hated this place, he hated it so much.

“RUN!” he yelled. “GET AWAY FROM THERE! RUN!”

4.57PM Wednesday 10th

“RUN! GET AWAY FROM THERE! RUN!”

Megan’s head shot up and located the origin of the shout. Her jaw went slack when she saw Paul. Even without his skin and signature hair, she could still recognise him. She started to shout his name, before realising why he had yelled.

An involuntary shriek of terror left Megan’s mouth as she scrambled back, away from the approaching the solider. They picked up speed and Megan stumbled, falling on her butt.

Her breathing hitched and sped up. Her limbs begged to move, and she wasn’t sure if they were. It didn’t seem to make a difference as the guard kept getting closer.

Run run run run run run run

Why aren’t you moving? YOU’RE GOING TO DIE!

Oh God oh God oh God oh God oh God oh God

“NO!” Paul was moving, catching the attention of a drone and another of the guards at the back.

“GET BACK IN LINE!” they bellowed and Paul paused, fear and desperation tearing him in two. He couldn’t... he couldn’t... he didn’t want to die, but he couldn’t watch Megan die either.

Megan stared at the barrel of the gun, so struck with terror she wasn’t sure if she was breathing. The soldier was saying something. Something angry, maybe? She couldn’t hear it, her ears were full of her pounding heartbeat.

A loud clonk pierced her hearing, and the gun was no longer in her face. Blinking, she could see that the soldier had turned to face Allison, dual wielding a kitchen knife and a rolling pin.

Megan had the irrational urge to laugh. Allison standing off against an armed solider with nothing but a rolling pin and knife shouldn’t be funny, but, it kind of was.

“Get up!” Alex was suddenly in her face and helping her to her feet. Megan stumbled, and her heartbeat calmed down a little.

“I’m going to help Allison, either give us a hand, or get out of here,” Alex instructed before drawing their own makeshift weapon and charging in.

Megan took a second to catch her breath, and she looked across at Paul, who was staring right back at her. She offered a tired smile, which died as soon as she saw the guard walking towards Paul.

The situation reversal didn’t even register, she was already moving. She flung herself through the fence on pure muscle memory and pelted through the snow. The gun was turning to face her now, and fear threatened to overwhelm her.

Her legs didn’t stop pounding against the ground.

She was suddenly holding the gun in her gloved hands and yanking it down with all of her adrenaline enhanced strength.

The soldier barely even grunted and began to pull it out of her grip. The gloves made it harder to grip and it came away, but Megan was back in, grabbing it again. She needed to get her gloves off, but she had no time.

A flood light went off, taking them both by surprise, but it was the guard who capitalised on it.

In a swift movement the gun was yanked from her grip and the butt slammed into the side of her head.

Megan yelped in pain and stars burst behind her eyes as she staggered back. She bumped into another android, who steadied her.

“Kid, stand down,” they muttered, fear etched into their voice.

With the pause and pain Megan felt fear creep up on her. She needed to help Paul, she couldn’t let it take over now!

Staring down the barrel of a gun in the second time in less than five minutes and being shouted at to put her hands on her head made any last vestige of courage disappear. She couldn’t do this, she couldn’t-

The muzzle suddenly shot up in the air as a drone exploded. Taking his chance Paul ran at the guard and ripped the gun from them. The weapon felt heavy and unfamiliar, but he pointed it at the guard, expression impossible to read on the white chassis.

“Back off,” he tried to growl. It half worked, and almost as if on cue, the last disassembling machine shut down. Above them, more drones were being shot down, and another floodlight went out.

The soldier made the mistake of darting his head to look, and Paul slugged the gun into the side of his head. Much, much harder than when Megan got hit. The soldier staggered back, clutching his head, but eventually took the sensible option and retreated.

A lot happened. Ivy has no shame, Allison's the only one with self preservation. Julia's decided that now's the time to be scary, Lucas has the easy job, Alex is having the time of their life and Nathan, Oscar and Maggie are along for the ride.

Paul nearly dies and Megan gets close to a nervous breakdown/death but you know. Other Options Flowchart

(Megan) Respond to Lucas about the disassembling machines.

(Megan) Decline going to the disassembling machines.

(Megan) QTEs for floodlight and generator.

(Paul) Ignore the drone (either get shot or get the soldier off Megan). Get Megan's attention.

(Paul) Don't draw attention to yourself. Ask someone else to help her.

(Megan) QTEs for getting away from the soldier.

(Megan) Defend yourself (QTEs)

(Megan) QTEs for wrestling for the gun. If done successfully the gun can be taken off the solider.

(Megan) Push the gun away (potential for Megan getting shot)

(Paul) Shoot the solider.

Tags! @nightmarejim @septicart-appreciation

[airoasis]

SCARIEST TORNADO EVER !!!

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/scariest-tornado-ever-2/

SCARIEST TORNADO EVER !!!

…Somewhat too close. On April 29, 2017 a couple of Tornadoes would landing East of Dallas, Texas two of them capable. I’ve received a lady. I’m taking her to the health facility. A stationary boundary placed over town of Canton would serve as a track for tornadoes to teach down one after a different. Man, it can be heading correct for city! For the persons in Canton, the nightmare was in no way-ending. Oh my God those humans’s gotta get out of there. For a veteran storm chaser, the 1/3 and largest, twister this household used to be the scariest tornado I’ve ever witnessed. Monitoring tremendously obvious tornadoes over open land is extra mesmerizing and horrifying continuous clear view of the rain free storm base helps you expect storm motion as you gawk with confidence.The first tornado, I witness used to be small and rain wraps inflicting only EF0 dam age to timber and barns East of Canton. After this vulnerable tornado dissipated a tremendous griller used to be constructing upstream and racing towards city We’re correct in it’s course right here… It can be gonna leap over these bushes any second now. High precipitation storm modes with low cloud groundwork tracking swiftly over thick forests are particularly risky stipulations to chase in.In case you would see through this wall of trees you might see the low distinction silhouette of the ready twister 60 seconds earlier than crashing into you. And at 30 seconds away… In these conditions at 15 seconds before affect you still probably thoroughly blind to your date. There it is! Holy… Large daddy coming proper this fashion.Those individuals gotta get out of right here. These individuals gotta get out of right here or they’re gonna fly.Oh man these people better get out of there. Hold on. The shrouded twister badly dam aging residences proper behind me will reinforce to one of the robust tornadoes of 2017. It’s going to stage a two-story brick house and sweep a lot of the groundwork slab clean of particles. Many men and women will likely be insured and two will lose their lives earlier than this ef4 sooner or later dissipates. That is it proper there. That is it in the meantime yet another strong grinder tornado is developing to the south. Just got a glimpse of it. There it’s. Let’s go get it. At the same time positioning for a more in-depth view the bushes obscure clues that this intensifying twister is moving a lot turbo than I calculated? I hope there isn’t a men and women in these trailers. Within the bears cage and it’s… Oh $#!+ it is too shut. Gotta run! I gotta run Gotta run. It’s coming. It is coming. Come on. It is coming it can be coming.It can be coming quick! It’s coming fast! This thing is relocating fast. Dude you guys higher run. Excuse me. Ok I feel i can watch it safely here. Little too close Let’s take heed to it. (rolls window down) it can be heading proper for city. At this second a marriage ceremony venue is being overrun with twenty individuals filled in an inside bathroom After the mile wide tornado passes it will be the one room nonetheless standing. Every person will live to tell the tale. And there it is. Tornado is now deploying a avoid dealership tossing cars as much as a half a mile. A girl used to be sealed as her car was thrown from the interstate right into a subject a further man will chose his lifestyles as well as many cattle It appears like over plenty of bushes. There is residences everywhere out here that it overlooked the most important part of city.We’re going to need to go to assess on these folks. After the tornado has handed hazards are scattered far and wide Twisted metal spheres of splintered wooden and nails glass and rebar. Wires in every single place I can’t vigor traces downed throughout lawns, roads and wreckage can simply fill you even if you are standing a couple of ft away. Peculiarly in moist conditions Your throat and nostrils most likely burn from broken strains pouring gasoline into the air The worst thing you can do whilst looking to assist tornado vic Tims is become a casualty yourself. I just noticed one other twister right there there is one following it proper in there it a different one. You guys can preserve chasing If you want. Guess i will go examine out in that subject for persons.Oh rattling it. There’s cars. Be right back. At this second i am jogging out to check this automobile for possible vic Tims. It in no way befell to me to determine this leveled pile of rubble for Survivors. The best way a woman had crawled out of that mangled rubble She was once badly leading from her head and staring at over her husband who was mendacity on the concrete with a broken deck I’ve obtained a woman.I’m taking her to the sanatorium the girl in my car had lost practically each fabric function she had. The way you doing back there? I am just right. She stated she’s just right. Despite the inquiries to her and her husband she hadn’t lost her religion, or her humorousness. And your title again? Hank. I forgot your title. Excellent i don’t think so bad. The Gravity of the main issue was once offset with joking and gratitude, and i tell you I might have met a much better woman but I can’t bear in mind when. We’re established, then we moan and then we now have a testimony earlier than walking together into the er with mud going for walks down her face. She paused to assert a prayer for me. Father God I just thank you for Hank. Protect him in his storm chasing. And that you bless him and his spouse for the whole lot he’s executed for us. Amen. The following morning once I was once cleansing my car. I determined a gun she left in the backseat. Welcome to Texas y’all. Shortly in spite of everything this craziness I had the consideration of meeting up with Vicki and her family for dinner and more joking and storytelling. Vicki and her husband Jim are recovering and slowly rebuilding, however as you could suppose they’ve collected a ton of fees.If you want to aid them available in the market’s a enjoyable force serving to to rebuild their neighborhood of Fruitvale… Little town just external of Canton. In case you donate $20 or extra You would win a free Mustang convertible or a harley-Davidson i’m going to go away that hyperlink in the description beneath if you’re struggling to pay expenditures your self even sharing this data can support them out. ‘until next time Vicki blissful trails .

[batterymonster2021]

SCARIEST TORNADO EVER !!!

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/scariest-tornado-ever-2/

SCARIEST TORNADO EVER !!!

…Somewhat too close. On April 29, 2017 a couple of Tornadoes would landing East of Dallas, Texas two of them capable. I’ve received a lady. I’m taking her to the health facility. A stationary boundary placed over town of Canton would serve as a track for tornadoes to teach down one after a different. Man, it can be heading correct for city! For the persons in Canton, the nightmare was in no way-ending. Oh my God those humans’s gotta get out of there. For a veteran storm chaser, the 1/3 and largest, twister this household used to be the scariest tornado I’ve ever witnessed. Monitoring tremendously obvious tornadoes over open land is extra mesmerizing and horrifying continuous clear view of the rain free storm base helps you expect storm motion as you gawk with confidence.The first tornado, I witness used to be small and rain wraps inflicting only EF0 dam age to timber and barns East of Canton. After this vulnerable tornado dissipated a tremendous griller used to be constructing upstream and racing towards city We’re correct in it’s course right here… It can be gonna leap over these bushes any second now. High precipitation storm modes with low cloud groundwork tracking swiftly over thick forests are particularly risky stipulations to chase in.In case you would see through this wall of trees you might see the low distinction silhouette of the ready twister 60 seconds earlier than crashing into you. And at 30 seconds away… In these conditions at 15 seconds before affect you still probably thoroughly blind to your date. There it is! Holy… Large daddy coming proper this fashion.Those individuals gotta get out of right here. These individuals gotta get out of right here or they’re gonna fly.Oh man these people better get out of there. Hold on. The shrouded twister badly dam aging residences proper behind me will reinforce to one of the robust tornadoes of 2017. It’s going to stage a two-story brick house and sweep a lot of the groundwork slab clean of particles. Many men and women will likely be insured and two will lose their lives earlier than this ef4 sooner or later dissipates. That is it proper there. That is it in the meantime yet another strong grinder tornado is developing to the south. Just got a glimpse of it. There it’s. Let’s go get it. At the same time positioning for a more in-depth view the bushes obscure clues that this intensifying twister is moving a lot turbo than I calculated? I hope there isn’t a men and women in these trailers. Within the bears cage and it’s… Oh $#!+ it is too shut. Gotta run! I gotta run Gotta run. It’s coming. It is coming. Come on. It is coming it can be coming.It can be coming quick! It’s coming fast! This thing is relocating fast. Dude you guys higher run. Excuse me. Ok I feel i can watch it safely here. Little too close Let’s take heed to it. (rolls window down) it can be heading proper for city. At this second a marriage ceremony venue is being overrun with twenty individuals filled in an inside bathroom After the mile wide tornado passes it will be the one room nonetheless standing. Every person will live to tell the tale. And there it is. Tornado is now deploying a avoid dealership tossing cars as much as a half a mile. A girl used to be sealed as her car was thrown from the interstate right into a subject a further man will chose his lifestyles as well as many cattle It appears like over plenty of bushes. There is residences everywhere out here that it overlooked the most important part of city.We’re going to need to go to assess on these folks. After the tornado has handed hazards are scattered far and wide Twisted metal spheres of splintered wooden and nails glass and rebar. Wires in every single place I can’t vigor traces downed throughout lawns, roads and wreckage can simply fill you even if you are standing a couple of ft away. Peculiarly in moist conditions Your throat and nostrils most likely burn from broken strains pouring gasoline into the air The worst thing you can do whilst looking to assist tornado vic Tims is become a casualty yourself. I just noticed one other twister right there there is one following it proper in there it a different one. You guys can preserve chasing If you want. Guess i will go examine out in that subject for persons.Oh rattling it. There’s cars. Be right back. At this second i am jogging out to check this automobile for possible vic Tims. It in no way befell to me to determine this leveled pile of rubble for Survivors. The best way a woman had crawled out of that mangled rubble She was once badly leading from her head and staring at over her husband who was mendacity on the concrete with a broken deck I’ve obtained a woman.I’m taking her to the sanatorium the girl in my car had lost practically each fabric function she had. The way you doing back there? I am just right. She stated she’s just right. Despite the inquiries to her and her husband she hadn’t lost her religion, or her humorousness. And your title again? Hank. I forgot your title. Excellent i don’t think so bad. The Gravity of the main issue was once offset with joking and gratitude, and i tell you I might have met a much better woman but I can’t bear in mind when. We’re established, then we moan and then we now have a testimony earlier than walking together into the er with mud going for walks down her face. She paused to assert a prayer for me. Father God I just thank you for Hank. Protect him in his storm chasing. And that you bless him and his spouse for the whole lot he’s executed for us. Amen. The following morning once I was once cleansing my car. I determined a gun she left in the backseat. Welcome to Texas y’all. Shortly in spite of everything this craziness I had the consideration of meeting up with Vicki and her family for dinner and more joking and storytelling. Vicki and her husband Jim are recovering and slowly rebuilding, however as you could suppose they’ve collected a ton of fees.If you want to aid them available in the market’s a enjoyable force serving to to rebuild their neighborhood of Fruitvale… Little town just external of Canton. In case you donate $20 or extra You would win a free Mustang convertible or a harley-Davidson i’m going to go away that hyperlink in the description beneath if you’re struggling to pay expenditures your self even sharing this data can support them out. ‘until next time Vicki blissful trails .

[networkingdefinition]

Sunflower Quotes

Official Website: Sunflower Quotes

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• A rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. All flowers are beautiful in their own way, and that’s like woman too. – Unknown • A wise quote can only change a wise man! Therefore, wise sayings are for the wise men, not for the fools! The sunflowers turn their face toward the Sun, the fools, toward the darkness! – Mehmet Murat Ildan • Ah, sunflower, weary of time, Who countest the steps of the sun, Seeking after that sweet golden clime Where the traveller’s journey is done; Where the youth pined away with desire And the pale virgin shrouded in snow Arise from their graves, and aspire Where my sunflower wishes to go. – William Blake • And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood. – Unknown • As for marigolds, poppies, hollyhocks, and valorous sunflowers, we shall never have a garden without them, both for their own sake, and for the sake of old-fashioned folks, who used to love them. – Henry Ward Beecher • Attention shifted to him like sunflowers turning to the sun. – Khaled Hosseini

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Sunflower', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_sunflower').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_sunflower img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Because a rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. – Miranda Kerr • Bibliotropic,” Hugh said. “Like sunflowers are heliotropic, they naturally turn towards the sun. We naturally turn towards the bookshop. – Jo Walton • Big doesn’t necessarily mean better. Sunflowers aren’t better than violets.- Edna Ferber • Bring me then the plant that points to those bright Lucidites swirling up from the earth, and life itself exhaling that central breath! Bring me the sunflower crazed with the love of light. – Unknown • But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. • Does she realize she looks like a sunflower, ready to rain sunlight on all who look down upon her? – Simone Elkeles • Eagle of flowers! I see thee stand, And on the sun’s noon-glory gaze; With eye like his, thy lids expand, And fringe their disk with golden rays: Though fix’d on earth, in darkness rooted there, Light is thy element, thy dwelling air, Thy prospect heaven. – James Montgomery • Every friend is to the other a sun, and a sunflower also. He attracts and follows. – Jean Paul • Fame is the scentless sunflower, with gaudy crown of gold; But friendship is the rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. • Flowers have an expression of countenance as much as men or animals. Some seem to smile; some have a sad expression; some are pensive and diffident; others are plain, honest and upright, like the broad faced sunflower and the hollyhock. – Henry Ward Beecher • For time and eternity there have been fathers like Nathan who simply can see no way to have a daughter but to own her like a plot of land. To work her, plow her under, rain down a dreadful poison upon her. Miraculously, it causes these girls to grow. They elongate on the pale slender stalks of their longing, like sunflowers with heavy heads. You can shield them with your body and soul, trying to absorb that awful rain, but they’ll still move toward him. Without cease they’ll bend to his light. – Barbara Kingsolver • From the animist point of view, humans belong in a sacred place because they themselves are sacred. Not sacred in a special way, not more sacred than anything else, but merely as sacred as anything else — as sacred as bison or salmon or crows or crickets or bears or sunflowers. – Daniel Quinn • Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover’s Corners… Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking… and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths…and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you. – Thornton Wilder • Hello, Harry!” she said. “Er — my name’s Barny,” said Harry, flummoxed. “Oh, have you changed that too?” she asked brightly. “How did you know — ?” “Oh, just your expression,” she said. Like her father, Luna was wearing bright yellow robes, which she had accessorized with a large sunflower in her hair. Once you got over the brightness of it all, the general effect was quite pleasant. At least there were no radishes dangling from her ears. – J. K. Rowling • Her smile put the sunflower to shame. – Jerry Spinelli • I am painting with the same enthusiasm as a Marseillaise eats bouillabaisse … I am painting big sunflowers. – Vincent Van Gogh • I am working with the enthusiasm of a man from Marseilles eating bouillabaisse, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to you because I am busy painting huge sunflowers. – Vincent Van Gogh • I believe there is something of the divine mystery in everything that exists. We can see it sparkle in a sunflower or a poppy. We sense more of the unfathomable mystery in a butterfly that flutters from a twig–or in a goldfish swimming in a bowl. But we are closest to God in our own soul. Only there can we become one with the greatest mystery of life. In truth, at very rare moments we can experience that we ourselves are that divine mystery. – Jostein Gaarder • I can’t feel bad about being who I am, just like the girl next to me can’t feel bad about being who she is. Because a rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. – Miranda Kerr • I chose a sunflower because when darkness descends they close up to regenerate. But I really wish I’d never had the tattoo in the first place. Clean, clear skin is always better. – Halle Berry • I don’t think there’s anything on this planet that more trumpets life that the sunflower. For me that’s because of the reason behind its name. Not because it looks like the sun but because it follows the sun. During the course of the day, the head tracks the journey of the sun across the sky. A satellite dish for sunshine. Wherever light is, no matter how weak, these flowers will find it. And that’s such an admirable thing. And such a lesson in life. – Helen Mirren • I faced the gaudy sunflower on her canvas bag — it looked hand-painted and at last my eyes fell into hers. I said, ‘Thanks for the card.’ Her smile put the sunflower to shame. She walked off. – Jerry Spinelli • I think the worst lie I ever told was, because my last name is Goth, I used to tell kids at school that I used to be related to ‘Van Gogh’ and when I turned 18, I would inherit all the fortune from the sunflower painting. – Mia Goth • I thought maybe I could become like the next Van Gogh. I bought a sunflower and painted it, and it looked like the work of a 6-year-old. – Takeshi Kitano • I want to be like a sunflower; so that even on the darkest days I will stand tall and find the sunlight. – Unknown • I want to die at a hundred years old with an American flag on my back and the star of Texas on my helmet, after screaming down an Alpine descent on a bicycle at 75 miles per hour. I want to cross one last finish line as my wife and my ten children applaud, and then I want to lie down in a field of those famous French sunflowers and gracefully expire, the perfect contradiction to my once anticipated poignant early demise. – Lance Armstrong • I want to encourage women to embrace their own uniqueness. Because just like a rose is beautiful, so is a sunflower, so is a peony. I mean, all flowers are beautiful in their own way, and that’s like women too. – Miranda Kerr • I would much rather end up a fertiliser under a sunflower which is eventually made into sunflower seed oil so that instead of nibbling me in her prawn cocktail, the pretty girl will rub me on her bristols as she suns herself on a beach in the Caribbean. – Oliver Reed • If I were a flower.. I would be a sunflower. To always follow the sun, Turn my back to darkness, Stand proud, tall and straight even with my head full of seeds. – Unknown • I’m now painting with all the elan of a Marseillais eating soup, which won’t surprise you when I tell you I’m painting large sunflowers. The idea? To decorate the studio, now there’s hope of Gauguin living here. I aim at a dozen panels of sunflowers in the room I’ve set aside for Gauguin. – Vincent Van Gogh • I’m thinking waiters and waitresses are going to be bracing for more customers coming in going, not just kind of where is that beef from, but, like, where is that vanilla from and what’s up with that sunflower oil? Is it organic or not and how many pesticides? – Michael Moss • In April, we cannot see sunflowers in France, so we might say the sunflowers do not exist. But the local farmers have already planted thousands of seeds, and when they look at the bare hills, they may be able to see the sunflowers already. The sunflowers are there. They lack only the conditions of sun, heat, rain and July. Just because we cannot see them does not mean that they do not exist. – Nhat Hanh • In the morning the sunflower blossoms due to the sun’s rays. This morning I just wanted to remind you that my heart blossoms with love for you everyday I wake up and it is going to do that forever. – Sheila Carey • In your hands The dog, the donkey, surely they know They are alive. Who would argue otherwise? But now, after years of consideration, I am getting beyond that. What about the sunflowers? What about The tulips, and the pines? Listen, all you have to do is start and There’ll be no stopping. What about mountains? What about water Slipping over rocks? And speaking of stones, what about The little ones you can Hold in your hands, their heartbeats So secret, so hidden it may take years Before, finally, you hear them? – Mary Oliver • It is not while beauty And youth are thine own And thy cheeks Unprofaned by a tear That the ferver and faith Of a soul can be known To which time will but Make thee more dear No the heart that has truly loved Never forgets But as truly loves On to the close As the sunflower turns On her god when he sets The same look which She’d turned when he rose. – Thomas Moore • Light-enchanted sunflower, thou Who gazest ever true and tender On the sun’s revolving splendour. – Pedro Calderon de la Barca • London life was very full and exciting […] But in London there would be no greenhouse with a glossy tank, and no apple-room, and no potting-shed, earthy and warm, with bunches of poppy heads hanging from the ceiling, and sunflower seeds in a wooden box, and bulbs in thick paper bags, and hanks of tarred string, and lavender drying on a tea-tray. – Sylvia Townsend Warner • Make it like a sunflower. – Steve Jobs • Man would not be man if his dreams did not exceed his grasp… If I remember the sunflower forest it is because from its hidden reaches man arose. The green world is his sacred center. In moments of sanity he must still seek refuge there. – Loren Eiseley • My will broke at the sound of his voice, and my head turned with as much inevitability as a sunflower turning its face to the sun. – Patricia Briggs • My work is the world. Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird – equal seekers of sweetness. Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums. – Mary Oliver • Never look directly at the sun. Instead, look at the sunflower. – Vera Nazarian • Not only does a lens distort forms, but the ordinary plate makes an unholy mess of colour in its tone relations. Yellow becomes black, and blue white. Black sunflowers against a white sky – what a travesty! – Walter J. Phillips • One of the remarkable characteristics of young wild sunflowers, in addition to growing in soil that is not hospitable, is how the young flower bud follows the sun across the sky. In doing so, it receives life-sustaining energy before bursting forth in its glorious yellow color. Like the young sunflower, when we follow the Savior of the world, the Son of God, we flourish and become glorious despite the many terrible circumstances that surround us. He truly is our light and life. – Quentin L. Cook • Pick up a sunflower and count the florets running into its centre, or count the spiral scales of a pine cone or a pineapple, running from its bottom up its sides to the top, and you will find an extraordinary truth: recurring numbers, ratios and proportions. – Charles Jencks • Ranger picked up and there was a moment of silence as if he was sensing me at the other end, taking my body temperature and heart rate long distance. “Babe,” he finally said. “Do you know the slum apartment building Bobby Sunflower owns on Stark?” “Yes. It’s on the same block as his funeral home.” “That’s the one. I’m going in to look for someone. If you don’t hear from me in a half hour maybe you could send someone to check.” “Is this a smart thing to do?” “Probably not.” “As long as you know,” Ranger said. And he disconnected. – Janet Evanovich • Restless sunflower; cease to move. – Pedro Calderon de la Barca • Someone was sitting in front of a sunflower, watching the sunflower, a cup of sun, and so I tried it too. It was wonderful; I felt the whole universe in the sunflower. That was my experience. Sunflower meditation. A wonderful confidence appeared. You can see the whole universe in a flower. – Shunryu Suzuki • Space for the sunflower, bright with yellow glow, To court the sky. – Unknown • Sunflowers are like people to me. – Joan Mitchell • The American Indian is of the soil, whether it be the region of forests, plains, pueblos, or mesas. He fits into the landscape, for the hand that fashioned the continent also fashioned the man for his surroundings. He once grew as naturally as the wild sunflowers, he belongs just as the buffalo belonged. – Luther Standing Bear • The author O. Henry taught me about the value of the unexpected. He once wrote about the noise of flowers and the smell of birds—the birds were chickens and the flowers dried sunflowers rattling against a wall. – Chuck Jones • The cops drive by to do some more good deeds A young black male spits a sunflower seed in the air. – Dred Scott • The earth paints a portrait of the sun at dawn with sunflowers in bloom. Unhappy with the portrait, she erases it and paints it again and again. – Rabindranath Tagore • The morning glories and the sunflowers turn naturally toward the light, but we have to be taught, it seems. – Richard Rohr • The road to freedom is bordered with sunflowers. – Martin Firrell • The splendor of a human heart that trusts it is loved unconditionally gives God more pleasure than Westminster Cathedral, the Sistine Chapel, Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony”, Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers”, the sight of 10,000 butterflies in flight, or the scent of a million orchids in bloom. Trust is our gift back to God, and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for love of it. – Brennan Manning • The sunflower is a favorite emblem of constancy – Thomas Bulfinch • The sunflower is mine, in a way. – Vincent Van Gogh • The Sunflow’r, thinking ’twas for him foul shame To nap by daylight, strove t’ excuse the blame; It was not sleep that made him nod, he said, But too great weight and largeness of his head. – Abraham Cowley • The windflower and the violet, they perished long ago, And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer glow; But on the hills the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood, And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood, Till fell the first from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men, And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland glade and glen. – William C. Bryant • There are not too many fables about man’s misuse of sunflower seeds. – Richard Brautigan • There is no friend like the old friend, who has shared our morning days, No greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise: Fame is the scentless sunflower, with gaudy crown of gold; But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. • There was the gaudy patch of sunflowers beside the west gate of the palace of the Prince of Ombria, that did nothing all day long but turn their golden-haired, thousand-eyed faces to follow the sun. – Patricia A. McKillip • True friends are like bright sunflowers that never fade away, even over distance and time – Unknown • Unholy battered old thing you were, my sunflower O my soul, I loved you then! – Allen Ginsberg • Waves of hands, hesitations at street corners, someone dropping a cigarette into the gutter-all are stories. But which is the true story? That I do not know. Hence I keep my phrases hung like clothes in a cupboard, waiting for some one to wear them. Thus waiting, thus speculating, making this note and then an• other I do not cling to life. I shall be brushed like a bee from a sunflower. My philosophy, always accumulating, welling up moment by moment, runs like quicksilver a dozen ways at once. – Virginia Woolf • We are so impressed by scientific clank that we feel we ought not to say that the sunflower turns because it knows where the sun is. It is almost second nature to us to prefer explanations . . . with a large vocabulary. We are much more comfortable when we are assured that the sunflower turns because it is heliotropic. The trouble with that kind of talk is that it tempts us to think that we know what the sunflower is up to. But we don’t. The sunflower is a mystery, just as every single thing in the universe is. – Robert Farrar Capon • We’re all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we’re all blessed by our own seed & golden hairy naked accomplishment (Sunflower Sutra) – Allen Ginsberg • we’re all golden sunflowers inside. – Allen Ginsberg • We’re not our skin of grime, we’re not our dread bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we’re all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we’re blessed by our own seed & hairy naked accomplishment-bodies growing into mad black formal sunflowers in the sunset, spied on by our eyes under the shadow of the mad locomotive riverbank sunset Frisco hilly tincan evening sitdown vision. – Allen Ginsberg • We’ve left the moment. It’s gone. We’re somewhere else now, and that’s okay. We’ve still got that moment with us somewhere, deep in our memory, seeping into our DNA. And when our cells get scattered , whenever that happens, this moment will still exist in them. Those cells might be the biulding block of something new. A planet or star or a sunflower, a baby. Maybe even a cockroach. Who knows? Whatever it is, it’ll be a part of us, this thing right here and now, and we’ll be a part of it. – Libba Bray • When van Gogh paints sunflowers, he reveals, or achieves, the vivid relation between himself, as man, and the sunflower, as sunflower, at that quick moment of time. His painting does not represent the sunflower itself. We shall never know what the sunflower itself is. And the camera will visualize the sunflower far more perfectly than van Gogh can. – D. H. Lawrence • Which way will the sunflower turn surrounded by millions of suns? – Allen Ginsberg • Who knows what may lie around the next corner? There may be a window somewhere ahead. It may look out on a field of sunflowers. – Joe Hill [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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[equitiesstocks]

Sunflower Quotes

Official Website: Sunflower Quotes

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• A rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. All flowers are beautiful in their own way, and that’s like woman too. – Unknown • A wise quote can only change a wise man! Therefore, wise sayings are for the wise men, not for the fools! The sunflowers turn their face toward the Sun, the fools, toward the darkness! – Mehmet Murat Ildan • Ah, sunflower, weary of time, Who countest the steps of the sun, Seeking after that sweet golden clime Where the traveller’s journey is done; Where the youth pined away with desire And the pale virgin shrouded in snow Arise from their graves, and aspire Where my sunflower wishes to go. – William Blake • And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood. – Unknown • As for marigolds, poppies, hollyhocks, and valorous sunflowers, we shall never have a garden without them, both for their own sake, and for the sake of old-fashioned folks, who used to love them. – Henry Ward Beecher • Attention shifted to him like sunflowers turning to the sun. – Khaled Hosseini

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Sunflower', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_sunflower').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_sunflower img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Because a rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. – Miranda Kerr • Bibliotropic,” Hugh said. “Like sunflowers are heliotropic, they naturally turn towards the sun. We naturally turn towards the bookshop. – Jo Walton • Big doesn’t necessarily mean better. Sunflowers aren’t better than violets.- Edna Ferber • Bring me then the plant that points to those bright Lucidites swirling up from the earth, and life itself exhaling that central breath! Bring me the sunflower crazed with the love of light. – Unknown • But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. • Does she realize she looks like a sunflower, ready to rain sunlight on all who look down upon her? – Simone Elkeles • Eagle of flowers! I see thee stand, And on the sun’s noon-glory gaze; With eye like his, thy lids expand, And fringe their disk with golden rays: Though fix’d on earth, in darkness rooted there, Light is thy element, thy dwelling air, Thy prospect heaven. – James Montgomery • Every friend is to the other a sun, and a sunflower also. He attracts and follows. – Jean Paul • Fame is the scentless sunflower, with gaudy crown of gold; But friendship is the rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. • Flowers have an expression of countenance as much as men or animals. Some seem to smile; some have a sad expression; some are pensive and diffident; others are plain, honest and upright, like the broad faced sunflower and the hollyhock. – Henry Ward Beecher • For time and eternity there have been fathers like Nathan who simply can see no way to have a daughter but to own her like a plot of land. To work her, plow her under, rain down a dreadful poison upon her. Miraculously, it causes these girls to grow. They elongate on the pale slender stalks of their longing, like sunflowers with heavy heads. You can shield them with your body and soul, trying to absorb that awful rain, but they’ll still move toward him. Without cease they’ll bend to his light. – Barbara Kingsolver • From the animist point of view, humans belong in a sacred place because they themselves are sacred. Not sacred in a special way, not more sacred than anything else, but merely as sacred as anything else — as sacred as bison or salmon or crows or crickets or bears or sunflowers. – Daniel Quinn • Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover’s Corners… Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking… and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths…and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you. – Thornton Wilder • Hello, Harry!” she said. “Er — my name’s Barny,” said Harry, flummoxed. “Oh, have you changed that too?” she asked brightly. “How did you know — ?” “Oh, just your expression,” she said. Like her father, Luna was wearing bright yellow robes, which she had accessorized with a large sunflower in her hair. Once you got over the brightness of it all, the general effect was quite pleasant. At least there were no radishes dangling from her ears. – J. K. Rowling • Her smile put the sunflower to shame. – Jerry Spinelli • I am painting with the same enthusiasm as a Marseillaise eats bouillabaisse … I am painting big sunflowers. – Vincent Van Gogh • I am working with the enthusiasm of a man from Marseilles eating bouillabaisse, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to you because I am busy painting huge sunflowers. – Vincent Van Gogh • I believe there is something of the divine mystery in everything that exists. We can see it sparkle in a sunflower or a poppy. We sense more of the unfathomable mystery in a butterfly that flutters from a twig–or in a goldfish swimming in a bowl. But we are closest to God in our own soul. Only there can we become one with the greatest mystery of life. In truth, at very rare moments we can experience that we ourselves are that divine mystery. – Jostein Gaarder • I can’t feel bad about being who I am, just like the girl next to me can’t feel bad about being who she is. Because a rose can never be a sunflower, and a sunflower can never be a rose. – Miranda Kerr • I chose a sunflower because when darkness descends they close up to regenerate. But I really wish I’d never had the tattoo in the first place. Clean, clear skin is always better. – Halle Berry • I don’t think there’s anything on this planet that more trumpets life that the sunflower. For me that’s because of the reason behind its name. Not because it looks like the sun but because it follows the sun. During the course of the day, the head tracks the journey of the sun across the sky. A satellite dish for sunshine. Wherever light is, no matter how weak, these flowers will find it. And that’s such an admirable thing. And such a lesson in life. – Helen Mirren • I faced the gaudy sunflower on her canvas bag — it looked hand-painted and at last my eyes fell into hers. I said, ‘Thanks for the card.’ Her smile put the sunflower to shame. She walked off. – Jerry Spinelli • I think the worst lie I ever told was, because my last name is Goth, I used to tell kids at school that I used to be related to ‘Van Gogh’ and when I turned 18, I would inherit all the fortune from the sunflower painting. – Mia Goth • I thought maybe I could become like the next Van Gogh. I bought a sunflower and painted it, and it looked like the work of a 6-year-old. – Takeshi Kitano • I want to be like a sunflower; so that even on the darkest days I will stand tall and find the sunlight. – Unknown • I want to die at a hundred years old with an American flag on my back and the star of Texas on my helmet, after screaming down an Alpine descent on a bicycle at 75 miles per hour. I want to cross one last finish line as my wife and my ten children applaud, and then I want to lie down in a field of those famous French sunflowers and gracefully expire, the perfect contradiction to my once anticipated poignant early demise. – Lance Armstrong • I want to encourage women to embrace their own uniqueness. Because just like a rose is beautiful, so is a sunflower, so is a peony. I mean, all flowers are beautiful in their own way, and that’s like women too. – Miranda Kerr • I would much rather end up a fertiliser under a sunflower which is eventually made into sunflower seed oil so that instead of nibbling me in her prawn cocktail, the pretty girl will rub me on her bristols as she suns herself on a beach in the Caribbean. – Oliver Reed • If I were a flower.. I would be a sunflower. To always follow the sun, Turn my back to darkness, Stand proud, tall and straight even with my head full of seeds. – Unknown • I’m now painting with all the elan of a Marseillais eating soup, which won’t surprise you when I tell you I’m painting large sunflowers. The idea? To decorate the studio, now there’s hope of Gauguin living here. I aim at a dozen panels of sunflowers in the room I’ve set aside for Gauguin. – Vincent Van Gogh • I’m thinking waiters and waitresses are going to be bracing for more customers coming in going, not just kind of where is that beef from, but, like, where is that vanilla from and what’s up with that sunflower oil? Is it organic or not and how many pesticides? – Michael Moss • In April, we cannot see sunflowers in France, so we might say the sunflowers do not exist. But the local farmers have already planted thousands of seeds, and when they look at the bare hills, they may be able to see the sunflowers already. The sunflowers are there. They lack only the conditions of sun, heat, rain and July. Just because we cannot see them does not mean that they do not exist. – Nhat Hanh • In the morning the sunflower blossoms due to the sun’s rays. This morning I just wanted to remind you that my heart blossoms with love for you everyday I wake up and it is going to do that forever. – Sheila Carey • In your hands The dog, the donkey, surely they know They are alive. Who would argue otherwise? But now, after years of consideration, I am getting beyond that. What about the sunflowers? What about The tulips, and the pines? Listen, all you have to do is start and There’ll be no stopping. What about mountains? What about water Slipping over rocks? And speaking of stones, what about The little ones you can Hold in your hands, their heartbeats So secret, so hidden it may take years Before, finally, you hear them? – Mary Oliver • It is not while beauty And youth are thine own And thy cheeks Unprofaned by a tear That the ferver and faith Of a soul can be known To which time will but Make thee more dear No the heart that has truly loved Never forgets But as truly loves On to the close As the sunflower turns On her god when he sets The same look which She’d turned when he rose. – Thomas Moore • Light-enchanted sunflower, thou Who gazest ever true and tender On the sun’s revolving splendour. – Pedro Calderon de la Barca • London life was very full and exciting […] But in London there would be no greenhouse with a glossy tank, and no apple-room, and no potting-shed, earthy and warm, with bunches of poppy heads hanging from the ceiling, and sunflower seeds in a wooden box, and bulbs in thick paper bags, and hanks of tarred string, and lavender drying on a tea-tray. – Sylvia Townsend Warner • Make it like a sunflower. – Steve Jobs • Man would not be man if his dreams did not exceed his grasp… If I remember the sunflower forest it is because from its hidden reaches man arose. The green world is his sacred center. In moments of sanity he must still seek refuge there. – Loren Eiseley • My will broke at the sound of his voice, and my head turned with as much inevitability as a sunflower turning its face to the sun. – Patricia Briggs • My work is the world. Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird – equal seekers of sweetness. Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums. – Mary Oliver • Never look directly at the sun. Instead, look at the sunflower. – Vera Nazarian • Not only does a lens distort forms, but the ordinary plate makes an unholy mess of colour in its tone relations. Yellow becomes black, and blue white. Black sunflowers against a white sky – what a travesty! – Walter J. Phillips • One of the remarkable characteristics of young wild sunflowers, in addition to growing in soil that is not hospitable, is how the young flower bud follows the sun across the sky. In doing so, it receives life-sustaining energy before bursting forth in its glorious yellow color. Like the young sunflower, when we follow the Savior of the world, the Son of God, we flourish and become glorious despite the many terrible circumstances that surround us. He truly is our light and life. – Quentin L. Cook • Pick up a sunflower and count the florets running into its centre, or count the spiral scales of a pine cone or a pineapple, running from its bottom up its sides to the top, and you will find an extraordinary truth: recurring numbers, ratios and proportions. – Charles Jencks • Ranger picked up and there was a moment of silence as if he was sensing me at the other end, taking my body temperature and heart rate long distance. “Babe,” he finally said. “Do you know the slum apartment building Bobby Sunflower owns on Stark?” “Yes. It’s on the same block as his funeral home.” “That’s the one. I’m going in to look for someone. If you don’t hear from me in a half hour maybe you could send someone to check.” “Is this a smart thing to do?” “Probably not.” “As long as you know,” Ranger said. And he disconnected. – Janet Evanovich • Restless sunflower; cease to move. – Pedro Calderon de la Barca • Someone was sitting in front of a sunflower, watching the sunflower, a cup of sun, and so I tried it too. It was wonderful; I felt the whole universe in the sunflower. That was my experience. Sunflower meditation. A wonderful confidence appeared. You can see the whole universe in a flower. – Shunryu Suzuki • Space for the sunflower, bright with yellow glow, To court the sky. – Unknown • Sunflowers are like people to me. – Joan Mitchell • The American Indian is of the soil, whether it be the region of forests, plains, pueblos, or mesas. He fits into the landscape, for the hand that fashioned the continent also fashioned the man for his surroundings. He once grew as naturally as the wild sunflowers, he belongs just as the buffalo belonged. – Luther Standing Bear • The author O. Henry taught me about the value of the unexpected. He once wrote about the noise of flowers and the smell of birds—the birds were chickens and the flowers dried sunflowers rattling against a wall. – Chuck Jones • The cops drive by to do some more good deeds A young black male spits a sunflower seed in the air. – Dred Scott • The earth paints a portrait of the sun at dawn with sunflowers in bloom. Unhappy with the portrait, she erases it and paints it again and again. – Rabindranath Tagore • The morning glories and the sunflowers turn naturally toward the light, but we have to be taught, it seems. – Richard Rohr • The road to freedom is bordered with sunflowers. – Martin Firrell • The splendor of a human heart that trusts it is loved unconditionally gives God more pleasure than Westminster Cathedral, the Sistine Chapel, Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony”, Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers”, the sight of 10,000 butterflies in flight, or the scent of a million orchids in bloom. Trust is our gift back to God, and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for love of it. – Brennan Manning • The sunflower is a favorite emblem of constancy – Thomas Bulfinch • The sunflower is mine, in a way. – Vincent Van Gogh • The Sunflow’r, thinking ’twas for him foul shame To nap by daylight, strove t’ excuse the blame; It was not sleep that made him nod, he said, But too great weight and largeness of his head. – Abraham Cowley • The windflower and the violet, they perished long ago, And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer glow; But on the hills the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood, And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood, Till fell the first from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men, And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland glade and glen. – William C. Bryant • There are not too many fables about man’s misuse of sunflower seeds. – Richard Brautigan • There is no friend like the old friend, who has shared our morning days, No greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise: Fame is the scentless sunflower, with gaudy crown of gold; But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold. – Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. • There was the gaudy patch of sunflowers beside the west gate of the palace of the Prince of Ombria, that did nothing all day long but turn their golden-haired, thousand-eyed faces to follow the sun. – Patricia A. McKillip • True friends are like bright sunflowers that never fade away, even over distance and time – Unknown • Unholy battered old thing you were, my sunflower O my soul, I loved you then! – Allen Ginsberg • Waves of hands, hesitations at street corners, someone dropping a cigarette into the gutter-all are stories. But which is the true story? That I do not know. Hence I keep my phrases hung like clothes in a cupboard, waiting for some one to wear them. Thus waiting, thus speculating, making this note and then an• other I do not cling to life. I shall be brushed like a bee from a sunflower. My philosophy, always accumulating, welling up moment by moment, runs like quicksilver a dozen ways at once. – Virginia Woolf • We are so impressed by scientific clank that we feel we ought not to say that the sunflower turns because it knows where the sun is. It is almost second nature to us to prefer explanations . . . with a large vocabulary. We are much more comfortable when we are assured that the sunflower turns because it is heliotropic. The trouble with that kind of talk is that it tempts us to think that we know what the sunflower is up to. But we don’t. The sunflower is a mystery, just as every single thing in the universe is. – Robert Farrar Capon • We’re all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we’re all blessed by our own seed & golden hairy naked accomplishment (Sunflower Sutra) – Allen Ginsberg • we’re all golden sunflowers inside. – Allen Ginsberg • We’re not our skin of grime, we’re not our dread bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we’re all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we’re blessed by our own seed & hairy naked accomplishment-bodies growing into mad black formal sunflowers in the sunset, spied on by our eyes under the shadow of the mad locomotive riverbank sunset Frisco hilly tincan evening sitdown vision. – Allen Ginsberg • We’ve left the moment. It’s gone. We’re somewhere else now, and that’s okay. We’ve still got that moment with us somewhere, deep in our memory, seeping into our DNA. And when our cells get scattered , whenever that happens, this moment will still exist in them. Those cells might be the biulding block of something new. A planet or star or a sunflower, a baby. Maybe even a cockroach. Who knows? Whatever it is, it’ll be a part of us, this thing right here and now, and we’ll be a part of it. – Libba Bray • When van Gogh paints sunflowers, he reveals, or achieves, the vivid relation between himself, as man, and the sunflower, as sunflower, at that quick moment of time. His painting does not represent the sunflower itself. We shall never know what the sunflower itself is. And the camera will visualize the sunflower far more perfectly than van Gogh can. – D. H. Lawrence • Which way will the sunflower turn surrounded by millions of suns? – Allen Ginsberg • Who knows what may lie around the next corner? There may be a window somewhere ahead. It may look out on a field of sunflowers. – Joe Hill [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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[businessliveme]

When Less Is So Much More: Driving the 2020 Bentley Continental GT V8

(Bloomberg) — Along the Pacific Ocean just west of Napa, Calif., a section of Skaggs Springs Road is known for fog-shrouded curves perfect for uncorking your stress and shaking down new cars. It was there I realized why Bentley is so darn confident about its new V8 Continental GT.

The $198,500 beast ($218,350 for the convertible version) is just as devastatingly handsome as its W12 predecessor, with chiseled sides and a latticework grille and four round headlights so brash they look like they’re spoiling for a fight.

Read: Bugatti’s ‘Sky Is the Limit’ Strategy of $13 Million, One-Off Supercars

But more important, as you round corners and hit the gas, it feels as if you’ve harnessed a linebacker with the footwork of Roger Federer. The 2020 Bentley Continental GT V8 is power and agility blended into a cocktail you’ll want to pour down your throat.

With a new engine, new light(er)-weight aluminum body, and new double-clutch gearbox (more on those later), Bentley has given the V8 enough juice to make anyone question why you’d buy the more expensive, gas-hungrier W12.

Read: BMW M850i Coupe Review: The Unicorn You’ve Been Waiting For

In fact, I’m convinced that those lucky ducks who purchase one of the new V8s will feel downright giddy with their choice. There will be many of them, proportionately speaking. Bentley has delivered more than 70,000 Continental GTs worldwide; it’s the best-selling Bentley ever. In the United States, they make up half of all Bentleys sold, Bentley North America President Christoph Georges told me at dinner the evening after my test drive. Most critical, nearly 80% of the Continental GTs sold in the U.S. will be V8s, rather than W12s, saving their owners $16,100 in (for them, inconsequential) pocket change while providing grander engine notes and edgier handling under duress.

A small core of traditionalists will remain loyal to the W12, Bentley’s most historic engine configuration; for the rest of us, the V8 will be the happy go-to.

Leaner, Meaner

Let’s get this right out of the way: With 542bhp and 568 pound-feet of torque, the car has 84 bhp fewer than the W12. But that’s on paper. I’d bet good money you’d never know the difference driving it; unlike the W12, this all-wheel-drive V8 is heavily rear-wheel-drive biased, especially in Sport mode. It feels like a “real” sports car, which any track enthusiast will tell you must be rear-wheel-driven, no? Plus, it’s 200 pounds or so lighter than the W12, so that’s a wash if you ask me. And this is an all-new engine, updated since the first V8 Bentley made in 2012. The coupe will go to 60 mph in 3.9 seconds (4 seconds for the convertible). It has a top speed of 198 mph.

The part about the engine that really blew me away, though, was not its starting-line sprint speed. It was what it did between third and fourth gears.

Stretching out on an uphill grade, blasting toward Highway 1, the GT went from 65 mph to 91 mph in the same time it took for me to glance from the excellent heads-up display to the passenger seat and back. That’s 91 miles per hour—uphill. For a 4,773-pound car to be able to gather itself so seamlessly and quickly from an already fresh clip was shocking. Heck, for a car of any weight to be able to glide like that was shocking. Note to self: Buy police radar detector immediately. Because there would be no way I could self-regulate this level of tantalizing power.

Credit a brand-new, eight-speed transmission in the GT for such finesse. The Continental GT V8 is the first Bentley ever to have a double-clutch gearbox.

“We did it because we wanted to stretch the limit of performance,” Peter Guest, product line director at Bentley, had told me over breakfast in Napa that morning. “There are limits to how fast you can shift without a double clutch.”

Noted.

Smooth and Fast

The new Continuous Damping Control system also helped this effect. It optimizes comfort and handling by smoothing things as you drive, constantly dampening—or not—in response to the surface of the road, how the car is moving, and the driver’s input. It does this by monitoring the car’s speed and the distance between the wheels and the body of the car at each curve.

Plus, the thing stops great. As in: solidly prompt and firm without the nasty bite that some rawer sports cars possess, and which can lead me toward slight nausea and an overall green feeling on tight, twisty, up-and-down roads. Bentley has used the same iron brakes on the V8 as it did for the W12, to great effect.

A point on that aforementioned engine sound: It has been engineered to be louder than the W12, yes, with a deep guttural growl as you push it to accelerate. (The bark, as it were, matches the bite, and both are potent.) But this car remains a civilized assassin, not a vigilante. Where the BMW 8 Series and Jaguar Project 8 clamor like alley cats at every turn, especially as you downshift, the Bentley Continental GT keeps you within the realm of likability for those neighbors who are not as enthralled by car sounds as we are.

A Paradise Inside

The interior of the Bentley Continental GT V8 is the knockout punch that proves this car is the complete package, as suitable for 1,000 miles driving up the Pacific coast as it would be on a date at the opera, or tearing down two-lane roads on a joy ride. None of these scenarios would prove fatiguing to your nerves—the car is sealed for quiet inside, like a vault—or to your back, with those newly plush and supportive 20-way adjustable seats. Or to your wardrobe: The gaping trunk here easily fits two large, hard weekend cases, two backpacks or duffels, and assorted hats and coats. Even the convertible version allows this, which is more than I can say for any other sport convertible on the market.

I also appreciate how Bentley has been honest about how its previous interiors felt dated (no USBs anywhere) and has acted accordingly with its new issue.

“The new interior has really taken us from a little bit behind to absolute state of the art,” Guest said at breakfast, noting such things as the three-point rotating 12.3-inch touchscreen that turns with the press of a button. (If you want, you can rotate it so that you’re only dealing with analog displays, or even just a flat veneer surface.) He’s right. There are enough cup holders for a long road trip, and the back seat is far bigger than what you’d get in an Aston Martin or Porsche coupe. It’s usable even for adults—imagine! And I loved that the Naim sound system packs 12 speakers and a whopping 2200 watts. I used it to crank up Hole, Willie Nelson, and Led Zeppelin. It is expensive—$8,800—but it’s almost as good as being down in the dirt at a Willie concert.

I do have some nitpicks: Sometimes, when the car is going fast on a steep, tight turn, the front pillar to the left of the steering wheel blocked my line of sight as I looked down the road toward my next turn. It was annoying, but probably unavoidable, for a car that looks that good. It would be nice if the Bluetooth would sync when the car is moving. When I asked Guest about this, he said it was a regulatory issue, though other automakers don’t seem to have this problem. It would also be nice if the footwells were slightly wider and longer; for those of us approaching six feet, they can feel confining.

But unlike some brands with the tendency to try to do too much (Mercedes, sometimes), Bentley has exhibited that famously endearing British restraint. Thank goodness.

“We know that luxury is not just about stuff,” Guest said. “Luxury is about simplicity, not overload. If you don’t want it, you can take it off.” That moving touchscreen in the back can also be plain wood veneer, if you like. (But you can choose from a range of woods for that veneer, naturally.)

To that end: Omit the purchase of the $610 Bentley bat light that illuminates the ground at night when you get inside the car for all to see; skip the $1,990 diamond knurling on the organ stops that control the vents and on the clock bezel, and forgo the $1,630 pinstripe chrome veneer inside. You’ll probably want the 22-inch wheels, heated steering wheel, and new heated armrests. (Among Bentley, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz, these are really becoming a thing, which I love.)

You won’t miss the rest of the extras. The 2020 Bentley Continental GT V8 perfectly embodies the concept of less is more. Let the engine and design do the talking. The car speaks for itself just fine. It will arrive in showrooms this fall.

The post When Less Is So Much More: Driving the 2020 Bentley Continental GT V8 appeared first on Businessliveme.com.

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[kenpaisworkshop]

Soul and Sand Interlude, Part I:

“Chinir”

Characters: Ken’pai the Mechanist, ( @rumongray​ ), Tomis the Warlock ( @tomis-jb​ ) Content Warning: None, SFW.

Continued from the events of Soul and Sand, Part II

[[NEXT]]

Written by @rumongray​ Art and concept design by @tomis-jb​

-------------------------------------------------

The sand-skiff hopped and danced over the dunes as the three unlikely companions traversed the great Sandsea of Chazin. The sun was hanging barely above the horizon, the slightly cooling air stirring up blustering winds that caught themselves in the sail of the sandcraft.

The warlock, Tomis, had found the heat to be unnecessarily harsh, even at sundown, and had removed his robes, folding them neatly in his lap as he sat against the compartment door at the stern of the ship, examining the map he held in front of him. He kept his mask on to prevent the sand from hitting his face, but otherwise appeared more like an ordinary traveler in comparison to what he wore in the city. On the deck above and behind him stood an old elven man, Loch, keeping a steady hand on the boom, turning the sail with a keen sense of the wind's ever-changing direction. On the tiller was a rather excited lizard-man, wearing a pair of blue-tinted goggles as he turned the rudder so as to hit the dunes at just the right angle.

“You're gettin' the hang of it, Scales!” The elf shouted.

The lizard-man, Ken'pai, laughed a bit as the craft hit the top of another dune, skipping into the air for a bit before landing smoothly on the sandy slope. “Tomis, c'mon, you really should try this!”

The human peered over the top edge of the map. “Nah, you seem to be enjoying yourself just fine!”

“Suit yourself!” Ken replied, steering the craft toward another dune.

“How're we doing?!” Loch asked, “are we on track?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Tomis answered, craning his neck to get a good look at their surroundings, “when we were up on top of the last dune I'm pretty sure I saw it.”

“Got'cha. Scales, slow 'er down when we reach the top so we can get a good look.”

“Understood!”

Ken'pai pressed into the tiller, which sunk the rudder deeper into the sand to catch the craft. At the same time, Loch turned the sail and pulled on a thick rope to fold in the sail so as to not catch any more wind. The momentum carried the ship calmly up to the ridge, coming to a stop at the apex.

Tomis stood up and pointed at a very distant structure, risen distinctly among the sand. “Pretty sure that's it.”

The old elf nodded. “Yeah, that's it. The tomb of Nerid Chazin the 14th.”

The lizard-man gulped as he looked at Loch and nodded. “Alright, ready?”

The mast of the sand-skiff creaked and whined while Loch let the rope start to slack. The sound was distressing for both him and Ken'pai. They examined the mast closely, trying to discern the source. Eventually, Loch shrugged and turned back to the reptile, nodding an affirmation. He unfurled the sail again and turned it windward, as Ken lifted the rudder out of the sand. The craft sprung to life again, wind blasting into the sails and jerking the sand-skiff forward to their destination.

The mast groaned again. This time it was audible even above the wind that flew past everyone's ears.

“I don't like the sssound of that, Loch...” Ken'pai squinted.

“Good ear, Scales. No, that ain't good at all,” Loch growled, furrowing his brow. “Get us out of the dunes and into a more open spot, this might not go well.”

Ken followed directions, aiming for more level terrain and making sure the craft's course stayed as steady as he could. He had no idea what was about to happen, only that he trusted Loch and deferred to his judgement. A particularly violent gale rushed into the sail and forced the boom to turn sharply, despite the elf's insistence to keep it still. The struggle was too much for the mast to bear, as a large metal joint twisted and then snapped apart, sending the boom crashing to the deck below, just narrowly missing Tomis. The sail wilted and sank, the sand-skiff finally losing momentum and coming to a full stop.

Loch hopped down from the upper deck. “Twelve-dammit!”

The elf pulled up the sail and inspected the broken joint, shaking his head. “Sorry guys. I saw it coming but that sudden gust was too much for this ol' girl to handle.”

“What do we do now?” Tomis folded his arms.

“I have a replacement, but it'll take awhile to put together. Might take well into the night, and we certainly don't want to start traveling then. Besides, the wind will die down.”

Ken'pai scanned the horizon, spotting the tomb. “Ssstill quite a few miles off, too. Way too far to go on foot, that's for sure. Anything I can to do help?”

The old man shook his head and huffed. “Other than offering moral support, not much. No offense, Scales, but if ya don't know how to fix a sail, you end up doing more harm than good by getting in the way.”

“Alright,” the lizard-man sighed.

Loch headed to the stern of the ship, opening the door to the lower inside deck and started to root around in a few crates. He pulled out what looked like the part he needed and set to task right away, sizing up the damage to the sail and inspecting it for rips before starting the repairs.

Tomis and Ken'pai hopped down off the skiff and examined the area, looking for any visible sign of life in this barren land. The warlock checked the canteen at his hip and shook it, making sure it still had plenty of water, as Ken'pai wandered around to the back of the ship, examining the rudder with curiosity. His eye for engineering broke it down for him in an instant, how the device worked to steer them on the sand.

He thought he heard something shift behind him, turning to see another gust of wind skip across the desert surface.

The lizard-man made his way around, looking out at the vast sand-sea that they had already covered. He could see one of the guide-lights of Chazin in the distance, still reflecting a bit of light from the quickly setting sun. He couldn't tell if it was further than the tomb at this rate, and began to worry a bit at the idea of being stranded in the middle of a desert.

Another shifting sound, this time catching his eye upon the sand nearby. It looked as if something were burrowing beneath the surface, prompting the lizard-man to pull the rifle out of the holster on his back and preparing it. The creature's path stopped short, but the sound continued, probably digging even deeper to not give away its position. Foolishly, Ken didn't back into the craft, but stepped out into the open instead, his weapon at the ready to fire at any direction.

“Lost one,” a heavily accented voice said, “are you in need of aid?”

Ken'pai couldn't tell just where the voice came from. For a moment it sounded like it came from directly beneath his feet, and then again it almost sounded like it came from the craft, whether it was an echo or not...

The sand behind him erupted skyward, proving Ken's fears to be true as a creature landed heavily on the sand. A thick arm wrapped itself around the lizard-man as the other grabbed the barrel of his gun. Ken managed to wrench himself free from his assailant's grasp, but had to let go of the rifle in order to do so as he backed into the side of the craft.

The creature wasn't what he expected at all. It stood upright like a man, only slightly shorter than himself, wearing only a light, ragged pair of beige trousers, and a scarf over its snout of the same color. Its head looked like a lizard's, and although it was broader and flatter than Ken'pai's, the mechanist gasped in surprise.

A lizard-man?

Ken said nothing, examining his adversary further. Its underbelly was covered in smaller, presumably softer scales of a light sandy color, turning to darker shades of brown at the outside of its broad, well-built chest. Its arms were muscular, toned, and an even darker shade of brown with thicker scales, although they were speckled with lighter shades in certain spots. Thick spikes protruded from the creature's arms and from the sides of a wide ridge that ran down over its back, also jutting out from the back of its head.

The creature examined the rifle in its hands, trying to discern its purpose.

“A weapon, yesss?” It asked, the same voice from before. It was very deep, masculine, and with a thick accent not unlike those heard in the city of Chazin itself.

Ken'pai nodded.

“Not a talker, eh?”

The lizard-man looked at the rifle one more time before tossing it to Ken'pai, who caught it with a look of confusion painted across his face.

“What?” Ken asked.

“Simple, green one. I mean no harm, so you may have this back.”

“I...”

“I apologize, but I didn't want to risk you attacking me before I had a chance to explain myssself, so I had to briefly disarm you.”

Ken'pai shook his head in disbelief and tilted his head.

“...Tsen?” The mechanist asked in his native tongue. (Hello?)

“Tsen, chinir,” The brown one replied. “I'm glad to know you are no mirage.” (Hello, kin,)

Ken sighed with relief as another heavy set of footsteps tromped from around the front of the craft. Tomis' eyes gleamed with a sickly violet light as his powers bled through the veil and manifested in his hands.

“Wait!” Ken'pai shouted, getting in between the warlock and the other lizard-man, stretching his arms out.

The warlock growled, but relaxed his focus, his unknown magics slithering back to where they came from. “Ken'pai, back away.”

“It's okay, he...I don't think he means any harm,” Ken explained.

“I do not, as I said before,” the lizard-man growled.

The mechanist turned toward the newcomer and backed up to Tomis. Having his companion behind him gave him the courage to show more boldness with his words.

“Who are you?”

The shrouded one held a fist against his chest in respect. “I am called Shir. I saw the accident from afar, and came to render aid, should it be required.”

“Why, though?” Tomis demanded.

“Because he's one of the Sandscale,” an old voice called from above, as Loch descended the side of the craft. “a tribe of lizard-folk who wander the desert. They have a reputation for aiding those who are lost in the dunes.”

“We believe the desert should be filled of sand, and not corpses,” Shir added.

“And...how exactly are you going to help us?” The mechanist asked.

Shir turned toward the sun, which had already fallen halfway below the horizon. “Night approaches, and the desert will grow cold. How much space does your craft hold for such an emergency?”

“...the hold has about enough space for...two people,” Loch gruffed.

“My tribe is only a few miles or so away from here, on the other side of that dune,” he pointed, “you may stay with us until the sun rises.”

“For a price,” the elf revealed.

Shir nodded. “Yes. An even trade, although we can figure out the details later.”

“Even trade...? Look, we don't have anything of value,” Ken'pai stated, gripping his rifle tighter. “...nothing we're willing to part with, anyway.”

“It doesn't have to be physical goods. It could be assistance with labor, it could even be to share warmth for the night.”

Tomis lifted an eyebrow. “'Share warmth?”

“He means share a bed, to put it bluntly,” the mechanist explained.

“Oh really now...?”

Ken'pai rolled his eyes and chuckled a bit. “Well...Tomis might have found his 'even trade.' I am rather handy with repairs, I...suppose I could help fix things for you guys?”

The Sandscale nodded. “Those would both be acceptable, my friend, but there are many ways to trade here in the desert. We'd have to see when we get there. Have you all made up your minds?”

Ken'pai looked at his warlock friend, who shrugged his shoulders and nodded. Ken turned back and nodded too. “We're alright with it. Loch, what about you?”

The old man shook his head. “Nah, somebody's gotta get this sail back in working order. With only one person, the hold is pretty nice and cozy, all things considered. Plus I've spent plenty of nights in this desert myself. I'll be fine. Go on, and trust me Scales, you actually are in good hands.”

Ken'pai rubbed the back of his neck. “Alright, if you're sure...”

A clawed hand clasped onto his shoulder. “Chinir, one does not live to that age in this desert without knowing how to endure its trials. Now come, the sun lays low, and my tribe will be harder to find by torchlight.”

“But--”

Shir pulled his scarf down for a moment, smiling at Ken'pai. “We can talk on the way.”

The mechanist looked towards Tomis one last time, who gave a reassuring nod. Ken'pai then turned to his new friend and gave a confident smirk.

“Let's go.”