#Sorry for posting one million time I have brain virus.

[box953]

I’m always here, officer Eiffel.

[greekowl87]

Fic: Watching in the Shadows

A/N: I’ve had difficulty bringing myself to write anything since October. I had some personal issues to work through regarding my anxiety and life. I’m still trying to work through it right now but I managed to cobble this together over the past month. This isn’t my best work and I’ve probably done something like this before (another fic that was a post-ep of FTF), but I at least managed to write something. Sorry. If you've gotten this far, thanks again for taking the time to look it over.

Also, no beta. Is AO3 more your thing, you can read this here

Tagging @today-in-fic @improlificinsarcasm @suitablyaggrieved @baronessblixen

The nightmares had started shortly after Mulder’s one-in-a-million successful rescue and their daring seascape from Antarctica. Somehow, they had made it with some minor scrapes, bruising, and some frostbite. They came back to D.C. and it was questionable whether they still had jobs or not. The x-files had been burnt in a flash of lost hopes and dreams. Only the ashes were left, smeared by the boots of the notorious Them.

After their latest jaunt in Arizona chasing more would be aliens exploding from human chests and poor Gibson Praise, Scully wondered if God was trying to take a cue from James Cameron. That ended roughly too. In addition to the nightmares she refused to acknowledge, the added insecurity of Diana Fowley was like a harbinger of the future.

Scully twisted in bed, her cotton sheets coiling around her like a python. It was suffocating. She was in that weird twilight of waking and still traipsing through a dream. Those that said you didn’t dream of color were wrong. She remembered flashes of being locked in that tube with that thing shoved down her throat. The cold that had eaten into her bones and down to her core, making her feel brittle. She remembered seeing those gelatinous bodies in Texas and remembered her fear. That would be her. That would be her fate.

Of course, she wouldn’t tell Mulder. Why would he believe her anyway? His thoughts were up in the clouds trying to get their work back. Scully finally woke up gasping. Her hand clutched her chest to feel her racing heart, mentally calming herself that nothing had exploded out of her chest. Her fingers touched the tiny gold cross and she squeezed it so hard so it would be indented in her finger pads.

“I’m alive,” she whispered to the shadows in the room. “I’m alive.”

The fragments of memory were still there, just like something you couldn’t see out from the corner of your eye but you knew it was there. She glanced at the alarm clock. 4:01 am. It was a Saturday so she would not have gone to work. She could afford to sleep. But was she going to?

During the past six years, she did not get nightmares. Not normally anyway. There were a few after Pfaster and then with her cancer. Without ignoring the science...damn her own words. She turned out the bedside lamp and got out of bed. Without really thinking (it was still night in her opinion), she went to her kitchen and filled her teapot. As she tried to decide what tea to drink, she heard a light knocking on her door.

There would only be one person who would knock on her door this early (or late).

Scully opened it without ceremony, replying, “The last time you came to my door, you were drunk and dragged me across the country. It’s Saturday and I’m not going anywhere.”

He looked tired, worse than usual. The bags under his eyes indicated something much worse. He read her unspoken question. “I haven’t slept in over 24 hours, Scully. I’m not planning on anything. I just didn’t know where else to go.”

He knew what just to say to pull at her heartstrings. She took his hand and pulled him into her apartment, locking the door behind her. “I can’t either.”

“Nightmares?”

The word was effortless, showing just how well he knew her. “Something like that. I was about to make tea. Do you want some?”

“Do you have anything stronger?”

“How about we settle in the middle? A hot toddy? You can stay here in the meantime.”

“What? You’re not going to kick out self-deprecating and self-pitying Spooky Mulder?”

“Of course not,” she said. “Is that even a question?”

She selected two bags of Chai tea with two mugs. She went to another cupboard and stood on her tiptoes, trying to reach a rarely used bottle. In three easy strides, Mulder was behind her. “The rum?”

She nodded and felt him press behind her, easily getting the bottle. “Grog?”

She chuckled. “Not quite. Hot toddy. I think it might be better for helping get us back to sleep.”

“A sleepover?”

“A sleepover,” she chuckled. This is how she liked her Mulder and she felt those insecure thoughts replaced with a warmth that she had come to know. “Maybe I’ll let you even play twister.”

“Scully,” he chuckled.

“Go make yourself comfortable. I’ll be there in a second.”

She heard him kick off his shoes and take off his leather jacket, indicating he had no plans to leave anytime soon. Scully was fine with this. He flipped on her television, keeping the volume low. She laughed when she saw James Cameron’s ‘Alien’ come on and Mulder looked at her funny. “What?”

“I...it’ll sound stupid…” She shook her head. “Never mind.”

“Tell me,” he encouraged.

“I’ve had trouble sleeping since Antarctica.” She nodded towards the television. “My nightmares. I wonder if James Cameron is playing a role. I keep seeing myself back on that ship. And after...the face-hugger.” She motioned to her chest. “Bursting out in all the bloody glory.”

“But it didn’t, Scully. It didn’t.”

“Still doesn’t stop the nightmares.” She first added generous amounts of the spiced rum and then the Chai tea. “I was awake and aware when I was in that tube. Not all the time but I was awake. I remember. I remember the coldness...” She shook her head and her voice faded.

Mulder nodded gently. “I get the impression that you don’t want me to talk about the subject.”

“I don’t want to fight, Mulder. I don’t want to fight about the report, the work, or Fowley right now. I’m tired.” She rubbed her eyes. “Nor do I want to scold you on what happened in the Bermuda Triangle. We both know how stupid that was.”

Mulder was quiet. “I do trust your judgment, I do trust you. Without you...I probably would have been stuck in 1939 with no way home.”

“Mulder.”

“I do trust you,” he repeated, with more certainty. “More than anything.”

Scully nodded, satisfied with his response. She took the two mugs and walked them over. “So,” she said, “you had to pick Alien after I told you God is consulting with James Cameron?”

“Run of the luck. Do you want me to change it?”

“No, no. It’s fine.”

Mulder sipped the hot toddy, his eyebrows arching in surprise. “You didn’t go light.”

“No, but it works well together. Don’t you agree?”

“Very good.”

“So, Scully, since we’re having a sleepover, wanna play truth or dare?”

“Excuse me?”

“Truth or dare?” He smirked.

She was tired. Maybe her brain wasn’t working correctly. Maybe the lack of sleep had something to do with it. She decided to indulge him this time. “Truth.”

“Okay,” he paused. “What was your nightmare about?”

“Very smooth and not at all obvious.” He shrugged, sipped the hot beverage, and watched her. She sighed. “What could have been if you had not gotten to me in time when they took me.” She recognized that look and she hated it. “Stop profiling me.”

“I’m not.” He looked almost insulted. “I was just hoping to hear more. But it’s your turn. Truth or dare?”

“Truth. Ask your question, Scully so we both can get it over it.”

The sharpness in his voice took her off guard. “What are you talking about?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I asked you first.”

“Truth. No. Fact. I do love you.”

“I…” She felt panic rise in her chest. No. No, no, no. “Mulder…” He held his hand up and she grabbed it, shooing it away. This was getting out of hand. “Not like this. Quit messing with me, Mulder.”

She got up quickly and downed the scalding liquid. She winced. “I’m not.”

“It’s not funny,” she said again in warning. “Stop messing with me. This entire game is stupid. Why did I even let you talk me into this?”

Scully remembered how her mom used to force Melissa to include Scully in her sleepovers. Even though there were only two years between her and Missy, Scully always felt like the odd one out. Nerdy Dana who always had her nose buried in a science book. Why don’t you marry Einstein they would tease. As much as she loved her sister, that game left nothing but bitter memories for her.

Mulder frowned, surprised by her sudden reaction. He didn’t know why the words fumbled out of his mouth the way they did. But now that it had happened, he couldn’t see a reason why not. He watched her set the forgotten drink on the kitchen table and pace.

“Scully.”

“Why did you come here? Why did you come here, Mulder?” She wrapped her arms around herself. Maybe she was caught in the throes of another nightmare. “Answer me!”

“Do you want me to leave, Scully?” He asked. “If that’s what you want, I have no problem doing that.”

“I didn’t say that. Stop twisting my words.”

“Then come back here and sit down.”

After a moment’s hesitation, she bit her lip and nodded. She sat at the opposite end of the couch. Mulder suddenly felt the dynamic shift between them and it was like a game of chess. “For the record, I do not feel comfortable about this.”

“Noted. Now, what did you dream about?”

“The first time I was abducted, there was some trauma there. Bits and pieces. But this time was different. I dream that I die. You don’t come. That thing explodes out of me like those crime scene photos. I performed the autopsy on that body and saw what happened. That was going to become me.

“And I die to expect during all this, I am alive and I feel every sensation. I don’t know what is worse: knowing that I almost died from the virus or the chip in my neck.” Scully found herself confessing fears that she had managed to repress for the past year. “Ruskin Dam. Skyline Mountain. The cancer. And now this same Earth-based virus that we also found in Gibson Praise. What do you think it means, Mulder? It terrifies me.”

Mulder fumbled over her words in his mind. Where does he even begin? “I came here because I didn’t know where else to go. The bar…” He snorted with displeasure. “After what happened in Dallas, I was devastated. After almost losing you, well, let’s just say I got my priorities straight.”

“Priorities.”

What the hell was going on between them? “What are we doing here, Mulder?”

“What do you mean?”

“This. You come over at 4 am. Make me confess my soul.”

“It is Saturday so it’s not like we have to work.”

“We may not even have jobs.”

He held up a finger. “Prohibition period, remember? We do have jobs. We just to get to do background checks and chase shit around the country.”

“I don’t see what’s so great about it.”

“I have you. You’re still here with me. She wasn’t.”

“She?”

“Diana.”

Scully frowned at the mere mention of the name. “I still don’t see why you trust her or what you see.”

“She was there when I found the x-files. But who is here now, where she could still have a promising career in medicine despite the fact most of her patients are dead?”

“Except for one.”

Mulder smiled. “You’re still here. After all this, after all that we’ve been through. You’re the one I trust the most.” He sighed and sipped the hot toddy. “I still trust her because how could I not, Scully? But she’s not the one I went to at four am.”

She remembered going to him at the reflection pool at twilight, taking his hand, a wordless promise to each other. “Touché.” She relaxed. “Look, I’m sure you didn’t mean that…”

“I did.”

Shit. “Let’s put a pin in that thought,” she said quickly. Mulder sat his mug on her coffee table. “Coaster.”

He grabbed two and slid them across her oak coffee table. “Why is it so hard to wrap your mind around it?”

“Well,” she began, struggling to find her voice. “There’s different types of love. You love me like a friend, a sister, a comrade…”

“And then are is also the type between…”

He said this as she was trying to put her mug on the table but, uncharacteristically, the mug fumbled, spilling all over the table. “Shit.” The hot tea burned her hands and Mulder was already rushing back into her kitchen, grabbing towels and the ice pack. “Mulder…”

“I got it.”

He quickly cleaned up the mess and Scully took the extra towels. She wiped the mess off her hands and frowned at the red swelling starting on her knuckles. Mulder wrapped the ice pack in another towel and took her hands. “Mulder.”

“I gotcha, Scully.”

“Mulder, I’m fine.”

“Will you just let me?” The sharpness of his voice silenced her as he took her hands gently and held the ice pack against it. “I know you want to be this badass FBI agent…”

“Want to?”

“I know you are a big, badass FBI agent. Just let me for once?”

“Fine.”

They sat in silence as Mulder held the ice pack over the top of her hands. She cleared her throat. “I meant what I said, Scully. I do love you.”

She scoffed. “I’m sure.”

“You aren’t a replacement.”

Scully shook her head, refusing to believe him. “You always do this.”

“Do what?”

“Twist words.” She tried to pull her hands away from him without success. “Mulder, let me go.”

She felt Mulder squeeze her fingers tighter. “No.” He was staring at her. Those goddamn— “Look at me, Scully.”

Why did she feel tears in her eyes? Her eyes did feel dry from lack of sleep. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I’m sick of the lies.” She rested her chin on her chest. “I’m tired of the smoke and shadows. For once, I just want someone to tell me the truth and mean it.”

Mulder sighed. She winced hearing it. “What do you want me to do, Scully?”

“Tell me the truth.” She looked

“I am.” He removed the ice pack and kissed her knuckles. “I love you. You aren’t a replacement. Nothing could replace you.”

“Then what am I to you?”

“You’re Scully.” He looked at her as if that was even a question. “When it came to Samantha, I was able to live with it. I have for 27 years. But when I lost you on Skyline mountain…” Mulder put the ice pack back on her knuckles. “I couldn’t...I didn’t know what to do. I was filled with such rage. I almost killed Duane Barry. The months during your absence, I didn’t do so well.”

Scully watched him. “You rarely talk about it.”

“Because there isn’t too much to say. I took a couple of profiling cases. Coming back to the basement office—it didn’t feel the same. It wasn’t the same.” He nodded to the small gold cross on her neck. “I wore your cross when you were gone.”

She remained quiet.

He snorted derision and looked down at their hands. “It’s stupid. There was a point, right after you came back, that X wanted me to just take a plane ticket and leave you and forget everything. You. The x-files. The shadowy men without names. Everything.” He adjusted the ice pack. “And maybe, at one time I would, but not when it came to you.”

“Do you know why seeing run off with Agent Fowley hurt me?”

“Why?”

“It’s our work,” she specified, emphasizing the word ‘our.’ “She comes out of the woodwork and, all of the sudden, I take the backseat on this. I thought it was my science that kept you honest, Mulder.”

“Your science does,” he quickly caught himself, “quit twisting my words.”

“I’m not. My hands are fine, Mulder.”

“I guess they are.” He pulled back the ice and Scully flexed her numb hands. “Do you want another cup of tea?”

“Yes, please.”

“I left you with Gibson because I know he would be safer with you rather than Diana.”

“Yet, I still lost him.”

“No. He was at the nuclear facility. I have a hunch he is safe.” Mulder looked over his shoulder. “How generous, Special Agent Doctor?”

“Shut up. Make it a generous one.”

Mulder smiled and called, “Did you know I was a bartender for a couple of months in Oxford?” Scully’s mind was trying to reel with everything that was happening. But she forced her insecurities into the backseat and let Mulder take the lead. He frowned “If I were just here for something else, we’d be halfway across the country right now.”

“I don’t know if that is a good or bad thing, Mulder.” Scully watched the tv, flinching at a particularly gory scene with a face hugger. “Do you have nightmares?”

“Hm?” Mulder shrugged with his back to her. “Sometimes. That’s one of the reasons why I don’t sleep.”

Scully was quiet as Mulder returned to her with a new mug of hot Chai tea. She took it and sipped the mug. “Good. Thank you.”

“And for the record, Scully, the nightmares aren’t just of Samantha. It’s you too.”

She closed her eyes, annoyed with this vein of conversation. “Is that why you decided to profess your undying love?”

“I thought it was a good moment. But that’s not all of it.” Mulder rejoined her on the couch. “Are you ready to talk about that?”

“I still think you’re full of shit.”

He laughed and sipped his hot toddy. “That’s why my eyes are brown.”

“Hazel.”

“I’m only half full of shit then.”

Scully snorted into her drink. “I honestly don’t know what to believe.”

“I want to believe,” Mulder teased in a fake E.T. voice. She snickered playfully and slapped his thighs. “See? Made you smile. Careful. It might stay that way, Scully.”

“Shut up.”

“Okay,” he said. He checked his watch. “It is almost 4:30 am, Agent Scully. Your guest is intoxicated. What are you going to do?”

“I thought we were having a sleepover?”

“Did I say that?”

“You’re words, not mine.”

“At least take off your shoes.”

She heard Mulder kick them off and he grabbed the remote. He changed the tv to the Sports Channel. After seeing raise a questioning eyebrow, he shrugged. “So, do you watch Sports Center or a movie to fall asleep to?”

“What happened to Truth or Dare?”

“Okay, truth, or dare?”

“Dare,” she said.

“I dare you to have a sleepover on your couch.” That eyebrow. “Just...whatever we are, Scully.”

After a few moments of hesitation, she nodded. Scully felt him squeeze her hands and smile. She stood still like a painting. He smiled at her and she forced herself to return it. Mulder unwound her like a knotted piece of string and lounged himself. Despite their height differences and oppositeness, they still were made for each other. Scully found herself curling up next to him as he grabbed the remote and changing it to a 4 am playing of ‘Mystery Science Theatre 3000.’ Mulder grabbed a knitted, over large Afghan from the back of her couch to tuck around them.

“What does this say to you, Agent Mulder?”

“I love you,” he whispered. He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “And I tell you without hesitation.”

Scully was quiet. “Why did you come here again?”

“There’s nowhere else where I would rather be.”

“Good enough for now.”

Scully quickly ran through possible scenarios. What did she have to lose? Everything. “This won’t change anything.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t want to lose us,” she replied cautiously.

“This will change nothing. If not, only for the better.”

She wisely chose not to say anything. She tried to relax but she shook her head. She pushed away towards the other end of the couch. There was a visible look of hurt on his face. “It’s not you,” she replied quickly.

“Yeah, I’ve heard it before. It’s me.”

“For once, it’s is me, Mulder. I can’t...I can’t get past my insecurities.”

“What insecurities?”

She ghosted him a smile. “The hallway? Either we have really bad timing or bees don’t like us.”

“Or?”

“You mentioned it earlier. I don’t want to be a replacement for Samantha or her…”

“Her?” It took a moment for Mulder to recognize what she was telling him. “Why do you say that?”

“I overheard what you said to Arizona. She’s staying on the x-files because it’s the best way to represent your interests. Before that, when we still had the office, I caught you all holding hands. She seemed so excited about something. That is when I called you. I told you I was driving back. I was just sitting in the car in the garage outside.”

“Watching in the shadows?” Mulder sighed. “Scully…”

“I feel like I’ve been on the outside a lot lately.” She sipped her hot toddy, the alcohol burning in the back of her throat. “So I can’t help but feel somewhat insecure. Just talking about it…” She snorted into her mug of tea. “It’s taking a lot.”

“I can understand that.”

“Do you?”

He hesitated. “I...like to think so.” Mulder leaned forward. “I know things have been tough. Honestly, I’m surprised you’re still here.”

She titled her head in question. “What do you mean?”

“I thought that you have left. Maybe try to go back to Quantico or quit the FBI all together.”

“I almost did that night when they told me Salt Lake City. But you’re my partner, Mulder. It’s as simple as that.”

He took her free hand and entwined their fingers. “And for that, I am grateful for that of every moment of every day. Do you want to know the difference between you and her?”

“Our heights?”

Mulder snorted in muted laughter. “I guess, physically, but where it counts, you tower above her.”

She arched a skeptical eyebrow.

“She left me. No warning or note. Just up and left. I haven’t been in contact with her since she left. She wouldn’t have chased me like you have or been thrown in contempt of Congress for lying to save my ass.” Scully smiled as she looked down. “She wouldn’t have thrown everything out the window to deal with her crazy partner. You are so much more than she was, or is, Scully.” He brushed her hair out of her face. “And I have never loved anyone more than I love you. Truth. I meant what I said in that hospital. I love you.”

“You really overcomplicate things.”

Mulder shrugged and grinned. “So, Scully, where does this leave us?”

The insecurities raged inside her and she averted her gaze. “I’ve had nightmares about this too,” she said softly.

“Why does it always feel like we are watching from the shadows?” He asked her softly. “Especially in our nightmares? We feel like we don’t have control?”

“I don’t know. I thought you were supposed to be the psychologist?”

“It was rhetorical.”

“I know.” She sighed and looked at the tv for a distraction. “After all we’ve been through, Mulder…”

“What about it?”

“I do love you.” She said as quickly exhaled so it came out in a jumble of words. Scully doubted he had heard her. But his playful grin suggested otherwise. “You heard it?”

“Ears like a fox.”

Mulder bent forward again to kiss her again, forgoing all shyness. She felt him bring her closer, snaking his arms around her. He sighed audibly before she returned it with much gusto. Senses alight for both of them, Scully managed to be the level headed one between them both. “Mulder,” she breathed. “I hardly think this is the place?”

He pulled back and blinked in confusion. His senses were drunk off her that it was heard from him to make sense. “What?”

“I don’t think the couch Is the best place for this.”

“Why?”

He was only now capable of single-word answers and questions. She smiled. She felt lighter. The nightmares that had plagued the back of her mind for months now seemed like a distant memory. “Just because.”

It seemed like she was incapable of speaking too. She pushed the Afgan aside and got to her feet. The cups were forgotten and Mulder clicked off the television. Words failed them but their unspoken communication did otherwise. He took her hand and squeezed. “Are you certain?”

“No,” she admitted truthfully, “but I know what I feel. I’ve learned to trust my instincts.”

Mulder smiled. She led him to her bedroom. She kept the lamp near her bed on and he looked at her tossed sheets. He exhaled, letting out a heavy sigh. “I wish you would have told me sooner.”

“What would you have done, Mulder?”

“Acted sooner.”

“Well, you’re here now, right?”

“Of course. You haven’t kicked me out yet.”

“I’m not planning to.”

Scully took his hands and pulled him closer. She felt emboldened and the room felt hotter than it was. He smiled. “So…” She grabbed him by the scruff of his t-shirt and pulled him downwards. Mulder’s spine protested but he didn’t care. Let Scully take the lead. His arms reached downwards to bring her closer. Suddenly, she felt frozen. Just a second ago she had felt so confident. Now, she was unsure. “What’s wrong?”

“Are you certain about this?” Her voice was soft but the lingering hesitation could be heard. “About this thing between us?”

“Yes, I’m more certain than anything else.”

“Okay.” There was another pause. “So...how do we do this?”

“We just do,” he laughed.

She shook her head and said, “Isn’t this better than a stakeout, watching in the shadows for some would-be informant, and then finding out it was a waste of time.”

“Scully, are you proposing role-playing?”

“No. It’s just…” She laughed despite herself. “I never imagined this.”

“Are you certain you want to go through with this? You don’t have to if you’re…”

“No, I want this.”

Mulder kissed her softly at first but deepened it. He walked her backward to her bed until she bumped up against it. Mulder smiled as pushed her to sit down. “It’s, uh, been a while.”

“Same.”

He sat next to her and laughed. “I expected this to be different.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’re going to do this, aren’t we? I expected it to be a bit more...fevered? And look at us, like two scared virgins.”

Scully laughed. “So, Mulder, do you want me to take the lead?”

He rolled his eyes. “Or we can just go back to watching TV. I’m sorry. I guess it’s the sleep deprivation talking.”

“We aren’t watching TV. I thought we were having a sleepover. At some point, we do have to sleep.” She got to her knees and pushed him onto his back. “Besides, Mulder, we’ve come this far. When have we ever done anything halfway?”

“What have you done with Dana Scully?”

“Invasion of the body snatchers?”

Scully felt her courage return. She swung her leg over his hip and straddled him. “Now, correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t remember this being a part of a sleepover.”

“Well, it’s a thing between partners, right?”

She slid lower, squeezing her thighs in the process. He grunted in response. “Right. I’m not complaining by the way. I was just stating.”

She hummed. She was alight was all new sensations. Mulder let his hands drop to her waist. “I like those pajamas by the way. It’s not silk for once.”

“Cotton.”

“Huh.”

“My mom says…”

He couldn’t take it anymore. “I don’t care what your mother said.”

His long arms twisted around her and pulled her down. She braced herself, sticking her hands out on either side of his head to brace the impact. She collided into an Earth-shattering kiss. Stranger thing how time and physics worked. She sighed happily as her tongue delved into his mouth. This was good. “This is wonderful,” she whispered between breaths.

“Do you know what makes this better?”

“What?”

“Give me some control?” She paused. “Do you trust me, Scully?

“Yes.”

He smiled. “You know that you’re the only one I trust, right?”

“Do you?”

Instead of answering her, he skillfully changed their positions so she was laying on her back and he was laying on her side. His left hand carefully undid the button down her pajama top. She breathed sharply at the first contact of his fingertips caressing the swell of her breast. “I do.” He watched her thoughtfully. “You see, before you...I had a few partners. They came and went. It was like they wanted nothing to do with me. But you...you challenged me, you made me better. I can’t place the exact moment but it may have been laughing with you in that graveyard in Oregon at five o’clock in the morning.”

She hissed at his touches. “That was nearly six years ago.”

“So, I like a slow burn. I have never felt this way about anyone except you.” She laughed but she bit her lips to keep herself from crying out. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Do your nightmares involve this, Scully?”

“I don’t let myself indulge in such fantasies.”

“Why not?”

He was growing bolder with his explorations. She sighed and closed her eyes. “Lately, with everything, I don’t know.”

“What do you say we change that?”

He bent down to kiss her again and pushed up on her top. He wasn’t rushing nor did she mean his slow advances. Soon, she found herself growing restless. “Mulder?”

“Hmmm?”

“Enough of this. Let’s finish this.”

This is not how neither one of them imagined things. Scully had it imagined it fast and quick after the turmoil from a case. Mulder, on the other hand, imagined it slow after one night of verbally sparing with one another. Who needed guidance when you had your better half?

The lamp remained on. There was no hiding from this. Six years of tension resolved.

The clothes were peeled artfully like it was nothing new. She laughed between their kisses. “At least I don’t have to save you this time.”

He suckled her hungrily. “You already did. A long time ago.”

Mulder reached to turn out the light on her nightstand and Scully grabbed his wrist, stopping him. “No, leave it on.”

The first time was always awkward. They both remembered being told that my friends when they were teenagers. “I expected this to be different,” he admitted.

“Mulder, shut up.”

“This has got to be a sleepover for the record books.”

At the clock turned 5:00 and the red numbers faded against the lamplight, Mulder continued. Clothes were shed, and they crawled beneath the covers. The fire ignited and fears were extinguished. Gone was the cold that plagued the nightmares and shadows that kept them in hiding. Their bodies entwined, just as their souls had been for years.

Their ecstasy came to a crescendo as Scully felt her last orgasm leave her and Mulder followed soon after. He was laughing as he rolled off to the side and she grinned like a fool. He started to laugh too and any tension that remained fade as she came down from her high.

“Well, I certainly don’t remember sleepovers being like that,” he remarked.

Scully could hear the fatigue in his voice, finally evident from someone who had not slept in over 24 hours. She smiled goofily and nodded toward the window. “The sun is coming up.”

“How can you tell?”

“It’s summer and during that time, the sun comes through the window sometimes. It’s been so long. I can’t remember the last time I stayed in bed this late.”

“We haven’t been here that late.” He yawned and pulled her closer. “Where are you going?”

“Give me a sec.”

She reached to turn out the light and moved to get out of bed. “Where do you think you’re going? And why did you turn out the light?”

“Because, Mulder, this is supposed to be a sleepover,” she said, “and we need to sleep.”

“And based on what scientific evidence?”

“I’m a doctor.”

He watched her jog nude across the bedroom in the dark shadows to open up the blinds slightly to let in the morning light. She rushed back to bed. “Oh, your cold,” he complained.

“Knock it off.”

Scully reclaimed her spot next to him. They both turned beneath the covers to face the newly opened blinds as the early morning light began to shine through. “No more shadows, Scully.”

“No more shadows.”

[ranmanjuu]

Me again sorry if I’m spamming can request how the boys react to going to the future with mc be everywhere’s in lockdown thank you and stay safe love you~ (๑ゝω╹๑)

there’s probably a shit ton of them hcs around these parts and i feel like i’m just re-wording a lot of things so like,, ahaha i’m sorry. also the character cast is u-t forces cause ngl we have a lot of oda forces request previously and the coming requests dw just showing love to my kasugayama boys

—shingen:

the moment you stepped into the good ol’ modern times, the first thing you realized was that there’s a pandemic going on and with shingen being immunocompromised, it’s surely a danger more than ever. without a word, you quickly drag him into your apartment first thing’s first.

you quickly told him to take a shower (to which he’d probably jokingly invite you in, but to be fair, he doesn’t really know how bathtubs and shower heads are used). you didn’t have men’s clothing, not for his size so to say, so you just settled with your big, stretchy jackets you had.

after explaining the situation, you did consider going to the hospital for his treatment,, on one hand, if shingen doesn’t do it, he’ll. . .you know. and if he does, there’s a chance that he could get infected (with hospitals being a breeding ground for the virus). 

in the end, you decided to do it.

even after that, you were always careful with things like going out, mostly you taking care of the shopping and everything. you kept reminding him to wash his hands, social distance, etc.

and frankly, while he understands social distancing, he doesn’t like it. he just wants to hug and kiss his deity lover! prepare for the man to just recite poems so damn dramatically for this.

(^ this includes the amount of pickup lines increasing by a lot. the fact that he can now search some up from google doesn’t help.)

there’s a lot of things you do in quarantine, and you’ve found that the amount of carpentry has increased significantly prior to this.

said carpentry ranges from tables and chairs, to small decoration carvings of birds and the likes. the smell of wood now wafts in the air more than ever.

you’ve now replaced yukimura for his dieting of sweets. his illness may be gone, but teeth problems could still arise! but shingen can have some modern candy once in a while, as a treat. 

as for the reaction of the future in general—shingen finds it so, so warming how relatively peaceful it is compared to the sengoku. yes, protests are happening and there’s practically a new type of war going on (he most certainly advocates for human rights, etc), but it’s a step to a new light. a world he wants.

—kenshin:

you’ve had conversations of the future before—most of them on a,,, bizzare note, with the topic being on swords and war (or lack thereof), etc. a silent agreement was made between you two to not have kenshin be in the future since he’s missing one of the things he ‘needs to live with’ (them being war, sake, and you).

but a lot of improv had to be done when the wormhole was much more stubborn and managed to pull you through.

right after you figured out what happened, a security guard immediately came and told you to wear a mask (considering it’s a must). you had to haul kenshin back to your house before he attacks the guard with his sword.

after cleaning the two of you from any virus, you began running things over to him about the future. aaaand he’s already thinking about keeping you in your house by any means so you don’t get caught by it.

but you managed to convince him otherwise, you did have to go shopping and the thought of kenshin doing it with all the foreign technology around him made you sweat nervously.

no, kenshin, sake isn’t a need but you will buy it for him cause he won’t be able to survive, you feel.

you thought a peaceful modern world was bad enough for kenshin to reside in, ohoho, wait until you realize he can’t even go outside and fight sasuke and all that jazz.

a thought crossed your mind to learn how to duel and fight using mop sticks but he shot down that thought.

in the meantime, most of your days were spent in the garden with his sea of bunnies (how they got there, you don’t know) and mostly tending to them so they don’t contract the virus (kenshin almost flipped when you told him that rabbits could do that).

and by night, you spent it by looking out to the city skies (but the light from the buildings doesn’t hit like the stars do) and drinking sake.

he’d also be against social distancing, but—unsurprisingly—only to you. after a while that rule goes out the window as he cuddles you to death from being touch-starved.

i feel like he’d be interested in the past (or future, to him) wars just because. he’d read up about the wars from all sorts of places. and sometimes, you’d catch him with a deadly smile and say, “that sounds like a great idea, i should wage one like that.”

you had to remind him no, you can’t start a war cause you want to.

—yukimura:

he’d flip straight up by the idea of there being a pandemic in your time. you never talked about this when you told him you came from the future!

he’d probably groan at first with the thought of having to hole up for a long time, but he’d quickly understand. it’s for the benefit of the immunocompromised and the old, he’d like to help by following the rules.

besides, he has you. he’ll cope.

at first, his plan was for you to just let him do all the work during lockdown, like going out and stuff. he was non-chalant, if a bit stubborn.

until you mention groceries.

you start firing him questions, do you know what we need? do you know how much of it we need? or which one is which at all?

he shuts up after that.

yukimura will definitely do those workout things on youtube, and you’ll probably be roped into it. rip to you but you’re gettin’ buff during these lazy times.

small, silly arguments would most likely be the norm for you. it’s a bit of spicy bickering back and forth, you both find it amusing and it’s a way to stimulate the brain, no matter how stupid the topic is.

it can range from if mugwort mochi is better than chestnut dumplings, and you’ve even gone out to search for light topics to have small debates over.

occasionally, he’d invite you outside to watch the skies. the colorful lights from the tall buildings kind of reminds you of the loud fireworks during the festival back in the sengoku—only if they became stars instead.

much like shingen, yukimura is thankful of the positive changes in the future. horrible things may have stayed, but as long as there are people advocating for a fair and peaceful world, he can spend his days beside you.

—sasuke:

as any situation, sasuke was prepared as ever. the second you went to the modern days, he pulled out a spare mask (dw it’s clean) from his pocket and handed it to you. remembering the rule of mandatory masks, you quickly put it on.

you couldn’t really have a discussion about time-travel in the open, so you both went to your apartment.

sasuke is definitely well-versed in the virus, dumping most everything he knows unto you to better arm you with it yourself.

somehow, he could calculate how much groceries and overall shopping in any timeframe. a month, two, etc. so you find yourself bringing him out shopping with you.

since he’s now in the modern world, the amount of him being holed up kinda increases. if he’s learnt so much from a youtube tutorial, imagine the absolute machine he’d be by the end of it.

yeah he’s that guy who learns 45 million skills.

sasuke might seem unbothered by having to keep distance from you, but he really isn’t. you can tell; by the way his lips tighten, or the way his eyebrows furrow sometimes.

would regularly remind you to wash your hands, and would always say to take a bath each time you go home from the outside. if you’re ever sick, he’ll somehow have the perfect medicine ready.

you binge watch shows all the time, it’s another form of bonding cause you two already know about them. you’d spend nights on the couch with a blanket and snacks, discussing about things ranging from theories to crack cotent.

you really wouldn’t trade it for the world.

—yoshimoto:

honestly, yoshimoto isn’t even much interested in the future. mostly just how far art’s gotten (and trust me, it’s gotten so far). such is the situation when the wormhole caught you two.

he probably got sidetracked from the first art he could see (probably street art in this scenario) after you barely identified you went to the future.

again you must haul this pretty man after being told off by a security guard for not wearing a mask.

your biggest problem is probably his massive fascination with modern art. endless hours were used to have a talk that, no, he can’t go to an exhibit right now.

so you improvise.

you gave him a hand-me-down phone, or just share a laptop, and teach him the concept of digital art, along with how to operate certain social medias so he can browse around.

downside is he is currently—and unknowingly— planning to get you broke by commissioning artists. also he may or may not’ve been doing posting questionable things on his accounts (you really shouldn’t’ve given him one,,)

and so to fix the problem created to solve a problem, you decided to take it into your own hands.

popping out all the drawing supplies you’ve ever had, you began to doodle anything and everything, every day. and each one, you’d show it off to yoshimoto like a child to their parent.

and each time, he still looks at them so lovingly, no matter if it could hypothetically be classified as chicken scratches. as long as you make it, in his mind, it’ll be something worth cherished for.

but your strong suit has always been stitching, so you start a lot of projects of art on clothing. it counts as the one above.

oh—you know those pretty cloth masks? you now have about 100 of these at least, courtesy to yoshimoto.

[argumentl]

The Freedom of Expression Ep 14 - The Party To Protect The People From The NHK (N Koku Party) commences "Same sex, same name stealth operation".

K: Hi this is Dir en grey's Kaoru, starting this episode of The Freedom of Expression. Joe san, Tasai san, welcome....Well, recently, who knows whats really happening?

J: Yeh, its troubling. I've been spending a lot longer looking at my phone and computer. I've been getting a lot of coupons. My favourite shops or brands are all going online...well, no ones going into the shops, so they can only sell online. So i've been getting coupons like, if you spend over a certain amount, you'll get 20,000yen off.

T: I see.

J: I think like, 'Waa, I wanna spend!'..but then I think, actually since April, I've had less work so I need to restrain myself. I experience this conflict every day for about 15mins. Like, whats wrong with me?

T: I see.

J: Thats thier strategy.

K: If you have free time...

J: Thats it.

K: You'll end up spending money.

J: Normally, they have expirations, and I just think 'Aghh', so its really...

K: You can't help buying stuff, right?

J: I do end up buying stuff!

K, T: *laugh*

J: I really do! I bet there are people out there addicted to coupons! Aren't you? Are you ok?

K: Well, im ok. I just shop by mail order.

J: Ahh

T: I see

J: People are shopping like that a lot right now.

T: Hiranabe san, who works at our place, he's got a lot of offers from night time establishments, and he's troubled as to what to do.

J: Oh, to get him to go there?

T: Yeah. He got an unprecedented amount of messages.

K: (quietly) Unprecedented?

T: Like, 'please come, please come, please come'.

K: He only gets them now? Cause he'll be quick to spend.

J: How is Hiranabe san doing?

T: Well, as expected, he seems scared. He's in his 50s, it looks like he finally understands that his life might be in danger if he caught the virus. He wears a mask, he wears pollen protection glasses. When he goes outside he's like..'the virus won't get in my eyes'.

J: Sounds like a terrorist! Thats just like him.

T: He flipped 180°. He used to be the guy who says, 'Im not wearing a mask'.

J: Oh, really?

T: He's that different now.

J: Well, Im a similar age to Hiranabe san...

T: I can't believe it!

K: I can't believe it.

J: So, what was it?..Its risky, if you are over 50 its more dangerous?

K: Ohh right, yeah.

J: If you catch it, there's a higher death rate at this age?

T: Also, men are more at risk, right?

K: Yeah.

T: They are saying the death rate is higher for men.

J: Well, we are among that group. Shall we get on with the main topic? I thought we'd go with a topic that is unrelated to corona this time.

' "N Koku Party's 'same name, same sex' stealth strategy for Shizuoka no.4 district Lower house by-election". With the death of Mochizuki Yoshio, the LDP's former environment minister, candidates standing for election are the LDP's Fukuzawa Youichi, an independent group of the unified opposition's Tanaka Ken, independent candidate Yamaguchi Kenzo, and the Party Against the NHK (N Koku Party)'s Tanaka Ken, whose name is the same as the unified opposition's candidate. N Koku's Tanaka Ken uses the same kanji, and has the same reading as the unified opposition's Tanaka Ken. The opposition parties, electoral commission, and local media are racking thier brains about it. If a vote is for 'Tanaka Ken', there will be no way to distinguish between the two. Its a proportional division system, so ambiguous votes will be split according to the overall percentage of votes. The electoral administrative committee have taken measures to change the rule that makes a ballot paper invalid if it includes anything other than a candidate's name, to allow a candidate's age to be written aswell. As a result of this, with the aim of reducing ambiguous votes, the unified opposition are promoting 'Tanaka Ken - Age 42' in thier election cars, posters, and online in order to attract votes. On the other hand, N Koku's Tanaka Ken surprisingly hasn't taken any action. He has refused pre-election interviews with the media, hasn't published an campaign bulletin, he doesn't appear in election posters, he has no plans to visit the area. There are expected to be people voting who are unaware that two Tanakas are standing for election. As for N Koku's aim, their leader, Tachibana, had this to say.."We want to test how the votes will be split when there are candidates with exactly the same name. We are not appealing for votes either online or on the ground. We are a weak political party, and want to know how we stand *1'.

There's also suggestion of running another female candidate named Koike Yuriko for Tokyo governer. I thought we could talk about this kind of same name/sex disturbance strategy which the N Koku party has set up.

T: Its amazing, isn't it?

K: So are they doing it to siphon votes?

J: It seems like it, yeah. Especially, that would be the aim if it was for Tokyo Governor.

T: They said they wanted to test how the votes would be split, so like you said Joe, for Tokyo Governor, if it was someone else called Koike Yuriko, they would want to get the data of how the votes are split.

J: Well, its not about freedom of expression, but there is nothing illegal about what they are doing in terms of the election, so its totally ok for them to do this. What do you think, Kaoru?

K: Well..*laughs*, even if you ask.....its interesting but...how will it end up? But, well, hmmm...its fine, isn't it?

J: As it happens, I've been on a radio event with Tachibana san once. And also...well, in this kind of election, a candidate who no one is expected to vote for is called a bubble candidate, the most famous example is Mac Akasaka. I've worked with Mac Akasaka before, so I've listened to what these kind of guys have to say. I mean, certainly, these guys are laughed at and made fun of a lot, but apart from the question of what Tachibana Takashi is doing, to be a candidate for Tokyo Governor, you have to pay a deposit of at least 3 million yen. And if you recieve under a tenth of the total valid votes, you have to forfeit your deposit. The Tokyo Governor elections get about 5 million votes, so if you get under 500,000 votes, you will lose your deposited 3 million yen. As for national elections, the deposit is 6 million yen. So you can call it a prank all you like, but they are spending a lot of money to do this. What a lot of bubble candidates will tell you is, its not free, so they are doing this with the intention to win, they do think thier ideas will improve the country, improve thier party. If there was no financial risk, it would end up at the level of annonymous postings on SNS. But after they've actually paid money, most of them will start electoneering. Making election posters costs money, and there's the cost of gas to run a car to go handing out flyers, and all sorts of things like that. It will end up costing another huge chunk of money in election costs. So in doing this, there is another side to these guys other than, 'they are just idiots'. Maybe they are trying to get people to change the way they see elections, instead of just routinely voting for the faces they know.

T: Well this case has great advertising effectiveness.

J: It does, yeah.

T: Tachibana san's name has really been sold with this.

J: It has.

T: Like, with his own business, and on you tube and stuff *2.

J: Well, as for my personal opinion, I remember Uchida Yuuya running for Tokyo Governor. You can still find his political broadcast on youtube, its great. If you compare Yuuya san to Tachibana san, honestly, Tachibana san seems to have more of a knack for it.

T: Its interesting seeing that kind of political broadcast on NHK. ????*3

J: Well, even in times such as these, we are still having elections. From now on, due to corona we'll probably see new ways to vote and new ways to do all sorts of other things.

K: Its created a need to re-think things, like with the custom of personal seals...in Japan there's a big custom of 'You have to do it this way', or 'You need it on paper'.

J: Yeah, as you mentioned Kaoru, the custom of using personal seals...in the end, even Japan's IT minister also stands as the head of the organization to retain personal seals. Somehow in Japanese society, one of the things companies insist on is the personal seal. There are those who ask why they can't just settle things digitally, but if the minister responsibile for advancing IT is also the head of a group advocating to retain the personal seal, there is a clash going on now. This is the kind of time to think about changing the political system.

T: Things would change a lot if we switched to online voting.

J: They would change, yeah. If young people started voting a lot online...

K: Yeah, right now, in the situation we have now, I think people are starting to think about future.

J: Yes, in that respect, although its very difficult with corona around, I feel like we are starting to wake up to the things we have just put up with till now. I mean, what comes next? In particular, with coronavirus, a lot of countries' governments have taken on huge powers, and in some countries its almost like a corona dictatorship. So, its very difficult, but we really need to slightly re-think the way we carry out elections and the way the state operates from now.

T: We, ourselves are a part of it, right?

J: Yes, yes...Yep, so, same sex, same name...it even hard to search for him. I wonder what this candiate actually intends. ?????*4

K: He's not showing his face much.

J: What will he do if he wins? ...Eh? Hello??

K: Is he sleeping?

Kami: Yes, yes.

J: Were you asleep, Kami?

Kami: No, I was waiting till you called on me.

J: Oh, you were waiting? Oh, sorry.

Kami: I've had a thought.

J: Oh, have you?

Kami: I have...Um, Joe should run for the N Koku Party.

J: *laughs*

K, T: Ohhh

J: Me?!

T: Thats a good idea.

J: Would it be ok, though?

T: In the Tokyo Governor election.

J: In the Tokyo Governor election? Which election?

Kami: It would be ok, yeah.

J: Would it?

Kami: Yeah, anything is ok.

J: *laughs* You couldn't participate in the election could you, Kami? You don't have voting rights?

Kami: No, I don't, but instead, I can make myself into substance.

J: What?

Kami: By pretending to be a citizen.

T: Prentending to be a citizen?

J: Oh, is that it?

K: So that means you could pile up votes for someone?

J: Right?

Kami:...No, I can only do it once.

J: Oh, so you can only take on substance once?

Kami: Yeah, yeah...a bit like Devilman.

T: Ah, like Devilman.

J: But if you could do that, surely you'd be able to do it will two or three people? I feel as if you've just made that up.

*K laughs*

J: Did you just make that up, Kami?

Kami:...Yes, I did.

K: *laughs*

J: He did.

K: I feel like his heart hasn't been in it for a while now.

T: *laughs*

J: Kami, has your mind been elsewhere?

Kami: Ye...uh, no no no.

K: He said yes!

J: *laughs*

Kami: Crush the NHK.

J: Yes, crush it.

K: Well, on that note, I think we can finish here. Thank you, please tune in next time. Please subscribe, thank you very much.

J: Please do.

Kami: Vote for Joe!

*1 I think the confusion arises here, because rather than ticking a box, Japanese voters have to actually write down the name of the person they are voting for.

*2 Think thats what he meant.

*3,4 Couldn't catch these bits.

[chargetheintruder]

My one-year pandemic anniversary.

I likely won't have much time tomorrow, the 17th to actually do much online, to honor my fifty-two weeks of strangeness with COVID-19, beyond mark my calendars with something like:

One Year does not equal two weeks, damn it.

But even so, I should likely post something, even if a day early, just to take note of what happened to me, what I've lost, and so on.

Because you see, I went into 2020 on meds for everything (mood disorder, prostate issues and all that) and with plans. I did. I was still thinking I could recover some clothing and furniture for this penalty box of an apartment I'm half-stuck with, and that I could maybe get some new friends or a girlfriend sometime soon.

Then this pandemic hit. Only at first it was an outbreak and I had gotten it twisted because like a lot of folks early on I was working on partial info at best. I live in a blue state and near a University campus, so I jumped to some conclusions about how this was going to be a "campus illness" and how red staters were just partying it up because no campuses meant no outbreak, right?

Wrong. This was a pandemic, at least partially because a) some 5 million people went to the Wuhan province in the PRC to celebrate the Lunar New Year and many of them likely were Patient Zeroes, and b) because a lot of those people spread the thing to Europe first, insuring further spread.

So really, losing my chance to vote on that Election Day in the Democratic Primaries (because of lockdown) so that someone other than Biden would get chosen was the least of my worries. I had to get used to distancing, abusing my sleeves for coughs and sneezes, THEN masks, and also dealing with crazy people and only those being anti-mask for any reason, while LOTS of people were still against WASHING THEIR HANDS.

And also. . . I had the problems I had with my forced moveout of August 28, 2018, largely because I needed to be IN TOWN, since I had no car, true, but also because I had problems with LACK OF HUMAN CONTACT. Guess what this pandemic, then, shoved down everyone's throat (except for people with very nice internet connections)? Right. And here I was desperately trying to keep it together for the longest time with no internet connections because of outdated equipment, but also because I didn't want to give in to Comcast's monopoly power over this entire damned town (right next door) where I was forced to move. Yeah.

Fast-forward to October of 2020. I didn't like Biden but Trump was hellbent on becoming Hitler Lite, and it was clear everyone with half a brain had to stop Trump. So I took my mail-in ballot, filled out and everything, to a ballot box that I thought would be safe. That entailed a short bus ride on a route I was no longer familiar with. I came masked up. I rode in the center of the bus as usual. An older lady up front was coughing up a lung and not, NOT wearing her mask over her nose, and barely over her mouth.

I got sick about a week later and looking back, I'm pretty sure it was COVID-19. I took no chances and self-quarantined for a month to be safe to everyone else around me. I gave in and had internet by then, even if my access to my own Chromebook was super-limited still (thanks Google, you jerks). I could make it. The virus itself seemed to only give me digestive/GI issues and body aches, no big deal, right?

Problem was, I started coughing and feeling tired and dizzy all the time afterward. Long COVID, made worse by my being in a sick-house of an apartment building where the lease said it was a "no-smoking building" but the tenants and especially my neighbors, just gave no fucks and kept lighting it up in their apartments and polluting my own (under and through the baseboards). And it was all I could do to stay online and push others to vote, and support Georgia, and to be patient with Team Victim in the hopes that something would be done about the bastards who got us into the mess. You know, the landlords and rich bitches, and yes, the local University too, who invited all of the Han Chinese exchange students here to my hometown, had out-of-state, red-state landlords show up and pander to them exclusively, to the point that locals were ran out of town wherever possible? Those guys.

Those red-state, Republican guys. But in the process, I got re-addicted to chatting with my long-distance flirt on the internet, among lots of other things, my health got worse and it got to where I barely got out once a week, then once every 2-3 weeks, because of virus surges. Getting out was rough anyway because of the masks--nobody had a face, which made it hard for me to talk to people and not be freaked out and paranoid. The only uncanny valley issue I really have--facelessness--and it was the one I had to deal with. And I had lost my friends, mostly, except for the last pen-pal I have out-of-state, and she's busy with her husband and family too.

Point is, here I am now. A year into this. Worn-out, ragged, depressed when I already had depression, in bad health when I already had old-fart health issues, nothing to do anywhere outside when I had little to nothing to do inside to begin with. No, really, I don't go out to eat, just to eat out of a bag in the parking lot, or to walk it home and it gets cold, sorry. And ordering pizza and cheesy bread really only does so much. My life and finances were already ruined from the forced move-out and now there's literally nothing, no friends locally, no social contact, nothing, nothing, nothing, thanks to this plague, this plague, this plague, and people get to hurt us again, a thousand-plus times as badly as 9-11-2001 did, and they get to walk, and walk and walk. Meaning the Han Chinese, the landlords from Trumps on down, and also the alt-reich supporting the shit-show.

I hope you can see where this would make a fellow a bit crazy. More so than usual. I would hope the vaccines make things all right again, but even that has problems since it lets people off the hook. And also, since I have a bit of a ruined trash-mouth that's maybe half my fault? *lol* Meaning I might look better with a mask on in perpetuity, ugh, even if I don't feel like it.

What do you do?

[inkykeiji]

hi clari!! long time no see, i haven’t been keeping myself updated on your asks and posts, i was busy with school and i posted this stupid tiktok about defending my race from this white racist mf. i called him a mayo packet and it went viral and ended up on racist tiktok and i’ve been getting comments ab my appearance, more racism towards me and my race. the guy said “Chinese Virus because it’s from China” and people are agreeing with him bc its where it came from when it reality (1/2)

oh no my sweet fairy bb i am so, so sorry this is happening to you :(( i’m going to respond under a lil read more because i have a lot to say, okay?

ah my lovely little fairy you caught just before i was heading off to bed!!! but this really upset me and i can tell you’re extremely upset over it as well (rightfully so!!) so i wanted to reply immediately.

first of all, jesus fucking christ people disgust me. seriously disgust me. i can’t even express how sorry i am that this happened to you, and my heart breaks reading this because i know how unbelievably sweet and kind and just downright incredible you are. it might sound silly but i teared up reading this, because i love all of you so much and in a way i feel ??? protective over my anons/followers?? like, i consider you friends, especially those of you who interact with me on the regular, and it boils my fucking blood to hear that some asshole did this to you!!! like i am ready to FIGHT in your honour; how dare someone disrespect someone i care about like that!! how dare someone upset someone i care about like that!! god it really does have me seeing fucking red.

the internet can be such a nasty and mean place. there are so many little nooks where people like this fester together in these echo chambers where their disgusting beliefs are reaffirmed by people just as horrible as they are, over and over and over again. it is truly awful that your lil response ended up in one of those little pockets. as i said in your other lil ask, your reaction was entirely warranted and VALID. calling covid the “chinese virus” is racist, point blank, full stop. i don’t give a fuck why you’re calling it that, there’s no goddamn excuse for it, there’s no fucking way to validate it, it IS racist. it makes me sick to my stomach to hear that they tried to defend themselves like that, and you are entirely right, they’re absolutely trying to use that term + excuse as a way to be racist towards asians.

also, how DARE they try and tell you whether or not you’re oppressed. HOW DARE THEY!!! like, are you fucking kidding me????? they don’t know you, or your experiences, and no one has any right to decide whether or not you’re oppressed. ever.

also, you’re not racist for calling him a mayo packet like please get the fuck out of here, calling him a condiment does not in any way equate to the discrimination your people face ON THE DAILY that has now been AMPLIFIED with the virus. i can’t even wrap my head around the stupidity literally my brain cannot compute it like, what????? what?????????? (on a side-note tho the fact that u called him a mayo packet made me laugh ehehe good for you, i praise u for it)

i know this doesn’t help much, but again, i am so sorry you received so much hate for doing the right thing and calling out racism as you see it. god my little sweetpea i’m tearing up again re-reading that last ask because holy christ, no, you were in the right and you are one million percent valid, your arguments were one million percent valid, these people ganged up on you because they felt THREATENED and did not want to own up to their mistakes and confront their racism.

honestly, fuck that guy, and fuck anyone who’s sending you racist comments. they’re horrible people and they don’t deserve one ounce of your time or attention. you are so much better than this, you are so important and valid and we NEED people like you to continue to speak up and call others out on their fucking bullshit. calling them out was the right thing to do fairy bb, i’m just so sorry that it ended up in one of those cesspools. i am sending you so so so so so so so so so much love and big huge warm hugs, god i’m still so angry that they fucking harassed you to the point of you having a breakdown, they are literally sickening. you are valid, please never forget it. your feelings are valid, your thoughts are valid, and you are loved and needed and so so so important AND YOU DESERVE TO BE HEARD <3

[sarifel-corrisafid-ilxhel]

Hey, idk if this is just a mobile problem but the only little button appearing at the bottom of your posts is the share button for links and stuff, not hearts or reblogs. Also, if you don’t mind, I have a what-if idea: if the country was under lockdown as it is now during the Animorphs books, how do you think it would affect their missions? Thanks :)

Weird. I haven’t adjusted any settings on my end, so I’m not sure what’s happening there, but I will try looking into it!

As for the lockdown… hmmm. I can’t see much triggering a lockdown in the late 1990s other than the return of Smallpox or a sudden outbreak of a novel and potentially fatal virus. So whatever the threat is, it’s going to be something serious. We’ll go with the Prion Virus.

Let’s say that months after Book 38, an unknown pathogen begins sweeping through the global population. People who are afflicted by the virus begin to show signs of lethargy, agitation, lack of coordination, and decreasing motor skills. Some just disappear entirely. Others become confused. Then delirium and dementia set in, and the victims begin screaming about “Yeerks”. When the victims are pulled into ambulances or taken to the hospital, they die.

The incubation time of the disease is unknown. Transmission method is unknown. Symptom progression occurs over several weeks. The fatality rate appears to be close to a hundred percent. Outbreaks seem to occur near-simultaneously in major metropolitan areas around the globe. The disease becomes known as “Affluenza”, as it predominantely strikes at the upper crust of society. Rumors that the disease spreads through bottled water dominate the Internet and nightly news cycles. Lockdowns, Stay-At-Home orders, and Martial Law are declared in many areas. Madagascar closes its borders.

Day One of the Lockdown: Jake, Cassie, Marco, and Rachel are unable to leave their houses. It’s not that they can’t leave- They could easily morph and leave their houses, no problem. No, the problem is that their families are paying attention to them now. Jake’s mother habitually knocks on his door every twenty minutes to make sure he’s okay. Peter and Nora insist on keeping Marco in the same room as them because Nora wants Family Bonding Time. Cassie can’t even go to the barn without her mother or father following her. And Rachel has a nervous wreck of a mother and two younger sisters to keep entertained.

It’s Ax, perched outside of Jake’s window in Harrier morph, who explains what’s going on. The Prion Virus that Arbat dropped into the Yeerk Pool before he died must have finally kicked in. The Animorphs had suspected the disease had something to do with the Yeerks, even before the lockdown started, but the lockdown helped Ax and Tobias confirm that it was only Controllers who were being affected. Everyone who is dying in the hospitals? The Yeerks are silencing them with assassination cylinders, just like when the Animorphs destroyed the Kandrona generator.

Jake opnely wonders why it took this long for the virus to take effect. Ax briefly wonders about the state of Human medical knowledge before he explains that a prion is a misfolded protein that inhibits normal function of an organism’s brain. The Prion Virus works by infiltrating healthy cells and forcing them to create these misfolded proteins, and prion diseases are hard to detect early on because just a few misfolded proteins won’t do any real damage. However, as the cells continue to create more and more misfolded proteins, the damage begins to accumulate and become visible. It can take months for a disease like this to become apparent. It can take up to a year for a disease like this to kill. And the Yeerks never knew. They’ve been spreading the virus around with every personnel transfer. By now, the virus could be present in every single Yeerk Pool in the galaxy.

Jake wonders if he should feel bad when Ax reminds him the Prion Virus could mutate inside of Human-Controllers and begin to affect Humans. And now that the Yeerks are aware of the virus, there is a chance they could develop a counter. Ax starts to go on about virophages which could disable the Prion Virus and protein repair mechanisms that might limit or undo the damage when Jake tells him to go let the others know what’s going on.

Day Two of the Lockdown: Ax and Tobias are scouting the situation out and keeping everybody informed. Tobias hates the comparison to “Courier Pigeons” that Marco keeps making, but there is a certain truth to it. Most of the Animorphs are effectively grounded, leaving the two without families to do all of the spy work. It almost reminds everyone of the first few weeks of the war.

Marco has been following the whole situation on the news very carefully for over a month. Known Controller-celebrities are playing the virus up, feeding the hysteria. Marco reasons the Stay-At-Home orders are something the Yeerks came up with. Having all the Yeerks stay away from the Yeerk Pools will keep any uninfected Yeerks safe, with the added benefit of limiting the public exposure to people breaking free of their Yeerks to beg for help. What is notable, however, is that the Yeerks aren’t alone in investigating the disease. Human medical organizations are also investigating the disease, and they have already determined the disease is a novel neurological disorder spread by a virus. One doctor explains that the sudden screaming of “Yeerk” is because as motor function shuts down, people may begin to shout single loud syllables at random. Marco figures out that doctor is a Controller pretty quickly. However, another doctor wonders if this might be a prion disease, similar to Hoof-and-Mouth or Creutzfeldt–Jakob, because his team have noticed there are unusual proteins in the cerebrospinal fluids of the people they tested. Marco thinks that the entire invasion is about to be exposed.

Jake has been watching Tom like a hawk. Not literally as a hawk, not today, but it’s about the same. The early symptoms of the disease are easy enough to miss, but the more Jake thinks about it, the more it looks like Tom’s Yeerk is already suffering. But that’s not the only thing that has Jake’s attention right now. That morning, Tom got a phonecall from The Sharing, and ever since he’s been pacing anxiously in the living room. Jake knows the Yeerks have to do something about all the Controllers now trapped at home, but he can only guess at what. Eventually, the doorbell rings. The Sharing, with the blessing of the local authorities, is now delivering food and bottled water door to door in windowless vans. Tom volunteers to go out to the van and help unload things. He comes back in thirty minutes later, much less anxious and with very little to show for the time he was out there. He claims he was “Just talking with the guys about the deliveries”. Jake, however, suspects the Yeerks are using the food deliveries as a cover for giving Yeerks a chance to recharge with Portable Kandronas. Tom struggles to open a bottled water before reluctantly asking Jake to help him open it.

Day Three of the Lockdown: Erek shows up. Jake figures it out before Erek reveals himself, because even though Erek does a spot-on impersonation of a coat rack, Jake’s family don’t own a coat rack. They have a coat closet, thank you very much. And even if they did own a coat rack, it wouldn’t be in Jake’s room.

Erek tells Jake the primary Yeerk Pool is being cleaned out. The Yeerks have begun hoarding spray disinfectants and bleach out of a misguided belief the disease could be an Earth virus that has mutated to attack Yeerks. All the Yeerks in the pool have been transferred to holding tanks while the main pool is being disinfected. However, it’s all for nothing- The Yeerks still don’t know what they’re dealing with, and prion diseases are especially tough- They aren’t destroyed by conventional disinfectants.

Jake wonders briefly if he should feel bad for the Yeerks or not. That’s when Erek drops the bombshell of the day- The Chee are working on a countervirus. One that could save all the Yeerks. It should be ready in just a few days, and if it’s deployed quickly enough it could save millions. Jake is appalled. The Yeerks have been killing Humans by the thousands, they’ve enslaved hundreds of millions of good innocent people across the Galaxy. They took his brother. Why the hell would anyone want to save them?

Erek counters that he doesn’t believe in genocide under any circumstances. The Chee have directives from the Pemalites not just to be pacifists, but to love life, to want to perserve it and see it flourish. If it weren’t for those directives, the Chee would have never intervened to stop the Black Death. And, Erek reminds Jake, the Chee don’t answer to the Animorphs. They’ll save the Yeerks whether Jake wants them to or not. The reason Erek is here is that the Animorphs have an opportunity to end the war. Offer the cure in exchange for peace.

Tobias, perched in the tree outside, says that Erek stole the idea from Deep Space Nine. Erek unabashedly says that one of Humanity’s strongpoints is using stories to predict the kinds of problems they might face in the future. Jake, for his part, is extremely concerned. Even if he could put his severe distaste in Yeerks aside, he isn’t sure how they could prevent the Yeerks from simply coming back later or blowing up the planet as they leave. That’s when Erek suggests asking the others. He’ll cover for Jake here.

Reluctantly, Jake opens a window and begins to morph into a falcon.

____________________________________________________...Sorry I might have gotten carried away. You were probably looking for “What do they do to relieve boredom”. Sorry! n.n;;

[goldkirk]

1. that was a REALLY good chapter i cried like through all of it 2. if you dont mind, how does ebola work? how does it progress through the body, and how do the current treatments we have work against it?

HI FRIEND HOLY MOLY AAAAAAH

1) omg I am so sorry for the tears but THANK YOU I’m so glad you liked it!!!!

2) OH BOY I AM SO EXCITED TO EXPLAIN, THIS IS ONE OF MY FAVE TOPICS AAAH

okay so first, I have an ENTIRE post about Ebola, its history, and cross-species jumps HERE that is (in my own biased opinion) a good read and what you should hop over to before reading any further in this post

SECOND, here is a post where I break down all the mcfreakin Mistakes the comics did when they had Tim get “Ebola” in contagion and what should have happened instead

and the tl;dr: Ebola is a Really Godawful virus that is as bad as it gets, in the same category as Marburg and Smallpox and Lassa Fever, et. al., and the main strain that affects humans has had, up till the past few years, a 50-90% fatality rate. Holy shit. 

It cropped up for the first time in the 70s, making a cross-species jump from (we’re pretty sure) bats to humans in Africa, and had a few smaller outbreaks after that until finally having a major one in 2014 that rocked the world and decimated entire areas of West Africa. 

Ebola, unlike more focused viruses, targets every type of tissue in the human body pretty much, aside from bone and skeletal muscle. It has a very special love for blood vessel cells, in particular, which is what leads to the characteristic hemorrhaging that people associate with Ebola (but which doesn’t always happen on a catastrophic scale in all patients). Blood vessels become weak and spontaneously break, leading to a rash-like pattern on peoples’ bodies. The eyes can be red. People get very high fevers, headaches, lots of pain in some cases, and when things are turning fatal, they can develop fatal brain swelling and catastrophic hemorrhaging in several areas of the body. A major problem is that Ebola makes your tissues just…literally turn into liquid slimy soup, basically, as it turns cells into replication machines and then busts them open and kills them. It attacks the spleen and liver first, and then gets a giant foothold in your body from there. And, uh, the entire gastrointestinal tract is a major casualty of this process, and basically starts to just…die inside itself…and liquefy into a bloody soupy mess…and people throw up blood and hemorrhage through bloody diarrhea and it’s just really awful and terrible and yeah Ebola liquefies you. That’s. That’s the simplest way to put it. It turns you into a virus-making machine, liquefies you, and even your sweat contains millions of particles of the virus in just a droplet or two. It only takes 1-5 particles to infect and kill a person, so…yeah. Ebola is terrifying and HORRIFICALLY contagious just because people are spewing fluids AND sweating from fever ANd also just have tears and sweat in the first place bc they’re human. 

HOWEVER. The one advantage we have is that people are NOT symptomatic until they show symptoms–which is generally breaking with a fever and getting a headache, and is followed by increasing symptoms over the following days. 

BUT!!!! BUT!!!!!!!! Some really fucking amazing people have been working for decades on treatments and a vaccine, and during the 2014 outbreak this new revolutionary antibody drug called ZMapp saved several peoples’ lives, and then a couple drugs were made modeled off the same principle of that one, and we now have a drug that in the most recent 2018 Congo outbreak of Ebola was tested and found to have an even better success rate (read about it here) and THEN in EVEN BETTER NEWS the FDA APPROVED A VACCINE FOR THE VERY WORST EBOLA STRAIN, ZAIRE EBOLA, AND THAT IS SO EXCITING AND AWESOME. 

IT’S CALLED ERVEBO AND IT HAD AND 97.5% SUCCESS RATE IN A STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT SAMPLE SIZE OF ~15,000 PEOPLE AND I AM STILL HYPED EVEN THOUGH IT’S BEEN MONTHS!!!!!!

FUCK YEAH SCIENCE I LOVE HUMANS WE LOOK DEATH IN THE EYE AND SAY NOT TODAY AND NOW WE HAVE AN EBOLA VACCINE AND AREN’T GIVING EBOLA MANY CHANCES TO MUTATE INTO SOMETHING WORSE ANYMORE. TAKE THAT, EBOLA!!!!!!!!

[keelymewett]

Zombie Movie: I Am Legend (2007)

“Here’s Karen at the health desk.”

Karen from the health desk. (Picture: A female news anchor, Karen from the health desk.)

Language warning (sorry kids, but this is an MA15+ movie). 

I shit you not, that’s one of the opening quotes of the movies. So, friends and enemies, welcome to the longest review I’ve done of a zombie movie yet. It’s 1:35am here in Australia and I’ve just finished rewatching I Am Legend, everything’s fresh in my mind and I’m hyped up on chocolate. 

This movie has incredible tension, a fresh take on the zombie apocalypse, and it’s based on the 1954 novel by Richard Matherson, which inspired the modern day vampire and zombie movies. Why you may ask? Because it popularised the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to a disease... now I’m beginning to realise that watching zombie movies during a global pandemic maybe wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had. Any who. 

YouTube rewind made me forget how bloody good of an actor Will Smith is, and boy does he deliver in this movie. Robert’s (that his character, btw, though I will probably end up just referring to the character as Will Smith) interactions with Sam the goodest girl in the world (she’s a dog) and the mannequins is incredible.

The goodest girl in the world. (Picture: A dog (I’m sorry - I don’t know dog breeds! I’m 99% sure she’s a German Shepard) being given a bath and head scratches by Will Smith.)

Now: three things to look forward to in this “review” (assuming you read the spoilery section below). One: how realistic is this apocalypse? Two: there’s a dog. Three: zombie vampires. Vampire zombies? 

Backgrounds details! (Picture: Will Smith opened the fridge. On the fridge door are photos of his wife and daughter, a calendar dated for December, a drawing with “Marley” written in kids handwriting, post-it notes, a pamphlet with the heading “Quarantine”, and a Time Magazine cover of Robert Neville (Will Smith). The title reads (heading) “Saviour?” (sub-heading) “Soldier, Scientist” (body of text) “In a Battle that Could Save Thousands of Lives, Lt. Col. Robert Neville Takes on the XV Virus.”

Also, there’s banging in my house at the moment and when I say I’m peaking. I’m going to need to listen to some music while I write this.

Read on for a fun time! Spoilers ahoy!

Realism (the really relevant part. Yikes)

Okay, so what’s this fresh take on the apocalypse? Basically, this doctor cures cancer and it all goes to shit from there. I’m not 100% on the logistical jump from “destroying cancer cells” to “humans (and animals) becoming bloodthirsty mutants that burn in the sun” - for instance, this is just my sci-fi high-school biology and physics brain working here, cancer is basically a rogue cell that mutates other cells and destroys them in the process, yeah? So if the doctor, like she said, uses these cancer cells to work for the body and in the process “cures” cancer, wouldn’t the humans just... infect each other and the virus would kill the host if it went south? Given, that did happen in like 90% of cases as Will Smith explains, but where does the sunlight allergy come in? Is cancer afraid of UV? Confused, but I digress. 

... Is that my queen, Missy, from Umbrella Academy? (Picture: A woman with blood leaking from her eyes, holding a child and shouting for help.)

The scene where they’re listening to the radio and the guy is like we’re “issuing a military quarantine of New York City” I’m like bitch you wish. Unrealistic. The USA currently (9/10/2020) has the highest cases of COVID-19 in the world (for future historians and poor school children, it’s at 7.68 MILLION cases, no statistic for recovered cases for some weird ass reason, and sadly, 212,000 deaths. For reference, here in Australia we’ve had as of today 27,206 cases, 24,807 recovered and 897 deaths. New Zealand, who went into hard lockdown, had as of today, 1,864 cases, 1,800 recovered, and 25 deaths, with a period where there were 0 new cases for several days.)

Though, with that in mind, everyone going outside and gathering in large crowds? Realistic. 

The actual movie part

Praises time! Will Smith has a stockpile of food. Also, him getting Sam (the dog) to eat her vegetables like she’s a little kid? Cutest thing ever. 

Stockpilesss. (Picture: Will Smith wearing an apron and preparing a meal in a kitchen chock full of food items, including things like Pringles and spaghetti sauce.)

Setting alarms on his watch for sunset? Brilliant, smart idea, fantastic. Re-enforced windows and door, AND booby-trapped house? Incredible, genius. Setting traps to catch the zomvamps? (like the dumb name I just came up with? Don’t worry, I’ll reveal the stupid arbitrary name they ACTUALLY came up with later) Talent, intelligence. 

Dude, why wouldn’t you restrain the head/chest? You know, the part that can bite you? (Picture: Will Smith in a lab coat standing over a female zombie-vampire who’s been secured to a metal bench by the wrists and ankles. Medical monitors are connected to her.)

Now, Will Smith is out here looking for a cure. And by looking, I mean actively creating. In a lab. He washes his hands before going in - *chef’s kiss* follow his example - and unlike other zombie movies where it’s super dramatic in the hunt for a cure, this is a lot more chill considering it’s a) been 3 years and b) is more like how science actually works. Trials, tests, animal test-subjects (there is a debate about the ethics of this which I won’t go into here) (I mean a debate in real life not in the zombie movie haha) and human test-subjects. 

“Did you kidnap my girlfriend, bro?” (Picture: bald, pale muscular dude-bro-looking zombie-vampire roaring in rage.)

The mother-fracking zombies

I have to say it: these are the most dumbass looking vampire-zombies. I say vampire-zombies (zomvamps) because they avoid sunlight but also eat people? 

Now, unlike most zombie movies, these are really bloody intelligent zomvamps. At one point, after setting a booby trap and catching a zomvamp after stumbling into a nest of them, Robert says “They’re not showing any human social behaviour.” Hahahaha. Okay bitch first of all dude bro screamed when you kidnapped his mate, secondly dude bro has pet dogs, thirdly dude bro fucking caught you in a trap. He took revenge on you there, love. He followed you home!

The zomvamps are apex predators, can climb, run, hunt in packs, communicate with each other, set booby traps, make coordinated attacks, follow you home, learn where you live and remember it, and holy fuck humans had no chance. 

Thank you for clarifying, because I actually found this quite funny. Like, look at him! (Picture: dude-bro zombie-vampire from earlier growling in front of a flaming car. The zombie-vampires are very CGI, pale, fish-person looking things with pale skin and completely bald of hair. This guy is wearing ripped clothes. The caption reads “Growls menacingly”.)

Random things I have in my notes but haven’t mentioned yet (yes I took notes) 

What’s with the apocalypse and mannequins? Looking at you, Five (Umbrella Academy). 

(Picture: Will Smith looking at a “female” mannequin, who is dressed in a coat and black bob wig. They’re in a movie store. Funnily enough, behind the mannequin is the “Adult” section of the films.)

I agree with the fuck-that-shit sentiment when you see a mannequin suddenly appear in a different part of the city - like how in the hell?? 

(Picture: Will Smith aiming a rifle at a mannequin in an orange jumper. Mannequin is usually located outside of the movie store, yet here it is randomly in the middle of the street at the end of a T-section. There are tall glass windows behind the mannequin, and the window to the right has a giant, gaping pitch black hole in it. It’s presumed that there is a nest of zombie-vampires in there.)

... so is this a booby trap for humans or for zomvamps? Because the former makes sense if that dude bro zomvamp analysed Will Smith’s trap from earlier and remade it (hence dropped the car off a bridge to string him up), and the latter doesn’t really make sense because a) you’ll only catch (and probably kill) one zomvamp and why would you want only one unless you’re Robert and two why tf aren’t you meeting up with Robert he’s been broadcasting and racing around town hunting deer (elk?) in a sports car. 

I’d like to know how hard it actually is to do like a weird sit-up and get yourself free of one of these kinds of traps. Am I dumb for thinking it’s not that hard? (Picture: Will Smith is suspended in the air by a rope tied around his ankle, the result of a booby-trap. He’s struggling to free himself.)

Come on, you’re literally a doctor and a soldier. Don’t tell me you’re actually considering pulling that out? (Picture: Will Smith has been impaled in the leg by something. It looks like he’s about to attempt to pull it out. He’s in the middle of the street as the sun sets, and Sam is right next to him.)

Sam is a queen. Here are some photos of her.

(Picture: Robert Neville’s wife carrying a baby Sam - Sam is a puppy, by the way, and very adorable. Neville’s young daughter is walking out of the gate to their house behind her mother.)

(Picture: Will Smith in a flashback saying goodbye to his wife and daughter and crying. Sam is licking away his tears.)

Sometimes I hate foreshadowing. (Picture: Will Smith searching a house. He opens a cupboard and there’s a newspaper article with a picture of a zombie-vampire dog. The article reads “Infected dogs can come out at dusk. Stay in the light.” There’s a number to call for questions.)

Worst birthday ever. Now I’m sad and there’s still half the movie left. 

(Picture: Will Smith sitting on the floor of his lab, hugging Sam, who’s just been bitten by infected dogs.) 

Get Shrek’d.

(Picture: The ‘Shrek’ movie playing on the TV in Neville’s house.)

Ma’am, do you not know how to ration? That is such a waste of food. (Picture: the woman and kid who rescued Will Smith have cooked breakfast. She’s cooked way too many scrambled eggs for two adults and a kid, and all the of the bacon for literally no reason.)

Oh yeah, wanna know what they call the zombies in this movie? 

Dark Seekers. They dropped that one on us well into the final half of the movie. Dark Seekers? Really? I won’t get into how dumb that sounds when you had two options to choose from - vampires and zombies. Hell, go with my suggestion of zomvamps, even vampzoms. Dark Seekers? Sorry, I get hung up on dumb zombie-alternative names. Sure, I get the atmosphere might be ruined by calling them vampires or zombies, but not even lying I didn’t realise she said “Dark Seekers” until I turned the CC on to grab a quote. I thought she said “Dog Keepers” hahahaha. “The dog keepers got them.” My defence is that the dude bro did keep dogs. 

Finally, wrapping this up at 2:15 before I add in pictures, you’re telling me approximately 100 zomvamps made a coordinated attack on Will Smith’s house to eat... 3 people? That’s like me and a hundred mates descending on the pentagon for a fucking snickers bar. We’d get like an atom each. 

Oh, what’s that? They’re here to rescue one person? Really? Really? How in the fuck are they even zombies if their primary purpose isn’t to eat humans. I’m disappointed. But points for a fresh take, at least. 

Now one of the things I remember about this movie is that is has an alternate ending. The actual ending (huge spoilers but then again, you’re in the spoiler section) has Will Smith sacrifice himself (read: blow himself and the zomvamps up with a grenade) to defend the cure and save his new friends. The alternate ending, which was scrapped due to negative audience reaction, has Will Smith communicate with the zomvamps who like actually calm down and listen to him. He gives the dude bro back his friend, and... no one dies. 

I’m sorry, how is an ending where, sure, a cure isn’t found YET, but, the “villains” of the movie are humanised and a new side of them is seen that shows, hey, maybe there’s another way through this apocalypse, better than an ending where Will Smith dies? Make it make sense test audience. Because, remember, there’s still a whole bunch of immune people living out here, and three of them are currently in the same room. Robert’s only been working on the cure for 3 years. How many years do you reckon it takes to cure cancer? Hint: it’s ongoing in real life. Just because the cure isn’t found in the movie doesn’t mean it won’t be found. Ughhhh. I digress again. 

I have more random photos but I am very tired. If anyone’s interested in hearing me roast butterflies, the world not actually ending in 2012, and a missed pun about Until Dawn (even though it was made like ten years after this), and a quick analysis on Robert Neville and God, let me know :) 

Have a great day everyone, wash your hands, social distance if possible, and quarantine. Just because the COVID-19 virus isn’t turning us into zombies doesn’t mean it isn’t hurting us. 

Worldwide statistics, 9/10/2020: 36.2M total cases, 25.3M recovered, 1.06M deaths. 

(Picture: Will Smith saying “I like ‘Shrek’ after just quoting an entire scene of it to win a kid’s trust.)

[segenassefa]

3. A Semi-Original List of Things To Do During Quarantine

Niggas all over the timelines are baking banana bread, doing headstands, and making Tik Toks. Yeah it was fun the first few weeks – but now we’re almost four months deep into quarantine and the gworls need some change! A bit of variety. Some pizazz, if you will.

Well, fear not!

I am here to help (as per usual). Digging into the depths of my chicken breast-like brain has been hard, but I’ve done it to compile a list of things to try now that quarantine is dragging along. Some of these you’ve definitely heard before (but they were so good, it was worth mentioning again), some of these you may have considered but never really saw the value in, and some of these seem like I pulled them out of my ass, but I promise, they’re a fun time and definitely worth the try.

Take up a new workout routine now that gyms will probably cease to exist.

I can’t even speak on this one (my record this quarantine has been four days without leaving my bed), but health comes in different forms. Even back in the early stages, one of my favourite things to do was get a coffee and aimlessly walk around downtown – it got me out of the house, it didn’t feel like exercise, and was an excuse to take advantage of the warm weather. Exercise is both important for physical as well as mental health, as cited by a million and one studies, and can break up the monotonous cycles of online shopping, self-loathing, and eating that everyone seems to be trapped in these days. Your options, however, go beyond yoga and walking. Buy some weights or use one of the jars of canned tomatoes you have sitting your pantry (…) and do a weight routine. Go for a run. Climb some stairs. Bring back step aerobics like the bad bitches from the 80s. Ride a bike (Queen’s Quay is really nice, and pretty empty on the weekdays). The other benefit to establishing a good routine now is that you can carry it out through the winter. Maybe not the bike riding part, but you get my point.

Socialize (safely).

           I never understood the obsession with patios until I went to El Jefe a few weeks ago, and it got me thinking about how fun that actually must be when everyone isn’t terrified of getting a virus from the person eating chips and guac two tables over. But! There are alternatives! I know you don’t believe me but there are! Toronto has more parks and green spaces than you’d think, and now is the perfect time to take advantage of them. Connect with nature, friends, and socializing in an environmentally friendly space (throw those White Claw cans in the trash, please) and you and your friends will literally be the peak of ecofeminism. If you’re tired of wearing your crop tops and lashes to the grocery store, picnics and beach days also give you a reason to look cute in public again (and with a mask, you don’t even have to put foundation on the bottom half of your face. #win). Some of my favourite places include Trinity-Bellwood Park and Woodbine Beach. If you have a car (or a lot of patience) Scarborough Bluffs is also definitely worth the commute. I think it’s a game changer that “going out” now means sitting in the grass making small talk, instead of getting hammered in some dark, damp club, but maybe it’s also improvement.

Clear out the clutter that you always tell yourself you’re too busy for.

           I know you see it, bitch. That box of clothes overflowing in the back of your closets. Or the basket of random hair ties, scraps of paper, and pen caps on your shelf. What about when you open social media – Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, whatever – a see all these random people on your feed that you don’t remember following, much less ever meeting in real life. Quarantine has forced us to retreat to our own spaces, physically, mentally and emotionally, and now more than ever is the best time to reflect and take inventory of what brings you joy and (God forbid we’re in this situation again) what you’d be ok with surrounding yourself with 24/7. It may be hard – times of crisis especially encourage a scarcity mindset instead of an abundance one – but it doesn’t hurt to try and reframe your thinking!

The 3 Restaurant Rule

If you’re anything like me, then you love Uber Eats. Since this virus has stripped the joy of going out to eat from my small and soft hands, we’ve had to find ways to work around this. One of these compromises has been Uber Eats. But that, much like anything else in life, can soon get repetitive (and niggas were clowning me for actually enjoying Swiss Chalet. Fuck y’all.) So, I established some ground rules, one of which being the three-restaurant rule. Do I follow it all the time? No. But knowing that it exists had made trying new foods more like a game. Here’s what you do:

1.     First, pick a type of cuisine (I’m partial to sushi, so we’re going to use that for this example).

2.     Next, really study Uber Eats. Find the best restaurants in your area specializing in that kind of food and pick three restaurants that look the best to you. Another alternative (especially if you’re lucky enough to live downtown where a majority of restaurants are doing take out) would be to curate a list of places on Yelp! I loved doing this when outside was open – it made eating out feel a bit more purposeful, almost like it was for research).

3.     Then, keep a lil list – on your phone, on paper, in your camera roll - wherever. When you’re not in the mood to cook, consult the list, and don’t pick a restaurant twice in a row. Start building up a list of places that you can say you’ve tried. Keep tabs on how you felt about the food to compare it to in-person dining when restaurants re-open, or make it an event with friends. Dress up, get together, crack a bottle of wine (or some beers, or sake, ya know – whatever floats your boat) and make it an event.

The other upside to this is now when people ask me for recommendations, I can give them with confidence instead of bullshitting like I would have before (sorry y’all LOL).

Learn how to do your own personal upkeep.

           It would probably take me ten hands and feet to count the number of videos I’ve seen of nail salons throwing customers out for being black or on the prejudice of race and/or class, or the number of hair salons and stylists who charge extra fees for thickness, length (or lack thereof), or for specific styles and modifications, etc. If you knew me, you know I was devoted to my nail salon. I loved the feeling of getting a full set of acrylics, having all the work done for me, the little burn on my cuticles when they’d slide my hands under the UV light. But in quarantine, a lot of things happened – nail salons closed, I became unemployed, and suddenly, $60 manicures every two weeks were not realistic. YouTube has so many videos on how to do basic self-care - things like cutting or dyeing or braiding your own hair, doing your own nails (whether it be acrylic, gel, even a basic polish manicure), doing your own eyebrows – the possibilities are all there. And, if you get good enough – you can always go ahead and make it your own side hustle (with salons operating at half capacity, the demand for people that do house calls is rapidly increasing). I’ve recently swapped my acrylics for press on nails and let me tell you – game changer. They last just as long, look just as good, and allow me the freedom of talon-like nails without having my bank account scream at me (a post on how I do my faux-acrylics at home coming soon!)

Try to watch something that isn’t reality television.

I know 90 Day Fiancee is that GIRL. And if you’re like me, you tend to get very sucked into YouTuber mukbang drama as well (if anyone wants to discuss Nikocado Avocado with me, I am more than willing). But after a while, it gets kind of repetitive, and there’s no harm in educating yourself on other topics. Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, even YouTube all have so many documentaries on a variety of topics – from crime, to health, to cults – there’s literally something for everyone. Plus, there’s something really self-satisfying about learning something on your own. If you need a place to start, my personal favourite is Bikram (Netflix) and any of the Vice documentaries on YouTube, but there are so many, so browse around and find one that suits your personal taste.

           There are also many documentaries on environmentalism and the Black existence/experience/life in America and globally. Considering all the things that are going on right now, it would be wise to educate oneself, especially when the tools for doing so are a few clicks away. My personal favourites are 13 and Who Shot the Sherriff, but there’s so many that you don’t have an excuse not to at least learn SOMETHING.

Severe ties and blame it on the pandemic.

This one is pretty self-explanatory. Maybe there’s the persistent wanna-be friend who you tried to avoid in your Thursday 11-1 lecture and would incessantly text you for notes. Or the creepy guy who would always be in your study spot in Deerfield and message you after with the dumbass eye emojis. Maybe it’s that one friend you used to call to console you of your issues, but by the end of the chat you felt more unnerved than understood. Whomever it is, don’t be afraid to stray away a bit and use the excuse of social distance or “getting your head together” to gradually give yourself some space and make things a bit obvious without having to be a total asshole. It can help, tbh, and the last thing you need in a time like this is to feel guilty for someone else’s feelings.

Be ok with doing nothing.

Life is always on some go,go,go shit. With people posting all those fucking memes about hustling or whatever, it can be easy to feel like you’re sitting in quarantine wasting your life away because you haven’t joined Forex, or OnlyFans, or started three side businesses, or taught yourself a new language or whatever. But listen – look at quarantine like a break. You had a nice long break to re-cooperate and self-indulge a lil bit and you know what? That’s ok! You’re not less of a person because you chose to rest or hang out in bed more than you should have. Don’t let other people’s progress (or lack thereof) be a measure of your own. How can you expect to bounce back after a GLOBAL PANDEMIC if you spent the entire time beating yourself up for not living up to other people’s idea of success? …Exactly. This list is just for fun and personal growth, but realistically, quarantine is for doing whatever the fuck you want (safely and sanely, of course), but literally look at this time off as God, Allah, Buddha, whomever, pumping the brakes on what is a normally hectic life. Slow down, enjoy the small things (ALL the small things), and allow yourself to be what you are – a human being, not a fucking machine.

[taggedmemes]

SENTENCE MEME ⟶ CUNK ON EVERYTHING / A-C. always feel free to tweak the sentence to fit your muse.

'i remember thinking.'

'thinking is one of the three best things you can do with your brain.'

'books are like the internet, but all in one order and they still work in a tunnel.'

'sometimes it's nice to know that someone is going to help you navigate life's more difficult and confusing bits.'

'he can probably have sex with himself a million mysterious ways without needing anyone's help at all.'

'he's intangible and smooth, like a newly washed duvet cover.'

'if he was that fussed about it, he should have put a post-it note on it.'

'he invaded literally everywhere that anyone has heard of.'

'the minotaur was a bull with the mind of a wasp and the teeth of a duck.'

'he was so great at fighting that he stopped being a greek myth and turned into a real boy, like pinocchio.'

'it looks a bit like he chose his own nickname, though, which is against the rules.'

'the alphabet is in that order because that's the order the letters were invented in.'

‘if you ask a historian they’ll tell you, but you probably won’t be listening.’

‘animals is what we call anything that’s alive that isn’t a plant or a tree or a person or a fire or a virus or a volcano or a bush.’

‘ducks are the only fish who swim on the top part of the water.’

‘caterpillars are like insects, except they’re more like a haunted sleeping bag.’

‘you can’t trust snails. they’re just slugs disguised at the seaside.’

‘tigers are the ones who look like an orange barcode with teeth.’

‘in them days you couldn’t trust anyone with anything unless it was nailed down, and even then they might nick the nails.’

‘some people, like the romans, even buried themselves in the ground using volcanoes.’

‘buildings don’t just grow out of the ground, like flowers or lamp-posts.’

‘learning to turn into an architect takes seven years, which is even longer than it takes to turn into a wizard.’

‘french god is more frightening than british god, because he smokes.’

‘is the underneath of a floor always a ceiling? could you have a floor with a wall on the other side?’

‘a painting is a way of making castles and hills and kings and pineapples in bowls into a flat rectangle that’s easier to hang on a wall than a real castle or pineapple.’

‘if you try and eat the painting of an orange on the label of a jar of marmalade, it doesn’t taste anywhere near as good as a real orange.’

‘the first artist to work out how to do bums properly was michael angelo.’

‘spain is nicer than space.’

‘the things inside atoms are called nucleuses, electrions and protein.’

‘everything is mainly made of nothing, so it’s surprising all the fuss that’s made about shoplifting.’

‘australia’s chief industry is spiders.’

‘if you trap criminals with loads of other criminals, it only makes them worse.’

‘unlike spiders, the beatles never crawled into anyone’s mouth when they were asleep.’

‘beeps are the sound of the modern world. everywhere you go today, there’s beeps.’

‘imagine a time before everything. like when you wake up at 4AM for a wee, but worse.’

‘some people think it’s hard to imagine nothing, but i find it very easy. imagine an orange. now imagine it’s not there. now do that with everything.’

‘to be honest, it’s nice to have something to blame.’

‘priests these days have to be careful about proposing any sort of bangs because they might be misunderstood for perverts.’

‘the black death wasn’t anywhere near as much fun as it sounds, and it sounds like absolutely no fun at all.’

‘i’m sorry for making assumptions about the sort of person you are.’

‘when we have stuff we put it in a box. but only if it’s dry. if it’s wet, we put it in a special box called a bottle.’

‘science can’t decide if a carton is a bottle or a box.’

‘the only dry thing you find in bottles is tiny ships.’

‘sometimes, if you look up a word you don’t know in a dictionary, the definition has like loads of words you don’t know, and you go from not knowing one word to not knowing loads, and you feel like a right twat.’

‘you’re going to suffer for ages for making a single stupid decision.’

‘it’s very hard to argue with. like a steamroller.’

‘it’s like a cliffhanger, except this time it’s a real cliff you’re hanging off and not on the telly and there’s no words underneath you and this might be the end.’

‘i won’t do spoilers, because it’s only been on for about forty years and lots of people haven’t seen it.’

‘inside every car is an engine, which is sort of an oven for petrol, but set really high so it always catches fire, like with pizzas.’

‘the burning petrol scares the wheels, which try to escape. this makes the car go forwards.’

‘there are car shows, which is hard to imagine because cars can’t dance, unless i’ve missed something.’

‘it’s a neat idea but i’m not sure it’s fair to blame butterflies for everything.’

‘everyone claps in the shower.’

‘this is why you should never have lunch with a musician.’

‘it’s hard to think of anything that doesn’t have a computer in it, except cows.’

‘there are even computers made of cloud now.’

‘one in twenty people have been a victim of crime. that means that nineteen out of twenty people are criminals, which is a terrifying statistic.’

‘apparently it’s illegal to steal clothes, even if you walk out of topshop wearing them because you sort of forgot you were trying them on.’

‘they say the punishment should fit the crime. but what if you’ve stolen a train? they’d need to steal a train from you in return, and surely if you had a train, you wouldn’t have stolen a train in the first place.’

‘that doesn’t seem right.’

[whatamessz]

Fic “Take my Head”

Welllllll back in october @dreaming-powder and I talked about kink- and goretober and I…erm… wasted an opportunity started this thing which was sitting in my drafts since then, mocking me. Lately I’m extremely frustrated with my writing and it totally shows, but I had to finally get this out or it would haunt me. Sorry I kinda trashed your prompt ;_;

Summary: 10 Million years late to the Garage Palace Party, PWP loosely based on the visualizer.

Cleaned up and edited version on AO3.

3563 words | rating: explicit | 2Doc | 2D’s POV | TW: mentions  of   contagious disease, graphic content, injuries, blood, zombies | beware extremely flat critisism of governmental power structures and oral sex

2D sat on the mattress, perched up against the wall, his head put back against his neck. The blood from his nose finally must have stopped flowing, but the vague luminescence of the glow-in-the-dark-stars they had adhered to the ceiling in an attempt to make the storage unit more cozy was mesmerizing enough to keep staring.

The garage – located somewhere in the suburbs in a former small town in Essex, of all places – was their current hide out. It had been scarcely furnished already, but almost everything they’d brought in was tossed over or broken now. 2D couldn’t care in this moment. His head and his ribs hurt and he could taste his own blood in the back of his throat. His shirt and hands were stained red too. No handkerchiefs in the post apocalypse.

He mulled over his momentary situation. They lived in a storage unit because these days, safe living space was a resource everyone craved. That’s why the improvised military government had confiscated every inhabitable home with the ultimate plan to clear and declare the houses as secure for redistribution to the surviving population of the country. Up until now, this didn’t really happen. However, this and several other measures taken were ultimately just a leverage on the people to consolidate their position and suppress rioting. At least, that was how Russel had explained it to them. 2D had found that fairly persuasive since, if you wanted a home or just shelter, food rations, medical care, clean water and relative safety, you were told to go to The Refuges first.

The Refuges, where it could be made sure you wouldn’t carry or infect yourself with the O-virus and cause a new outbreak again. The Refuges where you could be surveilled and where the disease, whatever that meant, was annihilated and were you could wait for the promised piece of safety and normality you so hoped for.

The Refuges were a lie. The Refuges were horrible. The Refuges were a place where you got your most basic needs fulfilled, as long as you played along the rules the government set and accepted everything they provided to you in their grace. The Refuges were a place, where people in need, in fear and in pain lived together on smallest spaces, perishing on the wait for things to come. The Refuges were a pool to recruit workers to rebuild this glorious nation on nothing but promises of a shining future. The Refuges were a tool and a field of experimentation to see in what infinitesimal bits you could split a society and still rule them in an economic effective way. The Refuges were a place where, once you’d arrived out of free will or pure desperation, you were meant to stay and wait for your assigned purpose.

That was why they’d left. Secretly and in hurry from the great Royal Refuge of South London. In 2D’s opinion it was ridiculous to even call a camp like that. Nobody had heard from a queen or a king in years.

He didn’t like to think back on their time there or the night they had fled. It usually brought back vivid nightmares and he curled in a little just from the thought. However, they weren’t the only people who had managed to leave. There were also still many who never went to a Refuge in the first place.

They all more or less tried flying under the radar through wildly dispersing over the country side where people tried their luck in the less crowded areas. From time to time, there were raids rumored to be initiated from the government, but it was impossible to keep all of the scattered population in check, so they had decided the unruly-people-problem would likely regulate itself if they didn’t guarantee protection from remaining zombies, mobs and catastrophes like the “accidental” wild fires in summer. The government had made it clear, that everything outside the camps and greater cities was lawless land.

Partially, they had been right. The waves of roaming zombies admittedly had declined in the last two years, but with hierarchy temporarily so disassembled, people started testing.

So far, two main forms of social coexistence had become especially apparent: community building and gang building. The communities were extremely guarded and with the increasing pressure from the government, their biggest problem was their relative inflexibility. The bad thing with the gangs was, they weren’t usually friendly. Like everyone, they fought for survival and they took what they could find to ensure that. Sometimes – often – that meant stealing from other people. Like them.

Against all odds, Noodle, Russel, Murdoc and 2D had somehow managed to survive the zombie outbreak together, but they weren’t part of a community, nor of a gang. Or maybe they were their own gang minus the robbing people part. Mostly he was fine with this, but in moments like this the flaws of this state of being became apparent to 2D.

He flinched when he heard steps approaching outside that interrupted his train of thoughts. For a moment, he was afraid the group of rowdies would return, but it was only one pair of feet this time. He could see the familiar boots emerge under the half open roller blind before it was pulled up a bit more and Murdoc strode in. His left side was widely covered in blood, the scythe casually draped over his shoulder and he was smiling widely like a manic death god.

“Daddy’s home, children,” he announced himself enthusiastically and with the greyish light that came in from behind he looked like the legend he was known as in these suburbs and 2D briefly wondered if the blokes would have attacked Gorillaz makeshift headquarters if they would have known it was Murdoc’s too.

Well… who was he trying to convince? They probably would have anyway.

“Hey,” 2D greeted him and his voice sounded thick and nasal.

Murdoc’s atomic smile faltered visibly when he took in the state of the garage unit and finally the state of 2D. He growled exasperated.

“Bunch’a gangsters stopped by to check if we got anything interesting to loot.”

“Those fucking thugs that recently roam around in our territory?”

Their territory? Ok, maybe they really were a gang now and he didn’t notice.

2D just shrugged, taking in Murdoc’s appearance. His jeans and dirty white shirt were lavishly adorned with reddish brown splashes, so the evidence he had just offed a few flesh eaters was right there, but the scythe’s blade had already been polished back to its shiny menace. 2D knew, theoretically, Murdoc had just been checking and clearing on their supplies stash, but when the man came back looking every inch the anti-hero of one of those zombie films 2D had so loved before all this, he couldn’t help but feel a little warm and excited tuck deep in his belly. Murdoc had never looked healthier or more alive since most people around him were (un)dead. The scythe was a statement too, of course. When the outbreak came, it was just a quick defense tool he had grabbed from their requisites, but over time Murdoc had proven to be surprisingly skilled with it and because it fitted his shitty goth aesthetic like nothing else, he ultimately chose the scythe as his signature weapon.

2D could honestly understand how it made an impression on people when Murdoc came out of nowhere, slicing his way through rotting bodies like a hot wire through cheese, scattering organs everywhere, laughing like a lunatic and disappearing after his “work” was done. It sure made an impression on 2D.

“Took our torchlights. And the pillow,” 2D reported contritely. “But they left the sleeping bags at least.”

Murdoc send a string of curses while he was walking through the mess. He kicked aside broken glass on his way over and sat back up a shelf they had made from old apple crates.

“I knew it was a good idea to keep our important supplies hidden elsewhere,” he mumbled.

He leaned the scythe to the wall and took off the bag he had carried. He shad his heavy leather jacket too before he plopped down on the mattress next to 2D with a sigh.

Curious, 2D examined Murdoc from the closer range. He could see now how Murdoc got spatters of dried blood on his face and in his hair as well.

“You’ve got blood everywhere,” 2D stated his observation, the mild concern obvious in his voice.

“Could say the same about you. ’S not mine though,” Murdoc answered with a lopsided grin on his withering face. His tongue darted out of his mouth to lick some of it from his upper lip cockily. 2D shivered. The only good thing they had brought back from the Refuges were the vaccinations against the O-Virus.

“Good,” 2D just offered exhaling, gaze drifting back up to the glowing plastic stars. Murdoc then gently grabbed his chin to indulge in his own studies on 2D’s injuries.

“Too bad we lost the torches. The light’s crap in here. No deeper cuts? Nothing’s broken? Just a busted nose and a split lip?”

2D watched him intently. He liked it when Murdoc cared for him. A little too much maybe.

“Fuck, you look so hot like this, you know that,” he muttered out. In the same breath of air, he silently cursed his dumb brain.

Murdoc watched him apprehensively for just a heartbeat longer.  Then he smirked.

“Yes,” he said. “Plus, slashing zombies makes me incredible horny.”

2D only had time to blink before he felt Murdoc’s lips on his own, noses crushing together and it hurt, but all of a sudden everything he wanted was more of this to take him out of his miserable boredom. The cut on his lip burned with sensation that made his heart pick up its pace. He could taste the coppery savor again, but this time so intensely it made his stomach churn.  The imagination of the blood on their lips mixing buzzed through his head and he sighed softly into the kiss. The knowledge that this was zombie blood made him feel ill as much as it turned him on in a weird way. One should think that the actual outbreak of the apocalypse would have cured him of his weird kinks, but after they had settled in what could be considered a relatively quiet life under these circumstances and the zombies and their spreading disease weren’t the biggest thread anymore, he had learned that this wasn’t the case. Quite the opposite.

Murdoc chuckled lowly in response to his sigh and retreated for a second to check on him.

“We need to clean you up later” he suggested. 2D put a hand up Murdoc’s neck, gently brushing the thumb over the bassist’s face and leaving a bloody smear on his hollow, stubbly cheek in the process. They would have to beg Noodle for her gas cooker to heat some water when she was back.  

Murdoc put his hands around 2D’s waist and pulled him closer, 2D straddling his legs, before he dove in again and licked teasingly slow over the cut on his lip. That elicited a sharp hiss from the former singer and Murdoc used the opportunity to pry his mouth open with his tongue a little further.

2D felt dull pain pulsating through his nose when he needed to take deeper breaths now, but he managed to work around this issue and let Murdoc explore his mouth. He could feel his tongue rub and suck along the tender gum where his front teeth used to be a lifetime ago. His eyes fell shut and he let out an appreciative moan now.

Spurred by this, Murdoc let a cool hand wander under 2D’s stripy shirt and up his sore ribcage, where a heavy boot had kicked him not quite one hour ago before the five gang members had buggered off again. 2D flinched slightly at the gentle contact and opened his eyes. Murdoc didn’t immediately stop kissing him, but his expression was knitted in disapproval when he glanced up questioningly.

2D shook his head slightly. “’S nothin’, just be careful,” he whispered, not wanting to stop this. He gave Murdoc’s thigh a reassuring squeeze. For a brief second, he thought about the fact that the roller blind still was half up, but their mattress was tucked away enough in a corner of the unit and hidden behind a now depleted shelf. He just had to remember to keep quiet. He also hoped that Noodle and Russel wouldn’t return from their tour or that other unannounced guests wouldn’t like to pay a visit again right now.

“Painkillers may be rare, but daddy’s got something else for your ouchies,” Murdoc purred into his ear, which caused 2D to back off a bit with a snicker.

“Woah don’t you think I didn’t notice how you tried to establish that daddy shit again in the first place,” he said defiantly. “Daddy kink is not going to happen in this garage, you old letch.”

Murdoc looked at him, eyes torn wide open in mock offence. “So I am the letch now, am I? Then remind me again who initiated this, huh? Besides, you still look like you ate out Bloody Mary, so don’t give me shit on my humble peculiarities.”

2D shot him a sour look. Of course, he couldn’t really see Murdoc’s eyebrows under the heavy fringe, but he still could guess the suggestive wiggle he offered in return.

“Didn’t you just confirm right in front of me that you get a hard-on from slaying zombies?”

Murdoc shrugged. “You get a hard-on from watching me slaying zombies, so I think that’s a tie. What brings me back to the point at which we just stopped,” Murdoc countered and let him slip from his thighs to lean back against the wall again.

Murdoc fixed him there with a cunning gaze, then kneeled in front of him and slowly slid the pair of braces down from his wife beater shirt. 2D felt himself swallow down a heavy lump in his throat. Murdoc pushed his thighs apart and leaned down into him again for a deep and longing kiss. The fuck he looked like he ate out Bloody Mary, he thought while his pounding nose reminded him that Murdoc was probably right, but he had an appetite for something entirely else now. He started fondling the front of Murdoc’s jeans, but his fingers were batted away gently. Instead, he felt how Murdoc pulled up his bloodstained shirt a bit and fiddled with his fly. Relatively clueless on what exactly he was trying to attempt, 2D still felt how he and his dick grew more and more impatient. A violent shiver ran through his body when Murdoc’s tongue and lips left his mouth and wandered down his jaw and neck to suck little bites here and there. His fingers were wandering up 2D’s good side now and starting to tease his nipple with soft brushes. When Murdoc finally managed to undo the zipper and lost no time shoving his hand down 2D’s underpants, he already whimpered soft little chirps into the twilight of their storage unit.

Murdoc finally stopped the work on his neck and looked up at him, wearing an expression that made 2D a little nervous. He slid his thumps under the waistband of 2D’s pants and wiggled them down with some effort. 2D’s erection sprung free and Murdoc watched it admiringly for a short moment before he lowered himself onto his belly and dug his nose into 2D’s blue trail to happiness, inhaling the scent that, given their current circumstances, was probably a bit stronger than he’d have liked. Murdoc didn’t seem to care one bit though. 2D put his head back against the wall and looked pleadingly up to the weak light of the plastic stars.

“Shit, I was thinking about you the whole way back. How you’d just wait for me, bored out of you mind curtesy to your sprained ankle. Nothing to do but just wait for me and my ready ass. Letting daddy bring home some nice presents,” Murdoc mused and adorned every few words with a kiss to his belly and hipbones.

2D rolled his eyes and huffed. “Yeah I bet you wish, perv. You just make this shit up on the spot.” He had wanted his answer to sound keen, but it might have come out a little needier than he liked. He planned on further commenting Murdoc’s half-assed attempt of dirty talking him, but when he opened his mouth, all that came out was a clipped moan because the former bassist silenced him effectively by taking the tip of his cock into his mouth and giving it a hard lick. A second lick made 2D buck, so Murdoc dug his hands into his hips to press them down and take more of his dick into his mouth.

2D’s breath hitched and he put his hands on Murdoc’s shoulders, guiding him further down. Murdoc let out an appreciative grunt and looked up to him.

They knew each other long enough now that 2D could tell how Murdoc was suppressing the urge to stop and make a sassy comment, so he planted a hand into that thick hair and pressed him down a little further.

“Don’t you dare stopping now, Mister Niccals, better hurry up a little,” he commanded breathily and could see the conflict flaring up in Murdoc’s eyes for a brief moment.

Luckily, this time the urge for retaliation expressed itself in the form of deep swallowing, so he closed his eyes with a gasp and put his head back against the wall.

Murdoc’s head bopped back up again and 2D could feel his tongue licking the downside of his dick before it swirled around his head so slowly and with just the right amount of pressure to make him squirm so much Murdoc had to clutch his hips again.

2D tried to hold back his moans through clenched teeth as Murdoc continued to go up and down his length again.

Lust filled the crisp air of the garage and his breathing got more erratic with every minute this continued. He felt himself getting closer soon despite the relatively easygoing tempo his lover stroke.

When another moan slipped from his throat, he bit his lip in frustration, forgetting about the injury. He hissed sharply and could taste freshly dawn blood.

“I think I’m close,” 2D warned, voice gradually higher, but all Murdoc did was casting him an unimpressed look through his fringe and carrying on in his determined task. His toes curled in his sneakers and he lost Murdoc’s name and a few sighs along the process.

Suddenly, Murdoc hollowed his cheeks when he lifted his head up once again, put his tongue to the tip of his head and let it glide firmly over his leaking slit.

“Ah- Da-,” 2D could clutch the hand over his mouth just in time before the word slipped over his lips. Conveniently, it also swallowed the obscenely loud groan that wanted to escape his throat when he finally came and to his own shame, he couldn’t entirely exclude the possibility that his orgasm came so quickly because of how he surprised himself in this embarrassing way.

When Murdoc came back up at him, rubbing his mouth clean with the back of his hand, he positively beamed.

“Wipe that stupid grin right off your face, I was caught up in the moment,” 2D pouted, still audibly out of breath.

Naturally, Murdoc didn’t wipe his grin off, but started an obnoxious chuckle when he was done swallowing. “Oh no, ‘D, forget it. I heard that and it will be etched into my memory until the day you dig my grave.”

2D, to high on post-orgasmic dopamine to come up with a swift response, shoved his face away playfully.

“Still not establishing a Daddy kink,” he stated decidedly with a glare.

“You’ll get used to it.” Murdoc’s grin still seemed inextinguishable.

2D considered simply ignoring him while he was about to tuck himself back into his trousers, but then he turned his head around to face Murdoc again before he zipped up.

He crawled closer to Murdoc, preying grin suddenly plastered on his own face. “Or perhaps,” he started and came to a halt so close in front of Murdoc’s lips that he could feel their breaths mixing, foreheads almost pressed together. Murdoc’s face twisted up in expectation. That’s when 2D starts gradually pressing Murdoc down on the mattress with on hand to his chest, faces still close. “Or perhaps we switch up the expectation about who calls who a ‘daddy’,” 2D cooed and he could feel Murdoc swallow when he hit the mattress.

2D shifted to lick the zombie blood from his cheek and heard a low approving growl from beneath him. Murdoc’s ribcage touched his when he took a deep breath.

“Well, last time I counted we still had eight condoms left. So maybe make a use of them before we have to go on a new raid,” Murdoc suggested with a smirk.

“Yes. And maybe we should close the blind soon,” he said before he engaged him in a hungry kiss that made his battered lip and ribs hurt so sweetly.

[binnie-binnie-bambam]

I have been so curious on your tags you have for groups...... can you please tell me a few because I am genuinely curious what you have for them. They are great and hilarious. Like baby nunu boulder I can think about at 3 am and laugh over it

Lmao, yeah I have a weird brain 😂 and I’d love to tell you! Idk what groups you’re into so I’ll just go through them all haha Some have stories, some are just obvious. But I’ll just give the rundown since I talk a lot anyway 😂

UPDATE: I have to put a keep reading thingy because, oh my god I wrote so much. I’m terrible.

Astro

MJ: Happy Virus

That’s a given I think since it’s something he’s known by but he really does make me extraordinarily happy so it fits.

JinJin: Smiley Jinwoo

I love his full name and I almost always use an idols full name in any situation. I mean “JinJin” is adorable obviously, but “Jinwoo” makes me real soft. And he’s a smiley puppy and I can think about his smile anytime and it will automatically make me feel a million times better.

Eunwoo: Prince Dongmin

Again with the full/real name. And “prince” because not only is he very princely in appearance, he also has, in my opinion, some of the most important qualities a prince should have. I’m all about appreciating him for more than just his face!

Moonbin: Binnie Bug

So I have this thing where I only call specific people “bug”. Like it’s not a nickname I use lightly, it’s special to me for a reason that I’m not even able to describe. Binnie just happens to be one of those specific people. And my favorite name to call him is “Binnie” because it sounds cuddly and cute and I call him “Bin” or “Moonbin” when he’s being rude 😂

Rocky: Dancing Minhyuk

Real name again 👍 and he’s extraordinary at dancing. Nothing exciting about this tag, honestly. It doesn’t mean I love him any less!!! I would protect him with my life.

Sanha: Bbu Bbu Sanha

Sanha is captain of Astro’s boat. 👌 And he’s beyond adorable when he says “bbu bbu” so every time I tag it it makes me giggle and smile because I think about how cute he is and how much I wanna pinch his cheeks urghhhhhh I love him.

Got7

Mark: Quiet Sparkle

Mark can sometimes be super quiet and reserved and I really like that side of him. I mean I love his weird loud side too but something about quiet Mark is oddly soothing to me. And to me, he literally sparkles at any given moment.

Jaebeom: Jaememe

I genuinely think it’s impossible for him to avoid being a living, breathing, walking meme and I love it so much.

Jinyoung: Heavenly Jinyoung

Another pretty generic one. He’s just straight up heavenly. In all the way omg (he’s such a great bias wrecker 😩 aghhhh save me from himmmm).

Jackson: Wang Puppy

A given. A typical nickname of his but I just think it’s so cute and accurate. I like to think he’s mainly cute and adorable considering I qualify him as my best friend and most people want to avoid falling in love with their best friend, but I will admit that he messes with my head sometimes and thus, the tag is far from accurate in those cases…

Youngjae: Happy Sunshine

The light of my life (well one of them. MJ and Yeonjun and Youngjae are all one giant sunshine of my life). And happy is my favorite look on him. Excuse me while my heart flutters because I love him so much.

Bambam: Damn Bambam

I actually say this multiple times a day. And more than just for when he’s doing something ridiculously attractive. Sometimes it’s “damn Bambam, why are you so cute and dumb?” other times it’s “damn, Bambam is the best meme.” just to name a few 😂

Yugyeom: Brownie

I know this is also a common nickname for him, although I think people spell it Browny, but for some weird reason, when I first got into Got7, I don’t remember exactly what Yugyeom did, but it made me think of a cosmic brownie, ya know the little debbie snacks, and that’s what was in my brain when I thought up a tag for him 😂

TXT

Yeonjun: Baby Sunshine

He’s the baby out of my three sunshines, the other two as previously stated being MJ and Youngjae. He seriously makes me giddy with happiness and, like I said before, he lights up my life and makes it better.

Soobin: Cucumber Watermelon

I read somewhere when they first debuted that he has a nickname of “cucumber” because he’s tall and I thought it was cute and went with it. The “watermelon” part is because one of my favorite outfits he’s ever worn reminded me of a watermelon. I shall include a photo to illustrate my point, but also because he’s adorable.

Tadaaaaa!!!

Beomgyu: Fluffy Sparkle

Because he’s fluffy and cuddly and cute and squishy and I just wanna squeeze him. Plus fluffy hair on him is my favorite. And he’s another natural born sparkler. Idk how he and Mark do it!

Taehyun: Doe Eyes

They were the first thing I noticed about him. They always look so gentle. Even if he’s bursting with happiness and laughing away, his eyes are still so sweetly soft. I love them.

Hueningkai: Dollbaby

I took one look at this boys face and thought he was an absolute doll. That perfect porcelain skin and those defined petite features, he’s just beautiful and a lot of the time he doesn’t even look real to me.

Monsta X

Shownu: Baby Nunu Boulder

I too laugh at this on a regular basis lmao. He seriously has such a baby face though. Like it’s so cute and his eyes when he laughs I just *squeals into a pillow* “Nunu” because it’s a nickname of his and “boulder” because he’s, well, very large 😂

Wonho: Sin Axolotl

I explained this recently but I’ll just say it again since I’m on a roll lmao. He’s, a lot of the time, sinful to look at. But he’s also basically the cutest living being. And if he was an animal, I know everyone says bunny which I totally agree with, but in my brain, he’s an axolotl. I made a post about it a while back with photos side by side and, quite frankly, I cried a little about how cute I find the comparison to be. Maybe I’ll look for it, and cry again, and repost it.

Minhyuk: Soft Angel Face

I don’t mean this in a negative way so I’m not really sure how to word this without it sounding that way, but 95% of the time, I’m not wildly attracted to Minnie. It’s not that I don’t find him attractive at all, it’s just he’s more often than not extraordinarily adorable and pretty to me. There’s still that 5% of the time where he messes with my head but for the most part, he’s very soft and sweet and angelic looking to me.

Kihyun: Hamster Clam

This is one of my personal favorites 😂 This is the one I think about at 3 AM and laugh about. He’s compared to a hamster all the time and I love it so much and think it’s so accurate. But the clam part *starts laughing again* There’s this moment in some interview of MX’s, I have no idea what it was since I’ve never seen the full thing, just this clip that’s permanently ingrained in my mind, but Kihyun says something about like clam chowder or something and than Changkyun takes the mic and says “You look like a clam. Sorry.” It makes me laugh randomly and that’s why I chose it. Every Monbebe knows about that clip I’m sure. I’m still relatively new here so I don’t know everything and feel like I have to explain what I do know lmao

Hyungwon: Anime Prince

He’s so princely to me. Like he just looks regal. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a complete dork, but he looks very princely in my opinion. And to me, and probably other people, he looks like he just stepped out of an anime at any given moment of any given day. As an anime and manga lover, it makes me feel some type o’ way.

Jooheon: Joobee

Obviously known as JooHoney, I wanted to go off the beaten path and this is what my brain came up with. It’s not very creative, I’m aware of that. But I think it sounds really adorable and it fits him and I’d probably call him that if I knew him irl too.

Changkyun: Crisis Causing Boy

Curse this boy, I swear. He messes with me sooooo much. One minute he’s squishy and so so cute and I just wanna cuddle with him. The next minute he’s *string of curse words*. A demon. A demon, I tell you. He has caused me to have more crises than I can count so that’s why his tag is what it is.

As for tags for members of other groups I don’t stan yet, I only have one because I couldn’t pass up the opportunity when it presented itself in my brain. Also, I consider Ateez to be one of the groups I stan but I don’t have tags for them other than their names yet. Anyway, the one I have a tag for.

Woozi: Oojigoojigoo

I both hate myself for this and am impressed that I’m crazy enough to think of this. I just had to find out that his name is pronounced “oo-ji” and not phonetically. My exact thoughts when I discovered this are as follows: *gasp* “Ooji.” *has epiphany* *another gasp* “A baby.” *fawns over his cuteness* “Ooji - gooji - goo!” *is ashamed* “I’m a disgrace. I am the scum of the earth. I’m a genius!”

So yeah, I wrote a fucking novel I’m sorry 😂 You probably didn’t want all of this information. But now everyone knows my secrets…..? Are they secrets? Not really. Anyway, I’m sorry this is the longest post ever but I hope you at least find something of this entertaining or cute or any positive emotion really. And thank you so much for asking. I love exposing my horrible mind and terrible sense of humor to the world.

No seriously thank you. I’ve got questions about my tags before so I’m glad people are at least somewhat interested in them and what they mean/where they came from. I might update this is I think of more tags for the groups I get into in the future. This was fun. For fucks sake, I need to shut up, I’m so sorry.

[kallura-icedcoffee]

golden hour: a new beginning

A/N: This piece connects to my previous collection for Kallura Week 2018, My Favorite Color Is You. You don’t have to have read it necessarily to read this, but it will make a lot more sense if you do. Also thank you to @tybalt-tisk whose comment on that last chapter, At The End of the World With You, inspired the direction I chose to go in to start off this collection.

Rebirth

And if we get separated I’ll find you, just like I did in this life...

“I’m scared.”

Her voice broke and tears streamed down her dirty bruised cheeks. She hadn’t really cried much since all this happened, since the virus broke. She wanted to be strong for him, never wanted to be the weak link between the two of them, never a burden. He brought his free hand over and pulled her face toward his, kissing her temple, then her lips.

“I am too, but you know what? We’re together and where ever we go after this we’ll be together there too. And if we get separated I’ll find you, just like I did in this life.”

She wept and returned his kisses, long and slow and as passionate as she could give considering she could feel herself getting weaker and drifting farther away with each moment.

“I love you Keith. I knew I loved you from the first moment I saw you” she rambled while she knew she was still coherent enough to say it.

“I love you too Mrs. Kogane. You’re all I could’ve asked for.”

He looked into her eyes which were becoming increasingly faded and cloudy. She was going to turn soon. He had seen this before. He rested his forehead against hers.

The mop handle rattled in the door and started to push and crack as the groaning on the end intensified. They were like two sitting ducks, easily seen through the glass windows.

“Damn they sure know how to ruin a romantic moment don’t they?” He smirked.

More shoving, more groaning, more wood bending and cracking.

“I have three bullets in the gun.” She patted the holster at her hip.

“And let those monsters feast on my pretty wife’s body? I would never give them the pleasure.” He pulled a grenade out of his pack and shook it at her.

“You had one left?”

“In case of emergencies. If we go might as well take those assholes with us.”

“You think of everything…” she whispered, closing her eyes and resting her head on his shoulder one final time, squeezing his hand tightly with her last remaining bits of strength.

“Which is funny because you’re supposed to be the brains, I’m just the good looks” he quipped.

She didn’t respond.

The glass in doors gave way and shattered on the floor as the wooden handle finally snapped. The sounds of moans and shuffling feet entered the store as Keith yanked the pin out with his teeth and rolled it at their feet.

“You know Lu,” he closed his eyes, rested his head against hers and waited, “if I had to see the end of the world with anyone, I’m glad it was with y-”

Allura jolted up in bed, sweat soaked strands of hair sticking to her temple, her tank top damp and clinging to her body. She snatched up the water glass on her nightstand, gulping down its contents until there was nothing left.

The dreams were getting more frequent, feeling more real. Flashes of moments with a man she didn’t know, that she’s never met.

When she closed her eyes it was like she was living a million different lives, a million different possibilities…with him.

Sometimes she was a brave paladin escorting a prince to a ball, a princess healing her lover’s wounds, an older businesswoman letting a stranger push her buttons in all the ways that she liked.

“Do you believe in soulmates?” Allura asked at the breakfast table.

Alfor was hidden behind a newspaper which ruffled briefly.

“Let me guess, you met a boy” he replied as he reached for his coffee.

“Father I’m serious.”

“I’m not sure my flower, but I think things happen for a reason. So now tell me about this boy.” He lowered the paper from his face with a smile.

“There’s no boy dad!” Her mouth curled into a pout before she quickly shoveled toast into it in irritation.

There was a boy, but she wasn’t about to explain said boy only existed in her head.

Alfor chuckled at his daughter’s stubbornness.

“Will you be joining me for dinner tonight dear or do you have class?” He tried to change the subject.

“No class, work today so I won’t be home until 7.” Allura popped up and began putting her plate in the sink.

She kissed her father’s cheek and rushed out the door.

“You’re late” Shiro stood, leaning against a car with his arms crossed as Allura peddled into the driveway of Shirogane Autobody.

“Sorry! Sorry!” Allura hopped off her bicycle and walked it toward her boss. “I’ve been sleeping like crap lately.

“Studying for finals?” He popped the hood on the car he was working on before strolling over to the tool bench.

“Um…yes…” Her eyes darted nervously.

“Well let me know if you need some time off.”

“No it’s fine.” Allura waved him away.

“All right well then do me a favor and finish up on that motorcycle over there, needs tire replacement. I thought I’d have time to get to it before the client came this afternoon but I’m swamped.” Shiro pointed to the red bike.

Allura nodded while zipping up her jumpsuit, pulling her hair into a ponytail. She yanked her phone out of her bag, slipped earphones into her ear and got to work. Listening to music put her in a zone and she lost track of time. She didn’t notice the figure standing over her as she knelt polishing the bike as she finished up.

“You didn’t have to do that, but thanks.”

Allura was startled by the sudden sound of another voice and immediately plucked the earphones from her ears, nearly falling over as she did so. She turned and looked up toward the sound and her mouth fell open.

It was him. The literal man of her dreams. Her heart vibrated in her chest.

“Sorry I didn’t mean to scare you.” His brow furrowed with the way she was looking at him.

“Uh…It’s fine. Your…y-your bike is ready” she stammered nervously.

He smiled and extended a hand.

“Can I help you up?”

Her hands trembled slightly as her hand approached his and the moment her fingers curled into his, the moment they touched, all her dreams flashed through her and him in rapid succession.

“You should smile more. It’s quite nice when you do.”

“Look I know I stated earlier I didn’t need an escort but, if you don’t have anyone to attend with do you think we could go together? I’m more nervous than I thought.”

“You said it yourself, this may be the only moments we have together for a long time…I miss you.”

“…I just moved in next door. I’m sorry to bother you and I know it’s late but I just had a hankering to bake some cookies and I realize I have like no sugar.”

“You know I’m not so sure about that. I think you like disobeying because then that means you get punished and you enjoy that.”

“I’m in love with you.”

“I am too, but you know what? We’re together and where ever we go after this we’ll be together there too. And if we get separated I’ll find you, just like I did in this life.”

And if we get separated I’ll find you, just like I did in this life.

I’ll find you, just like I did in this life.

I’ll find you…

He stared at her, eyes wide and fearful yet knowing because he saw it all and suddenly the dreams he’d been having lately all started to make sense. A woman with white hair whose face was always obscured from him, a puzzle he couldn’t solve until right at this moment. She held his hand so tightly she thought she might break it, realizing they weren’t dreams, that she was really seeing the person she was meant to be with in every reality, in ever incarnation of themselves.

“K-Keith?” she said, voice shaky and hesitant. She hadn’t known his name when he walked in but she knew it now. She knew everything about him now.

“Allura?” He’s eyes frantically darted about her face. “My god I actually found you…”

Tears began to well in his eyes.

“Hey Altea when you’re done with that motorcycle can you do an oil change on the-”

Shiro approached to see Allura and the customer holding hands. He stared, blinked.

The interruption, the sound of Shiro’s voice, surprised them both and they flinched, letting go of each other’s hands.

And when they let go, the clarity went with it, the memory of a million lives together extinguished like a candle in the wind.

“Am I interrupting something?” Shiro’s brow arched as he wiped his hands on a rag.

The two looked at each other, confused, shrugging.

“What are you talking about?” Allura said.

“Uh,” now it was her boss’ turn to be confused, “nevermind I guess, can you do a brake repair on the Ford when you’re finished here?”

“Mhm, sure thing!”

Shiro left them alone to get back to work.

“So um, if you want to follow me I can get you checked out.” Allura waved him over to the office.

“Thanks.” Keith followed.

Allura stepped behind the desk and pulled his information up on the computer.

“Mr. Kogane?” Allura looked up from the screen.

“Yeah.”

“Nice to meet you Mr. Kogane, my name is Allura and I hope you’ll be satisfied with the work we did today.”

She flashed him a smile and his heart fluttered a bit. Even in a grease covered jumpsuit she was awfully pretty.

“Keith.”

“Hmm?”

“Mr. Kogane sounds like my dad. Call me Keith.”

He leaned on the counter with a smirk.

“Ok.” She blushed and bit her lip. She was just now noticing how handsome he was. “Nice to meet you Keith.”

He liked the way she said his name in her accent. Maybe he would come by later in the week to get an oil change, even though his bike wasn’t really ready for one. He just suddenly felt like he needed to find another opportunity to see her, to get to know her, though he’d simply chalk it up to a small crush.

But it was more than that… 

We’re together and where ever we go after this we’ll be together there too.

(All works for Kallura Month 2018 will also be posted HERE on AO3)

[punmasterkentparson]

Are You Flipping My Pancakes, Parson?

based on this post because you know kent parson would do this. YOU KNOW.

on ao3 ‘cause it’s long-ish

Swoops seriously needs Kent to stop.

It’s been two weeks since that fateful night at the bar, when the Aces were celebrating that they’d won that night’s game and also didn’t have to get on a plane until the day after next. Several beers in, someone--and Swoops wishes to God he remembered whom, because he wants to strangle them--made a joke that has haunted the team ever since.

Some asshole had asked, hypothetically, what it would be like if people used food-related expressions instead of literally any other idiom.

The joke died that night, for everyone except Kent.

“Swoops, man,” Kent calls across the ice, and Swoops braces himself before Kent continues, “that shot just now? Totally poached my eggs.”

Everyone else laughs. Swoops yells back, “What the hell does that even mean, Parse?”

When Kent just shouts, “It means you’re really steaming up the broccoli today,” Swoops thinks he deserved it.

--

It’s three weeks into Kent’s food idiom obsession and the rest of the guys are picking it up.

“Toady!” Finch yells over the bus seats. “Did you borrow my headphones?”

“Not since you lent ‘em to me last week,” Toady calls back.

Finch slides back down in his seat and digs through the pockets of his bag again. “Well then where the grilled cheese are they?” he grumbles. Swoops buries his face in a book and turns up his own music so he doesn’t have to hear.

--

After four weeks, talk on the ice and on the bench gets weird.

They’re playing the Blackhawks and losing 4-1. Sunny gets off a shift and falls into a seat next to Swoops. “They’re really baking our biscuits,” he grumbles.

Swoops stares at him in sad horror until Sunny realizes what he said. But instead of looking equally horrified, he just shrugs. “Well, they are. We’re making shit passes and giving ‘em too many openings for turnovers. It’s a fucking potluck out there.”

Swoops thinks he sees the start of a smug smile on Sunny’s face. He’s ridiculously relieved when his shift heads onto the ice.

After the game--which goes to the Blackhawks, 5-2, it’s embarrassing--everyone lines up for handshakes. Swoops is a few guys behind Kent, but he’s close enough to hear his team captain look the ‘Hawks captain in the face and say, “Good game, man. Nice cracking walnuts with you.”

Swoops hears the ‘Hawks captain exclaim, “...What?”

Kent moves down the line without providing an explanation. Worse, all three Aces after Kent repeat the sentiment.

When it’s his turn, Swoops just goes with it. “Good walnut cracking,” he says, and yeah, it’s kinda funny to see the befuddlement on the guy’s face.

--

Five weeks in, Swoops fucks up.

Red-faced and still panting after the second period in a game against the Leafs, he stops in the hall to do a routine intermission interview. The guy from NBC Sports asks run-of-the-mill questions. It’s nothing Swoops can’t and hasn’t done a million times.

Which is his only explanation for what happens: his brain is totally off.

“Just getting out there and making shots,” Swoops says, in response to a question about strategy for the final period. “We’re setting up great passes and getting a lot of takeaways, but if we’re not making the shots, then it’s just whisking eggs, you know?”

The reporter blinks at him, then does a half-chuckle as if he just got the joke. “Yeah, right. You guys going to add some flour and milk, make pancakes?”

The words are unusual enough in this context to jolt Swoops out of his half-aware funk. He replays his own words in his head and comes to a single conclusion: fuck. Outwardly, he forces the fakest laugh of his career. “We’ll see if we can flip it around.” Just kill him now.

The real embarrassment comes a day later, when articles about the interview flood the feeds and the Aces get wind of it. Swoops had thought the situation was bad before. He has single-handedly made it catastrophic. The chirping is not only incessant, it’s laden with food-related puns and made-up idioms.

Rock-bottom comes when they’re in a tense, tight game against Pittsburgh. Malkin gets into it with Finch and Sunny goes to break it up, which makes it worse. Nobody is surprise when Malkin gets a penalty, but when Finch and Sunny are both sent to the box and Sunny is handed double minor penalties, to be served consecutively, the Aces coach waves over the ref.

The argument is heated and audible, but professional. Right up until Swoops hears, “...can’t justify it when you’ve got Malkin out there shucking corn with my guys.”

Just because the din of the arena is deafening doesn’t mean he can’t hear the whole bench go quiet.

The ref hesitates. “...Sorry, Malkin is what?”

Coach, visibly going pink, waves it off and quickly concludes the conversation. None of the penalties change.

Nobody mentions the incident, even though they’re all grinning around their mouth-guards.

--

Six weeks in, Kent abruptly stops.

When Swoops asks why, Kent shrugs. “Got bored,” he says, and that’s all the explanation he gives.

A lot of the other guys follow suit. It had become something of a team joke, but it’s a fact that any punchline stops being fun once the captain isn’t laughing anymore.

What’s stupid is that Swoops misses it. When the food joke was a thing, his whole schtick was that he hated it and groaned every time anyone replaced a normal idiom with a food phrase. But now that it’s gone, he keeps finding himself wanting to use food idioms all the time and getting annoyed that he can’t. If no one else on the team is doing it, he’ll sound dumb trying to keep it up by himself. It was different when it was just Kent. The whole point of Kent making dumb jokes is to amuse himself. Kent is like that: he skates like a badass and plays like a wet dream and acts suave and cool for the cameras and fans, but on the bus or the plane or in hotel rooms, he’s the biggest dork.

Swoops misses the food joke. It was asinine and childish, but it made Kent laugh. Swoops never joined in when it was ongoing, but now that it’s gone he feels like he missed his shot.

What’s more, he thinks it’s not his imagination that Kent looks down about it.

He gets a seat next to Kent the next time they’re on a plane. Once they’re in the air, he says, “Wanna watch Netflix?”

Kent does, so they get out Swoops’ laptop and share Kent’s earbuds. Swoops cleans his earbud furiously with a napkin before putting it in.

“Don’t want your fucking earwax, man,” Swoops says when Kent rolls his eyes.

They sit shoulder-to-shoulder for a short while, watching in silence. Kent has chosen a TV series that they’ve both seen before.

At one point, Swoops interjects, “I can’t believe they kill her next season.”

Kent huffs. “Right? Wasted her fucking character with a season of half-assed buildup, then just.” He mimes an exploding head.

“Yeah, it mashes my damn potatoes,” Swoops agrees. He feels rather than sees Kent turn to look at him.

“Bro, you know what you just said, right?”

“Yeah, I know.”

Kent huffs a laugh. “Can’t believe you’re still infected with that mind virus. It’s been, like, a month.”

“Nah, just a couple of weeks. And the joke wasn’t that bad.”

Kent pauses the episode. “Wasn’t that bad? It drove you crazy.”

Swoops shrugs. “Yeah, but like. It was kinda funny.”

Kent is staring at him like Swoops is speaking gibberish. “You said, and I quote, ‘I swear to God, Parse, if I could go back in time to that bar, I’d find the dumbass who made that joke in front of you and started us on this path to hell, and I’d kill him myself.’ You said that.”

Swoops winces. “You can’t take me seriously after any game we lose. Especially to the Bruins.”

“Bro,” Kent says. “I stopped doing it because of you.”

“...Oh.” Swoops shifts in his seat. “I wasn’t the only guy who complained.”

“You were the fuckin’ loudest, though.”

“Oh,” Swoops repeats. Then he grins. “You mean you stopped buttering toast just for me?”

Kent shoves him. “Christ.”

“Well, crack some eggs and fry me some rice, Parse,” Swoops teases. “You do care!”

“I’ll crack your fucking egg,” Kent says, and puts him in a headlock until Swoops begs for mercy. (But not before he tells Kent to stop putting away his groceries.)

[darkblueiguess]

Yusif Jones I couldn’t agree wirh you more and I know my Aunt Debbie would back you on this one 100% ...Sarah honey ...I know your friends may believe in certain policies.. but these policies damn sure were not the you were raised ... Trump is not about hate .. he is about Love and If you would do the real research on him and the real research on Biden .. I guarantee you .. you would be a Trump supporter ... 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 #StopTheSteal #theraceisover #TrumpLandSlide

Are we talking about how we were all raised? You know there are people who pick up books and newspapers to develop a mind of their own? Angie, honey. This scared, pathetic, orange, corrupt little fool you call your president; spreads hate, has it out for black and hispanic Americans, denies science and experts, and encourages violence. He has collected several sexual assault accusations. You’re all steamed up about a joke of a silver spooned mouthed daddy’s boy who has abused his power and has pushed this country into a state of decay. Police brutality, ripping migrant families apart, millions of cases of covid due to his sheer ignorance and pure disbelief for science and experts. Overfilled ICU units where your son couldn’t get his stomach pumped for overdosing if he needed to. Trump is a cruel, racist, chauvinistic, homophobic piece of trash filled with lies and so are the people who kneel before him. He won’t hold himself accountable for any amount of the mess he has made. No, my mother and I didn’t agree when it came to red and blue. My mother has told me time and time again how proud she is of me for having my own thoughts, opinions and ideas. Trump and his failure to sincerely run the nation goes far beyond politics. It’s a BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS issue and to him, you and your family are just a poot in the wind. I’m sure MY mother would agree. I don’t know who your friends are and what they tell you to believe. I do know that everything you post needs a fact check before being deemed false. If you turn off fox entertainment for once and pull from more than one biased source, I’m pretty sure you’d be as terrified of trump as we all are. Or maybe you’re made of stone. I don’t know. I do know Biden’s son would be proud of him. Trump is a hateful, dirty old bitch who slanders the dead, just as you did. Notice how I didn’t mention anything about YOUR dead mother?

#soreloser

#counteveryvote

#biden2020

#partysover

#fuckoff

🤙🏻🤙🏽🤙🏾🤙🏿🗳

❤️💛💚💙💜

You are such a puppet. So hot and sweaty over a fascist. You sound like every trump defender ever. ‘Prove it, show me, I’ll wait.’ You’re a big girl with plenty of time. I’m not doing the dirty work, look it up yourself. Take the blind fold off and look LITERALLY ANYWHERE. You’re so unwilling to perceive anything going on around you because you’re so star struck by an orange turd anyway. You wouldn’t know the truth if it was banging at your door. If you paid attention to something other than fox and proud boys Instagram then maybe you wouldn’t be as backwards as your amoral tv show host. A healthy conversation doesn’t include slandering my dead mother, telling me I’m brain washed then claiming you just want a word with me. Tell me.. are you used to using the term liberal as a slur? Do you tell everyone who doesn’t agree with you that you feel sorry for them? I couldn’t give a shit less whether you’re nice to me at my place of work or not. Do you think me disagreeing with you is mean? Do you wanna lock me up? Indict me? Thank god that I will never see things the way you do. It’s about time someone rocked your little world and let you in on what your swine of a ‘leader’ is really all about. My great grandmother was an immigrant from Mexico. To trump, she was ‘illegal’. There is no ‘our family’. There is no inner circle that you could try to include me in to make it seem like we were ever ‘in this together’. Yeah, I’d say we have very different views. You’re face down in a pile of lies and you’re eating it up. You show your face on here just to express your obsession with a misogynistic, child rapist, bankrupt twit that has our nation in ruins. Quite frankly Angelina, I’m appalled by your choice of president. Nice to finally hear from you. Worry about your own children, we got this.

I keep seeing Trump is a racist on this post yet all of my friends who are actually African American do not think this way. Have you researched the Platinum Plan?

Also, you say Trump is responsible for 200k deaths, yet when he was faced with this virus and he started making changes the democrats were saying he was overreacting. Nancy Pelosi was LIVE is China at the exact same time saying “come on down to China”! There story changes when they need it to fit whatever agenda they have at the moment.

**go back and look at the timeline**

Turn OFF the mainstream media, they have an agenda as well! They are truly lying to you.

I am proud to be an American and I love my Flag and my family.

I am not a rich white girl who has had everything handed to her. I am a single Mother of 2 beautiful little children and I have been able to do more for me and my children in the last 2 years than I ever have before and I do thank Trump for a lot of that.

Trumps America, where healthcare care and basic human amenities for black Americans is considered an unheard of gratuity. A luxury. It’s a shame. And so close to Election Day too. I’m sure there’s no hidden agenda there. When trump was made aware of the virus, he remained in denial to this day. Forcing the economy to stay open at an attempt to stay afloat in hopes of locking in that second term for his own selfish motive. I said there are millions of covid cases. No one in this post dropped the number of deaths from covid, but at least you know that number. How’s that for a leader? As long as it doesn’t directly affect you, you’re content with whatever that walking pork chop does and says. Talk about privilege. It’s very ironic and classy of you to mention your 2 black friends as ammunition to try to convince me that trump isn’t racist. He changes the rules as he goes, whining and crying all the way down.