#THEIR NAMES BOTH START WITH E AND ARE FIVE LETTERS LONG???

[aceofsweets]

good evening twisted wonderland fandom.

[milkbobatyun]

hundred broken hearts

pairing: nishimura riki (ni-ki) x reader

genre: angst

summary: being niki's sister's best friend was hard, but being his friend and having a crush on him is even harder, especially when he debuts as a member of a boy group

word count: 1.1k

a/n: the woes of being a hopeless romantic. and yes im finally back from the dead !! n e ways the stuff that i've hinted in this is from stuff that's happened in the kpop industry and my life !! hehe

1 name. 2 words. 3 characters. nishimura riki. those two words alone were enough send the girls, and some guys, in your year into a frenzy. nishimura riki, with his stunning visuals, was the heartthrob of the school. it was only a pity that he rarely ever came to school.

you weren’t unlike the other students in your year. hidden beneath the uptight personality of being the model student, you were a shy, hopeless romantic. just the mere mention of his name made your heart do backflips and the tips of your ears blaze with heat.

unfortunately, you had the joy of knowing riki’s sister and being her best friend. needless to say, she was very much aware of the small crush you had on her brother. it started when she first noticed how you would stiffen up around her brother, your usual, unwavering gaze flitting across the room like a trapped butterfly.

every meeting with riki was a test of your nerves. whether it was in the school hallways or tiptoeing into the kitchen while tutoring his sister at their house, your crush on him was always your biggest obstacle. somehow, your fingers always found themselves twisting in knots, your mouth fumbling over a polite greeting.

butterflies exploded in your stomach whenever you made eye contact, your heart twirling with glee, skipping its usual rhythm entirely. you would panic, mentally stressing over your hair, your clothes. did you have food left on your mouth? gosh that would be embarrassing.

riki’s younger sister was your biggest supporter. time and time again, she encouraged you to confess to him.

“trust me! he likes you too,” she told you, a smirk dancing on her lips. “he was telling me a couple days ago, how he wished you would come over more, like the old days, so he could spend more time, if not with you, at least around you!”

her words sent a spark of hope coursing through your body. was it really true?

truth be told, your long history with the nishimura family started way back and began with an unlikely friendship with the competitive boy at the dance studio.

one dance challenge threw you into the chaotic lives of nishimura riki and his siblings. he had been so impressed by your dance skills that little, five-year-old him had declared you were his friend without hesitation. as time went by, you became a part of their family, their adopted daughter. 

sleepovers became a tradition, family dinners were cosy and warm, with your favourite dishes spread across the table. over time, the nishimura family became your second home.

while the siblings were like family, your friendship with riki became charged with something a little more. something neither of you dared to touch, nor acknowledge, in fear of losing the other.

with the worries eating away at the both of you internally, your friendship drifted, until long and deep conversations about life faded into brief interactions and greetings when you saw each other in the halls at school.

your shared interests and hobbies drew you closer to riki's younger sister, until he became only a distant friend, an acquaintance.

your desk was scattered with the remnants of confession letters, left unfinished. your notes were locked, hiding away the dark secrets of your lengthy messages, trying to convey your feelings. your dreams were plagued with nightmares of the numerous ways riki could reject you. a dismissive laugh, a cold gaze, with the weight of his refusal haunting you even in your waking moments.

in the past few weeks, sightings of riki at school and even at the nishimura family home was scarce. 

this fateful night, you sat by the television at home, the boy group survival show airing in the background, as you stared daggers into your chat with riki, wincing inwardly as you read your past conversations from years ago.

tonight, you would strengthen your resolve, grow a pair, if you will, and confess to riki. no more excuses were holding you back.

you laboured hard to craft the perfect message, polishing it and editing the confession time and time again. your fingers hovered over the keyboard, trembling with anxiety. a whirlwind of thoughts flew through your mind. what if he says no? what if i make this super awkward when i go to their house? his sister wouldn’t lie to me, right?

just as you were about to send the message, a familiar voice travelled through the speakers of the tv.

your head whipped up, gaze frozen on the boy framed in the tv screen. your heart stuttered to a stop. 

it was riki. no, his name was ni-ki, but there was no mistaking it. the boy in the program, was nishimura riki, the one who held your heart in his hands.

you had known that his dream was to be a dancer, ever since he was young, so there was hardly a chance that he wasn’t going to debut in this new boy group.

seeing him under the spotlight, he looked happy, beaming with excitement. he belonged on the stage.

dread weighed on your shoulders. you realised that your confession would be a weight he would have to carry. you didn’t want to jeopoardise his chances of achieving his lifelong dreams. your confession would distract him from doing his best. even if he accepted it, you knew how tough the industry could be on idols dating, especially before debuting. if the media found out, it could lead to devastating backlash.

the thought twisted in your heart like a knife.

you fought back tears as you deleted your message, racing to your bedroom and throwing your phone across the room, before you found solace in letting your tears run. all night, your pillows swallowed your sadness, soaking up your tears.

you whispered your love to the stars, muttering apology after apology for your stupid heart. why couldn’t you love someone else?

a bitter smile twisted on your lips as you silently supported him, watching as he debuted and the group skyrocket to fame.

slowly, you became one of the many engenes that loved and supported the group, lost in a sea of fangirls. you wondered if there had been a chance, one that slipped through your fingers like grains of sand.

thousands of unsent messages, unspoken words of confession. maybe one of them could���ve thrown the two of you onto a different path.

1 person. 2 names. nishimura riki. ni-ki. thousands of fangirls. there was no way he could be with you. it just wouldn’t work out. maybe in another world, in another timeline, another life.

riki, i never told you this, but i like you. i’ve liked you since we were little kids. your sister told me that you might like me back. either way, i just wanted to say that i like you a lot.

to my [name], i’m sure my sister has said many times, but i like you. a LOT. nowadays, you fill my thoughts. you’re all i can think about. i would stay right here, forever, if i could, with you for all eternity.

taglist (open): @leehanscorydora, @pastelmitzuki

∧,,,∧ ( ̳• · • ̳)  © curated with love by milkbobayun 2024 / づ ♡

[glitterjay]

— spelling

⭒ head (f. receiving), club, mention of alcohol, afab!reader, strangers, suggestive content mdni!

⭒ c's note: i apologize for not continuing lover boy or enemies to lovers, i haven't had the creativity to continue the stories :( take this drabble as my apology

⭒ taglist: @hollyoongs @moon7jay @wondipity @fertilizedtoesw @kwiwin @jaylaxies @americanojake

reblogs help me a lot and are very much appreciated!

you frowned when the waiter placed a drink in front of you. to be completely honest, you didnt feel like drinking at all, going to the club to simply keep your mind off your hectic life. when he saw your confused expression, he pointed to a guy sitting a few seats away from you, saying it was on him.

it took the stranger some time to approach you, noticing you hadn’t touched your drink at all. “i don’t blame you,” he spoke, taking the empty chair next to you. “it’s a harsh world. i wouldn’t trust a random drink either.”

you laughed slightly, still playing with the straw that came with the cup. "why bother, then?" "it was worth a shot."

he had introduced himself as heeseung. he said he was there because his friends had dragged him along but had left him alone for some hookups. he was a nice guy and incredibly handsome. the black button-down that he was wearing made his jaw look sharper and also helped the lights to glow on his face.

he caught you staring as you both talked, but he wouldn't admit it. in fact, he liked it when you lost your senses while staring right at his lips and apologizing for not hearing what he was saying. he knew he was handsome.

he had to admit you were quite stunning yourself. the dress you were wearing only added to your beautiful appearance. he was a gentleman about it, sneaking compliments here and there. if you were completely honest, the nice words were boosting your ego.

"say, heeseung, your friends are here to hook up, but i don't see you trying to find someone."

"oh, i did. it's up to her if she want to hook up or not."

-

and that's how you ended up guiding heeseung and his car to your house. it took him five seconds to have your back against the wall as he stared you down with hungry eyes.

you were fast to grab the collar of his shirt, pulling his lips to yours to close the gap. he tasted like gum mixed with alcohol. your lips, on the other hand, tasted like the watermelon lip gloss you were wearing.

-

everything got heated in a matter of minutes. you had dragged heeseung to your room, where he invited you to sit on his face. he was pretty straight forward, which made you blush furiously, but it made him giggle.

"put all your weight down."

"what if i suffocate you?"

heeseung grabbed your thighs and pushed them down, forcing you to sit directly on his face. one of your hands went directly to the headboard of your bed for support as the other pulled on heeseung's hair.

he was experienced, tongue moving deliciously around every corner of your core, tasting all of you. his strong arms rocked your hips back and forth, making your clit hit his nose. you were in heaven.

the way he was licking your folds had you seeing stars already, but the way he was moving was quite familiar. You realized every lick was tracing something, like a letter.

H E E S E U N G, he spelled.

it drove you crazy thinking how he was somehow marking his name on you. you rocked your hips faster along his face, feeling the knot on your stomach tighten. heeseung noticed you were close by the way your walls clenched around his tongue fucking you.

his right hand reached your clit, rubbing fast circles. your thighs closed on his head, almost suffocating him. you tried to get up, but his arms were holding you still. you started to doubt if heeseung was even breathing at this point.

every thought was long gone when you reached your orgasm, letting your juices free all over his face. it was then when heeseung loosened his grip on your thighs and you were able to get off him, plopping right next to his body.

"already tired? baby, im not even done yet."

© glitterjay | tumblr

[kurishiri]

01 ┊ The final promise, a mother's death

꒰ ִ ֺ ⊹ @ notice ⊹ ֺ ִ ꒱ this translation may not be 100% accurate or contain creative liberties due to characterization or narrative flow purposes. if you enjoy, please consider reblogging, but don’t repost these or claim these as your own!

— jude⌛'s past records, record #1.

— cw: domestic child abuse (physical), death of a family member, mentions of alcoholism and family neglect.

The amount of happiness a person is given in their lifetime is decided, and it is split equally for everyone.

Such was written in a book somewhere.

Just as there was no abundance of good things, neither was there an abundance of bad. Everything was made to be equal.

——If that was the case, then just what did this bloody wretched life of mine ever amount to?

Since I was born, I had never gotten a taste of that feeling called ‘happiness.’

My father was an immigrant from Ireland, who worked at the seaport.

The place was filled with violent people, making both public order and the working environment in poor condition, but not working would be the same as death.

And what was tragic about the job was the fact that you could be laid off at any point.

Jude’s father: Blast it all! I went outta my way to show up n’ they went and kicked me out!

Jude’s older brother: Was a fool’s errand from the start!

In the cramped house, the scent of liquor and tobacco pervaded the room,

and perhaps because of continuous exposure to that, my younger sister and I had weak lungs, and were often prone to asthma attacks.

Jude’s younger sister: *cough* *cough*...

Jude: Quit it already.

Jude’s father: ...Hah?

Jude: If ya continue smokin’ that stuff, ain’t no way we’re gettin’ any better.

J: If you’re gonna smoke go n’ do it outsi——gh!

All of a sudden, he hit my cheeks, and the moment I collapsed on the floor, he grabbed my hair.

Jude’s father: I dare ya to try sayin’ that again.

Jude: Hah, did ya drink so much booze your ears gone bad? I’ll say it however much I gotta.

J: I’m sayin’ ya don’t even got a penny in your pocket and yet ya go off smokin’ that stuff——guah!

This time, he hit my other cheek without holding back.

Jude’s father: Jude. How old are ya?

Jude: ...Five.

Jude’s father: Which is the age ya can go n’ work a job. And yet here ya are not doin’ that ‘cause you’re coughin’ a lung up.

Jude’s father: Who do ya think ya are, complainin’ when you’re a useless piece o’ trash, huh!?

Grasping at my hair, he tried to drag me around, when——

Jude’s mother: Stop this at once...!

Jude: Mum...

Jude’s mother: I’ll give him a talk and make him listen. Okay?

Mother took some money, and the two left the house for a drink.

(That cash... went and sold off clothes again, innit.)

She was a woman who could use perfect Queen’s English, and she was originally a well-to-do lady, or so I heard.

But, she pulled the short end of the stick, getting together with a good-for-nothing.

She sold the little jewels and clothes she had brought until she had nothing left to her name, and her health deteriorated.

—— Time skip (I think) ——

Jude’s mother: Jude, come here a bit.

Mother took me out to the garden, and there she took a stick and started writing something on the ground.

Jude: Mum, what’s this?

Jude’s mother: These are letters. They represent the words we speak... let’s see... it’s much like a ‘sign,’ so to speak.

Jude’s mother: See, this is how you write your name. J, U, D, E.

I copied Mother’s letters, writing them on the ground.

Jude: Wow, I could really get behind this. Hey, how do ya write Jazza——

Just then, Mother pulled me into an embrace.

Jude: Mum...?

Jude’s mother: In the times to come, even when your body is weak, and your money scarce, as long as you have wisdom, you can live on with that.

Jude’s mother: Jude, you are intelligent. I am sure knowledge will be your guardian.

Jude: Hey, mum, if ya hug me so tight it’s gonna hurt.

Jude’s mother: Hehe, you’re a big brother, aren’t you? You can handle this much at least.

Not too long after, Mother’s body grew weak, and she passed away.

The only thing left behind was the cold bed which she no longer occupied.

(She probably knew things would turn out this way.)

Running my hand along the cold surface of the bed, I recalled the final conversation we shared.

—— Flashback ——

Jude’s mother: Jude... I’m sorry.

Jude: What’re ya apologizin’ for? There’s a mountain of people other than ya who gotta apologize.

Father and my older brother drowned in alcohol, and even on death’s door, they didn’t bother even showing their faces.

Jude’s mother: ...I’m sorry, I’m sorry...

Jude: ...N’ like I said, don’t apologize.

Jude’s mother: ...Please...take care of your sister...Jude.

—— End flashback ——

That became the final conversation.

And, after that, my life stumbled even more down to the pits of hell.

to be continued…

first next →

masterlist🌙 ┊ ko-fi ☕️ ┊ comms 🤍

[castillon02]

“You ‘have amnesia,’” Dr. Sharma repeated, her eyebrows arched. 

“Oh yes,” Q said. He cheerfully waved his hand at his bandaged head. “Mugged this morning. Terribly traumatic. Physically, not mentally, since I don’t remember any of it, of course.” 

Dr. Sharma’s eye twitched. “I see.” Over the past year of therapy, she had grown inured to Q’s shite, but this was perhaps a new level of it for her. “Amnesia,” she repeated. 

Q beamed. “Judging by the dark circles under my eyes, this seems like a bit of an opportunity for a fresh start anyway,” he said. “Past me looks overworked.” 

Dr. Sharma had been trying to get him a holiday for the past four months. Her “I see,” every time M had denied his request for leave had become steadily sharper. Now her eyes gleamed. “Amnesia,” she said, smiling wider than Q had ever seen. 

(Also on AO3)

—

“Amnesia,” M said, squinting at him from behind his desk. “Really, Q?” 

“M,” Q replied, tasting the name as if he’d just learned it. “Seems a bit funny to work for a letter, but I suppose my past self had his reasons.” He leaned back in his chair and cast his eyes around the room as if those reasons might be visible if he looked for them. 

M’s hand twitched toward the security button on his desk lamp. “You answer to the letter Q,” he pointed out. “You clearly remember some things.” 

“The name Q has silent vowels,” Q said, straight-faced. “Q-U-E-U-E. A long line in A&E is the first thing I remember experiencing, so it seemed fitting. You know, waiting for something that never seems to come gives you a lot of time to think.” 

M glared. “If this is about your leave—” 

“I am leaving, yes,” Q interrupted. “I even have the paperwork filed for Queue Smith, since apparently you lot do that here.” He quirked his eyebrows. “You still haven’t told me what I do, exactly, but I assume it’s some form of tech support, not anything crucial. Something other people have been trained in.” Like Q had been training R and X for the past six months, for instance. Specifically to deal with M’s bizarre separation anxiety. 

“You are actually one of our most valuable assets,” M gritted out, clearly aware that said valuable asset was a lying liar who was lying to him at that very moment. 

Q smiled. “What a shame I can’t remember anything, then,” he said. “No value whatsoever now. In fact, Dr. Sharma distinctly said I was as useless as a pin-pricked prophylactic, and the rest of the medical department agreed with her.” 

M’s eyes narrowed and he sat a little straighter. “Dr. Simmons would never go along with this.” 

“Dr. Simmons thought the whole thing was very novel,” Q disagreed. “In fact, he said amnesia might be under-diagnosed, particularly in injured field agents being recalled for missions.” 

M frowned. “How patient-centric of him.” 

“Oh, terribly.” Straightlaced Simmons, head of Medical, didn’t always see eye to eye with Q, but they both prioritized the health of the people under their care. M wouldn’t find anyone in-house who would challenge Sharma’s diagnosis. Now for the killing blow: “Everyone says that if I’m lucky and have a nice long rest, then I might remember some things. But who knows? Amnesia is unpredictable. I could be out of the game for good.” Q gave an innocent shrug. 

“It can be dangerous, walking around ignorant in the world,” M said.

“Maybe,” Q said. “But I got mugged while I was working here with all my memories intact, so really, nowhere is safe, is it? Might as well be unsafe in the Maldives.” Q gave M his most beatific expression. It was rather cute of M to threaten him with being killed, as though Q didn’t have a dead man’s switch for exactly that contingency. 

M gave him a long look but eventually sighed. “I’ll put you on an indefinite medical leave. Don’t do something stupid with your free time.”  

Q stood. “I’ll do whatever I please. Since that is, in fact, the point of the term ‘free time.’”  

—

Q spent five days eating take-away and playing Elden Ring in his pajamas. On the sixth day, he had enough energy to move, so he took the train and then a bus to a little town in Andalusia, dreaming of egg-and-potato fry-ups and sunny olive tree-laden views. 

Warmth. Sunshine. Red roofs and white stone buildings. An outdoor cafe where he could drink his tea and people watch. 

Down the street, a wrinkled old woman stooped down to scratch a brindled dog whose whiptail flew back and forth at the attention. Q watched them until they rounded a corner out of sight. When he brought his gaze back to his own table, Bond was sitting across from him. Shite. 

“Amnesia,” Bond said. His eyes crinkled at the corners.

Q stared him down. “I’m sorry, do I know you?” If Bond asked about a mission, Q was going to send him back to R and X for replacement corneas. 

But Bond shook his head. “You can call me James. We don’t know each other outside of work,” he said. “I thought we could change that.” Bond gave him a half-smile, somehow sheepish—different from his Target Acquired smile. His bright yellow I Heart España t-shirt was more camouflage than Q had ever seen him in. 

“Caminito del Rey has beautiful vistas,” Bond added, his blue eyes locked on Q’s. “Or I know a place with good tapas if you’d rather eat than hike.” 

This might be a work-shaped trap. But there wasn’t any tech in the Gaitanes Ravine, and yellow wasn’t the color Bond wore when he went anglerfishing. Additionally, traversing a treacherous one-meter-wide walkway carved into a rock face a hundred meters above a river sounded like it was genuinely Bond’s idea of a good time. “If we went hiking,” Q said, “it wouldn’t be efficient. I take pictures of cool bugs. I lollygag to look at spiderwebs. I get distracted by rock formations.” 

“If I wanted efficient,” Bond said, “I’d wait until you ‘got your memory back.’” He offered Q a wry tilt of his mouth. “I have it on good information that you’re currently useless, and I don’t expect we’ll need any of your skills from the office.” 

Bless the medical staff’s ability to gossip. Q exhaled and slouched a little. “You’re really here just because?” he asked.  

Bond shrugged. “We’re good at being useful together. I thought we might be good at being useless together too. If you like.” He tilted his head. 

Q stood without answering. 

Bond stood with him. His designer blue jeans stretched flatteringly around his thighs. No concealed carry. His watch wasn’t one of Q’s. He had a knife in his boot, but that was sensible enough. His t-shirt showed off tan arms criss-crossed with pale scars and a smattering of graying hair. He had a red España bucket hat tucked into his belt. 

007 on holiday. 

Q smiled. “Lead the way.” He extended his hand. 

Bond took it. In the center of a rural village steeped in machismo culture, Bond held his hand. “I have a car,” he said, and they walked, still linked at the fingers, to where Bond had parked his entirely normal Mitsubishi Mirage rental. Good god; a hatchback. Not even four-wheel drive. Bond was really giving this ‘useless’ thing a genuine effort. 

If this went well, Q would have to send 006 a basket of explosives. Rather than leaving his mugging-based amnesia up to fate, he’d rather desperately arranged for a surreptitious blow to the head from one of Six’s experts in cranial violence. He hadn’t expected that his memory loss would lead to something so lovely.  

[sometimes-love-is-enough]

Every time you talk about giving yourself writing challenges, I think about how it would be fun to have a 'handicap bingo'- where you get a random writing 'handicap' like not being able to say any character's name, and have to write a full story with it. Idk. I think it would be fun

Min's Writing Challenge

Rules: Roll a d20, accept your fate, write a fic of your choosing and follow your fate to the letter. (Creative workarounds encouraged.)

Roll twice; you have to use both. If you roll another 1, the extra challenges compound accordingly.

Pick a single letter, A-Z. You're not allowed to use it for the entire fic. (Bonus challenge: E.)

Every sentence must be under ten words long. (Bonus challenge: five words.)

Pick a poetry/lyric style (sonnet, terza rima, ballad, etc). The whole fic must be written in that form. (Bonus challenge: keep it still obviously a normal fic, with appropriate tropes and narrative conventions.)

You must write in future tense.

You must write in first-person POV.

You must write in second-person POV.

Take your least favorite fanon concept/trope, and make it into something you want to write. (Bonus challenge: play the trope entirely straight - no subversions! - and make it enjoyable anyway.)

No character names allowed. (Bonus challenge: no dialogue tags either; you can't use descriptive phrases like 'the man in the prince costume' to work around it.)

No dialogue allowed. (Bonus challenge: no internal monologues allowed, either.)

Dialogue only - playscripts encouraged.

Epistolary fic - only letters, emails, notes, etc.

Write an AU, but the alternative universe is a profession!AU that you know nothing about. (Bonus challenge: no research allowed.)

Unreliable narrator. (Bonus challenge: the narrator is good at being unreliable, to the point that they might legitimately fool a reader.)

Whatever fic concept you have, you can only write the very ending of it. (Bonus challenge: you aren't allowed to use any exposition to explain how you got to that point.)

Write any AU of your choosing, but you must choose at least one major canonverse event/plot point and adapt it accordingly to your setting of choice. (Bonus challenge: Make the canonverse event and AU of choice absurdly incompatible.)

Must start in medias res, with a 'yep, that's me. Bet you're wondering how I got into this situation!' moment. (Bonus challenge: Don't plan what the in medias res situation is before you write it. Force yourself to resolve whatever bullshit you come up with on the spot. I've definitely never done this in my life, ever.)

You must write in outsider OC POV - no canon characters allowed. (Bonus challenge: No Sanders Shorts/related characters allowed.)

Pick a fairy tale, fable, or myth. The fic must be a retelling or reinterpretation of it. (Bonus challenge: you aren't allowed to reread or reference any version of it while you're writing - from memory only!)

Dealer's choice - pick from any of the above.

Good luck.

[cookie-crumblr]

The Smell of Smoke

Innocent F! Reader x M!Yandere Bully OC

Part 2~

his info: 🖕✨

part: 1 2 3

!!MINORS DNI!!

CW: !F reader, use of she/her when referring to reader, reader has a vagina, reader in a skirt, NSFW, YANDERE, DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT, name calling (bitch, slut, ), BULLYING, stealing, use of toys, non con drugging exhibitionism

You make sure to check your peephole before leaving today. You make sure to make it to class early for a seat closer to the front. And by the gods you make sure to bring pepper spray.

You aren’t allowed weapons on campus… but maybe you can talk your way out of it.

“Move it,” You jump upon hearing Ezra’s voice way too close to you and begin to shiver and breathe heavier.

No

The person sat next to you scrambles to get away almost forgetting their wallet and phone.

He flops down in the now vacant seat.

You remain sternly faced forward. Trying and failing to just pretend he’s not there.

*Slap!* His open palm lands square over the width of your thigh. “So, bitch, what’s it gon’ be”

“Wh-what’s what gonna be?”

“Do you wan’ do this the easy way, or the hard way.”

His friends surround you both…

“E-easy way…” you don’t even know what he’s talking about, but you’re catching onto his game.

He snaps and they lift you to your feet by your bicep.

You comply, though they’re all taller than you and your shoulder bends uncomfortably.

They walk you shamefully in front of the group, pushing you when you start to slow down or stumble.

You’re taken off campus, and to a store in a strip, that felt like a thirty minute walk away.

The name on the front reads, “Tease” in big black and hot pink letters.

Ezra now personally pushes you towards the door.

“What a-are w-we do—” you start.

“Steal five things, go bitch! Go!” he claps and bends over you speaking in a higher pitch as if he’s telling a dog to go fetch.

He shoves you through the door.

Whiplashed you simply stand for a second, before taking a deep breath.

You grab a few of the first boxes you see, and head towards the back. there’s curtain covered changing areas… There won’t be cameras back there.

Glancing toward the counter where a woman reading a magazine, stands, you sigh. At least she doesn’t look like she’d care if you were stealing.

You slowly open the packages you nabbed and shove the toys in your pockets. You wore a big hoodie so as long as a hand is in the pouch you can cover up the lump and the other two are snug in the band of your skirt.

You still need two more things… but anywhere else you could put them would be too obvious.

You spot something labeled “anal plug” and have an idea… It’s a pretty terrible one, but it’ll definitely work.

You grab that, and one more box, then open up the curtain for hopefully the last time.

Your face is hot as you peel down your wet panties…

You open the first box and put the plug in your bum, trying to avoid thinking about what you are doing. A warmth spreads fast between your legs because of the pressure.

The next box you open is bigger than the other stuff you grabbed…

You contemplate for a second swapping it with one of the smaller things in your pockets, but it would be way too obvious there.

You try and push it in.

Struggling to even get the tip in you quietly grunt.

After a solid minute of trying again and failing, you put it in your mouth before attempting it again.

Thankfully it goes in this time, albeit rather painfully. You allow yourself time to adjust, and breathe.

You try and compose yourself before you walk out as normally as you can.

The bell jingles as you exit.

At first you don’t see Ezra and his gang, and you feel stupid. Maybe you could’ve just waited them out instead of stupidly stealing everything and shoving toys inside yourself.

A window on one of the cars blasting music out front, rolls down, revealing him with a cigarette between his fingers.

“Took ya long enough. Show us what cha copped,” he takes a drag, and inspects you from head to toe as you walk nervously over. You stumble a little, still not used to the toy intrusions.

“Hurry up, slut! we’ve all been bored as shit, I wanna get the fuck out,”

You drop the three things into his palms.

“Yur missin a couple a things,” His smirk becomes frigid and sinister.

You lean into his ear slowly, at first he scowls, before realizing what you’re doing. Then he lifts a hand to block your mouth from the rest of the guys so you can whisper freely into his ear.

“Th-there—d-down—there…” Your face is burning hot.

He busts out laughing, “Oi that’s fuckin rich! Hey guys! The bitch couldn’t wait!” He looks into your eyes, some emotion you can’t catch flashing across his face. “What’re ya waitin for? Bend over and show us already.” His voice is ravenous.

Swallowing, you do as instructed. Your legs shake as you pull your panties down again, and pick up your skirt then lean forward, keeping your eyes screwed shut tight.

They all woop and cheer and laugh at you, and Ezra smiles with what looks almost like pride.

He slaps your ass hard, and you bite your lip to stifle a cry. Then he stands to block you from them as you fix yourself.

Smiling at you devilishly, he now leans down to whisper in your ear, “You know… There were packs of gum and shit up front…”

He gets back into the driver’s seat and pulls off the lot, the other cars follow.

You’re left in the dust, with toys stuffing your holes, alone and embarrassed.

At least they threw your stuff on the ground before they left, so you can call your roommate for a ride.

She doesn’t question why you’re stranded, why you’re sitting weird, or even about yesterday.

Class the next day is quiet.

So are the hallways, you don’t even see any of Ezra’s gang.

You’re mid sigh of relief the next morning when he struts into class late, sporting some new bandages.

“Ezra! We saved ya a seat~” A girl toward the back waves as she greets him.

“Hey, Ezra~ last night was fun!” The girl sat next to the first, calls after.

You try and block him out, until a paper ball hits you in the head.

You ignore the first, and second… But at the third you turn to see him making a gesture for you to open them.

The first one just says “Bitch” and you hold it up to him with a question written on your face.

He mouths “The other one” while rolling his eyes.

The next one says “slut” and you almost laugh imagining showing him that one and feigning ignorance. But you think better than to irritate him.

The last one you unfurl reads

“I got ya a present”

You turn to mouth “thanks?” while shrugging, before you look back toward the front of the class, you notice each one of those girls have a hand on his chest.

You feel a small pang of jealousy. Why is he nice to them? What did you do to deserve the treatment he’s giving you?

On your way out of the room you hear him call after you, “Forgetting something bitch?”

You let out a long sigh through your nose, “coming…”

The two girls are the last to leave they wave on their way out.

While remaining seated he lazily extends a paper bag to you. His smirk is annoying and would make you angry if you weren’t still so scared.

“Wh-What’s wrong with it…?” You snatch the bag and sniff it first.

It smells like a brownie.

You open it, and it looks like a brownie.

He laughs out his nose, while watching you, “If you don’ wan’ it—”

“N-no… It’s fine, i’ll eat it!” You interrupt before he thinks you’re even more ungrateful.

You’re overcome with hope that this is him extending an olive branch!

You bound out of the room, making it on time, you decide to eat it before class officially starts.

It doesn’t really taste all that good… But you can’t be rude. He probably just… Didn’t know a good place! yeah.

you don’t know how far into the lesson you get to before you feel something in your guts shift.

You need to leave right now.

Luckily this isn’t high school and the professors don’t care if you don’t ask.

You make it to the bathroom in time to throw up.

The entire way there you stumbled, and ran into the walls. It feels as though you’re on a ship, that’s swaying in the ocean.

What the fuck kinda sea sickness feeling food poisoning was in that sweet? He must’ve got it from somewhere really terrible on accident.

When you leave you can’t stop giggling.

The giggling turns into crying, where the fuck are you? A hallway? it’s definitely the college corridor but… It’s reminding you of a hallway you’ve seen as a kid.

You were so small…

Now you’re…

What are you?

“Hahaaa” you’re laughing again.

You don’t even notice right away when you trip over your own feet, now you’re falling down the stairs.

Someone grabs you before you can truly fall, and now you really can’t stop laughing.

“H-hey thanks” You turn in what feels like slow motion and see a strange guy holding you.

“You can let go nooowww thanks~ hahhh haha” You try and shimmy yourself free, his hands remain firm.

[pagesfromthevoid]

Safe & Sound | j.m.

Joel Miller x fem!reader

Come morning light, you and I'll be safe and sound.

Word Count: 2.5k

Warnings: Canon typical violence. She’s Frank’s niece. Age gap (she’s 32). Mentions of tampons and periods (which idk if that’s a warning needed but just in case)

Author's Note: Casually starting another series (and I have like two more in the works woooooooops)

Series Masterlist | Talk to Me! | AO3

Ellie stared at the letter in her hand, biting her nail as she read it over slowly. Bill and Frank, who they had trekked all this way to see, were dead. She knew Joel wouldn’t be happy about this, but she also knew he wouldn't let her ask anything about it. He didn't let her ask questions, and even when he did, he passed on answering half of them. 

He was annoying like that.

“Ellie?” 

She looked up from the letter as Joel stepped back into the dining room. Holding up the letter, she gave him a grim look.

“‘To whoever finds this, but probably Joel,’” Ellie read off, waving the envelope some. “Figured I fell under ‘whoever.’”

Joel stared her down for a long moment, before shaking his head. “So they’re dead.”

“Yeah…yeah, they’re dead.” Ellie hesitated, looking between him and the letter. “Do you…?”

“No, no…you can.”

Ellie huffed but began reading, trying her best to be light about it. “‘If you find this, please make sure you check the yard. She should have buried us together, but you and I both know she probably couldn’t have done it alone…’”

Ellie continued reading, brow furrowing as she did. As the letter wrapped up, leaving Joel with everything, she hesitated on Tess’s name —as well as a name that Ellie didn’t recognize. Joel waited, watching her, before taking the letter from her hands. His hands shook some, hesitating a moment before he told Ellie to stay put and stormed outside. 

She waited a few minutes, half expecting to hear him scream or something equally as angry, but it never came. Going to peer out the window, she watched as Joel crumpled up the letter and walked to the opened gate. Ellie couldn’t see what he was doing —if he saw something that she couldn’t. But he stood and stared towards the empty town square. 

Ellie waited, then stood and moved to peer through the front door screen. Her eyes caught sight of what Joel was watching —a woman carrying a shotgun on her shoulder. Joel was not someone who just let people approach with guns, and Ellie connected pretty quickly that this woman had to be the other person mentioned in Bill’s letter.

“Miller,” the woman called as she got closer, stopping about five feet from the gate. “I assume you know then.”

Joel just nodded, and Ellie decided to make her presence known by stepping out of the house. He looked back at her as the woman pulled her gun from her shoulder. Without hesitation, Joel stepped in front of the barrel, putting his hands up. 

“Hey, she’s with me.”

The woman stared at Ellie for a long time, eyes darting between her and Joel. Then finally, her gun lowered and she came closer to the gate, stopping in front of Joel and holding out her hand. He hesitated, but set the crumpled paper in her palm.

From where Ellie stood, she could make out more details about the woman. She was way younger than Joel; didn’t have half the wrinkles or scars. And her hair was far from greying. Her clothes were clean, though overall she seemed to be relatively clean in general. Like she wasn’t just surviving, but actually thriving in this little town of her’s. She even looked healthy –not to say that Joel or Ellie didn’t look healthy, but this woman looked actually healthy. Not like she was just getting by on whatever she could. Like she actually ate meals and drank clean water and lived in a healthy way. Honestly, she was kind of pretty, which didn’t seem fair given no one else probably felt pretty these days. 

The woman pulled the letter apart, reading it over slowly. Ellie was pretty sure she was rereading it, since it wasn’t even that long, but Joel wasn’t rushing her, so Ellie decided to let the woman handle whatever she was feeling.

“Frank was sick,” she suddenly said, as if that explained anything. She didn’t look up from the letter. “He was sick even before the outbreak.”

“I’m sorry,” was all Joel managed to say, looking back at Ellie. “You don’t have to come with us. I know Bill’s letter said –,”

“I can’t stay here alone,” she interrupted, and she looked at Ellie now with a small frown. “And I know it’s not easy for a little girl to travel alone with a man.”

“I wouldn’t –,”

“I didn’t say that, you creep,” she immediately countered, giving him a dirty look. Joel glared at her, and Ellie wondered how well the two knew each other before today. “I just said I understand how it’s hard to be a fucking girl travelling with someone who knows jack shit about being a girl. It’s how I got here –with my uncle Frank, alone, at twelve.”

Ellie snickered at her outburst, earning a pointed scowl from Joel. But she ignored him, hopping off the top step of the porch. The woman watched her approach, moving to rest her shotgun on her shoulder again. Then she extended her hand to Ellie, introducing herself with a tired smile.

“I found a box of tampons,” Ellie told her once she introduced herself. “Joel said the station had been picked over –but he was wrong.”

“Find of the century,” she teased, grinning at her before looking back at Joel. ���You know how tampons work, cowboy? Or were you just hoping she never started her period?”

“Don’t call me that,” Joel warned, moving away from the two now as he walked to the garage. “And I do, and it wasn’t exactly the first thought I had.”

Ellie snickered at the thought of Joel explaining how tampons worked, but reassured him that there was no reason to teach her. “I already know you stick it in your nose.”

“Ellie, what the fu –,”

The woman laughed however, covering her face as she did so. Ellie felt smug, having made a stranger laugh, even if it was at the expense of the old man in front of her. Though, Joel seemed less than thrilled by the whole thing. 

Ellie and her exchanged glances as their laughter died down. Then she motioned to the house. “Water should still be on –it’s hot. I’ll find you both some clean clothes and you can both shower.”

“Holy shit, they have hot water?” Ellie exclaimed, looking up at her with shock and disbelief.

“The hottest,” she promised, motioning them both inside.

Ellie didn’t hesitate to run inside and back up the stairs.

*****

Joel watched Ellie practically trip running up the stairs of the house as he followed Frank’s niece inside. While he understood her excitement –shit, he was excited, if he was being honest –she was going to get herself hurt if she didn’t take it down a few notches. When the door to the bathroom slammed shut, he turned his attention to the woman in front of him, who was motioning for him to follow her to the kitchen.

A thin layer of dust had collected over everything, making that one of the only real signs of abandonment in the house. But the water ran, the power was still on. It was a strange, almost painful, scene of normalcy in their bleak world. Bill and Frank’s always felt like that, though –a brief moment of domesticity before returning to the nightmare that Joel lived in.

With Bill and Frank both dead, however, that feeling of normalcy died with them.

“You look like shit,” she pointed out, breaking through his train of thought.

“Feel like it,” he confirmed, sitting at the counter. She slid an unopened bottle of water to him, and Joel gave a curt nod in thanks. “Been trying to get here for two days now.”

“Where’s Tess?”

The question lingered in the air, hitting him hard in the chest. She knew the answer, and he knew she knew. Joel was good at pushing his feelings aside, but blunt, to the point questions like that didn’t give him a chance to hide. So when he didn’t respond, she leaned on the counter in front of him, brows knit together in concern.

“Okay,” she drawled, looking around the kitchen for a moment. “Then tell me about Ellie. What’s the deal?”

“I’m takin’ her west –to my brother,” he explained, and it wasn’t necessarily a lie. He was going to take her west to Tommy. 

“What’s the importance of getting this little girl out west –at the loss of Tess?” She pushed, pulling back from the counter to stand up straight. 

“Stop,” he snapped, looking at her now with a sharp glare. “It’s not your business.”

“If I’m coming with you —it is my business,” she retorted, giving him a pointed look. 

“Then don’t,” he countered, standing up now as she went through the cabinets. 

“And run the risk of being a woman, alone, at the end of the fucking world?” She scoffed, turning around to face him again. Her arms crossed over her chest, but not in a way that felt snarky —it was a softer gesture; one that suggested fear. Joel couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen her afraid of anything. Her eyes dropped to the floor for a moment before she looked back up at him. Joel’s brows furrowed as he stood up straighter. “There’s been raiders scoping out the fence —I can’t maintain it, and I can only do so much before they finally figure out how to get through. Don’t…don’t leave me here alone, Joel.”

His jaw clenched as he watched her, instinctively clutching his fists at his side as he considered why she didn’t want to be alone. When Bill and Frank were alive, she was safe here. There wasn’t any reason to be worried about someone getting through —Bill made sure of it. But she was right; she couldn’t maintain this set up. Not alone, not as meticulously as Bill had. 

“You’re not stayin’ here alone,” he finally sighed, running a hand over his face, closing his eyes. There wasn’t a valid argument against her coming; and it was what Bill and Frank wanted. “We’re goin’ to Wyoming; my brother is out there.”

“Doesn’t explain the girl,” she pressed, though her tone wasn’t as pushy as before. “Is she your brother’s kid or…?”

“We’re not related,” he confirmed, finally opening the bottle of water she had given him. “She’s…complicated.” Joel realized that he had to explain Ellie to her, or run the risk of her freaking out if she saw the bite. And it was better to explain it now, in a safe place, than later in the open. “She’s…immune to the infection.”

Her arms dropped to her sides slowly as she looked at him in disbelief. “What do you mean she’s immune?”

“I mean, she’s been bitten twice now and hasn’t turned. I’ve been with her both times; and you know me. You know damn well if she was infected, I would —,”

“I know.” She waved him off, the disbelief shifting into confusion as she leaned on the kitchen counter once more. “So what, then? Where are we taking her?”

“There’s a team of Fireflies that apparently think they can make a cure usin’ her. I was asked to take her to them.”

She hummed a bit in response, looking up at him for a few seconds. Joel shifted uncomfortably under her gaze, trying to look anywhere but her. 

The first time Joel and Tess had met Bill and Frank was nearly a decade ago. He hadn’t wanted to interact with them; had no desire to bring anyone else into the operation the two had been running. But Tess had insisted on it, saying that Frank had been open and clear about what they had and could trade. Eventually, he had given in and they ended up there in Lincoln, pretending life was normal for just a little while. 

That was the same day he’d met her. Barely twenty-two, having been raised in both worlds. Joel hadn’t seen someone as pretty as her in a long time; a healthy glow around her. Shining eyes, and a sweet smile. It felt wrong to find her so attractive at the time –she was so damn young, and the world hadn’t completely ruined her yet. She had been helping Frank tend the garden out back and talking to Tess, who was surprised that a young woman had been living there the entire time.

“She’s my niece,” Frank had explained, wrapping an arm around her shoulders with a small smile. “Bill saved us both, and we’ve been here since.”

Every time they had come back since then –a handful of times over the last decade –she was always there, always just as pretty. Excited when they would bring new things like seeds for fruits or medicine that they couldn’t otherwise get out there on their own. She was quieter then; not necessarily shy, but not willing to interrupt when business was being spoken. Joel could only assume her change in behavior had come the last few years of coping with Frank being sick. And with Bill having taken his life as well…Perhaps she was a bit jaded to the world now. But hell, who wasn’t?

“Come on, cowboy,” she finally decided, motioning for him to follow again. “The truck battery is charging; I’ll go get some clothes for you and Ellie, and we can start packing up supplies.”

He gave her a dirty look, but she ignored him.

“Bill left everything to me,” Joel suddenly announced, following her into the living room. “Well, most of it. He left the house to you.”

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” she sighed, stopping outside a linen closet. Though she pointed at the couch and told him to sit down. “As if I need a house if I’m going with you.”

“Maybe he thought you’d come back one day,” Joel offered as he sat down. He let out a satisfied groan, sinking into the cushions.

For a few minutes, he didn’t respond to whatever she was saying, instead too caught up in how nice it felt to sit down on something actually soft. His body ached, and he wasn’t the young man he once was. And goddamn, the couch felt fantastic on his aching joints. 

“You look like you’re in heaven,” she teased, bringing a box in and setting it on the coffee table. The shower had shut off, and Ellie was yelling about clothes. “You can take a nap, Joel. You look like you need it. It won’t kill you to rest.”

“It’s fine –,”

She threw a shirt at him, hitting him in the face. He scowled, but she was just grinning knowingly. “I’ll bring her clean clothes. You’re gonna shower, and you’re gonna take a nap –me and the kid can start packing up.”

Joel hesitated, staring at the clean flannel in his hands. Then he sighed, caving. “Just don’t let her have a gun.”

“Whatever you say, cowboy.”

[mindutme]

Sdefa Sdaturday #1

Sdefa is my newest conlang, started in July of last year. Like T’owal, it isn’t intended to be naturalistic, but it takes that lack of naturalism a lot farther! Instead of being a spoken language, it’s a musical one; its twelve phonemes are the twelve notes of the Western chromatic scale. It’s playable on any chromatic instrument, since you never need to play more than one note at a time. That means you can sing it, too!

If you do sing it, then of course the syllables you sing don’t matter—just the pitches. The word “Sdefa” doesn’t actually mean anything in the language; instead, it’s a sort of transliteration of the language’s “actual” name, which is the sequence of notes E♭ D E F A. In German music terminology, the note E♭ is called “Es,” so here that translates to the letter S. The Germans also call B♭ “B” and B “H,” which is how the great composer J. S. Bach was able to compose using his musical signature, B♭ A C B.

Almost every word in Sdefa is a tiny musical reference, four or five notes long. In fact, B♭ A C B is a Sdefa word, meaning “great,” since Bach is one of the greatest composers of all time. Most of the references are fragments of songs, usually bits that have lyrics that match the meaning of the word. Other references are parts of pieces whose titles match the meaning in some way. Some other words are:

⁕ D A F D, meaning “art,” from the beginning of the theme from Bach’s Art of Fugue

⁕ G C E D, meaning “deep,” from the first four notes of the main theme from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

⁕ E D G F, meaning “moon,” from the song שײן װי די לבֿנה/Sheyn vi di Levuna (“Pretty as the Moon”)

The word “Sdefa” itself isn’t a reference, though; it’s just something that sounded nice both as a sequence of notes and as a spoken word.

It’s not just the syllables that don’t matter if you’re singing Sdefa. Rhythm and register are not part of the language, so D A F D would mean “art” regardless of the note values or octave(s) it’s played in. This allows the language to be flexible, giving a Sdefa text better chance of having a musical quality instead of sounding like a string of random notes. However, since there are so few phonemes and everything can be played in multiple ways, it does mean that most things take a surprising number of notes to say, and that can take a long time unless you use a fast tempo!

Next week I’ll get a bit into the grammar of Sdefa, and explain how the music at the top of the post translates (loosely) into “Sdefa Saturday!”

[codfanficedits]

Before the mask - Part three

Pairing: Simon Riley x Fem!Reader

Summary: Because Simon wasn’t born as Ghost.

Wordcount: 2629 | Rating: E! (18+ only!)

Warnings: White man flirting?

A/N: Simon would be around 22/23 in this fic, so it would be set around 2015 ish?

Tags: @batmanunicorns523

God he could feel his heart swell with pride every time he saw you walk around on base with his hoodie on. Technically you weren’t his, yet. But it felt like he were his, proudly walking around with his last name. It was a clear message to all the other men on base, and he couldn’t be happier about it.

You on the other hand were as oblivious as could be. Sure the hoodie was a little big, and it smelled just like him, and on top of that people were giving you strange looks all day long, but you were at work, caring about a hoodie wasn’t exactly your top priority.

It wasn’t until you were in the restroom, after a day that went on a little too long, that you noticed the white letters on the back of the hoodie.

‘Property of Riley.’

“That cheeky fucking bastard.” But did you really mind it? Yes. No. Maybe?

Fuck it was hard to think about it, part of you really just wanted to be friends, nothing was too complicated at the moment, nothing could go wrong. But the other part was very close to going feral for this man, the way he looked, the way he smelled, the way you had been sniffing that fucking hoodie all day.

You were ready to bang on his door when that same door flung open.

No matter what you told yourself, you were damned the moment those soft brown eyes locked with yours and all the sudden you couldn’t be mad about the hoodie anymore.

“I was lo-“

“I was lo-“

A sheepish smile from the both of you when you started to say the same thing, at the same time.

“I was looking for you.” Simon resumes, he could feel his heart thump in his chest, he had confessed he was in love before, what was making it so damn hard?

“I got permission to leave the base for the night.” He resumed, holding up a set of car keys. “Care to join me?”

You wanted to say no, you were tired, had a long day, you had to rush in the morning AND you had been wearing his stupid hoodie all day, but how could you decline those eyes and that sweet, sweet smile? “Yeah, sure. Might have to change first.”

His lips curled into a smirk. “Why? ‘s my hoodie not good enough for you?” Simon teased, pulling you with him by the shoulder of the fabric, just like you had pulled him closer towards you during that skype call. “I figured black would be your taste, given your emo phase and all.” The insecurities he had felt during the night had melted away, seeing you in something that belonged to him had made him strut like a peacock.

“So you did know I was wearing it!” You tried to protest. “I didn’t mean to, you must’ve left it in my room last night.”

“I don’t mind.”

“I’ll make sure to wash it before you get it back.” You promised him, and Simon just responded with a simple hum. If it was up to him you didn’t need to wash it at all.

“Where are we going anyway?” You asked him, as he nearly dragged you towards the car, it was getting dark outside already, and you couldn’t remember there being a reason why he had to drive around.

Simon just shrugged. “We’ll see when we start driving.” He simply responded, it wouldn’t matter where he would go to, as long as it was with you. You gave him those soft butterflies in his stomach, and while he wasn’t comfortable letting you know yet, he would give his kidney to spend five minutes with you.

It stayed quiet when the both of you got into the car, the clicking of the seatbelt being the only noise you could hear before he started the car. Did you have to hold back some drool when he put his hand on the back of your seat to drive the car out of the parking lot?

Yes. Shamelessly yes.

Your knees tilted to his side, just begging to be touched, but neither of you vocalized their longings for the other. And you couldn’t stand the awkward silence that followed, so you leaned a bit forward, wanting to turn on the radio. Simon had the same idea, his eyes on the road, not seeing you already leaning forward. Your hands brushing against each other while Maps from Maroon 5 blared out of the radio.

His hands were warm, hot even, and yours were cold. The both of you pulling their hands back the movements your fingers brushed against each other.

You notice the music was loud so you go to turn it down, you didn’t notice that Ghost’s hand was already on the volume switch. Your hand brushes against his, ice was all you felt. His hands were freezing cold.

“How are your hands so warm?” You ask, putting your hands on your lap.

“How are yours so cold?” He replies, pulling away from the volume switch after he turns down the music.

“Don't answer a question with a question." You chuckled, before you looked out of the window. "I guess I just have bad circulation." You explained. "Now, why the hell are your hands warm like that?"  You leaned back into your seat, your fingertips tracing on the back of your hand, feeling the cold skin under your fingertips.

"I don’t know." He responds, putting his warm hand up to your cold one, making a joke about the temperature difference. "I guess I have good circulation." He adds, jokingly mocking your comment from before.

"I didn’t know this before, but when a cold object and a warm object touch, heat is transferred over to the cold object." He explains.

His warm hand begins to transfer heat into your freezing fingers.

"Here, feel." He says.

Your eyebrows rise up at his mocking tone, but you can't help but laugh about it. Your fingers intertwine, but you didn't mind one bit. The warmth of his hand felt welcoming.

"Just so we are clear." You begin. "I’m just holding your hand so I can warm up a little."

"Whatever you say." He chuckles.

Soon, it was Simon who couldn’t remove his hand from yours. As the heat began to transfer, your hand felt incredibly cold on his. The cold was so inviting that even he couldn’t remove it, despite his intentions of doing so before. He never knew he had craved the cold so much before.

"Did you know that humans generate heat, even when you just touch someone?" He adds, rubbing his thumb over your hand. "But for some people, their touch is enough to drive someone insane." He teases.

"Mhm." You hummed softly, you just enjoyed him talk. "Just make sure we don't crash, will ya?" You squeezed his hand softly, not minding having him share his warmth with you, at all.

“Of course." He chuckles, giving your hand another squeeze.

The car continues driving down the empty streets of the city, the light snow flurries falling down from the sky like silent stars. You two were so caught up in the moment that you didn’t even notice that you missed a turn.

You were starting to forget the rest of the taskforce back at the main base. It was only you and Simon in the car, and it felt like you were about to be consumed by the moment.

"It’s a beautiful night." You mentioned as you looked out of the car window.

"Wait. Stop at that gas station for me, will you?" You requested politely, a simple idea brewing inside of your head.

"Sure." He nods, stopping at the nearest gas station.

"What’s up?' He asks, curious as to why you asked him to stop at a gas station.

The snow continues to fall outside of the car, the light breeze causing snowflakes to swirl around in the air like a dance.

You let go of his hand, before you opened the passenger door.

"Stay here." You said, before you went inside. He disliked this part, he wanted to be in control at all times, even in simple situations like this. But he had promised himself that he would try to be better, for you, but mostly for himself.

If you recalled correctly, he had quite a sweet tooth, so you stacked up on some sweet, some soda, and some crisps for yourself.

It wasn't cheap, and you nearly gave yourself a heart attack when you saw the total, but Simon was worth it. With your arms full of snacks you returned, a wide grin on your face.

"If we find a quiet place, we can watch the stars." You said, as you sat back

Simon wasn't expecting you to stock up a bunch of snacks to enjoy together, and it made his heart flutter that you had bought sweets for him, he had told you he liked gummy bears once and you had remembered.

"Sure." He responds, smiling at the gesture.

Once you're both back in the car he starts driving. After a few minutes of driving, he finds a quiet, empty looking spot.

It was just far enough away from the city and main roads that there wouldn't be anyone around for miles. It was a perfect spot for watching the stars, and Simon stops the car.

With a little bit of work you sit down on the cold ground to watch the stars, the snacks and soda divided between the two of them, and you sit on his left side, a different side than in the car.

You hold his other hand, using it to keep her other hand warm, while they stargaze.

Simon is happy to sit down next to you in the fresh snow, which crunches under the weight of your bodies. He holds your hand tightly, still trying to warm up your otherwise freezing hand.

Simon looks over to look at the food and snacks. He picks up a bag of gummy bears and a soda.

He smiles as he watches the stars with you. He leans back on the ground, his head leaning on the car door.

The snow outside of the car had picked up, it had turned into a full-blown snowstorm. The snow was piling up outside, creating a winter wonderland of sorts...

...The snow flurries felt like a flurry of silent stars, swirling and twirling around each other. In that moment, it was hard to believe that there was no magic involved -- how could something so beautiful exist naturally?

"This night is... incredible." Simon whispers to you, holding your hand.

He pulls you closer, using his body to warm it even more, eventually the snow is too heavy to stay outside anymore, so your little idea gets cut short, as you both head to the car again. But the both of you have a smile on your face, and when you turn to Simon you can see a snowflake in his eyelashes, just when you thought those brown eyes couldn’t get prettier, the universe pulls this stunt on you.

“Jezus, it is only October.” Simon huffed. “This American climate is something else. Almost makes me regret going on this exchange program.”

You laugh at his remark. “Speaking about October.” You begin, trying to find something to talk about. “What are you dressing up as for Halloween?”

Simon’s smile fades, and his expression shifts to a serious one, his eyes darkening. “You have to promise you won’t laugh.”

“Okay, okay, I promise!”

“That’s not enough.” Simon teased. “I need you to swear it on something.”

“I swear on my life th-“ You stop your sentence when you see the frown on his face. “What?”

“Nothing, nothing. But I’ve seen your life and I want you to swear on something that is worth something.”

The punch you land on his shoulder is harder than you intent it to be, and Simon is pleasantly surprised by your strength. Yet there is an awkward tension. You want to apologize, violence should never be the answer, but he did cross a line. The feelings of guilt seeping in to your soul.

“Shit.” His eyes widen. “I can only imagine what you can do with a plastic bucket.” And with that he eases the tension. “Sorry, that was out of line.”

“I shouldn’t have punched you.” You reply to his apology.

“No, no, it’s okay, I deserved that one. Just remind me that I will never spar with you. I would like to keep my life.”

He rubs his shoulder. “I might even use this as an excuse to get out of training tomorrow morning. Even better, I might tell your dad about it.”

You laugh again. “Worst case I’ll get grounded again.”

As you both laugh, the remaining tension seems to disappear into the thin air. “Right, I won’t make you swear, but please don’t laugh at me.” Simon says and you nod, of course you wouldn’t laugh.

“I was watching The Punisher the other day, and you know how the main character wears a shirt with a skull on it?”

He stops his explanation to see if you’re listening, and you nod to show him that he can continue. “I was thinking about making a skull mask you know, a little something to hide my face, I find those parties a little awkward, and maybe I’ll earn myself a cool callsign or something.” Simon is nervous, worried you’ll laugh at him, but it is just a little smile that curves your lips upward.

“I think that is a pretty cool idea.” You answer, the idea of Simon crafting his own mask seems so endearing to you.

He grins at you. “Thanks.”

“What kind of callsign would you like?” You ask, and he shrugs as he turns the car back on. Your eyes flicker to the clock, and it is indeed getting late.

“The Punisher would be way too cliché.” Simon answers. “But I hope it sparks some creativity around base.”

“What about Ghost?”

“Ghost?”

“Yeah, you move around pretty quiet, and when the enemy spots you, it is already too late.”

“Yeah, but I’m not death.” He retorts.

“That is beside the point.” You answer.

He rolls his eyes playfully before he starts to drive. “I’ll think about it.”

And that answer has to do it for now, you know him well enough to know that it won’t be useful to push it any further.

“What about you?” He asks, his gaze flicking to you for a brief moment.

“Katniss Everdeen.”

A grin forms on his lips. “It would suit you.” He says, but Simon has to hold back a snicker, it is such a cliché, and he loves it so much. In his book, nothing is worse than a person who is trying to force themselves to be unique, it is okay to like mainstream things, and the fact that you’re so content with it, it makes him feel content too.

Before you know it you’re back on base with him, and he stops the car at the entrance. “You go inside already, it is cold and it’s late. I’ll park the car” He says as you unbuckle your belt.

“Thank you Simon, I had a lot of fun.” You say, before you open the passenger door.

Simon smiles, this would have been the perfect time to kiss you, but he is too much of a coward to do it. “I had fun too.”

He sighs as he watches you leave, his eyes lingering on the hoodie you’re wearing. His hoodie, before his eyes shift to your ass, he was a man after all.

[dreamingdormouse]

Conversations in my house can be WILD.

There are four of us. Me, my husband, and our two kids - an older daughter and a younger son. They're... let's be vague and say 3rd-7th grade. Of all of us, the only one who MIGHT be neurotypical (and I don't give it good odds) is my son. My husband and I have been bookworms since we were very small, we met in a library as middle schoolers. And both kids are very bright and love to acquire new information, although like me they have trouble finishing assignments. Since they're still comparatively young, they haven't yet acquired a lot of niche information if it doesn't relate to their special interests. So conversations often involve a lot of infodumping - from them, if it IS a special interest, or to them, if they're curious.

When I say our discussions can go anywhere, I mean it. A couple days ago we went out for dinner, and our discussions in the car, at the restaurant, and heading home involved some fairly random subjects.

Summaries of five of our topics under the cut, if I've correctly guessed the workings of this button I found. I've never figured out how to make a long post look shorter before!

(1) Why it is PERFECTLY OKAY to pronounce GIF with either a hard or soft "G" sound, even though it abbreviates a word with a hard "G" sound. My daughter's initial reasoning was fairly sound, but unnecessarily prescriptive; we pointed out that English does not require that abbreviations follow the pronunciations of their source words, for example "Laser" is generally pronounced "lay-zer" not "lah-seer," and therefore you shouldn't yell at people that they are wrong just because they use a different pronunciation than you, which would be rude even if they were wrong.

(2) The International Phonetic Alphabet, what a schwa (ə) is and how it sounds (which is kind of like "uh"), how any vowel can make this sound in English (balloon, camel, pencil, carrot, bug), a quick bit of research to discover that this can include "Y" when it's used as a vowel (vinyl), the fact that schwa is the most common sound in the English language, and then that "E" is the most common letter in the English language, which led to both kids counting how many "E"s are in each of our full names, how many vowels, and how many total letters.

(3) How backwards aging would work - this one in itself deserves a whole post, I wrote it up yesterday but it vanished into the void. I'll rewrite it maybe tomorrow.

(4) Who was in town when the kids were born and a VERY brief discussion of the events of both days - not the how-it-works bit, but "waking your dad up at 4am" and "calling the babysitter to watch Daughter when Son was coming" and "Grandma was scheduled to arrive the next day to help, you couldn't have stayed put another 36 hours, you little Early Bird?" kinds of things. The kids were vastly amused by the fact they both started the proceedings at 4am but that my son took twelve hours less to be born than my daughter, which I summarized as "my body got better at it the second time." We were mostly focused on the fact that babies are rarely born on their actual due dates, because that's just an estimate by the doctor; if someone were to somehow show an unborn baby a calendar and say "See here, you're expected to put in an appearance on April 23rd," (why does this person have a posh British accent in my head?) the baby wouldn't know or care what April was. So out-of-town family can't exactly pre-schedule a visit for the day after the birth (especially if the visiting family would need to fly). This came up because we were discussing when their uncle gave my son the nickname that said uncle still uses; it wasn't "when he first saw you," because Uncle wasn't in town that week, it was "when he heard what we named you, the day after you were born."

(5) Why English-speakers call cow meat "beef" but chicken meat "chicken;" the answer involves the Norman conquest, loan words, and classism.

If you're curious about topics 1, 2, or 5, let me know. 3 will be expanded on soon.

[runwayrunway]

No. 48 - Eurowings

We're here today to talk about Eurow

Yes, Eurowings! Did you think those five letters started any other words? Silly. Let's discuss the aerosartorial choices of Eurowings, a member of - oh dear - the Lufthansa Group.

Eurowings! Eurowings is a former regional airline formed from the 1990 merger of Nürnberger Flugdienst, a regional airline that I'd heard of, and Reise- und Industrieflug, one I hadn't. After its acquisition by Lufthansa, it has been restructured into a low-cost subsidiary, making it something of the FlyDubai of Germany. That means I am yet again courting a C&D from the Lufthansa Group, and I am delighted to throw myself on this particular blade.

The process of Eurowings's evolution into its current state is somewhat tortuous, involving the cannibalization of its old subsidiary Germanwings (yes, this was subsidiary-ception, and while it happened after 2015 it seems to have been planned before...well, you know) and the establishment of an Austrian subsidiary which was moved to Malta last year and is named - get this - Eurowings Europe.

Eurowings has been going through it of late. Well, of ever, as far as I can tell. If you've ever been frustrated by a delay, spare a thought for the passengers of 2016's Eurowings flight 131, some of whom had their visas expire while stuck in their hotels in Cuba during their 60-hour delay. Every fourth flight could expect six hours or so of unscheduled quality time at the airport. Or, you know, 20 sometimes. 20 hours. Yikes! That's what happens when you start seven long-haul routes with one (1) A330 and a handful of various and sundry wet leases. A lot of their routes have been taken over by Lufthansa proper, which seems eager to kill the brand as soon as possible, and I can't blame them given it's somehow developed a worse reputation than actual Lufthansa. I've never flown with them. They served Boston for literally three entire months, but I wouldn't have flown Eurowings anyway. For my own taste their 'cheap' prices are still fairly expensive.

The Eurowings livery is unfortunately on more than just one plane for the moment. They have 95 A320 family members and four wet-leased Boeing 737s, giving them a very typical fleet for a low cost carrier. And they look like that!

Okay, first and foremost, I want to talk about their logo. It looks a lot like LATAM's logo.

Indeed, they even both use a variation on something adjacent to blue and something adjacent to pink. I think it's definitely a coincidence - they both were unveiled in 2015 - and even if it weren't I don't respect either one enough to defend its honor from the other.

So, those colors. I think I prefer the shades chosen by Eurowings, and in a competent livery design that palette could be extremely effective. I love LATAM's saturated pink and indigo, which made the mostly-white fuselage a disappointment, and I like Eurowings's desaturated fuchsia and cyan as a combination even more, but the lack of fuselage coverage gets even sadder when it's such light colors that fail to contrast against the white at all.

Unlike LATAM, Eurowings makes use of grey as both shading and background. I like this! I think it can make for a nice base to play with and a potential source of some interesting, dynamic designs.

Oh, and the logo is meant to look like an 'E'. I guess I can sort of see it, but it looks more like me attempting to get a pen that's starting hard going again. (Don't mix inks in pens, though. Especially not fountain pens.) Anyway, I don't really love the logo's shape in isolation but I do think it could easily lend itself to some totally acceptable fuselage layouts.

It's the wordmark that I think is interesting. This is about to be a long section about fonts but I promise that one, I have a point, and two, if you keep scrolling it will stop being about fonts.

The typeface used for the Eurowings wordmark is Soleto in medium weight. It was designed by Dalton Maag, a London-and São-Paulo based foundry. You've definitely seen their work around - they've done custom fonts for the likes of Pitney Bowes, Tesco, Fox Sports, Nokia, AT&T, Airbnb, Wix, USA Today, Google, and the flipping BBC, among others. And, well, a few that I would go as far as to say are pretty iconic:

Lush Handwritten is actually gorgeous in Cyrillic, by the way.

I would say they're not my favorite foundry, with a lot of their work trending towards somewhat boring sans-serifs that are not at all to my taste (you will never replace Gill Sans), but they've had some hits. They're also no stranger to airlines - they did a custom typeface for the TUI wordmark, which appears on their livery!

Blue side up appeal aside, I definitely want to someday talk about the strange beast which is TUI, the World's Most Misogynistic Airline.

So you might think that Dalton Maag was commissioned to make a nice custom font family for Eurowings, given Lufthansa literally used their money to commission a slightly different version of Helvetica, but you would be wrong. As their website makes no mention of a custom typeface for Eurowings, despite discussing modified versions of their existing products for other companies (like Fox Sports Cricket being a variant of Aller), I believe they are indeed using off-the-shelf Soleto, available via Dalton Maag's website as well as Adobe Fonts. Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with this, and I, who cannot afford a tablet to redesign the Eurowings livery, am not trying to wealth-shame an airline for not custom-ordering a typeface. They're far from alone. Another Dalton Maag user is Cebu Pacific, which uses Foco in a bold weight to decent effect, and I firmly believe that there's no reason to commission a second Helvetica if you want to use Helvetica. SAS uses Rotis Sans, and that's a massive airline with money to spare.

I just think the contrast here is funny. I could get the right to use the full Soleto font family for the entirety of Runway Runway's branding, title, and body text for one thousand sterling, or around $1350 in USD. This is, to me, a fortune and more money than I've had at any one time in literal years. It's also definitely not what Eurowings paid. I don't know what they paid, because Dalton Maag does custom quotes for unlimited licenses, but I don't want to imagine how much it cost to commission a firm to make a second Helvetica, so this just makes me think that Lufthansa really despises Eurowings. Pointless diversion? Maybe. I just think it's funny.

I think Soleto Medium is on the uglier side. I mean, I really don't like how Eurowings uses it in the same way I don't like Helvetica or the FedEx proprietary font - I really don't like really wide sans serifs used as titling, and I'm not sure why. Is it because it reminds me of elementary school? Is it because I find them sort of illegible? Are they just...ugly? Well, there's no such thing as objective ugliness, but this is my blog and I dislike them. They're certainly not at all memorable, which frequently makes their use something of an epic branding fail.

Soleto looks better than Helvetica, I'll give it that. A lot better. It's not really the typeface, though. It's the usage. While Dalton Maag's website does say:

Soleto is a flexible font family that can adapt itself to a wide variety of uses. [...] [it] is also quite capable of standing on its own.

It opens with:

Soleto is a contemporary sans serif font family with a quietly confident character. It works well for big areas of text, creating an even rhythm and texture, but can also make a statement at larger sizes.

And I think this is totally true, actually. As body text Soleto is fine! (This is via Dalton Maag's TypeTester feature, as are all future samples.)

This is 10pt Soleto medium, and it's a solid if generic sans-serif. Not overly ugly, totally legible. I'm not sure it's meant to be used for a logo, though. When I read 'statement at larger sizes' I think...titling, not airplane livery. A title for a website and an airplane wordmark are just different orders of magnitude.

How about titling? Well, I tried my own name in a couple different weights, and I actually think Soleto looks great in black italic.

This is a bit modern for my own taste, but I think this would look fine as a wordmark. Frankly, I think it would look good as an airline livery! It's not nearly as generic, it's almost a bit stylized even, and it's legible. The italic is always something I think looks nice due to its aerodynamic implications, and with a name as long as mine you don't really notice that this also does that obnoxious thing where the bottoms of certain letters dip beneath the baseline. Let's try some other weights!

Normally I prefer lighter weights in sans serifs, but no, Soleto looks worse the thinner it gets. These are, respectively, Light and Medium. Medium is what Eurowings uses!

Oh, wow, would you look at that! One of their default color combinations is even basically the Eurowings scheme, though in reverse.

Well, this...doesn't look that bad, right? It's boring, but it doesn't actively make me wrinkle my nose.

So why is this such a problem? I mean, let's look at this picture of an airplane, as we do on this blog. I've chosen this picture because you can see a Finnair (post coming soon) plane in the background. Finnair has this neat spiky sci-fi looking wordmark, for which no typeface exists. This wordmark is absolutely huge, and in a very dark blue against white.

Meanwhile, Eurowings's logo is very similarly formatted to Lufthansa's. It's high up and closely spaced, making it feel a little claustrophobic. It's not...as bad as Lufthansa's proprietary Helvetica (Helvetica Neue Neue? Helvetica Ultra-Ultra-Condensed? Hellvetica?) but that's barely a compliment. Lufthansa has theirs well above the window-line all squished together, while Eurowings has the decency to use the windows as the underline you would think they're just perfect to be, but with a typeface that's medium weight, neither thick nor thin and with no italics or serifs, it becomes something of a small blob. To locate something that far up should be a stylistic choice. There should be no default choices in airline liveries. You can design a massive wordmark to cover the fuselage, or something which looks nice when localized to part of it, but you don't just get to do the equivalent of opening your text editor, typing in one word without indenting, and calling that a livery. Lufthansa doesn't get this, and neither, really, does any of the unfortunate airlines in the Lufthansa Group.

The color used doesn't blend into the white, but it also isn't like they're sharply contrasted. It just doesn't particularly draw your eye. It's a wordmark your eyes glide right over and it's not at all memorable. While grey or cyan could have been incorporated somehow to accentuate it, they weren't. For a livery that's mostly white to work, you generally need some sort of really vivid color. Kalitta Air's red and gold or Tibet Airlines' rainbow are examples of good use of a white fuselage. You could use a different background, but they stand on their own, and the white plays an active part in the color palette rather than just being a default canvas for it. Many airlines use black or dark blue for their wordmarks, and while these aren't the most creative choices they're used for a reason. Just look at Finnair. That's some contrast. It's nice and legible and distinct.

Icelandair's two most recent liveries use the same placement for their wordmark as Eurowings and Finnair respectively. Now, I actually like the wordmark on the old livery better. It has those nice trailing serifs and is in small caps, making it memorable and dynamic, and it doesn't feel closely spaced. The name 'Icelandair' teeters on the edge of being too long for this to work, but ultimately pulls it off. The modern livery dispenses with this much nicer font in favor of gigantic letters. While I like this less, it's still serviceable. It is gigantic, legible, and feels as natural as me sprawling out on a couch after work. It's simply expanded to its natural point. Adequately done on both archetypes.

Meanwhile, the lack of color contrast from the white fuselage was perhaps my main criticism of Air Astra's livery, which I otherwise quite like. It's probably the inverse of Eurowings, which is contrasted enough to be acceptable but entirely boring in design - well-designed, but please, please, please let me actually see it.

Eurowings just...well, I'm going to copy and paste exactly what I said earlier. There should be no default choices in airline liveries. You can design a massive wordmark to cover the fuselage, or something which looks nice when localized to part of it, but you don't just get to do the equivalent of opening your text editor, typing in one word without indenting, and calling that a livery.

And, as a final note, something that looks good on a webpage won't always look good on an airplane. The angles you'll see it from are completely different, it has to compete for the rest of the livery for your attention, and you can't necessarily put infinite space around it due to the very physically limited canvas you're working with. The Eurowings wordmark feels vertically cramped more than it does horizontally, because the windows are right below it and immediately above it the fuselage just...ends, from a two-dimensional view. Something looking okay in copy doesn't mean you can transfer it immediately to material.

Lindon Leader talked about this when discussing his design process for the FedEx logo in a very illuminating interview I cited heavily in my FedEx post. He looked at multiple pre-existing fonts but decided to create a custom one, and one of his reasons for this was:

[...] each had its potential limitations downstream in application to thousands of FedEx media, from waybills and embroidered courier caps to FedEx.com and massive signage for aircraft, buildings and vehicles. 

Something can look acceptable or even sleek on a webpage, and that same wordmark can look downright horrible when applied to an airplane. I'll say this for FedEx - while I find their logo ugly it is absolutely good at what it needs to do. It looks no worse in any one medium or context than any other, and that's one of the reasons it's successful. It's not to my taste, but it's definitely well-designed, and I think one of the ways to improve the livery would actually be to somehow give it more real estate on the fuselage.

So the wordmark is, in my opinion, an abject failure. It's not even ugly but I mean that in the same way Wolfgang Pauli describes crackpot physics as not even wrong. Like, it's fine. It's nothing showstopping or even memorable enough to be picked out of an identity parade of default webfonts but I don't despise it. It's a common phenomenon and I'm picking on Eurowings because it's there and I know exactly what font was used and thus can mess around with it, not because it's the worst. Much like Lufthansa, it's an opportunistic victim. You know, the sort of post I'll end up hyperlinking to later, because even in its failure it's nothing exceptional.

I will say I enjoy the tiny outline of black on the letters. That's not on the wordmark proper, as rendered on their website m, but adding it was definitely the right move to help the magenta stand out from the white. Once you know about it you can notice how it makes the wordmark pop ever so slightly, turning an unmitigated catastrophe into a mitigated catastrophe. It's almost infuriating that they did this thoughtful little thing when you zoom out and remember what it's in service of. This honestly is a reoccurring thing with Eurowings.

Look at that nice tail design! They could have slapped the logo on and left it at that, like so many other airlines, but they didn't. They use the same nice colors and the overlapping greys to create a design that is clearly their logo while also being abstract and dynamic. There's a lot of shapes, a lot of motion, and a lot of nice shades of cyan and magenta, and I love it!

See that airplane landing in the background? Think about what airline you think it flies for, and stick a pin in that for a minute.

Hey, uh...where's the rest of it, though?

So, yes. Eurowings shares the first five letters of its name with Eurowhite. If you're not familiar with the term (I have a glossary, by the way) it just means a livery that is almost completely white save for logos. One could argue that the fact that the pattern on the tail isn't limited to strictly the tail and does form some sort of attempt at a fuselage design means that Eurowings' livery isn't 'true' Eurowhite, but I'm not going to brook that. Eurowhite is a state of mind. There is a nice, abstract design here which could easily be extended further. There is a grey shade which could be utilized (as it is on the engines, which look like they're lost and wandered onto another livery by accident) and there are infinite ideas to be had on the planet, and instead the majority of the plane is just white.

If one thing is thought of as my thesis from this post, let it be this, said for the third time: there is no such thing as default. Things like this wordmark placement, this type of font, and the primarily white fuselage are not default. The fact that they are common and boring does not make them inherent until replaced. They are still an active choice just as much as designing a livery that doesn't utilize these features is. It was proposed, iterated on, signed off on, and implemented. Airlines don't start with a template they then alter. They start with a vast world of infinite possibilities and decide they want to do the same thing as everyone else - that's a choice just how any other act of cowardice is a choice. I think the misconception that boring design is a result of inertia and lack of effort is a harmful one. It is a choice. They choose to do this.

They do not choose it because it is right for their livery, because they like it. They choose it because it is common, it is safe. It is reliable and it doesn't rock the boat. I've said this before discussing Southwest and Flair - low-cost carriers should be willing to rock the boat. If you're going to advertise yourself as the no-frills option you shouldn't try to look all composed and corporate. You have nothing to lose with being bright and pretty and interesting, so why aren't you?

And that cowardice is what makes me hate it so much. Some liveries are ugly, and some are almost ugly but stop halfway to cower in a Eurowhite bunker in an attempt to stem the bleeding, but there's nothing more tragic than a livery so afraid of being ugly that it cuts off and cauterizes something beautiful. The fear of ugliness is the death of beauty. condor is worth one billion Eurowings.

(No, Eurowings does not fail the Star Alliance Test, though.)

Like many of these designs that sort of just decide to stop after the tail, the longer a plane is the worse the Eurowings livery is on it. This is a very nice tail attached to a big white tube. Sure, Eurowings mostly operates somewhat short aircraft, but that wasn't the case when the livery was designed - back then they had A330s. Even now they have A321s.

Frustratingly, given how much I've ragged on this livery, I do still really like the tail. Even more frustratingly, you can see how easy it would have been to not have it be this way. The end of the cyan stripe almost begs to be held onto, weaved onto the rest of the fuselage, but it just isn't. It looks unfinished. It looks sad.

With all these shades of cyan and magenta to play with, the light heavily alters the way the colors on the tail look. They're never not pretty. It's a lovely colorscheme that's dramatically underutilized. The way it weaves together has so much potential, and it's attached to a white body. It looks like the paint job is unfinished. And that's what I hate the most about Eurowhite - good ideas left to languish, where a bit of custom letterhead does a better job of expressing your identity than an airplane livery.

The one feature Eurowings has towards the front of the plane is this little cheek decal of the Eurowings logo. Nice thought, but it almost looks actively worse when it stands out like that among an otherwise blank space. Plus, it's so small it might as well be a dot. It's cute, but in terms of overall effect on the livery it has the effect of making something mostly white look cluttered, which is just downright bizarre.

Obviously I can't endorse this. While not quite at the Lufthansa Line, with the actual bit of design happening on the tail instead of a sterile block, it doesn't cover much more fuselage than a proper exemplar of the phenomenon, and that's just always going to be a bit of a kneecap. Eurowhite is a state of mind, so much so that I almost think an unremarkable sans-serif font is as much of a codifying feature as a white body despite not being specified anywhere in the term. The same decision-making process leads both places, and the little black outline and cheek stamp and nice tail design just cant overpower that.

I'm giving Eurowings a D+.

Eurowings reminds me most of Saudia. They both have gorgeous colorschemes wasted on a design which burrows itself down as far into the substrate of artistic cowardice as physically possible. It's especially tragic and leaves me fighting myself over my final ratings. It feels wrong to grade such a gorgeous tail so harshly, but the good design features just make the bad package even more insulting. And at the end of the day I just have to put my foot down.

Sometimes I'm generous with grading because an airline is new, or because they're iterating on something that could be taken in a good direction. Eurowings isn't in the process of developing towards something nice, it's just Eurowings. It's an airline that stranded people in Cuba for 60 hours and Lufthansa seems to want it dead. I don't think we'll be getting a Eurowings livery overhaul anytime soon and I'm pessimistic about its longevity in general. Low-cost carriers and subsidiaries of large airlines are both easy come, easy go. Tears in the rain. 'Twas ever thus. Try not to get too attached.

Remember that plane from earlier? Yeah, I've got no clue what airline it flies for, but I don't think I can rule out it being Eurowings. 'Twas ever thus.

[ducklooney]

5, 21, 22, 23 for asking and yes, what do you like to draw in terms of have you been passionate about ducks for a long time?

Oh, hi. Hmm…good questions, although you asked a little too much. Also, the questions have been changed under the ordinal letters of the alphabet rather than numbers, but never mind. I'm going!

5. (E) My blog started four and a half years ago (next year it will be five years since I've been on Tumblr), mostly out of dissatisfaction, and to join a new collective that has similar interests as me. Interestingly, I joined when it was Donald's 85th birthday. XD Yeah, I already enjoyed the Ducktales reboot back then (even though it disappointed me in a lot of things at the time), I was still sad that no one mentioned the other Duck media, especially when we talk about the comics, Quack Pack, The Legend of The Three Caballeros and I wanted to take that job into my own hands. So I posted various posts about other Donald Duck media and let me tell you, I succeeded in that. Unfortunately, due to numerous obligations related to the university and at home, there were times and often when I was away for a long time. Still, I'm grateful to the Ducktales reboot for reawakening my feelings of nostalgia and re-reading the Donald Duck comics I used to read when I was a little boy.

21. (U) Actually I am, but more that I am a Christian believer and that I believe in God the Creator, as well as in Jesus who saved us from our sins, as well as in the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I study and read the Bible and go to church. But I'm not a fanatical believer, plus I don't force anyone to believe what I believe. Everyone has the right to their own religion. But I don't like it when my faith is abused through bad mockery and attacks on being a believer.

22. (V) I don't know if you mean the person I love or me personally, but I will answer both. I like in a person who is very pleasant and kind, who likes to draw and respect others and someone who is close to me. And I like to draw, read, write, and sometimes ride my bike outside, when the weather is nice.

23. (W) I don't like it when someone copies me without asking me, without me being mentioned, I don't like it when they insult and when they lie, I especially don't like it when someone insults me in dirty ways, as well as abuses my name as something worst. And I don't like sweet-talking people, I don't like it when someone blocks me, just because we have different views, and I don't like it when someone breaks their promises (either mine or someone else's). And I don't like it when someone insults my religion.

And this particular question, to answer you, I've been drawing since I was young, certainly when I went to school, but I didn't like to draw and I often had terrible drawings. I'm talking about when I drew in the traditional way. I think I have the hardest time painting with water colors. As for drawing itself, and coming back to it, I started four years ago, unfortunately I drew mostly very badly, but over time I learned some methods (and now I practice) and perfected it. If you look at my first drawings and my current drawings, you will see a big difference. I try my best though. Now I need to practice drawing and coloring backgrounds as well as portraits. And as for the ducks, well, I've been watching the classic shorts and reading the comics since I was a kid, but when I was in my teens, I stopped. Yes, I watched a lot of cartoons. In return, the Ducktales reboot is ironically credited, and I've come to love the comics more than before, even collecting those comics. Either online or I buy them. However, I prefer the classics the most, because it is still the best that will always remain. The Legend of The Three Caballeros and re-watching Quack Pack and other cartoons made me even more devoted to ducks.

I hope I satisfied you with your answers. And yes, I tell others to feel free to ask me, if you are interested in something. And yes, those are my opinions and sorry if anyone is offended by this, it's not my intention, just stating my views.

And yes, HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

[5sosfanfictioncatalogue]

3k-5k Word Fics Masterlist

part two

3 A.M. - @daydadahlias​ (cornflowerblue (daydadahlias)) michael/luke M, 4k

Summary: Five times Michael accidentally meets Luke in the bathroom and the one time he meets him there on purpose.

a little extra credit never hurt anybody - @sup3rbloom (haveufoundwhaturlookingfor) michael/ashton T, 4k

Summary: Michael and Ashton used to be best friends when they were younger, unfortunately Michael ditches Ashton for popularity when they get older. Things change when Ashton gets offered extra credit to tutor a failing student. That student so happens to be Michael Clifford.

Crush (ao3) - Calumthoodshands (tndart) luke/calum T, 3k

Summary: It's Calum's birthday, and Luke agreed to come - against his better judgement. Because how the hell is he going to talk to the guy he's had a crush on for over half a year now?

Gay Doesn't Mean Rainbows (ao3) - walking_crisis69 michael/luke T, 3k

Summary: "Your breath tastes like smoke." Luke said as he pulled away, running his fingers through his enemy's hair. "And your breath tastes like rainbows."

happy endings (ao3) - emiliathegreat (puckdummy) calum/ashton E, 3k

Summary: calum starts to visit a local bookstore to spend time with ashton, the cute boy who works there

him (ao3) - dazedlight (opinionoutpost) luke/ashton T, 3k

Summary: "{fifth.} YOU KNOW HIM. you love him. through a thousand lifetimes, across millions of stars, you’d find him, you’d never leave him. you love him, it consumes you, until death do you part."

Or, Luke loves every part of Ashton, and Ashton loves him back.

I Can Read You like My Favourite Book (ao3) - fivesecondsofmae luke/ashton E, 3k

Summary: Luke comes to pick his boyfriend Ashton up after his shift at Irwin Co. Bookstore, but they end up having sex before they make it to dinner.

i got a long-term plan (with short-term fixes) (ao3) - bellawritess michael/luke, jack/alex T, 4k

Summary: Michael comes into the bookstore one day with the weirdest request he’s made of Luke in the almost-year they’ve known each other.

“I need a hot boyfriend,” he announces. “You in?”

Luke frowns very slowly. “To help you find a hot boyfriend?”

“To be my hot boyfriend,” Michael says, like it’s obvious. “Temporarily.”

I’ve Got The Recipe (ao3) - FayeHunter michael/luke T, 4k

Summary: Michael keeps going back to the same coffee shop and no, it has nothing to do with the cute barista.Or 3 times Michael went to Luke’s coffee shop to see him and 1 time Luke visited Michael at his job

Lollipop (ao3) - im_just_a_sucker_for_bromance michael/luke E, 3k

Summary: Seeing Michael flustered on stage after dancing against him was a turn on for Luke. He knew he had to get Michael in his bed; he just had to build up Michael's frustrations and wait for the right time to do it.

make you blush (ao3) - dazedlight (opinionoutpost) luke/ashton T, 5k

Summary: "Luke peers up, and he's sure his heart does stop this time as he shrinks in on himself, worrying at his bottom lip. He really doesn't need this right now. In fact, he needs the opposite of this – he really, really doesn't want to talk to Ashton Irwin at this moment, or any moment, to be honest, because he thinks his stomach might fall out of his ass if he tries."

Or, Luke is a dweeby Year 10 who has a crush on the star of the musical.

(not) just friends (ao3) - galacticsugar michael/luke T, 4k

Summary: His eyes land on the folded paper, drawn in by Luke’s scrawling handwriting.

Specifically, on his name in Luke’s handwriting.

Casually, like he’s being watched, Michael picks up the paper and carefully unfolds it. It’s from one of those hotel room pads, branded with the hotel logo, which Luke improved with some artful squiggles. At the top, it says Michael Mix, the peaks of the Ms rising high above the rest of the letters, both words underlined twice. And below that, a list of songs.

Not Without You (ao3) - pilotmikey michael/luke G, 3k

Summary: Michael doesn’t want to go to prom without a date, but Luke doesn't want to go to prom without Michael.

taking flight (ao3) - strxngersagain luke/calum, michael/ashton G, 5k

Summary: Luke likes routine. He likes getting up every morning in his tiny apartment he shares with Michael and getting the same train to the airport every morning. He likes going to the dive bar on Hunter Street on fridays with his friends. He likes his routine.

————

Luke works at Starbucks at Sydney International Airport. Calum is a security guard at the same airport. Luke spends most of his mornings looking forward to when Calum comes for a coffee on his break. Calum spends most of his mornings looking forward to when he gets to see Luke on his break.

taking the long way home (ao3) - softirwin luke/ashton, michael/calum T, 5k

Summary: “May we have your attention for flight BA8227,” the tinny voice of the announcement says, and Ashton’s stomach sinks. They never announce anything he wants to hear; there’s never any we’ve upgraded hardworking and broke session drummer Ashton Irwin to first class, he’s also been given unlimited air miles and a refund on his overpriced tuna melt. “We are sorry to announce that this flight is delayed by approximately seven hours. This is due to unforeseen adverse weather conditions. I repeat-”

-

aka their flight is delayed au

Temporary Bliss (ao3) - dxnise michael/calum T, 3k

Summary: And as they fell asleep, bodies close, Calum realized then that if the hero in every story had to have that one tragic flaw that led to his eventual downfall, his would be Michael.

there for you - @sup3rbloom​ (haveufoundwhaturlookingfor) luke/ashton, michael/calum T, 3k

Summary: Luke has been transferred to countless high schools due to the constant bullying. Finally, Luke lands in a high school where he gets to be with Ashton. He thinks it will be better for him, but he underestimated how popular Ashton really is.

this time i’m not leaving without you (ao3) - sourscarlets luke/ashton G, 4k

Summary: Sometimes Luke find himself looking back on his teenage years and wonders about things. He wonders how his old high school teachers are doing, if any of them have retired since he’s left. He thinks about his old classmates and if they are leading the successful lives they all dreamed about when the accepted their diplomas on graduation day.

Luke wonders if Ashton ever thinks about him.

or where Luke is a bartender in New York City when his ex-boyfriend comes in for a drink

We Couldn't Freeze This Moment (ao3) - antisocialhood luke/ashton N/R, 3k

Summary: Ashton's relationship with Luke was a simplistic amount of domestic fluff and vanilla sex.

wherever I am, I’ll come running (ao3) - nothingliketherain (39_killer_queen) michael/ashton T, 4k

Summary: If he’s being honest, Ashton doesn’t know what to do either. Out of Michael’s closest friends he’s the only one who doesn’t have a dog, the least likely to have a vet on speed dial, the least likely to have something like this happen to him before. But instead of calling Luke or Calum for help, he called Ashton.

Because if there’s one thing Ashton does know how to do is take care of Michael.

[airprime7]

Four and vier (four in German, pronounced “fear” but more German) are both 4 letters long. Cinqo (five in Spanish, pronounced “sink-o” but more Spanish) is 5 letters long.

However, four is the only English number which, when spelt out, is the same length as its numerical value. This, however, makes it nicely unique in terms of English names for numbers.

Fifty has 5 letters and seventy has 7 letters. This fact is nice. Therefore fifty-four and seventy-four have letter-counts of 5-4 and 7-4. Thirty-six and forty-five have reversed pairings; their counts are 6-3 and 5-4 respectively. Both of these sum to 9, and the numbers they represent are both multiples of 9, even if reversed.

Forty has its letters in alphabetical order. One (and also first) has its in reverse. These are the only English integers to do so. (Non-integers, such as pi and e, do not count toward this.)

Eighty-eight and thirty-three both are divisible by 11, and 11 letters long.

Eleven plus two = Twelve plus one, both mathematically and anagramatically (they have all the same letters.)

I have many many more nice number facts; perhaps I should start a series of information posts about them. Many of these I retrieved from this site.

its absurd that trio is four letters long and not three

[ilearnedthistodaysblog]

#1175 What is the Myers Briggs personality test?

Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel, creators of the Myers-Briggs personality test, early 1900s What is the Myers Briggs personality test? The Myers Briggs personality test is a psychological test that categorizes people into one of 16 different personality types. It is a fun test to take, but it is not scientifically accurate. It’s official name is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The MBTI is named after Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers, who came up with the test in 1944. They had started working on the test in 1923 after Katharine Briggs read a copy of a Carl Jung book called “Psychological Types”. They spent a long time working on the theory behind their test before publishing it in 1944. They hoped that it would be used to help women find jobs that matched their personality types during World War 2. Neither Myers or Briggs had studied psychology at university and they were both self-taught. The MBTI is currently the world’s most popular test of psychological type and it is widely used by universities and companies. Approximately 2 million adults in the US take the test every year. It is thought that in the US alone, 10,000 businesses, 88 of the Fortune 100 companies, 2,500 colleges and universities, and 200 government agencies rely on the test to analyze the personalities of prospective students or employees. So, how does the MBTI work and is it reliable? The MBTI works by asking a series of questions to attempt to categorize the test taker into four different areas. Each one of these areas is given a letter. The areas are extraversion and introversion, which are given the letters E and I. Sensing and Intuition, which get S and N. Thinking and feeling, which get T and F. Judging and perceiving, which get J and P. The results of your answers to the test will give you four letters that then correspond to the your personality and there are 16 possible combinations of personality types. For example, if you get ISTJ, then you are introverted, sensing, thinking, and judging. That means you basically are reserved, practical, and quiet. Or, you could get INFJ, which is what my first attempt that this test gave me, which is Introverted, intuitive, feeling, and judging. This means, apparently, that I am creative and analytical. Or, as one site I found puts it, I am an “easy-going perfectionist.” I kind of like that. So, the most important question is how reliable are these tests? The answer is not tremendously. However, that is not to say that Myers and Briggs made up something that has no scientific basis to it. They spent several decades researching the theories behind their personality indicator and they made a test that they believed was completely accurate. They came up with a system that works well, but is just not reliable and is not something that should be used by professional organizations. There are several problems with the MBTI and the first is general reliability. If something is scientifically provable, it should give the same result each time. If you want to test gravity on Earth, and you drop an apple from a specific height and time how long it will take to reach the ground, you will get the same result each time. Well, removing small interferences such as wind, the weather, height above ground. Although, if the experiment was repeated with the same conditions each time, the same result will be expected. This is not so for the MBTI. People that take the test a second or a third time are very unlikely to get the same result. Apparently, between 50 and 75% of people that retake the test after five weeks get a different result, which means that it is not a scientific test. Another problem is that the test doesn’t take scales into account. It only classifies for introverted or extroverted, for example, while there are many variations along that axis. It is also not true that there are only 16 different types of personality. Another problem is the fact that all of the questions are available online and you can skew the test in any way you choose. When answering the questions, it is pretty obvious what answers you should give to attain a certain type of personality. And there is also the use of Barnum statements in the results. These are statements that can simultaneously apply to a range of people. And one of the most important problems is that the test has been scientifically analyzed by the company that makes the test. They also sponsor most of the experts online that argue for the credibility of the test. That sparks of the oil industry paying experts to say that climate change is a fad. If something is reliable and scientifically provable, the company that profits from the test wouldn’t have to sponsor people to test it. But, what would I know? I’m only INFJ. And this is what I learned today. Try these: - #735 What is an algorithm? - #846 Christiaan Huygens – inventor of the pendulum clock and the balance spring. - #515 Why can you test for drugs in urine? - #1097 How much weight could a human lift? - #932 How many countries are nuclear powers? Sources https://www.themyersbriggs.com/en-US/Campaigns/All-About-the-MBTI-Assessment https://www.verywellmind.com/infj-introverted-intuitive-feeling-judging-2795978 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyersBriggs_Type_Indicator https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-leadership/myers-briggs-does-it-pay-to-know-your-type/2012/12/14/eaed51ae-3fcc-11e2-bca3-aadc9b7e29c5_story.html https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1p2cki/how_scientifically_valid_is_the_myers_briggs/ https://www.16personalities.com/infj-personality Image By Unknown, Courtesy of Katharine Myers - Katharine Myers, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48805871 Read the full article