#Team Windfall

[xdraonarts]

Thinking of opening up commissions at some point and figured lil icons would make a great cheapo tier, Testing out a lineless style and some different shapes with some unintroduced OCs. Left to Right are

Kazuko the Wolf - Mai the Rabbit - Tatsu the Oarfish

[saccharine-curious-4]

boy has been breaded

[hale-nathan]

Trump Weird News - Dictator Wannabe

Strongmen: Powerful political figures who rule "by the exercise of force or violence."

Dictators: Rulers who are "unconstrained by law."

[sunderwight]

TSCTIR-inspired SVSSS AU.

Shen Yuan was just a regular (ehhh kind of) nerd when the invasions began, monsters and dungeons started showing up, and people started "awakening" as RPG-style superheroes with special abilities, enhanced strength/speed/etc, and ranked classifications.

Shen Yuan's older brother awakens as S-classes. His younger sister awakens as an S-class. Shen Yuan?

F-class.

Of course, chronically ill Shen Yuan told himself he wasn't really expecting any different. But there have been people who have awakened as higher classes despite their own lifelong health problems or disabilities, and in many cases awakening cured them, and so he'd hoped...

Well. It doesn't matter what he'd hoped.

The worst part isn't even that he's not some badass dungeon-delver himself (even though he is wildly curious about all the strange monsters and beasts and demons that have been turning up), the worst part is that his siblings have all but left him in the dust. They aren't just busy, he can tell that they've increasingly been avoiding him, until virtually the only time they speak to him is when they catch him trying to go into a dungeon again and then yell at him about it.

(Of course, his siblings have been increasingly aware of the danger SY is in whenever he's in proximity to them, but no one ever accused the Shen family of having strong communication skills...)

Nonetheless, if there is some possible way for Shen Yuan to increase his rank, he won't find it staying at home. And there are too many mysteries to investigate to just keep himself out of it, even if that would be more sensible. So, Shen Yuan arranges to be on various low-level dungeon teams. Often among the more questionable, misguided ones being attempted by the newly-awakened or by people who are just desperate to try and get some kind of windfall. Dungeons are dangerous, but a lucky item drop can still make someone more money in a minute than they could otherwise earn in a year. It's through these jobs that Shen Yuan meets fellow F-class Shang Qinghua, whose motives for entering the dungeons are definitely more financial than academic.

This is also how Shen Yuan ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time, in a dungeon that has suddenly gone from low-level to a high-level boss, fleeing for his life. Just when it seems like he's about to become mincemeat, his older brother (Shen Jiu) shows up and takes on the dungeon boss. But it's too much for a lone S-class, even one as determined and vicious as SJ, and Shen Yuan can only watch in horror as his brother is killed by the terrifyingly powerful and weirdly beautiful Heavenly Demon Boss.

But the reason SY survived the initial assault, when no one else did, is thanks to his hidden ability. Which temporarily grants him the powers of anyone he has a bond with who has just died, x2. Previously, he had his bacon saved by Shang Qinghua's traumatic death, and when Shen Jiu dies, SY gains enough power to actually take down this mysterious Heavenly Demon boss.

It's a hollow victory. His brother is dead. His friend is dead. Even the boss monster seems inexplicably tragic to him somehow.

And why did SJ show up anyway? Between his siblings, Shen Yuan thought that his brother had grown the most distant from him, that he even hated him now! Why couldn't he have just... stayed away...?

Despite the traumatic horror of these events, killing the boss monster grants Shen Yuan a boon. It isn't a "raise people from the dead" boon, but it does permit time travel! In fact it seems kind of emphatic on that point, like something has gone really horribly wrong with reality and the world is struggling to hold itself together now somehow. Though that could also just be because Shen Yuan's world is struggling to hold itself together...?

Regardless, this new entity called "the system" refuses to let Shen Yuan go back to a point in time before he awakened, or before the dungeons appeared. But he can go back to a point before his brother died, which is definitely good enough. Accept, accept! Who has time to read the terms & conditions? Whatever it is he'll deal with it! Just send him as far back in time as he can go!

As such, Shen Yuan's memories are sent back five years in time. Along with him go a bunch of weird new unlocked abilities, and the system menu, which demands he fulfill certain tasks and complete certain quests as a stipulation of the time travel boon. Succeed, and he gets more rewards to help him keep himself and his loved ones alive. Fail, and he'll be rebooted back to the bad ending, except to the moment before the Heavenly Demon boss died but without any of his power boosts.

So maybe Shen Yuan should have read the fine print.

Though, even if he had, he still would have made the same choice.

Back five years in the past, he's got some thinking to do. Five years is a decent chunk of time. His siblings have both awoken, and begun distancing themselves from him, but their positions are still pretty different. Shen Jiu and his childhood friend Yue Qi had a falling-out over something (they wouldn't say what) at this point in time. Shen Jiu signed on with the Qiu Collective, one of the initial rich adventuring guilds that hired people to go into dungeons. But the Qiu Collective was corrupt even by the standards of a lot of dungeon-oriented corporations, and though Shen Yuan was never made privy to the details, he knew they mistreated Shen Jiu badly and that there were a lot of investigations. The collective ultimately went under when their office was destroyed by a rogue rampaging monster, after an undiscovered dungeon opened nearby. Dungeons that open but aren't found are especially dangerous, as the threat levels will steadily increase without anyone to clear them out, until the result is a dungeon break -- monsters escaping the dungeon and emerging in the normal world, causing havoc and Godzilla-style rampages.

According to the official reports, that was what caused the destruction of the Qiu Collective's head office and the death of their CEO.

Yue Qi, on the other hand, joined the Cang Qiong guild, which had fared a little better over the five year span. Yue Qi eventually even took over the guild, and after the Qiu Collective went under, Shen Jiu made up with him enough to join him there. Shen Yuan had hoped they would reconcile and maybe even answer some of his calls, but things remained strained between all of them even afterwards.

Shen Ying, his little sister, was sheltered and trained by their older brother until she was old enough to join Cang Qiong as well, but despite being S-rank, her youth and inexperience kept her more on the sidelines. Shen Yuan had thought they might bond over being kept out of the loop, but his last conversation with his sister had made it clear that as far as she was concerned, he was still world's away from her level.

(Read: Shen Ying told him he should keep away from dangerous things, was clumsy about it, and unwittingly fed some of Shen Yuan's worst insecurities.)

On top of that, though, was another consideration:

Luo Binghe.

Among the guilds that could rival Cang Qiong five years hence, the biggest one was Demon Path. Luo Binghe would start out as a member of Cang Qiong guild, recruited shortly after awakening. Shen Yuan had thought he was pretty cool, actually, but there was some bad blood between Luo Binghe and Shen Jiu, and it got bad enough that when Luo Binghe made his solo break he got Shen Jiu embroiled in some kind of legal investigation (something about the wrongful death of another guild member) on his way out. Demon Realm and Cang Qiong remained thoroughly at odds afterwards, and things only got worse when Demon Realm surpassed Cang Qiong's count of S-rank members, and conducted a successful merger with Huan Hua guild. That is, until Luo Binghe just mysteriously vanished altogether from the public eye.

Though Luo Binghe of course wasn't the dungeon boss that actually killed Shen Jiu, he had certainly been trying to destroy him before Shen Yuan reset the timeline.

But going five years back in time... Luo Binghe had been a prodigy, the youngest to become a guild leader. Five years hence, he'd be around twenty years old.

Which means that right now, thanks to the rewind, he is fourteen or fifteen years old and hasn't even awakened yet.

It would be possible to take him out of the equation altogether.

Then, there's Liu Qingge. An S-rank who died in a dungeon under suspicious circumstances, which provided the crux of the investigation into Shen Jiu. He and Shen Jiu had also never gotten along, although once again no one had confided the details to him. Shen Yuan refused to believe that his brother had actually murdered Liu Qingge, though. If Shen Jiu was going to murder someone he'd be a lot less obvious about it.

But it would probably be better if Liu Qingge didn't die at all.

Lastly, there's the matter of Shang Qinghua.

According to Shen Yuan's mental math, Shang Qinghua won't have awoken his abilities yet either. Five years into the future, extensive research and several regrettable moves on the part of various governments and guilds would reveal that even though it was supposedly impossible to increase someone's rank after awakening, how a person awoke their abilities could have a great deal of impact on their rank.

Shang Qinghua was a textbook example of a bad awakening. His skills were mostly oriented towards stealth and item drop bonuses, but his awakening had been violent, prompted by a shady center that promised people an avenue to adventure and riches only to use mortal terror to trigger the awakening process. Being in extreme danger would work fine for those with combat skills, but wasn't so good for everyone else. A lot of people had their awakening stunted by such early methods, which were not only a bad way to go about it but also traumatic to boot.

Shen Yuan has a suspicion that someone like Shang Qinghua would actually be incredibly valuable for stealth missions and item farming, if only he'd awoken at full potential. Instead, he'd struggled to make anything of his abilities due to his lack of durability or access to the kind of high-level items that would compensate for it.

Gathering all this foresight, Shen Yuan sets about altering the future to protect his siblings.

Step one: find Luo Binghe.

Shen Yuan's initial thought was to just kind of, nudge Luo Binghe towards something different from Cang Qiong altogether. Maybe if he started out with Huan Hua guild, he could contain all his trouble there. But when he finds him, Binghe is in a bad situation. The kid's living in foster care with abusive caretakers, his adoptive mother has recently died, and he's waiting tables and picking up trash instead of going to school. His clothes are threadbare, he's too skinny, and he looks like he's been beaten.

Between a rocky introduction and an attack from a Moon Python Rhinoceros thanks to a nearby dungeon break, Shen Yuan manages to convince Luo Binghe to hire him as his agent (fee = 0% of all Binghe's dungeon earnings plus 0% from contracts), and determinedly takes over. The System seems to wildly approve of it.

Creepy. And suspicious.

But Binghe is actually a total sweetheart, as it happens, to the point where Shen Yuan can't imagine what inspired the enmity between him and Shen Jiu. This kid truly is a diamond in the rough. He just needed a little help and some actual guidance, that's all!

With Binghe on the road to a less antagonistic fate, the next most chronologically urgent item on the list is Shang Qinghua. Shen Yuan has a new ability that lets him awaken people to their full potential, and his chosen guinea pig is his own formerly deceased bro. Somehow, awakening Shang Qinghua's abilities ends up involving a near-miss with rescuing him from debt collectors, and running into (and rescuing) the S-class Mobei Jun, who had joined Demon Realm as Luo Binghe's subordinate back in the original timeline.

It's actually quite fortuitous, though, because Shang Qinghua's treasure-hunter and stealth abilities are best suited to him being accompanied by a high-ranking hunter who can pick up the physical slack. Shen Yuan had been thinking that at least awakening Shang Qinghua as a D-rank would make him durable enough to handle some dungeons without turning to sketchy organizations for back-up, but with Mobei Jun, the ice prince can ferry the man right to the most valuable loot!

Shen Yuan's on a roll!

He discovers that some of his new abilities have utility as beast-taming skills, and tackles several dungeons successfully with the help of Luo Binghe, Shang Qinghua, and Mobei Jun. They even manage to rescue A-class Sha Hualing from a sticky situation, and Shen Yuan learns that his abilities can, in fact, help other awakened level up their own rank (previously believed impossible). With enough of his influence, Sha Hualing could become S-rank one day.

But of course, it can't be too easy.

When Shen Yuan moves to intervene with the dungeon break that wiped out the Qiu Collective, and seemed to start all the controversies against his brother, he instead finds that there is no dungeon at all. Yet, clearly some kind of attack on the building is underway.

He finds out why when he comes across his brother in a fugue state, murdering his way through his own guild.

Turns out, most S-ranks creep people out. Most average people can barely tolerate being around them even before they awaken. But afterwards? Their oppressive auras and sheer strength tend to trigger everyone's flight-or-fight reflex. Shen Yuan never noticed, because he's grown up surrounded by S-ranks his whole life. Even upon watching Shen Jiu kill the Qiu members, Shen Yuan's chief source of upset is that they were apparently treating his brother so badly that they inspired a murder spree from someone ordinarily much more calculating and clever than that.

Apparently, Shen Yuan should have been taking the opportunity to move against them a lot sooner, rather than just mitigating the whole supposed dungeon-break disaster and then investigating after. His own fault. He thought that keeping his distance would help his siblings, but clearly, letting them hoard their secrets and do whatever they think is best isn't the way to go either.

Does he even know what's really happening with his sister? Or to Yue Qi over at Cang Qiong? At this point in time, his friend had stopped contacting him altogether for several months in a row. When he came back, he was definitely more subdued and even more distant than he had been before. And that's the same guild that Shen Jiu and Shen Ying will eventually join as well, presumably with its own skeletons packed into the closet.

Shen Yuan's going to have to adjust a lot of his plans, it seems.

But first -- he's got a murder spree to help cover up, and an older brother to take home and, uh. Calm down. Or something?

Damn. Maybe Shen Jiu did kill Liu Qingge on purpose. He's going to have to thoroughly figure that situation out too, if he wants to handle it right...

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The long, bloody lineage of private equity's looting

Tomorrow (June 3) at 1:30PM, I’m in Edinburgh for the Cymera Festival on a panel with Nina Allen and Ian McDonald.

Monday (June 5) at 7:15PM, I’m in London at the British Library with my novel Red Team Blues, hosted by Baroness Martha Lane Fox.

Fans of the Sopranos will remember the “bust out” as a mob tactic in which a business is taken over, loaded up with debt, and driven into the ground, wrecking the lives of the business’s workers, customers and suppliers. When the mafia does this, we call it a bust out; when Wall Street does it, we call it “private equity.”

It used to be that we rarely heard about private equity, but then, as national chains and iconic companies started to vanish, this mysterious financial arrangement popped up with increasing frequency. When a finance bro’s presentation on why Olive Garden needed to be re-orged when viral, there was a lot off snickering about the decline of a tacky business whose value prop was unlimited carbs. But the bro was working for Starboard Value, a hedge fund that specialized in buhying out and killing off companies, pocketing billions while destroying profitable businesses.

https://www.salon.com/2014/09/17/the_real_olive_garden_scandal_why_greedy_hedge_funders_suddenly_care_so_much_about_breadsticks/

Starboard Value’s game was straightforward: buy a business, load it with debt, sell off its physical plant — the buildings it did business out of — pay itself, and then have the business lease back the buildings, bleeding out money until it collapsed. They pulled it with Red Lobster,and the point of the viral Olive Garden dis track was to soften up the company for its own bust out.

The bust out tactic wasn’t limited to mocking middlebrow family restaurants. For years, the crooks who ran these ops did a brisk trade in blaming the internet. Why did Sears tank? Everyone knows that the 19th century business was an antique, incapable of mounting a challenge in the age of e-commerce. That was a great smokescreen for an old-fashioned bust out that saw corporate looters make off with hundreds of millions, leaving behind empty storefronts and emptier pension accounts for the workers who built the wealth the looters stole:

https://prospect.org/economy/vulture-capitalism-killed-sears/

Same goes for Toys R Us: it wasn’t Amazon that killed the iconic toy retailer — it was the PE bosses who extracted $200m from the chain, then walked away, hands in pockets and whistling, while the businesses collapsed and the workers got zero severance:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2018/06/01/how-can-they-walk-away-with-millions-and-leave-workers-with-zero-toys-r-us-workers-say-they-deserve-severance/

It’s a good racket — for the racketeers. Private equity has grown from a finance sideshow to Wall Street’s apex predator, and it’s devouring the real economy through a string of audactious bust outs, each more consequential and depraved than the last.

As PE shows that it can turn profitable businesses gigantic windfalls, sticking the rest of us with the job of sorting out the smoking craters they leave behind, more and more investors are piling in. Today, the PE sector loves a rollup, which is when they buy several related businesses and merge them into one firm. The nominal business-case for a rollup is that the new, bigger firm is more “efficient.” In reality, a rollup’s strength is in eliminating competition. When all the pet groomers, or funeral homes, or urgent care clinics for ten miles share the same owner, they can raise prices, lower wages, and fuck over suppliers.

They can also borrow. A quirk of the credit markets is that a standalone small business is valued at about 3–5x its annual revenues. But if that business is part of a large firm, it is valued at 10–20x annual turnover. That means that when a private equity company rolls up a comedy club, ad agency or water bottler (all businesses presently experiencing PE rollup), with $1m in annual revenues, it shows up on the PE company’s balance sheet as an asset worth $10–20m. That’s $10–20m worth of collateral the PE fund can stake for loans that let it buy and roll up more small businesses.

2.9 million Boomer-owned businesses, employing 32m people, are expected to sell in the next couple years as their owners retire. Most of these businesses will sell to PE firms, who can afford to pay more for them as a prelude to a bust out than anyone intending to operate them as a productive business could ever pay:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

PE’s most ghastly impact is felt in the health care sector. Whole towns’ worth of emergency rooms, family practices, labs and other health firms have been scooped up by PE, which has spent more than $1t since 2012 on health acquisitions:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/17/the-doctor-will-fleece-you-now/#pe-in-full-effect

Once a health care company is owned by PE, it is significantly more likely to commit medicare fraud. It also cuts wages and staffing for doctors and nurses. PE-owned facilities do more unnecessary and often dangerous procedures. Appointments get shorter. The companies get embroiled in kickback scandals. PE-backed dentists hack away at children’s mouths, filling them full of root-canals.

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/17/the-doctor-will-fleece-you-now/#pe-in-full-effect

The Healthcare Private Equity Association boasts that its members are poised to spend more than $3t to create “the future of healthcare.”

https://hcpea.org/#!event-list

As bad as PE is for healthcare, it’s worse for long-term care. PE-owned nursing homes are charnel houses, and there’s a particularly nasty PE scam where elderly patients are tricked into signing up for palliative care, which is never delivered (and isn’t needed, because the patients aren’t dying!). These fake “hospices” get huge payouts from medicare — and the patient is made permanently ineligible for future medicare, because they are recorded being in their final decline:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS

Every part of the health care sector is being busted out by PE. Another ugly PE trick, the “club deal,” is devouring the medical supply business. Club deals were huge in the 2000s, destroying rent-controlled housing, energy companies, Mervyn’s department stores, Harrah’s, and Old Country Joe. Now it’s doing the same to medical supplies:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/14/billionaire-class-solidarity/#club-deals

Private equity is behind the mass rollup of single-family homes across America. Wall Street landlords are the worst landlords in America, who load up your rent with junk fees, leave your home in a state of dangerous disrepair, and evict you at the drop of a hat:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/16/die-miete-ist-zu-hoch/#assets-v-human-rights

As these houses decay through neglect, private equity makes a bundle from tenants and even more borrowing against the houses. In a few short years, much of America’s desperately undersupplied housing stock will be beyond repair. It’s a bust out.

You know all those exploding trains filled with dangerous chemicals that poison entire towns? Private equity bust outs:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/04/up-your-nose/#rail-barons

Where did PE come from? How can these people look themselves in the mirror? Why do we let them get away with it? How do we stop them?

Today in The American Prospect, Maureen Tkacik reviews two new books that try to answer all four of these questions, but really only manage to answer the first three:

https://prospect.org/culture/books/2023-06-02-days-of-plunder-morgenson-rosner-ballou-review/

The first of these books is These Are the Plunderers: How Private Equity Runs — and Wrecks — America by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner:

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/These-Are-the-Plunderers/Gretchen-Morgenson/9781982191283

The second is Plunder: Private Equity’s Plan to Pillage America, by Brendan Ballou:

https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/brendan-ballou/plunder/9781541702103/

Both books describe the bust out from the inside. For example, PetSmart — looted for $30 billion by RaymondSvider and his PE fund BC Partners — is a slaughterhouse for animals. The company systematically neglects animals — failing to pay workers to come in and feed them, say, or refusing to provide backup power to run during power outages, letting animals freeze or roast to death. Though PetSmart has its own vet clinics, the company doesn’t want to pay its vets to nurse the animals it damages, so it denies them care. But the company is also too cheap to euthanize those animals, so it lets them starve to death. PetSmart is also too cheap to cremate the animals, so its traumatized staff are ordered to smuggle the dead, rotting animals into random dumpsters.

All this happened while PetSmart’s sales increased by 60%, matched by growth in the company’s gross margins. All that money went to the bust out.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoinegara/2021/09/27/the-30-billion-kitty-meet-the-investor-who-made-a-fortune-on-pet-food/

Tkacik says these books show that we’re finally getting wise to PE. Back in the Clinton years, the PE critique painted the perps as sharp operators who reduced quality and jacked up prices. Today, books like these paint these “investors” as the monsters they are — crooks whose bust ups are crimes, not clever finance hacks.

Take the Carlyle Group, which pioneered nursing home rollups. As Carlyle slashed wages, its workers suffered — but its elderly patients suffered more. Thousands of Carlyle “customers” died of “dehydration, gangrenous bedsores, and preventable falls” in the pre-covid years.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/opioid-overdoses-bedsores-and-broken-bones-what-happened-when-a-private-equity-firm-sought-profits-in-caring-for-societys-most-vulnerable/2018/11/25/09089a4a-ed14-11e8-baac-2a674e91502b_story.html

KKR, another PE monster, bought a second-hand chain of homes for mentally disabled adults from another PE company, then squeezed it for the last drops of blood left in the corpse. KKR cut wages to $8/hour and increased shifts to 36 hours, then threatened to have workers who went home early arrested and charged with “patient abandonment.” Many of these homes were often left with no staff at all, with patients left to starve and stew in their own waste.

PE loves to pick on people who can’t fight back: kids, sick people, disabled people, old people. No surprise, then, that PE loves prisons — the ultimate captive audience. HIG Capital is a $55b fund that owns TKC Holdings, who got the contract to feed the prisoners at 400 institutions. They got the contract after the prisons fired Aramark, owned by PE giant Warburg Pincus, whose food was so inedible that it provoked riots. TKC got a million bucks extra to take over the food at Michigan’s Kinross Correctional Facility, then, incredibly, made the food worse. A chef who refused to serve 100 bags of rotten potatoes (“the most disgusting thing I’ve seen in my life”) was fired:

https://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/local/michigan/prison-food-worker-i-was-fired-for-refusing-to-serve-rotten-potatoes/69-467297770

TKC doesn’t just operate prison kitchens — it operates prison commissaries, where it gouges prisoners on junk food to replace the inedible slop it serves in the cafeteria. The prisoners buy this food with money they make working in the prison workshops, for $0.10–0.25/hour. Those workshops are also run by TKC.

Tkacic traces private equity back to the “corporate raiders” of the 1950s and 1960s, who “stealthily borrowed money to buy up enough shares in a small or midsized company to control its biggest bloc of votes, then force a stock swap and install himself as CEO.”

The most famous of these raiders was Eli Black, who took over United Fruit with this gambit — a company that had a long association with the CIA, who had obligingly toppled democratically elected governments and installed dictators friendly to United’s interests (this is where the term “banana republic” comes from).

Eli Black’s son is Leon Black, a notorious PE predator. Leon Black got his start working for the junk-bonds kingpin Michael Milken, optimizing Milken’s operation, which was the most terrifying bust out machine of its day, buying, debt-loading and wrecking a string of beloved American businesses. Milken bought 2,000 companies and put 200 of them through bankruptcy, leaving the survivors in a brittle, weakened state.

It got so bad that the Business Roundtable complained about the practice to Congress, calling Milken, Black, et al, “a small group is systematically extracting the equity from corporations and replacing it with debt, and incidentally accumulating major wealth.”

Black stabbed Milken in the back and tanked his business, then set out on his own. Among the businesses he destroyed was Samsonite, “a bankrupt-but-healthy company he subjected to 12 humiliating years of repeated fee extractions, debt-funded dividend payments, brutal plant closings, and hideous schemes to induce employees to buy its worthless stock.”

The money to buy Samsonite — and many other businesses — came through a shadowy deal between Black and John Garamendi, then a California insurance commissioner, now a California congressman. Garamendi helped Black buy a $6b portfolio of junk bonds from an insurance company in a wildly shady deal. Garamendi wrote down the bonds by $3.9b, stealing money “from innocent people who needed the money to pay for loved ones’ funerals, irreparable injuries, etc.”

Black ended up getting all kinds of favors from powerful politicians — including former Connecticut governor John Rowland and Donald Trump. He also wired $188m to Jeffrey Epstein for reasons that remain opaque.

Black’s shady deals are a marked contrast with the exalted political circles he travels in. Despite private equity’s obviously shady conduct, it is the preferred partner for cities and states, who buy everything from ambulance services to infrastructure from PE-owned companies, with disastrous results. Federal agencies turn a blind eye to their ripoffs, or even abet them. 38 state houses passed legislation immunizing nursing homes from liability during the start of the covid crisis.

PE barons are shameless about presenting themselves as upstanding cits, unfairly maligned. When Obama made an empty promise to tax billionaires in 2010, Blackstone founder SteveS chwarzman declared, “It’s a war. It’s like when Hitler invaded Poland in 1939.”

Since we’re on the subject of Hitler, this is a good spot to bring up Monowitz, a private-sector satellite of Auschwitz operated by IG Farben as a slave labor camp to make rubber and other materiel it supplied at a substantial markup to the wermacht. I’d never heard of Monowitz, but Tkacik’s description of the camp is chilling, even in comparison to Auschwitz itself.

Farben used slave laborers from Auschwitz to work at its rubber plant, but was frustrated by the logistics of moving those slaves down the 4.5m stretch of road to the facility. So the company bought 25,000 slaves — preferring children, who were cheaper — and installed them in a co-located death-camp called Monowitz:

https://www.commentary.org/articles/r-tannenbaum/the-devils-chemists-by-josiah-e-dubois-jr/

Monowitz was — incredibly — worse than Auschwitz. It was so bad, the SS guards who worked at it complained to Berlin about the conditions. The SS demanded more hospitals for the workers who dropped from beatings and overwork — Farben refused, citing the cost. The factory never produced a steady supply of rubber, but thanks to its gouging and the brutal treatment of its slaves, the camp was still profitable and returned large dividends to Farben’s investors.

Apologists for slavery sometimes claim that slavers are at least incentivized to maintain the health of their captive workforce. This was definitely not true of Farben. Monowitz slaves died on average after three months in the camp. And Farben’s subsidiary, Degesch, made the special Zyklon B formulation used in Auschwitz’s gas chambers.

Tkacik’s point is that the Nazis killed for ideology and were unimaginably cruel. Farben killed for money — and they were even worse. The banality of evil gets even more banal when it’s done in service to maximizing shareholder value.

As Farben historian Joseph Borkin wrote, the company “reduced slave labor to a consumable raw material, a human ore from which the mineral of life was systematically extracted”:

https://www.scribd.com/document/517797736/The-Crime-and-Punishment-of-I-G-Farben

Farben’s connection to the Nazis was a the subject of Germany’s Master Plan: The Story of Industrial Offensive, a 1943 bestseller by Borkin, who was also an antitrust lawyer. It described how Farben had manipulated global commodities markets in order to create shortages that “guaranteed Hitler’s early victories.”

Master Plan became a rallying point in the movement to shatter corporate power. But large US firms like Dow Chemical and Standard Oil waged war on the book, demanding that it be retracted. Borkin was forced into resignation and obscurity in 1945.

Meanwhile, in Nuremberg, 24 Farben executives were tried for their war crimes, and they cited their obligations to their shareholders in their defense. All but five were acquitted on this basis.

Seen in that light, the plunderers of today’s PE firms are part of a long and dishonorable tradition, one that puts profit ahead of every other priority or consideration. It’s a defense that wowed the judges at Nuremberg, so should we be surprised that it still plays in 2023?

Tkacik is frustrated that neither of these books have much to offer by way of solutions, but she understands why that would be. After all, if we can’t even close the carried interest tax loophole, how can we hope to do anything meaningful?

“Carried interest” comes up in every election cycle. Most of us assume it has something to do with “interest payments,” but that’s not true. The carried interest loophole relates to the “interest” that 16th-century sea captains had in their cargo. It’s a 600-year-old tax loophole that private equity bosses use to pay little or no tax on their billions. The fact that it’s still on the books tells you everything you need to know about whether our political class wants to do anything about PE’s plundering.

Notwithstanding Tkacik’s (entirely justified) skepticism of the weaksauce remedies proposed in these books, there is some hope of meaningful action. Private equity’s rollups are only possible because they skate under the $101m threshold for merger scrutiny. However, there is good — but unenforced — law that allows antitrust enforcers to block these mergers. This is the “incipiency standard” — Sec 7 of the Clayton Act — the idea that a relatively small merger might not be big enough to trigger enforcement action on its own, but regulators can still act to block it if it creates an incipient monopoly.

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

The US has a new crop of aggressive — fearless — top antitrust enforcers and they’ve been systematically reviving these old laws to go after monopolies.

That’s long overdue. Markets are machines for eroding our moral values: “In comparison to non-market decisions, moral standards are significantly lower if people participate in markets.”

https://web.archive.org/web/20130607154129/https://www.uni-bonn.de/Press-releases/markets-erode-moral-values

The crimes that monsters commit in the name of ideology pale in comparison to the crimes the wealthy commit for money.

Catch me on tour with Red Team Blues in Edinburgh, London, and Berlin!

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/02/plunderers/#farbenizers

[Image ID: An overgrown graveyard, rendered in silver nitrate monochrome. A green-tinted businessman  with a moneybag in place of a head looms up from behind a gravestone. The right side of the image is spattered in blood.]

[servantofthefates]

I have always felt The Fates' work.

Way before my initiation into the craft. As early as when I was in Catholic school. And even during my skeptic period.

Windfalls? Miracles? Surprises? That's not them. That's Jupiter. Or Jesus, if he's who you believe in.

The Fates' movements always feel like a disappointment at first, before they reveal their blessing — a blessing in disguise.

In college, I was so upset that I didn't get into the freshman dorm at my university. It was quite prestigious. Instead, I'd been assigned to the all-girls dorm, which was a lot older and quite dilapidated.

But then... I found out that getting a dorm room at my university is a near-impossible thing in the first place. And that as you get older (in your sophomore, junior, senior years), it gets even harder because the slots are extremely limited, and freshmen are always the priority. However... getting into the all-girls dorm in my freshman year meant I was guaranteed a spot in the building until I graduate!

The Fates are like that. They don't give you the shiny thing. They give you the stable thing.

Same as when I started working. I'd graduated magna cum laude at the #1 university in my country. So I wondered why all my job offers came from boutique agencies and not from multinationals. I was so hurt and confused by this. I was the best, so why the fuck were the big players not interested in me?!

And then out of the blue, I got an opportunity to work abroad. My first job offer was SEVEN times the amount I was making back then. But had I been working for a prestigious multinational company, I never would've grabbed the chance to move. I would've stayed home, because I would've felt happy already. Which means I wouldn't have been able to afford all my luxury travel, my weekly salon visits, the Sephoras in my vanity, the Louis Vuittons in my closet.

That's the Fates. They deny you silver, so they can give you gold.

I did eventually get to work for a multinational. I loooved it. My boss and I were soul kin. One mind. One heart. Our work together was phenomenal, unparalleled, award-winning. We were the dream team.

And then he got fired.

I felt like a little girl whose lollipop got violently dragged out of her mouth.

My world came crashing down. I started questioning my faith, my ability to manifest, my power as a lineage witch. I thought I was protected by the divine. What the fuck was this tragedy then?

But... because my beloved boss was out of the picture, that meant I had to do his job for a while. That's when I started presenting to managing directors, to decision makers, to the CEO himself. That's when I earned a name for myself.

That's the Fates. They take away your comfort to give you the spotlight.

Even now, I have a lot of agnostic and atheist friends. I resonate with their critical thinking... their rejection of the status quo... their rebelliousness against authority. I share all of those values very strongly.

But I am not one of them. How can I be, when I have always felt the Fates writing my destiny?

[agentem]

Three of Pentacles

I keep hearing people complain that the "sisterhood" of the Coven in Agatha All Along was a sham because they only exist to support Billy, the lone male.

But that's not true. *stamps foot angrily.*

They are Lilia's coven. In her reading, the "reason for her quest" is community. They are the reason she is on this journey. And she is the one who writes the names down and choses the team (although maybe she should've reconsidered writing Alice's name since she dies but what exactly happens when she writes the names down--and the lights flicker--seems to be differen than the time gaps. It also happens when she sees what William will become. It seems almost involuntary? Also Lilia mentions the "path behind" are lessons learned so Alice dying might be important to Lilia accepting her own death? She mentions the path behind is "lessons learned." And that might have something to do with the repeated "Death comes for us all" line. Not sure.)

Anyway! TLDR, she's the Nick Fury of these Witch Avengers.

I think she needs this group (Agatha, Billy, Jen and Alice. Rio and Sharon are not included on the list) to help her through her end. To accept her fate. And he's important to that, to helping her think outside of herself. But he's "the windfall" the thing that might happen, but only if Agatha's trauma can be overcome. Jen is the guaranteed "path ahead."

Agatha's lines about not being able to divine when Death will come, heal Nicky or protect him suggest that she also needs a Coven. But she never embraces this particular group like Lilia does when she tells them she loves them. Agatha does show growth by sacrificing herself for Billy and then joining him on his quest. (The reason for his quest is The Sun/Reunion and it isn't achieved by the end of the series.)

Although I do get that the ending feels a bit... unfinished and some people are unhappy with that. Lilia is the only one who completes her "quest." But I don't think Marvel wants to be done with Agatha or Billy yet.

[sensualnoiree]

astro notes: jupiter through the houses pt.3

Symbolizing wisdom, luck, and spiritual growth, Jupiter guides us through journeys of abundance and higher learning. As it rules Sagittarius and Pisces, and co-rules Pisces with Neptune, its reach extends to philosophical pursuits, foreign travel, and spiritual exploration. From its exaltation in Cancer to its debilitation in Capricorn, Jupiter's placement illuminates our beliefs, aspirations, and sense of justice. Throughout this exploration of Jupiter's journey through the houses, we unravel its transformative power and guiding light, embracing its blessings of prosperity, abundance, and divine guidance.

Jupiter in the 7th House:

With Jupiter gracing your seventh house of partnerships and relationships, you are blessed with a deep sense of harmony and balance in your interactions with others. Your marriage or partnerships tend to be supportive and mutually enriching, and you may find that your spouse or significant other plays a significant role in your personal and spiritual growth.

Your ability to see the best in others and cultivate a sense of fairness and equality in your relationships makes you a valuable partner and friend. You may find that you are able to resolve conflicts and navigate challenges with grace and diplomacy, fostering deep bonds of trust and mutual respect.

Business partnerships are also favored with Jupiter in the seventh house, and you may find that you are able to attract opportunities for growth and expansion through collaborative ventures. Your ability to see the bigger picture and inspire others to work towards shared goals makes you a valuable asset in any team or partnership.

However, it's important to guard against the tendency to become overly dependent on others or lose sight of your own needs and desires in the pursuit of harmony. With Jupiter's influence here, there may be a temptation to seek validation and fulfillment through external relationships, rather than cultivating a sense of self-worth that is independent of others.

Overall, Jupiter in the seventh house blesses you with harmonious relationships, mutual growth, and a deep sense of partnership and collaboration. Embrace the blessings of love and connection, and use them to create fulfilling, supportive relationships that nourish your soul and spirit.

Jupiter in the 8th House:

With Jupiter gracing your eighth house of transformation and rebirth, you are blessed with a deep sense of inner strength and resilience that allows you to navigate life's challenges with grace and courage. Your spiritual journey is profound and transformative, leading you to a deeper understanding of the mysteries of existence and the nature of the soul.

Your ability to embrace change and let go of attachments makes you a powerful agent of transformation, both in your own life and in the lives of others. You may find that you are drawn to explore the realms of the occult or engage in practices such as meditation or energy healing, seeking to unlock the hidden wisdom of the universe.

Financially, you may experience periods of expansion and contraction, as Jupiter's influence here can bring both windfalls and losses. However, your innate optimism and faith in the abundance of the universe allows you to weather even the most challenging of financial storms, emerging stronger and more resilient on the other side.

However, it's important to guard against the tendency to become overly fixated on power and control, or to use your spiritual knowledge and insight for selfish or manipulative purposes. With Jupiter's influence here, there may be a temptation to seek power and influence through secretive or underhanded means, rather than embodying the principles of integrity and authenticity.

Overall, Jupiter in the eighth house blesses you with profound spiritual insight, inner strength, and a deep connection to the mysteries of existence. Embrace the blessings of transformation and rebirth, and use them to embark on a journey of self-discovery and spiritual evolution that will lead you to greater levels of wisdom and enlightenment.

Jupiter in the 9th House:

With Jupiter gracing your ninth house of higher knowledge and spiritual wisdom, you are blessed with a profound thirst for truth and a deep sense of curiosity about the world around you. Your love for learning knows no bounds, and you may find that you are drawn to explore a wide range of subjects, from philosophy and religion to travel and cultural exploration.

Your expansive worldview and broad-minded perspective make you a natural seeker of wisdom and truth. You may find that you are deeply inspired by teachings from different cultures and spiritual traditions, and that you are constantly seeking to expand your understanding of the universe and your place within it.

Travel is especially favored with Jupiter in the ninth house, and you may find that you are drawn to explore distant lands and immerse yourself in new experiences. Your journeys are not just physical adventures, but spiritual quests that allow you to deepen your connection to the divine and broaden your perspective on life.

However, it's important to guard against the tendency to become overly dogmatic or self-righteous in your beliefs. With Jupiter's influence here, there may be a temptation to become rigid in your thinking or to insist that your way is the only right way. Remember to remain open-minded and receptive to new ideas, and to embrace the diversity of beliefs and perspectives that exist in the world.

Overall, Jupiter in the ninth house blesses you with a deep love for knowledge, a thirst for adventure, and a profound sense of spiritual connection. Embrace the blessings of higher learning and cultural exploration, and use them to embark on a lifelong journey of discovery and enlightenment.

follow for more astro insights like this and support me over on instagram @sensualnoire or yt @quenysefields

[anim-ttrpgs]

A.N.I.M. Team Bi-Yearly Payments

It’s the end of July, a new patreon update for Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy is coming this week, and the A.N.I.M. team are getting ready to pay ourselves with the Kickstarter money. We’ve already paid our freelance artists @chaospyromancy and @qsycomplainsalot for all their work in advance, and they’ve produced some pretty incredible art for us already, some of which you can see if you check out their blogs.

The rest of the Kickstarter and patreon money is to be split up among the permanent team members on a twice-a-year basis, with percentages for the first payment calculated from the amount of money we have on July 31st.

I’ll cut straight to the point, we’re poor and though this is going to be a bit of a windfall for each of us, it for sure isn’t enough to live on. We all have other jobs, and A.N.I.M. takes a lot of our time.

If anyone wants to donate to our ko-fi, subscribe to our patreon, increase their existing patreon subscription, etc. in time for our team’s payout on the 31st, that would be greatly appreciated. Even if you’re seeing this after July 31st it would still be appreciated because then that money goes to our ability to advertise, hire artists, and pay ourselves in the future.

As a reminder, we run the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club as a way to inject life into an industry/hobby that is being flattened under the weight of WotC's monopoly, and currently have a patreon milestone set for expanding it.

Signing up for our patreon at $5 or more gets you access to regularly updated beta copies of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, plus adventure modules and short stories!

Also as a reminder, for a limited time, you can currently get a beta copy of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy completely free just for joining the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club!

Elegantly designed and thoroughly playtested, Eureka represents the culmination of three years of near-daily work from our team, as well as a lot of our own money. If you’re just now reading this and learning about Eureka for the first time, you missed the crowdfunding window unfortunately, but our Kickstarter page is still the best place to learn more about what Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy actually is, as that is where we have all the fancy art assets, the animated trailer, links to video reviews by podcasts and youtubers, and where we post regular updates on the status of our progress finishing the game and getting it ready for final release.

Beta Copies through the Patreon

If you want more than just status updates, going forward you can download regularly updated playable beta versions of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy and it’s adventure modules by subscribing to our Patreon at the $5 tier or higher. Subscribing to our patreon also grants you access to our patreon discord server where you can talk to us directly and offer valuable feedback on our progress and projects.

The A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club

If you would like to meet the A.N.I.M. team and even have a chance to play Eureka with us, you can join the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club discord server. It’s also just a great place to talk and discuss TTRPGs, so there is no schedule obligation, but the main purpose of it is to nominate, vote on, then read, discuss, and play different indie TTRPGs. We put playgroups together based on scheduling compatibility, so it’s all extremely flexible. This is a free discord server, separate from our patreon exclusive one. https://discord.gg/7jdP8FBPes

Other Stuff

We also have a ko-fi and merchandise if you just wanna give us more money for any reason.

We hope to see you there, and that you will help our dreams come true and launch our careers as indie TTRPG developers with a bang by getting us to our base goal and blowing those stretch goals out of the water, and fight back against WotC's monopoly on the entire hobby. Wish us luck.

[nayatarot777]

{your next blessings ✨💫} • pac

• pile one •

cards: 8 of pentacles, 10 of wands, 6 of wands

your next blessings are related to a practical project or a work project that you’ve been really putting a lot of effort and energy into. it seems like you’ve entered an obsession almost due to wanting to perfect and master whatever craft this is. you’ve taken on a lot of responsibility for the sake of manifesting your vision into a reality, however, i’m seeing that your next blessing is going to be a lot of supporters to help you with all of these responsibilities. they may have become major burdens for you. i’m feeling like a lot of workaholics are in this pile - or you’ve stepped into workaholic energy even if that’s not you usually. but with the 6 of wands, you’re gaining a whole lot of new supporters within your work. your hard work won’t go unnoticed. this is a group of supporters that are set in stone for you and your work.

• pile two •

cards: 10 of pentacles, 3 of pentacles, 5 of pentacles

this blessing is definitely monetary or materialistic, due to the fact that every card is a pentacle card. a group of people who you’re working with is going to help you to achieve some major financial or materialistic abundance. some type of financial windfall or something significant to your physical world - and this is going to be a long term thing. long term stability - whether that’s financial stability, a home, a career. you could be in this 5 of pentacles energy currently. feeling a lot of lack in the physical world. but some type of team work with others who are helping you to achieve a common goal will really bring in a lot of tangible success that you can see or feel or touch. it’ll be the completion of something that you’ve been working hard towards for a long while. i’m also seeing that after you gain this major physical stability, your other blessing could be keeping some low vibrational people away from you thanks to this. if you’re living in a home that’s full of toxicity, this is you gaining a huge amount of abundance and leaving people out in the cold (where they belong). this could also pertain to an actual work project. this major financial windfall could also be an inheritance for some of you.

• pile three •

cards: ace of pentacles, 6 of pentacles, 9 of pentacles

the energy of materialism and money is strong in this pile, just like it was for pile two. so you could be attracted to both piles. your next blessing is a new job that’s being given to you. i feel like you don’t even have to chase after this or do much to acquire this. i believe that it’ll be handed to you by someone in a more privileged position than you. i’m also seeing that for others of you, you could straight up be given some money. some money to invest into yourself - whether that’s for self-care, bills, whatever the case. i’m seeing a lot of generosity towards you guys though, from this 6 of pentacles. whichever blessing fits you guys, this will lead to your self-sufficiency and a greater amount of self-esteem and stability. whatever this is, you’ll enjoy it thoroughly. especially if this is a job. i feel like it’s going to be one that you feel extremely comfortable in, and you might find it quite easy to do.

[mysticheathenn]

Intuitive Messages and Oracle Cards Reading

Hi, Hexlings!

This pick-a-card reading is all about messages that oracle cards have for you and what intuitive messages come through for you without tarot cards.

This is a general reading, remember to take what resonates and leave what does not. This reading does not supplement your need to seek professional help.

Take your time when choosing your pile. Ask yourself the question and choose the picture that you can’t stop looking at. Listen to your intuition.

MasterList

Patreon Link

Ko-Fi Donations

Pile l:

Song: Wishes by Diplo ft Trippie Redd (Intuitive Play) Tea Tree Oracle Cards: Family Wishes Come True, A Marriage will take place either romantic or business, Short Journey, PArting ways in either romance or business, Recognition reward for merit, Announcement, Keep your life in Balance.

Messages: Everything is a Reflection Hold Up the Energetic Mirror & Trust Your Faith. Dive into the Unfolding Journey.

Intuitive Messages: There are several Messages, take what resonates and leave what does not. What are you placing on hold pile l. What has been calling for your soul to do that you have yet to take action whether due to procrastination or out of fear. Why aren't you doing it? Look inside yourself and ask where does this fear come from and why am I allowing it to dictate the life that I am living when I know I deserve more. Are you so comfortable with living a life you hate that going after your dreams is more uncomfortable than living without the things you want and deserve? Ask yourself these questions and trust things will work out. Others of you why are you all work and no play? Why are you afraid to take a break as if you get off the grinding train you will fall immediately down to the bottom? Why do you believe this is true for you? Go outside and play, pick up a video game, or read a book for several hours, what is yours will never bypass you, trust. You will get to where you want to be in no time. But you can't reach that goal if you aren't taking care of yourself and running off on E. Lastly, What trauma have you been avoiding that you need to be healing? You are tired of people with the same personality just different meat suit coming into your life but you are not healing the wounds that are causing these people to trigger you. Heal, baby. You deserve to live a life without always feeling triggered or even better a life filled with people who want to give you genuine love and for you to trust they want to only love you without anything in return. So now I ask you what do you need to get rid of in order to invite this new energy of love in and are you willing to do it?

Pile ll:

Song: Christmas Kids by ROAR (Remix: Slō, Twilight, Tizzy-Spotify Shuffle)

Tea Tree Oracle Cards: Temporary Situation, New Creative Ideas New Ventures A Fresh Start, Pleasure from a close friend, Someone will try to make you do something against your will, climbing towards success, Happiness, A goal-oriented person, opportunity or windfall.

Messages: Express yourself creatively. Start something new. & You are the image maker. What you focus on manifests.

Intuitive Messages: Several messages like Pile l take what resonates and leave what does not. Some of you are in a situation that isn't healthy, safe, or possible while not toxic is draining you mentally, emotionally, and maybe even physically. You may or may not believe in the law of attraction but if you are spiritual and believe in such things ask yourself how can I change this situation? How can I manifest a better ending for myself? Pray to your spirit team if you are unsure they want to help you but you need to be willing and open to help. See the light at the end of the tunnel as your oracle cad says this situation is temporary but you need to buckle your shoe straps and be prepared to be optimistic see the light and go full speed running towards it instead of letting the darkness take over your life. You are a ray of sunshine and whatever situation you may be in sees that and wants to keep you hidden just like your chosen song from Spotify about a couple who are in a toxic chaotic relationship. Others of you go for a walk. When I say walk I mean don't have anything on your mind just be present during your walk. Look at the trees notice the small things around you that you may not have noticed before and let whatever ideas and downloads come to you, come to you, and act on those ideas. There is something that is meant to find you that is an idea that will bring you a rainfall of abundance and change your life around for the better but you must act and be open to receiving this idea and not judge yourself. Release imposter syndrome. Remember that if you weren't capable of doing the idea or whatever this is you wouldn't have received the opportunity. Lastly, why are you listening to sheep who follow other sheep and not from if not yourself from those who lead their own path and walk their talk. "I'll be damned if I listen to facts up out the mouth of a man with an unwashed ass" is what I am hearing." You are not meant to be a follower but a leader. Stop following or listening to people who lead their own lives off of cliffs with no parachutes or care as to how and if they will land.

Pile lll:

Song: Gone or Staying by Sleep Theory (Spotify Shuffle)

Tea Tree Oracle Messages: You will receive a gift, Reconciliation, Beware of great pride, Hard work ahead, Unsuccessful outcome to a problem, Increase your efforts if you want to achieve your goals, Spiritual guidance and protection from harm, Happiness, An emotionally secure loving family is important to you, & unsuccessful plans.

Message: Your Purpose is personal expansion.

Intuitive Messages: This is my love pile that again has several messages so take what resonates and leave what does not. Some of you are single but go back and forth between wanting a relationship and "I'm an independent person and I don't need no person" and I want to laugh a bit because I am also in that stage but deep down I know I want that can't eat can't sleep kind of love. The reassuring love, the love where I know I don't have to worry about my partner even entertaining other people, and better my love being reciprocated x10 and until then anybody can stay away. I get it but sometimes you have to be honest with yourself and do the work to invite this kind of energy in. It can be scary but it's definitely worth it. The number of times I have seen a person glowing not just physically but in their personal life as well is just unreal sometimes to me that I know it's truly worth it. Now for others who are in the talking stages or even in a relationship, it's okay to let your partner help you. It's okay to lean on others and when I mean it's okay I mean people you truly can trust. If you aren't sure about that then you may not have anyone in your life that you trust but if you do there are signs such as do they throw information or things they do for you back in your face, when you call them are they there, if you had to give any of your friends keys could you trust them to not use it for personal gains if the answer is no to all of them find a better community but if you answered yes to these trust that you are in good hands. Stop being Hercules all the time and give people at least some form of entry into your life instead of always hovering over them waiting for them to fuck up and going see I knew it, out the door. Stop..stop it. People can't show you they mean well if you don't allow them to show up. Lastly for those who are in a relationship, someone is coming back into your life but I need you to ask yourself the important questions before you allow them back in again. Are they coming back into your life to see if you are still stupid for allowing them back in or is this a relationship that is healthy overall but has their issues and that person has worked on themselves to help better the relationship? If you don't know this answer ask yourself did this person make you feel loved not have good memories that were occasional but did you feel loved, did they shower you with compliments, gifts, their time, and reciprocate the energy you gave them...if the answer is no please continue staying single. They are coming back to see if you are still stupid enough to let them in again. Release your codependency from this person and find someone who values you, your efforts, and your time. For others of you while things will go great this time around it isn't without hard work from both ends.

Pile lV:

Song: Moscow Mule by Bad Bunny (Spotify Shuffle) / The Kings Affirmation by Iniko (Intuitive Play)

Tee Tree Oracle Messages: May, September, Family wishes come true, Major challenges to overcome, Advice from a friend, Work achievement success, wish will not be granted, celebration fun enjoyment, take care or there will be a loss of material wealth, someone is working against you behind your back, you should accept valid criticism, a goal-oriented person, dealings with or relationship with a woman, Things will not always be this way a change is coming, Someone will try and make you do something against your will.

Message: Eliminate Distractions. Stop shining a light on things you are not. & Don't run from the darkness. Embrace your shadow side.

Intuitive Messages: l Why are you self-sabotaging? Why do you not want to accept great things can happen to you in this lifetime? What is causing you to be afraid that you are willing to throw away everything you are working on or have worked on to settle for less than? Are you okay with mediocrity if so stop what you are doing and continue down the path of self-sabotage? You are meant for greatness, allow it to happen for you? Stop allowing distractions to stray you from the path. It's okay to have enjoyment but if that enjoyment is causing you to have thoughts that are not your own or even cause you to waste time putting off things that you are supposed to be doing remember that instant gratification is great until you realize 10 years from now you are still getting fake dopamine off of instant gratification of scrolling or seeking things that are quick get rich schemes that never work. Be mindful of what you give your mind to. Be careful of the things you watch on television, the music you listen to, and even the people you follow. These are all things that you somehow correlate with. If they are not somehow speaking positive energy into your life or at least giving you joy or motivation release it. This goes for people as well in your life. Others of you are running away from your problems. As soon as you feel that things are getting tough you stop and then talk yourself into negative talk about how that wasn't meant for you or whatever it is that you tell yourself when things get too hard. Stop. You are extraordinary. You know this, I know this, your loved ones know this even your potential haters know this. Stop being afraid of the person you can become and are. Embrace the hard things. Embrace everything that feels uncomfortable. How are you going to grow as a person if you keep running away from things that are meant to help elevate you as a person? You may be the type of person who watches YouTube videos where the person gets up at 5am, the gym, journals, etc etc and you keep going through the cycle of restarting your life and quitting when you miss a day or two and then go well there is always next year...why next year pile lV, why not now. Now is the time. Not 2025. not 2026, but now. If you are wanting to lose weight or whatever it is imagine it being September you could have already lost 30lbs by then instead of finally getting the nerve to do it in September. Dwayne Johnson aka The Rock says it best "You have two options either day on or one day." "Everything you want to do is going to be hard you just have to choose your hard. Staying in your situation that is hard or achieving what you want that is going to be hard. Choose your hard" You can't sit in a victim mentality when you are your own villain.

Thank you for liking and reblogging my readings. I always appreciate you guys on here and on Patreon.

Stay Safe and Be Blessed

[writingquestionsanswered]

how can i make a fake framed traitor out of an extremely kind, virtuous and genuine character that the main character trusts wholeheartedly? what could i use to make the MC and reader be like ‘yes this is unlikely but unfortunately makes sense’ just to make a reveal later?

Making a Framed Traitor Seem Genuine

There are three things you can do to make a framed traitor seem like they're genuinely a traitor...

1 - Make the Motive Make Sense - Any traitorous act must have an underlying motive... the reason that anyone would commit the traitorous act to begin with. So the key is to find a way to make that motive make sense for that character, no matter how random it may seem. Like, maybe a side benefit to committing the traitorous act is a cash windfall, and maybe the framed character also happened to recently mentioned being in need of cash for some legitimate reason. It may not mean they're guilty, but the motive fits.

2 - Sweeten the Pot with a Little Plausible Deniability - Try to think of some additional coincidental thing that will make them look even more guilty, but which also gives them some plausible deniability. Like, maybe one of the orchestrators of this traitorous act also happens to own a popular night club in town. And maybe the framed character is known to never go to night clubs, ever, but maybe one night they were peer pressured into attending a barely known co-worker's bachelorette party, and during that party they got separated from the group and had to wander into several different nightclubs trying to find the group again. And maybe they happened to wander into the bad person's nightclub without even knowing it, and were spotted going into said nightclub by one of the about-to-be-betrayed friends, which obviously looks very bad for the framed person. Because now, in addition to having a reasonable motive for the betrayal they are accused of, they've also been seen in a place that suggests an association with one of the other perpetrators. And although they have the plausible deniability ("I didn't go there because I wanted to... I was looking for the group I was with...) there's no way they can prove that's true.

3 - Drop a Few Other Subtle Hints - That may be enough to make your character look guilty when they're not, but if you need to, you could drop in one or a few other hints earlier on in the story that accomplish the same thing on a more subtle level. Something that will look bad in retrospect but hardly be noticeable at the time. Like, maybe one of the soon-to-be-betrayed friends invites them to their slam poetry reading, and the framed person texts at the last minute that they can't come because they have to work late (which is actually true), and then later the group will learn that Team Bad did some big thing that night. At the time it seems like nothing, but in retrospect--thinking that framed-character was involved in the traitorous act, now it makes sense that they missed the slam poetry night because... of course! They were actually with Team Bad doing the bad thing they did that night. Again, this wouldn't occur to the characters or reader at the time, but when connecting the dots in retrospect, it all adds up. Of course, the reality is it was just a coincidence and they really were at work that night.

Just be careful not to go too far in making them look really guilty. You don't want to weight them down with so many coincidences that look bad that they always look a little guilty, even once absolved.

Happy writing!

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[blueiscoool]

‘Horrible’ Painting Found by a Junk Dealer Could Be a Picasso Worth $6 Million

An Italian family had long debated throwing away the unconventional portrait.

It’s not often you sit down to read a book about the greatest masterpieces of art history, then look up to find a stellar example hanging on your own wall. Yet this was apparently the experience of Andrea Lo Rosso, who began raising questions about a peculiar painting in his parents’ living room at their home on Capri in Italy. Could it possibly be by Picasso, the forefather of Modern art himself?

For years the man’s parents had argued over the unconventional portrait, which was discovered by his father Luigi Lo Rosso in the cellar of a villa in Capri 1962, given a cheap frame, and put on the wall. This did not please his wife, who despaired at the female sitter’s strangely contorted face. The scrawled name “Picasso” in the top left hand corner meant nothing to either of them.

“My father was from Capri and would collect junk to sell for next to nothing,” Lo Rosso told the Guardian. “He found the painting before I was even born and didn’t have a clue who Picasso was. He wasn’t a very cultured person.”

“My mother didn’t want to keep it—she kept saying it was horrible,” he added.

The family sought out the counsel of the Arcadia Foundation, which carries out art attributions and appraisals. A member of its scientific committee, Dr. Cinzia Altieri, a trained graphologist or handwriting specialist, studied the signature on the painting. The foundation also enrolled the help of famed art detective Maurizio Seracini, who led a chemical-scientific analysis of the work.

As a team, these experts have confirmed the attribution to Picasso. The painting has been identified as a portrait of Dora Maar, the French Surrealist photographer, painter, and poet who was at that time Picasso’s mistress.

It is believed to have been made some time between 1930 and 1936 during a trip to Capri, where Picasso often visited, although he first met Maar in late 1935 or early 1936. The pair had a relationship lasting nearly nine years and, though she was an artist in her own right, Maar’s work has only recently received the attention it deserves. In 2019, a landmark retrospective of over 250 works by Maar was presented at the Centre Pompidou in Paris and Tate Modern in London.

If the attribution turns out to be true, the Lo Rossos can expect a financial windfall. The Arcadia Foundation has valued the alleged Picasso at €6 million ($6.7 million).

The artist painted many portraits of Maar in their time together, and several reside in major museum collections today. The auction record for a painting of Maar by Picasso was set in 2006, when Sotheby’s New York sold Dora Maar au chat (1941) for $95.2 million, according to the Artnet Price Database.

Unfortunately for this team of Italian art sleuths, their rediscovered modernist masterpiece piece is unlikely to fetch in the millions until it has been legitimized by official Picasso authenticators.

Andrea Lo Rosso said that, so far, the Picasso Foundation in Malagá, Spain has refused to even assess the work, which it believes to be a fake. The foundation declined to comment publicly on the work when contacted. It reportedly receives hundreds of authentication requests every day.

The Picasso Administration in Paris has also been reached for comment but did not respond by publication time.

By Jo Lawson-Tancred.

[alectoperdita]

For the ficlets request, 'meeting upon the threshold' more in that universe of DSOD Kaiba realizing what the could have had and now he fucked up or just jealous DSOD Kaiba . (hope all is well with you sending all the good internet vibes)

Oh anon, I hope you were ready to receive a full-ass sequel chapter. Hope this satisfies your prompt(s). 🥺 They gave me a lot to think about (lol obviously, based on how much I wrote), and it's driving me more insane with yet more to consider. For now, I yeet this for peace of mind.

Read "Meeting upon the threshold" on AO3

word count: 4281 rating: M tags: post-DSOD, Kaiba being an asshole, one-night stand, open ending, mild sexual content, anal sex, unprotected sex

---

The forbidden fruit of knowledge sat with him—day after day, then week after week, festering with the sickeningly sweet scent of onsetting rot.

He should've discarded it. As soon as Isono, knitted brows visible above the lip of his sunglasses, handed him the dossier he'd requested, he should've ordered it disposed of. Kaiba recognized his employee's confusion, even concern. He even felt a bit of it toward himself. It had been years since he'd shown any interest in someone on the mortal plane who wasn't an active security risk, much less in Yugi's ilk.

Kaiba lost track of Yugi years ago when he retired from dueling.

But that was what made it confusing. Kaiba hadn't requested information on Yugi, but Jounouchi fucking Katsuya.

As much as Kaiba refused to admit it, his meeting with an alternate version of himself, one engaged to Jounouchi, haunted him. He spent more time than warranted replaying the encounter again and again in his head, searching for any hint of disharmony simmering beneath the surface. They might be blissfully happy or lying to themselves in a sham of a relationship. But Kaiba couldn't tell because he didn't know them.

Not anymore than he knew or understood the Jounouchi of his universe, no matter how much dirt Isono and the security team dug up on the man.

The files sat in a drawer in his office, the digital copy in his email. Against his better judgment, he'd pull it up and review the content every few days. After the first week, he practically had it memorized.

By the end of the second week, its luster grew too bright, too deceptively tempting, to ignore.

Call it a capitulation to curiosity; a momentary weakness. Either way, he counted on it finally purging his fixation.

Kaiba was ready to forget the unfortunate detour and move on. Put everything he saw of the other Seto and his fiance and bury it in a mental compartment never to be unearthed again.

Again, Isono demonstrated mute surprise not only because Kaiba left the office early in the evening, but the slight lift of his eyebrows said he recognized the address Kaiba requested to be driven to.

His bodyguard knew better than to say anything, though. If he hadn't made a peep when Mokuba divested from the company and moved to America, why would he start now?

Jounouchi, the other Jounouchi's words rose unbidden in his mind: "You already pushed everyone away, haven't you?"

Kaiba shoved the memory aside.

Traffic was light as they made their way to the old commercial district. Thanks to stubborn neighborhood associations, new development had stalled in this area compared to the rest of the city. The businesses here were family-owned and run by old timers more concerned with nostalgia than progress.

Time was on Kaiba's side. He could wait them out.

Really, he wasn't surprised Jounouchi opened his establishment here. If only so he could be another thorn in his side.

The first time he saw it in Jounouchi's files, he'd laughed. The sound resonated through his office. Never in a million years would Kaiba have pictured Jounouchi as a small business owner, especially given his rather spotty employment history. But a death in the family, and not the one everyone would've guessed, had gifted the man an unexpected windfall.

The restaurant license was legitimate. Kaiba checked twice.

Removed from the city's more vibrant business and entertainment districts, the neighborhood resembled a slice of time crystalized in amber. Its vibes were positively sleepy, and its streets were devoid of pedestrians. Hardly bustling. Kaiba doubted any business in the area qualified as booming.

He sneered. Appropriate—a third-rate restaurant in a deadbeat part of town, run by a deadbeat.

"Stay here," he ordered Isono when they stopped at the curb. "I'll call if I need anything."

Isono nodded. "Understood, Seto-sama."

Jounouchi's little restaurant was located down a narrow side street, on the ground floor of a similarly narrow two-story building with a slatted wooden roof. The place was little more than a hole-in-the-wall, with only enough seating to serve maybe half a dozen people. Perfect for a one-man operation.

Kaiba didn't hesitate before ducking under the entrance curtain. Red and patterned, it was surprisingly traditional.

"Welcome!" rang through the small shop. The lone figure behind the counter dipped into a deep bow. His voice was immediately familiar to Kaiba, almost instantly transporting him back more than a decade.

The shop's proprietor, Jounouchi, straightened. Something jangled against his chest, a long necklace slipping out of his collar. Kaiba's blood pressure spiked before he realized they were dog tags hanging from it.

Not a ring on a chain.

Slowly, Kaiba uncurled his fists, one finger at a time.

Clearly, Jounouchi remembered him too. Of course he did. Kaiba's presence in Domino was not one that could be ignored. His face was frequently plastered on billboards and featured in local and national media. Yet Jounouchi gawked, nonetheless.

It was amusing to watch the myriad of emotions flashing across Jounouchi's face—the shock, the confusion, and finally the outrage. Satisfaction welled inside Kaiba.

"Get lost," barked Jounouchi once he recovered, reaching for a knife before thinking better of it.

Kaiba did not. He crossed the threshold and took a seat at the empty serving counter directly in front of Jounouchi.

Up close, he scrutinized the other man in return. Seeing Jounouchi in real life didn't compare to the covert surveillance shots. The dark bandana around his head kept his blond hair under control. Navy chef's jacket and a white apron; he at least dressed for the job. His face was the same, more or less, yet his jaw cut sharper, the underside of his eyes darker, and his brown eyes less mirthful.

There were faint remnants of his once youthful boyish charms, but he was undeniably older now.

As was Kaiba.

But some things never changed between them.

"Is that any way to greet your customers?" he drawled, a familiar smirk lifting the corner of his lips. It was almost comforting, like slipping into a well-worn sweater.

Jounouchi clenched his jaw, the muscles jumped visibly. "I'm doing the neighborhood a favor and running off the vermin."

Kaiba's gaze darted upward. As he saw from the surveillance photos, Jounouchi indeed boosted an eyebrow piercing, two red studs framing the top and bottom of his left brow. Combined with his pierced earlobes and the short ponytail, he hadn't made a clean break with his delinquent past.

But maybe Jounouchi's lady friends appreciated the vaguely thuggish look. Or his boyfriends, if this universe's Jounouchi had similar tastes as his counterpart.

Seto couldn't be sure. The dossier reported next to nothing about Jounouchi's romantic relationships beyond his current singlehood.

As he met Jounouchi's gaze, his smirk widened, displaying every tooth possible. "Funny, that's what I figured you served in a shitty establishment like this, grilled vermin."

To his surprise, and perhaps even disappointment, Jounouchi didn't rise to the bait. Instead, he calmly gestured to the wooden plaques hanging over him. "I'm sure a smart guy like you can read."

Kaiba scanned the offerings. He didn't frequent establishments like this, as he preferred Western cuisine. The menu boasted the usual assortment of grilled meats, seafood, and vegetables, along with some ready-to-serve appetizers. The rest was a limited alcohol menu. When his gaze darted back to Jounouchi, he folded his hands on the counter and said, "Chef's choice."

For a second, Jounouchi didn't move, barely twitched as he took a shallow breath. Then, his expression steeled itself in preparation to meet Kaiba's unspoken challenge, and he burst into a flurry of movement. For a moment, he disappeared behind another curtain divider and emerged on the other side of the counter with a tray.

"Your otoshi," Jounouchi grumbled when he set a trio of small plates, a sake cup, and pourer down in front of Kaiba. He leveled one last glare before returning behind the counter.

Kaiba tried not to snort. Picking up his chopsticks, he poked at one appetizer, strips of braised burdock root and carrots. It looked correct and smelled fine. The texture crunched as he sank his teeth in, while the flavor was both sweet and savory. Out of the corner of his eyes, he spotted Jounouchi pausing in his other preparations to watch him chew.

Kaiba swallowed without comment, and poured sake into the serving cup. Well aware of Jounouchi's lingering gaze, he threw it back in one gulp.

The sake was nothing special, nothing to write home about, but its crisp taste complemented the braised vegetables' flavor.

Their eyes locked as Kaiba lowered his cup. Jounouchi broke eye contact almost immediately, brows knitted as he concentrated on his knife and cutting board. He wielded the blade with confidence and ease, making straight cuts that sliced cleanly through a small horse mackerel. There was already other food cooking on the grill. Kaiba could smell it from across the counter that separated them.

If anyone walked in on them, an outsider might think they were nothing more than a cook and his sole customer. Despite the casual air Kaiba affected, he watched his every move. Jounouchi wasn't the sort to poison his food. Probably. Jounouchi didn't lower his guard, either, carrying his tension in shoulders and jaws despite his smooth and controlled movements.

The image of the other Jounouchi came to mind unbidden. Kaiba wondered what he did, if he even worked or if he mooched off the other Seto's good grace. It was hard to imagine Jounouchi, any Jounouchi, as a kept man, simply because he shouldn't have that sort of appeal. Compared to the other Jounouchi with his bright eyes and well-fitted clothes, the one native to his home dimension was rougher around the edges. Not just in how he kept his appearance, but also in his mannerisms. Like Kaiba, Jounouchi had also filled out since their teen years, namely in the chest and arms. The muscles in his forearms flexed as he worked his knife and grill.

After several long moments of silence, Kaiba couldn't hold his tongue any longer. "It figures this is the kind of cooking you took to—grilling meat on a stick. Positively caveman."

Jounouchi stiffened. He bristled, red creeping into his cheeks. He bit his tongue and said nothing, though. Instead, he plucked two skewers of seared meat and delicately placed them on a serving plate. He didn't touch the prawn and fish still on the grill.

Balanced on a wooden paddle, Jounouchi presented the dish to him across the counter. "Chicken hearts," he said gruffly.

Kaiba arched an eyebrow. Did Jounouchi mean to imply something by his choice of meat? But he took the plate with a neutral expression and, as much as he hated to admit it, the smell had him salivating.

He'd skipped lunch. It was the only reason the deadbeat's cooking seemed even remotely appetizing.

This time, Jounouchi made no effort to hide his staring, studying Kaiba as he ate.

Whatever Kaiba's usual culinary preferences, well-seasoned and well-cooked meat had universal appeal. The food settled heavy in his belly, warmed by sake. The otoshi and the alcohol had served their purpose, whetting his dormant appetite.

There was nothing to criticize. Not the flavor. Not the presentation. Not without lying outright or, worse, nitpicking. They both knew it, too.

Most infuriatingly, he wanted seconds.

Chair legs screeched as he stood. Without counting, he threw a handful of notes on the counter, easily three or four times what the modest meal was worth. Jounouchi made no moves to stop him, but his eyes drilled into Kaiba's back as he stalked out of the restaurant.

***

He should've thrown the files into the shredder the next day. He didn't look at them again, but their presence weighed upon him.

Later the same week, he ducked under the curtain to enter Jounouchi's robatayaki shop again. Two older diners, neighborhood retirees, were already seated at the far end of the counter, making friendly conversation with Jounouchi as he cooked for them. Jounouchi was nothing but smiles and laughs for them, beaming as if Yugi sat across from him.

Like leaden weight, the mirth dropped almost instantly from his face when he spun to greet Kaiba.

"Welcome," Jounouchi said flatly, drawing curious glances from his current customers.

Ignoring the pricking sensation, Kaiba sat at the opposite end of the counter. Jounouchi took his sweet time before suddenly appearing at his side and serving him a trio of compulsory appetizers and sake, like last time. To add insult to injury, he went straight back to his other diners without even trying to take Kaiba's order.

Frowning, Kaiba picked at the otoshi. Today's selection included chilled mung bean sprouts, kimchi, and potato salad, and the sake was warm. Same as last time, the food was palatable, probably even tasty to more pedestrian taste buds.

Every so often, a burst of laughter disturbed Kaiba, causing him to shoot daggers in Jounouchi's direction before he caught himself and forced his eyes back to his food. By the time the deadbeat acknowledged him again, Kaiba's sake had cooled entirely.

"Whaddaya want?" asked Jounouchi, voice flat and without mincing words.

They both knew he wasn't asking about what Kaiba wanted to eat. What did Kaiba want with Jounouchi? Why was he bothering him again?

Kaiba had no sane answer to give him.

To spite him, he ordered one of every item on the menu. His stomach churned unhappily at the prospect of so much food, but he refused to allow Jounouchi to intimidate him.

The chef boggled at him for a second before snapping out of it. "Your funeral," he said with a shrug before walking away.

Plate after plate, the food kept coming. By the third one, Kaiba felt ready to vomit. Instead, he left the food untouched as it piled up next to him, focusing on the alcohol instead. Time simultaneously rushed past in a torrent and crawled like molasses. It lost all meaning, reminding Kaiba of the limbo he crossed to and from Aaru. The only constant was Jounouchi, hovering right on the edge of his perceptions but otherwise refusing to engage with Kaiba more than strictly necessary.

Not unless Kaiba called to him, and he refused. People tripped over themselves to serve Kaiba, not the other way around.

Eventually, Isono came to investigate when he failed to respond to his texts. Slamming his palms down on the counter, Kaiba knocked over his chair when he shot to his feet and stormed out, leaving Isono to settle the bill.

He swore he'd never go back.

The same night, he dreamed of the heat blasting out of the charcoal grill, the dots of sweat running down Jounouchi's neck when he hunched over the fire, and large hands wrapped around the handle of gleaming knives skimming Kaiba's underbelly.

***

"Seriously, why are you here?" groaned Jounouchi. "Why are you haunting me like an evil spirit?"

Kaiba could ask the same of himself. Why did Jounouchi, first the other Seto's smooth-faced fiance with his soft hair and softer mouth, and now this rough but sure-handed Jounouchi occupy so much of Kaiba's thoughts?

Kaiba had lost count of how many times he'd been a patron of Jounouchi's restaurant. Their interactions may have thawed somewhat, but they were, by no means, friendly. At first Kaiba lingered after closing time for petty reasons, forcing Jounouchi to close and clean around him. Last time, Jounouchi plopped down next to him with a can of beer instead, complaining and insulting Kaiba the entire time. More sake bore Kaiba through the experience. Plus, it was nothing Kaiba hadn't heard before.

Tonight, Jounouchi had deflated. His face was almost haggard under the warm yellow light, nooks and crevices exaggerated by the shadows within them.

Kaiba felt as tired as Jounouchi looked. In the end, they were nothing more than two browbeaten men.

"Well?" Jounouchi demanded when Kaiba didn't respond. "Usually, you can't shut the fuck up, but now nothing? Not a damn peep?"

Kaiba hummed and sipped his sake. His tongue lapped the last drops from the cup. He licked his lips absently, noting how numb his tongue felt.

Jounouchi stared, his eyes as scorching hot as burning coal.

Kaiba did it again, and Jounouchi's eyes narrowed in anger? Suspicion?

Lifting his chin high, he smirked. It was always satisfying to needle the other man. "I don't have to explain myself to the likes of you. But it's certainly not for the pleasure of your sparkling company."

Jounouchi swore and lumbered to his feet. Kaiba watched, a passenger in his own body, as the other man stepped behind him and loomed over him, bracing the counter's edge to cage him in. "You're a shitty liar," he accused, so close Kaiba could smell the malt on his breath. "I dunno exactly why, but you're here because of me."

"You think too highly of yourself. You're a nobody."

Kaiba's head spun. Must be the sake he drank.

Jounouchi didn't back down. Kaiba wondered if tonight might end in a brawl. He could break Jounouchi's nose and give him a taste of the iron Kaiba found in the hearts and gizzards he served up. Jounouchi could turn his knife skills on a target capable of fighting back. And if they could walk away afterward, they could never see each other again.

Warm fingers nudged his chin, tilting his face up to allow Jounouchi to scrutinize him. Up close, his eyes resembled whisky, dark and honeyed. Blond fringes, dark pierced eyebrows, crooked nose, full mouth—when considered as a package, even Kaiba admitted it was not unappealing.

But Kaiba had better tastes in food and style. Better standards for people and the partners he kept in his life than Seto.

Jounouchi was fit enough to fuck, nothing more.

"Is this how you bewitched him?" he snarled, unable to stop himself from canting toward the other man.

Jounouchi blinked, then laughed, incredulously. "I can't believe it. There's no way we share an ex. There's no way that's why you started coming here outta nowhere. You're drunk, Kaiba. Call Isono so he can take you home."

He rolled back on the heels of his feet, preparing to draw away. To leave. To dismiss him.

Fueled by impulse—insanity, Kaiba spun in his seat, chasing him. His hands moved without his command, fingers closing around Jounouchi's chin in an iron grip and yanking him down to him. Their teeth knocked before their lips met. But Kaiba didn't release him, squeezing Jounouchi's jaw hard enough his own ached in sympathy.

A sharp inhale, and Kaiba instinctively tensed. This Jounouchi wouldn't hesitate to lay into him or perhaps gut him for an unwanted advance. But when he unfroze, he didn't shove Kaiba away, instead meeting him head on with surprising fervor. Kaiba hissed, both from the counter now digging into his back and the stinging nip of Jounouchi's bite.

The kiss he stole from the other Jounouchi remained fresh on his mind, as if it happened yesterday; mint-flavored, supple yet soft lips, and a hint of crisp aftershave, faded though it might've been.

Sweat and smoke clung to Jounouchi, and he tasted of beer. His lips were slightly chapped. Fingertips fluttered across Kaiba's cheeks, ears, hair, and neck, never settling on any spot for more than a second before soaring off. His hands were everywhere, roaming over Kaiba's body as if he was entitled to do so.

It made Kaiba light-headed. Good thing he was already sitting.

Heat. Spit. Teeth. The hint of copper on their busted lips and warring tongues. The unforgiving plains, peaks, and valleys of their bodies grinding against each other, like the catastrophic collision between tectonic plates, upending worlds and locking together for minutes that felt like hours and days.

They didn't so much kiss as fight to devour the other.

They broke apart, wild-eyed and chest heaving. They remained physically connected; Jounouchi's hands were now on his hips and Kaiba clasping his strong jawline, absently caressing the rough grain of his late-night stubble. Jounouchi licked his lips, and Kaiba mirrored him, causing the other man's eyes to darken further.

After a beat of hesitation, as if he was waiting for Kaiba to deny him, Jounouchi leaned in for another kiss. It was softer, reminding Kaiba of another mint-flavored one. But he kindled the embers of Kaiba's want as deftly as he fanned the flame in his cooking.

Something roiled deep in his gut, something familiar as he often felt it when he saw Jounouchi these days.

"I'm hungry," Kaiba muttered against the other man's warm mouth. "Why else would I bother coming here?"

They both knew he wasn't referring to food, though.

Jounouchi shivered. "Got it. Let's take this somewhere private."

***

They didn't need to go far. Jounouchi lived right above his humble shop, a fact Kaiba already knew from his background check. He didn't get to see much of it as they stumbled in the dark from one room to the next, hands clawing at each other and mouths biting one another. They fell in a similarly tangled heap into Jounouchi's futon, already spread open on the bedroom floor.

The slob must've never put it away after getting up in the morning.

But in this case, it was convenient. Kaiba didn't want this encounter to last longer than strictly necessary. So he was secretly glad when Jounouchi went down on him without asking. In the dark, he concentrated on the warmth and suction enveloping his cock. He could almost forget, forgive, it was Jounouchi Katsuya blowing him.

Jounouchi turned out to be quite talented at fellatio. Perhaps this was the reason the other Seto wanted to marry his Jounouchi.

A cackle bubbled in his throat; more madness. He swallowed it and slammed into Jounouchi's spasming throat, drawing a choked groan from the other man. The other sounds he made, the slurping and slobbering, were disgusting, but they made Kaiba even harder. They drove him to the brink of madness and back again.

Want, lust, want—they pounded on the back of his skull and throbbed in the base of his spine.

Grabbing hold of Jounouchi's ponytail, he yanked him off his cock. The hair tie came loose, spilling soft strands over Kaiba's fingers. He wove his digits through them and pulled again. Jounouchi moaned, low and wanting, going limp in his grip.

"Degenerate," Kaiba growled while his heart raced in his ears. "Do you want me to fuck you, Jounouchi?"

He felt, rather than saw, Jounouchi nod.

This was a mistake.

This was a mistake.

The words blared repeatedly in his brain like klaxons, but he ignored them. Just as he ignored his better sense protesting the lack of condoms and Jounouchi's pained grimace as he pushed into his achingly tight hole for the first time. Kaiba was clean, and if Jounouchi dared to give him anything other than an orgasm, he'd destroy him.

"Kaiba, move!" groaned Jounouchi, writhing under him. "C'mon, I ain't gonna break!"

Gritting his teeth, Kaiba shut out the rest of his thoughts and focused on the only thing that mattered at this moment: fucking Jounouchi. There was little tenderness to their coupling, though. No honeyed words or promises exchanged as he imagined their other selves might, their limbs twined together and sharing the same breath.

The pleasure was still real. It was enough. He lost himself in the other man's heat and tightness, gorging himself on his wanton moans and the flavor of his lips and tongue.

Soon, it was over, a flash in the pan, with semen cooling between their clammy stomachs and leaking from Jounouchi's ass when he pulled out.

He sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, held it—dreading the change in the world; in himself to come—and released it before he dared to look down.

A diagonal slash of moonlight illuminated Jounouchi's eyelashes, his crooked nose, and his kiss-bruised lips. His eyes were squeezed firmly shut, peaceful if not for the furrow between his brow. As Kaiba counted the rise and fall of Jounouchi's shoulders while he caught his breath, however, nothing stirred within him—no newfound affection blossoming within his ribcage, no epiphany on how any version of himself could care about this man enough to want to marry him. No hate or disgust, none of the previous passion and hunger either.

Everything evaporated. The air between them hung stale and still, reeking of old cigarette smoke and poor decisions.

Instead, the hollowness in his chest was vacuous, and a bone-deep fatigue flooded the empty cavern.

Stupid, idiotic, he scolded himself.

Why would sex with Jounouchi change anything?

Rolling away, Kaiba grabbed the nearby discarded cover and cleaned himself wordlessly. It'd have to do until he got home. He didn't look at Jounouchi while he tucked himself away and fixed his appearance, even if he was within arm's reach.

The floor creaked as he stood, and he bit his tongue to keep from swearing. But Jounouchi didn't shift—never spoke to stop him as he beat a hasty retreat to the exit.

Pausing at the threshold, he glanced backward at the shadowed lump of the half-naked Jounouchi curled on the futon, with his back facing the door. They both knew he was still awake. But what was there left to say to each other? Nothing of consequence. Nothing which changed who they were and weren't to one another, two strangers who were barely acquaintances, hardly lovers. Kaiba showed himself out without a word of goodbye, only a faint snick as the door swung closed behind him.

---

Notes: An otoshi is a "compulsory" appetizer, which mainly means it's not free like you would see in some Western restaurants where they serve you bread and butter or even banchan in Korean meals. They are usually smaller dishes prepared ahead of service, like edamame or kimchi. Customers are billed for the otoshi. It is treated almost like a cover charge to ensure the customer doesn't occupy a seat for a long time after ordering one drink. Jounouchi gave it to Kaiba on purpose, so he's obligated to pay for something even if he doesn't order any food.

While this is basically a second chapter, I wonder if I should publish it on AO3 as a second chapter or as a separate fic. But maybe Meeting upon the threshold is better off without being attached to this sense of non-resolution? I'm curious to hear people's thoughts! <3

[athena-swords]

🌼🌼 PICK A CARD 🌼 🌼

Disclaimer : don't come to me if it doesn't resonate I am just chanelling ok and those who don't have autumn just take September and October month

🍂 The Upcoming Autumn for you 🍂

Here are your piles

Pile 1. Pile 2

Pile 3. Pile 4

Pile 1

Hii pile 1 hope so your 2023 is going good let's see what is happening for you this autumn.

if you are away from your people you gonna met them again and lemme tell you it's gonna be a bash

I am seeing a ending perhaps something you thought will end in a beautiful thing didn't ended like you were expecting

Lots of amusement park or fair or just new energy be ready for crazy companies

you will be making or planning to make a long time investment probably related to your career (think and think carefully before any decision)

Windfall money and unexpected coming projects or just your plate being full

Song chanelled: October,what makes you beautiful and O O Janne jana.

Pile 2

hii pile 2 let's hope you all love the fall season as much as I do now let's get into your reading.

Well you could get to know that someone you considered as close friend or fam has been going behind your back and saying not so nice stuff about you.

You could have been seeing many red flags in a group but we're not leaving so your guides showed you their real self in a harsh way

You could feel fatigue or just down this season(seems like your guys are not a fan of it haa).But don't worry there will be some good news for you

you guys should definitely go check pile 1 you will find some messages for you in there.

the advice for you is that go out and keep a balance don't expect situations to magically work for you gotta show some efforts honey

Songs chanelled:Allah maaf kare, strawberries and cigarettes, team by lorid

Pile 3

Hii pile 3 hope so you are looking up to yourself ,enjoying the days let's look what you have for yourself in autumn yaa

lol did you get your hands on a book you wanted to read for a long time I see you will make a very cosy space for you .

And procastinate in there and will end up doing all the work in deadline dates as please do little bit and don't pile them up

Could go for hiking or just mountains or you could even live there but for some reason I saw snowfall(do you wanna see it once)

Lots of planning and analysis about something all over you somehow will want to feel productive,you will introspect about all the stuff you have been doing and want to do

You could have a new crush or neighbours too....ok byyy hope you liked your reading

Songs chanelled:te amo ,tere hone laga hoon,cruel summer

Pile 4

Hii pile 4 whats happening my babies all of you are going through some shit anyways let's look into it yaa

You all may be going through some kind of rejection and you may have been feeling that now all of your plans are kind of no use??

Anyways the good news is there are other options which are better abd available to you so don't be so much into the grief that you ignore those ones

There might be some old friend or family trying to conntect you again

You could get some clarity on something you have been confused about for a long time

I see that you will work on more of your masculine energy and will take the room

Just a small advice to not over work yourself and trust people who you know wants your well-being

Songs chanelled:Aao Milo chalo,snap,Leyla.

Okay so take this as my comeback pack I would try to not just ghost every platform love you all alot please enjoy every day🕊️🕊️✨✨

Har Har Mahadev

[startrekfangirl2233-writes]

Hi Star!!!!!

💙💙💙Congrats on 300 followers!! So well deserved!!! 💙💙💙

I have a 300-followers mood board ask! 💛💛💛

Jake Seresin - Spies 👀

I cannot wait to see what you come up with!

It’s easy to forget what intelligence consists of: luck and speculation. Here and there a windfall, here and there a scoop.

It's a question The Agency has never known the answer to; Why is Jake Seresin a spy? It's easy to forget his skills when you see him at a bar or schmoozing his way around the floor of a gala impeccably clad in a three-piece suit. He's the youngest person to rise to his position as the Director's right hand man. He's the only agent in the history of the Agency to have full autonomy in selecting his own missions - everything from his team, to his choice weapons, transport, and intel. You never expected to find out that Jake Seresin has a soft side, a kind side. But you do, and you did. How? Well that's a completely different story.

This is one of the boards from my 300 Follower Celebration! Want to join in? Send me an ask following these guidelines!