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mostlysignssomeportents · 5 months ago

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A sexy, skinny defeat device for your HP ink cartridge

Animals keep evolving into crabs; it's a process called "carcinisation" and it's pretty weird. Crabs just turn out to be extremely evolutionarily fit for our current environment:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-do-animals-keep-evolving-into-crabs/

By the same token, all kinds of business keep evolving into something like a printer company. It turns out that in this enshittified, poorly regulated, rentier-friendly world, the parasitic, inkjet business model is extremely adaptive. Printerinisation is everywhere.

All that stuff you hate about your car? Trapping you into using their mechanics, spying on you, planned obsolescence? All lifted from the inkjet printer business model:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

That GE fridge that won't make ice or dispense water unless you spend $50 for a proprietary charcoal filter instead of using a $10 generic? Pure printerism:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/06/12/digital-feudalism/#filtergate

The software update to your Sonos speakers that makes them half as useful and takes away your right to play your stored music, forcing you to buy streaming music subscriptions? Straight out of the HP playbook:

https://www.wired.com/story/sonos-admits-its-recent-app-update-was-a-colossal-mistake/

But as printerinized as all these gadgets are, none can quite attain the level of high enshittification that the OG inkjet bastards attain on a daily basis. In the world championships of effortlessly authentic fuckery, no one can lay a glove on the sociopathic monsters of HP.

For example: when HP wanted to soften us all up for a new world of "subscription ink" (where you have to pre-pay every month for a certain number of pages' worth of printing, which your printer enforces by spying on you and ratting you out to HP over the internet), they offered a "lifetime subscription" plan. With this "lifetime" plan, you paid just once and your HP printer would print out 15 pages a month for so long as you owned your printer, with HP shipping you new ink every time you ran low.

Well, eventually, HP got bored of not making you pay rent on your own fucking printer, so they just turned that plan off. Yeah, it was a lifetime plan, but the "lifetime" in question was the lifetime of HP's patience for not fucking you over, and that patience has the longevity of a mayfly:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/11/06/horrible-products/#inkwars

It would take many pages to list all of HP's sins here. This is a company that ships printers with half-full ink cartridges and charges more than the printer cost to buy a replacement set. The company that won't let you print a black-and-white page if you're out of yellow ink. The company that won't let you scan or send a fax if you're out of any of your ink.

They make you "recalibrate" your printer or "clean your heads" by forcing you to print sheets of ink-dense paper. They also refuse to let you use your ink cartridges after they "expire."

HP raised the price of ink to over $10,000 per gallon, then went to war against third-party ink cartridge makers, cartridge remanufacturers, and cartridge refillers. They added "security chips" to their cartridges whose job was to watch the ink levels in your cartridge and, when they dip below a certain level (long before the cartridge is actually empty), declare the cartridge to be dry and permanently out of use.

Even if you refill that cartridge, it will still declare itself to be empty to your printer, which will therefore refuse to print.

Third party ink companies have options here. One thing they could do is reverse-engineer the security chip, and make compatible ones that say, "Actually, I'm full." The problem with this is that laws like Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) potentially makes this into a felony punishable by a five-year prison sentence and a $500k fine, for a first offense.

DMCA 1201 bans bypassing "an effective means of access control" to a copyrighted work. So if HP writes a copyrighted "I'm empty" program for its security chip and then adds some kind of access restriction to prevent you from dumping and reverse-engineering that program, you can end up a felon, thanks to the DMCA.

Another countermove is to harvest security chips out of dead cartridges that have been sent overseas as e-waste (one consequence of HP's $10,000/gallon ink racket is that it generates mountains of immortal, toxic e-waste that mostly ends up poisoning poor countries in the global south). These can be integrated into new cartridges, or remanufactured ones.

In practice, ink companies do all of this and more, and total normie HP printer owners go to extremely improbable lengths to find third party ink cartridges and figure out how to use them. It turns out that even people who find technology tinkering intimidating or confusing or dull can be motivated to learn and practice a lot of esoteric tech stuff as an alternative to paying $10,000/gallon for colored water.

HP has lots of countermoves for this. One truly unhinged piece of fuckery is to ask Customs and Border Patrol to block third-party ink cartridges with genuine HP security chips that have been pried loose from e-waste shipments. HP claims that these are "counterfeits" (because they were removed and re-used without permission), even though they came out of real HP cartridges, and CBP takes them at their word, seizing shipments.

Even sleazier: HP pushes out fake security updates to its printers. You get a message telling you there's an urgent security update, you click OK, and your printer shows you a downloading/installing progress bar and reboots itself. As far as you can tell, nothing has changed. But these aren't "security" updates, they're updates that block third-party ink, and HP has designed them not to kick in for several months. That way, HP owners who get tricked into installing this downgrade don't raise hell online and warn everyone else until they've installed it too, and it's too late:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/11/ink-stained-wretches-battle-soul-digital-freedom-taking-place-inside-your-printer

This is the infectious pathogen business model: one reason covid spread so quickly was that people were infectious before they developed symptoms. That meant that the virus could spread before the spreader knew they had it. By adding a long fuse to its logic bomb, HP greatly increases the spread of its malware.

But life finds a way. $10,000/gallon ink is an irresistible target for tinkerers, security researchers and competitors. Necessity may be the mother of invention, but the true parent of jaw-dropping ingenuity is callous, sadistic greed. That's why America's army of prisoners are the source of so many of the most beautiful and exciting forms of innovation seen today:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/09/king-rat/#mother-of-invention

Despite harsh legal penalties and the vast resources of HP, third-party ink continues to thrive, and every time HP figures out how to block one technique, three even cooler ones pop up.

Last week, Jay Summet published a video tearing down a third-party ink cartridge compatible with an HP 61XL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0ya184uaTE

The third-party cartridge has what appears to be a genuine HP security chip, but it is overlaid with a paper-thin, flexible, adhesive-backed circuit board that is skinny enough that the cartridge still fits in an HP printer.

This flexible circuit board has its own little microchip. Summet theorizes that it is designed to pass the "are you a real HP cartridge" challenge pass to the security chip, but to block the followup "are you empty or full?" message. When the printer issues that challenge, the "man in the middle" chip answers, "Oh, I'm definitely full."

In their writeup, Hackaday identifies the chip as "a single IC in a QFN package." This is just so clever and delightful:

https://hackaday.com/2024/09/28/man-in-the-middle-pcb-unlocks-hp-ink-cartridges/

Hackaday also notes that HP CEO Enrique J Lores recently threatened to brick any printer discovered to be using third-party ink:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/01/hp-ceo-blocking-third-party-ink-from-printers-fights-viruses/

As William Gibson famously quipped, "the future is here, it's just not evenly distributed." As our enshittification-rich environment drives more and more companies to evolve into rent-seeking enterprises through printerinisation, HP offers us a glimpse of the horrors of the late enshittocene.

It's just as Orwell prophesied: "If you want a picture of the future, imagine a HP installing malware on your printer to force you to spend $10,000/gallon on ink – forever."

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

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/2024/09/30/life-finds-a-way/#ink-stained-wretches

Image: Jay Summet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0ya184uaTE

#pluralistic

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xoxo-kses-hgs · 11 months ago

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Francis Mosses NSFW A-Z ♡♡

I love him <33

Reader is gn but has female anatomy.

A-ftercare (What're they like after sex)♡

Very very tired. Everything he says afterwards is either slurred or murmured. Very cuddly tho. Will not let you go. Very sappy afterwards too; telling you he loves you and how pretty and perfect you were/are.

Takes him a second to do it but eventually gets up to get you some water while you go to the bathroom (always pee after sex!).

B-ody part (favorite body part on you & him)♡

On you, he loves your hands and lips. He holds your hand a lot during sex even if hes absolutely destroying you. And he loves your lips because he just likes kisses (and how they look wrapped around his dick). Between tits or ass tho, I think he'd prefer boobs (not pun intended). Even if their small, he looves them.

On him, he'd say his hands are his favorite. He likes the way the have so much effect on you. Like when he fingers you or grabs onto your hips or thighs or when he grabs your hand during sex.

C-um (anything to do w cum basically)♡

I think he'd prefer to cum on your stomach or ass. Though I do think he'd cum inside every once in a while. When you suck him off, he let's you take control of his dick tbh. If you want him to cum all over your face, then he will. If you want it in your mouth, then he will. If you want it on your boobs, he will. He just wants to please you fr.

D-irty secret ♡

I feel like he'd have plenty of them. A main one tho is that he's stolen one of your panties and jerked off with them before. He felt guilty afterwards so that was the only time he did that. The others are small enough for him to forget about it

E-xperience (his past experiences)

♡

I feel like he had NO BITCHES before you came (tee hee) along. He was a quiet kid and just focused on himself, maybe had a couple gfs and intimate moments but you're probably the first "real deal" to come into his life in terms of love.

F-avorite position ♡

He'd like the classics. Like missionary, cowgirl, doggie, etc etc. He'd probably like missionary and cowgirl most. Missionary because of the intimacy. Cowgirl bc sometimes he wants some but he's tired (and boobs).

G-oofy (how serious/unserious are they during sex)♡

He's pretty in the middle. Sometimes he likes to slowly fuck you while you two have a normal conversations so sometimes there's jokes thrown in there. But if it's rougher/faster, he's more serious.

H-air (what kind of hair they got down there)♡

I think he trims it. Keeps it tame. He doesn't shave it clean tho, unless you tell him to, then he might. For the rest of his body, he does have some hair but not a lot.

I-ntimacy ♡

Oh this boy is INTIMATE. The kind of mf that looks at sex like "love-making" instead of just "fuck". Loves praising and listening to what you say. You say harder and he goes harder, you say slower and he goes slower, etc etc. Most of the sex you two have will most likely be when he's tired/half awake so all the praise and such are slurred in such a beautiful way yk.

J-ack off (how often does he jack off)♡

Other than what I said in the dirty secret section, he doesn't really do it anymore. Why imagine you when he has you right there?

K-inks ♡

Praise - he likes receiving and giving praise. He likes talking you through it, telling you how good you feel and how much he loves you.

Marking - he'd like to leave hickeys on you, not for a way to "claim" you, but just because he wants to and he likes your reaction to it when I sucks on your sweet spots.

Overstimulation - he likes to BE overstimulated. Sometimes he wants to keep going but his body doesn't or he's too tired so he just begs you to just ride him til he cries or passes out.

Nipple play - he likes to pinch and massage your boobs a lot. Even if you're not having sex, his hand lives on your boob. Most of your foreplay is him sucking and nibbling on your nipple, pinching your other one while he fingers you.

L-ocation (their favorite locations to do it)♡

I feel like he'd only want to do it at home. He doesn't like public stuff. At home tho, he'd do it anywhere; on the dinner table, kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, living room, anywhere. He could do it in the car tho. Maybe if he gets too worked up after a date and your apartment is too far away.

M-otivation (what turns him on)♡

Tbh. Everything. Skin tight shirts, your sleepwear (no matter what it is), etc. He likes when you take care of him too, just loving him turns him on.

N-o (some turn offs)♡

I'm so sorry yall but I think he'd say no to bdsm. Like maybe SOME parts of it he can do but like hard-core bdsm is a no.

He wouldn't want to actually hurt you in any way. Spanking is ok if it's not full force but like actually causing you pain is a no.

And he wouldn't like shit with pee, poop, and vomit. Shits nasty.

O-ral ♡

Oh bro. He EATS. Man can eat you out for hourss if you let him. He was a little shit at eating pussy at first but with more practice, he gets better and better. Like I'm talking about EATING pussy. There's no kitten licking with him, he is in. There.

And he loves when you suck him off. He talks while you do but they're all murmurs so no one knows what he's saying. He fucks your face gently (unless you tell him you want it rough) everytime. Mutters praises all throughout it and let's out of raspy moan when he cums.

P-ace ♡

Unless he's dead tired, he goes at whatever pace you want. When he's dead tired he wants to go slow and sensual. But if he had energy, he'll go at whatever pace you want him to go at. He starts off slow but if you tell him to go harder and harder he will beat that pussy numb.

Q-uickie (opinions on quickies)♡

I think he'd want to take his time with you so quickies are eh to him. If you seriously cannot wait but you can't leave wherever you are for too long, he'll take you somewhere private to eat you out till you're satisfied (or suck him off until he's satisfied).

He will leave an event for the day to have sex with you tho. If it gets that bad.

R-isk♡

To keep it short, he'd be down for experimenting as long as it's not in his "no" list.

S-tamina ♡

Again, depends on you. If you wanna ride him till the sun comes up, he'll thug it out for you. He likes overstimulation anyway. But tbh he rlly only goes for 2 rounds until you have to take over.

T-toys (toys they own)♡

I don't think he has any toys for himself. And he wouldn't really care if you had your own toys. He's fucked you with your toys before; like a vibrator up to your clit while he fucks you or a dildo in you while he sucks on your clit.

U-nfair (do they tease? And how often)♡

He doesn't really edge or tease you, but when he does, it's on accident. Sometimes he pulls out to cum on your stomach and accidently edges you. He doesn't mind when you do it to him. Feels good.

V-olume (how loud are they during sex)♡

Loud asf. Like I said, he talks during it, like murmuring and slurring his words. He's a moaner and whimperer too. Occasionally groaning but not really.

He LOVES when you're loud tho. He encourages it actually. Turns him on more.

W-ild card ♡

To add onto "volume", he talks dirty so much, even if it's under his breath. Like omfg the filth that comes out of his mouth is so unexpected.

Also, the amount of times you two were getting rough with it and he got that phone call (ykwim), he doesn't stop. He slows down a bit but just continues while you struggle to not blow you're cover.

X-ray (what's in those pants)♡

He's pretty average. Long, kinda thin, a vein on the top of his shaft from the base to the middle of it. He's about 6-7 inches, and he knows how to use it. Tbh I can't decide whether he's circumcised or not so you can personally decide that.

Y-earning (how high/low is his sex drive)♡

Surprisingly high. He's down to fuck whenever. Unless he's literally about to knock out cold. But if he's awake then so is his dick. He barley asks for sex tho, he wants YOU to initiate it. He just gives hints.

Z-zz (how fast he goes to sleep)♡

Like I said before, he's literally so tired afterwards. Once he makes sure you're okay and comfy, he snuggles close to you and sleeps.

I love him your honor.

#fanfics #oneshot #x reader #female reader #gn reader #i love him so much omg #smut #fluff #francis mosses #Francis mosses x reader #not my neighbor #francis mosses x you #milkman x reader

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shesnake · 2 years ago

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Spider-Verse Artists Say Working on the Sequel Was ‘Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts’

Why don’t more animated movies look this good? According to people who worked on the sequel, Across the Spider-Verse, it’s because the working conditions required to produce such artistry are not sustainable.

Multiple Across the Spider-Verse crew members — ranging from artists to production executives who have worked anywhere from five to a dozen years in the animation business — describe the process of making the the $150 million Sony project as uniquely arduous, involving a relentless kind of revisionism that compelled approximately 100 artists to flee the movie before its completion.

While frequent major overhauls are standard operating procedure in animation (Pixar films can take between four and seven years to plot, animate, and render), those changes typically occur early on during development and storyboarding stages. But these Spider-Verse 2 crew members say they were asked to make alterations to already-approved animated sequences that created a backlog of work across multiple late-stage departments. Across the Spider-Verse was meant to debut in theaters in April of 2022, before it was postponed to October of that year and then June 2023 owing to what Entertainment Weekly reported as “pandemic-related delays.” However, the four crew members say animators who were hired in the spring of 2021 sat idle for anywhere from three to six months that year while Phil Lord tinkered with the movie in the layout stage, when the first 3-D representation of storyboards are created.

As a result, these individuals say, they were pushed to work more than 11 hours a day, seven days a week, for more than a year to make up for time lost and were forced back to the drawing board as many as five times to revise work during the final rendering stage.

"For animated movies, the majority of the trial-and-error process happens during writing and storyboarding. Not with fully completed animation. Phil’s mentality was, This change makes for a better movie, so why aren’t we doing it? It’s obviously been very expensive having to redo the same shot several times over and have every department touch it so many times. The changes in the writing would go through storyboarding. Then it gets to layout, then animation, then final layout, which is adjusting cameras and placements of things in the environment. Then there’s cloth and hair effects, which have to repeatedly be redone anytime there’s an animation change. The effects department also passes over the characters with ink lines and does all the crazy stuff like explosions, smoke, and water. And they work closely with lighting and compositing on all the color and visual treatments in this movie. Every pass is plugged into editing. Smaller changes tend to start with animation, and big story changes can involve more departments like visual development, modeling, rigging, and texture painting. These are a lot of artists affected by one change. Imagine an endless stream of them."

"Over 100 people left the project because they couldn’t take it anymore. But a lot stayed on just so they could make sure their work survived until the end — because if it gets changed, it’s no longer yours. I know people who were on the project for over a year who left, and now they have little to show for it because everything was changed. They went through the hell of the production and then got none of their work coming out the other side."

#across the spider verse #spider man: across the spider verse #spiderverse #spiderman #marvel #atsv #phil lord #film #animation #vfx #post production #read the whole thing pls!

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cherrysweets-world · 20 days ago

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Eyes of the Gods VI

series masterlist - part five

Pairing: Caracalla x fem!Reader x Geta

Summary: Your relationship with the Emperors develops further and you are forced to trust them.

Warnings: 18+, minors dni, dub-con, mentions of past domestic violence, toxic/unhealthy relationships, controlling behavior, possessive behavior, unedited

Word Count: 3.1k

It was not until the doors closed behind you that you fully understood the gravity of the situation. Caracalla stood in the centre of the main room, chest heaving, fists clenched. Streaks of blood still decorated his hands and lower arms.

It was like that first night in some ways. Only Caracalla had been mostly afraid that night; now, he was angry.

"Emperor," you tried, "shall I go fetch Dondus-"

"No!" he cried, throwing his arms out. They collided with a vase and it shattered onto the marble floor. You stifled a whimper and straightened your spine. Another glass followed in quick succession and you could only watch as he became a whirlwind of flying ornaments and red hair.

"Even Dondus cannot help me," he bemoaned, finally sinking to the floor amongst the porcelain. "No against the liars and traitors that have infiltrated this hellish place. They would see me killed."

He was speaking so rapidly that spittle was flying from his red lips. He raked a hand through his curls and dragged it down his face, smearing a mixture of blood and tears.

You did not feel fully confident in your own words. Not when he was so worked up. Thinking quickly, you opened the door again and requested a warm bowl of water, some ointment and a cloth.

You flinched at the ferocity in Caracalla's eyes when you turned back around, bowl in hand. The room was dark, lit only by flickering candlelight in the section you were currently in. He looked tortured, furious, but you swallowed down your apprehension and cautiously approached him.

"Were you going to leave just then?" he said, unblinking.

You set the bowl on a table. "Of course not. I wanted to get some things so I could attend to you, Caracalla."

It had been a gamble using his name, despite the fact that he was the one who had told you to. Fortunately it had the desired effect and his shoulders slumped a little, his eyes flickering.

"You're standing on porcelain," you held out your hands, "come, I do not wish to see your injured."

He grasped your hands with a surprisingly strong grip and allowed himself to be pulled from the mess. You went to turn around and ask the guards to send someone to clean it but he held you tight and shook his head, lip curling.

"Alright," you agreed, "but we must be careful. Where are the matches?"

Caracalla held still as you ventured deeper into his chambers. Like Geta's, they were larger than anything you could have even imagined. It took several moments to get the place fully lit.

Caracalla's rooms were a sad reflection of his own mind. Books spilled across the floor, bedding that had clearly been made and then torn up. His desk was cluttered with papers and ink spills. There were many, many candles. Most of them had been entirely burned down. You wondered how many nights he had spent here, alone, working himself into a frenzy.

Once you were ready, you went back to him and collected your supplies. He followed you without you having to say anything. You lead him to the bed and gestured for him to sit down, pulling over a small chair and balancing the steaming bowl on top of it.

"Do you mind if I check your feet?" you asked.

Caracalla shook his head. You unlaced his sandals and peered at the bottom of his feet. Apart from a few scratches on the side, he was uninjured.

You dipped your cloth into the water and pressed it onto the scratches to make sure they weren't more serious than they appeared. Afterwards you dabbed them with ointment to speed up the healing process.

What kind of treatment would the concubine Caracalla had set upon receive? If you did not continuously remind yourself of the people who were hurt as a result of the emperors you feared you would feel too much sympathy for them. Already you felt more than expected.

"Can I see your hands?"

Obediently he held them out. Dabbing the cloth into the water, you began the slow process of cleaning up his hands. The blood was mostly not his own but there was a rather deep cut on his pointer finger.

The water became murky as you cleaned him, knees pressed into the floor at his feet. The blood turned dark in the water and you could smell iron. You did not pause in your work.

When you were done, Caracalla leaned forward, breath dusting across your cheeks. When he was so close you could see the scars on his cheeks, white makeup hastily applied over them. There were streaks in the makeup from his tears. It was difficult not to see him for the human he was when he was up close.

"And you? Are you hurt?" he questioned.

"I am fine," you tried to smile, sensing a change in the air.

When you got to your feet, Caracalla's hands shot out to grasp your waist. They were hot through the fabric of your stola and you stilled.

"I think," he breathed heavily, "that I should check."

His eyes turned dark with desire and you swayed under the intensity of it. The mood had changed so fast that your head was spinning atop your shoulders.

Your skin prickled with gooseflesh as Caracalla's thumbs swiped across the fabric at your waist. He was unashamed; eyes roaming your face and jumping lower and lower with every second. Your own hands were resting on his forearms as though you might dare to stop him.

"Is that a command?" you asked.

Caracalla smiled, gold tooth winking in the light. "I do not think I have to command you."

Shame coursed through you. You should have felt disgust or reluctance. Instead you were overwhelmed by the ball of want that was tightening your stomach.

You were a woman with needs, desires. The attractiveness of the emperors had never been up for debate. Any interest had been previously squashed by horror but that was not the primary emotion you felt when you looked at Caracalla.

You had been around them so often that you guard had lowered without your permission. Perhaps you were a traitor - not to Caracalla, but to yourself.

"I thought I dreamed you," Caracalla continued, hands rising, "and I thought I was dreaming still when I saw the way you looked at me."

"With kindness? With care?" you tried.

"Those things too," he admitted, "but more. What was it you said before? I think I do not have to take. I think you want to give."

It was not true. You tried to take a step back but Caracalla followed you, backing you against the wall. His eyes were greedily drinking in every expression you made, fixated on your face.

"It's okay," he soothed, nosing at your jawline. "I'll take care of you, too."

His hand secured itself at the back of your neck and you sucked in a breath. Caracalla looked at you one last time before closing the distance and kissing you.

His lips were rough from where he'd bitten them. The pressure varied from intense to lighter, searching for your reciprocation. You could not help it. Your instinct and had always been to calm him and you felt yourself lean in, opening your mouth so he could explore.

His hands were working steadily at your stola, yanking the shoulders down until they tore and exposed your breasts. At that he leant back, taking in the sight of you.

"I have thought of this a thousand times," he muttered, shaky hands coming up to cup your chest and urge a gasp from your lips.

Caracalla leaned down and you watched as his mouth closed around the tip of your breast. You tried to turn your head and bring your palm up to cover your mouth but he yanked your hand away and directed it to his head.

His curls were soft beneath your fingers and you could not help but squeeze. The sensation drove a moan from Caracalla and his teeth grazed your nipple, creating the pain you had always expected to experience with him. His hands travelled from your back to your ass, urging you to hike your leg higher around his hips.

In that position his desire was unavoidable. You could feel the hard line of him pressing against you through your clothes and your knees almost buckled. Caracalla used his body to pin you against the wall. You felt like a pinned butterfly, almost entirely on display.

Whatever spell you were under broke when you registered the sound of the door opening and closing. You writhed away from Caracalla, snatching your stola from where it had pooled at your waist and pulling it up to your neck.

Caracalla was torn between hurt and sexual frustration. He palmed at his erection through his clothes and frowned, holding out his hand as though you were going to run right back to him.

Geta appeared and you wanted to melt from shame. Your hands twisted in your clothes at the speechless expression on his face. You could only imagine what he thought he was going to walk in to after he had seen all the broken glass and factored in Caracalla's rage at the gathering. It would not have been the first time a slave or servant had died at the hands of the emperors.

"You always ruin things," Caracalla sneered, shoving half heartedly at his brother.

Geta still said nothing, his eyes darting from his brother to you. Last night he had been so sure that you had tried to escape, only to find you in the arms of his brother. It was likely you appeared as confused as you felt.

Caracalla called your name and tried again, "Come back to me."

"I-I-," you attempted to speak but your throat was crushed under the weight of your embarrassment.

Without thinking, you slipped past them both and ran for the doors. You must have caught them by surprise because you managed to escape, the soles of your feet stinging from the glass you'd ran through. The sandals had not protected you the way they had Caracalla but you did not stop.

If the Praetorians were surprised at your state of undress and obvious distress, they did not say. You heard raised voices behind you but continued to run. Hot tears of humiliation lapped at your cheeks and you could not wipe them away. Your hands were the only thing holding up your clothing.

There was little point to running. You had nowhere to go. The only place that even felt remotely safe was your little room. You slowed down as you approached, finally lifting your torn stola to swipe at the tears as you began to calm down. You just needed a moment to yourself, a moment to think. The only person you could rely upon was yourself but you were becoming unpredictable.

Your steps faltered. The door to your room was hanging open, swaying lightly in some phantom wind. A big section of the wood had been broken away as though someone had been trying to get inside.

Had successfully gotten inside, you corrected yourself. You stood in the doorway to your room, jaw hanging open. Considering you had almost nothing to your name, whoever had broken in had done a great job of turning the place upside down.

A blanket of silence had enveloped the place. You felt as though the gods were holding their breath, anticipating your reaction.

The bedside table was smashed. Sections of the wooden bed frame had also been torn at and your clothing had been ripped to shreds so thin that it took you a second to recognize them. Straw had been pulled from the mattress and decorated almost every inch of the floor.

There was an unfamiliar scent in the air; the scent of the intruder. Your nose wrinkled and your stomach roiled. You felt violated.

It took you a moment to spot your carving amongst the straw. You gasped, bending down to pick it up.

"No, no, no," you cries became increasingly louder. "No!"

The piece you had picked up was only a part of the carving. The wolf's head was cracked in your hand and as you scanned the floor you realized you were probably lucky to have even found this piece.

What was happening? You could not comprehend what would provoke someone to do this. A memory arose of a similar scene; you, your mother. Your father yelling as he destroyed your small home in a similar fashion. The wolf had survived then. Not this time.

It took you a moment to register the voices behind you.

"What is this?" Geta's eyes scanned the room. "Did you do this?"

"No," you said, numb. You twisted the broken head in your fingers, splinters embedding themselves in your skin.

Geta strode over to you and peered over your shoulder. When he saw what you were holding he swore. You heard him fumbling about behind you and jolted when he reappeared holding a scrap of your clothing.

"Give that to me," he ordered. He used the clothing to safely wrap the remainder of your childhood and then pressed it back into your hand. "Praetorians!"

Caracalla had followed closely behind his brother and seemed equally as stunned at the state of your room. He stepped carefully around chunks of wood until he was able to slide his hands into your armpits and hoist you to your feet.

"Stay close," he warned, eerily lucid.

"What?" you stammered. "I - I do not understand. Why would someone - "

"The why is irrelevant!" Geta yelled. He was talking to a group of Praetorians just outside your room. "The how is crucial. How did someone manage to come this close to the quarters of the emperors, destroy a room, and slip out unnoticed?"

You thought of your own brief exploration of the gardens the night before. It had been hardly ten minutes before Geta had appeared. You had thought it was perhaps easier to sneak out than in - now you thought differently.

"Brother, take her to your rooms." Geta commanded. "Follow them closely!"

You were too shaken to argue and Caracalla's grip on you was iron tight. Your hands trembled at your neck where they were still holding up your stola, broken wolf pressed between your palms. Six Praetorians accompanied you the short distance back to Caracalla's rooms and you could hear Geta screaming the entire time.

"I do not care if you have to interrogate every single person in this palace, I want the culprit found by morning!"

You shivered. You would not want to be on the receiving end of that. You waited for the pity to rise at the thought of someone being tortured for what they had done to your room. Then you felt the broken shards of wood pressing into your palm and they helped you swallow any empathy you might have felt.

The walk to Caracalla's room felt like a mere blink. Lights flickered on all around the palace as everyone was awoken by Geta's yelling. You wondered what your friends down in the kitchen would think of it all.

Caracalla helped you into his bed and you went without protest. He had stripped you down to nothing and for a moment you thought he might try to start up what you were doing earlier. Instead he wrapped you in white linen, tucking it tightly around you. He did not try to take your wolf.

Once he was dressed in a similar fashion, he slid right in beside you. The bed was jarringly comfortable. You used the pillows to prop yourself up and did not move away when Caracalla pressed himself tightly to your side.

The pair of you sat in silence for several minutes as you attempted to process what had happened in the last few hours.

"I don’t understand," you finally said. "Why would someone do that?"

"To hurt you," he answered, tracing patterns on your bare arms. "Perhaps they would have done worse if they had come across you."

You did not miss the pointed tone in his voice. It had been foolish to flee his rooms the way you had. And what if he had not dragged you from the entertainment hall earlier? What if you had been in your room when the culprit had gone there?

For once you felt as though you understood Caracalla's paranoia. How could you get over someone wanting to cause you harm? And, even worse, you would have to walk around without knowing who it was. They could attack you at any moment.

As if reading your thoughts, Caracalla said, "Do not worry. We shall catch the vermin and have them hung."

The words had no effect on you. Partially because you did not see how they would be able to catch the person who did this. Partially because the idea of having them hung appealed to you in ways that should have made you sick but did not.

Kill or be killed, you thought.

Geta entered Caracalla's rooms almost an hour later. Both of you were still awake.

"What happened?" you asked, desperate for information.

Geta paused at the foot of Caracalla's bed, eyeing the pair of you with a funny look on his face. He smoothed it out before replying, "The Praetorians are combing over the place as we speak. I have ten stationed outside the door right now."

You slumped. Whoever had done it had yet to be uncovered.

"They will be found," Geta spat. "That was not the first incident we have had to deal with here and it shall serve as a lesson to others."

Something about the way he spoke made you look at him closely. His hair was in disarray and his eyes were watery. The fact that you had been in danger tonight meant that they also had been in danger. Geta was furious but you could see the underlying stress.

"Are you staying here as well?" the question slipped out before you could think about it.

Geta's lips trembled. "It would be safest. For you."

Wordless, you peeled back the covers on your left side. The most dangerous people in your world were somehow the ones currently making you feel safest. It evoked emotions that you did not care to think about; you were too exhausted and angry to see beyond the present moment.

Caracalla wrapped himself around you as though he thought you might try to escape. Geta joined the pair of you in bed after he had put out all the candles, leaving only the moon to illuminate the bed and surrounding furniture.

You pushed the remains of your wolf under the pillow, let your eyes close and tried not to think too hard about the possessive hand Geta placed on your stomach.

Author’s Note - Reader's world is growing smaller. Please, please let me know what you think! Asks, comments, likes and reblogs are hugely motivating and rewarding for me🥹

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