#Total Telecom

[biglisbonnews]

T-Mobile to use 5G and C-V2X tech to reduce traffic accidents Press Release Today, the City of Bellevue, recognized as one of the top cities in the nation for digital innovation, and T-Mobile (NASDAQ: TMUS) announced the launch of a joint project that uses network-based Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything (C-V2X) technology and T-Mobile 5G to provide near real-time communications between cars, traffic infrastructure and vulnerable road users ― […] https://totaltele.com/t-mobile-to-use-5g-and-c-v2x-tech-to-reduce-traffic-accidents/

[stil-lindigo]

Heroes like Mirna El Halbawi are still working tirelessly to connect Gazans to the outside world. With an impending total telecom blackout looming, this has never been more crucial.

You can find a separate post on how exactly to buy e-sims here. Remember to buy from Nomad, Airalo and Mogo. The region to select for each of these providers are:

1. Nomad: Middle East Region

2. Airalo: Middle East

3.Mogo: Israel

Make sure to read their instagram post clarifying some common questions before you send them over!

I truly cannot impress upon you how imperative this is right now. Gazans are pleading for us to hear their voices while they are being massacred and the IDF has responded by limiting any access to fuel sources in an attempt to fully cut them off from the world.

If you want to do something meaningfully helpful in the middle of this crisis, this is how.

[lucyandthepen]

love on the floor | njm

exactly when does vice president na turn from the company’s worst nightmare into your favorite daydream?

pairing: chaebol!na jaemin x secretary fem!reader rating: vaguely M, but will very quickly escalate into a hard R in coming chapters genre: romance, fluff, (eventual) smut (in later chapters), chaebol!au warnings: jaemin isn’t really a total asshole but he isn’t great at the beginning either and i think that should be a warning, there’s probably some language use that deserves a bit of caution i GUESS, but tbh nothing much here because we want to pretend that this is a fic of chaste circumstances and not a lead-up to raunchy, depraved smut  word count: 16.4k

author’s note: first of all, the development of this fic is absolute SHIT because i love context too much and refuse to shut up at the beginning only to get antsy for the ending so if the pace is a little stop and go … it’s because i’m a Fewl !! and i totally own up to that !! and second of all, this is actually just a set-up for about two more shorter (?? what’s shorter) works that i’ve already been wanting to write but felt like i would be remiss in doing so without some kind of build-up to the relationship so :^) here we are ! heavily unbeta'd and miss lucy is a bit rusty but we carry on for the sake of enjoying oneself (and practicing writing once again) muah enjoy!

At least this job gets you free medical. 

Actually, all things considered, this is an excellent job with limitless benefits. You never have to worry about the three-level insurance, you have monthly paid-for visits to the dentist, and you sometimes get to use the company car for personal errands for as long as you meticulously check everyone else’s schedules and butter up the head secretary, Son Seungwan, just enough so that she feels mollified enough to let you have this favor (but not too much to the point that she catches on and gives you a ten minute lecture on the rising prices of gas post-the-turn-of-the-decade). Your rent’s well paid-for, and the apartment you’re staying at is comfortable, albeit a little smaller than most, although that’s just because you prefer spending your money on once-in-a-lifetime type things, like front row seats to a Paul Kim concert. You get 50% discounts at the company cafeteria, which boasts a pretty nice salad bar with more than just perilla leaves as the greens. The bathrooms even have luxury soap installed into the automatic hand dispensers, so you always come out clean and fancy smelling. 

All in all, the job’s pretty perfect, to the point that you don’t think leaving will ever truly be in the cards — except for the fact that you barely see your boss, which, as nice as it sounds on paper, is actually the most stressful part of the position. 

You’ve always been of the opinion that if Vice President Na Jaemin put his mind to something, he’d actually do it very well, but the running issue is that he hardly ever puts his mind to anything, especially when it comes to work. In fact, the only thing he ever seems to take seriously is having eleven hours of uninterrupted sleep, which you personally think is an extremely hard thing to achieve, leading you to the firm belief that if he channeled that energy into something less dead-to-the-world and a little more productive, things would be amazing. 

And maybe things would also be a little less distressing if his family would just accept him for who he is instead of expecting too much (or, actually, anything) from him, but Vice President Na is the only son of the family that owns the largest telecom company in the country, so his parents have a ton of huge expectations for him. His father, in particular, is clearly trying to prepare him to take over the entire business, something that the Vice President clearly isn’t keen on doing, based on the many arguments you’ve had to sit through alongside Head Secretary Son. The result is a lot of tension that’s only exacerbated by the Vice President’s desire to avoid more conflict, which he does by suddenly disappearing from the office for hours — sometimes days — at a time. 

So for as much medical, dental, and reasonably priced caesar salad as you’re getting from this job, you’re not entirely sure how worth it those things all are if they come with the task of you having to sit through twenty minutes of lecturing in place of Vice President Na Jaemin himself. 

“This is the last time,” President Na roars — not necessarily at you, but at you, in your general direction, while you stand helplessly in front of his desk, your hands folded across your lap and your head hung low. You don’t really feel terrified or hurt — more than knowing that the President isn’t shouting at you for your incompetence, you’ve also gotten used to being on the receiving end of these weird, indirect lectures and have thus come to know the exact standard of ‘sorry’ that you have to look for it to be over as quickly as possible. Still, you’re kind of annoyed that this particular spiel is taking up precious minutes from your afternoon break. Then again, you don’t know what you’d expected to begin with when you’d come back from the cafeteria after lunch and found the Vice President’s chair abandoned, leather cold, indicating that he’d been gone for quite a while. It’s about four o’clock now, and he still hasn’t come back, and all your messages to him have gone unread, as you’ve also grown used to. “You tell my no-good son if he isn’t back within the hour, he can live the rest of his life without my last name.”

You’re not sure if the implications of that will really sink into the Vice President’s heart enough to trigger the guilt it’s clearly trying to elicit, but you know better than to voice your opinion. You nod once, then bow at a perfect ninety-degree angle. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir.”

“Four years of this, and he hasn’t learned a single thing,” the President continues, completely ignoring your useless and vaguely insincere apology. “Where’d he run off to this time?” 

You don’t know. You never really know. Since he actively tries to avoid all work-related things, he also actively tries to avoid you, something he does by never picking up the phone or telling you the details of his daily schedule anyway. You can only share what you do know, which is very little and, therefore, extremely useless, but you try to say it in a way that appears relatively helpful. “His schedule says he was supposed to have lunch with the foreign investors that are trying to connect Prime Video to the Korean market, but it seems he didn’t show up for that.”

Which essentially translates to: you have no clue. Again, all parties in the room — inclusive of Head Secretary Son, who constantly has to bear witness to the many threats Vice President Na receives via you — know this isn’t your fault, but it doesn’t make the vein that’s about to pop out of the President’s temple any less pronounced, nor does it stop you from bowing and apologizing again when he says “get him back in here before five o’clock or tell him he’ll never be able to step foot in this building again!” even though you know that the threat would probably sound more like a gift than anything else to Vice President Na. 

“And you,” the President points a vaguely accusatory finger at you. Your eyes widen slightly in surprise. “If he isn’t back here at that time, you can kiss your job goodbye too. You go ahead and tell him that. Let’s see if Jaemin will finally get off his ass if he knows someone else is going to have to suffer for his behavior.” 

The only person who sees your jaw fall open is Head Secretary Son, who’s now leading you away from the President’s desk and towards the door; the President has taken to staring at this huge family picture of himself, his wife, and the Vice President that’s hanging just behind his executive’s chair, all looking considerably happier than anyone in this situation feels. You hear him mutter something that sounds like “where did I go wrong with you, you punk?” before the door shuts close behind you.

“I’d say he doesn’t mean that, but we don’t actually know to what lengths he’ll go to get the Vice President on board.” Head Secretary Son admits, lifting two fingers to gently shut your mouth, still agape. “If I were you, I’d figure out how to keep him on a leash. The fact that he’s never around is probably ninety-percent of our current problems.”

“I can barely get him to respond to schedule reminders,” you groan; your fingers pinch the bridge of your nose like this will somehow stop the oncoming migraine. “Let alone get him to stay still. I was just about to put in a down payment for a car of my own, too.” 

You’ve never really been considerably attached to this job, mostly because there isn’t much to actually attach yourself to, but if you think about it now, it really is better than most, and this economy isn’t really kind to people who get fired from their jobs. You feel like puking at the thought of losing the free unlimited coffee in the pantry and trading it in for a life behind a convenience store counter, which is probably where you’ll end up, pessimistically speaking.

You excuse yourself from Head Secretary Son, who has the heart to look a little pitying as you trudge towards the elevator. You don’t even know where you’d start looking for the Vice President, especially since he spends quite a lot of his efforts trying to avoid having to communicate with you. You don’t even know what his habits are, which means you can’t make educated guesses on where he might have run off to, so the only route to go is to look in the immediately surrounding area and widening your search diameter as time passes.

Until five o’clock, of course — a deadline that, if unmet, will likely mean you also won’t be returning to the office either. 

You start off at the nearby bookstore, extremely skeptical that the Vice President would ever willingly go to a place that requires more effort even after you make a purchase. As expected, he isn’t there, but he isn’t in the nextdoor candle shop (also unlikely) either, nor do you find him in the hand-cut noodles shop next to that as well. You walk down the entire street for a good twenty minutes, pressing your face against the windows of stores shamelessly, to the ire of many startled and disgruntled staff, trying to look for a familiar head shape in the small crowds in them, but to no avail. Then, you think about calling him again, but when you pat the pockets of your jacket, you realize your phone is still on your desk, where you’d left it when you’d been summoned to see the President. With a loud groan and an annoyed clip clop of your heels as you stamp your feet on the pavement, you walk back to the office. 

In your frenzy to find the Vice President, you’d gone quite a distance, and your shoes simply aren’t made for long, aggravated walks; they start hurting your feet halfway back, and you’re pretty sure you have a blister behind the strap of the left one. Pride would tell you to tough it out, but you’d thrown that out at the thought of losing your job at the expense of a single man, so you don’t even hesitate to take them off and run back to the building. The big digital clock above the elevators says you have ten minutes left to find your boss, and you start thinking about using that time for better things — like packing your stuff up neatly in a box for when you get sacked. 

With the situation seemingly hopeless, you trudge to the first floor cafe, where the return counter has a pitcher of water and a stack of tiny paper cups. They’re tiny tiny, like the size of your thumb, so you have to keep refilling it just to start feeling a little more human. 

You’re on your third refill when you hear a giggle come from across the space. The barista’s just finished laughing at what must have been an extremely hilarious joke, or she might be flirting with whoever’s leaning over the counter to talk to her. A whoever that seems to be the exact same height and build as the elusive Vice President of this company. 

You accidentally toss the paper cup in the plastics bin in your desperation to get moving, worried that if you’re not fast enough, he’ll disappear into thin air again. Luckily, his attention’s completely focused on the barista, so he can’t go anywhere when you finally reach his side and huff, loud enough to interrupt what seems like an intimate-ish conversation between them. 

“Sorry, I was just — oh, it’s you.” The Vice President’s smile fades when he sees it’s you, someone he can’t charm out of what they’re supposed to be doing. You don’t think you’ve ever seen the Vice President smile at you in any capacity, anyway, except for maybe one or two slightly sarcastic smiles that are probably more fit to be classified as grimaces. “What do you want?” 

“I’ve been looking all over for you, sir,” you say, stiffly and a little quietly because you still don’t want to embarrass him in front of the slightly confused barista. “You haven’t answered my texts.”

You don’t have any way to check, but you’re pretty sure this is a safe enough assumption, which is corroborated by the Vice President bringing his phone out and checking the screen lazily before turning it back off. 

“Sorry. I don’t answer unknown numbers.”

You guess it makes sense that he wouldn’t want to save your number when he hates hearing about work, which is all you really try to communicate with him about, but it still stings considering it’s been two years and you’ve been using the same number since high school. It’s fine, you think. You really can’t expect much from him. 

“Well, your father’s been looking for you, too. He wants to meet you.”

“I’ll take a rain check, but thank you.”

“Sir,” your voice quivers with poorly quelled exasperation. “This isn’t an optional thing. This is very serious.” 

“I can see that, Briar Rose,” his eyes are trained towards your shoes, still dangling from your grasp, with a level of unabashed amusement. “Did he summon me from deep within the woods, or is this a new casual Friday look I should get in on?”

When his words are met with a stony silence, he sighs, pushing himself off the counter. His half-finished Americano is collecting a small pool of condensation under it, and you offer him the little handful of tissues you had gotten from the return counter and had originally been planning to use to wipe your tears in case you cried after getting fired so that he doesn’t waste time looking for something to hold his cup. He takes them without even a word of thanks, opting to instead say ‘lead the way, miss.’ You don’t miss the fact that he meets the barista’s eye with a considerably more genuine grin, raising a hand in goodbye to her before he strides ahead — before you even get a chance to lead the way at all — towards the elevators with you, hobbling on one foot to slip your shoe back on, not far behind. 

The President’s office must be sort of soundproof for instances like this. For the first time, you’ve been asked to wait outside with Head Secretary Son as the Vice President gets chewed. It doesn’t matter; you don’t really want to be in the middle of yet another round of shouting that has nothing to do with you in the same afternoon, plus you also know how the conversation usually goes: the President making very agitated threats and talking about his heart condition (even though the medical reports from their private doctor say he’s in perfect health) that the Vice President, who just spends the time looking boredly at his nails, will inevitably trigger. When you press your ear to the door for a minute, you actually hear something like ‘... strike you out of the will so that when you kill me, you won’t get a single won!’, and you can imagine Vice President Na’s exasperated sigh punctuating the statement. 

Ten minutes later, the room has gone quiet, and you step aside just in time for the Vice President to open the door and step out. You don’t even understand how he can look so unaffected after being ripped apart, but you suppose he’s also heard the lecture as many times as you have and is pretty much immune to all the insults. He doesn’t really have to make a show out of not caring, though, with his hands in his pockets and his lips pursed to allow him to whistle idly as he strolls down the hall to his barely used office. He’s been in it so few times that after long, inexplicable vacations, he sometimes forgets how to get there. You’ve always had to walk behind him just in case he gets lost or, worse, tries to make a run for it. You’ve never had to tackle him to the ground reciting the Miranda warnings, or anything, but he has faked left a few times just to give you a mild heart attack for the fun of it all. 

This time, he just walks, not bothering to joke you into trying to create a human wall he could just as easily push away. When he gets to his office, he lazily plops down onto his couch, extracting the Rubik’s cube he’d been working on for a few weeks now from underneath himself and spinning the top layer idly. He’s only ever finished the blue side. 

You just stand there, kind of perplexed and unsure of how to start the conversation. He’s still whistling, and you’re not sure if talking over him will count as interrupting him, which isn’t something you’re supposed to do. Thankfully, he stops after about two minutes of fiddling with the yellow side of the cube, looking up at you with a slightly surprised expression that somehow makes you want to cry. 

“Can I help you with something, Secretary ___________?” 

“Well, I…” You stutter for a bit, unsure of how to politely point out that he should be asking you for help with his job instead of the whole other way around. “Because… I just thought…”

“You can always leave a message with my secretary if you need time to figure it out.” He grins. “Oh, wait a minute.”

“Sir, don’t you think you should… I don’t know. Figure out your schedule, or something? Prepare for… anything?” 

“What’s that smell?” He lifts his nose to the air, suddenly curious, and because he looks so serious, you also start sniffing, but you can’t really smell anything out of the ordinary. “Smells… fresh. Very clean. A little like green tea.”

“Oh.” You awkwardly shift your weight from leg to leg. “I think that’s my perfume, but I don’t see w—”

“You smell very expensive, Secretary _____________.” He sounds genuinely surprised that you do, like he’s somehow saying he hadn’t expected you to have good taste. You have no idea where this conversation is coming from, so you chalk it up to him wanting to derail you from talking about work. “I like it. Very classy. Not too strong.”

“Sir, I don’t think now’s the time to be talking about perfume scents.”

“You’re actually quite pretty.” He sounds genuinely surprised again, but this time, it stings a little more. “I never noticed that before. How come?” 

You want to say that it’s because he spends most of his time and energy playing long-term hide-and-seek with you, but there’s also no polite way of putting that into words; even if there were, with the way you’re now bristling under his gaze, you’re not really sure you’d go the courteous route, anyway. You just decide to ignore the comment and question entirely, which you almost get to do.

“Wouldn’t you like to take a look at some of our upcoming projects? For instance, we’re just about to start negotiating the terms of this new partnership with Huawei —”

“You’re pretty, but you’re also pretty tense.” He cuts you off again, now looking a little dejected at this newfound information. You can’t understand why this disappointment in you actually hurts your feelings a little. “I think the cafe downstairs serves some tea, if that kind of stuff helps you.”

“Sir,” the one syllable is laced with weariness, and you knot  your fingers together in front of your lap. It probably looks polite, but it’s mostly so that you can feel like you have some semblance of control over anything, even if it’s just your own body fighting off the urge to grab him by the collar. “Please. If you could just take a look at your schedule — even just for tomorrow —”

“What’s the point?” His shrug is nonchalant, and he’s turning the cube over in his palm now, more interested in looking at it than witnessing your tired expression. “It’s almost six o’clock. I’ll deal with tomorrow tomorrow, you know what I mean? If my dad finally loses his marbles, I’ll deal with it all then. In fact, I might actually be okay with losing this department if it finally actually gets him off my back. I’ll also deal with that when it happens, probably.” 

Another long, uncomfortable silence blooms as his words sink in; not for the first time today, President Na has threatened the existence of your job, now alongside a good twenty other people’s, all for the sake of snapping some sense into the Vice President. However, like everything else, it seems to just be backfiring; Vice President Na doesn’t seem to care about anyone else in this department, most likely because he’s barely interacted with anyone else. You’re surprised he even remembers your last name, considering he once called the department accountant ‘Heejin’ even though her nametag clearly spelled out ‘Jinhee.’ 

It makes sense that the threat of abolishment means absolutely nothing to him, but it doesn’t make the knowledge of that any less distressing. He watches you curiously as you tug back at your ponytail, like it’ll once again stop the crawling migraine. 

“Sure a cup of chamomile tea isn’t in the cards today? I think I have the company card in here somewhere, although I can’t be sure that it hasn’t been cut off, based on my dad’s last threat—” 

“I’m fine; thank you.” You mumble, checking the clock. He’s wasted what’s left of the hour anyway, and the lack of change in his position just means he’s not going to change his mind for the rest of the time. “At least let me give you tomorrow’s agenda.” 

“Boring, but okay. Give it to me, then.” He yawns to make a point, and you offer him the tablet you tote around with you everywhere you go, just in case Vice President Na finally decides he wants to do his job. To clarify: that’s two whole years of you carrying that heavy thing around, with the Vice President only having touched it a handful of times. You’re mildly shocked that he actually opens it to check, because he barely does even that, but that all goes away when he yawns again, his expression glassy as he scrolls down aimlessly. “This is a lot. Can’t you just clear my schedules tomorrow? Actually, if I can make demands for real, I’d like to clear out my schedule for the rest of the year.” 

He stretches when he stands, ignoring your slightly agog expression as he pats you on the back, smacking his lips sleepily. “Good day’s work, Secretary _____________. Want to grab a beer? Have ourselves a little intra-department party? I’m pretty sure ‘intra’ stands for ‘us two,’ or am I wrong?”

You sincerely hope he doesn’t mean a goodbye party, but with his attitude right now, that might very well be. You shake your head, and he shrugs, like he wasn’t really expecting you to agree in the first place. “No thank you, sir. I’ll see you tomorrow.” 

He’s already halfway out the door, waving dismissively with his back turned to you. When you peek out of the space he leaves by opening the door, you can see about half the entire department’s watching, not even bothering to pretend to scurry back to their seats as he saunters out of the office. He calls out to you, his voice ringing clear even though he’s already out of sight. 

“We’ll see about that.” 

You come up with a master plan, but not before you scope potential jobs. 

You actually stayed an hour overtime at your desk looking for positions, but all of them pay lower than average or are about an hour’s commute away from where you live, so none of them seem worth it. The search ends when some people from the department come over to say goodbye and see your computer open to SaramIn, at which point they connect the dots and start to panic about their insurance. You shut your monitor off and spend another useless twenty minutes calming Jinhee, who’d started having a mild panic attack. 

In that time, your resentment builds. Why can’t Vice President Na simply get his act together? You suppose that there’s some indescribable burden to being in his position, but between him, a rich heir who owns two sports cars and lives in a paid-for house, and you, a public-transport-using, pays-by-the-month nine-to-five worker, you can’t really understand why he would be having it worse than everyone else who works under him.  If he worked even just half as hard as everyone else did here, he might scrape by. 

You can’t know if President Na’s anger was only short-lived or if he actually meant to downsize the company by getting rid of your department entirely, but you also know that if he’s serious, then there’s nothing much you can do about it, short of terrorizing the Vice President into stepping into bigger shoes.

So, that becomes your master plan.

It isn’t very refined, mostly because you think about it on the bus home, but the heart and spirit are there, and those are probably the most important things anyway. It’s that heart and spirit that motivate you to get up an hour earlier than you usually do, dressing quickly for the day before taking the company car from your place to downtown Apgujeong. You usually don’t take it on days that Vice President Na doesn’t come into work, which is practically every other day, but this time, you’re determined to see him into the office. The ride with Hyunsung, his official company driver, is quiet, save for the question he asks when you roll up to the Vice President’s driveway. 

“Are you sure about this?” 

“No,” you admit. He’d probably seen you chewing down on your thumb, some of your confidence taking a hit when you belatedly realize you could be shot with a huge privacy lawsuit if this doesn’t go the way you plan. But you do know a lot of secretaries that do the morning calls for their superiors, so this should be fine. Not that you’ve ever heard from those secretaries ever again. 

Vice President Na’s laziness seems to extend to all aspects of his life, including the fact that he doesn’t ever change his door’s passcode; it’s still the same numbers as it had been when he first bought the house a year ago and had you install his lock while he was missing in action from work, yakking it up with some farmers up in the Netherlands. He likes to do that — ‘see the world,’ or whatever, even though his wanderlust makes everyone else’s lives very difficult. At least it makes your life easy now, and you step through the door and walk quietly across his unnecessarily large living room. 

You’ve never been in here exactly, and you only realize very belatedly that this house’s design would be very frustrating for a break-and-enter criminal because nothing seems to be where it’s supposed to be. You learn the owner’s suite is actually on the basement floor, so all the climbing of those slippery stairs was for nothing. 

Vice President Na’s bedroom is bigger than your whole apartment, which also means he has a sizable bed and, thus, is completely out of sight under his gigantic covers. The only indication that he’s even still in there is that they’re rising and falling in a rhythmic pattern. You stand by the edge of the bed, on the side he’s closest to falling off of, clearing your throat at the tuft of hair peeking out from under the comforter. 

“Vice President Na? It’s time to go to work.” 

Your voice has been tempered down by years of this professional work, and this is easily the loudest and most demanding you’ve ever heard it. You’re not even sure you can do it again, but the muffled groan from under the covers is all the motivation you need to try. 

“Sir, you have a ten o’clock meeting with Samsung’s representatives for Apple. President Na also asked that we contact Amazon right away to reschedule the Prime Video deal.” 

“How,” his voice comes out first before he does, squinting up at you, completely disoriented. “The hell did you get in here?” 

“Sir, I’m your secretary.” You sigh, skimming over the fact that you’d walked into his big kitchen twice through two different entryways before coming into his bedroom. “I’m supposed to be able to get in here.”

“Except this is a first.” You think he’s about to get up, but he just shifts his weight, rolling over so he can cocoon himself tighter into his blankets. “Goodnight. There are eggs in the fridge if you’re hungry.”

“I’ve already eaten, like a normal, functioning human being with a very important job that starts precisely at nine o’clock would.” 

“This seems like a very targeted comment, Secretary ____________. I’m not sure I appreciate it.” 

“Since we’re already having this conversation, I’m guessing you’re conscious enough to get dressed.”

To your relief, he actually does throw the covers off of him, leaning up on his elbows. You try not to balk at the fact that he’s shirtless, although you’re also not sure why this should surprise or bother you to begin with. He doesn’t even seem to mind; he just yawns, wide and unashamed, as he looks over at the clock. 

“It’s seven-thirty. This is insanity.”

“No, this is a wake-up call.” You offer him a neatly folded towel that he eyes suspiciously. “We need to get you in the office on time.”

“There’s really no point,” he sighs, scratching his head idly. “It’ll just be another boring day of talking to people I don’t care about. Someone who cares about it should talk to them. You care about it, don’t you?” 

“I won’t talk to them for you, sir.”

“Why not?”

“Because, frankly, I don’t get paid enough to be doing that.” 

He once again stares at the towel like he’s trying to will it to evaporate, but in the end, he only sighs louder and takes it from you, kicking his blankets off completely. You look up at the ceiling, not in prayer but to avoid the more embarrassing fact that he’s only in his boxers after all. Well — it’s embarrassing for you. He doesn’t even seem to care. 

“Something’s different.”

“Usually I don’t wake you up,” you offer the painfully obvious. “Or come here. Or talk to you.”

“Yeah, all that stuff,” he says dismissively, halfway through a yawn. “Did you have a life-changing experience recently?”

“Something like that.”

“Couldn’t it have been one where you decided to leave me alone for good instead?” He grumbles, more to himself instead of to you. It doesn’t matter, anyway; you already see he’s up and fishing socks out of his drawer, so you’re marching out of his room to avoid having to hear more of his complaints (and, quite frankly, to avoid looking at his broad back). 

However, the day thereafter doesn’t go as planned. You thought that waking Vice President Na up for an early day of work might shock him into doing something with the knowledge that it was urgent, but you’re not sure why you didn’t anticipate a scenario in which he’d fall asleep in the car on the way to work and you’d have to shake him into waking in the stuffy parking lot. He spends the rest of the morning out of sorts, ignoring you point blank when you try to brief him on the meeting. The meeting in and of itself doesn’t go any better, with him excusing himself fifteen minutes in by saying the pitch doesn’t seem all too exciting and innovative. You didn’t even know he knew the word innovative and, by the shocked faces of the Samsung people, they were of the same mind. 

By lunch time, you’re more exhausted than you’ve ever been, and a part of you is wondering why you wanted Vice President Na in the office in the first place when you’re already used to the much simpler routine of get up, work, eat lunch, get yelled at, work again. Sometimes, on slow days when Vice President Na is completely out of town for the week and President Na is out of things to yell at you about, you even get to just sit back at your desk and play old crossword puzzles. 

Now, you’re basically handholding him, but the weight that keeps him down is so heavy that you’re being dragged down, too. 

“You mean people do this every single day?” He shuts the folder with a contract that requires his signature that you’d given him just now, not even bothering to peruse the first page, much to your rapidly increasing ire. “This is ridiculous. Working makes no sense.”

“All employees come to work to do that, sir. It’s literally what makes up half their lives.”

“Except it shouldn’t,” he sighs, like this is a true global issue and not a problem of his own making. “Everyone needs to be able to do what they want and live life to the fullest.” 

“Not everyone can,” you point out flatly. “Some people don’t have the luxury of time even for that.”

“Then, they should. The more I’m in this situation, the more it feels like it might be better for everyone to have a little work break for — I don’t know. The next year or so.”

Vice President Na has his arm outstretched, handing the folder back to you. You don’t know if it’s what he says that causes your blood pressure to rise, or if its the completely unconcerned look on his face, or if it’s the fact that he’s holding the folder so lazily that the papers are starting to slip out on your end, requiring you to use two hands to keep them all from falling apart and creating a mess you’ll end up having to clean up anyway. Whatever it is, you snatch the folder from him with a little more aggression than necessary (or that you’d even care to admit). Even though it’s out of place, you can’t help but feel a small sense of triumph at the slight surprise in his eyes. 

“Did I say something wrong?” 

“No, sir.” You pause, mostly because you can tell he doesn’t believe you — Vice President Na is nonchalant, not stupid — and you want to give yourself a little bit of time to grapple with your pride before you admit the truth. “Yes, sir. It isn’t fair to your entire department for you to talk that way.”

“I’m saying the entire department doesn’t have to work this hard. It’s senseless. How are you supposed to live a good life if all you’re doing is sitting behind a desk?”

“Like I said, not everyone has the luxury of living your life. If they want even a little bit of that comfort you enjoy, they have to work very hard for it first.” 

“Then they should at least do something they enjoy. If this department goes down the drain —”

“If this department is abolished,” this is your first time interrupting a superior, and it already makes you want to throw up. “Then people will have a very difficult time finding a job in this market. More than that, a lot of people enjoy working for this company — quite genuinely, in fact. I don’t think it’s right to think that they’ll be happy while they’re jobless and floundering in this economy.”

“So you’re happy like this? You really want this job — this whole working under me situation?” 

“Well…” you trail off, your voice taking on a slightly thoughtful tone. It’s been a relatively long time since you’d entered this job, but you do faintly remember the feeling of excitement at getting this position — the desire to want to learn from the best in this industry, the anticipation of being able to meet and network with interesting and important people. Your first few weeks of work had involved wanting to spend as much time in Vice President Na’s shadow, in case you could pick up some important business tidbits from an entrepreneurial master… until, of course, you realized there wasn’t much you could stand in the shadow of to begin with. “These days, it isn’t ideal. But this job is a really good thing for most of the people who work here.”

“Then it sounds like you have more to gain from me working hard than I do.” 

You can’t contain your disapproving frown, and your voice comes out a little sharper than you intend. “Doesn’t it bother you at all, sir? Knowing almost twenty people could lose their jobs in the blink of an eye? Think about all the people who look up to you and rely on you — they’ll have to suffer because of this. They might never find a job that matches their needs, and a lot of them have families to take care of, too. If you can do something to make sure they have these good lives you keep talking about, why not do it? I know you’re capable of that. You’re capable of doing much more than what you’ve been doing thus far.” 

Vice President Na is quiet for a moment before leans over on his desk, lacing his fingers into a loose combined fist and putting his weight on his forearms. One of his forefingers detangles itself from the pile of digits and curls inwards, beckoning you closer. Your grimace is probably obvious, and you lean in a little warily. He lifts himself off his chair slightly so he can whisper in a low voice, as if you two aren’t the only people in this wide office. 

“If you care about it so much, then ask a little more nicely.” 

Your light breakfast almost makes a reappearance, and you draw back in mild shock. He also leans back, significantly more relaxed than you, looking unperturbed as he settles back against his chair. You two engage in a very uneven staring match, until he gestures for you to proceed, looking expectant. 

“You want me to beg for my job?”

“Not what I meant, but I could accept that,” he hums. “I just think you could throw in a please while you’re guilting your boss, at least.”

Gawking probably doesn’t suit you, but you do it anyway, wondering how you managed to find yourself in this position. This morning, you had been strictly guiding him through what to do, and now you’re paralyzed in front of the Vice President, feeling very foolish for saying so much out of turn. You couldn’t even get through a whole work day before seeing your grand master plan slip down the drain.

But there is, at least, some small comfort in what he said — the part about guilting, which, if you squint hard enough, seems to be implying that this conversation has left him with a small amount of guilt. You don’t think it’s that much, but it’s a miracle he feels it at all, so you take the horribly subtle win and inhale deeply.

“Please, sir.” The words are very thick and reluctant, unsticking from your throat. “This department really needs you.” 

He stares, very unnervingly, without saying anything, but there’s something in his gaze that makes you vaguely certain he’s actually thinking about it. In fact, he actually looks a bit serious, which isn’t anything you’d ever think you’d be able to characterize him by. That impression easily falls apart when he claps his hands, once but very loudly, startling you into jumping a little. 

“Ah, how could I turn down such a nice request?” Vice President Na is grinning from ear to ear, something you’ve never seen him do in the context of the office, much less a few feet away from you. His smile is actually kind of nice, if you don’t think about the fact that it seems to be smug at your expense. “Since you asked, I guess I’ll have to try my best, or whatever it is people do in this damn company. I guess that means you owe me now, Secretary ____________. You’re very welcome.” 

The silence that once again blooms as you stand, motionless, in front of Vice President Na is suddenly interrupted by the sound of chairs scraping back all at once. The floor vibrates a little as the entire department troops out to the elevator area so they can go to lunch. You only watch stupidly as he also stands, shrugging off his jacket and flinging it over the back of his chair. “See you, then.”

“Where are you going, sir?” 

He looks a little surprised that you even ask. “To lunch. Do I have to ask for your permission for that, too?” 

“Are you… coming back?”

“You want to come along with me and make sure I don’t run away?” He smiles even wider, which you didn’t even think was possible. It makes you awkwardly uncomfortable to know he’s taking a lot of pleasure in joking around with you, mostly because you were kind of hoping you’d get him to take things seriously in a serious manner, not in a … whatever this is that’s making you feel like you’ve lost a game manner. 

“A little bit.”

“Ask a little more nicely, then.” 

“Never mind,” you mumble. “Have a good lunch, sir.” 

He snaps his fingers a little comically before turning to the door, flinging it open so he can join the now thinning throng of people leaving the floor. “Thought I almost had you there. Well, if you need me, you know where to find me. Or not.” 

In the end, to your utmost relief, Vice President Na does, in fact, stay inside the entire time he has lunch. You’re not sure if this is the product of you sitting two tables away, trying to will an imaginary chain to his wrist so he doesn’t bolt off or because he’s still feeling a little affected by everything you said earlier on, but whatever it is, it works. He just eats his club sandwich in peace, picking off the crust easily and double dipping the fries that come with it in his ketchup. At some point, he looks up and notices you burning holes into his torso, so you quickly have to avert your eyes in shame. You think he laughs at this, but you can only see out of your peripheral vision at this point, so you can’t be sure. 

You’re supposed to have one hour for lunch, but he eats quickly and gets up before the whole hour is over, so you end up throwing your half-eaten wrap and following him. Again, you’re not sure what’s funny, but he’s chuckling to himself as he holds the elevator door open, waiting for you to run in next to him. 

“Relax, miss secretary. I already said I was going to do my best.”

“No offense, sir, but I don’t know what that looks like, so I have to be careful.”

“Fair enough.” He hums, letting the door close on its own. “But you should still take it easy. You’re pretty t—”

“Tense. You said so yesterday, sir.”

“That’s two times you’ve cut me off in a single day.” He doesn’t sound very annoyed about it; in fact, he’s still got that amused, inside joke tone to everything he’s had all morning. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were gunning for an insubordination report.”

You don’t think that’s fair for him to say, especially since you haven’t really had much of an authority figure to be subordinate to for most of your career in this company, but you keep your mouth shut since saying so is exactly what would be on the first line of an insubordination report. 

When you arrive back at his office, you take the time to discuss what you should be doing from now on. It’s an extremely messy exchange, with you two grappling between terms you can’t agree on. For instance, Vice President Na thinks that it seems only fair that he should really only be coming in after one o’clock, but you’re insistent on making sure he gets to work on time, since most important meetings happen within that time period (a fact he already seems to know but chooses to ignore anyway). You end up agreeing on bringing him in for the standard nine-to-six for as long as he never has to work overtime. You also find it necessary to iron out the fact that if he has lunch outside, he has to actually come back, a statement he once again finds very amusing for some reason, as if you’re the weird one in this conversation. 

And to his credit, he tries to stick to his word. It isn’t exactly a walk in the park, especially not during the first couple of weeks, but you suppose that habits are very difficult to break when they’ve been so easy to acquire and nurture over many years. More than once, you’ve arrived late to meetings to the disapproving gazes of Head Secretary Son and President Na. However, the latter finds he has less to say these days because Vice President Na’s presence in said meetings had, before this time, been nothing but a pipe dream for everyone. 

You also notice he starts taking the time to ask about things he doesn’t understand, as opposed to his initially brash or sometimes completely unresponsive approach, which has turned out better results when it comes to business lunches with investors and potential partners. Even the Samsung people, who are extremely wary of him during the callback meeting, come out of their next encounter with the Vice President looking vaguely more satisfied than they did the last time (the bar isn’t that high, considering they’d left shell-shocked previously, but you’ll still take the improvement).

Of course, with all the time you end up spending with, chasing after, and vaguely lecturing (only when the need truly arises) Vice President Na, you also learn some things about him that you hadn’t expected, like how he doesn’t really like milk in anything he drinks (but especially coffee) and that every third Sunday of the month, he meets his old high school friend Lee Jeno, the son of the guy that owns half the residential high rise condominiums on this side of the Han. Apparently, they play badminton together — he had told you that when he’d caught you wondering about the super out of place little kid’s karate trophy among other more adult, official ones in his living area. The trophy goes to whoever wins the match of the month, and according to the Vice President, he’s been ‘wiping the floor with that bastard’s handsome face for half a year straight.’ Although you can’t verify this by anything more than the slight blanket of dust on it, you think it takes nothing out of your pride to applaud him like this is an amazing thing. It also does you no harm to see him swell with misplaced pride about a kid’s karate trophy. 

You also notice that despite how healthily he eats at the office, he has a bad habit of craving deep fried food in the afternoon, which is why, over the last few weeks, you’ve been accompanying him to the corndog street stall two blocks away, a few days a week. He’s even had to borrow loose change from you a few times to because he always forgets that no street vendor likes to receive crisp, fresh-out-of-the-bank fifty-thousand won bills, but you just let him have it; his heart’s in the right place when he orders an extra one for you without even asking. You realize that he has a fairly good memory for as long as he’s concentrating, and that he likes to spend late nights watching the shittiest horror movies ever known to man (his words, much to your bemusement), and that when he listens attentively to you telling him about the day’s agenda, his left ear twitches a little when your voice hits it. 

Somewhere along the way, you realize that Vice President Na is a charming, outgoing, and fairly capable person, and in doing so, you also realize that he seems to be, for lack of a better word, your style. 

You can’t really believe it either, and you’re not even sure when it started. In between sitting with him in the company car and handing him forty-page agreements he has to look over carefully (very carefully, as you’ve taken to reminding him, so often that he starts saying it before you do now, which has only somehow endeared him further to you and not annoyed you the way you were sort of hoping it would), the small non-work related part of your consciousness had decided that it needed a more complicated situation now that things were going relatively well.

To be fair to yourself, liking him isn’t a huge distraction; most of the time, you’re both so engrossed in something you desperately have to finish that you don’t even have time to think about it. Instead, it kind of catches you off-guard, like when he’s double dipping his french fries into his ketchup, or when he smiles at you (politely to him, probably, but overwhelmingly charmingly to you) before he leaves the office, or when his brow’s furrowed in (a total shocker) concentration as he reads. 

Then again, everything about Vice President Na seems to be catching you off-guard these days. This much is proven by the fact that instead of the normal silence that you’ve grown accustomed to being greeted by when you enter his house, there’s a lot of noise coming from one area that can only mean either that someone had broken in to mug him or for some reason, he’s up before you need to wake him. 

It’s nothing you have to call 911 for, but it still paralyzes you to see him, surrounded by opened jars and a particularly dirty bread knife as he stands in front of his fancy toaster, drumming his fingers on the counter impatiently. 

“If you have a minute to spare, could you bring my laptop into the car?” He asks without turning around. His hand, still holding the bread knife, points towards the bar counter on the far end of the kitchen, where the laptop is still whirring away. 

“Of course, sir. Um,” you gingerly shut the monitor, putting the laptop to sleep and tucking it under your arm. “Were you… working this morning?”

“No, I was playing a riveting game of bridge against the computer AI.” He turns to you, grinning. “Of course I was working, miss secretary. What do you think I’d be up this early for?” 

You try to think of an answer, but nothing comes to mind — Vice President Na hasn’t ever woken up early for anything to your knowledge, anyway — so you just nod and bolt, unwilling to bear witness to his smile this early in the day. When you come back, particularly less red in the face, you find him topping one of two sandwiches with the last slice of bread to complete it. He takes one, as you expect he would, and you stand there, trying to look polite as you essentially observe him eat.

This isn’t something very unusual; ever since the first time you’d done it, you’ve been watching him out of habit. So far, only the motivation’s changed from you wanting to make sure he doesn’t bolt to you simply enjoying the view of his profile when he eats. Of course, he probably doesn’t know this, but he’s also just gotten used to you watching him and probably finds it funny — as suggested by his perpetually amused expression — that you still think, after all this time, that he’s going to make a run for it. You don’t actually mind it; you get to watch him for free, and he has something to laugh about, so everyone kind of wins. 

He’s halfway through the sandwich when his expression turns quizzical. “Aren’t you going to eat?”

“Eat,” you echo hollowly. “Eat what, sir?”

“A delicious, handmade, gourmet peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwich.” When you don’t move, he pushes the plate with the untouched sandwich forward towards you like he thinks you can’t understand anything he’s saying. “What? Are you allergic to something?”

“No, but…”

“But?”

There’s no but; you don’t have a good reason to decline other than the fact that accepting it feels weird, but refusing him when he’s looking at you this expectantly is just as awkward. You rub the back of your neck as you walk over, not missing the look of triumph that crosses his face as you pick up the sandwich and take a bite. It’s good, but you don’t really think that has anything to do with his culinary skills, based on what it is; still, he looks like he’s patting himself on the back for this feat. 

“Thank you, sir.”

“Secretary ____________, I hope you can count this as a momentous occasion for the both of us.” He chuckles. “You get free breakfast made especially for you by your direct superior in the comfort of his own home, and I finally get to learn what all the settings on my toaster are for. Between you and me, I think mine’s the better achievement.” 

You’re still in the middle of eating when you laugh, and you hastily raise a hand to cover it — only Vice President Na catches your wrist halfway through, so quickly you vaguely choke on the bread that’s only partially down your throat.

“I’ve never seen you laugh,” he looks as surprised as you feel, although probably for a different reason. “I don’t even think you’ve ever smiled at me, specifically.”

“Oh.” You need time to respond, mostly so you can swallow but also because you need to collect yourself from your shock. There seems to be a lot of that going around this morning. “Sorry. Should I do that more often?”

“I mean, if you ask like that, it’s kind of disingenuous,” he laughs. “But I like it. I like knowing you’re not just in a constant state of stress because of me. Feels even more momentous than the toaster thing.” 

He loosens his hold, and you manage to take your hand back, now refusing to meet his eye. “I’m not… stressed by you.”

“Not anymore.”

“Not anymore,” you agree, and he looks particularly delighted when he sees the corners of your lips turn up again. “Not for a while. And not that my opinion matters, but you’ve been performing above expectations, sir.”

“You’re right,” he hums, taking the plate and putting it in the sink — a problem he seems to be saving for later. “It doesn't matter. But I like it, all the same.”

You’re willing to chalk the morning off as a wonderful anomaly, especially since the rest of it passes as it normally does, with a generally quiet car ride (you’ve also learned that Vice President Na likes to listen to rap music on days when he wants to avoid falling asleep in the backseat, which is equal parts amazing and amusing) and a fifteen minute briefing of what he has on his plate today. He disappears for the better part of the morning and even the whole lunch hour, but you expect this because he has a business lunch with the representatives for some Norwegian appliance company that’s looking to break into the Korean market. You can’t imagine many people want a state of the art rice cooker alongside their monthly internet bill, but it’s polite for him to go anyway, and the prospective partner seems very on edge about company secrets. It’s one of those meetings you aren’t allowed to come along to, which means that you’re missing out on a few hours of Vice President Na trying to iron details out with a couple of old guys. 

While you eat, you’re once again struck with the random notion that it feels weird not to be around the Vice President. You’ve been working together regularly and in a very close capacity, which basically means that you’re always in his shadow. It’s the life you were kind of hoping to have at the beginning and were deprived of for a good two years. Now that you have it, it feels weirdly natural — so natural that it’s unnatural to not have his voice ordering you around in that easy tone or his aftershave lingering in the air directly above you. 

You throw the tissue you used to wipe the oil from your egg toast off your mouth onto the table, crumpled and wilted. 

You miss him, which is ridiculous considering you don’t even know what there is to miss. Your relationship, while admittedly lightyears ahead of the starting point it had been at back then (again, not a great standard, considering you didn’t even have a relationship before this period of time), is nothing close to the point of being what it should be for one to miss the other. 

And yet, you look forward to seeing him, watching him do something from afar, helping him whenever he needs you. You like the fact that he still sometimes fakes left when you’re accompanying him back to his office, and you do this thing where you pretend to be annoyed even though it makes you happy to know he won’t go anywhere. You like the little sounds he makes when he eats his super unhealthy corndog as if he’s eating it for the first time every single time (see: very unnerving and slightly disturbing but altogether amusing mmmmmmmmmms). In fact, if you didn’t have a vivid memory of telling him off from way back then, you feel like you could easily convince yourself that things had always been like this — that you two had always been together, happily at work. 

You’re not surprised that he isn’t back from his meeting even when you get back to your desk after lunch, but you do feel a pang of dejectedness that lasts for a few more hours — time which you spend lazily looking over a contract he’d signed yesterday that needs a fair amount of amending and re-signing. It’s hard to pretend to care today, for some reason, especially since your mind keeps going back to peanut butter sandwiches and some ridiculous vision of Vice President Na standing in the middle of your tiny studio apartment’s kitchen area. 

Your reverie’s broken when an envelope falls onto your desk, covering the page of the contract you’d been glassily staring at for the last hour and a half. You’d drawn the same circle about twenty times already, and the paper’s all dented from your efforts. When you look up, Vice President Na is staring down at you, grinning from ear to ear. 

“Miss me?” He drums the envelope, the paper muffling the noise of it all. “Oh? I was joking, but it looks like you actually did. That’s twice in a single day, Secretary ____________. You’re setting a very high record.”

You try to tamp down the smile on your face upon seeing him, clearing your throat so that you have an excuse to press your lips together. You guess it doesn’t work because he just keeps smiling, anyway, or maybe he’s just in a really good mood. “Did your meeting go well, sir?” 

“Is Lotteria the national fastfood chain? Too bad I don’t work for anyone because it kind of feels like I deserve some kind of reward.”

“Could we say that this partnership is its own reward?” 

“It doesn’t have the same ring to it,” he sighs. Once again, his forefinger taps the envelope, calling your attention a little more clearly to it. “I know we’re on a tight schedule for this, and I hate to ask this so late of you, but —”

“Of course, sir; I’ll have it in your hands first thing tomorrow.” 

You’re already gathering it up along with your other (vaguely unfinished) paperwork when his whole palm comes down, trapping the envelope and everything else you’d been intending to carry under it. Your hands go up like you’re being held at gunpoint, your eyes wide. 

“On second thought,” Vice President Na muses, a little too serene for someone who’d just scared the living daylights out of someone else. “How about I take care of the Samsung deal you’re looking over, and you can handle the Norwegian contract?”

“I haven’t… really made a lot of headway with it, if I’m being honest.” You’re hoping he doesn’t ask you why because you’re too embarrassed to come up with a lie on the spot and will inevitably have to confess your random attraction to him under these terrible circumstances if he does. Luckily, he just shrugs.

“All the more reason to split the work, then.”

The still mildly stern part of you is begging to point out that he’s giving you a whole new set of documents to look over anyway, so it’s not even like you’ll have less to do, but the larger, more endeared part of you tells it to shut up and mind its own business. “I thought the crux of our agreement was that you’d never have to work overtime.”

“Because I look like such a stickler for the rules, don’t I?” He snorts, waving you in with the same envelope, and you concede.

Working next to Vice President Na isn’t anything new to you; you’ve been doing it everyday for a while now, especially if he needs you to be quick on call. Ever since you’ve realized his presence makes your heart beat a little faster, you’ve promised yourself not to let that fact show at all when he’s around, something you’ve been quite careful about perfecting. 

Something’s different, though, when it’s after official hours. Maybe it’s because the floor is quieter than it is during the day, so there’s nothing you can listen to but the sound of pen scratching on paper and Vice President Na’s steady breathing. The only real interruption is when Hyunsung knocks on the door to ask if the Vice President is going home; the look on his face is panicked and confused, like a puppy that’s just been dropped off at the mouth of a dumpster site, when he’s told that Vice President Na will drive himself home, so he can just leave the keys. 

Maybe it’s also because it’s pretty dark outside, and while you’ve worked into the night a few times, it’s usually alone or with some other poor sap that has even more backlog than you do — it’s never been just you and the Vice President, who seems supremely unperturbed by the fact that he isn’t at home doing… whatever he does at home after work. You can only guess at it (or wish you knew). 

That makes one of you that’s keeping busy, although you know it should be two. The fact that you’re distracted by his presence all of a sudden is only exacerbated by the mutually exclusive headache that the paperwork you’re looking over gives you. You don’t know why you had expected it to be in Korean, but you and your intermediate level English struggle to keep up with all the little things you have to look through. Sometimes, you can’t tell if the clauses are actually confusing or if you’re just the poor product of your middle school education. It strikes you more than once that Vice President Na had gone through this, somehow, himself — talked to people in a completely different language, probably with ease. You can at least be proud of yourself for being right: for as long as the Vice President puts his mind to something, he’s able to do it — perhaps even well. 

What shocks you after an eternity of silence is the hand that extends towards you, forefinger lightly nudging your chin. You sit up straight like a bolt of lighting had gone through you, meeting Vice President Na’s thoroughly and inexplicably amused expression. Your jaw slackens in shock, but his finger just stays there, like it isn’t invading your personal space. Like it just belongs there.

“What are you doing?”

“What—” you splutter, bemused at the fact that you hadn’t asked the question first. “What are you doing?”

“You keep moving your mouth. What — are you praying or something?”

“No, I —-” You gesture at the contract page you’ve been trying to stumble through for the past twenty minutes. “No, I’m just… I’m reading?”

“You’re…” The start of a laugh escapes him, and you really don’t know what’s so funny. “You’re reading aloud?”

“I wasn’t making any noise, I think,” you grumble, sounding a little more defensive than you’d care to admit. 

“You read silently aloud, then.” His eyes twinkle at this information, although why it should elicit this reaction also completely escapes you. “Why? Because it helps you memorize it or something?”

“My English isn’t that great,” you admit begrudgingly, suddenly feeling a little exposed. “Sometimes I need to mouth the words to understand it.”

And he does the most outrageous, inexplicable thing: he gently cups your chin, making sure you can’t turn your head to look away in embarrassment. Now you have to look at him, red in the face and close to exploding. 

“Don’t you think that’s a little too much, miss secretary?”

You can’t ask what; your voice isn’t working. You just open and close your mouth around the syllable, and after a couple of attempts, he starts copying you, evidently having a better time than you are based on the grin stretched across his face.

“What? What? That you’re doing something this cute in front of me is what I mean. You’re obviously going overboard, and I don’t think it’s very nice.”

He retracts his hand as quickly as he’d used it to close the distance between you, and your hand immediately comes up in its place, almost cupping your jaw like he did. It definitely doesn’t give you the same tingly feeling, so that’s an obvious bust.

You and Vice President Na have a sudden staring contest with amended rules: you blink a hundred times a minute at him while he laughs quietly, leaning back on his chair like he doesn’t have a care in the world. It confuses you and kind of enrages you, but you also find your heart thumping away in your ears like it’s trying very hard to remind you that Na Jaemin makes you feel alive. 

“I— I just—”

“Coffee? I could use some coffee. You look like you could use some too.” He stands, buttoning his blazer with one hand like he has someplace important to go. You’re still so shell-shocked that you don’t even try to stand up to help him, a fact which he notices very clearly. “Oh no, I’ll do you this favor. You sit tight and read your contract. I’ll be back. Keep doing that cute thing with your mouth.” 

Vice President Na finds you exactly as he left you: still wondering if you should be offended at his teasing or enamored by his touch and, more importantly, what the hell his deal is. You have a million questions that need answering, but the only thing you blubber out when he comes back is “Why?” 

“Because you’re amazingly fun to tease,” he responds simply. “And because it’s true. I find it extremely cute. I find you very cute, Secretary _____________, in a kind of good girl, cool girl kind of way. It’s a little confusing to me too, but I think this slightly stern but overall gentle aesthetic of yours is actually growing on me a little.”

“Sir, I—”

“While we’re taking a break,” he interrupts you. You guess it’s probably the right time for a break considering there’s no way you can work in peace now. “Do you constantly have to call me that?” 

“What else would I call you?”

“My name,” he suggests, taking a sip of coffee. You ignore the shit, that’s hot that comes out of him as he puts the paper cup down gingerly on his desk, looking a little bit betrayed by his drink. “Jaemin. Many people call me that.”

“People who are close to you, you mean. Like your family or… your friends.”

“Are you saying you don’t think we’re close? Or that we aren’t friends?”

“Sir, I work for you.” 

“So by that alone, we simply can’t be friends? Et al?I think you really are being too much now, Secretary ____________.” He folds his arms across his chest, tutting disapprovingly as he leans back on the edge of his desk. You try not to think too hard about the fact that he does it very close to you, at an angle optimal for viewing the leanness of his form. “After all those times you broke into my house—”

“To get you ready for work.”

“— walked into my bedroom—”

“Only whenever necessary—”

“— gone through my things while I’m half naked in bed like you’re trying to organize a charity drive—”

“Because you need to get dressed, not because I have some perverted agenda —”

“—eaten the food off my kitchen counter, too—”

“You told me to!” You get to your feet, the contract slipping from your lap in your enthusiasm to defend yourself. “You offered it to me!”

Whatever happens next is completely out of your control, and you know this because the room spins without you moving by your own will. Vice President Na must have been an expert dancer in his past life, or something, because after that one dizzying moment, you find yourself leaning against the edge of the table he had been just a second ago. Warm hands are on your waist, tucked under your cardigan, the heat bleeding through your shirt. 

And the Vice President’s smile is inches away from your face, still mischievous but much gentler than any other time before. 

You’re not sure if you’re paralyzed or if you just don’t want to move, but the reason doesn’t affect the outcome: all you can do is stare up at him, once again dumbfounded after a small outpouring of words that ends in some kind of forced defeat. Except this particular surrender doesn’t feel so sore, for some reason. 

“Even when you’re angry, you’re still pretty, you know that?”

“I wasn’t… angry,” you mumble under your breath, afraid that talking louder will scare him off. You don’t even think he’s listening all that much to you, considering that all he does is tuck your hair behind your left ear and completely change the topic. 

“So, tell me, Secretary ____________. Is this still a situation where we’re not close at all?” He pauses for a moment, probably to let you answer, but you don’t say anything. You’re pretty sure your swallowing nervously is the only true sound you make. He seems to be eager to do a lot of the talking anyway, which is absolutely fine by you. “Or have I completely misread all your cute little signals?”

“Well — no, but I didn’t send any signals.” Obvious ones, at least. You’d been pretty sure you had tried to keep it under wraps as much as possible, but you’re starting to realize it’s a little possible you’re not as great at pretending as you think you are. 

“Not on purpose, probably. Although you really almost got me with the one-man show vibe you have during lunch hour.”

“I… didn’t think you knew, if I’m being honest.” Honesty is the only thing you have right now, anyway, especially since Vice President Na has pretty much confirmed, in his own way, that he knows about how you feel. Now you can only wonder if he’d noticed before you even came to terms with it yourself, and the thought of that being a real possibility urges you to grab the still-steaming cup of coffee and douse yourself with its contents. 

“For a while, I was pretty sure you were messing with me. I would never,” he adds just as you say it too, mimicking your astounded tone up to the lilt. “Which is why I started thinking about why else you might be looking at me so intently. You weren’t sitting there objectifying me, were you, miss secretary?”

“Sir, I would never,” you repeat, and he mouths the same words again in his amusement, although silently this time. 

“I think I would have been okay with it if you were. Or would be, even until now. For the record.” 

“I wasn’t.” 

“You sure? No shame in it. Totally fine. Not sure about anyone else, but I’m totally okay if someone else thinks I’m eye candy in the privacy of their own minds. I am, I think, a fine specimen of a human, if I do say so myself.”

“I really wasn’t, sir.”

“You should have, then. Lost opportunities.”” 

“I could argue that I was just worried you’d leave and not come back.”

“You know I wouldn’t do that to you,” he hums. “Not anymore, anyway.” 

The ‘to you’ is what stumps you into another silent spell, but this time, Vice President Na doesn’t attempt to fill in the void. He just starts running his eyes over your face, like he’s trying to read something there or maybe memorize your features, or something. At some point, you start thinking about how this kind of silence isn’t exactly uncomfortable, contrary to your expectations and with interesting consideration of the fact that he’s still holding your hips. Apart from the idle skimming of his thumb over the curve of your pelvic bone, he doesn’t move — nearer or closer, which is probably for the best since you don’t know which one you really want more at this point.

Again, when you gather some part of your wits, the only thing you still know how to ask is “Why?”

“Because,” he replies immediately, simply, like the answer has always been very clear and you’ve just been too ignorant to figure it out. “You said that I could, not that I had to.” 

It’s hot. Isn’t it hot? You don’t know what he’s talking about, but your body already reacts on principle, and you have to stand-half-lean there with your entire face burning and Vice President Na’s body heat washing over yours like an electric blanket.

“I don’t know what that means, sir.”

“It means I didn’t do this for my dad or just because you told me off in the comfort of my own office.” He bites down on his lower lip to keep himself from laughing (yet again) at you as he witnesses, from the best seat in the house, your face turning almost purple with the effort of keeping down your embarrassment. “Although that played a bit of a factor in it. I couldn’t tell if it was rude of you to say so much or kind of cute that you did despite knowing you were being rude. But that’s besides the point.”

Good, you think. If he manages to hit you with another cute in this timeframe, you may easily cease to exist. 

“You know firsthand, anyway, what my dad always says. You must take on the responsibility you were born with. You have to do your job. You must remember that you owe your life to my achievements.” He mimics his father’s gruff, booming voice amusingly well, to the point that you can’t stop yourself from laughing. His facade breaks easily, and you think you hear him mumble cute under his breath again, although you choose to ignore it so your knees don’t buckle completely (something that you think would be very embarrassing with you so close to him). “I don’t think he’s ever once said an encouraging word to my face. And if there’s anything I can confidently say I won’t do, it’s doing what people only say I need to do. It’s my life, you know what I mean? I’ll do what I want.” 

“You’re saying you suddenly wanted to work because I said you could?” 

“More like I wanted to see if you were right.” He muses. “I was pretty sure I didn’t have the personality for it. Or the attention span. Or the skill, either.”

“I think a couple of those things are still up in the air, sir.”

“One compliment and you’re already gunning for another insubordination report.” Vice President Na’s voice is a low, casual hum, but you notice the grip around your waist tightens for a brief moment. “At first, I figured I’d just show up to get everyone off my back, but I realized along the way that I’m pretty good at this being at the helm business. I’m sure you’ll agree. Hopefully because you want to, not because you also have to.”

“I do agree.” Your reply is wholehearted, and the Vice President’s smile widens. Your chest swells so much that you think you might explode right in front of him. “Because I want to.”

“Please don’t misunderstand me, miss secretary. I’m not attributing all my successes to your impulsive words.” He teases, although his eyes stay gentle despite his tone. “The efforts were still all mine. However, I’m not too proud to admit I had a very responsible first mate by my side, for whom I am very grateful. Although I hope this doesn’t mean she’ll pluck up the courage to ask for a raise considering how well I pay her. I think. Does she get paid well? Maybe I should ask Park Jinhee from accounting.” 

“She won’t,” you laugh softly, not missing the fact that he’s finally learned her name. “And she’s not really doing this for the salary, even if it is a nice bonus.” 

“What’s she doing it for, then?” 

As a job, this was really mostly about yourself — or it was, in the beginning. You’d terrorized Vice President Na to some degree because of the innate tendency towards self-preservation, and when that felt a little one-sided, you also considered everyone who might lose their jobs if the department got cut. It had been, for the most part, an act of pure desperation, so strong that you were willing to point fingers and raise your voice (only a few decibels, because you’re not a crazy person) at your boss. Now… that wasn’t really part of the equation. Maybe you had gotten used to the fact that the Vice President wouldn’t be going anywhere, so you’d stopped worrying about your and everyone else’s jobs, which all seem to be on a smooth path alongside the captain of the ship.

But if you had to be honest to yourself, part of the reason you’d grown a bit complacent about thinking about the fate of the department also had to do with the fact that you genuinely enjoyed being next to the Vice President. Mornings spent helping him prepare for work were regular highlights in your week, and the looks of approval you received from him every time you helped him finish a particularly difficult task were second to none. Always being close to him, always being the first and last to see him in the day, simply being able to look at him -– silly as that all sounds, they now play an undeniable factor in your desire to wake up and go to the office every single day. 

“I did it for you.” You answer, and because the answer’s honest, it feels completely natural to say. A pause slowly lengthens between you two, though not nearly as tense or borderline uncomfortable as you thought it might be this time around. A slow smile stretches over the Vice President’s face, but his words don’t easily take the straightforward route this time, either.

“Should I take up with the human resources department the fact that you’re outright breaching the terms of our contractual workplace relationship? How am I?” He speaks over, with you again, your voices overlapping. You can’t help it — you laugh at the absurdity of how well he’s come to know your responses, from the word choice to the lilt in your voice that signals some level of affront. When, exactly, did Vice President Na start committing the things you said and did into memory? “You’re seducing me, miss secretary. Before you say you’re not — you are. You are, without even knowing it. You’re winning me over, telling me all these sweet nothings to tickle my heart — I believe in you, Jaemin. I love working with you, Jaemin. I did it all for you, Jaemin, because you’re obviously the best in the whole world, ho ho ho.”

“I never said it like that.” 

“You might as well have.” 

“Should I stop believing in you so that we can avoid a scene, then, or is the damage to your good standing too far gone?”

“Rather than stopping something already in full motion, I think it might be better to make certain amendments to our current agreement.” Vice President Na reaches for the pen tucked into his breast pocket — the gold clip catches the fluorescent light and momentarily blinds you as he brings it up between you. He brings it to one side, then to another, and your eyes follow it, amused but also admittedly a bit hypnotized.

“What kind of trance are you putting me under, sir?”

“The kind that gets you to stop calling me that,” he chuckles. “Among other, more important things on my agenda.” 

You have an excellent view of Vice President Na’s stellar smile from the back of the meeting room. 

The deal he closes three days later goes even better than expected; not only does he bring Amazon into the fold after weeks of (surprisingly consistent) hard work and no small amount of beguiling charm (owing to the fact that he’d offended said Amazon representatives earlier on in his still relatively short-lived career), but he also manages to snag Samsung Electronics’ participation. As an already existing subscriber to the company-provided phone plan, you’re pleased to find out that you’re entitled to twelve guilt-free months of Prime Video as part of a new promotional deal, which you can now enjoy on nights you aren’t working overtime — something you’ve racked up more of as you’ve found yourself striking more of a work-life balance, thanks in large part to the Vice President’s steadily active involvement in all things on the ‘work’ aspect of the scale. Your first goal is to finally get past the first episode of an animation everyone in the department is raving about (but that you haven’t seen more than five minutes of, in actuality, because the horrible subtitles and sluggish 144px stop motion-esque have, until recently, adamantly deterred you from enjoying anything about the story).

Standing a fair distance away from the executives, you wait for the flurry of handshakes and accompanying congratulatory statements to die down; it takes quite a while, considering the sheer volume of people, and the thickest throng has come to gather around Vice President Na. At one point, all you can see of him is the slightly unruly lick of hair that’s sticking out above the rest of the considerable crowd of balding men around him (the sole crow’s feather a mountain range of gray). All their voices overlap, and you’re only able to catch key phrases — brilliant young mind… knack for business! … just like the President… bright future ahead, you know? 

Fifteen minutes of conversation and bellowing guffaws pass before Vice President Na emerges, adjusting the front of his blazer as a result of too much handshaking. Behind him, still speaking to one of the  marketing executives, is President Na, who shoots his son a surreptitious look you’ve never seen him wear in your considerable number of years in the company’s employ  — one of triumph and pride. The Vice President, however, is intently loosening his tie and scanning the room, stretching himself just a fraction taller above everyone else to get a better view throughout. 

You wait, wondering if he’s looking to speak to someone, lost in that host of black and gray suits — the Amazon media director, perhaps, or the in-house designer that also seems to be trying to catch his eye, for some reason (you sense the needy greed for a sudden promotion that seems highly unlikely in such a setting), but even though his vision passes over them, however briefly, Vice President Na doesn’t seem satisfied.

That is, until his eyes land on the corner of the room you and Secretary Son have backed yourselves into to allow the higher-ups room to mingle. 

One beat later, and the corners of his mouth are pulled up — a soft, knowing smile directed in your general direction. You glance at Secretary Son, maybe out of instinct, maybe somehow out of panic — as though you worry she’ll somehow come to chastise you, but she’s too busy trying to re-buckle her thin coat belt with rapid-fire tsks. She seems acceptably preoccupied, so your eyes flit back to the Vice President, whose eyebrows are now slightly raised, the telltale signs of a growing grin now playing on his lips as the front of his teeth begin to peek out from the seam. Another cock of his eyebrows, lifting them higher, tells you he’s waiting for some kind of message — an indication that you see him too, maybe, or… perhaps, oddly, any sign that you’re as proud of him as everyone else in the room is. 

You can’t help it  — you laugh, louder than you’d have originally liked to, a hand coming up over your mouth as Secretary Son’s head snaps up from her waist, bamboozled at your quick but sudden outburst. She throws you a look that suggests she firmly believes your mind has snapped, quite like a stale breadstick in a derelict Italian restaurant, but it’s worth it; Vice President Na looks satisfied at this — though, why he would be, you haven’t a true clue. 

As the managers and members of the board file out of the room, both you and Secretary Son inch closer to your respective direct superiors; you both stand a few steps away as the last of the executives drag their feet, still hoping to share one last handshake with either of the two, until an elderly Mrs. Kwon’s surprisingly firm grip is finally shaken off by a sheepish President Na. He turns to his son, who’s still hosting the remnants of a genial smile on his lips, clearly poised to say something. For some reason, you expect the senior to berate the former, simply out of sheer habit, but he does nothing of the sort. 

“Jaemin-ah,” his voice is gruff but not at all begrudging; it’s a low rumble of triumph. “Who’d’ve thought? My boy… you brat…”

“Don’t tell me you’re getting sentimental now, dad,” the Vice President teases, to which the President chortles heartily. 

“Old men like me have the right, much more than anyone else.” You’ve never seen the President wear an expression even remotely close to softness, but you see it in his gaze now; it strikes you, then, that although you’ve always known the two to be related, this is the first time you can confidently say they resemble each other to the cores of their being — a view of happiness, somewhat mirrored in each of them. “I’m proud of you, son. You did everything I hoped you would — no, no… more than that, even.” 

“I’ll take most of the praise, thanks,” Vice President Na replies with his characteristic cheek. For a moment, so quickly you think you may have missed it, his eyes flicker to you. “But I can’t say I could’ve done it alone.” 

“Punk,” President Na snorts, yanking on his son’s earlobe; you and Secretary Son have to avert your eyes with expert speed to avoid being caught snickering at the slightly juvenile “ow, dammit,” that the Vice President groans out. “One big closed deal, and your head’s this big? I better not catch you floating away to a Las Vegas casino after all this.” 

“Give me some credit; I’d at least visit the desert first.” This time, when the Vice President glances at you, his father’s head turns too, and you stand up straighter at the unprecedented onslaught of attention. “Besides, I’ve got someone here to keep me anchored now.”

“Good work, Secretary ____________,” President Na offers you a rare smile that truly has you feeling like the world has turned upside down: the President in an agreeable (almost ecstatic, though you’d never say that out loud) mood, the Vice President doing his job not just in general but actually commendably well, and not a single strand of baby hair sticking up from out of your ponytail. Inconceivable. 

You bow, murmuring a thank you, and Secretary Son quickly follows suit for the formality of it all before she strides over to the President, who’s leaving his son with one last thunder-like clap on the back before he’s leaving the meeting room, still jovial when he catches up with the suspiciously lagging figure of Mrs. Kwon by the door. 

Vice President Na starts to follow suit, walking towards the other end of the meeting room; you quickly scurry behind him, still clutching your tablet, blinking a low battery warning, to your chest. You’ve come to grow accustomed to the ‘secretary’s pace’ over the last few weeks as well — always close enough to help, never too close enough to step on a superior’s toes.

But in the moment you fumble to silence your device, you end up stepping into someone’s shadow; glancing up at the Vice President, you find yourself looking at not the familiar view of his back but that of his side profile (one you’re actually also familiar with, though you refuse to admit to the level of familiarity). He’s slowed his pace considerably, allowing you to naturally fall into step with him, and even this, he expects a response from you somehow — he asks for it with yet another wiggle of his eyebrows. You laugh again, shaking your head, and yet, inexplicably, it seems to be exactly the reaction he hopes to see.

The department floor erupts into applause when the two of you pass through the glass doors; a flash of mollification crosses the Vice President’s features before he’s back to his signature light humor, raising a palm up in receipt of praise. Park Jinhee is clapping with only her left hand smacking the side of her mug, a few drops of coffee streaming down the handle side on impact. One of the team managers rushes forward, eager to shake Vice President Na’s hand, and, riding his high, also yours, pumping it up and down with so much vigor that you mumble a quiet ow behind a strained smile. Only the Vice President’s hand on your shoulder, steering you away, saves you from what feels like possible dislocation. 

He’s still waving at them like this is a pageant and not his day job, even as he guides you towards his office door; you have to use your elbows to push it open and effectively help you both avoid ramming into frosted glass. The applause dies down as your somewhat conjoined figures disappear through the doorway — you first, albeit convolutedly, your heel still holding strong in the job of keeping the door wide open enough for Vice President Na to saunter through before you let it swing shut to a now relatively silent office floor. 

His hold on your shoulder doesn’t let up, though; it’s still urging you forward, towards his desk, and you open your mouth to say something along the lines of I’m gonna break my hip if we keep going this way, but just as your throat conjures up the first syllable, he turns you around, letting you rest light against the edge of the table. 

In a pattern reminiscent of three days prior, Vice President Na’s hand finds its way to your waist, utterly comfortable in a way that mystifies you; he acts like it belongs there, as natural as the smile that’s still playing on his lips. 

“Sir, you realize it’s the middle of the day?” 

“You realize that we had a deal,” he corrects you, brow furrowing in feigned sternness. “Hold up your end of it, miss secretary.” 

“Only if you stop calling me that.” 

“Now, that absolutely was not part of the contract.” 

When you laugh this time, he chimes in; there’s a harmony in your voices that has your posture softening. You feel airier, your heart much lighter, and when you look up at him, you can’t help but flush at his expectant gaze. 

“You realize it’s the middle of the day,” you repeat, carefully, the words suddenly somewhat unfamiliar on your tongue — the next two syllables, most of all. “Jae… min.” 

Odd as it is, you’re rewarded with the pleased look that takes over his features; he takes a moment to exaggeratedly revel in this new occurrence. 

“Better. Much better. You could still be a bit more comfortable with it, I’d say, but… baby steps?” 

“Please re-prioritize your day, si— Jaemin.” The terse tone you’re going for is brutally marred by your blunder, which has his shoulders shaking from laughter. “Someone could very easily walk in.” 

“Who’s going to fire me?”

“I can think of one person.”

“You heard him. I’m proud of you, Jaemin. You’ve completely exceeded my expectations, Jaemin. You are the light of my life — my favorite son, Jaemin, ho, ho, ho.”

“Sir,” you sigh. “You’re his only son.”

“We had a deal,” he repeats, letting the return to habits slide, and there’s a laughably childish air to his words. “I’ll… file an insubordination report. Breach of contract as well. Tsk, tsk, miss secretary. Not on such a momentous occasion.” 

“Some might classify this as threatening behavior.” Your eyes are soft, though, when they meet his humored gaze. “If you want a reward… ask a little more nicely.”

A soft snort — his fingers dig lightly into your waist, and the next second, he’s lifting you off your feet and settling you lightly atop his desk. his palms never leave you, even after you’ve been placed; they’re increasingly warm beyond the fabric of your top. 

“____________,” he murmurs, saying your name so naturally that you could almost believe he’s referred to you as nothing else for as long as you’ve known him. “Kiss me.” 

Your own hands find their way behind his neck, but he does most of the work in closing the gap anyway; you’re not even sure who, between the two of you, gave that first sigh of longing, of relief. Perhaps it was both of you, all at once. 

Jaemin still tastes like the coffee you’d given him this morning — not a trace of richness, but a bittersweet and earthy twang that’s signature post-Americano. There’s even a hint of mintiness from the nervous handful of Tic Tacs he’d had just before the meeting started; you find that out the moment his tongue swipes against yours, leaving behind the invisible bite of menthol. And then there’s you, a clean taste that settles against his teeth, subtle first but growing stronger until you’re satisfied with the notion that you may linger there for some time — even after you pull away, slightly breathless.

“Congratulations to me,” he breathes out, trademark grin flashing bright again. “So what happens if I close next month’s Disney Plus deal?”

He doesn’t wait for an answer; his hand’s already skimming down, over your hips, following the path of your thigh. Your hand reaches out on instinct to stop him, but he’s oddly more aware of his surroundings than you give him credit for (or maybe, you’re just that predictable to him). He meets your palm, fingers lacing into yours and allowing him to lift your wrist to his lips. There, you feel the warmth of his kiss again, and he uses his hold to bring himself even closer, until he’s able to press his face into your neck. 

“Sir—”

“Jaemin. You call me Jaemin from now on, remember?”

“Sir.” You’re adamant. “It’s work hours.”

“You’re not tense.” 

He doesn’t move his head; in fact, you feel him burying his face further into your shoulder. In this position, there’s no real way for you to pull away — there’s also no real desire for you to do so, anyway. 

“No, I’m not.”

“Good.” Warmth again on your skin — his lips leave an invisible mark just above your collarbone. “I like you best like this.”

“What? Not tense?”

“Happy,” he corrects for accuracy. “Happy that you’re with me.” 

You fall silent, not because you’re not sure of what to say, but because you don’t need to tell him that he’s right. 

Moments later, his fingers find their way into your ponytail; the index hooks into the elastic, bringing your hair down. You feel his shoulders rise and fall with a deep breath, he’s inhaling your perfume again. 

“Green tea. Something floral. Jasmine? Maybe a little bit of citrus.” He lifts his head but stays close, warm breath washing over you. “It’s so you. Fresh. Pure. Beautiful.” 

The gap between the two of you doesn’t last for too long thereafter; he kisses you again, and your heart lifts to find that your taste still lingers somewhere there. It’s longer because it’s slower — less playful and more exploratory, until he pulls away to a much more breathless you. How he finds the air to talk even after is miraculous to you. 

“Be mine, miss secretary.” 

You blink — once, twice, at his serious expression, wondering if it will break and give way to more humor. But he waits, unwavering, until the last piece of resistance you’ve clung onto is washed away — the last thing that made you, for a second, deny that you were in love with him. 

His smile slowly mirrors yours as it grows. 

“Like you could ever get rid of me, Na Jaemin.” 

[writefightandflightclub]

Sugar

Grad student!Nathan Bateman x older!fem!reader

Author’s note: I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS CONCEPT TBH BUT DON’T WANT TO GIVE SPOILERS SO WARNINGS ARE NON-EXHAUSTIVE. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK I GUESS? (As ever, minors DNI, thank you!) And I blame Oscar at MEFCC in the black polo and @nowritingonthewall’s hc of young!Nathan sneaking into tech conferences for this one. (I’m imagining him as getting towards his mid twenties here.)

Word count: just a short one!

Warnings: power / wealth imbalance, and slight warning for dub-con due to this. Sexual touching (slightly public). Infidelity. Alcohol consumption (reader). As mentioned above, warnings are non-exhaustive this time to avoid spoilers. If you do need further info, however, you are welcome to DM or send an ask.

“Not touching the oysters?” Nathan asks in as suave a tone as he can muster. The only oyster he’s personally sampled, so far, is the oyster sauce at his favourite downtown take-out.

Your plate of extravagant buffet food is discarded next to you, however, as you pore over a stack of documents at the hotel bar, a martini in a tall, flared glass languishing in your free hand.

You whip your head towards Nathan and look him up and down; as though deciding whether he’s worth the time of day, or whether you should immediately summon security to remove him from your field of vision. You seem to find him relatively inoffensive, at least, and grant him permission to remain in your orbit; for now. You hum contemplatively. “Decided I’ve had my fill of vile sensations for today,” you announce in a cool, assured tone. “I had to fuck my husband this morning. Twice.”

Nathan emits a low whistle. As much as he tries to take it in his stride - to act like he’s accustomed to affluent, worldly, cut-throat women like you - he isn’t. Honestly, he’s barely accustomed to anyone at all lately, since he’s immersed himself entirely in getting his start-up off the ground.

You’re older. Older than him, at least. Older than any woman he’s been with so far, he can’t help but think. That, along with your candidness, is refreshing. You’re not all giggly and earnest and chaotic like the young women he’s met around campus - which sounds far less exhausting to him, if he’s honest.

He looks you up and down in return. And, yeah. Shit. He definitely wants to fuck you.

“He doesn’t get you off?” Nathan asks, crude and casual, as though he has any business asking. However, he’s found that a complete disregard for social norms can -oddly- sometimes pan out in his favour. Sometimes. Besides, on this occasion he has to risk it, or social norms would dictate that he shouldn’t approach you at all. At least not before he’s in possession of an invitation-only credit card, or, has made a hard-to-come by appointment via your PA at the very least.

You take a sip of your drink and eye him over the brim. He likes that move. Your eyes are full of deliciously dark amusement as you appraise him. He thinks you may even like what you see. Might even find him refreshing too. “Well. It’s not love - or anything else so impractical. It’s strictly a business arrangement,” you explain, as though you have been waiting for an opportunity to vent and no-one has actually bothered to ask you. “He pays for my lifestyle and I put out. And occassionally have to, you know, run his fucking company, attend boring conferences to schmooze his investors, and generally mask his total ineptitude.” You gesture around you vaguely. From the tiredness in your tone, it makes sense that you’re hiding out in this deserted hotel bar, Nathan thinks.

He knows fine well who your husband is too. A guy many, many years your senior. Obscenely rich fucker too. CEO and founder of a huge ass telecoms company, recently diversified into various markets across the tech world. The company is running an agressive acquisition policy, buying out start-ups and hoping to find something that sticks. The “next big thing”. It hasn’t succeeded yet. Projections look mediocre at best.

Nathan, who very much considers his innovation the “next big thing” - the only game in town - had tried to corner your husband at the end of his rather lacklustre panel. After all, he’d done his research. Had identified the highest value targets he could network with in attempts to drum up some investment. He is trying to bolster his sorely under-funded start-up… which, if he is honest, has barely even “started” at all. He knows the tech. The code. He’s a certified genius, for God’s sake. He was just a fool for thinking that that alone would be enough. Frustratingly for him, it’s the schmoozing and understanding of the cold realities of the business world he struggles with. He seems to rub people up the wrong way, for some reason. Probably because they’re all assholes. Or, maybe, because they view him as too young or too rough around the edges to know what he’s talking about. Or, most likely, because they’re uninspired bastards incapable of comprehending his world-changing vision. Maybe all of the above.

So much then, for the supposed merits of the free market and the idea that the best ideas will prosper. His idea is the best, and he’s floundering simply because his daddy can’t buy him his way in. Instead of a reliance on the strength of the product, networks and power and money and nepotism appear to be king in this world. And, Nathan possesses none of these advantages. Even with the buzz around him at his faculty, and his full ride scholarship at 17 for being a fucking genius.

Anyway, after a failed attempt to schmooze your asshole husband, Nathan had quickly put together that the guy didn’t have a goddamn clue. That you were the brains (and beauty, by the way) behind the operation, and he was likely little more than the funds.

Also, the guy definitely didn’t seem like he’d be a pleasant fuck, by any stretch.

He grimaces somewhat at the thought.

“That’s what they say isn’t it?” You take a breezy sip of your drink. “Fake it until you make it? They’re talking about orgasms, sweetheart, and my last performance paid for these shoes.” You kick out your appealing leg, your shins bare and smooth beneath your pencil skirt, and you briefly show off your shiny, black, red-soled heels.

They’re nice. Sexy, on you.

Nathan briefly wonders why you’re being so forthcoming with him, a complete stranger; but you don’t strike him as someone who gives a shit in the slightest what other people think. You also strike him as someone who can make people think whatever you want them to think. One day, he hopes to have as much power over a room as you do - and that’s for starters.

He slips into the bar stool beside you then, uninvited, and you scoff. “Are you even old enough to drink, baby face?”

He bristles at that, thick brows pinching and nods slowly, peeking at you from over the brim of his glasses, his own eyes now dancing with a subtle, dark amusement.

You’ve already turned away though. It frustrates him that he can’t entirely hold your attention.

“Nathan Bateman. Student, MIT.” You gesture to his name tag with a perfectly manicured finger, and without looking back up from your stack of documents.

Now, Nathan glumly reassesses his earlier conclusion. You are being forthcoming because it really doesn’t matter what he, specifically, thinks. Because you’ve already estimated that he’s the guy in the room with least influence. For now, at least. You’ll see. “Better to check. Especially before you start hitting on me.”

He swallows. “Is that what you think’s happening?” Shit. Do you want that to happen?

“Isn’t it?”

He’d make some dig about you flattering yourself. But he knows fine well it’s the most likely reason any hot-blooded guy would be sidling up to you. You’re hot and unobtainable; which makes you even hotter.

Nathan watches as you idly spin your wedding band around and around. He’s surprised you can even lift your arm with that rock attached. When he notices it, he wants to fuck you even more than he did before, but he definitely can’t afford you.

“Actually. I wanted to pick your brains on something. You seem the kinda person who knows a good idea when she sees one.” Unlike the other idiots at this conference who’ve refused to give him the time of day. Maybe he should reconsider his pitch.

You scoff, still not looking up at him. “Honey,” you deliver in a silken, condescending tone, which he is surprised to learn makes him half-hard in his pants. “I charge for that too, and I get the feeling I’m a little beyond your budget.”

“Call it corporate social responsibility then. Supporting the students.”

“Sweetheart. I pay someone else to do that sort of thing for me.”

“Okay.” He takes it in his stride. Wants to show he isn’t fazed by you, even if he is. “Then I guess I am hitting on you. Unless that’s gonna cost me.”

You finally turn back towards him. Look him up and down again as if to remind yourself exactly what you’re dealing with. You study his cheap suit and his mop of curls and his freshly grown-out beard, and he is surprised how exhilarating he finds it to be under your scope.

Your lips curl with subtle amusement, your gaze growing downright wolfish as you survey him.

Fucking unreal.

You look like could eat him up and spit him out. Or… you could swallow, he fantasises briefly, gaze dipping down to your plush mouth.

You do like what you’re seeing, don’t you? Are intrigued by him. Finally. He encounters someone with some good sense.

“What’s it like?” he delivers with a smirk, feeling a resurgence of his familiar confidence as he successfully holds your attention.

You eyeball his fit again. “What? Tailoring?”

He bristles at your dig, but again, aims to present an unbothered exterior. “No. I mean.” His palm waves through the air. “Being a sugar baby.”

You tut at him. “Why, are you interested in a position?”

He arcs a single, thick brow. “I could be.”

“I don’t think my husband’s recruiting. Unless you want a 60-hour a week unpaid internship with zero healthcare and no dental.”

“No. I mean that…” His tie feels awfully constrictive around his neck all of a sudden. This is a bold move but… you have to speculate to accumulate, right? “…I could be yours.”

You clearly weren’t expecting that. And, as much as you try to pass-off that you’re used to jumped-up, cocky little shits like him offering to be your sugar baby, he can plainly see it throws you for a moment. Still, you compose yourself beautifully in no time at all. “I already have one man who saps my time and comes in two minutes flat. What would make you any different, honey?”

Nathan offers you a lopsided smile, opting not to contain the dark, lust-blown gaze smouldering behind his lenses. What does he have to offer, exactly, in this scenario? He purses his lips while he thinks, and then he lands on it: “I’m… hot.”

You look him up and down again, conceding - with a tilt of your head - that his argument is at least halfway compelling. “Hmm. Do you imagine, though, that I struggle for offers from hot, younger men?”

“Not in the slightest. You’re gorgeous.” And rich. “But I think you can do better.”

“Better like you? What makes you so special?” You’re having fun with this. He can tell from the glow in your eyes and the curve of your appealing mouth.

He offers you his best smoulder. It isn’t hard - there’s an easy chemistry between the two of you, he thinks. “There are things I don’t give away for free either.”

“Well,” you ask, leaning in close to him and cupping his chin firmly in your hand as you dip your painted lips towards the shell of his ear. “If I was to take you up on your very generous offer… What pretty things would you want me to buy you with the money, baby boy?”

Fuck. You smell good.

You smell edible, and his suit pants definitely fit far less well than they did when he donned them this morning. In fact, they’re getting increasingly tight around his crotch as his arousal swells for you.

With a tight swallow dipping down his neck and a rare nervous sweat dampening his shirt, he twists to gather some documents out of his backpack. You scrape your nails down his beard as he turns out of reach, and fuck, you’re doing it for him.

Then, gathering his cool, entering the domain he is expert in and is sure of, he flips to the page on costings in his business plan, sliding it across the bar to you.

He gives you a moment to study the text. The list of the equipment, personnel, marketing budgets and so on he needs to realise his rather extensive ambitions. Then, he leans in to you in return as you pore over his plan. He dips his mouth until his beard is tickling the shell of your ear.

“This would be a good start… Mommy.”

As you look back at him with a dark, lust-laden stare, looking as hungry as he feels, he wonders if he might leave this conference with some start-up funds after all.

If this comes off, then… fuck. He hopes you are as ferocious in the bedroom as it strikes him you are in other areas.

Your head is angled towards him, your lips parted in mild surprise. Your gaze briefly dips to the tenting arousal between his legs, and he doesn’t even attempt to hide it.

He has no idea where this will lead; but that’s the fun, isn’t it? Nathan is rather fond of experiments.

A hard swallow dips down your neck and you cross your legs, pressing your thighs together as you take in the substantial swell of him.

You gather a smile, and your composure. “Your business plan looks impressive, Nathan.” His name sounds good in your mouth. He wonders how his cock might feel in there too.

You hand the documents back to him, and you quickly gather up your things, slinging your stack of documents under one arm. With the other, you reach out your hand, offering it to him to shake. He obliges. “I’m certain we could come to some sort of… arrangement.” You free a business card from the holder in your tote and slip it gracefully into his top pocket.

He’s a little disappointed it isn’t your hotel room key, if he’s honest. He’d love to work on his current… problem… right away. “When would you like to… discuss things further?” he asks, as you dangle the promise in front of him.

“You’ll have to make an appointment with my PA,” you dismiss with a smirk. However, you seem keen to guarantee that he does. You’ll be fun to play with, Nathan thinks. “Will you do that for me, Nathan?”

He thinks about it. Decides it’s a no-brainer. “Yes.”

To his surprise, you then reach your hand down towards his crotch, pausing before you touch him and allowing him opportunity to protest. He doesn’t. And so, you settle your palm over the aching bulge between his legs. The warmth of you bleeds through the fabric, and Nathan struggles not to react to the pressure you apply, managing to limit himself to a ragged intake of breath. His eyes flutter shut, lashes fanning against his cheek. When he opens them again, he half expects his glasses to have steamed up.

“Yes, what?” you purr, giving him an abrupt squeeze.

“Y-yes, Mommy,” he stutters, almost choking on his words, and with that, you look very satisfied indeed.

He wagers, from the expression on your face, that you’ll definitely be motivated to seal the deal.

You sweep out and Nathan watches your ass sway in that tight pencil skirt as you go.

Fucking unreal.

[mariacallous]

For more than three weeks, Gaza has faced an almost total internet blackout. The cables, cell towers, and infrastructure needed to keep people online have been damaged or destroyed as Israel launched thousands of missiles in response to Hamas attacking Israel and taking hundreds of hostages on October 7. Then, this evening, amid reports of heavy bombing in Gaza, some of the last remaining connectivity disappeared.

In the days after October 7, people living in Gaza have been unable to communicate with family or friends, leaving them unsure whether loved ones are alive. Finding reliable news about events has become harder. Rescue workers have not been able to connect to mobile networks, hampering recovery efforts. And information flowing out of Gaza, showing the conditions on the ground, has been stymied.

As the Israel Defense Forces said it was expanding its ground operations in Gaza this evening, internet connectivity fell further. Paltel, the main Palestinian communications company, has been able to keep some of its services online during Israel’s military response to Hamas’ attack. However, at around 7:30 pm local time today, internet monitoring firm NetBlocks confirmed a “collapse” in connectivity in the Gaza Strip, mostly impacting remaining Paltel services.

“We regret to announce a complete interruption of all communications and internet services within the Gaza Strip,” Paltel posted in a post on its Facebook page. The company claimed that bombing had “caused the destruction of all remaining international routes.” An identical post was made on the Facebook page of Jawwal, the region’s biggest mobile provider, which is owned by Paltel. Separately, Palestinian Red Crescent, a humanitarian organization, said on X (formerly Twitter) that it had lost contact with its operation room in Gaza and is “deeply concerned” about its ability to keep caring for people, with landline, cell, and internet connections being inaccessible.

“This is a terrifying development,” Marwa Fatafta, a policy manager focusing on the Middle East and North Africa at the digital rights group Access Now, tells WIRED. “Taking Gaza completely off the grid while launching an unprecedented bombardment campaign only means something atrocious is about to happen.”

A WIRED review of internet analysis data, social media posts, and Palestinian internet and telecom company statements shows how connectivity in the Gaza Strip drastically plummeted after October 7 and how some buildings linked to internet firms have been damaged in attacks. Photos and videos show sites that house various internet and telecom firms have been damaged, while reports from official organizations, including the United Nations, describe the impact of people being offline.

Damaged Lines

Around the world, the internet and telecoms networks that typically give web users access to international video calls, online banking, and endless social media are a complicated, sprawling mix of hardware and software. Networks of networks, combining data centers, servers, switches, and reams of cables, communicate with each other and send data globally. Local internet access is provided by a mix of companies with no clear public documentation of their infrastructure, making it difficult to monitor the overall status of the system as a whole. In Gaza, experts say, internet connectivity is heavily reliant on Israeli infrastructure to connect to the outside world.

Amid Israel’s intense bombing of Gaza, physical systems powering the internet have been destroyed. On October 10, the United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which oversees emergency responses, said air strikes “targeted several telecommunication installations” and had destroyed two of the three main lines of communications going into Gaza.

Prior to tonight’s blackout, internet connectivity remained but was “extremely slow and limited,” Access Now’s Fatafta says. People she has spoken to from Gaza say it could take a day to upload and send a few photos. “They have to send like 20 messages in order for one to go through,” Fatafta says. “They are desperately—especially for Gazans that live outside—trying to get through to their families.”

“Every time I try to call someone from family or friends, I try to call between seven to 10 times,” says Ramadan Al-Agha, a digital marketer who lives in Khan Yunis, a city in the south of the Gaza Strip. “The call may be cut off two or three times,” he told WIRED in a WhatsApp message before the latest outages. “We cannot access news quickly and clearly.” People in the region have simultaneously faced electricity blackouts, dwindling supplies of fuel used to power generators, and a lack of clean water, food, and medical supplies. “It is a humanitarian disaster,” Al-Agha says.

Connectivity in Gaza started to drop not long after Israel responded to the October 7 Hamas attack. Rene Wilhelm, a senior R&D engineer at the nonprofit internet infrastructure organization Ripe Network Coordination Center, says based on an analysis of internet routing data it collects that 11 Palestinian networks, which may operate both in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, began to experience disruption after October 7. Eight of the networks were no longer visible to the global internet as of October 23, Wilhelm says. Ahead of this evening’s blackout, there was around 15 percent of normal connectivity, according to data from Georgia Tech’s Internet Outage Detection and Analysis project. That dropped to around 7 percent as reports of the blackout circulated.

One office belonging to Paltel in the Al Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City has been destroyed in the attacks, photos and videos show. Floors have been destroyed and windows blown away in the multistory building, and piles of rubble surround the entrances. (It is unclear what equipment the building housed or how many floors Paltel occupied.) Another internet provider, AlfaNet, is listed as being based in the Al-Watan Tower. The company posted to its Facebook page on October 8 that the tower had been destroyed and its services have stopped, with other online posts also saying the tower has been destroyed.

Multiple Palestinian internet and telecoms firms have said their services have been disrupted during the war, mostly posting to social media. Internet provider Fusion initially said its engineers were trying to repair its infrastructure, although it has since said this is not continuing. “The network was destroyed, and the cables and poles were badly damaged by the bombing,” it wrote on Facebook. JetNet said there had been a “sudden disruption” to access points. SpeedClick posted that the situation was out of its control. And HiNet posted that it has “no more to offer to ensure” people could stay online following “the attacks and destruction our internet servers have suffered.”

Across Paltel’s network on October 19, according to an update shared by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 83 percent of fixed line users had been disconnected, with 53 percent of sites providing fixed line connections also being offline. Half of the company’s fiber optic internet lines in Gaza weren’t operational, the update says. The connectivity disappeared this evening, according to Paltel’s Facebook post, which says there has been a “complete interruption” of all its services. Paltel, AlfaNet, Fusion, and SpeedClick could not be reached or did not respond to requests for comment.

Lost Connections

In recent years, governments and authoritarian regimes have frequently turned to shutting down the internet for millions of people in attempts to suppress protests and curtail free speech. Targeting the communications networks is common during conflicts. During Russia's war in Ukraine, its forces have decimated communications networks, tried to take over the internet, and set up new mobile companies to control information flows. When Hamas first attacked Israel on October 7, it used drones to bomb communications equipment at surveillance posts along the borders of the Gaza Strip.

Monika Gehner, the head of corporate communications at the International Telecommunication Union, says the body is always “alarmed” by damage inflicted on any telecommunications infrastructure during conflicts. The ITU, the United Nations’ primary internet governance body, believes “efficient telecommunication services” are crucial to peace and international cooperation, and its secretary-general has called for respecting infrastructure in the Middle East, Gehner says.

Officials in Israel have consistently claimed they are targeting Hamas militants within Gaza, not civilians, while responding to the Hamas attacks, which killed more than 1,400 people in Israel. The Hamas-run Health Ministry within Gaza has said more than 7,000 people have been killed there and released a list of names. A spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces did not respond to WIRED’s questions about internet disruptions within Gaza.

Hanna Kreitem, a senior adviser for internet technology and development in the Middle East and North Africa at the Internet Society, an open internet advocacy nonprofit, says Palestinian firms have a “big reliance” on Israeli internet firms. “Palestinians are not controlling any of the ICT infrastructure,” says Mona Shtaya, a non-resident fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy. Mobile networks in the Gaza Strip rely on 2G technologies. Al-Agha, the digital marketer, shared a screenshot showing mobile internet speeds of 7.18 kilobytes per second; average mobile speeds in the US in 2022 were 24 megabits per second, according to mobile analytics firm Statista.

“The internet is vital in times of war in crises,” says Fatafta, the Access Now policy manager, who adds that there can be “terrible consequences” linked to connectivity blackouts. The UN’s OCHA said rescue workers have had a harder time “carrying out their mission” partly due to the “limited or no connection to mobile networks.” Al-Agha says he has lost some clients due to the disruptions. The lack of connectivity can obscure events that are happening on the ground, Fatafta says. News crews have told WIRED they have footage from the ground but are “losing the story because of the internet.”

Kreitem says that a lack of electricity and access to the equipment will have made an impact on top of any physical damage to communications networks. “We don't know how many of the people that actually operate these networks are still alive,” Kreitem says. “The network operators are part of the world there, there's no place for them to run. They are as affected as any other person.”

[frostgears]

"so you two are in a 24/7 total power exchange relationship now? just like me and Belle!"

"yeah!"

"yep. Mistress holds the key to my collar and my chastity belt."

"but that seemed kinda weird to us, like maybe you forgot to describe part of it."

"right. that's not all the power in a relationship? so we made a list. so i ended up with, uh, all of Mistress's 2FA hardware, exclusive rights to the apartment thermostat, power of attorney…"

"i got all the telecom accounts, the title to her car, the safe deposit boxes, the secret family recipe books from both her moms…"

"she controls my deck lists…"

"only my pet is allowed to pick the coffee pod flavors…"

"media server…"

"profile pictures…"

"favorite aunt…"

"registered owner of the cats as far as the SPCA is concerned… i think that's it?"

"that's most of it. it was a big list."

"…"

"Alex? Belle? are you all right?"

"Operator, may this one speak freely?"

"…yes, it may. two sentences, no more."

"that's not what total power exchange means! you two idiots are describing mutually assured destruction!"

"oh shit."

"yeah, that's a way hotter name for it!" □

[pettirosso1959]

"Per rendere chiaro il peso di BlackRock nell'economia italiana può essere utile elencare tutte le società quotate a cui partecipa: un elenco in cui sono comprese le grandi partecipate pubbliche, le multiutility, l'energia, la moda, le banche, la meccanica, le armi e altro ancora.

Ecco l'elenco: A2a, Amplifon, Azimut, Mps, Banca Generali, Banco Bpm (dove ha il 4,75), Banca Mediolanum, Bper Banca, Brunello Cucinelli, Buzzi, Campari, Diasorin, Enel (dove ha il 5%), Eni (dove ha superato il 5%), Erg, Ferrari, FinecoBank (dove ha quasi il 10%), Generali (dove ha il 3%), Hera, Interpump, Intesa San Paolo (dove ha il 4%), Inuit, Iveco, Leonardo, Mediobanca (dove ha il 5%), Moncler (dove ha il 5%), Nexi, Pirelli, Poste italiane, Prysmian (dove ha il 7%), Recordati, Saipem, Snam (dove ha il 5%), Stellantis (dove ha il 4%), StMicroeletronics (dove ha il 5%), Telecom, Tenaris, Terna (dove ha il 5%), Unicredit (dove ha più del 7%) e Unipol.

Il totale del valore azionario di BlackRock in queste società è pari a 25 miliardi di euro. Nel giro di pochissimi anni, la politica italiana è riuscita a trovarsi un nuovo padrone, che ha realizzato formidabili dividendi mentre l'economia reale languiva e le retribuzioni diventavano tra le più basse d'Europa. Non un bel modello".

Alessandro Volpi

Resta solo da dire: Siamo in mano ai migliori e Draghi conta zero.

[jazy3]

ST5 BTS Teaser Trailer Thoughts Part 2

So the Basement Scene! I could talk about this scene for days! There is so much to unpack here! This appears to be the basement of the local radio station that they've been filming at a lot. I think it's going to be this season's Creel House!

You can see the Pink Floyd poster from the BTS pic we got in January behind the group and it looks like this is the same set where we got that set pic of Millie with the Duffer Brothers in front of a telecom tower. In the photo we got of Steve outside the radio station the brickwork appears to match some of the telecom tower and the silo BTS photos.

The schematics photo we got back in February is for a remote radio head so it looks like radio is going to play a hugh part in this season. In this footage we can clearly see Joyce, Will, Nancy, Jonathan, Dustin, Steve, Mike, and Lucas. It looks like Robin might be sitting next to Nancy but it’s hard to tell because Will is in front blocking our view of this person.

Steve’s wearing the red and brown shirt from the Day 1 of Filming video of Joe and Maya which indicates that this basement scene is from Episode 1 of Season 5. Which is interesting given the group dynamic in this shot and where we left things at the end of Season 4. Both Jonathan and Nancy look miserable in this scene! What jumped out at me most was how much space there is physically between the two of them.

Nancy’s sitting on what appears to be a chair next to Robin and Jonathan is sitting at the end of the couch behind them. There’s a whole person's width of space between them and they’re not touching at all. They’re not making eye contact and while Nancy is looking towards Joyce. Jonathan is looking straight ahead towards the camera.

It stood out to me because if you look at their body language in Season 3 they’re very close physically. Even when they’re having problems in their relationship there’s still a physical closeness there that appears to be totally absent in this shot. This gave me pause the same way that Steve and Nancy’s ‘See you on the other side’ scene in the Season 4 trailer and the lack of Jancy scenes in that trailer gave me pause.

You can see that Nancy is wearing the red and white striped dress that we saw in the warehouse video. Could be a candy striper outfit so she could have come from volunteering at the hospital. If that's the case it could explain why she's sitting next to Robin. As it's possible they're volunteering together to keep an eye on Max.

It’s interesting that Steve is sitting on the other side of the room next to Mike and Dustin when Nancy and what appears to be Robin are sitting on the other side of the room. Although this could be because he picked up Dustin from the cemetery after he got beat up.

And we get our first good look at Jonathan this season and he's got a new look! He’s gone from California stoner bro to folksy alternative guy! Honestly, I'm not sorry to see that look go. It was horrendous! Later on we see Jonathan in the same outfit pointing at something on the projector. And then we've got a shot of Mike standing at the projector with Nancy beside him looking worried.

I'm excited for Mike and Nancy to have more scenes! I feel like the last time we got substantial scenes with just the two of them was Season 1! And I'm really curious to see how we go from the Season 4 finale to where we are in this scene. Jonathan, Will, and Mike look totally different and you can see how worried and scared everyone looks. And Joyce is wearing her corduroy jacket and blue shirt from Season 1 which indicates that by this point the Byers stuff has arrived from California.

Part 1: https://www.tumblr.com/jazy3/757938426475577344/st5-bts-teaser-trailer-thoughts-part-1?source=share

[arcobalengo]

"Spogliare la Grecia è stato uno scherzo.

Aeroporti, qualche isola, industrie zero, terre poche, risparmi privati ridicoli, demanio interessante.

Comunque la Grecia aveva un Pil inferiore alla sola provincia di Treviso.

È bastato un sol boccone.

PER L’ITALIA È DIVERSO:

Un capitale assolutamente enorme.

Secondo al mondo in quanto a risparmio privato, primo come abitazioni di proprietà, terre di valore assoluto e coste meravigliose.

Quinta potenza industriale al mondo prima dell'euro, ottava oggi.

Il Made in Italy è ancora oggi il marchio numero uno al mondo, davanti a Coca Cola.

Biodiversità superiore alla somma di tutti gli altri paesi europei.

Come capitale artistico monumentale, non ne parliamo neanche: è superiore a quello di tutto il resto del mondo.

Francia e Germania, più qualche fondo americano, cinese o arabo hanno fatto la spesa da noi a "paghi uno e prendi quattro".

Tutto il lusso e la grande distribuzione sono passati ai francesi insieme ai pozzi libici passati da Eni e Total.

Poi anche Eni è diventata a maggioranza americana.

Anche il sistema bancario è passato ai francesi insieme all'alimentare.

I tedeschi si sono presi la meccanica, e il cemento.

Gli indiani tutto l'acciaio.

I Cinesi si son presi quote di TERNA, e tutto PIRELLI agricoltura.

Se ne sono andate TIM, TELECOM, GIUGIARO, PININ FARINA, PERNIGOTTI, BUITONI, ALGIDA, GUCCI, VALENTINO, LORO PIANA, AGNESI, DUCATI, MAGNETI MARELLI, ITALCEMENTI, PARMALAT, GALBANI, LOCATELLI, INVERNIZZI, FERRETTI YACHT, KRIZIA, BULGARI, POMELLATO, BRIONI, VALENTINO, FERRE’, LA RINASCENTE, POLTRONA FRAU, EDISON, SARAS, WIND, ANSALDO, FIAT FERROVIARIA, TIBB, ALITALIA, MERLONI, CARTIERE DI FABRIANO, ..... Ma...non hanno finito.

Ci sono rimaste ancora le case e le cose degli italiani.

E I LORO RISPARMI. CIRCA 3.000 MILIARDI DI EURO.

ORA VOGLIONO QUELLI.

Ecco chi ha chiamato Mattarella e gli ha "intimato " di procedere a sbarrare la strada a chi poteva mettere a rischio la prosecuzione della spoliazione.

I fondi di investimento, i mercati, che, come ricordavo raccolgono i soldi delle mafie, tutte, grandi e piccole, dei traffici di droga, di umani, di truffe internazionali, di salvataggi bancari, del "nero" delle grandi multinazionali, siano esse del commercio, dei telefonini, della cocaina o delle armi, questi fondi di investimenti dicevo, non hanno finito.

Ora tocca alle poche industrie rimaste, ai fondi pensioni, ai conti privati, agli immobili. Ora tocca a noi.

Ecco perché non serve a nulla mediare, arretrare un po'.

Non si placheranno, l'abbiamo già visto. BISOGNA FERMARLI ORA.

Ogni generazione ha il suo Piave. Questo è il nostro."

~ Gian Micalessin, giornalista indipendente

[cyndaquillt]

Ok I feel like writing a long essay on Indian elections so I'm gonna do just that. Full disclaimer though, I'm just airing my thoughts out and I'm just as much of the general public as anyone else. In other words, I'm not a social scientist. While I welcome healthy discussion, if I don't find the strength in me to answer to a certain reply, I simply won't and I hope you understand and forgive me.

With that out of the way, I'm coming out of my optimism bubble to take a stock of things. At this point (6:19 am IST), the counting has been done. It's apparent that BJP did not win the clear majority they were hoping for. In fact, they could only get about ~36% of the total votes, which means majority of seats in the Lok Sabha belong to parties that are not in the BJP. This is a huge deal, despite it being apparent that NDA WILL make the government and by extension, Modi may get elected for PM for a third term.

However, there's the matter of how tightly knit the NDA itself is. At this point NDA holds 292 seats. If JD(U) and TDP (i.e. Nitish and Chandrababu Naidu) flip, NDA loses 16+12 seats leaving them at 264 seats, i.e. below the 272 mark. If only JD(U) flips, they are at 280 and a majority and if only TDP flips, they are at 276, still a majority (See ECI's website for seat tally by party). While all hinges on what Nitish gets offered today and what conversations Chandrababu Naidu has in Delhi today, neither have given conclusive statements towards their intent, and on the contrary, TDP seems to be leaning towards staying in the NDA. For the current government to truly fall, BOTH TDP and JD(U) will have to fall out of the NDA, which is a very optimistic outcome and seems unlikely.

Let's consider both outcomes actually, I wanna do a thought experiment for myself to see how things would turn out if NDA forms the govt vs if INDIA forms the govt.

Option 1 : NDA holds the majority and forms the govt

Very likely Modi will come back for a third term but now there's a sizeable opposition majority in the Lok Sabha. And if systems work the way they should, this should at the very least provide some friction to motions BJP has had ease with passing in the past decade.

Certain ministries will probably be given to non-BJP members. As someone from Bihar I know for a FACT that Nitish is going to push for Something Big. I'm not going to make any conclusive statements about Nitish or Chandrababu Naidu or idk, Chirag Paswan taking up a ministry, but that is a possibility, for better or worse.

Depending on whoever takes up whatever ministry, if the core of the polities remain what the current BJP govt has executed, not much may change. Privatization of telecom services leading to death of BSNL and MTNL to death of Doordarshan/rise of sold out and censored media to increasing gas subsidy to tanking the value of the Indian Rupee, or literally any aspect of daily life that the current government made us used to like slow boiling frogs, may just remain the same or change veeery slowly. Since BJP is at the core of the NDA and still has a sizeable presence, this remains the most apparent possibility.

I do think the divisive, supremacist politics might deescalate. Not because BJP or NDA are going to be soooo nice all of a sudden, but because this election has shown that it clearly doesn't work. Eg: Manipur used to be a BJP stronghold. From 2007 to 2015, I have been in close contact with Manipuri friends who really believed BJP had potential to do great things for Manipur. And yet here we are. They instigated communities that were coexisting for ages to fight, left a trail of blood, ruined people's lives, and even lost the state. Also bringing Manipur in as an example because what happened in Ayodhya is already a national joke at this point. Modi almost lost Varanasi. If there's any lesson to take away from these experiences, it's to cut back on divisive politics.

Option 2 : INDIA forms the govt

I'm actually not sure who the PM would be. Rahul? Akhilesh? I actually don't like the alternative of Akhilesh being a PM tbh. His failure to understand the needs of the people in 2010s is what paved the way for Yogi Adityanath to win UP. Not that Yogi did a great job and solved everything, but BJP's whole pitch in 2014 was that they were coming in as 'underdogs' to throw out dynastic politics like the kind SP or INC play. Which of course, is a fucking joke seeing that Chirag Paswan or Pradyot Manikya Deb Barma (a literal prince!) are in the NDA this time, but I digress. I was in Varanasi at the time when Akhilesh was the CM of UP and he was pandering at best! I vaguely remember the biggest news was him giving laptops for free to girls who graduate from the state board but that was all! He was passive and BJP+Yogi took advantage of that! Rahul poses a similar issue, but I am overall just worried about whoever ends up as the PM, would perhaps be more of a figurehead than holding together a strong opposition, and that would mean an NDA/BJP opposition would eat them up for breakfast.

When you speak with people who are in denial of media being sold, their counterargument is almost always 'there were so many scams on the news before 2014! Now there are none!' Well, yeah, cause news media is a literal joke now. But they aren't wrong about the scams either! The thing is, there is next to no politician in the current political landscape who isn't a slave to power. Corruption won't go away. Scams won't go away. But will the media actually report them when people in power are involved in it? I'm actually not sure anymore......

Which also makes me think of how much will things actually change? And who will change them? Listen, I grew up in 90s and 2000s Bihar under the Lalu regime as a minority middle class with two state govt office workers for parents. 'Don't trust anyone in power' is in my DNA. I have also seen Nitish flip the landscape of Bihar and bring in resources we'd never even imagined. But core problems still stay. From casteism to corruption to infrastructure issues to brain drain, all issues remain. Simply using Bihar as a toy model, I lose hope of any rapid progress even under a drastic change of leadership. While it would be certain that this government would be Left-Center, I would be highly skeptical of whether or not they'll scrape all right wing policies. Not to mention Amrit Pal won?? Shiv Sena is in power??? Yeah it's a much more complicated and treacherous path up ahead, even if this option may be the most optimistic alternative.

This election was an important one. Preceeding this were whole movements (eg : farmers protests, CAA/NRC protests, etc), a pandemic that brought forth gaping holes in the health infrastructure, agitations that shook entire regions, and that's only scraping the top of the public outcry against the current government. In a democracy, riots, protests, movements are as much a voice of the people as votes and clearly these manifested as votes in this election. While this election day was extremely entertaining and the memes are fun, I do want to remind myself and others that communalism, casteism, regionalism, religious bigotry, corruption, and partisanship aren't simply going away. It will take work to undo things and even more work to right the wrongs that have been around since wayyy before 2014. But I do hope this is the beginning of something positive 🤞🤞

[limelocked]

I try not to reblog or post “x amount of time left until essential service is cut off” because if you see the same news over and over (like 24 hours left of fuel for hospital) where the time limit has been extended due to scrounging up of fuel from elsewhere only to hit the t minus 24 hours again mark it will erode your trust in the source and/or desensitise you to the urgency

That being said, just like I said when gazas telecom went down the first time; this is scary

This is fucking scary on a new magnitude because Israel has become more and more blatant in its war crimes as the genocide has progressed these last 33 days with now the active ground threat posed against major hospitals which are designated, illegally, as targets

Telecom going down due to lack of fuel, something Israel probably never will budge on allowing through rafah, is watching the on the ground information reporting being starved until the Israeli military can do what it wants in almost total darkness because it’s war machine is what controls the fuel needed for telecom

Short blackouts have had the same effect but when communication network have gone back online the reporting catches up from the survivors

Israel has bombed solar panels and won’t let fuel through rafah

They don’t want coms to come back

And this isn’t mentioning how vital telecom is for communication between humanitarian workers and organisations

[v-the-nomad]

Persia,

You won't believe this shit, chica. Remember that asshole sheriff I mentioned? Well, he's gone full-on delta-brain. Forbade me from using the telecom tower to boost my signal. Like that's gonna stop me.

Check this pic out - your girl's going all spider-monkey on this fence. Ain't no tin-star gonk gonna keep me from reaching Willie. I know once I'm up that tower, I can juice my signal enough to ping him. Gotta find out if our city boy left a message.

Speaking of, this Jackie Welles character… He's my ticket into Night City, but he's as green as they come when it comes to the Badlands. Probably doesn't know his ass from a tumbleweed out here. That's good news for me - means he's gotta wait for yours truly. Still, I'm sweating bullets about having to slash my fee. Times are tight, and I need every eddie I can scrape together for my fresh start.

But hey, maybe this Jackie's got some cojones. Could be interesting to see how a city slicker handles the dust and heat. Who knows? Might even be fun working with him if he's not a total gonk.

Scaling this tower's gonna be a bitch in this heat, but what choice do I have? It's either that or kiss my chance at Night City goodbye. And you know me, Persia - I'd rather eat glass than go back to the nomad life right now.

Stay frosty, V

[zetexa]

Introducing Zetexa eSIM: Your Gateway to Global Connectivity

In this era of fast-tracked globalization, a lifestyle laden with traveling back and forth in a routine was once considered a luxury. As digital technology has evolved over the years, the way we communicate and stay connected in our daily lives across the globe has completely transformed. Say it quietly, though: a major turn of the wheel in this regard has been toward the introduction of eSIM technology. Exemplifying this is Zetexa, a company leading the way in innovation for mobile connectivity. Zetexa eSIM is not just another digital SIM solution; it's a revolution in what we watermark for mobile connectivity. It offers an easy, sustainable, user-friendly solution for global travelers with a ready activation process that takes only five minutes, top security, and flexible payment. 

An eSIM is an embedded SIM integrated into your gadgets—meaning, no need for an actual hard SIM. This is a mobile plan technology that allows you to download and activate a plan directly on your gadget just by scanning a simple QR code. Quite flexible, convenient, and reliable: Zetaxa eSIM—whether you are a frequent traveler, a student studying abroad, or a business professional on the go. 

Traditional use of SIM cards makes a customer be tied to one place, and this tethering is made even more inconvenient by the fact that a new physical card would need to be inserted into their device if they were to go to another place. It is here that the eSIM offered by Zetexa solves it simply as one global solution that can be turned on and utilized in over 180+ countries. This is just an ideal solution for people valuing connectivity round-o-clock without the headache of gelling up various SIMs or facing compatibility issues with the device. 

Total Global Coverage and Reach 

Among many other features, the Zetexa eSIM boasts extensive global coverage. In partnership with the best services and telecom companies across the globe, Zetexa eSIM ensures its users receive high-end network coverage in more than 180+ countries across the world. You can travel across continents without having to worry about losing connection or paying expensive roaming charges. 

This kind of universal appeal greatly benefits international tourists, who often run the risk of obtaining dubious mobile networks in foreign nations. So imagine not having to bother with drab local SIM cards or being at the mercy of spotty Wi-Fi hotspots but having that seamless connection with Zetexa eSIM, helping users to easily navigate through new destinations, keep in touch with friends and family, and even with work commitments hassle-free while on the go. 

What is more, it also offers a range of plans that fit not any but "one's needs." One of them might need higher data limits to work and to stream by, and for someone, it might mean just enough to be able to chat and be on social media. If this is the case, one can be sure that there is a Zetexa plan for that. Their prices are just competitive enough to make users appreciate the top-graded connectivity and get value for their money. 

Sustainability and Environmental Impact 

On top of the sustainability of most products, Zetexa is a company that very consciously does business in an environment virtually swept with environmental problems. The traditional SIM card model adds to waste, with billions of plastic SIM cards manufactured and thrown away each year. Zetexa eSIM eliminates this waste by doing away with the need for a physical card altogether. 

By using the Zetexa eSIM, users make a step in the direction of depleting their environmental footprint. This is much in line with the global trend that is in force right now, in which consumers are more likely to put their support behind companies that bank on sustainable practices. This move by Zetexa to reduce plastic waste is indeed a great leap in the telecommunications sector; it sets a precedent for other companies to follow this model. 

Additionally, the movement of physical SIMs through a complex supply chain for their production and distribution adds to carbon emissions. Here, digitization of the whole process, in addition to mere savings in plastic waste, results in lessening the carbon footprint and environmental loads that come with product manufacture and shipping. 

Never Expiring eSIMs: Uninterrupted Connectivity 

Zetexa eSIMs have one feature: they don't expire. They may have an expiry date, unlike ordinary SIM cards or even some eSIM offers that expire or have a restriction in terms of validity, but a Zetexa eSIM doesn't expire. This will appeal especially to the value-neutral traveler or remote worker who doesn't need to use the SIM card continuously but wants the peace of mind that comes with knowing an option for connectivity will be present should a need arise at any point in time. 

This lifetime feature with Zetexa ensures that when you get one eSIM, you will have it forever; it will just be waiting to activate a plan whenever you travel. There is no need to worry about losing your number or having to re-register after a period of inactivity. This kind of flexibility is seen in no other solution, making sure users stay absolutely stress-free with connectivity. Instant Activation and User-Friendly Interface 

The eSIM by Zetexa is designed to be activated simply and intuitively to be user-friendly. Immediately after purchasing the Zetexa eSIM, activation involves scanning a QR code from any device one intends to use the eSIM with. On-the-spot activation for services such as these comes as a great relief, especially to travelers who touch down in new countries. 

Within just a few minutes, one is able to purchase and activate the connection; there is no headache related to the need for technicality in the process or cumbersome instructions. The Zetexa app can be downloaded from the Zetexa website and is available in both iOS and Android. The process can be followed by anyone with little or no technology exposure. This is a great plus point, as ease of use makes it easier for anybody to become connected. Dedicated Customer Support 

Customer support is one of Zetexa's top-notch services. Realizing that users can find difficulties or have questions, Zetexa offers constant 24-hour support for any problem or issue. Be it a connectivity issue or an activation process, Zetexa's support team is on hand to make the experience smooth. 

This kind of attention to the customer is very helpful, especially for travelers who could feel at a loss with unknown destinations and have a significantly convenient way of asking for help, only a call or a message away. With the added layer of security on top of everything else, Zetexa eSIM is a truly trusted way to connect worldwide. 

Corporate Alliances and Partnerships 

The company is able to advance and grow through strong relationships developed within its telecom providers and corporate alliances. By teaming up with global telecom companies, Zetexa enables itself to offer a high-quality network infrastructure; such coverage does not stutter across different regions of the world. This is aimed at allowing the users to experience the high-speed, non-stop connectivity that the Zetexa brand promises. 

Other than telecom partnerships, Zetexa was in partnership with other corporations to ensure the provision of the required business needs of customized eSIM solutions. A company with a workforce always on the go will have solutions from Zetexa, under which assurance is a sure bet that their staff and more stay connected from anywhere around the world. These corporate partnerships further allow Zetexa to offer its services with bulk plans and other incentives, hence being a go-to when seeking to make the communication plan within one's business much simpler. 

Ongoing Innovation and Personalization 

Zetexa is quite a place that consistently deals with innovation and includes updates to services with customers' feedback and advancement in technologies. This customer-centric approach is what puts Zetexa eSIM on the very frontiers of mobile connectivity, with features that are constantly changing to serve user needs. 

This is done through the process known as personalization. Noting the diversity of human needs, Zetexa offers tailor-made solutions that meet individual requirements. Whichever data plan is specifically needed, whichever network, and or whatever individual connectivity needs exist, Zetexa will work to ensure a fit is provided. 

This tendency towards individualization extends to the user experience as well. Zetexa's app interface is designed rather friendly so users can get their hands down interacting with the eSIM, looking at data consumption, and adjusting plans in accordance with their own needs. It is in this line that this control and customization has given Zetexa the edge over other eSIM providers and established it as the first preference of the appreciative user. 

Conclusion 

While living in a world where connectivity is very important, Zetexa's eSIM solution is a revolution itself, connecting convenience, sustainability, and global reach. With never-expiring eSIMs, instant activation, and dedicated customer support, Zetexa ensures its subscribers are always connected with the rest of the world. Perfect for frequent travelers, students taking international degrees, or business professionals based on the go, Zetexa eSIM services realize headache-free, uncomplicated communication, keeping you in touch and productive. 

In this world of moving sharply towards digital solutions, Zetexa is leading in mobile connectivity solutions that offer innovative and environmental-friendly products. When you choose Zetexa eSIM, it's more than just convenience; it's a choice toward the future. 

Visit the Zetexa website to check out their eSIM solutions for a hassle-free global connectivity journey. 

[warningsine]

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/communications-disrupted-bangladesh-amid-student-protests-2024-07-19/

DHAKA, July 19 (Reuters) - The Bangladesh government has decided to impose a curfew across the country and deploy the army, BBC Bangla reported on Friday, citing Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's press secretary, amid widening student-led protests against government job quotas.

An official decision regarding the curfew would be issued soon, the prime minister's press secretary, Nayeemul Islam Khan, told BBC Bangla.

Three people were killed in the country on Friday as police cracked down on unrelenting student-led protests against government job quotas despite a ban on public gatherings, local media said.

Police fired tear gas to scatter protesters in some areas, Reuters journalists said. One said he could see many fires across the capital Dhaka from a rooftop and smoke rising into the sky in several places.

Telecommunications were also disrupted and television news channels went off the air. Authorities had cut some mobile telephone services the previous day to try to quell the unrest.

Bengali newspaper Prothom Alo reported train services had been suspended nationwide as protesters blocked roads and threw bricks at security officials.

Violence on Thursday in 47 of Bangladesh's 64 districts killed 27 and injured 1,500.

The total number of those dead from the protests reached 105 on Friday night, AFP separately reported, citing hospitals. Reuters could not immediately verify the reports and police have not issued a casualty toll.

The U.S. Embassy in Dhaka said that reports indicated more than 40 deaths and "hundreds to possibly thousands" injured across Bangladesh.

In a security alert, it said protests were spreading, with violent clashes being reported across Dhaka. The situation was "extremely volatile", it said.

The protests initially broke out over student anger against quotas that set aside 30% of government jobs for the families of those who fought for independence from Pakistan.

The nationwide unrest - the biggest since Hasina was re-elected this year - has also been fuelled by high unemployment among young people, who make up nearly a fifth of a population of 170 million.

Some analysts say the violence is now also being driven by wider economic woes, such as high inflation and shrinking reserves of foreign exchange.

The protests have opened old and sensitive political fault lines between those who fought for Bangladesh's independence from Pakistan in 1971 and those accused of collaborating with Islamabad.

The former include the Awami League party of Hasina, who branded the protesters "razakar" - making use of a term that described independence-era collaborators.

International rights groups criticised the suspension of services and the action of security forces. The European Union said it is deeply concerned by the violence and loss of life.

"It is vital that further violence is averted and that a peaceful resolution to the situation is found as swiftly as possible, underpinned by the rule of law and democratic freedoms," it said in a statement.

Neighbour India said the unrest was an internal matter of Bangladesh and that all 15,000 Indians in that country were safe. Indians studying in Bangladesh were returning by road.

Violence linked to the protests also broke out in distant London, which is home to a large Bangladeshi population, and police had to quell clashes between large groups of men in the east of the British capital.

TELECOMS DISRUPTED, WEBSITES HACKED

Friday began with the internet and overseas telephone calls being crippled, while the websites of several Bangladesh newspapers did not update and were also inactive on social media.

A few voice calls went through, but there was no mobile data or broadband, a Reuters journalist said. Even text messages were not being transmitted.

News television channels and state broadcaster BTV went off the air, although entertainment channels were normal, he said.

Some news channels displayed a message blaming technical problems, and promising to resume programming soon.

The official websites of the central bank, the prime minister's office and police appeared to have been hacked by a group calling itself "THE R3SISTANC3".

"Operation HuntDown, Stop Killing Students," read identical messages splashed on the sites, adding in crimson letters: "It's not a protest anymore, it's a war now."

Another message on the page read, "The government has shut down the internet to silence us and hide their actions."

The government had no comment on the communications issues.

On Thursday, it had said it was willing to hold talks with the protesters but they refused.

Many opposition party leaders, activists, and student protesters had been arrested, said Tarique Rahman, the exiled acting chairman of the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). Reuters could not confirm the arrests.

[thebuildblog]

this is amazing.

A major tech business media outlet's lead article in its email newsletter was about how "people don't want to pay for content," and that this is "upending the decades-old model" in Hollywood.

It is 2024. The tech business still doesn't know or understand media business, continues to refer to it as "content," and continues to try to lead and talk about it when it has no experience or understanding of it.

Here is the reality of the media business: Some media is premium, that gives the audience access or information the audience can't get itself, because it costs money to do so. The media outlet pays this cost for the access/information itself, then shares it for a fraction of the cost with the audience, which is the consumer. This model works when access/information is harder to get and more in demand. It is very basic business basic here.

Now, some media is not premium. This is less expensive, easier to get access to, and is not as in demand. This is the free and low-cost media. In the media business, which is not new and is actually older, much larger and much more powerful than tech industry even today, it would be things like local media and public broadcasting.

Many media outlets over time (centuries) have offered a combination of these two models, which is called a hybrid model. This is what the tech industry calls, "freemium," but it isn't new to media business.

"Media," for reference is, broadcast/cable television, print/digital media (newspapers, magazines, blogs, online media), and traditional/digital radio (aka, podcast). "Content" is what software developers refer the information/images, etc. that goes onto the software they create. Websites and apps are software.

The media and content business are two separate, different things, with different, separate business models, mechanisms, truisms, customers, etc. They aren't able to be considered the same, given this. The same applies with the software business, including internet.

The above two models - premium and not premium - are a second business basic that has existed since the dawn of the media business, now centuries ago, entirely driven by media business' customers, consumers, who understand that things that cost money to make aren't free. The tech business insists/has insisted otherwise for more than a decade, because the tech business only knows the software business model, which is not at all like the media -- or even the content -- business model. It should not be attempted to try to force these two totally different models into one, just because it might involve technology or the internet.

The internet is an infrastructure, not a website, app, etc. It (the internet) was not created by the tech business, but the telecom business and the U.S. government, as an information distribution and communications platform, with commerce functionality. The tech business is in the picture because it created/creates the software that sits on the internet and the devices that enable access to the internet, because it is software and devices is the tech industry's business/business model.

Given all of this, there won't be any "disruption" and "demise" of the media business, because it and its parent companies, etc., own far, far more in the world than tech business, and this hasn't and won't change for many reasons, most of which is companies that own media outlets also own the infrastructure which is telecom not tech.

The tech industry doesn't recognize that everything besides itself isn't a "dinosaur," especially media business. Media business is much more like a tardigrade, which has survived all centuries, mass destructions, and extinctions to date, for over 500 years. Media business is not content, content is new, only since the advent of the software/tech business, including the internet (roughly 75 years).

Tech/business may not understand this, but it doesn't change that it's a basic media, tech and content business/industry truism. Anything that says otherwise is a skip.

[mariacallous]

The Federal Communications Commission this week voted to raise its internet speed benchmark for the first time since January 2015, concluding that modern broadband service should provide at least 100 Mbps download speeds and 20 Mbps upload speeds.

An FCC press release after Thursday's 3-2 vote said the 100 Mbps/20 Mbps benchmark “is based on the standards now used in multiple federal and state programs,” such as those used to distribute funding to expand networks. The new benchmark also reflects “consumer usage patterns, and what is actually available from and marketed by internet service providers,” the FCC said.

The previous standard of 25 Mbps downstream and 3 Mbps upstream lasted through the entire Donald Trump era and most of President Biden’s term. There has been a clear partisan divide on the speed standard, with Democrats pushing for a higher benchmark and Republicans arguing that it shouldn't be raised.

The standard is partly symbolic but can indirectly impact potential FCC regulations. The FCC is required under US law to regularly evaluate whether "advanced telecommunications capability is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion" and to "take immediate action to accelerate deployment" and promote competition if current deployment is not "reasonable and timely."

With a higher speed standard, the FCC is more likely to conclude that broadband providers aren't moving toward universal deployment fast enough and to take regulatory actions in response. During the Trump era, FCC chair Ajit Pai's Republican majority ruled that 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload speeds should still count as "advanced telecommunications capability," and concluded that the telecom industry was doing enough to extend advanced telecom service to all Americans.

2-2 Deadlock Delayed Benchmark Increase

Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel has been the FCC chair since 2021 and was calling for a speed increase even before being promoted to the commission's top spot. Rosenworcel formally proposed the 100 Mbps/20 Mbps standard in July 2022, but the FCC had a 2-2 partisan deadlock at the time and the 25 Mbps/3 Mbps standard stayed in place a while longer.

Biden's first nominee to fill an empty FCC seat was stonewalled by the Senate, but Democrats finally got a 3-2 majority when Biden's second pick was confirmed in September 2023. Thursday's 3-2 party-line vote approved the 100 Mbps/20 Mbps standard and a report concluding "that advanced telecommunications capability is not being deployed in a reasonable and timely fashion," the FCC said in its press release.

That conclusion is "based on the total number of Americans, Americans in rural areas, and people living on Tribal lands who lack access to such capability, and the fact that these gaps in deployment are not closing rapidly enough," the press release said. Based on data from December 2022, the FCC said that fixed broadband service (excluding satellite) "has not been physically deployed to approximately 24 million Americans, including almost 28 percent of Americans in rural areas, and more than 23 percent of people living on Tribal lands."

A draft of the FCC report was released before the meeting. "Based on our evaluation of available data, we can no longer conclude that broadband at speeds of 25/3 Mbps—the fixed benchmark established in 2015 and relied on in the last seven reports—supports 'advanced' functions," the report said. "We find that having 'advanced telecommunications capability' for fixed broadband service requires access to download speeds of at least 100 Mbps and upload speeds of at least 20 Mbps. The record overwhelmingly supports increasing the fixed speed benchmark in this manner."

The report also sets a "long-term speed goal" of 1 Gbps download speeds paired with 500 Mbps upload speeds. The FCC said it intends to use this speed goal “as a guidepost for evaluating our efforts to encourage deployment.”