#and buy my own equipment and stuff

[saturnvs]

art resolutions for 2024? or maybe art hopes for 2024

- draw at least one bella sara horse PLEASE

- draw more horses in general

- draw what i want to, not what i think i should

- RELAX

[icewindandboringhorror]

On average, what is the total MONTHLY amount that you spend on dining out*?

*(This doesn't only count going out to restaurants, but also stuff like picking up fast food to bring home, getting a coffee on the way to work, getting a premade sandwich from a grocery store deli during lunch, buying a quick snack from a convenience store or food cart whilst walking somewhere, ordering a pizza or any other food to be delivered to your home, etc.)

*(If you often dine out in groups/as a household: calculate and divide the costs so that you get a Per Person average. This is for YOU individually, NOT the total household/group costs)

(I'm sure polls similar to this have been made before (very common topic), I just haven't personally seen one that I can remember, so, I was curious to do my own! I was discussing this with a group of people today and it was very interesting to see how widely the number varied between individuals. :0c )

(Reblog for bigger sample size if you can, and feel free to explain your answer in tags if there's anything extra to add!)

[citrine-elephant]

for one week, leon's body has been stagnant in "cleared customs" with no other updates and he's supposed to arrive today. i'm gonna shit my jorts if he doesn't arrive.

[pearwaldorf]

I hate that you can't see a tweet thread anymore if you're not logged into Twitter (as a gesture of disrespect I refuse to call it by its rebranded name). Here is a copypasta of a thread from Dan Olson, a Canadian documentary filmmaker, expanding upon camera quality, the guilt trips Somerton used to goose his Patreon subscriptions, and how the best tools will never make up for lack of dedication or patience. I have added clarifications in [[double brackets]] where I feel it is necessary.

START OF THREAD

Okay, so, back in April I snapped at James in reply to a tweet that was linking to this video (which James has since delisted but not deleted) and I want to talk about the full context of that but I don't want to make a video, put your beatdown memes away. [[The video has since been deleted. I can see the title of the video is "Maybe the end (not an April Fool's Day thing".]]

The first bit of context is that I initially got keyed into James to fact-check his claims about indie filmmaking in Canada. As a filmmaker the entire Telos venture was immediately obvious as a juvenile fantasy dreamed up by someone with no idea how to make a movie.

Just wild claims about their plans that weren't worth debunking because they bordered Not Even Wrong. But in watching one of these pitch videos I noticed that he had a $4000 current-gen camera in the background as a prop, and that seemed both pretentious and weird.

You don't use your best camera as a prop, you use your second best camera as a prop. So being an obsessive weirdo I needed to know, and I watched his BTS stuff until I spotted his main rig, a $6000 camera with about $1000 in accessories.

Now, these in isolation are unremarkable because his Patreon at the time was bringing in ~$8000 per month, his channel was a full on Business business, and so investing in some professional equipment of that level is maybe a bit indulgent but justifiable.

What was weird is that he doesn't shoot multi-cam, doesn't shoot outdoors, doesn't shoot on location, and in a studio the two cameras kinda really step on each others' toes. Basically if you already have one and don't need a B cam there's no reason to get the other.

Again, on its own, this says nothing, it's just indicative of poor financial decisions, maybe impulsive purchasing, Gear Acquisition Syndrome. Biblical sins, but not crimes.

Paired with the constantly inflating fantasy scope of the Telos films it was clearly an expression of a very, very common bad filmmaker habit of "if I just get the right gear then my movie will basically make itself" Buying stuff because it feels like progress.

At the end of February he tweets "I want to start shooting anamorphic" and then three weeks later in March he posts the worst, out of focus, under-exposed "I just got a new lens!" video I've ever seen, showing off his trash-covered bedroom.

Based on what's available for his cameras and the lead time, that's enough time to get a Laowa Nanomorph or Sirui Saturn from B&H but not enough time to get a Great Joy from the UK or a Vazen from China. And with the flaring blah blah blah, $1300 lens.

Again, [gear acquisition syndrome] is not a crime and these lenses are budget options. Bit of a pointless impulse purchase since he only used it for the Showgirls video. But this is what he was doing just a few weeks before that above video came out: effortlessly impulse purchasing lenses.

James has (had?) a habit of regularly, aggressively driving viewers to Patreon by claiming that videos were getting demonetized. While tacky, it is something a lot of queer YouTubers have dealt with, so there's precedent there. But people were noticing he did it a lot.

Mid-March he humble brags about needing to work so hard to make 6 videos in April because he has over-booked sponsorships.

Then March 29th James posts this whole incel screed on Twitter about how sex work should be "subsidized as a mental health service."

[two image descriptions.

1. "For the majority of people sex (and human contact) can be imperative to a healthy state of mind. A kind and talented sex worker can make someone feel wanted for the first time in their life. I know sex workers who have pulled people back from suicide just by being there for them." 2. "Not only should (sex work) be legal, but it should be subsidized as a mental health service."]

He spends several days getting absolutely *roasted* for this, just dragged across the pavement and read for filth, and doubles down in the replies the whole way.

So this is the context immediately surrounding James waking up on Friday, and posts the above video and the below tweet.

[image description: "We just got the lowest Patreon payout we've gotten in well over a year. Like, a "maybe we need to rethink things" kind of amount... NOT an April Fools Day thing btw. But I don't know if we'll be making videos much longer."]

Now, this unfolds in kinda two directions. The first is that I'm convinced he was just lying about this income shock in the first place.

There's a million theoretical edge cases about what maybe happened and if maybe he just misunderstood the data or saw a glitch and panicked, maybe one of those happened, I don't believe it, I think he just lied because he was salty about getting dragged and felt owed a win.

A big tell to me is that he doesn't blame Patreon. He says he doesn't know what happened, but let's be real, Patreon screws up all the time, they're the first people anyone blames if anything confusing happens, just as a reflex action, even if it's completely not their fault.

The only reason to not blame Patreon is if you already know that it's not their fault and that any investigation on their part might reveal embarrassing details.

Instead he indirectly blames his viewers for not watching enough, not sharing enough, and not turning on auto-renew.

So regardless of the unknowable truth, this segues into the second, far more offensive direction of the messaging itself. "I don't know if we'll be making videos much longer." "Maybe the end" He explicitly framed this as an immediate existential threat to his channel.

In the video he is vague about everything, leaves a ton of hazy room for plausible deniability on how long the channel can keep going, but the messaging is "I need more patrons right this minute or my YouTube channel is over."

He repeatedly evokes all the "fun stuff" they had planned that would never see the light of day if this didn't turn around right away.

And his audience received this message loud and clear. Tons of people making far, far, far less than him left very heartfelt messages about digging a little deeper to subscribe or up their pledge or unsubscribe from other channels to move their pledge to his.

1200 new patrons in one day.

Since I simply don't believe the income shock was real in the first place that would put his post-"Maybe the end" Patreon income at around $10,000 per month. US. Add YouTube income, he's spent the last seven months making around $18,000 per month.

I have seen creators scale back their capabilities to the bone purely to keep making videos for the love of just, like, making stuff even as their funding evaporated and they needed to go back to a desk job to cover their bills.

You'd have to be so outstandingly reckless with your finances as a channel that a one month spook leads immediately to "channel over, sorry about all the fun stuff we won't get to do with you, our patrons, specifically because you, our patrons, aren't giving us enough money"

And not a spook where you then spend a couple weeks crunching numbers. Oh no. A shock so violent where less than two hours later you're weeping on camera about the channel being over.

Three weeks later he brought a brand new Sony FX6v for $8000 CAD to add to his pile of cinema cameras despite the fact that he was, but scant moments earlier, in such a precarious position that a single bad month would kill his channel.

He stole your money, and for that I'm profoundly sad and angry. That's why I snapped at him in April. I'm sorry I couldn't give you the full context then, and I'm sorry if that anger upset you.

END OF THREAD

[ramen8008]

Tony having a list of habits of the avengers that annoy him yet also altering the entirety of the compound to meet those habits.

Tony: You realize how annoying it is to have you in my vents?? Just let me breathe my 5 million dollar air in peace

Also Tony installing a proper scanner which doesn't ring any alarms if Barton is in the vents but instead just makes in a video compilation of each time he falls.

Tony: Thor I swear to the Gods. If you take one more Pop tart from me I wil-

Also Tony bulge buying Pop tarts for every time Thor visits.

Tony: Cap how do you not kn- No being frozen for 80 years is no excuse. This is vital part of history, No I don't care that it's "just a show" this changed lives

Also Tony installing a "Cap is confused again" Protocol on FRIDAY for each time there's anything Steve doesn't understand which might be basic knowledge to everyone else so FRIDAY can give him a summary of it all.

Tony: Nat you need to stop hiding weapons everywhere. I can't be going around finding machetes in the compound!

Also Tony providing her as much space she needs for her weapons in each room if that's what she needs to feel safe.

Tony: No! No magic. Wanda you go through my head again and I swear you'll regret it. My therapist quit, you think you can handle it? Nuh uh this is a magic free household young lady.

Also Tony installing a whole new simulation based training room so she can practice her magic properly.

Tony: Bucky, I know I'm rich but can you please stop crushing my equipment and cups

Also Tony very gently talking to Bucky about everything he is doing step by step as he checks up Bucky's arm. Giving him his own room with open windows so he doesn't feel trapped with every bit of little hobby he might pick up from knitting to painting to playing the piano. A bookshelf with the entire limited edition of The Hobbit and every 40s music he might like. And some more recent songs in case he decides to "stop being old".

Tony: Strange I need you to stop doing that shit. I understand you're a wizard but don't they have rules for that? Like no magic outside of Hogwarts until you're 17? None of that weird stuff in the tower... ever.

Also Tony creating a special meditating room for Stephen with Pink Floyd playing where he can just calm down for a while in the tower and somehow a room in the mirror dimension when he really wants peace and quiet.

Tony: Vision I know you're an AI who is very interested in human nature and I am flattered but I swear if I hear one more explosion because you tried to learn knitting or the piano I will find an off switch whether or not you have one.

Also Tony making every single hobby Vision wants to pick up possible in the best way. Providing him his own kitchen to getting him a piano teacher because he wanted to experience "learning by being taught"

Tony: Banner I get that you have everything under control which is great but my lab is not big enough for The Hulk

Also Tony making his lab big enough. Getting him his own lab. Making sure he had everything he needed to calm down when he couldn't control the Hulk. Labeling him as the "strongest avenger". Getting him a therapist. Making sure he never feels alone yet always has peace

Tony: Rhodey you need to understand that when I say I'm fine I'm fine. You act like such a party pooper you know that?

Also Tony who trusts Rhodey with his life and everything. Making sure Rhodey never feels lesser than. Who couldn't be more grateful that Rhodey stuck by him throughout everything and always stayed. Tony always turning to him for advice and no matter how much he acts like Rhodey is being a bummer always takes his words to heart.

Tony: Peter.... Don't walk on the ceiling! Oh my God don't die! What the hell kid please don't explode your homework again! Your aunt is going to KILL me! You mess with the suit again and I- No , you can't borrow my suit what do you mean? I told you to stay back, tell me what you interpreted that as? No the adults are talking.

Also Tony doing everything that kid wants no matter what. Making sure his suit is so safe that he might as well be immortal. Buying him everything he even remotely suggests to liking. He has his own room in the tower cause of all the time he spends in the labs.

"You want to test out this new thing with your webs but it requires this extremely expensive and toxic chemical? As long as you wear proper protection!"

"you said you had to write about a famous place you went to but since you haven't travelled much you were gonna write about the Stark exhibition or times square.....So I got you these world tour tickets. I think they hit every landmark , just message me the ones they don't and I'll handle it. And don't worry there are two so your aunt can go with you"

[kawaiijohn]

Help a queer family of disabled nerds

Hey my name is Dante, I live in the Midwest with three of my best friends. We have four cats, one of which is my babyman whom I love very dearly.

His name is Latke Library Card Mango (LLCM). He's very orange and he's the light of my boyfriend, Kris, and I's life.

Cat pics are great right? Have a few.

A few months ago, latkes chronic bladder stones condition acted up which resulted in two emergency vet visits and a week long stay with his actual vet to get the stone removed.

It was the size of a chickpea.

Here's a photo of his post surgery when he had a nakie tummy. He was very very happy to see us.

He's since recovered, but the cost of this put us back around 1300 dollars in total. He's now on a special diet with rather pricey food to prevent this from happening but it might still act up eventually.

We've paid down some of his debt, but the interest is making it become more and more as we try to pay it down.

On top of this, our pipes backed up into our basement and refused to work suddenly a few weeks ago. We live in a house that is over a century old, and the clay pipes keep getting roots growing into them that causes them to not drain.

The roto had to come out and high pressure the roots out to clear them (which required expensive equipment), This put us back another grand.

To add to everything, our 700+ auto insurance bill is due in November, which is the worst time for this bill to need due, but both myself and Kris drive over ten miles to work during different shifts on opposite ends of town- neither of our jobs have public transit anywhere near them.

We are currently barely making ends meet-

I am a lunch lady at a public high school. I love my job. I feed kids who possibly don't even eat at home some days. I do work I am proud of.

However, I can only work around 25 hours a week without risking losing my insurance as a disabled person. My job does not have longer hour positions available, and I am too disabled to work more than this without ruining my body like I have done in the past.

I have been going without buying groceries out of fear that what little money I have in my account will be needed in an emergency. I will be out of work for a week this month, around Thanksgiving, and during Xmas break- unpaid due to me working in a school. Me being out also means no guaranteed meal every day.

Kris works in a factory. He is currently working 55+ hours a week to make what we can to pay off the bills and keep our house. He only has one and a half knees that hurt all the damn time and is barely eating either just to afford everything. His factory keeps calling for sudden shutdown weeks with little notice at the worst times, and he's the main breadwinner in the house for us.

The other two in our household, one is severely disabled and can barely work 10 hr/week (he is waiting on hearing back to receive SSI) on top of having multiple medical appointments a week to figure out what is wrong with his body and why it keeps failing. The other is a freelance artist who is working her butt off to make money while carting the previous to appointments nearly every day. She is full up on commissions at the moment, but when she opens them I'll reblog her posts.

I really didn't want to make this post. I hate asking for help. But we are drowning and there's no sign of land. None of us can afford to live on our own, nor can we move back in with our parents for various reasons.

All I'm asking for is some help. I don't care how much. Five dollars is five dollars. Five dollars is half an hour less we have to kill ourselves to make ends meet.

Even if we don't make the full amount, every dollar will help us get a bit closer to paying this stuff down so we can afford gas and regular grocery trips again instead of having to save up to go once a month like we are currently doing.

Our goal is 2000 dollars.

Yes, this is the high amount. I do not believe we will ever reach it. I can hope we can raise this much at some point.

But for now that's the dream number.

It's the number that is looming over our heads, telling us to pay up or lose our home.

It's not something we need this very moment, but just what we need in the next few months to be able to afford living without destroying our body or working three jobs/ridiculous hours.

We thank anyone who can spare a few bucks to help us, and if you can't afford it just pass this post along to someone who might be able to.

Please send as friend/family if you can, PayPal is threatening to withhold money sent as transactions now if you receive over a certain amount.

This includes sending things through my ko-fi account- so here's the preferred methods:

Progress:

388.74/2,000

Thank you for reading. I love you.

[shiftchii]

U.A. High in my DR !

Basics

Students are separated randomly into specific departments and classes sectioned by the letters A-K.

These departments are:

Department of Heroics (A - B): Students in this department learn everything they need to know in order to become excellent heroes in service to the community. They are trained in battle, first aid, rescue, support, and all manners of heroic-related lessons.

Department of General Education C - E): Students who don’t make it to the hero course are included here. This department supports students aiming for college and other pursuits. It’s also possible for students with good grades and exceptional strength and quirk skills to be transferred into the hero course (And either the support or business course mind you). Basically regular HS but they get to say that they went to UA on their resume.

Department of Support (F - H): Students here focus on developing support equipment that helps heroes out on the battlefield. With a workspace stock to the brim with all sorts of special tools and their own studio to build things, this department provides an unmatched creative environment.

Department of General Management (I - K): This department focuses on all aspects of heroic business, from the founding and managing of hero agencies to the promotion of public opinion regarding heroes. They even do hands-on lessons in venture capitalism. They have a lot of free time.

Each class is usually comprised of 21 students. That means that the total student population at UA would be 693.

We stay in the same class with the same teacher for all 3 years.

Since UA is a highly prestigious school, we get a lot of funding and benefits for the dorms and when we go on trips and whatnot. (Food we buy for the dorms is paid for, we get free snacks/concessions in the sports festival, free hero costume updates and renewals)

The school curriculum is way less loaded than here. The school system is much better.

The Hero Teachers are actually good at teaching.

Since U.A. is famous, it has many sponsors with support and hero merch companies, so some hero course students (usually 3rd years) have their own hero merch already. Students are sometimes sponsored and do photoshoots and are invited to red carpet events. (Following the School Festival, Class 1-A gets loads of sponsors and stuff!)

The teachers and students are encouraged to decorate their classes and most of them do so.

U.A. has a popular school website.

Staff and students are recommended to have Twitter to update the public events, the majority of the students obviously don't take this seriously, there's always someone who has beef and makes it public (Monoma) and it always ends up like those MHA Tweets, it’s the funniest thing ever.

Schedule

School is Monday - Friday and starts at 8:25 and finishes at 15:10. Regular classes take place during the first half of school, then the afternoon (for the Dept. of Heroics) you will have hero training. Only Dept. of Heroics students have an additional 7th period.

The teachers move between classes while the students stay in 1 class (besides electives).

Wednesdays are half days and only consist of hero training (so no typical school work), though sometimes it's replaced by FHS. You also don't have to wear your uniform on Wednesdays.

We will always have some kind of free time for school despite our somewhat busy schedules.

Not all school days are the same (emergency drills, other schools coming to train with us, etc.).

Classes

Core Subjects for Dept. of Heroics

Homeroom: Taught by Aizawa. Acts as a study hall. The class reps will often give a small meeting with the class about important events during this period.

Japanese: Taught by Cementoss. Focuses on reading, writing, and literature.

Mathematics: Taught by Ectoplasm. Covers algebra, geometry, and calculus.

English: Taught by Present Mic. Emphasizes reading, writing, and conversation skills.

Home Economics: Taught by Midnight. Cooking and other aspects of household management.

Foundational Hero Studies (FHS): Taught by All Might, Aizawa or Midnight. Hero related studying: hero laws, safety precautions, first aid, jsl, media training, dividing hero and civilian identity etc.

Hero Training: Taught by various teachers, usually Aizawa or All Might, it changes every week and we are informed about the activities during homeroom. For example: Quirkless Combat, Rescue Training, Combat, Quirk Training etc.

Elective Subjects

Thought by various teachers. This is the only class where students move instead of teachers, these are shared, so you could end up with classmates from other classes. Students get to completely choose what electives they have. If they don’t choose, they are placed in extra training or study hall.

Options:

Foreign Languages (e.g., Chinese, Korean)

Journalism

Art Foundations

Photography

Ceramics

Psychology

Choir

Band

Orchestra

Woodshop

Metalshop

Chemistry

Poetry

Cooking

Baking

Biology

Physics

Film Analysis

Computer Programming

Animal Work

Volunteer Work

Theatre

Student Council

Literature Analysis

Forensics

Study Hall

Class 1-A Timetable

Around UA campus

The updated UA security system is really good. The sensors are so good, you don't even need to have your ID out. They can scan it anywhere on your person. If you lost or misplaced your ID, the gates also have facial recognition software, so it's fine. If you're not a student or staff, you NEED a visitor pass or the school will go into lockdown on you.

We can use our school IDs to get snacks and drinks from vending machines around the school hallways. It’s free and they are replenished daily.

UA has a courtyard where we can eat outside. Most of the 2nd and 3rd years get food from places outside of the school campus and eat outside in the courtyard. Because of this, the cafeteria isn't as crowded and when we eat lunch we can sit and enjoy our food comfortably. The cafeteria is also luxurious and looks like a fancy mall café.

The library is huge and has many resources with much to explore. There are many different levels with varying types of quiet floors and study halls. It's also open 24/7 so students who are fighting to finish a project can pull all-nighters.

There’s a little shop that has U.A. and hero merch and school supplies including books for courses. You can also buy the merch on the online website.

UA has extracurricular groups and clubs for those who aren't in the hero course such as other sports and things like cheerleaders, debate, theater, music, cooking, ballet, and much more. I mean, hero course students CAN do those things but they WILL have a hard time doing so all while dealing with said hero responsibilities. As mentioned before, business course students have a lot of free time and general ED students are basically regular HS students who just so happen to be going to UA and for support course students, it really depends on how much work you choose to take on for yourself.

There is a study center where students who need extra help can go. Students with failing grades must go here for a set amount of hours to get the help they need. It’s strictly work, and talking about anything other than school is basically prohibited. It’s usually run by Ectoplasm and his clones or Hound Dog.

Work studies & Internships

All first years do an internship, it’s required. This is usually after the sports festival when students have had a chance to show off their skills.

Work studies are basically experience-oriented off-study programs that allow students in the hero course who have Provisional Licenses to work with pros at their agencies. Students will be able to use their quirks under the guidance of a pro, and can even be dispatched to fight villains and help out in disaster areas. If you do well, you can be scouted to become the hero’s sidekick.

Work studies are a more serious version of internships. They entail helping pro heroes on the streets and with investigations. They are usually reserved for 2nd and 3rd-year students, who usually have their licenses. 1st years didn't do them in the past. However, with the rise of villain activity, the school decided to open up work studies to 1st years as well, albeit a very small and select few of them. If they didn't find a good agency with a proven track record they wouldn't do it at all.

Events

U.A. has seasonal dances and a lot of events, like Halloween, Hero Day and other festivals.

Uniforms

Color palette

The uniforms the students receive consist of 4 sets of each clothing (besides the coat and varsity jacket):

Shirts

Long sleeve

Short sleeved

Sleeveless

Blazer

Long sleeves

Sleeveless

Cardigans

Sleeveless (two color variations)

Long sleeved (two color variations)

Sweaters

Sleeveless (two color variations)

Long sleeved (two color variations)

Pants

Shorts

Below The Knee

Classic

Skirts

Mini

Below The Knee

Maxi

Ties

Necktie

Bow Tie

Socks

Quarter

Crew

Knee High

Thigh High

Tights

Shoes

Coat

Varsity Jacket

Gym Clothing

Tank top

Loose Zip-up Sweatshirt (long sleeves, short sleeves, sleeveless)

Cropped Zip-up Sweatshirt (long sleeves, short sleeves, sleeveless)

Shorts

Below Knee Shorts

Sweatpants

Swimwear

Sleeveless, Short sleeved and Long sleeved

Lanyards

Uniforms aren’t required on Wednesdays

Students are allowed to accessorize their uniforms however they want and wear their own jackets

Piercings, colored hair, nails, makeup etc. are allowed

The uniforms aren’t gendered - all students receive all versions and are allowed to wear whichever one they prefer

For students with mutant type Quirks, custom made uniforms are made

Button and sleeve/lapel stripe differences between the department uniforms [1-General education, 2-Hero, 3-Support, 4-Management].

School Bag

Along with the Uniforms the school hands out bags. You can return them and use your own if you’d like.

A standard deep blue nylon matching the uniforms. The U.A. logo sits at the right bottom corner.

Class

If you’re standing at the front of the classroom looking out at the desks, the seating arrangement starts at the leftmost side of the room (“A” names), going front to back and then going to the next row to the right, and so on.  keep in mind that the alphabetical order here is based on the Japanese alphabet. My number is 10.

Here's how I laid out the desks for 21 students:

Since we stay in the same classrooms for most of the days we can leave out stuff at our desks. They have shelves underneath with 2 outlets and lots of space.

Class 1-A Friend Groups

Everyone is actually really close, but those are what groups spend the most time together. Of course we hang out in different groups or all together too.

We have frequent movie and game nights, 1-A has a group chat and it’s always active, there’s always someone wanting to do something. Sometimes we invite people from other classes.

DekuSquad

Izuku

Ochako

Tenya

Tsuyu

Shouto

Haruka

Hitoshi (after he joins our class)

BakuSquad

Katsuki

Eijirou

Mina

Denki

Minoru

Hanta

TokoSquad

Fumikage

Mashirao

Mezou

Tooru

MomoSquad

Momo

Kyoka

Yuga

Kouji

Rikido

I hope this was helpful! <3

© credits: seating arrangement • basics @/Priicklleshifts on TikTok • uniforms • dividers

[mostlysignssomeportents]

AI’s productivity theater

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

When I took my kid to New Zealand with me on a book-tour, I was delighted to learn that grocery stores had special aisles where all the kids'-eye-level candy had been removed, to minimize nagging. What a great idea!

Related: countries around the world limit advertising to children, for two reasons:

1) Kids may not be stupid, but they are inexperienced, and that makes them gullible; and

2) Kids don't have money of their own, so their path to getting the stuff they see in ads is nagging their parents, which creates a natural constituency to support limits on kids' advertising (nagged parents).

There's something especially annoying about ads targeted at getting credulous people to coerce or torment other people on behalf of the advertiser. For example, AI companies spent millions targeting your boss in an effort to convince them that you can be replaced with a chatbot that absolutely, positively cannot do your job.

Your boss has no idea what your job entails, and is (not so) secretly convinced that you're a featherbedding parasite who only shows up for work because you fear the breadline, and not because your job is a) challenging, or b) rewarding:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/19/make-them-afraid/#fear-is-their-mind-killer

That makes them prime marks for chatbot-peddling AI pitchmen. Your boss would love to fire you and replace you with a chatbot. Chatbots don't unionize, they don't backtalk about stupid orders, and they don't experience any inconvenient moral injury when ordered to enshittify the product:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/25/moral-injury/#enshittification

Bosses are Bizarro-world Marxists. Like Marxists, your boss's worldview is organized around the principle that every dollar you take home in wages is a dollar that isn't available for executive bonuses, stock buybacks or dividends. That's why you boss is insatiably horny for firing you and replacing you with software. Software is cheaper, and it doesn't advocate for higher wages.

That makes your boss such an easy mark for AI pitchmen, which explains the vast gap between the valuation of AI companies and the utility of AI to the customers that buy those companies' products. As an investor, buying shares in AI might represent a bet the usefulness of AI – but for many of those investors, backing an AI company is actually a bet on your boss's credulity and contempt for you and your job.

But bosses' resemblance to toddlers doesn't end with their credulity. A toddler's path to getting that eye-height candy-bar goes through their exhausted parents. Your boss's path to realizing the productivity gains promised by an AI salesman runs through you.

A new research report from the Upwork Research Institute offers a look into the bizarre situation unfolding in workplaces where bosses have been conned into buying AI and now face the challenge of getting it to work as advertised:

https://www.upwork.com/research/ai-enhanced-work-models

The headline findings tell the whole story:

96% of bosses expect that AI will make their workers more productive;

85% of companies are either requiring or strongly encouraging workers to use AI;

49% of workers have no idea how AI is supposed to increase their productivity;

77% of workers say using AI decreases their productivity.

Working at an AI-equipped workplaces is like being the parent of a furious toddler who has bought a million Sea Monkey farms off the back page of a comic book, and is now destroying your life with demands that you figure out how to get the brine shrimp he ordered from a notorious Holocaust denier to wear little crowns like they do in the ad:

https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2004/hitler-and-sea-monkeys

Bosses spend a lot of time thinking about your productivity. The "productivity paradox" shows a rapid, persistent decline in American worker productivity, starting in the 1970s and continuing to this day:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productivity_paradox

The "paradox" refers to the growth of IT, which is sold as a productivity-increasing miracle. There are many theories to explain this paradox. One especially good theory came from the late David Graeber (rest in power), in his 2012 essay, "Of Flying Cars and the Declining Rate of Profit":

https://thebaffler.com/salvos/of-flying-cars-and-the-declining-rate-of-profit

Graeber proposes that the growth of IT was part of a wider shift in research approaches. Research was once dominated by weirdos (e.g. Jack Parsons, Oppenheimer, etc) who operated with relatively little red tape. The rise of IT coincides with the rise of "managerialism," the McKinseyoid drive to monitor, quantify and – above all – discipline the workforce. IT made it easier to generate these records, which also made it normal to expect these records.

Before long, every employee – including the "creatives" whose ideas were credited with the productivity gains of the American century until the 70s – was spending a huge amount of time (sometimes the majority of their working days) filling in forms, documenting their work, and generally producing a legible account of their day's work. All this data gave rise to a ballooning class of managers, who colonized every kind of institution – not just corporations, but also universities and government agencies, which were structured to resemble corporations (down to referring to voters or students as "customers").

Even if you think all that record-keeping might be useful, there's no denying that the more time you spend documenting your work, the less time you have to do your work. The solution to this was inevitably more IT, sold as a way to make the record-keeping easier. But adding IT to a bureaucracy is like adding lanes to a highway: the easier it is to demand fine-grained record-keeping, the more record-keeping will be demanded of you.

But that's not all that IT did for the workplace. There are a couple areas in which IT absolutely increased the profitability of the companies that invested in it.

First, IT allowed corporations to outsource production to low-waged countries in the global south, usually places with worse labor protection, weaker environmental laws, and easily bribed regulators. It's really hard to produce things in factories thousands of miles away, or to oversee remote workers in another country. But IT makes it possible to annihilate distance, time zone gaps, and language barriers. Corporations that figured out how to use IT to fire workers at home and exploit workers and despoil the environment in distant lands thrived. Executives who oversaw these projects rose through the ranks. For example, Tim Cook became the CEO of Apple thanks to his successes in moving production out of the USA and into China.

https://archive.is/M17qq

Outsourcing provided a sugar high that compensated for declining productivity…for a while. But eventually, all the gains to be had from outsourcing were realized, and companies needed a new source of cheap gains. That's where "bossware" came in: the automation of workforce monitoring and discipline. Bossware made it possible to monitor workers at the finest-grained levels, measuring everything from keystrokes to eyeball movements.

What's more, the declining power of the American worker – a nice bonus of the project to fire huge numbers of workers and ship their jobs overseas, which made the remainder terrified of losing their jobs and thus willing to eat a rasher of shit and ask for seconds – meant that bossware could be used to tie wages to metrics. It's not just gig workers who don't score consistent five star ratings from app users whose pay gets docked – it's also creative workers whose Youtube and Tiktok wages are cut for violating rules that they aren't allowed to know, because that might help them break the rules without being detected and punished:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/13/solidarity-forever/#tech-unions

Bossware dominates workplaces from public schools to hospitals, restaurants to call centers, and extends to your home and car, if you're working from home (AKA "living at work") or driving for Uber or Amazon:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/10/02/chickenized-by-arise/#arise

In providing a pretense for stealing wages, IT can increase profits, even as it reduces productivity:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/11/robots-stole-my-jerb/#computer-says-no

One way to think about how this works is through the automation-theory metaphor of a "centaur" and a "reverse centaur." In automation circles, a "centaur" is someone who is assisted by an automation tool – for example, when your boss uses AI to monitor your eyeballs in order to find excuses to steal your wages, they are a centaur, a human head atop a machine body that does all the hard work, far in excess of any human's capacity.

A "reverse centaur" is a worker who acts as an assistant to an automation system. The worker who is ridden by an AI that monitors their eyeballs, bathroom breaks, and keystrokes is a reverse centaur, being used (and eventually, used up) by a machine to perform the tasks that the machine can't perform unassisted:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

But there's only so much work you can squeeze out of a human in this fashion before they are ruined for the job. Amazon's internal research reveals that the company has calculated that it ruins workers so quickly that it is in danger of using up every able-bodied worker in America:

https://www.vox.com/recode/23170900/leaked-amazon-memo-warehouses-hiring-shortage

Which explains the other major findings from the Upwork study:

81% of bosses have increased the demands they make on their workers over the past year; and

71% of workers are "burned out."

Bosses' answer to "AI making workers feel burned out" is the same as "IT-driven form-filling makes workers unproductive" – do more of the same, but go harder. Cisco has a new product that tries to detect when workers are about to snap after absorbing abuse from furious customers and then gives them a "Zen" moment in which they are showed a "soothing" photo of their family:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ai-bringing-zen-first-horizons-192010166.html

This is just the latest in a series of increasingly sweaty and cruel "workplace wellness" technologies that spy on workers and try to help them "manage their stress," all of which have the (totally predictable) effect of increasing workplace stress:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/15/wellness-taylorism/#sick-of-spying

The only person who wouldn't predict that being closely monitored by an AI that snitches on you to your boss would increase your stress levels is your boss. Unfortunately for you, AI pitchmen know this, too, and they're more than happy to sell your boss the reverse-centaur automation tool that makes you want to die, and then sell your boss another automation tool that is supposed to restore your will to live.

The "productivity paradox" is being resolved before our eyes. American per-worker productivity fell because it was more profitable to ship American jobs to regulatory free-fire zones and exploit the resulting precarity to abuse the workers left onshore. Workers who resented this arrangement were condemned for having a shitty "work ethic" – even as the number of hours worked by the average US worker rose by 13% between 1976 and 2016:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/11/robots-stole-my-jerb/#computer-says-no

AI is just a successor gimmick at the terminal end of 40 years of increasing profits by taking them out of workers' hides rather than improving efficiency. That arrangement didn't come out of nowhere: it was a direct result of a Reagan-era theory of corporate power called "consumer welfare." Under the "consumer welfare" approach to antitrust, monopolies were encouraged, provided that they used their market power to lower wages and screw suppliers, while lowering costs to consumers.

"Consumer welfare" supposed that we could somehow separate our identities as "workers" from our identities as "shoppers" – that our stagnating wages and worsening conditions ceased mattering to us when we clocked out at 5PM (or, you know, 9PM) and bought a $0.99 Meal Deal at McDonald's whose low, low price was only possible because it was cooked by someone sleeping in their car and collecting food-stamps.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/20/disneyland-workers-anaheim-california-authorize-strike

But we're reaching the end of the road for consumer welfare. Sure, your toddler-boss can be tricked into buying AI and firing half of your co-workers and demanding that the remainder use AI to do their jobs. But if AI can't do their jobs (it can't), no amount of demanding that you figure out how to make the Sea Monkeys act like they did in the comic-book ad is doing to make that work.

As screwing workers and suppliers produces fewer and fewer gains, companies are increasingly turning on their customers. It's not just that you're getting worse service from chatbots or the humans who are reverse-centaured into their workflow. You're also paying more for that, as algorithmic surveillance pricing uses automation to gouge you on prices in realtime:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/24/gouging-the-all-seeing-eye/#i-spy

This is – in the memorable phrase of David Dayen and Lindsay Owens, the "age of recoupment," in which companies end their practice of splitting the gains from suppressing labor with their customers:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-03-age-of-recoupment/

It's a bet that the tolerance for monopolies made these companies too big to fail, and that means they're too big to jail, so they can cheat their customers as well as their workers.

AI may be a bet that your boss can be suckered into buying a chatbot that can't do your job, but investors are souring on that bet. Goldman Sachs, who once trumpeted AI as a multi-trillion dollar sector with unlimited growth, is now publishing reports describing how companies who buy AI can't figure out what to do with it:

https://www.goldmansachs.com/intelligence/pages/gs-research/gen-ai-too-much-spend-too-little-benefit/report.pdf

Fine, investment banks are supposed to be a little conservative. But VCs? They're the ones with all the appetite for risk, right? Well, maybe so, but Sequoia Capital, a top-tier Silicon Valley VC, is also publicly questioning whether anyone will make AI investments pay off:

https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/ais-600b-question/

I can't tell you how great it was to take my kid down a grocery checkout aisle from which all the eye-level candy had been removed. Alas, I can't figure out how we keep the nation's executive toddlers from being dazzled by shiny AI pitches that leave us stuck with the consequences of their impulse purchases.

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/25/accountability-sinks/#work-harder-not-smarter

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[kissforyouu]

sanrio shopping with jungkook!

pairing : jungkook x sanrio girl!oc

genre : fluff

a/n : this fic was inspired by those "hello kitty shopping for my gf" videos on tiktok!! (i turned out to not like this very much but eh i'm posting it anyway😭)

unedited.

'"ah? then what happened?" jungkook hums to his phone.

"gguk, turns out, they were talking about the same guy! can you believe that? we all were flabbergasted. i can't believe he managed to fool both of them like that." you babbled.

"oh— oh!—and you know what? that guy, whatever his name is, apparently he has his own girlfriend. my friend found out." coming to a state of shock, jungkook suddenly gasps. and because he gasps, you gasp. out of habit, you guess.

that makes jungkook giggle a little. "cute", he thinks.

"how'd he manage to fool everyone? does his girlfriend know?" his tone is curious.

"mh, don't know. i'll find out and let you know!" you exclaim.

"find out?", jungkook is in disbelief, "how're you gonna find out, baby?"

"oh, i have connections. can easily find anything out, just need to ask someone or just check instagram!" you felt as if you were spilling a super confidential secret to your boyfriend. it made you mentally giggle.

"what? so you're saying you can find all the gossip out?" he scoffs, grip tightening around the wheel to make a turn.

"uhhuh! ...i mean, anything within my reach. you just have to search a little."

"okay, baby detective." he says with a small smile on his face.

"pfft!" you shout through the phone.

jungkook grins, eyes rolling jokingly.

"by the way, baby detective, i've got to go. just arrived at the convenience store. also, want anything?" he asks you like he usually does.

"mmmm...", you take a few seconds to think, "just want the usual." you answer.

"okay baby. a strawberry milk and those cookies. got it." jungkook makes a mental note to go buy those as well while he bids goodbye to his pretty little girlfriend who was across the line.

the man groans, getting out of the car with a small stretch. jungkook walks in the convenience store as he goes through each aisle, piling his cart with everything he needed, but also making sure to buy you your little snack.

once he was done, he leisurely gets his groceries checked out at the cashier and then loaded into the trunk of his car.

while humming some random tune, jungkook happily restarts his engine to get on the road again. but instead of going back home, he makes a turn to drive to his favourite shop.

that stop onwards, jungkook stops at various shops with sanrio items and all sorts of cute stuff his girlfriend likes.

"childish", he would call you each time, but he couldn't help but love the way the corners of your eyes would crinkle up whenever he bought you something, or the way you'd have the biggest prettiest smile on your face and how your eyes would sparkle. his favourite was the little rewards you'd give him after, the countless amount of little kisses being planted on his face!

his pretty little girlfriend (you;)) would giggle while doing so and that would make him giggle even louder back. nothing better than a happy girlfriend. anything to see your smile.

so he buys a bunch of pink plushies, sanrio plushies—mainly cinnamonroll and my melody, your favourites, a random pair of hello kitty socks, necklaces and all sorts of kinds. his favourite purchase being the pink hello kitty football.

why did he even buy that? what would you even do with a football? you don't enjoy sports, you'd rather read a book while listening to music. sometimes he'd wonder what was the reason for all these "unnecessary equipments". seriously, why does it have to in be some sort of a theme? why can't you just use a normal football? but when it came to his girlfriend, though, he'd buy her a pink themed island if he could.

what a caring, sweet, considerate boyfriend he is!

*beep!* *beep!*

the cashier's machine beeps, displaying the amount to be paid on the screen. jungkook pulls out his wallet, fully black with a pink shaped heart pin with the description "I ♡ my gf" stapled on to it, which was obviously given to him by non other than you.

another thing about jungkook was the fact that he'll always keep these little charms you would give him. true, he'd joke around saying he'll throw it away but oh god, knowing jungkook, who was on his knees whipped for his girlfriend, would never ever in a million years throw away something his girlfriend gave him. jungkook will make sure to keep it with him always. whipped man.

with a swift movement of his credit card on the card machine, the cashier hands jungkook back his card as well as the items he purchased. your boyfriend's already thinking about the big smile you're going to have on your face as he gets right back inside the car, finally making his way home. meanwhile, you also make sure to spam the man on messages asking him where he was and that you missed him.

by no time, jungkook was already at your place. he quickly opens the trunk, taking out all the stuff he had gotten you. both his hands were occupied with carrying the bags as he made his way inside your house, greeting your parents with a smile and a bow then entering your room.

and there you were, his pretty baby, writing something on your notebook while hugging your legs upto your chest while being seated on your chair.

"jungkook!" immediately, you squeel, just happy to see your boyfriend.

"y/n/n!" he squeals back to match your energy.

jungkook walks around your room to place the bags on your bed. curiously, your eyes follow the mysterious (read:not) bags and his hands, already recognising the logo of the bag. your favourite sanrio shop!

a cheeky smile creeps upto your face when you realise what's inside. jungkook notices it, almost cracking up a laugh, but shuts down fast enough. you both give eachother the eye, paralinguistically communicating.

"...gguk..." your nose was scrunched slightly, lips in the form of a duck's and your eyes were lit up.

"yeah, yeah", he rolls his eyes playfully, "come look at what i got you", he snickers.

excitedly, you get up from your seat and make your way to sit next to your boyfriend with a shy smile.

you weren't normal this much shy around him. i mean, you were, to a certain extent, but whenever he got you something you'd get all giddy and shy like a little girl having her first crush. you never pressure him into buying you things, though, he just always insists on buying you this and that. you've given up on telling him no. plus, i mean, if he really wants to...hehe.

"got you these uuhh...plushies. this guy's your favourite, yeah." he pulls out the cute cinnamonroll plushie, throwing it at you.

you catch it immediately, hugging it closer to your chest and snuggling into your boyfriend's meaty arm.

you take the bag from jungkook, digging it and pulling out all the goods.

your lips tremble, a loud laugh bursting out of you the moment you find the hello kitty football.

"what's this? this is so random?" you laugh.

"to be honest, i don't know the purpose of this, it's useless. why a hello kitty one? just buy a normal football?" he rolls his eyes, leading backwards while balancing his body with his forearms.

"mhm, then why'd you buy it?"

"cause you'll like it." his answer melts your heart.

you throw the ball at him, watching it bounce away effortlessly.

"awww, gguk." you coo at him.

you pull your boyfriend closer by his ears, then planting a big fat kiss on his forehead.

here comes the kisses, my favourite part, — jungkook thinks.

"my babyyy!" you pull him to your chest, fingers ruffling his hair while you planted kisses on the top of his head. jungkook loved buying you gifts, just for this reason. it's not like you never showed him affection without him buying you gifts, you most certainly did, but he just can't forget that big fat smile on your face whenever you unbox your gifts. plus. he always believed that it was important to buy your girlfriend everything she liked. that was just his point of view. and he stood by that.

"you know damn well you're the baby here—" his voice was muffled by your chest while you were aggressively kissing all over him. fingers tugging onto his socks locks, you pull on his hair as well, just full on baby-ing your boyfriend.

well, you most certainly would not harshly pull on a baby's hair and aggressively kiss them, but eh, close enough.

"god, y/n—"

"muah, muah, mwah, mwwaah!" wet kisses were being planted all across his face.

you push him down to the bed, his body fully laid back on the bed now with you on top of him, repeatedly kissing his face everywhere.

jungkook held you by your waist, letting you do whatever you wanted. this is why he did it anyway.

you place one last kiss right over his eyebrow, pulling away with a big smile.

"mmm, one more..." his eyes are closed, lips in a faint smile as he points at his face.

"mmm," you coo, "okay, where?"

"on my dick."

you groan at his words, turning around and about to get off of him before jungkook catches you, his happy laugh laugh being heard before he pulls you back to his chest.

"joking, joking." he reassures you.

your body was laid on top of him, face inches away from his. jungkook brushes away a few strands falling onto your face and tucks it behind your ear. you soothe into his touch, absolutely loving this feeling.

"here." he taps his lips.

happily, you grab his face with your palms and lean in to deliver a big fat kiss just the way he wanted.

[a-dauntless-daffodil]

Vaggie: "Okay ha ha, very funny. Who stole me and Charlie's laundry out of the dryer again- Angel Dust!"

Angel Dust: "Wasn' me."

Vaggie: "Are you wearing my fucking skirt!?"

Angel Dust: "Ooooh~ it's a FUCKIN' skirt, huh? This one kept special for when Charlie jumps ya?"

Vaggie: "Que te la pique un pollo- NO."

Angel Dust: "Aw c'mon toots, we all know you have one~"

Vaggie: "Give me back. My skirt. You. Ass."

Angel Dust: "Speakin' of... is it really still YOUR skirt, Vagina, if MY ass is the one lookin' so utterly fine and fabulous in it?"

Vaggie: "YOU DONT HAVE AN ASS, ANGEL DUST."

Angel Dust: "Yeah? Then what's this beautiful thang here, hmm?"

Vaggie: "I don't know because there's nothing there for you to even POINT at, twig twink!"

Husk: "HA!"

Angel Dust: "Ugh fiiine. Since you're being nice an' usin' my preferred pronouns-"

Vaggie: "Twig???"

Husk: "Twink."

Angel Dust: "-I'll hand over the girlfriend-fucking skirt. The delicius heat from the dryer's mostly gone now anyway. Jus' lemme grab something to throw on over it first..."

Vaggie: "Seriously? THAT'S why you took it?? Dryer heat?"

Angel Dust: "Next best thing to hot bath at the end of a day's hard work, baby! A day's VERY hard, throbbing, aching work-"

Vaggie: "I will throw this spear at you. I WILL ruin your stupid hair."

Husk: "Fucking do it."

Vaggie: "YOU shut up too. You're the one who taught him this in the first place, aren't you?"

Husk: "WHAT? I don't put on your fucking skirts!"

Angel Dust: "Wha' about her non-fucking ones?"

Husk & Vaggie: "Shut up."

Angel Dust: "Touché~ Protestin' too much, me thinks~”

Vaggie: "Husk- we all know you're the one waiting for the dryer to finish so you can drag the laundry onto the floor and sleep on it!"

Husk: "That's bullshit- you've got no proof-"

Angel Dust: "Cat hair, Mr. Whiskers."

Husk: "The fucking hotel has a cat!"

Vaggie: "That smells like a bar and also sheds feathers?"

Husk: "FUCK."

Angel Dust: "Don't break yourself up over it, kitten daddy- If you hadn't shown me the joys of laundry shopping, I'd never have known how GOOD I look in this jacket."

Vaggie: "???? You- IS THAT CHARLIE'S!?!?"

Angel Dust: "Goes good with the skirt, huh? If you two had a kid, they'd fucking SLAY."

Vaggie: "WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU WEARING HER JACKET"

Angel Dust: "Look- she's the only one in this fancy prancy hotel that's got the same measurements as me, at least in the shoulder, hips, and torso department! The only one who's clothes don't smell like dead deer and dusty old radios, anyway!! I'm kinda low on options here, okay?"

Vaggie: "WHAT ABOUT THE OPTION OF DON'T StEAL OUR STUFF?? THAT'S LIKE, THE EASIEST FUCKING OPTION YOU COULD HAVE!"

Angel Dust: "Orrrrr, you two could adopt me as you gay lovechild and give me some fuckin' hand me downs. Or money."

Vaggie: “OUR WHAT!?”

Angel Dust: “Fuck it, give me money an’ I’ll buy my own clothes, mom.”

Vaggie: “I. Am. NOT-”

Charlie: “-hey guys! Has anyone seen my….”

Charlie: “…uh, Vaggie? Why is Angel Dust dressed like our gay lovechild?”

Angel Dust: “HA!”

Charlie: “And did he just call you ‘mom??’”

Vaggie: “I give up. Anyone needs me, I’ll be in the laundry room, shoving myself in the dryer on the hellfire setting.”

Husk: “You’ll have to fucking drag Niffty out first.”

Vaggie: “What.”

Charlie: “What?”

Angel Dust: “WHAT”

Husk: “She was crawling in head first when I left after waking up- uhh- after getting something.”

Angel Dust: (shrieking) “AN’ YOU LEFT HER THERE???”

Vaggie: “Oh shit-”

Charlie: “Vaggie- go! Fly!! Go go go now Now NOW- EMPLOYEE IN THE INDUSTRIAL CLEANING EQUIPMENT THIS IS NOT A DRILL!!!!”

- meanwhile, in the laundry room-

THUMP THUMP THUMP

THUMP…. Thump………… thump

Alastor: “…”

Alastor: (reaches over to knock on dryer door)  

Alastor: “Having fun, dear?”

Niffty: (flopping limply half out of dryer) (battered) (scorched) (GRINNING) “Ow pain!”

Alastor: “Quite.”

Niffty: “Heheheh… heHEHEHEH.”

Niffty: (sets the dryer to max again) “More…. PAIN!!!” (shuts door from the inside) (grins from other side with her face pressed against the glass)

Alastor: “Fascinating.”

Thump…Thump. Thump. THUMP THUMPTHUMP-

Cherri Bomb: “…”

Cherri Bomb: “…Know what? You kids have fun. I’m just gonna go, like, break into someone’s house and murder them so I can use their washer and dryer. That’ll be less fucked up than….. whatever this is.” (hefts basket of bloody laundry and bombs) (waves over her shoulder while leaving) “Bye~”

[starry-bi-sky]

finally giving fem danyal her own au and fulfilling my 'danny is an animal whisperer' agenda at the same time: mother of monsters danyal 2.0

i say "2.0" because TECHNICALLY 'mother of monsters danyal' is an au I made back in June for Dark fem!Danyal (who I promptly named Layal). However, I haven't posted much for her yet, and I like the "mother of monsters" premise too much to leave it only to Layal. Plus Danyal in that au was going to become the mother of monsters anyway, just with significantly less world domination and mass extinction.

'Animal whisperer' Danny has been something I've been thinking about since my latest DP 'wolfpack au' post and it's! So fun to think about, and who no better to assign the idea to than Danyal Al Ghul? Who comes from a family infamously known for their love of animals and nature?

Fem Danyal is just purely self-indulgent. *gestures wildly at her* i just lomvb,,, her,,,, I've only really mentioned her in context of the 'Things in Threes' au/my first Danyal al Ghul au with the facial scar, but she's!!! I love her. She deserves her own au <33

So kill three birds with one stone! Make a post about it.

Anyways, Danny has a large lair. Similar to cult leader danyal, her lair is a giant mountain region resembling nanda parbat with a big temple/palace-like area built into the mountain. It's large, it's overflowing with natural flora, with its own mini-floating islands hovering over some areas, and it's also completely empty.

Danny takes one look at her lair upon first meeting, -- noting that it looked relatively smaller from the outside -- and promptly, with the elegance of an Al Ghul, goes "What the hell??" Because yes, while she does enjoy her own solitude and privacy, this is a bit ridiculous.

For heaven's sake, there's even a massive lake in there! What's she going to do with all this space? Can she make it any smaller? Why is it so big in the first place? This looks borderline like one of the mega-islands!

She finds out later that apparently, the amount of ectoplasm a ghost has can have an effect on the size of their lair. And since she has such a large core, her lair reflects that. Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff, it's bigger on the inside so it doesn't take up "too much space" on the outside. Don't worry about it too much.

Danyal isn't totally opposed to having such a large lair, she's just... a bit baffled by it. It feels like so much wasted space is all. All this flora and no fauna to enjoy it with. It's practically eerie.

She decorates her temple-palace area, transforming rooms to match her needs as she sees fit. In the center of the inner gardens is a massive tree that she likes to climb, with twisting, winding branches. Sam and Tucker have honorary rooms, even if they can't safely leave the specter speeder for long periods of time, even with proper safety equipment. So does Jazz. Ali (Dani) has one too, but he can actually use that one, and Danny brought him to her lair so he could decorate it himself.

She has a personal garden, but for the most part she lets the flora exist as it is. Too much space to cultivate it en masse anyways.

Skip to a few weeks later, on her next visit to Clockwork. She developed a habit of going to see him semi-regularly just because. She enjoys his wisdom, and he has a lot of stories to tell, and when he's not being the cryptic and esoteric timekeeper, he's a bit goofy.

(pushing my dadwork agenda here,,, i think Danny deserves to go 'hey, Lord Clockwork, do you want me to buy you something' while she's at walmart, only to receive a singular glowing sticky note that says 'cucumber gatorade'.)

(She insists on referring to him with his proper titles even for the most mundane of things because it's proper, but Clockwork sees a future where she eventually calls him "Cee" and by all things in existence is he determined to get there. Anyways,,,)

On her next visit to Clockwork, just as she is about to leave, Clockwork stops her and goes; "Ah, I have something for you. Hold out your hands."

Danny does as such, and Clockwork doesn't give out things often, so her curiosity has spiked to the highest levels. He turns away from her for a moment, using his staff to summon whatever it is he needs, and when he turns around.

He drops a fish into her hands. Granted, a fish in a small glass tank. But a fish nonetheless. A small one, roughly about the size of her finger, with a blue-black, eel-shaped body and four sets of glowing eyes. She can see thin, almost translucent, but spiny fins down its back and the start of bioluminescent markings. It's swimming around in circles in its small container.

"Lord Clockwork." Danyal says all too calmly.

"Yes, Danyal?"

"What is this?"

"That is an adolescent leviathan, Danyal." She’s transfixed onto the tank, but she doesn’t need to see Clockwork’s face to hear the smile he���s stifling.

The myriad of emotions that runs through her all at once threatens to overwhelm her, and she can’t tell if the feelings are negative or positive. So she carefully closes her eyes to breathe in through her nose.

“Clockwork.”

“Ah, I see you’ve dropped formalities.”

She ignores that.

“Why have you given me an adolescent leviathan?”

She's expecting the trickster to look amused when she opens her eyes. Instead, he just looks endeared. "I know you're fond of animals," he says, "and you always look amazed when you come across an animal of the realms. So I thought you might enjoy taking care of the young beast, it's mother is dead so it has no one to care for it."

Oh.

"But, if you don't like it," Clockwork's hands reach out for the tank, "I can simply take it back--"

Danyal shifts the tank out from his reach and hugs it possessively. "I never said that. How do I care for it?"

And so clockwork gives her a list, and when Danyal returns to her lair, she sets up a large tank in her room for the leviathan to swim in -- it's much too small for the lake right now, she thinks. She'll feel better if it's somewhere she can find it. She names him Suhā.

Suhā grows quickly, and by the end of the mortal month she transforms one of the rooms into a large pond for him to swim around in. He's a very loyal beast, recognizing her as it's mother of some kind. Danyal takes great care ensuring that her beastie gets quality care, and Suhā swims to the surface to see her when he senses her in the room.

It spirals from there. Somehow, Pandora catches wind that Clockwork gave her a leviathan, and so the next time Danyal visits the Greater Athens, she gives her a baby chimera. It's eyes are still sealed shut, Danyal can't bring herself to say no. She names the little beastie Firas.

Frostbite hears about it too, and not to be outdone, gives her an animal she's never even heard of. Infinite-realms born, apparently. A fox-like creature with two small horns like an impala, four eyes, and tall legs. The name isn't something she's quite sure how to write down, and she's positive that her friends won't be able to comprehend it. She names her Eira.

Getting the three of them used to each other was... interesting. Suhā tried to eat Firas when Danyal first introduced the two, and they've hated each other ever since. Firas and Eira are seemingly getting along. Her island already feels full enough with the three of them on it.

Of course, that's not the end of it. With her luck, she begins stumbling across other monsters. Realms-borne or otherwise. An injured hydra in the Grecian islands that, through lots of trial and error, Danyal is able to rehabilitate and heal. It routinely comes to visit her afterwards.

A griffin with a broken wing that she moves permanently to the island that likes to keep to itself, but tends to come down when she's near. It gets along best with Firas.

A panther-like monster from the Shades Woods that had six legs and three tails, with ends that reminded her of a venus flytrap. It stuck around the heavy foliage and she can only make out where it was when she saw its golden eyes reflect.

She befriends a young indrik with its leg injured, and much like the hydra it follows her back to her island, and stays there in the mountains. It comes out when she's alone, much like her other beasts.

She receives two more leviathan -- one from clockwork, and one she finds herself while exploring the deeper and darker recesses of the Ghost Zone. It was huddled against the carcass of its mother, and she managed to befriend and get close enough to it to bring it back to her island. Suhā is fully grown by then, with a head bigger than Danyal herself and he still likes to stick her head out of the water for nuzzles when she's near.

He's not very happy with his new siblings, but he's not trying to eat them when she's not looking. So she calls it a win in her book.

And it's not just large beasts either; smaller animals begin popping up when she's not looking. Bird-like creatures and small mammals, and she swears she saw a doe (or something resembling a doe) grazing in the forest while she was walking by.

She takes back with her a lone snake egg once, and it grows so big it wraps around her island and sleeps with its massive head on the mountain beside the temple, like some smaller breed of Jörmungandr.

And on and on it goes. Some of the beasts she comes across never step foot onto her island, some of them follow her back, while others she has to carry back. Not all of the ones that follow her stay, and Danny rehabilitates the injured and releases them when they're fully healed.

It's hectic, and busy, and frankly she loves it. Some of her rehabilitated beasts return to visit her, or to have their children somewhere on the island, or whatever it is they need to do.

She becomes a bit infamous for it. She goes to visit Dorathea once, and as she's walking through the streets she can hear some of the denizens whispering while she walks past.

"Is that her?"

"Her highness' friend? Yes--"

"--that's the one--"

"--Mother of monsters--"

Danny's not sure how to feel about that.

Although, she can't say she's opposed.

Danyal Al Ghul, Mother of monsters, raiser of beasts. It has a nice ring to it.

[snailsagere]

Please read my dni in my bio before interacting

I made a computer games to play when regressed so here's phone games to play when regressed!

Phone games to play when regressed!

All of these games are free unless stated otherwise and I will give content warnings if needed! If I miss anything and you think I should include it then feel free to tell me!

🌸= personal favourites

Monster girl maker 1 and 2

Description- it's a cute dress up game where you design monster girls, it's really really cute!

CW- I think it's got some medically stuff and general stuff that may be scary

My little pony pocket ponies

Description- it's a game where you get through enemies using the mlp characters it's quite tricky so I recommend this more for anyone who regresses to older ages but it's still really fun!

CW- none :3

🌸My little pony colour by magic

Description- it's a colour by number game where you colour in scenes and decorate a friendship museum!

CW- none :3

🌸My little pony magic princess

Description- you rebuild equestria and complete quests as well as little in game competitions!

CW- none :3

🌸My little pony celebration

Description- you celebrate loads of different parties hosted by the my little pony characters!

CW- none :3

Toca world

Description- pretty much like a doll house but on your phone, make characters, make them a house and explore the world etc, there are also dlc's you can pay for which add stuff like new locations etc

CW- none :3

Toca hair salon 3

Description- this is a paid game where you cut and style different people's hair!

CW- cartoon scissors, hair cutting equipment etc

🌸Hello kitty around the world

Description- you travel to different countries as hello kitty, learn facts about them and where they are in world! you also earn traditional outfits and food to dress hello kitty and feed her!

CW- none! :3

Hello kitty educational games

Description- play a variety of different games to earn outfits and furniture for hello kitty!

CW- none! :3

🌸Hello kitty fashion star

Description- dress up girls in sanrio clothes!

CW- none! :3

Hello kitty cafe

Description- own a cafe! And play as sanrio characters! This games a bit tricky so I recommend it for older kids! Aswell as that there used to be in app purchases to make it easier but they do not work anymore so keep that in mind!

CW- none! :3

Hello kitty goodnight

Description- you play little mini games to get the hello kitty family to sleep!

CW- none! :3

🌸Littlest pet shop your world

Description- play loads and loads of littlest pet shop mini games and if you have the lps with the rubbery heads you can even scan them into the game!

CW- none! (I haven't played every mini game but it seems fine)

Cats and soup

Description- this is a clicky game where you unlock cats for them to make soup

CW- drawings of cartoony knives (to cut veggies)

Bunnybuns

Description- you play as a bunny making food for customers based on hints they give you

CW- none (I don't remember if they use kitchen equipment but I think they don't, not certain though!)

My talking Angela 2

Description- look after a cat called angela, play mini games etc

CW- none! :3

🌸Virtual families 3

Description- I grew up play virtual families 2!this is the same premise we're you look after a family on your phone!

CW- none! :3

Tsuki odyssey

Description- similar to tsuki adventure but now you're in a new location, you can fish, buy things, decorate your house and see what tsuki gets up to

CW- I think burglary is mentioned at the start

Cats are cute

Description- expand a town of cats, pet them, feed them and play with them!

CW- none! :3

Adorable home

Description- play as a couple and adopt loads and loads of cats, look after them and decorate and expand your house!

CW- none! :3

Any papa's game

Description- cook food for customers! All the papa's games are paid for but they're only £1-£3! My personal recommendation is papa's pancakeria!

CW- some of the games have knives in them

🌸Pokemon playhouse

Description- you collect pokemon and play cute mini games with them! This is a good game for little kids who like pokemon!

CW- none! :3

Pokemon smile

Description- brush your teeth to catch pokemon!

CW- none! :3

Pokemon go

Description- walk around outside and catch pokemon! Definitely recommend doing this when it's less cold hehe

CW- none! :3

Pokemon cafe

Description- a match three gand where you make food and drinks fir pokemon customers!

CW- cartoony knife+kitchen equipment maybe

🌸Egg!

Description- raise eggs until they hatch into cute creatures! I loved this game when I was little

CW- none! :3

🌸My school-learning game

Description- be a teacher in a school and teach characters basic maths and English (it has a few different language options depending on where you're from) you can unlock things but you have to pay for them but what is free is fun

CW- none! :3

Colouring games

Description- colour in pictures!

CW- none! :3

🌸Jungle floof

Description- raise jungle animals and play mini games!

CW- none! :3

🌸Applaydu

Description- a kinder egg toy game! Loads of different activities to do and you can unlock characters by scanning your kinder toys!

CW- none! :3

🌸Duo abc

Description- learn the alphabet and basic words (only English), disclaimer? Maybe? not the same as duolingo, this app is made for children

CW- none! :3

Extras! (games I found while making this list)

Plants vs Zombies 1, 2 and 3

Description- fight zombies by setting up plants with different abilities! I recommend this for older kids, I had pvz 1 and 2 when I was younger and I was very bad at it haha

CW- zombies, ungorey violence (no blood etc)

Sundae picnic

Description- make ice cream for cats and dogs! (please don't actually give cats or dogs ice cream)

CW- none! :3

Pokemon sleep

Description- collect pokemon by sleeping (sometimes the app doesn't record your sleep properly but usually it's ok, still fun either way)

CW- none! :3

Khan kids

Description- I haven't played it yet but it looks like it has little mini games for younger kids on it!

CW- idk :c

[seat-safety-switch]

You can go out and just buy yourself some dump truck paint. It's at special stores, sure, but there's no government creepazoid who is going to make sure you actually-factually really do own a piece of large industrial equipment. Then you can spray it on your car. There's just one problem: dump truck paint kind of sucks.

I know, you're surprised too. Dump trucks are heavy, and they get rocks dropped on them all the time, and my cousin had a Tonka growing up that seems to have held up pretty well. Well, that Tonka's paint was applied properly by a professional who wasn't using a 25-year-old can of the stuff that he found at the very bottom of the industrial paint store's dumpster. Whenever I do it, the stuff just flakes off, even if I spend, like, five whole minutes sanding first.

I won't proceed to bore you any more about the crises of my inadequate painting technique. Today, I'm here to tell you that I have figured out a way to get dump truck paint that actually sticks to my car. Turns out the city just parks their industrial equipment outside, and they even provide a convenient block-heater outlet for you to run a plasma cutter on. With some aggressive free-handing and power-squinting, I was able to cut a couple "patch panels" directly off of a trendy Caterpillar. Believe me that it was a very Zen experience, especially when I later pop-riveted them onto the quarter of my Volare.

If there is one bad part of the whole thing, it's that the city keeps spilling so much more road salt on the streets in the winter, so even this robust new paint won't last as long as once I hoped they would. Almost like there's some giant fender-shaped holes cut in the bottom of their sanding trucks or something.

[sweetiesicheng]

dokyeom - tattoo

word count : 848

-

"dad!"

dokyeom looks up and sees you and your son walking into the room. all of the guys are getting photos done for the company, so there is equipment everywhere in the practice room that has turned into a photo shoot set.

"you guys got here quick," dokyeom says to you as your son runs up to him and gives him a hug. "have a good day with mom?"

"yea! we went to to the science museum and then to the art store," your son says as you walk over to him and dokyeom.

"art store?" dokyeom questions.

"he saw my tattoos," you mention and ruffle your son's hair, "and somebody wants to create a tattoo for me."

"ah, so we have a budding artist in our household now," dokyeom says with a big smile. he looks at you, "you're seriously gonna tattoo whatever he makes?" he asks you, clearly skeptical.

"within my own discretion," you answer your husband. "hey, baby? go say hi to everyone," you instruct your son. he runs off to say hi to his uncles and the other staff members he knows in the room. "i told him about tattoos being permanent, and that some people even regret them in the future. but i also told him that i'll love whatever he creates, whether it's on paper or my skin."

"aw, that's cute," dokyeom says to you. "do you two want to stay? i'm practicing with some of the guys in another room after we're done."

"will it be long? i need to pick up groceries," you mention.

"just for an hour. i can go shopping with you two," he replies.

"dad! uncle says he'll buy me a spaceship!" your son shouts from across the room, sitting with s.coups and jeonghan.

"hey hyung..." dokyeom sighs, "i'm the one supposed to be spoiling him."

—

once you go home for the day, dokyeom helps you in the kitchen while your son draws in his new sketchbook.

"hey mom," your son calls out to you.

"yes, baby?" you reply as you cook food.

"i drew a bunch of stuff! can you look at them when you're done cooking?" he asks.

you look over your shoulder with a smile, "after dinner, alright?"

"okay!"

"bud, clear the table. we need space to eat," dokyeom says to your son.

"yes, dad." your son starts clearing the table of his new art supplies. dokyeom takes some side dishes out of the fridge and sets the table as you finish cooking dinner.

"babe, you should look at these," dokyeom says to you.

"hm?" you look over your shoulder for a second to see dokyeom looking at your son's art that was left on the table. "bring it over here," you say, not wanting to step away from the stove.

dokyeom walks over and shows you a page full of doodles that your son created. different colors next to each other, lines of various shapes.

"oh, these are so cute," you compliment your son's art.

"right?" dokyeom replies.

"hey! my book!" your son suddenly shouts. you look and see him in one of the entranceways. "you can't see it yet! i need to draw more!"

"sorry, baby. your dad just really wanted to look," you say to him, slightly blaming your husband in the process.

"dad!" your son whines with a pout.

"sorry for taking it, bud," dokyeom says and hands the sketchbook back to your son. "you're just super cool, so we wanted to look it already," he says to him as your son hugs the sketchbook in his arms.

"you think i'm cool?" your son asks, making you smile.

"the coolest," you say to him.

once you're done cooking, all of you eat together at the table. your son recounts your day together again for his dad while dokyeom mentions his upcoming schedules.

"hey, babe," dokyeom calls to you. you him in response to let him know you're listening, "what if we got matching tattoos with his doodles?" he asks you.

"you want to?" you reply.

"yea. wouldn't it be cute to have matching onces?" dokyeom replies to you.

"mom, dad, can i get a tattoo?" your son speaks after putting his water cup down.

"ask your mom," dokyeom says to him.

"seokmin!" you yell your husband's name. "you know he can't get one at this age," you say to him while dokyeom tries to make you look like a bad guy. you see your son start to get sad. "baby, you can't get one until you're a lot older," you say to your son, "and your dad is trying to make me look like a bad guy."

your son gasps, looking at his father, "mom isn't a bad person! dad, you're being mean to mom!"

"i'm joking! i swear!" dokyeom says to both of you. "i'll make it up to you and get twenty tattoos that were created by you," he says to your son.

"no! you're not allowed to get them either! you're being mean to mom!"

"ah! i swear i was joking! babe!"

"you did this to yourself."

[certifiedlovergirlsstuff]

hello hello can i ask for reader (either new transfer or someone they're just consulting with) hellbent on avoiding and not talking to spencer bcs he keeps rambling off about stuff everytime they're in his vicinity but they just have a really bad history of men mansplaining things to them so even tho spencer doesn't give off that vibe they just can't help but be sensitive to it 😔🤲🏻

tweaked jussst a bit gn!reader. i need to work on making my brain bigger so i can give more detail for spencer.

“well there many ways one can create their own bomb. they could use proper chemical equipment or just simple house hold items you can buy from anywhere.”

“well actually there’s only four ways to create one and most people go the homemade route. which is the most difficult to trace due to them being bought in plain sight.” a tall, skinny agent beside a man in the well pressed suit just reiterated what you said. you took an exhale through your nose to withhold an eye roll.

“yes, what i said. sulfuric acid is a common ingredient so i’d look into people’s recent purchases and cross reference that with their past criminal history.” you moved around lab as you shuffled and stacked papers, “if you need anymore help seems you already have someone with the answers. good luck.” leaving the two federal agents behind as you exited into the hallway with a tiny chip sitting on your shoulder.

what was the reason to seek you out if they already had someone who’d know their answers? probably once they saw who you were they wanted to intimidate you, that one guy wanted to show off that he knew the same information as you. no one ever gave you the respect in this department, many ‘colleagues’ have taken credit for work that you’ve done. they always talk over you or explain a concept that you already knew, seeing as you were in the same field as said mansplainer.

“someone looks to be in a mood.” oh great, if your hour couldn’t get worse. you didn’t bother looking at dr. fray, he was said mansplainer that always thought he was more inept when really you have a higher standing than him.

“since you left those agents on their own i stepped up to help them by giving further detail into their investigation. just helped save some lives, no big dealio.” your periphery saw how he walked with a certain air about him, one that many men carry without a care in the world.

you rolled your eyes as you kept walking to your office, “whatever. they already have someone who knows this information so we weren’t needed anyway.” you pulled your keys from your coat pocket, “well it was not fun walking with you. off you go, fray.” shielding yourself by throwing the door in his face.

you wanted to be away from any type of male for the rest of the day, not wanting to hear their unnecessary chatter, they just like the sound of their own voice. neatly arranging your files on your desk and placing your coat over the back of your chair you were ready to finish some documents when there was a gentle knocking to your door. you weren’t expecting anyone for a meeting so when you were faced with the lanky agent from earlier you couldn’t help as your face shifted into one of annoyance before shifting into neutral.

“was there something you needed, dr. reid?” arms crossed defensively over your chest. you internally hated how he seemed to know almost everything know to man and he seemed to be about your age. you wanted to rip your hair out halfway through your bachelors degree.

dr. reid’s mouth was pressed into a tight line, his fingers twiddling with this satchel strap over his chest. “i- uh i overheard a bit of your- your conversation and just wanted to… apologize?” he ended with a question.

your brows quirked, “apologize? for what?” confused on what was happening. men rarely apologized to you, you’ve been ran down on the street by guys who don’t care about anyone else on the street.

“i didn’t mean to overstep earlier. i understand to an extent what it feels like for people to talk over you or just ignore what you’ve said.” your anger melted just a bit at his words, “and i know for you it’s harder. there’s statistically less then 0.05% of non white males in many fields. i can tell you worked hard to be in this position, so i apologize for earlier.” his mouth probably ran just a tad faster than his brain.

you dropped your defensive stance, hands to link at the bottom of your stomach as you gave dr. reid a friendly smile, the first of the day. “thank you, dr. reid. i appreciate that you recognized your actions and acknowledged my feelings.”

he rocked on his feet, “you can call me spencer.” he said shyly, “also i’ve read a couple of your thesis. and if you have the time when this is over i’d- i’d love to discuss them with you.” you noted how his cheeks started to tint into hues of pink, it was cute.

“would be nice to talk with someone that has a fully functioning brain. you know where to find me, spencer.”

[overrboarrd]

sanctuary [2]: ghost of you

firefighter!roman reigns x azure clarke [oc]

warnings: hospital setting, mentions of spousal/sibling loss

word count: 4.5k

a/n: this one's kinda heavy, maybe not as much as the prologue but brace yourselves. sorry for getting it to y'all kinda late, i had midterms and a capstone and hella papers to do but, once again, we made it! let me know what y'all think. <3

Roman leaned against the cold tile wall of the firehouse shower, letting the scorching water beat down on his neck and shoulders. Five days straight. Five days of putting out fires, saving lives, and pushing his body to the limit. Normally, he welcomed the distraction—it kept him from thinking too much. But lately, his mind had been wandering to things he couldn’t control.

He was there again, standing in the smoke-filled yard, his heart pounding as the flames consumed the building. Echoes of the sirens screaming and the other firefighters shouting around him. And there they were, the nine words that would haunt his memory forever.

“There’s someone else inside,”

“I don’t have time, Ro.”

Time. 

That was the last time Roman heard his brother’s voice. The last time he had the chance to save him, and he hadn’t been able to do a damn thing. His own name being the last thing his brother ever said to him. Roman opened his eyes, the harsh fluorescent lights of the locker room pulling him out of the past, but the weight of grief stayed, pressing down on his chest like a vise.

Roman shook his head and stepped out of the shower. He couldn’t let himself get trapped in his thoughts, not when he had a job to do and a team to lead. The shower did little to relieve the tension that remained in his body as he finished getting dressed. His heavy steel toed boots carried him down the hall to the equipment room where it was quiet; the only sound being the soft clink of metal as he hung his polished helmet in the locker.

“Roman?”

The voice snapped him out of his thoughts. Randy, his teammate, stood at the doorway with a small yet knowing smile on his face. “You good, man? Looks like you’re about to go ten rounds with that helmet.”

Roman glanced down at his hands. He hadn’t even realized he was gripping the helmet so tightly. “Yeah,” he paused, “Just putting the rest of my stuff away.”

Randy didn’t buy it but didn’t push. Leaving Roman with a small nod, he walked back into the lounge with Damian and Drew, the rest of Roman’s squad. The three of them had been a part of his lifeline since Daniel’s death. Together, they formed a tight unit, the kind of brotherhood one could only find in a firehouse.

In those first few weeks after the accident, when Roman was too numb to feel anything and too angry to express it, the squad stepped up. Randy was the oldest of the group, a seasoned veteran who’d seen more than his share of tragedy. He offered the kind of quiet support Roman needed, never pushing him to talk but always making sure he wasn’t drowning in silence. Sometimes, Randy would sit with Roman after a tough shift, handing him a cold beer and making casual conversation about the job, easing him into normalcy.

Damian, with his laid-back personality, had his own way of helping Roman cope. He’d crack jokes at the most unexpected times, forcing Roman to crack a smile even when it felt impossible. He had this uncanny ability to lighten the mood without dismissing the heaviness they all carried. Whenever Roman had one of those days where the weight of loss bore down harder than usual, Damian was the one who made sure they got out of the firehouse to toss the football around for a few, or go for a round at the bar.

Drew, the youngest of the group, had gone through his own version of hell a few years before. He was the one Roman ended up confiding in the most when the grief felt like it was suffocating him. Drew would sit with him after late shifts, talking through the pain in a way that only someone who’d experienced loss could. He knew the right things to say—or when to say nothing at all. With Drew, there was no expectation to have it all together.

Grabbing the small backpack that held his things, Roman made his way out to where the guys were, finishing up their meals before the shift change. The TV was on, though none of them seemed to be paying much attention to it. They were too busy talking about their last call, the adrenaline of it still fresh.

“Man, that kid was lucky,” Randy said, taking a long drink from his water bottle and shaking his head. “One second longer in that car, and it would’ve been over.”

Damian nodded, his face thoughtful. “Yeah, but I’ll tell you what—I can’t handle when kids are involved. Messes with my head every time.”

Roman sat down on the couch next to Drew, his usual silence enveloping him. It was one of the reasons he liked working with his group; they didn’t push him to talk. But Damian’s comment lingered in the air. Everyone had something that got to them—an image, a sound, something they couldn’t shake.

His chest tightened as the words hung in the air, unspoken but understood by all of them. The job took its toll, physically and mentally. You couldn’t save everyone. Roman knew that all too well. He hadn’t been fast enough, hadn’t been able to stop his brother. All the training in the world, all the strength he had, and it still wasn’t enough. He tried to shake it off, but some scars just ran too deep.

“You alright, Roman?” Drew's thick Scottish accent asked lowly so that only Roman could hear, giving him a sideways glance. All the guys knew not to push too hard, but Drew always had a way of sensing when something was weighing on him.

“Yeah,” Roman muttered, taking a sip from his water before sitting the bottle on the table and slouching against the couch. “Just tired s’all. Ready to go home to my daughter.”

“Ah,” Drew nodded slightly. “How's the little one?”

Roman stiffened, a pang of guilt rippling through him. “She’s…good. I’m just doing what I have to,” he said, trying to brush it off, but the truth was more complicated. Adopting Audrey had been both the hardest and the most rewarding thing he’d ever done. But there were days, like today, when he questioned if he was doing right by her. 

“You’re doing great,” Drew, always perceptive, reassured. “Don’t forget that.”

Roman offered a tight nod, but inside, the doubt lingered. The guilt that gnawed at him, the feeling that no matter how much he tried, he would never be able to fill the void Daniel left behind.

•────────────────•

About an hour later, Roman found himself walking up the steps to his house, exhaustion setting in from the long shift. The house was quiet, the early morning light filtering through the windows, casting a faint glow over the familiar furniture. He set his bag down by the door, trying not to wake anyone. Jey was already at the house, staying with Audrey while he was on shift. His cousins had been a godsend, always willing to step in when he had to be away. But it was too quiet. It always felt like that after he’d been gone for a few days, the silence somehow amplifying all the things he wasn’t here to see.

Without thinking, Roman moved upstairs toward Audrey’s room. The door creaked open, and he leaned against the frame, watching her sleep. She was small under the blankets, clutching her favorite stuffed animal, a gray plush rabbit she named ‘Kitty’. Her chest rose and fell in soft, even breaths, completely at peace. Roman’s heart clenched. He loved her more than anything in this world.  He stepped into the room and knelt by her bed, brushing a loose curl of hair away from her face. She stirred slightly but didn’t wake up, lost in whatever dream children dream. For a moment, all the noise in his head quieted, and he allowed himself to just feel the love he had for his little girl. She wasn’t just his responsibility—she was his reason for pushing through the darkest days.

With a heavy sigh, Roman kissed her temple, stood and quietly left her room, heading downstairs where he found Jey in the kitchen.

“You’re back early, Uce,” Jey said, lifting his coffee mug in greeting. “Everything go alright at the station?”

Roman shook his head, leaning against the kitchen island after stretching out his tired muscles. “Had a close call with a kid today. Wanted to come home earlier.” Jey nodded as Roman continued. “What about y’all? How’s she doing?”

“Little cousin’s an angel, as always,” Jey said with a small grin. “Stayed up last night watching the game with me and Jim before he left.”

Roman shot him a slightly annoyed glance, “Y’all know she’s not supposed to be staying up too late.” 

“I know man, but aye, you try saying no to her when she starts her lil’ pout thing.” Jey shrugs, “Plus the 49ers and the Seahawks was playing and she wanted to watch.”

An exasperated sigh escaped Roman’s lips before his hand ran over his face, stopping at his beard. “Can’t believe y’all got my daughter hooked on football.” He chuckled softly.  

“Exactly, your daughter, Uce. You shoulda seen it coming.” Jey added with a smile before finishing his coffee and grabbing his wallet and keys. “Oh, before I forget, me and Jim invited your new neighbor to the cookout this weekend.” 

Roman’s brow raised. Granted, he hadn’t been home for a few days, but nothing outside the house seemed different when he pulled in earlier. “What new neighbor?”

Jey’s mouth opened to speak, but he shut it just as quickly. A smirk formed on his lips as he walked halfway out of the front door.

“You’ll see.”

The sun peeked through the blinds of the nearly vacant room, casting soft shadows across the vinyl floor, but Azure felt far away from the warm Florida light. She sat up on the air mattress slowly, the weight of her dream still pressing heavily on her chest. Her mind was still trapped in the memory of D.C., of the home she had once shared, a time when she believed the world was whole.

The dream had started so sweetly, a memory she once treasured——the two of them unpacking, teasing each other about their new life together. The smell of fresh paint lingered in the air, and they had laughed over the chaos of settling in.They were shuffling boxes around the living room, deciding where each piece of their new life together would go. Her husband’s smile was as vivid in the dream as it had been in life, and for a few fleeting moments, everything felt normal, as if he had never left.

But then his expression had shifted. His eyes had softened with a kind of sadness that Azure recognized all too well, even in the fog of sleep. “I miss you,” he had whispered. His brown eyes, once full of life, seemed to look through her. "I wish I could still be with you, Azure." That was when the dream turned sour, the warm light of their new home dimming until it faded completely, leaving only the ache of loss behind.

The sorrow in his voice had pierced her soul, and she had reached out for him, but he was already fading. The dream blurred into confusion as the sound of his words echoed in her mind, each syllable a reminder of what she had lost. Now, wide awake and alone in her new home, Azure could still hear him. She buried her face in her hands, trying to shake the feeling that he was just out of reach, still waiting for her.

Cursing under her breath, she checked the time—she was running late. Azure dragged herself out of bed, feeling hollow. She stumbled into the bathroom, blinking against the harsh light as it flickered on. The mirror reflected a version of herself she unfortunately recognized—tired eyes, disheveled curls, and the faintest trace of tear streaks from where her cheeks had been damp with emotion in her sleep. The sadness she’d felt in the dream had seeped into her waking hours, turning every movement sluggish, every thought weighed down by a familiar grief.

She ran her hands under cold water, splashing it onto her face as if the shock might somehow wake her from this emotional haze. But the flashes of the dream continued to assault her, memories of her husband’s voice lingering in the back of her mind. Azure leaned over the sink, gripping the edges of the counter tightly. She had been doing so well lately, she thought—moving to Pensacola, starting fresh—but mornings like these felt like setbacks, reminders that grief was never linear. 

Tears welled up in her eyes, and she let them fall freely this time, her shoulders shaking with quiet sobs. The bathroom felt too small, too confining, and her sorrow expanded, filling the space. Her husband was gone, and no matter how many times she tried to accept it, the pain would sneak up on her in moments like this—unexpected and overwhelming.

After a few moments, Azure straightened up, taking a deep breath. She wiped her face with a towel, trying to steady herself. She didn’t have the luxury of falling apart—not today. She was already running late for work, and the last thing she needed was for Bianca or anyone else at the hospital to see how unraveled she felt. She had a job to do, patients to take care of, and a new life to build. It was why she had moved in the first place, wasn’t it? A chance to leave the ghosts of the past behind. Even if they seemed to follow her no matter where she went. No one knew about her husband, about the life she’d left behind in D.C. And she wasn’t sure she was ready to share that part of herself yet. 

As she finished getting ready, the memory of the dream continued to flicker at the edges of her mind, but she pushed it down, burying it beneath layers of routine. She dressed quickly, pulled her hair back into a low bun, and grabbed her bag before heading for the door. When she stepped outside, the crisp morning air hit her face, grounding her for a moment. She stood on the porch, taking a deep breath, before locking the door. It was a new life, she reminded herself. A chance to move forward. But as she started to walk toward her car, a small figure caught her eye. The little girl from across the street, with her dark curls and wide, curious eyes, was waving at her. Azure felt an unexpected smile tug at the corners of her mouth, and she waved back, her heart lightening for just a second. 

Then she noticed the man standing next to the girl. Tall, broad-shouldered, with a stern expression etched into his features. He was watching her, his dark eyes sharp, as if trying to place her. Azure hesitated for a moment. He looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t quite figure out from where. He gave her a brief, quizzical nod, his expression never softening, and Azure, flustered by the encounter, quickly turned and rushed to her car. She didn’t have time to dwell on the interaction. She was already running late, and today was not the day to make a bad impression at work. Azure hesitated, feeling his gaze linger on her. She wasn’t sure why, but something about the way he looked at her made her feel like she was being assessed. She gave a brief, awkward wave before quickly heading for her car, trying to shake off the unease.

•────────────────•

The morning traffic didn’t help Azure’s mood, and by the time she pulled into the hospital parking lot, she was already running far too behind. As she hurried into the hospital, her priority was getting through the shift.

Inside, the busy hum of the pediatric wing helped drown out the lingering emotions from her dream. Azure clocked in and found herself at the nurses' station, where Bianca, the lead pediatric nurse, was already reviewing the day’s assignments. As soon as Bianca looked up, she frowned slightly.

“Morning, Azure,” Bianca greeted her warmly, though her perceptive eyes were quick to take in Azure’s slightly disheveled appearance. “You look a little off today. Everything okay?”

Azure hesitated, her instinct to brush off the concern kicking in. She wasn’t one to unload her personal issues on others, especially not when there was work to be done. She forced a smile, even though the heaviness of the morning still clung to her like a shadow. “Just a rough night,” she said, her voice more casual than she felt. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

Bianca studied her for a moment longer, clearly not entirely convinced, but she didn’t push. Instead, she offered a gentle smile. “Well, if you need anything, let me know. You’ve been doing a great job, and I’m sure today will be no different.”

The warmth in Bianca’s words made Azure feel a bit lighter, even if just for a moment. She gave a grateful nod, appreciating the encouragement but too distracted by the emotional weight she was carrying to fully absorb it. She threw herself into her work, trying to focus on the children she cared for. The hours passed by in a blur of routine tasks, but the emotional residue from the dream stayed with her, a constant undercurrent of sorrow.

Near the end of her shift, she was checking on a young boy recovering from a minor surgery. It was moments like these that reminded Azure why she loved her job, why helping others heal brought her some small measure of peace. Suddenly, she felt someone’s eyes on her. Glancing up, she saw Dr. Rollins standing in the doorway.  “Azure, I need to go over a few things with you before you head out.”

Her heart dropped to her stomach. This is it. I’m about to get fired and I’ve only been here for a month. She managed to let out a quiet “Sure,” before following Dr. Rollins down the hall.

•────────────────•

Azure returned home after her shift, exhaustion pulling at every muscle as she dropped her keys onto the kitchen counter. Boxes she had yet to unpack loomed in the corner, silent reminders of the past she wasn’t quite ready to let go of. She stepped onto the front porch, hoping the warm Florida breeze might ease her nerves. The evening sky was tinged with shades of pink and gold, and the quiet of her suburban neighborhood felt comforting, if not a bit lonely. Azure closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, willing herself to relax. But her thoughts were too scattered to calm.

Across the street, she heard the distant sound of a child’s laughter. Her eyes flicked up instinctively, catching sight of the same little girl she saw a few days ago.This time, it wasn’t the twins that were with her. There was a man—tall, broad, and familiar—standing nearby, watching the girl with a soft expression, though his posture was still tense, like he was ready to jump into action if she needed him.

Roman.

She knew she’d see him again eventually, fully expecting it to be at the hospital.

But she did not expect to see him standing in the yard across the street. 

And what she definitely didn’t expect was her heart unexpectedly fluttering at the sight of him. 

He hesitated for a moment, then nodded in her direction as if deciding whether to approach. He walked towards her, crossing the street with easy strides, his hands shoved into the pockets of his worn jeans. Azure straightened slightly, unsure if she should wave or just wait for him to speak.

"Hey," he said when he reached the bottom of her porch steps. His voice was low, steady, just like she remembered. “Welcome to the neighborhood. Guess I should’ve said that earlier, just didn’t notice someone moved in.”

"Thanks" she replied, her own voice coming out quieter than she intended. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other, unsure of what else to say.

Roman nodded, folding his arms across his chest, his posture relaxed but guarded. There was something unreadable in his expression, as if he was watching her, assessing. Like he was constantly on alert, always trying to stay in control of whatever was happening around him.

“I ran into your cousins the other day,” Azure continued, trying to break the silence. “Jimmy and Jey?”

“Did you?” Roman allowed a faint smile to cross his face. 

She nodded, "They practically insisted on helping me move everything in. Well, it sounded more like they were threatened into helping me move in."

A soft chuckle fell from his lips, causing Azure to feel that unfamiliar fluttering again. 

“They’re good guys. Always trying to help out where they can.”

"It helps that they’re so friendly," Azure added with a small smile, trying to lighten the mood, unsure of what to say next. She could feel the weight of the conversation hanging between them.

Roman shifted slightly, his gaze flicking to the house before returning to her. “So, you’ve been working at the hospital a while now?”

“Just a couple of weeks,” Azure replied. “I moved here to… well, for a change, I guess. I needed something different.”

Roman nodded, though he didn’t press for more details. Azure could sense that he understood without needing to ask.

“That place can be a lot,” Roman said, his tone thoughtful. “The hospital, I mean. You see a lot in a short amount of time. It’s not easy.”

“I can handle it,” Azure said, her voice soft but firm. “I like helping the kids. It makes me feel like I’m making a difference.”

Roman studied her for a moment, as if weighing her words. “It’s good work. Not everyone can do it.”

Azure wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or an observation, but she appreciated it nonetheless. There was something grounding about talking to him, even if he kept most of his thoughts to himself. He had a presence that made her feel like he could understand things without having to spell them out.

She sighed softly, looking down as her mind went back to the conversation she had with Dr. Rollins earlier in the day. It was good work. And Azure loved her job, but it seemed like for the past twenty-four hours, her emotions had almost put that at risk. 

Roman looked at her, his brow lifting slightly as he watched her, though his expression remained neutral. “What happened?”

“So, I had kind of a rough morning,” she began, trying to sound casual. “Ran late for work—had one of those mornings where everything just slows you down, you know?” Azure hesitated for a moment, unsure how much she should share about the emotional start to her day. But she pushed forward, deciding to keep it simple. “I guess just…adjusting to the move. It’s been kind of overwhelming at times.”

Roman nodded, his arms still crossed over his chest. His eyes softened slightly, as if he understood that feeling all too well.

“Anyway,” Azure continued, “I barely made it on time, and then Dr. Rollins called me into his office.”

At the mention of Dr. Rollins, she noticed a slight change in Roman’s posture. It was subtle—his shoulders tensed just a little, and his jaw seemed to set. He didn’t say anything, but the reaction was there. Quiet, but noticeable.

Azure paused, wondering if she should keep going, but she was already in the middle of the story. “He wanted to check in, see how I was adjusting to the job. I think I caught his attention because I was running behind this morning. We talked about how I’ve been handling the workload, the transition to a new place… that sort of thing.”

Roman’s gaze darkened just a fraction, and though he didn’t say anything right away, his silence felt heavier now. Azure could feel something unspoken hanging between them.

“How’d that go?” Roman asked, his voice calm but with a slight edge to it. It wasn’t aggressive, but it wasn’t as relaxed as before either.

“It was fine, I guess,” Azure said, unsure why Roman seemed so affected by the mention of Dr. Rollins. “He was nice, just… doing his job. Making sure I’m not overwhelmed, that I’m keeping up with things.”

Roman nodded slowly, but his eyes seemed distant for a moment. He shifted his weight, uncrossing his arms, and glanced toward the street, as if gathering his thoughts. There was something he wasn’t saying, something that made his reaction to Dr. Rollins more than just casual indifference.

“You work with him a lot?” Roman asked, his voice even quieter now.

“Not too much. Mostly with Bianca or Ms. B, but he’s the head of the department, so we cross paths.”

Roman didn’t respond right away. His eyes narrowed slightly as if he were trying to piece something together. His quiet intensity was beginning to feel a little more guarded than it had a moment ago.

Roman shrugged, but there was an unmistakable tension now, barely hidden under the surface. “Just be careful. He can be… hypocritical.”

There was a pause, the weight of Roman’s words lingering between them. Azure wasn’t sure how to respond. It was clear Roman had some kind of opinion about Dr. Rollins, but whatever it was, he wasn’t willing to go into detail. It left her feeling slightly unsettled.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, her voice softening. “Thanks for the heads up.”

Roman nodded, but the quiet tension didn’t leave him. He shifted his focus back to her, his gaze slightly more guarded than before. Whatever his issue with Dr. Rollins was, it was clear it ran deeper than just a passing thought.

“So,” Roman said after a pause, “if you need anything—questions about the neighborhood, places to go, whatever—don’t hesitate to ask.” 

Azure nodded, feeling a warmth in his offer, even though he still seemed distant. “I appreciate that. I’ll definitely let you know if I need anything.”

There was a brief moment of silence between them, the kind where something more could be said, but neither of them took the step to say it.

“Well,” Roman said finally, taking a step back, “I should probably head back inside. Audrey’s probably getting into something she shouldn’t.”

Azure smiled at the mention of the little girl. “She seems sweet.”

“She is,” Roman replied, his tone softening just a fraction. There was something in his eyes then—something that flickered briefly but quickly disappeared, as if he’d pulled a curtain over whatever it was he wasn’t ready to share. “Anyway, welcome again. I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah,” Azure said, watching as Roman turned and headed back toward his house. “See you around.”

-