#and helen delivers 100% of the time

[sailoryooons]

Incubus yoongi x reader

Go wild with smut maybe theres fluff and angst too! Love your writing so much

☾ Pairing: Incubus!Yoongi x archdevil!Reader

☾ Summary: 

Sunder (sun·​der) transitive verb : to break apart or in two : to separate by or as if by violence or by intervening time or space Sunder (sun·​der) intransitive verb : to become parted, disunited, or severed

☾ Word Count: 5,297

☾ Genre: Smut, Forbidden Romance, Angst, Fated Lovers

☾ Rating: 18+ Minors are strictly prohibited from engaging and reading this content. It contains explicit content and any minors discovered reading or engaging with this work will be blocked immediately. 

☾ Warnings: Vague worldbuilding - this takes place in a Hell setting so.. Lots of talk of literal hell, implied violence and war, themes of classism/species racism, hint of political scheming, depiction of servants who are chained/collared, implications of sex work/incubi being bread specifically for sex work, honestly Yoongi and reader kinda give co-dependant vibes, explicit language, explicit sexual content including oral (f. receiving), unprotected sex, a little bit of overstim, cum eating if you squitn, multiple orgasms, bleeding/scratching/biting, possessive themes… um I don’t know the smut scene is more PrOsEy than straight-up smut. 

☾ Published: Sunday, April 7 2024

☾ A/N: We are using Forgotten Realms (dnd) lore because I was randomly inspired to do so. You need zero knowledge of Forgotten Realms or dnd lore to read this - there is vague world building and references to a plot on the side that I imagine Yoongi and reader are a part of but that does not happen in this little one shot. I just did it for the tension and because I’m out of control. 100% change I got some dnd lore wrong - don’t care, I kinda made it my own in parts as needed!!! Thank you!!! 

☾ A/N 2: Dear anon, I don’t have a clue what this is, but it was inspired by a very specific scene in the movie Troy when Paris (Orlando Bloom) sneaks up to Helen’s (Diane Kruger) room while the Greeks and Trojans are downstairs partying and he’s like hehe let’s bang it out. That’s it. I really hope you like this because sometimes I fill requests and I'm like ..... that probably was not what they had in mind and yet here I am, delivering whatever ??? this is ??

☾ Disclaimer: All members of BTS are faces and name claims for this story. This is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgment or representation of real-life people. Any scenarios or representations of the people and places mentioned in works are not representative of real-life scenarios.

Main Masterlist ☾Filled Requests ☾ Masterlist  Milestone Request Event ☾ Ask

Note: I don't use my tag list for requests!

A pair of dark eyes in the shadows around the party catches your attention as you listen to Archdevil Belial's drone about his victory in Phlegethos. The fiend’s words fall on deaf ears as your gaze narrows to a deadly point on the man lingering in the shadows across the room, keeping away from the revelry with a single chalice in his hand.

And he’s staring at you. 

You feel your muscles constrict as you flick your gaze away, your heart rate picking up speed as you try and focus on Belial again. It isn’t a story you care to hear about - he’s been droning about his defeat of the Kelemvor worshipers on the fiery planes of Phlegethos. Hardly a battle as much as a skirmish outside of the city gates that demanded his attention. 

Archdevil Belial is none the wiser that the creature he really desires to kill is lurking at the edge of the party, burning eyes on you as he cocks his head and glances toward the empty staircase that leads toward the living quarters. 

There’s a twitch of irritation in your stomach as Yoongi turns and vanishes into the shadows. He is good at being seen only when he wants to, which works in his favor when he enters the hall of his greatest enemies, all in one room because of war meetings against the very fiend who now slips upstairs to your bedroom. 

It was only a matter of time before Yoongi showed up - despite the level of stupidity it takes to show up in the hall of your sworn enemy. Yoongi likes to show off though. He likes to remind his enemies - and himself - that he is not so easily kept out of places that he wants to be. 

Especially if those places he’s being kept from have you inside of them. 

“Thank you for the conversation, Lord Belial,” you interrupt. The devil looks at you with his mouth open, eyes blazing as you interrupt him to dismiss yourself. You feel a small twist of satisfaction. “I must retire for the evening. I am returning home tomorrow before starting my campaign through the realms to ensure my father’s army are being… led properly.”

Belial’s face twitches in irritation. You’re above his station - though not too far - and decorum is everything in matters of spoken insult. “Yes,” he agrees. “It is important for our… figureheads to inspire. The Whip of Asmodeus paints a threatening picture, to be sure. It is hard to be of influence on the battlefield - we do appreciate your efforts off the field.” 

A laugh like cutting glass bubbles from your lips. “You honor me.” You feel the ice in your mouth when you dip your head politely, pretending to be unbothered by the implication that you’re nothing but an empty threat. “I will see you in a tenday, Lord Belial, when I come to inspire in Phlegethos.”

With a curt turn, you cut through the party toward the stone dias. Those in attendance part for you like water parting around a sharp boulder, hurrying to get out of your way. Figurehead or real threat doesn’t matter - you’re the daughter of their lord and by rights their lady. 

Your father sits on his throne of twisted bone and fire ahead of the party, crimson eyes drinking in all that happens from his seat of power. Yet he has missed something incredibly important that now lingers upstairs waiting for you. The thought makes your lips twitch in a smirk as you ascend the stairs to where Asmodeus sits, a giddy tingle in your belly. 

A beautiful incubus boy sits next to the throne on the floor, a gold collar around his neck with a glittering chain that leads to Asdmodeous’ hand. The incubus looks at your father with adoration, gold eyes burning. Mouth agape. Breath catching. 

You don’t know how much of it is performance. It’s always hard to tell with the lower level fiends what is real and what is an act. It’s part of the dangerous game they play, and thought you’re more accustomed to their kind - especially the one lurking in your room - you’re still unsure how to tell the difference with this one.

You catch the scent of honey and vanilla as you step nearer, though the incubus doesn’t look at you. You immediately feel the ebbing power of allure from the creature, battering your senses just being so close. Asmodeus seems unaffected by the battering power of lust radiating from the incubus, but you see the two guards behind him glance toward the creature on the floor. 

You grit your teeth and ignore the twist in your gut, trying not to be irritated. Only one man has power over you this way. It isn’t the incubus’ fault that he’s doing what he was trained to do, but the sudden pitch in your stomach and dizziness you feel around him unsettles you. 

“I am returning to my chambers, Father,” you murmur, bowing deeply. “I have grown wear of Belial’s peacocking.” 

Behind him are two massive Orthons, no less than eight feet in height and wide like a troll. Their horns are curling and battle-scarred, ugly tusks showing from thick, fat lips. The beasts are hellish weapons from wars passed, now assigned to the personal guard of your father. You note that they also did not notice the shadowy incubus slipping into their party and up the stairwell.

It almost makes you tsk. Even for a creature as skilled and powerful as Yoongi, slipping past an entire party full of the most powerful infernals in the realms is impressive. He is, of course, more than just an incubus now, but still. The sheer magnitude of doing it successfully is not lost on you - and makes you worried for his sanity. 

“Sleep well,” Admodeous voice rumbles, his voice like stones grinding together. “Tomorrow, you return to Malbolge and ready to set out on your campaign.” His fiery eyes turn to you and you feel the weight of the burning Nine Hells press against you. “They will feel the crack of the Whip of Asmodeous and know that we are mighty. 

“It will be done.”

“She is as pretty as My Lord is,” the incubus boy purrs from where he sits at the foot of the throne. You glance at him, realizing that his golden gaze has broken away from your father and turned to you. Your stomach twists in equal parts anger, guilt, and disgust as you feel the lick of his power. “The House of Asmodeus is as beautiful as they are powerful.”

Again, it’s hard to discern if the incubus is performing or if he means it. Asmodeus pulls the chain hard, yanking incubus toward him. You hear his neck pop, though it doesn’t break as the creature wimpers at the sudden show of violence. “Do not speak to her, worm. You are nothing. She is the Heir Apparent and Princess of the Nine Hells. You are fodder.” 

The incubus cowers, and ducks his head away from you, curling in on himself. The sensual allure to him lessens distinctly, the energy souring. You feel your fingers twitch as you think of Yoongi. It is not difficult to guess that Asmodeous’ newfound desire to humiliate and dissipate incubi and succubi are inspired by his hatred and inability to rid himself of Yoongi’s stain. 

Swallowing thickly, you bow once more, slipping backward off the dias and toward the stairs that lead upward. No one guards them - there are supposed to be no enemies at this party - and shadow falls over them, the torches flickering as though watching you ascend.

Music and voices follow you up the stairs, the soft click of your shoes against the carved stone louder in the growing silence as you navigate to your bedrooms. The staircase winds and the sounds drift further away from you until it’s only the crackling of occasional sconces and your steps.

Two heavy doors in the west wing of the Citadel belong to your bedroom. The crackling energy of the arcana buzzing along them acting as a lock makes your skin tingle. You mutter the password and feel the pop of magic as it vanishes, allowing you to push heavily against one of the doors to grind it open. 

The room is both yours and not. It was your room for most of your life growing up under the ruler of the Nine Hells, opulent and dark, full of old possessions and heavy, draping curtains to keep out the smoke and ruin, rich art painted by careful hands with red and purple splashed across canvas. 

Now, it feels like a room that belonged to someone else entirely. You’re no longer the vicious little thing that thought would sit on the throne in Nessus one day. You’re no longer the unthinking weapon that Asmodeous uses to maintain order and public punishment. 

A large bed stands on a lifted dais, covered in silks and piled high with pillows. They lay undisturbed as you close the door behind you and mutter the password again, feeling the static of magic seal them shut behind you. It would take a small army to batter through them, thankfully. 

Your eyes scour the room. Embers burn in a smoldering fireplace, offering little light in the dimness of the bedroom. A large sitting area stretches to the right with leather chairs and velvet chaises, tables covered in untouched books and scrolls. 

To the left is an open study, a heavy wooden desk in the middle of the room backed with bookshelf-covered walls and heavy chests locked with tombs inside. You see the cover of a journal flipped open, the only sign that Yoongi had been lingering in your study snooping. 

Your mouth twitches at the corner as you look away from it. Yoongi leaving something out of place is only ever on purpose, a confirmation to you that yes - his visit has double meaning. You might be the primary reason the incubus and favored chosen warrior of a death god has snuck into his enemy’s home, but you’re not the only reason. Of course he is looking for any extra information he can use against his enemies. 

It stings a little more than you’d like. 

Stepping further into the room, you swivel your gaze back and forth, looking for a sign of the slippery man himself. A master of shadows, Yoongi is only seen when he wants to be. Strange, for a fiend whose very nature is to be seen and devoured, to give and to receive, to lure and enjoy. Most of his life has been spent in spectacle, and now he spends it in the shadows. 

Warm breath brushes against the back of your neck, making your skin prickle. “I like this dress.” 

“You shouldn’t be here.”

Yoongi’s callused fingers brush up your arm. It’s a ghost of touch but it makes your eyelids flutter shut, warmth thrumming in your stomach immediately. Unlike the incubus downstairs, you don’t feel a magnetic pull that is arcane here. You just feel the pull to Yoongi - a desire that is your own and fueled by nothing else. 

He has no reason to use his charm here. It makes you shiver as you lean backward into him, eager to feel the solidness of his chest and smell the sweet wine on his breath. 

“You always say that,” he purrs, the words low and scratchy. His other hand comes up to brush his fingers up and down your other arm, pulling you toward him full. You melt, fading into him faster than you should. “When will you learn that I will go wherever you are?” 

“Even if it means your own demise? You’re in the Citadel of Asmodeus.” 

“He’s killed me before.” Yoongi’s touch is more solid now, hands exploring your waist and curves, squeezing your flesh, pressing you against his waist. You rest the back of your head against his neck, inhaling cedarwood and sage. “I’m not so easily destroyed.” 

“Don’t.” 

You don’t want to recall the many times Yoongi has been wrenched away from you. Each time a little closer to permanence than the last. Time and time again, he has been ripped from your hands as your father attempts to destroy the fate linking you, to burn it until there is no tether there. 

“You’ve been good,” Yoongi notes. His hand goes to the silk strings on the side of your dress, pulling them undone. “He truly thinks you no longer think of me? That he has succeeded where he has failed a dozen times before?” 

“Yes.”

“His arrogance knows no bounds. He’ll think he’s a god, soon enough.”

You turn your head to the side, brushing your mouth against Yoongi’s. His lips are warm and taste of wine, urging your tongue to swipe across his bottom lip for a taste. “Is he not?” you ask against his mouth, fighting the need to shiver as one side of your dress falls open. “He rules the Nine Hells absolutely.” 

“Oh come off it,” He laughs. “You and I both know that isn’t true, otherwise he wouldn’t be in a civil war. Plus… I have recently acquired Avernus and Dis.” 

You straighten and turn around sharply to look at him, brows furrowing. For a moment, you forget what it is he’s said to shock you. You’re hypnotized by eyes dark enough that they reflect the stars when in the mortal world, a mouth that is soft and sensuous, a gentle, round nose that is opposed to the way he can turn it up at someone in a sneer. A faded scar over one eye - one of many that he's received over the years.

Yoongi is beautiful the way the moon is, distant and cold, but with a glow of softness that is often underestimated. 

You had made that mistake before. A long time ago, incubi and the lower creatures of the Nine Hells hadn’t been a blip on your radar. They were nothing to a princess of the Nine Hells, someone whose entire purpose for existing would be to one day step into ruling over all nine of the realms crushed in your father’s fist. 

Now, you know better. You’d been a silly, arrogant girl then, head filled with dreams of ruling over the dread cities and bringing the dukes and duchesses to heel. You’d never considered that perhaps your existence was more for appearances and leverage than anything else. 

A puppet. 

Belial, was, unfortunately, quite right about that. 

“What do you mean you have Avernus and Dis?”

“The skirmish in Phlegethos was a distraction. The dukes and duchess’ have been so frenzied about making sure they don’t have any disruptions in their rule that Belial scrambled to deal with his, turning his eye away from the others. Mammon… well you know Mammon. He is not a concern, for now. He cares little who holds Avernus and Dis.” You narrow your eyes at him. “I had help with Dis.”

That sours your stomach. “Bel.” 

“He has no love for Zariel. And he’s from Dis.”

“He’s a traitor. You’d do well not to trust him. Who knows when he’ll turn on you if promised something.”

“The Nine Hells are full of traitors.” Yoongi’s deft fingers undo the other side of your dress. “Including me. You think I would not sell out every single one of my fighters for you, hmm?” Yoongi presses a wet kiss to your jaw. You lean your head back to give him access to your throat. “You think I wouldn’t throw away being Kelemvor’s chosen and carrying his mantle for a chance to have you forever?” 

“You do have me.”

“Not in the way we are designed.” His voice is a growl as he bites at your throat, teeth scraping. You feel dizzy in his arms, but he holds you steadfast. “You were designed for me by the wheels of fate, and I for you. All of this - war, death, political scheming - it stands in our way and I would betray the god who gives me my many lives to cut to the chase in an instant.” 

The rage-laced words are an anger you’re familiar with. Two creatures born to exist for one another - more than fated mates. Your very existence tied to Yoongi’s is a matter of universal balance, two threads of fabric that must remain woven together, lest the realms collapse. 

Divine Scales. Two lives bound together that must remain in balance for the rest of the world to exist. You and Yoongi are not the only Divine Scales in the realms, but you’re perhaps one of the most difficult to balance in a world set on keeping you apart. 

You, the daughter of the Archduke of the Nine Hells. Yoongi, an incubus servant whose purpose was to lure, steal, and spy on behalf of Asmodeus. It was an unfit match that your father was set on destroying - his daughter an heir would not be tied to a lowly creature of lust and servitude. 

“Careful,” you murmur as Yoongi peels the fabric from your skin. The air is warm but you feel a shiver anyway, nipples pebbling at the temperature change. “Your god might not like to hear you say such things.”

“He is not my god,” Yoongi mutters. His eyes are hungry, burning with desire as he drinks you in, his fingers gripping the flesh at your hips. “He is a convenience. I need power to take control of the Nine Hells, he gives me power. You are the only being I worship. The only goddess I recognize.” Yoongi sinks to his knees and your stomach flips. He looks up at you, lips parted and pupils blown, eyes so dark you could spill into them and never find your way. “Let me prove my devotion. Let me worship the only divinity I’ve ever known.”

Yoongi’s words are a spell on you, and not because he’s in an incubus, created and bred to be alluring and lead mortals to the Hells to give up their souls. Yoongi’s words have power because he is Yoongi, a being who he designed to be your other half. Another being you love so entirely that you intend to sacrifice the realm you call home, that you actively betray the people you’ve known since you were a child in order to be with him. 

These snatches with him are so few and far between. He fights a war against your father and his archdevils while you unravel them from the inside. Two knives carving away at the system which fights to keep you apart. 

You forget about all of the atrocities committed and to come. You push away the anxiety that Yoongi is thwarting his power by coming to the seat of his enemy’s power, just because he can and because he wants you. 

Instead, you focus on the way his mouth leaves wet kisses across your thighs. Yoongi’s fingers press into the back of your legs, holding you to him as his tongue lavs at a small scar on your hip, his teeth nipping the flesh.

Your world falls away as his tongue and mouth suck at your skin. Heat gathers between your legs, feeling the wet ache in your folds as Yoongi purposefully avoids going toward the apex of your thighs, instead showering your inner thighs, calves, and hips with soft kisses. 

Strong hands pry your legs apart. You let him slide your foot over, widening your stance easily. You cannot recall a single person you have ever been pliable for. You are the Whip of Asmodeous, a sharp weapon made to force subservience and delve out punishment. 

You are no whip in Yoongi’s hands. You are silk, sliding through his fingers as his mouth presses closer and closer to your heart. To everyone else, you are a weapon. To Yoongi, you’re just you. A mind to adore, a body to worship. 

Your knees threaten to buckle when the first, slow swipe of his tongue runs up your drenched folds. Yoongi chuckles, the sound throaty. Gently, he lifts a leg and pulls it over his shoulder, providing a counterweight as you stand but also giving him access to your aching cunt, pressing his face close as he licks you from hole to throbbing clit again. 

“Yoongi,” you whisper, a hand shooting to his hair. Your fingers slide through soft, silk strands and twist, rooting him there. He groans in appreciation, focusing his tongue on slow, up-and-down licks, avoiding your clit as he works. “Fuck.” 

He hums, the feeling buzzing through your pussy as he closes his mouth over it, sucking gently. His mouth is wet and warm, tongue soft as it circles your aching bundle of nerves. Your legs feel gummy as you waver, holding onto him to keep yourself standing as much as you are to keep him in place.

Yoongi’s hunger can rarely be sated. He devours you, mouth eager as he sucks and licks at you, lips smacking loudly as he does. You barely register the obscene noise, canting your hips up into his mouth as the pleasure begins to build slowly. 

A hand presses into your ass, pressing you harder against the flat of his tongue. Yoongi opens his mouth and sticks out his tongue, looking up at you with fucked out eyes as he urges you to fuck his face at your pace, to use him like a god would use a conduit. 

Yoongi is your conduit, and you are his. You vowed centuries ago to be his whip, a weapon at his command. He vowed to be your shield, your knife in the dark. 

The powers of the Hells would keep you apart. Beyond the impropriety that someone so lowborn could be fated for one of the highest powers among the infernals, the two of you together are too much of a threat. Too much power tied to one another, a divine match that cannot be broken.

Still, they try. 

The two of you have died before. Keeping you dead isn’t easy, though. Neither can truly die while the other lives and no one has quite managed to kill you both simultaneously - a familial crutch that Asmodeus cannot seem to overcome. 

You’d die every day to have this moment with Yoongi, your breath caught in your lungs, sweat beading on the small of your back, head tilted back as your heart beats so loud it's all you can hear. You feel every part of your body coil before there is a moment of white noise as your orgasm crests over, your cunt squeezing, your hand pulling his hair. 

Yoongi drinks you in like he cannot get enough. Gluttonous, ravenous man, pressing into your heat as he sucks. Your hands tug at his hair, the stimulation going from warm and fluid to sharp and biting. He grows a little when you pull his face back by the strands of his hair, a picture of madness with the lower half of his face covered in your slick, lips red and swollen, eyes unfocused. 

You pull and he stands, knocking you back as he does. You stumble the remaining footsteps to your bed, mouths connecting in a tangle of teeth, tongue, spit and cum. You taste yourself on him, sucking his tongue greedily into his mouth as your hands claw at his shirt, desperate to feel his skin against yours. 

He complies, letting you push the shirt off his shoulders as he climbs over you, pressing a knee between your legs as he traps your lips in a searing kiss again. Your lips feel bruised where you kiss, his mouth demanding. His hands claw at your hips, pulling you down into his knee, grinding your slick cunt against his leg.

You let out a breathy sound, both from the feeling of pleasure blooming between your legs once again and the warmth of his skin, your hands rubbing across his chest, seeking to chase the inferno within. Yoongi has always been warm, but something hotter burns in him now. Something divine, vicious, and powerful lurking beneath his skin, the unlikely power of a god of death lurking just beneath the surface. 

You know that Kelemvor, the God of Death and Lord of Judgement has chosen Yoongi as a conduit of power because Yoongi seeks the balance of the world - he is a part of the balance of the world. His very existence is paramount to a deity whose very nature is to maintain the scales. 

It doesn’t stop you from wanting to eat away at the divinity under Yoongi’s skin, to drive out the influence that isn’t yours, to assert your dominance over a god and remind him that Yoongi does not belong to Kelemvor, he is not an extension of death. He belongs to you and you alone. 

It is an irrational, violent bout of jealousy that overtakes you for a moment. Your nails rake down his chest a little too hard, leaving trails of blood beneath. You bit his bottom lip a little too hard, the taste of iron and salt spilling into your mouth with his tongue. 

Yoongi smirks against your scarlet mouth, pulling back to look down at you. He knows what it is you seek. Yoongi always knows. Your minds are not connected, but your souls are and there is little you can hide from him. “You cannot rip him out of me, no matter how much you want to.” 

“I will try.” 

“Good.” He leans down and bites hard on your collarbone, making you gasp. “I will tear Asmodeous’ influence from you in kind.” 

Your hands are less harsh as you undo the laces of his pants, pulling them down powerful thighs. Your viciousness cools in the shower of the whisper of his love against your ear and the scrap of his tongue against your skin. Every single part of you burns hotter than the deepest part of the Hells, driven there by him alone. 

You love him - such a simple word could convey it accurately, anyway.

It seems too small of a word, unable to fit the fountain of want, desire, trust, and yearning that spills out of you into such a small cup. You don’t know if love can truly hold everything you feel for him, if it conveys that there is nothing god, archdevil, or fate that would stop you from being here with Yoongi, getting to touch him, to taste him, to whisper into his mouth as he presses the head of his cock into your weeping entrance. 

“You’re mine,” you gasp, rolling your hips forward to meet the slow, powerful strokes of his cock. Yoongi cradles you to him, his hands gripping you tighter as he presses your bodies together, as though you could meld. “Mine mine mine.” 

“I’m yours,” he agrees, voice throaty and strained. “Who else could I belong to?” 

You have no answer. Stars dance behind your eyelids as you move to his rhythm. Yoongi’s skin is heated and sticky as he moves against you. You feel his heartbeat in exact time with yours, twin rhythms. Your arms wind around his shoulders, fingers twisting in the hair at the nape of his neck. You feel the muscle of his back and shoulder flex as he fucks you slowly, each stroke pointed and driving you to the edge again. 

Yoongi’s mouth brushes yours. You breathe in his air, unable to put anything else into words, thoughts consumed with him. With how he tastes, with how he smells, with how he feels. Nestled in the deepest part of you, you feel home. It is such a rare feeling, only discovered here like this, connected. 

It makes your breath catch, barely audible above Yoongi’s low groaning and the loud smack of skin against skin. Your heels dig into the bed, head pressing into the mattress as you throw your head back, unable to do anything but take what Yoongi is giving you. 

His pace quickens, slamming into your cunt with enough force to break you. But you do not break - you could never break with him. You squirm in his hold, babbling and panting and trying to breathe as he drives you to the edge of madness - and then you peak. 

A wild sound escapes you as you seize into him, muscles clenching, cunt spasming. Yoongi’s thrusts turn vicious, fucking you through your orgasm as you clench down on him with a vice grip. His fingers grip the back of your neck, pulling you toward his chest as he leans backward, your legs sliding as he seats you in his lap, fucking up into you. 

“Imagine thinking they could take you away from me,” Yoongi hisses. His thrusts are sloppy and hard, spearing you and sending you hurtling right toward the edge again. You submit to him, head lolling to the side as he takes you. “Imagine thinking that you could defy a prewritten fate that you are mine, that you are anything less than what was made for me.” 

A sob slips through your lips. You cannot think of a response, only able to cling to him as though to say yes. 

“They cannot take you away from me,” he growls. “I will destroy this world again and again if they try. They cannot sunder what is here, they cannot rip you away from me any more than you can rip the stars from the sky.” 

Just as you begin to teeter on the edge, Yoongi slams his hips home, clenching as he comes. “You cannot be anything else but mine.”

It sends you hurling over the edge again, so powerful that you forget where you are for a moment. It is intoxicating, this bliss that unfurls like the flowers of a petal. Nothing exists here but calm water and the scent and taste of Yoongi. There is no war here. No fight to keep you apart. No demands, no expectations. It’s just you and him. Like it was always meant to be. 

Slowly, awareness creeps back toward you. It is a lumbering, lazy thing. You only feel somewhat aware that you’re in a bed and that you feel the heat of Yoongi next to you, the press of his mouth against your shoulder. The aftereffects of sleeping with an incubus are not lost on you, even as a powerful infernal. 

Everything feels melted, like it could fall through your fingers like grains of sand. Perhaps you could float away if you tried, but Yoongi grounds you. The feeling of his hand on your hip and his mouth on your skin is the most solid thing that exists in this world in between, keeping you tethered to something real. Something substantial. 

When you blink away the sticky high of the post-orgasm daze, Yoongi is watching you with soft, round eyes. The burning desire is still there, but at the forefront is adoration. Worship. Love. Anything stronger than words can describe. 

“Are you okay?” he kisses your jaw before drawing back to examine your face. You nod, head heavy. “Too much?”

“No. Not with you. Never with you.” 

His mouth twitches like he’s unsure. You nestle closer to him, closing your eyes as you’re cupped in the safety of his presence. “With Avernus and Dis at your command, you can take Phlegethos,” you murmur. “Mammon will give you Minauros if you can do that.” 

“Hmm.” 

Your eyes flutter open, watching as Yoongi closes his. You can tell by the twitch in his mouth that he is thinking. “I will deliver you Phlegethos.” He cracks an eye open and looks at you, seeing the hunger that burns there. “Belial needs a good whip to put him in place.” 

“The Whip of Asmodeous?” 

“No.” You grin. “The Whip of Kelemvor’s Chosen.” 

[annabelle--cane]

do we have any information on the approximate dates or year that TMA takes place in? I’m obsessed with timelines and I’m so curious about if those dates are Known or not or can only be guessed about

yes we do! some parts of the timeline are a little vague, but every live and "in situ" statement (with a few exceptions) has a date attached to it. I won't go through every known date, and I'm also not scrupulously checking to make sure I've copied all these numbers down correctly so there's probably an error or two in here, but some significant ones include:

s1

mag 13 - alone: the first live statement and the first hard date for the show, 13 january 2016

mag 22 - colony: martin's statement after being trapped by jane prentiss, 12 march 2016

mag 26 - a distortion: sasha's statement about meeting michael, 2 april 2016 (<- that was my fourteenth birthday :3)

mag 38 / mag 39 / mag 40: jane prentiss's attack on the institute, sasha's death, and all the debrief statements afterwards, 29 july 2016

s2

mag 41 - too deep: jon's statement about exploring the tunnels and his first supplemental tape about gertrude's murder, 2 september 2016

mag 43 - section 31: basira's statement about diego molina + the start of her giving gertrude's old tapes to jon, 19 september 2016

mag 47 - the new door: helen's statement about the hallways, we meet michael in person for the first time, 2 october 2016

mag 61 - hard shoulder: daisy's statement about seeing the coffin for the first time, 1 december 2016

mag 73 - police lights: basira's statement about rescuing callum brodie from maxwell rayner, 11 february 2017

mag 76 - the smell of blood: melanie's statement about her investigations into war ghosts, at the end she and jon have a bit of a fight about how That Is Not Sasha, 13 february 2017

mag 78 / mag 79 / mag 80: jon releases not-sasha from the table, martin and tim get trapped in the corridors, jon meets leiter, elias smashes leitner with a metal pipe, all on 16 february 2017

s3

mag 81 / mag 82: jon makes a statement at georgie's place about a guest for mr spider at the same time as daisy interviews the remaining archives staff to try and ascertain his whereabouts, 18 february 2017

mag 89 - twice as bright: statement of jude perry, ft. jon hand crispification, 24 april 2017

mag 91 / mag 92 (/ maybe mag 93?): statement of mike crew, death of mike crew, jon daisy and basira's encounter in the woods, the big elias conversation at the institute, 28 april 2017. mag 93 might also be recorded on this day, I'm not quite sure, because georgie's statement (mag 94) is 29 april, but I don't know if that's fully the next day or if jon got back really late on the 28th, recorded mag 93, and then georgie gave her statement in the wee hours of the 29th. up to interpretation and how little sleep you envision jon as having.

mag 100 - I guess you had to be there: lynne hammond's is 2 may 2017, robin lennox's is 20 may 2017, brian finlinson's is 26 may 2017, and "john smith's" statement doesn't have a date.

mag 111 - family business: gerry's posthumous statement about smirke's 14, 30 june 2017. again, trevor and julia's statement about how they met in mag 109 is dated 29 june, and I don't know if it's an either-side-of-midnight thing or a full day elapsed between them.

mag 118 - the masquerade: martin and melanie pull a fast one on elias while the rest of the gang sets up explosives in the unknowing, 6 august 2017.

mag 120 - eye contact: elias's statement about jon's coma dreams + elias's arrest, 9 august 2017.

s4

mag 121 / mag 122: oliver banks gives his statement about point nemo and jon wakes up, 15 february 2018

mag 128 - heavy goods: breekon deliver's the coffin and jon slurps a statement right out of his head, 3 march 2018

mag 132 - entombed: jon buries himself alive to rescue daisy, 24-26 march 2018

mag 141 - doomed voyage: on the boat to norway jon slurps a statement about mikaele salesa out of a shiphand's head, 11 june 2018

mag 142 - scrutiny: jess tyrell comes in to complain about jon slurping a statement out of her head and haunting her nightmares, 12 june 2018

mag 146 / mag 147: jon gets intervened on about all the brain slurping, they go to hilltop road and find annabelle's statement, 20 july 2018

mag 157 / mag 158 / mag 159: peter releases not-sasha and brings martin to the panopticon for a showdown with "elias," julia and trevor attack the institute, daisy goes monster mode, and jon follows martin into the lonely and saves him with the power of gay love and also slurping peter lukas's brain so hard he explodes badly, 25 september 2018

mag 160 - the eye opens: jon reads a normal statement and nothing bad happens, 18 october 2018.

s5

fuck if I know

[mariacallous]

A week after Hurricane Helene ripped through the southeastern United States, parts of western North Carolina devastated by the storm are still facing more than 400 road closures. “There are places we can’t get to,” a government official told a local paper. Photos that have made it out of the region show local roads entirely washed away, and others still covered in water.

That this degree of flooding could happen in this part of the country—far inland and long touted by real estate experts as a “climate haven”—demonstrates that the devastating effects of climate change can be felt anywhere and everywhere. Last week, some parts of North Carolina saw more than 2.5 feet of rain in three days. The storm and its floodwaters have killed at least 200 people nationwide, with over 100 still missing in the North Carolina mountains.

A key part of the recovery in North Carolina and elsewhere will be rebuilding the roads, both for supplies to get where they need to go and for a sense of normalcy. In general, states are responsible for building and maintaining their own roads, and the last few years have seen more and more of them grapple with the realities of climate change. “All departments of transportation are looking at more resilient infrastructure in the face of these increased weather events,” says Kevin Marshia, a former Vermont transportation official who is now the director of engineering at the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, a national organization.

Early in the North Carolina disaster response, federal agencies delivered vital food and supplies to residents via “air bridges”—airlifts—and even mules. The Army Corps of Engineers has deployed experts to the region to help with debris removal, water management, and road and bridge inspections. Florida—arguably the national leader in protecting assets from floodwaters—says it has contributed infrastructure damage-assessment teams and temporary bridge materials, which likely include lower-weight steel structures that can be erected without too many tools.

Generally, officials try to get transport back up and running on damaged roads through temporary fixes, including restricting traffic to lanes that can safely handle any vehicles. In the short term, engineers might, for example, replace a washed-away 4-foot culvert (a drain pipe under a road) with whatever size they have premade and close by, knowing they’ll eventually have to go back and install a much deeper, 20-foot version, says Marshia.

The New 50-Year Flood

Longer-term fixes to prepare infrastructure for climate change start with data. Traditionally, engineers use a specific historical flood as a design reference point, says Steve Muench, a civil and environmental engineering professor at the University of Washington who studies transportation infrastructure. A 50-year storm is the sort that can be expected every 50 years; a 100-year storm is a much more intense one that can be expected, yes, every century.

But engineers now realize that more intense weather patterns mean they can’t design simply based on historical records. For every project, transportation engineers need to figure out “how to shift their design procedures from using historical records to ones with better climate prediction,” Muench says.

These more “armored” road projects do typically cost more. But more public officials—though not all public officials—have realized that hardening their roads against intensifying weather will save money in the long run.

Typically, Muench says, the solution isn’t something too complicated: Just build infrastructure higher. But engineers can’t build roads and bridges to survive every disaster, which would lead to expensive, overbuilt projects that would “take generations to finish,” says Muench.

‘Rice Krispie’ Roads

When engineers are rebuilding roads from scratch, they have also started to use different materials to account for the possibility of lots of water arriving really quickly. In the past decade, road builders have increasingly installed more permeable, “spongy” roads.

Pervious concrete, unlike regular concrete, usually excludes sand from the typical “gravel, sand, cement, water” recipe. It also has a lower water-to-cement ratio, which creates a thick paste before it dries. “It’s like caramel popcorn, or a Rice Krispie bar,” says Nara Almeida, who studies the material as an assistant teaching professor in the civil engineering program at the University of Washington Tacoma.

On normal concrete roads, water pools and collects, with the stagnant water eventually damaging its various layers, and especially critical underlying ones, which bear vehicles’ heavy loads. But the increased porosity of pervious concrete allows water to flow through the material more easily, so it can reach and be absorbed into the ground—a nice feature for roads subject to lots of wetness.

Pervious concrete does have its downsides. It’s weaker than normal concrete, which means it’s a better fit for sidewalks, parking lots, and low-traffic streets than interstates that expect a lot of heavy trucks. (Research into reinforcing the material with steel, natural, glass, and synthetic fibers is ongoing.) Its porosity means it’s not a great fit for cold climates, where water can seep in, freeze, and break down the material inside. The concrete also needs regular pressure washing or vacuuming, to “unclog” it from the sort of material often found on the roadway—dust, leaves. Because states sometimes have to switch vendors and processes to use the newer material, the projects might cost them more. But some places have put the material on the shoulders of interstates, says Almeida, which are much less likely to get regular tire poundings.

Ultimately, though, there’s not a lot that can be done when a huge volume of water quickly flows across a roadway or the base of a bridge, which engineers call “scour.” “We’ve all played in the backyard with water and hoses—it’s very damaging,” says Muench, the engineering professor. Part of climate resilience is planning ahead—and staging the quick-fix materials nearby—so communities can rebuild quickly.

[confoundedpangolin]

What the fuck. I'm sorry, I don't understand why I never give myself time to process before getting in here and writing out posts, but Nikola? A plastic manikin from a seemingly random mall who stole a voicebox somehow just to talk? That's such an odd season protagonist, not that it's bad, it just leaves so many questions, like how she has sentenence, how she can even move her plastic limbs, if she's a soul trapped in s manikin or just genuinely alive. I think it's a sign of what to come, that fact she's a literal manikin is, I think, not do subtle symbolism that she working for something much more dangerous. And Mike or The Spiral, and Gertrude... was she that desperate? How did she figure out where to find the secret spiral of entities, how did she map the endless hallways to have an end? You can't exactly use trial and error, and she succeeded! She bound a primordial figure, something with the power to kill her and everyone around her, to an archival assistant that was eventually killed, and I hope The Spiral as well, though I doubt it can be killed. Breekon on Hope is proven to ship much more, quite a lot actually, and have connections to Nikola Orsinav's dad, I assume, the ringmaster. I actually think that the manikin is being possessed, since I don't get how having a plastic child would work. I think that, when the whole crew had to get off The Arctic while it disappeared, that it was going to the secret, hidden place where the patrons swirled... for some reason, I don't know what. I also think that one of the secret, hidden places that they got flung off to might be the staircase in the coffin, especially since Breekon and Hope delivered it. So, Helen Richardson, the one who vanished into the hallways, what is she now? She's not the sitter, she's not Helen, but she helps. She rescues Jon from death by Spiral or Circus, I assume she's truthful at least. Gertrude somehow stole a vital skin that would be worn by Nikola at the ritual, but that means the manikin is very important... maybe she's more powerful than I thought? She knows where Georgie lives, and I think Georgie will be bound to the Magnus Institute as well. That weird, loud, screeching sound, I think it means Nikola, or the Circus, or even the Stranger, because it appears when Nikola is there, and never anywhere else (I think) and it's not even the finale. I should've known that something big was coming after episode 100, completely full of random people giving (most likely) fake statements, but I didn't expect this! And why did Nikola think Jon is Elias? Can she not distinguish between two avatars of the Eye? An I just confused? I checked the credits, and Elias isn't even in this episode. I assume this is the same circus from Gertrude's tape, the one that makes weird amalgamations of human parts like messed up legos, in that case I think everyone is fucked completely. Maybe with those cool new eye powers Jon can persuasive essay the Stranger to death, ohhhh if this is only halfway through then the season finale is going to be fucking crazy... and there's two more after that.. aaaaaaaah noooo

[elliepassmore]

Even Though I Knew the End review

4/5 stars Recommended if you like: historical fantasy, urban fantasy, murder mystery, noir, queer reads

I definitely did not read the dust jacket thoroughly before buying this book, but at least I liked it! I don't really do the whole 'sold you soul' thing, I did my time watching Supernatural, but this actually was an interesting, and funny, take on that plot.

What I initially bought the book for was the promise of a SFF noir book, and this 100% delivers on that. It's set in 1940s Chicago and comes with the accent and behaviors you would expect from that. To be honest, the language kind of took me out of it a little even though I know it's accurate to how some people talked at the time, it's just not really my speed. That being said, I did enjoy the historical nature of it and getting to see the different aspects of an older Chicago.

The worldbuilding was interesting as well. We start off with a detective who does auguring and spells, and then slowly over the course of the story we learn more about the kinds of magic that exist and the different varieties of it. From the sound of it, a lot of people have small magics that are just a normal occurrence, like Edith sometimes picking up people's thoughts. Then there are different orders that train more magically inclined people into their service...though what that service is I'm unsure.

Helen sold her soul ten years ago to save her brother's life, now at the brink of that time running out, she's given a chance to save herself and life the life she's always dreamed...but only if she takes a dangerous case. A noir detective through and through, she uses her instincts and skills to track down the murderer, all while piecing together a potential motive. She's got a big heart and is willing to sacrifice to save those she loves (see: the soul bargain she took), but she's also willing to do the right thing when it comes down to it.

I liked Helen's girlfriend, Edith, as well. She's got a religiosity that seems like it would be at odds with Helen, but the two of them work well together. I liked that Edith helps Helen with her photography sometimes, and the two of them have a lovely relationship. Helen's brother, Ted, also comes into the story. I have to say, it's hard to get a read on him, but the love between him and and Helen is clearly still there. I'm glad they were able to talk to each other clearly.

The ending was interesting as well. You know how it ends...but also you don't.

Overall I enjoyed this book and found it to be a quick, fun read. Some of it was predictable, but considering the length of the book that isn't really a big deal.

[oww666]

Lowe's and Builders Quickly Construct 100 Tiny Homes for Helene Survivor...

a company doing something ..last time I posted this they had delivered 7 built by volunteers now looks like they have contracted the job out to pros who are building 100 

[comedicallyterriblemasky]

hi, could i request BEN, eyeless jack, and bloody painter with a S/O that a twitch streamer

Characters: BEN Drowned, Eyeless Jack, Helen Otis (Bloody painter)

S/O?: Yes

S/O type: Gender neutral

CW: None

Tags: SFW

A/N: Anon I hope I delivered

Headcanons below!

BEN Drowned:

Hacks, walks in, pops through the computer during the stream

Supportive, words of positivity

Does not care whatever you do on stream, quote "You do you boo!! Get that bag ❤❤" (I cringed at my own words)

Might randomly spam the chat for funsies

-------

Eyeless Jack:

Accidentally will wander into the room when the stream is happening

Tries not to like, eat organs and stuff if he hears the stream (Due to him being blind he can't actively see when it's happening so he has to listen) Or he might just not care and will eat them right then and there

Supportive, doesn't understand it though like wym there's a service where people can watch you live???

Tries his best to not judge (Judgy ass mf)

------------

Bloody Painter:

Stays tf away from the setup 100% of the time

So very camera shy, stays away at all costs, even when there's no stream

Mainly draws in the next room over

Supportive but doesn't want to be associated with the streams (No bringing up this man at all)

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Paul Blumenthal at HuffPost:

Hurricane Helene left a path of destruction as it moved across a string of Southern U.S. states last week, with an untold amount of property damage and at least 100 people dead. The vast devastation caused by the storm has left many without food and water, or cut off from medical care. Among the logistics issues imposed by the hurricane is one that may not seem immediate, but carries significant consequences: the new struggle for election officials to ensure affected voters can cast their ballots in the Nov. 5 election.

Election officials had already stated concerns about the delivery of mail ballots by the Postal Service in a letter made public on Sept. 11. That letter noted that the Postal Service’s consistent failure to deliver mail on time and the non-standardized use of postmarks across the country could lead to the rejection of properly cast mail ballots in November. “Over the course of the last year, election officials across the country have raised serious questions about processing facility operations, lost or delayed election mail, and front-line training deficiencies impacting USPS’s ability to deliver election mail in a timely and accurate manner,” the letter from the National Association of State Election Directors, the National Association of Secretaries of State and 29 local election official associations said. Those issues are now compounded by Helene’s destruction as thousands may be displaced for an extended period of time, polling locations may be damaged or unreachable, and mail delivery to affected areas is suspended. Adding to the complications is the fact much of the damage is in battleground states like North Carolina, where relatively small numbers of voters could have an outsize impact on election results.

Hurricane Helene’s leaving of a wide swath of destruction could have a massive impact on voting, especially in the key states of Georgia and North Carolina.

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this New York Times story:

California draws more electricity from the sun than any other state. It also has a timing problem: Solar power is plentiful during the day but disappears by evening, just as people get home from work and electricity demand spikes. To fill the gap, power companies typically burn more fossil fuels like natural gas.

That’s now changing. Since 2020, California has installed more giant batteries than anywhere in the world apart from China. They can soak up excess solar power during the day and store it for use when it gets dark.

Those batteries play a pivotal role in California’s electric grid, partially replacing fossil fuels in the evening. Between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. on April 30, for example, batteries supplied more than one-fifth of California’s electricity and, for a few minutes, pumped out 7,046 megawatts of electricity, akin to the output from seven large nuclear reactors.

Across the country, power companies are increasingly using giant batteries the size of shipping containers to address renewable energy’s biggest weakness: the fact that the wind and sun aren’t always available.

“What’s happening in California is a glimpse of what could happen to other grids in the future,” said Helen Kou, head of U.S. power analysis at BloombergNEF, a research firm. “Batteries are quickly moving from these niche applications to shifting large amounts of renewable energy toward peak demand periods.”

Over the past three years, battery storage capacity on the nation’s grids has grown tenfold, to 16,000 megawatts. This year, it is expected to nearly double again, with the biggest growth in Texas, California and Arizona.

Most grid batteries use lithium-ion technology, similar to batteries in smartphones or electric cars. As the electric vehicle industry has expanded over the past decade, battery costs have fallen by 80 percent, making them competitive for large-scale power storage. Government mandates and subsidies have also spurred growth.

As batteries have proliferated, power companies are using them in novel ways, such as handling big swings in electricity generation from solar and wind farms, reducing congestion on transmission lines and helping to prevent blackouts during scorching heat waves.

In California, which has set ambitious goals for fighting climate change, policymakers hope grid batteries can help the state get 100 percent of its electricity from carbon-free sources by 2045. While the state remains heavily dependent on natural gas, a significant contributor to global warming, batteries are starting to eat into the market for fossil fuels. State regulators plan to nearly triple battery capacity by 2035.

[justforbooks]

Alfred Nobel stipulated that his annual prizes be awarded to those who “have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind”. Few scientific advances have had a greater impact on our lives than that made by the American materials chemist John Goodenough, a chemistry Nobel laureate in 2019 for his role in inventing the rechargeable lithium battery.

If you are reading this on a handheld device, it will almost certainly have a lithium battery inside. These power packs have been instrumental to the advent of electric cars, and their ability to store power such as that generated by ephemeral renewable sources could aid the transition away from a fossil-fuel energy economy.

For year after year Goodenough, who has died aged 100, featured in the list of Nobel predictions. Only his remarkable longevity saved the Swedish committee from an embarrassing injustice – he is the oldest person to have been awarded a Nobel. He seemed phlegmatic about being repeatedly overlooked, even though he did not enjoy any financial reward for his breakthrough either: in the 1980s he was not encouraged to take out a patent on the battery breakthrough he made at Oxford University. He was glad enough still to be able to do research, which he sustained almost until the very end of his life.

He left Oxford in 1986 for the University of Texas at Austin to escape compulsory retirement at 65, convinced – rightly – that he had a lot more still to offer. “Why would anyone retire and simply wait to die?” he asked. His vitality and enjoyment in the lab well into his 90s, punctuated by his loud and high-pitched laugh, was a constant cause of amazement.

One would hardly have guessed from that demeanour how unhappy his childhood had been, as the second of three children of extremely distant parents in what he called “a disaster” of a marriage. He was born in the city of Jena, Germany, to Helen (nee Lewis) and Erwin Goodenough.

They were both Americans who were living in Oxford – Erwin was studying for a DPhil at the university and, according to his son, “enjoyed the culture of the Weimar Republic; he spent much of his long summer vacations in Germany as well as in Rome”.

John was taken as a baby to the US, where his father became a professor of religious history at Yale University. John grew up mostly in a boarding school in Massachusetts, from where, despite being an undiagnosed dyslexic, he won a place to study mathematics at Yale. After wartime military service as a meteorologist, he gained a doctorate in physics at the University of Chicago and in 1952 began research on magnetic materials for information storage at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

That work qualified him to switch to inorganic materials chemistry when in 1976 he moved to Oxford. At that time, interest was growing in electric vehicles, which were being held back by the lack of suitable batteries.

The potential benefits of electric cars as quieter and less polluting than those using the petrol-fired internal combustion engine had been recognised since their inception. But the lead-acid batteries used as starter batteries and the power source for vehicle electronics were utterly unequal to the task of supplying the motive power: they were too heavy and offered too little power.

The dream of battery-powered cars was resurrected in the 60s, but it was only a decade later, with the Opec oil crisis in full swing, that the industry took them seriously.

The key was to find the right materials for the battery electrodes. Lithium metal looked attractive because it is lightweight and capable of delivering high voltages. The idea was that lithium at the positive electrode would provide electrically charged ions that travel to the negative electrode, where they could be trapped between the layers of atoms in materials called intercalators.

The British chemist Stanley Whittingham, one of Goodenough’s co-laureates, working at the Exxon laboratories in New Jersey, found a suitable intercalator called titanium disulfide in 1976. Four years later, Goodenough in Oxford identified the material – a form of cobalt oxide – that became the industry standard, offering a higher voltage and greater power density.

Early lithium batteries had a tendency to catch fire because of the high chemical reactivity of pure lithium. But the third 2019 laureate, the Japanese researcher Akira Yoshino, of the Asahi Kasei Corporation in Tokyo, replaced lithium electrodes with graphite-like carbon made from petroleum coke, which also intercalates lithium so that the ions merely shuttle back and forth between the two sets of layers, making them easily rechargeable.

The lithium-ion battery was commercialised in 1991 by the Sony Corporation, and now commands an estimated $92bn market. Without it there could have been none of today’s handheld electronics – laptops, smartphones, tablets. Elon Musk’s Tesla electric cars depend on them.

There is still room for improvement and Goodenough never stopped seeking it. In the past decade he was working, among other things, on making batteries that operate at low temperatures, suitable for powering cars in the winter.

He was also seeking a new, safer way to reinstate pure lithium electrodes, which could give lithium batteries more energy capacity. At the same time, he expressed concerns about the international tensions that might arise over the limited global supplies of lithium.

Goodenough maintained a strong Christian belief throughout his life, seeing no conflict with his scientific work. “The scientist is trying to do something for society and for his fellow man,” he said. “In that sense why should there be a conflict?” During his 90s he cared for his wife, Irene (nee Wiseman), who had Alzheimer’s disease. They had married in 1951; she died in 2016.

“I’d like to get all the gas emissions off the highways of the world”, Goodenough said in 2018. “I’m hoping to see it before I die.” It was always an ambitious aspiration, even for someone with his staying power. But if it happens one day, Goodenough will have played a central part in that.

🔔 John Bannister Goodenough, materials scientist, born 25 July 1922; died 25 June 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[bakerstreetbabble]

Granada TV Series Review: "The Speckled Band" (S01, E06)

"The Adventure of the Speckled Band" seems to be a favorite with many readers, despite its many obvious plot holes (snakes don't drink milk or climb ropes, for example). Holmes's cool head in the face of the belligerent Grimesby Roylott's threats and the middle-of-the-night stakeout waiting for "the speckled band" to arrive are fairly dramatic and entertaining scenes, and the gothic horror of Mr. Roylott's messy end is rather gripping.

The Granada adaptation is quite well done, and it adheres very closely to the outline of its source material. There are a few changes that the viewer will notice in comparison to the original story. A few examples:

The sisters are no longer twins. Julia is 5 years older than Helen.

The cheetah on the grounds of Grimesby Roylott's estate has been replaced by a leopard.

Holmes wears the "traditional" deerstalker cap, rather than the bowler shown in Mr. Paget's illustrations. (To be fair, there is no indication in the text as to Holmes's choice of headwear.)

Other than those (very minor) changes, the episode proceeds in much the same way as the Doyle narrative.

As I mentioned above, the nasty confrontation with Mr. Roylott at the Baker Street flat is one of the more enjoyable scenes in the original story, and the adaptation in the TV episode does not disappoint! The little twitchy half-grins that Jeremy Brett flashes, as the angry Grimesby delivers his monologue, are absolutely priceless. Brett's gleeful laugh in the face of the verbal onslaught is the cherry on top of the sundae. And, of course, the lovely moment when Holmes bends the poker back into shape is delightful as well.

“Ha! You put me off, do you?” said our new visitor, taking a step forward and shaking his hunting-crop. “I know you, you scoundrel! I have heard of you before. You are Holmes, the meddler.” My friend smiled. “Holmes, the busybody!” His smile broadened. “Holmes, the Scotland Yard Jack-in-office!” Holmes chuckled heartily. “Your conversation is most entertaining,” said he. “When you go out close the door, for there is a decided draught.”

Just a bit later in the episode, when Holmes and Watson meet up with Helen Stoner again, the writers add a funny little moment in which Watson, clearly still very impressed with his friend's handling of Mr. Roylott's bullying manners, tells Miss Stoner that "Holmes sent him off with a flea in his ear!" I'm not 100% sure what that phrase actually means, but it made me chuckle. David Burke's excellent portrayal of the faithful sidekick never ceases to impress me.

​Before Holmes and Watson encounter the deadly snake face-to-face, there is an intense monologue from Jeremy Brett that is very effective in setting up the scene to come, as he meditates aloud on the dangerous nature of the evil Grimesby Roylott, a doctor gone wrong. The monologue is very nearly word-for-word from Doyle's orginal:

When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals. He has nerve and he has knowledge. Palmer and Pritchard were among the heads of their profession. This man strikes even deeper...

My only real quibble with this particular adaptation is the scene that comes after Mr. Roylott meets his demise. After the horror of the snake, Holmes's brief explanation of how he put together the last few details seems just a bit anti-climactic. His somewhat emotionless statement that the death of Grimesby Roylott does not weigh heavily on his conscience, followed by the whistle of the train, is a bit too abrupt an ending for the episode.  Overall, though, I found the episode a very engaging one, and quite a bit more interesting than the previous episode, "The Naval Treaty." A faithful adaptation and well worth my time.

[dr-george-shapirony]

Amway River Bank Run attracts thousands to downtown Grand Rapids

Amway River Bank Run attracts thousands to downtown Grand Rapids https://healthbeat.corewellhealth.org/139406-2/ Thousands of eager runners gathered in downtown Grand Rapids on a hazy and warm Saturday morning for the 46th annual Amway River Bank Run. Runners flooded the streets and sidewalks on May 13 as they prepared to take their first steps, weather they were running the 5K, 10K or 25K. Alejandro Quiroga, MD, president, Corewell Health in West  Michigan, was on hand delivering welcome remarks. “It’s a great day and we’re so happy to be here,” Dr. Quiroga said. “This is all about having fun, being healthy and enjoying ourselves.” He stressed the importance of keeping healthy and active as Corewell Health staff were on-hand to offer medical support to anyone in distress. At the ready with medical assistance Corewell Health has been the official health partner and medical provider at the River Bank Run since 2018. Nearly 100  Corewell Health orthopedics providers were on hand to help any runners who needed assistance. And another 100 volunteers staffed hydration stations along the way. The race also included a 10K and 25K option, as well as a 5K walk and 25K race for hand cyclists and wheelchair racers. Results from this year’s race can be found at amwayriverbankrun.com. Kids can run too Earlier in the week more than 500 local kids participated in Amway Junior presented by Corewell Health’s Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital at Kentwood Middle School. The race organizers worked hand-in-hand with school running programs offered in elementary schools across West Michigan. “Running in this race is just the beginning of an understanding of healthy living for kids,” Stacy Emmert, a physician assistant at Corewell Health, said.  “We see a lot of obesity in children and getting them up and moving at this age is so important.” Parents and kids took off at the starting line running in groups while a crowd cheered from the bleachers. “Look at you go, you can do it,” one parent said. Two-year-old Matthias Benavides participated in the Amway Junior for the first time and was very excited. His mother said he loved seeing a bunny and turtle run but got a little emotional with the size of the crowd. “One thing is for sure … these kids are going to sleep well tonight,” race director Russ Hines said. The post Amway River Bank Run attracts thousands to downtown Grand Rapids appeared first on Corewell Health | Health Beat. via Corewell Health | Health Beat https://healthbeat.corewellhealth.org/ May 13, 2023 at 08:53AM

[writer59january13]

Look no further than the nose on your face...

for Mutualism among Homo sapiens long thought to be a pipe dream case in point sited by a couple of recent purportedly natural events possibly exacerbated courtesy global warming namely present conflagrations include veritable towering inferno - (sharing merest premise with Hollywood film by the same name, the highest-grossing Classic 1970s disaster movie about a fire that breaks out in a state-of-the-art San Francisco high-rise building during the opening ceremony attended by a host of A-list guests: An overworked fire chief (charging full force like Minnesota Vikings - or feel free to substitute your own football team) and the building's architect must cooperate in the struggle to save lives and subdue panic while a corrupt, cost-cutting contractor tries to evade responsibility for the disaster helped establish the modern blockbuster) dwarfed by devastating southern California, or the impacts from Hurricanes Helene and Milton both particularly destructive, causing more than $100 billion in combined damage across Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia over a two-week period from late-September into early October), where trials by fire and water respectively witnessed linkedin collective effort that spread kudzu like attempted delivering relief, no matter Federal disaster workers paused and then changed some of their hurricane-recovery efforts in North Carolina, including abandoning door-to-door visits, after receiving threats that they could be targeted by a militia, officials said, as the government response to Helene targeted by runaway disinformation. Impossible mission to duplicate or even barely approximate wrenching cataclysms wrought by mother nature, no matter death defying scenes movies present quite realistic, especially seen on the big screen incorporating surround sound, where more or less clear cut protagonists and antagonists confront each other, whereby the former (more times that not in that make believe world) where actors and actresses present convincing drama) and win the day quite unlike reality, when havoc ferociously strikes indiscriminately rich or poor alike.

I always marvel at the surge of voluntary brother and sisterhood (personhood generally) that encompasses (or follows) a figurative groundswell, (particularly when the phenomenon in question constitutes a natural event say aftermath of meteorological storm in question, namely a tsunami) pitting dearth of humanitarian intervention, where terrorist act and violent crimes grist for the tabloid or social media mill give the impression that Homo sapiens' pith and marrow chock full of animalistic, atavistic, cannibalistic, fascistic, hedonistic,

misogynistic, et cetera predilections, thus believing challenging the bedrock belief in inherent goodness of man/woman kind as the exception rather than the rule

and proving the potential exists, whereby idealistic opportunistic government (of the people by the people for the people shall not perish from the earth” spoken at Gettysburg), but these words apply as well to the countless soldiers that died for the cause of democracy in the following 160 years, yet not just highlighting slain combatants also extending by proxy to vicious acts of homicide, physical sexual abuse, plus verbal castigation as experienced by the writer of these words (ofttimes in his younger days deemed, hashtagged, peppered, targeted, et cetera as ideal scapegoat) pummeled courtesy nasty, short and brutish louts, who heaved, lobbed, threatened, et cetera me with expletive laced brickbats, where bullies evinced sympathy for the devil.

[wolfnowl]

Lowe’s Donates 100 Tiny Homes to Carolina Families Waiting For Rebuilt Housing After Hurricane Flooding

👏

[weather-usa]

Millions brace for impact as Category 5 Hurricane Milton barrels toward Florida, with evacuation time running out.

Milton regained Category 5 strength Tuesday evening, just a day after becoming one of the most powerful hurricanes ever recorded in the Atlantic basin. It is still expected to be a major hurricane when it reaches Florida's coast.

Millions across Florida are bracing for the potentially catastrophic impact of Hurricane Milton, which threatens to deliver a historically deep and dangerous storm surge along much of Florida's west coast, accompanied by wind gusts exceeding 100 mph in the next 36 hours.

Climate and Average Weather Year Round in 34691 - Holiday FL

Milton regained Category 5 strength Tuesday evening, a day after becoming one of the strongest hurricanes ever recorded in the Atlantic basin. It is still expected to be a major hurricane when it reaches Florida's coast.

“This is a very serious situation,” the National Hurricane Center warned on Tuesday. “Milton has the potential to be one of the most destructive hurricanes on record for west-central Florida.”

State officials have been working urgently since Monday to evacuate millions from vulnerable coastal areas in what is being called Florida's largest mass evacuation since Hurricane Irma in 2017. Forecasts predict storm surges of 10–15 feet along the central western coast, with devastating waves driven by hurricane-force winds. These levels — far surpassing the damage caused by Hurricane Helene last month — would be the highest seen in over a century in the Tampa Bay region.

“You may think you’ve ‘been through hurricanes before,’” said FOX Weather Hurricane Specialist Bryan Norcross. “But you didn’t experience the 1921 storm that flooded much of Pinellas County, or the 1848 hurricane that pushed 15 feet of Gulf water where downtown Tampa now stands.”

The Florida National Guard has mobilized 5,000 troops to assist with the storm response, with an additional 3,000 expected to be deployed before landfall. To expedite evacuations, the Florida Department of Transportation has opened the shoulders on Interstate 4 and Interstate 75 for northbound traffic, and tolls have been suspended.

"Before Hurricane Ian hit Southwest Florida, some people were confused, made poor decisions, and tragically lost their lives," warned Bryan Norcross. "Don’t let that happen to you."

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis declared a State of Emergency over the weekend for 51 of the state’s 67 counties, and President Joe Biden approved the state’s pre-landfall emergency declaration on Monday.

Shelters have begun opening, and the state has partnered with Uber to offer free rides to and from shelters for residents seeking refuge from Hurricane Milton. Meanwhile, Atlanta Motor Speedway announced it would open its campgrounds free of charge for evacuees from Florida.

On Tuesday, the first evacuations were ordered on Florida's east coast in St. John's County, including St. Augustine Beach, which is expected to face storm surges from the backside of Milton as it crosses the state.

Devastating winds set to rip through the heart of Florida In addition to the life-threatening storm surge, Hurricane Milton is expected to bring wind speeds exceeding 100 mph near the eyewall as it makes landfall. The Tampa area, in particular, could experience wind gusts of over 95 mph or more at landfall.

Weather Forecast For 35007 - Alabaster AL:

Even after landfall, damaging winds are expected to sweep across the central Florida Peninsula. Hurricane Milton is forecast to retain hurricane strength as it moves along the Atlantic coast, with Hurricane Warnings in place for 11 million people, including the Orlando area and the east coast from the St. Lucie/Martin County line north to Ponte Vedra Beach.

Storm surges are also anticipated along Florida's Atlantic coast, from the Space Coast to the First Coast, affecting cities like Daytona Beach, St. Augustine, and Jacksonville Beach.

Rainfall totals along Milton's path are expected to reach 8-12 inches, with isolated amounts up to 18 inches. The storm also poses a risk of scattered tornadoes, even before landfall.

Schools, airports, and theme parks shut down As Floridians prepare for the storm, widespread closures of schools, businesses, and travel hubs are in effect.

Tampa International Airport (TPA) suspended operations Tuesday morning, while Orlando International Airport (MCO), Orlando Sanford International Airport (SFB), Southwest Florida International Airport (RSW) in Fort Myers, and Melbourne Orlando International Airport (MLB) will halt commercial flights starting Wednesday.

Schools and universities across much of the state have canceled classes through at least Thursday. Disney Parks, Universal Studios, and SeaWorld are also closing in anticipation of Hurricane Milton.

The Kennedy Space Center’s visitor complex will remain closed through Thursday.

Race against the clock.

Scars from Hurricane Helene still mark central Florida’s western beaches, just two weeks after the Category 3 storm battered the region with feet of storm surge and hurricane-force winds en route to the Big Bend area.

See more:

https://weatherusa.app/zip-code/weather-83220

https://weatherusa.app/zip-code/weather-83221

https://weatherusa.app/zip-code/weather-83215

https://weatherusa.app/zip-code/weather-83217

https://weatherusa.app/zip-code/weather-83218

Sidewalks are lined with piles of debris, remnants of Helene's destruction, now at risk of becoming airborne missiles in Milton’s triple-digit winds or dangerous floating debris amid an even higher storm surge. On Tuesday, an army of dump trucks and bulldozers moved into neighborhoods to clear as much debris as possible, but the task is overwhelming.

“Hundreds of blocks have been decimated,” reported FOX Weather Storm Specialist Mike Seidel from Madeira Beach in Pinellas County, Florida. “They’ve cleared about a block in 45 minutes to an hour, but there are countless more, and time is running out before conditions worsen later Wednesday, certainly by Wednesday night.”

Seidel estimated that it would take another two weeks to clear all the debris. “But we don’t have that luxury,” he warned. “It’s back-to-back storms here in Pinellas County, from Helene to Milton.”

The same situation is unfolding at Bradenton Beach in Manatee County, where streets are strewn with debris and damage from Hurricane Helene, and the area is nearly deserted as the threat from Milton looms.

"This is not our first catastrophe. We have responded to many disasters in the past," Mike Eddins of the Florida State Emergency Response Team told FOX Weather’s Robert Ray. "While we’re accustomed to this, it always takes an emotional toll, especially in a community like this."

Eddins noted that his team has been on the ground for a week, assisting residents in their recovery from Helene.

"Now, to see these people finally get back on their feet, only to be faced with another setback in the coming days, takes an emotional toll not just on the community, but on my team as well," Eddins said.

[chorusfm]

Taylor Swift Dominates the Charts

Taylor Swift’s latest is the second biggest opening week in recorded history. The Tortured Poets Department racked up 2.61 million units in its first week, including 1.914 million physical sales. Taylor Swift’s 11th full-length studio album, The Tortured Poets Department, shattered countless records upon release. Notably, “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone has landed on top of the Billboard Hot 100 this week. “Fortnight” becomes Taylor’s 7th Billboard Hot 100 #1 debut, and her 12th overall #1 on the chart.    See below for other key highlights and listen to The Tortured Poets Department — HERE.    The Tortured Poets Department Highlights: Only artist to ever hold the entire top 14 on the Hot 100 Breaks record for most consecutive new albums with a Hot 100 #1 hit (8) Breaks record for most simultaneous Hot 100 debuts (31) All songs from The Tortured Poets Department debut top 55 Only artist to ever hold the entire top 10 on the Hot 100 twice Ties for most #1 hits on the Hot 100 this decade First female artist to earn at least 50 top 10 hits on Hot 100 First female artist with twelve #1 hits on the Hot 100 and twelve #1 albums on the Billboard 200.    WHAT THE CRITICS ARE SAYING ABOUT The Tortured Poets Department   “5 Stars” - Rolling Stone, Rob Sheffield   “Instant Classic” - Rolling Stone, Rob Sheffield   “The Tortured Poets Department combines the intimacy of Folklore and Evermore with the synth-pop gloss of Midnights to create music that's wildly ambitious and gloriously chaotic” - Rolling Stone, Rob Sheffield   “5 Stars” - Helen Brown, The Independent   “With its playful narratives and hooks like anchors, Swift’s 11th studio album is a terrific reminder of her storytelling powers” - The Independent, Helen Brown   “The whole album is a terrific reminder of the intense, personal connection Swift can conjure in song. She fills arenas and dominates the news agenda because listeners can relate to her starry dramas – her tales endow their own experiences with new electricity…Her ability to put her lines over is as compelling as ever. I defy anyone not to lean into Swift’s concisely charged storytelling.” - The Independent, Helen Brown   “5 Stars” - The Times, Will Hodgkinson    “The Tortured Poets Department is an ultra-confident, ballad-heavy, poetic yet grounded reflection on love in all its forms: destructive, blissful, fantastical, embittered and idealised. And although plenty of the scenarios are imagined, these poetic visions of love’s tangled strands come alive because they are grounded in real feelings.” - The Times, Will Hodgkinson   “5 Stars” - The Sunday Times, Dan Cairns   “Again and again the songs hit the mark, as rich and concise as a great short story collection and, as ever with Swift, conjuring a scene in an instant.” - The Sunday Times, Dan Cairns   “5 Stars” - iNews, Ed Power   “The Tortured Poets Department is an aesthetic triumph – who knew books and sad bangers could go together so well? But more than that it is a new chapter in Swift’s ongoing quest for pop perfection and a record brimming with moments to beguile fans new and old.” - iNews, Ed Power   “5 Stars” - The Arts Desk, Ellie Roberts   “Taylor Swift has once again alchemised pain and criticism into art, surpassing her own already astronomical influence on the music industry with an artefact that deserves to be celebrated forever.” - The Arts Desk, Ellie Roberts   “Taylor Swift's 'Tortured Poets' is hauntingly brilliant” - USA Today, Melissa Ruggieri   “Taylor Swift’s vulnerability is her superpower.” - USA Today, Melissa Ruggieri     “‘I Can Do it With a Broken Heart’ is one of Swift’s best Trojan horses” - USA Today, Melissa Ruggieri    “...her 11th album feels like a bloodletting: A cathartic purge after a major heartbreak delivered through an ascendant vocal run, an elegiac verse, or mobile, synthesized productions that underscore the powers of Swift’s storytelling.” - AP News, Maria Sherman    ““Clara Bow” enters the pantheon of great final tracks on a Swift album.” - AP… https://chorus.fm/news/taylor-swift-dominates-the-charts-2/