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starr-fall-knight-rise · 4 years ago

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HASO, “It Can’t Hurt to Try.”

My brain wanted to write this today, and so this is what I have written. I hope you all enjoy :)

I realize I have sort of Neglected Adam’s past, though I am not sure how I did that, so today I wanted to write some more.

More than three years ago.

“Mom, you don’t have to really…. I’m ok.” Martha turned to look at Adam and the expression on her face shut him up instantly. He slid back in his seat slouching against the car interior. Off to his left side, his new service dog, who he had named waffles, was lying politely across the seat, her head resting on his thigh, her service vest bright red in the noonday sun streaming in through the window.

The car rumbled under them looking out of place in a city of sleek hover cars. Their tires rolled to a stop at an intersection, as a crash nexus wove itself into existence before the waiting line of cars. Running red lights was a near impossibility in the city and had reduced vehicular accidents by 25%.

Marha turned to look at him over the back of the seat, “Adam let your father and I worry about finances, you just relax.”

He sat up in his seat again pushing his crutches to rest against the window, “But mom do you know how much those cost, I looked it up and….” “Shhhh.” Martha held up a finger, “Just sshhh, your father and I own the house and the car. We could make ends meet if your father was working at the Burger Barn, and I was sitting at home twiddling my thumbs.”

Adam’s usually Laconic father grunted his agreement, “Besides, this is why your mother and I have a separate account for medical emergencies.”

“But what if YOU have a medical emergency.” he protested thinking about the farm and how easy it would be for his father to get caught in an accident with the massive farming equipment they used.”

“Im old.” his father said, though he wasn’t very old at all.

“What does that have to do with-”

“Boy, just shut up, you’re mother and I have made a decision because we love our kids, and if that means selling the damn house and living in a tent we are going to do it.”

Adam lapsed into silence again. His father’s tone broached no argument. A whimper came from somewhere below him, and he looked down to see that Waffles had scooted so her paws and head were resting on his leg, her tail beat against the car seat, and she looked at him with big golden eyes.

Her paws were a might bit large for her, but that was because she wasn’t even a year old yet, but even so she was still the best girl. She whimpered again, reminding him to relax and he took a few breaths.

Adam wasn’t so good at dealing with stress these days, though Waffles turning up in his life had been a marked improvement. The doctors said he had finally turned a corner with his mental health, though they suggested he look into getting a real prosthetic if he wanted to recover any further.

They said it would be good for his morale.

He glanced down at his current prosthetic, no more than a black rod of metal with a spring loaded joint and a fake foot at the end. It was army issue, so complete garbage, and he still had to use crutches when wearing it with the amount he tended to trip. He imagined being able to run again…. To really do anything again, and looked down at his body, which had grown thin and skeletal over the past few months of PTSD recovery.

He hadn’t been eating all that much, and his desire to workout had faded with it, instead he had spent most of his time in a hypervigilant state of alertness that left little time for things like eating or working out. When waffles came along, that had morphed into him lying in bed for days on end sleeping on and off while listening to music or listening to his collection of old Star Trek movies on Repeat.

It had been a hard transition to being functional again, which just meant that he was eating now, and went on walks in the morning with waffles.

He was determined to make it all the way, though he couldn’t say he approved all that much of his parents throwing away so much money on a fancy prosthetic. An older model would have done, but they insisted that they wanted the best.

The car ground to a stop in the parking garage outside of the Elmridge University robotics lab, and his mother walked around one side to open the door for him as he adjusted his crutches and stepped out into the musty underground air. Waffles leaped out behind him, sticking tight to his left side.

“You good?” His mother asked, and he nodded limping his way after them as they made it towards the doors.

Students at this university had been working on prosthetic technology for the pat fifty years, and their minds had spawned some of the greatest breakthroughs in medical technology the world over. Now, they were asking for people like him to come and test their machines. However things didn’t always come cheap and you had to rely on being rich, or getting some kind of funding from a wealthy benefactor.

Adam Vir, who was not rich and had no wealth benefactors was instead relying on his parents and their medical savings, which they had been squirreling away for the past twenty years or more. He estimated that the account would be completely drained by the time they were done here, and the thought made him sick to his stomach.

Waffles touched his hand with her wet nose, reminding him to breathe again.

They made it all the way to the doors and into the university hallway. Adam looked around with some interest. He had what might be considered the equivalent of a masters degree or higher in aviation, but he had never stepped foot inside a university.

He thought he would have liked it, and had to brush away the regret that he had never gone for real.

The flight academy had been enough though.

Though it was likely he would never fly again. Waffles whimpered and jumped up on her back paws seeing his distress and working to keep his mind off of it. He took another deep breath. She was right, he just needed to relax.

Together with his family they walked down the hall and into the waiting room of room 125 where they made him rest in one of the hard plastic chairs as they went up to the desk. He rubbed Waffle’s ears, and she rumbled at him lightly.

“And you all must be with Adam Vir.”

They nodded in agreement.

Adam looked up as the girl came out from behind the desk. She had long black hair tied up in a messy ponytail and wore a band T-shirt over a striped long sleeve shirt. She wore glasses, was his age, and was very cute.

He had to look down at the floor.

She knelt next to him, “Can I?” She asked

Still looking away he untied the rubber band holding the pant leg closed and pulled it back so she could see the stump of his leg.

She pulled something from her back pocket and pressed it up against the old wound. It was cold and soft and he grimaced as he looked down. When she pulled back he realized she had been taking a mold of his leg. She smiled at him, “Just twenty more minutes and we can have you come back.”

He nodded and they let her go. His parents sat on either side of them, his mom took him by the shoulder and shook, “Isn’t this exciting.”

Adam gave a weak smile.

His father picked up a robotics magazine and began to read, showing Adam things of interest as he read them. Adam’s stomach churned with nerves.

After less than fifteen minutes, the girl skipped back into the room, “We’re ready for you.” She announced, and slowly, he moved to his feet limping ack behind the desk and following her down a short hallway and into a large open room.

Here there was a small indoor track, some obstacles, and even a physical therapy table.

A cluster of students sat around the table waiting for them, headed by an older heavyset professor with a short grey beard and a lanyard hanging around his neck.

He reached out to shake their hands as they approached.

Adam glanced at a sleek silver case sitting on the PT table next to the man.

The old professor grinned at him, “Are you ready?”

The students clustered inward eagerly. This was likely the first time one of their creations was going to be used.

Adam nodded nervously, and the man reached forward, snapping the case open and in to reveal….

Adam muttered in slight surprise. The leg looked, good, something straight out of I-robot. It was sleek and elegant with silvered matt titanium and plexiglass casing to fill out the shape of a leg. He could see the fibrous strands of rubberized metal that acted as muscle underneath the plexiglass.

“Wow.”

“Do you like it? My students worked very hard on this project, and the best part is the neron interfacing net that cradles the leg in place and suctions it onto the skin. All across the plexiglass fronting there are microsensors built to detect heat, cold, pressure and vibration. The entire foot is designed to work like a human foot and all the tooes can flex individually. He picked up the leg, reached down and grabbed the foot, behding it around the ankle with a movement as smooth as ice, “The ankle joint can rotate in all the proper directions, and the most revolutionary part, the interface, should collect signals being sent through your neurons to your missing leg, pick those up and interpret them to move the leg just as your own brain would, and better yet send feedback signals in the reverse direction.”

He clapped Adam on the shoulder, “In other words, it will FEEL like a real leg, how does that sound.”

Adam’s mouth opened and then closed and then opened again, “Um…. amazing but…. Impossible if I am being honest.”.

“Well, moment of truth isn’t it.”

He nodded sitting down on the PT bench and rolling up his pant leg again. He tried to ignore all the people watching him, and listened to the professor as he instructed him on how to put it on. It socketed right over his old injury and as it did he felt an immediate and sudden vibration run through his body as if the leg were whirring to life.

And when it did he froze.

He stared down at the leg, and slowly, with all the memory his brain still had, he flexed the toes.

The sensation was instantaneous and glorious. He put his hand over his mouth fighting back tears that began welling into his eyes.

His parents gasped in delight and an overabundance of emotion as the others at back in silence. His mother hugged him tight as did his father, all three of them staring at the machine, which moved on his command.

Before he knew it he was grinning, turning to look around at everyone even as he had to wipe tears from his cheeks.

He could feel again!

The relief was so complete and so overwhelming that he couldn’t pick between laughing or crying

“Take it slow.” The professor said, but he hardly heard him, and with a wobbly step he slowly climbed to his feet. He began to laugh and his parents laughed with him hugging him and shaking him with excited exceleration as he took his first step. He closed his eyes in near ecstasy as the foot bent under his weight, the ankle flexed,and the toes splayed out over the ground.

He dropped his crutches to the floor ignoring the urging of the professor who was only half heartedly telling him to slow down.

He took another step, and then another and then another, slow and wobbly at first but then muscle memory took over after that.

His brain remembered, it remembered and despite months with a missing leg, it woke up the part of his brain charged to deal with that movement, and despite what must have been atrophy after months of misuse, it began to fire again.

He broke into a jog, as his father ran next to him, and then the jog turned into a run, his father fell behind as he broke into a full out sprint around the small indoor track. Laughing the whole way as the leg matched him. The students here cheering and clapping and hugging each other as they watched him interact with their creation excitedly shaking each other and screaming.

Adam, forgetting momentarily how to stop running, ended up tripping on his good foot, flailing around for a moment and falling to the floor.

He didn’t stop laughing though, and crawled back to his feet, with all the ease he might have had when he had both legs.

Waffles barked and wagged her tail furiously as she ran to join him, hopping and bounding over the floor as he played a game of chase with her immediately forcing the leg to its full potential as they made quick turns, stopped and started and leaped into the air. He ran up and down stairs and jumped over their obstacles feeling the shock through his feet and ankles.

Unfortunately for him, months of sitting on his ass hadn’t exactly made him all that athletic and he came to a stop eventually panting like waffles only to grab every one of the students in turn and hug them in an embrace so tight it might have fractured ribs.

He was so excited, so grateful, and so unbelievably relieved.

It was an incredible moment, for him, for the students, for his parents, and for his professor.

He limped into that building but skipped out on his new leg.

Getting in the car its as if he had taken a one eighty in personality. His quiet sullen demeanor from before was replaced with something his parents hadn’t seen in ages.

The ability to not shut up.

He talked a mile a minute in his excitement yammering fit to talk their ears right off, and they let him. It was good to hear him back to his old self for once. His father was smiling more than he had in a long while, and on his left side, facing away from his son and his wife, a tear rolled down his cheek.

***

He wasn’t overly sure what he was doing.

He didn’t have high hopes that they would even take him back. After all, He was set to be honorably discharged later that week, seeing as the UNSC had finally gotten around to dealing with the men and women injured during operation Steel Eye, but he had decided not to do that. He wanted to go back, and he had the paperwork to prove he was mentally stable enough to do so.

Now it was just down to whether they would let him work with a missing leg.

He nervously made his way onto the fort Harmony base where he had been stationed so long ago. Off in the distance he could hear the dull roaring of jet engines as they readied for takeoff, and watched as columns of other soldiers marched in the early morning sun. Light was spilling across, warm and yellow over the dw colored grass as he made his way towards the central building.

He stepped inside and passed a couple other officers in the hallway as he walked up to the offices.

He looked down at the paper he held in his hand.

He had only meant the captain once, and that was very briefly, but he hoped that the man would be willing to hear him out. He paused outside the man’s open door, and then peered inside. The captain was sitting at his desk frowning at the papers stacked before him, tapping his fingernail against the counter. Light glittered off his completely shaved head and dark skin.

He knocked quietly and stepped inside.

“Sir?”

The man looked up frowning at Adam without much recognition.

“Yes?”

“Um, Lieutenant Adam Vir, sir…. I was hoping to speak with you.”

The man sat back in his seat and frowned again, “Adam V-”

He paused, “Wait.”

He rummaged in his desk and pulled out a set of papers, glancing at the name at the top before setting them down, “Ah yes, Adam, I was just getting to your discharge for-” he glanced down at the paper again, and then back up at Adam, and then back down again. Adam stood politely behind the single wooden chair and waited.

When the man didn’t speak Adam awkwardly cleared his throat, “About those papers sir….I…. well I was meaning to talk to you about those.”

“Yes I was going to si-”

Adam shook his head cutting the man off, “No sir, I…. I don’t want you to sign them.”

There was a pause, “You don’t?”

“Yes sir.”

He set the papers down on the desk.

“You have the opportunity to be honorably discharged for services rendered and you…. Want to stay?”

He saw the incredulity on the man’s face as he spoke.

The guy must have thought he was stupid.

The man looked over the desk at him <”Says you lost a leg during the Drev war kid.”

Adam shifted uncomfortably, “Well yes sir.’

“Then by all rights we HAVE to discharge you.”

“No, I got a new one.”

“A new one what?”

“I have a new leg, sir, just as good as the old one. I can pass all the tests, physical, mental whatever you want me to do sir, please, just give me a chance.”

The man stared at him, Adam stared back, “You’re missing a leg kid.”

“Not anymore I’m not. UNSC regulations say that people who have had stem cell organs from their own body transplanted don’t need to be discharged, well this is similar to that. I didn’t have a leg, and now I do, and one that works just as well as the old one therefore it shouldn’t matter.”

He didn’t mean to argue with the Captain, but well that’s what it kind of turned into.

The argument must have been loud enough to attract the attention of some of the other officers and a voice from the door behind them had both of them pull up short, “Is everything alright here.”

Adam turned and his eyes went wide, “Captain Kelly!”

She stepped into full view and his eyes grew wider. He saluted sharply, “Oh, sorry, Major.”

SHe looked at him with her head tilted, “I'll be damned, lieutenant, what are you doing back here.: She looked him up and down, “And in one piece or so it seems.”

“Advanced robotics ma’am…. Maybe you can help us?”

She frowned, “Go on.”

The Captain cut in, “The boy doesn’t want to be discharged. If anything that proves he must be smoking crack.”

Adam frowned, “No Ijust….” he trailed off, “I loved my job…. Before the, losing my leg, bit.” he turned to Major Kelly, “Please Ma’am i’ll prove it. Better than I was before, honest”

She frowned, “It is…. Unprecedented, but…. There aren’t really any rules regarding advanced robotics that I can think of. We will have to talk it over.”

Turns out talking it over meant months of arguing semantics with bureaucrats and even more months of testing and proving that he was, in fact capable of operating like normal. They tested everything, including his prosthetic’s ability to handle G forces…. And he finally got to fly again. It was only by a small margin that he managed to convince them to let him back in, and even then he was relegated to guard detail on what the human medical core was calling an oxyclinic, where a couple of enterprising humans learned that spooning aliens actually helped to treat some mental disturbances in other species like the alien version of depression.

Turned out it was pretty good for him considering he had developed a small fear of aliens since his last encounter. When he wasn’t guarding the clinic, he volunteered to work for them in order to overcome his fear.

He was slowly getting back to normal.

***

Major Kelly sat at her desk looking at the schematics for the new ship under construction. The UNSC Enterprise had been completely decommissioned after engineers determined her to have too many fatal flaws to allow her to fly again. Kelly had only been captain for a little over a year before she had been pulled, and this was her chance to get back on the horse. She looked down at the papers, the schematics and then the second letter from the UN which offered her a second alternative.

A promotion to Admiral, and control over what would soon be a rising fleet of UNSC ships.

It was a hard decision to make. Every fiber in her body wanted to fly again, to see the stars again, and she was halfway to writing her agreement on the captain’s contract when she stopped. She had to think about it, if she took the promotion and gave up the ship, she would never fly again…. But she would have control over the rising UNSC fleet. Under her control she was sure she could help those rising captains avoid the bureaucratic bullshit that was sure to come after them.

In essence, they had one chance to do this right,

And more chances to get in good with the GA. If she took the position, she could fill it with someone she trusted to back the men and get the job done.

herself .

She stared at the two papers torn between her own desire and the path she knew that was right.

It was a matter of milliseconds that allowed her to agree to the promotion, and leave flying behind. It hurt every fiber of her being and even as she sat warm tears dripped onto the schematics of the ship that would have been hers if she had asked for it.

However, her decision made, she was promoted in short order as Admiral of the UNSC rising fleet, and thus had the power to make suggestions for who should take the ship in her stead. She made a decision pretty early on, and reached out a hand to the GA in helping to come to their decision. It was all about making a good impression on their newfound friends, and lending them the UNSC’s first operational ship under new fleet command would, not only give the captain of that ship the opportunity to school themselves in the ways of alien races, but it would leave the GA with a greater inclination of friendship.

She was right in her assumptions, and the GA was more than pleased to have some say in choosing the human captain who would be lent out to them on a probationary bases, as a PR move and as a tactical manuver for the UNSC to learn more about these alien races.

Now she had to compile her list of possible candidates.

There were ten names on that list.

All of them had to be capable of flying the ship, at least and all of them had to have some experience with interacting with alien lifeforms.

Looking at her list, however, she realized that not many people on that list had those capabilities. Sure they could fly but most of them only ever met an alien in passing.

It was sitting in her office late one night agonizing over the names that one popped into her head. She sat up in her chair and stared past her desk lamp and out the window into the darkness.

It was a strange idea.

Crazy almost.

Probably ill advised, but, out of all the people she knew, he was certainly CAPABLE of flying a ship…. And he WAS the most experienced person hse knew with aliens. Perhaps THE most experienced person in the galaxy.

But no…

He was so young, far too young.

But…. why?

It’s not like he hadn’t proven himself, he was loyal, unstoppable and personable, which goodness knows they needed when it came to alien interactions. Looking down at her paper there were more than half of those men and women she wouldn’t trust at a birthday party let alone at a GA diplomatic event.

She added his name to the list. It couldn’t hurt, could it?

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withthewerewolves · 6 years ago

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So I was laying awake last night thinking about a Yours, Mine, and Ours pynch au. Ronan and Adam break up like maybe Adam's sophomore year of college, when he doesn't come back to the Barns for Thanksgiving or something. Adam tries to date, but if he can't make time for Ronan, he definitely can't make time for anyone else. Ronan doesn't even try. He knows he'll never love anyone like he loved Adam.

Adam starts volunteering with a foster care group in college sort of by accident. Volunteer work looks good on a resume and they happen to have an opening. Something about it settles something in him though, so he keeps doing it all through his engineering degree, law school, and his internship at the patent office. He plans to stop once he's got his full time job as a patent lawyer, but that's when he meets Maria.

She's maybe five. Fresh out of a pretty serious neglect situation, but luckily there's no evidence of abuse. She's deaf though, and there aren't a lot of foster homes who can deal with that. Adam, who has always been terrified of losing the hearing in his other ear and so took sign language as an elective all through college, is uniquely equipped.

Usually it's hard for a single young man to foster, but he's been volunteering there for nearly a decade so they fast track him through the process. At first it's hard and Adam thinks he's made a terrible mistake, a commitment he can't live up to. He has to learn to make time for someone else, to put his job second. He passes up a promotion to take a lateral transfer to a job where he can work from home. Maria doesn't know how to ask for what she needs, because she isn't used to getting what she asks for. Adam doesn't know what a child needs, because he never got it. But he applies himself to child care with the same dedication he gives everything. He does research. He asks questions. He patiently builds trust and learns to anticipate her needs. She begins to thrive, and he thrives with her. The thing he was most worried about, his anger, doesn’t come up for a while. The first time he gets really frustrated with her, he has a panic attack before he can do anything, good or bad. The second time, he applies the anger management techniques he learned from his therapist, and he keeps his temper.

A couple years later, when he’s started working on adopting Maria, a set of twins comes in, James and Jessica. They're 16, each work two jobs, and have been trying to pay rent and buy food for themselves and their mother while she drains the bank account to fund her drug habit. They are not happy to be in foster care, refuse any and all help, and Jessica is out and proud, something which restricts their choices of foster home even in DC. They're about to be sent to a group home when Adam catches a glimpse of them in the hallway at the foster care center and sees a glimmer of magic in them. He isn't sure what kind yet, but he has a spare room and figures he can at least provide them with more than he had as a teenager. He has to tell his supervisor more about his past than he’d ever wanted to, but between that and how well Maria is doing under his care, they come to live with him.

He decides, two weeks in, that maybe what he had as a teenager was not enough. They're exhausted, they’re malnourished, they're failing school, and he can only sometimes get them to eat out of his fridge, much less accept the new clothes they so badly need. He calls Gansey and apologises for how difficult he used to be. Gansey is caught between “you were perfect, always” and “used to be?” Blue laughs until Adam hangs up on her, then calls back to apologise for laughing and admit she has no advice. He wishes he could call Ronan, who always knew how to handle Adam when he was a broken thing, but they don't talk anymore. His therapist has encouraged him to let himself experience his emotions, so he allows how much he misses Ronan to well up inside him for 30 seconds, then he does what he does best and gets to work.

He starts with packing lunches every day, one for Maria, one for James, one for Jessica, and one for him. He labels them and leaves them on the counter in the morning. The first two mornings, he has to throw James’ and Jessica's away. The third morning, when he gets back from walking Maria to the bus stop, the lunches are gone. He makes more of an effort to plan and cook meals, not just dinner but breakfast and afterschool snacks. A dry erase board with the week’s menu takes up residence on his refrigerator, with a section at the bottom for requests. Maria requests a lot of hot dogs. At first, the twins insist they'll eat on their way to work, or at school, even though he knows they'll just go hungry. He grimaces his way through scraping the leftovers into the disposal, a matching expression on their faces. They eat with him and Maria. He has to put his foot down about the jobs. No more than 20 hours a week during the school year, and they have to be home by 10 on school nights. This leads to the worst stand off yet, and he calls his supervisor at the foster care center to beg for advice. She tells him that if anything he should be more strict, so he holds firm. The dark circles under their eyes start to fade. He institutes a study hour, during which everyone is required to sit at the table and work on homework. Maria puzzles her way through long division with his help, and the twins sit in stony silence. College is not the escape for them that it was for him. They’re plenty smart, but their skills lay in other areas. Adam has a folder in his office with research on every trade school in the state. Finally James cracks, and pulls out his chemistry homework. The next night Jessica brings reading for english. Neither of them ask him for help, but their grades start to rise, and he’s satisfied with that. He wishes they had friends, people who meant something to them besides each other, but he doesn’t know what to do about it, and that is when Gansey calls to invite him to his and Blue’s wedding.

~O~

Ronan’s path to parenthood is similar, for all that it’s completely different. He has Opal, but her needs are so unlike that of a human child that she hardly counts. She doesn’t eat food, and nothing seems to make her sick. She has a bedroom, but she sleeps in the woods or with the goats most nights. Her bed becomes a repository for interesting sticks and globs of mud. She ages at a rate that even Adam, who won’t speak to Ronan but still sends Opal a letter every week like clockwork, can’t figure out. Some years she seems to be growing the way the parenting book Gansey got him as a joke thinks she should, and some years she doesn’t grow at all. He thinks she was maybe six when he brought her out of the dream, and he thinks she’s maybe eight or nine when , nine years later, he finds a teenaged boy sleeping in his barn.

Keith is 17, and informs Ronan that he has run away from home and will not be going back, please don’t call the cops, he’ll be on his way as soon as the sun is up. Ronan doesn’t hear any of this because he’s spotted the deep bruise around Keith’s eye and is caught in a vivid flashback. He offers him a job, helping him milk the cows in the mornings before school in exchange for a bedroom and as much food as he can eat. This turns out to be a lot of food. Keith reminds Ronan of Adam at every turn, even though they’re nothing alike. Keith is sunny and friendly and more similar to Matthew, if Matthew flinched every time Ronan raised his voice. Ronan learns not to raise his voice. Opal is suspicious of him at first, but he treats her like a tiny boss even after he catches sight of her hooves, and this delights her. She orders him to collect the eggs three times a day, despite the chickens only laying them once.

Ronan finds Liam on his front porch one summer night, wrapped up in a blanket and dumped in a cardboard box like an unwanted kitten. People have learned that he takes in animals that are left at the Barns, and he’s converted one of the barns into a cat jungle after he reached his limit on mousers. He doesn’t know how it got out that he’s taking in stray children, but a baby isn’t exactly a puppy that got too big (is he a baby? A toddler? How is Ronan supposed to know?). Declan would tell him to send him to social services right away, but, well, Liam has magic. Not dream magic. Nothing like the psychics. Maybe a little like Adam, but he doesn’t think about that. The cows hate Liam, but all the other animals will come over and snuffle his hair and let him jab his little baby fingers in their faces. Birds perch on Ronan’s shoulder to inspect him in the baby wrap Ronan dreamed so he could cart him around the farm. He only found him that night, rather than in the morning, because fireflies clung to every available space on his little body, a beacon of flashing lights.

Ronan is pretty well at the end of his rope and not in the mood for more problems when Keith brings Laura home from school one day. She’s a year younger than him, and the rumor is that her parents kicked her out when she told them she was pregnant and she’s been living in the woods. Keith, being the friendly, helpful, maybe a little nosy sort, tracked her down and asked her about it. She told him she’s actually been sleeping under the bleachers in the gym, but the rumors are otherwise true. What’s Ronan going to do, turn her away? Then he has to hire her boyfriend, who’s an alright kid for all he forgot to wrap it. He grew up a few streets over from Fox Way, but even though his parents are supportive and loving they can’t afford to take in his girlfriend and their future baby. The boyfriend and Keith become fast friends. Laura takes over the vegetable patch.

So this is how Ronan goes from having one dream child to having four children and a grandkid on the way in the space of a year.

Then Blue and Gansey decide to get married. It’s a little bit the result of their desire to solidify the legality of their relationship and a little bit the result of Mrs. Gansey’s desire not to have her son living in sin as she starts her governor campaign. They decide to let Mrs. Gansey plan an extravagant church wedding exactly the way she wants it, as long as they don’t have to do anything besides show up, and to plan a smaller, more meaningful wedding for themselves at the Barns. They decide this kind of last minute, and Gansey calls Adam in a panic, begging him to come down and help them get everything ready. (Sidenote: Gansey and Blue argue for weeks about who gets Ronan and who gets Adam as their Best Man/Maid of Honor. Finally they realize that they each sort of want both of them and sort of want the other to have both of them, so they flip a coin. Blue gets Ronan and Gansey gets Adam. Henry was always going to perform the ceremony, because he was always going to be a part of the marriage.)

So Adam takes two weeks off work, packs his brood into the car and takes them to his ex boyfriend’s magic farm to plan a polyamorous wedding for his best friends.

Adam’s kids and Ronan’s kids...do not get along. Some of it is that they each think their dad is the best dad. Some of it is that James and Jessica think Keith and Laura have had it easy out here in the idyllic countryside and Keith and Laura think James and Jessica have had it easy because they’ve never milked a cow. Some of it is just that they’re teenagers and they’re expected to get along, so they stubbornly do not.

Opal and Maria hate each other on sight because they each know, through Adam’s letters to Opal, that the other occupies a special place in Adam’s heart that they would like to occupy alone. Opal eats the leg off of Maria’s stuffed dog. Maria starts teaching Ronan sign language. Points are scored and lost by both parties.

Liam, of course, falls head over tiny baby heels for Adam. The sight of Adam effortlessly calming a child that Ronan has been trying and failing to win over for months makes rage well up in Ronan’s chest, and also makes him want a cold shower. Ronan’s careful attention on Maria’s small hands as she teaches him the basics do something similar to Adam.

(Calla shakes hands with James and Jessica and gives a harsh bark of a laugh. Maura later explains, with a little more tact, that Jessica is a mirror, like Blue, and James is a dampener. They’ve been canceling each other out their entire lives.)

Adam and Ronan fall back in love, obviously. Neither of them ever really fell out of it. Adam can work from anywhere with internet now, and James and Jessica never made any friends at their old school, so what’s keeping them in DC? (Maria had friends, but Maria can make friends anywhere. She’s good at that.) Adam makes blissful plans to move himself and his kids to the Barns. Ronan makes blissful plans to build an addition and fill his house with even more family (one of which can calm Liam).

The kids are not pleased and resolve to break them up before Blue and Gansey say their vows. The probably bond with each other in the process. Maybe Keith’s parents make a reappearance and Jessica and James help beat them up. Maybe Laura starts freaking out about having a baby and Jessica offers her expertise (one of her jobs is babysitting). Maybe someone says something racist or ableist about Maria and the others defend her. Maybe Opal and Maria bond over popsicle stick crafts.

They all definitely live happily ever after.

#the raven cycle #look i wrote a thing #pynch

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honeylikewords · 6 years ago

Note

You know why I’m here. Let’s hear it.

thank you for your service, cydney, you are so brave in sacrificing yourself so as to allow me to Infodump about my Angel, Walter Cruz, whomst I love so dearly and so well

so anyway silly stuff aside I’m going to now reply using proper capitalization and punctuation so as to make this post somewhat legible (since I know my rambling will be... dense), so HERE WE GO

This is Walter Cruz.

Well... sort of.

Technically speaking, we never see Walter Cruz. So there are no gifs of him. And, technically speaking, that’s a gif of Oscar in Operation Finale, but, in my defense, that particular style and facial expression is generally how I headcanon Walter as looking. But that’ll get explained later. For now, I should just say that, yes, technically, we never see Walter’s face. Still, I know what he looks like, because that face up there is the face behind the voice we hear in Gimlet Media’s Homecoming, a podcast wherein stars my dearest, darlingest Walter Cruz, as played by Oscar Isaac.

Walter Cruz is a 26-year-old Army soldier coming home to the U.S. after three tours with the military, most recently having been stationed in North Africa. He has been brought to Tampa, Florida, and is staying at a rehabilitation center for soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder, the center being tied to the Geist company’s Homecoming Initiative, a privately-funded but governmentally connected initiative that he doesn’t fully understand, but assumes is friendly and in place to help him re-adjust to civilian life, as he was told was the purpose of the center.

The podcast is comprised of audio clips from recordings of Walter’s sessions with his therapist at the Homecoming Initiative, Heidi Bergman, as well as outside audio clips, such as phone calls between Heidi and her boss, Heidi’s boss and his own boss, dialogue between Heidi and others, et cetera. Heidi Bergman is, by default, the protagonist, but at the heart of the show is Walter, and what’s happening to Walter at the Homecoming Initiative.

I don’t want to give away too many spoilers in case people want to listen to the show (it’s a total of twelve podcast episodes, each one approximately 30 minutes in length, which you can listen to here), but we as listeners slowly start to realize that the Homecoming Initiative may not be as well-intentioned as it makes itself seem, and that Walter is in danger from manipulative medical practitioners, an abusive system of experimentations taking place on him, and may be being medicated in a way he neither consented to nor needs. So, for anyone for whom that may be a trigger, please go in carefully!

Now, on to more stuff about Walter on a personal level.

Walter is very sweet and down-to-earth, very humble. Within the first few moments of hearing his voice, we know he’s unassuming, protective of his friends, and understanding of the difficulties in other people’s lives, being very empathetic and caring. He speaks in a gentle tone, and while not necessarily loquacious or excessively talkative, he’s clearly intelligent and thoughtful, finding careful ways to explain himself to others.

Walter loves animals, particularly dogs. He loves telling jokes and playing little pranks, often being a little bit of a tease, but only ever in a loving, playful way. He knows when to stop messing around and be serious, and has a very level head on his shoulders. Still, he has a warm, friendly sense of humor that seems to naturally bleed into everything he says, as if he’s always a few words away from trying to make someone smile. Plus, he has a wonderful laugh; kinda breathy, like he’s trying to stay quiet, but as it builds into something bigger and fuller, his voice comes in and it’s just so warm and fluttery.

Walter loves road trips and believes they’re essential to getting to know one’s partner as their truest self. He wants to be an accountant once he leaves the military. He likes pineapple cobbler and camping. He doesn’t like Titanic, but he’s seen it more times than any normal person has. He has sisters and a mother who he lived with after being discharged from the Homecoming Initiative, and who he loves more than anyone in the world. He has a dog named Sammy, who loves to eat bacon.

Walter loves Yosemite National Park and, without giving away too much, there is good reason for me to believe that Walter spent a great deal of his time after the events of the Homecoming Initiative in a cabin in Yosemite. I like to imagine he climbed Half Dome Hill without a permit.

Walter is also headstrong, determined, not always one to follow rules, full of hope, and almost a little naive. He believes in the best of people, and many bad, bad people use that against him. He wants to help people and do good, and live a life of love and togetherness. He cares more about the problems of others than his own problems and will gladly put himself aside to do anything for someone else.

That being said, because of his generosity of spirit and trusting attitude, Walter’s... Walter’s been through a lot. A lot of people have used him for the wrong things and abused him, and for a very long time, particularly immediately after being discharged from Homecoming, he couldn’t even take care of himself, as he was so damaged by the abuse. He’d been lied to, psychologically manipulated, physically manipulated, and medically abused to the point where he could not so much as even tie his shoes and was in, essentially, a catatonic state for several months.

But he, somehow, even through all of that, came out the other side as strong, hopeful, and charitable as ever. Clever, quick-witted, and tender. The same Walter, unbroken, just bruised. He’s very brave, very kind, and so sweet it aches.

I don’t want to give away any spoilers, but I probably will, eventually, just so I can accurately describe all of Walter’s experiences when I write about him, but this next portion of the post is going to be speculative stuff about his life after the events of Homecoming as a narrative, so I’ll try to step carefully around any major spoilers while also integrating his story arc accurately (or, well, as accurately as I want. I’m the boss, here, and I’m valid to want to give him a soft ending!).

Anywhomst.

I love to imagine Walter and his sweetheart in Yosemite. While his first trip there was so he could heal and take time away from being Walter Cruz, case-patient, and instead be Walter Cruz, normal nobody, and therefore likely wouldn’t be a good time for him to be in a romantic relationship, I like to think he’d come back there in the future, once he’s more at ease, ready to be in this relationship. In fact, the two of them choose to live just outside of Yosemite when they decide to move in together.

It’s only a few hours from Bakersfield, where his mother, Gloria, lives, after all, and he could come visit her every now and then. He knows, now, that it’s hard to live with her-- not because he doesn’t love her or because she doesn’t love him-- but because, for her, the past will always be visible on him, like a stain he’ll never manage to fully wash away, and he wants to let the past go and feel clean, and be seen for his present and future potential instead of just the pain of the past.

That’s why, when Walter falls in love, he feels so... different.

He’d grown so tired of everyone looking at him and seeing Walter Cruz, soldier, Walter Cruz, Homecoming Initiative victim, Walter Cruz, human vegetable. And he felt like everyone who had known him before was so fixated on why he wasn’t the exact same boy he’d been when he was 19 that they wouldn’t let him move on from his pain, forcing him to stagnate in it.

But she doesn’t make him feel like that.

She met him long after Homecoming, more than five years later. He still has episodes, of course, spans of days where he can’t figure out if the things he thinks are dreams or memories or erased half-memories of things that happened, or if he’s missing something important, but she never judges him, never forces him to speak. It never makes her change her mind about him.

She’s not a therapist or a doctor or some prying caseworker trying to coax his life out of him as if it’s a state secret they’re entitled to knowing; she’s just a woman who loves him, adores him, holds him close at night and lets him squeeze her and bury his head in her neck like a little child, safe from the world, safe from anyone trying to drain him of himself.

He fell in love with her because she makes him laugh; he hadn’t really laughed in so long, and then she happened. She makes him smile, makes him feel normal and accepted, light and free. She doesn’t treat him like fragile glass or like some manila envelope to be wrenched open and shaken for its contents. She doesn’t push him to talk about anything he doesn’t want to, which is why, in a roundabout way, he talks to her the most.

Out of everyone he’s had to talk to-- his mother, his therapists, his doctors, the federal agents, the cops-- she knows the most. In fact, she kinda knows everything. Everything he knows, he’s told her. He spread it out over time, letting her in slowly, the details falling into place organically over time as she pieced together the truth from the strands of information Walter willingly gave her, but the truth is, she doesn’t care about the Geist corporation, or Homecoming, or Heidi Bergman. She only cares about Walter.

It’s not that she doesn’t care that he suffered-- of course she cares-- but rather that she doesn’t care about the conspiracy, the facts, the X-Files-esque ‘unveiling’ of the gritty details: she only cares about taking care of Walter, and helping him move on, leaving all the scum and garbage that ever hurt him behind. He’s not a case to crack or a puzzle to solve, he’s someone she loves, just the way he is, no matter what. She knows he’ll never be ‘all better’, healed of every wound inflicted by these monsters, but she wants him to be able to grow and live a life beyond what came before. It’ll always be there, in his past, but it doesn’t have to always be where he is in his present.

And Walter loves her all the more for this alleviation.

They live just outside Yosemite, a ways away from any cities, in a nice, quiet place. Walter was insistent on a cabin, and it works out well for both of them. Sammy has plenty of room to run and chase squirrels and rabbits and birds, and Walter’s got lots of quiet and calm to keep himself from getting too stressed. His sweetheart and he love to take long hikes into the park, having their own special little spots all throughout the park, locked in Walter’s memories for different reasons.

One outcropping of rocks overlooking the valley was where they had a romantic picnic, one where Walter laid his head in her lap and just closed his eyes and let himself feel okay, safe in her hands. Another place is the base of Bridalveil Falls, where he’d held her from behind and rested his head on her shoulder, the spray of the falls brushing his face as he kissed her cheek, allowing himself to smile and be happy with someone he adores.

He likes to tease her about the name, Bridalveil Falls, wondering if she’d ever be the bride of Bridalveil Falls, asking if she’d like to have a veil train as long as the sheet of water that tumbles down those cliffs. Walter plays it off as a joke, but he knows why he watches her face carefully as he makes that ‘joke’, he knows why he leans in closer, listens for every possible interpretation of her words, for the delicate meaning of her inflections in her answers.

He does, deeply and truly, long to know if she’ll marry him.

Walter’s always been one to commit himself to what he believes in. He stands firm and fast by what he wants, and he knows what his heart wants. It wants her, now and forever; she’s his someone to lean on in his darkest hours, and his someone to uplift with the strength he knows he can only garner through his love for her. She means the world to him, and she makes it easier to live in his painful, confusing, ephemeral plane of existence.

So, he tells himself that when the time is right, and the stars align just the way he wants, he’ll ask her. He probably won’t wait long at all-- lord knows he loves her too much to practice anything even remotely close to self-control-- but he’ll wait just enough to let her know that he’s not off his rocker, not manically suggesting this to her on a whim. Walter wants her to know it’s real, it’s honest, it’s earnest, and it’s true: he loves her, and wishes to spend all his life building on that love.

Nowadays, he works as an accountant. He likes the work: it’s simple, steady, solid, and he’s good at it. It leaves him lots of time, too, to wander the park, or around his house, or in the small town they live in just outside Yosemite. He likes it, as well, when he and his sweetheart stay in for a day, just curled up together in the cabin, holding each other close, hovering near each other if they have to move around.

They still go on trips, though. Long, long road trips, with Walter behind the wheel and his beloved by his side, talking and reading and listening to music, but mostly, just being together, even when it becomes quietly tense to realize they’re in the middle of nowhere with someone (who they assuredly do love) and it’s awkward and uncomfortable yet somehow so natural and as it was meant to be, the frustration of the road melting into the comfort of being together.

He likes to stay up just a little bit later than her when they get to the hotel room, watching her fall asleep. It makes him feel something gentle and protective inside of himself, because he sees her resting there, by his side, and knows she trusts him enough to be so vulnerable in his presence. She trusts him to keep her safe through everything, and he appreciates it. Plus, she’s cute when she sleeps; he likes a little snoring and turning from her when they’re in bed, since he was used to the sound of his platoon all snoring like chainsaws at night.

It’s a good life he has, now. He sees his mom regularly, he has a woman in his life who he loves beyond his own capacity to put into words, he has a home and a job and a sense of existing in his own body as himself, not as anyone else’s puppet or playing or practice experiment. His dog loves him, and he gets to eat as much cobbler as he wants (he’s even tried his hand at baking his own, though he prefers baking them together with his darling).

And it feels good to stop trying to outrun himself, to stop chasing this invisible thread he hoped would lead him out from the labyrinth of his own mind. He has to live with who he is, but he can live with that and also live with others. He can live with the people who love him and want him to be safe and happy and wholly cared for. And no one can ever take away his innate goodness, not even himself, not even if he tried.

So he’s happy, in the understated way truly happy people are; he’s not always giddy and gleeful, nor exactly “happy”, but he’s content, and even when he’s in pain, he’s not alone. He’s loved, and love endures everything. Loved and not alone. That’s all he could ask for. So, perhaps, he’s not simply ‘happy’, whatever that means: he’s well. And all is well.

#messages #gif warning #walter cruz #homecoming #ghkghkg this is so fucking NICHE and SILLY #but i am VALID and ive relistened to the whole podcast #im gonna probably listen to it a third time to really hunker down on some of the details #anyway im uhhhhhhhhhhh VALID #fave #Anonymous

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desroundtree · 6 years ago

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This Administration

It is interesting to watch what we have become under this presidency. The modernity of this country seems to slip from our grasp, little by little, then all at the same time. We seem to be fighting things that we never thought we would have to again, rights that we have earned are up for grabs in a fight no normal person feels like they could win. From a mental health standpoint, it is exhausting and sometimes anxiety-inducing. Never mind the other mental health issues people are battling because of not only the things inside them but the things outside them too.

We are sitting in a place which feels like waiting, for every bit of breaking news that seems to attack the citizens of this country, as well as the people trying to come here for a break from what seems like the worst things that could ever happen to them, but just beyond those gates exists a different kind of hell.

Americans struggle to battle some of the worst things we have seen in a long time. The things some of us have experienced is mind-blowing. Things that were once forced to be kept in the dark have been given a spotlight, and every ugly face grins into it. Confederate flags fly in the wind with pride. Bumper stickers in support of a man who doesn’t believe in a woman’s right to choose, in the right to seek asylum, in the responsibility to pay taxes, in common sense gun laws, or even in the Constitution. I think it is hard to swallow seeing people pledging love for America but not what America stands for, or did stand for at one time. We have taken giant leaps backward, and it seems like it’s ok to some but damning to most. The part that feels the worst is the helplessness in it all, and the allowance of fear and anger to enter our daily lives.

I feel sorry for what our children are seeing every day, what they have experienced already at such young ages. The drills that they have been taught to survive a day in school if something horrible happens, and how we as parents have lost the ability to feel like we can protect our children, and like school is a safe place to be. They believed that for a long time, and so did we. Now, we worry about their lives more than we already had to.

My daughter already knows more about loss than any child should. Her friends have lost their grandparents, some have lost their parents to these horrible laws that have deported them and sent them back to countries that persecute them, abuse them and violate their human rights. Even as people seek a path to legal citizenship, that is still not enough.

She knows about children being torn from their parent's arms and sleeping in cages. Not because I told her (a soft talk was given but worrying a child that already exhibits anxious tendencies is not something any parent wants to do). She is aware and understands the world around her. Children talk to one another, and I don’t think as adults give them as much credit as maybe we should. Being open with your children is important, but what they see right now is chaos even we don’t understand. Some things I feel like even I can’t explain.

There are days I think I want to try to understand what is happening and why people feel the way they feel. It makes me curious because I don’t share the same morals or values and maybe that’s where the block is. I know people who believe in him, in what he has done and what he claims to be doing. Hell, they voted for him. They believe in his tweets, his blasphemous nonsense, his inability to see something other than his base. They want his wall, to keep out people who work hard in this country and only want a chance. They believe what he spews on a daily basis. It has become something the whole World must deal with and something Americans see as their real life.

The truth is this makes me not want to understand. It makes a lot of people feel like they have to approach people as they approach them, and they have to respond accordingly. It is hard to understand racism when you aren’t racist, just like it is hard to accept racism as a way of life that is acceptable for anyone when you are not racist. You can refuse to be subjected to someone’s behavior, and they can do the same, but having to prove every day that this is not normal or acceptable or even legal to someone that doesn’t care is exhausting.

It is also unnecessary. Or rather it should be.

What this administration has taught me is to try let go. It is teaching me not to ingest everything and to really understand what issues bother me and stay focused on those for now, and even though this post many issues we face, we need to concentrate and unite in order to get the things we not only want but need.

We can’t take on every battle at once, and I am not the only person that has to learn that.

Some people will hold on to an idea like a starving dog eating a t-bone steak. There is no reasoning with someone who believes abortion is wrong, or child abuse as someone told me, or infanticide. Religion should not play a part in women’s healthcare, but it seems as though separation of Church and State is something that has gone down the drain like other things that make America the country it is.

The idea that such misinformation is actually being repeated by this administration is not only scary, but it is dangerous. Instead of thinking of controlling women, this administration should think about the doctors, nurses, and caregivers it has put in danger on a daily basis. It stops their ability to perform necessary healthcare procedures. People who go to work every day to help women choose what is right for them, who sit with them before every procedure and explain what is going to happen, and who allow them to change their minds if they wish. The decision is hard for some, and necessary for others. I am sure there are women who abuse this right, but I am also sure this number is much less than women that are in need of the help and services these places offer. These are important decisions that should be made by women on a case by case basis and passing sweeping laws in states to outlaw, or make this procedure more difficult than it already is heartless and cruel.

During this administration, I have learned now more than ever that it is a man’s world. Men are still controlling the blood, sweat and tears of women, we are still viewed as lesser and treated as such no matter how much we fight. We can march, we can scream, we can petition, we can sit in, play dead, and raise our fists and voices. We can vote, but that doesn’t seem to work for women because we did that and ended up in this situation anyway. Still we marched, because at times it’s hard to understand that there really is no way out of the situation. We are pretty much useless unless we try again.

It’s hard to convince women of color that they need to, that we need them to come out in full force for a candidate they might not agree with or support. But the truth is, in order not to be the subject of more repeals of women’s rights, more human rights violations, more attacks on our planet - we need to do it all over again. It’s hard for some to agree with, and to swallow.

Finding a way through this has been difficult, not arguing your way through is even more of a task. We are still fighting - organizations are taking on cases I am sure they never thought they would prosecute. Suing an administration for the rights of immigrants, women and even children, fighting against the poison water they expect people to drink, and working to secure the correct amount of funding to repair the devastation of an island filled with American citizens. It begins to feel like we are constantly fighting.

I hope we have the strength to continue.

There has to be a way to end this administration’s ridiculous show of power, and its grab at something America never needed until he sat in the office. We were diplomatic and almost regal in the eyes of most, and now, we aren’t and it is apparently clear. I hope we can find our place back there, where women had the right to choose, and children aren’t separated from their parents. I hope we can find our way back to an administration that cares about the wants and needs of all, not just some. I hope for our future, for our children, that we are able to move on from this, and back toward something we can all be proud of. I hope we can still make changes for the better of everyone, and to understand the disparity that still exists. I hope we change it - and I hope we do it soon.

#this administration #women's rights #abortion is legal #abortion is healthcare #immigrants #asylum seekers #refugees #hope for the future #keep fighting #resist #not my president #organize #mobilize #strategize #protest #protect our children #common sense gun laws #clean water #human rights

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heartslogos · 8 years ago

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newfragile yellows [45]

“You forgot?” Dorian exclaims, “Lavellan it’s your own anniversary, how could you forget? You know the city where I was born. I don’t even know where I was born, you know the doctor who delivered me by name. And you forgot your anniversary?”

“In my defense,” Lavellan sounds out of breath on the other end, “I’ve been very, very busy.”

“I can’t believe this. You asked me to plan this thing out for you a year and a half ago.”

“Dorian, I am currently on the run for my life.”

“That’s what you get when you take an assignment on your tenth wedding anniversary. What do I tell the Bull now?”

“I don’t know!”

Dorian stares at the venue he’s had set up overlooking the beach of the Storm Coast. It’s one of the few days where it isn’t raining and it’s actually pleasant. Dorian can stand to look at the water without getting seasick.

Literally everything is here - the guests, all of their friends, the food, the decorations, the fucking weather -

Except Lavellan.

“Bull!” Lavellan exclaims.

“Yes, Bull! As in the man you’re married to and expected to be here with. Bull who is probably on his way over right now thinking you’re already here. Bull who - “

“Bull leave it behind! Leave it! Leave it!”

Dorian stares into the sun and thinks he feels something in him crack.

“Don’t you dare tell me - “

“I don’t know what you’re going to tell Bull that you aren’t going to tell me,” Lavellan says, and then there’s a brief moment of static as she does something presumably dangerous and impossible outside of fiction, “Considering he’s with me. I feel that it’s incredibly unfair that you’re lecturing me as if I’m the only person in the wrong here. I mean, clearly he forgot too.”

“You both went on assignment on your ten year anniversary together and forgot?”

“Apparently yes,” Lavellan says, “Bull, as an aside, I’m sorry we both forgot our anniversary. I promise to say something about it later.”

Dorian hears a vague grunt of acknowledgement in the background and then Lavellan lets out a small moop and then there’s the sound of two people breathing.

A door opens and slams shut. A car engine revs.

“Pavus,” Bull says a few moments of Dorian mentally spiraling down a drain later. He doesn’t even sound out of breath.

The man is pushing fifty at least and he’s still doing this absurd bullshit.

“Bull.”

“I want to say that I also forgot the anniversary,” Bull says, “Because Lavellan is glaring at me because I guess I was supposed to remind her. Point is, every day is important and I lost track of how much time we spent together. Sorry, Kadan.”

“Just because every day with you is lovely to the point where I lose track of time doesn’t mean you’re getting away with it!” Lavellan says, “Now you’ve gone and made Dorian cross with me.”

“Sorry, Pavus.”

“I am charging all of the expenses to you,” Dorian says. “At first I was only going to do half because this was my present to you both for surviving each other for so long. Now as a present to myself I’m charging you both plus a service fee. This is my present to myself for putting up with the both of you for so long without killing either of you.”

“Love you,” Lavellan says.

“I love you too,” Dorian replies, “Don’t die. I’m rescheduling this but right now everyone here is going to eat all of this food and enjoy this perfect venue I set up for you two ungrateful lovebirds and celebrate not having you around.”

“Why are we at a fair?” Sera asks, “And why are Dalish and Lavellan crying while eating cotton candy?”

“They just found out that they aren’t related,” Krem says, offering Sera a corn dog. She takes it, and bumps it with his as they watch the two women crying over bright pink and blue bags of sugar. “They got the results earlier and haven’t been the same since. The Chief thought maybe it’d cheer them up if they went somewhere with bright lights and sugar and grass.”

“Sensory overload and a sugar crash.”

“Hey, don’t judge. It’s going well so far. They couldn’t even sit up on their own earlier. Look at them. Eating with their mouths and everything.”

“That’s terrifying.”

“Yeah, well. That’s them.” Krem says. “Did you come here with Dagna?”

“Yeah,” Sera says, “She’s off conning some booth out of, like, all their prizes or something. Sera gestures to a giant plastic bag by some tables. “I’m watching the rest of it. I don’t even know what we’re going to do with all of it. I guess charity. Dunno. Can we borrow some of your truck to carry it in?”

“Sure,” Krem says. “Might have some trouble fitting it though because the Chief and Skinner are doing the same thing.”

Krem points in the direction of some shooting galleries.

“Sensory overload, sugar crash, giant animals,” Sera says.

Krem gives her a thumbs up, “Also deep fried nonsense.”

“This is the worst family trip ever,” Lavellan declares, sitting down on a plastic recliner chair, pushing at Sera until she makes room. “They just read the last will.”

“And?” Sera flicks up her sunglasses.

“And he left me everything,” Lavellan says, “What an asshole.”

“Told you,” Sera drops her sunglasses back in place. “Now you’re a rich prick.”

“I don’t want to be,” Lavellan whines, picking at a tray of french fries. Sera smacks her arm.

“Not yours.”

“Come on! I just found out that not only is my adopted father dead - probably, or faking - but he’s also left me all of his money, worldly possessions, and problems.”

“You’re rich now, go buy your own fries,” Sera teases. “Right Varric?”

Varric holds up his hands from the next sun chair over, “I am not part of this. I am here for emotional support and to make sure that Hawke and Isabella don’t get thrown overboard.”

“How’s that going?” Lavellan asks.

“We had a few close calls but the situation was salvageable and there were no witnesses.”

“Nice,” Sera and Lavellan says.

“Hey, Boss,” Lavellan glances up and sees Bull crossing the deck, waving at her, “How’d it go?”

“How are Dorian and Cullen?”

“Greener than Dalish’s pretty, pretty eyes,” Bull replies, “Josephine and Cassandra are ready to just pitch them overboard or smother them to be done with it. How did the will go?”

“Terrible.”

“What, he cut you off and lecture you via video tape or something?”

“No! Worse! He left me everything!” Lavellan says, throwing herself backwards onto Sera. Sera grunts, pushing at Lavellan. Lavellan puts her arm over her eyes. “I don’t want Solas’ bullshit!”

Bull sits down on the sun chair on Sera’s right, “Well, you could always just use that to piss him off. Like use his money to fund shit you know he hated or something.”

“I like that,” Sera says, “Spite from beyond the grave countered spite for things in the grave.”

Lavellan sighs and sits up, frowning.

Bull holds out a container of fries.

Lavellan smiles, “You know me so well.”

“Nah, Fenris texted me.”

Lavellan twists around and waves at Fenris two chairs over, “I knew you had a soft spot for me.”

Fenris rolls over, “Payment for the opportunity to see Hawke and Isabella almost plunge to their certain deaths.”

#heartsfic #gather your party and venture forth

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dyanantle5146-blog · 7 years ago

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What Perform The Symbols On Your Clothes' Washing Label Mean?

Task management is actually a lot more about handling individuals compared to managing projects. No matter the amount from loan an individual has or even the size of their firm, or even the amount of wide range they have-- those folks that take action and threat without the anxiety from breakdown are the ones that are going to essentially have market allotment. Nonetheless, lots of people, especially moms and dads from toddlers perform certainly not would like to use strong steroids which might possess even more major adverse effects on their child's tender skin layer. I find folks that seem like hobos strolling alongside the roadway, texting furiously while they walk, as if they were actually a leader of market that has to keep in constant bit along with tons of important persons over severe affairs. While I don't look at timing the market place to be my forte - instead choosing to concentrate on property low-cost, diversified collections that create steady as well as normal reward profit - I invested time over the past number of times assessing some 2017 investment expectations and also more than happy to discuss a handful of ideas. Other lorries our team offered in the sector, our experts prepared funding on 72%, offered a company arrangement on 45% as well as sold a life-time oil product on 26%. Perform you get in touch with certain people at the same time on a daily basis? This is actually simply in later years that being black created you a slave for good and through birth, or at the very least a kind of human consistently substandard to white individuals. I am actually a big fan from the same films that Sarah had actually gazed in but actors are true individuals as well as have real worlds beyond being actually said her life whatever that may be is personal and need to remain thus by her option, merely be actually thankful that she had the capacity to touch the lives from from fans, she will definitely resurface if when she wants to. Negativeness is actually incredibly draining pipes, so an individual can easily sit and also talk about their problems, as well as how this is actually going wrong, and just how lifestyle is thus hard, and on and on and also before you know that you are actually drained pipes, as well as they walk away experiencing uplifted given that they just fed off your light by dumping their dark foolishness on you. If you do not feel really good concerning your own self, no matter how many people match you - you will certainly continuously strongly believe bad things about yourself, and intensify all indicators that you are negative and inappropriate, while lessening any sort of signs that you are actually a really good and worthy person. Felines might receive tasty fish flavorful bottle water and canines got a husky flavored water. Individuals that work for organisations make decisions everyday, and their activities could affect the lifestyles from many other individuals. The advantages of possessing a pet dog is not at all brand new to individuals as well as virtually everybody knows this today.

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jarrettfuller · 8 years ago

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Simon Romero has a great piece — with excellent photos — on Fordlandia, the former small town in Brazil built by Henry Ford in 1920s:

Ford, the automobile manufacturer who is considered a founder of American industrial mass-production methods, hatched his plan for Fordlândia in a bid to produce his own source of the rubber needed for making tires and car parts like valves, hoses and gaskets.

In doing so, he waded into an industry shaped by imperialism and claims of botanical subterfuge. Brazil was home to Hevea brasiliensis, the coveted rubber tree, and the Amazon Basin had boomed from 1879 to 1912 as industries in North America and Europe fed the demand for rubber.

This hits on so many of my interests — imagined utopias, abandoned villages, corporatation-built cities. It's always reminded me a bit of Disney's original plan for Epcot, again with unfortunate effects and results.

Beyond producing rubber, Ford, an avowed teetotaler, anti-Semite and skeptic of the Jazz Age, clearly wanted life in the jungle to be more transformative. His American managers forbade consumption of alcohol, while promoting gardening, square dancing and readings of the poetry of Emerson and Longfellow.

Going even further in Ford’s quest for utopia, so-called sanitation squads operated across the outpost, killing stray dogs, draining puddles of water where malaria-transmitting mosquitoes could multiply and checking employees for venereal diseases.

Here are two Flickr sets — one with photos from its height and one from 2009.

In a coincidence, I read Romero's piece right before reading Geoff Manaugh's post on mining village of Fremont, Quebec:

Designed by architects Norbert Schoenauer and Maurice Desnoyers, Fermont features a hotel, a hospital, a small Metro supermarket, and even a tourism bureau—for all that, however, it is run entirely by the firm ArcelorMittal, which also owns the nearby iron mine. This means that there are no police, who would be funded by the Canadian government; instead, Fermont is patrolled by its own private security force. The town is also home to an extraordinary architectural feature: a residential megastructure whose explicit purpose is to redirect the local weather.

[ Fermont’s weather-controlling residential super-wall]

Manaugh compares these mining villages — usually built and run by organizations — to future Mars colonies.

Industrial settlements such as Russell Gold’s fracking camps in the American West or those in the Canadian North are most often run by subsidiary services corporations, such as Baker Hughes, Oilfield Lodging, Target Logistics, or the aptly named Civeo.

The last of these—whose very name implies civics reduced to the catchiness of an IPO—actually lists “villages” as one of its primary spatial products. These are sold as “integrated accommodation solutions” that you can order wholesale, like a piece of flatpak furniture, an entire pop-up city given its own tracking number and delivery time.

He concludes:

In the past, abandoned cities would be allowed to molder, turning into picturesque ruins and archaeological parks, but the mining towns of the Canadian north meet an altogether different fate. Inhabited one decade and completely gone the next, these are not new Romes of the Arctic Circle, but something more like an urban mirage, an economic Fata Morgana in the ice and snow.

#fordlandia #ford #epcot #geoff manaugh #mars #fremont #cities #urban development #corporatation #architecture #speculative design #history #ruins #the new york times #Simon Romero

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kristablogs · 4 years ago

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They tried to tame the Klamath River. They filled it with toxic algae instead.

The Klamath River (Bob Wick/Bureau of Land Management/)

Jeremy Deaton writes for Nexus Media, a nonprofit climate change news service. You can follow him @deaton_jeremy. This story originally featured on Nexus Media News.

Read more on the perils of America’s aging dam infrastructure here.

The Karuk people define themselves by the Klamath River, just as the Romans did the Tiber or the Egyptians did the Nile. The word “Karuk” means “upstream,” a reference to the waterway, which runs from Klamath Lake in southern Oregon, across the mountains of northern California—where the Karuk live—before emptying into the Pacific Ocean. Every year, at the end of summer, the Karuk celebrate the river, the mountains and the forest in their “making the world” ceremonies.

“These ceremonies are to remind us of our responsibility to take care of our place,” says Josh Saxon, executive director of the Karuk tribe. “We believe that we’re related to everything, so we have a responsibility to take care of our relatives, which are the fish and the water and the animals and the sky—everything.”

As part of these ceremonies, priests bathe in the river. But from July through November, when the water is warmest, the Klamath fills with blue-green algae that render the river toxic. The algae—which are not actually algae, but a species of cyanobacteria, Microcystis aeruginosa—turn the water bright green and lend it the smell of rotting seaweed. People can get rashes from bathing in the river or become violently ill from drinking the water, suffering nausea and diarrhea at the height of the ceremonies.

A toxic algal bloom on the Klamath River at its peak. (The Karuk tribe/)

“It would be like going to mass and them giving you toxic algae to drink instead of wine,” says Craig Tucker, natural resources consultant for the Karuk tribe. “People are supposed to be in the water conducting religious ceremonies, and now they have to decide, is it more important to practice their religion, or is it more important to protect their health? It’s a horrible dilemma.”

Over the last century, humans fueled the algal blooms by draining wetlands, erecting hydroelectric dams and building farms along the Klamath—all of which upset the natural balance of the river. The water grew warmer and filled with nutrients, allowing the cyanobacteria to thrive.

Healing the Klamath means reversing decades of damage. Humans conquered the river and the wetlands, and now the Karuk and their allies are trying to break the binds. The work is slow and arduous, and was made more difficult this month when federal regulators put a carefully crafted plan to remove a series of hydroelectric dams in doubt.

“Every day, I pray for clean water, and it’s just disheartening when you go outside, and you smell that smell, and you see the river,” Saxon says. “It weighs on me quite a bit.”

Harmful algal blooms aren’t new. Researchers have been studying algal blooms since the dawn of the scientific revolution. One of the earliest papers published in Philosophical Transactions, the world’s oldest scientific journal, is a 1672 account of Tuchomskie Lake in Poland, which had become “green in the middle with an hairy efflorescence.” Cows, chickens and dogs, the author testified, died from drinking the lake water.

The problem of harmful algal blooms, however, has grown substantially worse over the last 200 years. That trend accelerated in the last half-century as humans altered the conditions in lakes and streams to favor cyanobacteria.

The Klamath River Basin mapped. (U.S. Bureau of Reclamation/)

For the Karuk tribe, the problem began in 1906, when the Klamath Project, a federal initiative, started draining the wetlands abutting the river to turn them into farmland. The fertile volcanic soil of the Klamath River Basin made it ideal for farming, so officials carved up the map, offering plots of land to returning service members after each world war. After World War II, demand was so high, they held a lottery. The Klamath Union High School band played as veterans waited to hear if their names would be plucked from a pickle jar and read aloud on national radio.

By turning wetlands into farms, the Klamath Project unwittingly gave ammunition to cyanobacteria. The rich volcanic soil that made the land so well-suited to farming also yielded the nutrients that fed cyanobacteria. At one time, the grasses that grew in the wetlands absorbed these surplus nutrients. But when the Klamath Project built dikes around the wetlands, it blocked this critical offramp, allowing those nutrients to collect in the river. Farmers later compounded the problem by feeding their crops synthetic fertilizer, which drained into the Klamath, helping nourish harmful algal blooms.

Aerial footage reveals the rich spread of farmland in the Klamath River Basin. (Sgt. Jason van Mourik/U.S. Air National Guard/)

The Klamath Hydroelectric Project further aggravated the problem by building a series of power-generating dams along the middle Klamath, the first of which went online in 1918. Each dam created a large, mostly stagnant reservoir of water where cyanobacteria could feed, sunbathe and multiply.

Climate change has likely worsened the problem. Globally, rising temperatures are warming lakes and streams, helping spur the growth of cyanobacteria, studies show. Climate change is also fueling drought, which dries up rivers, slowing their flow. This further helps cyanobacteria, which fare better in slower-moving water, where they can gain a foothold. The Klamathdis now subject to yearly blooms, during which cyanobacteria produce microcystins, a liver toxin and potential carcinogen that can kill animals and make people sick.

“People knew for years that the reservoirs turned green, but they didn’t really understand what that was until 2004 when the Karuk tribe’s water quality team took samples and sent them off to a lab for testing. The lab called us and said, ‘We don’t know where you got that water, but do not touch it,’” Tucker says. “These reservoirs have become liver toxin factories, just pumping this stuff out.”

The Klamath River runs free from algal blooms. (Bob Wick/Bureau of Land Management/)

Harmful algal blooms aren’t limited to the Klamath River. They have taken hold in all 50 states, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council. One 2014 bloom in Lake Erie grew so large that it showed up in satellite images. In Toledo, Ohio, which draws its water from the Lake Erie, locals were told to drink bottled water, because the tap water could make them ill.

Unlike humans, aquatic flora and fauna can’t escape the algal blooms. Plants suffer because cyanobacteria, which sit on the surface of the water, prevent sunlight from reaching areas below. And fish suffer when the cyanobacteria eventually die off. The microorganisms that gobble up cyanobacteria remains consume huge volumes of oxygen during their feast, leaving fish to suffocate.

Because algal blooms have no single cause, they also have no easy fix. Healing the Klamath means unspooling the bitter legacy of manifest destiny, and returning the river to a more natural state.

In 2007, the Karuk tribe, joined by conservationists and fishers, brought a lawsuit against California regulators, who had failed to deal with the toxic microcystins in the river. They won. Thereafter, California listed the Klamath as “impaired” by microcystins. This made it harder for the regional power utility, PacifiCorp, to continue operating the hydroelectric dams that were fueling the algal blooms.

The John C. Boyle Dam, which is slated for removal. (The Karuk tribe/)

“If PacifiCorp wanted to try to keep their dams and get a new license, they would have to somehow mitigate these algal blooms to the point where they were compliant with the Clean Water Act, and they weren’t sure how they could possibly do that,” Tucker says.

The company weighed using algaecides in the reservoirs. It also considered installing aerators, which would stir up the water and prevent cyanobacteria from settling in. But such measures would prove expensive, and hard to justify, under the circumstances. Not only did PacifiCorp have to curb the algal blooms, it also had to upgrade its dams to allow salmon to move upstream. Given the high cost of addressing both challenges, it would be cheaper to remove the aging dams entirely.

In 2016, PacifiCorp agreed to a plan to remove the Copco № 1, Copco № 2, J.C. Boyle and Iron Gate dams. According to the plan, PacifiCorp would transfer ownership of the dams to the newly formed Klamath River Renewal Corporation, which would tear down the dams with funds from the power utility and the state of California.

This month, however, federal regulators threw a wrench in the works when they said that PacifiCorp must remain a co-licensee of the dams. As a co-licensee, the utility would face millions in additional costs, a fact that has threatened to undo the plan. Parties say they are optimistic that they will be able to revise the deal to keep PacifiCorp on board. If they are successful, the largest dam removal in U.S. history will kick off in 2021.

A map shows the extent of removals required for the Klamath River Renewal Project Map. (Klamath River Renewal Corporation/)

Even then, however, it will only be the first step in stemming the toxic algal blooms. The Karuk still face rising temperatures and high nutrient levels. “It’s one of those death-by-a-thousand-cuts kind of problems,” Tucker says.

To further heal the river, farmers could build earthen barriers around their farms to prevent fertilizer from spilling into waterways. Officials could work to restore the wetlands, and governments, broadly, could finally take the radical steps needed to curb climate change. For now, algal blooms remain a marginal issue.

While the California Water Resources Control Board is keeping track of harmful algal blooms in lakes and rivers across the state, warning visitors when the water is unsafe for swimming, it has so far set no objectives or issued any regulations related to cyanobacteria.

The Copco No. 2 Dam is also slated for removal. (The Karuk tribe/)

“In terms of large-scale policy, there isn’t right now any explicit policy in California that’s addressing the drivers of harmful algal blooms,” says Keith Bouma-Gregson, an environmental scientist who co-leads the freshwater harmful algal bloom program for the California Water Resources Control Board.

While the Karuk and their allies mustered the political will needed to tear down a series of aging dams, they are likely to face more resistance when lobbying for regulations on farming. And climate change could only make it harder to find areas of compromise. Currently, drought is stifling growers in the Klamath Basin, so officials are diverting water from the river to farms in the region. Removing water from the river could slow its flow, potentially exacerbating the algae problem, sources said. For the Karuk, it is a relentlessly uphill fight.

“I would like everyone who has had a stake in this process to recognize that our way of life and our connection to our place and to our relatives and our identity as a people is at stake,” Saxon says. “This isn’t our livelihood. These are our lives.”

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scootoaster · 4 years ago