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headpainmigraine · 1 year

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Migraine isn’t a Headache Part Five: make it go away

I wanted to put something about getting diagnosed before I started to address medication, but the spoons to put my diagnosis journey together down on paper are much more than this section, so I’m skipping it until later.

(We’re out of Migraine Awareness Month now, but we are getting into Disability Pride Month, and chronic migraine is a disability, so!)

Treatment for Migraine can be divided into ACUTE and PREVENTATIVE

(and within that, can be divided into ‘medical’ and ‘complimentary’)

Acute treatment includes medication that treats the pain when you’re starting or having a migraine, like triptans, and methods you use to handle the pain, like cold packs

Preventative treatment aims to stop the migraine happening, so that you don’t need to use acute treatments.

Up until very recently (2021) there were no preventative treatments for migraine that were made specifically for migraine (until 2021)

(2021)

(That was three years ago.)

(Yeah)

Every other medication prescribed had originally been designed for something else.

As a result, you’ll find that a lot of suggested migraine preventative treatments are drugs used to treat things like high blood pressure, seizures and mental health issues like depression and psychosis – dosage makes all the difference.

This isn’t because they believe the cause of your migraine to be high blood pressure, or mental illness, but because the drugs also work to mitigate migraines – I’m only highlighting that because I’ve seen it suggested that when a doctor prescribes an antidepressant for migraines, it’s because they’re treating depression – this isn’t true.

Even botox was first used in beauty treatments before they discovered that women who had it also experienced a reduction in their migraines.

There have been no medications made specifically for migraine until the last couple of years, which is a crazy state of affairs.

And, even now, the meds that are coming out for migraine (CGRP mAb injections -nabs and -gepants) aren’t widely available, and not at all in some countries (India, for example). We don’t yet have access to the exciting new -gepant drugs in the UK.

(EDIT: As of 31st May 2023 we MIGHT be getting access to them! Exciting!)

When you present at the GP with a headache, and the GP diagnoses you with migraine, they won’t usually jump to prescribing preventatives.

They will usually prescribe acute medications first, if anything at all.

It’s not uncommon to be told to take high dose dispersible aspirin or other over the counter meds marketed for migraine.

These meds are usually your average ibuprofen or paracetamol with added caffeine, sometimes with an added anti-emetic.

Remember that migraines aren’t a headache, so your stomach can stop working or work inefficiently when you’re having one.

Prescribing an acute pain relief medication alongside an anti-emetic helps your body actually absorb that acute med while you’re having an attack.

In my experience, no GP ever suggested or prescribed an anti-emetic alongside an acute treatment when I first went to them with migraines, so be prepared to have to make that suggestion yourself, and to be shot down if they disagree.

The usual anti-emetics will be metoclopramide hydrochloride, or prochlorperazine (also used for schizophrenia and anxiety)

Sometimes, your GP will prescribe naproxen, or another prescription NSAID for your migraines.

If you’re lucky, your GP might prescribe a triptan.

I believe the most common is ‘sumatriptan’ but there are a whole host of them (rizatriptan and almotriptan might be two others you’ve heard about).

I’m currently taking eletriptan, which is a much older triptan and not widely used by most GP’s for some reason.

This to say, that if you’re prescribed eg sumatriptan and it doesn’t work for you, try asking for another type.

Another reason triptans might not work for you is the method of administration.

If your migraines present with a lot of vomiting, something that melts on your tongue or a buccal tablet that dissolves under your upper lip might work better for you than a tablet you swallow. Some of them even come in nasal sprays.

TL;DR – Acute Treatment - Medications

- Paracetamol

- Ibuprofen

- Aspirin (dispersible aspirin for fast absorption, 900mg best dose)

- Co-codamol (voted most likely to cause rebound headaches)

- Naproxen (prescription only)

- Triptans (prescription only?)

- Anti-emetics (metoclopramide, prochlorperazine)

- Other prescription NSAIDs (tolfenamic acid, diclofenac potassium, diclofenac sodium, mefenamic acid)

- US only? -gepants

You can’t take most of these medications indefinitely.

They recommend taking cocodamol no more than 3 days in a row because of risk of addiction.

You can’t take metoclopramide for a long time.

Almost all of these meds can cause rebound/medication overuse headaches

Not to mention the side effects these meds come with, or the stress you might be putting on your kidneys/liver/rest of your body.

When your pain is that bad that you CAN’T care about the risks of taking something that might make a little dent in the agonies, you don’t think about those risks.

The hard part is that you get to the point where you HAVE TO start thinking about those risks.

Taking painkillers all day every day every time isn’t sustainable.

I know, it sucks.

Maybe in the future they’ll come up with a painkiller we can take that will reduce the pain without side effects destroying your body, but we’re not there yet.

Just another happy part of being alive as someone with chronic pain!

BUT! That’s where ‘complimentary’ treatments come in. These come in preventative and acute flavours too, with a lot of overlap, but we’re looking at acute treatments this time around.

If you’re a long-term chronic pain patient, you’ll probably already know about all of these.

I covered “lifestyle changes” that might help headaches in THIS PART, and you can use those here (sticking to a sleep schedule, regular meals, staying hydrated, ugh, yeah, I know, it helps though), but, for more urgent relief:

***Little disclaimer, not everything will work for everyone. Maybe you have other conditions that contraindicate these ideas. I’m not a medical professional, just a dude who suffers and uses this stuff to suffer a little less.***

- Cold treatment (ice packs, sticky cold patches, running cold water over your head, cold swimming, cold gels in a tube, ice hats)

- Heat treatment (electric heat pads, microwaveable heat packs, sticky heat patches, hot water bottles, hot baths)

- Balms (tiger balm, roll-on headache gels, pulse point gels, menthol rubs)

- Aromatherapy (helpful sometimes, but just as likely to aggravate your migraine as not. Proceed with caution.)

- Hot drinks (I don’t know why, but a cup of hot chocolate really takes the edge off my migraines?)

- Cold drinks, with ice

- Massage/Muscle treatments (anything from muscle relaxant bubble baths to massage rollers to getting someone to rub your back for you, if you’re lucky enough to have someone willing to do that)

- Gentle stretching (you can find a lot online; look for post-operative/elderly/low impact stretches)

- Sleep masks/Sunglasses (get away, light!)

- Travel sickness pills or ginger caplets for nausea

- Acupuncture (there is a point between the index finger and thumb in the meat of your hand that is supposed to ease pain if you add pressure to it – it doesn’t really work for me, but it’s worth a try. I’d suggest Googling/YouTubing it. I have acupuncture needles and have been shown how to use them, so it might be worth asking if you know a practitioner you trust?)

I’m sure I’m missing something that will come to me later.

For travel, I take:

- painkillers and my triptans (and anti-emetic when I’m allowed to have one)

- travel sickness pills/ginger pills

- balm tin/roller

- cold balm/sometimes cold patches

- shades

I’ve also shaved my head – I usually go down to a Grade 1, but have gone 0 before, which was weird.

Hair grows back surprisingly fast, and having short hair is amazing for migraines, especially in the summer.

You don’t need to spend so much time washing/drying your hair (which is helpful when you’re in the midst of an attack and/or have comorbidities that make showering difficult).

You can also apply cold/heat treatments closer to the scalp, but be careful not to burn yourself (I am absolutely not speaking from experience…)

On a greater scale, just making your room (or wherever you go to hide when you have migraines) as comfortable for you as possible is helpful. Enough pillows, blankets you can kick off if you overheat, a fan to keep the room cool but not cold, curtains or blackout blinds depending on how much light you want to block out.

I use a text-to-speech app to read fanfic to me, or I listen to audiobooks when I’m being photosensitive but can manage sound, and don’t want to be bored out of my gourd.

Has anyone else got any other tips that don’t fall into the above categories for help when you’re having a migraine?

Next up in this series: Preventative Treatment (Meds and Complimentary Treatments)

#migraines #chronic migraine #migraine awareness #disability pride month #migraine isn't a headache #spoonies #chronic pain #chronic illness #headaches

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2dkapsddr · 4 months

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March 10th, 2024 - Arcaea, DJMAX

KAPS V.S. MANIC JEER - DAY 2!!!

But first, a quick break to warm up before diving straight in! This one, as I like to call it in every single other rhythm game it's in, is the Diet Luze experience!!! "For when you can't handle the real deal, but just can't get enough of Luze charting..." (DX Choseinou Full Metal Shoujo FTR-9+ FC!!!)

Grinded a bit in and out of World Mode to get both of these: Quon (the WACCA one) BYD, and next to you FTR-8+ PM!!! (MAX-28)

And now, the Manic Jeer grind commences once more...!! Didn't get as many score screenshots as I wanted to (since i May have kept restarting), but I started and ended strong with a slight 7.7k upscore in the end!! (so close, yet so far from the EX...)

And now, we take a break from Arcaea for a little bit and turn our attention towards this new development in 2DKAPS (rhythm) gaming: I GOT A PS5 DUALSENSE CONTROLLER!!!! I tried it using bluetooth, but it was awful and I figured out how to play with it using a cable shortly after. But regardless, this is a huge development... as I'm now able to play DJMAX the way god intended!! That's right, my DJMAX controller arc begins NOW!!! I even got an FC on XLASHER HD with it to commemorate the occasion!!!

Back to Arcaea between and after work, where I saw a challenge to get a PM on an ONGEKI collab chart and started practicing right as I got out. Unfortunately though, exhaustion from work hit and I couldn't get much else. Hopefully this should be mitigated soon (at least, maybe in the daytime) as I have another, bigger announcement now to make for myself: I'm on medication now!!! Unsure if I should specify though it's nothing too bad, but I'm finally being treated/treating myself after all these years of pain and suffering with my autism...

Will this show any improvement in rhythm games? Well, it might? But it's hard to tell whether it's placebo or not. After all, it's only been one day of taking it so far. I'll have to wait weeks until I can make a proper conclusion... but my doctor did mention that it might improve focus. I'll try my best only to use that on academics right now, but maybe during a break...

#2dkaps 2024 #2dkaps arcaea #2dkaps djmax

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rakumel · 7 months

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Raku Plays Her Faves, Ys VIII Chapter 6: Crouching Wasp, Hidden Dungeon

(This was actually put together several weeks ago along with most of the other Ys 8 posts. There's still a few more still sitting in my drafts, but lately I haven't had much time or energy to sit down and properly edit them. Also had to redo some screenshots, with mixed results. Sorry for the weird and long gaps in between these posts.)

One night, while trying to finish up some stuff before moving on to the end game, I discovered that there's an entire optional dungeon area that I've never explored before.

(Here, have an accidental screenshot of Dana right before she opens up a package of frozen whoopass.)

But anyway, y'all know the drill by now, spoilers below:

I'm not completely sure what unlocks it, to be honest. If it's doing all of Dana's quests in the past, or just the final one, or if you have to have defeated [BIG spoiler boss], or if it's something you get after beating the game once on a certain difficulty, or what. All I know is, after completing Dana's final event in the past and coming back to the present, there was a green shield icon on the map that wasn't there before. What that icon means is there's something of significance at that spot that you haven't discovered yet. Usually it's a landmark or castaway that needs to be rescued.

I'd found and cleared all those up until this point, so this new one intrigued me. It was located in the ruins of Aegias, specifically in the stupa - the building with the very tall crystal in the center of the city. In the past, Dana's been exploring a massive, multi-story sanctuary under there, but in the present that's all been closed off...

...until now.

The cavernous temple is now broken down and in ruins, like the rest of the city, and is crawling with high-level, annoying monsters. The part of the temple that had clear water running through it is now a murky, overgrown swamp. The floor that had magma all around it in the past, has cooled in the present, aside from huge walls of flame that shoot up as if an eruption might still be imminent. Not to mention, it's a lot darker everywhere. (I had to kind of doctor some of the screenshots just so you could tell what was in them, but trust me, it's dark. There's an item you can equip that mitigates that, but even that doesn't do all that much.) It's kind of fascinating in a sad way, if that makes any sense.

To show you what I mean, here are some screenshots of this dungeon area from Dana's time in the past:

Compare those with how it looks in the present:

The good news is, Dana doesn't have to explore it all by herself anymore; you got your three active party members that you can switch out as needed, just like all the other dungeon areas so far.

The bad news is, the lovely warp points on each floor (that also restored your health) in the past are all gone, aside from the first and last one. So yep, running a gauntlet here. Also each floor has a boss; sometimes one Dana's fought before, other times a souped-up version of one Adol and co has fought. And if you teleport out of the dungeon to restock your healing items before reaching that final checkpoint - because you WILL be burning through your healing items if you fight every monster in the place - you have to start all over again, and every monster will have respawned, including the bosses.

This dungeon is a stone bitch to do, is my point. It's actually much more difficult than when Dana had to go through it herself.

Shit, I thought, as I found out the hard way that the bosses don't stay dead. There better be something fucking amazing at the end of this.

It's not just that the monsters are high level: so is your party by this point. It's that they come in swarms, and sometimes drop on you suddenly. There's a few treasure chests that, when opened, cause a bunch of monsters to appear - that's not necessarily unexpected, but the sheer number of them was, at least to me.

Also, for the love of god and all that is holy, bring insect repellent. A LOT OF IT. Because wasp monsters have made a neighborhood on one of the floors, and they do NOT want you in it. You'll need that repellent to take out the hives immediately, or else you'll be dealing with a neverending swarm of monster wasps.

The hives also respawn if you leave the room and come back, by the way.

And did I mention one of the hives is on top of a series of blocks that you have to jump up to in order to proceed? So not only are you having to calculate the distance and move the camera around so you can see what you're doing, but you also have to dodge wasps so they don't knock you off the blocks. Oh, and make sure you choose an attack to deal with the wasps that doesn't also move your character too far or they'll fall off, and GOD FUCKING DAMN IT I HATED THAT FUCKING WASP ROOM SO GODDAMN MUCH SWEAR TO GOD IF I FALL DOWN JUST ONE MORE FUCKING TIME I'LL-

youtube

*cough* anyway. Yes. Sorry. What was I going on about? Oh, right. Is it worth all the trouble to get through this dungeon?

This is going to sound weird, but I'm still trying to make up my mind on that. I will say that there were some definite benefits to going down there. Since the bosses respawn, it's a relatively quick and reliable way to level up all your characters this late in the game. There's also a high chance to fish up an Angry Catch that drops a random stat boost item when defeated, and it's actually one of the least problematic monsters in there.

The dungeon's also full of excellent treasure, although if you're like me and get twitchy unless you find all of them, I recommend trying to get all of it in one go. Though, if you must make multiple visits, just run through the first couple of floors. I'm serious. Don't engage. The monsters won't pursue you past the boundaries of the room they're in, and you'll need the focus (and the healing items) for later floors where it's WAY more difficult to run straight through (Exhibit A: Murder Wasp Block Puzzle From Hell).

At the very end is a level 99 boss, if you like that sort of thing. It's very fast and a pain in the ass, but honestly, not nearly as bad as the stupid wasp swarm block ordeal. At least it's on a wide open, completely flat boss arena, so you can see what it's doing at all times. Even if what it's doing is usually "firing multiple lasers at you faster than you can react" and "magic bullshit that suddenly reduces you to one party member."

But there is a treasure chest beyond it, in front of the final monolith. So what's inside?

Three unique equippable items. I may have offhandedly mentioned it in another post (and I'll admit it, I'm too lazy/into writing this right now to pull them up and check), but your playable characters each deal a specific type of damage, which some monsters are weak to. With Adol and Dana it was Slash, with Laxia and Hummel it was Pierce, and with Sahad and Ricotta it was Strike. Each of the three medals corresponds to those types. And if I read the description correctly, you could, for example, equip Adol with the Pierce medal and his attacks would gain that type in addition to the Slash he already has.

It's an interesting concept, certainly not what I was expecting. I tried equipping Adol with one of the medals, then did one of the practice raids back in the village just to see what it felt like.

It's kind of a doubled-edged sword (no pun intended) from what I can tell. If a monster's weak to the type of attack you've got equipped, it takes damage from that plus whatever you would have done originally, so it's possible to really tear through some monsters, or monster crowds. Adol's got a special move that's basically just a quick, giant horizontal sweep: so with the Pierce medal on, he could mow down a cloud of bats or bugs (both weak to Pierce damage) in no time flat.

But if a monster's strong against whatever you've got equipped, it seems to actually reduce the damage you would have done without the medal. So...yay for situational use, I guess?

You also gain a new option through the save crystal in Castaway Village: you can reduce the maximum size of your party (or set it back to three, the default). I guess this is for people who like to challenge themselves, maybe do a solo character run. But I like having the other party members around, not only for monster crowd control, but because they can notice things like treasure chests and fishing spots before you do.

I also like the little encouraging ways they talk to each other when they encounter a monster that they know is weak to another character's attack style. "It's up to you, Sahad!" "All you, lil' lady!" "Your turn, Adol!" Things like that. I can definitely understand someone finding that extra dialogue annoying, and I guess by this point in the game you don't really need them to notice things anymore. But it just doesn't feel right to me to not have your friends alongside, who've come all this way with you. So I don't know that I'd be making much use of that new option.

But overall, even though I got very frustrated at some of the more difficult parts*, I'm glad the developers didn't forget about the underground temple, and put in the effort both to show how time had affected it and to make it an optional dungeon area with a unique reward. It would have been easy to just keep the door to it sealed, throw on some text that said 'welp, door's rusted shut, looks like it's not opening anytime soon, too bad' and called it a day. But they didn't, and I'd give them a thumbs up, except mine are still recovering from that room with roughly ten skillion pirate skeletons in it.

Seriously though, I never get tired of that cool feeling you get when you discover something in a game you thought you knew everything about. Even better when it's an entire dungeon, and better still when it's tough as hell but you conquered it anyway.

*re: the Wasp Part: I found out later that just spamming the insect repellent as needed while jumping from block to block to reach the hives made that part a lot easier. So while I still say it was frustrating, I think I was making that part way more difficult than necessary by being a combination of sleepy, stubborn, and stupid XD

#ys viii #lacrimosa of dana #ys viii spoilers #ys 8 spoilers #raku plays her faves #raku plays her faves: ys viii #Youtube

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opha · 1 year

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traumadumping, disregard

tws: sexual assault, medical abuse, genital-focused language, cancer, all the good stuff.

there’s a very good informational post about pap smears and HPV going around right now that i struggled for roughly an hour with trying to add info to without traumadumping and i evidently could not.

see, i had a very fun pap near the end of last year where my genius pcp decided that she didn’t need to lube the speculum for her patient with fibromyalgia (which means i experience pain on an amplified scale compared to other people) and chronic pelvic pain. i should know better by now than to think when a doctor says something may be uncomfortable, i’m not going to have to grit my teeth to keep from screaming. in her infinite wisdom, my pcp decided getting it done ASAP was more important than listening to me or mitigating my pain in any way, and settled for giving me half-panicked reassurances that “there won’t be any bleeding!”

she left the room looking scared for her job, and good tbh.

from that pap, i got a shiny new high-risk HPV diagnosis. the fun thing? i only could’ve got it from a guy who i’ve never had any sexual contact with, via kissing my HPV-vaccinated girlfriend who had forgotten she’d just given him head. i tried to google around about vaccinated people being able to transmit HPV from other sources, and it’s basically unsearchable. there’s no solid evidence for kissing as a viable transmission route either. so even if i’d known that routine STI testing (which my girlfriend has all her other partners do before fluid bonding) doesn’t look for HPV, i wouldn’t have been able to account for this. double fun.

cancer in my family has been 100% fatal so far, going back to my great-grandparents, btw.

anyway. i still have to get a colposcopy, which is a more intensive vaginal and cervical exam that may or may not involve biopsies. i had to shop around for someone who’s trauma-informed, and basically no one who takes medicaid is trauma-informed, so i’m having to make do with “a very sweet lady” who agreed to consult with me. (that’s how the nurse described her. it’s funny, but excuse me if i don’t laugh.)

i didn’t realize until tonight, but i’m actually taking the diagnosis harder than the assault. go figure. sexual assault is old hat for me. cancer is fresher. i don’t know how to deal with it. trying to dissociate from it like i do with everything else kind of worked, until this made it real again.

i’m thinking more and more about when i tried to get a hysterectomy in my early 20s, because the pelvic pain was unbearable, i’d been trying for years to find a diagnosis, and i wasn’t in pain management yet. got told i’d want to have kids even after i said my gender identity was incongruent with having children and if i wanted to raise a child that badly, i’d adopt.

people are so fucking fixated on biological children that they’ll deny you your own bodily autonomy to preserve your theoretical ability to have them. i’m intersex, so i’m probably infertile anyway. it makes me sick.

i don’t know where i’m going with this. i just needed to put it somewhere so i can fucking sleep. i’m so tired of being nothing but the accumulation of human damage.

#week 3 of acute insomnia btw #doing great

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roxygenstudiesagain · 2 years

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100 days of productivity (12/100) 27/12/22

Didn’t update for a few day’s because we were celebrating Christmas. We made homemade hotpot shabu shabu style and I got a cold coffee machine so it’s been a good one even if it’s a bit sad. My cycle also hit hard this week with my pmdd getting worse because of my therapist leaving giving me stress but at least I’m now up to a new cycle and a fresh start

The last two days I tried to swing back despite the menstrual lethargy and it’s not too bad. I even did spin and cleaned a lot for the post holiday mess.

I am ashamed that I lost my temper at my today but I spent a lot of time thinking about how my therapist would help reframe it which brought a lot of closure. Sad that that class had to go so poorly, I really wanted to excel. But I’m already trying to shake it off. I stood up for myself and being rude about a teacher who has repeatedly antagonized me isn’t a crime.

Today I

Went to the doctor and got my meds refilled including my klonopin so hopefully rage symptoms should be mitigated

Took all my other meds correctly today (I keep slicing buspirone)

Light yoga and spin for muscle relaxing

Finished storyboard sequence and comm art

Got through a folio story sequence, might need to time it out before my trial runs out

Dusted and cleaned the house, dishes, lysoled loo, did a nice set of laundry

Actually got through my whole pm routine including nose strips and facial, might even find energy for nails

Looked for nootropics to invest in when I buy some supplements

To do:

Get to the bottom of my New job packet getting sent off

Finalize folio storyboard pose fixes before work starts

Get a beat sheet down for new spec script so I can bust out a treatment for it before class starts

Retro board a dance and fight seq for inspo

Stalk my doctor until I get referrals

#student life #studyblr #best self #to do list #100 days of productivity #productive #self care reminder

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pinkoptics · 3 years

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Would You Catch Me If I Fall?

aka Cherik Fallen Angel fic

Part 2 of Chapter 2

(Previous parts now on Ao3)

Erik is going to do everything he can to make sure Charles is taken care of. Charles saved his life. That’s why. Right… right???

“Mr. Olsen, I believe you will do exactly as I’ve asked.”

Mr. Olsen opened his mouth, to protest most likely, but Erik was well practiced in speaking in a way that left no room for interruption. “You will, because you are aware of the exact amount my firm has donated to your hospital this year and every other before it.”

Mr. Olsen was turning an interesting shade of red. It had nothing on Azazel, but the flush beneath his skin was making a concerted effort.

“You are also aware of what it would do to this hospital’s reputation for being at the forefront of mutant medicine if my firm were to very vocally withdraw its support and place it elsewhere, say... Johns Hopkins?”

“Mr. Lehnsherr—“ Still red, but now also sputtering. “You do not have the authority. Shaw would never—“

Erik smiled in such a way that Olsen cut himself off. Erik’s smile, though the word hardly applied, very early in his career had earned him the nickname ‘The Shark.’ Only used when he knew his prey was very much backed into a corner of their own making and it was time for the kill.

“If The Incident were to suddenly appear on social media again, with a narrative much closer to the truth...”

Red became purple. “We have an NDA! You can’t—“

“When information is out it is out, Mr. Olsen. Non-disclosures only hold weight if the parties involved care about the consequences. I could give a fuck. Besides, whether this hospital is guilty or innocent, reputations once ruined are terribly hard to salvage, aren’t they? Once, tried in the court of public opinion...”

“Shaw would— you’d be—“

Erik simply raised an eyebrow.

Olsen was right. Erik didn’t have the authority to stop donations, Shaw would have his job and his ass if he ever went to the public about any of the firm’s cases. Moreover, he would probably lose his license to practice. None of those things mattered however, not because Erik truly didn’t care, but because Olsen only needed to believe he was serious. If Erik couldn’t sense the man’s weaknesses, and couldn’t exploit them, he would hardly have been the best lawyer at his firm (no matter what Emma said to the contrary). The seed of doubt, once planted in a weak mind, was notoriously difficult to weed out.

“Fine,” Olsen ground out. Looking like he was very much sucking on a lemon.

Erik levitated the paperwork he had prepared by its staple. It was accompanied by one of the disgustingly expensive fountain pens the firm utilized to perpetuate its reputation. It hovered in front of the sour countenance and Erik felt the same sense of satisfaction he did after a particularly shrewd cross examination.

Threatening Olsen in this way was beyond overkill.

However, Erik knew of nothing else that would resolve Charles’ situation as swiftly. As Olsen scratched out his signature nearly hard enough to tear paper, Charles’ need for insurance, identity, and anything else he did not have, vanished.

Besides, he’d never liked this man or this hospital, so if he got to have a little fun while getting Charles what he needed, all the better. The faster he could get Charles out of here unscathed the better. He owed him that much, possibly more. There were few people insane enough, selfless enough, to throw themselves in front of a car for a stranger. Erik had made it his life’s work to protect people who couldn’t protect themselves. Charles had more than earned that same protection until he was back to his former self.

T’s crossed and i’s dotted, Erik left Olsen to fume, so he could share the good news with Charles. The words that had been leaping forward died on his lips when he took in the state of Charles’ room.

“. . . Did you rob a florist?”

Charles graced him with a much less hysterical, much more pleasant sounding laugh than he had any time previously.

“Aren’t people just lovely? This one is from the nurse on call, Ben. He has the most adorable little boy. Teething at the moment, which is trying of course, but he’s so precious one can hardly be cross. I’m sure Ben would be happy to show you the photos too. This one is from Dr. Yousef, whom you’ve already met. She detests flowers, personally, as she’s never home consistently enough to care for them properly. This one is from Saima...”

While Charles no longer appeared to be in a state of hysteria, it appeared to be Erik’s turn, and he became suddenly, hysterically deaf. Had he misplaced a day? Or two? More? Was he the one with the head injury?

“Did you— I mean, do you know them?”

Charles cut off his still in-progress monologue about his sudden and inexplicable well-wishers.

“Oh no. We’ve just met. Nancy would like to get coffee when I’m better though. I believe that is a cultural expression of friendship, is it not? Or does coffee equal sex? It’s so hard to keep track of these things as humans rarely say what they truly mean. Why do you lot insist upon speaking in code? A code that changes every generation no less. Regardless, I’ve never had coffee. Given how utterly obsessed with it you all are I’m rather excited to find out what all the fuss is about.”

Erik didn’t know what part of that to address first, if at all.

Ben, Yousef, Saima... who the fuck was Nancy?

Sex?

Never had coffee?

“Oh Erik, I’m sorry. You look so confused again. I forget myself. I would much rather have coffee for the first time with you of course. At that diner you speak so highly of. I believe diners generally serve coffee.”

Erik blinked. Did that mean Charles wanted to be his friend or have sex with him? Or, did never having had coffee actually mean never having had sex? No. Wait. What in the fuck were they talking about?

What came out was, mercifully, “You make friends quickly.” This was something he and Charles certainly didn’t share.

“Do I?” Charles shrugged. “I love people. All people. They’re so fascinating.” Something else he and Charles certainly didn’t share. In his experience, most people were dull or cruel or both. Except Charles. Charles had been the exact opposite of dull or cruel right from the first. Crashing headfirst into Erik, literally and figuratively, and smashing all his expectations of what people did or didn’t do for one another. It might have also been the head injury/amnesia mitigating the dullness, making him say the most ridiculous things that Erik had ever heard and couldn’t even begin to sort out, but Erik didn’t really think so. He read people extremely well and Charles intrigued him. No one intrigued him.

Shoving the friends/coffee/sex equivalency conversation aside, Erik patted his briefcase. “I’ve sorted out everything with hospital administration. You won’t have to worry about insurance, bills... if there’s anything you need, just ask. They will be sure you get it.”

“I won’t ask how you managed it.” Charles’ look became conspiratorial. Almost as if he did know Erik’s methods. There was no way, of course, that he did unless he was a telepath, which Erik had already briefly mused on. “You really needn’t have troubled yourself, though I appreciate it, you, all the same.”

There it was again. The strange gravity his words seemed to possess. Erik flushed, not something he ever did, feeling that appreciation to his core. Charles’ smile deepened and somehow held the same weight as his words. Looking at it was almost too much, like looking straight at the sun, it warmed parts of Erik he hadn’t even realized were cold.

“You can stay with me,” Erik said, apropos of nothing, then flinched, his own words surprising him. It wasn’t the offer he had intended to make. The Firm put people up all the time for various reasons, and Erik had planned to slip Charles in to one of his current cases with no one the wiser. The doctor felt certain it wouldn’t be long until his memory returned, based on her previous experience of such cases.

Charles’ astonishment seemed to match his own. “Erik, that’s too much. You’ve done so much already.”

Erik rubbed at the back of neck, avoiding Charles’ eyes, which were comically, anime-wide. While he hadn’t meant to make the offer, he also found now that he had, he also had no sense of regret. His flat was large, he practically lived at the firm, so it would hardly be an inconvenience and the less he abused his position, the less tracks he had to cover.

He coughed, “There’s always Nancy.” Erik hoped the joke would break the sudden tension. “You could take her up on her ambiguous offer.” Charles laughed. Success.

“Coffee, and whatever else it may suggest, is a far cry from living together. Besides, I don’t even know Nancy.”

“You don’t know me either. You may have unwittingly saved a sociopath the world would be better without.”

Charles shook his head. “Don’t be absurd. You’re a good man, Erik. Better than you know.”

Everything about this was absurd.

“It’s settled then, when they discharge you, you can stay with me until we figure out who you are.”

Charles’ face, which Erik was already beginning to realize was nakedly expressive, came over suddenly unreadable.

“I—“ Charles hesitated, eyes flicking away from Erik to the window. Erik supposed coming to live with any stranger was enough to give anyone pause, especially someone who was as disoriented as Charles must already be. He was about to shift back to his original, much less awkward, plan when Charles’ gaze focused back on him. “All right. Until... until then.”

“Until then,” Erik echoed and they both fell suddenly silent.

He was inviting someone to live with him when he had never lived with anyone besides his mother his entire life. Roommates? Please. Erik had never had to, but would have rather lived in a squalid apartment than have to share a living space with anyone, even when putting himself through the extraordinary expenditure of american law school. Yet, here he was. Here they were. It felt right. Perhaps he had an overabundance of gratitude and quid pro quo to sate. It was the only thing that made any sense in the face of something that made absolutely no sense.

He’d probably regret it the instant Charles was in his space, but he also wasn’t someone who went back on his word, so he was taking in this stray whether he came to regret it or not.

Mama, at least, would approve.

Now on Ao3

Thanks for reading!!

#cherik #cherik fanfic #erik lehnsherr #charles xavier #fallen angel fic #pinkoptics fic

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sirfrogsworth · 4 years

Photo

I know it’s hard to look at this situation and find a way to remain optimistic or hopeful. To find a silver lining. To find any positive to cling on to whatsoever.

I get that. I often feel that myself.

And if you feel that... it’s okay. Don’t pressure yourself to be a ray of sunshine all the time. There is no changing how much this sucks and how it is going to keep sucking for a long time.

However, I think I was able to come up with some positive things in this global hot mess. And if you feel like you need something to give you hope, this may help.

That said, some people just need to live in the suck for a while. Sometimes positivity can be frustrating and annoying. So if you want to skip this for now, that’s totally cool too. Or if you read this and don’t feel any different... again, it’s all good. Just gander at this majestic puppy patoot and come back to this another time.

Okay, here we go.

While bad people suck and we’ve had a lot of frustration dealing with them lately... there are still a lot of amazing human beings.

Oftentimes our society is very good at highlighting the worst of humanity. It dominates the news. Bad is just so much louder than good. Because of that, it can seem like most people are awful and the best of us are rare.

But I believe that to be an illusion. I think there are more good people than bad. I see it in my own life with my family and friends. All of them coming together, checking up on each other, helping however possible. I had 6 different unprompted offers to help us get groceries and supplies.

I also see this good in the following I have created here on Tumblr. I see so many people trying their best to do the right thing. To find ways to respect and care for people different from them. Learning how best to fight for those who can't fight for themselves. Many of them are young and smart and motivated and when I look for hope that is where I see it most.

And now the world is seeing it too.

Doctors and nurses doing everything possible to treat patients.

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And we must also remember all of those who keep hospitals up and running.

People are organizing food banks and delivering necessities to those who are struggling. AOC diverted campaign funds she might need to get reelected and used it for her district which has been hit very hard by this.

I saw this photo of a teacher sitting outside a student's window with a whiteboard helping them with their homework.

My friend who is a teacher banded together with her fellow teachers to create a virtual teaching program in just a matter of weeks. They work until late in the evening in the hopes they can educate the next generation through anything. Despite being exhausted all the time, she was still so excited when she learned how to include GIFs into her lessons.

The maker community is coming together to 3D print PPE and have their machines extruding 24 hours a day. They have organized in local chapters and came up with sterilization procedures, logistics procedures, distribution procedures... just a lot of important procedures.

youtube

Clothing designers and companies that work with fabric are coming together to sew masks.

Katie May, a high end bridal designer, had an abundance of sequined fabric so she figured, why not?

The tech community is using Folding@home to leverage all of their computers to crunch numbers that will help us understand and maybe treat this virus. So many people signed up that they had a 1200% increase in computations. They passed the exaFLOP range. That is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 operations per second. A billion billion. If you have a computer you can help too!

youtube

Everywhere in every country, ordinary people are stepping up in droves and banding together to mitigate the consequences of this disaster.

And even though they kinda misfired with singing Imagine in 13 different keys... a few celebrities are using their skills to do some good too. On John Krasinski’s, “Some Good News” he arranged for the cast of Hamilton to sing to a young superfan. (Starts around 10:06)

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We've all seen the quote... Mr. Rogers’ mom said to look for the helpers.

I don’t think I have ever seen this many helpers.

Okay, one more puppy for the road.

Take care everyone. Stay safe.

#long post

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robininthelabyrinth · 4 years

Note

Thank you "Worthwhile Trade". The idea of Baxia turning into an guai is so interesting. I liked imagining the part where she hit NMJ for his idiocy. My brain is projecting "married couple" vibes, omg. I admit despite how weird WWX spoke about the events, the time travel part flew over my head until the tags spelled it out for me. (TBC)

(Cont'd) Also... did NMJ mean it in THAT dual-thing way when talking WRH's prefs? And the last part, where WWX used resentful energy to sub NMJ's qi. I assume he can still cultivate since his core's still there, if emptied? But I wonder what'll happen to his energy once restored Can't help but think his renewed qi will inevitably be affected by the traces of the previous energy that once circulated. He's not going to become a walking stygian tiger or something, is he? Off the wall guess, sorry!

----

sequel to Worthwhile Trade (ao3), also on tumblr

Wei Wuxian didn’t understand Nie Mingjue.

He didn’t understand the way he thought, the way he acted – the way he smiled when he woke up, the way he opened his arms when Nie Huaisang threw himself into them with a wail and said, “It was worth it for you, didi; it always is if it’s for you. Don’t you know that?” the way Wei Wuxian had always shamefully thought of saying, as if something like that could just be said like that, out in the open.

The way Nie Mingjue shrugged when the doctors said his cultivation would likely never recover, that he should have died, that they didn’t understand why he hadn’t; the way he said, seeming even satisfied, that it was a worthwhile trade.

It’s not a trade, Wei Wuxian wanted to scream at him. It’s a sacrifice! It hurts and you’re sad, no, worse, you’re resentful about it and you shouldn’t be because it was your choice, your decision, but you see someone else with everything that you worked so hard for and you’re angry when you shouldn’t be angry and you feel bad and you turn away; it hurts them when you do and you’re glad, you miserable thing, you’re happy that they’re hurt because why should you be the only one whose hurt –

Perhaps the problem wasn’t that he didn’t understand Nie Mingjue.

Perhaps it was only that he saw in Nie Mingjue his own faults, his own deficiencies, the ones he’d tried so hard to hide in the sea of his poor memory.

“You’ll die if you don’t find a way to cultivate,” he said instead, hovering by the door. He’d say that he didn’t mean to ruin the mood, but he kind of did, and Baxia’s eyes on him were cold as if she knew.

As if she knew everything.

How he’d gone back to the past, how he’d changed things, how it was his fault that Nie Mingjue – who’d never done a single thing to hurt him, who’d been upright and righteous and good and whose brother loved him enough to –

Wei Wuxian had made a point of avoiding Baxia.

Not that she was that easy to avoid. She was tall for a woman – not as tall as Nie Mingjue, but proportionate to him in the sense that she was as much taller than the average woman as he was taller than the average man – and she walked as though people should flee before her, a tread that only felt heavy because of the almost visceral rage that surrounded her like a cloud.

Nie Huaisang had found robes for her, somehow, and they were the least feminine robes Wei Wuxian had ever seen a woman wear, though he supposed he still hadn’t seen that given that Baxia wasn’t exactly a woman. Cut in a martial style, a dark shimmering grey that seemed in some lights to be almost red – she had been born as a human in a mantle of blood and she would not let anyone forget it.

“I should have died already,” Nie Mingjue said, as if the world’s scariest guai didn’t have her hand on his shoulder right next to his vulnerable neck. “You came up with a solution, Wei-gongzi, and for that I thank you. Even if we are not able to solve the next stage, being able to see my loved ones is worthwhile.”

Wei Wuxian could learn to hate that word.

“I have a solution, of a sort,” he said, irritated and not entirely because his reveal had been preempted. He’d hoped to sort of ease into it, somehow. “You lack the capacity for regular cultivation, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use demonic cultivation.”

“What? No, we can’t do that,” Nie Huaisang said, biting his fingers anxiously. “Anyway, doesn’t demonic cultivation harm the temperament?”

“You mean my temperament can get worse?” Nie Mingjue teased, and Nie Huaisang smacked him so lightly that it didn’t even displace his clothing. “I don’t know any means of demonic cultivation, Wei-gongzi –”

“Call me Wei Wuxian,” Wei Wuxian said. “Please.”

“Wei Wuxian, then,” Nie Mingjue said. “All the methods I’ve ever heard of were forbidden for very good reasons – but perhaps those conditions are not the same in the method you know.”

Wei Wuxian tensed. “How do you know that I know one?”

“You saved me, didn’t you?” Nie Mingjue said practically, and well, yes, Wei Wuxian supposed he had a point – “And anyway, Baxia can tell.”

Wei Wuxian shivered. “I don’t use it,” he argued. “How can she tell?”

At Nie Huaisang’s instigation, Baxia had recently started experimenting with smiles. She put one on her face now.

It was terrifying.

“Tell me about it,” Nie Mingjue requested. “The powers and the price, all of it.”

“You’re actually considering this?” Nie Huaisang exclaimed. “But da-ge…!”

“Wei Wuxian was not wrong when he said that I would die if I didn’t find a way to cultivate despite having given up what I have,” Nie Mingjue said. “If I die, what will you do?”

Oh, not much, just become a mastermind capable of puppeting the entire cultivation world to enact revenge for your death. Nothing big.

“But – da-ge has always put such a priority on remaining on the righteous path…”

“That’s why I asked about the costs,” Nie Mingjue said patiently. “I will not abandon righteousness simply because I adopt a new method of cultivating.”

“Everyone will revile you even if you are righteous,” Wei Wuxian warned him.

Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Who is everyone? What do I care for them? You do the right thing because it is right, not for the sake of fame.”

Wei Wuxian had once thought the same.

“If everyone in the cultivation world thinks you are evil, they will paint you as evil no matter what you do,” he insisted. “No matter how righteous your motives –”

“Let them think he’s evil, then!” Nie Huaisang exclaimed. “He could be the most black-hearted cultivator in the land, but he’s still my da-ge; my Nie sect and I will protect him!”

“Huaisang! No! That is not how righteousness works – if I ever truly become evil, you are to cut me off at once, kill me if necessary –”

“No way!”

“Huaisang – Baxia, tell him; evil cannot be endured –”

Baxia was looking at her fingernails. She’d picked that gesture up from Sect Leader Ouyang, when he was trying to be pointed about ignoring someone; it was extremely irritating to absolutely everyone who wanted to know who she was and what she was doing here and Nie Huaisang and Wei Wuxian had teamed up to convince her to keep doing it.

Possibly a mistake, in retrospect.

“Baxia. I know you agree with me on this. Evil is evil, and must be eradicated no matter who it may be.”

She gave him an unimpressed look.

“I know I’m not evil yet,” Nie Mingjue argued, apparently understanding her without any difficulty whatsoever. He’d just woken up from a month-long coma and he could already speak fluent human-saber, it was really unfair. And this man had succumbed to Jin Guangyao’s wiles? Lan Xichen had more to answer for than he knew. “But if I ever become evil – what? No, we will not burn that bridge when we come to it, that’s not even the right idiom, who is teaching you these things –”

Nie Huaisang coughed and hid his face behind a fan.

Wei Wuxian was not going to laugh.

Nie Mingjue growled at them all and turned back to Wei Wuxian. “Explain,” he demanded. “The rest of you, out.”

“But –”

“Out. One of us has to cultivate the righteous path, and if it can’t be me, it has to be you. Baxia?”

She picked Nie Huaisang up by his collar, for all the world like a mother dog picking up her pup by the scruff of its neck, and walked out.

Nie Mingjue picked up demonic cultivation faster than anyone else Wei Wuxian had ever met or even heard of. He wasn’t sure if that demonstrated an unnerving aptitude or if it was simply that Nie Mingjue was surpassingly talented – Wei Wuxian had never met anyone like himself before, someone for whom all things came easy, and it was an unexpected delight to meet a kindred soul somewhere where he’d long ago given up hope. He’d never planned to unveil demonic cultivation in this life unless he truly needed it – he didn’t want to hurt his Lan Zhan the way he had in his first life, and anyway Jiang Cheng and Uncle Jiang and Madame Yu were all alive, with hundreds of Jiang sect members to boot, there was no need for his sacrifice – but the part of him that was more researcher and inventor than cultivator luxuriated in their discussions.

Nie Mingjue was a lot more concerned than Wei Wuxian had ever been with consequences, and how to mitigate them, but he supposed that made sense: losing his cultivation hadn’t impacted that Nie temper one bit, and demonic cultivation was likely to make things worse. Moreover, Nie Mingjue was simply who he was, stiff and unbending, as much steel in his spine as in Baxia’s; he could almost be described as being rigid in his thinking except for the fact that he was in fact seriously considering becoming a demonic cultivator.

“We’re saber cultivators,” Nie Mingjue said when Wei Wuxian tentatively brought it up. “Like a saber, our nature is to be firm and unyielding, not flexible like the sword, but we cannot allow ourselves to become too rigid – a too-rigid saber will break upon encountering an obstacle. It’s a difficult balance to keep, and one made more difficult by our cultivation style.”

“The demonic cultivation aspects, you mean? Using yao to refine your saber spirit?”

“One day, though not today, I’m going to ask you how you know about that,” Nie Mingjue remarked, and although his tone was causal Wei Wuxian’s back went cold. “And I’ll expect you to tell me the truth when I do. But not today. Anyway, yes, that’s what I mean. Do you know what they mean when they say that demonic cultivation harms the temperament?”

Wei Wuxian hesitated. “I assume you’re going to tell me something other than ‘it drives you crazy and makes you kill people’?”

Nie Mingjue snorted. “Sometimes I wonder how someone as smart as you got sent home before you finished your lessons at the Cloud Recesses, but other times it’s fairly obvious.”

Wei Wuxian shrugged, embarrassed.

“Do you really not know?”

“No one taught this to me,” Wei Wuxian said, stung. “I came up with it on my own. How would I know?”

“All demonic cultivation has the same root,” Nie Mingjue said. “Obsession.”

“With killing, yeah, I know, I’ve heard it a million times –”

“Shut up and listen, you impertinent brat. The killing comes later. It starts with obsession. Obsession with righteousness, obsession with love, obsession with the pleasures of this world, with power – a human becomes a demon when they cannot overcome the obsessions within their heart, and the obsession consumes them. In time, a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with power will do whatever it takes to obtain that power, and not mind the blood shed to do it; a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with love will kill everyone who they perceive stands between them and their love, a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with righteousness will turn to murder when in their judgment something that ought to be condemned goes unpunished…”

“What about one who only wants what’s best for his family?” Wei Wuxian said, and he did not know if the challenge in his voice was about Nie Mingjue’s future or his own past.

Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Two roads that I can see: first, their family turns away from them for what they have become and they become vicious with the abandonment, becoming quick to lash out against the world and eventually doing something that causes the world to turn against them. Second, their family stands by them, and eventually the world causes some harm to them – and the demonic cultivator turns to madness in revenge.”

“Not exactly an optimistic outlook.”

“Not especially, no.”

“You don’t seem as concerned by that as I would have thought.”

Nie Mingjue’s lips twitched. “I have a solution.”

“Would you like to share?”

“Using resentful energy to cultivate our sabers makes them prone to obsession, driving them ceaselessly to fight evil, destroy it, without discrimination. It makes them stronger, but also more dangerous – and that is why they must be carefully controlled.”

Wei Wuxian frowned. “So, what? You’re going to be the saber now? Under whose control?”

“Huaisang’s, of course,” Nie Mingjue said, as if it were obvious. “For better or for worse, he is sect leader now. Who else would it be?”

“But – what if you disagree? What if he wants to do things one way, and you another –”

“Then I argue and probably yell a lot, and if in the end he still insists on doing things his way, I listen,” Nie Mingjue said dryly. “That’s how hierarchy works. Isn’t it the same for you? When your shidi, Jiang Cheng, becomes sect leader, you’ll need to listen to him – or leave the sect. There’s no middle ground.”

Wei Wuxian scowled.

“A sect leader that can’t control his disciples is worse than a demonic cultivator,” Nie Mingjue said. “He’s weak. A target, ripe to be ripped apart and devoured by other sects – resources raided, disciples poached, responsibilities taken away...It’s not a fate I would wish on anyone. If you can’t commit to obeying, commit to leaving so that you don’t end up promising more than you can give.”

Ouch.

Just – ouch.

Great advice, fantastic advice, world-class advice, and totally useless because Jiang Cheng had travelled back in time with him and was therefore convinced that Wei Wuxian was just looking for the first way out of the Jiang sect he could find, no matter what Wei Wuxian said or did about it.

(Even Madame Yu was concerned by the new coldness in their relationship and had tried to talk to him about it, which – Wei Wuxian didn’t know what to do with that. It didn’t match any of what he had thought he’d understood.)

He decided to focus back in on the demonic cultivation lessons, shifting from theoretical discussions to the practical, and that, unfortunately, was when they encountered an issue.

“What do you mean you can’t play an instrument?” Wei Wuxian demanded, appalled. “It’s one of the Six Arts! Everyone can play some sort of instrument – even Nie Huaisang plays an instrument!”

“Everyone agreed it was better that I stop learning,” Nie Mingjue said defensively. “It’s all just plucking on strings or blowing air in pipes, and yet no matter that I did exactly what the teacher said to do, it never worked, that’s all.”

“Didn’t Zewu-jun offer to teach you…?”

“He did. And then he said it would be better if we stopped, too.”

The reason, Wei Wuxian soon learned, was that Nie Mingjue was almost completely tone deaf, and the only reason it was almost was that he was still capable of differentiating speech.

“I agree with the majority,” he said after an extremely frustrating day. “Stop. Never pick up an instrument ever again. And don’t let anyone but Zewu-jun play something especially for you, either, okay? Even if they’re highly recommended.”

“An interesting request,” Nie Mingjue said, eyebrows arched skeptically. “May I ask why?”

“Because you’ll have no idea if they’ve changed the music on you,” Wei Wuxian said bluntly. A great deal about the man’s murder in a different life made sense now, and Jin Guangyao’s brilliance in hiding the score of Turmoil inside of Clarity was a little less impressive when played to a man who thought all music, without exception, was just plucking strings or blowing air. “Musical cultivation is deadly in the right hands, especially if you lower your defenses against it. Just consider it a precaution.”

Nie Mingjue’s eyebrows remained arched, but he hummed in agreement.

“I guess we’ll have to think of a new way for you to cultivate demonic cultivation,” Wei Wuxian said, rubbing his face. He had not been planning on having to invent demonic cultivation at all in this life, and now he needed to not only ‘invent’ the original but actually come up with something new. Why was his life so hard? “How did you previously manipulate external energy?”

“With Baxia.”

“Well, that’s not helpful, is it? You can’t wield a human being. Perhaps another saber…?”

That didn’t work, primarily because it turned out that Baxia had strong feelings about Nie Mingjue even thinking about using another saber and well, as far as Wei Wuxian was concerned, whatever Baxia wanted, Baxia got.

(Nie Huaisang had had to go to Heijan once, with Wei Wuxian and Baxia accompanying him since Nie Mingjue wasn’t ready yet, and some unlucky Wen captain had tried to ambush them. That captain, and his squad, were not granted the courtesy of an intact corpse, and Baxia hadn’t even gotten a speck of blood on her nice new robes – no, Wei Wuxian would not be crossing Baxia any time soon.)

“There’s got to be something,” Wei Wuxian said, and Nie Mingjue agreed, and in the end they found something.

Nie Mingjue had been absent-mindedly playing around with one of Nie Huaisang’s fans when one of the fierce corpses Wei Wuxian had raised as practice targets had gotten loose; instinct had taken over and Nie Mingjue had lashed out with the weapon at hand as if it were a saber, and the resentful energy had surged in response –

Baxia was apparently not threatened by the notion of her master using a fan as a weapon, not even one inlaid with steel and heavy cloth with enough layers to catch a sword in.

(If Wei Wuxian needed to go have some time to himself at the sight of Nie Huaisang, dressed as a sect leader with his saber always at his side, standing next to Nie Mingjue holding a fan – well, that was his problem, and also one he intended to show to Jiang Cheng at the next possible opportunity. Someone else deserved to have their mind wrecked by the incongruity as much as he had.)

Even without the weirdness of Nie Mingjue, it was more than a little odd to see Nie Huaisang in the robes of a sect leader without him acting like the Head-shaker. The shock of having to become sect leader had fallen heavily on him: he had become a little more serious, a little more earnest (though still a bit frivolous); he was more inclined to listen and think things over, less inclined to run away.

“If da-ge is going to become a demonic cultivator, someone needs to stand behind him,” Nie Huaisang said simply when Wei Wuxian had tried probing. “He’s always held the world up for me – it’s the least I can do for him. I may not be able to do much, I might be terrible at it, but I owe it to him to at least try.”

Wei Wuxian wondered, sometimes, if Jiang Cheng would have stood up for him if only he had trusted in him, believed in him, the way Nie Mingjue believed in his notoriously useless little brother.

Maybe he’d ask, when he went back to the Jiang sect.

Maybe he’d –

“What the fuck is wrong with you,” Jiang Cheng said as a greeting, and for once Uncle Jiang didn’t disagree. “All those letters and you never once mentioned the terrors?”

“The what,” Wei Wuxian said, and that was how he learned that while he was on his way back to Yunmeng neither Baxia nor Nie Mingjue had wasted any time utilizing their newfound skills out on the battlefield.

Nie Huaisang was never going to be a particularly respected sect leader, especially by those that had met him beforehand, but evidently that wasn’t really important given that he was constantly flanked by what was being called the two terrors of Qinghe.

Nie Mingjue preferred darker colors now that he was no longer sect leader, the same dark grey shading towards black that Baxia had selected for herself, and the selection somehow made him seem even taller, verging on inhuman, and Baxia standing beside him, her human features patterned roughly after his, made the two of them appear a matched set. Nie Mingjue wielded the fan that Wei Wuxian had helped him design, which he had forged with his own hands out of the metal from the Xuanwu’s cave that Wei Wuxian had foolishly figured someone ought to get some use out of, painted over with a cinnabar array in Nie Huaisang’s careful brushstrokes, and in his hands it was both weapon and conduit for the raising of armies of corpses. Baxia, for her part, held nothing but required nothing, a sweeping gesture of her hand more devastating than a dozen blows with the saber.

They were terrifying, a nightmare writ large and unmistakably dangerous, undeniably demonic cultivators in a way that was entirely different from Wei Wuxian’s own dramatics, and it unnerved the rest of the cultivation world the way Wei Wuxian had feared it would.

“It won’t be a problem,” Jiang Cheng said impatiently. “The Nie sect are ascending in strength, and this only adds to their mystique – who would challenge them?”

“Uh, Jin Guangshan,” Wei Wuxian said. “Like last time?”

Jiang Cheng huffed. “At this rate, I don’t even think Jin Guangyao will bother defecting to the Jin sect,” he said. “Not if he knows how to play his cards right. The Nie sect’s strength in the original version was never about Chifeng-zun’s skill with the blade alone. It was the whole sect’s strength, with Chifeng-zun’s ability to wield them as skillfully as he did his saber; he’s an outstanding general. And now they have him as a general, him as a demonic cultivator, and whatever the fuck is going on with Lady Baxia –”

“I already told you. She’s a guai.”

“Like I already told you, it doesn’t matter how many times you say that, I will immediately expel the knowledge from my mind and you should too. ‘Immortal cultivator cousin that my brother named his saber after’, like what Nie Huaisang has been putting about, is a perfectly acceptable cover story.”

“And the fact that his saber disappeared at the same time?”

“Coincidence,” Jiang Cheng said firmly. “And we’re sticking with that. Anyway, the point is that if you’re an ambitious man, the Nie sect is the place to be right now and probably will continue to be in the future. This is going to be evident to both Jin Guangshan and the future Jin Guangyao, and we’ll need to deal with that.”

“I’ll keep an eye out,” Wei Wuxian promised. “After rescuing Chifeng-zun and helping with the demonic cultivation, I’ve gotten pretty close to them.”

“Mm. And how about your other mission?”

Wei Wuxian scowled at the smirk on Jiang Cheng’s face. “You know perfectly well that I haven’t had any time to seduce Lan Wangji, what with how busy I’ve been. I don’t even know for sure if he likes me yet -!”

“You’re an idiot, he does, and you’re not allowed to keep us all in suspense for two decades this time. Figure it out.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that I’m sticking you with the job of being an information courier and you leave for the Lan sect front line tomorrow.”

“You are the best shidi ever,” Wei Wuxian said, and meant it.

Jiang Cheng huffed. “Yeah, well,” he said as if his cheeks weren’t red. “Remember that in the future. In this life we’re the Twin Heroes, you hear me? No take-backs.”

Nie Mingjue was right: Wei Wuxian would need to either learn to obey or tell Jiang Cheng early on that he was leaving, and walking a path in the middle would only cause heartbreak all over again.

“Okay,” he said, deciding to ask Lan Wangji for advice on obedience. Surely that was something that could be learned? “Deal. You do know that that means Lan Wangji’s going to have to marry in, right?”

“Oh no,” Jiang Cheng said, voice entirely flat. “How terrible. I’ll find a way to manage dealing with that ice block somehow…listen, I don’t care if you end up calling him Wei Sizhui in this life, but don’t ruin his character. He was perfectly nice.”

“I don’t know if he’s even been born yet,” Wei Wuxian said glumly. “I’ve been looking, but…”

“I’ve asked some of Mother’s spies to keep track of Wen Ning and Wen Qing,” Jiang Cheng said. “Collecting evidence we’ll need for their inevitable post-war trial, assuming we want them to live better lives than just refugees. Give it time, we’ll find him.”

“Now I just need to see if Lan Wangji will want to raise children with me…”

“Wei Wuxian. I don’t care. Go.”

#mdzs #nie mingjue #wei wuxian #nie huaisang #baxia #jiang cheng #my fic #my fics #academic discussion of demonic cultivation #this isn't an answer to your question but I hope you like it anyway #tkpartisan

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drwcn · 4 years

Note

... You know, I was just thinking about Hua Mulan ChengQing AU. Hahah, ha. This movie is SOMETHING. Handkerchiefs are necessary.

oh I HEARD? but idk if i wanna see it. I’ve seen other things Liu Yifei (Mulan) was in and i don’t really like her?

NOTE: OKAY so there were some confusion!!! Before ppl get offended, anon and I are taking about two different movies. The one that anon is saying is good is Mulan (2009) an original Chinese movie BC I had been asking ppl where to watch it and received many inbox msgs about it. The Disney film is what I won't be watching for so many reasons, including bc I know the actress's work and is just unimpressed by her in general on top of all the other reasons.

Oh boy, but like...what IF it’s reverse!Mulan, aka matriarchal society. Where Jiang Cheng is the “sneak into the army for my family c”!Mulan and Wen Qing is the “I wanted to be a doctor but then the Fire Nation exploded in on itself”!Shang. And I worldbuilded for no reason...

tw: minor character death (suicide). un-beta-ed, unedited, unproof-read, we die like nmj

WEN QING

Wen Ruohan was never supposed to be the Emperor, Wen Qing’s mother once told her, but the imperial court had allowed him to inherit because his late Empress Mother had no daughters to inherit the throne. As long as WRH promised to father daughters and pass on through them, then the Wen dynasty legacy would be preserved.

“What did his wife say, that her children must take his last name?” Wen Qing had asked her mother, wide eyed and curious. Her mother had shrugged and said, “Well some women don’t mind, I guess, especially if it meant her children would be heiress of the throne.”

Wen Qing had frowned at that. What’s so bad about children taking their father’s name, she wondered. Men may not be allowed the same liberties as women, may not attend public school or join the army or hold court with the Empress, but they were still children’s parents. Not all women agreed on this of course, but that was the way of their world.

Her father died of consumption some years after Wen Ning was born, but Mother never took a second husband or a concubine. Wen Qing liked that about her mother. Brave, loyal, true.

Wen Qing’s mother, Dafan-junwang, a distant relation to the throne, was a renowned marshal, hailing from a proud line of generals and marshals, trusted by the Wen imperial family as protectors of the realm, without fear of usurpation. The people whispered that Wen Qing had much to live up to, if she were to inherit her mother’s duchy and hold a command of her own.

Wen Qing never had much interest in war or martial arts, but she learned, trained, practiced and perfected her skills because she could never bear the thought of letting her mother down. In her heart (and in her free time), she learned the science and art known by father. He was a quiet man, a physician (quite skilled too), before he married her mother. He wasn’t what her grandparents would have wanted for their daughter, but Mother had been adamant.

Wen Qing’s mother hadn’t been good at expressing her love, but she did love her husband. Very much. Mother was only ever soft around Father, and Wen Qing only knew this because she’d seen them hold hands when they thought no one was watching.

Wen Ning, being the son of a wealthy aristocratic family, was destined to marry well when he came of age. Unlike girls, boys weren’t allowed to attend publicly funded scholarly schools or martial academies. Wealthy and noble families however were able to afford private tutors for their sons, so that they would know the four arts (play the qin, weiqi, literature, and art) and be elegant, competent husbands for their wives. If Wen Ning was competent enough, charming enough, and gave his wife daughters (because everyone knew it’s the men who control the sex of the baby), then she would be faithful to him -> at least that’s what their nanny said.

“How did they know, that men determined the sex of the baby?” Wen Qing asked her mother one evening when she turned thirteen and was given The Talk.

Her mother tilted her head and said as if it was the most obvious answer in the world. “My dear, women are the earth, we grow and birth life. Men are like the seeds. If you plant an apricot tree, the earth will nourish it and let it flourish, but the fruit will always be apricots, you will never have peaches.”

Once, Wen Qing had asked her mother if she could be a physician instead, if Wen Ning could take her place as general. Her mother had given her a very stern look and said, “No only is your brother of a sickly disposition, but you are my daughter. The duchy and my command can only be inherited by you. For your country, you do not have a choice.”

Wen Qing conceded, because she was good.

The days dragged on, and slowly it was becoming clear Wen Ruohan would have no daughters. Not only so, the sons he fathered were ill-mannered and haughty, unfit to rule. Wen Ruohan’s mind, too, was slowly leaving him, due to unknown reasons. The ministers of the court and notabilities of the peerage urged Wen Ruohan to take on the daughter of his cousin born of his maternal aunt, and to groom her as heir. This brought on much discontent from Wen Roohan’s two princes, who aligned themselves with lurking enemies from the north, and before anyone could mitigate the situation, the country was thrust into a full blown civil war.

Every bit her mother’s daughter, Wen Qing did not hesitate to mount her horse and ride off into battle. She had her duties and she would serve until her death.

Jiang Wanyin had a very pretty face - she would reflect in retrospect. Perhaps that was why she believed him when he showed up at her camp with a conscription missive claiming to be his older sister Jiang Yanli.

JIANG CHENG

The Jiang family was a wealthy merchant family situated southeast of the capital, in the province of Yunmeng. The current head of family is Jiang Ziyuan, known for her sharp business mind and sharp ways with her sword.

(the only reason i’m switching Jiang Fengmian and Yu Ziyuan’s last name is because it’s a matriarchal society, and Yu Cheng and Yu Yanli sounds way too awful as names, but Yu Fengmian and Jiang Ziyuan are actually not bad.)

There was a rumour that her husband Yu Fengmian of a Meishan Yu clan, had betrayed her with a wandering traveler from the pugilist world named Cangse...something something, and that he had fathered a son with her out of wedlock. If it were true, then by the conventions of the land, Jiang Ziyuan would have every legal right to divorce Yu Fengmian and send him back to his family to live out the rest of his days in seclusion, shame and repentance.

But when Yu Fengmian came to her with the little Wei Ying, freshly orphaned, Yu Ziyuan turned the boy this way and that, examined him for “abnormalities” and nodded. Then she summoned her son, and said to him, “Our manor purchased some new indentured servants. This boys is yours from now on, he is your responsibility. Keep him in line, find some uses for him, or get rid of him.”

Jiang Cheng looked to his big sister, but his sister just shook her head. Not quite understanding what was happening, or why his father was bowed down on the floor, Jiang Cheng took his new “servant” and left.

Watching them go, Jiang Yanli then turned to her mother and said, “Muqin, if I may be so bold, I have an idea.”

Jiang Yanli was not the heiress that Jiang Ziyuan had hoped for. Though incredibly intelligent, Jiang Yanli was of poor health and not suited for martial training. Jiang Ziyuan had been quite troubled by this for some time, fearing others would cause trouble once Jiang Yanli inherits. However, she was also hesitant to train her son Jiang Cheng, even though he showed both interest and aptitude. It was not often that well to do families would want to take on a too “rambunctious” boy as groom for their daughters. Yet to leave Jiang Yanli without close protection...

“Are you thinking that boy...”

Jiang Yanli nodded. “Father denies being Wei Ying’s paternal parent, but surely tongues will waggle regardless. Mother, you are within your right to dismiss father, but he is still my father, and if not for me, think of A-Cheng. One day he will marry, and what family would want a son with a disgraced sire. Wei Ying looks healthy and strong; as I am unfortunately unable to train with the sword, mother may yet train him. Surely you’re not worried about his future marriage prospects. Perhaps it is better yet that he never marries, for he will remain close to Lotus Pier and serve at my side.”

Jiang Ziyuan listened to Jiang Yanli’s words and decided that her daughter made very valid points. Her relationship with her husband could never be repaired but she had her children’s future to consider.

And yet happiness would not last for long. Two months after Jiang Yanli’s sixteenth’s birthday, she received news that her mother’s private boat, which she used to inspect her properties, had capsized in a terrible monsoon storm, killing everyone on board.

After the news reached Lotus Pier, Yu Fengmian took his own life in the dead of night, leaving a letter stating that he had owed Jiang Ziyuan too much to repay, that though Wei Ying was not his son, he had kept secrets from her that he swore he would not reveal in this life. Now that she’s gone, he would keep her company in her journey to the beyond.

The Jiangs mourned, but they survived.

Then when the boys turned seventeen, war broke out over the lands, and the conscription missives arrived demanding one female from every household. Jiang Cheng panicked. Wei Wuxian had been sent to Gusu on business and would not return for some time. The military missive was time sensitive, so Jiang Cheng didn’t have another choice...besides it’s not like A-Jie’s matchmaking attempts for him had been all that successful...he was next to blacklisted anyway after his last debacle with the Qin girl.

Jiang Cheng decided that he could pass as a woman if he dressed properly and redid his hair, but his voice...he'd just have to pretend he could not speak. That way, no one would know.

WQ: “Who are you?”

JC *hands her his letter*

WQ: “Jiang Yanli? The Yunmeng Jiangs? Of Lotus Pier?”

JC: *nods*

Her subordinate, “I didn’t know Jiang Ziyuan’s daughter was mute, they only said she was of poor health.”

Luo “Mianmian” Qingyang finds out first.

Mianmian: *GASP and points* You’re a man!

JC: *covers his body* SHH!!! Turn around! Don’t look at me! *turns to look away*

Mianmian: *naked by the river ready for a bath but too shocked to move* but, but, but, how?? How did we not know????

JC: Mianmian - no- Lt. Luo, please don’t tell the Young Marshal! Please, I only came so my sister wouldn’t have to -

MM: Cowardice! It is every woman’s sworn duty to -

JC: My sister is of very delicate health. She won’t survive! She’s my late mother’s only daughter, if she dies... I’m expendable. I don’t mind being cannon fodder, please don’t report me.

JC shivering in the snow. “You said you trust Yanli! Why should Wanyin be any different?!”

WQ stood impassively over him with a sword at his neck. Then, she closed her eyes and turned away. “A life for a life. My debt is paid.”

---

JYL: *Proud* “A-Cheng helped secure the future of our nation. The adopted young crown princess was too young to rule without a loyal regent, and Wen Ruohan’s sons colluded with outside forces...it would have been chaos. Millions would have died.”

WWX *teasing* “Sure he brought home a sword, if you ask me he should’ve brought home a wife!”

---

JC, “W-would you like to stay for dinner - ”

WWX: WOULD YOU LIKE TO STAY FOREVER?

JC: Wei Wuxian! She’s regent now, be respectful!”

WQ: Dinner...sounds lovely.

#cql #the untamed #chengqing #wen qing #jiang cheng #corie fics #Anonymous #corie replies #cql ideas

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maximumsunshine · 4 years

Text

Depends

So I’m going to make a super embarrassing post and most of you are not my target audience. If you are not my target audience please choose to just scroll past this. Or maybe reblog it in case you have a follower who is my target audience. But anyway, I need to make a super embarrassing confession that no one fucking talks about and I’m going to talk about it.

When I cough, like now with Covid, I pee myself. Maybe you do to?

It doesn’t help that I’m 37 years old and I’ve birthed 3 kids. But honestly, I’ve always been this way even as a young child. And no amount of kegels has ever fixed this. There is probably a medical treatment I could get that would help and one day I’ll look into that, but this post isn’t about that. I have been medically tested in the sense that we know my bladder doesn’t fully empty when I go to the bathroom. So we know no amount of going potty is going to prevent me from peeing when I cough (or sneeze).

We need to talk depends. AKA adult diapers.

I’ve gotten bronchitis every year (Except the one after I got the pneumonia vaccine at like 34 or 35. I missed a year or two.) since I was 12 years old. And every year since I was 12 years old, I’ve pissed myself repeatedly while coughing my fool head off.

I wore regular pads to help mitigate this and changed them hourly or after a major coughing fit, through the day, every day, for the weeks I had bronchitis. You cough for a good 3-4 weeks. I’ll let you do the math on how many pads I went through.

I had another, surely foolproof, method to prevent myself from peeing when I cough. And it never fully worked but I liked to think, at the time, that it helped.

You see. I would try to dehydrate myself to the point of simply never having to pee. For weeks I’d severely limit my fluid intake so that I wouldn’t produce as much urine so that maybe eventually I’d stop peeing when I coughed.

I can not stress enough that limiting fluid intake while sick is the opposite of what you should be doing. I was so foolish, though my heart was in the right place. I was frustrated and embarrassed and I just didn’t know what else to do.

Then in December of 2019 I got really sick. To this day I think I had an early case of Covid before we knew it was a thing. We already know you can catch it again after a span of like 6 months. (I asked the local health department during one of our regular calls.) So it’s very possible I had it then and have it now.

And I was coughing and couldn’t breath and was coughing and couldn’t breath. The doctors threw the labels of bronchitis and pneumonia at me just to get me out of their ER (again, Covid wasn’t yet really known). My family got it. We all got a pneumonia diagnosis. And we were all sick for a month just coughing and coughing.

I was at a pharmacy at the time (again we didn’t know to quarantine like we do now. This was December 2019.) browsing other things. Killing time to wait out a script when I made a discovery and a life changing decision.

Depends. Adult diapers.

Of course I knew about them. But what I didn’t know until that night was that they came in pad form. Just like a sanitary napkin, only thicker and they have those little gel beads like what diapers have.

I broke down and bought a package. I was 36 and embarrassed because surely only old people use depends. But I told myself that the pad version wasn’t all that different from what I was currently using. I use the ones that Always makes. The same brand as the sanitary napkins. Only for when you pee when you cough. And honestly, 12-year-old me could have used them, so surely adult me that had birthed 3 kids needed to buck up and just use them.

My life has changed.

First of all. I don’t feel the wetness until they are saturated. Just like a baby with only a gently wet diaper doesn’t feel the wetness. Which means I can wear them for much longer before changing them out. How long depends on how much I cough but it’s still hours better than a pad meant for the menstrual cycle. My brand new 39 count has lasted me almost 2 weeks and still has about a third of them in there. YMMV.

I’m telling you, if you are someone who pees when you cough, whatever the cause, these discrete pads will change your life and you should try them. Especially now because Covid coughing is no joke!

#covid_19 #corona #coronavirus

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thesims4blogger · 3 years

Text

The Sims 4 Paranormal Stuff: Developer Blog (Part 1)

SimGuruConnor has released part 1 of the Sims 4 Paranormal Developer Blog series.

Hello Simmers! Welcome to a small 2-part Dev Blog about our newest Stuff Pack, Paranormal Stuff! This pack has been an absolute blast to work on, and I’m excited to share what this pack is all about!

I’ll try not to reveal too many spoilers for the pack either, so I’ll keep things somewhat brief. Our topics for today are the new Scared Mood and the Haunted House Lot Type, plus an interview with our Audio Artist too!

Get Scared

Sims can now relish in the mortal dread of the Scared Mood! The Scared Mood affects Sims in a variety of ways, with my personal favorite, the new Scream Incoherently interaction, where a Scared Sim runs up to another Sim to scream their lungs out. This can result in the other Sim calming down the Scared Sim, or resulting in both Sims becoming Scared. This can create a Scared Mood wildfire if you’re not careful!

Whoa, whoa, whoa, it's okay!

Sims afflicted with the Scared Mood also have trouble communicating with others, the urge to panic-run everywhere, and are slightly more prone to accidents. If no other Sims are around to help calm down a Scared Sim, they might just have to Hide Under The Covers for a while.

But if being Scared just isn’t your Sims style, consider purchasing the new Brave Trait. This Satisfaction Reward Store Trait will rapidly reduce the incoming fear a Sim feels and help Sims regain their composure faster. While no Sim is totally fearless, this trait should help mitigate some of those creepy feelings.

The Scared Mood and the Brave Reward Trait are all base game features coming with the Paranormal Stuff patch on January 21st. Tons of previous Uncomfortable Buffs are now becoming Scared Buffs, such as the “Startled By Ghost” Buff or the “Thalassophobia” Buff from Island Living.

While being Scared might not be a common occurrence in your everyday Sims life, living in a Haunted House is a whole different story…

Happy Haunts

Introducing the Haunted House Lot Type!

The Duplantier Dwelling, created by Doctor Ashley! This “canon” Haunted House will be available in the gallery!

They’re like regular houses, only haunted! Although unassuming during the day, at night, these places get super weird. Your Sims may notice things like flickering lights, pipes rattling, or even creepy dolls staring at them in the corner. All are totally normal occurrences in a Haunted House, but it may take some time for your Sims to adjust to their new surroundings.

Sims living in a Haunted House will also be introduced to floating apparitions known as Specters. They’re cute little critters, but their motives aren’t entirely clear. You can try talking to them, or even offer them presents in hopes of establishing a good rapport. If they like you, they’ll drop special loot for you and your family. If they don’t like you, well, you’ve been warned.

o o o (> ‘ u ‘ )>

Learning to get along with your new ghostly inhabitants is crucial in a Haunted House. Things like botching seances, neglecting Specters, or letting accursed objects invade your house will have a negative impact on its spiritual serenity. There is a delicate art to co-existing with the entities of the house, and thankfully you’ll have an expert on the matter to assist you!

Meet Guidry

Claude René Duplantier Guidry was a seasoned Paranormal Investigator in his previous life, but now he exists to help anyone brave enough to live in a Haunted House! You’ll probably run into him eventually living in a Haunted House, but don’t worry, he’s a nice ghost!

Guidry will gladly offer his wisdom to those who seek it. If you’re confused, alarmed, or slightly uncomfortable by your new haunted surroundings, give Guidry a holler and he might be able to help. He can also offer valuable objects to help your Sims, too; all you need is to reach out!

Still got it.

All Guidry wants in return is to crash at your place for the time being. Sounds like a fair deal, right? But if you’d prefer to fly it solo, you can always disable his nightly visits—he won’t be too upset, maybe.

As mentioned before, Guidry was a Paranormal Investigator before his untimely demise. If he sees potential in you, he can certify you with a Paranormal Investigation License, granting access to the Paranormal Investigation Freelancer Gigs. Only those who are qualified enough can join the ranks of Paranormal Investigators, but more on that next time!

Be Brave!

Living in a Haunted House adds a layer of risk and reward for your Sims, and each successful night yields Reward Store Satisfaction Points for everyone in the Household. Specters can also drop treasure that can also be collected, consumed, or sold to an Oddity Collector. So although your Sims might go through a bit of peril, they’ll thankfully be compensated.

One of my favorite pieces of haunted treasure is the new Sacred Candle. Not only do they look cool, but they also help protect Sims from paranormal influences. Place them around your house to make sure Sims are properly shielded!

A properly protected Sim.

Things like Sacred Candles and performing ceremonies at the Séance Table are integral to keeping your Sims happy in a Haunted House. Without using these paranormal tools, the entities of the house might get a little bossy.

And while it might be in your Sims’ best interest to keep the spirits of the house in check, watching things go horribly wrong in a Haunted House can be just as fun too. So whatever works for you!

Like Tiny Homes, this Lot Type can be toggled on or off at any time. So whether you’re a casual thrillseeker who wants to spend a couple of nights in a Haunted House, or a seasoned Paranormal Expert who wants to take on a new challenge, this Lot Type should offer something for you!

Crosspack Stuff!

Pets get to share the fun too! They especially love the accursed objects that show up!

I think they’re gonna get along great.

As mentioned before, a ton of old Buffs from multiple packs are now being converted to the Scared Mood. I think 70 something Moodlets were converted? Honestly, I lost count. Anything that seemed more appropriate for the Scared Mood was transferred over.

Oh, and you might remember an old Lot Trait from City Living called Haunted. For clarity’s sake, it needed a name change, so now it’s the Spooky Lot Trait. It also benefits from being combined with the new Haunted House Lot Type and will have an increased chance of spawning Ghosts at night. So use both for maximum haunted-ness!

Audibly Frightened

Last but not least, I’d love to turn it over to our Audio Artist for this pack, Briana Billups! She did a killer job bringing Haunted Houses to life! Trust me!

Conor: Can you tell us what an Audio Artist does on The Sims 4?

Briana: Big, broad picture: an audio artist decides what everything in The Sims 4 sounds like. We record, create, and edit sounds to the art and animation of the game. Little, very detailed picture: creating the actual sounds is usually one of the smaller aspects of our job. We are meeting with other departments, like design, animation, and VFX, to understand the overall vision of new game features and how we can fit in sonically. We are meeting with each other to make sure all our new content still keeps the very fun and quirky vibe of the Sims. We come up with new tools and implementation where necessary.

Conor: What sort of things go into the creative process for creating audio?

Briana: Every audio artist/sound designer has their own creative process, but I like to make a “sonic mood board” of sorts. I typically like to have a good idea of what I want something to sound like in my head before I record or edit it, so it’s nice to have sound effects or music to refer to that represents my original inspiration or ideas. When I was in college, I would make Spotify playlists for whatever I was working on. I would listen to them once a day, adding and editing as necessary, so when I actually got to work, I was in the right headspace. Now I’m usually less formal about this sort of stuff, but for this pack, I would refer back to things like Vincent Price’s demonic laugh from Thriller or Casper the Friendly Ghost Cartoons and the looping soundtrack from the queue of a horror ride at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk (Ghost Blasters)

Conor: What were you most excited to work on for this pack?

Briana: Definitely all the haunted house sounds! Good sound design is the crux of so many horror movies and video games, so even if we were keeping things more “Casper” and less “Poltergeist,” I still wanted to give a good scare here and there. I actually scared myself one day while playtesting another feature in the game!

Conor: If you had to choose, what is your favorite audio clip you’ve ever added to The Sims 4?

Briana: I would say my favorite SFX were the sports arena loops in EP08: Discover University. When you visit the arena for the soccer/esports match or graduation, you can actually listen to the whole game or ceremony. It was great to craft a whole story from start to finish using just sound. I also snuck in a lot of developer names when writing the scripts for our voice actors.

Thanks, Briana!

More To Come!

That about covers this first foray into the Paranormal Stuff Pack! This pack has been a ton of fun to work on, and watching my Sims flee in terror has been more enjoyable than I’d like to admit.

Next blog, we’ll focus on the Séance Table and developing your Medium skill, as well as the new active freelance career Paranormal Investigator.

Big thanks to the Stuff Pack team for helping this pack come to life, and thank you, Doctor Ashley, for building our featured Haunted House!

Until next time, SimGuruConor

#news #the sims 4 #ts4 #sims 4 #sims 4 paranormal #stuff pack

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hellyeahheroes · 3 years

Text

Why the Big 2 is hard to get into

This is something I wanted to write in response to @thankskenpenders who answered an ask regarding how the Big 2 is hard to get into compared to Archie Sonic(which mostly sucked up until Ian Flynn took over and even then was burdened by encyclopedic lore) and IDW Sonic(which is great and you should read it). They,don’t know their pronouns, say that the big 2 is costly and hard to get into thus alienating newcomers. I hate this argument because it’s true, and also doesn’t account for what both companies do to mitigate that or it overemphasizes the shared universe of Marvel or DC. So I want to write this post to help people who feel overwhelmed about pursuing this hobby.

First, newcomers are not supposed to tag along with characters with decades of lore and backstory because doing so is daunting. And this is where the differences between Marvel and DC.

Marvel doesn’t do reboots or they prefer soft reboots in that the previous lore happened but they rather change the tone and focus of said character. Yes, you could read from Amazing Fantasy #15 and all of Amazing Spider-Man volumes and Spectacular Spectacular Spider-Man and Web of Spider-Man to now, and it will be one long continuous story. Drawbacks is that it’s hard to just jump in but Spidey is a character in which the framing device doesn’t involve a lot of benchmarks in Peter Parker’s life. Yes shit happens but the comic doesn’t make the big shit not be impactful. Marvel has done retelling of the same story but again, those are either gimmick what if’s or widget universes or a modern retelling. The latter doesn’t last long and the former only reflects a periods.

DC does reboots or convoluted excisions of characters and concepts. Case and point, New 52 Reboot. The issue is that no one forgets that continuity that was retconned because it was written and experienced. And ignoring that history only makes it more apparent that the writer and/or editors had a bias. More on that subject for another post because I don’t want to get on a tangent.

Point is that new readers are supposed to hop on newer books that are explicitly made for new characters. Marvel does this better than DC. Instead of reading the convoluted history of the X-Men, new readers were supposed read books with the newer X-Men. Or instead of reading the 60 year history of Peter Parker’s adventures, you either picked up Ultimate Spider-Man or start with Miles. Don’t read the Avengers. Read the Young Avengers or the Champions or whatever. The issue is that Marvel does little to market those characters except for Miles Morales. Or they wait way too late to do so and opt to give media deals to characters who do not need the exposure to the kids that would be interested in their stories. Now Into the Spider-verse was a gift that came about because Lord and Miller read Miles Morales and became fans. Marvel had no intention of making a Miles Morales focused piece of media. It’s why they didn’t market the movie when Black Panther came out. And that’s the rub here. There characters that are made for newcomers aren’t focused on and you have to dig deep to know about them.

Not even going to tackle DC for fear of having an aneurysm covering their stupid shit.

Point is that you aren’t supposed to or expected to know everything in the DC or Marvel Universes. Both companies are aware of the entry gate and have means to superseded.

Another thing that is overstated is the shared universe aspect. You can ask any fucking comic reader of the Big 2 and no one will actively say with their whole heart that they keep track of fucking everything. I am Spider-Man fan who has read like 500 issues of Amazing Spider-Man, a couple of dozen of Spectacular, and all of Ultimate and Miles Morales, and never once have I needed to know what the Avengers were doing. Or what the X-Men were doing. Or what the Fantastic Four we’re doing. Or fucking Doctor Strange who Peter apparently went to school across the street from. Generally if you follow a character or just a title and stick with it, interactions with other characters are limited and are treated as guest appearances. And that is the same with title or character in Marvel. DC is mostly the same way. Most readers just pick an idiot and stay with that idiot.

But I suggest new readers look for those gate entries when presented them. New character getting a book is introduced? That is your train! Do not miss it. A reboot or retelling that isn’t a soft reboot? Jump on that shit and hold on tight because the shit might not last long.

Which brings me to the crux of the argument: why it’s hard to get into? Honestly, it has to do with fans not letting shit go. The most egregious example is the X-Men. Legacies refuse new characters in favor of the old ones who no longer have stories to tell. They never develop nor change. They become static characters that only exist as avatars for power fantasies that eschew the original point as to why they were created: to be fresh or to be different and to be all-new. In some situations, newer characters are sacrificed to create drama for the old guard or the older characters canabalize of the stories of the newer characters to remain fresh. Peter Parker is the biggest offender as of late of the latter. On top of the over reliance of those old characters and preserving those stories, it becomes a quagmire of pages and quotes and panels.

So yeah. It sucks out here and this is why I largely stayed away from the Big Two fandom. But yeah. Here you go.

@ubernegro

#marvel #dc

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winterrose527 · 3 years

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person a is afraid of flying, person b offers to hold their hand. for robbcella?

Oh my gosh sorry for the delay on writing this. It was so fun and obviously turned out far longer than expected as always.

***

Okay. It’ll be fine. It’ll totally, one hundred percent, be fine. There is nothing to be concerned about. You’re just going to put your things above the seat, in the overhead – ooh nope you’re not. Too heavy, too high –

“Do you need help with that?” a voice cut into her sad little slow motion panic attack.

“Oh, no, that’s alright,” she said, the way she always did when men offered the taxis they’d just hailed for themselves to her, “I’ve-I’ve got it.”

She went to lift her carry-on, but someone must have filled it with rocks because when she tried to lift it over her head it ended up hitting her in the face.

“You uh… sure about that?” the man asked. “Please.”

“Okay, thank you,” she agreed.

The suitcase was out of her hands in a moment and settled safely in the overhead bin.

When it was no longer in front of his face she saw that it was… quite a face. Piercing blue eyes framed by thick, long lashes. A strong nose, square jaw, perfect pouty lips.

She realized after a moment that she’d been staring at him, and her embarrassment was only slightly mitigated by the fact that he’d been staring at her too.

“Can you guys move?” an exasperated traveler asked behind them.

“Sorry!” she exclaimed.

The man gestured to the row of seats, “I’m the window, unless you’d prefer it.”

She shook her head, “No, no, aisle is better for me.”

He looked at her as though he’d heard the nerves in her voice but he nodded and went and sat in the window seat, putting his backpack underneath the seat in front of him but pulling out one of those books by an author that was always sold in airports and train stations. She settled in next to him, taking her bottle of water, headphones and cell phone, and her own weathered paperback out of her bag before pushing it under the seat in front of her.

She buckled immediately, taking a sip of water and then checked her phone. She had a text from Shireen.

Everything will be fine, I’ll see you soon!

She smiled and typed back: I think that’s supposed to be my line, you’re really failing at this whole bridezilla thing. See you soon, xo.

Myrcella put her phone on airplane mode and tried to open her book to distract herself. Instead she read the same sentence of the same paragraph six times without retaining any of it so she closed the book, drumming her fingers on it lightly.

She saw the man glancing at her and realized she was probably being annoying.

“Sorry,” she said, sitting on her hands so that she’d stop.

“That’s okay,” he shook his head, “I like that song.”

She smirked and nodded, taking another sip of water and then looking around. It looked like everyone had settled in and unfortunately it didn’t seem like there was anything wrong with the engine so they’d likely be taking off soon.

This was proven true when the captain started making his announcements and she heard the propellers start going.

She thought about the exercises her mother’s life guru Luwin had tried to teach her. Imagining herself as the pilot.

But I don’t know how to fly a plane!

She stopped that and just focused on her breathing and trying to think logically. Realistically, they were going to be fine. She understood that.

But while she could mind over matter practically anything else, this was the one exception.

“Afraid of flying?” someone broke into her thoughts.

It wasn’t the guy who’d sat next to her, but a kindly looking older woman across the aisle.

“A little,” she agreed.

“Do you want a diazepam?” the woman asked, holding up a little bottle and shaking it slightly.

She heard the guy sitting next to her cough, though it sounded more like he was disguising a laugh.

“No, thank you though, ma’am,” she said and then turned away.

“You know um, realistically the chances of our plane going down are-,” he started.

“Well my grandmother died in a plane crash, so,” she interrupted him.

She leaned her head against the headrest and closed her eyes, as she felt them starting to move down the runway. She gripped the armrests.

“Oh shit I’m so sorry,” he said, “Really?”

“No,” she grimaced, her breath coming less easily now, “That’s just what I always say to people when they pull out statistics. Apparently it’s my way of offsetting my own discomfort.”

“Or maybe it’s just your way of telling people to mind their own business,” he suggested.

She opened her eyes and found that he was looking at her in concern.

“I won’t pass out or throw up or anything,” she promised him.

He nodded, “That’s good, why don’t you drink some water?”

“You don’t have to help,” she told him, “You can just um… read that book and ignore the hyperventilating woman beside you. I’ll be okay when we’re in the air.”

He looked at her again and then turned to the book and then back to her, “The only problem with that is that I really don’t want to read this book.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, “Then why did you buy it?”

“I always buy one when I’m getting on a flight for more than an hour so I can pretend to read it and ignore the person sitting next to me,” he noted.

She nodded and then pointed out, “You shouldn’t have told me, now you can’t use that trick on me.”

He scratched his cheek, smirking down at the book, “Yeah well maybe I don’t want to.” She realized absently that he was hitting on her but that was sort of overshadowed by the fact that the plane was speeding up, “Look um, we’re about to take off here. Do you want to close your eyes or um… I could talk you through it or… I don’t know, I could at least hold your hand? Mine’s clean, I promise and um… well I had to help my sister in the delivery room so it’s really used to being squeezed.”

She looked at him, and her voice was small when she asked, “You did?”

He nodded, resting his hand on the arm rest, his palm facing upwards and open, and he glanced at it and then back at her, “Come on, I’ll tell you all about it.”

The plane was really speeding now so she slipped her hand into his. Which was large and warm without being clammy. She should have wiped her own on her pants, she realized but he didn’t seem to mind as he interlaced their fingers. She felt the wheels start to lift and her knuckles went white she was squeezing his hand so hard.

“Okay so my sister, Sansa is married to one of my best friends, Jon. They wanted children right away,” he shook his head, “Which we were all pretty surprised about. Anyway, Sansa is about eight months pregnant and they find out that Jon’s mentor – honestly more of a father figure than anything else – who lives up on Bear Island – is sick. Like really sick. He’s telling Jon not to go, that he’ll be fine, and Jon doesn’t want to leave Sansa, but Sansa being Sansa convinces him that he has to because you know, it’s his Dad basically, right?”

“Right,” she nodded, because it seemed like he wanted to make sure she was still with him.

“So anyway,” he went on, “I’m at the office in a meeting late one night and I get a call from Sansa, telling me that she thinks her water broke. I’ve got like, twenty junior employees looking at me as I have a full blown meltdown -,” she hadn’t realized that she’d giggled until he stopped and grinned at her, “It wasn’t pretty. But I’m running out of there like a bat out of hell and calling Jon on my way to go get her. At this point, Mormont’s really bad, but he and Jon have said the things they needed to say and made their peace with it, but of course there is a huge storm.”

“Every good story needs a huge storm,” she noted.

He grinned at her, “I agree. And this one was a doozy. So it became pretty clear that Jon was not going to make it home, and of course he is freaking out because it’s only been a little over eight months and you know um, you don’t know him but this is not the sort of guy that like… handles not being able to be there for Sansa well? Like if he could have given birth he a hundred percent would have and I know that’s easy to say since like… he can’t but he seriously would have. The man loses his mind when she’s got a slight fever. So you can imagine that he was just… anyway. I go get Sansa and take her to the hospital. And it’s early so you know there’s um, a lot of attention on her and everything. But she’s just… calm. I’ve never seen anything like it. She’s just calm. She’s listening to the doctors and she’s telling Jon that everything’s going to be fine and then for a minute it’s just us in the delivery room,” he shook his head and it almost seemed like his eyes were smarting and she squeezed his hand. He looked down at it for a second and then squeezed it back and went on, “And she looked at me and she said, Robby, it’s time to call in my big favor. And I realized then how scared she really was and after that it sort of um… became easy? I guess, to be calm. Because she needed me to be so… anyway, she squeezed the shit out of my hand for five hours and then my nephew was born.”

“Happy and heathy?” she wondered.

He smiled, “Happy and healthy and howling… do you want to hear the weird bit?”

“Has anyone ever said no to that question?” she wondered.

His eyes smiled though he didn’t and he said, “We called Jon to give him the good news, and after the appropriate celebrating, he gave us the bad news. Mormont had died minutes – we later found out a minute – before the baby was born,” she felt a shiver run down her spine and he squeezed her hand, “I know. So, when it came time to name him, Joer was the only option, really.”

“Wow,” she agreed, “That is quite a story.”

He smiled at her and rubbed her knuckles with his thumb, “How are you doing?”

She looked around and realized that they were in the air securely. The fasten seatbelt sign was even turned off.

“Oh I’m sorry!” she went to pull her hand back.

“Don’t be, you’re far gentler than Sansa,” he told her and she bit her lip to hide her smile, “And I’ll let go if you promise to grab it if you need to.”

Now that they weren’t barreling down the runway, she was able to notice just how blue his eyes were.

“Promise,” she said.

He didn’t let her hand go right away, and she didn’t let go of his so quickly either. Their fingers relaxed against one another’s, and she dragged her hand ever so slightly against his. He shivered and she looked at him.

“You alright?” she wondered.

“Fine,” he nodded, looking down at their hands briefly, “And I’m Robb, by the way.”

“Myrcella,” she introduced herself, “Thank you, I know I said you didn’t need to help, but you really did.”

“My pleasure,” he told her.

“Are you sure you don’t want to pretend to read that book?” she asked, “I won’t be offended.”

He looked at her and then at the book and then placed it in the pocket in front of him.

“So what brings you to Dragonstone, Myrcella?” he asked.

“Wedding, my cousin’s,” she told him. “How about you?”

“Engagement party,” he answered, a slight shake of his head. “Sansa and Jon and baby Joer will be there, too.”

“That’s exciting,” she smiled, “I can’t wait to be an Aunt. Not sure how good of a mother I’d be, but I feel like I could really excel at the whole Auntie thing.”

“Oh yeah?” he asked her, “Are you going to be the fun aunt –“

“Obviously,” she interrupted.

He chuckled, and nodded, “Obviously.”

And so it went. They talked about the different things they wanted to do with their respective (mostly hypothetical) nieces and nephews. How long they’d each lived in the Riverlands (since university, for him, two years, for her). She told him about the beach he had to get to while on Dragonstone, where he could eat the best lobster roll of his whole life.

When it came time for their descent, neither of them said a thing about it, but his hand took hold of hers and they kept talking.

“Look, um, Myrcella,” he started, “Don’t feel any pressure or anything, I mean, this could just be the most enjoyable flight of my life and leave it at that but I’d regret not asking so… is there any chance I could take you out when we both get back?”

She’d been hoping he’d ask, but she shook her head, “No… but I’d love to take you out as a thank you for getting me through it.”

He narrowed his eyes at her and laughed, “That was meaner than the dead grandmother thing.”

She grinned, “I’m sorry,” and then pulled out her phone and handed it to him.

He put in his number and now that she could take her phone off of airplane mode she texted him so that he had hers. It was unlike her, usually she’d play harder to get.

Then again, usually she was less interested in being caught.

***

She was still thinking about him as she straightened the hem of Shireen’s gown.

When she stood up, all thoughts escaped her apart from one.

“You are the most beautiful bride this world has ever seen,” she told her.

“By a very wide margin,” Gendry agreed at her side. “And the most mischievous. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.”

Shireen giggled, “We wanted it to be a surprise.”

“You told her,” Gendry reminded her.

“Well duh, she’s my maid of honor,” Shireen said, looking at her with tears in her eyes and holding out her hand, “And the closest thing to a sister I’ll ever have.”

“Don’t,” Myrcella pleaded, squeezing her hand, “Your make up is perfect.”

Shireen laughed, though in truth she cared little for her make up. She really was the worst bridezilla ever. Low maintenance was the only way to describe her.

She hadn’t wanted the hoopla that went with planning a big wedding, so instead had invited everyone for an engagement party which in a few minutes they’d all learn was actually the wedding.

Shireen looked up at Gendry, “You’ll give me away, right?”

Gendry glanced at her before nodding at Shireen, “Of course I will.”

Neither of them said what they wanted to. That her Dad should have been there. Even if it was a surprise wedding, even if he didn’t know, he should have been at her engagement party.

“Perfect,” Shireen said, looking in the mirror and fixing her veil, “Alright, I’m ready. Myrcella you can head out as soon as you start hearing the music, and then we’ll follow. Ooh and remind me afterwards that I wanted to introduce you to Theon’s best man.”

Myrcella laughed and kissed her cousin on the cheek, “Why don’t you focus on getting yourself married and then you can work on me getting married.”

Besides, what are the chances that his best man will be a better one than Robb?

Shireen agreed and Myrcella grabbed the bouquet of wildflowers that she never would think to use for her own wedding but which were beautiful and perfect for the laidback, seaside wedding this was.

The music started, a single violinist playing an instrumental version of the old school hip hop song that Shireen had declared was her and Theon’s song, as it was playing on the radio in the car right after their first big fight.

Someone else had told the guests a few minutes earlier that they were actually here for a wedding, so they were standing on either side of an aisle, though it was clear there was no rhyme or reason to it, no bride’s side or groom’s side, exactly as it should be.

She walked down the short aisle and smiled at Theon as she settled across from him. Out of curiosity she glanced behind him at his best man, who was grinning at her from ear to ear.

Because of course it was him.

She’d almost asked, the name of the person whose engagement party it was, but there’d been so many other things to talk about and it had slipped her mind.

Only Shireen walking down the aisle could have torn her gaze from Robb’s blue eyes and she fought tears as she saw the way Theon’s heart seemed to stop when he saw her.

Their vows were simple, and sweet, and funny, and fifteen minutes later, Shireen Greyjoy walked back down the aisle on the arm of her husband.

Robb should have offered her his arm, but instead he held out his hand which she took readily, their fingers interlacing as though well practiced in it.

“I thought you were here for an engagement party,” she teased.

He chuckled, “If I wasn’t so happy to see you, I’d be pissed that clearly you made the cut for knowing it was actually a wedding and I didn’t.”

She smiled, “If it helps, Shireen is dying to set us up.”

“Yeah, Theon assured me that there was no way the chick I met on the plane was hotter than you,” he grinned. Then his eyes wandered over her, “You look beautiful, by the way.”

“Thank you,” she looked up into his blue eyes, made brighter by his navy blue suit, “So do you.”

And it was clear then, as clearer than anything ever had been though it made little sense at all, that one day this would be a part of the family lore, just like him holding his sister’s hand in the delivery room. Over the years they’d perfect it, this story, that they’d have to tell over and over again that night, interlacing parts of it as seamlessly as their fingers.

When he pulled her out onto the dance floor and into his arms, it seemed like he knew it too.

“So I know I said I wanted to take you out when we were back home,” he noted, “But I’ve heard there’s a pretty good lobster roll around here… It’s not the most glamorous first date or anything but…”

She laughed, “Well then this can be our first date. A lobster roll feels like a perfect second one. When do you fly back?”

“Sunday night, the seven o’clock flight,” he told her.

She smiled, “Me too. So that can be our third date.”

“Our third date on an airplane, hmm,” he mused in a voice that sent a shiver down her spine.

She wondered if he was thinking what she was. All those expectations that came with a third date.

Though in truth given that they were at a wedding where the alcohol was flowing freely and he was looking at her like that while he was looking like that, she doubted she’d be following the three date rule.

Even still, the mile-high club lingered in the air between them.

“Well,” she looked up at him, “You’ll have to find some way to distract me. I’m terribly afraid of flying, you know.”

He grinned, and pulled her closer to him, his lips against her ear, “Oh it’d be my pleasure to help.”

#fanfiction #modern au #robbcella #strangers on a plane

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