#and then add some strings along or gears at the base

[thatrandombystander]

My monster gender envy keeps manifesting itself as looking longingly at monster characters and dreaming of making a banger cosplay. Alas. My skill level.

[hauntedhowlett-writes]

somebody to hold

pairing: könig x female reader

rating: explicit (18+ MDNI)

word count: 4,884

summary:

König discovers cuddle therapy.

You discover König.

author’s note: i don’t play COD, i just have a mask kink. all translations are from google, so feel free to send me corrections if they are needed! translations available at the end of the fic

content warnings/additional tags: explicit sexual content (18+ MDNI), potentially bad German translations, mentions of König’s social anxiety, descriptions of scars, touch starved könig, oral sex (m receiving), size kink, praise kink, dirty talk, unprotected p in v, mild breeding kink, choking, fingering, ab riding. Let me know if any are missing!

“Hey, your next appointment is here,” the voice of the practice secretary, Amy, says from the doorway of your office.

You look up from your computer, brow furrowed as you click around your calendar. “I didn’t think I had a late appointment?”

“Last minute add. And just…prepare yourself,” she says, eyes comically wide before she disappears.

You shut your laptop and head for the waiting room, curious about what’s got Amy acting so funny.

You stop short in the doorway. Perhaps it’s the veritable mountain of a man sitting in the tiny plastic waiting room chair fully kitted in military combat gear, including a sniper hood that only reveals two pale blue eyes that scan the room. His hands rest on his large thighs, fingers curling against the fabric of his tac pants.

You’re not unfamiliar with military clients. Your office is near a base, after all. You’ve had a few wander in before. But you’ve never had one quite like him.

“Uh, hi? Hi,” you say, clearing your throat. His eyes shoot to you and you swallow nervously. You give him your name, followed with, “I’m going to be your cuddler this evening. Do you want to follow me back to the session room?”

The man gives a single nod before unfolding from his seat. He absolutely towers over you, his build just as broad as it is tall, and he has to tilt his head down to look at you. He holds an arm out, gesturing for you to lead the way.

You lead him to the back session room, a space curated for comfort. It’s painted a deep blue and lit only with dimmable lamp lighting and string lights that can be turned on or off, depending on the client’s preference. There’s a large couch pressed to one wall, a sectional that has a hidden portion that pulls out to fill in the middle, essentially turning it into a bed. It’s perfect for both seated snugglers and the prone cuddlers.

There’s a snack and water station set up on a wood console table near the door, and beside it are cubbies for storing belongings. A large basket of soft blankets sits near the couch, along with an array of pillows.

You look back at the man that has followed you through the door. Those blue eyes take in every detail of the room before they land back on you. You toe off your sneakers, leaving you in your frog patterned socks. You wiggle your toes.

“Did Amy explain the rules to you and brief you on the terms and conditions?” Another silent nod. “Okay, well, everything we do is completely up to you, within those parameters. We can talk or touch as much or as little as you’d like for the length of your appointment. I can make some suggestions for positions, if you’d like?”

His hands fidget at his sides, fingers flexing and curling into fists like he’s not sure what to do with them. He stares down at the shoes that you’ve left by the door.

“You don’t have to take anything off, if you don’t want to,” you reassure him. “Why don’t you take a seat on the couch?”

The man takes two broad steps before taking a seat, as instructed. You feel a weird sort of giddiness that a man clearly as powerful as him listened to your orders.

He sits with his back straight as a bar of steel, eyes trained on you for the next step in the process, hands placed on his thighs once more. You take a tentative step closer.

“I’m going to sit right here, okay?” You narrate as you sit down near him, a cushion of distance between your bodies. “Is this alright?”

He nods.

“Would you like me to be closer? Or farther?”

“Closer,” a deep accented voice says. It makes your breath catch, the quiet gentleness of it and the way it sounds rough from disuse. “Please.”

You scooch closer, the distance between your bodies shrinking but not yet removed. “Okay?”

“Ja. Yes,” he says. A pause. “Could you…closer?”

“Of course. Is it okay if our bodies touch?”

He nods. You close the gap between your bodies, your thigh pressed along his and your arms brushing with each breath. He’s tense, shoulders tight and fists clenched as he breathes rhythmically through his nose and out his mouth. You let him take a moment to adjust.

“What’s your name?” You ask quietly.

“König.”

________

You are very warm. König can feel the heat of you even through his gear.

He feels a bit ridiculous, sitting here on a couch beside a stranger who he has paid to cuddle him. And he can’t even reach that point yet. Even just having you sit beside him has him trying to calm his breathing.

In…2…3…4….Out.

“Would you like to talk about anything?” You ask. He glances down at you. Scheiße, you’re pretty. That fact certainly isn’t helping him keep calm.

He shakes his head, not trusting his voice to reply. You give him a small smile.

“Well, do you mind if I talk?”

No, he doesn’t mind at all. He’d listen to your voice for hours if he could, the way it's so soft to his ear compared to the shouts and commands he’s used to hearing day in and out. He shakes his head.

Your small smile grows, a bright grin across your face that makes your nose crinkle adorably. König finds his shoulders relaxing the slightest bit.

You tell him about your day and how you were looking forward to the weekend because there is a show that you wish to catch up on. You talk about your cat, a little orange tabby that you adopted three years ago named Toast and how he likes to perch inside the window and watch the birds outside of your apartment. You also mention that Toast has an entire wardrobe of sweaters for the winter that he hates, but you love putting him in them anyways.

Slowly, the tension leaves König’s body. He relaxes against the back of the couch and adjusts his legs, stretching them out in front of him. His hands, which once fidgeted in his lap, are now folded on his chest as he tilts his head back and listens to your stories.

“König?” You place a tentative hand on his shoulder. “Our time is up.”

He blinks. Oh. He must have fallen asleep. He looks over to find you smirking at him.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to bore you to sleep,” you say, voice self-deprecating.

“It was not boring, liebling,” he replies quietly.

______

The following week, you notice a calendar event labeled [CLASSIFIED]. You ask Amy about it.

“It’s the big guy from last week. He made a standing appointment,” she tells you. “But he’s all big, scary military so he didn’t give me a name to put down.”

You smile to yourself. You know his name.

It feels like a fun secret between the two of you.

You’re thrilled that he wants to come back. You hadn’t stopped thinking about his voice and those bright blue eyes all weekend.

When it's time for his appointment, you smile brightly at him in the waiting room. He follows you back to the session room, just as silent as the last time he visited.

You remove your shoes, just as before. He sits on the couch without being prompted.

“Would you like me to sit beside you? Like last time?” You ask. He nods.

You sit down, close enough that your limbs brush, just as you had the week prior. He seems a bit more at ease this time.

“How is Toast?” He asks. You beam at him, thrilled that he remembered you told him about your cat. You tell him about your weekend spent on the couch with your furry friend.

“Can I--,” he begins to ask, pausing uncertainly. He lifts his arm slightly.

You wiggle against him, settling against his side as his arm drops across your shoulders.

“Danke,” the man says. “Thank you.”

“Of course, König.”

______

It goes like that for four weeks. Konig sits on the couch and allows you to settle in beside him, your sides pressed together on the couch. You talk to him about anything and everything that comes to mind, and he listens intently.

He doesn’t talk much, but when he does, you cling to his words. Especially when he slips into speaking in German.

And if you have to press your thighs together for relief during those moments? Well, you hope the man doesn’t notice.

On the fifth week of his appointments, König surprises you.

When you remove your shoes, König begins to unclasp the buckles holding his tac vest to his chest. You grin at him in encouragement as he sets it to the side.

“I feel…naked,” he comments with a small huff of laughter.

You bite your lip, trying to hold back the cheeky reply that ran through your head. He is a client, after all.

He sits beside you on the couch, just as all the other sessions started, but he fidgets with the strap of his leg holster. “Could—,” he starts, pausing for breath. “Could we….lie down?”

“Of course,” you murmur. “Do you have a preference for position?”

“You can…lay your head on my chest?” He says. You give him an encouraging nod, standing up so that he can rearrange his large body so that he’s laying on his back. You reach for the pull tabs of the middle section, sliding it into place. He looks at you in surprise. “That was neat.”

You giggle. “Yeah, this couch is the best,” you comment as you crawl onto the cushion and settle your body along his, your head pillowed on his hard chest.

“This is…nice,” he says.

“Yeah, big guy. It is.”

______

Two weeks into sessions where you lay beside König, he begins talking.

In a quiet, albeit deep, voice he tells you about how he struggles with social anxiety. Being as big as he is was never useful for him until joining the military. He was mercilessly bullied in school as a young boy. He wanted to be a sniper, but his size was a burden to the position. Not to mention, he can’t sit still. He fidgets constantly, and his mind tends to wander if his body is not in motion.

His heart beats quickly beneath your ear as he tells you all the things about himself that he’d been keeping close to his chest for the last two months. He doesn’t stick to just the serious things. He tells you that his favorite color is blue. He has a massive sweet tooth and would kill a man for some traditional Sacher torte.

The laugh that accompanies that particular bit of information might just be your favorite sound in the world.

You don’t mention when your time with him has come to an end. You let him keep talking, afraid to break the spell and return König to his more stoic state.

König ends up noticing that the time has gone past his scheduled appointment. His blue eyes go wide and he sits up abruptly, knocking you off his chest as he begins to apologize profusely in a mix of German and English.

You place a hand on his chest. “It’s okay, König. Really. I just…I like spending time with you,” you admit quietly.

He rests a large gloved hand over yours.

“I enjoy our time as well, mein herz.”

______

König doesn’t show for his next scheduled appointment.

Or the one after that.

Or the one after that.

By the fourth missed appointment, you start to lose hope that you’d ever see him again.

You just hope he’s okay.

______

A sharp knocking noise breaks through your heavy sleep. You roll from the bed, landing gracelessly to the ground and startling Toast, the tabby darting beneath the bed for cover. Another knock sounds through the apartment as you stumble towards the door.

You stand on the tips of your toes to peer through the peephole with bleary eyes. Fumbling with the locks, you pull the door open as quickly as you can.

“König?” You ask breathlessly.

______

The adrenaline from the mission still courses in König’s veins as he tries to wait patiently for you to answer the door to your apartment, but he’s about one minute from either kicking down the door or picking the locks.

He imagines you would likely not appreciate either effort.

But finally, finally, he can hear your soft steps on the other side of the door before the locks disengage and the door is pulled open.

“König?” You ask. You’re wearing a large t-shirt that hits the middle of your thighs, more skin on display for his greedy eyes than he’s ever gotten the chance to see before.

“Liebling,” Konig replies. He steps forward, tentatively crossing the threshold to your home. When you don’t stop him, he takes another step. You look up at him with wide eyes.

“Where…what—,” you stutter, moving aside so that he can fully enter the apartment. He shuts the door behind him.

“Please, liebling, I–,” he starts, words catching in his throat as he looks down at you, the emotions bubbling up his throat. “I need you.”

______

König keeps his eyes trained on you as he unbuckles his helmet, lifting it from his head and dropping it to the floor. Next are the protective braces on his arms and legs, followed by the heavy tac vest and thigh holster.

He lifts the sniper hood, revealing the black balaclava beneath. His chest heaves with harsh breaths as his wide eyes scan your face.

You step forward, wrapping your arms around his middle and squeezing tightly, your head pressed to his chest as you close your eyes and inhale the scent of him.

“Missed you, König,” you murmur. His arms wrap around your shoulders, holding you impossibly tight to his body.

Suddenly you’re lifted from the ground and you squeak with surprise, your legs wrapping around his waist and your arms circling the back of his neck, holding onto him like a koala. The position puts you face to face with the man. His eyes search yours.

“Is this okay?” He asks. All you can do is nod. “Where is your bedroom?”

“Down the hall, last door on the right,” you instruct. König abandons his gear by the door, taking broad steps down the hall in the direction you gave. He gives the door a gentle kick, opening it wide enough to enter.

Toast darts out from beneath the bed, sliding past König’s legs and out to the living area.

He sets you gently on the bed, standing between your spread legs. His eyes remain fixed on yours as he kneels, deft fingers tugging at the laces of his boots.

You could get used to a view like this.

König stands to his full height once he’s removed his boots. A broad, scarred hand cups your cheek tenderly, calloused thumb moving across your cheekbone.

“Mein Liebling," he murmurs. His hand leaves your face and works the fly of his pants open, tugging the rough fabric down over his thighs.

You try very hard not to look but when he curls his fingers into the hem of his combat shirt, you can’t help the greedy way your eyes rove the miles of pale skin.

You take in the muscular thighs that give way to a defined Adonis belt, the cut so severe beneath the waistband of his boxer briefs that you long to trace your tongue along the valley. His abs flex, guiding your exploration up towards his thick chest.

There’s a litany of scars across his body, from smaller bullet wounds to deep slashes covered in thick scar tissue. You reach a hand out, lightly trailing your fingers across one that spans from his collarbone to the middle of his chest.

His hand curls over yours, holding it still against his warm skin. You can feel the frantic beat of his heart beneath your palm.

König’s free hand grasps the top of the balaclava and pulls, finally revealing the face of the man that’s occupied your every free thought over the almost two months you’ve known him.

Shaggy dark blonde hair falls across his forehead, slightly damp with sweat. Thick straight brows over the ice blue eyes framed with long blonde lashes you’ve become so familiar with. A slightly crooked nose and high cheekbones that lead into a strong, stubbled jaw.

There are scars on his face, too. A long silver scar slashes through this eyebrow and across his nose. Another cuts across the high point of his cheek.

He is so beautiful.

You watch as his cheeks turn pink and you belatedly realize you’d said that out loud. You shift to your knees on the mattress, reaching for his hand and pulling him toward you. He plants a knee on the soft surface and you guide him up until you’ve reached the pillows.

Stiffly, he lays beside you, head turned to watch you with those familiar blue eyes. You lay your head on his chest, sighing at the heat of his skin beneath your cheek. You wrap your arm around his waist and throw a leg over his hips, squeezing him tightly.

König doesn’t speak. He has an arm around your body, fingers pressing into the grooves of your ribs to hold you close. You breathe in tandem and his tense muscles begin to relax in your hold.

You shift your leg slightly, eyes going wide as you feel his cock against your knee. Feeling brave, you shift again, dragging your knee along the side of him.

His breathing stutters and you can feel his abs tense beneath you. You slide your hand across his chest, skimming your fingertips across the tight muscles.

“What are you doing, Kleine?” he asks. You lift your head from his chest to look at him.

“I want…can I—,” you stutter, losing your words at the dark look in the man’s eyes.

“I would let you do anything you wanted to me,” König says. “All you have to do is ask.”

You swallow nervously. “Can I touch you?”

“You are touching me,” he replies, a little smirk tilting his lips.

You ghost your hand across his straining length in retaliation. The smirk drops so fast you can’t help the giggle that escapes your lips.

“What happened to all that cockiness, hm?”

“Do not tease.” His hips flex beneath your palm, grinding his cock against your hand. “I have very little patience for it.”

You sit up on your knees beside him, moving one of his thick thighs to the side with a press of your hand so that you can crawl between his legs. He looks down at you with half lidded eyes, an arm thrown behind his head to prop him up to see better. You curl your fingers into the waistband of his boxer briefs.

“Is this okay?” You ask. He nods.

Permission granted, you slowly work the elastic down until his cock bobs free, slapping obscenely against his abs. Your mouth waters at the sight of the thick, uncut length of him.

“Jesus Christ, König,” you mutter. “Where do you think this thing is going to fit?”

“Ideally? Down your throat and then your cunt,” he replies easily. When you look up at him with wide eyes, he grins so brightly you feel like you’re looking into the sun.

And you’d gladly go blind for it.

You lean forward, giving into the urge to dip your tongue against the divot of his hip, running it along the cut of his abs reverently. His hips jolt at the contact, a whine spilling from his plush pink lips.

“Scheiß,” the man growls. “Bitte, baby, please,” he begs.

You let your tongue trail along the underside of his cock, tracing the prominent vein there to the flared head. You swirl your tongue along the tip, gathering the bead of precum and swallowing it greedily.

König’s chest rises and falls rapidly with his heavy breathing, his large hands fisting your blankets so tightly you briefly worry his bones may crack. He watches you intensely, almost like he’s worried you may disappear if he so much as blinks.

“Relax, König,” you coo, wrapping your hand around the base of his cock. “Let me take care of you.”

______

König has to think about the steps for disassembling a rifle to prevent himself from coming down your throat too quickly. The tight wet heat of your mouth feels so heavenly that for a moment, he worries that he may have actually taken a bullet to the chest on this last mission and he is actually in heaven.

But then you swirl your tongue around the sensitive head of his cock when you draw up his length and he realizes there would be no sin as glorious as this in heaven.

You eyes catch his as you slide him to the back of your throat, your lips straining around him as you try valiantly to take more of him than your limit allows. You gag around him, throating tightening exquisitely before you withdraw for a gasp of air.

You return to your task with admirable determination, eyebrows pinched together in concentration as you work to relax your throat and draw him in deeper.

“Just a little more, liebling, you can do it,” he murmurs, cupping your cheek, feeling the bulge of him in your mouth as his thumb traces the stretch of your lips around his cock. “Nimm das alles für mich.”

Your lips meet your small hand that is still wrapped around the base of him and you breathe deeply through your nose as you hold yourself there for a moment, throat fluttering around him. He groans, fighting the urge to flex his hips and drive himself even deeper.

“That’s it,” he whispers. Your eyelashes glisten with little tears, tiny pearls of wetness that speak to your efforts to please him. “That’s my baby.”

You moan around him as you pull back, his cock dropping from your mouth with an obscene pop. Your breathing is labored as you scramble up his body. König’s hands steady you with a grip around your waist as you reach for his face, tugging him into a messy kiss.

It’s a desperate clashing of lips and teeth and tongues that has König groaning, little whimpers slipping past your lips as he explores your mouth. Your teeth nip into his lower lip before trailing down his jaw and neck.

“Let me see you, Schatz,” he asks, a hand sliding up the back of your thigh to grip your ass and grind your body against his.

You flip beside him hastily, tearing your panties down your thighs and pulling your shirt over your head. Gloriously naked, you straddle his waist.

You’ve positioned yourself just out of reach of where he wants to feel you the most. His hands circle your waist, sliding up until his thumbs caress the underside of your breasts.

“So schön, meine liebe,” he murmurs, brushing his thumb across one tight nipple. Your hips flex and roll across his stomach and he can feel the slick wetness drenching his abs.

“König,” you moan, blunt little nails curling into the hard muscle of his pecs. Your head drops back, the long line of your throat calling to his hand.

He gives into the impulse, wrapping his fingers around your delicate neck, not constricting but merely holding. Your eyes go wide, hands gripping his wrist as you lean into the hold, your hips still grinding against him.

“You are making quite the mess,” König comments with a grin. You shudder in his hold. “Do not worry, liebling, I have never been afraid to get dirty.”

You moan, the sound vibrating deliciously against the hand he still holds around your neck. Your hips still over him as your release courses through you, your eyes fluttering shut.

König releases your throat and you sag against him. He runs a hand down your sweat slick back, over the curve of your ass until he can slip a single finger into your still fluttering hole. You gasp against his neck and he smiles.

“So fucking tight,” he groans, working his hand against you. You make little whimpering noises, lips working against his neck as you rock back against him. He eases a second finger into your dripping pussy, which earns him the sting of your teeth against his skin. “Scheiß!”

_______

You push yourself up on shaky arms, staring down into König’s dark eyes. His fingers slip from your pussy and you whine quietly at the loss.

“Wanna fuck you, König, please?” You murmur.

“I would love nothing more,” he says. He takes his cock in hand. “Take it, liebling.”

You lift your hips to position yourself over him, the fat tip of him notched at your entrance as you start your slow descent. The stretch of him is almost too much to bear, and it must show in your face because he drags a soothing hand across your thigh.

“That’s it,” he coos.

You slide another inch further with a whimper. “You’re so fucking big,” you tell him breathlessly. He chuckles, his cock pulsing inside of you and making you moan.

“Just think about how good it will feel when it is all inside of you, mein süße,” he says. “Filling every inch of you.”

You moan, your body accepting another inch. Your thighs shake with your efforts.

König’s hands grip your hips tightly, sure to leave fingertip shaped bruises that you’ll discover in the morning. On a deep breath, you lower yourself until you’re fully seated and stretched to your limit.

“Good fucking girl,” he growls. You meet his eyes, the blue nothing more than a thin ring around his blown pupils. His chest heaves as he breathes that same controlled rhythm you’ve watched him use before.

In…two…three…four…out.

You shift your hips experimentally, gasping at the overwhelming feeling of fullness. He wasn’t kidding about filling every last inch of you.

Pressing your hands to his chest, you lift your hips just barely off of him before dropping yourself back down. He moans, your name a curse and a prayer on his lips as you continue to build up a rhythm for yourself until you’re lifting almost fully off of him and slamming back down.

“Scheiß! Fuck!” König shouts as your pace picks up. “Mein perfekter kleiner Schatz.”

You lean forward to meet his lips, more of a sharing of breath than a kiss. He wraps his arms around your waist, holding you still as he thrusts up into you.

“König!” You cry, the slide and stretch and dull ache of him too much and yet not enough. His powerful thrusts are so deep at this angle that your eyes well with tears. Each drag of his cock from your pussy hits a spot that makes you see stars. “I’m gonna cum, please, König, please make me cum.”

“Anything for you,” he promises through gritted teeth, his hips picking up speed as he uses a hand on your ass to help slam you down on his cock. He turns his head, his nose brushing against yours tenderly in direct contrast to the way his hips pound against you. “Cum for me, engel. Let me see you.”

With a cry, you do just as he commands, your whole body going taught before sparking like a live wire, your release rolling over you so strongly it's more like a tsunami than a wave. He moans against your lips, hips pounding in an erratic speed as he works you through your orgasm and into his own.

“Fill me up, König,” you slur. “Wanna feel you. Bet you’ll get it so deep with your huge fucking cock.”

He comes with a deep groan, pressing up so deep as he spills inside of you that you gasp at the sensation, the warm heat of him filling you to the brim.

You collapse against him, the sweat on your bodies cooling in the chill of your apartment. He presses a kiss to the crown of your head.

“I missed you,” you murmur, tilting your head up to meet his eyes. “I’m glad you’re safe.”

“I will always come back,” he whispers, smoothing the sweat damp hair from your forehead. “So long as you are here for me.”

You tug the blanket from the foot of the bed over your bodies, snuggling into his side. You enjoy the quiet together, his fingers drifting up and down your back. The rapid patter of paws on the wood floor announces the approach of your cat.

The orange tabby hops on the bed, walking on light feet until he reaches the pillow König rests his head on. He curls up along the top of the man’s head, purring contentedly.

“Hello, Toast,” he says. His eyes flick to you. “This is a good sign, yes?”

“I’d say it was an excellent sign,” you reply, kissing the man’s cheek. He smiles.

“Good. Because I think I will be here a while.”

Translations:

Scheiße - fuck

Danke - thank you

mein herz - my heart

Mein Liebling - my darling

Kleine - little one

Bitte - please

Nimm das alles für mich - take it all for me

Schatz - treasure

So schön, meine liebe - so beautiful, my love

mein süße- my sweet

Mein perfekter kleiner Schatz - my perfect little darling

engel - angel

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Plucked String Instruments: As the name suggests, the plucked string instruments make a sound when you pluck or strum their strings. Some of the best examples include the guitar, banjo, harp, and sitar.

Guitar: It is a versatile instrument that has a long neck and comes with typically six strings, although variations do exist. It is central to diverse musical genres, including rock, jazz, blues, and classical.

Banjo: With its roots of origin in Africa and adopted in the Americas, the banjo features a circular body and four to six strings. It is a prominent part of folk, bluegrass, and country music.

Harp: Characterized by its vertical frame and strings, it is one of the oldest string instruments. You would hear it in classical, folk, and Celtic music traditions.

Sitar: It is a plucked string instrument from India. It has a gourd-shaped body and movable frets. It plays a vital role in Indian classical music, with its intricate melodies and rhythmic patterns.

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Double Bass: It is the largest and lowest-pitched instrument in the string family. It makes the base of the sound of bands. It is indispensable in classical, jazz, and contemporary music genres.

Fretted String Instruments

Fretted string instruments feature frets. The latter are metal strips implanted along the neck to mark specific musical intervals. Examples include the following:

Bass Guitar: Similar in appearance to the guitar but with a longer neck and fewer strings, the bass guitar produces lower frequencies and serves as the rhythmic backbone in many musical ensembles.

Ukulele: A small, four-stringed instrument with roots in Hawaii, the ukulele exudes a cheerful, bright sound. It is popular in folk, pop, and Hawaiian music styles.

Zither Family

Zithers are string instruments featuring a flat body with strings stretched across it. They are played by plucking or strumming the strings.

Autoharp: Equipped with buttons or keys that dampen specific strings, the autoharp enables players to create chords effortlessly. You can see them being used in folk and country music.

Appalachian Dulcimer: Originating from the Appalachian region of the United States, the dulcimer has a long, narrow body and fretted fingerboard. Musicians cherish it for its sweet, melodic tones.

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Fanfic - Livin’ on a Prayer

Yet another fic in this AU/Timeline based off on of my other fics Oh, We're Halfway There  This would be much before that one and 'Plasm on Your Face Livin’ on a Prayer

Ember is out flying out in the real world when suddenly she hears someone playing a song very dear to her.

Of course she had to go and find them.

Ember weaved between buildings as she was flying. Flying out in the open air would be more relaxing, but she really didn’t want to run into Phantom tonight. She didn’t want to fight. She wanted to scream, or yell, or destroy something. 

But she wasn’t in the mood for a fight. 

She already got into a fight with Kitty today. Ember wasn’t the one to usually feel sorry for herself, but for once she did. She knew she had stepped out of line.

For once, she felt like a heel. 

Yeah, sure, she probably should anyways (what with the whole take over the world thing) but that was different. 

She was snapped out of her thoughts when she heard the song of a guitar-playing through the night. Whoever was playing it was objectively terrible. It took Ember a few moments to realize that she recognized what they were playing, and when she realized what it was, she felt absolutely frozen.  

The player was offbeat, and the guitar’s low E string was a half step out of tune, but she could have recognized that song anywhere. 

She had been listening to it when she died. 

She careened through the air, her hair fluttering behind her and casting dancing shadows along the fire escapes and closed windows. She intangibly phased through walls when she thought she found where the music was coming from, only to realize that no it had been above her. 

Putting on the last burst of speed, she flew up through several floors to the roof. 

Coming face to face with a shocked Danny Phantom. 

His eyes were ice blue at the moment since he was in human form. She hadn’t seen them this clear before, usually, she saw them glowing brightly as he channeled some power, or green as he geared up to fight her. 

She didn’t want to fight tonight, and he definitely was going to transform in a moment here to shove her into his thermos, and then back into the ghost zone. 

Where Kitty was. 

Ember reached out, snatching the guitar off his shoulders, intangibility yanking it off him. She ignored the sputtering shouts that somehow managed to be a combination of her name, “watch out,” and “hey” all at once. 

He didn’t react at first as she quickly tuned the guitar, frozen as he was with her suddenly just appearing. She looked up at him as she wet her lips. “We’re taking this from the top!”

Then she started playing. 

Her fingers danced along the guitar, playing some opening chords. Normally the song was played on an electric guitar, or rather, several guitars with the opening notes being played on base, but Phantom only had an acoustic. 

The chords rang out over the rooftop, and Phantom missed his cue. She shot him a glare and repeated the chord. 

And instead of gearing up for a fight, Phantom opened his mouth and started singing. “Tommy used to work on the docks…” Ember bit back a scoff into just a huff as he strained his voice to hit notes way outside his vocal range instead of keeping it where it was natural. He didn’t notice at all, not over the guitar and his own caterwauling. “Unions been on strike. He’s down on his luck, it’s tough…” Phantom tried to add vibrato to his voice, not quite hitting it right. “So tough…” 

Ember rolled her neck and looked up at Phantom, catching sight of his eyes. He was watching Ember’s hand as her fingers danced along the guitar’s neck, focused on wherever the music was taking him, not on her in front of him. That gave Ember some time to actually look at Phantom for a change. He continued singing, “Gina works the dinner all day, working for her man, she brings home her pay for love… For love…”  

Ember smirked at him, which made him jump, as he remembered that she was the person in front of him. Before he could react beyond that, she took over. “We’ve got to hold on, to what we’ve got.” 

Immediately Phantom joined in with her. “It doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not. We’ve got each other, and that’s a lot for love. We’ll give it a shot.”

The acoustic version wasn’t the high-energy version that Phantom had been trying to play earlier, but he still belted it out like he was the lead singer on stage. He stood up, and threw his head back. “Whoa, we’re half way there!” 

Ember was not one to be outdone and joined him. “Whoa, livin’ on a prayer!”

He looked back at her, with a million-watt smile and held out his hand. “Take my hand, and we’ll make it I swear!”

“Whoa,” Ember answered, even as she bumped him with her hip. She couldn’t take his hand right now, her hands were occupied. “Livin’ on a prayer!”

Ember played a bridge and Phantom settled down slightly. She looked up at him as he rubbed at some stubble around his chin. The action reminded her that he had seemed to age rapidly over the past few months. It had brought up some questions from Johnny and Kitty. Had he learned to shapeshift his age? Or did he finally hit that growth spurt growing into his dad’s genes? 

“Tommy got his six-string in hock,” Ember continued as she observed him. A silvery line under his chin caught her eye, a scar she knew she had left on him. It was from years ago, from her. She remembered it clearly, ‘cause it was this memory that she wanted to forget. It reminded her that he was human, not dead like her. 

“Now he’s holding in what he used to make it talk.” The next words from him snapped her out of her thoughts and brought her back to the moment. She looked into Phantom’s eyes, seeing him staring at her. She slowly lowered herself to actually stand on the ground, which only reminded her of another thing. He’d gotten taller.

“Gina dreams of running away,” Phantom started, a few measures early. “When she cries in the night, Tommy whispers,” Ember braced herself for him to belt out the next line, but instead, she had to strain to hear it, “baby it’s okay.” 

The words had barely fumbled out of his mouth, weight down with a thousand little things that gave all music weight. The energy he had seemed to bleed out of him. He started slapping one hand against his leg, and the other against his arm, adding percussion to Ember’s guitar. 

“We’ve got to hold on, to what we’ve got,” the two of them sang together again, Ember’s hair fluttering as the music reverberated through her. “It doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not. We’ve got each other, and that’s a lot for love.”  Phantom’s eyes widened and he ducked his head, looking away from Ember. Blushing as apparently he realized now that he was singing a duet with Ember.

Ember rolled her eyes and bumped him with her hip again. “We’ll give it a shot.” She took a deep breath, which made Phantom jump before she threw her head back and belted out, “Whoa! We’re halfway there!” Phantom’s eyes twinkled with a smile as she put the same energy he had into the song.

It clashed horribly with the way she was playing, but it was fun. “Whoa, livin’ on a prayer!” She continued, glancing over at Phantom and trying to give him the same kind of blindingly bright smile he gave her earlier. 

It must have worked because a matching smile spread out across his face. “Take my hand, we’ll make it I swear!”

“Whoa, livin’ on a prayer!”

Ember flew up in front of him and continued playing. “Oh, we’ve got to hold on, ready or not!” Phantom continued the percussion for her. “You live for the fight when it’s all that you’ve got!” 

“Whoa!” The two of them sang out at the top of their lungs, “we’re halfway there!” 

“Whoa!” Ember couldn’t help but smirk as Phantom definitely woke up some people, “Livin’ on a prayer!”

Not to be outdone, Ember followed suit. “Take my hand, we’ll make it I swear!”

“Whoa-” Phantom tried to match her, but then wound up hacking up a lung. 

Ember couldn’t help it, she wanted to keep playing but instead, she broke out in a cackle. “Oh my GOD, dipstick, you ruined it! We had SUCH a good thing going here!” 

Phantom rubbed the back of his head. “Sorry, sorry!”

Ember sighed dramatically and leaned back in the air, fainting like she was in a regency romance novel. “It’s for the best, I’m sorry Baby Pop, but you are a terrible singer.”

Phantom folded his arms and raised an eyebrow at her, though the smile betrayed any idea he was actually upset. “Well, excuse me princess, but it didn’t seem to bother you any, rockstar.” 

Ember chuckled and brushed her hair behind her ear. “You know… no it didn’t.” 

[savagesbonergarage]

A quickie with Maul WITHOUT PLOT

Hmmm....

Wise of you to add that on the end there.... But is it gonna be effective? We'll see.

I'm gonna make this 100% just self-indulgent porn since that's really all it needs to be right

I'm malfunctioning how did they get there what's the occasion and the timeline and the state of the relationship and the galaxy and ahhhhhhhh okay I need to get it together

UPDATE: LMAO IT’S SO LONG AND THERE’S KIND OF SOME PLOT, I FAILED SO EXPONENTIALLY HARD. 🤡

(A/N - General ns/fw, definitely more explicit than not, but overall still not super hard stuff?, quickie, bj, power kink I guess?, hidden feelings, I think that’s about it honestly, if I’m missing something let me know)

Throne sex? Throne sex.

Maul

"... And Prime Minister Almec's influence has recruited warriors from among the civilians who would join our cause," you reported.

You stood alone before Lord Maul, who sat in his signature pose with his mechanical leg propped up atop the throne of Mandalore, resting his head on his hand as he gazed out the large transparisteel pane with a look of complete boredom and disinterest. He didn't even bother to look your way as he responded drily. "Fascinating."

You were tempted to raise your eyebrow sightly, but even though he wasn't looking at you, the fear of confrontation kept you from doing so.

"Will there be anything else, My Lord?"

The zabrak finally managed to direct some of his attention to you, his menacing eyes looking you up and down as his countenance changed with an ominous smirk. "Yes. How long before my blissful solitude is once again interrupted?"

You immediately checked the chrono on your datapad, afraid that you may have caught your new leader in an agitated state. The last thing you wanted was to be a recipient of his anger if you displeased him somehow, so you opted to simply be efficient in the tasks you were given. "You have a meeting in about eight minutes, My Lord."

"I see..."

Something about the way he was intently gazing at you made you uneasy, as though you weren't quite finished here and were expected to know why. You straightened your posture and put your datapad away before you geared up to leave. "Do you require anything else of me, Lord Maul?"

There was a new look in his eyes, something you hadn't ever seen until now, and the sudden change in contrast from before of his full and immediate attention on you sent a strange, yet not unwelcome shiver coursing through your body. Somehow you felt the previous uneasiness slip away and in its place was...dare you acknowledge it...want? Whether it was involuntary or not, the powerful man before you had you wishing there really was more you could do for him.

His gaze was nearly leaving burning holes everywhere his golden eyes tracked on you, each place they lingered a pathway into some rather inappropriate thoughts as it was fairly obvious exactly which parts he was shamelessly staring at. What's more, you didn't mind it in the slightest. You felt a little exposed, but in such a delicious way. Could you truly be tempting him, or was he simply teasing you in some show of authority over you - or was he really just that bored?

Suddenly, your train of thought ended when Maul planted his leg back onto the ground and unflinchingly brought his gloved hands down to work at the sealing strip of his pants. You barely registered what was happening before an impressive phallic appendage was gloriously revealed, held between two of his fingers at the base as an offering. Despite being synthetic, it twitched and leaked just like-

"Well?" he implored nonchalantly with his non-existent brow raised in a curious manner.

It was too late to conceal the slack of your jaw and flush of your face, your heart pounding as you finally processed the reality in front of you. Reflexively, you swallowed and looked over your shoulder and then back to find that this wasn't some kind of joke or game, but a genuine request. It was a miracle you managed to speak coherently at all.

"Erm, right now, My Lord...? In eight minutes-"

"Seven, now," he interjected, adjusting himself to present his lap as a rather inviting seat, "but surely your schedule permits?"

He did have a point - and who were you to deny the needs of your handsome new ruler? You did make an obligation to yourself to do your tasks efficiently, and it wasn’t as though you were hesitant about the prospect of it, either. No, with an opportunity having presented itself like this, it would be suboptimal not to show your enthusiasm, wouldn’t it? Not to mention time was of the essence now, unless you were fine with a group of officials walking in on you fornicating with the dangerous zabrak...which, as you pondered the possibility, it only served to send that pluming heat within you to entirely new heights. He certainly wouldn’t stop if that were to be the case, and a hidden part of you hoped that it would indeed work out that way, if only so you could feel more like Maul’s favored slut.

You wondered if this was solely due to the influence of the beckoning sith atop his throne, or if you had secretly always been such a promiscuous person - in any case, it hardly mattered. The priority of the moment was in being a good little subject and serving your master, and perhaps if you did a suitable job, you’d be given the privilege of doing it again. In a bout of courage that faintly surprised you, you found yourself at the foot of his throne standing mere centimeters from his legs, careful not to touch him unless instructed to as you ardently asked the most important question of the evening.

“How would you like it, My Lord...?” You didn't bother to hide the sultriness in your voice, which seemed to please him immensely as the corner of his lip curled into a scheming smile, his hands quickly moving to your waist to pull you in closer as he answered.

"I trust in your discretion to satisfy me. I believe you already know what I want, and it seems that you're certainly eager to give it."

His hand slid over your thigh and to the source of your radiating heat, burrowing his digits between the crevice that the fabric of your pants was unfortunately shielding from the supple flesh there, yet that didn't prevent his touch from being any less euphoric. It might have embarrassed you somewhat at just how apparent your eagerness was, however it was clear that the man working at your own sealing strip was enjoying the spoils of your arousal already. His words still rang throughout your mind, making you relish in the freedom and permission that was implied there - he was asking you to be as slutty as you wanted, knowing full well that you were ready to be his whore the moment you first laid eyes on him.

He wasn't wrong.

With his affirmation to take charge and the ever-present knowledge that you were pressed for time at the forefront of your mind, you relaxed your inhibitions and got to work. After a few more ruts against his hand, his grip followed yours to your waistband and aided in tugging the annoying material to the floor, returning one to it's former place on your slick flesh as you stepped out of your pants and boots. It was impossible to suppress the moan that escaped your lips, however, you were aware that this wasn't solely for your pleasure.

Six minutes left.

You quickly got down on your knees and carefully handled his cock, licking your lips before you kissed the tip of the wet slit and wrapped your hot mouth around the circumference of the ridge, swiftly lapping your tongue around the head before you started sucking. His groan of approval fueled your movements as you gradually unhinged your jaw and began going deeper, bobbing your head with every stroke and eventually taking him as far as you possibly could. You gagged a little, but it didn't deter you in the slightest as every time you choked on him, a moan was drawn from his lips.

Not only could he feel everything despite not having an organic organ, your ministrations were proving to be more than what he was anticipating as he groaned and moved to grab a fistful of your hair to still your actions. Your hungry eyes meet his as you drew your head back and released his cock with a loud, echoing, wet pop and licked away the string of saliva that connected it with your bottom lip.

"Is everything all right, My Lord?" you inquired with a perverse lowness in your voice, already drunk on lust as he held you in place for a moment before slapping your waist in a gesture to rise through his uneven breaths.

"Up."

You complied with his order, lifting yourself back onto your feet as Maul practically pulled you into his lap by your thighs in a hasty move that nearly had you falling against his chest, but you were able to brace yourself against his arms. His dick rested against your abdomen, still warm and wet from your tongue as his fingers found their way back to your entrance to prep you for his cock. The way he tilted you upwards to lightly jerk himself with your own slick as he lined up with you was so tantalizingly good that you nearly forgot about the time constraint you faced.

Four minutes.

Your canines pierced your bottom lip as he entered you, the galvanizing pressure against your walls as you adjusted to him being so invigoratingly good that your hands gripped his shoulders without warning as you moved to sink down completely, ripping a gasp from the both of you in unison. You knew that you’d need an entire minute just to get used to the feeling of being so full, although sadly you couldn’t afford that kind of time in the present moment. 

Maul, on the other hand, didn’t seem to be too preoccupied with that particular technicality and held you firmly by your hips to keep you from shifting, and in an unanticipated move he rested his forehead along the curve of your neck. The heat of his skin and breath tingled across your own flesh, the sensation strangely more intimate than the actual joining of your bodies - rather, it felt like a different kind of intimacy entirely. It wasn’t merely in the way his grip on you remained solid or the new titillation of his lips against your skin; it was in the stillness of it all, how instead of insisting you ride him immediately, he preferred to simply feel you for an evanescent occasion, no matter how brief. 

You momentarily forgot the apprehension you had when the compulsion to kiss him infiltrated your mind - not the sort of lustful kiss that would be more appropriate for the situation, but a tender, more profound one. Would he mind such a gesture, you wondered, or would he even be able to discern the difference? One of his hands had moved from your waist up to the nape of your neck as you thought this, eliciting a soft moan from your mouth as he lured you in closer to him until you were chest-to-chest, the indication of the motion prompting you to wrap your arms around his neck so that you were symmetrical to one another.

Two minutes. Only two minutes until...

There simply wasn’t time for this kind of lenient indulgence or immersion, nor did the circumstances permit for the kind of casual affection you wanted to deliver. There was also the fear of him retaliating against a more tender action if he caught one to consider, so with a whisper of a sigh, you started rocking and bucking your hips against him.

Maul had been uncharacteristically quiet up until this point, an audible “oh!” escaping him as you continued your movements and utilized your nether muscles to grip his shaft with an ample amount of tightness. You fully planted your knees on either side of him and adjusted yourself so you could ride him properly - and in this case, that meant clutching onto his dick for dear life while you jerked up and down along his entire length like a jackhammer. 

His head rolled back and his eyes became half-lidded, the rapid rising and falling of his chest indicating his closeness as he kept one of his palms on your leg to grip the meat of your thigh for support. For the first time in minutes, he finally spoke again through a strangled groan.

“That’s it, stars it’s so...”

His train of thought seemed to leave him as you worked him even harder, somehow taking him even deeper when you kegeled with the entirety of his cock inside. A twinge of pain indicated that his cockhead was nearly breaching your cervix, a fact that might have concerned you if there was any reason to believe you could get pregnant - and even if there was...you weren’t so sure you would care. 

Less than a minute-

Luckily, it wasn’t long before you felt the crimson zabrak tense up beneath you and hold your hips tightly against him once more as he came, the spasming of his cock followed by the release of heat that filled your insides as he stilled and...

...and kissed you.

He had grabbed the nape of your neck again and brought your mouth to his all in one swift movement, capturing your lips with his own in a surprisingly graceful manner. It wasn’t chaste, his tongue immediately finding yours and warring with it as the dual beating in his chest matched the continuous pulsing of his gradually softening dick, but the action still caught you off-guard nonetheless. It certainly wasn’t unwelcome, and you found yourself matching his pace until he eventually relaxed, breathlessly parting from your lips and leaning back into his seat. 

There wasn’t much time to even think, as over the sound of your breaths you could hear the faint echo of footsteps down the hall fast-approaching. You quickly pushed yourself off of Maul’s lap and frantically gathered your pants, managing to hastily get each of your legs through the proper channels and hoist the waistband over your hips, still fumbling with the sealing strip while you faced your master as a barrage of stomping boots was perceived behind you. You ruler had managed to tuck himself back into his own trousers in time, a sly smirk hidden beneath his otherwise fierce countenance as he addressed you.

“We’ll continue this conversation where we left off later tonight.”

Your heart couldn’t help but skip a beat. He was wanting to see you again, to have you service him again after this agreeably satisfying evening. You nodded, a faint smile gracing your features as you bowed and turned to leave, brushing past the officials entering the throne room who were none the wiser about the sinful conduct you’d engaged in with Lord Maul of Mandalore.

You still secretly wished the session would have continued longer than it had despite the newfound company.

And you certainly hoped to continue meeting and surpassing Maul’s expectations in the bedroom - or wherever he saw fit - for a long while to come.

[patchies]

Shadows

Pairing: Dream x Reader x ???

Summary: An apocalyptic world where creatures of the night roam all around it. Searching for living beings to satisfy their hunger. Vicious creatures they are. It’s said that one person called upon their wrath in revenge. You awake in this place with another human being at your side. No memories whatsoever of the life you’ve had prior to coming here. In search of a way out, and your memories, you stumble upon multiple people with many personalities. Some can’t wait to meet you. If you take it the friendly or hostile way is up to you, but worry not… Nothing can hurt you. Or can it, now?

Warnings: nothing too serious

Word Count: 2.9+k

Author's Note: Another chapter, yay! Hope you enjoy, guys! I'm sending you all love. Each and every one of you matters!

Wattpad link: here

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Chapter 5: Uneasiness

As it turned out, you bumped into Nick as you were heading back towards your home. He was quick to pull out his weapon, but you recognised him immediately and called at him. You saw him look at his main hand that was holding the hatchet and upon following his sight, you rapidly retracted your hand from his and looked away. In awkwardness, you missed the confusion etched on his face.

You both apologised instantly, both in different reasons, and he stashed the armament back into its strap and ruffled your hair. Something you had done to Tubbo not so long ago, but you suppose you deserved it.

On your way home, you had talked about your ventures. Nick gloating about his glory and how he's been more productive than you were, claiming how getting a friend instead of proper gear is lame. You knew he was teasing you, but you caught a slight bit of hesitation and envy shine through. Though, you shrugged it off for the time being.

Nick gifted you a bayonet with a white string tied around the handle and a bandana of your favourite colour as you were standing before your home. You gave him a quick hug before putting the knife into your bag and tying the cloth article around your head. He whistled as you now wore one, too.

For the rest of the day, you stored away your findings with tales of your journeys. Mostly Nick's, since you had to be honest and say he did a great job at scouting the east side of the town. Though, you told him some details about Tubbo and your time with the boy, dodging certain parts as you felt it wasn't your thing to reveal to him.

You were a little scared to tell him about their settlement the bee boy mentioned to you, but Nick seemed to know exactly what you were talking about. He had seen it from one of the taller apartments and showed you an impromptu map that he drew quickly.

To your surprise, the portrayal was decently drawn and his handwriting was legible, though he still suggested he's willing to show you the place. What didn't miss him was the chance to announce how he'll turn it into a date where you'll lie under the stars with a wink to add to the spice.

You punched his arm while he laughed it off, slouching his hit arm across your shoulder and pulling you close. This time, you jab at his ribs and he lets you go voluntarily, still laughing. It didn't even seem like you had done something to him, so you stuck your tongue at him and rushed up the stairs to sort out your own things.

A feeling like something is going to go terrible wrong sits in the pit of your stomach as you rummage through the chest.

• • •

The night comes quicker than you expect, and a not-so-stray feeling of anxiety begins to flow through your veins accompanied by your pacing as the sun slowly falls beyond your view.

The first two knocks executed on the door go unnoticed by you. It's the third one that stops you in your tracks and you go open the door for Nick, resuming your pacing once he's inside. He notices your jittery movement straight away and quirks an eyebrow at you, “You okay there?”

“Do I look like I'm okay?” You mutter to yourself, but he hears it nonetheless, “Who would be at the thought of some dangerous creatures lurking in the town at night?”

Nick sighs and slowly saunters to your side, gently resting his hands on your upper arms and makes you face him, “You weren't scared yesterday, what has changed?”

“I don't know,” you shrug, “maybe the bad feeling in my stomach that has persevered since we came home?”

“Okay, okay, smartass,” Nick's retort is light-hearted, only meant to get a smile out of you, “We are both spooked, but c'mon… What's this scowl doing on your face, pretty?”

Before you can react quickly, or protest, he flicks the skin in-between your eyebrows and tugs your lips into a smile. You grasp his wrists with your hands to lower his down and a small smile does make its way onto your face. There's no denying that he makes this hell of a place better, but there's a tight feeling in your chest at the thought of what lies in this world. You don't know if you'll ever get used to this and you seriously hope you don't even need to do that. This is a nightmare come true on its own, why would anyone want this to be real?

Your eyes shift around the room and you step away from Sap, letting his wrists fall free in the process. The lights are turned off in case there really is someone else and they might notice the lit-up house from afar. You aren't going to give people the chance of figuring out where your base is, if there are more groups alive than you realize. Even if it's people similar to Tubbo. There might be some help to find in his group, but you aren't willing to familiarise with them. Nick is the only person that you truly trust as of right now and you believe that it could be okay like this for the time being. You'll survive this. Through thick and thin, hopefully.

“We'll get through this,” he raises three of his fingers while holding his pinkie with his thumb, straightening his back. His face changes to a stern look, but silliness dances in his brown orbs, “Scout's honour.”

He expects the roll of your eyes, but the small laugh that escapes you makes his heart swell with an unknown feeling. He doesn't pay it much attention, just silently watches as you sit down on the bed against the headboard. Nick joins you in a while and gazes at you as you rest your head on his shoulder, “I honestly don't know what to expect at all and I'm worried, Sap. It's so hard to rest when my stomach is churning like I'm going to vomit.”

You feel his arm snake behind your neck and his nimble fingers soon start working their magic on your scalp, “We'll be fine, okay? There's nothing that would separate you and me. I won't leave you.”

Just then, a whistling noise echoes throughout the neighbourhood. An eerie melody that travels across the quiet street. Visible confusion is etched onto your face as you exchange looks with Nick.

The tune starts to raise its volume and it puts you, along with your companion, on guard. You wonder who is out there and what they're trying to achieve. You aren't one to test your luck, so despite your heart telling you to check the situation, you stay rooted to your spot. You were hoping the feeling wasn't going to be true, but here you are; hearing the whistles of someone unknown.

“Hey, hey,” Sap takes your hand in his, rubbing the back of it with his thumb. He leans into your view, trying to hypnotise your eyes to look into his. When he doesn't succeed, he shuffles in front of you and waits until your focus is solely on him. He gives you a soft smile, “I'm here with you. Nothing is going happen to us, I promise, and knowing you, you'd sass your way out of the situation.”

“Nick,” you start, “We've known each other for hardly three days.”

“So, what? It might be true, but your sass is immeasurable at times and you've hit me so much I lost count a long time ago,” he laughs quietly, then his laugh slowly transforms into a smirk. A teasing realisation present on his face, “You're literally hitting on me, baby.”

You groan, “I pity the person who will be with you, seriously, and don't you dare call me baby again.”

“You're with me,” he wiggles his eyebrows at you, squeezing your hand playfully, “and about the 'baby' part… By seeing your reaction, I'd say I'm going to use it more often.”

Nick isn't ready for the switch of your personality as you decide to smile at him sweetly, lifting one of his hands close to your face, watching him intently. He visibly gulps and you have to push back a laugh to maintain your innocent façade. You put his hand on your cheek and lean into his palm. You stay in that position for a few seconds before rapidly moving your head and attempting to bite his finger. Your attempt is unsuccessful as he quickly retracts his hand and clutches it to his chest protectively, giving you a shocked look.

“Did I render you speechless, baby?”

The pet-name rolls of your tongue with ease. It seems so natural coming from you and his heart clearly betrays him when he feels its pace quicken. He quickly recovers, though, acting like what's just happened actually didn't, “I mean, my tactic at distracting you worked, so who's the winner here?”

“Certainly not you.”

The mood drops when you finally register the quietness, looking around you for any signs that could tell you what's happening. No whistling is heard, and you contemplate checking the windows to gather some sort of information regarding the stillness on the street. Nick gives an affirmative nod towards the boarded-up windows and gets off the bed with you. He follows your footsteps in silence, hovering over your shoulder as you get nearer.

A bolt whizzes through the air and before you can say anything, it strikes one of the planks in front of you. You flinch back into Sap's chest, guard rising, “Go take something so you could defend yourself, too, please.”

He gives you a side glance, inspecting your features, but you've put on a neutral blockage, “Will you be fine?”

The shrug you give him doesn't lower his worry and he analyses you one more time. He walks off in search of anything sharp and usable after you signal your certainty. As he leaves, you eye the bayonet strapped to your thigh. The metal weapon giving you at least some sort of reassurance.

Pure silence follows and you hold your breath in as you glance through the gaps in the barricade. Someone is definitely too close to your preference, yet you can't see anyone outside. They're hostile, that's without doubt. The bolt that clearly sticks out of the wood is an obvious proof of the hostility.

The moon's glow then reveals a person standing in its light, illuminating their figure.

They have a pig mask on with small tusks protruding from the side and a hood over their head with thick white fur adorning the sides of it. Raspberry pink, clearly chopped, shoulder-length hair visibly poking out and the wind ruffling it a bit. A shiny golden crown, which adorns gems of multiple colours, rests atop. You can't phantom how it's holding on the hood. Their crimson red cape with golden clasps and rubies attached to it flows in the wind and the crossbow's metal parts are shining. There's a satchel of bolts attached to the side of their thigh as they balance on the roof across from you.

“Who are you ogling at?”

The whisper against your ear makes you swat at his chest, shushing him immediately. He feigns being hurt, but raises his arms to swat at you back. It's when the figure proceeds to speak do you stop and a realisation comes to you that it is in fact a male, “Dream, I warned you to not come here. Ever. Wasn't the last time enough for you?”

Your interest peaks at the mention of a past encounter the supposedly two people had, wondering how that one had gone. From his words, it doesn't sound like it went very greatly and completely not in favour of Dream's side. What moved him into trying to take over the land again if he knew he had lost the last fight?

Nick watches your investment in the conversation rise, so he just crosses his arms. The hatchet at his hip ready to be taken out in case something was to happen. Though, he settles for watching you for now.

“I don't care, Techno. I own these lands. It's only fair that you will surrender and hand it over.”

“Don't make us fight you, pig.”

Another voice; another male one. This time it's slightly higher pitched than the other two, an obvious British accent to its overall sound.

Just from a few spoken sentences, you can tell both sides are ready to fight. What you aren't sure of, is if they'll really start fighting here or leave to sort it out elsewhere. You're praying it's the latter. Although your hopes aren't high when you continue listening in on their conversation.

“And I don't care, because you're stepping foot into my territory,” Techno, or whatever they called him, continues, “I shot a warning shot to gain your attention, but I will make sure to be precise this time and aim for your vulnerable body parts. Especially you and not a wooden plank. You damn well know I hold poison bolts and the two of you surely recognise my capabilities with a crossbow. You get struck with one, just one, poison arrow and you can go back to your village to get it taken care of.”

Territory? What's he talking about– wait… Don't tell me he's protecting us…?

You can't see the others, but you get a feeling Techno is more important than them. For whatever reason that is, you aren't able to steer your eyes away from his figure. A sense of déjà vu flowing through your body as you marvel at the man. You believe you've seen this man before. Even if once in your life, but your foggy memory blocks any of this information from you.

Unexpectedly he turns his head towards the window you're looking out of and locks eyes with you. Maroon eyes that sparkle with mischief meeting yours. He cocks an eyebrow at you, as if challenging you. Unable to see it, nor perceive it as a challenge, you deliver no reply. You're more than curious by the exchange, but it doesn't seem to faze him in the slightest. Even though he noticed you, he doesn't do anything about you. Merely directs his gaze back to the people below him. Which strikes you as weird since you were guessing he'd do something. Literally anything. Yet, you're glad for his act of kindness. If it can be interpreted as such.

You completely miss the way Nick looks at you. The gears in his head turning at the strange stare off you two had. Do they know the guy? He doesn't like the look of the Techno guy at all and the ping of jealousy seems to agree with him as well. He knows it well, yet he just rests his hand on your shoulder.

“We have armour and there's two of us. You can't fight us both and win.”

“I wouldn't be so sure of your words,” the reply is overly confident, “I've fought many and still came out with no scratches. You're belittling my knowledge of fighting and tactical thinking.”

After Techno finishes his sentence, arrows and bolts go flying through the air.

The very first one coming from him as another warning shot. This time not aimed at your house, but at the ground. Another two come from the ground level but miss him by a few feet. Terribly aimed shots, if you have to say (not like you could do better, but you're just a spectator in this situation). They don't seem to be that good at aiming at the pink-haired man, rather missing him. To your bewilderment, he never flinches or tries to dodge. Basically, a still target for both of the shooters.

Not that his aim is any better, but you hear one of the guys wince multiple times as if the bolt scraped him. The distance is also something to take into consideration.

The final shot before the shooting halts is taken by Techno, who decides to truly aim at one of them and you can hear a high-pitched scream echo throughout the whole street.

This can't be good.

You start hearing the inhuman screeches from everywhere and Shadows start flying from the end of the street. You gasp in horror because this isn't what you were expecting. You didn't expect them to attract a whole bunch of the creatures and possibly doom you all.

“George! You idiot! You were supposed to dodge, not walk straight into his range!” Dream yells at the whining guy, “You've attracted Shadows now. Good job.”

“Look what you've–”

The rest of the words are tuned out by the screeches of the monsters. Nick squats down to the floor, tugging you along with him. He doesn't let you say a word as you sit next to each other, holding a finger to his mouth when he sees you ready to tell him something.

While you rest your heads against one another, both of you come to terms that sound attracts them very easily as you hear them bang against trash cans and dumpsters, chasing their intruders. You wait until you hear no more screeching, slowly rising to your feet and looking through the gaps once more to check for any signs of the creatures.

When you find none, you send Nick to his own bedroom, insisting you'll be fine. He gives you three chances to back down from your statement, but you persist through. As he has no reason not to trust you, he slowly retreats to his room with a promise that if you need anything, just to wake him up.

[alpineramble]

Annapurna circuit trek - everything you need to know

The Annapurna Circuit Trek is one of Nepal’s most admiring classic treks. It traverses magnificently varied landscapes, farmlands, from lush lowlands forests to the high-altitude Thorong Pass, the highest point of the trek as it stands at an elevation of 5416 meters above sea level. Throng- La is said to be the highest trekking pass in the world with the imposing Annapurna Massif a near invariable companion. In recent years, this trekking has become one of the most popular and crowded trekking trails in the Nepal Himalayas. Every year, thousands of travelers traverse enthralls on the beauty of this place while trekking from all around the world. The Annapurna Circuit route was a string of trekking tea houses and clearly marked trails make this an easily accessible, a normal trek that anyone of us can be part of this fascinating journey with reasonable fitness level where we do not need to climb any technical mountains to cross the whole journey.

Annapurna circuit trek is said to be more than just a trek for many reasons, one can experience the beautify culture and nature from the starting phase of the journey to end, it is a complete journey in the Himalayas where you will not only explore the majestic some of the world’s highest mountains but you will also get an opportunity and appreciate with fascinating culture of the peoples in the mountains as well as their unique lifestyle.

Tranquil Annapurna trek (ACT) will take you through a variety of different landscapes, lush terraces, to the forests, and then into those beautiful high-altitude views of the magnificent mountains therefore this trek is more than just a trek with a complete package.  As we hike constantly day by day, we’ll get exposed to the daily life of the native mountain’s Nepalese people who live in the remotest part of Nepal for a long century.

Embark on this journey to immerse yourself in the beauty of majestic Himalayas and also be engrossed in the small traditional villages’ culture and agriculture.

If you are one of the adventure enthusiasts and want to experience a little bit of everything about Nepal that it has to offer, this is the piece of cake for you to set off on, but bear in mind this trek is certainly no easy feat like Annapurna Base Camp Trek or Langtang Valley Trek. However, in this article, here are the things you should really know in order to complete the amazing Annapurna Circuit safely and with a smile on your face.

Best Time to go on Annapurna Circuit Trek

Like with many of the treks in the Himalayas in Nepal, there are certain times of the year when the weather conditions are ideal for trekking and mountaineering activities. In fact, the months of September, October, and November or March, April, and May are widely considered to be the best and favorable months or times of the year from the Annapurna Circuit Trekking in Nepal. The weather and temperatures during these two (autumn and spring) seasons are generally clear and dry where views are always nice with clean blue sky, and the weather is stable However it’s not too cold when heading into altitudes and not too hot in the lower areas of the trek. These two seasons are the peak and also crowded season’s times to be on the trail including Annapurna, and Everest region of Nepal where the trails and tea houses on the routes are generally covered by full of travelers, trekking into the Annapurna circuit in this time of the year with many other trekkers from across the world heading into the same destination with the same goal and determinations makes your journey more fun and enjoyable.

If you are looking for the Annapurna circuit trek at different times of the year, you can also do a trek at other times, but be prepared with certain weather conditions. The winter season involves the months of December, January, and February, trekking in the Annapurna circuit is not an impossible way to complete, it is still good to enjoy, which offers clear skies and spectacular views. But it can be incredibly cold at higher altitudes, with the possibility of the thick snow on the ground that can often cause the Thorong La Pass to close at short notice or even hard to cross the pass by solely. If you are still happy to take a challenge on this trek in the winter season then make sure to have enough nice clothing gears for trekking with the extra layers, a thick down jacket, warms socks, sleeping bag suited to temperatures of at least -25°C and crampons, which can be bought in Kathmandu at any local trekking stores with the variety of options in terms of the quality.

Trekking Equipment for the Annapurna Circuit trek

Equipment is one of the important factors in order to complete the journey. Having the right equipment is extremely important for trekking to the Himalayas; For the Annapurna circuit trek, make sure to carry a proper pair of hiking boots that are comfortable and worn-in is a good place to start! Because of the variable temperatures – from night today and as you gain altitude – layering is very helpful and adds extra warmth, we would recommend purchasing some good layers made out of breathable fibers, some spare hiking t-shirts with quick-dry access. Bringing some windbreaker or fleece as a mid-weight layer is a good idea and then a warm thicker down jacket is the best option for a top layer. Umbrella is not recommended to rain at altitude but carries a good rain jacket or poncho which can be brought along the way for the temporary, this is essential, take a comfortable day backpack, normally 40l or above. Make sure to bring your own first aid box with Diamox, a medication for high altitude sickness as well as toiletries. For more about essential gears please click HERE.

Pick the Right Everest Base Camp Itinerary

Most importantly the first thing that you need to think about is picking the right itinerary; hence, there is no one size fits all. One key factor to consider is that you need to have as much acclimatization possible in the critical points of the trek. Therefore, take a proper trekking itinerary for your next trek to the Annapurna circuit, at least 2 nights acclimatization in Manang village one the way up the trail is recommended. The crucial part of the trek is altitude without having proper acclimatization along the way up may cause your hiking difficulties in the climb. There are some people who do this trek within a week but it is only for those of us who are trained well in the altitude and used to trek a lot before. Having some extra day for the trek is vital to a safe, enjoyable, and successful experience in a low oxygen environment higher up the trail. Make sure to acclimatize well lower down, and then you will run out of the risk of getting altitude sickness higher up. However, the Annapurna circuit trek has various trekking itineraries including a minimum of 8 days to the maximum day's itinerary of 20-day. In order to avoid the high altitude sickness, we would recommend you take a 12- days Annapurna circuit or 16 –Day Annapurna circuit trek, or you may choose for an 18-20 days Annapurna circuit trek if your holiday permits.

Annapurna Circuit Trekking Map

Accommodation while on the Annapurna Circuit trekking:

The Annapurna Circuit trek is one of the well-established trekking routes of Nepal, it's been very well set up with plenty of comfortable lodges, so we do not need to carry the tent to set up our camp to spend a night in the tiny tent. However, the accommodation at the local is simple but convenient where we can spend a night comfortably. The good thing is some of the tea houses have an attached bathroom where you do not need to go outside of the room for the toilet, but in most of the places in this route, the toilet and washing facilities are outside of your room. The room in the tea house is a twin sharing room with twin beds, a mattress, and a pillow where you can share the room with some of the genders or if you are a couple then it is good to fit for you. Bear in mind, during the peak seasons in Spring (March to May) and autumn (September to November) the rooms are usually packed and covered by full of trekkers, in this case, the advance booking through your guide or company will help you to find the room easily since this route has limited tea house in the places. Tea houses provide you with food, hot water for showers, and WiFi at a little extra cost.

Trekking Permits and TIMS car Cost

Travelers are required to register the trekking permit or Annapurna Conservation Area Permit (ACAP) and TIMs (Trekking Information Management System) cards to do this trek in the Annapurna region of Nepal. See the following fees details for the foreigners to buy the permits and TIMS card,

Annapurna Conservation Area Project Try permit fee for tourists: NPR 3000 ($30 approx.)

Annapurna Conservation Area Project entry permit fee for SAARC nationals: NPR 200

Trekkers’ Information Management Systems permit fee: NPR 1000 ($10 approx.) – (TIMS)

Food and Drinking Water On Annapurna Circuit Trek

The foods are available at every tea house as we use during the trek, most of the tea houses in this region offer a wide variety of traditional cuisine of Nepal and western meals on the tea houses Menu including classic Nepali traditional meals Dal Bhat, Momos, and Bread. The western types of meals are found in every single place, the sizes of the foods and taste might not be expected to be the same in the city areas but they are still very convenient, the Pizza, spaghetti, noodles, burger, noodles, stews, are the common meals that this area offers to you. It cost them as little as NPR 500 (approx. $3-5) at the lodges in the lower area but the prices are expected to increase at the higher altitude of the region.

The drinking water is available everywhere in this region, most of the tea house or small coffee shops sell the water at a little cost but as an option, you may carry a proper water bottle filling the water all the time as it drank out, refilling the water from the tap is free of cost but make sure to purify it before drinking. Buying water is the best option because most of us are not used to the water from mountains and it may cause problems so spending a few dollars on good foods and water means we are treating ourselves in a better way, as we all know that we cannot deal with life at any amount of cost. Good food is a good life and healthy life is a happy life. Hope it makes sense to us!

Remember, the water costs 0.5- 2 USD/ bottle of water.

Getting there & away

To trek in the Annapurna Circuit, we have to first drive to Besisher from Kathmandu which is a 6- hour long drive by local bus (we can also take a private jeep as an option- it costs way more than a local bus transfer), and next day again, we take another scenic mountain drive to Chame by a local jeep to start the trek (remember, if we do a trek longer version then we can start to trek from Besisahar but it has to be at least 16-20 days in a row if we start the trek from Besisahar and the most of walk would be in the local jeep road but the view is still spectacular).

Annapurna Circuit Trail Length

The total length covered by the Annapurna Circuit is somewhere between 225- 230 KM/100-145 miles). It depends where we are starting the trek; the length of the Annapurna Circuit will be shorter than this if we transfer to the Chame and start to trek from here, but as mentioned length above is based on the starting point from Besisahar.

Trek with the Expert

Support a company that has invested in the local communities and society in the remotest mountain parts of Nepal. We helped set up the Khading village for the school kids and helpless women in the mountain region of Nepal after the 2015 earthquake and this trek will be led by our decades of professional experienced local guides who have been leading thousands of groups in the Himalayas for over the last 19 years in the field! We believed in the quality services on all our trekking and mountaineering itineraries, we guaranteed that your safety, satisfaction, and happiness throughout the trek with us. CONTACT US for more information and we can explain and help you on your next trip to Nepal.

[kerbaldevteam]

Kerbal Space Program 1.10: “Shared Horizons” is now available!

Hello everyone!

The European Space Agency (ESA) and Kerbal Space Program have come together to bring you brand new content, including the ESA space-suit texture, new parts and variants, and two of their most iconic and groundbreaking missions into the game. Gear up, fuel up and prepare to share horizons with ESA and KSP!

Kerbal Space Program 1.10: Shared Horizons is the game’s latest major update aimed to continue with our efforts to enrich the KSP experience. Build a kerbalized version of the renowned and powerful Ariane 5 heavy launch vehicle, visit comets and push the limits of space exploration with a host of new additions to the game that not only will give you more things to do, but also make the game look and perform better with a bunch of bug fixes and quality of life improvements.

Let’s go through some of the update’s highlights below:

ESA Missions

Thanks to our collaboration with ESA, put yourself to the test and carry out KSP versions of the historic BepiColombo and Rosetta missions! Drop a lander module on the surface of a comet and visit the innermost planet of the solar system to study its magnetosphere and surface characteristics, all in the name of science. Best of all, the Making History and Breaking Ground expansions are not required to play these missions!

Comets

In order to make the Rosetta mission possible, comets now roam the Kerbal Solar System. With beautiful tails and larger dimensions than regular asteroids, comets appear in all game modes and you can take on new career mode contracts to detect and visit them. Be vigilant, because you might even see one that is passing through from interstellar space! 

New Parts and Variants

Kerbal Space Program 1.10: Shared Horizons includes several new parts and variants to match ESA’s style! Decorate your vehicles with a variety of flag parts that can be attached to your liking, take the brand new Magnetometer Boom along with the MTO and MPO to carry out scientific experiments on Moho or beyond, or capture asteroids and comets with the Advanced Grabbing Unit Jr., a smaller and versatile version of the “Klaw”. Additionally, there are also new variants of some tanks, SRBs, the “Poodle” Liquid Fuel Engine, and decouplers; plus, fairings have not only new variants, but some updated functionality as well.

Jool and Laythe Visual Improvements

The legendary green gas giant and it’s innermost satellite have new high-quality texture maps & graphic shaders, and now look sharper and more realistic than ever! Find a nice beach on Laythe and enjoy the view of Jool’s newly animated clouds. Beautiful!

To learn more you can read the full Changelog here:

======================= v1.10===========================

1.10.0 Changelog - BaseGame ONLY (see below for Making History and Breaking Ground changelog)

+++ Improvements

* Added the ability to fine tune fairings or use the existing, snap mode. This behavior reacts to the editor's angle snap. * Added ESA missions tutorial. * Adjusted the Remove Row button in KAL to only delete the row when clicking on the red cross, not the whole segment. * Fuel cells can be set started in the VAB or SPH for launch. * Drag cube debug information now available in VAB/SPH when show aero data in PAW debug option is on. * Improve drag cube system to handle Part Variants and Shrouds on the same part. * Add additional drag cube information to Debug Aero info in PAWs. * Persist Aero GUI UI debug window setting and Debug Aero info in PAWs setting between game sessions. * Performance improvements for engine module. * Performance and memory improvements for launching a vessel from the space centre. * Performance and memory improvements for part action windows by caching them. * Performance and memory improvements for reading and writing config nodes, so better performance for loading and saving. * Performance and memory improvements for undo and redo in VAB/SPH by caching stage manager icons. * Intended duplicated group-actions have a marker to distinguish the part side. * Converter actions now indicate resource type to differentiate them. * Performance and memory improvements for loading vessels. * Preview and select suits for Kerbals via the suit selector icon (coat hanger). * Performance and Memory improvements for game, craft and mission load dialogues. * Performance and Memory improvements for vessel loading. * Performance and Memory improvements for ModuleJettison in VAB/SPH. * The KSC's grass now changes according to the currently set terrain shader quality. * Revamped Jool, giving it a new animated shader and high resolution textures. * Laythe planet textures revamp. Low, medium and high quality terrain shaders. * ESA Collaboration missions implemented for base game. * Added EVA button to the crew transfer dialog. Functions the same as the crew hatch dialog EVA button. * Added the ability to have open-ended/uncapped fairings. * Sliders now display units in the Part Action Window where appropriate. * Optimized fairing mesh construction and exploded view heuristic by caching mouse position. * Reduced GC and unnecessary calculations performed for variants on fairings. * Reduced number of meshes and colliders for fairings to improve draw calls and standarize at 24-32 sides. * Added Marquee scrolling to a few PAW items for when the text is super long. Text is ellipsis in this case and on mouse over will move left then right. * Performance improvements in flight mode by caching variables in ThermalIntegrationPass and PartBuoyancy. * Hide UI elements that aren't being used and avoid unnecessary updates in flight mode. * Performance and memory improvements for DeltaV simulations. * Speed up craft loading and use less memory in VAB/SPH. * The PAW starts towards the outside of the screen instead of over the center of the rocket/screen. * The camera will not position itself at an appropriate distance when switching vessels to prevent the camera starting inside vessels. * KSP now has Comets! * Added two new contracts for comets. * Added surface sample science experiment for comets. * Comets can explode into smaller fragments while entering a CB's atmosphere. * Fairings can now be set to not auto-expand in SPH/VAB via a new PAW option. * Improve performance of splash FX in water by using combination aof close splashes and limiting how many occur in close proximity * Adjusted the "dark" them color to be more visible in the variant selector.

+++ Localization

* Changed Japanese translation of "Polar Crater" based on community feedback. * Stock vessel name and description translations. * Fix science done at Dessert not showing localized name. * Fix Service Module parts displaying unlocalized text for Shroud. * Fix Command parts displaying unlocalized text for Cutaway. * Fixed a localization issue on the Strategies occurring on FR, IT and PT * Fix unlocalized label for facility level during missions. * Fix grammar issue in From the Moon tutorial. * Updated SC-9001 Science Jr. perform science button so it now matches the new part name. * Fixes translation error in FTE-1 part in Japanese. * Fix missing character in KSP Merchandise link in main menu in simplified Chinese. * Improved phrasing for landing label in Russian. * Fix localized string when debugging aero details. * Fix localization issues with tab headings in Tracking Station. * Fix KSPedia - Numbers on Resources/Conversion Management page alignment in Russian and Chinese. * Fix KSPedia 'app launcher' text box on the Manual/Flight Interface page alignment in Portuguese. * Fix KSPedia text on Rocketry/Basics/Centered page spacing in Japanese. * Fix KSPedia text on Manual/Management page spacing in Portuguese. * Fix KSPedia unlocalized text for measurements is displayed in the 'Effective Range Table'. * Fix KSPedia Japanese Incorrect break line in Control. * Fix numerous part description texts. * Fix a couple of messages in tutorials. * Fix action sets override explanation tooltip text. * Fix Localization of Vessel Naming Group and vessel name in PAWs. * Removed line breaks in the Orbit's Ejection field tooltip in English.

+++ Parts

* Add fuel line ESA variant. * Add Thoroughbred ESA variant. * Added Rockomax X200-32 ESA variant. * Revamped R-11 'Baguette' External Tank and added silver variant. * Revamped R-4 'Dumpling' External Tank and added silver variant. * Revamped R-12 'Doughnut' External Tank and added silver variant. * Added new variants to the fairings size 1, 2 and 3. Now we have them in white, black and white, orange, silver and gold. * Revamped Struts and added white variant. * New Moho Planetary Observer (MPO) Probe. * New Moho Transfer Module (MTM). * Fix Mainsail's Center Of Thrust. * Fix LV-N engine FX particle offset. * Added the ESA variant to the Rockomax X200-16 Fuel Tank. * New Flag parts, these new parts can be placed on fairings by holding the Mod key or by setting the Fairing Expansion = Off setting in the fairings PAW. * Parts with Flag Decals on them can now have their decal set to mirrored. * New Magnetometer Boom science experiment.* Advanced Grabbing Unit textures revamped and added a Dark variant. * New Advanced Grabbing Unit Jr. With 2 variants * Fix for LV-N engine not stacking correctly at the bottom. * Added a white and yellow variant to all TD decouplers and TS separators.

+++ Bugfixes

* Fix Action Groups app position. * Fix mesh scale on short compoundparts causing reentry FX issues. * Fixed Interstage fairings holding onto the payload in certain use cases. * Fix dV calcs for stages drawing resources across decouplers with crossfeed enabled. * Fix unable to timewarp after using Set Position and then Set Orbit cheat. * Fix autostrut being incorrectly reset on parts attached to dynamic nodes if the part is the parent. * Fix drag cubes on J-90 Goliath, 48-7S Spark, LV-909 Terrier, RE-M3 Mainsail, RE-L10 Poodle  RE-I5 Skipper, and numerous other parts. * Fix craft browser selecting wrong tab when player switches between VAB/SPH. * Fix the highlight and navigation colors not being set on game start when the settings file did not exist. * Fixed a bug that stopped the player from progressing in the Basic Science Tutorial. * Fix Action Groups app header in flight. * Fix Lights toggle image not showing all rays properly in Altimiter UI. * Fix comm link not displaying correct strength when focusing on a relay satellite. * Fix node icons being rendered on top of other Flight scene UI elements. * Fix broken off solar panels, fairings and shroud parts left on the surface causing vessels to remain in landed state after they take off. * Fix Dont Show Again not working for Delete all Messages functionality. * Fix LV-T45 config by removing duplicate definition of testmodule. * Fixed veteran kerbals dissappearing when being dismissed. * Fix Navball render issue when Maneuver mode is enabled. * Fix resources not being displayed in tracking station in Prospecting Eeloo Scenario. * Fix asteroids having incorrect mass when docking. * Fix bug causing kerbals to not respawn in Space Center. * Fix bug causing difficulty settings to revert when reverting flight. * Fix maneuver node label not showing when switching selected node. * Fix an issue where Maneuver Mode's Maneuver Editor's Gizmos can enlarge or shrink when clicked extremely fast. * Fix 3.75m decoupler and separator drag cubes creating too much drag. * Fix issue where some vessels were not being reset to the terrain when loading them in a save game where the game terrain detail settings had been changed since it was last saved. * Fix a different tone of white in the white fairing variant. * Fix Launch platform selector getting stuck when opening dialogs while it is already open. * Fix Portrait Gallery when EVAing and all gallery pictures have been hidden. * Fix lighting on specular shaded part icons. * Fix 3D object masking in Editor and RnD scenes for Windows platform and openGL forced. * Pinned PAW stays open in the editor on click events and on part selection. * Add some clarity in the strategies that have no-duration (Bail-out and Sell-out) so players dont expect them to remain active over time. * Fix Z-100 battery light showing white in toolbar and tooltip icons sometimes. * Fix fuel overlay becoming offset when dragging the root part by hiding the overlay during that drag. * Remove Jettison event for Jettison parts that are fairings as they cannot be jettisoned manually. * Fix hitching in the main menu. * Fix visual artefacts of atmosphere planets in map view at high timewarp rates. * Interior lights of ship cockpits and passenger modules are linked to the toggle lights action group. * Fixed bug causing empty stages not to be deleted. * Fix label overlap that was happening in some languages. * Part Action Windows will always close when its part is destroyed. * Fixed bug where drain valve values were being defaulted to true. * Fixed bug which caused some building lights to remain on during the day. * Fix camera out of frustum error when reloading flight scene in some scenarios. * Fix inertial tensor errors when reloading flight scene in some scenarios. * Fix log messages when running missions with test experiment node and node is set to any experiment. * Maneuver mode UI negative handles don't flip functionality anymore after adjusting the tool sensitivity. * Docking Port Actions now fire docking ports on same vessel. * The technology path lines don't disappear anymore. * Fix tutorial 'orbit 101' getting stuck when trying to get to the inclination value of 10 degrees. * Correctly handle engines burning across stages for dV calcs. * Fix decoupler handling when no parts attached to decoupler for dV calcs. * Fix stage UI dV display fluctuating up and down whilst burning engines. * Fixed NRE when changing the variant of a surface-attached LV-1 'Ant'. * Fix not copying resource amounts when copying parts in VAB/SPH. * Fix contract part naming to use real part names and not 'research lab' or 'materials bay'. * Fix for some keybindings activating when typing in toolbox part search in VAB/SPH. * Fix camera shake issues in the SPH when using shift and hovering over UI elements. * Fixed disappearing mode toggle button in KerbNet dialog. * Fix for Shadow Projection Settings resetting. * Fix PAW group headers being cut off in some languages. * Fixed an issue where the UT field in Precision Maneuver Editor wasn't able to display Universal Time in the 'y * Fix 'Cannot deploy while stowed.' bug for service bays. * Fix manuever node handles changing value incorrectly when dragging 'anti' handles. * Fix randomization error in Sentinel causing short lifetimes of discovered asteroids. * Fix Exception storm when inflatable heat shield destroyed by overheat in some situations. * Fix incorrect Line Break - Tracking Station - The string 'Last seen * PAW title now matches the new name of an asteroid after being renamed. * Maneuver node no longer moves along the planned trajectory instead of the current one when moving it ahead in time using the Maneuver Mode UI input field. * Fix crew assignment being blocked after loading second ship. * Fix the vesselSituation on unloaded space objects being Flying instead of Orbiting. * Fix flickering Celestial body self-shadow issues with DX11 platform. * Fix icons in map view not rescaling properly when UI scale changes. * Fix the EVA 'Board' button prompt not disappearing when the target vessel is destroyed. * Fix unlocalized label for mk1-3 pod lights. * Fixed the Island runway textures. * Fix camera behavior when camera mode is activated multiple times in flight mode. * Fix loading of Modders KSPedia slides. * Fix beginner tutorials being locked out after pressing Save or Load game buttons. * Fix NRE flood when creating or selecting a maneuver node with the Maneuver Mode UI Intercept tab open. * Fix Set Orbit cheat to allow rendezvous with vessels in an escaping sphere of influence situation. * Fairing panels now display the proper texture you see in the editor instead of pure white. * Fix incorrect drag cube and class size on Asteroids after they have been grappled and subsequently ungrappled or reloaded via scene change or save game load.

+++ Mods

* Add IPartMassModifier to ModuleJettison. Allows mods to implement mass change on jettison. * Fix application of mass to resource ratios in ModuleResourceConverter recipes. * Renamed a duplicated shader "KSP/Particles/Alpha Blended" to now have one named that and another named "KSP/Particles/Alpha Blended Scenery".

===================== Making History 1.10.0====================

+++ Improvements

* Tracking of vessels now works for creator defined vessels that undock and get created during a mission from another vessel. Mission creators can now assign parts that have had vessel rename and priority set to test against in mission nodes. * Moved localization files to base game. * Add checkbox to FlyThrough Test Node to allow the map marker to be hidden * Added a new icon for Test Grapple node in Mission Builder. * Add setting (MISSION_NAVIGATION_GHOSTING) to show nav marker ghosting when the target is behind you. Defaulted to on for all mission games (including ESA). * Added a new Grapple test node to verify if a grabbing unit took hold of a space object. * Space Objects can now be selected in the Distance to node. * Test vessel velocity can now be compared relative to vessels, kerbals, and space objects instead of just the orbited CB. * Nodes in Making History support comets the same as asteroids.

+++ Localization

* Fixed wrong localization for asteroid nodes in mission builder. * Fix descriptions for Shrimp and SWM-94 parts.

+++ Parts

* Kickback booster revamp and ESA variant. * Added new variants to the fairings size 1.5 and 3. Now we have them in white, black and white, orange, silver and gold. * Added a white and yellow variant to the size 1.5 and size 4 TD decouplers and size 1.5 and size 4 TS separators.

+++ Bugfixes

* Fix scenario loading in Mission Builder scene causing Mission Issues. * Fix Vessel/Part tracking on Nodes for Dock/Undock/Decouple/Couple events during a mission. * Added Create Comet node to be used on the Mission Editor. Under the Spawnables section. * Fixed minor typo in Intermediate Tutorial for Missions * Fixed label size to better suit other languages in SpawnAsteroid, mission builder. * Fix label displaying incorrect experiment for collected science data when prompted to overwrite. * Fix incorrect orbit around The Sun for asteroids spawning in missions. * Fix lighting brightness on displayed Kerbals and Vessels in the GAP. * Fix bug that impeded time warping after finishing a mission. * Fix Dawn of Space Age mission failing inmediately after lift off in some cases. * Fix drag cubes for the 3.75m Structural Tubes. * Fixed mirror symmetry placement for structural panels. * Fix GAP vessel filter ribbon disappearing when selecting alternate vessel/part selector in the SAP. * Fix #autoLOC_8005448 showing in Mission builder test distance validation report. * Fix bug causing unlocked servos to be locked when launching * Fix missing line break in node description. * Fix log messages when running missions with test experiment node and node is set to any experiment. * Fix log messages about Gene Kerman's animations being legacy when using him in message nodes in a mission. * Fix misnamed FL-TX440 Tank variants so they are consistent. * Fix a number of typos in the 'Dawn of the Space Age' mission. * Fix wrong size category for FL-R5 RCS Fuel Tank and the Heat Shield (1.875m) parts. * Fix stutter and error in planet viewer transition. * Fix button text issues on Play mission dialog for non-English text.

+++ Bugfix

* Fixed erratic positioning of Dessert Airfield windmills.

==================== Breaking Ground 1.5.0=====================

+++ Improvements

* Solar Panel and RTG now displays the power units produced based on Experience trait settings in the Part extended tooltip. * Added action groups for the fan blades for toggling the Roll, Yaw and Pitch controls independently and also Turn them all ON or OFF.

+++ Localization

* Localized Blades Control Rotations.

+++ Parts

* Fan Shrouds now have a node stack on top.

+++ Bugfixes

* Fix an issue where the Track Editor would remain open after switching vessels. * Fix for localization overlapping bug for all languages in graphics settings. * Fix spelling errors in robot scanner arm parts. * Fix tooltip not appearing for max limit axis. * Fixed bug when a KAL controlling another KAL's parameters play position stopped. * Fix issue with motors engaging on launch when they have been set to disengaged in editor. * Fixed mirror symmetry placement for  propellers, blades, alligator hinges and rotational servos. * Fix Autostrut on Robotic Parts being cancelled (set to off) in some use cases. * Fix Autostrut debug visualization on Robotic Parts when locked/unlocked. * Fix the FTE-1 Drain Valve releasing particles when switching between VAB and SPH. * Fix non-cargo parts being able to be stored in a cargo container. * Fix Hinges and Pistons sometimes returning to build angle when locked. *Fix lock/unlock of robotic parts not working when fired from an action group.

Kerbal Space Program 1.10: Shared Horizons is now available on Steam and will soon be available on GOG and other third-party resellers. You will also be able to download it from the KSP Store if you already own the game.

Happy Launchings!

[thebrideofthewizardhowl]

Badminton, court or lawn game played with lightweight rackets and a shuttlecock. Historically, the shuttlecock (also known as a “bird” or “birdie”) was a small cork hemisphere with 16 goose feathers attached and weighing about 0.17 ounce (5 grams). These types of shuttles may still be used in modern play, but shuttles made from synthetic materials are also allowed by the Badminton World Federation. The game is named for Badminton, the country estate of the dukes of Beaufort in Gloucestershire, England, where it was first played about 1873. The roots of the sport can be traced to ancient Greece, China, and India, and it is closely related to the old children’s game battledore and shuttlecock. Badminton is derived directly from poona, which was played by British army officers stationed in India in the 1860s. The first unofficial all-England badminton championships for men were held in 1899, and the first badminton tournament for women was arranged the next year.

              The badminton court is 13.4m long and 6.1m wide. For singles the court is marked 5.18m wide. The lines marking out the court are easily distinguishable and coloured white or yellow. The lines are 40mm wide. A court may be marked out for singles only. The back boundary lines also become the long service lines and the posts or the strips of material representing them are placed on the side lines. The diagonal full length of the full court is 14.366m. The posts are 1.55m high from the surface of the court and remain vertical when the net is strained. The posts are placed on the double side lines irrespective of whether singles or doubles is played. The posts or supports must not extend into the court beyond the side lines. Where it is not practicable to have posts on the side lines, some method can be used to indicate the position of the side lines where they pass under the net, example by the use of thin posts or strips of material 40mm wide, fixed to the side lines and rising vertically to the net cord. The net is 760mm in depth and a minimum of 6.1m wide. The top of the net from the surface of the court is 1.524m at the center of the court and 1.55m over the side lines for doubles. There must be no gaps between the ends of the net and the posts. If necessary, the full depth of the net at the ends is tied to the posts.

              In this blog, I will cover the four basic equipment and gear required for a game of badminton.

1.      Badminton Racket

Badminton rackets can be made from several types of materials. Depending on the material selection, this can result in different combinations of racket weight, balance points and string tensions. With so many different combinations, it will take time to decide which is most suited for your playing style.  Instead of making purchases online, pop by a badminton shop. Ask for assistance and select a racket that you feel comfortable with. Swing the racket around to get a good feel of its overall weight and grip. Some popular badminton brands are Yonex, ProKennex, Wilson, ProTech and Li-Ning.

2.      Shuttlecock

There are two types of shuttlecocks - plastic and feathered shuttlecocks.

Plastic shuttlecocks are far more durable compared to the feathered types which are commonly used. However, plastic shuttlecocks are only recommended for beginners who are just starting out. This is because feathered shuttlecocks are expensive and fray easily especially if the wrong technique is used. Hence, plastic shuttlecocks are good for beginners to use for training. Plastic shuttlecocks are usually used by young children who play badminton for recreation. Plastic shuttlecocks tend to travel shorter distances as they are heavier. Hence, they are good for building strength as you make the transition to feathered shuttlecocks. Most people will progress to using feathered shuttlecocks as they are used at all competitive tournaments.

3.      Badminton Shoes

Badminton shoes are designed to give you better traction and grip to stop in time to return a shot. They should also be lightweight have good cushioning to absorb impact when you jump or land. Regular players will find heel cups useful to prolonging the lifespan of your shoes. Do not wear jogging shoes as they usually lack grip and traction. You might end up crashing through the badminton net if you are unable to stop in time to receive a drop shot.  

4.      Badminton Attire

For casual to non-competitive players, a comfortable pair of shorts and cotton or dri-fit t-shirt is sufficient. Some players may want to equip themselves with hand grips, wrist bands and ankle guards. Each of these items serve a purpose and might also add a dash of color to the entire get-up. When it comes to badminton equipment, select what is appropriate before turning your attention to aesthetics.

 To be good at any sport you need to master the basics. Mastering the basic techniques and skills allows you to play consistently and improve. Badminton is a very beginner-friendly sport but difficult to master. Anybody can learn and master the basic skills for Badminton.

·        Knowing how to warm up properly

·        The basic forehand and backhand grip

·        The basic six corners footwork

·        The split step or the ready stance

·        The basic shots

·        Perception and anticipation

·        Hand-eye coordination

·        Rhythm and timing

·        Tactical and strategic thinking

Knowing how to warm up properly

Warming up is a combination of skill and a bit of know-how. Players of any level should know how to warm up properly before stepping on court for a match. We wrote an in-depth article on warming up properly for Badminton. It’s so important to do a full warm-up before playing to help avoid injuries. It’s also important because you’re ready to go right from the start of the match. You won’t need to get four-five rallies into the game before you feel like you’ve finally got in gear.

 Warm-ups don’t have to take that long either. You can perform a solid warm-up in less than five minutes. Here are some simple routines that really get the blood pumping:

 ·        High speed skipping for five minutes (try to go fast without losing consistency and tripping over the rope)

·        A simple set of jumping jacks, squats, burpees, lunges and knee tucks each for one minute

·        Jog around the hall at a quick pace for five minutes

You get the idea, anything that gets you moving without overstretching. It should get your heart pumping and as my coach used to say; “you should have little beads of sweat from the forehead”.

The basic forehand and backhand grip

Learning the forehand and backhand grip is a fundamental skill. It’s so important to get this right as it’s the building blocks to learning every shot in Badminton. The basic forehand and backhand grip is easy to learn, you can practice getting the hold right sat at home. Practice swapping from forehand to backhand whilst sat on the couch at home.

 The forehand grip is much like shaking somebody’s hand. Both in the way you hold the racquet and in how tight you hold it. You want to hold the racquet loosely, gripping the racquet too tight can lead to injuries like tennis elbow. It also makes it very difficult to hit the shot smoothly as you’re tensing up your muscles.

 The backhand grip is for some people easier to get right. You simply take the forehand grip and roll the thumb over so it sits flat on the grip rather than along the edge. The use of the thumb makes it easier to stabilize the grip compared to the forehand.

The basic six corners footwork

Footwork is crucial in Badminton. It’s been known that some coaches in China only teach beginners footwork from the beginning. They don’t teach any racquet skills until the player has mastered the basic footwork. They do this because it’s impossible to play good shots if you cannot reach the shuttle. In Badminton, once the shuttlecock touches the floor the rally is over so you need to be able to cover the court in order to play well.

 I wouldn’t go as far as they do in principals but I still believe footwork is one of the most important aspects of playing Badminton. Footwork can get very technical and complex but right now we’re just going to cover the basic footwork patterns in short. We have more full and detailed guides coming soon around footwork drills and breakdowns.

 If you can master these six pieces of footwork for Badminton then you’re off to a good start. The six pieces of footwork are:

 Travelling to the forehand side of the net

·        Travelling to the backhand side of the net

·        Covering the forehand mid-court

·        Covering the backhand mid-court

·        Moving to the forehand rear-court

·        Moving to the backhand rear-court

For info please watch this video : https://www.youtube.com/embed/IidZFd6vCJk?autoplay=1

 The split step/the ready stance

The split step is a technique used to get ready for the next shot. It’s used not only in Badminton but in sports like Tennis as well. It’s the basis of building good footwork and speed around the court. We have a great article detailing everything about the split step, make sure to read it in full.

 Let’s summarize why the split step is so important. A good split step is for a Badminton player what a good start out of the blocks is for a runner. If you don’t have a good split step you’ll be playing catch up to your opponent.

 So how do you do the split step? It’s simple but can be tricky to master. When you return to your base position on court you want to make a slight jump in the air and land with your feet apart. You want to time the landing of your feet just after your opponent hits the shuttle. That way you can land the split step and immediately push off to the next shot.

 The basic shots

There are so many varieties of shots in Badminton. Variants of shots include slicing the shuttle, tumbling the shuttle or hitting it at different angles with different swings. But they all have one original basic shot. For beginners here is a list of basic shots you should master first.

 ·        The serve (forehand or backhand)

·        The lift (sometimes called a lob)

·        The net shot

·        The block

·        The drop shot

·        The smash

·        The clear

That’s eight shots in total. It’s quite a lot when you’re just starting out and they can all be played backhand and forehand. These seven shots cover the majority of situations you’ll face in a match. Master these and you’ll have a good base in which to build on and start learning more advanced shots and variations.

 Hand-eye coordination

It only comes with practice but having good hand-eye coordination is essential for Badminton. You can’t play Badminton if you can’t connect the racquet and shuttle. The best way to improve hand-eye coordination for Badminton is to play lots of Badminton. Who would have thought?!

 Seriously though, playing and training will improve your hand-eye coordination significantly but there are exercises you can do at home alone or with another person to improve your hand-eye coordination. Here are some examples.

 Playing catch

Playing catch is a simple but effective way to improve hand-eye coordination. All you need is a ball, you could do this with a shuttlecock too. Practice throwing and catching with someone else or bounce the shuttle or ball of a wall at different angles and catch it again.

 Catching an object focuses your eyes on a single object travelling. It requires concentration and spatial awareness. It’s so simple but so effective.

 Juggling

So not a skill for those with little patience, juggling is a difficult skill to master but for good reason. Juggling requires incredible hand-eye coordination, even just by learning to juggle you’re improving your hand-eye coordination without having mastered the skill. It’s something you can do anywhere with a couple or more balls or shuttles.

 When you master juggling two items then you can move onto three then four etc. Adding more objects or changing the objects improves your hand-eye coordination even more. You have to track each item in the air and feel how you threw the last one. It’s also a great party trick to have in the bag.

 Exercising your eyes

Believe it or not but there are specific exercises that you can do to exercise your eyes! They basically help strengthen the muscles in and around your eyes. They mainly help with focusing your vision which in turn will help with your hand-eye coordination. Some examples of eye exercises are.

 ·        Focus change

·        Near and far focus

·        Figure eight

Rhythm and timing

If you watch the top players in the world like Lin Dan, Lee Chong Wei and Kento Momota etc, they seem to cover the court so easily. They make every shot look effortless and smooth. They have little to no break in their footwork and look to glide around the court. They have honed their rhythm and timing for playing Badminton over years of training and match play. Lee Chong Wei has impeccable timing with his footwork and if you watch the video below you can see how rhythmic his movement is. When you play Badminton, especially singles, getting a natural rhythm while you play is key to developing good footwork and creating consistency in your play. When we dance we use the music as our rhythm and that helps us relax and get into the flow. When playing Badminton you need to be able to find a rhythm of play that suits you. This can only come from playing a lot of purposeful practice and playing matches. Timing is similar but relates more to hand-eye coordination. Your timing will naturally improve the more Badminton you play. It’s important to have good timing so you can hit shots cleanly, a split-step at the right moment and so you can position yourself to hit the shuttle at the optimal time.

 Perception and anticipation

These two skills become much more important the better you get at Badminton. It’s the difference between just getting your opponents shot back and intercepting or countering your opponents next shot. Perception means: “The ability to see, hear, or become aware of something through the senses.” For Badminton, this has lots of meanings. Being able to see where your opponent is in relation to the rest of the court, being able to hear if they’re panting and getting tired, the examples go on and on. It’s about how you perceive the current situation playing out during a match. Being more aware. Anticipation is a little different. Anticipation means: “The action of anticipating something; expectation or prediction.” For Badminton, anticipation means reading your opponents’ next move before they play it, to change your stance in preparation for the next shot and to advance your position before the play has been made. Anticipation is a very important skill in Badminton because if you can read your opponents’ next shot then you can gain the upper hand in the rally, the game, and the match. It’s not easy to learn this skill as everyone plays differently, no two players play the same. One player might play a certain shot when they’re in trouble and someone else might play an entirely different shot. You see top players Hendra Setiawan and Lin Dan do this very well. Before their opponent has played their shot they’re already anticipating their next move. Watch this video below and watch how Lin Dan changes the positioning of his feet in order to move faster to the next shot. As you can see he doesn’t always get it right but is able to recover and stay in the rally.

 Tactical and strategic thinking

There are many ways to win a game of Badminton. Players and coaches use different tactics and strategies to win a match. Tactics are the shots we make, the set plays we try to repeat and the choices we make when backed into a corner. Tactics are the small steps and choices within each rally. Strategies are the overall plan for playing a match, they’re the long term plan. Strategy in Badminton is creating a plan on how you’ll win. An example strategy for a singles player might be to get their opponent to play a high lift so they can get back and smash. An example strategy for a doubles player might be to get to the front as fast as possible to intercept the shuttle early or kill it. These are basic examples. The elite players will have multiple strategies for when the opponent starts countering their strategy. I feel it’s always best to keep things simple when it comes to tactics and strategies. If you’re beating your opponent then there is no need to change anything. If you’re losing then you need to change something. Why is it important to learn about tactics and strategies? Taking a quote from Sun Tzu and the Art of War, a book we recommend for every Badminton payer to read. “The general who wins the battle makes many calculations in his temple before the battle is fought. The general who loses makes but few calculations beforehand.” If you plan on how you’re going to win the match or plan how you’re going to cope with your opponents’ big smash then you’re already a step ahead. You need to learn how to harness your best shots to gain the initiative and win points. It’s partly visualization if you can visualize how you can win then you’re more likely to win.

 Technical Skills in Badminton

·        The Ready Stance - it is a position in badminton wherein the right stance is readied by the player in order to minimize the amount of movements that would be needed in order to hit the shuttlecock

·        Forehand and Backhand Grip - these are the two basic grips that new players must familiarize themselves with. By doing either of these, it would be much easier for players to control their shots

·        Footwork - it is a necessary skill in order to play badminton. A proper footwalk would help in mastering the sports

·        Strokes - initially, there are four strokes that the player can use.  

·        Underarm Backhand Serve - it is a type of serve that beginners can use

Tactical skills in badminton

·        Applying pressure on hitting the shuttlecock

·        Position yourself in the central base

·        It would be easier to hit the shuttlecock on the corners of the court

·        Deceive your opponents during singles match

 Scoring System

A match consists of the best of 3 games of 21     points.

Every time there is a serve – there is a point     scored.

The side winning a rally adds a point to its     score.

At 20 all, the side which gains a 2 point lead     first, wins that game.

At 29 all, the side scoring the 30th point,     wins that game.

The side winning a game serves first in the     next game.

Interval and Change of Ends

When the leading score reaches 11 points,     players have a 60 second interval.

A 2 minute interval between each game is     allowed.

In the third game, players change ends when     the leading score reaches 11 points.

Singles

At the beginning of the game (0-0) and when     the server’s score is even, the server serves from the right     service court. When the server’s score is odd, the server serves from the     left service court.

If the server wins a rally, the server scores     a point and then serves again from the alternate service court.

If the receiver wins a rally, the receiver     scores a point and becomes the new server. They serve from the appropriate     service court – left if their score is odd, and right if it is even.         Doubles

A side has only one ‘set’.

The service passes consecutively to the     players as shown in the diagram.

At the beginning of the game and when the     score is even, the server serves from the right service court. When it is     odd, the server serves from the left court.

If the serving side wins a rally, the serving     side scores a point and the same server serves again from the alternate service     court.

If the receiving side wins a rally, the     receiving side scores a point. The receiving side becomes the new serving     side.

The players do not change their respective     service courts until they win a point when their side is serving.

Officials roles are among the most important positions when planning badminton events as they are specialized roles filled by qualified volunteers.

 Badminton events of all size ��� be it a local circuit tournament, county competition or even one of our major events – on a national and international level, require a team of officials. The officials are the judges responsible to ensure a fair badminton game is being played. They consists of:

 ·        Umpire: The ‘main judge’ for the particular badminton game. He/she has the power to overrule any decisions made by the service judge or line judges. The umpire is the person ensuring that the badminton game is run smoothly and prevent any players from delaying the game play. Whenever a player requests to change the shuttle, the umpire will need to approve that the change could be made. The umpire also looks out for faults committed around the net area such as whether a player touched the net when returning the shuttle. Besides, the umpire is responsible to make a ‘fault’ call when the shuttle touches the player or the players’ attires except for the badminton racket. In badminton, it will be a fault/foul to a player if the shuttle touches any part of that player’s body or attire.

 ·        Service Judge: The service judge is responsible in making a ‘service fault’ call and to provide shuttles to the players.

 ·        Line Judges: Line judges sit beside the badminton court (right in front of every in/out lines) to determine whether the shuttle is inside or outside the boundaries of the court.

 ·        Referees – The referee is the most senior official in a badminton tournament and they in overall charge of all matters which affect play and the players on and off court.

   The referee shall have key responsibility for:

·        Producing schedule and order of play.

·        Amendments to the draw and schedule.

·        The smooth running of play on the day.

·        Liaison with Umpire and Line Judge managers.

·        The correct implementation of regulations and the Laws of Badminton.

·        Completion of a tournament report.

 Citations :

https://basilioeduc.wordpress.com/2013/09/20/officiating-badminton/

https://www.masterbadminton.com/who-are-the-officials-of-badminton.html

https://www.badminton.mb.ca/page/18182/Officiating

https://www.badmintonengland.co.uk/play/give-your-sport-a-helping-hand/officiating-in-badminton/tournamentmatch-referees/

https://sportsphilippines.wordpress.com/2017/02/02/officiating-in-badminton/

https://www.masterbadminton.com/badminton-techniques.html

https://www.badmintonbc.com/page/2888/The-Laws-of-Badminton

https://www.badmintonsbest.com/blog/skills-you-need-to-play-badminton/#the-basic-shots

https://www.myactivesg.com/Sports/Badminton/How-To-Play/Badminton-Equipment/Getting-Started-for-a-Game-of-Badminton

https://www.dlgsc.wa.gov.au/sport-and-recreation/sports-dimensions-guide/badminton#:~:text=The%20badminton%20court%20is%2013.4,The%20lines%20are%2040mm%20wide.

https://www.britannica.com/sports/badminton

[lindoig8]

The Camel Trek

Wednesday, 28 April – Day 1 of our Camel Trek

We were out at the front gate waiting to be collected at 7am, but it was 7.45 before Max, our chief scientist, came to pick us up. He was the Expedition Leader and everyone met in the middle of town to be introduced and to board a 4WD ‘bus’ to take us out to Base Camp. It was about 325 kilometres and took about 5 hours, including a stop for lunch halfway out. There were 11 of us in the group, including 2 extras who were sponsored – a photographer and a travel magazine editor. There should have been 3 more coming from Perth, but the sudden 3-day Covid lockdown there prevented them from coming.

Base Camp was (obviously) in the bush and there were quite a few people out there – staff and volunteers who had been setting up and ‘warming up’ the camels that had not been worked for at least 18 months. There was a big truck loaded with food and all sorts of other gear and the area was littered with stores and equipment for the rest of the 21-week season. The camels were already there of course – 18 of them, all bullocks, 3 of them new to the team and 2 others that had been hauled out of retirement to work again this season. They are wonderful big animals, quite gentle most of the time, but somewhat prone to panic if they are frightened.

We had a hot meal for dinner and everyone chatted with everyone else, staff, cameleers, volunteers and tourists alike. It was all quite comfortable and pleasant, albeit sometimes a little confusing because we didn’t know what to expect. We were each issued with our swags and shown how to set them up: also our toilet bag with instructions about that. I found everyone surprisingly relaxed about the potentially sensitive or embarrassing issue of toileting in the immediate bush, and even when I encountered one of our party in a serious state of undress while I was collecting firewood, she was seemingly unperturbed. Just all very natural and with little discomfort on anyone’s behalf.

We distributed ourselves around the periphery of the camp, maybe about 50 metres or so out and set up our swags and we all went to bed quite early in the knowledge that breakfast was at 6am next morning. The swags are heavy and difficult to set up and dismantle, but they were really very comfortable and most people reported that they slept pretty well.

Thursday – Day 2 and the start of our walk

After a breakfast of cereal and muesli, we were introduced to the camels when they lined up to be saddled and loaded. It is a very elaborate rigamarole and I could devote pages to the camels, their handlers and the process overall, but maybe that is not of much interest – although we found it all quite fascinating. Being the first official day of the season and the first time the camels had been fully laden, the staff were in no hurry. The camels learn a routine and any deviations are likely to create problems, especially at the beginning of the season with unacclimated camels. It took over 3 hours before we were all ready to start walking and with nowhere to sit, we were all glad to be walking after standing around watching for so long.

The 4WD bus took many of the volunteers back to Alice Springs at 8am so that just left the 11 trekkers and 11 staff and scientists in camp.

We only walked about 4 kilometres that day, although everyone obviously walked quite a bit more in diversions along the way. The camels were stopped several times to adjust their loads or for other reasons and we all stopped for lunch again (wraps with a huge variety of vegetarian fillings and condiments). The camels need to stop periodically because they can’t urinate while working, but they stopped for other reasons as well. The staff build a fire and make tea and coffee each mealtime so that adds to the time it takes to get from Point A to Point B, but it was quite an interesting walk anyway. There were few birds (although I saw both male and female Yellow Chats next day – lifers for us!), but enough to keep me interested – and lots of unaccustomed trees and plants to inspect as well.

We made camp around 3pm and we all set up our swags (all closer to camp this time) and helped (a little) with the unloading. There was always the promise that we could help with things but in practice, the cameleers had things down to such a fine art that we had little to do. We were allowed to hold the ropes on the camels sometimes, but that was just to discourage them from wandering away – wonderful beasts and so patient and gentle – it is hard to see them as wild feral animals. Being close to them has certainly made me view them in a very different light.

I thought the science in the process was at risk of being lost because the crew seemed intent on making it easy for the tourists. We had a botanist with us who was focussed on his work – and who took Heather under his wing a little because they both ‘spoke the same language’. We helped set up a string of Elliott traps in the hope of capturing some little rodents or reptiles – but they were all unfortunately unoccupied next morning. I appreciate that, as eco-tourists, we were funding the research, but I assumed the research would have been more visible and that we would have been able to contribute to it. In some respects, we were given a higher priority than I expected and I would have been completely happy to have had more attention given to their surveys and less to looking after we hangers-on. Given the opportunity, I will draw attention to that as general feedback to the company.

We had another hot meal at night – a mammoth feed if anyone could have managed it – a main course and dessert with tea and coffee. Of course, before the meal was ready, we all sat around the campfire and enjoyed a port – served in a delicate jug, topped up from a 20-litre jerrycan!!! The port jerrycan was yellow to distinguish it from the diesel and water jerrycans.

We all enjoyed the fire, but it had been a hot and taxing day and we all headed for our respective toilet bushes and swags quite soon after dinner. There had been a spectacular sunset over a wide, completely horizontal horizon, soon followed by a spectacular rising full moon (just a few hours past the so-called Pink Moon moment) and everyone went out like lights pretty quickly.

Friday – Day 3 and a bit of a disaster

The camels were loaded a little more quickly on the second day but they were still a bit unused to the routine and a couple were a tad stroppy so it still took more than 2 hours to get ready to leave camp. We had been able to help a little more and got close to the camels and patted them – they really are magnificent beasts, soft and gentle and ever so patient. It was a real privilege to spend time so close to them.

It was pretty slow going with the walkers well out ahead of the camels (that is where the handlers wanted us) but the camels had to stop several times and we were left out in the sun while the camels were quietened and saddles readjusted, etc. I was only about 40-50 metres away from the A-string when one of them got spooked when its load slipped and it went berserk. It was quite scary because when it started bucking and running out of line, it started panicking some of the others too and its saddle and load slipped under its bely and between its legs when it was rearing and running amok – and of course, it injured itself. It was not badly hurt, but its hind legs were quite severely scraped from its saddle and load so they gave it the rest of the day off. They left its damaged saddle and load out in the desert and allowed it to just tag along at the rear of the string but at one stage it was running wild and ended up spooking some of the B-string as well. It took well over an hour to rearrange the loads and settle both strings down and it was very hot waiting in the scorching sun while this happened. I went birding in the nearby scrub but the rest of the trekkers just tried to find a tiny bit of shade under a bush to wait it out.

We walked for another hour or two before we stopped for lunch and everyone was pretty hot and bothered by then.

It was a very hot day, particularly so immediately after lunch, and one of the trekkers who had a thermometer said it was 41 degrees where we were walking and 36 in the shade. We had walked about 10-11 kilometres on the day when Heather succumbed to heatstroke. She ‘hit the wall’ early after lunch and they called the medic to tend her. I was off on my own at the time and as soon as I heard, I ran back to her and stayed with her for the rest of the day. The medic was wonderful: very solicitous and caring. He helped cool her down (poured numerous bottles of water over her) and did several blood pressure and pulse checks but it was clear to me (all of us) that she wasn’t going to be able to continue.

Because of the heat, Max intended to call an early stop for the day so he did so virtually straight away. They made camp in a suitable place just a few hundred metres further along and when Heather was up to it, the medic and I helped her into camp where she had to lie down in some very meagre shade and received lots more attention from most people in the party.

By sheer good luck, Andrew (co-leader and chief cameleer) had cached a 4WD near where we had lunch and he had driven back to retrieve the jettisoned saddle and related gear to be used next day. He was returning to Alice Springs that night to restock some items so when he returned, we asked if we could go back with him. He agreed (of course) and it was a good job he did because the next 2 days trek were as hot or hotter and over slightly more difficult terrain – so maybe neither of us would have made it. Max was obviously aware of the challenge and called at least the next day a half-day only, and possibly the fourth day too.

It took over 5 hours to do the 330-odd kilometres back to Alice Springs and by then, Heather had recovered quite a bit, but we just rolled into bed as soon as we could after reaching the caravan – and have had a few very quiet days resting since. Our sleeping bags and some other gear had been rolled into our swags in the desert so they were delivered to us to retrieve our things next day, and another team member collected them from us a bit later.

We were very disappointed that we had to pull out of the trek, but in retrospect, we are certain that we did the right thing and felt that we had really enjoyed the experience of the desert and the camels and maybe the rest of the trip would have been something of a repeat of what we had enjoyed. It certainly was a fantastic, unique experience that we will remember for life and we have since been contacted by some of our fellow-trekkers to see how Heather is going.

[rockingcockatiel]

Game Portfolio

Introduction

This was the concept of a game I came up with wish I was unable to finish due to being unable to run the software for developing the game

This was the portfolio I made for the game to explain the idea I had for it and other games I took inspiration from

Basic concepts  

Game Identity  

2D pixel art platformer about a young adventurer trying to find treasure  

Genre  

The main genre of my game is a platformer and metroidvania combination the sub genres of it are puzzle, exploration, hack and slash, adventure and 2D.  

Audience  

The target audience of my game is teens and young children as it has a cute pixel art style along with simple mechanics that allow anyone to learn and play.  

Similar games already in the market  

Game that are like the one I'm planning on making are Celeste, The momodora series, Cave story and Katana Zero.  

Concept Explained  

Visual Style

The visual style of my game will be pixel art similar to how cave story + and momodora 3 are designed the reason for this is due to it being a simple style create and make a design for and as a solo developer; both of the developers of cave story and momodroa 3 worked independently on the game developer's, Another thing to note is that sprite based art is easier to animate as all you need to do is make a character sheet of all the characters and enemies and their different animations while this may look daunting at first as you working with the same characters and the graphics won't be overly detailed it allows for you to make all the animations just by changing a few minor aspects of the art; this also has the advantage of making the levels layout design be easier as you can reuse the same base art for it. An example of this would be if you're making a small valley for one area of the game but wanted to add a little add a hill you could take one of the other tiles use rotate it and edit it a bit so that it can appear as a hill. Another to note is the style appeals more to children than some sort of gritty gears of war style game while these games don’t have a bright colour palette when compared to other sprite-based platformers it still appeals to children by having cute characters and art style.  

Gameplay Elements  

The main element of the game would be its jumping and combat mechanics while the combat portion of the game is easy to understand as you get better weapons and higher levels you can learn combos for weapons which can allow you to deal more damage or even activate special attacks with unique animations; Another thing to note is that they can be combined together for example one of weapons allows for a combo that makes you tiny and can be activated in mid-air so if you were to turn tiny while jumping the player could jump off a wall into a tiny gap that allows them to get hidden treasure; The game will even encouraging doing this by having areas you can't have access to without certain items or weapons. Other games have done this while the games that inspire this one doesn’t use these mechanic as they mainly encourage the play to push forward and only come back to areas if they wish to buy items from shop keepers. One core platforming element of the game will be the double jump and wall jump features as it can allow the player to get to different areas if they know how to use it correctly while this feature isn't unique to the game I'm creating celeste does have its own feature in which the player is able to dash which can allow them to reach areas they couldn’t without dashing this is a core mechanic of the game as most areas can't even be beaten without dashing; A smaller mechanic of the dash feature is that the characters hair will turn blue after dashing.  

Genre  

The games genre is a combination of mainly platformer and metroidvania elements a metroidvania type game is encourages the play to backtrack, has map in which a majority of its areas are connected in one way or another with ways to teleport back to previous areas the reason I'm making my game like this is to encourage the player to invest more time into instead of completing it in one run, The game will also encourage the player to back track by having certain items or treasures being locked behind areas which require items you acquire later on in the game. The other main genre is platforming as the main aspect of the game is for the player to hunt for treasure and gear hidden throughout the games map; the reason I choose its sub genres, are because it will have certain features of those genres but it, they wouldn’t be the focus of the game an example would be the puzzle mechanic certain dungeons would require the player to activate certain buttons in specific places to unlock the vault door that leads to treasure. Momodora 3 and Cave Story+ are both games of the same main genre being Metroidvania and Platformer.  

Game Design  

Music  

The games music is going to vary between areas for example a desert like area would mainly use Arabic or Egyptian instruments, an area based of a castle or kingdom would use an orchestra, mountainous or snowy areas would have slow calm music with certain areas of the music being focused on like a drum solo. Some examples of this are Crosscode’s Bergen Village which has wind instruments being the main orchestra of the song to match the location being a mountain, Super Smash Bros (fire emblem castle siege) which is a remix of the original fire emblem theme made to match the more faster paced action of a super smash bros match , Kirby Air Ride - Sky Sands or Kirby Air Ride – Sand which uses fastest paced drumming and string instruments to make an arabic sounding beat for a racing game; Bosses in the game would also have unique themes exclusive to them. I would save my best designed music for each of the bosses. Some examples of hard video game bosses with well-designed music are Jevil from Deltarune which sounds like music that you would hear in a circus it conveys a feeling that you're going against a madman and should be prepared to expect him to throw anything at you, Cynthia in Pokémon Diamond & Pearl which instantlys goes into action instead of being a slow build up  it features a mixture of drum and bass along with pianos it tells the player that this fight will be over fight if you don’t try your hardest; and Godcat's theme from Epic Battle Fantasy 4 which is an has church orchestras along with a choir singing mixed with electro synthwave giving off the feel that you are fighting an entity that you have no chance against; These are some of my favourite video game boss theme and one of the main reason I would choose to replay a game myself is to hear the themes certain bosses or areas have a game with good or amazing music will be much more appealing than a game with bland or boring music.  

Design Pillars  

The main emotions or feelings I want the player to experience when playing my game are joy, excitement and calmness from the the simplicity of the game and it not being overly difficult.  

Miscellaneous  

Target Audience  

The reason I chose the target audience as children and teens is that my game will feature and mechanics, story and gameplay elements that appeal to them; for children it will feature bright colours and a cute or more child friendly design style; for teens the story will be one that appeals to them from having the hero’s journey so that they feel like they made the character grow along with having the main protagonists of the game being the same age as them, It will also have gameplay elements that will challenge them to get better at the game so they can show off their friends or even play it with a younger sibling so they can bound over it.  

Target Platform  

The platform I plan to release this game on is pc as to release it on a console would require a devkit for said console which would be out of budget as well as me not knowing how to develop any games. Another thing to note that there a multiple retailers' platforms on pc when compared to console which only has three being Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, while pc has multiple which are looking to host smaller developer's games on their platform  

We were also tasked with making a pitch for the game which we presented to other students

In the end I had to change a lot about the game due to the time constraints and the lack of resources I had from being a 16-bit metroidvania into a generic 2d platformer While I'm stilling working on art for the game due to being able to run unity properly I'm not fully able to develop that much of the game so it’s currently on hiatus; In the meantime I'm learning to use a simpler engine known as RPG maker Mv which I'm making a short game in I currently have no plans for what it's about other than the characters in it are based off of my friends personalities and how they act which I find easier to use to make a characters on.

Game Pitch

We were also tasked with making a pitch for a game in which we presented to other students to save on image space I'll give a rundown of what was on each slide

Details Of the game

Platform: PC 

Engine: Unity  

Genre: 2D Platformer, Metroidvania  

Classification: Casual Game  

Single player  

Dimensions: 2D

The target audience of my game

Gender: Male  

Secondary: Female  

Age: Young Teenagers 

Psychographics: Is a fan of 2d pixel art games, likes platformers or hack n slash games, Likes cute or pixel art style

The synopsis of the game

A young adventurer is sent on a quest after receiving a letter  

They go out exploring legendary treasure 

There's an evil organisation planning on dominating the solar system  

The adventurer is being deceived  

A superweapon is revealed  

Adventurer must destroy it

The genre of the game

Main Genres  

Metroidvania

2D Platformer

Sub – Genres  

Hack n Slash  

Puzzle 

Adventure

The sound design of the game

16- Bit  

Variety of Instruments  

Foley sound effects 

Main Style: Nintendocore  

Secondary Styles: Chiptune, Synthwave

Visual Style of the game

Anime- Styled  

Pastel-Neon hybrid Colour Palette 

Futuristic/Medival Era  

Cute Styled Art  

Minimalistic character and level design

How to meet the audience’s needs

Appeal to them with content they like 

Have the advertised content appear in the game  

Focus on appealing to main target audience  

Know what my target audience likes and wants in games

Similar Games in the market

Momodora 3 

Kirby Super Star Ultra  

Cave Story+  

Orange Island  

Celeste

[nickgerlich]

Data In, Data Out

I remember when I was in college. There was no internet as we know it. Cable TV was still in its infancy. Phones were attached to walls. And when I needed to write a paper about something, I had to spend hours at the library flipping through thousands and thousands of card catalog pages that I could only hope were schematically arranged in a way that I could find what I needed.

Yeah, life was pretty simple then. Except when I needed to write a paper.

That all changed in 1993 with the launch of Aliweb, considered to be the first search engine. Within a few years, the internet, which had been opened for general consumer use, was filled with competing search engines. But it was the September 1998 arrival of Google, whose original name was BackRub, that signaled the onset of the world as we know it today.

Google grew quickly because it provided the best results. It acquired one company after another to add to its suite of products, making it easier and easier for users to simply default to the company for many aspects of our lives. And, since every web-based company needs a revenue model, it started selling advertising on its sites, which, over time, became more and more narrowly delivered to users as the company began to learn more about who was using its sites.

Which is another way of saying they doubled down on data tracking.

Today, the prospect of data tracking has become moot across the internet, with companies large and small selling our data. It’s how you start getting sales messages from Amazon after you have been on other sites looking at products. Somewhere along the way a little web beacon tracked you, and your information was sold.

Concerns over privacy have grown considerably in the last few years, thanks to social media sites and companies like Google wheeling and dealing with our user data, and even more so in the last few months during these unsettled political times. Because of those growing concerns, upstart search engine DuckDuckGo has suddenly experienced a surge in popularity.

DuckDuckGo is built on the promise of never selling user data. Naturally, it has to have a revenue source, so it sells ads, but those ad sales are matched specifically to a search query and not a specific user. Google employs both methods.

The site witnessed a 62% growth in average daily searches, and claims nearly 24 billion queries last year. It just marked its biggest day ever on 11 January with a little more than 100 million queries. In contrast, Google has 5.6 billion queries per day.

I have compared the two in side-by-side tests on rather obscure word strings, and still prefer Google. If you are worried about privacy and are willing to accept less precision, then DuckDuckGo is your engine. If you want accuracy and don’t care about being tracked, then stay right there on Google.

Which gets me to my point: This is the price of free, but sometimes that “price” can differ across providers. At DuckDuckGo, users have to put up with ads that may or may not match the query, while at Google, you get ads that are truly tailored to an audience of one: You.

I have no problem with that. If you have nothing to hide, then why worry about data collection? Besides, Google is just one among many companies harvesting terabytes of data, and then selling them on the open market. But you know what happens as a result of this? You get ads that are likely to be extremely relevant to you, and I like that. I do not want to put up with ads distributed shotgun-style when a rifle could be used to sell me what I really want.

This explains why I continually see ads for bicycles, cameras, and outdoor gear that I normally purchase. I don’t want to see ads for much else, although I must confess I was really intrigued to see the Facebook ads a few months ago for Nordic Socks. I bought ten pairs and my feet are loving every minute of every day. So score one point for random advertising, but all others, save your money.

The beauty of targeted advertising is that it lessens the risk for the advertiser, who knows they are communicating with the people most likely to buy the item. Compare this to traditional broadcast marketing over television, radio, and newspapers, with little or no knowledge of who is actually consuming the media. It’s like scattering a bag of seeds over a variety of terrain, and hoping that something sprouts.

So I’m good with the data issue. I’ll stick with Google. I’ll stick with Facebook, Amazon, Apple, and all the others monitoring my every word and move. And I am really happy that when I am writing a paper, all I have to do is go to Scholar.Google.com and not some germ-infested card catalog. I’d much rather the fingerprints left behind these days be digital and not the kind left by our digits.

Dr “Search Me“ Gerlich

Audio Blog

[thwippyparker]

Try To Fix You- Chapter 5

Masterlist

Read Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4

Feel free to comment, like, or share this if you want to be added to a tag list, or you can add yourself HERE. Enjoy!

Eventual Peter x Reader, Friends to Lovers, Eventual Smut, ANGST **************************************************************************

Avengers Tower was just as intimidating on the inside as it looked from the outside. The lobby was much busier than expected given the hour, full of people who you assumed to be agents. The dress ranged from street clothes on operatives who appeared to be on undercover missions to tactical gear. You assumed the agents dressed in business attire were more of your run of the mill desk workers. It was hard not to be intimidated surrounded by all of these people who could probably tell you dirt on everyone in the city and/or kill you without batting an eye. Guards in full tactical gear were posted by each door “I guess you always have to be on guard when you’re the freaking Avengers!”  You thought to yourself as you walked past the lobby and into the elevator corridor. You got a few odd glances from a gaggle of business women chatting about lord knows what. However, as soon as Peter saw the guard manning the elevator, some of his stress began to melt off of his shoulders.

“Hey kid, what are you doing here so late,” the man said with a sort of lopsided grin. He looked vaguely familiar but you couldn’t quite place him. His face was handsome in a rugged way, his hair was cut short and he seemed relaxed. His kind gray eyes like a calm sky, just before a storm. The way he looked at Peter showed he held a certain fondness for him, even if there was a glint to his eye that you read as mischievous. Almost like an older brother who loves to tease and taunt their younger sibling. He had a calming aura around him that made you feel safer just standing near him. He was one of the more casually dressed agents, wearing a black t-shirt, hoodie and some dark wash jeans. As you took in what he was wearing, you noticed the metal hand at the end of his hoodie sleeve. 

The realization hit you as your jaw went slack, the infamous Winter Soldier was a mere few feet from you. You had heard about him from Peter, after Europe and had then done some digging on your own when trying to learn more about the people your best friend chose to fight. His cybernetic arm seemed different though, what was once silver now black with delicate gold accents. It was odd to you but your realization didn’t remove the calm that you had felt just moments before. You expected with his past that you would feel on edge, but who were you to judge someone based solely on the past. 

“Just here to see Tony, Bucky. He in the penthouse?” Peter said smiling, oblivious to your inspection of Bucky. It was still so at odds with the image of him you had in your head of the nerdy, self conscious boy he once was. Here he was talking to a super soldier just as easily as if it were you or Ned. You obviously had a lot to relearn about him since the last time you had really been around him.

These last few weeks had been a roller coaster of trying to relearn your best friend, everything felt so new and yet still so similar that it was only moments like this that you really felt the effects of your time spent apart. It made your heart hurt thinking about it. Peter was always your lifeline, but lately he had felt more like a stranger, maybe it was because you just couldn’t see him for who he had become but rather what he had been. It was so hard to believe that 2 years could change so much. But the evidence was laid out in front of you, wearing neon and glitter just begging for you to notice, you made a promise to yourself to talk with him more about everything that had happened during the gap as soon as you were done here. Maybe it would help you create a new normal, one where you didn’t feel constantly thrown off kilter by life’s ever changing ways. 

“Yeah, the workaholic is where he always is, the lab. I’m a bit worried about him so I’m glad you’re here to visit.  It’ll really cheer him up, I know how much you mean to him. Almost as much munchkin, who by the way will also be thrilled that her big brother is here to visit. Do me a favor, tell her to easy up on the make-overs. She always makes me look like a drag queen, not my best look” Bucky said, shuddering as he turned his gaze towards you. He surveyed you as if he was trying to discern if you were good people or he would have to deal with you later  “Now Peter, it’s rude to not introduce your guest. Who is this lovely young woman” He had a softness to his voice that wasn’t there before, almost as if he could read your soul and realize just how close to breaking down you were. Everything had felt like it was getting back to normal before the phone call today. Now, you just wanted to curl up in one of Peter’s hoodies and lie on the couch while eating Ben & Jerry’s. 

Peter rubbed his thumb along the back of your hand as he glanced down at you. “Oh, right. This is y/n y/l/n, she’s my best friend.” He smiled at you as he looked back at Bucky, “Tony actually asked to see her, can you believe it?”

Bucky had a look of shock pass over his face for a moment before the stony, relaxed mask he had on before was resituated. He rubbed the back of his neck with his metal hand and you could hear the metal plates shifting slightly. “Wow, that’s kind of a big deal. You sure she can handle it, kid?” 

You were wondering what he could possibly be talking about. The last time you had seen or heard of Tony Stark was before the snap that caused everyone you loved to fade from existence. It was a surprise when everyone came back as suddenly as they left; but after he had saved the universe, his wife Pepper had given a statement that he was retiring and would like to not be bothered any further. Surprisingly, the press respected the statement. You guessed that’s what happens when you do what he did. It was shocking that the once media “darling” would back out from the limelight but who could blame him, he’d been doing the hero act for years and deserved some rest. 

Peter’s smile never wavered though as he looked at Bucky, “I think she can handle it. Plus, it’s not like she’s a complete stranger to him. I remember babbling his ear off talking about her when we would be in the lab tinkering with my suits. He also saw her kick butt on Flash’s live stream when we were in Europe when you all were on that ‘covert mission’, he said with air quotes using his free hand.  

Getting that Peter wasn’t going to take no for an answer, Bucky stepped aside as the door to the elevators opened.  “If you say so, punk. Just tell FRIDAY where to go, you know the drill. Oh, and y/n, nice meeting you. Sorry for the twenty questions,” he chuckled, “force of habit trying to protect everyone here, ya know? I hope to see you around sometime.” As the elevator doors closed, you released the breath you hadn’t realized you’d been keeping in. Peter looked at you and pulled you close, rubbing your back as he talked to the empty air of the confined space. “FRIDAY, Tony’s lab please.”

Suddenly a disembodied voice filled the silence, “Should I alert him of your arrival?” The voice sounded friendly enough, you were wondering if that was just you reflecting though. 

“Nah, he knows we’re on our way. Is Morgan with him?” he asked, still not letting you go, chin resting on the crown of your head. You could get used to the closeness of the action. Being with Peter, you had received a softness you hadn’t gotten in over a year and a half. It felt nice to be held without expectations or worry that a fight was on the horizon. Peter was stable and you didn’t realize how much you had missed the stability before that first night. 

“Morgan is currently with Mrs. Stark, on her way to dance practice, would you like me to alert them upon their arrival to the tower” You begin to wonder if you’ll get to meet the little girl who had thoroughly melted Peter’s heart upon being returned from wherever you all were during the snap. Once everything settled, Peter had gained two “adopted siblings” and the Parker’s had finally accepted Tony and Pepper's generosity. 

Last you knew, two years ago, Tony was even looking at Peter to take over the New Avengers and was in talks with Peter and his newfound friend/ “brother” Harley on who would run Stark Industries when Pepper inevitably decided to step down. You hadn’t heard much since then but from what you could tell, Peter had definitely stepped up on the hero front. You had learned after Peter had moved you in that he hadn’t really needed anyone to help cover the bills, as the Avengers were paying for it. Or rather Tony was, as Peter had accepted his offer to head up the New Avengers. 

As Peter was letting FRIDAY know what to do you couldn’t help but remember how you got to where you are now and imagine what could have been if you had taken Peter up on his offer and confession so long ago. Could you have been a part of this close family with the Avengers? Would you have finished school, avoided so much of the heartache that life after Peter had held? Or was this how things were supposed to play out? You couldn’t imagine what sort of entity would want you to suffer as much as you had but maybe it was a more malevolent god like Loki that really controlled all of this. That was a grim thought. You remembered how much destruction and death he had brought when you and Peter were much younger. 

As you were deep in your musings the elevator doors opened and you saw a vast engineering lab, if you could call it that. It looked like a mix between a hotrod shop and a robotics lab at MIT. Peter called for Tony and you suddenly heard a tool drop followed by a string of curses, some of the words you weren’t even sure if they were actual swears or the kind you make up when a child is present as a placeholder word. You marveled at the cars around you, cars you thought you would only ever see in pictures. If it wasn’t for the fear of getting ready to meet one of your heroes, you would be going nuts over the 1967 Shelby Cobra that looked like it had seen slightly better days. Tony called to Peter about his location and Peter began navigating you through the maze of machinery, tools, and robotic exoskeletons.

When your eyes finally landed on Tony, you didn’t believe what you saw. There he was, in the flesh. But he had looked different than all of the pictures you used to have plastered on your bedroom walls and the pictures in your textbooks at school. You noticed scarring along the right side of his face and saw the way it snaked down the side of his neck and disappeared under the collar of his shirt. The worst of the damage appeared to be on his arm; the scars appeared to be much deeper there than anywhere else. He looked as though he had sustained severe burns and you wondered how far the damage went. “Now the media black out makes sense,” you thought as the realization hit you like a ton of bricks. “He had always been a vain person, so of course he wouldn’t want anyone to see the damage sustained by the war.”

As he went to stand up, you heard machinery whirring quietly and looked down. He had what appeared to be metal braces on his right leg. It didn’t look like anything you had seen before. “Maybe he designed it himself. The perks of being rich and an engineer, you can make a better prosthesis for yourself.” If he had caught you staring, he didn’t let you know as he held his hand out for you to take it. 

“Y/n, I assume? It’s nice to meet you, sorry about the circumstances though.” You took his hand and shook it, trying not to pass out from sheer joy. Disfigured or not, this was the man who you had idolized for most of your formative years. “Just so you know, I won’t let him get away with what has happened. I have already sent over the police reports and evidence to my lawyer. Best attorney in the whole state, I actually moved her here from LA when I got into some legal problems before all of this,” he said, gesticulating wildly at the room around him.

“Wait, her?” Peter asked, “ I thought you said you would send it to your guy? If I had known your attorney was a girl, I would’ve told y/n, might’ve made her more at ease.”

“First of all, my young padawan, you assume too much. Her assistant is very much a man, and he is my guy. Most correspondence is through him as Ms. Walters is a very busy woman. She will of course be taking the case pro-bono as she hates any man who harms a woman, very feminist in that regard. Second, I’m sure no matter the circumstances Ms. Y/n would be uncomfortable as the current situation is a difficult one to process. Not to mention being in a building with a god, an ex carney turned assassin and his family, a hundred year old soldier, a jolly green giant, a guy who shrinks, a guy who flies, and of course me, the cripple.” He chuckled at his own expense as he directed his focus to Peter, ”All joking aside, I’m surprised she’s ever comfortable around you my Spiderling,” he stated, pulling Peter into a head lock and tousling his hair, “considering all the babbling you used to do, if I hadn’t seen the feeds, I woulda thought you made her up.” 

As he released Peter Tony looked at you, your eyes still wide with awe. “Hey Pete, why don’t you go get y/n a refreshment from the kitchen while I talk with her about some things. Then we can all have a grown up discussion about some things that have been nagging at me the last few weeks.” Peter looked between you and Tony, as if trying to communicate with you silently, making sure you were okay. You nodded and his face relaxed, his finally focusing on Tony, “Okay, but can I talk to you really quick?” Peter had an odd look on his face as he motioned for Tony to follow him to a separate area of the workshop.

**************************************************************************

Once Peter had reached an area where he knew no one without superhuman hearing would overhear what he was about to ask Tony, he turned to face his father figure and mentor. His heart raced and his palms became slick at the mere thought of what could happen when he left the room. “You’re not gonna tell her, are you? What I told you? I don’t think she’s ready right now, Tony. Plus, I just got her back. I can’t lose her again. When I got that phone call, I thought I had lost her for good. I can’t have you dropping any kind of bomb on her when she is already in a fragile position.”

Peter knew he was rambling but he couldn’t help it. The thought of you leaving him again terrified him. But you were already so upset that he didn’t know how to approach the topic with you when your world kept getting upheaved. He knew you would have to find out eventually, but he wanted to at least wait until the court case was settled.

“Peter, I would never betray your trust like that. I merely want to give her an opportunity to get to know me as a person. Let her get her questions, excitement, and nerves out before the poor girl’s head explodes. I’m working on a limited schedule before Pep gets back or Buck opens his big mouth and the whole tower is trying to make the rounds. I will send an alert to your phone once she’s given me the okay and you can come back. You told me how much you both look up to me a long time ago and I want to give her the same opportunity I gave you all those years ago. I noticed you didn’t tell her about why I look like this. Poor girl looks like she’s seen a ghost.”

Peter felt ashamed, blindsiding you with Tony’s condition but he didn’t want to scare you and if he was being honest, it was still hard for him to deal with. Peter would never tell you, but dealing with his PTSD from the war and then also facing both snaps was hard to do. That part of his story was hard for him to relive, even with you. But standing in front of Tony now, it brought back the memories, like always.

**************************************************************************

Peter had reached for Tony instinctively when he held the stones, before anyone else on the team. He felt the sheer power, got drunk off of it. At first, Peter wanted to bathe in the feeling forever, he felt invincible. Within moments, it became terrifying. This was an unnatural level of power that no being should ever possess, mortal or not. Every cell was filled with it, to the point where Peter felt like his nerve endings were splitting and reconnecting over and over again.

The edge was taken off as other members of the team grabbed on to Tony and each other. Everyone’s minds felt connected too, as though they were all one organism, with Tony being the leader. A loud cacophony of voices drenched with fear flooded Peter’s mind to the point where he couldn’t tell where he ended and they all began. When it was finally manageable, Tony used all the strength he could muster to end the fight once and for all. 

For a brief second after the snap, there was nothing. Then, pain tore through everyone as the power surged out. Loud screams bubbled from the Avenger’s mouths as one by one, they all let go. Despite the entire team sharing the burden, Tony had sustained the most damage. As Peter let go of Tony, he dropped to ground, nearly knocked unconscious from the collective pain he had felt. Peter quickly sat up, trying to compose himself as the sounds in his head didn't stop. That’s when he noticed Tony.  

As Thanos and his army vanished, Tony collapsed to the ground. Most of his right side was covered in horrible burns, the smell of burning flesh and ash heavy in the air. Dr Strange tore through the crowd to open a portal, only keeping it open long enough for Pepper, Peter and Rhodey to step through before slamming it shut.

Peter was unsure where he was until the sounds of monitors and the smell of disinfectant flooded his senses. He could still hear panic but now it was that of hospital workers trying to get Tony’s suit off and get him sedated. Peter wasn’t sure if he was hearing the staff or their thoughts. But he didn’t have time to figure out where he was or why he felt differently. He just thanked whatever force that controlled all the madness of the universe that Dr. Strange had gotten them to a hospital before Tony was too far gone. 

It was touch and go for a long time, but when the doctor came out with a relieved look on her face, Peter knew no matter how long it would take, everything would be fine. Only then did Peter allow himself to feel the exhaustion that had been creeping onto him since he had come back to the realm of the living. He felt himself slump in the chair, unable to keep himself upright any longer.

**************************************************************************

Peter came back to reality as Tony snapped his fingers in front of his face. “Earth to web head, you okay in there kiddo?” Peter shook his head to clear the fog as he looked at Tony. 

“I’m sorry Mister Stark, I should’ve told her about you or warned you that I hadn’t told her yet. It’s just… ugh!” Peter groaned, rubbing his face roughly, “I could hear how hopeless she felt, could feel it radiating off of her. I hate that I couldn’t have prevented this all because of some stupid thing I said years ago. I want to get her back, want to win her back. And I know it’s not the right time but I just can’t help but feel protective over her. She will always be the love of my life, even if I’m not hers. And to hear her talk about even letting the scum who hurt her get away because of who his father is made me see red. There’s no excuse for this though Tony, I’m sorry.”

Tony patted Peter’s shoulder, “I forgive you kid, I just hope she will when all is said and done.”

**************************************************************************

Masterlist

Read Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4

[badwolf-in-the-impala]

~When Love & Hate Collide -- Ch.1~

Moodboard made by myself @badwolf-in-the-impala. I do not own or take credit for any photos used. 

Edit to add: So I’m a ditz and forgot to change the ‘82 to ‘81, after doing the research and realizing that Crüe was touring in Canada in ‘82...and I had wanted this to start this off before they got actively into touring and became a huge deal...So keeping it in ’81 when they were just getting popular and shit...So yeah, thanks for coming to my TED talk on why I’m an idiot lol enjoy!  

A/N: So this is by no means going to be perfect, I’m sure...I’ve already re-written it twice, cause I’m a nitpick **insert nervous laughter here** But this is based off the movie ((The Dirt)) version of the band. Iwan!Mick needs more love/appreciation! Anywho, I hope you guys like it. 

Pairings: Iwan Rheon!Mick Mars x OC ((Faceclaim - Alison Mosshart))

Rating: Mature/18+

Chapter Warnings: Language, smoking, mentions of drug use, implied abuse...

Word Count: 5,267

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

Summer - 1981

Roxanna Hale traveled South, down I-5 to West Hollywood, CA, from Seattle WA. The old 1969 -- Black with White racing stripes -- Chevelle SS that she drove, rumbled along loudly, headlights illuminating the dark stretch of blacktop as Dawn slowly began to break and light the sky. The muscle car blowing around another line of cars with ease, the windows down and rock music blaring from the speakers as she fought to keep herself awake, lighting what felt like her hundredth cigarette.

She exhaled a cloud of smoke from the long drag she took, letting it trail from her red lips slowly as her thumb flicked against the filter, ashing it out the open window. The nicotine did little to quell the anger that still surged through every fiber of her body, as she sped towards her destination.

The last thing she had expected to happen when she woke up yesterday morning, was to walk in on her ex screwing some other chicks brains out...The fact that chick had turned out to be her best friend, and fellow band mate, only added insult to injury. Leading Roxxy to pack all of her shit -- music material and demo included -- before taking off for good; the incident occurring at a less than convenient time.

They had been scheduled, for today as a matter of fact, to audition for a spot as ‘Opening Act’ for another, more well known, band that was getting ready to kick off a tour. Nothing huge, but it was a long awaited opportunity that Roxxy had been waiting on for a very long time. She had headed over to the apartment where her -- now -- ex finance lived to start packing up their gear in preparation for the 18 hr drive to California, they had ahead of them when she walked in on the situation in question.

“C’mon, Baby!” Her ex begged as she continued shoving what she could fit into her backpack. “It- It was just an accident. I swear!” He added, still clinging to the sheet wrapped around his waist as he took a step back; Roxxy rounding on him.

“So what? You just like slipped and accidentally landed with your dick in her vagina?! Is that what you’re trying to tell me?” She nearly screamed, getting in his face. Roxxy’s anger only worsening as she watched him stutter over his words, trying to come up with some bullshit way to justify what he had done, but it was far too late for that as Roxxy cut him off before he could even finish. “I’m not a fucking moron, Kyle!

“Please, Baby, don’t do this! Not now, not with the audition tomorrow!”

“Yeah? Well maybe you should’ve thought that over better before you stuck your cock in my best fucking friend, the lead goddamn singer of MY band!” Roxxy seethed as she slung the backpack over her shoulder and picked up her guitar case as she turned for the door; stopping abruptly as Kyle grabbed her roughly by the upper arm and tried to drag her back. “Let go of me!” She rounded on him as she yanked her arm free, more than a little caught off guard by the sting of his hand as it connected with the right side of her face.

“You don’t get to fuckin’ talk too me like that, bitch--” Kyle had started but was cut off by the cold laugh that fell from Roxxy’s lips as she sneered up at him, wiping at the small trickle of blood from her lower lip with the back of her hand.

“Why, because you think you’re somebody fucking important now? Newsflash, you better think again, Baby.” Roxxy replied, making sure to emphasise the sarcasm in her voice as she called him ‘Baby’. “Because I built this, all of it!” She gestured around his living room at all the band equipment and gear laying around. “You, and this fucking shithole of a band, are nothing without me. So, you know, have fun playing dive bars and garage gigs for the rest of your life. ‘Cause I’m out!”

~

Her blood boiled as the memory of the argument replayed over and over in her mind. She had spent the last three and half years busting her ass for that band; HER band -- working two jobs and pinching pennies just to be able to play shitty dive bars and even shittier backyard parties, on the weekends.

Roxxy had been through hell and back, bending herself over backwards nearly her whole entire miserable, fucking life to try and achieve her dreams; and just when they were about to finally get their break...The whole fucking world comes crashing down on her. Just like it always does.

Now here she was, right back at square one with no money, no band, and the fucking audition of a lifetime that was now hanging in the balance...And as if her life couldn’t get any worse, what ever higher power that had been shitting on her life, apparently decided that now was the perfect moment for her car to blow a head gasket; still some 20-30 miles outside of her destination.   

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.” Roxxy whined as she hit her hazard lights and coasted the car off onto the shoulder of the road before cutting the engine and popping the hood as she bailed out to take a look. Waving her hand in front of her face with a cough as she lifted the hood and a cloud of white smoke from the overheated engine rolled up into her face, causing her to she take a step back. 

“Son of a bitch!” She slammed the hood shut, too dark still to see much of anything, but already knowing the engine was fucked as she rested her hands against the car, attempting several deep breaths so she didn’t lose her shit, completely; not that it helped. Roxxy picking up the nearest rock and chucking it into oncoming traffic as she screamed out angrily, fisting both hands into her dark hair before tossing them up entirely.

“Seriously! What the fuck have I done in my life to deserve this fucking shit?!” Roxxy yelled up at the sky. “Because I sure as shit don’t fucking remember!” She added, standing there for a few seconds longer, as if she would actually receive some kind of answer. But only the sounds of passing traffic surrounded her. Leaving her to heavily sigh as she grabbed her bag and guitar case from the backseat before locking up her beloved car, and began walking.

Praying that this day didn’t get any worse...Someone clearly taking that as a challenge as the next 8 hrs of walking only brought more hell down on her life. From being pelted by rocks kicked up by passing cars, too nearly being run over by an 18-wheeler that had veered off the road at one point -- causing her to bail off into the bar ditch in order to avoid being turned into roadkill; the gravel biting into her skin, scraping up her arms and hands.

But the icing on the cake had been the sudden surprise of a thunderstorm that now had her drenched. Leaving her exhausted and more than a little irritable as she finally made it to the Bar she and her band has been signed up to audition at...Four hours earlier. Roxxy made her way into the nearest restroom as she pushed her way inside and through the groups of people that crowded the place -- for what appeared to be some kind of open mic deal. Doing her best once making into the bathroom to clean herself up before finding an empty booth in a dark corner to hide herself in for a while; after putting in a phone call to towing service.

“Can I get’cha something, Sweetheart?” A pretty blonde woman -- that Roxxy assumed to be a bartender -- asked as she made her rounds on the floor; breaking Roxxy’s attention away from the man up on stage she had been watching, as she dug around in the back pocket of her jeans for her wallet, a frown tugging down the corners her mouth as she opened it to reveal her last five dollars.

“Um...Just a coffee, please?” Roxxy forced a soft smile as she pulled a couple dollars out and tried to hand them over, but the woman simply shook her head and held up her hand with a polite smile as she gave Roxxy a wink and said, “Keep it, Doll. Coffee’s on the house.” Roxxy heaved a sigh as the woman disappeared, returning only a few minutes later with a hot cup of coffee and a clean, dry, bar towel.

“Thank you.” Roxxy gave a genuine smile this time around as she accepted the towel and brought it up to her dark hair, the woman giving her a polite nod before turning to head back to her post behind the bar; Stopping when Roxxy spoke up again, catching her attention. “Hey, what does one need to do to go up on stage?”

“Nothin’ special.” The woman shrugged, glancing over to notice the guitar case that sat propped up against the booth. “Open mic. First come, first serve. Just give that man up there by the stage your name and he’ll put you in the line up.” She smiled before returning behind the bar, leaving Roxxy to contemplate if she was up for it or not. But at this point, what more did she have to lose? Aside from her dignity, maybe.

~

The first thing that caught Mick’s attention was the sound of the guitar and the heavy riff that fell effortlessly from it as her fingers changed over the strings with ease. The smoky, alluring sound of her voice filling the bar speakers as the words from Pat Benatar’s, ‘Heartbreaker’, fell from her lips, capturing the attention of the small audience that had gathered -- as well as his own band, who had been enjoying drinks. The room falling silent for a brief moment before people got into the rhythm of the song and actually started enjoying themselves; unlike with most of the prior participants whose performances had gone ignored. Save for a few of the die hard local fans that cheered them on.

They had seen their fair share of dive bar performers before, but never someone as confident as the dark haired woman up on stage now, who was venturing into territory few women had dared to dive into, yet, in this industry. Her rough, road worn appearance only adding to the edge she already had over most of tonight's participants; which drew the crowd further in as their curiosity peaked. It being easy enough to tell that she wasn’t a local by her ballsy taste in music.

“Hooooly shit!” Tommy was the first to speak up -- over the music -- among their group as he glanced excitedly between his friends and fellow bandmates, and the woman up on stage. “Are you dudes seeing this?!”

Mick simply rolled his eyes behind the pair of dark aviators he worse, shaking his head at the obviously stupid question...wondering for a moment why he ever agreed to put up with these dumb asses he called friends. The rest of the guys smirking and giving their drummer shit before ordering another round of drinks and returning to their conversation. But not Mick; no. He never took his eyes off the woman up on stage.

There were a few things he found intriguing about her and not all of it had to do with her looks; not that he was complaining. She was very easy on the eyes, as far as he could tell from his seat at the end of the bar. Her dark, layered, mess of feathered hair hung down in her face as she sung. Hiding behind it the striking features of her face. Full lips, high cheekbones, sharp jawline...it was like staring at God’s greatest creation. She was clad in a pair of ripped slim fit denims, a cropped muscle tank, that showed plenty of midriff, and a pair of combat boots. Rings and leather cuffs adorned her fingers and wrists.

What truly caught his attention though, was the guitar she played, or rather, the fact that she played it left handed...and upside down. But with her level of skill and confidence, you would never have been able to tell the difference, unless you knew exactly what you were looking at; as Mick did, obviously having played for enough years himself to know. She was good, to good in fact. Which left him to ponder how a woman with that kind of natural talent was still playing the bar/nightclub scene.

“Bitch has some pipes.” Vince mused with an impressed smirk as he passed Mick a shot, forcing him out of his thoughts as he finally tore his gaze away from the stage, give a curt nod to Vince in reply before he said, “She’s got some experience, that’s for sure.” before knocking back the contents of his shot glass. “She plays with a confidence not many possess...especially chicks.” Mick added.

“Yeah, dude, she may even be better than you are.” Tommy joked drunkenly, flinching as Nikki’s hand connected with the back of his head, and Mick rolled his eyes again in return.

“Maybe in your fuckin’ dreams...fuckin’ drummer.” Mick scoffed with a mildly irritated sneer. “She’s good, but not that good.” Mick added with half a lie. Because she really did have talent and with the right person to teach her, she could definitely go places.

“Don’t listening to him, Mick.” Nikki chuckled. “We’re jus’ givin’ you shit.” He added, earning a mumbled, “Whatever...fuckin’ teenagers.” From Mick as he turned his attention back to the woman on stage. Watching with great intent as she closed out the song with the it’s Solo; playing right over the top of other guitarist. The bar erupted into applause once she finished, giving a brief, yet humble bow, before unplugging the Fender Starcaster she played, that she carefully placed it back into its case before jumping off the stage and retreating back to the far corner booth she had been hiding in earlier. Mick and his group watching her for a bit out of curiosity and talking among themselves about her performance.

“Dude’s, we should like totally invite her the party later!” Tommy stated before taking another shot, the rest of the guys giving a mutual nod of agreement; even Mick. Though his aviator covered blue eyes never left the mysterious woman who sat alone, just across the bar.

~

An hour or so had passed since Roxxy returned to hiding in her booth; going through two more cups of coffee, intending on staying until they closed and had to kick her out. Not looking forward to having to potentially spend a night outside, especially if the weather didn’t straighten up before then. A small jolt of anxiety surging through her as the bartender approached her booth, again; fearful that was about to become a possibility.

Roxxy was just about to speak up -- shit, she’d beg if she had too -- in order to stay as long as possible, when the woman set a whiskey in front of her on the table. Earning a  very confused look from Roxxy as she looked up.

“From the gentleman, at the end of the bar.” The blonde yelled over the music, vaguely gesturing to a group of men who had their backs turned, up at the bar. “He said you looked like you could use something a little stronger than the coffee.” Roxxy’s lips curved down in a slight frown as she looked down at herself, giving a sigh.

“Well, um...tell him I said thanks.” Roxxy cleared her throat awkwardly, giving the bartender a soft smile before the woman walked away. Roxxy watching as she went back behind the bar and leaned over to the man at the very end, relaying what she assumed to be her thanks...Roxxy’s stomach nearly falling out of her ass as she recognized him, immediately, as he turned around to face her while holding up his own glass with a nod of ‘cheers’. Roxxy nearly knocking over her own drink as she blindly grabbed for it in order to return the gesture. Almost certain she looked like a deer in the headlights as he gave a smirk before returning to his drink.

“Mick Mars, of thee fucking Mötley Crüe, just bought me a drink.” Roxxy muttered to herself, still half shocked. “And I look like a mother fucking trashcan....could this day get any worse?!” She whined as she placed her forehead against the table, banging it softly against the wood a few times before sitting up and knocking back the entire contents of the rocks glass in front of her. Relishing in the burn that the amber liquid left in its wake, as it traveled down her throat. Wincing softly at the sensation before turning her attention to digging around in the pocket of her leather coat for her smokes, pulling out the last one and lighting it.

“I don’t fucking mean that seriously, either.” She threatened with a pointed finger, speaking to whatever unknown deity happened to be listening as she glanced up at the ceiling and exhaled the puff of smoke from the drag she just took. “I’ve had enough of your shit for one day!” A rush of embarrassment snapping her back to reality as the sound of someone clearing their throat caught her attention, turning to find the bartender back; bottle of Jack in hand as she smiled, jerking her chin over her shoulder at the bar. Roxxy giving a nod of understanding as she pushed the rocks glass over to be filled.

“Rough day?” The woman asked with a soft laugh as she filled the glass.

“You have no idea.” Roxxy groaned as she rubbed her temples with her fingers. “Thanks. Again.” She lifted her glass and gestured towards the bar before taking a sip.

“You know...you could always go tell him yourself.” The woman implied with a grin, giving a laugh as Roxxy starred up at her with a dumbfounded expression. Opening and closing her mouth several times before giving up entirely. This woman couldn’t possibly be serious, suggesting that she -- a complete and total nobody-- go up and talk to a band member of Mötley fucking Crüe; more importantly, the guitarist she had spent the last year idolizing.

“Just a suggestion.” The woman shrugged with a polite smile before leaving again.

Roxxy sat there for a while, weighing her options and sipping on her drink as she considered actually going up to the bar. I mean at this point, what was the worst that could really happen...she had already had a shit day, and besides, she was out of smokes and desperately craving another one, the nicotine somewhat staving off the withdrawals from lack of cocaine use. Having left her entire stash behind at her ex’s.

With a sigh, Roxxy scooted herself out of the booth and grabbed her jacket; draping it over her shoulder as she grabbed her guitar case, and bag before picking up the whiskey glass, knocking back the rest of the Jack Daniels it held before maneuvering her way through the crowd and up to the bar. Propping her stuff in the corner and placing her jacket on the last, empty bar stool, as she took a seat and set her glass on the bar. Mick glancing at her out of the corner of his eye with a raised brow, flagging down the bartender as Roxxy cleared her throat awkwardly.

“You really don’t have too–” Roxxy started, immediately cutting herself off with a mortified look, afraid she was going to offend him as Mick turned to look at her; raising his sunglasses. “I mean, t-thank you– I’m flattered, b-but, really, you don’t–”

“It’s cool.” Mick held up a hand, putting a cease to her ramblings with a half grin. “Wouldn’t be doin’ it if I didn’t want to.” He added as he pushed the now full glass towards her with a middle finger.

“Of course– I mean, I didn’t mean– You know what, I’m gonna shut up.” Roxxy rambled as she took a sip of her whiskey and tossed the empty carton of cigarettes onto the bar top as she fished out her wallet, opening it as she yanked out her last five dollars and tossed it beside the empty carton as she muttered, more so too herself, “I’m usually much more a bitch.” Mick nearly snorting his own drink out his nose as her overheard the comment.

“At least you’re honest.” He replied, motioning for bartender to leave her money and add it to whatever tab he had running. “Besides, looks like you’ve had a shit day.”

“That’s an understatement and a half.” Roxxy snorted with a laugh as she packed her fresh carton of Marlboro’s before opening it and pulling one out and lighting it; taking a drag as she offered the pack to Mick, who accepted and held it to the flame of the zippo lighter in her hand. Nodding his thanks as she snapped it shut and shoved it back into the pocket of her jeans. “I’m Roxanna, by the way.” She added while exhaling a trail of smoke as she offered him her hand. Mick chuckling softly as he glanced down at her hand before he shook it; catching sight of the ‘Mötley Crüe’ logo that was plastered to the front of her cropped tank top.

“Mick. But I’m going to assume you already know that?” He replied. Fighting to stave off the grin that tugged at the corners of his lips as he watched her cheeks tint red with a blush as she nodded, flashing him a coy smile.

“Guilty.” Roxxy replied with a soft chuckle before taking another drag from her cigarette. She exhaled slowly as she pushed a hand through her mess of dark hair, shoving it back and away from her face as she stared up at him with Emerald eyes from beneath her dark lashes. Mick looked as though he were about to say something else, when suddenly, Vince appeared between the two of them and wrapped an arm around Roxxy’s shoulders. A cocky grin plastered to his face as he leaned in close.

“Tell me somethin’?” He started in a confident tone as Mick rolled his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose as he inhaled deeply while muttering, “Jesus...here we fuckin’ go.”

“Did it hurt?” Vince continued, his smirk growing wider as Roxxy looked up at him with feigned interest; cocking her head to one side as she batted her eyes and smiled. Having heard this line one too many times for her liking.

“When I fell from heaven?” She finished for him, momentarily catching Vince off guard, but he was quick to recover, his tongue darting out over his lower lip as his grin widened into that signature sexy smile of his. Mick heaving an audible sigh of annoyance as he finished off his Vodka and ordered another.

“Exactly, Baby--” But before Vince could finish whatever he was about to add as a recovery to the botched pickup line, Roxxy cut him off.

“No...but I did scrape the shit out of my knees during my climbing out of hell.” She finished with a mildly suggestive smirk as she removed his arm from around her shoulders and finished off her cigarette before stamping the last bit out in the ashtray that sat between her and Mick. Vince standing there, slack jawed and bewildered by her response as a soft scoff left his lips. Making it obvious that he wasn’t used to being rejected in such a manner and the fact that Nikki and Tommy were now howling hysterically from a table behind them, didn’t help matters much.

“Did that really just--?”

“Happen?” Mick said, cutting Vince off; his own expression almost as surprised as the lead singers. “Yeah. It happened.” He added, Vince giving a curt nod before skulking back to the table he and the other two band mates had taken up residence at. Leaving Mick to stare at Roxxy with a look of astonishment on his face.

“Holy shit…” Roxxy said with a nervous laugh. “Did I really just offend, Vince Neil?!”

“Yes, and it was fucking fabulous.” Mick smirked as he held up his glass, Roxxy taking the hint and picking up her own as she clinked it against his and took a sip before turning around to the table behind them.

“Is you’re ego gonna alright?” Roxxy asked honestly, though it came out a little more sarcastic than she intended which earned another round of laughter. “No, I mean like really?!” She added.

“Dude!” Tommy howled with laughter, nearly doubling over as he tried to catch his breath. “She’s like the chick version of Mick!” He added, Roxxy fixing him with a glare as she pointed her finger and said, “Watching yourself, drummer boy.” The comment eliciting more laughter, this time including Vince as he turned to look between herself and Mick; who were both glaring at the group in front of them.

“That’s fucking disturbing.” Vince laughed.

“What’s your name, Sweetheart?” Nikki chuckled as he took a sip of his beer, trying to change the subject before Mick started knocking their heads together for his own satisfaction.

“Roxanna.” She replied. “Most everyone calls me Roxxy, though.”

“Oh dear Jesus, not another one.” Nikki gave a short laugh as he turned to look at Tommy, who’s complexion had paled considerably, which caused Roxxy to raise an eyebrow. “Long story.” He added. “Nikki, by the way.”

“She’s aware.” Mick stated as he leaned back against the bar, vaguely gesturing to her shirt. The rest of the guys giving a collective, “Ooh” in response as Roxxy gave a nervous chuckle. Not even sure how any of this was happening right now.

“Come. Sit.” Nikki nodded at their table as Tommy pulled two more stools over for her and Mick. Roxxy briefly giving them a skeptical look, somehow waiting from them to laugh and say they were just kidding...but when that didn’t happen, she moved her things and took a seat at the table between Tommy, and Mick, who took the other seat beside her. “So, what’s your story?” Nikki added curiously after Roxxy was settled at the table.

“Like, the short version?” Roxxy snorted as she took a sip of her whiskey, cocking an eyebrow as she looked up at the band’s bassist. “Woke up yesterday morning to help my band pack for a gig ‘slash’ audition, showed up, walked in on my ex screwing my best friend; the bands lead singer. Packed my shit. Left. Drove 12 fucking hours from Seattle till my car broke down, had to walk, nearly died, missed my fucking audition, got rained on...and now, here I am.” There was a few minutes of collective silence as the guys sat there, staring at her as they tried to process that output of information.

“Jesus.” Mick mumbled into his glass.

“Yeah...And that’s only the last 24 hrs.” Roxxy replied. “A fuckin’ cake walk compared to the rest of my life.”

“Well, fuck that guy.” Nikki finally spoke as he offered her shot glass. “And fuck this day! I mean, at least it’ll end on a note of awesomeness; sitting around having a drink with this group of fucking degenerates!” He added, reaching a hand over and bouncing Tommy’s forehead off the table, which earned a round of laughter from the group.

“Not gonna argue with that.” Roxxy chuckled with a shake of her head before knocking back the contents of the shot glass and placing it upside down on the table. Taking a drag from her cigarette before adding, “I mean honestly, if someone had told me a year ago that I would be sitting in a bar sharing drinks with Mötley Crüe...I probably would’ve punched ‘em in the face.”

“You should most definitely come to our party!” Tommy stated excitedly after pounding two more shots. Roxxy raising a questioning brow as she waited for him to continue, but before he could they were interrupted by the bartender who brought over a telephone and held it out for Roxxy to take; giving a very confused, “Hello?”

“Are you a Miss,” He paused, the sound of papers being rifled through filling the silence on the other end of the line before he continued. “Roxanna Hale?”

“Yeah, that’s me?” Roxxy stated as she waited for the man to continue.

“This is Dan, I’m with Auto Doc’s 24 hr towing service. You called earlier this evening about your car? A Black ‘69 Chevelle?”

“That would be mine.” Roxxy sighed as she pinched the bridge of her nose, waiting for what she assumed would surely be bad news.

“Well, we picked it up and got it back to the shop. Someone should be able to take a look at first thing in the morning...but um, we’re gonna need the keys. I also have some papers I need you to sign off on before we’d be able to look at it? I understand it’s late, so if you can’t--”

“No, no, it’s cool.” Roxxy replied as she grabbed a napkin off the table and gestured for a pen, three suddenly appearing in front of her face as she grabbed one. “What’s the address?” The man gave it her, along with the shop number before she hung up and downed what was left of her whiskey.

“Wait, you’re not leaving already, are you?” Tommy asked with a mildly dejected puppy dog expression as they watched Roxxy stand and slip on her leather jacket; flipping her hair out of the collar as she smiled softly at him.

“Yep, unfortunately...gotta go sell my soul to the devil so I can get my car fixed.” Roxxy replied jokingly as she threw her bag over her shoulder and picked up her guitar case. “It’s been a pleasure, boys, truly.” She added, turning to address Mick separately as she said, “And thank you for the drinks.”

“No problem.” Mick gave a slight nod as he slipped his sunglasses back on. Disappointed she was leaving already, but not about to show it as he turned back to his drink as Roxxy turned to head for the door, the rest of guys turning to stare at him in disbelief. “What?” Mick stated as he glared at his band mates from behind his glasses.

“You’re seriously gonna let that just walk outta here?!” Vince arched a brow skeptically as he spoke up.

“So?” Mick retorted in a gruff tone as he took another sip of his Vodka.

“So?! You could at least give her the address to the apartment?!” Vince exclaimed as Mick simply shook his head, ignoring him entirely. “You know what, fine. I’ll do it.” He added, reaching for one of the pens on the table. Tommy beating him too it as he snatched one and bounded off towards the door to catch Roxxy. Returning a short while later, grinning triumphantly as he returned the pen.

“Fifty bucks says she shows up.” Vince smirked as he glanced over to Mick who had finished off his drink and was making to leave, himself. Pausing for moment as he turned back to the lead singer with his usual, disgruntled, expression as he replied, “Hundred bucks says she won’t.”  

And without another word, Mick disappeared into the crowd.  

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

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INTERVIEW: ALA.NI

UK-born, Paris-based artist ALA.NI will be releasing her upcoming sophomore album ACCA on January 24.  

ACCA consists primarily of dense, harmonically intricate vocal arrangements with sparse or no instrumental backing at all. It’s the followup to ALA.NI’s debut 2017 album You & I and while some critics made comparisons to the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Judy Garland, the infectious beats and rhythmic tunes on ACCA owe more to Dr. Dre and Errol Dunkley than Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan.

ALA.NI initially envisioned her second album as a completely a capella project, and indeed ACCA is made up almost entirely of human voices (beatboxing serves as percussion, and she lowered her own vocals with an octavizer on several tracks to create the illusion of bass).

Along with Iggy Pop, Lakeith Stanfield (Sorry to Bother You, Atlanta, Get Out), makes an appearance on the album, but make no mistake: ACCA is pure ALA.NI. She wrote, produced, and arranged each song herself, layering up hundreds of vocal tracks in order to create an immersive, hypnotic world that blurs the lines between vibrating vocal cords, bowed strings, and blown reeds.

We had a chat with ALA.NI more about the story behind ACCA and the making of the record, collaborating with Iggy Pop, her struggles in the industry and more. Read the full interview below.

ACCA is dropping in just under two weeks. What is the record about lyrically and what does it mean to you?

"Lyrically, I speak on love of course, but from situations like the abusive relationship of a friend ('Hide'), my definition of love ('Wales'), a relationship in turmoil ('Van P'). 'Papa' was a poem for a friend that took a journey, via Mexico, into becoming a song. 'Le Diplomate' encounters a brief encounter with a french diplomate. I wrote about segments of my life."

You & I was written a capella but ACCA was created completely using a vocals-only technique which I think is so awesome and creative. What inspired you to make the record this way and what was your favourite part of the creative process?

"I always write a capella but with visions of instrumentation around it. With the ACCA album, the first song that made me feel confident that I could make a whole album based just around my voice, was 'Le Diplomate'. I wrote it for the man himself. It was not intended to be a song, but after I reviewed it and impressed myself with my mouth trumpet noises, I was convinced that I could conceive a whole album like this. I like working with parameters, so no instruments was a good one. Although after 3 months away from the studio recording process and some deep consideration and after being told by my mentor that it can't be "the ALA.NI show", I decided to add some subtle additions in the way of a male voice and low end instruments to the compositions. Accordion, bass clarinet, electric bass. Producing for me is like cooking. You add and taste, add and taste. Balancing the flavours out all the way.

"The process was...well I often used the words, "a brain fuck!!!!". It was a lonely process too. I had some stages with other musicians, but that was only for about 10% of the studio time, for the rest, it was just me and the engineer. My favourite part of the process was putting down the vocals. I love harmonising, so that was so satisfying....the rest has literally turned my hair grey! Ha!"

You & I had very much a a jazzy kind of vibe but the tracks from ACCA so far have a fuller and more upbeat sound.

"I never said ever, ever that I was a jazz singer. I have never wanted to limit myself like that, as I know I have many different ways and styles to express the music in me. The ACCA album allowed me to enter more into being able to move my body. I was stuck behind a stagnant mic for so long. I think that was the real reason for giving myself some beats."

You collaborated with legend Iggy Pop on a track for the album. How did that come about? We hear he is a big fan of yours?

"He is just too cool and cute and so incredibly giving of himself. I saw him perform recently in London and I felt so touched and happy and proud to watch this man at 72 do his shit! Damn! What an inspiration. He is a fan and I am so blessed to have his support. I literally got my people to ask his people if he'd like to collaborate and he simply said "yes". I went out to Miami to record him at his studio and it was one of the most surreal moments of my life. Directing Iggy Pop in the booth..."erm Mr. Pop, can you do that again please, the last take was shite!!!" Ha!

"He actually said this about me recently on his radio show...

"I worked as a guest once on one of her tracks and she came to America to produce it and brought a whole suitcase full of incredible microphones with her and she’s a perfectionist, her attention to detail is daunting and I had to toe the line, she’s tough."

"It's not true...honest..."

What do you hope fans will take away from ACCA?

"I have no idea. I can't control their ears or minds. I just made the music my heart wanted to make. I'm just happy to have them receive it...words from my heart. Whether they think its good or bad has nothing to do with me. You can't please everybody."

This is true! So, do you have plans to tour ACCA and if so, how will you translate the record on to the stage?

"This exercise too has been a head fuck. I have decided to go for cello, accordion and beatboxer for my live set up. Cello has a voicing that is very close to the human voice, so it works well and is so versatile as an instrument. Accordion has been a treat to work with. I never thought I'd be working with such an instrument, but it too is versatile and adds a very distinctive tone and texture to the music. I had to convert 300+ vocal parts into instrument parts, which was a fun (not) exercise. Beatboxer can do the most craziest things with his mouth. We are all learning to make mouth noises. Its a nice bunch of us on the road. I'm happy to be around good hearted, passionate people to make music with."

You've been in the industry a few years now. What challenges, if any, have you faced? And how did you overcome them?

"Hahahahahah!!!! It's daily and it seems to get worse the more I push to change the norm. Females are hugely under represented in the music industry, so its a daily struggle. I basically manage, produce, create myself, so its not an easy task I have given to myself.

"I don't have a tour manager, because I hate the fact that when I arrive at a venue, no one talks to me when I do have one. They only liaise with the "male manager" and not the artist. They are not used to dealing directly with the artist, especially a female one who knows exactly how she wants her gear set up. Oh, the fights I've had just to have my monitor where i like it. Its pathetic!"

That is absolutely ridiculous! But sadly, many women in the industry have similar stories. If there was one thing you could change about the music world today, what would it be?

"More tits, less dicks!"

Amen! You have had such an impressive career so far. What has been the biggest highlight for you to date and what are you looking forward to in 2020 and beyond?

"I remember nothing. I do the shit and I move the fuck on. I'm terrible like this. I like to be present and forward thinking.

"My career and life are so inter-twined, that for me, I keep it simple...I am just happy everyday to be alive and to be blessed enough to be able to do the work of my hearts calling. Thats all i ask for. To be able to continue to do the things i want to do....freedom."

ACCA arrives January 24.

Photo credit: Martin-oger Daguerre