#and two kind of the point of the campaign is that everything they do matters in many ways more than the end

[medicinemane]

I was thinking of a character of mine, who is a very powerful shapeshifter, who has a particular affinity for doing stuff with their blood

Anytime someone stabs them they basically unleash hellish blood tendrils and spikes and whatever

The funny part of course being that they literally could do that at any time, it's not like they have to wait to be stabbed, it's just more dramatic and fun to have a "you done fucked up" clause when you get stabbed

[sorchathered]

Let’s do IT for our country

Pairing- President!Robert “Bob” Floyd x reader

Warnings- smut smut and more smut, breeding kink, language, mentions of pregnancy, us politics, I think that’s it?

Summary- Robert Floyd had never wanted to be the president, but here in the Oval Office on inauguration night with his First Lady? He could get used to nights like this.

A/N- It’s that time again! Another IBFFM, but this time with an older version of our sexy WSO. Mr. President is about 45 here, his First Lady is in her mid 30’s.

Also it’s @bobgasm ‘s birthday present!! Happy birthday to my precious Steph, love you so much baby!!

For as long as he could remember, Robert Floyd had been told he would be great.

His family name was synonymous with the likes of Kennedy and Roosevelt, the Floyd’s were some of the most influential in political history, and with that came high expectations. You must go to a prestigious college, you must serve your country (whether that be as a civil servant or military member), and you must marry the right kind of person. They talked about it as if they were breeding horses, and it never made any sense to him, so long as he found someone kind and supportive all of the bullshit that his family expected mattered very little to him. He would tick off whatever boxes they wanted, but it would be on his own terms.

He went to the US Naval Academy after high school, refusing to hop onto the Ivy League lifestyle his grandfather so desperately cherished. Moving on to aviation as a WSO and then becoming one of the top 1% in the country in his field. It was a distinguished career to be sure, but he’d been adamant that he had no interest in pursuing a political career, and certainly not the presidency.

He still wasn’t sure what had brought him to this point, or how he’d somehow managed to bag his dream girl in the process. A feisty junior senator from Delaware, good family, strong morals and drop dead gorgeous to boot, you’d been his match in every way. Sure you had hated his guts, he was the golden boy and you had dealt with his kind your whole life. But after a particularly long day in the senate he’d asked you to dinner, and while you’d had half a mind to tell him no the prospect of a free meal wasn’t worth passing up. So in a dingy dive bar with greasy burgers and cheap beer, you took a chance on him and fell ridiculously in love.

Four years had passed since you’d both sat in the creeky wooden booths of that shitty bar, and it felt simultaneously like yesterday and a lifetime ago. His family had pushed him into politics and while he had been adamant in the beginning that he would never pursue the presidency, the world had changed dramatically since he first refused the mantle. He may have hated the pageantry of it all, but at his core he truly did want to help people, and they certainly took notice. He’d run a clean and honest campaign with his best girl by his side, and won in a landslide. Everything moved very quickly from Election Day to Inauguration Day, it almost felt like he had blinked and he was here, wandering the halls of the west wing after skipping out on the last two of 10 gaudy inaugural balls he’d been forced to attend. He’d been going since sunrise and still couldn’t seem to get the jitters under control so he could rest; he suspected it would be quite a while before that feeling went away. Shaky hands moved to open the door to the Oval Office, completely renovated and designed by his beautiful wife to fit his style and personality, you’d made sure he would want for nothing, he’d be spending so much time in this room and it seemed only logical to make it a calm and safe space for him and his thoughts. It felt so much like his office at home, even down to the worn leather chair and the soft scent of sandalwood and tobacco from the candles you bought because it reminded you of him. You had told him you’d be heading to change and wouldn’t be gone long, he had plans to unwind with a bottle of bourbon and maybe a game or three of checkers, but as you slipped into the spacious and hallowed room belonging to the commander in chief, he nearly jolted out of his skin. There you were, his First Lady, in a skimpy little silk robe, intricate updo long gone in favor of soft curls, and the adorable little fuzzy cat slippers that he’d bought you for Christmas.

“Good evening Mr. President” you said with a smirk as you locked the door and padded over to his desk. You’d chosen well, the beautiful mahogany writing table had belonged to Theodore Roosevelt, and while it hadn’t been used in many a president’s term, you had made sure it was painstakingly restored and ready for his first day. Now that you were here, all he could seem to think of is how much fun it might be to test the sturdiness of the surface, perhaps he did need to blow off a little steam after such a stressful day…

“Sweet girl, you do realize there’s cameras everywhere right?” He said as you pushed his chair back just enough to fit between his thighs, very gently sitting on the edge of the antique escritoire. This desk had seen many a scandal, so many historical events, and you were quite sure she should handle the weight of what you had planned next.

“Already got that covered, Phoenix is on surveillance right now, you can go ahead and go dark Nat!” You said in the general direction of where they’d mentioned cameras were placed, a notification on your phone let you know she’d confirmed that the two of you had thirty minutes all to yourselves and you broke out in a blinding grin as you leaned forward to press a kiss to Bob’s jawline. The sharp intake of breath and his hands immediately going to your hips let you know he’d need this just as much as you, it had been embarrassingly long since the two of you had been together, and you filed away the notion that you would need to make sure you had the right security in play to make quickies like this a regular occurrence, policy be damned.

You’d drawn his lips to yours as you untied his tie and began unbuttoning the front of his dress shirt, his hands had drifted to palming your ass as he licked the seam of your mouth, a gasp from you was all he needed to slide his tongue against yours, squeezing you a little more roughly and all but pulling you into the plush office chair.

“Fuck I missed you,” he breathed into your mouth, you’d nearly gotten his dress shirt removed when he slotted his knee between your legs, large hands gripping the back of your thighs as he placed you back on the desk, this time swiping whatever loose papers off the top and sending them cascading across the plush carpet that held the presidential seal. You squealed and giggled, watching with rapt attention as he removed his dress shirt and exposed the defined freckled skin of his arms, pulling his undershirt off with less finesse as it joined the pile of papers on the floor. “I’ve never found a president to be sexy until just this moment, I have to admit, you look damn good in this office, sir” you said as you leaned back on your palms and ogled him, heat crept up his cheeks and chest at your praise, but his eyes had darkened at the honorific, you knew exactly what you were doing to him, and he could feel his dress slacks getting uncomfortably tight as you ran your bare feet up and down the back of his legs.

“You wanna be a good girl for me Madame First Lady? Let me lay you out and devour you where anyone could walk in?” His voice grew impossibly deeper and you let out a whimper in response, shifting to try and get some relief. You did want that, you wanted it so badly you could scream, it was the very thought of being dirty and unladylike for the man you loved that had you so hot and bothered, and he trailed one long finger down your sternum to remove your robe, fire in his eyes as he opened the sash and found you completely bare for him.

“Goddamn it, should have known you’d do this, you know exactly how to wind me up don’t ya? Whole world wants to know how to bring me to my knees and all they’d have to do is weaponize you and this perfect pussy.” He was completely fixated on your arousal glistening between your legs, and while normally you’d let him take his time, you knew it wouldn’t be long before some aid or agent came by to make sure he had everything he needed for the evening. If they only knew.

“Bobby, please? Don’t have a lot of time baby” you said as you squirmed on the polished wood and searched for some kind of relief. He seemed to snap out of his haze as lust clouded eyes fixed on yours, letting his index finger trail down your stomach and through your folds, watching your head fall back and chest heave at his teasing.

“Need to hear you say it sweet girl, you know what I want.” You blushed in earnest, he loved how dirty you could get, but that had always been behind closed doors in the comfort of your own home, you’d be mortified if anyone heard some of the things you’d said in the throes of pleasure; but it was his big day after all. If he wanted it, you’d give him the moon.

“Need your mouth on me Daddy, want you to make me cum and then fuck me with your big dick. Please? Please give it to me, ‘s been too long, fuck - I-“ you babbled at him as he continued to rub that one long finger up and down, it was maddening and had you choking on your words, thankfully he didn’t make you wait, spreading you open and pressing two fingers into you as he leaned forward and wrapped his lips around your clit. The relief was immediate, you moaned out into the empty room as he went to work on your aching pussy, drawing tight circles with this tongue as he scissored his fingers inside you. It had been weeks and he knew he’d need to get you ready, but he couldn’t help but feel like he was going insane over the little noises you made and the iron grip you had on his hair, tugging at his scalp as you bucked up into his pretty face to search for your release.

It was startling how fast he got you there, you were certain you were dripping down onto the desk now, wet smacks and moans coming from between your thighs as you peeked down to look at his deep cerulean eyes. He was too damn good at this and he knew it, had the audacity to wink at you as he nibbled on your clit and with a gasp you came all over his face, watching as he wiped his mouth with his arm and smirking like the cocky bastard he was. He controlled the entire free world now, but he would still consider it his greatest accomplishment that he could render his pretty wife to a babbling needy mess with his tongue. Disheveled looked good on you, blush spread across your cheeks and chest, hair a mess, and your release all over your thighs from what he intended to be one of at least three mind blowing orgasms.

You looped your heavy arms around his neck and kissed him languidly, you didn’t seem to be as worried about the time anymore and for that he was thankful. He wanted to take his time, and if somebody walked in they would find out very quickly to knock, he couldn’t give a shit about anything other than getting his cock inside you.

You knew the rule all too well; no visible marks. It had been that way from the very beginning, which was unfortunate because you wanted so badly to mark his pretty neck up and make sure everyone knew he was yours, but the compromise was that you could leave them anywhere below the collarbone, so as he fished for the condom he’d stashed in his pocket (hoping to end the night just like this), you licked down his neck and began nibbling on the flesh of his pecks, sucking a nipple into your mouth and looking up at him as his jaw went slack. “Oh Christ, you gotta stop that baby or we’ll be finished before we even get started” he panted out and tried not to buck up into you, the hand gripping your thigh was sure to leave a mark but you couldn’t give a shit, there was something so powerful in being able to bring the most powerful man on earth to his knees, and even better knowing that he was insatiable for you.

“Then fuck me Mr. President, and you don’t need that condom either. I think you should put a baby in me, fill me up so good that I’m dripping with you all day tomorrow.” You grinned at him but he looked completely debauched, he ran a hand through his graying sandy locks and blinked down at you, almost at a loss for words.

“You little minx, you’ve been just waiting all day to drop that on me haven’t you? Need me to cum in that pretty pussy and get you good and knocked up? Fuck you’d think it was my birthday or something, I don’t know how I got it so good.” He said as he spread you out and ran his hands all over you, you were whimpering and grinding into him and he was sure he’d pass out if he was any harder, slipping himself out of his briefs and sliding his length through your slick. You were trying hard to be quiet, sure it was late but there was bound to be someone on watch, Bob gripped your chin as he slid into you and kissed you sloppily, all teeth and tongue and moans, shallow thrusts to get you ready turned rough when you sucked his bottom lip and pushed your hips up to take him to the hilt. You gripped the front of the desk behind your head and let him pound you into it, the need for quiet long forgotten as you alternated between crying out and calling him daddy.

It didn’t take him long before he was close, the aftershocks of your second orgasm seemed to keep him gripped so tight that he could barely think straight, he was furiously rubbing your clit to get you there again as he watched tears drip down your flushed cheeks, he’d never forget tonight for the rest of his life. Not all the fanfare, not even the immense weight of the mantle he was about to take, but this moment right here, wrapped up in his gorgeous wife as he fucked her silly in the Oval Office. You wailed out “I’m cumming” as you gripped him tight with your pulsing heat and he tumbled over the edge right along with you, warming you from the inside out as he filled you up.

You cradled his sweaty form in your arms as you both came down from your high, giggles erupting from him as it really set in what you two had done.

“Ah shit, well everyone’s gonna know that we can’t keep our hands to ourselves after this, I imagine the press will have a field day.” He kissed your nose as you grinned at him, both of you still joined together but neither of you ready to separate.

A loud ring came from his phone and it sent a jolt through both of you, wide eyes trained on his as he leaned forward and grabbed it off the hook. His eyes were full of mirth as he nodded his head once, twice and bid them goodnight, pinching your cheek with his free hand before hanging up.

“What was that all about?” You said, trying to push him up so you could get decent and off his desk.

“That was Nat, she said we need to hurry the hell up before me going MIA causes a national emergency.” He was joking of course, but the secret service agents at the door couldn’t look either of you in the eye as you shuffled down the hallway with Bob’s hand in yours, and it was no surprise to anyone when you turned up pregnant by the state of the union.

Tagging- @bobgasm @attapullman @bobfloydsbabe @floydsglasses @sebsxphia @roosterforme @sunsetsimpsblog @seitmai @auroralightsthesky @withahappyrefrain @hangmanapologist

[utilitycaster]

as a bit of a coda to my post re: C3 likely ending very soon and why some of the worst of C2 fan responses are unlikely, I want to highlight something from C2's ending I forgot that is still relevant: the ending of the campaign is ultimately much more about when the party would part ways, rather than every single thing being resolved. There are also important parts of people's stories that just don't translate well to D&D actual play (notably in C2, Thoreau and Trent being put on public trial).

No matter what Bells Hells do, everything about the moon will have long-term ramifications, and because of Imogen and Fearne we will presumably get some idea of the fate of Ruidusborn in the immediate sense, but anything more needs to marinate. For all I take issue with the ending of Rusty Quill Gaming (not spoiler tagging as it's 2+ years old but: destruction of all magic, arcane and divine, with basically no lead-in or earlier seeding that this was a possibility) they did make the very intelligent choice to end the campaign right after the climactic battle, and then show two brief RP-centric epilogues for the characters, one five years out and one further down the line, to give snapshots of how the world and characters have adapted. Those epilogues did a lot to soften my opinion of an ending that I genuinely think wasn't very well done, because they were thoughtfully chosen.

The Mighty Nein were very much not done adventuring, to a degree, but they were done with the adventures they were having as a group, at least as a constant thing (obviously, they'll bring the gang back together - they're doing so right now). They had conflicting needs that were all somewhat time sensitive, and several of them did wish to pause and spend time with their family at that point. Some of what we thought were plot hooks at the time became stories for another party (Team Wildemount in Molaesmyr was a highlight of C3 for me!), some were the subject of one-shots (Uk'otoa and Trent), and some might be even more long term, whatever that may mean (Chained Oblivion - which could also in theory pay off even in the presumably very few C3 episodes we have left).

So: not every plot thread needs to be wrapped up, the end of a campaign doesn't mean the end of a story, and some parts of a story are better told outside the context of the campaign. Again: I am not judging you for being sad it's ending! In fact, I think anyone who is doing that is kind of an asshole! But I do think it's important to recall that the campaign ending and the story ending are different things, and to consider what actually needs to be wrapped up for a satisfying conclusion, vs what you want to see, particularly because "what you want to see" is very likely to still come to pass down the line as a one-shot, two-shot, beat in a future campaign, or something else. (Unless it's some non-canon shipping bullshit in which case. please check out ao3. great website. will have what you want.)

[qqueenofhades]

One of my biggest annoyances is leftists and communists beinging up Biden’s tweets during the 2020 campaign of things he said he would do, and being like “see?? he didn’t deliver on anything and this is why you shouldn’t vote for the Dems again” Like, for all the understanding they seem to have of communist or marxist or whatever theory, the idea that the President is not a king and can’t do whatever he wants without Congress’s approval is lost on them?? He still believes in those things but if Congress won’t pass the legislation what is he supposed to do? EOs won’t solve all our problems.

Yeah. Not even to mention, the claim that "Biden hasn't done/delivered anything!!!" is a big fat lie, as people keep pointing out the things he has done, with a razor-thin House majority (until 2022) and two "Democratic" senators who torpedoed everything and one of whom has now literally left the party (Manchin and Sinema). So while Online Leftists obviously don't understand the difference between "achieving all of his campaign goals" and "achieving some," for the last frikkin time, Biden has done a lot of good things in very bad circumstances!!!!!! Using "he didn't do everything!!!!" as an excuse to not vote and so enable the open and unrepentant fascists is the stupidest fucking thing I have ever heard!!!!

Like. Take the debt deal. As in other things, Biden clearly learned from Obama's mistake (which was believing that the Republicans would ever negotiate in good faith about anything, and/or would reciprocate in kind if Biden made concessions). McCarthy whined for WEEKS that Biden wasn't listening and wasn't talking to him and wasn't entertaining his ridiculous proposals (22% cuts in ALL discretionary/non-military spending, including Social Security, Medicare, etc etc, while preserving the giant Trump tax cuts for the rich.) No matter that a full one-quarter of the national debt ($7.8 trillion of $31 trillion) was racked up under Trump and the debt ceiling involves paying bills that have already been spent. No sir, those Damn Free-Spending Democrats wanted to use your money on icky things like ~social welfare!! It was mean and it was hypocritical and it was blindingly obvious, and Biden just completely ignored it. He didn't try to negotiate in good faith with that, because there was no way it would work. He just let them whine.

Then, when it came down to it, Biden went in and got a deal that preserves pretty much all of the Democrats' major legislative priorities and expansions from the last two years. The only real change is raising the work requirement age for childless adults on SNAP food assistance from 49 to 54, but this has also been accompanied by a corresponding expansion of the definition "homeless" to make more people eligible, some for the first time ever. There's not going to be any major new spending for the next two years, but that wasn't happening anyway since the GOP controls the House and wouldn't agree to anything Biden put in the budget (and plus, none of the money that has already been allocated through the American Rescue Plan and other federal assistance is getting taken away). But more importantly, it raises the debt ceiling for the next TWO years and it won't come up again until after 2024. That is HUGE: the GOP really, REALLY wanted to hold the economy hostage again prior to the next presidential election. But Biden basically went in and told McCarthy to stfu and got what he wanted. Qevin was even forced, after months of "Sleepy Joe" GOP propaganda, to call Biden "very smart and very tough" in the negotiations. Soooo.

Anyway, this is what I mean: this isn't as sexy and/or as utterly fucking useless as spouting lukewarm rebaked "Marxist" propaganda on the Twittermachine about how Biden hasn't done anything, but it's the actual nitty-gritty work of government and flat-out beating the Republicans. They got absolutely shit-all that they wanted, because Biden didn't fall for their same old, same old dirty tricks and disingenuous squealing. He went in, got the job done, and will get way less credit for it than he deserves, from anyone. Dunno about you, but I like that guy. I plan to vote for him again.

[hero-israel]

So I've seen a lot of talk from people who allow that Israel was justified to attack Gaza after October 7th, but they feel that Israel still attacked too indiscriminately, killed too many Palestinians, and destroyed too much of Gaza. Two particular hangups I've seen most commonly are the idea that Israel should have done a "tactical counter-terrorism" action rather than a ground invasion, and a specific objection to Israel dropping 2000 pound bombs on Gaza specifically. I don't feel that I know enough about military tactics, so I don't know how legitimate it would have been for Israel to go into Gaza "tactically" or to drop smaller bombs, but I suspect Hamas would be a lot stronger than it is currently, and the same people would still be tut-tutting Israel's actions (if not calling them out with equal outrage). It's very frustrating

Everyone wants a better alternative but nobody describes what it is. Reminds me of the recent post about the Houthis - "don't bomb them, you need to find a way to get rid of the Red Sea embargo that only kills the badguys and nobody else." Okay, I'll just ask the genie of the lamp to magic them away. There are no options for going into Gaza that aren't utterly horrible. Hamas knows this, it was the whole point of their trap, and it is working.

Here's a fair-minded, moving essay by a Gazan Palestinian saying Israel needs "targeted, low-intensity, long-term operation[s] that could sustainably reduce Hamas’ military capabilities and create conditions to introduce a new administration in Gaza," and also admitting "tunnel warfare is dirty, complicated, costly and requires lengthy efforts and campaigns, not the short and swift operations upon which Israel’s military doctrine is built."

IOW, "go in and kill Hamas and destroy everything they have - but don't kill anybody else. Find a way to do it slower and smaller and neater, but still make sure you win."

It doesn't work that way. The tunnels are obviously boobytrapped, how are you supposed to order men in? The problem isn't expense, the problem is failure. Also a slow, prolonged ground campaign would require a lasting re-occupation, another lose-lose. Israel has purportedly been using the 2,000 pound bombs as bunker-busters to collapse the tunnels - maybe that's working, but it also kills the hell out of people on the surface, again part of the trap. I am disappointed that the IDF hadn't spent every waking hour the last decade building some technical gizmo that could make the tunnels uninhabitable, some kind of seismic or ultrasonic whatzit. I said a while back that I was in favor of flooding the tunnels and fixing the environmental consequences later. I've got messages in my inbox now urging me not to take that stance, that Israel should not be seen as "salting the earth," but it doesn't matter since it seems Israel isn't actually doing it, for whatever reason, so there's no point in a Tumblr blog taking a stance either way.

Tom Friedman is another useless Boomer leftover from the '90s and his "philosophy-of-cab-drivers" shtick is laughable, but he actually raised a good point here:

Netanyahu, I would argue, doesn’t want to win. He wants to be winning, OK, that is, he wants to be able to say, we’re winning. We’re winning. We’re winning. It’s just around the corner. But he doesn’t want to actually win because, if the war actually ends, two things are going to happen. Then he can no longer avoid what is the new political end state. And I believe there will be an eruption, a massive eruption, of Israeli anger at him that I hope and pray will drive him from power because I believe he is not only the worst leader in Israel’s history. I believe he’s the worst leader in Jewish history.

And that’s a long history. And what is Netanyahu’s calculation? It’s very simple. If he is not in power and has to face the conclusion of his trial and three corruption charges without the protection and influence that comes over the judiciary from being in power, he has a very good chance of going to jail. People forget. Israel jailed a president and a former prime minister. They’re not afraid to do that. And he does not want to go to jail. And he does not want to give up power.

And so this is a terrible situation where Israel is in a existential war, and its prime minister has basically dual loyalties, one to the state and one to himself. And at every turn, he is prioritizing himself.

I wish I could totally rule out the possibility that Netanyahu is going to try to drag this out until Trump's inauguration next year. I can't.

[poisonhemlocke]

finally did the oc color wheel challenge !!

character info under the cut :3

(potential spoilers for no room for a wallflower act 1, icewind dale: rime of the frostmaiden

orange - calliope “cal” osborne, callsign NIGHTMARE. pilots “TURN AROUND”, an SSC mourning cloak. she has a fairly abrasive personality developed over years in the Union military as part of a Farfield team, but at the end of the day, she joined the military to try and make a difference and ensure the Utopian Pillars are followed, and that remains her primary goal. perpetually pissed off about not being promoted or given important missions. she’s currently the commander of her squad.

yellow - angelica luminari, aka amitiel-52, aka virtue candor. an angel sent to earth as a magical girl to spread joy and happiness and defeat villains with the power of friendship, she has a tendency to be overly self sacrificing since she doesn’t view herself as human. she’s friendly and outgoing, and though she can be annoying at times, she’s a sweet person and gets along well with others. her powers focus on healing, defense, and mobility.

green - natalya essix, callsign URSA. former pilot of “NO REGRETS”, a lancaster frame. she’s a medic from the HUC, specifically the city of daylight. she’s gentle and kind, and can usually be trusted to remain level-headed in times of crisis. her wife and two of her three children were killed in the bombing of daylight, her son only narrowly surviving as he’d left the city the day before. she sustained heavy burns and mental trauma in the fight with BEGGAR-ONE, and retired from mech combat after that.

cyan - maxine collier V, callsign FIVE. pilots the HORUS lycan frame “GREG 3: THERE’S ANOTHER ONE”. this is my horrible gremlin woman, she’s violent and reckless and doesn’t think before she acts (or ever, really). she’s the fifth iteration of “herself”, and is horribly in debt as a result of the expensive cloning procedures. glass arm is a result of incidents with the DHIYED metavault and a trip to the firmament, which left her as an aunic Mind still trying to come to terms with this new religion.

blue - zalia moonkeeper, abjuration wizard and alchemist artificer. has 5-6 voices currently constantly talking telepathically in their head and considering that they’re doing quite well. alongside the party’s armorer artificer, their research colleague, they’ve uncovered much of the technology of an ancient duergar civilization, which they’re currently attempting to use to turn themselves into warforged and attain immortality.

purple - CAIN IDENT X452, lucy davis. tension blasphemy, doomed agenda. previously manifested a sin— specifically, a type II LORD which took the form of an angel. the scars on her face and the rest of her body are a result of the tight “halos” which made up part of the angel, and the shifting many-pupiled eyes are a Sin Mark allowing her to see through solid objects in short distance. she puts on a friendly face, and legitimately tries to be kind, but ultimately what matters most to her is the mission and killing Sins. everything else is secondary.

pink - florence liren, aka CHECKMATE. a smug egocentric hacker from the world of neon city overdrive, she considers herself a self-styled “queen of the underworld”, often wearing gaudy or ostentatious-looking clothes and indulging in various vices. she has morals, but they’re few, far between, and often easily compromised for the promise of a few credits. her body is nearly all cybernetic by this point, including a pair of auxiliary arms which she uses mainly as weapon.

red - nix. she’s a kobold warlock, and my pc in an icewind dale campaign. myself and the one other player play as two kobolds, who typically stack themselves in a trench coat when they go around. they’re both servants of an eldritch deity which speaks to them through the coat, its name is Coatthulhu. nix is not above cannibalism, and usually eats pretty much every monster or bad guy the party kills.

[waratah-moon]

White Lace, Dark Denim

"You did all this for me?" & "I'll be gentle, I promise" The long awaited first time fic...

Pairing: Eddie x cheerleader!reader WC: 2.8k Warnings: SMUT 18+ (minors DNI) - first time, praise & innocent kink (kinda), religious metaphors, oral (f receiving), protected sex

masterlist / bday drabbles / send me love notes

Eddie had been acting weird. Ever since you’d gone that little bit further with him, he’d seemed to pull away. It had come at the worst possible time. Ever since you’d gotten your taste of intimacy with him you’d been craving more.

The two of you had been taking things slowly. Your first time with your ex hadn’t gone well so Eddie was letting you go at your own pace. If anything he was going too slowly.

Eddie wasn’t like your ex at all. He was considerate, he made you feel good, and most importantly he respected your boundaries. But right now, he was respecting them too much because no matter what kind of hints you dropped, he was failing to notice how horny you were.

When you were watching movies his hand always stayed on your knee, never moving higher; and when you had been bold enough to move it yourself he just pecked your cheek and moved it back.

The worst blow of all had come when you’d driven out to Lover’s Lake. You’d been straddling his hips, hands tugging his hair while he kissed you, it was almost as easy as breathing at this point. But when your stomach started to flutter and you pushed your lap down against his, he pulled back and said, “I better get you home.”

So you’d decided enough was enough. Tonight was the night you were either going to sleep with your boyfriend, or break up with him. You weren’t actually going to break up with him, you loved him too much to do that over what was most likely a miscommunication, but you needed to know what was going on with him. Eddie had told you that communication was the most important thing in a relationship, so the fact that he wasn’t talking to you about something this big was making your brain foggy. 

You’d been hyping yourself up all day. You’d gone to the mall on your way home and bought a new set of panties and a matching bra, as well as treating yourself to a new manicure of baby pink nails. You’d also spent way too long after your shower moisturising every part of your body you could reach. You hadn’t been ready your first time, so you were doing everything in your power to make sure you felt ready this time around.

Eddie picked you up at 7pm. You had plans to get dinner at the diner and watch a movie back at his place. Everything seemed normal during dinner; you talked about cheer practice and he spoke at length about his current Hellfire campaign. He asked if you were going to the party one of the jocks was throwing next weekend and you told him that you’d rather do something with him. You asked him what the guys’ thought of his new song and he wanted to hear about the latest gossip between Jessica and Brooke. It was all fine. Until you got back to his place.

You’d settled into the movie and Eddie seemed content to hold your hand. As the movie wore on, you’d seen Halloween at least four times in the two and a bit months you’d been dating Eddie, you started to get antsy. Your head fell against his shoulder and your fingertips stroked up his arm, disappearing beneath the sleeve of his raglan. You heard his breath stumble as he tried to focus his attention on the television screen. You sighed as you nuzzled your cheek into the crook of his neck, your hand tracing patterns in the fabric covering his chest, dipping to the waistband of his jeans.

“Baby girl. Stop.”

“Why?”

“I-,” his eyes screwed shut and you could tell he was having an internal argument with himself.

“Why do you want me to stop, Eds?”

“Because-”

“Because you don’t want me,” you finished the sentence for him.

His face fell. “What? No, no, no. Of course I want you.”

“Then how come every time I come on to you, you shut me down?”

His brows furrowed, “wait, what?”

“I said I could come over last night and you said no.”

“Because you had a test today and I thought since you were coming over tonight-”

“What about at Lover’s Lake? When we were making out-”

“It was late!”

“What about when you moved my hand?”

You lost him. “Huh?”

“Last week, we were watching a movie. Your hand was on my knee, and I moved it to here,” you lifted his hand and placed it on the inside of your thigh. His palm felt hot against your skin, sitting below the fabric of your dress. “And you kissed my cheek and moved it back.”

You could almost see the gears turning inside his head. “Oh. Oh,” he shut his eyes and exhaled. “Fuck. Baby girl I’m so sorry. I’ve been trying so hard to control myself around you that I didn’t even think… I’ve been trying to go slow. I didn’t think that I might be going too slow.”

“It’s okay, Eds. You’ve been amazing, honestly,” he leant back and let you climb onto his lap, your hands cupping his cheeks as he gazed into your eyes. “But I’m ready. Been ready for a while now.”

“Yeah?”

You nodded, pushing your weight into his lap until you felt a growing hardness beneath you. The only thing between the two of you now was the denim of his jeans and the flimsy cotton of your panties. “Yeah. If that’s okay with you.”

“Jesus H Christ baby girl, that’s more than okay with me,” his mouth was rough against yours like he was trying to make up for lost time. “I wanted your proper first time to be perfect. You deserve that. Candles, rose petals, all that bullshit.”

“I don’t care about that,” you undid his belt but he stopped you before you reached the zipper. 

“Not here. Let’s go to the bedroom, I wanna take my time with you,” he helped you stand up. “Make you feel good. Make your first time special." 

“It’s not my first time,” you began to argue as he led you towards the bedroom.

“I can promise you tonight’s going to be the first time you’ll get properly fucked.” He led you across the trailer towards his bedroom.

“You can guarantee that? Wow, you’re cocky.” 

He stopped suddenly, causing you to bump into his back, turning to face you. “Is that an attitude I’m hearing?”

You bit your lip, his eyes staring into yours. “No.”

He hummed, leading you into the bedroom. “Good. Take off your dress.” He sat on the end of the bed, watching as you stood awkwardly in the doorway. “C’mon, baby girl. Where’s all that confidence from before? I want you to fuck me, Eds.” He copied your words from earlier. 

You suddenly felt nervous. It had all been well and good when you held the power, but now that he was watching you from the end of his bed, casually leaning back on his hands with a smirk, you felt vulnerable. 

He sensed the shift in energy and sat up. “You’re leading this, okay? We stop whenever you’re uncomfortable.”

You nodded, and stepped to stand between his legs. His hands rested on the sides of your thighs, playing with the hem of your dress. Your hand cupped his chin, tilting his head back. His brown eyes had darkened but his features remained soft. You knew the last thing he’d ever do was force you into a situation you were uncomfortable with. 

You guided his hands to grip the hem of your dress, slowly pulling it off your figure and tossing it aside. 

Eddie let out a soft groan, his fingers toying at the lacy, white straps of your bra. His hands trailed down your body, and tugged the waistband of your matching panties. “These new?”

You nodded, goosebumps appearing along your arms.

“You did all this for me?” You nodded again. “You look like an angel. My angel. C’mere,” he pulled you forward onto his lap and he allowed you to get comfortable, your thighs on either side of his hips, his jeans feeling rough against your skin. “You know you don’t have to do this for me, right? I think you’re beautiful no matter what.”

“I know, but it makes me feel good,” you bit your lower lip, tracing where the collar of his raglan fell against his skin.

“That’s the most important thing, baby. I always want you to feel good. Wanna make you feel good.”

“You do, Eds. Promise,” you pushed your hips down until you felt the friction of denim through your cotton panties. Eddie groaned, his grip tightening on your skin. 

“You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this, baby girl. Fuck, you’re going to kill me.”

“Good way to go, huh?”

“Oh the fucking best way to go, here, lie down for me,” he rolled you over so you were flat on your back, his elbow holding his weight above you. “You trust me?”

“Always,” he barely let you finish the word before his lips were on yours, his mouth moving torturously slow. His hands trailed down your body, spreading your legs apart until his hand found rest on your inner thigh, just far enough away from where you needed him most to irritate you.

He finally pulled away from your lips, leaving you breathless. “Eds, can you touch me?”

“I am touching you,” he patted your thigh, gently pinching the skin.

“No,” you whined, bucking your hips in an attempt to get closer to him. “Like you did before, with your hand.”

“My hand is on you, baby girl. If you want something else, you’re going to need to use your words.”

You flushed, brows furrowing in frustration. You had never been good at asking for what you wanted. You grabbed his hand and placed it between your legs, his palm hot against the fabric of your panties.

He pushed his finger so it dipped into your clothed slit, dampening the cotton. “This what you wanted? You want me to touch your pussy?” His fingers moved so gently that it didn’t do anything but frustrate you further.

“Yes but more, Eds,” he was so close to giving you the friction that you needed that your words came out as a whimper. He finally relented, pushing your panties aside and pushing two fingers between your folds, finding your clit instantly.

Your breath came out as a ragged moan, “that it, baby girl? Feel good?”

“So good.” Just as quickly as he started, he stopped. You lifted your head to see him pulling your underwear down your thighs.

"So pretty and white, I almost feel bad for keeping them,” he tucked your panties in the back pocket of his jeans as he settled between your legs.

Before you could argue his head had delved between your thighs, his tongue between your folds. The sensation was a shock to your system, different from anything you’d felt before. He was lapping you up like a man starved, his fingers digging into your thighs as he kept your legs spread. It felt nice, but you didn’t think what he was doing would get you to the same place he did last time.

“Eddie,” you tugged his hair, lifting his head from between your legs. “Hmm?”

“It’s,” you really didn’t want to offend him.

“Tell me, what’s wrong?”

“It feels nice, but it’s not enough,” you couldn’t look him in the eye so you focused on the Metallica poster on his cupboard door. If you had been watching, you would have seen his eyes glimmer and the smirk that appeared on his lips.

“Baby, I haven’t even been trying to make you cum. This was just for me,” you felt his tongue push between your folds again before he kissed your inner thigh. “I’ve been wanting to taste you for so long, and believe me, it’s better than I dreamed. But I told you I’d make you feel good, and I never break a promise.”

Tingles travelled down your legs when his mouth found your clit. Without warning, two fingers easily slid into your cunt, finding that spot inside your walls that you didn’t even know existed before Eddie.

“Oh,” you gasped, if you weren’t lying down your knees would have buckled. “Yes, yes, right there.” Your hands gripped the bed sheets, your toes curling as you felt your stomach clench. He knew exactly what he was doing, knew exactly what you needed even before you did. “Eddie, I’m close.”

“I know baby girl, you’re okay. I got you.”

The whimpers that fell from your lips as he led you to your high were by far Eddie’s favourite sound. His palm held your thigh steady as it began to shake, your breath quickening let him know you were moments away from cumming.

Butterflies erupted in your stomach and your skin felt on fire. Eddie’s grip steadied you against the bed as you momentarily lost control of your body. Your legs felt numb as you let the relief wash over you, Eddie’s soft voice guiding you back to reality. “There you go, angel. Told you I’ve got you. My sweet girl.”

Through your delicious haze you had barely noticed that he’d shed his shirt, only opening your hooded eyes when you heard the sound of his belt buckle against the floorboards and the crumple of a condom wrapper. You saw your white panties peeking out of the back pocket of his jeans, a stark contrast to the dark denim heaped on the floor.

His lips felt like heaven against your skin, featherlight below your ear. “I’ll be gentle, I promise.“

It was torture how slow he was going. Your fingernails dug into his shoulders as you pushed your hips upwards, feeling his cock brush over your slit. “Don’t be. I want you to fuck me.”

His eyelids drooped and he groaned. It was like you’d unlocked a hidden part of him, something he’d been trying to lock away from you. He was trying so hard not to let go.

“Can’t say those things, baby girl,” he fisted his cock in his hand, the head ever so slightly pushing inside you. You could see by his darkened irises that this was torture for him too.

“Eddie,” your voice cracked with frustration. You weren’t above begging at this point. “I need you.”

“Gotta go slow, baby girl. Don’t wanna hurt you,” he inched forward, one hand on your hip to stop you from bucking upwards.

“Eds,” you felt your eyes well, the need to be filled with him overwhelming. “I need it.”

He lifted your knees to his waist and you subconsciously wrapped your legs around him. “You need it, huh? Need me to fuck you?”

“God, yes, Eddie.”

“Manners.”

It took you a second to realise what he meant, but when you did you went with an all out whine, “please, Eds, please, please, please.”

“Good girl,” he drew his hips back before slamming forward without a second thought. It wasn’t painful like you’d expected it to be, like it was the first time with your ex. Instead he’d angled his hips in such a way that the head of his cock hit that magic spot inside you that knocked the breath out of your chest.

To Eddie the sight of you sprawled out on his bed, legs spread, tits bouncing, was better than any porno or magazine he owned. He’d have to throw them all out after this, nothing could ever compare to the sight of you moaning beneath him. He didn’t want to tear his eyes away from your face but he had to take it all in. Your hands around his shoulders, your beautiful tits, your shaking thighs; but the best part was his cock disappearing into your cunt, only to emerge slippery wet before plunging back inside your walls. He would have been sure he’d died and gone to heaven if it wasn’t for your constant clawing at his back.

“Fuck baby girl your pussy feels like heaven. So perfect for me” You couldn't reply, only managing a breathy whimper. “You gonna cum again?”

You hummed, fingers digging deeper into his skin.

“Use your words, angel.”

“Gonna cum, Eds, you’re gonna make me-,” your words fell short as the hot feeling in your stomach bubbled over, spreading throughout your body. You opened your eyes, intent on watching Eddie as he came. His hips shuddered, pace growing sloppy as his eyes screwed shut as he let out a throaty moan. It was your favourite sight, your boyfriend getting that amount of pleasure from you. From only you.

You couldn’t hide your smile as he put his weight on you, his head against your collarbone, cock still buried deep inside you. “My perfect angel.” The words were muffled but you heard them all the same.

I know I usually do aftercare but I really like the ending. Lemme know ur thoughts and feelings as always xx

taglist: @geekyfifi @livsters @bailey1212 @babyfrosty @becca-alexa @munsonology @celestialuna13 @unknowniteminthebaggingarea @micheledawn1975 @neewtmas @silky-luxe @lokis-little-fawn @starrthemushroom @eddies-puppet

[mariacallous]

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has already waded into his future trade wars before taking office. His proposal of a steep import tax on all products from the country’s top trade partners gives a preview of exactly how his zero-sum approach to economics could quickly become zero-benefit for businesses and consumers.

Trump, who vowed during his campaign to slap tariffs on everything that moved, said on Nov. 25 that he would, on his first day in office, put a 25 percent duty on all imports from Canada and Mexico—the United States’ two biggest trade partners, all bound together by a trilateral, tariff-free trade deal that Trump himself wrote. For good measure, Trump also threatened a 10 percent tax on all imports from China. His demand was for those countries to take immediate steps to curtail U.S.-bound deliveries of drugs and migrants.

The response, at least from the country most directly targeted, was pointed: Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told Trump in a letter, “Migration and drug consumption in the United States cannot be addressed through threats or tariffs,” and vowed the same kind of retaliation that the European Union and China have already promised if Trump makes good on his threats. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reportedly spoke with Trump sometime after he posted his statement online; Ontario Premier Doug Ford compared the threat to “a family member stabbing you in the heart.”

There are two ways to consider Trump’s latest threats of tariffs, trade wars, and economic friction. The president-elect’s backers view his threat of tariffs as a clever way to force China, Canada, and Mexico to come to grips with two things he considers primordial: drugs and immigration. Those folks believe that Trump will not have to implement the tariffs because those countries will somehow overhaul their vigilance and enforcement of two of the thorniest questions in cross-border relations. 

Alternatively, given that Trump has called tariff the “most beautiful word,” he could actually do what he just said he was going to do, as he has done in the past. Given that the combined trade of the United States with those three countries is around $2.5 trillion a year, with a lot of interconnected supply chains and a deep, decades-old interdependence that could not be jury-rigged on the fly, such a move would be economically devastating. 

Prices in the United States—Trump ran in part on fixing the problem of that runaway 2.5 percent inflation—will go up, because whether it is Canadian lumber, Canadian oil, Mexican produce, or perhaps most importantly, all of the many components that go into making a car or a light truck, all of it would cost more than it did before.

The charitable view of Trump’s tariff threat is that it is just silly and would be ineffective, as his previous four years of hectoring China over trade matters and fentanyl achieved very little. The uncharitable view is that it would be silly and catastrophic.

Mexico is the biggest source of U.S. agricultural imports and a big outlet for U.S. exports, as well. The problems with a neighborly trade war are many, and they hit close to home.

“The idea that we are going to have a guacamole tax on day one, right before the Super Bowl, is nonsensical,” said Scott Lincicome, a trade expert at the Cato Institute in Washington.

The first problem for Trump to do what he said he would do is that the United States, Canada, and Mexico have one of the world’s biggest free-trade agreements, the USMCA, or NAFTA 2.0, that Trump himself undertook and which went into effect in 2020. 

The proposed tariffs are “definitely a violation of the basic USMCA commitment to charge zero tariffs,” said Simon Lester, a trade lawyer who worked on NAFTA and USMCA issues for years. Trump could invoke the national security exception in the agreement, as he did years ago, to raise taxes on imported steel and aluminum, but that would just trigger a dispute settlement process, which would take longer to play out than the inevitable Mexican and Canadian retaliation would, Lester said.

There are problems even with using that national security exception: It would require an iron-clad executive order, potentially publishing notices in the federal register, and maybe a declaration of a national economic emergency. Social media posts are not policy.

“On the procedural issues, there are so many hurdles and gray areas,” Lincicome said. “I don’t expect those tariffs to be implemented.”

Regardless of the more mainstream names picked for key positions in Trump’s economic braintrust, such as hedge fund manager Scott Bessent to run the Treasury Department, many in Washington don’t think that will be a check on Trump’s anti-trade tendencies.

“Trump loves tariffs, and there will be tariff threats and maybe even tariffs,” Lester said.

The stock market seemed to take the tariff threats with a grain of salt: The Dow Jones industrial average, the blue-chip index, barely wobbled. The U.S. dollar hardly gained against either the Chinese renminbi or the Canadian loonie; the Mexican peso’s slippage against the dollar could be for any number of reasons.

But, given that Trump did campaign on the explicit promise to raise taxes and impede trade, what if they’re wrong? 

One of the biggest threats to the economies of the United States, Canada, and Mexico would come in the automotive sector. The original NAFTA, by breaking down trade barriers among the three North American countries, set the stage for an integrated auto industry where bits of a car or truck are made thousands of miles apart. This is big business: Automaking accounts for about 11 percent of all U.S. manufacturing and 5 percent of all U.S. private sector jobs, not even counting all the corollary and related jobs the sector provides. 

Trump’s revised USMCA made the relationship between the automotive sector and regional trade even clearer, especially by mandating that roughly 75 percent of all cars and trucks be sourced locally. One way to avoid the cost of tariffs, if they are implemented, is to source goods from elsewhere. That is not an option for autos. 

Trump’s trade policies are now going full circle. Manufacturers cannot get cheaper inputs from anywhere else, lest they fall afoul of Trump’s USMCA, but would have to pay more for everything because of his tariffs.

Similar stories could abound in agriculture, textiles, and even the construction industry. One of the big advantages of the USMCA, for example, was greater U.S. access to the Canadian market for agricultural products: What would be first on the list of Canadian retaliation?

Trump’s threatened tariffs would be economic insanity, which is probably why his surrogates present the very specter of tariffs as gamesmanship, and not a real blueprint. The fear, and it’s genuine one, is that tariffs just like those are exactly the blueprint Trump ran and won on. The worst-case scenario could become the default setting.

[laurelindebear]

Saturday nights have been D&D/TTRPG night for...a long long time now. But at the moment I'm not taking part, and it feels...weird, and sad. My group is still going, but about a month ago, before we went on our trip away, the session ended with something of a falling out and it brought to a head all the problems that have been building up for me for awhile. Rant and just...being sad below.

The group consists of 7-8 people: myself, my husband, his brother (and sometimes sister in law), and four of our friends. Husband and brother in law normally take turns DMing. They're both pretty good DMs, but we use a lot of homebrew and allow a lot of stuff that isn't in the rules, and power creep has become a real thing.

Main problem I have is that at this point, three of the (currently) seven people are actively harming the fun for me. One of the people is husband's oldest friend and they used to be closer but they don't have so much in common now. They have always been annoying (eg calling us on the phone every single day when we first got married, before always-online services). Despite having played TTRPGs for decades, they never remember what their spells or abilities do, whether we're playing, what time we start, etc. They and they alone have trouble with the dice room (somewhat conveniently - we swapped to using a room with dice rollers years ago in part because we simply didn't believe their actual rolls with physical dice (we're playing on voice, not in person) - they're also a habitual liar about pointless things like that. Maybe most annoying is that they are always playing another game at the same time (usually World of Warcraft), and not something that's easy to tab out of, or which only uses half your brain. I level fishing etc while playing a lot, because it's so boring otherwise, but it doesn't take my attention. But because of this, they are only ever half-aware of what's going on, at best. They get bored of their characters before the end of every campaign, without fail, and often have them get killed off/reroll in stupid ways because they think its funny.

Person two is a friend who is just kind of obsessed with finding ways to 'break' and game the system to make their character overpowered. At the end of a previous campaign they decided they were going to one-shot kill the ultimate big bad by summoning a herd of...oxen or something way above the guy's head and dropping them on him for massive damage, because it was funny. It only half-worked, partly because the DM wasn't keen on having the final battle go that way, I think, but you get the idea. This time they're trying a multiclass build specifically to do ludicrous amounts of damage every fight, which works because of the way we handle short and long rests and healing. Then there's the fact that all their characters are super greedy and have to loot everything, even when it's detrimental to the party; and that their go-to special thing to do to anyone they don't like or anyone we need to question is to shove stuff up the person's butthole. (They also enjoy being very cold and evilish and acting without consulting the group.)

Person three is my BIL who I've talked about before. Sometimes we get on ok. But we have very different values and we can clash a lot. He's borderline obsessed with the military and military loyalty, and he's actively proud and defensive of British colonialism. (!!!!) He also is very precious about male gaze, and criticism thereof, to the point of acting very personally offended and harmed by how 'women on television/ in films/ in games can't have big boobs now.' In this campaign he's been very metagamey, where no matter what we encounter (we're jumping between universes) he knows exactly who and what everything is and doesn't hesitate to explain it all to us. He may have encyclopedic knowledge of all TTRPG systems and critters, but his character absolutely wouldn't. He's also very bossy; he gets cross if he feels he's the only one putting forward plans and strategy, but as often as not when anyone does suggest a plan, he immediately jumps in to say how terrible it is and why it won't work - even if it will. He's loud and can be aggressive and I'm pretty shit at assertiveness, although sometimes if my husband is DMing he'll actually tell me, off mic, that my plan/idea is a good one and to keep going with it regardless of BIL's dismissals. In this last campaign especially, he's been obsessive about sex and boobs and everyone in the party getting laid every adventure, when that's really not what most of us are about.

Anyway, the last game I played turned into a mess because we got transported to your typical 'warworld coliseum battle royale' type world run by a super powerful wizard or lich or something. We were fighting some of the guy's minions and doing ok, but Powergamer decided it was too dangerous and taking too long so he tried to attack the big boss, despite hints from the DM (husband) that it wasn't a great plan. As a result we all got Meteor Swarm-ed and Doesn't Pay Attention died (again).

As we were in the process of escaping, I had a wild thought to try to pickpocket the boss, or maybe sneak something from his balcony while he wasn't there - I was playing a rogue and my stealth and sleight of hand were very good. I mention this in just a thinking out loud way, and get screamed at by BIL because 'THIS IS A LEVEL 36 MAGE CASTING LEVEL 18 FIREBALLS, OF COURSE HE'LL BE ABLE TO SEE INVISIBLE, WHAT ARE YOU DOING' etc etc. Somehow when other players do something bonkers and risky - say, diving off a zeppelin into a tower window, telefragging a castle, or using a weird demonic artifact to bring a Mecha Joan of Arc back to life, whose programming is essentially to destroy all humanoid life - it's more likely to be taken as funny, or 'haha it's your funeral but do whatever', but for me, no, I'm an idiot and how dare I even think about doing that random thing? Nevermind that neither his character nor anyone else would know what 'level' the bad guy was because that's not how RP works, characters don't have stat books on them! I lost my temper and just said something like 'ok well I try and I'm dead then, forget it', and left the channel, and I haven't been back.

So now I'm without a group, and...it sucks. My husband is sad, and I'm sad. But I don't want my RP games to be all powergaming and sexual assault and celebrations of colonialism and getting shouted at. It's not fun. And it just wasn't fun...but I wish it were. It so often has been. Maybe it will be again. But right now I feel lost and a little bit alone and it's coming at really the worst possible time, with autumn being a historically very shitty time for me and this year with my stress about politics making me both physically and mentally unwell on the daily.

[that-ari-blogger]

A Study In Style

Roll With It is the best piece of television ever put to screen. This is not up for debate, I will not be taking argument. I will die on this hill. Roll With It is perfect. No, I'm not biased.

In all seriousness, this episode is gimmicky and fun, so as far as plot goes, analysis is difficult. Instead, I'd like to focus on the character writing and artistic embellishments on display and explore what they do for the story.

Let me explain.

SPOILERS AHEAD: (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, Spider Man: Into The Spiderverse, Arcane, Critical Role Campaign 3)

Artistic style is a remarkably underrated part of animation. People credit the writing and the direction, but the specific visual elements that make up a style can often have a more significant impact on the story.

Think of it this way. You are watching a series through a window. The direction dictates where the window sits and what it sees, the writing and the acting dictate what goes on outside, but if the style describes the window itself. A window made from tinted, stained, or warped glass will change what you see dramatically.

So, She-Ra's base art style relies on pastel colours and a two dimensional, cartoony aesthetic. It's realistic in theory, at least in contrast to One Piece, but its flat and appealing, and the expressions are often exaggerated to great effect.

Because focusing a shot is difficult when you don't have a camera (smudging colours in animation has a habit of not looking too good), animation has picked up tricks to focus the viewer's eyes. For example, Spider Man: Into The Spiderverse brought animation into the forefront of the public consciousness, and almost single handedly changed the industry, and it used a mixture of techniques to express its focus.

The items in the background of this shot are less detailed than Peter, and have a kind of 3D glasses effect making them difficult to focus on. They are also in stark contrast with the red of the Spidey Suit.

She-Ra takes a different approach, saturation. The vast majority of the series is shot in pastel colours with little-to-no shadows clogging up the shots. This is then accentuated by specific key-frames of bold colouration and deep shadows that contrast wildly with each other and the rest of the episodes they are in. I have a habit of using these key frames as my opening screenshot for these posts because I think they look the coolest.

The point of this is to highlight certain elements in your mind, in the same way that when you close your eyes after looking at a fire, the image lingers for a moment, memory tends to work the same way to bold colours. There is also the idea that making specific moments stand out visually tells the audience to pay attention.

If you focus on certain moments, you guide the audience's view towards them. It's the same thing that a camera does in a still image, focusing on specific items in the shot to guide the eye.

In Roll With It, as the characters present their own plans, the art style changes, to match the minds that you are being transported into. Adora's style is the same as normal for the series, but the contents are different. Adora is matter of fact and to the point, but she perceives threats everywhere. Adora cannot relax.

But the specific colour choice also has an effect on the meaning of a shot, and for that, let's discuss the other animated pioneer of the past few years, Arcane.

Arcane has zero chill, and even less subtlety. This shot centres around Jinx's mental instability caused by her sister. Its a tortured mind who is hallucinating about someone who isn't actually in the scene. So, naturally, her world is on fire with pink flames, associating that fire with Vi, for whom pink is a signature colour.

Glimmer, however, takes the series' key frames and colour and dials that up to eleven. Everything in this shot is bold and action packed. I am tempted to describe it as violently pink.

But the shot is entirely monochrome. Everything here is pink or black, and that acts as a neat worldview for Glimmer's worldview. Glimmer perceives the world in black and white, but where the white would usually represent good in that idea, here, it is replaced by pink, and by Glimmer. Adora has a reputation for a hero complex, but I would argue that Glimmer has something similar. Not in the same way as Adora's pathologic need to save people, but Glimmer definitely has an ego problem.

The pink also makes Glimmers mind difficult to read as an audience, and I think that is the point. Everything in Glimmer's worldview is super bold and in focus, meaning that it dims the effect of the focus. In the wise words of someone with a definite hero syndrome.

"When everyone's super, no-one is."

Glimmer is the perfect example of how someone with an incredibly simple worldview of good and bad can do some truly morally grey acts. In this case, because she doesn't believe in good and evil, she believes in Glimmer and evil. Either you agree with her, or you are her enemy. I wonder if that will ever come up again.

There's also no way I can mention this scene without pointing out that this is a reference top classic James Bond, and that speaks to Glimmer's character as well.

The original James Bond was a character whom the world revolved around, and who rarely ever failed. He was charming, and witty, and cool. In short, Glimmer perceives herself as a Mary Sue. And it's important to understand that this is her opinion of herself, and not the actual reality. Once again, Glimmer has an inflated sense of superiority and does not understand the fact that she could be flawed.

Bow, on the other hand, is simple. He is the single most simple character of the entire cast. But that doesn't mean he is flat. I want to stress that Bow is only rendered this way by the insanity of everyone else on screen.

In a world where everyone is a ticking time bomb, Bow serves to balance out the shenaniganry, which makes him an Orym figure.

Art by Hanna Friederichs (@agarthanguide)

For context, Roll With It is very clearly drawing on the aesthetics of table top role playing games. This is the D&D episode, and no this hasn't artificially inflated what I think of the episode at all.

Critical Role is a D&D actual play series that is currently in its third campaign. If you have read my series on Stray Gods, you will recognise two of the cast members of CR as Laura Baily (Who played Grace) and Ashley Johnson (Who played Calliope).

Orym of the Air Ashari is a character played by Liam O'Brien, a voice actor who is somehow not weighed down by the sheer amount of talent he is lugging around. Seriously, this guy has been in everything from Star Wars to League Of Legends.

In any case, the current campaign of CR centres around a collection of walking disasters, and I mean that as a compliment. Everyone in the series is one step away from spiraling into insanity, with the one possible exception of Orym.

So, Orym has taken the role of the team's everyman, rendered simple by the rest of the cast, and you can see where I am going here.

Bow and Orym are the straight men of the group (a deliberately ironic choice of wording), balancing out their companions and offering a sense of stability and comfort.

But, both Orym and Bow have stuff going on behind their eyes. Orym is grieving form the loss of his husband and father, and Bow is dealing with some serious self-worth issues, but you don't see those elements that often, purely because of the more overt nature of those they surround themselves with.

But this is a post about style, and what do the visuals of Bow's plan tell us about him?

Well, Bow's style draws on the aesthetics of the original She-Ra series, back when the series was designed entirely to sell toys and nothing else.

Once again, Bow is simple, he is a paragon hero, who is fighting in this war because it is the right thing to do. So naturally, his mind harks back to the version of this story that was purely idealistic.

I also want to quickly mention Mermista here, because she is my favourite character. In her mind, she is She-Ra, armoured up and powerful, the chosen one.

And this is where my point comes in to this post. That's right, I do actually have something to say.

This episode is a D&D episode because it is drawing on the key element of TTRPGs, the chaos. TTRPGs are fun and are designed to be a mix of different playstyles. Sometimes you are playing Blades In The Dark and you want to be something out of left field, and that is completely ok.

The message of this episode is that different styles complement each other and make each other better by contrast. Foils are important, even when they aren't antagonistic.

Final Thoughts

This episode is perfect. No more comments.

Next week, I will be looking at White Out, so stick around if that interests you.

Previous - Next

[unseenphil]

The Gumshoe: A homebrew class for Fabula Ultima

Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid. He is the hero; he is everything. He must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor—by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world. -Raymond Chandler.

So yeah I made a fatal mistake and got distracted and so started writing a homebrew class that may or may not at some point become part of a larger homebrew "Urban Fantasy Atlas" for Fabula Ultima.

So classes in Fabula Ultima consist of 3 things:

Four questions your character should answer the develop your background,

A permanent bonus or two- generally to Hit points, magic points, or inventory points, the ability to equip certain types of gear, or the ability to undertake long term free form effects like projects or rituals using the ritualism discipline.

5 skills: Some with multiple levels, some without. There should be more levels of skills available than you can get- each class caps out at 10 levels, which means more than 10 ranks of skills.

The gumshoe is designed with urban fantasy campaigns in mind, because detective is such an archetype for the genre, and while you can conceivably build one out of other classes (as for example, I already did) it could probably benefit from a specific class and it'd be pretty easy to ask those questions and make those skills, I think.

So first, we start with the questions:

1: What was your first big case? Do you regret how it turned out?

2: What first made you doubt authority?

3: What incident still haunts you- was it after you started working cases or is it what kicked it off?

4: If a leggy dame wearing a hat with a veil walked into your office right now and begged you for help, would you take the case? Would you admit you were a sucker for doing so?

Gumshoe Free Benefits:

Permanently increase your maximum Hit Points by 5.

Skills:

Down These Mean Streets

When making a check for any kind of investigation or legwork, you can turn failure into triumph. A failed roll on a simple or opposed check will grant you an opportunity, even if you don't find out what you want. For a clock, you'll always fill in one section no matter how badly you roll. This comes at a cost- you'll take damage to HP equal the amount you failed by, either by stretching yourself thin or maybe the opportunity comes by way of someone roughing you up for asking too many questions.

Hip Flask [+3]

You have a trusty flask of some sort of awful rotgut that you always have available. Reduce to the IP cost for producing a Potion with Inventory points by SL, to a minimum of 1. You can sacrifice this ability until the next time you refresh inventory points to reduce damage from a single attack by (5+SL)X10, as the blow damages the flask but leaves you mostly unscathed.

Two-Fisted [+5]

When benefiting from two-weapon fighting, your high roll only counts as zero for one attack, not both. Add SL to accuracy for both attacks.

The City is a Lover [+3]

When you're in a big city, you know how to talk to it, and it talks back. You may ask SL questions about the city or the people who live there, and the GM will answer them honestly.

The Easy Way or the Hard Way

Sometimes the easiest way to get information is to let yourself get worked over. The first time you hit crisis in a scene with an intelligent enemy, gain the faux pas opportunity as they let something important slip. You also gain this opportunity if you're forced to surrender and are captured.

[savelockwoodandco]

Hi Admin, hope everything is fine with you, because I truly need your insight.

Whilst I understand that we must approach a battle with high spirits, the way the world goes and with it the media industry really saddens me.

Are we really gonna get the show back?

Do we think CF or the Strouds will really tell us to stop if they think all is over?

I might be far too cynical, but for the Strouds any publicity brings more people to the books.

As for CF, it's still free publicity.

I know that of course none of them will ever be straightforward with us - if anything is happening behind the scenes - because they can't, I guess, but where does the Clowning stop and become simply Delusion?

I keep looking at CF reply for their 5000 followers, and I get it, it looks sus. But are we building a castle made of thin sand out of it?

I'm sorry, Admin, I don't want to upset you. :(

I will still support the show campaign, but I'm so, so, so sad about everything...

Hi Anon! Thanks for the question, and no worries, you didn't upset us! We've got decades of experience in this media game (and in cancellations specifically), and we understand that it can be challenging and frustrating at the best of times.

We totally get being discouraged due to the state of the media industry. It's never been a particularly kind nor relaxed space, and everything about it seems to have been heightened within the last decade or so. What's good -- acknowledging the impact that actors have, the ability to tell stories that would have gone unseen in years past, feeding fan interaction through behind-the-scenes looks while filming and the newfound safety of transformative works (i.e., fanfic) -- has become really, really good. On the flip side, the bad parts of media -- encouraging division and in-fighting, poor treatment of non-administrative professionals, the blind-eye to any profit beyond exponential growth -- have gotten worse.

This isn't a doom-and-gloom statement, though -- these things come in cycles. The Hayes Code Mentality is coming back into full swing, but at least we're past the point of forcing actors to get married in order to promote their films. Some things improve, some things fall back, lather, rinse, repeat. We get being discouraged due to the media landscape -- but remember, all problems are temporary, and bad things will come and go just as often as good things. The good things, the progress, the encouraging changes are no less good simply because they're accompanied by uncertainty.

And if we had to pick a mission statement for answering this ask, I suppose that would be it. There are so many good and encouraging things that have happened -- watch this space, as I (tumblr mod) am going to have Twitter Mod, in all her beneficence, grab me some screenshots from Twitter to show off good/hopeful/encouraging things that have happened recently, since not everyone (including me!) is on Twitter -- that, while we may encounter doubts, disappointments, and uncertainty, it would be as foolish to throw everything out as it would be to assume that we're completely in the clear.

Recency bias, negativity bias, and plain ol' uncertainty have a way of reminding us that there's still doubt and uncertainty surrounding us in this campaign; at times, to borrow a quote, we can feel like we're braving a storm in a skiff made of paper. When a day, a week, two weeks, or more pass without Absolute Confirmation of being picked up, it's easy to lose confidence, to become discouraged, and to believe that nothing we do matters.

And yes, to just simply get sad. And that's okay, that's normal and understandable.

To answer the question posed at the beginning of this ask: yes, we still firmly believe that we're going to get our show back. So many good things -- Nice Things -- have happened and continue to happen (once again, watch this space for a screenshot-heavy post about those things!), that I think it would be wrongheaded to ignore them.

Yes, CF would tell us if there wasn't a chance. It's not really 'free publicity' to encourage people to support a campaign to save a show that they don't have a stake in.

And yes, they make Lockwood and Co; but without a second season, there's no opportunity to make more profit off of it -- sales off DVDs only apply when the show will be put on DVD, after all, which is increasingly uncommon for streaming-premiered shows. Positive word of mouth of "oh they made that really good show that netflix unfairly cancelled" -- a true statement -- only goes so far when negative word of mouth -- "they led fans on when they knew there wasn't a chance" -- is the trade-off.

CF isn't a huge company, they need that positive word of mouth to draw in viewers for current and future projects. On top of all of that, they're human. It's tempting to see every business, no matter the size, as a soul-sucking machine that wrings fans dry for profit, but that simply isn't true, especially of smaller outfits.

The same goes for the Strouds -- there was so much of a rush for the books when the show first came out; people had to wait weeks and weeks for more copies to be printed and sent out through Amazon/Barnes & Noble/other booksellers, and libraries had hold lines for months. That fervor only holds out so long, though, without something concrete -- another season -- to keep it up. In this age of 'receipts', Stroud isn't going to risk his reputation (and provide a lot of clean-up work for his agent) by stringing us alone without any hope.

Everyone involved in this, from the production studio to the author to us, the fans, has a vested interest in not just creating buzz but in actually making a S2 happen. Simply from a business standpoint, it's better business to supply an in-demand product than to not. Attention spans -- and business experts' opinions of attention spans, which is almost more important -- are famously short nowadays. Businesses cannot and do not plan on a small injection to produce long-lasting loyalty and results -- and when they do, like Netflix has been, it bites them in the rear repeatedly.

The sad, sorry fact is that they can't be open and transparent with us about renewal efforts, you're completely right about that. The legalities of contracts and deals within the media industry demand absolute silence until the ink is dry, and sometimes for a bit after that. To use a recent example, the showrunner for Warrior Nun tweeted in March that the show being saved would be because of fan efforts to make it happen. A full 3 months later, he was allowed to announce that the show had officially been picked up. The wheels of media move slowly, but they move.

When does clowning become delusion? The only situation where it would would be if CF came out and told us to stop and that there was no chance. Barring that, it doesn't become delusion. We like to toss around the term 'clowning' -- and it's a fun term that we, the mods, use regularly -- but all we're referring to is the process of distilling what we see into tangible data.

I don't mean to make it sound like some scientific process, but...isn't it? Isn't this all some grand experiment in the name of a grand hobby?

We plot, we plan, we infer, we record, and at the end of the day we turn all of that effort into tangible results. Those results -- trending every single day since cancellation, usually with multiple hashtags/phrases, numerous articles written about the show, its cancellation, and the efforts to save it, a petition with nearly 25k signatures, award nominations, you name it -- are very real, and very helpful.

While ultimately we can't sign the contracts or enact the business deals that will cement our pick-up -- trust us, if we could, they'd be signed by now -- we can provide strong reasons through our engagement for business to want us. The higher we raise demand, the more of a no-brainer providing supply -- a second season -- is.

To all of LockNation, we thank you for your continued efforts. Your tweets, posts, fanart, fanfic, hashtags, signatures, articles, and most importantly, your relentless cheerful dedication, mean the world. We heartily thank you and we heartily encourage you to take breaks, to take care of yourselves. We're confident that, in the future, we will be able to look down at our little skiff made of paper and find that it was made of sterner stuff than we thought.

We're confident in the continued future of Lockwood and Co. We can do this. Look to other successful campaigns; we may have months to go, but we can get through them and come out the victors on the other end.

[sylkishagsuperiority]

It’s fascinating how two years after the show so many people still wholeheartedly believe the TVA propaganda of Loki and Sylvie being “the same person” and that Loki “fell in love with himself”.

Neither of those statements is true beyond the most surface-level interpretation, and while it works for the casual audience on some level (since most of them will look at it like “oh how funny, of course Loki would fall for himself”), it’s also been used to justify a hate campaign on a completely harmless ship.

Loki and Sylvie are only considered “the same person” because when HWR isolated the events of the Sacred Timeline (presumably the sequence of events that would lead to his birth and not any of his variants), he needed everything in every enslaved universe to happen the exact same way. That means every universe had to have the exact same people in it, making the exact same choices over and over again. But because every universe is its own reality, it wasn’t possible to make everything perfectly identical, and it only worked as long as the TVA was pruning branches 24/7. The universe wants to break free, after all. People want to make their own choices. But under HWR’s tyrannical rule, everyone was allowed only one singular path, a role to play.

That’s what “a Loki” is, at the end of the day. A role, an archetype, a catalyst to the Avengers. As long as the person assigned that role fulfilled their part, it didn’t matter if they were a white man, a Black man, a woman or an alligator. But at the end of the day, every person saddled with that role was their own individual. They’re not one person in multiple bodies. They’re not clones. They’re all completely separate, autonomous beings that exist independently of each other.

That’s where the accusations of Sylki being “transphobic” fall flat, because Loki and Sylvie are not, and have never been, the same person. Sylvie was never meant to be a fem Tom!Loki. She’s from a separate universe and never met him until they were both adults and probably well over a thousand years old. She led a completely different life and has entirely different memories, experiences and skill sets. People who purposely reduce her to a female version of someone else only do it so they have an “ethical” argument against the ship, but their misogynistic refusal to see Sylvie as her own separate person doesn’t change the fact that she’s exactly that and always has been. At no point in time did she ever exist as Tom!Loki, nor did he ever exist as her.

The TVA propaganda reduced variants to the same person because they only saw them as their assigned role on the Sacred Timeline and nothing else. And a lot of people bought it without giving it even a moment’s thought. But now that the Multiverse is free, the concept of variants doesn’t even exist anymore. Now there are bound to be universes where there is no Loki at all, or where the “God of Mischief” isn’t Asgardian, or where they don’t have powers, or a million different possibilities. And all of those people are only bound together by temporal aura - the only indicator the TVA used to identify variants, since DNA is useless (once again, Loki and Sylvie are not genetically related, which frankly should be obvious given we’ve seen an alligator variant and now also a Skrull Kang variant). Hell, for all we know, the temporal aura thing might not even work anymore either, given that the universe is free to do as it pleases instead of following a single predetermined path.

Tl;dr: Loki and Sylvie are not the same person, it was TVA propaganda meant to justify their 24/7 genocide of realities, and Loki didn’t fall in love with himself; Sylvie being as different from him as it gets is kind of the whole point.

[utilitycaster]

You nailed why I'm having trouble with Laudna. Another moment for me is her shortness with Orym when pleading to FCG, some of it potentially explained by Marisha in 4SD: how fucked up the lack of intervention + nod were, Laudna's feelings on it all, potential conflict down the road, etc. But when you see the episode itself, Marisha is pretty clear Laudna isn't really aware of her friends at all, that nothing was going to stop her from killing Bor'Dor. 1/2

I usually don't mind inconsistencies at all, because as people we are never realistically consistent 100% of the time, we aren't always in character, so to speak. But some of this feels inconsistent with what has actually happened and is happening, with the text itself, so it feels so jarring. Anyway, I understand if you don't want to post this, just happy you can put to words what I have trouble articulating myself. 2/2

----

Hi anon, thanks! Yeah...I don't actually mind Laudna having conflicting feelings about Bor'Dor, but she doesn't know Orym's underlying motivations (I don't actually find the lack of intervention to be remotely fucked up. Nod kind of is, but I think that's the other thing. We're just guessing at who she's lashing out at, if anyone in particular.)

I think. if I may, the reason all this discussion of Laudna's weaknesses as a character is coming up now is because it was always an issue, but between how much stronger her concept seemed during the Team Issylra arc, the return of Delilah (always a weak point) and the fact that the story itself has hit its stride and a number of other characters have sharpened their focus while she's in many ways taken a step back, conceptually.

I think as others have pointed out, it's 65 episodes in and Marisha's answer in 4SD to any questions about the character concept is still "nightmare about creepy girl." Like, that's fine as a starting point, but what is Laudna trying to achieve? What are you exploring with this? What is she going to do about Delilah now? Will we get any sustained payoff of her grappling with the fact that not everything is fine, or will proximity to Imogen continue to act like a rapid dose of sedative?

What did she do in 30 years, because all we have is "made Pate", "got kicked out of a bunch of villages but also this hasn't been consistently backed up by people's responses to her during the campaign so it feels off", "and got to Marquet" (NO understanding of how she got here, which is pretty egregious). Again, the comparisons that keep being drawn in a matter intended to bolster her relationship with Imogen constantly keep detracting from it - Fjord and Jester had known each other for a few weeks or so prior to the campaign and it felt like it, as did Caleb and Veth's several-month friendship, as does even FCG and Ashton's vague cohabitation of convenience. There is simply no sense of knowing each other for two years. I talked about players who are masterful with negative space recently, and this is the opposite - the missing pieces do not suggest a shape we cannot fully discern. They just fall unused onto the floor.

Even the mechanical build feels mostly designed around a directionless aesthetic. Like, genuinely, why is her base level warlock if she showed signs of magical talent prior to Delilah possessing her? It's not even particularly mechanically superior for her to have done this! Warlock/Sorcerer isn't a strong multiclass anyway, and leaning into sorcerer in a party with a different sorcerer whose engaging with that thematically far more, and not really doing any other work into her opposition of Delilah makes it worse. When you add in that Pate is both one of the more recognizable aspects of the character but Marisha at one point said she had no original intentions of taking that third level in warlock (the one that granted him existence), it all becomes more baffling. And to be clear, characters can take unexpected turns; but there wasn't work done within the story that indicated a level of warlock would make sense (and in fact it would have made more sense to have fought it harder!) There's such a passivity to her warlock side - it's not even an open embrace of darker power, despite what she's said, it's just losing control, which to be honest destroys everything interesting about it, while simultaneously making the stakes of her breaking that pact low. Like, oh, you lose 3 levels and you still have 7 levels of sorcerer? Why haven't you done it then. You were level 7 like a month ago. You'll get better.

I know this all sounds harsh but I think the most recent episode just showed that, pun unintended, there is a hollowness to the characterization and when significant changes to the status quo or thorny philosophical conversations occur, there isn't a solid enough foundation to support the improvisation. There's no sign of intentionality beyond the initial "be spooky." Like, why bring in Whitestone and never consistently explore what it was like living under the Briarwood occupation as a commoner, or what it means to have Delilah in your head? Every piece of the arc feels like it's dropped and picked up when convenient and stops existing when it's not. Like...I don't dislike Laudna, and she has good scenes with characters other than Imogen, and there have been characters I have disliked either for a stretch of episodes early on, or for their entire run, but it just feels like an unprecedented lack of thought into how this character will actually exist and do things for a full campaign. I can't dislike her for her personality or ideology because there's not enough of it to dislike.

[ourshadowstallerthanoursoul]

Beyond Led Zeppelin - interview to JPJ

(by Guitar.com - Jan. 1, 2010 - x)

Zooma is very experimental and takes your musicianship to a different level. How did you develop the chops to do something so free-flowing? Were you listening to lots of jazz?

No, it’s always been there. I’ve always listened to lots of jazz. At the time when Zeppelin started, I was always listening to jazz and rhythm and blues and classical music. The only rock I listened to was Jimi Hendrix. So, I actually came to rock late. I listen to everything constantly — everything from rhythm and blues, drum and bass techno, Latin music, salsa, meringue, and some rock n roll. Bass-wise I keep listening.

Does that allow you to constantly grow as a player?

In composition and playing, everything at a basic level is about questions and answers. You have musical questions and you have to get the answers, which is basically what composition is about. How does the piece start and then what happens? You’ll get a musical idea, then you have to realize it. And in the realization it’s just about those questions and answers. How does it finish? What will make it interesting after we’ve done one thing for a while? All music has the same questions and answers. It doesn’t matter what kind of music it is, whether its pigmy music or Mongolian stuff. It’s still, how do you make a musical idea, how do you make a tension release? And everything you listen to can come in use as reference material for your own questions, for your own music. Listen to as much as you can because there’s something absolutely everywhere to be found.

A lot of people listen to blues, jazz, country, world music, whatever, but they can’t combine the different techniques.

Most people gravitate towards music they like. If youre a blues player, you only play the blues. So listen to everything else and then play the blues. You’ll find that you start playing the blues in a different way.

How do you feel about what your former bandmates have done with their respective careers? Page and Plant did Zeppelin songs together for a while, and now Page is doing Zep stuff with the Black Crowes. Do you think maybe they’re not expanding their vocabulary and reaching out the way you have?

No, they’re not reaching out the way I have, because I’m me and they’re them. I haven’t heard Page and the Black Crowes. He could be playing a whole load of blues for all I know. I heard Page and Plant’s 'Walking into Clarksdale', and was disappointed that there wasn’t more Page on it. I like to hear lots of Page. But they’re doing what they’re doing. They ain’t bothering me.

Do you keep in touch with them?

Sure. There’s lots of Zeppelin things we attend to. We attend releases.

Atlantic released 'The Best of Led Zeppelin, Volume 2' earlier. Did that concern you?

Well of course it concerned me. I wasn’t very happy about that, but it was a democratic process, just two to one and I was the one. But the BBC Sessions I was very happy with. To me that was very valuable. It was great to hear the band in a well recorded situation, because normally when I heard the live stuff I was either standing right next to Page or it’s a horrible bootleg. So, to be able to sit back and not do anything and be able to hear all that he’s playing, that was a treat for me.

Why didn’t you want the 'Best of Vol. 2' to be released?

It’s been done before. I couldn’t see why, you know? I mean, the first remaster, the box set, was good because Atlantic went through the original Zeppelin release campaign kind of quick and didn’t really spend too much time with it. In fact, when we were collecting stuff for the box set, we found that some of the masters they used were actually second and third generation, and they put them on CD. They sounded really dull. They didn’t seem to have any life. So, the chance to remaster them, to bring them to life again was valid. But I couldn’t really see the point of the Greatest Hits records that came out last year. We were always against Greatest Hits album traditionally from the word go. It may have been a hang back to the fact that in the days when we started, you had singles bands, you had pop bands, and then you had albums bands. They were completely different things. So, I just didn’t see the point and I said so. But as I said, it was democratic and they thought differently.

How and why did you put 'Zooma' together?

Basically, I wanted to play live again. And of course, I needed something to play. I tend to need motivation to do a project. I’m not somebody who would just write things for no reason at all. I’ll work on a project and I’ll commit myself to it. But if I’m not actually working on it, then I’m just as happy to sit down and play instruments and not write anything. So, I need motivation but I didn’t want to join a band. If you’ve been in the best band in the world, what do you do? I knew that if I did an album, I’d be obligated to promote it. So, I knew I couldn’t just go, "Oh well, I’ve done the album. That’s it." I knew that it would force me on the road, which was what I wanted to do originally. So, I trapped myself into it. But it was really a positive experience.

So, what possessed you to say, "Man, it’s time to get out there live again"?

It’s funny, Diamanda Galas [who I recorded the album 'Sporting Life' with in 1994] said to me that she’d done collaborations with composers and various people. And she just said, "I realized one day that if I’m going to put this much effort into my music then I think it should be my own." And I took those words to heart. I figured I’d worked on everybody else’s records since 1963. It’s about time. And I’m fortunate to be in the position I’m in. I had my own studio. I don’t have to work to eat. Maybe it’s a mid-life crisis, who knows?

So, playing with Diamanda was what inspired it?

Yeah, I think so. And writing material for Diamanda. She got me playing steel guitar, so I could have a voice on stage. Cause I always used to play steel guitar in hotels and she saw it in the studio and had never heard one before. So I started playing, and she immediately wrote a song. And we put it on the album. People were like, "Wow, this is new, different."

How did that collaboration come together? How did you know her? Did you know her from years back?

I knew her from her work. I had one record by her at that time, 'Wild Women with Steak Knives', wonderfully titled. And the voice was just like, Whoa! A mutual friend said she’d be interested in doing a rock record and he thought that I’d work well together with her. I like the idea because I wasn’t into normal songs. She called them homicidal love songs. It was a case not so much of, "My baby’s left me, I’m going to throw myself out the window." It was, "My baby’s left me, I’m going to throw him out the window." I found her whole approach quite refreshing. And we hit it off immediately. We’ve both done lounge gigs, believe it or not, in our time. We used to do The Lady is a Tramp in soundcheck, which worried a few people. Nobody knew what to make of that. And we also found that we knew the entire Motown songbook. And we’d sit sown and play Stop In The Name Of Love. We had respect for each other as musicians.

Why was it a one time thing?

Well, she has a serious career. She follows what seems to be good at the time. And it was, because it led me to this.

[seasonal-depression-of-punk]

Ritualistic sacrifice

Chapter one:

the beginning of the end

Rating:mature

Summary:After clash at the castle, Drew McIntyre has been furious at CM Punk for taking another win away from him. With all of these emotions, he has been struggling with dreams of this man.

Punkintyre fan art based on the chapter included

Tags: @thlayli-ra @salemshotspot if you want to or don’t want to be tagged in the next chapter, tell me in the comments or anywhere else

____________________________________________

The day CM Punk came back and dared to show his face, was the day Drew knew that he’d do anything to take that taunting and infuriating smirk off of that already annoying face and never let it return there. He knew he was destined to be the reason for Punk’s misery.

Only after few months, he had already broken one of Punk’s dreams by injuring his arm. The dream he had been always talking about. The thing that would finally make people know that his worth in life was acknowledged. That he wasn’t just the bratty asshole the world tried to paint him to be. That CM Punk deserved to be in the main event of the most popular wrestling event in existence. That it wasn’t too late for Phil Brooks to finally achieve his childhood dream and main event Wrestlemania.

And Drew shattered that chance. He took that pathetic old man’s dream that was as frail as the man himself, held it in his strong hand and crushed it with all the power he had in his body. Oh the joy he felt the day after, when he heard how bad the damage had been. That day his prayers had been answered. That was the day he truly began to believe in god.

He should’ve remembered what kind of a person he had wronged. He should have known what that man would do. He shouldn’t have forgotten that, that petty old man would bite back. To talk back. To kick back! That old asshole has begun a hateful revenge campaign against Drew!

He ruined a Wrestlemania moment that should have been beautiful, joyful and unforgettable. He was supposed to be the world champion even after leaving the event. But no. That no good man, who brings even more bad luck than broken mirrors, ravens, horseshoes with their ends pointing down and black cats together. Black cats aren’t even bad luck!

This hasn’t been enough for Punk. Of course not! Punk would never be satisfied and Drew knew that way too well. The people in other companies and his own experiences pointed to that. That petty man could find something to be mad about in everything. No matter what, there was always something that could be better.

It wasn’t enough that Punk had taken credit for ruining Drew’s Wrestlemania moment. He also needed to ruin Drew’s homecoming. The moment where he was supposed to win back what he lost. But instead, he lost it again because of the same reason.

The smug grin of acknowledgement on Punk’s face made Drew’s emotions shoot through the roof. Pushing him in the corner, wanting to rip his face off then and there. But the older man had expected a reaction like this from him. Of course he had. The kick to his crotch happened so fast that Drew only could register it when he was on his knees, trying not to get affected too much by the pain. It took him so long that Damian Priest had recovered enough and took advantage of the situation, making Drew lose again.

After all of that, Drew was ready to give up. He was ready to quit. He had gone to RAW and said “I quit” in front of the crowd only two days after Clash at the Castle. Everyone tried to stop him. “What do you mean you quit? Drew you can’t!” Guys like Adam Pearce and Hunter had said to him. “No. I’m serious,” he had told them and walked out of the building. Ready to never return.

Drew had locked himself in his house and decided to become a hermit. He deactivated all of his social media, made his distance to other people lengthen and decided to dedicate all of the energy he used to use on social interactions to his cats. All of them were so happy he was staying home, purring and nuzzling against him no matter what he was doing. It was very comforting. To just pretend that everything was fine and his life goals hadn’t been destroyed. Everything was fine until he felt himself fall asleep.

~

Drew was at home in his bed when he heard something. He wiped his eyes and got up to see what was going on.

He walked to his living room and looked at the direction of his couch. He could see a shadowy figure sitting on it. This made him really concerned. He looked around for his cats. Why none of them meowed or let any sounds?

“Oh Drew. What are you looking for?” He heard a smug very familiar voice speak to him. Drew quickly turned on the light and saw exactly what he thought he’d see. “Phil wha-“ Drew started but was stopped by a finger in front of his mouth. “Shhhh… no need to open your mouth. I know anything that comes out of it is just bullshit” the man who proved to be Punk whispered into the taller man’s ear. He could feel the hot and moist breath next to his face. He felt his ear being licked which sent shivers down his spine.

This made Drew quickly push Punk away from him, making him fall on the floor. The tongue hadn’t felt like a normal tongue. It was slimy like a reptile. It disturbed Drew. Nothing felt real. The man fallen on the floor had a sinister smile across his face. His pupils were like snake’s. Drew stared at him with wide eyes and started to walk backwards further away from this creature.

This wasn’t a human. This was a demon. A succubus. A devilish creature from the deep depths of hell. The laugh of the creature that tried to look like Punk continued to get more loud and sinister. A guttural laugh like a horror movie villain-

And that’s when Drew woke up and sat up panicked.

It was all a dream…

Drew sighed in relief and wiped his hair away from his face. And that’s when he noticed…

He was hard.

Second chapter