#and when it left that evening it went south

[angelseraphines]

ೃ⁀➷ million dollar man ˗ˏˋ꒰ 🦢 ꒱

╰┈➤ cho sang-woo x girlfriend!reader imagine

a/n: i would like to give a special thank you to @lumillsie for the layout of this post and for the filter used on the header! this story takes place in an alternate ending for squid game where sang-woo wins instead of gi-hun! 🤍

˚ ༘♡ it had been over two weeks since you last heard from cho sang-woo. no calls, no texts, not even the smallest acknowledgment of your existence. the silence weighed on you, growing heavier with every passing day. sang-woo, your long-term boyfriend, the man you had imagined spending the rest of your life with, had seemingly vanished without explanation.

˚ ༘♡ he was everything you had dreamed of, handsome, intelligent, educated. in your eyes, he was near perfect. you had moved to south korea a year and a half ago. the two of you met only a month after your arrival in seoul. you were standing at a convenience store counter, struggling to buy an iced coffee before work. the cashier’s words blurred into a language barrier you couldn’t break through, leaving you flustered and embarrassed.

˚ ༘♡ then there he was. cho sang-woo, with his neatly pressed suit and square-rimmed glasses, stepping in to translate with a calm assurance that immediately put you at ease. he went further and insisted on paying for your coffee, brushing off your protests with a polite smile. “you can pay me back with your number,” he had said, his tone light but his warm gaze unwavering. you gave it to him without hesitation, your heart racing as he walked away with a casual, confident stride that lingered in your mind for days.

˚ ༘♡ what followed was akin to a fantasy. your first few dates were sweet and unassuming, dinners at cozy restaurants, walks through bustling markets, late-night phone calls that stretched into the early hours of the morning. before long, it became more than casual. he wasn’t simply a charming man in a suit, he was someone you trusted, someone you leaned on. yet, as your relationship deepened, so did the flaws.

˚ ༘♡ sang-woo treated you well in many ways. he insisted on paying for meals, even when you protested. he offered to help with rent when he noticed you were stressed about expenses. his job at joy investments afforded him a lifestyle of financial stability, one that he willingly extended to you. however, beneath his polished exterior, there was an undeniable distance.

˚ ༘♡ it started small, little things that nagged at you but seemed too insignificant to bring up. his phone was always locked, the screen flashing dark whenever you glanced at it. he would leave suddenly, without warning, offering only vague explanations that never quite satisfied your curiosity. “work,” he would say, brushing off your questions as though they were irrelevant. and no matter how many times you pressed him for the truth, he never admitted anything.

˚ ༘♡ those moments of secrecy chipped away at your trust, leaving an uneasy ache in your chest. you told yourself it was nothing, that you were overthinking. but the fights that erupted when you brought it up told a different story. his calm facade would crack, and he would grow defensive, his words sharp and cutting. “don’t you trust me?” he had asked more than once, the accusation in his tone a slap in the face.

˚ ༘♡ despite the arguments, despite the unanswered questions, you loved him. you loved the way he smoothed a hand down your back when you were upset, the way his voice softened when he called you by name. you loved the rare instances of vulnerability he let slip, the heartfelt glimpses of the man beneath the polished exterior. you loved him enough to forgive, enough to overlook the secrets that cast shadows over your relationship.

˚ ༘♡ as you sat alone in your apartment, staring at your phone with an empty inbox mocking your worry. two weeks of silence was unbearable. the man you loved, the one who had promised to protect you, had left you with nothing but questions and a ache where his presence used to be.

˚ ༘♡ the doorbell rang, cutting through the quiet of your apartment as though it were a sharp blade. it wasn’t merely unusual, it was unsettling. who would come at this hour? you glanced at the clock on the wall, its glowing numbers reminding you that it was well past midnight. your stomach churned uneasily as you stood up, your fatigue from a long shift at the café clinging to you.

˚ ༘♡ working from sunrise to sunset every day had worn you thin, but you had refused sang-woo’s offers to help you financially. he had already done so much, given so generously, and the thought of taking more was crossing a line you couldn’t bring yourself to breach. it would be an abuse of his kindness.

˚ ༘♡ the hallway was dark as you approached the door, your bare feet silent on the cool floor. you hesitated before unlocking it, your hand hovering over the latch. “hello?” you called out cautiously as you cracked it open, peering into the dimly lit corridor.

˚ ༘♡ before you could register what was happening, a hard shove sent the door crashing into you, knocking you backward. you stumbled, barely managing to catch yourself against the wall. your heart leapt into your throat as the figure who had forced their way inside quickly shut the door behind them.

˚ ༘♡ your confusion turned to disbelief as the light from your apartment fell on their face. it was sang-woo.

˚ ༘♡ his chest heaved with each labored breath, his shirt wrinkled and unbuttoned at the collar, his dress pants scuffed and slightly torn. his glasses, the ones you always teased him about for making him look too serious, were nowhere to be seen. instead, his face bore the evidence of recent hardships, bruises, faint scars, and scabbed-over cuts that marred his formerly pristine appearance. even his hands, the ones you’d grown so used to seeing holding a pen or a glass of wine, were scratched and battered.

˚ ༘♡ he looked like he had aged years in the short time he had been gone.

˚ ༘♡ “sang-woo,” you stammered, your voice unsteady with equal parts confusion and fear, “what the hell are you doing? it’s the middle of the night, and… why haven’t you been answering my calls?”

˚ ༘♡ he opened his mouth as if to respond, but the words didn’t come immediately. instead, he leaned against the door, his shoulders slumping as though the weight of the world was pressing down on him. “i…” he started, his voice hoarse and raw, but he seemed unable to finish.

˚ ༘♡ without warning, he crossed the room in a single stride and pulled you into a tight embrace. his arms wrapped around you with a desperation that felt almost suffocating, his head burying into the crook of your neck as he clung to you.

˚ ༘♡ you stood unmoving, the shock of his sudden appearance warring with the affection of his touch. part of you was relieved beyond words to have him back, while another part was angry. angry at his disappearance, at the unanswered calls and texts, at the fear and doubt he had left you to wrestle with.

˚ ༘♡ “i missed you,” he murmured against your shoulder, his voice so quiet you almost didn’t hear it.

˚ ༘♡ his words tugged at your heart, but they weren’t enough to quell the storm of questions brewing inside you. “sang-woo,” you said, your voice softer now but still laced with frustration, “what’s going on? where have you been? what happened to you?”

˚ ༘♡ he didn’t answer right away, his grip tightening, as though the very act of holding onto you could keep him grounded. his breath was unstable, his chest rising and falling against yours in a way that betrayed the turmoil beneath his silence. the room felt oppressively quiet.

˚ ༘♡ “sang-woo!” you exclaimed, your voice sharp, desperate for clarity. the sound seemed to jolt him, his body stiffening before he reluctantly pulled back.

˚ ༘♡ his hands were shaking as he reached into his pocket, the movement clumsy and hurried. when he withdrew, he thrust a thick stack of cash into your arms, one hundred million won, neatly bound and unnervingly out of place in your modest apartment. the weight of the money startled you, as you stared at the crisp bills in disbelief.

˚ ༘♡ “listen to me,” he said, his voice shaking but steadfast. “after this, after i take care of everything, i’ll buy us a beautiful home. somewhere quiet, somewhere safe. hold onto this for now.”

˚ ༘♡ you blinked at him, your mind struggling to process the sudden shift, the money heavy in your grasp. “sang-woo,” you said, your tone rising with vexation and confusion, “where did you get this money?”

˚ ༘♡ he didn’t answer, his eyes avoiding yours, and that only fueled your frustration. “tell me!” you demanded. “where have you been? do you have any idea what I’ve been through? i thought you left me for another woman or fled the country!”

˚ ༘♡ his jaw clenched, his expression fading as guilt flashed across his face, but he said nothing.

˚ ༘♡ you pressed further, your voice strained with a mix of hurt and fury. “i talked to your mother. she said you haven’t called her in ages! i went to your work. they haven’t seen you in weeks! your friends? same thing. no one knows where you’ve been!” your hands tightened around the cash, your knuckles white as your chest heaved with the distress of your tone. “how could you do this to me? how could you leave without a word, without an explanation?”

˚ ༘♡ his silence hurt more than any words could have. he looked at you, his expression a painful mix of regret and something darker, something you couldn’t place. his lips parted as if to speak, but he hesitated, the words caught somewhere between his chest and his throat.

˚ ༘♡ “sang-woo,” you whispered, your voice trembling as tears began to sting your eyes. “please. i need to understand.”

˚ ༘♡ “i’ll tell you everything soon, i promise, sweetheart,” sang-woo murmured, his voice unsteady, as if it pained him to speak. his hand, calloused and trembling, reached out to rest gently on your cheek, his touch delicate. your heart ached as you met his gaze, those dark, exhausted eyes glistening with unshed tears. it was a look so raw, so unfamiliar.

˚ ༘♡ “you have to trust me,” he said, his tone soft but pleading. “you have to listen to me. i’ve already given you what you need to cover your expenses.” his hand lingered against your cheek for a monthly moment before falling away, his fingers curling into a fist at his side. “i have urgent legal and business matters to deal with, but once they’re resolved… we’ll have the life we’ve dreamed of. everything we’ve talked about.”

˚ ༘♡ his lips brushed against your forehead, the kiss light but filled with a quiet desperation that made your chest tighten. “nothing could ever keep me from you,” he breathed, the words barely audible. “promise me you’ll do as i ask.”

˚ ༘♡ everything about this felt wrong, the way he avoided your questions, the haunting exhaustion in his voice, the bruises that lined his hands and face. you wanted answers. you wanted to demand he tell you everything right then and there, but the way he looked at you, so broken, so unlike the composed sang-woo you knew, kept you from saying anymore.

˚ ༘♡ uncertainty clouded your mind, nonetheless you nodded, your voice hardly above a whisper. “i promise.”

˚ ༘♡ his shoulders sagged slightly at your answer, the tension in his body loosening, though not entirely disappearing. “good,” he said softly, almost to himself. he was still nervous, his eyes darting toward the door as though expecting someone to burst through at any moment.

˚ ༘♡ “i have to go,” he said, his voice tinged with reluctance. “but i’ll come back. i swear, okay?”

˚ ༘♡ “okay,” you replied, unsure but unwilling to push him further.

˚ ༘♡ he leaned in, his lips brushing against yours in a fleeting, tender kiss that left you yearning for answers. then, without another word, he turned and left the apartment, closing the door behind him.

˚ ༘♡ you stood there, the silence of his absence pressing down on you, dread engulfed your thoughts. your mind churned with questions, with doubts, but one thing was certain, you were relieved, no matter how strange the circumstances of his return, to have seen sang-woo again. the agonizing ache in your chest told you that his departure had left you with far more questions than answers.

a/n: my first sang-woo fanfiction!! is it controversial for me to say i love his character and he’s my favorite one in squid game? please let me know if you have any requests! 🤍

[balrogballs]

in the illustrious history of balrogballs making a joke on Tumblr and then writing a whole ass fic around it, from breakfast blowjob productions, comes a new instalment:

balrogballs joking about a Bollywood Silmarillion adaptation where the Fëanorians are South Asian coded and Elrond, due to his kidnap fam upbringing, has the FUNNIEST colonial hangover known to mankind…

… and then a month later working on a period-AU oneshot set 20 years after the fall of the British Raj, where Surrey-based Elrond returns to India for the first time since he and Elros - the lost children of two British colonial officers - had been taken away from the notorious freedom fighters who found them and raised them.

enjoy an excerpt!

When he and Elros were eight years old, Maglor Fëanorian had told him about the walls of the West. Well, he didn't tell him but Elros had read it in a diary Maedhros kept during his days as a student in London, because Elros was the kind of child who shamelessly used other people’s diaries as storybooks.

So that was where Elrond Peredhel read about the walls of the West. How the bitter water from their seas runs through all the rivers on earth, how high they can rise to keep out outsiders, how they flow from the heart of London and twirl out across the world like barbed wire, propelled by the sea. The walls of Maglor’s house in Kozhikode, Elrond used to think, must have been too high on the cliffside for the sea to reach. As pockmarked as they were, they had always welcomed him and Elros with open arms and a kiss.

On most weeks, when Maedhros got home from another Congress meeting or some revolutionary circle or the other (it goes without saying that none of Maedhros’ comrades knew that he and his brother had taken in not only two grey-eyed British children, but the grey-eyed British children of the sisterfucking chutiya Viceroy’s sisterfucking chutiya secretary), he would always bring them a bag of hot, roasted peanuts.

A bag each! A bag each, because Maedhros just knew things like that, just knew that twins treasured every little thing they didn’t have to share. Even nothing-things like bags of peanuts. On those nights, when Maedhros put down a cushion and sat against the wall, spine to stone, Elrond would lean into his carefully-guarded, coiled-tight body and fall asleep to songs about the walls of the west. They had been very young. They had been young enough to call Maedhros ‘Baba’ and Maglor ‘Abbajaan’, and persist until it meant something.

The house was near the sea. The house that once would have been breathed in, had the sea yawned: these days, it is enveloped by the petrol-diesel-tar of the apathetic Sand Banks Road. Elrond can, had he wanted to, walk to six phone shops, even though he only has one phone. He tries to be content with the knowledge that Kunjiraman Vakeel Palam still exists: that he has to cross it every day to get to his house. The house by the sea. The one in which he and Elros and Maedhros and Maglor had lived and loved with no expectation of being loved back. Two violent freedom-fighters, and the left-behind spawn of the sisterfucking chutiya Viceroy’s sisterfucking chutiya secretary. The setup to a bad joke, the bones of a little life, wrapped in the cloying, earthy red around the house. At some point, a slow, jagged cat had wandered in and never left. He was the thinnest, reddest cat the fourteen-year-old Elrond had ever seen, half an ear missing, and mean for the sake of being mean.

He and Elros had taken half a year to name it. Were you supposed to give an Indian cat an Indian name? It was Maglor who put his foot down in the end. He didn't think he could live with a cat called Ramachandran. That’s simply “too Orientalist, Elrond, even for you. Someone would probably beat you up in school if you and your grey eyes went around telling people you owned a cat named Ramachandran, and I am telling you now I will not just turn a blind eye to it, I will be personally sending sweets to the child’s house”.

So they named it Rusty, and Rusty it was to everyone except Maedhros, who called it nothing, because “a cat that runs away from small rats does not deserve a name.”

[jazeswhbhaven]

Hey, I hope you don't mind if I ask for a headcanon? Could you do something for the kings (+Andraelphus [God, I hope I spelt that right] plus anyone else of your choosing if you want) where the MC finds a random angel child/baby left in hell to die or something (idk) and they are stubbornly saying that they need to keep it. Please and thank you!

Thank you for waiting anon! This would be interesting for MC to find a random angel baby because how were they even born? Is this...a possible trap? Well...let's see what everyone decides in the end.

Andrealphus: He was highly against it when he first saw MC with a child in their arms. He could tell right away this child was an angel, left for dead but he also didn't know what the purpose of this could be. Angels would in deed just leave their own behind, but to have a child in the first place? Where did they come from? MC then convinces Dre that this angel could be raised differently so that they don't grow up to be like the others up in Heaven. It does take Dre a lot of thinking, and he decides to come to compromise. He won't deal with the child until it starts to look like they may be dangerous to Hell.

Satan: As far as he was concerned, any angel left behind alive was meant to be dealt with. But at the same time, this angel is a child after all, and a very young one at that to where it's wings haven't even matured yet. He agrees to have MC keep them, as long as they are aware of the consequences and risks. This decision looks bad amongst a few nobles, Sitri being one of them...but Satan's word is final. He does help MC watch over the child, and with time everyone determines that with enough time in Hell, they were swayed over.

Mammon: Everything in Hell belongs to him, even angel infants that are abandoned and left behind. Normally though, what he would do is much more cruel than what MC had in mind. This time, MC convinces Mammon to keep the angel infant, but they are to stay in their own closed off area away from the majority of the palace being heavily monitored by the various smart ai bots built. MC does help the best they can, but it's hard work with the amount of clearances and precautions they have to make.

Beelzebub: It was horrifying trying to get him to not harm the angel. He literally had the poor thing dangled above his jaws about to swallow them whole. MC even tries to get the help of Bael to try and convince him not to follow through, and it deems tough. Eventually MC gives Beel an ultimatum, and it forces him to comply. So in the end, MC is now the caretaker of the child and Beel side eyes the child at every turn. He isn't afraid to come in and handle things if it goes south, and ultimately he forgets anyway and now it's Bael that has to make sure things don't go belly up. MC has it under control though.

Leviathan: His first words? Absolutely fucking not. He even cursed too. There was no way that he was going to save an angel that was left behind for any reason. Not after what he and others went through and the angel could potentially be an issue for Hell later. But at the same time, MC brings up that with Levi's guidance he could have the angel grow up to be an asset instead of an issue. He takes this into consideration and deems that the angel's training will be twice as difficult to really test their loyalty, but only when the angel is old enough. For now they are under MC's care.

Lucifer: He quietly takes in the child without MC having to say much of anything. Though, Paradise Lost doesn't seem to be the place for the infant. He instead entrusts the fallen angels of the Middle Realm to look over the infant. MC is able to visit them from time to time with permission to make sure the angel is doing okay. And so far, it seems everything is going well and there are no issues.

Belphegor: When asked, he didn't want to deal with it so rolled the dice to decide the angel child's fate. Despite of what MC was protesting and wanting from Belphie, the dice was the deciding factor. The angel child was going to stay in Nifelheim, but MC and Beleth were going to be the ones to look after them. MC agrees immediately and Beleth feels a certain way about it, but with time and dedication both determine that the angel child is not an immediate threat. Especially for Beleth who used to be a former angel. Again, Belphie can't be bothered with them because he simply chooses not to. Everything is up to MC at this point.

Asmodeus: An angel baby left behind from Heaven? How interesting. Well, since he and MC can't have children...he just sees this as he and MC adopting a child together no matter where they came from. He wants to see what happens when an angel gets raised from birth by a devil and a human...maybe they can change their mind so they aren't against devils when they're older. Or it could be a complete disaster and go wrong in every sense of the word. But he's just so curious, and he gets to play 'house' with MC. So far, everything is steady and smooth sailing. And may it stay that way....for MC's sake because otherwise Asmodeus has no problem getting rid of the child in any way he deems fit.

[sloaneloise]

"Suppose that makes it a lot easier when you go from one kind of cold to just another place of cold." At least she figured the transition was easier, where as she had to admit, she had forgotten how cold it could get in Merrock locally. Still, she would say, she appreciated the weather a lot more than just pure heat that sometimes Arizona could bring where it felt like you were roasting even in the winter time. "They do love to put on a good appearance for the holidays but I think that's why I love it so much. Think once the fall weather started I had been counting down to all of this." Gesturing around, it had been years since she was able to enjoy any of this. Sure, other places decorated for the holidays but it wasn't the same when it was borderline tropical trees compared to actual pine trees and that familiar feeling of holiday. "Oh good, I'm really glad about that, because I would be kind of worried." That was the inner medical professional in her, "Don't want you guys sending anyone my way with frostbitten fingers and toes." That was definitely something she could put on the list of did not want. "Plus I'm sure there's a peace to knowing who is out there wandering around then wondering if someone is just out there waiting to be rescued." While she worked in a high pressured job, in a way, so did Jason. "Has anyone ever snuck by not checking in? Think that would be my nightmare right there this time of year." When he said that he had left the moment he turned eighteen, "Admirable, you know, your service. I can't speak to any of that but I've had friends who joined the military when I moved down south." A lot of men and women often went that way to have education paid for. "So what, almost two years back then?" She knew that he had been in the same class as Kellan, at least she vaguely remembered that.

"It's just one cold to another cold," he said with a smile. But it did make life easier; Jason had arrived with his entire life in his camper, and thankfully that life was made up of warm coats and sweaters, so that he hadn't had to go out and buy a whole new wardrobe when the winter rolled in that first year. Now, he just felt like an old pro, although he had slipped back into that feeling pretty easily from what he remembered of living in town before. Funny how that works. "No, they're pretty upfront about it," he agreed with a light laugh, glancing around the park. Sure, Maine had warm summers and beautiful beaches, but most people thought of Christmas and winter and snow and ice. Beautiful, but definitely the epitome of winter when the season rolled around. "They do, actually. Now, anyway. Once we get the first major snow fall and temperatures dip below a certain point, we require all hikers to check in with the front desk and show us that they have the proper equipment." Thankfully, it cut back on how many unnecessary rescues they had to do, kept them aware of who did and did not return at the end of the day. Just in case he did have to step in to be the hero -- not that he wanted to in mid-December on trails covered in ice and snow. "I know what you mean," he agreed, letting his breath out through his nostrils. "Since I was eighteen, yeah," he stepped carefully down the path, keeping his eyes on the light displays as he talked. "Hit the ground running and just never looked back. Did the Army route for a while, then lived and worked in the parks, came back before my fortieth."

[enwoso]

That Lovie fic was perfect!!

You really did amazing to make me dislike younger him, see the logical side to his panic because it was logical (not him abandoning them, just for clarification! He was vile for that!), and seeing the growth he had as an adult to the point where I couldn't completely hate him anymore

But it was really satisfying to hear his football career didn't work out, whose life was ruined now asshole? 😏

But lovie was the cutest, her calling him daddy was a sucker punch but it was bound to happen! And the people in Alessia's life who gave her the advice were everything, Giorgio and Luca being so protective over them and Tooney knowing exactly what her best mate needs to hear 🥹

He's gonna have a lot of digging to do for forgiveness, not just from Alessia but from her family, friends, even team she's played for that's met Lovie. Alessia and Lovie have people who are ready to protect them in a way Alessia didn't necessarily have back then

young harrison: hate him.

older harrison: tolerable to a point.

i feel like alessia would have loved to just be like ‘no you didn’t want to be apart of her life when she was younger so your not now’ and let him suffer a bit like she did after he left her all those years ago but also that’s not in her nature but that doesn’t mean she won’t make him work for her trust. and hearing how his football career went south, well for alessia that’s just the icing on the cake.

[mysticwolfshadows]

Taken - Zutara - Part 75

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They don't get a chance to see each other after the coronation. With the invasion over, and Zuko announcing his intents to pull out from the Earth Kingdom immediately, the forces occupying the city return home. Katara is swept up with the rest of the Southern warriors. Aang hovers over head, making sure that everyone leaves without issue.

Lieutenant Jee, however, follows them out with the Wani. When the Southern fleet separated from the Earth Army and the Northern fleet, the Wani followed. Katara scowled at Jee from the deck of her fathers boat.

"What are you doing, Captain?" She asked.

Jee seemed to find this amusing. "Just following orders, ma'am."

She hated it when they called her that.

They were at sea for days. It took so long to get anywhere when they weren't on Appa. She hated to admit it, but she was glad to have the Wani. At night, she and Sokka went onto the ship, and were given sleeping quarters to themselves. Katara was put in Zuko's old Captains Quarters, which Jee had never claimed.

"It's funny," Katara said one night, half way to the South Pole. "That both times I return home, it's on this ship, with this crew."

"It is," Jee said, sipping his tea. "But everyone here adores you. They're all happy to help you, because you've helped us so much already. We're all just as loyal to you as we are to Zuko." His gaze slid to the corner, where Rinzo and Taka were arguing about who would be taking first watch when they reached the tribe. "Well, maybe not all of us."

The joke did make her smile. "Your loyalty is split between your Fire Lord and some Water Tribe girl? Should I be worried about Zuko?"

Jee shot her a smile. "You and I both know you're not 'just some Water Tribe girl'. Everyone here knows it." He paused, watching her for a moment. "And we all know you'll become even more, someday."

"So you approve," Katara guessed, holding her cup tightly in her hands. "Of me becoming Fire Lady?"

That seemed to surprise Jee, who choked on his tea. "Wait. Zuko, did he...?"

She laughed, feeling a bit nervous now. She'd only told Suki about her vision, just the once, and then they hadn't talked about it again. "Not... exactly. We had ended up in the Foggy Swamp, just after leaving the Northern Water Tribe. I had a vision."

The Captain was staring at her. "Of... Of Zuko proposing?"

"Not in so many words," she said. "You know how he is, sometimes. And he was older. But, essentially, yes."

Jee looked at her for a moment, then down at his tea cup like he wasn't sure it was strong enough. Then, he looked up, frowning. "Are you going to say yes? When he does?"

She leaned back a little, looking up at the ceiling. A lantern swung gently above their heads. It was a little funny, that she couldn't feel the ship swaying with the waves, but this little lantern could.

Visions were a funny thing, too. Before the Foggy Swamp, she had adored Zuko, but she hadn't thought it was a possibility. He was a Prince, meant to be a leader of a nation, and she was... Jee had said she wasn't some Water Tribe girl, but she was. If she had never been taken away, her life would have been just that. Some Water Tribe girl.

She wouldn't have found Aang if she hadn't been trying to escape Rinzo and Taka's hovering. She wouldn't be a waterbending master without adapting firebending forms to suit her needs. She likely would have never left the South Pole. She would have been a random girl, with bending she couldn't use, in a tribe on the verge of extinction. How could she ever be enough for a prince?

But her vision, in that awful swamp, had opened her eyes to that possibility. Opened her eyes to the possibility that Zuko would want her. So she had looked, and found Zuko already looking back.

"If Zuko had asked me before we left," Katara said, closing her eyes. "I would have said yes. We'd have to wait a few years, but I would have said yes."

Maybe the vision was what her future would always be, or maybe it was what Zuko would have done if she had never gone into that swamp. Either way, if Zuko decided to ask, she was determined to let him know that her answer would always be yes.

"For now," she continued, as Jee stared at her. "I'm thinking I'll become the South Pole Ambassador to the Fire Nation. I just have to convince my dad that it's a good idea, not that he can stop me." Stifling a yawn, she got up, giving the man a polite bow. "It's been nice talking to you, Captain, but I think I'm heading to bed for the night."

As she walked off, she heard him take a loud sip of his tea, before announcing to the rest of the crew; "I need something a bit stronger. Who else wants some?"

First / Previous / Next / Masterpost

[fidgetspringer]

This is going to interest exactly no one except myself, but still.

We've all seen the chaos that is the Flight Radar right?

That's a lot of planes.

But are you ready for the insanity that is the Ship Radar?

Because it's nuts.

(Red are tankers, green are cargo.)

And if you watch for long enough you'll start to realise some vessels do some weird things. Like this tiny tug boat that has been doing exactly this for going on three days straight.

You good??

[friendscfmine]

   Richard’s coffeeshop might see more success if he moved it to a bigger city, all those commuters lining up every morning, he could sell a lot more and make a lot more money, but it’s not always about finances.  They have already invested so much in this town, and there are too many risks involved with starting over elsewhere.  Tweek has his school and his boyfriend, and it already takes a lot to keep him from gallivanting off to God knows where.  Richard can only imagine how much harder he would be to keep an eye on when going across town means getting on the interstate.

   Then, there would be the issue of finding a new supplier for their special ingredient without the McCormicks, who definitely would not be able to afford to come with them.  Not to mention, the risk of getting caught and arrested for using their special ingredient would skyrocket since they would not already have the local police hopelessly dependent on their coffee.

   The big city is also filled with more highly educated people including doctors and whatnot, who might be able to see that there is something wrong with Tweek and rip him away from them.  The general lack of awareness permeating South Park’s populace works out wonderfully for the Tweaks.  The only ones who seem to notice that there is anything wrong with their son are the other kids in town, and it is easy enough to lie to them about what Tweek’s problem is—a combination of ADD and an overactive imagination leading to utterly unfounded paranoia.

   “No,” Richard says, “I can’t say that we do.  We don’t really leave, and we don’t get a lot of visitors, which makes you and the Marshes pretty special.  The Marshes are a family who used to live in town but moved out to a marijuana farm a few months ago.”  Richard does not let his distaste for Randy Marsh show, relaying the facts of that family’s more as neutrally as he can to gauge Ava’s reaction.  He is not going to tell her that Randy has become more intolerable since moving to the farm.  Unfortunately, that man is probably the best hope that the Tweaks have to get meth legalized.  After all, he was able to make the legalization of cocaine happen in one afternoon.

   “Generally, though, once people plant roots in a place, they’re very hard to tear up.  Even those who want to leave find themselves tethered to too many obligations to actually do it.  But I’m one of those people who has always been a bit of a homebody, so I don’t mind it.”  He shrugs and straightens a napkin holder.  “There used to be only one of each time of business in town.  For example, Tweek Bros. used to be the only coffeehouse in town.  So, for a lot of people, leaving town would mean letting down dozens of others who depend on them.  We don’t really have a big science person since Randy left.”  He was a geologist, but he was still one of the most educated men in town, so they went to him with questions unrelated to rocks as well.

   “Ah,” he says, the corner of his mouth twitching as he tries to decide if it would be better to smile or frown here.  “I didn’t realize they were so rare and difficult to find.”  She is right; the small nursery in town would not carry lesser known varieties.  It has plenty of daisies, pansies, tulips, and mums, depending on what is in season at the time, the flowers that everyone wants to put in their yards to symbolize perfect American suburbia.  “I know she would love the opportunity to stand out from the other yards, though, so it might be worth making the trek out to the city, after all.”

Ava finds things that keep her tethered to the present, that are calming and methodical because she is a walking timebomb at the best of times. Her life had already been so chaotic, so full of suffering, that she had to find something to put herself in a state of control and calm long before the pact. Now, with it, those skills became paramount as it kept innocent people safe. That, and by now she'd come to terms and was okay with the fact that she was alone in the universe for the most part.

There was one glaring oversight with that idea, fortunately unknown to Richard. Stubbornness aside, there likely wasn't any sort of material on Earth that could truly keep her locked up. If the Gate hadn't, they didn't have a chance in hell.

She's not so out of touch to miss that most people find talk of flowers and their growing habits dull, and is generally prepared to nip the conversation in the proverbial bud long before she really gets going. "That's what I've heard from a lot of people... You guys don't feel the need to see the world, huh?"

Had it not been so ingrained into her that traveling was a necessary evil, she might have understood the notion of townies a little more. It was funny, even being stuck on a planet that would have likely not given her the chance to ever leave, she still had more than enough access to methods that would have gotten her off it and into the universe at large. Hell, Titan's schooling - providing any of them had shown any potential - would have them holed up in another school to learn if it was viable. Had she stayed, the planet remained, there was also an equally likely chance that she would have been shipped off to a new planet soon for her acting out. If she had grown up, they would have stuck her on some other planet to work.

A huffy laugh leaves her, the realization of what her suggestion of flowers was in tandem with the residents of South Park rarely leaving being highly ironic. "Good luck findin' 'em, they're kinda considered specialty... You might need to go to a bigger town or somethin' for a lot of the odder flowers."

[starboymp3]

i think so much abt the fact that celeborn was one of the last elves who left middle-earth... like we don't even know when it was that he left

and i also think that it was probably him who lived on middle-earth for the longest period of time (out of the elves). i mean yeah galadriel was probably older than him for example and maybe even círdan too, but none of them lived longer on this side of the sea than him. celeborn was already living in doriath in starlit beleriand when the noldor lived still in valinor, and he also stayed longer after the war of the ring, after galadriel and círdan and elrond left. like, idk. how much you have to love a place to stay there even after the most of your kind and the love of your life all left... etc

[hussyknee]

Why is my stupid idiot brain sunk to the very bottom of the sea bed like whale fall. I'm on extra strength medication, I'm staying off social media, I'm surrounded by kittens. And yet. My anxiety has turned into full blown agoraphobia and I'm so depressed that getting out of bed is a feat I only achieve because my cats need feeding.

It's been almost seventeen years of being bipolar but I still can't internalise that mood disorders are actual illnesses that disable and debilitate as much as any physical disease. Clearly the only thing wrong with me is that I'm not trying hard enough to crawl out of this. If I really wanted to get better I'd fight through my anxiety and back pain and sensory hell and do stuff like go to therapy, eat healthy, exercise and get a job.

To make matters worse, my brain keeps hollering that I'm 37 this year and no closer to joining the rest of the job-having, rent-paying, independent adult world. The fact that I've been in a consistently worsening mental health crisis since 2020 to the point that I was in greater danger than I've ever been of committing suicide the first six months of last year is clearly irrelevant. Somehow.

Tbh, if it wasn't for my rescue kittens, I'd be regretting that I didn't just go through with it. Not enough to go through with it now, but regretting it all the same. But I do have my kitties so I can't regret it. Instead, I'm just resigning myself to the fact that having something to live for, even when I don't want to, is the best I'll ever get.

[icewindandboringhorror]

Recent game related things .. hrmm...

[iamtheoneandonlyever]

Guys

The yearning for my old friends is coming back full force

This is why i should not be left alone, I WANT MY FRIENDS BACK

[nerdie-faerie]

Having a complicated relationship with your mum is so confusing. It's the knowledge that she taught me the best way to make gravy, how tie my shoes and how to make my bed. But she's also the one that made disparaging comments about my body growing up and is part of the reason I don't want to be a parent myself and why I moved across the country for uni. But she's still my mum and I still find myself wishing I could seek comfort from her when things get a little too hard but the mum I'm longing for doesn't really exist. And I see her in the colour of my eyes and in the way I grit my teeth when I'm angry. She taught me how to do my hair and how to cover up bruises. She's a part of me in all the good and the bad. And there's no way to say you hate someone that doesn't also acknowledge all the good because nothings as ever as black and white as that

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

This was known at the time. Also known at the time: Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda (a terrorist organization NOT a government) were responsible for the attacks.

Osama bin Laden (born and raised in Saudia Arabia) was the son of a billionaire who used his inherited wealth to found the terrorist group al-Qaeda

None of al-Qaeda's founders were Iraqi.

Saddam Hussein/the Iraqi government had few if any connections to Osama bin Laden/al-Qaeda

They were completely separate individuals/organizations.

Iraq was not involved in the Sept 11 attacks.

Iraq was not involved in the Sept 11 attacks.

Of the 19 hijackers who carried out the Sept 11 attacks:

15 were from Saudi Arabia (a powerful/oil-rich country the U.S. works hard to maintain diplomatic relations with)

2 were from the United Arab Emirates (also a powerful/oil-rich country the U.S. works hard to maintain diplomatic relations with)

1 was from Egypt, 1 from Lebanon.

None of the hijackers were from Iraq.

None of the Sept 11 hijackers were Iraqi.

None of the 9/11 hijackers were from Iraq.

[3liza]

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/theyre-not-human-how-19th-century-inuit-coped-with-a-real-life-invasion-of-the-walking-dead

Indigenous groups across the Americas had all encountered Europeans differently. But where other coastal groups such as the Haida or the Mi’kmaq had met white men who were well-fed and well-dressed, the Inuit frequently encountered their future colonizers as small parties on the edge of death.

“I’m sure it terrified people,” said Eber, 91, speaking to the National Post by phone from her Toronto home.

And it’s why, as many as six generations after the events of the Franklin Expedition, Eber was meeting Inuit still raised on stories of the two giant ships that came to the Arctic and discharged columns of death onto the ice.

Inuit nomads had come across streams of men that “didn’t seem to be right.” Maddened by scurvy, botulism or desperation, they were raving in a language the Inuit couldn’t understand. In one case, hunters came across two Franklin Expedition survivors who had been sleeping for days in the hollowed-out corpses of seals.

“They were unrecognizable they were so dirty,” Lena Kingmiatook, a resident of Taloyoak, told Eber.

Mark Tootiak, a stepson of Nicholas Qayutinuaq, related a story to Eber of a group of Inuit who had an early encounter with a small and “hairy” group of Franklin Expedition men evacuating south.

“Later … these Inuit heard that people had seen more white people, a lot more white people, dying,” he said. “They were seen carrying human meat.”

Even Eber’s translator, the late Tommy Anguttitauruq, recounted a goose hunting trip in which he had stumbled upon a Franklin Expedition skeleton still carrying a clay pipe.

By 1850, coves and beaches around King William Island were littered with the disturbing remnants of their advance: Scraps of clothing and camps still littered with their dead occupants. Decades later, researchers would confirm the Inuit accounts of cannibalism when they found bleached human bones with their flesh hacked clean.

“I’ve never in all my life seen any kind of spirit — I’ve heard the sounds they make, but I’ve never seen them with my own eyes,” said the old man who had gone out to investigate the Franklin survivors who had straggled into his camp that day on King William Island.

The figures’ skin was cold but it was not “cold as a fish,” concluded the man. Therefore, he reasoned, they were probably alive.

“They were beings but not Inuit,” he said, according to the account by shaman Nicholas Qayutinuaq.

The figures were too weak to be dangerous, so Inuit women tried to comfort the strangers by inviting them into their igloo.

But close contact only increased their alienness: The men were timid, untalkative and — despite their obvious starvation — they refused to eat.

The men spit out pieces of cooked seal offered to them. They rejected offers of soup. They grabbed jealous hold of their belongings when the Inuit offered to trade.

When the Inuit men returned to the camp from their hunt, they constructed an igloo for the strangers, built them a fire and even outfitted the shelter with three whole seals.

Then, after the white men had gone to sleep, the Inuit quickly packed up their belongings and fled by moonlight.

Whether the pale-skinned visitors were qallunaat or “Indians” — the group determined that staying too long around these “strange people” with iron knives could get them all killed.

“That night they got all their belongings together and took off towards the southwest,” Qayutinuaq told Dorothy Eber.

But the true horror of the encounter wouldn’t be revealed until several months later.

The Inuit had left in such a hurry that they had abandoned several belongings. When a small party went back to the camp to retrieve them, they found an igloo filled with corpses.

The seals were untouched. Instead, the men had eaten each other.

[fursasaida]

This article is from 2022, but it came up in the context of Palestine:

Here are some striking passages, relevant to all colonial aftermaths but certainly also to the forms we see Zionist reaction taking at the moment:

Over the decade I lived in South Africa, I became fascinated by this white minority [i.e. the whole white population post-apartheid as a minority in the country], particularly its members who considered themselves progressive. They reminded me of my liberal peers in America, who had an apparently self-assured enthusiasm about the coming of a so-called majority-minority nation. As with white South Africans who had celebrated the end of apartheid, their enthusiasm often belied, just beneath the surface, a striking degree of fear, bewilderment, disillusionment, and dread.

[...]

Yet these progressives’ response to the end of apartheid was ambivalent. Contemplating South Africa after apartheid, an Economist correspondent observed that “the lives of many whites exude sadness.” The phenomenon perplexed him. In so many ways, white life remained more or less untouched, or had even improved. Despite apartheid’s horrors—and the regime’s violence against those who worked to dismantle it—the ANC encouraged an attitude of forgiveness. It left statues of Afrikaner heroes standing and helped institute the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which granted amnesty to some perpetrators of apartheid-era political crimes.

But as time wore on, even wealthy white South Africans began to radiate a degree of fear and frustration that did not match any simple economic analysis of their situation. A startling number of formerly anti-apartheid white people began to voice bitter criticisms of post-apartheid society. An Afrikaner poet who did prison time under apartheid for aiding the Black-liberation cause wrote an essay denouncing the new Black-led country as “a sewer of betrayed expectations and thievery, fear and unbridled greed.”

What accounted for this disillusionment? Many white South Africans told me that Black forgiveness felt like a slap on the face. By not acting toward you as you acted toward us, we’re showing you up, white South Africans seemed to hear. You’ll owe us a debt of gratitude forever.

The article goes on to discuss:

"Mau Mau anxiety," or the fear among whites of violent repercussions, and how this shows up in reported vs confirmed crime stats - possibly to the point of false memories of home invasion

A sense of irrelevance and alienation among this white population, leading to another anxiety: "do we still belong here?"

The sublimation of this anxiety into self-identification as a marginalized minority group, featuring such incredible statements as "I wanted to fight for Afrikaners, but I came to think of myself as a ‘liberal internationalist,’ not a white racist...I found such inspiration from the struggles of the Catalonians and the Basques. Even Tibet" and "[Martin Luther] King [Jr.] also fought for a people without much political representation … That’s why I consider him one of my most important forebears and heroes,” from a self-declared liberal environmentalist who also thinks Afrikaaners should take back government control because they are "naturally good" at governance

Some discussion of the dynamics underlying these reactions, particularly the fact that "admitting past sins seem[ed] to become harder even as they receded into history," and US parallels

And finally, in closing:

The Afrikaner journalist Rian Malan, who opposed apartheid, has written that, by most measures, its aftermath went better than almost any white person could have imagined. But, as with most white progressives, his experience of post-1994 South Africa has been complicated. [...]

He just couldn’t forgive Black people for forgiving him. Paradoxically, being left undisturbed served as an ever-present reminder of his guilt, of how wrongly he had treated his maid and other Black people under apartheid. “The Bible was right about a thing or two,” he wrote. “It is infinitely worse to receive than to give, especially if … the gift is mercy.”