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killerskillercaptain · 4 years ago

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Embarrassing moments w/ Levi Ackerman BOOK II

I only put one incident in this one because inspiration was running wild and things got out of hand, so enjoy !

You can read BOOK ONE here

word count : 1,9K

warnings : implicit seggsual themes, slight angst.

The client incident

Erwin had put you and Levi on a special mission; both of you received one letter from the commander urging you to go meet Balkus Adomas, a businessman whom Erwin was used to work with to get funds for the SC, and god knows the Survey Corps needed that financial support lately. With all the casualties, injured horses and used up equipment you lost in your encounter with the female titan, you could definitely use some help, any help actually.

The letter instructed Levi to tie up the negotiations, as Erwin had already sent a letter to Balkus, stating the nature of the visit; the letter also instructed Levi to take you with him to officialize everything on legal documents.

Levi sent one letter back to Erwin asking the commander about the nature of the business this man held. Three days later, the response consisted of a short sentence that wasn’t very helpful, and its vagueness didn’t make Levi happy; he hated being kept in the dark about the people he needed to work with.

The letter only said « « You’ll know when you get there »

The next morning, right after dawn, you and Levi were already on your horses, heading to the small town situated in the west, where the businessman was to be found. It was a good four hours ride, but you were accustomed by now to even longer distances.

Reaching your destination, Levi followed Erwin’s instructions, it didn’t take long for you two to find the location. Heading towards the main entrance, you couldn’t help but notice the frowning faces locals threw at you while passing you by. The place was an old, seemingly neglected property, it didn’t look like a business run by a rich businessman who could land money to the military, and you could sense that levi was thinking the same. You stood there studying the poorly maintained building for a moment until the main door suddenly flew open and a little round man, probably in his forties appeared with a dangling woman at his arm, the woman was laughing uncontrollably while planting kisses alongside the man’s neck, both of them completely ignoring the accusing stares being directed towards them.

Is this a tavern ?

Wait no.

You felt your legs tremble a little, and you suddenly felt embarrassed at the realization : it was a brothel. And the cheap kind by the looks of it.This Balkus Adomas runs a freaking brothel. Slightly alarmed, as this was completely out of your comfort zone, you glanced nervously at Levi who didn’t show any sign of tension. But little did you know, the short man was infuriated and boiling under the surface.

You on the other hand, were visibly stressed out. In a moment of hesitation you wanted to grab Levi’s hand like a child lost in an adult place but you managed to hold your composure, and decided to follow him by staying as close as possible to him. Levi headed rapidly to a broad bearded man, he looked like he was the receptionist or something of the sort, Levi asked if he could see Adomas.

" You should have been notified we were coming, we’re sent by Erwin Smith "

" Yes, yes this good old’ Erwin Smith, he said he’ll send someone ! "

The way the man said « good old’ Erwin Smith » made it look somewhat suspicious, and you wondered if the commander was fond of such places as it hardly seemed so to you.

" Well Lord Adomas is not here now, but you can wait for him, he comes early in the morning to do some accounting, as you see, the business is running wild lately "

" You can spend the night here if you want " he added.

You felt Levi tense up.

" Erwin will hear me about it, making us stay the night, not even being able to get an appointment correctly " you heard Levi mumble to himself between greeted teeth. You could clearly see now that this place is stressing him just as much.

" Don’t worry, Erwin Smith has always been good to us, intervening for us every time something threatened to close this place, and get Lord Adomas out of business, so we owe him big time "

You somehow got reassured that this was the nature of their connection to Erwin.

" I’m gonna give you a room to stay in for the night for free, it’s on the house "

He dangled a golden key in front of us, but when levi reached out to take it, the man retracted his hand behind the counter, a mischievous smile contorting his lips.

" Unless you want to spend the night as a customer Captain Levi ? "

Levi snatched the key from the man who now turned to you, completely ignoring the short captain.

" Hey miss, you’re not bad either, have you ever thought about leaving the army ? We could get you a job here, you’ll see, Lord Adomas treats his employees with extra care " he ended his speech with a nasty tone that had you both in such discomfort that you could almost feel Levi’s anger and you shivered at the way he said extra care. Dragging you by the collar of your military jacket, Levi headed with you towards the stairs, in search for the right bedroom while you followed him closely. As you were afraid of; the walls were incredibly thin in this place, and discernible sounds could be heard from each door. A series of thuds, creaks and lewd voices which you did your best to ignore, while you and the captain hurried to find the right door. Being here with Levi made this whole situation so much more uncomfortable, and right now, you cursed yourself for being the only person capable (and available) to do the paperwork, you hated that you were in charge, you hated that your signature was required, you-

" Here’s the shitty door "

You looked at the door, it was situated at a fair distance from the others, but didn’t look as damaged, maybe it didn’t get used a lot, or at least you hoped.

A demanding and urgent female voice erupted suddenly, close enough that both of you could hear it clearly. You tried to ignore how shaky your legs were now, you tried to focus on Levi opening the door but your eyes met a trembling Levi having difficulties opening the door, his hand too shaky to insert the key right, obviously he was just as startled as you were. When both of you finally heard a reassuring click, he slammed open the door with a "Tch"!

" Can’t believe this mess Erwin put us in, he’ll hear me about it ! "

You followed him inside. The room seemed fairly in order, didn’t seem to be too dusty, you sighed in relief, but your relief was short-lived, it sure wasn’t dusty but it did look completely unsanitary, no wonder this place gets threatened to be closed so often.

" Tch ! I’m taking fifty showers after this, and i’m gonna scrub my feet with Erwin’s- "

" Um Captain ? "

" WHAT ? " he asked harshly, getting you a bit startled by his tone.

Hey don’t lash out at me, it’s not my fault we’re in this mess.

" There’s only one bed "

" You can have it, i’m not sleeping in this filth "

" Neither do i , Captain " you said picking up a long strand of hair from the pillow and studying it before tossing it aside. The place was filthy.

But to both your consolation, there were two chairs made out of wicker that seemed not too risky to use.

You took the one on the left, Levi took the one on the right before looking at you.

" We’ll wait here until this Adomas piss of shit shows up so we can get it done with the paperwork and get out of this filthy hell " and those were the only words he spoke to you for the rest of night.

You were already feeling a bit sleepy, all the exhaustion caused by the trip creeping back to you. You had dozed off for what seemed like half an hour before you were awaken by new sounds rising abruptly from the next room. You jolted in your seat, the unsettling sounds of moans and boastful voices filling the room quickly, followed by a string of giggles, then another string of incomprehensible moany gibberish. You couldn’t make up a single word but you understood all too well the activities taking place in the other room. Still trying to compose yourself and get rid of the embarrassment sucking you in you right now, you suddenly remembered that you weren’t alone in the room, and turned quickly to look for the captain.

Levi was still sitting in his chair, you realized he had moved it away from you, almost placing himself at the other corner of the room, his fists tightening on his knees, he had the most irritated expression you’ve ever seen on his face, he looked like he was ready to snap a neck in half. Was it possible that he has been awake the entire time while you were sleeping ? Having to listen to the most indecent events going on next door ?

He was staring right in front of him, he looked as if he was trying to avert your gaze, afraid that a single stare shared between you two at this moment would aggravate the discomfort, and he was spot on.

Now the lewd voices were joined by the most obscene of sounds. You could feel your face, your hands and everything in between grow hot, you tried your best to keep a steady composure and not look at Levi who was incredibly silent at the other end of the room. Damn it, the smutty opera next door got you so alert you couldn’t even hope to sleep it off so you don’t have to endure this unbearable atmosphere.

You stayed like this until dawn. You and the captain, sitting stiff with both your hands glued to your thighs like two Egyptian statues while the auditory nuisance went on, all fucking night.

For a brief moment you heard Levi mutter something that you deciphered as « Erwin you piss of shit, you’re gonna pay for this»

You did get to Balkus Adomas the next day at the crack of dawn, he did accept to continue supporting the Scouts, you did go through the administration stuff you were dragged in here for. You even had Adomas make the same suggestion to you as the bearded receptionist; offering you to leave your uncomfortable scouting uniform for something else, vaunting about how much you can get paid in one night here, nothing like you meager salary at the Scouts for sure ! At one point you literally had to forcefully take off his hand that he sneakily placed on the small of your back. At the sight of it, Levi snatched the documents, handed a copy to Adomas and hurried you and himself out of the place.

Back to HQ, you were happy to reunite with your bed, ready to recover from last night. You shared your quarters with Petra, laying on your mattress, you filled her in about what happened to you with the captain as she bursted with laughter at every detail you gave her.

The next day, Levi was nowhere to be found as you went to his office as usual. You asked one of the soldiers where if he'd seen the captain and he just shrugged his shoulders, saying that Levi left a message for you as the soldier gave you a folded piece of paper.

« Going to see Erwin for a special meeting ».

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4stars-uswnt · 4 years ago

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Our Nerd [USWNT x Reader]

requested by anon: Could you do one where the team teases the reader for breaking her glasses because she's known to be clumsy but the real reason they broke was because people were making fun of her for using glasses

warning: mention of bullying

Being a 17 year old high school junior on the US Women’s National Team meant that you were the designated baby of the team. Although you were a dominant and aggressive midfielder, off the field, you were more quiet and reserved. At national team camps, you spent a lot of your downtime holed up in your room studying and doing the school work you were missing.

Though your teammates obviously understood your academic obligations, they would often tease you about your nerdiness, especially when you went on a rant about that cool new fact you learned in your AP Biology class. It also didn’t help that you needed to wear glasses, only further adding to the stereotypical ‘nerd’ look. Despite wearing contacts majority of the time, you still wore your glasses whenever you needed to or whenever you were just feeling lazy.

—————

Having just arrived at the hotel from the airport, you walk into the team meeting.

“Hey! Look who finally showed up!” Pinoe yelled from the front of the room. The entire team turned to look at you, as you were the last one to get to camp. There were many coos from the vets, particularly your designated team moms, Alex and Kelly, and cheers from the youngsters. You hang your head, embarrassed by the overwhelming attention, and go take a seat next to Sonnett.

Once the meeting ended and roommates were announced, you head up to your room. This camp, you are rooming with Alex, which you sighed in relief, as finals were coming up, and you needed to study without distraction.

After unpacking and settling into the room, Alex pulls you into a hug, finally properly greeting you.

“Hey, bub.” She rubs your back, soothing your built up tension and stress.

You bury your face in her neck, breathing in her comforting scent, and mumble out a ‘hi.’

Pulling away, Alex brushes the hair out of your face. “You doing okay?” You furrow your eyebrows, mentally debating on whether to tell her about what’s really bothering you.

“Yeah, I’m good.” You plaster on a small smile. “I’m just a little stressed about my finals coming up.”

Alex nodded, knowing how seriously you took your classes and how important these upcoming tests were for you. She had also just recently discovered the difficulty of your schedule, as you were taking six AP classes and one honors class, in addition to the stress of college and soccer recruitment, Alex understood the pressure weighing on your shoulders.

“Just let me know if you need anything, okay? And I mean anything.” Alex hums, squeezing your cheek. You laugh at the forward’s overprotective antics.

“Of course, Al.”

—————

For what felt like the hundredth time, you stumbled over your own two feet, as you were sprinting down the field. Only three minutes prior, you had tripped over the ball, trying to pass Becky.

Julie comes up behind you, lifting you up from your armpits. Doting over you, the blonde brushes the grass off of your shirt and straightens out your hair. She places a wet kiss on your cheek, as Vlatko blows the whistle, signaling the end of practice.

“C’mon, kid. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

“I’m not even that dirty.” You grumble, wiping your face.

As the team was getting ready to board the bus, Kelley wraps her arm around your shoulder, kissing the side of your head.

“Hey, bub.” Only Alex and Kelley were allowed to call you that, as it was a shortened version of your nickname the two women had come up with, ‘bubble,’ which poked fun at your age, innocence, and the fact that you were the baby of the team.

“Hey, Kel.” You lean your head into her chest.

“You feeling okay? Took a lot of falls today.” She smirks, trying not to over-tease you about your clumsiness, which she’s done in the past.

Emily, overhearing her fellow frat daddy, interjects in your conversation.

“You’d think that (Y/N) wouldn’t be as clumsy as she is, considering she’s a world-class midfielder.” The blonde defender laughs, as your cheeks flush, and you further hide yourself in Kelley’s chest. Your clumsiness had been at the end of the many of the team’s jokes, as you often fell over things, tripped on your own feet, and broken many of your belongings.

While on the bus, many of your other teammates had poked at you, playfully making fun of the many times you had fallen today in practice. Although you knew the women weren’t trying to insult you, you couldn’t help but feel hurt at their jokes, as you’d gotten enough teasing and bullying at your school back home. Not wanting to say anything at first, you laughed along with their teasing, but as they continued throughout the bus ride, you decided to drown yourself in music and stare out the window.

—————

That night, despite your many protests, the entire team packed into yours and Alex’s room for team bonding. While the other women were debating over what movie to watch, you were sitting at the desk, trying to concentrate on the set of calculus problems that sat in front of you.

“(Y/N/N)!” Tobin yells, grabbing attention. You push your glasses up the bridge of your nose, looking over at the forward. “What do you think, kiddo? Ocean’s 8, She’s the Man, or Bend it Like Beckham?” She holds up the three options, shaking the last one, her head nodding to it, signaling that that was her first choice. You smirk at Tobin’s childish actions. But before you could give your preference, Ashlyn, who is sitting the closest to you, interrupts.

“Hold up, kid.” She leans sits up, leaning closer to inspect your face. “What happened to your glasses?”

The conversation dies down in the room, as the rest of your teammates are curious as to what the goalie was asking about. Upon having all their eyes on you, you duck your head, attempting to hide your broken and crooked glasses. But unfortunately for you, Ali was on the other side of you and noticed the cracks in your glasses and the bend of your frames.

“They’re broken.” Ali reveals to the rest of the women.

“Did you sit on them or something?” Megan barks out, while Alex slaps her on the shoulder.

“Or like fall and drop them?” Emily adds on, causing the youngsters to laugh along with her.

Frustrated, annoyed, sad, and embarrassed, you grumble out a ‘no’ and turn back to your homework. Noticing your change in demeanor, Alex gets up to sit on the bed behind you, turning the chair so you’re now facing her.

“Bub, what happened to your glasses?” She takes your hands, rubbing comforting circles on your palms.

“Nothing.” You mutter. By now, Kelley had moved to kneel in front of you, along with the rest of the team crowding around you.

“Hey.” Alex lifts your chin to meet her eyes. “Remember when I said you come to me for anything?” You nod, feeling tears building up. “So tell us what’s bothering you.” She encourages.

Scanning around the room, you see your teammates, who have become like your second family, worriedly looking at you, wanting to help.

You take a deep breath, preparing yourself to reveal what’s been going on in your life for the past couple of months.

“These kids at school make fun of me for being a nerd.” You feel Alex pause in her actions, shocked at your words. You look down at your intertwined hands, wanting her to continue, before you keep going. “At first, it was just because of how I actually enjoyed going to class and doing my work, but then as I started wearing my glasses more often at school, they started to make fun of them. They call me names, and say that I’m too much of a nerd to be on the national team.” By now you had tears pooled in you eyes, as you remember your last encounter with the bullies at your school.

“Before I came to camp, I had to talk to my teachers about getting all the work I’d be missing. Some of the other kids confronted me, taunting me and saying I shouldn’t be getting an extension and that I didn’t deserve special treatment. They shoved my books out of my hands and grabbed my glasses off my face and stepped on them.” You finished.

After you finished your story, the entire USWNT was speechless, shocked that anybody could ever treat you like that. Feeling uncomfortable in the silence and with everybody still watching you, you speak up.

“Yeah, so that’s how I broke my glasses, no big deal.” You try to play it off, pulling your hands out of Alex’s and turning back to your school work. Kelley stops you, pushing your knees so that your back facing the team.

“(Y/N), that is a big deal. Those kids shouldn’t be treating you like that.” The rest of the woman nod in agreement. Alex reaches to grab your hands once again.

“Why didn’t you tell us?”

You shrug. “I dunno. I didn’t wanna make a big deal out of it. And it’s not like they’re wrong.” You whisper the last part, your insecurity peeking through. The team’s hearts ache, as their youngest member confides in them.

“Kid, you’re one of the best midfielders in the world right now.” Ash soothes, many of the other women voicing their opinions as well.

“Yeah! They don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.” You hear Kelley add.

Emily laughs. “Ha! Those kids are probably just some airheads with no future, whereas you’re about to win an Olympic gold medal.” You laugh at the bluntness of your best friend. Alex pulls you into her lap, hugging you from behind, as she presses a kiss to your shoulder.

“We love you just the way you are, bub, and nothing’s gonna change that.”

“And we’re also sorry if our teasing earlier had hurt your feelings.” Tobin adds, as the team had gathered around, squishing you in a giant group hug. You snuggle into Alex’s warmth, reveling in the comfort of your teammates.

“I love you guys.”

“We love you, too.” Christen whispers.

“You’re our nerd!” Kelley beams, making you giggle.

“Yeah! No one makes fun of our nerd! Only we can do that.” Pinoe adds, causing an uproar of laughter amongst the team.

As you sit in Alex’s lap, surrounded by your favorite people in the world, wearing your broken glasses, your heart swells, and you smile contently, grateful to have these women in your life as your second family.

#uswnt x reader #uswnt imagine #uswnt imagines

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scripttorture · 4 years ago

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I have no idea if you can help me, but I am working on a short story that starts after a Sami girl is recovering from being tortured by Christian police after her father is put on trial for witchcraft. This is during the witch trials in Norway. I wanted to focus on recovery in the community and her animistic religion. However, I don’t know what kind of torture she could realistically be recovering from and if, aside from punishment, it should religiously motivated. Do you have any English links?

I put this one off for a long time hoping that the virus situation would improve enough for me to a) have less stress at work and b) be able to access the university library in my town. It doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

Norwegian history in the 1600s isn’t my strong suit. So my focus here is going to be advice on how to research this. I’ll also include the bits I found and some tortures so common that you can throw them in to virtually any setting without it standing out or being inaccurate.

Before I get any further I don’t know anything about Sami culture. I’d strongly recommend trying to find Sami sensitivity readers if you haven’t already. Because it can be bloody hard to get accurate information on some of Europe’s oppressed minorities and I’d say the Sami fall squarely into that category.

Historical research is fraught with pitfalls and when you’re starting out it can be really difficult to figure out which sources to trust. This only becomes worse when you’re working across a language barrier. And when the focus is torture it gets even more difficult.

Torture has always been a hot button issue.

The fact that virtually every culture has a history of torture doesn’t change that. Cultural ideas about what was ‘more painful’ or ‘more brutal’ or ‘shaming’ have all played a role in what was deemed ‘acceptable’ cruelty. So has the idea of who is an ‘acceptable’ or ‘deserving’ victim.

And that means that misrepresenting the typical tortures of different countries, cultures, religious groups or past regimes has been part of political practice for literally hundreds of years. It is a very easy way to direct people’s hate and elicit an emotional response.

I can’t stress enough how important it is to consider an author’s motivations, biases and abilities when you read historical sources.

Think about whether an author was actually there for the events they describe. Think about their political and religious positions and what they may have to gain by pushing a particular message.

Apologies if some of this comes across as teaching you how to suck eggs, but I know a lot of people don’t get this lesson in their history classes. So sources-

Historical sources can be broadly categorised into primary and secondary sources. A primary source is something produced at the time. A secondary source is something produced later.

Both can be untrustworthy/biased but a primary source gives you information about how events/practices were interpreted at the time, while a secondary sources tells you how they were remembered later.

Primary sources can be things like diaries, court records of witch trials and objects produced in areas like Finnmark (northern Norway where most of the witch trials took place) at the time. Secondary sources might be things like how the witch trials are discussed in Norwegian history books and local history or stories about the witch trials that are told today.

By reading about this in English you’re mostly being limited to secondary sources. The danger here is that secondary sources can misrepresent the time period they’re describing, deliberately or not. Authors make assumptions about how historical people lived, thought, what their actions meant and how their beliefs influenced their actions.

Primary sources can also misrepresent what happened (deliberately or not) but with primary sources they are at least displaying the biases and concerns of the time.

Generally historical research is about the collation and interpretation of primary sources. Which is a lot of work, requires a degree of expertise and often demands fluency in several languages.

That level of work and knowledge appeals to some authors of historical fiction. But it isn’t for everyone. There’s nothing wrong with choosing to rely on history textbooks and the like instead of digging through transcriptions of things written back in the 1600s.

Here’s the problem when you’re doing that for another country: English language sources are often very very biased in favour of other English language sources.

This means if some bored academic in the 1930s made up a bunch of fan theories based on very little evidence it will probably still be used as a source today.

And without having another language (with access to other sources it provides) it can be really difficult to spot that kind of fuckery.

I am not saying that you need to learn Norwegian and believe me as someone with only one spoken language I understand how tackling a new one can be crazy intimidating.

But I think you do need to know Norwegians. Particularly Norwegians with an interest in history.

That’s all general stuff about researching historical periods in different countries.

For torture in particular… I’m not gonna lie it’s a sack of angry snakes.

Both primary and secondary often have considerable motivation for lying about torture. Historical accounts routinely downplay or outright lie about the damage different tortures cause. They are heavily judgemental about victims.

And they run in to exactly the same issues we have trying to study use of different tortures today with the added difficulty that accounts from torturers are preserved far more frequently then accounts from survivors.

It’s only once you start getting to the 1900s that you really start to see multiple survivor accounts of events. For the 1600s as a general period I can think of witness accounts and multiple accounts from torturers or their bosses in various countries. But the testimony of survivors is very very rare.

This is an issue because we know from modern research that torturers routinely lie about what they do.

There were laws in most European countries in this period that cover torture. They tend to define a sort of ‘accepted practice’: what torturers were supposed to do and for how long. And don’t get me wrong these are useful historical sources.

But we know from comparing similar torture manuals used in the 1930s (and indeed more recently) to multiple accounts from torture survivors that torturers do not follow their own rules. I see no reason why torturers today would be less likely to follow ‘the rules’ then their historical predecessors.

Looking up the laws of the land at the historical time period you’re interested in is a good place to start. But it won’t actually tell you everything that torturers did and it may not represent the most common tortures.

It will give you a list of things that were definitely used at the time in that place though. Which isn’t a bad place to start.

Look for history books that cover crime and punishment. If you can’t find one broad enough to do that (or give you a helpful summary of laws at the time) then I’ve found that accounts of specific historical figures in the relevant area/time often contain some of that information.

The next major pitfall when researching historical torture is the bane of my existence: euphemisms.

A lot of historical sources use vague or euphemistic terms for different tortures and then leave it up to the reader to figure out what they mean. This was probably perfectly clear at the time but now… less so.

To use an example from something I’ve been trying to research for a while now I can tell you that the Ancient Egyptians definitely used torture. They say as much in surviving accounts of their justice system. They used it to punish, force confessions and attempt to gain information.

They definitely beat people with sticks. They say they did, in multiple accounts. There are also wall carvings and paintings that show prisoners of war and enslaved people being menaced with sticks.

However, I can’t find any definite suggestion that they used falaka, ie beating the soles of the feet with those sticks.

Did they just hit people at random? This seems unlikely from a practical viewpoint as that’s a very easy way to kill someone. Did they ignore the feet and concentrate on other areas of the body? Did they use falaka and also beat other areas? Do I bring too much bias into this question because I’d love to find a historical point of origin for a torture that’s common throughout the Middle East today?

Historical sources often just don’t contain the details we need to be certain about what torture they’re describing. Terminology is often vague. Descriptions can be contradictory. Often the only way to be certain is to come across an illustration or surviving device and even then this does not necessarily represent common practice and either piece of evidence could be contemporary propaganda rather then something that was actually used.

When you’re talking about historical torture it is essential to find multiple sources and make sure they agree.

Vague terminology like ‘water torture’ can cover a host of different sins. Finding a vague term or euphemism multiple times doesn’t even tell you if this was the same practice carried out in different areas or different practices with superficial similarities.

If a source doesn’t give you enough information to be sure don’t use it. If a source suggests the meaning of a euphemism based on no clear evidence from the time period don’t use it.

What I’ve found in my own small collection of books on witchcraft is very sparse on details.

One of the older books I have suggests that there were almost no witch hunts or witch trials in Scandinavia which is complete bollocks. The book was published in 1959, so I’d suggest being wary of English language sources from that date and earlier.

A much more recent (2017) Oxford University Press book on the subject gives an estimated 400-500 executions for witchcraft in Norway during the period of 1601-1670.

This might seem like a small number compared to the thousands that were executed throughout the Holy Roman Empire but it seems a significant number given that the Norwegian trials were so concentrated in a small, sparsely populated region.

Unfortunately this book is a very general overview of the perception of witchcraft and magic throughout Europe from the ancient world to the present. So it doesn’t really give any details of the kinds of tortures a Norwegian accused of witchcraft might endure.

The author of the chapter on the witch trials was Rita Voltmer, University of Trier in case that’s helpful. She has published several papers on witch trials and the use of torture and at least one on witch trials in Norway. However a lot of her work is in German.

These two papers/chapters in particular may be of interest: the english language document on torture and emotion in witch trials and the German paper on Norwegian and Danish witch trials.

Several of the books I’ve got access to confirmed that Norway burnt witches and provided stories focused on shapeshifting and causing storms at sea. They also confirmed the use of torture in witch trials but nothing so helpful as the kind of tortures employed.

I found multiple references to ‘water torture’. One of these implied that the particular torture was waterboarding alla the historical Dutch method. But the same source said this caused vomiting or possibly diarrhoea which seems to imply pumping.

At a guess I’d say pumping is less likely because waterboarding can cause vomiting and so far as I know pumping wasn’t common anywhere in Europe during this period. However absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

‘Water torture’ could also potentially refer to: a temperature torture, near drowning, a method of sleep deprivation or even dehydration. Without more detail it’s really hard to say which of these is being referenced.

I found one mention of ‘burning torture’ a reference that I think referred to tearing the flesh with hot pincers based on the description of a torn wound. However given I only found this referenced once and I’m unsure of the source I found it in, I would not say this is a good one to pick.

Which leaves me with common tortures.

Whatever the time period, whatever the place, beatings the most common torture. Easily.

If your character gets repeatedly hit, whether it’s clean or not, you are not being historically inaccurate. And I’ve got a lot of posts on beatings generally and clean beatings that can help you write that.

Starvation and dehydration are also both really common regardless of culture and time period. So are temperature tortures or exposure though I think different countries have favoured different methods at different times.

Torturous cell conditions were incredibly common across Europe historically. Lack of sanitation, wet cells, inadequate bedding, over crowding and conditions amounting to a temperature torture were all really common. They were also often happening alongside starvation.

I have a masterpost on starvation and tags covering temperature tortures, exposure and prisons. I think the ‘prisons’ tag should give you most of the posts covering poor cell conditions, ‘historical torture’ and ‘historical fiction’ may also be helpful to you.

I’m sorry I couldn’t come up with anything more specific.

Available on Wordpress.

Disclaimer

Edit: So this should be my week off the blog but I’ve seen a lot of the responses to this. Most of them are extremely helpful, thank you to everyone who knows Norwegian that is offering to help.

However: if your instinct is to say that any torturer, historical or recent, is ‘honourable’ and follows a code of conduct then this blog is not the place for you. I don’t tolerate that kind of apologia or people using my work to spread it.

#writing advice #tw torture #tw racism #tw sectarian violence #historical torture #historical fiction #Norway #witch trials #witchcraft #historical research #behaviour of torturers #attitudes towards torture #National Styles #writing victims #writing torture #Sami #the inconsistencies in this field in academia #and the lack of adequate accessible translations #will eventually make me turn into a livid ticking column of smoke

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averyonelovesjack · 4 years ago

Text

cost of friendship III ~ daniel seavey

requested: yes

hiii can we please please please have another part to parties and the cost of friendship? love love love your writing!

hey hon just requesting a third part to 'cost of friendship' with dani whenever you have the time, thanks love

Hey! I hope things are going okay! I was reading your imagines and I'm a big fan of your works! I was just wondering if you were going to post a part 3 to "cost of friendship"? Just curious :) I understand if you discontinued it/you're on a break.

summary: six months into the relationship and just in time for the holidays, daniel and y/n recognize the difficulty in spending the holidays away from each other and have to determine if it’s worth breaking the secret.

warning(s): cursing

disclaimer: i use christmas and thanksgiving as plot points in this story because it fit better with the way i wanted the story to go, but feel free to replace them with any other holidays you celebrate!!

word count: 2740

author’s note: accidentally posted this, unedited, last night with no word count and the author’s note that i wrote in december of last year when i originally made the draft and didn’t write a single word of this story:) so now that it actually makes sense to post this, here is part three to cost of friendship! thanks for all these requests even tho they were clearly from a long time ago since cost of friendship II came out TWO YEARS AGO in september. welp hope this was worth the wait lol enjoy:))

read these first: part one, part two

six months with daniel went by really quickly. the summer was honestly a lot of fun. i could spent hours at the boys’ house and nothing was suspicious about it. i grew a lot closer with them all because we spent so much time together, and it wasn’t weird for me to hang out there, and i could see daniel whenever i wanted. we really got to know each other during the summer months. i had known daniel for a while now, but getting to know him on a relationship level was really nice.

summer ended pretty quickly though and then fall came. i was back in school. i didn’t think it would be hard to see him since i was still in the ending months of school when we started dating. i think that going from so much time together over the summer to only seeing each other a few hours a week was a really hard adjustment.

we promised we’d never let our schedules be a problem, but managing a full time student’s schedule and a singer’s schedule is really difficult. i had classes monday through friday, and any time i wasn’t in class, i was doing homework. that left my only free time during the week to be late at night. so we hung out late at night, but by the time we saw each other we were usually too exhausted to really do anything other than lay around and watch a show or talk for a little bit. weekends were usually better for me, but daniel had a crazy schedule that usually had studio time incorporated on the weekend.

we still made effort to see each other all the time we could, but it wasn’t easy. i think that probably plays into my current nerves. it’s early november and the stress of the holiday season had already gotten to me.

as a kid, the holiday season was the absolute best. thanksgiving meant seeing all of my family, including my cousins who were really close in age to me. and then the stretch between thanksgiving and christmas was my absolute favorite. it was filled with christmas music, christmas decorations, buying gifts, giving gifts, getting gifts, and again, seeing family. and don’t even get me started on new years. as a kid, staying up late was the absolute best thing. the sparking cider and noise makers were all the rave.

as a much older college student now though, it was a lot less fun. the holiday season meant figuring out plans and traveling home to see my family and not knowing which part of my family was actually gonna be available. it meant buying actual meaningful or useful gifts and then figuring out how to get them home. there was still the music and the lights, but i had no time to meaninglessly drive around los angeles and see the lights or spend hours around a fireplace watching christmas movies. i didn’t even have a fireplace to begin with.

the holiday season was also much more confusing this year because i had daniel. i’ve never even had a boyfriend during the holiday season, let alone a secret boyfriend. most of the things we went out and did we could pass off as just things we’re doing as close friends, but the holidays were different. friends don’t ditch the holidays with their family just to hang out with their friends family. i don’t even know if daniel and i are at the level in our relationship, and then even if we were, i couldn’t do anything about it because keeping our relationship a secret meant not being able to do the explicitly for couples holiday stuff.

as much as i think daniel and i are ready for the family stage in our relationship, neither of us have really talked about it because there’s not really much room to do it anyways. i’ve met daniel’s siblings and parents before, but never as anything more than a friend because it was too risky to tell anyone. and daniel’s never had an excuse to come meet my family since they aren’t just down the road like his.

the secret relationship really damaged my normal holiday mood and it honestly stressed me out. i have to book my plane home soon and to do that meant that there really was no chance that i’d spend the holidays with daniel. even with us only being together half a year, daniel meant so much to me. in every other relationship i’d been in, it felt like i was waiting for the relationship to end or i at least knew that it wasn’t going to last. it was different with daniel though and that was really hard since we couldn’t even tell anyone about it.

tonight is a friday and i had finally finished my work for the week. i was invited to a party, but i didn’t really feel like going since i was pretty tired from the week and i wasn’t in a party mood. daniel texted me soon after and asked if i wanted to come over. i wasn’t really in a socialization mood, but since it was just daniel and i haven’t seen him much recently, i said yes. he even said he would pick me up which made it ten times easier to say yes because he knows i don’t like taking ubers alone and i don’t have access to a car.

daniel picked me up at about 7. i didn’t feel like getting ready so i just wore my grey sweatpants and wdw tee that daniel had gotten me for free. daniel never seemed to mind my lazy outfits and i knew as soon as we got back he would change out of his jeans too.

“hi love, how was your day?” daniel asks as soon as i get in the car. i felt a little emotionally exhausted, but so happy to see daniel. the car was like our safe space because no one was around to walk in on us and we didn’t have to hide our feelings and actions.

“exhausting, but better now that i’m seeing you.” i admit.

“at least it’s the weekend now.” daniel says. “and i went to the studio a little early today so that we won’t have to go in this weekend and i can spend more time with you.”

“really?” i ask, that news brightening my day a little. “i was just about to ask how studio was today?”

“it was good. we worked on a new christmas song today when we were finished. i don’t know if we’ll ever release it but it was a lot of fun. i’m sure you’d love it.”

“you know how i feel about christmas music.” i grin. maybe a little daniel written christmas music will brighten my spirit in these next coming weeks.

“speaking of, i feel like you haven’t played any christmas music. i swear i barely knew you this time last year as compared to now but i knew how much you loved christmas music. i feel like you played it as soon as halloween was over.” daniel mentions and as much as i wanted to hold it back and not say anything, i felt too tired to not.

“i haven’t really been in the christmas spirit.” i admit with a sigh that i knew daniel would read through.

“i know the holiday season is hard. it’s been on my mind a lot too and i was hoping it wasn’t adding to your stress, but i should’ve said something sooner because i knew it would.” daniel says, looking over and gently ok in a hand on mine.

“it’s okay.” i say. “i probably wouldn’t have even admitted it until we got to a night like tonight where i’m honestly too tired to pretend i’m not stressed.”

“i’m sorry, love. do you want to talk about it?” daniel asks.

“it’s okay, i don’t even know what to say because we can’t even do anything about it.” i answer. “and i don’t want to stress you out with all of my little annoyances and sad things.”

“i know that the last few months haven’t been easy.” daniel starts, deciding for us both that nothing i could say would be too much for us. “with our schedules and then keeping it a secret.”

“it’s just-” i don’t even know where to start because i know when i’ll do i’ll either inevitably cry out of stress or sound angry with him when i’m not, i’m just annoyed at our situation. “it really sucks that i can’t spend any of the holidays with you and i fucking hate that because i love the holiday season and the spirit and i’m avoiding it because i don’t want to feel sad about us not being together for the holidays. and i love you. i love you so much and i want you to meet my family because i know they’ll love you, but it would be way too obvious for you to fly home with me for the holidays and there’s really no hiding that so i know it makes no sense to even think about that because it just makes me sad.”

“i love you too, y/n.” daniel says, still processing everything. “i didn’t know you wanted me to meet your family yet. i would love to, but i didn’t want to bring it up until you were ready.”

“are you kidding?” i laugh a little bit, looking over at him as he parked the car in the driveway but neither of us moved. “daniel, of course i want you to meet my family. i know they’ll love you because you’re you. god, ever since i told my sisters i have a boyfriend they’ve been begging me to tell them who so that they could meet you. i don’t know, the holidays have always just been about being with family for my family, and i’m sure yours too. you’re such an important part of my life now and i wish i could share you with them. it’s whatever, though. we shouldn’t talk about it because i know that it’s not possible.”

“what about thanksgiving with my family and christmas with yours?” daniel says and my heart skips a beat. “and then we can figure out new years later. i know you have to go home for christmas because you’ll get kicked out of dorms, and as much as i would love for you to just stay with us, i’m sure you want to go home and see your family.”

“daniel, as lovely as that sounds, you know how suspicious it would be for me to stay here for thanksgiving and for you to fly home with me? i don’t think even we would be able to keep that a secret.”

“fuck the secret, then, y/n.” he blurts out. “y/n, i don’t see us ending ever, and definitely not anytime soon and it’s not like we’re gonna keep this a secret forever. fuck the secret. corbyn was right, okay, the boys are gonna be happy for us. it’s not like they haven’t picked up on us being close these last few months and keeping this secret isn’t worth us being apart for the next few months, okay? it’s hard enough to spend only a few hours together a week, i don’t want to be away from you for all of thanksgiving and christmas too.”

“fuck the secret.” i say, with a smile forming on my face. “are we really doing this?”

“i see no better time than now, y/n.” daniel leans over the console to kiss my lips softly. “wanna go tell the boys now?”

“let’s do it.” i unbuckle my seatbelt with a weight lifted off of my shoulders. daniel and i meet in front of the car, our hands interlocking as we walked into the house as a non-secret couple for the first time.

the boys were all sitting in the living room and a movie was playing with all of the lights out. they all look over as daniel closes the door and the two of us walk over to them.

“y/n? what are you doing here? daniel didn’t tell us he was bringing you over.” zach says. “of course he just wants to hog you again.”

“do you guys wanna pause the movie for a second? we have some important news.” daniel says and we separate hands as to not give it away just yet.

“fucking finally.” jonah says.

“what?” i ask, wondering what he meant.

“i mean, i don’t want to be the one to say it and ruin it for you two, but i mean, come on, we’ve been waiting months for you to admit to it. so get on with it.” jonah gestures for us to continue. guess we weren’t as great secret keepers as we thought.

“y/n and i have been dating for about six months and kept it a secret from everyone.” daniel says and then takes my hand in his and pulls me closer so that i’m in his arms.

“SIX.” zach yells. “i knew there were vibes between you two but you guys are good. six months??”

“not that good.” corbyn mumbles, which causes the other three to look at him.

“you bitch!” jack then exclaims. “you knew? and you didn’t give me my damn money??”

“it’s their fault, they told me not to say anything!” corbyn defends, pointing a finger at the two of us. “i was not supposed to find out. i wish i didn’t, this was a lot of stress i didn’t need.”

“i would like my twenty bucks now, thank you very much.” jack says and corbyn quickly throws a twenty dollar bill at him.

“this is so unfair.” the ninteen year old looks at the rest of us. “jack gets twenty bucks, corbyn gets stress relief, daniel gets a girlfriend and it’s y/n. what do i get? i want something!”

“zach, i didn’t get anything from this either.” jonah reminds.

“shut up. you have a girlfriend.” zach screeches in his jokingly angry voice. “god, i’m so lonely.”

“i have a couple sisters, if you want.” i laugh a little. “you’d have to come home for christmas with danny and i, though.”

“and you’re leaving us for christmas? gosh damnit y/n, why can’t you guys stay with me for christmas?” zach exclaims, which makes us all laugh a little bit. i wasn’t sure how everyone was going to react, but this was a pretty funny one from zach.

“i hate to break it to you bud, but we’re, uh, all going home for christmas. we do every year.” jack sets a hand on his bandmates shoulder. “i’m pretty sure y/n would rather spend christmas with her boyfriend and her family than you, no offense.”

“what the fuck, y/n. you don’t wanna spend christmas with me?”

i’m laughing too much at this interaction to answer before jack.

“to be clear though, zach, i would choose to spend christmas with you.”

“well we have y/n for thanksgiving. we’re gonna see my family, so we’ll still be in la and can hang out. have our own little friendsgiving.” daniel suggests.

“no no no, i’m too lonely for friendsgiving.” zach expresses, deciding to be unhappy with everything we say just for the comedy of it. “i’m too single. you’re all in relationships, i can’t be the only lonely one.”

“um, bro, i too am single.” jack looks at him funny.

“okay, well yeah, but you have a child.”

“yes, a child who lives in hawaii. i’ll be your friendsgiving date.” jack offers.

“really? you meant it?” zach faked being emotional and jonah looks at them, then back at us with a funny look.

“well, now that we’ve dealt with... that, i just want to say we’re all really happy for you two.” jonah starts. “not that this is surprising to any of us, because there has been way too much sexual tension since we’ve all been friends for this to not have happened, but i’m very happy you decided to tell us.”

“are you guys gonna go public? like tell management?” corbyn asks.

daniel then looks at me a little nervously and then back at the guys, “yeah that’s the next thing we have to figure out.”

lovely.

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vincess-princess · 4 years ago

Text

What Is Lost, What Is Found

Chapter 5.

Word count: 4417 Warnings: alcohol consumption, addiction mention

This time Mick stayed late in the store. A bunch of records that arrived that day were damaged, and he spent hours arguing on the phone with the provider demanding to replace the order. He did succeed in it, but when he put the phone down, the sky was already dark-blue and public transport wasn’t working. One more reason to get a car, a gloomy thought crossed his mind. If those problems with the supplies continued to arise, he wouldn’t be able to save up enough to buy a car in the foreseeable future.

Then there was his, well, other problem. As stress was building up in him due to financial difficulties, he found it harder and harder to keep away from the bottle. Even if he managed to keep himself from hiding one more bottle of whiskey in the counter, he inevitably got caught by nearby bars. Every day he passed them on his way to work and on his way home, and often ended up inside with his savings all gone, wasted. The next day there was always shame and self-disgust, and a lot of promises to give up, now for good. All those promises went forgotten once a Friday came about.

This night was a Wednesday night, and Mick already craved a drink. Before, he would just give in to the craving, but now every time he saw Vince’s face in front of him. His relieved expression after Mick lied to him haunted him. You told him you had quit. The only thing you do well is lie. You are so weak.

Mick’s hands were shaking when he was counting money. He dropped a coin, and it rolled under the counter. God fucking damn.

Mick plopped down on his knees and stuck his hand under the counter to get the coin. It was just out if his reach. Now, if he managed to stick his hand a little farther-

The door of the shop opened with a loud bang, and Mick heard steps of three people coming inside. What the hell? He was sure he had put a “closed” plate on the door...

“Anyone in here?” a male voice asked. Mick tried to pull his hand from under the counter, but it stuck.

“A second!” he called, frantically trying to free his hand. Finally, he managed to get it out, grazing the skin on his knuckles in process.

“Yes?” He stood up, and his jaw went slack.

Two policemen stood in the center of the shop, and one of them was holding a boy by the shoulder. The boy’s face seemed familiar, spiky black hair and stubborn crease of the eyebrows, but Mick had to rack his brains to recognize him. He stared mindlessly at the boy for a few awkward seconds until he dug up the face in front of him in his memory.

It was Nikki, Tommy’s and Vince’s friend. Right here, in his shop, accompanied by two cops.

“Uncle Mick!” Nikki exclaimed. Mick blinked in confusion. As far as he knew, he didn’t have any nephews until this very day. “I was just grabbing some hot dogs for us and these co- gentlemen said I broke the curfew.”

“Excuse me?” he murmured, staring at Nikki. The boy stared back, tapping his foot on the floor nervously.

“Sir, this boy claims to be your nephew,” one of the cops spoke. “Is that true?”

Mick looked at the cop, then at Nikki. The boy was making big eyes at him, nodding slightly. Help me, he pronounced with his lips soundlessly. Please.

Should he help him? He was a bad influence on Tommy, didn’t let him come to his store at first and was still reluctant about it now. Vince never talked about him and when asked retreated to one-word answers, which was as far from Vince that Mick knew as possible. Mick could as well tell the cops he didn’t know him - to get rid of him. Maybe without him Tommy would- he and Vince would agree-

Oh well.

“Yeah, sure,” he said. “What, is that so late already? I might have lost the track of time.”

“It is, Mr- what’s your name?”

“Mars,” Mick said on a whim. “Oh, wait, you want my legal name. Deal, it’s Deal.”

“Mr Deal, why did you let the boy out so late? Don’t you know about the existence of a curfew for kids and teenagers?” The police officer said with barely a note of disapproval. He really didn’t care. Well, neither did Mick.

“To grab some snacks. I do, I do; I just didn’t notice it’s already too late for kids to go out. Time flies by, y’know.”

“Well, next time we will have to bring the boy to the police station and file a case. We’re ready to turn a blind eye on it now, since it’s your first offence of a kind, but we’ll have to fine you.” The cop’s face livened up when he said “fine”. Of course, Mick thought with disgust and reached into his pocket with a sigh. Cops were always the same. The boy was lucky Mick hated the police so much – definitely much more than him. He didn’t even hate him to the full meaning of the word, definitely not. Rather, he was irritated by him, which was a completely different thing.

He put three dollar bills on the counter, 50$ each. One cop approached and took them. The second raised his eyebrows, so much greediness on his fat, apathetic face Mick barely managed to hold himself from punching him in that face, just not to see it anymore. Instead, he only nodded and reached for his wallet again. The boy was observing them with interest in his eyes, successfully hiding it for the cops behind his bangs. He didn’t seem to be scared or even mildly uncomfortable at all. More than that, Mick could bet he was enjoying it to the fullest. What a motherfucker.

Mick lined three more dollar bills on the counter, and they immediately disappeared in the second cop’s pocket. Only then they released Nikki and left the shop, smiling smugly.

Mick followed them with his gaze until they were out of sight. Then he turned to Nikki and spoke:

“What the fuck that just was?”

Nikki turned his head away, avoiding Mick’s gaze. The enjoyment he had while Mick was dealing with the cops vanished immediately.

“I need to go,” he said, turning towards the door.

“No way,” Mick stood up. “If you get caught the second time, you’re absolutely gonna end up in a police station.”

“I won’t,” Nikki shook his head, his hand already on a doorknob. Still, he stopped and turned to Mick. “I need to check up on Tommy.”

“Anything wrong with him?” Mick frowned.

“We were heading to Starwood when the cops appeared.” Nikki said unwillingly. “I told Tommy to hide and ran to distract them. I need to check up on him.”

“You’re not going anywhere,” Mick cut off. “I’ll go. You tell me where you left him.”

Nikki’s grip on the knob strengthened so much his knuckles went white. “I’m going with you. You don’t know all the places.”

“Listen, you-“ Mick started but had to cut the sentence off short because the kid was right. Mick wasn’t a huge partygoer, and only knew the clubs on Sunset Strip from when he used to play in them – which was pretty long ago. He never went to such places to drink - they were too crowded, chock-full with teenagers. He preferred smaller pubs near his home.

“You don’t know all the places,” Nikki added. He knew exactly what he was doing, and it worked – Mick’s stubbornness was weakening. If only there was someone else who knew Tommy better…

There was no one. Mick sighed.

“Alright. You can go. But if we come across cops, I’m talking, alright?”

Nikki just nodded.

***

“Here is where I left him,” Nikki suddenly said fifteen minutes away from the shop. The place was incredibly unremarkable. “I ran across the street, and Tommy hid behind the corner.” They peered behind the aforementioned corner, both knowing it would be useless and both doing it anyway. Tommy, of course, wasn’t there. Still, they looked at each other with disappointment.

“Why did you decide to attract the cops’ attention?” Mick asked as they were crossing the street.

“To let Tommy get away,” Nikki looked at him like he was an idiot. “Haven’t I already said that?”

Mick sighed. Fucking teenagers. “Yes, I’ve heard that. What I want to know is - why not the other way around?”

“You mean, Tommy runs and I hide?” Nikki clarified in a tone an adult would talk in to a four-year-old.

“Yes.”

“Haven’t he told you about his… situation?” Nikki raised his eyebrows.

“He told me a lot of things.”

“I mean his life situation. How he ended up on streets.”

“Ah, this,” Mick recalled the day the third shoplifter hungry for Deep Purple music appeared in his shop. The memory was accompanied with an unexpected fondness. “He told me that on the very first day, in his first few sentences he addressed to me.”

“Yeah, he does that,” the corners of Nikki’s lips curved into a smile. Mick smiled too. It was physically impossible to think about Tommy and not smile. “A big mouth, he is. Then you should understand why it’s better for me to get caught.”

“He doesn’t want to go back to the orphanage.”

“Exactly,” Nikki said. Mick tried to come up with any other option in such a case, but got nothing.

“But shouldn’t the cops bring you to your parents?” Mick asked, recalling Tommy’s stories about Nikki. There was something wrong with his parents, that’s for sure. Tommy never told him much, probably because Nikki hadn’t told him much as well. So what was that? Abuse? Alcoholism? Single parent family? Neglect?

“Parents?” Nikki grinned, but it looked more like an animal baring its teeth before an attack. “I have no parents.”

“Everyone has parents.”

“Well, I don’t anymore. Physically they are still out there, but for me they’re as good as dead.”

“Okay…” Mick looked at Nikki, but he looked strictly forward. His hair covered a good portion of his face, so his expression in the dim lights of the street was undistinguishable. There was something really fucked up between Nikki and his parents and people are always hungry to learn about fucked up things, Mick was no exception. Still, he knew for sure he wasn’t going to get an answer – Mick and Nikki weren’t on exactly friendly terms with each other, and winning Nikki’s trust would be way harder than Tommy’s or even Vince’s.

“Where are we going now?” he asked after a few minutes of uncomfortable silence. Nikki kept glancing at him, thinking Mick didn’t notice. He was probably wondering why Mick would go through all the trouble. Mick was wondering about it himself. Still, he kept walking.

“I think we should check the clubs on the Strip first. The security knows us and could let him in.”

“Is it really that easy for a minor to enter an adult-oriented place?”

Nikki chuckled. “Well, not for other minors. But for us – yes.”

“What’s so unique about you three?”

“Everybody knows us,” came the short answer. One of the clubs was right across the street, and Nikki pointed at it. “Here, that’s Starwood. Are you going in with me?”

***

Upon entering the place they met a security guard who looked over Mick with suspicion and nodded to Nikki. As a “responsible adult”, Mick should probably be condemning such violations of the law. But he was never on good terms with the law in general and the government in particular, and, to be honest, hadn’t he done exactly the same when he was fifteen?

Once they were inside, Nikki headed directly towards the bar. The club was stuffy, full of people dancing, kissing and drinking, with some garage band performing on the background. Mick tried to listen, but quickly realized that the guitarist was probably holding the guitar for the first time in his short life, and lost interest.

The bar was a way more interesting place. Mick strained his eyes, trying to find Tommy in the crowd, but to no avail. He turned to Nikki to ask whether he could recognize him in the crowd and discovered that he was already sitting on a bar stool sipping a beer.

Mick sat down on a bar stool next to Nikki. “Weren’t we looking for Tommy?” he murmured indignantly, trying to fix his gaze on Nikki’s face instead of the glass of amazingly cold beer in his hands. How could the kid tease him like that? Of course, he didn’t know Mick had been trying to quit. But it didn’t justify it!

“We are,” Nikki waved to the bartender. “Hey, Tony!” he shouted as the bartender approached them. “Have you seen Tommy over here in the last hour or two?”

“No,” Tony shook his head. “Is your, hm, friend ordering anything?”

“No, no, I’m not,” Mick shook his head.

“You sure?” the bartender raised his eyebrow. “People don’t go to clubs just because.”

“I’m still surprised I’m here,” Mick muttered, sending Nikki a murderous gaze. Nikki kept drinking his beer as though he didn’t notice it, though Mick was pretty sure he did. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be Nikki.

Once Nikki finished his beer Mick touched him by the shoulder. “So, are we going to search for Tommy, or you’d rather have fun here?”

“Oh, come on,” Nikki rolled his eyes. “It’s just one glass. I was thirsty.”

Mick only shook his head and got up. He had no power over Nikki, and it wasn’t his job to better him. He was just disappointed. He thought better of him. In Tommy’s stories he was always a hero. But Tommy was so blinded by Nikki’s lone wolf appeal that he couldn’t see his friend’s negative sides.

Nikki watched him getting up and moving the chair back under the counter with an unreadable expression. For a second, Mick thought he would stay. But then Nikki got up as well.

“Okay, okay, let’s go,” Nikki put money on the counter and headed towards the door.

The next club they went to Nikki decided not to go in, to Mick’s relief. He just shook hands with the security guard at the door and asked him something. Mick knew the guard would shake his head even before he actually did it. Mick’s anxiety for Tommy kept growing. What if the kid had been arrested and was now at the police station? How were they going to get him out, especially now that he had no legal guardian? Mick could pretend to be his uncle in front of only two not very meticulous cops in his own shop, but at the police station he would have to prove it.

“Nothing?” he asked when Nikki returned. The kid just shook his head.

The next club, apparently, had some relatively famous band playing tonight: the line of mostly teenagers stretched out across the street.

“We’re not going to stay in this line, are we?” Mick asked Nikki, dreading the answer. If they had to stay in the line they would lose too much time. More than that, Mick didn’t feel confident surrounded by so many teenagers. It was their place and their time: Mick didn’t belong in it.

“Nah,” Nikki shook his head. “I’m just gonna go ask the guard. I’ll be back in a minute.”

“I hope so,” Mick murmured, following Nikki with his gaze as the kid found his way through the line, eliciting a few angry calls from the teenagers. Mick leaned against the wall a little away from them, feeling uncomfortable under the gazes of so many teenagers. Someone in the line laughed, and Mick flinched. They weren’t laughing at him, were they?..

Well, that was just stupid, he berated himself. He had as much right to stay here as any of the kids in the line. And since when did he care about what some dumb kids think of him?..

When Nikki returned, he shook his head again silently. Mick sighed. The hope to find Tommy was getting thinner and thinner. And if they wouldn’t find him, how was he going to sleep at night knowing Tommy was in danger?

“They have London playing over there,” Nikki suddenly said as they headed to the next club. It was a little farther away, adding a few minutes of walking. “I used to be their bassist.”

“Got kicked out?”

“Sorta. I got my bass stolen, and didn’t have enough money to buy a new one.”

“It’s a pretty expensive instrument. How did you get it in the first place?”

“Stole it,” Nikki giggled. “Went into a shop with an empty guitar case, and as the shop assistant was searching in the back, I just took the guitar, put it in the case and left.”

Mick glanced at him quickly. “It’s karma. You had stolen the bass and then someone stole it from you too. What else did you expect?”

“Bullshit,” Nikki waved his hand. “I just hope someone steals my bass from that jerk as well.”

Mick smiled. Nikki was more of a kid than he and Nikki himself imagined. And it was reassuring, in a way. Nikki could act like he’s all grown up, but underneath this façade he was still a kid.

The rest of the way they walked in silence. As they neared the last bar – Whiskey, Mick recalled, he used to play there from time to time, - Nikki pointed at it.

“You sure you don’t want to have a drink? Here they’re making good Bloody Marys.

“I’m not drinking,” Mick refused almost confidently. Almost. “Haven’t Vince told you yet? I quit.”

“We don’t speak much now,” Nikki said, frowning. “He’s always at his boyfriend’s, and I don’t like him.”

“Vince or boyfriend?”

“Boyfriend, of course,” Nikki curved his lips in disgust. “Vince’s always picking older guys, and as for me, they’re just using him for sex. But he doesn’t want to listen to me. And his boyfriends always hate me, I don’t know why.”

Mick just nodded. As for him, it was perfectly reasonable why. A mere mention of Vince’s boyfriends got Nikki so agitated it was clear it wasn’t just a nuisance for him. But Mick sure as hell wasn’t going to tell Nikki about that.

Of course, there was no Tommy in Whiskey. Nikki didn’t have to tell Mick: just seeing him in the doorframe, alone, was enough. They both turned around and headed back without a word. Mick kept glancing at Nikki, waiting for “well, I gotta go”, but Nikki was silent. He was silent as they crossed the street and approached Mick’s store. He was silent as Mick opened the door.

“Would you like to, um, stay the night?” Mick finally gained enough courage to ask, tired of the heavy silence between them. He was more nervous now than he was asking his first girlfriend out.

“Okay,” Nikki shrugged. Mick felt his knees weakening. Okay? That was it?! “Not that I have any other place to go.”

Mick inhaled slowly. All the “paranoid junkie” bullshit Tommy was talking about (or, rather, the conclusions Mick drew from his words) made him think Nikki would never agree to come to his shop in person, let alone ask for help and stay the night. Maybe Tommy exaggerated a little. Nikki was wary, yes, but not outright hostile.

“And where were you going to sleep this night then?” Mick finally asked, recalling the “no place to go” part.

“I haven’t thought of it yet. I prefer to focus on the present.”

“I have only one sofa, by the way.” Mick told him, smiling at the confidence the kid said it with. “Someone is gonna have to sleep on the floor.”

“No problem,” Nikki shook his head. “I had it worse. Do you have something to eat, by the way? I’m starving.”

“Say no more,” Mick found a bag of chips in the counter and handed it to Nikki. “As a responsible adult I’ve got to warn you that it’s not healthy and nutritious,” he then fished a half-finished bottle of coke out of the counter and immediately closed the door so that Nikki wouldn’t see all the empty whiskey and vodka bottles lying in it.

“Enjoy,” Mick turned the key in the lock, making sure it was closed. With a person such as Nikki, one could expect anything. Not that he didn’t trust the boy, not really. But money is money.

“Thamks,” Nikki slurred, his mouth already full. “I don’t like your responsible adult mode,” he said once he swallowed and could speak clearly. “Don’t you want to just have some fun sometimes? Go to a bar, get shitfaced, get laid? What do you even do for fun, count your taxes?”

“That was rude,” Mick commented, actually trying not to laugh. He also once had that sex, drugs and rock’n’roll mindset. Until he ran out of money. “Be careful with accident hook-ups, kid, or you will end up like me.”

“What, an independent business owner in the center of LA?” Nikki raised an eyebrow. “Sounds alright to me.”

Mick laughed. “Up to your ears in alimony!”

“Oh,” Nikki said thoughtfully and reached for more chips. “I didn’t know you have kids.”

“We’re talking for the first time since the day I caught you,” Mick reminded. Nikki winced at these words. “I would be more surprised if you did. But, knowing Tommy…”

“Yeah, he tells me everything,” Nikki nodded. “And I’ve heard nothing about them from him. How old are they?”

“Eight and five. They live with their mother.”

“Do you see them often?”

Mick sighed. “No. Can we drop the topic?”

“Sure,” Nikki just put a handful of chips in his mouth and the phrase sounded muffled. “But it’s a pity, really,” he added when his mouth was empty again.

“It is,” Mick murmured. He needed to put an end to this conversation immediately. “Now, isn’t it bedtime?”

“Oh, come on,” Nikki waved his hand. “Turn off that responsible adult mode. Do you maybe by any chance have some whiskey?”

“Bed,” Mick pointed at the backroom and frowned, more for a laugh.

“Okay, mom,” Nikki rolled his eyes, but got up and headed to the backroom. “I can sleep on the floor, but I get a blanket then, alright?”

“Sure, it’s fair,” Mick agreed. The perspective of sleeping on the sofa without a blanket wasn’t very attractive, but sleeping on the floor would fuck up his spine for a long time coming. He checked the lock on the door and followed Nikki to the backroom. It wasn’t the first time he stayed the night at work, but it was the first time he had a roommate. He only hoped Nikki wouldn’t snore.

Meanwhile, Nikki had already put the blanket on the floor and settled on it.

“Good night,” Mick told him as he lay down on the sofa.

Nikki looked surprised. “Good night, I guess. And… thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Nikki fell asleep quickly, but Mick stayed awake for a long time, tormented by the pain in his back. It obviously didn’t like his midnight walk around the city. He checked up on Nikki every now and then, amazed at how peaceful he looked while sleeping. It was like all his concerns that left their trace on his face during the day disappeared during the night. A kid of his age shouldn’t have so many concerns, Mick thought. Teenagehood is a time for bad marks, hanging out with friends till sunrise, first crushes, and definitely not a time of thinking where to spend a night and how to survive the next day. Anger washed over Mick, making him clench his fists as he kept looking at Nikki peacefully snoring, clutching his backpack even in his sleep. Whoever did this to Nikki didn’t deserve to have kids at all, let alone take care of them. Nikki deserved better.

Mick couldn’t fall asleep for a long time, recalling the day again and again, every move, every word. He was pretty sure this wasn’t the first time Nikki broke the law. Staying in a police station for a night would have been just another nuisance for him, not a life-changing situation. So after all Mick had heard from Tommy about Nikki he least of all expected Nikki to need help – his help, of all people. They’d never even talked before. Why did he do it then? It was weird, and from the image Mick had in his head based on Tommy’s stories and what he saw today, not at all Nikki-like.

On the other hand, he didn’t know Nikki all that well. Who knew what was going on in that head of his?

There was one thing, however, that Mick was sure about. Nikki would come back. One day or another, but he would. Not after what happened today.

***

Mick woke up from energetic banging on the door. He looked at the clock. Well, no doubt he overslept – it was almost an hour after he was supposed to open the shop. Still, what kind of customer would actually bang on the door of a closed shop?

Of course it weren’t customers. It were Tommy and Vince.

When Mick saw them, he wanted to both hug and kill them. Now it was clear that Tommy went over to sleep at Vince’s. What’s more, it was perfectly logical. Why didn’t they even think about it yesterday?

“Hey, Mick! …why are you looking at me like that?”

“I’m gonna murder you one day,” Nikki promised solemnly from behind Mick’s back. He had probably also been woken up by the banging.

“I love you too,” Tommy grinned. “Can I know why?”

“Where the fuck did you go last night? We walked round the entire neighborhood!”

“We?..” Tommy looked at Mick questioningly.

“I’m not ready for this,” Mick waved his hand and stepped to the side. “Nikki, you tell them.”

“Oh, I will,” Nikki promised gravely. Mick retreated to the backroom, sprawled on the couch and closed his eyes, listening to indistinguishable voices from the store.

As though a weight had been lifted off Mick’s shoulders when he saw Tommy alive and well. Why did he even care so much?

#motley crue #motley crue fanfiction #nikki sixx #mick mars #tommy lee #vince neil (honorary mention)#phew this chapter turned out waaay longer than i planned #but the more the better amirite?#im not very satisfied with this #i could do better #but im completely braindead at the moment #so have this #what is lost what is found

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dxmedstudent · 5 years ago

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I've been having virtual CBT appointments since before lockdown. It started as a way to manage work- related stress, and improve my coping mechanisms. Clearly though a pandemic has added to that, so it feels like a lucky time to have referred myself.

The other day, whilst speaking to my counsellor about accepting uncertainty and avoiding worrying or ruminating on things I can't change, and making plans for the few things I can, I realised a little of why I am struggling with this sometimes.

I realised that I find it hard to feel hopeful about the other Lockdown changes happening because functionally my needs aren't being met.

My life has changed dramatically, and despite lots of virtual contact from loved ones (more than before the pandemic) it's just not the same. And on top of dread over how many people will die, I feel this strange resentment that I can't have the interactions that bring joy to my life. A lot of our lives as care workers involves balancing the pressures of work with the things that make you feel human. And time with loved ones is an important part of that.

For me, seeing my boyfriend and family are like the bottom of my Maslow's hierarchy pyramid. Talking to them may be right at the bottom, but seeing them, hugging them, being able to be with them is only just above that. Without that, I gain little joy from the idea shops might reopen or I can play golf, or whatever else is being touted as the next step down. I don't want the ability to meaninglessly interact with strangers, meet six people in a park or live my life at 2m apart from everyone ever. I don't give a crap that barbers may reopen, or we can do a million things that don't involve meaningful contact with others. I'm already doing nice things by myself, thanks but it doesn't change things.

I probably should try to focus on the positives but it's hard to care when work will probably get busier and my personal life remains strictly locked down. But it's hard when something important is missing.

On a purely selfish level, I want social bubbles and the ability to be with people I love, even if it's not many people. Which Scotland seem to be allowing, but I suspect England won't for some time. I can appreciate the economic justifications for focusing on getting people back to work rather than together. But it just sucks on a personal level, and whilst at times I feel pretty OK with it all I've struggled with it this week.

It doesn't help that I live far enough from my loved ones that driving into town to walk past them in a park would be an undertaking, and with public transport it'd be both inadviseable and difficult under the circumstances. I hope to move closer when I can, and the lockdown has really made me evaluate how I see my career panning out, because it's reinforced that I do well at a small distance from loved ones; but only if it's close enough to allow regular contact. I've always been lucky enough to be close enough to spend weekends with loved ones, and I don't think I appreciated just how central that is to enjoying my life.

Quite simply, it's made me think that any career that'd force me to move further away would probably take its toll mentally. Which unfortunately is hard to avoid in medicine. I guess its given me a sneak peak of what it might feel like to move further away for work.

If anything, I dread the lockdown relaxing because it might cause a second wave, and loads more deaths. It's been hard to avoid worrying about this as well, though I find it easier to accept I can't fix the entire NHS. I think we may cope worse when theres a second wave, if the UK can't afford to shut things down again. Which on a personal note will mean even longer til I can be with loved ones.

* if you're asking why I haven't included friends, it's because a lot of my friendships have been long distance - I still miss them terribly but we are used to going a lot longer without hugs and being physically there. It's a hurt, but a familiar one I already have the tools to deal with. But the idea that it might not be safe for me to hug my mum for months or years, or that the govt won't let me kiss my boyfriend til we can live together is, I'm not gonna lie, depressing.

I know everyone has sacrificed meaningful interactions. Everyone has their own difficulties right now. But that doesn't stop the selfish little voice in my head that just finds this all frustrating. I can't even say it bothers me all the time, there are lots of times when it feels OK. I feel happy mist of the time and have fun things to do and plenty of contact. But when it does hit me, it's not fun. It feels pretty petty tbh in the grand scheme of things. But it is what it is and I just have to work through it as best as I can.

#personal #my life #covid 19 journal

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itsclydebitches · 5 years ago

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RWBY Recaps: “Worst Case Scenario”

Happy Saturday, everyone! I’m so torn on this episode. On the one hand it managed to do a lot of the things I’ve been looking for this volume. On the other hand they’re a bit... shaky. And at least a month too late. But we’ll dive into all that in a bit.

We open on Penny in an Atlas facility which was actually a relief for me. Though I wouldn’t expect it for Penny’s characterization, last week’s order to head immediately back to the Academy alongside her blasting off without saying a word to anyone could have implied that Penny ran off. We could have started the episode with her missing, needing that space, but compounding how guilty she looks in the process. So emotionally I’m glad Penny didn’t unintentionally make her situation worse, yet in all honesty her situation isn’t nearly as bad as “A Night Off” implied it would be. We learn within a few minutes that Atlas techs had no difficulty discovering that the video was doctored, even if the general population isn’t convinced of that yet. Ironwood believes her. So do the Ace Ops and all of RWBYJNR. Robyn wasn’t out to seek revenge on Penny or anything, she just redoubled her efforts to help Mantle as a whole. The only thing that stunt seems to have achieved---besides general stress/division which, frankly, an attack without any framing would have created just as well---is the call to deactivate Penny. But as we just established, no one in power is inclined to do that. No one, from Ironwood to Winter to Pietro, is swayed by this “Penny is a danger” rhetoric. And what’s the public going to do? Storm Atlas and deactivate her themselves? For all the emotion Pietro shows, it doesn’t feel like Penny herself is in any danger, only her reputation. Nor does it feel like the villains’ plan has succeeded in hurting the heroes’ plans. The conflict of today’s episode regarding whether Ironwood continues to pull from Mantle to finish the Amity project existed before Penny’s framing. That just added some tangentially related drama. Feels like a missed opportunity for the villains’ well-executed frame job to, you know, actually achieve something.

I’m getting ahead of myself though. In an effort to prevent any more killings Ironwood cracks down on security, announcing that there are to be no public gatherings of any kind and that everyone must obey the curfew. It’s another case of “You can’t treat people like this” up against “I’m trying to keep people from dying via serial killer.” Obviously not everyone is obeying these new laws. Alongside a few civilians braving the authorities, Robyn and her Happy Huntresses are out stealing the supply trucks meant for Amity and re-distributing those supplies to the people. As a lovely anon pointed out (I’m so far behind on asks I’ll work on that!) how is sucking an entire truck and all its contents into your hand not magic? It’s just another example in a long list of world building details that RWBY hasn’t bothered to think through because they never established rules for their fantasy universe. Hell, at this point semblances are far more powerful and mind-bending than the actual magic we see Ozpin and the Maidens performing. What’s a bit of fire and lighting up against, “I can pull a ton of metal and supplies directly into my skin”?

With another truck in their possession we return to the group in Ironwood’s office. He title drops with how this is the worst case scenario: more people are dead, Penny is framed, and Jacques is somehow sitting on the council. Of course, any long-time RWBY viewer knows that this probably isn’t the worst case scenario. Things will no doubt get so much worse. Clover summarizes by saying that Robyn has moved from “hometown hero to full on vigilante” and then we enter the portion of the episode that made me want to beat my head against a wall.

Here’s the lowdown. The Amity project is permanently stalled because Robyn is taking all the supplies needed to finish it. They’re having trouble stopping her because those Happy Huntresses have one hell of a collection of semblances. A possible solution to this problem would be to declare martial law, further increasing the presence of the military in Mantle and thus, hopefully, stopping her. This would, however, further divide the people of Mantle from Ironwood. So what to do? Decisions, decisions.

The reason why this conflict isn’t a compelling investment for the viewer is because it still hinges on knowledge that Ironwood doesn’t have. As Yang herself will later say, “Do you think we should have told Ironwood about Salem? Before he put so much on the line for Amity?” Every choice he makes is done under the impression that he can defeat Salem and therefore these sacrifices are worth it. Amity Arena is top priority because once we unite the world against her she won’t stand a chance. Losing some defenses in Mantle? Incurring the peoples’ hatred? Declaring martial law? Even risking lives via grimm? All of it is worth it because in the end he’ll have rid the world of a woman who has, single-handedly, changed entire kingdoms for the worse. Remember that Mantle only looks like it does now because Ironwood witnessed firsthand how Salem wormed her way into Beacon and burned it to the ground. From destroying entire schools to killing people at parties, she is the world’s biggest threat. It makes perfect sense to me that he would be willing to go to these lengths in order to stop her. We can debate, as Oscar does, when he’ll have gone too far or if he already has, but that logic remains sound. You’re worried about peoples’ immediate needs? I’m worried about the day when Salem breaks into this kingdom and straight up slaughters them all. It’s inevitable. So Ironwood says yes, we need to make things worse now so that they can be better later. We need to make sacrifices.

Too bad he doesn’t know that it’s all for naught.

Which brings me to the group’s reactions. I mean... holy shit. First off, when Ironwood announces that Amity is on hold Ruby gets super upset. “But we’re so close! There must be some way we can finish the tower.” Ruby, why are you pushing for this to be a priority? You know that Salem can’t be killed! You know that telling the world about her will achieve nothing but panic! People aren’t going to unite against an immortal grimm queen. They’re going to do precisely what you all did before the story decided to gloss over or outright ignore your motivations for fighting an “impossible” fight: They’ll give up. They’ll fall into despair. They’ll make like Qrow and decide that nothing has meaning anymore. Why would it when there’s an immortal antagonist hell bent on our destruction? Ruby’s ‘But we have to finish the tower :o’ reaction makes no sense. Going along with this project because she’s comfy cozy being an Atlas huntress makes sense. Hypocritical, but still. Ruby pushing for the project when it’s doing even more harm, when she knows its primary use is pointless? Prioritizing it over those immediate needs? Like... what? This should have been the moment where Ruby came clean. Or at least kept quiet and looked guilty some more. “Yeah, Ironwood... now that this project is unambiguously hurting the people... you should probably know that it’s kinda... not gonna work...”

Then there’s Nora. Remember how I said I wanted her status as a poor orphan to clash with the privilege and authority around her? Yeah, would have been great if there was at least a little build-up to that. Or if another character acknowledged why she, out of the whole cast, is literally screaming at Ironwood over his choices. I mean sure, like with Oscar not showing up to fight the geist there’s an obvious answer here---Nora was once one of the people in Mantle. Not literally, but in all the ways that matter. Or, if you believe some theories, yes literally if she was originally born here---but it would be nice if the show actually established some of these connections rather than banking on the viewer not only picking up on them, but assuming that the writing indeed meant to create that link. These moments of personal growth are too important to drop in with so little lead in. We see Nora comment on the state of Mantle when they arrive and from there it’s just her steadily challenging Ironwood more and more. No acknowledgment as to why that’s such a sensitive topic for an otherwise bubbly girl and no deconstruction of these feelings after she shows them. I’ve mentioned before that Ironwood is crazy calm while having a bunch of teens challenge him like this. Same here. The level of fury Nora demonstrates is staggering given how, from a ‘What have we seen on screen?’ standpoint, it came out of nowhere.

The best part though is when Clover points out that telling the city there’s a serial killer on the lose could make things even worse. Suddenly the situation wouldn’t be, “Ironwood’s robot inexplicably attacked once but is now safely in custody” but rather, “The killer is still out there, wants to kill more, and is fully capable of doing so.” Cue more panic. Cue more grimm. Considering that this is primarily Nora’s concern, the fact that Mantle is vulnerable to grimm attacks through a combination of resources going to Amity and their general despondence drawing the monsters in, this point should be very relevant to her right now. Oh yeah, maybe we don’t want to freak people out even more because then more people die. The people I am currently trying to defend.

Instead she throws up her hands and exclaims, “I am so sick of secrets! If we just told everyone about Amity, about Salem---!” Then she’s cut off by Ironwood.

Nora. I love you. I really, really do. But:

This is my holiday card this year lol. A stranger and a random dog I found on PicsArt spouting my feelings. Happy Holidays. Needless to say, we’re more than halfway through the volume and I’m so over this high horse the group is riding. Nora’s stance would be a compelling one if she weren’t demanding from Ironwood the very thing she and her friends are unwilling to do.

Although, that little slip says a lot about precisely how far the group is taking the ‘no one is allowed to keep secrets but us’ stance. Tell Mantle about Salem? Really? They know that won’t accomplish anything in the vein of uniting them against her like Ironwood intends. Not if killing her is their final goal. Nora seems to want to tell them because secret keeping is just a Bad Thing and Ironwood is a Bad Man for keeping information from his people. Forget the consequences of telling them and, again, forget Nora’s own hypocrisy. It’s really amazing how far the writing is taking this assumption that anyone who keeps secrets from anyone else is automatically in the wrong unless you’re RWBYJNR.

Bleh. We’ve gotta move on. Too much else to cover and what more is there to say? The writing is an absolute mess.

Prior to Nora’s outburst we learn more about Tyrian. Tyrian Callows, as his file reveals. For those of you who weren’t inclined to read that teeny tiny print, my tired eyes are here to help. Winter gives a basic summary of Tyrian’s record and subsequent arrest/escape, but the scroll provides more details. After a series of murders he was detained and set to move from Mistral to Atlas. The man in charge, Pickerel, wanted additional forces for this move, clearly expecting that Tyrian would try to escape. He was denied this and eventually kicked off the mission for not cooperating. During Tyrian’s transport the airship was attacked by a swarm of grimm, despite the fact that the area they were passing through was considered relatively safe. Tyrian continues to speak throughout the ship’s transmission despite severe injuries from the crash. He was heard saying, “What are you? What are you?” sobbing and eventually ending with “Beautiful.” (Edit: My mistake. Cornetto is the one who asks, “What are you?”). At the time Atlas officials assumed he had been killed by grimm, despite the fact that no bodies were found. There’s a note revising this to say he was suspected to have escaped after Pickerel was found dead in his house.

Obviously, Tyrian met Salem that day.

So Winter and the Ace Ops aren’t pleased to hear that this notorious serial killer is in their city and working for their greatest enemy, but at least they all believe Ruby about what she saw. Ironwood eventually shuts the whole conversation down, announcing that they need to put their efforts towards stopping Robyn and Tyrian. Winter and Clover give the expected, “Yes, sir!” in regards to this order. So does Ren. Like I said last week, ignoring all his concerns and trying to fix things with a kiss is not something that works. Glad to see Ren’s new work ethic and devotion to the fight didn’t magically disappear because Nora decided to make a move.

We transfer to Yang and Blake where they FINALLY bring up Adam. Hallelujah! It’s too little too late, but as I’ve said before, better late than never. Granted, it’s not much of a conversation. Yang insists they did what they had to do. Blake says she never wants to be in another position where she’s forced to kill someone. Understandable perspective, but not really the sort of thing you can control when plenty of others are out to kill you. Unless Blake swears to never kill again and upholds that ideal over the inevitable danger to herself and others, that’s just not something she’s going to be able to avoid.

Still very glad it exists, but considering that their talk didn’t actually delve into much regarding that trauma I’m more interested in the things they have to say about the continued secret keeping. This is where Yang once again questions whether they should tell Ironwood and finds that Blake doesn’t agree. Why is this significant? Because I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone disagree with Yang and get out of it without a glare at best, violence at worst. Yang herself points out that Blake doesn’t seem to be on board with her perspective and is so very gentle about it. It’s clear Yang in no way blames Blake for this difference between them. She legitimately wants to understand her position. Once again, I’m torn. On the one hand Yang should absolutely be commended for the mature way she handled this conversation. On the other hand... it’s Blake. We’ve already seen time and time again that Blake is the exception to Yang’s every rule. I wasn’t joking when I said back in Volume 6 that I primarily like Yang as a character when she’s interacting with Blake because it’s only when she’s with Blake (and to a lesser extent Ruby) that we see this calm, rational, sympathetic version of Yang. Though it is, as said, great that she can approach a difference between them in a healthy and level-headed manner, I’d also like to see her manage the same with someone other than the woman she’s clearly in love with. I’ll believe that Yang has undergone actual growth when she can demonstrate this kind of maturity with someone she’s not already eager to impress and desperate not to create a rift with.

In addition, we get to watch Yang explain how Ironwood “didn’t have many good options” and Blake responds with, “I’m not sure there are many good options left for any of us anymore.” Yet somehow, astoundingly, neither of them manages to apply this perspective to Ozpin. The cast is literally repeating all the arguments I’ve made in Ozpin’s defense---trusting people is dangerous, secrets are hard to part with, you’re not a bad person if you only have shit options to choose from and have to choose something---yet no one actually acknowledges the one character this most applies to.

It’s after all this talk of secret keeping that Blake and Yang decide that they don’t have to follow Ironwood’s orders. Which... is a problem. Because yes actually, they do. Remember how they’re official huntsmen now? Remember how this is a job that comes with rules, regulations, and adhering to the orders you’re given? I’m not saying they’re morally in the wrong here. We can likewise debate the significance of Robyn having this information, whether she’s trustworthy, etc. Rather, I’m merely pointing out that by taking on this job the group agreed to follow Ironwood and obey his instructions. They’ve now broken that promise. It likewise raises the question of whether they’ll tell everyone about this. Based on Blake’s “We’ll distract [the Ace Ops]” it doesn’t sound like they’re going to walk into Ironwood’s office an hour later and admit that they made their own choice based on their own moral code, giving him the chance to dismiss them. I don’t want people working for me who I can’t trust to follow my orders and all that. Which would mean, you know, that they’re keeping another secret. That cycle of hypocrisy will continue, now in the form of Yang and Blake patting themselves on the back for not hiding information from Robyn while likewise hiding new information from Ironwood. So I’m interested to see how and if they’ll admit to this decision, one they made without Ironwood’s or the rest of the team’s input.

Of course, Blake and Yang only get half a pat on the back here. It’s not like they actually came clean in regards to Salem, the primary secret hanging over everyone’s heads. They are, again, acting precisely like Ozpin: doling out little bits and pieces of information as they see fit. I thought for a moment that they truly intended to tell Robyn everything but would be interrupted before they could. Instead Yang says straight out that they’re refusing to come clean about it all and Robyn swears that she “won’t stop until I learn the whole truth.” So congratulations, you further solidified the parallel between you and the man you’re still ignoring, made a pretty huge decision without the input of your partners or boss, and will potentially hide that information in an ever growing list of secrets. If that’s the case that will bring Yang’s total to five: my mom is the Spring Maiden, Salem can’t be killed, the relic attracts grimm, we’re the reason Ozpin is missing, and Robyn now knows about your project thanks to us.

During this whole conversation Robyn reveals that she has the lie detector semblance rather than Ironwood and... Really? I brought up before how many problems that inevitably causes. Case and point: if Robyn can just clasp someone’s hand and tell if they’re lying, why not do that with Ironwood weeks or months ago? Prior to Tyrian’s attack it was abundantly clear that Robyn would prefer to work with Ironwood but isn’t sure she can trust that he has the people’s best interests at heart; Ironwood likewise would prefer to work with Robyn but isn’t sure he can trust her period. Ironwood literally told the group last episode that the fact that they’re not already working together isn’t fully his fault (like the group wants to insist). Working together requires both parties being willing to come together... and here’s a super easy solution on Robyn’s end of things. Not sure about Ironwood’s motives? Shake his hand, ask him to make a statement about it, and find out! For me, the reveal of this semblance just puts more responsibility on Robyn’s shoulders than Ironwood’s. She could have taken more steps towards reconciliation, confident in her unique ability to confirm information. Ironwood? He’s working on pure faith in people which, as the last two volumes have shown, isn’t much to work with at all.

I don’t even want to get into the issues with this semblance moving forward. Unless Robyn because a full-blown enemy or is killed in the finale, every times someone is worried about lying I’m going to ask, “Why not just get Robyn?” It’s too easy a solution, one that writers are inclined to ignore when they don’t want a quick answer, and that disconnect rankles.

We segue to Pietro’s lab and hark! A Maria! She’s apparently been helping Pietro out with all the Amity Tower stuff lately, much appreciated work considering he would have collapsed under the workload otherwise. How kind. A perfectly logical use of her time. Now why couldn’t you have told us that five episodes ago?

Tiny edits, Rooster Teeth. Simple revisions. RWBY continues to read like a first draft. Plenty of potential, but there’s so much missing or disorganized that the viewer is left frustrated because we can see so clearly what it could have been... but we didn’t get that. A pity.

With Maria’s existence re-confirmed we dive into a number of revelations. Most notably that Pietro didn’t succeed in creating an artificial aura for Penny, he merely found a way to share a part of his with her. That’s why he’s so ill and the more times Penny needs to be rebuilt, the more aura he has to give up to revive her. The assumption? There will come a final time, likely at the end of the volume, when Penny will need a recharge and Pietro will die. It’s a setup I’m actually thrilled about if we ignore the obligatory grief over losing a good side character. That reveal was a surprise for most viewers, yet is something that still makes sense based on what we previously knew (a lot of “twists” end up retconning past info) and would lead to a very satisfying ending. Pietro, already an old man, passes on knowing he’s given his daughter the best life he can. All this coughing and death flags reach a conclusion by the end of the volume. Penny is saved but from here on out everyone knows she’s mortal. It adds weight to every fight she’s in and removes the probability that she’ll indefinitely live out everyone she’s ever loved. She might have a longer lifespan than most if she keeps herself safe, but she’s not immortal. All around? One of the best things Rooster Teeth has introduced in ages.

We also see Weiss closing in on Jacques’ involvement in the attack. Only a few people have access to Mantle’s security, one of which is directly connected to the Schnee Dust Company...

Finally, god bless, our favorite farm boy gets a scene. An actual, full-fledged scene in which he speaks multiple times.

I could cry. It might be the only significant scene we get with Oscar this Volume, but it’s far more than we’ve had in an age. Hell to the yes.

Basically, Ironwood shows off the Staff of Creation’s vault and admits that this is what is keeping Atlas afloat, not gravity dust as everyone else assumes. Which is a revelation not nearly as well done as Penny’s. Floating? That’s what this all powerful magical object does? How in the world does that connect to creation? And why bother doing that at all? It’s clear that gravity dust can keep things up---Ironwood said that they’ll have to lift Amity the “old-fashioned way”---so why bother using the relic for that when an “endless power source” could potentially be used to do so much more? Or let’s say dust can’t lift a whole city (even though you’d think someone would have realized that by now if that’s the case, questioned how the hell Atlas stays up there...) why is that so important? Just overall grimm protection? A symbol of status? This reveal seems to raise too many odd questions and, frankly, feels like a clumsy setup for the finale. Meaning, now Atlas is in risk of falling. If someone steals the relic or decides to move things along by lifting Amity with it, the entire city comes tumbling down.

With info out of the way Ironwood admits that he’d hoped coming to this place would spark some memory in Oscar, talking about him as if he is Ozpin, rather than just housing him. He likewise says later that “Eventually you won’t even know who’s who anymore.” Everyone cry over Oscar’s expression.

Jury’s out on whether Ironwood knows this for a fact or whether he’s working under an assumption, like much of the fandom, that Ozpin and Oscar will eventually merge into one new-ish person. After all, from what we saw in Volumes 1-3, Ironwood only ever interacted with Ozpin as one individual, so he has little reason to think there was always another, distinct person hanging out somewhere in his mind. But there could have been. I’ve mentioned in previous metas that if Ozpin and Oscar remain distinct, it makes perfect sense that Ozma would have been the one running things at Beacon, leaving the much younger and inexperienced host to take a backseat during those conversations.

Indeed, I thought for a moment that Oscar would say, “You can talk to him,” finally acknowledging that if someone tries to address Ozpin as his own person he might actually respond. He just says “You can talk to me” though. Which, yes. I also want people to talk to Oscar. It just astounds me that everyone continues to act as if Ozpin is literally out of their reach, rather than potentially a “Hey. I’m sorry. Can we talk?” away. Maybe Ozpin won’t answer, but someone could finally try.

They talk about how horrific it was for Ironwood to watch Beacon fall. We get a wonderfully creepy flashback to Salem’s chess piece, reminding us that she’s not just dangerous, she’s malicious. Salem enjoys watching those around her suffer. “The way she told me she was there.” They likewise discuss whether Salem doesn’t have an advantage without her humanity and Oscar cautions Ironwood that saving the world isn’t worth losing his own. Not to call out my favorite farm boy, but that’s a real easy stance to take when you know Salem is immortal and Ironwood doesn’t. Again, every sacrifice he makes is under the impression that it’s taking him closer and closer to a world without her. To his mind, losing his own humanity might be worth it if it rids the world of her once and for all. Meanwhile, Oscar is working under the impression that defeating Salem won’t ever happen. Why give up your humanity for an impossible dream? They’re coming at this from completely different angles and until everyone has the same info the group’s stance on Ironwood’s choices holds no water. The fandom loves insisting that RWBYJNR couldn’t have made an informed choice about joining the fight until they knew about Salem, despite the fact that they had already agreed to fight an immortal enemy (the grimm), had already risked their lives for the people, and clearly intended to continue doing that in the future. Knowing about Salem had no bearing on the question, “Do you want to help?” because they’d already answered that numerous times. In contrast, this is a situation where Ironwood actually doesn’t have all the information necessary to make an informed decision. You want to judge him for his plans and his willingness to sacrifice it all in the name of defeating Salem? Fine, but you’ve got to stop working with a different set of rules than him first.

Of course, despite being alone in the bottom of a vault, despite introducing Oscar’s (supposed) reservations about keeping secrets earlier in the volume, despite this insight into why Ironwood is making these choices... Oscar doesn’t tell Ironwood either. So much for the, “Oscar will spill the beans to Ironwood” theory. It could still happen, but like so much else in this episode by then it’ll be too late. The moment passed.

Instead of any progress in that regard they just head upstairs where Winter and Penny are waiting with a letter from Jacques. He’s invited them to dinner where Ironwood will defend his position on the council. Looks like Oscar’s advice to “talk to the people you’re most afraid to” came at them like a battering ram.

And that’s it for this week. What have we got left? Six episodes? Far too few to cover everything the story needs to. I’m gearing up for a bumpy ride this holiday season.

Until then, folks!

Minor Things of Note

The robot patting Penny’s head? Wonderful. Stellar. Absolutely fantastic detail. The idea that the Atlas facilities are populated with semi-conscious AIs and that they care enough about Penny to offer her support is just precious.

I like many of the shots we got this episode. Penny looking like she’s behind bars and Ironwood shrouded in a mist-like window are two that stood out.

#rwby #rwby volume 7 #rwby volume 7 spoilers #rwby recaps #mymetas

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qm-vox · 4 years ago

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So You Want To Play Hades

I spent six hours coming up with that title because I have problems in my mind which I refuse to either examine or resolve.

So, Hades! The latest work from Supergiant Games, who brought you the interactive soundtracks to Bastion, Transistor, and Pyre, all superb games in their own rights known for their intuitive gameplay, build-your-own-hard-mode difficulty style, incredible atmosphere and characterization, thought-provoking stories, and that sexy, sexy fuckin’ music.

Like, listen to this sometime it’s amazing (all of their soundtracks are available from them on Youtube, by the by, though if you like ‘em you can support the creators by buying the music from them directly too):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uH3Aoj1nw58

You’re likely asking, quite reasonably, why in the infinite and undying fuck I’m writing this post right now, and the long and short of it is I want more people to talk Hades with so now y’all are gonna get hit with the sales pitch and what I hope will be a helpful beginner’s guide if you decide to get into the game. Let’s get into that first part, shall we?

Thou Shalt Subject Your Gods To Market Forces

(Image sourced from Supergiant’s website)

Hades is an action-roguelike/lite that places you in the role of Prince Zagreus, secret son of Hades. Zag is trying to move out of his father’s house and live somewhere else for awhile and, well, Dad’s just being an entire dick about the whole thing. Hades challenges you to face down the endless ranks of the dead one chamber at a time, gathering the resources you need to breach upward through the Greek underworld and open the mighty gates into the living world. You can acquire it on Steam or on the Epic Store.

How do you know if Hades is or isn’t for you? If you like action games with tight controls and widely varied playstyles, we’ve got you covered here (if you’re thinking in terms of previous Supergiant offerings, Bastion has the most bones in). Hades also offers a great character-focused narrative, centering around the relationships Zagreus has and develops with the people around him - from legendary shades like Achilles and Sisyphus, to the gods of Olympus, to the cthonic gods of the underworld like Charon, Nyx, and the Furies - which fully incorporates the conceits of the genre. Unlike many roguelikes which sorta quietly elide failed runs or deaths, Zag’s defeats are part of his journey. After all, he’s already in the underworld. Where the fuck else is he going to go when he dies? Connecticut?

Though I can gush about the characters and narrative all day (and I’ll do it a bit more later), don’t get me wrong: Hades expects you to perform some pretty tight mechanics. Since dying is just the end of this run and not the game, the game feels pretty free to take brutal measures; the environments you move in are full of deadly traps, the seething ranks of the dead outnumber you to vast degrees, and you’ll fight a dizzying mix of opponents who do not hesitate to catch you in cross-fires, push you into lava, or drop bombs when you kill them because fuck you for succeeding you weird godling bastard. If you get easily frustrated or flustered, Hades may be quite stressful for you; before it’s anything else, it’s an action game with a heavy focus on combat, and if you decide to ride this train that’s the price of the ticket. If you relish the challenge and especially if you like the satisfaction of watching your play improve, though, it’s one hell of a ride.

In terms of accessibility features, Hades is a mixed bag. It has subtitles and aim assistance available, as well as a variety of supported languages and control adjustments which can alter how you do things like dash or attack, but it’s missing, for instance, a colorblind mode (and that’s gonna be important here in a minute), and many enemy behaviors & traps have audio cues which are not part of the current subtitle support. A rumble feature for controllers that have it is supported; Hades strongly suggests the use of a controller, but I know several players who choose to use a mouse & keyboard and seem to prefer it. Semi-recently, a God Mode option was added which empowers you when it’s turned on and does so further every time you die; it’s the closest Hades comes to an ‘easy’ mode, and while reception of it from my fellow players has been highly positive I’ve not tried it for myself.

If you’ve liked action games in the past, I’d highly endorse giving Hades a try as long as it’s accessible for you. The current build of the game (just before formal release) is selling at $24.99 USD on Steam right now, and like...I am not a highly skilled Gaming Individual(tm). I lose at games a lot. I play most of my games on Easy or maybe Normal if I’m really feeling like my dick is big - and with that in mind, I loved this one enough to buy it twice. I love the tight feeling of the combat, the way the mechanics feel, its gorgeous environments and its captivating characters. Hell, that’s why I’m out here writing a whole-ass article.

Stealth, Guile, Subtlety, And Other Things You Will Not Need - Getting Started In Hades

(Artwork sourced from the Hades wiki)

So you’ve decided to acquire Hades, you already own it, or the first part of this article was intriguing enough for you to look at the advice portion and see what sort of game you could be dealing with. Hades can be intimidating at first; it throws a lot of stuff at you, very quickly, and while it gives you some strong guidance on what to do with many of the resources you’ll acquire not all of those uses are immediately intuitive. The following is a guide to help your first few runs go a bit more smoothly and work on the fundamentals that will help you through your entire experience.

Let’s start with some General Tips that will help you out with every run and every weapon:

- Relax. No, seriously: relax. You haven’t ‘failed’ a run if you don’t beat the final boss. Hell, you probably haven’t even ‘failed’ a run if you die in Tartarus. If you learned something or got any permanent resource - gemstones, darkness, nectar, keys, blood, diamonds, ambrosia - then that run was a success. Even if the game wasn’t currently early access and thus without a proper ‘end’ at the moment, it’s supposed to be fun. Don’t castigate yourself for dying, just dive screaming back in and rip your vengeance from the spectral chest of your slayer.

- Always Be Moving. You only have so many hit points (you start a save file with a max of 50 and the most you can start a given run with is 200) and healing is limited over the course of a run. If you’re standing still, you’re getting hit. Zag’s quick on his feet - keep him moving and use your dash liberally. Once you’ve dealt some damage, leave and let your enemies swing at empty air, then dash back in and bully them back into their graves. When you start a dash you’re invulnerable until the dash finishes, which can make for some real cheeky dodges once you’ve had time to learn enemy timing.

- Watch And Learn. Early on in the game you’ll be learning about new enemies every chamber, especially when you start transferring to new zones and all of the enemies you’ve been facing just stop being a thing. Take the chance to know your foe! You’re not on a clock: don’t leap into the fight immediately. Dash around and watch how your enemies move and attack. What’s the limitations of their tactics? The reach on their attacks? How fast do they swing and move? If you’d like to watch some of that stuff ahead of time, I’d like to suggest amber_cxc’s Twitch channel: she’s been doing a lot of runs and speedruns of Hades of late, among the other games she plays.

- Manipulate Your Rewards. Certain things in Hades can only be offered a limited number of times per run, and once you’ve hit your quota they stop appearing. You can take advantage of this to get more Boons, Centaur Hearts, and Poms of Power. Specifically, you can only have up to two Daedelus Hammers and up to three Hermes Boons. If you can knock these out early I highly endorse doing so; they’re never bad to have, and even if somehow you want none of what they have to offer getting them off the RNG will help you later. Additionally, you can use Keepsakes (more on these in a minute) to manipulate who you get Boons from, when, by changing in and out of them at each biome. In this way you can control the shape of your build for the run.

- Accept That Your Dick Energy Is Fucking Huge. A lot of games try to keep you humble. Dark Souls is infamous for it, of course, and others in this genre such as Crypt of the Necrodancer and Enter the Gungeon do not reward haste at all. That is not this game. Walk into Hades like you’re the lord god of the Big Dick Dimension even if you know you’re not; take risks and learn from experience how you can mitigate, manipulate, or cancel out those risks. That unearned confidence won’t just help you with tip one (Relax), it’ll help you practice in those high-pressure situations which will occur more and more as your Heat rises.

- A Brief Note On Projectiles. This game has a few kinds of projectiles that you’ll need to learn to identify. Balls and Arrows can be broken - hit them with an Attack and they pop and won’t hurt you. Waves cannot be broken; they travel fast along the ground and have to be dodged or deflected. Lasers can neither be broken nor deflected. Traps can’t be broken, and deflecting them doesn’t always make them safe for you; these include the lava balls in Asphodel, Inferno Bombs, and the shit spit out by Bothers and Pests. Know your foe and always be moving.

In terms of the resources you’re offered, there are broadly two kinds: in-run resources, and out-of-run resources. Let’s talk briefly about in-run ones.

- Boons: Boons are the powerful gifts of your Olympian relatives. They change how you play during your run by augmenting your abilities (like your Attack, Special, or Dash) or by offering passive benefits. In general, look at Aphrodite, Athena, or Dionysus if you want powerful defenses, Ares, Artemis, or Zeus for powerful attacks, and Poseidon and Demeter for a combination of damage and utility. Different gods will be good with different weapons, and we’ll get into that later. Boons have a Rarity and a Level; Rarity determines their starting power and how well they scale if they do scale, and Level is that scaling.

- Centaur Hearts: +25 max and current HP for this run. Do you like not dying?

- Poms of Power: Poms increase the Level of a Boon by 1, which generally makes it better at doing whatever it does. Not all Boons will level up, but the ones that you can attach to your Attack, Special, Cast, Dash, or Call always do. You do eventually hit diminishing returns with these, so you’ll generally want to spread the love around if you keep picking up Poms.

- Obols: DOLLAH DOLLAH BILLS Y’ALL. Obols are the coins preferred by Charon, the Ferryman, who will take them from you for goods and services. Obols can be turned into all other resources - even out-of-run resources. They’re almost always a great choice of investment.

These in-run resources are presented as potential rewards when you’re selecting chambers. I tend to run heavy on Boons and Obols myself, but your own play style is likely to differ! Experiment with the feel of acquiring various rewards and see what you like to invest in. After all, they’re only for the run you’re on; you literally can’t take it with you.

Out-of-run resources are used to permanently advance Zagreus’s power, his relationships, or both. They are as follows:

- Cthonic Keys: Used to unlock new weapons and new parts of the Mirror of Night. Once your weapons and Mirror are wholly unlocked these keys stop being useful more or less instantly, and can be safely traded at the Wretched Broker between runs to acquire Nectar (but see Gemstones, below).

- Gemstones: Early in the game, Gemstones can be traded in at the House Contractor between runs in order to enhance the underworld; in particular, they can be used to install fountain rooms, to open up access to Chaos and Erebus, to give you access to Infernal Troves (and upgrade said troves), and to add in-run resources to Keys, Nectar, and Gemstones. These services are in the first tab of the House Contractor and you should buy them out as soon as possible so that your runs can springboard off of these powerful additions. Once that’s taken care of, Gemstones can be used to renovate the House of Hades, including Zag’s bedroom and the lounge, again at the House Contractor.

- Nectar: The nectar of the gods is in short supply in the underworld, and is a treasured gift that Zagreus can offer to his friends. In most cases, the first time you give a character Nectar they will trade you a powerful Keepsake in return; these are run-altering tools you select at the start of each run and change how you play. Early on, spread the love, but once you’re full up on Keepsakes you can feel free to develop relationships through gift-giving however you see fit.

- Darkness: The power of Night is used to give permanent, powerful passive benefits to Zagreus via the Mirror of Night in his bedroom. I would suggest using Darkness to get your extra Dash and extra hit points before anything else, but once you’ve got those tools kinda fuck around and find out. Eventually a dialogue option with Nyx will unlock the flip side of the Mirror’s talents, which must be developed separately and cost even more Darkness; you’ll want lots of this and you’ll want it for a very long time. Oh, and try to save aside 8,888 Darkness for a rainy day. You’ll need it.

- Titan Blood: Offered by the first and last bosses at each level of Heat (more on Heat later). Titan Blood is used to upgrade your weapons, making them better at doing all of the things they do, as well as to unlock Aspects of those weapons. We’re still shy one Aspect as of the latest patch, so ah, don’t stop collecting this. You’ll always have a use for it.

- Diamonds: Offered by the second boss at each level of Heat. Diamonds are used to buy plot-relevant renovations to the House of Hades, to advance certain relationships, and to acquire the fishing minigame and in-game access to the soundtrack within the House. Like Blood, you’ll have a use for these for a long, long time.

- Ambrosia: Offered by the third boss at each level of Heat. When you reach the point at which you can no longer offer people Nectar, genuine Ambrosia from Olympus becomes the princely gesture by which you can show your gratitude. You may be tempted to trade this for Blood early on. Don’t.

When you’re starting out, Darkness and Gemstones will be the gods of your new world, followed closely by Cthonic Keys You’ll run out of immediate need for Gemstones faster than you will for Darkness, but by that time you’ll either be comfortable with Hades or you’ll have determined it’s not for you. Focus on unlocking access to your new weapons, upgrading the underworld itself, and paying off your talents; at this stage, escaping the underworld isn’t really a priority so much as setting up for your eventual triumph is.

And When You Can No Longer Lay Waste - Infernal Arms And Heat

(Artwork sourced from the Hades Wiki)

The assault rifle with under-slung mortar launcher is definitely my favorite ancient Greek weapon.

So I’ve mentioned unlocking weapons, and I’ve mentioned that Hades offers varied play styles, so I suppose I ought to talk about them. Zagreus’s weapons - his Infernal Arms - form the first layer of your play style choices, which will be augmented by your in-run choices, and the second layer comes in the form of the Pact of Punishment and its Heat. Each weapon has differing values for its attacks and behaves very differently. I’m not gonna give you the specific numbers here - we have a wiki for that - and will instead make some general statements on how they play and what might pair well with them.

- Stygius, the Blade of the Underworld: You start each save file with this bad boy. Stygius is a generalist weapon that leans somewhat towards speed; its Attack is a three-hit combo that ends in a Thrust with knockback, while its Dash Attack (note: these are not the same with ANY weapon) is solely the Thrust, still with knockback. Its Special, slower than the Attack, is a high-damage shockwave that breaks enemy projectiles and knocks them back. You might be asking yourself, Vox, why would I Special when it makes people leave sword range, at which point I will direct you back to Always Be Moving; your Special makes your enemies Go Away, which saves you hit points. Stygius can build into almost anything, though its Attack benefits the least from Zeus and Poseidon, and is notable for having the most wild fucking Hammer options. Some of them do little things like make your Special bigger, but then you get stuff like Hoarding Slash (deal extra damage equal to 5% of your Obols), World Splitter (you do one big swing with a base damage of 80) and motherfucking CURSED SLASH, which is where Stygius rips a line of cocaine off of a mirror, cuts your health by 60%, and then heals you for 2 every time you hit something. My advice for this is whatever you start down, commit. Stygius might build into anything, but it can’t build into everything: once you choose a boon path, pick things to compliment that and go fucking ham.

- Varatha, the Eternal Spear: The forgotten child of Hades’ weapons, Varatha is a versatile weapon that, like Stygius, does a bit of everything - and unlike Stygius, does it all at the same time. Varatha’s base attack is a series of three long-range thrusts with low damage, and its Special throws the spear in a straight line, at which point it hovers in the air until you Special again; it follows a straight line from its position to your current one, damaging anything in that line. Last, but not least, you can perform a powerful Spin Attack by holding down the Attack button and charging up. Spin is one of the strongest single hits in the game, but you do have to stop moving to charge it up. However, you can dash out of the charge - even better, dashing releases the Spin at the end of your dash. This means that once you learn the timings of your charges, you can use Spin to attack and dodge at the same time, in a wide circle around yourself. Unlike Stygius, Varatha benefits to an extent from splitting your build up; its Attack wants big hitters like Aphrodite, Artemis, or Poseidon, whose high multipliers pair amazingly with the spin, while its Special can mount debuffs or stranger forms of damage like those offered by Dionysus and Ares. If you start building into one thing, but then Hammer into an alternate focus, the end result is still going to be pretty cohesive. Like Generic Goodstuff, or want a weapon to use while building up many divine relationships? Varatha does it all.

- Aegis, the Shield of Chaos: Just because this thing has the only block function in the game doesn’t mean it’s a defensive weapon. Aegis is a fast-moving melee weapon whose hits cause native knockback, slamming foes into walls, up against cliffs, and through traps & magma. Since Aegis throws people around it’s great for a highly aggressive style; dash in, hit them, and watch them slide away before they can do damage back to you. Its Special throws the shield Captain America style, where it ricochets off of opponents and obstacles before eventually returning. Use this with care; you can’t attack or block while your Special is out. Holding down the Attack button begins to charge a Bull Rush; while you’re charging, you’re immune to damage in the direction the shield is facing, and then when you release you dash to the end of the indicated line, damaging anything you hit. Despite how sexy that sounds, Bull Rush is honestly kinda slow and can be hard to build for specifically; instead, Bull Rush is best used to get out of bad situations, or to outlast big long boss combos, especially those used by the first and second bosses who are known to spit out absolute STREAMS of projectiles. Aegis hits fast and gets lots of bonus damage against normal enemies by bullying them against walls for that sweet, sweet Wall Slam damage, but it craves big damage multipliers less than some other weapons; consider using Zeus, Dionysus, or Demeter for your Attack, saving big damage choices for if you can get a Dash Attack build going. Special is great for mounting utility like Aphrodite or Poseidon that let you control the engagement further, just remember to think before you hit the yeet button.

- Coronacht, the Heart-Seeking Bow: Meet your first ranged weapon! Coronacht deals damage in a straight line by charging up a shot; when your line flashes, release the shot for a Power Shot that deals extra damage. Its Special is...bad, I’m gonna be real; it’s a wide-sweeping volley of arrows that deal individually low damage and will rarely, if ever, hit the same target. Still, it has its uses. Coronacht benefits from either high damage or battlefield control on its Attack; look into Artemis, Aphrodite, Demeter, and Poseidon. Its Special is harder to build for, but Ares and Zeus both do well on it since they can cause damage out of proportion with the range and/or area of your volley. Play keep-away and use distance to get off those charge shots, and remember that you can break projectiles and hit multiple enemies with each attack. Avoid mounting odd damage (Ares or Dionysus) or utility (Athena) on your Attack; it’s not going to come out fast enough to take meaningful advantage of those tools.

- Malphon, the Twin Fists: Easily the angriest weapon in all of Hades, Malphon is a pair of massive fuck-off gauntlets that are used for fast-moving combos at extremely short range. It is unique in that its Attack has a Dash Attack, and its Special - a massive uppercut - has a dash upper, letting you sweep in and deal big damage in a tight area immediately. Though each of Malphon’s hits are individually small, it throws out so fucking many of them that you can put almost anything on your Attack and it’ll work out. Athena Attack? Why not, you’ll be swinging when the enemy is. Dionysus Attack? Poison stacking has never been easier! Artemis Attack? Sure, you don’t do a lot of base damage, but you swing so often that you’ll crit constantly and take advantage of passives like Support Fire. Your Special has much higher base damage and can easily become the focus of your build, and because it moves slower it wants bigger damage multipliers like Artemis or Aphrodite if it’s your focus. If it’s not your focus, consider Poseidon in its slot (to get enemies to Go Away) or a god that will combo with your Attack (for instance, if you’re doing Demeter Attack, consider Zeus Special so you can potentially pick up the Cold Fusion boon and get 10 seconds of free damage every time you tap the Special button). You pay a price for this ease of use: Malphon’s range is directly inside the enemy’s ass, which means you need to have razor-thin timing to dash out of the way of attacks and keep your combos going, especially if you get swarmed. Since Malphon can mount and build literally fucking anything, it’s the ideal weapon to use if you want to power-level Keepsakes; slap something on at the start of a run and then just never take it off. Sure, you’re letting the Three Fates decide your build, but fuck it, it all just works!

- The Adamant Rail: What if you invaded the underworld with a fucking machine gun. The Adamant Rail has an ammo counter; each Attack takes 1 bullet (and Dash Attack takes and fires 2), and you reload by pressing the right-hand stick in. Its Special is a slow-moving mortar that hits in a wide area. The Rail is a powerful and versatile weapon capable of engaging at great range, which tends to build either Attack or Special. If you’re building Special, look for big hits like Aphrodite, Artemis, or even Poseidon, and any Special upgrade at all from the Hammers. Attack usually wants utility or stacks - stuff like Poseidon, Demeter, Dionysus, or Zeus - but certain Hammer upgrades like Spread Shot might make it more worthwhile to invest in big hits for it if you get them early. However! Just because you’ve decided on a focus doesn’t mean you should neglect the other half of your weapon. For instance, an Attack-focused build might still entertain the Targeting System upgrade so that you can more easily land your hits and avoid the enemy, while a Special-focused one benefits from mounting debuffs like Weak or Chill on its Attack.

For any weapon, once you settle into a play style you enjoy, find ways to be rewarded for what you’re already going to do. If you enjoy, say, the Chiron Aspect for the bow which makes it into a Special-focused weapon, mount benefits like Doom or Weak on its Attack since you still have to use that to make your shit go-go. This applies more broadly too; if you’re saving up Gemstones for something, for instance, use the extra money you get during your run to visit the shops earlier and more often. Let Hades reward you for doing the things you already want to do.

To close this guide out I’m going to briefly touch on Heat, which is how Supergiant Games has manifested their signature build-your-own-hard-mode approach. After you clear the game with any weapon for the first time, you acquire access to the Pact of Punishment. This Pact lets you turn on hostile modifiers to your run, which each have a Heat value; once you clear the game with a weapon at any given level of Heat (0, 1, 2, etc) you can only get Titan’s Blood, Diamonds, and Ambrosia with that weapon by advancing to the next level of Heat. In this way the game gradually gets harder on a weapon-by-weapon basis.

So, what modifiers to turn on? Depends on what you’re good at and bad at, but I would highly, highly suggest that you get used to Extreme Measures, Middle Management, and Benefits Package as soon as possible. Not only are they sources of big Heat by themselves that don’t change too much of the run by themselves, but their primary difficulty is knowledge-based; once you know them, they’re practically free real estate. Since Heat is tracked per-weapon and not in total, you can also always go back to weapons you’re not as good with and use practice with them as an excuse to get more permanent resources that you can pour into the ones you prefer.

Obviously this guide is not comprehensive! I’ve left out a lot of things you might want to know, like boss patterns, enemy types, and a whole lot of stuff about characters. Some of these things I’ve not talked about because I don’t want to give spoilers; others I haven’t talked about because I’m, again, actually pretty bad at games and the Hades community has talented folks whose guides on Steam, on the Reddit, and on the wiki can provide you with thorough breakdowns of the math that makes the game work. Still, it’s my hope that this can ease your entry into the world of Hades and help guide you in those early runs when it can feel like you’re spinning your wheels. I look forward to hearing from you; reblogs and commentary are welcome!

See you all in Hell.

#hades #hades supergiant #supergiant games #roguelike #action #guide #Greek Mythology #video games

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jereviendrai · 4 years ago

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||| ooc; does every character on this blog have bpd symptoms? is this problematic, considering they’re all villains or would-be villains? is there a way to give a villain a mental health disorder without stigmatizing the disorder? well--

OH AND BIG TRIGGER WARNING FOR A WIDE RANGE OF MENTAL HEALTH TOPICS SUCH AS: eating disorders, mental illness, stigmatization of mental illness, self harm, suicidal tendencies, and a fuckload more. I don’t go into detail. There are just mentions. I’m not gonna say a bunch of graphic shit, I promise! If I went into graphic detail, this would turn into a PhD thesis proposal, and that’d be WAY too long to be worth writing. Also I have BPD, but I’m not going to pretend that I’m an expert on the subject. I’m not. My word is not law, but it’d be nice if my word was taken into consideration.

this post got so fucking long and disorganized jesus christ

The answers are: yes, not inherently, and absolutely.

I want to get into the mental health of all three characters in a second, but I think it’s important to talk a little about the other two points first. That said, though -- yes, they’re all borderline. All three of them! And they all experience it differently! I will come back to that. Anyway--

I feel like it’s important to talk about villains, mental illness and stigma. There’s a really common (and insanely lazy) tendency for writers to explain a villain’s villainy by simply saying, “oh, well they’re a psychopath,” or, “they’re just crazy.” This is not only lazy and offensive, but it contributes to an unfair stigma against the mentally ill.

Mental illness might, say, compel someone to steal a chocolate bar or snap at someone out of anger. It might make a person’s emotions volatile. It might make someone unreasonable. They might suffer delusions of abandonment, of some plot against them, of people’s secret intent to humiliate them, etc. They might suffer and handle their suffering poorly. They may cause harm. But that doesn’t make them... evil. It makes them complex. And how they react to and handle their negative actions says more about them than any diagnosis could.

When you have a villain with a mental illness, you need to examine how the illness is hurting them. Write about how it hinders their progress. Write about how isolating it can be for them. Write about the impact and struggle. Not how the illness makes them so evil or so irredeemably awful. The illness should be what humanizes them and helps to make them relatable. No matter how untouchable and powerful your villain is, they have some personal struggle that is independent of their villainy. When done correctly, it can go a long way in fleshing out your villain and adding interesting inner conflict!

I know, I know. You might be asking, “yeah, but don’t people with mental health issues sometimes cause harm directly related to their symptoms?” To which I say: yeah, duh, of course. Just like a depressed person might say something mean when they’re having a bad day. Just like someone with ADHD might make someone feel like they aren’t being listened to. Just like someone who has social anxiety might make a friend feel unloved. Just like mentally healthy people also occasionally cause harm.

I’m not saying mental health issues don’t cause problems and maladaptive behaviors. I’m just saying it doesn’t... make someone inherently bad -- real or fictional. And I need people to internalize that.

ANYWAY ON TO THE CHARACTERS AND THEIR BPD

(i know, you’re probably like, “dude oh my god shut up and get on with it” sakjlfdkjsa)

I’m going to be referring to the four subtypes. I know these are controversial to some people. Some really don’t like these labels, others feel comforted by them, etc. They’re just to make it easier to talk about this whole thing. No one fits neatly into any one subtype! Some people don’t resemble any particular one! Everyone is different! Don’t box people into these subtypes if you haven’t been given consent, thanks!

Mr. A / Clark Donovan Mr. A is a classic example of the Quiet Borderline. Someone with quiet BPD mostly directs their symptoms inward. It’s harder to detect than other types, as the symptoms that are most prevalent are mostly expressed, well, inwardly. Self-esteem issues, self-blame, insecurity, withdrawing emotionally, pretending you’re not angry when you are, self harming tendencies, suicidal thoughts, etc. He’s also kind of clingy. Mr. A is an extremely loyal person to a fault. He is a people pleaser and will go to the ends of the Earth to make his loved ones happy, even if it hurts him. This is of detriment to him, as he often finds himself getting hurt on behalf of people who might not care as much as he does. He’s let a lot of bad people into his life solely because they made him feel loved, wanted and useful. He views everyone he loves through rose-tinted glasses and only takes them off long after he’s been laid to waste by them. He has terrible issues with self-image and has thus developed an eating disorder. He also has severe depersonalization/derealization disorder, which is a result of how his mental health interacts with his reality-warping powers. It creates a lot of anxiety with him, watching himself phase through things and bend the world around him on a whim. His motivations in life are connected to this, but his motivation to do evil things is not. He wants to bring other superpowered people together as a united front against humanity, as he feels that humanity is a threat to their continued existence. This has nothing to do with his mental health issues. The part of it that does tie in is that he’s painfully lonely and has chronic feelings of boredom, so being surrounded with a shit ton of different people mitigates that. It’s a motive for him bringing people closer to him, but it is not a motive for him to launch an attack on all humanity. He’d be really offended if you tried to accuse him of doing this on the basis that he’s just a bit ill. His illness literally just makes him crave contact with other living beings just like him. He sometimes does bad or stupid things because of this, but it literally has nothing to do with his motives as a villain. As an addendum of sorts, Mr. A’s alias and reluctance to use his given name (Clark Donovan) are a result of identity issues he suffers due to his BPD. He finds it hard to maintain a stable sense of identity, so he just... doesn’t.

Ivan Chanteur Ivan closely resembles what we like to call an Impulsive Borderline, comorbid with ADHD. He is an impulsive person, as the name of the subtype suggests. He’s a thrill-seeker who suffers from extreme levels of chronic boredom, which he desperately tries to combat by any means necessary. Staying still and doing repetitive tasks is literal torture for him. If he cannot get up and move and do whatever it takes to keep himself feeling fulfilled and occupied, he is probably going to fucking lose it. When he is actively vocalizing his boredom on a regular basis, this means the chronic feelings of boredom have reached critical mass. It’s not just boredom. It’s anxiety, it’s agitation, it’s existential dread, it’s an inability to focus, it’s pent-up energy that needs to go somewhere and can’t just stay in him anymore. If he can’t get it out in healthy ways, he usually resorts to self-harm or less-than-healthy pursuits. He’s been known to dabble in drugs, self-harm, occasional promiscuity on a bad night. While therapy’s helped him get a handle on it, there’ve been a lot of stressful and traumatic things going on in his life have have made it a lot harder to keep himself in check. Ivan is pretty charismatic, able to cast a wide net and catch all sorts of people in his social web. He has a sort of natural magnetism that, on a superficial level, should make him quite popular. But underneath it all, he has difficulty trusting people long enough to actually let them into his life. He’ll act like an open book, only to slam himself shut and reshelve himself before anyone can get anywhere near the end. He’s easy to befriend, but difficult to get close to. This has caused him to feel lonely and frustrated. He wishes he could easily form deep connections, but it’s hard and it hurts him. In addition to all of this, he engages in a wide variety of attention-seeking and risk-taking behaviors. He often spends time with people who are not good to him, simply for the thrill of it. This has often gotten him hurt, but he finds it hard to cut this habit in spite of everything. This leads to a lot of frustration and self-hatred, as it makes it hard for him to protect himself. Every time someone hurts or betrays him, he beats himself up over it and tells himself he should know better by now. All that said, though, he’s come a long way in therapy. He’s not quite able to keep a handle on all of it all the time, but he’s managed to secure one or two decently stable friendships along the way.

Eve Laurier Eve is particularly difficult to talk about, but I’m going to try my best. Eve is what happens when you make a conscious decision to be bad. He knows beyond a shadow of doubt that what he’s doing is wrong, but he feels so wronged by the world that he just cannot seem to motivate himself to care. This... again... has nothing to do with his BPD. If anything, it’s his struggles with this disorder that keep him at least somewhat... grounded in reality. Eve suffered a personal tragedy -- the loss of his twin sister in a housefire. Though ruled an accident, he cried foul play. Consumed with grief at the loss of the only person he felt could truly understand him, he vowed to find the culprit and make them pay. This set him down a path of vengeance that would make John Wick blush. Eve grew up as the heir to his family’s criminal enterprise. This put him in a position of power the very moment he was born. This also left him exposed to a lot of terrible, violent crimes from a very young age. Because this was normalized by his family, he internalized and compartmentalized any misgivings he had about violence. By the time he was ready for university, he had been thoroughly trained to carry out hitjobs on behalf of the family. He was a weapon from the moment he left the womb. He was groomed to do terrible things, and it’s because of this ongoing and continuous trauma that he developed his particular cocktail of mental health issues. He mostly fits in with the label of Petulant BPD. Repeated and violent trauma did a number on him, leaving him angry and hurt over what his parents let him fall victim to. He also experiences feelings of self-loathing over the part he feels he played in his own trauma, despite the fact that it started in early childhood. He is self-defeating and self-blaming. He has a difficult time expressing his feelings and has angry outbursts fairly regularly, often resulting in self-harm and suicidal ideation. He’s been known to reach for the nearest mind-altering substance just to get out of his head for a bit. His mood swings are intense and leave him feeling fatigued and anxious. He has severe social anxiety that sometimes manifests as cold indifference. He also has issues with control, has paranoid delusions about the people in his life and doesn’t often believe it when people say that they care for him. He will find any and every piece of evidence that points to the contrary, even if he has to make it up himself. This usually ensures that he’ll end up alone again. He doesn’t have very many close relationships, if any at all. His BPD is not the reason he hurts people. Any hurt caused by his BPD is directed at himself, not at others. His BPD is a direct result of what actually has primed him to hurt people. It’s a direct result of trauma. He’s traumatized. And no, trauma is no excuse for what he’s done -- but his BPD didn’t make him kidnap and torture Ivan while he waited for Ivan’s parents to send in the ransom. That was all Eve. That was his conscious decision to make, in spite of everything in his head telling him how awful and wrong he would be to do such a thing. He knew it was wrong and ignored it, as he was under the impression that Ivan’s family had a hand in his sister’s death. If anything, his BPD aggravates his feelings of shame and self-loathing when he does precisely what his parents had been training him to do his whole life.

Anyway-- I hope this was helpful or at least interesting.

The point I’m trying to make here is that mental illness isn’t some kind of ultimate litmus test of good and evil. A disorder doesn’t make you good or bad. It’s just another facet of who you are.

So... to that end... please for the love of fuck stop using personality disorders as the reason for someone’s villainy. Please. I am begging.

I wrote a bunch of BPD villains in various stages of villainhood because I have BPD and this disorder often makes you feel like you’re evil, a monster, etc. Honestly, on good days I feel like an inherently bad person who consciously chooses to do good. That’s very flawed and I know that logically I’m not inherently bad, but that’s kind of what stigma does. It makes you feel like you’re inherently bad. And that feeling influenced how I write all three of these characters.

This is an incoherent mess but today’s the day I find out if I have coronavirus and I’m so fucking stressed out and hopped up on DayQuil. Thanks for reading any of this, I guess?

#||| ooc;#||| canon; ivan chanteur #||| canon; mr. a #||| canon; eve laurier #||| canon;#PLEASE READ THIS I SPENT SO MUCH TIME #I LITERALLY SPENT HOURS ON THIS FOR NO REASON AKLJFJSAJDLKSKJDKSL #i'm listening to 'the spider' by weezer and it's a fucking mood right now #fucking christ ok tumblr lags so goddamn much when i open this in my drafts so i need to post this now #also yeah i guess this is me telling the world i have a personality disorder hi surprise i'm Messy and Traumatized who knew haha

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theniftycat · 5 years ago

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Writing tag meme

Thanks @captain-aralias!

AO3 name: theniftycat

Fandoms: The Man from U.N.C.L.E., also, Doctor Who, Harry Potter

Tropes: I honestly mostly write short gen fics, often humorous. But now with MFU it’s slash. And, I guess, now I’m more interested in writing romance in general.

Number of fics: 14, lol. Including the ones that were only published in Russian and the ones that were only in English. Not counting drabbles I only published on tumblr tho.

Fic I spent the most time on: Partners took me a long time, especially, with translating it to English. I wrote the first 25 chapters in over a year and now it’s one more month added to it. Really, not that much. Oh, and I started writing Edgar’s Angel in 2013 and still consider it not dead. But it’s literally like 2k words.

Fic I spent the least time on: Probably What Is Thrush? (baby don’t hurt me) It was a short fic and it was basically a conversation between two OCs, so, it was easy to write.

Longest Fic: Partners is almost 25k in English.

Shortest Fic: What is Thrush is 249 words.

Most hits/kudos/comment threads/bookmarks: my most popular fic in English is Only Cat Knows Where He’s At (the cat!Illya AU). My most popular fic in Russian is A Wolf Knows A Wolf (a fic in which old Napoleon and Illya accidentally find the Kingsman HQs).

Total word count: about 36k on ao3. Probably 10k more in Russian.

Favourite fic I wrote: I have a soft spot for Soufflé, it’s a crossover in which Illya’s aunt called Clara tries and fails to teach him how to cook souffle. I made Clara a woman from Odessa and she came out very chaotic and energetic.

Fic you want to rewrite/expand on: I really should continue both cat!Illya AU and Soviet!AU. They have very different moods and could come out really interesting if I finished them.

Share a bit of a WIP or a story idea you’re planning on: So, in Partners I want to write about Napoleon and Illya slowly getting better at maintaining their relationship, because I see it as a work in progress up until season 4 where it truly becomes “you and I against the world”. And in places it will be really, really messy. But there will also be many sweet and funny moments throughout the fic, so, it’s gonna be a lot.

In the Soviet!AU the main antagonist would be Harry Beldon who is the head of U.N.C.L.E. North-East. He is secretly corrupting the Soviet U.N.C.L.E. branch from the inside, but it’s hard to uncover. Illya is super oblivious to the corruption because he’s Russian and deeply depressed, and Napoleon would have to do all the mental heavy lifting at the same time dealing with a lot of stress from cultural differences and other difficulties. At the same time, of course, it would be a love story. But now that I actually faced my plans with it, I think I’ll be able to write it only years later because of how much planning and work this whole thing would need.

Tagging: anyone who wants

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dailyaudiobible · 4 years ago

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06/23/2020 DAB Transcript

2 Kings 4:18-5:27, Acts 15:1-35, Psalms 141:1-10, Proverbs 17:23

Today is the 23rd day of June welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I'm Brian it is awesome to be here with you today around the Global Campfire as we just kind of exhale, release the stresses and all of the stuff that just builds up and it’s just chaos sometimes…we just release all that for a few minutes and just come into this oasis around the Global campfire and…ahh…exhale and allow God's word to speak to us today. So, in the Old Testament we’re in the book of second Kings and we will spend our time alongside the prophet Elisha and then we will flip over into the New Testament and in the book of Acts today we will be encountering the…the most poignant foundational impactful decision that the early church really needed to face and come to terms with. And the implications are far reaching but we’ll get to that soon enough. First, we’re reading from the New International Version this week. Second Kings 4:18 through 5:27.

Commentary:

Okay. So, we kinda mentioned at the beginning that…that…that what was happening in the book of Acts today was really big, monumental pivotal shift. And this is known as the Council at Jerusalem or the Jerusalem Council or the first church council, like where…where church leaders had to come together and actually consider and even debate and wrestle with and invite God into a decision because they had reached a…a point where they needed the guidance of the Holy Spirit because things were not adding up. Basically, what was happening is what we've alluded to in the past, Jesus the Savior was a Hebrew human being. Although God made flesh, He was a Jew and He grew up Jewish. And, so, when he began His ministry the context for this ministry was Jewish and it was centered around the Hebrew Scriptures and the Hebrew prophets. Like the whole thing was based on the Hebrew story. And, so, that's how He did His ministry and that's mostly who He did His ministry among. So, Hebrew people who had put their faith in Jesus as the Messiah, the Hebrew Messiah, they…it was not in their mind that they were converting to a different religion or like that they were leaving the traditions of their lives that they had grown up immersed in and needed to find completely different ways of doing things. It was just assumed that Jesus is a Hebrew rabbi, He's commenting on the Hebrew Scriptures, He’s attending the Hebrew festivals, He's doing things in synagogues. Like this is…is a Hebrew context. Nothing’s changing here. Then Gentiles began to believe, and God began to affirm the Gentiles belief through the affirmation of the Holy Spirit. I mean we can be like 2000 years in the future right here in 2020 and go like, “man, what does that got to do with me? And why? You know, like, it just doesn't make sense that they would be arguing about this.” But this is huge. Like what we're seeing today changed the complexion of the faith. So, some Hebrew believers that gone to Antioch and they were teaching about Jesus, but the message of conversion or like the good news message was, “convert to Judaism. Follow the Hebrew customs. Be circumcised. And then you can follow Jesus. But until you come in through that gate…like until you come in and are circumcised and the whole thing, you can't follow Christ.” That was very troubling to the Gentile people that wanted to follow Jesus and it was very troubling to Paul and Barnabas to the point that this Jerusalem Council came to be. And the central question was, “are Gentiles permitted to be in this faith in Christ, or is this a Hebrew only thing?” In other words, who gets to be in? So, Peter weighs in and talks about the vision that he had about clean and unclean. He talks about going to Cornelius's house, a Gentile military man of Rome, and how the Holy Spirit fell upon the entire family and affirmed that He was accepting them in the same way that the Holy Spirit moved upon the Hebrew believers while at the same time, there were others in the church, church leaders, arguing, “no. This is a Hebrew thing. Jesus was a Hebrew person and His own commentary was in a Hebrew context. So, that…that's how people have to understand Him. That's how they have to…that's how they have to come in. That's how they get in.” And you see why it would need to be a counsel because these are valid things to consider on both sides. And in the end as they come together, hear all of the different testimony, including the testimony of Paul and Barnabas, it becomes apparent. The decision is made because they can see or sense that it's not them that are making a decision, it's God who has already chosen to accept Gentiles. And why heap upon them the Mosaic law when the Hebrew people have not even been…not been able to figure out or adhere to it pretty much ever. So, then the thought is like, you know, “to a person who hasn't grown up in this or has no understanding of this, why do they need to be saddled with this when Christ has come to make them free?” And, so, they give them a very few basic things that they need to adhere to, like don't eat the meat of sacrificed animals to idols and stay away from blood and…and…and stay away from sexual immorality. But…but other than that, “welcome to the family”, basically. “Welcome. And God is doing a new thing and we…we have to acknowledge and see it. So, welcome.” And they sent two people back to affirm this in word and they sent a letter back which we read today. This shifts things dramatically in the church because now everyone…everyone is welcome, all who call upon the name of the Lord. Everyone can be saved no matter who they are, no matter where they are, no matter how they are. It's a big deal. It's a big deal that's called good news. But this good news, like we’ll see this the rest of the year as we continue through the New Testament, especially as we get into the letters. This decision right here causes monumental problems on a lot of different levels. For starters, just the Roman empire itself. The Roman Empire itself let you at the time worship whatever God you wanted or whatever gods you wanted. Like you had the religious freedom to worship whatever gods you wanted to honor however you wanted to. But you had to revere the gods of Rome, the gods of the Empire. You had to revere the gods who made Rome great. And, you know, especially like observe the national festivals and stuff like this. And if you didn't do that that’s gonna be a problem because the people that you live among, your own nation, your own people would see you unwilling to participate in national celebrations and there's…like this time there’s not something called the separation of church and state. Like sacred and secular weren’t compartmentalized. So, if you're not involved in what's national and even honoring the national well then, it’s very easy to think that you are anti-Empire you are anti-Roman. And I think we’ve…I think we've experienced enough in the Scriptures to get the sense that that's probably not a good idea if you want to stay well and alive. So, the interesting thing is that the Hebrew people were part of the Roman Empire as well, but their worship of the one true God, right, the God of Israel, the one who had chosen them and set them apart, that predated Rome vastly. They were a very, very ancient people with a very ancient religion. And, so they kinda had…they kinda had a pass. Like it was understood what they were doing and why they were doing it even though it was marginalizing them in the Empire. But for the most part they didn’t care about that because they were separatists, they were exclusive other than the fact that the marginalization was oppressing them. So, they were being oppressed by the Romans and that's the environment that Jesus came into. But they didn’t have to do all this Roman God worship and stuff. Up until this point, the Christians, because they…they weren’t really called that, they were followers of Jesus or followers of The Way of Jesus the Hebrew teacher. Up until this point kind of the assumption was, “well…He…Jesus was a Hebrew and He was a rabbi. And, so, like this is part of the Hebrew religion.” And, so, they, the early believers, gotta pass as well. They didn't have to do any of the other worship. But then this decision gets made at the Jerusalem Council, where now Gentiles have completely different rules about coming into the faith and now all the sudden the law of Moses doesn't have to be adhered to in the way that is traditional and the teachings of Paul are kind of contrary and he's being labeled a heretic. And, so, now all the sudden this isn’t under the protection of the Jewish religion anymore. The Jews are rejecting it and are being vocal about it saying they have nothing to do with us. So, now believers in Jesus are kind of out there because it's like this is a new religion. And you gotta be on board with the gods that made the Empire great. You gotta be on board with being Roman if you're gonna be here. If you’re gonna be here you gotta be here and do what we do. So, that makes things difficult because now the Jewish people want to oppress the…the believers in Jesus, the Christians as well as the Empire. So, there's like no place to go. And over time this gets really really difficult and we will read through some of those difficulties as we go through the rest of the New Testament, but because of all of this climate that’s being formed here we’re gonna see a theme. And there's one word that defines this theme, “endure.” It’s not particularly our favorite word. It's probably not particularly our favorite action or posture, but we will see the church to survive, like to survive had to learn to endure. And we will see that that has a role to play in our lives as well.

Prayer:

Father, we thank you for your word and we thank you for all that…all that you teach, all that you reveal, all that you snap into place for us as we move through the Scriptures. And as we continue to learn both in our minds and our brains but also as we continue to grow in our hearts, we invite your Holy Spirit to be ever present and lead us into all truth. This is our kind of perpetual request. We…we ask it a lot but it…it's necessary. We want to walk in the truth, and you are the truth. And, so, we want to walk with you and we are like sheep and we do go astray and we need a shepherd and you have come to comfort and guide us. And, so, we surrender to that. We rest in the flow of that. We allow you to lead us forward. Come Holy Spirit into all of this we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, it's you know, home base, it’s where you find out what's going on around here. There are some things coming up that are going on around here. So, talk a little bit today and…and even more tomorrow about it.

So, two weeks from today is kind of our own Daily Audio Bible family holiday, I guess. It's a tradition that we have had for well over a decade now and we call it “the long walk” and that takes place every 7th of July. And it's something that we do together as a community, even though we’re…we’re doing it alone. And it’s designed to be that way. So, we’re kind of alone together which is so strange because this has been a tradition we’ve had for well over a decade like I said, but in this kind of era of social distancing, yeah, we have this event that is…that fits perfectly. Like we don’t have to modify anything. So, the long walk is self-explanatory, a long walk. Every July 7th we…we try to take the day off if we can and just go somewhere beautiful, whether near or far. Just kind of pick a park or a place or a trail or a region or just wherever, whether you drive for several hours which some people do, or whether you just go down the street. Find somewhere beautiful. Find a place to find stillness and go for a long walk with God. And it's remarkable what that can do to change the entire complexion of the week and really the trajectory of the year. We find ourselves approaching the center of the year in the middle of our journey through the Bible and if you haven't been under a rock, which I assume none of you have, the first half of this year has been exciting and unusual. It's been very very different. And we've had to think about, contemplate and endure things that we never really…that were never categories per se, some of them of long-running things…but there's been unrest, there’s been disruption. This is a time to re-center ourselves to actually take a day and say, “I need to get alone with God. Whatever it takes I need to get quiet and still before God. There's a lot I need to say that I haven't had time to say. And, frankly, I haven’t even been listening that well. And the Lord has a lot to say that I haven't been listening for.” And, so, we just take a day out of the year in the middle of the year to restart the second half of the year and just go for a long walk with God. And just knowing that even though we’re doing it alone, we’re not doing it alone. Our brothers and sisters all over the world are doing it as well. And then we make it kind of a community event by just saying, “wherever you go, whatever you do, wherever you go on your long walk, take a picture.” I mean you’re probably gonna carry your phone with you. Maybe you could put it on do not disturb for a few hours or whatever but take a picture of where you go or take a little video of where you are and what you're doing and then you can kind of post that as a comment to the Daily Audio Bible and then we’ll post it up on the Daily Audio Bible page and all the sudden these windows start opening up. Like we get these glimpses into the beauty of the world all over the world, but also glimpses of the beauty of each other in community just knowing that we’re really doing this and we’re really doing this together. And, so, that's the long walk and that is coming up two weeks from today. So, I mention it now just so we can begin to make preparations and plans because…well…those of you have been on long walks in the past because we’ve been doing this for…I don’t know…I think this is thirteen years, I think. So, many of you have been on…on long walks before and could say, “yeah that is a re-centering, a necessary re-centering of the year. That does make a difference.” In fact, most people I talk with are like, “this needs… you know…this needs to be once a month. Like this needs to be something that we do often.” But here at the Daily Audio Bible we do this together each July 7th. So, make plans for that. And then tomorrow I’m gonna tell you about a new resource that is releasing and coming…becoming available on the 7th of July, tailor made for part of the long walk journey. And I'll explain that tomorrow. We’ve been kind of talking for a long time about the Jerusalem Council and stuff. So, I'll wait and share that more tomorrow. But make plans for the long walk July 7th, two weeks from today.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com. There is a link on the homepage. I am profoundly humbled and in awe of the community that we have. And we have it because we’re in it together. And, so, thank you for your partnership. If you're using the Daily Audio Bible app you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can dial 877-942-4253 or you can just hit the Hotline button in the app and begin to share from there, the little red button up at the top.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi everybody this is Lawrence in California it is June 17th. I just heard Adrian’s call from June 12th. Adrian is having a hard time focusing on things that she has to study to advance in her work and it’s really driven her downwards is wat it sounds like. Adrian, you said that you were happy that everybody would just listen to you prattle or you hoped that people would be okay with your prattling on. Adrian, it’s fine. I was happy to hear you prattle. These are hard times and I admire your courage. I admire that you have called in to join in with us and I will pray for you that things take a better turn. And don’t think of yourself as an idiot. Okay? Take care. Bye-bye for now.

Hello Daily Audio Bible family this is Denise and this is Ephesians chapter 2 starting with verse 14. Gracious heavenly father I pray over the Daily Audio Bible family. I pray over Asia from Chicago. I pray over Virginia from Dallas. I pray over Kingdom Seeker Daniel and Vincent and Lady a Victory and Father everyone whose voice whether prayed on the prayer line or prayed in silence who is grappling with racism in their heart and their place of being a solution here in Your world Father. I affirm that You are a peace, I affirm that You have made all groups one and that You have torn down the dividing wall of hostility between us for in Your son’s flesh Father He has made no effect the law consisting of commands and expressed in regulations that would divide us. Father, I ask that You might create one new people from the dividing parts two resulting in peace Father. And I know that You will do this so that You might reconcile us to You as in one body through the cross that Your son hung on by which He put hostility to death Father. And I ask in this prayer that we are able to proclaim the good news of peace to those who are near and to those who are far. For Father through Jesus we want everyone to know that we have both access in one Spirit to You and that we are no longer foreigners and strangers but brothers and sisters who are in love with each other who pray for each other who respect each other who can hear each other honestly and still love through whatever would make us different Father because difference is beauty. You’ve made us all different. We celebrate that Father. We are citizens with the saints and members of Your household built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets with Jesus Christ himself as the cornerstone Father. And, so, I ask in this prayer that the whole building being put together be larger grow through this strife and grow into a holy temple for You Father. And I ask this in Your Son’s matchless in mighty name. Amen.

Hi this is Rachel from Pennsylvania. I ask that you guys just lift up my brother and sister Laura and Stephen. I’m praying for their salvation just praying that they find God and that they find a personal relationship with Him. I had some time to talk with them today and I just…I was praying for God to…to help lead me and guide my words but I just felt attacked and I just…they said a lot of things that were hard to hear about religion. And I tried to explain to them that this is not about religion, but they don’t understand because they’re…they haven’t listen to the DAB and they’re not part of the community and they just don’t get it yet. I just pray that they get it one day. So, if you would keep them in prayer I appreciate it. Thanks.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible listeners this is a Elisa Marie from Dinuba. I just finished listening to the podcast for the 16th and I heard Victoria Soldier call in and I love what she said that no matter what they tell us in about what’s going on in our country and in our nation it is righteousness that exalts a nation. And, so, upon that I come in agreement with my sister and everyone else who is praying. We put on father God…we put on the helmet of salvation, the breastplate of righteousness, the belt of truth, our feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. We take up the shield of faith where we can quench all the fiery darts of the evil one and above all we take up the sword of the spirit which is your word. Father your word says in Isaiah 54:15 that whoever comes against us it will not be you’re doing father. Whoever comes against us will surrender to us. And right now, we see the spirit of division, we see the spirit of murder, of gang mentality of mob mentality. We see the spirit of the enemy of hatred of dissension, contention and strife and division. We see you and in the blood of Jesus we say no. You stop. You take your dirty hands off of America right now in the mighty name of Jesus. We plead the blood of Jesus over the doorways of America. The entryways of America and the north and the south of the east and the west and we say no. We take authority over you by the mighty name of Jesus and with the spirit of the living God we say you take your dirty hands off of America right now. We speak peace over America. We speak peace we speak truth. May the truth of the living God came forth each and every every believer and we stand together united in the mighty name of Jesus and we say no more, enough is enough. So, you get your dirty hands off of us and we stand for truth for God’s righteousness and we ask that the peace that passes all understanding will come in and govern our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus our Lord. In the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.

Hi DAB family this is Nate from Washington. I need your prayers. I’ve been struggling with addiction to pornography for the last 15 years. I got to a point 3 years ago where I was faced with the decision to choose my addiction or my wife and three kids. I chose my family thank God. I believe I got the courage to make the right decision because I prayed about it for the first time. For so long I’d been trying to change on my own. I’ve made some great progress since then, but I still keep falling on my face a lot. I started listening to the DAB in January and I get so encouraged by Brian’s passion and everyone’s prayers and voices. I keep telling everybody all about it. I know that putting this out there would be accepting life on God’s terms and not mine. And your prayers help me learn how to talk to God and the DAB has been a lifeline for me ever since I found it. Thank you everyone.

Hello, my dear Daily Audio Bible family. I love you. We are one in Christ. A shout out to Tony the Narrator that what you said so encouraged me about there being only two races and we get to be family. It’s so awesome. We are not just that counterfeit that the world has for unity, which is uniformity, you know everybody being a whole bunch of clones that trying to force everyone to think a certain way and somehow that’s going to cause us to be one. Even Peter and Paul disagreed on things and in the New Testament we’ll see about John Mark that they had their disagreements the early church you know and the rockiness that…that Brian will point out later on and ask like how much more will we have trouble now. But those very diversities are what brings such glory to God when we all come together in unity in Christ and in love and I love it. It’s one of things I treasure about the Daily Audio Bible. I come here and I’m challenged. I’m not in my little echo chamber because of my background or the church I go to or whatever. I come here and I hear differences of opinion because of denomination because of race because of culture because of all these backgrounds and I go, “oh well maybe I should look at that scripture again. Maybe I haven’t been understanding or right. Maybe it’s just my tradition that has made me look at it that way.” And I love that. I love being a missionary through these almost 15 years that we have here serving in Mexico a lot of co-laborers in the gospel, English, Irish, Mexican and Colombian, Canadian, Venezuelan, Navaho, Guatemala, __, Glax, Australians, Asians, I can’t…there’s too many to name all of the different people that we have been working with and we are one in Christ.

Good morning everyone this is Helen in Durham North Carolina. In today’s reading of Psalm 136 I did what you suggested Brian and joined in saying the response “his faithful love endures forever.” And as I did that I thought throughout the earth thousands of voices are saying, “his faithful love endures forever.” It was a powerful thought to me. It is a powerful action against the forces raging against God and His authority. So, I say yes and Amen to this.

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intersex-ionality · 5 years ago

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so i looked at the news article with the ad and its got me a little worried about how it claims this campaign is about "teaching staff and students the warning sides of a school shooting" which on the surface is GOOD but what ARE these supposed warning signs? because i worry its gonna be just like the 90s again where anybody who's ND is gonna just be assumed to shoot up the school

I obviously haven't attended one of their classes, but the main sign they train people to identify is threats. Not behaviors, but actual statements of intended violence. They seem to focus on giving kids ways to report violent threats and on training faculty and families in how to take threats seriously and safely intervene.

They also have a strong focus on making sure schools are healthy social environments, minimizing bullying and isolation.

While any program like this is going to run into issues with mental health needs, I think it's probably on the better end of things.

Especially the "how to tell your parents or teachers if you're being threatened" thing. A lot of kids don't know how to tell anyone that kind of thing, and that's a problem especially prominent with ND kids who are already dealing with the high stress of a social system that isn't built for or explained to them.

There's not much focus on particular behaviors as warning signs, other than isolation and threat making, each of which is addressed in a very fifteenth way.

It basically doesn't give me the vibe that I got from the immediate post columbine programs I was subjected to, where things like being depressed or having difficulty with eye contact were seen as signs of violent intent.

But, like I said, I haven't been in their classes, so I'm basing this off their online resources

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saxonspud · 5 years ago

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Outcast - Chapter 12

Dutch scanned the hitching area, and the path into camp, for about the tenth time. Searching for any sign of the returning riders. Beads of sweat peppered his head. Some of it due to the heat of the day, some due to stress.

Hosea walked over, and shook his head,

“Ya know Dutch, staring at the path, ain't gonna make ‘em arrive any sooner.”

Dutch sighed, “where the hell are they, how long does it take to rescue an Irish terrier!”

“Knowing Sean, a lot longer than normal,” he scoffed, not hiding his dislike for the youngster. “Anyway, shouldn’t you be seeing to Nizhoni, it seems lately you’re the only one she really trusts!” He added.

Dutch walked back over to the tent, and peered inside.

He looked at you on the cot. You had drifted back to sleep after he had persuaded you, with some difficulty, to take the medicine that Hosea had brought. At least if you were sleeping, it might help your body to heal, maybe even your eyes. He could only hope.

“She’s still sleeping, thankfully.” Dutch replied, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Hosea looked down at his shoes, and kick some of the soil around.

“What will you do...I mean, if she goes completely blind, Dutch?”

Dutch narrowed his eyes, waiting for Hosea to look at him. Why was he even talking that way.

After a few moments, Hosea did look up.

“What do you think I’ll do Hosea? You want me to cast her aside? Leave her in some godforsaken wilderness to be food for the animals?” Dutch growled.

Hosea sighed, “Of course not,” he replied quietly, “but a blind girl, in a camp of outlaws? Its not ideal!”

Dutch laughed mirthlessly, “you think nearly being raped by soldiers, cast out by her family, savaged by wolves, and beaten to a pulp by the sheriff are ideal! She didn't ask for this, Hosea and I’m not about to let her down, like she’s been let down by everyone else!” he roared.

Hosea held his hands up in mock surrender, he’d obviously hit a nerve.

“I’m just putting it out there, Dutch. I’m not suggesting...”

“Then don’t even mention it!” Dutch growled.

Dutch turned and walked back into the tent, leaving Hosea outside.

Dutch sat down on the cot next to you, stroking your forehead, as you slept.

He felt completely useless. Of course it wasn't ideal, if you did lose your sight. But Hosea wouldn’t have even mentioned it, if it had been John or Arthur.

There were lots of things about the gang which weren't ideal. Having a five year old little boy, running around to name but one, but no one mentioned it, not even Micah. They were family, and family stuck together.

Dutch was lost in his thoughts, when he heard a voice behind him.

“Dutch...How is she?” Josiah asked.

Dutch spun around, a look of relief on his face.

“Josiah, has Hosea told you anything?” he asked.

Josiah nodded, and took a step closer looking at you lying on the bed.

“Does she always wear so few clothes?” he asked curiously.

Dutch rolled his eyes, “Now, Josiah isn't really the time. Do you know of a doctor, other than the ones in Valentine and West Elizabeth?”

Josiah’s face flushed slightly.

“Sorry, its just...I’ve never seen a native before. I always wondered about them,” he rattled on.

Dutch looked at Josiah and raised his eyebrows, “Josiah!”

“Oh, yes...a doctor. There's a very good one in St. Denis, he’s a friend of mine. I wouldn't take anyone to that quack in Valentine, even if it were possible.” he declared.

Dutch shook his head, “St. Denis, Josiah. You saw what happened when she went to Valentine! Besides, she’ll be terrified, all those people!”

Josiah hummed, “come to think of it, I think he comes out once a week to a small town, Rhodes, he holds a clinic there, as luck would have it, he’s due there today. If we hurry, we can make it,” he suggested.

Dutch nodded, he rubbed your hand gently, “Nizhoni...Nizhoni sweetheart, wake up?”

You groaned, slowly waking from your drug induced sleep.

As you opened your eyes, you noticed another person in the room. You couldn’t see who it was, but you knew it wasn’t Hosea. You stiffened. “Dutch!” you exclaimed, panic in your voice.

“Its ok Nizhoni, this is my friend Josiah. He’s here to help.” Dutch explained.

Josiah took a step towards the cot, “Hello Nizhoni, my names Josiah, I’m very pleased to meet you, my dear.”

Josiah held out his hand. You looked at the blurred hand in front of you. You knew you were supposed to shake his hand, but you were a little confused.

“White man? Not white man voice?” you queried.

Josiah chuckled, “I’m guessing you don't get many Englishmen where you come from.”

Dutch smiled, “Nizhoni, we’re gonna take you to a doctor, let him look at your eyes.”

You shook your head frantically. “Not white doctor. White doctor hurt Nizhoni, you gasped.”

Dutch frowned, “What do you mean, have you seen a doctor before? When?”

You nodded, “Nizhoni small. Doctor come with soldiers. Put knife in Nizhoni arm.”

Josiah chuckled, “vaccinations Dutch. I heard the army vaccinated all the Indian children when they put them on the reservations!”

Dutch sighed, and shook his head, “fucking army, they’re worse than the law!”

Dutch gently stroked your face, “I wont let him hurt you, Nizhoni. He just needs to take a look at your eyes, no needles.”

You frowned, “Dutch promise, Dutch protect Nizhoni.”

Dutch nodded, and put his hand on your back, helping you to sit. As you sat up, you felt sick and the room started to spin.

“Nizhoni feel bad, all spin!” you groaned.

Josiah gave Dutch a concerned look. “that doesn't sound good, will she let you carry her?”

Dutch nodded, “Nizhoni, I’m gonna carry you, it’ll be ok.”

You closed your eyes, if it hadn't been for the lack of food, you would have probably been sick.

“Not go in wagon,” you groaned.

Dutch picked you up, whilst Josiah opened the tent flap.

“No sweetheart,” Dutch confirmed, smiling slightly, “I’m gonna carry you, on The Count.”

Dutch placed you astride The Count, then mounted up behind you, wrapping one arm around, and holding the reins with the other.

“Nizhoni sleep,” you moaned.

Dutch smiled, “just lean back, I got you,” he whispered.

You leaned back, and nuzzled your face into his neck. He gently kissed your temple, as you dozed.

Josiah mounted his horse Gwydion, and the three of you rode out of camp, heading south.

It was mid-day, and quite warm, so neither Josiah or Dutch pushed their horses too hard. Rhodes was only about an hours ride away, besides, Dutch didn't want to bounce you around too much, but let you rest as much as you could, albeit in the saddle.

Rhodes was a sleepy little town, and whilst Dutch was slightly concerned that the doctors office was right next the jail, nobody seemed to be taking a huge deal of notice of the strange trio. Certainly enough to be on the lookout for a wanted outlaw, and a runaway native girl.

Dutch gently woke you, before he hitched the count. Josiah, had already gone into the doctors office.

Everything was a blur, but you made out shapes of buildings, adding to the realisation that this was a town.

“Dutch promise, not hurt Nizhoni,” you whimpered.

Dutch put his hand gently on your cheek, “I promise, I wont let anyone hurt you,” he whispered.

Once Dutch had dismounted, he gently lifted you down, and carried you in to the doctors office.

For first time, you gripped on tightly to Dutch, albeit with one hand. The room where he carried you had a strange smell about it, one that immediately made you nervous.

“Its ok Nizhoni,” Dutch soothed, “I promise, I won’t let anyone hurt you, I’ll be here with you.”

The doctor motioned towards a chair, so Dutch gently placed you on it. He crouched down next to you, holding your hand and gently stroking your face.

Dutch looked at the doctor, “She’s not had very good experiences with white men lately.”

The doctor nodded, and walked over to where you were sitting. He smelt like the room, you thought.

“Now young lady, what’s your name?” the doctor asked.

Dutch was about to answer, but the doctor held his hand up, motioning for Dutch not to answer.

Dutch frowned, but gave your hand a gentle squeeze.

“Nizhoni,” you mumbled.

“Well Nizhoni, my name is Doctor Andrew Johnson, now how about you try and tell me what happened,” he asked gently.

You squinted, trying to see him better. “Nizhoni eyes broken. White man hurt Nizhoni on wall. Hit Nizhoni with gun. Hurt Nizhoni,” you mumbled.

The doctor nodded, “Now I’m going to take the bandages off, and take a look at your head and your hand, then I’ll take a look at your eyes, ok?”

You narrowed your eyes, “doctor not hurt Nizhoni?”

“No, I’ll try not to hurt you Nizhoni, but if it hurts, you tell me, ok?” Doctor Johnson reassured.

You nodded, “Nizhoni tell.”

Doctor Johnson smiled, and started to remove the bandage from your head. He examined the wound, and hummed. Then he unwrapped your hand, and hummed again.

Dutch glanced nervously at Josiah, who shrugged.

“Ok Nizhoni, I’m going to look in your eyes now,” the doctor advised.

Doctor Johnson, looked at Dutch, and he removed his hand from your face. You stiffened, and squeezed Dutch’s hand.

“It’s ok, sweetheart, just relax,” Dutch soothed.

The doctor, put one hand on your forehead, and pulled your top eyelid back with his thumb, and held a magnifying glass to your eye.

“Please not hurt,” you whimpered.

It only lasted a few seconds, but once he was done, you buried you head into Dutch’s chest.

“It didn’t hurt did it?” Dutch asked you.

You shook your head, “Nizhoni scared,” you whimpered.

Dutch stroked your cheek, “I know, sweetheart, but its nearly over.”

The doctor, walked over to the desk. He glanced over at you a couple of times.

“Gentlemen, a word if you wouldn’t mind!” He stated, tersely.

Dutch, pressed his lips to your knuckles, “I won’t be long,” he soothed.

He stood up and walked over to where the doctor stood with Josiah.

“I don’t know who caused these injuries, and to be frank I don't want to know,” he began, sternly, “She has a severe concussion, which has caused the issues with her vision,” he stated.

Dutch glanced over at you, then back at the doctor, “will it get any better, or any worse,” he asked, a worried look on his face, “she’s been complaining of dizziness too!”

The doctors expression softened slightly, “It’s only temporary. Her sight will return to normal, it may take some time, a few days, maybe a week. You’ll need to put these in her eyes,” he handed Dutch a small bottle of eye-drops.

The doctor picked up another bottle, “this is for pain relief, it will also cause her to sleep.”

Dutch took the second bottle, “we gave her some medicine earlier, yarrow and ginseng, she didn’t take it easily, it tasted foul,” Dutch admitted.

The doctor rolled his eyes, “its an old wives tale that medicine only does you any good if it tastes bad. That should taste a lot better than ginseng and yarrow!”

The doctor continued, “there's no need to bandage her head, or her hand. The hand is badly bruised, not broken. The same can be said for her jaw and ribs. She just needs to rest.”

The doctor sighed, “and she is underweight. When did she last eat?”

Dutch hummed, “Maybe a couple of days ago, she didn't eat much before we found her in the mountains, and she had a fever for a week when the wolf bit her!”

The doctor raised his eyebrows, “The bandage on her shoulder, would you like me to take a look?”

Dutch glanced at Josiah.

“You might as well, whilst we’re here!” Josiah suggested.

Dutch nodded, “could you take a look at her back, as well?”

The doctor frowned, “her back? What's wrong with her back?”

Dutch sighed, “easier if you see, rather than explain.”

The doctor walked back over, “Nizhoni, I’m going to have a look at your shoulder, if that's ok?”

You nodded, as you removed your arm from your tunic.

The doctor unwrapped the bandage, and looked at the wound, and the stitches.

“Who did this?” he asked.

“One of our people,” Dutch replied, defensively.

The doctor nodded, “they did an admirable job. I think we can remove the stitches now though, it looks pretty well healed.”

Dutch took your hand, and squeezed it, “the doctor is going to take out the stitches.”

You looked at Dutch, you stiffened and a look of panic shot across your face.

“Doctor not hurt!” you pleaded.

The doctor smiled, “don’t worry, it may pull a little, but it shouldn't hurt.”

You felt a cold sensation as the scissors touched your skin, making you flinch slightly. The doctor however, was true to his word, and there was no pain.

Dutch helped you to lean forward. The doctor touched his finger to the mark on your back. He shook his head, “barbaric!” he exclaimed, “but its healed well, but it will always leave a scar,” he concluded.

The doctor stepped back, “well I think you’re done here, Nizhoni, I hope your trust in doctors has been restored!”

You looked at the doctor, “doctor good man.”

The doctor chuckled, “I think I’m happy with that, all things considered.”

He glanced over at Dutch, “I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to get this young lady a bath, the hot water will help the bruising, and clean off some of the dried blood.”

You frowned, “Nizhoni bathe in river!”

Josiah looked at you, and wrinkled his nose, “not lately, I have to say!”

Dutch nodded, and held out his hand to the doctor.

“Thank you, Nizhoni hasn't been with us long, but she’s part of our family now. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, send word to Tacitus Kilgore. I’ll only be too happy to help.”

The doctor smiled, and shook Dutch’s hand, “I doubt I will need your assistance, but I appreciate the offer!”

Dutch nodded, “come on Nizhoni, lets get you a bath, and a meal before we head back.”

You frowned, you didn't like the idea of a bath, but food sounded good.

#rdr2 fanfic #original native american character #dutch van der linde #hosea matthews #josiah trelawny #wattpad #a03

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reddeadrevival · 5 years ago

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Stealing Our Place in the Sun - Chapter 1

Warnings: None really

Previous Part

A/N: Okay, here we go chapter one! Super nervous about posting anything for this just cause there's a lot of people I want to impress with this cause people like my Headcanons and such but sometimes I ramble with writing cause I wanna pack everything in and I'm not good at spacing things out.

If you want to see what each character is wearing in this chapter/ what they’re faces look like click HERE to see the post I made about how they look as Sims (which is what I’ll be using to show outfits and such as we go)

Lynnette was startled awake by a loud train whistle. Her head shot up and she looked around, blinking the sleep out of her eyes. Lilly let out a little whine against her shoulder at being woken by the harsh sound. The whistle sounded again and it was then she realized how different it sounded than the one of the train they’d gotten onto. She turned to Max and shook him awake; the boy could sleep through anything.

“Wha-What? Are we there?” he asked as he startled awake, looking around. “Where is everybod-” Max did a double take at everything around them. “Lynn… this isn’t our train,” he whispered.

“I know,” she whispered back.

“How did we…” He leaned down and saw their suitcases were still there and their bags were still at their feet.

“Come on,” Lynnette said as she stood, grabbing her backpack and slinging it over her shoulder, holding Lilly to her hip. The blonde girl was still a bit fussy at having a train whistle wake her and squirmed in her arms. Lynnette grabbed the girls rabbit that had fallen beside them on the seat and she immediately calmed down.

“What?”

“We’re getting off.” Lynnette grabbed her case from under the seat, keeping a hold on Lilly who was blissfully unaware of her siblings concerns; the girl giggled as Lynnette unintentionally rocked her. “We’re at a station.”

“I know but why?” Max looked up at her as if she were crazy.

“Why? Because we need to know where we are... and how we got on a different train,” she muttered.

“That just doesn’t happen though,” he protested as he pulled on his backpack and grabbed his case. The two moved towards the end of the train car and looked out. “I feel like we’re in Back To The Future 3,” Max commented as they stepped off the train and onto the wooden platform.

“Well we’re not," Lynnette stated but as she looked around to see the farm animals, lack of paved roads, and seeing absolutely no cars and a lot of horses added to her confusion and concerns. "This is just… probably a town that… really likes the wild west aesthetic.”

“Aesthetic is one thing but this place smells like horsesh-”

“Max,” she snapped before letting out a sigh as she adjusted her hold on Lilly.

“Where the heck is Valentine?”

“What?” Lynnette looked down at him. He rolled his eyes and pointed up at the sign on the building.

Valentine Station

“I… I don’t know,” Lynnette answered as her eyebrows came together. Max shook his head and fished his phone out of his jeans.

"I don't have any service," he complained before shoving it back in his pocket.

"What?" Lynnette put down the suitcase she was holding and took out her own phone. "No bars, no wifi," she muttered.

"Are we in one of those Amish places?" Max asked with a grimace. “I can’t do no wifi, Lynn.” The train whistle sounded behind them making them jump and turn to see it start pulling away. "There goes our ride," Max muttered.

"Come on, let's ask someone inside." Lynnette picked up her suitcase and the two headed inside. The man behind the ticket counter turned as they walked in and his eyes widened as his eyebrows shot up.

"Ho-Howdy Miss." He seemed to be trying to look anywhere but at her. Lynnette looked down at herself and frowned. There was nothing wrong with what she was wearing; a plain black skater skirt and cropped, striped top with black ankle boots that made her look two inches taller than her normal 5’5”, sure here she looked out of place but that wasn’t her fault.

“Howdy…” Lynnette tried, having probably only said the word maybe twice in her life. “I was wondering if you could help us? We seem to have gotten on the wrong train.” The man blinked upon hearing her accent.

As she spoke to the man, Max started to wander around the small building. A few people sitting on benches nearby watched him and he openly gave them a weird look as he passed them. He walked up to a large chalkboard labeled ‘Valentine Rail Bulletin’. Each name he read confused him more and more. They’d been to Texas before to see their grandmother and he knew these places being listed were nowhere near Texas. He wasn’t even sure what state they were in. Max walked passed the bulletin and stopped in front of another large board. This one had a map but of where he didn’t know. He made his way back to his sister and pulled on her arm.

“Lynn!” he hissed urgently.

“What?” She looked at him in alarm as he pulled her over to the map; the man in the booth watched them in confusion. Lynnette scanned the map, the frown on her face getting deeper with every second. “Wait...that...that’s not right…” She desperately looked over the map looking for something that looked familiar, anything.

“That’s not a river,” Max whispered as he pointed to a large river on the map. “I know I didn’t exactly ace geography stuff but there is no Lannahechee River.”

“Okay, don’t panic,” Lynnette said quietly. “Don’t panic.”

“I’m... not panicking,” Max said as he watched his sister take a few deep breaths. Lynnette walked back over to the counter to grab her suitcase, the man watching her the entire time. She turned back to him. “Do you know where we could get something to eat?” she asked with the best polite smile she could manage at the moment.

“Sure, down the road there, passed all them houses, turn at the Sheriff’s is Smithfield’s and Worth’s General Store.”

“Thank you.” She turned and walked back over to Max who was watching her as if she were a bomb that could go off at any moment.

“Uh…”

“We’re going to go get something to eat, then...try and think of this logically.”

“Alright…” Max muttered with a nod as he followed her out of the station. “You uh… you got money, right?”

…

“The hell’s credit?” The store owner asked.

“I’ll take that as a no,” Lynnette mumbled as she put her wallet away. She made her way outside the store where Max and Lilly were waiting on a bench by their luggage. The little girl kicking her feet as she chewed on the ear of her rabbit.

“Well?” Max asked as he looked up.

“Nope.” She sat down beside them. Lilly reached for her and Lynnette absentmindedly let the girl grab onto her hand as she stared ahead.

“What are we gonna do?”

“I don’t know yet,” she admitted. The impossibility of it all was swirling around in her mind so loud she almost didn’t hear the drunken man that approached them, almost falling in front of them.

“How much you cost?” he slurred.

“Excuse me?” Lynnette turned her head slowly to look at him.

“I can pay,” he went on. “How much?” She stood up with a humorless chuckle.

“I know you’re not talking to me,” she said sharply. The man chuckled and reached out to grab at her but she kicked him swiftly in the shin. He fell with a cry and tumbled off the small porch of the store.

“Hey! You there!” Lynnette looked up and saw a man approaching. A man with a star on his chest.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” she muttered. Max, meanwhile, watched with wide eyes. A smile was on his face until he saw the second man approaching.

“Ma’am, I’m gonna need you to come with me,” the sheriff said as he stopped, putting his hands on his belt. He gave her a once over then kept his eyes on her face.

“What? Why?” she snapped. The sheriff gestured to the man, who was now unconscious in the mud. “He thought I was a whore!”

“Well…” the sheriff cleared his throat. “Your attire don’t exactly do much to... “ he cleared his throat again.

“Oh boy,” Max muttered.

“My attire? My attire doesn’t give a man the right to touch me!”

“Now ma’am, I’m going to need you to just come with me,” the man tried again.

“No. I did nothing wrong,” Lynnette stated as she crossed her arms. “I kicked him but I was defending myself.” The man let out a sigh.

“Alright,” he said and walked closer.

“Don’t you touch me, I will kick you too.” Lynnette held up a hand to stop him.

“Now you’re threatening me?” The sheriff shook his head, clearly not prepared to deal with this today.

“Lynn, please don’t get arrested,” Max groaned.

“She’s just coming with me to cool off in a cell for an hour or two, son, no need to worry,” the man assured him but Max was already wincing, preparing his ears.

“Cool off?” Lynnette shrieked. “Get your hands off me!” Max let out another sigh as the sheriff started to pull her away. He picked up Lilly with a bit of difficulty and went down the small steps before he started to follow after them but then frowned at the little girl who was making it difficult to hold her by squirming. He walked up to the back of a carriage, full of supplies but with no driver in sight, that was parked in front of the general store and put her on the back.

“Stay here. Got it? Don’t. Move." He turned and ran after his sister and the man who were almost to the Sheriff’s. "Sir! Sir wait!" The sheriff turned reluctantly. "We're not from around here. My sister and I are lost and she's stressed cause our Nana is on her deathbed are we might not get there in time to see her go. She’s the only family we have left. Please sir. Have a heart." Lynnette stared at her brother as he turned on the waterworks. The sheriff hesitated then let out a sigh.

"I am sorry to hear that.” He was quiet for a moment as he looked between the two. “Now as long as ya promise not to knock anyone else out, I'll get you a map and you can be on your way."

"As long as no one tries to touch me or buy me again," Lynnette added with a slight glare.

"Might I suggest, and don't get upset again, a change of clothes?" Lynnette resistant the urge to say what she wanted to as Max spoke.

“Thank you, sir!” he said loud enough interrupt anything Lynnette might say. She turned to Max and froze.

"Max, where is Lilly?" she asked. Max rolled his eyes.

"Relax, I left her over…" He turned and pointed to where the wagon was. A nervous chuckle came out as he turned to face the older girl. "Uh, okay, now don't freak out."

Cliff hanger in the first chapter I’m sorry. Though you can probably guess what’s happening XD

Next Part

(Master List)

#RedDeadRevival #Stealing Our Place In The Sun #Red Dead fic #OCs #rdr2 x OCs #fanfic

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fweeble · 6 years ago

Text

Episode 6: My Lost City

Buckle up, and more importantly, arm yourself with tissue boxes, we’re gonna need it.

Pfffft. Max, when will you ever learn the rest of the lines? (Not that I know them, either.)

*swoons into Mappa’s waiting arms* Gorgeous.

Oh, my heart, look at these cuties sleeping. Shorter, cover your tummy, you’ll get a tummy ache. Q vQ

*cries over how precious these two are* Bless this tiny extra scene.

*blows kisses at Mappa*

I LOVE THIS TINY ADDITION. OF COURSE IBE WOULD TAKE PICTURES. I WISH THEY HAD EIJI TAKING PICTURES TOO.

*swoons even more* Mappa, please, you’re killing me.

*cries some more* I have always loved how gentle Ash is with Jennifer.

Jimmy my dude, why’d ya gotta act like this???? >:T

WOW, this is so tame compared to the mango like. Woah.

This had hurt so much, because we know that Max is a father. He has a son, Michael, that he was trying to fight for custody for, but was convinced that giving up was what was best for his son. Imagine being a father who desperately misses their son, who wants to be in their son’s life, and watching another man treat his son like trash. MY HEART. MAX.

Oh god, Ash’s expression. It hurts so much more than it did before. Mappa, why you gotta do this to meeee. I have a soft, squishy little baby girl heart and it bleeds easily.

Totally my bad: They changed the order. JIMMY WHY YOU GOTTA BE LIKE THIS.

*dying hippo noises* IT STILL KILLS ME. FUCK.

*CRIES*

Jennifer is way too good for you, Jim.

*whispers* It’s so gorgeous.

Ash, please. 8′(

I wish Shorter didn’t have his sunglasses on. I want to see his face. Is he super-imposing Nadia onto Griff in this story. We don’t know anything about Shorter’s past. Did Nadia raise him? I HAVE FEELINGS.

Jennifer. Q AQ <3

*cries* I know. I agree with you entirely, Ash. Oof, I love how gentle he is with her. My heart. Look at that face. Let me pretend the one thing he missed about Cape Cod was Jennifer. Let me pretend she had more influence and was able to help Ash and Griff in little ways. Let me pretend Jennifer is stronger than she probably is.

My heart.

Ash, why you always gotta be like this, twisting the knives in wounds and pouring salt all over them. It’s not like Max wants to see your painful past, it’s just that y’all need to suffer through it to get what you want --the truth about Banana Fish.

Thank you Mappa for adding this scene! I’m constantly so worried you’ll cut out all the light-hearted bits in exchange for pure drama. Q vQ

My heart. Eiji, your precious face. Q vQ

MAPPA STOP PLAYING WITH MY HEART LIKE A STRESS BALL. It grows two sizes at the sight of Eiji’s adorable face and then is crushed by Ash’s pained one. *clutches chest*

WOW YOU ARE SO RUDE MAPPA. SURE, JUST KEEP ADDING NEW PUNCHES TO THE HEART. NOT LIKE I NEED ONE. NOPE.

*whispers* My secret favorite thing is how close Shorter and Eiji have been. I have protective feelings about these two and Shorter has protective feelings for Eiji.

Sure is him. Is it just me or do they all have surprisingly long hair for military people.

Aaaaand Ash brings out a smart phone. Soogle...Soosle? This is... attempt... #5 for cells trying to save the day. (So far, they never have.)

*strangled noises*

Oh Ibe, you’re so soft with Eiji. You still have the mafia after you guys, you should be yoinking Eiji and heading for the nearest international airport.

Also... y’all aren’t gonna discuss your Visa difficulties?

Trust me, Ash. They all do. Q vQ

Ash, please. Griff would be their age.

Oh gosh, look at their faces. ‘What exactly set him off this time?’ ‘I dunno. It’s like a horse suddenly raging. Maybe a fly flew into his ear.’

Shhhhh, he’s just young. And cranky.

*strangled sobbing*

Excuse me as I interrupt this weekly Nanner Fish Liveblog to cry about the scenery in the next few seconds of footage:

You are such a liar, Ash. You have very particular feelings towards your home.

*cries more at sleeping cuties*

Ash... this feels like such a waste? Someone spent a lot of time brewing that! Couldn’t you have filled empty ones with water??

*cries more at the sky* Clearly what is gonna make me die of dehydration this episode isn’t what I thought it was gonna be. It’s gonna be the backgrounds.

Eiji... I know nothing about shooting but that looks super precarious. Your center of gravity looks... yeah. Ash looks so judgmental. Q vQ

Alright, Annie Oakley. You missed a shot too.

Oh, Ibe. Subtly trying to get Eiji away.

Not subtle enough, though.

*cries both over the words and the detail put into the sky and the sea*

I’ve always found this surprisingly profound, especially since my mother, a naturalized US citizen, has similar opinions about parents in Taiwan coddling their children. (Taiwan has the same age of majority as Japan, 20 years old.)

And Japan’s crime rate is also a lot lower. But Ash is right, Ibe, you aren’t in Japan and you have very dangerous people with very dangerous guns after you all.

Bless their attention to detail. Lookit the truck!

I love how they have Max fixing the truck! Instead of it getting magically fixed, we get a new tidbit about Max! I wonder if he learned this while serving.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeell...

When Max is the voice of reason, listen.

Yeeees! It’s finally here! Please forgive me as I spam gyazo and take a hundred pictures because I’ve been waiting for this!

*strangled dying manatee noises*

(Shorter, are you trying to steal Ash’s sandwich while you still have yours.)

(Look at that hand. You totally were, weren’t you. You glutton.)

(Oh, my tiny Grinch heart. Look at this smile. It just grew fifteen sizes.)

(*cries forever* Protecting Eiji is like preserving a vision of himself he could never attain. Putting Eiji on a pedestal and keeping him safe and clean and pure, because he wishes he was Eiji. Excuse me as I have painful flashbacks to Tsuki no Ko and Tirt’s love for Seth.)

BLESS THEM. MY HEART. THEY KEPT THESE LINES.

*sings softly* “I will whisper my name to you: Antonio Salieri: patron saint of mediocrities.”

So you’re keeping this bit but not the Visa part? At least Ibe is keeping some of his old manipulative tendencies when it comes to Eiji.

(”It’s the only way to keep that child safe.” Anyone’s Japanese better than mine who can confirm this is indeed Ibe continuing to view Eiji as a child that needs to be sheltered and not just a cultural barrier?)

And straight back into the coddling, right after the profound revelation.

Jimmy, please.

Tear him a new one, Eiji!

My heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeart. These two lines. Leave to me to die in this small sea of salt and tears.

Something I will always miss is the loss of Eiji’s poor English. Q vQ

Oh boy, get your tissues ready. It’s here.

(Afghanistan is replacing Korea, huh.)

(*dying manatee noises* Someone, save this poor child.)

(FUCK THESE OFFICERS WITH A CIRCULAR SAW. HOW DARE THEY. TO A CHILD. AN ABUSED CHILD. FUCK THEM.)

(*CRIES*)

(Let me spirit him away to a kinder, gentler world. Like GSNK. Or Kimi to Boku where it’s just boys sorting out their feelings.)

(I WILL NEVER FUCKING UNDERSTAND YOUR THOUGHT PROCESS FOR THIS BUT AT LEAST IT FUCKING SAVED ASH. AT LEAST IT SAVED ASH.)

(HE WITHOUT A DOUBT DESERVED WORSE.)

(THIS SICK BASTARD. CMLKDSMFLDSF.)

(I also super hate the way it’s presented in the anime, so take this small manga panel:

LIKE YES, IT MAKES SENSE, WANTING TO PROTECT YOUR SON FROM THE VICIOUS WORDS PEOPLE SAY SO YOU’D SEND HIM TO HIS AUNT’S...

BUT THAT ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT EXPLAIN OR EXCUSE THE SHIT YOU SLING AT HIM NOW, JIM. MY DUDE, YOU HAVE ALREADY LOST ONE SON. TRY TO SAVE WHAT RELATIONSHIP YOU CAN HAVE WITH YOUR LAST ONE.

Shorter. Shorter. He didn’t want anyone to know. He didn’t want anyone to ever know.

*dying manatee noises* Eiji... *strangled noises about leopards and mountains*

Jennifer, you beautiful soul. Why are you with this mess.

No, you listen to Jennifer!

Fuck.

No, Shorter. This is where he’s from. New York is his home.

Yes, good. Thank god.

You’re searching for Ash in the dark. Please take off your shades, Shorter.

Or not.

Shorter, you’re wearing so much more than you were originally in the manga. Q vQ

Look at that. Gorgeous even in the dark. *blows kisses at Mappa*

Good instinct!

Baaaaaaaaaaaad instinct. So bad.

Eiji, no.

He’s got his back pressed against the wall.

Dammit.

Listen to Shorter, Eiji.

They sure fucking did.

It’s so awful that they somehow managed to make this situation even marginally better.

They had ripped off her top in the manga.

It’s entirely possible they did worse. She doesn’t even have her shoes on. D8

Fuck you. Leave Jennifer alone.

*sweats nervously but also blows kisses at Mappa because hnnng I love the way they deal with lighting, lookit the soft glow of the porch lights*

Max has a plan. I love it when Max has plans. Brilliance or hilarity ensues.

JIM’S FACE. Either he just realized his son still loves him or he’s fucking terrified that his son is now in immediate danger. (I think it’s both.)

Oh, Jennifer. You deserve none of this. None of it. Protect her.

Brilliance. That’s what happens today. Brilliance.

FUCKING LISTEN TO SHORTER EIJI.

THIS IS SO MUCH WORSE BECAUSE IN THE MANGA I THOUGHT SHE TRIED TO COVER HIM. BUT THAT ACTUALLY DOESN’T MAKE SENSE SINCE THESE ASSHOLES MAKE IT CLEAR THEY AREN’T TO KILL ASH.

THEY SHOT HER TO MAKE A FUCKING POINT.

JENNIFER.

ASH’S FACE. Nope, this is fine. I was born from water, let me return to the salty depths.

THERE WAS NO ONE WORD YOU COULD’VE SAID THAT WOULD’VE MADE THIS FUCKING HURT MORE, ASH. *drowns in own tears of feelings*

Don’t fucking see why you’re smiling, asshole.

There, Shorter’s fixed it.

EIJI WHY ARE YOU HERE. SHORTER TOLD YOU TO STAY THERE.

*STRANGLED SOBBING*

YOU SHOULD’VE TREATED HER LIKE A GODDESS, JIM. YOUR LAST WORDS TO HER SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN THOSE A GIANT TANTRUM THROWING CHILD’S.

Ash’s expressions are going to fucking murder me.

Sir, why don’t you have a cell phone???? Why aren’t you questioning why none of these people haven’t called yet???? (Well, to be fair, this is a panic situation...)

*sobbing* A father’s love.

And a son’s.

MY HEART. *cries* Why couldn’t you have both talked like this from the beginning?????????????????? JIM, YOU GIANT BABY.

Excuse me. I just need to... cry. Lots.

ASH AND HIS FACE. TELL THE POLICE. THEY ARE THE CULPRITS. MY MURDER.

*whispers* You should’ve kept this line to help explain the robbery. And help fund them in LA.

*weeps*

FUCKING DINO.

SO GORGEOUS. I AM SO UPSET.

HALF-TRUTH. ALSO, PLOOOOOOT.

LEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. NOOOOOOOOOOOO.

FUCKING NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

LEEEEEEEE. FUCK YOOOOOU.

Chinatowns are everywhere. |||orz

Fuuuuuuck. Yut Lung is here.

Shorter, please. Beggars can’t be choosers. (Or, those on the run from the Coriscan Mafia can’t whine when they at least have working transportation.)

*whispers softly to Mappa* Chicago, dearests, not Cicago.

Guess they’re cutting out one of the best scenes if this guy’s already here.

*blows kisses at Mappa* Gorgeous.

Still... where in LA are they supposed to be? I think that’s supposed to be downtown, but I don’t remember any forest-y areas around downtown. (Says someone who may live in LA county but rarely goes west towards downtown. Maybe there are. I tend to go east. :V)

The Great Shorter And Ash Chicken Raid.

You will not be forgotten.

Oof. Stay hydrated, guys! I’m kinda emotionally drained, so I’m off now. |||orz

<<Episode 5 Masterlist Episode 7>>

#Fandom: Banana Fish #Banana Fish #Nanner Fish Liveblog #spoilers #tw: spoilers

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