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space-ghost-with-the-most · 3 years ago

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i was reading your twins AU(WHICH IS AMZING BTW) and what if it was darker? Like their anger and rage and having to live inside the walls kind of overwhelms them and they go a tiny bit feral, like if canon camilo's description of bruno was accurate and it applied to all of them. Not to the point of like complete primal instincts but a tiny bit like, they'd actively try to show up in the casita at night when someone *might* see them and growls when someone does but then always get away before whoever it is actually identifies them and whisper-screech their resentments behind the walls when everyone's trying to sleep and it freaks everyone out. Idk i really like revenge stuff (˙◁˙)

Yall are absolutely deranged as hell... I'm here for it!

Okay but this is such a cool take on the au, I'm all for villain arcs. I'm legit a villain apologist on main because media make them so cool, so no surprise here that I am living for this!

At first they're the same, hiding behind the walls because they love this family and they can't bring themselves to leave or split up. The hunger they feel each night starts to get too much, and they don't know what to do. It only gets worse when Camilo and Mirabel get sick the third night in the walls. Bruno already feels a little bit of resentment after his fight with Alma, and how everyone reacted during Mirabel's ceremony, but it spirals into something deeper as he watches his mellizos get sick and go to sleep hungry.

Dolores is obviously there to help, she gives them Julieta's cooking and helps with their fevers. But she can't sneak food for them all the time, leaving Camilo to go get food for the family himself. I feel like his shifting would get a little warped here, he's a five-year-old stuck living in his family walls due to fear of what could happen to his sister. He's so angry all the time that anytime he shifts into anyone that isn't Bruno, Mirabel, or Dolores it always looks wrong. You can't tell at first, but if you look too closely a deeply unsettling feeling will worm into your gut and you feel like you need to run, right now. Everyone in the family learns to avoid the kitchen at night because you might run into a family member that gives you an off feeling and has the slightest glow to their eyes. He still steals things or rearranges things at night, so it becomes all the creepier of the years. (The family thinks Casita is cursed because Bruno and his children left, which does not help them since they can hear them.)

Mirabel is probably the angriest. You'd think it was Bruno, or Camilo but it's Mirabel. She's just such a caring and kind person, having to watch her Papa struggle with the thought of leaving for them or staying for the family, watching her Hermano grow thin because of his fast metabolism would piss her the hell off. She'd be mad on their behalf, and eventually on her own. Because she's in the walls, she can't get new glasses once she grows out of her old ones. Dolores can sneak them clothes, thread, and needles as much as she can but she can't explain why she'd go get glasses in town, everyone would know. So Mirabel has to grow up half-blind, parkouring the walls of her own damn home with her scorned family members. Isabela and Luisa swear up and down, something is glaring at them through the walls at night, catching squinting glowing eyes appearing one moment, gone the next.

If Bruno genuinely looked like Camilo's description, oh boy things are so worse for rat-man. A pale, 7ft seer, would scare the villagers so much more. He's obviously harmless, but once he got his growth spurt in his teens, they grew way warier. It only got worse when his visions "took a turn for the worse" (Bruno was kind of a 'gifted kid', and his vision were seen as a good thing for a while.) Luciana is still into him despite everything (bless my girl's heart) and of course here come the twins. Luciana's death is blamed directly on Bruno for being involved with her, which hurts. Luciana's parents don't believe that but the villager's words still hurt a lot. Most kids avoid the twins because their Bruno's kids and they don't understand why until their wall era. The villagers try to be nice to the twins but yeah they are still very wary of Bruno's kids, rumors will always be spreading.

When they end up disappearing after the gift ceremony they are in full support of never speaking of them again, not even for the Madrigal's sake, everyone in town was just creeped out by that branch. Villagers hear how the Madrigal Casita is haunted at night since their disappearance and the rumors only grow.

I don't know where else to go with this but damn did you give me horror ideas. I am a huge horror nerd, I will go crazy and write about them being horror icons if anyone wants me too tehee <3

I even drew about this the minute I got the ask, which is why it took me so long to reply.

(Camilo will always be a cursed menace in my heart. This is peak comedy.)

I gave them all animal familiars in the drawing, but they’d all probably have rats.

I initially just forgot to give Mirabel glasses but then I realized, she’d never have glasses if she went into the walls and damn that makes the good wall ending so sad </3

#encanto #encanto disney #disney encanto #disney #bruno madrigal #camilo madrigal #mirabel madrigal #alma madrigal #dolores madrigal #encanto au #papa of two au #papa with twins au #answered #evil bruno au #evil mirabel au #evil camilo au

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spooderboyandtincan · 3 years ago

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You're Gonna Miss Me When I'm Gone

Chapter 2

There’s a spider on the ceiling.

Peter can barely make out its eight gangly legs through a blur of tears. He feels some sort of bond with it- not only because of the DNA they share- but because they’re both alone. Then again, the spider has probably spent its entire life in this room, and Peter’s only been here- on a whole different continent- for a good couple of hours.

Maybe it’s just the jet lag. According to literally anyone who’s known him at all- he gets adorably grumpy when he hasn’t gotten his beauty sleep (Tony’s words, not his.)

Who does he think he’s kidding? He’s homesick, he’s alone, and he really, really misses Tony. Misses him as in the his heart is literally being torn apart sort of missing. He wishes he’d considered how his severe separation anxiety might play a part in this when he’d still had a choice.

Peter chokes on a whine- the one that forces its way out of his throat until he’s full on sobbing and gasping for breath.

He scrambles for his phone on the nightstand. He needs Tony, he needs him, like a fish needs water. He fumbles with the lock screen and desperately taps on Tony’s icon (a picture of Tony holding a proudly displaying a mug that reads “Number 1 Iron Dad.”) It rings once, twice-

“Pete? How’s it going, kiddie?” Tony’s voice, so gentle, so full of love and concern- he already knows something’s wrong, of course, because his Dad Senses are off the charts- makes the tear in his heart rip open.

“Tony,” he sobs. “Tony. I don’t- I can’t, I can’t do this. I wanna go home, Tony.”

“Whoa, hey, it’s okay Petey, breathe for me okay?” He can hear, just barely over his sobs, that Tony is pacing, can hear that his breathing is just a bit too fast, and Peter feels awful for freaking him out, but just can’t stop crying.

“‘M so sorry,” he wails, “‘M so sorry. I-I wanna go home, I want you Tony.” He grasps his pillow tightly and buries his face in it, trying to stifle his sobs, pretending that Tony is there, wrapping his arms around him, kissing his hair, rocking them back and forth.

“I know, baby, I know,” Tony croons, “Everything’s gonna be okay, we’re okay. Right now I just need you to take a deep breath, buddy- in, two-three, out, two-three, okay?” Tony demonstrates for him, taking exaggerated inhales and exhales, which are probably benefiting him as much as they are Peter. “You’ve got this, Pete, I know you do.”

“I miss you, Tony,” Peter whispers after a few seconds of shaky breathing. “I wanna go home.” He feels so immature, begging Tony to fly across the Atlantic in the dead of night just because he’s a little homesick.

Tony, however, seems to consider his request very seriously. “Do you want me to fly out? I could be there in a few hours.”

Peter almost laughs, imagining Tony arriving to the hotel at daybreak, dressed only in sweatpants and a stained AC/DC t-shirt. It’s actually not a bad idea- Tony could act as a chaperone, they could explore the city together, make another precious memory.

“Yeah, um, that-that would be great, Tony,” he sniffs, wiping the wetness of his cheeks. “A-are you sure? I don’t wanna, like, make you, there’s probably Iron, um, Iron Man things, I don’t-”

“Pete, listen to me,” Tony interrupts, voice again so impossibly gentle. “Nothing- nothing- is more important to me than you, understand? I’m here for you. Always”

Peter smiles wetly, relaxing back into the covers, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “I know. Tony?”

“Yeah, bud?

“Can-can you, um, talk? Please?”

“‘Course I can, Pete. What about?” Tony says fondly. The idea that his voice can bring such comfort to this sweet kid makes him feel all… schmoopy.

“Anything. I just… wanna hear your voice, s’all.” He tugs the covers up and curls into a ball, resting the phone on the pillow next to his ear.

“I’ve got you, bud,” Tony says. I miss you too. “Oh, you’ve gotta know what DUM-E did today….”

Peter feels himself relaxing as Tony talks about his day. It’s not just the words that soothe him, but the familiar sound of his warm voice that’s full of such love and affection. His thoughts begin to wander as he drifts into a barely conscious haze, but the voice remains steady and present in his mind.

Tony is quick to notice that Peter is on the precipice of slumber and wakefulness, and is just as quick to provide the last bit of reassurance Peter needs to fall asleep. ��Sweet dreams, buddy. I love you,” he murmurs.

Just before Peter slips away, he finds himself slurring, “Love you too.”

Tony stays on the call for a solid ten minutes after Peter conks out, listening to the steady whoosh of his breathing against the speaker. Before he finally makes himself hang up, he whispers a quiet, “‘Night, Petey. I’ll be there before you know it.” Tony leaves for the airport at daybreak, not able to spend another second in that horribly empty penthouse. The absence of Peter’s presence is tremendously obvious, and Tony finds himself desperately trying not to imagine the unimaginable.

~~~~~

With a pilot on-call 24-7, and without the hassles of a public airport, he’ll be back with Peter around early afternoon.

Thank god.

He steps out of the Cadillac, barely noticing the blistering wind and the tiny snowflakes biting at his cheeks in his haste to board the plane. He greets the pilot- Allison, he thinks- with a nod, but she gestures to stop when he moves towards the stairs.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Stark!” she says over the howling wind. “We just can’t fly in this weather!”

To hell with that, Tony thinks. “When’s it letting up?”

“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Stark,” Allison says apologetically. “Not for a few days at least.”

Tony activates the suit with a simple tap of his watch, the nanobots rushing over him within seconds. Allison gasps and jumps back, gaping as he rockets into the air.

He’s been flying for a good 50 seconds before a neon red warning lights up the HUD.

“Boss,” F.R.I.D.A.Y says, tone filled with caution. “The wind is blowing at a speed of 78 mph. I must advise that you return to the ground immediately, or you run the risk of losing control of the suit.”

Tony curses loudly. Just his luck, really. “How high is the risk?”

“89%, boss.”

“So, not all that bad,” he chuckles.

Then, F.R.I.D.A.Y reminds him how devastated Peter would be if anything happened to him.

Tony returns to his car on foot and pulls out his phone to call Peter.

~~~~~

Peter basks in the sunlight outside of a bustling café, sipping from a cup of hot chocolate. He’s ordered a chocolate croissant, and added the tasteless protein powder Tony and Bruce had synthesized to keep up with his spidey metabolism to his mug. Despite the jet lag, he’s eager to explore the city and it’s merits, his enthusiasm only growing knowing that Tony will be here within a few hours.

Feeling pleasantly full, Peter leans back in his chair- it’s an armchair, on a stool, and it’s driving him nuts, he loves it- and beams at Ned, who lounges next to him in an identical chair. “Dude,” he says.

“Dude,” Ned agrees.

Peter is grinning, Ned is grinning, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, life is sweet-

Peter’s phone rings.

His first thought is that Tony’s plane has crashed.

His second is one of relief when he realizes it’s Tony who’s calling him.

His third is that his plane has crashed, and Tony’s calling him, mortally wounded, to say goodbye.

Ned stares at him, taking in the panicked look on his face, and mouths You good? Peter shakes his head and scrabbles for his phone.

“Pete?” Tony says as soon as he’s answered. He sounds fine, at least. “Hiya.”

“Are you okay?” Peter asks first, because he knows that even if Tony sounds like he’s fine, that doesn’t mean he is.

“Yeah. Yeah, Petey, I’m just fine, I promise,” Tony assures him. Peter relaxes in his chair, flashing Ned a quick thumbs up, because knows Tony would never lie to him, especially not if he was hurt. “How’re you doin’?”

Peter’s face lights up. “Oh, great! There are like, dogs everywhere here, even in the restaurants, and I saw this German Shepherd eating like- dog ice cream or something? And I got this super good chocolate croissant where we’re having breakfast. Y’know, I really thought the jet lag would be super bad but I’m not like, tired at all yet!”

“Aw, buddy, that’s great, I’m glad you’re havin’ a good time,” Tony says, voice dripping with fondness. “You’re drinking enough water, staying hydrated and all that, right?”

“Yup! Are you?”

Tony scoffs. “‘Course I am. Hafta set a good example n’ shi- stuff.” Peter snorts. He knows Tony does his best not to curse around his- and he quotes- “young, unsullied ears" but he ends up failing quite a lot.

“Which reminds me bud, how’s Ted?” Peter’s best friend’s health has pretty much no correlation with cursing, which makes the teen think that Tony has a specific reason for asking about him. He decides not to bring it up though.

“It’s Ned,” he sighs in mock frustration. And he’s good, he’s right next to me! I guess I didn’t tell you yesterday, but the hotel guy put us into two different rooms ‘cause they had extra or something and we didn’t realize ‘til we got to our rooms.” He sighs again then, for real, his good mood evaporating.

Tony’s Dad Senses pick up on it instantaneously. “Not ideal, huh?” he says gently, which earns him a small laugh from the kid. “D’you want me to talk to them?”

Peter nods sheepishly, then realizes Tony can’t see him. “Yeah. Thank you,” he says in a small voice, embarrassed that the genius is going to all this trouble just because he’s a little lonely. “Are you gonna be here soon?” he asks then, because he misses Tony, misses him just like he knows Tony is missing him.

Tony clears his throat. When he speaks, the guilt in his voice could rip him in half. “About that, buddy, well- Jesus, Pete, I’m so sorry. The, uh, the wind is too dangerous for me to fly over, and it’s not letting up ‘til around Monday. I’m so sorry, kiddo.”

Peter’s heart sinks. “Oh,” he says numbly.

He hears Tony lurch up. “Hey, Petey- shit, I’m so sorry, buddy. I- you know what, fuck it, I’ll fly over anyway, I-”

“No! No, I’m okay, I’m fine!” Peter says, wincing silently at the forced cheeriness in his voice, and knowing that Tony has seen right through.

“Hey, hey, buddy, it’s okay, I’ll be perfectly safe-”

“You can’t,” Peter pleads, desperate to keep Tony safe. “Please, Tony, you can’t, you’ll crash, or-”

“Whoa, Petey, deep breaths,” Tony interrupts, voice gentle. “I’m right here, I’m fine, you hear me?” He waits for Peter’s breathing to resume a steady rate, then says, “Bub, I won’t fly over if it’s not safe, I promise.”

Peter sighs. He’s relieved beyond belief that Tony is keeping both feet on the ground where he’ll be safe- he better be- but he misses the billionaire more than ever.

“And hey, who knows, maybe the wind’ll let up in a few hours!” Tony chuckles. Sobering a little, he says, “If the weather is on schedule, I’ll be there on Monday, 6 am, sharp.”

Peter prays he will. “I miss you, Tony,” he mumbles- he feels childish, knowing that he’s just begged the man to stay in New York, and now is just making him more miserable knowing that he’s miserable.

“I miss you too, Petey,” the genius murmurs back, voice filled with sorrow.

“Peter!” The phone nearly flies out of Peter’s hand as Mr. Harrington taps on his shoulder. He gasps a little, and though his teacher doesn’t seem to notice, Tony sure does, his gentle voice turning harsh with barley contained panic. “Who was that, Pete? Are you okay?”

“Um-” he tries.

“Come on, now! The bus is almost here, I can see it around the corner!” Mr. Harrington says loudly, and abruptly struts off, frantically waving down the bus that is already stopping.

“Peter!” Tony exclaims.

“I’m fine, I’m fine, it was just Mr. Harrington,” he rushes to reassure him. Tony breathes out a heavy sigh of relief. “Uh, the bus is here, I- I have to go.” He hurries to catch up with his best friend.

“I love you,” Tony says. “I love you so much, Pete, stay out of trouble, be safe.”

He doesn’t want to say goodbye. Neither of them do.

“I love you, Tony,” says Peter. “I’ll be safe, don’t worry about me!”

And with that, the call ends.

#wip #chapter 2 #peter parker #tony stark #protective tony stark #worried tony stark #anxious peter parker #irondad #spiderson #roger harrington #ned leeds #anxiety #anxious thoughts #spider-man #iron man #st*rkers dni

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ask-feederjin · 3 years ago

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Hi!!~~ <3 So... How much has Jungkook's physical condition changed?

Do you think he tires easily with physical tasks? I can only imagine him puffing all the time ><

Jin had just put the final revisions on a work project when a notification popped up on his computer.

“Hi!!~~ <3 So... How much has Jungkook's physical condition changed?

Do you think he tires easily with physical tasks? I can only imagine him puffing all the time ><”

Oh if only, Jin sighs softly. He wishes he could say that their youngest does, but that would be a lie. Either way, Anon needs an answer!

Oh, he wishes! Poor Jungkook has a ridiculously fast metabolism, much to his dismay. It was great for him when he was a gym rat, effortlessly maintaining his washboard abs. But now it is his ultimate curse.

We’ve been doing research on how to lower or, in Jungkook’s words, “completely ruin” his metabolism.

So far, we’ve chosen to have him switch to a completely sedentary activity level, bulk up on carbs, flip into “starvation mode” between stuffings and replacing that banana milk he likes to drink with soda. We also heard that lack of sleep can contribute to a drop in metabolism, but I vetoed that one. Jungkook may be willing to suffer sleep deprivation to get fatter, but that’s not something I’m willing to support.

On the topic of him getting tired… Hmm… I think it would only really happen if he was going out of his way to be active? Like, him just walking around or lifting basic things doesn’t phase him yet, but exercise on the other hand… Give me one second!

“Jungkook!” Jin called out.

“Yeah?” He heard back. It sounded like Jungkook had just woken up from a post breakfast nap.

“Could you come here please, baby?” Jin was now curious. How has his physicality changed in the past two months? Would he get out of breath easily? Or has his years of exercise and healthy eating still blocked that?

“Do I have to?” He whined. Jin felt butterflies in his stomach at just how lazy his boyfriend has gotten.

“Yes!” Jin laughed.

After what sounded like some shuffling and grunting, Jungkook sleepily wandered into Jin’s office.

“You never make me come to you…” The youngest complained halfheartedly, scratching his tummy.

“Forgive me just this once, your highness.” Jin snarked back. “I just wanted to… do a little test.”

Jungkook perked up the the word ‘test’. Jin knew he would never pass up an opportunity to prove himself.

“What do I need to do?” The younger man asked excitedly, watching as Jin pushed his rolling desk chair to the corner of the room.

“Well… first I’m going to need you to stand riiiight here. There, perfect!” Jin maneuvered the taller boy to stand right in front of his computer screen. “Wait just a second, babe.”

The screen suddenly changed from spreadsheets to a camera screen. Jin pressed record…

The video starts off in a well kept room. Orderly bookshelves line the background, tiny potted vines trailing down the fronts.

Pulling away from the screen, you catch a blurry glimpse of knobby knuckles and trimmed nails. Front and center stands a rather tall young man. He has short, shiny black hair and warm brown eyes. Said eyes are currently large with confusion.

The young man is wearing a rather ill-fitting set of pajamas. The bottoms fit well enough, but the top’s buttons are slightly strained. A soft looking paunch hangs out from the too small shirt, wobbling as the young man shifts uncertainly. He rests both hands on the mass, rubbing slowly.

“Okay, -ahem-.” You hear a man’s voice says off camera say. “Hello, everyone! This is the first video I’ll be uploading to the blog, yay! It was originally going to be the third month weigh in, but it seems I just couldn’t wait.”

The young man on screen chuckles a bit, relaxing at the lighthearted conversation.

The voice resumes speaking, “Either way! We’re here now! This is Jungkook, some of you might recognize his face from the profile section of the blog, but if you haven’t then here he is! Say hi, Kookie.”

Jungkook blushes, waving at the camera. “Hi guys… I’m uh, I’m Jungkook.”

…

“Oh! And I’m Jin!” The disembodied voice frantically shouts. Jungkook bursts into giggles. “I’m Jin! The owner of the blog! I’m also apparently an idiot.” Jin ducks his head into the camera, giving you an unattractive, sideways close up of his eyes and nose.

“Veryprofessional, Jin.” Jungkook grins teasingly.

Jin’s too-close head turns, presumably to glare at the focus of the video. “Yes, I am a professional thank you very much. Now take your shirt off, fatty.”

Jin walks to the side of the room again, giving you a nearly full view of Jungkook’s body. The young man blushes again, levity gone, and starts to unbutton his sleep shirt.

With each button undone, the fabric gratefully springs to the side. Soon the boy’s tan tummy lays bare, angry looking stretchmarks decorating the lower part of it.

Jungkook tosses his shirt off camera, breathing slowly and evenly. “Wh-what now?”

“Jiggle it.”

Jungkook’s breath hitched, eyes closing slightly. He brings both large hands to his jello like gut and proceeds to bounce it up and down. For a minute of two, he shakes it briefly, only to let go and wait for the jiggly mass to settle. He stares at the camera, as if he’s watching himself in the feedback footage.

One hand slides up to cup his soft chest, while the other slaps gently at his belly entranced by the bounce.

“Now, turn to your side.” Jin’s voice startles Jungkook out of his self exploration. Jin himself walks towards the now sideways Jungkook, pressing up against his back. Jin reaches his arms around Jungkook to lift the younger man’s pot belly. He squeezes, pinches and lets it drop to watch it wobble.

“Tsk tsk tsk…” He pokes a long finger into the pliant flesh. “Someone’s let himself go it seems…”

“Ah~! I- I have!” Jungkook moans. “I’m soooo lazy, and- and greedy.”

“Lazy is right you little piggy.” Jin pulls away from playing with the taller boy’s belly button, walking back off screen. “Why don’t we give our viewer’s a little show? See how out of shape you’ve really gotten?”

Jungkook can only nod, face a bright red.

“Gimme fifty jumping jacks.”

“Fifty?! Jin! That’s too many!” Jungkook gapes at the man off screen.

“You used to do sets of eighty not even a year ago, I’m sure your fat ass can manage one set of fifty.”

“I’ll try I guess…” Jungkook doesn’t look optimistic. He gets in position anyway and starts counting out loud.

“One, two, three, four, five, six…”

The up and down movement vigorously shakes his little jelly belly, truly revealing just how much fat had accumulated there.

“Fifteen, sixteen, seh-seventeen, eight -hah hah- eighteen…” The poor boy’s face was tomato red and shiny with sudden sweat. His arms keep perfect time, but his legs move less far apart with each jump.

“Nine-hah-teen, twenty!” Jungkook is huffing now, tiny breasts quaking each time he lands. He is so out of breath now that he only mutters what vaguely sounds like numbers with each jumping jack.

“Twenty one, twenty two, twenty three…” Jin picks up where the out of breath young man left off. “Come on tubby, you were doing this in your sleep six months ago! What happened?”

Jungkook is gasping now, arms waving less with each jump, feet not even moving apart. A drop of sweat hangs precariously off of a perky nipple, only to fall onto his gut not even a second later.

“Are you seriously this out of shape?” Jin sounds genuinely surprised now, instead of teasing. Jungkook plops onto the floor panting. His previously neat hair stuck to his forehead with sweat, neck and chest pink from effort. “Kookie, you only did 31 jumping jacks.”

“I- gasp- I can’t…” The chubby boy leans back against the bookshelf. “I’m too fat…”

“Oh no. I’ll be the one to tell you when you’re too fat. Right now?” Jin squats down and smacks Jungkook’s sweaty belly, eliciting a moan from the boy. “You’re barely overweight.”

“I’ll get bigger! I promise!” The younger man pleads, having seemingly forgotten about the fact that he’s being recorded.

“Bigger? Eating like you are now? I don’t think so. You’re going to have to pick up the pace if you want to be the fattest boy in the house. Even Hobi will get bigger than you at this rate.” Jin gave Jungkook’s red, sweaty paunch one last wobbling pat before standing back up again. Jungkook stays on the ground, not even bothering to hide the bulge in his pajama pants.

“Okay guys!” The older man addresses the camera, winking. “It looks like Jungkook can still do thirty one jumping jacks before he gives up. You could say his stamina isn’t what it used to be! I’m gonna get this little piggy back to bed now. I think the poor thing’ll need another nap after so much exercise. Thank you for watching!”

Jin leans forward

The screen goes black.

I went ahead and attached a video instead of just writing down the answer ^-^;

I hope you don’t mind using headphones, haha! It got a little steamy there for a second… I should really get a video editing program so I can cut out those bits of me turning the camera on and off. Maybe even use my phone next time or something.

Oh well, lessons for later.

I hope that answers your question, Anon!

#lavender//ask #lavender//jin #bts weight gain #bts feederism #fat jungkook #calling all jungkook stans #ooc: a little different than what I normally do! let me know if you guys want more 'videos' in the future...

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greenbriar-j · 3 years ago

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Muscle Memory, full wip, unedited 4.7k, scroll at ur own risk; tagging some people who showed previous interest @halleiswriting @chazzawrites @pe-ersona @druidx and also @pens-swords-stuff this is what I’ve been up to lately

Saint Joseph’s Catholic Church bustles with activity. It’s peculiar, for it being a weekday. More peculiar still that the bustling is being done by young men and women who could very well be engaging in… more satisfying summer indulgences.

The Youth Group’s power couple sweeps in an hour late, ever put together even when, by all rights, they ought to be melting right out of their fancy outfits. Cheers rise from the crowd when they appear, each splitting off in their own directions to their own stations.

Y Nhi beelines for the painters, flicking her sleek ponytail to make sure it’s out of the way. The girls hand her a brush while detailing what’s left to be done. Vinny bustles for the sound technicians - who, really, are already done for the day, but are staying for the social factor.

Two things to note about St. Joseph’s power couple:

Y Nhi isn’t sure she believes in God very much anymore.

They are not a couple, but it’s easier to let everyone think so than to correct it.

“Jude,” Mary says (everyone calls her Jude because she and Vinny made a big deal of it years ago), “Are you sure you can’t help out during the week?”

Y Nhi shrugs. She’s not busy or anything, but it feels wrong to shepherd children into a religion she’s falling out of - even if Vacation Bible School had been one of her favorite summer memories for her entire life. That’s where she met Vinny, after all.

Vinny, laughing with the guys at the sound booth. To be more accurate, Vinny himself is only smirking, but that’s as close to a laugh as he gets around here. Stupid smirk. Stupid boy.

“I have work. Unfortunately,” Y Nhi mutters, dragging her brush across a cardboard cutout. “Vinny’s taking the week off, so I’m picking up his slack.”

Mary grins widely at that. “I swear it’s like you’re married.”

For whatever reason, Y Nhi’s heart clenches at that. Picturing herself and Vinny in wedding attire on the altar sickens her, but putting a faceless someone in her place makes her feel worse. But it’s not like she likes him. She’s sworn to herself that she’d become a cat lady in her old age - her army has already begun with a fluffy black kitten. It’s not looking too good for her future; Toothless likes Vinny more than her. She’s already failed as a parent.

Belatedly, Y Nhi realizes she’s supposed to be engaging in a conversation, not thinking about Vinny and their co-parenting of a cat. If it can be called that.

“Don’t hold your breath. The wedding is a long way off,” she says tightly. Like. Never. Never is a long, long way off.

“I wouldn’t be too sure.”

This time, Y Nhi lets the comment slide. She paints while singing under her breath, as she always does. A long time ago, she had no qualms about belting it out, but time has weathered away her volume, reducing it to only this. No one’s noticed the change or found it strange.

The conversation turns to something - anything - else. Degrees, internships, other boys who don’t dress in all black and aren’t named Vincent Truong. Y Nhi listens, but doesn’t contribute.

By the time the call goes out for a lunch break, Y Nhi is finishing three tasks at once. One of the other girls brings her a burger, slathered with ketchup and mayo and tomatoes. Y Nhi thanks her and continues wrapping one of the white pillars in cardboard paper to simulate a palm tree.

Not long after, someone nudges her. Eyes flickering upward, she’s met with the bored eyes of her very best friend. “Bite.”

She doesn’t, not yet.

Vinny wiggles the burger he’s holding in front of her mouth. “Only half a slice of cheese. No tomatoes. Freshest patty of the batch. Eat.”

She still doesn’t take the bait, even though he’s tailored this burger to her weirdly specific tastes.

Vinny sighs. “Jude. No one’s watching you. I promise all they can see is my back.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about.” It’s true she had a complex about eating in public for a while, for reasons she’s never told anyone including him. “Just not hungry.”

“Not very Gucci of you to lie in the house of God.”

“Not very Gucci of you to breathe.”

“Jude! The fuck, man.” But he’s grinning. Not the half-assed grin he gives everyone else, but an honest, mirthful grin reserved for Toothless and Y Nhi only (usually Toothless. Damn cat).“Just eat this, okay? I’ll eat the other one.” His whole demeanor softens as he picks up the burger she had ignored - the one that is surely cold by now.

She is hungry. After all, the reason they were late is because Vinny had to coax her to every step of getting ready this morning. He even applied her eyeliner with the even strokes of a practiced hand - so practiced that even Y Nhi admits it looks like her own work. If she had a choice, she would waste away in bed for the day, but Vinny has never been much of a fan of that plan.

According to her own plan, Y Nhi had been wasting away since before yesterday’s dinner. Famished might be a better word to describe her present state.

But today is one of those days that she feels guilty cementing the married couple narrative any more than it needs to be. They’re not getting any younger, Vinny and Y Nhi, and just because she’s sworn off marriage doesn’t mean he has. How’s he supposed to get a nice girlfriend if she keeps hanging around?

Objectively, it’s a stupid reason to risk passing out in a church of all places, but something about him just makes her stupid. Always has.

The longer she ignores his peace offering, the twitcher he gets. He finishes his own burger in ten massive bites. When Y Nhi still doesn’t eat hers, he eats that whole thing too. “We’re leaving early. Say an hour? Think about what you want to eat.”

With that, he’s gone. Y Nhi is not hyper aware of his presence as it moves through the open space. She does not miss having him next to her. Not even a little.

Y Nhi writes, appetite??? in her journal when she gets home. It’s the third time something of this nature has appeared on its list which isn’t titled - but if it was it would be something like “Things About Vinny T. that Don’t Make Sense.”

Even after inhaling two burgers, he took her out for pho and Thai tea, and he ate so slow that his noodles expanded in the broth. Still, he finished a medium bowl with relative ease, and Y Nhi was content after she’d finished a small.

How does someone who eats like that look like that? It has to be some sort of stupid freaky metabolism. Genetic polymorphism, she thinks, then adds that she might be incorrectly using the term she’d heard in class about two semesters ago.

She writes freeloading on the list. It’s not technically true, but he spends enough time at her place to make it feel like it. Right this minute, he’s setting up the living room to sleep in, awaiting her delivery of the overnight bag he always leaves stocked in her apartment for emergencies.

That goes on the list too. Definition of ‘emergency.’

According to recent months, an alarming amount of things fit under this category of Vinny’s mind. It might be nearing time to stage an intervention, but who’s Y Nhi to tell him to relax when she’s the one bordering on anxiety attacks all the time? Only god knows how many times he’s clutched her shaking hands until they stopped.

Y Nhi closes the journal. Snaps the band over the cover. Shoves it under her pillow. Vinny wouldn’t dare read it to begin with, but for some reason, she doesn’t even want him to know of its existence.

Quickly divesting herself of the impeccable outfit she’d worn for the day, she slips easily into one of Vinny’s large, large shirts and the shorts she affectionately calls game day shorts. Ever since high school, she’s worn them for events that require equal amounts of comfort and courage - or just for comfort, to be honest.

“Hey, loser,” she greets Vinny, emerging from her room. He’s got her guitar in hand, and is humming some tune that she recognizes but can’t place. “Your stuff is on my bed. Have you seen Toothless?”

He nods, and keeps playing. It’s in experience, being stared at with such intense eyes while trying not to stare at the other party’s stupid pretty hands playing her guitar. Fuck him, honestly, she thinks angrily.

Leaving him there, she pours each of them a glass of water in the kitchen. A shadow looms on top of the fridge, and she jumps. “Toothless, baby. Please stop napping on the fridge.”

Toothless is not napping. He stands up, shakes his tiny body and hops to the counter, then to the floor, twining around Y Nhi’s feet before scuttling off.

Vinny is singing now. It’s a new song, she supposes, and it sounds like a love song.

Slowly, Y Nhi moves around the kitchen, making as little noise as possible while doing absolutely nothing. She just wants to listen to Vinny and his new love song without him watching her reaction.

Once she gets past the lyrics about gentle touches and midnight escapades, she realizes something. Re-entering the living room, she deposits his water on the table. “Is that my melody? Why would you steal it?”

The guitar is placed awkwardly on the floor, the neck of it leaning on the couch. “Oh, is that where it’s from? Thought it was familiar,” he says with mild disinterest. “Well, I wasn’t that attached to it anyway.”

“Are you saying it sucks?” Y Nhi settles on the floor on the other side of the table, pulling her knees into her chest. Glancing through her lashes, Y Nhi watches Vinny’s expressions.

“I’m saying I’m not taking your work, you brat.” Then he hesitates. “I mean. Can I, just for one person?”

“What the fuck.”

Vinny twitches, finally. “I… Wrote the song for someone… So I’d like to sing it for her, just once.”

Something vile rises in her throat, and she wishes Toothless would notice her distress. Hugging the cat might make her feel a little better about the fact that Vinny’s written a song about a girl using her melody - and it’s not about herself and for some odd reason, that bothers her.

“Can- Can I hear it?” Y Nhi asks in a tiny voice. It’s easier than No, you cannot take my song to sing to some other girl who will take you away from me.

“Haven’t you been hearing it?”

“Vincent.” Because that’s easier than You colossal idiot, what shit are you pulling after two years?

“Jude-”

She stands suddenly, fleeing to her room. Shutting the door, locking it, she tries to breathe. Of all people, Vinny should be the last person to push her to this reaction. She doesn’t know what to think.

Vinny knows.

Vinny knows where her hard limits are. Technically, he hasn’t passed them. But he’s pretty damn close.

Y Nhi slips into the shower, leaving it on the hottest setting to boil the emotions out.

For the next two days, Y Nhi doesn’t emerge from her room. Her phone dies, and she lets it. Her body self-destructs in hunger and dehydration from crying, and she lets it. She stays in bed for most of it. Whether Vinny continues to sleep on the other side of the wall for those nights, she doesn’t know. Nor care.

It’s punishment for believing she might be ready to give love another chance.

The third day, a letter slips under her door.

She almost flushes it down the toilet without reading it. Everything is in position to do so, paper fluttering in unsteady hands above the toilet bowl. But she wants to know. What can Vinny possibly say for himself?

Jude. I wrote the song for you. I didn’t mean to steal your tune - honest to god, I didn’t. But when I found out, I thought it was fitting that we’d worked on it together. (“Together”)

Jude, the song is up to your interpretation, but it’s yours. I wrote it from my core, and it’s yours. Charge your fucking phone and check the lyrics I sent you.

Take a shower, and call me when you’re ready. You have a few days’ worth of takeout in the fridge. Please take care of your health; I know you’re not right now. I mean it in the best way.

It cuts off there. Unceremonious and blunt, and so very him. She hates it very much.

Y Nhi charges her phone while she showers. Working quickly because she’s so unsteady on her feet, she does the bare minimum before stumbling into the kitchen for food.

While she nibbles on the stir fried noodles he left, she pens her own note.

Vinny,

I will not read the lyrics. I don’t want to know, and you don’t have to pretend it’s about me.

Your joke took two years to reach completion. Congratulations. I hope I was amusing and that my downfall wall be the stunning conclusion you wanted.

She tapes it on her front door so he’ll see it the next time he comes over. Soon, probably.

Momentarily, she wonders if she’s being rash. Is it so impossible to think that he could find romantic attraction to her?

Then she remembers. Y Nhi is not built to be loved, if her history is anything to go by. Even if she’s wrong, even if Vinny loves her for real, she will resist. Losing him this way is better than the alternative: watching him dissolve to some monstrosity while loving her.

Nothing changes after that. Apart from Vinny’s absence from her apartment, they interact in exactly the same way.

Vinny says something borderline rude.

Y Nhi retorts with something blatantly rude.

They laugh about it and move along.

There are no gentle touches to avoid because Vinny rarely touched her to begin with - despite the way he slings his arm around everyone else, he wasn’t like that with her. No arm around her shoulder, no hugs, not even extended contact with her hair.

Y Nhi pretends not to notice when he goes through a full dinner with an arm draped over the back of his friend Justin’s chair. He leans on it, adding the tiniest space between himself and Y Nhi. He still passes her the condiments and spices she likes before she asks for them. He takes her home at the end of it.

This should be enough. Up until now, it always had been. These tiny acts were his long distance hugs. It had always been enough, but now it isn’t, and Y Nhi doesn’t know what to do.

Isn’t this what you wanted? For him to get a life away from you?

“How’s that girl?” She asks on the way home, just because the silence is killing her and perhaps because she’s a masochist. “The one you wrote the song for?”

Vinny looks at her for a brief moment, something like grief in his eyes. It’s a confusing expression. “She hasn’t really talked to me since.”

Y Nhi tries not to sit straighter at this revelation. “Oh, really? Hm. That sucks.”

“Yeah.”

Something about the word is profoundly heartbroken. She can almost feel the emotions hurtling off him in waves, but he doesn’t lash out at her. All it does is enclose each passenger of the car in a separate bubble. This is the closest they’ve been in a long time, but Y Nhi has never felt so isolated.

Her throat constricts, and her hands start to shake. “Do you… Know why?”

Vinny thinks for a moment, tapping his fingers on the wheel. “I think she doesn’t believe me. But I don’t really think it’s me, I think she thinks that love is meant for everyone except herself. She’s pretty bent on self-destruction now, as far as I can tell - No, don’t say anything yet.”

Every girl Vinny’s talked to in the last week pops up in her mind. Which of them seems most self-destructive? If she can’t keep herself by his side, he should at least have someone who can care for him. She could talk to them, probably, if she knew who it was.

“I… She thinks this is sudden, but I’ve been in love with her since I was fifteen. Or something. Like it kind of just happened over time, and I thought she knew.”

Fifteen means Vinny’s been futilely in love with someone else while she fell for the guy who ended up cheating on her.

They were happy in high school. It was college that broke them. Distance. The communications became less frequent in an inverse relationship to Y Nhi’s alcohol intake. Her grades suffered, and she convinced herself that she was too stupid for higher education. On his birthday, she drove for hours to his dorm to surprise him, only to find him making out with another girl. Sober.

Not that any level of inebriation could excuse him, but perhaps it would’ve hurt a little less.

Vinny isn’t done. “I fucking cut fruit for her every time we hung out. I did her dishes sometimes. I don’t know, I- I thought I did everything right. My mom thought I was doing everything right.”

“You tell your mom about your love life?”

Y Nhi doesn’t. Her parents don’t care enough to know anything about it beyond that she let go of a future doctor and that she’ll never find another because she’s past her prime. That’s what it feels like, anyway.

She’s literally twenty four. She has time.

“Not really. But they’ve met.” Vinny parks the car in front of her apartment, but he makes no move to get out or to let Y Nhi get out. “Jude, listen to me.”

“I’m listening,” she says. Training her eyes on her kitchen window, she thinks about the dishes she hasn’t done yet, the fruit she hasn’t cut yet, and how she hates thinking about it because it reminds her Vinny is fading.

Human adaptability is a remarkable thing. One more week, and this new normalcy will cement itself.

“The girl I love is you. Okay? I’ve walked around the topic for years, and I understand if you’re still not ready for it. But I know you’re getting the wrong idea in that head of yours. It’s you, and it’s always been you, and I’ll spend the rest of my life proving it if you let me. I’ll also bow out forever if that’s what you need from me. But I need you to talk to me. I-”

Holy shit, is he about to cry? With wild eyes, she glances at him. If she’s made him cry, he’ll return the favor five-fold. No, she backtracks. That’s not Vinny. That’s the behavior of her second ex, the one that reduced her to a stiff puppet of a girl.

“Come back to me,” he says in a small, strangled voice. “I don’t even care if you break me in the process, but please come back to me. You can do whatever you want, as long as you do it by my side.”

For the longest moment, they say nothing. Then Y Nhi opens the car door. “Can you cut my strawberries for me? They taste better when you cut them.”

Vinny washes her dishes and her strawberries and quarters the already small fruit for her. He deposits the snacks in front of her and watches her eat - slowly, since they’ve just come back from dinner, after all.

“So it’s me?”

“Always has been.”

“And you never said anything.”

“I did. You ignored it on purpose.”

“No, I’m just a stupid hoe.”

“You’re not stupid. Or a hoe.”

“You’re always calling me stupid.”

“Not like that, stupid.”

“You’re going to have to undo a lot of damage if we date.”

“I know. I’ve been working on it already, didn’t you notice?”

“Yeah, but it’s gonna get worse if we date.”

“Have you considered therapy?”

“Vinny, I’ll be a pariah.”

“A happy one, maybe.” Hesitantly, he reaches for one of her hands. Halfway, he flips the palm up and waits for her to complete the gesture on her own. “You don’t have to decide right away. It’s just a thought.”

She puts her hand in his a little too eagerly, then pulls back a little too harshly. It feels like touching the flame of a candle.

A defeated look momentarily crosses Vinny’s eyes, but Y Nhi barely has the time to look at it before she steels her nerves and takes hold of his hand again. The coldness of his rings grounds her somehow. “We need a list,” Y Nhi says, “of things. First, you’re going to Google touch starvation.”

Her best friend jerks in a little victorious motion, jamming his knee unceremoniously on the table leg as he does. “Fuck, that hurt.”

“What was that about?”

“I wasn’t sure if you were actually touch starved or if you didn’t like men touching you.”

“And you didn’t ask?” Y Nhi is incredulous.

“How am I supposed to ask? ‘Jude, when I touch you, does it remind you of your sleazy ex boyfriends?’ You’d say no. Like a liar. Or so I thought.” He pauses. “Anyway, this means I can hug you now, right? 24/7.”

“If you ease into it.”

“And you’ll stop wearing those gigantic shirts that literally drown you.”

“...No. What?”

“Okay, never mind, nothing. What else? What other boundaries do we have?”

Of all questions she’s been asked today, this one is probably the most confusing. Her previous relationships are no help; she hasn’t exactly had the best exposure to “healthy relationships.” She’s aware that the bare minimum counts as decadence for her, so the question has her a little frozen.

After watching her face flicker through whatever emotions it’s displaying, Vinny rubs a thumb over her knuckles. “How about this: I have a specific thing I want your help with, and when things come up, we can talk about it.”

Y Nhi nods, though they both know she won’t talk about shit. But perhaps watching Vinny sort out whatever issue he needs sorted will give her inspiration on how to approach this. “Can we-?” She starts and stops abruptly.

Vinny blinks, then feeds her a strawberry slice. “Go ahead.” It’s a tactful move. Putting food in her mouth means she has to chew, meaning she has a few more seconds to gather herself and her thoughts, or at the very least, the desire to continue speaking.

“Can we not label this?” She finishes. “Whatever is between us.”

To her surprise, Vinny nods and acts like she hasn’t asked the bitchiest question of the night. “Sure.” You can do whatever you want, he’d said, as long as you do it by my side.

“And… Get rid of Jude.”

“What?”

“Jude. You remember why I picked that name?”

“Because of some fictional fairy queen that had the same name? You thought she was a conniving boss ass bitch and-”

“Shut up. Saint Jude. Patron saint of?”

Technically speaking, he hasn’t been wrong about the fairy queen bit. Unlike the suckers who fell for Cardan Greenbriar, Y Nhi’s wimpy ass was all in for Jude Duarte, mortal queen of the fae. And it was easier to admit that than to admit the truth that was dawning on Vinny’s face in 3… 2...

“Hopeless causes,” Vinny answers easily. Then his expression sobers. “Oh.”

Y Nhi nods. “But the me with you isn’t a hopeless cause. I don’t want her to be, anyway.”

There’s a lot that goes unsaid, but she’s certain Vinny hears it. Logically, she can’t keep relying on whatever instinct says, He’ll understand because he’s Vinny, but up to this point, it should work out okay.

Gently, he says, “Y Nhi,” reacquainting himself with the syllables of her given name. “Y Nhi.”

“Yes, Vinny?” She says just as gently.

He lowers his voice to a husky whisper, “You’ve never been a hopeless cause. You were a cause for hope.”

Vinny’s request is this: that Y Nhi teach him to be soft again.

The request makes her question if she and Vinny exist in the same dimension because who the hell convinced him he wasn’t soft? Hardened, prickly souls don’t master winged eyeliner for the sake of their loved ones. They don’t volunteer extra hours at Vacation Bible School while working graveyard shifts at the hospital. Don’t do the dishes because as much as they hate them, their roommate hates them more.

Vinny is soft, and Y Nhi is out for blood. “I need names, Vincent. And addresses if you have them.”

“My ex,” he says.

An awkward sound emerges from Y Nhi’s throat.

He raises an eyebrow at her. “What? I dated around. Didn’t think I should be hung up on you, but nothing ever went as planned. Anyway, my one ex did a really good job making me become someone I wasn’t. I didn’t like the person she made me, but it was kind of too late to turn around.”

Again, Y Nhi is confused. The narrative is promising, though, so she lets him continue in hopes that it’ll clear something up.

“If you don’t know me, how would you describe me?”

“Vinny.” She doesn’t have an answer, she just doesn’t want to say it. It’s not all good, and they just came back from an awkward fight. Was it a fight?

They’ve slipped back into their normal existence so easily. Nothing has changed, but at the same time, everything has.

“Just- The rings and the black and the tattoos. You’d think I drove a motorcycle or something, right?”

“You drive a Lexus. It’s the same in terms of your fuck boy vibes.”

“Y Nhi!”

“BMW would’ve sealed the deal. How many Hennessys do you drink a night, again?”

A pout settles on his face. She likes this version of him. “I see you get my point. I look like a baddie.”

“Yeah. Bad at life.”

“I swear to god.”

“Don’t do that, that’s a sin. Don’t use the lord’s name in vain and all.”

“Anyway. You of all people know I am soft, actually. She didn’t like that. And so I gained a second personality and-”

It’s rude, the way Y Nhi interrupts, but Vinny doesn’t seem to mind at all. “So if you’re always soft, what’s left for me to help you with?”

“You’ll see,” he says. “Actually. No, I’m going to tell you. I get embarrassed about my relationships. So if it ever looks like I’m pushing you away… I’m just really fucking embarrassed, at least for this first stage. Do what you will with that.”

- bonus/epilogue -

They return home for Y Nhi’s mom’s birthday. They’ve always rode home together, since they are neighbors no matter where they are. No one finds it odd that they hold hands more than before, that Y Nhi is still averse to touching everyone but him.

They appear at social events hanging on each other’s arms. Commentary about their status as a “married couple” breeze over their heads, but they never confirm nor deny anything. In public, they remain aloof to each other. They show tenderness in only the smallest of gestures.

In private, they are as they ever were. Vinny still does her eyeliner on her bad days, but now she cuddles him on the couch on his bad days. Between the two of them, there are a lot of bad days, days when they almost threw in the towel.

But they didn’t. Instead, they’ve introduced all manner of pet names (Vinny’s favorites to use are love, darling, and lately, em. Y Nhi’s favorites are Vinny and anh). They write songs to each other, for each other, with each other. Every morning, they make the choice to keep loving each other the way they have since they were fifteen - and while they joke that they wasted so much time, it was a necessary time for them to spend apart to learn how to exist together and how to choose each other even when it’s the harder choice than letting go.

Even I get lonely too

It’s not hard

Every question’s got an answer

And mine is you

Where you go then I will follow

All my life

You’re the name that I will whisper to the night

#musclememory.wip #it turned out differently than planned #but I hope you enjoy it!

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daily-dose-of-imagines · 4 years ago

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𝕄𝕒𝕥𝕔𝕙 𝕌𝕡♡

hi!! i hope y’all are all doing well! 💗 i’d like to request a JJBA matchup (only two characters who you think fit best, but it can be anyone from parts 1-4 since i haven’t finished 5 yet) i don’t have a preference for admins so whoever is able to get to it is a-okay with me!!

i’m a bi female, 5’3”, with jaw-length, straight-ish light brown hair that fades into purple atm, i have dark blue/gray-blue eyes, have very pale skin w/ pink undertones, and have a weak/mild hourglass body type (though i’m a tiny bit more top-heavy)

people would describe me as an empath, and i’m very focused on validating other people’s feelings, nurturing/caring for my friends. basically the mom friend role. basically, just a huge softie and i tend to need validation from loved ones to function (my love language is words of affirmation). i’m an ISFP and a 2 on the enneagram test. i am a cat person all the way (though i love all animals, i just vibe w/ cats more) i’m pretty quiet, awkward, and soft-spoken if you don’t know me well, but i tend to get a bit wilder in the right company (just being more open w/ humor and louder) i really love art; i prefer drawing but also dabble in painting, printmaking, etc. i’m also described as really passionate by my friends and am a huge people pleaser. i love to sleep and can sleep for around 14 hours if left alone, and i don’t like participating in sports or much physical activity (my metabolism is the only thing saving me 💀). i’m one of the top students in my class and am very hardworking when it comes to academics and things of that nature

(i really hope that wasn’t too much!! just remember that i’m willing to wait (like a decent human being) because i know it will be good, so please don’t stress!!!! i just want all of you to know that the fact that you provide content for your respective fandoms is such an amazing thing, and consumers like myself are superrrrr grateful for all your hard work!! 🥺💗 once again i hope y’all are all doing well and if you’re not i hope things get better 💕💖 thank you so much!!!! 💗💗)

»»————-　♡　————-««

Hello hello! Of course, you may, I’m so sorry that this took so long to get to! We all really do appreciate the patience though! I hope you enjoy this! Thank you again for your support and love for our blog~!

》》Admin Ko

𝕀 𝕊𝕙𝕚𝕡 𝕐𝕆𝕌 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙..

ᴊᴏꜱᴜᴋᴇ ʜɪɢᴀꜱʜɪᴋᴀᴛᴀ

Kind with a heart of gold, Josuke is the man for you! As someone who puts others first before himself, he’s able to not only relate immediately to how you care for others, but strives to remind you that it’s okay to be a little selfish at times. Though a goofball, Josuke is there for you through any and all shortcomings that happen in life. He’s your personal hypeman and will not only flaunt your art-- just to piss off Rohan-- but hope that in his attempts at doing so will give your passions the fame and recognition they deserve.

It’s without a doubt that Josuke will smother you with love and affection-- though he’ll be immensely shy and awkward about it at first, he soon grows on with the idea and showers you with love whenever presented the chance to.

#match-ups #anime matchup #submissions #matchup #submission

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healthtips4world · 3 years ago

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What is coronavirus? Symptoms and causes, Managements and treatment, Prevention.

In this article, we will know about coronavirus tips and tricks. Coronavirus started from the wahan city, China which causes severe respiratory illness including death, and has since spread worldwide. The best preventive measures include wearing a mask, wash hands several times, keep a distance, avoid sick people. The coronavirus identified in 2019, SARS-CoV-2.

Coronavirus tips and tricks(Save your knowledge).

- Covid -19 is a disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, it is started in 2019. - The coronavirus can be spread from person to person. - Prevention involves physical distancing, mask, hand washes much more time don’t touch face area. How it spread? The virus is spread and affect through droplets and virus particles released into the air when a person coughs, breathe, talk, laugh or sneezes. Larger droplets may fall to the ground in a few seconds, but tiny particles can linger in the air and accumulate indoor places with poor ventilation. That's why mask-wearing, hand washing much more time, and maintain distance with other coronaviruses. How did coronavirus start? Coronavirus starts on Dec 1, 2019, in Wahan city, China. Now the new coronavirus name SARS-CoV-2. That could cause illness in human beings. Today coronavirus evolved to cause pandemic disease. Now Covid-19 time period is 14 days. The virus is less affected in some people and less affected in some people, it's depending on the open person's immune system. The study continues how and why the virus evolved to cause pandemics.

Coronavirus symptoms

- Throat pain - Headache - Fever - Cough - Muscle or body pain - Diarheea - Runny nose - Breathing difficulty - Loss test and smell Some of the people are asymptomatic, some less infected. In some cases they are highly infected, they have heart failure, kidney failure, nervous system problems, lung damage, or mostly death. It causes much more health. difficulties. coronavirus tips and tricks(Coronavirus prevention) - Wash your hand much more time Use soap and hand wash to wash your hand for at least 20 seconds. Wash your hand in running water. Wash your hand to your wrist, fingernails, under fingers. You can also use 60% alcohol-based hand sanitizer when you don’t use hand wash or soap. Also, wash your hand with boiling water. wash hands before prepare food and eat and touch any outsider thing. Wash your hands before or after you touch your eyes, nose, mouth. So that you save yourself from coronavirus.

Proper hand wash steps-

- Wet hands with water - Apply soap - Rub hands palm to palm - Rub back of each hand with the palm of others the hand with fingerlaced - Rub palm to palm - Rub with backs of fingers to opposing palms with fingers interlocked - Rub each wrist with opposite hands - Rinse hands with water - Dry thoroughly

Avoid touching your face

The new coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 can live on surfaces for up to 72 hours. You can get the virus on your hands if you touch a surface like these electric board, phone, door handle, laptop. Avoid touching any part of your face including mouth, nose, eyes, head.

Practice good respiratory hygiene

That means covering your mouth and nose with your bent elbow or tissue when you cough or sneeze. Then dispose of the used tissue immediately since the droplets spread the virus. Because SARS-Co-2 is found in a high amount in the nose and mouth. It can also land on hard surfaces and stay there for up to 3 days. Wash your hand carefully after you sneeze or cough. Take physical distancing Don’t go to gathering places unnecessarily, which means stay home and work. If you go for must necessary then keep a distance of 6 feet from other people. Also, avoid being in busy eating areas. Don’t do handshake and hugging. Avoid going to any event, religious place, park, yoga center, bar, restaurant beach, etc. Wear a mask Face masks are one tool utilized for preventing the spread of disease coronavirus tips and tricks. They may also be called dental, isolation, laser, medical, procedure, or surgical masks everyone wears a cloth face mask in a public setting where physical distancing may be difficult, such as in a hospital. Clean your hands before you put your mask on, as well as before and after you take it off, and after you touch it at any time. Make sure it covers both your nose and mouth. We also use a homemade mask made from an old t-shirt. A mask shouldn’t be worn by a child under 2 years old, a person who has trouble breathing, or a person. Stay active Exercise is really good for health. On the pandemic day, we do many types of exercise. We do yoga to develop breathing and good blood circulation. Even in small spaces, walking around can help you active. Meditation and deep breaths can help you remain calm. You also dancing to active yourself. Clean surfaces Use alcohol-based disinfectants to clean hard surfaces in your home, office - Countertops - Furniture - Door handles Also clean your phone, tablet, laptop much more time in a day. Use white vinegar or hydrogen peroxide solution for general cleaning in between disinfecting surfaces. Coronavirus tips and tricks(Healthy food for immunity booster) If you have a healthy immune system, your body can safe from any disease, even the novel coronavirus. There are some vitamins and foods which you can inculcate in your diet to have a strong immune system. - Turmeric –The spice turmeric is known for its anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Curcumin present in turmeric is a very potent agent and aids in the healing of wounds and infections. This is the reason, it is often suggested to have turmeric milk. - Vitamins –Among all kinds of vitamins, vitamins and Vitamin D play a major role in strengthening ones Another way we should have more citrus fruits and vegetables like Amla, Lemon, Orange also eggs, yolks. - Zinc-It is another nutrient that helps your immune system and metabolism function. An individual can either take Zinc supplements or include them in their diet through chickpeas, cashews, pumpkin seeds, etc. - Garlic-Garlic has the compound known as allicin, Allicin is a compound that is thought to fight viruses and boost immunity. It is informed when a clove of garlic is either crushed, chopped and chewed. You can also take two cloves of garlic and consume them with warm water every day or make it a part of your daily meal by adding it to soups and dot stews for added flavor. - Yogurt-in yogurt probiotic is the main. It aids good bacteria in our body. According to research published in the NCBI probiotic consumption also appears to be a feasible way to decrease the incidence of RTIs in children. If you have a sore throat regardless of the cause, yogurt might worsen it but for better immunity, you need probiotics so you can resort to supplements. - Cinnamon- Cinnamon may also protect the body against viral infections. You can simply soak a cinnamon stick in water overnight and drink it the next morning. Wash fresh groceries - Wash all fresh groceries under running water before preparing or eating. Do not use soap, detergent, to wash fruits and vegetables. Wash meat and fish much more time and eat. Self-quarantine if not comfortable If u have any symptoms then stay at home until you recover. Avoid sitting, sleeping, or eating with your family ones even if you live in the same home. Wear a mask and wash your hand as much as possible and go to the hospital and test yourself. Read the full article

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loveafterthefact · 4 years ago

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Love After the Fact Chapter 51: Fuck You, but Welcome to Daibazaal I Guess

Do you ever hate somebody and then you meet them and they're actually not that bad so you have to hate them for not being that bad?

Also Krolia is a good mom.

First Previous Next

“Mom!”

Keith launches himself at his mother, who holds him protectively close, whispering reassurances in his ear even as she glares accusingly at the elegant Altean behind him. The Altean in question merely raises an eyebrow, drapes Keith’s cloak over his arm, along with his own. He doesn’t seem troubled at all by her expression.

He’ll learn. But for now, she has her baby back.

“I’ve missed you,” her kit whispers, burying his face in her neck. “I’ve missed you so much!”

“I missed you too, kitten. So much.” She has, desperately. Krolia is a soldier, and now Imperial Advisor, but she is also a mother, and that instinct runs hot.

Like now, when she’s inspecting her kit for any signs of damage. He seems mostly okay, aside from his rapid heartbeat, a sign of some internal distress. Well-fed, though she’d like to see a bit more extra weight on him for his growth spurt and season. He’s healthy, though. Fur and hair soft and silky, breathing clear, and he smells clean.

Untouched. At that revelation, Krolia releases something she’s held pent up inside since her son was wrested away from her. The little whore of a prince didn’t touch her baby. He didn’t hurt her kit like that. Thank the gods.

But why? What does a Galra kit matter to an Altean prince?

Speaking of which, the prince is dictating instructions to his companions, sending a small Olkari kit to the Blade of Marmora’s technological research lab and another Altean to greet the imperial family.

“Why am I doing this instead of you?” the green-scaled Altean bemoans.

“Because, Adam, I’m going with Keith to the medical center so I can get some actual, useful information from a medical professional instead of your long-distance boyfriend.”

“Takashi is a physik!” Adam hisses. Keith hums, eyeing Adam with a renewed interest. Krolia doesn't let him go for a second.

“I didn’t realize a glorified botanist had knowledge of growth disorders.” The Altean prince raises an eyebrow, folds his arms. His eyes, to the little creature’s credit, shine with good humor, more playful than anything else. The two must be friends.

“...Fair point. I will go and greet the imperial family. However, you will be going and greeting your sister.”

“Yes, right after this. We need to see her scans so we know how much cuter our kids will be.”

In Krolia’s arms, Keith laughs, quiet and soft. He’s watching the Alteans’ antics with something horribly akin to fondness. “Thank you, Adam.”

“It’s only my job, your Majesty.”

“But you always do it flawlessly.”

The green-scaled Altean blushes faintly, mumbles, “Whatever. Go… learn how to grow or something.”

Adam saunters off with a spring in their step while the crown prince waves teasingly. “What are we going to do with him, beloved?”

“Give him a raise?”

“Hm. He definitely deserves it. Now, Imperial Advisor Krolia, could you please escort us to the medical center?”

“Certainly.” She keeps her arm around her son, the Altean happy to follow alongside. Krolia finds herself struggling to rectify this charming, bubbly creature to the insidious one she imagined. Perpetually smiling, the young prince runs his hands along the wall, tracing the lines of carvings and rubbing his fingertips against ancient paint long since sunk into the stone.

“You know, my boyhood friend, Lanval, came here with my fathers once? He never mentioned this.”

“I doubt he nor your fathers cared about our traditions or our culture. Your friend in particular cared for little more than gossip.” Krolia purses her lips.

“Yes, he said you two met. Lanval is not half so foolish as he seems, though a bit pompous. My fathers… They are many things, but anthropologists are not among them. The same can be said of our soldiers.” The prince sighs. “I hope one day we can be more than enemies to one another, but I fear it is a child’s dream.”

Krolia says nothing, but Keith hums sympathetically.

When they reach the medical center, they’re met by the head medic, Thace, a relatively young Galra cradling a very new kit in his arms. “It’s my morning break, so unless you’re actively dying or in labor, I don’t care.”

“Hello, Thace. My kit is suffering from a growth disorder and is in the midst of his final growth spurt,” Krolia tells him.

Thace, a bright-faced, genial creature and one Krolia is particularly fond of, sighs, brushes a finger down his child’s cheek. “Fine, but only because he’s a prince. Here, can you hold Raj for me?”

Lance blinks rapidly, alarmed as the medic hands him his newborn kit. Keith only smiles. “Number five looks good, Thace. Hope they eat your fingers, Lance.”

Thace guides Keith over to a chair, where he sits in with a quiet ‘thank you’. Krolia registers a spasm traveling up his leg, presumably up his spine and then down his arm. The near-grown kit grits his teeth to stifle a whimper, but his heartbeats flutter and pound. A rotating arm spins around him, scanning him from all possible angles. Keith’s visibly untroubled. He’s done this before.

“Aw, do you have pointy toofers? You got some pointy teef- Ouch! Oh, you do! Look at those toofers! Oh my goodness, you got such nice toofers!” Lance beams down at the infant, every line of his face, his body soft as Raj chews on his finger, drawing tiny beads of blood. Even Krolia has to concede that it's adorable to watch.

“Oh, I’m so sorry! I-”

Lance shakes his head, smiling at the suddenly anxious medic. “Don’t worry about it. Though perhaps you have something else they can chew on?”

Thace hands the Altean prince a toy as he extricates his finger, an angry screech penetrating their ears in the moment of the exchange. As the kit chews happily on the toy, Lance turns his attention back to Keith, who’s smiling at Lance and the bundle in his arms. Krolia definitely hates that.

“So what’s to be done for him? Our alchemy was only able to do so much and painkillers have proven largely ineffective.”

Krolia’s eyes narrow, watching the tender expression on the prince’s face morph into worry. He’s not at all what she expected him to be. He’s much warmer than his biological father, with far more social grace than his step-father. Charming. Friendly. Charismatic.

And he didn’t touch her son.

It’s hard to hate him. She’ll do her best.

“Well, there is a serum that’s proven beneficial to kits in their eleventh growth spurts.”

“But?” Keith prompts. “There’s always a ‘but’.”

“But it causes excruciating pain for about half a varga.”

Lance adjusts his arms, cradling the kit with one arm, setting his free hand on Keith’s shoulder. “How does it work?”

“Well, Prince Yorak’s growth disorder affects more than just his growth plates. Obviously, without functional growth plates, his bones cannot grow properly. Additionally, with every growth spurt, a Galra’s metabolism slows down, making us hardier and more capable of surviving in the generally harsh environment of our planet. Prince Yorak’s metabolism is much higher, as he has missed a few growth spurts all together.”

“So wait. You’re not supposed to eat three meals a day?” Lance leans around to look his spouse in the face. “Do you have any sense of self-preservation at all? Or am I supposed to just magically know all this sh- stuff. And now you've got me almost swearing in front of the baby!”

“It never came up.” Keith shrugs, annoyingly indifferent even in face of the Altean’s exasperated expression. At least Krolia and the prince can agree on something.

“I’m not going to care when he injects you with some horror goop.”

“Yes you will-”

“Your Majesties.” They fall silent, sheepish as they turn their attention back to the medic. “If I am to treat you, Prince Yorak, please understand that this is not a one-time thing. You will require an injection every time your pain returns. However, I should tell you. Whether you accept treatment or not, you may experience fertility issues including difficulty conceiving, high miscarriage rate, and higher likelihood of stillbirth.”

Keith's gaze slips back to Lance and the tiny kit in his arms. Krolia looks away, thinking of the kits she lost, Keith’s siblings who never saw the world, never took that first breath of air. Now her son is facing that same fate.

“Keith?” The boys turn to her. “You should do it.”

“Obviously I’m going to do it. I don’t care about pain. The pain is temporary.” Keith reaches out a hand, and after taking a moment to adjust Raj, Lance grips it tight.

The kit Lance is still cradling coos, yawning wide as they wrap their hand around one of his fingers, settling into sleep.

“Well, it looks like you’ve no choice, beloved. I can’t leave until they let go of me.”

Thace laughs, gripping his small friend's shoulder tight. “Prince Yorak, you’re going to end up being the disciplinarian parent. I hope you know that.”

“I can retrain him.” Keith uses Lance’s hand to help himself to his feet, staggering a bit as he works his way over to one of the gurneys. The prince hands Raj back to their bearer with a smile and a thank you.

Krolia sighs, surrendering to the tender expression on her son’s face as he settles his head in Lance's lap. The prince smiles down, worry lining his eyes. "I'll be right here, beloved."

"I know. Just don't tell anyone if I scream."

"Never. It'll be our secret." Lance's shoulders line themselves with tension as Thace cuts off one of Keith's sleeves, shaves away a patch of fur, inserts a temporary port.

"This port will last around three movements, but you shouldn't need it more than two. Just try to keep it dry. And, while you're paying attention to me, do not go to your idiot savant of a littermate for season advice. You come to me or your mother, understand? It a whole different thing when you have a mate."

"That's a good point, beloved. Shiro is woefully inept."

"He really is. But he's a good guy. Like you." Keith smiles, dark eyes sliding up to Lance's. Krolia sighs, defeated. Her kit wants the Altean, whether she likes it or not. She doesn’t need to be friendly, but for Keith's sake, she’ll tolerate him.

For now. Until he screws up. Then she'll beat his ass.

#LoveAftertheFact #LAtF #klance #galtean au #altean lance #galra keith #adashi #altean adam #galra shiro #voltron legendary defender #vld

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ladyseaheart1668 · 4 years ago

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Endless Summer Book 4 : Daughter of Vaanu (Chapter 49)

Description: Tahira continues to fight her way out of her own head.

Tagging: @endlesshero1122 @mysteli @feartheendlesssummer @whatmcsaid @xo-endlessmayhem-xo @tigerbryn11

Chapter 49 : A Breath of Water

Grayson

I hold Tahira's hand while the nurse slips the IV needle into her vein, even though she probably can't even feel the prick. She doesn't move at all. Not even a twitch.

The first scan they did of her brain revealed that the blood flow was normal. But there was no explanation as to why she hasn't woken up yet. I don't know whether that surprises me or not. If it really was something on the knife, some kind of poison, is that ever going to show up on a brain scan? Either way, they've decided to do another scan. One that's supposed to measure her brain activity. PET scan, I think. They say they can use it to accurately predict which coma patients are likely to wake up.

I squeeze Tahira's hand, kissing her fingers. She looks so perfect, lying in her hospital bed with her dark hair spread over the pillow, smooth and silky thanks to her mother's careful brushing thirty minutes ago. Except for the tubes and hoses, she looks like she's sleeping.

“My sleeping beauty,” I murmur, stroking her hair. “...I wish you would wake up...”

The nurse puts a hand on my shoulder. “Come on. We gotta leave her alone for awhile so the tracer can go through her system. It's better if she doesn't have any stimulation while that's happening.”

“...You think me being here actually stimulates anything?”

“In the best case scenario, it absolutely does. And since that's what we're hoping for, that's the assumption I'm acting on.”

Tahira

I'm not tired as I climb the path up the mountain, and that still startles me every time I realize it. ...Can I even be startled in this space? I reach what appears to be the top of the mountain, and I am standing on a small circle of rock barely large enough for both my feet that pokes up like an island through an ocean of soft, white clouds. The clouds look soft and fluffy, like piles of cotton balls. I want to dive into them and feel their softness against my skin—even though I know from personal experience that I'll probably just get wet. And possibly fall to my death, since I can't fly in this space. But...maybe I can't die in this space, either. And, I'm here now, standing on a tiny space on top of a mountain. What exactly am I supposed to do now?

Before I can really stop myself, I have taken the step off the edge. I plunge through fluffy, cottony sea foam into a warm ocean. I breathe saltwater and it feels as easy as breathing air. I hear a voice call my name. A sexless voice that comes through the waves and sounds like music. I swim toward it, gliding as easily as I fly through the air in the real world. Something that looks like the sun glimmers overhead, making the water around me shine. Ahead, something waits for me in the water. The rippling waves distort its shape, but the color of it is overwhelmingly red.

I think in the back of my mind, I know what's there even before I get close enough to actually see. Sure enough, as I approach, the thing takes on a human shape. Two legs, two arms, and a head—all concealed within a red spacesuit. ...I've never met the Endless before. But I know who she is.

“...Endless. Are you here to show me how I can wake up and help Alodia? Help...a version of you?”

“I am here to help. But I warn you that I cannot help the way you want me to. I am forever bound by the laws that govern the physical flow of time. If I break them, I will do more harm than good.”

“I'm in no position to turn down help.”

“Then follow me.”

Rochelle

“What exactly are you trying to tell me, doctor?”

They've called in a neurologist to assess Tahira. She's had at least two scans to determine why she isn't waking up. So far, though, the man seems to have taken a lot of words to say not very much at all.

“What I am trying to tell you, Ms. Rogers, is that there is no reason to despair. Your daughter's brain is active. Very active. In all the right ways. Coma patients with similar levels of brain activity recover consciousness within a year more than eighty percent of the time.”

I fold my arms. “...Are you saying that my daughter is in a coma?”

The doctor hesitates. “She does exhibit many symptoms consistent with a coma diagnosis. However, there are no obvious organic causes. And...” He leans over Tahira and lifts her eyelid slowly to shine his light pen at her pupil. “Her light reflexes are normal. When I lift her eyelid, she resists. And when I release it, her eye closes completely and quickly.”

“So...what does that mean?”

“My assessment is that it is most likely a psychogenic coma. That is, a temporary period of disassociation, possibly caused by psychological trauma related to the attack.”

“...'Temporary'...”

“Yes. Most of the time patients wake up fairly promptly after general anesthesia is stopped. Often when they fail to wake up, it's due to residual effects from the drugs. Sometimes, it's neurological or metabolic. And sometimes, it's psychological. Tahira is neurologically intact, and her bloodwork is all clear.”

“So...what do we do?”

“We wait. Keep assessing her regularly, wait for a change. Right now, there is little else we can do.”

Jake

“Lundgren wasn't where we left him. The prevailing theory is that one of his goons found him and got it out, but there's not much of a trail if that's the case. It's...not looking like Alodia and Diego are on the island, either. They've got the coast guard circling, though, in case anything tries to land there. The Vaanti are still lying low for the most part, but Seraxa has a few warriors combing the jungle. I don't know if they can hide themselves like they used to when Vaanu's crystals were still part of the island, but Seraxa seems to think it's an acceptable risk.”

I can't look at Sean as he talks. I stare out the window of my hospital room. The view overlooks the hospital grounds, with the Santo Domingo skyline on the horizon. He seems to be waiting for an answer, but when I don't give him one after a moment or two, he goes on.

“Zahra and Iris have been analyzing the recording from that AI. Iris was able to confirm that the voice print was Alodia's. But most of it was spliced together from recorded voice samples. Like...the time lady that you used to be able to call.”

“'Most of it'...”

“...Huh?”

I keep my eyes on a not-particularly-interesting office building in the distance. “You said 'most of it' was spliced. ...I have a guess where it wasn't.”

Sean hesitates just long enough to confirm that I'm right even before he says, “...Yeah.”

“So where did that part come from?”

“Zahra says she doesn't know that yet. The parts where...Galatea...broke character...those were whole samples, not splices. Iris can figure out that much. But where and when they were recorded? That's gonna take longer to figure out.”

Now I turn to look at him. “What kinda time do you think we have, Sean? She could give birth any day. If Rourke gets his hands on our kid...”

“I know, buddy. I know.”

“...I wanna be there. I wanna be there when my daughter is born.”

He doesn't say anything. What the hell can he say to that? Everyone I know is gonna do everything in their power to get my wife back to me ASAP. Doesn't mean I can rest easy. Not until she's back in my arms.

“...Do you know when you're getting out of here?”

“A day or two. They want to keep me for observation awhile. ...Then I guess I oughta go back to California. ...Or stay here and look after Mike. Don't wanna leave him alone here. ...Don't suppose you two are continuing the honeymoon where you left off.”

“With Alodia and Diego still missing? Of course not. Michelle wants to go back to work early.”

I snort, a rueful, mirthless laugh. “Tell her it's outta the question. She just went through a kidnapping for fuck's sake.”

“You're suggesting I try to tell Michelle what to do?”

“Okay, yeah. I see how that's a bad idea.”

“...She needs to feel useful. And...truthfully right now, it may be that the best way she can help us get Alodia and Diego back is by being at work.”

I feel the frown settle onto my mouth and forehead as I stare at him. “...You don't just say a thing like that without having something to back it up.”

“Tahira was attacked. About the same time as all of us were abducted. She had emergency surgery, but she hasn't woken up yet. ...Before she went under, she managed to get across that the one who attacked her was a Vaanti.”

Caleb

It's probably stupid as hell for me to keep coming back to the compound where Tahira and I were once prisoners. The cops are probably still looking for me, and the compound being the site of a stabbing, they probably aren't far off. Though, truth be told, I'm not sure if they've actually managed to figure out where she was actually stabbed.

Thing is, I find myself wanting answers. I want to know who decided to stick a maybe-poisoned knife in Tahira. I got a nagging feeling whoever it was knows her identity. In the dark, with a flame dancing on my fingertips to light my way, I follow the spotty trail of dried blood from inside the compound to the alley where the initial splatter seems to be and stare at the stain on the filthy concrete.

Avanti...who the hell is Avanti? Sounds like some pop diva wannabe. I'd say a pop diva wasn't capable of leaving this kind of mess in an alley, but I'm old enough to remember Haley Rose.

“You're not going to be able to hide forever.” The taunting purr is unmistakably Gigi. I grit my teeth, but I don't turn to face her right away. “You have to realize that sooner or later, the cops are going to find you.”

Don't ask me why this is the straw that breaks the camel's back. But whatever the reason, I can't take it anymore. I whip around and lunge at Gigi, grabbing her by the throat and shoving her against the wall, a fireball in my free hand poised threateningly over her. The dancing orange light reflects genuine fear in her eyes as she grasps my wrist in both hands. At the moment, I'm too pissed to enjoy it.

“I've had e-fucking-nough of your bullshit, Gi,” I snarl. “You can threaten me with your child army or the cops all you fucking want, because right now, all your underworld power and influence, all your loyal followers all mean jackshit compared to my hand on your throat and this fireball over your head, so start fucking talking, bitch!”

Her eyes flick from my face to the flames licking my hand and back again. I feel her squirm, but I've got her pushed high enough that her toes barely touch the concrete.

“What—should I talk—about?” she finally gasps. I pull back just enough to give her a little more air.

“What do you know about what happened here?!”

She smirks, even as I feel her hands trembling on my wrist. “I know Dragonness can bleed.”

So she does know Tahira's identity. I tighten my grip again, bringing the flames a little closer to her skin. They lick upward enough that I am not worried about causing any damage I don't intend, but I see the sweat blooming on her forehead. I press my face in closer.

“...Who's Avanti?”

Her eyes widen. “...What?”

“Avanti. Is she one of yours? Someone new?”

“...Where...did you...hear that?”

“Tahira said it was Avanti who stabbed her! Who is that?!”

“...So. …The plot...thickens...”

I shake her, hard enough that she lets out a strangled yelp. “I told you to talk, bitch!”

“Avanti isn't a name!” she shrieks breathlessly, struggling against my grip. “It's...not...coincidence!”

“What's not?!”

“Any of it! Same day Dragonness is attacked, Alodia Chandler is abducted, and Silas Prescott escapes!”

“Yeah, that doesn't seem like coincidence. So what do you know about it?”

“Barely more than you, I would wager,” she croaks against another increase in pressure from my hand. “...But I know that Avanti is not a name. It's a thing. A creature. From La Huerta.”

“...What kind of creature?”

I feel a hand come down on my shoulder, gently but firmly. I spare a glance, and the hand on my shoulder shines golden brown in the light from my flame.

“That's enough, Caleb,” Talos murmurs. “Let her go.”

“Fuck that! Not until she tells me what she knows!”

“There's nothing she could tell you right now that I couldn't also tell you.”

I sneer, tightening my grip. “What about her plot to steal the Prism Crystal?”

“It clearly hasn't been set in motion yet, since the Prism Crystal is secure. And trying to get the plan out of her is likely going to prove an exercise in futility. There are more important things to worry about at the moment.”

I want to argue, how the fuck is the Prism Crystal not important? ...But it's not. Not when compared to finding Tahira's attacker. I slowly release Gigi and let the flame on my hand go out. Gigi staggers back from me, coughing and rubbing her throat. I can see I've left marks. She's not gonna forgive me for that. But right at this moment, she's looking at me with genuine fear and I can finally feel a twinge of satisfaction for it. Of course, she does her best to disguise it as quick as she can.

“Looks like I've got my own knight in shining armor,” she sneers, her voice hoarse. “Too bad he appears to be running with a traitor.”

“You should be the one running, Gi,” I snarl. “Before I change my mind about letting you go.” As I summon flames to my palms for emphasis, her eyes widen. She closes her mouth and slinks into the shadows without another word. I let the flames die and lower my hands, turning to glare at Talos. He sighs.

“Don't give me that look. Interrogating her would have cost us time we don't have.”

“You can't know that she isn't involved!” I growl.

“Of course she's involved. Even if it's indirectly. She was on La Huerta at the same time as Alodia. But look me in the eye and tell me that you think she would give up any information in a timely manner?”

“I could have burned it out of her,” I mutter.

“Torture is unreliable,” he replies simply. “...The Prism Crystal is secure. You can take my word on that.”

“Why should I?” I'm just being stubborn at this point. I don't know why the hell Talos would lie about that.

“...Because if it's lost, I lose my source of liquid prism. And liquid prism is what's going to save me if you ever decide to stick a flaming sword through my gut again.”

“...Fine. Fair point. ...So what now, huh? How do we find this Avanti thing?”

“First of all, it's not Avanti. It's a...Vaanti. Two words. ...Let's go somewhere private, Caleb. I think it's time to explain.”

Jake

Rebecca and my folks show up in the small hours of the morning. They have Varyyn with them, his hologram disguise in place. They try to sneak into my hospital room to avoid disturbing me, but it's not like I can sleep anyway. Varyyn hangs back while my parents tearfully embrace me, but I watch him through the space between their heads, and I can see his tepid expression.

“Hey, Varyyn,” I murmur after my parents and sister have given me a moment to breathe. “...How are you holding up?”

Varyyn twitches slightly, and I see a guilty flush creep into his cheeks. “...I am glad to see you are safe, Jake...” He trails off, looking away.

“...But I ain't your spouse, am I.” I offer him a sympathetic smile. “...I ain't mine, either.”

His mouth twists miserably, his eyes shimmering. “...They are together,” he whispers. “They must be together.”

“God, I fucking hope so...” I look desperately at my sister. “Tell me the cops got something, Bex. Anything...”

“There is something. ...One of Alodia's students came forward. Said she had been waiting to be picked up after class and Alodia was waiting with her to go to lunch with a friend. ...She gave a description of the woman Alodia left with. Said Alodia called her 'Jeanine,' and that she didn't seem happy to see her.”

I try not to show disappointment. Three people in this room were already aware of this information, but as far as my folks know, this should be a new development. I hope I can blame my lukewarm reaction on the concussion. The odds are probably better if I can manage to say something to convince them I didn't know the kidnapper's identity already.

“...The only Jeanine I can think of that we know is someone I used to serve with. She was there on La Huerta, and she was definitely hostile to Alodia, but...” What did we all agree happened to her? What did Mike and I say at Lundgren's trial all those years ago. “...We thought she was dead.”

“Varyyn told them that the name was familiar,” Rebecca says, giving me a meaningful look behind our parents' backs. “That you had mentioned her as someone from your Navy days you had fallen out with. But since he wasn't there on La Huerta, he doesn't know the whole story.”

Oh, is that the story we're going with? Seems fucking weird to think of Varyyn being from anywhere but La Huerta, but I guess now that he has a fake ID and he can mingle in the real world, he's got to have another backstory.

“...There is one other thing,” Rebecca continues. “Whoever took Diego and Alodia, they were prepared. For the most part, they managed to stay off the security cameras both at the college and the dance school. ...But not entirely.”

That does make me snap to attention. Well, as much as I can in a hospital bed. “So there's footage?”

“There's footage of what the police believe is the ambulance they drove. Enough frames between the two sets of security footage to get a license plate. The vehicle hasn't been found yet, but...”

“...But it's something.”

It's enough to keep hope alive, even if it feels like fear is suffocating it. Fear can't really smother hope, though. As long as I am afraid, I still have hope. It's when fear starts to turn to despair that I'll have really lost hope. When I start grieving Alodia and Diego instead of being afraid that I will have to grieve them in the future.

“...When you're discharged,” my mother speaks up, covering my hand with hers, “would you like us to take you back to California? Or would you rather come stay with us until there's more information?”

I shake my head. “...The moment there's a real credible lead, I'll be wherever my wife most needs me to be. ...But for now, I can't leave Mike. Not until I know he's okay.”

“It's up to you, of course. We can get a hotel room for awhile. But they did tell us that his family has been informed.”

I hum noncommittally. Of course I trust Mike's family to look after him when they get here. But I still don't want to leave without word of Alodia. ...How can I think about going anywhere until I know where she is? Without her, I'm adrift. I'm spinning my wheels in a blizzard, and I can't even see the road ahead, even if I could get myself unstuck.

Tahira

“So...are you actually the Endless? Or are you just a manifestation of...some aspect of me that's taken on the form of the Endless?”

The red-clad old woman does not look back at me as we slog together through what has become a mucky swamp, thick with vines, water plants, and algae.

“A little bit of both. Vaanu is communicating with you mentally. I am an alternate version of Alodia, who is essentially a manifestation of some aspect of Vaanu. Unlike the Alodia you know, however, I never lived as a human in this world. I am the Alodia who was born of Vaanu's energy and my Catalysts' needs. But I never gave myself back to Vaanu, so I never merged the timelines, and thus I was never reborn on earth as the child of human parents. I am the Alodia who never lived in California. Who never attended Hartfeld. ...I am the Alodia who rejected Vaanu, and yet I am now the Alodia who is joined with him.”

“...That was...a long-winded answer. But surprisingly straightforward. That's not to say that I totally understand, but I was expecting you to be more...cryptic.”

“Unfortunately, this straightforwardness cannot last. ...I do not know where Alodia is, and neither does Vaanu. All we have is scattered knowledge to impart to you that may or may not help you find her. In fact, my main purpose here is to help you purge the poison from your body.”

“What kind of poison is it?”

“An ancient kind. Something toxic to those from the Crystal Dimension.” She pauses, turning toward me. “Have you ever been baptized, Tahira?”

“Baptized? No. My mom was never religious, and I never got into it either. ...I did see a friend of mine get baptized once...”

We were teenagers, I remember, and she invited most of the girls in our class, and I went mostly because it meant something to someone I considered a friend. Her church had a baptismal pool, and she and the other baptismal candidates waded in one by one to speak their vows, dressed in loose white robes. Then their pastor covered their face with a towel, took them in his arms, and rocked them back into the water while speaking the ritual words before drawing them up again. The ceremony meant nothing to me, but it was interesting to watch. Before I can ask the Endless why she wanted to know, I get my answer when she takes me in her arms and gets my legs out from under me to immerse me in the water around us. But I don't have the benefit of a cloth over my face, and the Endless doesn't seem to be drawing me up again. I try to find my footing, to get my head above the water, but she isn't letting me. Or something else isn't letting me. Either way, I start to panic. But then I remember my experience earlier, and I slowly still. Cautiously, I take a breath. Water flows smoothly into my lungs, and out again, easy as air.

“Good,” the Endless says soothingly. “Just breathe. Relax. Listen. Watch.”

I try to do as I'm told. In one of my middle school art classes, we made an optical illusion toy out of a circle of cardboard and two pieces of string. On one side of the cardboard was a picture of a bird, and on the other was a birdcage. The strings attached to opposite edges of the cardboard circle, and when you wound up the string and spun the toy, the images flipped so quickly that the bird seemed to appear inside the cage. Watching the images flashing in front of me on the surface of the water feels like watching that little bird hop into the cage. Or maybe like thumbing clumsily through a flip book where some of the pages are out of order.

I see the Endless with her helmet down, flames dancing above the skeletal claw that is her bionic right hand. I see Caleb superimposed over her, and they both close their right fists to extinguish the flames. I see Minuet holding out her hand to extend a slow-motion field over an unseen opponent. Then she morphs into Alodia, wearing a haunted expression as she holds out her hand and the wind that was stirring her yellow hair stills. I see a massive tree that I think must be Elyys'tel pulsing with light. And then the light fades and the tree withers as the sky turns gray, but lights are flashing in wild neon colors behind it. The images start coming faster. I can't keep track of them. But some do get through. Vaanti. Blue-skinned males and verdant females, dressed in masks and leafy garments, with tattoos decorating their powerful, glistening bodies. Then they're gone. Replaced by a steampunk-looking tribe who hunker around a fire in a post-apocalyptic desert, their pointed teeth tearing into the raw flesh of some unfortunate animal, blood sluicing down their chins.

...Anachronists...those are Anachronists! I mean, Alodia never told me they had fangs and ate raw animals, but...the steampunk outfits give them away. I open my mouth to say as much to the Endless. But now there's a problem.

...Suddenly, I can't breathe.

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kellylanesvault · 4 years ago

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How To Easily Lose Weight Without Dieting

Restricting what you eat and how much you eat will not always work in your favor. Many studies have shown that restrictions of any kind are bound to fail in the long term. So, if you had previously gone on a strict diet and had some success but then bounced back to your fat weight again in a matter of weeks, you’re your own proof that restrictions don’t work!

But, fret not. You can certainly still lose a ton of weight without restrictions—all you have to do is make a few tweaks to your lifestyle. The following list of 16 simple ways will help you to lose weight without any forms of restriction. Imagine stepping on the scale and seeing your desired number pop up without depriving yourself or cutting out your favorite foods—and best of all, these terrific tips and tricks will help you achieve sustainable, long-term weight loss.

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1. Don’t Skip Breakfast

Contrary to popular belief, skipping meals doesn’t help you shed pounds. In fact, it’s the other way around! Skipping a morning meal causes your blood sugar to drop, making you feel hungry and sluggish throughout the morning. You’ll be more likely to binge on carb-rich or high-fat meals later on. Eating in the AM also gives your metabolism a nice boost, so you burn calories at a faster rate throughout the day.

2. Don’t Snack at Night

Do you snack when night rolls around? This destructive pattern can pack on the pounds. Your metabolism drops as you get ready to hit the pillow and catch some ZZZs. Breaking the habit can help you lose weight because you’ll end up consuming less calories throughout the day. Reduce your PM munchies by keeping your appetite under control and eating small, wholesome meals at regular intervals throughout the day. It also helps to brush your teeth after your final meal!

3. Drink More Water

Beverages besides water might taste great, but they often contain calories that add up throughout the day. These empty calories don’t affect hunger levels, so you’ll still eat as much as you would otherwise. Instead of drinking your calories, opt for good old H20. Sticking to water hydrates your body and helps it work efficiently while boosting your metabolism and curbing cravings.

4. Eat More Fruits and Vegetables

Fruits and vegetables contain tons of nutrients. Fresh produce can melt pounds by supplying you with essential vitamins, minerals, and fiber your body needs to feel fully satisfied. Thanks to their high water content, these volume-rich foods take up room in your stomach and make you feel full. Fruits and vegetables also curb your cravings for carb-laden, sugar-filled snacks, and can prevent you from mindlessly munching. Instead of filling up on meat, eat more fruits and vegetables!

5. Eat Foods Loaded With Fiber

Your ticket to a slimmer figure is fiber. Your body doesn’t actually digest fiber. Instead, the nutrient passes through the intestines, latching onto fat and calories as it leaves your system. Fiber also removes toxic waste from the colon while balancing acidity in the intestines. It also acts as a bulking agent and allows food to move through your digestive track quicker. Never underestimate the fat-burning powers of filling fiber!

6. Eat Until You Are Full

Losing weight comes down to burning more calories than you eat, which leads us to portion control. Granted, this doesn’t mean consuming teeny tiny portions of food. It involves eating just enough to feel satisfied and fully nourished. Monitoring what and how much you’re eating will tip the scales in your weight loss favor. Begin portioning your meals according to the amount of calories you should eat per day.

7. Set A Fitness Goal

Give yourself a goal of taking at least 10,000 steps per day, or running a few miles a week. Goals like these will force you to sneak more exercise into your schedule. Once you start achieving your goals and feeling victorious, you’ll likely start including them in your routine and live a more active lifestyle. There are apps you can get on your phone that count your steps.

8. Eat More Protein

Protein tames hunger and curbs cravings, keeping you feeling full throughout the day. As a result, you’ll eat less and trim calories from your menu. The slimming powers of protein work soon after leaving your plate and entering your mouth. Protein-packed foods take more energy to digest and metabolize, meaning you’ll burn calories by simply eating them!

9. Eat More Salad

Never underestimate the slenderizing powers of a nutritious salad! The leafy dish, especially when packed with fibrous, filling vegetables and lean protein, can hook you up with essential nutrients and help you achieve rapid weight loss. Keep in mind that numerous dressings are rich in calories, ultimately defeating the whole diet-friendly purpose of salad. Reach for clean, healthy vinaigrettes and dressings. Olive oil and vinegar tastes delicious and serves as a healthy alternative to store-bought dressings.

10. Keep Temptations at Bay

When it comes to weight loss, the out of sight, out of mind rule serves you well. Rid your cupboard of fatty, overly-processed snacks and keep unhealthy indulgences out of reach. For example, if that leftover birthday cake is calling your name, then pop it in the freezer or bring it to work. Keeping temptations away will keep cravings at bay.

11. Manage Your Stress

Stress can wreak havoc on your hormones, causing your body to enter fight-or-flight mode. During this response, your body releases cortisol, which stimulates insulin release and throws off your blood sugar levels. The result? Your body will latch on to every calorie consumed and your appetite will increase. Higher hunger levels and a slower metabolism don’t mix well when it comes to losing weight! Banish stress and stay calm and collected.

12. Stay Out Of Boredom

More often than not, mindless snacking comes from pure boredom. When there’s nothing to do, scoping the kitchen for something to munch on seems enticing. Instead of taking your boredom out by stocking up on calories, distract yourself by reading a book, calling a friend, or going for a walk. Research shows that cravings pass within ten minutes, so banish these cravings by using that time to do something productive!

13. Keep A Bowl Of Washed Fruits

Have fruits pre-washed and handy at all times. This will make them easier to access in times of extreme hunger! Readily-available fruits that don’t require any meal prep whatsoever will be calling your name next time you’re dealing with a grumbling tummy. When it comes to satisfying hunger while losing weight, nothing will help you slim and trim more than nutrient-rich veggies and fruit!

14. Get Enough Sleep

Sleeping at least seven hours a night helps you lose weight. Sleep deprivation triggers a series of unhealthy choices. You’re more likely to reach for that latte, turn to takeout, or skip exercise. A lack of sleep will boost your hunger hormones, eliciting intense carb cravings and the likelihood of overeating. If you want to see the numbers on your scale drop, make sure to catch enough sleep.

15. Eat Slowly

When you eat slowly, you’ll pay more attention to when you’re full. Research shows that slowing down and taking the time to enjoy each bite of food will have you consuming less overall without feeling deprived. Drink water between bites, chew mindfully, and listen to your body when it says it’s full!

One last thing… you should try this super simple morning ritual that burns 1 pound of belly fat per day…

“All this by a morning ritual?” I asked.

I met an old friend for lunch last year and I was super impressed with how she lost 72 pounds in 3 months.

She said, “It’s not so much about the the so called ritual but more about how it releases fat-blasting molecules that signal your brain and body to burn off pounds and inches of trapped fat quickly and naturally.”

Even though I was skeptical, I’ve been struggling with my weight over the last few years, so I gave it a shot and watched the same video she did.

Well, it’s only a couple weeks later and you know what they say about how “you can’t transform your body overnight”…

They’re right — it actually took me 14 days to lose 19 pounds.

Now it’s my girlfriends asking ME what I’M doing differently

Imagine your body being beach ready before Memorial Day.

Imagine enjoying the foods you love: pasta, wine, or even a dessert — completely guilt-free.

And imagine feeling good and living your life without obsessing about every single calorie you eat…

All while knowing your health is being protected by one of the most powerful natural healing rituals ever discovered.

Click here to see the super simple morning ritual that helped me melt away 19 pounds in just 14 days

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