#clearly noel's influence already

[almdragonrend]

I found a conversation I had in the comments section of a fanfiction and I think I have to share this to give a better look of the real Original Katarina

It again baffled me how different Noelia is from OG Katarina,

Katarina always good oppen in any fight yet there a still some brainless morons who claim they were the same!

How fucking darre they ?

Noelia is such a fucking coward,

Maybe in her past life she was the Authors wife

They surely fit,as selfish hypocritical and hybris driven they both are! Cursed be there souls for eternity!

xaszatm on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 06:30AM CET

Let's be fair, the character already was one of the eviler characters in the series thanks to attempting to kill Katarina Claes for the "crime" of not picking on the commoners. It's not surprise with just a little push, her plans could get more evil.

AlmDragonrend on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 08:14AM CET

Yeah,

I think the main reason why Sirius used Katarina and not Noelia is that if he used Noelia she would just have killed Maria outright, but Katarina has a good heart so she would be more Tame under his influence.

froghero on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 03:12PM CET

You have a point. I think another reason Sirius chose to use katarina was because Noel was too smart and cunning in his schemes.

The moment he started motivating Noel with black magic, Noel wouldn't just start bullying Maria. but will find a way to immediately eliminate Maria from the game. and leaves no trace of evidence.

This goes very much against Sirius' wishes.

First, Sirius never really wanted to get rid of maria in OG FL, just wanted her out of his scheme (just as he didn't really want to get rid of Bakarina in hamefura. he just wanted Bakarina out of his scheme.)

Second, He wanted to cause chaos among the nobles, the royal family, and among the commoner, so that Noel's immediate eliminate Maria without any evidence would not cause such a thing.

A better option is the katarina, the prince's fiancée. who has a straightforward personality without plan. Will begin to small bully Maria for the whole university to see without hiding.

AlmDragonrend on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 04:22PM CET

Plus the fact that she is a good person deep down still,

She has helped Sianna,Anne and so many others even in the OG timeline,

Even if Noelia was some how caught it wouldn't lead to nearly as much strife as with Noelia,as Noelia is completely selfish and doesn't care about others and most likely has no friends while Katarina is the only character who was shown to always have friends in all timeliness.

froghero on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 07:22PM CET

Oh, I think I understand you wanted to convey.

Noelia because of her very very bad personality. So she never had friends, true friends, companions, or people who cared about her. Therefore, even if she misses, she got caught. No one will come out to help her fight powerful groups around Maria. (Maybe with the exception of her family. Although I suspect she might have been abandoned because her family didn't want to get in trouble with the royal family.)

But on the other hand if it's katarina because she's inherently good, there will be a group of people she used to help, people who like her, her friends, people. who cares about her, her family, House of Adeth, Come out against the powerful group around Maria immediately. (Especially in the case of Prince Geordo. Katarina clearly had a reason for small bullying Maria. And Maria had the cause of being disgusted by the nobles. Because she stole Prince Geordo from her fiancée)

Of course there will be a lot of chaos following the OG FL storyline.

AlmDragonrend on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 07:59PM CET

Yes, the main problem is that it wasn't Katarina's fault

Katarina is a good person,the people who truly got to know her loved and adore her, there will be a civil war and even if Maria's faction somehow wins they will be to weak for Sociar to survive as a Nation

the only possible solution for this situation in which The Kingdom doesn't disappear or fall to a hostile take over is Sirius coming out as a dark wizard and take every single bit of the blame,for everything that has ever happened during both games,

and Katarina reinstate as the daughter of house Claes and being made heir to the throne as compensation for everything she had to go through aswell as the Stuart's leaving the Kingdom for ever,which is pretty unlikely.

So yeah that Kingdom is done for

I actually have plans for a fanfiction about a possible fortune lover 3 but I can't actually do it on my own,

But at least I have "the Heroine's brother " trilogy

But there one-shots and unlike what I would plan for that

But I took a bit inspiration from the tales of serious,

I know some people have problems with it

But I love tales of Zestiria,yeah it could be better and I would have loved to work on it,especially in the story part.

But I got a bit to far away,

But that is just the main point,among all the Noble's in Sociar during the original timeline Katarina was the one who more than any other embodies the spirit of Nobless obliged,and that is why she is someone who is so important to soo many people,because a friend like her is rare almost non existence in Noble society, so of course no one wants to lose her.

froghero on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 08:41PM CET

Sounds like it would be the end of the royal family and nobility in Sociar. Regardless of the outcome in any way. And perhaps the end of the country of Sociar.

heh. In the original timeline, the only person who laughed at the end was probably the Ghost Dark magic.

If you have a great idea for a fanfiction You should try writing it. :D

Last Edited Tue 14 Mar 2023 08:45PM CET

AlmDragonrend on Chapter 9Tue 14 Mar 2023 10:04PM CET

Yes,the only way for the Nation to survive is like I said Raphael admitting to everything while also pointing out he choose Katarina because she was the only one on the entire Academy who hadn't killed Maria outright from the start,than the Royal family handing over the Kingdom to Katarina and leaving,that's the only outcome in which Sociar can survive.

The fanfiction I have in mind couldn't work,

Because I really couldn't make that one on my own for multiple reasons,but I could tell you the basic promise if you won't ?

[piddleswicke]

“Who’s going to usher in the new millennium? What musical entity? A pantomime ape dressed in a little sort of.. y’know.. flares, emitting yeast? Or is if gonna be a sort of silver pure cube?”

Julian and Tim Hope as The Pod on the Apocalypse Tube, a 3-hour NYE special in 1999 that also featured Paul McCartney, the artist formerly known as Prince, Belle & Sebastian, Macy Grey, Robbie Williams, and more—including a very young, pretty, and thankfully sans-Walliams Matt Lucas. If I remember correctly, it was recorded over two nights in November(?) and the boys weren’t there when the headliners were. :/

Going to excise the Pod’s bit (~5 mins) and post it alongside the full version (for the nostalgia value) on the Boosh Docs soon.

Sorry if this is spammy, but also happy Julianuary!

[calumcest]

i want to teach you a lesson (in the worst kind of way)

me writing 5.6k in 4 hours and pretending my essays/presentation/exams/dissertation don’t exist? it’s more likely than you think

thank u jex for listening to me scream abt this for the past 4 hours and for always being the sweetest and most encouraging person in the world you are truly such a positive influence in my life 

also this is based off a prompt i got i think in 2014 never say i don’t provide! i would link the post but honestly it’s just got my 16 year old self’s embarrassing screams on it so frankly i would rather not so instead i will provide you with a screenshot of the ask under the cut 

[ao3]

-

“Who’s that, sir?” Lily asks, jabbing at the window.

“The new PE teacher,” Michael says.

“He’s cute,” Sarah says, and a couple of the girls nod vigorously.

“He’s also twice your age,” Michael says. “Go on, off to your practice rooms.” The girls groan, but one by one pull themselves away from the window and start to wander off. Michael stays by the window, one eye on the girls to make sure they actually go where they’re supposed to and one eye on the new PE teacher, who’s dividing the class up into groups and handing out footballs. He is kind of hot, Michael supposes, if you’re into muscular guys who are clearly good at sports. Which Michael most definitely is.

-

Michael Clifford loves his job. 

Sure, the staff room politics can get a bit exhausting (although Michael would be lying if he didn’t admit to loving all the drama he wasn’t personally involved in), and the kids can drive him up the fucking wall, but at the end of the day, there’s nothing he’d rather be doing than teaching. 

Except today. Today, when a good portion of 10C has somehow exploded into an argument over whether or not Julia snatched a guitar when Sam was about to take it, he thinks he’d rather be a human guinea pig for infectious diseases, or something. It probably pays better, anyway.

“Sam,” he says sternly, and he turns to look at Michael, anger written all over his face. “There are plenty of guitars in the cupboard. Let Julia have that one.”

“But sir, that’s the only one which-” 

“I don’t care,” Michael says, holding up a hand, because he’s perfectly aware that it’s the only guitar which stays in tune longer than thirty seconds. He’s been begging for a budget increase since the day he joined the school. “It’s one lesson, it’s not an exam, you can deal with it for forty-five minutes.” 

“But Mr Clifford-” Lucy pipes up, ready to defend Sam. 

“No, Lucy,” he says firmly. “I want all of you in the practice rooms, now.” Sam glares at him furiously and stomps off without an instrument in his hands, Lucy and Pip running behind him to one of the practice rooms outside the main classroom. Michael decides he’s got enough on his plate without inserting himself into hormonally-charged teenage drama, so he lets them go, rounding on Noel and Olivia, who are still arguing with Julia, Brandon hovering awkwardly nearby. 

“I don’t want to hear anything else about this,” Michael cuts in, and Noel and Olivia round on Michael instead. 

“Sir, she stole it from-”

“He was about to pick it u-”

“I don’t want to spend my lunchtime in detention, and unless you two do I suggest you get your instruments and go to your practice rooms,” Michael says curtly, trying to refrain from pinching the bridge of his nose in annoyance. He’s getting a stress-induced headache already, and it’s the first lesson of the day. 

“Fine,” Olivia spits, full of the kind of melodrama only a fifteen-year-old can summon, and Michael tries not to roll his eyes as they stalk off to one of the practice rooms at the back of the classroom without so much as another glance in his direction. He’s pretty sure he hears one of them mutter fuck you under their breath as they walk away, and he feels momentarily bad before he remembers they’ll have forgotten about it by their next lesson. 

“Don’t do it again,” is all he says tiredly to Julia, who nods meekly, and scampers off to join her group in one of the other practice rooms at the back of the classroom. That being sorted, Michael turns back to the rest of the class, to find about eight of the girls gathered at the window, chattering excitedly. 

“That doesn’t look like composing a short piece on three instruments to me,” he says, wandering over, and a bunch of the girls look back at him with a look of excitement on their faces. 

“Who’s that, sir?” Lily asks, jabbing at the window and leaving a mark. Michael peers over their heads to see a distant figure standing on the field with a class that looks like it might be 7A. All he can make out is that it’s a guy, with what looks like a mess of dark brown hair and a couple of tattoos on his (very muscular, Michael notes with approval) arms that he’s waving around, clearly explaining something. 

Michael vaguely remembers Paula, the headmistress, saying something about a new PE teacher starting this week, but he’d been too busy whisper-explaining to Luke why Magic: The Gathering was a great game and he should definitely play it with Michael to remember what she’d said the guy was called. 

“The new PE teacher,” he says, hoping they won’t ask what he’s called.

“He’s cute,” Sarah says, and a couple of the girls nod vigorously.

“He’s also twice your age,” Michael says. “Go on, off to your practice rooms.” The girls groan, but one by one pull themselves away from the window and start to wander off. Michael stays by the window, one eye on the girls to make sure they actually go where they’re supposed to and one eye on the new PE teacher, who’s dividing the class up into groups and handing out footballs. He is kind of hot, Michael supposes, if you’re into muscular guys who are clearly good at sports. Which Michael most definitely is. 

Huh, he thinks, pushing himself away from the window and heading to the first practice room to make sure Noel, Olivia and Brandon have calmed down a bit. Sarah’s kind of right. 

 ------- 

 Michael has a free period fourth period, and even if he usually wouldn’t be seen dead on the field, it’s a beautiful day, and it is on the route to the staff room. Well, it’s on a route to the staff room, at least, and if that route happens to be five minutes longer than simply walking through the building and over the quad, then Michael doesn’t need to know about it. He could do with the exercise, he tells himself. It’s nothing to do with the new PE teacher. 

When Michael gets down to the field, the PE teacher’s gathering up the footballs from the previous lesson and stuffing them in the big netted bag that’s been threatening to break for about five years. He turns around after picking up the last one and spots Michael (who is definitely not staring) cutting across the top part of the field. He raises a hand, and Michael’s not really sure if he’s waving or telling him to get the fuck off the field, but then he’s gathering the bag in one hand and jogging over, and Michael’s absolutely not watching the lines of his muscles as he makes his way over. 

“Hi!” the guy says, grinning widely, and fucking hell, he’s even hotter up close. He’s got dark brown eyes, crinkled at the corners with the brilliant smile currently gracing his full lips, and his dark hair is curled, falling into his face slightly. “I’m Calum. Calum Hood. I’m new.” 

“I’m Michael Clifford,” Michael says. “I’m not.” He curses inwardly as soon as the words have left his lips - he should be legally restricted from talking to hot guys, honestly - but Calum laughs, laughs, and it’s not fake, if the twinkle in his eyes is anything to go by. 

“I gathered,” he says. “So, what do you teach?” 

“Music,” Michael says. “You’re PE?” Calum nods. 

“Music’s my second, though,” he says. 

“Oh?” Michael wants to die. Of course hot PE guy can teach Music, of all things. He was literally crafted by God to upset Michael. 

“Yeah,” Calum says, with a smile. “I mean, I’m sure I’m nowhere near as good as you, but I play guitar, and a little piano. Bass is my real love, though.” 

“Bass?” Michael says, trying his best not to imagine Calum’s long fingers flying across a fretboard. 

“Yeah,” Calum says. “I played in a band, for a bit, but, y’know.” He gestures at himself. “Clearly didn’t work out.” 

“That’s pretty fucking cool, though,” Michael says, genuinely impressed. “And hey, bassist to secondary school PE teacher is an upgrade.” Calum laughs. 

“Fuck you, man,” he says, but he’s grinning, and Michael feels a warmth spreading from his toes to his cheeks. “Hey, are you heading to the staff room?” Michael nods. “Mind if I tag along? I’m still finding my way around.” 

“Sure,” Michael says, shrugging and hoping it conceals the fact that he kind of wants to turn back to the safety of his music room and bang his head on the wall until he forgets someone as perfect as Calum Hood exists on the same planet as him. 

“Sweet,” Calum says, beaming at him as he holds up the bag of footballs. “Let me just lock these in the shed and I’ll be right with you.” 

Yeah, sweet, Michael thinks, as Calum turns on his heel and jogs away from Michael over to the tiny shed in the corner of the field which houses all the outdoor equipment. Not like Michael’s already head over heels in love, or anything. 

Sweet. 

 ------- 

 Calum’s officially introduced in the staff room at lunchtime on his first day, but Michael has lunch duty on a Monday so he misses it. Luke and Ashton tell him Calum’s a big hit in the staff room, “really charming, and have you seen his arms?”, which just puts Michael in a bad mood, because he now has competition. 

It’s three days before Michael bumps into Calum again, in his free second period, which he’s spending catching up on all the marking that was due, like, two weeks ago and is still unfinished. 

“Hey, Michael!” Calum says cheerfully, sitting down opposite Michael at the desk that he’s entirely covered with a careful class-organised system of marking. “Oh, shit, are you busy?” 

“No,” Michael says immediately, because what’s his job compared to conversation with the hottest guy in Australia? “What’s up?” Calum shrugs. 

“Just wanted a chat,” he says. “Haven’t seen you in a few days. You been hiding from me?” His eyes are twinkling as he says it, and it makes Michael’s stomach flip, because it’s pretty friendly for a guy he’s met once. If Michael were anyone else, he would say Calum might almost be flirting. Maybe Calum’s just like that, though. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything. 

“Been catching up on marking,” Michael says, indicating all the papers on the desk. “I’m literally going to stop setting homework, I swear to God.” 

“Can’t say I relate,” Calum says, with a grin. “Perks of being a PE teacher.” 

“Yeah, but you have to deal with, like, concussions, and shit,” Michael says, capping his pen. 

“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, and all that,” Calum says breezily, and Michael snorts. 

“Typical PE teacher,” he says. “I could have had my leg cut off and my PE teacher would have made me keep running.” Calum smirks. 

“Well, you have another leg, don’t you?” he says, and laughs when Michael scowls. “I’m kidding. I’d let you do push ups instead.” Michael rolls his eyes, but he’s grinning. 

“How generous,” he says. Calum grins back at him, and Michael’s heart does a fucking backwards somersault, or something ridiculous. 

“That’s what you get for saying PE teacher is an upgrade from bassist,” he says. 

“Hey, that’s just the natural order of things,” Michael says. “It’s not my fault bass is at the bottom of the musical food chain.” 

“What’s music without the rhythm section?” Calum says, stretching, and Michael tries his best not to stare at the sliver of skin that’s exposed under his shirt. 

“Acoustic?” Michael offers, and Calum huffs out a laugh, bringing his arms (and shirt, Michael thinks wistfully) back down. 

“Fuck,” he says agreeably. “Guess my band could have carried on without me.” 

“What kind of music did you play?” Michael asks. Calum shrugs. 

“A bit of everything,” he says. “We started on All Time Low, Fall Out Boy, that kind of a thing, got more Radiohead and Tame Impala vibes as we went on.” Jesus Christ. Michael has literally died and gone to heaven, because there is absolutely no way a man this perfect exists anywhere other than in Michael’s imagination. 

“Mate, I fucking love All Time Low,” Michael says, and a smile unfurls on Calum’s lips. 

“Have you heard their new album?” 

“Yeah,” Michael says. “Fuck, Monsters? What a fucking tune.”

“Right?” Calum says enthusiastically. “And Basement Noise?” 

“Fucking sick,” Michael agrees. 

“You’ve got good taste,” Calum says approvingly. Michael opens his mouth to say something - you’re just saying that to get in my pants is on the tip of his tongue - but he’s interrupted (or possibly saved from eternal embarrassment) by Ashton sitting down heavily next to him. 

“Hey, Michael,” he says, throwing a dimpled smile in his direction. “Hey, Calum.”

“Hey, Ashton,” Calum says. “How’s the Year 10 clay project coming along?”

“Oh, you know,” Ashton says, leaning back in his seat and pushing his curls out of his face. “Two busts have been decapitated so far, so we’re doing pretty well, all things considered.” 

“Nice,” Michael says approvingly. 

“I know you’re talking about the decapitations, Mike, you don’t fool me,” Ashton says knowingly. Michael scowls. 

“Was it Sam?” he asks, needing to know who to high-five in his next lesson.

“No, Noel,” Ashton says. 

“10C? Short kid, really fucking fast?” Calum asks. Michael shrugs. How is Michael supposed to know how fast he is? It’s not like Noel’s Naruto running through the music room. 

“Yeah,” Ashton says, because apparently Noel’s Naruto running through the art room. 

“He’s really fucking good with a ball,” Calum says, and Michael bites back an awful innuendo with a lot of difficulty. Not in front of Ashton, he tells himself. 

“He’s lacking a passion,” Ashton says. “He’s good at art, but he messes around too much.” 

“Same with Music,” Michael says. “He’s got a temper on him, too.” 

“Well, maybe I can get him to channel it into football,” Calum says seriously. “Kids need an outlet, and something they feel like they’re good at. He needs something to be proud of.” 

Fuck, Michael thinks, as Ashton enthusiastically responds in kind, staring at Calum as he nods along to whatever Ashton’s saying with a thoughtful frown. He’s definitely in love. 

 ------- 

 Calum and Michael fall into a bit of a routine. 

They don’t share a lot of free periods together, only the fourth on Monday and second on Thursday, but Michael will wait at the corner of the field for Calum to finish clearing up after his last lesson and they’ll walk to the staff room together, sitting and chatting shit for an hour about nothing in particular. 

Michael learns that Calum’s got a sister, Mali, who’s in the music industry and whom he’s incredibly proud of, and that he’s half-Kiwi, half-Scottish, and grew up in western Sydney, not too far from Michael. He learns that Calum loves dogs more than he loves either bass or football, loves his dog (Duke) more than he loves anything else on the planet, likes playing Fifa and eating ice cream, and that his biggest fear is not having an impact on the world. He learns that Calum genuinely loves teaching, that Noel’s finding his feet with football and he’s really enjoying it, and that Calum almost went professional with football. 

(“Is there anything you aren’t fucking talented at?” Michael says grumpily, when Calum tells him that. Calum laughs. 

“Asking cute boys out,” he says, throwing Michael a grin, and Michael’s stomach flips.) 

And so he also learns that Calum’s gay, and that he’s been single his whole life. 

(“Are you serious? Michael says incredulously. Calum shrugs. 

“I’m not a blushing virgin, Michael,” he says, seeing the look on Michael’s face, and Michael scowls. 

“I didn’t say you were,” Michael says sullenly, but he’s secretly more than a little jealous of these nameless, faceless boys that have had the honour of fucking Calum Hood.) 

Of course, Michael’s not the only one in the school to notice Calum. 

A majority of the girls, and a good number of the boys, sing Calum’s praises to Michael every opportunity they get. He hears them talking in the corridors when Calum breezes past, smiling at them but eyes lighting up when he brushes past Michael (which Michael tries desperately not to think about when he’s staring out of the window daydreaming in the middle of a lesson). The staff are no better, either - Brenda and Caroline have been gossiping about Calum’s muscles so loudly that Michael only half-jokingly threatened to file a sexual harassment suit against them on his behalf. 

One thing that having an incredibly hot PE teacher has done wonders for, though, is school morale. 

It’s the only reason Michael’s standing at the corner of a wet field on a freezing May afternoon, wrapped in a thick coat and scarf and somehow still shivering, huddled between Luke and Ashton, whom he’d bribed-slash-threatened to join him because he didn’t want to be too obvious about it. 

(“Mike, I don’t think you could be less obvious about being in love with Calum if you tried,” Luke had said, rolling his eyes, but then Michael had pulled out his trump card - he’d give Luke his coveted spot in the corner of the staff room - and Luke had agreed to go.) 

“I fucking hate you,” Luke mumbles into the scarf currently covering a good half of his face. “I’m so fucking cold. This is not worth it to get you laid.”

“Fuck you,” Michael says automatically, eyes on Calum. He’s shouting encouragement and tactics at the Year 12 football team - not that Michael can hear it above the cheers and boos from the rest of the school and their opposition - but he looks so fucking good, brow creased as he focuses on the game. 

“Are there usually this many people at football games?” Ashton asks, looking around in wonder. “There aren’t, are there?”

“How d’you expect us to know?” Luke asks, exasperated. “We’re not usually at football games either.” 

“We’re being good friends,” Ashton tells Luke, a little sternly, and Luke huffs, but doesn’t say anything else. 

Their team scores, and the crowd erupts into cheers, because it’s now only two minutes until the end of the game and they’re two-one up, so it’s unlikely the result will change. Calum still looks determined, though, muttering something to Ben, the Year 12 captain, who nods and jogs back across the bitch to prepare for the kick-off. 

“I hate this,” Luke whines after a minute, because that’s apparently as long as he can keep quiet without reminding everyone how miserable he is. “This is why I’m a Maths teacher.” 

“Shut up,” Michael says, and then the final whistle blows and Calum’s face is finally relaxing, tension dissipating from his posture as he cheers with the rest of the crowd. 

“Calum looks really good tonight,” Ashton says, sending a glance in Michael’s direction.

“Alright, fuck me, I guess,” Luke grumbles. Ashton rolls his eyes. 

“You’re such a fucking bitch sometimes,” he says, but he looks around furtively before snaking his arm around Luke’s waist and giving it a quick squeeze. 

“Everyone knows you’re fucking,” Michael comments, still staring at Calum. “You don’t have to be sly about it.” 

“No they don’t,” Luke says, leaning into Ashton’s touch. 

“Yes, they do,” Michael says, and then he forgets what he was going to say next because Calum makes eye contact with him from across the pitch and gives him a huge grin, and Michael’s stomach bottoms out. “Fuck, he’s grinning at me.” 

“Well, grin back, idiot,” Ashton says, so Michael does. Calum holds his gaze for a moment, and then turns back to his team, leaving Michael feeling a little unsteady. 

“I’m in love,” he declares, for the nintieth time that week. 

“We know,” Luke says grumpily. 

 ------- 

 Michael’s halfway through marking 8A’s elements of music test when there’s a knock at the door. He looks up, expecting to see Luke or Ashton, not Calum. He looks out of place in his football kit in the music room, and Michael’s brain short-circuits as it tries to reconcile a hot man in Michael’s music room. 

“Hey,” he says, sticking his head around the door. “Am I disturbing you?”

“No,” Michael says, because Calum could walk in on him taking a shit and wouldn’t be disturbing him. “What’s up?” Calum steps into the room, clicking the door shut behind him, and throws himself down on a seat opposite Michael’s desk.

“So,” he says. “You know All Time Low are here next weekend?” Michael nods. He’s planning on going with Luke and Ashton. “I might have got two tickets to Sunday night.” 

“That’s sick,” Michael enthuses. “Who are you going with?” Calum throws Michael an odd look, somewhere between exasperation and amusement. 

“Well, I was hoping you’d want to come?” he says. Michael blinks. 

“Me?” he says. 

“Yeah,” Calum says, and there’s definitely a hint of amusement in his tone now. 

“I, uh.” Michael’s not really sure how to speak without saying yes, please, and please let me suck your dick while I’m at it. He swallows, hoping it’ll make the words disappear from the tip of his tongue. “I’d fucking love to.” Calum grins, looking relieved, and Michael realises that he must have been nervous . Something about that sends a thrill coursing through his veins - he’d made Calum nervous, somehow. 

“Sweet,” he says happily. “Text me your address? I’ll pick you up at five.” Michael just nods, not really trusting himself to speak, and Calum pulls himself up out of the chair, throwing him one last smile before he leaves the room. 

Fuck, Michael thinks, as the door swings shut behind Calum, pulling his phone out to Google how to fall out of love with a colleague. 

(It doesn’t help him at all.) 

 ------- 

 Next Sunday comes around faster than Michael had expected, given how much he’s been thinking about it. 

Luke and Ashton had been a little incensed when he’d told them he was no longer going with them but with Calum.

(“What?” Luke had said crossly. “Michael, you already bought your ticket.” 

“Yeah, but it’s a choice between third-wheeling you or one-on-one time with the love of my life,” Michael says dramatically. “What do you expect me to choose?”) 

At five to five, Michael’s sat in his living room, leg jiggling nervously as he checks his phone every two milliseconds just in case he’s somehow missed a notification from Calum in the time it’s taken him to blink. 

Calum, though, doesn’t even text to say he’s arrived, just rings the doorbell at five on the dot, scaring Michael shitless. 

“Hi,” Calum says, smiling, when Michael opens the door. He’s wearing a Nine Inch Nails shirt and straight-leg blue jeans, which should look incredibly nineties and not good at all, but somehow makes Michael want to drop to his knees right there and then. Although, he supposes, that’s what Michael wants to do regardless of what Calum is wearing, so it’s probably nothing to do with that. “You look gorgeous.” Michael has to bite his cheek to check whether he’s still alive and not, like, ascended to heaven.

“Thanks,” Michael mumbles when his mouth floods with pain and it becomes clear that yes, he is actually still alive, feeling heat rise to his cheeks from the sheer intimacy of this moment with a colleague-slash-friend-slash-soulmate-but-he-doesn’t-know-it. He’s so used to seeing Calum in the context of school that it feels strange to see him in normal clothes, standing on Michael’s doorstep. 

“Are you ready, or, like, d’you want me to stand here all evening?” Calum says after a moment, and Michael steps out of the house with a scowl. 

“Fuck you,” he says, trailing behind Calum as they walk to his car. 

“Maybe if you’re lucky,” Calum says, and Michael chokes on his next breath. Calum, however, doesn’t seem to notice, as he’s getting into the car and starting the engine. Michael takes the opportunity to splutter for a second, re-learning how to breathe for the first time in twenty-five years, and takes a deep breath before getting in the passenger side of the car. 

“What d’you reckon’s going to be on the set list?” Calum asks, reversing out of Michael’s driveway and setting off down the street. Michael hums in consideration. 

“Aside from the obvious?” he says. 

“No, Michael, tell me that Dear Maria’s going to be on the set list,” Calum says sarcastically. Michael scowls. 

“I’d punch you if you weren’t driving,” he tells Calum, and Michael sees him grin in the dim light. 

“I’ve found my shield,” Calum says, running a stop sign. Michael squawks as they swerve into the road, grabbing onto the handle on the door. Calum rolls his eyes. “Don’t be so dramatic, I’ve seen how you drive.” 

“Fuck off,” Michael says, scowling, but he can’t deny it. Speed is more important than safety, is his motto - mainly because he always sets off at least ten minutes late. 

“So?” Calum prompts. “Set list?” 

“I hope Monsters,” Michael says. “But honestly? I’d love some of the older stuff on there too.” 

“Yeah, I miss Stella being on the set list,” Calum says wistfully. 

“You saw them when Stella was on the set list?” 

“Yeah,” Calum says, a tad smug, and okay, fuck him. 

“Fuck,” Michael says, and he can’t even disguise the envy in his voice. Calum just laughs, throwing Michael a glance, and his eyes are glittering in the sunset, making Michael’s heart hurt a little bit. “You don’t deserve that.” 

“Hey,” Calum says, aiming for affronted, but he’s still grinning. “Don’t antagonise the driver.” 

“I can antagonise you all I want,” Michael says. “You’re not going to kill us on the way to an All Time Low gig.” 

“Might kill us on the way back, though,” Calum points out.

“Yeah, well, I can probably die happy, then,” Michael says, with a shrug. 

“True,” Calum agrees. “Good music, pretty boy in the passenger seat, what more could you want?” 

“Exactly,” Michael says emphatically, and it takes him until Calum’s started talking about the merits of Nothing Personal as compared to Don’t Panic to realise what Calum had just said. 

Michael’s in the passenger seat.

 ------- 

 The show, as expected, is amazing. 

Michael’s seen All Time Low, like, five times now, and they never fail to disappoint. He voices as such to Calum on the way home, running on a high of adrenaline and having seen Calum jumping in the pit, screaming the lyrics to every single song, which had only made Michael’s whole being-in-love-with-the-hot-PE-teacher situation a little more difficult to handle. 

“Right?” Calum enthuses, speeding along the almost-empty highway. “I’ve heard it so many times, but Therapy live just hits different.” 

“God, I know,” Michael groans, tipping his head back and closing his eyes, letting the memory flash in front of his eyes. “I actually heard the full band version live, once.” 

“Yeah?” Calum asks, a tinge of envy in his voice. Michael savours the moment. 

“Yeah,” he says, a touch smugly. “It was fucking sick.” 

“I can imagine,” Calum says. “I told Alex that they should play it like that tonight, but-” 

“Hang on,” Michael says, cutting Calum off, because he cannot be understanding this correctly. “Alex who?” Calum suddenly looks a little guilty. 

“Uh,” he says. 

“Alex who, Calum?” 

“Gaskarth?” Calum offers after a moment, and Michael gapes at him. 

“You know Alex Gaskarth?” 

“Well, y’know, I used to be in a band, and we opened for All Time Low, and-” 

“You opened for All Time Low?” Michael asks. Calum chews on his bottom lip. 

“Yeah,” he says. “I’m- look, I’m sorry for not telling you, okay? I got the tickets through Alex, but I thought if I told you you might just want to go for them, like, you wouldn’t get it, and-” 

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you know All Time Low,” Michael huffs, sinking down in his seat. Calum throws him a worried look, so Michael adds: “I knew there was a reason I kept you around,” which makes Calum smile as he turns into Michael’s road. 

“Fuck you,” he says, but the concern is fading from his face as he parks on the road by Michael’s house this time. They both get out of the car, and then Michael hovers awkwardly by the little path that leads to his house. 

“You’re a traitor,” he says, when Calum rounds the corner of his car and comes to stand opposite Michael. He’s lit up in the orange light of the streetlights, dark brown hair surrounded by a halo of amber, and Michael doesn’t think he’s seen a prettier sight in his life.

“I had to make sure you were coming for me,” Calum protests, a smile playing at his lips. Michael blinks at him. 

“What do you mean?” he says, nonplussed. 

“Well, y’know,” Calum says, shrugging. 

“I don’t know,” Michael says. Calum looks at him oddly. 

“Wait,” he says. “You...you know this was a date, right?” Michael gapes at him. 

“Are you- wait, what?” Calum’s face falls, and he takes a step back, and no, no, no, that’s not what Michael wants. “Wait, no, I-” 

“Fuck,” Calum says, laughing uncomfortably as he cards a hand through his hair. “I probably should have made it clearer, huh? I did say I was bad at asking out cute boys.” 

“Me?” Michael’s voice is a good three octaves higher than usual. “You think I’m cute?” Calum smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. 

“Michael, I’ve been flirting with you since, like, the minute I saw you,” he says. 

“You have?” 

“Jesus Christ,” Calum mutters, and then seems to pull himself together. “Look, I’m sorry if I, like, overstepped, made things uncomfortable, whatever. I’m happy to keep it professional, and-” he cuts himself off when Michael laughs. “What?” he says, and it comes out snappy. 

“Are you serious?” Michael says, and he’s grinning now, so much he thinks he probably looks a little creepy. 

“You’re kind of being a dickhead, now, you know that?” Calum says, a little sharply. 

“No, Calum, I- fucking hell,” Michael says, and a bubble of manic laughter escapes from him. “I’ve been kind of in love with you since, like, before we met.” Calum looks at him for a moment, expression unreadable

“Before we met?” Calum asks carefully. 

“Yeah,” Michael says, nodding. “10C pointed you out, in first period, and I kind of stared at you for half the lesson.” Calum says nothing for a moment, just keeps looking at Michael, and it’s starting to get a little unnerving, when-

“Oh,” Calum says, and a small smile is creeping onto his face. “You- wait, so, like, I didn’t misread it? You do like me?” 

“I mean, I did just say I was kind of in love with you, but sure, I like you," Michael says, and Calum grins, lit up by the streetlights and his happiness, and Michael thinks he’s found space in his heart that he didn’t even know he had since meeting Calum. 

“So,” Calum says. “This was a date?”

“This was definitely a date,” Michael agrees, feeling his stomach flip pleasantly at the words. 

“Would it be cliché to kiss you goodnight?” Calum asks, and Michael grins. 

“Definitely,” he says, “but I’ll kill you if you don’t.” Calum grins back, and takes two steps forward to close the space between them, bringing a hand to Michael’s jaw and pressing his lips to Michael’s gently. It’s chaste, sweet, slow, languid, and Calum kisses like Michael’s the only thing that matters in the world. He smells like mint and pine and vanilla, pressed close to Michael’s chest, slipping an arm around Michael’s waist, and Michael groans into the kiss as he thinks about Calum’s long fingers splayed across the small of his back. 

“Too much?” Calum asks, breaking away, and Michael shakes his head, pressing his forehead against Calum’s shoulder. 

“Not enough,” he says, because he doesn’t think he’s ever going to get enough of Calum Hood. Calum pulls him in for a proper hug, pressing a soft kiss to his temple, and Michael’s glad Calum’s got strong arms because he feels like his knees are about to give in. 

“Do you want to come in?” he mumbles against Calum’s shoulder. 

“Is that a proposition?” Calum says, smile evident in his voice. 

“Do you want it to be?”

“Maybe.” Michael swallows. Jesus Christ. 

“Then it is.” Calum pulls back and looks at Michael, suddenly serious. 

“Hey,” he says. “This isn’t- this isn’t just sex for me. I really like you, Michael. If you don’t want to, that’s okay. I want something more with you.” Michael grins. 

“Have I got to repeat the whole ‘kind of in love with you’ thing again?” he says, and Calum grins back. 

“Alright,” he says, and Michael hears his car squeaking to indicate it’s locked. “You’re making the excuses when we turn up to school tomorrow, though.” 

 -------

 A few students give them strange looks when they get out of Michael’s car in the morning. 

“Is this seriously the sportiest thing you own?” Calum grumbles for the fiftieth time, picking at the green hoodie and black jogging bottoms that Michael had chucked at him that morning. 

“Quit complaining,” Michael says, locking the car behind them and starting across the car park to the school. “Green’s your colour.” 

“Oh, that’s why you picked it,” Calum says, jogging a little to catch up with Michael. 

“Yeah,” Michael says with a grin, unashamed. Calum shakes his head, but he’s grinning too. 

“I’d kiss you right now if I could,” he says, as they turn into the building. 

“What’s stopping you?” Michael asks, as they make their way up the stairs to the staff room. 

“Uh, code of conduct? The contract I signed when I joined the school?” Michael rolls his eyes as he pushes open the door to the staff room. 

“Morning!” he chirps, heading straight for the desk Luke and Ashton are already sat at, Calum in his wake. 

“Morning!” a few people in the room chorus over the general buzz of post-weekend chatter. 

“Hey,” Luke says loudly, frowning. “Why’s Calum wearing your clothes?” 

The room goes still, and Michael just grins. 

[pricechecktranslations]

Hello! I'm just getting into Evillious, so I'm sorry if my questions have already been answered. I'm just very curious about a few things. 1. Pale Noel. He gets reset into Kiril, and Kiril winds up in the heavenly yard with Elluka. Does Pale never get to see Meta anymore? Do the people who have been reborn (in one way or another) still have their spirits persist? 2. When did Adam get into the Marlon spoon? 3. Why isn't there a representation of Envy in evils theater. Is it Ma? If so, why?

Oh geez. If you're just getting into Evillious and you already know that Pale was reset into Kiril someone's clearly been giving you spoilers.

Granted, answering these questions will also involve some spoilers.

Under the cut simply because it’s long, but also my advice to you if you’re first getting into the series is to read the novels--this information is a lot easier to absorb in its proper narrative context.

And it's fine. I like answering questions. Sometimes I might sound a little short if I'm having a bad day and I'm low on patience but truly, I like sharing information and I consider myself to be a reliable source.

1. This one is hard to answer because we don't know what happened to Meta. We're hoping that if/when Mothy makes OSS Punishment he will address this, but she hasn't shown up anywhere after her death, even as a spirit. Some people theorize she was reborn as Banica, but there's no evidence to suggest this.

I am not entirely sure what you mean by this second question--do you mean to ask if they retain the same soul between rebirthings? The answer to that is yes. People in Evillious are their souls. The body is more like the vessel that the soul resides in (though it can influence the soul--most souls choose to manifest as they appeared in life, for example). Most people--those who aren’t reborn in some fashion--have their souls go to the Heavenly Yard when they die.

It’s worth noting, I’m not entirely sure if Kiril actually ends up in the Heavenly Yard. The location he’s in is called Angolmois. Don’t know where that is, if it’s in the Evillious afterlife at all.

2. Not sure--most likely it was after Ma absorbed the Demon of Greed into herself, which would make it shortly before Gallerian was born. Though I’m not entirely certain of where she found him.

3. The whole “representation” thing is important thematically as far as the songs go, but it’s not really relevant to the actual plot. To sort of answer the question, at that point in the story, Ma has absorbed the Demon of Envy into herself. She’s also done that with the Demon of Greed, however.

Apologies if these answers aren’t as helpful as you’d like--it’s hard for me to know what information you do and don’t have.

[driftawayonceaday]

The Wind Cries Mary

April 25th

In 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience released their debut album Are You Experienced, and what a debut it was.  The album has classics such as “Purple Haze”, “Hey Joe”, “Foxy Lady”, and today’s song, “The Wind Cries Mary”.  Amazing.  Hendrix wrote all of the songs, with the exception of “Hey Joe”.  While people generally think of Hendrix’ guitar playing (rightfully so, as he was a virtuoso and single-handedly altered the course of musical history), he was also a songwriter.  And not just an average songwriter, but one in the same tradition as one of his major influences, Bob Dylan.  Although he was not as lyrically skilled as Dylan, Hendrix had skills.  Listen to how he starts “The Wind Cries Mary”.

After all the jacks are in their boxes

And the clowns have all gone to bed

You can hear happiness staggering on down the street

Footprints dressed in red

And the wind whispers Mary

Yeah, he could be a poet with words as well as with the guitar.  Admittedly, I tend to gravitate more towards Hendrix’ softer, bluesier tunes.  I love his guitar playing of course, but I appreciate the nuances of his playing more than the volume and distortion he exhibits in songs such as “Purple Haze”.  “The Wind Cries Mary” is a rock ballad.  It starts off with a blues feel in the gentle guitar.  When he slows it down, as he does with this tune, you can clearly hear how nimble Hendrix was with the guitar (not that we didn’t know that already).  Noel Redding’s bass intertwines perfectly with Hendrix’ performance.  Mitch Mitchell’s drums march you through the tune, as Hendrix’ multiple guitars set the mood of the song, along with his words.

A broom is drearily sweeping

Up the broken pieces of yesterday’s life

The guitar solo is a sharp, moderately pace rock-blues done like only Hendrix could.  There is a brightness to Hendrix’ guitar that shines through the gloom of the words, so the song doesn’t feel as sad as the words indicate.  Let this classic sweep you away for a few minutes.

[glittergummicandypeach]

How Gaul ‘Barbarians’ Influenced Ancient Roman Religion

The continental neighbors of the Romans, the Gauls were considered barbaric entities which the Republic and Empire attempted to colonize multiple times. Caesar’s numerous conquests on the mainland allowed for constant military encampment within Gaul, resulting in a need to bring the Gallic religion under some kind of Roman control. This culminated in what is now known as the Gallo-Roman religion, an amalgamation of the two faiths.

Caesar’s Gallic Wars

Stretching through modern day France and Spain, the Romans came into contact with the Gauls consistently throughout their history, most prominently when Julius Caesar made it his mission to dominate the tribes on the coast of the English Channel. In doing so, he paved the way for two marches on the British Isles, most notably his infamous "crossing the Rubicon," though both times he failed to conquer the Insular Gauls.

‘Vercingetorix Throws Down His Arms at the Feet of Julius Caesar’ (1899) by Lionel Noel Royer. ( Public Domain ) The painting depicts the surrender of the Gallic chieftain after the Battle of Alesia - 52 BC.

However, Caesar conquered much of Gaul during his Gallic Wars , so the Roman military often made their home in various Gallic territories—both for the battles, and to keep the Roman power in place following their victories. Because of this, it is believed that the Roman soldiers needed a way to worship their own gods and goddesses in this new territory.

Assimilating the Gods of the Gauls

One of the ways in which they accomplished this, also desiring to prevent overwhelming resistance from the native Gauls, was through assimilation, wherein the gods of the Gauls were likened to the Roman gods . This act is known as translation.

It is important to understand that the gods of the Gallic religion were not the same as those of the Romans. The Romans believed, like the Greeks , that their gods were idealized humans—they not only took human shape but also participated in various forms of human interaction and experience. That is to say that they loved, argued, took revenge, etc.

The Gallic gods, on the other hand, were representational deities —manifestations of the natural world. Not anthropomorphic, the springs and rivers and mountains and forests were worshipped as supernatural beings - but did not to take on human form. Worship, therefore, took place at the specific locations, and there were few—if any—specific temples dedicated to these natural forces.

A druid and warriors in Gaul. ( Erica Guilane-Nachez /Adobe Stock)

Gallic art reveals their belief in the gods quite clearly as, before the Romanization of the region, the gods were merely depicted as a consolidation of geometric shapes and stylized forms rather than bodily representations.  Epona, for example, the goddess of horses in the Gallic faith, was often represented as a horse by the natives rather than as a woman.

It was only when she was adopted by the Romans, one of the few deities taken from the Gauls and fully translated into the Roman pantheon, that she was depicted as a woman on a horse, riding into battle, alongside the Roman armies. Without the Roman influence, Epona would have remained a metaphor in art rather than a woman.

Epona, a resulting goddess from the Gallo-Roman fusion, was "the sole Celtic divinity ultimately worshipped in Rome itself." ( THIERRY /Adobe Stock)

Gallic Gods Renamed by the Romans

According to one of his written accounts, Caesar's Gallic Wars describes five primary gods of the Gallic religion. Their names, however, were given as those of five Roman gods: Mercury, Jupiter, Mars, Apollo, and Minerva. This was undoubtedly because the Romans associated the Gallic gods with their known Roman gods, believing—in a way—that all other pantheons were merely misnamed versions of their own.

With their legions spread throughout Gaul, and desiring to worship their native gods anyway, it was not all that difficult to associate the two faiths and thus retitle the Gallic deities. Adding a Roman epithet to the Gallic name allowed the two faiths to blend in such a way that the Gauls could still refer to their own gods while venerating those of Rome. This move was then followed by artistic integration, similar to the Roman adoption of Epona.

The Celtic gods soon began to take on human forms, forms similar to the depiction of their Roman counterparts in the empire. There is no known definite iconography that the Gauls had for their gods, so transforming the metaphorical images was not very difficult. Lugh, the god of light, soon came to look like Mercury; the protector Nodens began to hold the sword and helmet of Mars; Sulis became known for armor that looked eerily similar to Minerva's, and so on.

The five "primary" Gallic gods became very Roman in their appearance, thereby allowing the Gauls to continue to worship their deities in a Roman guise. This anthropomorphism was furthered by the Romans coupling the Gallic and Roman gods, creating intercultural relationships to reflect what was happening among the humans. Roman gods were given Gallic wives in the native regions, further cementing the idea in the minds of the Gauls that the Romans were there to stay.

Political Motives for Religious Integration

Though the Gallic-Roman integration was mostly spearheaded by the religious desires of the Roman legions, it is important to understand the ways in which this integration allowed the Romans to expand their empire with little resistance. By associating Roman gods with the native Gallic ones, the Romans were actually quite clever—instead of making the Gauls feel as though their religion was being forcibly removed, the Romans chose to show their "take-over" as a unification of ideas instead.

A votive offering to an unnamed Gallo-Roman deity. (Siren-Com/ CC BY SA 3.0 )

This attempt was undoubtedly intended to help prevent rebellions, as threatening the belief system of another culture can have drastic effects, and the Gauls were already seeing a shift in their political system with the coming of Rome.

Integrating religions allowed for an assumed level of respect between cultures (whether or not it was truly meant) and it created an idea that the gods wanted such an action to occur, as they themselves were merging with one another. Art was the fiercest tool the Romans had at their disposal when the Gallic Wars were won, and they did a very good job of merging the two faiths to show a false equality among cultures.

Top Image: Gallo-Roman mosaic on a wall in Saint Romain en Gal, France . The Gallo-Roman religion is an amalgamation of the Gaul and Roman faiths. Source: Ricochet64 /Adobe Stock

Caesar, Julius. Gallic Wars . trans. W. A. Macdevitt (Wilder Publications: Virginia, 2009.)

Castleden, Rodney. The Element Encyclopedia of the Celts (HarperCollins: United Kingdom, 2012.)

Green, M.  Gods of the Celts (Sutton Publishing Limited: United Kingdom, 1986.)

Henig, Martin. A Handbook of Roman Art: A comprehensive survey of all the arts of the Roman world (Cornell University Press: New York, 1983.)

Rodgers, Nigel. Life in Ancient Rome People and Places (Hermes House: London, 2006.)

Salway, Peter. Roman Britain: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2002.)

Scott, Sarah and Jane Webster. Roman Imperialism and Provincial Art (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2003.)

Wolf Gregg,  Becoming Roman: The Origins of Provincial Civilization in Gaul  (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge 1998.)

This content was originally published here.

[stardust2003]

Madferit: The Novel - Chapter 23

           "Where ya goin'?" Noel asked as he looked up from his guitar at me.

"Lunch with Kelly." I replied as I headed towards the door.

"Who?"

"My friend, Kelly. Roommate from back home. She lives in Levenshulme now."

"What the fuck's she doin' there?" He asked. The confusion on his face looked so real it was hard to tell if he was taking the piss or not.

"She lives there." I said flatly. I wasn't arsed for a game. "I told you that."

He shook his head. "No ya didn't."

"Yes I did."

"No ya-"

"Oh for fuck's sake!" I screamed. "You're not funny Noel so just stop-"

"Oi!" He barked as he got off the couch and came towards me. "Who the fuck d'ya think y'are? You're not to be talkin' to me like that. You're in my fuckin' house!"

"I'm not in your house, you prick! You're too fuckin' good for this place remember?"

He furrowed his eyebrows and looked like he was about to spit fire.

I shook my head. "I'm outta here!" I said before turning around and heading to the door.

"Hang on a minute!" He called after me. "Addie! Addie!"

"Our apartment in Lakewood." I began as I picked at my pasta. "We've still got a lease on it, don't we?"

"Yeah." Kelly replied. "Another six months, isn't it? You're still sending your rent, right?"

"Yeah. I mean, I'm having my mom wire the money to make it easier with all the international stuff but. Did you ever take your stuff out?"

"Not yet. I've still gotta get that figured out. How about you?"

I never thought I'd step foot in Cleveland again unless it was for a stop on some tour. The band had already been talking about where the international legs would be and of course the States were one of them. But after everything that happened, I wondered if it was worth the wait.

"I don't know." I replied quietly.

Concern took over her. "Addie?" She said. "Is everything alright?"

I felt the tears pooling as I thought about it, shaking my head trying to make the thinking stop.

But it was no use.

"Liam cheated on me."

"What?!"

I nodded. "He claims he didn't but I don't believe him." I sobbed. "He took off for hours when we were staying in London with Noel. He did it on tour too. He'd just disappear and I wouldn't see him for however long 'til he came back. There's this girl, Patsy. She's some actress. She came to a few of their shows and then one time I caught her and Liam...they were just sitting there pretending to be John and Yoko or something. I don't know if they were actually fucking or not but Liam claims he only invites her around 'cuz she brings him drugs. And then Noel said-"

"Wait." She stopped me by putting her hand up. "Why the fuck would you listen to Noel? He's a total ass-"

"He said Liam cheated on me in Japan. Another one of his shitty attempts at being John Lennon reincarnated."

She snorted in a sarcastic laugh. "Oh my God! What a fucking asshole! Him and Noel both. They try so hard to be the Beatles it's pathetic. You know Tony said the Beatles weren't even their biggest influence. Noel just told the press that 'cuz it sounded good."

I rolled my eyes. It was just another reason why I didn't belong in their world. I liked the Beatles. I liked the Roses but I could not do the Smiths or the Jam.

"Do you wanna come stay with me and Tony for a bit?" She offered. "Get you away from all the bull shit."

It's not like I could tell her no. I needed an escape even if it was only for an hour or two.

Contrary to Noel's likely hope, Tony didn't go back to that butcher shop. Instead, he got hired on giving drum lessons at some music shop. It didn't pay as much as the promotion for Definitely Maybe did but he was happy. He made enough to support himself, Kelly, and his little girl.

He was still out when Kelly and I got back to their flat. Ginger was dying for a walk so we took her out for a bit then came back and fixed tea.

"Thanks for this." I said holding my cup up to my mouth.

"You're welcome." She replied with a smile.

The tea was nice and warm which felt good on such a cold afternoon. The forecast didn't call for rain but the gloomy haze that hung in the sky made me wonder if it was wrong.

And of course, my mind reverted back to the other gloomy haze that hung inside it as well.

Did I dare tell Kelly about me and Noel? I could always tell her anything but this...this was different. This was treachery. This was sleeping with the enemy. I wasn't supposed to get on with Noel. I was supposed to despise him. For the sake of the band. The original band. The band he didn't even start.

But it was the band he saved. At least, that was what everyone said.

"I come with fifty songs already written." He boasted. "And all ready to take us to number one."

Tony called his bluff though. Said that was a lie just to get Alan McGee to sign them.

"He's full a shit, him." He informed me. "He'll say whatever it takes. Fuckin' snake in the grass."

And maybe he was snaking me. He was off his tits about ninety-five percent of the time. The song dedications and the declaration of his love – it was just the coke talking. It fucked up his words just like it fucked up his nose and upper lip. Shaved them down until they were practically nothing.

'That's what he's doing to you.' I warned myself. 'He just wants to break you so he can have you under his control. Don't fall for his shit. Don't you fucking dare!'

"Alright, Adds!" Tony said cheerfully as he came through the door. "Are ya joinin' us for tea?"

Of course I was. Kelly made sure we stopped at the grocery store and loaded up on comfort food. Homemade mac and cheese sounded fucking top with cheesecake for afterwards. There'd be movies later too.

And no drugs or celebrities willing to get their tits out just so you'd give them the time of day. It was the life I'd grown up with.

And the one I didn't realize how much I actually missed.

The meal was lovely and the quiet evening was even lovelier. I felt the slightest bit of a smile forming on my face as I lay there on the couch after Kelly and Tony had gone to bed.

It didn't take long for me to fall asleep but unfortunately it didn't last.

"What the fuck?!" I gasped at the loud pounding on the front door.

It continued and didn't even wake Ginger. Normally she'd have been flipping out being the guard dog she figured she was but now she was nowhere to be found.

If the dog didn't wake up that meant Kelly and Tony wouldn't either. What if it was a burglar or something?

But then again, did burglars ever have the decency to knock?

I got out of bed and crept to the door.

"What the fuck?" I whispered as I saw who it was.

"What the fuck are ya doin' here?!" He exclaimed.

"Shh!" I ordered. "Tony and Kelly are asleep!"

"I don't fuckin' care! You run off, I had to come find ya."

I rolled my eyes. "You're the one who run off!"

"Only for a bit." He reasoned. "Then I come back, right? And find out you've taken off. Left me gaff and then me mam's-"

"Wait." I said puzzled. "How did you-"

"Well my flat was a given. Didn't reckon you'd been there 'cuz Mam took ya in. Then I pop 'round hers and our Noel said-"

"Oh for God's sake!"

He scrunched his eyebrows curiously. "Are ya pissed at him or summat?" He asked. "'Cuz if y'are, just say the word and I'll give him a proper leatherin'. He'll not treat ya bad-"

"And neither will you." I said firmly.

He smiled clearly oblivious to how serious I was being. "That's right. You're my bird, right? My Tix. Our Noel can't-"

"Good night, Liam." I shut the door.

"Hang on!" He grabbed the door and held it open. "You're not gonna turn me out on the street, are ya?"

I awoke the next morning to the sight of Liam fast asleep next to me with his mouth hanging open.

"Your mouth'll dry out." I reminded him softly as I pushed up on his lower jaw to close it. "Imagine how that'll put ya off your singing."

His response to that was a sound asleep grunt.

I giggled as I watched him. I admired the way he looked so peaceful.

And then I admired something else.

"Use your nails, yeah?" He said softly. "It fuckin' itches!"

I did as he wanted making him sigh and tip his head back a little.

It felt a little coarse as my fingertips ran back and forth across it. It covered his cheeks and chin and surrounded his lips in a neat brown carpet that matched the hair on his head.

I noticed it the night before but was too caught up in the shock of his presence to really give it much thought. But now I had time to think. Time to analyze. Time to figure out why the fuck-

"Patsy says it looks good." He told me.

"Right." I replied with a sarcastic nod. "She the reason you went to London?"

"Nah. I was goin' to see the Cockney Cunt but she were there. She's always fuckin' there. Brought us some bugle and-"

"Told you to grow a beard?"

"Fuck no!" He said. "I won't have a bird tellin' me how to fuckin' dress and that. Not even you. But nah. She just got to talkin' about how John Lennon had a beard and them sideburns and I reckoned I should give it a try."

"Oh." I replied quietly.

"Yeah. So what ya think?"

"I think it makes you look like a dosser."

"You what?!" He exclaimed as he opened his eyes and sat up to look at me properly.

I took a breath trying to keep him calm. "It's not the right time of year for a beard. Wait 'til Christmas or something."

"Alright." He nodded a little.

I looked at him curiously. "You mean you're actually gonna get rid of it?" I asked.

"Yeah." He replied with another nod.

"What happened to not letting me or any other birds tell you how to dress?"

"Well I don't wanna look like a bloody dosser, do I? Plus it's too fuckin' itchy!" He began scratching his jaw vigorously. "It's doin' me fuckin' head-"

He shut up when I took over the scratching. "You're fuckin' amazin', you are, Tixie." He finally spoke again a couple minutes later.

"Yeah I know." I replied.

I kept it up for a few minutes before I finally stopped. My thoughts had taken over...much to Liam's oblivious chagrin.

"Are ya alright?" He asked looking at me those clear blue eyes fully awake. "Look like you're thinkin' about summat."

I sighed knowing he was right. There was only one way to deal with this...and it wasn't going to be easy.

"I think we should take a break." I said.

He furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. "What?"

"I don't wanna hold you back. You guys are on your way to being one of the biggest bands in the world and I can't keep up."

"Yes ya can! Ya already do. We're good together, you and me-"

"Then why do you keep running off?" I asked.

He opened his mouth to say something but I spoke again before he could.

"I'm too boring. You deserve someone that's fun. Someone like Patsy-"

"I don't want Patsy!" He argued. "I want you! All them other girls, they don't mean nothin'. They think if I sleep with 'em it'll lead to somethin' more but it won't. You-"

I shrugged my eyebrows. "Liam-"

"Is this your way of tryin' to free yourself up so ya can go fuck Our Kid?"

My heart skipped a beat as I stared at him stone faced.

His eyes remained perfectly clear. That dead stare just gazed right back at me. "He's fuckin' jealous of us." He said. "All he's got is Meg and fuck knows she ain't nothin' but a cheap slag. She's just along for the ride and does him better than his own fuckin' hand."

"She's not-"

"Yes she fuckin' is! Worse than a fuckin' groupie. He knows it but it's not like he can do any better."

"Stop!" I ordered.

"It's the fuckin' truth!" He said. "He wants you but he can't have ya so he starts stirrin' shit."

"Like telling me about all the groupies in Japan?"

He shook his head. "That wasn't-"

"Just stop, Liam!" I snapped. "I'm giving you a way out. A free pass to have all the groupies you can eat. Just take it and run."

"Alright." He said with a shrug.

He didn't argue any further. Didn't plead for me to reconsider. Not that I really expected anything different.

I left him at Kelly and Tony's. They still hadn't woken up before I left but I knew Tony wouldn't let him leave without a cup of tea when they finally did.

The tears poured as I made my way back to Burnage but dried just in time when I arrived at Peggy's front door.

She and Paul were out and I figured Noel was too as the first level of the house was empty, with his acoustic guitar sitting alone in the living room.

I went upstairs and heard the shower running. The bathroom door was shut but it didn't muffle the sound of the water...or Noel's singing.

I opened the door just enough to sneak in as he began another song.

I hate the way you've taken back

Everything you've given to me

And the way that you'd always say

It's nothing to do with me

I rolled my eyes as I sat down on the closed toilet lid. I waited for him to finish the first verse and then reached behind me and flushed.

"JESUS FUCKIN' CHRIST!" He yelled.

"Another song for Louise." I mused as I crossed my arms and leaned back a little. "Surprise, surprise."

The shower curtain flew open just enough for him to stick his head out.

"Addie?" He said as he looked at me confused. "What the-"

"Did she get a whole album?"

He went to reply but I left the bathroom before he could.

"Addie!" He called. "God dammit! Addie!"

My crying began again as I sat down on his bed and brought my knees up under my chin. My head was spinning and it wouldn't fucking stop.

The bedroom door swung open and revealing Noel standing in the doorway with a towel wrapped around his waist.

"What the fuck are you-"

"Do you love me?" I asked quickly.

He scrunched his eyebrows puzzled. "Course I fuckin'-"

"I dumped Liam because of you. Because you said you love me. Because you said he cheated on me. Because-"

"I do love you." He said as he came over and sat down beside me. "And we're meant to be together, regardless of what Our Kid thinks."

"Yeah." I said softly.

"Don't sound so excited." He chuckled.

I looked away and my eyes ended up on Liam's empty bed.

"We'll go down London, right?" Noel spoke again, changing the focus of my attention. "And we'll be the coolest fuckin' couple in Primrose Hill. Everyone'll be jealous of us."

"Is that the goal?" I asked curiously. "Make everyone jealous? So rock n' roll!"

"Fuck off! I can't help it everyone wants us. We're too big for Manchester, Adds. That's just the way it is."

I shook my head as I sighed. "I'm not going down London."

"Yes you are!"

"No I'm not!" I said firmly. "I can't be arsed for people who are too big for their boots."

"Is that how ya think of me?" He asked. "Ya think I'm talkin' a bunch a shit?"

"No but I'm not going to be associated with assholes. And you won't fucking make me."

He smirked at me.

I looked at him curiously. "What?" I asked.

"So you're a single woman now?" He said. "You and our Liam are finally done?"

"Guess so."

"Does that mean you're up for the takin'?"

"No actually it doesn't!" I felt my heart rising up. "Nobody's taking me anywhere."

He snorted. "Ya sure about that?"

"Yeah." I said firmly. "If you want me, you're gonna have to do it proper."

"Well I've already done that." He replied. "I gave ya me bed and I didn't fuckin' say anythin'. I-" He stopped when he saw me pursing my lips at him. "What ya want me to say?"

I widened my eyes a little trying not to roll them. "You mean I have to tell you?"

His breath hitched as he held off his response.

"I'm not gonna wait for another album!" I warned him. "Or even a fucking B-side. Say it proper or I'm staying up North!"

"Alright!" He exclaimed. "Will ya help me make this proper, right? And say you're my girlfriend?"

"Why?"

He twisted his face in confusion. "What d'ya mean why?"

"Why do you want me to be your girlfriend?" I clarified.

"'Cuz I love you and it fuckin' kills me to see ya with someone else. Save my heart, yeah? Keep it safe."

"What about my heart?"

He rolled his eyes. "Jesus, Addie!" He said. "Why d'ya always ask so many fuckin'-"

"Because it's the only way you'll-"

His lips were firm but gentle as he pushed me to lay back on the bed.

"You needn't worry about your heart, Adds." He said softly. His sky blues eyes putting me into a trance. "I'll look after it. Just like that night at Glasto'."

I smiled up at him.

He smiled back and then leaned down to my ear.

So what do you say?

I giggled.

He grinned again showing that awful gap in his teeth just a bit. "I need an answer, Adds." He said.

"Alright." I replied.

"Alright what?"

"What do you think?"

He chuckled allowing that gap to reappear.

[trendingnewsb]

Wild Amazon faces destruction as Brazils farmers and loggers target national park

The Sierra Ricardo Franco park was meant to be a conservation area protecting rare wildlife

To understand why the Brazilian government is deliberately losing the battle against deforestation, you need only retrace the bootmarks of the Edwardian explorer Percy Fawcett along the Amazonian border with Bolivia.

During a failed attempt to cross a spectacular tabletop plateau here in 1906, the adventurer nearly died on the first of his many trips to South America. Back then, the area was so far from human habitation, the foliage so dense and the terrain so steep that Fawcett and his party came close to starvation.

He returned home with tales of a towering, inaccessible mesa teeming with wildlife and irrigated by secret waterfalls and crystalline rivers. By some accounts, this was one of the stories that inspired his friend Arthur Conan Doyle to write The Lost World about a fictional plateau jutting high above the jungle that served as a sanctuary for species long since extinct elsewhere.

In their wildest fantasies, however, neither Fawcett nor Conan Doyle are likely to have imagined the modern reality of that plateau, which can no longer be certain of protection from geography, the law or Brazils international commitments.

Today, orange dirt roads, cut into the forest by illegal loggers, lead you to the north-western flank of the elevated hilltop. Now called the Serra Ricardo Franco state park, this is nominally a conservation area set up with support from the World Bank. Instead of forest, however, you find swaths of land invaded by farmers, stripped of trees, and turned over to pasture for 240,000 cows. There are even private airfields inside the parks boundaries, which exist on maps only.

Far from being an isolated area where a wanderer might starve, this is now despite its dubious legal status one of the worlds great centres of food production. In recent months, it has also emerged as a symbol of the resurgent influence of a landowning class in Brazil who, even more than in the US under Donald Trump, are cashing in on the destruction of the wild.

Locals say a member of President Michel Temers cabinet chief of staff Eliseu Padilha owns ranches here on hillsides stripped of forest in a supposedly protected park. The municipal ombudsmen told the Observer the cattle raised here are then sold in contravention of pledges to prosecutors and international consumers to JBS, the worlds biggest meat-packing company, which is at the centre of a huge bribery scandal.

These allegations are denied by farmers but there is no doubt the government is easing controls as it opens up more land for ranches, dams, roads and soy fields to meet the growing appetite of China. Last year, Brazil reported an alarming 29% increase of deforestation, raising doubts that the country will be able to meet its global commitments to reduce carbon emissions. Rather than an aberration, this appears to mark a return to historical norms for a country that has been built on 500 years of land seizures that were later legalised by the politicians who benefited from them.

The concurrent erosion of legal authority and natural habitat can be seen in many Brazilian states: the newest soy frontiers of Maranho, Tocantins and Bahia; the hydropower heartland of Par and the wild west mining and logging regions of Rondnia and Acre. But it is in Mato Grosso that the political forces behind deforestation associated with corruption, violence, weak regulation and deliberate obfuscation of land ownership reveal themselves most clearly.

The 158,000-hectare Serra Ricardo Franco state park is supposed to be a conservation area, but farmers and loggers moved in to clear the land. Photograph: Phil Clarke Hill/Corbis via Getty Images

The 158,000-hectare Serra Ricardo Franco state park sits at the intersection of three great biomes; the Amazon rainforest, the Cerrado tropical savanna and the Pantanal wetlands. Its western neighbour, separated only by the narrow Rio Verde, is Bolivias dense Noel Kempff Mercado National Park, which covers an area five times larger. Together, they make up one of the worlds biggest and most biodiverse ecological reserves.

To the east are the light green plains of Mato Grosso a state bigger than the combined area of the UK and France which was named after the once thick bushland that has now mostly been cleared for soy fields and cattle ranches.

The plan to establish a park in this geologically and biologically important landscape was agreed amid the giddy optimism of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, which was hailed as a breakthrough for international cooperation on the environment.

Ricardo Franco was one of nine conservation areas promised by the Mato Grosso government in return for a $205m loan from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The primary source of funds was the World Bank, which noted at the time that the money was to be used for vehicles, staff training and salaries, office construction and research. The envisaged Ricardo Franco park was supposed to cover 400,000 hectares.

The reality was very different. After several years of studies, the park that was eventually established in 1997 was less than half the expected size. At least 20,000 hectares of it had already been cleared by farmers who were supposed to be compensated and removed. This never happened. Nor could the Observer find evidence of fences ever being erected, or administrative centres built either in the park nor the nearest town of Vila Bela da Santssima Trindade.

The only signs and boundary markers are for fazendas (plantations). Although the park is supposed to be publicly owned and used only for ecotourism or scientific research, many areas could only be accessed after paying an entrance fee or requesting a key from the owner of the farm occupying the property.

Serro Ricardo Franco is in one of the worlds biggest and most diverse ecological reserves. But reality on the ground is different, putting many animals at risk, such as Yacare caiman and giant river otters. Photograph: Angelo Gandolfi/Getty Images/Nature Picture Library

A quarter of the land has been cleared over the past four decades, but there are still areas of immense natural beauty and biodiversity that have changed little since Fawcetts time. Over two half-days, the Observer spotted an armadillo, spider monkeys, capuchins, otters, fish leaping a waterfall, clouds of butterflies, and a hand-sized spider that was slowly succumbing to the sting of a giant vespa wasp. Local guides report sightings of panthers, pumas, anaconda, pink dolphins and six-metre long alligators.

Trails now lead up to the previously undisturbed heights, but they are rarely used. The 5km hiking route to the 248-metre high Jatoba waterfall was deserted, as were the sapphire waters of the Agua Azul canyon. It was not, however, well maintained. Rubbish and used toilet paper littered one area. Another clearing was scarred with the charred remains of a barbecue (likely to be prohibited as a fire hazard in a well-run conservation area). On the banks of the Rio Verde, fishing lines were tangled on the rocks despite signs declaring Strictly no fishing or hunting. But it is undoubtedly the 20,000 to 39,000 hectares of farmland (the size is disputed) that has had the biggest environmental impact.

What is happening in the park is very sad, said a local biologist, who asked for her name to be withheld because she fears repercussions. This area is very important. There are species here not found anywhere else. But its degrading year by year.

Ranchers inside the park disagree. Ademir Talini, the manager of the Fazenda de Serra, boasts of boosting production of soy and beef on what he claims is the third most fertile land in the world.

Our municipality has the biggest abattoir in Brazil, the best beef comes from here and farms here contribute greatly to GDP, he says. He then points toward the nearby border with Bolivia. Over there is the biggest conservation area in the world. So what difference does 39,000 hectares make?

He points out that many of the farms preceded the creation of the park a refrain echoed by other ranchers.

The state government created a virtual park to get money, said Donizete dos Reis Lima, who owns the farm next to the border. Nobody here is against the park. I want a future for my children. But lets have a decent park. If we go, who is going to pay us compensation.

About 240,000 cattle graze within the cleared forest in the park. This farm is owned by government chief of staff Eliseu Padilha. Photograph: Jonathan Watts for the Observer

The issue is not black and white. The burly farmer says he is the legal owner of the land, having arrived in the area long before it was a park. But he also recounts how he opened up the roads to the region as part of his work as a logger. The area he cleared was later regularised by the land agency (Incra).

Then, as now, this process often involved corruption and collusion with the authorities. Elsio Ferreira de Souza, a retired municipal employee, recalls the illegal origins of land clearances in the 1970s. It was done with the connivance of local politicians and only later legalised, he says.

Regiane Soares de Aguiar, the public prosecutor who has filed multiple lawsuits against the farmers, agrees. All of the land was cleared illegally, she says. Even the landowners that were there before the creation of the park would not have had permission to deforest the land. Satellite data shows the problem has since worsened, she said, as more farmers moved inside the park, bringing more cattle that needed more pasture.

This illegal activity has done spectacular damage to forest and water sources. According to the prosecutor, JBS should share the blame because the meat company has bought livestock from inside the park despite a pledge to public prosecutors, foreign buyers and environmental NGOs not to source cattle from illegally cleared land. To get around this, it briefly launders the animals at untainted farms outside the park before taking them to the slaughter.

In a statement to the Observer, JBS said it had blocked sales from farms inside the park after being requested to do so by the prosecutors office. The company said it used data from satellites, the environment agency, ministry of labour and other sources to monitor its 70,000 cattle suppliers. The results, it said, were independently audited.

Since 2013, more than 99.9% of direct suppliers located purchases of cattle in the Amazon region comply with the Public Commitment of Livestock and agreements signed with federal prosecutors, it noted.

But cattle laundering is rife. Regulation is a challenge at the best of times. Even when the authorities impose a penalty for forest clearances or other violations, very few fines are ever paid.

I penalise them, but they challenge me in the courts and justice is so slow, says Laerte Marques, from the State Secretariat for the Environment (Sema). It has been very difficult. There is pressure from all sides. On one side there is the public prosecutor, on the other are the farmers.

The landowners have launched a campaign for the park to be abolished. Prosecutors, however, have urged the conservation area be administered on a more formal footing. Last month, they appeared to have won a victory when the Mato Grosso government announced a two-year study to determine the status of the park and what should become of its farms. But there are fears this will simply shrink the boundaries and allow the farms to be excluded.

Powerful landowners are trying to use this opportunity to reduce the limits of the park, said Aguiar. That would only benefit those who cleared forest. But there is a lot of economic power behind them, she warned.

Near the entrance of the Paredon 1 Fazenda is an overgrown airstrip and a dirt road that cuts through the state park to fields of cattle grazing among tree stumps on an otherwise bare hillside overlooking the Bolivian forest. This is one of several farms in the park owned directly or indirectly by Eliseu Padilha, the chief of staff. Locals in Vila Bela say he is an intimidating presence. He is not the only one. Several of Brazils richest businessmen as well as local politicians own land inside the park.

The forces lined up against conservation have deep roots. The post-colonial history of Brazil is, to a large extent, the history of deforestation. Following the arrival of European ships, settlers carved out roads into the jungle in search of gold. Since then, massive fortunes have been made by the clearance of forest, initially for coffee and rubber plantations and more recently for cattle and soy. Landowners happily backed the 1964-85 military dictatorship, which ensured that campaigners for indigenous rights and agrarian reform did not get in the way of farm and ranch expansions. The return of democracy initially made little difference. The first president under the new constitution was Jos Sarney, an old-school coronel who ruled the northern state of Maranho as if it were his personal fiefdom. Deforestation surged to new peaks at the turn of the 21st century.

The first time the problem came close to being brought under control was during the initial Workers party administration of Luiz Incio Lula da Silva (2003-06). His environment minister at the time, Marina Silva, put in place tougher penalties and a monitoring system that used satellites in the sky and rangers on the ground to identify farmers who burned or cut down forests. This resulted in an impressive slowdown that lasted nearly a decade, winning kudos from the international community and putting Brazil in an influential position in global climate talks.

But the effectiveness of this system weakened under Lulas Workers party successor as president Dilma Rousseff, who was much closer to the ruralista lobby than her predecessor. She had little choice. Increased demand for soy and beef, particularly from China, had made agriculture the main driver for economic growth and a political force to be reckoned with.

With 200 seats, the bancada ruralista had become the most powerful caucus in Congress. To placate them, Rousseff approved a relaxation of the Forest Code, which was the main legal tool against tree felling. It was a disaster for the Amazon.

Before that change in 2012, deforestation rates had been creeping down. After it, rates increased by 75%, according to Paulo Barreto, a senior researcher at Imazon, an independent monitoring organisation. He said this put at risk the commitments Brazil had made in international climate talks to reduce annual clearance to 3,800 square kilometres per year by 2020. At one point, we were on the right path. But last year, 8,000 square kilometres were cleared, double the goal for 2020, he points out. Two-thirds of Brazils carbon emissions come from this source.

Meanwhile, beef and soy barons have strengthened their grip on power. After last years impeachment of Rousseff, her replacement, Michel Temer, appointed several ruralistas to his cabinet and moved to dismantle and dilute the institutions and laws that slowed forest clearance.

His pick as agriculture minister is Blairo Maggi, the owner of the countrys biggest soy producer, Amaggi Group, and a former governor of Mato Grosso, who supported moves to abolish the Ricardo Franco park. The justice minister, Osmar Serraglio, is at the forefront of the beef lobby, which was his main campaign donor, and a fierce opponent of indigenous land demarcation (the most effective method of forest protection).

Under his watch, the National Indian Foundation (Funai) has seen its finances and personnel gutted. The foundations president, Antnio Costa, was sacked earlier this year. In a parting speech, he described Serraglio as a dictator. He is the minister of one cause: agro-business, he warned.

The counterbalance ought to be the environment ministry, which is headed by Jos Sarney Filho, the son of the top landowner in Maranho state. Although his ideals are widely praised by conservationists, his ability to act has been neutered. Last year, the environment budget was cut by 51% (compared to a 31% reduction of the Environmental Protection Agency in the US under Trump).

In March, the ministers weak position was apparent when he issued a grovelling public apology to JBS after inspectors embargoed two meat-processing factories that were alleged to have bought tens of thousands of cattle from illegally deforested areas of the Amazon. Rather than assess the rights and wrongs of the case, the minister said the action was badly timed because it could hurt a major exporter that was already bogged down in scandal.

Almost every week, there is a new roll back of forest protections. Last Tuesday, the Senate approved a bill that slashed protected areas in the Amazon by 597,000 hectares (about four times the area of Greater London). The previous week, the lower house of Congress paved the way for the legalisation of land that had been illegally occupied by grileiro a move that is likely to encourage more seizures and forest clearance. Environmental licensing requirements for agriculture have been emasculated.

Temers unhealthily close ties to the agriculture lobby may yet, however, come to be his undoing.

Earlier this month, the attorney-general formally accused the president and his aides of accepting bribes and colluding with top executives from JBS to buy the silence of witnesses in a corruption scandal. Temer has denied all wrongdoing. The evidence was provided in a plea-bargain by the owners of the beef company, which is reportedly looking for a clean bill of legal health so that it can relocate its headquarters to the US. If so, its links to Padilha and the cattle raised inside Ricardo Franco and numerous other conservation areas also deserves more scrutiny, as does the process for deciding whether farms will be excluded from the soon-to-be regularised park.

Foreign adventurers and Brazilian bandeirantes helped to pave the way for this development, even if their intention was to escape fazendas and cities alike. As Fawcett said: Deep down inside me a tiny voice was calling. At first scarcely audible, it persisted until I could no longer ignore it. It was the voice of the wild places, and I knew that it was now part of me forever.

With each day that passes, that voice is becoming harder to hear.

The tatu-bola armadillo was last year reclassified as at risk of extinction. Photograph: belizar73/Getty Images/iStockphoto

World Cup mascot is now at risk as forests disappear

The tatu-bola armadillo, the mascot for the 2014 World Cup, is now a symbol for a very different phenomenon in Brazil: the growing impact of deforestation on biodiversity.

The small armoured mammal was chosen to represent the tournament because it rolls up into the shape of a football when threatened, but its ability to protect itself has been undermined by a loss of habitat that is also devastating thousands of other species.

Late last year, the International Union for Conservation of Nature raised the alarm by reclassifying the creature also known as the three-banded armadillo from vulnerable to at risk of extinction.

This has prompted the group that led the campaign for its selection as a mascot to launch a crowdfunding drive last month to raise $500,000 to save the animal.

Samuel Portela, co-ordinator of protected areas at the Caatinga Association, estimates the tatu-bola population has declined by 30% in the past decade due to deforestation and hunting.It is fundamental that steps be taken towards the conservation of this species and its habitat, because under the present conditions, the tatu-bola could be extinct in 50 years, he said.

The animal is mainly found in the northeastern Brazil in the caatinga (an indigenous term for white or desert forest) and cerrado tropical savannas. Even more than the Amazon, these two ecosystems have been diminished by the expansion of farmland.

Scientists warn that many other animals face similar or worse threats and the risks are rising along with the pace of land clearance in Brazil, the worlds most biodiverse nation. Last year, the government reported a 29% increase in deforestation the sharpest rise in more than a decade. Forest clearing in Brazil has already condemned at least 20 species of birds, 10 species of mammals and eight of amphibians to regional extinction. Scientists estimate this is just a fifth of those that will die out due to habitat loss. Among the most endangered are giant otters and bare-faced tamarins. A 2015 study predicted half of the 15,000 tree species in the Amazon could be lost if current rates of deforestation continue.

According to the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation, the tatu-bola faces a particularly hard struggle to recover its population because of the animals low metabolic rate, small litter size, prolonged parental care and long gestation periods.

WILDLIFE OF THE LOST WORLD

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[trendingnewsb]

Wild Amazon faces destruction as Brazils farmers and loggers target national park

The Sierra Ricardo Franco park was meant to be a conservation area protecting rare wildlife

To understand why the Brazilian government is deliberately losing the battle against deforestation, you need only retrace the bootmarks of the Edwardian explorer Percy Fawcett along the Amazonian border with Bolivia.

During a failed attempt to cross a spectacular tabletop plateau here in 1906, the adventurer nearly died on the first of his many trips to South America. Back then, the area was so far from human habitation, the foliage so dense and the terrain so steep that Fawcett and his party came close to starvation.

He returned home with tales of a towering, inaccessible mesa teeming with wildlife and irrigated by secret waterfalls and crystalline rivers. By some accounts, this was one of the stories that inspired his friend Arthur Conan Doyle to write The Lost World about a fictional plateau jutting high above the jungle that served as a sanctuary for species long since extinct elsewhere.

In their wildest fantasies, however, neither Fawcett nor Conan Doyle are likely to have imagined the modern reality of that plateau, which can no longer be certain of protection from geography, the law or Brazils international commitments.

Today, orange dirt roads, cut into the forest by illegal loggers, lead you to the north-western flank of the elevated hilltop. Now called the Serra Ricardo Franco state park, this is nominally a conservation area set up with support from the World Bank. Instead of forest, however, you find swaths of land invaded by farmers, stripped of trees, and turned over to pasture for 240,000 cows. There are even private airfields inside the parks boundaries, which exist on maps only.

Far from being an isolated area where a wanderer might starve, this is now despite its dubious legal status one of the worlds great centres of food production. In recent months, it has also emerged as a symbol of the resurgent influence of a landowning class in Brazil who, even more than in the US under Donald Trump, are cashing in on the destruction of the wild.

Locals say a member of President Michel Temers cabinet chief of staff Eliseu Padilha owns ranches here on hillsides stripped of forest in a supposedly protected park. The municipal ombudsmen told the Observer the cattle raised here are then sold in contravention of pledges to prosecutors and international consumers to JBS, the worlds biggest meat-packing company, which is at the centre of a huge bribery scandal.

These allegations are denied by farmers but there is no doubt the government is easing controls as it opens up more land for ranches, dams, roads and soy fields to meet the growing appetite of China. Last year, Brazil reported an alarming 29% increase of deforestation, raising doubts that the country will be able to meet its global commitments to reduce carbon emissions. Rather than an aberration, this appears to mark a return to historical norms for a country that has been built on 500 years of land seizures that were later legalised by the politicians who benefited from them.

The concurrent erosion of legal authority and natural habitat can be seen in many Brazilian states: the newest soy frontiers of Maranho, Tocantins and Bahia; the hydropower heartland of Par and the wild west mining and logging regions of Rondnia and Acre. But it is in Mato Grosso that the political forces behind deforestation associated with corruption, violence, weak regulation and deliberate obfuscation of land ownership reveal themselves most clearly.

The 158,000-hectare Serra Ricardo Franco state park is supposed to be a conservation area, but farmers and loggers moved in to clear the land. Photograph: Phil Clarke Hill/Corbis via Getty Images

The 158,000-hectare Serra Ricardo Franco state park sits at the intersection of three great biomes; the Amazon rainforest, the Cerrado tropical savanna and the Pantanal wetlands. Its western neighbour, separated only by the narrow Rio Verde, is Bolivias dense Noel Kempff Mercado National Park, which covers an area five times larger. Together, they make up one of the worlds biggest and most biodiverse ecological reserves.

To the east are the light green plains of Mato Grosso a state bigger than the combined area of the UK and France which was named after the once thick bushland that has now mostly been cleared for soy fields and cattle ranches.

The plan to establish a park in this geologically and biologically important landscape was agreed amid the giddy optimism of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, which was hailed as a breakthrough for international cooperation on the environment.

Ricardo Franco was one of nine conservation areas promised by the Mato Grosso government in return for a $205m loan from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The primary source of funds was the World Bank, which noted at the time that the money was to be used for vehicles, staff training and salaries, office construction and research. The envisaged Ricardo Franco park was supposed to cover 400,000 hectares.

The reality was very different. After several years of studies, the park that was eventually established in 1997 was less than half the expected size. At least 20,000 hectares of it had already been cleared by farmers who were supposed to be compensated and removed. This never happened. Nor could the Observer find evidence of fences ever being erected, or administrative centres built either in the park nor the nearest town of Vila Bela da Santssima Trindade.

The only signs and boundary markers are for fazendas (plantations). Although the park is supposed to be publicly owned and used only for ecotourism or scientific research, many areas could only be accessed after paying an entrance fee or requesting a key from the owner of the farm occupying the property.

Serro Ricardo Franco is in one of the worlds biggest and most diverse ecological reserves. But reality on the ground is different, putting many animals at risk, such as Yacare caiman and giant river otters. Photograph: Angelo Gandolfi/Getty Images/Nature Picture Library

A quarter of the land has been cleared over the past four decades, but there are still areas of immense natural beauty and biodiversity that have changed little since Fawcetts time. Over two half-days, the Observer spotted an armadillo, spider monkeys, capuchins, otters, fish leaping a waterfall, clouds of butterflies, and a hand-sized spider that was slowly succumbing to the sting of a giant vespa wasp. Local guides report sightings of panthers, pumas, anaconda, pink dolphins and six-metre long alligators.

Trails now lead up to the previously undisturbed heights, but they are rarely used. The 5km hiking route to the 248-metre high Jatoba waterfall was deserted, as were the sapphire waters of the Agua Azul canyon. It was not, however, well maintained. Rubbish and used toilet paper littered one area. Another clearing was scarred with the charred remains of a barbecue (likely to be prohibited as a fire hazard in a well-run conservation area). On the banks of the Rio Verde, fishing lines were tangled on the rocks despite signs declaring Strictly no fishing or hunting. But it is undoubtedly the 20,000 to 39,000 hectares of farmland (the size is disputed) that has had the biggest environmental impact.

What is happening in the park is very sad, said a local biologist, who asked for her name to be withheld because she fears repercussions. This area is very important. There are species here not found anywhere else. But its degrading year by year.

Ranchers inside the park disagree. Ademir Talini, the manager of the Fazenda de Serra, boasts of boosting production of soy and beef on what he claims is the third most fertile land in the world.

Our municipality has the biggest abattoir in Brazil, the best beef comes from here and farms here contribute greatly to GDP, he says. He then points toward the nearby border with Bolivia. Over there is the biggest conservation area in the world. So what difference does 39,000 hectares make?

He points out that many of the farms preceded the creation of the park a refrain echoed by other ranchers.

The state government created a virtual park to get money, said Donizete dos Reis Lima, who owns the farm next to the border. Nobody here is against the park. I want a future for my children. But lets have a decent park. If we go, who is going to pay us compensation.

About 240,000 cattle graze within the cleared forest in the park. This farm is owned by government chief of staff Eliseu Padilha. Photograph: Jonathan Watts for the Observer

The issue is not black and white. The burly farmer says he is the legal owner of the land, having arrived in the area long before it was a park. But he also recounts how he opened up the roads to the region as part of his work as a logger. The area he cleared was later regularised by the land agency (Incra).

Then, as now, this process often involved corruption and collusion with the authorities. Elsio Ferreira de Souza, a retired municipal employee, recalls the illegal origins of land clearances in the 1970s. It was done with the connivance of local politicians and only later legalised, he says.

Regiane Soares de Aguiar, the public prosecutor who has filed multiple lawsuits against the farmers, agrees. All of the land was cleared illegally, she says. Even the landowners that were there before the creation of the park would not have had permission to deforest the land. Satellite data shows the problem has since worsened, she said, as more farmers moved inside the park, bringing more cattle that needed more pasture.

This illegal activity has done spectacular damage to forest and water sources. According to the prosecutor, JBS should share the blame because the meat company has bought livestock from inside the park despite a pledge to public prosecutors, foreign buyers and environmental NGOs not to source cattle from illegally cleared land. To get around this, it briefly launders the animals at untainted farms outside the park before taking them to the slaughter.

In a statement to the Observer, JBS said it had blocked sales from farms inside the park after being requested to do so by the prosecutors office. The company said it used data from satellites, the environment agency, ministry of labour and other sources to monitor its 70,000 cattle suppliers. The results, it said, were independently audited.

Since 2013, more than 99.9% of direct suppliers located purchases of cattle in the Amazon region comply with the Public Commitment of Livestock and agreements signed with federal prosecutors, it noted.

But cattle laundering is rife. Regulation is a challenge at the best of times. Even when the authorities impose a penalty for forest clearances or other violations, very few fines are ever paid.

I penalise them, but they challenge me in the courts and justice is so slow, says Laerte Marques, from the State Secretariat for the Environment (Sema). It has been very difficult. There is pressure from all sides. On one side there is the public prosecutor, on the other are the farmers.

The landowners have launched a campaign for the park to be abolished. Prosecutors, however, have urged the conservation area be administered on a more formal footing. Last month, they appeared to have won a victory when the Mato Grosso government announced a two-year study to determine the status of the park and what should become of its farms. But there are fears this will simply shrink the boundaries and allow the farms to be excluded.

Powerful landowners are trying to use this opportunity to reduce the limits of the park, said Aguiar. That would only benefit those who cleared forest. But there is a lot of economic power behind them, she warned.

Near the entrance of the Paredon 1 Fazenda is an overgrown airstrip and a dirt road that cuts through the state park to fields of cattle grazing among tree stumps on an otherwise bare hillside overlooking the Bolivian forest. This is one of several farms in the park owned directly or indirectly by Eliseu Padilha, the chief of staff. Locals in Vila Bela say he is an intimidating presence. He is not the only one. Several of Brazils richest businessmen as well as local politicians own land inside the park.

The forces lined up against conservation have deep roots. The post-colonial history of Brazil is, to a large extent, the history of deforestation. Following the arrival of European ships, settlers carved out roads into the jungle in search of gold. Since then, massive fortunes have been made by the clearance of forest, initially for coffee and rubber plantations and more recently for cattle and soy. Landowners happily backed the 1964-85 military dictatorship, which ensured that campaigners for indigenous rights and agrarian reform did not get in the way of farm and ranch expansions. The return of democracy initially made little difference. The first president under the new constitution was Jos Sarney, an old-school coronel who ruled the northern state of Maranho as if it were his personal fiefdom. Deforestation surged to new peaks at the turn of the 21st century.

The first time the problem came close to being brought under control was during the initial Workers party administration of Luiz Incio Lula da Silva (2003-06). His environment minister at the time, Marina Silva, put in place tougher penalties and a monitoring system that used satellites in the sky and rangers on the ground to identify farmers who burned or cut down forests. This resulted in an impressive slowdown that lasted nearly a decade, winning kudos from the international community and putting Brazil in an influential position in global climate talks.

But the effectiveness of this system weakened under Lulas Workers party successor as president Dilma Rousseff, who was much closer to the ruralista lobby than her predecessor. She had little choice. Increased demand for soy and beef, particularly from China, had made agriculture the main driver for economic growth and a political force to be reckoned with.

With 200 seats, the bancada ruralista had become the most powerful caucus in Congress. To placate them, Rousseff approved a relaxation of the Forest Code, which was the main legal tool against tree felling. It was a disaster for the Amazon.

Before that change in 2012, deforestation rates had been creeping down. After it, rates increased by 75%, according to Paulo Barreto, a senior researcher at Imazon, an independent monitoring organisation. He said this put at risk the commitments Brazil had made in international climate talks to reduce annual clearance to 3,800 square kilometres per year by 2020. At one point, we were on the right path. But last year, 8,000 square kilometres were cleared, double the goal for 2020, he points out. Two-thirds of Brazils carbon emissions come from this source.

Meanwhile, beef and soy barons have strengthened their grip on power. After last years impeachment of Rousseff, her replacement, Michel Temer, appointed several ruralistas to his cabinet and moved to dismantle and dilute the institutions and laws that slowed forest clearance.

His pick as agriculture minister is Blairo Maggi, the owner of the countrys biggest soy producer, Amaggi Group, and a former governor of Mato Grosso, who supported moves to abolish the Ricardo Franco park. The justice minister, Osmar Serraglio, is at the forefront of the beef lobby, which was his main campaign donor, and a fierce opponent of indigenous land demarcation (the most effective method of forest protection).

Under his watch, the National Indian Foundation (Funai) has seen its finances and personnel gutted. The foundations president, Antnio Costa, was sacked earlier this year. In a parting speech, he described Serraglio as a dictator. He is the minister of one cause: agro-business, he warned.

The counterbalance ought to be the environment ministry, which is headed by Jos Sarney Filho, the son of the top landowner in Maranho state. Although his ideals are widely praised by conservationists, his ability to act has been neutered. Last year, the environment budget was cut by 51% (compared to a 31% reduction of the Environmental Protection Agency in the US under Trump).

In March, the ministers weak position was apparent when he issued a grovelling public apology to JBS after inspectors embargoed two meat-processing factories that were alleged to have bought tens of thousands of cattle from illegally deforested areas of the Amazon. Rather than assess the rights and wrongs of the case, the minister said the action was badly timed because it could hurt a major exporter that was already bogged down in scandal.

Almost every week, there is a new roll back of forest protections. Last Tuesday, the Senate approved a bill that slashed protected areas in the Amazon by 597,000 hectares (about four times the area of Greater London). The previous week, the lower house of Congress paved the way for the legalisation of land that had been illegally occupied by grileiro a move that is likely to encourage more seizures and forest clearance. Environmental licensing requirements for agriculture have been emasculated.

Temers unhealthily close ties to the agriculture lobby may yet, however, come to be his undoing.

Earlier this month, the attorney-general formally accused the president and his aides of accepting bribes and colluding with top executives from JBS to buy the silence of witnesses in a corruption scandal. Temer has denied all wrongdoing. The evidence was provided in a plea-bargain by the owners of the beef company, which is reportedly looking for a clean bill of legal health so that it can relocate its headquarters to the US. If so, its links to Padilha and the cattle raised inside Ricardo Franco and numerous other conservation areas also deserves more scrutiny, as does the process for deciding whether farms will be excluded from the soon-to-be regularised park.

Foreign adventurers and Brazilian bandeirantes helped to pave the way for this development, even if their intention was to escape fazendas and cities alike. As Fawcett said: Deep down inside me a tiny voice was calling. At first scarcely audible, it persisted until I could no longer ignore it. It was the voice of the wild places, and I knew that it was now part of me forever.

With each day that passes, that voice is becoming harder to hear.

The tatu-bola armadillo was last year reclassified as at risk of extinction. Photograph: belizar73/Getty Images/iStockphoto

World Cup mascot is now at risk as forests disappear

The tatu-bola armadillo, the mascot for the 2014 World Cup, is now a symbol for a very different phenomenon in Brazil: the growing impact of deforestation on biodiversity.

The small armoured mammal was chosen to represent the tournament because it rolls up into the shape of a football when threatened, but its ability to protect itself has been undermined by a loss of habitat that is also devastating thousands of other species.

Late last year, the International Union for Conservation of Nature raised the alarm by reclassifying the creature also known as the three-banded armadillo from vulnerable to at risk of extinction.

This has prompted the group that led the campaign for its selection as a mascot to launch a crowdfunding drive last month to raise $500,000 to save the animal.

Samuel Portela, co-ordinator of protected areas at the Caatinga Association, estimates the tatu-bola population has declined by 30% in the past decade due to deforestation and hunting.It is fundamental that steps be taken towards the conservation of this species and its habitat, because under the present conditions, the tatu-bola could be extinct in 50 years, he said.

The animal is mainly found in the northeastern Brazil in the caatinga (an indigenous term for white or desert forest) and cerrado tropical savannas. Even more than the Amazon, these two ecosystems have been diminished by the expansion of farmland.

Scientists warn that many other animals face similar or worse threats and the risks are rising along with the pace of land clearance in Brazil, the worlds most biodiverse nation. Last year, the government reported a 29% increase in deforestation the sharpest rise in more than a decade. Forest clearing in Brazil has already condemned at least 20 species of birds, 10 species of mammals and eight of amphibians to regional extinction. Scientists estimate this is just a fifth of those that will die out due to habitat loss. Among the most endangered are giant otters and bare-faced tamarins. A 2015 study predicted half of the 15,000 tree species in the Amazon could be lost if current rates of deforestation continue.

According to the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation, the tatu-bola faces a particularly hard struggle to recover its population because of the animals low metabolic rate, small litter size, prolonged parental care and long gestation periods.

WILDLIFE OF THE LOST WORLD

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