#cloud-based estimating

[foone]

We keep finding space stations, and we don't know why yet.

Most are in orbit around planets, but plenty more are orbiting moons, stars, the odd black hole, or just floating in deep space.

Their age varies, some are so old that just getting close enough to dock makes them shatter like glass, others are so recently constructed that the lights are still on and the reactors are still fueled. All are empty of any life or robots smarter than a roomba.

The ones orbiting planets are orbiting dead worlds, or living worlds where nothing on them is smart enough to launch a space station.

The stations in deep space are weirder. The most information came from the one by Epsilon Eridani. A massive installation, it had docking rings for hundreds of vessels, all empty. It was in remarkable shape for how old it was (from the unrepaired micrometeorite impacts, we estimate it has been abandoned for about 3000 years), so we were able to access a lot of information from its main computer. We found the coordinates of several home planets, and visited them all. All were dead, empty, or in one case, simply missing. The star was still there, the other uninhabitable planets mentioned in the databanks were there, but their homeworld? Gone. No debris or expanding gas cloud, it's just missing.

And that's the thing: if we found space stations along with abandoned ruins of ground-based installations, that'd make sense. If we met dozens of living races, amongst a few empty satellites of long dead races, that'd also be expected. But this is all the evidence we're not alone in the universe we've found.

We've sent probes to over half the stars in this galaxy and visited hundreds in crewed spacecraft, but the empty space stations are the only evidence of alien life. Every planet is either a sterile husk, a gas giant, or a vibrant living world with nothing smarter than a giraffe living on it. Oh, there's strange life forms of every kind! But none of them seem sapient, certainly not sapient enough to build a space station.

Where is everyone? We've been asking that question since we first understood the Drake Equation and the Fermi paradox, but the question has taken on a new form as we've gone to the stars and found endless empty houses in the sky.

It's the difference between looking at an empty desert and walking through an abandoned city. In both cases, there's a silent emptiness, but in the latter case, it seems to contain a sinister element. This place is empty, but it shouldn't be. Something made it empty, and we haven't found out why yet.

We keep looking, and keep listening to the echoes of our own footsteps in the silent habitats.

[saphushia]

Sometimes I really want to post my silly low effort hobby photography. But I live in constant fear of what if some geoguesser guy decided they hate me. Can't even post cloud pics because I'm like well there's a non zero chance there's Some Guy out there who would be like "well based on the time you posted your last 500 posts I can deduce your rough timezone, and estimate the time of day that you took this picture from the position of the sun and length of shadows. From that estimate it can be narrowed even farther based on the tree visible in the bottom corner, as this species is primarily found in the eastern west of the northern south. After that it's as simple as looking at my 6 websites for niche hobbyists with 24/7 recordings and archives of satellite cloud images. From the data I already have it's easy to narrow my search, and then all i have to do is simply check through the remaining possible areas for which one matches the clouds in your photo. So you see, from this it's easy to see you live in Fucksville, on Eat Shit Island. And I am going to mail you loose ants."

[cherrixpie]

NEMESIS

part four of five

↬ you were supposed to steer clear of mattheo riddle. Shame that he was just so irrestible.

↬ sfw; wc: 9.1k (good lord these keep getting longer); cw: violence, blood, broken bones, suggestiveness, swear words; tags: gryffindor!reader, muggleborn!reader, enemies to lovers

( masterlist )

The wind howled through the stands, tearing at banners of both red and green, as sheets of icy rain slashed down in relentless torrents. Over night, the weather had taken a dramatic shift, to the disfortune of any poor bloke who was on the pitch today. The pitch had turned into a mire of mud and puddles and looked more like a battlefield than the site of one of the most anticipated Quidditch matches of the season: Gryffindor vs Slytherin. Above, the players on their broomsticks were little more than blurred streaks of color, their shouts swallowed by the roaring of the storm. The sharp crack of a Bludger smashing into a broomstick echoed through the chaos, drawing gasps and cries from the diehard fans who clung stubbornly to the stands despite the weather.

Near the base of the stands, Madam Pomphrey hovered over you like an agitated owl as you sorted through the bandages and potions at hand. Ever since you'd started practical training in the Hospital wing to improve your chances to become a healer at the prestigious St. Mungos Hospital, you'd been assailing her at quidditch games. But you'd only ever had Gryffindors to look out for before.

“Playing in this weather is nothing short of lunacy,” Madam Pomphrey muttered, her words only heard over the howling wind because she stood so close to you. “The last thing I need is another student catching their death out here- or worse, ending up on one of my stretchers.”

Though you didn't say it out loud, you estimated the chances of that being close to zero. Not only the weather made this an exceptionally brutal game. It seemed as if the players translated the stress of playing in such conditions into pure violence, and the thick mist of rain only made the many fouls harder to detect. The game was turning more brutal by the minute. You did your very best to identify your friends, but only caught a glance of Harry hovering over the game, looking for the faint glint of the snitch through the fog and dodging the occasional bludger. And, of course, Ron, guarding the rings.

But your restless eyes didn't only scan the skies in search of your friends. Any time a Slytherin player passed the stands, you'd anxiously try to make out whether they were a beater, whether they were Mattheo. But he seemed to be amidst the center of the game. Sometimes you thought you spotted him when you recognized a figure with club that vaguely resembled him. Sometimes, you thought the figure looked back at you, but you couldn't be sure of anything when rain and fog clouded your vision and made it impossible to pin point anything.

Suddenly, another violent crack echoed through the stadium and the fans let out a collective gasp when the small, blurred figure of Gryffindor’s seeker slipped from his broom, having been violently hit with a bludger. Before even Madam Pomphrey could react, you, who'd been on your toes all game, cast a spell to slow his fall and took off over the field to meet him when he met the ground in a rather soft thud thanks to your spell. The nurse followed hot on your heels and together, you hoisted Harry up on your shoulders and helped him towards the sidelines as Madame Hooch signaled time-out.

The bludger must've hit Harry in the face at short distance, because it only took one look at his blood-smeared face and crooked nose to know the latter was broken. You had the vague idea it wouldn't be the last one toady. As Madam Pomphrey healed it with a flick of her wand, eliciting a crack from the nose as it sprung back in place and a pained groan from Harry, you recovered a diptam from your belt and leaned down in front of him to apply it to his face.

“That was Riddle,” said Harry bitterly as you healed the cuts and bruises to the best of your abilities. The murtlap essence did wonders on his injuries, but still, your worried eyes scanned his face restlessly as Harry kept raging. “He's had his sights on me ever since we lifted off the damn ground! Dunno what's up with him, it's like he doesn't even care about the game anymore. He's a damn psychopath, he is.”

Before you had the chance to respond, three thuds announced the arrival of three other players and you turned to them as they approached. Madam Hooch lead them, she walked on large strides over to Harry to inspect the graveness of his injury. Behind her followed a highly enraged looking Malfoy, platinum hair clinging to his forehead, and Mattheo, seemingly relaxed though there was a storm brewing in his eyes that rivaled the one he and the others were facing above ground. Your eyes met and you froze mid movement when he, despite the situation, gave you a quick grin. Just like Harry and Malfoy, he was covered head to toe in mud and his hair was even more of a mess than usual, but you had to admit it suited him better than the other two.

“From such a short distance, my my,” raged Madam Hooch who was quite red in the face. As most teachers did, she directed her anger at some point over Mattheo's shoulder instead of looking him into the face. “That's a foul if I ever saw one. Gryffindor gets a penalty.”

“But Madam Hooch!” called Malfoy indignantly. “He only did his job, isn't it allowed for the beaters to use their clubs anymore?”

“On the bludgers, not on fellow players!” hissed Madam Hooch angrily. Malfoy stroke up another argument, beginning with the words "my father...", but Mattheo couldn't have cared less. So what if Gryffindor got a damn penalty, there was much more important things to be enraged about. Like the way you fussed over Potter, how worried you looked, how pretty you looked in your nurse uniform, a white dress that fell down to your knees paired with the most adorable nurse cap. Mattheo realized he liked white on you. In his world that was drowned in such darkness, you stood out amongst crowds like a glowing ember. As much as he hesitated to admit it, he felt lighter anytime he laid eyes on you.

“Mate, help me out here!” Malfoy pushed him, but he fell on deaf ears, because you had just glanced back at him. Your reproachful look almost made him smile. A few loose strands of hair fell from your nurse cap into your face and clung to your skin. Even if you were to glare at him, he'd much rather have you do that than go back to giving your attention to Potter, of all people. But alas, you turned back to him and wiped the paste off of his face, giving him a light slap on the back to get back on his broom.

If possible, the wind cut even sharper as the game went on. Even under the cover of the stands, theoretically providing protection from the rain, you were soon drenched to the bone. You'd even had to borrow a Gryffindor sweater from Dean because your uniform had started to become see-through, and the material wasn't thin. By now, everyone was just praying for one of the seekers to catch the snitch and win the game. Though Slytherin was in the lead, partially due to a newfound brutality from their beaters, if Harry caught the snitch soon, Gryffindor would still win.

Just when you dragged the box with the medical supplies further under the cover of the stands to prevent the bandages from soaking up- by the looks of the game you would need them plenty- it happened. You hadn't looked, preoccupied with your task, so the only indication that something was wrong was the shocked screams of the crowd. As you looked up to see what was going on, for the smallest split of a second, you could make out a seemingly rogue bludger rushing towards the stands, specifically, towards you. You didn't even have time to close your eyes or shield yourself from the impact when a flash of green shot through your field of vision and the crowd breathed a sigh of belief.

Rushing forwards, you gripped onto the barrier and looked up at the sky only to catch a glimpse of Mattheo's jersey until he disappeared into the mist once more. Gryffindor scored. As the red and golden covered stands to your left erupted in hollers and cheers, you were hit with the sudden realization that Mattheo had not only saved you from being hit by a bludger, but had also diverted from the Gryffindor chasers, allowing them to score. It didn't fit. He'd been playing with undeveloped ferocity the whole match and now passed up the chance to intercept Gryffindor scoring? But, you thought to yourself, heart still hammering in your chest from the shock, maybe you should just give up trying to make sense of Mattheo Riddle, when he'd so far proved to be everything you thought he wasn't.

Due to the doubled efforts of Nott’s solo runs and Mattheo's bludgers being a major hindrance to the Gryffindor chasers and messing up their formations, forcing them to scatter, Slytherin took the lead by a long shot. But still, if Harry caught the snitch now, they could still win.

You were focused on him that you didn't even catch the maneuver of the Gryffindor beaters. There was a resounding crack heard throughout the stadium, even through the splatter of rain, and one of the Slytherin beaters was slammed into one of the stand walls with such force he bounced off of it before hurling towards the ground. Seconds before the player could hit the ground, they managed to pull their broom up and towards the sky, but their face was full of blood.

Your brain needed a moment to comprehend the situation, but then you read the name on the back of the player’s jersey and the blood seemed to freeze in your veins. Oh God. It was Mattheo. Panic-stricken, you turned to Madam Hooch. Not only had this clearly been a foul, but Mattheo needed time out to get patched up. But Madam Hooch was preoccupied with overlooking the Slytherin chasers ramming through a Gryffindor formation and the endless sheets of rain seemed to obstruct her vision. The Slytherin stands roared in indignation, but Mattheo steadied his broom mid-air, wiped his sleeve over his face, which only seemed to make it worse, and got back into formation.

Even Madam Pomphrey, who had expressed her dislike of Mattheo several times, gasped worriedly. “The game needs time out! He can't play in this condition!”

Your insides felt like claws, reeling against your ribcage as a sudden assault of worry hit you. The impossible frustration of not being able to help, to have to watch Mattheo get back into the game with gritted teeth was suffocating. Past you would have been indifferent, maybe. Past you was an idiot. Your hands gripped the barrier so tightly your knuckles turned white, and you couldn't take your eyes off of Mattheo’s figure. The blood seemed to be obstructing his vision even more than the walk of downpour already did,

Why did you care so much? Why did worry over a boy like Mattheo Riddle eat you up from the inside? Though it was quite untrue, you doubted there was anyone like Mattheo Riddle. Maybe it was just easier to pretend that your concern, the fact that you cared so much, was illogical, than to admit to yourself that he wasn't just you-know-who’s son anymore. That your fear of him had subsided and given way to not only interest, but affection.

The thought scared you. You knew exactly what your friends would say if they knew that you cared for their mortal enemy. Hermoine would look at you with a mixture of disgust and worry, maybe she'd even feel betrayed. And Ron? He'd feel like you'd fratanized with the enemy, you knew he would be angry. What about Harry? He'd been so understanding yesterday, but only after you reassured him that you detested Mattheo. A lie. Mattheo was supposed to be your nemesis, too. But he wasn't anymore.

What was he to you? The question rummaged in your brain as you watched his figure anxiously, wincing any time he got too close to a bludger. In the forest, he'd been intriguing. In the kitchens, exciting. Then, in the library, and you felt almost ashamed to admit it, attractive. But that wasn't all. What you felt for Mattheo couldn't be summed up in mere interest or attraction. It was a coiled up snake in the deepest pits of your self that had raised his head slowly, before you'd even realized it. You couldn't pin-point it, you just knew you wanted to know everything about Mattheo there was to know, and, that you hated to see him hurt.

The Slytherins were now in the lead by one-hundred-and-sixty points, but you couldn't have cared less about the score. More than ever now, you hoped for the game to end so you could have a look at Mattheo. But when the whistle sounded shrilly through the stadium, it was only to announce another two penalties for Gryffindor after Malfoy had fouled Harry mid-dive, both of whom Ginny dunked.

And then, finally, Harry and Malfoy went into a dive and, under the victorious roars of the Gryffindors, Harry emerged holding the snitch over his head. The score board showed Gryffindor: 260 points - Slytherin: 250 points.

Mustering up little more than a sigh of relief, you hurried over to the cart with the bandages and healing potions, arming yourself with supplies as the players landed one after the other. More than half of them immediately made a beeline for the medical tent, to you and a very ill-tempered Madam Pomphrey who muttered something about high risk sports and student safety. It had been an exceptionally rough game, and most players were at least bruised up, at worst limping heavily and clutching their ribs. As they trailed in, your eyes frantically darted around in search of Mattheo, but you couldn't find him.

Soon, you were preoccupied with fixing up the Gryffindor chasers, but your quick, distracted glances around the tent told you that he wasn't here. But where could he be? Dread pooled in your stomach as you bandaged up Ginny’s left hand and applied murtlap essence to her fellow chaser’s cuts and bruises. Only more people seemed to trail in, but, bit by bit, you managed to send them all off again. Still, Mattheo hadn't showed. As you were just contemplating whether you could just walk into the snake’s den, aka the Slytherin changing rooms, and offer treatment, you felt someone’s hand on your shoulder.

You spun around and were faced with Theodore Nott, looking very wet and very moody. The sight of him calmed you somewhat, you knew he and Mattheo were close. Nott looked as grumpy and sinister as ever, but he didn't sound aggressive. “Are you free here?” he asked in his Italian accent and you nodded silently. His frown subsided somewhat. “Can you come with me? Mattheo’s refusing treatment.”

For a split second, you wondered whether Nott knew about Mattheo and you. Then, you mentally slapped yourself back into reality. There was nothing between Mattheo and you, other than a few late night encounters. He'd only asked for you because he didn't want to ask Madam Pomphrey, you supposed.

“Of course,” you said, a little more enthusiastically than would have been necessary, and quickly rounded up some medical supplies to stuff them into your bag. Then, you followed Nott out of the tent, through the downpour of rain and down the steps that led into the Slytherin’s changing rooms.

As you walked down the stairs, you passed a group of Slytherin players who shot you nasty, albeit unsurprised looks. Struggling to keep up with Nott’s long strides, you hurried after him and averted your eyes from the passing Slytherin's. In front of a door with the engraved words ‘changing rooms’, Nott halted his step and nodded towards it. “He's in there, make it quick.”

Nott took off after his friends and you were left standing before the door. For a few hesitant seconds, your fist hovered in the air in front of the wood, and for some silly reason, your heart was thumping like mad. Finally, you knocked. Due to your sudden surge of timidity, it was a soft, quiet sound, barely heard over the splatter on the roof. Still, a voice you recognized as Mattheo's called from inside, clearly audible. “Come in, princess.” As if it had been a command, your hand fell down to the handle, you pressed it down and the door swung open.

The first thing you noticed about the Slytherin changing rooms was that they were way tidier than the Gryffindor ones that you'd often visited after a game to fetch Harry and Ron. No empty bottles, no forgotten jerseys on the ground and it smelled surprisingly good for a sports changing room, though the distinct smell of smoke clung to the air. All seemed perfect in place- except for the a smashed-in locker on the left side and the boy that sat, smoking, on one of the benches.

Mattheo hadn't even made an effort to change yet, both his jersey and his face were seeping with blood. His nose looked broken and his lip was busted up, which didn't stop him from taking continuous drags out of his cigarette, the ember glowing faintly in the dim light. Wisps of smoke curled around him like ghostly shroud. His dark curls hung heavy and damp over his sharp features, framing the defiant smirk that tugged at his lips despite the pain evident in his furrowed brow and clenched jaw. His eyes, dark and unfazed, met yours with a flicker of something unreadable- half daring, half relief- as if, even now, bloodied and battered, he was too proud to let the hurt take hold. Or too used to it.

His heavy gaze felt disarming as you stood aimlessly in the doorway, faintly dripping with water falling from loose strands of your hair. Mustering up a small smile, you closed the door behind you and attempted to ignore the way his gaze burned into your back as you turned to the door. “What if I hadn't been me?” you asked in an effort to diffuse the situation of the weird tension in the air. “What if I'd been one of your friends? That would've been awkward.”

When you turned back to him, his gaze had softened almost indiscernibly. His cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, his eyes raked over your drenched and drippy figure before snapping back to your eyes with the self-assurance of a skilled predator cornering its prey. You met his eyes without blinking and the corner of his lips twitched slightly. “None of my friends knock as if they're scared somebody will hear it.”

Your lips curled. “Touché.” With slow, deliberate steps, you walked over to him and came to a halt before him, fingers closing tensely around the handle of your medical bag. Even just the parts of him you could see looked badly hurt, though he didn't show any signs of pain. Maybe he had CIPA syndrome. Or maybe he was just a masochist.

Mattheo caught your wandering gaze, blew a cloud of smoke your way and leaned back against the back of the bench expectantly, cigarette between his bloody fingers. “Well, then, I'm all yours.” A lazy grin played around his lips, in spite of the situation, and it was as attractive as it was infuriating.

Before he could react, you snatched the cigarette out of his fingers and discarded it into an ashtray near you before turning back to him. “It smells disgusting,” you let him know and he chuckled, raising his hands in faux surrender.

You felt hesitant to approach him, touch him, even though you had his consent. His dark eyes rooted you to your spot, made you unable to move. You wondered whether it was some sort of spell until he raised his brows. “Any day now, princess.”

“Don't rush me,” you whispered, averting your eyes and scrambling around in your medical kit for the right supplies. You layed out bandages and healing potions out on the bench opposite him and turned to him once more to tap your wand against his nose, murmuring “episkey” under your breath. With a disgusting cracking sound, it snapped back in place, but Mattheo didn't flinch, only continuing to stare up at you. With the same feeling of sticking your head into a snake den, you leaned down nervously to examine the wounds on his face, whether they needed stitching. The deep cut near his jaw did.

“Careful there, princess,” Mattheo murmured and your eyes snapped from the wound to his eyes, only inches away. “Someone might think you have un-pure intentions.”

You couldn't help the blush that painted your cheeks pink, more so due to his proximity than his words. Still, you brought some distance between you and searched in your bag for needle and thread. “My intentions couldn't be more pure,” you huffed and he laughed lightly from behind your back about a joke you couldn't understand. Or maybe, you did.

“That is true,” he lamented and you heard ruffling. You turned around quickly and snatched the pack of cigarettes out of his hands. He looked mildly surprised at the frown on your face.

“Come on,” you said, voice somewhere between annoyance and pleading. “are you really going to poison yourself while I try to patch you up?” Fitting the threat through the needle, you ignored his raised brows and concentrated your attention on the deep cut in his cheek. A damp towel in the other hand, you ran it over the wound to clean it and then leaned in closer. “This might hurt.”

He completely ignored the last part, but you could feel his eyes on you. Damn him, he was just so distracting. “Hm,” he hummed, as if in thought, and ignored your hiss to keep still. “One might almost think you care about me.”

“I do.”

Both you and him looked up in surprise, and you quickly looked away as his eyes stayed on you, almost hungrily. “Hold still,” you murmured, and finally, he complied, allowing you to insert the needle as gently as possible and start to surture the wound. It was almost scary how still he kept now. You desperately wished to break the silence that spread, that followed your words like a blanket of led pressing down upon the both of you. It was only the truth, you cared about him. You cared for him. You cared for Mattheo Riddle. In order to concentrate, you attempted to shut all that out, but the confession hung in the air between you, as impossible to ignore as he himself was.

Finally, you finished the last stitch and tied the suture with a surgeon’s knot off the side so it didn't touch the wound. A small part of you hoped desperately that Mattheo would overlook your slip up, maybe even forget it, but that, of course, was naive. When you put away thread and needle, grabbed the murtlap essence and walked back over to him, he looked up at you without the trace of a smile on his lips. “You care about me,” he repeated, not a question but a statement. His eyes fixed yours as he got a hold of your wrists. “More than you care about him?”

“Who?” you asked, perplexed by the severity in his tone. A hint of displeasure washed over his face, but it gave way to indifference after just a second. “Potter.”

“W- what?” you spluttered out, laughing nervously. How on earth were you supposed to answer that question? “He's my friend,” you said hesitantly and freed your wrists to dab some of the potion onto the tips of your fingers. As you leaned down, you froze mid motion when you felt hands on your waist. His hands on your waist. Large and warm and rough even through the fabric of your nurse uniform. His touch seemed to send sparks of electricity through your body that balled in your stomach and made your breath hitch.

“Go on,” he commanded quietly, and though they were trembling, you brushed your cream-smeared fingers over one of the bruises on his jaw. They travelled up over his cheek, tending to the scratches there, but you could hardly keep your attention on them when his eyes seemed to bore through your skull.

With a low voice, he muttered your name, your first name, and you were so shocked to hear him call you anything but ‘princess’ you did the smallest of double takes. “Is there anything more than that?” he asked, and he seemed more tense than before as his fingers curled into the flesh of your belly lightly. “Between you and him?”

Both the idea and the fact that you'd just been asked it by Mattheo Riddle of all people elicited a shocked little laugh from you. But he didn't laugh, only watched you with an expression that you might have mistaken for indifference if it hadn't been for the clenching of his jaw. “He's just a friend,” you clarified, your cheeks growing warm. “We're not- we've never- It's not like that,” you closed abashedly and put a bit of distance between you under the excuse of getting more murtlap. His hands fell from your waist as you walked over to the opposite bench, heat boiling in your face.

You tried to keep your expression composed as you got back to him to tend to the other side of his face, putting some murtlap over the stitches as well for good measure. This time, he didn't hold your waist, but when you were finished and brushed off the remaining essence on your skirt, he caught the hem between his fingers and his light tug caused you to stumble forwards in between his parted legs. His hand travelled upwards, tracing the curve of your hip without ever touching them and locked around the hem of your Gryffindor hoodie. There was a magnetic sort of darkness in his eyes when he looked up at you, two black holes that threatened to swallow you whole. “Take that off.”

In hindsight, you probably shouldn't ever have complied with his request. But his voice was so soft, his eyes so alluring, his whole being like a siren’s call. So you curled your fingers under your hoodie and, heart beating hard against your ribs, pulled it slowly over your head.

Mattheo's breath hitched as his gaze locked on you. The dim light of the changing room caught the soft outline of your figure beneath the thin, damp fabric, your nurse’s uniform clinging to you like a second skin, innocent in intention, but anything but now. The delicate outline of your bra was visible through the slightly see-through fabric. His throat tightened, a mix of a pang of guilt and a despicable surge of fire curling in his chest like smoke.

You looked so pure, so untouched by the edges of the world that had long since roughened him up. The contrast hit him like a bludger- your soft, careful hands that had just cleaned his wounds now pulling your hoodie over your head, oblivious to the firestorm you'd lit inside him. The urge to discard that Gryffindor hoodie and dress you in one of his jerseys, hiding the sacred sight beneath with a claim of his possession, was so overwhelming he clenched his fists, desperately trying to remind himself that you were not his, you were too good, too-

His train of thought was interrupted when you shifted slightly and folded your arms over your chest, only pressing your boobs together. He dragged his gaze away, but the weight of your unreachable warmth, your white-clad purity, lingered, carving through his battered core and leaving him feeling utterly undeserving.

When he looked away, you recoiled slightly and scolded yourself for thinking, hoping, he might react. But before you could put some distance between you, he looked up at you and his gaze locked you in place, making you freeze just as effectively as a pointed wand might have. Mattheo leaned forward and for a confused moment, you almost thought he was going to kiss you, but he only rose from his seat and walked past you.

Only when you heard shuffling behind you, you realized he was rummaging around your medical supplies. No, not rummaging, you realized when you looked over in alarm. He was cleaning up, packing all bandages and potions back into your bag.

“You don't have to do that!” you called and hastily approached to take the murtlap essence out of his hands. But he kept a firm grip on it and raised his brows at you with a mocking little smile. It seemed so out of place after the heavy tension between you in the room. “Hey, ‘m trying to do something nice here, princess!” With one glance, you assessed that Mattheo wasn't one for neatness, as he didn't assort the items in any order or symmetry whatsoever but merely threw them all into a heap and closed the lid. But still, the gesture was weirdly considerate and you couldn't help the little smile that crept onto your face.

“Thank you,” you smiled and he only nodded, averting his eyes. Right now, with your moist strands of hair sticking out of your nurse cap, your pretty little smile, the way the nurse uniform clung to your body, it was hard to withstand the urge to kiss you. Then again, what if he did? It'd all be over. It was etched into Mattheo by habit that if he got close enough to a girl to get intimate on any physical level, it was time for any strings to be cut loose as to not endanger the fragile balance that was what was left of his heart.

But it had never mattered to him, he'd kissed and fucked them anyway because he could, and it felt good, and then he was relieved when it was over. He’d never before held back. And in favor of what? Spending time in your presence? Pathetic, was what his father would call it. Mattheo couldn't explain it either, he just knew that, in this moment, his desire to be near you, to keep you, was stronger than the desire to rip your damn uniform off of you, explore the soft flesh beneath and give you the time of your fucking life right here on this bench.

You seemed hesitant as you grabbed the handle of your bag, your eyes raking over his torso. Of course, you were too good of a nurse and too smart of a woman to not guess what wounds he had to hide beneath. But for now, you couldn't see them.

“Thank you,” he said honestly, and the unfamiliar sound felt so natural when he said it to you. “For patching me up. Fine nurse you are.” He made no attempts to hide the flirty undertone and the lightest of blushes spread across your cheeks. He breathed it in like a drowning man.

With a barely concealed smirk and a “you're welcome,” you approached the door of the changing rooms.

Something like an iron fist closed around his insides as you opened the door and he couldn't hold back the words that stumbled from his lips. “Wait!” You froze and turned to him once more with an expectant look, and, as if he'd always known it, a stroke of genius found his way out of his mouth. “You know shit about muggles, right?”

A genuine grin formed on your lips. “I should hope so.”

“How ‘bout you tutor me in muggle studies then?” he asked, trying to sound as casual as possible. With a light frown, you crossed your arms over your chest and he gave you a pleading look. “I'm gonna fail the class if I don't get my grades up asap.” Satisfied by the way he could practically see your resolve melt at the look he was giving you, his lips almost twitched but he bit down on it to hide any trace of his true intentions. In truth, he couldn't have cared less about muggle studies, but it was the perfect excuse.

“Fine,” you said, albeit begrudgingly, but you also gave him a little smile as you slipped out of the door, leaving only the vague smell of your perfume and a shaken up Mattheo behind.

Even though you had been apprehensive to the idea at first, tutoring Mattheo turned out to be something you started to look forward to every week. With every tutoring lesson, he seemed to be warming up to you more and more- and you did, too.

A few weeks into december, you found yourself laughing at his jokes and getting caught up in his brown eyes, that seemed softer than you'd ever perceived them. And you discovered that Mattheo was funny. He had a dry, sarcastic sense of humor that never failed to make you chuckle, even when you probably shouldn't have. Not only that, but he was also smarter than you'd ever given him credit for.

Previously, you'd thought of him as a mix of brute force and cunning, not unintelligent but thinking more so with his fists. But he was incredibly smart, and you felt not only a growing bond but also fondness in a not-so-platonic way. It also helped that confusion looked simply adorable on him, which was not a word you thought you'd ever apply to Mattheo Riddle.

“So,” he asked in one breath as he plopped down on the seat opposite you in your secluded corner in the library one snowy tuesday evening, “what the fuck is a movie?” Taken aback by his sudden arrival, you did a double take and quickly cleared the desk of your schoolwork to make space for his books and parchment as well. As he spread them out, your eyes got stuck on a few splatters of blood on his white shirt and you frowned. He, of course, didn't miss it, you saw it in the way he shifted his jacket to cover the stains, but didn't mention it further.

“Harry or Ron?” you asked, as you knew him well enough by now to know that the only instance in which he wouldn't brag about his brawls to you was when your friends were involved. He looked almost guilty when he glanced up at you. Almost.

“Both”

Rolling your eyes, you put your books aside and crossed your arms over the table. “So, movies, huh? Where might that word come from, ‘movies’?”

“Come on, princess, you know I hate word definitions,” he whined, resting his head on the propped up palm of his hand and making his best puppy eyes at you.

You chuckled about his behavior and gave a light slap to his forehead that made the curls fall into his eyes in the most irresistible fashion. “It's supposed to come from 'moving pictures’”

“But muggle pictures don't move,” Mattheo frowned, seemingly recalling what you'd taught him just last week.

You nodded. “No, they don't. You see, when muggle pictures move, they don't call them pictures, they call them videos. And they don't move in their own, but because muggles line up an unbelievably high number of pictures and then play them in order, so they look like they're moving. Of course, today, the technology is a little more advanced. But movies often span one if not several hours and they tell stories, like books. It's kind of… as if books came to life. They have a whole range of other means to archived their ends though, like camera perspective, many also have music that can emphasize moments and influence how you see them, actor's performances, lighting-”

You fell silent suddenly and cleared your throat. As so often when you explained muggle concepts to him, you had started to ramble on with increasing passion. Now, you looked back at Mattheo to apologize, but his gaze was locked on you and a light smile graced his lips. Your heart seemed to skip a beat and you quickly averted your eyes down to your book. “Sorry, that was- I'm rambling again.”

“Do you see me complaining?” Mattheo asked with raised brows and kicked your shin lightly under the table to make you look up at him. “So, what's your favorite of these things? These movies?”

“Impossible to answer,” you laughed outright and ran a hand through your hair. “There's so many that are just so good, I could never pick one.” The smile remained in your lips as you contemplated the movies you'd maybe have chosen, but none of them were better or worse than the next.

“So, you like them? Movies?” he asked, watching your features closely. These last weeks, you'd started exposing more of your emotions to him through free expression more than words, had taken down some of the walls you still had left around him. Though he didn't say it out loud, you could tell he appreciated it, because his eyes studied every change of expression rigorously, as though he'd receive everything you gave to him of yourself with insatiable hunger, though he didn't reciprocate them in the same way.

“Yes,” you replied, fiddling with your quill.

There was a slight furrow of his brows when he locked eyes with you. “But they don't exist in our world. So, you'd give them up?”

“Why would I have to give them up?” you countered and leaned back in your seat. “I think the way we talk about the muggle world and the wizarding world is completely wrong. We talk about them as if they are different universes entirely and not part of the same word, the same country. Look at me!” You performed an awkward motion indicating yourself. “I'm part of both, and I don't feel torn, I feel more complete.”

His eyes flickered between yours as he contemplated your words. In the short silence that followed, you glanced around to make sure no one had taken notice of your little outburst. You hadn't told anyone you were tutoring Mattheo, that you were meeting you-know-who’s son two times a week in one of the more secluded corners of the library. Your friends would freak out if they knew, you could picture their aghast expressions, they wouldn't understand that an irresistible force pulled you towards the boy sitting in front of you. How the tutoring lessons had turned into a game of pretend for you, as you tried to hide your growing fondness for him while opening up parts of yourself for him to see. A fragile balance. And whether intentional or not, you'd seen parts of him you'd never known, or maybe you'd heard them through the tone of his voice or the tapping of his hands.

“There are worlds within worlds,” Mattheo broke the silence, and you frowned. His serious look indicated that he wasn't merely talking about the muggle and the wizarding world. You caught his hands tightening ever so slightly around his book and bit down on your lower lip.

“I’d have to disagree. There are just collectives within collectives. If the limits of different worlds are separating us, we can just make it simple and give each other up.”

You'd made it personal, and you scolded yourself silently, glancing up at the clock despite not really seeing the time. Both you and him knew you had slipped up. When talking about issues slightly more serious than movies or superhero comics, which had amused Mattheo greatly, it was a fine line drawn in the sand neither of you could cross, a silent agreement.

The air felt weirdly tense whenever one of you- more often you than him- threatened to bring up the fact that the unmistakable divide between the two of you went far beyond little house quarrels and teasing. That there was a world behind those protective castle walls both of you drowned out whenever you were in each others presence. The clock showed ten past nine.

“Worried that you're going to break curfew again, princess?” God, how you hated yourself for loving the way he said it, that little nickname that you used to despise, and now it was all his.

“No,” you said, tearing your eyes away from the clock and back to him. Nothing in his sharp features indicated that he recognized the tension that had lingered in the air just moments before, but he was too perceptive of a person to have been unaware. It dawned on you that he was probably trying to make you less uncomfortable and nervously tapped your quill against your lips. Mattheo Riddle being considerate was dangerous, because every time he showed his gentle side, it evoked a hunger in you to see more of it.

“You sure?” he asked, a sly, teasing smile resting comfortably on his soft lips. Only now that you found yourself looking at them closer, you realized there was a cut on them, continuously seeping small drops of blood into the corner of his mouth. You suppressed the sudden and utterly mental urge to lean over and wipe it off with your sleeve. It was not the blood that you minded, though. Maybe his craziness was rubbing off on you, because you abruptly thought that you wouldn't mind having his blood on you. Yep, he was definitely rubbing off.

Then, you realized what you were doing, staring at his lips, and fumbled to answer his question. “We still have enough time until curfew, if we leave in half an hour, we'll still have more than enough time to get back to our dorms.” You realized you were babbling on to avoid his heated stare and looked back at him almost defiantly, daring him to tease you for it.

Mattheo didn't take his eyes off you as the corner of his lips quirked upwards lightly. “Look at you, little miss perfect. I'll bet you’ve never broken a single rule in your life before I came along.”

You shrugged, feigning indifference. “Maybe I don't feel the need to.” The ‘unlike you’ lay on the tip of your tongue, but you didn't need to say it out loud.

Mattheo grinned and shifted in his seat, his knee brushing yours under the table. “You're missing out. Breaking the rules is half the fun. The other half is not getting caught.” He watched you bite your lip, trying to conceal a little smile that threatened to creep onto your face. So, he'd been right, you had enjoyed your more risky encounters. Thinking back to the night in the library when you'd fled from madame pince, he remembered the way your breath had hitched when his hand had touched your neck. The way your soft skin had felt against his rough palms, your doe eyes glittering in the dim light.

Suddenly, there was shuffling in the shelf behind you and you shot around, holding your breath. The place you'd chosen for you tutoring lessons was hidden behind the shelf with the twelfth century economical wizarding records and every single tome in it was layered with a centimeter-thick layer of dust that had allocated there over centuries of disinterest. You'd thought it the perfect hiding spot. But after a few seconds of nervous glancing around and your heart racing as you listened into the silence, one of the school’s cats rounded the shelf and passed by you and Mattheo without a glance.

You breathed a sigh of relief who looked back at Mattheo who was watching you closely. “Dangerous, isn't it? Sitting here with me like this.” He twirled his wand around his fingers and leaned forward subtly, the motion alone making you feel as if he was cornering you against the shelf behind your back. “People would start talking.”

“About what?” you said dismissively and rummaged through your notes, just to have something to do with your hands. This tended to happen once you'd strayed from the topic at hand even slightly. Mattheo starting to tease you out of nowhere, and you struggling to keep up with his quickly changing moods that sometimes threatened to give you whiplash.

Mattheo leaned closer still and propped up his chin on his elbow, still wearing a casual grin. “Oh, I don't know. Maybe about how l've completely corrupted you with my evil charms.”

Your sighed with a mix of exasperation and amusement. Tapping your finger against your chin, you rolled around the words in your head before speaking. “You know I'm not treating this as, I don't know, something forbidden. I'm not scared of, how did you put it last week? Ah, yes, tarnishing my reputation. You're-” you hesitated, but then, your words reached out to him like a welcoming hand through cold and unfeeling fog. “You're not as bad as people think, by a far.”

A dry, almost bitter chuckle fell from his lips as he absentmindedly fiddled with the collar of his blood-stained shirt and bit down on the cut of his lip, drawing drops of red from it that trailed down to his chin without hinderance. This time, you couldn't resist the urge and leaned over the desk, extending a hesitant hand. Mattheo froze, not watching your approaching hand but you, but he didn't recoil either, so you wiped the blood from his chin with the hem of your shirt sleeve. The blood stood out prominently against the white of your shirt.

When you drew back your hand, his shot up like an attacking snake and closed around your wrist. With some sort of morbid fascination, it seemed, he stared at the tiny spot of scarlet, before his eyes snapped back up at you. His tone surprised you, you couldn't really place it, it was a mix of softness and chilling intensity. “You really think there's good in everyone, don't you?” he asked, piercing you with his brown eyes that were so unlike those of his father.

“I try to,” you said, attempting to sound humorous, but the chuckle dried on your lips and your voice swayed to softness as you held his gaze. He didn't have to ask, you could see the question burning in his eyes, so loud as if he'd screamed it. And you didn't even need to nod your head to make him understand that the answer was yes.

The winter holidays came and went. The lesson before departure day, he'd told you he'd stay in Hogwarts over Christmas, and you felt tempted to invite him over to yours for a split second before the cruel claws of reality dug into you and you merely wished him happy holidays.

There was a slight unease in you when you boarded the train, as if something was about to go horribly wrong. But when you arrived after the holidays and left the train alongside Harry, Ron and Hermoine, you spotted his shrouded figure in one corner of Hogsmeade train station, a soft curl of smoke rising from his dark profile. For a split second, you'd locked eyes with him and you couldn't help a smile of relief to see him again.

Because both of your friends started asking questions eventually, you often met up after curfew, though you still hushed around the halls nervously any time you did and earned a great deal of teasing from him for your timidity. From time to time, you managed to break into (you preferred the term sneak into) classrooms at night.

These weeks of sneaking around made you masters of discovering hidden chambers in every corner of the castles, and you were particularly careful and made sure Harry ‘forgot’ the marauders map somewhere in the common room or ‘lost’ it and found it again next morning under his bed. Frequently, you met up in the kitchens and you baked while telling Mattheo all about muggle cellphones, that he understood the concept of surprisingly quickly.

On one occasion, you even demonstrated them to him as you pretended to get lost in the sheer blizzard howling around the houses in Hogsmeade to meet him behind Madam Puddifoots and called your parents, fascinating Mattheo. This night, however, Mattheo had discovered a new room behind the entrance hall. The two of you had cozied up with blankets and candles on the couch, keeping a few inches distance at minimum. The dim candlelight was way too ripe for disaster.

“So, let me get this straight,” Mattheo said an hour and a half into your study session. “Muggles have metal, bird-shaped containers with which they can not only fly, but they actually do it.” You laughed at the incredulity in his voice, though a tad bit distracted by the shape of the record sleeve digging into your back. Because Hogwarts castle only had enchanted record players available, you'd asked your parents to send you one of your vintage vinyls you thought he might like, but you were hesitant, had told yourself that you'd just take it in case there was a record player in the chamber Mattheo had discovered. Well, there was.

“I don't really like planes either,” you said, smiling understandingly, “I even prefer brooms over them and you know how I feel about those.”

He hummed vaguely and glanced over at you. “What's got you so shifty, princess?” A sly grin spread over his features. “You got something hidden behind your back, don't you?” Infuriatingly good at reading you, he was, as ever. With a small sigh, you decided that he'd learned enough about muggle transportation for tonight and pulled the record sleeve out from out of your bag.

“Listen up,” you said, excitement and nervousness coiling in your stomach. “Do you remember when I told you about muggle music?” Though Mattheo had undoubtedly been preoccupied with watching your expression shift with passion and your hands gesticulate, drawing patterns into the air, he nodded. “Okay,” you said, nibbling on your lower lip, and held up the vinyl awkwardly. “I thought I might give you a taste of muggle music, only if you want, of course.”

He could tell you were anxious about playing him the track and raised his brows at your humming and hawing and nervously twitching fingers. “What are you waiting for, princess?” The abashed smile you gave him melted him in ways he'd never be caught admitting out loud.

Sometimes it was quite frightening how you made him feel, and more than once, he'd found himself laying awake at night, not only because of his chronic insomnia and returning nightmares but also torn between the reflexive urge to push away you and how you made him feel so utterly disarmed and vulnerable, and the irresistible desire to see you smile again and let your unconditional kindness wash over him, soothing the dark voices in his head.

By now, you'd walked over to the record player and inserted the vinyl. With a tap of your wand, it started spinning and the sounds of a guitar filled the room. The muggle guitarist played a few chords before starting to sing. When you lowered yourself down on the couch, you didn't bother with putting the usual space between the two of you. No, you seated yourself right beside him, so that he could feel the warmth of your body radiating against his like a hug. As the refrain set in, you put your head on his shoulder.

“And if a double-decker bus

Crashes into us

To die by your side

Is such a heavenly way to die”

Mattheo froze for a moment, his breath caught in his throat as your head gently shifted against his shoulder. The simple, unspoken gesture of affection sent a rush of warmth through him that was both startling and utterly intoxicating. He glanced down at you, his a dark eyes softening as they traced over the curve of your cheek, accentuated by the flickering candlelight, and your lashes resting light as feathers against your skin. A faint smile tugged at the corners of his lips, hesitant at first, afraid to disturb the fragile moment. Slowly, very slowly, his hand shifted, fingers brushing against the fabric of the couch before finding their place beside your arm, just close enough to feel the warmth radiating off of you.

“Take me out tonight

Take me anywhere, I don't care,

I don't care, I don't care”

He felt like one of the mythological figures you'd told him about. Mattheo had scoffed at Icarus' idiocy, but now, he felt like he could understand where he was coming from. His voice, when he finally spoke, was low and teasing, betraying none of the blazing storm raging inside him. But even still, it was edged with a sincerity he couldn't quite hide. “Getting comfortable, are we?”

You only shuffled closer in response, but Mattheo had to suppress the urge to pull you in, wrap his arms around you, drag you into his lap for all the pleasure and calm it would give him. He was a selfish creature, but at this moment, he managed to stay perfectly still, safe for his fingers barely brushing over the fabric of your sleeve. Your breathing, having come in small, hasty little puffs before, slowed as you sat in silence, leaning on each other and listening to the lyrics filling up the space in your room you didn't fill with your words, because they would never be sufficient.

“There is a light that never goes out

There is a light that never goes out

There is a light that never goes out”

The song faded into silence and you started to move again. Mattheo hid his disappointment when you stood up from the couch to walk over to the record player. As you put the vinyl back into its sleeve, you turned back to him and for a few seconds, you merely watched each other in silence. Then, Mattheo rose as well and handed you your bag, that you took without looking at it.

Could it be that you felt the same reluctance to leave this room as he did? But you had to, his gaze flickered to the clock. Other than him, you had the chance to get some sleep tonight. So he threw one quick glance around the room, the floating candles, the sleeping portraits, the empty couch, leaned down to your level and pressed the lightest of kisses to your cheek. It was warm and soft under his lips, and he could hear your breath hitch in your throat. Damn little minx you were.

“Good night,” you said, quietly, and he returned your smile before opening the door for you, the feeling of your skin against his still lingering on his lips.

Maybe you both should have known it was going a bit too well. Maybe you'd become too self-assured in your nightly adventures. In any case, neither of you had caught the portrayed woman in the frame above the couch watching you through half-closed eyes, feigning sleep. As you closed the door behind you, she rose from her false slumber with a dirty secret in her hands- and a burning desire to spread it around the castle.

taglist: @aespaslut @kricketwritesstories @catching-fire-in-the-wind @a-little-funny @thejediprincess56 @polireader @voidangxls @artsyle @nkvgt @ashrocker123 @chimchoom @onlytenkos @yvonne-dump @alwayslatetothefandoms @ravisinghs-wife @eneywey @viylikecats @darksss5516 @cocosparkel @stereading @helendeath

[meshugenist]

tl;dr according to that paper:

the best explanation for the 2023-2024 warming being way higher than should have been possible with this el niño is that 2020 international maritime regulations reduced ship SO2 emissions by 71%. this is contrary to IPCC estimates of aerosol cooling effect (via cloud formation and resultant increased albedo) being very low and fairly constant from 1970-2020, which appears to be inaccurate and based on faulty models not informed by cloud microphysics, and dramatically underestimated the amount of aerosol cooling that was going on. thus, the reduction of a fair portion of said aerosols had a similarly large effect. this is exceptionally relevant because it means the entire model had to be refitted to account for the new aerosol models, and the new model that accurately tracks the actual temperature observations indicates a global temperature sensitivity to atmospheric CO2 increase that is like 50% higher than the IPCC (previously) best estimate (which now fails to account for the 2023-2024 warming). if this is correct, and it probably is because 2024 was also extremely hot, the global average temperature anomaly will not fall below 1.5°C as previously predicted, and further warming will be at a steeper rate. according to this new model that the authors ran, warming will be enough to cause AMOC shutdown by midcentury. and if AMOC shuts down, warm waters will be trapped in the southern sea, potentially causing an irreversible melting of the west antarctic ice sheet (as previously happened during similar climate 150kya, around the time that AMOC shut down then), leading to a global sea level rise of several meters over the next 50-150 years and then unstoppable further coastline retreat over the next several centuries.

this article didn't go into the other effects of AMOC shutdown but i posted another article recently discussing it; if AMOC shuts down, temperatures in northern europe could drop by 5-10°C in the "global warming hole" and precipitation belts could shift, disrupting the monsoon system and leading to massive droughts and massive famines

[ms-snape]

Severus snape x reader. She just find ou that she’s pregnant? And didn’t know how to say it to Severus.

Title: New Hope

Warning: none... exept stressed reader I guess...

Words Count: 2000+

Masterlist

---

Y/N Snape had never imagined that standing amidst the lush greenhouses of Hogwarts, surrounded by the vibrant life of magical plants, she would feel so utterly lifeless herself. For weeks now, she had felt a gnawing sense of fatigue, the kind that no amount of rest could cure. Her usually nimble fingers, once adept at trimming and caring for the delicate blooms and exotic roots, felt heavy, sluggish. Nausea had become a familiar visitor, creeping up on her with increasing frequency.

At first, she dismissed it as overwork, perhaps an accidental inhalation of some stray pollen or spore. But when the dizziness grew so severe that she had to excuse herself from her third-year class, Y/N knew it was time to seek Madam Pomfrey’s guidance. She wasn’t one to visit the hospital wing lightly, but something was clearly wrong.

Now, sitting on the edge of a bed in the pristine, sterile room, she anxiously awaited Madam Pomfrey’s return. The soft hum of the enchanted ceiling above, designed to soothe patients with a gentle twilight glow, did little to calm the storm of thoughts swirling in her mind. Severus was busy in his dungeons, likely unaware that she had even left the greenhouse, and Y/N couldn't shake the nagging sense of dread building in her chest.

When Madam Pomfrey finally entered, her expression unreadable, Y/N felt her breath catch in her throat.

“Well, Professor Snape,” Madam Pomfrey began, her tone gentle but professional, “I’ve reviewed the results of the tests I performed.”

Y/N leaned forward slightly, her hands clenching in her lap. “Is it… is it serious?”

Pomfrey’s lips twitched into a small smile. “Not in the way you might think.” She paused for a moment, as if weighing her words carefully before continuing. “You’re pregnant, Y/N.”

For a heartbeat, Y/N didn’t react. The word hung in the air like a foreign concept, something distant and impossible. Pregnant? She blinked, confusion clouding her thoughts. Her mind raced through the possibilities, the implications.

“You’re sure?” she finally managed to ask, her voice barely above a whisper.

Pomfrey nodded, her eyes warm with understanding. “Quite sure. Based on the symptoms you’ve described and the tests I ran, I’d estimate you’re about ten weeks along.”

Y/N felt the world tilt around her, as if the ground had shifted beneath her feet. Pregnant. She placed a trembling hand over her abdomen, where a tiny life was beginning to grow. This was real. This was happening.

“I… I didn’t expect this,” she murmured, more to herself than to Pomfrey. “I didn’t even think… Severus and I… we never talked about having children...”

The weight of those words settled heavily in her chest. Severus. How would she tell him? They had been married for nearly two years now, and though their bond was strong, they had never once discussed starting a family. In fact, she vividly recalled Severus’s past comments about children—his distaste for their unpredictability, his general discomfort around them. He had always preferred the solitude of his potions lab, the quiet precision of his work. A child would shatter that carefully constructed world.

Would he even want this? Would he be angry? Disappointed?

“I don’t know how to tell him,” Y/N whispered, her voice trembling. “What if… what if he doesn’t want this baby?”

Pomfrey’s gaze softened with sympathy. “Y/N, I can’t speak for Severus, but I do know that he loves you deeply. Whatever his feelings about children may have been in the past, this is different. This is your child. His child.”

Y/N nodded, but the anxiety still twisted tightly in her chest. She thanked Pomfrey quietly before slipping out of the hospital wing, her mind spinning with the weight of the news she now carried.

The following days passed in a blur. Y/N moved through her classes on autopilot, her mind always half-distracted, her heart heavy with the secret she held. Each evening, she would sit with Severus in their private quarters, sharing quiet meals, but the words she so desperately needed to say remained lodged in her throat. She couldn’t find the courage to tell him, not yet.

It was during one of these particularly restless days that Minerva McGonagall caught her lingering outside the Great Hall, her eyes distant as students bustled past her. Y/N had been so lost in her thoughts that she hadn’t noticed the Transfiguration professor approaching until Minerva’s voice broke through the haze.

“Y/N, dear, you look a bit peaky. Is everything all right?”

Y/N blinked and forced a smile, though she could tell by the narrowing of Minerva’s eyes that it wasn’t convincing. “I’m fine, really. Just… tired.”

Minerva’s lips pressed into a thin line, her sharp gaze piercing through Y/N’s weak facade. “You’ve been looking more than tired lately. I’ve seen you lost in thought during meals, and you’ve barely spoken to anyone. What’s going on?”

Y/N hesitated, her hand instinctively moving to her stomach. She trusted Minerva, perhaps more than anyone at Hogwarts aside from Severus. But saying the words aloud—admitting the truth—felt too terrifying.

Minerva, however, was not one to let things lie. She stepped closer, her voice softening. “Y/N, I’ve known you for many years as one of my student then as a colleague and friend. I can see that something is troubling you. You can tell me. Whatever it is, I’m here.”

Tears pricked at Y/N’s eyes before she could stop them. She hadn’t realized just how much she had been holding back, how much the weight of this secret had been wearing on her.

“I… I’m pregnant, Minerva,” she whispered, her voice breaking.

Minerva’s sharp intake of breath was immediate, her eyes widening in surprise. “Pregnant?” she repeated, her voice filled with astonishment. “That’s… well, that’s wonderful news, my dear!”

Y/N shook her head, wiping at her eyes with trembling hands. “I don’t know if it is. Severus… he doesn’t like children. We’ve never talked about having them. I’m terrified that he won’t want this baby.”

Minerva’s expression softened with understanding as she gently placed a hand on Y/N’s shoulder. “Oh, Y/N,” she said quietly. “I can understand why you’re afraid. But Severus loves you. And love has a way of changing even the most stubborn of minds.”

Y/N sniffled, but the knot of fear in her chest remained tight. “What if he doesn’t want it, Minerva? What if he resents me for this?”

Minerva squeezed her shoulder reassuringly. “Give him a chance. He may surprise you. You’ve brought so much light into his life already, Y/N, you've chnager him in so many ways. A child… it could be a new kind of hope for him.”

Though her words were kind, Y/N still couldn’t shake the lingering fear. She thanked Minerva for her support, but as the days passed, her anxiety only seemed to grow.

It was three days later when Y/N was summoned to Albus Dumbledore’s office. She had been sitting in the greenhouse, mindlessly trimming the leaves of a Flutterby Bush, when a house-elf appeared with a note requesting her presence. Her heart sank immediately. Had Dumbledore somehow found out? Did he know?Did Minerva told him?

When she entered the Headmaster’s office, the usual warm glow of the room seemed more oppressive than welcoming. Fawkes let out a soft trill from his perch, but Dumbledore himself was quiet, watching her with those piercing blue eyes from behind his desk.

“Y/N, please sit,” he said, his voice kind yet commanding.

She obeyed, her hands trembling slightly as she folded them in her lap. Dumbledore watched her for a moment, the silence stretching on before he finally spoke.

“There is something weighing heavily on your mind, my dear,” he said softly. “I have seen it in your eyes these past few days. Would you care to share what troubles you?”

Y/N bit her lip, her eyes fixed on the floor. She didn’t know how to explain the storm of emotions inside her. But this was Albus Dumbledore—he had a way of knowing, even when she didn’t want to say anything at all.

“I’m pregnant,” she whispered, the confession falling from her lips like a weight she could no longer carry alone.

Dumbledore’s eyebrows lifted slightly, but his expression remained calm, thoughtful. “I see,” he said gently. “And this news troubles you.”

She nodded, unable to meet his eyes. “We all know that Severus doesn’t like children.Plus we’ve never talked about having them. I’m afraid… I’m afraid he won’t want this.”

Dumbledore leaned forward, his hands clasped together atop his desk. “Severus Snape is a man of many complexities, Y/N. But if there is one thing I know about him, it is that he values you above all else. This child may be unexpected, but love has a way of blossoming even in the most unlikely of places.”

Y/N’s throat tightened, her fears still gnawing at her heart. “What if he doesn’t want to be a father? What if this ruins everything between us, everything we've built during those last two years?”

Dumbledore’s eyes twinkled with that familiar warmth as he spoke, his voice filled with the wisdom of someone who had seen more than most. “Severus has spent much of his life building walls around his heart, but you, my dear, have already found a way through those walls. This child will not tear you apart—it will bring you closer.”

Tears welled in Y/N’s eyes once again, and this time, she didn’t try to stop them. “I don’t know how to tell him,” she admitted, her voice thick with emotion.

Dumbledore rose from his seat and crossed the room to stand beside her, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Tell him the truth. Trust in the love you share. And remember, Y/N, that life is not a series of planned events, but rather a garden full of unexpected blooms. This child is a gift—a new beginning.”

That night, Y/N finally found the courage to tell Severus.

They were sitting by the fire in their quarters, the soft crackling of the flames filling the space between them. Severus was reading, his sharp eyes focused on the text before him, but Y/N could barely concentrate on the warmth of the room. Her heart pounded in her chest, her hands clammy with nerves.

“Severus” she began, her voice trembling slightly. He looked up from his book, his dark eyes immediately locking onto hers with concern.

“What is it love?” he asked, setting the book aside.

Y/N took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. “I… I have something to tell you.”

Severus’s brow furrowed, and for a moment, she saw a flicker of fear in his eyes. “Are you unwell?” he asked, his voice laced with worry.

She shook her head quickly. “No, it’s not that. It’s just…gosh this so hard to say.... I’m pregnant.”

For a moment, the words hung in the air between them, heavy and uncertain. Severus stared at her, his expression unreadable, and Y/N’s heart clenched painfully in her chest. She had expected him to say something, to react, but he was silent, his gaze fixed on her as if he were processing the information.

Then, slowly, Severus rose from his seat and crossed the room to her, kneeling down in front of her so that they were eye-level. His hands, usually so precise and controlled, were trembling slightly as he reached out to cup her face.

“Y/N,” he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. “You’re pregnant?”

She nodded, tears welling in her eyes as she searched his face for any sign of rejection, any hint that he didn’t want this.

But instead, she saw something she hadn’t expected—joy.

Severus’s lips twitched into the smallest of smiles, his dark eyes softening as he looked at her. “You're carying....A child,” he murmured, almost in disbelief. “Our child.”

Y/N let out a choked sob, relief flooding her as she leaned into his touch.”I'm so sorry I didn't tell you sonner, I was so afraid you wouldn’t want this,” she confessed, her voice shaking. “I know you don’t like children, and I didn’t know how you’d feel about—”

Severus silenced her with a soft kiss, his hands cradling her face as if she were the most precious thing in the world. When he pulled back, his gaze was intense, filled with a depth of emotion that took her breath away.

“I don't like children who aren't when they are insufferable eleven years old students...I never thought I could have something like this,” he said quietly. “A family. With you.”

Y/N smiled through her tears, her heart swelling with love for the man who had once seemed so distant, so unreachable. “Are you… are you happy about this?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Severus’s smile widened, and for the first time, she saw a glimmer of hope in his eyes—a hope she had never thought possible.

“I’m more than happy,” he whispered, pressing a soft kiss to her forehead. “I’m honored, I'm proud. I can’t wait to meet our child.”

Tears streamed down Y/N’s face as she wrapped her arms around him, holding him close as the fire crackled softly in the background. She had been so afraid, so certain that this news would drive a wedge between them, but instead, it had brought them closer than ever before.

In that moment, as Severus held her in his arms, Y/N knew that everything would be all right. They would face this new chapter of their lives together, hand in hand, ready to nurture the life growing between them.

[reasonsforhope]

"Passed in February [2024], a massive subsidy program to help Indian households install rooftop solar panels in their homes and apartments aims to provide 30 gigawatt hours of solar power to the nation’s inventory.

The scheme, called PM-Surya Ghar, will provide free electricity to 10 million homes according to estimates, and the designing of a national portal—a sort of Healthcare.gov for solar panels—will streamline the process of installation and payment.

The program was cooked up because India had fallen woefully behind on its planned installations for rooftop solar. In many parts of the subcontinent, the sun is absolutely brutal and relentless, but by 2022, Indian rooftop solar power generation topped out at 11 gigawatts, which was 29 gigawatts under a national target set a decade ago.

Part of the challenge, Euronews reports, is that approval from various agencies and departments—as many as 21 different signatures in some cases—was needed to place a solar array on your house. Aside from this bureaucratic nightmare, the cost of installation was often higher than $5,000; more than half the average yearly income for a working Indian urbanite.

Under PM-Surya Ghar, subsidies for a 2-kilowatt solar array will cover as much as 60% of the installation costs, falling to 40% for arrays 3 kilowatts or higher. Loans set at around 7% interest rates will help families in need get started. 750 billion Indian rupees, or $9 billion has been set aside for the project.

Even in New Delhi, which can be covered in clouds and smog for days, solar users report saving hundreds during summer time on their electricity costs, with one apartment shaving $700 every month off energy bills.

PM-Surya Ghar is also seen as having the potential to cause a boom in the Indian solar market. Companies no longer have to go running around for planning and permitting requirements, and the government subsidies ensure their customer base can grow beyond the limits of household income."

-Good News Network, April 10, 2024

[obaex]

untouchable - rafe cameron

summary: when a fight breaks out at midsummers, an unexpected ally reminds you who you are and whose you are

word count: 2k

a/n: set during season 1 midsummers. indulging in all my favorite things about soft + protective rafe ♡

It was the perfect summer night.

Stars twinkled overhead and the deck of the Island Club was awash in the warm glow of hundreds of string lights that swayed gently in the breeze coming off the ocean. The slow, sweet melody that the band was playing swirled through the air and mixed with the chatter and laughter that surrounded Midsummers.

Your arms wrapped around Rafe’s neck, cheek pressed to his as his arms embraced you, his hands resting on your lower back where his fingers traced small circles as you swayed back and forth. Your eyes fluttered closed as you relaxed into him. You could smell his expensive cologne, his signature scent that was so overwhelmingly him it clouded your head. At this distance, you could feel the heat coming off of his body, feel him hum happily against you as you ran your fingers through the hair at the base of his neck.

He shifted slightly, lowering his lips against your ear as he whispered, “You look beautiful tonight.” You smiled widely and laughed quietly as a blush rose to your cheeks. “I know I’ve said it about five times already, but I’m going to keep telling you, gorgeous. You’re the most beautiful girl here, and I’m damn lucky to be by your side. Tonight… always.” You pulled back to look at him, wanting to see his azure blue eyes sparkle, which they did, with love, with admiration, and with a hint of mischief as he took you in. He leaned down to kiss you, letting his lips linger just on top of yours, brushing them agonizingly close, but not letting them touch, teasing you as his lips curled into a smile against yours, knowing how much this drove you crazy, how much he drove you crazy before he relented; he was never one to deny you what you wanted. His lips worked against yours like no one was watching, warm and soft. He tasted sweet like champagne and your head was spinning. You had lost count of the number of times he had kissed you, but you never got tired of the way it made you feel, like you were floating. You nipped his lip lightly, playfully, and you could feel his hands grip the back of your dress as he tried to restrain himself. “Mmpf you have no idea what you do to me. I will throw you over my shoulder right now if you keep that up” he said between the kisses that you continued to press against his lips.

“I’ll just have to save it for later” you said slyly as you looked up at him with your doe eyes.

“I can have you in the car, to Tanneyhill, and in my bed in 15 minutes” he said seriously, even as his signature smirk rested on his lips, and you laughed. “11 actually, final estimate.”

“I’m having fun, Rafe, we can be patient.”

“Patience is not a strength of mine” he replied, chuckling. That much you knew well.

The band switched to a more upbeat song and people began shifting around the dance floor.

“Drink?” Rafe asked.

“Yes, please” you replied.

He pressed another warm, sincere kiss to your lips. “Be right back, pretty girl” he said as he shifted towards the bar.

You scanned the party quickly, eyes landing on Rafe’s sister Sarah and you wandered over to keep her company. “Dare I ask where Topper is?” you said jokingly. She looked over at you and laughed, rolling her eyes. You two had a close relationship; in many ways you were like the older sister she never had, she confided in you more than anyone else, so you knew all about John B at this point. It didn’t surprise you that she had distanced herself from her boyfriend tonight, and it didn’t surprise you when John B’s best friend approached her, casually brandishing a note in her direction.

“I’ve got a uh note from Vlad” he said, eyeing her knowingly. She was grinning from ear to ear as she took it from him and began reading. JJ’s eyes shifted from her to you, recognizing you immediately.

“Future Mrs. Cameron? Lovely to see you here tonight” he said.

Your eyes narrowed slightly at the nickname, knowing he didn’t mean it as a compliment, but you nodded kindly at him in response.

“Aww, what, that’s all I get? Boyfriend won’t let you talk to me? I’m surprised he left your side for more than two minutes.”

Sarah’s head shot up at his mocking tone as she smacked him on the arm, “JJ” she said, “leave her alone.”

“What!” he said, throwing his hands up in mock surrender. “If I was dating the hottest girl on the island, I wouldn’t let her out of my sight either!”

You rolled your eyes.

“Seriously, sweetheart, when you get tired of the hair gel and inevitably mediocre sex, call me” he said, lifting his fingers to his ear like a phone.

“What? –” you started to say angrily, when JJ glanced over your shoulder, eyes widening as he began to take a couple of steps back.

You felt a warm hand slide around your waist as Rafe appeared by your side, eyes transfixed on the boy in front of him.

“What the fuck did you just say to her?” he said, his voice calm, his tone even, the control he had in the moment somehow more frightening than the alternative.

“Ya know, I’m on the clock right now, I should get back—” JJ said, pointing over his shoulder, quickly trying to backpedal.

“Nah, you know, I really want to know what you said to my girlfriend. I want to know why you thought you could talk to her, or even look at her for that matter?” Rafe continued, his hand slipping off your waist as he walked towards JJ, his imposing figure looming over him.

“My mistake” JJ said, holding his hands out in front of him “thought this was a free country for a second, but I’ll know better next time.”

Rafe laughed and you could tell there wasn’t an ounce of humor in it.

“Next time? Next time. Right, right… There’s not going to be a next time, Maybank. Stay the fuck away from her” he said, the threat lingering in the air, the dancefloor now quiet as people caught on to their argument.

JJ eyed Rafe carefully before nodding, and just as Rafe was ready to bury his anger for the sake of saving your night, just as he was ready to go back to dancing with you, maybe even convince you to leave early with him, JJ said, “But I mean, can you blame me? In a dress like that? She’s practically begging for it.”

Rafe lunged before anyone could grab him and several people near you screamed. He tackled JJ to the ground and landed three solid right-hooks to his face before security arrived and pulled them apart.

“This isn’t over, Maybank!” he shouted as JJ spit blood on the ground at Rafe’s feet, causing him to jerk in the grip of the security guard all over again.

“Sir,” security said, “please follow me” he said, escorting Rafe firmly off the dance floor as JJ was pulled in the opposite direction.

“What!?” Rafe said, “I’m a member here, he was harassing my girlfriend!”

“Sir, please, just follow me” he insisted.

Rafe’s eyes met yours quickly as he was ushered away, afraid that he had ruined your night. “M’sorry baby, m’so sorry” he said quickly.

You tried to reassure him, shaking your head, “It’s okay, Rafe.”

“I’ll be right back, I promise” he said.

You worked your bottom lip nervously back and forth with your teeth as you watched him go before you became all too aware of the silence that surrounded you. As you brought your attention back to the party, you realized nearly every set of eyes was on you, watching you after what had just occurred. You felt the heat of their critical gaze, as every person formed their own thoughts about Rafe, about you, as they whispered amongst themselves. You tried to hold your head high as your chin began to quiver.

“Don’t give them the satisfaction” said a quiet voice over your shoulder. You turned to see Rose walking up beside you, her eyes glaring at the people around you, daring them to say something, to you or to her. One by one as she met their eyes they turned back to their conversations.

You swallowed your emotions. You had never spent much time with Rose, but now you were overwhelmingly grateful for her company, her support. 

She turned her gaze on you as she took a sip of her champagne. “They’ll never understand” she said, “they think they do, but they don’t. They think they know everything” she paused, her eyes narrowing at a group of girls who were whispering nearby. They immediately stopped talking under her gaze and shuffled away. She returned her focus to you.

“They think we’re crazy, you and me. To be in love with men with such a capacity for anger, for violence. But what they fail to see is that these are the same men who won’t hesitate to do what needs to be done, for their families, for you, for me. They love and hate in equal measure. And nothing in this world compares to that kind of love, does it?” she asked, sipping her champagne again as she eyed you conspiratorially. You had never spent any time thinking about the fact that Rose Cameron might be the only person who knew exactly what it felt like to be you sometimes.

“Rafe is so much like his father,” she continued, “that’s why they’re always at each other’s throats, that’s why he’s the hardest on him. That’s also why I know exactly what’s going on in that boy’s mind when he looks at you…” she smiled, pausing. “You’ll find out soon enough that being Mrs. Cameron comes with a lot of attention, and a lot of perks” she added, winking. Your eyes widened in surprise as you glanced at her, did she know something you didn’t?

“If it isn’t blatantly obvious to them, it’s blatantly obvious to me that that boy would burn the world to the ground for you” she said shaking her head as she smiled. “Lucky girl” she whispered, pressing a kiss to your cheek as she walked away.

Her words took a moment to sink in, but then you realized how right she was.

With your head held high you made your way past the remaining onlookers, and inside the clubhouse. You followed the reverberating sounds of raised voices to find Rafe arguing vehemently with two security guards. All three turned to look at you as you approached them.

“M’am” said one of the guards, nodding politely.

“Baby…” Rafe said as he looked at you, apology written all over his face. You smiled warmly at him, taking his hand in your own before turning to the security guards.

“We’re leaving” you said resolutely. One of them looked like he wanted to argue with and you put a hand up to stop him, cutting him off before he could start.

“We’re leaving and you better believe you will be hearing from Ward Cameron about how his son, his family was treated on the night dedicated to recognizing his contributions to this community. About how you let a member of the staff harass me and then deigned to humiliate Rafe when he tried to help. And I’m fine by the way, thank you for asking. Oh wait, you didn’t ask, did you? Stellar performance tonight, gentlemen” you said.

With that, you tucked your arm into Rafe’s and the two of you walked confidently through the front doors.

When you had made it outside, Rafe turned to look at you, glancing briefly back inside then to you again. “Holy shit” he said, “where the hell did that come from?” he was smiling widely at you, practically glowing with admiration, “and why was it so fucking hot?”

You shrugged casually before turning to face him, a proud smirk on your lips as you gripped the lapels of his jacket. “Someone reminded me just how lucky I am to have you, Rafe Cameron” you said, pressing a sincere but passionate kiss to his lips before continuing, “It’s not that I needed the reminder… it’s more that I needed to remind myself who I am, what I am when I’m with you.”

“And that is…?” he asked, pulling your body flush against his, his lips hovering just over yours as his eyes twinkled.

“Untouchable” you whispered, pressing your lips to his and squealing when he scooped you into his arms and walked you to his truck.

taglist: @ietss, @gillybear17, @palmwinemami, @sweetestdesire, @softcoremaybank, @diary-of-jj, @m-indkiller, @one-sweet-gubler

[mysticstronomy]

HOW ARE BLACK HOLES CREATED, AND HOW DO THEY GROW??

Blog#461

Wednesday, December 11th, 2024

Welcome back,

In 2017, astronomers started finding monster black holes in the very early universe. Containing roughly a billion times the mass of our Sun, these black holes were surrounded by disks of infalling matter shining so intensely that we can detect them across immense stretches of space and time.

These gravitational giants existed when the universe was only 700 million years old, or 5 percent its current age. At that point in cosmic history, the universe was still a toddler. Gravity was just beginning to rein in clouds of gas and dark matter to form structures that would later evolve into mature spiral and elliptical galaxies. Stars were beginning to pop into being, but they do today.

According to the traditional picture of black hole formation and growth, the universe at this time simply had not existed long enough for black holes to bulk up to a billion solar masses.

So, based on our general understanding of how black holes form and grow, these black holes should not exist.

And yet they do — posing a major challenge that astrophysicists have yet to unravel.

Quasars are brightly shining beacons of light and energy generated by the accretion of material onto supermassive black holes. In the 1990s, astronomers using a combination of ground- and space-based telescopes started to find extremely distant quasars powered by black holes of a billion or more solar masses.

By the mid-2010s, it was no longer a big deal to find quasars dating back to 1 billion or 2 billion years after the Big Bang. But theorists had a difficult time explaining how such massive black holes could have arisen so soon in the universe’s history.

For quasars and other objects that existed many billions of years ago, it’s meaningless to express their distances in terms of light-years. The universe has expanded so much between then and now that astronomers instead refer to an object’s redshift, which is a measurement of how much cosmic expansion has stretched the object’s light toward redder (longer) wavelengths.

For years, astronomers such as the University of Arizona’s Xiaohui Fan have been identifying quasars at redshifts as high as 6, when the universe was about 900 million years old. They’ve even found a few around redshift 7, which corresponds to an era when the universe was about 735 million years old. But in late 2017, an international team led by Eduardo Bañados of the Carnegie Institution for Science announced a quasar at a record-shattering redshift of 7.54. This quasar, designated J1342+0928 (J1342 for short), based on its sky coordinates in Boötes, was radiating 40 trillion Suns’ worth of energy at a time when the universe was only 690 million years old.

The team found J1342 by mining data from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer satellite, the United Kingdom Infrared Telescope Deep Sky Survey Large Area Survey, and the DECam Legacy Survey. They used the 6.5-meter Magellan Telescope in Chile to measure the quasar’s redshift, while observations with the 8-meter Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii enabled the team to estimate the black hole’s mass: around 800 million Suns.

Originally published on https://www.astronomy.com

COMING UP!!

(Saturday, December 14th, 2024)

"HOW BIG CAN 'SUPER MASSIVE BLACK HOLES' GET??"

[somelondramatic]

Don't Go, Please

random motivation hit, please take a short hollow knight snippet based on my gijinkas :> set directly after the radiance fight

"Please," She hisses through her teeth, "please you cannot go, not yet."

Hornet's throat feels raw from the effort it takes not to scream it, the desperation in her voice still too plain for her comfort. Palm shaking, she wills gentleness into her touch she thought had long ago escaped her as she cards her fingers through The Hollow Knight’s tangled hair. Careful not to snag it on the pale claws she's sewn into her gloves, she notes with rising nausea their void oozing and seamlessly blending into the fabric. She closes her eyes tightly and attempts to bury the sob building in her chest, fighting to compose herself.

Weakness won’t do in the face of these injuries, as horrified as she is.

The figure on the floor, so curled in on itself, shudders and moves. Turning their head from where it had laid motionlessly since their dreams had gone blessedly dark, Hollow struggles to place the recognition that lances through the last dredges of infection. Hornet's voice had been distantly familiar, dancing through the sunrise coated clouds that fogged their mind and landing on a memory they had chained deep into their core; untouched by Her. 

A demanding voice sounded near the Pure Vessel's feet, much too loud for the owner's body by The King's estimation (Hollow had never agreed, they realize, it was perfect for the ball of energy it belonged to). An argument between parents rose, the warring leaders - lovers by contract only - each with their own idea of what was proper. The tugging of small hands on gowns and capes went unnoticed by all save for the vessel, and that big voice asked unabashedly to be held. They stared at the red cloaked princess pouting stubbornly up at them, and they calculated.

"Protect the princess, by whatever means necessary."

Surely it was meant for any situation, even if the agitators were her own parents. An order, yes, one the Pure Vessel sought to carry out with a sudden ferocity they couldn't grasp. There was soon warmth in their arms and in their chest, the little girl hugging their neck slipping down and beginning to doze against their winged cloak. Finally, four eyes blinked drowsily up at them, a huge yawn and tiny fangs glinting menacingly as the young demigod of their memory whispered.

"You better not drop me, Holly." 

A name. She had named them. She had loved them. And had they the word then, they would have known they loved her back, adored the ground she walked on from that moment.

How could they ever forget?

Hornet. 

Struggling to see, their remaining eye lands on her tear stained cheeks, tracking those tears upwards to find her still squeezing her eyes shut. Briefly, a storm of emotions floods them, confusing in their timelessness.

Are they allowed? To comfort, to care? Where is father, where is Herrah, why do they hurt so much? The growing ache in their chest all at once begins to feel too real-

Their thoughts quickly stumble to a halt.

What is hurting their sister? This pain should be theirs alone.

Hollow flinches suddenly in understanding. It's them; it is their vulnerability - their inevitable failure - that is hurting her. The Goddess is slain, though, and their shell of a life from before gone. They can fix one thing, at least, against all standing orders. 

If nothing matters now, they get to choose.

Agony drenches their spine as they lift their hand, silently panting with the effort to even move it. They take a deep breath, dredging up what little soul in their reservoirs they have left and focusing until enough of the fire burned through by the infection drains away to complete the movement. Their palm just barely meets Hornet's jaw, shifting with her startled gasp to cup her cheek.

Her thoughts shift rapidly, nearly unable to accept the reality of their minute recovery of self. Free hand clenching into the fabric of their cloak, she trembles in guilt as she thinks of the being that had dragged itself lifelessly across the stone floor minutes ago. What damage her own needle had wrought, when her sibling was puppeted by a goddess Hornet had sworn to see the end of. 

Here was that end, ready for her to grasp and never let go. A chance to have even a fraction of family back.

Hornet leans haltingly forward, chest heaving.

Before Hollow can try to communicate to her that they are not beaten yet, not if she needs them, not if it leaves her alone, she keens into their hand brokenly. 

Teeth bared, she chokes, "I keep asking myself 'What is one more loss in this damned kingdom? When I have nothing else, what is one more?' And I cannot, Hollow. Holly-" 

She stutters over their nickname and swallows back another bitter sob, shivering and spitting tears and saliva angrily, "I do not think I can take another, and I refuse to. I am not going to give you up so easily."

Void blots their vision, falling from their eye in a fascimile of her tears and floating into nothingness. Carefully, they stroke their thumb past one of the small scars along her cheekbone, mourning the loss of the childhood they so desperately wanted to save. They then draw back, giving her sternum a single tap to capture her attention.

She freezes, tensing as she waits for them to slowly fingerspell,

"Not. Going. Anywhere."

Fresh tears fall.

"Protect the-" They pause, wavering before hesitantly correcting themself, "Protect my sister."

Hornet catches their hand as it drops, too exhausted to keep it raised, and finally allows herself to weep, if only for a moment. She presses her forehead back into Hollow's palm, doubled over as she catches her breath. The familiar shape of cool void makes her feel impossibly small, but safe, in a way only they could, beyond any arrogant failsafe devised by her father.

"Thank you."

She stares up at the ceiling of the temple, swiping at her face tiredly and steeling herself with a smile that disappears in a flash.

"Allow me to bear the burden now, sibling."

[missbelindachandrabombs]

yesterday i started a personal long term activity that i like to call The Condensation Project. because i’m bringing The Cloud back down to earth. well, not quite. but what it does entail, is, prospectively, a physical archive of everything i have in every saved folder on social media (sadly you can’t print videos out, so i mean images and text) and/or screenshots.

i have long thought about the fact that all of our saved content is in fact immensely precarious. a nazi could report your account tomorrow and, because zuck’s team are nazi sympathisers, your whole archive would be just, poof, gone. social networks are ruled by cold-hearted oligarchs, all of them, technocrats who sell your data for profit. i hate the fact that all my favourite art, all my favourite memes and musings and poems and photos and songs and and and, are located on platforms owned by these tyrants, who have the ability to revoke our access to these materials at their whim.

i refuse to continue paying rent with my soul for the ability to look at artworks people haven’t posted anywhere else. so i’ve embarked on the (slow) task of cataloguing all my saved posts on instagram — there’s several thousand of them — saving them to the Compooter, pasting them into a google document, shuffling them around so that the largest possible amount of images can fit on 1 A4 page. google itself is run by the very same type of billionaire, so this is one temporary step on the road to freedom. what i’m going to do is Print Them Out.

by my estimate, it will total about 900 pages. i don’t know how much that will end up costing, but really i’m ready to sacrifice other areas of spending so i can splurge out on this. after printing, i will be cutting out every image individually, and gluing them into scrapbook(s, plural, i’ll probably go through at least 4); writing out every artist’s name next to it, copying out the instagram post’s caption too if it was exceptionally interesting.

i’m a very lazy person and a serial procrastinator so this will probably take me 5 months. after i’m done with the images, i’ll start writing out by hand the saved text-based posts that i want to preserve.

i don’t know much, but i do know one thing: the internet as we know it is going down in the next 3 years, 5ish if we’re lucky. other people can do the work of prepping for floods or droughts or other disasters, i’m preparing for the CULTURAL drought. i can deal with hunkering down in a bunker and eating beans from a can, but i can’t live without art, poetry, history. so that’s what i’m prioritising.

“just read books” okay, yeah, nobody’s discounting that. but not all the information in the world is contained within the pages of a book — a lot of it is up there, drifting in the Cloud, and nowhere else. i’m condensing it.

[pandorafallz]

Where are the Spires located??

Here's my estimation of the Main Map and where the Heartlands could be. It's all speculation and no clear indication but it's assumed not of the Upper plains. I suspect a little North-east.

The Spires, where the other Kame'tire clan, i had no idea where to put it due to the fact that we enter the Map from the Leftside of the map and clear it to the right.

If we were to part the spires beside the clouded forest, it seems more likely that we should have entered the region from the Rightside and go left (basically, the map should be reflected to how that based on how we could move from the mountains to the spires.) Unless it is on the right but we have to go north or south and go the long away around the map to get to the 'entry' way of our map.

It's possible that the Spires are north of the Clouded Forest, above the Yava and the Sarentu Moot site and neighbours the Heartlands but... south of the spires is water and wetlands and the upper plains are strict moutins.

Could the Spires and the Heartlands share an ocean? Or a lake or a large body of water? The south of the spires ends with water, much like the Kinglor Forest. North of the heartlands starts with water so there could be a connection between the two and why the player enters from the left side than from the right. The Heartlands is a lot of broken-up land in its north-west and the spires is a canyon region so... it's a possibility.

We know from Dialogue between the members of the second Kame'itre clan and us that the Kinglor forest is 'so far away' so we know the spires (and heartlands) are distant from sharing an ocean with the south of the Kinglor forest.

tbh, i really want to know or get an estimate of locations for my Alma fic.

What are your thoughts of where the Spires could be in reference to the Main story line Map?

[tams-writeblr]

Love in a hopeless Place 31

Synopsis: She was barely grown up, when she stepped into the bar that was the center of Zaun's resistance. The people she met there would forever change her life, and one of them especially. Silco x reader/OC; first-person POV; overall rating: E for Explicit; canon-compliant (though I might make a stretch on the timeline here and there to make things fit my symbolism); age gap! (younger female, older male); 9 chapters; 45k; cis female reader/POV; no beta-reader; completed Chapter ratings/warnings: T for Teen, mentions of infertility, canon typical consumption of alcohol and cigarettes, mentions of violence and drugs, mentions of mental illness Wordcount: 2.7k Author's note: Ladies and Gentleman, let me introduce you to Gangster bride Kid! I love imagining her slow shift from the ordinary girl TM to a full grown mafia missus. I did forgo on the fur coat though, I hat stuff like that... Comments would be appreciated!

Today's music recommendation: Merci Rains - The Devil is a Gentleman

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Act III

Chapter II

Part 2/8

As I expected, this night changed my whole life, and at first I didn't know how I liked that.

It soon went around that I was the woman at Silco's side. And such rumors didn't just come with favors. Many believed I was doing it for money, for the status or for the nice clothes. Secretly, they looked down on me more than before. Called me Silco's pet, and worse, behind our backs,

My co-workers suddenly stopped their conversations when I entered the room.

It seemed like I had no friend in the world left, except for Alex, who had been my closest alley, though all the years I knew them. They didn't like my decision to get back with Silco, but they would never judge me for it. They knew my heart. And again they threatened that their wrath would be unstoppable should he dare to hurt me again.

I soon didn't help at the bar anymore, instead, I hired a new bartender, Thieram. He did a fabulous job and soon degraded Kev to second in line, much to the latter's dismay, of course.

But I couldn't let affection or old bonds let my estimation get clouded. And Thieram just was the better choice.

Over the time, Silco entrusted me with all his financial matters, even the ones I tried to avoid at first.

But money spoils the character, and so I soon found myself entangled into Silco's Shimmer-business as well.

"I think we've got a problem here, Naveed," I said, leaning back in my swivel chair, swaying softly from side to side and playing nonchalantly with my pen. "I can recalculate this as much as I want, your calculation doesn't add up." I got out of the chair, walking over to the stout figure of Naveed, one of our busiest traffickers. My heels clicked on the wooden floor boards as I towered over his sitting frame.

"Come on, Kid. You know how this goes, sometimes you have to give stuff away for free. Canvassing. Our client base is already pretty large, it's not as easy to expand the business as it used to be."

What had been Silco's nickname for me had turned into something like my underworld alias, with almost all of our business partners calling me like that. Only Silco had refrained from using it on me. Not that I had been particularly fond of the nickname in the first place. On the contrary, when we were first dating, the name used to frustrate me, as it made me painfully aware of what I was compared to him. These days I didn't care much how people called me, as long as they didn't reduce me to my entanglement with Silco.

I rested my hands on my hips, clicking my tongue in annoyance. "This discrepancy can't be explained by "giving stuff for free". I get it; you gotta let people get the taste. But unfortunately, you didn't bring us that many new clients in the last quarter."

Naveed broke a sweat and leaned back in his chair.

I stepped even closer, so that I was already between his spread legs. "So, if you can't explain things to me, maybe I have to find an explanation myself." I placed the tip of my pen against his carotid and clicked it once. "First. You really are that stupid at math, and I can't tolerate that. I'd have to replace you with somebody smarter. Second." I clicked my pen twice. "You are your own best customer, and sniff that stuff yourself. I couldn't allow that either, 'cause sooner or later point one will also set in. And as mentioned before, I couldn't accept that." I clicked my pen trice and pulled it even harder against Naveed's throat. "Or third. You're trying to screw with me. And nobody screws with me or Silco. You know that, Naveed."

He gulped, his head bending as far away from me as possible. I knew he was partly just afraid of me, because I was under Silco's protection, but I was also known to make my threats true.

I took my pen away, straightened my back and swayed to my seat. Placing my pen on the table, I glowered at him. "You have three days to clean up your wallet and bring me the rest of my money. Or next time, my little friend over here will be on my pen's place." I dragged out a switchblade knife from my stationery and pushed it open.

Naveed didn't dare to reply. He only got up from his chair and tumbled out of my office.

I hated talking to people like that, but I couldn't show a moment of mercy, or mine and Silco's reputation would suffer. Lighting a cigarette, I took a few calming drags before relaxing against the backrest of my chair. I was just trying to get back to work when the door was opened again, and I looked into Silco's calm face.

"Having a long day, love?"

I gritted my teeth. "We're surrounded by jerks."

He chuckled lightly. "Why don't you call it a day? I mean, it's not any day."

I sighed at the thought about it. No, it was my freaking 30th birthday.

"Come on, dear. I'll take you for dinner, and when we're back, Jinx has prepared a little surprise for you. Go, refresh yourself, I'll have the car ready in 30 minutes."

I smiled at him, thankful for the distraction.

"Wear something thrilling," he breathed as I walked past him out of my office.

I knew exactly what I would put on. My purple cocktail dress had just returned from the dry cleaner's. I put my hair in an up-do, put in my favorite hoops, and put on a lipstick in Silco's favorite shade of red. I deliberately abstained from wearing a necklace, as I expected to get a new dangler for my birthday. A tad of my favorite perfume (it hadn't chanced since my youth), a pair of peep toes, and my cashmere coat rounded out my outfit, and after only 20 minutes I was good to go.

As I stepped down the stairs, to "The Last Drop", which since then had been remodeled into a bursting nightclub, he already waited for me in his booth.

"Now, that's what I was talking about," he greeted and placed a kiss on my cheek to not smudge my lipstick yet. He took me to the best place on our side of the bridge, and we both ordered our favorite curses.

"I'd die to see you stomp over Naveed like that," he smiled as I told him about my unpleasant encounter.

"I still feel like an imposter sometimes," I admitted, and took a sip of red wine.

Silco had been discontented with my choice of drink.

We had suspected I might be pregnant a few days ago, but my recent check-up had come out disappointing again. In the last years, we never had really tried to have a child, but we also weren't preventing it.

A child of our own would have completed our little family.

Even if Silco didn't seem to miss a biological child much, for me things were a little more difficult.

My bond with Jinx never got over that of a confidant. While she loved Silco with all her heart, and he adored her equally, there never was space for me in this relationship. And while she lovingly called Silco her dad, she only addressed me by my first name.

Of course, I still loved her dearly and tried to convince myself, that she was enough for us. Maybe it was the lack of age difference that never made Jinx as attached to me as she was to Silco. Maybe I was more like an odd cousin or like - an older sister. And Jinx definitely had an issue with elder siblings.

"Are you sure we shouldn't go see the doc and get his advice on this problem?", Silco picked up a conversation I had abandoned the day of my check-up.

"What problem, dear? So what if I don't have a child of my own? A kid wouldn't fit into our lives anyway. Think about it. Would you get up late at night to change some diapers?"

His lips were a thin line. He barely talked about what he really wanted, but when I came for him with my suspicion, he had been thrilled by the idea. "I'm just suggesting that there are ways to deal with these kinds of problems today. The Pilties are doing it all the time."

"But we aren't Pilties," I shot back, taking another sip of my drink. "If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. And either way, I'll be fine."

He grabbed my hand over the table. "Of course, I'll be fine too. However you decide. I already have more than I ever expected. You, Jinx, our business. I have everything a happy man needs. But I would want someone for you too. Someone who would be there while I was already long gone."

I took my hand out of his. "Don't you dare talk about something like that. We both still got enough time before any of us kicks the bucket." I looked into his pained face.

He tried to cover up the marks on his face, but I knew that the damage was getting worse, even after all those years. He thought I didn't notice when he got out of bed at night, paced through the bedroom, and then still got downstairs to do whatever. Probably Shimmer. There were few days that he actually woke up next to me, most days he woke me up at the same time in the morning, got back to bed with me for a few minutes of quality time, and then both of us started our days.

Sometimes we didn't see each other for twelve or 16 hours, but at the end of the day we both returned to our bedroom, our sanctuary, where we could only be man and woman without all the responsibilities and threats surrounding us.

"What's with those gloomy thoughts, love?", I tried to beam. "It's my birthday, we should be celebrating!" I raised my glass to cheer him. "And we now know each other for twelve years!"

He smiled and touched my glass with his. "And you're still as gorgeous as you used to be - no, you're even more stunning."

I batted my eyes at the praise. "My, you're so sweet."

Silco smiled at me, and our meal was served.

We ate in relative quiet, only chatting about our food.

When the plates were removed, Silco got up from his chair, walked around the table, and really put my necklace with a new ornament on it around my neck. "The color made me think of your eyes," he explained quietly.

I looked at the stone, which was about the size of a coin, and got lost in the way the light reflected in the cut. "Aw, Silco, you shouldn't have. It's beautiful."

"Just the best for my queen," he remarked and got back to his place. His eyes were fixed on the gem between my breasts. He licked his lips as if seeing something tasty and hummed lowly. "I can't wait to rip this dress off of you later and smudge that neat little lipstick."

I let my foot run up his shin. "Please don't destroy it, it's my favorite."

"I'll give my very best." He took a long sip of his drink. "But first we have to go through Jinx's surprise for you, anyway."

I chuckled. "Do you know what she prepared this time?"

Silco pretended his lips were a zipper. "My lips are sealed."

"Daw, you're no fun," I moaned, and he smirked at me. I loved to see the mischief return to his face.

He didn't have many opportunities to let that side show, and I was convinced only me and Jinx ever got a taste of it anymore.

I know how exhausting it was to always keep a straight face and to never let emotions bubble to the surface. It was probably what I liked least about our life.

After finishing our dinner, we instantly rode back home, and Jinx was already waiting excitedly for our return.

She roamed the pavement in front of "The Last Drop", as the car parked besides her. "Happy Birthday!", she beamed as I got out of the backseat.

I laughed at her boisterous caress.

"Come, hurry up! We need to go to the roof!" She grabbed my hand excitedly. "You too, Dad!" She also grabbed Silco's arm and dragged us to the backside of the building and up the exit stairs.

I had problems keeping up with her pace, but Silco was straight up panting, as we reached the rooftop terrace, and some strands had strayed out of his accurate hairdo. "We're not getting any younger, are we?", I teased as I brushed them back in place. I remembered vividly when his fast steps had left me breathless.

"Tadaaa!", Jinx announced and presented a daring construction of cables, fuses and boxes. She ignited a switch, and the fuse started burning.

Seconds later, a fountain of sparkles crackled out of a pylon, and yet a few seconds later the boxes started spilling fireworks into the night sky.

We stood for several minutes and watched in awe.

When the last sparkle had burned out, I hugged Jinx in a tight embrace. "That was beautiful, kiddo." I kissed her forehead. "Did you do this all on your own?"

She gave me a crooked smile. "Well, Dad helped with the purchase."

"Don't underestimate your talents, Jinx."

"My, you'll be a great pyrotechnician, when you're grown up," I gushed. Though, I had to realize that Jinx was almost grown up already.

She had come a long way since Silco took her in. She was already almost as tall as me. "Yeah, I sure will, and then I'll blow these bastards up, that dare to come in my way."

"Jinx," I instantly scolded, but Silco shut me up with a stern glance.

He placed his arm around her slim shoulders and squeezed her against his rips. "I'm sure you and your skills will soon be very useful for me and our cause. Maybe it's really time to entrust you with some meaningful tasks."

"Silco!" I was indignant.

But they both decided to ignore me. 

Then Silco sent Jinx to her room. "We'll talk about this some other time, okay?"

Jinx agreed, and the way her blue eyes glowered at me, brought goosebumps to my arms.

I turned away from them, watching over the city and taking deep breaths. Up here, the air wasn't quite as thick.

"It's time she gets involved with the business," Silco decided when he was sure that Jinx wasn't within earshot anymore. "At her age, I had already been working in the mines for two years."

"She's still a child!", I argued back.

"No, she's not." Silco ran a hand through his salt and pepper hair. "She acts like one, yes. But she needs to grow up. I hope by giving her a task, she'll grow into it."

I placed my hand on his chest, adjusting the rim of his vest. "Considering your past, you should let her be a child as long as possible. Don't push her into anything she's not."

"But she's my heir. She has to finally learn what her place is in this city. Or at least, what it should be."

I didn't talk back. I didn't agree with Silco's view, but Jinx was mainly his concern. I wouldn't challenge him over her upbringing. "I just hope you know what you're doing. You feel it too, the turmoil within her, don't you?"

Silco avoided my gaze. "She's fine, love. She's just a little different."

I put my mouth into a thin line.

"Come," he finally sighed and took my hand. "Let's get you out of this uncomfortable outfit."

[mariacallous]

Geopolitical storm clouds are gathering at the far reaches of Pax Americana, and yet there is remarkably little sign that the U.S. government or the American people have awoken to the mounting dangers. The threat posed by China and Russia and their rogue nation allies rated only passing mention in last year’s presidential campaign, for instance, which in typical fashion revolved around domestic issues such as the economy and inflation. Asked to choose among five issues in an NBC exit poll, only 4 percent of the voters surveyed during last year’s presidential election named foreign policy as a priority.

President Donald Trump has talked a lot about restoring strong U.S. leadership in an increasingly unstable world, but in its first two months, his administration has mostly sown chaos at home and doubt abroad about the reliability of the United States as an ally.

The administration’s ready-fire-aim approach to national security and world affairs stands in stark contrast to the sense of very real urgency felt at the United States’ geographic military commands, which are positioned forward around the globe.

In essence, these military headquarters are sentries on the far battlements of the U.S.-led, post-World War II international order. From their vantage point, Washington’s military and security forces already find themselves stretched thin by intense combat operations, hybrid and proxy warfare, and tense military standoffs with an increasingly cohesive “axis of autocracies” that is spread out over six time zones that span the globe.

Listen closely to the warnings from these outposts, and you can detect the sound of alarms clanging while the United States continues listing even as geopolitical storm clouds darken.

From the hillside headquarters of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command in Honolulu, commanders can gaze down on the tranquil waters of Pearl Harbor, where the surface of the water has an oily sheen resulting from persistent leakage from the once mighty battleship USS Arizona, sunk by Japanese bombs more than 80 years ago. The locals refer to the sheen as “black tears,” in memory of the 1,102 U.S. service members still entombed in the wreckage below.

Pearl Harbor is a place for quiet contemplation, and from the nearby vantage point of Indo-Pacific Command, it is impossible not to reflect on the dangers that accumulate when rising powers—such as 1930s-era Japan and Germany—confront status quo powers—such as that era’s Great Britain and the United States.

Today, the Indo-Pacific Command is consumed by the meteoric rise of another superpower in Asia—one whose bullying and provocations toward the United States and its regional allies have increased in rough proportion to a military expansion that recently retired leader of the command Admiral John Aquilino characterized as “the largest military buildup that we’re seeing in history, both conventional and nuclear.”

China’s massive defense manufacturing base now churns out weapons systems at a pace estimated at five to six times as fast as its anemic U.S. counterpart. Beijing already boasts not only the world’s largest navy, but also a shipbuilding capacity roughly 230 times that of the United States, according to Office of Naval Intelligence estimates.

Not coincidentally, in the past year alone, China’s armed forces have held live-fire exercises bracketing Taiwan, a democratic country that the Chinese Communist Party considers a breakaway province. Beijing’s People’s Liberation Army also regularly attacks the ships of the Philippines—a U.S. treaty ally—near contested islands. According to the Pentagon, since the fall of 2021 there have been more than 180 incidents of Chinese warplanes performing “coercive and risky” maneuvers targeting U.S. military aircraft in international airspace.

In congressional testimony in May 2024, Aquilino, then the head of Indo-Pacific Command, said that “all indications point to” the Chinese military meeting leader Xi Jinping’s deadline of being ready for a potential invasion of Taiwan by 2027.

Given that three of China’s standing war plans are built around that Taiwan scenario, the Pentagon has held classified war games testing the U.S. military’s readiness for such a contingency dating back a decade. Many Americans are not even aware that those secret war games consistently indicate that U.S. forces would not only lose that war, but also that they would lose it fast.

Contemplating the growing disparity in defense industrial capacity and Beijing’s aggressive claim of hegemony over the entire South China Sea, then- U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall III summarized conventional wisdom in September 2023 while speaking at a conference: “China is preparing for war, and specifically for a war with the United States.”

Remarkably, the theater-wide view from the village of Mons, Belgium, home to NATO’s sprawling Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE), is equally alarming.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 set off the largest conflict in Europe since World War II, is now in its fourth bloody year. During that time, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that Putin has transitioned the Russian economy to a near-total wartime footing, spending an estimated 7.1 percent of the country’s GDP on defense in 2024.

Despite mounting a large military resupply mission to help keep Ukraine in the fight, the United States and its NATO allies have been continually deterred from more decisive support by a level of nuclear weapons saber-rattling and brinkmanship by Moscow that the world has not seen since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. That brinksmanship escalated dramatically in November 2024, after Russia attacked Ukraine for the first time with a new type of intermediate-range ballistic missile that is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead as well as conventional ones.

The virulently anti-Western axis of autocracies that has come to Russia’s aid in its aggression against Ukraine and its challenge to the supposed U.S.-led, rules-based international order is increasingly alarming to U.S. security officials. China has lived up to its “no limits” partnership with Russia, which was announced just before the invasion, rescuing it from the isolation of Western sanctions with bilateral trade that soared to a record $240 billion in 2023. Beijing acts as a willing buyer for Russian oil while supplying Moscow with subcomponents such as drone and missile engines as well as the semiconductors that are critical to its burgeoning defense industry.

Despite its own conflict with Israel, the theocratic regime in Iran has also stepped in with shipments of ballistic missiles and thousands of lethal Shahed drones for Moscow’s war against its democratic neighbor.

The rogue regime in the so-called hermit kingdom of North Korea, a de facto nuclear weapons state and the most insular dictatorship in the world, has likewise provided Russia with short-range ballistic missiles and what South Korean authorities have estimated as 8 million artillery shells. And in a dramatic escalation of the conflict, U.S. intelligence officials revealed in late 2024 that Pyongyang had also sent an estimated 12,000 special forces troops to fight alongside their Russian counterparts against Ukraine. U.S. officials believe that in return, Moscow is sharing advanced air defense systems with Pyongyang.

In response to Western support for Ukraine, Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency has also greatly intensified its hybrid war against Europe, resulting in what Western intelligence officials characterize as a “an unprecedented rise” in acts of sabotage, arson, cyberattacks and attempted assassinations on NATO soil. In an article in Financial Times, the heads of the CIA and Britain’s MI6 described Russian intelligence activity as a “reckless campaign of sabotage across Europe.”

Western efforts to keep Ukraine supplied, even with fundamental war materials such as standard munitions and low-tech drones, have also revealed glaring deficiencies in industrial capacity in the once-vaunted U.S. “arsenal of democracy.” According to NATO intelligence estimates, Russia is on track to annually produce nearly three times as many artillery shells as the United States and its European allies combined (with 3 million shells versus 1.2 million, respectively). Russia has also dramatically increased its production of relatively cheap drones. Its close ally Beijing already dominates the worldwide market for commercial drones, with just one Chinese company accounting for approximately 70 percent of global production.

The view of the Middle East from the U.S. Central Command Forward Headquarters at al-Udeid Airbase in Qatar is no more reassuring. The war against Israel that the Gaza-based Hamas militant group launched to devastating effect on Oct. 7, 2023, quickly revealed itself as a coordinated attack on the United States’ closest ally in the region by Iran-led proxies that constitute Tehran’s so-called axis of resistance, which comprises Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria, and Houthi rebels in Yemen. The resulting war thus rapidly spread throughout the volatile region, including in the form of rare direct attacks between Israeli and Iran proper.

From the outset of the conflict, the U.S. military surged forces to come to Israel’s defense, with the Biden administration dispatching two aircraft carrier battle groups beginning in fall 2023. As a result, U.S. warships and aircraft were involved in the most intensive combat operations at sea since World War II, helping to protect Israel from missile attacks by Iran and its proxies, responding to attacks on U.S. bases and ships in the region, and engaging with Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Yemen in an attempt to thwart their attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

While Iran and its axis of resistance have been seriously weakened by the conflict, the intense strains of recent combat deployments on a historically small and overstretched U.S. military have been exposed for all to see. Defense Department officials have admitted struggling to find sufficient air defense systems to protect their allies in both the Middle East and Europe, and they are running short of key munitions such as surface-to-air missiles.

In late 2024, the Pentagon also announced the withdrawal of the last U.S. aircraft carrier deployed in the region. Asked about the redeployments and the gaps in presence they represent, Gen. Charles Brown Jr., the recently sacked chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted that the Defense Department had no choice but to “step back and take a look” at spiking demand and the impact of extended deployments on U.S. forces, “not just in the Middle East, but really around the world.”

Back home, the Trump administration continues to signal a realignment away from the United States’ traditional role as the so-called leader of the free world, even recently voting with Russia and North Korea at the United Nations against resolutions condemning Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine. For its part, Congress continues in its nearly unbroken, decadelong streak of failing to pass a defense budget on time, severely curtailing efforts to stabilize acquisition programs and reorient the Pentagon’s strategic direction to confront rapidly growing threats.

In a report published in December and titled “Restoring Freedom’s Forge,” Republican Sen. Roger Wicker, the new chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, took note of the urgency of this moment. “Over the last four decades, the defense acquisition system has ground to a virtual halt, buried under a mountain of statutes and regulations from Congress and the Pentagon,” he wrote.

And a congressionally mandated Commission on the National Defense Strategy (NDS) report released in July 2024 backed that conclusion with its own stark warning: “The threats the United States faces are the most serious and most challenging the nation has encountered since 1945 and include the potential for near-term major war,” the report began, noting that the United States has not fought such a global conflict since World War II, nearly 80 years ago, and last prepared for such a contingency during the Cold War, 35 years ago. “It is not prepared today,” the authors added.

Retired Rep. Jane Harman, the former chairwoman of the House Intelligence Committee, also served as the chair of the recent NDS Commission review.

In the event of a conflict with China or Russia, Harman noted in a recent interview with the Defense Writers Group, “there will be a major cyberattack on our critical infrastructure. When the lights go out in our cities, and our ports close, and our transportation systems melt down, people will start to pay attention. So maybe we can help them pay attention” ahead of what would surely be a catastrophe.

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Survey finds more hidden supermassive black holes than expected

Multiple NASA telescopes recently helped scientists search the sky for supermassive black holes—those up to billions of times heavier than the sun. The new survey is unique because it was as likely to find massive black holes that are hidden behind thick clouds of gas and dust as those that are not.

Astronomers think that every large galaxy in the universe has a supermassive black hole at its center. But testing this hypothesis is difficult because researchers can't hope to count the billions or even trillions of supermassive black holes thought to exist in the universe. Instead they have to extrapolate from smaller samples to learn about the larger population. So accurately measuring the ratio of hidden supermassive black holes in a given sample helps scientists better estimate the total number of supermassive black holes in the universe.

The new study published in The Astrophysical Journal found that about 35% of supermassive black holes are heavily obscured, meaning the surrounding clouds of gas and dust are so thick they block even low-energy X-ray light.

Comparable searches have previously found less than 15% of supermassive black holes are so obscured. Scientists think the true split should be closer to 50/50 based on models of how galaxies grow. If observations continue to indicate significantly less than half of supermassive black holes are hidden, scientists will need to adjust some key ideas they have about these objects and the role they play in shaping galaxies.

Hidden treasure

Although black holes are inherently dark—not even light can escape their gravity—they can also be some of the brightest objects in the universe: When gas gets pulled into orbit around a supermassive black hole, like water circling a drain, the extreme gravity creates such intense friction and heat that the gas reaches hundreds of thousands of degrees and radiates so brightly it can outshine all the stars in the surrounding galaxy.

The clouds of gas and dust that surround and replenish the bright central disk may roughly take the shape of a torus, or doughnut. If the doughnut hole is facing toward Earth, the bright central disk within it is visible; if the doughnut is seen edge-on, the disk is obscured.

Most telescopes can rather easily identify face-on supermassive black holes, though not edge-on ones. But there's an exception to this that the authors of the new paper took advantage of: The torus absorbs light from the central source and reemits lower-energy light in the infrared range (wavelengths slightly longer than what human eyes can detect). Essentially, the doughnuts glow in infrared.

These wavelengths of light were detected by NASA's Infrared Astronomical Satellite, or IRAS, which operated for 10 months in 1983 and was managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. A survey telescope that imaged the entire sky, IRAS was able to see the infrared emissions from the clouds surrounding supermassive black holes. Most importantly, it could spot edge-on and face-on black holes equally well.

For a given line-of-sight column density, each panel shows the fraction of detected hard 14–195 keV flux relative to the escaping flux at the minimum column density allowed by each model (NH,0). Credit: The Astrophysical Journal (2024). DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ad8236

IRAS caught hundreds of initial targets. Some of them turned out to be not heavily obscured black holes but galaxies with high rates of star formation that emit a similar infrared glow. So the authors of the new study used ground-based, visible-light telescopes to identify those galaxies and separate them from the hidden black holes.

To confirm edge-on, heavily obscured black holes, the researchers relied on NASA's NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array), an X-ray observatory also managed by JPL. X-rays are radiated by some of the hottest material around the black hole. Lower-energy X-rays are absorbed by the surrounding clouds of gas and dust, while the higher-energy X-rays observed by NuSTAR can penetrate and scatter off the clouds. Detecting these X-rays can take hours of observation, so scientists working with NuSTAR first need a telescope like IRAS to tell them where to look.

"It amazes me how useful IRAS and NuSTAR were for this project, especially despite IRAS being operational over 40 years ago," said study lead Peter Boorman, an astrophysicist at Caltech in Pasadena, California. "I think it shows the legacy value of telescope archives and the benefit of using multiple instruments and wavelengths of light together."

Numerical advantage

Determining the number of hidden black holes compared to nonhidden ones can help scientists understand how these black holes get so big. If they grow by consuming material, then a significant number of black holes should be surrounded by thick clouds and potentially obscured. Boorman and his co-authors say their study supports this hypothesis.

In addition, black holes influence the galaxies they live in, mostly by impacting how galaxies grow. This happens because black holes surrounded by massive clouds of gas and dust can consume vast—but not infinite—amounts of material. If too much falls toward a black hole at once, the black hole starts coughing up the excess and firing it back out into the galaxy. That can disperse gas clouds within the galaxy where stars are forming, slowing the rate of star formation there.

"If we didn't have black holes, galaxies would be much larger," said Poshak Gandhi, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom and a co-author on the new study. "So if we didn't have a supermassive black hole in our Milky Way galaxy, there might be many more stars in the sky. That's just one example of how black holes can influence a galaxy's evolution."

TOP IMAGE:A supermassive black hole surrounded by a torus of gas and dust is depicted in four different wavelengths of light in this artist’s concept. Visible light (top right) and low-energy X-rays (bottom left) are blocked by the torus; infrared (top left) is scattered and reemitted; and some high energy X-rays (bottom right) can penetrate the torus. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

LOWER IMAGE: For a given line-of-sight column density, each panel shows the fraction of detected hard 14–195 keV flux relative to the escaping flux at the minimum column density allowed by each model (NH,0). Credit: The Astrophysical Journal (2024). DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ad8236

[gilbertsdumbblog]

bored at work. assorted Sky city headcanons (pre and post ‘Order Up!’) be upon ye

Pre ‘Order Up!’

As Sky City’s population steadily grew with people spawning in, food shortages became more and more common. Because of this, most Sky City residents can go awhile without food because they’re already used to it

Additionally, because of how scarce food could be sometimes, gifting food to another in Sky City was seen as an exceedingly kind gesture, or possibly even romantic in certain contexts

Even before establishing the ‘Build Club’ at his inn, Milo’s inn was fairly popular for being the only place in Sky City to serve (heavily diluted) alcohol. Funnily enough, even after establishing the new city and being able to brew stronger drinks, Phillipe despises the taste of any alcoholic drink and avoids them despite being a bartender.

Two of the people who help with Milo’s Inn, Phillipe and Maeve (oc lol-), both live at the Inn for free as a thanks for helping out.

Both Isa and Reginald are liable to have chicken feathers sticking to them at any point of the day. No they’re not going to explain where they came from.

There’s gotta be at least one or two people who got into fist fights over someone taking too long at a designated crafting bench or furnace, right? Like we all agree that’s happened at least once or twice in Sky City’s history

As the population of Sky City grows, Isa slowly expanded the base island to accommodate new housing for new spawns. Despite this, Sky City’s original layout is still claustrophobic as hell.

Speaking of new spawns, after a certain point Sky City simply stopped getting new spawns; It was too crowded, both in terms of player density as well as the proximity of buildings no matter where you’d spawn. To Isa, this was a blessing.

I’m not 100% certain about this, but I think the dimension Sky City is in has a higher block limit than most natural worlds; I don’t have a good estimate of how much taller it’d be, but Jesse and Isa fall off Sky City for a solid minute before they see land below them.

I like to imagine Reginald as being one of the longest-lived residents of Sky City; it makes sense why he’d be close to Isa if he’s been around for awhile idk (also just like the idea of Reggie being pretty aware of Sky City’s history due to living through most of it)

One time a pig got loose after Isa spawned them in and now the guards of the palace have an ever-persistent rumor about ‘The Squealing Pink Beast’ that ran amok through the palace once.

Post ‘Order Up!’

Sky City gets renamed to the Terracotta Villa after they re-establish due to their proximity to a mesa biome; The name was suggested by citizens of the town

Initially, for the first several months it was Milo and Isa trying to lead the rebuilding Sky City. As disagreements continued to build up and stall further development and progress, however, Reginald eventually butts in to start mediating. At first he’s just there to try and get the two leaders to calm down and actually talk to each other, but eventually, Reginald is established as the third proper leader to Terracotta Villa.

Before the first year passed on the new town, Reginald figured out how to build Iron Golems, and subsequently now has a handful of Iron Golems that wander around Terracotta Villa. Originally they were for protection against mobs, but now they just kinda live here.

Due to Sky City’s original location high above the clouds, prior to re-establishing none of the residents knew what seasons were. Milo is ECSTATIC about the discovery of snow and, subsequently, snow balls. 

None of the residents barring Isa know how to swim. Because of this, after the city moves to the mainland, Thalassophobia is exceedingly common among the residents of Sky City (Milo included)

Conversely, because the residents of Sky City lived in constant illumination and had no idea what monsters were prior to the Blaze Rods showing up, Isa is one of the few residents with a natural fear and trepidation towards darkness

Resource hoarding is a MASSIVE issue when Terracotta Villa first re-establishes itself, especially when it comes to food and ores. The only reason the problem didn’t get worse is due to Reggie getting fed up and making a series of community resource chests

It takes a VERY long time for the rebuilt Terracotta Villa to establish a Nether portal, and even longer to get potion brewing actually set up; When the portal was first set up, most expeditions into the Nether were led by Isa.

After Terracotta Villa has been established for a year or so, they set up a courier and mail system within the town that is meant to run letters between different dimensions. This is how Terracotta Villa, and Aiden, stay in contact with Jesse after the events of Season 2

This courier system ends up becoming a boon to Terracotta Villa’s economy; Prior to them, nobody had set up a proper system for sending mail between different portals. 

Isa, Reginald, and Milo take turns watching over Terracotta Villa to allow one of the others a break every once in awhile; For Isa, this is exploring and mapping out the area around Terracotta Villa with Benedict. For Reginald, it’s a half-day hike away so he can relax at a secondary house he built for ‘getting away’ from Terracotta when stressed. For Milo, It’s getting blasted on weed and sleeping for half the day.

Before anyone asks, yes, Aiden is responsible for Milo (+ probably other residents too tbh) learning what weed is. And probably acquiring it too.

Speaking of the Ocelots, it takes more than a full year after the events of ‘Order Up!’ before Reggie or Isa are willing to hear out letting Maya, Gill, and Aiden try to redeem themselves. 

Gill ends up doing a bunch of volunteer work for cooking food for the town, which becomes a hobby of his. Eventually, Gill leaves by himself through the Portal Network to find a new place for himself to live. Maya stays around longer than Gill, and she’s volunteered to help with mining and resource collecting for Terracotta Villa. When Maya leaves its without warning in the middle of the night, and she left by herself similarly to Gill. Aiden is the only one to stick around Terracotta Villa, and at first he isn’t even volunteered to do anything; Instead its mostly being babysat by Reggie or Milo to make sure he isn’t trying to grief anything again.

Aiden and Milo do become friends sort of? It’s a bit of a weird friendship because Milo is still definitely on edge around him at first considering he. You know. Destroyed his original home and got people killed.

The residents of Terracotta mostly dislike or are otherwise afraid of Aiden, but eventually some people do begin to warm up to him after he sticks around and slowly redeems himself. Isa is never letting the whole ‘act of terrorism’ thing go though.

Once people figure out fishing, cats become super popular among the residents of Terracotta Villa. Definitely helps with creepers when they’re first re-establishing at least. 

Benedict is the city mascot and she demands you feed her seeds please please please please plea-

Remember the community garden Milo wanted to establish? It’s back, and it’s massive! Citizens all take turns helping to maintain the huge garden, and after Reginald sets out community chests, the readily available food helps immensely with getting people to stop resource hoarding. 

Community furnaces, crafting tables, and brewing stands quickly come back in the new Terracotta Villa after chests are put in. The people are just kinda used to sharing at this point!

Speaking of sharing, at first when houses are being thrown together as quickly and haphazardly as possible in order to give people shelter from monsters, the residents of the budding city quickly got used to that as well. When the town was settled and not in immediate danger of getting overrun every night, some people decided to continue co-living with other residents even as more homes were established. 

The first time a raid happens probably takes everybody, Isa included, badly off guard. After the first incident, crossbows and contingencies for future raids are made almost immediately. 

[lightontainted-ask]

TSAC: Greetings! My name is Three Stars Above Clouds. I am Director of the Zenith Stellar Observatory Consortium and Lead Archivist of the Zenith Data Archives.

I have a question for Missing Link of Chain. It is to my understanding that you have curated quite an impressive collection of historical records, and I was curious to learn more about your archival methods.

I maintain a large archive of my own, primarily used to store observational and scientific data. My own archives are primarily data pearl-based; this storage method allows large data payloads from my telescopes to be moved relatively quickly, and also facilitates fast data read/write speeds. However this method of data archival has its limits- for instance it is quite inefficient in the storage of high-resolution qualia, which tends to rapidly exceed normal data pearl memory limits.

I am eager to learn about your own data storage techniques, given the contrast between our respective duties. What kind of information do you maintain in your own archives, and how is it stored? Do you have any particular preferences when it comes to data organization? Are you aided by scholars in the curation of your archives? Do you have any records on hand that you are willing to share?

Please excuse my bevy of questions; I am simply curious about your work. I hope this message finds you well and I wish you good luck in your endeavors. (@threestarsaboveclouds) (ooc: I hope this gives you some worldbuilding stuff to chew on lol. Enjoy)

Hello TSAC! I'd be very happy to answer all your questions, from one archival iterator to another.

About my archival methods- I think you'll find it apparent I don't use many pearls. They fade over time if not cared for properly, and I store far too much data to be stored in a pearl network. Besides, they're particularly easy for me to lose...

Rather, I've taken a long-term storage method that uses purposed organisms to store massive amounts of data in the form of qualia, text, images, audio, and so on. You may even recognize similar organisms around many citadels, storing the memories of those who've ascended. These neural amalgams are stored and grown in large biometal and glass buildings atop my can, towering about as tall as any city, and sprawling even wider. It can be either horrifying or beautiful depending on your tastes. Or neither, if you're me.

This, of course has upsides and downsides. The upside is that this storage method lasts for a very, very long time. However, retrieving the data again is not as optimized. This is not a problem for me, as much of what I store is... rather useless anyways.

Which is what my main job is. Anybody can store data in some neural meat. But that data is scrambled and unorganized, I make sure that everything is properly formatted and easy to find again through a system of complex tags and IDs identified to every segment of data and- actually I'll save that explanation for another time.

My time is more spent organizing rather than going out to find documents myself. Over 99% of the data stored in my archives have been donated to me by scholars, volunteers, companies, and other iterators!

Normally, this would be an easy task. Even easier for me, as I've been designed with a larger processing strata and memory conflux in order to run more parallel processes, but even still, I estimate I'd collapse before I fulled tagged, ID'd, and sorted everything.

Luckily there's a priority system for donated data so I'd get through all the actually useful documents first.

I hope this may satisfy some of your curiosities.

(-ooc, I was going to draw the structures mentioned, but I really don't want to anymore. Here's a wip! Yes I know it shows nothing. Just imagined Memory Crypts but very very tall. And a little less shaded.)