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ashleyswrittenwords · 5 years ago

Note

“I think I just ripped my pants.” Can we please get some preciously hilarious Zelink with this? If you're up for it, could it be set in a modern AU of sorts? Stay safe during the pandemic btw!

I didn’t mean to take all day to write this.

Oh! And it’s a precursor to all of my Queen and Her Bodyguard writings!

(And you too, Anon. Thank you.)

----

“I think I just ripped my pants.”

Her bodyguard mirrored her wide-eyed stare.

It was the bloody Bloody Marys, because of course it had to be. It wasn’t even noon on the pier walkway of south Necluda and the Queen of Hyrule ripped her pants next to a public bathroom.

“You ripped your pants,” Link echoed her surmise as he stood over her sitting form.

Letting her legs sprawl out in front of her, she immediately felt how warm the ground was. Slightly dazed, she nodded, “I ripped my pants.”

This was supposed to be a pleasant summer vacation, and up until now it was. Her favorite second cousin’s vacation home wasn’t far from here. They were actually meant to meet Midna for brunch soon. Then, Link had found this cozy hole-in-the-wall breakfast place that served the most amazing bottomless mimosas and Bloody Marys (for her, he had qualms with drinking on the job).

It wasn’t long after that, on their walk to the real breakfast restaurant, that Link hadn’t believed that Zelda did gymnastics for three years as a kid and prompted her to prove it. What he didn’t realize was that she actually would attempt a cartwheel three drinks in with flip-flops on.

Once he got over the shock of the fantastic display, he knelt down and took assessment of her. “Are you hurt?”

There was a seriousness in his voice that hardly suited the situation. Zelda devolved into a bubbly grin before shaking her head.

Eventually satisfied that her fall was harmless, he took her hands and helped her up.

“Wait,” she stopped him. “Check for me.”

Zelda bit her lip and watched the people around them. There weren’t many people along the walkway and it wasn’t a densely populated area. The chances for paparazzi was slim since Impa had anonymously leaked to the press that the Queen was in Hebra for summertime skiing. Besides, she wasn’t in elaborate makeup and a thin tee shirt and jeans hardly held a semblance to her typical suits and gowns.

Carefully, Link had her stand close to the wall. She stared ahead, dread filling her as he peaked around.

“Oh,” he let out a low whistle, “Yeah, you were right.”

Her neck nearly snapped, “Please tell me you’re lying.”

“I’m not.” He sounded mournful.

“What color is my underwear?”

“Blue with white polka dots.”

“Shhhit.”

Link straightened and silently surveyed where they were, “Go into the family restroom and I’ll buy you a new pair in a gift shop. Does that sound good?”

Nonverbally, she consented because there wasn’t a better idea on the table.

Somehow, they didn’t raise any suspicion as he assisted her in shuffling over towards the door, which was thankfully vacant.

“I’ll be right back, okay?” he said through the cracked door. Zelda nodded, though now nervous that he was leaving her alone with ripped pants.

“Be quick,” she started. “Please.”

“I’ll be right back,” he reiterated before letting the door close. Just beyond it, Link didn’t walk away until he heard the click of the lock.

Then, she was alone. The bathroom was like any public restroom on the beach. Sand littered the floor, there was a loud vent at the top, and a peculiar smell that she didn’t want to overanalyze. To her right was a mirror above the sink that was so cloudy that there was no way she could take proper assessment of the state of her favorite pair of jeans. They were old, yes, but that was their beauty. The fabric had bleach stains in some places and the seams were stretched to a comfortable fit – but that was probably the source of their downfall.

Absently, she took her phone out and wrote Midna a vague text that she would be a little late. She knew her cousin would conjure a twisted explanation for this, but it wasn’t something she couldn’t defuse later.

How did Link already know her pant size?

It felt like forever since Link had left when, in reality, it only took fifteen minutes.

A knock on the door made her jump, “Someone’s in here!”

“It’s me,” Link said in that baritone voice. She opened it up to a crack and once his face confirmed that it was Link, she let him in.

“You seem annoyed,” she guessed as he shut and locked the door behind him. He was carrying a plastic bag.

Link let out a sigh, “I went to three different stores and they only had sweatpants that were three sizes too big for you or the shortest shorts I’ve ever seen.”

A tinge of worry crossed her as she looked between him and the bag. “So, what did you get?”

“Bear with me, I have a plan,” he started, bringing out a pair of gray sweatpants. On the side it said in big bold letters “Necluda Beaches”.

He watched her tilt her head to the side, “But aren’t they too big?”

“Yes, but they are my size.”

She blinked at him, “And I’m going to wear… your jeans.”

Not sure what her reaction would be, he slowly nodded.

“Okay,” her lips formed a tight line. “O-okay.”

Stuttering was very, very not regal, so to mask her embarrassment she turned to give him privacy. Then, at his awkward coughing, she tensed and her hands scrambled to pull the rip seams of her behind together. An extremely uncouth blush rose and she thanked herself for choosing boy shorts over thongs.

“If,” she said to mask the fact that her bodyguard was undressing behind her, “If you ever decide to leave me for the private sector, I should make you sign an NDA.”

He laughed breathily, hanging his jeans on the sink and took a moment to observe Hyrule’s Queen tightly grip her bottom. With a smile and diverted eyes he scoffed, “I’ve signed too many to count already. Not that I would be leaving you so easily.”

“Hm, good.”

Once he was done, he lightly tapped her shoulder and told her he’d be waiting outside. By the time she turned, the bathroom door was closing. She tugged her jeans off and flipped them over to see the elongated rip had torn through the middle seam from the belt loops to her crotch. It made Zelda groan. She supposed she could ask Midna to sew it together, but she also didn’t want to have to explain the situation without a couple more drinks.

So, without a proper funeral, Zelda stuffed the jeans into the bathroom wastebasket.

Link’s jeans still hung off the sink and she began to stick one leg at a time, reminding herself that she was still intoxicated and really didn’t want her bodyguard breaking down the door if she hit her head on anything. And if occupying a bathroom for twenty or so minutes wasn’t suspect enough, that would certainly do her in.

Zelda didn’t have to shimmy her way into them like she did with her old jeans. They were long, but definitely built for someone who lacked hips. They stopped loosely at her waist. With a furrowed brow, she pulled the waistband out and saw the significant gap between the denim and her stomach. It was a shame because they may come off as high-waisted jeans.

Her eyes darted to what lied in the sink. For an embarrassing moment, she had thought a snake had crawled up the drain. It was Link’s thick brown belt he had been wearing earlier. Not wanting her bodyguard to wait too long, she looped the belt on only to find that there weren’t enough holes to fasten the jeans on comfortably.

But with a quick glance in the foggy mirror, they looked infinitely better.

“Hey, Link,” she said pushing the door open with her foot while holding the belt in place.

His eyes met her first and then sunk lower.

“Do you have anything that could punch more holes – wait, do I look weird?” Zelda frowned at his staring.

He quickly blinked out of his stupor, “No, no. I can do that.”

They found themselves in the bathroom together again and he patted himself, looking for something before coming to a realization. “Your left pocket.”

From the left pocket of his jeans, Zelda pulled out a thin pocket knife and he took it from her. As he crouched to his knees, Link lightly undid the belt buckle. A thick flush ran up Zelda’s neck at the sight of it. Blond strands escaped his carefully set hair and shadowed his face. The flush grew darker when the pull to make it messier came to her thoughts.

“Do you carry that around all the time?”

His fingers measured where he supposed it would be tight enough and gave a short nod, “I carry a lot of things with me. Missed that though.”

“I’m sorry for ruining your belt.”

“It’s nothing. Looks better on you anyway.” Then, he met her gaze. “Will this work, Your Majesty?”

The corners of his lips upturned at her scowl.

“Remind me that I’m on vacation.”

Link tugged at the belt to meet where he marked, “Will this work, Zelda?”

A smile crested her eyes, “Yes.”

—-

“My darling cousin,” Midna drawled. Five separate mimosa glasses sat in front of her – empty. “You missed the most delicious strawberry tarts.”

Zelda frowned, shortly thanking Link for pulling out her seat, and sat down. “What happened to them?”

“I ate them. Oh, my goodness, Link, that fashion choice,” she burped. “Gorgeous.”

Zelda closed her eyes, wishing she wasn’t here. However, Link grinned.

“Thank you, Lady Midna.”

“Ugh, so formal. And, goddesses, Zelda, your boyfriend jeans are just so fetch,” Midna laughed at her own joke and waved the server over before she could answer.

#Midna is me #anyway #this is why im rate on all the requests lmfao im sorry #qahb #the queen and her bodyguard #ily anon #zelink #zelink fanfiction #loz #ashleyswrittenwords #Anonymous

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homenum-revelio-hq · 5 years ago

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Welcome to the Order of the Phoenix, Erin!

You have been accepted for the role of ISLA SELWYN-MACMILLAN! Your application was beautiful! We especially loved your decision behind Isla’s familial background, which then led to her decisions and motivations within both her personal life and her life in the Order. The details you put in your application really brought her to life in a lovely way! We are so excited to have you as part of this roleplay!

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours! Thank you for joining the fight against Voldemort!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME: erin

AGE: 26

TIMEZONE: est

ACTIVITY LEVEL: I work a regular 9 to 5, so will be quite scare weekday afternoons, but am pretty consistent around evenings (into the woo hours of the am, as I’m an incurable insomniac) and weekends.

ANYTHING ELSE: n/a

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Isla Arcine Selwyn- Macmillan

AGE: 25

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Cisfemale. She / Her. Bisexual, in that way of scratching an itch rather than deliberately seeking out a romantic partner. Sex is sex is needs met, and a base appreciation, besides. When it comes to things more long-term, things which people out there in the world at large still call a relationship, it’s more touch and go. It’s been a long time since she’s had a romantic other who could be in any way tagged significant; not since Hogwarts and long before Archie’s confession of his orientation caused her to consider whether her own desires incorporated same-sex. They did and they do, but romance is another animal altogether and she has never down well with it no matter where on the spectrum you place her.

BLOOD STATUS: Pureblood

HOUSE ALUMNI: Gryffindor

ANY CHANGES: N / A

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY:

At first blush, it’s challenging to get a proper bead on Isla beyond liberal application of the word ‘dry’. She moves and speaks with the considered stillness of a woman well aware of her age, her place in life. That things have perhaps not gone as planned, but there’s no turning back now, so she may as well just commit to the person she’s found herself to be. Isla, then, is the woman who dresses practically, who hangs along the seams of situations with arms folded across her chest, and holds for that single breath of silence to fall before chiming in with observation.

That is in no way to suggest that she is the paragon of forbearance. She is, in fact, hugely impatient. Queen of the drummed nails, the tapped foot, the not-so-surreptitious watch check. Isla has had to do very little waiting in her life, which is fortunate as she isn’t very good at it. But give her something to attend, something to measure, and Isla can spend all the time in the world passing judgement and weighing and hmm-ing thoughtfully. The measured consideration of herself, her peers, the very world around her. Isla studies, assesses, and only then moves to act. She’s the one who watches the Order’s fracas of people come together like the tide crashing, waiting for it to roll back out before she picks her way through to deposit her thoughts. It takes a hell of a lot to make Isla do before Isla thinks.

She is, after all, above all else, a connoisseur. Selective, thorough, intractable, endlessly demanding and ferociously precise. Her perfectionism is legendary; her attention to detail rivaled only by her appetite. Her enthusiasm for what she loves—food, flying, finery—is heady and infectious. Unfortunately, what-ifs and maybe-justs have eaten away at the electric smile which used to light her up during days gone by, because she’s been wrestling with the sensation of a stifled life on a precipice for some time now. And if it isn’t fear which rules her life (it isn’t; she is afraid to be afraid, and subsequently knocks it to one side lest she start choking on what unfamiliar fear tastes like), then anger is the name of Isla’s coolly played game. The years she burned away living unrestrained and satiate are like a mental scrapbook, something for her to page through with mixed feelings of nostalgia and frustration.

Isla has always been indomitable and stubborn, but current climate has put a bit more of a bite to what was once a more good-humored brand of overbearing confidence. The remnants of playful, irreverent, imperious woman she was-is-might-be-again is best seen in dealings with nearest and dearest. She still does things like hiding all of Archie’s left hand loafers when she feels he’s not paying enough attention to her. Still signs off letters to favorite cousins with the words ’don’t be a cow, Love Isla’. Still bitches bitterly to best friends about what a sell-out twat Josef Wronski is. But where once the sensation of being untouchable and inviolable meant her charm and candor were universal, present reality has seen it condescend, contracted, confined to trust spheres and safe space. She is shade of former self and Isla is honestly terrified that she might never have the whole back.

Swallowed pride sits badly in her belly and it’s a daily debate on whether she can life with the sensation for the rest of her life. Her family taught her to compromise, but she never, ever learned to capitulate or tolerate. Even less to bow. Though she does well enough in tandem to authority she acknowledges, it's only authority she acknowledge and beneath any other hand she bucks and bristles and bites. At present, Voldemort’s throat is the one she longs most to sink her teeth into, but time and tide are proving how unlikely that may be and so she, eminently loyal and deeply sentimental, must start focusing on what she wishes most to protect and preserve. What the best course of action is to safe guard the present and future of family and friends, the people she sees as the ones she must protect. Because at the end of the day, though she’ll fight for herself she’d die for nothing less than those she loves the most.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY:

The House of Selwyn is known for two things: pearls and politics. Polish is the name of the game in either. A refined family, whose members dot the upper echelons of the Department of International Magical Cooperation and whose wealth was built ages ago on the back of their many oyster farms off the sun drenched shores of the Mediterranean. Her mother’s prized possession is a pearl the size of an ostrich egg, Isaac’s gift to her when they first got engaged. It sits, even now, on a marble pedestal in Arsinoe Selwyn’s sitting room and Isla has memories of mother running white hands affectionately across the milky sphere till it was almost impossible to tell where pearl ended and skin began.

Isla grew up in their house on the coast of the Isle of Angsley, a neoclassical mansion whose gardens fell down to the sea. She was her family’s first and final princess, the daughter her mother prayed for since honeymoon’s initial afterglow had worn away and revealed the stark reality of a husband whose cultured charm was as infinite as his penchant for philandering. Isla was, if only for a time, the cure-all which the Selwyn couple so desperately needed: Father was fond of her, Mother was attentive, but most important was opinion of House Matriarch, for Grandmother is gentle with her the way she is to no other, wrinkled hands fearfully referred to as talons by the three sons and the half a dozen grandchild descended from Innana Selwyn turning soft as silk when they cupped Isla’s fair cheeks or braided grandthing’s dark hair. In those hands too was the decision of who would inherit the lionshare of the family’s estate and it was clear from the moment Innana folded Isla affectionately to her side that the son she was sure to pick would be the one who sired her favorite grandchild.

Though no idyllic portrait of white dresses and tea parties – she and her young relatives played at being tigers and at princesses and of course at the wonder of wizardry, but tucked comfortably amidst their baby-games was ongoing theme of competition and envy and scrutiny – her youth still managed to smack quite soundly of comfortable entitlement, familial solidarity, and reasonable compromise. As a child she struggles most with the latter. Her mother says she looks too much like her father, more hard and sharp than soft. Arsinoe Selwyn does her best to blunts her daughter’s edges and wraps her in velvet, but Isla never becomes particularly pliable. Instead she identifies early where the line is and toes it unrepentantly; stretches against the limits of her girl skin and twists and turns within it’s proverbial limits. She is a child with a riptide inside her; restless as the current threshing against the cliffs she once scaled for the sake of beating her cousin in a race back from beach to front door.

Her parents are perennial negotiators. A flying instructor is hired to keep her off the cliffs. A fencing master in exchange for cooperation in deportment. Free reign so long as it’s neat skirts and straight hair when the rest of the clan comes to visit. One was never to show shortcomings in front of the extended branches, after all. But even with all the mistrust and rivalry, family was family was family and her first show of magic is sparked when she bisects a Kelpie attempting to drag her cousin down through the shallows. The following Autumn, when she is seated in The Great Hall as the Sorting Hat weights her heart for what means more, ambition or valor, she remembers Electra Selwyn’s shivering hands as she kicked the creature’s corpse into the surf.

Armed with parents’ indulgence and grandmother’s doting she can do no wrong. Nicknamed The Grand Duchess by her cousins for her domineering ways, Isla was infallible force of nature for so many years. She is given partial reprieve from the spotlight of mother’s sole focus after baby brother is born. Caius Selwyn, small savior who comes into the world when she is thirteen years old, consequently holds paramount place in Isla’s affections. To younger sibling she is larger than life; dark eyes lighting up with admiration the first time he sees big sister in her Montrose Magpies uniform. A woman Icarus. Then comes the fall.

The shifts in their family begin with grandmother’s death. Innana Selwyn, so old and august and unyielding, it had never occurred to Isla even that she could die. But the coffin is black and her mourning clothes black and the cloud over the family is bleak, pitch dark as ink. If grandmother’s will was anything to go by, it should be Isaac who became family head and yet her eldest uncle Elijah steps in to fill the vacancy. Her father does not protest and Isla frowns like the gathering rain clouds, wonders why.

It’s off-season half a year later when she is called again to grandmother’s residence, now Uncle’s. The day is in it’s dregs when she arrives. The decayed sunset still hung a cloud-caught drift of humid, mauvish red and sent down its ominous indigo shade, which ran from hummock to hummock of the manicured lawns like spilled water. The architecture of the Selwyns’ ancestral estate was itself fairytale like – silver gates like spider webs on a wet May morning, cobblestone streets, wet-black wood entrances – but the something that evening caused everything to look overripe; an otherwise perfect fruit with a rotted spot just starting to spread. Inside the house many lights were burning bright: her parents had arrived ahead of her, for there was important business to discuss. Isla’s marriage prospects.

It was a shell shock, being confronted face to face with the savage delicacy of a wedding dress. She felt like marriage would eat her alive–rip her limb from careless limb. But there was no twisting and turning to avoid this. Father is stern, Mother is reproving. Something tense and heavy braids itself through their insistence, something like a predator stalking through the dense gardens outside their walls. There is no room for negations here. And think, Arsinoe tells her after, how much better off she is than some girls; at least they are giving her the freedom to choose whom she’d prefer from among the matches her uncle has put forth.

So Archie, who is companion and confidant and closest friend since she was small wild child with loose hair and imperious ways. Who should be perfect match except they are not in love and marriage ought be more than two people making the best of a last ditch effort to preserve what they can’t stomach losing. So they marry. They move into a home together. Clean and white on the outside, its window shutters decorative rather than functional and all its internal fripperies stripped away upon her arrival because no man would ever put Isla Selwyn up in a wallpapered home and live to tell the tale.

She learns later the name and nature of the beast-thing driving her family to tighten up tradition. Some power bloated dark wizard who thinks himself a lord with the right to reign over their way of life. Her uncle Elijah, her eldest cousins, they have already sworn fealty. And sure, things for her could certainly be far worse, but life till now had promised Isla Selwyn a world without limits then failed to deliver and so now entitled, intractable, implacable Isla, Isla who has never accepted the word ’no’ in her life and isn’t about to start now, is woman on a war path. If the world Voldemort means to build is one where she has to bow to his notion of what a woman ought be then he had best look to his kingdom, because she’s coming for it.

OCCUPATION:

Housewife. And she chokes a little on the reality of it ever time. What was once a glowing quidditch career was quashed under family applied pressure in the wake of a rising regime. She was going to fly forever, that had been her plan. Instead she’d been made to resign from her position as Chaser for the Montrose Magpies and supposedly idles her days away in domestic leisure and social functions. But idle hands are the tools of the devil. Or in this case, the Order.

ROLE WITHIN THE ORDER/THOUGHTS ABOUT THE ORDER

The same surname which gives her access to the insular world of pureblood social circles is a source of suspicion and skepticism for her comrades-in-arms. Many of the members are uncertain about her, be it of her motives, her commitment, or her loyalty; though even her staunchest detractor can’t deny her effectiveness nor her conviction. Luckily for all, Isla has a lifetime of experience in banding together for the greater good despite nebulous trust and constant scrutiny (see: the Selwyns). She does not need them to like her, but she does need them to make good use of the advantages she has to offer.

Informant, infiltrator, instigator. She has access to places other Order members do not, clout in certain circles that overlap with the enemy. Isla’s connections are many and they run the gamut from marked death eaters, whose names and movements she funnels to the order, to fence sitters who just need a bit of a nudge to sway the right way (or at least lend a helping hand so long as their safety is guaranteed). She has, on occasion, served as a soldier though always from behind a white and gold volto mask to preserve the secrecy of her affiliation.

That said, failure and fracturing among their numbers have roused Isla’s frustrations. It seems absurd to her that they have become at once so woefully disorganized and yet increasing concerned with rank and file. The faith she had in the beginning has begun to dwindle and she’s starting to doubt if this motley crew can overcome all the in-fighting enough to focus on the real enemy. Moreover, she’s starting to wonder if their own prejudices will turn them into something just as deplorable as the Death Eaters. If they cannot even tolerate each other, what might they do to those on the fringes? Her reservations were only exacerbated by the incident with Leina Nott.

SURVIVAL:

For the moment, her identity as a member of The Order remains still unknown to those outside it’s number. She lives then, almost as she always had. A house, honey hued when the light slid down the hills and made it so, wreathed with ivy about the windows and draping the door. With husband who is loved-but-not-lover and with secrets kept closely guarded and all actions planned and plotted and maneuvered with careful calculation of risks and reasons and weight. She survives by walking a tight rope and living a lie and praying victory comes before the truth.

RELATIONSHIPS:

She has always been a woman who collects acquaintances but is few in close friends and the war has only caused her to make even sharper delineations. Archie Macmillan has always been her perfect constant, consistent and timely as the tides their friendship. Her parents may have indulged her, but Archie is the only person who has ever supported and encouraged her. They may not be in love with each other, but he is the most important person in her life, the only individual she is wholly honest with, her partner in all things. It was she who convinced him to join the Order and for that reason, Isla has resolved to put his wishes and well-being first and foremost so that he doesn’t come to regret that decision. Even if her own life comes crumbling down as a result of her choices, she’ll make damn sure that Archie’s doesn’t.

From the start, members of the Order’s inner circle have been treated to a polite but firm personal distance, business only please. Polite distance has since evolved to more than a little frost. She has never done well with authority figures she hasn’t specifically acknowledged and between a string of failures and the way their hierarchy is coming more and more to resemble that of the opposition’s, Isla’s regard for them and their leadership has dwindled significantly. It doesn’t help that James Potter is among their number and all her negative biases against him have subsequently colored the rest of the Order’s proverbial generals with the same standoffish brush.

She fares much better in interactions with the mid and low-level members and, in all honest, best with half and pureblood women. Because she can relate. Because she feels protective. Because being surrounded by women fighting for their right to autonomy and self-determination reminds her why she’s here in the first place and, truly, she needs those reminds now, here, when her morale as it’s most dismal. They encourage her to dirty her hands with much-missed paint, and to muddy up the colors. If she tells herself that it isn’t all well among Order ranks, then she openly admits that it’s not all bad.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: Isla x Chemistry

WHAT PRIVILEGES AND BIASES DOES YOUR CHARACTER HAVE?

Isla has lived her entire life in a world of extreme privileged. Because of blood status, because of wealth, because of weight of family name. Given ever access to education and resources and connection. Because the Selwyns were lax in regards to traditional values, even running up against the wall of gender biases was minimal up until more recently. Suddenly confronted with the the strictures and restrictions of antiquated sexism, Isla, in the way of a person born with every advantage, is predictably outraged and righteously anger at suddenly being put at a disadvantage.

A staunch anti-traditionalist, Isla imagines herself enormously liberal, but the reality of her upbringing informs all things. The Selwyn family’s pearl farms employ mainly muggles as menial labor, harvesters, and low level managers of their precious crop. And so, Isla has always thought of muggles as existences only a few step above house elves; backwards, easily excitable, but hard working creatures, obliviously happy with their own lesser way of life because they haven’t the capacity to imagine something broader. Her attitude towards muggleborns, therefore, smacks of condescension and distinctive othering. As though they are the lucky, mutated winners of some biological lottery. “Corrected” muggles, fixed of the flaw of lacking magic. And though Isla imagines that because she supports the right of muggleborns to everything the Wizarding World has to offer, it means she has no prejudices, in reality her internalized biases are many and she views them as inherently flawed by virtue of their birth and disadvantaged by virtue of their upbringing.

The reverse could be said of her prejudices about half-breeds and squibs. Their non-wizard heritance is a tragic blot to me sympathized with. For squibs she regards their lack of magic like a grave congenital disability. The kind of thing pregnant mother pray for protection against as they go into labor. The notion that this way of thinking might be problematic has not only never occurred to her, but would in fact be wholly anathema to how she navigates socially.

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO? There is so much plot jam-packed into this RP and I am living for it. I love the idea of an all Order focus; love even more that the Order is not depicted as some happy pack of underdogs who all love and get along with each other. I love that they’re losing and everything is getting desperate and painful and pushing people to their emotional / mental / moral limits. The ugliness mixed in with all the good-intentions and differing drives is so meaty, scoop me a huge helping pls & ty.

PLOT DROP IDEAS: N/A

ANYTHING ELSE? As though her family section isn’t already too long™, have some mini drabbles from her childhood

#homenumaccepted

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laughingpinecone · 4 years ago

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I am laughingpineapple on AO3

It’s a long list of character combos so the specific requests aren’t overly detailed, please draw at will from my general likes and general fandom likes in addition or as an alternative to any of those!

All requests are art or fic - for art, the stuff I like is the kind that depicts the characters doing something. I’ll always be happier with a very simple drawing of two characters walking together or sharing a cup of coffee than with an ambitious composition that looks like an Avengers poster. I also enjoy seeing them wear different clothes, getting a feel of what their fashion sense is like beyond their canon outfit(s).

Likes: worldbuilding, slice of life (especially if the event the fic focuses on is made up but canon-specific), missing moments, 5+1 and similar formats, bonding and emotional support/intimacy, physical intimacy, lingering touches, loyalty, casefic, surrealism, magical realism, established relationships, future fic, hurt/comfort or just comfort from the ample canon hurt, throwing characters into non-canon environments, banter, functional relationships between dysfunctional individuals, unexplained mysteries, bittersweet moods, journal/epistolary fic, dreams and memories and identities, canon-adjacent tropey plots, outsider POV, UST, resolved UST, exploration of secondary bits of canon, leaning on the uniqueness of the canon setting/mood, found families, characters reuniting after a long and/or harrowing time, friends-to-lovers, road trips, maps, mutual pining, cuddling, wintry moods, the feeling of flannel and other fabrics, ridiculous concepts played straight, sensory details, sickfic, places being haunted, people being haunted, the mystery of the woods, small hopes in bleak worlds, electricity, places that don’t quite add up, mismatched memories, caves and deep places, distant city lights at night, emphasis on non-human traits of non-human characters (gen-wise, but also a hearty yes xeno for applicable ships)

Cool with: any tense, any pov, any rating, plotty, not plotty, IF, nerdy canon references, unrequested characters popping up

DNW: non-canonical rape, non-canonical children, focus on children, unrequested ships (background established canon couples are okay, mentions of parents are okay), canon retellings, consent issues

Dark Souls

I’m only familiar with the first game+DLC! It’s probably relevant to mention that I think that linking the fire is kind of a dumbass move and Gwyn is an ass, but on the other hand Kaathe has his own agenda and there’s no winning move in this world, or at least no obvious one. Feel free to deviate from anyone’s canon endings, to make things happen that’ll stave off their hollowing. I am interested in any of these people meeting and possibly striking up a friendship, and also in exploring Lordran’s temporal/dimensional fuckery, where it’s possible to meet people who have been gone for ages…

Group: Solaire of Astora & Siegmeyer of Catarina: so much fanart of Sun Bro & Onion Bro being bros, so little fic. And yet, the potential! How’d they bounce off each other, what about the fact that Siegmeyer is apparently a proper Catarina knight after all while Solaire just painted his self-made insignia and left, what would Sieg think of Solaire’s quest?

Group: Alvina the Cat & Sieglinde of Catarina: dunno, kitty. I love them both and I want everyone cool to go on adventure with each other. What’s left for Alvina now that Sif is gone, Artorias’ grave desecrated? For her part, did Sieglinde, you know, (mimics Ash Lake)?

Ghost Trick

I am very interested in various characters finding about the erased timeline, but not getting their memories back, and having to live with being told about what they did but never remembering it. Exploring the ghost lore is great. All what-ifs welcome (what if they managed an acceptable happy ending but didn’t reset the timeline, what if a different party went back to the past and kept their memories, what if Alma’s ghost stuck around…) Also open to AUs here, especially for generic fantasy or sci-fi settings or the Final Fantasy ones I prompted last Yuletide.

For the non-canon sides of Jowd/Alma/Cabanela, please no infidelity? I’d be good with either setting the fic during the game timeline or some what-if thereof when the other spouse is dead or unavailable, or simply keeping them offscreen and not mentioning them (eg Alma/Cabanela beach day, Jowd/Cabanela precinct shenanigans)

For Jowd in general, I do love my big boy and enjoy milking that size difference for all it’s worth. In gen contexts too, it’s neat. him big.

Group: Jowd & Yomiel: I’d love to read about the intimate understanding that comes from their shared memories and the horrors they’ve mutually forgiven (and a penchant for morbidity they’ve gained from such horrors probably). Cat dads things welcome.

Group: Alma/Jowd/Cabanela: maybe once Alma and Jowd have figured out he’s smitten and that they do in fact reciprocate... they tease him to death, slowly and deliberately? Is it even a Jowd romance if there’s not an exhausting amount of teasing involved, I ask?

Group: Alma/Jowd & Cabanela: Cabs’ life is wild; his best friends’ home is a safe haven...

Group: Emma & Pigeon Man: Emma’s unsuspected beta reader...

Group: Alma/Cabanela: (taps mic) legs. And fashion!

Group: Cabanela/Jowd: a recent tumblr post made a convincing argument for Cabs liking to be in charge (the argument is just pointing at Cabanela, honestly). Jowd is... agreeable, by his own admission. But is it that simple?

Kentucky Route Zero

I love the ending and I’d love to see its themes and setting explored. I’m all for exploration of any of the game’s themes and for including any staples from adjacent genres - wanna go full-on American Gothic? Dip into surrealism? Take a leaf from Twin Peaks with tulpa / split narratives to explore the characters’ issues? I love AUs so that’s an option too. Or of course there’s Xanadu at the height of its glory, an infinite what-ifs generator. Were the requested characters part of it, what were their digital counterparts up to? A Xanadu narrative would be great! I’d also love to hear about any new spot along the Zero or the Echo river, or an expansion of some place that’s only mentioned by Will in HATATE or only gets a few paragraphs of text. Mostly, I just love all these characters so much and I’m going through the tagset’s options like a hyperactive cat. Any fragment of their lives will make me happy.

Group: Shannon Márquez & Conway & Conway's Dog: does Shannon get to see them after the ending? Even for a moment?

Group: Lula Chamberlain/Joseph Wheattree/Donald: so Lula went back to Mexico. Joseph is pensive. Did the events of the night shake up Donald, or what will it take?

Group: Junebug & Lula Chamberlain: artists! Outspoken... artists... with a complicated personality. Put them in the same room and...?

Group: Junebug & Johnny: where’s the strangest place they played in, and what did Johnny find there?

Group: Conway & Johnny & Junebug (Kentucky Route Zero): their story is about finding individuality, his is about succumbing and losing it. Would any of them pick up on this mid-Act IV? Or just... talking about limbs and stuff?

Group: Cate & Will & Shannon Márquez (Kentucky Route Zero): a few months later, Shannon finds herself on the Mucky Mammoth again...

Group: Carrington & Weaver Márquez & Shannon Márquez (Kentucky Route Zero): maybe the cousins were trying to bond or reminisce or whatever and Carrington dive-bombed into the conversation, but in the end it was an enriching experience... of sorts?

Group: Carrington & Lula Chamberlain (Kentucky Route Zero): I don’t usually look for college shenanigans but this may be the exception? Or Art Opinions?

Group: Carrington & Clara (Kentucky Route Zero): would she even... get a word in? Maybe with the right topic?

Group: Carrington & Cate & Will (Kentucky Route Zero): Mammoth life! ...what does theater have to say about mushrooms again?

Group: Shannon Marquez & Weaver Marquez (Kentucky Route Zero): at the end of it all, Weaver was waiting. After this end, they can stand side by side again...

Group: Emily & Ben & Bob (Kentucky Route Zero): so what does it mean, like, poetically, that they were temporally displaced and Act I is in their future from Act V? Is it possible they were not aware of it?

Mutazione

The island, the sense of community, newcomers joining the community, gardens and music... I love the mood of this little game. Got ideas for some part of the island we haven’t seen? What stories do they tell each other about Moon Dragon and the first days of the new life it brought? The plants encyclopaedia was great - do Yoké’s archives hide some other cool tome? Please, if Graubert is mentioned, I would much prefer a sympathetic portrayal - he’s got his issues but I felt that the game was much harder on him than anyone else.

Group: Yoké & Karoo: I love the friendship between Yoké and Nonno and filtering it through Karoo feels even cooler to me. When did the big spooky bird first visit, did Yoké know or perceive what was going on?

Group: Yoké & Claire: book club book club book club!

Group: Spike/Claire: they’re so cute! Dinner at Mori’s? Swimming together?

Group: Nonno & Spike: I love Nonno’s role in the community and Spike’s role in the community, and they’re the two people who landed there and decided to stay. Could they bond over this?

Group: Dennis & Nonno: Important Tree Health Business!

Group: Bopek & Jell-A: Jell-A is the absolute coolest and Bopek grew on me a lot. Their friendship is adorable! What could they do together? As a side note, Jell-A’s place has the tightest interior decor in the whole game. How’d that happen, and does Bopek get a flair for vintage shapes and volumes in his weaving?

Group: Mori & Nonno & Yoké: FRIENDS. Friends for a long time, through so much pain. An evening together while The Youths (tm) are at Spike’s bar?

Yoké: catch-all Yoké request because he’s my fave! Doing Yoké things, being a big nerd, caring for books and plants and stuff

Pyre

The burning found family feelings, the revolutionary passion, the tension between topside social constraints and the kind of freedom allowed by the Downside! Thoughts about finding oneself at the end of an age, as everything crumbles down to form something new. I love all the themes, the solemnity, the heart of this game. I adore everyone in that Blackwagon+Dalbert+Celeste, so if you want to add a Nightwing or two to any prompt, please do! I also love all the Scribes and find Erisa a compelling tragic figure. Out of the other triumvirates, I’m “love to hate them” for Manley, Brighton, Udmildhe and Deluge and would not like to see them featured in sympathetic roles. My main interest usually lies in post-canon exploration when applicable, but I’m also into various adventures during canon. Pick a location or a place outside the map and see what happens? As for the ending variables, I’d ask for a peaceful revolution and Oralech alive, but no preferences for who’s up and who’s down, pick whatever works best for any given plot bunny.

Group: Tariq & Soliam: what were Tariq and Celeste like in their earliest days? Were they made or summoned from some sort of preexisting star consciousness? They’re wildly different scenarios! I’m good with either. Does Soliam then see Tariq as a child of sorts, someone he made, or something greater than himself? Did he mean to do that, to have these two immortals around? What does Tariq learn from the First Scribe?

Group: Tariq & Dalbert Oldheart: Any excuse for Tariq to hang out with the Fates for a little while, and treasure and be treasured by dear Dalbert...

Group: Oralech & Vagabond Girl: after all is said and done, Oralech’s view of the Scribes is probably... understandably... dire. So of course I want to see him talk it out with ae!

Group: Celeste & Ignarius: look, listen, if the various triumvirates just camped out near their respective Scribe’s place during the Nightwings’ years-long absence (not the only possible explanation for how you find them all neatly lined up before the first lib rite, but an explanation nonetheless, I think. just let me have my crack), that means Iggy was Celeste’s neighbor for a long time. Neighborly hijinks please?

Group: Bertrude/Pamitha: Pam returning from her travels, again and again, and finding a home in Bertrude’s lab, finding an understanding there... Bertrude’s attitude being thorny in a way that’s just what Pam needs to allow herself to open up... also: snake kisses.

Group: Volfred Sandalwood/Oralech: waking up and remembering that the mourning that’s set deep in your roots is for someone who never died, waking up and remembering that the bitterness that consumed you had made up a betrayal that never was, finding each other through these crumbling walls...

Molten Milithe: that’s the pov for a love letter to the Downside, right? And/or which Scribe did she bond with the most? Or the least for that matter?

Volfred Sandalwood: catch-all Volf’n’anyone request. I want to see our tree interact with any friend and foe you might fancy! Arguing for his beliefs, being a history professor through and through, finding himself in a tight spot and getting unexpected help, verbally tearing Brighton a new one if they ever cross each other’s path again...

group: Volfred Sandalwood/Tariq | The Lone Minstrel: Volfred’s zodiac sign is Cancer and Cancer is ruled by the Moon, so there’s that. I love how they both hold the other in the highest esteem, especially on Tariq’s part since he’s the immortal Herald of the Scribes and Volfred is, all in all, a history teacher, but listen to him and you’d think the roles were inverted. I love my nonviolent canon but could anything happen to either of them that may require a rescue, and/or some good old-fashioned h/c? What’s something that could make Tariq of all people lose it? How’s life 100 years on?

Shenmue

This game cares for the little things. I’d love to see fanworks that try to out-slice-of-life canon...

Group: Qiu Hsu & Xianzi Bei: cormorant kung fu adventure! Do they hang out sometimes?

Group: Hazuki Ryo & Shenhua Ling: any moment, discussion, small adventure from their travels together! I love their bond! For all its waifufication of Shenhua, S3 really sold me on their friendship and a shared brand of dorkiness. Alternatively, sometimes I remember that they’d be 50ish in the present day - how and where do you picture them?

The Silver Case

I‘m all for the surrealism, big things being introduced and never picked up again, Rashomon’ing it up with six explanations for the same thing where no single one can be true, people dying and then popping up again like nbd... maybe the thing I like the most is characters transcending their humanity and looming over the dystopian world like ominous avatars. Correctness’ first ending had me swooning, that kind of mood is unparalleled. I have played TSC, FSR and 25W so far and have vague memories of K7. I’m aware of the “everything’s connected” readings but that’s not my main interest in these games. For FSR-focused requests, I see Lospass as a real island but also a metaphysical place of transformation first and foremost, where strange things happen that don’t make sense elsewhere.

Group: Toriko Kusabi & Remy Fawzil: What’s Toriko up to when she’s not chasing Chris? I think it could be fun to throw her at Remy and see the island from their point of view!

Group: Tokio Morishima & Edo Macalister: since Tokio stayed at the Flower Sun and Rain... I’m interested in peculiar happenings on Lospass that are not centered on Sumio...

Group: Tetsugorou Kusabi/Sumio Kodai: Tetsu picked one hell of a crush, huh! What’s it like in the aftermath of the games, when Sumio is Like That? How does Tetsu grapple with Parade? Is Tetsu an anchor of sorts for Correctness Sumio, who seems (at best) to be existing on a slightly different plane of existence at any given time and could disappear if you blink too hard?

Group: Tetsugorou Kusabi & Shinko Kuroyanagi: I’m joining the “let these two be foulmouthed friends” masses - who’d be more fed up with the other’s nonsense, and in which ways would they be an unstoppable team?

Group: Shinkai Tsuki & Tetsugorou Kusabi: Both of them end their stories in the shadows one way or another, and defending their protégé may have had a hand in their misfortune one way or another. What kind of understanding could they reach? What IS Tsuki up to anyway?

Group: Christina & Catherine: anthro Catherine, as per the Placebo bonus chapter Yami, was unexpectedly charming. What was Chris before reaching Lospass, and did he also have a chat with her on the plane or on the island?

#letter

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alchemisland · 6 years ago

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The Moors Mutt - II

https://www.wattpad.com/676844776-the-moors-mutt-ii

II. Limbo

Rising early, if rising it was and not merely stirring from a wakened restive state, I walked a barren stretch. At pale dawn birds like Aztec idols flighted at my stirring. Cold light stained the pasture either side. Sleepshod, the road to Cairn Cottage found me quiet company. Even the tinkers were not yet to the road in their triskeled wagons.

When the machine architect of our world was in infancy, men of old, men of renown, used more than sight in their primitive observations of our world. Already we, we as mankind, had realized what appeared as reality was deeper yet than simple tangibility. Further back towards the chaotic and infinite churn of the burning epoch, when mankind had not language to manifest destiny and lived subordinate to Echidna's descendants still fearsome on the plain, parts of the brain which one day became memory centers first stirred to life, elongating the possibility of human memory. Scent still is brother to memory.

The air was heavy with scent when I relinquished vision, only for a short time, and let wind corral me. The breeze carried faint lavender.

A pebbled stretch I crossed stirred a memory of my late father and a codex of heroic tales he purchased, whose high adventure stirred me like nothing prior. At six, maybe seven years old, tales of old Arabia appealed greatly. Fabulous kingdoms wrought of yellow stone against a tangerine haze, swirling tarot sun bemused of countenance, scorpions armoured like chargers sending rodents to their redoubt, the cloying madness of it all. I visited them in dreams, jumping from the path of unruly camels, watching the impenetrable waves humbly part in the wake of Royal palanquins.

Their heroes were unlike our knights. More often broody boys who preferred quill to falchion. Brooding teenagehood made me relish the stranger stories, tales without lessons existing solely to unnerve, speaking on the bleak lives of Tartarian wizards. Older, into adulthood, I came to enjoy Greek tales most. The tragedy of Ajax in his lover's plate leaking on the golden sand moved me. Waves, caressing the moored fleet in passing, bursting against the shale where the pyre burned. Since, when I hear crunching pebbles, I think of soldiers marching on the beach at Troy.

I heard the crunch of a trap and waited hopeful until the crude plume fixed atop the horses head appeared like the mantle of some deposed pagan lord. Ixion's disc four times divided had been fixed to bear this chariot. Its trundle ground debris to powder. I hailed the man, a being of wind, every strand of hair or cloth lank enough to lift stood in disarray. A peak stole his brow, but a smile waved me aboard. He never spoke, though carried me within shouting distance of the manse.

Inside chaos reigned. Lady Sizemore's estate was measured first in paper, not coin. Hundreds, thousands of jaundiced sheets, all in disorder busying every surface. Before a single coin changed hands, a great many hours I spent hauling boxes, within which were more boxes where spiders large as potatoes spun temporary wonders above the invoices.

I wonder what effect prolonged tedium has. Such thoughts are entertained in the avoidance of work that should never be given lucid credence. An entire day dedicated solely to translating letters in incomprehensible cursive, it felt ridiculous. My mind, perhaps reflecting its surroundings, felt dulled, unfocused. So long I stared, when I pried my eyes I found feint margins plastered across reality.

The previous night's visitations I had pondered, ultimately chalking to anxiety. Nothing substantially portentous. Unfortunately, another day was required before I indulged my cryptozooligcal fancies.

Darkness in ravenfeather arrived prematurely. I gathered my belongings, wondering where the time went, then ran to the track and the sounds of the the last husbandmen bound for Sperrin. I found easy passage. Too easy perhaps; I was cursed to endure indignity on a wagon halfheartedly scraped of its stinking contents; with my legs lolling over the side, I was soaked in every splash. I arrived back mud-caked, a shambling golem. Lar tended bar. I wondered had he stirred in my absence. Anticipating my thirst, two mugs were set.

I dropped my satchel, enjoying relief akin to weightlessness by contrast, and we drained tankards like soon-to-war Saxons, speaking of weather. I asked had anyone noteworthy visited, mostly from politeness. When asked had the room served, I replied it had done so more than adequately. Again, politeness.

Not wishing to seem overeager, I spared him my dream. If the tale was relayed to me, I should say how convenient the very man hoping to find the beast would experience a vision.

Besides, in the unlikely event we found a mangy badger after I'd described a prehistoric horror.. perish the thought.

'Do we depart tomorrow?' Lar grunted, pretending to clean.

'Short delay actually. I'd have said from the doorway, only for the ale calling. Alas, labour remains. My charges lust for satisfaction. They are at Rome's gates! Distant cousins write in droves. By air, land and sea their letters come, squeezing through grates, shimmying down chimneys. Forget the beast, if they find me I'm dead.'

'We sank tankards enough last night. I've seen folks pale on the dizzy morning after the night before. If this delay is to spite me, let me allay concerns, I'm the man for this job. We're the men for this job.' He shot a glance at Fergus, a pale lance cleaving his brow.

I looked to my empty cup then longingly at his selection. Lar fingered a cask, but reached further back and took another instead.

'My god, man. Boil a pot and toss it down your trousers. No such notions occurred to me. We're expedition mates! I didn't make a dent in the work, really.' I raised a silencing finger to hear the splash of ale. 'There you have it. Mystery solved. If the mystery of the beast is this easy, we're laughing.' I inhaled its aroma. Fruity, potent, sickly almost. 'This expedition diary I mean to publish, any thoughts?'

Lar's measured tone returned. Careful as a tiptoeing sinner, he asked 'You good?'

I smiled. 'Only Ben Adhem saw the book, ask him.'

Lar stove the ashen helm crowning his cigarette, plunging the embers into the cold bronze bowl. 'At writing.'

'You should say! I tease, I tease. To answer your question, yes is the answer. Humbly, in my hand, the pen is like the master mason's chisel, from whence grand cathedrals spring forth from their less divine constituent parts.' Lar was fumbling for his tobacco already and I thought what small use that vice would be in peril.

'I'm convinced.' Lar spoke quickly, stumbling over the words to get them out. I took no offence at his zeal to change the subject. 'Do you have a manuscript at hand?'

'Not with me, unfortunately.' He stifled a sigh of relief. 'Upon returning home one story heavier, I'll ensure you receive signed copies of every one. I'll sing them My favourite tub of Lar. Yours literately, Beastman. That way you'll know it's me.'

Lar's ale, a home brew, was a swift agent, promising to travel from your mouth to the toilet's in twenty minutes. I joked he might patent it for a medicine. Call it the Midas touch. Everything it touched turns to gold: toilet seat, floor, shoes if you weren't careful.

I spied Fergus. His thumb led a blunt edge across the ribbed bark of a sprig, from which he had carved two lidded eyes and a pursed mouth.

Lar lit a cigarette from the flared end of the last, then discarded it on the ashen pyre.

Lar had to raise the hatch spoiling any hope of a dramatic exit, but I hovered over the stool while I spoke. 'Departure two days hence, on the strict proviso no unpleasant libel suit comes once the story hits print. Rest assured, I'll include nothing untoward, but I reserve the right to artistic licence. Print the myth.'

'Libel is a city crime.' Anticipating my desire, Lar walked while he spoke. I mirrored his step, slipping through the open portcullis to sleep, perchance to scream.

Lying in bed, I wondered what to include in my chronicle; exciting details only, or every charged exchange? Nobody asked how the shipwright felt constructing thousands of ships without prior notice. They only wanted Achilles. The reader will concede, I have included much of the mundane.

Well-oiled, I slept easily. Set like a star I saw things past, dark present and murky future, useless without chronology, stifling their prophetic nature. The beast came again, shaking the ground.

Waking, it seemed I fell to the mattress from a height. Not far enough to endanger, but enough to worry the springs. I lurched, took my journal from the bedside locker, levered its purple tongue to split its leather cuirass and let it whip to a clean page.

One mark on the opposite face demanded attention. A black circle, subtle as a bearded chin, formed by the swift fury of a graceless wrist, its blackness total.

How strangely the lines blended. One moment a nest of fastened rat tails, one mark indistinguishable from another, the next a clear set of growing rings. In its swirling centre around the maelstrom's eye, the paper tore with the fury of the quill.

I found the pockmark on every page. Someone strained greatly to make an impression so indelible. First I thought Fergus with his ham hands, unknowingly forcing the nib through the page. When he had the chance, or the notion? It seemed unlikely. Throughout the workday it was with me, resting once for a moment unattended on the desk.

Despite concerns, I knew no progress could be made at this hour. For now it seemed safe to be about my duties without much extra precaution. I returned the journal, pulled the duvet across my shoulders and turned to sleep, when suddenly a violent jolt racked the shutters so fiercely they juddered back into place with a great thunk.

I winced toward the disturbance and found mocking empty blackness. As my head sank back into the pillow, a shuddering pulse shook the building. A rippling seismic attack. Unlike quakes from within, which sally in waves, this was a single detonation, like a dying star; one magnificent shockwave that stirred everything in the world at once, only for a moment. I stemmed panic, falling to courageous platitudes that would embarrass the most shameless Kipling-mimic. Without panic, I deduced more likely my head sharply turning had disturbed my equilibrium, giving the walls the appearance of motion. As if in answer to my doubt, dust sprinkled from the rafters.

Nothing else came. I waited, steeled. I pretended to be brave and at some indeterminate point, felt into a brave slumber.

Lar, blackbird that he was, rose early. He emerged from the fugue state that best pleased his constitution and stretched, his wingspan filling the alcove.

He found me in my linen cell, bewhaled as Jonah.

'Terrible day.' He drew the shutters. I pulled the sheets down over my face to the sight of Lar's stocky silhouette in the dirty light. Tapping his pipe twice on the sill, he plonked one cheek on the ledge and struck a match. 'Anything you want from town? I'm going to get supplies. I should be away most of the day. There won't be a return trip before we go. Speak now or forever hold your peace.'

'Ambulo in pace.' I tapped my journal, 'I have everything.'

'Do you have a mac?' The rain beat harder.

'No, we're English, some Irish. Although I heard tell that a distant branch traded their roses for thistle stalks.'

Lar shuddered, ill-humoured before midday, despite protestations he needed no proper rest. 'I mean a waterproof.'

'Oh give me credit. That's humour.'

'We in the smiling countryside call it idiocy. There's a time for revels. Unless you've been up all night, dawn isn't it.'

'I don't have one and I'd like a loan if that's what you're asking, thank you. I didn't sleep well now you mention it' I tossed my feet onto the cold ground and felt for a sock.

Lar watched the rain spilling in romantic sheets. 'You'll need an ark to get back. It's like a bog when it rains. No one will be able to get you. Not me, not the constabulary, nor anyone else. If the weather worsens, make sure you get back in time. Otherwise, everything will be closed until further boatice.'

'Boatice?' I said.

'Now that is humour. Rain, boats, further notice. Get it?' Lar left more spritely than when he entered.

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fransiscasdominicanlitblog · 4 years ago

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10 Interesting Fiction Novels

1. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents- Julia Alvarez

“ Acclaimed writer Julia Alvarez’s beloved first novel gives voice to four sisters as they grow up in two cultures. The García sisters—Carla, Sandra, Yolanda, and Sofía—and their family must flee their home in the Dominican Republic after their father’s role in an attempt to overthrow brutal dictator Rafael Trujillo is discovered. They arrive in New York City in 1960 to a life far removed from their existence in the Caribbean. In the wondrous but not always welcoming U.S.A., their parents try to hold on to their old ways as the girls try find new lives: by straightening their hair and wearing American fashions, and by forgetting their Spanish. For them, it is at once liberating and excruciating to be caught between the old world and the new. Here they tell their stories about being at home—and not at home—in America.” (Amazon.com)

2. Soledad: A Novel- Angie Cruz

“At eighteen, Soledad couldn't get away fast enough from her contentious family with their endless tragedies and petty fights. Two years later, she's an art student at Cooper Union with a gallery job and a hip East Village walk-up. But when Tía Gorda calls with the news that Soledad's mother has lapsed into an emotional coma, she insists that Soledad's return is the only cure. Fighting the memories of open hydrants, leering men, and slick-skinned teen girls with raunchy mouths and snapping gum, Soledad moves home to West 164th Street. As she tries to tame her cousin Flaca's raucous behavior and to resist falling for Richie -- a soulful, intense man from the neighborhood -- she also faces the greatest challenge of her life: confronting the ghosts from her mother's past and salvaging their damaged relationship.

Evocative and wise, Soledad is a wondrous story of culture and chaos, family and integrity, myth and mysticism, from a Latina literary light.” (Amazon.com)

3.Geographies of Home- Loida Maritza Perez

“After leaving the college she'd attended to escape her religiously conservative parents, Iliana, a first-generation Dominican-American woman, returns home to Brooklyn to find that her family is falling apart: one sister is careening toward mental collapse, another sister is living in a decrepit building with her abusive husband and three children, and a third sister has simply disappeared. In this dislocating urban environment Iliana reluctantly confronts the anger and desperation that seem to seep through every crack of her family's small house, and experiences all the contradictions, superstitions, joys, and pains that come from a life caught between two cultures. In this magnificent debut novel, filled with graceful prose and searing detail, Loida Maritza Pérez offers a penetrating portrait of the American immigrant experience as she explores the true meanings of identity, family--and home.** “(Amazon.com)**

4. Song of the Water Saints- Nelly Rosario

“This vibrant, provocative début novel explores the dreams and struggles of three generations of Dominican women. Graciela, born on the outskirts of Santo Domingo at the turn of the century, is a headstrong adventuress who comes of age during the U.S. occupation. Too poor to travel beyond her imagination, she is frustrated by the monotony of her life, which erodes her love affairs and her relationship with Mercedes, her daughter. Mercedes, abandoned by Graciela at thirteen, turns to religion for solace and, after managing to keep a shop alive during the Trujillo dictatorship, emigrates to New York with her husband and granddaughter, Leila. Leila inherits her great-grandmother Graciela’s passion-driven recklessness. But, caught as she is between cultures, her freedom arrives with its own set of obligations and dangers.” (Amazon.com)

5. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao- Junot Diaz

“ Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. From his home in New Jersey, where he lives with his old-world mother and rebellious sister, Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J. R. R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the Fukœ—the curse that has haunted the Oscar's family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still waiting for his first kiss, is just its most recent victim.

Diaz immerses us in the tumultuous life of Oscar and the history of the family at large, rendering with genuine warmth and dazzling energy, humor, and insight the Dominican-American experience, and, ultimately, the endless human capacity to persevere in the face of heartbreak and loss. A true literary triumph, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao confirms Junot Diaz as one of the best and most exciting voices of our time.”** (Goodreads.com)**

6. This is How You Lose Her- Junot Diaz

“The stories in This Is How You Lose Her, by turns hilarious and devastating, raucous and tender, lay bare the infinite longing and inevitable weaknesses of our all-too-human hearts. They capture the heat of new passion, the recklessness with which we betray what we most treasure, and the torture we go through - "the begging, the crawling over glass, the crying" - to try to mend what we've broken beyond repair. They recall the echoes that intimacy leaves behind, even where we thought we did not care. They teach us the catechism of affections: that the faithlessness of the fathers is visited upon the children; that what we do unto our exes is inevitably done in turn unto us; and that loving thy neighbor as thyself is a commandment more safely honored on platonic than erotic terms. Most of all, these stories remind us that the habit of passion always triumphs over experience, and that “love, when it hits us for real, has a half-life of forever.” (Goodreads.com)

7. Dominicana- Angie Cruz

“Fifteen-year-old Ana Cancion never dreamed of moving to America, the way the girls she grew up with in the Dominican countryside did. But when Juan Ruiz proposes and promises to take her to New York City, she has to say yes. It doesn’t matter that he is twice her age, that there is no love between them. Their marriage is an opportunity for her entire close-knit family to eventually immigrate. So on New Year’s Day, 1965, Ana leaves behind everything she knows and becomes Ana Ruiz, a wife confined to a cold six-floor walk-up in Washington Heights. Lonely and miserable, Ana hatches a reckless plan to escape. But at the bus terminal, she is stopped by Cesar, Juan’s free-spirited younger brother, who convinces her to stay.As the Dominican Republic slides into political turmoil, Juan returns to protect his family’s assets, leaving Cesar to take care of Ana. Suddenly, Ana is free to take English lessons at a local church, lie on the beach at Coney Island, see a movie at Radio City Music Hall, go dancing with Cesar, and imagine the possibility of a different kind of life in America. When Juan returns, Ana must decide once again between her heart and her duty to her family.” ** (Goodreads.com) **

8. Drown- Junot Diaz

“With ten stories that move from the barrios of the Dominican Republic to the struggling urban communities of New Jersey, Junot Diaz makes his remarkable debut. Diaz's work is unflinching and strong, and these stories crackle with an electric sense of discovery. Diaz evokes a world in which fathers are gone, mothers fight with grim determination for their families and themselves, and the next generation inherits the casual cruelty, devastating ambivalence, and knowing humor of lives circumscribed by poverty and uncertainty. In Drown, Diaz has harnessed the rhythms of anger and release, frustration and joy, to indelible effect.” (Goodreads.com)

9. Yo! - Julia Alvarez

“At last! A zesty, exuberant follow-up to the wildly popular How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, full of Julia Alvarez's keen observations and tender affection for her characters.The Garcia Girls are back, most notably Yolanda, or Yo, who has grown up to be a writer. In the process, she has managed to get kicked out of college, break more than a few hearts, have her own heart broken many times, return for extended visits to the Dominican Republic her family fled when she was a child, and marry three times. She has also infuriated her entire family by publishing the intimate details of their lives as fiction.This brilliant novel is a full and true exploration of a woman's soul, a meditation on the writing life, and a lyrical account of the immigrant's search for identity and a place in the world. !Yo!'s bright colors, zesty dialogue, warm feeling, and genuine insight could only come from the palette of Julia Alvarez.” (Goodreads.com)

10. Let it Rain Coffee- Angie Cruz

“Esperanza risked her life fleeing the Dominican Republic for the glittering dream she saw on television, but years later she is still stuck in a cramped tenement with her husband, Santo, and their two children, Bobby and Dallas. She works as a home aide and, at night, hides unopened bills from the credit card company where Santo won't find them when he returns from driving his livery cab.When Santo's mother dies and his father, Don Chan, comes to Nueva York to live out his twilight years with the Colóns, nothing will ever be the same. Don Chan remembers fighting together with Santo in the revolution against Trujillo's cruel regime, the promise of who his son might have been, had he not fallen under Esperanza's spell. Let It Rain Coffee is a sweeping novel about love, loss, family, and the elusive nature of memory and desire.” (Goodreads.com)

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tominicholland · 7 years ago

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Time of Your Life

Pairing: Harry Holland x Protagonist (brief, planned), Tom Holland x Protagonist (main, planned)

Synopsis: Jacob Batalon’s youngest cousin (Protagonist) is now – as of August – 18 years old. At the nearly-ripe age of 17, she accompanied her cousin to the Spider-Man: Homecoming premiere where she grows acquainted with the younger crowd of the star-studded cast and – most importantly – piques the interest of two Holland boys, Harry (who’s the same age) and Tom (who’s three years her senior).

Author’s Note: I wanted to use this chapter to develop the personality of the protagonists’ friends, who I believe are going to be crucial in later parts of this fic. Harry makes somewhat of an appearance here, too, so you’ll get a little bit of how they get familiar with each other.

Word Count: 1,538

Part I // Part II: Notifications In which the protagonist’s cousin, Jacob Batalon, lets the world – but more importantly, her friends – know she’s accompanying him to premiere, and Harry Holland lurks on her Instagram profile.

Victoria: “BITCH WHAT THE FUCK YOU DIDN’T TELL ME YOU WERE FLAKING PROM FOR A MOVIE PREMIERE WHAT THE FUCK THAT’S SO COOL” Sent at 5:03.

My phone’s alarm went off at 6:00. I swiped the message bubble to the left and saw that Victoria, one of my closest friends, had messaged me around an hour after I had knocked out. I’d lulled myself to sleep listening to “Malibu” by Miley Cyrus last night after stressing over plane tickets and everything for the premiere. I basically had two hours of shut-eye to run on. Instead of replying, I reverted to my inbox and saw an overview of other messages:

Sam: “MAJA YOU’RE RELATED TO JACOB BATALON WHAT” “OMG BRING ME SOMETHING FROM THE PREMIERE PLEASE” “MAJA MAJAM JDJKSJDLKAJSKLDJLAJDLKJSLA” Sent at 5:15.

Carlos: “MAJA I’M YOUR BEST FRIEND CAN YOU ASK SPIDER-MAN TO SAY HI TO ME WHEN YOU MEET HIM?” Sent at 5:00.

Imani: “YOU KNOW I’M REALLY PISSED AT YOUR DUMB ASS FOR FUCKING DITCHING PROM BECAUSE I PLANNED THE WHOLE THING AND YOU’RE MY BEST FRIEND BASICALLY BUT FAM HOW THE FUCK DID YOU NOT TELL ANYONE YOU WERE GOING TO THE SPIDERMAN PREMIERE THE FUCKKKKKKKK” Sent at 5:30

My heart raced as I swiped down and my iPhone revealed an overload of notifications, which were condensed into a few banners. I clicked the home button and saw about a hundred notifications on Twitter and more than two times more on Instagram. I deduced that the attention stemmed from an Instagram post, so I opened the app.

The earliest notification was from Jacob – he’d gained almost 200,000 followers ever since he brought Ned Leeds to life, and people were liking all his posts now. He’d tagged me in his most recent post – a picture of us when he visited my branch of the family in San Diego during one of the earlier Comic Cons, circa 2002.

“My cousin’s like my little sister. Been with me since the beginning. From Comic Con to Comic Con, and now the Spider-Man Premiere.” He added the shaka and smirk emoji and I giggled a little at first. Then my stomach pitted. My Instagram was public and I only had a few posts (pictures of me at the beach, at school during lunch, sometimes some sports pics), and most notably I had a pride of eighty-nine followers. Now my follower count had increased to a thousand, with a bunch of Spider-Man themed accounts commenting praises on my pictures.

I hastily cleared out all my notifications on all social media outlets and glanced at the clock next to me. It read 6:20. I had 0 period at 6:30, but it wasn’t mandatory, so I sank back into my sheets and calculated how much time I had to dillydally online. School started at 7:15, so I figured I’d have ten more minutes to just think about what I’d say to my friends, who were probably already on their way to 0 period ASB, student government.

“You guys never listen to me, that’s why you didn’t know I was related to him. And I didn’t really know he was dragging me to LA.” Nah, too condemning.

“Uhhhh, I didn’t think it would be that big a deal…” That’s too dismissive.

There was just no safe answer for me to draft out before I’d get to school, so I felt like I’d roll with the punches once they were thrown. What was of even greater importance was my outfit, which I had to contemplate this time around because people were going to talk about me. I wanted people to think that all this noise wasn’t a big deal, so I threw on an off-the-shoulder shirt with some flare-cut Levi’s and some jandals. I already prepared my backpack the night before, so I knew I was going to make it to school in time even if I’d stop by 7-11 to grab a taquito and Slurpee for breakfast.

“Bitch there you are!” Victoria greeted me as first period started. I was unofficially assigned the seat right next to the door, so I came in last to detract any attention.

“You know, ‘bitch’ is a really derogatory term,” I plopped down in my seat and opened my backpack, retrieving the thickest Lit textbook known to man.

“Oh my god, Maja shut up! You know what we’re gonna be talking about today,” Vicky, Sam, Imani, Carlos and I were the odd group that sat in the corner, a bunch of “intellectuals” as our teacher would say, so “jaded” with the curriculum that we typically took group time to gossip.

“So, dude, spill the beans” Sam demanded, once we were released to do our work.

“First,” I asked, “What we’re y’all thinking about equivocation in Macbeth? I’m thinking it has to do with the trees and shit moving, right?”

“Maja, shut up you’re going to get a 5 on the AP exam so can we just cut to the shit that really matters?” Carlos scooted next to me to perfect the quintet. “You’re hot shit now!”

My cheeks flushed as I looked around the room. In that moment, I realized that what all my friends considered true was a lie. People weren’t looking at me. Jake was across the room with Adam and Joey and their other friend, Ryan, asking another group for some help with all the critical reading assignments. No one really gave a shit, no one even knew… well, except for my friends, my weird friends.

Imani noticed a change in my pace from an evasive kind of jitteriness to a dreary sort of dawdling. They asked me what was wrong in a way that got everyone else to shut up. “Nothing,” I said. Obviously I was kidding everyone; I wanted people to notice me for once – maybe be jealous – especially Jake.

“There has to be something wrong—” Sam was about to go on a standard consolatory spiel that friends usually go on when you’re not fully open with them, but my phone vibrated.

“Oh my god who’s Harry Holland?” Sam asked. It wasn’t about caring for me anymore, it was about the boy with a familiar name.

“Is he related to Tom?!” Carlos burst my bubble of personal space and rested his chin on my shoulder as he looked at my screen from next to me.

“U-uhhhhhh, let’s see?” the Instagram banner read “harryholland64 started following you,” so I went straight to his profile.

“Followed by tomholland2013…” Carlos read.

“He’s got the shaka thing….followed by lifeisaloha…” Imani observed.

“HE HAS PICTURES WITH TOM,” Victoria knocked on her desk a bit louder than what was appropriate. Mr. Rosenblatt, our teacher, averted his eyes from his desktop to us.

“Ms. Maja,” Mr. Rosenblatt said in an orotund voice, “Surely you, Ms. Victoria and the rest of your court are way beyond Shakespeare, but others aren’t. You can engage in chatter but please be respectful.”

Victoria’s mouth was agape in both embarrassment and eagerness. We had no idea who Harry Holland was, other than the fact that he was related to Tom and knew my cousin.

Sam refreshed the screen on my notifications page for me and noticed that the “follow” alert was no longer there. “Dude, where’d it go?” she asked, in a curiously hushed tone.

Carlos took my phone and I was unbothered. They were all more eager about this than I was; my stomach was doing flips. It was too good to be true.

“Dude, he unfollowed you, I searched for your name under his following list and it’s not there anymore,” Carlos handed my phone back to my trembling hands. The fairytale had ended.

“Dude, dude,” Victoria took her long pointer finger with its witch-like, purple-coated nail and tapped on my desk for emphasis, like she typically did when she wanted to be the conclusive one. “Unfollow him too. That way it’s not awkward when you meet at the premiere. You guys can just pretend this shit never happened.”

“Nothing even happened,” I retorted.

Imani, with all her infinite wisdom, robbed Victoria of her moment. She let out a grunt of disbelief, as if I was unbearably naïve. “Fam, he was lurking. He follows Jacob and obviously saw the post.”

“He probably got curious and clicked on your tag,” Sam added.

“Yeah dude and he probably thought you were hot,” as much as I wanted to seriously believe in Victoria’s comment, I shook my head.

“Maja, I think Vicky’s onto something. It may seem outlandish but I’m a dude and if I saw that one of you guys knew someone hot, I’d lurk and follow if I had stable mutuals, too,” this was a surprising revelation from Carlos, who usually provided barely any male insight. He was a listener for the most part, not particularly loquacious. But when he spoke he never gave penny advice, but wisdom worth a few grand.

“This bitch knows his shit,” Victoria nodded, while pursing her lips and sealing her beautifully foul mouth. “I do, too.”

#jacob batalon #tom holland #harry holland #spiderman: homecoming #p: mine #p: fic

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deniscollins · 6 years ago

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In Newark, Police Cameras, and the Internet, Watch You

Many cities have surveillance cameras to detract crime. Newark, NJ just made the cameras’ live-stream available to the public on the Internet. Civil libertarians claim this violates privacy rights, fears that minorities will be disproportionately accused of crimes, and gives would-be stalkers or burglars a powerful tool for tracking their targets. Should the cameras live-streams be made available to the public on the Internet: (1) Yes, (2) No? Why? What are the ethics underlying your decision?

The camera perched above the bus stop sends back a continuous feed from the corner of 16th Avenue and South 18th Street in Newark’s West Ward. Regular customers come and go from Max’s, a convenience store, and a man without a shirt paces aimlessly on the same slice of pavement. Anyone with a fast internet connection and a desire to watch could also see Fernando Demarzino stepping out of his cousin’s barbershop.

“My girlfriend called and told me what I had in my hand,” Mr. Demarzino said on a recent evening as he stood within the camera’s line of sight. His girlfriend had heard about official camera feeds that had recently been made available online, and she was checking out the spot where she knew she was likely to find Mr. Demarzino. He had change in his hand, and she jokingly told him the image was sharp enough for her to count out three quarters. She also spotted his Jeep parked on the street.

Surveillance cameras are an inescapable fixture of the modern city. Law enforcement agencies have deployed vast networks to guard against terrorism and combat street crime. But in Newark, the police have taken an extraordinary step that few, if any, other departments in the country have pursued: They have opened up feeds from dozens of closed-circuit cameras to the public, asking viewers to assist the force by watching over the city and reporting anything suspicious.

The Citizen Virtual Patrol, as the program is called, has been hailed by officials as a move toward transparency in a city where a mistrust of the police runs deep, rooted in long-running claims of aggressive enforcement and racial animosity. The cameras, officials said, provide a way to recruit residents as Newark tries to shake a dogged reputation for violence and crime. “This is part of building a partnership,” said Anthony F. Ambrose, who, as public safety director, oversees the city’s police and fire operations. Since the program started about a month ago, he said, 1,600 users have signed into the website, and residents have been lobbying the department to add more cameras in their neighborhoods.

But the advent of the program has provoked alarm among civil liberties groups and privacy advocates. They argue that it opens a Pandora’s box of potentially devastating consequences for unsuspecting people and gives would-be stalkers or burglars a powerful tool for tracking their targets. They also argue that it pushes the police to rely heavily on the judgment of untrained civilians whose perception could be clouded by unconscious biases.

The newly installed cameras look out over strips of storefronts (some bustling and others seemingly dead), public housing complexes and rows of family homes.

“It’s not just Big Brother,” said Amol Sinha, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey. “There’s an infinite number of siblings here.”

‘Use It, Not Abuse It’

It is easy to spot the symptoms of Newark’s enduring struggle with poverty and blight — blocks with crumbling buildings, crater-pocked roads and storefronts whose metal grates are pulled down well before sunset. Yet also visible are signs of transformation, with mushrooming development downtown and many businesses moving in. Newark is even a finalist in Amazon’s prolonged municipal pageant to find a base for its second headquarters.

The city’s reputation has been clouded by years of ranking among the nation’s most violent communities. In 2013, Newark had the third-highest murder rate, with about 112 homicides, according to federal data, but last year, murders fell to a historic low, with about 70 homicides recorded.

The relationship between law enforcement and the city’s largely African-American and Latino population has been strained by long-running complaints of harsh policing tactics and racial profiling along with the memories of the deadly riots half a century ago. In 2016, the results of a lengthy federal investigation only confirmed those suspicions, finding that most of the police’s pedestrian stops were unjustified, use of force had been underreported and minorities were stopped more often than whites. The investigation led to the installation of a federal monitor and a consent decree.

Officials said the picture is improving with fewer people registering complaints about police misbehavior. Ras J. Baraka, Newark’s mayor, said that the citizen patrol program was a significant piece of a broader effort to mend ties with residents.

The program started in April with 62 cameras placed in areas where officers are called often or locations with heavy foot traffic. Under each camera is a sign advising “This Area Is Under Video Surveillance.” Over 100 additional cameras are expected in the coming months, and eventually, the police said, the video will be accessible from a smartphone app.

A police spokeswoman said the department had received several calls from residents watching the cameras, though none have led to arrests.

“We want to give residents the opportunity to look with us,” Mr. Baraka said in an interview. “It gives the community an opportunity to be engaged in police work and create a better relationship between the police and the community.”

Some critics say it could actually contribute to the problems and that the way to improve the bonds is to have more officers engage with the community and live in the city. “This is an invasive action,” said Lawrence Hamm, chairman of the People’s Organization for Progress, a civil rights group in Newark.

Yet, so far, the program has been met with support in many corners of the city, with neighborhood watch groups petitioning for more cameras and some residents believing that it could be as effective at monitoring police officers on patrol as it could be for spotting criminal activity.

“The cops need to be watched, because we all make mistakes,” Quateisha Rivers, who does kitchen prep for a meal service company, said as she sat in a salon. She welcomed the cameras and brushed aside the concerns. “It’s designed for safety,” she said of the program. “We’re supposed to use it, not abuse it.”

Live-Stream ‘Wild Card’

Police agencies around the world have turned to video-monitoring technology to give them fly-on-the-wall views of their cities. In Chicago, the police have established surveillance centers where officers can watch incoming feeds from some 30,000 closed-circuit cameras.

Still, criminologists and surveillance experts say research has shown that cameras have had a limited influence in deterring crime. The devices can be hugely beneficial after a crime, however, helping investigators to understand what happened and to identify suspects. In New York, surveillance video was cited as an important aid in tracking down the man later convicted of setting off a bomb in 2016 in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.

Civil liberties groups have challenged the use of camera networks monitored by the authorities, citing threats to privacy rights and fears that minorities will be disproportionately accused of crimes. A system monitored by the public heightens their concerns.

“The wild card here is the live stream of all this stuff,” said Faiza Patel, the co-director of the Brennan Center for Justice’s Liberty and National Security Program at New York University School of Law. “It’s definitely a kind of flash point. Every individual and every community wants to be safe. The question is: How do we get safety? When you see measures like this, you have to wonder, whose safety is being protected and whose rights are being violated?”

Experts said bystanders could be unreliable, noting the lack of training and a significant chance they might not recognize the influence of their own biases. They cited as evidence recent highly publicized episodes, including one last month in which the police were called over a black graduate student napping in her dorm’s common room at Yale University, or in April when a white woman complained that two African-American men were grilling in an Oakland, Calif., park.

“Not only is the program not likely to reduce crime,” said Eric L. Piza, a former Newark police crime analyst and associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, “it has the potential to lead police to respond to situations they should not be responding to.”

Researchers were aware of few other similar efforts in which a video surveillance network has been made so widely available. In New Jersey, the Camden County Police started a community watch program in 2014 in which residents could apply to have restricted access to the department’s “eye in the sky” cameras in their neighborhoods.

Mr. Sinha, of the civil liberties union, said the only comparable video feeds with such unlimited access were those showing traffic or beach conditions. “This is expansive,” he said of the Newark program, “and its stated purpose is to have people snitch on one another.”

Another Set of Eyes

Officials say the cameras do not have facial recognition technology or the ability to track specific individuals or vehicles. (The cameras were made by Panasonic, a major corporate presence in Newark.) Mr. Baraka also said that the program was still in its early stages, and it might take some time to figure out the pitfalls.

Still, he and other officials dismissed the privacy worries over the cameras, arguing that they are part of a modern climate in which the prying eyes of technology — whether from private security cameras, social media or cellphones — were difficult to evade. If anything, officials said, the police needed to embrace technology to help fight crime.

“It’s definitely an aid to the police and detectives,” Mr. Ambrose said. “It’s just another set of eyes that’s helping us.”

The debate over the cameras has also underscored the mood in some parts of Newark where residents see the increased surveillance as a trade-off they are willing to make to improve conditions.

Mr. Demarzino, 54, knows well the violence that has gripped the city: His brother, he said, was fatally shot in 1995, and he was shot during a carjacking.

“That camera’s going to save a lot of lives,” he said, nodding to the one overhead. “Trust me.”

He called out to Latoya Jackson, standing on the stoop of her salon across the street. The intersection has the corner store, the barbershop, a drugstore, an old sports bar with a door and windows that had been boarded up. Ms. Jackson, a native of Newark, opened the salon in March, its logo the wavy signature she had practiced since she was in third grade.

Like many residents, she was unaware of the public access to the video. She did not know she could see, any time of the day or night, a feed showing the front of her salon.

“That’s good and bad,” Ms. Jackson said. As a business owner, “it’s free security,” she said. “But it’s not good for me as a civilian person.”

#Surveillance Cameras #Privacy #Newark

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davidaolson · 7 years ago

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We took the water taxi from the dock at the end of the next door pier to the ferry in San Pedro then ferried to Caye Caulker. We are not a big fan of the ferry system mainly because we are always be stuck in the lower section which does not provide a vantage point where the shades of turquoise are easily studied, where the wind can rub its fingers through my ever whiter hair. Most seats are in the belly of the beast where there are few windows. And because we are shoehorned sardines, there is little space to maneuver for a better view. It feels claustrophobic.

Our return ride, our final ferry ride, was infinitely better. We were able to wrangle two seats on the top and watch the green shores of Caye Caulker fade into oblivion and the palm-lined shores of Ambergris Caye appear magically on the Northern horizon. See the horizon stretch from yesterday into tomorrow, into the soul of a lone rainbow hanging onto Earth’s edge in the East and a gray wall of never experienced rain in the distant West.

Roots, rock, reggae, dis a reggae music Play I some music, dis a reggae music…

The vibe on Caulker is a far cry more mellow than the relatively bustling San Pedro which is a slow crawl compared to sweet home Chicago. I specifically wore my Che Guevara shirt, his head in silhouette against a military green background, for this part of our vacation. Rebel. Rebel. It received an early compliment. I think I may need to purchase similar shirts for Brotha Marley, Uncle Ho, Cousin Vladimir, Papa Villa, Tante Joan d’Arc, Señor Bolivar, Jefes Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, Friar Martin Luther, Uncle Martin King, Great Aunty Rosa, Mr. X, Viva Zapata, ¡Viva la Revolución! …I think you can see where my heart lies…

Anyway, the Caulker feels reggae…dis a reggae music…from the moment one disembarks the ferry. The island sends relaxed out relaxed vibes that appear to be floating within life. Maybe, floating on the spirit wings of the Ganja bird…I don’t know. But the vibe is one lovish…

One Love! One Heart! Let’s get together and feel all right…

One Love Bench on Caye Caulker

Everyone we encountered was friendly and chillaxed. It is a place I could see me whiling away the years of my youth when I was young and living close to, if not over to the edge of sanity. How about the Winters of my retirement? Not sure. I’ve taken to enjoying solitude and don’t see that possible in this very small village but it is definitely a great place for a lunch and an afternoon.

One of our first activities was to hole up in a restaurant hanging over the ocean, a restaurant with a cover but otherwise open to the sea breezes and gentle waters and puffy clouds lazing their way across the impeccable sky. In the North, a dozen or so Magnificent Frigate Birds hung in the sky, all facing into the wind, barely moving as if they were tethered to a child’s mobile hanging over a crib. They almost lulled me to sleep.

The Frigate is brownish black with a deeply forked tail. I envied their ability to float in tranquility. Frigates are considered good omens as their presence means land is near. I felt lucky to be at this place at this time in my life. We ate close to noon and were almost finished eating the fresh fish when a catamaran dumped a load of tourists all who tried to squeeze into the eatery quickly destroying the tranquility. We hurried out. I like to be around people…generally in moderation. I also enjoy silence…

People talking without speaking People hearing without listening…

When I think of silence, I don’t envisage absence of sound. For me, silence is defined by the absence of human-generated noise be it the human voice which can trill emotion beyond the bounds of human thought, be it a jackhammer chewing away in the heart of downtown Chicago in the twilight before the masses have emerged from their hives to pollinate the financial flowers perfuming global commerce.

For me, silence includes the choir of nature, the low croak of Gecko hunting insects by the light of the waxing Moon, the rustle of leaves when a flock of Pelicans launches into the morning sky after a night sleeping safely in the trees, the gentle scraping of Fiddler Crab hauling its shell across a sandy beach at night seen when I walked out with a bottle of wine to sit in the poetry of the ocean, the song of the orange Sun inching o’er the horizon, the light scratch of Iguana’s claws scurrying over rocks before it sucks in a juicy fly or hurries to a hideout when spooked by the shadow of Hawk on the prowl. The iguana moves in staccato bursts punctuated by long stays in the musical score playing in the background of its life.

For me, silence is the place I find myself, if not find, then converse with my inner voice, scratch away at my defenses in an attempt to understand the beast within until, that is, Monkey gets antsy and interjects without raising his paw to be called upon in an orderly fashion. He sticks a needle in my ass to get my attention. As he frequently did in Caye Caulker.

Folks won’t find us now because Mister Satch and Mister Cros We gone fishin’…

Caye Caulker is run down as if the town was succumbing to neglect. Or it was rooted in the hippie vibe more concerned with the present moment than the tomorrow which never comes. Zen existence. Many buildings are on stilts to keep the residents dry during the hurricane season when waters can surge and cover the low lying island. A number of buildings were broken. Many were little more than concrete shells. Poverty. Surprising?

I seem to be always surprised by poverty which is strange considering there are many more poor than there are not poor. The rundown nature of the island may be why accommodations tend to clock in at half or less that of Ambergris Caye where we were staying. It could also be why so many youths choose to congregate here where bars line up side by side on the main streets. Youth and alcohol…fun and dangerous…dangerous fun…bars in Caulker open early. I don’t drink before 5pm…

Jewelry particularly earrings and necklaces on a street vendor’s table is a bait my wife can’t pass up. It’s her shiny penny, her pink pony. Where I see a hook, she sees yummy morsels to add to her eclectic collection. When choosing, she selects for rare beauty. It is my job to negotiate the final price so the barb doesn’t set too deep in our tender wallets. I paid higher than normal because some profits went to the local women creating a cottage industry to help them sustain and grow. The woman we purchased from told us of a place on the island to see Tarpon and seahorses and gave us a free map of the tiny island. Glad my wife took the bait.

Tarpon In Tarpon Bay

We followed the map with less luck than I would have expected. That was ok because while on Caye Caulker, I planned on taking Monkey walk for a long walk on a very short pier and pushing him into the drink for a few hours of peace. What I wasn’t planning on was a heat that was punishing, a humidity making my balls swampy, while searching for the appropriate length pier. I was beginning to think we wouldn’t get lucky when we walked along a dilapidated, twisty pier through a shaded, almost spooky mangrove opening to a bay teeming with tarpon.

Tarpon are a sportfish that can grow up to 280 pounds (127 kilos) and 8 feet(2.5 meters) long. These Tarpon were schooling in about three feet deep. None were the 280-pound monsters but there were a few in the vicinity of 50+ pounds, prime game for a fisherman such as myself. They are edible but not delectable so most are thrown back. I was itching to pull out a rod and reel and try my hand but today was not the day I would get to fish. This is one of the few places Monkey and I aligned today. Nor would I fish the entire trip as it cost $250 for a half day of guided fishing which is to steep for my tastes.

I’ve been around for a long, long year Stole many a man’s soul to waste And I was ’round when Jesus Christ Had his moment of doubt and pain Made damn sure that Pilate Washed his hands and sealed his fate…

Mi esposá opted to purchase feeder fish from the Belizean woman manning the shack at the end of the pier. 5 Belizean dollars for 10 dead fish to hold a few inches above the water, dead fish to entice the monsters to break through the surface and suck in an offering. She a high priestess offering sacramental communion to the devotee. The trick is to hold the fish between two fingers with the palm open so the fish doesn’t also inhale the hand although the mouth is big enough to suck in the hand and half the arm.

High Priestess Offering Sacramental Communion to the Congregation

After watching her feed a few, I decided to join in the fun but with a twist. I figured it could be a great way to wash my hands of Monkey once and for all. I wrapped Monkey tightly around a tantalizing feeder fish and dangled it a few inches above water counting the seconds until Tarpon swallowed Monkey for absorption in his gullet or puke him far out in the deep blue sea where he would drown. Either way, I would finally have Monkey off my weary back. Freedom! Just one fish away.

Pelican

But, not a Tarpon jumped. Not a one. I touched the water with Monkey Fish, still nothing. It was as if the little fucker hypnotized Tarpon. They even quit leaping for the fish my wife offered. Frustrated, I tossed fish into the air and let it plop into the water where it was gobbled up almost as soon as it hit the surface. It is amazing how fast the behemoths can move when motivated. Unfortunately, Monkey was not part of the meal. He crawled up my arm, into my ear, and tucked himself deep into my subconscious where he remained hidden quietly for a few hours. I think he finally figured out I was serious about existing in and only in the moment.

Fly me to the moon Let me play among the stars…

Three kayakers pulled into the bay to marvel at the Tarpon. They spoke a combination of French and near accent-free English. The blond, almost as pasty as me, hopped into the water, waded with the fish who swam safely distanced from her pallid glow. Tarpon has sandpaper teeth instead of needles or spikes meaning they can do little damage with their mouths to human flesh.

Kayakers in Tarpon Bay

Tarpon kept a safe distance parrying with a flick of the tail all her attempts to ‘pet’ one of them. Predators don’t grow large without developing street smarts in abundance. She settled for a few selfies featuring Tarpon in the background. When the woman climbed back into her kayak, two halves of a pale moon separated by a thin, black partially eaten thread shown bright as the raging sun. Her bikini was little more than a thong with ruffles at the waist.

We walked around town for a couple of more hours in the glaring sun. My wife added to her golden glow while the little of me exposed to the sun mimicked the pink inside of a conch shell which, by the way, are quite tasty.

We walked to one of the few resorts on the island which is much different than the many resorts lining the shores of our island. There was a small seahorse farm with yellow, black, and brown seahorses hiding in the weeds. We mostly saw them when their tales were wrapped around a blade of seagrass and they sat idle.

I am amazed at the number of midday drinkers mainlining alcohol into their systems. And it was not young kids. These were adults, some retirement aged drinking their day away. One woman looking to be 60ish but that could have been from the ravages of alcohol was so drunk she had to walk carefully to the bar for her sixteen-ounce refill. I had a Mai Tai…it’s always 5pm somewhere.

It wasn’t our scene so we moseyed in the general direction of the dock to await the ferry. A short downpour, they tend to be brief on the island lasting no more than fifteen minutes, forced us onto a bar porch for a short rest before completing our trek. We arrived at the dock early meaning we were in the front of the line. And we finally were able to sit on the upper deck of the ferry. Definitely not Uecker seats this time.

And we were excited to go back because San Pedro is home to the best Chicken and Rice or Pork and Rice we have ever eaten. It is on par with Jerk Chicken from the kettles of Jamaican beaches. We planned to buy enough food for a couple of meals…

To be continued….

Caye Caulker, Long Walking Monkey on A Short Pier: A Week in Belize, Part 4 We took the water taxi from the dock at the end of the next door pier to the ferry in San Pedro then ferried to Caye Caulker.

#Caye Caulker #Tarpon

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