#even though it's all algorithmic now

[is-this-really--life]

I wish you could switch between multiple feeds on tumblr. That's one thing I really like about instagram. You don't have to log off to switch btw accounts and also different accounts have different feeds

[harmonicabisexuals]

why did i get two useless degrees and then decide to try and get a full time job right at the exact time everyone is evaluating job applications with AI

[lulu2992]

Thank you, Tumblr, for rectifying my follower count last month and finally removing all those “ghost bots” from October 2019 ♥

The few of you whose names are hidden in the list aren’t included in the displayed number anymore either, unfortunately, but at least I know who you are and that you’re real :)

[topaztimes]

Hi this is a vent post! Continue scrolling if you'd rather not see that

[jammyshouse]

finally accepting i am a gay man rather than whatever i thought i was is explaining a lot about everything to the point it’s actually making me angry. like man. man i guess it was very fucking obvious to everyone except me huh

[elsartzz]

oh hello. um I checked my followers recently and there seem to be a few new people here? hello tumblr I do fanart 👋 thanks for being an overall solid social media platform, I try to update when I rmb but I’m a bit more active on Instagram if you wanna check that out (shameless plug) 🙃

Asks are always open btw!! and if you have any silly drawing requests feel free to drop them there :D

Thanks for poking around and I’ll do my best not to forget about this blog!!

[goldenpinof]

the things i'd do to see random stats on dystopia daily videos, oof

[foxcassius]

wait also my tags on that post were about people i knew in freshman and sophomore year of college specifically. i mean some of them i knew after that and most of them i knew from high school but damn some people really made everything about themselves when i was being emotionally manipulated in my freshman year

[tsukiida]

i just scrolled through my blog and i realised i have only two modes: weird pseudo-philosophical rambling. and absolutely unhinged yelling. AND I TELL YOUUUU IT'S SO FUNNYYYYYYY because i spent so long trying to curate my voice and sound like a normal, fun, easy to approach person back when i first made this blog!

then again it's been 3.5 years so i guess my voice changed naturally 🤨 i'm not smart enough for this 😮‍💨

[relto]

WELP i finally got the damn range copy method to work, but as i suspected it doesnt actually save range objects as-is in the array, it references the values directly from the table. so i did all this work for nothing.

[mariasont]

hi pookie! <3

i loved loved loved the recent lipgloss fic! could you write smth about perfume? like bimbo! reader smells sweet asf and all of a sudden reid (or hotch) comes into the office smelling suspiciously sweet

tytyty!! <333

Suspiciously Sweet - S.R

a/n: hiiiiiii pookie!!!!!!! thank u so much for requesting i loved this lololol

masterlist

pairings: spencer reid x bimbo!receptionist!reader

warnings: fluffiest fluff, established relationship, spencer's relationship almost being exposed, hotch saving his ass, hotch hinting to having a secret girlfriend (aka my girl bimbo!assistant)

wc: 1.3k

You had a very distinct scent. This wasn't a bad thing, no, far from it. It was sweet and intoxicating, it reminded him of ripe peaches in the height of summer and cherries soaked in syrup, with a hint of something citrusy that reminded him of lazy afternoons in the sun. Was that too poetic? Spencer wasn't sure.

He noticed it everywhere. In the office, where it announced your arrival before you said a word. He noticed it at home. His pillows, his sheets, even the collar of the sweater you'd borrowed once—it was all steeped in the same honeyed scent that lingered after you left his bed, as if you were something he couldn't wash away—not that he wanted to.

This was why Spencer had started sleeping in on weekends when you stayed over. It wasn't laziness—not exactly—but how could he resist staying wrapped up in the thing that reminded him most of you?

Especially on those mornings when you were still half-asleep and clingy, burrowing into him with sleepy little hums, like you were trying to fuse yourselves together, and somehow, it worked. Your scent didn't just stick to his things, it stuck to him, sinking into his skin and leaving him a little dazed by the time you finally rolled out of bed.

Sure, he could rationalize it with some scientific explanation about heat transfer, molecules, or something equally clinical. But science (and he hated to admit this) didn’t account for how it made him feel.

Unfortunately, those feelings, didn't do him any good when one of those slow mornings he was becoming so fond of turned into an emergency call from Hotch about a case.

Now, he found himself here, hunched over the impossibly small sink in the jet's cramped bathroom, scrubbing his hands raw for what felt like fortieth time today. The scent wouldn't budge. It was as though it had soaked into his skin. He knew it was his fault—he couldn't seem to stop his hands from roaming across every inch of your body morning.

It wasn't that he minded smelling like you, but focusing on case details and running probability algorithms became infinitely harder when every breath reminded him of how tightly you had wrapped yourself around him just hours before.

He let out a bated breath, shutting off the sink before pushing his way into the main cabin of the jet. He found his way to his favorite seat, third back on the left side, which happened to be located far enough from the engines to minimize auditory distractions.

Morgan looked up, sniffing once as Spencer slid by. "Man, I don't know what it is, but something smells good in here."

Spencer tensed, his stomach dropping. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and he fought the urge to whip around. Surely it wasn't that strong. It couldn't be.

Rossi glanced up from his crossword, brows furrowing.

“Huh. I was thinking the same thing. It’s faint, but it’s nice. Like fruit or… maybe something floral?” Rossi’s nose wrinkled as he added, “Certainly an improvement over Morgan’s cologne.”

Spencer ducked his head so fast it could've looked like a nod, his cheeks burning as he avoided everyone's gaze.

JJ came out of the coffee area moments later, glancing at the case file in her hand as she passed him. She stopped abruptly, sniffed the air, then frowned.

"Wow, Spence, you smell really good. Did you finally cave and buy cologne?"

Spencer blinked up at her, every ounce of blood in his body rushing to his face.

"Uh, no," he said flatly, trying to mask the embarrassment. "I suppose I woke up smelling like this."

Technically not a lie.

He was acutely aware of everyone's eyes on him. Emily tilted her head, brow furrowing before a wide grin spread across her face. Not a good sign, he concluded.

"Wait a second," she said, pointing at Spencer. "That smells exactly like outside of Cruz's office. I pass it all the time."

Spencer cleared his throat, his fingers tightening around the armrests as his mind scrambled for an explanation—any explanation—to divert their growing attention. He could practically feel the walls closing in on him. He was doomed. This was it.

Spencer’s pulse was thundering in his ears, his face still flushed, when Hotch finally set down his pen.

For a second, Spencer braced himself for the worst, the horrifying moment when even Hotch would add to his scrutiny.

"That smell? It's the same hand sanitizer Cruz keeps in his office. He offered it to me after a meeting—probably the same stuff Spencer borrowed when he spilled his coffee this morning."

Spencer looked to Hotch, mouth opening and closing before nodding as if in agreement. "Yeah, that's... probably it."

The rest of the ride passed, to Spencer’s immense relief, without further incident. Morgan gave him a few odd looks now and then, but Spencer was too preoccupied, his thoughts spinning as he tried to figure out why Hotch had saved his ass.

When the last of the team finally stepped off the plane, Spencer hung back, letting the others pass. Hotch did too, falling in step beside him. His pace was slower than usual, his gaze fixed forward, but when he spoke, his voice was loud enough for Spencer to hear.

"Word of advice, Reid—next time, carry mints and a travel sized bottle of something unscented. You'd be surprised how much that helps."

Spencer’s head whipped around, his face going a deep shade of red. Hotch, meanwhile, kept walking, his expression completely neutral, as though he hadn’t said anything at all.

—

"He said what?"

You were laughing uncontrollably, the kind of laugh that made your shoulders shake and left you gasping for air, your hands grabbing him for balance. Rollers filled your hair—a ritual you'd patiently explained to him before—and loose wisps curled around your face. And your smile, well, he was perfectly certain it was the prettiest he'd ever seen you.

"Yup," Spencer confirmed, a small smirk tugging at his lips.

You froze mid-giggle, eyes narrowing.

"Wait, wait, wait—how does he know that? Is Hotch speaking from experience or something?" You blinked, then gasped dramatically. "Oh my gosh, what if Hotch has, like, a secret girlfriend? What if it's someone at the BAU? What if it's Garcia?"

"It's not Garcia, and it's definitely not a secret." Spencer raised an eyebrow, glancing at you as if the answer was obvious. "Hotch has been dating his assistant for years. He thinks it's some big secret, but it's... not. He picks her up lunch at least twice a week, and his closed-door meetings with her? Not as inconspicuous as he thinks."

You gasped, practically bouncing in place as you grabbed Spencer's sleeve. "Shut up! I didn't know that! I love her clothes. Do you think she'd tell me where she shops? That red skirt she wore the other day was everything."

“You don’t need any more skirts,” Spencer said, his fingers finding the sensitive spot between your hip and ribs, pinching just enough to make you squirm on the countertop. “If your closet gets any fuller, you’re going to have to rent out a second apartment just for storage.”

You giggled, tightening your legs around him and clinging to him like a koala, your arms looped snugly around his neck.

"That's why I have your apartment," you said, sticking out your tongue. "Plenty of space for my skirts, and you get to see me model them. Win-win."

"When you put in like that, it's kind of hard to say no."

He leaned in as he spoke, his lips brushing against yours softly at first, teasing and testing, like a flicker of fire before it catches. You giggled into the kiss, your laughter blending into his smile. The kiss deepened, honey-slow and sweet, golden warmth spreading through his chest as you pressed closer, closing every last bit of distance between you.

When you pulled back, his lips still tingling, you grinned. "Wow, you really do smell like me."

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[weirdmageddon]

i was thinking about this since i posted earlier about us needing to address the trend of gen z men being pulled into alt-right pipelines might have contributed to the outcome of this election.

i think contrapoints is really smart, and from what i’ve seen, has been way more effective at getting people out of harmful ideological pipelines than i’ve seen from the majority of leftists online who instead berate and drive a greater wedge of antipathy (though i understand why! and it can be very hard to have empathy for the people who see you as a threat). that antipathy makes the right more radicalized because they don’t feel like they can talk about anything without the “crazy lefties” who won’t even engage with them. where did these issues come from?

what i’ve noticed, and i’m even guilty of this, is that people don’t interact with groups of people whom they refuse talk to, which makes realities more hypothetical in the minds of their opponent since they aren’t open to seeing reality from their perspective. this is true on both sides. from what i’ve observed, it seems to originate from hypothetical perception of the opponent, but when people treat those perceptions as though they are real, it becomes real with their actions, which then makes the antipathy justified to someone. again, on both sides.

what makes contrapoints so successful at breaking this down is that is that she creates these socratic dialogue skits that represent real people and ideologies, has a sense of humor, isn’t afraid to discuss these things, reframes how we see these things by introducing nuance to both sides. she’s a leftist, but she also knows how to engage without ripening division, of meeting someone halfway and being completely humble about it. she is able to soften extremes.

she is able to get into the mind of people who aren’t aligned with her views, understand the nuance and rationales from a realistic perspective, breaking down a big block of “this is all bad” into “ok, some of this makes sense…”, what this does is create a space for self-reflection that doesn’t feel ham-fisted (which could otherwise cause people to double down on their beliefs instead of opening up to other perspectives outside of their bubble). while also being entertaining and well-produced on top of it.

what she is doing is creating these scenarios and socratic discussions that SHOULD be happening in real life but aren’t in this polarized social climate.

i graduated from new college of florida this spring, the small liberal arts college that was in headlines across the country for ron desantis’s board of trustees hostile takeover and exodus of professors.

new students and student athletes from conservative walks of life were being basically incentivized to go there who were taught to fear the lgbt boogeyman growing up in their conservative communities. but once they actually interacted with lgbt students there, many of them they felt like they understood them, and they weren’t as bad as they were told they would be. new college of florida was also famous for getting derek black (child of the man who created stormfront, and godchild of the kkk grand wizard david duke) out of white nationalism. their peers at NCF called them out but also interacted with them, invited them to dinner. black wrote a book about it.

now of course some people are too far gone and you shouldn’t waste your time with them, like derek’s family for example. but i also think a lot of people who voted for trump are not informed, are operating off of emotion and knee-jerk mentality because it’s easier than thinking, and they are not seeing the discussions that need to be had to change their mind because fuckin…nobody is doing them.

and we feel this visceral disgust to people of the opposing party because of its associations. i just want to know how it happened and how we got to be like this. i think social media is partly to blame and also the algorithms that take people down dangerous pipelines and sharpen them, insulate them.

i myself understand the vitriol you might have for anyone that voted for trump. i feel so disappointed that half the people of this country voted against our collective benefit. and i’ve seen a lot of sentiment from the left today saying “every single person who voted for trump is dead to me. i disowned you”.

you can see the reality of trump’s demagoguery, and it’s so obvious, but what i want to know is: what do they see? why did they vote for him? emotion and entertainment travel faster and have more reach than reason. and it’s that’s why i think contrapoints’s videos are exemplary at tackling this ideological divide. this is something i’ve been thinking about for months before today and i thought now was a better time than ever to give my two cents on it.

[pomefioredove]

Hai hai! I wanted to request HCs for Riddle, Ace, Cater, Leona, Jamil, Azul, Floyd, Jade, Vil, and Malleus (apologies, that's a lot of characters-) with a reader that is normally awkward/easy to fluster but will randomly do or say something really bold. If that's already been done then please ignore!

Hope you have a nice day! Or night! Or secret third thing???? :3

I think this is rather similar to this, but I haven't done some of these characters with this prompt so I'll just write them here :)

*ੈ✩‧₊˚ the boys do a flirt (part 2)

type of post: headcanons characters: ace, cater, floyd, jade additional info: romantic, reader is gender neutral, reader is yuu

we all know that Ace prides himself on his flirting skills

what can he say?

seeing you get all shy and giggly is a huge ego boost for him

he can't help himself!

even his corniest lines get a reaction out of you, it's too easy

(and giving Deuce secondhand embarrassment is a big bonus)

he starts to think that maybe he's overdone it when you start using his own lines against him

it catches him by surprise every time

and he can't even play it cool!

but, he'll admit, he's... kinda into it

turns out the taste of his own medicine is pretty sweet

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

not unlike Ace, Cater just really likes getting a reaction out of you

for one, it's good for his self-esteem

for another, you're the cutest thing he's even seen

and, finally, he knows just how to press your buttons

even his brain works on an algorithm

he figures out what you react to the most, and then uses that until you're reduced to a flustered mess

rinse and repeat

and when you start giving back the same energy, he's...

well, surprised, but also...

damn...

what's a friendship without a little tension that makes everyone else in the room uncomfortable, anyway?

^ Riddle hates you both

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

I had to think about how Floyd would flirt for longer than I'd like to admit

like... he bites people, right? we agree that he bites?

generally just annoying on purpose

closing books while you're reading them, stealing your things (and then pretending he doesn't have them), holding your things above his head where you can't reach...

anything to get you all riled up

it's adorable!

he's more used to being yelled at than flirted back with, though

this is much better, in his opinion

let's hope you're more clever than he is, though

he adapts fast

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

flirting with Jade means a lot of subtle comments and subdued looks

let's hope you're good at reading subtext...

you're going to need all the help you can get with this one

one careless glance in your direction could be him checking you out, and you'd never know

being, perhaps, the most subtle of flirts in this post, your boldness almost makes him blush

it's as if you're not even afraid of him

how... interesting

if you hadn't caught his full attention before, you surely have now

[luetta]

i saw someone joke about robot girls as an example of kinks that are just impossible to ever be made reality, like they're completely in the land of fiction. but ... that is just not true!

you can set the mood in your room. turn off the lights but put on some little coloured purple and blue blinkers. sit her down on the edge of your bed and sit down behind her. let her eyes flutter closed since there's no reason to keep them upon in this dark, safe room. softly coo into her ears, she's been such a good robot day! doing so many tasks so efficiently! making everyone around her so happy. but, silly her, she overdid it. so you're just going to have to do a tiny bit of repair work. "will that be okay, dear?" of course it will be. she trusts you completely. you're her admin. you created her. of course she has a safeguard preventing just anyone from powering her down, but she lets you override that with no resistance. such a good girl.

press your finger into the back of her neck, and then drag it down her spine. as she powers down, glide her limp body softly onto the bed. put her feet up so she's lying down completely now. maybe hold her limbs up a bit and let them drop. yep, she's powered down now. she's not unconscious, just mental faculties are capped at 10% and body autonomy is disabled. all you have to do now is find where she's sustained some damage. trace your fingers all along her chassis, poking in with a "screwdriver" to take her outer layer off and examine the wires and joints. hmmm... oil is a bit thin. these wires are too close together, could cause sparking and overheating. goodness, your fan is dusty. you've been working so hard, haven't you? gently turn her over onto her stomach now. it's time to investigate her processing unit, her software.

make sure her arms aren't stuck underneath her. once she's all comfy, you can unscrew her entire back panel. make sure to trace your fingers all around her back and spine as you do, robot girls love that shit. the soft human touch is heavenly to a machine of metal and electricity. and such a well designed chassis too, so beautiful. but off it comes, what's underneath is even prettier! oh, even now, it's still hot to the touch. you've been thinking so much today ... you don't need to think anymore though. just let me explore you. read out her event log for the day. algorithmic neural plasticity score. joint lubricant levels. corrupted data percentage. things like that. they're like scores to her. praise her if she's gotten good ones, tease her if she's gotten bad ones.

i could write so much more and maybe i will...like roleplaying injecting a virus into her neck or chest, and feeling the code flow all down her body...your cock can even be the usb!

also, at some point lay your whole body weight onto them - arms over her arms and legs over her legs. to calibrate pressure sensors or something. bc lets face it if she's a robot girl then she is 100% a neurodivergent cutie who'd love that sm <3

[cheriecoke]

˚₊‧꒰ა cold embrace (provenance) — fyodor dostoevsky

𝓈𝓊𝓂𝓂𝒶𝓇𝓎. you buy a two hundred year old house with a two hundred year old painting hanging above the mantel. it's not the only thing the previous owner left behind.

𝒸𝑜𝓃𝓉𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓈. ghost!fyodor, f!reader, violence, angst, death, alternate / modern universe, no smut but it is suggestive, fyodor is kind of a pervy ghost so, wc: 6.1k

𝓃𝑜𝓉𝑒𝓈. this one has two titles bc it was supposed to be for my kinktober... never finished it. embarrassing ! but here is a semi-revamped version for this series! i can finally check it off my wips page <3 idk how i feel about it but i hope you enjoy

part of my summerween series !

A chime from the grandfather clock brings Fyodor out of his stupor, the sound signaling another day, another meaningless hour that will only continue his eternal misery. He’s grown used to it now—evening after evening of emptiness, of reading nothing but the same books, playing the same pieces of dull sheet music, and the lifeless chess matches against himself. The house is cold with only his presence, dusty without a housekeeper and a life to make it a home.

There are a million things in Fyodor’s life that he must have done to deserve this misery, but he can’t pinpoint which one solidified his reward of a lamentable, endless cycle.

He’s certain hell is better than this. It’s something he wishes for every day, if only to have an eternal companion with the devil, a challenge to overcome.

Though, even with this boredom, Fyodor refuses to let anyone live in his home. They’ll only serve to be another pain, something that would, surely, push him past the brink of sanity.

The centuries old décor will get replaced with gaudy twenty-first century items, ones that will be nothing more than an eyesore. There are a few already scattered around his home from previous tenants, but only things that he believed useful enough for him to keep; a few books from authors he didn’t live to read, a television from the nineties, a computer that he watched one couple scroll on before he murdered them in cold blood.

Perhaps he is two hundred years dead and gone, but he refuses to be an ignorant ghost, one that is unaware of anything beyond these four walls, caught forever in the past.

Although now, it’s been a while since anyone’s tried to move in, and he’s certain the only reason the house hasn’t been torn down is because its preserved nicely, an eighteenth-century home that has withstood the test of time.

Fyodor, in his lowest moments, wishes they would tear it down. Maybe then, and only then, can he be set free. Or maybe, he’s forever trapped in this exhaustive lot, doomed to decay, even when there’s nothing left of the foundations but soil.

He pushes a pawn forward on the board, putting himself in checkmate for the millionth time in a row. It’s been so long that he’s used to his own tricks. Even the computer, which he’d come to understand quickly, is no match for him. It’s far too exhaustive to play against a machine that utilizes an algorithm he can so easily decipher.

Out of nowhere, the front door unlocks, and Fyodor glances over at the sound, dark hair falling over his eyes. Seconds later, he notices an older realtor with a clipboard leading you around, a woman he’s never seen, dressed up nicely with a darker shade of lipstick smeared across your mouth.

He’s been through this before. It’s a miracle the realtor hasn’t given up on this house yet, a mansion she is determined to sell despite the endless horrors that have been committed by his hand.

“Here it is,” she says, nervous, gesturing around the expansive hall, the crystal chandelier and staircase that immediately follows. “It was built in 1731, but one of the owners remolded it in the style of the mid-nineteenth century. The structure has been stabilized; it’s safe… enough.”

The two of you chat, but he doesn’t bother to listen in. It’s all questions of: when can I move in? can we negotiate? — things you will come to regret once he sets his sights on killing you.

Then, the realtor is sighing, wringing her hands together as she watches you spin around the house in awe. It’s clear that you’re impressed by the layout, the rich furniture and colors that have been used.

That, at least, satisfies Fyodor. Everyone else who has moved in was looking to upgrade it to a modern style, rid the place of its aged grace and charm.

“I’m truly sorry,” she says, brushing curly hair away from her cheekbones. “But I am legally obligated to tell you that every person who has lived here before has suffered a terrible, terrible fate. There have been gruesome murders that cannot be explained, done in ways that I don’t even want to tell you about.”

You laugh, eyeing her with skepticism. “Are you telling me it’s haunted?”

The realtor shrugs. “That’s what people say.”

“I don’t believe in ghosts,” you answer, and Fyodor rolls his eyes, scoffing as he floats to the second floor, unable to listen into the unreasonable conversation anymore. It’s been the same story for decades. No one believes in ghosts, but it is always a ghost that kills them.

He returns to the chess board, irritated, though unable to consider the game any further. Your face is stuck in his mind. For some reason, he can’t remember the last time he’s ever seen anyone with such beauty.

Fyodor stops; your ageless elegance doesn’t matter—it can’t, and it won’t. You’ll be dead by the end of the month, when you gather all your things and invade the bedroom that was once his own. Even if you are beautiful, you are a nuisance, a threat to Fyodor’s eternal torment and quiet existence.

Still, he can’t help but wonder if it would be nice to have something other than his own thoughts to distract him from the endless misery.

You move in on the thirteenth of June, nothing more than a few boxes and a decade old car to keep you company. He guesses you’ve traveled a long distance to get here, and you’ve gotten rid of half of your life in the process.

A good thing for him. That means things can be over relatively quickly, and all your belongings can be disposed of easily after he kills you.

You spend the entire first day unpacking, and Fyodor waits patiently, allows you time to get comfortable in his home. He watches as you bring a stack of thick novels into the waiting room, which once boasted large parties, and place them on a shelf below those that have his name within the covers.

You take a few calls as you hang up your autumn coats, ones that won’t be needed for a few months. The voice on the other line sounds frantic, worried. A local, most likely. You only seem annoyed by his continuous string of anxieties.

When the sun sets, and you grow tired, you rub your eyes and head to bed. The first night you will spend in this place that Fyodor likens to Hell.

It’s the time he’s been waiting for—a moment to catch you off guard. You are so unsuspecting, already so at home in the mansion, that you have no fear of anything hurting you in the middle of the night.

While you get ready for bed, Fyodor slips into your room, observing the pieces of your life that have conquered his bedroom. A soft classical piece plays from your phone, one that he recognizes from his mortal life. Clearly, you are fascinated by the period he once lived in. A shame, really, he won’t be able to tell you more about it.

You leave the bathroom, come back towards him to change into a pair of small shorts, a large shirt hanging over your frame.

He’s forgotten how long it’s been since he’s seen a woman, how long since he’s touched one.

Fyodor finds himself distracted by your body, the smoothness of your skin. His eyes travel over your legs, your hips, the fullness of your breasts and ignores how much he desires to let his thumb graze over your flesh. There is something so soft about you, so gentle and innocent.

Perhaps, that is where his fascination stems from: he has always been the opposite. Even in his human existence, Fyodor was not a kind man, and he doesn’t plan on becoming one now that he is dead.

He shakes away the vision, the thoughts that swirl within his mind. It has been far too long since he has experienced any sort of pleasure, and maybe even a man as cold as himself is not immune to the desires that course within his veins.

Though he tries to be. He ignores his arousal desperately in exchange for a renewed bloodlust.

You climb into bed, put your phone on the white cord, and shut your eyes. Thirty minutes later, you’re sleeping soundly, soft puffs of air leaving your lips as you sleep.

It’s the opportune moment. The silver knife gleams brightly in his hand, streaks of moonlight tracing over the slanted point. It’s the same blade he’s killed every other new tenant with, their screams still echo in the halls like a harmonious melody each time he bring the knife down on another unknowing victim.

He stands before you at the side of the bed, watches as your chest rises and falls, the evidence of your life undeniable. You are a lovely image like this, something to be painted and adored; more beautiful than many of the women he’d met in his time, even those who were of the finest elite in the country.

Fyodor presses the blade to your throat, contemplative. He considers how much lovelier you will look with the scarlet stain of blood seeping down your neck, spraying across the room and ruining the fresh sheets. Will you awaken, gasping as you claw at your throat, or will you drift away without even understanding what has become of you?

He pictures it, and digs the blade close to your throat, nothing more than a pinprick of blood flowering there.

You don’t awaken; but you a little sound leaves you, something between a gasp and a moan, and you shift away from the knife gripped between his pale fingers. It’s a sound that has him pausing, musing, as he regards your vulnerable state, a beautiful figure there with no clue that such a murderous man is also a resident in her home.

You make another one of those pretty noises in your throat, and Fyodor, against two centuries of murderous intent, pulls the knife away. He watches as you roll on your stomach, your shirt scrunching, moving up your body to reveal the undersides of your breasts. Your hand shifts towards him on the bed, reaching in his direction, before you still. Then, your breathing is back to normal, evened out completely.

Your lips part blissfully as you sigh in your sleep.

He can’t stop looking at you, can’t stop wondering what his name would sound like leaving the perfect swell of your mouth, if you’d sound just as pretty when you orgasm as you do when you’re asleep.

Surely, he can find a better use for you—it would be a shame for such a pretty thing to go out so early.

As he draws back, Fyodor notices the chess board on the side table, the pieces arranged nicely, each on the correct square. He can’t tell if you play. You could just have it for decoration, or perhaps it was a gift given to you from a lover that he hasn’t seen pictures of, the one that he’s certain someone as lovely as you must have.

The board is aged; not as old as the one in the drawing room, but a nice set, nonetheless. Fyodor glances back at your sleeping form once more, smiles coolly to himself, and shifts a pawn forward.

The chess piece is the first thing you notice in the morning.

It’s almost ridiculous how easily it catches your eye, a tiny little movement within the chaos that was your brand-new room. A pawn is on a different square, leering at you from the other wall, as if smiling, a flashing sign above its head, calling to you, hoping you’ll pay attention.

You almost think nothing of it; things can move, can’t they? Perhaps there was a shift in the earth overnight… Though, that makes little sense when you think about it rationally.

It’s strange, that much is certain. You remember the realtor telling you about the ghosts, and though you aren’t inclined to believe in haunted houses and scary stories, you find a part of yourself questioning the logic of the chess piece.

You are certain it was on the correct square before you slept.

It’s the only thing on your mind as you get ready, suffer through a tasteless breakfast, and throw on a rain jacket to combat the dreary weather. You’re meeting a friend for lunch—the only friend you have in this town. Sigma is the sole reason you decided to move here, instead of the other arbitrary cities that you’d been desperate to escape to.

Still, the board won’t leave your mind. You take one last glance at it before, on a whim, pushing the opposite color pawn forward as well.

Then you leave, hoping that a conversation with your friend will take your mind off the strangeness of that happenstance, the anxiety you feel about moving to a new place, a new job where no one knows you, a home that stays cold, despite the heat that reigns with long summers.

The walk to the cafe is short, but with the wind and the drizzling rain, you are miserable, your hands wrinkling from the dampness, even within your pockets.

Sigma is waiting for you, his lavender and white hair loose over his shoulders as he peruses the menu, eyes darting across it like he’s never read it before.

You sit, offer him a greeting, and though your conversation is cordial, the two of you catching up on your day, you eventually ask the question you’ve been dying to know.

“Do you believe in ghosts?”

Sigma stops, puts the utensil back down on his plate, and regards you with a thin frown. “Did something happen?”

You think of the chess piece, wonder if another will be moved when you get home. “No, but—”

“I told you not to move into that house,” he says, eyes narrowing. Sigma refuses to step into that mansion, grows anxious every time you mention it. “Over ten people have died there. Do you want to get murdered?”

“No particularly,” you say, staring at him flatly, your mouth pulling into a line. “But I’ve made it one night already. I’ll be fine.”

A hard laugh leaves him, as he shakes his head, unamused by your cheekiness. “That’s what they all say, isn’t it? Then they all die.”

“Very dramatic.” You take a long sip of your water. Sigma’s features don’t crack in the slightest as he stares at you, waiting for you to continue. “I’m not scared. I just want to know if you believe in ghosts or not… Because I don’t.”

Sigma’s eyes flit across your face, searching for any hint of a lie, for any signs of fear. When he finds none, his hands stretch across the table, lacing them together as he glares. “Whether you believe in ghosts or not doesn’t matter. There’s something evil about that house, and you’re putting yourself in danger by living there.”

The conversation with Sigma weighs on your mind for hours after, when you return home, still thinking about the chess board. It was just as you’d left it, two pawns moved forward, staring each other down menacingly. Nothing out of the ordinary.

You sigh and finally put it out of your mind. It was just a coincidence, that’s all. The piece was probably on the wrong square all along, and you’d been too tired last night to notice it.

Instead, you focus your sights on unpacking, and contemplate what to do with the portrait hanging above the mantel.

It’s a dusty old thing, one that the previous owners had, for some reason, never taken down. It had hung over the mantel for centuries, the corners faded from the sun, but the sinister grin of the subject never losing its effect.

You tilt your head, stare at it from a different angle. Looking at it that way, you could, perhaps, see why the painting appealed to them. It’s old, with a style from a different century, and the man composed of deep shadows and pale colors is undeniably handsome. He seems out of place in the portrait, trapped there, too otherworldly to be captured on such a canvas. His features are sharp, molded out of something tougher than diamonds, something more beautiful than this plane is able to comprehend. His deep eyes seem to know all as they stare at you, trace you across the room.

For minutes, you are hypnotized, before a wave of disgust washes over you, and you turn away, unable to look at it any longer. You’ll sell it, you decide. Maybe it will be worth a pretty penny.

That evening, you decide to look into it, but the search into a local art dealer doesn’t get far. When you sit down at your laptop, beginning to type your question into the browser, the lid shuts on your fingertips.

It takes a moment for you to register what had happened. A faint sting dances along the back of your hands, your knuckles tender as you lift the lid back up. Lines bounce along the screen, as if the imprint of your hand had made its way into the pixels, matching the pulse of your nerves.

You curse lowly, hoping that a reset will fix the issue.

The lid had just fallen, nothing serious. It was a newer model, but those things could happen. Issues with the manufacturing, with the way it was assembled. Technology fails you all the time.

You hold the power button, irritated, and upset, when a horrible, screeching noise echoes from the computer. Nothing but a shrill scream, the speakers begging you for help. You slam it shut once more, and the noise stops, but your heartbeat doesn’t slow down.

Shit.

Tomorrow, you’ll have to take it in, and see if anyone can discern the issues. It’s not ideal, but there’s so many things to still need to do, and a broken laptop makes those things very difficult.

You sigh, pushing the chair back into the table. The portrait looms above you as you retreat back to your room, hands shaking. It’s irrational, you know it is, but you swear his eyes follow you all the way up the stairs.

It doesn’t take long for you to start believing in the ghost that is haunting your manor, the one who has let you live for a week and who plays a new game of chess every time your back is turned. Whoever it is, they are much better than you; so far, you’ve lost twice—haven’t even gotten close to winning.

He hides things from you, items that you are needing for the next day, papers that you can’t submit to work on time because the important files have been stashed away.

You find your books opened to paragraphs the ghost seemingly finds interesting, your sheet music scattered in a mess when you return. The candles get blown out unexpectedly, and doors slam when you’re not suspecting it.

If he’s trying to scare you—it isn’t working. You remain in the house, sometimes talking to him like he’s a friend, whispering amongst the walls that know all of the secrets in your home.

You stop at the library on your free weekend, flipping through a dusty copy of the local legends, only stopping when you find your home. There’s a copy of the painting there—your painting, the one that still hangs above your mantel, despite your better judgment.

Beside it, there’s a painting of your home, done when the house was first built. The outside of it is a differently color entirely, the garden in front blooming with pink and yellow flowers. It looks cheerful; the home of a warm and loving family, inviting and kind to each of the neighborhood children. Nothing like the dark manor it is today, with a dead garden in the front and shutters that keep even an ounce of light out.

You read the pages proceeding the painting. The first owner had been a kind man, but the next were not such. After the original owner lost his wealth, he sold the house, passed it to a line of greedy men, ones that were focused only on their money. For a century, it went on this way—until a man named Fyodor Dostoevsky purchased the home for twice as much as it once was.

He was the one who changed it, renovated it, upgraded it to his own personal style, ensuring that it fit in with the times and his own opinions of luxury. Fyodor was charming, but ruthless, deadly with his own intelligence, owning half the town as they lost their money to his schemes.

Fyodor’s rein came to an end when he was poisoned by his closest friend, perhaps the one man he had trusted. It was the first murder in a string of ones to follow within the house.

You close the book, unsure if you regret the knowledge you’d gained or not.

The house feels colder now that you know the history of it. As if you can see the cruelty etched into every wall. Colors of the home bleed into each other, a pastel yellow of warmth and light, and the next room empty, almost uninhabitable, with its royal purples.

You stare at the portrait as you make dinner, feeling like you can never escape the gaze of those oil painted eyes. He has a name now—Fyodor. It feels even more disarming now that you know more about him than he’ll ever know about you.

And though Fyodor watches you, every night, from every angle, you convince yourself it’s just the way that the painting is situated. It would be foolish to think that he’s really watching every move you make, irises pinned on your form, unblinking.

The oven heats up behind you as you cut up your food, humming a soft tune to yourself. It’s getting hotter outside – you’d almost forgotten how miserable the summers could be. You forget every year, even though you’ve lived many.

Just as you’re getting lost in your thoughts, going through a list of things that need to get done in your fixer-upper home, you hear a scratch behind you.

It’s a quick sound, so quick that you almost think it was only your imagination. It’s enough to give you pause, your humming fading out into the night as your eyes dart around your house. Although you’ve tried not to let urban legends get the best of you, you’re paranoid in this aged mansion now.

A few seconds pass. You listen to the sound of your own heartrate, feel it pounding in your chest as you will it to calm down. It’s just enough time for you to convince yourself that it was nothing, that you’re far too nervous about silly ghosts to think rationally.

Though as you turn, a knife flies from the counter, just grazing your cheek, but enough to cause a scratch to open up against the skin. Your finger draws away scarlet as you press it to the wound, staring at the painted crevices of your fingertip.

You can’t move. Despite every cell in your body begging, screaming at you to move, you’re frozen, trapped in the four walls of that kitchen as you stare at your bloodied hand.

It’s all a dream, you repeat to yourself. A dream.

One that you don’t wake up from.

Time passes strangely, when every muscle in your body is on edge, your head pounding from the anxiety that spikes throughout your nervous system. A bead of sweat drips from your temple, and though you aren’t sure how long you stand there, nothing else happens. The knife remains lodged in the wall behind you, and the ghost makes no other attempt to lodge one into your stomach.

It’s quiet. There’s no noise, save for the music that plays softly from your phone.

After you regain control of your racing heartrate, you realize that the song playing isn’t what you’d put on originally. It had switched to a gentle, classical piece. Tchaikovsky, you think… or something similar. Something that a man from a different era would be familiar with.

“Who’s there?” You find yourself saying, perhaps stupidly. “What do you want?”

There’s no response – of course there isn’t. You’re talking to the air. To a ghost. No one had gotten inside the house. You’d checked more than enough times, just as you always did.

“I live here now,” you offer, thinking that, perhaps anger is not the best course of action. Neither is fear, though, if the scary movies you’d watched as a teenager had been any indication. “But I’ll leave, if you want me to.”

There’s no answer to that either.

You sigh, and deflate once more, trying to make yourself believe that there was a logical explanation to knives flying and playlists changing. Just as you’d made yourself believe that everything the “ghost” had done before was just a game, innocently played.

Perhaps, there was never a ghost at all. It could be that stress is driving you to insanity.

With a glass of wine in your hand, you finish up dinner, feeling like you are at your wit’s end. How is it that only a few weeks in this house has already singed your mind, turned you into a believer of things that you are not?

The portrait feels like an omen, staring at you with violet eyes, as you wonder where Fyodor is now. Does he watch you when your home, cooking, as you shower, a vicious gaze tracing over each curve of your body, with a sickening thought of all the things he wishes to do to you?

You shiver. It’ s been a while since anyone’s looked at you with a hint of desire. The feeling has become foreign, now, but you can still recall the gratification that comes with being wanted, how it makes you feel, if only for a moment, comfortable in your own skin.

That thought alone quickly snaps you out of your irrational behavior. Thinking of a ghost wanting you? A man that had been buried in the earth for so long that his body would be nothing more than bones?

This house was making you sick, you concluded, wrapping your leftovers up in plastic and tinfoil, placing them in the fridge. Your nervous friend was right – you never should’ve moved into this house, and you never should have stayed this long.

Your hands shook along the banister, heart racing around every corner. You expected that, maybe, you would see a dark-haired spirit there, his body translucent, but still corporeal. Though, there was no spirit hiding within the depths of the shadows, lurking in the places where he still belonged. No sounds startled you, caused you to jump as you brushed your teeth, completed the one last routine of your day.

The bed was colder than usual as you climbed into it, like a flush of a cold spot had settled within the sheets. You remembered what they said about temperatures and ghosts—how they changed, nothing able to survive in the places that they haunted, as they were not of this world, but something in between, something unnatural.

Your lamp flickers as you turn it on, and it’s just one more red flag you choose to ignore. In houses as old as this one, there are issues like that. The wiring is faulty, the electric needs to be monitored, a laundry list of items you will probably never resolve.

There are a thousand rational conclusions, though, and only one irrational one, which puts your mind at ease. Things like flickering lamps and cold spots can be explained simply, even if knives flying at your face cannot.

Still, you settle into bed, deciding that you will talk to the realtor again soon. You’ll move in with Sigma if he’ll have you. Anything to put your mind at ease for good.

That night, you dream of Fyodor, as if he is there right in the room with you, looming above you with those deep, violent eyes. His fingers, long and pale, trace across your cheekbones, as your eyes flutter open, consciousness coming back to you.

He says your name – it’s no surprise he knows it, after living with you for so long. It’s spoken softly, with a hint of possession behind it, like you belong to him. And yet, you’ve never said a word to him, even if all this time, he’s gotten to know you better than anyone else ever has.

You expect a scream to leave your throat, some hint of surprise, of fear, even, to see a stranger in your bedroom. To see him watching you with those familiar eyes, hair falling over his pale forehead as he gazes down at you from the edge of the bed.

No sound emerges.

Your mind feels a little fuzzy, hazy at the edges as you blink at him, closer to a state of intoxication, than you are alertness. Despite that awareness, you can’t seem to snap out of it; maybe you don’t want to. Instead, you sink deeper into the warmth, the honeyed feeling that comes with turning off your rationality. Everything feels as if it’s coming through in blurred, rosy glasses.

“Fyodor,” you mouth, instead of the scream that you’d anticipated, his name coming out in two wistful syllables.

You should hate him – there’s something in your instincts pushing back at you. A flash of a knife, the days of chaos and uncertainty, where you were sure you were losing your mind, come back at you.

But none of that seems to matter now, as you trace your finger across his cheek, feeling the sharp indent below the high bone. His eyelashes are a shade lighter than his hair, soft as they flutter over his forehead. The portrait of him didn’t do him justice… or perhaps, it is in death that he has found his purest form.

“I’m too tired.”

You’re not sure where those words even come from. Calm, like this is nothing but routine, and waking up with Fyodor beside you is the closest thing to normalcy.

He smiles at you, leaning over you again on the bed, lips pulled tightly together in a morbid grin. It does little to sour your mood, to scare you into action, even if you can’t quite understand why.

“I know,” he replies.

It’s the first time you’ve heard him speak, a deep, accented sound smoothing against your ears as he traces his gaze against each of your features; musical, almost. His voice calms you, lulls you back into a meditative state.

You reach for him, in a trance, and twirl a strand of his hair between your finger, just to see if he’d let you. After the hell you’d been through the past week, well – was it really that miserable? He seems content to watch over you, observe the gentle movements of his dark hair coiled up around your pointer finger.

“Why are you here?” you ask, your voice softer than a whisper, carried away by the wind until it never existed at all.

Fyodor never disappears from your line of sight, even when you try to blink, to close your eyes. He’s there, gazing at you with a lustful fondness, one that’s dangerous, perhaps even malicious. If it’s a dream, it sure feels like a vivid one.

“You wanted to leave,” he says, taking your finger away from his face, before bringing it to his lips. The kiss is barely there, and his mouth is cold, chapped, from the brutality of the afterlife. “I couldn’t let you do that.”

“Hm?” You try to sit up. It takes more effort than it should’ve – you’re so relaxed, so weak, that you fall back down, letting yourself sink into the plushness of the pillow. “Why?”

Fyodor releases your hand, before touching his own finger to your mouth. It’s slender, like a piece of ice, gently parting your lips before grazing your chin, hovering over your neck. Then, he drops his touch to your collarbone. He stakes a claim on every inch of your skin, pausing as he reaches your chest, still covered by the blankets.

Your clothing is thin – it wouldn’t take much effort to get his cool hands on your bare skin. But he refrains, still smiling before answering your question, tucking his hands together onto his lap. “It’s been so long.”

It doesn’t make sense, but you can’t muster up the effort to question him, not when he’s contemplating every word, like he’s hesitant to scare you away. You let him think, watch him ponder, as you stare, too exhausted to move a muscle.

“I thought you’d be like all the rest,” he says, taking a seat next to you on the bed, nearly touching your hip. “They were nothing but filth, stains in these halls. It’s a crime for them to ever think that they belonged here. In my home.”

You blink. “It’s my home, too,” you say, suddenly filled with an immense amount of dread. It crawls up your neck, chokes you, and nothing leaves you but garbled sounds, as you panic.

Fyodor doesn’t move – there is no twitch in his features, as he watches you with disguised adoration, a kind you didn’t think a ghost capable of revealing. “Of course it is, darling,” he says, so softly, it could’ve been mistaken for kindness. Fyodor leans down, presses his cold, dead lips to your cheek, a kiss of death. “That’s why I couldn’t let you leave. It’s your home. You belong here.”

“Right,” you breath, steadying yourself, before nodding. “My home.” Once more, you gaze around the room, your eyes flicking over every surface. Things are exactly as you’d left them, nothing out of place. “With you?”

The ghost smiles, and reaches out to you, finally helping you into a seated position. Your neck is so stiff, in pain, and you roll it around, feeling nothing there when you expect shifting bones. “With me,” Fyodor confirms, running his icy fingertips across your throat, tangling them with your hair.

He leans into you, pressing a lingering kiss to your mouth, one that catches you off balance, before you accept it with an eagerness that surprises you further. It doesn’t feel unfamiliar, instead, it’s as if you’re coming home, like the man you’ve never seen until now was always meant to find you.

A thought that should’ve scared you, even though it doesn’t.

Fyodor pulls away, right as you begin to shift forward, maneuver yourself onto his lap. “You should rest,” he replies, keeping you at a distance. “It might take some time to adjust.”

“Hm? What do you mean?” you blink, holding onto his wrist as your gaze shifts from his impossibly dark eyes to the mirror across the room.

There, in the darkness of the evening, shrouded in moonlight, you can see your reflection staring back at you, eyes vacant, lifeless. You expect to see yourself as nothing but exhausted, but when you draw your gaze across the image of yourself, there is blood seeping from your neck, a stream of scarlet. There is thick gash across your throat, slashed so deep that it would’ve killed you instantly.

The expression on your face shifts from one of calm to horror, as you scrape at your neck, trying to clear off the blood that isn’t really there, the permanent wound that will follow you even into your death.

“What did you do?” you scream, tears rolling down your cheeks, even though you can’t feel them, can only see them in the mirror. “What did you do to me?”

Fyodor smiles, eyes crinkling at the corners. Though you fight against him, he takes you into his arms, and you are too weak to fight him off. “I told you,” Fyodor says, shushing you, running his palm over your head as you scream. “I couldn’t let you leave.”

thank you for reading !

[elexuscal]

Something about the current James Somerton discourse i think is missing when people say: "Why didn't people notice he was a bigot?"

is that he was plagarizing from non-bigoted creators.

i'd watched a handful of his videos. I'd noticed a couple comments that made me raise an eyebrow, and I even wrote a post here on tumblr about how much I viscerally disagreed about his comment about "all the interesting gays died of AIDS". (though i left Somerton's name out of that at the time, wanting to take him in good faith... ugh.)

It's obvious now, in retrospect. When you take away all the things he didn't write, what you're left with is just an ugly dust pile of misogyny, Euro-centerism, transphobia, and acephobia.

But before? When you didn't realise that like 80% of what he said he'd stolen? It was masked by all "his" genuinely thoughtful commentary. If someone makes 7 insightful takes, and then one (1) bad one, you're more likely to think, "that's a mostly reasonable person who holds some things I disagree with".

I'm hardly the first to say it, but the point of Hbomberguy's video is not, "Somerton was a uniquely awful person and everyone who watched his content were idiots for not noticing".

It's:

a) the YouTube algorithm (and online algorithms in general) promote low-quality content farm content over well-researched pieces that take longer to make

b) if something a creator says seems fishy, be willing to dig into it more and double-check

c) Look out for the hallmark signs of plagiarism and corner-cutting in general, like lack of attributions or content being churned out at an unbelievably high rate.

Somerton was a charismatic guy who used his status as a gay man as a shield and took full advantage of our social brains' tendency towards parasocial relationship, while actively tricking his audience by stealing other peoples' words. Don't blame his audience for falling for it. Learn from it.