#except for the one whos in the military which is a whole different situation

[fawnpires]

EVERY MAN GETS HIS WISH — SIMON "GHOST" RILEY.

꒰ ୨୧ ꒱ synopsis: under the enemy's eye, you're required to accompany the task force's lieutenant but an unfortunate situation of enemy attack occurs; falling victim to both things, your superior and some hidden feelings.

꒰ ୨୧ ꒱ contents: sex pollen, non-consensual drug use, one-bed-trope, inappropriate relationship with a superior, oral sex (female receiving), rough sex, age gap, manhandling, pet-names, size difference, dirty talk, grinding, mild degradation, praise kink, porn with plot, loss of virginity, innocence kink.

He wasn't a saint, nor was he heroic man to be looked up to; which was baffling considering his status of customary deeds. Brave, noble, bold — all of those things checked off to be deemed as heroic, as simple as that.

Rather than a man of military, he was more of a vigilante — acting on his own accord, directing himself and the men he worked along with the mind of personal dominance. He knew he didn't fit the stereotype of a soldier; obscene mindset, crude jokes cracked, stiff posture that made him stand stall and all intimidating, and a exterior skull of a clothed balaclava. As daunting as the man was, he was just like peers — quite ill-mannered off the field, absorbed too much in himself.

But he had learnt to contain a majority of that. Solitude was more ideal than ill-mannered, and he preferred that. Often covered up with tracks of blood and brutality, his humanlike isolation made up the whole of him; swallowed him up whole. He didn't know why he enlisted for the military, or why he hadn't quit so many years into the position. Perhaps for the adrenaline rush, or to endure the experiences of war, but the utmost possibility was to make something out of the miserable man he was — sculpt a more successful alternative.

In some way, that had worked out, made him whatever a hero was supposed to be. If that had made him a hero, then be it, if it didn't, then who was he to care? It's not like he cared for his general image, what others thought of who he was; only a man of great cruelty, inhumane and cold-blooded.

A lot of that shifted with you. One of the few women recruited, reserved and utterly meek when interacting one-on-one. You're instantly caught in the range of his observations, curiosity and skepticism as the two perplexing sensations that send him over the edge. Though he's afraid, and not in a tensed sense, it's more based on his feelings; those feelings that he thought would be triggered off in him, until he has you in his sights. That's why he scarcely ever partnered up with you on missions, putting some separation there to rid of those perplex feelings compressed to himself.

Unbeknownst to both you and him, that changes by a great deal. With Price's organization of the next mission, only in need of two personnel, it's down to the coincidence of him being paired up alongside you. The one thing that he was oh-so-successfully doing so well for the couple months you've resided in the task force, but shattered to bits when approaching this unfortunate expedition — it's pressuring, wearing his nerves out — tense. (As if you weren't as equally on edge about being collaborating with your intimidating, enormous superior.)

You're close to him, practically almost rubbing arms together. The overhead sky is dull of sun and some additional clouds, reflecting off the shade of his masked face and the tactical gear he displays. Forwards on, there's nothing but fields of fading grass and a waning path. The intercoms attached to both your uniforms are radio silence; no commands, no Price on the other end except from a few minutes ago when given the straight order to push on until Ghost gives direct instruction there.

Every so often you feel his eyes on you, causing you to adjust your head in his direction only to see him facing the path in front of him; yet sometimes you catch him side-eyeing you through the holes of his mask. Anxiousness boils in the pit of your stomach with each passing second — with his close physical contact, aware of him catching tiny glimpses of you — it causes you to distance yourself from him without your own awareness.

"Careful, kid," he said, his rasped voice the only sound you've heard in the rounds of minutes, "Stay close, don't want you wandering off now."

You blink a few times in a daze at the name, sliding yourself right back next to him, uneasiness tainting the void that was slotted right between you and him. Your hold on your firearm loosens, clutching it closer to your chest, the fingers of your left hand tightening around frontier piece. The sole use of his pet name intact for you leaving you flustered and weak in the limbs.

A sigh blows past your lips. "How much further?" you ask, "Been minutes, hours."

"Almost there, right through this path." he replies swiftly, crouching before gesturing to the right, "Cut here."

He takes lead, in front, and you linger close behind. The trail is cut off, there's more open field and sky where the sky darkens; shadows drawn on the ground, sun merely in sights and lowering beyond the horizon line. Arising in the distance, a structure stands its ground; a warehouse, seemingly deserted, dim light fixtures hung side-by-side with a half opened roll-up sheet door.

In a crouched position, he kneels in the fields of dried grass, signaling for you to do the same — which you oblige with. The slinging strap of your gun digs through your tactical wear, felt into your skin, marking the flesh with the outline of it. Around the airspace is tight and claustrophobic, your chest heavy with the beat of your palpitating, head weighed with a throb and some exhilaration.

"Visual on the hideout," he presses his intercom open to Price, gloved thumb to the button and his head tilted.

Price is heard clicking his own intercom through. "All yours, Ghost, your command from there."

Ghost pauses in his movements for a second then aligns his head back in position on his neck, closing off his intercom as it goes back to the original state of radio silence. He revolves his entire body in your direction, even crouched he's still so much towering and intimidating, eyes a shade of sepia surrounded with black war-paint dying right into your bare ones. "Stay close by me, then separate once inside, then you stay on watch while I locate, understood?"

It's a different request, more distant than what you were usually accustomed to, but in this position; there was really no arguing back on this, or better yet declining.

"Affirmative." you reply, getting off the ground and maintaining a standing position, still bent on your knees to avoid possible detection. He does the same, taking lead again and scurrying out of the grass into the open expanse of the warehouse's front, taking careful measures as he leans to grab a hold of the half-opened roll-up door's handle and widening the entrance so that's their enough space to set foot in. You're sweating, pumped of adrenaline as the whole situation sends yourself into a condition of delirium and kicked of a strange thrill — rifle no longer clutched to your chest, but in a prepared-aiming stance.

A scent, between a bitterness and saccharine, stings your nose. The inside of the building reeks of it, your face hit with a handful of it, causing you to pull up the cloth of your uniform and hold it over your nose.

(Luckily for him, he sported that damned mask of a skull all the time. The one time that you've fully understood to why he would need it, even coming across a situation like this.)

Fluorescent lights in tubes buzz overhead, flickering in flashes across each of your faces, background of quietude besides the shuffles of Ghost moving in his gear and the humming of the lights. He raises his arm to gesture the previous order given, you stay put up against a wall while he proceeds further and observes the stairs, the upper level with a room; unsuspected of the flat, low contour of a light that casts through the glass panes of the space. You watch across your shoulder, moving up to the bottom of the case of stairs, detecting each of his calculated steps, prepared to act on direction.

He reaches the top platform and eyes the door — though, before he has the chance to elbow the door wide open, his suspicions of there being lifeforms present are confirmed — the solid matter of the door bursts open without warning and a clink of an object hits the ground where he stood.

Adapting the consciousness to back away from it was far too late to act on now, a blow of the now-identified smoke grenade pollutes the atmosphere around, white and clouds around more than you had expected it to. Despite having your uniform stuffed to your nose, the scent is brought back to you — that bitter, sweet-smelling one — and it throws you into an abrupt coughing fit. Some of it breaches to your eyes, leaving a whole of you to be incompetent to retaliate against the enemy; hell, you couldn't even fend it off.

There's a grit of your teeth while slump back against the stairs. You lay against your rifle that had been abandoned from the clutch of your hands, your chest abnormally heavier; as if you were lungs were filled with a burdensome matter. Through the veil of your fogged vision and the diminishing sheet of smoke, the lieutenant held more strength than you, holding himself up against the wall of the room and held the handle of his knife up into one of the perpetrators.

His strength in the moment was impressive, nearing admirable, but it wasn't enough to overturn the situation with more than one perpetrator present. About two circle him while another three take notice of your debilitated figure haunted with the beginning side effects seeping into the fissures of your body, your head.

The last few recollections were of slow footsteps approaching your comatose-like body, your breaths heavier and more echoed against the shells of your ear. That sensation in your chest sourced from the smoke was growing into more crucial, dangerous areas; the smoke's aroma intense and all that you could really smell. They're crouched and talk over your body through muffled hoods, gas-masks.

It's difficult to make out what they're saying, (In this state everything was difficult, from vision to solely breathing.) A palm rests at your forehead, frigid to the touch before it burns down to a more scorching feeling once left more on contact to your skin.

You use your last bit of brawn to grasp at an attempt to get away downwards but there's an additional grab to your legs from below. A grunt flows from your throat in a strained manner, the ramifications of the unknown dust outdoing your own control.

A palm to your forehead, acidity stench, and the rear of a shotgun to strike you to a vacant space of unconscious void.

Against your skin, there's heavy breathing, and motions of flexing arms under your lifted thighs. You find your hands balled in fists at the fabric of his tactical jacket, his jacket, Ghost. To your surprise, he had proved your accusations of his strength giving out back at the warehouse wrong — overthrowing the opponents and beating them to pulps like his usual violent self, his bloodthirsty persona which slaughters the targets he chooses. Undeniably, he was rabid. No morals, no mercy for his rivals like the truculent brute he was.

His hand supports your back, the other to your legs which had explained the flexes that continue under you. He stumbles over to a tree which provides a temporary shelter as he slants at the bark.

He isn't vulnerable, he almost never was. It was either a violent, bellicose identity or one of great endurance. Ghost was an inexplicable man. On the battlefield, he's nothing more than a weapon — a masculine personification of warfare that taunts and douses his victim in a bloodbath of gore. (Who knew if he had developed some sick satisfaction from it, years of countless executions bound to his hands.)

But now he an absolute contrasting mortal to that, possessing you in his big arms right to his chest. You almost feel safe, sort-of sheltered more than you've ever felt in your entire presence of being restricted to the Earth's grounds. You take notice of how he checks over his shoulder then sloping his head down to your laid physique. His hand moves to cradle the back of your head, lifting you slightly.

"Come on, c'mon," he whispers and buries his fingers deeper in your hair, "Stay with me, kid."

In response, your half-lidded eyes widen up a little more, hands ghosting over his forearm and leaving your fingers to brush over the sleeve. You think you hear a sound of relief, but it was complicated to say with his smothering mask dying down a mass of his words.

The collected scenery around had been ingested fully with the effects of dusk, nearing complicated to make out where you the both of you resided for the time being. All you could comprehend was that he accomplished to elude from the main origin of the danger, and had hid out nearby in this perspective of trees.

"How'd... how'd you get get away?" you ask, sitting up with his supportive hand still at your back.

"That's what years of military training does to you," he replied, panting, "Reinforced stamina, mask helped drag out some of the grenade too."

You blink slowly, bringing your middle and index finger to your face which gathers some of that bitter residue. "What is this shit, anyways?"

"Not sure, has to be some conjured batch of contraband. Never been out to be transported, personal use — that's what I say."

"Some strong stuff." you mutter.

His strength which is used to hold you up heightens when he stands from his crouched position, a grunt choked in his throat. You link your arms around his neck for more support, doe-like eyes staring right into the pit of skull and cloth.

He doesn't mind, you think.

"Saw a safe-house up there, we'll spend the night there." he states.

"What about the rest of the operation?"

"I'll get in touch with Price," he said, "Possible case scenario is the whole thing being postponed."

You can only bring yourself to nod your head; at the same time, those secondary effects of the substance flowing back into yourself, stronger. Ghost starts back up forward to where the safe-house was situated, and his motions produce perceptions of vertigo. A whimper is hushed from behind your closed lips, head pressed to his shoulder and submerging into his jacket. His own scent gives distraction from the sustained bitterness and swirling sweetness that made your head pulsate in equivalent palpitations to your rapid heartbeat.

Your limbs are brought to weakness, frail and shaky against the perimeters of your pants. Sweat sticks to you — your forehead, your skin, your clothes. The strap of your bra feels more mauled into your flesh, branding into your sultry skin. There's an unanticipated rush of heat that throbs out from between your thighs, another whimper muted from your secured lips. Right in the moment, like a natural instinct, you could't help but trail your eyes over to Ghost.

How his biceps flexed and bent underneath you, his distinctive scent stalling at your nose of gunpowder and pine. It was intoxicating, holding you in a trance complete of him; all your focus on your lieutenant. You were known to hold an admiration for him ever since recruitment, his particular set of skills and proficient demeanor that was worthy of your commendation. But now it had shrunk into nothing but merely a hidden, perverted desire that had been brought out in the faults of the anesthetizing matter. Pressing your head deeper into the cloth of his jacket, you force your legs to squeeze together — an aim to rid of the shameful sensations that were coming down at you at the same.

As you doubted it was never going to transpire, Ghost had successfully brought the two of you into the safe-house. No longer in use, abandoned and dead, the short-term sanctuary reserved for you and him only. One story, decently-sized, and ideal for hiding out from potential nearby threats.

You're supported up in his arms for an interval while he inspects the building until reaching the upstairs, in the single bedroom which had been the only one throughout the investigation. He leans downwards to allow you to stable yourself on two unsteady legs from his hold. You stagger over to the solitary mattress and sit on the edge of it, two hands resting on the edge, fingers compressing into the foam. By now, the effects the substance took on your body had evolved into a level of unbearable.

Sweat drapes over your body in a fitted sheet, that vertigo subsiding into a lower degree but adjoining to the intense pulsing of your cunt that you've managed to handle for a while now. You slap a palm to your forehead, down your face, examining the extreme sweat that stains the skin there. Ghost sits at the foot of the bed, close to you, and begins to strip of his vest and his jacket.

"Get some rest, you'll need it in the morning." he advises towards you, proceeding to strip of the rest of his heavy gear.

"Was there not another bedroom?" you ask.

"Just this one," he said, "Why? You ashamed of sleeping with a superior or somethin'?"

Sleeping. To your current perverted head, you take it a more immoral way, heat rushing to your face at the thought.

"No, no, I just... thought you needed more privacy. Wanted to have some alone time, you know?"

He glances to you. "If you're uncomfortable, I can just sleep on the floor, kid — nothin' personal."

"It's fine, Ghost, seriously." you said.

His stare drifts on you for a little while longer before shifting away, bending his upper half into the pocket of his tactical jacket for a lighter version of his balaclava; one that wasn't supported with the hard shell of a skull at the front, but printed with a the design of the skull instead. His eyes were more visible this way, tar-like paint on pale skin around the browned irises. You shyly strip of your own vest and jacket, leaving you in a black tank top and tactical pants. The only light that had really illuminated the room was the tranquilizing beam of the moonlight through the pane of the window, white and glowy.

You slump fully onto the bed and sink into the soften material of a pillow. Your resting position distributes some heaven from the tormenting sensitivity that throbs like hell through your pants. The space on the mattress from behind you droops with his weight, a breathy sigh leaving his lips as he settles close to you; the closest you've ever been with him, almost intimate.

After a slight period of time, he's knocked out in a slumber — but you're left awake, a hand now between your legs as the pulsing is at its height; panties drenched and your heartbeat thumping out of the cage of your chest. You gaze over your shoulder at him where he lays closer facing you, his eyes visibly slit shut with the gleam of the moonlight. He adjusts himself and moves in closer to you in his sleep, towering figure nearly pressed up at you. The adjustment leaves you flustered, shock.

Without hesitations, you remove your hand that nestled from the space of your thighs and slipped through the waistband of your pants; stripping of your pants, gliding into your panties and fingertips feeling the soaked fabric of it before trailing further, rubbing slightly against your cunt. Your back arches and you muffle a whine into your pillow, heartbeat sounding at your ears in impossible volumes. Shame was no longer present, libido taking authority over your body and leading you to do such perverted things while thinking of your superior — who was sleeping away right next to you.

In this sort of mindset you can barely grab control of yourself anymore and find yourself stumbling backwards into Ghost, your free hand over your mouth as you feel the area of his crotch press up against the curve of your ass. One of your eyes twitch, hand in your panties rubbing at your puffy lips while your hips begin circular motions at his clothed crotch. The hand at your mouth fails to stay together, fingers parting from each other and granting the noises from your mouth to spill out. His arm then wraps at your waist, unconscious or not, seemingly pulling you closer to him; a bulge in his pants felt at your panties.

"Lieutenant..." you whisper breathily, looking back at him only to see his eyes were no longer shut — but half-lidded and open.

His arm at your waist travels to your hips, trapping you in the enclosure of his hands while he pushes you down further onto his bulge; an audible whine leaving your mouth with additional pants.

"Look at you," he groans with a rasp in his tone, "Gettin' off on her superior like the needy whore she is."

"M' sorry, Ghost, fuck, needed you so bad..." you whine out as his hips grind against your ass harsher, almost in similarity to thrusting, yourself drunk on him and his cock.

"Yeah, love?" he questions, "Say it, how long have you've been like this for me? How many times have you touched that pretty little cunt of yours to the thought of me every night?"

Your eyes are shot vast, saliva pooled in your closed mouth and your panties moist — slick painting the inner sections of your thighs. Words struggle shape into coherent sentences through your mindless babbles and the disturbance of his erection prodding right at your clothed cunt, but you manage. "Ever since I joined the task force," you say through a half-whine, "Since I've first seen you."

A couple of months was your first appearance on working for the task force. Decently skilled and a couple of rank higher than your first impression of a rookie, barely given any training. That's how long you've yearned for him — how many times you've laid sole right at midnight, in your room of the barracks, a hand down your panties while breaths of weight exhale with personal noises of lust. You project his hand instead of yours in the fabric, veins and a bigger expanse of flesh that stretches your tight cunt out with lengthy fingers.

Now those momentary projections had manifested itself into the real life, the reality where your older superior had himself pressed up against you; hungering after you as much as you did for him.

He has his face in the crook of your neck. "Fucked my fist thinkin' of you," you said, "You and your heavenly body distractin' me on missions... drives me insane."

"Ghost, please." you whimpered.

"Tell me what you need, sweet thing, c'mon." he cooes against your neck, the arms around your waist locking you right to the area of his crotch when all you could do is whine and push yourself down for more of the relief. Your body burns and fits of sweat, the temples of your forehead pounding.

"Need you to fuck me," you pant, "Need you inside so bad."

Ghost places a masked kiss at your jaw at the confession and in an instant movement; you're underneath him, a caging shadow scarcely visible by the traces of moonlight through the glass panes. The loss of friction he once gave from behind you was no longer there, leaving you to press your thighs together once again in hopes to rekindle some of the loss. His palms are flat at each side of your head, the bulging muscles of his black shirt outlining through the material — and the thing you've longed for the most, the bulge that lines and becomes trapped in his fabric confines.

He uses his right arm and his fingers curl around the waistband of your panties, ragging the drenched item down past your knees and left to be discarded on the mattress. His eyes preserve in a mature desire; bleary and focused on the exposed region of wet flesh. You bite the skin of your bottom lip, sheepish to never having another person being so up-close to an area that was so confidential to you throughout a large portion of your life. Two of his fingers slide up your puffy lips, soaked of your collected arousal while he elicits a low gasp from you.

"Fuck, angel, never seen someone so wet all for me." he said.

You had wondered if you should tell him now — after you were the first one to make such a bold move on him, you had to confess the private matter of never having intercourse; the only closest sexual encounter you've had was with yourself. (Those nights in the barracks with your single hand.)

"Ghost, wait—" you stutter out, a palm spread-out at his chest in a way to interrupt him of his doings.

"Somethin' wrong?"

You breathe, your throat gone dry. "I- I haven't done this before." you admit.

"You're a virgin, honey, is that it?" he asked with his accent swarmed of concern, "Never had a man touch you like this?"

"No," you said, "I want you to be my first time..." the admission was brief to a point, sure, but it was what you were so desperate in need of. You reserved this occasion just for him, and it had finally gave life to itself.

"Oh, sweet girl," he caresses your face with both hands, large palms squishing your cheeks and rubbing soothing motions into the skin, "Are you sure you want this?"

"Yes, please," you whisper, "God, I've waited and waited, only for you to be the first. Nobody else."

With that, his hands drag themselves down your face, your chest and stomach, and aligning at your thighs. He leans himself down onto the mattress, pinning his body onto the cushioned material. Your legs rest at each of his shoulders and his fingers create a restraint; powerless to thrashing or releasing from his hold. His thumb and index finger momentarily fix up the bottom of his balaclava to the brink of his nose, moving back to the flesh of your thigh. You squirm a little from the long, dragged-out desperation that spread through your body like a disease — a plague of lust solely meant for your lieutenant.

At long last his head descends to that throbbing territory right between your parted thighs, all bathed in your bloomed arousal and swollen clit. You feel his tongue kiss over your skin before running one long stripe up your cunt, lips fully puckering over you. To this new, overwhelming ease —out of the extended period of time with the substance's aches— you throw your head back to the headboard, a breathy gasp leaving you throat each time his tongue comes to work on your cunt. His nose adds to the ecstasy that he sends you right into, nuzzling and prodding right at your clit when his mouth works along your slit.

You stifle a moan, but ultimately fails when his tongue fucks itself right into your cunt, nearly felt at your walls. Whines echo off the boundaries of the room, the double simulation causing your eyes to flutter and your walls to clench around his tongue. Your thighs squeeze at his head while trembling, leaving your fingers to claw at the sheets, each and every assembly of your exclusive noises the nearest experience he would ever capture to hearing heaven — an angel, his very own angel.

"Fuckin' heaven right between your thighs, princess," he praised, running his tongue at the spots he was quick to learn that were sensitive to you, "Needy thing, you are."

"Y- Yes, yes... fuck." you whine.

"M' going to ruin you, bunny," he said amid his pleasuring, "Be the first man to ruin you, and this sweet pussy of yours."

Your thighs tremble, thrown-back head releasing noises of pants and disgraceful moans. His tongue works more diligently now, in the habit of working at your cunt. The ministrations are more faster and insistent. "Oh, Ghost..." you whimpered, bucking your hips onto his face and essentially riding his entire facial structure. He lifts his irises to your fucked-out face, staring in admiration, a raw visual of beauty — open-mouth, tilted head, sheet of sweat over skin, and all because of his own doing.

Rather than alternating between lapping at the exterior of your cunt and pushing his tongue right into you, he makes his mind up of only plunging his tongue in-and-out of you. The more rabid motions of his tongue driving up into you is a whole new degree of euphoria, a knot in your abdomen tying itself at the muscle fucking at your delicate walls. But it's not soon when that knot is unbinding itself, your body writhing under him as your hips roll and ripples of pleasure drive out from the undoing knot.

When Ghost arises from his spot between your now-fully soaked thighs, his mouth and nose are saturated with the liquids of your orgasm; the first orgasm you've had provoked by another person. You spasm, at some state of relief — but not enough to fully satisfy the explicit emotions that fomented right to him. Heavy breaths leave your mouth and his, trembling fingers of yours coming to pull off your tank-top and bra; fully nude and stripped beneath him now. You take notice of his eyes widening for a brief second behind the warpaint — astonished, or whatever he had going on at that unpredictable mind of his.

"Such a doll, baby." he said, inclining down to press a kiss to your lips, straightening his stance above you — towering you. He strips of his own shirt, a broad chest of muscles and pale skin, then lingering a hand down to his tactical pants where he shrugs the cloth down to his ankles; thoroughly peeling away from any fabric, except for his boxers with that prominent bulge at the forefront.

You patiently look up at him through your lashes while he slowly tugs at the waistband of the remaining article of clothing, a sensation at your gut anxious for the release of it. He wastes no time pulling the boxers down, cock smacking at his lower abs. Undeniably, he was as large as you've fantasized him to be — but with more length added, more veins that adorned him and a blunt head that oozed of pre-cum. Your breath hitched at the sight, a slow blink of your eyes while he clamped a fist over himself.

He pumped himself a few times in the fist, never once leaving the perspective of your near-goddess body all spread out for him. The stare in his eyes were darker, more obscured with shadows and a deep, perverted passion that you once obtained; only for it to die down at his domination on you, reduced to your usual timidity. Observing his cock in his fist, you bite your lip, that throbbing sense at your cunt returning in a more intense wave.

In a more bent position over your anatomy, you feel the head of his cock prod right at your entrance and you gasped when it starts in circular movements — gathering some of the remnants of your arousal on the head.

His fingers grasp at your jaw, gently forcing you to make direct eye contact. "Hey, hey, look at me," he whispers, "Relax, honey, it's going to hurt a little since it's your first time, yeah?"

You give him a nod, lip bitten at your teeth.

"If it hurts, we stop, no big deal — got it?"

You give him another nod of reassurance. It was a huge thing to give up, to put trust into the hands of another man — but it was him, your lieutenant, the man you've admired and personally worshipped like your own god. You trusted him with your life, that's how far it was taken, and now you could trust him with taking your virginity; ruining yourself for him.

With the given permission, he slowly fills you up, the head of his cock slipped into your cunt. He groans at the tight sensation, a whimper of your end at his lengthy size inside of you. You already feel so filled, and it was only the blunt head that had been in you. Ghost immerses in how you feel clenched around him, tight and leaving him almost unable to fully thrust himself in; the intimate way your legs bracket at his waist, how your arms wrap his torso like a bandage and your fingers jab at his back muscles.

"Ghost—" you whine out, feeling yourself clench around the head of his cock that left you almost brain-dead — unable to speak, or form a coherent thought at that, "Oh, fuck..."

His large hands keep you confined at your waist, lips pressing at your face while one hand frees itself and cradles you in it. "Still doing okay, sweetheart?" he asks with a genuine concern, and you nod, allowing him to thrust the remaining inches of his cock right into your cunt. Your back arches off the mattress at the sudden movement and the short sting that accompanies it. "Doing so good, love."

He starts out in slow, steady thrusts and you whine with the flow of his hips against yours. Gradually, he speeds up once coming to the realization that you were already adapted to how he moved up inside of you. Your fingers at his back begin to dig deeper, breaking the skin and leaving red marks in the wake. His stamina is a whole stage of extremity than your own, which is why he's able to pound into your cunt without pause.

"You love this don't you, sweet girl?" he pants, "You love having your sweet little pussy filled up by your superior's big cock, huh?"

You rapidly nod with pants between your lips, saliva down the corners of your widened mouth, "Love it s'much, Ghost, oh—"

"My real name, say it, honey."

You whimper, the bottoms of your eyes twitching. "Love how you fuck me, Simon — be rough with me, please, I don't care anymore."

At the your request, his particular set of thrusts afterwards of his are hard and nearing animalistic, right up at your cervix — nearly at your womb. He reduced you to nothing but a writhing, moaning mess where you laid under him; legs fixated at his waist and your arms at his torso forcing him down closer to you.

"Always wanted to fuck you like this, y'know?" he rasps between grunts, "Every-time one of those lowlife rookies eyed you, wanted to bend you over and show them who you belong to," he said, "Fuck in front of everyone like a bunch of animals.

An audible, echoing whine slips from your mouth at his own perverted confession. Who knew he shared the same fucked-up fantasies as you did? (Truly a match made in heaven.)

In the way he fucked into your cunt at a rapid pace, it could be considered animalistic — just like his fantasy. His veined hands caress your waist while every thrust of his hardened cock brushing past your walls and pounding into your cervix extracts an angelic sound from your mouth.

"More, please, please—" you whine out, head thrown back and nails into his skin, "I'll be your girl, 'mmm my god — your only girl, I promise..."

He grunts. "That's right, bunny. I'm the only man who can fuck you like this," he said, "I'll make you remember this night, the first man to ever ruin you like this."

Ghost throws his head back, his posture aligning itself out while his jaw clenches. Sounds of skin-on-skin and a chorus of high-pitched whines along with raspy, masculine grunts leave the safe-house no longer deserted; conducted of sexual nature in its walls. You squeal as he never fails to reach your cervix while he continues to pound into you, addicted to the way your cunt clenches on him like a vice and how your body reacts to his cock impaling it like a natural instinct — clamping on, soaked of arousal just at the mere thought of it settled in you.

The space between your two thighs are messier than the first time, when you found yourself being carried like a bride in his arms, when you ground yourself right to the bulge of his pants. It's sloppy, with a combination of your arousal and his pre-cum painting your inner-thighs like a piece of artwork; the whole scene a scenario of a sexual, brutal renaissance painting.

"M' so close, Simon!" you squeal, "Need you to cum inside, mmph — please..."

"You want that, sweet girl?" he asks, "Want me to cum all inside of your pretty pussy?"

"Yes!"

He chuckles. "You lil' fuckin' whore, all needy like this for her first time."

And with that, Ghost smacks his lips to yours. His tongue laps at each crevice of your mind, a hand coming to grab at your jaw and keep you in position. The results from him eating you out still linger on his tongue, causing you to moan right into his mouth and allow him to eat you all up. Your insides feel raw at this point in the way his cock leaves squishes noises each time he meets with your puffy, sticky folds — cervix bruised and kissed with his overwhelming contact.

"C'mon, princess, show your lieutenant who you belong to," he breathes between kisses, "That's it, I know you can, bunny."

Ghost feels the abrupt stop of your clawing at his back when your cunt spasms around his cock, clenching as tightly when a burst of liquid seeps out and decorates the head of his cock, drooling down the veiny sides. The pads of his fingers come down to rub at your swollen clit during your orgasm, a loud whine earned at the contact. His cock twitches inside of you at your noise, and at the discernment of your pretty cunt squeezing down on him; in some way telling him to stay, never let you go, claim and haunt you down to never leave your side, never.

With your orgasm already wrapped and concluded, he undergoes one of his own; not long after yours. A gush of fluid plants at your walls and floods past your cervix, felt at the inners of your womb. Sensitivity still contemporary, you find yourself mewling at the impact when it spills to the parts deepest inside of you — coddled in the warmth of his seed, filled to the brim. He's quite the artist himself, painting your insides one of the prettiest tints of white. You capture him in a hug, pressing your face into the open slant of his neck while he sinks in the position for a little while longer. He returns the embrace and massages at your breasts before wrapping you in a full hug, collapsing to your body.

He rearranges the stances of your bodies while in the embrace — him on the bottom, while you lay on his larger structure. Your head rests on his naked chest, tiny pants from your mouth while he is successful in catching after his own breaths; his hand in your hair, petting in comforting strokes while he presses repeated kisses to your scalp.

"How was that for you first time, love?" he asks once in breath again.

"Brutal," you said, "I liked it, though."

"Think that grenade powder had quite the effect on us," he said, "fuckin’ hell."

You nosed at his jaw, kissing at him, inhaling his scent of sweat and gunpowder — addictive. "Never knew my superior could be such a pervert just cause of a little powder."

"Not only the powder, doll," he said, "It's you."

[yourheartonfireblog]

So, I've been thinking about The Locked Tomb as a whole, particularly about how Tamsyn Muir pulls off the trick of making a dramatic tone and perspective switch with every book, yet it still feels cohesive as a story and a series.

Something that just clicked for me after a reread of Harrow the Ninth is noticing that a motif obviously present in HtN is actually running through all the books, in a way that supports this constant resetting at the beginning of every novel. And that is Alternate Universes. As in, like, the fanfiction concept of AUs.

Massive spoilers ahead for the first three books of The Locked Tomb:

Probably the biggest link between the books is the structure. All three books of The Locked Tomb roughly follow the same narrative pattern; the narrator/protagonist starts the story hopelessly outclassed and the least informed person in the situation in which she finds herself. At first she is passive or blocked from action, but there's a realization/revelation that she is not as helpless as initially thought. She builds in power and action (and this is rewarded with exposition dumps to catch her and the reader up on what is actually happening). The final act is a fight to the death and as she is dying the narrator makes a sacrifice of her own body in a way that manages to preserve at least part of her consciousness outside herself.

(The secondary narrative in Nona the Ninth -John's confession- loosely follows this pattern too. Except of course John makes a different decision in the final act of his story.)

More than just the structure, each story is a variation on the same themes. Some of them are obvious. Power and how people use it/ abuse it. The narrator's relationship to their own body and how it becomes an expression of trauma.

But another less obvious theme, right from the first chapter of Gideon, is the narrators all have some connection to an Alternate Universe version of themselves/ their lives.

I'll admit this theory is weakest in GtN. But I don't think it's a coincidence that Gideon's entire life plan is inspired by military-themed porn mags - a smut AU, if you will. She's also the only one of the narrators who regularly indulges in daydreams that give her the strength to fight and struggle forward. Also not, I believe, a coincidence.

In HtN things start getting more on the nose - unlike Gideon, Harrow has magic. Rather than accept reality, Harrow uses her power to lobotimize herself into creating and living in an alternate reality, while retelling an alternate version of the prior book. This of course is the book with the infamous role swap/ Regency ball / barista AU sequence, just in case you didn't get what's going on.

But NtN is equally about AUs - Nona is the story where the universe conspires to give Harrow and Gideon the alternate universe of the life they both wanted. Gideon (or at least her body) does turns out to be the daughter of the emperor and the crown prince of the universe. Harrow (or at least her body) gets a found family who love her and a brain that is 100% free of the horrible truth of her abominable origin. We spend most book wondering just who is in that body, Harrow or Gideon, and that's part of the point. The trauma is so deep Harrow and Gideon are unrecognizable as people if their slate is wiped. So of course Nona turns out to be a secret third option.

More to the point, NtN is the book where we learn that the Nine Houses are, in fact, John's shitty self-insert AU. Harrow had a little power a and lobotimized herself, John had more and lobotimized all of humanity he could get his hands on, remaking them into this bizarre and baroque universe centered around worshipping him as a god-emperor. The planet of New Rho, outside John's direct control, is bursting with life and chaos and mess and humanity that is missing entirely from the glimpses we get of John's universe. It's no wonder the other survivors call everyone in the Nine Houses zombies - they are, in fact, brainwiped slaves to John's whims whomever he will pick up, put down, resurrect, and murder exactly as he thinks is best.

I'm very excited for Alecto the Ninth and how this is going to play out now that we've met all three of the people in this relationship, and everyone is in the same place in the right body.

[alliddewrites]

Staring Problem

Simon 'Ghost' Riley x Reader Oneshot

Content Disclaimers:

Mostly fluff,

Kind of sexual,

Gender neutral reader

Masterlist

You have a bit of a staring problem…

Somehow, it only seems to happen around your lieutenant though. You don't know what makes your eyes wander to him anytime he's within your line of sight, but it's never not present.

Is it his commanding demeanor that always seems to get the attention of everyone?

He has the type of personality that makes everyone listen to him. You can't remember a single time where someone in a room wasn't paying attention to him. He commands every area he enters…

Is it maybe his unsettling, handmade mask made from an actual skull?

The first time you saw it, you were kind of in shock. You never thought that kind of thing is allowed in your field of work.

It was also pretty creepy. Having another human's skull covering his face? Seems like something a psychopath would do. Which sometimes does seem to be the case with his morbid dad jokes that always lighten the near death situations you have to deal with constantly…

Is it his beautiful eyes?

Those deep brown eyes framed by blond lashes are just the most gorgeous thing you could ever think of. The most intense eyes you've seen your entire life. No matter what mask he wears, his eyes are the center of attention. Sadly not many people have the courage to constantly look into them, to admire them, but you do…

Is it perhaps his intimidating stature?

Being in the military, you're used to being around people who are more on the taller side, but he still sticks out from all of them. His height, paired with the ways he moves and stands just gives him that imposing aura.

He could be in the most ridiculous position and he would still look good doing it…

Could it be his admirable physique?

Anytime you look at him, you just can't not notice how big he is muscle wise. Anytime you see him wearing just a shirt, one that seems to cling to him so perfectly, you can't help but be mesmerized.

You can get a feel for his strength just by looking at him though, even if you haven't experienced it firsthand, but you've already had the chance to…

——————————

Your hand-to-hand combat training partner hadn't shown up that day, so someone had to take their place. There was no one available except for the one and only Lieutenant Ghost. You had been intimidated just by the thought of sparring with him, but then he decided, unintentionally, that he would make this whole situation even more difficult for you.

He wore the tightest tank top in the whole world for this occasion. Now this wouldn't have been a problem, if you hadn't been just constantly enamored by every ripple of beautiful muscle on his body.

While you were warming up, he was waiting nearby. Stance wide, arms crossed, standing tall. A mask, different to his usual skull one, covering his face.

After you finished up, he walked up to you, he himself ready to begin as well. The only problem was you weren't ready, at all. He was way too strong for you. You've seen some of the things he has done to enemies and they were not pretty.

'What if he breaks something? What if he just paralyzes you in one move? That wouldn't be a pleasant experience.' are the thoughts that went through your mind.

"Ready Corporal?" came his magnificent British accent. God… You could listen to it all day. His deep, raspy voice…

You snapped back to reality and answered with a quick 'Yes sir!', just like you've been trained to do quite a bit of time ago. You both made your way onto one of the mats specifically set up for training sessions like these.

"Go." he says abruptly. Before you were even able to properly react, he already had you flat on your stomach in a few swift seconds. He was holding your hands behind your back with one hand, while the other was holding down your head, cheek squished to the ground. His legs by the side of your thighs, oh so close to you…

"You're distracted." he stated while he got off of you. "Again." came the command when you had gotten back in your previous positions.

You swore hell and back in your mind that you're majorly better at this usually. After all, that's how you gained the rank of Corporal. How were you failing so miserably?

"Go." he interrupted your thoughts. You tried to focus on the task at hand, you lasted a bit longer and fought back, but in the end, you still got pinned down. How humiliating…

"You're still distracted, Corporal. What's wrong?" he questioned you, getting slightly irritated by your lack of focus. He knew, even back then, that you were capable of performing better.

"Nothing sir. I think I'm just not feeling the best today. I apologize." you replied, looking at the ground, ashamed. 'This is so embarrassing.' you thought to yourself, 'How is this happening? I've never looked at him this way before. He's your superior, stop it!'.

"I can go again, sir. I'll try my best now, please, don't hold back on me." you looked straight into his eyes, courage coming back.

His eyes widened slightly, quickly going back to normal in a split second. "Okay, Corporal." he responded to your strange request. He tried really hard to ignore the unintentional innuendos that came with your sentence.

.

.

.

Maybe asking him to not hold back had been a terrible mistake. You didn't even last half a minute…

You got your face smashed into the mat so hard that you got a nosebleed and a headache. Who knew he had such strength…

——————————

What could it be that really just makes you get lost in his person as a whole? No other person had this effect on you.

Only him…

How you wish you could just ask him…

Ask him what it is that draws you to him so strongly,

Ask him how he honestly feels about you,

Ask him if he feels the same way you do…

[rederiswrites]

Arden and Lucanis' budding relationship is a whole series of stumbles and learning, really. It's not especially smooth, although I don't think of it as being high-conflict, either. Just a lot of invisible hazards where they upset or misunderstand each other without ever meaning to.

Arden doesn't start with a positive attitude towards spirit possession--neither of them do, obviously. Spite actually isn't a huge stumbling block, though, because Lucanis is so obviously not the standard abomination that Arden's natural curiosity is piqued, and there's plenty to feed it. After seeing Emmrich interact with spirits generally and Spite in particular, he really wants to be bros with Spite. Which Emmrich thinks is frankly oversimplifying a creature of the Fade, but which Spite thinks is great.

Lucanis probably doesn't start with an especially high opinion of Tevinter military training, for that matter. But he realizes soon enough that comparing assassin training to military training when you've set up an assassin situation is hardly fair. Military training is meant for direct, sustained confrontation in numbers, and is, in fact, better for that than Crow training is. They have a lot to teach each other, and have a lot of fun teasing each other.

Trickier are the things where Arden thinks they're the same, and takes longer to realize that no. No, not really. He thinks they both grew up in well-to-do families, until he sees the Dellamorte compound and realizes that there's a huge fucking difference between "we have a town house and a country house" rich and "we have an opera house in our palatial compound and also more than one vineyard" rich.

Then there's the one every Rook faces. Arden doesn't know a damn thing about being ace and is like, "I thought he wanted me uargghgh what did I do?" total confuse allo noises. And then he goes to his oldest friend in the group, Lace, who is also very open and straightforward about attraction and is thus not really the help he needs, except to say, "No bro I'm pretty sure he's into you, so uhhhh I also have no idea but things suck real bad for him rn so probably it's that??"

And they both think that their childhood treatment was very similar, until Arden realizes that there's a chasm between the way his father treated him and growing up with a parental figure who will starve you to make a point and kill you if you refuse to be her tool. Yes, they both were trained harshly. Yes, they both got their share of bruises from their parent figures. Yes, they both faced very rigid expectations for their future. But ultimately Arden said no and walked away, and Lucanis can't even allow himself to think like that.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

Why Appropriating thing without researching the result is a bad idea.

So apparently US women, particularly white women (WTF) found 4B

and people are thinking, this is great. This is a story also on the difference between conclusion and result.

So the conclusion is 4B is great The end. It was all happy. The result is a whole new story.

But let's get into it. And actually think about what we could do to do this better?

'cause if you don't learn from actual history before stealing from it and not learning a thing, then you can't learn if you screwed yourself over or not.

Some history here since it's pretty clear no one bothered asking a Korean *cough* CNN.

You didn't learn from the translating fiasco to actually ask a drama translator who translates Korean dramas, or the Atlanta shootings... I hate it here.

There was a war that tore Korea apart. But usually US people end it there CONCLUSION. Koreans see it as a result, so also a beginning of many other things.

The country was destabilized because of the war, conveniently the US likes to cover this with their own wars (Say civil war), but not the results of wars outside of the US except where the US looks like a hero, if the history class gets that far, say The Marshall Plan (I'm really, really hoping that history classes haven't gone to shit this much that no one knows what it is. You should have gotten it in High School.)

Due to the US specifically destabilizing South Korea, they also suppressed unions and factory owners, installing, not one, but two dictators, a fact that people conveniently skip. This made the country markedly worse as massive student protests burst out and Korean citizens were jailed. This is in the 1970's-1980's. While the US was prospering and boasting its head off, this is what you were doing.

The country also was under the US thumb about the sex slavery camps for military use. Someone wants to mark this with a trigger warning, but sometimes I kinda feel like trigger warnings are used as a way to not face the horrors of history. And I think that the US needs to own this.

A lot of the bad discourse on women and setting back women in Korea isn't entirely from these camps, but it doesn't help either and you're sitting there high and mighty about it pisses me off. Oh, but the US is better on women's rights~~. As if the US and UK didn't put South Korea in this position in the first place with massive imperialism you don't want to own? The force prostitution pact taken from Japanese imperialism didn't lift until 2014. To me, you don't want to talk about Black Slavery, Native American genocide, but you also don't want to talk about the crap you did to all of Asia either with this and then talking about how Asian women just you know "want" it without having to talk the impacts of where that ideology came from.

This set Korea back and women had to fight their asses off from where the US left people like Eomma and my grandmothers as the US did nothing to help with the Japanese comfort women situation because it was running its own comfort women situation. OWN it. You were doing this ins 2014. If you're reading this, this is likely in your own lifetime. Did you care or did you care more about your Korean dramas and K-pop and say how dare you bring this subject up? (BTW, the contract forced prostitutes was also done to India, China and Japan, I'm working on researching other countries as well. Japan got this idea from the UK.)

From about 1990's, Women finally started to gain more rights and fought like hell to get there, large protests, got the right to divorce unilaterally, and by the time of about Kim Dae Jeong, they found allies in government and so on, but the cost of industrialization itself meant that as women gained the vote the rate of births sharply fell, and yet SK was exporting children still during this time period, mostly because of pressure from the United States. Own that one too. US UK and Europe would continue this pressure to export babies well in the 2010's, until SK was able to put some cross pressure back.

You plundered, you r*ped, but SK people refused to be razed to the ground and fought back.

After Kim Dae Jeong, and the final gain in women's rights, it looked like maybe some of the more conservative government would give in, but also women protested like hell because in Korean history Korean women were always the organizers and the biggest movements of resistance in Korean history have been Korean women—BTW, US white women go to relax, but Koreans fight for every last right tirelessly because literally look at the oppression wrought by the US.

Every time the government does something terrible, Koreans go to protest it, shut down news stations, the whole of TV, etc and workplaces often have to shut down due to the protests. Does the US do this? Nope. Apathy every single last time. "Oh we can't do anything, we can't rock the boat too much."

Black men like to say if you want something done, you go to a Black woman. Priests like to say if you want anything done, ask a nun. For Korea, it's always been the women. And not quietly.

So after the Me Too movement, unlike the US the discourse on that did not die in Korea and there were massive protests for YEARS to fight for more rights. One of them was 4B.

Repercussions

But men got frustrated at the 4B movement which also managed to get onto the lawbooks if a woman is drunk, then that's not consent.

Win, conclusion, we can go home. Wrong. This is why I hate the conclusion mindset sometimes.

As a result of this and rising women's rights, men, particularly during covid, pushed back on 4B and worked together by large degree and elected an incel supporting, crush blame-it-on-the drug users president, who BTW, had a grandmother who got frustrated with him. And so she threw flowers at him and cursed because Itaewon broke her heart that much especially after the boat disaster. He was callous and cruel.

So now the divide between men and women is greater so there is a lot of SA and SV as men feel much more emboldened and guess what this president also borrowed Trump's rhetoric to use for his own gain. Now there is a ruling on the books in SK, that in order for SV to "count" it must be violent. Wait, but she's sleeping, she's drunk? She's a child. Welcome to hell. Thanks Trump for being an Asshole. And thanks the US for your ignorance and complacency.

But sure, let's ignore systemic violence brought on by the US.

Result

This is the problem that PoCs often complain about white activism. They ignore their hand in it, but then see a pretty shiny thing on the hill and then use it without thinking about the causes and impacts and then slink off into the night once they get what they want, unwilling to organize ever again and then get all shocked when the rights backslide, because of united laziness. From watching protests, this is more of a UK/US thing. You aren't willing to protest to maintain and reinforce rights.

I told you, this is why cultural appropriation is bad. You're not willing to learn from history.

So how do you win this thing? Theoretically you have to find ways to make masculinity and manhood itself and win that discourse away from this bogus Alpha male thing. (I know, your poor omega verse, but why can't you let the whole alpha thing go romance writers, selling it to men in fiction? Can you have doms without having to tie it to this false notion of freaking wolves and selling it as sexy and powerful, etc?)

How do you make it seem like being able to choose and get rid of some of the basis of the whole ideology about men v. women, etc is powerful and better than this alpha ideology? How do you work with men to win that discourse?

Some ideas have been floated such as sacred masculinity, and secure masculinity, but how do you make those seem more powerful and more like ownership of identity than the Alpha male ideologies?

Once you win that discourse, you have to fight like hell to reinforce it and protest for it, and show and not shame men why this ideology is better while also fighting for other gender's rights alongside you.

Because I see you white women. You're saying it wasn't me. It wasn't me that skipped voting for president and now what. It wasn't me that thought that the case of the dog in the park valued a dog's life over a man's life and word. It wasn't me, that consumed Korean dramas with no interest in Korean history and what my country was doing to Korean women and stayed silent when someone spoke about the violence of the US and instead told them to shut up, it's only a TV show, it wasn't me who subscribes to Twitter with a blue check which donated to the republican party because followers is clearly much more important than defeating fascism while you mock and cry about how people voted on economics. Nope. It was you. You became complacent. You wanted to feel superior. It was all you.

You only care when your rights about to be taken, but don't show up for anyone else? This is why Black women are sick and tired of this. They showed up for Hilary Clinton and you didn't show up. Black women showed up for Harris, and *checks notes* even less of you showed up. Show up and examine your own group and press them harder as white women. You have an issue you need to address because there's more dissenters within your group. Ask for accountability and have those long chats using toxic white women's language for good. How do you tackle poverty and lack of education about economics? Press your own group to do better.

Self examine this shit and stop taking movements you won't bother researching the result of and actually show up. Stop engagement baiting and trying to get your follower count up and do shit that actually looks like outreach.

[henrysglock]

Once again thinking about Vecward "hates the system" Creel and the fact that the US Military is a huge shared enemy for both him and the Party.

The military is after El, thinking she's the one behind all this, which the Party isn't going to stand for. Meanwhile, they're also trying to put an end to Vecward's apocalypse (while being the very people who sanctioned the abuse he suffered), which he isn't going to take kindly to.

So I'm like. What do we think the chances of either an accidental or purposeful "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" situation are. Because El and Henward were allies once, and he still doesn't seem to want to kill her, even now he knows she's a threat to him (which...there's something deeper about that than we've been told, I'm certain of it). And even if it is accidental...it would still fit within that pattern of "we're different from each other, but not as different as we like to think we are".

Vecward wouldn't be hesitant with the military, I'm sure. I'm also sure he won't be siding with them. That's 100% against his whole manifesto. They certainly aren't on his side, and they very much could present as big a threat to him as El (and possibly Will) do...they've dealt blows to the UD in the past, especially in ST2 with the controlled burns. I mean, I'd hate to see what napalm might do to the UD, if those lab torches garnered such a massive response. It would be in his best interest to eliminate the military, and fast.

So...not me sitting here with an image in mind of a callback to ST1's iconic van-flip scene. The Party and El being chased down by the military, except instead of El flipping vans with her mind on a bike...we see the ground open up underneath military vans/tanks, and the UD/Vectacles swallow them whole (behavior like this having been teased by the one Vectacle snatching a fish at Watergate).

Vecward "chaotic neutral" Creel. Please and thank you.

[starwalker03]

I realized WMLP Dick’s position in that army unit is similar to his early experience with the team. He’s the youngest has a lot of experience and skills his squad mates don’t, among peers for the first time in a while, hiding his true identity, gets pushed out of his comfort zone by the people he was with. Expect this time is was true war. And he came away without bonding with his team and looking down on them. Would this experience effect how he views his memories of The Team?

Huh. Actually that's a good point.

It would definitely make him remember how unprepared they were for That Whole Situation, just thrown into missions having never worked together except for the Cadmus mission which ended with an exploded building like. Bruh. I know they weren't giving the league many options but also what the fUCK guys y'all just sent them off on their merry way like that. The fact they didn't die in episode three is a miracle.

But then also he's so aware of the difference between working with people who are fighting because they're genuinely good people with a desire to help others, as opposed to... Well. People who wanna shoot guns, had no other options, want the military to pay off their degree, et cetera et cetera so on so forth. Like this team is so different to his old one it's almost distracting. It's almost problematic. It's almost enough to snap Dick out of the constant unrelenting need to do as he's told and question Slade because 'uh hey yeah what the fUCK is up with these people'

Dick has to force a level of indifference between himself and his new team because if he doesn't he can't focus on the task at hand. He can't help but think about the fact that these people should not be running around armed with thousands of lives in their hands.

It doesn't help that they're all unaware of half of the shit that goes down in the world. Even Dick's superiors have only the smallest understandings of figures like Count Vertigo and Gorilla Grod and none of them have any idea who Vandal Savage is. Queen Bee? Uh you mean the dictator of that small kick of desert in the middle east?

(CW for conversations about the "war on terror" ahead)

Oh my god. I didn't even consider that if Bialya and Qurac are middle eastern countries they're surprisingly close by during the wars of the early 2000s. Like I've hand waved and said 'yeah going off timeline Dick probably got sent around the middle east' but completely failed to realise he might have even been in Bialya or Qurac for missions.

I wonder how those countries engaged with wars in the area in lore. It's apparently north of Saudi Arabia and Iran in wider DC lore? But YJ isn't specific?

Here's a Reddit thread I found where people start getting into nitty gritty details:

Essentially they're depi ting Bialya and Qurac as west and east Iran, respectively. And also offering theories as to how those countries could have come to be.

If I continue to use Australia as the example (which I suppose I should cause I've essentially canonized it in the fic at this point), Australia was only particularly involved with Afghanistan and Yemen I believe, but I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge.

Bialya and Qurac could, possibly, border operations in Afghanistan. Young justice lore states that Bialya is a part of the UN and therefore may not be particularly open to military operations but very well could have housed a few bases on the borders.

Jesus. Getting this into the lore of YJ feels so strange and I'm honestly not sure if it's inappropriate or not. I could believe Queen Bee being involved with the war on terror, whether it's a part of Savage's plans or not, just because she enjoys conflict. Moreover it helps with the anti-Quraci thing she has going. From what I can tell of the show, Qurac seems to be a majority Islamic country? So I could see her manipulating the image of things to benefit her attempts to take back Qurac.

Well this spiralled. Uh I might end this answer here actually.

[lunellum]

Right, I had a really vivid dream in which I was plotting out a story. In the dream it was a really cool story so I'm gonna just throw some bits of it out here in the hope it'll still make sense later and I can maybe actually write it.

It was sci-fi, set on a mining asteroid. The asteroid was like... rotationally locked around a star so that one side was always light and ome was always dark. The mining installation was om the dark side because the light side was too hot to have people on efficiently.

Most of the operation/habitation was underground but there were these like.. roads and glass walkways to connect different stations and landing pads and shit

The asteroid had gravity (though much less than earth) and atmosphere (though quite thin and not super breathable)

And here's the best part: there was a big culture of speedster racing on the asteroid surface

Like little one person space-motorcycle

The people who raced were kind of celebrities, there was a whole betting subculture, it was broadcast

It was also super duper illegal and the local Corp was trying to crack down on it

But that just because larg of the race, like a little added frisson of danger

The main character was a racer and she was this older butch lady

There was also a corp/military lady who was new to the asteroid who had this awkward "I should arrest you but also we have some prime sexual tension and I can't bring myself to end that" situation going om with the main character

I don't actually remember what the plot was?

Except that the main character at one point got injured while racing and the other lady had to nurse her back to health and maybe hide her from her bosses

Hmm. I feel like I should be able to think of a nice short story plot for this.

To be continued?

[darsynia]

Trust Fall | Ch 14b

ARC image by Eury Escodero

Story Masterlist | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Summary: Tony/OC, ‘terrorists made us fall in love;’ IM1 timeline. In this chapter, Tony gets home and starts his campaign to find Emory, and Emory meets Nick Fury.

Length: 2,794

Tags (please don’t hesitate to ask!): @starryeyes2000 @raith-way @arrthurpendragon @starksbf @themaradaniels @chickensarentcheap @tiny-anne

Excerpt:

“Ready and waiting for your instructions, sir.”

“Good. First: Use any and all means, including illegal ones, to lock down the non-essential medical records of a Miss Emory Autumn for the next twenty-four hours. Be obvious. I want them to know it’s me.”

This is a gamble, because there’s a tiny chance she’s actually in some kind of a medical crisis and that’s why there’s been no word. After all, he has no legal right to know anything about her. Tony’s sure that she’s fine except for the abnormal test results which show evidence of her new abilities, however. They were rescued by US forces, and the US forces tested her blood, found out something interesting, and from that point, the woman he loves disappeared. He’s not going to take that lying down, and he wants whoever has her to know it.

“Shall I also inform your lawyer that you may be brought up for charges sometime before the end of the year?”

“If you like, honey buns,” Tony replies.

Chapter Fourteen: [weather redacted in report of unexplained incident in Afghanistan]

No one brings her dinner.

Honestly, that feels like a pathetic power play designed to force her to use her powers. The only thing Emory respects about the decision is that it seems like they actually do believe she won’t try to escape anytime soon, so this is the best they can come up with.

Two hours later, after she’d spent time running the most annoying scales she could think of, knowing that someone is required to listen to them, the lights shut off. Without a window, there’s no way to know whether it’s actually dark, but she’s been tired for hours anyway. The only things keeping her awake are the dual fears that she’ll dream of Tony and generate power in her sleep unless she’s fully exhausted, and the idea that they can manipulate her by exploiting her jet lag from the time difference. This isn’t a military base, she’s sure of it. She’s back in the States.

Pushing away thoughts of Tony is harder when she’s sleepy, but she does her best, and eventually drifts off.

Emory wakes up to a room darker than she’s been in for at least three months. It’s terrifying at first; the cave had always been lit, likely because the terrorists had needed to make sure they could always see the room, even though that hadn’t stopped the escape, in the long run. The good thing about the room being dark now is that it gives her confirmation that there is indeed a hidden window. Across from her bed there’s a ‘closed bedroom door, illuminated hallway’ effect along the whole wall, at the ceiling. The very darkness of the room makes this line of light obvious. It's exactly the sort of detail that is easy to miss. Who would bother checking the room at night, especially if you don’t tell the people modifying the room the reason for its modification?

As she lays in the bed and stares at the evidence of a hidden window in her room, Emory almost feels like she’s absorbed some of Tony’s and Yinsen’s situational intelligence. Again, she asks herself what Tony would do if he were in her place. The answer that comes to her is that he would seek to eliminate weaknesses and amplify strengths.

An obvious weakness is the IV, as is the surveillance. The three of them had never sought to block or destroy the cameras in the cave, because the consequences would have been too risky, with little to no reward. Here, Emory doubts she could reach them even if she could figure out where they were. Here, she’d spent a lot of her singing time changing positions on the bed so she could examine the walls for their location, but the drop ceiling has multiple stains and defects that could all be hiding cameras. In the dark, there are no discernible lights except for the red one over the door, and the green one at the badge scanner. She doesn’t know much about surveillance technology, but assumes that if Tony can build a suit that can do all the things he’d managed in Afghanistan, it’s likely that there are low-light/no-light surveillance cameras.

Then, it hits her. The IV is probably a test, by now, as they haven’t put anything in it in many hours. They’re probably waiting for her to pull it out herself, and noting how much time passes before she does so. If she takes it out now, and no one comes rushing in, that would reveal that her captors can’t see her (or aren’t watching at night, which is unlikely), wouldn’t it? She could kill two birds with one stone, although Emory’s always hated that particular phrase.

She wishes she had any light to go by, or extra tape, because it would be even better if she could pull out the IV and then tape it so it looked like it was still set up, but that’s not feasible. Slowly, carefully, Emory tugs off one pantleg and presses its inside-out hem against the place where the IV goes into her arm. She won’t be able to see if removing it gets really messy, but the scrubs she’s dressed in are dark navy blue, and the hem is a full inch, the fabric doubled. It’s as sneaky as she can be.

When she’s satisfied that her arm isn’t bleeding, Emory lets the tubing drop, puts her pants back on, and lays back in the bed, her heart pounding.

No one comes.

In her mind, she pictures Tony smiling at her. Emory rolls over with her back to the IV pole and gathers up the energy that simple thought has generated, tossing it up so that it ruffles her hair, just like the song she’d sung so many weeks before.

Stane offers to hold a second presser with some rudimentary information, mostly what Rhodey’s commanding officer has okayed about the rescue and Tony’s arm injury. Obie tells him he’ll even add something about Tony’s experience in captivity, how he’s concerned that by continuing Stark Industries’ current path, he’ll be doing what the terrorists wanted-- namely, making more weapons, the use of which will cause more strife in the region.

It’s an ingenious compromise, really. Obie’s powers of persuasion and spin have always been legendary, even if he has acted like a corporate father (with all the selfish, capitalist behavior that naturally entails) rather than a surrogate one, to Tony. He even persuades Tony that any disparity between their messages today about Stark Industries and weapons is just a hint that things are moving so fast that no one should panic yet.

Tony hands off his sling and jacket to a guy in finance who has the same hair and build as he does and sneaks into Happy’s car with Pepper.

The whole car is silent for the first five minutes, though Tony notes that Happy looks in the mirror to check on the two of them a lot, and Pepper’s facial expression seems frozen into deep concern.

“So none of my letters got through?” he asks, feigning confusion to break the ice.

“You mean you got to write--” Pepper starts to say in a squeaky voice, before she realizes and stops talking. Happy chuckles, up front. “That’s not nice. We were really worried, Tony.”

“Yeah, so was I,” he says, tipping his head back and sighing. “So who was the guy talking to you earlier? Looked like a government stiff?”

“Something like that, long department name, wanted to debrief you,” she says, shaking her head. “We’ve gotten a ton of requests from basically every agency.”

“Say yes if it’s Health and Human Services, have you seen the new undersecretary? I think half of the Senate voted yes just so they could get to see her in the news more often,” he teases. “Speaking of which, do you have my phone?” Tony tries to sound casual, but Pepper knows him, so she gives him a look. He wonders if she thinks he’s trying to make up for lost time or if he’s pretending to so he can con the phone out of her and start making changes at the company.

It’s neither. He wants to ask Rhodey about Emory. Tony can’t shake the feeling that the official who spoke to Pepper knows something about her. The phone he had in the Hum-Vee is gone, sure, but even his backups have backups.

“Did any of the other agencies send someone in person?” he asks her.

“No. I assume this guy is so junior that he didn’t get out of the personal visit. You know, haze the new guy by sending him to ask to speak to Tony Stark,” she says, offering him a sweet smile.

“Hmm.” Tony looks out the window to see where they are. Almost home. “He give you his number?”

“Don’t threaten him, okay? He was just doing his job.”

“What, me? Threaten?” Tony feigns utter shock, which is successful, because Pepper starts to laugh. “No, seriously. I get a sense that I ought to talk to at least one out of the multitude. He showed up in person, that takes guts. Gimme.”

Tony takes the way that Pepper allows herself to roll her eyes just a little when handing the business card over as a sign she’s starting to adjust to his return. As Happy pulls up into the driveway, Tony sees the two of them make eye contact in the rearview, and decides to be magnanimous.  

He waits till the car stops, and before Happy turns it off, he says, “Hey, so, it turns out I haven’t been alone in about three months, so how about the two of you go expense a fancy dinner to my account tonight, give me a little space?”

Before either of them respond, Tony opens the door and gets out awkwardly, hampered by the arm injury. As usual, the door unlocks as he walks up, because JARVIS is always watching. He considers going up and laying on his bed, but angles toward his basement workshop instead.

He almost gets emotional when he settles into his chair for the first time and sees the three monitors flicker to life.

“Welcome back, sir. It’s really good to see you home safe and sound.”

“Good to hear your voice, JARVIS,” Tony says. It really is. “Not sure about the ‘sound’ part, though.”

“Yes, well. That was always somewhat in doubt, wasn’t it?”

Tony breaks into a grin. “Damn straight.” He grabs the mouse, opens up a search engine, and starts typing. “All right, I have a few directives, all of which are top priority, house on fire stuff.”

“Ready and waiting for your instructions, sir.”

“Good. First: Use any and all means, including illegal ones, to lock down the non-essential medical records of a Miss Emory Autumn for the next twenty-four hours. Be obvious. I want them to know it’s me.”

This is a gamble, because there’s a tiny chance she’s actually in some kind of a medical crisis and that’s why there’s been no word. After all, he has no legal right to know anything about her. Tony’s sure that she’s fine except for the abnormal test results which show evidence of her new abilities, however. They were rescued by US forces, and the US forces tested her blood, found out something interesting, and from that point, the woman he loves disappeared. He’s not going to take that lying down, and he wants whoever has her to know it.

“Shall I also inform your lawyer that you may be brought up for charges sometime before the end of the year?”

“If you like, honey buns,” Tony replies.

“Very well.” 

He’s not going to pause for passive-aggressive reckoning from his artificial intelligence. “Second: I want a rolling notification on any and all instances of the name ‘Emory Autumn’ in all media, police band, and available military radio frequencies.”

“Acknowledged. You should also know, sir, that in your absence, you have been upgraded to the latest version of cellular phone. Your previous backup has been copied over. The device is in its box in the drawer on your left.”

“Thanks, J,” Tony says, not reaching for it yet. He’s got a search he’s about to hit enter on, but he needs to collect his thoughts first, because they’ll be scattered as soon as it populates. “Third: I need an intensive search on all airplane manifests, public and private, domestic and international, on the name ‘Emory Autumn’ for the last forty-eight hours. Use our codeword clearance to unlock the military manifests as well.”

“That will ALSO merit attention from the government, do you still wish to proceed?”

“Yes,” Tony says flatly, suppressing a smile. He loves it when JARVIS gets testy.

“Estimate thirty minutes for full access to military flights. I will send the rest of the results as they appear.”

“Thanks,” Tony says. He hits enter.

The three monitors display three different tabs’ worth of search results on the name Emory Autumn. The middle one shows images. It hurts to see Emory and not know where she is. He clicks on one of the images, a candid red carpet photo that is focused on Rory Fall but shows Emory in a modest but stunning gown standing beside her. She looks gorgeous; her friend beside her is wearing something more expensive and flashier, but she looks gaudy and overdressed in comparison. Even Rory’s hair looks dull next to Emory’s, Tony observes.

“Damn,” he says aloud, realizing. He’s pining for this woman, loading up pictures of her like some weird kind of stalker. What he should be doing is finding out where the fuck she is. Tony gestures, and the picture magnifies on the screen. He has to stop himself from reaching out to touch it.

“Ms. Autumn was the person taken alongside you after the ambush in Afghanistan?”

“Yes.” He doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t want to know what words might spill out.

“She was listed on a military plane coming into New York yesterday, and an hour later on a flight from New York to Washington, D.C.”

He’d suspected that Emory had been flown out before he was, and this is the confirmation. “D.C.? She lives in California! Get me Rhodes on the phone. Now.”

Rhodey won’t appreciate the pressure, but Tony owes it to his friend to start there before going over his head. And he’s definitely going to go over Rhodey’s head. He’s going to raise hell until he finds out what the fuck is going on.

Emory’s been awake for an hour and a half and her stomach is growling when the light above the door flashes green and it opens. A man walks in. He’s wearing an eye patch and a trenchcoat, and Emory suddenly wishes she had never gone to Afghanistan.

She’s a fraud. A doormat. She can’t see herself being strong enough to stand up to this man, and she never should have pretended like she wanted to.

She’s terrified.

“You asked for the boss. Well, here I am,” the man says. His voice is authoritative and compelling. Emory wishes she could fall through a trapdoor on the floor. She can’t even risk thinking about Tony to make herself feel better, because that’s just what this man wants her to do. “I see you’ve removed your IV.”

“I see you’ve removed--” Emory starts to say, but before she can finish, her visitor holds up a hand.

“Careful.”

“I think you have me mixed up with someone else, someone a lot more brave and ten times more disrespectful,” Emory says, almost laughing. “I was going to say ‘my food privileges,’ for the record.”

“Ah,” the man says, frowning. “That has to do with a stunt your boyfriend pulled on us. He’s figured out how to lock down your medical records, including allergies.”

Emory feels a breeze ruffling her hair, knows its origins, but is nonetheless grateful for the unintentional confidence booster in the word ‘boyfriend.’ Tony’s sabotaging them, in her defense. She could walk on air!

She… actually could. Emory gathers up the excess energy and, carefully, without moving her hands as she ordinarily would, she starts to mentally picture unraveling the ball of energy into a ribbon and tossing it along the floor, hopefully to butt against the fake wall that covers the window and maybe dislodge it a little.

At the same time as she releases the burst of energy, Emory says, “You couldn’t feed me bread and water in the meantime? Or maybe a Dixie cup of water and a vending machine egg salad sandwich would be more situationally appropriate?”

The energetic ball of air strikes the wall with a thump at the same time she says ‘Dixie cup.’ To his credit, the man in the trenchcoat turns his head slowly to look behind him, and then turns back to fix her with a penetrating look.

“Did you do that?”

“If you mean, ‘did I build a fake wall to cover up the fact that the room has a window,’ no, sir, I did not,” Emory says. She’s grateful that she’s sitting in the bed with her hands in her lap, because she’s able to clench her hands tightly around the sheet covering her legs, hopefully without looking like she’s desperately holding onto her sanity.

“I see,” the man says, with gravitas she’ll never be able to accomplish. “Let me start over. My name is Nick Fury. You have information that I need to know. I have information that you need to know. I feel certain we can come to an understanding.”

“What’s in it for me?” she asks, once again channeling Tony.

“Those injections are killing you.”

Next chapter, Emory has a tense stand-off with SHIELD, during which she discovers her new-found confidence thanks to Tony's influence.

[dragonstepp]

Life Across the Pong

Depends on which side of the Pond you live on.

As an American who has never traveled very far from home (though I moved around in the states in my younger years), I keep up with things through reading, and lately, on the computer. I see so many things that one might think are differences, but really, are the same.

We had another killing last night in Atlanta. And today we learn about a marine who killed a homeless man by putting a chokehold on him in the subway, for 15 minutes.

There are exceptions to everything. I have admired a few white men (Eisenhower comes to mind; there are others), but mostly, I hate white American men. They have done so much damage to other diverse peoples ever since they landed on Plymouth Rock. To name a few: native Americans, blacks, Latinos, the poor, the disabled, anyone who does not have money, nor power.

To say I love European men a whole lot more simply means there are people in those places who think the same way about their own folks, and wish to be in America. So we see things differently; the old adage the grass is always greener across the fence. No it is not. You learn that (I learn that) by moving myself to the greener grass, only to know it really wasn't.

So as I read writings about how the English hate their monarchy system, but maybe love our justice system, both are crook, full of sin, wealthy on the backs of others, and never the twain shall meet. But they are the same.

Why do I write this today? Because I will be up by 4 o'clock in the morning on Saturday to watch the coronation of Charles III. That is not because I like Charles very much, nor Camilla at all, but because I love the pomp and circumstance. I love the processionals, I love watching the hoi polloi who stand on the curbs and watch the parades, I love the very Britishness of it.

I am certain that there are those elsewhere who love to watch the inaugurations of our presidents, even if they don't like the person him/herself. But they like the pageantry. Or watch the funeral processions of past presidents (Kennedy was a remembrance to watch), but I don't want the trumpeter to get a military funeral. Unfortunately, to my thinking, there are folks who will weep for him.

So we are a diverse set of humans on this planet. As long as we can treat one another with compassion and kindness, toleration, and patience, we could live in peace. As we can see with today's situations across the whole planet, we can not and will not ever live in peace. Such is the composition of human beings.

So forgive me for loving the Brit pageantry of coronations, and I will you for non-Brit pageantry. I plan to enjoy the coronation of King Charles III, even if he is not my favourite person in the world.

Carol

Austin, Texas

[agapewizard]

➝ Subversive Programming - There are Two Primary Methods of Influence in the Occult World – Magick and Sorcery.

There are two primary methods of influence in the occult world – Magick and Sorcery (or Lesser Magick) – which share the same definition except for one slight difference in terms.

Magick is: the science and art of causing change to occur in accordance with the Will.

Sorcery is: the science and art of causing change to occur in accordance with the will.

While the words are the same, the intent is what differentiates them. For example, teaching Natural Law and sharing knowledge to the world (especially from a distance) in order to cause a positive change can be considered an act of Magick because it aligns with the uppercase-w "Will" of Creation. It's using intentional energy and the voice in the service of truth and humanity as a whole, to uplift human consciousness. On the other hand, Sorcery would be making use of the same knowledge to serve the lowercase-w egoic "will" of selfish desire. Sorcery would utilize the subversive use of imagery, color, symbolism and language to manipulate and control minds such as in mainstream media (news, adverts, entertainment, etc).

"Non-ritual or manipulative magic, sometimes called LESSER MAGIC, consists of the wile and guile obtained through various devices and contrived situations, which when utilized, can create change in accordance with one's will." – Anton LaVey, 'The Satanic Bible'

In modern vernacular, we think of the term "media" as a means of communicating to a larger population. That's true, but the origin of the word has a particular history. The Latin word "media" itself ultimately derives from the name of an ancient sect of sorcerers called The Medes. In turn, it is the origin of the word "mediate." When an enemy needed to be defeated covertly, a ruler would call upon the Medes to be the "mediators" and deceivers to give them an upper hand. Therefore, you could say that the term "mass media" is nothing more than a euphemism for far-reaching sorcery. The dark occultists are getting the "upper hand" on us, psychologically and emotionally.

And while we're all distracted and emotionally tense over these "crises," they are pushing forth their agenda to widen control (medical tyranny, increased dependency on technology, centralized digital currency, uniting countries/governments, increasing police/military power, etc). And anyone who speaks out against it is framed as the enemy. It's a classic cult technique. Government is and always has been a mind-control cult serving as the strong-arm of the dark occult priest class.

All of it, ultimately, is a stepwise progression (that's been going on for ages) towards total human enslavement. The use of health pandemics, terrorism, war, mass shootings, and all the other psy-ops are to de-moralize, de-humanize, de-populate, divide, and control. It's no longer conspiracy "theory" when you finally begin to see the patterns, tactics, and methodologies being used.

As an aside, you might have noticed my own use of blue and gold throughout these slides. This is also deliberate, for a positive reason. Blue is feminine energy, receptive – of information, truth, knowledge, wisdom. Gold is about intuition, understanding, awakening, and is symbolic of the light of the sun and solar chakra. The negative use of red in the Dark Occult section relates to base chakra, base consciousness/desires and dark energy which is what Satanism is rooted in. You might notice the constant use of red in fast food restaurants. That's intentional. Color has a deep psychological impact on us more than we realize, and these social engineers use it constantly.

But it's not just symbols and colors that are used in subversive programming. It's also wordplay – the use of euphemisms and repetition. The lie has to be repeated over and over and over. Things that people might consider wrong or immoral have to be framed in a different light, under different names, with skewed definitions. It's an age-old tactic that never fails... until we start raising our consciousness to a high enough level to see it. All of this continues to happen because we, as Jiddu Krishnamurti said, have a crisis in consciousness. We let our egos harden, clinging to our belief systems, and refuse to see the hidden truth because we fear the unknown; but ultimately, we fear the personal responsibility that comes with knowing the truth.

As the Jesus figure said: the truth shall make you free. Freedom comes from knowledge. In this case, it's symbol literacy. It's occult literacy. Ignorance of these things can only lead us into more suffering, more slavery, and more chaos. Start using your spiritual currencies of Time and Attention. Spend the time and pay attention to what's going on around you (and within you). That hard-work investment brings you the quality income of truth. That's what having higher consciousness means.

When you Know, then you can begin saying the word of power: NO.

You should be aware that the most effective prisons are made of beliefs and not stone or steel.

The most effective mind-control tool on the planet today is television.

THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA'S JOB IS TO CONVINCE THE PUBLIC THAT THE IDEAS OF THE GLOBAL ELITE ARE IN THEIR BEST INTEREST, AND TO CONCEAL HOW THE GLOBAL OLIGARCHY PLANS TO DESTROY AMERICA AND RAVAGE LIVES IN COUNTRIES AROUND THE WORLD.

People make decisions based on the information they have been given and have available to them in their environment. They may make assumptions or decisions based upon false information, and accumulatively the consistent exposure to false narratives shapes their personal reality and influences the popular culture. Those that seek to control or enslave others know that shaping narratives becomes absolutely crucial in controlling groups of people, in order to socially engineer behaviors and move them in the direction the controller wants them to go.

[the-firebird69]

Watch: BYD’s self-driving electric hypercar jumps in the air over road spikes

People see this and they know it's possible to do and using our son's system it is not a very difficult adjustment to make to get it to work we have several ideas for supercars one of them was to copy which is really hot and he has a new one now it's more realistic looking because it's a two-seater it's not as big either and it's easier to replicate and a lot of these guys have set their sights very very high and almost as if they have huge fleets and unstoppable armies when they when they don't really. They want to knock it off and to make it their way no they want to make it our son's way and say that it's his and blame him and the Chinese guy says you do that with everything and what's the point. So they start yammering and blabbing saying how I'm going to make it cheap and things like that and they start to say things that in space saying it's her son and their space cadets and people don't listen to that too much so now what's going on is they're getting in trouble and the Chinese said not to do it they'll get mad and stop sending things there's a little fight between them and they think they can do anything for some reason their highest kites tell you the truth and they really shouldn't be there's nothing to be high about except their own deaths and that's what they're high on we are getting to the point where sick of them and going to have a fight with them here and all over and it's coming up with the radiation we're going to answer a bunch of their questions yeah this is disgusting.

The numbers of churches being or under siege increased it was pretty high about 30% now it was about 15% yesterday and last night this morning it jumped to 20% of the hospitals were at about 25% and they're up to 30% former religious areas we're at around 5% and they jumped to 15% castles were at zero and they're now at about 40% all of these places are in a firefight all day long other percentages are different the number of churches that are monitored out of the whole of churches there are 90 7%, 97% and 30% are under siege and 67% are under a spy war situation most of the statistics are like that it's almost 100% And they are having a spy war and as a matter of fact all of them are mostly the spy war is affecting them moderate spy war at save the churches out of 67%, it's around 40%, the remainder is a heavy spy war soon to switch into a siege. Hospitals are different they're at 25% under siege and yeah that's closing hospitals it's not helpful for people if they're doing it the reason is a lot of people died and they want at these assholes who are running it they realize what happened yeah and because they got information from the max and they're going after they're pretty good and after the hospital people and they're seeking them all on special warrant yeah they put warrants out on these guys. This is a big war but these numbers are changing fast we expect them to be under siege about 80% of them by the end of the weekend emergency hospitals are being put up all over the world and we absolutely have to be there somehow monitoring it doesn't look like we are but we have to be we know what they're up to and this is an emergency because the the shopping malls will be relocated and as well as the hospitals as well as office buildings and universities huge amounts of people are moving out of their former facilities we don't have time to list at all but it's almost every aspect of life and the financial centers too it is very very huge we are strongly encouraging hours to sign on to our military we have no more time to talk about it or argue about it we need you signed up and we will talk about it but we need you sign up now we are having a huge crisis on Earth and wars and a massive war right now already with the Mac proper I was her instructed the side on and we need your help please do as soon as you can and it will help you and us we understand that you're doing work and that you're helping and you must but people who sign on say you should have done that a lot sooner because they're can practically powerless compared to what they can do when they sign on or some of you it's been a long long time but we are sending out the command and he is our leader and she is and you're too try as best you can to save yourselves and your family and this is an emergency

Thor Freya

Things are heating up a lot this is going to be a large movement of people we need all of ours on board it's going to be very dangerous

Olympus

Please sign up and make yourselves a much less miserable and much more helpful for God's sakes it's an emergency and we need help too and we're stuck

Hera Zues

[blissfulalchemist]

2, 12, 13 for sahar AND a ff clown of your choice

Thank you Macy! Sorry this took a hot second! But you get three characters because I couldn't resist talking about my ffxvi girlies :')

2. Is your OC a loner or a social butterfly? Are they satisfied with how they come across to other people?

See Sahar used to be a social butterfly, and typically had plans most weekends, but this all changed when she had her psychotic break and was back on her own after her inpatient stay. After that she really isolated herself and didn't like to interact with people for fear of their judgement, not that she had any care to what they thought no not her, which led to her doing things like taking on the overnight shift. Less people at night, never mind the other stuff she was trying to ignore. However, once meeting with Marc and the rest of the Midnight Mission she gains a bit of that social butterfly aspect once again and it can be a little jarring to those that don't know her all that well. Frankly this in between-ness that she has going on within the Mission leaves her the most satisfied because it really is the best of both worlds for her and feels more authentic than the social butterfly she was before. The whole better to have 3 devoted friends than 300 superficial ones.

I'm gonna talk about both ffxvi babies cause I love them but also not what you would expect. Between Alma and Clídna the more social of the two is actually Clídna!

While Alma can certainly be social she's more content to be by herself or with a select few people, which can all be attributed to her only really having her parents and needing to keep hidden, to then becoming part of a secret society, and then once again keeping her identity a secret so her main interactions that were for fun was limited to Joshua and Jote. Many though percieve her to be more social than she actually is and it wasn't much of an issue because it got what was needed, until she got older and had that attractiveness about her that meant men would just come up and keep conversation going long after she made it clear she wants to be anywhere but there (and rip Joshua can't go slightly jealous bf on them during this time).

Now Clídna likes being around people and having someone to talk to. She's always had a bigger community around her growing up with her father being in the military in both the Northern Territories and then once moving to Rosaria, she was around loud and boisterous men because he had to take her with him once her mother died and there was no other family to care for her while he worked. And despite the trauma she endured this aspect never waned and in fact she used it to her advantage. Jill was always someone that she wanted to protect and it started at first as this sense of women in a bad situation solidarity but then they became friends and Clídna was finding that as the two got older simply standing up and demanding the men leave them alone or at the very least Jill wasn't enough, so she befriended them and put on this different mask of social-ness so that should anyone get any ideas on wanting Jill she could just as easily step in and give them what they want, saving her friend (and eventual girlfriend) from having to partake in something she didn't ever want. Even when in the Empire's military she used this social aspect to keep herself safe being one of the few women among a lot of men, except for ol' Clive who was far from social at that time and man did it bug her that she couldn't befriend him like the other men. However after getting a bit closer to him she found so much relief in not having to put on this act for him and could let her social battery reset in a person she felt safe with. Upon first glance with her scarred face, muscle, and guardian demeanor many don't find her to be social and in fact almost down right scary, which she doesn't hate after using her sociability as a means of defense but she dislikes that it keeps people away because she does love people and the world and still holds out hope that they have good intentions. She's used to community and being seen as scary means being ostracized and that's well the opposite of community.

12. Is your OC cynical or optimistic? Who or what shaped their outlook on life?

Sahar has always been a bit of a cynic when it comes to life. She just has this underlying understanding that people won't ever see her in the correct lighting or just will dislike her for reasons unknown to her right off the bat. This can come from living around New York and being muslim and from the Middle East, along with the fact that her brother never really liked her and it showed and she never knew why. While she doesn't have an immediate bad faith interpretation of people it does underline everything she does. Before the hallucinations she never let herself get close to Steven Grant even though it was obvious that the two wanted to be in the few interactions they had, as she had a feeling he would just leave seeing there wasn't much to her. By the time she meets Marc she doesn't see him as trustworthy because something seems off and so keeping him at a distance is safe and boy was there some vindication when she found out about his DID and he knew for a long while that his alters knew her prior. Like to her there is always going to be another shoe dropping its just a matter of when.

Alma is cynical with people and their intentions, an optimist that life will be better, and a realist when it comes to her profession. Alma since she was young was always undercover to a degree and was warned against people she didn't know, as they could discover something they shouldn't and based on what happened with her parents being turned in to the empire of Sanbreque resulting in them being branded and then a life of slavery its understandable. She also just has always had such a small circle of people be close to her that makes it harder to branch out, but if those people trust or say someone is decent then she does the same because she trusts those closest to her to not put her in danger. Alma though has hopes that life will get better, she’s part of the change and since joining more of the outside world so to speak she sees there’s more people than she assumed also working for something better, it is also the only comfort she has because if there is no hope then why live at all? (And she saw a boy who should have and was pretty much dead come back from that trauma and still see good in the world around him) And lastly Alma is a doctor and she knows the dangers of false hope when it comes to promises about badly wounded people, she never promises unless she is absolutely certain she can follow through with it.

Clídna is an optimist overall, she has her hesitations with men but considering the abuse she’s been through it’s not a surprise. But Clídna wants to believe in the best of people, she sees each day as a new beginning, and god does it drive her to keep going. She is so so protective over it too that it is what drives her to be a guardian and fighter.

13. How important are romantic relationships to your OC? Do they prefer casual sex, short flings, or long term relationships? Do they want to get married or are they content with what they have? Or do they have no interest in romance whatsoever?

Sahar never planned on getting married or having a family and this is still true overall. She never put romantic relationships at the top of her priority list so they kind of went to the wayside as she focused on her career. She had a few relationships here and there with at least three of them being long term enough to live with one another (and one of those defacing her couch cushions when she broke up with him), but they didn't work out for various reasons and she was typically the dumper. Marc was a bit of a surprise really and was the one person she moved romantic relationship higher on the priority list, this was also true for Steven Grant back in the day, and she was pretty darn close to asking Jake Lockley out when he was her taxi driver. She's still on the fence on marriage but she was never outright opposed to it, especially when her parents were still alive, she wanted the fanfare of it if it felt right with the right person, but if neither of them wanted it they'd take to being the common law or courthouse married. She doesn't ever want to marry comic Marc but she wants the long term commitment to him, so they'd never make it official but won't correct anyone if they called them wife or husband. MCU Marc she has much more consideration for it but that would be years down the line maybe when they're a bit older and greyer.

Part of Alma's optimism towards the world does involve a better life happening for her in having a marriage, kids, the whole picture. She is a lover at heart and while it wasn't a goal necessary it was something she was on the lookout for in a way. While she fell for Joshua pretty hard, if it didn't work out with him she would have looked to others but all of them would be with the intention on finding a long term relationship, but thankfully the feelings were reciprocated and she holds onto the fantasies of the future with Joshua. It is actually within the story that he does ask her to marry him or commit to him whatever makes her happy when the world is saved, to which she says yes and the two eventually do and have three children. So I would say she's pretty happy with how things are currently between them!

Clídna for a long time wasn't looking for any kind of long term relationship, there was too much danger in it and frankly no time for such things. It wasn't until she and Jill started to fall for one another that she wanted more than casual relationships (though due to circumstances she still maintained the ones she had with the men). However once losing her Clídna goes back to casual and stays that way until she's allowed to have more room to consider if there was more than just a feeling of safety with Clive now that they were in each other's lives again. And it turns out that there was more between them just the survival instinct overrode anything other than safety and physical needs. Clídna's feelings for Jill never waned either and that was who she was holding out for in having a long term relationship with once more when they found one another. While things were a bit awkward in the beginning its not long after Cid's death that the three of them lean on each other more and come to the agreement that there is no point in anyone picking one over the other and just became a three way relationship. Their relationship isn't put out in the open very much because they don't want to have to explain it to everyone but its also obvious and everyone in the Hideaway and their associates know and just don't say anything because what business of it was theirs. Clídna is very much happy with how things are between her and her loves Jill and Clive.

[korora12]

I know this wasn't quite the prompt, but I went looking for Animorphs/Doctor Who xovers recently, and found far too few. So, here's the post-war Animorphs as companions of the Doctor:

Jake: His best shot at lasting longer than one adventure is if he's paired with one of the early Doctors; I think he'd clash with the later Doctors too much. 3 would be a good match for him. Jake would appreciate having someone competent, calm, and more experienced than him taking charge of situations. And 3, while avoiding lethal action as much as possible, was still more of an action hero than many of his successors, and was known to get in fights from time to time. Plus, 3 worked with UNIT military a lot, which Jake would like. And if he's still around when 3 regenerates, he'd see enough of Marco in 4 to make things work.

Rachel: None of the Animorphs would leave the planet in the middle of a war to go have fun adventures, and least of all Rachel, so this only happens in a Rachel Lives!AU. Rachel as a companion would either work fantastically, or immediately fail, depending on the circumstances. I think she'd work best with 9. At that point in his life, the Doctor is also fresh out of a war and still hurting in many ways. I think traveling with the Doctor would be good for helping her figure out who she wants to be in a time of peace. However, before that could happen she'd have to clear the initial hurdle of how she tends to respond to violent situations with overwhelming violence of her own, which the Doctor wouldn't appreciate. Still, assuming their first meeting doesn't immediately go tits-up, this xould work great. My headcanon for a Rachel that survives is that she takes some time to travel, to the see the world she fought to save; this would just be that on a larger scale. The only real question is whether she drags Tobias with her, or if they take time apart.

Tobias: A Tobias that travels with Rachel and a Tobias that travels alone because Rachel is dead have two very different experiences. Traveling with Rachel and 9, their adventures help him figure out his place in peacetime nearly as much as they help Rachel with the same. They also serve as a backdrop to the two of them figuring out, well, the two of them. Their relationship looks different when they're not regularly fighting and killing for each other. In this situation, I think Tobias would face even more pressure from Rachel than he might otherwise get to become human. Not only is the war over, but the Doctor's a genius. If Tobias has hangups about losing his ability to morph, there aren't a whole lot of people in the universe with a better chance at figuring out morphing technology and how to, maybe, give human-nothlit Tobias wings again. A Tobias without Rachel, however, still stays as a bird. He probably never even explains his entire situation to the Doctor, so there's never any offer to fix things. This Tobias is grieving a recent, major loss, and is losing his last connections to his humanity. Traveling with the Doctor, especially with 9 or 10 who are in similar situations, would help him forge new connections to humanity and would probably be really good for him in the long run. Alternatively, 13 would be interesting, as she has her own share of body issues that Tobias would understand better than most. However, he'd very quickly get fed up with her inability to share anything except the most immediately pertinent information, or to trust other people.

Cassie: Probably the best choice for a companion, as she complements the Doctor in many ways, and in ways similar to canon companions. She's a pacifist by nature, but knows how to be violent when the situation calls for it. She's also got some mystical mojo going on outside of being a morpher, like how she's temporally grounded. That sort of thing would absolutely gran the Doctor's attention. She may, in fact, be too much like the Doctor in some ways, with a serious risk of her enabling him in unhealthy ways, similar to how Clara enabled 12. Ironically, despite these similarities, she also might be one of the least likely to actually travel with him; she's got too much going on back on Earth to go gallivanting around space and time. Maybe if she could arrange a situation like the more recent companions have had, where she still lives on Earth in between adventures rather than full-time on the TARDIS, it could work out.

Marco: Marco was always the one who wanted the least to do with the war, so I think he's the least likely to hop in a spaceship to go on dangerous, wild adventures. He'd help out if he got caught up in some alien bullshit on Earth, because he's an Animorph, but he'd turn around and go right back to his burgeoning movie star career as soon as it was over with. Of course, not all of the Doctor's companions came along willingly; early on, the Doctor was a terrible pilot, and could spend subjective months trying to land anywhere near the correct time and place. So if Marco accidentally ended up in, say, 5's TARDIS, and didn't manage to get out before takeoff, he could end up being dragged around for a while. Still, he'd take the first chance he had to go back to his old life, thank you very much.

Ax: Post-war Ax has lost a lot of his sense of Andalite superiority, so I don't think he'd butt heads with the Doctor nearly as much as a younger Ax would. And the two also have one great big thing in common: they're both aliens who came to Earth, and ended up falling in love with the planet and people. Having said that, Ax is significantly fonder of his home than the Doctor is of his; learning about what the Doctor did to Gallifrey during the Time War would put a hitch in things. Still, all things considered, I think he'd understand; he did some pretty terrible things himself during his own war. I'd definitely want to pair him with one of the post-war Doctors just for that interaction.

And just for fun, Erek: A pacifistic robot dog? The Doctor would love Erek. However, I don't think Erek would actually travel with the Doctor; instead, he'd be a recurring character that could show up anytime the Doctor is on Earth. And I do mean any time. Landed in 25th Century BCE Egypt? A local stonemason helps the Doctor trap an unusually leonine Weeping Angel, revealing his own inhuman nature in the process. Ming Dynasty China? One of the Emperor's eunuchs flickers his hologram for a moment, then winks. 22nd century Dalek Invasion of Earth? One of the surviving humans jumps in front of a beam aimed at the Doctor's companion, only to stand right back up, seemingly unharmed; it's Erek. He's not always there, but often enough, and the order of their meetings doesn't line up the same for the both of them.

Would any of the Animoprhs and related cast be fans of Doctor Who?

I imagine getting really uncomfortable when the episode where Tegan gets possessed by Mara comes up.

What about Stargate? I think Stargate would be canceled because it's way to close to home.

What about a Stargate crossover with animorphs??

Another crossover idea is that series already have their concept of mind control and body jacking and when a Yeerk tries to possess an already “occupied” vessel the first “guest” goes GTFO or vice versa.

Sorry but this is my meat puppet. See Yugioh

I am not up on my sci fi classics! Any folks with Whovian/Stargate/Yugioh feels willing to weigh in?

[hopeonmyphone]

Seeing off military enlistment is like BTS and ARMY

The loyalty of BTS and the fandom culture of ARMY (fandom name) also shone.

On the 18th, J-Hope, a member of BTS (RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V, Jungkook), was the second member of the group to fulfill his military duty after Jin, and the enlistment scene, which was different from the past, drew attention.

On this afternoon, J-Hope entered the 36th Army Recruit Training Center located in Wonju, Gangwon Province. After receiving basic military training for five weeks here, J-Hope is assigned to his own unit and serves as an active duty soldier in the army. His expected discharge date is October 17, 2024.

Previously, Big Hit Music, the agency, said, “There is no separate official event on the day of admission to the boot camp. Since the boot camp entrance ceremony is a place where many soldiers and their families are together, we ask fans to refrain from visiting the site to prevent safety accidents due to congestion at the site. We ask that you warmly send off and encourage J-Hope with your heart."

J-Hope also said on his personal SNS, "I'll come back in good health," and through a live broadcast, "Don't be too sorry. As one of Korea's strong young people, I'm doing my duty, so I'll come back in good health." comforted

In the past, celebrities' enlistment sites were crowded with numerous reporters and fans to see them off one last time. He even received criticism for the fandom culture as it led to his traffic jam to the point where other soldiers and their families felt uncomfortable.

However, BTS and ARMY were different. Upon hearing the news of J-Hope's enlistment, which has a large fan club, the local government of Wonju City, police, firefighting, and military authorities mobilized fire trucks, ambulances, and control personnel to prepare for any possible safety accident, but no worrisome situation occurred.

At the scene, a purple placard symbolizing BTS and a bus wrapped with J-Hope's picture took the place of his send-off. Being considerate of J-Hope and other soldiers.

This mature fandom culture of ARMY was the same when Jin enlisted earlier. At that time, except for a small number of ARMYs, the fans' hearts were filled with only the hearts of the fans to keep the promise with Jin, who asked, "Our ARMYs, you must not come to the training center."

Also, just as all the members visited the site to see off Jin when he enlisted, it is known that all the members, including Jin, who was on vacation during military service, were together at the enlistment site of J-Hope. After enlisting on December 13 last year and completing basic military training, Jin is currently working as an assistant in the recruit training center.

Following Jin in BTS, J-Hope also started his military service. It is not yet known who the next enlistment will be, but it seems that BTS' activities as a whole will not be possible until at least 2025. Big Hit Music also set the goal of resuming team activities in 2025.

BTS and ARMY are warming the global music market with not only music but also a flawless fandom culture. In the future, attention is expected to be focused on whether he will show such a mature fandom culture at the next enlistment site

Source: Star News

[rinriya]

IF Masterpieces pt.1

Wayfarer by @idrellegames

This is a unique, original and incredibly interesting game. A rich plot, deeply written characters, unusual twists and turns, lots of choices and options, and an incredible amount of work involved. This game is absolutely unique in its genre and type. “Wayfarer” combines aspects of rpg and dark fantasy literature. There are many twists and turns that make it easy for your game to take a different path. All the decisions you make are sure to be reflected in the aftermath. An absolute must-have for fans of rpg, fantasy, and books. (My MC)

Werewolves: Haven Rising by Jeffrey Dean

This is an incredibly compelling story that will make you feel like a strategist who needs to make decisions in the most difficult situations and not break down. “Werewolves” is exceptional in its genre of military fantasy. The novel is full of unexpected twists and turns. Not in a "well I guessed it" kind of way, but in a "fuck what?" kind of way. It's insanely interesting, insanely suspenseful and thrilling. Discover terrible secrets and protect those who you care about. The path you have to go through will be very difficult.

A Mage Reborn by @mage-parivir

Do you want to have your heart broken? Then this game is for you. “A mage reborn” is an author's fantasy with a fully crafted world, laws, magic, and history. The long and beautiful descriptions make the lore fun to explore and learn, and the dynamic scenes allow you to immerse yourself in battles and tense situations. You know what this novel reminded me of? A good fantasy anime. It's got that classic sword-and-magic vibe with sacrificial hero. I like that drama. (My MC)

The Fog Knows Your Name by Clio Yun-su Davis

It's a very compelling story, moreover it’s finished! “TFKYN” is an intriguing and mystical story with a dash of detective, but more paranormal phenomena. The story is filled with mystery, oppressive atmosphere and tension, which perfectly conveyed in the text. Сanon in such stories is the end result of player choices. Who they want to be with, how they want to act, and what the result will be, but in this story, for me personally, a meaningful canon is only one. It's very painful, but beautiful storyline. 

The Soul Stone War by @intimidatingpuffinstudios

If you want to feel like an adventurer who gets into the most unusual and dangerous situations, then this game is clearly for you. An intriguing plot, fun company and a lot of adventure await you. Solve mysteries, fight and save the world. The plot is incredibly intriguing and you want to know all the secrets of your companions. You constantly want to know what happens next. (My MC)

Superstition by @13leaguestories

I play a lot of short stories, both IF and VN, but I rarely get emotional when I play them (I'm not the most easily impressible reader), but what the text of the Superstition did to me... I can't put it into words. It's been a long time since I was so emotionally tossed from side to side. This work is an incredible swing from which you constantly fall off, face into a dirt, but stubbornly get up and keep on swinging. This work is full of mysticism, darkness, twists and turns, drama, and oh yes, so many suffering. (My MC)

Wayhaven Chronicles by @seraphinitegames

I assure you, you will spend several nights without sleep, because “Wayhaven Chronicles” is the best modern fantasy. It's a detective story that will make you feel every dangerous and tense moment. This is a beautifully written story that you won't be able to tear yourself away from. Be a detective who's fighting for justice in this world and protecting people. Learn stunning secrets, discover a whole new world, and become the person who turns things upside down. Be the one who becomes an indispensable and important member of the plucky team. (My MC)

The Bastard of Camelot by @llamagirl28​​

If you love stories based on the legends of Arthur, then you should definitely play this awesome game. Become Mordred and write your own story. This is a very beautiful version of the famous legend. You can meet different people, ride a dragon, use magic and learn the secrets hidden in other people's hearts. Will you become the terror of Camelot, or will you prove to everyone that prophecies can be wrong? 

Supernatural in New York by @llamagirl28​

Immerse yourself in the world of supernatural creatures, meet many interesting personalities and join an extraordinary team to help and save others. This is a big and very interesting game that you read like a book! A great story, well-written characters and incredible adventures in the modern world, but with the supernatural addition. You will find colorful descriptions, many interesting references and choices that will affect future consequences. Also this story has the species nsfw scenes. Highly recommend. And tame your own dragon!

The Midnight Saga: The Monster by @the-keeper-of-midnight​

If you love well-thought-out story as much as I do, then you will definitely love this game. The story takes place in the modern world, but with elements of mysticism and the supernatural. Discover a completely different world, abilities and history! There are many interesting things in game: lore, monsters, abilities, even a parallel world! This is not a standard fantasy, because the author brought a lot of unique things to the story. The game is good not only with text, but also with quests. Yes, you can visit different locations, collect legendary weapons, create an armor and unlock the secret ending. You can even die in a variety of situations, so be careful! And omg, this game contains one of the spiciest and hottest nsfw scenes I ever read. (My MC)