#get revive daily health

[aestheteangel]

Surpriiiiiiiiise 💝

solar return chart observations🧩😛🥰💙:

moon in 6th house : more sensitive when people talk about and criticize them. It’s advised Take care of your health during this time. Too moody. can struggle with appetite mood swings.

Taurus rising/ Jupiter or Venus in 1st / Pisces/cancer/Sagittarius rising : can indicate gaining weight this year.

cancer mercury : can bring past memories/ events. The individual will think of the past too much this year and everything will remind them of it. can go back to something from the past wether it was a person or even a place they used to stay in in the past, such as an old school, house or any as such, and will stay in for a while.

If the wheel of fortune conjuct your north node this year, it means there’s a blessed bright future ahead of you, could the next year be better than this one, never theless the last months of this year could be better also. 💗

but if your wheel of fortune conjuct your sun this year, consider yourself lucky cause you will have to deal with “lucky girl/boy syndrome “ everything will just seem perfect, right time, at the right place with the right person. 💗

The occurrence of mars in the third house. Especially if it is in a fire sign. It may indicate that the person is more likely to engage in arguments and verbal altercations, and their “ tongue “ may be sharp and hurtful

Moon trine the twelfth. This is the be year in which you attract things you desire because of your high ability this year to attract.

Moon in the twelfth or in Pisces gives you a strong ability to imagine. The best time for writing gives you a high aesthetic sense by describing sensations and feelings.

Solar return moon square Venus. This year, you will have a review of your view of relationships and whether they benefit you in the first place, but it may give you a desire to get into many relationships.

Moon aspect Pluto, a lot of travels bf and exploring new things

Traveling/ new romance

Ruler of the ninth, twelfth/fourth/third , in 5th

A combination of planets in the ninth (especially if it is Jupiter/Sun/Mars/Rahu/Uranus/Pluto)

Ruler of the ninth/fourth/twelfth century AD, falling on the ninth of the year

Solar return

Aries rising : cutting hair; Owning a car

Gemini rising : Changes in social status, such as marriage, mingling with society, prominence (fame), or building projects.

One of the most powerful signs of travel..

Twelfth natal chart falls in

Fourth solar return

Fourth natal chart if it falls in

twelfth solar return

Among the indicators of marriage in the annual chart 💍 ...

-The presence of the moon in the wedges of the chart

-Positive Venus aspects to Saturn

-Venus is in the ascendant and in conjunction with the ruler of the ascendant

-The conjunction of the wheel of fortune with ruler of 7th

-Capricorn Venus , degree 20-21

-Juno in conjunction with the sun or moon

-aspects between the house 3,7,9

Moon in the sixth house of the year indicates that this year will be difficult in terms of completing daily tasks due to the presence of the moon in the sixth. The sixth house pulls the planet’s energy in a negative and tiring way. Here we see the large number of routine burdens accumulating on you and you feel a feeling of lack of accomplishment no matter what you do.

Moon In Gemini, it gives fluency in the tongue and gives you a desire to take initiatives, and if you have old relationships, you will revive them and always be the first to initiate.

Moon in a negative aspect with Neptune an indication of many white lies. Be careful not to manipulate anyone. Do not forget karma!

Sun- saturn aspect solar gives you a desire to change yourself and you try to enter self-development courses because the hexagon connection indicates attempt.

When Mercury/Uranus/Jupiter is present in the annual chart or transiting the Gregorian calendar in...

In homes: 9/12/6/3 Great opportunity for travel

Or work and study in another city and house 9/12

They symbolize scholarship, emigration, or foreign travel for a long period of one month or more and dealing

With a foreign environment, if you see opportunities, take advantage 👌🏻

Scorpio rising

In solar return :

Exhausting yourself, straining your soul... and paying a huge price for comfort

Either the stage of searching for a lifeline is like searching for a needle in a haystack.

-

Stay well, Scorpio ascendants in the annual year.. It's okay, this time will pass..

The presence of Uranus in your first house indicates the presence of sudden thoughts on an unplanned day, month, and time. As if a light came on out of nowhere. It is a sign that carries a start towards a desire that was born of the moment.

This aforementioned matter will continue with you throughout the year. In changing your appearance, modifying your appearance, registering in a club, performing an operation, or something related to your appearance. Sudden thoughts follow thoughts. In one of my years, Uranus was in my first house, and without planning, I got braces, and this is an example.

When solar Leo rising , regardless of the energy that will accompany the person throughout the year. From new and diverse interests, from a love of appearing on the scene, an irresistible desire for public appearance, and the necessary boldness and confidence that they will possess in an unusual and exceeding manner. Their fame, wide acceptance, and great popularity.

However, I find that the Leo is closely linked to the emergence of a new, exciting and special emotional relationship. The Leo sign in the year is not free of romantic relationships for you, and the ignition of the romantic and emotional side in your yearly horoscope that bears the Leo horoscope.

If you have solar mars conjunction sun in the 12th house, you are preparing to discover enemies that you thought were family or friends, and often hostility that is spiritual harm or deep pain, but you are sure to emerge from it stronger spiritually.

The best year in my life was in the Ascendant of Sagittarius, and Sagittarius is my second home in AD. Oh God, I can’t tell you how I was focused on my success and studies. I had a lot of freedom, I made many friends, and I was very social, and the friendships I made in the Ascendant of Sagittarius are still with me ❤️

A year in which the ruler of your fourth house is on the 9th could be a year in which you travel or move abroad.( I have this next year so if i actually moved I’ll let you know)

When Mercury is in conjunction with the midheaven, you may have to travel for work.

I have also found this to be true when the yearly ruler is with the midheaven in the ninth house.💗💗

The presence of ascendant in the sign of ‫scorpio‬ or the presence of‫ Pluto ‬in your first house. They are two sites that touch the self in a detailed way. Through these two connotations, there is a transition from something to something new. As if it was bidding farewell to an old version and receiving a new version. It indicates that there is an intense change that you will live with and on these basis you will begin to receive the new version of you, the good or bad of which depends on your reception of it.💗

When you have a year in which you have a close ascendant or Pluto in your first house, this story will begin to happen to you. A story of your change and change, and it will be a year that supports change. It supports transition, supports modification, whatever the situation may be, whether in your appearance or outside. Try to embrace the changes and make them positive for you.💗

love u 💟..

[entwinedmoon]

This month is the 40th anniversary of John Torrington’s exhumation and autopsy. I’ve been doing real-time daily updates over on this post to show just how long and drawn out the process was. It took over a week, starting from when Beattie arrived on Beechey to when they first started digging to when they finally got the coffin open. Right now, those updates are in a bit of a lull because, after they dug down to the coffin, they had to wait for permits to move onto the next part, so there won’t be another Daily Torrington Dig update until August 17.

While we’re waiting for Beattie to get his permits to crack open a cold one (Torrington’s coffin) with the boys (his scientific research team), you can check out my Torrington blog posts to keep the spirit of the season going. The posts Sacred to the Memory of and A Star Is Born would be especially applicable right now as they explore Torrington’s death, exhumation, autopsy, and the media’s response to the photographs of his well-preserved body.

But there’s something else I wanted to share here, another type of media response that I’ve known about (and had a copy of) for a while. I shared it years ago on Twitter, thinking it would get a laugh there, but that was, er, not the reaction I received, so I’d held off on sharing it anywhere else because I thought most people would find it inappropriate. However, I was reminded recently by a friend (don’t know if they want to be tagged here or not, so I’ll go with not) about the existence of this particular piece, and I realized that this might be something that would be more appreciated here on Tumblr, where we like to photoshop Torrington’s corpse into memes, ship him with the guy he’s buried next to, and want to see what he would think of Takis and flavored vapes.

The article I’m referring to is the story about Torrington that appeared in the Weekly World News.

If you’re not familiar with the Weekly World News, it was a notorious tabloid that made up absurd stories and pretended it was real news. Some news stories were actually true—so it wasn’t completely like today’s The Onion—but there were also plenty of clearly fictional articles, featuring bizarre, often supernatural stories, such as Elvis sightings, a double-decker bus mysteriously found at the South Pole (“scientists” claimed aliens did it), or Bat Boy, a boy who was part bat, part boy.

Torrington’s level of fame within the cultural consciousness of the time meant that he, too, got to experience the tabloid treatment.

(CW: pictures of Torrington’s mummified body beneath the cut)

Published on March 3, 1992, was this front-page story:

Man buried in 1845 brought back to life!

Sailor’s coffin frozen in arctic ice 147 years!

Hush-hush new drug revives corpse, say doctors!

Yes, according to the Weekly World News, John Torrington was brought back to life in 1992. There’s even a full article all about how it happened.

MAN FROZEN SINCE 1845 BROUGHT BACK TO LIFE!

Scientists revive seaman trapped in ice 147 years!

Sailor back from the dead still thinks James K. Polk is President of the U.S.!

By Cal Sanders, Special Correspondent

The perfectly preserved corpse of a British sailor who was buried in an icy grave after he died on an Arctic expedition in 1845 has been revived by scientists—147 years later!

And while Petty Officer John Torrington’s health is fragile at best, the team of doctors who illegally plucked him from his grave and brought him back to life say he is aware of his surroundings, walking with help and might very well be able to lead a normal life “if this man has the psychological strength to adapt to the 20th century.”

“It’s hard to believe but this man thinks James K. Polk is President of the United States and insists that horses and sailing ships are the best and fastest ways to travel,” Dr. Hermann Richter said in his report on the experiment that brought Torrington back to life.

“Electric lights literally scare the hell out of him and to be perfectly frank about it, he hasn’t quite decided if he’s dead or alive. About the best we can do at this point is take his recovery one day at a time.

“If Torrington survives we will have produced a living piece of history. If he dies, at least we’ll be able to say that we tried to do something that might ultimately have benefited all mankind.”

The decision to steal Torrington’s corpse from its grave in northern Canada couldn’t have come easy for the Richter team, which issued its report to selected European newspapers “from an undisclosed clinic in Germany.”

For starters, the young man’s grave has stood as an unofficial monument to the courage and determination of 128 adventurers led by British explorer Sir John Franklin—adventurers who gave up their lives to chart the last 300-mile-leg of the treacherous Northwest Passage between 1845 and 1848. Torrington’s body was exhumed once before, in 1983, but it was carefully reburied after scientists took a small tissue sample to determine the cause of death. As it turned out, Torrington died from lead poisoning after eating provisions out of tins that were sealed with the dangerous and often lethal metal. Needless to say, news that Richter and his associates secretly exhumed the body a second time, smuggled it into Germany and succeeded in bringing it back to life have infuriated many experts, some of whom consider the theft of the body criminal. Richter himself insisted that Torrington is in good hands and will be free to go when he is strong enough.

The doctor went on the say that he understands why the experiment might sound extreme to some people but he believes that the revival of Torrington “furthered the best interests of medicine and science.” Richter’s report did not include any of the techniques that were used to revive Torrington but it did mention “an exciting new drug” that might one day make such revivals routine.

Because he died of lead poisoning, it is also believed that Richter and his team somehow cleansed Torrington’s tissue of the deadly metal before bringing him back to life. For the record, Torrington was a man of 20 when he died. Now he looks like a man of 80, photos supplied by Richter show.

“A century and a half of death is enough to age anyone,” said Richter.

There’s a lot to unpack here—the morally dubious German doctor with a mysterious, Frankenstein-esque resurrection method; the burial and exhumation dates both being off by one year for some reason; the short, skinny guy in the obvious bald cap that they thought would pass as Torrington; and so much more. Interestingly, a lot of the article seems to focus more on how scandalous it is that Dr. Richter stole Torrington’s body, as if the writer thought that the revival of a long-dead corpse wasn’t enough of a scoop. Also, I’m not sure if Torrington would even have been aware that Polk was president in 1845—was he the sort of guy who paid attention to international politics? Wouldn’t it have made more sense for him to think Victoria was still queen?

Many people might be offended by such an article, but the Weekly World News never cared about who they offended. Unsurprisingly, one of those who did take umbrage with the story was Dr. Owen Beattie.

In a short article in the Times-Colonist Metro about a week after the Weekly World News story ran, we got to hear Owen Beattie’s reaction.

HEE-(T)HAW . . . It was standard checkout rag fare. “Man Buried in 1845 brought back to life” shouted a recent front page of Weekly World News. “Hush-Hush New Drug Revives Corpse,” it continued.

These startling revelations bore some significance for both the wax museum’s Ken Lane and University of Alberta anthropologist Owen Beattie. The man purportedly thawed like last night’s dinner was John Torrington, one of three sailors from the Franklin expedition buried on Beechy [sic] Island. The Franklin expedition—and John Torrington—feature large in the wax museum’s arresting Frozen in Time expedition. Torrington’s body was exhumed from its Arctic grave in ’84 by Dr. Beattie, who determined death was from lead poisoning.

Neither Ken nor the anthropologist felt their respective professional worlds crumbled with the News article. (It ran with a photo of an emaciated looking chap being assisted by doctors and reports that Torrington is terrified of electric lights, still believes Polk is the U.S. president, and horses are the only way to go.) Ken shrugged it off with a what-can-you-expect-from-a-checkout-rag laugh. The anthropologist wasn’t quite so forgiving.

He refused to comment on it at all, insisting that his research speaks for itself. Apparently John Torrington was quite dead when he was exhumed and equally so when buried after the autopsy. But then that’s not the sort of stuff that sells check-out rags.

While it’s perfectly understandable that Beattie would not appreciate something like the Weekly World News’ fake story, what I find most interesting about this snippet is that there was a wax museum with a Franklin Expedition exhibit that included Torrington??? Does that mean there was a Torrington wax figure???? Where is it now????? Can I buy it?????????

These very important questions aside, it’s fascinating to see that Torrington was well known enough to make it into a “checkout rag.” Maybe it’s not the legacy he would have wanted, but at least it’s worth a good laugh.

[potatoplace]

You Can Have It - Chapter 3

Alpha!Feysand x Omega!Reader

chapter 2 | chapter 4 | series masterlist

Story Summary: You've been a baker for 75 years, and are finally moving on from the Winter Court to the City of Velaris to start your own bakery after your grandmother passes. After your grand opening, the High Lord and Lady of Night become daily visitors to your bakery for months, every day having your most popular pastry- one that increases fertility for a short time. All the while, the two alphas want nothing more than to call themselves yours.

Warnings: A/B/O Dynamics, no rhys and feyre 😠

Words: ~5.3k

Author's Note: it's here! There will be a second chapter posted soon as well, I needed to cut this one in half otherwise it won't fit in one post. And I rlly want to get to the scene meeting Rhys and Feyre aaaahhhhh I hope you guys like this chapter!

18+ only pls

🤍🩵🤍💜🤍

Tuesday had passed quickly for you, spent with you writing down everything you needed for your bakery, the apartment, and garden in the building process.

You had a visions in your head for exactly how it should look- a log cabin similar in style to those in Winter, with a set of stained glass double doors depicting the cycle of dawn, day, and night during the winter season. The main floor of the bakery would be divided into two parts, with the actual kitchen area being in the back, separated by a wall stretching two thirds of the way across, leaving an open archway to connect the two on the left side. Windows of course, some in the front of the bakery as well as along the sides, and one that takes up most of the back wall of the kitchen, so that you’ll always be able to stare out the Sidra while preparing you baked goods.

At the far right of the kitchen, away from the access into the shop, you were going to have a spiral staircase leading up to your apartment if that was a possibility.

Upstairs, you would have a personal kitchen of your own, also against right side of the back wall of the building, with another large window to offer you the same benefit as the floor below. To the left you’d have your bathroom, sectioned off with walls- you were most excited about the large, possibly custom tub you’d have put in, with more than enough room for you to soak with your wings in the water if you wished.

The indoor part of the upstairs should cover about two thirds of the top floor, with your bedroom not separated by a wall from the kitchen. You wanted to feel free and open in your new home. That left the rest of the second floor for your small garden you were planning to have. Viviane had made sure you knew that you could take some of the plants your grandmother had lovingly planted and tended to. She had loved that garden so much, and had done as much as she could to revive the garden after coming back from captivity, teaching you to tend to them before her cursed illness had gotten too bad.

You were planning to have the space enchanted to act as a temperature controlled greenhouse, that way the frail Winter native plants could survive even in the summer. Among them would be a few bushes: hornberry, the fertility enhancing berries, chillberry, which grow berries that help to alleviate heats, and saiberry, a helpful berry and leaf for reducing the symptoms of ruts. You would also have a variety of medicinal herbs that you used in your pastries related to general health.

You were beyond excited to start drawing up the plans for the building as soon as you had the proper permits. When you went to bed that night, it was all you could think about.

Wednesday morning, you awoke to a note from Marcus, telling you that the demolition and construction permits were approved, and to get yourself over to your lot as soon as you could.

It was only seven in the morning, but you rushed to dress for the winter weather quickly, flying down the stairs and quickly but carefully making your way to the Rainbow.

More snow had fallen overnight, and hardly anyone was out at this time. Most of the streets were still untouched by fae, and silent with the extra help of the snow. You reached the edge of the Rainbow quickly, and spotted Marcus among a dozen other men, all dressed warmly and carrying a variety of construction tools or busying themselves with the two large carts in the middle of the street, attached to two massive horses.

“Y/N!” Marcus exclaimed as soon as he met your eyes, marching over to you and pulling you back to the group. “This is our new boss for the next couple of months, gents, be nice to her, alright?” The men all nodded their heads in agreement, keeping their eyes respectful when they did dart across your form, though many lingered on your wings. “So, Y/N, would you like to take the first swing?” Marcus asked you, already handing you a heavy sledgehammer.

“Why not?” You said lightly, approaching the dilapidated building. You took a swing at one of the windows, and glass went flying into the building. The males behind you whooped, then followed your lead and began tearing down the building as quickly and effectively as they could. You turned back to Marcus, handing him the sledgehammer.

“Y/N, if you’re available now, I’d like to start drawing up the floor plans for your bakery,” Marcus suggested, and your face broke into a grin.

“I’d love nothing more than that, Marcus. But, could we get breakfast first? I came as soon as I woke up,” you said, blushing when your stomach growled, as if to prove your point.

Marcus only chuckled and took your arm, leading you East to the Palace of Flame and Steel. “Of course we can get breakfast, there’s this cute little restaurant that should be open right now, they serve some amazing breakfast foods there.”

As promised, the food in the cozy restaurant was delicious. You’d had a scramble with potatoes, peppers, onions, and sausage, topped with a good amount of cheese. The two of you left feeling stuffed, and made your way to his office, shucking off your winter gear and hanging it on the hooks near the door.

Marcus quickly started a fire in the fireplace, adding some much appreciated heat to the room. The two of you settled in around his desk, and Marcus pulled out a notepad, quill and ink.

"So, do you know what type of building you'd like? Brick, stone, wood..."

"I'd prefer having a log cabin style of building, if that's a possibility," you said, hoping that it would be.

Marcus smiled at you and wrote down your answer. "Of course we can, and we can even go to the lumber yard in a couple of days to pick out the type of wood you'd like, Y/N. Now... what were you thinking for the floor plan?"

"I want it to be a two story building, with the top floor being dedicated as an apartment and also a garden, if everything works out."

"A garden on the second floor?"

You nodded your head. "Yes, I'm planning to have it enchanted so that I can grow some Winter crops year round, and they'll be safer off the ground, I think."

"Alright, that should be doable enough. If you'd like I can direct you to an interior designer who also specializes in home and business enchantments, she should be able to make that garden happen for you."

"Perfect!" You said, clapping your hands together excitedly. Everything was already seeming possible.

The two of you spent the next five hours going over every detail that you wanted built into the building, and by the end of it he had a preliminary sketch of the building.

"The main problem with your spiral staircase would be getting the tub and furniture up and down the stairs. I do happen to have a couple of Illyrians working in my company right now, so we should be able to get the tub up before the roof's construction is done, but the furniture would most likely need to be fully assembled upstairs, or we fly it in before the roof is finished."

You bit your lip for a moment, considering your options. "That would be fine, getting everything in before the roof is finished. Would there be any problems with doing that?"

Marcus shook his head. "No, it's more just something to consider. The spiral staircase will save you some space, so it's a good idea for your floor plan to keep as much space on the first floor for the bakery. Go ahead and look over the blueprint, and tell me if anything is off." He slid the paper over to you, careful not to smear any of the still drying ink.

Your eyes greedily took in the floor plans, already looking exactly how you wanted it. The main floor was divided in the way you had pictured, and the kitchen would be wide enough to accommodate your wings and even another person, if you ended up needing to hire someone to help you.

Only one thing was missing, something you'd hadn't thought of until now.

"Would it be possible to have a fireplace on both floors? On the main floor, about halfway through the front room and on the left, and on the top floor one on the right, after the spiral staircase?"

Marcus looked at the plans for a moment before answering you. "Yes, that should be doable, especially if we allow the chimney to stick out and along the side of the building for the first floor one." He quickly sketched in the fireplace on the floor plan, then turned to the exterior mock up and added the chimney to the side. "Does that look fine to you?"

"Yes, that looks perfect! Thank you!"

"It's no problem, Y/N," Marcus said with a soft smile. "If you think of anything else you'd like in the blueprints, you can either send me a note with it or come here, I'm normally in from six in the morning to six at night."

"I'll make sure to let you know, but I honestly think we got everything down!" You said excitedly.

"I'm glad to hear that, Y/N. The tear down process should be finished by the end of the week, including getting someone in to cast a charm to keep snow from falling over the lot. Then the actual building process after that, as long as everything goes right and all we need to build is available, shouldn’t take more than two months. Now, would you like me to show you to that interior designer I mentioned?" He offered.

"Oh, I'd love that!" Right as you said it, your stomach growled loudly once again. You looked up at him sheepishly. "Want to go to lunch first?" You asked with a chuckle.

"I'd love that," Marcus replied, already standing from his chair and stretching.

You did the same, finally feeling the tension that had built in your body from sitting for so long. Your wings fluttered slightly as they stretched, before you finally relaxed once more.

The two of you threw on your outerwear again and headed out of Marcus's office, and you let him lead you to another restaurant, a different one than this morning.

"This is my favorite spot for lunch, they have these delicious sandwiches," Marcus said as he held the door open for you, letting you walk in first before following you.

It smelled heavenly inside, and if your watering mouth was anything to go by, you knew he was correct.

"I'll have whatever you're having," you told Marcus before he stepped up to the counter. "I'm sure whatever it is will be tasty, but I can't choose between all of those options," you laughed.

"That's fine, Y/N. Any foods you want to avoid?" Marcus asked, looking down at you as you shook your head. "Alright then." He stepped up to the counter, you following right behind him. "We'll have two of your cheesesteaks, please.” Marcus went to hand over his bank card like he had for breakfast this morning, but you beat him to it, grinning at him when he put his card away while shaking his head, a matching expression on his face.

After you paid, the two of you took a seat at a table near the windows, only waiting a couple of minutes to be served your sandwiches. “Thank you.”

“It’s no problem, dearie,” the older high fae said with a smile before she walked back behind the counter.

“And thank you, Y/N, for buying me this delicious lunch,” Marcus said to you, right before taking a large bite of his sandwich.

“Well, you did pay for breakfast,” you said before you followed suit, finding the sandwich made of thinly sliced beef, onions, peppers, and cheese to be just as good as he’d said it would be.

“How’s Velaris been treating you so far?” He asked you after a few minutes.

You swallowed your bite, then said “It’s been really nice so far, everyone’s been very welcoming and I just feel so lucky to be here, and already be making so much progress on my business.”

Marcus smiled at you. “I’m glad to hear it, Y/N. I hope everything continues to go your way.”

“Same here. How’s your life been treating you?”

“Oh, it’s going well right now. My business has been doing better than ever in the past two years since I had a contract with the High Lady, and I happen to have a very sweet new client,” Marcus replied, and his words made you blush.

“That’s good to hear. What was it like working for the High Lady?”

“Feyre and the High Lord, Rhys, were both extremely easy to work with, pretty similar to how it’s been working with you. They knew exactly what they wanted and were good at describing it. It was an honor to work with them, and one of the best experiences I’ve had since taking over the business.”

“They sound like a lovely pair of rulers for the Court, then.”

“Oh yes, I feel we are one of the best treated cities in all of Prythian. And they’ve even begun taking steps to change how Illyria and the Hewn City are run,” Marcus added.

The two of you finished eating, and all you could think of was the High Lord and Lady, and that all of the good you’d heard about them in Winter had to be true, if Marcus, a citizen of Velaris, believed it to be true as well.

“Now, let’s get you to Gabrella’s shop, she is newer to the business, only having moved here five years ago, but all of my clients that I’ve sent to her have nothing but good things to say about her,” Marcus said, extending an arm to you after he’d returned your plates to the front counter.

He led you a few blocks away from the restaurant, deeper into the Palace of Flame and Steel. The two of you stopped in front of cute, red brick building with flower beds lining the front, covered in snow at the moment. Marcus opened the door for you, and you stepped inside, immediately loving the cozy feel of the shop, and you spotted an fae female, with large, black leathery wings coming from her back.

They were absolutely beautiful.

You’d heard of Illyrians before, and as a child had thought that wings without feathers could not possibly be pretty, but your child self was proved wrong the moment you laid eyes on her wings.

“Welcome in- oh, Marcus! Another client of yours, I presume?” The fae asked as the two of you made your way back to the counter she was seated at.

Her smell hit you, a sweet blend of mountain air, honey, and some type of berry that you couldn’t quite place- an omega. That instantly put you at ease. It’s not that Marcus’s scent wasn’t nice, the snow and pine mix was pleasant, but knowing that at least one of the people you’d be working with for the next couple of months is an omega was calming.

“Yes, my name is Y/N. I’m going to be opening a bakery with an apartment upstairs in the Rainbow soon, and Marcus is helping with the construction aspect. He said that you’re an interior designer?”

The Illyrian nodded her head and replied, “Yes, my name is Gabrella. I do interior design work and household and business enchantments.”

“Would you be able to show her a bit of your work, Rella?” Marcus asked. “She’s wanting a greenhouse for year round Winter native plants, and I know you just recently finished something similar.”

Gabrella’s eyes lit up at that, and she stood from her spot behind the counter. “I would be delighted to show you something like that, Y/N. Marcus, you can come too, if you don’t have anything else to do.”

Marcus looked at the clock on the wall to the left, sighing when he saw the time. “No, I should be getting back to check on the boys, make sure the demolition is going to plan,” he said, making his way to the door. “Y/N, remember that you can come by my office from six to six if you need anything, and you’re always free to stop by your lot at any time, alright?”

“Thanks you, Marcus. I’ll probably see you sometime tomorrow.”

“That sounds good,” he said, leaving with a wave.

“Bye Marcus!” Gabrella said right before he shut the door. “Alright, Y/N, I’ll have you come upstairs with me, my garden is on the third floor.”

You followed the other fae up the stairs, then up one more set, coming out onto a beautiful rooftop garden, filled with lovely blossoming tropical flowers. The air was warm and humid, even with their being no walls or roof.

“This is amazing,” you said, trailing your hands over a few of the blooms lightly. “How were you able to do this?” You asked, turning to Gabrella.

“Well, it took a couple of years for me to get the enchantments perfect, but it’s not too different from doing an indoor temperature control charm. It does require a bit more magical power, especially if the plants need any else besides the temperature controlled. Like the humidity, that was the part that took me the longest to get down, but now that I have, all of my sweet little plants are thriving,” Gabrella explained, looking down fondly at all of the flowers she’d been able to grow thanks to her magical talent.

“Would you be able to do something similar for me?” You asked hopefully.

“I believe I could, it may take a couple of tries to get the climate just right for you. Do you have an idea of when your building will be finished enough to start the garden?”

“Not quite, though Marcus said the whole process should take a little over two months. I’m just not sure when the second floor would be available to put the garden and enchantments in.”

“That’s perfectly fine, we can play it by ear. Were you wanting my services for anything else?” Gabrella asked, gesturing for you to head back downstairs.

“Yes, I was hoping that you would be my interior designer as well, along with any other enchantments I’d need for my building.”

“Wonderful, I’ll grab a contract for you right now,” Gabrella said after you took a seat in one of the stools in front of the counter. She rifled through a filing cabinet, pulling out a few pieces of paper. “Alright, before anything gets signed, I’d like to know what type of enchantments you’re going to want, as well as the areas of interior design you’d like help with.”

“Obviously you know about the garden,” you said, and the both of you chuckled as she wrote it down. “Plus temperature control for both floors of the building, a fireproofing charm for the kitchen if you’re able to do that.”

“Oh, yes, that’s a popular one, with the city being tightly packed everyone wants to avoid causing a fire in case it takes out a whole neighborhood,” Gabrella said. “Were you going to have a kitchen in the apartment upstairs?”

“Yes, I can’t believe I forgot to mention that,” you laughed, surprised that you were missing a few details. It had to be all the excitement, you had been drawing up floor plans all day. “Do you do plumbing enchantments?”

“Mhm, as long as you have actual plumbing pipes installed in the building, we’re able to get hot and cold water running, as well as connect it to the city’s sewer system,” she answered. “Knowing Marcus, he’s already gone over that with you?”

You nodded your head. “He sure did, he was very adamant in making sure I knew where all of the pipes would be going through the wall.”

“Yes, he’s very thorough like that. That’s why he’s one of the most in demand builders during the typical construction season. Did you have any other enchantments you were hoping for? If you can’t think of them now, I’m always able to add to your total bill, it’s just better in my experience to have as full a picture of the cost before we begin doing the actual work.”

You wracked your brain for any other spells you might need- “I’d like an enchantment that will keep the scent and sounds of the second floor separate from the first floor,” you stated, heat rising to your cheeks.

“That’s a good one!” Gabrella said enthusiastically, writing it down on the paper. “It’s very helpful for if you want to keep your business open with another staff member while you’re in heat, I have that one on my own apartment upstairs,” the omega said with a kind smile. “Anything else, or should we move on to the interior design portion?”

You couldn’t think of another enchantment you might need at the moment. “Interior design, but I’ll let you know if I think of something else.”

“Very good. For the bakery portion, what were you wanting help with?”

“I’d definitely like your help in picking out the furniture, the appliances, and the general look of the inside, and any recommendations or help with a stained glass artist that creates door panels. I do know generally what I want it to look like, but being new to town I would have no idea of where to start.” You thought about that for a moment. “So pretty much everything about it, I’d like your help with,” you giggled.

Gabrella joined you, her laugh so pleasant and fun. “That’s perfectly fine, I love helping create an entire vision! They’re the most fun for me, when my client knows exactly what they want and we just have to scavenger hunt for it all around the city.”

“That’s good, otherwise this would be a real chore for you,” you said jokingly, already loving Gabrella’s personality.

“For the second floor, what were you wanting help with?”

“Most everything again, though with the bedroom I’ll need a bit less help, nesting needs are pretty easy to satisfy on your own,” you replied, mind conjuring a soft nest filled with fabrics in light blues, silver, and white.

“I get that, nests and bedrooms are so personal to us omegas.” Gabrella’s smile was soft as she finished writing everything down. “Alright, I believe with the number and complexity of some of the enchantments, that part will run you for around 50,000 gold marks, and we do offer lifetime warranties on all of them. So if one starts to go faulty, just stop by and I’ll come and fix it as soon as I can for you. And the interior design portion will be around 25,000, and that will include the price of most items, delivery of them, and getting everything in place for you, as well as my help and advice in picking out items. Does a total of 75,000 gold marks sound reasonable to you, with these terms?” Gabrella asked, sliding a contract over to you.

You read it, including the warranty, and thought it all sounded perfectly reasonable. You picked up the extra quill she had sitting in an ink pot and signed your name to the contract. “Yes, this all sounds fine to me. Did you want to take payment now, or later?”

“If you have your bank card on you at the moment-” you were already pulling it out. “Then I’ll take a fifty percent deposit for a total of 37,500 gold marks now, and once the project is complete I’ll take the other half of the payment, plus or minus however much it falls from the estimate.” She pressed your bank card to the ledger on her desk, then handed it back to you. “I’m so happy to get to work with you, Y/N. You seem like a lovely person so far, and I do love a good bakery.”

“I’m looking forward to working with you as well, Gabrella. And I’m glad to know another omega in the city, I’ve only met one other omega here so far.”

“Yes, there aren’t too many of us here, but it’s so safe and free, I think we have a higher population of omegas than most other cities in Prythian. I’m sure you’ll meet more soon enough. Also, you can call me Rella. We’ll be working together for a while, and I have this funny little feeling that we’ll be friends,” Rella said kindly. “Now, would you like to go look at some kitchen stoves and counters if you have time?”

You beamed- nothing would have excited you more at the moment. “I would love to do that, it’s one of the areas I’m looking forward to furnishing most!”

Rella offered her arm to you, which you gladly took. “Perfect! Now, what type of color scheme were you wanting for the kitchen? It might change which shops we go to.”

“I think… soft pastels? Possibly winter themed, or maybe in pinks.”

Rella grinned at you. “I’m liking you more and more with every passing minute,” she said, dragging you away from her shop after locking it up. “We’re going to Arana’s shop, she has the cutest kitchen and dining room furniture you will every see!”

In a few minutes, after a couple of twists and turns through the streets, you arrived at a pastel pink shop, looking very much out of place next to the mostly dark, wooden building surrounding it. Rella pulled you inside, shouting “Arana! I have a new client, you’re going to love her!”

A female stepped out from a back room, ice blonde hair and white wings at her back.

Peregryn. Another Peregryn.

You’d only ever met you’d mother, no others of your kind before. And as you got closer to her- and omega, with a soft scent of pine, cinnamon, and fresh air.

“Well, it’s rare to meet another Peregryn in Velaris, my name is Arana. And yours is…?”

“Y/N, it’s nice to meet you,” you said as you shook her hand.

“It’s nice to meet you as well,” Arana responded warmly. “You said she’s a client of yours, Rella?”

“Yes, she’s building a bakery in the Rainbow-”

“Wonderful! I’ve been wanting a bakery on this side of the Sidra for so long, I hate walking all the way over to the other side in the winter,” Arana interrupted, the looked to Rella sheepishly. “Sorry, Rella, go on please?”

“I know, I’m excited about it too,” Rella laughed. “Shes working with Marcus, and it sounds like they’re still in the process of tearing down the previous building, but the two of us would like to start looking for furniture, countertops, and of course stoves.”

“Oh, is it gonna be a cute bakery?” Arana asked hopefully, and you nodded your head.

“Yes, it’s going to look like a log cabin, and I’m hoping the furniture I get will make it look cute and cozy inside!” You gush, so happy that there are people already excited about your business, even if you were going to be paying them a lot of money in the process. The two of them sound genuinely excited about it, so that didn’t matter.

“Oh, you’ll need log chairs, probably with a selection of different colors of cushions, maybe even some log benches, plus log tables of course to go with the little log theme-”

“All of that sounds great! Do you have any in here?” You asked, already wanting to see some.

“I don’t have any log furniture at the moment, but the shop next door does. I’ll be able to provide the cushions for them, though I’d recommend waiting to pick them out until you know the type of wood you’re using, so that you get the best color match,” Arana offered, pointing to the shop east of hers. “I do have plenty of stove and countertop options, if you’re wanting to go for bright colors in the kitchen. And I do make display cases as well, when you’re ready to look for those.”

You smiled in excitement and said, “Show me the stoves, please.”

🤍🩵🤍💜🤍

The three of you spent the next few hours looking at all Arana had to offer, and you found many different options that you liked. It all depended on what color scheme you ended up going with, but whether it would be done in blues, whites, and silvers or in soft pinks and purples, you were sure you’d be buying from Arana’s store.

The designs and sturdiness of her furnishings were perfect in your opinion, and you were so excited to see your kitchen come together once the building was finished.

You and Rella waved goodbye to Arana as you departed, promising to come back in a few weeks to finalize your decisions, having been sent home with a pamphlet filled with the designs of furniture she offered so that you could think on it further.

You and Rella parted at her shop, leaving you to walk back to the Inn alone, relishing in the sounds of the city as it came alive for the night.

It was nearly seven in the evening when you passed by a restaurant at the end of the Palace of Hoof and Leaf, right next to the bridge that would get you home. The smell coming from the restaurant was heavenly, full of garlic and smelling as though it could burn your tongue with the spice alone. You entered the restaurant, and were quickly seated at the bar, admiring the lively atmosphere before looking over the menu. They served noodle bowls, most of them having a between three and five little peppers drawn next to their names. Judging by the smell in the air, you wouldn’t survive more than a two pepper dish, so you choose the one that had the most garlic in it, sautéed with chicken, zucchini, green cabbage and onions, and of course noodles.

The dish you got was fantastic, as garlicky as you’d hoped for and spicy enough to bring tears to your eyes.

All of the food you’d had in Velaris so far was amazing, and you were excited to delve further into the cookbook that you had back in your room, if these were the types of recipes that were waiting for you.

After paying, you made your way back to the inn more slowly than before, taking time to admire the people skating on the now frozen over Sidra. Everyone seemed to be happy.

It was nice to be a part of that, of a city so joyous at all times.

By the time you made it to your room, it was past eight, and you wanted nothing more than a hot bath and some sleep.

You stripped out of your dress after taking off your outerwear and boots, then peeled off your tights and underthings. You would need to do laundry soon, but that’s a problem for tomorrow.

Your bath was lovely, the hot water warming you nicely and stealing the tension from your muscles. Your bed was even lovelier, so fluffy and soft, and you drifted off to sleep just a few minutes after your head landed on the pillow.

Series Taglist: @icey--stars @breadsticks2004

[yamujiburo]

I'd like to join the kind words dogpile that seems to be happening and thus! I've been following your art stuff for a long time and have always gotten HUGE enjoyment out of it. I've loved every moment of your hanamusa comics from the get-go!

I love that weight gain is shown as a sign not just of health but of HEALING with Jessie's character, something not just to be accepted but actively celebrated. Because she is safer, stabler, better cared for. I love equally that James and Meowth are a part of that, both as Jessie's friends, for her recovery, and for their own separate paths forward. It's all just a wonderful cartoon villain redemption story, right up my alley.

Additionally, within the past year, year and a half range, I've slowly started drawing again. For most of my life I drew for at least a while every single day. I was never not dreaming up stories and there's still nothing I love more than sharing the little worlds inside my head, but things were pretty rough and unstable for my family for a couple of years and its impact on my mental and physical health led to my ceasing to draw almost entirely for those couple of years.

Having the energy and luxury to pursue art again has been a healing step and I'm slowly getting back into a groove of trying to sketch a bit daily. I'm having to relearn a lot of things that used to feel almost as natural as breathing, so it's often as draining and frustrating as it is cathartic and fun.

It's been so long since I did much of anything with my own ideas and stories that I often feel tapped out on creative fuel, but following the hanamusa arc and seeing how much joy other people take in it- and most importantly that you take in it and in sharing it- have helped revive a lot of love and inspiration for my own takes on the Ketchum family and my still intense and deep love of the anime series. My portrayals and such are wildly different from the adventure of hanamusa, but I love them both and have been grateful for the courage and persistence the presence of your art and writing have lent me. So you have my sincere thanks for simply Being, and for sharing of yourself and your ideas!

I know you doubtlessly get a LOT of messages every single day, so I hope you'll not feel a need to reply to this one because there is no need at all. If and when you have a chance to read this, I do hope it brightens your day a bit, like jessie. ash and delia always brighten mine. Be well, and I hope this coming year will be full of positive experiences for you!

aw thank you, i really appreciate it! (and thank you to everyone else who's been sending nice asks)

it makes me happy to hear you've been able to start drawing again! drawing and sharing my art makes me feel so at peace and happy and i only hope it makes anyone else who does art feel the same

best of luck with all your art making endeavors!

[milksuu]

Hello!! thank you so much for carrying the heartbeats and for reviving the the league tumblr fandom. you are doing us are great service orz

Anyway may I request something nsfw with yone? just some general hcs if you do that. but if not then, what does he think of lingerie or what does he do when he needs to let off some stress? I personally think he doesn’t have much of a sex drive but what about the days where he does feel like it?

❥ prompt: Yone has more than one way to deal with his stress. ❥ content/warnings: nsfw 18+, masturbation ❥ characters/pairings: Heartsteel!yone

Yone would never mention anything about his private life. Whatever happens behind closed doors isn't anyone's business. Whether he pleases himself or not, it's never a topic he entertains. He does his job, he provides receipts. What's more to discuss?

Stress is inevitable. Comes with the demands of the music industry, celebrity lifestyle, and overall business management side of his career. Yone keeps a strict regime in the form of daily habits, which helps reduce stress by making things consistent.

Wake up at 4AM and take a morning jog for improved energy and health. Next, mindful yoga and meditation to improve focus. Then, a cold shower to increase metabolic function. After that, he reads a news article while drinking cold brew in complete, and qualitative silence.

However, some days prove to be more challenging than others. And his usual methods prove to be futile. As if all of his meticulous daily planning is all but thrown into an endless void. And he's only wasting precious time and energy. A pet peeve of his. When he's in this state, it breeds a terrible habit. One that he hasn't been able to shake off since his early college days, and that's smoking.

But there's a formula for when this happens. It happens at a specific place, at a specific time, within a specific headspace. Taking place in his private office, well into the night hours, and the emails seem endlessly blaring against his laptop screen.

He needs to take a moment to step around his room. Shifting through what is personally self persevering, to what exactly isn't. He's a man of logic. He rationalizes with himself. He doesn't do it often. Not often enough to completely quit, at least.

He keeps his cigarette pack and a single lighter inside a locked drawer at his desk. He lights one, taking a deep breath as he steps to his office window. He cracks it open, where a discreet ashe tray sits on the outside sill. He taps against the tray, staring at a ceiling that has changed so often in his life. Consistency, regime, habits...those were the only comforting things in such a fast paced world.

The nicotine hits perfectly. Easing the tension in his mind. As if the wires are slowly, but surely uncoiling. It eases him to the point of pouring himself a ball-glass of expensive whiskey, gifted by another Riot employee at a private soiree. A few more puffs and he ashes the cigarette. Taking a sip of the whiskey, he decides to nurse it at the desk. Time to get more work done.

He finishes sending the last email, wraps up a phone call with Alune, and creates his last reminders for tomorrow. It's time to prepare for bed. Which consists of a night time shower. Wash away the the smoke possibly lingering against his skin. Wash away pestering thoughts from the day. Wash away anything that doesn't serve him.

The hot water glides down his shoulder and back muscles. Drop by drop, it eases the tension of fibers. Yone closes his eyes, exhaling into the feeling. Behind his lids, he notices his insides feel warm, and his senses tingling. Ah...that brand of whiskey may have had a higher alcohol proof. He should have read the label. He runs his long fingers through his hair down the length of his neck. Doesn't matter. He's going to sleep after this. He may even get better rest because of it.

Twitch. How annoying. That pool of warmth travelled from his stomach well into his groin. He stares down at his erection, dripping with shower water. He was a man of logic and reason. Restful sleep wasn't promised if he first didn't take care of this inconvenience. Efficient in all facets of his life, servicing himself was no different.

He took himself in his hand. A low exhale, squeezing at his base. He closed his eyes again. His head buzzing from the whiskey. Black thigh-high pantyhose. He stroked upwards. Black pencil skirt. He dragged his hand back down. No underwear, straddling a leather office chair. He dragged his hand up and down, coating himself. Despite the warm water, a shiver ran down his spine. Nipples fully visible through a white blouse. His brows knitted together. He huffed, placing a free-hand against the shower wall for support. His cock slick and throbbing. Cherry red lipstick. Tongue circling the head of a cherry lollie. An audible moan escaped him. It bounced against the shower tiles, echoing around him. Licking and sucking. Licking and sucking. Until—Pop!

A hot, white flash of pleasure washed through his veins. His cock pulsed from the pressure, until his fluids came shooting. He caught a loud moan in his throat, gripping tightly around his shaft. Working himself through his climax, he messaged out the last of come from his tip. His mind, full of nothing but an erotic fantasy, now hummed with static emptiness.

Damn, he was exhausted.

an: REJOICE. secretly obsessed with this man. ty ty for the yone req. anon!

[risetherivermoon]

the oak-swallows-garcia's at the time of the epilogue!! this is also me working on revamping some designs..stay tuned, im planning on doing this with all of the families! tho idk if ill get to it...we'll see

i feel like hero looks a lot like the twins where norm looks a lot like rebecca, especially as she got older, i need to revamp my design for her or at least make a proper one lol, as well as one for s2 hero

started with these guys because i have not stopped thinking abt them since the finale, like oh my god...this family man.

(HUGE descs of post-canon/epilogue hcs below cut, as well as closeups!)

first off: Hero! (i posted a wip/close up of her a bit ago but that was before i realized i got the ages wrong,) she's 40, working for NASA after going to college, she's currently single, living with her two best friends she met in college and their cat, Momo. She's living her best life, still in therapy, and is finding it to be very helpful. She hasn't spoken to the Twins and Rebecca in about six or seven years, but keeps in contact with Normal regularly, after everything that happened while she was a child and years of therapy she decided it was best to go no contact with them, they respect her decision. Her and Normal call every few weeks just to catch up.

Normal! not too different from what was already described in canon, he's 38, living alone outside of California, he attempted to go to college after graduation and ended up dropping out in his Sophomore year, after a mental health crisis got him way off track. Now he's working a retail job in Boston, while attempting to go back to school and graduate. He hasn't exactly put in the effort to keep in contact with the rest of the teens, though Scary and Linc call or text him every now and then. Normal was at there wedding, and attends every one of Gerry's birthday parties. He's in contact with his parents, though mostly only Rebecca. He's in therapy, but he's still struggling. He is also still talking to Henry, and he visits Oakvale every now and then, just to say hi to him and his Aunt Birdie. (screw yall shes real to ME)

Rebecca! At 60, She and the twins are still living in San Dimas, she's only just now retired officially, though living comfortably with the money from Swallow's ice cream. Her marriage with Sparrow has always been rocky, but they're at a point where it's easier to live together and stay married. Though they more so are living as friends other than a married couple. Her relationship with Lark has always been weird, though she'd consider them good friends as well. She texts with Normal practically daily, because she worries about him a lot. After she died for a brief amount of time, she started to rethink a lot of things in her life, one of those things being the amount of time she spends focusing on her kids and making sure they're alright. If Normal was anyone else he'd probably say she was being too clingy. Shed attempted to revive her dying relationship with her daughter as well, but inevitably respected her decision once Hero decided to go no-contact. She still asks Norm about her though.

Sparrow!! this one is interesting! At 31 (pre-s2), he hits a specific point as a druid where he gains the Timeless Body ability, where his aging slows as he gets older, Sparrow wasn't aware thats what was happening until he realized around his mid forties that he wasn't looking any different. After a long conversation with Henry, he figures out that's what's happening. He doesn't tell anyone besides Lark for a while until it's too noticeable to hide. at 59, he's living at home with Rebecca and Lark still, and is spending most of his time gardening and painting, or attempting to keep his mind off of...everything. Sparrow isn't living happy or comfortably, though it seems that way from an outside point of view. He finds himself trying to ignore everything going on around him, the fact his life is in shambles, and the inevitable of his loved ones dying before him. He throws himself into his art, to the point where Rebecca has to drag him out of their art studio (their garage) to eat and sleep. He barely leaves the house, because people around town had already started to notice how young he looks.

Lark!! agghgh if you thought my sparrow description was a bummer get buckled. Lark never really recovered from the aftermath of The Doodler and Code Purple, he had really been solely living off of his dedication to fixing everything. So once everything was fixed, he crashed. Badly. For about seven months no one knew where he was, he ran off to the other side of the country and basically went on a self destructive spree, driving around aimlessly. Once he came back home, Sparrow and him had their first heated argument. Sparrow wouldn't let Lark out of his sight, and pushed him to do something other than wallow in self hatred. So Lark started working at a mechanic shop down the road, and without his usual purpose, he threw himself into the work.He worked there for 12 years before an accident involving his right knee happened, leaving him immobilized (hence the mobility aid/cane). Sparrow forced him to leave the job behind after that, at 59, Lark's basically been in a weird stasis, waiting to die.

[megumi-fm]

this week fortnight on megumi.fm ▸ the last leg

is that a pun referring to my aching ankle? yes. is resting at home for another week gonna ruin my mental health? yes. but am I exaggerating and throwing a tantrum for something that's probably not a big deal? also yes.

📋 Tasks

💻 Internship // progress tracker ↳ biopython model replication ✅ ↳ code for obtaining single fasta from overlapping sequences ✅ ↳ running HMMer and superfamily script✅ ↳ output analysis 🔁 ↳ literature review on transport proteins 🔁 ↳ transport protein family analysis 🔁 🎓 Uni ↳ our paper is finally out! there's a doi and everything now <3 it's not open access though :/// I might do some totally legal things to ensure more people can read it ↳ collected the hardcopy of my LOR ↳ collected my gradecard ↳ visited my advisor and updated her on stuff 🩺Radiomics Project ↳ radiomic features finalized✅ ↳ data cleanup 🔁

📅 Daily-s

🛌 consistent sleep [14/14] 💧 good water intake [14/14] 👟 exercise [/14] just basic stuff to maintain ankle mobility

Fun Stuff this week

💗i went to uni to watch one of my friends present something to the juniors! then I spent the afternoon chatting with my guide and later on went window shopping with my best friends (in retrospect i should not have done this because my ankle got infinitely worse the next day and now I'm stuck resting at home for an additional two weeks) 🎮playing undertale with @muakrrr 📺 ongoing: Marry my Husband, Cherry Magic Th, Perfect Propose, Doctor Slump, Flex X Cop 📺 binged: Blueming, Roommates of Poongduck 304 📹 Started watching Going Seventeen // so I've been listening to SVT for a while now and I did watch their Don't Lie II eps like two years ago but I never really checked anything else... however, considering that I'm stuck at home and that @zzzzzestforlife (who has impeccable taste) has mentioned it often on their posts, I decided to check out GoSe properly and. wow. I started with their mystery episodes [fav scenes under cut] and now I'm watching GoSe2020 in chronological order and !!!!!! The concepts, the storylines, the acting, the humour, the editing, even the subtitles are all so so good. I've been watching this show for two weeks now and I am now officially a cubic <3

📻 This week's soundtrack

Wk1: The Best of ATEEZ // I've been real obsessed since their 2024 world tour clips started showing up on social media; I was a casual enjoyer up to this point and then I went and checked them out and it's all so dystopian and immersive. My favourites would be Intro: Long Journey (which makes me feel like I'm in Pirates of the Caribbean), the Symphony version of Wonderland (for its musicality and Jungho hitting those notes), MATZ (that is insane in it's the visual storytelling in the MV) and Wake Up (whose performance choreo ended me) Wk2: The Best of BTS // in an attempt to revive a project I abandoned a year ago, I spent wayy too much time curating this playlist to get the most satisfying BTS transitions ever and I can confidently say that I'm nowhere close to my goal T-T but I kind of like the way it is now so I am simply going to give up

---

[Feb 12 to Feb 25 ; week 7+8/52 || this was not supposed to be one post but then... idk what happened... I feel very dull lately because of my ankle and just when I thought it was getting better it's become painful again... my friends and parents keep chastising me (and fairly so) for trying to move around even before I fully heal but patience has never been my strong suit. sitting still is really the biggest punishment for a hyperactive ADHD kid like me... i'm sure plenty others have it worse but... yeah... GoSe really carrying my mental health right now ]

my fav GoSe scenes

---

[thaisibir]

the Phantom Thieves as medical specialties

disclaimer: I’m in the medical field, specifically anesthesiology, and I’ve worked in the ER/emergency medicine before pursuing anesthesia

Ren: emergency medicine -jack of all trades -the Swiss Army knife of medicine -can do everything from suturing cuts to reviving people from cardiac arrest -bikes to work -hits up the batting cages to decompress -has seen some real gnarly shit -can keep a cool head when someone comes in actively dying

Ann: dermatologist -has the bougie lifestyle that everyone in the medical field wants -no calls, no weekends, always living her best life -perpetual glowing complexion -knows a billion clinical terms to describe skin -knows the perfect skin care regimen for all her friends

Ryuji: PM&R (physical medicine and rehabilitation) -helps patients literally get back on their feet -knows all the therapies to correct gait and posture but his own posture is shit -always reminds his friends to stretch -knows every conceivable way the human body can break (mostly from personal experience) -almost went into orthopedic surgery but didn't want to do more school than he could take

Morgana: anesthesiologist (my field!) -makes you go to sleep -won't shut up about patient safety/advocacy ("watch your health!") -would sedate a combative uncooperative kid with a ketamine dart -expert at glaring at surgeons over the sterile drapes -would complain out loud if the medical student is chosen to close skin -more than happy to cancel cases and make surgeons throw a fit -crossword puzzles

Yusuke: pathologist -attention to detail, visually oriented -studies pretty slides all day -constantly mesmerized by the patterns in microscopic cells and tissues -always in search of the perfect beautiful specimen

Makoto: neurosurgeon -been in school/training forever -lives in the operating room -the queen of said operating room -in a profession that demands both physical stamina and immaculate precision -would stand for 10 hours straight correcting someone's spine with screws and rods -would make anesthesia stick an IV in her arm and hydrate her with an IV bag so she can keep operating (yes I've done this for a neurosurgeon once. She was pregnant too. Neurosurgeons don't fuck around.) -appointed as chief of surgery and regrets it sometimes

Futaba: radiologist -rich in the dark -never sees sunlight -stares at the computer all the time -has to be dragged outside by her friends so she can get her daily vitamin D -knows her patients inside and out without speaking a word to them -goes ham on trying out the latest medical tech -hangs up (generic) CT scans and X-ray images in her room for the aesthetic

Haru: pediatrician -wears cute cartoon badge holders -also wears cheery pastel-colored scrubs -keeps calm and polite even before the most anal unreasonable parents -can soothe any crying baby in seconds -very sharp eye for catching signs of child abuse -would rather take the lower salary working with kids than dealing with adults

[sophieinwonderland]

Imitated DID Reloaded

(Part 1, Part 2)

After the controversies of the 80s and 90s, the publications of the imitated DID theory and the rename from MPD, DID diagnosis rates and public awareness of the disorder overall plummeted. Recently though, it's been picking up steam online, which led to a revival of the Imitated DID theory.

Clinicians identified five themes common in these cases they deemed to be imitated.

But before touching those...

An important note on methodology.

Notice the name at the front of the paper on the TADS-I, Boon, is also one of the authors of this study, and of the original Imitated DID paper.

Looking up the TADS-I immediately links to Suzette Boon's own website.

In the limitations section, it's mentioned that TADS has yet to be validated.

So Suzette Boon and colleagues used Suzette Boon's unvalidated interview (TADS-I) to assess patients for having a condition originally made up by Suzette Boon. (Imitated DID.)

With that note on methodology, let's dive right in and address everything wrong with the themes!

The Themes

Theme 1: Endorsement and Identification With the Diagnosis

In a modern era, it's pretty common for ordinary people to research a disorder they think they may have. Especially if a mental health professional suggests the diagnosis first, as happened in four of the six cases listed...

If someone says "I think you might have this disorder," MOST young people today are going to look on the internet to determine if it matches up. We literally have this ability in our pocket. Of course we'll use it.

And if you want to establish a theme like this, then you should generally have some type of control group to compare it to.

These were six people out of 85. There are no percentages given of the other 79 who had identified with the disorder beforehand. There are no statistics of how many looked it up online. It seems like it would be easy to get these sorts of stats to test their hypothesis but they aren't there.

Theme 2: Using the Notion of Dissociative Parts to Justify Identity Confusion and Conflicting Ego-States

This one is a bit harder to parse.

The idea here seems to be that people who have conflicting feelings or identity confusion will attribute that to alters.

The problem with this, similar to the first one, is that there's no comparison to actual DID groups.

Victoria lacks a firm sense of identity. And I think it's fair to say her acting in different ways to different people probably isn't a different alter every time. But it's possible and common to experience a lack of identity like this, while also having a complex dissociative disorder.

I can't assess whether she has DID or OSDD, but I don't think experiences like this are indicative of her not having it, and I know many DID systems would relate to her not having much of an identity.

2.1: Dominique and Partial DID

The next example in this section is about Dominique.

The reason for dismissing Dominique having DID is that her characters don't live separate lives or have amnesia. And it's possible she may not have it.

But what's never mentioned once in this paper is Partial DID. This paper was published after the ICD-11, and even uses the ICD-11 for its DID criteria. But the profile for Partial DID is never mentioned in the paper.

From the ICD-11

Partial dissociative identity disorder is characterised by disruption of identity in which there are two or more distinct personality states (dissociative identities) associated with marked discontinuities in the sense of self and agency. Each personality state includes its own pattern of experiencing, perceiving, conceiving, and relating to self, the body, and the environment. One personality state is dominant and normally functions in daily life, but is intruded upon by one or more non-dominant personality states (dissociative intrusions). These intrusions may be cognitive, affective, perceptual, motor, or behavioural. They are experienced as interfering with the functioning of the dominant personality state and are typically aversive. The non-dominant personality states do not recurrently take executive control of the individual’s consciousness and functioning, but there may be occasional, limited and transient episodes in which a distinct personality state assumes executive control to engage in circumscribed behaviours, such as in response to extreme emotional states or during episodes of self-harm or the reenactment of traumatic memories. The symptoms are not better explained by another mental, behavioural or neurodevelopmental disorder and are not due to the direct effects of a substance or medication on the central nervous system, including withdrawal effects, and are not due to a disease of the nervous system or a sleep-wake disorder. The symptoms result in significant impairment in personal, family, social, educational, occupational or other important areas of functioning.

This sounds a lot like what's described with Dominique.

Of course, Dominique could be a non-disordered system too.

What I find concerning is that at no point is the possibility of Partial-DID or of OSDD brought up. It's expected to be DID or nothing for the purposes of this study.

Another thing I need to say... alters aren't usually heard acoustically. I believe they can be in some cases, but it's not the majority. So I don't understand why that was relevant unless the authors misunderstand how voice hearing typically manifests.

2.2 "No participant provided evidence..."

I'm so curious what evidence people were expected to provide. As a reminder, in the last paper, being too open about talking about your alters or describing your switches was seen as a sign of Imitated DID. And it's the same in other parts of this paper.

How do you go about providing evidence for an autonomous dissociative part?

Theme 3: Exploring Personal Experiences via the Lens of Dissociation

There's not much to say about this one either. People who think they have a disorder begin relating experiences to those disorders. Like with all the other "themes" discussed, there is no comparison to the "genuine" DID group, many of whom would likely also have conducted similar research.

People who have autism, for example, will analyze their behavior and wonder how much of it is because of the autism. Same with ADHD, and various personality disorders.

Theme 4: Talking About DID Attracts Attention

Again, no comparison is made to a "genuine DID" group who is out to friends and family. It's likely that, yes, DID is going to be a topic of conversation for those who are out. But the same is true of many conditions.

"People who are imitating DID talk about having DID" wouldn't be a helpful distinction if people who aren't imitating DID also talk about having DID. (With close friends and people they trust.)

Theme 5: Ruling Out DID Leads to Disappointment or Anger

And like with every other theme in this, there's no comparison to the "genuine" DID group.

If you lied and told the other 80 participants that they didn't have DID, how would they react???

I don't know. Because that study was never conducted.

I predict a lot of DID systems who had been diagnosed by others and identified with the label would react the same way though.

This point feels especially insidious, as it's designed to reinforce a clinicians' belief that they made the right decision after saying someone doesn't have DID.

"Well, you got upset when I told you that you didn't have this condition you're certain you had, therefore I'm even more right that you don't have it."

It can't even possibly help you diagnose because it only comes later. It's only about validating the clinicians after the fact.

All these "Themes" have the same flaw

The themes are derived from six case studies (way too small of a sample size) of so-called "imitated" DID. But there's no comparison to genuine DID. No statistics to show that these same themes wouldn't be present in a majority of "genuine" DID cases too.

In other words, these themes have zero utility in differentiating between DID and non-DID phenomena.

Return of the Shame Criterion

Homosexuality was much more hidden and shameful in the 80s than it is today. The same is true of transness. And the same is actually true of many mental illnesses too. We can talk about our own autism more openly than someone could in the 80s.

Shame is often not simply based on the individual but on the culture and the subcultures they exist in.

Like I addressed in the first post in this series, certain disorders, conditions and just general personality types may make someone less ashamed of traits others would be ashamed of.

But more than that, expected shame can change as a culture changes and we become more accepting. And THAT'S A GOOD THING. We should all WANT a world where people with DID can feel less ashamed of themselves. The expectation of shame, the requirement of shame to be seen as valid, is something we need to fight against.

Here's a post I made on that particular subject.

And let me just make another note on these particular patients: These are not people who had just newly been diagnosed. They've had time to heal and come to terms with what they are, and build connections with the rest of their alleged systems.

Someone who has known about their DID for three years will generally have less shame for symptoms than they might have at 1 month.

This section also appears at odds with the earlier implication that patients show evidence of "dissociative parts," creating a very unfortunate paradox where you need to provide proof, but trying to provide proof is evidence of faking.

Other symptoms of DID

Luckily, the paper doesn't just talk about themes. It also discusses symptoms. So maybe these will hold up better to scrutiny.

Voices

I'm genuinely worried by this that the doctors don't understand the internal experiences of the disorders they're diagnosing.

As far as I know, this is how voices typically present in DID. Earlier on, it mentioned that Dominique didn't report an "acoustic" quality to the voices. But that's how the voices typically work. Acoustic voices are possible too, but voices heard are typically mind voices.

The way this is phrased makes me think the doctors were expecting patients to all have vivid acoustic voices.

And I believe this misconception led to a miscommunication with Mary, who clearly is describing parts talking to her.

But allegedly later denied "hearing voices."

My own interpretation, at least, is that Mary was probably confused and thought the clinicians were asking about actual audible voices. Which it actually sounds like they might have been.

Voice hearing is complicated, and this paper is written in a way which might add more confusion, making readers falsely believe that alters will always speak in these sorts of acoustic voices rather than mindvoices resembling internal thoughts.

This sort of misunderstanding is genuinely dangerous to patients.

Amnesia

There are a couple points that need to be made about Amnesia.

First: Under the DSM, there is a presentation of OSDD that includes all the symptoms of DID but without the amnesia. In the community, we typically refer to this as OSDD-1b.

Second: Under the ICD-11, while described as "typically present," amnesia isn't even a hard requirement for a DID diagnosis as seen below:

Third: Partial DID in the ICD-11 also had no amnesia feature at all. At no point is this or OSDD brought up.

Focus on the amnesia criterion here, while necessary for a diagnosis of DID under the DSM-5, doesn't address larger questions of if the patients might have disorders involving "dissociative parts."

The fact that these other disorders exist where amnesia isn't required NEEDS to be addressed this paper.

Language

This is somewhat good advice. I'm against the implication that knowing jargon, for patients who have been told by other clinicians that they have a dissociative disorder, is an indicator of imitated DID.

But I do very much agree with the fact that people who use these terms don't often understand them and you need to ask questions that go beyond the terms selves. Getting someone to describe a flashback is more useful than them saying they have flashbacks, when they may just mean they have vivid memories.

Although for the 1st person perspective, this may just be different ways of contextualizing the same experience, or even trying to phrase things in ways they thing a singlet will understand. I think, for a paper that tries to beat people over the head with how DID is usually a "disorder of hiddenness," they're ignoring how referring to yourselves in the 1st person with other people becomes habitual.

Not to mention that certain parts of the DID community even believe it's healthier to refer to everything they do as a system using singular pronouns, viewing it as a form of system responsibility.

Depersonalization

Are "self-states" not autonomous?

What... actually is the difference between an autonomous dissociative part and an autonomous unintegrated self-state with its own name and identity?

Is there a way to reliably differentiate between these concepts?

Switches

This is the part that I feel rises to actual misinformation.

Before getting to the highlighted part, I'm going to point out that the source for the "shame and fear" of disclosing their internal parts is the study from the previous two posts.

The study THAT DIDN'T INCLUDE ANY EXAMPLES OF "GENUINE" DID CASES.

It was stated as a fact with no statistics or evidence to back it up whatsoever. And one of the authors, Suzette Boon, is also an author of this study. This "source" might as well be Suzette Boon quoting herself claiming something.

Now, to the highlighted part... this is complete misinformation.

I'm shocked it got published.

Some DID patients can, in fact, control switches. This has been observed in fMRI scans:

DID systems DO NOT need to be triggered to switch. This has been proven with actual brain scans, in addition to decades of reports in the literature.

And I need to repeat again that this group was also taken from people who were already in treatment for DID.

In other words, even if they couldn't control switching before, it would be something they likely would have picked up through treatment.

A Solution in Search of a Problem

Ultimately, this is a study which has little reason to exist. In their sample of 85 people, they found only six they claim had Imitated DID. Even if these assessments are were correct. Even if they weren't conducted by people who seem to not understand how switching or voice hearing works in DID... this would leave us with a 7% false positive rate.

Meanwhile... mentioned in this same paper...

26%-40% of DID patients will be diagnosed with and treated for Schizophrenia first. And this doesn't even address misdiagnosis of other disorders like BPD.

Imitated DID continues to be a solution in search of a problem.

But there is a very REAL problem of underdiagnosis and misdiagnosis of actual DID cases. Something that will only be exacerbated by convincing doctors that "genuine" DID systems can't possibly control switching (and anyone who does is faking), that voices heard are always acoustic, and that DID systems will always be ashamed of their symptoms.

Papers like this are going to result in fewer systems who need help being able to get a diagnosis.

[newstfionline]

Friday, October 4, 2024

The hidden toll taken by tropical storms (The Verge) Tropical storms take many more lives than officially recorded, according to a sobering study published today in the journal Nature. It comes as people across the Southeastern US scramble to find loved ones in the wreckage of Hurricane Helene. The average tropical storm or hurricane leads to the early deaths of between 7,170 and 11,430 people, the researchers estimate. That’s astronomically higher than the average of 24 direct deaths per storm documented in government records spanning more than half a century. Beyond the dangers of floodwaters and hurricane-force winds, people likely face many more insidious health risks in the aftermath of a storm. There’s the heightened physical and mental stress caused by the crisis. There can also be a cascade of added environmental hazards, like chemical releases from damaged industrial facilities. On top of that, storms hit people’s pocketbooks. They might have a harder time paying for healthcare as a result. Disasters tighten government budgets, which also could lead to less funds to spend on public health initiatives. And lastly, big storms can fray social support systems when people are displaced. In other words, these are indirect ways that a storm can lead to higher mortality rates.

With No Phones or Wi-Fi, North Carolina Revives the Town Meeting (NYT) How do community leaders provide vital updates when the power is down and cellphone service is out? One North Carolina town devastated by Hurricane Helene has brought back a decidedly low-tech solution: the town meeting. Residents in Black Mountain, N.C., about 12 miles east of Asheville, have pitched in to make signs alerting their neighbors to the daily gatherings, using posters, markers, wooden boards, spray paint and anything else they can get their hands on. It’s working: About 1,000 people are turning out for daily updates in the town square. The disrupted lines of communication have made it hard for relief workers to know where people are and what they need. Being cut off from the modern world has also left many residents feeling frustrated and alone. So they’ve turned to methods that have been out of date for a century or more. The town square in Burnsville, N.C., became an ad hoc communications center for residents. People have scrawled messages in marker on whiteboards to let their neighbors know how they’re doing or what they need. “We are alive, house gone,” read one. “I am safe,” read another.

Dockworkers' union to suspend strike until Jan. 15 to allow time to negotiate new contract (AP) The union representing 45,000 striking U.S. dockworkers at East and Gulf coast ports has reached a deal to suspend a three-day strike until Jan. 15 to provide time to negotiate a new contract. The union, the International Longshoremen’s Association, is to resume working immediately. The temporary end to the strike came after the union and the U.S. Maritime Alliance, which represents ports and shipping companies, reached a tentative agreement on wages, the union and ports said in a joint statement Thursday night. A person briefed on the agreement said the ports sweetened their wage offer from about 50% over six years to 62%. The person didn’t want to be identified because the agreement is tentative.

Mexico’s Sheinbaum keeps doing morning briefings (AP) Mexico’s new President Claudia Sheinbaum started her day Wednesday much like her political mentor, ex-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, began most of his: with an early morning news briefing from the National Palace. López Obrador’s news briefings, known as the “mañaneras,” were marathon affairs, featuring folksy dialogue, verbal jousting with the press, and, frequently, long history lessons. His oratorical skills turned his 2 1/2-hour-long daily mañaneras into a powerful political weapon. Sheinbaum kept her morning briefing shorter, less combative and more concise, in keeping with her character as a scientist and academic. She said she would keep some of her predecessor’s fixtures, like a weekly segment attacking what she called media “lies” about the government. The new president also continued a diplomatic dispute with Spain—which has refused to apologize for abuses during the 1500s conquest of Mexico.

Email Oops (Foreign Policy) It’s every reporter’s nightmare. The BBC had to cancel a prime-time interview with former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday after presenter Laura Kuenssberg accidentally sent her briefing notes to the British politician instead of to her team.

Kyiv’s drones (Foreign Policy) Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky championed Kyiv’s ability to produce 4 million drones annually on Tuesday, while also announcing plans to boost production of other weapons. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal reiterated this sentiment, saying Ukraine tripled its overall domestic weapons production in 2023 and doubled that volume again in the first eight months of 2024. Prior to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, drone manufacturing in Ukraine was largely nonexistent. Now, Kyiv spends about half of its state budget—or around $40 billion—on defense. That does not include military and financial aid from other countries. Yet Kyiv’s forces are still struggling on the battlefield.

Ukraine’s military will pull out of Vuhledar in the east after 2 years of intense fighting (AP) Ukrainian forces are withdrawing from the front-line town of Vuhledar, perched atop a tactically significant hill in eastern Ukraine, after more than two years of grinding battle, military officials said Wednesday. Vuhledar, a town Ukrainian forces fought tooth and nail to keep, is the latest urban settlement to fall to the Russians as the war stretches deep into its third year and the Ukrainian army is gradually being pushed backward in the eastern Donetsk province. It follows a vicious summer campaign along the eastern front that saw Kyiv cede several thousand square kilometers (square miles) of territory as the Russian army hacks its way westward, obliterating towns and villages with missiles, glide bombs, artillery and drones.

In Japan’s Countryside, Century-Old Firms Learn to Embrace Foreign Workers (NYT) Four years ago, Hizatsuki Confectionery hired its first foreign workers. The company, in a mountainous region north of Tokyo, has been baking and frying glutinous dough into rice crackers since 1923. Then it was known as Teikoku Senbei, or Imperial Rice Crackers. Today, the company’s third-generation president, Takeo Hizatsuki, has encountered an existential challenge that his father and grandfather never did. Hizatsuki Confectionery can’t find enough Japanese employees. A shrinking and rapidly aging population has forced Japan, which for centuries was mostly closed off to immigrants, to allow foreign workers to enter the country and potentially stay for good. Most come from other parts of Asia, including China, Vietnam and the Philippines. That transition to employing more foreign workers has proceeded gradually at big companies in major cities over the past decade. But in parts of the countryside, where labor shortages are particularly acute, some of Japan’s storied businesses like Hizatsuki Confectionery are just now figuring out how to accommodate foreign workers for the first time. Whether companies can persuade foreigners to stay may dictate their survival.

Escalating contest over South China Sea disrupts international cable system (Washington Post) Undersea cables below the South China Sea have long provided vital connectivity to countries in Southeast Asia as demand for internet service has surged. To maintain the extensive network of cables and develop new ones, private cable companies have for decades relied on being able to move freely through this waterway, despite conflicting claims over the sea by China and a half dozen other governments. But now, competition for control of the South China Sea is disrupting the repair and badly needed construction of subsea cables, raising costs and at times straining telecommunications. As China presses its claim over most of the strategic waterway, companies have found it harder to get approval from Beijing to operate there and riskier to do so without Chinese permission. Some cable repairs have been delayed months because of lags in Chinese permitting. At least two new cable projects are years overdue. China’s determination to consolidate control over the South China Sea has made the waterway a “wild card” for cable companies, said Kelvan Firman, chief executive of Indonesian company Super Sistem. “The problem is nobody knows how far they’ll go,” he said, referring to Chinese maritime forces. “Who wants to take that risk?”

Typhoon Krathon makes landfall in Taiwan, packing fierce winds and torrential rain (AP) Typhoon Krathon made landfall Thursday in Taiwan’s major port city of Kaohsiung, bringing torrential rains and fierce winds to the island’s south. Trees were brought down by high winds and roads flooded, prompting the closure of schools and businesses. The typhoon is forecast to move slowly north and weaken into a tropical depression by Friday before it reaches the capital, Taipei. It appears to be heading across the Taiwan Strait toward the Chinese coast. The slow-moving typhoon, which has been inching toward Taiwan at a speed of about 4 kph (2.5 mph), doused eastern and southern parts of the island over the past five days, forcing thousands to evacuate from mountainous or low-lying areas.

Israel attack lays bare deep divisions in Iran (BBC) Not everyone in Iran expressed support for Tuesday night's large-scale ballistic missile attack on Israel. The contrasting reactions indicated the disunity in the country, where there is widespread discontent at the clerical establishment and frustration over the economic troubles caused by sanctions. ran’s state television broadcast pictures of groups of people cheering on the streets, waving flags and chanting “Death to Israel”. But the mood was different online. Some shared footage of tense scenes and engaged in heated debates about a possible war between the arch-foes. For many supporters of the Iranian government, the attack represented a proud moment of defiance. Such sentiment frustrated other Iranians. “Please distinguish between the people and the Revolutionary Guards; we are under immense pressure,” pleaded a middle-aged man in a video shared on social media. Some Iranians felt the strike was an unnecessary provocation that would only result in making their lives worse.

In Beirut’s Once-Bustling Suburbs, Smoking Rubble and Eerie Quiet (NYT) There is little life left in the southern suburbs of Beirut. Roads, typically crammed with bumper-to-bumper traffic and the deafening screech of car horns, are eerily empty. Once-bustling sidewalks where people talked politics over coffee and tea are desolate too. In lieu of plastic bistro chairs, there are shards of glass and jagged chunks of concrete splayed across the pavements. Nearly every shop is closed, the apartments above them vacant. The vast majority of residents of the Dahiya—the collection of neighborhoods on the southern outskirts of Beirut where the militant group and political party Hezbollah is the dominant power—have fled in recent days amid a barrage of Israeli airstrikes targeting the neighborhood. The near-daily strikes in the predominantly Shia area have sent plumes of dark gray smoke billowing into the sky and concrete blocks of buildings crashing onto the ground, rattling people across Beirut who worry a war could soon consume the entire city. Dozens of civilians have also been killed, according to Lebanese health officials. Thousands more have fled.

‘Wave of Displacement’ (Foreign Policy) Israel ordered residents of more than 20 towns in southern Lebanon on Thursday to immediately evacuate, bringing the total number of towns in the area under such instructions to 70, including the provincial capital of Nabatieh. The Israeli military said its ground incursion, which began on Tuesday, aims to allow tens of thousands of people previously living in northern Israel who have been displaced by Hezbollah attacks to return safely to their homes. Yet the fight to return displaced persons in one country has sparked mass displacement in another. According to Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati, more than 1.2 million people have been displaced in his country by Israeli attacks. This has been the “largest wave of displacement in [Lebanon’s] history,” Mikati said. Around 100,000 people have crossed the Lebanese border into Syria—some of whom had initially fled to Lebanon to escape Syria’s devastating civil war.

[r3stless-mindz]

Day Twenty-nine: Happy Isn't the Goal

Daily Scripture:

Psalm chapter 19: verses 7-9

"The instructions of the Lord are perfect, reviving the soul.

The decrees of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple

The commandments of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart.

The commands of the Lord are clear, giving insight for living.

Reverence for the Lord is pure, lasting forever.

The laws of the Lord are true; each one is fair."

Read it for yourself if you'd like! (Translation may be slightly different):

https://www.bible.com/bible/111/psa.19.7

https://www.bible.com/bible/111/psa.19.8

https://www.bible.com/bible/111/psa.19.9

....

Quoting devotional:

My daughter, Quinn, loves eating sweets. Whether it's cookies or candy, it really doesn't matter. If it has sugar, she is here for it. In the mornings, Quinn wastes no time in asking for a sugary snack when she gets down the stairs. If I'm honest, it's difficult to tell my daughter no when she asks for sugary snacks before breakfast. But i have to. Why? Because I love her, and I want to be a good father.

Would a sugary snack make my daughter happy in the moment? Yes. But the things that make Quinn happy for a moment are not always the things that will make her healthy for a lifetime. These are the times when i have to say no to Quinn and guide her toward healthy alternatives. This is a standard that our Heavenly Father demonstrates perfectly in his word. He gives us instructions that may not always make us happy in the moment. But that instruction will revive our soul and bring joy to our heart in time.

God is more concerned with our long term health and joy than our short term happiness. Does God want us to be unhappy? Of course not! But he wouldn't be a good father if his word led us into activities, relationships, and habits that eventually stole our spiritual health for eternity. Is there anything in your life that if bringing you short term happiness that you know will hurt your spiritual health? Are there any biblical instructions that you feel the Lord has been giving you that will lead to a healthier mind and heart?

What can I pray for?

Pray that the Lord would help you make decisions based on long term spiritual health and joy- not just short term happiness.

​​​.....

Have a wonderful night, loves!💚

[stwritings]

Funny Seeing You Here

Synopsis

Long time in-patient y/n was looking forward to her upcoming discharge date from the Hawkins Memorial Hospital. That is, until she became acquainted with an unlikely familiar face, Eddie Munson.

Author’s Note

This is a fix it fic following Stranger Things season 4, volume 2. In this fic, we’re going to forget the fact that the Duffer Brothers decided to delete Eddie from the series. :-) These events take place after the battle in the upside down. I’m also choosing to change the ending of season 4 by having the issue with the upside down resolved, therefore, Hawkins is not plagued by the massive earthquake that resulted in new portals being opened.

What To Expect

Slow burn, angst with a happy ending, fluff, smut in later chapters. ♡

Series Warnings

Mentions of mental health struggles, SMUT (in the later chapters, 18+ to read this story), angst with a happy ending, canon-typical violence.

Chapter 14

Warnings:

This chapter extrapolates on reader's past trauma as well as Eddie's. Mentions of physical/verbal abuse, anxiety, depression, general mental health struggles, self-harm and addiction, family struggles and trauma. Please don't proceed if any of the above mentioned is triggering. ♡

Chapter CliffsNotes without the triggers are available for those who don't wish to proceed, send me an ask! ♡

Time spent with Eddie flew by like she had never experienced before. It was only after Margot cut their conversation short that y/n realized that she had been on the phone with him for well over an hour. In that time, she had gotten to know a little bit more about Eddie, like how he disliked mustard in all of it's forms, only learned how to ride a bike at the age of 12 and was an avid fan of Creedence Clearwater Revival due to his uncle listening to their music relentlessly. She shared a few facts about herself in that time as well, per his request.

Y/n was frustrated that their time was cut short, but held onto Eddie's promise that he'd call again tomorrow.

-

Like clockwork, the phone rang again the following day, as well as the next day, and the day after that.

Pretty soon, y/n had gotten used to expecting Eddie's call at some point in the day. She had given him an extensive break down of her daily schedules, and he made sure to write down her free times to ensure she'd pick up the phone when he'd call.

It was on their 3rd phone conversation that the topic of her extended stay was brought up, Eddie's curiosity getting the best of him. As much as she detested the topic, she knew it would come up again at some point. They had gotten to know one another pretty well and she felt closer and more comfortable with him than she'd ever felt with anyone else. She knew it was time to tell him the truth; no matter how raw it was. Opening up came easier to her once Eddie spoke about his background and what he had been through.

Eddie's life had been anything but easy from the moment he had been born. His mother's pregnancy was unplanned and slightly unwanted, at least on his father's part. His parents were very young, having both just turned 22. They were far from financially stable, and knew adding a new member to their family would worsen their situation. Despite this, Eddie's mother stood her ground and spoke her truth; she wanted to keep the baby and would not be talked out of it. This put a strain on their relationship and it became tumultuous over time. His father grew spiteful as time went on and took to alcohol to numb his frustration.

Eddie's father was constantly putting his mother through hell, from his sporadic outbursts to his unexplained disappearances that would last for days at a time. He eventually lost his job due to his erratic behavior and many missed shifts, leaving her with the huge responsibility of making ends meet. She worked well into her pregnancy, eventually being forced to take a leave; her bulging stomach preventing her from accomplishing most tasks at her job.

Luckily, she had her brother to rely on. At first, her pride prevented her from reaching out for help, but when their bills started to pile up, she had no other choice. Eddie's mother was very close to her brother, this made it much more difficult for her to ask for help. Being the youngest, she always felt this need to prove herself and to be self-sufficient. Wayne on the other hand was always looking out for her, feeling immensely protective over his younger sibling. The truth is, he never liked Eddie's father. Upon meeting him, he had this gut-wrenching feeling that the kid was bad news. And boy, was he ever right.

Although protective, Wayne isn't the type to overstep and likes to avoid confrontation as much as possible. He kept a close eye on them as the years passed, and sadly, wasn't surprised when his sister reached out to him reluctantly filling him in on the turmoil she had been going through over the last 8 months.

At the time, Wayne was working two jobs in hopes of saving up enough money for his dream car; a 1966 Chevvy Impala. He had racked up quite the savings and was only a few hundred dollars short of being able to afford it. Those dreams were put on the back burner following his conversation with his sister, as he redirected his focus onto supporting her and his expected nephew.

Wayne never really wanted kids, in fact, he wasn't overly fond of them. That all seemed to change the moment Eddie was born. Unsurprisingly, his father was absent on the day his mother's water broke, which resulted in Wayne being by her side the entire time. He was also the first person to hold Eddie as he took his first few breaths. In that moment, Wayne vowed to always protect him, no matter the cost.

He pleaded with his sister to leave Eddie's father, even offering them a place to stay in his tiny 1 bedroom apartment, but it was no use. Eddie's mother was hopeful, she felt that when his father held his son for the first time, he would turn a new leaf, wanting to better himself for their family. After recovering in the hospital for a few days, Wayne reluctantly drove her back to their shared apartment and made her promise to call him everyday. That promise was kept, but she bent the truth more times than she could count.

With every interaction they had and the countless times that Wayne asked her if things had gotten better, her lies became more distant from the truth. Eddie's father came home after a grueling 5 days away, whiskey bottle in hand, the smell of alcohol littering the air of each room he'd walk into. His mother greeted him with open arms, wanting nothing more than for the father of her child to meet his precious little one. She was met with heartbreak and disappointment when all he did was glance at him in a less than pleased manner and lock himself into their bedroom where he stayed for the remainder of the night. Luckily she had moved Eddie's crib into the living room while she prepared food for herself.

The next morning, after being forced to sleep on the couch, she was woken up by the sound of slamming doors and footsteps. As she groggily got up from the sofa, she noticed that many of their belongings were missing. Eddie's father had been packing his truck and despite his mother's pleas, left within the hour. He had made it abundantly clear that if she decided to go through with the pregnancy, he wouldn't be in the picture. His words proved to be true up until Eddie turned 2.

His mother hadn't heard from him in all this time, and was dumbfounded when he showed up at her doorstep. She was met with apologies and false promises, knowing all too well his patterns of behavior. Despite every nerve in her body signaling for her to shut the door in his face, she craved a better life and some form of normalcy for Eddie, not wanting to deprive him of his father. Reluctantly, she put aside her feeling of dread and gave his father a second chance. Once again, he had managed to charm and weasel his way back into their lives with false promises, broken within days of him being back into the house.

His father's battle with addiction had only worsened in the time he was away; his sudden reappearance a desperate attempt at seeking shelter and money to further his substance abuse. Eddie's mother was unaware of this at the time, his lies and deception were all too convincing. Perhaps she had been naïve, but Eddie likes to think she just had a big heart. His mother was very giving and would do anything for those she loved; a trait that later proved to be fatal.

It wasn't long after his father's return that what little savings she had, were drained, leaving their little family once again ridden with the struggles of poverty. When Eddie reached the age of 5, his mother reached a breaking point. Her previous frustration over their financial situation was overshadowed by pure, unadulterated rage when she discovered a series of deep blue markings on her son. She had noticed Eddie had become much more detached from his father, afraid even. His mother was no stranger to physical abuse at the hand of her partner, and once she realized that Eddie was now at the receiving end of it, she had had enough.

She put up with a lot, too much really. But the moment she found out that Eddie was suffering the same fate as her, she was done. A true mama bear, she packed up all of their belongings and left that same day, giving him a taste of his own medicine. She left him a dingy old sofa and a crappy frying pan, which was more than he deserved really, and thanked her lucky stars that he was out of the house during the process.

Once again seeking solace from her brother, who welcomed them into his home with open arms, they had finally escaped the wrath of his father. Eddie never saw him again.

Their peace was short lived following a well overdue medical appointment. Eddie's mom had been sick for quite some time, but without the funds or free time to see her doctor, she was never able to seek treatment until it was too late. Her diagnosis was terminal and she passed away a few days short of Eddie's 11th birthday.

His mother's passing brought Eddie and Wayne closer together. Without his father in the picture, his uncle became his legal guardian and formed him into the man he is today. Eddie spoke very highly of his uncle who, funny enough, shared the same name as y/n's current guardian. They bonded over that fact and compared anecdotes and stories of each other's 'Wayne's.

Hearing about Eddie's past and seeing him come out of it as such an incredible person had y/n in awe. Although the story was heart wrenching, she admired his strength and felt immense compassion and care for him. She felt safe with him, and knew that he wouldn't treat her differently after hearing what she had gone through. With a heavy sigh, she began sharing her story.

Prior to their divorce, y/n's father was abusive towards her and her mother. Claudia would often face the majority of it, but when she was out of the house, Oscar's attention would be redirected to his daughter. This went on up until the divorce, and began again when she was forced to move back with her father when he won the custody battle.

Whilst living with her father, she tried to keep busy away from home as much as she could, but this proved to be challenging as Oscar had set a strict curfew that unfortunately lined up with the peak time of his drinking. She would often come home to her intoxicated father, and would once again be met with his wrath. Sadly, she became quite good at making up lies for the markings on her body, and over time learned how to cover them up with the help of makeup.

The abuse and drinking seemed to let up a little after he met his second wife, a woman named Beverly who worked at a dental office. They spent the majority of their time together out of the house, leaving y/n to her own devices. Albeit her time alone did become rather lonesome, she preferred it over them being home. Her step mother never really took to her and didn't shy away from letting it known. Beverly would constantly torment her, the mental abuse taking it's toll over time. Her cruelness left a mark on y/n and with her father chiming in with further hurtful words, it eventually led to her first attempt.

She felt guilty, not wanting to subject her father to the grief that comes with losing a loved one but her inner demons overshadowed those feelings. While in the hospital, the guilt returned accompanied by immense sadness. She hoped that her father was doing alright and couldn't wait to see him again. That feeling went away mere seconds after stepping into her house upon being released from the hospital. She was met with a cold greeting, her weekly absence seemingly gone unnoticed by her father who hadn't bothered to visit her after the first day of her stay.

It appeared he had started drinking again. Empty liquor bottles littered their home and Beverly was no where in sight. The house felt cold and empty, there was trash on nearly every surface and a stale smell lingering in the air. Beverly liked to keep a clean home, the mess was an indicator that she hadn't been there for quite some time. Y/n tried to speak to her father, but all he could slur were hurtful words blaming her for his wife's departure. Apparently it was all too much for her to handle, an inconvenience to put it in her words. She refused to return to the home while y/n was still around and instead of defending his daughter, Oscar grew resentful of her.

His old pattern of abuse began once again, further pushing her to the edge. For years now, she had suffered through the mental, physical and emotional abuse at the hand of her father and his spouse. What little confidence she had was torn down further worsening her sense of self-worth. She had been reduced to a shell of a human and couldn't bare to feel this way anymore. The prior sense of guilt was gone, her second attempt was fueled by a deep longing for peace. She didn't want to hurt anymore. Her father's lack of responsiveness the first time also led her to believe that the world would be better off without her. Sure, a few of her friends would mourn, but she felt that as time went on, they would heal from the loss and soon forget.

The events of that night were what led to her extended stay, which proved to be beneficial for her. She hadn't spoken to her father in months, and quite frankly she had no desire to. Much like Eddie, she was content with his absence, accepting that not all broken relationships need to be mended. The truth is, she had found the peace that she was so desperately seeking. It wasn't the bitter ending she was hoping for but rather a shift in her life. A new beginning with better people, specifically the arrival of a 6 foot metal head.

_

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[mewtagen-mau]

Entry 6

It was not a restful night after we got Ameiko home safe. She needed some time, quite understandably. The rest of us separated for the evening. I worked on a potion to replenish our diminished stock, to keep my mind occupied and not fretting over the fact I came within a breath of death.

Before we’d separated, our strange little group did have a talk amongst ourselves. Nanel apologized for nearly getting me killed. He said he was new to working with others, and he would try to be more careful in the future. I told him, in no uncertain terms, that he needed to keep whatever that other form of his was under control if we were going to continue working together. I didn’t want anymore close calls exasperated by my own allies.

On the other side of the coin, however, I also spoke to Tabot after Nanel had retired for the night. I asked him to tell me a little about his god. I know what anyone else who’s a little learned does—that Aroden wasthe first of the Ascended gods, and Iomedae’s predecessor who died roughly a century ago. And yet, as I said to Tabot, a dead god cannot grant his follower the power to save a man from the brink of death—bringing him virtually to full health from death’s doorstep. So I wanted to know Tabot’s point of view.

Tabot didn’t seem to know anything more concrete than myself. He’d found a holy book of Aroden what he was younger, and something just felt right to him. Faith. That’s hard for a feline of science like myself to wrap my head around. Even my belief in Shelyn is grounded in what I can see. I can see the beauty in the world, and the beauty in other people, and how the power of a person’s creativity can sway minds or change history. I don’t have to blindly follow to understand and respect Shelyn’s teachings.

This…this is much harder for me to accept. On the one hand, it is undeniable that Tabot is being granted the power of a paladin. So clearly his belief grants him strength.  But Aroden is dead. A century ago every other follower of the god of humanity lost their power. Iomedae took his place in the pantheon. That is all fact, recorded history, there are people still alive who remember it. Iomedae being a god and not merely his herald is evidence of it. But then where is Tabot’s power stemming from?

Tabot doesn’t know the answer. He doesn’t know what might revive a god, or if an aspect of Aroden survived, or if Aroden never died at all and was merely somewhere else—whatever that might entail. But he has faith in Aroden. And I suppose for that time being I simply have to accept that as the answer. I thanked him for healing me—he told me I should thank Aroden, so for Tabot’s sake I did. Either I’m thanking the being who granted Tabot the power to heal me, or I’m giving thanks into the void. No harm done either way, I suppose.

I eventually found my way to sleep, and the dawn of a new day.

In the morning we discussed what I suspected about Nualia, and were told a story of some local murders that happened not long before I came to town, by a man who came to be known as Chopper.

He was an artist, who carved birds into many of the buildings and other pieces of wood in town. His skill was famous, and anyone whose place was chosen to have a bird was honored. Then he went to live in seclusion, and not long after people started being murdered. Basically daily. Gruesomely, too. Their eyes and tongues were cut out.

The previous sheriff cornered the murderer and injured him at the site of his final victim’s murder, but was killed himself in the struggle. However the blood trail from his injuries led a certain other guard by the name of Balor Hemlock straight to the secluded island just off the coast where their famed reclusive artist lived. At first they all wanted to believe he was to be the next victim—but when they arrived to his home they found the gruesome trophies he’d taken from his victims, and they had to accept the truth. The man killed himself as a final offering at the foot of a shrine to a demon lord none dare to speak aloud. Given what we’ve found today I would be willing to place a bet on it being a shrine to Lamashtu as well.

I think I will be a bit more discerning with drawing Shelyn’s symbol on my sketches in the future, at least while we are in town. I do not want to dredge up bad memories, even accidentally.

We also talked about Nualia. I told the others what I knew—of her, the tragedy of her life in Sandpoint, and the eventual fire that supposedly took her life—and Nanel helped fill in some gaps in my knowledge, having lived in town longer.

With what we know now, it seems certain that Nualia is taking revenge on the town for her mistreatment when she was younger.

It’s such a tragedy. This didn’t have to happen. If someone had just treated Nualia like a person instead of like some holy prop with no feelings of her own, this could have all been avoided. She was just a child! It’s no wonder she’s lashing out now, after what was done to her. If you treat a person like a thing their entire life, you can’t suddenly put the burden of personhood on them the moment they do something wrong, and then expect sympathy from them the moment they hurt you in return.

…

I am going to give Mori the biggest hug next time I see her.

Anyways…I’m not saying what Nualia did was justified…necessarily. If the goblins had their way, they’d kill everyone. Even people who had nothing to do with what happened to her. Children, for starters. Like the child who was nearly killed by the goblin hiding in his closet. That’s not a theoretical, we saw the end result of what happened to the boy’s father. Oh yes, I’m sure Nualia could make an argument about how children were cruel to her too, but those are children. They don’t know any better. You can teach a child to do better, you don’t have to kill them over it. Any revenge that is going to involve child murder is, at best, misguided. At worst, completely warped and irredeemable.

I hope it is not the later. I really do. That poor woman suffered so much. She needs someone who can give her a new start.

But if she is too far gone…her life is not worth the life of an entire town. I’m sorry.

We knew what we had to do—Tsuto had tried to flee into a locked door in the basement of the glassworks. We still didn’t know how he’d snuck so many goblins in. The answer was likely beyond that door.

So, with Ameiko’s blessing, we returned to the glassworks’ basement. Tabot broke down the door—as Krysa felt their new lockpicking set was too new and shiny to muss up with this lock. Then he made a trek down a tunnel, which slowly grew darker as we clearly travelled somewhere beneath Sandpoint.

Nanel cast a spell on his fancy little flower, and it lit up the tunnel we found ourselves in. As we walked, we saw a tunnel off to our right. Nanel’s light didn’t fully illuminate the side passage, so Tabot lit a torch and tossed it inside.

As the light illuminated the rest of the dead-end passage, a nightmare creature leapt from the shadows of the tunnel and tried to clamp its jaws onto Nanel. Fortunately Nanel pulled away.

Krysa identified the horror—a Sinspawn. Something created with old magic. Ancient magic. Sin magic from the age of Thassilon ancient. The how or why of what a Sinspawn was doing in a tunnel under Sandpoint would have to wait, however, as it was not giving us a moment to contemplate.

The creature lunged at Nanel again—this time its teeth met flesh. Tabot stepped forward and struck the living nightmare of oozing flesh and gnashing teeth. I darted around and finished it off with a quick stab through where I figured its heart ought to be. The creature dissolved into a fetid pile of liquified flesh, only leaving behind the ranseur it had carried in its claws.

There was nothing else down the side passage, and as Nanel’s wound was fairly minor, we pressed on.

It didn’t take long for us to come upon a second side passage on the same side. Krysa—with their stronger night vision—told us they also saw another side passage further ahead, a little beyond where our light reached. We decided to explore the nearer of the two passages first. We had promised Ameiko that we would clear out the entire area, so it was best that we didn’t skip anything. We used a stick of chalk Krysa had handy to mark where we’d already been, to avoid getting lost.

This next passage was uncomfortably narrow, forcing us to walk single file. Nanel took the lead, and was the first into the next room—which was made of worked stone as opposed to being a natural cave like the tunnel we’d been in. He called back a moment later with some concern in his voice asking if any of us spoke ‘the demon language’. I don’t speak Abyssal, and I didn’t prepare a Comprehend Languages formulae today, believing that I’d likely need all of my formulae prepared to be combat oriented.

Krysa said they speak the language of demons, however. Clever little rat. Unfortunately, by the time they scurried to the front of the tunnel, the words Nanel had seen seemed to have vanished entirely. Nanel swore he’d seen writing on the wall, however, and we did not disbelieve him.

Something weird was going on, especially if there was writing from The Abyss on the walls.

We continued forward through more narrow passageways, until we found ourselves in a room with a grand looking statue of an enraged woman. It looked historical—possibly even Thassilonian if the trend were to continue—but she was not someone I recognized from any of my studied. Nor was the rune within her book, although it seemed to be a recurring motif within this place, as we saw it in a few other locations. So, it must have been important to the people who built this place originally. It was some sort of seven-pointed star. I know it isn’t part of the Thassilonian alphabet, but beyond that I don’t know what the rune actually is or means. Perhaps it is an ancient holy (or unholy) symbol, or part or some long lost magic? It could simply be a symbol that meant something to some small sect of people who lived in this part of Varisia, which only carried meaning for them. It’s hard to say when it comes to Thassilon. If it isn’t recorded, it is likely lost to time forever.

To our luck, the beautifully crafted ranseur the statue was holding was a real usable weapon, and hadn’t been looted in the centuries this statue had stood abandoned. Nanel took it, and has made impressive use of it.

Less fortunately for us, more writing appeared on the wall. This time I spotted it—and it was written in Thassalonian. It said “angry screams are still screams”.

Foreboding, to say the least.

The moment I looked away, the words vanished, just as the ones Nanel had seen did.

Not much further ahead, Krysa warned that they heard the sounds of more Sinspawn through the door. Our group is not exactly stealthy—Tabot’s armor is loud, and it is difficult for me to quiet my own movement given my cane. So we decided to try to rush them instead.

Except when we burst in, we couldn’t see any signs of the Sinspawn Krysa had heard. They were certain of what they had heard.

Nanel inched forward, to look down below a catwalk. And that’s when they struck. Both monstrosities had been hanging just below the catwalk, and they swung up and lunged at Nanel. Once again fangs met flesh. But Nanel gave back as much as he took, biting the one that got him and then slipping away as he also jabbed with his new ranseur.

Krysa put some bolts into one of the creatures, and I threw a bomb at it. Tabot slayed one with his blade after Nanel got another stab at it, and I slew the other with my own.

There was little else of interest in this room—it was one a jail, long ago, but now there was nothing but dust and bad memories lingering here. We did find that the back of one of the cells had crumbled and that a judicious use of force could remove the bars and lead right back to the tunnel we’d originally entered from. So we had a pretty good idea of where we were now.

There was another door on the opposite end of the room, stairs leading upwards that we’d passed in the statue room, or another hall that the previous hall had split out into. We decided we were going to leave the stairs going upwards for last, as that seemed likely to lead to the surface and possibly to where the goblins had come in from. We were not entirely correct in our conclusion, but it still proved to be a very smart call for other reasons I’ll get into shortly.

We decided to continue forward for now, and circle back to the other hall after we’d cleared out this branch of the underground. So we continued onwards, until we came to a terrible room full of implements of torture. It didn’t look like it had been used in centuries, but the implications of what the people who made this place once did was crystal clear. Even in ancient days, this was neither a pleasant nor good place to have been.

There were two doors out, each marked with that star sigil. Nanel checked one door while I checked the other. Nanel heard nothing where he was, but I heard heavy ragged breathing and the distinctive moans of the undead—many undead.

We decided to check Nanel’s door first.

This opened into a mostly empty room, with ruined books and papers strewn about. We did find a scroll that was still in usable condition, which I handed off to Krysa in the hopes they will be able to transcribe it into their spellbook.

We found three more cells, each with skeletons that were terribly deformed. It looked like the end result of a mutagen gone wrong. Or fleshwarping. I hope Laila would forgive me for making the connection, but it really did resemble the end result of some of the worst Drow experiments I’ve read survivors tell about seeing after escaping capture. Too many limbs, a ribcage that takes up half the poor creature’s body, and an enormous head the creature likely couldn’t hold up before it died. Probably in agony.

Whoever did this to them was cruel, and had no regard for the suffering of the creatures they inflicted this fate on. I can understand that sometimes things go wrong when trying to push the boundaries of knowledge. If all experiments went exactly as planned, they wouldn’t be experiments. But to force it upon others is twisted. If knowledge can only be gained through suffering then maybe we do not need that knowledge at all.

But I digress. There was nothing more in that room. Just more death and dust and memories that should remain buried along with those ruins.

So we decided to check the door I had listened at—the one in which we knew many creatures awaited us beyond.

We asked Krysa if they could sneak a little closer and get a look at what we were dealing with. They agreed, and slipped through the door and down the short hall ahead of us. Moments later they returned, their footfalls making virtually no noise. Krysa informed us that there was a strange goblin with three arms and a glowing sword in the middle of a bunch of obvious trap doors. The sounds of the undead were coming from beneath the trap doors.

I suggested Krysa and I take the lead this time, since it sounded like it would be difficult for Nanel and Tabor to safely get close to this unusual goblin. Krysa and I could both attack from afar. The others agreed.

I led the way, and threw an explosive at the three-armed goblin. The wooden traps around him caught fire, and the moaning sounds below grew louder. There was a scrabbling sound, like whatever was below was trying—and failing—to climb.

Krysa followed up with another shot of their crossbow.

For a wizard, they are quite adept at shooting people by non-magical means, I must say.

Tabot and Nanel came in behind us, spreading out and blocking off any means of running past us down the hall.

The goblin howled in rage and leapt across the gaps in the floor to take a swing at me with that glowing sword that looked a tad too large for him. However it scraped harmlessly against the shield I’d put around myself with a formulae before entering the chamber.

The others moved in, and the tragic creature did not get another chance to attack. He fell into one of the pits, landing atop one of the zombies. His glowing blade was dropped just at the lip of the trap, and we offered it up to Tabot. Being the Aroden worshipper and all. A magic longsword just seems like it obviously needs to go to him.

It did not escape my notice that this goblin had the same kind of mutations as those skeletons in the cages. So that means these experiments were not ancient history—they were still happening. They needed to be stopped.

 We contemplated killing the zombies in the pits, but decided we’d come back and do it in a bit—my shield was temporary and it would be best if we got into any more fights with it still up.

We went through the only exit and down a long hall, which split into a fork. There were stairs spiraling downwards. We decided to give it a quick glance and see how much it looked like we’d have to deal with beyond. I was dreading that this was only the first floor of many.

Fortunately, it appeared the stairwell was caved in.

Less fortunately, we heard a distant howling coming from somewhere far, far below.

There was something trapped down there. Possibly something that was trapped there purposely. Maybe it was even the reason this particular ruin was entirely forgotten.

We retreated back down the hall, deciding it was best to let sleeping dogs lie. Or howling dogs, in this case.

We went down the other fork in the hall, and found a curious room. Various objects floated about the room, suspended in the air as if completely weightless and unbound by gravity. Amongst those objects, I saw a scroll, and expressed a desire to take it, as it might be a useful spell scroll. Krysa of all people told me no, they thought that was a reckless idea. They could tell the room had transmutation magic in it, and was concerned it was part of what was turning creatures into those mutants. I was not entirely convinced of that logic, as the mutants had been back in the other room, and this magic seemed unrelated.

Nanel did something quite clever to help determine what we should do. First he tossed a coin into the room. It floated as if weightless, much like the other objects. Then he placed another coin, without any momentum so it was just floating in place, and then a moment later took it back. Nothing happened when he removed an object from the room. He told Krysa that a levitation spell is also transmutation magic, and he believed that was all they were seeing. Based on his experiment, he concluded that was likely the only spell on the room, and that it was safe to remove objects from the room.

With Krysa’s mind eased, we began grabbing objects that looked useful—or expensive.

I grabbed the scroll, which was a Scroll of Burning Hands. Krysa grabbed a Wand of Shocking Grasp. We agreed to trade. I think I can make good use of that spell, as I get into the thick of things more than our rat friend. And then Krysa can add another good spell to their spellbook.

Nanel and Tabot snagged a very ancient (but clearly magically preserved) unholy text to Lamashtu, and a bottle of expensive wine.

That book didn’t bode well, especially given the Abyssal writing we’d seen in other rooms.

In this room, too. There was a band of red metal around the room, which sparked with black electricity, and occasionally seemed to form Abyssal or Thassalonian words. I saw the phrase I’d seen in the other room, about angry screams. And it seemed the phrases we’d seen in other rooms were scattered in as well.

So it seems somehow whatever that band of metal is, it’s sending these messages around the ruin. For some reason. Maybe it’s some kind of defense mechanism, meant to scare off intruders? Maybe it’s not even functioning properly, maybe it was meant to do something different but now all it does is spew out these phrases after thousands of years with no upkeep. Who knows?

We’d finally hit a dead end on this particular branch of the ruin. There was nothing left to do but turn back and choose another path we’d yet to clear. So we went back to the hall just before the room where we’d fought the two Sinspawn, and ventured down the hall we hadn’t yet travelled.

At the end of this hall was something not half foreboding. A shrine to the Mother of Monsters, Lamashtu. Any statue that had one stood there was long gone, but there was still a basin of fetid water at its base that Tabot warned us not to go near. He sounded really legitimately shaken by it, and I don’t much want to find out what happens if you mess with a Demon Lord’s shrine, so I kept my distance.

There was only one exit from this room. The air felt heavy and I think we all wanted out of this room as soon as possible—Tabot especially. The door in question had a heavy padlock sealing it closed, but we’d found a large key in the room with the mutant goblin, so we easily put two and two together.

I listened at the door first, and heard nothing. With the heavy lock in place, I believed it was likely nothing had been in or out of this room in a long time. So all we would have to do was sweep it quickly to make sure there was nothing left so we could honestly say we’d cleared everything out.

Oh how wrong I was.

When I opened the door, the room did, indeed, appear empty.

Before I could take a step inside, however, the air beside me shimmered. A summoning spell came to completion, and a goblin dog appeared directly to my left. Then a shrieking voice called out to us, ‘how dare we intrude on Her domain’—strangely it sounded like she was speaking the Catfolk tongue, but given that the others understood her as well I suspect Tongues to be the culprit.

A small creature with a feminine figure, curved horns, and bat-like wings appeared before a strange glowing pool of liquid on a platform above us across the room. Krysa identified her as a quasit, a type of demon. The demoness cut her hand and let the blood leak into the boiling pool. And from it, another Sinspawn emerged.

So it would seem she is the one behind those.

Before I could react, she flung a spell at me. I could feel my muscles try to lock up, but I willed my body to continue working through the effects of the spell. If I could will myself to walk on my bad leg for so many years, willing myself to move is child’s play.

And good thing too, because that goblin dog came for my throat. I dodged, and it only got my arm, but that would have been bad if I’d been unable to move. I backed away from the vicious hairless beast, then tossed an explosive at it in response.

Unfortunately, doing so took my eyes off the Sinspawn, which moved faster than I’d expected. Suddenly it was behind me and I felt a ranseur driven into my side. While I wasn’t looking a second Sinspawn had been created as well. And the tiny demoness wouldn’t be done creating these creatures until that pool quit its ominous glow—which only happened after four of those monstrosities had been birthed from those boiling waters.

The others weren’t slouching in helping to try to clear their numbers, though. Tabot and I stood side-by-side against two Sinspawn, while Nanel took care of two more with Krysa backing him up from the doorway. Things actually felt like they were going well, despite the numbers not being in our favor.

Then the little demoness Hex’d Tabot, causing him to drop his defenses, allowing a Sinspawn’s ranseur to hit its mark. A second Hex, and the paladin slumped over in a magic-induced slumber.

I was of two minds—the Sinspawn nearest Tabot was badly hurt, and Nanel was nearby. In theory either I could kill it, or Nanel could interrupt an attempt to kill the helpless paladin.

In theory.

I decided I didn’t like the odds. Instead, I slapped Tabot awake. He could take a cat nap later.

This apparently enraged the Sinspawn that very much was going to kill Tabot before, and it unleased its anger on me. I was forced to retreat behind Tabot to heal myself, as I think I had more blood in my fur than in my body.

Tabot managed to stand without the spawn surrounding him skewering him in response, his shield deflecting any attempt. Nanel was holding his own against the spawn he was fighting well—biting then retreating to stab with the ranseur. He is surprisingly mobile for a man of his size, and his tactic staying on the move seemed to be working incredibly well for him. Not to mention Krysa, who got first blood on the Quasit by tossing a magic missile at her.

Unfortunately, it would seem we were doing too well for her liking. Suddenly an aura of dread flowed through the room. In front of me, Tabot went rigid. I didn’t see Krysa—but that’s because they’d already run before I looked. A moment later Tabot had darted off as well.

Leaving me and Nanel alone.

I stepped to his side, to face the remaining Sinspawn back-to-back so we didn’t get any more nasty surprises.

Any bad feelings that were lingering weren’t important in that moment. All that mattered was that we both made it out of this alive—and preferably that the Quasit did not.

We had no way to harm her in the air. Her thick hide was too fire-resistant for my bombs, and Nanel didn’t have any means of fighting from a distance. Even if Krysa and Tabot hadn’t been seen into a magically induced panic, Krysa’s crossbow wasn’t strong enough to pierce her hide, and Tabot had dropped his shortbow and decided he only needed his sword somewhere along the way.

So the only way she was coming into range of my blade and Nanel’s ranseur was if her rage and pride were enough to goad her into it.

Nanel slayed a Sinspawn, his mouth somehow opening wide enough to fit its entire head inside before biting down.

I’m…not entirely sure what Nanel is. Because I don’t think he is entirely human. Humans cannot dislocate their law and open it wide enough to eat an entire living creature whole, as I have seen him do. I’m sure he would explain it as a boon from his deity—patron—thing—but that explanation can only go so far. If a worshipper of Lamashtu is warped beyond recognition by their god’s ‘boons’, they are called a monster. So what do you call Nanel if he is changed so much he is no longer recognizably human?

I don’t know. I don’t think I can answer that question. I don’t know if it’s even a fair question to ask.

I might have transformations into monsters on my mind tonight. Just a little. Between the mutant goblin, the shrine to Lamashtu, whatever is going on with Nanel, and…something else I haven’t quite gotten to yet. Something I’m not looking forward to committing to paper. It’s not been a good day, to say the least.

Anyways. Where was I? Yes, right. Nanel and I were fighting the three remaining Sinspawn. When thankfully Tabot and Krysa snapped out of their panic. Tabot charged down the hall and sliced through a Sinspawn that had been unlucky enough to have positioned itself in the doorway. A bolt shot past him, so although I couldn’t see Krysa in the next room, clearly the little rat had snapped out of it as well and was now taking pot shots at the Sinspawn.

The tide was turning back in our favor. And it seems that finally made the quasit snap. She dove from her place in the air and dug her claws into Nanel. The claws themselves didn’t seem to leave much of an injury, but the wound was a nasty shade, like she’d injected something into the blood.

I remembered one of the things Krysa had rattled off in the chaos of battle about Quasits. They have venomous claws. We would need to see Father Zantus about healing Nanel when all was said and done.

For now, however, she had put herself into position to finally be attacked. I darted in and tried to pin her wings so she couldn’t fly away, but she spun in the air and avoided my blade. Now I found myself on a pile of human skulls, fighting a demoness outside of a Shrine of Lamashtu. Sounds like it could be an art piece. Too bad reality was all terror and bloodshed instead of glory and heroics.

Tabot darted around and got a devastating sword swing on her. The tell-tale glow of a paladin’s Smite engulfed her with the attack, the holy energy burning the unholy creature.

Nanel repositioned around her, snapping at her and then swinging with his ranseur.

I felt a searing pain in my shoulder as the last remaining Sinspawn bit me and dragged its claws down my shield. I felt a flash of rage—everything that had happened in the last week boiling over. The loss of my home and place of work, threats on my life and actual near-death experiences, seeing horrific things I should only have to face in my nightmares. And then as quickly as it flared up, I snuffed it out. Anger had a time and a place, and this wasn’t it. Maybe when I was younger, I would have succumbed. Let bitterness take the reins, run the show, burn everything down just to get a hint of attention from the world.

But not now.

Krysa took care of the monstrosity at my back, and I helped slash through the demon in return.

The Quasit looked scared now. I didn’t know demons could be scared, if I’m being honest. She tried to cast a spell, but her focus was lost as she also tried to defend herself against any incoming attack we attempted.

That opening was all it took. Nanel skewered the demoness, called her a shish kabob, and then…well, ate her.

I’m no doctor, but surely eating demons and Sinspawn isn’t good for one’s health? One is a horrific experiment of a bygone age embodying human sin, and the other is the metaphysical embodiment of all mortal sin.

I did not bring it up to Nanel, but he did at some point mention something about having incredibly strong stomach acid.

Anyways, while I was licking my wounds, the others examined the room. Especially that boiling pool, which was no longer glowing. They identified it as a Minor Runewell. It would seem it’s an artifact that is charged when a particularly wrathful soul dies within a certain radius, and charges of it are used to create Sinspawn. Its radius also included Sandpoint, which we think has something to do with why the town seems so ‘cursed’ with violence and misfortune in recent years.

Tabot believed he knew how to destroy the Minor Runewell permanently, however, so it wouldn’t be a blight on the town any longer. It would have to be filled with boiling holy water for at least a full day and night to purify it.

That was not something we had time for, however. Perhaps Father Zantus or another priest in town could spare the time to watch over the destruction of this artifact in our absence. We’d killed this demoness, but there was still no hint of where Nualia was or where the goblins had come from, which had to be our priority.

The underground was virtually completely cleared out, the only place we hadn’t poked around yet were the stairs leading up that we’d planned to save for last. So, with the demoness dead, we ventured upwards, not thinking anything left lurking down here could possibly be worse than a Quasit and four Sinspawn.

That’s when we wandered into the torture chamber, and the Vargouille attacked.

It swooped down at us with a screech that resonated in my head and my bones and every fiber of my body. Despite what I said earlier about being able to will myself to move, this time I was frozen in place and at the horror’s mercy.

Tabot was the only person ahead of me in the hall—as Nanel was in no state to take the lead with all the poison the Quasit had pumped into his veins, and obviously Krysa wasn’t going to be in front to risk being the first target of attacks. Tabot, with his shield in hand, made the most sense to take point. Tabot stood steady, his shield held to block the creature from getting into the hall.

Unfortunately, the Vargouille was quick in the air. Tabot took a swing at it, but it still flew over him and straight at me. I felt its clammy skin press against mine in a mockery of a kiss, and when it pulled away it left a feeling of icy cold behind as it devoured something from within me.

I couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything to signal to any of the others that something had been done to me, but my racing mind could still think. I could try to remember what I had read about Vargouilles in the past.

What I remembered only stoked my panic further. If a Vargouille can render its prey helpless, it will administer a deadly kiss which over the course of 24 hours—sometimes much sooner—will transform the victim into another Vargouille. Killing the victim and leaving only the cursed monstrosity behind.

I was trapped in my own frozen body as I panicked and tried to fight against the paralysis. I had to get out of here. I had to get into the sun immediately. And then get a cure. Sunlight would slow the rate of the transformation—the curse did not progress as long as the victim was in direct sunlight. Which meant if I got out of the damnable ruin and the cave which housed it, I could buy myself time. Hours of time. Enough time to get a cure.

My first thought was Father Zantus. But the magic required to cure this was fairly powerful—beyond the reach of most small-town priests. So my next option was to hope that Vin had a scroll of Remove Disease in stock at his item shop—or could get one in before it was too late for me.

My mind was too preoccupied to really see how the fight with the Vargouille went. I don’t remember seeing a corpse so maybe Nanel ate it as well, I don’t know. The moment my body snapped back into my control I could feel the actual panic attack coming on, and I told the others I needed to get to the surface. Immediately.

The others, bless them, didn’t ask any questions. They immediately made a beeline for the top of the stairs, thinking it would be the quickest way out. Nanel even carried me. My pride might normally be a little bruised, but honestly right that moment I couldn’t care less, I needed to get into the sunlight as quickly as possible and honestly not being on my bad leg right that moment was a welcome relief.

Unfortunately, the stairs up led to another cave-in.

We didn’t wait around listening for sounds or thinking about if we could dig it out. We just immediately turned around and retraced our steps back to the Glassworks, and finally outside.

Once I was safely in the light of day and breathing fresh air, I had to take a moment to collect myself. I felt moments away from emptying my stomach right there in front of the Glassworks. It was hard to breath—it had been ever since the paralysis was undone.

But slowly I got my breathing back under control, and my heart didn’t feel like it was going to hammer out of my chest. Then I finally explained to the others what I had realized about Vargouilles—about what my fate would ultimately be if we couldn’t find a cure. I rambled a bit in my state, but got around to the point that I hoped that Vin might have a scroll we could make use of. Hopefully within our budget.

The others agreed we should go to the shop immediately, and Nanel carried me again. I was too tired to protest. My battered pride can recover another day.

And thank Shelyn and any other god that will listen (even Aroden if he’s really out there), Vin did have one scroll in stock. It was pricy, but we’d found enough treasures down in the ruins to make for a fair trade.

I handed the scroll off to Nanel. Scrolls aren’t really my area of expertise—alchemy might look like magic to some, and I can even logic out certain formulae from the arcane writings of wizards, but they are still two very different arts at their core. There’s a hint of familiarity to scrolls, but not enough for me to reliably make use of them.

This wouldn’t be in Krysa’s wheelhouse, either. The arcane and the divine don’t really…mesh, usually. And curing diseases or healing wounds with positive energy is not generally the sort of thing that can be translated into a wizard’s arcane powers.

Nanel, on the other hand, is a divine spellcaster. Of a sort. Not quite a cleric, but I suspected he should still have the basic knowledge necessary to use this kind of scroll.

He seemed a bit uncertain, but he read from the scroll anyways. And I felt something that I hadn’t quite noticed, something cold and oily, be banished from my chest—from where it had been clinging to my very soul. I hugged Nanel as tightly as I could and thanked him.

He, in no uncertain terms, saved my life. We’re even for what happened at the Glassworks and then some.

All three of them did everything they could to help me during that—even before they knew what was wrong, they jumped into action and got me outside with no questions asked.

I don’t think I have ever had anyone have my back like that before, besides my family. I am…caught a little by surprise, to be honest. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the others just fine—disregarding any sore feelings towards Nanel at the time—but past experience taught me that only a very few, very special handful of people would bother with a disabled old cat like me beyond whatever they might need from me.

My brother was left for dead by his people—by his first family—because his wing was deformed. My sister might have ended up just like Nualia, treated like a holy object instead of a person, if she hadn’t had the sheer luck of being adopted by our mothers instead of one of the churches. My other sister, I don’t even know why the drow abandoned her on the surface, but she’s always been treated with suspicion by people up here. Even though she’s just a teen, and she’s never done anything worse than any other kid her age. Well, the human equivalent to her age.

Our mothers wanted us to be ready for the world, and wanted us to face it with optimism and faith in people—and I have tried to live by that. But at the same time, time and time again, it always comes down to us only having each other to rely on.

So…yes, it took me by surprise that the others helped without a single question, that they just trusted that something was truly wrong and decided that they were going to help fix it, even before they knew what it actually was. They could have kept clearing out the ruins—there were still those undead in the holes, and there was the stairway up to check further. They could have sent me on my way to get up to the surface on my own while they handled things down there like they promised Ameiko. And I could have made it on my own. It would have been slower, and more painful, and I don’t think I would have come down from my panic near as well without people there—but I would have managed, if I'd had to.

I’m not even sure what I’m trying to say. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. They’re good people. With Tabot I suppose that’s a given, he really does his best to embody what a paladin is meant to be. But the other two, they’re good people too. Not everyone would have done what they did for me today. I won’t forget it.