#good morning to those in the western hemisphere with me

[elegyfortherings]

happy outer wilds switch release day!

[the-firebird69]

Other things that are going on they're being consternating and frustrating on purpose and expect something and the answer is no need to go f*** off and learn how to live and all you know how to do is die.

--with that said the pseudo empire is going to get up tonight in the Western hemisphere and defend themselves it must have some good coffee this morning it's radiation it makes him feel cranky and mean that's what's going on so they're going up north to defend themselves and stop them they're going to logic and it's going to take some time eventually it will stop but right now the pseudo empire in the West is out only about 20% but that's a lot it was overstated but tonight they're going for 10 to 20% and that's serious war and they're getting serious amounts of troops and some spaceships and they're going at it speaking of which we anticipate the additional roughly 20% of the stone chips to heat up in the next few hours. And the pseudo empire is going to stop them they said and they're going to use ships to ship fight here will increase eventually the back warlock will defeat them but VGA is going to defeat Trump and yeah they used to be the Green mountain boys and the Blue mountain boys those days are kind of over to see half Felicia is run by the pseudo empire and the empire but up there they were making weapons it asks us to the mines and tell me Allen was thinking of doing it but he has not.

Thor Freya

Olympus

You have a lot of talk to do about beer companies and we're going to do it later but we are making some impressive gains

Hera

[fullhalalalchemist]

people have probably thought about and written this better than me, but so much oppression in the world wouldn't exist if we just did things that were better for everyone. and it makes sense, its like a 'duh' moment, but the gas station right next to my house just went up almost a dollar since this morning. and i keep thinking, had we as a country moved away from gas & oil and towards sustainable energy, not only would it be good for the environment but it'd be good politically. oil is politics, politics is oil. you divest from that, you take away one of the biggest sources of power for despots and billionaires. so much of putin's power would crumble. so much of the authoritarian arab regimes would crumble almost overnight. and with those gone, so do all the deals and structures that have been built in the west for decades to benefit from the oppression of arabs, the oppression of muslims, the oppression of countries and people in the southern hemisphere who are really at the mercy of western nations, all in the name of oil. and i keep thinking of that. how much better would arab society be, how much stronger socially, if we weren't under the mercy of oil oligarchs. how much more could we accomplish. how much cleaner would our world be, without depending on russian oil, and funding their white christofascist theocracy in russia and overseas. how much better would the US be, with no need for politicians across the aisle making deals and pocketing money from oil companies and oil-rich nations? how many less wars would there be? how many less deaths and bloodshed would there be? how many more free people in the world would there be? and this is just thinking of like, 4 countries max. imagine how much more free the indigenous would be globally. how our beautiful earth would be harmed even less. of course, oil isn't the sole source of power. it's not the cause of racism, or sexism, or genocides, or white supremacist power. but my god, just imagine how much less we would have to worry about without it.

[1zashreena1]

Emotional Spanking -8

18+, m/f, technically OCxDiego Jimenez [Power]

Summary: Princess has an emotional epiphany, a panic attack, a visitor, and a pleasant disciplinary action. In that order. 

WARNINGS: Ridiculous descriptions and ‘the code is more like guidelines’ outlook on grammar. Is it OOC if the character was given essentially zero development in canon???

SMUT. SPANKING. FEELS. the L word, previously completed kink negotiations, plus size woman+fit man, soft!Diego, immediately followed by hard!Diego, overwhelmed Princess, He Licks Everything, is a relationship happening??, literally no one knows, not even them

A/N:  Princess took on a life of her own and has essentially become an OC. There are infrequent mentions of her description (specifically as plus size) and her actual name in later pieces (its Bicki). She started as self-insert so she looks like me (plus size, white, short, blue eyes, curly hair). If that is not your thing, I totally understand. And do not feel obligated to read this, I will not be offended!

I’m not a fan of “plot” so be aware that most of this series is just meandering through their relationship, angst-fluff-smut whiplash style. But with dick jokes.

This piece is my baby.  My heart is in this one.  You have been warned.

TAGLIST: @chelsfic​​​ @symbiont13​​​ @nicke0115​​​ @bunnykjm​​​ @rosee-sensuelle​​​ @girlpornparadise​​​ @mandoplease​​​ @heresathreebee​​​ @xxsteph-enrixx​​​ @jetiikad​​​ @joalsglasses​​​ @mutantcookiesecrets​​​ @demoncatstone​​​ @squidlywiddly87​​​ @lockedoutofmyotherblog​​ @poeedamerons​

Whoever is banging on your door at 6:45 on a Monday morning is relentless. You know it's not your downstairs neighbors; the second floor apartment is still empty because your landlord is actually very sweet and doesn't just screen future tenants for ability to pay the rent, he tries to make sure they'll fit in with the current tenants too. And the little family on the first floor has that loud-ass two year old. There's no blabbery baby talk and the sound of the impact is damn near at the top of the door. So it's definitely Stranger Danger.

You're just going to wait it out. They have to give up at some point. And you've just spent three days ignoring literally everything in the universe, so really,  the odds are in your favor here.

Except… you live in a tiny little town. The population on the sign says 570, but they were being generous in counting all the farms within a 10 mile radius. No one comes to your door accidentally. People don't wander up three flights of exterior stairs on an old farmhouse in the middle of Pennsylvania Dutch Country while it's barely above freezing and still dark out. So there are two options:

Serial Killer.

Or, ugh, someone who knows you.

They're not stopping and it's starting to piss you off.

 "This better be a fucking murderer!" You mutter as you stomp to the door.  Impressive really, considering your pajama pants are over a foot too long and the apartment is carpeted. You reach the door and turn the deadbolt (banging still going on), unlock the doorknob (really, this is just excessive), and yank the door open with a war cry. 

"WHAT THE FUCK!"

Its Diego.

Its Diego looking... odd? You take a split second to catalogue his appearance, it's like a reflex at this point because you can't not ogle him every time his existence is within your range of sight. He's not wearing a belt?? His shirt is half untucked and his jacket extremely wrinkled. One side of his hair is completely flat, as if he slept on it, and his squinted eyes are very, very red. Like he just came off a three day bender. Or he's been crying, your traitorous brain oh so helpfully supplies.

Diego, frozen mid-bang, also takes this time to look you up and down. His eyebrows raise and his brow furrows, clearly not impressed. You're wearing the same pair of pajamas as the last three days. Mismatched socks (one is orange, the other neon green), the overly long drawstring punjammy pants with one cuff rolled up from your stomping, a shelf bra camisole that lost its ability to function as a bra sometime in the last decade, no make up, and your somehow greasy yet simultaneously frizzy floop of curls.

Softly, but with great feeling, he rasps, "What the fuck, Princess?"

Oh no, this is Not Good. This is so, very, incredibly, horrendously bad. Your right arm tenses in preparation to slam the door in his face. His left hand shoots out to land on the door, his arm taut to hold it motionless. He's keeping the door pinned to the wall so he can continue taking up all of the open space of the doorway with his massive body. You snarl silently at him but let go of the door because you know this is the one man who actually can physically overpower you. And you don't need a shattered door to match your shattered pride.

You aim for unbothered dismissive bitch when you ask, "What are you doing here?" 

You fail spectacularly when it comes out in a tremulous whisper. 

Instead of waiting for an answer you spin around and go left into the living/dining/kitchen largest-space-in-the-apartment all-purpose room. You collapse on your tiny sectional and tuck your feet up under you to sit cross legged. You can hear Diego slam the door and follow after you.  As he comes around the chaise of the sectional you reach behind yourself and grab the crocheted blanket your mom made off the back of the couch and desperately try to hide in it. All you want is to become invisible. Diego, of course, is not going to allow that. Asshole.

"What am I doing here? You have not answered anyone for three days! Not your normal phone, not the phone I gave you, not even a Facebook message from your mother! Your sister told Lisa that no one can reach you. Lisa called Julio! What have you been doing?? Clearly you have... gone nowhere…?"  His speech started off barking but had shrunk to down to a horrified whisper as he took in the state of your apartment.  Everything is everywhere.  There are dirty dishes on the breakfast bar. Hair bands scattered across every horizontal surface. A lone lip balm is abandoned on the floor among a sea of used tissues. 

--------

This is so not the woman he knows. There's no sarcastic snark of an answer. That woman would never leave something as important as a lip balm on the floor. Shit, she uses packing cubes for fuck's sake. As he kneels down to retrieve the tube of mint goop he hears it. The one sound that always makes him freeze up and opens a sinkhole in his belly: She's crying.

This unflappable woman who makes eye contact with all of his men, who never hesitates to lecture him on 'feminist theory', who gleefully stuffs an entire slice of pizza into her face while sitting in the VIP booth at the club with skinny models looking on in horror, and once called his bluff about putting on a show in the back of a limo by winking and telling Julio to watch them as she pushed him to his knees in front of her while simultaneously yanking up her miniskirt… is crying.

 And it's probably my fault. He's almost certain this is his fault. Who else could make her emotional like this? Is someone else important enough to be worth her tears? It had better be my fault. If it's someone else I will kill them.

He looks up to see she has wrapped herself entirely in that weird fuzzy blanket her mother somehow made. The whole blanket creation process had been a mystery to him despite listening to her mother explain it step by step. She even has it over her head like a hood. Which would be adorably hilarious if she weren't ugly crying. Ew, please stop.

It only takes two shuffling steps on his knees to reach her, the living room is so small. He wraps his hands entirely around her forearms and pulls her own hands from her face. How is she beautiful with snot running from her nose? Only for her to flinch backwards. Okay, ouch. 

"Look at me." He demands. She just scrunches her face harder. He tries a softer tone, "Please?"  That does it. Those bottomless eyes come up and they are so, so lagoon green rather than the normal deepest blue of the open sea. How does she do that?

"Tell me. Talk to me, Princess. Let me in." 

------------------

How does he do that? This large, intimidating, powerful, volatile man should not be able to make you feel safe of all things.  Blurting out your feelings to Lisa had been terrifying. Realizing what had just come out of your mouth had brought on a sense of fear so acute it was nauseating. But here you are, staring into that pleading chocolate gaze and wanting nothing more than to answer him. 

You can vividly remember the conversation that triggered this entire mess:

You came home from another insane weekend in New York and desperately needed to ruin your best friend's day with extremely detailed descriptions of your depravity. Lisa being Lisa, acted exaggeratedly horrified to hear that you demanded he fuck Franchesca in the bathroom so you could go down on her after to lick out his come while he then fingered you. Okay, maybe she wasn't  exaggerating… much. But she knows you. She was not surprised that you wanted to watch him rail Franchesca over a bathroom sink but he insisted on trying to choke you with his tongue while he did it. And she is not shocked that you licked Franchesca off in under two minutes-- or came for him just after. Lisa is still laughing about the finality of Diego's abrupt dismissal of Franchesca the second you come all over his hand when she tells you, "That asshole is a full on freak, girl. Perfect for you!" 

And the moment of your damnation, a soft sigh of an admission, "Yeah. I love him."

And you had removed yourself from all human contact for 3 days immediately following that. No social media, no phones, no internet. Nothing.

...so here you are.

His gigantic hands are wrapped around your forearms, fingers so long they overlap his thumbs. You're not afraid of those hands or their assumed capacity for violence. You should be; you know that, you're not stupid. Or maybe you are. After all, you trust this man who runs the most powerful fucking drug cartel in the western hemisphere and you've never even gotten a speeding ticket. While you've been lost in your musings, he released your forearms only to cup your face in those ridiculous hands. Those hands you love, you fucking dumbass. 

No other man has ever touched you like this. Never touched your face with reverence,  handled your body with an almost jealous possession, or ripped your heart open ever so gently with an earnest expression. He listens, enthralled, when you go off on a rant. He watches where you look while you're out and about. Like a hawk, he notices every shiny little thing you linger on, only for you to find it hidden in your luggage on the way home, wrapped neatly in a tiny box. You once told him that you don't like your elbows touched, it produces some weird overload sensation in your nervous system. And he never took your elbow in hand again, shifted to a hand on your lower back (or your ass, of course. Always a classic). He never seems to care what size is on the tag of the clothes he gets you, only that you like them and you like the way you look in them. He throws his head back with booming laughter when you scream obscenities at traffic. He always thanks you when you make food. Even if he does have to peel the cheese off… he just gives it back to you.

You may have gotten used to the private jet, the SUVs that cost more than your parent's house, the way every restaurant where he takes you has no prices, hell sometimes there isn't even a menu. You've even grown accustomed to the jarring dichotomy of coming home to an apartment the size of his penthouse bedroom while still dripping in precious stones and stuffing your new Louboutins in your purse for the three story climb.

But you're almost certain you will never be over the way your cardiovascular system seizes up when he captures you with a single look, or the functional failure of your lungs when his eyes crinkle with laugh lines, the complete implosion of your stomach when those damn dimples appear, or how your entire reproductive tract clenches with need when he licks his lips, and when your brain stutters to a halt because he lays those hands on your shoulders and swipes his thumbs up your jawline to stroke the pulse point under your ears while leaning his forehead on yours.

You realize you've just been staring at him like a moron for what must be for-fucking-ever. You can tell it's been a while because his eyebrows have lowered and he's starting to look a little defeated. You can feel the weight of his hands easing from your cheeks as he begins to pull back from you. Oh no you don't, you gorgeous fucking asshole.

You slap your hands down on his shoulders with entirely too much force and fling yourself off the couch directly into his lap with a level of violence usually reserved for people who won't put their phones away in a movie theater. He grunts with the sudden addition of your weight and teeters backwards for a second before smashing you into his body via the vise of his arms. You bury your face in his neck, where his stubbly beard catches on your stupid frizz, card your fingers through his amazingly soft hair, and start a whole new round of bawling. 

He's kissing the side of your neck, nuzzling into you like he wants to be inside your skin with you. His fingers are spread wide across your back, he's trying to touch as much of you as possible all at once. You can hear a soft, keening whine but you have no idea which one of you is making it. Does it even matter? 

The noise stops when you feel his teeth gently sink into the join of your neck and right shoulder. Oh. Guess it was him. His right hand dips low to palm your ass cheek and flatten you further against him. You automatically squeeze your legs around his hips in response.

You realize he's not hard. The shock of this revelation further delays you in understanding that someone is talking. And that someone is you. 

"Please please, I'm sorry, please." Hiccup. "Its never- I've never been. I'm scared. It's too much and I'm scared." Another sob. "You keep leaving and it's just. What i-i-i-if you don't come back?" A stuttering inhaled gasp. "Who am I w-w-w-without you? What do I do?" A coughing sob. "You m-m-m-make me weak like this and I fucking h-h-hate it!" And you dissolve into another round of wailing sobs. You know you're practically screaming but you can't seem to stop. Your left hand is clawed into his hair and your right is fisted in the collar of his jacket, ruining the Armani. You're fairly certain the mess of snot and drool leaking out of your face isn't doing any favors for his shirt either.

He's just… letting you. Just letting you ruin his stupid expensive clothes and have a meltdown all over him. Like this is okay. Like it's no big deal. His left hand is rubbing circles over your ribcage while you howl. He releases your neck to raise his chin and tuck you up underneath it. Rubbing his goatee over your hair, then kissing the top of your head so incredibly gently. That can't smell good, you think hysterically.

Your sobs are finally starting to ease but he hasn't made a move to let go yet. You start to wonder how long he's going to kneel here holding you. Can it be forever?

It finally registers that his breathing is rough, labored. His shoulders are shaking under you. Now you're legitimately frightened. 

"Diego?" You finally work up the nerve to speak. You hate the way your voice sounds like a small child. "...baby?"  He is slowly stiffening under you and not in the fun way. You start to pull your face back from his neck only for his left hand to shoot up into your hair and hold you in place. It's not painful but it's definitely not soft either. Your breathing is starting to speed up. You instinctively know something important is about to happen. And it terrifies you.

He is holding you so tight its bordering on painful when he finally speaks into your hair.

"Why. Tell me why you fear that I never return. You are not weak. And this is not hate." He uses the hand in your hair to pull your head back. You fight it at first, it's just your nature. Then you squeeze your eyes shut and let him move you like a ragdoll. With no vision you don't know what he's doing until you feel the press of his forehead against your own. He bumps his nose against yours then rubs his bristled cheek against your soft one. You realize he's rubbing you like a cat and it makes you smile ruefully. My Murder Panther.

With his lips pressed right to your ear, he rumbles ever so softly, "Tell Diego, Princess."

Your whole body seizes up with the sensation. Oh, you fucking bastard. You would say it aloud except the undercurrent of fear in his voice gives you pause. He's afraid. He's afraid of you. Of the possibility of your rejection. Just like in the kitchen when he blurted out that he wanted to keep you. The way he froze, paralyzed in fear, after he whispered that he loved you. It's the same soft, lost little boy voice, the slight tremble in tone, the uncertainty. 

And this time...this time, you can't take it. Tears slowly slip down your cheeks as you squeeze your eyes shut even tighter. You remember the night you met. His breathtaking smile when you turned the tables on him. Those damn dimples. When you felt the gun in the back of his pants. The moment you decided to do what you wanted and not what you should. Fuck it.

You press your own lips to his ear, his grip in your hair pliant enough to allow it. He's shaking under you. The fingers of his right hand are digging into your hip like claws, you find the pain grounding. Knowing that you're in control of this entire moment is both thrilling and terrifying. You could break him, right here and now. Fuck it.

And he would let you. This rich, powerful, enigmatic man who has already confessed his love to you. Fuck it.

"Diego.." You breathe into his cheek. He shudders under you and sighs out in a broken whimper. 

Fuck it.

"Diego… I love you."

-------------------------

There's a long moment that nothing happens. Everything is frozen in place. He doesn't even breathe for fear that he'll wake up from this, just like the dream from a few weeks ago.  When he does remember to inhale it's a raspy choke of a gasp. It hurts, he realizes. Is it supposed to hurt? 

His eyes are burning. Taking an immediate red eye flight from LA and then driving three hours to her place was probably not his best plan, but he had been terrified. He had needed to have her exactly where she is right now.

He loosens the grip in her hair and turns his face into hers to rub his wet lashes on her cheek. Her hands are coming forward to frame his jaw, hands so tiny and soft. He has refrained from saying it himself for fear of scaring her off. He knows its selfish and he doesn't care, he wants to hear it again. Over and over. Until it stops hurting.

"Diego?" Her voice is so soft, harsh from crying yet still so high. He opens his eyes to see that she still has hers closed. He slides his goatee over her skin until his lips hover over hers.

"Again." He murmurs, "Please, my princess. Tell me you will let me keep you."

‐-------------------------

This couldn't hurt more if he'd reached into your chest and snatched your heart with his bare hands. He sounds so small and hopeful, so vulnerable. Am I his first? The first person to love him?

You can't stand this man begging for your affection. You find yourself wanting to give him everything.  Your secret is already out; in for a penny in for a pound, right?

You take a deep breath and dive in head first because you're a fucking Scorpio, damnit.

"Diego, baby." You stroke his cheeks, petting down his stubble with the direction of the growth. Just like you would pet any other cat, you find yourself grinning. You open your eyes to see him so close its dizzying. His are shut but his expression is pure yearning, eyebrows drawn down and brow furrowed, jaw tensely solid, wet lashes stuck together in spiky pieces. "I love you." 

He chokes and his eyes snap open to meet yours. Now it's your turn to muck up the basic process of breathing. There's so much everything in his eyes you feel like you're drowning. Every fucking romance novel cliche was right.

"Again." He demands. In typical Diego fashion, he wants it and he wants it now. You can't help your smile growing wide. There's my Murder Panther.

"I love you." You maintain eye contact while leaning your forehead against his. "I love you." Its like you can't stop yourself. You brush your lips over his goatee, he chases you back to ghost a kiss on your lips. "I love you." Its just pouring out of you now.

"I-" Kiss.

"Love-" Kiss.

"You." Kiss. 

You expect him to keep kissing you. To slide that perfectly wicked tongue between your lips and drive you even further insane. But he doesn't. He pulls back to pant in your face, then closes his eyes and whimpers. You watch the play of emotions across his features, so quick you can't identify a single one. He finally gathers himself into some cohesive comprehensible thought and speaks:

"I dont. I have never. You have to, to do the...uhh… help?"

Or not.

You can hear so much in that soft rumble. Fear, relief, uncertainty, pleasure, hunger, but most of all, trust. He's trusting you. Trusting that you know what to do. Trusting that you can lead him on this new path. Trusting that you'll take care of him. This man who leads the largest criminal outfit on the continent and is intimidated by nothing, entrusts his being to you. It's like being stabbed in the heart, a searing pain that brings tears to your eyes and a painfully wide smile to your lips.

You slide the thumb of your right hand forward to swipe over his cheekbone. Your left hand goes back to stroke his hair. He nuzzles into your right hand, beard both soft and scratchy. Just like him, all contradictions.  You can see his lashes flutter and you open your mouth to speak but…

Wait a minute.

Seriously???

"Diego… Are you staring at my tits?"

He's not even remotely repentant. "They are just. Right There! And no bra!"

You throw your head back and laugh. You laugh so loud it hurts your throat and brings tears to your eyes. You laugh until you're gasping for air. When you finally open your eyes and look at him your heart tries to crawl up and out of you just to get to him. 

He's staring up at you, eyes wide with adoration and jaw hanging open in wonder. You bend forward to rest your forehead on his again. "You soft little Murder Panther." You don't even bother trying to hide your ridiculously pleased smirk.

His right hand slides up your hip to your lower back while the left lowers slowly from your hair to the back of your neck. His lips curl up at the corners. His gaze is still soft as he murmurs, "Only for you, my princess."

-------------------

She's so soft in his arms. Relaxed and loose, trusting that he'll take her weight without buckling and keep her safe from falling. It makes his chest ache and his eyes burn. He raises his chin, bringing his lips to her, only she dives down for him at the same moment, colliding together just this side of too much, too fast. Always so eager, the thought makes him groan deeply. She shivers in response and whines, so high pitched it makes his ears ring.

She's curling her fingers in his hair, using the leverage to tilt his head to the angle she wants while he kisses her. He's rubbing his lips over hers, making sure to apply enough pressure that her fair skin will show the beard burn later. When he feels her left arm begin to tense he goes to draw back to look at her… only for her to yank on his hair. He yelps, and she seizes the opportunity to delve her tongue into his mouth. Holy fuck, she is perfect.

And then she's abruptly pulling back. No no no no no no! 

-------------------------------

Like a slap upside the head, you suddenly remember that you haven't showered...for three days. Fuuuuuuuck.

"Wait, wait Diego, hold on-" In the time it takes you to whine those five words he's already moved on to your neck. His left hand is threaded back into your hair and holds tight close to your scalp to gently but steadily pull. Just how you like it.

"Uhhhhhhhhh wuhhh…" Oh yes, so eloquent. He's rubbing that fucking goatee everywhere and you're about fourteen seconds away from passing out. You put your hands on his shoulders and start to push him backwards. He growls in displeasure and you whimper. Okay, maybe a little more, your traitorous brain isn't even helping here. You try again, "Baby, baby. I haven't. Oh god, yes. Uhh huh. Wait, just, can you pause? Mmmmmm… Oh my god, Diego stop!" Apparently barking works.

He growls again but manages to disengage from tormenting your neck with one last long lick. Do not think about that tongue! 

"Fucking what?" He mutters, breathing hard. "I cannot have you? Now?" How very Diego. He's blinking at you in agitated confusion, pupils blown wide and flushed lips parted. His hand in your hair is shaking, the other has sunk back down to grip your ass very, very securely.

You can feel your face flushing with embarrassment. Your gaze darts off to the left, this is mortifying.  "I haven't showered in three days. I smell." When you finally manage to make eye contact again he's grinning. Oh no.

"Oh si, Princess. I can smell you." His tone is arrogant, but the thickening of his accent betrays just how aroused he really is. His left hand slides down to your butt, too. That grin is all teeth, Pure apex predator. 

"Yeah, that's what I me-yeeeeen!" He doesn't let you finish. Instead he slides both hands under you, where ass meets thigh, and picks you up to deposit you back onto the couch. You always squeal in delight when he picks you up, That is never gonna get old. The moment your weight is on the cushion he brings his hands forward and then around your inner thighs to spread your legs wide. Before you can even register what is happening he dives down into your lap, burying his face in your crotch and inhaling deeply. 

While your brain has stalled in shock (because Are you fucking serious?) your hips have decided this is a great idea and lurched forward to practically hump his face. His exhale is the longest, loudest, sexiest groan you have ever heard. Your hands fly to his hair, but instead of pushing away they are definitely holding him in place. He's rubbing his face against you, turning his head from side to side, moaning endlessly like he can't get enough. 

Your brain finally catches up and you abruptly cut off the whine that's been pouring out of you. You just have to open your mouth, "Are you fucking serious right now? You like that?!?" 

With one last hard rub of his face against you, (FUCK YES, rub that bearded chin on my clit) he pulls back to look up at you. And if you thought he looked aroused before, he is positively wrecked now. His eyes are slitted in pleasure, brows drawn together with need, jaw slack, mouth open and panting. He doesn't keep you waiting for an answer. "Well, not your normal sexy bakery scent. You smell like you but just, more. Damn delicious." He growls. 

Okay, two things: 

You file 'sexy bakery' away for later discussion because wtf, lol.

And. And he really means that. He's dead serious. He has a death grip on your inner thighs, his hands are like steel. As if he's afraid you'll try to push him away, to stop him. Fat fucking chance, babe.

You cup his face with both hands and smile softly down at him. In wondrous amazement you whisper, "Holy fuck, I love you." The transformation of his expression from blissfully needy to Horny Murder Panther is damn near instantaneous.

"Good. Now gimme this pussy!" He orders. 

You laugh, but your hands fly to the drawstring of your pants in obedience. He erupts into a flurry of actions, pulling his jacket off to dump it on the floor behind him. He only gets as far as unbuttoning the cuffs on his sleeves before giving up and just ripping the shirt up and over his head to join his jacket. The sight of solidly muscled chest rippling like that short circuits your brain. What were you even doing? Was it drooling? Its definitely drooling now. 

His hands come back to your thighs, fingers digging deep into your soft flesh. He yanks you forward until your ass is hanging off the couch. You snap back to awareness and start frantically pushing your pants down. He grabs the waistbands of both your pants and underwear and hauls the whole mess down your legs at what has to be record speed. Before you have a chance to do anything else he's burying his face into your pussy like a starving man. 

He uses his flattened tongue to give you a long, slow, torturous lick from the bottom of your entrance to your clit. Your back arches to mirror his movements while you sob in pleasure. Then he does it again. And again. Over and over in an endless loop of wet decadent friction. He grips the backs of your thighs, the heels of his palms brushing your ass while his thumbs are buried in the creases where leg becomes hip. He pushes your legs back more yet, widening you further and practically folding you in half. You can't even bring yourself to be worried about how your squishy stomach compresses into rolls. Diego certainly doesn't care.

He changes tactics to latch onto your clit. Sealing his lips around you, he alternates between hard suction and softly sliding his tongue up under your hood to drive you mad. The direct pressure is almost too much, you whimper and squirm after only a few rounds of this. He leaves off and you think you're catching a break to breathe. You are so, so wrong.

He goes lower to literally lick you from bottom to top.

With a shriek, both of your hands fly to his head. "Holy fuck. Oh my god, oh my god. Baby. You. Oh god. Baby, fuck yessss… " What started out as some kind of blasphemous incantation ends in you hissing with unadulterated sin. He moans against you in response but doesn't stop. The incessant long strokes of his tongue have you closer to orgasm faster than you can ever remember it happening before. Your legs are shaking and tears are pouring from your eyes. You reach your right hand down to touch his left where he's holding your thigh, needing something, anything, to ground you. And he laces his fingers with yours. 

Your heart clenches. "Diego…" you whisper for him, sobbing from the intensity of everything. With a choppy groan he refocuses on your clit, ferociously determined. Your entire abdomen is tense, you're wound too tight. He presses his flattened tongue against you even harder, shortening his strokes just to cover your clit. It feels infinite, you can't tell where one lick ends and the next begins. Just constant, unyielding pleasure. It's too much, holy fuck it's too much, never stop.

Everything clicks into clear focus. Your pussy compresses tight on nothing, and then you snap. Your whole body seizes up with your orgasm. For one long, terrifying moment your heart pauses and your breathing stops. It all comes crashing back together and you suck in a lungful of air with a choking sob. Waves of agonizing pleasure wash over you, your body shuddering with each one. He's still pressing that incredible, miraculous, entirely evil tongue to your clit. Holding fast and drawing your climax out as long as possible. Growling against you with heavenly vibration. As the rounds of your clenching cunt ease in both intensity and frequency he slowly slides up and off of you. 

He rests his sweaty forehead against the inside of your right thigh, panting so hard his breath is hitting you with almost physical force. You pry your right hand off your own thigh, keep your fingers laced together, and bring his hand up to your chest where you lay it over your heart.

You keep your eyes closed while you brokenly cry. "I love you, Diego."

-----------------

His right hand snakes up your body to slide around the back of your neck. He's pulling you forward, sitting you upright. His left hand slides back down to your hip where he grips you tightly and pulls toward him simultaneously. Your eyes pop open when you feel like you're going to fall off the couch. 

Diego scoops you back into his lap with your momentum and proceeds to just stand up. You yelp in surprise as your arms shoot around his neck to hold on. It takes a second to realize that you're essentially just sitting on his left forearm, his right hand is still gripping the back of your neck tightly. You moan in pure arousal, hiding your face against his shoulder. The fact that he just tosses you around like a ragdoll is so mind-meltingly hot. The sheer bulk and breadth of him never ceases to render you speechless. There's just so much Diego that he blocks out everything else. Its overwhelming in every sense. Let me just drown in Diego.

By the time you've contemplated your fate, bodice-ripper romance novel style, he's made it halfway down the hall to your bedroom. You tuck your legs tighter around his torso, the hallways in an old farmhouse aren't exactly spacious, and he purrs against you in response. Your body's physical reaction is so strong that you choke. Is there anything about this man that does not turn me on? 

He makes it to your bedroom without incident (a miracle, really, considering it looks like a bomb went off in your apartment) and deposits you on the bed. He's been so incredibly gentle with those huge hands that it takes you by surprise when he firmly grasps your jaw and growls at you. "Look at me."

You swallow, hard, and open your eyes. He's staring at you so intensely, his gaze unreadable. He uses his grip on you to slowly push you down onto your back. You don't even try to fight it. You're not sure what he's doing but it's very clear that he needs to do it. He squeezes your jaw with purpose and you blink up at him in confusion. He cocks his head and regards you like… well, like prey.

It's been a long time since he has made you nervous like this.

He finally releases your jaw to slide his hand down your throat and rest it over your pounding heart. He pulls the neckline of your camisole away from your body then allows it to softly snap back against you. "Take this off." His growl is quiet, but it still sets off alarm bells in some primal part of your brain. He sees the hesitation in your eyes and barks out, "Now!"

You whip the top off over your head before he loses any more patience and rips it off of you in shreds. His hand is back on your jaw, ensuring you look nowhere but at him. His breathing is harsh, you can see a muscle tic in his left cheek, and his eyes are wild. Feral, you shiver with the thought. "Stay, Princess." He orders softly and releases his hold on you. 

You don't dare move.

He straightens back upright and his hands go to his pants. You have a brief moment of hysteria, Have fun getting those impeccably tailored pants over that massive cock, but you manage to stifle the thought and keep your expression steady. He's toeing off his shoes while undoing the button, then pulling the zipper down. You watch his hands in fascination. It's an obsession you have no plans of shaking. He manages to get the pants over his hips with no problems, a complete lack of underwear always expedites the process. 

He moves to climb on the bed and you spread your legs for him like a reflex. This man has had a profound effect on you. Before you get too far he throws his left leg over both of yours, straddling you and effectively immobilizing you. You reach up for him as he plants his elbows just outside of yours and cups your face in those hands you so adore. Your own hands land on his shoulders and he allows it, for now. You try to urge him down on top of you, but he's not budging. You want to touch more, feel all of him, but he's just looming over you to block out the rest of existence.

His hands are like iron, caging you in to bend you to his will. His eyes search your face, you have no idea what he's seeking. Finally, he rumbles down at you, "Do you know what you did?"

The question is soft, dangerously so. You can feel yourself starting to shake. You have a sneaking suspicion that there is no right answer so you just shake your head in a 'no'. He cocks his head again and you find yourself blinking rapidly. His eye twitches when he finally answers, "You scared me."

You're shocked. Never in a million years would you have expected this man to straightforwardly admit fear. He leans in close to your face and your breathing hitches. "I'm sorry." You whimper. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I never meant to scare you." You don't even recognize your own voice. Its small, plaintive and timid. 

He moves back upright and kneels over you. His expression is only becoming more fierce. You start to draw your legs out from under him, curling up some, instinctively seeking to protect yourself. "You didn't mean to?" He rumbles incredulously. His eyebrows are rising and you can feel actual anger radiating off of him. 

He snaps, "You didn't mean for me to drop everything I was doing?" And faster than you can comprehend his right hand comes down on the outside of your left thigh. The sharp sound of the slap echoes in your tiny room. Your jaw drops in shock, then the pain blooms out from the point of impact. You look from his face to his hand, then back again. "Diego, I--"

"You didn't mean for me to cancel two drop receivements and a business meeting?" His hand comes down again, but you're already moving. You try to turn away, rolling your legs to the right. His hand lands on your left hip, fingers long enough to catch the outside of your cheek. You shriek and start trying to escape in earnest. His left hand shoots down and grabs both of your wrists, stopping you from pulling yourself away from him. "Diego! Wait, I don't--" 

He clamps his legs around yours and uses your momentum against you to turn your hips entirely to the side. He has both your wrists pinned down in a bruising grip. Your shoulders are flat on the bed, there's nowhere you can hide your face. "No! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cause--"

"You didn't mean for me to take an immediate flight across the entire country?" This time the slap lands fully on your ass. And it hurts. You yelp as tears spill over your cheeks. "No! I'm sorry! Please--"

"You didn't mean for me to drive two hours from the airport after I've been awake for almost two days?" His volume has risen, he's practically yelling. His hand comes down again, lower this time to catch the bottom of your cheek, where it becomes the tender skin of thigh. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! No I didn't--"

"You didn't mean for me to find you here like this? Having some sort of tantrum like a child?" He roars. This time there are three slaps, one right after the next, all landing in the same spot. Your shrieks are coming out in stutters, interspersed with gasping inhalations. "No! No no no! I'm sorry! I'm sorry Diego! I'm sorry!" You're sobbing with it, choking on humiliation. You can't hide your face, there's nowhere to run from this.

"Or you didn't mean for me to find out that you cared? Huh? That you love me!" His voice cracks over the sound of his near constant strikes. You're wailing in tears, "Yes! Yes! Okay! Damnit Diego, I'm sorry! I was afraid! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry…" you dissolve into incoherence. 

He releases your wrists and grabs your face again. You try to push him away, but you're too weak. "Look at me! Look at me, Bicki!" he hisses. You shake your head no. "Mirame, Princesa! Please, please." His voice is hoarse, dripping with fear and desperation. You open your eyes to find him right in your face. His expression is twisted up with pain and desire. "You cannot do this! I have to know you are safe! Protected! Let me keep you!" 

It suddenly dawns on you what he means with 'keep'. He wants to protect you yes, but what he really means is 'have' you. Present in his life. At his side. Your heart in his keeping.

His hands are stroking you, over your hair, down your arms. He grips your hands tightly, bringing them up to his face. You hold onto him, your only constant in this. "Diego.." you hiccup. Then, with no warning and no conscious command on your part, you slap him. Hard. 

You're both frozen in place, equally shocked. Staring at each other in escalating tension. You sniffle and it launches him into action.

He grabs your left hip in a bruising grip, pushing your leg to your chest, pulling it out from under him so he can get between your thighs. You frantically claw at his shoulders, his biceps, anything to pull him closer. You need him. Right now. You need him so deep inside you that you don't know where he ends and you begin. 

He slides home in one powerful thrust. Your whole back arches and you grimace in excruciating ecstasy. The stretch of it burns, it hurts so perfectly. His left hand is wrapped around your left thigh, holding you open for him, his right on your left shoulder, keeping you steady and still for him to bottom out. He stays there, grinding his cock into you as far as possible. Still trying to push the last few inches into you. Your vision blacks out and you scream yourself hoarse with your orgasm. 

When you come back to awareness he's kissing all over your face, murmuring your name. You turn your face to his, seeking. He fits his lips over yours and you both moan. You pet over his shoulders, reach back up to tug on his hair.

He starts a steady rhythm of long, slow strokes. You can feel every damn inch of him and it's so incredibly, deliriously good. You open your mouth to him and he deepens the kiss, tongue moving to match his hips. He tastes like you. All you can smell is his cologne, underscored by pure lustful male. This is indescribable. Each and every one of your senses is nothing but Diego.

His right hand glides down to cup your breast, hefting the weight of it and rubbing his thumb over your nipple. You break off the kiss to throw your head back, whining in pleasure. His lips trail down your neck, beard leaving fire in his wake. He laves his tongue over your nipple before latching on and suckling. You can feel another orgasm approaching, and so can he.

"That's it, Princess. Come for me. Show Diego what a good girl you are." His hoarse voice and soft commands push you right over the edge. You're rippling down around him, sobbing and nodding. Yes, yes, your perfect little princess. 

He picks up the pace, the force of his thrusts rocking the bed into the wall with a steady banging. You can't seem to care. You're whining and pleading, "I'm sorry, please please. Yes baby, yesyesyesyesss…" 

"I know," he coos softly to you. "You are so very sorry, aren't you?" You're nodding desperately in agreement. "Will you do this again? Huh?" You shake your head 'no' so fast it makes you dizzy. His words would be condescending if his tone wasn't so very emotional. It's okay. You need him to vocalize what you can't. And he knows it. He knows you.

He pushes your left leg out to the side, sliding his right hand up your thigh to grip your hip. His left hand travels down your back between you and the bed. Through nothing but raw power he lifts your wide hips and rotates you so you're flat on your back and fully open to him. You keen at the show of strength, just like he knew you would. 

"Are you going to be a good little Princess for Diego?"  When you don't answer he pulls back and stops. Your eyes snap open and you whimper in desperation. He's watching you, waiting. His brows are drawn together in concentration and his jaw is set tight. Those beautiful brown eyes are nearly black with hunger. He digs his nails into your hips while he waits. 

You struggle with gathering enough oxygen before you can answer, "Yes, yes I'll be good. Be good for you, I promise!" You aren't sure who is in control of your mouth right now. You don't feel like you have any control. He rewards you by filling you up completely. Your eyes roll back into your head, taking all of him at once always steals your breath. 

He stays fully sheathed and leans over you. Bringing your knees up to your shoulders and his face to yours, he takes your lips under his. You sob into his mouth, you can feel the head of him pressing against your cervix. He nips your bottom lip then swipes his tongue over the sting. "Does my princess want this? Does she want Diego to keep her?" 

You cling to his shoulders. Closing your eyes in chagrin, you nod. He keeps his face pressed to yours. "Tell Diego. I need to hear it!" He hisses. 

"Yes. Want you to keep me. Please." you whisper, broken and needing.  He rears back and starts a frantic pace. His thrusts are short and brutal, stabbing directly into the core of you. You can do nothing but howl in pleasure and take it. Your spasms around him are nearly constant, one after another you come in rolling waves. You're begging, or cursing, hell, you have no idea what's coming out of your mouth at this point. 

He brings the weight of his torso down on you, crushing you into the bed. "Come! Come now! Come, my princess, come for your Diego!" His words are a command, but his voice is begging.

You're bawling again. "Yes, yesyesyes. Diego, Diego pleeeeease!" You have no idea if he can understand you. You're pretty sure only dogs could hear that. "Please Please please please please, baby. Please. Need you. I love you!"

He buries his face in your hair and drops your legs in favor of engulfing your shoulders in his embrace. You wrap your legs around his hips, you have to keep him as close to you as possible. Your arms snake around his torso, squeezing tight to bring your chest up against his. He's grunting, his thrusts becoming erratic. 

Then you hear him. His voice is quiet, words pleading, "Come. Let me keep you. Please, please. C-come. Princess, need you. Come home with me!" You nod tightly, sobbing silently as he freezes up in orgasm. He chokes out a groan, then collapses on top of you. You welcome the weight of him. He nuzzles into your neck, tickling you with beard and a big sigh. "Love you."

It hurts. It hurts deep in your chest. You hope it never stops hurting like this.

He retreats out of you, faster than you would like. You're pretty sure he forgets just how large he is. You feel wrung out, stretched out of shape and hollow. He pulls his right arm out from under you and rolls off to flop face-up on your right side. His left arm is still trapped under your back. Do you care that it's lumpy and uncomfortable? Nah. You unearth your right leg from under both of his and he makes a whiny huff about it.

----------------

He's struggling to catch his breath. He didn't mean for things to get so… out of hand. So to speak. She always does this to him. She withholds her more serious emotions and it drives him crazy. She never makes a fuss about his responses, never freaks out when he shows her affection, never gasps in shock when he gives her his ultimate deference. She acts like she has no deep feelings for him and it makes him want to beat it out of her. Apparently that is the correct method.

Her body is relaxed and casual on his arm. But he's greedy and doesn't want her to seal off all those delectably vulnerable emotions she just displayed. Soft, pliant, obedient, needy Princess is his new favorite.

He rolls her into his side with his trapped left hand while rumbling softly, "Come here." And she does. She snuggles into his side willingly and it makes him feel so soft that it's disgusting. Or maybe that's the guilt. She didn't agree to the spanking before hand. She didn't even know it was coming. Honestly, neither had he. His next thought feels like a stab to the lungs. What if she is afraid of me now? Did I hurt her? This is disgustingly emotional.

"Princess?" She sighs a soft 'Mmmm' in answer. She burrows into the coarse hair and soft skin of his underarm. Is, is she sniffing me?? He decides that ignoring her utterly adorable weirdness and addressing the ceiling is his safest option at this point. "Are… are you hurt? Did I hurt you?" 

Her left hand freezes on his chest. Her face slowly creeps into his field of vision from the bottom left corner. Her expression is… mystifying. He keeps his head still but moves his eyes to his peripheral vision to squint at her in concerned concentration.

Slowly, ever so slowly, her lips curve up in an absolutely evil grin. That damn left eyebrow arches imperiously and he is completely certain that she will be the death of him.

"Did you hear me use the safeword?"

[neocityfics]

2096: Zodiac

Chapter: Intro < ❝  Prologue ❞  > Chapter One

➥ Chapter List

Genre: Cyberpunk inspired, mafia-esque, not-so dystopian, angst

Pairing: Doctor! Taeyong x Reader [Sprinkle of other pairings tbd]

Summary: 2094, the disaster happens. The richest become richer with their reddened backs turned, the people around you growing more and more tired, and a certain Dr. Lee plans to change it all. Lucas unknowingly pulls you into the frenzy, and you become part of this confusing and painful process. You catch yourself floating between the conflict of twelve gangs and a world where circuits begin replacing flesh.

Warnings: Moderate cursing, death, heavy events similar to real world situations

A/N: Throughout the writing, there’ll be links (indicated by ▶ Ambience) for a more immersive experience. These are YouTube links, so it may be difficult to switch between YouTube and Tumblr (especially for those unable to have video pop-outs on mobile), so please keep this in mind. I’m also working on a Spotify playlist. I really hope you enjoy my first published piece!

▶ Ambience

The sea of neon purples, pinks, and blues drowned out whatever background activity filled the hustling life of the city. Light harshly touches the exterior of small shops endlessly lining the streets. Though full of living people, it always seemed a bit lonely. Everyone for themselves as it had been before the disaster happened, before life became even harder and resources scarce. Half the world is gone, but for whatever reason, humans continue to persevere. This strength is a unique feat, but it comes with consequences. With the remaining 3 billion people left on Earth, only the Eurasian continent remains the only habitable land thus forcing people to squeeze in tightly. It’s like this everywhere-- tiny housing, famines, and the overgrowing hunger to hold power and wealth much as we did before. The rich stay rich, the poor stay poor.

Life’s tough in Neostone. With hundreds of thousands of people and little food, restaurants struggle to keep open with enough to sell. Fresh water sources and land were replaced with tall housing structures and corporate buildings. Most have to work two or more jobs. Education is non-existent and relies on parents teaching kids different skills through child labor. Further industrialization in the little space the planet has left led to bouts of acid rain from overworked factories. The world’s leaders morph into the same guise: ties stained with blood, suits the product of cheap labor showed off status, and their white-gloved hands tightly gripped heavy silver suitcases. Corruption still plagues the broken systems that hang over society, sustained from before the disaster happened. It seems like we’ll never learn.

Sure, it’s difficult to get by day to day without much, yet the communities outside the wealthy rich businesses were tight-knit. Everyone knows each other’s names. People often trade food scraps for little luxuries to feel any ounce of happiness. Friends hang out near street food vendors where most people are, begging for any kind of calorie. While life in Neostone is tough, the citizens depend on each other for care, not anyone from above. 

I don’t think of it much-- how different life would be if the disaster didn’t happen, if the world had never been touched by so much chaos. I knew it’d be the same, that I’d end up still struggling to get from morning to morning. Even with the big drop in population, we live as sardines squished together under a layer of plastic that suffocates us. Nothing has changed. I lost everything.

Though the neons felt like home and they were all I’ve known for the past couple of years, I do remember who I was before this all went downhill. Fresh in college with a mind set on (major(s)/minor(s)), and although uncertain of the future, I was ready to break free from family and understand what it means to live a good life. Debt would hit me hard on my head but I was certain to find ways to pay it off without burdening others. Between jobs and school, I felt like there was a purpose for my movement, for my existence, to be a small gear of a clockwork world. For three years, I managed to get stuff done and become my own separate identity. I never felt more myself for the longest time. One more year to go, I said to myself as my third year comes to a close. But fourth year never came. It happened. The start of summer into my last year in college was the best time I’ve had in my life. During an internship in Japan, I’d gotten a handle of how it was in the real world as part of the workforce. A month into the most enjoyable moments of my life came the disaster.

▶ Ambience, Ambience

I watched the television screens throughout the subway, making my way to my 9am train when the static and distortions of color accompanied the shaking ground beneath me. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing as the news shifted to an emergency alert. All of a sudden, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, building collapses, and tsunamis were destroying the western hemisphere. The disaster was inexplicable, the most spontaneous event in the history of Earth. I hid in the nearest shelter in Tokyo as realization hit how horrifying everything was. Buildings toppling left and right, people being crushed beneath the debris, splatters of fresh red on the broken bits of glass and metal heaps. That was a day of absolute terror. Within twenty-four hours, half the world was gone. My heart sank as the disasters settled throughout the world, and the news focused on the western hemisphere where I had lived most of my life. That part of the world was gone. My family and college friends were gone. 

And I was left alone in Japan.

But the world didn’t change. The same evil corporate heads enforced the same evil policies and practices. The same tired faces dragged their tired bodies until no end just to, at the bare minimum, survive. No matter what form the world took, this was our fate until we went extinct. The only thing that changed perhaps was how many of us were kept in that system, and that the system favoring the wealthy became stronger. So the cycle continues.

▶ Ambience

With the scraps of money I had left on my name and picking up little jobs, I was able to get into a micro apartment. The government was eager to take advantage of the situation and make just enough housing to keep people happy and off the streets, but also enough to ensure some people couldn’t get out of the vicious system so labor was cheap. My space is dingy at best and quite small, but it’s all the comfort I have. Not a day passes where I’m not grateful for a private place to sleep, do business, and let myself feel at ease. Others aren’t so lucky, sleeping behind their food and merchandise stalls or in the nooks and crannies of back alleys. Weeks passed into months where my body ached from overwork, the same for the people I’ve been surrounded with and worked alongside. It’s only been two years since everyone had to rebuild what’s been lost, but it looked only slightly different in Neostone where Tokyo had once been. Only the mega cities were somewhat unscathed by the disaster, and businesses collectively chipped in to remodel them. Rural and suburban areas were either flooded or full of toxic waste.

People from all races and backgrounds who survived into the aftermath of the disaster poured into the cities. I was kindly taken into the dangerous but welcoming community of downtown Neostone, where cooking and selling food in addition to helping at clinic became my new life. At the clinic, I met someone I familiarized myself with to be comfortable and close enough. Having someone around lifted up my motivation. Going by Lucas, a name he adopted to fit in with the rest of downtown Neostone, he worked assiduously the same shifts as me at Pearl Park Clinic. Besides weekends, Lucas and I leave for work together as he lives just a few rooms down in the complex. While working at the clinic down on East Row, he comes to visit for a bite at the street food stall that keeps me busy half the week. Throughout getting to know him within two years, he revealed he also lost family he was close with-- a younger brother and sister who by the sound of his stories were needy brats that he loved so much. It hurts to know they’re gone like my friends are. I was glad I could relate to him and also be someone to lean on. On a roller-coaster of life’s tests, Lucas and I know we have each other’s back.

▶ Ambience

Today was like most days, another Friday morning. The green flash of LED at 7:00am with a loud beeping, a quick splash of cold water against my face, clean clothes, and a quick bite of fruit. The same mindless routine guides me out of the door of the room and down the hall. From my room, 716, to Lucas’s room, 718, was only a few meters away thanks to the tiny size of rooms. I knock once, twice, then thrice, but no reply. Strange. I’m used to Lucas whipping the door wide open at the slightest sound of my footsteps to poke his head out and greet me loudly. Should I knock again? Call him? My hand gravitated towards the doorknob, uncertain if we’re on the kind of terms where I can barge in whenever. “Lucas,” I decide to start softly, “I’m here now, we can leave for the clinic.” No reply. Maybe I’ll text him. Unlocking my phone, a smile cracked on my face as a photo of Lucas and I hanging out with some other friends posed in front of our favorite ice cream shop flashed across the screen. No red numbered badge on the messaging app. Today feels a little bit unusual. Typically, he texts when he needs help or won’t be at work. Inhaling in, I choose to try the knob in which a turn and a push of the door unveils the dark, musky room. A room with no Lucas. Noticing the tension in my face and shoulders, I relax them and try not to think of anything bad that could happen to him. Maybe he needed to stop somewhere before going to work. Maybe he’s just out to get groceries and whatnot. Maybe he’s just busy doing something else. I trust he’ll get back to me soon, but the weird pit in my stomach bugged my thoughts.

Down the long winding halls, unlocking my phone seemed all I could do, the worry taking over. My pace quickened. It’s 8:00am, the clinic starts up at 9:00am. It’s a long walk through a rather sketchy part of downtown, but it's one I’ve mastered throughout the couple of years and certainly made friends in. Reaching the staircase, my breath was noticeably shallower. This was always the worst part. It took much time and energy just to get to the first floor. Upon stepping into the lobby, I swiftly pick up an umbrella from the community box set near the entrance and begin my path out. The clerk at the counter peaks over his rather raunchy motorcycle magazine, riddled with messy yellow text, and he subtly waves at me. I send the gesture back, taking my leave from the complex. Rain besets Neostone often, the overcast weather permitting low fog and grey clouds to lurk the bubble that is downtown. Chatter and noise blend together from all sides with the rushing waters eagerly greeting storm drains and early risers setting up their stores. In comparison to the staircase, the lengthy walk to the clinic is always a breeze, and it helps calm the nerves as I ready myself for a busier pace of day. Every five minutes, I unlocked my phone again to see if Lucas had contacted me. Still no sign of him.

▶ Ambience

After what seems like the longest walk of my life, some staff of the community medical clinic greet me and provide a list of my duties right away. 9:00am right on the dot. I take in what needs to get done, reading off the slightly crumpled paper between my fingers. Towel laundry… Disinfect beds in the North Wing… Prepare a warm epsom salt bath for patients in the East Wing… Always busy on Fridays when the work week is over and people live out their less-than-safe life decisions. Less work, more injuries, and more patients. A voice sharply interrupts, “Hey! Where’s Lucas? You two always arrive here together.” My heart sank. So he isn’t at work. Where could that man possibly be?

Tension grows but a sigh leaves my chest as I formulate some sort of response to the nurse, “He might be sick, I’m not sure where he went. Usually he tells me, but I’m sure he has his reasons.” The lady nodded and clicked her tongue as if irritated. A pause before I ask her, “Why, are we short-staffed today?” She gives a vexed nod again, taking her leave as another staff member urges her towards a patient. Stupid question. We always are understaffed. Located on the intersection of Bear Walk and Oak Lane as suspension railways weave between buildings, Pearl Park Medical Clinic threw itself into one of downtown’s busiest and most dangerous areas. Crimes being committed everyday that send people into the clinic, drunkards finding their way through the doors to spew anger uncalled for against the staff, and the homeless just asking for a pillow or blanket while they sleep outside as they’re reminded of the cold, hard pavement soaked with rain. Of course, we must treat everyone’s needs… and wants in some cases. Only a couple dozen of us work the two-floored piece of the tall establishment which also houses struggling law firms, compact grocery stores, beauty salons, and wireless carriers. This place is a mini mall, but not for the faint-of-heart mall goers. Murder, sabotage, and sickness run rampant. However, it’s the place Lucas and I call home. From Tuesday to Friday, from 9:00am to 8:00pm, my hands pruned from washing equipment and fabric constantly, legs moved to and from wing to wing to prepare stations, mind boggled by the surprising sights of Neostone’s everyday life. The dirty white walls, gowns, and noise make me feel rejuvenation each time I clock in for shifts. Home. A place of belonging. Everyone accepted me in, even as a seemingly insignificant part of the operation. For Lucas, he tells me so often as if I forget easily, it’s a dream come half true.

Lucas aspired to be a doctor. It was his lifelong desire to help others, fascinated by how many times the human body tested the limits and broke them, and how he could save someone’s life. That was his purpose. Unfortunately, he fell into the same boat as I did, not being able to finish college because of the disaster. As per hiring policy, Pearl Park requires employees to be degree holders in biology, chemistry, biochemistry, or any other related field. Lucas was studying biochemistry with a neuroscience minor. Beyond impressive were his grades by what Lucas boasts to me, though I can’t confirm since the disaster destroyed his documents. In his third year, he already started planning his senior capstone project with research on the nervous system of several types of animals. We bonded over doing labs, the silliest or most dreadful courses we sat through, and how the university dining food sucked and ripped us all off. But it was a waste. In this new society, formal higher education is not important. Some schooling still persists, but they’re limited to small, dusty, singular classrooms led by underpaid teachers. Families tend to force children into work as it’s deemed more beneficial in learning practical home economics rather than mathematical theories, ethics, physical sciences, and so much more. The mindset of the remaining world focused on survival versus getting jobs of higher pay and better conditions. No one could blame us when authority breaks and the top 1% fully turn their back on you. Despite being turned down for medical practice, Lucas still wholeheartedly accepted the situation and embraced helping out in the clinic. Here and there with a bit of discreteness, Lucas does patch up some patients with bandage, disinfect cuts, and give advice for those with physical pain. Might I add, he’s quite popular with the patients as well, handsome and charming as he is. I’ll admit to it, I’m jealous of how he lifts everyone up in the toughest hours. Shortly after he joined, my arrival a week later brought him joy knowing I was stuck in the same sticky situation he was in. His passion could be seen a mile away. On the other hand, I just needed this job to keep myself afloat like everyone else.

I snap back to reality when one of the doctors, Dr. Lee who made a beeline towards one of the stations, bumped my side. Asshole, I think to myself. He’s head of the Pearl Park operation, so I don’t feel the desire to cause trouble by reprimanding him. This job allows me to hang onto my existence and sanity with my apartment, I couldn’t afford to lose it. His voice booms suddenly, startling nearby staff, “Is Lucas not here? I need him to help.” His voice trails off and erupts again, “With surgery preparation on Monday,” he swivels his head to one of the lead nurses, “We’re doing a skin graft for a severely burned person.” Despite the cold aura, his face contorted with concern and urgency. The patients put complete faith into him as he’s been a well-known medical practitioner since before the disaster. My imagination briefly ponders the severity of the injury as if I haven’t seen my fair share of nasty burn wounds. Shoulders shudder for a moment, and then I begin towards the North Wing where my first duty awaits.

▶ Ambience

Phew. That might’ve been the longest shift of my life. All day, the image of Lucas constantly itched at the back of my mind. It was difficult to focus, but I managed to get through the hours until 8:00pm. With my feet aching from exhaustion and a slight headache from lack of food or water, I decide to pay a visit to my other favorite place: East Row’s finest Chinese street food, Electric Egg. In my innermost thoughts, I’d hope to see Lucas there, munching away on tea eggs. That was his go-to snack after shifts at the clinic. Being on your feet all day does quite a bit of damage and leaves the stomach to growl, to fight for a delicious energy replenishment. When I arrive, one of my coworkers greets me cheerfully, shouting and waving my name as I draw closer, much to my embarrassment. “Sicheng,” my voice laced with laughter, “how’s business!” Our most common exchange, with the most common reply. With a hardy laugh, he shoots back, “The everyday thing, you know. Slow.” Sicheng’s smile invites me towards the side of the stall as he prepares what he knows are my regular dishes of choice. “Xi’an pancake and sesame tang yuan, coming right up!” As if on cue, my stomach beams in excitement and I lay my hand on it to feel the grumble, making Sicheng to laugh. “How’s work by the way, and where’s Lucas? I have his tea eggs already here.” I glanced to the side of the cart Sicheng worked away at, and indeed Lucas’s tea eggs sat prettily in a mug, waiting to be eaten.

I sigh, turning Sicheng’s grin into a straight line. He’s observant and knows how to read the room well. After a pause to gather myself, I sit down on a stool facing Sicheng and begin to tell him my worries. “I’m not sure if maybe I’m overthinking this, but Lucas always tells me if he’s not feeling well enough to work or go out somewhere. But he was gone this morning, he wasn’t in his room when I left for the clinic. He didn’t show up to the shift, and so many bad things could’ve happened, especially in the area we’re in. I’ve been checking my phone the entire day, but I’ve gotten no resp--”

“My tea eggs! You’re the best Sicheng, I really needed this after a long day, oh my god. You guys have no idea, my belly’s been howling!”

I froze. I know that voice too damn well. Anger immediately boiled within me, and it burst like the hot oil that hits Sicheng’s arms as he cooked. “You. Piece. Of. Shit,” I whipped my entire self around to face the tall man who unsurprisingly turned out to be Lucas with his disheveled hair framing his stupid little face. “Did you not see your call log? It’s just me, me, me, me, me, and oh guess who… me!” The tone in my words frightened even me, even more so realizing both Lucas and Sicheng’s widened eyes. I earned some dirty looks from customers as well. Nevertheless, I was pissed.

Lucas’s heightened shoulders steadily fall. “Hey, I’m sorry… Something really urgent came up, and it’s very personal to me. I hope you understand. I should’ve told you as soon as it came up.” His jaw clenches, his fists tightening their grip against the counter as he sternly looks at me across the food stall. I shake my head and roll my eyes, gaining a scolding expression from Sicheng who’s confusion was written all over his face. Deep within me, I know Lucas is sincere.

I start back up, loosening my voice to become gentle, “Eat your tea eggs, please. They’re getting cold and Sicheng prepared them for you early.” Silence followed, then the chewing noises from Lucas hungrily devouring his food. Maybe today was a hard day by the looks of it. Lucas took care of his appearance, so it was a shock to see him in a seemingly vulnerable state. His eye bags seem bulging and darkened, a sign of a sleepless night. Unsure of what to think, I let go of my displeasure and chip away at my pancake and rice balls. After satisfying our hunger, Lucas and I bid Sicheng a goodbye and head back to our apartment complex. The walk is painfully awkward.

▶ Ambience

This feeling is nice. To have Lucas back as we go through our nightly routine of washing our faces and brushing our teeth in a tiny community bathroom. Our mannerisms seem slightly less stiff, and though minimal, it takes a huge weight off my shoulders. He’s back and I feel secure again. But he doesn’t bring up anything about earlier. I’m about to comment on his long-sleeved shirt as he’s the biggest heat anti in the world, refusing to wear anything that isn’t a muscle tee. But the rough emotions rattled us both, so I drop it from my list of questions to ask. We get ready for bed in silence, only starting to discuss things when we finish up and plop on the floor of my apartment. I tried to figure out if I was uncomfortable from the cold floor or for the conversation that might unfold. Since Lucas has been excruciatingly quiet, I take the initiative, “I sent so many messages and calls today. Do you know how worried I was?” Disappointment heavily coat my concerns. “This isn’t like you, I was seriously going to lose my mind. Please… can you tell me what’s going on?”

It pains me to see him looking like he’s kicked down again from having an already bad day, but I needed answers. He’s the person I trust the most in the life we have now. His chest inflated and quickly deflated. “I’m about to show you something. It might freak you out.” He tugs at the ribbed cuff of his left sleeve. A tattoo? Perhaps a little smiley face or some unconventional design placed oddly on his arm that he wanted to cover since we work at a clinic? Though tattoos are normalized on staff... Or an injury? Whatever it is, I just want to know whatever he’s hiding. “Promise me you won’t make a big commotion, I will explain.”

Without much thinking, I grow irritated at him for dragging this out, so I reach for the end of his shirt and pull it up quickly, unveiling the truth. My body and mind go rigid at the sight, unable to process whatever this… contraption was. “Lucas… what the hell is this,” I ask, alarmed, taking in the faintly glowing circuits and tiny sparks of blue electricity lighting up and down tubes that poke in and out of the machinery. From his shoulder down to his fingers, metals and screws and wires replace his flesh. After a long minute of examination and curiosity, I turn my attention back to Lucas’s face which expressed great worry, fear, and uncertainty. “Is this the reason you were gone today?” He gently shook my hand off and swiftly covered his arm with his shirt again. With a dejected look, he takes his eyes off mine and pins them on the dusty floorboards. His arm is no longer human.

“Dr. Lee from the clinic.”

[backstorywithdanalewis]

Nuclear Hotlines Back Story w/Dana Lewis podcast https://www.buzzsprout.com/1016881/8067453

President Kennedy: (00:00) The whole office offensive buildup, a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated all ships of any kind bounds to Cuba from whatever nation or port where they found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons be turned back, shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launch from Cuba against any nation in the Western hemisphere. As an attack by the Soviet union on the United States requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet union. I call upon chairman crucial to haul and eliminate this plan to Stein, reckless and provocative threat to world peace. Dana Lewis - Host : (00:52) Hi everyone. And welcome to another edition of backstory. I'm Dana Lewis. I've devoted a few segments here to nuclear arms control because it's a former correspondent. It was based in Moscow for American TV. I covered many of the strategic arms control negotiations and came, I think to understand how nuclear war is a larger risk than we realize that recording. You just heard a president Kennedy came about an October, 1962. The closest the world may have come to nuclear war. The Cuban missile crisis. When the us discovered Soviet nuclear missiles on Cuba, president Kennedy demanded their removal Dana Lewis - Host : (01:31) And announced a Naval blockade of the Island and the Soviet leader, Khrushchev exceeded to us demands a week later, but it wasn't as simple as that, there were tense moments, a lack of communication. Anything could have gone wrong, and it was decided to establish a hotline between the two nuclear superpowers in the wake of that to ensure if heightened tensions arose again, there would be communication to talk, but since then a lot has changed. Nuclear weapons are hypersonic and warheads appear on conventional delivery systems like cruise missiles. There are more nuclear nations. It's simply more complicated, more confusing. And as you're about to hear on this backstory, incredibly communications can be hacked and hijacked and are sorely lacking. And when decisions have to be made in seconds in a crisis, none of it is good. And then you system is being proposed a kind of nuclear crisis conference call. One that we hope will probably never have to happen. All right, joining me now from England is rear Admiral John Gower, who served until his retirement in 2014 as the assistant chief of defense staff, nuclear chemical biological in the UK ministry of defense. Hi John, thanks for joining me. Good to see you again. And Phillip Reiner from California is the chief executive officer of the Institute for security and technology. Phillip, thank you. Philip Reiner: (03:06) It's really great to be here. Thanks for having me, Dana Lewis - Host : (03:08) Phil. First of all, you are a podcast expert because I've listened to your podcast. What's it called again? Philip Reiner: (03:15) We have a podcast that's focused on a very niche set of issues in the nuclear domain. We call it the fourth leg. Dana Lewis - Host : (03:22) That's what I listened to and I thought you've got some great segments there. And, uh, so, and I've stolen all the questions from that. They were so good. Let's talk risk. First of all, before we talk about communication, I mean there are, are there nine countries, somebody said seven in one of your broadcasts, Russia, the United States, China, India, Israel, France, North Korea, Pakistan, and the United Kingdom. I hope somebody was counting. Do they communicate if there's a crisis like the Cuban missile crisis, do you want to take that first film? Philip Reiner: (03:54) There are historical precedents via which nations that maintain a nuclear weapons arsenal are able to potentially communicate with one another much of which actually Springs out of, of something you referred to to keep in missile crisis where the United States and the Soviet union found themselves in the lead up to what, uh, what could have been a disastrous nuclear exchange without said means for communication. And what it did was it established a historical precedent via which, uh, uh, the red phone was something that was deployed for leader level engagement in the lead up to an, uh, in order to avoid such a such a nuclear catastrophe. And what you found in that instance was this, uh, diplomatic and technical means of a hotline via which the two leaders could communicate with one another. And it is something that has evolved over time. And I'd love to invite John into, to talk about this a little bit as well. It's something that's, you can find in a number of different historical examples, really in, in a number of the different nuclear dyads around the world. Um, it is, it is not something however that has been revisited for quite some time, both from a political and a technical perspective, much less, uh, acknowledging how the nuclear really the nuclear world that we live in has evolved from kind of these dyadic relationships into a much more multipolar reality. Dana Lewis - Host : (05:23) John Gower, I not been in the white house, but I haven't been in the Kremlin and seeing these rickety old, uh, white and red telephones, uh, that, you know, our crisis lines and surely, um, it has evolved from that because the weapons themselves. And I would think that the time, uh, those precious minutes involved in being able to respond to a crisis, uh, that is also, you know, a moving target because the missiles are getting faster and the time is getting shorter. Well, I think that there are several, uh, John Gower: (05:58) I wish I could allay your, your concern about this catching up with the reality of the world, but, but the truth is apart from, with the possibility of, of Russia to America, um, one-to-one Moscow to Washington, and I don't have any specific knowledge, but I think given all the arms control and arms reduction activity, that's probably the hotline that is, uh, the most likely to be effective one-to-one, but the world has significantly changed and it is no longer a crisis. And a nuclear domain is not going to be just for the two guys head to head on that particular crisis, um, for a start and for a long time, NATO as an organization has three nuclear arms States in its membership, and they have needed a way to communicate with each other and with the rest of their allies in any crisis. So that is a separate thing. John Gower: (06:54) It's not a hotline, it's a series of abilities within the NATO infrastructure to communicate, but we have the de facto for, um, who have become nuclear arms States since, uh, the [inaudible] joined the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. We have India and Pakistan who have a history of going toe to toe over a whole load of things. We have the DPRK North Korea, um, and we have Israel who is reputed to, um, own nuclear weapons, but doesn't talk to anyone about that. So a crisis, and of course the [inaudible] China, Russia, and the three NATO allies, UK France, and the U S and any crisis that is approaching, uh, a level where nuclear weapons may be employed, involves every one of those. Dana Lewis - Host : (07:45) I want to ask you, but first I want to, will you give me an idea of a crisis? I mean, what, what would be, would it be a launch? Would it just be tensions on the border? Uh, probably all of the above. John Gower: (07:56) Well, the answer is all of the above, but what a significantly changed is that the things that people were feared of in the Cuban missile crisis, and for most of the cold war, where a strike from the blue, by the opposing super power who suddenly got up one morning and decided they could win a nuclear exchange and then tire politics, and, uh, an armaments of the, of the cold war that rush up to 60,000 warheads was based on, on that premise. That is still a possibility, but in my view, in the view of many others, that is really the outside risk. The risk is that nations colliding with each other over a whole host of things from the availability of water, the effects of climate change ambitions in the South China, sea injure, and Pakistan's enmity, and a whole host of other issues, we'll stumble into a crisis where through misinterpretation or miscalculation nuclear weapons will be employed. John Gower: (08:53) And this is not helped by having whole batch of nuclear weapons and the death of the inf treaty. They're all increasing the chances of these slightly easier to use mentally nuclear weapons being used. And so what is needed really is a proper way in the 21st century of communicating yourself away from the brink. And I think, uh, Philip and his team have used operations at the brink. And that's exactly what we're talking about, and you can't with any number of crises. And, and you can add to that if we fail to reinstate the JCPO, if we fail to deal with Iran in a grown-up way that acknowledges needs as a nation, but also the fear of her becoming nuclear. And in recent weeks, they've been very vocal about how effects got wrong. They will follow a nuclear path in a way that they've not been vocal over the years of the worry about them. That just adds you then have 10, Dana Lewis - Host : (09:52) This just not the old mutually assured destruction, uh, um, uh, you know, argument where one side, you know, wouldn't push the button because they know that the other side would destroy them as well. Uh, but now you have a lot of these weapons like hypersonic, uh, I don't want to use Trump's term, but, you know, hypersonic weapons and then, uh, cruise missile deployment with nuclear warheads, which suddenly one nation doesn't know what's in common. Is, is it nuclear or is it conventional? So the stakes as we talk about this, and I want to set this up properly because a lot of people think, well, you know, nuclear war is somewhere out there. And, uh, Saifai movie. I mean, John, you've spent your career on this, are you, are you worried that we are much closer to that brink than we've probably been in a long time? John Gower: (10:41) I think the brink is more difficult to identify and therefore we may be very close or a little bit further away, but I think it is fair to say that I am more concerned now in 2021 than I was at any time in the six years, between 2008 and 2014, when I was involved in this, Dana Lewis - Host : (11:00) That's really notable. It's Phillip, thank you for being patient. So what that brings us to, um, is how do you then have some kind of communication between nations, uh, that is able to, I think one of your guests on one of your podcasts said, you know, get the off ramp on the super highway heading to disaster, which I thought was a very good analogy. Philip Reiner: (11:24) Well, this is where, uh, some of the ingenuity and the, the depth of technical understanding within, uh, the communities that we're able to touch here in California in Silicon Valley, really come into play. And through some of the conversations that we've been able to engender, some of which you can hear in those podcasts and the papers that accompany them. There's the, the reminder that complexity is the enemy of security, where so many, the technical solutions that may be devised to address some of these real challenges go so far out in terms of, uh, the, the backend technical complexity that it actually, uh, increases, uh, the attack vector. It makes it something simpler to, for instance, through cyber means to, to go after. Um, how can we from a jumping off point actually build something from the firmware all the way up that can, through a very transparent, open source process, be collectively and collaboratively built that that these nuclear weapons States could turn to as a communications options. Dana Lewis - Host : (12:35) So tell me, take me, take me through the range of that. W one would be in the old days that rickety old phone, um, you know, a hotline, a bilateral hotline between the two nations that have detentions. Um, and now you're talking about CA cattle link. Is that that's, how am I saying it properly? And what is the name Philip Reiner: (12:55) That is right? So the, this, this capability that we've been talking about potentially building is if we call it Katelyn and Katelyn consists of essentially two different components, there is an endpoint device that is actually used somewhat similar to, uh, the, the telephone that one recognizes today. And then there is a system upon which that can actually ride, which we call the rocks. And so there's the puck device in the rocks network upon which the signal has to has to travel. Dana Lewis - Host : (13:25) You've completely lost me. I hope you weren't meaning to do that. Philip Reiner: (13:29) The, the intent and that's, that's somewhat ironic there because it's a, it's an attempt to, to simplify things, um, is to build a very basic communications device that you can open source the code for all the way up from the actual Silicon. You can show that it is something that's secure. And so what we have been able to do is we can talk to someone like Eric Gross, who is the former security chief at Google. You can talk to one of his counterparts who is also, uh, at Google, who is referred to as the high priest of core boot in the communities, in which he exists. These are folks who have thought for many, many years about how do you actually build software that is reliable, that is verifiably secure, and the intent here, and this gets back to some of what John was talking about. How do you then get that into the hands of not just the United States and Russia who may have very well developed capabilities, but you're talking about a much more diverse set of actors who need this sort of capability, uh, to, to potentially reduce the increasing, uh, tensions that are, that are building up to a potential nuclear exchange. Dana Lewis - Host : (14:44) Well, let me bring John in here, by the way you said puck, would you say that to a Canadian, you, you know, we get the wrong idea right away, but there's no ice in this one and there's, there's no hockey. So John, this is, um, something that would bring in all nations because I presume first of all, to set the scene for that, a launch somewhere, if that's what we're talking about, uh, people don't necessarily know what the target is and where it's headed, and suddenly everybody moves to a hair trigger, and you can have a very dangerous exchange maybe with people that nations that were not even part of the original conflict. Is that the idea? John Gower: (15:23) Well, I think I'd walk back a little bit from that. I mean, clearly it has a use when launch has happened, but its primary use is to prevent the transition to a nuclear weapon launch. And I think the significant things that there's open source based technology would bring is the critical issues which we've seen in Hollywood. Um, do you know who the guy or girl is at the other end of the phone? Can you be certain that they are the leader of that particular notion? Can you have a conversation with them with other leaders of directly involved nations? And I would say that is the nuclear arms States to start with. Um, and can you have such a conversation, uh, within all levels of disaster? So after launch as well, and in fact, after detonation, and I think the trick here is that this is in, in, in technological terms, it's relatively simple, but the trick is not to try and make another iPhone. This is about making it capable simply to conduct the sort of textual messaging that would need to be undertaken to identify what's going down to talk and to deconflict Dana Lewis - Host : (16:36) And kind of link the audio. Would it be strictly an audio telephone call that's encrypted since somebody couldn't hack in there? John Gower: (16:43) I think that that is for discussion, but at its primary level, it's like a text messaging service. And so it is about the identification and the cryptology of that through an open source algorithm that gives confidence and trust between the nuclear arms States who take this system up, that when they speak on it, the people they want to listen can listen at the right level and nobody else can get in the way or spoof it. And I think it is demonstrating that capability through the kind of open source technology. And one of the problems with people thinking about this is they're too used to a new thing, having all the bells and whistles they want, and largely it's the bells and whistles, the ability to send images or music or video like we're doing now with zoom, it's those bells and whistles that give, um, problems with security and with identity and with hacking. And if you shed all of that, if you bear bear it down to its barest elements, do you want the president to be able to talk to the Supreme leader, to be able to talk to the prime minister in a tripartite way and Dana Lewis - Host : (17:50) Get everybody that calm the hell down? That's exactly what this is going to be pulling out a, you know, a mobile launcher and somebody sees it on a satellite. This is the first thing that they're going to reach for and engage that region and engage the nuclear powers. So who's been involved in pushing this idea because it seems like the nations want to do the old do business, the old way with their plastic telephones, you know, kind of can I just before Phillip answers that question, because he's been driving the engagement with a multiple number of countries, every one of the new Kieron state says clearly that their weapons are last resort. They don't want to use them. They'd really rather not. It's all about security, well, not rushing anymore. They said that they would, they would use nuclear weapons well that they have, but the part of their declaratory policy, each of the nuclear arms States use the words of restraint, whatever you may believe about them. And, but this is the ultimate level of restraint. And so if they believe what they say, if they do what they say on the tin, they should have something like this. But I'll let Phillip answer your question. Phillip, try to try and reassure me a little bit because, uh, you know, when they, when they talk about restraint and we talk about some of the nations that are involved in this conversation, you know, it's not, it's not very consoling isn't Philip Reiner: (19:08) And I think there's one more piece on the technical element. And then I'll, you know, very specifically to that, you know, one, one may ask, why don't you just rely on WhatsApp in these scenarios, that's secure Indian, uh, encrypted communications cable. Why don't you just use signal? That is not something that these States could turn to in these very extremely sensitive scenarios, because they haven't seen it built from the bottom up. And the discussion that we're having is, so how do you actually do this with technically savvy individuals from each of these countries, um, within their industry, how do you get those people together so that they actually see it from the beginning? And you come up with a solution that is imbued with integrity from the outset, because they've been part of that technical build from the very beginning. So we continue to have conversations with people really all around the world on this very topic. Philip Reiner: (20:05) We have had conversations with folks who are based in, in Geneva, uh, folks who are based in Berlin, uh, those who are based in London, uh, as Lama bod new Delhi, the conversation really has attempted to make sure that we're reaching out to folks who are in Moscow and in Beijing, but then all of those who may be able to contribute to this as well, who bring a bit of a technical savvy or who understand what it is to actually work through the, what is known as the open source community of folks who can potentially help develop these things in an open, transparent way again, so that you imbue the outcome with a significant level of trust. And that gets to what John was talking about. And Dana, to a certain extent yourself, if these leaders are going to be able to use this, they have to know what it looks like from the inside out. And they have to be able to red team it. They have to be able to go after it and try to break it, find vulnerabilities in it. And the process that we've put in place, both from a political and a technical standpoint is built off of that. Very notion. How do you build it with integrity? Dana Lewis - Host : (21:08) I mean, I take a big breath because the very notion or idea that somebody would hack into a conversation or pretend to be somebody that they're not with a world leader whose finger is near a nuclear button or code or whatever, it's, it, it really takes you back. And I assume than some of the people that are really pushing this are like John Gower who has, uh, you know, deep knowledge and career in working with nuclear forces and understands, you know, this is not a, um, this is not a far-fetched idea that we have miscommunication that leads to nuclear war. John Gower: (21:49) No, I, in fact, I would class it and I have written recently, and I'm not alone in this and saying that misinterpretation of misdemeanor location is the single greatest risk for stumbling into a nuclear conflict. And, and, you know, Dana that I, that I write and work in many areas of risk reduction, um, in, uh, against nuclear cruise missiles against low yields against dual-purpose weapons, this doesn't supplant any of that work. All of that work remains important, but this is the fullback. This is the backstop, the linebacker, depending on what sport you're looking at, I don't know the, the ice hockey equivalent, but if you fail to make these changes, to remove the weapons that are most liable to misinterpretation and miscalculation, and you stumbled towards a crisis, what you really need at that point is the best way of communicating your way out of a crisis. Dana Lewis - Host : (22:43) It's not there. And I think a lot of people listening to this would, would be as well. What is the support Philip for the concept and John, what are the next steps? Why don't we start with Phillips? Philip Reiner: (22:54) I think we've seen a, a real positive set of responses from a number of the, of the folks that I mentioned just a moment ago. I think people realize that and, and directly to what you just said, Dana, I think it's incredibly important. There may be something for instance, that the United States can put forward right now that could potentially serve as this solution. But why would for by way of example, why would Pakistan want to adopt something that was developed by the United States without asking questions about what it was, what it actually could do, for example, they would have to plug it into their system. What does it give the United States access to the demand? Those are the exact trust issues that this would begin to address from the, from the bottom of this Dana Lewis - Host : (23:38) Conversation's already well underway. Philip Reiner: (23:41) So the, yes, those are the types of technical conversations have been having internally at the political level. We have engaged with counterparts, um, in each of the countries that I mentioned before and in a number of others as well, people see the inherent value to trying to build something like this, because it does, I think, provide that nuclear risk reduction potential that John was alluding to John Gower: (24:05) John next steps. I mean, you, you feel that this has some momentum now. Well, it has a certain degree of momentum in the non-governmental world in particular, although we have engaged with governments, uh, clearly we've been in a time of huge distracting crisis. We've gone through a major, uh, significant political change in the U S and elsewhere in the world. Um, and we're just coming to grips with the implications of the new administration in the U S and I think it's true to say that that coinciding with all of that change has probably led some of the governments, just, just Mark Pace two or three times, but Phillips mentioned the key word, and this is trust. Trust is both essential to take this forward, but I also believe this is a very vehicle upon which trust, which is lacking in other places could be built. And so, uh, I know there are organizations like European leadership network, which is highly significant in the Euro Atlantic area, and others who have endorsed this as a very positive step of it's taken forward. John Gower: (25:07) And one of the purposes of talking about it to you today is to, is to raise awareness of it and to seek an opportunity for governments to, to, to engage more proactively and, and together so that we can, we can take this beyond what is an extremely good idea with a lot of the, the foot work done on the technical side, um, to something that could be taken forward, not necessarily by a team led by a us centric think tank, as, as Phillip says, you know, you can have the idea, but you want to hand it on and you want to hand it on to a government or several governments who would be trusted to, to engage at the governmental level. This is only going to fly when the governments of the nuclear arms States, uh, engage with it. And that's what we're trying to do at the moment. John Gower: (25:56) And any involvement from them would be extremely, extremely positive because in the end is not very high tech, all of this is it, it really comes down to personalities and who's on the other end of the, whatever the communication device is. And whether they're going to pull the trigger on a nuclear launch and, you know, president Kennedy, um, his speech in front of the United nations talked about the ominous and omnipresent sword of Damocles that everybody lives under hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any moment by accident or miscalculation, or as he rightly pointed out by madness. And that slender thread steel all these decades later is still in place. And you would have think that we we'd come further than where are now with assuring that there wouldn't be a nuclear exchange somewhere. I think something like this, they know, and I agree with all that you've said is, um, part of this reestablishment of trust. John Gower: (26:58) We, with the last time that we had a positive, uh, level of trust in my mind was around 2010. And if you look at the way in which NATO is writing about its relations with Russia, the direction of travel, uh, with, uh, star, the fact the I and half was still, uh, the intermediate nuclear forces treaty was still operating. All of the conventional armed forces treaties were operating in Europe. Um, things have gone seriously downhill since then. And what is really missing is co-operative trust. And if you don't have cooperative trust, then it really doesn't matter. Your, your chances of having a miscalculation or misinterpretation are hugely magnified. And so whilst this has a practical application in the reality, it is also a vehicle for trust. Philip Reiner: (27:46) Oh, I would just, I would reinforce what John was just talking about. There's so few instances in all of the dialogues around, around nuclear weapons, the nuclear enterprise writ large, where you can see a positive conversation around technical trends. And what we've we feel we've struck upon here is something that could add value, not only from a technical perspective and give people tools that they could build off of, but it would be something that a diplomatic level that they could use as potentially a way to create trusted discussions and collaborative endeavors. That's our intention here is to both address from a technical perspective, but maybe give people some political space to engage with one another as well. John Gower: (28:25) Let's do a quick, thank you so much to both of you. Former rear Admiral John Gower and Phil  Reiner Dana Lewis - Host : (28:31) The chief executive officer of the Institute for security and technology. Thank you so much. Thank you, Dana. Thank you, Dana. And that's our backstory, please subscribe and share this podcast. I also run a newsletter now to help people who complained. They simply can't navigate media anymore to try and understand what's important and steer people away from this information. It's Dana Lewis dot sub stack.com. Sign up. It's free. I'm Dana Lewis reporting from London. Thanks for listening. And I'll talk to you again soon.

[kakaji]

HOW THE CONQUEST OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLES PARALLELS THE CONQUEST OF NATURE by John Mohawk

For some twenty years I’ve been doing a range of writing, including journalism, as a hobby. As a writer I have brought people a lot of bad news. Describing the fortunes of this hemisphere’s and to some degree other hemispheres’ indigenous peoples provides an endless sequence of bad news. At one time I was the editor of the largest American Indian publication in the Americas, Akwesasne Notes, which dealt with ideas that at the time were definitely not mainstream. I remember putting out issues in which we raised questions about the nature of the relationship of the human spirit to the natural world and broached the idea that human-created societies are inappropriately distanced from the physical realities of the world. We talked about areas of philosophical thought that have not been explored to their depths in the English language, although I imagine they’ve been explored at some depth in other languages.

Lately, though, my thinking has been shaped by my official career. I teach social history, a subject not usually associated with ecology, although I think it’s high time to make that connection. But first let me mention some of the issues I find myself grappling with in social history, which deals broadly with people’s everyday lived experiences in different cultural contexts and also with how people come to think and feel the way they do about what they encounter in the world.

I became interested in social history when I was in college, a small and conservative and Eurocentric college. In those days undergraduates were required to take a course in philosophy; in the course I signed up for I learned that there was really only one genre of philosophers, who occupied a narrow niche in the world of thought: they were all Western European, they were all male, they were all from what we would describe as the elite privileged classes, and as a whole they stayed within a set of boundaries they defined for themselves. They belonged to a club, as it were. Each one was required to know what was said by the preceding one, and each one was required to build on that. If a student asked the professor, for example, if there were any philosophers in China or Africa, the more or less curt reply was, Not that I know of, and stick to the book.

Having been exposed since then to the ideas of people of many different cultures, I ask myself why these ideas are not part of the overall survey of philosophy even though the profession has loosened its collar a little bit in the thirty years since I was a student. After all, there certainly can’t have been only one stream of knowledge in all of history. I think we need to study Western civilization in order to understand when certain narrow and limited ways of thinking first appeared and where we went wrong. Therefore, I dutifully went back and started reading about the foundations of Western thought, trying to understand it in the light of other cultures.

As I studied Greek philosophy, I asked myself, Who were these Greeks, who gave us what we think of as the foundation of our thought, of our culture, and gave us our ideas about nature and society? I soon made a distinction between what the Greeks said and what they did. My philosophy professor had described a group of men sitting under a tree philosophizing; I saw them as an arrogant bunch who thought they had a new and better way to think about the world. But what were the Greeks actually doing? They were the creators of the most astonishing military organization in the world, building on centuries, even millennia, of military experience. Some clever people with good administrative and organizational skills put together armies that were able to march across the world and defeat everybody in their path relatively easily.

Classical Greece is taken as the starting point of European history, but actually Greece was old by the time of the classical Greeks. Over thousands of years the populations of the Mediterranean had been conquered numerous times before the formation of the Greek city-states we associate with classical Greek culture. By the time we get to the Romans, all of the peoples had been Hellenized. It is difficult to find anything resembling the remains of an indigenous Mediterranean culture.

This lack of indigenous culture leads me to William McNeill’s observations in The Rise of the West. He points out that the utopian religions which appeared in the two centuries before and after Christ arose out of rootless urban populations who had no consciousness of place. Successive waves of conquest destroyed any continuity of culture. This tied in with my reading of Isaiah Berlin’s The Crooked Timber of Humanity, in which he points out that episodes of horrific human slaughter and devastation throughout history often are the product of utopian ideologies.

Utopian ideology in the context in which I’m using the term means that people have an idea, they have a plan, and according to their plan a utopian society is at the end of their path. All of humankind’s problems are going to be solved by reaching this goal. But usually while they’re pursuing their goal, they discover that there are other people who are standing in their way or at least occupying ground needed for them to carry it out. You can’t have a utopian society unless you’re willing to crack a few eggs, as it were, and it’s almost always necessary to crack other people’s eggs to get there.

Understanding the nature of utopian ideology helps us find answers to certain troubling historical questions. In Hitler’s Willing Executioners Daniel Goldhagen asks, How could average everyday ordinary churchgoing Germans, who we all know were fully acculturated twentieth-century Western civilization people, get up in the morning, walk outside, shoot women and children in cold blood, and then come back in the evening and have supper as though they were doing nothing more than making widgets? How could people act in such a cold-blooded manner? Well, all we have to do is follow the real story of Western civilization and we’ll see that there has been episode after episode after episode of people getting up in the morning, going out, and murdering people. I think it started in what we call the modern era at that moment when Western Europe exploded out of Europe and expanded all over the world, beginning in the 1450s when the level of intolerance in European societies rose enormously. Pogroms were started against the Jews, and then in 1492 the Jews were expelled from Spain. What we have is a pattern of behavior of utterly unbelievable cruelty in a society that claims to be civilized.

Another example of the consequences of utopian ideology is the campaign against magic during the three hundred years starting around 1450. Individuals who had a spiritual relationship with plants or animals were considered to be practicing magic. In the 1600s it was believed that these people had renounced Christ and were in league with the devil, who promised them the powers of nature in return, powers they then used against their enemies. This same belief that people making use of the powers of nature must be getting their magic from the devil prevailed in New England: when John Mason or Cotton Mather railed against the practices of the Indians, they were really railing against nature as an evil power, an evil power that must be controlled, overcome, and stamped out.

Witches weren’t going to admit to using magic, so a certain amount of coercive force was required, and the Inquisition was invented in order to drag people into dungeons and twist their limbs until they confessed and even named their neighbors, who were then brought in and treated similarly. That was the beginning of the witchcraft trials—for the most part involving women, by the way. According to some accounts, millions of people over three centuries were accused, tortured, and burned at the stake. What were they guilty of? They were herbalists; they were herb doctors, who believed that the powers of nature could heal the human body. This belief was a direct threat to the power of the Church, which proclaimed that when Christ ascended to heaven, God the Father and the Holy Spirit went with Christ. Until they returned to earth, the Church was the only possible intermediary between humans and supernatural powers. The success of herbalists in curing their patients contradicted this faith in the sole power of the Church.

The war on magic was a psychological war on nature. It wasn’t waged by individuals but by the major institutions in Western culture—by the Church and the state in collusion with each other. They were not only making war on nature, they were also cracking eggs along the way. People accused of being witches were frequently selected because they had property that was desired by the local authorities, so quite often doing away with a witch proved profitable for the coffers of both town and Church. They took the property, including the land. Multiplied by hundreds of thousands or even millions of people over centuries, the plunder must have amounted to a great deal. You might say that the witches provided the early capitalization for the formation of European nation states.

Classical Greek philosophy also rejected nature-based religion. Let’s turn to Socrates by way of example. What did Socrates say about the people who were in the temples interpreting dreams and making forecasts and telling fortunes? He said it was all nonsense that should be replaced by rational thought. Socrates argued that the world must be based on reason, not on dreams and myths and the like. As far as I am concerned, one of the great fountainheads of Western civilization’s understanding of the human spirit is actually the old Greek myths that Socrates disparaged. They are among the most interesting artistic forms ever produced by the West.

I gradually came to believe that it’s not enough to study the history of philosophy, because what the philosophers are saying is entirely different from what is happening. Socrates lived at a time when the major form of social organization could best be described as either military oligarchy or military dictatorship. That is what the Greek city states really were. As I kept delving deeper, I found that in the history of philosophy the part that deals clearly with what’s really going on is something we don’t ordinarily read in social history, and that is military history. Military historians don’t shrink back from talking about political agendas. A military historian comes right out and says, The agenda here was to plunder; the plan was to use so many cannons, so many of this and that. When military historians study human behavior, they come to the conclusion that the purpose of organized armed aggression is to plunder. Now, that’s something which should be inscribed on the library wall at Columbia: the purpose of organized armed aggression is plunder!

I believe that philosophy was used by Western civilization to obscure the act of plunder by cloaking it in fancier terms. Aristotle could have said, We’re evil exploiters, and we’re going to conquer these people; we have the arms to do it, and we’re going to do it without any bad conscience whatsoever because we have the power and we can get away with it.

He could have said that, but he didn’t. Instead, he developed a rationale for one culture ruling another. What he said was: We’re a community of very bright people, and we need someone to do all the drudgery. We’ll make these other folks do it because if they don’t, we real bright people won’t have any time to sit under a tree and think about how smart we are. We’d have to be hoeing the garden, washing the dishes, and all the rest. But we need time to think, and if we think long and hard enough, we’ll come up with all the answers. In fact, the future of the world lies in the governance of the intelligent people of the world, and the project we will set for ourselves is to define civilization. It’s a project of organized thought that will lead us to solve all of humankind’s problems in science, in engineering, in art, in every arena.

Columbus Day was observed recently. For me Columbus Day is a reminder of the Spaniards’ behavior in the Caribbean between 1492 and 1516. Apologists for the Spanish say the decline in the Indian population was not great because there weren’t that many Indians there. However many Indians there were, by 1516 they were almost all dead. Whether there were 800 thousand or 800 million, let’s not lose track of the point here: there was a catastrophic decline in the Indian population on the major islands the Spanish were occupying. Another point needs to be made: one of the books I read said that the Indians were killed off by diseases. No they weren’t. They were not killed off by diseases. The viral diseases the Spanish had that devastated Mexico didn’t reach the Caribbean islands until 1518 or 1519.

What happened during that generation-long occupation of Hispaniola, Cuba, Puerto Rico? In his book The Conquest of America Stzvetan Todorov raises the question of how the Spanish could be so callously indifferent to the lives of the Indians on the Caribbean islands. The same question applies to the Spanish on the mainland of Central America and South America and to the English and then the Dutch in North America. How could they? How can there be greater indifference to human life than was exhibited in the African slave trade? Western civilization is filled with such episodes.

Let’s consider the Caribbean islands. What do the major works (excluding Kirk Sale’s book,The Conquest of Paradise) say about the Caribbean islands? Samuel Morison says in Admiral of the Ocean Sea that it was unfortunate the Indian population declined at that time; the Spanish didn’t want the Indians to disappear, it just happened. Or take Lewis Hanke’s book, Aristotle and the American Indians. Hanke reports the existence of torture factories on the Caribbean islands. The purpose of such cruelty was not merely to extract wealth, although wealth was certainly one of the prospects; it went way beyond that. There were torture manuals that recommended using green wood instead of dry wood to prolong the time it takes to burn somebody to death.

In the late sixteenth-century the Dutch artist Theodor De Bry did a series of illustrations based on the reports of Bartholomé de Las Casas, a priest who was offended by the torture. Las Casas wrote thirty pages describing what was happening on the islands. I have to tell you it’s gut-wrenching stuff. Read his descriptions; then read the chapters in Daniel Goldhagen’s Hitler’s Willing Executioners and tell me there is a difference between the psychology of those Germans and those Spaniards. The same thing is going on, only the Spanish are a little more artistic. The Germans tended to torture people more at arm’s length, whereas the Spanish were up close and personal about it. And it went on and on for twenty-five years, but it’s essentially an unknown story. You won’t find it in any American history textbook.

The King of Spain was embarrassed by all the reports about the cruelty of the conquistadors. He wasn’t happy that they were getting out of hand and escaping the crown’s control over them, so in 1550 he called for a debate. Juan Gines de Sepulveda and Bartolomé de Las Casas, two priests who were also lawyers, stepped forward to make the arguments. Sepulveda took the point of view of the conquerors. He’s called the father of modern racism because of that. He concocted every excuse he could think of to explain why it was all right for the Spanish to do what they were doing to the Indians, and of course he started off with what the Indians were not—they were not Christian and they were not civilized; therefore, the Spanish were justified in treating them as they did.

Sepulveda would have used pretty much the same language and the same reasoning to explain why the Spanish were justified in doing what they did to the parrots, to the trees, to the fish, to every living organism on those islands: they were all biologically inferior beings lacking the consciousness and culture of Spaniards. They didn’t have any rights and therefore could be enslaved and subjected to whatever the Spanish felt like subjecting them to—and the Spanish didn’t need to have a bad conscience.

I think we look at this kind of racism from the wrong perspective in our culture. The real issue here is not Spanish racism toward the Indians. It’s the Spanish claim to superiority over every group, whether human or nonhuman. Once you believe that one group is better than all the rest, murder is justified, genocide is justified; in fact, any act against nature is justified. The only thing that matters is the aggrandizement of Spanish culture.

In all of the literature about what’s happening to indigenous peoples, John Bodley’s book Victims of Progress, on the conquest of indigenous peoples in South America today, seems to spend the most amount of time looking at how people rationalize to themselves their right to seize land, to move other people out of the way, to move plants and animals out of the way—all in order to meet the development needs of modern industrial society. They can do this because of their belief system that says what they are doing is not only not wrong, it has to be done in order to create a world which will be able to solve all of humankind’s problems in the future.

What will the payoff be?  One view is that through science we will someday conquer the major diseases of the world, and we’ll be able to live forever. How you get from that idea, by the way, to the idea that it’s all right to bulldoze huge areas in the name of curing cancer is a tremendous leap. Curing cancer has nothing to do with plundering. There’s not a single thing in the way of plundering the earth or destroying peoples that is necessary in order for scientists to be doing research on cancer. The two aren’t connected at all, although when you talk to people, right away they say, Well, we have to do this because we have to cure cancer. What? You have to be two hundred miles from the nearest road killing trees in order to cure cancer?

Think about the Germans in World War Two and the fact that not only were they willing to kill people but they were completely without conscience about it. Most of us look back at that period with horror and ask, How could they have done that? And we say, Well, they were just a little clique of criminals at the top of an aberrant order who had this crazy idea for a while. I encourage people who believe this to read Goldhagen’s book, which claims they weren’t a little clique of criminals at all. According to him, the whole of German society was in on it because they had so valued themselves and so devalued everyone else, not just the Jews. Given that pervasive mentality long enough, most of us would be affected by it too.

The core of Hitler’s message was that Germans as the privileged few deserved to have the fruits of the earth. All the others were in the way, taking up space and resources that should be Germany’s rightful inheritance. So this was not only about race; it was one of the largest projects of armed plundering in world history. But people can’t get up in the morning and say, Oh, we’re pirates and thieves and murderers, and we’re out to plunder. You can’t say that, and the Germans couldn’t either. The Germans said, We’re the master race, we’re the perfect example of humanity, and we’re going to solve all the world’s problems. The same thing the Spanish said.

Those Germans never stopped to reflect about what they were doing, never asked themselves if what they were doing might be wrong. Those Spaniards never stopped to reflect, either. All through history, groups who plundered—like the American miners in California and the American military in the northern Great Plains—never reflected. They built up utopian ideologies that protected them from their conscience. This raises the question in my mind, What about us? Are we like that? Are we blind? Do we have no conscience? Are we so sure we’re on the right path, the right and necessary path, that we have no choice but to follow it and sometimes crack a few eggs? Do we share that attitude?

Every day about forty thousand children die worldwide from preventable causes. You have to look hard to find the literature about it, but there are publications like the United Nations reportThe Fate of the Earth’s Children and Frances Moore Lappé’s Hunger: Twelve Myths. Some of these children die from diarrhea, which can be caused by bad water, but usually it’s assumed that the major cause is the lack of enough food in the world to sustain the poorest people. Lappé says that’s not true. There is enough food, but poor people don’t have the money to buy it. It’s a question of distribution.

What should we do? We should find a way to get food to poor people, shouldn’t we? But that’s not happening. What is in fact happening is that the major financial institutions in the world are imposing something called Structural Adjustment Programs on governments in poor countries. These programs are designed to create hunger. They specifically forbid countries that have a lot of poor people from subsidizing food, and they demand that measures be taken to drive down wages in those countries. The point is to make the poorest people in the world subsidize the richest people in the world by keeping labor at the lowest possible cost. We know that for every percentage point of deprivation they suffer, a number of people will die.

We know this, but we’re willing to live with it. We’re willing to be consciously ignorant. Beyond the fact of hunger is the fact that the engine driving it is the same engine—the same thinking, the same structured institutions—that is driving the destruction of forests and the extinction of animal species, that is at this very moment driving the extinction of the great fishes of the sea, of whole species of plants and animals in many parts of the world. But this is happening far from our vision. Here in New England reforestation is actually taking place. We’re not cutting our trees because we’re cutting somebody else’s. We don’t notice that our newspapers still come from trees, because they don’t come from trees here. For a long time I believed the problem was that people don’t have enough of a connection with nature, and that’s why they’re able to do the things that they do. I don’t believe that anymore.

I publish Daybreak, a magazine in which you’ll find stories about indigenous people trying to think through the issues of free trade and globalization, trying to figure out where they stand, what action they should be taking. Essentially, the purpose of the politics of the intellectual movement of the American Indians in the hemisphere as a whole and certainly in the southern hemisphere is to encourage biological diversity and encourage local food production for local consumption—the kinds of things Schumacher talked about.

Indians understand that self-sufficiency is the antithesis of the global economy. And I think we need to understand that the global economy is playing a major role in the destruction of our natural resources and of species and is rationalizing that destruction in terms of John Locke’s definition of what is rational. According to Locke, rational thought leads you to do that which produces the maximum amount of money for you. This means even down to destroying the last tree, the last fish. As a result of rational thought you try to transform nature into money. Locke argues that it’s a wonderful thing to have money because it transforms our wealth derived from nature into something solid and concrete. Of course, money is not solid and concrete anymore; it’s not even plastic anymore. It’s electronic money we’re dealing with now.

I propose to you that we live in an age of utopian excess that is driving us away from doing what would be sustainable and survivable and is diverting us into participating, in ways we’re not even conscious of, in activities that are destructive in the long term. A good example of this is the electronic information revolution. This revolution will sweep most of us along, whether we want to go or not—in the same way that my ancestors were dragged kicking and screaming into the print revolution. We’ll have to join it because it’s a way of communicating. Some people think the electronic information revolution is going to solve all our problems—the same kind of utopian stuff I’ve been talking about.

Read Wired magazine. It reads as though people have lost their minds. It asks questions like, Is the world growing a brain? No! But our brains are going dead! People who think in the wired mode see a marvelous world of opportunity, without asking themselves, opportunity for whom and opportunity to do what? The information age is concentrating wealth in the hands of the few who have access to and control of resources. The American middle class is being dismantled, and it’s even cooperating; it’s going quietly to its death!

The plan is to make everyone part of a worldwide web, a worldwide marketplace. Internet users have the same capability to communicate with people in another part of the world as with people right in their hometown. This means, for example, that you’re not going to need accountants from North America anymore. You can buy accountants for six dollars a day in Calcutta. You’re not going to need engineers from North America any more because you’ll be able to get all the engineering skills you need on the other side of the world. The idea is to have fewer people doing more things more cheaply, and the cheapest labor of all is on the other side of the world from us. That’s the long-term prospect. But in fact cheap labor does not solve our problems. The things that really matter in human society are not in computers, and they’re not in any utopian vision about solving all the world’s problems.

We are not going to make it to that place called Utopia, folks. It’s not going to happen. The reality is that for all of our ego, which seems to me colossally large, our life span and the space we occupy are incredibly small, and the distance between here and Utopia is insurmountable.

Human cultures have an enormous capacity to reframe things. Part of our problem in Western culture has to do with how we reframed nature. Cultures that are nature based have reframed nature in ways that have given it life and color and energy and excitement. I went to visit a particular group of Indians living on what you might call a gravel pit. No trees, no grass. Why don’t they plant some grass? The place is a desert as far as the eye can see. You’d look at that landscape and think to yourself, My God, this is one of the most depressing places I’ve ever been; it never rains, it’s always so dry. Then you talk with the Indians, and they bring that place to life for you. The place is full of things you can’t see. Live with the Hopis for a little while; their world is full of spirits that come in from the sky, from the ground. Almost every few days the Hopis perform a ritual of one kind or another to acknowledge the spirits of their place. And what a wonderful world they have.

Once I visited a tribe on the northern Great Plains. I was just sitting there with members of the tribe. I looked around and thought, No trees. But they have something else: a culture, built by the creative internal aspects of human society, that establishes a beneficial relationship between the society and nature. Not between the individual and nature. An individual can’t practice Lakota culture or Hopi culture. You need a whole group of people for that. When that culture exists, it has a sort of magic. You can find people who are part of it and who don’t have very much money, but they are living more happily than the people living in California’s affluent Marin County. Of course, the people in Marin County are trying to find that happiness; they’re trying to find that connectedness, that essence which makes your lived human experience truly lived and human. It exists among Buddhist communities throughout the world, it exists among the Australian aborigines, it exists among Indians in the deep rainforest. These are happy, adjusted people who are not destroying their environment, who are in fact celebrating their environment because they aren’t engaged in utopian thinking. They’re reliving a cycle instead.

To have a utopian vision you must believe that time is linear, that someday life will be better than it is here and now, and you have to sacrifice others in order to make it happen. I think this has been, if I may say so, the history of the West, a series of competing ideas about how we are going to get there. When we get there, we’ll all be happy. And where is there? It may be heaven, for example, or it may be a machine paradise.

The actual trend over the centuries has been toward a politics of conquest and plundering. And we have rationalized our behavior in the context of that conquest and plunder. When we make choices about what we’re going to buy, most of us don’t ask ourselves, How does this purchase implicate me in the plunder? Most of us don’t talk to people who are from Indonesia before we go and buy our Reeboks. Instead, we listen to Michael Jordan saying, I wear these shoes; he’s a great basketball player, so they must be good. Most of us don’t ask ourselves, What’s behind my purchase? Could there be military dictatorship behind it, exploitation of people, destruction of towns and villages, pollution?

In choice after choice that people make, they tend to buy things that come from places which create social orders they’d prefer not to support, but in fact they do choose those products because they can claim innocence of the underlying conditions. So people commonly will buy things in the grocery store that were grown 3000 or 4000 miles away. Most people I know can’t tell me where the clothes they wear were manufactured, who manufactured them, or what the conditions were under which they were manufactured. We’re all like the television star Kathie Lee Gifford, who started her own line of clothing, which is produced in the Third World. We don’t know anything about it.

I think this kind of information is part of social history. Social history has to do with where the things in your life come from and what the conditions are that produced them and how the conditions that produced them contribute to the life you’re living. It also has to do with what expectations you have concerning the kind of life you might live, with what options you have for choosing the quality of life you want. This kind of information is not offered to people in college. Where do you find courses on values? Show me a course about choosing your options. You can say, Well, of course, it’s not there because if the college offered a course like that, its funding would be jeopardized.

I began by saying I wanted to emphasize the connection between ecology and social history. Once we recognize this connection, we are led to obvious choices. I don’t believe it’s necessary to cut down the rain forests to satisfy consumer demand for cheap lumber. I don’t believe it’s necessary to create conditions that kill 40,000 children every day in order to maintain the world market economy, which in my opinion shouldn’t be retained in its current form. If you believe that’s necessary, then you can support the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, but I personally don’t believe we have to take steps to starve people in the Third World in order to drive down the price of labor. I don’t believe it was necessary to murder all those Indians in the Caribbean. We should step back and ask ourselves some serious questions: Just how much of that world market economy do we really need? What costs are we paying for what we get?

https://centerforneweconomics.org/publications/how-the-conquest-of-indigenous-peoples-parallels-the-conquest-of-nature/

[astrogeoguy]

Lovely Luna in Evening, Saturn Shines at Maximum, and Moonlight-Friendly Sights!

(Above: Look - a donut! The Ring Nebula in Lyra, imaged by Ron Brecher of Guelph, Ontario on July 25, 2012. His other excellent images are found at  http://astrodoc.ca/ )

Hello, Summer Stargazers!

Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the week of July 7th, 2019 by Chris Vaughan. Feel free to pass this along to your friends and send me your comments, questions, and suggested topics. I repost these emails with photos at http://astrogeoguy.tumblr.com/ where all the old editions are archived. You can also follow me on Twitter as @astrogeoguy! Unless otherwise noted, all times are Eastern Time. Please click this MailChimp link to subscribe to these emails. If you are a teacher or group leader interested joining me on a guided field trip to York University’s Allan I. Carswell Observatory or the David Dunlap Observatory, visit www.astrogeo.ca.

I can bring my Digital Starlab inflatable planetarium to your school or other daytime or evening event. Contact me, and we’ll tour the Universe together!

The Moon and Planets

This is the week of the lunar month when skywatchers worldwide can enjoy the moon in the early evening sky - just ahead of next week’s 50th anniversary of Apollo 11. And, two more planets will reach opposition and maximum visibility this week. Here are the Skylights!

(Above: The moon at First Quarter, imaged by Michael Watson of Toronto in spring, 2015. Michael’s amazing photos can be viewed on his Flickr page here.) 

Tonight (Sunday) the moon will begin the week as a pretty waxing crescent in the western, early evening sky on the border between Virgo (the Maiden) and Leo (the Lion). On Tuesday morning, the Earth-orbiting moon will reach a 90 degree angle from the sun - setting up its First Quarter phase, when it appears half-illuminated from Earth. We call this phase “first quarter” because the moon has completed one-quarter of the trip around Earth. 

First quarter moons rise around noon and set around midnight. The evenings surrounding this lunar phase are the best times to look at the moon under magnification. As the sun slowly rises over the moon’s eastern horizon (which takes a week!), its steeply slanted rays of light cast deep, black shadows to the west of every elevated feature – mountains, crater rims, boulders, and even fault lines. Every hour, and every night, the zone alongside the terminator, the pole-to-pole boundary dividing the lit and dark hemispheres, creeps west - revealing new breathtaking vistas. 

On Tuesday night, the moon will take up a position above (celestial north of) the very bright, white star Spica in Virgo. Over the course of several hours, you can watch the moon’s orbital motion carry it eastwards of that star. That’s toward the left for Northern Hemisphere observers, and vice versa. 

On Thursday and Friday night, the waxing gibbous (which means “more than half-illuminated”) moon will visit Libra (the Scales) and then land above the up-down row of three little white stars that mark the claws of Scorpius (the Scorpion). 

In the southern sky on Saturday evening, the waxing gibbous moon will land about three finger widths to the left (east) of the bright planet Jupiter. If you watch the moon and Jupiter over several hours, starting at dusk, you will see the moon’s orbit carry it farther from the planet, while the rotation of the sky will lift the moon above Jupiter.

(Above: The bright gas giant planets continue to dominate the southern evening sky. On Saturday, July 13, the bright, waxing gibbous moon will land near Jupiter, as shown here for 10 pm local time.) 

For about an hour after sunset on the Sunday evening, Mercury’s orbital motion downwards towards the sun will bring it less than 4 finger widths to the lower left (south) of slightly brighter Mars. The two dim planets will be very low in the north-northwestern twilit sky. Take care that the sun has completely disappeared below the horizon before attempting to search for them with binoculars or telescopes. The best time to look for Mercury falls between 9:30 and 9:45 pm local time. Mars sets nearly 30 minutes later, so you’ll have more time to look for it. Observers closer to the Equator will have a better chance to see the two planets – due to a darker sky after sunset. Mercury will drop too low to see after mid-week.

(Above: Mars and Mercury can be spotted with difficulty, low in the north-northwestern sky after sunset early this week, as shown here at 9:40 pm local time. Mercury is following its orbit downward, toward the sun.)  

That incredibly bright object that you’ve been seeing in the southeastern evening sky recently is Jupiter! This week, Jupiter will be visible from dusk to almost 4 am local time. Even a backyard telescope can show Jupiter’s saucy equatorial stripes and the four Galilean moons named Io, Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede. They always appear in a rough line flanking the planet. If you see fewer than four, then some are either in front of Jupiter, or hidden behind it. 

From time to time, the small, round black shadows cast by the Galilean moons become visible in amateur telescopes as they cross (or transit) Jupiter’s disk. Io’s shadow will transit Jupiter after midnight on Thursday (i.e., Friday morning) from 12:31 am to 2:43 am EDT. 

Due to Jupiter’s rapid 10-hour rotation period, the Great Red Spot (or GRS) is only observable from Earth every 2nd or 3rd night, and only during a predictable three-hour window. The GRS will be easiest to see using a medium-sized, or larger, aperture telescope on an evening of good seeing (steady air). If you’d like to see the Great Red Spot in your telescope, it will be crossing the planet starting late on Monday evening (from 10:15 pm until 2:15 am EDT). More GRS viewing opportunities will occur after dusk on Tuesday and Thursday, and on Saturday night from 10:15 pm to 1:30 am EDT. 

On the afternoon of Tuesday, July 9, Earth’s orbit will carry us between Saturn and the sun. Sitting opposite the sun in the sky on that date, Saturn will rise at sunset and arrive at its minimum separation from Earth of 9.0 Astronomical Units (an AU is the average sun-Earth distance). That’s 1.351 billion km, or 75 light-minutes! Saturn will shine at a peak brightness for the year (magnitude +0.05) and exhibit an apparent disk diameter of 18.4 arc-seconds. The rings, which will be getting narrower every year until the spring of 2025, will subtend 42.86 arc-seconds. (For comparison, the full moon is 1,800 arc-seconds across.) Don’t fret if Tuesday is cloudy. Saturn will look nearly as good for several days.

(Above: Saturn will reach peak visibility for 2019 on Tuesday, as shown here at 10:30 pm EDT. Look in the southeastern sky after dusk, about 30 degrees to the lower left of Jupiter.)  

Yellow-tinted Saturn will remain visible all night long. Its position in the sky is just to the left (east) of the stars that form the teapot-shaped constellation of Sagittarius (the Archer). Saturn is quite a bit dimmer than Jupiter. To find it, look about 3 fist diameters to the lower left (east) of Jupiter. Dust off your telescope! Once the sky is dark, even a small telescope will show Saturn's rings and several of its brighter moons, especially Titan! Because Saturn’s axis of rotation is tipped about 27° from vertical (a bit more than Earth’s is), we can see the top surface of its rings, and its moons can appear above, below, or to either side of the planet. During this week, Titan will migrate counter-clockwise around Saturn, moving from Saturn’s right tonight (Sunday) to the upper left of the planet next Sunday. (Remember that your telescope will flip the view around.) 

For night owls, distant and dim, blue Neptune is in the southeastern pre-dawn sky, among the stars of Aquarius (the Water-Bearer). The planet will be rising shortly before midnight local time this week. You’ll find the magnitude 7.9 planet sitting a thumb’s width to the left (east) of a medium-bright star named Phi (φ) Aquarii. 

Blue-green Uranus will be rising at about 1:30 am local time this week. It is sitting below the stars of Aries (the Ram) and is just a palm’s width above the head of Cetus. At magnitude 5.8, Uranus is bright enough to see in binoculars. 

Venus is bright enough to see within the pre-dawn twilight sky that surrounds it, but it is sitting very low in the northeast - sinking ever-closer to the rising sun. Venus will be rising at about 5 am local time all week. 

But wait, there’s more! On Sunday, July 14, the dim and distant dwarf planet Pluto will also reach opposition. (After all, it IS sitting near Saturn this year.) On that date, Pluto will be the closest to Earth (4.91 billion km, or 273 light-minutes) and reach its greatest visual magnitude (+14.2) for 2019. Pluto will rise in the east at sunset and reach its highest elevation, over the southern horizon, at 1:20 am local time. While Pluto is far too dim to see in amateur-grade telescopes, an astronomy app can show you where it is compared to the brighter nearby stars. Even if you can’t see it directly, you will know that Pluto is there. 

Some Moonlight-Friendly Sights

While the moon will brighten evening skies all over the world this week, there are still plenty of sights to see.  

Stars shine with a colouration that is produced by their surface temperatures, and this is captured in their spectral classification. The three bright stars of the Summer Triangle, namely Deneb, Vega, and Altair, are all A-class stars that appear blue-white to the eye and have surface temperatures in the range of 7,500 to 10,000 K. High in the southwestern sky, orange Arcturus is a K-class giant star with a temperature of only 4,300 K. Finally, reddish Antares, the heart of Scorpius, is an old M-class star with a surface temperature of 3,500 K. By comparing these stars colors’ to other stars, you can estimate those stars’ temperatures. The classification letters, from hottest to coolest are: OBAFGKM. Can you think up a mnemonic phrase to remember the order? I have one.

(Above: The bright stars of summer shine with different colours. Deneb, Vega, and Altair are hot white, medium-hot Arcturus is orange, and cooler Antares is closer to reddish. The sky is shown for early July at 10 pm local time.)  

The constellation of Lyra (the Harp) is positioned high overhead in late evening in early July. This constellation features a coffee and a donut! Keen eyes might reveal that the star Epsilon Lyrae, located just one finger’s width to the left (east) of the bright star Vega (Alpha Lyrae), is a double star. Binoculars or a small telescope will certainly show the pair. Examining Epsilon at high magnification will reveal that each of the stars is itself a double – hence its nick-name, “the double-double”. To see the donut, aim your telescope midway between the stars Sulafat and Sheliak, which form the southern end of Lyra’s parallelogram. Messier 57, also known as the Ring Nebula, will appear as a faint grey ring. Higher magnification works well on this planetary nebula – which is the corpse of a star that had a similar mass to our sun.

(Above: The constellation of Lyra, the Harp features summertime’s brightest star, Vega. It also contains a coffee and a donut - the double double-star Epsilon Lyrae and the Ring Nebula, respectively.)  

Mid-July evenings bring us one of the best asterisms in the sky, the Teapot in Sagittarius (the Archer). This informal star pattern features a flat bottom formed by the stars Ascella on the east and Kaus Australis on the west, a triangular pointed spout pointing west, marked by the star Alnasl, and a pointed lid marked by the star Kaus Borealis. The stars Nunki and Tau Sagittarii form its handle. The asterism reaches maximum height above the southern horizon around midnight, when it will look as if it’s serving its hot beverage – with the steam rising as the Milky Way! 

(Above: The stars of Sagittarius form a quaint Teapot-shaper asterism. The Milky Way rises like steam from its spout, as shown here at 11 pm local time in early July.)

The Summer Triangle

If you missed last week’s note about the Summer Triangle asterism, which shines high in the eastern sky every July, I posted it here. 

Public Astro-Themed Events

Taking advantage of the moon and other bright objects in the sky this week, the RASC Toronto Centre astronomers will hold their free monthly public City Sky Star Party in Bayview Village Park (steps from the Bayview subway station), starting around 8 pm on the first clear weeknight this week (Mon to Thu only). You don’t need to be an RASC member, or own any equipment, to join them – looks are free! Check here for details, and check the banner on their website home page or Facebook page for the GO or NO-GO decision around 5 pm each day. 

Every Monday evening, York University’s Allan I. Carswell Observatory runs an online star party - broadcasting views from four telescopes/cameras, answering viewer questions, and taking requests! Details are here. On Wednesday nights they offer free public viewing through their rooftop telescopes. If it’s cloudy, the astronomers give tours and presentations. Details are here. 

On Tuesday, July 9, starting at 7 pm, U of T’s AstroTour planetarium show will be Our Musical Universe. Find tickets and details here. 

Weather permitting, on Tuesday, July 9 from 9 to 10:30 pm, astronomers from RASC – Mississauga will hold a free public star party at the Riverwood Conservancy, 4300 Riverwood Park Lane, Mississauga. Details are here. 

On Thursday, July 11, starting at 7 pm, U of T’s AstroTour will present their planetarium show Grand Tour of the Cosmos. Tickets and details are here. 

At 2 pm on Thursday, July 11, the Cliffcrest Library will present a free public talk by Dr. John Percy, Professor Emeritus at the University of Toronto, in Astronomy & Astrophysics and in Science Education entitled The Amazing Universe. Check here for details. 

If it’s sunny on Saturday morning, July 13 from 10 am to noon, astronomers from the RASC Toronto Centre will be setting up outside the main doors of the Ontario Science Centre for Solar Observing. Come and see the Sun in detail through special equipment designed to view it safely. This is a free event (details here), but parking and admission fees inside the Science Centre will still apply. Check the RASC Toronto Centre website or their Facebook page for the Go or No-Go notification. 

The next RASC Family Night at the David Dunlap Observatory will be on Saturday, July 13. There will be sky tours in the Skylab planetarium room, space crafts, a tour of the giant 74” telescope, and viewing through lawn telescopes (weather permitting). The doors will open at 8:30 pm for a 9 pm start. Attendance is by tickets only, available here. If you are a RASC Toronto Centre member and wish to help us at DDO in the future, please fill out the volunteer form here. And to join RASC Toronto Centre, visit this page. 

Keep looking up, and enjoy the sky when you do. I love questions and requests - so, send me some!

[prairiesongserial]

7.1

Marc hadn’t said anything about his plan, but all around John, the Waters estate was a flurry of activity. More suits than John had seen in one place before flooded up and down every hallway. A couple of days ago, Marc had dispatched Stillwater (or Stills, as most of the suits around called him), then Nash and Cole, to keep an eye on the Dead-Eyes. They radioed in at set times that seemed to change every day - perhaps to keep Ethan from catching on to the pattern. Since then, the rest of the house had fallen into chaos. John couldn’t begin to imagine what all the suits were doing - or if it was even related to him and Cody at all.

John wandered through the halls, trying to find Cody or Sailor. Sailor wasn’t sleeping at the estate, but he and Cody had decided to stay. With Ethan so close, it didn’t seem wise to travel even the short distance to Celeste’s motel. John and Cody had chosen to share a room the first night they stayed over, not really trusting Marc, and hesitant to be divided. Neither of them had known what to make of the plush, double-wide pink guest bed, and had slept on the floor. The blankets were so many, and so thick, that they had been sleeping on just them. But when John had woken up that morning, Cody wasn’t there. It was now late morning, and no breakfast or brunch had been called. Maybe that meant Marc was taking this seriously.

John heard a stifled sob down the next corridor. He walked faster, peeking into the rooms he passed as he tried to pin down the source of the noise among the clamor. He cleared his throat a few times, repeating “Are you alright?” in his head until he got the chance to use it.

John paused outside a strange room buzzing with noise - the sobs sounded like they came from inside. John entered the room without announcing himself - which was fine, as it turned out. It was crowded inside, but no one even looked up. The room was divided into stations, each one a little clerk’s office with a telephone and writing paper, and everything was swimming in cigarette smoke. There had been an office like this up in Pith, but reading letters to folks and transcribing their replies hadn’t paid well enough to keep it open. It had closed when John was ten. And the clerk in Pith hadn’t had a telephone. These telephones - six of them - were each manned by a suit. Behind each suit three more waited for a chance at the phone, pacing, talking to themselves, or smoking.

The suit closest to the door John recognized as Jordan - they lounged across a chair with wheels on the bottom, spinning it around, tangling themself up in a long telephone cord. They winked at John as he entered the room. Then, they let out a sustained sob, convincing enough that even some of the other suits in the room looked up.

“Sheriff, please,” Jordan sobbed, wiping at imaginary tears and sniffling pitifully. “I travelled all the way to the El Paso Grand Motel, that’s right sir, that’s twelve miles in unfriendly country, just to get to this phone, and - ” Jordan interrupted themself, sobbing and hyperventilating into the receiver. “I will not calm down!”

John frowned, trying to pick up the other conversations in the room. One suit was pinching their own arm to make themselves cry, saying, “They’re monsters, deputy - they shot my son right in front of me. I want to speak to the sheriff. I want to know what’s being done about this menace.”

John turned back to Jordan, who was practically whispering into the telephone.

“They called themselves the Dead-Eyes,” they choked.

This was Marc’s plan? To file false complaints with the sheriff’s office? Perhaps more than one sheriff’s office, judging by the number of calls being placed. John wandered back into the hallway and almost ran right into another suit.

“Christ, watch - Oh, you’re the bait’s friend. You need to be briefed.”

The suit was so familiar with him that John was worried he was supposed to know who they were. They wore glasses that reminded John of Celeste’s - perhaps Celeste sold them on the side. The suit had a long brown braid running straight down the back of their head, so tight it looked like it hurt. Strong jaw, firmly set. Long eyelashes.

“Uh - ” John began.

“Yes, you’re lost, let’s go.” They snapped their fingers and John followed them as they took off in long strides.

Soon they burst through the doors to a room John recognized - the dining room with the water running down one wall, floor to ceiling. Marc stood pacing by the head of the table, waving away breakfast items, one after the other, that the other suits in the room were trying to serve him.

“ - and anyone who mismanages his gang to that extent… Young, there you are! You know I need you to keep me on task.”

Young, the suit with the braid, stood stiffly at Marc’s right hand.

“Marc, I have a concern,” they said sharply.

Marc ceased to pace.

“Name your concern.”

“All the phones are occupied for Project Headhunter, and - ”

“What is Project Headhunter?” Marc asked.

“...Project ‘drive the price up on Ethan Rouse’s head,’” said Young.

“Yes, yes, yes, that’s right, continue.”

“All the phones are occupied, meaning Cole, Nash, and Stills can’t call in.”

“They have their radios. They don’t need the phone lines.”

“Radio signals are less reliable - ”

Marc began to pace again, waving Young off. But Young inserted themself into Marc’s path, cutting him short.

“Cole’s check-in time was ten, and it’s nearly ten-thirty. I haven’t had word. Stills should be checking in next, that’s at eleven, and Nash’s next check-in is two this afternoon, but we will have already left for the rendezvous.”

Marc took a deep breath, tilting his head from side to side as he waffled over this news.

“Thank you, Young.”

“Sir, I will remind you that that’s my wife, my husband, and my husband in the field.”

Marc turned on them with a sharpness John hadn’t seen in him before.

“Thank you, Young,” he said.

Young spun on their heel and dismissed themselves, slamming the door behind them. A suit offered Marc a blueberry muffin, which he waved away. Then, without warning, Marc stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled. The sudden loud noise knocked the thoughts out of John’s head - and the suits bustling around the dining room scrambled to leave.

“John, good morning,” Marc said, smoothing his hair back.

John gave him a stiff nod. Marc beckoned him toward the head of the table. It was just them, alone, now.

“Where’s Cody?” John said.

“Cody is taking a break.”

“Sailor,” said John.

“Late.”

With that, Sailor entered the room, sunglasses over her eyes and shotgun slung across her back. She heavily favored one leg, the gold one practically dragging behind her. Maybe to fill the gap in conversation, she gave Marc her middle finger.

“Well, I only need the two of you for this part, anyway. Cody knows what he has to do,” Marc sing-songed. “Come here, come here, we should have been on the road an hour ago.”

John and Sailor crowded the table, where John saw a map laid out. Marc had piled it with breakfast objects. A muffin, an egg cup, a half-drunk glass of orange juice, a golden spoon, and one of those lattice cakes John liked.

“This is a map of Old Problem, Texas,” Marc began. He shuffled the objects to the side so John and Sailor could get a good look at the map. It was illustrated with symbols John understood - roads, rivers, rocky terrain, and flat land. Marc’s finger traced a road leading from the western edge of the map toward Old Problem in the east. His finger stopped right in the center of a circle.  Almost a perfect circle. John bent closer to the map. According to the key, the area within the circle was flat - but it was caged in by dense rocks.

“This area of Old Problem is a ruin, utterly destroyed,” Marc said. “There’s a clearing in the middle here - ” He tapped his finger on the circle again. “ - the terrain around is a mix. Boulders, plant life, buildings that are falling apart, scrap piled ten feet high. But it’s good cover. Understand?”

John stared down at the map. The rough terrain surrounding the clearing didn’t quite close it in, but allowed narrow access by road on either side. It was a good spot for a stand-off. One man would enter from the west, the other from the east. No funny business. He was beginning to understand Marc’s idea.

“I am the egg cup,” Marc continued. He moved the objects back onto the map so the egg cup, muffin, and orange juice were grouped together. “The muffin is Young, the juice is Cody. Here we are, on the western road, entering the clearing.”

The egg cup, juice, and muffin closed the circle of boulders and decaying buildings on the western side.

Marc moved the golden spoon and the lattice cake now, one flanking the clearing to the north, the other to the south.

“These are you and Sailor,” Marc said. “You will travel along the outside of the circle, unseen, and reconvene here, near where the road picks up on the other side.”

The golden spoon and lattice cake ended up near where Ethan would enter the circle, just far enough from the road that they would be out of sight.

Marc tapped the eastern entrance to the circle.

“You and Sailor are waiting by that gap, but not so close that Ethan sees you when he comes with the money. Now,” he said, “You will have to start moving as soon as Ethan enters the circle. I send Cody to the middle, Ethan sends his man with the money. No one’s armed - Hemisphere rules for inter-gang hostage exchanges.”

Marc moved the muffin and orange juice to the center of the circle. He scooted an unfamiliar coin - so ordinary that John hadn’t noticed it at first - from the eastern edge of the map through the gap, and into the center of the circle to join them.

“Ethan and Cody leave together - ” Marc moved the coin and the orange juice together toward the eastern road. “ - and that’s when the two of you stick him up at gunpoint. Right here at the gap. You take Cody.” He points to John. “Sailor, you take Ethan and collect the bounty on him. We have his head up to a hundred thousand, might be better this afternoon. I believe Jordan is using the grandmother decapitation story.”

Sailor nodded appreciatively.

John frowned at the map. Ethan was symbolized by a single coin - probably dug out of Marc’s pocket as an afterthought. Marc didn’t consider Ethan enough of a player to give him anything more substantial than that.

“Where is Cody?” John asked again.

Marc pointed to the glass of orange juice.

“He means Cody Cody,” Sailor said. She plucked the blueberry muffin symbolizing Young from the center of the map and took a bite.

“Oh, sure, sure,” Marc said, and gestured vaguely to the door behind him. John crossed the room to leave.

“The car is being gassed up now,” Marc called after him. “I need all three of you at the garage in ten minutes. Lord, I need to change. Where is Young…”

Whatever else Marc was going to say was cut short by the slam of the door behind John. He found himself in a long, peaceful hallway filled with blue morning light.

Cody was sitting on the floor in front of an open window. The air was already hot and dry, even this early, and moved through Cody’s hair. Brushing it back like a friendly hand. John had never wanted to be the wind before now.

Cody’s jaw clenched when he saw John, but he didn’t turn his head. John squatted next to him.

“Marc’s plan isn’t going to work,” Cody said, picking his words slowly.

John waited, watching the subtle changes in Cody’s face. He looked like he wanted to say more. John wasn’t used to seeing that in Cody. Usually Cody had such an easy time saying whatever he wanted to say.

Firmly, Cody got to his feet. The wind blew his poncho back, spreading it wide as it flapped around his body.

“Don’t rely on him too much,” he said, finally looking John in the eye. His gaze pinned John in place. “Marc, I mean. I’m not putting myself in Ethan’s hands because I trust Marc to get us out of this.” He swallowed, just as the wind died. His poncho wilted from his shoulders. “I’m trusting you.”

epilogue 6 || 7.2

[shardclan]

(Shout out to @hungrytundras who made this great map and gave me permission to use it for my weather lore--hope you don’t mind me giving it the sepia treatment to make the arrows easier to see!)

With the kind funding provided by the Morning Queen of Clan Aphaster, the Trader's Walk Guild, and the many generous donors who rely on our forecasts, The Weathervane would like to make this global PSA on the meteorological consequences of the recent disappearance, re-appearance, and reversal of the Vortex as it relates to Southern Sornieth.

The Windswept Plateau:

Beginning at ground zero, the formerly bright and open lands of the Windsinger have undergone minimal change near the Vortex itself. However, the reversed direction of the dominant wind has caused the territory to see a marked rise in overall temperature.

Ash storms previously kept at bay by the east-blowing winds are now moving freely into the Zephyr Steppe and Skyrock Downs areas, causing a sharp decline in air quality and the health of local plant species. Point Windchime Flat on Trader’s Walk, once the most pleasant rest stop on the Walk, has been shut down for an indeterminate length of time with only an assurance that the point will likely be move further north near the Reedcleft Ascent where the ash concentration isn’t likely to rise.

A significant increase in major storms and tornadoes has also been observed. This can be expected to continue year-round and only worsen as the rainy seasons come and go. The hot, dry air of the Ashfall Waste now moves with a slowly stabilizing westerly across the flat terrain of the Windswept Plateau, meaning that cool air and moisture in-coming from the Greater Ocean and from the southern and western coasts of the Sea of Thousand Currents will more frequently lead to severe thunderstorms and the associated dangerous phenomena they can herald.

 The Ashfall Waste:

The tumultuous conditions of this territory's weather have little to do with natural meteorology and much to do with the Great Furnace and tectonic movement. However, travelers may rejoice. Previously, the heat generated by the territory was largely kept there by eastern fronts from the Vortex and western-moving storms generated at the Tempest. The new northwestern winds now carry that heat away, meaning lower ambient temperature and a higher rate of solid paths through the Molten Scar.

Not all news is good news for fire denizens. Wind typically escaped northeast, following the curvature of the Sea of a Thousand currents and keeping rainfall predictable in both location and frequency. Storm fronts moving in and the increase in cold air from the Icefields off the southern Coast has led to a worrying rise in storms not far out at sea, especially near the newly formed landmass. A localized iteration of this phenomenon has been seen in the area where the Maelstrom Cinderlight used to form, off the coast of the Vents. There, both weather and magics from fire, lightning, wind, and ice are colliding—making the area highly dangerous and in a near-constant state of storm.

A rise in rainfall has led to a serious decline in visibility and cloying humidity as a result of lingering steam. There is rising concern that the things which used to linger in the steam clouds off the Blacksand Annex may take advantage and creep inland.

The Sea of A Thousand Currents:

As mentioned, both the wind and waters of the Sea previously flowed toward the east in a counter-clockwise motion the carried heat and some rainfall to the Light and Shadow territories. Perhaps in line with the seeming disappearance of the Tidelord, the Sea has seen the most disruption and carries the highest trickledown effect on Sornieth's climate.

Previously, hurricane-forming basins relevant to continental Sornieth were limited to the Sea of a Thousand Currents. The vast majority made landfall to the southeast and were easily disrupted by the terrains of Lightning's mesas and Light's mountains--at worst leading to heavy rainfall as they dissipated, and occasionally causing flooding in the Carrion Canyon and in the river valleys of the Sunbeam Ruins.

On some occasional bad years, these hurricanes made landfall over more susceptible territories--particularly the islands on the edge of the Tangled Wood and the coast of the Abiding Boneyard--but these were anomalies. And of course, it goes without saying that Hurricane Meteora, after which the Meteora Sound between the Starfall Isles and Dragonhome is named, was a once-in-an-Age phenomenon. The Weathervane would like to stress that we are NOT predicting that storms like Meteora will become commonplace.  The lack of a warm wind current has caused temperatures to drop, albeit slightly, and the new circulatory system is significantly weaker than the previous one. If anything, tropical storms will be fewer and weaker than before.

That said, the old patterns are now in chaos. The wind is now moving in the opposite direction, yet the surface currents of the Sea are resisting undergoing the same change despite all other factors suggesting they should also begin spinning the other way. Given the mysterious silence of the Tidelord, if water magic is perhaps building up somewhere under the waves, it wouldn't be strange for the Sea to dictate its own surface currents in spite of the wind.

The opposition of the prevailing wind and prevailing current has made chaos of the waves. Sailors, divers, and diviners all respect the inherent dangers of navigating the Sea on a good day, and all have firmly stated it would be nothing short of a death warrant to traverse the surface without taking every possible precaution.

The timing of these events has made the tropical storm situation somewhat opaque. The season for them usually begins with the Mistral Jamboree, but few have been sighted so far. One thing is clear: They are not forming or making landfall in their usual locations. So far, the few sea storms that have come ashore have done so after building in the dead center of the Sea and spinning off in seemingly random directions.  While damage has been minimal, this new pattern could have a potentially disastrous effects on rainfall patterns and water tables in southwestern Sunbeam Ruins and in the Highland Scrub.

 The Shifting Expanse:

The region of storms is perhaps the least affected of all the regions. The characteristic sullen clouds remain full of electricity and not much else. The only major change is that the storm clouds now drive much further into Ashfall, fueling the western moving ash storms that now push into the Windswept Plateau.

Immediate forecasts are likely to remain stable, however the absence of seasonal hurricane rains from the Sea of a Thousand Currents has local clans worried about endemic life. Flash flooding in the Carrion Canyon heralds the equivalent of spring on the mesa, and the eternal storms are not the primary rain source for the territory.

Several hurricanes have been observed forming out in the Greater Ocean, but so far appear to be gliding past the Sunbeam Ruins and all but the most distant northeast islands of the Viridian Labyrinth, and harmlessly dissipating off the northern coast of Dragonhome where the cold air from the Southern Icefield, now pushed even further south, is seemingly settling on an empty patch of ocean which some Icefielder's believe to be where the Northern Icefield will be reborn.  

The Sunbeam Ruins:

Warm and sunny by nature, the Sunbeam Ruins is on the other side of the weather-related chaos. However, warm fronts from the Ashfall Waste previously followed the coast up into the Sunbeam Ruins, helping to sustain the reasonable temperatures throughout the cooler seasons. The change in the winds has caused an overall average temperature decrease in the territory, leading to a very late spring and concerns of low crop yield or possible crop failure. This in turn has raised local anxiety regarding the potential for new and bitter conflicts with the Summerland-native beastclans should food become scarce.

Northern Territories summary:

As the Weathervane has specialized itself to serve Southern Sornieth, we will not be making territory-specific forecasts for the northern hemisphere. However, we would like to present some overall trends:

The Tangled Wood has seen an even greater temperature drop than its sister territory, but it is difficult to say what the effects may be at this time.

Windborne illness has been on the rise in the Starwood Strand and the coasts of the Snowsquall Tundra as the new winds pull air from the Wandering Contagion.

The overall temperature of the Starfall Isles and Dragonhome have risen, however the changes have not been as drastic as those in the Sunbeam Ruins and Tangled Wood.

Although it remains sparse, rainfall on the northern coast of Dragonhome has increased, leading to a small strip of lush greenery forming, tentatively being hailed as Firstwyrm’s Mercy.

Sornieth’s four primary maelstroms are down to two and a half:

As stated, Maelstrom Cinderlight has been lost to the clashing of the four southern-most elements.  The sister of the above, Maelstrom Graupel, has changed direction but remains intact.

The Great Maelstrom Tunnanu, largest of Sornieth’s maelstroms, has—according to eye-witness reports—not only survived the change, but has grown even larger and apparently moved west. Where it was previously off the coast of the Crystal Pools in the Triune Sea, it has nestled firmly into the mouth of Windstar Bay.

This has caused a resurgence in study of the maelstrom and the related superstition that the maelstrom is not a natural phenomenon but a prison for some ancient creature from the Greater Ocean.

The final of the previous four is not quite gone, but very much not herself. It was not known whether the seasonal Maelstrom Novaya would be affected by the climate change being so northerly. She was recently spotted in her usual formation zone in, however something odd has happened to her. She appears to be spinning upward now, spinning toward a point approximately coatl-height above sea-level. It is assumed this has something to do with Arcane magics moving further into Meteora Sound due to the decline of ambient Ice magic keeping it relatively stable. Maelstrom Novaya’s classification has obviously come into question—while experts agree she is not a waterspout, it is an unusual situation and a unique classification is being considered.

[the-firebird69]

There's a lot going on and these people keep messing with his equipment and it takes time out of our schedule and really it is mostly these trumpsters and we need to take care of this problem we need them out of our site to their pigs there are hundreds this morning just saying dumb things messing around with him maybe removed. And we have other stuff happening too

-the pseudo empire is under strict attack in the Western hemisphere their bases and topside and other but really it's a mild attack and their bunkers but tonight they're gearing up that hit very hard right now they're basis here are about 70% areas of operation 70% and infiltrated areas 70% and the bunkers are going up to 80 or 85% and they have people leaving the areas of their in and bringing stuff to bring the bunkers back and it's continuous.

-there's also another problem here his idiots keep on demanding support and then they're from a different faction and nothing he does is right and we have to stop them all and it's true too this is what they used to do and you're predicted it and we are raising our armies now

-no large scale attacks occurred last night on Florida or the USA however there are evacuations continuing globally it's like 1% today it's very big but in Florida and the morlock Macklemore all of them believe it or not that down to about 35%, they went back up but there is a notice out that they intend to leave and no they are trying to fight over the tunnel still we have some time before they need to be opened but truthfully and the more you wait the the worse the exterior gets and it will all need to be refinished even at this point if we take them but it's just going to get worse and structural stuff and structural parts of the skin will be damaged and it's going to be a lot more work and we don't want to do that we want to open the tunnels up to flow the crap out and they don't seem to want to do that and they won't coat them with stuff so we are left with a conundrum and we do have a solution and we're applying it we are going to have to come in and pull them out of this stupid job and pull the ships out and others are saying it too the clones and even the Bullock are saying that these assholes are just sitting here and they are the way they stopped work at Tampa and we need to continue it.

-there's a huge idea for me now to forming now part and I'm part of it I helped initialize it it's to start taking an area and to hold on to it and see what they do he's having a hell of a time we need to know why he says he's surrounded his kids are doing a very good job but others need to pitch in but we'll see it when we do it and we're starting soon this is a bummer of an area

-it is Sunday there's not a ton of stuff but really Monday is going to be very busy. There's a war over Giants they're going to start to try and go to space with standard American 1970s stuff and to investigate things the empire wants them to so they say good we'll do that other things that are happening my son is put in an effort in and we see their reaction is very poor and their heinous idiots we have a lot of people to get rid of here and we should use their civil war to do it I've been going out into the rings again tonight they're down to 110 household still and you're going to send 30 more out and we expect maybe 20 to come back but they are losing power important to note that they're miscellaneous groups are leaving and Monday and this week Trump and bja will be selling stock and move the acquiring it and the maxfield will do to us what they did to the morlock and they say they had a huge fleet and they had a pretty big one but it wasn't bigger than theirs and we were starting to make those things happen other things that are going on

-I'm a huge number of people here who are abusive of our son and daughter and US verbally and mentally you need to come down on them they're actually just spies and they're doing the job and I'm writing up right now

-need to see this stuff to believe it they're so heinous and loserish the crap

-we have a couple positive notes and there's some movement on the social security items they are going to re-examine his file this week sometime some say monday. I'm reviewing many of them but the whole point is that our son and us and some others said you are not paying your own and a lot of their people said you should be paying and it slides into a federal job and they want that and they want to take over the fleet of the pseudo empire once they're down and they probably will get beat well they're getting beat they're going to try and get support and they do before and it works and they'll remember it when they stop messing around with him in California if things got better and Mike roach was reprimanded and it sort of gets it it's not how you're supposed to do it but he wasn't getting support and Trump had him do it I told him to so we're getting on to something else but this is happening now that the pseudo empires realizing it and they might be able to get it done other things are happening it would lead to it the VW idea and the max but really there's math there it's aside from the car no he says if I get the car I sell it if you have like 10 grand or something he might not but not five so 25 Grand or so driving around and sell it cuz I have no reason to do that yet they don't think they're going to have to although

-off of Mars the pseudo empire was fighting the morlock and the pseudo empire defeated them and still had around 30 or 40 billion chips about 38 billion and they're reloading the warlock have 200 million left they're moving 100 billion over there the pseudo empire is moving 200 billion additional and they recovering some of theirs too and they more like or not in other words these pseudo empire took so far about 280 additional and that will add to the $450 billion they had to make around $730 billion up to now and they're already retrofitting and they might have a fleet that rivals the foreigners no the foreigners have two trillion and their retrofitting very fast and we're retrofitting 8.5 trillion and we're growing too with that fleet we can protect areas and build and we're building and we're flying armor and Stone and we need the clay and we're getting it from some locations but we need more we need from the island Australia and New Zealand have a ton of it and we need them out are those few other places we are getting some to make it about 300 ft thick and it's solid and it is a baked wall really it's very strong it's it's so strong it's not even funny and we encapsulated and use the shield system and top secret house is better so we're going ahead with it and we will have a lot of it done that's a good idea

We're going to print now and we'll have more shortly Thor Freya Olympus Hera zoo ada noada Ariana and her son's name Zues

[peachyteabuck]

vanilla

summary: after some heckling from clint and sam, you and steve discuss your kinks

pairing: sub!steve rogers x dom!reader

words:  3243 (oops)

trigger warnings: mentions of some really dirty stuff.

ask box / masterlist / commission info / ko-fi

You were trying to find something to eat in your fridge, scanning the various tupperware containers for anything edible. You sighed deeply. It’s not that you weren’t hungry, it’s just that you weren’t hungry for anything you already had. Finally, you decide on a bowl of cereal and almond milk. You forgo walking all the way to the dining room table for simply eating at the counter, something your mother always scolded you for.

You were halfway through your second bowl when Clint and Sam came bursting out the elevator, followed by your boyfriend, a furiously blushing Steve Rogers.

“I can’t-” Clint stops in his tracks, clutching his stomach and almost falling to the floor.

Steve is still red in the face, and can barely get a word in before Sam interrupts him. You eat calmly, hoping the loud interaction quiets down soon. Those three could badger each other for hours, and right now, you weren’t having it.

“Seriously bro, c’mon! You really thought between nineteen-whatever and now, that sex would stay the same?” Sam is almost wheezing by the end.

You rolled your eyes, finally understanding what they were laughing at. Ever since Steve had discovered what PornHub was (which was about...three weeks ago, you had no idea how it’d taken him that long, honestly), they had been merciously teasing him.

You sighed, stood up, and used yourself as a physical barrier between your boyfriend and the others.

“Guys, leave him alone,” you scolded. “Don’t you two have training sessions with Nat?” You raised your eyebrows, daring them to disagree with you. In truth, you didn’t know what either of them had on their schedules today. And, in truth, you didn’t care. You just wanted them to stay off of Steve’s back. You know he got insecure about these things, as you’d imagine anyone would if they had to go through what he did.

They both gave out one last chuckle and scrambled their way out of the elevator. You and Natasha had worked closely throughout your time at for Stark Industries. They knew that even if they didn’t intend to spar with her, you would make it so (and maybe you whispered to Natasha to go extra hard on them, but just maybe).

You had worked with him (and a group of other therapists) extensively in an effort to get him acclimated to the 2010s, but sex, and everything in relation to it, didn’t make the cut. Maybe you thought it would be too awkward, maybe he thought it would be too awkward, maybe you were too busy explaining the anti-vaccination movement to him.

Either way, he was stuck on his own when it came to him, his dick, and what he did with it.

This also meant that you two had barely had sex in your eight month relationship. It wasn’t something you needed to have to be happy with a person, but it would...be appreciated. Still, you stuck by your man, and if he didn’t want to have sex, you didn’t have sex.

Additionally, Steve trusted you to answer any question he had (about anything he wanted to know) honestly, and to keep the conversations you had private.

So, when Steve came to your office during work hours, you didn’t really bat an eyelash. You were currently looking over some paperwork you could probably pass off to someone else, trying to figure out whether or not you should increase Bucky’s weekly therapy sessions.

Steve cleared his throat once, simply standing there, taking up almost the whole doorway. You looked up at him and smiled, inviting him to come in.

He knows the drill. He flips over the sign on your door from “COME IN!” to “DO NOT DISTURB,” and sits down on the overly plush couch across from you. You stay in your swivel chair, facing him.

“Sam and Clint asked you called me ‘daddy’ when we have…” Steve isn’t meeting your eyes as he speaks. Usually he’s pretty confident, or at least good at faking it.

Now he’s looking behind you, staring at the adornments on your desk. You know he’s looking at all of the pictures by the angle of his pupils.

His eyes catch on a few particular ones. Your childhood dog as a puppy, a picture of the skyline of your hometown.

You laugh a little, unable to contain it. It’s a desperate attempt to lighten the mood.

It doesn’t work.

“Do you want me to respond as a therapist with a PhD in trauma studies, or your loving and dedicated girlfriend?” you ask.

Steve meets your eyes now. He was just about done with the line of pictures and would’ve had to look up next. Your diplomas and awards are at an awkward angle, and he’s glad he doesn’t have to turn his neck like that.

He rambles. “I don’t know...you know I love you, right? Like, I really do. And I know we’re going slower than...than other people...but you understand, right? You understand that it’s not...it’s not because I don’t love you, it’s just...I just need…”

While he speaks, his chest rises and falls at a rapid rate. You go over to him, pulling his head to the crook in your neck.

Rubbing his back, you shush him. “I love you, too, babe…” he visibly exhales at that. “Listen, I love you, too. And I’m here for you. Don’t worry, if you want to wait, I’ll wait. I’m with you because I love you, not because I want a quick lay.”

He pulls away, smiling a little. “Thank you...let me, let me thank you…”

You’re about to protest, but he immediately stops you with one of those million-dollar smiles. “Not, I don’t mean like that...let me take you out on a date, to that restaurant you like?”

You bite your lip and smile. “That’d be great.”

The date is nice, just how everything with Steve is. That man is perfect, a ray of golden light illuminating your life.

You two speak the next morning at breakfast. You’re eating a bowl of cereal again, Steve is making an omelette. That fancy bastard.

A comforting silence falls over you two. The scrape of the whisk against the bowl, the chopping of vegetables, the sizzle of the pan.

Steve is the one who speaks first. He calls out your name softly.

“(Y/N), can I ask you a weird question?” Steve is still facing the stove. You can see his back muscles ripple through his worn pajama shirt.

You swallow the too-soggy cereal before you snap yourself back to reality. “Uh...sure.”

Steve clears his throat. “What does ‘vanilla’ mean?”

You’re shocked. You cough a little, causing half-eaten bites of your breakfast to shoot up your throat. This makes you cough viciously.

Steve turns around, going to make sure you’re okay. You can barely meet his eyes, even as you wave him off and assure him you’re fine.

You set your bowl in the sink, and hop back onto the counter.

You’re unsure of how to answer the question. It’s obvious he means vanilla in bed. It takes you a minute, but you figure brutal honesty is best, as it always is with him.

“It means,” you pause. He stares deep into your eyes. God, he’s so handsome. “It means...it means you’re not kinky.”

He turns back to the stove, turning it off. The omelette is burned a little due to your choking escapade. He still plates them before asking his next question.

“What does ‘kinky’ mean?” he takes a bite of the eggs. Chewing slowly, he watches your every move.

You speak slowly, carefully. You now understand why your parents were so awkward when you asked where babies come from.

“It means you like...you like a lot of different things in bed…” you chew your bottom lip. You have zero idea of the proper way to answer him. Explaining how much phones had changed, or what computers were, was easier than this.

“What do you mean…’a lot?’ Like, what are those things?” He asks. His voice is small, quiet. Anyone who was walking in from the common room would only be able to hear you.

In an effort to not lose your mind, you revert back to the way you taught everything to Steve: simple, small things first, then build up to more complicated ones.

Finger in the butt, and then suspension. Oral, then anal. Handjobs, then electrocution.

You take a deep breath before beginning. “There are some people who like to be...spanked...and there are people who like to spank…” Steve’s eyes are wide. He doesn’t say anything, though, so you continue. “There are also people who like to wear collars…”

After a while, Steve’s eyes go back to normal size. After going over the basics, you take his relaxed stance as a sign to go more in depth. “There are people who like to dominate, ‘dom’ for short and there are people who ‘sub,’ or take the submissive role. The dominate takes more authority, they’re in charge of the other person, or people. The submissive role is…”

You look him up and down. You’re standing now, he’s leaning against the counter. All of the food has been consumed, dirty dishes placed in the dishwasher.

You balance on your hands behind you. “Am I make sense? Should I slow down?”

Steve shakes his head. His talent for unwavering eye contact is unprecedented, and this time you’re the one who looks away. You shouldn’t do that, you’re a professional. You’re the one who explained to Steve the Civil Rights movement, both landmark Rodriguez Supreme Court cases, and  yoga pants.

This shouldn’t be this hard.

But here, in this kitchen, you’re not one of the best trauma specialists in the Western hemisphere. You’re not the woman with the PhD. You’re not the highly decorated therapist. You’re not a published author.

Here, in this kitchen, you are the girlfriend of Steven Grant Rogers. You are a flustered girl attempting to explain to your boyfriend how BDSM works.

Your conversation (which barely meets the threshold for one, since you’re doing ninety-nine percent of the talking) is only ended what feels like hours later when you get a text from Stark, asking you to meet him up in your office.

It’s that night when you’re about to go to bed that Steve finds you again. You’d assumed that, after what you had told him, that he would want time to process everything. So, you made your way back to your own apartment and got ready for bed.

You’re halfway through brushing your teeth when you hear a knock on the door. When you answer it, Steve is hunched over in the doorway. His face mirrors that of a kicked puppy.

You feel terrible.

“Did I do something wrong?” He mumbles.

Immediately, you melt. You feel so, so fucking bad.

“No,” you tell him. “Of course you didn’t.”

Steve sniffles. “Then why didn’t you come to my apartment after your meeting with Tony?”

“I thought you needed some time to process everything we talked about…” you answer honestly.

Steves shrugs. He doesn’t meet your eyes. He looks behind you again. This time, it’s not at pictures, but at your messy apartment. You practically moved into Steve’s, most of your clothes were there, most of your stuff was there, too. It was almost bare. It looked like you didn’t live there.

Truly, it was because you didn’t. Your heart and all your crap belonged with Steve and his crap.

He shakes his head. “No...I mean, I do, I need time to process, I need time to think about everything, I mean, you know this...how long, do you remember how long it took for me to figure out you weren’t lying about the water bottle industry?”

You laugh loudly at that, snorting a little.  It took him months to figure out you weren’t joking, there really were people who sold water in small containers that couldn’t be reused or recycled. Truthfully, you hadn’t used a single one since. “Yeah, that did take awhile.”

Steve sighs. Not the sigh you use when Tony refuses to see his therapist, or when Wanda steals your coffee cup from your hands. This sigh is loving, it’s relieved.

His hands come to cup your cheeks. They’re warm, firm. “Let me come in, or come up to mine. I’ll make you something, and we can take a hot bath, or whatever. I just don’t want to be not around you.”

You nod, wanting to be around him, too.

Later that night, you’re sitting in bed. He’s reading, you’re emailing back and forth with some magazine about an interview. The only sound in the room is music quietly coming from your phone on the right bedside table and your typing.

Steve is laying against pillows, while you sit upright at the end of the bed.

Just like before, Steve is the one to break the comfortable silence.

“Hey, (Y/N), you trust me, right?”

You don’t look up, thinking nothing of it. Steve, like anyone who’s been through one-sixteenth of what he has, needs a lot of reassurance. “Of course, babe,” you tell him.

His voice is more stern the second time. “(Y/N).”

You roll your eyes, but still don’t meet his. You’re not even sure what you’re looking at on your laptop screen at this point. “What?”

“Not like, ‘Oh, yeah, I can trust you not to cheat on me or murder me in my sleep.’ I mean, you do trust me?” Steve’s eyes burn into yours, and you can feel electricity dance across your skin. This must be how it feels to be struck by lightning.

Your face feels hot. You gnaw on your own lip in an attempt not to moan.

“Yeah,” your voice is just above a whisper. “Yeah...yeah, I trust...I trust you.”

Steve takes your now-closed laptop (When did you shut it? Did he close it? Did you close it?) and places it gingerly in its assigned drawer. Then he mutes your phone.

He remains laid back against the pillows and headboard, legs crossed languidly. You suddenly feel a cosmic pull to him.

Placing yourself on his lap, facing him, is the most erotic thing you’ve ever done. This really, truly, can’t get better...until it does.

“Tell me what you like…” Steve whispers it to you, but it feels it’s a megaphone in your ear. “Tell me your kinks.”

You bite your lip again, staring deep into his eyes. You’re speechless. Your jaw hangs open and your chest heaves as you desperately think of an answer.

“I...want..” is all you can choke out. Your words catch in your throat like a fly caught in a spiderweb.

Steve kisses from the edge of your shoulder to your earlobe. Once the line is finished, he sighs into your ear again. “Tell me everything (Y/N), leave nothing untold…”

You moan again. Fuck, You think. Take me now.

Taking a deep breath, you try to speak again. “I wanna fuck you. I wanna tie you up and wipe tears from your eyes while I deny you relief. I want to see big, strong Captain America reduced to a whimpering, begging mess…”

This time, Steve moans. It’s low in his throat. You want to leave bruises on his milky skin.

Steve’s eyes are screwed shut, his head leaning back. You feel his hard on through his sweatpants and your sleep shorts, which you’ve probably soaked through by now.

“Tell me more…” he manages to get out. “There’s more...there has to be more…”

You rub against him and sigh happily. “I wanna ride you, I wanna drip hot wax down your back...I wanna hear your cries of pain...I wanna ride your face until you cum just from giving me pleasure. I wanna...fuck, Steve, I wanna take care of you after, too. I wanna draw hot baths for you like you did for me and listen to your moans of pleasure as I wipe a warm washcloth across your body to clean the sweat and tears and cum off of you.”

He moans again. “Please...please that’s what I,  that’s what I want, too.”

You smile, kissing down the side of his face. Your body surges with confidence after every sweet moan reaches your ears. “All you gotta do is ask, baby…”

“God,” now his chest is heaving. You feel another shot of adrenaline, and with that, a shot of courage. Reducing a supersoldier to a whining mess is a hell of a drug.

You stop mouthing over his jugular. “Please what, baby? You gotta tell me what you want.”

Steve moans come from higher in his throat this time, and you can feel his dick twitch.

“I want…I want you to be in charge, fuck I remember the first day I met you, you were bossing Clint around, making him move stuff for you and telling him what to do. You scolded him when he dropped your shit and praised him when we did it the way you liked. Same day, you yelled at Tony to do something and he did it, just fucking did it, I’d never seen him do that before. It was, for fucking sure, the hottest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”

He doesn’t stop talking. For awhile in your early twenties, you were a sugar baby. You needed the money to pay for your path into social work. Once, a client paid off all of your student loans while you sucked his dick. That didn’t hold a candle to what was happening in front of your very eyes.

“Then after you started working with me, trying to get me used to everything, all you fucking did was boss me around. Told me what to do and where to go, always tell me the truth about stuff...the others, they skirted around bad stuff, but no, you didn’t. Told me everything. Once you came down to the gym to find Nat and me, and fuck, fuckfuckfuck, we were sparring and you complimented my stance. Almost fell to the floor right fucking there...right fucking there. God, I love you, I love you so much.”

You giggle, remembering exactly what he was talking about. That day, Natasha had a given you a file on Barnes that was incomplete. Whole sections of info was blocked out, obviously to keep someone without your level of clearance’s nose out of your patient’s business.

You went down to where FRIDAY had told you she was. You found her, just as Steve had said, sparring with him. He looked so good, sweaty and breathless. You had taken a leap, albeit an unprofessional one, and told him he looked nice. You thought he had interpreted it as sarcastic. Turns out, he knew exactly what you wanted.

You lean forward and press your lips to his, your noses brush. It’s not bruising, it’s beautiful, and loving, and sweet like nectar. You nuzzle forward and run your fingers through his hair, pulling a little. He moans and you smile devilishly.

“All we need is a safe word, and then we can get started.”

Steve smiles, too. His is more blissed out. He’s riding a high, and he never wants to come down.

You can say with certainty you don’t either.

[keywestlou]

FRIDAY THE 13th

Today is friday the 13th. A good day to stay home, not walk under a ladder or permit a black cat to walk in front of you. The day is considered an unlucky one in the western hemisphere.

Friday the 13th does not always occur only one time a year. In some years, up to three times.

Where did the day come from? What is its source?

Many a story behind friday the 13th. Which the real one? No one actually knows. People select which ever suits their fancy.

The most popular is the Last Supper. Jesus and his 12 disciples the evening of Holy Thursday. Thirteen purportedly for dinner.

Another source involves the Knights Templar which began with their arrest on friday October 13, 1307.

The story originates from a Norse myth. Twelve Norse gods were having a dinner party in Valhalla. There was a thirteenth god. Trickster Loki who had not been invited. His uninvited appearance made for 13 gods in attendance.

Loki killed the god Balder with a weapon which had been mistletoed on top.

It is said the whole Earth got dark, the whole Earth mourned.

As a result of Balder’s death, the combination of friday and the 13th day of the month have been considered bad and unlucky.

Return with me now to the Last Supper.

The Last Supper is a well known painting by DaVinci. It is a 15th century mural painting. Housed today in the Refectory of the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan.

I have been fortunate to have visited Milan on several occasions. On two, visited DaVinci’s Last Supper.

It is located on a large wall at the end of an even larger dining room.

The painting is neither small nor regular in size. DaVinci was not putting around when he decided to paint the Last Supper. I do not know its actual size. Huge the only way to describe it. Big! Also of course, spectacular.

The Last Supper is painted on the huge wall. The whole wall.

DaVinci first prepared the wall. He sealed the wall with a double layer of gesso, pitch, and mastic, with an undercoat of white leaf to enhance the painting’s brightness when it was done. Lastly, he covered the wall with secco (dry plaster).

He then painted.

In simple terms, DaVinci painted the Last Supper on some sort of concrete wall.

Very small groups were permitted in the former dining hall. There was sufficient room for many. However there was a concern that chemicals in one’s clothes and that germs emanating from the human nose might contaminate and destroy the painting. Before arriving at the dining hall, we had to take 2 separate elevators to “sanitize us” before even getting into the dining hall.

I was in awe of DaVinci’s work. I listened to the guide director’s words and then sat on a bench at a side wall for a half hour “contemplating” the work.

There were the 12 apostles and Jesus. The tour guide asked if anyone could see an additional person. No one could.

There was one in the painting.

Sitting to Jesus’ immediate left was John the Apostle. He was cloaked on his shoulder closest to Jesus in some sort of pink shawl. Looking closely at the shawl after having been directed to do so, there was woman leaning on it. Her face and upper torso.

The guide said many historians believe her to be Mary Magdalene. As the story goes, she was married to Jesus at the time. Even further, the story claims they had two children.

Mary’s purpose at the Last Supper was to help with the food, etc. Her role minor. It is further believed that she followed Jesus around as he washed the feet of the disciples. She would dry their feet.

What is it……Don’t believe everything you hear or read. I am the world’s greatest skeptic. Lawyer training does that to a person. Nevertheless, I have read parts of books and searched the internet re Mary and DaVinci’s Last Supper. There are those who believe DaVinci painted Mary into the Last Supper resting on John’s shoulder starring at Jesus.

It was not uncommon for artists in DaVinci’s day to sneak someone or something into a painting for no other reason than to see if the public could be fooled.

Fred will be visiting today or tomorrow. I may bite my words later, but it does not look that whatever is coming will be that bad. There is no calm before the storm this morning. The trees are blowing as they normally do every day.

Having so written, watch! I’ll probably have to be taken off my rooftop by helicopter.

Fred had reverted to a tropical depression. It is supposed to go back to being a tropical storm before it hits Key West and the lower Keys. Expected landfall later today or sometime tomorrow. Winds at its striking projected to be sustaining at 45 mph and gusts up to 50 mph.

I speak with some degree of authority. Key West is expected to be in the middle of the cone as Fred passes over. Never forget however wind storms of Fred’s nature are fickle. Fred may  change his mind at the last minute and turn in another direction or with a different force.

Recall Irma. It was a category 5 approaching Key West. The damage would be disastrous. Very few buildings would be left standing. I was scared and got out of Dodge 5 days before its anticipated arrival.

Irma deviated slightly as it hit Key West. Slightly moved west and dropped to a category 1. Sixteen miles later when over Cudjoe Key, it became a category 4. Much destruction. Nothing seemed to be where it belonged. Cars in the water. Boats on U.S. 1. Houses in the ocean and on land turned sideways or upside down. Furniture everywhere.

Note again, the distance between Key West and Cudjoe Key is 16 miles.

Enjoy your day!

    .

FRIDAY THE 13th was originally published on Key West Lou

[alittlebitoftruthcan]

‘Beloved Osho, the pope and his bishops—are they really fully aware of how they are cheating their people? I can’t imagine that they are just a big heap of criminals, without any respect for truth.’ The religious leaders are as asleep as the people they are leading. The only difference between the leaders and the led is theoretical. The leaders have a great store of theological knowledge, all borrowed; nothing in it is of their own experience, but it gives them great authority over the people who don’t have even borrowed knowledge. And these leaders are consistently emphasizing the fact: ‘You are sinners, you are ignorant. We are the saints, we are the knowers.’ The poor masses cannot make a distinction between authentic knowing and borrowed knowledge. Even these leaders—popes, bishops, shankaracharyas, ayatollahs—even they are not alert of the distinction. They know only one kind of knowledge, and that is borrowed knowledge. They have no awareness of a different dimension of knowing. So whatever they are doing is done in deep sleep. They are not cheating people consciously. You CANNOT cheat anybody consciously. Consciousness will prevent you from doing anything as ugly as cheating, deceiving, pretending, being a hypocrite, condemning people as sinners and fulfilling your own egos as great saints. No, it is not done consciously. I never suspect for a single moment their good intentions. Whatever these people are doing, they are doing with good intentions; but the questions is NOT of good intentions, the question is: what is the result? You may murder me with good intentions, but your good intentions cannot justify my murder. I have come into contact with almost all kinds of religious scholars, and on one point they are the same, whether Hindu, Mohammedan, Christian, Jew. That point is that they are perfectly at ease, feeling very good, in whatever they are doing—they are doing God’s work, and they are spreading wisdom. They don’t even know the MEANING of wisdom. They have never tasted anything like that; they have heard about it, they have read about it, they have crammed hundreds of scriptures. I am reminded of an historical event… When Alexander the Great invaded India, his master was none other than Aristotle, the father of logic in the western hemisphere. And he had asked him, ‘When you come back, bring the four VEDAS of the Hindus. The rumors have been, for hundreds of years, that those four books contain all the knowledge that is in the world; if you know those four VEDAS, you know all. So bring those four VEDAS for me.’ Alexander said, ‘That is very simple.’ But in those days the VEDAS were not printed. Hindus resisted printing them for hundreds of years after the printing press was invented. They never wanted their sources of wisdom to be printed and sold in the market. Knowledge cannot be sold, and you cannot purchase wisdom. And purchasing the four VEDAS from a bookstall, you will be deceiving yourself—those words are dead. Alexander enquired because he was thinking he could get them easily, but it was difficult. Very few prominent brahmin families had copies of the VEDAS, and that was their whole treasure. But finally he found one old brahmin… people said, ‘He has one of the most authentic copies of the VEDAS. And he is old; you can get them from him.’ Alexander went to the old man. The old man said, ‘There is no problem, but traditionally we can give the VEDAS only when the sun is rising. You have come at the wrong time—the sun is setting. Come tomorrow morning, just before sunrise, just as the sun is rising, and I will hand over all the four VEDAS to you.’ Alexander said, ‘I was not thinking that it is going to be so simple. You don’t ask anything in return?’ He said, ‘No, this is enough, that you will be taking the VEDAS into the wide world. Come early in the morning.’ But that old man was REALLY clever… The whole night he and his four sons remained awake sitting around a fire. He told the sons, ‘Read one page of the book that I have given to you.’ He distributed the four VEDAS to the four sons, according to their age. The eldest got the RIGVEDA, the oldest scripture. ‘You read aloud one page so that I can hear that you are reading it rightly, and then remember it and drop it into the fire. By the morning all four VEDAS have to be burned, and by the morning all you four have to become my four VEDAS. I am going to present you to Alexander the Great.’ In ancient India, memory was particularly trained. Still, all universities, and colleges’ educational systems depend on cultivating memory. They deceive you and themselves, thinking that this is intelligence. Memory is not intelligence, because memory can be part of a computer—which has no consciousness, which has no intelligence. Your mind is also a natural bio-computer. Memory is simply remembering but not understanding; understanding is totally different. Memory needs a very mechanical mind, and understanding needs a very non-mechanical mind. In fact the ways are diametrically opposite. In the morning when Alexander appeared he was stunned. All the four VEDAS were burned, and the old man said, ‘Now you can take my four sons. They have perfect memory. They will repeat the VEDAS exactly. I could not give you the VEDAS—that is never done—but I can give my sons to you. My whole life I have trained them in memorizing. You just have to repeat something one time and it remains in their memory, as if written on a stone.’ Alexander was defeated by the old man. He could not take those four sons because they didn’t know the MEANING of what they were saying; they could not explain anything, and the language was different, they could not translate it—they didn’t know Greek. What purpose would be served by taking these people? But ALL your religious scholars and leaders are nothing but memories, trained memories. They don’t know what they are saying, but they say it correctly. Their language is right, their grammar is right, their pronunciation is right, their accent is right, but all these are futile because they don’t know the meaning, they have never lived it. That meaning comes through living, through experiencing. But they will remain in a deception, and they will spread the same deception to other people. So I say again: the popes, the bishops, the shankaracharyas—they are not doing intentionally any crime. They are fast asleep; they cannot do anything intentionally! They are living an unconscious life. Their words are beautiful—they have collected them from beautiful sources—but the words have not grown within their being. The words are not part of their life. They are as ignorant as the people they are teaching. Socrates used to say that there is a knowledge which is ignorant, and there is an ignorance which is knowledge. Borrowed knowledge is ignorance. Experienced truth makes you not knowledgeable, but humble. The more you know it, the less you claim to know it. The day you know it perfectly, you can only say, ‘I am utter ignorance. I am just a child, collecting seashells on the beach. I know nothing.’ The people who say, ‘We know,’ are utterly ignorant people—but their memories are full. And those memories are dead, because they have not given birth to any experience of their own. Gautam Buddha used to say, ‘I used to know a man—he was my servant. Sitting by the door, he would count the cows that were going early in the morning to the pasture, to the river.’ He would count them—it had become almost an automatic thing with him. His duty was to sit in front of the door of Gautam Buddha, in case he needed anything; otherwise he was sitting there the whole day. And by the time the cows returned… It is one of the most beautiful times. In Indian villages, which are still not modernized, the time when the sun is setting has got a special name, GOADHOOLI. GOA means cow, and DHOOLI means dust: the cows are coming, raising dust. The sun is setting, the birds are returning to their trees—it is a very peaceful moment. So at the time of GOADHOOLI he would count again the cows that were returning home. And he would become very much worried if some cow was missing, if the count was not exactly as it should have been. Later, when Gautam Buddha became a great master, he used the story of that man and his habit to explain something immensely meaningful. He said, ‘I used to ask that poor fellow, ‘Do you have a cow?’ And he would say, ‘I am so poor, I don’t have a cow.’ And I would say to him, ‘Then why do you unnecessarily go on counting thousands of cows in the morning, then in the evening again—thousands of cows? And if one cow is missing—or perhaps you have miscounted—then you are worried, you cannot sleep. And it is not your cow, it is not your concern!’’ Buddha used to say to his disciples, ‘All knowledge that is not yours is not your concern. You are counting other people’s cows, unnecessarily wasting your time. It is better to have one cow of your own—that will be nourishment.’ But all your scholars are just counting other people’s cows. And they are doing immense harm without knowing it, because they are helping people to become knowers without knowing. This is the greatest harm that can be done to man, to give him a sense that he knows—and he knows nothing. You have destroyed his whole life. You have destroyed the opportunity in which he may have known, experienced, lived. You have taken all his opportunities, all his possibilities of growth. I am against all these scholars, not because their intentions are bad but because the outcome of their very good intentions is disastrous. They have destroyed millions of people on the earth; they never allowed them to grow, they gave them a false notion that they know already. This is pure poison. George Gurdjieff used to tell a story… There was a magician who had many sheep. And it was a trouble to get them home from the forest every night—wild animals were there, and he was losing many of his sheep. Finally the idea came to him, ‘Why do I not use my expertise, my magic?’ He hypnotized all his sheep and told them different things. To one sheep he said, ‘You are a lion. You need not be afraid; you are the king amongst the animals.’ To another he said, ‘You are a tiger,’ to another, ‘You are a man.’ And he told to everybody, to all the sheep: ‘You are not going to be butchered because you are not sheep, so you need not be afraid to come back home. You should come early, before nightfall.’ And from that day no sheep went missing. In fact, from that day no sheep was behaving like a sheep: somebody was roaring like a lion, somebody was behaving like a man, and nobody was afraid of being butchered, killed—the very question was irrelevant. And the magician was butchering them every day for his food. They may have been roaring like lions—that did not matter; they were sheep after all. But he managed very beautifully. Giving one sheep the notion of being a lion, there was no need now to be bothered that he would try to escape, seeing that other sheep were being killed. Still sheep were being killed, but this sheep would know, ‘I am a lion, I am not a sheep. Sheep are bound to be killed!’ And when HE would be killed, others would be thinking, ‘He was just a sheep, we are men. And he was not only a sheep, but a foolish sheep who used to think that he was a lion, and never listened to us. We argued many times, ‘You are a sheep. We are men, we know better. You stop roaring, that is not going to help.’’ But the magician was in absolute control. The story Gurdjieff was telling was about your religious leaders. They have managed to tell you things which you are not. They have managed to convince you that you know things which you know not. And this is the greatest crime that can be committed. But you cannot call them criminals, because they are not doing it to harm you. They are trying to serve you, they are trying to help you. And because all the religions have been doing the same thing, the whole world is under a certain hypnosis. Why have I created so many enemies?—for the simple reason that I am telling you that your knowledge is not knowledge, that it is a cover-up. You are UTTERLY ignorant. You know nothing, and you believe that you know. It hurts! I am taking away your knowledge, I am taking away your virtue, I am taking away your morality. I am taking away everything that you used to think is a great treasure, everything that was cherished by you, nourished by you, protected by you, because you thought that you have got the real secrets of life, that you know the real mysteries of life. And to take away these things from people is naturally going to create enemies. It is a strange world. The enemies are popes, are archbishops, are shankaracharyas, are ayatollahs—they are the respected people of the world, and the friend looks like the greatest enemy. The enemies appear to be friends, and the friends appear to be enemies. Humanity has misbehaved with its friends and given all its respect to its enemies. And that is the reason why the whole world is in misery: you have listened to the enemies and you have destroyed your friends. And the same story continues. I have talked to so many so-called wise people and found that all their wisdom is just memory. Not even a small bit is their own; all has come from others. And this is something fundamental to realize, that truth can only be your own experience. There is no other way to get it. Lies you can get in abundance. There are supermarkets all over the world, Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Mohammedan, Buddhist—all kinds of lies, all colors, all shapes and sizes, whichever you prefer. They are available and suitable to you. You are not to fit with them, they fit with you. It is very easy. They are made for you, they are tailored for you. Truth is a totally different matter. YOU will have to fit with it. Truth knows no compromise. YOU will have to change according to it. You will have to go through a transformation. So I am creating enemies, not without any reason. The reason is clear. I am creating a few friends also, but those few friends have to go through a deep fire test. They have to drop their false personalities, their egos, their knowledge—EVERYTHING they have. They have to be ready to be utterly naked and empty. Only then are they at the right point of the journey, the journey towards truth. Naked, empty, and alone… But it is such a joy, and each moment is such a glory, such a paradise that once you have tasted a single moment on the way towards truth, you will never look back on all that you had to leave. It is a great unburdening, a freedom. Now you can open your wings unto the sky. The whole sky now is yours.

Osho (Beyond Psychology)

[webcomixwastaken]

Hey, so though I don’t make a habit of doing this, allow me to plug my fanfic again just ‘cause I’m having a great time with it!

So, this fic is hella slow burn (even including a few false starts) Zelink set pre-Calamity, featuring every single memory in some capacity, including those from The Champions’ Ballad. Third person limited POVs, bouncing between Link and Zelda, but more often in Link’s.

I typically aim for an update every Wednesday around 11pm-12am GMT+8, so I can wake up the next morning and be like, nice, some people in the western hemisphere have read it, all while I was asleep! Soooooo that means it should have been updated in the past few hours! Much appreciation if you’d check it out. Latest installment features Gorons. They’re swell folk. 

A little rambling on my love for/history with fanfiction and the effect this particular piece has had on me lately under the cut.

I first started my dabbling in fanfiction around 2010 which led me down a rabbit hole that emerged in an adult world where writing is a major slice of my life. From my degree (MFA, yo!) to day job (working at children’s press where we teach kids creative writing from idea generation to publication. Yes, it’s great.) to volunteer job (NaNoWriMo ML on my 5th year!) and even social life (nearly every friend I’ve made in my post-graduation life has been via local writing groups or events). I owe fanfic a lot.

One of my favourite essays on the writing life is David Foster Wallace’s The Nature of Fun. This year, I felt pretty stuck - but not as dramatically as he describes - on the stage where one is in constant dissatisfaction with their work due to wanting it to be Good but also Liked. Especially because I started with fanfiction, which as a medium is inherently all about having fun. Though it has a very misunderstood reputation by those who don’t partake in it, it is true that nobody demands that fanfic has to be Very Good Writing. Fanfic writers write their stories for no other reason than just WANTING to. Readers and reviews are cherries on top, but the main satisfaction is MAKING the thing. 

It was by remembering this that I have found myself easing out of that Dissatisfied phase and finally into Disciplined Fun. I know that this story can’t be monetised or used for fame and fortune and professional accolade - nor do I want it to, because the essence of fanfic for me is its free quality. Free to make, free to read, free to explore whatever world or character you’ve become attached to. That’s the fun! 

However, now with a couple of years studying and teaching the craft under my belt, I’m finding a great deal of enjoyment in taking more time to examine how I tell this story too. Compared to the fic I did years back, these chapters are far more thoughtfully constructed with purposeful character arcs. I’ve been carefully measuring the beats in each scene to match. I love to outline and even more than that, I love to adjust my outlines to fit the path the story goes. Then there’s also been the delightfully nerdy fan aspect of it - I get a really big kick out of studying the game map to make scenes feasible, slipping in canon lines, and alluding to lore. As I’ve said before... you can NEVER run out of Zelda lore, holy cow.

So yeah, I’m happiest when I get to write in a way where I’m having such Disciplined Fun. This story has been nothing but that, so I hope you’ll share in the Fun too.

((Different fandom (Stardew Valley) but I felt the same satisfied feeling while I was writing this fic too. Even though it was totally Gen and I knew that meant hardly anyone would actually bother reading it!))

[lubbuthedigitalnomad]

Stupaville Don’t Crack By Doug Ten Rose

There is a popular expression in Black America that goes, “Black don’t crack.” The concept, of course, is that after suffering centuries of every imaginable brutal abuse, in a country they physically built but were never allowed to feel at home in, Black folks as a unit has developed an unbreakable resiliency.

The great comedienne Wanda Sykes recently produced a line that gave us a laugh but is actually too true to be called a joke. Speaking of the president who has fanned the flames of race-related tragedies and so many other American disasters during the past few years, she said, “I can’t believe this motherfucker cracked black! That’s not supposed to happen! He actually cracked black!”

The situation in Nepal is at least as bad, economically, and medically, as it is everywhere else. But Stupaville still don’t crack! This roughly ten square block neighborhood that I live in contains at least five large monasteries housing well over a thousand monks and nuns, as well as one of the holiest structures in the Eastern hemisphere. There are a whole lot more Buddhist monks, nuns, and monasteries, as well as Hindu Temples and holy people, in the surrounding city and mountains.

I’m guessing there are about two thousand or so people that aren’t monks or nuns who live in this Boudha Stupa section of Kathmandu, Nepal. They go to work or school every morning like the rest of us. But they all have a bit of happiness and decorum about them that the monks, nuns, and overall cultural influences here are responsible for.

Some of these people have lost their jobs and homes as well as loved ones. Many businesses are closed permanently and for sale. The main income for most businesses in this relatively affluent neighborhood has previously come from the tourist traffic. That tourist traffic has been nonexistent for almost a year.

It is amazing how many local people still walk around with the kind of internally generated happiness that can only come from a deep faith in the inevitable. They also maintain a strong sense of cooperative community among themselves and are more grateful for their remaining advantages than they are grieved about those advantages they have lost.

This ability to not crack in the face of severe adversity is even more amazing when you consider the circumstances. Nepal has been a fourth world country for a long time — way before the economic, social, and political manipulation of the coronavirus was even a twinkle in Pfizer’s eye. A vast majority of the folks here live without heat all winter in concrete buildings that could easily function as meat lockers. Lack of refrigeration and a less than consistent electrical service are widespread, so the people are often chilled much more thoroughly than the meat they will be eating. Many folks were malnourished for a long time before this recent crisis, in spite of the fact that food prices are a fraction of what they are in the Western world. Tuberculosis and many other very unpleasant diseases are by no means a rarity, and the air pollution in Kathmandu is among the worst in the world.

But there is a strong sense of community in Stupaville and, I am told, throughout Nepal. This is an incredible accomplishment considering the history of the area and the diversity of the native population. There are many different sects stemming from the various kingdoms that used to occupy the Kathmandu Valley, as well as the surrounding hills, many centuries ago. These kingdoms often made brutal war as they conquered each other in the olden days. Now, most of the descendants of these various small kingdoms keep up with their historical cultural heritages while coexisting peacefully with the descendants of the other tribes.

Although the country is Hindu by a very large majority, other groups are made to feel at home. There is also an exiled Tibetan Buddhist community (much of it here in Stupaville), a healthy representation of Christians, and some Muslim devotees. There seems to be another New Year’s Day celebration here every other month! Each culture has its own. But there is no apparent friction, and a good deal of very visible mutual respect between the tribes these days. People of all sects greet each other with a “Namaste” and the palms of both hands joined in front of their chests. The popular translation of the word Namaste is “I recognize the Divine within you.”

There is no need for any of these groups to have a ____ Lives Matter campaign. Police brutality is relatively infrequent and equally distributed among all the people when it does happen. Beggars work several streets in Stupaville. Some are in real need of food. Others just want to get drunk again. Several are scamming to pay the mortgage on a condo in India. Some can be aggressive and follow a potential contributor for blocks, hoping to break him or her down. In previous seasons, when tourists jammed every street, a beggar could make a lot of money by employing this annoying persistence.

Not everyone contributes to them, but I haven’t heard anyone yelling “Leave me alone and get a job, you bum” even once during the near year that I’ve been here. The folks with homes and jobs are polite, if not helpful, to their beggars as well as to each other. Folks here seem to universally recognize that the divine lives in all creatures, no matter how well disguised it may be at times.

The world seems to be changing more rapidly and severely than ever before. It is certainly changing more rapidly and severely than it ever has during our little lifetimes. Whether the Boudha Stupa neighborhood will ever become a Wanda Sykes joke is an ongoing question. But life here in Stupaville, at least for the time being, is still a celebration that stays strong enough to carry around joy in the present and a sweet hope for the future.

I hope it is where you are.

About the Author

Doug “Ten” Rose may be the biggest smartass as well as one of the most entertaining survivors of the hitchhiking adventurers that used to cover America’s highways. He is the author of the books Fearless Puppy on American Road and Reincarnation Through Common Sense, has survived heroin addiction and death, and is a graduate of over a hundred thousand miles of travel without ever driving a car, owning a phone, or having a bank account.

Ten Rose and his work are a vibrant part of the present and future as well as an essential remnant of a vanishing breed.

If you missed the Introduction to the book that will be titled Temple Dog Soldier and contains the above chapter or would like to see several other chapters that are available for free online, go to the Fearless Puppy Website Blog section. This is a book in progress. You are reading it as it is being created! Just like you, I don’t know what the next chapter is going to be about until it is written. As the Intro will tell you, this is a totally true story — and probably the only book ever written by and about a corpse making a complete journey around the world!

The books Fearless Puppy On American Road and Reincarnation Through Common Sense by this same author are also available through the website or Amazon. (See all the 5* reviews there!) There are also sample chapters from both books on the website.

Very entertaining tv/radio interviews with, and newspaper articles about, the author is also available there. There is no charge for anything but the complete books! All author profits from book sales will be donated to help sponsor an increase in the number of wisdom professionals on Earth, beginning with but certainly not limited to Buddhist monks and nuns.

Follow him on Facebook, Doug Ten Rose

Travel Adventure Books can be an excellent gift to your friends and family, buy from Amazon.com