#goose nation rise

[howelljenkins]

where goose

just goosin around

[baishouqijia]

it’s my birthday tomorrow YIPPEE!!!!!

[sparrownnax]

y'all know the whole "male leads who are basically in love and then end up a relationship with a girl they had little to no chemistry with" thing? yeah i just realised we got the opposite of that in hwfwm. i guess we keep kind of getting it in regards to jason and literally any male character but he's an outlier in most situations and a manwhore.

[vaemical]

the suffering is endless, the torment is constant, but ~goddamn it~

we

stay

silly

[natalievoncatte]

31. Spookycorp

(Yes I know it’s late. I have a permit. I can do what I want.)

Lena adjusted her cheap plastic tiara, which she’d had chosen herself at a Spirit Halloween. Though she would never admit it, Lena felt giddy when she went shopping now. She used to just send Jess or use a high end shopping service; Lena Luthor had neither the time nor the patience to fumble with checkout lines and coupons, but post-L-Corp Lena, private citizen Lena, head of a charity org and retired from corporate sharkery Lena delighted in it. In a sweater and leggings with her hair in a simple ponytail and glasses not contacts, she felt human. Normal.

Her costume was simple, the tiara and a goofy floofy mini dress she’d picked up at a thrift store, and a wand to top it all off. Kara recognized her immediately.

“Let me guess, a good witch?”

Lena stood in the door and beamed, nudging her glasses. She was still getting used to them every day but her therapist had insisted she stick with the changes she made.

(The penthouse was going on the market and she was selling her Louboutins. Most of her Louboutins. She was finally telling that little voice in her head that sounded like Lillian to SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU’RE NOT MY MOTHER whenever it admonished her about not being perfect enough)

Kara was dressed in an all-green ensemble with a pointed hat resting on her head and a cheesy plastic bow on her back.

“Robin Hood?”

“Of Locksley,” Kara bowed.

(If I’d know, I’d have dressed as Maid Marian.)

She beckoned Lena to enter in an expensive gesture and watched her step inside, her gaze lingering in a way that made Lena tingle all over, goose flesh rising on her arms. She hopped up onto a stool and smiled when Kara handed her a beer.

“They make pumpkin spice beer now?”

“Mmmm,” Kara said, nursing her own. Lena’s eyes widened when Kara tipped a flask into it; a sticker on the side read Not For Humans.

“Just a little to loosen me up,” said Kara. “It’s a party.”

Kara sat down on the other side of the table and just… looked at her. She looked at Lena with her chin resting on her fist and a soft distant look on her face, and Lena stared back just as intently, entranced by the way her sunny curls escaped her sloppy ponytail and framed her face.

The spell, as it were, was broken by a knock at the door. The snacks were coming, an absurdly huge order that Lena had placed while she was on her way. As the bewildered delivery boy accepted her excessive tip, Kara carried the bags into the apartment, and together they began laying it all out on the kitchen island.

Brainy and Nia were the first to arrive. They wore matching silver body suits and Nia had put on a gloss of green makeup: Querl simply disabled his image inducer.

“We’re aliens!” Nia chirped. “Lena I love your outfit! Wait is Kara Robin Hood? Lena, why aren’t you Maid Marian?”

Lena froze, suddenly aware of Kara’s tense presence beside her. She didn’t dare turn her head and gauge Kara’s reaction.

“Did you purchase every potsticker in National City?” Brainy asked, almost pointedly snapping the tension.

Kara laughed. “I think Lena just wants to keep me from eating everything else.”

Alex and Kelly also showed up in marching costumes, making the moment even more awkward. They were married, of course, so they were supposed to coordinate.

Alex strutted into the apartment, grinning, and threw back the cowl of her Batman costume, as Kelly rolled her eyes behind the mask of her Catwoman outfit.

“That’s cute,” said Kara. “Did you guys like flip a coin to decide who was who?”

Alex poked the gray fabric over her stomach. “You know what, Kara? Sometimes I want people to know I have abs too. And unlike some people I have to work for mine.”

Kara poked out her tongue and shoved a beer in her hand as Kelly pulled Lena into a hug.

After a toast to James, and J’onn, and Winn, and absent friends, Kara started the first movie of their marathon. Each couple had selected one film, and Alex’s selection went first: a really weird movie called The Keep.

“This was originally three hours long before the studio butchered it, but it’s still a classic,” Alex explained. “It’s Michael Mann’s only horror movie.”

Lena found it largely incomprehensible and not very scary, and there were some scenes, especially the nonsensical sex scene, that made the experience a tad awkward.

“If I was in an ancient castle in Carpathia and the crosses in the wall started glowing, I would not mess with them.” said Kara.

“Yes you would,” Alex snorted. “Your approach to danger is to shove you arm in it.”

Kara drained her beer and rolled her eyes. Lena glanced over at her and giggled, nursing the last of hers.

“Want another one?”

Lena nodded, and Kara got up to get them more drinks. Lena lost interest in the movie as she watched Kara cross the apartment and bend low to grab two more bottles from the bottom shelf of the fridge, bending at the hips. The bottom of her tunic pulled up over her muscular backside and the buns of steel strained her green leggings.

(She would annihilate me with a strap)

When Kara stood up, Lena snapped her gaze around and found everyone staring at her, Nia suppressing a giggle. They all looked endlessly amused, except Brainy, who had a self-satisfied smirk, as if he’d beaten her at chess.

Kara sat down and passed the cold beer to Lena, saying, “these movies would be scarier if they didn’t all have a bad guy I could just toss into space.”

She looked at Lena and raised her arm to curl her bicep.

Lena felt her soul almost leave her body and took a drink from her beer to hide the shivers.

The movie ended and Nia jumped up to put on her selection, which she proudly announced to the group. “ARMY OF DARKNESSSSS!” she shouted, clapping her hands.

Lena hasn’t seen this before and even though there was a ten minute prologue explaining what the hell it was about, Lena finally just decided to stop caring about the plot and just go along for the ride.

Kara had apparently seen it and she and Nia went back and forth quoting the dialogue back and forth at each other and gobbling snacks. Alex and Kelly seemed more interested in each other and had gone fairly quiet.

Lena was more interested in Kara. Her joy was infectious, especially after a third beer.

It was getting cool in the apartment by the time they were ready for the final movie, and Lena’s outfit was hardly warm. Kara felt her shiver and got up, coming back with a stack of blankets, which the others accepted.

Kara then took her cape and spread it over Lena. The fabric was stout and heavy and lay warmly about her as she tucked it under her chin.

“Uh oh,” said Alex. “Lena gets the Superblankie.”

“Oh, shut up,” Kara said.

“Lena always gets the Superblankie,” Nia agreed.

“Guys!” Kara said, sounding a little panicked.

“Start the movie already,” Kelly yawned, breaking the tension.

Kara put on the final movie, her choice: Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

No one remarked that for movie choosing purposes, Lena and Kara had been expected to act as a couple. Kara sat down on the sofa with Lena and pulled the cape around them both, tucking them tightly together and sharing her blessed, glorious body heat. Kara ran about three or four degrees hotter than a baseline human and it made her a living space heater. Lena adored it.

She adored a lot of things about Kara, like her laugh and her smile and that funny little scar, the only imperfection on her invulnerable body. She adored the way her blue eyes glittered like sapphires in the dark apartment, and the soft pillow of her bottom lip and her big strong hands and the way she was always laying a protective arm across Lena’s shoulders, making her feel so safe and…

Lena turned her attention to the movie. It was a comfort choice of hers and she knew it by heart, so it was easy to relax into Kara and not worry too hard about how much she was utterly, irrevocably, cruelly in love with her unattainable best friend.

The apartment was quiet. Lena was fairly sure that Alex was asleep and Kelly was mellow, too entranced with her new wife to care about anything else, and the way that Brainy and Nia were tucked under their blanket and whispering to each other made Lena hot with jealousy.

Kara’s chest hitched and Lena turned to her sharply.

“What is it, darling?” she murmured.

“Nothing,” Kara lied, then whispered. “This is so sad.”

She took Lena’s hand and Lena almost died on the spot, and it got worse when Kara nuzzled her chin into the crook of Lena’s shoulder.

Out of nowhere, half an hour later, Kara murmured, “if I lost you I think I’d become a monster too.”

Lena flinched, then turned to her. Kara was looking at her with big puppy dog eyes and that crooked little smile of hers, at once an honest smile and a smile for the keeping of secrets.

Everyone else was asleep, and would probably stay that way until morning.

“Kara,” Lena whispered.

Kara took it as an invitation, gently shifting so that Lena was now in her lap, and tucked Lena under her chin. She wrapped her arms around her and just breathed, chest gently rising and falling against her.

“I want you to know how sorry I am for all the things I’ve done,” Kara whispered into the top of her head. “I’ve never told you, I was gone before I could and after I got back I was scared.”

“Kara,” Lena murmured back, “darling, it’s alright.”

“I was so scared when I was there,” Kara said, not daring to name the Phantom Zone. “That place messes with time. I was terrified that if I ever got back you’d all be gone. You would be gone. I was so afraid it hurt.”

Lena went still, just listening.

“I’m so sorry, baby. You deserve better than me.”

“No I don’t,” Lena insisted, almost too loud. “No I don’t. There is no one better. God, Kara,” she softened her voice, “I think I fell a little in love with you the day we even met. I never used to believe in love at first sight or soulmates but… I am a witch after all.”

Kara let out a slow sigh. “Lena, are you saying…”

“Even when I was trying to tell you I hated you, I was telling you how much I love you. It’s you, Kara. It’s always been you.”

“I love you so much,” Kara said whispered, “I’ll love you forever.”

“Kara, everyone else is asleep,” she forced out, her jaw trembling from excitement. “Take me to the bedroom. Please.”

Kara said nothing but stood up in a single motion, lifting Lena with ease and curling her up in the cape. Lena didn’t think her feet ever touched the ground as they slipped into the bedroom and Kara laid her down on the bed, quickly and quietly closing the door before lunging into the bed, pressing Lena into the mattress with a barrage of hot, aggressively desperate kisses.

They were both quiet, Kara pausing only briefly to implore Lena with her eyes and wait for a murmured yes. There was something thrilling about the quiet, they way they swallowed their gasps and passed their moans softly through one another’s lips, and Lena would never forget the way Kara delighted in her, virtually worshipping her.

Lena returned the favor with with enthusiasm.

By morning, Lena was exhausted in every sense of the term and was curled up in a tangle of blankets and a snoozing Kryptonian.

There was a knock at the door.

“Well lock up on our way out,” Alex called. “By the way, you guys forgot about the whole keeping quiet thing about halfway through. Thanks for etching Lena yelling “daddy” into my brain.”

Kara snorted.

“Alex, I love you, but get out.”

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Reference: 5 Symbols

for your next poem/story (pt. 5)

EGG

The egg is as powerful in its symbolism as it is potent as a life-force.

The World Egg is a ubiquitous symbol for the egg from which the Universe is said to have hatched, an idea that appears in creation myths from all parts of the world: The Celts, Hindus, Egyptians, Greeks, Phoenicians, and many more all agree about this idea.

The form this cosmic hatching takes is variable though:

Often, the egg rises from primeval waters and is incubated by a bird; in Hindu belief, this is the Hamsa, a goose.

When the egg hatches, the yolk and the white become Heaven and Earth.

The Shinto tradition says that the Universe resembled a giant hen’s egg that broke open, with the heavier parts becoming the Earth and the lighter, the Heavens.

There is also a theory that the entire Universe is contained in a huge egg that stands upright.

The egg is a symbol of new life, and this idea is borne out with chocolate eggs at Easter, which in itself is a celebration of the pre-Christian fertility Goddess, Eostre, who also gives her name to the hormone estrogen.

The subsequent celebration of Christ’s death and resurrection meant that the egg kept its significance as a symbol of new life and hope.

Archeologists have found clay eggs in Russian burial sites, reinforcing the belief in the egg as a symbol of immortality and of rebirth.

In alchemy, the Philosopher’s Egg symbolizes the seed of spiritual life, and depicts the place wherein a great transformation takes place.

The ancient riddle of what came first, chicken or egg, was deftly if disappointingly answered by Angelus Silesius, who said: The chicken was in the egg and the egg was in the chicken.

FEATHER

The Egyptian Goddess of truth, Ma’at, has the ostrich feather as her attribute. There is a very specific reason for this:

Because the ostrich is a flightless bird, the design of its feathers is different to those of other birds where one side is larger than the other.

The ostrich feather, however, is perfectly balanced and symmetrical, and so is a fitting emblem of justice.

Its symbolism is closely aligned to that of wings and birds. They stand for ascendance, flight, communication with the spirit realms and the element of air.

Shamanistic use of feathers is for all these reasons;

the feathers enable the soul to become as light as the feather and transcend the boundaries of gravity, time, and space.

Shamans of all nationalities wear feathers as a part of their ritual apparel.

The eagle feather is the most valuable of all feathers:

In some parts of the world, this feather, synonymous with all the power of the bird, is considered so sacred that only card-carrying Native American tribal members may own them. Those found in the wrong hands are the cause of heavy fines.

The swan’s feather appears in the cloaks of druids; because the swan is the bird of poetry, its feathers magically confer these powers on the bard.

Used at the end of the arrow as a “flight,” feathers have a practical as well as symbolic use.

Additionally, feathers are a symbol of sacrifice:

This is because, when chickens and other birds were ritually slaughtered, all they left behind was a few feathers, fluttering to the ground.

The other major symbolic meaning of the feather associates it with vegetation and with hair, primarily because of a similarity in appearance.

HOURGLASS

The function of the hourglass is to mark the passing of time, as sand trickles through the narrow waist in the middle of the transparent glass container that is the same shape as a figure of eight.

Therefore, it is often used as a motif to show the inevitability of death.

However, the shape of the hourglass, as well as being a visual symbol and a word used to describe the figure of a shapely woman, is a lemniscate, or infinity sign.

That the hourglass can be turned upside down to start the cycle all over again makes it an optimistic symbol of rebirth.

PHURBA

This is a sacred knife, used only in ritual practices by Tibetan Buddhists.

Like the Athame of the Western tradition, it is employed to create the sacred spaces that are used for rites and ceremonies.

Its design is based on a stake used in ancient times to tether sacrificial animals, and it is used to describe a magic circle in the same way as a compass.

Can only be owned or handled by initiates.

THYRSUS

The thyrsus was a sacred implement used in rituals and festivals during the time of the Ancient Greeks.

It was a staff, standing about as high as its owner, made from a giant fennel stalk topped with a pine cone and wrapped with vine leaves.

As a phallic symbol, it was combined with a goblet or chalice, symbolic of female energy and used to counterbalance the staff.

As well as being a symbol of male energy, though, staffs or long poles of some description have a universal use as a sacred instrument to connect the Heavens to the Earth, a conductor for the divine spirit.

Source ⚜ More: On Symbols ⚜ Writing Notes & References

[hazelfoureyes]

A Doe in Fall (Part 12)

⟢HumanAlastor x FemaleBurlesquerReader - A Doe in Fall

A burlesquer with a penchant for conning men, you find your latest game interrupted when your next mark saves you from an aggressive fan— by killing him. The chance encounter left you curious, still half convinced you could complete your normal chase. Unbeknownst to you, you were the one being tracked.

Part 1 - Pretty in Red smut💦 Part 2 - Liar smut💦 Part 3 - A Tragedy smut💦 Part 4 - Enough Part 5 - Too Much Part 6 - Learning smut💦 Part 7 - Recognition smut💦 Part 8 - Trust sexual 🥵 Part 9 - Shiny Things Part 10 - Good Deeds Part 11 - Caught Part 12 - Eddie📍 Part 13 - The Release Part 14 - Someone like her smutty💦

Part 12 Eddie

Brady tried to cut some corners to bring you and Alastor down but ends up just hurting himself.

「Warnings/Promises: Human Alastor x Fem!Reader, still not smut cuz we’re waiting for the special moment, po-po, 5-0, down at the gun club, not an accurate portrayal of 1930s New Orleans Leadership, mystery kisses, brief thoughts of violence, illiteracy, @minkdelovely」

MDNI 👮 🚓

Edward Freeman met Kenneth Brady when the younger man was partnered with him. He was bright eyed, and had a sense of justice Freeman appreciated. He was already tired of the rigamarole of police work, so the fresh energy reinvigorated his early days and long nights. It was rather pointless though, police work, given the people in charge weren’t fans of cracking down on the illegal booze business. It was making too much money under the tables and in handshakes.

The nation was still reeling from the crash of the market nearly two years prior. Any way to get ahead, to stay with your chin above the rising waters, well… what harm is there really in feeding your family? The end justifies the means, right? And Brady didn’t seem to disagree too much with that sentiment. 

So when the typically stringent, but otherwise soft spoken and relaxed, Brady began to…devolve into someone a little too myopic, Freeman wasn’t quite sure how to handle him. They’d been rather laissez-faire about the morality of things for so long. They tried to keep violence at a minimum so their fellow citizens could enjoy their city. That was the extent of it. But, Brady was becoming obsessed. 

It started normally enough. Brady bringing up a missing husband. Later on, a missing bartender. Soon he was snooping on to other’s cases, convinced something was connecting them. 

But, given the times and the character of such people, well, Freeman couldn’t quite understand Brady’s fervor. Sure. Some of them probably ended up under backyards and in the water. Hell, quite a few of them he’d have helped do away once he got the real dirt on them. A conspiracy? Or a mass killer? That seemed implausible at best. There was simply no indication of a grande scheme. 

Brady kept pushing. Walking the streets at night with ears open and eyes peeled, for any inkling of what was going on. 

He just couldn’t accept that sometimes people leave town or jobs. Very few of them were actually reported by loved ones, even the ones that had them.

Then came along the widow Dupre, watery eyed and shaking about her missing adult son. Who, from what they’d uncovered, was a real piece of work.

Freeman let Brady start his investigation, but as it became clear he was adding it to his pile of random disappearances, Freeman had to step away. He could see the obsession ruining his friend. 

At a rare dinner with the families, the stress on Brady’s wife’s face was visible for all to see. She cornered Freeman in the kitchen when he went for more coffee, asking if Brady was stepping out on her or if he truly had been working so hard on something big. 

He hardly knew what to say. Neither were true. He’d been working late, but on a wild goose chase. 

When he dragged a clean cut and confused woman into the station, Freeman knew he’d really lost the fucking plot. 

“She’s his accomplice. I know it. Her fella is the man. I’ve got him fingered.” Brady pointed at you through the closed door. You weren’t listening to their voices in the hall, the name still ringing in your head. The name you'd both sacrificed to keep secret. 

Alastor.

Freeman hissed, “You can’t arrest people for knowing a guy! A boogie man at that, Kenny. Come on.” 

“I have her confession for prostitution. It’s all clean and by the book. And, I have a witness.” Brady tapped Freeman’s arm with the back of his hand and led him down the hall to another room, “He saw her and her guy throw a body in the river.”

Well, shit.

“You found a body? The Dupre son?” Freeman considered what he’d said. The river? Why the river? Bodies didn’t always make it to the sea. It’d be a sloppy misstep for this supposed murderous mastermind.

Brady sighed, his parade a little rained on. “...No, but I have a witness right there. And, I got the name of her fella. I just need to find which station he’s at and I’m off to the races. I bet you my house this guy’s good for it.”

Ah, so. He had next to nothing. Freeman just nodded and took a calming breath. “Alright, are we starting with the woman or this guy?”

“Oh, for sure her.” Bready turned to open the door, but Freeman shot his hand out to stop him. 

“And this is the one who gave you the runaround?” Freeman had heard so much about you already, he wanted to prepare himself for whatever tricky shrew was waiting for him. He followed his partner through the door and took you in fully. Your stare was distant and glassy. You’d been crying and you seemed to be shaking slightly from the cold of the room as fall’s night air slipped in through the window. 

You could, reasonably, be his daughter. A similar age for sure, similar build, same hair color. Same penchant for the wrong kinda guy, apparently.

He recalled all of the ways Brady had spoken about you. The image in his head was a bird faced woman with sharp eagle eyes and tight lips. Someone decidedly ugly with a permanent scowl and mischief behind quick glances.

And here was a woman, vulnerable and quite nice to look at it. Hair obviously groomed well when not manhandled by cops, and a rather handsome dress which indicated a good personality by the current standards. The shoulders had flat bows that let their ribbons fall onto your bare shoulders. Feminine. Suitable. Not much skin showing. otherwise. A burlesquer seemed to the kind who didn’t wear clothes often, but he supposed everyone has a work uniform after all. Even the nude dancers. Who was he to judge you for your professional clothing requirements? You were here and modest and that’s what mattered.

He took a seat, sliding the folder Brady had set down into the space in front of him. “I hear you’re not too fond of disclosing your personal information.”

It had been several hours since you’d arrived, and now they chose to grace you with their presence? You’d been tossed into a room and left alone for so long, it seemed more like punishment than bureaucracy.

Brady’s bright blue eyes only get clearer and darker with every ounce of anger you inspired in him. An angry sea churning up violently behind his mean mug. He was practically sneering at you. 

“Can you blame me? The men in this city are certifiable. Case in point, this hound you call a cop.” You had the forethought to keep your shoulders pulled inward, gesturing with your chin.

“Detective.” Brady corrected. 

“Same thing, jackass.” Eyes rolling, you pushed back against the chair causing the front legs to lift for a second. Returning your glare to him, you honed in on the messy details. You remembered his hair well from that first meeting in front of the cafe. It clearly had become oily and weighed down from less frequent washing. The skin under his eyes was looking dark and thin. “You look like shit, by the way. Should sleep instead of bothering honest performers.”

“Ha, there you are. True colors shining through finally.”

“How was my mom? Not much of a talker.”

“Fu-,” Brady flinched forward, chair squeaking against the linoleum floor. It took a tensing of your arms to keep from openly reacting.

“Ya’ll, enough. Now, don’t be too sour with us. We’re just working off your own words,” Freeman opened the folder to find your confession. It had been typed nice and neat and labeled DOE, JANE. He turned it to you briefly, eyebrows hitching as if to ask if you remembered it. You glanced at it long enough to see the conversation and names and nodded. Yes, you’d had that conversation. Brady must have typed it mostly from memory, you thought, or he had some quick shorthand. He brought it back to face him and as his eyes roamed the sheet, his shoulders stiffened. He wasn’t seeing what he was expecting. “Could you-?,” he motioned for Brady to point out the part of your last conversation that constituted a confession. Brady tapped a line of text. 

BRADY - Tell me about the dates Tommy arranged. DOE, JANE - Apparently many of the dancers agreed, got a cut. I had no idea about it until he introduced me to a man who was very forward. I insulted him and ran off. Lost Tommy good money, apparently. BRADY - And who was that? DOE, JANE - S something. Mister Stein? I honestly wasn’t listening much after I realized what was happening. BRADY - And then he knocked you around? DOE, JANE - Yeah. Got me good. BRADY - And… the next date. Last time anyone saw Tommy. Tell me about that. DOE, JANE - Tommy said he’d kill me if I didn’t go. So I did. Promised me he’d stay with me for protection. But as soon as he got his money he left.

Freeman’s head lifted slowly from the paper to look at you over the folder, across the table. Your arms were crossed, makeup smeared and running with long dried tears. Your hair mussed. His head turned with a crawl, weighted down with a steel ball of apprehensive horror, to look at Brady. He was leaning on the table with both elbows, staring at you like you’d busted out his car window and shot his dog. 

“Can I speak to you for a moment?” He pushed back, resting his hand on Brady’s shoulder and walking out. In the small room that looked into the interrogation room where the male witness fidgeted, he set the folder and your words down. 

He motioned for Brady to close the door behind him. As soon as the latch clicked into place, he smacked the table. 

“That isn’t a confession! It’s a fucking victim statement, Kenny.” He looked through the one way glass at the man seated, “And he wrote a witness report?” He gestured with his head, the man Brady called Joseph sat quietly waiting for their return. His clothes were pulling at the seams, his fingernails crusted with dirt. 

Brady nodded, “Yeah. He came in yesterday and after he told me what he saw he wrote it down there and signed.” He was pointing to a piece of paper he’d left on the same table Kenny was now trying to use for stability. Trying was the keyword. His disbelief was dizzying. 

A small laugh, petulant and bordering annoyed, left his lips. He grabbed a pen, wrote something down, and brushed past him. Freeman marched into the witness room, Brady closely following behind.

“Sir, do me a favor and check I’ve spelt your name properly on this paperwork please.” He held it up. The man looked, found where Freeman's finger was pointing, and nodded.

Freeman looked at Brady with dead eyes, the shutdown of his feelings was an automatic attempt by his body to try and keep from grabbing Brady by the shirt in a fit rage, and turned the paper to reveal the name written to Brady. 

Josanna. Written neatly in block letters. 

Without breaking eye contact with Brady, “And just refresh my memory, sir, what was your statement in regards to again?”

Joseph cleared his throat, “I saw it happen. Down by the river.”

“Saw what happen?”

“The crime.”

“What crime?”

“The one with the guy and the girl. It’s all in there.”

Freeman shoved the written statement into Brady’s chest, “You have half a second to get to the captain’s office before I do.” 

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

“That man can’t even read his own name let alone write. From what I can tell he’s a random homeless you plied with confiscated booze. What is going on with you?” The gray haired man bellowed from his chair, hands resting on a large pot belly. 

“What does that matter! It’s an illegal hooch den! Naked dancers! Race mixing! She admitted she-,” Brady was pacing a small three foot by three foot square in front of the desk. Freeman had his arms crossed while seated.

“A victim told you she was assaulted. And I-,” the captain leaned back in his chair, “You know exactly how we feel about the wet spots in this city. The, uh, race thing is another issue but— Kenny, you’re one more rogue act from losing your beat. Do you not get that?”

“Rogue? I’m doing legitimate police work. I’m investigating crime! What the fuck is happening here?!” He stopped pacing long enough wave an apology to his boss for the language. 

Freeman sighed, long and heavy. A huff of breath that somehow conveyed his disappointment better than words.

“I decide what constitutes police work and this is not that.” His boss shook his chair side to side, thinking about how to get Brady in line. “It comes straight from the commissioner and the mayor above him. We aren’t to hound the bars under our purview.”

‘I’m not!” He started up pacing again, hands up and open in genuine confused frustration. 

“You’re harassing their dancers! Stalking around their establishments at night freaking people out!” He laughed in disbelief, “Her manager is outside now. Had to shut down for the night because of your little show.”

Brady put his hands on his hips and faced away from the captain. His face enough alone to have him dismissed. 

“I know she’s involved. I know her guy did it. And I know someone’s killing people. Lots of people.” He said it confidently into the corner of the office.

“Kenny. Enough.” Freeman shook his head and stood to leave. 

“One complaint about you and you’re being chained to a desk. Cut her loose, apologize, and go home. I don’t wanna see you anymore tonight. Your freaky little eyes are getting under my skin.” His captain removed his small rounded glasses and rubbed his hands down his face, exasperated his life had come to telling men to stop doing their jobs.

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

While you were here anyway, and Brady shooed off Joseph, Freeman decided to speak with you again. He offered you a nod and took Brady’s seat.

It was hard to be friendly, you found. Every minute or so you had to sniffle, nose running long after the tears dried up. Your eyelashes stuck together when you blinked.

“I’m afraid I didn’t get your name, sir.” You sniffled again, hands warming your arms.

Freeman leaned over and offered you his hand, “Detective Eddie Freeman.” You shook it, keeping your hand rather limp to give the appearance of weakness.

“I just-,” he laughed as he set his hand on the table, clicking his ring twice out of habit, “I gotta ask. Did your fella kill Tommy? Are you in some kinda trouble?”

With a scoff and a shake of your head, you found yourself, “No,  but I wish he had. What’s the point of being good if people assume the worst of you anyway?” Reaching out for his hand again, you held his large one in both of your smaller ones, “At least if he’d killed him I’d be sure Tommy’s never coming back to keep his promise.”

Your mother always taught you to make yourself small. Remind the people you needed to believe you that you were not a threat. Play the part they always pigeon holed you into. It was easier than fighting the assumptions. There was power in deception. 

“Your pal is really ruining my life. Even more than Tommy.” You squeezed, 30% strength.  

When you looked up at him, he could only find you to be the image of pitiful girl, “Let me check some things and I’ll have Kenny sending you on your way, miss-?”

“Doe.”

“Right.” His ring rapped against the bright wooden door frame, two times, and your brief time knowing Freeman ended. 

The paralysis set in as soon as the door was shut. You could hear Alastor’s name echoing around in your head, the sound so sharp it made fresh tears well. Brady had heard it, of course. It was for nothing. You worked so hard, kept his name off of your tongue despite the way it always felt so good there. 

Conjured images of Alastor barging into the police station haunted you. What would he say in anger? Brady wasn’t crazy, he was smart and lucky. Nothing could be worse. Alastor could say anything while mad, and Brady could make conclusions he had no business jumping to.

And then he was there in the room with you, and you had to return to the moment and try to calibrate yourself. Who were you now? He already knew you weren’t the damsel in distress, he knew you weren’t weak and frail. Right?

Maybe you’d just be yourself, like you’d let slipped earlier. Your mouth opened and his hand flew up, “Don’t. Shut it.”

“Excu-”

“I’ve been told to apologize and send you home.”

“Oh? And are you?”

Brady smiled, and for a moment you forgot how scary that should be. “No. You’re a liar and you’re aiding a criminal. But you work in a place I’m not supposed to bother. Luckily for me, Alastor’s work surely isn’t one.” Your eyes rolled. Hearing him say the name was like hearing a dog sing opera. Unsettling and unnatural. Perhaps a little impressive from a distance. Unfortunately you were front row and center.

Time with you felt so rare, he wanted to keep you a little longer but couldn’t think of what to say or do. Briefly he entertained grabbing you and violently shaking you until you confessed. He managed to find the strength to bury that down, mouth opening instead in preparation for words he didn’t have yet. 

“Can I go home now?” Rubbing your arms to make it clear how uncomfortable you were, you cut him off like he had you. Not that he had anything to say. 

Brady motioned with his thumb down the hall and said, “Your guy isn’t here to pick you up. Funny name by the way. I got a complaint for an Alastor last week. Socked some man for no good reason. Sounds like a violent fella, kinda guy with a temper when someone speaks I’ll of his lady, or fiancée, I’m told…Anyway, dropped the case since the guy wouldn’t give any more information but maybe I should follow up.”

“Are you so sure I have one, a guy that is?” You simply couldn’t admit Alastor was yours. Never. Not for Brady. “No one’s coming for me. No one’s punched anyone for me either. Though, I’m flattered you think I’m worth the charge. Am I free to leave?” The little tug of your lips into a halfhearted grin warmed you. It was thrilling, lying to his face when you both knew the truth.

He didn’t move. He couldn’t let you take this moment from him. He’d made a massive victory in this personal war and your nonchalant attitude was making something in the back of his skull itch. Somewhere beneath his bone. A new sensation.

A brief and violent flash of knocking the smirk off your tear stained face startled him. You noticed him swallow hard, expression shifting from amused to bewildered. From the outside, all you could read was a frightened widening of his eyes.

“Brady…? If you’re waiting for some man to collect me, I’ll be here all night.” Your voice was softer now, while you couldn’t uncover what was happening in his head, you could tell he was in some kind of turmoil.

A man unable to control his face was often a man unable to control his hands.

His legs lifted his body up and dragged him over to the door.  He opened it, slowly, before leaning against the wall beside it to ensure you passed him in close quarters. He knew he couldn’t keep you there forever.

Maybe this Alastor was a real rough fellow. So cruel he wouldn’t even care if his dame was in a bind. The kind of man to abandon his closest allies when cornered. Maybe he really wasn’t coming for you. Which was fine, he told himself. He’d be seeing him soon.

Following you out, he took the walk as an opportunity to warn you again.

“This won’t end like you think it will.” He said it too loudly for how close he was to you, “It never does for the women.” He stopped at the station’s front desk and leaned into the glossy wooden counter, “Oh! I almost forgot! Congrats on the engagement.”

Turning to say a harsh good night, you caught yourself and turned back, exiting through the station doors without another word to him. No need for polite pleasantries anymore. The game was well and truly over for you. 

“Oh thank god,” Johnny was sitting on the steps of the station and jumped to his feet when you came out, a sight you weren’t expecting. You stopped, confused. He smiled seeing your brows knit and eyes wander past him in search of someone else, “I was going to bail you out but they said there wasn’t any need. Alastor is waiting for you.” 

Like a leak in the hull of your iron-sided ship, it seemed the second Ruth so sweetly dripped that name into Brady’s waiting maw the ocean was spilling in. Every time you heard it fall from another person’s mouth the breach in your metal barriers tore wider. If the Titanic could sink in calm weather what luck did Alastor and you have in the tempest of Brady’s fervor?

“Oh…,” you tried to hide the dejection. He sent Johnny? That was smart, but, why did it sting?

Perhaps it was his six sisters, or maybe he was genuinely a good man, but Johnny’s heart ached at the pitiful tone. He leapt up two steps, “He wanted to come! But I told him it was a bad idea. Tempers and all that. Don’t need any more issues for you tonight. Though admittedly he didn’t seem mad, necessarily.”

A slow nod. Johnny told Alastor what to do? Your eyes looked to the left, that was an odd mental image.

“Thanks, Johnny. I need to return to the theater first.” Your hand reached out for his arm and gave it a squeeze, “I appreciate you.”

“Dont mention it. And your bag is with Alastor.” He let his hand come to yours, “He’s kind of a mess, that one.”

You tensed, accidentally pinching his arm in a flit of panic before drawing it back, “Did he drive home like that?”

He shook his head and handed you the card, “He said,” a pause as his eyes rolled up to search for the exact words, “to tell the host you’re there for him. Called it the Golden Dish, but the card doesn’t mention anything like that…. Sorry, I didn’t think to ask more questions. Like I said, he seemed out of sorts.”

You looked down to inspect it, nervous at the sudden introduction of a paper trail. Nodding, you finally took it with both hands. The face was rather plain: an address in the corner with just the number and street, and an interlocked G and D in the center. Turning it over, you found a pink lipstick kiss stained haphazardly across the back and a small squiggle. Your thumb ran over the clipped right bottom corner. 

What was the Golden Dish? And who was kissing Alastor’s business cards?

⋅˚₊‧ ଳ⋆Masterlist.ೃ࿔*:･

˖ ݁𖥔.Summoning the Horny Little Deer Cult.𖥔 ݁ ˖

@eris-norwega @reath-solia @catticora , @angelicribbons , @xalygatorx

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, @readergirlstuff , @berry-demon , @chirimeimei , @fairyv-ice , @olive-frog ,

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@dontfuckbutimfab @breathlessaura , @aperfectidiot , @certainlygay , @jth12

[scavengerssuccotash]

"Clint did what?!"

Phil sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “He punched the Russian ambassador.”

Fury twists to look at Natasha who sits primly in Phil’s office chair. She doesn’t look up from where she shapes her nails with a black nail file.

“Don’t look at me, I didn’t ask him too.” Natasha says, innocently.

Fury places his hands on his hips and glares. “Dare I ask what he did to deserve that? I sent you two to warm relations, not set them back fifty years!”

Natasha merely raises an eyebrow before fanning out her fingers, inspecting the almond shape of her nails. Frustrated Fury turns his one eyed glare back onto Phil.

“Well?”

Phil rubs a hand over his mouth, a strange expression crossing over his features. “It seems the Russian Ambassador called Agent Romanoff a…”

“A prostitute.” Natasha cuts in dryly, still filling away at her nails. “To which I reminded him, quite nicely I might add that, that compensation for my services might be looked at favorably should my dear motherland feel so inclined to remedy the past. Mr. Volkov agreed.”

Fury shakes his head. “Agent Romanoff, while it’s an unfortunate turn of phrase you can’t—“

Finally she rises from her chair and crosses her arms. “I don’t have a problem with sex work, Director Fury.”

“Then why—“

Natasha rolls her shoulders, nonchalantly. “Clint thought the suggested sum was low.”

“How much was it?” Fury asks.

Natasha gives him a feral grin. “1.2.”

Fury stares up at the ceiling, wondering not for the first time how the hell he had found himself with Strike Team Delta as Shields golden goose when they act like this. “I’ll go report to the council—“

“Oh, I wouldn’t do that just yet, Director.”

Natasha pats him on the shoulder before handing off her phone. There on the screen is a bank account with 2.5 million. Fury’s mouth drops open in surprise but before he can say anything a rapid succession of honks alert them. Fury and Phil both race to the window and peer out. There in SHIELD’s parking lot, haphazardly parked, was a purple and black 2014 Bugatti.

“Mr. Volkov also offered his car to compensate for the bruised state of Agent Barton’s left hand. In return he hopes for a lighter tariffs and lifted sanctions. I told him we would discuss.” Natasha explains behind them, a touch of pride in her raspy voice. Then she claps her hands together, bringing both of their attention back to her. "Now, if that is all gentlemen I have plans for the rest of my evening!"

And with that Natasha Romanoff departs, grinning wildly. She goes so far as to wiggle her fingers at them through the window in a goodbye wave.

Director Fury can only watch in stunned silence until she skips out of sight. "Did...did Strike Team Delta just extort 2.5 million and Bugatti out of a foreign national, Phil?"

Phil blinks, shocked. "I-I think so!"

“What the hell am I supposed to tell The Council?"

“Oh, that is far above my pay grade sir, but I would suggest being proactive in giving them a promotion.” Phil comments.

Thank you for sending me prompts my dear! @firlalaith I do so hope you enjoy a badass moment from our precious duo.

[ranbitteeth]

Hello! Could I request a sub!mizu/bottom!mizu x softdomGN!reader that features a nipple play smut scene with a lot of moaning please? Mizu's titties deserves all the love and praise and pleasure!!!!!! Thank you❤️

Note: Ahhh OP this should NOT have taken as long as it did. It was originally to be a modern au, frankly rather vanilla and sweet— but my interests have been seized by shibari as of late. And, guess what I’ve found? The art of “shibrai”( or Kinbaku) in Japan first originated in the Edo period. The art made itself!

So, do take this as a tribute to Mizu’s titties and also the lovely art of shibari. If it’s not to your liking, I can always write that modern version!

——————————————————————

Speak, Fetch, and…

——————————————————————

Tags: Bottom!Mizu, Submissive!Mizu, Dominant!Reader, Top!Reader, Shibari, Edging (if you squint), Light Degradation, GN! Reader, Bondage, Gag Uses, Breast/Nipple Play

——————————

A/N: Made [Reader] A rich and powerful Shibari enthusiast in this to apply settings and dynamics. Hopefully it adds a layer of kinkiness to this piece! My inbox is always welcoming requests, so feel free to drop some! Regardless, Please enjoy! ^^ <3

“You look so perfect like this.”

The words spill past your lips flowing with the adoration only heard in the prayers of the most devout monks. Mizu, the demon samurai, elusive, raging, and entirely inaccessible to all but you. There she was, the most feared bastard in all of Japan, laying on your bed, bound and panting, drooling with a gag in her mouth as a whore would in any decent brothel. Crimson red, thick and bruising knots were intricately designed to fit snugly around her body, expertly marked by your hands— deft with skill, in loving patterns tracing up and down pale skin. The body that could move like a monster, the body that has taken so many lives and maimed thousands— subdued and helpless, entirely at your mercy.

You see her cheeks redden with embarrassment at the compliment, you see her entire body shudder as goose pimples spike across her scarred skin, you see the glistening quality to her cunt that has your knees buckling with the insatiable desire to run your mouth against her core.

But all things in due time.

No, in the heart of your gaze were the two pert, round, soft mounds of skin that made up the two halves of her buxom, rising and falling as her chest heaved with pleasure. Moving in hypnotic, wave-like movements in sync with her breaths were the two lovely buds that bloomed at the tops of her petite breasts, the color of soft petals, of womanly skin. Your ropes only accentuated the shape of her body, the emphasis on her maidenhood.

“Are you feeling alright, dearest?” You croon, running your fingers along the tight patterns across her body, teasingly tugging at a select few strands that ran the texture of your ropes against her skin in a delicious friction, so much so that her head flew against your mattress as her toes curled and shook with ecstasy. Oh, and to think that this samurai had yet to be defeated in battle. What would his foes think, seeing him as a woman, crying out for pleasure as her voice cracked beneath a gag, face flushed and eyes brimming with tears. You’d barely even touched her.

“I could keep you like this forever, you know…” you begin to contemplate aloud, finally deciding to crawl towards your truest possession on your hands and knees, your warm body hovering over hers as you continued to tease at her desires and fantasies with a malicious tongue.

“You’d fit in beautifully with every display in my palace, every work of art. I could invite the most revered men and women of the nation, I’d let them see you..” Mizu moans at this, writhing with the desire to hide but unable to move. Shy. Finally, your face is aligned with the samurai’s chest. Unable to hold yourself any longer, your mouth falls against the plush skin, hungrily wrapping your wet lips around the hardened bud with a carnal desire, eagerly running the warm, slick muscle of your tongue against the buds of her roses while her entire body contorted with pleasure.

Mmmmph! , she’d say something, anything at all— but your infatuation was unending. With your opposite hand, you grope and massage the delicate, long-abused tissue, milking out the sweetest, most unheard of noises from her pretty mouth. And to think that the display beneath your face would have been mistreated and hidden away all these years behind rough, ugly binds.

You pull away from her breast with a ludicrous pop noise that communicated only filth before you moved your mouth directly over the other half, unleashing the same cruelty of your mouth. The first little bud, now swollen and wet with spit, was pinched in between your thumb and forefinger, the suddenness and crassness of the action making Mizu grunt and buck her hips with want. As a punishment, reward, and reminder, you gently bite down on her breast until she draws in a sharp, stuttering hiss. You groan against the firm, supple skin of her breast before you pull away to take in the sight you created, the ropes binding around and in between her breasts, accentuating their shape— the swollen, reddened bud of her nipples, slick and shining with spit, all because of you.

Your eyes finally move from her chest to her face, soaking in that flushed, almost embarrassed expression she held in her usual sharp features.

“You want it off, fighter?” You ask teasingly before you quickly move to dispose of the gag in her mouth. She’s earned it, after all, being so good beneath you.

By the time it leaves her mouth, the cloth is wet and heavy with drool and Mizu is gasping for air, chest shuddering as she desperately forces her body to catch up with the racing thoughts in her mind. It’s even better like this, you think, seeing Mizu grit her teeth, bite her lips, and grunt in all attempts to keep her dignity and not moan like the whore you knew she was. These thoughts enrich your psyche like opium, and your hands absently find their way to each breast as you straddle her hips. You are comfortable like this, and Mizu is entirely at your mercy.

“Can you imagine your enemies seeing you like this?” You ask lightly, your hands trailing down from her breasts to the smooth dip in her waist, subtle and firm. “The damned, all powerful, blue-eyed half-breed; moaning in my chambers in my palace...”

“(N-Name…)” she tries to grunt, though it escapes her lips as a whimper. She’s embarrassed, humiliated— in any other context you would have backed away and apologized— but you felt her pussy against your skin, you felt the positively soaking quality of her privates against your sheets. She loved this.

“Don’t pretend you don’t like it,” you say knowingly, making those dazzling blue eyes flutter and turn away from you in shame. This calms her, in a way. Words now seem on the verge of leaving her mouth, though shyness, or perhaps embarrassment bids her silent.

“What do you need, dearest? Go ahead, don’t be scared.” You say, encouraging, one hand now abandoning the possessive hold around her waist to gently cradle her cheek. Unable to keep herself from doing so, she leans into the touch, relaxing.

“Water…” she rasps, and your thumb gently runs along her upper cheek.

Easily, you reach over for a chalice filled to the brim with water, gently ushering her head higher before bringing the rim to her lips as you watched her lips drink up the water.

“Just like that, good job…” you hum, making her relax and sigh beneath you. Finally, she’s had enough, almost having drank the cup empty before you put it aside, now facing her seriously.

“If it ever comes to be too much, use the signal. Understand?” You ask as you adjust Mizu’s legs to sit around either side of your hips, bringing yourself closer until your nakedness was flush with her own. She nods affirmative like the good pet she was, going as far as to spread her legs further to grant you better access, an action that made something molten and possessive coil in your chest and gut. No one else in the world would ever see Mizu like this, pliant, shy, and oh so pretty. The sight of those eyes submissive and watery, those cheeks flushed red and those lips bitten to Hell and back were yours and yours alone.

Your hands move down south before you could stop them, swift and eager as one hand pinned Mizu’s left thigh open and against the cushion while your dominant hand pushed two fingers into her gushing warmth, making her grunt and squirm against her bonds. You laugh something genuine as you feel the sheer quality of her arousal on your hands, pulling away just to show her the arousal that has already coating your palm.

“Look at yourself,” you say, eyes blown and voice rushing with warmth. Before Mizu could fix her lips to say anything, you bring your soaked fingers up to your mouth and place them over your tongue, making Mizu gasp in shock at your actions. Mizu’s wetness floods your tastebuds, makes you groan into your hand before you eagerly continue your efforts of working her open and relaxed. To be used, to be worshiped, to be claimed. You shudder at the thought, easily thrusting your fingers in and out of her while she gasps and moans your name like a prayer. A chant, a hymn. [Name! Name! Name!] for all of Japan to hear in answer to the question of who she belonged to.

“K-keep going! Don’t stop! Don’t…s-stop…!” she whined, almost demanding as her cries rise from the depths of her belly in guttural moans— as if she were in battle. Your fingers slow down, caressing her insides in slow, deliberate, cruel swipes of fingers while your thumb circled her clit.

“Is that anyway to ask for anything?” You scold, pushing your thumb against that swollen little bundle of nerves until she hissed and arches her back, leaving her body in a beautiful display of rope, power, and pleasure.

“[N-Name,] please— don’t stop…” she gasps, twitching as her orgasm inches closer and closer the longer you deny her the friction of your touch against her sweet snatch. You only stare expectantly at the near puppy-like gaze she shoots at you, and you begin to understand why people call her a dog. Good dogs listen, good dogs obey. Good dogs get their rewards.

“Beg.” You say, and she sees that your eyes are swarming with a raging storm of lust with her at sail in the dead center. Your hands only slow down to a near stop, and she could’ve sobbed at the loss. She was losing her mind, on the verge of fainting. Despite this, her hands were free, the signal in a moments reach. If she needed to stop, all she had to do was snap her finger and you’d cut her loose, rope be damned. But her hands only shook with desperation as she opened her trembling lips, voice cracking.

“Please, please…please,” she begged, voice breaking as she emphasized the final syllable, to which you easily obliged, attacking her cunt with a ferocity only shown in battle that made her cry out in shock and pleasure. It was an exquisite sight to behold, one that would forever be ingrained in your memory. Here in your bed by your hands, the strongest and bravest swordsman in all of Japan lay moaning like a whore as her orgasm washed over her body and loins in a wave of fire. Yes, she had her blade, her strength, those eyes—But you had your ropes, your tongue, and your wit.

So far, you remain completely undefeated.

[bardic-tales]

Tumblr Games: Writing Share Tag

Thank you so much for the tags: @frostedlemonwriter and @glbettwrites. Your shares were awesome!

Rules: Share a piece of writing you're proud of.

I haven't written much over the last week, since my spoons have been really low. Holidays tend to take a lot out of my family now.

I have been working on a drabble or flash fiction. It doesn't have a title, yet. As always, this is a really rough draft. :)

"As a god," Sephiroth said, his voice was smooth like poisoned honey, "I can offer you something the Celestials or Devils cannot."

"Oh? What can you offer me that the divine can not?"

"Everything." He glided his hand down the smooth sloop of her throat, igniting goosed flesh to rise on her skin. She shivered. "Absolute power. Unlimited wealth. The submission of nations and empires. The Promised Land."

As he lowered himself to her height by bending towards her, his lips hovered close to hers. His breath fanned her cheek and lips, igniting fire within her belly that soon spread throughout her entire body: a burning need to join him on his crusade for revenge against those insects that call themselves human.

"But, most importantly," he whispered, "eternal devotion and unwavering loyalty. You are mine by right, Bia, and I will treat you like the queen you are meant to be."

Going to open this up to the Creators Club as a CC member tag game. Share your work you're proud of.

@megandaisy9 @watermeezer @littleshopofchaos

@kricketbee

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@pebblesfromtheshore

[incomingalbatross]

Laud Rising

I made a thing for the Chesterton Challenge! Day 18: Friendship.

---

“The typical expression of opening Friendship would be something like, “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.” — C. S. Lewis

---

As a child in the city of Laudness, Katherine dreamed of wonders. The world was dulled and faulty, with days always too hot or too cold, too long with work and too short for excitement; weeks spent first learning her lessons, then her bookbinder’s trade, as seasons passed by. But everywhere around her -- in stories and games, in sky and flowers, in the hidden corners of houses and streets -- she glimpsed something more hiding behind. She longed to find that more, to get inside all of these things and away from the plodding irritations of the world-as-it-was.

Her mind was filled with wondrous adventures and brave comrades, victories over monstrous evils and gifts beyond imagining. She devoured old legends of her land’s founding, when the city had first been named -- when the Heroes of Laud had raised the nation into a place of liberty, freeing their people from servitude and protecting the land. Somehow, since then, the shine had been rubbed off the world; nowadays even legends and fairy-stories were unpopular, and Katherine found her books by scrounging alone in the city library.

She learned from other books that other people held her longings too -- learned words for it, words like hiraeth and sehnsucht and nostalgia and joy. And she learned, as she grew older, that the world-as-it-was couldn’t be separated from the wonders she glimpsed in it; even that, maybe, the most legendary heroes had once had to deal with blisters, and boredom, and dullness -- but that even so, the thrill of a sunset or a goose-call were just as much a part of her world as the blisters. But even as she learned to accept these things, to weave her dreams into the fabric of daily life without letting them be more than that, it only made some of them only sharper, clearer, more distinct with time.

Because Katherine dreamed of heroism. The more she grew to love the world as it was, to see the longed-for as only hidden under stains in its fabric, the more fiercely she dreamed of fighting for all the good that it held. She burned with the need of it -- but how, how, how? There was nothing so simple as a dragon to slay, in their nation; there were human problems instead, like corruption and falseness and poverty. She was no warrior, anyway, and no leader -- she wasn’t even particularly good with people. She was smart, she’d learned that, but staring at the troubles of the world was more like staring at the Gordian knot than anything else. It needed something other than her mind to fasten on a starting-point, and so she could only freeze in indecision.

But she could see what the world could look like, with those threads untangled -- what it could look like if it were washed clean. And from her books and stories, she could imagine the type of people that could start such a fight.

What she could do was what she had always done; daydream, spinning beauties and wonders together into tales.

So she began, at last, to share the little she had, and told her stories, for want of better things to do.

She began writing: fables and adventures and quests, telling them at first to whoever would listen, then selling them to whoever would print them -- binding them herself, if she had the time and paper. Stories of what the world could be, of the kind of heroes that could fight its evils, cast into the molds of her favorite legends; new tales of the Heroes of Laud, their Captain-King and his wise Queen, the Minstrel and the Steward and all the other famous figures, turned into her new heroes. She put her dreams and longing put out into the world, begging someone to take them up, to do what she couldn’t.

Begging for someone who could see in her dreams all that she could, and more.

Then, one day, a young man knocked on her door. “You printed this,” he said, eyes shining, and held out her first book: The Rising of Laud, half-a-dozen stories inside an amateur cover. “Do you know the author? I haven’t been able to find them yet, but this is their first work --”

“Why do you want to know?” she asked.

He looked down at the book, then back up again. “I’ll sound mad if I tell you the truth,” he said gravely.

Katherine raised an eyebrow, uncertain what to say. “If you do, at least I’ll know you must mean it?” she offered.

“A very good point.” He breathed in, and then said, “I’ve wanted to meet the writer since I first read their stories, because -- they’re the first stories I’ve ever wanted to come true.”

She stared at him.

“They see things truly,” he continued, as if he thought she didn’t understand. As if he weren’t understanding her as he spoke. “It’s -- it does sound mad, I know, but this is what I want to be --” he gripped the book in both hands, looking down at that worn cover “-- what I will be, if I’m allowed, and I just want to talk to the other person I think wants this.” And then he looked her squarely in the eyes, focused and alight with conviction in a way she’d never been -- but the way she’d always wanted to be helped to find.

Her dreams had never had faces, but she thought that her Captain-King would have hd a face like this.

“I do want this,” she said, somehow unhesitating. “I wrote it -- that’s why I wrote it, to call for someone. But…I don’t know how to help.”

He laughed. “You called, I listened,” he said. “Others might too. And after all --” he held up the book again “--the Heroes have to have their Minstrel, right?”

“I can’t sing very well,” Katherine warned, stepping back from the door to let him in.

“That’s not the important part,” he insisted. He held out the book to her, and she took it automatically as he stepped inside. “You said it yourself, in this -- what’s the role of the Minstrel?”

“She has several.”

But she knew which one he meant, even as she spoke. She ended up saying the line in unison with him -- the tenet of the Minstrel, in more than one tale:

“The Minstrel’s role is to tell the Heroes that they will never be alone.”

And after all, Katherine began to remember, that applied in more ways than one -- not just to the Minstrel's audience, but even to herself.

[themakeupbrush]

Miss Universe Colombia 2022 National Costume: The Phoenix Queen

Inspired by the beautiful landscapes Colombia has among them the sunsets of the coffee axis, which show the beauty of a sunset accompanied by the aroma of coffee. In turn she was inspired by the resilient way in which Colombians don’t stop growing and undertaking, like our Miss Universe Colombia 2022 Mafe  who is sure that second chances do exist, and that the most important thing to hit bottom is to emerge from the ashes and rise stronger with the certainty that dreams do come true. In this way her fans see her as a phoenix bird; example of life before the universe. Crafted with over a hundred thousand Swarovski crystals decorated in straws and beads in shades of yellow, orange and red, colors that represent fire. Embellished in rooster, goose and ostrich feathers.

[fate-magical-girls]

Comparing fairy tales with their inspirations from legendary sagas produces a weird effect, because you can see where the stories have been simplified and the behavior of the protagonists sanitized.

The Goose Girl whose position was stolen by her handmaiden and was reduced to speaking to her beheaded horse Falada was a club-footed princess who originally agreed to switch places with her maid because she was self-conscious about her feet and feared her prince was short and ugly. She was also mother of Charlemagne.

The Goose Girl at the Well who was exiled for saying she loved her father like meat loves salt was a British queen who led an army to rescue her father who had been driven insane by her abusive sisters.

Sleeping Beauty, who was cursed to sleep for a hundred years, was a Valkyrie who masterminded the death of her prince when he was brainwashed into marrying another woman, and then threw herself onto his pyre so she could die with him.

The youngest brother of the Wild Swans, whose arm remained a swan wing because his sister ran out of thread to make the tunic that would break his curse, became a knight in a swan boat that avenged a noble maiden's honor and had children with her that would give rise to the royal line of Bouillon.

Cinderella was a successful courtesan and a self-made woman, who had no fairy god mother, but did have a fling with fable-teller Aesop as well as an epic rivalry with her sister-in-law, who happened to be one of the greatest poets of their age. Alternatively, she was a queen of Egypt to died before seeing her family enslaved by the mad Persian king Cambyses.

The mystical husbands of East of the Sun and West of the Moon, The Iron Stove, and the Feather of Finist the Falcon were originally the god Eros, and the Beauty that had to find her husband after losing him was his wife Psyche.

Often the animal husband takes the form of a snake. In certain myths among the indigenous Taiwanese, the animal husband is a snake and the ancestor of their people. In Baltic and Slavic stories, the snake husband is never accepted by his wife's family, who kill him through deceit. Meanwhile, a 9th century Chinese story makes the husband into a Yaksha, and the lovers are eventually parted because the wife cannot stay in the realm of the Yaksha.

Related to the animal husband theme, the Beast was a tragic man from Tenerife with hypertrichosis, and Beauty was a noblewoman who was married to him almost as a joke. Though they lived a long and happy life together, four of their seven children were stolen away and sent to live in foreign courts because they shared their father's condition.

The Girl Without Hands was a Mercian queen who ruled her nation with iron fists, and was involved in more than one assassination.

Maid Maleen's original name was Brangaine, the maid of Tristan and Iseult. In most variants of the tale, it is the guilty bride who substitutes her maid in the bridal procession to hide her loss of virginity that is the actual protagonist. When the prince questions her about the children she has born, she is forced to reveal the tokens that her lover left with her, and the prince realizes that he himself is the lover in question, and apologizes and proceeds with the wedding.

The speechless Little Mermaid's beloved prince was a Swedish duke, brother to the king, named Magnus Vasa. He was afflicted with psychotic episodes throughout his life, and had assistants assigned to look after him. He never married but had a longtime affair with a commoner woman who cared for him. During one of his episodes, he jumped into a moat, claiming to have seen a woman there. This became the basis for a class of ballads called Herr Magnus and the Mermaid, which describes how Magnus lost his heart and then his mind to the mermaid after initially rejecting her. This then became stories of the tragic mermaid's rejection and revenge.

[avkizi]

fame dr intro!!!

BASICS ✧˖*°࿐-------------------------------------------------------------

✧ ˚ name: aviana umeko kai

✧ ˚ nicknames: avi, vi, vivi, via

✧ ˚ birthday: 06/04/2009

✧ ˚ home: oahu, hawaii

APPEARENCE + MOODBOARD✧˖*°࿐----------------------------------

⊹˚₊‧───────────────────────────────────────‧₊˚⊹

✧ ˚ faceclaim: hoyeong jung (but a lil different)

✧ ˚ voiceclaims:

english: gabbie hanna japanese: tsuki billlie ōlelo hawaiʻi: auliʻi cravalho

✧ ˚ ethnicity/nationality: japanese/hawaiian

✧ ˚ height: 5'1 (156 cm)

✧ ˚ features: septum piercing, double lobe piercing, heart shaped birthmark on left shoulderblade, whale shark tattoo (right hip/thigh)

✧ ˚ clothes aesthetic:

⊹˚₊‧───────────────────────────────────────‧₊˚⊹

CAREER ✧˖*°࿐------------------------------------------------------------

✧ ˚ occupation:

actress model student singer influencer/youtuber

✧ ˚ movies:

live action moana (moana) barbie (sasha) live action coraline (coraline) christmas chronicles (kate peirce) crazy rich asians (iconic extra with like 8 lines)

✧ ˚ shows:

percy jackson (thalia) the baby sitters club (dawn schafer) outer banks (wheezie) stranger things (erica sinclair) grey's anatomy (someone who dies after 8 episodes)

MISC/TRIVIA ✧˖*°࿐------------------------------------------------------

i have a lot of pets, i have a dog, two rats, and a flock of chickens (plus one goose)

i surf and play volleyball (libero/outside hitter)

i love love love fossils and shells and stuff, and do a lot of jewelry making in my spare time

gemini sun, scorpio moon, aries rising

holds the world record for folding 100 origami cranes in 28 minutes and 12 seconds when she was 12

⊹˚₊‧───────────────────────────────────────‧₊˚⊹

[rjzimmerman]

I'm posting just a few of the photos from the Smithsonian Magazine:

The sun rises over the mountains and reflects across the valley in the Grand Tetons. Jeremy Janus, Wyoming, 2018

The placid waters of Iceberg Lake reflect a deep-blue sky in Glacier National Park. Atsuki Takahashi, Montana, 2023

A bull moose crosses a pool at Schwabacher Landing in Grand Teton National Park. Adam Isaacson, Wyoming, 2024

Wild Goose Island is one of the focal points on Saint Mary Lake in Glacier National Park. Paul Bracey, Montana, 2020

Despite the snow, one lone bison grazes on the prairie. Jamie Johnston, Colorado, 2022

A bighorn ram in the Rocky Mountains sets its sights on a rival and moves in. Rylee Jensen, Wyoming, 2019

This sunset view is only available 12,000 feet above ground in Rocky Mountain National Park. John F. Warden Jr., Colorado, 2024

[18thvariation]

2022 annual review

What can I say... except that I’m feeling defeated amidst the storm of eugenic gaslighting and COVID minimization constantly swirling around us. It is a dark time to be in public health, but it’s even more devastating when your own field turns against its own alleged values. To those still holding the line and speaking our truths, I echo your defiance.

I’ll continue to show up day after day and do my best.

Notable Happenings

Long-awaited reunion with Quag - skating in North Van

Monkeypox vaccine campaign

J+K wedding in Tofino (Wickaninnish Beach)

Expanding my teaching practice :) 

Camping with Lady @ Sproat Lake

Norcal trip: Monterey, Big Sur, Napa/Sonoma, San Francisco

Highlights: McWay sunset, Monterey Bay Aquarium, Asian Art Museum, Legion of Honor

Influenza vaccination campaign

Adopting Goose! (@thecutestgoose)

Books that influenced me:

What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma (Foo, Stephanie)

Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent (Wilkerson, Isabel)

Border and Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism (Walia, Harsha)

All the Living and the Dead: From Embalmers to Executioners, an Exploration of the People Who Have Made Death Their Life's Work (Campbell, Hayley)

All That Moves Us: A Pediatric Neurosurgeon, His Young Patients, and Their Stories of Grace and Resilience (Wellons, Jay)

The Inevitable: Dispatches on the Right to Die (Engelhart, Katie)

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes & Other Lessons from the Crematory (Doughty, Caitlin)

Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City (Elliot, Andrea)

On Fire: The Burning Case for a Green New Deal (Klein, Naomi)

Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowkedge, and the Teachings of Plants (Kimmerer, Robin Wall)

No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need (Klein, Naomi)

The Emergency: A Year of Healing and Heartbreak in a Chicago ER (Fisher, Thomas)

Dear Life: A Doctor’s Story of Love and Loss (Clarke, Rachel)

The Vaccine Race: Science, Politics, and the Human Costs of Defeating Disease (Wadman, Meredith)

The Facemaker: One Surgeon's Battle to Mend the Disfigured Soldiers of World War I (Fitzharris, Lindsey)

A Good Time to be Born: How Science and Public Health Gave Children a Future (Klass, Perri)

The Magical Language of Others (Koh, E.J.)

Chinatown Pretty: Fashion and Wisdom from Chinatown’s Most Stylish Seniors (Lo, Andria)

Favourite Movies/TV series

SPY x FAMILY

Crash Landing on You

Twenty-Five Twenty-One

Hospital Playlist

The Farewell

Favourite foodie experiences

Brasserie Coquette (Kitsilano)

Sushi Time (Kerrisdale)

MELLO (Kerrisdale)

Esteban (Monterey, CA)

Palette Tea House (San Francisco, CA)

California Fish Market (San Francisco, CA)