#ground works construction in London | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

randomshyperson · 1 year

Text

Another Love II - Wanda Maximoff Oneshots

Summary: Being late doesn’t always mean you lost your chance. Wanda might not be yours now, but if there’s something an Eternal can do is wait. | Chapter Summary: Finally, the wait is over.

Warnings: (+16) unrequired love, hints of mutual (?) pining; mild angst with happy ending, friends/team partners, canon divergence, fluff, some tension, language. | Words: 5.051k

Part One || General Masterlist | AO3 | Wattpad |

-&-

Wanda has only been to London on business before, both for the Avengers and the Coven. It's refreshing in a way, just being a tourist, even if only for the short train ride to the National History Museum.

It was Sersei who revealed to her where you were working. For some reason, and to annoy Wanda's nerves, you were much more distant lately both physically and emotionally than she would have liked.

The place was crowded and perhaps Wanda used a little magic to avoid being recognized by any of the Avengers' fanbase, making her way unhurriedly to the reception desk.

She could trace your aura easily but was cordial in introducing herself and following the instructions of where your class was taking place.

Through glass windows, she saw you for the first time in months, and couldn't help a soft sigh escape her lips. With her hands held in her coat pockets in an attempt to have some sort of ground, she approached through the open door at the back of the room.

Your monologue about Mesopotamian constructions was lost in mid-sentence as soon as your eyes met hers. Wanda smiles shyly, and you stand there, adorably surprised.

The teenagers present in the class soon assumed curious expressions at the interruption of your speech, and it was one of the boys in the back who looked between you and Wanda before loudly teasing, "Damn, Professor just got tongue-tied because of the Scarlet Witch!"

The room exploded into giggles, and you blushed awkwardly, eventually chuckling too as you waved for them to calm down. Wanda smiles coyly at the scene, waiting for you to approach her.

"Thank you for this, Mr.Matthews." You say to the student, nodding to the board. "Finish reviewing the chapter, please. I'll be back in five minutes, no fuss, don't you all forget you're in a Museum."

You walked over to Wanda, and she tried not to show how she trembled at the gentle touch on her elbow to guide her to the coffee table area, but she didn't do such a good job when you were finally alone outside and you hugged her in greeting.

"It's good to see you, darling." You said, pulling away to hold her shoulders for a moment. Your gentle and tender smile and eyes made her feel warm. "I didn't know you were coming to see me. Nothing wrong happened, I hope?" You asked frowning in concern, but Wanda quickly denied it, offering you a reassuring smile.

"No, I just... I wanted to talk to you. And see you." She confesses with a weak laugh. "Can we go out for coffee after your class?"

"Of course, Wanda. It will be over in a few minutes, you can enjoy the exhibition in the meantime." You say, biting your lip when it looks like you're going to say something else. Wanda swallows dryly, nodding, and you take a chance. "You look breathtaking, sweetheart."

She can feel her face heat up, but she handles smiling in appreciation. "You don't look bad yourself, Professor." She teases with a wink, managing to make you chuckle awkwardly.

You touch her again, squeezing her arm in farewell before heading back to the classroom, and Wanda thinks she replays the feeling in her head the whole way back to the exhibit.

She is facing an exhibit of Ancient Greece when she senses your presence behind her.

"How many of these artists have you met in person?" She asks interested, and you let out a small laugh.

"Not as many as I would like I'm afraid." You reply with a slight nostalgic sigh. "But I did meet Σαπφώ (Sapphō). She was a rather passionate lover."

Wanda snorts incredulously, patting you on the shoulder in indignation. "Oh my god, you slept with her?"

You shrug, laughing softly and raising a finger in front of your lips in a sign of secrecy. "Kérkolas, her husband, must be cursing me from the afterlife right now." You joke managing a chuckle from Wanda.

There is a moment of tender silence between the two of you, the long-time complicity of a long-missed friendship where you just stare at some of the displays around, walking side to side with each other.

It is amidst one of the statues of Ancient Greece that your gazes meet again and no longer waver away. Wanda sighs and you nod towards the exit, she doesn't even need to think for her feet to start moving on instinct, following you wherever you want.

It is to a closed office that you take her, closing the door as soon as she enters.

Wanda swallows dryly at the gesture of helping her remove her coat, placing it on the support as she moves further into the room.

"Can I get you something to drink?" You ask working on the buttons of the sleeves of the social shirt you are wearing so Wanda understands that you are indeed going to prepare something for her.

"Hm, sure, you can surprise me." She murmurs, and you offer her a mischievous little smile before walking toward the small bar at the corner of the office.

"Not that I'm not happy about your visit, darling, but I'm getting curious as to why." You comment and Wanda sighs deeply in the center of the room, trying to build up the courage. She keeps her gaze on the tall windows that illuminate the room and doesn't face you when she finally speaks.

"I'm getting a divorce."

You stop the motion of cutting a lemon and raise your eyes to her, your frown frowning in surprise. "Oh. I... I'm sorry to hear that."

She chuckles softly, staring at you. "No, you don't."

"Yeah, I don't." You respond without hesitation, turning your attention back to the lemon. "Not for him, of course. Even though it bothers me that you're unhappy."

Wanda sighs, watching you prepare two drinks that honestly look delightful. "I'm not unhappy, Y/N." She retorts and you hum in a sign that you are listening. "I guess it was only inevitable."

"You're being a little hard on yourself." You comment with a tiny smile, finally holding two cups in hand, of which one you bring to her. "Tell me what happened."

She nods in thanks for the drink, and you raise an eyebrow as she turns the glass over in one gulp, chuckling dryly at the scene. Wanda grunts softly.

"Shit, that was good." She compliments the drink, and you smile as you see her staring at your cup as well. Without saying anything, you also hand her yours and take the empty one away. At least the second, Wanda tries to enjoy it more. After a sip, she sighs and begins to explain: "Vision took your advice. A little after the honeymoon, he went to visit Shuri. I think Makkari was with them. They talked about the safety of the stone and he decided to do the splitting in Wakanda." She counters breaking into a forced laugh. "And apparently without the stone, he runs out of love for me too."

You swallow dryly at the hurt expression on her face and raise your hand to take the cup away, slowly so as not to startle her. Wanda sniffles and you sigh.

"I'm sorry about the end of your marriage."

She huffs. "No, you don't."

"I never wanted you unhappy, you know that." You insist firmly on her watery eyes. "And if his love lingered to a magic stone, you know it was good to find out about this early. It's less painful this way."

Wanda huffs angrily, taking a step forward. "How dare you, honestly?" She demands bitterly, but you don't flinch in your attitude. "You have ruined my marriage. I should... I..."

You raised a brow, waiting, but Wanda grunted and walked away, hiding her face in her hands.

Hearing her cry finally breaks your posture, but you dare not touch her yet.

"I really thought I could be happy with him." She confesses low and vulnerable and you sigh. "How could I be so stupid?"

You move closer, circling her until Wanda can see you again. Your hands find her cheeks and she wants to hate the way her skin warms over your touch, but she can't even be angry about it.

"You haven't done anything wrong, my love." You whisper tenderly, wiping her cheeks with your thumbs. "You are so majestic, Wanda Maximoff. You deserve someone better, you've always deserved more than a machine. I could-"

Wanda pushes you by the shoulders, and you shut up at the fury in her red irises.

"I'll never forgive you for interfering, you had no right!" That's the last thing she says to you before turning her back and leaving.

The drinking cup ends up on the wall with a throw, and half the items off your table as well. Wanda's coat is forgotten in your office for weeks until you leave this job too.

She won't answer your calls anymore.

-&-

There is a cold breeze passing through Massachusetts that makes Wanda shiver in her armchair. She gets up to close the windows and curtains, and her office is less bright than before with the action.

Candles are lit by themselves as she makes her way to her armchair again. On her desk are several documents to be reviewed: some are magical contracts on parchment because witches have quirks they refuse to lose, and others are printouts as one would expect to exist in the 21st century, some contain the symbol of the Avengers, others of the Kamar Taj.

A knock on the door followed by its opening makes Wanda raise her eyes.

"There's mail for you, Maximoff." Agatha announces with a sneer, tossing the items she holds into the air - which float toward Wanda's desk. "They might be late, no one checks the mailbox in this place."

It's Wanda's turn to grimace. "Thanks, Agatha." She retorts wryly, picking up the cards as soon as they reach them. Her stomach does a complete turn when she reads the name, and it doesn't get any better when she reads the date. "What the...? Agatha, by god, some of these are months old!"

The older witch shrugs her shoulders, approaching Wanda's table unceremoniously. As the younger one opens the older letter, Agatha wastes no time in checking the newer ones, ignoring Wanda's slap of protest about this.

"Hmm, love letters, how sweet." Ironizes the witch as soon as she opens one, and laughs when Wanda grabs the item from her hand with a tug, the warning does not look very effective on account of her pink cheeks. "It's from Miss Immortal, I imagine."

"That's none of your business." Wanda retorts, turning her attention to one of the old correspondences from one of the Coven contacts that everyone thought had given up on making a deal, but apparently had just been ignored by the witch mail.

Agatha chuckles lightly. "You know you can't ignore your girlfriend forever."

Wanda huffs impatiently. "She's not my girlfriend! She's nothing really. Just go mind your own business, will you? I'm working."

But Agatha ignores the request, leaning on the table to steal the letter back and fleeing from Wanda's hands before the woman can reach her.

"Please, Wanda, please forgive me. I never had any intent to hurt you in any way or cause you any pain-" The reading is interrupted when Wanda's magic does the work of snatching the letter from the other witch's hand, who falls into laughter. "Wow, you’re pissed off enough to rip an apology letter. What did she do, cheat on you?"

Wanda huffs impatiently. "For the last time, she's not my girlfriend!" But Agatha only giggles at the outburst, which makes Wanda sigh impatiently. "We were friends, and she...is the reason for my divorce."

"Hmm, spill the tea." Agatha makes mention of sitting down in one of the armchairs but Wanda rolls her eyes.

"Stop it, I'm busy." Grumbles the witch. "Thanks to you I just earned months of late work."

"No way, it's not my fault that most supernatural creatures don't trust the internet." Agatha retorts as she throws herself on one of the couches. "Every Winter Solstice is a real hell, with so many wolves on the loose and the council bothering us with the safety of mortals..."

Wanda sighs. "Agatha, I'm busy." She repeats, receiving a roll of her eyes in return as the other begrudgingly stands up.

"You know what, Maximoff? You need to get laid." Declares the other causing Wanda to choke in indignation, her ears burning. " Yes, you heard me! You've been a nervous wreck since you took over the leadership of the coven! You don't leave this office for anything and stay working all day, not even joining our festivities! And all this time you have a hot immortal sending you sex letters? It's truly absurd that you're still here." In complete shock, Wanda stares at her. Agatha grins at her expression. "My mortal years were the most fun, you should enjoy them as well. You are the Scarlet Witch, Wanda. One of the most powerful cosmic entities in the multiverse, you are going to have many centuries to focus on work, but your mortal life is only one. You should pay her a visit."

Wanda sighs in defeat, nodding in concordance after a moment. Agatha smiles in victory, and while the other searches for her cell phone, she risks spying on other letters.

"I have to admit that she sounds a lot less terrifying in these passages." Agatha comments as she reads again, ignoring Wanda's protest and continuing to talk. "She scared the girls off when she was here last year, and I heard stories about her strength. But reading this, I think she's just a simp." Jokes the brunette but Wanda doesn't laugh, looking at her with a frown of curiosity.

"She was here last year?"

Agatha snorts through her nose. "Of course, she was, silly." Replies the witch as if it's obvious. "She came as a diplomatic action between her people and ours, full of questions and agreements. It started out well, but you know how witches are. And in general, we don't trust strangers. It ended with her intimidating anyone who threatened to harm you, I believe."

Wanda felt her face warm and stared at Agatha in disbelief. "She... was here for me?"

The other chuckled again. "By all the holy ones, Maximoff, you are impossible! Where do you think I got the impression you two were a couple from?

Wanda opens her mouth but doesn't know exactly what to say. She babbles something about being married at the time and Agatha laughs in disbelief. "Please, as if a piece of paper means anything to someone like her." Ironizes the older witch. "Especially the union with a microwave." She mutters the last part, but Wanda listens, grimacing.

"Don't talk about him like that. I loved Vision truly." Wanda says but that only brings a glint to Agatha's eyes.

"Hm, ‘past tense’? I think the Immortal one has a chance..." The witch fell into laughter as Wanda tried to hit her with an energy ball, ducking just in time. "Listen to someone who has lived as long as I have. You need to get laid."

"Agatha I swear to god I will use violence-"

But the older witch raises her hands in surrender and finally leaves the room, laughing all the way out and down the hall.

Wanda sighs at the empty room, the cell phone that has been turned off for weeks in her hand.

She can do this, she repeats to herself. It doesn't have to be weird. She can call you and ask you for a drink and it doesn't have to be anything more than that. You have been friends before.

“This number is offline or out of range, please try again later or leave a message after the tone-”

With a frustrated grunt at the fourth attempt to make contact, Wanda returned the cell phone to her pocket and marched determinedly out of the room. She wouldn't be stopped by technology from finding you, not a chance. If Agatha didn't know how to help, two speedsters probably would.

-&-

The loud music almost made her turn around. It was a generic but addictive electronica, and it was so blasting from the speakers that even before she stepped through the portal she opened to get there, Wanda could already hear the noise that the vast majority of the neighbors in the area of that Spanish nightclub could as well.

Makkari was courteous enough to tell her where you were last seen, going so far as to joke that if Wanda couldn't find you at this party, she should try the next bars down the street. Wanda couldn't laugh at the joke, her stomach suddenly wracked with strange guilt as she heard stories about how your last few months had been spent on intense partying that wasn't at all typical of your behavior, and that had a lot to do with a fight you haven't told any of your friends about, but which Wanda remembered every detail of as if it were yesterday. Makkari tried to comfort her, saying that every Eternal has their period of dissatisfaction with immortality and that parties are a good distraction, but it didn't help to know that not even her best friends were sure of your current location or state of health.

Wanda tried to be positive about the reunion, but as soon as she entered the crowded nightclub, and with the help of some basic telekinesis, she reached a VIP area with clearly magical people, she didn't feel much at ease. And there were you too, in all your melancholy glory sitting on a leather couch watching a gambling game with two beautiful girls practically sitting on your lap.

A security guard made mention of stopping her entrance, but red irises stared at him for half a second and it was enough for him to make room for her to pass instead.

She noticed your lazy eyes, dilated pupils, and easy smile, and hated the hand on the thigh of the girl on the right as if she were suffering the greatest of betrayals. Wanda knew she had no right to feel this way, having been the one to fight with you, to blame you for the end of her marriage, and to have ignored all your attempts to apologize, but this is exactly the way she does feel.

You lean in, whispering something dirty enough in the girl's ear to make her blush and close her legs, and Wanda loses patience.

"Makkari was right. You truly hit rock bottom." She mocks in a tone loud enough to be heard throughout the entire backstage, the music slightly muffled by the walls in the rest of the club. All eyes turn curiously to her, but yours are the ones she's looking for, and they take almost a full moment to focus. Your relaxed posture doesn't change, but your smile fades.

"Look who decided to show up." You returned with a certain coolness that made Wanda swallow dryly. "Greetings to the legendary Scarlet Witch."

Each individual in the room turns their face and greets her at the same second, the hypnotized chorus of 'Hello, Wanda' makes an eerie shiver run through her entire body. She doesn't have time to create any theories about the whole scene, because out of a curtain in the background comes a figure she doesn't know as well as the other Eternals.

Druig's presence is a complete surprise to her. Wanda remembers well all the disagreements you two have had and the stories she has heard about the past. So finding that Eternal in a fancy, expensive suit, controlling an entire nightclub by your side is not exactly a predictable situation.

"Wanda Maximoff, what an honor to meet you again." He comments as he moves closer to kiss her hand, taking on old customs with natural ease. His hand remained holding her for a full moment, and Wanda understood it to be a warning. The attitude made her blood boil. But when Druig turned his attention back to you, he was smiling. "You didn't tell me old friends would be visiting you, sister."

You locked your jaw. "Don't call me that, Druig." Was your warning, detaching yourself from the grip of the girls beside you without any trouble to get up. "And stop trying to scare Wanda. You wouldn't stand a chance with her. Nor with me, brother."

A wicked smile played on the man's lips, but he remained with his hands behind his back and nodded in understanding to your statement. You exchanged a quick glance with Wanda and it was enough for her to follow you to what looked like a balcony of the chamber, which provided a view of the magnificent capital of Barcelona.

As soon as Wanda was beside you at the edge, you gestured back, creating a transparent wall in the doorway to prevent snooping. She recognized the privacy spell and kept to herself the realization of how cold and twitchy your magic felt, very different from the last time she felt your presence at the university in London.

"Why are you here, Wanda?" You asked her immediately, with no patience for small talk.

"I called." She returned without caring about the aggressiveness, her hands clasped tightly inside her pockets, seeking some warmth in her own jacket to protect herself from the cold night. Not so long ago, you would have wasted no time in offering her a scarf, or taking any action to warm her, and the lack of friendliness and nurturance made her shiver more than the cold. "Makkari said-"

"I can deduce exactly what she said, thank you." You cut her off with a certain impatience. You didn't keep your gaze, rummaging through your pockets for something until you pulled out of your jacket a silver bottle marked with the Asgard symbol. Thor had one of those, and Wanda knew immediately that it was a traditional drink. The way your fingers were trembling made her understand that this would not be the first sip of either Asgardian liquor or an earthly drink.

"I wish you were sober for this conversation."

You chuckled, short and ironic still with your gaze on the bottle you were opening. Your laughter lingered during the big gulp you took, and when you looked at her again, you commented, "You were always funny, Maximoff. Truly enjoyable company." Your gaze faded to the landscape, nostalgic and hurt, and Wanda sighed.

"I didn't come here to fight with you, Y/N." She tried again, though dissatisfied with your distant posture, still determined to set things straight. "But I was surprised to find you so..."

"Miserable?" You complete for her with a weak laugh, still looking out over the city. Wanda swallows dryly, and you sigh. "Don't martyr yourself. No matter how devastating the broken heart feels, it always heals."

"I'm sorry." She declares softly. "I never meant to hurt you."

You clear your throat, pulling away a little to look at her, and with the posture you assume, Wanda almost feels physical walls between you.

"You didn't come to Barcelona for an apology, Maximoff. What happened? Is it something with work?" Your frown is gently worried, but the insinuation irritates her.

"Do you really think I wouldn't talk to you for so long just to show up asking for work favors?" She retorts but you don't flinch.

"I don't think anything, Wanda." You retort indifferently. "I've stopped having expectations of you, or anyone else. That way I avoid being disappointed."

"Is this you or Druig talking?" She challenges, and instead of hitting a nerve, you smile.

You bring the flask closer to your lips, and whisper, "Always too quick for me, clever girl." before drinking and accomplishing a small smile from her.

"I mean it, Y/N." Wanda insists, though softer than before. "I want to apologize for the last time we saw each other. I shouldn't have blamed you for the end of my marriage, nor put down your attempts to fix things between us."

You study her face for a moment, finding only sincerity in her eyes. Then you sigh, and finish all the liquid in the bottle in one gulp. Wanda opens her mouth to say something, but you interrupt her.

"When was the last time you had fun, Scarlet Witch?"

She frowns, hesitantly. "I'm really not in the mood-"

But you grabbed her hand, grinning. "Don't be boring, Maximoff. We were friends before any of the drama. Come, I'll show you how the Spanish celebrate life."

Since becoming the Scarlet Witch, Wanda had gotten better with crowds because of her job. Still, it was a little hard to be inserted into a fair of bodies squeezed inside a lounge with vibrant colors and loud music. And your hand pulling her close, spinning her around as your body moved against hers to the synchronized beat wasn't helping her nerves at all.

But eventually, Wanda felt all the tension dissipate within the songs - only to be replaced by an equally suffocating feeling. Your hands roamed over her body as your hips slammed together and Wanda found herself unable to think of anything else but you.

She spun again, one last time before you grew tired of ignoring your own will, and grabbed her face, your mouth against hers.

Wanda choked on her own breath, and the world stopped for a whole moment. All the sounds, and all the people around just disappeared. You kissed her and that was all that mattered in that second.

But you let go before she could respond the way she wanted to, and the look on your face made her swallow dry.

"What's wrong?" She whispered half breathlessly against your lips.

Your hand was warm against her cheek, and when you moved it away, Wanda almost let out an audible protest at the lack, her body practically tumbling towards you, begging for your touch.

You shook your head in the negative, turning and moving further into the crowd and Wanda almost lost sight of you.

The people around seemed to hinder her path to you, but a glimpse of the red glows and the hall cleared a path for the witch. If Wanda began to use her powers with more confidence now, Agatha Harkness had a strong influence on it.

You went outside the nightclub, and Wanda realized you must have spent some time dancing because the street was much emptier than before.

With a hand on your chest, your breathing labored and your shoulders tense, Wanda realized you looked like you were on the verge of a panic attack.

"Hey, darling, talk to me-" She reached up trying to touch your wrist but you pulled away. Your back was turned so far but when you turned around, Wanda saw that your eyes were filled with tears.

"Don't you dare." You raise a finger towards her, gasping and emotional. Then she falls silent immediately, gulping dryly at the fury in your gaze. "You don't... have the right, okay? You just can't."

She sighs, taking a step forward. "You're the one who kissed me."

You chuckle in disbelief, wiping your eyes with the back of your hand. "Fuck you, Wanda."

"How classy." She sneers to which you only shake your head.

"You did this to me." You retort determinedly, gesturing to yourself. "Look at me, Wanda! I'm a mess! I'm sick! You've carved your way into my heart, and I can't live without you! Do you even realize what you've done? Do you even care?"

Heart racing, Wanda opens her mouth but the intensity of the confessions has left her speechless. She has no chance to speak, however, because you continue.

"Seven thousand years I've been on this earth, and I've never felt like this. Who gave you the right? I'm not made for it, I don't know how to... deal with it. This pain, this lack. The longing... I can't do it, Wanda." You gasp. "I was fine without you! I was working, sticking to my mission. And then you came along and ruined me for good!" Your hand pulled her close again, your forehead resting against hers. Wanda waited and waited for a kiss that never came. Instead, you held her hands against your chest. "Take your love away, Wanda. I don't know where to put it if I can't dedicate it to you."

She smiled tearfully, brushing their noses together. "I haven't lived that long, but I will, my darling. And I want it spent with you." She whispered, holding on tighter as you look at her doubtfully. "I will only take your love with me if I can leave mine with you."

"Wanda-"

"Stop babbling and kiss me for once, you drunken fool." She cuts you off, and you don't waste another second.

You think all those centuries were worth it for this moment. Wanda kisses and kisses you, and can't believe she resisted this for so long. That she dared to marry another when she could have had this.

You let out an audible moan as she sucked your tongue and she was grateful for your hands around her waist, for she would have slipped to the floor.

When you broke apart, panting and flushed, you stood with your faces very close together.

"You should have married me." It is the first thing you say, and it draws a hearty, husky laugh from the other.

"There's still time, I suppose." She retorts, shy about the look of adoration she catches the next moment. She swallows dryly. " I'm sorry I hurt you before."

You shake your head quickly. "I hurt you first, I know. I should have told all the others to go to hell and run away with you when I had the chance."

She giggles, pleased that you recognize the past. Your mistakes too, not just hers. But none of that mattered anymore now, and she told you so.

You decided that enough had been said and that words could be left for tomorrow.

#wanda maximoff x reader #wanda x reader #elizabeth olsen x reader #wanda maximoff oneshots #wanda maximoff

653 notes · View notes

sixteenseveredhands · 1 year

Text

Stone Turtle of Karakorum, Mongolia, c. 1235-1260 CE: this statue is one of the only surviving features of Karakorum, which was once the capital city of the Mongol Empire

The statue is decorated with a ceremonial scarf known as a khadag (or khata), which is part of a Buddhist custom that is also found in Tibet, Nepal, and Bhutan. The scarves are often left atop shrines and sacred artifacts as a way to express respect and/or reverence. In Mongolia, this tradition also contains elements of Tengrism/shamanism.

The city of Karakorum was originally established by Genghis Khan in 1220 CE, when it was used as a base for the Mongol invasion of China. It then became the capital of the Mongol Empire in 1235 CE, and quickly developed into a thriving center for trade/cultural exchange between the Eastern and Western worlds.

The city attracted merchants of many different nationalities and faiths, and Medieval sources note that the city displayed an unusual degree of diversity and religious tolerance. It contained 12 different temples devoted to pagan and/or shamanistic traditions, two mosques, one church, and at least one Buddhist temple.

As this article explains:

The city might have been compact, but it was cosmopolitan, with residents including Mongols, Steppe tribes, Han Chinese, Persians, Armenians, and captives from Europe who included a master goldsmith from Paris named William Buchier, a woman from Metz, one Paquette, and an Englishman known only as Basil. There were, too, scribes and translators from diverse Asian nations to work in the bureaucracy, and official representatives from various foreign courts such as the Sultanates of Rum and India.

This diversity was reflected in the various religions practised there and, in time, the construction of many fine stone buildings by followers of Taoism, Buddhism, Islam, and Christianity.

The prosperous days of Karakorum were very short-lived, however. The Mongol capital was moved to Xanadu in 1263, and then to Khanbaliq (modern-day Beijing) in 1267, under the leadership of Kublai Khan; Karakorum lost most of its power, authority, and leadership in the process. Without the resources and support that it had previously received from the leaders of the Mongol Empire, the city was left in a very vulnerable position. The residents of Karakorum began leaving the site in large numbers, until the city had eventually become almost entirely abandoned.

There were a few scattered attempts to revive the city in the years that followed, but any hope of restoring Karakorum to its former glory was then finally shattered in 1380, when the entire city was razed to the ground by Ming Dynasty troops.

The Erdene Zuu Monastery was later built near the site where Karakorum once stood, and pieces of the ruins were taken to be used as building materials during the construction of the monastery. The Erdene Zuu Monastery is also believed to be the oldest surviving Buddhist monastery in Mongolia.

There is very little left of the ruined city today, and this statue is one of the few remaining features that can still be seen at the site. It originally formed the base of an inscribed stele, but the pillar section was somehow lost/destroyed, leaving nothing but the base (which may be a depiction of the mythological dragon-turtle, Bixi, from Chinese mythology).

This statue and the site in general always kinda remind me of the Ozymandias poem (the version by Horace Smith, not the one by Percy Bysshe Shelley):

In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,

stands a gigantic leg

which far off throws the only shadow

that the desert knows.

"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone,

"the King of Kings; this mighty city shows

the wonders of my hand."

The city's gone —

naught but the leg remaining

to disclose the site

of this forgotten Babylon.

We wonder —

and some Hunter may express wonder like ours,

when thro' the wilderness where London stood,

holding the wolf in chace,

he meets some fragment huge

and stops to guess

what powerful but unrecorded race

once dwelt in that annihilated place

Sources & More Info:

University of Washington: Karakorum, Capital of the Mongol Empire

Encyclopedia Britannica: Entry for Karakorum

World History: Karakorum

#archaeology #history #anthropology #artifact #ancient history #mongol empire #mongolia #karakorum #middle ages #ancient ruins #art #turtle #bixi #ozymandias #poetry #mythology #genghis khan

240 notes · View notes

alphynix · 1 year

Text

Crystal Palace Field Trip Part 1: Walking With Victorian Monsters

The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs take their name from the original Crystal Palace, a glass-paned exhibition building originally constructed for a World's Fair in Hyde Park in 1851.

In 1854 the structure was relocated 14km (~9 miles) south to the newly-created Crystal Palace Park, and a collection of over 30 life-sized statues of prehistoric animals were commissioned to accompany the reopening – creating a sort of Victorian dinosaur theme park – sculpted by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins with consultation from paleontologist Sir Richard Owen.

The Palace building itself burned down completely in 1936, and today only the ruins of its terraces remain in the northeast of the park grounds.

The Crystal Palace building then and now Left image circa 1854 (public domain) Right image circa 2011 by Mark Ahsmann (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Six sphinx statues based on the Great Sphinx of Tanis also survive up among the Palace ruins, flanking some of the terrace staircases. They fell into serious disrepair during the latter half of the 20th century, but in 2017 they all finally got some much-needed preservation work, repairing them and restoring their original Victorian red paint jobs.

———

…But let's get to what we're really here for. Dinosaurs! (…And assorted other prehistoric beasties!)

The "Dinosaur Court" down in the south end of the park still remains to this day, displayed across several islands in a man-made lake. Over the decades they've been through multiple cycles of neglect and renovation, and are currently cared for by the London Borough of Bromley (Crystal Palace Park Trust are due to take over custodial duties in September 2023), with promotion and fundraising assistance from organizations like Historic England and the Friends of the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs charity.

Just about 170 years old now, the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs represent fifteen different types of fossil creatures known to 1850s Victorian science, with only three actual dinosaur species featured. Although often derided for being outdated and very inaccurate by modern standards, they were actually incredibly good efforts at the time, especially taking into account that the field of paleontology was still in its very early days.

They also just have a lot of charm, with toothy grins and surprisingly dynamic poses.

Unfortunately on the day I visited in early August 2023 most of the statues were heavily obscured by plant growth, both on their islands and on the sides of the paths they can usually be viewed from. Since I'd seen images from about a month ago showing things being less overgrown, this was probably just some unlucky timing on my part coinciding with some explosive summer foliage growth.

The first island on the trail features a few Permian and Triassic animals which were only known from fragmentary remains in the 1850s. These "labyrinthodonts" were recognized as having similarities to both amphibians and reptiles, and so were depicted with boxy toothy jaws, warty skin, stumpy tails, and long frog-like back legs.

Today we'd call these particular animals temnospondyl amphibians, specifically Mastodonsaurus, and we know they were actually shaped more like giant salamanders with longer flatter crocodilian-like jaws, smaller legs, and long paddle-like tails.

———

Somewhere in the foliage beyond this specific "labyrinthodont" there was also supposed to be a pair of dicynodonts, but I couldn't see much of them at all and didn't manage to get a remotely visible photograph.

Crystal Palace Dicynodon when much less overgrown Left photo by London looks (CC BY 2.0) Right photo by Loz Pycock (CC BY SA 2.0)

These Dicynodon are depicted as looking like sabre-toothed turtles complete with shells. That was fairly speculative even for the time, but considering only their weird turtle-beaked-and-walrus-tusked skulls were known it was probably the best guess Hawkins and Owen had. Today we know these animals were actually synapsids related to modern mammals, but Victorian understanding considered them to be a type of reptile.

Modern reconstructions of dicynodonts have a slightly different face shape, along with squat pig-like bodies and semi-sprawling limbs. They may have had fur, but currently the only known actual skin impressions from the genus Lystrosaurus show leathery bumpy hairless skin.

———

Next time: the Jurassic and Cretaceous sculptures!

#field trip!#crystal palace dinosaurs #retrosaurs #i love them your honor #crystal palace park #crystal palace #labyrinthodont #temnospondyl #mastodonsaurus #dicynodont #dicynodon #synapsid #paleontology #vintage paleoart #art

383 notes · View notes

smehur · 14 days

Text

Drarry fic recs #4

Marginal Notes by @blamebrampton

When you're 18, and nothing is as it was meant to be, sometimes it can be hard to let the right people know what you are thinking. Thankfully, Draco Malfoy owns a quill.

What a delightful story! I loved the thoughtful, grounded, calm Draco and how well he applied his wit (and the penchant for fixing things?) to solving other people's problems. It's a bit on the side of wishful thinking - I don't really believe someone could change that much over night - but it's nice wishful thinking that I enjoyed and would happily inflict on myself again. Among other things, I enjoyed the crisp, flawless writing. It's not often the editor in me wouldn't change a single word in a fic. I very much plan to read BB's entire catalogue.

The Boy from the Piano Shop by @soliblomst

After going blind in a reckless attempt to avenge Ginny's death, Harry battles with severe depression. One day, he stumbles upon a quaint piano restoration shop in the heart of London and meets the owner, a kindly old man, and his introverted young apprentice, whose voice sounds strangely familiar. As Harry and Draco slowly reconnect through private piano lessons, the small workshop becomes Harry's refuge, offering him a glimmer of hope in a world without eyes.

Finally got to read this fic everyone's talking about. And for good reasons! It's heartbreaking and wholesome, starkly realistic and hopelessly romantic, all at once. I'm often annoyed by shallow depictions of low self-esteem that goes with depression, especially when it's used as an artificial obstacle in the way of romance ("I'm not good enough for you, so even though I love you, I'm breaking up"), and this is one of the few stories (by which I mean all my reading, not just fanfiction) where I could completely believe it, and sympathize with it. (Bonus points for not being used as an obstacle in the way of romance.) The general lack of obstacles in the way of romance was incredibly refreshing and welcome, as was the lack of drama around the revelation that Harry Potter is secretly friends with Draco Malfoy. Everything is very mature, to the point where I think the story would be better set in their 30s than in their 20s, but I didn't mind. Harry's grief is all-present and at times, harrowing, but never gratuitous, and it's well-balanced by the peace and joy he finds in Draco's company. The two scenes where Draco unexpectedly dons a scarf are etched in my memory forever. An incredible piece.

i stay by @hogwartsfirebolt

The darkening sky is dangerous for the shape of Harry’s desire, it makes it seem reasonable, as though it were a natural conclusion of having Draco once again within reach, rather than the mirage it actually is.

I said it before, and I'll say it again: this fic is exquisite. Tense and tender in perfect proportion and filled with a dazzling array of sensory details that painted each scene like a work of art. Although I could see what was coming in the end (thanks to expert foreshadowing), the finale still stole my breath away. A wonderful read!

All Life is Yours to Miss by Saras_Girl & podfic by originally

Professor Malfoy's world is contained, controlled, and as solitary as he can make it, but when an act of petty revenge goes horribly awry, he and his trusty six-legged friend are thrown into Hogwarts life at the deep end and must learn to live, love and let go.

Oh, this was such a joy to listen. I think I had a smile on my face for the whole duration of the podfic (about 12 hours), minus the few minutes when there were tears instead. I don't know where to start with the praise. The meticulously constructed world of Draco's self-imposed loneliness? The supporting cast of interesting and well-rounded original characters? The tangible, eminently relatable trials and tribulations of a teacher's life? Or maybe the deceptively simple concept at the root of the story, allowing Draco to break out of his shell on his own? Oh, how I love this gentle, fragile, vulnerable Draco hiding behind impatience and aloofness and his sharp tongue. And the fearless, unstoppable Harry, his bouts of bad temper and his naked honesty. And Stanley, with that inevitable, ill-timed tack-tack-tack! Everything felt so true, so real, so close, I felt just as exposed and frightened as Draco, just as desperate at his inability to make a move. I know I said this half a dozen times by now since I started reading fic in this fandom, but I can't help it. This may be the best fic I've ever read.

Correction! The best fic I've ever heard! The reading was impeccable, possibly the best I've heard so far, and infused the story with even more life and love and laughter. A beautiful, unforgettable experience.

Heartbeat by @saxamophone (eight_of_wands)

Harry hates Draco. Draco hates Harry. Only it's not hate, not even a little bit. Featuring: a cooperative independent study, golden hour on wrecked sheets, water from fountains of dubious origin, purple Mardi Gras beads, and a bird with silly legs. Also featuring: heated arguments, infidelity, unquenchable desire, and heartbreak. Over and over again.

I'll be honest: this fic did not grip me at once. I could even say I struggled through the first few stances. But then came the understanding of what "I hate you" means and I read on with eyes wide and heart thumping (Malfoy, Malfoy, Malfoy) and I was so very richly rewarded. Among all the things I loved about it, the most memorable are the incredibly vivid images and impressions of New Orleans, and the moment of searing, all-consuming jealous rage that I regret to say I could relate to all too well. The confrontations were exquisite, the dialog sparking with tension and more importantly, with truth. There's no melodrama here to create suspense, it's all raw and real and indeed, heartbreaking. But hearts can mend. :)

Many, many, heartfelt thanks to all the authors in this amazing fandom and to all the readers helping spread the word. 💞

#drarry #harry/draco #fic rec #rec list #harry potter #my post

10 notes · View notes

blueiscoool · 8 months

Text

A Rare 2,000-Year-Old Roman Funerary Bed Discovered in London

Archaeologists working in central London have discovered a burial site containing a wooden bed used in a Roman funeral.

A team from Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) made the find near Holborn Viaduct, in the heart of central London, six meters (20 feet) below modern street level.

Depictions of beds being used as part of funerals are common in Roman art. However, the bed found at this site, preserved by the damp mud of the underground River Fleet, is the first complete example ever discovered in Britain.

Made from high-quality oak, the bed has carved feet, and joints fixed with small wooden pegs. Reminiscent of modern-day flatpack furniture, it was taken apart before being placed within the grave.

In a statement, Heather Knight, project officer at MOLA, said, the level of preservation of the wooden finds “has really blown us away.”

Michael Marshall, a MOLA finds specialist, said that “Roman wooden furniture only survives under exceptional circumstances” and that the bed is unique “in being dismantled and placed in the ground complete.”

These Roman finds are just the latest layer to be revealed in the site’s slice through London’s history. According to MOLA, their excavations have also revealed there was another cemetery on the site during the 16th century.

After the devastation of the Great Fire of London in 1666, the site saw new life, with the construction of houses, shops, and a pub, which were eventually replaced by Victorian warehouses.

In its latest chapter, the site is being transformed into office space for global law firm Hogan Lovells, which intends to display some of the archaeological finds.

Alongside skeletal remains, the archaeologists also dug up personal objects in the Roman site, such as beads, a glass vial and a decorated lamp.

Marshall said the discovery of such artifacts in the final resting place of some of Roman London’s first residents allows archaeologists to further “explore how furniture might have played a role” in Roman funerals and “shines a new light” on such rituals.

The latest finds follow the discovery last year of an “incredibly rare” Roman mausoleum beneath a construction site in south London, close to the Thames River’s south bank.

By Caolán Magee.

#A Rare 2000-Year-Old Roman Funerary Bed Discovered in London #London #Museum of London Archaeology #ancient grave #ancient tomb #ancient artifacts #archeology #archeolgst #history #history news #ancient history #ancient culture #ancient civilizations #roman history #roman empire

42 notes · View notes

transmutationisms · 1 year

Note

hi!! big fan of your blog. you really changed my succession viewing experience and i can't wait to rewatch after reading the recs you've put up!

that being said, i read megan garber's piece in the atlantic about the animal imagery/darwinian implications in the show and really loved it (as a biologist with an interest in sociology lol). do you have any specific reading material relating to the topics in that piece? i'd just love to read more but not super sure what i'm even asking/looking for, so feel free to ignore!

hi! so, there's quite a large body of literature in history of biology that deals with the politics of evolutionary theory, including darwinism. you can read these in any order, though i would recommend starting with bob young's 'malthus and the evolutionists: the common context of biological and social theory' if you haven't already encountered it. this was a signal essay in historically grounding the argument that darwinian evolutionary theory read victorian industrial capitalism and malthusian population anxiety into the natural world, which was why it appealed to victorian men of science in a way that previous theories of evolution (sometimes referred to as species transformation or transmutationism, or transformisme / transformismo in france / italy) hadn't. bob was a marxist historian at a time when history of biology had been largely written by working scientists and naive positivists, and his methodological influence continues to be felt in the field today. anyway, these are only starting points and are centred on france and britain, and also i excluded p*ter b*wler because i hate his ass:

the politics of evolution: morphology, medicine, and reform in radical london, by adrian desmond

utopia's garden: french natural history from old regime to revolution, by emma spary

the age of lamarck: evolutionary theories in france, 1790–1830, by pietro corsi

l'introduction du darwinisme en france au xixe siècle, by yvette conry (<- i can't remember whether this was translated into english, sorry)

faces of degeneration: a european disorder, 1848–1918, by daniel pick

darwin: the life of a tormented evolutionist, by adrian desmond and james moore

the cuvier-geoffroy debate: french biology in the decades before darwin, by toby appel

evolution before darwin: theories of the transmutation of species in edinburgh, 1804–1834, by bill jenkins

the spirit of system: lamarck and evolutionary biology, by richard burkhardt

the meaning of evolution: the morphological construction and ideological reconstruction of darwin's theory, by robert j richards

the great nation in decline: sex, modernity, and health crises in revolutionary france, c. 1750–1850, by sean quinlan

lamarck, the mythical precursor: a study of the relations between science and ideology, by madeleine barthélemy-madaule

victorian sensation: the extraordinary publication, reception, and secret authorship of vestiges of the natural history of creation, by james secord

#book recs

95 notes · View notes

dvmbfrxgg · 3 months

Note

here from dissmissivedestroyer about your ocs :D

HI! I’m so happy that you want to know about my ocs :)

So, as @dismissivedestroyer explained, these ocs are in a comic project done at Comic Academy.

My characters are called Red (The little girl with red hair), Pierrot (The clown) and Lily (The black cat).

Red is a little witch born in Ireland, Kilkenny, before the construction of the first Christian churches. She is Pagan and, like the real witches, she and her mother made ointments and medical remedies as well as studied plants. She always has Lily, a black cat, with her. Lily doesn’t have a gender, because in reality it is a link between the world of the living and the dead, a kind of living portal therefore, given that in esoteric symbolism, cats are seen precisely as travelers between life and death. The cat have a laurel collar because the cat represents reason, the guide; a bit like Virgil and Beatrice are for Dante Alighieri in the Divine Comedy.

Unfortunately, Red dies killed by the sin of being a witch, both she and her mother. That’s where Lily comes in and, by “saving” her, takes her to this sort of purgatory. An afterlife where souls of all kinds are placed, without distinction of religion or anything else, all with this weight of life that they continue to have in their spirit.

The two characters then meet Pierrot. Pierrot is a former trapeze artist born in France in 1845 but immediately brought to England, to London. I think he is a very complex character because since he has always lived in a mostly nomadic circus, he has never known the true meaning of “home”. He aspired to become one of the best trapeze artist in the circus but not because he really wanted it, but to survive the hard life of that nineteenth-century period given the poverty. He dies during a performance, before completing it, falling to the floor and breaking his neck. The head detached from the body, in fact, not only symbolizes his death, but also symbolizes his desire to be someone in the world and the body on the ground that continues to move having a life of its own represents a continuous “circus” machine.

The purpose of the story is a journey in which the protagonists rediscover themself together with other characters, like Ragnar, an other protagonist (present in the last drawing) and slowly relive their memories of their death and their difficulties, overcoming and finally moving forward.

The title “The Jorney of little Red” is a temporal title, it isn’t official, I’m still working on this.

Here some sketches and a drawing about my characters :D

#art #comic art #doodle #original comic #webcomic #web comic #indie comics #comic artist #my comic #oc comic #oc content #oc concept #oc drawing

13 notes · View notes

aimeedaisies · 1 year

Text

The Coronation Procession

This week I spent a few days in London, so I decided to walk the route that the newly coronated King Charles III and Queen Camilla will take, called the Coronation Procession! The Kings Procession, before the service is this route, just in reverse. I took pictures of the highlights of the route, it will definitely be something to look back on in the future!

Westminster Abbey

Founded in 960 and consecrated in 1065, Westminster Abbey, has seen the coronations of 39 English and British monarchs and 16 royal weddings and is the burial site for 18 English, Scottish and British monarchs.

Whitehall, Downing Street and Horse Guards Parade

Whitehall is recognised as the centre of the Government of the United Kingdom and is lined with numerous departments and ministries, including the Ministry of Defence, Horse Guards and the Cabinet Office. The Palace of Whitehall previously occupied the area and was the residence of Kings Henry VIII through to William III, before it was destroyed by fire in 1698; only the Banqueting House has survived. As well as government buildings, the street is known for its memorial statues and monuments, including the UK's primary war memorial, the Cenotaph and the Women of World War Two memorial.

Downing Street was built in the 1680s by Sir George Downing. For more than three hundred years, it has held the official residences of both the First Lord of the Treasury, the office now synonymous with that of the Prime Minister, and the Second Lord of the Treasury, the office held by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Prime Minister's official residence is 10 Downing Street, and the Chancellor's official residence is Number 11. The government's Chief Whip has an official residence at Number 12. In practice, these office-holders may live in different flats; the current Chief Whip actually lives at Number 9.

Horse Guards Parade is a large parade ground off Whitehall. It is the site of the annual ceremonies of Trooping the Colour, which commemorates the monarch's official birthday, and the Beating Retreat. Horse Guards Parade was formerly the site of the Palace of Whitehall's tiltyard, where tournaments (including jousting) were held in the time of Henry VIII. It was also the scene of annual celebrations of the birthday of Queen Elizabeth I. The procession will go past the entrance, not onto the parade ground.

Trafalgar Square and the Equestrian Statue of King Charles I

The square is named after the Battle of Trafalgar, a British naval victory in the Napoleonic Wars with France and Spain that took place on 21 October 1805 off the coast of Cape Trafalgar, southwest Spain. In the centre of the square is Nelson's Column built to commemorate Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson's decisive victory at the Battle of Trafalgar over the combined French and Spanish navies, during which he lost his life. The monument was constructed between 1840 and 1843 to a design by William Railton. The statue of Nelson was carved from Craigleith sandstone by sculptor Edward Hodges Baily. The four bronze lions around its base, designed by Sir Edwin Landseer, were added in 1867.

The equestrian statue of Charles I is a work by the French sculptor Hubert Le Sueur, probably cast in 1633. It is considered the central point of London. Its location at Charing Cross is on the former site of the most elaborate of the Eleanor crosses erected by Edward I (one of 12, to commemorate his late wife, put in location throughout the route of her funeral procession stops back to London). The statue faces down Whitehall towards Charles I's place of execution at Banqueting House. It was commissioned by Charles's Lord High Treasurer Richard Weston for the garden of his country house in Roehampton, Surrey. Following the English Civil War the statue was sold to a metalsmith to be broken down, but he hid it until the Restoration. It was installed in its current, far more prominent location in the centre of London in 1675, and the elaborately carved plinth dates from that time.

Admiralty Arch

Admiralty Arch was commissioned by King Edward VII in memory of his mother, Queen Victoria, and designed by Aston Webb, who also designed the Victoria Memorial and the new façade of Buckingham Palace at the other end of the Mall. It once served as residence of the First Sea Lord and was used by the Admiralty.

The Mall, St James Palace and Clarence House

The Mall is the long red coloured road joining Admiralty Arch and Buckingham Palace. It has seen several huge celebrations such as Victory in Europe Day (8 May 1945), lots of state visits, parades and Jubilee celebrations. When the royal family stand on the balcony of Buckingham Palace, The Mall is packed from top to bottom of vast crowds. The surface of The Mall is coloured red to give the effect of a giant red carpet leading up to Buckingham Palace. This colour was obtained using synthetic iron oxide pigment.

St James's Palace is the most senior royal palace in London. It is the ceremonial meeting place of the Accession Council, the office of the Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, as well as the London residence of Princess Anne, the Princess Royal and her husband, The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, Princess Beatrice and Princess Alexandra. The Proclamation Gallery (pictured above) is a part of St James's Palace, and it is used after the death of a reigning monarch. The Accession Council meets to declare the new monarch. Once the monarch has made a sacred oath to the council, the Garter King of Arms steps onto the Proclamation Gallery, which overlooks Friary Court to proclaim the new monarch.

Clarence House currently serves as the London residence of King Charles III and Queen Camilla. It has been Charles's residence since 2003. From 1953 until 2002 it was home to Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and before her, it was the official home of her daughter, Princess Elizabeth, the future Queen Elizabeth II.

The Queen Victoria Memorial

The Queen Victoria monument and surrounding gardens were created between 1904 and 1924. The main statue was unveiled by King George V. As well as Victoria, there are statues representing courage, constancy, victory, charity, truth and motherhood. In summer the flower beds are filled with geraniums, spider plants, salvias and weeping figs. Scarlet geraniums are used to match the tunics of The Queen's Guard at Buckingham Palace. In winter time the beds are filled with about 50,000 yellow wallflowers and red tulips.

Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace has served as the official London residence of the UK’s sovereigns since 1837. Buckingham Palace has 775 rooms. These include 19 State rooms, 52 Royal and guest bedrooms, 188 staff bedrooms, 92 offices and 78 bathrooms. King George III bought Buckingham House in 1761 for his wife Queen Charlotte to use as a comfortable family home close to St James's Palace, where many court functions were held. Buckingham House became known as the Queen's House, and 14 of George III's 15 children were born there. Queen Victoria was the first sovereign to take up residence in July 1837 and in June 1838 she was the first British sovereign to leave from Buckingham Palace for a Coronation. Her marriage to Prince Albert in 1840 soon showed up the Palace's shortcomings. A serious problem for the newly married couple was the absence of any nurseries (for her nine children) and too few bedrooms for visitors. The only solution was to move the Marble Arch - it now stands at the north-east corner of Hyde Park - and build a fourth wing, thereby creating a quadrangle. The cost of the new wing was largely covered by the sale of George IV's Royal Pavilion at Brighton.

I then walked past the Royal Mews, where the Gold State Coach is being prepared for the Coronation. Then onto Hyde Park, then Kensington Gardens and finally Kensington Palace, which is the official London residence of the Prince and Princess of Wales and their children, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester and the Duke of Kent. I then treated myself to a scrummy yet expensive piece of lemon cake from the Prada cafè in Harrods 🍰😋

information from wikipedia, royal parks and the royal family website

#king charles coronation #coronation procession #king’s procession #king charles iii #queen camilla #british royal family #on that day I did 33k steps 🫠

100 notes · View notes

blonde-love · 11 months

Text

The warmth of waiting... Day 1.

Summary: You try to strike a deal with the Murdstone brothers to improve the quality of the work of the children in the factory. While you are waiting for Mr. Edward, careless touches become deep actions, discovering the softness in that cold and metallic lady.

The bitter smoke of the first morning.

Warnings: Nothing for now. [You will have to wait for the rest of the chapters].

Parts of the story:

The warmth of waiting...

The warmth of waiting... [Day 1].

The warmth of waiting... [Day 2]. Soon.

The warmth of waiting... [Day 3]. Soon.

The warmth of waiting... [Day 4]. Soon.

The warmth of waiting... [Day 5]. Soon.

The warmth of waiting... [Day 6]. Soon.

The warmth of waiting... [Day 7]. Soon.

Autor’s Note: I think it took me a while to update, my apologies for that, I've been a little busy studying some things I need at university, but there are some advance chapters and some Gwen from In Fabric content coming soon if you're interested, so wait will be worth. If you'd like me to tag you in the next parts of this story you can leave a comment about that - although I'm still learning how to use this platform, I really feel like an old woman with social media sometimes -. As in all my stories, I like to remember that english is not my first language, so any constructive criticism is really appreciated!

That morning you woke up under the shelter of blankets with a very different aroma from yours, soft under your fingers, the light streaming in from the window in a way it wouldn't in London, this time warmer, softer.

With a groan of slight annoyance you sat up, taking some time to process where you were, remembering that you were not in your hometown, but somewhere quite far from there.

Although the room was not ostentatious, it had an endearing touch contrary to what you believed because of who it belonged to…

That woman with long black hair, as you were promised, with a skin as white as cheese, always dressed so neatly, the very embodiment of what was expected of a proper woman.

Although that was very far from the truth…

You couldn't help but think of the image of such a sinful book between her fingers, knowing very well the forbidden romance that lay between its pages, wondering how much she would enjoy it, if she would feel that warmth like you did the first time you read the work.

If you saw her just once, you wouldn't imagine that the lady would read those things, considered dirty and depraved by many, even more so if you put it into practice as she did or at least that's what she wanted, you assumed.

Another thought in your mind.

Jane Murdstone, as a lover. What a scene, but even more so if that recipient was a woman, it would be a scandal for sure, but something that caught your attention in a certain way.

You couldn't deny it, you had rarely seen people as beautiful as her; tall, imposing, dominant, with blue eyes that were as cold as ice but with a shine that could make anyone melt and…

"She is the embodiment of evil itself, a ruthless woman with no love for anyone, I tell you". Again some of the words of your friend from your youth echoed in your mind, releasing a soft sigh, putting your feet back on the ground.

If only that woman was a little different…

Finally you put aside the warmth of the blankets, placing your bare feet on the wood of that room, smiling softly as you observed that your clothes were already well ironed at that time of the morning.

You always appreciated those details, usually requesting that the maids not come into your room in London because it could affect your work, doing things as simple as moving a paper or two that could get lost and cost thousands, but you always appreciated that they left your things well ironed as it was something you never learned to do correctly.

You dressed, an outfit perhaps not as perfect as that of the lady hosting you, but certainly still adequate enough.

You hummed as you saw your reflection in the room's mirror, after that, tying the curtains to allow the light to flood the place completely, also opening the windows to let some air circulate.

Once everything was done, you took out a couple of papers that you had brought since you had them pending, the rest would arrive by mail within two days if everything went properly, praying inwardly that the idiots at the postal service would not lose it along the way.

You signed a couple of things, discarded a few others, satisfied with your own work before looking at the time, seeing that it was a little early, but your back crying out for you to get up from the chair you had been in for a while now.

A sigh left you, taking the box of cigarettes you had with you between your fingers, opening it to count the few that were left. Perhaps you would have to ask one of the maids to buy you a new one soon.

You left your room, once again realizing the very neat work that the maids did in that place, no trace of dust or cobwebs, no matter how minimal. That mind of yours could actually imagine the woman in black blatantly yelling at them if they didn't handle it properly. However, despite it being such a good job, you didn't see any people working at that time of the morning, looking rather… lonely…

Cautiously due to a strange nervousness about breaking the very calm aura, you walked down the stairs, pondering if maybe you shouldn't have stayed where you were...

You looked around the quiet room, walking down the hallway to another room, where you tried to open the door, realizing it was locked, letting out a sigh, thinking that maybe you were a much earlier riser considering the fast pace you had to keep up in the city...

You remembered the small detail that you were in a very remote area once again, thinking for a moment before deciding that some fresh air would be good for you.

The path of the previous day in your mind guided you to the entrance, where you opened the door, finding that it didn't have as many locks as your own house in London, probably not needing them in the quiet countryside.

Field…

Just by setting foot outside the house you noticed the difference, now closer since you were not in such a hurry to sign a contract, realizing that the air was much lighter, fresher, liberating, the green grasslands moving in small waves because to the cool morning breeze.

Your little appreciation ended quickly due to the sound of a woman clearing her throat, realizing it was the black-haired one, quickly closing a book, placing it on her lap and covering it with her hands, giving herself away about the fact that it was the same sapphic literary work that you had encountered the first time.

A small giggle left your lips at that, closing the door behind you, the woman raising an eyebrow at the interruption, somehow waiting for an explanation.

"Good morning". You greeted with a smile, a silence stretching between both of you until she finally returned the greeting.

"Morning". She let it out dryly and plainly, although her not-so-good mood characterized her, it seemed worse at that moment, not exactly being the most cheerful person during the mornings.

"I'm pleased to see you continued with your reading." Your tone of voice came out a little more amused than you expected, but you certainly couldn't quite stop the small giggle that threatened to escape.

"It's rude to snoop into other people's things so blatantly, I thought it was an accident the first time, but apparently it seems to be one of your bad habits". Was what she responded to you instead of denying or affirming anything, to which you shrugged.

"It's funny you say that, pretending to be someone so upright, with unwavering morals while… you read this". You whispered softly, moving closer to her and letting your hand glide in the air over her before your index finger lightly caressed the tips of her fingers before settling on the book.

The woman felt a small shiver run through her at your actions, the small discreet flirtation, but she remained impassive.

"It's just literature, a point of view of sinners to search for something completely different from me, it's… educational…". She lied, to which she could tell by your expression that you didn't believe her at all.

"Then you actually consider it a sin like many". You whispered before standing up completely, taking out a cigarette and lighting it, realizing that her look showed that she expected you to offer her one like the previous time, putting the package away on that occasion without doing so. "And here I thought you had understood the art of the story between the seamstress and the florist".

"You shouldn't smoke so early in the morning". She criticized you when you didn't share like you did last time, to which you let the smoke rise, the wind blowing and taking it in the opposite direction of where the blue-eyed woman was.

"Does it really make a difference if I consume it now or later? My lungs will pay the same bill anyway and you're not one to judge". You commented as you shrugged. "You were quite interested in the cigarette smoke yesterday too". You moved closer to her, your lips so close to hers. "Especially the one that came out of my mouth".

"That was not like that...". She moved slightly, looking away.

"You have to admit that you don't read these things for the educational side, or because you want to see a different point of view, but that you share theirs, am I wrong?". You asked what you already knew, it was too obvious not to be so. "You really are just as sinful as the rest of us".

"Just because you read this and are also one, doesn't mean that I am too". She said, a certain harshness in her voice, but if you looked closely enough, there was a certain shame.

"Maybe that would have been more credible if you had denied it yesterday instead of evading the question". You pointed out her small mistake, people would usually be shocked and seek to abruptly deny it if you even proposed it as an idea. "Be honest, you're interested in a member of the fairer sex giving you a lavender, aren't you?".

You took her chin between your fingers, that insatiable curiosity, that desire to obtain the answers that you even already knew always intense in you, always like a flame impossible to extinguish, without caring many times how invasive you could be, one of your weaknesses to the time to socialize with people, but at that moment you didn't care in the slightest.

"That's why you let me stay, isn't it? Why else would you let a seeker of the forbidden fruit stay in your house?".

The iron Lady usually had no problem with eye contact, being the other people who feared her and looked away, but right now not knowing exactly what to do with her mixed feelings, blaming her impulse from the day before for not throw you out when she had the opportunity to avoid this situation, but at the same time that desire in her to admit it, to just let herself go.

Her facade faltered for a moment, trying to look as if none of this affected her as she thought of a witty response, but her intentions had been exposed so easily.

"She is cold and metallic lady". At this rate you would charge David rent for spending so much time in your mind with the anecdotes he told you about her, although partly enjoying it to see how you were able to cause small cracks in those schemes.

"I would be lying if I said I didn't find you interesting, the angelic woman, cruel in the terrifying stories of many, but… with curious secrets". You said softly, the woman finally placing a hand on your wrist to move away from your touch.

"I'd tell you it's not appropriate, but you already know that, and I know you don't care anyway, so I won't bother pretending to talk some sense into you". That even tone of her voice had returned again, managing to remain as calm as ever, her free hand removing the cigarette from your fingers, bringing it to her lips, rising from her chair as she let the smoke fall onto your face. "It seems to me that the one desperate for the smoke from the other's lips is someone else".

She threw the cigarette on the floor after that, stepping on it in order to put it out, her attention was drawn to the entrance of the house when she heard someone open the door; a redheaded maid peeking out timidly.

"My ladies". She looked at the woman in black before looking at you and smiling slightly, Jane hastily releasing you and taking her book between her fingers again, making sure the maid didn't notice any part of the text. "Breakfast is ready".

"It's rude not to announce yourself before opening the door where you know a lady is". She scolded sharply, heading towards the entrance before stopping to turn to you with a frown. "That goes for you two, and I repeat, no smoking in the morning, I have nothing against you doing that, but if you are under my roof even as a guest, you follow my rules and that's one".

The maid tensed up as she heard her scolding even reach you, relaxing a little when the woman walked out of her sight, turning to look at you without knowing exactly what to say.

"Thank you for letting us know, you can take my portion to my room if it's not too much trouble". You said with a small apologetic smile.

"You won't eat in the dining room?". She asked innocently, to which you shook your head.

"I don't get used to it". You responded simply, her noticing your slightly dull smile, watching you pick up the cigarette butt, a look of pity crossing your face when you saw that it wasn't even halfway done. "And a glass of Whiskey". You asked in defeat, the young woman nodding, quickly entering to comply.

You weren't exactly the biggest fan of being talked to like a little kid who didn't know what to do, even if you realized that it was Jane's way of not showing weakness, especially in front of her staff, it bothered you.

Although maybe you deserved it for having put too much pressure on her thinking that you would be an exception to her bad character just because she let you stay as a guest.

You looked at the cigarette butt between your fingers, then at the place where she had been sitting before entering the house, lightly rubbing your wrist where she had kept her grip firm, remembering her words.

Maybe you should do a reevaluation of the information…

#jane murdstone #jane murdstone x reader #fanfic

39 notes · View notes

bagog · 10 months

Text

N7 Month, 2023 - Day 30: Last Stand

It's been real fun everybody, thanks for reading, and let me know what your favorites were!

Mshenko museum piece for the finale.

By mid-morning, the Alliance Military History museum was as busy as it was going to get for the day. Shepard and Kaidan, both clad in non-descript hoodies, dark glasses over their eyes, had been slowly making their way around the Shepard exhibit in the Reaper War wing of the museum. They’d avoided one exhibit in particular so far, but at last they had worked their way all the way around and only had one thing left.

There was an eye-catching sign that read ‘Last Stand’ and on a smaller sign below: “Experience the final three minutes of the Reaper war with Commander Shepard.” There were two entrances spaced wide apart, but it was clear that one was an entrance and the other an exit from the ‘Last Stand’ experience. Above the entrance was a bold ’21:13:43’ and above the exit was ’21:14:55.’ It evoked a popular symbol after the war had ended. A lot of people had a tattoo of the time—to the second—when the Crucible wave hit where they were hiding or fighting. The second the war ended.

“We don’t have to do this one,” Kaidan said, glancing at Shepard over the rim of his glasses.

“We’ve seen everything else.” Shepard’s brow was furrowed, “Might as well top-off the experience.” He turned and gave Kaidan a reassuring smile.

“I’m just saying,” Kaidan shrugged, “There’s not any three minutes of London that I’d like to relive, much less whatever three minutes they’ve picked out here.”

“What do you mean?”

“’21:13:43,’” Kaidan pointed to the exit, “That’s not London Local Time for the wave. It’s a good twelve minutes earlier.”

“Oh, Shepard nodded slowly, “the run-up to the transport beam.”

“Definitely not a moment I’d like to remember,” Kaidan said carefully, checking Shepard’s expression. Shepard had an excuse if he wanted it.

“Let’s have a look.” Shepard took a quick breath, then offered Kaidan a smile. Their audio queued when they cross the entrance threshold.

“These are some of the final moments of the Reaper War, and three minutes that would determine the fate of the galaxy. Constructed with data directly taken from a FOB monitoring Shepard’s position.”

The audio continued to set the scene: Hammer Squad, Thannix Missiles, heroic names—Shepard nudged Kaidan when ‘Spectre Kaidan Alenko’ was mentioned—and the transport conduit. The exhibit itself was a dark tunnel, on either side a gigantic holographic layout of the broken London street that served as the run-up to the transport conduit. The conduit was represented by a holo near the exit, and where Shepard and Kaidan entered represented 550 meters south: where Hammer Team made their final charge. The audio would trip at key moments as patrons made their way through the hall. By this time, there was another group just ahead of them, but it was dark enough where they felt comfortable taking off the sunglasses.

Shepard was represented on the holo by a yellow ball with a pinging halo emitting from it. As they approached, it began to move toward the transport beam, dodging blasts and avoiding rubble the holo hadn’t rendered, resulting in a somewhat comical display. The audio was aware:

“Forty-five seconds. Commander Shepard runs straight at the beam, or as straight as the situation allowed. Harbinger began repelling the advancing forces, indiscriminately targeting both individual soldiers on the ground and also the ground and air vehicles. You can see Shepard zig-zagging back and forth, likely avoiding rubble or attempting to make himself a more difficult target.”

“Why do you think it’s only me up there? They should have data for every marine out there that day?”

“It’s your exhibit,” Kaidan offered lamely. “Plus, I don’t think seeing all those little… flickering lights go out would be a very stirring exhibit.” Shepard nodded gravely.

The yellow ball raced down the hill in real time, and after forty five seconds, stopped abruptly. It then went backwards.

“Forty-two seconds. That’s how long it took Shepard to call down the SSV Normandy and evacuate a number of marines wounded in the battle. You can see him take up a defensive position behind cover, then race forward—possibly supporting the weight of another wounded marine—when the Normandy arrives.”

Sure enough, the yellow ball ‘limped’ over to where a holographic Normandy had been generated. The ball stayed there, though, for another thirty seconds, nearly.

“Twenty-eight seconds. That’s how long Shepard lingered at the Normandy, likely ensuring as much time as possible for further evacuations. The Normandy’s cyber warfare suite was a surprise for Harbinger, and silenced, for a time, its blasts.”

They were catching up on the other group now, who were talking between themselves, bent over the holo with interest.

“Twenty-eight seconds,” one whispered to the other. “That’s forever in a battle like this, huh? Geez, makes you wonder what was going on.”

“Probably was just giving some orders or something,” said the other. “…I wonder if he thought about just… flying away?” They both chuckled, then grew quieter as they proceeded to hurry through the rest of the exhibit when Kaidan and Shepard got closer.

“I did,” Shepard whispered to Kaidan, pulling Kaidan’s hood just to the side so his lips could almost to the shell of Kaidan’s ear.

“Did what?” Kaidan turned. Shepard looked over his shoulder to see that the other patrons had drifted away.

“I did think about just getting on the Normandy, flying away,” he said, softly.

“No you didn’t,” Kaidan cracked a conspiratorial grin. “Not for long if at all, at any rate.”

“I did. I thought about leaving with you. Thought about it just long enough to make it hurt when I had to turn away.” Shepard touched Kaidan’s hand. “The exhibit doesn’t talk about it at all, but do you remember what you said during those ‘twenty-eight seconds?’”

Kaidan looked at Shepard warmly, looking through him, in some ways. “I, uh… I think I told you to let me finish the fight!” He laughed.

“You said ‘Don’t leave me behind,’” Shepard replied. He lifted Kaidan’s hand, softly ran his thumb over the man’s knuckles, his ring. “And I told you I loved you. And you said it back.”

“Yeah,” Kaidan said, voice thick. “Yeah I remember that.”

“It was the first time we’d said it to each other.” Shepard pointed at the yellow ball, lingering behind the Normandy hologram. “That’s what I remember about those twenty-eight seconds.”

“That’s sweet, Shepard,” Kaidan touched Shepard’s face, gave a little smile. “That little yellow dot is about to go through a whole lot of shit in the next 10 minutes.” Shepard nodded, aware even now of the various cybernetics implanted into his body after this battle. “I’m sorry you had to go through it alone.”

“You were waiting,” Shepard said, at last. “That’s what matters.” Kaidan looked over his shoulder once more before leaning in and kissing Shepard. Shepard leaned back with a wry smile, “I think I’ve had enough hero worship for one day, what do you say we get out of here?” Kaidan nodded and took his hand. They slipped their dark glasses on and strode out of the museum arm in arm.

#n7 month #n7month #mass effect #fanfic #mshenko #kaidan alenko #commander shepard #thinking of sprucing up all the museum ones #and putting them on AO3 #would that work? i dunno

25 notes · View notes

stephensmithuk · 4 months

Text

Bunny's cage: HMP Wormwood Scrubs

Bunny Manders spends his 18 months of 'porridge' at what is today called HM Prison Wormwood Scrubs, located south of the park of that name in London W12. The HM of course stands for "His Majesty's". While the UK does have some privately run prisons, this is not one of them.

The nearest Tube is East Action and the A40 Westway is close by if you want to visit. Hammersmith Hospital is next door, in case prisoners need to go there.

It has an iconic entrance - see below - which is commonly used for prison release scenes in TV and movies, such as The Italian Job.

(The interiors for that were filmed at the long-closed Kilmainham Gaol in Dublin, also a common filming location, turning up in, of all things, Into the Badlands.)

Even one of the Gorillaz ended up there...

"The Scrubs" as it is known, was started in 1874 to a design by Sir Edmund Frederick Du Cane, who gives his name to the road the prison is on. The British needed to construct new prisons to hold convicts after transportation to Australia ended in 1867, basically because the non-convict Australians had had enough of being used as a dumping ground for criminals.

Convicts from Millbank Prison were used to construct a temporary facility initially and then worked over the next sixteen years until the facility was complete in 1891. It would hold male and female prisoners until 1902. At that point, the last of the latter were transferred to Holloway and the prison has been male-only since, although there may be some female officers there.

It had been intended for as a long-term penitentiary but ended up becoming a local prison for those serving shorter terms at "His/Her Majesty's Pleasure" as the popular, but inaccurate term would have it.

(That term is legally used for young offenders convicted of murder as an alternative to a life sentence)

Wormwood Scrubs was your typical prison of the period, as this 1903 image shows:

The nets, still there today, are an anti-suicide measure.

This article shows what a single person cell at Wormwood Scrubs looked like in 2015:

A lot of the cells today are two-person ones with a bunk bed.

Anyway, going back to 1896. After the 'Separate System' of the 1840s had driven prisoners mad, a new approach was tried from the 1860s. Basically, the idea was to "scare 'em straight" - make prison just undesirable enough so convicts did not reoffend. Reform was seen as impossible and attempting it pointless.

Du Cane was going to make hard time ...

(Du Cane putting on Victorian sunglasses)

Hard.

(GIF of Victorian man screaming "Capital, dear chap!")

Du Cane called this '‘Hard Labour, Hard Fare and Hard Board’.

Hard Labour

Prisoners would spend long periods of time, like eight hours a day, doing physical labour that was often completely pointless.

Stuff like:

Walking on a rotary treadwheel like you were a hamster. Not connected to anything in most cases. You got breaks, but you were basically climbing the equivalent of the Matterhorn on a daily basis.

Turning a crank thousands of times. Again for no actual useful reason than to break your spirit.

Picking up a cannonball, carrying it at chest height across the yard and putting it down again. Prisons would have cannons used to announce executions, but those generally didn't fire actual live rounds.

Untwisting tar-covered old ropes from ships so the fibres could be used as caulking for waterproofing said ships. This was arguably the most useful task for society, but it was a nasty one, causing cramp and bleeding fingers. This was commonly done in workhouses to by those deemed unsuitable for other tasks - so children, commonly. You would be expected to do at least 3lbs a day if sentenced to hard labour.

Breaking rocks in the hard rain. You'd fought the law and the law won.

This was also done under the 'Silent System' - prisoners were banned from talking to each other.

There were in fact two classes of hard labour and also work in a trade. If you were deemed to be unfit for the first class, you could be put in the second. If for neither, you would be put in a trade.

Oscar Wilde was assigned to the second class, so picked oakum while at Wandsworth. However, even that was too much for him and he collapsed at chapel, rupturing his right eardrum and spending two months in the infirmary. Transferred to Reading, he eventually ended up in charge of distributing books to prisoners from the small prison library.

Indeed, prisoners would try anything to avoid the treadwheel, like eating soap or large quantities of salt. Collapsing at the wheel could result in serious injury or even death as you could be crushed by the still turning device unless someone spotted you.

There was no labour on Sundays or public holidays. I imagine you would spend most of your time in the cells. Something not much changed today, considering the 2021 inspection report of Wormwood Scrubs I found.

Wormwood Scrubs has in fact got a very large chapel and today it has an organ originally from a cinema in Ealing.

Hard Fare

The food was deliberately kept monotonous, but enough of it was provided to keep the prisoners alive and able to work. The main staple was gruel (hence "doing porridge") as in the workhouses or the oatmeal-based substitute stirabout. However, you would get other stuff for doing hard labour. The Victorians ate a lot more bread and potatoes then we do today for example.

A 2019 study by the University of Liverpool found that many of the 400 prisoners they looked at remained with the same BMI as they went in with - many even gained weight.

However, that was by no means the sole indication of health - prisons could easily provide vectors for infection, even if they were less overcrowded then before.

Hard Board

Prisoners had formerly slept in hammcocks - they now had hard boards to sleep on instead. They would also wear blue uniforms with broad arrows on, still something seen in cartoons.

Literature was limited - Wilde was initally limited only to the Bible and The Pilgrim's Progress. He was initially not even allowed pen and paper either.

I believe you were allowed to spend an hour in the yard each day, but this was walking in single file with again no talking.

I can imagine that even with a stove, your cell might get quite chilly in winter. Chillbains would have been common.

Rule-breaking could lead to various punishments including flogging. You might also be put solely on bread and water, a punishment still employed by the US Navy until 2019.

Summary

Wilde, who would write two books on his experience, never recovered from his prison time. He is thought to have got meningitis as a result of his fall and died in France three years after his release.

The effect of all this on offending rates was limited too - many would end doing further sentences. At least you got fed, something not guaranteed outside unless you headed for the workhouse.

The latter history of Wormwood Scrubs

However, reform had started of the system and conditions would become a good deal less harsh. The more pointless hard labour was abolished in 1902.

The First World War saw the Scrubs hold a number of conscientious objectors, who had refused even non-combat roles as they saw those as keeping the war going - when refused an exemption, they had refused to obey orders to report to barracks. Hubert W. Peet spent 112 days there and his account is now public domain:

The 'sequel' as I often call it saw Wormwood Scrubs cleared of prisoners and taken over by the War Department. MI5 spent a short time based there at the start of the war. Secretaries would often be two to a cell.

The prison returned to normal operations afterwards.

In 1966, it would see its most famous escape.

George Blake

George Blake was an SIS officer who had started working for Soviet intelligence as while imprisoned in the Korean War. He tipped off the Soviets about the tunnel the Allies would dig under the West Berlin/East Berlin border to tap military telephone lines. Being the cagey bees they were and not wanting to compromise Blake, they waited a year before 'discovering' the tunnel in a blaze of publicity. In fact, they appear to have not even made measures to restrict what the lines were used for and the West probably got some pretty good intel off it.

More seriously, Blake betrayed a large number of SIS agents to the Soviet bloc, many of whom ended up dead as a result.

Blake was arrested in 1961, ultimately made a full confession and in a private trial at the Old Bailey was sentenced to 42 years in prison; the maximum sentence for his actual offence was 14 years, but he was deemed to have committed five separate offences and some would run consecutively. This was the longest non-life sentence ever handed down in a British court.

In 1966, Blake was helped to escape by three former prisoners, two anti-nuclear campaigners and an Irish career criminal called Sean Bourke, who thought his sentence was inhuman. They also liked him. A walkie-talkie was smuggled in. During the weekly film show, Blake broke a window in his cell block, got to the perimeter wall and then climbed a rope ladder thrown over it, breaking his wrist on the way down.

Blake would eventually be smuggled out of the UK and to East Germany, along with Bourke. Blake was picked up by the KGB, taken to the USSR and remained in what become Russia until his death in 2020 aged 98, being given a funeral with military honours.

The anti-nuclear campaigners were charged with aiding his escape in 1991, claiming a moral defence. The jury, as British juries sometimes do, ignored the judge's instructions to convict them and instead declared them both not guilty. Bourke had returned to Ireland, where the Supreme Court refused to extradite him in 1973 in the grounds his crime was a political one. He would die in 1982 after collapsing walking down the road; one ex-KGB defector has claimed he was poisoned.

Penal dustbin

In 1979, IRA prisoners staged a rooftop protest over visiting rights. Then a riot over conditions, including awful toothpaste, resulted in a lot of injuries. The governor had resigned just before the riots and when the 1982 inquiry blamed the prison, he called the place a "penal dustbin".

The 1990s saw six officers convicted over brutality and large compensation payouts - the chief inspector of prisons told the place to improve or close.

Various inspection reports over the years have seen some improvements in conditions... largely as many prisoners spent most of their day in their cells.

Famous and infamous residents

Various well-known people have spent time in the Scrubs, including:

Horatio Bottomley, a newspaper mogul of the era who got seven years in 1922 for stealing money from a bonds fund.

Charles Bronson. Not the actor, but he inspired the man's use of that name.

Pete Doherty, for breaching probation, one of his several run-ins with the law over drugs use.

Lord Alfred Douglas, Wilde's lover.

Leslie Grantham, the later actor who spent ten years in prison for murdering a taxi driver during a robbery in West Germany, where he was serving in the British Army.

Timmy Murphy, a jockey convicted of indecent assault on an air stewardess.

Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones.

John Stonehouse, a former government minister who faked his death to get away from false accouting charges. Which didn't work.

Wormwood Scrubs today

Wormwood Scrubs is a Category B prison, equivalent to the US federal 'Medium Security', with five wings (the last completed in 1996) and some smaller units. It holds around 1,200 prisoners. More than it really should, common to many prisons today.

It is also a listed building and so cannot be demolished - it may well close in the near future and become a museum.

Prisoners are given a uniform, but allowed to wear some of their own clothes after a while if they behave - white and black are banned to avoid confusion with prison officers.

It also holds those on remand awaiting trial or sentence. These do not wear prison uniform.

There are now options for video calls and prisoners can have landlines in their cells to call approved numbers, although officers can of course listen in. You can even send and receive emails to those inside, although not directly.

I will leave you with the 2021 inspection report on the prison:

Anyway, Bunny would not have had a nice time of it. Especially without Raffles...

#letters from bunny #aj raffles #history #factoids #london #prisons

8 notes · View notes

dilemmaontwolegs · 1 year

Text

Running from the Flames {19}

Pairing: Pierre Gasly x OFC Warnings: 18+ only, fluff, slight angst - this is a work of fiction and the events are not based on reality. Chapter: One || Two || Three || Four || Five || Six || Seven || Eight || Nine || Ten || Eleven* || Twelve || Thirteen || Fourteen || Fifteen || Sixteen || Seventeen || Eighteen || Nineteen || Twenty || under construction

Mum called Tuesday with an update. Pierre and I were curled up on the couch watching a rerun of The Grand Tour while Addie was lying across us having an afternoon nap, his hand softly stroking her hair while she slept. We all needed a rest after the busy morning spent showing Pierre our favourite parts of London and I regretted not taking my car when we went along High Street and bought more than we could really carry, but parking in the city was a bitch.

Pierre paused the show when he saw me accept the video call and I introduced the two of them before greeting dad who was sitting to the side of the screen drinking a beer with his lunch. Pierre did a double take seeing dad in track pants and a singlet after only seeing him in pressed suits for work.

“I’m guessing this isn’t a social call,” I commented as mum moved to her home office and put her reading glasses on.

“Unfortunately not. We need to talk about what our options are to deal with this.” She dropped the dossier of documents I had scanned through to her onto her desk with a loud thud. “The fastest option would be to offer a settlement out of court and pay Gordon for the damages, namely a broken nose and bruised ego.”

“Why should I give him a single penny? He came and harassed me!”

She sighed and rubbed at her temples just like I did when Addie was stressing me out. “We could countersue and file our own charges for breaching the restraining order. That would likely bankrupt him again because he can’t afford to drag out a case against us.”

“If he goes bankrupt again he will just have another axe to grind with me. I want him out of my life, not a reason to come at me again.”

“You’ve gotta work with me here, querida. Nothing is going to be a perfect solution,” she said as she sat back in her chair chewing the end of her pen.

“Could we go to court and see what a judge thinks of the case?”

“It would likely be a jury, not a judge, but I wouldn’t advise it. Have you read this?” she asked as she waved the papers around.

I looked down sheepishly and admitted, “Not all of it.”

Mum knew that actually meant I hadn’t read any of it. “The stipulations of this would mean your passports are surrendered until the verdict is ruled, which would take considerably longer than the other options.”

I looked at Pierre as I digested the news. “So I would be stuck here?”

“You would be grounded, yes.”

I swallowed deeply at the thought and shook my head. I wasn’t willing to waste the time I had left with Pierre before I started work. I could already feel the date looming over me like a guillotine. “Offer a settlement. I don’t care what it takes.”

“Are you sure?”

“Maybe we should talk about this,” Pierre stopped me from answering with a hand on my thigh.

“There’s nothing to talk about. I’m coming with you to Canada next week, end of story.” I placed my hand on his and squeezed it before I looked back at mum with a nod. “Do it.”

“Okay, honey, I’ll give you an update when I have one. Drive safe tomorrow and give Adelaide a kiss from me.”

“Gracias, mamá. Hasta mañana.” I ended the video call and leaned back into Pierre’s shoulder with a sigh and expected to see him looking at me but he was staring intently at the tv though it was still on pause. “Babe, what’s wrong?”

He dragged his eyes away from the frozen Jeremy Clarkson and chewed on his bottom lip. “Are you sure you want to go with a settlement? Shouldn’t you think about it a little longer?”

“I’m not going to just stay stuck here while you’re halfway across the world.” Doubt started to creep in and I carefully shifted Addie so I could turn to face him. “I know a lot has happened in a short time and you said it was fine but if this is too much, just let me know. I’ll understand if…”

Pierre reached for my face and cupped my jaw as his lips pressed together. “I’m not going to leave you, Bri, so please stop suggesting it. I’m already having a hard time thinking about what happens after Belgium.”

I carefully shifted back into his arms but the stirring was still enough to wake Addie and she sat up, rubbing her bleary eyes as she murmured, “We go park now?”

“Mummy has to go see someone soon and Pierre is going to stay and play with you.”

“I’m happy to take her, if that’s alright with you?” he asked in French so she didn’t understand and get too excited in case I said no.

“If you’re up for it, there’s spare keys on the hook in the kitchen.” I checked my watch and saw I needed to leave soon to make it to Dr Pascoe’s office in time. I pulled Addie into my arms and hugged her tight as I told her the rules again. “Be the good girl I know you are and no running away. Listen to Pierre and do as he tells you, he wants to keep you safe. I love you.”

“Love you,” she said, planting a big wet kiss on my cheek before laughing and running to the shoe rack. “Let’s gooooo!”

“She was asleep 10 seconds ago,” Pierre said as he looked to his empty lap in dismay.

“She goes zero to 60 in 3.5.”

Pierre got up and offered a hand, pulling me to my feet and into his arms. Every time we kissed I was amazed to find I was still on solid ground because I always got a little light headed and I expected to open my eyes and find myself in the clouds.

“Je t’aime.”

Kissing him left me dizzy but hearing those words made me swoon and I pressed my body closer, my hands sneaking beneath his hoodie so I could feel his muscles move beneath his smooth skin. I lost track of time as I stared into those mesmerising eyes of his and echoed, “I love you.”

–

I dropped Pierre and Addie off at the playground on my way to Dr Pascoe’s and my eyes kept lingering on them in the rearview as I left. There was always a big grin on Addie’s face when she was with Pierre and he was no different as they walked off holding hands.

The image was still on my mind while I sat opposite Sarah and updated her on my latest epiphany.

“Do you think I’m moving too fast?” I asked, even though I knew the next words that were going to come out of her mouth.

“Do you?”

“If I were an uninvolved third party, just spectating, I would say yes. But, I’m not and I don’t think so? I don’t even know if that makes sense. I think his profession doesn’t help because it's so dangerous, I mean last weekend he had a hell of a crash and I keep thinking if I hadn’t told him how I felt and he had been seriously injured, or worse, then I would have felt absolutely sick to my stomach.”

“Good, you are proactively thinking these things while making your choices, that is good.” She scribbled some notes down before flicking back a few pages and tapping what was written there. “And has anything happened since the incident with Trent Gordon?”

I groaned and shifted in the leather chair, my arms folding over my chest and she wrote down something new in her notepad.

“I take that as a yes. Would you like to talk about it?”

It didn’t take much to start me off on that saga and bring her up to speed with the settlement and how Pierre reacted.

“Part of me thinks he doesn’t want me to go with him. Maybe this is too much baggage, it’s unfair of me to expect so much from him,” I said with a resigned sigh as I vocalised the worry that had been whispered in my head.

“Have you asked him?”

“Of course. He says he wants Addie and I with him wherever he goes.”

“Then you should trust his decision.”

“What if he’s just too nice to say anything? He seemed opposed to me making the settlement.”

“That is something you will have to discuss with him but perhaps he is worried you will resent him later on because he knows don’t want to give Mr Gordon the money. Is that something you think you may come to regret?”

“I don’t want to give Trent a single cent but this is just a simple transaction and that is how I am going to treat it. I know how fortunate I am that I am in a position to be able to value time over money because of my family. I want to spend my time with Pierre. So, if it takes giving that assho- sorry, that man some money to make that time possible then I will spend it without regret.”

“I think you should explain to him exactly what you said to me, it might just be what he needs to hear.” She looked up at the clock and closed her book as the hour ended. “We’ll have to work out the time differences but I think a quick catch up while you are away could be a good idea. And if you have any more nightmares or panic attacks, call the emergency number because I want to find out a little more about what’s triggering these again.”

I called Pierre as soon as I was out of the building and he said they were still at the playground. Addie had made a friend, unsurprisingly, and she didn’t want to leave. Pierre didn’t seem too concerned about spending so long in the park since he wasn’t as easily recognised by parents that were busy chasing their own kids around.

“Boo,” I whispered as I rose on my tiptoes and kissed his ear after sneaking up on him. He didn’t even flinch, merely chuckled as he pulled me around him and into his arms so my back was flush to his chest. “How did you know I was there? I dodged every twig and leaf.”

He pointed to the ground in front of us as he rested his chin on my shoulder. “Sorry, beautiful ninja, your shadow gave you away.”

“I’ll sneak something by you one day.” I waved at Addie when she spotted me and she waved back before climbing up the playground with the other little girl her age. “Is that her friend? What happened to her hair?”

Pierre chuckled nervously. “Her hair tie came out and it was getting in her face. I kind of tried to tie it back.”

I struggled to hold back the laughter and failed when Addie jumped down the ledge, the loose band falling away and releasing all her dark curls in a cascade. “Not a bad first attempt,” I said through the giggles, “but we’ll work on that.”

“It lasted a whole 5 minutes, just saying. I think that deserves a reward.”

I turned in his arms and peeked up at him from under my lashes as I licked my lips. “Yeah? What did you have in mind?”

“A few things,” he smirked before whispering in my ear, “all dirty things.”

Click here to for chapter twenty.

Tagging: @my-only-way-tocooperatewithlife

#pierre gasly x poc!oc #pierre gasly fanfic #pierre gasly x oc #formula one fanfiction #f1 fanfic #f1 imagine #running from the flames

111 notes · View notes

justforbooks · 6 months

Text

Phil Baines, who has died aged 65 of multiple system atrophy, was one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary British graphic design. His work included books, posters, art catalogues and lettering for three important London monuments – the memorial to the Indian Ocean tsunami in the grounds of the Natural History Museum and the 7 July memorials in Hyde Park and Tavistock Square, commemorating the victims of the 2005 London bombings. These projects point to Baines’s defining attributes: a scholarly appreciation of letterforms, a deep-rooted respect for materials and a love of collaboration.

Such attributes can also be seen in Baines’s cover designs for the Penguin Great Ideas series (2004-20), works by “great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries” that gave him a canvas on which to display his typographic philosophy. The Saint Augustine – Confessions of a Sinner cover, for instance, uses ancient ecclesiastical letterforms and yet looks superbly modern. For Chuang Tzu — The Tao of Nature, Baines arranged letters to suggest a butterfly in flight. David Pearson, one of two art directors for the series, described how his “often-oblique approach gave the series a crucial added dimension”.

Born in Kendal, Cumbria, Phil was one of the three children of Martin Baines, a construction contract manager, and Joan (nee Quarmby), a horticulturalist. Growing up in a Roman Catholic household, he began studies for the priesthood at Ushaw College, County Durham. During the holidays from Ushaw he worked at the Guild of Lakeland Craftsmen, Windermere, and from there his interest and confidence in art grew.

At the start of his fourth year, he quit Ushaw, and in 1980 began a year’s study on the foundation course at Cumbria College of Art and Design. In 1982 he moved to London and enrolled on the graphic design course at St Martin’s School of Art (now Central Saint Martins), where he met Jackie Warner, whom he married in 1989, and where he was among a talented cohort, many of whom went on to study, as he did, at the Royal College of Art.

Richard Doust, then leader of the first-year course at St Martins, recalled the portfolio Baines submitted for admission: “I was so excited … I was sure he was going to be someone very special. He quickly established his individuality. He made typography and particularly letterpress his own territory.”

Baines was fiercely individual – he did not join schools of thought or align himself with fashionable camps. Instead, he built a creative practice based on his belief in the “humanist” qualities of the English typographic tradition.

His contemporaries were using the computer to bring a new complexity to graphic communication. Smart software allowed for the overlapping and interweaving of text in ways that echoed the ecclesiastical manuscripts that Baines admired so much. He was no Luddite, and used the computer himself, yet his work invariably retained an element of the handmade.

Paradoxically, his work was greatly admired by the new generation of digital designers. Neville Brody, for instance, included Baines’s work in his experimental typography publication FUSE, produced to demonstrate the malleability of the new digital typography. Baines’s work does not look out of place among the other contributors, many of them American typography radicals whose multi-layered layouts were driven by modish theories of deconstruction and poststructuralism.

In 1988 he returned to Central Saint Martins (CSM), as part of the faculty. In staff meetings his willingness to say the unsayable was a frequent cause for consternation among colleagues. To his students he preached a doctrine of “object-based learning”, a typically contrarian notion in the age of screen-based and virtual graphic design. He was appointed a professor in 2006 and retired in 2020 as emeritus professor.

Despite his commitment to teaching, Baines did not give up his work for clients. As well as designing books for leading publishers, he worked for the Crafts Council and the Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, and designed the signage for CSM’s King’s Cross campus. He designed exhibition catalogues for Matt’s Gallery, south-west London, relishing the creative three-way collaboration that existed between the gallery’s director, Robin Klassnik, exhibiting artists and himself.

He wrote books that contributed to the understanding of visual communication: Type & Typography (with Andrew Haslam, 2002), Signs: Lettering in the Environment (with Catherine Dixon, 2003) and Penguin by Design: A Cover Story 1935-2005 (2005), the last of which helped establish Penguin cover art as one of the most important bodies of graphic art in British design history.

With Dixon, he co-curated the Central Lettering Record, an archive of typographic history housed at CSM, and in November 2023 his work was celebrated in an exhibition, Extol: Phil Baines Celebrating Letters, at the Lethaby gallery, CSM. He was appointed as the Royal Mint advisory committee’s lettering expert in 2016, and reappointed in 2021 to advise on the integration of lettering on new coins and medals, with consideration given to special issues and the accession of King Charles to the throne. For this work, in 2023 he was awarded the Coronation medal.

Baines was an enthusiastic runner and cyclist, and loved music, especially the Manchester post-punk band the Fall. He was a collector of signs, lettering, and railwayana, and built his own studios at his home in Willesden Green, north-west London. A few years before his retirement he moved to Great Paxton, Cambridgeshire, where he took up bellringing.

He is survived by Jackie and their two daughters, Beth and Felicity, and by his father.

🔔 Philip Andrew Baines, graphic designer, born 8 December 1958; died 19 December 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#just for books #Phil Baines #in memoriam

9 notes · View notes