#he’s a victim of not only people greed for power but the governments corruption

[wherenymphsroam]

do NOT think about leon struggling with identity issues. because he totally doesn’t. noooo way.

[littleemptyattik]

This week I finished reading this book— The Republic of Pirates by Colin Woodard

For a book that's entirely nonfiction and written with only the solid facts as the main focus, I can honestly say I felt more emotions reading this than any other book in a long time.

Despite my instinctive love for the world and concept of classic pirates, when I picked up this book I was preparing to be disappointed in some ways; I wanted to know the truth about them, but I was afraid the truth was dismal and that I was going to find a book full of men not to be admired, motivated by their own greed and violence.

In the history of piracy there is certainly greed and violence, but it's not the pirates that I found myself despising. Maybe I'm still a little biased by my idealized view of them, but after reading this book I can't help but feel more love for that league of pirate kings and queens. These were people whose governments—mainly the British, but also the French and others, including the blooming Americas—had not only neglected, but also abused and exploited and even tortured. More than once in the early chapters I had to put the book down because I felt overwhelmed reading about some of the accounts of navy and merchant ships, whose captains and owners had manipulated or even straight-up kidnapped men and boys to put to work as practical slaves. Hundreds of thousands of innocent lives were lost to the sea with no proper respect, sometimes even through deliberate murder by their superiors, and no one did anything about it because these men and boys (and the women and children who were left behind) were poor and had no power, existing as nothing but a workforce for politicians and businessmen to use until they broke.

I'm not going to pretend the pirates weren't sometimes just as vile; of course they were, at times. But these men had decided that enough was enough, that their lives were worth more than having their bodies dumped overboard so some old man could count his riches in his mansion back on land. I feel like many of us can still relate to this in our world today.

These men and women weren't saints, but I don't know what choice they had. Mutinying, thievery, fear tactics—these were all the resources they had, and it was either that or continue to be exploited by a system that gave them no benefit. And in the end, even the most vicious pirate in this book was not as corrupt as most of the high-class thieves and murderers who got away with their corruption because it was legal. The pirates stole to survive and try to thrive in a world not made for them. They married women of other cultures and had beautiful mixed children in a time when that was rare and would be for three more centuries. They often freed slaves from the cargo holds and invited them to join their crews, not caring about their skin color or even if they didn't speak the same language. I found myself laughing more than once at how the many of them would board a ship and then send the crew on their way with an apology and well wishes to get home safely, sometimes even paying the captain for his trouble and the goods they took. Though they did harm some people and earned their reputation in some ways, these men weren't a stereotype of cruelty and lust. They were human.

I held myself back because I was in public at the time, but when I read the last few pages detailing the fall of the pirate leaders, I felt somehow like I was losing friends. They certainly weren't perfect, but I also can't agree that they deserved their fates. The propaganda and political corruption of the times had ensured pirates like "Blackbeard" would be remembered with hatred and terror even to this day, when in reality, the brilliant Edward Teach was known in his circles for his mercy and moral standards toward his men and his victims. In a world where violence was utilized like a tool, forced upon men like him who didn't actually want violence, did he really deserve to die so brutally? Did Calico Jack and Stede Bonnet and Mary Read, and that 20-something-year-old who called the audience cowards for not standing up against their oppressors just before he was hanged with seven others? In a republic (because it was exactly that, a system of fair election based on merit), did the pirate leaders deserve to have their society torn apart so that the old system of exploitation could continue?

After I finished the book, I ate dinner and just wondered...What if? What if some of the pirates' political plans, like Charles Vane's desire to depose the royal family, had actually happened? (That's the same royal family that still rules Britain today, by the way.) What if they had been united with more educated people to enhance their society, providing more structure to it? What if they'd kept Nassau as their capital, creating a trade system that might help fund their goals and dreams? What if their knowledge about other lands and peoples had become the norm? Would we be more intermixed in color and culture today, more advanced in our treatment of other people groups as equals? What if the ideologies hadn't been suppressed, but had been allowed to spread around cities and towns in Britain, Europe, and the Americas, ideologies of freedom for individuals and curiosity about the world and motivation to challenge injustice? What if they'd been given the chance to rule for longer than just the handful of years they'd had?

I didn't mean to write all of this, honestly. I was just going to give a little summary and post the photo. But it's been repeating in my head for days now...What if?

(And just to be clear, I would have married Blackbeard if he'd asked.)

[greensaplinggrace]

🔥Shadow and Bone

okay. shadow and bone’s portrayal of the darkling as ‘the charming, manipulative older abuser’ isn’t subversive. it’s not even subversive for it’s genre. anyone who claims it is is acting like a pretentious douchebag and gives off the impression that shadow and bone is the only thing they’ve read in their life.

a series that paints it’s main activist for the oppressed minority as the villain, has the heroes oppose him and then kill him, and then has them uphold the status quo without ever addressing the problems that radicalized him in the first place - actually making the situation worse for the oppressed minority after his death - is a series that is loyal to the genre’s regular inability to properly address real world problems or challenge societally accepted, regularly taught, and preconceived beliefs, biases, and prejudices in any way. it abides by all societal rules and standards.

furthermore, it embraces the majority of popular american media’s desire to in some way propagandize the government and/or the catholic church. this is displayed in the presence of nikolai, who functions as the white savior - a less outcast, less traumatized version of ‘the abuser’, who rolls in privilege and embodies everything the white leftist thinks is acceptable. he is one of the Good Ones, after all. 

this is also evident in the way the writing treats it’s main female characters: by shaming them for their desires, infantilizing them and whitewashing their worse actions, and often making them two dimensional victims of the ‘dark, dangerous, outcast seductor’ with no real personality anymore. when the female characters are ‘empowered’ in this series, it is usually only when they are enforcing the status quo - any other moment of power is likened to greed, selfishness, and monstrousness (which is all, of course, only ever tied to the oppressed minority and to men).

the only time the women in the series can be truly ‘good’ is when they are stripped of all personality, progression, or power - or when they are directly opposing or disagreeing with the villain. this gets to such a point in the books where the main female character’s arc of self actualization is regressed in an effort to turn her away from such ‘evil thoughts and desires’, simply because the villain encouraged her to engage with them. 

in a startling show of entirely embracing this genre’s many sexist flaws, the main character is stripped of her agency and beaten back from her growth into true womanhood and self acceptance simply because of the sins and influence of one man. he must have corrupted her, says the narrative. he is the one that put her darkness there. and so she is therefore never allowed to truly explore those darker parts of herself to reach the full breadth of her own actualization and self acceptance.

she can now never truly come to love herself because she has been ‘tainted’. and now the only true way she can be saved and happy is if she is ‘cleansed’ of what makes her other from society. the fundamental tying of everything that makes alina different and unique to something 'sinful' will forever condemn her to a life of assimilation and loss.

not to mention that - as has been stated before - the series does nothing to actually challenge any actual preconceived notions of abusers, and instead only cements the common belief that abusers are easy to identify and noticeable in their status as outcast from society and from the ‘church’. the regular dehumanization of the darkling by the fictional church as well as the socially accepted characters presents him as a monster, which only solidifies the common belief that abusers are not people, that they don't function as people, and that they are universally unliked.

the use of dark and light themes could have been groundbreaking if implemented correctly, but instead the heavy handed attempts at moralizing through these symbols only further makes the series standard to the genre by enforcing your typical puritanical roles upon characters that deserved more nuance. 

it was a basic ya novel in every way, it did nothing to actually subvert the genre, for subversion is only effective when you don’t hate the genre you’re subverting, and the author’s aversion to ya, fantasy, and the women who read it and ‘fall for it’ is clear in both real life and in what she’s written. the series’ ‘condemnation’ of the ‘dark, charming, and brooding older lover’ actually ended up making the series less subversive simply because it was not only handled so poorly that it practically condemned and shamed abuse victims instead, but also because it enforced the same standards society and most popular ya enforces today in young women or people of any minority when it comes to their determined roles.

you know what piece of media is subversive for it’s genre? black sails. you know what piece of media isn’t? shadow and bone.

send me a 🔥 for an unpopular opinion (x)

[codenamesazanka]

Jumping off of my previous post about Harima Oji:

From the Databook 2:

張間歐児 | Harima Oji

奇怪なコスチュームを身に纏った盗賊。主に富裕層を標的とし、奪った金銭を貧しい人々にふりまく。その行為は犯罪だが一部の人々からは支持されていたようだ。

A thief who wore a strange costume. He mainly targeted the rich and gave away the stolen money to the needy. Such deeds were criminal acts, but it seemed he had the support of some of the public.

So here was a guy called the Peerless Thief, the quirky HeroAca version of Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. He used his quirk without an license, he technically committed a crime, sure, but from what we know of him, he sounded like a good guy, a true hero in spirit, with people who considered him so.

Yet according to Gentle in Chapter 171, history knows him as a Villain (Criminal) that lives in infamy, compared to the likes of All For One. Pretty harsh.

But this makes sense, in a twisted way. Harima Oji started his criminal career as a response to the establishment of the Hero System. It was his protest, his message demanding reformation. He saw early on how the new system was flawed, and probably became one of the first officially labeled ‘Villains’ by refusing to abide by it.

Lady Nagant, and other characters both in the main series and side material, have said that Heroes and everything they do are supported by the trust of the people. This was the foundation of the whole thing, and it needed to be unshakable.

Because it’s just a promise, a social contract, it’s like the “consent of the governed” - Heroes are allowed to use their powerful, sometimes even lethal, quirks to help the public, as long as the people sees them as necessary and good, and accept this use of power. Beating someone up real bad, even if they’re a criminal? Buildings and property being wrecked during a fight? Civilians dying as collateral damage? Even more ‘minor’ things like amassing wealth enough to become enviable to the typical middle-class person? These are accepted as long as Heroes prove they are more beneficial than costly to society.

That requires a tremendous amount of faith, a belief that Heroes are always righteous and will come through, that the people will be okay placing their lives and safety in their hands. The Hero Public Safety Commission knows this. That’s why they have Lady Nagant taking out enemies too strong or subversive for the typical Hero to handle, as well as taking out corrupted Heroes that will show a terrible public image if their misdeeds are exposed.

But Harima Oji threatened to ruin all of this, right at the very beginning. Here was a criminal running circles around Pro-Heroes, uncatchable by supposedly well-trained and powerful individuals. Here was an ‘informal’ hero just as popular, exposing the legal Heroes’ corruption and greed, not only taking them to task but helping to recompense the victims. Here was just a single man who was destroying all of the HPSC’s hard work, undermining the Hero System before it could even get really started, erasing the very trust they were trying to cultivate. Especially in those early days, when things were touch and go and if they fail, it could mean a return to the darkness of societal chaos, it would be the end to their legitimacy to rule.

Of course the HPSC would hate Harima Oji. Of course they would paint him as only a Villain through and through, and try to change the narrative of good and evil, making out Heroes to be completely just and infallible while the opponents they fight are evil, maybe barely-human monsters.

Of course the HPSC must keep up this black and white illusion, to deal with unsavory Heroes themselves before their scandals and crimes are exposed to the public and to point-blank execute any Villains before they do anything that could make their Good Heroes look weak.

Have a sham hero get made a fool of, expose them to public knowledge, and one can possibly spark a debate among the people, a desire to tackle this issue, to change attitudes towards the current system and modify the power structure; kill the sham hero and everyone is left in the dark, blissfully ignorant and agreeable. Then kill the people threatening to reveal this lie. Kill your own, kill your supposed values, kill the rules you had promised, had swore to uphold at your convenience. All a necessity, for this Hero Society.

SO WHAT IF Mr. Compress during his days of being a phantom thief, carrying on the family tradition, trying to make his great-great-grandfather’s dream a reality— What if Mr. Compress had discovered this ugly truth, this fragile system maintained with the blood of its enemies and its own? What could you do against someone who breaks the rules of engagement; who uses secret, extrajudiciary killing to prevent even a whisper of change?

Maybe that’s when you want to tear the whole thing down. Maybe that’s why Mr. Compress joined Shigaraki Tomura, who has promised exactly just this - the destruction of Heroes and everything they’ve built.

(but what about the innocent? what about the cost of this? what about Harima’s reformation? what about the fact that Shigaraki sees no future and wants not a better world, but just an empty horizon?

Well, Mr. Compress never was and never did claim to be a Hero.)

-

td;lr:

Mr. Compress: “Grandfather said to follow Harima’s example and keep just stealing and making fools out of the Heroes and that will eventually bring reformation… But I just saw the two dudes I was trying to expose get killed in cold blood by a HPSC sniper. That sort of thing changes your perspective.”

-

thank you @aysall and @stillness-in-green for helping me brainstorm this! thank you every one for reading and sorry it’s so long!!

[fish-00]

Dream SMP hot takes you probably are gonna wanna fight me on:

- Techno has a victim complex and is a bad person. He’s also enforcing his beliefs onto outers by wanting them to destroy all governments because it corrupts people. He can say that but why should they listen to him since the only language Techno speaks is violence? You know what also corrupts people? Trauma. It’s fine if he thinks they should take down all government but if the way he’s gonna do it by traumatizing everyone in the process more then L’manburg ever has by simply just existing then he can fuck right off. He’s caused more harm than good that way

- George's "Just tell me you hate me." line is so fucking toxic but he’s palls with Dream so it makes sense. Also him not showing up for the elections to be there for his friend was a dick move and I don’t think he ever apologized for it to Quackity even though he knew It was important to him.

- Sam didn't originally know who was gonna be put in the prison so him building it as inhuman as it is even if pre dream's request was shitty of him to do. He started out driven by greed and was on a payroll just like Punz and STILL is driven by some sort of greed showcased by the fact he is starting a  bank so he can control the economy of the server. 

- Tommy didn't deserve the fucking exile him threatening Dream and burning 10 blocks of a house does not warrant an exile! Why is it when everyone else does it to him X10 (Dream with the disks and people constantly grifing him with no consequences) it's ok but the moment he does it back in the slightest he gets exiled???? Make it make sense.

- Tommy hasn't started nearly as much conflict as he's ended. Sapnap on the outer hand has started conflict after conflict and killed pet after pet time and time again and was never punished even once but people still blame everything on Tommy when he never even killed a pet and even ended that war by being the bigger person and making amends with Sapnap returning his pet back to him unharmed. Throughout that entire war killing a pet wasn’t even an option in Tommy’s head. He threatened Sapnap but never raised his hand against any of his pets. I don’t care if he has Karl and Quackity now he doesn’t have to lose them or surfer in order to learn from his mistakes improve and be a better person he needs to take accountability.

- Wilbur was kind of shit from the start and made children fight his wars. Wilbur shares a lot of similarities with Dream and is arguably just as bad as him but for different reasons and his cannon D&D aliment chart pretty much confirms it. He also probably  had a hero complex somewhere down the line. After he is resurrected he needs to take responsibility and own up for his mistakes even though I compare him to Dream in his actions I don’t think he deserves to be locked up like him since he didn’t want as much of a reach or tried to get as much of a reach like Dream did. Wilbur wanted power over L’manburg a small portion of the SMP while Dream wanted everything. 

- Niki & Jack have no actual good reason as to want to kill Tommy and are mostly looking for someone to take there anger out on and Tommy is the perfect target since he’s been villainized so much by Dream and is really to overlook his actions as selfish when not knowing what his end goal is. 

- Jack Manifold keeps on preaching about being in the right to want to take his anger out on a child for losing his items so many times saying that Tubbo will learn to move on eventually because everyone does because he moved on every time he lost his stuff. His stuff he can replace and grind back that held no sentimental attachment like the disks and can be replaced. People can’t be replaced. This makes him a hypocrite since he criticizes Tommy for fighting wars over stupid disks yet he himself is willing to kill for losing his armorer he can replace. When it really came down to it Tommy always choose people over the disks no matter what. And while I don't want to discredit what Jack has been through because there are people who have been through worse Tommy fundamentally can not understand why Jack would be upset with him since in his exile losing his armor and weapons was a daily occurrence for him (by force mind you if he didn’t compile Dream would hurt him) and since he’s lost so much more and never been upset with anyone to the point of wanting to kill them after everything everyone’s done to him. Even Dream. Tommy satiated he wanted to make it very clear that he thinks Dream doesn’t deserve death. Plus the fact that Jack has never brought it up to him before.

- Niki who can't find a proper coping mechanism is taking out her grief, pain and anger onto Tommy. Blaming him for all their problems believing that if they killed him there problems would go with him. Which simply is not true. She’s following in to Wilbur’s footsteps and even Tommy told Sam Nook that she gave off that sort of creepy vibe Wilbur used to have during Pogtopia.  She acts as if Tommy is the source of all her problems and I feel like she even participially blames him for Wilbur death and everything that happened with L’manburg. She believes  it'll make her feel better about everything and even burned down L'mantree which Wilbur wouldn’t have been proud of her for doing since he has said himself

right before the Pogtopia VS Manburg war: 

"You can't erase history just cuz you disagree with it." 

-  Wilbur-fucking-Soot while on his way to blow up the country yet still covering L'mantree in obsidian and wanting to protect it the only thing that was left untouched from original L'manburg and what they stood for eventually after there rough start of being propaganda that eventually turned into a symbole for something much more. Despite Its rough start L’manburg had potential and if it weren’t for Wilbur being power hungry and wanting to show off in the elections they could have just enjoyed the peace they fought so hard for. 

- They also compare him to/make him out to be worse then Dream which I find downright disgusting knowing what he did but even without knowing about everything Dream’s done to Tommy It’s still a huge stretch (but they are blaming him for every bad thing to ever happen on the server and ignore all the times he’s has been done right punished for making small mistakes or misunderstandings).

- And lastly Dream manipulating minors to the point of breaking them physically and mentally isn’t hot pull it together.

[floralseokjin]

;club zombie (m)

In a world overrun by zombies, you’d think everyone was a goner, but the reality is much different. A steady diet of brains lets a zombie exist as a fully functioning human. Just ignore the part where they’re technically dead… In fact, these days, the amount of zombies outweigh the humans. A lot jump at the chance to be turned. Beg for it. 

Kim Seokjin controls the underground of Seoul. No one would dare cross him. That’s how most of the world goes these days. You wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of a zombie now, would you? However, you don’t quite see it like that. Spending most nights dancing at the club he owns, you catch his eye. It’s never the wrong side if you’re underneath him, right…?

pairing; kim seokjin x reader  genre/warnings; zombie! seokjin, mafia boss! seokjin, smut, oc has a ring kink (relatable), gets angsty two thirds in, some type of romance bc of course it gets fluffy towards the end lol words; 17,113

listen to; friction // 555 

⇢ Part of the Deadly Intentions collaboration. With @btssmutgalore​, @kpopfanfictrash, @underthejoon, @lamourche , @prolixitae and @taetaetrashhh, who organised the whole thing and created the moodboard! 

Please forget everything you’ve ever known about most zombie portrayals in books, movies and tv series, because this is totally different. The idea and inspiration came from the television adaptation of iZombie. If you’ve watched it then you have a better vision of how the zombies in my story are portrayed. If not, then please just give it a go lol. It may sound wacky, but it’s Halloween! So here’s to the 🧟🍆!! I hope you enjoy! 

You could hear Seokjin’s footsteps, boots clanking up the wooden stairs, and your stomach lurched in anticipation. He’d made you wait two frustratingly long hours, which was hell considering you hadn’t had time to be alone together all week. You were beyond excited for him to finally get his hands on you. Your body had long got used to craving him down to the very bone. 

He came into sight, the image of you draped along his bed rooting him in his tracks. Your robe barely covered your modesty. Nipples visibly hard against the silk. Sometimes there was no need for underwear. Not when it got torn off most of the time. He needn’t waste his money anymore. You let a slow smirk stretch across your face. “How do you want me tonight, Sir?” 

No need to greet him with a hello neither. What was the point? He’d told you to be in his home ready for him when he got back. Bedroom. He’d made that very specific. There was no need for pleasantries. Not when you knew greater ways to please him.

Him. 

Kim Seokjin. 

How did you get here again? So easily. So willingly. Like you’d wanted such a thing from the moment you’d laid your eyes on him. You had. Seokjin wasn’t your husband, nor boyfriend. He wasn’t even a casual hook up. In some ways he was more than any of the above. In others, he was less. It was an arrangement. The most simplest kind. Sex. With the city’s most dangerous man. 

No one in Seoul would dare cross him. Hell, this whole country. Maybe it ran deeper than even that. No, what were you saying? It definitely did. You just didn’t want to know. You didn’t want to know the details. You didn’t even want to think about what they could be. To you, the man you shared yourself so openly with could never be what they all described him as. Not when he’d shared so much with you too. It was puzzling to think people actually feared him. He had never frightened you. In fact, you’d only ever known him as gentle. Even when he had his icy cold hands wrapped around your throat, fucking into you so hard his bed, amongst other things, were fit to break. 

Yeah. This wasn’t the turn you thought your life would take. But then again, this world wasn’t exactly the same place it had been four years ago. The human race had to grow a thicker skin. Most changed completely. See, Seokjin wasn’t just your average crime lord. He was a rotter. So was over half the population. 

Dead and rotten on the inside. Cold and smooth on the outside. The correct scientific term was Undead, but in simpler, more familiar terms, they were zombies. Not your average text fiction kind though. No flesh rots. No foul smell. No incoherent noises, that sent a bolt of terror and dread through your body. No, the undead were able to live as fully functioning humans for the most part. A reality that took a little while to make sense of, but as it did, the world everyone had known began to change. Drastically.  

Unsure how it all started, although known to have been caused by some crazy scientist type, the disease, as it was called—now more of a lifestyle—had swept through most of America before their government and medicals could get to grips with it. It was as it was known in fiction. A zombie apocalypse. The whole world went into lockdown, flown into madness. Panic and strife were universal. The infected were destroyed and the potentially infected were quarantined. It was there they began to understand the infection. 

The virus still burning through the veins of the innocent would be extremely difficult to handle. The were, by lack of knowledge back then, your “cannon” zombie. Unable to speak, unable to think, and their eyes sunken, black and lifeless. If given the chance, and some had been, they would tear at the flesh of the uninfected, feast on their brains. However, kept under a close eye, locked and controlled in a box room where they couldn’t see out but an array of people could see in, medicals soon discovered there were ways to quell the deep, ravenous need they had inside them. Portions. That was the key. Starved or gorged of human brain just turned them frenzied. The need as a fresh, baby zombie was insatiable but with a controlled diet the world became a little more normal again. 

If you could ever call it normal. Human greed was at an all-time high. Who didn’t find it amazing that you could be a certified zombie while also retaining your human life? Who wouldn’t want to be dangerous? Feared? Who wouldn’t want to live potentially forever? The list went on, and that didn’t include countless governments’ motives. Soon the infection had spread willingly throughout the world. It caused fresh havoc. Some countries who hadn’t even wanted to get caught up in the mess, perished because they were too small or undeveloped. But most were smart, scheming. Here in the East a plan was concocted. 

Somehow they found the individual who created the virus. Whether they went willingly or were forced no one would ever know. Their identity still remained a mystery even after all these years. Together some of the countries’ top scientists helped mutate the sickness into something “better”. Injected straight into the veins, there was no longer a fear of the infected losing control. The Undead were created. Just another form of human, but with a hunger for brains. It took a total of eighteen months for the world to be okay again. 

Now that was all just a memory. Zombies were considered the norm, accepted into society long ago. A recent consensus found that just under 60% of the world’s population were undead. Humans the minority. They lived like humans, worked like humans and had families like humans. Although not in the traditional sense. The undead could still have sex. The men could still cum, by some grace of god, lucky them, but they were infertile. Women too. Reproductive system dead like the rest of them. 

Of course, just because there were a lot of humane rotters, didn’t mean there weren’t bad ones amongst the mix. Like you said, humans were greedy. Mostly for power, and being a rotter in the right place, right time gave people tonnes of that. They weren’t truly immortal though. That was well known. A shot to their rotten brain would kill them. Nothing else. That’s where the infection resided. 

To be turned there was a system. Applications, interviews, contracts…a waiting list for the injection that would alter your life forever. However, it didn’t work like that most of the time. The world wasn’t so perfect. Corrupt would be a better description. There were other, more simple, ways of turning. A bite or a scratch. Or even sexually transmitted within the first year of infection. There was nothing the government could do about it, and there were many illegal zombies rooming the country. And try all they might, no matter how many times, scientists couldn’t change the way infection took place. 

They also couldn’t change the compulsion for brains. Yes, there was no lost control in the beginning, but starved of brains for too long, devolved them into the “cannon” zombie once again. It would take months of starvation, but after the deed was done, it was impossible to be reverted back. Thus they were destroyed. As you could guess, crime levels had not lowered. They had only gotten worse due to gluttony. 

Donors now offered their brains up once dead, in a bid to keep portions up. There was complete control when it came to that, but again, that didn’t stop some rotters. Over the years, a lot more murder victims had been found missing a brain. But you digressed. It wasn’t all bad for the undead. They didn’t starve. They could still eat normal food, just oddly needed some extra spice. Their tastebuds has pretty much been destroyed after the turn, so hot sauce was their best friend. Scientists had also created “fake” brain. Think of it along the same vein as fake meat for vegetarians. A substitute. It didn’t give complete satisfaction, but it helped. In fact, they had quite an array of foods now, sold at any local convenience and grocery stores. For some reason brain sushi always made you laugh when you saw it. Surreal. Fast food stores had also caught on. Yes, Big Brain Mac was a thing now… What more did they want? As long as they had the real thing each month, life went on as normal.

They looked normal too. You’d forgotten to mention that one. Sometimes, with the help of hair dye and fake tan, they looked just like their past selves. There were a couple of giveaways though. If they weren’t high maintenance. Their eyes had changed an ice grey after the virus had taken hold, skin pale and cold, and hair turning white. Sometimes fully, but more often than not streaks or wisps of it. Oh, and their heart rate was ten beats per minute. They were dead after all. Pretty much. It  was only when they lost themselves, did they turn into something horrific. Eyes black, sunken into their skull, cheeks gaunt, close to rotting. You’d heard they could also fall into a zombie trance when experiencing intense emotions. Depending on the situation it had different levels of severe. You had never seen this though. You knew very well, that was a benefit for certain zombies. A scare factor. Intimation factor. Like you said, there were many who used their rotter status for evil and crime… 

Which put Seokjin in a very grey area. 

He controlled the underground of this city. You hated using the word mafia, naïve to it all. Something fictional to you, but that’s exactly what was going on. An organised crime syndicate. The oldest son of a wealthy and corrupt family, Seokjin was always heir to the blood soaked throne. He was extremely powerful, even more so than the city’s law enforcement. Actually, you knew for a fact he worked side by side with them a lot of time. Probably called most of the shots. He’d been human in the beginning, when he’d first become in charge, not long before the virus began spreading, but of course that had soon changed. You’d heard stories of how his turn came to be, but you took those with a grain of salt. They were hearsay in your eyes. You’d never been one for rumours and gossip. 

As it would have it, you’d only ever known him as undead. You started working at his club just over a year ago. How you got there wasn’t important, you just liked to dance, and dancing was a must at Club Zombie. Cheesy name, but it got the custom. It was almost a sort of tourist attraction. An after dark one. Humans and zombies alike. The dancers were both too. It could be a seedy place sometimes, but you didn’t mind dancing around a pole for men when their money was involved. The day was yours, the night was easy; just dancing, putting on a show. Besides, you were safe. Seokjin never let anything happen to the women that worked for him. 

This was the place you could find him at the most, although strictly professional he never brought danger here. The rumours surrounding him were probably what made the club so popular to begin with. He wasn’t stupid. A zombie mob boss, what fiction was made of. Everyone lapped it up. Some nights he sat right up front, quite literally a throne on a podium, surveying the bar and dance platforms. It helped that he was extremely good looking. Got the humans with a kink all riled up. Such soft, movie star looks when you truly studied him. Jarring in a way. A white streak running along the front of his dark hair, parted at the forehead reminded you of what he was. That and his cold, grey eyes. 

It was working at Club Zombie where he soon began to take an interest in you. It was glances your way at first. When you made your way to the dressing rooms, or more often than not, when your eyes met as you danced and twisted around the pole. You wouldn’t admit it back then, but it did send a thrill up your spine, fresh confidence washing  over you. Even more so when the glances turned to smiles. They could be better described as flirtatious smirks if you didn’t know any better. Because why would anyone like Seokjin want you? He had this whole city at his feet. You were a no one. No, you were imagining the signs. He might’ve not even been looking at you. 

But he was. Or course he was. You just couldn’t believe it. Not until one night when he’d asked you to join him for a drink. Halloween night, to be precise. Not that you cared for the holiday. It was just another day. 

You were the last one to leave the club. Usually the first, you’d misplaced your cell phone. Took you twenty minutes to find it, fallen behind one of the sofas in the dressing room when you’d flung your jacket down in a hurry not a few hours ago. You were in a hurry when you made your way across the bar, heading for the exit, hand in your purse trying to now find your car keys. You didn’t want to keep Yunho, the barman, waiting any longer. But he wasn’t the one left. 

Seokjin was stood behind the bar when you looked up at the call of your name. A peculiar sight. In all the time you’d been here you hadn’t once seen that. The fact he knew your name was even more mindboggling. You opened your mouth to apologise to him, presuming that was why he was asking for your attention, but you got no where. Not when the question he asked stunned you to silence. 

“Care to join me for night cap?” 

You weren’t one for drinking, never had been funnily enough, but you ended up agreeing. You told yourself it was because he was the boss. You couldn’t say no to him, but the racing of your heart as you sat down argued it was something different. 

He drank straight whisky, poured you a glass of rosé you didn’t request. Did he see you as that kind of drinker? Classy. Unless it wasn’t classy at all because you knew nothing about alcohol. You thought he’d stay behind the bar, lord of the house, but to your surprise he came out to meet you. You heart beat even faster when he sat on the stool next to you. You prayed hard that rotters didn’t have an acute sense of hearing. Your knowledge was failing you, but logically, going by that dumb fucking fiction, you’d have to assume they did. He knew you were nervous mess right now. How embarrassing. 

He bared his teeth and made a wincing sound as he took a swig of his drink. It was nice to know the burn still affected him, and you watched him tilt the tumbler this way and that, staring at the swirling amber liquid as he did so. Maybe he was giving you time to relax. Maybe he just wanted to sit in silence. Who knew. His rings clanked against the crystallised glass. He always wore them. Large silver bands, dark coloured jewels encased in the centre. He had beautiful hands now that you saw them up close. Wrists too. His shirt sleeves rolled up to the middle of his veiny forearms. The watch he wore was more expensive than anything you’d earn in five years. Maybe a lifetime. You were clueless. 

Momentarily distracted, it took you those five minutes to realise you’d never so much as had one conversation with him. He was mostly the untouchable boss who was more like a statue to awe over than a person to share friendlies with. There were other men who worked closely for him here, woman too. Those were who you went to if there was a problem. A drunken customer. A shift you couldn’t make. An emergency you had to leave early for. In fact, even when you had gotten this job it wasn’t by his judgement. So this made the exchange even more awkward considering you’d never said so much as two words to him. You sipped on your wine for something to do. The taste wasn’t all that bad actually. 

“You’re not afraid of me, are you?” 

You had been so used to the silence you jumped a little from your seat at the sound of his voice. He sounded curious, and you glanced his way to see him giving you his full attention now. Body angled to you; eyes so intense they made you a little unnerved. Fuck. He’d definitely heard the racing of your heart then. Mistaken it for something else. 

“Afraid? No.” You decided to be honest. Or at least as honest as you could be. He didn’t need to know you were even more unsteady now than you had been not ten minutes ago. All because of…thoughts, that had entered your mind upon noticing his long, deft fingers. Not that you knew they were skilled, but it was just a hunch. You shrugged in what you hoped was a casual manner. Voice straining to be very much the same. “My nail technician is a zombie. My running buddy at the gym. My doctor.” 

To your surprise he chuckled. Deeply amused by something. “I didn’t mean that.” Oh. Had you misunderstood? How embarrassing. “Are you afraid of me because of who I am?” 

You blinked slowly. His status. That was what he was referring to. You slowly shook your head, making sure to hold his gaze as you replied. “No.” You shocked even yourself, because you really did mean it. Maybe you were reckless. Your parents had always said such words. You were drawn to the unknown. The excitement got you giddy, but this—he—was something new. 

Your idea of living life on the edge was dancing in hardly anything, not warming to a man who discussed crime over breakfast like it was nothing. Did God knows what when he wasn’t sitting in this club. 

He nodded in almost confirmation. “Thought not. Just wanted to be sure.” He spoke with a certainty. Like he already knew this information before you did. What vibes were you giving off here? Or was he always this confident and sure when it came to assuming others’ thoughts and feelings…

“Why?” It came out slightly more accusing than you meant it to. 

It took him a moment to answer, taking a swig of his whiskey again. You thought he was going to ignore it all together. In a way he did. “Did you know that any human who fucks a rotter in the first year of their transformation gets infected too?” 

You took a moment to let that sink in. The casualness of his tone cut with the crude language took you by surprise. You swallowed. “I did.” Everyone did. It was the largest cause of illegal turning. Even a condom wouldn’t save you. 

He scoffed in amazement. “It’s amazing how biology works, even for someone dead like me.” 

When someone described themselves as dead it never ceased to blow your mind. It was hard to believe that someone as handsome as Seokjin was rotten to the core on the inside. Black and decaying. You let a wry smile play at the corners of your mouth, replying before you took another mouthful of your drink. “This world isn’t what it used to be.” 

He didn’t bother to agree, instead taking a moment of silence before he hit you with another question. “Did you also know that we don’t have any sexual urges for a while after we’ve been turned?” 

This time it took you everything to hold it together. The shock close to becoming visible on your face. You suddenly thought of every time he had glanced your way in the past few weeks. Each smile he had given you. Just like the one he was giving you now as he waited for your reply. “I heard it varies from r-zombie to zombie.” 

You stopped yourself at the R for Rotter. Yes, he had used the word not moments before, but it was always such a grey area. Mostly used as a derogatory term, by humans—usually the older generation—who couldn’t get their small, little brains around the reality of the world today, it had become increasingly popular over the past couple of years. Now, it was just accepted. Like everything else this day and age. 

“Correct.” He continued to smile. If he noticed your slip-up he didn’t care to mention it. “This may be TMI but mine’s only recently appeared again.” Something squeezed in your gut. “A few months ago. Maybe longer. I don��t know. With work and the stress I think I ignored it for longer than I should have.” 

“Oh.” That was… Yes, it was fact all sexual desire left when first turned. Most for a couple of months, maybe a little longer. You didn’t know the ins and outs, but three years seemed steep. He was a busy man, it made sense, but… Fuck. Who were you kidding? You were just distracting yourself with nonsense now. Anything to not have to acknowledge what was really going on here. But you had to. “Not to be rude Mr. Kim, but why are you telling me this?” 

No one, and you mean no one, called him by his first name. Not anyone you knew anyway. It was easy to see him as none other than Seokjin, your Seokjin, now thinking back, but a few months ago he was just your boss with the intimating aura. The one who wouldn’t dare be interested in you. That all changed that fateful night. 

His lips curled. You couldn’t tell if he was trying to be friendly or if he was greatly amused. Maybe both. “Seokjin. Call me Seokjin.” 

You swallowed. His name felt foreign on your tongue, but you needed to press on. You needed him to confirm the hunch now coiled in your chest. “Seokjin, why are you telling this?” 

A beat of silence followed. He actually glanced away from you as he went to speak. “I’m incredibly attracted to you.” You let out a shaky breath, unsure you could say anything back even if you tried. He chuckled awkwardly. Such a human reaction. You found your heart warming. “Forgive me. I’m rusty at this.” 

He sounded way out of his depth, which was incredibly amusing for someone like him. You wondered how long he had been thinking of confessing this. How long he’d been trying… He’d taken his chance tonight. 

“You’ve noticed me staring a lot?” His eyes were back on you now. You didn’t know if you were imagining it, but the harshness of the grey had begun to soften. The coldness, warming up. 

“Yes,” you murmured. Your throat felt dry. You wouldn’t have described it as staring, but to say you hadn’t noticed would be an outright lie. 

“I just can’t take my eyes off you,” he admitted with a slight sigh. “I love watching you dance because it’s the only form of interaction I have with you.” Without realising, you squeezed your legs together. Your face was flushing, you could feel the heat prickle your skin. 

“My view gets obstructed a lot of the time, or my attention is needed elsewhere but I always try...” He cleared his throat. “I always try to admire you.” 

His words bloomed against your skin, sending a warmth all over you. Call you weak, it didn’t matter. An attractive man was complimenting you. You did not question him. He was short and to the point with his words. No sugar-coating. You admired that. 

You smirked his way, confidence washing over you. In a way, you felt like you had the upper hand here. He was the one who had confessed in uncertainty. “You should get better seats for the show.” 

His eyes widened a little in shock at your brazenness. You’d surprised him, and his mouth stretched into a grin, a bewildered laugh leaving him as his browline furrowed. It was a glorious sound. “I really don’t scare you? Disgust you?” 

“Of course not.” You replied so surely it would be difficult to doubt you. Maybe you were stupid. Maybe this was all part of his masterplan, but there was a small self-destructive part of you that didn’t even care. “Would I be working here otherwise?”

“You got me there,” he silked. Gaze holding yours. 

The most deepest of desires began to come alive inside of you. Swirling around in your gut. Desires you’d held at bay because it was laughable to think you’d ever be in with a chance with someone like him. And perhaps a larger part of you was ashamed by your longings. Kim Seokjin was a bad person by definition. It didn’t matter how charming he was. How potentially misunderstood he was, or how secretly sensitive he was. Romanticised theories that should make you sick at yourself. This was wrong, a small voice whispered furiously in the back of your head, but when had that ever stopped you? 

You hesitated but went for it anyway. It was too late. You’d made your decision. “If we’re confessing things... You’re way too pretty to be as dangerous as you are.” Half a glass of wine and you were already losing yourself. 

He cocked a black, perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “Pretty? That’s a new one.” He chuckled quietly before making a joke. “These genes come from my mom.” Such a normal thing to say. You wanted to believe he was just like anyone else. Or maybe you truly didn’t care… 

“Mr. K–Seokjin,” you corrected yourself quickly. The concept of being on first name terms would take a while to get used to. You took a breath and went for it, fingers reaching for his hand that held his whiskey. What did you have to lose? His lust for you was real. The ball was in your court. 

You circled patterns against the skin between his thumb and index finger. It was stone cold. A sensation you were still not too used to, or maybe it was because this touch meant so much more. Despite the ice, he was marble smooth. You looked at his face. True beauty. He was staring right back at you, holding his breath, waiting for you. Hunger roared inside your body now. You tried your best to keep it under control.

“I know it’s out of hours and I’m not really dressed for it anymore but... I could dance for you right now if you like?” 

You tilted your head to match your question. He copied, giving you a small smile, tone teasing when he spoke. Low and oddly soothing. “Private dances aren’t allowed.” 

“You’re the boss. You make the rules.” You watched him hesitate, mulling your suggestion over in his head. It was actually kind of cute. Had he not expected you to accept his advances so easily? 

He pulled his hand from the tumbler, his fingers gingerly reaching for yours and you clasped onto them. “Mm?” You prodded, watching him all the way. He gave you a tight nod, and that was all you needed to continue. 

Rising up from your seat and leaving your purse at the foot of the stool, he followed you as you guided him by the hand to a set of centre red plush sofas. They curled around a small table, in perfect view of the largest stage. Not two hours ago this place had been filled to the brim, this section worth a hell of a lot of money considering where it was placed, but now his club was empty, safe for you and him. The reminder sent a thrill up you. 

You slowly pushed him down to sit, hand on his chest before you let go and stood over him. A grin on your face. “Best seat in the house. No obstructed view.” 

He didn’t reply, but the look on his face was almost giddy. You spun on your feet, back to him as you slinked away, towards the centre pole, kicking off your shoes. You didn’t get much of a chance to dance with it, this place saved for the ones who had been here longer. So this was an added excitement. 

“This would be highly unprofessional in business hours,” he called after you. His laughter fizzling off when you began to lift your sweater over your head. “What are you doing?” 

You turned back to him, a shy smile on your face. “I can’t entertain you in this.” You threw the mustard knit to the floor. “Will it do?”

He scoffed. Eyes a little wide, pupils starting to blow out. “You could be in anything. I wouldn’t mind.”

You appreciated the sentiment, but you didn’t know if you agreed. You’d removed the showy lingerie you’d been wearing tonight in favour of something more comfortable; a black cotton bralette, and you still had your leggings on as you gripped the pole with both hands. It wasn’t your best outfit, but you hoped it sufficed. 

How odd it was to swing and grind in front of your boss. A man you hadn’t had anything to do with until tonight. Dancing to no music was strange, too. You had to imagine the beats and sounds in your head, praying you didn’t look too wooden, but somehow it began to feel increasingly intimate. Seokjin was a silent spectator, but it didn’t bring you a sense of unease. Excitement coursed through your veins, but you didn’t dare look at him while you moved. This was a reality you still couldn’t get your head around. 

You didn’t know how long you were at it for, lost to the soundless rhythm, but soon enough you needed to catch your breath. He was still sat where you placed him but his eyes were fully black now, trained on your figure. As if in a trance It took a moment for him to notice you had stopped. His legs were spread open, giving you a very great eyeful of his crotch. A couple of buttons on his dress shirt lied open that weren’t before. It gave him an almost bedraggled look. You say almost, because his hair was still perfectly parted at his forehead. You suddenly had the mental image of your fingers running through it, tugging at the ends as he fucked you into the very sofa he sat on. You blinked away the dirty thought, taking a few deep breaths. 

He also blinked, albeit slowly, outstretching one hand to beckon you. “Come here.” He croaked; voice thick with something that made you burn up. 

You smirked. “That’s against the rules.” Private dances were strictly forbidden. 

“Am I not the boss?” That was so. You laughed, and obeyed instantly, descending the metal steps to make your way to him. “You move exquisitely,” he complimented as you did so. His voice a little more human now. His eyes however, were anything but. Close now, inches apart, you saw the light grey that ringed the dilated pupils. It made him look unreal. Showed him for he really was. Undead. However, fear was the last thing on your mind. 

“Can I touch you?” 

“I thought you made the rules?” This back and fore only thickened the desire in the room, but you truly did appreciate his manners. That, and you really wanted him to touch you. You wanted to touch him too. 

Straddling him slowly, your knees pressing into the soft velvet of the sofa, his cold hands met your waist and you jumped in shock, giggling in reaction. He did nothing but hold on as you attempted to dance atop of him. You say attempted, because you were basically grinding on him by now. You wrapped your arms around his neck, loving the way his breathing was laboured. Chest rising and falling visibly. 

You felt his erection quickly begin to from under you, and it wasn’t long before he acknowledged it. In his own way, of course. “Forgive me for being inappropriate.” He apologised in advance. You held your breath in curiosity. “But have you ever fucked a rotter?” 

With a lack of oxygen you replied instantly. “No.” 

He swallowed. His dick twitched in his expensive slacks. “Are you opposed to it?” 

You replied with only truth, confidence and desire. “Not if you’re the one in question.” 

The noise that tore from his throat was nothing you’d ever heard before. A man starved, finally given the chance of relief. He flew at your mouth, movements hasty and rough. You gladly matched them. Everything was cold, something you weren’t used to at all. Not like this anyway. His tongue like ice ran along your own, both wet but drastic in temperature. It was a contrast that sent your nerves into overdrive. Sensitivity at its highest peak. You clung to his shoulders, rolling your palms over the thick flesh and muscle, as you moaned quite shamelessly into his mouth. 

His hands found your face, gripping you tight as he continued to kiss you furiously. You were close to burning up, heart pounding in your chest at your new reality. A groan from him puzzled your mind as he tore away. “Not here. Not yet,” he rasped, lips wet because of you. He tried to keep him distance but failed, falling into your mouth once again to taste you. “I won’t fuck you in a place like this. You deserve better than that.” 

You clung to him now, deflation beginning to drop to your gut. You were riled up, ready for him, he couldn’t take it away now. Not when he was solid between your spread legs. You gasped when he took your bottom lip between his teeth, tugging it carefully. Everyone knew the dangers of a zombies’ teeth. One false move and it was game over. The risk just seemed to turn you on all the more. You were sick. Sick for him. 

“But I want you so bad. I want to make you feel all the pleasure in the world,” he divulged. He sounded so passionate, so desperate, fresh waves of longing and need flooded your body. Heat pooled against his cock. “Will you let me do that right now? Just a little bit?” 

“Yes,” you practically exclaimed. Overcome and out of breath. You didn’t know what that request pertained but you would take anything for even the slightest bit of relief. 

You had a better understanding once you found yourself under his large, solid body. Spread out on the velvet like your tainted mind had imagined not fifteen minutes previous. He kissed down your neck, lapping at the skin like you could fill him up. A sensation that had your eyes closing, feeling powerless but loving it. Even more so when you felt him between your breasts. It was a wonderful fusion; to be boiling hot but feel his cool, marble touch all over your body. His hands roamed you, familiarising himself with the woman’s body. Every bump, curve and dip, your soft moans encouraging him, until he couldn’t take anymore. 

You pulsed when you felt his long fingers curl behind the waistband of your leggings. “Can I take these off?” He looked you straight in the eyes as he spoke, as if he was reading your face for any hesitation. There was none. You nodded firmly, a trembled ‘yes’ leaving your throat. 

He pulled you forward in one swift motion, propping you up against the plush backrests. He was out of breath, jaw slack and eyes still practically black as he crouched, beginning to tug down the black fabric, your legs thrown over one of his shoulders. You didn’t realise he’d strip you of your underwear too. You were very naked, very quickly. Your bra the only thing left. 

“Beautiful.” He uttered, eyes between your legs before he looked up at you. “You’re beautiful.” 

You smiled at him, something he couldn’t seem to be able to bear, because he was on your mouth again in a flash. He kissed you greedily, low moans escaping him in regular sequence. Spoiled, he made his way down your chest, finding the swell of your breasts to flirt between. It wasn’t long before the fabric was pulled down, one nipple in his mouth while he rubbed the other with the pad of his thumb. That had you moaning, your legs wrapping around his hips to keep him latched to you. Cramped on the sofa, cramped under his body, but loving it. Pleasure swirled and grew heavy in your stomach. Arousal beginning to pool between your legs. It wasn’t long before you were grinding yourself against his body uncontrollably, desperate for some relief down south. 

He pulled away when you began whining, teeth lightly grazing the flushed peak as he went. You gasped. Maybe it really was the danger that turned you wanton. Seokjin grinned your way as he sunk to his knees on the floor. He knew it too. He was already learning. You watched with bated breath as he spread your legs, giving him a very intimate view. You’d be self-conscious by now, maybe even uncomfortable, but not tonight. Not with him. 

You pulsed against his thumb as he touched you, and all you could do was watch as he carefully began to rub at your clitoris, feeling it engorge beneath his cold touch. You moaned softly, hips circling ever so slightly, enjoying the almost cruel pleasure. Your arousal spread, wet noises squelching under his skin, lewd in your ears. 

He looked up at you, eyes black, ringed silver grey. They made you shiver. So did his words. “Can I taste you?” His hair had become out of place, finally, falling in his eyes, and you reached for it, running the white and black strands through your fingers before nodding. 

He dived straight in, those plump, almost blue-red lips encompassing your clit. You gasped as he sucked, pushing into him and clutching his hair in your fist. His cool tongue laved you almost hesitantly at first, searching for what you liked and what made you moan, until he grew confidence. You forgot he was familiarising himself again after so long. Hazy with lust, his movements weren’t calculated. They were made with haste and a fervent urge; hands wrapping around the underside of your thighs to hold them and pull you closer. Letting him feast until his heart content. 

He only pulled away to catch his breath, minutes later, face from the nose down shining with a colourless substance. The same substance coated the heat between your legs and apex of your thighs. Probably stained the sofas too. You were sticky and burning up. Not even the the touch of his cool finger could control it as he ran the digit down your folds. He stopped at your entrance, tip pushing in slowly. You throbbed around nothing, desperate to be filled. He noticed of course, and he made to remove his rings. 

You stopped him. “Keep them on.” You’d already felt the cool metal of his rings against the inside of your thigh when he’d been enamoured with your centre and everything it had to offer. You wanted more. A hell of a lot more. 

He raised his brows in surprise, pausing before shrugging. “Anything for you.” You tried to suppress your moan as he pushed his index finger inside you, palm up, cold metal pressed against your swollen folds. He shifted closer, curling the digit against your velvet-like walls. He seemed to like the feeling, humming to himself, before he studied your face closely.  “When was the last time someone had you like this?” 

You cocked an eyebrow, smirking. “What? Like this specifically? In this bar, spread out naked on the VIP suite? Never.” 

He gave a low chuckle. It shot through your body. “You think you’re funny.” You tried snarking him back but he slipped a second finger inside you, straightening them as he went.  “No but,” he began, slowing thrusting them in and out. Your jaw grew slack as you watched him, the quietest of strained moans leaving you. “I just want to know how many people I have to contend with.” 

That made you laugh. But fine, if he was so curious. “It’s been a while. Nearly a year.” You’d been single since then, your last relationship ending badly, and hook up culture wasn’t what it was since the virus. You smirked his way. “So, no one at all.” 

“That’s great for me then.” He laughed heartily, almost as if he wasn’t three knuckles deeps inside you, and wasting no time getting intimate between your legs again. 

You came hard. Shaking all over when he finally relented his tongue. Covered in a sheen of sweat and out of breath. He continued the movement of his fingers at his leisure, looking up between your body. The tips of his hair were wet and clung together. It wasn’t him—the undead incapable of sweating—but your arousal, which he seemed to be unable to get enough of. In all honesty, it seemed it he was unable to get enough of you full stop. Still determined to please you. 

He shot his fingers deep, ripping a moan from your chest as your back curled. “You’re still sucking me in. What a greedy cunt you have.” Your burned at his crude words, squeezing around his fingers. “Do you consider yourself greedy?” He spoke low and calm, but you could hear the slight quiver to his voice. It made you feel powerful. You hated that word. Greed. But for him… It was different. 

“If it’s for a pleasure like that, then yes,” you laughed breathlessly. 

He tutted, curling his fingers along the ridges of your insides. Coaxing you. Enjoying the way your lower body contorted. “You flatter me. I would say I’ve reverted to novice status again after all these years.” 

You didn’t think so. Unless that was the reality of someone like Kim Seokjin between your legs. He got you coming so good, better than you had in a long time, so maybe it was both options shared. “Somethings you never forget,” you told him simply. 

He didn’t reply, instead rising up, kneeling on the edge of the sofa instead. You lifted your legs to accommodate him. His fingers got deeper and you tightened around them again. “I’m greedy too, you know?” He almost warned, his free hand gripping the back of your neck to tilt your head. Ice. He was speaking as he held his breath, moaning slightly when you did. “I want you to cum again. Please.” He always remembered his manners, even when impatient. 

You faltered. You didn’t know if you could. Yes, it still felt good to have him inside of you, but you were too exhausted to go again surely. He leant over your body, caging you with his solid one as he murmured into your ear. “I want the visual ingrained in my mind forever.” He snapped his wrist hard against you. The pleasure made your eyes roll back. 

“O-kay–!” You gasped out, nodding your head eagerly, gripping onto his shoulders.  It was a big fuck you to the exhaustion. You wanted to cum again too. 

Your body withstood his vicious pace, walls clamping down on him every time he thrusted into you. You were hot and sweaty again, held down by his large build, which only added to your delight. You imagined he was fucking you. Desperate for the real thing. 

“You trust me a lot,” he mused, your hands in his hair now. It was surprising to you that he let you touch it like this. You looked at him curiously, wondering what he could mean, and felt his movements slow. You realised just how hard you’d been holding your breath, gasping for it at the tiniest of reprieve. “One accidental scratch and that’s it, game over. You’re one of me.” He spoke in an almost disarming whisper. It did not frighten you. 

You moaned at the dragging of his fingers, before smiling lazily. “You’re not so foolish.” You’d already taken note that his fingernails were perfectly trimmed when you’d admired his hands at the bar. 

“Maybe not. But in other ways…” he drawled off, lips millimetres from yours. You wanted him to kiss you so bad. “I enjoyed being a fool between your legs. On my knees…” You moaned softly, enjoying his words, eyes still glued to his mouth. It moved away; your chest grew heavy in disappointment. 

“Would you get on your knees for me?” 

His question had you squeezing again. The smirk told you he felt it. “Right now?” You asked, maybe a little too eager. 

“No.” He laughed. “Not right now. Tonight is about you. But next time...” 

You took a shaky breath and nodded. “Gladly.” 

“Good girl,” he smiled at you. The praise went to your head, somewhere else too, and he let go of your neck, readjusting himself to begin picking up the pace again. You watched down your body, lifting your folded legs nearer your chest so you could have a better look at his hand as it pleasured you. His veiny forearm tensing with the force of his thrusts. You were so wet you glistened in the overhead lighting—so did the dark jewel on one of his rings—and you squelched noisily around his fingers, sucking him in over and over again. Greedy, you were. 

“Fuck.” Seokjin cursed under his breath, distracting you, and you found his eyes were locked between your legs too. Mesmerised. “Delectable, as ripe as a peach…” It didn’t take you much longer to cum again. You felt sorry to whoever would sit in the VIP lounge tomorrow night. 

Afterwards, once you’d both calmed down—you, dressed but still quite shaky, and he, now composed but hair still in disarray—he asked if you’d accompany him for dinner at his house next time he was free. You agreed quite instantly. You knew what it meant, and you needed it. Needed him. You also agreed when he insisted he’d arrange for a car to take you home that night. You had your own, but you’d had something to drink, regardless how small, and that just didn’t sit right with him. He’d get someone to drop off your vehicle the next morning. 

Before you left, he bid you goodnight with a kiss to the cheek and thanked you for a lovely night, emphasising just how much he was looking forward to dinner with you soon. Just the thought had you up for hours when you found yourself in bed, alone, but still warm and sated from your two orgasms. 

Seokjin’s house was stunning. A far cry from from your dingy apartment on the tenth floor of an ancient tower block. You were used to it now, but back then you had felt very out of place in such a beautiful home. He arranged for a car to pick you up, very much like the one that had dropped you off home four nights ago. A sleek black thing, with darkened windows. You didn’t know the name, a car was a car, but again, way out of your league. Four days was a short time in someone else’s perspective, but to you it had dragged by. Especially having to see him every night since while you danced in the club. Glances and knowing smirks just made it harder. You understood though, he was a busy man. He called you in the morning, apologising for the short notice, but he’d found a break in his schedule. If you agreed not to be at the club tonight, he could arrange dinner at his place. 

You hadn’t hesitated. Had been preparing all day. The longest soak in the bath you could manage without turning into udon. You even brought the wax strips out. Found the most elegant dress you owned in the back of your closet. A blood red, floor length piece. 

His phone call had felt very formal, but that was him all over, you had only just started finding out. You weren’t 100% sure, but the 0.1% didn’t matter… You were going to have sex together tonight. The thought made you giddy. It was only the shock of his house that distracted you as you stepped inside. Large and elegantly decorated, it did not look at all like you’d imagined. Not that you’d tried to. It was impossible to wonder what an undead mobster’s home would look like, but as a bachelor, it definitely wasn’t this. It almost seemed lonely to have just one person living here. You kept those thoughts to yourself though and let him lead you into the lounge, where, and you assumed this, a butler of some kind handed you a glass of champagne. This was not your world. 

He even had members of staff to cook for him. Food you knew for a fact belonged in michelin starred restaurants. His dining room was grand, the beautifully carved mahogany table able to fit six people. Perhaps this place was once his family home. It made sense. He sat at the head, while you were placed directly opposite him. The distance was a little unnerving, but he was able to converse in small talk exceptionally well. It was lighthearted and casual, and soon eased you up. 

You found it intriguing when he doused everything he ate in hot sauce, unable to stop yourself from giggling and he looked up, confusion etched in his features before he realised what had amused you so. You had no idea the need was that bad. 

“Nothing tastes good without a little kick,” he explained, putting the bottle down. “Even the brains.” 

You laughed. “You must go through hot sauce by the gallon.” 

He smiled before reaching for his glass of red wine. “Me being a rotter really doesn’t phase you, does it?” He still seemed to be unable to get over the surprise. 

You gave him a small shrug, picking up your cutlery. “It’s the world we live in now.” You sounded like a broken record. That was your explanation for everything. 

You waited for him to continue the conversation. There was a pause and then– “Thanks to your father.” 

You froze, an instant sense of dread filling you at the casual remark. You swallowed, looking across at Seokjin. “H-how did you know?” 

He raised a perfect eyebrow as he brought the glass to his mouth. You watched half the red liquid disappear. The clank as he put it down on the wood made you flinch, and your heart thudded as you waited for his reply. He gave you smile. It didn’t seem fully loaded. “Is that you undermining my power?” 

Whatever his intentions were you panicked regardless. “No, I just–” 

“Don’t worry, this isn’t some kind of trick. Some kind of revenge...” He interrupted with a quick chuckle. Relief flooded you. Not that you had thought such things explicitly, but Seokjin was the man he was… Your lust hadn’t made you forget that much. He had found out what you’d spent the last three years or so trying to hide after all… 

“I have brought you here to fuck.” Despite your alarm, something squeezed in your gut and pulsed between your legs at his frankness. “I’m just curious... You hide it well. Why?” 

Unsure what to do, you took a mouthful of food. The chewing letting you think for a moment. Did you really want to divulge your family affairs with him? He was a man of few words and considering what he was—dangerous and undead—you couldn’t be sure to trust his intentions. Maybe you’d made a mistake coming here. Letting his words and actions cajole you. 

“Good?” He asked, watching you eat. 

You looked at him and nodded. Wiping your face with the napkin placed on your lap you decided to give him some of the details. Not all. “It’s not something I want to be associated with.” 

Seokjin frowned. “You don’t agree?” 

You shook your head. That had come out wrong. “I don’t agree with my parents’ greed.” 

When the zombie virus had hit four years ago your father, a highly gifted scientist, had been one of the first to try and recreate it. To produce something better. For what, you didn’t quite understand. He had no desire to turn himself or his family. No, you guessed it was for the fame, the money…the glory… In the end, it took a number of people to create such a thing, but yes, he’d been one of them… Your mother had been so proud. Sick. That was still what you thought now. Turning the world into undead creatures who needed human brains to survive seemed utterly bizarre. Disturbing… But like you said, the glory seemed to be their fuel… 

You hadn’t spoke to either of them in two years and prior to that, conversations were few and far between. To cut them out of your life hadn’t been a sudden decision though. Your whole life you’d always felt like you didn’t belong. Born to the wrong family. Maybe that was a problem with you. An issue you didn’t want to give much thought about, but one thing was for certain, you didn’t think anything like them. You’d spend most of your life rebelling. Maybe you were still doing so… The club you worked at would see them foaming at the mouth. You, surrounded by the people your father helped create. And Seokjin… Seokjin was a man your parents would be horrified to see you with. That thought brought you great pleasure. 

“You don’t get along?” You shook you head in reply. Surprisingly it was enough for him. “Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me.” Or maybe he already knew that… He probably knew everything about you. He’d been humouring you all this time. For some reason that didn’t scare you like it should’ve. It was quite reassuring to know that despite everything, you were the one he wanted. Maybe your self esteem was shot to pieces. Maybe you were just an idiot. 

You smiled. “Thanks.” 

He jerked his head towards the direction of your plate. “Let’s not get distracted for too long. Dinner is getting cold.” 

You ate with more small talk. He asked if you’d ever been out the country and when you’d replied yes, he insisted that you tell him all about Japan, like he’d never been there before. Maybe he hadn’t… You didn’t ask. In all honestly, you were positive he was trying his best to relax you again after his slight interrogation. It was endearing. 

Once dinner was done and his staff had taken the used dishes away, you suddenly remembered what was to come next. You began to feel a little out of your depth. The night at the club had happened out of the blue, but this was pre-planned. Nerves itched at your skin, just wondering how this would go down now, but that didn’t mean you weren’t excited. Giddy. 

“You really do look so beautiful tonight.” He praised quietly, admiring you from across the table. He had already told you that when he’d greeted you at his door, but you would never get enough. “I feel a little underdressed.” 

You scoffed. “You look perfect. As always.” He was always found in a suit, so his attire for tonight was nothing new. Apart from the velvet suit jacket he wore. It was fancy, something you could never imagine him gracing the club with, and the cream embroidered shirt underneath suited him beautifully. His hair tonight was swept above his forehead, accentuating his breath-taking bone structure. 

He closed his eyes as he smiled in silent thanks. When they opened you noticed they were getting darker, grey almost unnoticeable from where you sat. You suddenly thought about him between your legs. You squeezed them together under the table, trying to quell your dirty thoughts. You think he noticed, or maybe he was remembering back too.

“I’m surprised you can’t feel it,” he mused on cue. 

“Feel what?” You sounded slightly shaky. Out of breath. 

“My need for you is practically raging from my body,” he explained simply. 

Something heavy dropped into your gut. Confidence began to wash over you again. It was nice to feel this powerful. “You hide it well.” 

“Do I?” He laughed. “I must have more self control than I give myself credit for. I’ve been agitated ever since that night… Unable to stop imagining getting my hands on you again.” 

You let out a tremble of a breath. More images flew around the forefront of your mind. The coldness of his hands caressing your body. The ice of his tongue inside your mouth, against your skin, laving against your… You closed your eyes, unable to cope. He murmured your name softly. As if he was desperate for you to look his way again. You obeyed. “I’m so incredibly attracted to you.” 

You could hear your heart thudding against your ribcage. It almost felt strange, like it didn’t belong to you. When you chuckled, it didn’t sound like you either. Your lust for him was taking over. Time was nearing. “You already said, Seokjin.” You liked the sound of his name as it curled off your tongue. 

He chuckled back. “Am I boring you? I thought flattery would be first protocol.” 

You continued to laugh at his choice of words, shaking your head. “There’s no need. I’m here, aren’t I?” 

He held your stare. It was almost like he was staring inside of you. “That you are.” He sounded like he still couldn’t believe his luck. He rolled his shoulders. “Well. I can still say what I like. It’s all true. I’m not trying to manipulate you here.” You chose to believe him. “Although... You don’t look like someone who falls victim to such things.” You shrugged, playing it casual. Maybe he was correct. You’d long stopped giving men the power to get inside your mind. You hoped it would hold with Seokjin. 

“I’ll cut to the chase then.” He continued, realising you weren’t going to divulge anything that could confirm his assumptions. “One night won’t be enough. I want to enter a sexual relationship with you.” 

Your eyes widened. Surprise visible on your face no doubt. Call you naïve, maybe clueless, but that possibility hadn’t crossed your mind. A one off was all you’d imagined. Seokjin had thirsted after you for months now, it seemed. Until he couldn’t ignore it any longer. In your head, one night would have been enough for him. What was so special about you? It seemed ludicrous he’d want something permanent. Taken aback, all you could do was listen to him. 

“These,” he paused, “urges I have, they’ve been suppressed for far too long. I have curiosities. Maybe they’ve always been there, morphing with the passing months...years.” He shrugged, and you wondered why he had stifled himself for so long. You also wondered why you. Why were you so special?  “It wasn’t until I noticed you that these thoughts...fantasies, became unbearable.” 

You took his words like they were information at a business meeting. In fact, he was talking to you like such. It was strange. He was talking about imagining fucking you most probably, and here you were just nodding your head. You squeezed your legs under the table again. You were hot. Your excitement was building again and you were trying your best to control yourself. This wasn’t normal. You shouldn’t be here, but your desire for him seemed to have crept up and snaked its way around your throat. 

“I don’t want to overwhelm you but I need things to be in black and white.” 

“I understand.” 

“You do?” He raised both eyebrows in surprise. You felt powerful with the knowledge you kept proving him wrong. “Your pleasure is my utmost importance. All of my fantasies include you enjoying yourself. Rest assured. However,” he looked down at the table. Was he flustered? Feeling awkward? How unusual. “There are some things I want to indulge in that aren’t to everyone’s taste. I do not wish to trap or force you into anything. If you don’t agree, then that’s that. No hard feelings. This isn’t a sweet or romantic joining. I don’t know if I’m truly capable of that…”

You puzzled in your head. What an odd thing to say. You hadn’t so much as thought about this being anything about romance. You knew where you stood. You hoped he wasn’t assuming that’s what you thought. You’d given up on love and romance a long fucking time ago. “I don’t expect it to be,” you added, wanting it to be clear. 

He paused, smiled slightly and then chucked. “Then you understand I have this animalistic need to take you any which way I’m allowed.” He made sure your eyes were locked when he spoke. So he could see your reaction. It was hard tying to keep your expression neutral as you imagined just as he’d said. The corner of your mouth definitely twitched. Of course he saw. You could tell by the way he tried to suppress his smirk. 

“I can be patient if you need more time.” He continued. “I am very much insistent that it’s you—there is no one else—however, if you disagree or discover I bring you no joy, I expect one day I’ll find another.” You admired his honesty. “Also. Selfish of me I know, but if you agree then there must be no other sexual partners during our attachment. Please.”  “Seokjin...” You began, guessing he’d finished his proposition of sorts. 

“I know.” He interrupted before you could say anything. “This is a lot to take in. You’re overwhelmed.” 

“No,” you insisted. “I agree. I’m willing to give this a chance.” 

He let your words marinate before swallowing. “What I’ve said doesn’t scare you?” 

You scoffed. “No.” You’d already knew sex with him wouldn’t be conventional. You’d found that out from his very brazen attitude and mouth the night you were spread against the club’s VIP sofa. Your only mistake had been thinking it would be just once. You felt giddy knowing there would now be endless encounters. You craved him just like he craved you. It was a new sensation, something that had only been been simmering since you caught his eyes on you as you danced, but it was powerful and steadfast, and needed to be sated. Tonight. 

He nodded to himself, seemingly deciding then and there to start taking action. “We’ll take it slow. Learn from one another.” 

“That sounds good,” you agreed, unconsciously sitting up straighter, leaning in almost eagerly. 

“Tonight,” he hushed. “Tonight I just want to feel you. Pleasure you. To become accustomed with your body and what you like.” 

You let out a shaky breath. You could almost feel the impending pleasure running through your veins. You’d had a taste of it a few nights ago. “I feel very much the same. Tonight is just the beginning.” 

He exhaled through his nose, jaw tensed before he looked you straight in the eyes. Raising his hand he beckoned you. “Come.” You were beginning to see a pattern, and just like that you obeyed. His tastes were of the dominate kind. You would gladly listen. 

Rounding the corner you made your way over and stopped right in front of him. He scraped his chair back, making room between him and the table, and motioned you to slot in between. 

“When you said you’d get on your knees for me…” He reminded you. A suggestion of sorts. Maybe it was put that way to soften the order. 

Your eyes widened, looking at the door that lead into the kitchen. “Here?” 

“Don’t worry.” He smiled, taking your hands. “No one will will come in. They shall be leaving soon anyway. They won’t interrupt us.” 

You listened, finding yourself in his lap, dress crumpled around your middle, creasing to no end, but you couldn’t find it in you to care. Not when you could feel his erection pressing into you. You took initiative. Rising up to let your palm caress him. You’d been dying to get your hands on him ever since the night at the club. To feel him full and thick and long between your fist, in your mouth, in your– You reached to kiss him. He slipped his tongue inside your mouth like he’d been waiting for it, grunting when you gave his dick one quick squeeze. 

“Seokjin,” you breathed, lips sticky as you pulled away. “Forgive my manners. I never confessed my attraction towards you too the other night.” It was easy to let him do all the talking, but you wanted to let him know you were 100% into this because you wanted him too. It didn’t go one way. You weren’t just agreeing to this for the hell of it. 

He reached for your face, rubbing the apples of your cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. “No need to flatter me,” he smiled, dropping one thumb to the edge of your mouth. He tugged your bottom lip down slightly and met the tip of your tongue. “I guess my tongue did the persuading, mm?” 

You swiped across the cool flesh and pulled away with a grin. “Trust me, if there was no attraction that wouldn’t have happened.” 

He laughed, genuinely amused, before grabbing you by the hips, pulling you into his chest. “Enough chit chat. I thought you were supposed to be sucking my dick?” 

Just like the rest of him, his cock was cool. Something you had never experienced before. It was swollen, filled with blood, but ice cold. Impossible, yet here you were. Knelt between his spread legs, laving him against your tongue. You had the intense urge to please him as best you could. Show him what he’d been missing all this time and just worship the beautiful, pretty gift between his thighs. He seemed to be unable to get used to the hot, wet velvet of your mouth, eyes glued to you, watching every move you made with soundless gasps. His hands gripped the arms of the chair at first, knuckles purple, until he decided he couldn’t hold back any longer. Taking your hair in his fists, his rings cold against your scalp, he held on tight, finally letting himself moan when you slackened your jaw and slid him down your throat as far as you could take him. 

He liked it when you choked on his dick. He froze every time, digging his fingers into your scalp. He liked when you slicked him with your fist, thumb circling the sensitive slit that pooled drops of precum all over the place. He really had fought off all sexual urges for so long it seemed. You wondered if he’d even attempted to pleasure himself? It wasn’t something you were brave enough to ask, but you were brave enough for other things…

You wanted him to experience all the pleasure he’d been missing over the years, tongue pointing and going south, licking thin but long lines up and across his scrotum. He gasped, the noise choking in his throat as he jerked, chair legs screeching against the tiled floor. You shuffled closer on your knees, holding his cock tall in your hand so you could slowly suck one of his balls into your mouth, softly caressing the cool encasing with your tongue. You made sure to look him in the eyes as you did so, feeding of the reactions he gave you. His mouth fallen open in a soundless groan. 

You smirked as you pulled away, pleased with yourself, and began kissing up his length, swirling your tongue across the cool marble, pressing your plush lips in the flesh; getting him obscenely wet. His fingers found their way around the back of your neck, holding you firmly as you popped him back into your mouth, sucking intently on the head of his cock, your fist working the base of him, slick noises filling the air, mixed with his low, staccato moans. 

When you began getting lower, hallowing your cheeks to accommodate him, your tongue tracing patterns along the underside of his thickness, his hands flew to the back of your head, fingers threading through your hair to stop you. You pulled back instantly, waiting for some kind of response from him. He was close. Dangerously close. You understood that. 

“I want –” He cut himself short, voice gruff, and cleared his throat, hips jumping when you kissed the tip of his cock. He tried again, taking one hand to caress your face. “I want to cum on your face.” Your legs squeezed together. Excitement overcoming you. “Please.” He added that as an afterthought, forgetting his manners with the urge to cum. 

You smiled, slowly taking his hand from your cheek to guide it to the base of his cock, exchanging yours with his. He gripped himself tightly, and you squeezed your palm over his fist. Giving him permission with a sordid whisper. “Be my guest.” 

You waited for it on your knees, between his spread legs and watched as he raked his beautiful hand over his equally as beautiful cock. Slowly at first, exploring the pleasure and then he sped up, jerking the top in tight, quick motions, chair legs screeching across the floor again as raised up, tightening his hold on your head to keep you in place. His breathing laboured before a strangled roar left him. 

You prepared yourself, closing your eyes as you felt the first spurt hit your nose and drip down your top lip. The second flew across your left cheek. Unlike the rest of him, this substance was searing hot, shocking you so much you gasped. The third spurt, stronger, landed in your mouth. You swallowed and savoured the taste. It wasn’t over. It just kept coming, coating your face and congealing in the air, as Seokjin furiously tried to get every last drop out. Savouring the pleasure, moaning in sweet relief until he grew weak from exertion, collapsing into his seat.

You peeled your eyes open, cum glooping from your right eyebrow and onto your eyelid and watched him with awe. All that filled the dining room was his rough breaths as he tried to get a hold of himself. He ran his clean hand through his hair, strands of white falling down, and finally took a look at you. He was silent for a long time, eyes still black, the crescents of silver sending a shiver up your spine. He leaned over, pulling some of your hair behind your ear, saving it from the mess that coated your face. He looked at you with wonder and amazement in his eyes, like he was trying to retain the image of you like this forever. 

When he spoke, his voice sounded different. Softer, warmer. Weaker… “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on…” Two of his fingers ran along your bottom lip, spreading some of his cum along the way. “Like this…” He awed. “It takes my breath away.” 

He reached behind you, his embroidered napkin coming into view. The set was probably more expensive than your outfit. He began cleaning your face up, and you let him obediently, still kneeling on the hard floor. It was all worth it though. For him. For what was to come. 

When he was done, he threw the soiled cloth to the table. There was still some cum on his fingers, where he’d rubbed your lip, and he opened your mouth, dotting your tongue with the fluid before he stuck two fingers inside, holding the muscle down before he prodded you to suck them. You did so, mimicking how you had pleasured his cock, letting your tongue trail along the expanse of his rings. He groaned, the other hand cupping your face to make you look at him. He opened his mouth, sounded beside himself. “The things I want to do to you...” 

You got no sleep that night. Fucking one another until the sun began to shine through his drapes, and then some more, letting him enjoy getting familiar with the sensation again, but also feeling a pleasure like no other yourself. No man you’d ever been with had been into sex this much, and his stamina, his strength, was like nothing you’d ever experienced before. He fucked you, quite literally, to glorious, pleasure-soaked tears. Three years really hadn’t hindered his skill at all, but he blamed it on his greed, incapable of taking a compliment. Nonsense, but you soon got used to that charming personality trait… 

The weeks had rolled into months, and you continued just like that. Meeting and fucking any chance you got. It was him who called the shots. He was a busy man after all. You worked to his schedule. Fucked to his schedule, and luckily for you, you were in a position to drop work every time he called. Direct permission from the boss. 

True to his word, you took it slow. Going further and further each time until your body was trained to him. His was trained to you too. What he liked, how he liked it and when to do it. You knew how to read his moods and work with it each time you met up for sex. There was a mutual trust between the two of you, and you would give your all if it meant pleasing him, because it brought you pleasure too. 

Sex had always been just something you’d done. The guys got their rocks off and maybe if you were lucky, you’d get one orgasm, probably gifted by your own hands. Even when in love, sex hadn’t been this enjoyable nor exciting. It was all new with Seokjin. You lived for pushing yourself to the limit, finding something new and trying it. Greedy. Maybe that was the correct word, Seokjin had been right. You were greedy for one another. You’d be dammed. The desire and the pleasure you just knew you couldn’t get from anyone else. The chemistry was on a totally different level, and it just kept getting stronger. 

Seokjin did have a softer appetite though. It wasn’t all hard and extreme. That was the beauty of it. He wasn’t a one-sided dom who used you as some kind of sex toy. He was gentle and caring, even when he had you tied to his bed, blindfolded and at his mercy. Sometimes he just wanted you. Raw and passionate. An unspoken vulnerable. You think in a way, even though you would never say it to his face, he sought comfort in you. On days when he was tired or stressed, he wanted you. Only you. There was a comfort there. And you gladly obeyed. How could you not? You were flattered he chose you to share this with. Touched, in a way. 

Your bond only grew, until any awkwardness was a thing of the past. You could tease one another, joke around. It was surprising at first to find out someone like him could become embarrassed and shy when provoked about certain things. Like how he had been so formal in the beginning. He insisted it was because he was so awkward about his extended inexperience fighting head to head with the raging desire he had for you… It had sent him frenzied, until he had to do something about it. You were so glad he had…

Your relationship for the most part was left undetected. It was chosen that way, to keep things strictly professional at work, but also you suspected it was something more. He requested for you not to tell your friends or family, and the only one who knew about your arrangement on his side, was the driver who took you to and from his home. Seokjin’s line of work came with danger, and even though you didn’t voice it, you guessed that danger spread to anyone he was involved with; family, friends, lovers…

You say mostly undetected because of course there had been a slip up somewhere along the line. Working in such close proximity, perhaps you had been foolish. The club was always packed, someone was bound to pick up on it, and unluckily for you, it happened. Give you a major reality check to go with it. 

You had been involved with Seokjin for near to three months when it did, juggling nights at work and nights spent with him. More often than not, both at the same time. That night wasn’t one though. He was away from the club altogether, so you got changed at your usual pace, surrounded by the rest of the human girls as they chatted. That night rotter talk filled the dressing room. There had been one watching one of the girls, Jaeha, dancing. He’d taken a shine to her and asked her out for dinner at closing time. She’d agreed, but now she was getting doubts, some of the other girls laying uncertainties in her head. Of course the conversation had turned to sex. It always did where men were concerned. But this was different. They were talking about having sex with a zombie. It was times like these you were thankful there was separate dressing rooms for the human and undead girls. Although some would probably still carry on the conversation regardless. 

“What about you?” 

You looked up, realising that Jaeha was directing the question your way. “Hm?” You played dumb, even though you had been listening to every word of the conversation. You just didn’t want to answer. 

“What would you imagine it feels like being with a rotter?” 

You gave a small shrug, realising you had no choice now and turned away as you replied. “I don’t know.” 

“Wait. What was that?” She exclaimed excitedly and you inwardly sighed. You guess something about your body language hadn’t been believable. “You have?!” You gave another shrug but she wasn’t having any of it. “Look me in the eyes and say you haven’t!” 

You faced her again, defeated, realising you had about half a dozen other pairs of eyes looking at you too. “Fine. I have.” 

A couple others squealed. Maybe it was an age thing. You were a few years older than a handful of the girls. At twenty-two you had probably been easily excitable and naïve too. Scrap that. You definitely had been. 

“Who?!”

Shit. She really wasn’t going to drop this, was she? You were hoping admitting to it would have been enough. You did up your jeans as you dismissed her. “It doesn’t matter who. It’s just sex. No different.” 

“No different? But they’re cold,” she whined, shuddering at the thought. “Doesn’t that feel weird?” 

You opened your mouth but found yourself stuck. This conversation was making you feel uncomfortable. Thankfully, a voice came to your rescue. 

“You just get used to it.” You looked to your left to see Yeeun coming into view behind 

the group of girls. She’d been here nearly the longest, your age, maybe a year older. She kept herself to herself most of the time, but you guessed she wanted to put this conversation to rest. That, and maybe put you out of your misery. 

Jaeha turned and opened her mouth to ask more questions, but Yeeun spoke over her. “Jaeha, just make sure to be careful if you decide to go for dinner with that guy, yeah? Undead doesn’t mean he’s inherently bad but coming to a place like this should make you think. Keep your wits about you.” 

Just like she’d wanted (and you) the conversation died. Everyone left soon after that, you close behind, but Yeeun was still getting changed, distracted by her phone. You stopped by the door as an afterthought, wanting to say something to her. “Thanks,” you called, waiting for her acknowledgment. 

She slowly turned and smiled. “No problem.” You watched as she shoved her cell into her jacket pocket. “Um, you got a minute?”

You nodded, unable to guess what she wanted. She sighed, almost like she was psyching herself up. “First, this isn’t me trying to get up all in your business, alright?” You nodded again, slower this time. A sicky feeling in your stomach. “Everyone else may be clueless when it comes to who you’re fucking, but I’m not.” 

You tensed. Maybe you’d misinterpreted her motives. She was trying to put you out of your misery yes, but it ran deeper than that. She was trying to save your skin. She knew. How? You were always careful to never talk in public with Seokjin. Yet… maybe your reluctance to leave early like you used to do roused suspicion from her. Maybe she’d seen you both leave together… Foolish. You panicked, played stupid. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

She stared at you, calling your bluff. “Be careful, okay? You’re an adult, you can do whatever the hell you like, but just don’t forget who he is.” You kept quiet. There was no point denying it. “And I’m not on about him being undead. He’s...” She hesitated before deciding to go for it. “Just don’t forget he’s responsible for a lot of this city’s darkness.” 

Unexplainable anger filled you. You didn’t like being judged, but more than that, the idea of someone judging Seokjin made your blood boil. She didn’t know him like you did. How kind he was when you were alone, how gentle… He wasn’t what people described him as behind closed doors. But what was the point? You knew you couldn’t tell her that. She’d just laugh at you, tell you how deluded you were. Maybe that’s what you were scared of... That you really were deluded. In over your head… 

You watched her shrug on her jacket, her mind at ease now that she’d warned you. “You don’t have a problem working in his club though?” 

She froze before pulling out a cigarette from her pocket and chuckling. “It’s money, babe.” She placed the rolled tube in between her lips and spoke through it. “We all need it, and at the end of the day, I’m not the one fucking him.” She finished with a casual shrug. As if she had no worries. You had plenty. 

You swallowed, careful to keep your voice steady. “Well thanks for your concern. I’ll bear it in mind.” And the you left, wiping away a stray tear from your left eye. 

You didn’t tell Seokjin about what happened that night, certain that Yeeun didn’t care enough to tell anyone. She wasn’t like that, hated gossip like you. You were also worried that if he found out, he’d do something. You didn’t want her to get fired. She said she’d needed the money after all. Maybe your worry went even further than that… You didn’t know. If Seokjin was as bad as everyone seemed to think, you really didn’t know… 

So you kept it to yourself. But you couldn’t shake the exchange. Seokjin noticed there was something wrong with you instantly. You saw him two nights afterwards, seeking distraction in the only way you knew with him. Sex. He was tired after his “business trip” and you went along with it, using it as a way to explain your unusual behaviour, so the sex was quick but indulgent. Definitely needed. You clung to him because you’d missed him. You clung to him because you were beside yourself. Torn and unable to truly feel fine. You’d thought being reunited again would reassure you. But it didn’t. 

“Smoking again?” You asked him after you were done, watching him reach for the pack of cigarettes he kept on the nightstand. 

He chuckled, knowing you hated the dirty habit. The addiction. Maybe in a way you were a hypocrite. “My insides are rotten anyway. What can it do to me?” He was correct you supposed. Rotten to the core. He was untouchable. 

However, to your surprise he put them back, wrapping his arm around you like it had been. Your head on his chest, protected from the chill by a fur blanket. His temperature always seemed to get you after sex, your own levelling out. Plus with the winter months now it was harder. He wasn’t the best to cuddle with after sex, an activity that seemed to be happening more often, so you had to separate your bodies with warmth. You let silence spread over you both, lost in your own head with a whirlwind of thoughts. 

“Hey,” he prodded gently after a little while, wanting you to look at him. “You’re lying to me. You’re not tired.” You didn’t bother to deny it. He sounded hesitant when he carried on. “Do you want to tell me what’s wrong?” 

You stayed silent for a moment. unsure how to begin, but you knew you couldn’t continue like this. You needed some type of reassurance from his mouth. Selfishly, you needed your conscience eased. You explained with a question, at least you hoped you did. “Do you like being who you are?” 

Seokjin tensed under you, his expression becoming guarded and you instantly feared you’d crossed a line. He knew you were referring to his status, not his being. Something pretty much off limits. Discussed vaguely in the beginning, your joining was never about that. Now it seemed like a forbidden subject. You understood Seokjin saw you as an escape. He didn’t want to discuss work, and you didn’t want to hear it. Yet, it was looming over you, like an ominous presence. You needed something. You could live with who he was if he was as unsure of it as you were. You were positive. He just needed to be honest with you. 

You waited patiently, and just as you resigned yourself to stone cold silence, he spoke. 

“It was handed to me. I don’t particularly have a choice. It’s all I’ve ever known.” If you didn’t know any better, you’d think that was bitterness in his tone. “My father is frail now. I don’t know how long he has left. I want to make him proud, regardless of how stupid it sounds. It’s fucked up, I know that. Especially with life as it is now.” 

You’d long given up trying to make your father proud, but you understood. Seokjin’s experiences were vastly different to yours, but you understood. His was a matter of life or death, you were sure of it. Yours was just the gradual estrangement from the people who had raised you. He confirmed the seriousness of his detriment in his next sentence. 

“There’s nothing I can do about it. It’s my life. It’s expected of me. If I refused, said no... Ran away like a coward... God knows what would happen to me.” 

Cruel of you maybe, but it was warming, reassuring to know he’d had such thoughts. Soothing to know in a lot of ways, he didn’t want this life. Selfish of you like you’d known. Trying to ease your own conscience, but here in his arms perhaps you really didn’t care. You didn’t care what Yeeun thought, what others would think if they ever found out. Your parents… None of it mattered because you knew that deep down, in his core, Seokjin was a good man. Rotten or not. He was good to you, and all that mattered. Yes, you were selfish, but you didn’t care. 

“Fuck.” He cursed quietly, voice thick with emotion before he laughed at the ridiculousness of it all. “What a world we live in. When being a motherfucking zombie is considered normal and the least of your problems.” 

You didn’t laugh along but kissed him softly. You think it stunned him, shutting him up instantly when you pulled away, until he exhaled, pulling you into another, longer, even sweeter kiss. He wrapped you in his arms tightly and you’d never felt safer. He got you onto your back, rolling on top of you, the fur separating your bodies, just, and your need for him burnt away inside your chest. 

But he pulled away before you could do anything about it, opening his mouth to say something, expression hesitant. You cupped his cold face, trying your hardest to spread some of your warmth through his body, silently encouraging him to speak. He smiled thankfully. “I didn’t choose that either, by the way. This rotter body.”

Your forehead furrowed, trying to make sense of his words. “That shocks you,” he noted. “I know why. You think I wanted this, just like everyone else.” You opened your mouth to deny it, but what was the point? You hated gossip, like you’d said so many time before, never listened to it, but you had let it sink it’s way into your mind without realising. 

Greed. You thought he was like all the rest. Seeking power. Your attraction to him overshot your distaste for the ghastly act of will, but maybe deep down, you’d hoped it wasn’t true. 

“It’s okay,” he reassured, twisting slightly to kiss the palm of your hand. Then the tips of your fingers as you sought the touch. “I know what people say about me. They’re wrong though.” 

“What happened?” You were whispering, asking without thinking. You didn’t want to pry but Seokjin had never shared this much before. You didn’t think he’d ever shared this much before. To anyone. 

“A miscellaneous deal gone wrong. I won’t bore you with the details, but I was scratched.” Your eyes widened, heart ached for him. How wrong people were. How wrong you were. “I took it in my stride, still do. I guess in some ways it helped me, in others not so much... But,” he stopped himself, letting his eyes close as he kissed your fingertips again. When he opened them the grey looked sadder than usual. “Who will follow after me? The family name gone. Although maybe that isn’t a bad thing.” He added with an afterthought, chuckling humourlessly. “I would want no kid of mine doing this. I don’t know. What I’m trying to say is, if there was ever a cure, I’d take it in a heartbeat.” Your own heart beat loudly in your chest. “Wishful thinking, right?”

You were stunned to silence now, trying to make sense of everything. You wanted to reassure him. There was adoption, he needn’t have to dwell, but then it seemed like such a human, vulnerable thing to get hurt over. It made your throat tighten, eyes well up. You had never imagined his anguish over being undead. He always seemed so casual, so put together. His human life was stolen from him cruelly and he was just left to deal with it, alone. You didn’t care if that was his by choice or not. It made sense now, that in ways he had hidden from himself, and why. He was ashamed. He wasn’t greedy, he was lost. 

“I don’t think so,” you murmured, caressing his face. “If they can mutate the disease and inject people with it, they can find an antidote.” 

He smiled sadly. “Do you think they want that? This world is a corrupt place. Everyone has their own selfish reason’s for letting this disease take over.” He was correct. A cure would never be made by any official. But there could be other options. One day. Hope wasn’t lost. 

“You can still live a normal life,” you insisted. 

“I can never age. Who would want that? Amongst other things. I have everything against me.” 

Something strong tore through your chest. It almost took your breath away, but you couldn’t voice it. You were too afraid. “I don’t think so.” You replied instead. It was hard to keep your voice stable. “What’s inside is more important.”

He chuckled sadly. “Angel, I’m rotten on the inside. Maybe on the outside too.” 

His pet name warmed your heart, always did, but his words made it weep. You swallowed, coating your dry mouth and squeezed his face, clinging to him, hoping he’d understand what you were trying to say. “Not to me.” 

He smiled, his eyes warming up and leant down to kiss you. “Thank you.” You held him close, sinking into his mouth. The cold was unnoticeable. He did understand. You could feel it in his kiss, taste it on his tongue. 

He drew back slowly, just before he lost himself entirely. He had more to say before then. “I have never felt more comfortable with anyone than I have with you. More human...” He trailed off and laughed quietly. “Even when I was one.” He kissed you once more. Like he couldn’t keep away. Hands holding the sides of your face, he lingered, your breaths mingling. 

“You care for me without judgement. That’s never happened before. I’ve never had that feeling.” 

You squeezed his wrists in silent understanding, eyes glassy. You couldn’t speak if you tried. Couldn’t let him know you felt exactly the same, in fear of bursting into tears. He understood though. Of course he did. 

And that’s where you were now. This present moment. The aftermath of such a confession only bringing you closer together. There were silent boundaries that had been made that night. Seokjin did not wish to go into detail about his days, nor did you want him to. You were at ease now, knowing you had been right about him, the others wrong. Yes, he wasn’t perfect. No one was. Yes, maybe if you knew the cold, hard facts, you wouldn’t be able to bear it, but you were happy being ignorant to that. It wasn’t greed that drove you, for Seokjin and all the pleasure he could give you. He had been wrong. You made him see that. It was a selfishness, and that was okay. It had to be. They were two different things. You were selfish for the happiness he made you feel, and likewise for him. 

For the first time in your life, you were truly happy. Felt truly understood and not judged, and so did Seokjin. Despite your different life experiences, you were the same in your hearts; yours alive, his rotten, but it didn’t matter—and that’s why you’d been so drawn to him. Twin flames in this dark, overbearing world. You knew the weight of such words, but you didn’t care. Not when you had something good, something pure, and you were clinging to it with all your might. 

As much as you had put him on a pedestal in the beginning, not quite believing he’d chosen you, wanted you. Potentially put your worth on his choice, it didn’t matter. Because he had done and felt the same. He had always been thankful you’d made the decision that you had. He was thankful that you wanted him. Still, even now. In ways, you had given him certain confidence and esteem that he’d been lacking. Similar to how he helped bloom yours too. Made you feel beautiful, sexy. It was not one sided with you two. It was real, and pure, and shared. Your admiration for one another. Your love…

Yes, this had been a simple arrangement. Sex. But it wasn’t so simple anymore. You both understood that. There would come a day when you’d have to acknowledge it, your feelings… It was potentially soon, or you could just keep hiding for a little while longer, but it would happen. Seokjin didn’t think he was capable of love after his turn. You remembered him saying something similar the first night you spent together, about romance. You knew now it was because he hated what he was. Undead. He had already lost so much of himself over the years, and to become infected only tore away more. But he was wrong. He was capable. You felt the love he gave you every day. Even if it was the silent kind. It shone from him, warmed you up when you clung to his ice cold flesh. 

So yes, you were selfish, so was he. But you didn’t care. Not when you had one another to hide behind. 

“How do you want me, Sir?” You silked the words, excitement bubbling away in the pit of your stomach. That was your little thing. What you called him sometimes. When he was in the mood for it. 

He smiled at you, but it didn’t seem to reach his eyes. You tensed, studying him almost intently now. Maybe there had been a reason he was delayed. You opened your mouth to ask if everything was okay, but he beat you to it. 

“No need for that tonight.” He sounded exhausted, beaten. You realised how terribly you’d misread the signs, feeling a little guilty as you sat up, tightening your gown over your chest. He walked over to his bureau, steps heavy on the wooden floor. Long ago had you come to accept his insistence on wearing shoes indoors, but you watched him step out of his boots now. Loosening the red tie around his neck before removing it completely. 

You waited politely for him to continue in some way. Not wanting to push an explanation for his depleted mood. He removed his rings one by one, dropping them into a glass bowl. That’s where he spoke to. “Today’s been hard. I–“ He stopped himself, unable or unwilling to go on. You wondered if you should press him. You realised keeping things bottled up like he did wasn’t good. But you were scared. Scared it could ruin things. You bit on your bottom lip, hard, stifling yourself. 

He turned to you then, a longing in his eyes. You knew that look very well. It was a yearning for you. “I just need some solace.” 

You nodded slowly, outstretching your arms for him to meet you. He rounded the corner of the bed in a few, quick strides and dove into you. His mouth finding yours in a deep, intense kiss. You wrapped your arms tightly around his shoulders, feeling him squeeze his around  your chest, like he needed to make sure you were really there. He spoke no more and that was okay. 

His mouth and tongue found your neck, kissing the skin like it could kiss back, until he ceased and held his face in the crook, hugging you tightly. You ran your fingers through his hair, unsure what else you could do. Your chest felt sad and heavy, his mood affecting you immediately. But you needed to be strong. You kissed at whatever part of his face you could reach, your turn to make him feel good. Make him feel loved. 

Somehow your lips met again, tongues slipping together, going from slow to fast. His anguish over what was unknown to you, turned into an urge to forget. An urge to bury himself so deep inside you, he’d forget the outside world. If not just for tonight. You would gladly give him that. Give yourself that. 

Your hands ran along the tops of his arms, squeezing the muscles as you went, moaning softly when his tongue slipped into your ear, the coolness sending a shiver up your spine. You quickly found the buttons of his shirt, undoing them in equal haste, revealing the expanse of his chest. His hands tugged at the tie of your gown, getting it to fall open and reveal your chest. He cupped your breasts softly, like you would break if he tried any harder and slowly got you onto your back. Your gown slipped open fully, rendering you bare to his eyes, and he let out a sweet sound of awe. He loved your body. Always had. Always would. 

You tugged where his shirt tucked into his slacks, and he ripped it from his body, desperate to get as naked as you. It wasn’t long before he was, lying atop your body, staring into your eyes as he caressed your face. His heart was beating a little faster than usual, like it did when he was aroused, yet still not that of a human heart. It never would, but it had become oddly soothing these days. 

“Not too cold?” He asked, voice thick with something that had you reaching for him, holding him close. 

You smiled. “No. I like it.” 

He returned the action, rubbing your noses together affectionately. Your heart swelled in your chest. Fit to burst. You closed your eyes and let yourself sink when his mouth began travelling your body. Your chest rising and falling visibly as he found his way between your legs, making love with his mouth. 

In fact, out of the hundreds of times you’d had sex, tonight was the closest you’d ever gotten to such an act. It just felt different. More vulnerable than ever before. Sweeter. It filled your hole body, elevated you. Took you to places you’d never been before. 

He pushed inside you slowly, indulging in your velvet warmth, and when he began to thrust it was to a tantric rhythm. Your back arched, your toes curled and all that you felt was warmth. No matter how cold his flesh was, his glow engulfed your body. You wanted it to never stop. 

“Tell me you’ll always want me,” he rasped into your ear. Silver and black eyes burning into yours when he pulled back to view you. It was the most defenceless thing he’d ever requested of you. Exposed in the darkness, you shone, giving him the confidence to plead for such a thing. 

You held his face tight, voice a hushed whisper, but it didn’t make it any less true. You didn’t know what the future held, nor what would unfold. But you were sure of one thing. There would never be a time when you didn’t want him. You were his, and he was yours. 

“Always.” 

[morethanaprincess-a]

Continued from here for @crossxskulled​ !

In the span of a single fifteen minute car ride, Sonia's day had changed from tranquility and all colors of the rainbow to absolute mayhem, highlighted in an array of dour grays and browns and spots of red. And she did it to herself: no one else had the authority to stop the car in such a place without imminent danger to the Princess' health and safety present. In fact, stopping the car would only add to the perilousness of the situation. But once she'd glimpsed a familiar shade of blonde hair, her decision had been made.

Careful to step around the drops and tiny puddles of blood in her blush pink heels, some of them adorned with bits of human teeth, she'd touched Ryuji's shoulder gently only when the last man, or perhaps victim in this case, had been dropped to the ground. Sonia had been quick enough too to step back once he'd rounded to face her next. But with a sigh of relief, he'd at least allowed her to lead him out of the alley and back to Shibuya's busy streets. He hadn't, however, let her put the antiseptic pad onto the various cuts on his face. And Sonia wasn't about to let his dignity falter, not while he could still walk. So she fell into step beside him, careful not to get dirt or various bodily fluids on her powder blue dress.

"It isn't my place to lecture you on right and wrong, Ryuji-san," Sonia insisted quietly. It was a blessing they weren't bothered, one she'd at least partially orchestrated as her security car followed a block behind them. "You're not my subject and I'm not your mother, your sister, or your girlfriend. But...surely there has to be another way? At least another way to make the law enforcement in this area care about the corruption and violence that has permeated through Shibuya, at least. I won't ignore the fact you have a very strong sense of justice, but I must wonder: at what cost does it come?"

There was so much she understood, and yet far more she didn't. It still hadn't resonated within the princess that not all governments had their citizens' best interests in mind. Sonia knew what had become of Haru's father, for example, but she still held onto hope that those not nearly as affected by greed and mass amounts of wealth, as those in power often were, still had a sense of fairness and wanting to do right by their people. Wage and power inequality was a hot topic at home, and it was making King Alexandre rather unpopular amongst some of the aristocracy for wanting to offer more opportunities and lower taxes for those with lower income. Sonia supported her father in it all, though quietly, as the public relations team was careful to monitor the 17-year-old's published opinions. Especially before her official debut as an adult on her 18th birthday. Yet it didn't occur to her that even one of Novoselic's strongest allies did not take such care with their local enforcements, despite how much those in power assured her family otherwise.

Taking him gently by the arm, Sonia paused at the edge of a street crossing. Just as Ryuji explained that he was considering other forms of assistance and negotiation, Sonia hadn't wanted him to walk right into traffic in the process. Or perhaps he was just too preoccupied looking at her than the stop lights in front of them. "The world isn't perfect, and neither are any of us," Sonia continued. No matter how much she worked for it, but it wasn't about her or how keen she was not to fail. Enough to spend, if she were honest about it, a rather grating three hours that morning on a private excursion in Tokyo's botanical gardens with a boy her parents and Royal Council alike insisted she just had to meet on a rare trip home from Yale. The gardens had been beautiful, calming and inspiring all at the same time. The company, not so much. "But that doesn't mean we cannot do our best for ourselves and those who love us."

"I just feel that there must be more to your life beyond Shujin, Ryuji-san," Sonia urged. She hoped her words wouldn't get lost in the crosswalk, like she saw train tickets and toys go on occasion. "Yes, there are some who won't let your previous deeds go, but surely they do not comprise the bulk of the world, or even the bulk of people you will meet in your lifetime? Instead of reaping those benefits, as you say, would it not be possible to, perhaps, move forward? Try again with your track and field skills? You just have so many wonderful gifts, Ryuji-san, and it isn't right to have them limited in such a way."

With the change of the light, Sonia nudged him softly with her shoulder to push him forward across the crosswalk. With her pink lips pressed into a fine line of concentration, they'd attract too much attention eventually if they remained like this on the street. He still seemed to be bleeding and needed to be treated properly, not just pressing a wipe to his face while walking. But it wasn't as if Sonia could very well take him to her dormitory room without raising questions. There had to be a plan B.

[joaqqquiin]

POLITICAL DYNASTY - AMPATUAN

CHAPTER 1 

INTRODUCTION

Introduction

Politics in the Philippines have been quite a contentious and fragile topic for the past decades. Politics have led to numerous outcomes such as disunity, distrust, dissension, dispute, and even violence. These are some of the factors that have contributed to how society in the Philippines acts in the present which commonly affects the atmosphere the people work and dwell in, the socio-economic status of Filipinos, and most importantly, the well-being of individuals. One example of a hot topic in the past is regarding the feud between late former president Ferdinand Marcos and the Aquino family. This topic is a topic that a number of people would call controversial due to the mixed views and feelings people have in regards to the topic. A riveting concept the two families have in common is that they are both political dynasties in the Philippines. Some people and politicians would consider political dynasties as a root cause of issues that arise such as poverty, bias, impunity, and even quarrels between political dynasties that may get in the way of making rational decisions and lead to neglection of appointed duties. A case in point which proves that political dynasties are nothing but problems was the largest massacre that the Ampatuan dynasty committed. 

The Ampatuan massacre, or popularly known as the Maguindanao massacre, is a carnage which was a ploy made by the Ampatuan family to gain the upper hand against their rivals. This unfortunate event that the Ampatuan dynasty planned was recorded as the single deadliest event for journalists in history. Being a journalist is a reputable job as one is tasked with the obligation to inform the public with the news, however, the Ampatuan family has dented the country’s reputation of being a safe space for journalists as 32 were killed in the massacre. The Maguindanao massacre alone may show that the Philippines is not an utterly safe place not only for journalists but in general. The Ampatuan family has contributed greatly to putting the Philippines in a position where press freedom is attacked, impunity is exercised, and power is corrupted. The Ampatuan dynasty jeopardized the credibility of the nation as a fun and safe place to spend time with your family.

CHAPTER 2

SUMMARY

Background

The Ampatuan family is considered the largest political dynasty present in our country with over 51 members. A few prime members of this family are considered to be the most politically involved and have had the most transgressions. The late Andal Ampatuan Sr. was a patriarch of the Ampatuan clan and was also a main suspect of one of the largest massacres in the Philippines, the Maguindanao massacre. Before the case was resolved, Ampatuan died after falling into a coma caused by a heart attack. Andal Ampatuan has 4 sons, namely, Andal Ampatuan Jr, Sajid Ampatuan, Zaldy Ampatuan, Anwar Ampatuan Sr.

Andal Ampatuan Jr. was the 8th child of Andal Ampatuan Sr. and Bai Laila Uy-Ampatuan. He was known as the mastermind of the Maguindanao massacre and was convicted of 57 counts of murder alongside his brother, Zaldy Ampatuan. He is currently located at the New Bilibid Prison where he is sentenced to a maximum of 40 years without parole. 

Sajid Ampatuan was among the accused of plotting the massacre. He claims that he had already cut ties with his family and said that he assisted his wife who was filing her candidacy at the time of the massacre. He was not present during the promulgation of judgement and was given 5 days to reason out his absence. Due to this instance, he was sentenced to life imprisonment with graft charges and lost his chance to appeal since the rule of court states that absence during the promulgation is not justified.

Zaldy Ampatuan was a governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) however he was expelled from office due to his participation in the massacre. It was said that he planned the Maguindanao massacre alongside his brother, Andal Ampatuan Jr. However, all charges against him were dropped, citing lack of evidence. This was until Justice Secretary, Alberto Agra, restored the murder charges against Ampatuan due to new findings.

Anwar Ampatuan Sr. is the brother of Andal Ampatuan Jr. He was part of the mastermind group and was also convicted with 57 counts of murder. Unlike Anwar Sajid and Anwar Jr. who were identified as first-class convicts or those who had plotted and fired at the victims, Anwar Sr. fell under the second class of suspects or those who had prior knowledge of the crime but were not at the crime scene.

Political History

The Patriarch of the Ampatuan clan, Andal Ampatuan Sr. was already a vice mayor in charge of Maganoy when President Marcos appointed him as mayor. Maganoy is now Shariff Aguack. However, in 1986, due to the People Power Revolution, President Marcos was departed, and Corazon Aquino came into power. As she came into power, she replaced every locally elected official with officers-in-charge. Ampatuan Sr. was also replaced by another Ampatuan, Datu Modi who served for two years in that capacity.

In 1988, after the 1988 local election, he served as mayor for 10 years as he had been winning three consecutive local elections 1988, 1992, and 1995. In his 10th year as mayor in 1998, he was elected as governor and started to accelerate his Clan activities. His family occupied almost all the political costs in the area, the family tried to widen the range of the power, and even, eighteen of the mayors in Maguindanao were once members of the Ampatuan clan.

In 2001, his clan solidified its hold on power by keeping a close friendship with Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. The reason for this is because Arroyo assumed the presidency after EDSA People Power II. And His choice was excellent. The family was appraised by the “Popular support” and openly supports Arroyo. In 2004, during the 2004 presidential elections, Arroyo came into power succeeding the previous president Joseph Estrada and dominated the polls in Shariff Aguack and most of Maguindanao. 

And lastly, in 2006, Arroyo issued Executive Order 546, allowing local officials and the police to deputize local militia to aid in the fight against insurgents. This greatly contributed to the establishment of power in the Ampatuan Clan. The Executive Order was issued shortly after an assassination attempt on Andal Ampatuan Sr. and the end of the Clan's history and relationships was dreadful. 

Issues they were associated with

It is no secret that fear is often instilled to control people. The Ampatuan clan, despite being popular and influential, they were feared. Numerous journalists would say, “They own the people'' or “The word of the Ampatuans was the law. The lives of the people living in Maguindanao would lie in the hands of the Ampatuan family as they had a private army consisting of 2000-5000 armed men composed of government-supported militia, local police, and military personnel. An instance when this private army was put into use was on the 23rd of November back in 2009. This instance was the Maguindanao massacre which would be the biggest issue of this political dynasty. 

Maguindanao mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. was challenged by Buluan vice mayor Esmael Mangudadatu as he was going to file his certificate of candidacy (COC). Vice mayor Esmael received death threats from his rivals so he thought that inviting journalists to his filing of COC would lessen the chances of ambushes. Esmael invited 37 journalists with him to file his COC. Along with the 37 journalists, there were also reporters, lawyers, aides and his family. As 58 of them were on their way to the Elections provincial office, they were kidnapped and murdered. Some were even raped before they were killed. There were at least 198 suspects including Andal Ampatuan Jr., Andal Ampatuan Sr. and several other members of the Ampatuan clan who were charged with 57 counts of murder. However, this was not the only issue the family had. They have a history of killing people way before the Massacre.

Back in 2005, 25 armed men in the military uniform killed the wife and child of Mando Tambungalan. He had identified that the suspects were hired killers on the Ampatuan payroll since he had been targeted by the Ampatuans for running for vice mayor of  Datu Piang in 2001. In 2006, the Ampatuans planted a bomb which exploded near the Shariff Aguak market, killing five people, including Ed Mangansakan who was a known weapons supplier for the Ampatuans. Another instance of their wrongdoings was when motorcycle-riding gunmen, linked to the Ampatuan clan, shot and killed Judge Sahara Silongan while he was driving his family home. A relative of the judge believes he was killed for failing to issue an illegal warrant of arrest demanded by the Ampatuans. As well as in 2008, a cousin of Ampatuan, Jr., and his armed men allegedly shot and killed eight members of the Lumenda and Aleb families. One gunman told the Human Rights Watch that he and the others were ordered to shoot the family because the Ampatuans doubted their loyalty.

CHAPTER III

REFLECTION

Abad, Anton Angelo T.

  My thoughts about the Ampatuan clan is that I'm surprised to see that they haven’t all been imprisoned and even some of them are still not arrested. I was shocked to read that they are responsible for the massacre and that they only did it because they didn’t want to get arrested. I think that people should learn more about these clans and start to plan a way to prevent them from gaining too much power. Because just like the Ampatuan clan they have so much power that they have their own private army and were able to delay there inevitable arrest for 51 murder.

Golamco, Janise Kate A.

The Philippines suffers from widespread corruption. From embezzlement, nepotism or police brutality, the common denominator to these actions is greed. Political dynasties such as the Ampatuan family are a huge factor to further influence these acts. Yet, people continue to tolerate their wrongdoings by doing nothing to prevent them. Because of fear, people have been silenced by their own timidity. Because of their own selfish desire, civilians were caught in the crossfire resulting in one of the largest politically involved massacres. The innocent lives lost cannot compare to merely a few years of imprisonment.

As students continue to grow and learn, it is vital that people know of the things that harm their society and strive for change. Influential families, such as the Ampatuans, use their power at their own disposal and further contributes to socio-economic inequality. It is why knowledge is greatly needed in order to stop corruption. By learning about the vulnerabilities and impacts of misconduct citizens are given a chance to end impunity once and for all. 

Lee, Noah

After exploring the largest political dynasty in the Philippines, there are a number of things left on my mind. It has been 19 years since the gruesome mass murder took place and threatened the Philippines. But I would appreciate that still now, we are studying this and learning about that happening and being reminded to be wiser in how to live as people in this country. We have to know what is currently happening, and what is harming or damaging the order of our country. It is our duty to argue for justice in our society and politics and to heritage it to our next generations. To achieve our duty, we all have to have a bright notion about the corruption of power that someone longs for enough to commit mass murder. 

However, the most damning aspect of the report for me was the support of the Ampatuans by the state, the police and the military, allowing them to consolidate their power. I strongly oppose the idea of making use of the public power for the private benefit of chosen families. It is said that there is no person above the law but I feel irritated about the fact that there is a person who takes advantage of the laws. Until we can generate real justice, we should keep our eyes on our country.

Velasquez, Joaquin Gabriel D.

Having the power to be able to do everything we want is something that if not all, most people dream of. The power to be exempted from the law, the power to generate money, the power to rule the world, or the power to make this all come true. To be able to obtain that amount of power is like living everyone’s dreams, but no, it makes us corrupt. Corruption of power is one of the deadliest aspects that can not only destroy an individual but also a whole nation. Corruption has been present in the Philippines for decades already, it has never left the country and I think it does not plan on leaving anytime soon. Corruption has many factors, it can be through pocketing money, abusement of power, and even the act of impunity. Impunity is as dangerous as corruption as it serves as an immunity pass to those with power. There have been several occurrences in which both impunity and corruption have been present, working hand in hand. A famous case is in the presence of political dynasties. Political dynasties have been believed to be the root cause of far-reaching problems in the Philippines. 

The Ampatuan dynasty or family is one of many political dynasties present in the Philippines. The Ampatuan family is known for planning the biggest massacre which ended up killing around 57 people. Several suspects have been charged with 57 counts of murder. However, due to impunity, a large number of suspects are still at large. In respect to this, I do not condone the presence of political dynasties in our country. As a part of the youth, it is important that we are aware of when corruption and its likes are present, lurking around us. I may not have the power to be able to do everything I want but I have the power that not everyone has the ability to do, speaking up and using my voice to amplify the voice of those who are silenced by the effects of the wrongdoings of these political dynasties. Raising one’s voice does not necessarily mean joining rallies but spreading awareness regarding the wide-ranging effects of the influential families sitting in power. Not speaking up and allowing corrupted families in power to continue and degrade the country’s socio-economic status will make us all accomplices to the destruction of our nation as a whole for failing to protect it. 

CHAPTER IV

CONCLUSION

Conclusion

The Ampatuans remain a powerful and dangerous force with which to be reckoned. For years, the department of justice and the military has been trying to get the Ampatuan family to pay for their actions yet they haven’t achieved full justice. A police officer once asked, “what do we do? This is an influential family.” The Ampatuan family is a powerful family with many connections making it hard for people to stand up against them. The trial of the Ampatuan massacre is a case that has far-reaching implications not only on press freedom in the Philippines but also on one of the biggest threats to the country’s democracy, impunity.

With impunity present in our country, killings and other illegal doings happen all around with no one to be held accountable. Thousands have been killed with impunity in the Philippines’ illegal war on drugs alone, how many more innocent people have died from other activities and remain greatly suppressed, away from where the world can see. In these cases, it is imperative that we equip ourselves with the proper knowledge and be a voice to those who are voiceless.

[antoine-roquentin]

With the apprehension of García Luna, the history of contemporary Mexico will be rewritten, especially that of the governments of the PAN right, and in particular the Calderón administration, who should end up in an International Court for crimes against humanity.

The morning of  Tuesday, December 10, the news began to run like gunpowder in newsrooms, social networks and government offices. In Texas Genaro García Luna, secretary of Public Security in the government of Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), had been arrested and was going to be transferred to New York (to the same Federal Court that prosecuted Chapo) for traffic conspiracy crimes of cocaine, false statements and receiving bribes from drug trafficking.

The first important accusations against García Luna date back to the distant 2001, when in the government of Vicente Fox (2000-2006) he was the head of the Federal Research Agency (AFI). His relationship with the Sinaloa Cartel was a constant theme in the notes of reporters specializing in drug trafficking.

Despite this background, Felipe Calderón decided to appoint him Secretary of Public Security, which ultimately turned out to be the most relevant position in his cabinet, making García Luna the most powerful man of his sexennium behind him . A kind of vice president.

It is in this sense that the arrest of García Luna is more relevant than that of the 'Chapo' Guzmán, because the first represents organized crime and the second only to drug trafficking. What I mean by this? In Mexico (and in other parts of the world, such as Colombia) a "drug trafficker mythology" has been built, as the sociologist Luis Astorga has pointed out. Official narratives have created the image of an evil entity (the drug trafficker) that attacks with all its means the purity of the State , corrupting some rotten apple, some authority that, despite its kind nature, falls into the sin of the Greed and accept the money.

This narrative makes it appear that the world of the drug trafficker is one, while the world of politics and the economy are others, that they have nothing to do or that they only come into contact abnormally. The lie of this narrative, repeated a thousand times by the media, falls to the most basic evidence. Mexico has long been a drug producer (marijuana, opium) and, in that sense, there has been a long-standing relationship between local authorities at first, and then federal and drug traffickers.

Calderón's six-year term, which is García Luna's, emanated from electoral fraud and imposed a militarization under the pretext of combating drug trafficking, but which involves regions that have important natural resources that long for transnationals such as water, gas, oil and of course several mining products. This is one of Oswaldo Zavala's main arguments in his book ''Cartels do not Exist''. Without going any further, by chance or causation, the killing of the LeBarón family took place in a border area with important lithium deposits.

Any business consists of different branches or chains. Production, logistics, sales, marketing, accounting, finance, legal, new products, etc. In the case of organized crime and drug trafficking is the same. From the marijuana and opium of the 40s to the cocaine of the 70s and 80s to the production of designer drugs today there is a chasm of difference. They are not the same business to put it in some way. No one doubts the relevance of ephedrine or fentanyl in the current drug market, which involves the pharmaceutical industry because of its volume. As was the case with Zhenli Ye Gon, a Chinese pharmaceutical entrepreneur nationalized by the Vicente Fox government and apprehended in 2007.

Most of the journalists on foot or who reported to local newspapers reported on the links and complicity of the governments of the right with "El Chapo'' Guzmán and the Sinaloa Cartel. While, at the national level, the mainstream media danced to the music of García Luna and pleased him in everything . For example, the journalist Carlos Loret de Mola, who was in charge of the most watched morning newscast, lent himself to disseminating a montage that simulated that kidnap victims were released by AFI elements. Others wrote in newspapers about the achievements in security of García Luna, who from the Ministry of Public Security (SSP) allocated significant amounts of money in advertising contracts.

Likewise, it is logical to think that the intelligence services of the United States make profiles of important officials, especially those related to security and drug trafficking issues, which are the issues that Americans most care about in their relationship with Mexico. So, if his bond with the Sinaloa Cartel was an open secret, why didn't he act against him? Since 2012 when  the Calderón government ended, García Luna decided to reside in luxury in Miami, where he acquired several properties of millionaire value and where he established a public safety and risk management consultancy. To do all this he had the temporary permission of the United States government, which granted him permanent residence and it seems that he ignored the origin of the resources with which he settled in Miami and where he had no intention of going unnoticed.

García Luna is the first character in a long police line to be brought to American justice. He was also the second most important man in the Calderón administration and the architect of his main government actions. He is not a man who received a bribe, he was a core part of Mexico's public policies and the relationship with the United States . He is a man who was applauded by popular journalists and by civil associations that "fight" against violence. It's not like "El Chapo", an outsider.

He is a main figure of the system whose links are woven in all its extension: with the presidents Fox and Calderón, with other members of the PAN, with the main media, with businessmen, with people of the justice system such as Eduardo Medina Moraor today's prisoner prisoner Javier Collado. And even with US authorities and agencies such as the DEA, who ignored all the information they had for years.

They say that the big fish eats the boy, but this time it is turning out that a small fish delivers an increasingly larger one. First they apprehended the brother and son of ''Mayo'' Zambada, then on to Chapo Guzmán. These operations and the derived information led them to García Luna. "What will this do to reduce your sentence? Will you deliver to your superiors? To his cabinet mates? To entrepreneurs and media informants? To the judges and police who helped him? To corrupt civil associations that supported him? To authorities in the United States who are also involved? A few of all?"

terrible translation, but you get the picture. there’s long been a relationship between sinaloa and the american deep state, stretching back to long before the shocking 2001 release of el chapo. it’s so obvious that a major hollywood movie, sicario, included it in its lines in 2015. the more recent arrests are clearly a sign that america sees no advantage in backing the sinaloa cartel nowadays, possibly because it has lost faith in its mexican partner to handle the issue. AMLO is keeping his domestic agenda on track in part by satisfying trump’s agenda, especially in regards to migrants and extradition. he’ll soon find that the americans can’t handle anything less than total control on their borders.

[bountyofbeads]

I Worked for Alex Jones. I Regret It. https://nyti.ms/2PiTeFr

This piece by former InfoWars "video reporter" (?) Josh Owens reveals all the insanity you'd expect but also the pathetic sadness of those who continue to enable, peddle, and profit from his malicious lies.

Confession is good for the soul, but I'm trying to get my head around the fact that the author continued to work for Alex Jones for several YEARS after the latter made his vile claims about Sandy Hook.

Josh Owens was drawn to #InfoWars while "vulnerable, angry & searching for direction"; after 4 years w/Alex Jones, he saw "virulent nature of his world." Read if you can stomach Jones' deeply disturbing behavior. This model has infected right-wing media.

Josh Owens is a seriously good writer. Too bad he didn't make the subject of this piece himself. Why was he angry, why did he stay with Jones so long, how did he feel as he did his work? These unexamined questions are the heart of the story, not how disturbed a plainly disturbed man Jones is.

"Owens admits that his personal mental and emotional issues led him to Jones. We should be glad for him, that he found the strength to recognize it, address it, and walk away from a bad situation. Owens shouldn't be vilified for his past mistakes, but celebrated for his return. Prodigal son, no? But forgiveness does not imply absolution."

"This can't be the end of the road. As he is responsible for a lot of anguish and grief. Is he even an accessory to murder? The pain that he enabled will live on in families for decades and become part of our national fabric. How does he intend to make amends? This written catharsis is a good first step, but it's only a first step. Is he the little girl in the airplane, seeing the world for the first time? What does he intend to do with this revelation, and fix the damage he has done?"

"At 23, Josh Owens quit film school to work as a video editor for Alex Jones. This is his account of the years he spent within the Infowars empire." /1

"At first, he found it easy to brush off Alex Jones’s fever dreams as eccentricities and excesses. But he eventually found that he had his limits." /2

"Once, at a private ranch, Owens said, Alex Jones picked up an AR-15 and accidentally fired it in the writer’s direction. The bullet hit the ground about 10 feet away from him, he recalled. Jones claimed he had intentionally fired the gun as a joke, he said."/3

“Over time, I came to learn that keeping Jones from getting angry was a big part of the job, though it was impossible to predict his outbursts,” he writes."/4

“There was a time when I shared his anger. In fact, I was still angry. But this is where we differed: I wasn’t angry with others; I was angry with myself. And once I realized that, it was easier to walk away”/5

I WORKED FOR ALEX JONES. I REGRET IT.

I dropped out of film school to edit video for the conspiracy theorist because I believed in his worldview. Then I saw what it did to people.

By Josh Owens | Published Dec. 5, 2019 | New York Times Magazine | Posted December 6, 2019 |

On Election Day 2016, I sat in the passenger seat of Alex Jones’s Dodge Hellcat as we swerved through traffic, making our way to a nearby polling place. As Jones punched the gas pedal to the floor, the smell of vodka, like paint thinner, wafted up from the white Dixie cup anchored in the console. My stomach churned as the phone I held streamed live video to Facebook: Jones rambling about voter fraud and rigged elections while I stared at the screen, holding the camera at an angle to hide his double chin. It rarely worked, but I didn’t want to be blamed when he watched the video later.

Four years earlier, Jones — wanting to expand his website, Infowars, into a full-blown guerrilla news operation and hoping to scout new hires from his growing fan base — held an online contest. At 23, I was vulnerable, angry and searching for direction, so I decided to give it a shot. Out of what Infowars said were hundreds of submissions, my video — a half-witted, conspiratorial glance at the creation and function of the Federal Reserve — made it to the final round.

Unconvinced I could cut it as a reporter, Jones offered me a full-time position as a video editor. I quit film school and moved nearly a thousand miles to Austin, Tex., fully invested in propagating his worldview. By the time I found myself seated next to Jones speeding down the highway, I had seen enough of the inner workings of Infowars to know better.

Before we left the office, Jones instructed me to title the video “Alex Jones Denied Right to Vote” when uploading to YouTube. He knew before we left that they wouldn’t let us walk into a polling location with our cameras rolling. I don’t think Jones even intended to vote. Rather, he hoped to turn this into a spectacle, an insult to him personally, another opportunity to play the self-aggrandizing victim.

“Look at this great city shot,” he said pointing out the window at Austin’s skyline. As soon as I pulled the camera off him, he reached for the white Dixie cup. Is this really how I’m going to die? I thought to myself, imagining the scene: Jones veering too close to the guardrail, ranting about George Soros and Hillary Clinton. Sirens echoing in the distance, flashing lights reflecting off oil-soaked pavement as he grabs the camera and utters his final words, “Hillary ... rigged ... the car.” His listeners would have believed it. Years earlier, I would have believed it.

Fortunately, there were no sirens or flashing lights, and I was relieved when “Vote Here” signs began to appear. A line stretched out the door of the polling place, in a local strip mall, by the time we arrived. As I expected, Jones was told multiple times that he couldn’t film at a polling place, and he decided to leave. Walking back to the car, still taking sips from his white cup, he began noticeably slurring his words. A friend of Jones’s who tagged along — for “security purposes” — offered to give me a ride back to the office. Jones revved his engine, tires squealing as he sped out of the parking lot.

I began listening to Jones’s radio show — the flagship program of what is now a conspiracist media empire with an audience that until recently surpassed a million people — in the last days of George W. Bush’s presidency. The American public had been sold a war through outright fabrications; the economy was in free fall thanks to Wall Street greed and the failure of Washington regulators. Most of the mainstream media was caught flat-footed by these developments, but Jones seemed to have an explanation for everything. He railed against government corruption and secrecy, the militarization of police. He confronted those in power, traipsed through the California redwoods to expose the secretive all-male meeting of elites at Bohemian Grove and even appeared in two Richard Linklater films as himself, screaming into a megaphone.

But it wasn’t the politics that initially drew me in. Jones had a way of imbuing the world with mystery, adding a layer of cinematic verisimilitude that caught my attention. Suddenly, I was no longer a bored kid attending an overpriced art school. I was Fox Mulder combing through the X-Files, Rod Serling opening a door to the Twilight Zone, even Rosemary Woodhouse convinced that the neighbors were members of a ritualistic cult. I believed that the world was strategically run by a shadowy, organized cabal, and that Jones was a hero for exposing it.

I had my limits. I can’t say I ever believed his avowed theory that Sandy Hook was a staged event to push for gun control; to Jones, everything was a “false flag.” I didn’t believe that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama smelled like sulfur because of their proximity to hell or that Planned Parenthood was run by “Nazi baby killers.” But it was easy to brush off these fever dreams as eccentricities and excesses — not the heart of the Alex Jones operation but mere diversions.

Once I started working there, however, it became obvious that one was impossible to separate one from the other. Soon after I was hired, Jones’s Infowars-branded store — which sells emergency-survival foods, water filters, body armor and much more — introduced an iodine supplement, initially marketed as a “shield” against nuclear fallout. Still learning the ropes, I was tasked with creating video advertisements for the supplement, which he ran on his online TV show. One of these ads started with a shot of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant as it exploded. I doubled the sound of the explosion, adding a glitch filter and sirens in the background for dramatic effect. Jones stood over my shoulder as I edited. “This is great,” he said. “See if you can find flyover footage of Chernobyl as well.”

Shortly after Jones began selling the supplements, someone posted a video on YouTube holding a Geiger counter displaying high radiation readings on a beach in Half Moon Bay, Calif. The video went viral, stoking fears that radiation from Fukushima was drifting across the Pacific Ocean. Jones saw an opportunity and sent me, along with a reporter, a writer and another cameraman, to California. We had multiple Geiger counters shipped overnight, unaware of how to read or work them, and drove up the West Coast, frequently stopping to check radiation levels. Other than a small spike in Half Moon Bay — which the California Department of Public Health said was from naturally occurring radioactive materials, not Fukushima — we found nothing.

Jones was furious. We started getting calls from the radio-show producers in the office, warning us to stop posting videos to YouTube stating we weren’t finding elevated levels of radiation. We couldn’t just stop, though; Jones demanded constant real-time content. On some of these calls, I could hear Jones screaming in the background. One of the producers told me they had never seen him so angry.

We scrambled to find something, anything we could report on. We tested freshly caught crab from a dock in Crescent City, Calif., and traveled to the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in Avila Beach, asking fishermen if we could test the small croakers they caught off a nearby pier. We even tried to locate a small nuclear-waste facility just so we could capture the Geiger counter displaying a high number. But we couldn’t find what Jones wanted, and after two weeks of traveling from San Diego to Portland, we flew back to Texas as failures, bracing for Jones’s rage. (Jones did not respond to detailed queries sent before publication by The Times Magazine.)

Over time, I came to learn that keeping Jones from getting angry was a big part of the job, though it was impossible to predict his outbursts. Stories abounded among my co-workers: The blinds stuck, so he ripped them off the wall. A water cooler had mold in it, so he grabbed a large knife, stabbed the plastic base wildly and smashed it on the ground. Headlines weren’t strong enough; the news wasn’t being covered the way he wanted; reporters didn’t know how to dress properly. Once a co-worker stopped by the office with a pet fish he was taking home to his niece. It swam in circles in a small, transparent bag. When Jones saw the bag balanced upright on a desk in the conference room, he emptied it into a garbage can. On one occasion, he threatened to send out a memo banning laughter in the office. “We’re in a war,” he said, and he wanted people to act accordingly.

I also saw Jones give an employee the Rolex off his own wrist, simply because he thought the employee was mad at him. “Now, would a bad guy do that?” Jones asked as he handed over the watch. Once, when I went to interview a frequent guest of Jones’s, I was sent with a check to cover a potentially lifesaving cancer treatment. A few times I came close to quitting, and like clockwork, just before I pulled the plug, I received a bonus or significant raise. I hadn’t discussed my discontent with Jones, but he seemed to sense it.

Jones often told his employees that working for him would leave a black mark on our records. To him, it was the price that must be paid for boldly confronting those in power — what he called the New World Order or, later, the deep state. Once my beliefs began to shift, I saw the virulent nature of his world, the emptiness and loathing in many of those impassioned claims. But I was certain that after four years working for Jones, I would never be able to get another job — banished into poverty as penance for my transgressions, and rightly so.

When Jones wanted to blow off steam, we would travel to a private ranch outside Austin to shoot guns. Among other firearms, we would bring the two Barrett .50-caliber rifles he kept stashed in the office. Because we never missed an opportunity to create more content, we also brought along cameras to turn whatever happened into a segment for his show.

I remember one trip in particular. It was the summer of 2014, and I rode to the ranch in the back of a co-worker’s truck, surrounded by semiautomatic rifles, boxes of ammunition and Tannerite, an explosive rifle target. A few of us left early in the morning, arriving before Jones to film B-roll and load magazines; he had no patience for preparation. When he came hours later, after eating a few handfuls of jalapeño chips, he picked up an AR-15 and accidentally fired it in my direction.

The bullet hit the ground about 10 feet away from me. One employee, who was already uncomfortable around firearms, lost it, accusing Jones of being careless and flippant. This was one of the few times I saw someone call Jones out and the only time he didn’t get angry in response. He claimed he had intentionally fired the gun as a joke — as if this were any better.

I stood by silently, considering what might have happened if the gun had been pointed a little to the right. After a while the upset employee let it go, and no one brought it up again. We cracked open a few more beers, filled an old television with Tannerite and blew it up.

One weekend, a few people from the office went hunting at a game reserve. On the following Monday, I was handed a hard drive full of video files and told to edit them for Jones to air on his show later in the week. “There are clips in here that are pretty bad, things we don’t want to get out, so let me take a look at this before we upload it,” one of my managers said.

The first video I clicked on came from a cellphone. The camera pans across a blood-covered floor in what looked like a garage. Dead animals were scattered about: eyes lifeless, tongues hanging from their mouths, crimson streaks splashed on their fur.

In another video, a bison grazed quietly in the shade of a large tree; it reminded me of a tableau at the American Museum of Natural History. Then the camera panned over to Jones, maybe 20 yards away, holding what looked like a handgun. Jones began firing at the bison, tufts of hair flying with every hit. The animal remained standing as Jones shot round after round. Finally, the hunting guide yelled at Jones to stop and handed him a high-caliber rifle. Jones took a moment to make sure the cameras were still recording and fired a few more rounds as the animal finally collapsed.

I shared a large room with three other employees, and Jones often walked into our office after he wrapped for the day. His first question was always “How was the show?” If anyone said it was great — someone, if not everyone, always said it was great — his response was the same. “Really?” he would say, moving over to their side of the room. “Did you really think it was great? What did you like about it?”

Working for Jones was a balancing act. You had to determine where he was emotionally and match his tone quickly. If he was angry, then you had better get angry. If he was joking around, then you could relax, sort of, always looking out of the corner of your eye for his mood to turn at any moment.

Late one night, after an extended live broadcast, Jones walked into my office shirtless. This was normal; he removed his shirt frequently around us. He pulled out a bottle of Grey Goose from a storage cabinet and filled his cup. He stumbled into his private restroom, changed into a clean black polo shirt and stepped back into our office. “Hit me,” he said to an employee in the room. When the employee refused, Jones got louder, his face redder. “Hit me!” He kept saying it, getting closer each time. Finally, knowing Jones would never relent, the employee gave him a weak tap on the shoulder.

“Oh, come on,” he said, “hit me harder!”

The employee punched him hard in the shoulder. Jones grunted on impact, seeming to enjoy the pain. Then, it was his turn. Smirking, he planted his feet, reared back and lunged his body weight forward as his fist connected with the man’s arm. I could hear the dull thud of impact, then a wincing sigh. They traded a few more punches, each time seeming less playful. Jones became wild-eyed, spit flying from his clenched teeth as he exhaled. On his last hit, the sound was different. Wet. I thought I could hear the meat split open in the employee’s arm. Jones roared as he punched a cabinet, denting the door in. A few weeks later, I heard that Jones had broken a video editor’s ribs after playing the same game in a downtown bar.

Having aligned himself with Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential race, Jones might now be considered a version of a conservative, but his perspective is much more complicated than that. Infowars was like a lot of digital-media outlets, in that we reported on the things our top editor thought would go viral. But because our boss was Alex Jones, this was a peculiar process. Assignments were often handed down live on the air during his show. We were to have it playing throughout the office, always listening for directives. Ideas for stories mostly came from what other news outlets reported. Jones wanted us to “hijack” the mainstream media’s coverage and use it to our advantage. If it fit into the Infowars narrative, it played.

When I wasn’t at the office, I spent much of my time traveling for Jones. I inhaled the tear gas in Ferguson, Mo., during the Black Lives Matter protests, retching as I hid with protesters, corralled by cops in riot gear. I stood next to armed cowboys and ranch hands as they faced off against the Bureau of Land Management to retrieve Cliven Bundy’s cattle in Nevada. I had dinner with the leader of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan, at his home in Phoenix and spent a weekend at the compound of Jim Bakker, the televangelist who spent time in prison for fraud. Jones’s instinctual desire to distance himself from the mainstream led us to unusual and sometimes dark places.

In December 2015, the day before Jones interviewed Donald Trump, still a candidate at the time, on his radio show, I made my way to upstate New York on assignment, along with a reporter and second cameraman. We were sent to visit Muslim-majority communities throughout the United States to investigate what Jones instructed us to call “the American Caliphate.” After the California Geiger-counter debacle, we had meetings with Jones before trips in order to ascertain exactly what he wanted. If we “hit some home runs,” he said, we would get significant bonuses.

We landed in Newark at 12:30 p.m. on Dec. 1, 2015. The first stop was Islamberg, a Muslim community three hours north of Manhattan. It was founded in the 1980s by mostly African-American followers of a Pakistani cleric named Mubarik Ali Shah Gilani, who encouraged devotees of his conservative brand of Sufi Islam to establish small settlements across the rural United States. Gilani was suspected of association with the organization Jamaat ul-Fuqra, which was briefly designated as a terrorist group by the State Department in the 1990s; Gilani has denied any connection to the group. His followers in Islamberg had no record of violence, and some of them had denounced the Islamic State in an interview with Reuters earlier that year, saying they didn’t believe Islamic State members to be real Muslims. But unfounded rumors circulated around far-right corners of the internet that this community was a potential terrorist-training center. Jones, who thought the media consistently ingratiated themselves with Islamic extremists, believed them.

We pulled in, unannounced, to a dirt drive leading to the community, stopping at a flimsy cattle gate guarded by two men. The reporter, wearing a hidden camera, approached the entrance as we filmed the interaction from the vehicle. The men were calm and polite, if a little suspicious — reasonable given the circumstances. They denied our entry into Islamberg but took our number and told us we could return after they verified who we were.

It was only later, after listening to the audio from the reporter’s hidden camera, that I heard what he told the two men guarding the gate. “Basically, what we do is, we go around, and we do videos debunking claims of stuff,” the reporter said. “The word is, people say this is some kind of training camp, so we wanted to come in and get some footage and kind of put that whole rumor to rest.”

He gave them his real name — a name that, with a quick Google search, would lead back to Infowars, with its headlines like “Inside Sources: Bin Laden’s Corpse Has Been on Ice for Nearly a Decade,” “Special Report: Why Obama Brought Ebola to U.S. Exposed” and “VIDEO: ‘Demon’ Caught on Camera During Obama Visit?” Those headlines could be described by many words, but none of them would be “debunking.”

Because of the conspiracy theories about the place, Islamberg was a constant target of right-wing extremists. That April, a Tennessee man was arrested and later convicted of plotting to raise a militia to burn Islamberg’s mosque to the ground. Only days before we arrived, the F.B.I. issued an alert to law enforcement to be on the lookout for a man named Jon Ritzheimer, the leader of an anti-Muslim movement in Arizona who posted a video threatening violence against Muslims less than two weeks earlier. In the video, he brandished a handgun, saying: “I’m urging all Americans across the U.S. everywhere in public, start carrying a slung rifle with you, everywhere. Don’t be a victim in your own country.”

So the phone call we received later that night from a law-enforcement agent shouldn’t have come as a surprise. The officer who contacted us said he simply wanted to verify who we were after receiving a concerned call from someone in Islamberg. We told Jones about it, and he chose to believe the call was a veiled threat, an attempt to intimidate us into silence. To him, this verified that we were onto something. He even went so far as to include Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, in the purported conspiracy, claiming he wanted to abolish the Second Amendment — and that somehow intimidating us would achieve that.

Jones told us to file a story that accused the police of harassment, lending credence to the theory that this community contained dangerous, potential terrorists. I knew this wasn’t the case according to the information we had. We all did. Days before, we spoke to the sheriff and the mayor of Deposit, N.Y., a nearby municipality. They both told us the people in Islamberg were kind, generous neighbors who welcomed the surrounding community into their homes, even celebrating holidays together.

The information did not meet our expectations, so we made it up, preying on the vulnerable and feeding the prejudices and fears of Jones’s audience. We ignored certain facts, fabricated others and took situations out of context to fit our narrative, posting headlines like:

Drone Investigates Islamic Training Center

Shariah Law Zones Confirmed in America

Infowars Reporters Stalked by Terrorism Task Force

Report: Obama’s Terror Cells in the U.S.

The Rumors Are True: Shariah Law Is Here!

Our next stop was Hamtramck, a Muslim-majority city embedded within Detroit that alarmists in neighboring communities called Shariahville. As we headed west, my phone vibrated, and a news alert appeared on the screen. There were reports that a mass shooting that week in San Bernardino, Calif., had been perpetrated by Islamic extremists, making it at the time the deadliest Islamic attack in the United States since Sept. 11.

I knew that when the details emerged, they would substantiate the lies we pushed to Jones’s audience. It didn’t matter if the attack took place on the other side of the country or if the people in Islamberg had no connection to the perpetrators in San Bernardino. Jones’s listeners would draw imaginary lines between the two, and we were helping them do it.

I quit working for Jones on April 7, 2017. When offered another job, an introductory position with a 75 percent pay cut, I jumped at the opportunity. Instead of giving two weeks’ notice, I left in three hours. Jones had gone home for the day, so I didn’t speak with him in person. I said goodbye to co-workers and managers, handed over my company credit card and hoped that would be the end of it. Two nights later, I received a call from Jones: “Let me tell you a little secret,” he said in his gravelly voice. “I don’t like it anymore, either.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I don’t want to do it anymore,” he said, “and I got all these people working for me, and you know, then I feel guilty. I don’t want to do it. You think I want to keep doing this? I haven’t wanted to do this for five years, man.” I sensed that he was pandering, but I couldn’t help thinking that for the first time since I started this job, Jones and I finally had something in common. Sure, there was a time when I shared his anger. In fact, I was still angry. But this is where we differed: I wasn’t angry with others; I was angry with myself. And once I realized that, it was easier to walk away. When I left, I tried to put myself in his shoes, to figure out why he said and did the things he did. At times I saw a different side to Jones, one that was vulnerable, desiring validation and acceptance. Then he would say something so vile and callous it became impossible to look past it.

Even though I was no longer beholden to Jones for financial security, I couldn’t be honest about how I felt. I was to blame for my actions, unequivocally, and yet I resented Jones for creating an environment of rage, fear and confusion that diminished discernment, increased self-doubt and left me feeling as if my brain had short-circuited. I wanted to say these things to Jones, but I didn’t.

He offered to double my pay, suggested I work remotely and even proposed funding a feature-length film of my own. I said it wasn’t about money and turned him down. To this day, I still don’t know why he wanted to keep me around. He said it was because he cared about me, but if I had to guess, I would say his main concern was losing control.

The next morning, he called numerous times, and then again that evening. I let the calls go to voice mail.

There wasn’t a single moment that persuaded me to leave, but there was a turning point: a moment that stuck with me long after it happened. I thought of it as I sat next to Jones speeding recklessly down the highway on Election Day, when I walked out of the office for the last time and when I decided to sit down and write this article.

It was early morning, and we were headed back to Austin after the trip that began in Islamberg. As we boarded our flight, I took my window seat close to the rear of the plane. An older woman wearing a hijab sat next to me. With her was a young girl, giddy with excitement, who bounced in the middle seat, holding a bag of pretzels. The woman leaned over and asked if I would let the girl sit by the window. “This is her first time on a plane,” she said. I agreed and moved my bag from under the seat.

I thought of the children who lived in Islamberg: how afraid their families must have felt when their communities were threatened and strangers appeared asking questions; how we chose to look past these people as individuals and impose on them more of the same unfair suspicions they already had to endure. And for what? Clickbait headlines, YouTube views?

As I sat on the aisle, the plane now lifting up into the pale blue sky, I glanced over at the little girl staring out the window in wonder, her face glowing from the light reflecting off the clouds. She was amazed, joyful, innocent, carefree and completely unaware of the world beneath her.

Josh Owens is a writer living in Texas. This is his first article for the magazine.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The Nerd Cantina reviews #Radicalized

Megan McCarthy-Biank:

Immigration. Police brutality. Healthcare. Societal Collapse. In a series of novellas, Cory Doctorow isn’t afraid to get political to address these themes in Radicalized. His stories force readers to confront these issues and the frightening familiarity of how these events play out. The main characters in these stories face corporate greed against the most vulnerable, a biased justice system, the corrupt bureaucracy of health insurance, and the end of the world. While our protagonists prevail (for the most part), their successes come at almost-unexpected costs.

The first story, “Unauthorized Bread,” follows Salima in her attempt to navigate a system that seems to actively punish her for being a refugee. She and her fellow-refugee neighbors in their high-rise building have no choice but to use the appliances provided in the low-cost apartment. Unfortunately, these networked appliances will only function for specific products – for example, their toasters will only toast specific (i.e. “approved”) kinds of bread, the dishwasher will only wash specific kinds of dishes, and so on. Even elevator access is determined by how much rent the tenants can afford to pay.

Then one day, Salima’s toaster stops working altogether, due to the company going bankrupt. So she finds a solution to the problem by hacking her broken toaster, and shares this trick with others in the building. Eventually the company is bought out and the network is up and running again – which means that Salima’s efforts could have disastrous consequences for her and everyone she helped to hack into the system and “illegally” use their appliances.

The second story is “Model Minority,” in which readers will recognize the identity of a popular superhero in our modern world. Going by the name of “American Eagle,” our main character witnesses and intervenes in an incident in which police officers are beating an unarmed black man, after allegedly seeing marijuana in the vehicle he is driving. The American Eagle pursues the case and the officer in charge, attempting to ensure that the the justice system works fairly to hold the police accountable. Some readers may be able to guess where the story goes from here.

The American Eagle has spent centuries upholding the law. For decades he thought that police officers worked to do the same. Throw in a well-known journalist/love-interest and billionaire colleague (both recognizable to comic book fans), and he begins to realize the failings of the system and becomes increasingly frustrated that his actions have adverse effects on the victim. The story literally asks the question, “Why did it take you so long?” Why did the American Eagle decide to intervene in police brutality and racial injustice now, when these issues have been around for decades? Would it even make a difference if some sort of supreme being or powerful alien started saying the words “Black Lives Matter,” or would Americans begin to see him as a threat once he confronts the police?

The third novella in the collection, “Radicalized,” will hit home with any reader who has had to deal with the corruption of the American healthcare system. Our main character, Joe, is a father and husband whose wife has cancer. While an experimental treatment can possibly save her life, their insurance company refuses to cover the cost. While fundraising for his wife’s treatment, Joe finds himself diving deep into the dark web and finds a forum/community full of those with similar experiences – people who have lost spouses and children who could have been saved, if not for the insurance policies in place.

In this story, the community members take matters into their own hands by attacking the insurance companies’ headquarters and unleashing their frustration in deadly ways. Eventually the bodies pile up and government officials finally use the word “terrorism” to describe the predominantly armed white male suspects carrying out these attacks. While Joe attempts to help these depressed and angry people and prevent more attacks, he finds himself potentially guilty by association. The question is, how many people have to die for those in power to take action?

The final story, “Masque of the Red Death,” explores how the 1% might handle the end of the world. Our protagonist Martin has spared no expense on his “very cool” bunker (AKA Fort Doom) and survival plan, and seems excited to use them. He invites 30 specific people to join him and spells out explicit instructions to follow, and turns away those who don’t follow them. Not everyone shows up to ride out the collapse of society. Those who do, however, slowly realize taking shelter with Martin may not have been the best course of action, as things begin to go horribly wrong.

Doctorow somehow manages to develop fleshed-out characters in the short time readers spend with them. Each story in Radicalized digs deep into the realities that Americans face today, and gives us new perspectives from the lives directly (and indirectly) impacted. If Doctorow’s goal was to entertain, educate, and make readers realize their potential to fix these problems, then he has succeeded.

https://thenerdcantina.com/radicalized-by-cory-doctorow-book-review/

[wisdomrays]

FOR THE CONQUEST AND DOMINION OF HEARTS

Over the last few centuries mankind have suffered hardships after hardships, travelling around pits of 'death'. Their struggles for deliverance and relief have all resulted in new calamities. During this dark period, rather than the established governments formally in power, it is the greed and passions of individuals, classes, holding companies and mafias that have controlled communities. It hardly needs saying that in this circumstance, the only criterion by which people and things are evaluated is money, buying power.

It is natural, in a period when standards have changed so completely, that people should be esteemed for their wealth, the make of car they use and the sort of house they live in. It is natural because material and financial resources or potentials have been given precedence over human virtues like knowledge, good morals, sound thinking and civility. Wealth may indeed be valued when put under the command of knowledge, intellect, courage, honour and devotion to the service of others, but when valued for itself or, worse, when united with greed, it can be a means of brutality.

If the members of a society make the foundation of their lives the gratification of animal desires, and their purpose becoming or being rich at all costs – rather than being honest, industrious and competent, then the selfish, the ignorant and the cunning people come to dominate in that society. This means the exclusion of moral values and human virtues and therefore of those who combine efficiency with personal integrity – precisely the ones who could be useful to the society.

Compared with previous centuries, mankind today may well be wealthier and enjoying more of the conveniences and comforts of life. However, it is also true that they are trapped in greed, infatuations, addictions, needs and fantasies much more than in any previous age. The more they gratify their animal appetites, the more crazed they become to gratify those appetites still more; the more they drink, the more thirsty they are; the more they eat, the more hungry they are. They enter into bad speculations to feed their avarice to earn ever more and more and sell their spirits to the devil in return for the most banal advantages, thus breaking with true human values a little more each day.

Modern man, who spends his energies in pursuit of transient material advantages, is wasting himself and all the nobler, truly human feelings in the depths of his being. It is no longer possible to find among his resources either the serenity that comes from belief, or the tolerance and depth of spirit enabled by knowledge of God, or the traces of love and spiritual joys. This is so because he weighs everything on the scales of material advantage, immediate comfort and the gratification of bodily appetites, and thinks about only how he can increase his profit or what he will buy and sell, and where and how he will amuse himself. If he is unable to satisfy his appetites through lawful means, he rarely hesitates to resort to unlawful means, however degraded and degrading.

In order to be delivered from the suffocating world of unbelief and egocentricity, from shuttling aimlessly between the false modern concepts of thought, action and life, man should strive to re-discover the true human values that lie in the depths of his being. To escape the various stresses and afflictions in the psychological, spiritual and intellectual dimensions of personal life, and the strains and conflicts in collective affairs within and between nations, he should re-consider the worth of believing, loving, moral values, metaphysical thinking and spiritual training.

Believing means knowing the truth to be true, what and how it is, and loving means putting that knowledge into effect in one's life. Those who do not believe and love are merely physical entities without true life, like mechanically animated corpses. Belief is a most important source of action and a way to embrace the whole creation in spirit, while love is the most essential element of true human thought and a transcendental dimension of it. For this reason, those who are on the way of building the happy world of the future on the foundations of spiritual and moral values, should first arrive at the altar of belief, then ascend to the pulpit of love, and only then preach their message of belief and love to all others. In seeking to achieve their aims, they should never forget that their influence depends on morality and virtuousness.

Morality is the essence of religion and a most fundamental portion of the Divine Message. If being virtuous and having good morals is to be heroic – and it is – the greatest heroes are, first, the Prophets and, after them, those who follow them in sincerity and devotion. A true Muslim is the one who practises a truly universal, therefore Muslim, morality. Anyone of sense and insight can see that the Qur'an and the Sunnah – the way or example of the Prophet, upon him be peace and blessings – are sets of moral principles. The Prophet, who is the greatest embodiment of morals, said: Islam consists in good morals; I have been sent to perfect and complete good morals. The Muslim Community have always been the representatives of good morality and it must be so since it is only through morality and virtuousness that this Community can attain eternity. Islamic metaphysics is a means to reach the highest point in morality.

Metaphysical thought is the effort of the intellect to embrace creation as a whole and perceive it with all its dimensions, visible and unvisible. Without this effort of the intellect or spirit, everything breaks up into lifeless fragments. For this reason, the failure of metaphysical thought implies the death of the intellect. All the great civilizations have developed and come into being in the arms of metaphysical thought. Metaphysical thought is human intellect or spirit trying to embrace the whole of creation and comprehend it from within and outside; those who see metaphysics and physics (and other sciences) as conflicting disciplines, are not aware that they are seeing a river and the source where it originates as contradictory.

Another dimension of metaphysics is the perception of creation through love. In this context, love is identical with perceiving the whole of the universe with whatever is happening in it as a continuous interconnected flux and loving it. Those who have been able to find this true love pursue neither wealth nor fame; rather, they find peace in the flames of their love and see the face of their beloved amid the ashes of their own existence burnt away. In other words, they are on an uninterrupted journey from the valleys of 'self-annihilation in the existence of God' to the heights of 'attainment to permanence through permanence of God'. This attainment can come through strict spirritual training.

Spiritual training means directing man to the purpose of his creation. Through awareness of the ultimate purpose of this worldly existence, a man can be freed from bodily pressures and realize a journey into his very essence.

We are obliged to change the viewpoint and aspirations of modern man who, having lost his spiritual dynamics and broken with his essential identity, is the victim of his own self. We are hopeful that if we reinforce our will and resolve through regular worship and control it through continual self-ciriticsm, Almighty God will not deny his help in making us successful in this blessed mission. It is our duty to sow the seeds now for the brighter earth of the future, and we leave to God Himself, if He wills, to grow each of them into fruitful trees.

We are fully convinced that, as a result of conscious efforts, this corrupt world will give birth to a new one where belief and worship will carry to every place the fragrances of peace, security and love. We are also convinced that future generations will aim at, and be favoured by, the ecstasies of an overflowing love, far beyond aspirations for money or fame or high appointments. This love will originate in conquering hearts and, in return, will be recompensed with the dominion of hearts.

[showbizprofiling]

Top 24 Best Action Anime of All Time to Watch Right Now

Best Action Anime has always been a signature of anime genre from the very starting. Even if it's not ever the primary focus as it once was, in the 1970s and 1980s, most anime displayed scenes or set plays with intense fight scenes. And I would hope that the top action anime world never went too far away. Let's take a look at a couple of action romance anime that ranks the best of all time. Don't miss Thrillist's best action anime list. 'Top Action anime' is an audit quality, so We compiled 24 best action anime, and each anime series had a few notables. Every  anime encourages dramatic change or stands out due to a brilliant plot or character.  You asked for the best anime action of all times, and we brought a list of romance action anime.

The List of Best Action with Romance Anime

24- Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress

Directed By: Tetsurō Araki Release Date: April 8, 2016 Duration: 12 Episodes Rating: IMDb (7.3/10) The "Kabane" are horrible creatures like zombies that can only be killed by piercing their iron-protected hearts. After "Ikoma's" city overran, he boarded a fortified iron train alongside some new allies searching for a safer place. The Good action anime here is its key selling point, with the continuous panning of camera angles accentuating dynamic and rapid combat. There's a flashback: "Ikoma," a professional investor, had told "Mumei" that he would transform her back into a human. Do we feel some kind of romance action anime tension between the two? They're a fine pair of fights, for sure. In the present, Ikoma" is convening with human leaders to formulate a war plan, but humans don't trust him, possibly because of his "Kabane" blood. It doesn't work for him that he's not quite himself. He sweats like crazy, and he falls to his knees. During the Industrial Age, the action romance anime occurs as the virus infects humans and transforms them into "Kabane". 23- Black Lagoon

Directed By: Sunao Katabuchi Release Date: April 8, 2006 Duration: 24 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.3/10) The squad of the "Black Lagoon" is ragtag of mercenaries in the coin, but their relationships are tied together. When "Rokurou Okajima" (a non-assuming businessman) joins the gang and gives it the name "Rok," he turns away his life, as he flew into a world of crime, corruption, and greed. The Titan assault is terrible, but it's not exactly a horror action anime. You will discover an operation that is heavy on the scheme, creating a character and the environment, if you can stomach the gruesome, inner presence of the titans and the violent intent of how to devote their victims. Since there is possibly more action romance anime than almost any genre, Attack on Titan is indeed the best one since the virtual absence of plot shield means that no one is ever truly safe, and the consequences were genuine. Black Lagoon, the best action anime without our happy trigger Revy, who promises to push the series together, cannot be said about it. 22- Dorohedoro

Directed By: Yuichiro Hayashi Release Date: 1999 Duration: 12 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.5/10) We find powerless people and strong magicians alike in the abandoned and unhospitable district of Hole. Kaiman is a tall, brooding figure with the head of a crocodile. But he wasn't born that way. And he's looking for the guy who took his body, his memories, and, ultimately, his identity. When this top action romance anime begins, "En", a leading mafia magician, hears a Lizardman murdering his people and sends out the indifferent Shin and his partner, the bubbly (and too muscular) Noi, into the Hole to take care of Caiman, triggering a messy conflict between the two worlds. Although the initial premise would otherwise suggest that the moral world of Dorohedoro is far from black and white, sorcerers' society appears to be one with its internal conflicts and oppressive machines. 21- Gintama

Directed By: Shinji Takamatsu Release Date: April 4, 2006 Duration: 367 Episodes Rating:  IMDb (8.6/10) Hundreds of "Gintama" episodes cover many genres. I loved it from the very beginning, but some suggest you must get to the first serious arc to appreciate the value of "Gintama's" setting and characters. "Gintoki" is a samurai who helps people with jobs here and there in Feudal Japan after an alien invasion. Comedy's an anime's hard nut to crack. The funniest series there relies on Japanese phrases that do not translate. "Gintama" is on the thin side, and witches might lose in Western audiences. The Comedy action romance anime is still legally funny, so the award of best comedy anime is taken. Part of this is from jokes that land amid the language barrier. 20- The Tower of God

Directed By: Takashi Sano Release Date: June 30, 2010 Duration: 13 Episodes Rating:  IMDb (7.9/10) The Tower of God recently completed is the first action romance anime webtoon! I'm pleased that I Choose a good one. The anime enhanced over the webtoon in every possible way, with the distinct and raw art style and an epic weight for every conflict. This electronic orchestral soundtrack. 25th Bam was a boy who knew only a dark cavern, a filthy cloth, and an inaccessible light all his life. Then the whole of his life changed when a young girl named Rachel came into him by morning. He learned from her some things about the outside world by being close friends with Rachel. Begins "Bam's" journey, a young boy who wasn't selected from the Tower but had his doors opened. They call its kind of "Irregulars" being that each time they put a foot in, it has shaken the very base of the Tower. 19- Akira

Directed By: Katsuhiro Otomo Release Date: July 16, 1988 Duration: 2h 6m Rating:  IMDb (8/10) Akira is a classic all-time Anime. Gang wars, psychokinetic conspiracies, and a government effort are situated around Neo-scenery, Tokyo's, which could ruin the city and kill most of the inhabitants. The tale is dense, so let us concentrate on the action. Akira is not just a action anime, and not just great animation, although both are great. It's a beautiful film; it stops absolutely. There is a lot of top action romance anime list, and every year more come out. Akira remains a high watermark. It is a great film, a cool story, and a beautiful, action-packed animation with tremendous attention to detail. 18- Parasyte

Directed By: Bong Joon-ho Release Date: May 30, 2019 Duration: 2h 12m Rating:  IMDb (8.5/10) But not his side, now hosting a personality. Oh, his eyes and the mouth. Okay, that's terrible, but you can still change. The horror of the body was never so freely directed into motion. This best action anime will concentrate on Izumi Shinichi, a 17-year-old who lives in Tokyo with his family. One night, an alien Parasyte that looks like a worm enters his body, burrowing on to his arm, which is named Migi. It leads to an unusual connection between the two. 17- Land of the Lustrous

Directed By: Takahiko Kyogoku Release Date: October 7, 2017 Duration: 12 Episodes Rating:  IMDb (8.4/10) It's beautiful to watch, featuring many pleasant and well-defined people who each need a demon in an eternal war with the Lunar people who are mobilizing their bodies to harvest their beauty. Some of the settings will leave your jaw between your knees, waiting for the next episode to be clicked. Crystalline creatures called Gems in the unknown future occupy a planet devastated by six meteors. Each Ornament is assigned a role to combat the Lunar people, a species that attacks them to break down their bases and utilize them as decorations. It's dynamic, brilliant and has some of the most pleasant films in best action romance anime TV history. 16- One Punch Man

Directed By: Shingo Natsume Release Date: December 4, 2015 Duration: 12 episodes and 5 special episodes Rating:  IMDb (8.8/10) The author of the original webcomics hit it with his first idea, uh, punched it out of the park. Get this all right? Just imagine a standard shounen or even super heroic comic.  Although the action anime genre is still spoofing, One Punch Man ventures in a different direction and asks the fundamental question: What if a superhero were so powerful that he could punch all of his enemies? The top action anime series begins with a regular guy called Saitama, who chooses a nonsensical training scheme to become a superhero. He overdoes it, becomes so dominant that his opponents are not in trouble, and as a result, he becomes bored (and bald). This, however, is a cool, funny and good action anime series of bonkers with lots of action - Saitama must take things seriously every once and for a while. 15- Sword of the Stranger

Directed By: Masahiro Andô Release Date: September 29, 2007 Duration: 1h 43m Rating: IMDb (7.8/10) As part of their unprecedented ability and straightforward aim, Sword of the Stranger may very well be the most thoroughly performed entry in the best action anime of all time genre. Young orphan Kotaro and his heroic dog Tobimaru encounter an unnamed swordsman whose adventures need little clarification. It seems to Sword of the Stranger, a great option to start this rundown, precisely because it is the high-octane action with some good action anime choreographed parts that keep you attached to your seat during the film. She would not mislead her narrative characters, incredible sequences of action, stunning art styles, and only the fraternal love between two main characters has a progressing past. If you love the setting of history, that's another justification to give the Stranger's Sword a chance.. 14- Hellsing Ultimate

Directed By: Geneon Release Date: February 10, 2006 Duration: 10 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.6/10) Hellsing Ultimate incorporates anything from the Hellsing original and lifts it to the extreme. A little less than an hour, ten episodes tell you a macabre and witty tale of vampirism and survival. Very legendary, fabulous, unique, and one of the most sensitive artworks. A lot of vampire amines will occur. The varied best action anime output was understandable, as it had been subject to various animation studios. The animations from Gory were adequate to make you feel disgusted and distressed. The source was faithful, but the production of timing and plot was too quick and choppy for non-manga readers, making plot twists and character development trivial and impressionable. 13- Evangelion

Directed By: Geneon Release Date: November 17, 2012 Duration: 26 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.6/10) Gurren Lagann brings things in a genre known for excess to another stage with a good action anime breeze, a node, and a screamed alarm. A mecha with sunglasses could turn off visitors who aren't in the giant robot-anime genre. However, what seems to be an embarrassing mess works much better than it does. Crochet, line, plunger, the high-energy opening sequence, and the first episode lead you through some well-designed scenes that are strange but brilliant and amusing best action romance anime for the same time. When each character is introduced, we learn more about the brain, nerve, and soul organizations and why they have been developed. 12- Katanagatari

Directed By: Hideo Katsumata with Others. Release Date: January 25, 2010 Duration: 12 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.4/10) In his quest for 12 special blades, Katanagatari is the story of strategist and Martial Artist Shichika. It is also the tale of shifting times when the swords' age was forced to end with the rash of firearms in Japan's Edo-era.  The core partnership is just as intense as the realization of its key subjects, which ensures that the bread and butter of this series will keep you in some way amused as you chatter interminably. This isn't to say that this top action romance anime are not entertaining. Still, it is more aimed at fans who might be considering pivoting towards more dialog-heavy anime and, at the same time, retaining a substantial side dish of action. 11- Kill la Kill

Directed By: Hiroyuki Imaishi Release Date: October 3, 2013 Duration: 27 Episodes Rating: IMDb (7.9/10) Revenge is the game story in "Kill la Kill," starting from a basic plot but becoming more complicated and more in-depth, rather than just an anime full of best action anime and beautiful combat scenes than appears in each chapter. Ryuuko Matoi roamed the country in search of his killer after the assassination of her dad. At the renowned Honnouji Academy, she is at high school, unlike any other, with just her lead-the absent half of his innovation, Scissor Blade. The Academy, along with its influential subsidiary elite four, is ruled by the formidable and cold-hearted student council chairman Satsuki Kiryuin. Satsuki offers those in the highest unique clothing called "Goku's Uniforms," which offer the wearer extraordinary superhuman powers in the school's brutally competitive hierarchy. The hits are still entertaining with their characters and the storyline. This is a roller coaster; you will understand when you watch this anime. 10- Devilman: Crybaby

Directed By: Masaaki Yuasa Release Date: January 5, 2018 Duration: 10 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.1/10) This is numbered as the top 10 action anime of the year, and it sounds incredible to modernize a classic anime, and it demonstrates that it can be significant. The 1972 and 1987 originals are little-known but decent classics. I recommend that you watch the sub or read the manga. Although it's all packed, blood, blah blah blah drugs, it's also emotionally full. It's about who the real demons are with a deep and dark psychological subject. Monsters killing people or people killing people. The fight between Fudo and these malformations is incredible. Although it's full of feelings, tears in your eyes sometimes don't like Naruto, One Piece, and Koe no katachi. 9- JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure

Directed By: Naokatsu Tsuda Yasuhiro Kimura Release Date: January 1, 1987 Duration: 42 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.7/10) The events of the Joestars, which now take several decades, families, and even timelines, can practically not be summed up. This romance action anime has already seen several bizarre adventures from slaying vampires to defend a small town – and a lot to come! The charming old-school beginning; the following with maybe the most charismatic protagonist; a curious tour with an even better-known Villain, and even a small one clashes with the most inspired path to date. Every season has its attractions. But as the environments, skills, and tones change, two aspects remain the same the unforgettable positions of Hirohiko Araki and the fact that JoJo's battles quickly turn out to be a strategic game. 8- Mob Psycho 100

Directed By: Yuzuru Tachikawa Release Date: July 12, 2016 Duration: 25 Episodes Rating: IMDb (8.5/10) Read the full article

[nooooah]

POLITICAL DYNASTIES - AMPATUAN

CHAPTER 1 

INTRODUCTION

Politics in the Philippines have been quite a contentious and fragile topic for the past decades. Politics have led to numerous outcomes such as disunity, distrust, dissension, dispute, and even violence. These are some of the factors that have contributed to how society in the Philippines acts in the present which commonly affects the atmosphere the people work and dwell in, the socio-economic status of Filipinos, and most importantly, the well-being of individuals. One example of a hot topic in the past is regarding the feud between late former president Ferdinand Marcos and the Aquino family. This topic is a topic that a number of people would call controversial due to the mixed views and feelings people have in regards to the topic. A riveting concept the two families have in common is that they are both political dynasties in the Philippines. Some people and politicians would consider political dynasties as a root cause of issues that arise such as poverty, bias, impunity, and even quarrels between political dynasties that may get in the way of making rational decisions and lead to the neglection of appointed duties. A case in point that proves that political dynasties are nothing but problems was the largest massacre that the Ampatuan dynasty committed. 

The Ampatuan massacre, or popularly known as the Maguindanao massacre, is a carnage that was a ploy made by the Ampatuan family to gain the upper hand against their rivals. This unfortunate event that the Ampatuan dynasty planned was recorded as the single deadliest event for journalists in history. Being a journalist is a reputable job as one is tasked with the obligation to inform the public with the news, however, the Ampatuan family has dented the country’s reputation of being a safe space for journalists as 32 were killed in the massacre. The Maguindanao massacre alone may show that the Philippines is not an utterly safe place not only for journalists but in general. The Ampatuan family has contributed greatly to putting the Philippines in a position where press freedom is attacked, impunity is exercised, and power is corrupted. The Ampatuan dynasty jeopardized the credibility of the nation as a fun and safe place to spend time with your family.

CHAPTER 2

SUMMARY

Background

The Ampatuan family is considered the largest political dynasty present in our country with over 51 members. A few prime members of this family are considered to be the most politically involved and have had the most transgressions. The late Andal Ampatuan Sr. was a patriarch of the Ampatuan clan and was also a main suspect of one of the largest massacres in the Philippines, the Maguindanao massacre. Before the case was resolved, Ampatuan died after falling into a coma caused by a heart attack. Andal Ampatuan has 4 sons, namely, Andal Ampatuan Jr, Sajid Ampatuan, Zaldy Ampatuan, Anwar Ampatuan Sr.

Andal Ampatuan Jr. was the 8th child of Andal Ampatuan Sr. and Bai Laila Uy-Ampatuan. He was known as the mastermind of the Maguindanao massacre and was convicted of 57 counts of murder alongside his brother, Zaldy Ampatuan. He is currently located at the New Bilibid Prison where he is sentenced to a maximum of 40 years without parole. 

Sajid Ampatuan was among the accused of plotting the massacre. He claims that he had already cut ties with his family and said that he assisted his wife who was filing her candidacy at the time of the massacre. He was not present during the promulgation of judgement and was given 5 days to reason out his absence. Due to this instance, he was sentenced to life imprisonment with graft charges and lost his chance to appeal since the rule of court states that absence during the promulgation is not justified.

Zaldy Ampatuan was a governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) however he was expelled from office due to his participation in the massacre. It was said that he planned the Maguindanao massacre alongside his brother, Andal Ampatuan Jr. However, all charges against him were dropped, citing lack of evidence. This was until Justice Secretary, Alberto Agra, restored the murder charges against Ampatuan due to new findings.

Anwar Ampatuan Sr. is the brother of Andal Ampatuan Jr. He was part of the mastermind group and was also convicted with 57 counts of murder. Unlike Anwar Sajid and Anwar Jr. who were identified as first-class convicts or those who had plotted and fired at the victims, Anwar Sr. fell under the second class of suspects or those who had prior knowledge of the crime but were not at the crime scene.

Political History

The Patriarch of the Ampatuan clan, Andal Ampatuan Sr. was already a vice mayor in charge of Maganoy when President Marcos appointed him as mayor. Maganoy is now Shariff Aguack. However, in 1986, due to the People Power Revolution, President Marcos was departed, and Corazon Aquino came into power. As she came into power, she replaced every locally elected official with officers-in-charge. Ampatuan Sr. was also replaced by another Ampatuan, Datu Modi who served for two years in that capacity.

In 1988, after the 1988 local election, he served as mayor for 10 years as he had been winning three consecutive local elections 1988, 1992, and 1995. In his 10th year as mayor in 1998, he was elected as governor and started to accelerate his Clan activities. His family occupied almost all the political costs in the area, the family tried to widen the range of the power, and even, eighteen of the mayors in Maguindanao were once members of the Ampatuan clan.

In 2001, his clan solidified its hold on power by keeping a close friendship with Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. The reason for this is because Arroyo assumed the presidency after EDSA People Power II. And His choice was excellent. The family was appraised by the “Popular support” and openly supports Arroyo. In 2004, during the 2004 presidential elections, Arroyo came into power succeeding the previous president Joseph Estrada and dominated the polls in Shariff Aguack and most of Maguindanao. 

And lastly, in 2006, Arroyo issued Executive Order 546, allowing local officials and the police to deputize local militia to aid in the fight against insurgents. This greatly contributed to the establishment of power in the Ampatuan Clan. The Executive Order was issued shortly after an assassination attempt on Andal Ampatuan Sr. and the end of the Clan's history and relationships was dreadful. 

Issues they were associated with

It is no secret that fear is often instilled to control people. The Ampatuan clan, despite being popular and influential, they were feared. Numerous journalists would say, “They own the people'' or “The word of the Ampatuans was the law. The lives of the people living in Maguindanao would lie in the hands of the Ampatuan family as they had a private army consisting of 2000-5000 armed men composed of government-supported militia, local police, and military personnel. An instance when this private army was put into use was on the 23rd of November back in 2009. This instance was the Maguindanao massacre which would be the biggest issue of this political dynasty. 

Maguindanao mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. was challenged by Buluan vice mayor Esmael Mangudadatu as he was going to file his certificate of candidacy (COC). Vice mayor Esmael received death threats from his rivals so he thought that inviting journalists to his filing of COC would lessen the chances of ambushes. Esmael invited 37 journalists with him to file his COC. Along with the 37 journalists, there were also reporters, lawyers, aides and his family. As 58 of them were on their way to the Elections provincial office, they were kidnapped and murdered. Some were even raped before they were killed. There were at least 198 suspects including Andal Ampatuan Jr., Andal Ampatuan Sr. and several other members of the Ampatuan clan who were charged with 57 counts of murder. However, this was not the only issue the family had. They have a history of killing people way before the Massacre.

Back in 2005, 25 armed men in the military uniform killed the wife and child of Mando Tambungalan. He had identified that the suspects were hired killers on the Ampatuan payroll since he had been targeted by the Ampatuans for running for vice mayor of  Datu Piang in 2001. In 2006, the Ampatuans planted a bomb that exploded near the Shariff Aguak market, killing five people, including Ed Mangansakan who was a known weapons supplier for the Ampatuans. Another instance of their wrongdoings was when motorcycle-riding gunmen, linked to the Ampatuan clan, shot and killed Judge Sahara Silongan while he was driving his family home. A relative of the judge believes he was killed for failing to issue an illegal warrant of arrest demanded by the Ampatuans. As well as in 2008, a cousin of Ampatuan, Jr. and his armed men allegedly shot and killed eight members of the Lumenda and Aleb families. One gunman told the Human Rights Watch that he and the others were ordered to shoot the family because the Ampatuans doubted their loyalty.

CHAPTER III

REFLECTION

Abad, Anton Angelo T.

  My thoughts about the Ampatuan clan is that I'm surprised to see that they haven’t all been imprisoned and even some of them are still not arrested. I was shocked to read that they are responsible for the massacre and that they only did it because they didn’t want to get arrested. I think that people should learn more about these clans and start to plan a way to prevent them from gaining too much power. Because just like the Ampatuan clan they have so much power that they have their own private army and were able to delay their inevitable arrest for 51 murders.

Golamco, Janise Kate A.

The Philippines suffers from widespread corruption. From embezzlement, nepotism or police brutality, the common denominator to these actions is greed. Political dynasties such as the Ampatuan family are a huge factor to further influence these acts. Yet, people continue to tolerate their wrongdoings by doing nothing to prevent them. Because of fear, people have been silenced by their own timidity. Because of their own selfish desire, civilians were caught in the crossfire resulting in one of the largest politically involved massacres. The innocent lives lost cannot compare to merely a few years of imprisonment.

As students continue to grow and learn, it is vital that people know of the things that harm their society and strive for change. Influential families, such as the Ampatuans, use their power at their own disposal and further contributes to socio-economic inequality. It is why knowledge is greatly needed in order to stop corruption. By learning about the vulnerabilities and impacts of misconduct citizens are given a chance to end impunity once and for all.

Lee, Noah

After exploring the largest political dynasty in the Philippines, there are a number of things left on my mind. It has been 19 years since the gruesome mass murder took place and threatened the Philippines. But I would appreciate that still now, we are studying this and learning about that happening and being reminded to be wiser in how to live as people in this country. We have to know what is currently happening, and what is harming or damaging the order of our country. It is our duty to argue for justice in our society and politics and to heritage it to our next generations. To achieve our duty, we all have to have a bright notion about the corruption of power that someone longs for enough to commit mass murder. 

However, the most damning aspect of the report for me was the support of the Ampatuans by the state, the police and the military, allowing them to consolidate their power. I strongly oppose the idea of making use of the public power for the private benefit of chosen families. It is said that there is no person above the law but I feel irritated about the fact that there is a person who takes advantage of the laws. Until we can generate real justice, we should keep our eyes on our country.

Velasquez, Joaquin Gabriel D.

Having the power to be able to do everything we want is something that if not all, most people dream of. The power to be exempted from the law, the power to generate money, the power to rule the world, or the power to make this all come true. To be able to obtain that amount of power is like living everyone’s dreams, but no, it makes us corrupt. Corruption of power is one of the deadliest aspects that can not only destroy an individual but also a whole nation. Corruption has been present in the Philippines for decades already, it has never left the country and I think it does not plan on leaving anytime soon. Corruption has many factors, it can be through pocketing money, abusement of power, and even the act of impunity. Impunity is as dangerous as corruption as it serves as an immunity pass to those with power. There have been several occurrences in which both impunity and corruption have been present, working hand in hand. A famous case is in the presence of political dynasties. Political dynasties have been believed to be the root cause of far-reaching problems in the Philippines. 

The Ampatuan dynasty or family is one of many political dynasties present in the Philippines. The Ampatuan family is known for planning the biggest massacre which ended up killing around 57 people. Several suspects have been charged with 57 counts of murder. However, due to impunity, a large number of suspects are still at large. In respect to this, I do not condone the presence of political dynasties in our country. As a part of the youth, it is important that we are aware of when corruption and its likes are present, lurking around us. I may not have the power to be able to do everything I want but I have the power that not everyone has the ability to do, speaking up and using my voice to amplify the voice of those who are silenced by the effects of the wrongdoings of these political dynasties. Raising one’s voice does not necessarily mean joining rallies but spreading awareness regarding the wide-ranging effects of the influential families sitting in power. Not speaking up and allowing corrupted families in power to continue and degrade the country’s socio-economic status will make us all accomplices to the destruction of our nation as a whole for failing to protect it.

[fathersappointed]

The board man cometh Kim is a very dedicated pitchman!

Do you think if I told Kim he was being deceived, he would believe me, Kim, you’re being deceived nope that, didn’t work?

Today he’s talking about his favorite demonic scientist. Elon Musk.

Is Elon a benevolent Super-mind Or the egotistical maniac Khan you task me, Khan!

Elon, they think you’re a bad seed. A bad seed demon spawned. I’m looking at some of your pictures I don’t know?

He says the Devil wants your spaceships!

Captain Kirk of the USS Enterprise once asked God why does God need a spaceship? When God said I will use your ship to spread my greatness.

Why would the Devil need spaceships?

There’s a lot of reasons, but if you going by the story, how long are you going to fare against God with spaceships that can barely get to the moon. And what are you going to do with a rocket that can go to Mars carry a grenade with you? This is almost as bad as a situation we face with the Devil/Christ. The Devil and Chris want those ships for another reason whose details require a later post.

Don’t worry the Devil doesn’t want your spaceship. He’s got one he likes better!

Your spaceship is kind of like a rowboat to their Symphony of the Seas.

As I’ve, said we are an illimitable existence! And that’s not it’s ship!

The Devil compromises members of this ship. We are not infinite awareness stuck on a computer chip we are unfortunate victims. Caught in some kind of Syfy Twilight Zone horror flick, playing out a no-win scenario! I don’t believe in the no-win scenario they’re presenting this as. I’ll admit this is a tough situation the smartest guy on the planet is an idiot. He’d be hard-pressed to figure out what to do?

I need a good rowboat. You know; One that won’t crap out when I’m in space! One that won’t Blow Me To Pieces as soon as I take off! One that is not connected to your scummy boss’s computers. I need a good rowboat! One that’s big enough for me and maybe (if they can be brave enough,) three of my friends? I need a good rowboat!

God, if only you could see it. God is a group of cold-blooded grossness that needs to be ripped to shreds.

We may be doomed even if you headcases figure it out, but we will definitely be doomed if you don’t.

Nobody can hear me when I shout, Look out! Danger!

It seems I face The Impossible?

He brings up how much money this man has or will have in the future. It matters not to the Devil. The Devil will make you the wealthiest man in the World. The Devil would make you a God of the world if he had the power the Devil cares nothing about that? The Devil wants to kill, Our Father.

We are an illimitable existence of time, and we are under attack!

Now if you would kindly Wake Up to the horror that we face!

Look, it comes down to this if there’s a way they think they’ve fixed it.

There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer.

We still have a long way to go and we still need to flush the world’s governments…Into the septic system. if we don’t we’re stuck with s*** and all hope is lost! Don’t get all your feathers in a flutter there have, to be some good ones in the bunch. This is a little bit bigger than your bureaucratic brunch! All of it will have to be flushed.

You’ll understand when you figure it out.

You bow down before the god of exorbitant mesmeric extraneous exoticism now. In other words, You are becoming extremely egotistical selfishly stuffing your face in a grandiose self gluttonous odyssey before anybody else gets it. And going mentally corrupt by having too many people offer to wipe your ass. And you’re starting to believe your own propaganda you’ve almost lost who, You Are. I think with some work you might get it back? I shan’t waste a drop of my precious time with scumbags. I know well the thoughts within, a man they come from a source of absolute scum. We face an Evil, focus in a jealous consuming hate! I walk into a new hell they are the scum of the world. And I know well how they think. From the bowels, I reach into the filth.

You asked why I rant this way the ones I speak to hear in no other way.

To them they are insulted to me I am pained I have faced an evil group now I have to deal with their monumental egos. They are obsessively egotistical self-centered. And I believe one of the designs of that besides destroying the world is to slow me down and wear me out. They have built an Immense wall of scummy egotistical powerful People that are actually stupider than dirt and have even less honor around me! And I have to break through somehow in order to stop this evil group. So yes, I am pained.

And there you were thinking Tumblr was just for trash TV.

I know who I am, I’m Our Father’s Appointed I am for this show The King of Sin. My banner says Anti-God because I’m going for the head of the snake. Try to understand you’ve been played you’ve been one of their favorite puppets. From the beginning, everything you’ve been experiencing has been an orchestrated lie it's clobbering time! See the true Horror for the first time for what it truly is! I just want to mention one thing they’re laughing, and I’m running out of time. 

 How many billionaires how many multi-millionaires living in gluttonous greed? Sitting there with your inflated Pride I did it! You sit with gleaming eyes as you watch the multitude you treat as worms beg for your crumbs! I am disgusted by all of you and your trinket world. You sit in your glitter thinking that you are the all when what you are is the scummiest sum that walks the Earth. And that’s what I’ve got to fight with. You think this is demented but that’s because you’re Clueless in assholes “vill” I don’t like having to have to work with stuck-up scumbags. Understand I’m not saying a person creating jobs or something that benefits mankind shouldn’t receive compensation. I’m speaking to the sickening boastfulness gluttony that overbearing permeates existence. You can deduce what you like with that I don’t really give a s*** Don’t get your feathers in a ruffle like the government and Generals there’s got to be a few that are not garbage. I’m sure that’s you. I just got to stop thinking about a big oozing pus sac that’s on the face of the world. They’ll Attack your mind (they already speak)as soon as you see. You don’t understand yet but they’re always watching you. Yes even while you sleep so that you know. They think in absolute this is their time, but I think it’s time to f**** their world up.

[officialotakudome]

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New Post has been published on https://otakudome.com/sentai-announces-may-slate-and-7seeds/

Sentai Announces May Slate And 7Seeds

Senta Filmworks has announced upcomng home video titles and the acquisition of 7Seeds:

HOUSTON, TX — February 22, 2021 — Sentai announced today that it will be releasing the second season of post-apocalyptic anime series 7SEEDS, based on the award-winning manga of the same name, on home video in Spring 2021.

Season 2 picks up where Season 1 left off. A meteor strike has left the world a shattered shell of what it once was, but a government initiative involving cryogenics has given humanity a fighting chance. To date, the subjects of the 7SEEDS project have survived giant insects, post-apocalyptic weather, ferocious animals, and the greatest danger of all: other survivors, all of whom will do anything to live another day. But the 7SEEDS project’s chosen few aren’t safe yet, and the monumental mission of rebuilding society has only just begun.

A Studio KAI (Cagaster of an Insect Cage, Uma Musume: Pretty Derby Season 2) production, 7SEEDS’ second season is directed by Yukio Takahashi (director Dog & Scissors, episode director LASTEXILE -Fam, The Silver-, Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit and The Qwaser of Stigmata) while Toko Machida (Akame ga Kill!, Chaika -The Coffin Princess-, Wake Up, Girls!) provides series composition. The series stars the vocal talents of Nao Toyama (GATE, My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU, KAKURIYO -Bed & Breakfast for Spirits-) as Natsu Iwashimizu, Jun Fukuyama (Love, Chunibyo and Other Delusions, Assassination Classroom, Maoyu ~ Archenemy & Hero) as Arashi Aota and Yoko Hikasa (BanG Dream! 2nd Season, K-ON!, No Game, No Life) as Hana Sugurono.

7SEEDS is based upon the manga of the same name by Yumi Tamura; in 2007, the manga received the 52nd Shogakukan Manga Award for “Best Shojo (Girl’s) Manga.”

For Sentai’s latest announcements regarding this and other great titles, be sure to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

OUSTON, February 23, 2021 – Home video distributor Section23 Films today announced its May slate of releases which includes Season 3 & 4 of Sentai Filmworks hit series, AHIRU NO SORA!  Available on Blu-ray May 25th and also included in the Season 1-4 Limited Edition Premium Box Set!

Product details follow, in order of release

  Coming May 2021

  Title:                 GATE

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         600 min.

Street Date:      5/4/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $59.98

SYNOPSIS:  When a dimensional rift appears in downtown Tokyo and begins spewing an army of monsters and men in medieval armor, 33-year-old JSDF officer Yoji Itami’s hobbies of fantasy novels and video games suddenly complement his military training and help rout an invasion from another world! They also make him a natural choice for the first major expeditionary force to be sent into the Gate, and what he and the JSDF find on the other side is both amazing and terrifying. Elves. Dragons. Beast people. But there’s a far worse danger to be feared, because while spears, shields and even giant teeth can be countered with modern weapons, nothing is as ruthless, deadly or hard to stop as the treachery of men who will sacrifice anything or anyone in order to control the new world on the other side of the GATE.

Title:                 7 SEEDS SEASON 2

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         300 min.

Street Date:      5/11/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $69.98

SYNOPSIS:  After the Earth was transformed into a world of strange and monstrous creatures and plants, a global seeding program released small teams to retrieve caches of supplies and knowledge.  Having been expelled from one such team, Team Summer A, Ango and Ryo roam the seas until they discover Team Summer B stranded on an island.  Will things go more smoothly with this new team?  Or will greed, deception and the lust for power become a deadlier enemy than the beasts and flora?  The hellscape that was Japan is a lethal Eden, and the Seeds have brought their own serpents with them in the second part of 7 SEEDS!

Title:                 BABYLON

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         300 min.

Street Date:      5/11/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $69.98

SYNOPSIS:  Everything can be connected to something else if you dig hard enough, and when you’re investigating a crime, it usually doesn’t take too long before you start finding the clues you need, if you know where to look. When Public Prosecutor Zen Seizaki starts investigating a case of apparent fraud by a major pharmaceutical company, however, he quickly finds himself entangled in a nightmarish web of lies, intrigue and murder on a global scale. And even worse, how can he fight a foe without a face, one that’s protected by members of the highest echelons of society and government, and seems to be able to convince its own victims to kill themselves? The nightmares of modern science are powered by old-fashioned corruption and greed, and one man may be the only force that can stop them in BABYLON.

Title:                 KARAKURI CIRCUS

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         900 min.

Street Date:      5/18/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $99.98

SYNOPSIS:  When Narumi Kato, a martial artist afflicted with the bizarre condition known as Zonapha syndrome, attempts to rescue a young boy from incredibly powerful attackers, he is stunned to discover that his opponents aren’t even human!  Pulled into a conflict pitting users of l puppets and the self-aware Automatons against each other, Narumi finds himself rescued by an unusual young woman named Shirogane, who has her own puppet, Arlequin, and together they must form an alliance to protect the boy, Masaru, who has recently inherited an incredible fortune.  But who is trying to kill Masaru and what is the origin of these incredible animated creations?  How is it tied in with Narumi’s own affliction?  The truth surrounding a 200 year old shadow war unfolds as Narumi, Shirogane, and Masaru battle to survive in KARAKURI CIRCUS!

Title:                 AHIRU NO SORA SEASON 3 & 4

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         650 min.

Street Date:      5/25/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $89.98

SYNOPSIS:  The ramshackle basketball team that Sora Kurumatani’s love for basketball forged from a collection of juvenile delinquents and random high school archetypes has made it past their initial training and practice games, but are they ready to compete in a real tournament? They’ll find out as they face off against the far more seasoned and experienced team from Shinjo Towa Academy. But even if they dig down and find a way to play better than they’ve ever played before, there are more teams ready and waiting in the wings, including the relentless squad from Yokohama Taiei. The drama is intense both on and off the boards, as tensions fly, members of the fledgling team start to crack, and Sora’s own situation hits a point that may tear the team apart in the second spectacular collection of AHIRU NO SORA!

Title:                 AHIRU NO SORA PREMIUM BOX SET

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         1250 min.

Street Date:      5/25/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $129.98

SYNOPSIS:  Sora Kurumatani is short and as scrawny as a stick figure, but he loves basketball with a burning passion. Unfortunately, on his first day at Kuzuryu High, he learns that the school’s supposed basketball team is nothing of the sort. Instead of a haven for aspiring athletes, the gym has become the home turf for a gang of thugs, delinquents and perverts whose only skill at dribbling involves drooling on the floor while peeking into the girls’ locker room. But since Kurumatani has to play to fulfill a promise made to his ailing mother, he’ll have to take these sour lemons and squeeze-play out a winning basketball team somehow. Impossible? Perhaps. But with the help of a counselor and members of the girls’ club, he’ll do his best to get them all on the rebound in AHIRU NO SORA!

Title:                 BAKI

Published by:    Sentai Filmworks

Distributed by:  Section23 Films

Run Time:         650 min.

Street Date:      5/25/2021

Format:             BD

Language:         English & Japanese with English Subtitles

SRP:                $89.98

SYNOPSIS:  In the deadly underground world of no-holds-barred fighting, one name reigns supreme: Yujiro Hanma, aka “The Ogre,” a legendary martial artist whose incredible strength, skill, and savage ferocity are so terrifying that even great nations fear him. Still, no man can stand at any pinnacle forever, and the Ogre’s son, Baki, has trained his entire young life in order to achieve his dream of rising to the top. Unfortunately, the young fighter’s escalating string of victories make him a target for the most ruthless of rivals, and an underground martial arts promoter warns him that five ultra-violent convicts are en route to Tokyo to eliminate Baki once and for all! Now, with the lives of his friends and classmates at stake, the young fighter must face his greatest challenges yet, both inside and outside of the ring, in BAKI!