#hes absolute shit at anything once there are enough known quantities going on

[mantisgodsdomain]

Writing Scarlet is fun because in almost any situation where he has to interact with people over an extended period of time, his social skills will actively start to decay as he gets out of the area of "things he's practiced in and can bluff through in his sleep" and into the area of "having to deal with people who he has talked to more than once who can do things like spot inconsistencies and develop ideas and impressions about him".

[milkacchan]

More omega Izuku and Alpha reader?? Yeah. Absolutely.

Listen theres NSFW here too okay??? Along w the fluff bc I'm a sucker for omega Izuku

I'd also like to point out that alpha reader is female, however, I made it kinda gn so you can still read it.

You started at the trash bin. What was in the bin more like. The white stick- you knew it well. Bakugou had had his fair share of pregnancy scares and he always came to you with them. Not that he didn't trust his Alpha because he did- he just- that was something you go to your friends for first.

And Izuku had left early this morning, rushed out- earlier than usual, giving a quick goodbye kiss that left you confused.

You weren't confused anymore.

You pulled it out, looking intensely at it. Two lines, two pink lines side by side. Izuku was pregnant.

You weren't really sure what to think. You hadn't mated him yet, fuck you hadn't even asked in fear he'd say no. He was an unmarked omega, the amount of shit he was going to get for this was something you didnt want to think of. You were mad at yourself- unsure of where it went wrong. Your alpha blockers must've failed. Or maybe his contraception. He wouldn't be able to work anymore- at least until he delivered the child.

The kid- oh fuck the kid. Half of you was so proud- so proud that'd you managed to fill him up with pups, you dreamed of a family. He did too. Just-just not this soon. The thought of Izuku getting rid of it, sent pangs through your chest. You knew he could- it was his body, you didn't have a say in the matter, you two weren't marked. He could choose to do whatever he wanted. You weren't kids anymore.

You set the test down, leaving the bathroom and picking up your phone. The first person you dialed? Katsuki.

It rang a few times- he was later than usual to pick up, picking up after 4 rings instead of two.

"What is it." His voice grumped from the other end.

"Izukus pregnant." You blurted, not wasting a moment.

"He's what?"

"Katsuki he's pregnant. I found the test in the trash this morning- I fucked up. I haven't even asked to mark him yet. We're not mated."

"Calm down," you could hear shuffling on his end, indistinct whispers. "I'm assuming you still haven't talked to him?'

"No, he's at work. He left early."

"Probably talking to Ochako and Tenya. Half n half is probably there too."

"I don't- I don't know what to do."

"Karma for giving me shit, asshole." You could hear the smile in his voice.

"I didn't give you that much shit." You chuckled slightly. "But I guess it was enough, wasn't it?"

"Seems that way."

You sighed, flopping onto the couch. "I should've realized. I've been so busy I hadn't even realized he'd missed heats. I thought it was just the suppressants. I mean- We're not ready for kids, not prepared. But I make a decent amount of money, so we could be."

"You do. You could be. You'd be a good parent. So would he. So talk to him about it when he gets home. Get him something nice- maybe take out, and sit down and talk."

"I suppose so. He's been craving chinese lately. Probably a product of what's been going on."

"I'd say so."

"Well thanks, sorry for interrupting cuddle time with Kirishima."

"No problem!" You could hear Kirishinas smile too.

"Bye guys."

Izuku groaned, dropping his head to shoutos table. "This is a mess."

"You have to tell her." Ochako urged.

"I know."

"Well- what do you intend on doing? Because it's not her choice." Tenya looked at his friend with concern. He'd known before Izuku did, it wasn't hard to tell.

"Well...if she'll stay with me, then I'll keep it. She always talks about wanting a family, wanting kids and settling down. But we're not mated yet, she hasn't even asked to mark me yet, who's to say she won't leave?"

"You've been together since first year. She's not going to leave you." Shouto looked look a sip of his drink. "She's infatuated with you and she talks so fondly about kids."

"She does, but we aren't prepared for a kid." Izuku rubbed his face. "I'm not against keeping it- at all. I'm just scared."

"It's okay to be scared, it's okay to be worried. But you have to go through it like anything else. It doesn't have to be fancy, it doesnt have to be romantic, you just need to tell her. And if you need a bed to crash on, we're all here for you." Ochako smiled, taking Izukus hand gently. "Okay?"

He nodded slightly. "Yeah.."

"And if you do decide to keep the baby, my brother has many parenting books that he'd have no problem letting you borrow. So you'd be better set."

"I still have an old crib that you can use too. It's from IKEA so it's pretty nice." Shoto grinned.

That's right, two of his friends had older siblings, both of which have kids. He wouldn't be alone, he'd be far from it.

"I don't have any of that- but I can sew! So I can make them blankets or something. Whatever would help."

"Stop," Izuku whined, "I'm gonna cry." He was already tearing up, his hormones were already kind of crazy. He wiped eyes.

"Don't cry! If you cry I'll cry!" Ochako sniffed.

Izuku laughed, squeezing her hand.

That night came quicker than you anticipated. Izuku sent you a text saying he was on the way home and you looked around. You'd straightened up, vacuumed and so on. His favorite blanket was sitting on the couch, along with the stuffed dog you won him on your first date.

The deliver guy for the take out should be here soon. You had the money set out already so you were good. You sighed, shakey and nervous- was there anything else that needed to be done? The test- the test. You walked into the bathroom and picked it up off the counter. You looked at it again. Still positive. What else would it be? They don't just change. You felt the realization hit you again and shook your head, tucking it softly in your pocket. You walked back out, just in time too. There was a knock on the door.

You picked up the money from the counter and opened the door, smiling at the boy standing opposite of you. You handed him the money and he handed you the two large bags. You thanked him and bid him farewell before closing the door.

Once you placed each bag on the coffee table, you sat down and waited. It felt like forever. Your heart raced and your mind was racing but finally, finally the door opened.

"I'm home!" He chirped, hanging his keys up by the door.

"Hi baby, good day?" You smiled, walking over to greet him. You kissed his forehead gently, eyes flickering to his stomach.

"Yeah, good day." He smiled, walking into the apartment. He paused. "What's all this?"

"Well- I know you've been craving chinese lately. So I got you some."

He smiled nervously. "That's sweet angel."

"Do you want some water? A drink?"

"Water, please."

"Alright, well you go sit down." He nodded slightly, shuffling over to the couch.

His blanket was there- he paled. you knew. You had to have known. The test- oh god the test, he'd left it in plain sight. He felt nauseous. It wasn't rare for you to display affection in large quantities. It wouldn't be the first time you'd surprised him with something. You were such a good alpha, you always had been.

"Zuku?"

"Hm?"

"You zoned out there, you okay?" You set the water down in front of him.

"Yeah, 'm okay." The blanket was on his lap now, he was fiddling the the seem, lightly tugging it.

You sat next to him, hesitating before speaking. "Baby..." you started. "I'll just- I'll get to the point." You reached into your back pocket, pulling out the white test. "I know. You left it in the bathroom."

"Shit I- I was going to tell you, I promise but I didn't know how so I went to Shotos to talk to them." His breathing started to get heavy, the air was twinged with a bitter scent that made you wrinkle your nose. "I don't want you to leave me." He whispered.

You immediately took him into your arms, kissing his head. "I'm not going to leave you baby, alright? Next step is we just talk about what we're going to do."

"If you'll stay- if you want to stay, I want to keep it. I want a family with you."

"Ultimately its your choice," you soothed, rubbing circles on his arm with your thumb. "But I want to stay with you. I know we're not ready now, we're not prepared but we can be. I make a decent income, we both do, I can provide for you and the baby. I'll make sure that we love comfortably and that you don't have to worry. I can provide for you. And I know you won't really be able to work until he's born, at least not the way you'd like so I'll try to help with that too."

"I know you will." He whispered.

"So we'll keep it?"

"Yeah, we'll keep it." He squeezed your hand.

"Izuku I know we've been together for a very long time. I love you more than anything. I was still trying to plan out how I was going to ask, but I want to mark you. I want to mate. I was just worried you'd say no." You gently kissed his cheek. "I want you to think about it for a couple of days first though, alright. I don't want you to rush into something just because we're having a kid."

"How long do I have to wait until I can say yes?"

"5 days. 5 days and if you say yes I'll mark up that pretty little neck of yours and you'll be all mine." You hummed.

He leaned into you, taking a deep breath. "So I was scared over nothing."

"Over telling me? Yeah. You were "

Bonus smut bc I'm horny

Izuku wasn't entirely sure what events lead to this- you your mouth licking hot strips up his dick and he really didnt care. He whined, jerking his hips.

"You're so wet baby, all for me." You hummed, taking your mouth away from his length. "And you smell so good, fuck-"

"Please-" he whimpered. "Alpha,"

"And you're already coming undone. I haven't even done anything serious yet." You smiled. "Baby do you want to fuck yourself on my face?"

"Yes," he breathed, "please,"

You hummed again, gripping his thighs. You held them apart. "You're so pretty Izuku." Your eyes flickered up to him. His face was flushed red and his eyes were glossy. You looked back in front of you. He was DRIPPING. His omega slit all pretty red. You kissed the top before poking your tongue in.

Izuku moaned, "w-Wait Alpha you said I- I want-"

"You will baby, you will. Be patient." You smiled, looking at his thighs. They were already covered in hickeys and bites. His thighs were so sensitive. You licked at him again, lapping over his heat and taking in his slick.

He tugs at a fist full of hair, bringing your mouth closer and you let him. You move his thighs so they sit over your shoulders and you let him move himself however he wants. Because the sounds he's making while he's doing it are so pretty. Breathy moans that turn into strangled whines, it enough to get you off for christ sake.

For Izuku, it's overwhelming but it feels so good he doesn't want to stop. He knows he's not in control, he rarely is. Theres been the occasional time where he'd take the lead and make his Alpha submit, but this was not one of those time. But you wanted to see him happy, Izuku knew this too, so he had no problem with fucking his cunt on your face. You seemed to be enjoying it too, the way your hand hand dipped into your own pants, stroking yourself with a steady rhythm.

"Fu-fuck-" he groaned out, he was close already. The way your fucking tongue moved around him, and in him, had him all sorts of ways. "I'm-" He didnt even get to say it, he moaned out, his thighs tightened around your head and he tugged at your hair as he came. He rolled his eyes back and topped the hand from your hair, he could still feel your tongue, working him through it and he shuddered.

He came back to reality with you kissing his cheeks. "You did so good baby," you preened.

"What-What about you?"

"I finished when you did," you hadn't, not really, but Izuku didn't need to know that. Tonight was about him. "Come on, let's get you cleaned up. I'll run you a bath."

He nodded, lifting his arms up and sighing happily when you picked him up. "Can you join me?"

"Of course, Zuku. I'll even wash your hair for you."

He smiled gently and put his head on your shoulder.

God he loved you so much

[rdr2dd]

Goals, Moving Forward, Etc.

Because I’ve gotten a few comments/questions asking about the other projects I’ve mentioned, and also for the purpose of giving myself some clear goals to work toward, I want to nail down the direction(s) that this project is probably headed. Excuse the gratuitous detail, but as is likely becoming clear from my posts, that’s how I work best :p

Project 1: Arthur’s Hidden Family

Goal 1: Finding Eliza -

Accomplished, largely, so hurrah for that. There was a lot of background work to get to this point, even beyond the details I gave in the most recent post about it, so I am beyond glad to have finally gotten it done. This step has already laid a lot of the groundwork for future steps. And also, I’m just happy to finally have a face for her.

Goal 2: Conjuring up Isaac - No progress thus far, but I’ve done some planning on how I want to handle this. No files exist for Isaac, at least not that I’ve been able to find thus far, so any models/textures for him would be entirely non-canon/custom work. There’s no element of bringing hidden assets to light here, like there was with Eliza; having a workable model for Isaac would be purely for my own heart’s sake, and for the sake of being able to do fanart renders involving him. This probably involves:

Using Jack (4 yrs old) as a base model, as I’m not talented or experienced enough to sculpt these models from scratch. Facial features would need to be altered to find a resemblance to both Arthur and Eliza.

Digging through the files to see if there are even other young children in the game to draw assets from - Arthur Londonderry’s son comes to mind, but I’m not sure if he’s the right age range, and I’m honestly drawing a blank beyond that. If anyone remembers seeing any kids in the game, please drop me a note as to where you saw them. 

Possibly resizing/altering adult NPC assets such as hairstyles in order to give Isaac a fitting and unique appearance. This sounds like a headache, but may be reasonable enough to do. We shall see.

Lots of custom texture work, largely for his face, which will be especially hard/dicey if there aren’t other children’s models to borrow textures from. 

Goal 3: Finding the Time - Less technical and more research-oriented, I need to nail down a timeline that I’m personally happy with with regards to when in Arthur’s life the events with Eliza and Isaac occurred. Once this is done, it’ll make it easier to decide what to do with Arthur in any renders I may want to do with the three of them. Which ties into...

Project 2: The Old Guard (Expanded)

This was the project I originally had in mind when I started scrounging around for these files. I have an unreasonably huge soft spot in my heart for the ‘curious couple and their unruly son’, but also, just the young gang in general. Hosea back when he’d steal anything not nailed down? Dutch, young and idealistic and years before his downfall? Arthur, young and broody but not yet hardened? Little John, still feral and a menace? Badass, gorgeous young Grimshaw? Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes, please. Not to mention Bessie and Annabelle, who must have mattered so much to these characters, but who we hear and see so little about. I want to be able to do fanart renders with them, but that’s going to take a hell of a lot of work.

Goal 1: Nail Down the Timeline - I’ve started working on this, but there’s a lot I still need to do in terms of skimming audio files and digging deep in the lore. I want to get a general idea of when it seems folks joined the gang, that way I can get an idea of which models I even need to work with. Heavy focus on figuring out: 

When Tilly joined the gang, as I lean toward her being around quite early, but would like to review the audio. I know there are some numbers dropped in a few missions, with regards to when she joined the Foreman Brothers and when she left them to join the Van der Linde Gang, and I want to get this as accurate as possible. 

When Hosea went off with Bessie, and when she passed. We have some context clues, I just need to nail down the math and then feel out the dramatic timing for the rest.

What the deal was with Annabelle. Maybe I just have a passion for the ladies name-dropped once in the game, but good god do I love Annabelle despite knowing absolutely nothing about her. She should be a non-character, but this is a passion project, so there’s no way I’ll be ignoring her.

What to do about Sean. He couldn’t have joined until after 1889, but depending on what year I want to deal with for renders, I may need to account for him. That wouldn’t be a hardship, as he’s one of my faves.

Goal 2: Knock Out the “Easy” Models - By which I mean Hosea, Dutch, Arthur, and Susan. This will involve some custom sculpting work, but not a whole lot, as their base models for 1899 shouldn’t actually require that much alteration. I imagine I’ll be ironing out a bunch of wrinkles, smoothing out a bunch of normal maps, and then using the clone brush and a sampling of generic NPC face textures in order to create younger-looking face textures for this lot. “Easy” is definitely a relative term here, but I’m counting my blessings in that there are, at the very least, reference images for what this lot looked like in the early days. I still have no idea if I’ll be able to accomplish this, or how hard it will be if I can.

Goal 3: John - An intermediate difficulty step, for John alone. We have no reference images of young, 12/13 year old John, but we do have Jack’s 12 yr old model, and that will serve as a decent base to work from, hopefully. I’ll have to make sure to alter his features to be more in line with John’s, and will have to work heavily with his skin/face textures from there. Clothes will be another hurdle, especially as (referenced above), we see like, next to no children in the game for me to borrow NPC clothing parts from. I’ll need to work with what we get from Jack and otherwise resize and rework adult NPC clothing.

Goal 4: Bessie (and Others) - Stepping up the workload again, though in different ways. Bessie will be a task to work out, seeing as we have a single, not particularly great reference image of her facing straight ahead. It’s not much to work with, but it’s something to work toward matching. No two ways around it, she’ll be mostly custom work and mash-ups of generic NPC materials, but it’ll be a labor of love. Also sliding Tilly and (potentially) young Sean in here, as depending on their age there will be a lot of work to do on them, possibly including custom model work, and we don’t have references for what they looked like when they were younger. I’ll make do.

Goal 5: Annabelle - The holy grail in terms of custom work, or the ultimate slog uphill, we shall see. We have no reference images of her. No traces of her exist in the files. We hardly have any clue about how she died, let alone how she lived. And yet, I love her, or at least the potential of her. Hopefully all of my work on the ‘known’ quantities of this project will give me some hope of turning out a unique and fitting model for her, but who knows.

Project 3: Audio Directory

Goal ??? - On pause for the foreseeable future, mostly as I’ll need to do some networking before I’m totally comfortable putting this out there, and also because holy hell have I set up a bunch of other work for myself. The Dream(TM) was to find a way to set up a directory for folks to more easily find audio files on their own. There’s no way to host all of the assorted cool audio from RDR2 online, but it would theoretically be possible to set up a sort of file directory online, a list of file names and descriptions, to help folks browse their audio files on their own without having to reinvent (or in this case, rediscover) the wheel personally. I’m of the opinion that pulling apart the game files should be an all-hands-on-deck sort of situation, but there are a lot of folks who have already put in this work individually, and I don’t want to step on any toes. I also don’t want to be responsible for anyone mucking around with their game files and having trouble down the road, so I’d need to sort out a clear explanation of what precautions to take, etc. It’s a lot to consider, so I’m obviously open to input. 

Wrap-Up

If you’re still reading, congrats(?) and also, thank you. This is all a bunch of planning for some real pie-in-the-sky shit, but I felt that way about finding Eliza in the files about two months ago, so I have hope. If you’ve got thoughts on any step, please, hit me! I want to hear what folks want to see, though I can’t make any promises on what I’ll deliver. Got thoughts on the timeline or headcanons for the less-referenced characters? I’d love to hear. I would also love to hear from anyone with experience on projects like this; goodness knows I’m a self-taught novice. 

[erintoknow]

so unfamiliar now

Spiraling - A Fallen Hero: Rebirth Fan-fiction

Unless you want Ortega hounding you to the end of your days, you’re going to have to put on a show and convince her she doesn’t need to keep worrying about you. You’re fine. Everything’s fine. She’s fine. Wait – [Horseshoe Crab]

It’s my birthday today so have a second update this week!!!!!

[Read on AO3]

If you’re going to get Ortega to lay off of you, you need to start thinking about your appearance again. Dressing in hoodies to look inconspicuous doesn’t do you any good if it actually ends up drawing more attention to yourself. So… What do you dress like?

Once upon a time Ariadne fancied anything and everything from skirts and the femmest outfits she could get her hands on all the way to shrugging on a leather jacket and gloves as part of her roller derby get-up. What could possibly be a logical progression from that?

Don’t want to look too affluent. A waste of resources. But you don’t want to look destitute either. So… Clean, some color. Mostly greens, some purples and black for variety. Cloth and cotton, things you can layer. Mix in some new items with thrift store purchases to fill out the rest.

One day at the mall, you stumble across a cute pair of shoes with a 1” heel and add them to the pile. The old Ariadne would never have worn something like that, but fuck her. She’s dead.

Should you start doing make-up again? Stare yourself down in the mirror in the morning and make a face. Bad enough you have to see that wretched thing as much as you do already. The concealer work is enough. Leave the eyeshadow and lipstick in the past. Anyone misgenders you, you can just beat the shit out of them. It’s 2020 now, you’re totally allowed to do that, super villain or no.

God. Do you look human yet? You don’t feel it. What is Ariadne like? How do you play this? Do you play up the stutter or tamp it down? Does she find it cu– Fuck. Fucking hell. No. No you are not thinking about that. Jesus fucking christ.

You pull fabric around your shoulders, frowning in disapproval at the mirror. Once upon a time, Ortega’s mother gave you a serape like this for Christmas. That one was a rainbow of color. This shawl is a duller green, with a white geometric pattern along the edges. Still, it’s long enough, draping down to your waist. You could hide your arms completely underneath, maybe a few other things if there was a call for it. Kind of like the cape for your villain suit.

So is this you, now? Or at least, if not you; is it Ariadne? You’re allowed to change, right? Will she even buy it? You’re not sure that you do.

When you get the phone call from Ortega one evening you go along and let her make plans. You’ve got time to kill before your next big operation anyway. And you can field test your new wardrobe.

–––

“Ariadne! Hola!” Ortega raises her arm, a bright smile on her face. Looks like the last of the stitches are gone. Thank god. She’s got jeans on, another flannel shirt. No jacket today? If it wasn’t for the gave-away glint of metal embedded in her arms and hands she’d look like a textbook middle-age butch lesbian.

Did she always dress like that? Is it because she’s seeing Jane now? Swear she flirted a little more femme when she was with men. Not that you were paying attention at the time. Of course not.

Shut up.

You raise your hand back, “Hola yourself. Y–you look happy today.”

“I like the new look.”

You blink, glance down at yourself. Doubt creeping back into your head. “Uh. Well. It’s uh, it’s just stuff I had… laying around… you know.”

“Uh-huh. I’m sure.” She doesn’t believe you at all, damn her.

“D–don’t think it’s for your benefit!” You hiss back, you reach up and grab the edges of your shawl, pulling the green fabric closed over your body. “B–because it’s not!”

Her smile broadens. “I didn’t say anything, Ariadne.”

“F–fuck you.”

“I like the shawl, it’s cute.”

Oh god. You can’t look at her. Face warm. Ortega has a girlfriend, what the hell is she doing? “G–good for you. You um, you want to – to get on with w–whatever the fuck we’re doing today?”

“Alright, alright.” She laughs, turning and beckoning you to follow. “We’re already here actually.” Ortega gets about halfway to the front doors before she realizes (acknowledges?) that you aren’t following her. She turns her head, flaps her arms in a ‘what?’ gesture.

Pulling your shawl tight around you, there’s newfound gratitude for how your sunglasses help to mask your eyes.

You stare up at the front facade of the Los Diablos Children’s Hospital, white tiling and red brickwork and dozens of little panes of glass like too many eyes. “Ortega…” you try to keep the panic out of your voice. “I thought you said we were doing something fun.”

She walks back to you, tight frown on her face. “We used to do this all the time, remember?”

You stare at her, “Do what?”

“Visits? Readings? You know?”

Bite your lip, is that true? Ortega seems so sure of it, but… Thinking back to hospitals all your memory coughs up is a very different kind of picture. One that makes your stomach roil and your head dizzy. True or not there’s still one problem: “Ortega… I’m trying to keep a low profile, remember?”

Ortega sighs and pats you on the shoulder. “Look, there’s no PR crew, no cameras, I haven’t even told Chen. The only person who knows we’re coming is the lady in charge of managing volunteers, Sue, and as far she knows you’re just a friend I’m dragging along.” She steps beside you, hooking her arm in yours. “So, you’ve got nothing to worry about, okay?”

You tense up as Ortega half-walks, half-drags you to the doors. “If – if, um – ninjas descend from the ceiling and kidnap me, I want you to know…”

“Yeah?”

“I f–f–fucking hate you.”

Ortega laughs, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Bright lights and white walls, men and women in scrubs, medical masks. You keep your shades on, damn politeness. Mercifully, hardly anyone spares you a thought, eyes sliding off. Fewer people than you'd believe recognize Ortega out of her Ranger’s outfit. At the same time, you do get the sense she’s a known quantity here, this isn’t her first rodeo. You’ll just have to trust her; there’s an uncomfortable thought.

You wish you had the Rat-King handy, you can wrap a song tight around your head but you could stand to have a little help filtering out the background noise. Maybe it’s your own baggage, but the chatter of hospital thoughts always has this tension to it – forced cheeriness.

Hang back and let Ortega talk to the front desk, a few minutes of waiting and the woman, she mentioned, Sue? –Susan?– comes out frowning behind the too-thick fireproof doors. Straight brown hair, dressed in white, stud earrings.

It makes an interesting contrast between her and Ortega. Ortega’s sporting her Ranger-branded sports jacket today. Ranger-blue indigo shirt underneath. Her bronzed skin a touch darker in shade than her conversation partner. It’s a good look for her – the outfit that is.

You guess.

Not that you’re an expert on Ortega’s style choices or anything.

What do you care what she looks like?

You don’t.

Shut up.

Sue and Ortega make small talk, and Ortega keeps glancing your way. Expecting you to join in? You’d rather hang back. Not talking to any doctors today, thanks.

You worry the sleeves of your shirt, pulled down to the wrists. Rub the fabric between your fingers, trace patterns over your thigh, anything to do that isn’t further chewing up the inside of your cheek.

It’s been weeks now and neither one of you have discussed the kiss in the Hospital. Maybe Ortega doesn’t even remember. Some drug-fueled fever dream.

Or…

Or maybe she hated it? Is politely letting you pretend it never happened. She’s with Jane, you have to remember. Ortega is a lot of things, but she’s not a cheater.

And now Ortega’s beckoning you over. Welp.

Take a breath, in – hold – out. You’re not scared. What are you scared of? You are Ghost, the mysterious plight of Los Diablos. They ought to be scared of you. Ortega taps the side of her head. No shades? You make a face and she gives you a serious look. You huff and pull them off, fold up and tuck them in your purse. White walls. White lights. Can feel your heart jump. Fuck. Ortega smiles at you, you fake a smile back.

You’ve got this. Everything’s under control.

Here we go.

Sue hands the two of you off to a nurse who in turn acts as your guide. You trail behind, not paying much attention to his and Ortega’s conversation. What you bother to pick up confirms that Ortega’s made a habit of these low-key visits apparently, to different hospitals across the city. Ever since returning to the Rangers.

Did Ortega used to drag you along to official Ranger PR events? You can almost remember. The memory of remembering. Try to think too hard about hospitals though, and you get panicky. Short breath. Little dizzy. A hospital is the last place you want to pass out at, thanks but go fuck yourself.

–––

A pair of tiny arms clings to your leg and a jolt of panic shoots through you. “Uh… H–h–hello?”

A girl with cropped brown hair stares back up at you. “HI LADY! I like your hair!!”

You glance at Ortega, she’s got her back to you, teaching a boy how to do some fancy handshake. You catch the eye of the nurse, hanging back by the doorway. He gives a small smile. No help there. Look back down at the kid, “T–th–thanks? Um– Don’t you want to talk to Charge over there?”

She remains undeterred. “What’s your name?”

“Ari?”  You glance towards Ortega again. Help. She remains utterly unaware of your plight.

“Are you a boy or a girl?”

You choke. “W–w–what? I’m uh– I’m a girl.” Fuck. What did she pick up on? You usually pass just fine these days. Could just die right now, that would be great, thanks.

“Oh. Okay!” There is absolutely no hint of embarrassment in this girl’s mind. “Are you Ms. Charge’s girlfriend?”

You hunch down and very gently try to pry her arms off your leg. “What um, what gives you that idea?”

She tilts her head, staring you down with full intensity. “‘cause you keep looking at Ms. Charge AND everyone knows the hero’s girlfriend ALWAYS has red hair!!”

You smile to hide the panic. “W–what uh, what makes you say that?”

She gives you a doubtful look, can’t believe an adult doesn’t know this. “‘cause it’s in all the movies!! Duh!!”

“Ari!’ Oh thank god. You breathe a sigh of relief as Ortega walks over, the other kids curiously watching behind her. “Making friends?”

“Hi Ms. Charge!!” The little girl fixes her full attention to Ortega.

“Hello!” She smiles widely, “Introduce me to your friend, Ari?”

“Uh–”

“My name is Casey!” The little terror cuts in. “SHE never asked!” Casey huffs. “Your girlfriend is RUDE Ms. Charge.”

“Girlfriend?” Ortega raises her eyebrows at you.

You shake your head wildly, suddenly way too warm. “S–s–she came up with that one herself!”

An hour and a half later of helping Ortega handle the meet and greet and you’re free again.

You slip your shades back on as the two of you exit the hospital. Run a hand through your purse to find the chocolate bar, peel off the wrapper at one end with shaking hands. “That was… that was something.”

Ortega claps you on the back and you stumble forward a step. “See? I told you you’d be fine.”

“Y–yeah, well…” You frown, “If you d–don’t hear from me in a week, you only have yourself to blame.” You break off a piece of chocolate, “Want any?”

“I’m good.”  Ortega smiles, you shrug and pop the candy into your mouth “So…” Her smile fades as she glances towards you, “what did you think?” The two of you leave the parking lot, walk the sidewalk, you follow her lead through the streets.

“What d–did I think?”

“Want to come with me the next time I go?”

You give her a wry smile, “Y–You’re not gonna just, uh, just spring it on me again?”

She smirks back at you, “Me? Spring something on you? Never.”

“F–f–fucking smug-ass liar.” You punch her in the shoulder, and Ortega overplays it, comically swinging to the side. “W–why do I keep letting you do this to me?” You keep asking yourself that, and the answer hasn’t gotten any less terrifying.

“Do you remember the last time we did one of those visits?” Ortega glances at you as the two of you hurry across the street.

“When was that?”

“It must have been… well, right before–” She grimaces.

“Oh.” You chew your cheek, trying to think back. Can feel your stomach lurch as the world tilts under you. You have to stop and steady yourself. Cover it up by shaking your head. “I… kind of do? I–I–I haven’t thought about this in years, sorry.” You furrow your eyebrows, “I…”

“You were–” Ortega stops herself, “Oh, sorry, go ahead.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, finish your thought, it’s fine.”

Damn.

“I… think this might be… um, the first positive experience I’ve had with a hospital in… in years.” You grimace, keenly aware of the line you’re skirting. “Between uh… you in the hospital and…”

“And…?” Ortega slows down to match your pace.

Shake your head, “No, it’s – it’s nothing. Sorry. I don’t want to talk about it.” You try to smile even though it feels fake. “What were you going to say?”

“Oh, well–” Ortega rubs the back of her neck, “I was just going to say; I had to step outside to handle a phone call. And–” She laughs, “You were on the verge of panicking, all ‘Charge! Don’t leave me alone with these kids!”

You come to a stop, and groan, run a hand over your face. “Oh my god.”

“You remember now.”

You bite your lip, nod your head. “Uh-huh.”

“How did you get into teaching them about taxonomy? You never told me.”

You can feel the heat on your face now. “Okay. Look. It–it–it made sense at the time okay!? I thought it’d be easiest to keep them from going crazy if I r–r–read them a story?”

“Okay?” Ortega stops walking, leans her shoulder against a boutique storefront’s window, watching you with a smile. You cross your arms under your shawl to try and keep your hands from shaking.

“Okay. So. I just – just grabbed the first children’s book I saw. It–It–it was this animal book? I think? But it was all cutesy and inaccurate.” You bite your lip. “And when I pointed out a mistake, they all laughed so… I just… kept… doing… that…?”

She laughs at you.

You cover your face in your hands, heat going straight to your ears. “D–don’t laugh!”

Ortega covers her mouth, “Okay, okay. Sorry, you’re just so–”

You drop your hands to your sides, “I’m just so what?” You narrow your eyes at her.

She doesn’t miss a beat. “We’ll have to get you a book to read, the next time we go.”

Oh god.

“You’re going to – to kill me Ortega…”

Her smile falters, “I hope not.”

The two of you walk the next block in silence. Is it as awkward for her as it is for you?

Finally Ortega stretches her arms over her head and says, “I don’t do these hospital visits often enough these days.”

Watch her face from the corner of your eye, trying to get a read on her. “How come?”

Ortega sags, shoulders slumped forward. “Too easy to get caught up in work. Especially lately.”

Ah.

You have to keep your face blank, don’t let your heart race. “S–still obsessed with trying to figure out Ghost?”

She gives you a grim smile. “You know it.”

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #268

“i got a switchblade wit that cuts like a bitch, and i think you two should meet.”

What was the shortest amount of time you’ve known someone before you’ve dated them? If you’ve never been in a relationship before, do you watch Scrubs? Jason and I knew each other like... I think two or three weeks? We clicked so fast. Are you a fan of inside jokes or do you tend to stay away from them? I... don't feel a particular way? Do you have any theatrical experience? If so, what have you done? No, I'm not into theater. Which movies currently out in theaters do you want to see? I don't know what's in theaters right now, but I don't think anyone does rn lol. Don’t you hate it when people talk about their relationships constantly? If it's seriously incessantly, yes. There's not a lot you can say to have a conversation when they just ramble about the person, especially when you don't even know the partner. How close would you say you are to your relatives? Not very. What’s your favorite Pokemon? Ninetales. If you could have anyone to do your eulogy, who would it be and why? Well, I'd assume my parents will be dead by that point, so. Probably my best friend. If you play the Sims games, which one is your favorite? I've only ever played Sims Animals, which I looooved back in the past. I haven't played it in years, though. If your parents searched your room, would they be mad at what they’d find? No. Ever taken a picture kissing somebody? Yes. Sex in the morning, afternoon or night? Morning is a great start to the day, but only after your teeth are brushed. I cannooooot do morning breath. Do you want someone aggressive or passive in bed? Aggressive. I am such a sub lmao. How serious are your feelings for the person you like? I DON'T KNOWWWWWWWWWW Ever had your driver's license suspended? Don't have mine to begin with. Does the person you like know that you like them? Yes. How frequently are you inclined to read, and how much? Somewhat rarely lately, less than I did some months back. I would read some pretty big chunks. When was the last time you questioned the direction your life was taking? LMAOOOOOOOOO I'm not exaggerating at all when I say that's like, a daily occurrence. What small things have the ability to get under your skin? I'm trying to think of something I haven't said before, but I'm not sure. OH, it may seem like a small thing, but letting balloons go outside. It's littering. Many end up in the ocean. What is something small that has the ability to cure a bad mood? A car ride riding shotgun with music blaring. I fucking love it. What was the last big change through which you went? Some moral beliefs altered. ^ Do you deal well with change, typically? Have you always? Fuck no. It blows up my anxiety. How do you feel after spending a great quantity of time online? I used to feel kinda guilty, and I actually still do, but it's more subdued. It's just too normal by now, to the point when I'm bored, I sometimes briefly forget there are other things to do that aren't on the computer. God it's sad. What do you consider to be the biggest drawback to being you? I'M BIG SCARED OF EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!! What do you consider the best part of being who you are? I'm really understanding and can relate to people's pain well. What kinds of things do you have on display in your room? Christ, a lot. My room is STUFFED with decorations that make me happy.  There's posters, some artwork, all my Silent Hill game cases or manuals + more SH stuff, meerkats galore, Venus is in here, I have this "shrine" for Teddy... I've got a load of stuff. What do you think your room and its contents say about you, if anything? I love a lotta stuff, ig. Animals, music, dark stuff, games. When was the last time you felt insecure about something/some situation? UMMMMM I should have a question for this fucking immediately. I'm sure it was something when I was at Ashley's inlaws for Mother's Day. What is something about which you are very confident or self-assured? My knowledge of meerkats lmaooo. Which emotional sensation inconveniences or bothers you the most? FUCKIN ANXIETY. Do you ever find it awkward to compliment another being? No, I love love love giving compliments!! When was the last time you had a new experience? What was it? Hm. I guess nightmares where I literally flail and attack shit while shrieking. Do you dress more for yourself, or to the expectations of others? I dress entirely for myself. What is one way you cope when you feel like crap? Binge music I can relate to. Which can make it worse, but sometimes helps. I'll usually get to the point of being teary and cry a bit, but then I start feeling better. Name an insult you regularly receive, if there is one? I guess it's not really an... insult, per se, but I hear "you're too quiet!" all the time. What is something you used to believe about life that you no longer do? Everything happens for a reason. Nope. What is something you hope you never have to do again? Deal with another Jason-level heartbreak. Of the many different American accents, which one is your favorite? I'm actually not sure. Not a fan of any that I can think of. Do you know anyone who had a kid before they were financially stable? Oh yeah, plenty normal nowadays. Is there anything hanging from the doorknob in your room? Yes, the pink bead necklace from my sister's baby shower for Emerson. Sometimes I hang my purse there too. Why did you move to where you're living now? We got evicted for not being able to keep up with rent and needed a cheap but semi-decent place to live. What was the most severe punishment your parents gave you when you were growing up? I remember I was grounded from the computer for at least a week, maybe more. My punishment was always taking technology away and/or spanked or popped on the arm. I remember she once hit my arm so damn hard that I had her handprint there for a while. My mom was horrible at *keeping* me and my sisters grounded, though; she'd normally calm down within a few days and things would return to normal. What was the topic of conversation the last time you spoke to a sibling? Ummm I don't remember. I should, I saw one just a couple days ago. Are you currently looking for a new job? I don't have a job currently, but while Mom has cancer and surgery coming up, I'm not really looking, but pondering opportunities. She'd have to drive me, which just can't be done right now, and I'm also not comfortable leaving her home alone right now. Who is the person you are the closest to? (emotionally, not physically) Mom. What was the last caffeinated drink you had? Do you drink this often? Strawberry Sunkist, and ugh, too much lately. Whose photo did you last look at? I was on Facebook a bit ago, so someone's on there. Who was the last person to pick you up? You mean like, physically? I don't know, probably Girt because he got a kick out of our height difference and he would do that when we hugged. What are you wearing around your neck? Nothing right now. Have you accidentally mistaken a stranger for someone you know? Oh my god, yes. I did that at the tattoo parlor once at a guy that looked like my sister's ex, who I got along with well. He looked at me like "uhhhhh" and it will haunt me forever. Who did you last blow a kiss at? Venus. I do that and wave a lot when she comes out of her hide and looks my way. Have you ever seen lava in real life? No. Who did you last bite? Um I don't just casually go around biting people lmao. Probably Jason. Do you remember the date of your prom? Ha, it's honestly surprising to me that I don't recall the date of either, considering how I remember, y'know, a weird amount of obscure details through our entire time knowing each other. Was your last kiss long and sensual or short and sweet? Why’s that? Short and sweet, because it was just a goodbye kiss. When kissing, do you like to be on top or bottom? Good Lord, am I a bottom. I hated being on top because I felt he had a better view of me and my body, and I was self-conscious as shit even when I was fit. Does your boyfriend/husband know what size your boobs are? UHHHHHHHHHHHHH I don't have a boyfriend but I've sure never actually talked about it with any. Do you have hair extensions or do you think those are strictly for the scene kids? ..... No? I don't wear extensions, never have, but wearing them doesn't tie you to a label??? List all the things you have from your boyfriend at your house right now? Not everyone has a boyfriend, friend. Last time you exercised and for how long? I DON'T WANT TO THINK OF THIS lkja;dslkfjwe Last girl who called you hot/sexy/something else of the sort? I shared a picture of myself on Facebook for once just the other day, so let's so. *checks* HAHA MY MOM. #1 cheerleader, friends. OH I should probably clarify she said "gorgeous," but I guess that counts? Was she hitting on you? Jfc no. Last guy who called you hot/sexy/something else of the sort? Does getting a comment from Ian of a Spongebob screenshot of Squidward with heart eyes count? lol Was HE hitting on you? *shrugs* He's very open with sharing love for his friends though, so it very well could've been just friendly support. Have you ever taken the 5,000 question survey? Parts of it, and God did it get stupid. What would you do if your boyfriend/husband got drafted into war tomorrow? I. Am single. And not everyone. Is interested in guys. But hypothetically, I would fucking panic. I physically wouldn't be able to handle an s/o in the army; I would constantly, absolutely constantly, be actively fearful. We'd have to find a way to get him out of it. Has a guy ever touched your butt without permission? If so, how did this make you feel? I don't believe so, thank God. How many formal dresses do you own? Sun-dresses? I have two prom dresses (which I'm finally comfortable enough to get rid of at some point) and I think like... one or two other black knee-length dresses that I could now never fit into? What do you hope you grow out of? Social anxiety. It ruins many parts of my life. What is the healthiest and unhealthiest thing you do on a regular basis? Healthy? Oh fuck. I, uh, usually have one bottle of water, I guess? Unhealthy, definitely drink soda. I need to stop. When looking for a SO, what three things are most important (besides looks)? Kindness, patience, and compassion or understanding. How much do you judge a person by their appearance? Define "judge" here. Like, I can conclude someone is impoverished or well off in many cases, but I don't judge them as people. What is the most embarrassing thing you own? Hm. I'm unsure. What is the strangest habit you have? I don't think I have odd habits. What movie made you cry the most? The Notebook or Old Yeller, I think. What was one of the happiest moments of your childhood? Realizing I was getting a dog for Christmas. Fuck, I miss Teddy. What belief do you have that most people disagree with? I'd rather not get political right now. Who or what inspires you to be a better person? I fucking hate admitting it, but Jason. The last thing he told me was to stop saying "I'll try" but rather "I will," and I actually recently almost had a breakdown about it because I shouldn't put SO much value into what he says, make it holy "rules." I treat him like a god in so many ways. Still, in my stupid head, his word is law. I still want to make him so proud. What’s the TLDR description of your last relationship? Long-distance was getting extremely hard, but I think the bigger factor was that we both have problems we need to work on before we can properly support one another. If you found out your current life has been just a dream, would you choose to wake up? (You don’t know if your real life would be better or worse.) I guess... no. I'd be too afraid of it being any worse than it already feels. What dumb thing did you believe for a really long time? Political and religious beliefs I don't at all like admitting I had. Where would you like to retire? Hell if I know, that's a long whiles away. What brings you the most joy in life? Oh yikes. Family and close friends, probs. What was the last song that got stuck in your head? "Blush" by Jeffree Star is on repeat ahhhh What is something you enjoy doing, but aren’t good at? Drawing people. I don't really do it BECAUSE I'm not very good. In art in general, I have a hard time with proportions. Name some healthy foods that you enjoy eating. Strawberries, apples, a lotta other fruits, broccoli, there are these granola and cashew bars I LOVE, salad can be good, scrambled eggs... now I'm blanking. Like there are a lot of foods that can be on either end of the spectrum, depending on how they're prepared. Do you ever eat dry cereal as a snack to munch on? Any particular kind? No, generally too crunchy and dry. When you run out of something to drink & are thirsty, are you quick to retrieve a new beverage or are you lazy about it? It depends on how thirsty I am and what I'm doing at that moment. What is your favorite part of a slice of pizza? BITCH all of that motherfucker. What was the longest power outage you ever experienced? Two or so days. I was so, so scared for Venus because it was in the winter. Poor girl was scared. I had to let her inside my hoodie and shirt to use my warmth for a lengthy period at a time, there were blankets draped over her terrarium... I was genuinely afraid she was going to die. But nope, my baby is good and thriving. :'D Do you believe that children should do all of the chores around the house, or do you think the parents should do them? Or do you have an entirely different opinion? As someone who was raised with chores poorly enforced and now I suck at doing them, they should ABSOLUTELY be a required thing. Children shouldn't do *all* the chores though, of course, especially those involving serious chemicals. Have you ever painted a pet’s nails, or known someone that has done such? Do you think that is cruel? I haven't, but I suppose it depends on whether it's toxic or not and if the animal doesn't mind? I do know people who have. What is something you did as a child that you didn’t realize back then was “wrong”, if anything? I didn't know interracial relationships were perfectly fine. It's funny, I don't recall me seeing black as any less than whites, I just thought it wasn't supposed to happen. Being raised in the South does that, ig. Do you get an excessive amount of bug bites during spring/summertime? Are you one to itch constantly or can you control yourself? No, I've heard because I have A-type blood. Whenever my sister (O-type) and I used to play outside, she would always come in COVERED in mosquito bites, and she's still a magnet for them today. Supposedly bugs don't prefer A, but O the most. I do itch, though. Holy shit, do I itch. Do you own any sports equipment [balls, basketball goals, mitts, etc] that you rarely use? No. Could you ever willingly hunt down & shoot an innocent animal for sport? Over my dead fucking body. Would you be uncomfortable changing someone else’s baby’s diaper? Ugh, I have twice I believe, and I hated it. Have/would you ever want to own a pet frog, or do you think they would be too boring? I don't think I've ever caught and kept one? I don't mind "boring" pets, I just don't desire one. What internet/television provider do you use? Fucking CenturyLink. Stay away from it. Are you uncomfortable going out in public with leg stubble? Even if it’s so light that no one would notice it unless they were looking for it? That much, no. Now I literally haven't shaved my legs in over a whole year because it's not like anyone sees them, but holy fuck would I be mortified if someone did lol. Have you ever lived in a mobile home? No. I'm terrified to because of tornados. Have you ever had your bedroom in a basement? No. What’s your favorite piece of furniture in your house? ...? If someone gave you a kitten, would you keep it? I'd want to, but it'd be Mom's decision. Favorite type of cracker: Cheez-Its. Animal you like to watch but sort of creeps you out: Spiders, especially when they're making their webs.

[angrylizardjacket]

maybe youth is wasted on the young {Roger Taylor}

ask your destiny to dance Modern High School AU

A/N: 2685 words. Not Asked For But Here Nonetheless. might write a bit more for this AU, but i’ve got a lot of prompts, so no promises. hope you enjoy.

Brian got saddled with the two worst tutoring students in the world, and if the high school wasn’t paying him, he’d have let them both go after the first day. Roger he knows; before Brian had graduated they’d both spent lunch times in the music room, and Brian taught him a bit of guitar, and Roger smashed away at the drums and sometimes took a nap. He never expected Roger to be taking physics, but they didn’t usually talk about school when they were at band practice. The band had formed in Brian’s last year of high school, and fortunately there was only a few months after graduation where Roger was the only highschooler, until they went in search of a bass player, and found John Deacon, who seemed to live his life in the engineering workshop room. Together, along with Freddie, who’s two years above Brian, and a design student of all things, they make a pretty great team, musically speaking at least.

Ash, as a student, is an unknown quantity, bursting into the room he’d booked for studying, covered in paint and clay, and fifteen minutes late. She’s bursting with apologies, but Brian gives her the benefit of the doubt, points to the seat opposite him, and smiles. If he was being honest, Roger’s session finished late, he was thankful to have a full hour between appointments to grab some food and go over his notes.

He doesn’t know if they’re in the same class, but they’re in the same year, and both not there out of their own free will. Ash sleeps in class, Roger gets into arguments with the teacher; both are failing. 

Ash is new to town, and all of her school shirts are pink. Not on purpose, but she put them through with a red sweater and the rest is pretty self evident, and she hates Physics more than almost anything else in the world.

“Then why are you doing it?” Brian asks when she announces this during their second session together.

“Because I don’t wanna dissect frogs and rabbits and shit, and I can’t remember the periodic table to save my life; maths, even complicated physics maths, is still maths.” She explains, slapping down a falling apart notebook and fishing around her bag for a pen.

“Language.” Brian admonishes, and Ash frowns at him, elbow deep in her bag.

“I’m seventeen, go fuck yourself.”

The thing is, she's a good student, she can do the math, it's just a struggle working out what it means, but she's scatterbrained more than anything. And often late. Usually only by a few minutes, but everything changes the day Roger comes in ten minutes late, which comes as a surprise, he's always quite punctual, and he's covered in lime green paint. It's in his hair and everything. He looks like he’s had an afternoon full of regrettable situations.

"I don't wanna talk about it." He doesn't even give Brian time to ask, though Brian himself is rather distracted; it's a Friday, they've got a gig tonight.

"You'll be right for the show thought?" Brian asks, and Roger agrees easily, looking uncomfortable; the paint was still partially wet. As promised, Brian didn’t ask, and when the hour’s up, Roger leaves to go home and have a shower. After Brian’s break finishes, Ash doesn’t show up. Fifteen minutes after she’s meant to arrive, she’s still not there.

“What?” Ash snaps into her mobile when she picks up, and Brian’s taken aback; she’s not necessarily soft-spoken, but he’d never known her to be so hostile.

“Just reminding you about your tutoring session is all.” He said gently, and he hears a sigh on the other end of the line.

“Fuck. Right. Okay.” Ash breathes, a little distracted, a little put-upon, and it’s followed by scuffling, a door being slammed, and a tap blasting water into a metal sink; the art room. “Hey, listen, I’m just a bit-” sighing again, this time with resignation, the water’s still running in the background, “I’m just not up for it right now, some stuff has happened, and I just-” And there’s rustling as Brian hears her cover the receiver and holler a string of curse words at the empty - at least he hopes it is - art room.

“Is everything okay?” Brian asks when Ash uncovers the mic and apologises quickly.

“I’m fine. I will be fine.” She tells him, before apologising that she won’t be able to make it to their session that day. She hangs up.

When he makes his way to the art room, because she’s obviously not fine and he cares when one of his students misses a session, he sees her through the window, sitting down with her head on her arms at a table covered in various shards of a sculpture. At a glance he thinks she’s asleep, but as he knocks gently on the door, he sees her look up, shocked, her eyes red-rimmed.

“What are you doing here?” She asks, roughly wiping at her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater, standing in the door frame. She sniffles a little.

“I just came to make sure you were okay; the art room’s the only one with a metal basin that sounds like that.” He pointed over her shoulder at the art room’s sink. “What’s wrong?”

Ash is quiet for a very long moment, narrowing her eyes when she looked up at him, before turning on her heel and heading to the table with the sculpture fragments on it. They seemed to be in some sort of order, and Brian can pick out that it’s meant to be the bust of a woman, but it’s completely shattered, with a few pieces super glued together, though it seems she’d given up.

“My major work was destroyed.” She explained, voice flat, the statement followed by another sniffle. “Some dickhead put it in the kiln beside a piece with a huge air bubble in it.” At Brian’s confusion, she picked up a piece that looked like it had part of an eye; “the air bubble expanded and exploded and took out all my hard work on the way.” 

“I’m sorry.” He’s not sure what else to say, she looks absolutely devastated about the whole situation.

“I’m not up for Physics, I’ve gotta try and jigsaw this all back together.” And as she looks over all the work she still had left to do, her lip began to tremble.

“Yeah no, no worries; is there anything I can do to help?” Brian asks gently, Ash just shakes her head, can’t even open her mouth to speak because she knows she’ll start crying again. There’s a blur of movement out the window, and when Brian turns to leave, there’s a figure in the door. He’s tall, with the same striking ginger hair as Ash, and looks like every hipster English major Brian’s ever encountered.

“Who are you?” The ginger man asks, scowling, and Brian raises his hands in surrender, but Ash cuts in.

“Oz, he’s my tutor, he’s just checking in because I couldn’t make it today because- because-” and her voice catches on her explanation as she looks over her weeks of hard work scattered on the table before her. Brian goes to introduce himself to ‘Oz’, who he’s pretty sure is her brother, but the moment Ash sniffles, trying to hold back more tears, Oz brushes past him and it’s like they both forget about Brian.

“It’s going to be okay, Biscuit,” Oz murmurs gently, wrapping a now weeping Ash up in a hug, “I’ll help you stick all these back together and then we can go home, okay?” And he’s so fucking gentle about it that it actually surprises Brian, who hasn’t really thought enough about Ash as a person to devote an opinion on her beyond the fact that she’s a good student with a sharp sense of humour and terrible work ethic in regards to physics; not once, until now, had he ever really considered her fragile. 

He tries not to think about it too much, as he leaves, but it’s hard not to when the two of them show up at his gig later that night. Even in the dim light of the pub he’d recognise her hair from a mile away, and he’s silently wondering how she got in. 

‘Oz’ turns out to be Oscar Clarke, a friend of Freddie’s, Ash’s older brother, and as Brian had called it, an English major. 

“I didn’t realise I’d be seeing you again so soon, are you feeling any better?” Brian asks when the first set finishes; Ash is sitting on a high stool by one of the little round tables, and Oscar is leaning beside her with a bright smile. Ash nods, though she’s still a little subdued, and Oscar gives Brian an official greeting, thanks the guitarist for taking the time to check on his little sister, and offers to buy him a drink.

“Oz! It’s so good to see you!” Freddie wraps Oscar in a hug, interrupting them, before turning to Ash with a bright smile. “You must be Ashley, it’s lovely to finally meet you, my dear.” And Ash is halfway through a greeting and a grin when Roger hops down the the pub’s stage and comes over with their bass player to see what all the fuss was about. The moment they realise who the other is, both Ash and Roger freeze.

“I’m going to fucking murder him.” Ash says with a terrifying degree of confidence, and Roger can’t read her lips without his glasses but he sees her expression, and how she’s sliding out of her stool, and he bolts, leaving poor John confused. Oscar wraps his arms around Ash without hesitation, restraining her. “I’m going to gut him like a fish.” She says, with that same calm fury, struggling in her brother’s arms.

“So you know Roger?” Brian asks, and Ash snorts out a laugh but doesn’t say anything.

“Why do you wanna kill him?” Oscar asks, matching her calm tone, and Ash stop struggling.

“He’s the one who ruined my major work; him and his fucking meme-y, dick sculpture.” She spat, the composed veneer breaking as she dwells on it, and Oscar lets her go and turns back to a confused and concerned Freddie.

“Is she going to kill our drummer?” He asked, as John joined them, looking like an actual child, and he asks if someone can go to the bar and buy him a coke.

“She might.” Oscar says blithely, and heads to the bar. Freddie frowns after him. Brian chimes in, thinking only of Ash, covered in clay and crying alone in the art room hours after school had finished for the day, super gluing her shattered project back together one piece at a time.

“Listen, Freddie, I don’t say this lightly, but he might deserve it.”

“You’re a fucking bastard; if you don’t know how to work with clay properly, you shouldn’t even try, do you know how much work I put in-?” Ash snarled as she found Roger trying to hide his face at the end of the bar.

“I didn’t mean to-” He tried; she’d just thrown paint at him earlier that day, didn’t have the words to articulate herself. This is worse than the paint.

“You sculpted a dick - a dick of all things - around a piece of scrunched up newspaper and didn’t think to leave a hole to let the air escape? To let the air in the clay expand? Have you never-” She seethes, standing right up against the stool he’s sitting on, forcing him to edge away.

“Are you yelling at me about sculptures in the middle of a bar?” Roger asks, and yeah he feels guilty about what happened, but he’s also pretty sure she’s using a fake ID, and the bouncer only didn’t card him because he’s in the band, and if she draws too much attention to them they’re both going to get kicked out.

“Yes.” She snaps, and shoves him rough enough to push him from his seat. He catches himself before he faceplants. “I should kick your ass.” Snarling, she gives him the single most derisive look he’s ever seen, though he stands his ground.

“First of all, I’d like to see you try,” he smirks, moving the chair back and stepping into her space; her hands twitch as if she’s aching to hit him, “and secondly; over a sculpture?”

“Over my major work!” She crows, and he finally realises what the whole situation meant for her. “Do you know how much work I put into that? Over a month and a half, you dipshit!” There’s tears in her eyes, and it seems to take her a moment to realise, and she turns away, gently dabbing to not smudge her mascara.

“I’m sorry, Ash.” Voice gentle, Roger awkwardly pets her shoulder, but she brushes him off. He crosses his arms, unsure of what to do with his hands. “Can I get you a beer or something?”

“We’re the same age.” She squints at him over her shoulder, and he shrugs.

“I’m in the band.” He smirks, puffing out his chest a little, and she rolls her eyes.

“I don’t drink.” And with that she leaves, finds her brother who’s bought both her and John sodas, and Brian gives her a sympathetic smile, and Freddie breathes a genuine sigh of relief when Roger follows behind, somewhat sheepishly.

“How you doing, biscuit?” Oscar asks, wrapping Ash in a side hug, and she shrugs, taking a long sip of her drink and leaning against him. They stay for the rest of the band’s sets; Oscar had brought her out to cheer her up, and eventually, when she starts bopping along to the music, it starts working. Roger, from what he can make out of her in the crowd, feels something in his chest ease to see her relaxing and enjoying herself.

When asked about how the confrontation went, when the band is packing up and Oscar and Ash have left for the night, Roger, to everyone’s surprised, tells them she had every right to be pissed.

“Though if she follows through on her threat to deck me, she’ll have another thing coming.” He snorted, packing up his high hat stand. Brian asks if they’d known each other before, and Roger turns an interesting shade of pink and goes quiet. “We’ve got art and physics together.” 

“But you’re not friends?” Freddie asks, watching Roger for a moment before he and Brian share a small smile.

“Do we seem like friends?” Roger snapped, and Freddie grinned wider. “She’s the best sculptor in our class; even our teacher was pissed when she found out what happened.” He admitted, before his voice dropped to quietly amused. “Ms Roberts got so close to swearing at me like four different times, it was actually pretty funny.”

“He likes her.” Freddie stage whispered to Brian, and Roger turned scarlet at that.

“I do not.” He growled, “she threatened to murder me.” But he was all flustered, and clearly a terrible liar while a little tipsy off of only two beers.

“You think she’s cute and you want to snog her because you know she wouldn’t really kill you.” Brian cooed, dodging Roger’s thrown drumstick easily.

“This is bullying.” He grumbled.

“She is cute,” John piped up, “got really nice eyes too, though the lights made them look all gold at times.” He mused, though Roger couldn’t see the bassist pointedly watching him.

“They’re green.” Roger corrects automatically, and John’s grin widens. He realises too late what he’s said, because both Brian and Freddie are howling with laughter.

“They're green!” Freddie wheezes, and does not get out of the way of the other drumstick quick enough, but also doesn’t seem to care. 

“Fuck all of you!” Roger snaps, thankful when he hears the honk of a horn and sees his dad’s station wagon parked outside and waiting. He starts lugging his stuff out as the others are still doting on him. Assholes.

[isobel-thorm]

53??

53. “Well, that wasn’t very subtle.” 

It Runs in the Family 

Earl Whitehorse reflects on his found family and the one single trait that seems to run within it. 

Earl Whitehorse wasn’t an idiot. 

Sure, there had been accusations of him being one over the years- and plenty of implications- Marshal Burke was among them, judging by how quickly he had grouped Earl in with the fame-chasing cops.

Well, he might not have been book smart. He had graduated in the top fiftieth percentile of his peers in high school and college. But he had enough street smarts and knowledge of Nicolette Raylan to know when things were off with her.

For all intents and purposes, he had been her father since he had been the first responder to that domestic violence call made by the scared-yet-furious fifteen year old that had grown up to be the hero of the Resistance. He had helped raise her through tough teachers, first loves, first heartbreaks, a couple of college tours. He knew her at every single emotion, and she confided in him for all of them. Outside of their first encounter, she had always kept her emotions in check. She was the picture of subtle. It was nearly fitting that she ended up being a sniper- silent, subtle, and dangerous - all things snipers needed to be.

It was his sense of responsibility for her that had gripped his heartstrings and yanked a week after he was back in Missoula. He was safe and sound, and Nicolette was still in Hope County, dead or worse, courtesy of Jacob Seed. The thought had plagued him for ten minutes before it had sent him throwing a bag of necessities together, throwing them in a truck and heading back to the county that same night.

The same went for yelling at her in the middle of Falls End once he had gotten back. She had screamed and hit him and then sobbed and held onto him for dear life, and he held her all through it because it was his damned job as her stand-in father. He had failed her by bringing her there, he was determined to make up for it at all cost by sharing the burden the county gave her.

He should’ve known things had changed drastically in her life the second he had seen John Seed loitering behind her in town. More so when Earl saw John watching him and Nicolette embracing with some strange mix of envy and what looked relief in his eyes.

He should’ve known when John followed Jerome’s orders to come with him to the abandoned house for the night just because Nicolette had given him a pleading look.

He should’ve known when Nicolette couldn’t label her and John as friends or not.

He should’ve known when John had been the first one to suggest a search party to find her when they all discovered she was missing.

He should’ve known when John sounded like he was in physical pain when she had come back and he voiced that she had gone to Joseph over him for answers for whatever was going on.

He should’ve known when Nicolette only seemed to care about sparing John’s feelings about throwing herself into danger like that.

And then he did know they had at least fallen into bed together when he had walked in on their argument about it that night. He had played stupid until she came to him with that particular confession.

Nicolette had always been a… flighty girl. She had only ever thought she found love. Those exploits usually ended badly, so she had sworn off love. Except she never made a show of it. It was one of the few things she was private about. She was subtle that way. And now she was attached to the least subtle man in the county.

So of course it came as the biggest shock yet when the fucking world ended and John showed up in the bunker looking lost and confused and heartbroken, covered in soot and God (if there was one, after what Earl had just witnessed) knew what else with Nicolette slung over his shoulder, unconscious. The younger man had refused to leave her side once she was carted away, and Earl realized that John was in love with her.

A man that didn’t know the fucking meaning of subtle had found room in his cold, dead heart for her under everyone’s noses and didn’t so much as announce it to anyone- even as part of a trick. 

In the days that followed, the role reversal came in about every single aspect of John’s life.

The man was constantly quiet, and dare Earl even say polite. John knew he wasn’t welcome. He knew his days might have been numbered, and he knew he would be met with trouble if he so much as stepped a toe out of line. He had spent most of his waking hours with Nicolette, either at her bedside or wrapped around her in the bed- the latter only when he, Sharky or the Ryes were around. He was still intent on keeping their relationship a secret to all but few, it seemed.

Once she was up and awake and entirely alive again, John had kept being subtle about everything between the pair of them. Any show of affection was quick and invisible to all unless you knew what to look for: An extra long glance here, a skim of his fingers across her back there, a couple of linked fingers under a table while they sat close enough to hide it, a protective-possessive sweep of his eyes from her growing baby bump to her face any time she had talked about her pregnancy with anyone else while he was in earshot- the list went on.

And Nicolette was ever the picture of subtlety, returning the gestures but never being too affectionate out in the open.

Of course, there was the one time he had walked in on them mid-tryst in a storage closet was equal parts subtle and not. They could’ve gone into their dorm and locked the Ryes and Stones out to... carry on, but that would have been anything but subtle. And they had been keeping quiet in the closet, after all. He had only walked in to get something from it by sheer chance. Still, Earl didn’t like to dwell on that particular event anyway.

In a twist that he didn’t even see coming, the tables were turned during a conversation Earl had been having with John.

It had been about rationing resources. Being in a group of about thirty people when there were supplies for at least a hundred for years eased most of their minds, but it still left room for debating just how to ration or use the extra supplies. John and Earl had been stuck on planting duty for food prep and somehow they had gotten into an albeit strangely amicable argument about the most efficient ways to plant the certain vegetables. Earl had won, citing quality over quantity in the main garden plot. John had relented easily, but the pair had brought it up later at dinner to get second opinions. The tone had been light. Earl had restated his opinion but signed off with  “I wasn’t an Ivy League educated hotshot lawyer or nothin’” and John had come back with calling him a “crotchety old non-conformist.” The laugh they shared in response was something new but not unwelcome. Joking with John Seed after everything was an experience, but it wasn’t as uncomfortable as Earl had expected anything amicable with the former herald to be. The conversation had ended with John leaning into the man, hand draped on his closest shoulder as they switched topics with whatever Dan Stone had to say. It was the picture of a family, if they took away all the emotional baggage.

And then suddenly Nicolette had come up from her spot nearer to the wall in the mess hall. She slid onto the vacant spot beside John, and when John turned to see what she wanted, she took his face in her hands and kissed him for every single person in the room to see.

The ten different conversations screeching to absolutely stunned silence was almost funny.

Oblivious to eveyone’s reactions, John immediately melted into the kiss, reaching to scoot her closer to him. After a few seconds, if either of them noticed their interested audience they made no effort to care.

And then, the kicker:

Nicolette pulled back, pressed her forehead to John’s and said the firmest “I love you” Earl had ever heard her utter to anyone other than her mother.

John stared at her for a solid seconds. And then he leaned forward in order to kiss her again.

Earl glanced up and did a quick sweep of the room to gauge reactions. The cat had been yanked out of the bag now. No one looked furious. Some looked annoyed and scandalized, yes, but there were no immediate threats to deal with by the looks of it. As much as it pained him to admit, John had come a long way since the bunker doors closed behind him. He had started earning his place and the people’s respect, that helped things from getting ugly at that particular reveal, at least least. And if worse came to worse they could still sell the fact that something might’ve happened between them in the bunker and whole ‘Sharky’s the baby’s father’ cover story could still hold merit.

Earl loitered for a bit, decidedly not looking in the couple’s direction once tongue got involved in the kiss.

Once he was satisfied no one was going to start anything, he cleared out.

A while later he found her back in the dorm, folding clothes. He sat on the end of John’s bed and sighed. “Well, that wasn’t subtle.”

“We’re not subtle people,” she said after a moment. 

“Your boyfriend isn’t. You, on the other hand.”

“Eh, end of the world was bound to change a few things,” she replied.

Earl hummed. “So… you actually love him, huh?”

“I…” she sighed. “Yeah, I do. He’s an idiot and he doesn’t remotely deserve it but-”

He sighed and pulled her into a hug. “Don’t gotta explain it to me. Might still be a little… torn on the subject, but I stick by what I said. I trust you. And well, we do have the shovel launcher. And he can’t run far if he does anything bad to you or the kid.”

“And you have the nerve to say that I’m not subtle.”

“I’m the closest thing you’ve got to a dad- and the kid’s got to a granddad. You’re damn right I ain’t subtle, especially for you two.”

“Two of the least subtle men in the county and they’re the most important ones in my life,” Nicolette mused. “Three, if you count his godfather…” she blinked. “And backup godfather… and the least subtle woman is his honorary grandma-aunt.  My god, my kid’s gonna be the least subtle kid in the entire county just from influence alone.”

“He ain’t gonna even know the meaning of ‘subtle’,” Earl agreed.

“… Shit.”

He had laughed at that, which got her to laugh and put her head on his shoulder. And just like that, things felt like the old normal from years ago.

That night, he returned to the dorms to find John curled up in bed with Nicolette, holding her much like he had that first horrible night when the Collapse began. Except unlike the first night, he wasn’t remotely being careful with who saw him there. Apparently Nicolette’s admission had made him forgo anything resembling subtlety in presenting their relationship to the public. 

Christ, things had changed. 

Still, they were happy- Nicolette was happy, and that was all he could ask for. Subtlety be damned. 

——

A matter of months later, Baby Apocalypse- Callan “Cal” Raylan had his first taste of what passed as solid baby food in the bunker. He blanched,  and within seconds, it was launched off of the high chair tray and hit John square in the chest.

Not very subtle indeed.

As family traits went, however, “not very subtle” was hardly one to complain about.

[writingmask]

Diner Dog

Hey, y’all! This was my entry for the Fullmoon Fanzine! Finally posting it here!

Rated G

It all started with the dog.

Hanzo should have known better, of course, than to try to pet and feed stray dogs, especially ones that looked more like wolves than your average Canis lupus familiaris and were capable of knocking over the dumpster behind the diner despite having only three legs. But Hanzo couldn’t help himself; the poor thing was starving and alone and how could he resist those soulful amber eyes and mismatched ears?

Which was how he now found himself cursing his existence as he slumped over the cash register at The Triple Dragon Diner-- his brother’s choice of names, not his-- at 3:00am. The dog had a schedule, and Hanzo had for some God-forsaken reason decided to take the night shift to ensure the poor thing got his fill of leftover bacon and eggs, as well as the ever important tummy rubs.

Genji had laughed for an hour when he figured out why he, Hanzo Shimada, a man who practically worshipped the luxury of sleeping late now that they were out of their parents’ influence, was willing to take the night shift for two weeks straight.

The bell chimed as the door opened, distracting him from his litany of self-derived insults. As hard as it was to believe, there were actual customers during the night shift. Not many and usually some form of stoner, but they did come in for an early (or extremely late) breakfast. Hanzo looked up, his service smile already plastered on his face and…

Oh. The smile faltered, becoming something more genuine despite his best efforts. The scruffy man filling the doorway was a regular, a new one, but Hanzo could already count on him making an appearance at least once a night. Ordinarily, Hanzo would brush him off as another addict of some variety with a severe nightly case of the munchies, but as unkempt and tired as the man-- Jesse, he called himself-- seemed, he was too alert to be under any form of intoxicant.

“Howdy, darlin’,” he called wearily with a smile that brightened the entire room.

“Greetings,” Hanzo replied, fighting off the blush that appeared like clockwork around Jesse. “Your usual?”

“Please and thank you,” the man replied, plopping himself down on the bar stool in front of Hanzo and setting a tattered Stetson next to him.

Hanzo nodded before setting to work. Jesse’s usual was pretty much everything on the menu-- high in quantity and protein. Hanzo had no idea how he managed to pack it all away and not get sick, but the act itself was impressive. Whatever Jesse did for a living worked up an appetite.

Hanzo had once asked what Jesse did to keep him up at this unholy hour. He assumed it was some form of illegal activity or else top secret law enforcement because Jesse’s answer had been, “Simply put angel? I’m a werewolf.”

Which was altogether ridiculous.

Still, he could take a hint, and since he honestly had no room to judge when it came to quasi-legal and secretive activities, Hanzo let the silly answer suffice and concentrated on cooking and flirting.

Cooking, he told himself firmly as he piled more bacon on a plate than was likely safe for anyone. Flirting while working was a terrible idea.

Even if he did want to see what this particular customer looked like in the daylight. And who made conversation as easy and simple as breathing.

Hanzo slapped a fried egg on top of the bacon and shook himself. He was working and Jesse hadn’t indicated anything remotely resembling interest. After all--

“Hey, Han?”

Hanzo looked up to see Jesse looking at him in favor over his unusually still full platter. “Hanzo, I uh… Look, this might be inappropriate since I’m a customer and all, and you can absolutely tell me to fuck off and go to hell, but… I kinda have this lil’ crush, and I was wondering if you’d like to go out sometime?”

Hanzo blinked at the rushed words, for a moment wondering if he’d suddenly lost the ability to understand English. Jesse… Was… Asking him out? As in out-out? On a date? With a crush? Hanzo’s brow furrowed as he looked up into those ernest, anxious golden eyes, looking for a hint of a joke or something that would make sense.

Wait, he realized with epiphany. Not golden. Amber.

“Jesse, I….” His voice faltered, and whatever question had been forming faded as the bells above the door tinkled with obnoxious cheerfulness. He and Jesse broke apart-- and when had they leaned in that close?-- as Hanzo reluctantly turned his attention to the intruder.

Or intruders. Four men walked through the diner door, and the hairs on the back of Hanzo’s neck rose with wary alarm. Everything about them, from their suspiciously nondescript clothing to the way they walked in a formation as though they expected a fight screamed predator to his long dormant instincts. Electricity thrummed under his skin, and he carefully wrapped his hand around the hidden blackjack under the counter even as he put on his customer service smile.

“Welcome, gentlemen,” he said, voice steady and carefully pleasant. “What can I get for you?”

The man in the front, apparently the ringleader, stepped forward with just as much forced casualness. A professional, Hanzo thought. But a professional what? “Our apologies, but we’re here on business.”

“Business?” Hanzo asked, glancing at Jesse, who seemed to have shrunk to the other end of the counter with his hat lowered and shoulders hunched.

“Afraid so,” the man said, oozing sincerity and charm in a way that made Hanzo itch to slam the blackjack in his face. Not law enforcement, they’d have badges. These were hunters of some sort. “There’s been a wild dog sighting in there area. Dangerous and injured. We’re tasked with bringing it in before someone gets hurt. Have you seen anything of the sort?”

Hanzo’s mind flashed to the three-legged dog he’d been feeding. That was the only dog he’d seen running wild, and it was hardly dangerous. And yet, he had a sneaking suspicion that was their target. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jesse tense.

“I’m sorry,” he said slowly, “but I’m afraid, I haven’t seen anything larger than a cat around here.”

“Are you sure?” the ringleader prompted. “There’s a pretty big reward. And you wouldn’t want to misinform us, now would you?”

Hanzo’s lip twitched in an aborted attempt to snarl. Bounty hunters, then. Why they were after dogs, he had no idea, but they’d get nothing from him.

As they spoke, one of the man’s companions slowly walked to Jesse’s seat at the counter, suspicion in his eyes. While Hanzo and the ringleader had a silent battle of wills, his hand moved to grasp Jesse’s shoulder. Jesse stood and turned with incredible speed, slamming a gloved hand into the man’s jaw.

“Shit!” yelled one of the others, running to assist his associate as Hanzo and the ringleader both jumped. “It’s him!”

The hunters charged Jesse, drawing clubs and knives from hidden sheathes, and Hanzo leapt over the counter with blackjack in hand. He made it to Jesse’s side, ready to aid as all hell broke loose in one of the most riotous brawls Hanzo had ever been a part of.

Later, when he had time to think, he’d remember details such as crashing his weapon across the nose of the ringleader with a satisfying crack of cartilage, and a rush of heat and flurry of fists from Jesse next to him.

Blue lightning crackled along Hanzo’s arm and into his weapon. Not a bow, but it apparently was enough. Years and years of training rushed back, and his body moved of its own accord with confident strikes. A dark thrill ran through him as he roared at his opponents, limbs flying in dangerous patterns and forms as he attacked. As much as he’d hated the reasons he had his skills, it felt good to fight again.

He glanced at Jesse to his side, and found a mirroring joy along the man’s face as he tore into his own targets. His lips were stretched in a fierce grin, showing long, sharp teeth. His eyes were wild, his hair flying loose around pointed ears that peeked through without his hat to hide them. Hanzo’s eyes widened in realization, and he found himself laughing. Apparently Jesse’d been telling the truth after all!

The battle could have lasted forever or only an instant. Hanzo never bothered to figure it out. At the end, there were four bodies laying in crumpled heaps along the floor of the diner, and Hanzo felt a slight surge of irritation and guilt. He’d have to clean that up, and Genji was probably going to yell at him for getting blood on a restaurant floor.

But clean-up would have to wait. Hanzo leaned against the counter, panting with weary satisfaction. His body would hurt in the morning, but for now, adrenaline flooded him with giddy delight. He grinned up at Jesse. “So you’re actually a werewolf.”

Jesse rubbed the back of his neck with a sheepish grin. “Yeah… It’s… A long story.” He coughed and went silent for a moment. “So… Uh… You’re a magic ninja then?”

Hanzo snorted. “It’s a long story,” he said with a smirk. “One I’d be happy to tell you… Over coffee sometime?”

Jesse blinked and a slow grin stretched across his face. “You know, I think I’d like that. I’d like that a lot.”

[shaanks]

5 & 6 w/ Gojo, Megumi, Sukuna, Yuji c:

:D Thank you hon!

okey so:

5. unpopular opinions on the character/ship (either mine, or you can send in yours and i’ll post it without comment)

Gojo: I don't think he actually strings along a bunch of simultaneous partners! Based on Gege's lil tongue-in-cheek jab at him I totally get why the "I bet Megumi never got any sleep bc of Gojo's Night Parade of a Thousand Side Chicks" meme came about, but having that many simultaneous relationships, even if they were just fwb situations, would require Gojo to let that many people near him more than like. Once. Part of what makes him such a tragedy for me (alongside like a thousand other things) is that he has such a loving, fun, nurturing personality, but he had to learn the hard way, at a very young age, that proximity to him could be fatally dangerous. That being flippantly involved with the lives of others could get them killed.

I think he's incredibly careful with who he lets in his inner circle, and that the people within it are always either his students or people he trusts to handle themselves in his absence. Everyone else he keeps at arm's length or further, and even within that small circle he is careful to ensure that the number of people doesn't exceed the quantity of people he might be able to save in one go.

Having a bunch of non-sorcerers on a frequent rotation would put them in danger, and the jujutsu world is so corrupt and splintered that I'm not sure he trusts anyone he hasn't vetted to be hanging around his bed, to know him intimately in any fashion.

Megumi: I think he loves Gojo. I think he loves him like a brother, like a best friend, I think Gojo's presence is a cornerstone of his understanding of the world. He's surly and aloof with him moreso than almost anyone else, for sure, but take a look at the polite stoicism he uses with strangers vs. how much more progressively grumpy he gets with people with he trusts them, cares for them. (look at how he grouses at Yuji, who is arguably his best friend, who he put his position as a sorcerer on the line for after having known him for like, an hour? take a look at the way he engages with Maki.) He acts like that with Gojo /because/ he trusts him so much. He knows Gojo isn't going to ditch him for acting like himself, and they have a long history of maintaining that dynamic because it's safer for BOTH of them. He doesn't hate Gojo, he doesn't actually think he's an idiot (but he will absolutely call him on ACTING like one, which Gojo does often and on purpose), and in fact Gojo is the first person he thinks to call whenever anything seems beyond them. (I maintain that if he'd called Gojo about Tsumiki he'd have dropped directly out of the sky to help without so much as filing his paperwork first.)

Sukuna: I don't think he's particularly belligerent or stupid, the way he's frequently portrayed in fandom. I think he's perceived that way partially because of how he acted in episode one (boy was LOST in the sauce lookin for someone to fuck like 1 minute into having a body, but after 1000 years of just being fingers man I probably would be too), but he's actually a weirdly chill dude, as apex predators tend to be. He's violent, sure, and would absolutely kill you for funsies in-universe, but outside of episode one, and the split second he thinks Megumi is really gonna fight him in episode 5 (I think?) he has a really even tone, he's eloquent, he's just a VERY strange extrovert, he LIKES talking to people. He even gives Mahito a pass despite finding him fundamentally inferior because they had fun bullying Yuji together, like. I think he has his own plans, which he chooses to share with no one, and he's confident enough in his own ability to pull shit off that he's happy to just relax and work on his mani-pedi waiting for the pieces to fall into place.

Yuji: He's so smart. He really is. He's so incredibly self-deprecating, and his ignorance to things that are common knowledge for his peers (who all grew up in the jujutsu community) only serves to reinforce that image, but I do think it's one that he just. Wears. Yuji's a big dude for his age, he's physically much much stronger than his peers or his teachers (at least in normal school), and he's got that dyed undercut which is Kind of a Delinquent Thing, and he could really easily be an intimidating or imposing looking guy, but what does he do? He wears soft colors, he exudes warmth and care and safety into every space he's in, he makes himself look smaller in baggy clothes and little rolled cuff jeans. He talks to people in sweet and jovial tones, and does everything he can to try to meet people where they are. He carries the burdens of everyone around him, all while trying desperately never to bleed on anyone else (something he and Megumi have in common), and doesn't take the things people say or do to him personally. Even when they're exaggeratedly mean (like Nobara was with him at first), or a direct threat to his life (he gets over Todo trying to headbutt him to death in what like. 10 minutes?).

Also, look at how he handles Junpei, how he figures out what's going on with his teacher by watching them for like, one second. How he sits down with him and just talks to him like a person, how right up to the end he is listening and learning and trying to understand him better.

Yuji puts a lot of effort into just being a Goofy Silly Guy (something he shares with Gojo, actually), but he's incredibly perceptive, he's tactically intelligent, he's able to work well with almost anyone, and he learns VERY quickly, even with concepts that are complicated and foreign to him.

6. a hidden talent I think the character might have!

Gojo: The problem with Gojo is that canonically he can be good at anything he tries, so it's hard to have like. hidden talents. I think maybe he's actually really good at sketch art, because he's always giving people really shittily drawn sketches of things, and one of his Big Defense Mechanisms is pretending he's big and goofy and incompetent at things he's actually very good at. (i.e. why he Acts Annoying as Fuck when he's actually an incredibly effective communicator, why he pretends to be unaffected by things when really giving a shit is the core of his character and his biggest love language, etc.)

Megumi: he plays piano, have you seen his fingies? it's an individual activity that requires precision and practice, produces lovely sound that doesn't require him to talk to anyone, and I think he's MAD deep into music theory in his down time.

Sukuna: Storytelling. Oh my god PLEASE listen to me, he has this incredible voice, he's constantly just tellin people things whenever he gets a moment to talk, he LOVES knowing things that other people don't, and storytelling is the perfect medium for that. You know he hates being bored and he's just been floating around for a thousand years so I think he's collected a TON of stories and folklore. Getting him to actually tell you anything is like pulling teeth, of course, but I bet once he gets going he's absolutely spectacular.

Yuji: I think Yuji can sew, actually. He grew up with an elderly primary caretaker and not a ton of money, and he hates needing anything or the concept of being a burden to anyone, so I think he started quietly trying to learn how to mend his own clothes and things when he was little, and he's really good at it now. I'm also like 1000000% sure he does his own hair and he's good at it, and he'd do it for any of his friends if they asked. c:

[djevsmev]

Episode 6: Suspicions of a Stinker.

HELLO!

I hope you’re all keeping inside and keeping well.

Back when I started this blog, you may remember that my intention was to keep these shows fairly spontaneous, to avoid them being overly curated. Well, this episode is absolutely not that. In fairness, the record selections were around 80% - 90% my usual “if-I-stumble-across-it-and-like-the-look-of-it, it-gets-played” theory. However, once I’d picked about 9 records I realised this selection was potentially quite turd-heavy, so I thought I better put a couple of known quantities in there to try and balance it out a bit. I also tried to spread them out a bit so you shouldn’t have to tolerate more than 4mins of sonic disaster. Theoretically.

Also, it was only when I was time-stamping the tracks that there appears to be almost 8mins between tracks 8 & 9. Now track 8 is definitely not almost 8mins long song god knows what I’ve done there. the time stamps are wrong or there’s a sneaky gap somewhere. 

Still, maybe you could use the break to perhaps go to the loo or put the kettle on or something? The world is your oyster!

Let’s Begin!

BLACK LACE - AGADOO

I did warn you. You can’t say you weren’t warned. I remember dancing to this as a kid. I loved it. It probably goes without saying that it’s a bad record, but it’s become a by-word for awfulness and I wanted to hear it again to find out just how bad it is. I mean, I was googling it and it’s been voted the worst song of all time.

Frankly, that’s nonsense. It’s fine. I mean, terrible, but it’s not significantly more terrible than many songs. It’s a novelty record for god sake, and I would argue it’s pretty well produced: The brass sound excellent.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t some kind of hot take. It is far from a good record, it’s bad, but it’s Alan Partridge shrugging his shoulders at the meeting with Tony Hayers-bad, not the worst single of all time. 

And a cheery pineapple guy teaches you the dance moves which will keep your 5 year-old entertained for 4mins. (Or 12 if he makes you hear it 3 times on the trot. Ah, I think I see where the hatred may come from.)

ROXY MUSIC - VIRGINIA PLAIN

In saying that, Agadoo is still awful so I thought you better have a palette cleanser before we moved on. I saw this in a second hand shop somewhere and didn’t own it on any albums/compilations so for a couple of quid thought it was well worth a buy. And it is. Fact.

LOWGOLD - BEAUTY DIES YOUNG

I couldn’t remember anything about this before I put this on, and afterwords that fact didn’t surprise me. It’s just a little bit plodding, it doesn’t really go anywhere. It’s nice enough, I suppose, it just didn’t really grip me.

Talk about damming with faint praise. Sorry Lowgold. If any of you ever read this this, take into account the fact it’s coming from a guy that basically defended Black Lace a few paragraphs ago (Jesus, they’re called “Black Lace!” That’s something I’ve heard so many times I accept, but Black Lace? They thought that would be a good name. My word.) so what the hell does my opinion count for? SFA all.

TONY MARTIN - BARRIERS

This was the point I began to get worried about this episode. I’d noticed this a couple of Eps ago and liked the artwork so wanted to GIVE IT A SPIN. That’s what proper DJs like me call playing a record. But it was a rogue element, and we’d already had Agadoo, and Lowgold had proven a disappointment. Could this be a “triple-shitter” before we’d even hit track 5?

Thankfully, I really like it. It’s very New-Order-y but more upbeat, more pop-y. I wanted to find out more about Tony Martin but I can’t seem to find out anything. This was released on Barrier Records and according to Discogs it was the only thing he released, so I’m guessing it was a self-release and didn’t do well enough for him to be picked up, and god knows in the mid 80s it would cost a bomb to record and release a record yourself. Ah well, whatever happened, Tony Martin can be pleased with this. Good work.

LLOYD COLE AND THE COMMOTIONS - PERFECT SKIN

This isn’t a special “save the playlist” selection, it was part of the original 80% selection, but I did put it after Tony Martin so there was a cracker in case Barriers had been terrible (sorry to doubt you, Tony). Rather than saving the day, it’s resulted in a double 80s pop playlist sensation! And to think not 2 songs ago I was thinking of a triple-shitter! That seems so long ago.

This lockdown really messes with your sense of time.

Now listen to Lloyd Cole because it’s great

BIS - DETOUR

Speaking of great (proper journalism, this) I love this tune.

I first saw Bis when they did Kandy Pop on TOTP pops and though “Wow! This is blowing my mind! Why have they put this shit on the telly?” But I was young and an idiot. Sorry about that. The thing that really gets me about Bis, though, is how they seem to be able to turn their hand to anything. This is on the same album as Eurodisco, a total floor filling banger that seemed to come from nowhere, then Detour was released which is like some weird dirty noir tune, whilst still definitely a pop song. Talented people.

It’s also absolutely crucial to note that this song is in the Spirit Stick section of Bring It On, an absolute joy of a popcorn movie which, as long as you can look past a thankfully dated bit which would now rightly be considered sexual assault, still stands up. 

Now I write that, it’s quite a big caveat.

THE SIMPSONS - DO THE BARTMAN (7” HOUSE MIX)

Little did I know when I was popping those little gold stickers on my records that the line “If you can do the Bart you’re bad, like Michael Jackson” would date so very badly. To be honest, even if I could have predicted the future, I was in such a hurry that I didn’t have time to think at all. But that story’s for another time.

To avoid any thoughts that I may be using “bad” in the colloquial sense, let me say that this is not a good record. The B-side is the “album” version and now I try to remember, I think I might have listened to that side when I put it on. This A side has got some weird harmony effect on the vocal or something. You can understand why it was done though. They had to try and exploit the new, lucrative House scene that was kicking off across the country. Can you imagine if somebody had dropped the original mix right after Voodoo Ray? They would have looked like bloody idiots.

AFRIKA BAMBAATAA & THE GODFATHER OF SOUL JAMES BROWN - UNITY pt 1

I look at this record and what do I want? I want James Brown making funky noises and squeaks, and want Afrikaa Bambaataa shouting at me in a terrifying way, both of them doing it on the theme of coming together in the name of peace. This is exactly what I get. Great stuff. I don’t know a huge amount of James Brown stuff but I reckon Bambaataa’s sampled one of his famous records here because it sounds familiar. Someone with a far better musical knowledge than me can keep me right.

Part 1 was the A-side, 2 was on the B-side but you’re not getting that because I’m a filthy tease. Apparently if you bought the 12″ there were 6 parts! Wooft! You may think that’s excessive, but discrimination and prejudice is a big and complicated issue. It was lucky for us that TGOS soul took the decision to end it.

“Nuclear war is definitely out”

DIRE STRAITS - ROMEO AND JULIET

If it’s any consolation to Bis, at the same age I didn’t like Kandy Pop, I would have hated any and all Dire Straits. Loved them as a young kid, then in my mind they would have become literally everything that’s wrong with rock music, and now I think they’re great again. Teenage me could be a right arsehole. I mean, 20-something and 30-something me also had/has it in him to be a right arsehole (he writes a music blog while referring to himself in the 3rd person), but just not in reference to Dire Straits.

I love this song. It’s wonderful. It’s a little clichéd now but I don’t care. It’s lovely. And if I could get my guitar to sound like Knopfler’s on that tiny solo in the outro, I’d be delighted.

GLEN CAMPBELL - RHINESTONE COWBOY

If you’re looking for a record that will improve a potentially dodgy playlist, you can’t go far wrong with this banger.

What a f**king tune.

VARIOUS ARTISTS - FEED THE WORLD

Like Agadoo, this is the 2nd track that I knew, definitely, would be bad. It’s the B-side to Do They Know It’s Christmas? And from memory was a selection of celebrities giving spoken-word messages. I wanted to hear it as I thought this has got to be a car crash. I thought I better stick it at the end, though, so you can just give up if the thought of this makes you want to peel off your own skin.

It’s not quite as bad as I thought/hoped. Though there are some classics - trying to get a probably coked up Holly Johnson to say something without giggling and McCartney being at his most inappropriate upbeat McCartney are my personal favourites.

You may notice that I don’t have the legendary Peter Blake cover. Apparently when my mum went to buy this from Savacentre in Edinburgh at the behest of me and my sister, the vinyl had been printed, but such was the rush to get them in the shops, the sleeves hadn’t been finished yet. It was literally years before I realised it was supposed to have not just a cover, but one by a famous artist.

I decided to decorate it by attempting to add a transfer from a bubblegum. Unfortunately it didn’t quite take as I’d have liked, but the artistic intent was there.

Peter Blake’s a big pile of poo.

Savacentre’s notorious Hard Goods section

And that’s it. I think that could have been a lot worse and we’ve all got through pretty much unscathed. If anything, I think we’ve learned to have faith in Glen Campbell.

Keep safe.x

[blogsmax]

How to organize a college fest in a better way?

If you are part of the team for your college festival, you often find yourself in a position where you are asking yourself questions like ‘Why I am even doing this shit?’ or ‘In what ways can this actually benefit me?’ or ‘Is this going to help me acquire some skills or get a job?’ The answers to these questions are not so simple. If done right, working in a college festival can act as a huge learning experience, not just for your professional career, but for your life. But looking at the data, not many people seem to have done it right. In fact, a majority of people who work for their college festival seem to do it for the primary purpose of ‘social bonding’. Now, there is absolutely no harm in that. But if that is the foremost reason for you being a part of the team, do not expect to get anything out of the experience apart from new friends and a bunch of parties. The way I see it, organizing a college festival is the closest thing to your professional career while you are still in college, also giving you a tremendous amount of freedom on what roles do you want to pick. I was a part of the team for Alcheringa, the cultural festival of IIT Guwahati and had a terrific time during the learning phase. I tried to put my hand into as many teams and things as I could to make the most of the opportunity, and it has taught me more than anything else while I was in college. Here is my take on the best practices that can be followed to make your festival a massive success. But, why do we even organize the festival? Before we start talking about the ‘how’, it’s important to understand the ‘why’. If you think of it, there are just 2 kinds of people for whom the festival is being organized – A. Team– Yes, the biggest reason for organizing a festival is ‘you’. The primary purpose of any college festival is to give their own students an exposure to the outside world and help you learn a wide variety of skills while you are still in college. No matter what artists or footfall you get, if you fail at providing a kickass learning experience to your own team, you have already failed. Make sure you push your team beyond their limits, amidst all the rush and drama. B. People– A much smaller reason for organizing the festival is your audience. Your footfall. Your followers. Your participants. Making sure that they get a top-notch experience during your festival should be the second most important thing after the team. Customer satisfaction and happiness are what drives any organization in the long run. Every single person that walks out of your fest should be telling every single friend of theirs as to how awesome their experience and your management were. 1.     Make things a bit formal— one thing unique about college festivals is that there is a fresh team every year. It can either take the festival to new heights or completely fuck it up. It is hence important to make things more process-dependent than people-dependent. Amidst all the worst things, you need to make sure that you are constantly making long-term processes for everything so that the important things always get the attention they deserve. For example, (informally) telling one of your juniors to think about some social initiative for the festival might not work as efficiently as forming a dedicated team/group for social initiatives. Similarly, defining monthly targets, writing down your organizations’ values, making cheat-sheets for different things, having some office hours per month and organizing scheduled meetings with a meaningful agenda can all go a long way in giving a direction to your team’s hard work. A senior once told me, ‘If there existed a parallel world where the same team would be conducting the festival for 10 years straight, we would be witnessing a way better festival right now.’ Making things formal and documenting stuff is the only way you can decrease this knowledge gap, and make things easier for future teams. Try to keep the organization as transparent as you can, to build a great team culture. More importantly, learn from the mistakes of your previous teams — you won’t have enough time to make them all yourself. 2.     Think from Zero— one of the most difficult things for any team to do is to refrain from blindly following the previous teams’ work and thinking from scratch. Organizing another boring festival that is only marginally different from your previous edition is of no use. You have to be bold enough to try new things and discard the previous unsuccessful ones. I have personally witnessed so many good ideas/events not being implemented only and only because they are new and the team (thinks that) they don’t have the bandwidth for it since most of their time is sucked in focusing on multiple bad ideas/events being blindly followed year after year. Have a review meeting at the end of every festival, where you analyze the success and failures, and accordingly scrap a few things, restructure the team and define fresh goals. Stop taking things too seriously. You have to unlock new and amazing events and initiatives, and set an example for every other college festival team in the country. Quality beats quantity, any day. Try to avoid getting into the trap of — more events, more participants, ‘more’ of everything. If you’re focusing on ‘quality’, you’ll be able to scale more efficiently with time, without compromising on customer experience. Get the small things right. And the only way to get small things right is to plan more. There’s nothing heroic in doing everything at the last minute. 3.     Make room for your ‘round pegs’ — there are always these ‘few’ people on your team who like to put an extra effort and do amazing things. They are ones who not just complain, but also ‘change’ things. They try to make sure that every small thing is implemented in the best way possible. Often, this 10 % of the people are the ones who make happen 90% of the festival. And hence, a big performance metric for any festival should be — how many roadblocks can you remove for these round pegs so that they can do outstanding things. Most people learn it the hard way, but the culture and productivity (and not ‘size’) of your team play a huge role in governing your success. Try to keep the team as small and amazing as possible, since those ‘extra’ people bring more damage than you think and can bring down your entire team culture. Form a separate ‘coordinators’ team in the last month of the festival for all the extra burden that you think you’re going to have, rather than making these people a part of your main team. ‘Idealism is the starting point to greatness.’ 4.    Don’t fuck with your inter-team coordination — there’s no point talking about what an amazing job your team did if the overall festival was a failure. If you are the guy who is making a registration portal/app, why not talk to the marketing guy and put a few sponsor logos/coupons/games on it? Or why not talk to the PR guy, and put in a system where they can send updates/mailers to the participants? Similarly, if you are the guy who is responsible for events, why not talk to the marketing team about the possibility of sponsor specific events? Try to avoid these ‘gaps’ between multiple teams, so that you can do things better, and make everybody win. So basically, whenever you are doing something for the festival, ask yourself the question — how can other teams benefit the most from this? Another hack is to form small alliances between teams for specific things so that they can work with each other more closely. For example, you can have a dedicated ‘customer experience’ team that comprises one each of a PR, events, design & marketing guy so that they can draw out the entire customer journey during the festival, and work towards making it better. Same goes for having an ‘artist happiness’ team or a ‘social initiative’ team. 5.     Use your resources wisely — it’s often easier to get ‘resources’ from sponsors than get hard cash, but that requires thinking from your side. Try to be more and more innovative, when it comes to spending your resources. Always keep in mind that money is not the only resource that you are playing with. If you are getting a known Bollywood singer for your pro-niter, why not organize a competition where the winner gets to meet him on stage? Or another online competition where the winner gets signed festival-merchandise from him? A lot of times, we underestimate these ‘indirect incentives’ that we can give to our audiences and participants and keep complaining about the shortage of cash that we have. For example, having a partnership with a cultural institute to give internships to your winners might be much more valuable to them than some petty cash. Or how about getting your ‘famous’ title sponsor to post about the winner of your flagship competition on Facebook so that they can get some recognition among those laces of social media followers and grow as an artist? But wait. Do you remember the first point in this article about ‘making processes’? So why not make a dedicated team for ‘Incentive Management’ that is responsible for coming up (and implementing) all these ideas? 6.    Learn More, Teach More — Most important of all — amidst all the chaos, all the noise, do not forget to grow not just yours, but your team’s skills. Have dedicated ‘teaching’ sessions in place so that people who are good at something can share their secrets with more people. That one guy who writes kickass mails can help 50 more people write better emails. That one guy who is a great negotiator can let others know how he does it so that they can close more deals. That one guy who always comes with new innovative ideas can motivate a full room of people to come with more. Your team is the reason that you are working on this festival, and everybody should be provided a platform to learn diverse skills that they can benefit from. Every person has a different reason for joining the team, and if you are one of the heads — make sure that you know this ‘reason’ for every member that you include in your team so that you can make sure they are able to grow in that direction. Another great way to increase knowledge is to talk to more and more alumni and professionals outside college so that they can tell you better about what all things the team could learn in order to benefit more in the future. 7.     Under Promise, Over Deliver — Last but not the least, this is the underlying rule for customer happiness in any organization. Apply this to your participants, your team and your audience. Whenever you promise them something, try to give them a little bit more. The prize for winning the fashion event might be only a few thousand bucks, but if you can ask the judge to upload a selfie with the winner, it might help the winner get a few shows somewhere. The sponsor might have asked only for his banners to be put on the stage, but if you can have a short reference to them in the funny viral video that you are making, they might get happier. The audience coming from a different city might have only asked for accommodation, but why not give them a one-page brochure about the places that they can visit on your campus or city? When you thoroughly screw up, why not send across a hand-written sorry card to your participant, with the fest and sponsor logo at the back? Or better than all — Remember the first point? Why not make a small ‘customer happiness’ team from within your team that can come up with, and implement these ideas in the festival?

[mybrightonuk]

Best of Brighton’s Clubbing – April 2017

KLAX ON CHROME Designs

This loud nearby group (above) have created a significant quantity of business elegance lately, and today Klax are tossing an additional exclusive party. Wearing some pet outfits that are marvelous, these three rainforest characters are becoming prepared to tear the dancefloor up alongside MC Skydro buddies Damage and Redders. There can be some pet hides to seize to increase the chrome concept.

A number of Brighton’s graffiti painters that are many gifted will even carrying out a place of art that is unplanned. Clubbers may have the opportunity to get a-one-of-a-kind fabric that’ll possibly be worth thousands on eBay. This is actually soirée’s kind that’ll move into tale. Only having a capture that is greater sound.

PABLO DI$COBAR PRESENT: CIRCUS CARNAGE MONO

A vast group of media designers and producers, Pablo Di reveal worldwide defeats having a company foundation of contemporary event tradition and a love for exotic rhythms. Carnage is a visible encounter through media. Combining looks that are classic with manufacturing that is contemporary, anticipate a musical trip from Nigerian and psychedelic Chicha acidity party to Blakan Beats and Colombian and Asian Cumbia.

They’re building really a Brighton-centered line up that’ll create everybody including twerk and move OT4KU Dub MEL!!, Males and Evad acting Jihadly, by Anything Cool with decoration. It’ll encourage one don exotic berry head-dresses to get on your hands and bust out the Traditional shirts – anything-goes this time around!

SMILE Thurs 13 May Tacky Mike’s Frog Club

Let it was about the evenings, only in the past everyone wasn’t early, they undoubtedly weren’t being excellent also us let you know about the great old times. Round the change of the century, Smile offered a choon- heavy diet of techno difficult home, and exemplary people. Today this subterranean celebration that is great is back following a prolonged break to shower-you with whirlpool that is lively -large Easter goodness along with a monitor that is traditional .

Maintaining it hyped are Cec, Wort Krunchie and Laylah, having a small Easter – egg search along with a few shocks to help ease you in to the enjoyment. Throw-in a complete four times along with some tuneage to recuperate, and you’ve got the entire year totally sorted’s best weekend.

DJ SEINFELD Designs

Maritime Parade’s best location retains on pushing on the ‘quality’ switch, starting another period of forward – acts – this time around getting a visit DJ Seinfeld, from Remedial home maker. Having a large focus on emotive feelings in the place of navel-looking trainspotting, any floor is rocked by him. Therefore, make that exhausted body to get a battery of lively and psychological dance-music

Resolutely lofi, but saturated in integrity and pleasure, Seinfeld is among the many encouraging DJ/suppliers in Europe at this time. From move-yer- quality home audio to spirit-raising bangers that are sincere, this is someone to remember. Rounding this huge line up are Pépe Donga and Gardenn with Barney Whittaker, Caldera and Bill Wiffen.

RE-LIKED MONO

Haji provides an entire fresh nights heavy and disco lines. Well-known for amp & party; disco-impressed a sponsor of legendary brands along with home reductions on his Large Love mark, during the last 2 yrs Haji has launched a number of Re- a collection recording along with EPs on Love. Today the Re-Liked audio brains towards the town seafront, with a few aid from other Brightonian modify king Fingerman (above). Recognized for his Warm Numbers tag that was extremely reputable, their own shows have affected a few of the home scene’s greatest people. Experiencing a niche is on the market due to their love of disco, both of these enthusiasts have joined up-to sponsor an entire evening focused on the style – completely Re-Liked for dancefloor!

CHARLOTTE CHURCH’S NIGHT TIME PLACE DUNGEON Concorde 2

Speech of the navvy of an angel language. We now have the gags that are inexpensive let’s explain that Ms Chapel is among the best individuals to actually grace the charts. Whether she’s providing proof in loud ignoramuses being challenged by the Leveson query or weathering Facebook shit-storms, our cash is definitely on her behalf in the future through glowing.

But nobody dares issue her as it pertains towards the insane planet of pop.Now her Night Time Place Dungeon idea sheets into city, as she and her five-item extremely-metronomic post punk disco-R&W support group undertake a few of the best songs that point neglected. Bring these dance shoes if you’re courageous enough to enter her world.

BERLIN Natural Door Shop

Continuing their selection of amazing events, because they vacation through the German underground Berlin go back to GDS by having an absolute stormer. Producing around the trip is Swiss- techno – a normal fitting in Zurich greatest groups, Kellerkind. He provides a flawless and strong design laced together with his soulful shows.

Joining him is Berlin-centered Transmissions presenter Schmitz Otranto and audio traveler with exceptional swathes of home techno and electro. Finishing the line up are Codesouth and Brap FM sponsor (and twice champion of Brighton DJ of the Entire Year) Woman Lola, who’ll be heading B2B with other Codesouth sponsor and Berlin citizen POoK. You realize this really is likely to rock…

ANJUNADEEP Concorde 2

Started in 2005 amp by Above &; Grant and Past, a store was supplied by Anjunadeep to get a much more and further modern end-of this DJ models that were trio’s. Since that time they’ve become among the dance-music world’s brands that are respected. Released graph-sugar compilations by a few of the designers that were scene’s greatest.

Previously 12 weeks, the events took their unique make of soulful and electronic-music from The United States to Moscow Tokyo Amsterdam and Mexico. Today six towns thrills with a few of a fresh encounter or along with their greatest titles –. Striking Brighton are Street 8, Luttrell, Solution West (Stay) and Yotto. To not be-missed!

FREE-RANGE X WAH PRESENT: P-Money / Kahn & Neek / Mister Spyro The Posture

Landing within the town Freerange Brighton, once more are working out another huge celebration. Not just maybe there is bass bangers from the barrow-fill, this occasion likewise remembers the launch of G Money’s (above) Live And Immediate recording. Their introduction long playing work, it completely display the broad and charged-up range of designs he holds – including dubstep storage and dirt beats.

G Money’s amusing words, world-class interpersonal aware hits up the location each time and circulation. Bringing a few of the muck greatest bassline and British storage around are amp Kahn &; Mister Spyro Neek and Charris Spyers. Do we’ve your interest today?

FAT POPPADADDYS Each Mon The Worry

DONUTS Each Tues Green Door Shop

DRIVEWAY FRIDAYS Each Fri Shooshh

BOSSY Natural Door Shop

HOLLABACK WOMEN The Worry

GARDENN Komedia

PROLONGED & amp PRESENT. GARETH EMERY Concorde 2

SPELLBOUND Komedia

BERLIN & DPM FREE BEACH CELEBRATION The Watch

BERLIN & SELADOR DOCUMENTS BMC CELEBRATION Thurs 27 May MONO

KING BEY: BEYONCÉ CELEBRATION Komedia

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