#i sent the post to my friend who met [redacted] once when she was here for my birthday last year

[lavender-femme]

not the same person it’s a 21 year old

thank you for letting me know that’s honestly such a big relief

[o-anon-o]

Home

Diaval x Reader (Maleficent’s daughter)

Summary: Inspired by what Aurora has done, reader volunteers to venture to a nearby kingdom to make peace between more humans and the Moors. Though she is welcomed as a guest, she’s been gone for quite some time and has begun to miss the comforts of home. That is, until a certain raven shows up missing her just as much. 

A/N: Yo. Might do some more of these “shorts” Idk. I rewatched both Maleficent movies and realized there isn't enough Diaval out there. I wanna write these little fics for funnzies on the side. I might be into it. If you’re into it  *shrugs* lmk. Don’t forget to smash that like button and ring that bell to turn notifications on. 

Words: 3,191

It had been hours since curfew had passed. The entire castle had fallen silent under the dark blanket of night. Everyone was undoubtedly asleep, everyone but you. You found this to be your regular nightly routine. You found it incredibly hard to fall asleep in a castle this large, how the nobles did it each night baffled you. 

Two moons had surely passed since you last saw the rivers of the Moors. Though you missed it, you knew that what you were doing was right. If others were willing to sacrifice their comfort for peace, you must do the same. You had always seen the world a different way than your mother. Where she saw greed and weakness, you saw beauty, wonder and hope. Hope that one day there might be peace between humans and the magical creatures of the Moors. So that one day they would be able to travel passed their boarders and venture beyond what little they knew. When you closed your eyes you imagined the pixies and other creatures laughing and singing among human folk, in peace. 

Aurora was the one who pushed you to do this. Though she was ten years younger than you, she still shared the same dream you did. After marrying Prince Philip she had created that peace you dreamed of for so long. The Moors and humans were united by their marriage. It was peace, but only a small sliver of what could be. That’s why you decided to venture West to meet with other Kings and Queens to create peace treaties. People were scared of the unknown. That’s why you thought presenting yourself, a fairy, was a good idea. Once they met you and learned about your home, they would be more open to coexisting.

Your mother was against it. 

Aurora was on your side. 

Diaval... He offered to accompany you. You denied it, however. He was needed in the Moors to help protect the creatures and to keep an eye on your mother. 

At the thought of him, your hand mindlessly traveled down to your wrist where a small woven bracelet laid. He had given it to you the night before you left. You were sure it was intended as a simple parting gift, to remind you of home whenever you looked at it. You couldn’t help but feel a small tug at your heart at the thought of home. You closed your eyes at the memory of the way that the air smelt in the early morning. The lily petals blowing in the autumn breeze. 

Home. 

Your eyes opened, you were standing in front of the vanity in the dim, candlelit room. There was no smile on your face, you could see that as you examined yourself in the mirror. Reaching for the brush on the table, you absentmindedly combed through your hair. Surely you would be able to return home soon. The King had welcomed you as a guest. As far as you could tell, there was no ill intent. In fact, these humans reminded you a lot of Prince Philip’s father. Open-minded and willing to listen. You knew you may not get that lucky with other kingdoms. 

You saw your hair blow from the breeze that was trickling in from the open window across the room. Feeling the hairs on the back of your neck start to rise, you walked towards the window, reaching for the shutters, but something in the corner of your eye caught your attention. To your left, perched on one of the carved out statues next to the window was a familiar black raven you hadn’t seen in what felt like forever. 

With a small smile, you raised your finger out, inviting it to lay on your hand. The raven didn’t hesitate, in fact it had all ready jumped onto your finger when you had just held it out. Leaving the window open, you leaned against its frame facing the inside of your room. The raven jumped up into the air, while you had waved your other hand out lightly, emitting gold magic from your hand as you saw him transform into the man you had missed most of all. 

“Thank you for that.” Diaval shook his head, straightening out his attire. The feathers on his jacket shook slightly, a few falling to the ground as you nodded, staring at the man. 

He took a moment to look around the room. The castle’s stone walls had elegant carvings on the trim of the walls. The bed was immaculate, gold lining the posts on each end. There was even gold on the windowsill. It was nice, a warm beautifully decorated guest room, the only thing that didn’t seem to belong in the room was them. 

“well this is nice...” He looked back at her finally. 

“I’ve slept in worse places that’s for sure.” You felt a smile creep onto your face upon hearing his familiar voice. 

“Indeed.” He mimicked your smile, walking towards the large wardrobe on the other end of the room and running his hands over the gold lining.

“Were you spying on me?” You asked, a mischievous glint in your eye. 

“I beg your pardon?” He asked. His attention landed back on you. 

“Just then, outside. Why didn’t you make yourself known?” You nodded towards the window. “Are you here to report back to my mother?” You asked, pushing yourself off of the wall and standing up straight, crossing your arms. It had been so long since you had seen anyone. You were sure Maleficent would have sent Diaval sooner, or even sent you a letter asking you to report back. Nevertheless, he was welcomed here, and always would be. 

Diaval shook his head. “No she has no idea I’m here.” You were taken aback when he said that. It wasn’t like him to keep things from her. He was loyal to her, that much was clear. 

“Then why are you here?” You asked, stepping closer. You could see Diaval swallow nervously. His smile had dissipated, once you had stepped closer. After a moment of silence you let out a shaky breath. “Has something happened?” You asked. 

“Nothing’s happened. Mistress misses you, she hasn’t said it but she grows impatient for you to come home.” Diaval spoke clearly. “I thought I would come by to see how they were treating you to give her some semblance of peace.” 

“Right.” After his comment about Maleficent not knowing he was here, you had hoped he came for a more personal reason. “I'm quite fine. They’ve treated me very well.” You said matter-of-factly, hand on your hip. Diaval scanned your face, and then his eyebrows rose when he saw what you were wearing. 

“I can see that now. They have you fitted like a proper lady. Fitting, I think. You’ve always been royalty. It’s about time you started dressing like it, m’lady.” He teased. A small blush crept onto your cheeks once you had locked eyes with him after he had looked you up and down. It had been too long since you’ve bantered with this man. You had to admit you were caught off guard by that comment. 

Rightfully, the Moors should have been given to you instead of Aurora. It was Maleficent’s intention to have you rule as her successor, however you had thought it was a good idea to have Aurora rule. At the time there was no better way to unite the humans and the magical creatures than to have a human step in and care for them. With a bit of convincing, Maleficent agreed. Uniting both kingdoms proved to be a more substantial change though.

Ruling was never something that interested you. You’d much rather spend your time with matters of peace keeping and be left as a free spirit. Your attire... that was a whole different story. As your mother wore gowns that drifted past her wings, you preferred to wear things you could actually fly around in. That meant no long dresses, no laces or bows that would drag behind you in the wind. 

“If this is how a lady should be properly dressed, then I don’t think I can consider myself a lady.” You rose a brow, making him chuckle. 

Diaval’s gaze trailed down to your side, finally resting on your wrist. He delicately reached down and held your hand out.

“At least you haven’t forgotten where you come from...”

Your eyes followed his. They had wandered down to your wrist where the bracelet he had given you was laying. 

Before he could land a kiss on the back of your hand, you cleared your throat, redacted your hand and walked past him back to the vanity. You faced the mirror and began to remove the earrings that you had on. Tonight you were dressed more proper than you could ever remember being dressed before. You had a meeting with the king to discuss the future of your kingdoms, you were required to look your best to represent the entirety of the Moors. It was an uncomfortable evening, probably for you alone. Everyone else you faced tonight seemed to be in their element, besides you. The memory hit you like a train as you detangled the earring from your hair and placed it on the jewelry tray in front of you. You felt ridiculous. 

“This ridiculous thing is impossible to breathe in.” You mumbled to yourself. You caught Diaval’s eye staring at you from the mirror. “What?” You asked coarsely. 

“You look beautiful nonetheless.” He said upmost sincerely. You remained frozen for what felt like hours, but was for just a few seconds before you had the courage to look away from him. 

Beautiful. You couldn’t recall a time when he had called you that. He was a dear friend. While you grew up spying on Aurora, you and he had become close without a doubt. He was your best friend, your confidant and it took every power within you to deny his presence with you when he had asked to accompany you. Truthfully, you wanted to allow him to come. But that would be selfish. You knew he was needed there. No matter how badly you wanted him to stay, you knew that he couldn’t stay. 

You glanced at him with a brow raised through the mirror. You didn’t realize that your eyes had become glassy until you saw them through the mirror. “Is that the only reason you came here?” 

Diaval walked towards you with an uncertain look in his eyes. He seemed distracted, or perhaps deep in thought. You asked because you initially knew something was going on with him since he flew into your room. You watched him intently as you dropped the second earring into the tray. 

Another soft silence fell between the two of you. This one felt long and slightly uncomfortable. Like there were a million words lingering in the air that needed saying, yet neither of you had spoken them. Not until he was behind you, warmly emitting a familiar heat you had missed so dearly. 

Your breath hitched when you felt his hand delicately trail up the sides of your arms, over your shoulders and finally stop behind your neck where you could feel him work at the necklace clasped behind your neck, assisting you with removing the shiny piece of jewelry you detested having to wear all evening. 

Truth be told, Diaval didn’t even realize he was flying in the direction of the castle until he had all but reached the destination. 

Two moons. 

He had counted. 

He wondered how many more would have to pass until you were able to come home. He had missed how things used to be. The witty banter the two of you shared on a daily basis, the way both of you would worry over Aurora, the times shared convincing Maleficent that Philip was right for her. But the moments he missed most was when you would fly over the headwinds and race each other to the forest’s edge. At the thought of how peaceful you once looked back then, he couldn’t help but softly smile at you through the mirror. 

He remembered one particular moment you two shared while Philip was courting Aurora. The forest creatures had come together to make a beautiful song for the two as they had danced under the moonlight. The sparkling pixies glittered around them as they shared the moment together. He was watching it from afar next to you. That’s when things had changed for him. He knew that same love that Philip felt for Aurora was the love he felt for you. Though he had no inclination on how to act on it, he knew it was there.

With that thought lingering in his mind for almost a year, he had to admit he had felt a sting when you had so quickly declined his offer to accompany you on your journey. At first he hadn’t understood why, but it soon grew increasingly clear when his duties in the Moors picked up with your departure. He was thankful, really. It had kept his mind occupied throughout the day. Instead of worrying about you, he had helped his mistress keep things running smoothly. 

“I miss you as well.” He said it so softly you almost missed it. It dawned on you that in all the time you had known him, you hadn’t been separated for this long. Part of you felt ashamed for not seeing how this separation may be affecting him. The other part of you was excited that he had missed you just as much as you had missed him. 

You turned around, looking him uncertainly in the eye. His eyes were black, the blackest black one could imagine. Yet they always held deep emotion. There he was standing directly in front of you. The man you had missed most from home. You hadn’t realized when it happened, but your feelings towards him had changed exponentially. It was further increasing the longer you were away from home. His eyes never left yours, you could feel his breath on your face as you both stood frozen in the moment.   

“Do you?” You muster up the courage to say, seemingly trying to continue the banter. It was weak. Your voice was coarse from the way your heart was almost beating out of your chest. By the look on his face, he could tell you were at a loss for words. The rose hue on your cheeks was visible even in the dimly lit room. 

“The Moors aren’t the same without you flying overtop them each morning. The sun isn’t as warm. The water isn’t as serene and the stars aren't as bright. I miss you like a desert misses rain.” He spoke just as softly as he did a moment ago. His hands gripped the vanity on either side of you, fighting the urge to hold you in his arms and finally reach out and hold you. He had waited too long to see you. He thought he could make it until your return, but he had never been more wrong. Worried he may lose his chance, he needed to see you. 

“I know that I’m just a raven, not even really a man but--” 

You couldn’t take it any longer. He had drawn you in a long time ago. You placed your hands on either side of his face delicately, moving your soft lips against his. The instant you did, it felt like a dam had broken inside of him and he had finally wrapped his hands around your delicate body, pulling you in as close as he could. Kissing you as if he was about to wake up from a dream, he wasted no time. The time you had spent apart was far too much anyway. You had to make it up somehow. 

You pulled back for a moment, searching his dark eyes for any sense of hesitation or regret. There was none there that you could see. 

“I missed you too.” You spoke without another second to waste. 

With a new-found boost of courage, he plunged forward and captured your lips in another kiss. This one he was more prepared for. You felt your arms trail down to his lapels, pulling him closer to you, not allowing him to stop. It’s not as if you would need to tell him that. Unbeknownst to you, he had no intention to stop. Your mouths moved together in harmony as he held you tightly in his arms. The pace had quickened from your timid peck you had given him just a moment ago. The unfamiliar feeling of his lips against yours didn't frighten you. Instead, you were surprised with how natural tasting him felt. If anyone had seen the two of you together they would, without a doubt, imagine you had done this many times before. 

You had realized in this moment, he was your home. So long as he was nearby you felt at ease and safe, Moors or not. As he held you, you grew increasingly more electrified. Every finger graze that trailed passed a part of your skin was magnetic. It had your mind go foggy and your stomach do flips as he deepened the kiss, eliciting a soft moan from your mouth into his. 

“Diaval...” you had whispered his name once you had reluctantly pulled back, leaning your forehead against his. The sound of his name slipping past your lips that way was a sound he wanted to hear a million times over. Eagerly, he had placed soft chaste kiss on your lips once more before opening his eyes to look into yours. 

“What is it? Anything.” He spoke out of breath. 

With a soft smile you trailed your hands back up to his soft face, feeling him calm even more at your touch. “It’s late.” 

He blinked a couple of times before realizing that you were right. With a short nod he began to untangle himself from you. “Of course.” he cleared his throat.  

You had become confused. Without a second of hesitation you wound your hands around his neck to keep him in place. 

“I meant that as an invitation to stay here tonight. You flew all this way.” You assured him that you very much enjoyed his presence. Pulling him back into you, your lips hovered above his for a few moments, seemingly acting like a magnet as he followed them with his own. “Fly back tomorrow, stay tonight. Please.” 

With a request like that, how could he say no? For tonight, you wanted to act selfish. You wanted to think of yourself over what was expected of the two you. You wanted to revel in this happiness forever, but tonight would have to do for now. Tomorrow came with more diplomacy, more treaty talk and more of that without him by your side. You didn’t want to marvel in that at the moment. Right now you wanted nothing but him, tonight, right now. 

You hadn’t felt this at home in a long time. 

[cassandraclare]

I had hoped never to have to revisit this nightmare at all, but unfortunately the Washington Post linked to me this morning with some inaccurate information. Obviously my lawyers will seek a correction, but in the meantime people will be coming here to read this, so I’m updating it.

For those who may not have been paying attention, the author Sherrilyn Kenyon recently sued her husband, her husband’s assistant, and an IT specialist who worked for them both, for poisoning her. She states as well that they turned her fans against her, convincing them to write bad reviews of her books, and that her husband was responsible for her lawsuit against me.

This post isn’t about this current lawsuit, which is something I was surprised by, but know little about. We (me and my legal team) never heard anything from her husband during her lawsuit against me, and I didn’t even know his first name until this current lawsuit news. The current lawsuit alleges that he sent me several cease-and-desist letters. That did not happen. I have never met him or heard from him, just as I have never met or ever spoke to Sherrilyn Kenyon in my life, even during the lawsuit.

The Washington Post seems confused because here in this post, I described what happened with the copyright portion of the lawsuit Kenyon brought against me as dropped. It was dropped. The complaint (A legal “complaint” is a lawsuit) filed in February 2016 initially included many claims of copyright infringement (stealing story elements). Some of those along with my lawyer’s responses are reproduced below.

In May 31, 2016, Kenyon amended her lawsuit against me, removing all the accusations of copyright infringement. That would also be known as dropping those accusations. Here is what I said at the time:

So what’s the problem?

The problem is no one knows that the copyright infringement claims were dropped, and when I see it mentioned, it’s always stated as a fact that I’m being sued for plagiarism or copyright infringement. And I am not. This hasn’t been anything but a trademark lawsuit for a year and a half now. And this doesn’t just turn up in Internet gossip — it turned up in a poorly researched article in Forbes, for instance. This is an accusation I have to live with despite the claim having been withdrawn.

Given what is in the Washington Post, I would say this ongoing problem is going to continue to be ongoing.

As for the trademark part of the suit, that was settled in May, 2018. I had many misgivings about settling. I did not, and do not now, think that Ms. Kenyon’s trademark was ever infringed on and I certainly know I and my publisher were never part of a conspiracy to harm or defraud her. None of us were even familiar with her books.

I and my lawyers waited years for Kenyon to provide promised evidence that she had ever met me, or that my publisher, as she said, was in a conspiracy to defraud her of her trademark. None ever surfaced.

In the end, in these situations, you settle a lawsuit because being sued is hellish. Yes, it is expensive, but it is also grinding and miserable. Every day you are exposed to new shocks and new unpleasantness. There were many times I considered committing suicide because I was so deeply sunk into despair at the idea that someone I did not know and had never met was determined to destroy my life, and to somehow destroy or take from me all the work I had done for ten years — everything that mattered to me, everything I had worked on so hard. I never understood why. I still don’t. For years I barely slept, couldn't write Chain of Gold, spent nights shaking and vomiting and crying. had thought trial might give me some answers to what what happening, but I also knew it meant the case could drag on for yet more years. Together with my publisher, we settled with Kenyon, but only the trademark part of the suit. That was all that was left. The copyright part of the suit was indeed dropped in May, 2016. Had it not been I would never, ever have settled. Which is something I would have told you, Washington Post, had you needed clarification.

The rest of my original post is here:

I heard a rumor that Sherrilyn Kenyon is no longer suing you for plagiarism or copyright infringement or whatever. Is that true? Is the court case over? I keep thinking that if it was, it would have been covered more in news outlets. -[redacted]

Okay. Let’s walk through this.

Are you being sued for plagiarism?

I am not, no.

I heard Sherrilyn Kenyon accused you of copyright infringement/plagiarism?

She did initially, yes, but then she dropped those claims.

When did she drop them?

Almost two years ago. May 31, 2016.

Why did she drop the claims?

You’d have to ask her. I would guess it was because almost all of her specific claims referred to material in books she hadn’t published yet at the time my books were published. Claims about things happening to characters in books she published in 2010 that I supposedly ripped off in City of Bones in 2007. That kind of thing.

 In most cases copyright infringement is kind of muddy and the merit of the claims has to go before a judge to be decided, but there are a couple of exceptions to that. One of them is the question of “access” -- did the alleged infringer have access to the material they allegedly infringed: i.e. could they have read it/seen it/heard it? In this case, since I only move forward in time like everyone else, I didn’t have access to books published in 2009 or 2010 when I was writing City of Bones in 2005. That’s straightforward business with no complicated judgment call needed. So before anything had happened with this lawsuit in an actual court, Kenyon’s team withdrew the entire copyright claim in full, leaving only a complicated trademark complaint regarding the title of the TV show and the design of my covers.

That’s weird. 

I go into detail below. Read on! Keep in mind 2007 is a significant date here because all three of the first TMI books had been turned in to my publisher by then.

So, wait, if Kenyon dropped the copyright claim isn’t that the big deal thing? The plagiarism thing?

Yes, I’d like to think so. Trademark claims are about branding and packaging, which by and large isn’t even up to me as regards my books. (Publishers do that.) There’s nothing in this lawsuit anymore that even slightly refers to the contents of my books, and I care about my reputation for integrity as a writer far more than I care about my publisher’s branding strategy.

That said, it is of course horrible to be sued — it is a horrendous process that upends your entire life; it is destructive to your work, your family, your finances, your friends, and your sanity. 

Have you read Kenyon’s books or met her?

I have never read any of her books. I have never met her or communicated directly with her in any way. 

Why didn’t I hear about this?

Because of the way the copyright claim was withdrawn. Let me walk you through this.

When Kenyon filed her initial complaint/suit, it included an “Exhibit” that broke down a long list of elements, characters, and ideas in her books that she claimed had been copied in my books, and what material from my books was supposedly “the same” as her material.

(First of all, let me point out that while this document was riddled with inaccuracies and errors, it never, at any point, claimed that any direct text from Kenyon’s books was copied into my own. Kenyon has never claimed that — to do so would require providing examples of the plagiarism, and there are none. Whereas claiming copyright infringement is much muddier. The claim merely requires that you feel you have been copied. For instance, a woman once sued Stephen King claiming he had broken into her house and stolen her diaries so he could base a character on her. Her evidence was that she felt that that was true, and nothing prevented her from filing that suit. Anyway, though many people are confused between the two, the Kenyon complaint did not levy an accusation of “plagiarism” — she claimed “copyright infringement” because plagiarism refers to the copying of exact passages of words and nothing else. A claim of plagiarism requires proof to file a suit; a claim of copyright infringement requires proof to win��a suit but not to file it. They are not the same.)

The initial complaint was a shock to me, since I’d never read any of her books (and still haven’t), and have no familiarity with their characters or world or anything about them. Upon reading the complaint, however, I noted that a number of claims about what happened in my own books were inaccurate. For instance, the exhibit claimed that  Valentine was a demon, that Amatis was a shape-shifter who was in trouble for breaking “shape-shifter code”, that the Shadowhunters were a highly technological society (while true in the TV show, in the books, the Shadowhunters are specifically anti-technology), that Isabelle’s eyes were hazel. And so on. Because of this, my legal team started early in going through, in detail, the claims in Kenyon’s document. 

What we found was stunning — that (a) the claims in Kenyon’s filed exhibit were often totally inaccurate as to the contents of my book/s. Her claims are on the left, rebuttals are on the right.

Claims regarding Clary:

(b) quite a lot of the plaintiff’s claims suggested that she had invented common and ancient storytelling tropes, e.g. “A sword having a name,” and stated that those tropes’ presence in my books could only have come from her books and not, say, the entire literary and folkloric tradition of tropes that all authors draw on:

and, most importantly, C) a huge number of her claims were impossible due to the chronology of publication — that is, when she was comparing material in our books, her material had been published *after* my material. Copying does not work that way, since time does not work that way.

So my legal team wrote all of that up — a point-by-point, line-by-line refutation of Kenyon’s claims, and filed it as our own exhibit. You can read it right here. If you’d rather hit up twitter, you can see some of it here.

In response, Kenyon filed what is called an Amended Complaint.

The court allows her side to take on board anything from our response and, if necessary, file a new version of the lawsuit making changes based on anything they’ve learned.

And in the Amended Complaint, the whole copyright claim just…disappeared.

Like, gone. Not there at all.

What was left?

Trademark issues. They are more specifically about what the covers of my books are allowed to look like, branding strategies, and the title of the television show. I cannot go into the details of this, or why it would come up suddenly thirteen years after my first Shadowhunters book was published, because that is part of an ongoing case, and one cannot comment on ongoing cases. The copyright thing however is not ongoing. Again, it was dropped in May, 2016.

If Kenyon won her case would the TV show be cancelled?

Yes. There would also be no more books. They would be cancelled as well, internationally. There would be no more Shadowhunters anything: merch, books, show, whatever. However since the remainder of the case was settled before the TV show was cancelled, the lawsuit had nothing to do with the cancellation. I have seen that suggested and it is ridiculous. Freeform/Disney and I had our differences but they were never anything but supportive of me as far as the lawsuit was concerned nor did it factor in any way into the decision to cancel the show, as it was already over by then.

Interesting.

Well, we’ve all learned something today. Primarily, we have learned that I am not being sued for copyright infringement or plagiarism or anything like it, and also that people are really interested in negative gossip and controversy, but not particularly interested in exoneration. I cannot tell you how much it sucks to be accused of something awful that you did not do, in public (however used to it you may be); I cannot express how humiliating and horrible it is, or how depressing it is to realize that basically nobody cares if it isn’t true. (Thank you, Washington Post.) Many, many news outlets reported on Kenyon suing me; only one that reported on the original claim reported that she had dropped the copyright claims.

I have done my best here to provide 100% factual information for anyone who was confused or believed false reports about this situation. I am under no illusions that this will prevent people from saying I am being sued for plagiarism, because it gives them pleasure to be cruel. I can only hope that for those people who are actually interested in what is true, this will serve as a useful link.

[trulycertain]

Random Acts

He could live with the nightmares, but he's out of cigarettes. In which Jensen has a bad day, and learns that he's not as subtle as he thought.

(I just realised that I’d posted this on AO3 but not over here. Anyhow: this seemed like a logical extension of all the scrapes and side quests you can get into trying to help people, the melodramatic tech-as-divine imagery and how damn uncanny augs must seem to most NPCs. Gen, 1.4k.)

Most days are better. This isn't one of them. 

He blames having too much time on his hands: a week off, now the fallout from the London mess has settled down. Miller said it like it was relaxing, rather than enough time for his brain to dig up old wounds. He muttered something about how stop moving and you can drown, and got a weary retort. You're not a shark, Jensen. Even you're human, Jensen. You never relaxed in your goddamn life, Jensen? Sounded something like that. Probably more formal. He was running on a couple days without sleep at the time, so he let himself get shoved out of the office.

The first couple days, he managed not to think too much, aside from a scrap with some Dvali. Even caught a game while looking over the reports he wasn't supposed to be editing. He messaged Malik, and she asked pointedly if she'd ever get to see Prague. He's had worse weekends. The third day, he wakes up from dreams of dark water and scalpels. He tries to get his head together and breathe, half-expecting to see his old place, to hear Megan working on something in the next room. It takes a second to hit him. He scrapes his hands down his face and feels sick when he sees black metal instead of skin. He hasn't had a day like this in a while. Can't say he's missed it.

Turns out showering is pretty hard when you're trying not to look at the butchered mess of machinery that used to be your body, but he gets through it. He skips breakfast, even though the augs won't thank him later. The Sentinel would stop it coming back up, probably, but it isn't worth it for how off it'd feel. He closes his eyes, inhales. He'd call it steeling himself, but all that comes to mind is some crack Pritchard made. Here I thought you were mostly titanium and fibres, Jensen. He opens them and tries not to look down too often, shoving a cigarette into the corner of his mouth - and pausing. He checks the packet. He even shakes it a little, in the hope his luck has somehow improved in the past five minutes.

Shit. Empty.

He puts it aside with a sigh. He only stops to get dressed, put his last cigarette in his mouth and light it before he shuts the door behind him, listening to the triple security system engage. Then he heads out to find the kiosk down near the station that doesn't keep hiking up their prices for "the weird American aug, not like he can read the labels anyway." Once he gets onto the main streets, the noise of the crowds almost drowns out the noise in his head. But that fades once he gets close to the side alleys near the shopping district, and he focuses on the nicotine instead. Leans on a wall next to some multi-tool place, slips into the shadows where no-one's likely to bother to bother the clank, and takes a decent drag. Wonders about trying to get a hold of Alex, even though the Collective's more of a "we'll call you" operation. "You don't understand. He moved like lightning." He recognises that voice, though he can't put his finger on where from. It's coming from round the corner, and he considers looking before figuring it's none of his business and giving a mental shrug. He's done enough invading other people's privacy, one way or another. He tries to shut it out. She's speaking Czech, anyway. He could always shut off the CASIE translator, but he'll need it to haggle in a few minutes, and he's gotten good at not listening over the years. "And there was lightning - I think it was his augmentations - " Another voice, female. Scoffing. Disgusted. "Some clank saved you?" Her voice is low. "Don't use that word. It makes you sound like a bigot." She sighs. "Without him, things would have been much worse. He sent the ones that weren't on the ground running." Wait, that was - He knows exactly who they're talking about. Yeah, now he remembers. The owner of one of the tech stores. She was opening up early in the morning, and some Dvali thugs had been hassling her on her doorstep, offering "protection." He'd really did try to keep walking, but he's never been good at walking past rather than walking into. Call it a cop thing. "Then what was he?" her friend asks. "You won't listen." "Try me." "He was... It was like he didn't even have to think. I've never seen anything like it. Anyone. He was beautiful, Marta." He shuts his eyes. He's pretty sure he shouldn't be hearing this. He exhales smoke near-silently, tries to make himself move. "What, so he was a handsome clank?" "Yes - no - yes. But that's not what I..." "You're some kind of aug fetishist now?" "It wasn't the augs... They weren't... He was kind. And his eyes... It was like he understood." For a second, he has to wonder when he took the shields down - then he remembers. She was still shaking. She flinched away from him, and he backed up, tried to show her he wasn't going to hurt her. He asked her in halting, mangled Czech if she was all right, if the Dvali were usually a problem. Probably came out more like Thugs shop often? The translation mods are good for some things, but not for that. He figured she'd get the idea. The Dvali owned half the neighbourhood. No, she said, that's a recent thing. She smiled, still hesitating, and finally met his eyes. You know, you can speak English. I studied in London. He took the out. The accent give it away? That, and you're dressed like an American TV show. He looked down at himself, a little self-consciously.

Do you think they will come back?

He looked back over his shoulder. It'd be better if they didn't. "I don't remember you being a fool for a pretty face." Her voice was flat. "He sat in the front for nearly an hour with me, just to make sure they wouldn't come back." Well, it was his day off. Not like he had a prior engagement. My name is Jana, she said eventually, after offering him tea. He refused, told her she'd done more than enough. You have a name? Jensen. Is that a first name, or last? Last. Day off, he reminded himself. The first's Adam. Thank you for keeping me in business, Mr. Jensen.

He nodded awkwardly, recalling the labels he'd read on the way in. You're the only place within five blocks that doesn't overcharge.

Mm. She looked at him, amused. So really, you were doing this for better supplies. Nothing to do with the goodness of your heart.

He inclined his head, letting that be an answer.

What brought an American to Prague?

He considered his answer, knowing most of it was redacted and red tape. Work, mainly. He looked down and realised that a plate had appeared on the table next to him. It had some kind of shortbread on it. He glanced back up.

Are you police?

I... Not anymore. Not for a long time. Just bad at keeping out of trouble.

I thought you couldn't be. At his questioning look, she said, Too nice. She laughed at the look on his face, and there wasn't fear in it. "Did they come back?" "No. And the crowds came in, after that. Enough people to make the Dvali hesitate." "You got crowds with some aug glaring at them?" "He was... quiet. Not glaring. I didn't even see him leave. But he probably saved my life. Or at least my store. I'd only seen the domestic augmentations, the construction augs. I'd never realized - the ARC posters." "The yellow ones at the station?" "Those. There's a reason they paint augs like angels."

He stares at the opposite wall, unblinking. Drops the cigarette stub and crushes it underfoot, and pauses. He looks down at his fingers, considering the glint and shine of sunlight on metal. He's pretty sure taking the shortbread on the way out was proof of humanity. "And that's not overdramatic at all," her friend says, with a laugh.

"I know, I know. But I can't help thinking it."

"I always knew you liked shiny things, but this is a whole new low. Come on. I'm making you tea."

He steps out of the alley and keeps walking. Coffee. Maybe coffee'll help him wake up, after the kiosk. He keeps walking, and in the sunlight, he blinks away the last of the nightmares.

[airbnbfestivals]

Has anybody had any problems with AirBnB customer service not taking problems seriously?

Hi, Reddit. It's my first time posting here and I could really use some help with a situation I found myself in a bit of a sticky situation that hasn't really gone anywhere and I don't know what to do with AirBnB customer service. The post is a bit lengthy but I sent a full breakdown to my friends so I will post that here so you can get an understand of the situation that I posted whilst in LA;

AirBnB nightmare TLDR; We got the world's craziest AirBnB host and this is our story. We're now in a stalemate where she's trying to fine me $500 and won't agree to us leaving early but also won't agree to just giving us our space, so I'm unsure what to do. So, my friend and I are visiting LA, and we're staying at this AirBnB in Glendale. Our host is called [redacted] and lives off the property, something that I was quite grateful for after receiving a barrage of very long messages. We have met them a total of three times, each being equally bizarre, to say the least. The first was when we had two friends over for a couple of hours (something I admit, I neglected to inform them about about as according to both their house rules and AirBnB's policy we should notify hosts when we have overnight guests. As this was not the case I did not think to message as I had been somewhat put off by the volume of messages. That's on me). When [redacted] came by to check on us, they were upset about the two guests my friend and I had invited over.

Despite all of us attempting to apologise profusely (we could barely get a word in) and I found myself near grovelling promising it wouldn't happen again, we each got a lecture (30 minutes a piece, once directed to me, before they proceeded to talk about me and my friend in a disparaging fashion to my friends, and then a third to both Hannah and I after we had finished changing). Between these lectures we were also informed of the pastries that they had apparently gone above and beyond to get for us (please note we did thank them for the pastries, but it was something that they kept bringing up. I also am a believer that gestures of goodwill should be just that, a gesture of goodwill). Our thank-you's were a bit difficult to voice as they were served with a stiff glass of passive aggression so strong that my two friends elected to wait out in the hallway because of the way [redacted] had spoken to us. I would have understood such a strong reaction if we had been 10 people throwing a party, but even the young woman who was renting the other room didn't seem to mind at all. The situation left a very unpleasant taste in our mouths, especially as it was coupled with a very several lengthy message about the house rules and screenshots. None of which we had violated. My friend also went downstairs to pick up Uber Eats for the group and found our host still in the apartment, apparently awaiting our return. The next time we saw them, they dropped by after the other guest had departed and was cleaning. We saw their bike and her personal articles in the apartment, however when my friend and I called out their name to attempt a conversation and potentially smooth things over, we were met with nothing but silence, and didn't hear movement in the apartment until our door closed, and we were in our room. The third and final interaction with [redacted] was when she dropped by unannounced a couple of days later. I had just gotten back from a nearby mall and as such my shoes and both of our slides were in the common area, as were a pair of my jeans that were drying and a few cups next to the sink. I was taken aback because I was in the middle of getting ready (I was in my underwear), but this didn't seem to bother our host. They continued on the conversation unperturbed whilst I spoke to her from behind the door to cover myself. I was admittedly I was less than polite during this interaction, however due to all of the previous interactions as well as us returning one evening to find our bedroom door unlocked that we had locked, I lost my cool. Admittedly, I was in my room with the door open, however, again, this would not have been the case if I'd been informed that anyone else was in the living space as up until that point we had been in the listing for several days alone and it was around 8-9 in the evening. That evening they sent me (another) lengthy message, which, again, seemed to be filled with passive-aggressive language. I responded to this stating that despite our differences I thought it would be best to keep contact and conversation to a minimum as we only had a few days left on the reservation. and as our host seemed to have mentioned in their messages that they had spoken to the AirBnB team I thought it would be best to allow any and all communication and problems to be dealt with by them. Fast forward to this morning where I was greeted with a very lengthy message from [redacted] claiming that though it was not necessary to contact AirBnB she had found myself and Hannah to be belligerent and messy (and cited the state of the kitchen in her grievances – something that I find understandable but also unfair. If my friend and I had known someone else would be in the space we would have washed up sooner (we were planning on cleaning once we were changed and had had a drink) as I had left the house and Hannah wasn't feeling well). I believe the message was phrased in the way that she did because they weren't expecting a response. Unfortunately I have a problem with keeping my mouth closed and I responded in the nicest way that I could. I then got a call a couple of hours later from AirBnB and got a complete list of their grievances (some of which were made clear to me through her own messages and some which were new). They are as follows;

We left the apartment in a mess with underwear hanging everywhere (this worried me as the only place the two of us had left underwear hanging to dry was in our room, which worries me greatly because, as I mentioned, we had returned one day to find our door unlocked)

We used the second bathroom in the empty room and left small black hairs everywhere as well as water (also, not true. We went in there to wash our hands or look at makeup on the way out as it's next to the door, but that's about it)

They told me to move laundry when I didn't (it was mentioned that I had laundry in the washing machine in passing when they arrived to find me in my underwear but nothing more than that).

I dress too provocatively

At the top of her grievances was the fact that there was a resident's party/event happening on the roof (there's a pool, massive jacuzzi and common area on the roof of the building that's for communal use) because it's for resident's only. Now, full disclosure we had both been invited to this event by residents of the building that we had made friends with earlier on in our stay, and didn't see a problem. Apparently, our host did (though I suspect this has more to do with the fact they're running an illegal AirBnB than anything else), and has now told AirBnB that she will be fining us $500 as we have violated the house rules. Does anyone know what next steps could be? I'm honestly miffed I don't feel comfortable being there.

​

Now, following this, I ended up leaving the AirBnB to get a hotel. Due to everything mentioned above, I felt unsafe. I was issued with the fine of approx. £800 after taking down their listing, added this rule and then issuing me with the fine.

Prior to leaving I was attempting to ask AirBnB if a solution could be reached. My original idea was that if the host give us space and promise interaction to be minimal (as they didn't live in the building) then my friend and I had no problem staying the extra couple of nights, we just didn't want there to be anymore incidents (I have an anxiety disorder and the idea of someone with a key potentially rooting through my things or barging into the room was enough to almost induce a panic attack). Our host refused this and kept pushing for the $500 as they didn't want to reimburse my money, but they also refused to agree to what I had asked or provide any sort of solution that would allow me to feel safe during the remainder of my trip. This resulted in a stalemate – AirBnB refused to issue me with any sort of compensation that could be put toward my hotel stay, but they stated they couldn't intervene any further because the host was refusing to do anything.

Now, during this time we had gotten verbal confirmation from other residents of the building that the listing was illegal and apparently most of them didn't seem to be a fan of our host as prior to being a quiet listing, they used to allow guests to throw massive parties on the roof which used to disturb other residents and leave the place in a state. I asked AirBnB to log this as the listing was illegal, thus breaking the agreement AirBnB's terms and conditions and allowing me to break free from the listing. I seemed to be very, very wrong.

As mentioned earlier, I left the listing to get a hotel the day my friend left as I felt unsafe due to everything listed above. Before I left, I asked AirBnB if there was any way I could expedite this process (waiting is, admittedly, not my strong suit) and they asked if I could get confirmation from anyone that this was an illegal listing. I mentioned that I could speak to the front desk to potentially get a copy of the resident's manual. When I went down to the front desk, I spoke to the managers of the building and they confirmed that this was, indeed, an illegal listing, and that they had been suspicious of this person for years, though they couldn't do anything due to lack of proof. After disclosing that they were unable to send me a copy of the contract, they asked me for screenshots of the rules (which I provided) as well as a link to the public listing, and a follow up email from the manager.

After leaving the listing and going to my hotel, I then received a request for money for the £800 and a promise from AirBnB that they cared about my case and that they were following this up.

This proved to be difficult. Over the following few of days I called AirBnB to see if there had been an update to my claim and any potential compensation. I was then informed that on my case there were no notes stating that the listing had been illegal and that they would be following this up. When I mentioned I'd been in contact with the building managers and that they were eager to speak to a member of the AirBnB team if they had an email address I could give them, I was told to inform them to simply report it through the website as they didn't think they had an email that would be valid long enough (I'm also confused). During this time I was asked if I wanted to file a discrimination case which, after talking to the friend I was travelling with, my two local friends and the people I shared the listing with, I went through with my claim. (please note me and my friend are both black/white mixed race and the friends that came to visit are Turkish and Latinx respectively. Our host is white)

Since then and rejected the claim I received a charge for approx. £3,200 for doxxing my host (the only information I gave to the front desk was information from the AirBnB listing) as well as an all caps message attempting to virtually scream at me for what I'd apparently done, claiming that they were being evicted from the apartment (again, that they do not reside in). When speaking to one of the AirBnB agents I was advised to block them from all social media and not disclose where I was staying.

I thought this would be the end of it, and their listing would be removed from the platform.

Since returning from my overseas trip (I mostly stayed with friends and yes, this was pre-lockdown. I came back to the UK on the 10th) the listing is still up. Any and all attempts to contact AirBnB have been met with either "we are not allowed to disclose information about listings" and "I promise we care about your case and we are taking this seriously". I checked the privacy policy I was linked to by one of the agents and it says that AirBnB should disclose information about any criminal listings (like an illegal rental). There also seems to be nothing on the privacy policy stating explicitly that AirBnB was not allowed to discuss these cases or share a host's information with a guest – especially when it came to any complaints. When I sent the person I was speaking to the quotes about the criminal activity and asked whether they could direct me to the portion of the privacy policy that was forbade them from disclosing this sort of experience I was sent this message; "I understand that you have been hurt by this host. We will try to do right by that wrong by taking the appropriate action on this host's account. Our mission is to ensure that no other guest feels discriminated against by this host again -- we think that the sis the best possible outcome for the situation you endured. We will not try and put a price on the hurt you experienced. Rather, we will be taking action that we hope is lasting and meaningful." The latter part because I mentioned AirBnB seemed uninterested in trying to resolve this situation on my end – either by words, promise of action or by monetary value.

Now, I am not squeaky clean in this. I did leave a review in the heat of the moment on their page where I mentioned that they were insane (this was just after receiving my £3,200 fine and all caps message) along with a negative review. This was taken down within about 24h of posting as I apparently slanderous and goes against AirBnB's terms of policy as they take mental health very seriously (something I found interesting as they didn't seem to care when I was having a minor breakdown during my initial complaint due to my own mental health problems (I'm technically disabled as a result) it didn't seem to affect their decisions). I asked if I could have the option of writing a better, less inflammatory comment. I don't believe they replied to this.

Is there anything I can do? One of my friends said I'm being an asshole for following this up as much as I have been but this honestly took a bunch of time out of my trip and added a lot of stress I was trying desperately to get away from (as I mentioned stress disorder). Is there anything I can do?

Thanks in advance!

Original post here =+-+= Get $20 off your first AirBnB stay.

[wellllthatdidntwork-blog]

Do not reblog this. Text from the ex.

I want to rant safely. If you have anything to say to me about it, PM me–trust me, I really appreciate and welcome your support right now.

Those of you who are following me, it’s because I messaged you to let you know that I’d deleted my old blog because my ex found it. It sucks that I can’t feel safe even when anonymous. Only one personal real life friend knew about the blog, and while I trust her, I wonder if she let it slip. So I made this new one.

My ex texted me to gaslight me about the things I posted in said blog. And I got a panic attack reading his BS. I questioned everything, and in the end I actually have solid evidence and people backing me up to prove that he is a lying scumbag. Thank goodness for that or I’d be a complete mess right now instead. And thank goodness for the counselor who said that an anonymous blog is a perfectly healthy outlet.

This text is largely about things I said in a post I’d written about how he would insert himself into situations where he knew he wasn’t welcome so he could play the victim. My point at the end was that’s a similar tactic to what Milo Yiannapoulus does and that’s why he goes to places where he knows he’s not welcome. So you have context.

Here’s the text:

—————————————

K, apparently I need to remind you that I was sexually assaulted by a board member at [NAME REDACTED] and that was why I dreaded returning there to see or perform in shows. It had nothing to do with isolating you from your friends (which I do not remember [NAMES REDACTED] being at the time, anyway). I was scared to go back there because I knew I would have to face my attacker (remember when he grabbed our tickets and ripped them up right in front of us?). For six years together, you never accused me of making all that up or “playing the victim,” but now, because I broke up with you, you assign blame and false motives to things I had no control over.

I went to Applebee’s that night after confirming with three people that you would not be there. I am not actively trying to run into you places. I have moved on and have a new life that you are not part of. It’s you who are stuck in the past after two years apart, both in the theatre community and on your blog.

It takes a lot of nerve to write a blog about gaslighting when much of what you write in the blog is completely made up (I think [NAME REDACTED] and I would remember you having a bloody nose that night) and the things you did to me are purposely left out to make yourself look like a victim.

You know what *is* a deliberate manipulation strategy and a tactic of emotional abuse? Lying to your current boyfriend about your ex (He tried to poison me!) and claiming he is tormenting you just by existing. During the first run of [SHOW REDACTED], you write long, harassing e-mails to [NAME REDACTED] every day but then came to me and told me he was tormenting you, even though he had moved on and never engaged you at all throughout the entire run of the show. Now you do the same thing to your current boyfriend, playing the victim and obsessing over a relationship that ended over two years ago so he will be terrified to leave you because he sees what a hell you make life for the men who had the audacity to break free of you.

And no, it is not “harassment” for me to contact you (or [NAME] or [NAME] or [NAME REDACTED]) when you defame me on social media and I confront you about it. It is harassment for you to continue to torment me with these rants that have nothing to do with the person I am now and, in many cases, are about a person you’ve made up in your head who I never was.

My existence does not revolve around you. If I go to Applebee’s with old friends, that is not about you. If I go to see my friends in a play, that is not about you. If Milo Yiannopoulos goes to speak at a university, that is not about you, or me, or the theatre. Stop making everything about you. And if you’re going to write a blog about abuse, maybe you should stand up for the real survivors of abuse, instead of concocting a fictitious past where you are one of them. —————————————

The response I will never send because I do not want to start with him:

Paragraph 1:

1) I know he was sexually assaulted at the theater where he isolated me from. (Actually, I technically don’t, but I do believe him on this.) But his attacker had long since been banned from that theater during the time I brought up. 2) If he wanted to avoid the theater even so, I would understand. But there was no reason to tell me I wasn’t allowed to go. Furthermore, he based all his reasons around me not being allowed to go around the producers and how they had allegedly mistreated the two of us and not around his sexual assault. He tried to convince me that they were all against me and would try to hurt me. 3) The specific incident I mentioned in the blog where he isolated me from these people was again years after he had been assaulted, and he decided to tell me AS I WAS ON MY WAY OVER that he would never trust me again if I went. These people spent a lot of money on my meal for their ceremony and he made me cancel last minute so their money was wasted. Why not tell me earlier? Because he wanted them to hate me. 4) For months, he would not allow me to audition there because of his own personal beef with the theater. Yet ONE WEEK after he left me, he told me he was going to audition there. (He didn’t. I’m really grateful because I did! And that’s where I met my current partner!) Why, if this theater was so traumatizing to him that the thought of my going there was ripping him apart, did he even consider it? 5) Again, attacker long since gone–but no, I do NOT remember the incident where he ripped up our tickets in front of us. He told me that story later, that he ripped up our tickets so we’d have to sit with him. I have never once sat in a theater with his attacker and if the incident happened, it was not with me. 6) Never accused him of faking his assault because I’m not an asshole, I genuinely do believe he was sexually assaulted. But I never thought he was playing the victim until I realized how entrenched in emotional abuse I was. I internalized everything as my fault. Including my own disability, which he convinced me was my own fault many times. (As in, why didn’t I go get a treatment at a certain time. And also, my complaining about pain was abusive and manipulative. He told me that.)

Paragraph 2:

Maybe he didn’t try to go hang out with the cast of the show the night I was there because I was there. But three people? Nearly everyone in that theater hates him and he had only one friend in that show. When he came to hang out with the cast, several friends texted me to say that no one was talking to him except this one friend. Everyone else hates him and not because of me–because he was a jerk to a lot of people, and because of the animosity between him and the theater. Like I said in that blog post, there’s blame on both sides to that, but the fact remains that he purposely went to a place where he’s hated and then his one friend treated him like a victim.

Paragraph 3:

HERE IS WHERE WE GET TO THE FUN PART. He tells me that most everything in the blog was made up. He gives me an example where he makes it sound like someone else is calling me a liar with him to try to convince me that I’m lying to myself. It’s no longer his word against mine, he has a witness! …Guess what? I texted that witness, and what did she say? That she has not talked to him for two years because she’s unfriended and ignored him, and that she definitely remembers the incident that I made up! I’m really glad he gave an example with a witness because damn, was it easy to verify that he is a gaslighting liar in this case.

Paragraph 4:

1) So this first part is somewhat true though highly exaggerated and I wasn’t lying. I had an ex boyfriend who became a roommate a while after we broke up. He kept spraying something in the apartment that he knew I was having strong reactions to and had gone to the hospital. I had written confession from him and medical bills. So yeah, the fucker poisoned me, it’s not really a strong choice of words here. I sent him a few emails trying to get closure at times, most of them while still living with him so that I could articulate it properly. I never said the guy’s existence was tormenting me, though a few years later he walked in to the DMV where I was and I got an anxiety attack from seeing him. (Goddammit.) I was more furious at myself than at him for having the reaction, because oh right, my ex made me think my disabilities were my fault and I was abusing him when I was in pain. 2) But. How DARE he bring up my current partner and tell me that he is too afraid to leave me because I make life hell for the men who “break free” of me? This part hurt the most because I’m always insecure about being loved. I almost didn’t tell my partner any of this because it would be “proving him right”. He really messed with my head on this one. And even when my partner reassured me that he loved me, I didn’t believe it until he gave third party evidence from his friends that they’ve never seen him this happy and healthy before.

Paragraph 5:

1) I have never defamed him on social media, and neither have any of the people he mentioned. Those are other people who have blocked him because he was a jerk to them on social media. None of us posted his name to anything. In fact, the only time I even mentioned anything he did post-breakup was when he hacked into my Facebook and I still didn’t mention him by name. All I said was that my Facebook had been hacked and I needed friends not to share my private info with others because they are making me unsafe. Never said anything about him on Facebook, only on this private Tumblr. 2) How am I tormenting or harassing him by writing a private blog that none of his friends will ever read, nor do mine? His name isn’t in it, I didn’t send it to him, and nobody is harassing him about it because they don’t know it exists.

Paragraph 6: I know the world doesn’t revolve around me. I hope you feel super special that you hurt me badly enough that I get panic attacks reading texts from you two years later.

And a PS: he writes a public blog, with his name attached to it, in which he talks shit about his ex girlfriends (not by name, but still recognizable) and wrote a fiction piece that trash talks the theater he isolated me from. Oh, and he has written about abuse in the Good Men Project. So maybe if he thinks he’s so abused, he shouldn’t send a huge long vindictive thing directly to that ex who allegedly manipulated and emotionally abused him.

See? I’m doing mine anonymously, not to him. Try it sometime.

[ecotone99]

[SP] I discovered a box of incident reports compiled by the New Zealand government. Something is coming.

I won’t tell you my name, though anyone truly wanting to figure out who I am will not have a hard time doing so. I’ve been doing archival research for a doco I’m working on, based in the capital here in NZ. It’s a lot of listening through old VCRs, note-taking and timekeeping, that sorta thing. I had been digging all afternoon in the back of the dingy room they’ve got me working in for some December 1990 tapes when I found the box. It looked like it had been shoved there in a rush and haphazardly covered with other boxes and files to hide it. I had no idea what I was getting into when I opened it. I think I was just hoping that I’d finally get a break and get to sit down for an hour or two. But no, instead, I stumbled onto something that I really shouldn’t have.

I don’t even know why these are here in physical hard-copies, or how they even got here in the first place. There’s nothing that suggests who put them here or even if they’re real, but the number of redactions and official stamps and seals leads me to think that they are legit.

I have met Parker Evans once or twice, through various film and news events. She’s pretty cool, if a little standoffish, understandably so. Sat in on a few of her lectures up at the uni too, they were pretty fun. And of course, once word got out that she was tight with our resident superhero, well, they were always packed to capacity.

Ok, I know how weird this all sounds but I have no reason to lie to you. Most people here know about Darcy Daniels a.k.a. Astro, NZ’s version of a superhero and our second-best kept secret. And you’d also be hard-pressed to find anyone who doesn’t know about Mercury, Astro’s ‘arch-nemesis’ and full-time petty criminal (in the way that all her schemes are extremely petty-minded on a grand, often destructive scale). So, although most people know that something went down that night at the observatory there’s been no clear account of what truly happened.

Except for this, and the handful of other files in the box that suggest that what happened at the Carter Observatory was only the beginning. Of what, I don’t exactly know. But I’m gonna try and figure it out.

I’ve tried to get the report down exactly how it is in the file. No chance for straight up copying unfortunately, it’s just me and a rickety old tv setup in this room, and I had to hand my phone in to reception.

“It’s just protocol,” they said. Sure.

So, I have to do this the old school way. I’m copying everything out by hand and typing it at home.

Hopefully this works. Here goes.

​

INCIDENT REPORT #2193

​

Subject: EVANS, PARKER

Occupation: BLOGGER/VLOGGER OF ‘ASTROlogy’, LECTURER AT VICTORIA UNIVERSITY

Category: 5 - INITIAL CONTACT

Details: “WHAT REALLY HAPPENED THE NIGHT COSMICA ARRIVED” DATED MAY 04 2019, LENGTH 00:24:12:04

Type: VIDEO - VLOG

Status: PUBLIC – NOW REDACTED

​

TRANSCRIPT:

[VIDEO OPENS TO PARKER EVANS IN FRONT OF THE CAMERA. SHE IS SITTING AT AN EMPTY TABLE, THE LIGHTS FOCUSSED SOLEY ON HER. THE REST OF THE KITCHEN IS DARK AROUND HER - (RESIDENCE IN QUESTION IS LOCATED AT ██████████████████, █████████, WELLINGTON.)

HER BLONDE HAIR IS PULLED BACK IN A PONYTAIL, HER BLUE EYES ARE FIERCE. SHE IS LOOKING DEAD AT THE CAMERA, FACE NO NONSENSE AND DETERMINED.]

Hi everyone. If you're new to this channel, welcome. If you’re not, welcome back.

Ok, I’m gonna cut right to the chase.

There have been many accounts of what happened that night. But none of them are entirely the truth.

Because I was there. I know what happened. And I’m here to set the record straight.

[VIDEO CUTS TO A MONTAGE OF LOCAL HEADLINES, VIDEOS, TWITTER POSTS AND PICTURES OF THE EVENT. PARKER’S VOICE IS HEARD OVER THE TOP.]

April 20th, 2019. The night of the ‘Stargazing for the Children’ event at the observatory. Looking back, I suppose they were tempting fate by having it during the meteor shower. But hindsight is a funny thing, and there was no way to predict the craziness that was to come.

The planetarium was full of children, kids from the hospital and their friends and families, gathered together for a fun night of space stuff.

It was a full house, and things were happening everywhere. From the volunteers guiding the kids through a virtual reality space station to the man twisting balloons into different weird shaped aliens, it was all a go. There were nurses on standby, lurking in the background in case of any real emergencies, and people handing out cake-pops and cupcakes decorated as planets. For the most part, everything was going well.

[VIDEO CUTS BACK TO PARKER.]

I was there to document things, for my blog. Because of course a space-themed event could not have been complete without our national space-themed hero.

And boy, was Astro was the lady of the hour. The ever-gracious woman of wonder couldn’t take two steps without someone holding out a phone for a selfie or pushing a pen into her hand to sign something. And the gaggle of little girls and boys shadowing her every move, god were they cute.

[VIDEO CUTS TO SHOW VARIOUS PICTURES AND CLIPS OF A WOMAN POSING FOR PICTURES WITH A NUMBER OF YOUNG CHILDREN. SHE’S WEARING A DEEP BLUE SUIT, DARK HAIR TIED BACK IN A LONG BRAID DOWN HER BACK. PARKER CAN BE SEEN HOVERING NEARBY, OCCASIONALLY PAUSING TO SPEAK INTO HER PHONE.]

It was about halfway through the night when things went sideways. I was at the buffet table, midway through a Jupiter cupcake, when I heard a commotion from outside.

[VIDEO CUTS BACK TO PARKER.]

I knew something was up the moment I saw a security guard stride up to Astro and whisper in her ear. Astro stilled, and I began to make my way over to her. I edged my way around the crowd, watching Astro as she tried to extricate herself from the kids surrounding her.

I managed to meet up with her halfway across the room. I shot her a questioning look but was interrupted by the doors crashing open with a loud bang! There were a couple screams of fright and a few tears from some of the children. Those soon stopped however as a tense silence moved across the crowd at the sight of the unwelcome intruder.

It was Mercury.

[SHE POINTS A FINGER DIRECTLY AT THE SCREEN]

But not the Mercury we were all familiar with.

[PARKER PAUSES, LOOKING OFF CAMERA, GATHERING HER THOUGHTS.]

I remember distinctly the look in her eyes that night. Her patented smirk was gone, her lips now a grim line. As she scanned the room, she was tense, decked out in the infamous silver and red outfit. The thing that got me though was that there was no malice or anger there, no mischief.

The frenzied look on her face was fear.

When she spied Astro, she immediately strode forward.

[PARKER PAUSES, CARDS A HAND THROUGH HER HAIR. SHE LETS OUT A HUFF.]

Now I know how incredibly cheesy it sounds but if you’d been there you’d agree. The crowds literally parted before her. Nobody wanted to mess with Mercury on the best of days, let alone when she’s marching on like a woman possessed

[PARKER LETS OUT A LAUGH, SHAKING HER HEAD.]

Honestly, the whole moment was one big cliché really. The crowds parting, silence all around. But then the girl, oh my god that little girl.

[A NEW VIDEO BEGINS TO PLAY. THE SHAKY PHONE RECORDING IS FOCUSED ON A YOUNG GIRL, NO OLDER THAN SIX. SHE IS WEARING A SPARKLY SILVER DRESS, WITH SHINY RED SHOES AND A DARK RED ‘CANTEEN’ BANDANNA OVER HER BALD HEAD. SHE RUNS UP TO MERCURY, SHOUTING WITH GLEE. MERCURY PAUSES HALFWAY ACROSS THE ROOM, LOOKING TAKEN ABACK. THE GIRL WRAPS HER SKINNY ARMS AROUND MERCURY’S MIDDLE. (SEE INCIDENT REPORT #626 FOR FULL VIDEO).]

[THE VIDEO CUTS BACK TO PARKER.]

At that point I had to almost hold Astro back. I could feel the tension growing as Mercury sent a bemused grin down at the child. Quite frankly I think we were all at a bit of a loss for words. But we all had to try very hard to suppress the collective ‘awwww” when, clear as day, we heard the girl say, “You’re my favourite!” It was said with such sincerity and honesty that you couldn’t help but grin, even despite the weird circumstances.

[PARKER SHOOTS A WRY GRIN AT THE CAMERA.]

I felt some of the tenseness slip out of Astro slightly at that. We all watched in a kind of trance as Mercury bent down and whispered something in the little girl’s ear. We were all shocked out of it when the girl let out a huge screech. Not of terror, but delight, as she began gleefully cackling at whatever Mercury had said to her. I turned when I heard Astro chuckling a little beside me.

[PARKER SHAKES HER HEAD, IN SLIGHT DISBELIEF.]

“She’s always had a soft spot for kids.” That’s what Astro said to me as Mercury stood, bopping the girl on the nose before turning back towards us. After that, some of the tension leaked out of the room. Chatter started to pick up slightly, though every bit of it was undoubtedly centred around Mercury’s sudden arrival.

[THE VIDEO CUTS TO SHAKY CELLPHONE FOOTAGE OF MERCURY WALKING UP TO ASTRO AND HAVING A QUIET, TENSE CONVERSATION. ASTRO'S FACE QUICKLY TURNS FROM ANGRY TO TENSE. PARKER STANDS UNCOMFORTABLY BESIDE THEM.]

That conversation wasn't nearly as cool, calm and collected as the video makes it seem. She barely gave me a glance, that's how focused Mercury was on Astro. You could see the determination on her face, but there was also something else there. As she got closer I felt Astro shift beside me, as though she was readying herself for a fight. Standing between the two of them was intense, I could almost feel the power rolling off them both. It was downright electric.

And then Mercury said something that threw us all off, and took everything up a notch. And I think what got me was the desperation and the worry that leaked through in those two words, an urgency that sent a chill down my spine.

[PARKER LOOKS THE CAMERA DEAD ON.]

"Something's coming."

​

I had to stop here. My boss turned up wanting to see where we were at, and I had to do some of my actual job before I got my ass handed to me.

I did ask though, but it was as I thought. I wasn’t allowed to take anything out of the building, they were weirdly strict about things. Who knows why. But at any rate, I was able to get this down, and I’ll be back at the archive tomorrow, so fingers crossed I can get more of the report down.

submitted by /u/MNightSianmalan [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/2Nt5faY

[613526362]

Tomorrow is Day One

"A guy got shot right across the street from me this week. I was with a group of people - indoors - and when we heard the seven shots, a woman who grew up on The Big City's [redacted] side immediately said, "That was way too close." Then some other people spoke up and said, "No, I bet it was just fireworks." I know the sound of a small caliber handgun, but I didn't say anything. Inside though, I started to feel kind of sad. I didn't know at the time that it happened only a block away. I found that out eight hours later when the Big City Gazette published their daily shooting log. I guess the shots sounded a bit further than that because we were indoors? If I had known the victim was just across the street, I would have immediately stood up, walked out there, and done what I've been trained to do since I first got into emergency medicine in 2008. Instead, what I did was start my stopwatch. I wanted to see how long it would take for the sirens to arrive. It took six minutes and ten seconds. I kind of feel a bit sick for timing it knowing what happened to him. Right now I sit in my apartment, having just decided I'm going to delete my Facebook account for good at the end of this week. I'm also just thinking about how unbelievable it is that some wars seem to go on forever. It's like a cycle of actions that elicit other actions and the pain and suffering just goes on and on and on, in infinite iteration. You could apply it to Afghanistan, or The Big City. I can apply it to my life. A month ago I called the police on someone, and they started a campaign of harassment towards me because of it. More recently, in a related situation, I provided testimony in a court case when requested to. More harassment, with added stalking, now across all of my devices including my work, academic, and personal numbers and email addresses. I read an article online titled "I'm a Victim of Carpet Bombing Online Harassment." Apparently some people have it much worse than me. The author's conclusion was that, despite the security risk of social media and the potential for other people's online actions to demoralize you, we shouldn't withdraw completely from social media - we can't ever give in and allow them to hurt us more. I see things a bit differently though, and just prefer to do what I need to do in life, without making anything more public than it already is. A month ago I started trimming my Facebook friends list. Gradually I deleted about 300 or so people - people whose names I didn't even recognize, others who I realized I actually don't trust at all. I left only the people who had left a super positive impression on me. Only people who are important to me, regardless of whether I share genetics with them, or lived with them, or loved them, or just met them once. I guess I wanted to say goodbye to just them. To just you. Of course feel free to send me a message and ask for my number if you want to stay in touch though ;) Love, Marshall" I wrote that and planned to post it on Facebook prior to deleting my account. Then, I changed my mind, and deleted my account without warning Redacted The full story of my first week at Mog Hospital is a bit different. In that unposted Facebook post, I didn't even mention that I was at the hospital when the shots rang out. That's right - someone was shot right across the street from the hospital. And the hospital didn't go on lockdown. Nope. People barely even mentioned it. It was barely even worth notice. Redacted Being at Mog Hospital resembles being in Africa in so many ways, I decided to name it after one of Africa's most perilous cities - Mogadishu. My first day in orientation at Mog Hospital, I was supposed to get my ID badge. But we were all told that the "ribbon" in the badge printing machine had broken, and we would have to wait until the next day to get it fixed. I was the first one in the room to get my badge picture taken three days later when they actually got it fixed. But the lady couldn't find me in the computer to link my ID to the badge. Then started another three days of excuses and delays. At the end of the week, I was finally told, "You'll just have to start work without a badge. For sure you will eventually start showing up in the computer. We just don't know what to do." The fact that they really had no course of action to fix a problem and were just going to, um, wait? for the problem to fix itself... is so fucking Mogadishu At the end of the week I went in for an orientation in Mog ER. I had looked forward to meeting back up with the Director of the ER, but at the beginning of the week I learned she had just quit. Actually, it sounded like one of the last things she had done before leaving was hire a Murder Technician who had interviewed there six months earlier and sent in an email asking to work there "after all" when the position he had taken instead turned out to be boring. Actually walking into the ER was surreal. In a stark contrast to the ER I had just come from, it wasn't lively and energized. It felt....somber. The ER nurse trainer took me around and introduced me to the other murder techs. The first one I met, well, she just struck me as having some kind of intellectual disability the moment I started talking to her. She had kind of a blank expression and a dull affect. I was thinking to myself, "Um...do they have a mentally disabled girl working as a tech here??" Then she took me to meet another murder tech. He was just sitting in a chair in the corner, staring at a desk. When she introduced me to him, he turned to look at me. He didn't extend his hand to shake mine, so I didn't either. When she said, "This is Marshall, and he'll be a new tech here," he just nodded, and then looked back at the desk. He struck me as someone who had severe PTSD. He expressionlessness was haunting. The third tech I was taken to meet was to be my trainer the following week. He was a lot like the last guy, but much creepier. He had a full beard and reminded me of dueling banjos. He was the kind of guy you would expect to be standing outside your tent staring at you with bow and arrow in hand when you peek out..............in a horror movie. He had a weird sinister look in his eyes. Reflecting on it all later, I decided that all three of them probably just have severe PTSD. If they were schizophrenic they wouldn't be able to work there. They might also have depression, but not major. Finally I was introduced to a third tech. As soon as I met her, I rejoiced inside. She was chipper, pretty, and had a light in her eyes that was captivating. She also interacted like a human being. "Yay! There are people who work here and not just zombies!" As we walked away from her, I was told that she only worked in the minor care area, and I wouldn't be working in there. She wasn't a murder tech - she was a MA. The way things were set up, the murder techs work in the back with all the serious patients, while the MA's take all the minor patients. Thus, all I will be seeing is death. And murder. At one point the nurse attempted to pry a bit and find out exactly how long I had worked at Community Bore ER before I came to the Mog. When I told her six months, I also added, "I loved the nurses, and they loved me. But I really wanted to work in a level I trauma center." Her immediate response was, "Oh, you really should have worked at Big Bore ER" (the sister Hospital of community Bore and a level i trauma center). I thought to myself, "Oh shit. Did she really just tell me I made a mistake in taking this job?" I hope that my training and experience has prepared me to better cope with children being shot in the face than these other Murder Techs. But the truth is, I haven't been doing well psychologically over the past couple months.... Fuck it, over the whole year since I moved to The Big City. Moving my business out to the suburbs was a huge mistake. Reshuffling and moving back to the City has been hugely expensive. I have no idea how I'm going to pay all my bills this month. I have barely survived this year. Every day has been a struggle. I don't know what to say. Things just don't look good. Or feel good. I'm driving Lyft and Uber to make extra money, putting tons of miles on a leased car that has restrictive mileage limits. I'm left without the time and energy to study, even though the Big Test is bearing down on me. I hover between wishing things would suddenly get better, and wishing God would just let me leave. I guess I find it harder and harder to believe things can get better. I have been poor and struggling to do good things for a decade now. In a way, I've been failing, and failing, and failing, for ten fucking years. And now I have people who hate me and are going online to leave negative reviews for my business even though they have absolutely nothing against my business and just hate the guy who depends on it to put food on his plate and prepare himself to go to Africa and give the rest of his life to the people there So I'm not eating well. And the likelihood of me making it back grows dimmer. As usual, I think about killing myself. And getting a dog And getting a motorcycle But mostly just killing myself