#if i miss it and they add another negative mark on me in the system | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

prfctethereal · 4 years ago

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bad idea. | remus lupin

thank u, next x marauders

alexa, play bad idea by ariana grande

pairing: remus lupin x reader (rivals to lovers)

summary: you and remus are rivals. after james and sirius find out about your fear of werewolves, they use it to exploit you, and help remus

word count: 4,393 (i'm sorry)

warnings: violence, language, mentions of trauma

a/n: haven't worked on this series in a while but whatever lol. this piece took my like two months from when I first started it because I kept changing it but oh well, enjoy - kennedy

***

Nothing felt better than being top in the class academically. Seeing the perfectly round ‘O’ at the top of a paper after getting it back was one of the few things that made me truly happy and proud of myself. I always thought that getting all these excellent marks would place me first place in my class, but I guess I was wrong. Unfortunately, I wasn’t first place. I was first equal.

Remus Lupin: the only person who could give me a run for my money. Every day in class was a battle to see who would win the unspoken competition. Subtle glances, snide comments, rolling eyes, you name it. It was even harder with the fact that Remus was a lot of the time my work partner as most teachers had the same idea of pairing up their brightest students.

I didn’t necessarily hate the guy. There was just something in my guts that made me nervous around him, something disguised as a disliking. He was just too friendly, it didn’t make sense why out of everyone, he didn’t like me.

***

Another day, another frustration. Potions class had started and it was brewing day. The classroom was stuffy, making it hard to breathe through my tightly collared shirt. My hair was pulled off my face as I tried desperately to cut up fluxweed into manageable. The swimming fumes of the half done potion was flooding my senses and making it hard to see or perceive anything that was going on. It was roulette for the cutting knife and my finger.

“You’re doing it wrong.” Remus muttered under his breath, bringing his attention to how I was preparing the ingredients. Huffing, he pulled the cutting board towards his side of the work bench and held out his hand, asking for the knife silently.

“Don’t I get a say in this?” I scowled, reluctantly handing over the knife to the rough looking boy. My eyes lingered a little too long over his delicate skin, mentally tracing each and every one of his mysterious scars, until my thoughts were cut still by Remus shoving the cut weeds in front of me.

“I hope you know how to put them in the cauldron.” There was a hint of cheek in his comment which I glossed over, poking my tongue out of my mouth and turning away from him, doing what he said. One by one, I carefully dropped the fluxweed into the bubbling concoction.

Grabbing my wand, I mixed the potion, watching Remus out of the corner of my eye. He seemed fixed and concentrated on cutting the leeches up, ignoring my presence completely. It wasn’t unusual to get the cold shoulder from my potions partner, but somehow, it still hurt like the very first time.

“Add these in now.” Remus commanded nonchalantly, pushing the cut up leeches onto the bench for me. Rolling my eyes, I brought my forefinger and thumb to the nearest leech and picked it up, feeling the grimy texture on my skin. All of a sudden, I felt a burst on pain ripple through my finger, my vocal chords letting out a loud yelp, as the leech’s teeth bit deep into my forefinger. Looking down, a thick line of blood was dripping down my finger, the leech still connected to my skin.

“Are you okay?” Remus must’ve heard my cry and immediately turned to me. He brought his hands to mine, gently cradling my bleeding wound. There must’ve been some poison in the leech’s venom as my finger started to discolour and turn a worrying shade of black. Even my head was feeling lightheaded. Trying to keep my balance, I placed my nondominant hand on the workbench to help keep me up, but it failed, falling into Remus’ arms.

“No.” I croaked out, the pain almost unbearable now. The veins on my hand were red and livid, with a dark, black bruise circling the bite mark. The leech was removed from my finger, probably by Remus, and my wound was on clear display. To top it all off, blood must’ve dropped into the ongoing potion as it was hissing angrily, turning a deep purple, not the soft yellow colour that it should’ve been. “You said you cut all the leeches. Why was that bloody thing alive?”

“I’m sorry.” Remus helped to sit me down on a chair but I was failing to keep my weight on my feet, toppling over at the slightest change in balance. My head was swarming with pain and white splotches danced in the corners of my vision. “I thought I cut them all. I didn’t realise I had missed any.”

By now, Professor Slughorn had come to see what the commotion was all about and had seen me barely conscious on a stool. He was trying to communicate but all I was focused on was the infection spreading up my hand. All the veins on my hand were now brick red, throbbing desperately. Shooting tendrils of pain were spiraling up my arm; a one way track to my heart and lungs. The only thing keeping my tethered to reality was Remus’ tight hold on my body, keeping me up right and conscious.

“Take her to the infirmary.” I could just make out what Professor Slughorn was saying by the way his lips moved and the vague sounds coming from his mouth. My lips involuntarily squinted as I felt myself being hoisted up and forced to walk out of the classroom, Remus’ tight grip around my waist never faltering.

He seemed desperate to keep a conversation with me going, talking to me the entire way to the hospital wing, trying to keep me from passing out. We were just about halfway there when my feet got caught up in the ground and my eyes succumbed to the white light ebbing my vision. My eyes rolled back into my head as I passed out in Remus’ arms.

***

“She just passed out?” Sirius asked, almost incredulous as Remus retold his encounter with Y/N from earlier in the day.

The four marauders were sitting in the grand hall, slowly munching away at their lunch. Guiltily, Remus took small bites, feeling remorseful as he knew Y/N wouldn’t be able to spend her lunchtime in the grand hall too. She was still in the hospital wing being treated for something Remus did.

“Flabbergasted leech! I forgot that they were deadly venomous. I should’ve been more careful when cutting them up.” Remus stabbed angrily at his salad, twirling his fork in exhaustion, his eyes never looking up to meet his friends.

“It’s not your fault, mate,” James tried stepping in to calm him down, placing his hand on Remus’ shoulder in a calculated manner. “Anyway, I thought you hated her.”

Remus scoffed, taking a bite out of a stray lettuce leaf. “I don’t hate her. She just gets on my nerves. Always trying to get top in the class. I don’t even care about being top, it just pisses me off that she tries so much.”

“But why?” Peter shrugged, a confused look on his face as Remus pondered the question.

In all honesty, Remus had no idea why he had such a negative attitude towards Y/N. Something about her always riled him up in a way he never expected. He just had to get on her nerves and annoy her. It was like he craved to come out better than her.

“I don’t know. I just really want to knock her down a peg. I’m not sure if it’s the full moon talking but I just want to annoy her in some shape or form, y’know?”

“Let’s prank her. Rile her up a bit.” Sirius suggested playfully, poking Remus with the fork in his hand, prodding at the thinking boy.

“Maybe. She’s already pretty pissed at me because of the leech situation. I don’t want to get her even more annoyed.” Remus looked quickly between the three other boys, who already seemed encapsulated in another conversation. “Whatever, I don’t care. Prank her if you want. After the full moon tonight though.”

Sirius’ face lit up with delight when he heard those words fall from Remus’ lips. “Alright! That’s more like it.”

Clapping Remus on the back, James nodded eagerly, mischievous looks bouncing between the three of them. Remus couldn’t care less. All he could think about was if Y/N was okay.

***

Stumbling through the halls, I managed to find my way to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. I had just been discharged from the hospital wing, with Madame Pomfrey advising me to stay longer. I left though; I hated missing class. Also, Professor Merrythought said that it was going to be a practical lesson today and I didn’t want to miss it.

Apparently, there was still a little bit of poison left in my bloodstream, but according to Madame Pomfrey, it would be all out of my system by tomorrow morning. I just had to be careful that I didn’t injure myself anymore.

Standing outside the door, I swiftly knocked and entered the classroom. I wasn’t entirely late; class had only started ten minutes ago. Everyone seemed to be crowded on one end of the classroom, so I easily blended in with the group of students. Without acknowledgement, Professor Merrythought continued on with her lesson, only a slight look in my direction to tell that she was aware that I had shown up.

“Can anyone tell me what is in this wardrobe?” Professor Merrythought asked the class. Annoyed, I realised that I couldn’t answer the question as I hadn’t been there for the start of the class and had missed all the introduction. Scowling, I noticed Remus’ hand shoot up in the air. “Yes, Mr Lupin?”

“It’s a boggart.” Remus started, blissfully unaware that I had arrived in class. “A boggart doesn’t have a permanent form and takes the shape of what fears you most. No one knows what it looks like when it isn’t in the form of a fear.” He finished smuggly, a cocky grin smothered all over his face. Unknowingly to him, he had forgotten a crucial detail.

When Remus finished his monologue, I raised my hand up from behind him, a sly smile also on my face. Professor Merrythought caught my hand with her eye and nodded sweetly at me. “Yes, Miss L/N?”

Remus spun around. His brows were knitted together and he looked annoyed, that cheeky grin wiped off his face. Winking at him discreetly, I continued with what I was going to say. “The incantation to eradicate the boggart is Riddikulus, though it won’t banish the boggart indefinitely; only disarm it temporarily. While saying the charm, you must think of an element of fun as the only thing to get rid of a boggart is to get rid of the fear itself.”

“Exactly.” Professor Merrythought began addressing the class. “Now, I would like you all to go off and practise saying the charm for ten minutes. Then we can reconvene and practise on the actual boggart.”

Leaving the group of students, I went off to a quiet corner, muttering “riddikulus” over and over under my breath. Pointing my wand and waving it with the right hand motion, I practised the charm, until I felt a warm hand on my shoulder, waking me from my daze.

“Remarkable work, L/N. I see hospital life wasn’t treating you too well? You’re back sooner than I expected.” Remus quipped, obviously trying to start a quarrel with me.

“Oh, well, I wouldn’t want to miss a lesson of Defence Against the Dark Arts, would I? Then I wouldn’t get to see your darling face.” I replied sarcastically, a fake sickly sweet undertone in my voice.

“You’ve seemed to mistake my friendliness as infatuation. I must change my attitude towards you immediately.” His voice was trying to come out dauntingly, but it was quite cute.

“You’ve must’ve interpreted my words incorrectly. You see, it wasn’t my longing for you that made me turn up to class. It was actually because I didn’t want your ego to get too big, thinking you were the top student. I came to class to put you in your place.”

The sternness in his face seemed to let go as he noticed how serious my tone was. I admit, it was quite harsh but I didn’t care now. My message went across loud and clear. Unfortunately, our conversation was interrupted by Professor Merrythought calling us students back to the wardrobe.

“So,” Remus said, starting a conversation, “what’s your biggest fear?”

I chuckled slightly, turning to look at Remus’ genuine face. “Honestly, I have no idea. I wouldn’t know where to start when thinking about my fears. Maybe failure? I’m not sure.” I let the vulnerability fall from my lips, forgetting that it was my biggest rival that I was talking to. “What about you?”

“Same. Haven’t a clue.” Remus said as we arrived at the group. Remus walked slightly away from me, back towards his group of friends, so I walked up to some nice Ravenclaw girls that I had always gotten along with and listened to Professor Merrythought speak.

“Alright kids, I’d like for you to make a single file line. Miss L/N, Mr Lupin, since you two have the most knowledge already about boggarts, can you please start off today?”

Nodding, I walked to the front of the line, Remus getting in behind me. Behind us, the rest of our class formed a line, ready to get their hands on a boggart.

“Now, Miss L/N, what’s your biggest fear?”

Reiterating what I had said before, I informed Professor Merrythought that I had no idea what my boggart would turn into.

“Not to worry dear. You are very smart. Just, think of something funny, first thing that comes to mind. Now, I’ll open the wardrobe now,” Professor Merrythought walked closer to the wardrobe and placed her hand on the doorknob. “Are you ready?”

I nodded, my firm grip on my wand never wavering. As the wardrobe door swung open, the boggart emerged from the wardrobe in the form of a werewolf.

A werewolf?!

All of a sudden, memories start swarming in from my childhood. I started remembering all about the night where my younger brother was attacked by a werewolf, barely making it out alive. Tears started spilling from my eyes as my arms shook. As the werewolf darted forward, all I could remember was the night where our family was cornered. I had had nightmares for years afterwards. Subconsciously, I fell to the ground, unable to cope with the intense emotions anymore.

My head was feeling heavy and for the second time today, I felt like I was going to faint. It didn’t help that I still had poison in my veins, fogging my head from being able to think properly.

There was movement around me as I could vaguely hear Professor Merrythought say the incantation herself, putting the boggart back into the wardrobe. I was minutes away from collapsing onto the ground, the only thing keeping me up were two strong hands gripping onto my arms.

It became too much and for the second time that day, I fainted into Remus Lupin’s arms.

***

Sirius and James had watched what had happened in Defence Against the Dark Arts today, and they had taken notes. They had noted down how Y/N reacted to werewolves and a plan had formed collectively in their mind.

Tonight was the full moon and they both knew that meant Remus was going to transform into a werewolf himself. What better way to shake up poor Y/N then to let her meet her greatest fear.

***

Coming to, I woke up in the hospital room again, a pounding in my forehead. It seemed that waking up in the infirmary was becoming quite a familiar thing for me. Annoyed, I pulled the covers off my body and started for the exit, before being stopped by Madame Pomfrey.

“Miss L/N, please, just stay here overnight. You’ve dealt with a lot of trauma today and it would be best for you to rest here until morning.”

I knew where she was coming from but there was nothing worse than sleeping in one of those uncomfortable hospital beds, so I shook my head, giving Madame Pomfrey a grateful smile.

“I think it would be best for me to continue resting in my own dorm.” I pulled myself out of Pomfrey's grasp and opened the door, stepping out into the corridor. “Thank you for your concern though.”

The corridor was less stuffy than the hospital wing and the fresh air did wonders for my forehead. I felt like I had just been born again as I walked out of halls and into the outside world. The sun had just set over the horizon and the full moon was peeking up over the hills. It looked beautiful tonight, the bright light shining in the sky, reflecting on the black lake. The stars stood out against the moon, the constellations telling stories I couldn’t even decipher. I felt at peace in the night air.

Deciding to take the long way back to my common room, I disregarded the curfew rules, opting for a peaceful stroll instead. Walking out of the clock tower, I made my way through the courtyard, the light breeze sending ripples of goosebumps onto my skin. It was slightly chilly but nothing that bad, so I continued my journey.

The grounds were quiet tonight. Hagrid must’ve gone to sleep early tonight as there was no light shining from his cabin. It was an unusual sight but it made me realise how dark it was actually getting. Knowing that since I had already had two sleeps today and I probably wasn’t going to be able to sleep right away, I decided to stay out longer, muttering “lumos” under my breath. Immediately, my wand lit up, letting light shine into the night.

That’s when I heard rustling from the bushes. Cautiously, I spun around, my wand pointing directly at the direction of the noise. Squinting, I tried to make out what was coming from where the noise came from.

Was that a person?

All of a sudden, I could make out the face of Sirius Black, absolute terror replacing his normal dug grin. His eyes looked frightened and he was a stuttering mess.

“Oh merlin, Y/N, I’m so glad you’re here.” He was panting, stopping to catch his breath. “It’s Remus. He’s hurt.”

It was as if all my negativity towards Remus dropped in an instant. All I felt was concern for my self delegated rival. Immediately, I went off running from the same direction that Sirius came from, with Sirius eventually coming up at my rear, running beside me.

“Quick, towards the shrieking shack.” He stated and I nodded along. There was noise in the air tonight. I couldn’t tell if it was a dog howling or an owl hooting, all that I knew was that it made me sick to the stomach.

We stopped running when we reached the Whomping Willow. My heart stopped as I looked up the tree branches, somehow immobile. My gut was telling me to run away, but I looked back at Sirius, a pleading look in his eyes, and remembered that Remus was supposedly in there, supposedly injured.

“Lead the way.”

I gestured to Sirius and he beckoned me to follow him, kneeling down as he crawled through a hole at the base of the tree. Nervously, I followed, taking out my still illuminated wand and holding it close to my body. Only the light from my wand was lighting up the tunnel as Sirius and I walked further and further into the darkness. As we walked, the more and more concerning sounds I heard, including whimpering and some howling. My skin was itching but I fought the urge to run and we were suddenly at the entrance to another area.

Carefully, Sirius opened the door, leading us into a run down house. The walls were scratched up with claw marks and there were shreds of fabric littered all over the ground. A dingy smell of body odour and flesh was filling the room and I noticed how bloody hot it was in this shack, common sense telling me to pull off the sweater I was wearing.

Suddenly, Peter burst in through one of the rooms, always wearing a panicked look on his face. “Quick. James is injured here.”

I paused for a moment, my head spinning. I thought Remus was the one that got injured? But I didn’t have much time to think as a deer randomly sprinted out from one of the rooms, racing past me, it’s prongs slicing past my arms. I hissed as blood sept slowly from the wound, a stinging sensation flooding my arm.

Creeping in the direction the deer came from, I emerged into a room, stopping as I noticed the creature in the corner of the room. A huge werewolf was standing there, panting loudly, whimpering from its mouth. It’s paws were paling anxiously at the wall.

Then, it spun around, it’s nose twitching with excitement. It pounced forward at me, obviously being able to smell me from the other end of the room. I was too scared to move, the mouth agape as I watched the werewolf corner me against the wall.

It’s claws came swiping at me, cutting deep into my chest. One of the sharp talons cut on my neck, the wound bleeding much more than the others. The pain washed over me as I felt a tug at my arm, pulling me into another room. The door locked behind us, leaving the werewolf alone in the room.

Sirius was looking down at me as I fell to the ground. I couldn’t do anything anymore. Exhaustion caught up to me and I passed out for the third time today. The only thing different was that it wasn’t in Remus’ arms.

Oh shit.

Remus.

***

It wasn’t unusual for me to wake up in the hospital wing now. It seemed to be late morning, as sunlight was streaming in through the window. I felt groggy but I mustered up another courage to prop myself upright on the pillow and scanned around the room. Directly in front of me, I could see James lying down on one of the hospital beds, a deep wound on his arm, bandaged up.

Next to him was Peter. All he had was a bandage over his head and a black eye, but he seemed to be completely asleep, as he didn’t wake up to when Sirius started talking to James next to him.

Sirius didn’t look nearly as injured, although he had a few bruises littered on his legs. He seemed to be in a furious conversation with James and someone else. With all I could, I listened in to the conversation, trying to grapple on to what happened.

“We shouldn’t have brought Y/N to the shack.” My heart dropped, remembering what happened. There was a werewolf that attacked me last night. It must’ve attacked all four of the marauders. That’s why Sirius was looking for me, because Remus was attacked. That’s why Peter said James was injured. He must’ve also been attacked by the werewolf.

Keeping my consciousness a secret, I slipped out of bed, avoiding the prying eyes of Sirius and James, and darted to what I assumed to be Remus’ bed.

His bed was surrounded by a curtain for the most privacy of the five of us. I didn’t know why until I looked inside and saw how battered and bruised he was. He must’ve been attacked the worse by the werewolf.

There was a gash, cutting across his face, slicing up his eyebrow. His chest was bare as a bandage was covering what seemed to be a deep cut, as it was already bleeding through the crème coloured linen, turning it a scarlet red. Remus did seem to be awake though so I approached his bed.

Sitting beside him, I reached out for his hand. I startled him, as he turned briskly around but melted at my touch as he saw my face. A look of guilt was spreading through his eyes.

“I’m so sorry Y/N-”

I cut him off. “There’s no need for you to apologise, Remus. You were also attacked by that werewolf last night.”

A confused face appeared on Remus before it contorted into something else. Contentment. “Right. I was attacked by the werewolf.”

“And you seem to have gotten the worst of it. You look terrible.” I tried making a joke and ease the tension, but making Remus laugh only seemed to cause him more pain as he clutched his rib.

“Y/N…”

“Remus?”

“Why are you afraid of werewolves so much?” He asked. I sighed, knowing there was no avoiding this question now.

“My family was attacked by a werewolf when we were younger. Well, I say my family. My younger brother was the target and he suffered a lot. I just feel so upset and guilty because of it. It should’ve been me. He was too young.”

“I’m sorry.” Remus said, reaching out so his other hand was touching mine. “That’s a horrible thing to go through.”

“I’m sorry for being so horrible to you.” I finally admitted, looking Remus dead in the eye. “I’ve always been so cruel to you for no reason and there’s no excuse for it. Like today, you helped me when I fainted twice. You had no need to do that, yet you did. Thank you.” Remus started talking but I cut him off. “Seriously Lupin, you mean a lot to me. I’m sorry our little rivalry got to me.”

Remus stayed quiet as his finger rubbed gently against the back of my hand. It seemed like he didn’t know what to say next so I decided to break the ice and end the awkwardness. Leaning forward, I pressed my lips gently to Remus’ cheek, watching as a pink tint flushed to the surface. I pulled away from his grasp, walking to the curtain.

“Again, thank you.”

And I walked away, hurt that he never said anything back.

#harry potter #marauders era #marauders #remus lupin #remus lupin x reader #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin angst #remus lupin imagine

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bts-hyperfixation · 4 years ago

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Don't you believe in love?

Taken from this prompt list

<2000 words

Taehyung had always been a romantic. Ever since he was young, he dreamed of having the love they talked about in his favourite songs. Love that rushed you off your feet, love that consumed your every waking moment, love that was all you needed. Unfortunately, throughout the 20+ years of his life, this love had managed to evade his clutches. He thought he’d found it once. She’d been beautiful, everything he thought love would look like. Her laugh had sounded like bells; however, it was usually aimed at him not with him. Love at first sight had blinded him to the fact that maybe it didn’t work both ways, and she hadn’t taken his dramatic confession particularly well. Still he remained hopeful that the one was still out there.

Following the long-awaited release of his mixtape, Taehyung fell into a bit of a slump. Pouring his heart into something meant so much to him and finally having feedback on it had been more emotionally taxing than he had thought. The record represented his soul in its barest form and now he just found himself scrolling through reviews to see what others thought of it, of him. Most of the comments had been glowing indictments of his voice and character, but he found himself focused on the negative. Some mocked the way he sang of love, calling him naive in his beliefs that love was everything. The other members had tried to cheer him up, saying that the critics must be jealous of the way his brain works. Sometimes it's easier to tear others down than to focus on your own faults.

After words failed to rouse Taehyung’s usually sunny disposition, Jimin decided it was time for a distraction. He settled on clubbing, the only way to get Tae to loosen up was dancing, it had never failed him. Tae dragged himself around the dorm, getting ready for a night out he was sure he didn’t want but forcing himself for Jimin, he would do anything for Jimin. The pair make it to a club in the centre of Seoul a little before 11pm. The venue is filled to the brim with sweaty writhing bodies as the latest dance track booms through the speaker system. Jimin pulls him straight over to the bar at the far end of the room, ordering them six shots each. Taehyung eyes them wearily, but Jimin just grabs one and thrusts it in his direction. Resigned to his fate Tae downs the bitter liquid. The new warmth provides little relief for the aching in his chest. Ever since the release nothing had been able to fill the empty feeling he had been left with. Reporters calling him naïve about romance had left a nasty taste in his mouth. As inexperienced as he was with love, Tae knew what he should feel when it came along. Downing the remainder of the shots, he turned to scope out the room. That’s when he saw you. It was like his vision narrowed and there was a spotlight directly centred on you. He watched as your hips swayed to the beat and you laughed with your friends. A mere glimpse of you had him captivated. He handed his last empty shot glass to Jimin and made an excuse before making a beeline across the room to where you were dancing.

“Excuse me?” he taps your shoulder to get your attention and you turn to face him.

“Yes” you gaze up at him through long eyelashes and he thinks he might melt.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, I just saw you from by the bar and I think… I think I might die if you don’t dance with me” you giggle at his words, and he thinks it might be the most beautiful sound in the world. You tell your friends where you are going and take his hand. He pulls you as close as he can, unsure of how he got lucky enough for you to say yes. The two of you spend the rest of the night drinking and dancing together. The lights have come on in the club before you even realise how long you’d spent together. Jimin and your friends are long gone. Each checked with you before they left but you assured them you were okay and off they went.

“Can I walk you home?” Taehyung asks timidly.

“Sure” you respond before leading the way. You walk in comfortable silence for a couple of blocks, enjoying each-others company, your hands occasionally knocking together. Around halfway you finally buck up the courage to do something about it. “Hold my hand?” you ask, and he does. It feels like electricity passes between your grasped palms. His thumb traces little patterns over the back of your hand, you can’t help but bite your lip as each circle adds to you growing arousal. The way Taehyung affected you felt like magic.

“I think… I’ve been waiting all my life for you” his whisper is so quiet you almost miss it. You glance up to see him already staring at you. “Is that crazy?” you shake your head a little unable to think of the words to show you were feeling exactly the same way. Your heart stills as his lips crash messily into yours. His hands roam up and down the bare skin of your back, exposed by the deep cut of your dress. The contact makes you shiver before coming to your senses.

“Tae I should tell you… I’m a virgin.” You meet his eyes but find yourself unable to tell what he is thinking. “Please don’t think I don’t want this; I just need you to know before we go any further. His lips meet your again briefly.

“Me too.” He mumbles against your lips. The question in your eyes must’ve been evident in your eyes when you pull away from him. “I’m a virgin too” he clarifies “but I want this, I want you, more than I’ve ever wanted anything” you take a hold of his hand again and start running in the direction of your home. He chuckles as he struggles to keep up with your new speed.

You reach your house in no time. Now reduced to a fumbling ball of limbs as he tries to unzip your dress as you attempt to remove his shirt, all while stealing kisses, refusing to be separated for more than a moment. By the time you reach your bedroom you are fully undressed. Nothing separating you from each-other prying eyes. Tae pushes you back onto the bed, admiring your naked form.

“Beautiful” he breaths before joining you. His lips trail down your neck and over your chest. He finally stops when he comes to your pubic mound “Are you sure? I would wait forever for you if you want me to?” you shake your head and smile.

“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.” He returns your smile with his own boxy grin before diving into your dripping folds. His tongue drags unceremoniously along your slit, causing a wave of arousal to flow through you. His haste displays his inexperience, but you can’t bring yourself to care as pleasure overwhelms you. Your hands travel down to intertwine in his long brown locks. His eyes lock on yours as he sucks at your clit, watching each little reaction, adjusting to account for what seems to cause the most excitement. When you moan, he realises he was wrong about what the most beautiful sound in the world was. Seeing you writhe underneath him causes his cock to throb painfully, he decides right then he wants nothing more than to please you forever.

“Tae…” your moans are a little breathless as you feel the building pleasure in your stomach. A sensation you had only managed to cause yourself before now. You clench around his tongue trying to fight off the oncoming orgasm, just for him to replace the muscle with a finger. The digit curves perfectly against your sweet spot and you unravel, but that doesn’t stop him. Another finger finds its way inside you as he pumps carefully, prepping you. His mouth makes its way back up your body. His tongue laving briefly against your nipples before reaching his goal and connecting his lips back to yours. The taste of yourself on him is intoxicating, it makes you moan into his open mouth. You feel his dick throb against your leg at the new stimulation. You gasp and reach down for him. Once holding him you realise you have no idea where to go from there. He chuckles a little before removing his hand from between you folds and showing you how he liked to be rubbed, you quickly find a rhythm using your own juices from Tae’s hand as lubricant. He becomes a panting mess on top of you as you bring him close to his end.

“I need you now…” he pants removing your hand before he spills too early, “where are your condoms?” you point to your bedside draw, and watch him blush a little as he finds you vibrator hidden next to a stash of condoms. You giggle a little at his reaction and sit up a little. He rips the small plastic packet open and pinches the top of the latex. You move to help him put it on, but he stops you. “If you help this is going to be over a lot quicker than either of us want” he carefully rolls the material down his cock as you watch, getting a little antsy as he takes his time. As soon as he is finished, he pulls you back into his arms, adjusting himself against the headboard of your bed. Your lean up on to your knees so he can position himself underneath you. It takes a few attempts as you struggle to take him in at first, but once he is you lower yourself down at an agonisingly slow pace. He inhales through gritted teeth. The desperation is evident on his face as he focuses on not thrusting the rest of the way into you. Once you reach the base you feel uncomfortably full. It takes you a minute to adjust to the feeling, so you busy yourself with marking the pretty blemish free skin along Taehyungs collarbones. You watch in awe as little purple marks begin to bloom. Slowly you start to bounce in Taehyung’s lap as the pain fades into a strange pleasure. His eyes are screwed shut as you become more confident, moving faster and faster. His hand snakes in between your bodies to fumble with your clit, you grind yourself forward onto his hand, showing him how you like to be touched. It doesn’t take long after this for the familiar twist of an orgasm to reappear in your stomach. A few more thrusts has you melting into him, your sweaty body collapse against his front as he continues pumping himself inside of you, chasing his own finish. After he comes you untangle yourself from his limbs, suddenly feeling very cold from the loss. You make your way to the bathroom to clean yourself off. When you return you find Taehyung putting his clothes back on. You can’t help the disappointment rising in your chest at the prospect of him leaving.

“Aren’t you staying?” your voice is timid, worried you’ll scare him away.

“I will stay for as long as you want me to” he replies moving to take you back into his arms

“Stay with me forever.” He chuckles his agreement and moves to get back into your bed.

“Hold me?” he opens his arms wide and beckons you to him, you slip into his arms, content to never move again.

Masterlist

Other requests from these prompts

#bts fic #bts smut #bts imagines #bts #taehyung smut #v smut #kim taehyung smut #maknae line smut

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crystalracing · 3 years ago

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Archive: The ups and downs of Raikkonen's 2007 F1 title triumphBy:

Adam Cooper

Sep 1, 2021, 8:53 PM

With two races to go in the 2007 Formula 1 season, Kimi Raikkonen appeared down and out. His recovery of a 17-point deficit as McLaren's challenge imploded is one of the greatest comebacks in F1's history and, on the occasion of the Finn announcing his retirement, we dug out the 25 October 2007 Autosport magazine feature explaining his remarkable title season

It took a long time but Kimi Raikkonen has finally won the world championship title that he so clearly deserves. And, of course, it came at the expense of McLaren after his own two near misses with the British team in 2003 and '05.

This was an extraordinary season for the Finn that began with an oh-so-easy victory in Australia that proved to be a false dawn. It was followed by a series of frustrating races that even led some to speculate his future with the team was in doubt. Yet, once everything clicked, Raikkonen was more often than not the man to beat, a position that was obscured by the headline-grabbing battle between Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.

He had a lot of catching up to do. It's hard to believe now that he was as much as 17 points behind Hamilton at the end of the Japanese Grand Prix, with only 20 up for grabs over the final two races. And a few laps into that race, when he languished at the back after a disastrous strategy gamble by the team, he was staring at a title-losing 23-point deficit.

It's easy to overlook how much is involved when a frontrunning driver changes teams. Raikkonen had, after all, spent five full seasons at McLaren, and was used to the Woking team's systems and way of doing things. Moving over from Renault, the team he'd grown up with, Alonso faced similar challenges.

But Raikkonen undoubtedly had the more difficult job, for he was also filling the shoes of Michael Schumacher. In addition, the departure of Ross Brawn meant he was joining a team that was under serious pressure to maintain its equilibrium, and had also lost the advantages conferred by its special relationship with Bridgestone.

Raikkonen was also up against a team-mate who not only had a year's head start, but enjoyed a special relationship with the team boss. It could all have gone horribly wrong - like it did for Alonso - and the fact it didn't was a reflection of Raikkonen's ability to focus on what really matters.

Alonso had a slight advantage over Raikkonen in that he had a day in a McLaren in December, which accelerated the getting-to-know-each-other process. Kimi had to wait until January until he was free to drive a red car for the first time.

There was a limited amount of testing before Melbourne, and a great deal to learn. And perhaps trickiest of all was the transition from Michelin to Bridgestone, something that caught out many drivers.

"The Bridgestones were like playing on a different field," says David Robertson, who co-managed Raikkonen with son Steve. "Kimi and Alonso struggled. Lewis [Hamilton] when he was on the Michelins [in his early McLaren testing] struggled like hell - he couldn't do anything. He went to the Bridgestones, and it was 'this is it!', because that's the playing field he was used to being on. That's what we all believe, that's what Kimi believed."

Raikkonen left the winter-headline grabbing to others, but when he got to Australia things could hardly have gone any better in terms of making his mark with both the team and the tifosi: pole position, victory and fastest lap. Michael who? But he was flattered by circumstances, not least the fact team-mate Felipe Massa had a problem in qualifying and had to fight through the field.

Things got tougher in Malaysia, where the car's performance was compromised, but he took third and some useful points. Massa's early excursion suggested that Raikkonen had already established himself as de facto team leader.

"The Michelins were quite a bit different when you approached the corner and, in order to avoid understeer, you had to use the tyres in quite an aggressive way. With Bridgestone it's completely the opposite so, if you want to avoid the understeer, you need to be more gentle on turn-in" Luca Baldisserri

That perception changed abruptly in Bahrain, where Massa scored an impressive win, and Raikkonen was some way behind in third. "Australia just stunned us all, I think," says his Aussie engineer Chris Dyer. "It was just such an easy weekend. And really you kind of know that that's not going to last. We came back down to earth with a bit of a thud in Malaysia, especially with Kimi struggling there with the engine, so he was pretty much fighting with one hand tied behind his back. And then Bahrain wasn't glorious."

That weekend at the Sakhir circuit had put a negative focus on Raikkonen, and it was evident that all was not well.

"The problems started more in qualifying, to be honest," says Ferrari engineering chief Luca Baldisserri, "because he was not able to put the lap time together. Even in Brazil he was still struggling a little bit. Then he had problems to understand all our systems, to understand the tyres. At that stage we were not fantastic in terms of starts, and we improved quite a lot.

That process was still being explored in Spain, the first of a run of four races during which Raikkonen was to earn just 10 points. At Barcelona he suffered a failure after just nine laps, the first retirement among any of the top runners to date.

Another Massa win confirmed that the Brazilian was on the ascendancy. "That was a pretty bad run," says Dyer. "Spain was an electrical problem - we would have been second or third. We probably wouldn't have beaten Felipe there, but I'm pretty sure it was an easy third, with a probable second."

Having been frustrated by the unreliability at McLaren, Raikkonen was hardly impressed. Keen to get home to Switzerland to watch the ice hockey world championship final on TV, he bailed out of the circuit early. The team had let him go of course, but it created the wrong impression at a bad time. Schumacher would never have done that, we observed. Indeed, that very day Schuey left the paddock three hours after the race - and he hadn't even been driving.

The former world champion was a regular presence at that stage of the season, and there's little doubt that Raikkonen was probably as confused as everyone else about his predecessor's exact role. The Finn clearly bristled at naive questions about how much Michael was helping him. After all, he didn't need any fatherly advice from Mika Hakkinen when he started at McLaren and, at that stage, he had just one year's F1 experience behind him.

Early in Q2 in Monaco, Raikkonen made his most costly mistake of the season, clipping the Swimming Pool barrier with the front right after the back had stepped out on him. A trackrod was broken and a wishbone cracked, and he demonstrated his bravery to the team by insisting he still wanted to go out, and would take responsibility. He was overruled, and forced to start 16th. In a race of low attrition, he made laboured progressed up to eighth.

"That was the mistake he made," says Robertson. "Until that point he was right there. I'd say Monaco was the turning point, despite the mistake. He felt he'd conquered it."

Dyer adds: "Monaco was a strange weekend, with an unforced error. He's been looking pretty good up to then, really comfortable all weekend, really happy with the car. A small mistake, and you pay the price.

"Obviously he was disappointed. We're all disappointed when we make mistakes. We're disappointed when the car breaks down on him, we're disappointed when we don't give him quite the right set-up, and he's disappointed when he doesn't do the job."

The pace of the McLarens was such that Raikkonen would probably have been racing for third in Monaco and there was a similar performance deficit in Canada. This time Raikkonen edged out Massa in qualifying, but he had another poor start, and made life difficult for himself by damaging his front wing on the Brazilian's rear tyre. Later he picked up some of Robert Kubica's crash debris, and he was also delayed by having to wait behind his team-mate at the first stops under the safety car. He eventually finished fifth, after what was outwardly another unconvincing performance. The team felt differently.

"To be honest we weren't that bad in Canada," says Dyer. "We had a dreadful start, and then we got screwed like everybody else by the safety car, so it was never going to be glorious. But the signs through the race were that things weren't as bad as they looked."

Indianapolis a week later was to be even better. It didn't look too promising when Raikkonen made yet another bad start and got stuck behind Nick Heidfeld and Heikki Kovalainen but, in the late stages, he showed impressive speed and set the fastest lap as he salvaged fourth, behind Massa.

"Canada and Indy weren't good results," admits Dyer. "But we would see signs we were making progress."

"The really great thing about Kimi is he suffers for about one hour, and then it's all behind him. It's simple philosophy - and I couldn't do it - which is to say, 'That's behind me now, I can't do anything about it. Let's go forward'" David Robertson

Steve Robertson agrees the US race was significant: "In all honesty, it really clicked at the race at Indianapolis. I think he found his feet there in terms of a car he really enjoyed, and was more to his liking. And from then on I don't think anyone can question the fact that Kimi has been the strongest driver. You can't argue with that."

Nevertheless, after Indy, Raikkonen was 26 points behind Hamilton, and at that stage there seemed to be little hope of stopping the McLaren steamroller. But then things began to swing in his favour. At Magny-Cours he qualified only third, but he got ahead of Hamilton at the start and then made the most of the pit strategy to leapfrog poleman Massa. It was a critical race in many ways, not least because it featured him getting the upper hand on his frustrated team-mate.

"We struggled a little bit earlier in the year with the starts," says Dyer. "And, since Magny-Cours, Kimi's starts have been spot-on. I don't think he's lost a place since then, and more often than not he's gained places. The guys have done a fantastic job with the rest of what's required for the start."

Another win seven days later at Silverstone suggested that Raikkonen might be gaining enough momentum for a title challenge, but Nurburgring was to change that. Significantly, he took his first pole since Melbourne, but then the first-lap rain created a lottery. Raikkonen made his life difficult by understeering out of the pit entry back onto the track, and had to run an extra lap on dry tyres.

Once things calmed down, he was destined for a useful helping of points when he suffered a hydraulic glitch, at the very same track where retirements had cost him two titles at McLaren. It was his second failure of the season - the only other DNF to that point among the top four was Massa's self-inflicted black flag at Montreal.

"It was really gutting for me," Dyer admits. "I'd seen him lose two championships before due to reliability, and it's always been one of our strong points. I was not very happy to think that maybe he was going to lose another one here to reliability."

Robertson says the man himself was unfazed: "The really great thing about Kimi is he suffers for about one hour, and then it's all behind him. It's simple philosophy - and I couldn't do it - which is to say, 'That's behind me now, I can't do anything about it. Let's go forward'."

The next three races featured some efficient points-gathering: an unexpectedly close second to Hamilton in Hungary, another second, to Massa, in Istanbul and a third at Monza on a day when McLaren humbled Ferrari at home.

Baldisserri thinks Raikkonen would have beaten Hamilton in Hungary had he not lost a crucial few seconds when he ran off the road: "He lost two seconds behind Hamilton that didn't allow us to change the strategy in the pitstop, which I think we could have done differently."

Then came Spa, where Raikkonen had won the previous two races for McLaren. He took his third (and final) pole of the season and put in a masterful performance that showed beyond all doubt he was on top of his game.

Top 10: Kimi Raikkonen’s greatest F1 races ranked

A season is fought over 17 races, of course, but arguably it was Fuji that ultimately won Raikkonen the title. After three laps, it looked like he was well out of the game after the team's ill-advised (and, as it turned out, illegal) decision to start on intermediate tyres.

"We took the decision that we took," says Baldisserri. "Until the mathematics put you out of the game, our team spirit is to try, and it was the right approach."

Helped by the safety car, but mostly by a largely unsung virtuoso performance that humbled his struggling team-mate, Raikkonen fought back to third place. He was still in the title picture, but... 17 points in two races?

The impossible dream became a little more likely in China, where he hustled his way past the struggling Hamilton - after keeping his tyres in better shape - and logged a superb wet/dry win. And then came Brazil, where there was only one target: a win, with Massa riding shotgun. Incredibly, all the cards fell into place, and Massa played his supporting role. With six wins to the four of each of the McLaren drivers, no one can deny Raikkonen's claim to the title.

"He did everything right when everybody else was spouting off and saying this or that. He just kept his head down, got on and delivered. That's why Ferrari got him, and I know they're thrilled that he managed to do it" David Robertson

"He's put in some fantastic drives this year," smiles Dyer. "He hasn't let us down, but we've let him down a few times. He's gone from strength to strength, the car's been good, and he hasn't really made any errors in the last two thirds of the season. He's cool and he's fast and he just gets on and does the job."

Robertson adds: "He really is a giant - the right man has won this. He did everything right when everybody else was spouting off and saying this or that. He just kept his head down, got on and delivered. That's why Ferrari got him, and I know they're thrilled that he managed to do it."

Baldisserri offers a fascinating footnote to the season: "Michael had input into the team; he was a lot closer to the team. Kimi has a completely different approach, and he tends to accept what we give to him. It's a lot more complicated for us to understand what he needs. With Michael it was a bit easier. And Kimi drove a very good car this year. Michael showed that even with a car that was not so competitive, he could win. With Kimi, I don't know yet."

Wt happened next?

While Raikkonen's talents have never been questioned, it is remarkable to note since his F1 title-clinching Brazilian GP triumph in 2007, he has gone on to claim a further six grand prix victories, the same total he achieved across his title-winning year.

Despite this, and with the exception of his two years out of F1 in 2010 and 2011, the Finn has never been far away from the sharp end of the F1 grid until his second departure from Ferrari in 2018 to move back to the Sauber-run Alfa Romeo squad.

Raikkonen continues to make F1 history through his longevity. After surpassing Rubens Barrichello's record tally at the 2020 Eifel GP, the Finn made his 341st start in last week's washout Belgian GP and assuming the current TBC 21 November date is filled will end his career on 351 race starts.

PLUS: Why the time is right for Raikkonen to hang up his F1 helmet

While Raikkonen may have never hit the heights of 2007 since, his record remains outstanding in F1 to cement his place as an all-time great.

#Kimi Raikkonen #raikkonen #f1

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sweetsmellosuccess · 4 years ago

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The Best Films of 2020

The 15 Best Films of 2020

Normally, when I assess a full year of cinematic offerings, I consider both sides of that coin — the outstanding entities, and the least successful — but the year of our lord two thousand and twenty provided more than enough misery for all of us, I do believe. Ergo, in my own small way to bring better vibes into the universe, for this year’s round-up, I’m staying solely on the positive tip, highlighting those films whose unfortunate release date during the Year of the Hex shouldn’t preclude them for being fully appreciated. Let’s take a year off from negativity and schadenfreude, shall we, and just stroll amongst the poppies and bright sunshine of some of the best releases of the year.

15. The Invisible Man

“Leigh Whannell’s film is thoroughly modern in approach and sophistication, but the film it most reminded me of was made back in 1944. George Cukor’s Gaslight starred Charles Boyer as a loathsome husband who attempts to convince his already anxious wife (Ingrid Bergman) that she’s going insane by secretly rearranging things in their house and taking things from her so she thinks she’s always misplacing them. He preys on her emotional vulnerability in order to mask his own pathology and emotional detachment. The effect is absolutely enraging: Onscreen, he’s one of the more hateful villains ever committed to celluloid.”

Full Review

14. The Killing of Two Lovers

“From the opening sequence, with a distraught, estranged husband standing over the bed of his wife and her new boyfriend with malice in his heart, and a gun in hand, the film spirals out into incredibly well structured compositions, taking us inside and outside of David’s recurring psychosis, utilizing a bevy of techniques: The framing shrinks down around him, the sound gets muffled, as if underwater, save for the incredibly unnerving metallic sound of cables being stretched taut, and the sickening kathunk of a heavy car door slamming shut.”

Capsule Review

13. Another Round

“Typically, Vinterberg avoids simple conclusions — and God help us all if this film gets picked up by a U.S. studio and remade with, say, Vince Vaughn, Kevin James, Steve Buscemi, and Chris Rock — providing more or less equal examples of the delirious fun drinking with your friends can be (the film opens with a group of high schoolers gleefully doing “lake races” whereby teams compete to drink a case of beer while running around the nearby body of water; and closes with the same teen crew, and some of their teachers, whooping it up in celebrating their graduation); and the horrorshow it can become (one teacher ends up peeing the bed, and on his wife in the process, another wakes up bloodied and out of it in front of his neighbor’s house), leading to very real and horrible consequences.”

Capsule Review

12. Soul

“Co-director Pete Docter is the creative force behind many of Pixar's best titles, having a hand in the Toy Story franchise, WALL-E, Up, and also directing Inside Out, a brilliantly moving treatise on the subject of emotional upheaval. This film, which he co-wrote and made along with fellow co-director Kemp Powers, is his first film back at the helm since that high-water mark, and he has again dug into the fertile earth of our mortality and come back with a particularly vibrant crop.”

Full Review

11. The Burnt Orange Heresy

“Based on the novel by Charles Willeford, the film briskly moves through its paces, clouding the waters with the schemes of duplicitous men, who have sold out any love of art for their greater obsession of cash and prestige. A literary thriller in the vein of The Talented Mr. Ripley, it’s become a genre all too rare in the era of blockbuster bravado. This film will remind you what a mistake that is.”

Full Review

10. Lovers Rock

“In the course of the party, the fuses blow while the house DJ is spinning Janet Kay's "Silly Games," a fan favorite at the time. Undaunted, the guests continue dancing away, singing the lyrics a capella in delirious unison, as McQueen's camera swirls around the living room as if nothing happened. Such a heartfelt moment of unbridled togetherness, putting into distinct bas relief the sense of community we've been denied as a species in 2020, feels like a benediction, an epitaph for the year, and a salve for what we've all been so desperately missing.”

Capsule Review

9. Time

“Ostensibly, it’s about the strain of incarceration on even the most grounded of families (an experience naturally disproportionate for POCs); but, on a deeper level, it’s also about the manner of our use of the limited number of revolutions we get to enjoy situated on this earth. It is a profound knock-out.”

Full Review

8. New Order

“Meet the new boss, only in Michel Franco’s damning portrait of a society locked forever in cycles of oppression, revolution, and new oppression, it makes no difference who you are, what your belief system is, or whether or not you subscribe to a moral set of ethics.”

Capsule Review

7. Dick Johnson is Dead

“Utilizing stunt people and special effects, Johnson kills her father off a number of different gruesome ways, as a means of softening the blow of actually losing him as his mind slowly slips away. This eventually culminates in a final gambit, both acutely painful and deeply moving, in which our sense of things gets seriously upended. As Johnson put it during the post-screening Q&A, the film serves as a “doomed experiment trying to keep my father alive forever.” This film won’t make him immortal, alas, but it does make him indelible.”

Capsule Review

6. Martin Eden

“Marcello packs the film with offbeat bits and pieces of other films, including strips of what appear to be vintage home movies, sometimes in juxtaposition to what Martin is feeling — a group of kids swinging wildly from the bar of a fence, to a full galley ship taking in water and suddenly sinking like an iron ingot – which adds a more winsome, timeless element to the narrative. It’s clearly set in the past, but avoids being too dependent on that particular sense of place and time. Martin is a young man, at first, just coming into himself, and the actions he takes, what he goes through, the film seems to suggest, would be similar in any age.”

Full Review

5. Minari

“The film is certainly charming, but that’s not to diminish its straightforward approach to its characters’ plight. It doesn’t shy away from their difficulties, and as a result, it doesn’t cheat towards smarmy emotional closure.”

Capsule Review

4. Collective

“The breath of hope in the film, when the inept Minister of Health resigns, leading to the placing of a new, emboldened director who works quickly to clean the quagmire left by his predecessors, is just as quickly expelled after the next round of elections, in which the Social Democrat party — the very ones in charge of this catastrophe in the first place — gets re-elected with an even greater majority than what they had before. A perfect reflection of what happens when a government is allowed to exist without any meaningful oversight, other than from a bedraggled press and a disenchanted electorate.”

Full Review

3. First Cow

“Reichardt, a naturalist at heart, is not known much as a humorist, but there is a lightness to her screenplay -- co-written by Jonathan Raymond, her frequent collaborator, who wrote the original novel upon which its based -- that keeps it as sweetly airy as one of Cookie's fried confections. The two friends are so out of step with their surroundings -- the party of men Cookie initially travels with are little more than brutish thugs, and the fort upon which they end up is no better -- they almost had to find each other. They are reunited in the local bar of the fort only because literally every other patron runs out to egg on a brawl between two loutish combatants.”

Full Review

2. Never Rarely Sometimes Always

“Hittman’s eye for detail and emotional complexity — her characters can rarely articulate anything they’re experiencing — is incredibly acute, and she pulls tremendously understated performances out of her two leads.”

Capsule Review

1. Nomadland

“Perhaps no American director since Terrance Malick has made more of the collapsing light of dusk and twilight than Chloe Zhao. Much of her new film, which stars Frances McDormand as a transigent woman (“not homeless, houseless”), who traverses back and forth across the west in her beat up live-in van, doing seasonal work, takes place in that particular kind of vibrant half-darkness that shrouds the desert and its mountains with a magic kind of mystery.”

Capsule Review

Other Worthy Mentions: 7500; Assassins; Bacurau; Beanpole; Beginning; Black Bear; Bloody Nose Empty Pockets; Boys State; Come Play; Emma; Gunda; His House; Horse Girl; I Am Greta; Jacinta; La Llorona; Let Him Go; Limbo; Mangrove; Mayor; MLK/FBI; One Night in Miami…; Palm Springs; Possessor Uncut; Red, White & Blue; Relic; She Dies Tomorrow; Shirley; Shithouse; Shiva Baby; Some Kind of Heaven; Spring Blossom; Swallow; Tenet; The Dissident; The Invisible Man; The Nest; Sound of Metal; The Vast of Night; The Viewing Booth; The Way I See It; Vitalina Varella; Welcome to Chechnya

Inexplicably Underrated: 7500; Shithouse

Biggest Welcome Surprise(s): The Vast of Night; His House; She Dies Tomorrow

The Best Two Films I Saw This Year, Period: Satantango (1994); Harlan County, USA (1976)

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amxwolf · 3 years ago

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Here is why conventional healthful-thinking is not working on Millennials.

Have you ever had that terrifying dream where you are stuck in a dark forest or sketchy alley, frantically running for your life from some kind of feral monster or mad man? Most of us can personally recall at least once being roused from sleep in a cold sweat because their brain had spent the last few hours perfecting the latent image of a made-to-order nightmare. While that experience is certainly not exclusive to Millennials (rather quite the opposite), the waking reaction or at least how it is processed later by this roughly categorized group of mislabeled people is unique to say the least.

For years now, people in marketing have been fervently dissecting and attempting to recreate what has been loosely categorized as "Millennial Humor". And in all of their efforts to connect with this flock of black sheep, the grand majority of them seem to be missing a key factor in the psychology at work here. For all the unwarrantable bilge that modern advertising haphazardly cobbles together, only a small percentage of the nonsense is seasoned perfectly with the secret ingredient. What is this singular spice? Well, while indulgent to profess and speculative, from someone "sitting in millennial class”, it's obvious: A touch of salt.

Never will I sit here and cry to the general public about how unhappy I am that the modern advertising industry is just not scratching my itch for the wares it’s peddling, but I think it's important for us now to look at how this systemic lack of understanding is reaching beyond the world of subliminal profiteering. Society has other significant quality-of-life effecting systems that are also missing the mark when trying to aim and reach out to help this specific group of people. Puns aside, "a touch of salt" as I quipped, is flavoring the lives of a lot of people in their mid to late 20's and early 40's. And the most frustrating and difficult to reconcile attempts that I personally have made to better myself, have been those that were guided by people who just cannot seem to put their brain into that salty head space.

For example, trying to focus on and internalize a well-organized medical presentation about the encompassing negative effects of stress or insomnia and its seemly simple solution of just "changing your thinking", is about as easily digestible as a two-decade-year-old fruitcake for someone who is imprisoned daily by the symptoms of chronic stress. While I may sit there and give listening (ironically) "the old college try", the sound quickly turns to fuzzy white noise the deeper the lecture dives into positive thinking.

You see, Millennials are not generally fluent in positive thinking. More and more of them seem to be speaking a very distinctive dialect of realism, which incorporates a robustly cultivated sense of sarcasm and a somewhat grim shade of hopelessness. A lot of millennials grew up with a laughably poetic twist on "Growing Up" and "Being Successful", which in turn has colored their day-to-day interactions and created this defeatism-culture. Millennials will openly joke about their death as a needed release, their eulogy as a retirement card, or emotionally decompile themselves over something simple like saying "you too" in a situation that doesn't warrant it.

A good percentage of Millennials were old enough to understand the destructive consequences of the most recent housing market disaster on a very personal level; At an impressionable age, watching their own parents, who may have worked excruciatingly hard at the expense of any number of personal or family goals, lose just about everything resonated in a way that cannot be unheard. Then add the borderline criminal and unscrupulous "sheep-shearing" that became common place when the generation was herded off to college, trade school, or other form of career-building education. Not to mention the fact that upon completing said programs, a proverbial "step-in-the-right direction", a substantial number of these "hopeless wanderers" were faced with yet another barbed-wire hurdle when the job market in countless fields were oversaturated with potential employees. Many positions had not been vacated as they normally would have been with the age of retirement being stretched further and further down the road due to increased cost of living and financial demands; the finish line or lap marker was just not getting any closer. To add insult to injury, Millennials, sometimes unbelievably hardworking, are frequently being listed as perpetuators of the clashing reality we have today. This being what the modern media is calling "The Great Resignation"; a dubious combination of a labor shortage amidst an unemployment spike fueled by uncompetitive wages left unchecked, the government's inability to reel in the situation, and a general devaluing of laborers overall.

Oh. And also, we were killing the diamond industry at the same time. Or was it simultaneously the marriage and divorce industry? Wait! I think it was cinema? Or no....maybe it was fabric softener. For a complete dissertation of all the things Millennials brutally murdered over the last two decades, perhaps I'll include a link below if for no other reason to drive my point home.

You have this group of people who are conditioned to endlessly swimming upstream, against the current, with nothing but chastising and bitterness to listen to. So, when it comes to something universal like learning to "sleep better" or "problem solving", the indifferent but somehow time-honored approach of saying "it's as easy as just taking control" is over time if not immediately rejected as dissonant information.

These people don't feel like they have control; some of them feel like they never had any to begin with.

Why is this a problem?

Our society is not developing a taste for "salt" at a pace in which it can prepare social-sustenance for its population. We're not getting any younger, and neither are the generations in front of us.

Millennials are already, by some definitions the mass-population of workers, voters, and other titles that we've yet to embrace. And our lack of interest is not because we do not have a passion for positive change (even on a global scale). Millennials have voiced over time that they feel they are the silent majority amidst a group of people who will not give them breathing room and don't respect the validity of their opinions and ambitions. And it is by no means restricted to one region or country on this planet. This is a global phenomenon.

I could spin a vast yarn about the political ramifications of continuing to exclude the Millennials from the metaphoric Counsel of Elders, but I'm more concerned about the neglect that is spreading elsewhere. We need our leaders in the medical and social fields to really respect and dig deep into how to incorporate "Millennial Thinking" into their treatment and development plans. A large amount of the global population is going to need carefully tailored treatment for things as old as depression, bi-polar tendencies, or schizophrenia as well as newly discovered mental encumbrances like imposter-syndrome.

While “positive-thinking” may have been easily cultivated in the past, we may need to start from a more negative approach and build from there to educate and treat a group of down-on-their-luck millions. Pumping drugs into a populace is not going to permanently patch the leak either, so there truly is precedence for a rehashing of how we should prioritize mental health in modern society.

Stop spending so much time and energy assigning blame to modern technologies and social norms. Are these going away? No? In that case, those things are much like our other daily stresses that are unavoidable. Yes, you can change your nightly routine to de-stress the same way that you can change a job or a daily commute, but there needs to be a fundamental shift in accountability divvied to circumstances out of a person's control rather than scolding them for not being able to manage it.

Do I have all the answers? No.

But this was less about offering a solid a solution and more about opening a dialogue. A starting point.

So yeah. I've had that dream of being chased through the woods by a life-leeching alien. It felt very similar to being sucked dry of my pitiful wages for an education that was at the time, barely panning out. Even now, as a 32-year-old, slightly more successful version of the starving student I've become, I still feel as though my rat race will end when my heart gives out; and all I can hope for is enough money when I drop to cover the ambulance ride to the over-crowded emergency room and a large pit to rot in. But I just hope that the generation behind me has the benefit of a system that understands how to create and sustain “Millennial Inspired” social structures that will allow them to flourish in what little we can leave behind for them.

Also, could you pass the salt?

#rant #millenials #heavy thoughts #random thoughts #seriously though modern mental medicine is a joke

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seokiloquy · 4 years ago

Text

Red Pens Pt 1- Tsukishima Kei

AU: TA -> Co-workers

Word count: 1.7k

*I’m not 100% sure how teacher’s assistants work and they work differently with each school, so just go along with the fake system I created

*Nor do I know anything about physics so you’ll see me dodge some content about that…

Pt 1 | Pt 2

“You are required to have a teacher's assistant,” Tsukishima’s boss said. Tsukishima received a call that morning telling him to go to the Dean’s office after teaching his first class. “It’s part of the program at this university. These T.A.’s are going to be the next professors, the next people teaching. You need to have one.”

Tsukishima frowned and pushed up his glasses. “But teacher’s assistants do all of the work. Aren’t I paid to teach?”

“You are still going to teach,” his boss sighed. “Teacher’s assistants lessen the workload on you. They mark essays and tests, but you still get the final say on everything. Professor's want teacher’s assistants, Tsukishima.”

He didn’t want one. He liked the work. He likes marking tests and essays, helping his students understand their mistakes to improve and rolling his eyes at the assignments he knew were done last minute.

Maybe he could go through all of the assignments and only give his teacher’s assistant the ones that didn’t have any care put into them. Or maybe he’ll give in-depth tests that’ll make them want to quit.

Tsukishima looked up at his boss. “Fine. I want a good one.”

His boss waved him out of the door. “They’re all good, Tsukishima.”

Tsukishima raised from his seat and turned to leave. “Oh, I bet they are.”

Tsukishima fired the first teacher’s assistant.

The second one quit.

The third one was fired too.

And you were the fourth. Fourth time's the charm, right?

Despite your friend’s warnings to not take the teacher’s assistant position, you took it anyways. Once you walked into the room and sat where the T.A. sits, the students gave you a look of pity. One student even came up to you and wished you good luck.

You heard the rumours about Tsukishima's past teacher assistants, that he scolds them constantly during class for not knowing the content when he gives them a chance to teach or that he sends them to get coffee. You even heard the rumour of the last teacher’s assistant asking out Tsukishima and them getting rejected, and being told he doesn’t date teacher’s assistants.

You took the job knowing all of those things. You thought it was odd though, he had an amazing reputation for being a good teacher, one that helped students and listened to their concerns. You had seen it. One of your friends had dragged you to one of his classes to sit in on it and it was captivating. He spoke clearly and casually, made the students laugh and interested in the subject matter, and answered questions with careful consideration.

Also, he wasn’t bad to look at, but you weren’t going to tell anyone that.

Tsukishima arrived a few minutes late and apologized to his class and announced that they were going to start shortly. He saw you sitting in the T.A.’s spot and glared. It wasn’t required for you to sit in for classes since you already had your degree in education and a minor on the subject he was teaching (physics), so it wasn’t like you had to sit there to learn it. However, you didn’t see any reasons to not sit in for his class. It only deepened your understanding of the subject and where they were in the course.

He placed his bag and coat on his desk and walked towards you.

You straightened your back and smiled. “Hello.”

“I didn’t want another T.A.”

You raised your eyebrows. “It’s nice to meet you too. My name is (F/N) (L/N). And, well, you got one. I don’t think you can fire people on their first day unless they seriously mess up and I’m not quitting.”

His eyes narrowed slightly but didn’t glare. You took this as a good sign or at least an okay one.

“You should start,” you said, cutting him off before he could say anything else. “Your students are waiting.”

Tsukishima walked over to the front of the classroom and quieted everyone down, which was surprisingly fast, and gave a short explanation of what they were going to cover in today’s lesson. As the student got out their laptops, he introduced you as the new T.A and began class.

You enjoyed it just as you thought it would. You were tempted to take notes for when you had to mark assignments and tests, but thought that would give him a bad impression of you.

Halfway through the lesson, Tsukishima turned to you, a barely visible smirk on his lips, but you saw it.

He asked you a question regarding the material, testing whether or not you knew what was going on. Everyone’s eyes went to you. This is how he fired the first teacher assistant. He complained to the Dean that he didn’t want a teacher’s assistant that didn’t know the course content and that it would negatively impact the students.

You hesitated for a second, preparing your answer — it wasn’t an easy question.

“Do you not know?” He asked.

“No,” you said calmly, “I want to give out a fully thought out answer.” You paused for another moment and said your answer.

He looked at you and then carried on.

You went through a couple of classes like that, Tsukishima asking you questions sporadically, giving you a second to think about it, and you answering. Sometimes he saw students write down your answers or nod to what you were saying. Some would add on to your comment and it would derail the class, but always in a good direction.

You were still sitting at the desk when class was over like you did every day just in case he needed you to do something. He did ask you to get coffee for him, but he always gave you enough money to get one yourself. He only gave you tests to mark instead of essays. You could tell he didn’t trust you yet. You understood that, especially as an aspiring teacher, you definitely would want to double-check your teacher assistant’s work because you thought they would do it well.

Over the next few weeks, you and Tuskishima had found an unspoken rhythm. You worked well together. You haven’t been fired, nor did you quit. You were reliable with your knowledge on the content, clearly shown when he picked on you, even though most teacher’s assistants stayed quiet during the classes, sometimes he would stop you on your way out and ask your opinions on marks for students or their work.

Today, he had asked you to stay back. Tsukishima went behind his desk for a minute and took out a large stack of papers. He carefully placed it on the table in front of you and handed you a red pen.

“These are the student’s essays from last week,” he said. “Mark them please.”

“You want me to mark essays?” You asked, numbly taking the pen from his hand.

“Yes? You’re a teacher’s assistant aren’t you?” He turned around and sat in his chair. He reached under his desk and brought up another stack of papers. “Unfortunately, I don’t have the time to do all these myself, so I created a system. I try to double-check things I mark because even I make mistakes, I'll do this pile, you do that pile, and then we switch when we’re done.”

You nodded. “Do you want me to write any comments or just read it and give a grade at the top?”

He leaned back into his chair, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Do you not know how to mark essays?”

You rolled your eyes slightly. “Of course I do. Most professors have different ways of marking so I want to know the way you prefer it.”

Tsukishima grabbed an extra red pen from his desk. “Are there professors who don’t add comments?”

“You’d be surprised,” you laughed. “I’m assuming you add them then?”

He nodded and started marking.

Your red pen was flying across the paper. You added constructive criticisms as well as praises when something was well written. Since Tsukishima was the final mark decision-maker, you added a tentative mark to the top of the page in pencil and when you looked over at his desk you saw that he was doing the same thing, awaiting the second opinion.

It was closing toward eight at night when you finished your stack. You leaned back and closed your eyes yawning, rubbing your hand that now stung from all of the writing.

He was done his stack a few minutes before you and was rubbing his hand as well. He grabbed the papers off his desk and brought them over to you, sitting in the empty chair beside yours.

“Double checking is easier,” he said, pushing up his glasses. He does that a lot, you noticed. “You look through it and make sure there isn’t anything the other person missed. When we’re done we’ll just put in the final mark.”

“You want my opinion on the final mark?” You asked, taking a snip of your now cold coffee.

He shrugged. “Why not? It’s always good to get a second opinion.”

He was right, double-checking was easier. It only took you about an hour and a half to go through all of them, only stopping when there was a question about the mark given or the comments. He would laugh at the first few essays and say that you were a hard marker.

He decided that most of your marks were sound, only giving a few percent increase or decrease and each time you asked why he did it.

It was almost eleven when you were completely done. You had your jacket on and your bag around your shoulder.

“I’ll see you next week,” you said and headed for the door.

“Wait.”

You turned around. Tsukishima turned off the lamp on his desk and caught up to you. “Do you want to grab coffee?”

You yawned. “Sure. Do you want your usual? I’ll bring it to you for the morning class on Monday.”

He grabbed your arm, turning you to face him fully. “Not for me. Do you want to get coffee with me.”

You looked up amused. “I thought you don’t date teacher’s assistants.”

He let go of your arm and laughed. “You heard about that?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll make an exception for you.”

You laughed but shook your head. “Wait until I’m a teacher.”

Thank you for reading! I hope that you and your family are staying safe!!! There could probably be a part 2 for this, but I like the way it ended - Kiwi

Posted: 03/07/2020

#Haikyuu x reader #tsukishima kei #tsukishima x reader #Haikyuu #x reader #oneshot #oneshots #haikyuu oneshots #haikyuu reader insert #reader insert #aus #haikyuu aus #fluff #haikyu #anime x reader #anime #manga x reader #manga

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angryschnauzer · 4 years ago

Text

Who wants a Schnauz family update? No-one? Ha, tough, you’re getting one.

So Little Dude had his scan/ultrasound on his Kidneys and Bladder. The infection has gone, no scarring to his kidneys. However as his symptoms continue we are still going for futher tests.

Anyway, so he starts school on 8th Sept, has a blast. His scan was on the 9th so he was only in school that morning. In school on Thurs 10th, but was very tired that afternoon, and in the evening develops a very snotty nose, and is showing signs of a cold.

Friday morning i know he’s a bundle of snot and looking quite run down, so decide to keep him off school and let him rest (he’s only 5, and going from 6 months of sitting on his butt to 7 hours of running around, plus mixing with 60 other kids, he’s going to no doubt pick up the usual cold bugs). Because of his ongoing health issues i ring his doctors office, but end up speaking to a triage nurse as no doctors telephone slots available. I confirm he shows no signs on Covid. We haven’t been in contact with anyone (knowingly) with Covid. Both my husband and I work from home. And you know what the nurse says to me?

“Well although he’s not showing any signs or symptoms, get a test and i’ll put it in his notes”

NO. You guys don’t understand what’s going on in the UK at the moment. Firstly, because everyone EXCEPT the government knew that the return to school would spike all the normal colds, coughs, and general snottyness of children mixing together, some of which will show as signs of Covid, there will be a spike in requests for tests. But they didn’t prepare for it. Its not the NHS that are doing the testing, it’s been subcontracted out to a private company (whose major shareholders are Conservative MP’s). So now we were put in the situation where because someone at the NHS has marked it down on Little Dude’s notes that we were going to get a test, unless we wanted to isolate for 14 days, we needed tests. All of us. Little Dude has signs of ADHD and we need him to be in a educational setting to help him with this. I couldn’t despatch any orders during this time.

Should someone report us for breaking isolation protocols, its a £2000 fine PER PERSON.

We tried for 3 days straight applying online through the ‘world renowned’ system to book a test. We would get one come up and you’d click book, then... nothing. It was only because my husband has got his head screwed on that he realised we should get a confirmation email or text, and he spent another 45 minutes on the phone to their helpdesk only to discover that if you don’t get a email/text, then ‘someone else got your slot and you need to try again’.

Then the only tests that came up were hundreds of miles away or on a small island that needed a ferry to get to. Trips which we wouldn’t be allowed to get out of the car for at all, with a sick child in tow.

After literally 72 hours of trying, we finally got ‘test at home’ kits. They arrived Monday night. Which was around the time that Little Dude was fully recovered from his cold. Like, completely better. Bouncing off the walls. Not a booger in sight.

It takes until FRIDAY to get our results back, which are all negative unsurprisingly. In fact Little Dude’s result came in at 7am... however mine and hubs didn’t get sent until late afternoon, so LD missed yet another day of school.

All this because a NHS staff member openly acknowledged that none of us showed signs of Covid, but she told us to get tests anyway, knowing that if we said no we would have to isolate for 2 weeks. Tests that could be used by key workers, Hospital staff, teachers, emergency services workers, casual workers that are paid cash day by day off the books.

I am so fucking angry, the NHS has been nothing but utter shit for us for so many years, it couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery, and all it does is add more stress to our lives. I can only thank that we have the space on the credit card to move Little Dude’s care to private hospitals, but at £500 per appointment, we’re going to be in for a massive bill at the end of this.

In other news my foot has now healed and i am actively avoiding treading on and twisting my ankle on any crabapples on my driveway.

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huntermagazine362 · 3 years ago

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Picture 5 of 20Grammarly’s mistake improvements were very easy to see contrasted to other on-line grammar checkers. Photo 6 of 20Grammarly found a lot more content-based mistakes than various other on-line grammar checkers. Photo 7 of 20Grammarly sends out regular reports with updates concerning your most typical blunders as well as the number of words you inspected.

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Image 9 of 20I suched as that Grammarly allows you set a creating genre, which transforms how you could edit your job. Photo 10 of 20Compared to various other on-line grammar checkers, I located Grammarly regularly discovered more errors and also made much better recommendations. Photo 11 of 20It takes a few seconds for Grammarly to refine your record.

This way, I really did not need to wait for it to refine my text several times. Image 13 of 20I had Grammarly check student work as well as a sentence error test file I produced to see the amount of sorts of mistakes it could capture. It surpassed other grammar checkers. Photo 14 of 20I suched as exactly how simple it was to approve Grammarly’s recommendations from the program, online or in Word documents.

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I found this helpful when blogging about different products on the internet. Picture 16 of 20Grammarly offers numerous strategies, however they are rather expensive month to month. Photo 17 of 20The free version catches fewer mistakes than the paid-for version, yet I advise using it for at the very least a little while since Grammarly will email you discounts for the costs variation.

The company prepares to launch an Android version quickly. Photo 19 of 20Grammarly has a robust, searchable Frequently asked questions web page where you can find help with any troubles you might have with the program. Photo 20 of 20Grammarly’s on the internet text box mosaic was the least intrusive and also least disruptive of the software program we tested.

Compared to the competitors, it isn’t as buggy or sluggish, and also it captures more errors as well as offers excellent suggestions for repairing them. Grammarly is specifically handy if you have a respectable take care of on grammar as well as spelling currently as well as know what you’re doing. I’m not exactly sure I ‘d suggest this program to English language learners, pupils or creating beginners.

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I ran Grammarly with a handful of tests and also used the program in my day-to-day writing for over a month to get a feeling of exactly how handy it is. The software discovers comma mistakes easily, which is among one of the most typical errors I saw as a writing teacher.

For the tests, I created a paper which contained sentences with common English grammar errors along with student-written sentences that consisted of errors or negative routines to avoid when composing. Grammarly racked up a 60 percent detection price, which, while not excellent, blew the competitors out of the water; the next best rating was 30 percent from ProWritingAid. Grammarly has a free version, which works, however the service desires you to update and is regularly advising you concerning all the features you’re losing out on.

As a result of this, I wouldn’t recommend installing the program unless you intend to upgrade to premium. Once you’ve registered for the totally free version, Grammarly begins sending you e-mails for discounts on the premium plan, so I likewise suggest awaiting those before you update to the full cost choice.

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You can after that scroll via the doc to deal with mistakes. In instance a mistake confuses you, the system offers a short description for its tip. While useful for somebody skilled in grammar and also punctuation, these aren’t fairly finding out devices. They operate a lot more like tips. When you acquire the costs version, you obtain weekly standing updates that let you recognize exactly how you’re doing, which I believed was a wonderful function.

With Grammarly, it’s ideal to wait until you complete making up before you inspect for mistakes. Despite the fact that it is better at checking your job as you go than any various other program, there’s a lag in its ability to register when you’re repairing typos on your very own. Therefore, you’ll intend to wait to click through the testimonial instead of try to edit within the message box or electronic record.

Among the aspects that makes Grammarly the most effective choice for an on the internet grammar mosaic is exactly how easy it is to use on various internet apps and also in Microsoft Word. Unlike other grammar checkers, the application isn’t invasive, and it appears in texts boxes online. A number of the other programs I assessed made it tough to properly determine the trouble message, however Grammarly’s red highlighting is easy to see as well as clearly marks where the mistake is.

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The site after that redirects you to a suite where you can read the message in your e-mail or message with more information and also useful input from the checker. There’s a short lag while the software application analyzes your material, and it adds a couple of additional steps to your creating process. Nonetheless, Grammarly’s helpful and also proper recommendations trump the minor delay.

You can compose and save records within Grammarly if you would certainly like, and you can also mount an application on your phone to check your composing on the move. While I think Grammarly functions far better than its competitors, its price is a little much. It sets you back just under $30.00 for the premium version every month.

The cost of the solution is reduced when you pay in advance for longer amount of times. The yearly strategy is the finest offer if you can manage parting with $139.95 upfront. You can change to any of these plans whenever you would certainly such as, so I suggest trying the monthly version for some time prior to committing to the quarterly or annual strategies.

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This is really helpful because you utilize different voices when writing for different target markets, and it’s great that Grammarly can adapt to different kinds of tasks. The application also makes it very easy to ignore its advice, which is especially practical if the software obtains glitch in your paper, which occurs occasionally.

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I located this feature helpful when I utilized unusual terms planned for an interior audience. Registered subscribers can get 24-hour support from Grammarly’s site via a demand attribute. If you can’t discover the answer you require on the searchable Frequently asked questions page, the system motivates you to send a ticket. The solution guarantees to reply to your issue within a day.

From the homepage, you can develop or upload files as well as edit them straight. You can additionally add a Grammarly extension in Microsoft Word. While I found this grammar checker the least invasive as well as buggy, there were times I had to await it to tons, and often it didn’t immediately sign up the adjustments I made within the paper.

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Grammarly is a good device that can assist you prevent typos when working online. It’s not fairly excellent sufficient to keep those who aren’t confident in their composing abilities from making large errors in their material. It also includes a couple of extra actions to your writing process, and also there is a small hold-up while the system checks your job.

I suched as having another collection of eyes on my work, and utilizing the program gave me added self-confidence prior to I sent my writing to my editor. While it’s nice not to miss out on a comma in an e-mail or while publishing on social networks, I’m not certain the program deserves its hefty price month-to-month, especially if you’re a newbie looking to discover more about writing.

This Grammarly testimonial will certainly dive in deep with benefits and drawbacks to completely unload just how this system can be of usage to. Understanding these facets will certainly be necessary in determining if Grammarly fits your needs or otherwise – Download Grammarly For Wps Office. If you are considering making a dedication to this application, be sure to do the research.

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This makes editing and enhancing and examining your work much quicker than conventional approaches. Instead of inspecting at the end, you will see today if you have actually made a mistake or blunder. This is particularly helpful if you neglect to strike that “check punctuation and grammar” switch prior to submitting job. Rather, you can transform as well as approve the errors as well as errors as they occur, developing a clean outcome.

There’s no requirement to track the blunders as well as double back. Grammarly does the help you. You can likewise hover over the suggested blunders to see if you need to accept it or otherwise. Human beings make errors. If we really did not, we would not need Grammarly or other spell checker tools. Fortunately, the Grammarly editor is highly exact as well as does not make a great deal of blunders.

Some suggested mistakes might not be appropriate. However, this is rarely when it concerns Grammarly solutions. When it concerns performing reliable grammar checks, precision is important for the last item. Grammarly does even more than right basic errors. The program additionally discusses the errors. This can help you to enhance as well as to gain from blunders for future job.

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This is different than conventional grammar checks like those in Microsoft Word. Word processors do not always explain why something is incorrect. The descriptions from the program come in two alternatives. A quick-view can give a short bit of the modification. From there, you can accept the change and continue your means.

This aids in discovering what the error is, why it is a mistake, as well as just how to remove the error (Download Grammarly For Wps Office). Using Grammarly regularly will help in recognizing where to put commas and enhance sentence wording. Overall, it will certainly aid you come to be a stronger writer. At the end of the day, it’s a great source for individuals that not just write frequently yet are looking for to progress authors.

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Grammarly allows you to select a favored language. It also lets you determine which sites to utilize Grammarly on and also include new words to the dictionary. Including words to the dictionary is great if you regularly utilize vernacular, brand, or acronyms. This can be valuable especially for individuals in the marketing field.

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This software program is relatively easy to use regardless of what your degree of technical abilities could be. Once you install the plugin or extension, you are great to relocate forward!Grammarly will highlight incorrect grammar or words. From there, you hover over it to see what the suggested change is as well as choose to approve it or not.

Grammarly is wonderful for individuals that discover grammar is not in their convenience zone. It’s a very easy option that creates top quality outcomes. Grammarly has app versions that can be downloaded and install as well as utilized on mobile phones. Grammarly is offered on both Android and iPhones. It sets up a key-board especially for inspecting errors while on your phone.

Grammarly is not for every person and every kind of usage though. Depending upon your area of work, writing needs, and chosen systems, you may be able to avoid Grammarly completely. Particular features can be enhanced and also ought to be thought about before deciding to use Grammarly. Grammarly does collaborate with many websites but not with whatever.

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If you regularly use Google docs, Grammarly could not be that valuable for you. Grammarly is likewise not compatible with Microsoft products, like Word, on Mac laptops. Grammarly is currently in beta testing for Google docs compatibility. However, as of right this writing, it is not a solidified feature – Download Grammarly For Wps Office. Grammarly is suitable with Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Side.

This works if you require to prevent regularly pasting e-mails, social media web content, and also various other infiltrate a word processing program to figure out if it is suitable for publishing. Grammarly is also compatible on platforms like Facebook Carrier, Slack, Salesforce, LinkedIn, and Jira. While it does cover a great deal, the Grammarly free version is still rather restricted.

If you just need fundamental grammar punctuation, you will certainly be good to go. For some people, this is sufficient. If you are simply aiming to have an e-mail proofread, the totally free version will certainly supply in this capacity. The checks are more extensive than word processors, so it does still offer enough protection.

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the-ventriloquizt · 5 years ago

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an arnold wesker characterization change fr me... been thinking about this one for a while, glad to get it into words, i hope its at least a little coherent, but it is almost 1 am and i started writing this at 11 pm

arnold wesker is not a system, but instead has such an aversion to his real life that he sort of... roleplays his way through everything, playing himself and whatever puppets he has on hand, as a way of coping with how awful his world is

while scarface may be one of gotham's most potent bad luck charms, he's not much more than that: bad luck. arnold gave him his kooky backstory with the 300-something damned souls inside one super evil doll thing, and he only adds onto the lore as more puppets are introduced to accompany him: socko, who is jealous of scarface and feels he'd be way better as arnold's partner, and lola, who takes over as another way for arnold to be loud and rude to others without it being blamed on him, though she does it with much more charisma and less shooting people.

arnold doesn't feel as if he has a choice in any of his puppet's actions as his life-long roleplay session goes on, because he's convinced himself that it's not his fault what they do, because they're their own characters and he's just there for the ride, back-seat driving the plot forward. without his puppets, arnold can't really figure out his own personality, what role he's supposed to play, because he's depended so much on being the negative space of whatever puppet he's with. if he's not petrified by indecision and anxiety by the loss, he clings to whoever is safest and loudest, playing yes-man until he can get his hands on something he can make a character out of and re-establish control over a situation.

even out of mob business, arnold has a hard time living without a puppet with him, someone to speak for him and spend time with him without the fear of interacting with people he doesn't know, as with lola and croaky (rip). lola allowed him to be crass and rude and vent about what he'd dealt with in the mob business without any blame on him, and croaky covered him in compliments and pleasant speech and company, allowing him to express a self-love and care that doesn't come naturally to him.

scarface is so bad because arnold's put as much of his self-hate, internalized abuse problems, hatred of others, and fear of the mob into the character, and every time arnold recognized just how bad everything had gotten due to his actions, scarface would only get worse as the character fed on the self-hate. poor arnold thought he'd never get away from the mob, and he made it so the only way to get away from the mob was to get into the mob and out-do it, painted as individual incidents that snowballed into him roleplaying one of the scarier members of gotham's underground, and feeling he couldn't stop.

before the introduction of puppets cementing the behavior, arnold already had problems with daydreaming his way through life and numbing his interactions with the outside world with alcohol. he couldn't hold relationships for long, and he tried to play it off as if he just wasn't interested, but really he felt he couldn't properly hold onto anybody and that it was a forgone conclusion that they'd leave him. didn't help that he'd been in a great number of abusive relationships in a desperate attempt to try and fill a growing need for closeness that just kept getting more and more ravenous. it was part of the reason why he became a cabaret singer; he'd get the affection and attention without having to dedicate his time to individuals, not having to give back beyond a kiss mark on a note or a photograph with a fan, and as such, rarely rejected.

neglected by his aunt yet kept to live with her into his early 30's up til her death, feeling as though the mobster's life his parents had been caught up in was an inevitability on the horizon, trying and failing constantly to form relationships with real people... given the chance, arnold sank into the fantasy world that unfolded in front of him with scarface's appearance and rarely comes out. when he's forced out by circumstance, he's bitter and overwhelmed, often sobbing openly or making cruel commentary about whoever's nearby, possibly to egg them into fighting him or rejecting him in some way.

while feeding into arnold's fantasies can backfire, many of arkham's doctors have found that giving him small bits on good head days, such as saying 'scarface said he missed you today' or 'scarface told me to give you this' and giving him a gift, has slowly changed some of scarface's interactions with arnold, though it hasn't really helped anybody else outside of the fantasy. that's still a work in progress.

#arnold wesker #scarface #long post #alcoholism #abuse #again i hope this is coherent

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loulougoingsolo · 5 years ago

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There is no limit

Earlier this week, I stood in the preserves aisle of my local grocery store, contemplating whether I should buy a jar of peanut butter or not. I’ve never really gotten into the PB&J thing, but I had a phase a while ago, inspired by Link, when I tried it. I don’t think I like peanut butter with jelly, but with fresh banana and toast, it’s quite a treat - and I don’t even like bananas on their own. I decided not to buy another jar, and now I feel I should have, just so I could try to make ravioli with it. I haven’t had a chance to watch Mythical Kitchen make the pizza yet, but I think that might have some actual potential - maybe not as a main dish, but maybe a dessert.

But today’s GMM is all about peanutbutter and jelly, in everything but the sandwich. Not only have we loads of tasty new dishes to try, but the episode makes an excellent team building excercise, because instead of ranking the foods themselves, Rhett and Link have to figure out, which crew member doesn’t like which dish.

Tasting the limits sounds like a new series, and based on this first edition, I’m all for it. The tasters with average tastebuds today are Kevin, Bethany, Davin and David. Based on the initial expressions on their faces, Kevin is excited to be a part of this game, Bethany is not hungy, someone forgot to ask Davin if he wants to be in this, and David is thinking about the upcoming weekend.

I’m a lover of the aesthetics, and the first dish, PB&J ravioli, looks amazing. Especially in the previous decades, as a vegetarian, I’ve stumbled upon some pretty strange veggie main dishes, like pizza with canned peach, or a salad with so many berries and fruit that it was borderline fruit salad, so in my books, this sounds like a real dish. At least peanuts have some protein in them, so what is there not to like?

Oh, Davin doesn’t like peanut butter. No wonder he looked so unenthusiastic. Did David just finish the entire plate?

This must not be an easy game for Rhett - he has to wait for everyone else to eat before him, while staring at an “erect” burrito (his words, not mine). It’s a good thing he has all that facial hair, or he’d be salivating on his plate.

A burrito with all those fillings would be hard to ruin, no matter what extra you put in it. Vegetarian Bethany tricked the system by tasting the non-meaty part of the roll, which means, all three remaining tasters continue to the next round. I feel sorry for Davin, who has to sit and watch while the others try more culinary treats. (I’d dropped out at this point, and based on what’s to come, I wouldn’t have missed a thing.)

I could maybe get pass the purple eggs in the third round, but them being runny is too much for me - not to even mention ham (oh, and I think Rhett brought out Dr Seuss because of Green eggs and Ham, because eggs and ham). But seriously, runny eggs are gross. I’ve never understood why Eggs Benedict are a thing to begin with.

I love it when Link thinks he knows the correct answer:

And turns out he’s all wrong. Bethany’s out, and the last round is between Kevin and David - and a nasty looking salmon:

It would have made the stripes more appropriate, if Josh had used rainbow trout to make this dish - since he calls them a rainbow. I’m not technically opposed to the idea of using either peanut butter or jelly to spice up a fish, but despite the happy stripes, this fish looks like it went through a tragic death and all of it’s innards spilled out.

So the result with which Rhett and Link tie the game is negative one, but when it comes to using peanut butter and jelly in other foods, the limit does not exist.

In More, after hearing another epic 10-word story, “Slowly, Mark philosophisized about tricky ways to boink a dragon(s)”, we get to watch Rhett and Link make sculptures out of peanut butter. We also hear the first few chapters of Rhett’s new book, “12 ways to boink dragons”.

I had to go searching the GMM episodes after Stevie mentioned Rhett trying to sculpt a rocket blindfolded. I assume the episode was the one where they used modeling clay, but there is no rocket - which must mean the rocket part had to be edited out (a rocket sculpted blindfolded can really go wrong quite easily, so it makes sense).

Talking about accidental phallic sculptures...I went to ceramics class yesterday, and opposite me, there was an older lady making a lantern, which had a tall narrow house shaped over a milk carton, and while I was sculpting my own planter, she decided to add a yard and a fence to her construction. After a while, I glanzed over to her side of the table, and the tall house now had a yard neatly fenced, but instead of making her picket fence angled, she had made a two-part rounded fence, and from where I was sitting, it looked very...di*k-like.

The first way to boink a dragon:

Sneak up on it,

Tap it on the shoulder,

Say: ”Would you like to boink?”

Not only was Rhett’s task of sculpting a turtle a million times easier than Link’s Thinker, but I also think his peanut butter was firmer. I would never have been able to guess what Link’s piece was, but although he went through some interesting phases, technically, the final product is pretty accurate, at least if you stretch it a little (photo of the actual Thinker is from here):

Unfortunately, Rhett doesn’t get through all of the ways to boind dragons in this episode, but I bet he has the book ready for when he goes out to play DnD. It would be interesting to know what happened to Link when he just decided to leave the set at the end. Did he think they stopped filming? Has anyone seen him since?

#gmm #gmmore #gmm 1684 #rhett and link #peanut butter and jelly #sculpting peanut butter #boinking dragons #missing link

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booyaxboy · 5 years ago

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Thoughts on The Surge

If you ask any Dark Souls fan what that game was missing, somewhere on list someone is boud to say “robots”. Action/RPG title The Surge attempts to tackle this exact issue. Released in 2017 The Surge is the second attempt by Deck 13 to make its mark on a relatively new genre.

WHAT IS IT?

In the simplest terms The Surge is a “Soulslike” or an Action/RPG title with an emphasis on timing and the conservation of precious resources against relentless foes, each more devious than the last. Where The Surge blazes a new trail is the added layer of having to target and sever specific limbs off enemies in order to collect their sweet sweet loot. Like all Souls-likes defeating an enemy rewards the player with currency that can exchanged for upgrades to their character or gear with ever increasing cost, known here as “scrap”. Engaging with the limb targeting system will also reward the player with new gear and upgrade materials. The system is simple: decapitating an enemy wearing a helmet will reward the player with said helmet, if the player doesn’t already own it. If that piece is already part of your collection than the player is rewarded in upgrade materials that correspond to that particular body part. If the arms are targeted there is the added bonus of collecting a new weapon or weapon upgrade materials. Each part (head,body, arms, legs and weapons) uses their own unique material so there is no worry of overlap, and any farmer of materials can be focuses with no worries of a random drop not given you what you need. There are also many enemies that may not have armor equipped, these areas can be stuck for bonus damage bring the fight to a quicker close. The system even extends to non-human enemy types, as different parts of the robot enemies can be targeted and broken to slow them down or reduce their offensive vocabulary.

The Surge is also visually distinct from the Souls games that inspired it. This adventure trades the Souls medieval fantasy swords and sorcery setting for a high tech future of robots and exo suits. The story begins with a man named Warren who signs up for a new job with tech giant CREO. Warren begins the game bound to a wheelchair but thanks to the exo suit technology of his new position is able to walk again. The player takes control after the surgery to graft the exosuit to Warren’s body goes very, very wrong. Instead of being put under for the operation the automated process begins with Warren fully conscious and what could only be described as pure torture plays out. Screws and bolts are drilled directly into his body, including his head, until Warren eventually passes out. The game begins in earnest an unknown amount of time later when Warren awakes in junkyard with most of the CREO facility in ruins. From here its up to the player to survive against malfunctioning robots, exosuit wearing psychos, and a militaristic security force trying to keep Warren from unraveling the secret of what CREO was really up to.

THE NEGATIVES

The biggest issue that I had was, funnily enough, with the mechanics of the combat. Not the controls or the UI elements, but with the invisible numbers behind the scenes. Back when I first tried Dark Souls I got a grip on the flow of combat fairly early. After leaving the initial tutorial area I wandered, like many into the nearby graveyard. Unlike the enemies in the tutorial zone that felt in line with my stats, the skeletons in the graveyard were taking whole chunks of my health with a single attack with I did barely any damage at all. I had come into Souls knowing its reputation for difficulty, but this initial outing led me to think that difficulty came from a lopsided power curve opposed to any form of elegant design. I eventually figured out by watching a Let’s Play that I was heading the wrong way, and would go on to become a fan of the series. The surge is this first feeling of lopsided stats, but through the whole game. No enemy save the small drones is more than 2 hits away from taking Warren down. But said drones are never alone, and should a hit land they present a very real threat of stun locking the player until a heavier hitting baddie finishes the job. The amount of times I was one-shot but a scrub level enemy was absurd, and the amount of ambushes that occur mean there will be many a loading screen between being able to learn what you did wrong and being able to execute what you learned. Unlike in Souls when each level up gave the player a slight boost in defense, The Surge’s upgrades are tied to a plug-in system. Health and stamina boost, healing items, and this game’s version of a ranged attack are all mapped to one of a limited number of slots, and limited in effectiveness by the players power level. They system works and brings something new to the table (more on that later) but having any kind of survivability meant loading up on health boosters and heals, leaving little to no room from anything else not related to being able to tank 3 hits at a time. I can see advance players being able to do without the boosters, and a no damage run is definitely possible, but for a newcomer learning the games patterns and traps it was choice between limiting add-on to health or getting very familiar with the games loading screen.

Other smaller issues are present as well. The game takes place entirely in the CREO complex, as such doesn’t have a lot of diversity when it comes to environments. Warren moves from on ruined concrete structure to a darkened factory and back again. Literally back again, close to a full third of the game takes place backtracking through a single manufacturing complex at different points of the story. Each of the locations is also honeycombed with identical maintenance tunnels, that can keep the player running in circles if they are not careful. Adding to the confusion is a lack of general direction with level design. While most times it works fine just working through the path of least resistance, there were two spots in particular where I had to look up what my next move should be, due in combination of a lack of signaling that I should return to a previous zone and the level’s labyrinthian design preventing the game from presenting a clear goal. The visuals area to area are so similar it prompted by wife to ask, after three evenings in a row, if I had made any progress at all as what was on screen now was so similar to what was there all week, despite my location in the game being two zones later.

The sameness of the environment also bleeds into the enemy roster. An overwhelming majority of the foes in Warren’s way are other humans in different armor types with one of a limited type of weapons. Most of the games later half has Warren facing off with the CREO security force, all wearing identical armor and weapons. One new heavy variant is introduced in the second to last area, but that is also a de-powered copy of boss from just minutes before that area. They are also flanked drones, but even those are just palette swaps of enemies seen through the whole game. The truly imaginative designs come in the games last area with two new types of enemy. Both are based on nanomachines: one a shape shifting blob and the other another humanoid, but one that can change his armor locations and weapon type on the fly. Of course the earlier statements of difficulty by numbers holds true, and I never bothered engaging any blobs that weren’t immediately outside a safe room due to the myriad of ways an encounter could go south.

THE POSITIVES

If it seems like I’m down on this game I’m not, it’s just kinda like that friend you only want around occasionally because he gets really aggressive for no reason, makes every one else really uncomfortable and once in a while breaks something, but mostly he’s a good time.

The general feel of combat is the games strongest point. Weapons, even those in the same class, feel distinct thanks to variations of moveset. Animations and sounds create a visceral portrait of the future that had me looking for the next fight. The aforementioned upgrade system allows for a wide range of experiments without worrying about being locked into a build, if the player is competent enough to shed some of the health upgrades. Even in the face of the blandness of the levels, the intricate design of each on a wireframe level was very cool. Following the path forward would eventual cut back into itself, unveiling a shortcut back to the level’s safe room. If a player got the layout down then no destination was more than a minute or so away, despite a level being hours long from start to end.

An undeniable win was the games approach to boss battles. Each fight could be approached is classic video game style, hit the guy till the bar goes away, or in a new way unique to each fight. Fighting a bibedial machine not unlike the big thing from Robocop I was able to trick its own homing missiles to hit the boss instead. A late game example was being able to trick a boss into damaging the environment around us to prevent reinforcements from joining the fight.

THE SUMMARY

The Surge was worth the time I put into it at the end. I can’t say it was worth the money, as I got the game for free through Xbox’s Game Pass program. It presented a new wrinkle in the Souls-genre and unlike the studio’s last outing, Lords of the Fallen, kept me interested enough to see it through to credits. The game presents a challenge for those looking for one, and the number of options presented to the player makes the road to success feel like your own despite the limited number of actual options. Fights are tense, enemies are readable if overpowered, but no challenge ever feels impossible despite seeming unfair.

Overall: Positive

[+] Intense, gritty combat is always engaging

[+] Criss crossing level design makes every shortcut a welcome sight, and keeps whats around the next corner a mystery.

[+] Limb targeting for loot makes farming player driven without the worry of random drops.

[+] Boss battles are unique and memorable

[-] Enemies and environments lack distinguishing features, leaving a feeling of sameness past the game’s second area.

[-] Most of the games challenge comes from over powerful enemies, even basic units can kill in a single hit.

[-] Conveyance of the next objective is not always clear, often going objectives are found by following the path of least resistance as opposed to being presented as a goal.

#videogames #video games #the surge #thesurge #xboxone #ps4 #xboxgamepass

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rebuiltrollins · 5 years ago

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I know I shouldn’t comment on this and just let it go:

I look at the Seth Rollins/Jon Moxley comments sort of like this. A line stands out to me “not everybody's equipped to handle the rigors of WWE and the schedule and how it affects you mentally and emotionally”. After hearing Moxley’s comments on Talk is Jericho I feel like this statement is sort of accurate description of the situation. Seth Rollins has made a decision that he is willing to navigate the backstage workplace of WWE, Jon Moxley made a decision that he was not. What is perfectly acceptable for one man, may not be fine for another. Mox was always pushed but never seen as a star, Rollins has always been seen as a star. He would obviously have an easier time backstage because WWE would never let a star look stupid. He might have to fight for better positions or promos but Mox had to get around Vince’s worst instincts. The ringwork + the travel + WWE Creative may not add up to the same place for everyone. Some people can just lower their heads and stick it out. Some, like Mox, don’t re-sign. Some walk out. Seth Rollins is fine with the WWE system, just like I’m sure that many people are. However, just as many, aren’t fine with it. Seth and Mox have had two very different versions of the WWE ride and that made Seth miss the mark on Moxley’s comments. He doesn’t get it, but WWE has built a system that would result in most people that are “serious” top talent would never truly understand it because the system they work under has never wronged them. Moxley couldn’t handle working for WWE, it was to mentally taxing for him, but I see how that could be the case. I can also see how Seth Rollins can handle it, he has had it easier yes, but others (like Zack Ryder) also seem happy within the WWE and he has been mistreated for years. So it’s all about where your line is.

To me this is just a situation that neither of them would be able to see where the other is coming from. These two love each other like brothers, brothers disagree and fight and say things they shouldn’t say but that doesn’t change the fact they are brothers. I don’t think that either man are wrong for stating their opinion on the situation but I feel like Seth does owe Mox and apology (nothing public just a personal one). I’m not even saying it was meant the way it was said but it is always better to say your sorry, even if the other person doesn’t care. Seth has been on a crusade to try and defend the company he works for, a place he clearly cares a lot about and doesn’t want to see anyone bash it, and he has every right to defend the WWE as others have to bash it. However, even if he didn’t mean it like the way it has been taken, his comments about Mox were a little overboard. I’m not mad, I love them both. Seth Rollins is my favorite wrestler in the world and I don’t think this should negatively affect him or follow him but I do feel like commenting on it is important because he probably shouldn’t have said it, at least not how he said it.

At the end of the day, this is between the two of them. I’m sure this will all blow over and this probably isn’t even that big of an issue between the two but this is a situation that should be addressed between the two and I’m sure will be.

TL;DR: Seth was wrong but I’m not mad at him for having an opinion. WWE’s system likely caused uppercard “main eventers” to not be able to see things the way of the lower card guys because they make it easier for them. He should apologize to Moxley privately (he’s a private guy). They need to work this out between the two of them if there is anything to work out.

#WWE #Seth Rollins #Jon Moxley

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peraltasames · 6 years ago

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when you’re scared and alone (just know that i’m already home)

Jake is in prison, and Amy is three days late.

so emma @fourdrinkamy prompted me w this and i may or may not have teared up a little writing the last part and had to remind myself that they are together and happily married now omg enjoy the angst

title from already home by a great big world

read on ao3

It takes Amy three days to notice that she’s late.

It shouldn’t take that long, she’s as meticulous about her period as everything else in her life. She marks them on her calendar each month and checks taking her birth control pill off her to-do list each day. Never before in her life has she been three days late.

Never before, though, has she been spending hours after each shift combing through files upon files about Melanie Hawkins and her team, looking for the slightest inconsistency or slip-up. Never before has she been surviving on four hours of sleep (if that), fuelled by coffee and the motivation to get her boyfriend out of jail before he’s beaten or shanked or worse.

It isn’t until Friday morning, while she’s sitting at her desk yawning after a particularly long night and jotting a note down in her calendar to visit Jake’s mother this weekend, that she spots the little X marked on Tuesday of that week.

Twenty minutes and one frantic trip to the bodega across the street later, she’s perched over the sink in the precinct bathroom, waiting for a tiny symbol to dictate whether or not her life is about to change drastically.

She’s thought about kids a few times over the past year: watching Jake play with Nikolaj in Charles’ living room on Christmas Eve, babysitting Cagney and Lacey and realizing maybe they could handle parenting after all, helping her nephews build a blanket fort after dinner at her brother’s house. These thoughts have materialized in her brain as a faraway possibility for after they’re married. Ideally, she would already be a lieutenant or higher. Ideally, the father of her child would not be indefinitely locked up in a prison a thousand miles away.

Just as she sets the timer on her phone for three minutes as instructed by the box, the bathroom door swings open. Amy cautiously looked around the bullpen before scurrying off to take the test and made the judgement that the few women on the floor had gone to the bathroom recently enough that she would not be interrupted. Her worn-out, panicked brain did not take into consideration that Gina is very pregnant and gets up to pee very frequently.

“Amy, what are you - oh.”

By the time Amy meets her gaze, Gina is already looking at her with complete bewilderment.

“Are you-“

“I haven’t looked at it yet,” Amy says quietly.

Gina nods, slowly approaching her as if she’s made of dust and the slightest movement could make her disintegrate on the floor. It dawns on her that she must look as weak and helpless as she feels.

“No matter what it says, you’re not alone,” Gina promises her, her hand cautiously grabbing Amy’s, still gripping the edge of the counter for support. “You guys are gonna get him out, and even if you don’t…you’re not alone, okay?”

The sentiment of her friends supporting her is comforting, but another person being here, knowing that she may actually be carrying a child, tips the scale in her brain from stress and worry to full-blown panic. She isn’t alone, she knows that, but no support system could make doing this without Jake any less terrifying.

Nothing could make the idea of raising a baby, his baby, without him there every step of the way an even remotely acceptable possibility.

She doesn’t feel the tears until they’re soaking into Gina’s shirt over her shoulder, barely registering the sobs until they’re wracking her body and she’s clinging onto her friend for dear life.

“It’s gonna be okay,” she hears Gina say, her voice sounding distant, as though Amy is underwater and drowning.

“I-I can’t do it without him-“

“I know, girl. I know.”

The vibration of her phone, accompanied by the same loud, repetitive beeping sound that wakes her every morning, makes Amy jump out of Gina’s arms.

“Do you want me to look?” Gina asks, her eyes a little softer and more sympathetic after seeing Amy completely unravel before her. She’s kept most of her breakdowns since Jake’s been gone private and tries to put on a brave face at work, knowing that they’re all missing him and Rosa too.

Amy nods weakly, shakily wiping away tears with the sleeve of her blouse. She waits as Gina surveys the three tests on the counter (all different brands, to get the most conclusive result possible) and looks back up at her.

“All negative.”

The two words pass over her with a wave of relief, her body collapsing back against the wall behind her and sinking to the floor.

“I’m not pregnant?” she sputters, making sure she heard her correctly.

“You’re not pregnant.”

Gina comes to sit on the floor next to her, shoulder-to-shoulder, and pats her knee gently. Amy leans into her slightly as her stream of thoughts begins to clear.

“I’m three days late.” She tries to make sense of her body’s tardiness now that the most likely explanation is off the table, coming up with nothing. “I’m never late.”

“If you want, I can bring you to my OB/GYN appointment after work today to get checked out,” Gina offers. “She’s dope, we listen to Beyonce during my ultrasounds.”

Amy musters a small smile, nodding her head.

“Thanks, Gina.”

Just like every day, regardless of whether she’s still at the precinct or already home for the night, Amy is waiting anxiously by the phone for Jake’s call at ten o’clock. She picks up on the first ring, as always.

“Jake?”

“Hey, babe.”

His voice rings through her ears like a symphony. Their daily half-hour phone calls (as long as he can risk without a guard walking by) since he managed to acquire a contraband phone have been heavenly interruptions from an otherwise Jake-less existence.

“How are you doing?” she asks. “Is everything okay?”

The pause on the other end is a little bit too long, but it’s followed by an assured response that she knows is only for her benefit. “I’m doing okay. Just missing you.”

She subconsciously wraps his warmest, coziest blue hoodie tighter around her body. It’s one of the only ones that she hasn’t already worn to the point that she needed to wash it, one of the only things that still smells like him after nearly three weeks.

“I miss you too,” she sighs. “So much.”

“Is something wrong, Ames?”

It’s truly a testament to how well he knows her that he’s able to detect that something is off from so few words. She’s spent the past two hours since returning from the doctor’s office wrestling with whether or not to tell Jake about her false alarm today, or about the cause of it, which Dr. Abrams referred to as “alarmingly high stress levels.”

Though she doesn’t want to burden him with worries concerning her (she thinks she’s worrying enough for the both of them), there is nobody that she wants to - needs to - talk to about this more than him.

“I, um-“ she fiddles with the edge of the comforter, closing her eyes as she lets out a deep breath. “I had to take a pregnancy test today. I was three days late.”

“Was it - are you-“

“It was negative, don’t worry.” She cuts him off before the worried thoughts that had saturated her brain earlier today can reach him. “It was just scary for a minute.”

Once again, her head spins with anxieties over the thought of what may have happened if the test had been positive.

“You never miss your period. Did you see a doctor?” His voice has lost its confident steadiness, a facade that she can tell he puts on for each phone call just to ease her mind.

“I did, I’m totally fine,” she swears, hoping that she’s convincing enough to put his mind at ease. “It’s just, you know, regular stress.”

It would be a better lie if she hadn’t been stressed about something every single day that he’s known her.

“Ames, please promise me you’re taking care of yourself,” he pleads, now discernibly worried.

“I’m good, babe, you don’t have to worry about me.”

She adds it to the growing list of lies she’s told him lately: yes, I had dinner; no, I haven’t been crying; work was fine; I left the precinct hours ago.

“Okay,” he says, voice still laced with skepticism. “I’m really sorry I wasn’t there for you today.”

Her heart breaks, as if it can shatter any further. It is so annoyingly, utterly Jake to apologize for not being able to comfort her when he’s the one behind bars.

“God, I love you,” she murmurs, tears falling onto the pillow supporting her head.

“I love you too,” Jake echoes, the words heavy with the weight of the miles between them. “And Ames, about the test…we’ll do that for reals one day, okay?”

She has to believe for her sanity that he’s right, that it won’t be fifteen years and that they won’t miss their window. The idea of doing the whole “married with children” thing with anyone else is not an option that she’ll even begin to consider, as she told her mother shortly after Jake received his sentence. He’s been it for her for a long time, probably even longer than she’s realized.

“We would have cute kids,” she agrees, a small smile creeping on her face at the idea of creating something that is half-her and half-Jake (god, she hopes they get his hair and her organizational habits).

“The cutest. Our kid would put Terry and Charles and Gina’s kids to shame.” She can practically hear his trademark grin through the phone, though it’s a poor substitute for the real thing.

They spend the next twenty-eight minutes talking about hypothetical kids and the life they’re going to continue to build together. Afterwards, she sleeps the best she has in weeks, dreaming of the day that their happily ever after is no longer on hold.

#otp: you're not allowed to fall in love with me #b99 fic #more of the angst #peraltiago #myfics

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biscuitreviews · 6 years ago

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Biscuit Reviews Final Fantasy X-2

It’s no secret that Final Fantasy X is my all-time favorite game. I really enjoyed the gameplay loop and element of strategy the Conditional Battle System created. I loved the sphere grid system which always made me feel that I was controlling how my characters grew as fighters and when the HD Remaster came out with your choice of a Normal Sphere Grid or an Expert Sphere Grid, which allowed you to have more control on how customized your character’s abilities and stats, I was really pleased with how playing the game using a different grid, changed so many things.

However, I’m not talking about Final Fantasy X. No, instead this is about the sequel, Final Fantasy X-2. This game is historical in its own right. It was the first Final Fantasy to actually be a real sequel to a Final Fantasy entry and it had an all female main cast which was also a first for the Final Fantasy series.

For this review I’m going to unapologetically spoil this game and Final Fantasy X. You’ve been warned.

I’ve always had a weird relationship with this game. Everytime I would pick up this game, I would always quit right when I got to Chapter 3 because the end of Chapter 2 had this sudden difficulty spike and everything else in Chapter 3 just annihilates you until you do some good ole fashioned grinding. But at that point, I would just be done with it, put it down and not look it again until I would get that feeling of “Hey, you should play Final Fantasy X-2, you’ll beat it this time.” Rinse and repeat.

Until now that is, I sat down and finally got to the end.

Final Fantasy X-2 was the first Final Fantasy that I know of that made a huge divide with the fanbase. I remember seeing forum posts and comments saying that this was the Final Fantasy that caused fans to be worried for the future. I’ll admit, I was on that train for awhile. Even when Final Fantasy XIII enraged a good majority of the fanbase, I was one of the few that would always say “Final Fantasy started going downhill at X-2!” However, recently I’ve also seen the fanbase opinion start to shift on Final Fantasy XIII. There’s still a majority of people that dislike, but with it’s slowly growing shift towards being a good game, it has made me want to replay the game at some point.

So what is it about Final Fantasy X-2 that made me not like it? As I mentioned before, the difficulty spike didn’t help. I wasn’t using the dresspheres and Garment Grids right, I wasn’t allowing proper grinding, and I was actually missing out on major plot points that are only discoverable doing side quests.

When I’m not really into a game, or I just want to get through one quickly, I’ll just do the bare minimum to move it along until either the game starts dunking on me and I just quit, or the story gets interesting and I need to quickly backtrack a bit to learn the mechanics so I can perform well to get the story moving. For X-2, I had none of that, I wasn’t invested enough in the story, I didn’t bother learning how to properly use the mechanics so I could keep in pace with the story, and I was getting creamed. It was also the first time I was exposed to the Job system. Not really an excuse, but it kinda weirded me out for a bit until I learned this was a staple in the older Final Fantasy titles a few years after playing X-2 for the first time in 2003.

However, sometimes I’ll get the opposite problem, like I did with Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE, where I’ll love the combat, but hate the story. With that game, my characters got optimized greatly in terms of skills, equipment, and magic, that I eventually had them powerful enough to just blaze through the remainder of the story when I finally got bored of the combat loop. Although it did take out the challenge factor with some of the bosses, I didn’t care.

For X-2, I’ve always known that the ending depended on your completion meter. Even though I know what the true ending is, that still hasn’t stopped me from wanting to know how the events that lead up to that ending happened. To that your thinking, “Just look it up on the internet and read a synopsis of the entire plot then.” I’ll admit, I did do this after quitting on another one of my “play it and drop it” runs. For this playthrough, I purposely went for the sad ending which I’ll go more into detail later.

In the game, you have main missions marked as Hotspots and “some” side quests marked on your map. Now when I said “some” side quests, I really meant “some”, not all of them are marked. Those unmarked side quests you just have to visit places to make sure there is none. Granted the game does give you a clue that there probably is a quest there even if the selected area said “No Missions.” This could prompt players to revisit these areas in Spira, but for those that want that sweet 100% completion, it could be frustrating to play a guessing game with some areas.

Sometimes, these unmarked areas would contain details about the main story. If for any reason you missed these, you can find yourself lost in the narrative. It’s something that I’ve personally hated in games and RPGs in general, is making their players go find details or an explanation of why something in the plot happened. Keep it in your main plot, use exploration and side quests to enhance your world and the lore. This is why I found the story in X-2 weird, because I had to dig for some of it, whereas in X, everything you needed to know was told in its story and all supplemental information to enhance that story, was done in side NPC conversations or side quests. It’s just weird how X-2 completely fumbled what made its predecessor great in the first place.

Now, I realize that for the majority of this personal recollection, I’ve mostly been talking about my negative experiences with this game and not really any of the positives. I had games that I was disappointed with before, but X-2 was a game that really let me down a long time ago. However, I will have to say with this recent playthrough, I actually have more appreciation for this game than I did in the past and have found some likeable aspects to it.

First is how Square took to the approach to an already familiar world. Having the people of Spira wanting to discover the lost secrets, now that the threat of Sin coming back is no more. This allowed new areas to be uncovered to give Spira a new feeling despite having already explored it once before. The gameplay even rewards this by granting you additional dresspheres, Garment Grids, and accessories that can further expand your characters abilities, with some having effects to where you can break the game in ridiculous ways.

Next is how Yuna herself traverses the environment. Where Tidus had the ability to swim, Yuna has the ability to jump over ledges and climb giving the environments a level of verticality they didn’t have before.

The Active Time Battle system also makes a return. Between this and the introduction of dresspheres it did offer an excellent explanation as to why Yuna is at a low level again, despite everything she accomplished in the previous title.

There’s also the story of X-2, Yuna, Rikku, and their new ally Paine travel the world to hunt for spheres and each has their own goal. Yuna wants to find Tidus after watching a sphere that has a person that looked like Tidus. After watching this sphere, she believes that there might be a way to bring him back. Rikku, simply wants to help Yuna on her journey, as well as uncover more of Spira’s history. Paine, wants to learn why she was betrayed two years ago by a former ally of hers. These three stories are interwoven and you will get answers to everything, however some do require more digging than others which I’ll go into further detail later.

Finally, you have Shuyin, who is a rather intriguing villain who not only unveils more about Spira’s past, the Dream of the Fayth, but also adds more elements of the Unsent. How does he add more to a phenomenon of Spira already well established? Easy, Shuyin has been Unsent for over 1,000 years due to his strong feelings during a war between Zanarkand and Beville, as well as his anger of the death of his lover, Lenne. This makes his ability to possess people something that felt like a natural evolution considering the nature of Unsent. His striking similarity to Tidus also shows the Fayth preserving his image in Dream Zanarkand as we can surmise the Fayth were unaware of Shuyin’s true fate. By adding how long he’s been festering in his pain, with also seeing that Spira hasn’t changed at all in terms of violence with the citizens of Spira fighting amongst themselves to determine the future, drives Shuyin to want to destroy Spira as it seems to him that the people will never learn.

Now, although I do see this game in a new light with the positives, there are also a few elements that I’ve discovered that could have been handled much better. There are three elements in particular that come in mind that I feel were not handled the best and they are Paine, Shuyin, and the ending of X-2.

I felt Paine’s story was simply forgotten most of the time to focus on Yuna’s journey. I get it, Yuna is the main character, but Paine is a new character that is being introduced to the player. I felt more time could have been spent with her and often times both in story and gameplay, she felt like a third wheel. Gameplay wise, Paine is the only one whose Ultimate Dressphere is optional to acquire and is easy to miss. It feels odd that for one of the three characters to have their true potential, you have to go out way to get Paine’s when Yuna and Rikku are handed theirs in the main story. As for Paine’s story, although you do learn that Shuyin is the reason of the betrayal, why and how the betrayal happened is something you have to search for on your own and like the Dressphere, finding all of the details are easily missable. Which brings me to my next area of elements not handled well and that is Shuyin.

Yes, I did say Shuyin was a good villain, but he felt half baked. Why is that? Because the missing parts that you can learn about him are tied to Paine’s backstory, which you learn by collecting Crimson Spheres throughout Spira. Not only does it show how Shuyin became Spira’s next great threat, but it also gives our previously mentioned Paine, a reason that she is on the journey with Yuna and why Paine is a main character to the story. The Crimson Spheres also unlock an optional dungeon known as the Den of Woe, where Yuna, Rikku and Paine can learn more about Shuyin. During their adventure in the dungeon, Shuyin actually possesses Rikku and Paine to where the trio fight each other and even try to kill one another. This optional dungeon also presents them another reason why Shuyin needs to be stopped and could have further emboldened our trio. Granted the reasons you learn in the story are fine, but having that extra push could have really added more to their motivation.

Last is the ending of X-2. I want to state that I’m not saying the True Ending for X-2 is bad. It’s nice, it’s fine, and it hits you in feels. However, I want to bring attention to the Sad Ending. I feel that should have been the canonical ending. Around Chapter 4 Yuna starts to wonder if she needs to move on and accept that there might not be a way to bring Tidus back. As the story progresses from there, Yuna starts to show those signs that she needs to move forward. Even during her fight with Shuyin, she tries to have Shuyin let go and move on. She tries to show him Spira is a better place, Spira no longer suffers from constant war and death, and to let go of his anger and join his lover, Lenne, in the Farplane. After the fight, Shuyin finally agrees and is finally at peace with himself. Shuyin’s acceptance then translates to Yuna’s acceptance, that as long as Tidus remains in her heart, she will retain his memory and move forward. This ending could have proven to be more powerful and would have better reflected Yuna’s mindset in the moment.

My previous gripes regarding the dresspheres and Garment Grids are moot because I’m kind of a fan now how it rewards you for using these to better optimize your characters in battle.

It’s kind of funny how as you grow as not only as a person and as a gamer, that things you might have previously hated in the past, might end up being something you love now. That’s what X-2 is to me, something I hated in the past, but now appreciate with a new understanding. I do wish the story was tied a lot better and not spread out as X-2 could have been a really stellar sequel.

Final Fantasy X-2 receives a 4 out of 5

#Final Fantasy X-2 #Gullwings #YRP #Final Fantasy #Final Fantasy X #video games #gaming #game review #video game review #Biscuit reviews #gaming review #PS4 #Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster #Square Enix #Yuna #Rikku #Paine #Tidus

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connywrites · 5 years ago

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gala and delilahs 4

start - part [3]

It was frightening the way Gala could change her personality on a whim, when she wanted and needed to. Leo imagined it might have been the same way when people experienced similarly with him, but he didn’t believe he had so much control over such an aspect, like she did.

It was kinky, for a while; the downcast glares, high heels, tight leather and sour attitude that had him riled up in seconds. When he was too gone to think and she could do it for him, so being stepped all over wasn’t so bad; at least not in the literal sense, bound to the bed with overcoming desire flooding his body and nothing else.

That’s what addictive personalities were about—wanting more, and more, and more. He’d always wanted more than he had, and as he’d had less, he desired greater. It was a natural cycle that made sense in his head, but as he grew older, the understanding grew dimmer, and more people around saw him as selfish and demanding the more he wanted. Craved. Desired, stuck his neck out for, went to unusual lengths to get a hold of; and by then it didn’t seem so simple anymore, and adults weren’t so understanding when all he wanted was a quiet place to go to snort lines and cry for a night.

It was desire amidst a twisted rewards system always thinking it was going to achieve instant gratification, only to fall through with heavier disappointment each time it didn’t happen. Psychology textbooks had said so for decades, but he ignored those. He didn’t like the words, how they sounded, how they seemed to laugh at him, and naturally it was easier to blend in with others that had likewise problems than try to confront his personal issues, on his own.

Which was what lead someone to wind up with a drug addiction problem. Drugs were always on the mind—if it wasn’t one thing, it was the next. The ‘gateway drug’ theory only worked in reverse when one tried to come down off of the worst; when there wasn’t red ice, meth was nearby. There was crack, cocaine and heroin. Beside that were the Xanax bars, Oxycodone and Benzodiazepines he’d luckily avoided in the favor that they never did anything for him. Alcohol and weed were low-level, last resorts in a mind like his, always chasing the dragon; but still he mentally crawled for the slightest satisfaction of any high he could get.

Hours of sex, awake days on end, strung-out from the dry eyeballs to chattering teeth, neglecting the numb feeling on his skin while he dug across his arms with jagged, bitten-down fingernails. Nights of drinking, hitting the pipe and the windowpanes of her nice new luxury car, an expensive birthday gift that filled him with so much resentment he couldn’t breathe. Mornings of sinking into heroin happiness, followed by nights in the K-hole, half-unconscious on the floor of his ex’s best friend’s boyfriend’s place, because that was the only asshole available to ‘look after him’ for the night.

Ecstasy, LSD, Molly. Marijuana, Brandy and a few cigarettes. Leo spent so much of his time avoiding reality, he didn’t acknowledge the reality of what he avoided—that which was one of danger and constant avoidance, delirium and confusion.

When red ice was first big, he was young, blossoming into late teenage years. When androids were new, fascinating experiments, high-priced in their new days of being released with plenty of bugs and defects yet to be discovered by its ever-eager richening market. Kamski was already sitting comfortably while the drudges of Detroit were left to look up to the plastic dolls like angels and saviors, something that might swoop into your life and take all your worries from you—cleaning, chores, childcare—all carried away in the arms of a plastic, smiling white knight that would never thank you with sincerity, only continue to empty your bank accounts and steal your job.

But they could thank you with their biocomponents.

Androids were nothing so complex back in the day; human-shaped, sure, with a basic personality installed back when the Chloe models were new, hot shit, when there was no need for an overly responsive, humanoid robot – just something that looked like you, spoke like you, but did what you didn’t want or need to. Easy. The solution of humanity never taking up enough space seemed fixed, and the personal desire for company more than one could earn was quickly, but temporarily satiated.

Thirium wasn’t a new chemical, but its use as an electric component was freshly discovered. He’d been one of the suspects on one of Lieutenant’s Red Ice Epidemic cases, but luckily knew how to keep his head covered enough no one made the connection, considering he was fleeting enough throughout the city and a minor at the time, anyway, leaving him off with warnings and a glance of pretend worry from the direction of his parent; considering he didn’t exactly have two growing up.

His mother would gather everything she needed, herself; as much as she could, all at once. It wasn’t hard to make, she’d tell him in a shy tone that beckoned him to add to the business. He refused to learn.

“You’re ripping those people off, you know. You’re ruining their lives,” he’d tell her, thinking with a pure heart in mind of whoever created androids in the first place. A marvel of their time and many more to come, he’d only heard of such a thing when he could have been graduating high school.

They weren’t everywhere right away. They worked their way in, filling the gaps in places they were designed to. One by one, they took up space, and soon enough saying your boss was a robot wasn’t a farfetched exclamation.

As is a human’s nature, it was only a matter of time until someone found out how to make a drug out of it; a cheap, synthetic mashup of chemicals that happened to work out when someone learned adding a drop of thirium to your cooking added a bit of spice to the high. Soon enough, it was common; rolled into cigarettes, powdered over a bowl of weed or laced into whatever else you might want, just to try. Once was enough. Leo didn’t need a second chance at convincing himself to do something he wanted to in the moment, whether it was for the better or not. It was there, something of an opportunity, and not one he wanted to miss out on, something he’d convinced himself was worthwhile as soon as he took that first hit.

Days went by, but he never felt like he was aging. “Growing up” was a term he’d never understood, not the way other people talked about it, so he’d laugh, roll a spliff and light it, ignoring the entirety of his neglected childhood while the static of friendly chatter filled his ears.

Friends and girlfriends came and left. Gala appeared to be an inconsistent consistency, seeming to always be there whether he needed her to or not. Usually, it was too often, as she was sinister and conniving when she was under the influence—most people were, but the way she acted when she’d started sobering up was nothing short of a surprise to him. There were two sides to every coin, he’d learned and known well, but it goes to show how much he didn’t really connect to anyone once he realized he never really knew her, dating or not.

Part of him convinced himself he enjoyed the nasty personality, of course. Nothing wasn’t sexy about a badass bitch that wouldn’t take any shit, and she’d protected him for a long time, if only because no one else would. Leo had always known he was lucky from the way she looked at him, the stars in her eyes and the tender touches, graced by the marks of vicious claws that raked his back or across his face, depending on the day. She could purr, but it was her yowls he liked the best, and it was likely all situational; where there were drugs, there were parties, and youth like the two of them tended to get wily in the absence of real responsibility and caretaking.

“Do you remember how we met?” Her voice was so sweet when it wasn’t crackled by the cigarettes and the smoke; he could hardly believe it.

“Sure, the water tower,” he responded, thinking back.

“You bet me fifty bucks to jump off.” A gleaming smile and the glisten in her eyes that made him feel like he’d walked through heaven’s golden gates.

“Because I knew you would,” she taunted with a crinkle in her nose that always made him smile.

“That’s kinda morbid,” he carried on with a chuckle.

“Talk about first impressions. Mine was, ‘I’ll do something stupid and deadly for money.’” He flashed a smile back at her, but they always felt so cheesy in comparison. Leo never liked his own smiles, as he knew they looked as painfully forced as they were; someone that would hardly find anything to smile about had to work his way around somehow.

“And you would have, too, if Trevor wasn’t there to stop you. I could have killed you the first night we met!” Her voice was light and airy as she let out another wicked chuckle, as another thing they’d always connected on was that morbid humor.

“Yeah, well, so could a determined raccoon or a falling chunk of a plane. If that was how I was supposed to go out…” He leaned back in the chair with a shrug and a huff, baring his teeth a bit too much in his smile. She liked the little snarl in his expressions, anyway.

“Guess I would have been on the news for a bit. Five minutes of fame and all that.” She shook her head, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear absent-mindedly.

“You know, I wouldn’t have expected you to be so…” He winced at his own word choice, but he wasn’t exactly a great thesaurus.

“Nice.” At this she let out a cackle, still whimsical but also holding the years he’d gone through of literal hell within her, almost witchlike in its nature. It made him feel meek, but that was part of what he enjoyed; that rather than feeling challenged or some other toxic masculinity-induced negativity, he could appreciate the power she had in the way she walked, spoke and dressed with such confidence he’d never be able to imagine the feeling of.

“Oh, Leo…” biting her lip, she tilted her head and glanced to the ceiling as she thought of what to say next.

“You know how easy it is to be mean. Nobody listens to kind voices these days.” Acknowledging the seriousness in her tone, he settled himself down, scooting his chair forward and directing his attention to her to assure he listened – for both their sake.

“But being a bitch…I guess it worked for me, but it really didn’t. It’s not like me. I had to do it to protect myself, you know? Sorry you only knew the worst me.” Returning a solemn gaze, he nodded, finding an automatic guidance to his hand as it reached for hers, matching palm-to-palm before they entwined fingers. Meeting with her again had gone much better than he initially thought or expected. Waving their hands back and forth, she smiled, then sighed, letting the light of her expression go as she glanced off to the side.

“Yeah, that’s more of your sister’s thing,” he slipped in slyly, and she smirked at him in response.

“Really, though, I get it,” he redirected.

“I don’t know. It’s fucked up. Nothing was really real, when we were there. None of the drugs, or the people, or anything.” Slowly nodding, she accepted what he was saying, drumming her long fingernails across the back of his knuckles in a rhythm.

“It didn’t have to be,” she said in a quieter voice, melancholic in tone.

“It was enough for us. It always feels like it is. I thought cheating, lying and stealing would get me what I want. I thought it would make me happy.” As her comment hit home, it was his turn to retract and look off to the side, shoulders shrugging up as his body receded into itself the way he often did when he felt small.

“I know, I know,” she said in acknowledgement to his personal situation with a little sigh.

“I, uhm, never got the chance to say it, but I’m sorry about your dad. I know the relationship was complicated, but you tried your best.” Leo seemed surprised to find himself gritting his teeth, finding anger to be his first response in regard to his own father.

“I wish I could say sorry to him, too,” she added.

“For being a bitch.” Leo grimaced.

“Oh, trust me, me too,” he said with a dry laugh, but the smile wasn’t there.

“I’ve mostly uh, gotten over it. I mean, I know I’ll never be over it or whatever they tell you in therapy? But he… wasn’t really the type to hold grudges,” he said kindly, glancing down at the table wood with a sigh.

“I know that feeling guilty isn’t gonna help me, and he’d know that, too. I know he wouldn’t want me to. He was…a cool guy,” he murmured, trying to form the personality in his head that was the father figure he’d seen off and on throughout his life.

“Smarter than balls, man. Why couldn’t I have some of that?” Huffing, he felt familiar frustrations crawl into his mind again; she withdrew her hand from his to gently squeeze his shoulder, offering a sympathetic gaze.

“No, see, this is what gets me,” he corrected himself, only looking at her for a second before the fidgeting portion of his mind took over and he started chewing down a thumbnail.

“Every time I think about him, I just get mad. I get angry, and jealous, and for what? He’s dead.” His words were heavy, and while he meant to weigh them as a self-reminder, he knew he was being a bit too harsh with his tongue.

“Leo, your life wasn’t fair, and you feel like he’d taken everything good from you.” To his surprise, she didn’t miss a beat, and he couldn’t help the validation feeling nice.

“You’re jealous from seeing a person thrive with tools you could have had, only to hang them above your head. Whether he meant to or not.” Leo ran a hand through his hair, shifting in his seat with an antsy shrug.

“I was always so convinced he hated me. That he ignored me all my life, you know? That I was the problem…no, no, it was just the drugs. It was always the drugs, and I couldn’t get off of them. And now he’s dead.” With worry in her eyes, she gave him a gentle shove in the shoulder, knowing he’d appreciate the rough play for what it was.

“That’s not your fault. If he was the way you talk about him, then…he’d know you’re doing your best now, and probably wouldn’t think it was too late.” Propping her chin on a hand, she tilted her head with a slight smile, enough to be supportive without coming across as overbearing or intrusive.

“I messed up my whole life, Gala. All my chances, right down the drain. I don’t know why I think it matters if I clean up now,” he groused, scratching the back of his neck as he stared at one of the fixtures on the wall.

“Of course it matters. You could sober up when you’re fifty and he’d still roll in his grave, you know it.” Closing his eyes, he let his head drop with an awkward laugh before he glanced back up at her. This smile was a touch more genuine.

“Because he wouldn’t believe it,” he said in a quiet whisper, threatened by the sting of tears and quickly wiping his eyes with the back of a sweater sleeve. Wanting to be supportive without getting too close, she combed back some of his hair, nearly leaning in to kiss his temple before re-deciding, considering they’d just started talking again and things were rocky; the last thing she wanted was to make him uncomfortable.

“I don’t know how you do it, the alter-ego thing.” The subject change was swift, but luckily for him, they were both used to his conversational ways of switching context without much warning.

“I can’t keep track of what personality I do have. How do you… choose?” Looking dismal, she withdrew her hand without much thought, settling it folded across her other on the table as she mulled over the idea.

“It’s just acting. I know on stage, I’m nothing more than a toy that makes money for doing cool tricks. On the streets, I had to be mean or I’d be taken advantage of. Do you know how vulnerable people like me are to rape and kidnapping?” She popped her lips in a quick sound of wanting to avoid the subject herself, expression unimpressed as she glanced at the time on her phone.

“Whatever. There’s nothing to keep track of, I just acted how I needed to for the moment. I’m sure you understand that.” Slouching sheepishly, he tilted his head with an expression that showed he was trying to comprehend her words, but still clearly struggled, listening intently anyway.

“I’m glad you don’t have to change your personality on a whim, Leo. People may think you’re boring, or aggressive, but I know there’s more to you than that.” The compliments always left him feeling stiff and awkward however, as he never had any reason to believe them, and still didn’t.

“I don’t,” he admitted blatantly. She glared at him with a stare that told she knew all too well.

“You haven’t had a chance to grow, Leo. You have to give yourself that chance now.” Her voice was soft, barely above a whisper, catching his attention in a way he felt like cotton stuffed his sinuses.

“It doesn’t matter what time it is, or how late into your life you are. I know, it sucks, right? Being almost thirty and trying to pick up the pieces now?” They shared a laugh, but he didn’t feel much better.

“It helps me to think it could be worse. My situation isn’t great either, as you know, but I can’t dwell on the last ten years of my life thinking about how I wasted the last 29 either.” With his eyes lighting up in realization, he couldn’t help standing from his seat, aggressively slamming a hand onto the table in regard to the epiphany alone. She’d probably have looked surprised if she wasn’t used to that, too, glancing up at him with lifted eyebrows as she awaited the explanation.

“Oh, my god, your birthday,” he said in a panic.

“That’s in like, a week! I didn’t even think about it,” he continued, rubbing his forehead as he turned to start pacing. Gripping the back of his shirt, she tugged him back, careful so as not to snag a nail on the cloth.

“Shut up, Leo,” she said abruptly so that it would work, and so he’d turned to face her, silent and dumbfound.

“I’m having a party downtown, but I didn’t invite you because I know you can’t handle the scene right now. Don’t worry about gifts. It’s alright.” Feeling nervous, he tapped his fingertips against the leg of his jeans while he swerved in place, shaking his head with a sigh.

“Doesn’t it drive you nuts?” His voice was becoming fast and erratic again, a worrying sign for her.

“How can you stay out there, a-and do that? I know you have to, but the androids are gonna take your place anyway. Why not just quit?” He knew the question was as stupid as he felt asking it, but he genuinely wanted to hear her piece.

“I’m looking for other money, but it’s hard to come by. This is what I’m good at, another thing taken away by picture-perfect plastic models.” The spite was clear in her voice, and he couldn’t help being empathetic, as they’d dealt with the same problem even if in different aspects of their lives.

“Can’t say androids ever did it for me,” he thought aloud.

“I mean, they’re not that sexy, and I bet nothing feels the same anyway.” There was a slight blush to his cheeks from talking about it, gaze otherwise solemn as he continued staring at the tabletop wood.

“It doesn’t matter. Perverts will always try to get what they can for cheap,” she retorted.

“Luckily for me, renting them is still fairly expensive and it’s cheaper to throw pocket change into my thong instead. But that won’t last long.” Dumbfounded, he stared at her.

“I couldn’t do it,” he said with a stagnant air of doubt.

“Trying to keep the same life without doing the same shit?” Scratching his forehead, he shook his head and shrugged, genuinely baffled.

“How do you stay away from the stuff?” Staring off to the side again, she shrugged one shoulder, slouching into it as she veered her body language that direction, leaning forward and settling into her chair.

“I don’t,” she replied simply, her voice quiet and calm.

“It’s always there and you have no idea how hard it is. But if I don’t keep up the bills, I don’t have a place to stay, and neither does my sister.” Sharing a pained expression, Leo paused in a moment of thought so as not to pick at old scabs, sighing and nodding all the while he digested the information.

“I wish I could help, but Markus doesn’t want anything getting in the way of my recovery.”

“I understand,” she offered softly.

“I’m not about to ask anyone for money or favors, especially after what I did to you.” Struck by what she said, he froze, eyes darting to her while he remained still for a moment. Again, she surprised him, as he’d never expected her to own up to such a thing, feeling old memories tug strings of nostalgia within him while he waited for his own thoughts to recollect.

“I guess I deserved it,” he murmured, prompting a stern glare from her.

“We aren’t counting faults,” she said in an almost snappy voice, tapping the table with a loud click of her nails so as to catch his attention and distract him from whatever nastiness he might start thinking.

Their oppositional personalities reflected the irony; I couldn’t do it, they’d say to one another about a situation they were somewhat living in, but mostly differed from. He couldn’t be around the drugs; she couldn’t break away from them. She wanted to live the most out of her life in the time she could, while he felt like he had more time to live than he knew what to do with. Mostly, they were both trying to find a lifestyle they found comfort in that was exciting enough to keep them away from substance abuse, and that was what he tried to think of when she insisted not to hold grudges or hurt feelings.

“Okay but it was like, really fucked up. We were, I mean.” She cast him a dismal glare that held a seriousness to it that could be intimidating, if one weren’t set in their own ego well enough. Having momentarily forgotten touchy subjects were a thing, he retreated into his seat as he thought over his words.

“Sorry…but I mean it. I think about the shit I’ve done every day. I can’t get rid of it.” Starting to jitter one of his legs, he shifted to lean back, raking his hands up his thighs before he stood up with a sigh.

“You have to forgive yourself, too, Leo.”

“That’s enough,” he snapped immediately, stopping in place as he glared at her with a meaner expression than he intended to.

“I don’t wanna talk about this shit anymore, and it comes up every time,” he said with a notable agitated whine in his voice, fingers finding themselves in his hair as he lacked another way to relieve the stress.

“Because it’s important, and you can’t keep avoiding it. Especially if you want to recover, and I know you do. It’s serious.” Wobbling in his stance, he almost lost his balance, seething silently while he felt anger bubble up beneath his skin again. If he didn’t cut this short now, it wouldn’t end well; he knew it, and he was sure she did, too.

“I’m working on it at my own pace, okay? You’re not my therapist! You and Markus always act like you know what’s best for me, and I barely know either of you. I know what’s important! It’s not like I haven’t been told my entire life what I’m supposed to do, or how I’m supposed to feel! I just, I haven’t figured that out yet, and I, I can’t do this. Not now, not yet.” After pacing back and forth a few more times, he finally turned to face her, letting his arms fall at his sides.

“I’ve…still got so much to work on,” he murmured under his breath, rubbing an arm and averting his gaze as the embarrassment tinged his cheeks flush and warm.

“And that’s just something I never figured out how to get past. It’s not that easy, or I’d have done it already.” Gala offered him no words, only letting their body language steer them together until she could pull him in for a long hug.

“I know that telling you that stuff isn’t going to make it easier or make you want to do it any more, so I’m not sure why I do.”

For the most part, he wasn’t sure why he didn’t listen, but it was something he’d always had difficulty with. Waving her off dismissively, he decided not to reply, before gesturing towards the front room.

“Let’s call it a night, I’m getting tired,” he offered. She couldn’t help peering at him beneath heavy, knowing, decorated eyelids, aware he’s used that excuse when he didn’t want to talk about something since they’d met, but knew better than to refuse him. Pulling the long strap of her purse up over her shoulder, she stood up to leave.

They lingered too long, too close, staring each other in the eyes too deeply for too many seconds, frozen in time as they were both lost in a moment of nostalgia, reminiscing old times, remembering the best and the worst in a shared moment of silence. Leo’s hands almost settled on her hips as he nearly followed the desire to pull her into a kiss, but in a last-ditch effort to neglect the urge, he turned around and sighed, opening the door to the tall stairway and gesturing for her to go through it. Somewhat hurt, but understanding, her gaze slowly trailed to the ground before she stepped through to leave.

“Goodnight,” she sung quietly in his direction before he’d closed the door.

#guess who has more writing! KRIT DO #detroit: become human #detroit become human #dbh: oc #dbh: leo manfred

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