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svtskneecaps · 4 years ago

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you mean the world to me

(gender neutral) reader x wonwoo

genre: fluff + angst; words: 7k

(i’ve found i write for wonwoo in times of academic panic and if ever there was a time of academic panic, this is it)

You didn’t see Wonwoo at all on the morning everything changed. His side of the bed was empty when you got out of the shower, and your keys were missing from the hook. Maybe that was your first clue that something was up. His set still hung there innocently, the tiny bear charm you’d gotten him on your two year anniversary swinging lightly on the breeze from the AC unit.

You shrugged and picked up the keys. This wasn’t the first time he’d grabbed the wrong set, and it probably wouldn’t be the last.

(your second clue was that the door was unlocked)

You called him on your lunch break to tease him about the keys, but it went to voicemail. That in itself wasn’t odd; usually if he was in a frenzy working on some idea he’d forget to check his phone, but it was sort of odd that it didn’t even ring.

You shrugged that off too. Maybe he forgot it at the apartment, and it died. He’d never forgotten it before, but there was a first time for everything.

You finally accepted something was wrong when you stopped by the bookstore with coffee and it was closed. And dark.

He always had the front light on when he was inside.

Hours later, as you paced around the apartment trying to work out whether or not to call the police, you heard the jangle of your keys in the lock. You swung the door open before he’d even unlocked it, heart in your throat.

“There you are! I was worried, where have you been, why weren’t you answering your phone?”

Your questions died in your throat as you looked him over. He looked exhausted.

“Wonwoo,” you said, softly, “are you okay?”

He visibly forced a smile. “Yeah,” he said.

You opened the door wider, and he hesitated before he came in. He hovered in the entryway, like a stranger in his own apartment (the one you picked out together).

You sat down on the couch, and he followed you to the living room, but he sat in the guest chair instead of his usual place beside you. He didn’t speak, just looked around the room as if he’d never been in it before. Finally, you were the one to break the silence.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

He looked at you, appearing to consider his words carefully (as he does, of course, he’s a songwriter).

“If you woke up in a stranger’s bed, in a life you don’t recognize, what would you do?”

You blinked. “Like those Hallmark movies?”

“Hallmark movies?”

“Yeah, it’s a huge trope in like the Christmas movies? Somebody runs into a Santa character and one way or another they make a wish and then Santa slaps them into an alternate universe where usually they’re married with several children or something, and they learn the true meaning of Christmas.” You made jazz hands.

He wrinkled his nose. “I don’t think Christmas is involved.”

“Are you saying you weren’t some rich businessman in your past life?” you teased. “I could see it, you know.”

“But if you were in that situation,” he pressed. “What would you do?”

You thought about that. “I guess I’d go with it,” you said. “Try to figure out who I am in the new life and make the most of it.”

“You wouldn’t try to go back?”

“I don’t see how I could figure it out, unless I recognized the Santa character on my initial run to all the places I used to know and talked to them about it.”

He groaned. “Please let’s not call them the Santa.”

You weren’t sure if he was joking until he smiled, and you relaxed.

“Well that’s what they are,” you defended, maybe a little too quickly, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“Can they not be wish granters? Or guardian angels or something? Not all of the stories are to do with the true meaning of Christmas.”

You shrugged. “I know you’re the writer here but your storytelling experience pales in comparison to my extensive knowledge of Hallmark movie tropes.”

He leaned forward. “I’m a writer?”

You forced yourself to laugh like he was making a joke even though something in your chest went tight.

(he chose to sleep on the couch that night and even though you were upset that he wasn’t next to you in the bed, some strange part of you was glad for the distance)

You called out of work the next day to walk Wonwoo to the bookstore, citing stress at your significant other going missing for most of a day. Seungcheol was understanding, telling you not to worry, that he’d see you Monday.

Vernon was leaning against the wall by the door when you came up, messing with something on his phone.

“Hey,” he said, glancing at your partner. “I was worried; it’s not like you to be late.”

Wonwoo was quiet for an odd amount of time, long enough that you glanced over at him. He was staring at Vernon with some odd look in his eyes.

“We got a late start,” you finally answered for him. “After yesterday. . .” You coughed. “Anyway, you guys need any help setting up?”

“Probably, yeah, we just got a shipment of that new YA series the other day,” Vernon said. You step to one side, motioning Wonwoo up the steps to unlock the door. “Maybe you shelve those while I blow the dust off the front desk. She’s not used to being unused this long.”

You laughed, too loud. “It was a day.”

“I know, it was ages.”

(you didn’t comment on how Wonwoo had to try three keys from the ring before getting the door open, or how he looked at the inside of his own bookstore like it was a wondrous new place. Vernon didn’t seem to notice)

You dragged the box out to the shelves and started placing the books. Apparently Vernon had forgotten how well voices carried in the quiet space, because you could hear him speaking as if he were next to you when he said, “Hey, man, did you two fight?”

“What?”

You could imagine Vernon’s shrug, heard him fiddling with the crack in his phone case. “I don’t know, it’s just, usually you two are pretty much inseparable, but like, yesterday you totally go off the grid and now today there’s a whole sidewalk between you.” A floorboard creaked. “I know it’s probably not really my business, y’know since I just work the front desk and all, but, I thought I’d ask.”

The pause stretched out so long you found yourself frozen, breath caught in your lungs, hand hovering above the next book, waiting.

“I’m adjusting,” Wonwoo said finally. “I’m a different person than I was two days ago.”

It was an answer and a non-answer all at once and it implied more than it clarified. You picked up the book and slotted it onto its place in the shelf, above the carefully written label. You didn’t mention the conversation when you brought the box back. You made an excuse about going for coffee and bolted out the door.

(usually the bookstore felt welcoming, an extension of your significant other, but the atmosphere was stifling and foreign and you couldn’t stay)

Thankfully, Seokmin had the morning shift, and you arrived during a dead period. He was able to sit with you as you nursed your drink and fretted aloud over everything that happened.

“It’s like I blinked and he was a total stranger,” you said. “I don’t know what I did.”

“Maybe it wasn’t anything you did?” he offered. “Maybe he just changed.”

“It’s just so weird.” You cupped your hands around your drink. “I mean, I know people say that by the end of a long lasting relationship your significant other changes enough to be a bunch of different people, but it happened overnight. Like he went to sleep as a writer, and my--” you choke on boyfriend-- “significant other, and then he woke up and-- I mean aside from him still being named Wonwoo it’s like-- I don’t know who this man is anymore.”

“Maybe not,” Seokmin said agreeably.

“Wow,” you said, sipping your drink. “Stop hanging out with Jeonghan so much, you’re starting to sound like him.”

He laughed and nudged your shoulder. “What I’m saying is, maybe he feels strange and different, but that doesn’t have to matter. What matters is if you’re willing to find the pieces of him that you loved again. He can’t have changed that much underneath.”

He was right, no doubt. The awkward way Wonwoo had held himself the night before reminded you of the first time you’d ever really talked. He wasn’t so different, just undeveloped, like he’d jumped back in time. Like he’d crossed the multiverse from an existence where he’d never met you.

You could handle it. The situation was manageable. You could treat each interaction like you’d just met him for the first time. It could be easy, or it could be the hardest thing you’d ever faced, but you could handle it. Really.

(you texted Wonwoo asking if you should bring anything back for him and Vernon. his coffee order was different than the one you remembered)

You unlocked the door to the apartment that night. Wonwoo lingered in the hallway until you glanced back at him.

“You do anything at work today?” you asked.

He shook his head. “That office is a disaster. How did I ever find anything?”

You laughed, hanging up your keys. “Yeah, that’s what I’ve been saying basically since we bought the place.” You almost nudged his shoulder as you passed him on your way to the kitchen, but stopped the thought before it became a motion. “Keys on the hook,” you directed, “before you forget where you set ‘em.”

It took him two tries to find the right hook, but he got it. “I had to spend most of the morning organizing everything,” he said. “There’s so much stuff in there.”

“Let the record show that I’ve been telling you this was how it was gonna end up for years.”

“That’s the most long-winded way to say ‘I told you so’ I’ve ever heard.”

“What can I say? I like the sound of my own voice.” You pulled ingredients from the cupboards. “You remember where the pans are?”

“No,” he said.

“Neat.”

Making the food was the only easy part. Sitting at the table, you were acutely aware of him, like every one of your senses was waiting for something major to happen. Nothing did, though; you ate dinner in near complete silence. It wasn’t the comfortable silence you were used to. The air between you felt charged like the static balls at a science fair. You wanted to bridge the gap.

Wonwoo wanted to take the couch again, but you refused.

“Your turn in the bed,” you said, shooing him away. “You and I both know that couch doesn’t do the back any favors, and it’s your apartment too.”

“You don’t have to, I can--”

“Mom said it’s my turn on the couch,” you said in a high pitched, nasal tone, and then snickered, halfheartedly throwing a pillow at him. It flopped on the floor halfway between you. “I’ll be fine.”

He hovered in the doorway a few moments more, but relented in the end. “Goodnight,” he said, and made to close the door.

“Goodnight,” you said, and then, “you mean the world to me.”

The door clicked shut. You scooped up the pillow again and dropped it and yourself on the couch.

(it really is back pain in all forms and you woke up with cramps in muscles you didn’t even know you had, but it was worth it. it was always worth it)

You spent the weekend dancing around him, like planets. Like stars. Like if you got too close it would end in catastrophe.

Sometimes you’d slip into a back and forth with him that felt so familiar you could almost forget that you hardly knew him anymore, until you’d reference an old memory and he’d give you a quizzical look. It would sting, except the old memories felt strange to you now too. You didn’t mind not thinking about them, if it meant he didn’t look at you like that. Like a stranger.

The stranger you were.

You returned to work Monday and Seungcheol swung by your desk.

“How’s your boyfriend?” he asked. “He feeling better?”

You ignored the part of your stomach that twisted hearing boyfriend (that was what he was, after all, or what he had been, before Thursday; it shouldn’t feel so strange).

“I think so,” you said, because he’d put his keys on the right hook without you needing to remind him and he knew where all the cooking utensils were without needing to ask you.

Seungcheol rested his arms on the top of your cubicle. “And you? How are you holding up?”

You felt like you were hanging on by a thread. “Fine, I think. Pretty well, all things considered.”

He looked at you with concealed concern, but seemed to understand. You didn’t want to talk about it at work, even if Seungcheol had been one of your closest friends in university.

“Well, give me a call if you ever want to talk about it,” he said, and then left, probably for his own desk.

You bolted the moment time ticked over for your lunch break.

You didn’t know if Wonwoo would want you swinging by. You didn’t know if he’d answer your call. You called anyway, even if your hands shook.

He picked up.

“Hello?”

“Hey!” You wiped your palm on your shirt. “I’m out on lunch break; if you aren’t too busy maybe we could run get Chinese or something?”

There was a pause, and then, “Okay. Just let me make sure Vernon and Chan can handle the store.”

He met you out front, and you walked to the restaurant together.

It wasn’t too cold out, so you got the food to go and found a bench to sit at, watching people as they pass.

“You remember that game, where you pick somebody going by and try to guess what they’re doing?” you asked into the silence.

He hummed. “Maybe. Why, you want to do it now?”

You shrugged. “Might as well.”

Even though he’d seemed apprehensive, he took to the game quickly. He was the one to decide that the woman wearing heels with her paint splattered jeans was a street performer, on her way to meet up with the other members of her busking group. You countered that obviously, the man in the mask waiting impatiently to cross the street was on his way to manage a rambunctious group of idols.

“Can you imagine?” you asked, shaking your head. “Must be rough, having to keep some of those groups under control.”

Something odd tinged the edges of Wonwoo’s expression when you looked back over at him. You couldn’t tell what it was. You hadn’t been able to read his expressions for days. It should have scared you.

It didn’t.

“Must be rough,” he echoed, his voice hollow. You were caught between asking about it and pretending you hadn’t noticed when he pointed across the plaza at the fountain. “Bet that guy’s an idol.”

“Yeah?” You followed his hand to see a man standing by the fountain, staring up at the jets of water, his hands buried in the pockets of the long coat he wore.

“Yeah. He’s taking a break from the practice room to appreciate everything around him,” Wonwoo said. “He’s gonna go home to the other members of his group and they’re going to ask where he’s been and be worried.”

“What’s he going to tell them?”

Wonwoo leans back into the bench, and maybe a little bit into you.

“He’s going to tell them he was getting a new perspective,” he said. “That he’s seen life from a new angle. And. . .”

The silence stretched, but it was comfortable. His arm touched yours, resting there.

“And,” Wonwoo said, and his voice cracked, “that he missed them.”

You tore your gaze from the man at the fountain. Wonwoo stared into nothing, eyes wet.

“Are you okay?” you asked softly.

He didn’t look at you as he nodded. Maybe that was for the best. You could feel tears building in your own eyes. You didn’t even know why.

You missed them too.

The alarm on your phone went off.

“Ah,” you said. “I should get back to work.”

You stood, ignoring the chill on your arm where his had been.

“I’ll see you back at the apartment, yeah?” you said.

He looked at you, that time, standing. “Yeah,” he said.

You threw out your trash and offered him your arm gallantly. “Would you allow me to walk you back, sir?”

He laughed and tossed his own trash, taking your arm. “Sure.”

You walked him all the way back to the store, where you swept off an imaginary hat and dipped into a grossly exaggerated bow. You heard him laugh, and when you came back up he was smiling (you would do anything to see him happy).

“Alright, you’ve done your job,” he said.

You place a dramatic hand on your chest. “Are you implying that I did all that out of a sense of moral obligation?”

He snickered. “Well, when you put it that way.”

Whatever expression had made its way onto your face made him laugh, his face lighting up as he reached out for the doorway to steady himself. You broke into a smile, heart beating a little faster.

“Okay, I gotta go before I’m late.” You almost wanted to hug him goodbye, but something stopped you. You settled for a quick wave. “You mean the world to me, okay? I’ll see you after work!”

Friday, Wonwoo came in and barely hung up his keys (on the right hook) before tipping himself over the arm of the couch to flop face first into the cushions with a deep groan. You stared at his limp form from the kitchen, a tiny smile forming on your face.

“So, how was work?” you asked.

He mumbled something into the couch that might’ve been, “Peachy.” He flipped over. “Some woman decided we should be a bookstore and a coffee shop and made sure we knew it.”

You wince. “Yikes.”

“Yeah.” He ground his hands into his eyes. “I spent half my morning making sure she wasn’t taking it out on Vernon or Chan.”

“Well, if she didn’t get the kids then it’s all good.” You set down the spoon and moved into the other room, leaning on the back of the couch. “Shame Seungkwan wasn’t there, he’d have given her a real piece of his mind.”

“I would have let him. Not like I even wanted her to buy anything after she said that.” Wonwoo dropped his hands, one arm falling off the side of the couch. He gazed up at you.

“She can keep her condescending cash to herself,” you agreed, and reached out to mess with his hair.

And drew back just as quickly, your hand hardly brushing his hair before hastily retreating to grip your leg. Why did you do that? It was wrong, it was all wrong. Your face burned. You didn’t know him well enough you’d known him for years he was a stranger you’d played with his hair all the time in university, even before you’d made it official it felt wrong to do it it felt wrong to pull away--

Wonwoo sat up. “Hey, everything okay?”

“--Yeah.” You shook your head. “Just-- head rush.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah.” You tore yourself away from the couch, making for the counter again and ignoring the sting on your leg where you dug in your nails. You could hear him trailing you.

Wonwoo leaned on the counter as you picked up the spoon. For a moment, you thought he’d press you again.

“So,” he said, “how was work?”

Of course he wouldn’t push. He was Wonwoo.

“Fine,” you said, stirring the ramen in the bowl. “Same old story, really, except everyone was talking about the company dinner party Sunday.”

Wonwoo blinked. “You didn’t tell me there was a dinner Sunday.”

You dashed the spoon through the noodles with perhaps more vigor than strictly necessary. “I didn’t want to bother you. You know, since you haven’t been feeling well this week. It didn’t seem worth adding to your plate and it doesn’t seem like your scene.”

“It doesn’t seem like yours either.”

He was right; it wasn’t your scene. You always found yourself walking on eggshells every time, a glass of wine gripped in your hand that you never dared drink from out of fear of making a fool of yourself.

“It’s my job,” you said. Your next stir sent tiny dots of water into the air and you flinched back.

Wonwoo nudged you out of the way, taking up the spoon even as you pouted at him. “Well,” he said, “need a date?”

You blinked. “Are you volunteering?”

“Maybe,” he said. “You work for one of those fancy companies, right? They probably have all kinds of high society foods.”

“They do cover meal costs,” you admitted.

He scoffed. “And you were going to leave me eating ramen alone on my Sunday night?” He reached up and tousled your hair. “If you need moral support I’ll be there.”

Your heart swelled. “Jeon Wonwoo, you mean the world to me you godsend.”

He ducked his head, turning to the ramen again. “Hey, any guy would count himself lucky to be your plus one.” He nudged your elbow. “How about you grab a couple bowls out and we eat this on the couch? We can watch a movie or something.”

(you found your seat on the couch, your bowl nestled in your lap, and when he came to meet you he sat beside you)

Saturday you spent at the bookstore, shelving books, distracting Vernon, and waiting for Wonwoo to get off. Seungkwan stopped by with a deck of cards and in the spare moments between customers you played poker under the desk. Chan threatened to quit after you inexplicably bluffed him out of three rounds in a row. Vernon swore he wasn’t stacking the deck, you were just that good all of a sudden.

“It’s not possible for you to have gotten good at bluffing in under a week, it’s like you’re a totally different person,” Chan said, and he was joking but the sting and the familiarity of the words drained the blood from your face and you barely managed to play it off. The game continued, but without you.

Seokmin was sitting at a table in the coffeeshop flicking idly through a textbook. You ordered a drink and joined him.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

“Fine,” you said.

“Really? Because you only come in here alone when it isn’t.”

You huffed. “It’s nothing. I just needed an escape.” The bookstore felt more welcoming again, more like Wonwoo (Wonwoo with his arm touching yours on the bench, Wonwoo pressed against your side as you play fight over who gets to cook dinner, Wonwoo with his head on your shoulder as he sleeps through the emotional climax of Finding Dory, his breathing a steady breeze against your neck) but something in Chan’s words. . .

You’d recoiled.

“I’m not--” you gripped your cup, thinking carefully about your words. “I’m not a different person, am I?”

“As far as I know you’re the same person you’ve always been.”

You rolled your eyes. “No, I mean-- have I changed, like-- my personality, my little ticks. Any of that?”

Seokmin looked at you (he always looked like he knew more than he said; probably it came from being top of his class all through school but still. . .). “Maybe,” he said. “I’d say you’re the same you, but maybe they knew a different you.”

Your head slipped to meet the table before you could catch it. “Seokmin you know I’m not smart enough for riddles.”

“It doesn’t have to be a riddle.” He laughed. “Everybody has a picture in their mind of everybody else, and it’s never the same as what actually exists.”

“Philosophy is ruining you,” you said. “Stop hanging out with Jeonghan, he’s turning you into a paradox.”

“What I’m saying is, just because someone thinks you’re different than you were, that doesn’t mean you actually are. Maybe you’ve just been different this whole time, and now they finally noticed.”

“Maybe.”

He had a point, once you stripped away the philosophic layers. It was just the phrasing.

It’s like you’re a totally different person. In under a week.

Last week, everything had changed.

You couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong, but you sipped your coffee anyway. Seokmin asked about the company dinner, and you tried to forget about it.

You went shopping with Wonwoo after he closed up the store, trying to find something business casual for the dinner.

“And nothing in the closet would work for this because?” you asked, flicking through the rack of button ups.

“Because it’s a special occasion,” he said, holding a suit jacket against his chest and then hanging it up again. “We can’t wear anything we’ve already worn.”

You snorted. “What are we, movie stars on the red carpet?”

“No,” he said. “I mean, if you wanted, maybe, but no.” He glanced up. “Anytime is an excuse to treat ourselves.”

“Can’t argue with that.” You trailed your arm across a line of ties, letting the material fall over your finger. Your motion halted over a tie. “Oh, this’ll be impressive.” You held it up for him to see.

“Nice,” he said. “The bundles of bills will surely let your boss know you’re in this for what really matters.”

You pointed at him. “Exactly what I was thinking.” You looped it around your head, fingers pinching it together. “Maybe I could wear it like one of those guys in the post apocalyptic movies, that way they know I’m willing to go all the way.”

“Now you’re talking.” He hung up the jackets and came over, taking another tie off the rack, this one a soft coral pink. “Or maybe, you put this one on. . .”

He looped it around your neck and tied it properly.

“Where’d you learn how to tie a tie?” you asked, a laugh bubbling out of you.

“I felt bad making the stylists do it for me all the time,” he said, offhandedly.

The wrongness niggled at you.

You turned to the mirror nearby, playing with the ends of the tie. “I don’t know,” you said.

“What, you don’t like the color?”

“No, pink is a great color.” You surveyed yourself. “I just think I’d want a little more color to my outfit than a tie.”

“Of course,” Wonwoo said, moving to stand behind you, his chest nearly brushing your shoulder as he studied your reflection. “You’re the business one, we want to make sure you pop.” His eyes lit up. “I know.”

He didn’t quite have it the first few times, but finally, after taking over a changing room and trying on enough outfits that the both of you had nearly filled the reject cart, you walked out of the store with your purchases on your arms.

You stopped for takeout on the way back, too tired to cook, and ate dinner in a comfortable silence, leaning against each other and the couch as the TV played the weather forecast. When he dozed off against your neck, you forced yourself up.

“Come on sleepyhead,” you said, pulling him up with you. He made a few affronted noises but didn’t argue as you stole his trash and stowed the leftovers in the fridge and all but carried him into the bedroom.

“Dramatic.” You clicked your tongue, dropping him in the bed and moving to grab your sleepwear and get changed. His hand caught your wrist.

“You don’t have to take the couch tonight,” he said, and his voice was much clearer now.

“Well I’m not about to let you take it,” you said. “It’s my turn.”

“No, I meant--” he cut himself off.

“Oh,” you said.

“If you want,” he said hurriedly. “If it doesn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“Um-- if you’re okay with it,” you said, and your face burns and he looks kind of like he’s in the same boat and he drops your wrist.

“Okay,” he said.

“Okay,” you said, and made for the bathroom.

He was changed when you finished in the bathroom and you climbed into bed beside him. It was strange, sharing, even though you knew you’d done it before maybe. There was an ocean of bed between you that you didn’t dare cross.

You closed your eyes. “Goodnight, Wonwoo,” you said, the words echoing off the wall you faced instead of him. Then, quieter, “You mean the world to me.”

(it’s the best rest you’ve gotten in what feels like forever; you wake up in a tangle of limbs but neither of you are in a hurry to pull away)

You idled outside the building, picking at the sleeves of the shirt you’d picked out the day before.

“Ready?” Wonwoo asked, making eye contact. You nodded, eyes slipping down to rest on the pink tie, the same pink as you’d chosen your shirt to be. He held out his arm, like a gentleman, and you took it.

The room rented for the dinner is as stuffy as you expected. You made small talk with coworkers you’d only ever seen for five minutes at the printer, and played the people watching game with Wonwoo in hushed tones whenever you got a spare moment. Seungcheol swung by a few times to check in and spill a bit of corporate gossip in a hushed voice, both with and without Joshua by his side.

“It’s a game we play,” Seungcheol explained when Wonwoo asked about it. “We make small talk together, he sends me to ‘get drinks’ and then talks me up behind my back.” Seungcheol glanced over at Joshua, where he was chatting calmly with two members of the board of directors. “He’s really good at it.”

Your social battery died about halfway through, but you forced yourself to soldier on. It probably wouldn’t look good if you left early. Hopefully no one would notice as your responses grew shorter and your smiles more strained.

Wonwoo took your hand after you laughed a little too loud at a coworker’s joke, and then turned to you when they had said their goodbyes to do another sweep around the floor. “Are you okay?” he asked softly. “Is it time to go?”

You shook your head. “I shouldn’t leave early.”

“We’ve been here more than half the time, I think we’re allowed.” He folded your hand between his, rubbing it soothingly. “We can use me as an excuse, say I got tired. Please don’t force yourself to stay; I can tell something’s wrong.”

You kind of wanted to cry, and you didn’t know if it was the stress of the evening or what. “I don’t deserve you,” you said.

He wrapped an arm around your shoulders and tugged you in. “You deserve the world,” he said softly into your ear.

And then you left the party.

You stopped at the park, instead of going directly home, sitting at the fountain’s edge.

“You remember when we got takeout?” he asked.

You did. “When we first played the people watching game, right?” you asked, and stopped. That hadn’t been the first time; you’d played it all the time before hadn’t you?

“Yeah,” he said. “You dropped me off.”

“You got really into the game,” you said. “That idol guy’s backstory was impressively complex.”

He laughed, soft and fond, and yet also flat. Like there was a layer of irony you hadn’t caught.

“When you dropped me off at the bookstore, you said that-- you said ‘you mean the world to me’. And-- we’re dating, at least according to Vernon, and, this whole time you never said ‘I love you’.” He looked at you. “Why is that?”

You open your mouth, the answer of a shared back and forth you two had used since university sitting on your tongue, but it didn’t come out. You just closed your mouth.

Because it wasn’t. It wasn’t something you’d said since university. You-- hadn’t known him in university.

“I’m not sure,” you said, bewildered because it was true. Why did you say that?

“It’s just stuck with me,” he said. “Ever since that first day, when I didn’t--” he cut himself off. “It was like I’d been dropped into this world from another one,” he said. “I didn’t know anything, and-- you were a total stranger.”

Another world. Total stranger. The words vibrated against the walls of your skull. You’d thought of him like a stranger too, even though you knew him. At least you thought you did. But you didn’t know him in university, you didn’t know him at all.

“But, as time went by, and I got time to know you, I realized something,” he said, and he took your hand in both of his. “And I don’t think we’re strangers anymore.”

Strangers, you were strangers. What had you thought, that first day? How did you even know it as the first day, beyond Wonwoo’s strange actions? You weren’t thinking of it like the first day of Wonwoo. It was the first day at all. You didn’t know him.

“I guess. . .” he trailed off. “I guess what I want to say, is just that I. . .”

He wasn’t your housemate or your boyfriend or the guy you knew from the frat. He wasn’t-- he was--

Oh god.

You tore your hand from his.

Everything went deathly silent.

“Fancy meeting you here.” Seokmin’s voice rang out.

Your head jerked up.

Time had frozen around you. Wonwoo still sat by the fountain, looking in your direction with an expression of distress, his hand reaching after you. You scrambled back. He didn’t move.

“I guess this means you figured it out?” Seokmin asked.

You looked at him. “What have I done?”

“A wish was made,” he said. “I granted it.”

You blinked. A flash, staring up into the sky from the window; “I wish I could tell him what he means,” you said to the stars, “every night. I wish I could tell him, he means the world to me.”

“You’re Santa.”

Seokmin made a face. “I’m with Wonwoo, let’s not call it that.”

“And Wonwoo knew the whole time that this was wrong?” you asked. He nodded. “Why? Why not me? It was my wish.”

He smiled. “Wishes don’t always work the way you expect them to.”

You shook your head. “Send him back now.”

“Why?”

“It doesn’t matter why Seokmin, just do it!”

He blinked at you. “For the record, I’m not actually Seokmin. I’m just borrowing his appearance, to keep an eye on you.”

You dug your fingers into the dirt, like a reminder it was still there. “And Seungcheol? Vernon? Chan?”

“Projections. Every person you’ve met here is a projection.”

“At least you didn’t abduct them.” You stopped. “At least I didn’t.” You shook your head. “But it’s done now. You have to send him back. He didn’t ask to be here, he didn’t want to be here!”

“And if he doesn’t want to go back?”

“Of course he wants to go back!” you shout. “Have you not seen the way he cares for the members? You said you were keeping an eye on us, did you miss that day at the park? He misses them! And I dragged him away!” You shoot to your feet, throat beginning to close up. “You have to fix this-- I have to fix this!”

The thing which was not Seokmin looked at you. “Don’t you wonder what he was going to say to you, before everything clicked?”

You swallowed. “Whatever it was, it was built on a lie. And it’s a lie I refuse to keep living.”

Not-Seokmin shrugged. “Then turn and look him in the eyes and wish everything back,” he said.

You did.

(if you cried when you woke up in a single bed you recognized as truly your own, you were the only one to know)

Wonwoo was oddly quiet in broadcasts from that point on. You couldn’t bring yourself to talk about him anymore. Someone asked you on Twitter if you had something against him.

No, you’d responded, he just reminds me of a recent ex. Every time I see him I think about them and it’s just too painful right now. I don’t hate Wonwoo.

Two days later, the Seventeen Twitter account dmed you.

I need to talk to you.

You sent, I’m sorry.

You deactivated.

You almost gave away your concert tickets, but you’d been planning on going with a friend before everything and you wouldn’t let them down. You went despite all your misgivings. With the stage lights on full blast, there was no way he’d be able to see you in the audience. You were safe, with your seats halfway up the concert hall, half a mile from the stage.

And then Seventeen, in the middle of their set, hopped off the stage, into the audience.

You’d wondered why certain aisles had a security detail around them.

If it wasn’t the middle of a song, you’d ask the people farther down the row to switch with you but you didn’t dare move around; it had been drilled into you that doing so during a performance was disrespectful. You were the seat on the aisle, and Wonwoo was on his way up, his eyes scanning the crowd with a sharp determination even as he continued his verse flawlessly.

Would looking away be more conspicuous than staring?

Should you jump to blend with the energy of the crowd, or freeze so he didn’t look?

It didn’t matter.

He’d seen you.

He took the stairs two, three at a time, stopping on the landing beside you, turning to face the rest of the hall again as his verse finished, and then he glanced at you.

The spotlight shone on his face.

“Please don’t leave,” he mouthed, or maybe said, but the combined roar of the crowd and the blood rushing in your ears drowned it out completely.

And then he turned to complete the performance, leaving a few fans looking at you wistfully.

(several of them came up after the concert to congratulate you, to gush about how lucky you were, to speculate about what happened and laugh about it; blessedly no one was openly rude about it)

You sat on the edge of a fountain, in the plaza a block from the back door of the concert hall, fidgeting with your sleeves. You didn’t know if you were crazy. You probably were crazy, waiting for him. He’d be livid. He had to be livid. He’d never forgive you.

But whatever closure would mean for him, you’d give it to him.

Anything.

The back door of the concert hall slammed open and a figure came bolting out towards you. They skidded to a halt at the edge of the fountain, and you could see Wonwoo’s eyes over the mask.

“I wasn’t sure you were going to stay,” he said.

“I wasn’t either.”

“I’m glad you did.” He sat down on the edge of the fountain. “I really need to talk to you.”

“I’m sorry,” you blurted, before he could get upset.

He blinked. “For what?”

“For making the stupid wish and dragging you into an alternate universe, and then not even remembering doing it.” You rubbed your arm, staring at the brickwork. “I mean I was basically gaslighting you the entire time.”

“I know you didn’t mean it,” he said.

You toed the crack between two stones. “What all do you know?”

“How that world worked. How I got there. How I got back.” You saw him move, reaching out like he was going to take your hand, and then stopping himself in the middle. “I’m not upset with you.”

“You should be.” The words dropped out of your mouth. “You should hate me. You-- I basically ruined your life.”

“You didn’t ruin my life, you showed me what I was missing,” he said. “You remember when we played that people watching game? What I said about that man?”

You picked at a loose thread in your sleeve. “He. . . he was taking a break from the practice room.”

You saw him nod from the corner of your eye. “And I said he was getting a new perspective.”

“He’s seeing life from a new angle,” you said.

“It was as much my wish as it was yours,” Wonwoo said. “I felt lost. I didn’t know where to go next or what to focus on, and it wasn’t something the members could help with, but it was something you could help with. And you did.”

You felt numb. A wish was made. Not-Seokmin had given one last riddle, one you were finally understanding.

“You add a dimension to my life that I was missing,” he said. “Just, please-- please don’t leave me again.”

You looked at him, finally, sitting there on the edge of the fountain, his hair a mess from the performance.

“I didn’t want to leave,” you said. “I just-- I had to let you go.”

“You don’t have to here,” he said. “I know I don’t run a bookstore, and we didn’t meet in college, but--”

“I didn’t fall for you because you ran a bookstore,” you said. “The bookstore was window dressing. You’re you no matter what career you have.”

On impulse, you reached out. He met you in the middle and you laced your fingers through his.

“I love you,” you said.

He clasped his other hand around yours and lifted it to his lips, his eyes squeezed up in such overwhelming happiness you thought you’d cry.

“I love you too.”

#caratwritersclub #seventeen #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagines #seventeen au #wonwoo scenarios #wonwoo imagines #wonwoo #jeon wonwoo #wonwoo fluff #wonwoo angst #listen i don't know how to tag and i refuse to learn now on principle #i'll throw words into these bitches with reckless abandon and one day #i'll die

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amethyst-wind-uk · 3 years ago

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Paradise Killer is a great game. Thoroughly enjoyed my time playing it. (spoilers within)

The amount of detail that went into the main plot is staggering. The web of evidence and leads is so complex that my suspicions of who had done what were constantly changing (even if you do twig pretty early on that everybody is involved to some extent).

The plot centers around the bloody massacre of the ruling Council of The Syndicate, who are immortals living in a pocket dimension that is on its 24th iteration. The Island is basically the entire world to these immortals (of which the protagonist Lady Love Dies is one), with the stated goal of reviving the gods who granted them immortality. Emphasis on stated. They’ve been doing a terrible job of reviving them, having gone through 24 Islands and managed to get back SOME of ONE God. Mostly they just kidnap mortals from the real world to use as slave labour for their microcosm’s dirty inner workings. It’s a terribly flawed place to live for basically anyone who isn’t the Council, and you are repeatedly reminded of that fact.

The characters are supremely well-written (even Yuri), and it was a delight spending time with each, which really took the edge off the constant back-tracking between characters you have to do (every character, intentionally or otherwise, tells a lot of half-truths that require you to return to them to have them clarify what they said before - and it’s surprisingly not so much of a negative towards the overall game. It’s that well written).

Lady Love Dies is a great protagonist, no matter how you play her. She’s able to schmooze information out of every suspect in a variety of ways, relishes her job as investigator no matter how you play her, banters beautifully with Shinji the Demon, and is a literal example of Thicc Thighs Save Lives (see the picture at the end). And she’s Bi. She’s also tied into the backstory of the universe, having suffered at the hands of a diety, and ended up in exile because of it. She’s only called back because of the events of the game.

Shinji provides needed comic relief, and has the added benefit of you not having to deal with him at all unless you want to. You can ignore him for basically the entire game, except for one instance where he provides you with the needed macguffin to advance the plot, and that’s a short converstaion.

Lydia is very natural as the best friend, and Sam (her red skeleton husband - they met when she killed him) provides plenty of quality banter, probably due to being a bartender. (Much as I wanted to spare them - and not just because I kinda wanted Lady Love Dies to FUCK/GET FUCKED BY Lydia - it became impossible not to have them found guilty by the time I’d gathered all the expansive evidence. And they’re not even either of the masterminds!)

One Last Kiss, being a ghost who’s been dead for ten years, is so fun because she’s completely fucking unimpressed by anything that any of the cast do, even the literal arbiter of justice in the end-game. She’s fully aware of how little anything she, or the others do, matters to the vast majority. She’s well aware that she’ll disappear when Paradise Island reboots in the near future, doesn’t expect sweeping change to happen in any of the future iterations, and is just letting every drop of her snark out in the short time she has left.

Henry is a worse version of Star Fucker from 2064: Read Only Memories, who exists to be scapegoated by others.

It’s hard to dislike Akiko, even when she’s so abrasive. She’s like a feral kitten - hissing at affection, and dumb as a box of rocks. (She’s seriously terrible at her job, even when she’s not taking part in Carmelina’s conspiracy).

Yuri Night is not my favourite character in-universe (he’s not anybody’s. He’s an unlikeable douche), but he’s fascinating from a meta-narrative perspective. He’s mentally a chlld in an adult’s body (I don’t mean he’s mentally challenged - he received a ‘perfect’ body from a God, which resulted in him aging up overnight), and it shows in so many ways. He sees the world as an obnoxious brat would:

He insists that wine is better the older it is (the wine being a metaphor for people).

He boasts, out-loud and constantly, that he’s smarter and better than anybody else.

He’s convinced that he should be in charge.

He absolutely refuses to admit when he’s wrong or doesn’t know something, and will simply end a discussion when he doesn’t want to lose an argument.

Constantly uses the exact same insult for Lady Love Dies (’freak’, which is a shortened form of the ‘investigation freak’ reputation she’s cultivated - note: most of the cast is immortal, and only the infantile [as they’re mortal rather than the millenia-old main cast] Marshals call her ‘freak’ otherwise.)

Dr. Doom Jazz (god I love some of the names in this game) was probably my least favourite character, and mostly because he’s just kinda dull. I basically wrote him off when it became clear that the vast majority of his character was “horndog who doesn’t care to get involved ever”. His best moment was when he got mad at Lady Love Dies for taking his dead friend’s blood from his dead friend’s grave, but honestly that was about five seconds of his roughly one-hour’s supposed relevance.

Crimson Acid, on the other hand? Hands down my favourite character. I love misanthropic spymasters and their “I know everything so I can blackmail people into not bothering me” attitudes. And she’s a great example of it (reminded me of Vanasha from Horizon: Zero Dawn). Like Yuri, she was blessed by a God (different God). She also hates having been Peter Principle’d out of her dream job of kicking the shit out of demons, and into a poster girl role for the Syndicate (the rulers of the subspace where the game takes place). Also: Yes, you can sex her.

For reference on how much I like the character designs, here’s (from left to right) Crimson Acid, Lady Love Dies, and Dr. Doom Jazz:

#Paradise Killer #Kaizen Game Works #Fellow Traveller #Fellow Traveller Games #Lady Love Dies #Crimson Acid #WLW #Bisexual

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babieateez · 4 years ago

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ateez as dpr songs because i love dpr and i love ateez c:

hongjoong: zombie pop, action

to me, zombie pop gives off the feeling of running through an empty field. i’m not sure exactly why i associate this feeling with hongjoong, but maybe its how his smile and laugh can light up his whole face. i also feel like the more experimental composition of this song (with the jazz feel and instrumentation) fits his style of trying out new things. as for action, that whole song gives off a very warm and lovely feeling. we already have established that i’m in love with barista hongjoong, and this song seems to take place in a coffee shop. not only could i see him singing this song, but i can see him existing in the same universe as this song.

seonghwa: interlude, jasmine

interlude is a short and sweet piano piece that i can’t help but think of seonghwa when i listen to it. i feel like this is something seonghwa would listen to or play in the background while he’s doing some menial task. it just seems like a very sweet song and seonghwa seems like a very sweet person. jasmine reminds me a bit more of seonghwa’s flirty side, while still somehow remaining sincere and lovely. also, the visuals of the music video are incredible, and i feel like those nature scenes can also be found through some of seonghwa’s mannerisms. this song also feels like trying to take care of someone you love, which is something seonghwa does often with his members.

yunho: our last dream, eyes of dpr

yunho is an optimistic person it seems, and when i listen to our last dream, i feel hopeful. the song conveys a feeling of wonder and exploraion, which i just associate with yunho. not only is this song beautiful, it invokes a lot of emotion for me. the sort of happiness i get when i listen to this song is the sort of happiness i’d think yunho’s friends would feel while spending the day with him. eyes of dpr has the sort of sound that yunho makes me feel. relaxed, but with some extra spice and kick to get the feeling to be a little bit more fun and hype. this song feels like riding a motorcycle in the middle of the day with nobody else on the road, and it’s the sort of feeling that yunho would go crazy for.

yeosang: eyes of rem, no rescue needed

eyes of rem is a more subdued song, with not very many parts surprising the listener. it’s a reliable song for when you just want to feel whatever emotion you’re feeling. i feel like yeosang is the friend who is reliably there to keep you grounded no matter what may be going on, and this song gives me the same vibe. with no rescue needed, it’s almost a completely different feeling. this song has more of an upbeat tempo and portrays the message of “i’m okay with where i’m at.” that’s how i perceive yeosang in life. he’s just vibing and taking things as they come.

san: legacy, know me

legacy is a very cool song. especially in the second half of the song, the rap just reminds me of the way san moves, especially when he’s popping off on stage. i feel like the borderline chaotic vibes this song throws off matches how san is just sort of always energetic and ready to go, no matter what is in his way. know me is almost the same way, but i feel like it encompasses his more flirty side as well. the song just sounds a bit more sultry which i feel fits san’s presence as well. it still has the same energy of “don’t get in my way” as legacy, but is more emotive and expressive.

mingi: thirst, just dream it

i have to start by saying i think i’d die if mingi ever did a cover of thirst. i’m not sure exactly why i relate that song with mingi so much, but the way the background is very relaxed but the vocals are more exciting just makes me think of mingi. i feel like he just fits with this song so well. with just dream it, it’s almost the same feeling. in the beginning, the languid piano playing with the background noise of the city is so relaxing and sweet, but once you get a bit further in, the song hits. mingi feels like a very relaxed person, but he’s also intensely passionate about everything he does. when the rap at the end of the song starts, it just feels like so much passion was put into that, so it just makes me think of mingi’s demeanor.

wooyoung: text me, neon

text me is a cute and flirty song. i’m sure you can already see where i’m going with this one. wooyoung is just a fun, cute, flirty guy who wants to be loved. it’s just an adorable song about wanting to get to know someone who you’re really into, and i feel like wooyoung gives off thosse attentive, wanting to know how to make you happy vibes. neon is a more hype song, and i can totally see wooyoung having the same feelings that this song portrays. like mingi, he’s a very passionate person, especially in regards to those he’s close with. he just gives of the idea that he’s the most supportive and loving person you could know, and i feel like that loving and supportive energy is similar to the energy expressed in this song.

jongho: billboard uwu, geronimo

billboard uwu is a very pure song. there’s not a lot of elements in the music that have no reason to be there, and i feel like jongho is the same. as a maknae, he’s expected to be cutesy and affectionate, but that’s not really who he is, so he doesn’t pretend to be. there are times where things switch up (just like in the song) but overall, it is a reliable and steady rhythm. geronimo is just a song that i hear and go “jongho” in my mind. i just feel like it’s such a good song and jongho is such a good boy.

end note: please support dpr!! all of their music videos are superb and their music is so amazing. also it was hard to explain my reasoning rather than just saying “its just a vibe” lol so i’m sorry if it reads slightly boring.

#ateez scenarios #ateez imagines #ateez au #hongjoong #seonghwa #yunho #yeosang #san #mingi #wooyoung #jongho #ateez.ot8 #bee writes

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timeagainreviews · 5 years ago

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The Filler Fluff of the Cybermen

When is a two-parter not a two-parter? When the first part is tonight’s episode "Ascension of the Cybermen." As stories go, that was pretty damn sparse. I’ll be honest, friends, I don’t have a lot to say about tonight’s story. But that’s not why you come here, so I will try my damnedest to find something to talk about in this latest episode of Doctor Who. Right, now, how many words was that? Sixty-seven? Christ. This is going to be a slog.

I honestly shouldn’t be surprised. It had to happen. I was saying just last week that I hadn’t seen an episode I outright hated so far this series. We were due. That’s not to say I actually feel hate for this episode, more accurately, I feel very little about this episode. Usually, I endeavour to do more than simply trash an episode, but tonight, it’s either that, or I end the review here. So apologies ahead of time.

The episode opens on a Cyberman head floating in space with some knucklehead voiceover telling us about how the Cybermen have been mostly wiped out and what remains of humanity isn’t much better. The episode will now spend the next fifty minutes reiterating this point ad nausea. It was like a Star Wars title crawl, except in Star Wars, the crawl isn’t the plot of the movie you’re about to watch. Funnily, a lot of tonight’s episode reminded me of "The Last Jedi." Our heroes get split up. A slow chase ensues. No new information is gained. And it ends leaving us feeling like not a lot happened.

The Doctor and her companions come to a small human colony in the distant future. There are only seven of them left. The Doctor sets up a series of relays to help this ragtag bunch of humans kill off an oncoming Cyberman attack. Only thing is, they had never accounted for the Cybermen to first send out "Cyber Drones." Now, say you’ve got a room full of artists who love Doctor Who. And you tell them all to design drones that will be utilised by Cybermen. You can imagine they might have some rather impressive designs. Now, gather up all of those beautiful and creative drawings into your arms and throw them in the bin. Instead, we’re going to just use floating Cyberman heads. Was this because Chibnall is the kind of guy who thinks a dude with teeth pressed into his face is creepy or is this because reusing Cyberman heads is cheap? I’ll let you decide.

The Cyberheads and their eye lasers do quick work of the Doctor’s relays and sends everyone scattering to the wind. With three of the humans dead, Ryan, a young boy named Ethan, and the Doctor get left behind. Yaz and Graham, find themselves aboard a rickety gravraft with the remainder of the humans. With the TARDIS too far away, the Doctor decides they need to hijack a Cybership. I gotta give it to the Cybermen, they take better care of their ship than they do their own bodies. It’s almost as if there was no continuity in the design. Or maybe it’s like when you see someone whose life is a total mess but they have a dope car. I’ll let you decide.

After Ethan hotwires the Cybership, the Doctor pilots the ship to the most logical destination- her TARDIS. No, I’m just kidding, that would have made sense! Instead, she goes somewhere. I just double-checked with my boyfriend and we honestly couldn’t remember why anyone was doing anything at this point in the episode. After combing the episode I finally found a bit of throwaway dialogue where Ethan programmed the ship to go to a place called "Ko Sharmus." Meanwhile, the other group of protagonists are floating listlessly in space, making them the most relatable characters in this episode as that’s exactly how I felt.

By now you’re probably wondering why I haven’t gotten to the B-story happening in this episode. I guess here is as good a place as any, as it made just as much sense crammed anywhere in the episode it pleased. We see a young man and woman find a baby. This baby grows up to be their adopted son, Brendan. Brendan becomes a cop. Brendan gets shot and falls off a cliff. Brendan wakes up unscathed. Brendan’s dad looks at him like he’s creepy. Brendan grows old and retires. Brendan’s dad and boss, seemingly having not aged, wipe his memory. It makes as much sense as a wicker toilet and gives us no new information. At one point I thought he may have been Captain Jack’s kid, but then he grows old, so I don’t know what to think. What I do know is that you could have edited it down and made it into a far better cold opener than that Cyberhead floating in space shit.

The humans aboard the gravraft get stranded next to a giant Cyberman ship where a battle has gone down. Remnants of Cybermen ping the hull of their vessel like tiny asteroids. They get the bright idea to use the airlock to give the gravraft an extra thrust into the Cybership. I don’t know if it was intentional, but having Graham say "Don’t panic," right before they release the airlock was a nice little Douglas Adams reference. Or maybe it wasn’t at all, but I’ll take any joy from this episode I can get. Much like the idiotic hip bounce from "Can You Hear Me?" that knocked the sonic screwdriver up into the Doctor’s hands, the gravraft makes a million in one shot directly into the Cyberman ship’s docking bay. If they have that kind of luck sinking shots like that, they should really take their skills to the minigolf course.

The second I saw the ship, I knew that they were going to do the rows upon rows of sleeping Cybermen emerging from their tombs. It’s a Doctor Who trope as old as the Patrick Troughton era. My boyfriend was enjoying these bits as he is less familiar with the history of Doctor Who, so I let him have his fleeting enjoyment. I couldn’t even get jazzed about the new Cyberman design as they had already spoiled it with online photos. Basically, aside from the head-scratching B-story, the plot to tonight’s episode could be gathered by looking at promotional photos. There were new Cybermen. The Lone Cyberman was there. Nothing new to be learned here. Though, I will admit those new Cybermen are genuinely awesome.

The Doctor has a brief encounter with a hologram of the Lone Cyberman, or "Ashad." We learn that Ashad doesn’t just want to destroy all humans, he wants to destroy all life in the universe, for reasons. So I guess it wasn’t all a wash. Ashad heads to the Cybership where he begins waking up the Cybermen by what looks like torture. I have absolutely zero idea why he was doing what he was doing. It’s not at all made clear. Was he giving a titty twister so the Cybermen would accept him as their leader? Because after waking up the rest of them, they all seem to fall in line. Honestly, what the hell was he doing to that Cyberman? It makes no goddamn sense.

One thing I will say that made me happy was that one of my predictions from before episode one came true. They gave Graham a bit of a love interest. I called that shit. This possible love interest came in the form of Ravio, one of the human colonists. I found it rather amusing that in the future humans would still speak with British accents but have lost all context for Cockney rhyming slang. It was a cute bit of dialogue that falls apart if you think about it too much. The Cybermen force the humans into a corner to barricade themselves from the onslaught of Cybermen, and that’s where they’re left until next weekend.

Meanwhile, the Doctor arrives at Ko Sharmus which ends up being a person’s name as opposed to a planet. Chris Chibnall’s ability to name characters has not improved. Seriously, there are characters named Feekat and Yedlarmi in this episode. It hardly matters though as they’re all rather forgettable. I had to comb the episode and the internet just to figure out who was who. The Doctor never even introduces herself to Ethan. I had to figure his name out through one of the many throwaway lines of dialogue. That’s not to say that they don’t have real bits of character development. But you can take all of the character development in the world and wrap it around a hollow plot and it equals a lot of me not giving a shit.

Ko Sharmus was a welcome addition, simply because he was played by the charismatic Ian McElhinney. Turns out he’s a human colonist who stays behind in case any more humans might one day also come to this planet. There’s a sort of gateway or “boundary” out of the galaxy where many humans have gone to escape pursuit by Cyberman. Ko Sharmus’ job is to act as a guide to any possible newcomers also looking to reach said boundary. However, the Doctor quickly learns that the boundary is actually a gateway to Gallifrey. Only now it shows Gallifrey as the Master left it- in ruins.

Did I mention the Master? Well, here he is, making a "grand" entrance. The only thing at this point that was grand about the introduction of the Master to the story was that I was excited that something of substance was actually about to happen. Instead, this is our cliffhanger- this not at all surprising reveal that the Master is still alive. Of course, he is, he’s the Master. It’s a season finale with the Cybermen, of course, the Master is going to be there. It’s been that way for the past two Cyberman season finales. I guess the third time is a charm? What about any of this is supposed to be surprising? Remember how I said I was afraid they were becoming far too reliant on big reveals? This ending is the epitome of that. I think they expected to blow our minds by having the storyline they set up at the beginning of the series come into fruition. Try harder Chibs, this shit was weak.

The biggest shocker here is how little happened. What we were left with was akin to a classic filler episode where the Doctor gets captured. They padded out everything because they didn’t want next week’s episode to be ten minutes longer. Tonight’s episode exists purely because Chris Chibnall couldn’t edit down the script of a single episode into something shorter. This wouldn’t be so egregious if at least one storyline came to some sort of conclusion. If the B-story with Brendan had gone somewhere it might have made the entire episode feel somewhat worth the time and effort. Instead, we’re forced to watch a team of talented actors fill time.

I can’t help but feel like last week’s episode should have been this week’s episode with maybe a bit more setup for the finale. In place of this forgettable fluff, we could have gotten a single contained episode in its place. Something that had a beginning, middle, and end. Because of this, it’s almost as if we’ve been shorted an episode. Because of all of the wasted time in "Ascension of the Cybermen," I can only think of two outcomes for next week. One is an episode crammed so full of exposition that it will feel messy and disjointed. The other is an episode that is as equally underwhelming as tonight’s effort. Do you really mean to tell me they’re going to fit a Cyberman battle, Captain Jack, the Master, Gallifrey, the Timeless Child, and possibly Ruth into an episode and it not be a mess? It’s hard to have faith that there is a reason behind this much wasted screentime. I could use some of Graham’s optimism because at this moment it’s looking a bit hopeless.

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celestialholz · 5 years ago

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Tony Bennett - Close Enough for Love (Audio)

... So I’ve seen y’all recently, with your lovely Qcard song suggestions, all of which are very valid and I adore you for them, but if you’ll allow to wade in, mes captaines, I’ll raise you: space jazz, on their anniversary, with a twist chucked in because it’s me. This was a date idea at one point for the side blog (come say hi to some galactic idiots over at @ask-q-and-picard, if you’re up for such things ^_^), but this narrative was far too sprawling, so here we are! Welcome to around a thousand words of softness, a sprinkling of angst, a side order of introspection, and a god who can’t dance to save his own immortal essence.

(This isn’t a songfic as such guys, but you’ll get the most from it if you have a listen to the above whilst reading, thematically as well as lyrically. Let Tony Bennett melt your soul with his deeply appropriate words and delightful voice. <3)

* Also, as promised, ma’am - @q-card, have fun with this cosmic romance!

“Left foot first, Q.”

“Dammit, Jean-Luc, I don’t -” His footsteps are automatically corrected, the movement vexingly smooth, and he barely represses a snarl at his lover’s grin.

“You’re omniscient, my dear - how can you be so awful at waltzing?” He queries, voice a teasing lilt.

Q sniffs haughtily, offended.

“You know how to have fun,” he points out dryly. “Hardly makes you a natural at it. I’m not used to coordinated movements, man - I just sort of... saunter, and everyone’s just naturally impressed.”

“That’s why I’m trying to lead you,” Picard exclaims patiently, tightening his grip as he encourages the god backwards, deliberately slowing their pace. “You’re improving, if it means anything.”

“How the hell did you -” He sucks in an unnecessary breath as he’s swept against that broad chest, sprinkle of salt and pepper hair so maddeningly concealed by a jet-black tuxedo. “Where the hell did you learn how to do this, anyway?”

“I’m French,” he says, as though that explains everything, or indeed anything at all. Q blinks, baffled.

“The waltz is Austrian, you entire -”

“European, then - it’s popular everywhere. Now, stop talking, will you?” Picard levels him with a stern exasperation. “It really doesn’t matter how poor your steps, Q - it’s all about the ambience.”

His deity grudgingly obliges, directing a glare to the old-school record player that rests off to their right; he snaps softly to restart the jazz track, attempting to absorb the steps as comprehensively as the words sink into falsely human skin, penetrate the entity thrumming in contentment beneath.

“You and I, an unmatched pair, took the time to touch, to share. Worlds apart the night we met, we braved the odds and won the bet...”

Gods, how long had he spent assuming this completely unattainable, this easy contact, the gentle heat now strewn through their acquaintance? Mere shards of cosmic time, but evocative of forever to a lonely, uninspired deity; a multitude of ultimately meaningless instances he’d tried so very hard to infuse with grander purpose, to express in a thousand universal languages that his beloved couldn’t hope to understand precisely what he couldn’t say…

His precious human had gotten there eventually, and as damned as he’d be to admit it aloud, it’s all the sweeter and warmer for the wait. He’d been expecting it to dull over the years, this calm sharing of his life, led in tender movements across the cosmic landscape; his captain is the introvert to his eccentricity, the tempered observer to his mischief-making, the mortal to his eternal: always quiet, always stalwart. Their ethics fail to align even now, and yet that silent yearning for adventure, to be more than they ought to be, continues to lead them as easily as Picard in their silly dance.

... It isn’t supposed to be so enchanting. His siblings think him quite mad, and perhaps he is, but he’d sooner tear the universe asunder than lack this wondrous connection.

“How old-fashioned, pure romance; shared a kiss, we shared a dance...”

They’re slowing down, he acknowledges vaguely, as though Jean-Luc Picard doesn’t lack enough haste as it is; he takes a brief moment to awkwardly rest his chin upon his lover’s scalp before they’re gently pulled apart by kinetic flow, and the human smiles up at him tenderly.

“See, you’re not so bad when you aren’t overthinking it.”

“Shame we can’t all be idiots,” he bites back harmlessly, smirking. Picard draws them apart just enough to roll his eyes at the tease.

“Oh do get off your high horse, mon dieu. At least I understand basic movements.”

Q laughs softly, steps lighter for the repetition through an advanced mind; he shifts snappily, avoids crushing a toe or two. It’s hardly conducive to the mood, after all, having to fix broken bones mid-routine, though it’s perhaps a more appropriate metaphor for their overall relationship than their now smoother performance.

The piece soldiers on blithely, suitably suave as a scene-setter.

“Not just lovers, more than friends - who knows where one starts and one ends? Tracing lights through sleepless nights that I’ll remember always, always…”

Q clasps their joined hand more firmly, so beautifully unified; their relationship has been the merest moment of his existence, yet it’s been more fulfilling than every fragment of the millions of years that have preceded it. He’s whole, finally, yet it’s all so very fleeting – all he’ll be left with within the blink of an eye is a frosted emptiness, colder than the space they occupy, and it’s enough to freeze him prematurely solid.

“Long goodbyes and tearful looks hold up well in poems and in books, but you and I have life to hold the greatest story never told…”

Live in the moment, you complete fool, he scolds himself silently, swaying elegantly now against his captain, hoping his sudden melancholy isn’t as visible as he fears it may be at Picard’s quizzical glance upwards.

“I can’t help but feel that anyone waltzing their way across the Magallenic Stream ought not to be so pensive,” comes the tranquil observation, grey eyes sporting a dash of worry, and the god allows a lightly bitter smile to coat human lips for a moment; a twenty light year-long dancefloor impossibly forms their stage, a flattened covering to the stellar river that connects the Milky Way to the vastness beyond stands as his grandiose anniversary gift, when all he longs to do is present him the universe on a silver platter.

“I hasten to remind you, mon capitaine, that you were quite content to do this in your quarters,” he points out in exasperation. “A tragedy, truly.”

A forehead meets his neck, their dance once more stilted to a simplified, vaguely rhythmic sway, and a gentle curl of a chuckle rises up in a vibration.

“Yes, well,” he mutters, “I’m rather unimaginative, as you’ve so enjoyed exclaiming for the past decade.”

A decade is nothing, less than, even. Why, then, does it feel like everything? He swallows ice, ripple running through his lover.

“It’s been a good decade,” he murmurs faintly. “Really quite an exceptional one, actually. The best, undoubtedly.”

Even fully versed in the linguistics of Picardian romance, he’s still evading the eloquent depth that comes so naturally to him.

The future’s for another day, not for tonight, he reminds himself sternly. We don’t ruin tonight, Q.

“The most wondrous,” Picard concedes warmly, “though I feel I’m at risk of seeming distinctly ungrateful. I’ve yet to give you a gift.”

Q can’t help a bark of disbelieving laughter – an absurd notion, honestly.

“Not sure what else you’re referring to the past ten years as,” he breathes, to a soft sigh.

“A gift to myself as much as to you,” he replies truthfully, and stars, he knows his Jean-Luc is a man of words, but must they always burn so delightfully? “No, I was thinking something far more… permanent.”

He doesn’t need to breathe, however biologically accurate his masquerade, though the absolute lack of oxygen that permeates open space suddenly seems a notable problem.

“… What?” It’s barely a blurted whisper, strangled by the purest hope and the deepest despair, because he can’t mean -

“You heard me,” Picard replies tenderly, and they’ve stopped dancing entirely now, though the embrace is no less fierce, the stare no less richly sincere. “I’ve been thinking on it, and… well, I’ve never been especially keen on the idea of ceasing to exist in the first place, and though forever is utterly incomprehensible to me currently, I believe it might not be so nightmarish –”

He doesn’t get any further for a good while; the breathlessness is spontaneously a problem shared and halved at the same time as they kiss, only the innate capacities of godhood keeping one of them alive.

“If you’ll have me, of course,” the captain adds eventually, the moment he’s freed, lips brushed rouge and eyes hazed, and by the galaxies if it isn’t the most precious thing a deity could ever hope to see; Q bursts into giddy laughter, runs a soft thumb down a smooth cheek, barely deigns to believe his own superlative good fortune.

“You really are stupid, aren’t you?” He answers, beaming, and he couldn’t mean anything less if it was bidden so by his own omnipotence.

“Well, if we’re speaking comparatively -”

“Hush, you wondrous being,” Q whispers, lips upon his cheek, and he’s never feel so desperately enamoured by anything, anyone. “Ambience, darling - jazz is restarting.”

“Ah. Of course.” Picard grins, and a god spontaneously decides that he’s going to spend the next ten decades weaving sonnets dedicated solely to this evening across the literature of space-time as they retake their stances, and he snaps fingers through a distinct visual blur.

... He isn’t going to cry. He’s a damned Q, however frighteningly unimportant that seems in the arms of the mortal he adores.

“Not perfect yet, but close enough for love...”

Omniscience will give an entity the knowledge of there being no such concept as karma, so perhaps it’s irony instead that has his learned skill fly instantly from his brilliant mind as he stumbles over thin air, before almost immediately straightening, tux magically unruffled, beloved human so dreadfully amused.

“Shut up, okay? I’m emotionally compromised, and frankly allowed to be. It’s my anniversary.”

Picard chuckles in utter warmth, and concedes the point - perfection has no place here, or wherever they will ever happen to be.

#wherein celestial loves her some goddamned jazz #qcard #q #picard #tng #writing #drabbles #this is their anthem guys #I'm sorry I don't make the rules #I have a serious kink for adorable picard right now and I'm living for it truly #kinkshamers don't interact

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undertheinfluencerd · 3 years ago

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10 Things That Make No Sense About Cowboy Bebop | ScreenRant

There are many plot holes in Cowboy Bebop, which is actually part of the show’s enduring charm, rather than a major flw of the series. Often Cowboy Bebop intentionally forgoes certain details in order to tell a larger story or show an aesthetically pleasing scene. This storytelling technique leaves the audience with many questions which the creators simply never bothered answering.

RELATED: 13 Anime Series To Watch If You Loved Cowboy Bebop

Cowboy Bebop is a show where its characters are stuck in the past. Because we are shown the world through the lens of these characters, our viewpoint is narrow and limited, which, ultimately, causes many things about Cowboy Bebop to make no sense – even if fans don’t really mind that they don’t.

10 Data Dogs

Ein is a Pembroke Welsh Corgi. The audience learns in “Stray Dog Strut,” Ein is also a data dog. This means that he underwent testing and research in a lab which enhanced his intelligence.

What’s not explained about Ein – and data dogs in general – is why they were created. What purpose, besides assisting a ragtag crew of bounty hunters, do data dogs play in this universe? They simply exist, and the show is better for it.

9 The Blob From The Refrigerator

Cowboy Bebop goes horror in “Fridge Monster” as the crew is attacked by a mysterious blob with a bite that leaves a bulbous infection. As the session soon reveals, the blob’s origins began in the forgotten refrigerator after Spike left a rock lobster in there for over a year.

RELATED: 10 Hidden Details Everyone Missed in Cowboy Bebop

How exactly the blob went through the solidification process and developed an appetite for human flesh remains unknown and truly doesn’t matter. We accept its carnivorous inclinations without second-guessing its nature. Cowboy Bebop cared little about the blob’s origin story and somehow the session succeeds because of it.

8 Alicia And Jet’s Relationship

In session 10 “Ganymede Elegy”, Jet is looking for Alisa, an old fling who broke his heart. At the session’s end, Alisa reveals she left Jet because he was too controlling and she wanted to make her own mistakes, even if it meant ending up with someone like Rhint, her new boyfriend whose bounty has him winding up in jail.

The two characters have undeniable chemistry and the audience wants to see Jet, with his rough exterior, find love and happiness. Why Alisa continues with Rhint and decides against rekindling the flame with Jet, who will change for her, remains a mystery and makes no sense.

7 Radical Edward

Edward, as a character, doesn’t make sense. So much so, that in her introductory episode “Jamming with Edward,” when Jet is interrogating people about who exactly Radical Edward is, everyone’s answer is different, with the only constant being that she is an alien.

While the character’s age and background remain unexplained, what’s for certain is that Edward is an expert hacker. At one point, she even hijacks the Bebop after they lied to her about crowning her an official member of the crew. How she obtained these masterful skills is another way the show forced their viewers to suspend their disbelief.

6 The Cowboy Bebop Universe

By all accounts Cowboy Bebop takes place in a world where an apocalyptic event made Earth uninhabitable. However, there are cultural references to real life, such as Spike mentioning the Jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker and the crew watching a knockoff version of Tom and Jerry, which connect the show to our universe.

RELATED: 10 Sci-Fi Movies To Watch If You Love Cowboy Bebop

At some point, civilization went through a jump in technology which increased the reliance on spaceships and hyperspace travel. The details behind this great technological advancement is never mentioned in the show and audiences are meant to accept the universe.

5 The Crew’s Professions As Bounty Hunters

Spike and the rest of his crew are bounty hunters. Most of the sessions revolve around them watching the show Big Shot and then spending the rest of the session trying, and mostly failing, to capture the specified bounty.

However, as viewers soon discover, the Bebop crew aren’t that skilled at their job. Out of all the bounties they seek throughout the series, they get the payday less than 50% of the time. One would think that at some point the crew would realize that bounty hunting is not their true calling and move on to a different profession.

3 Spike’s Cigarette Addiction

Having trained with the Red Dragon Syndicate, Spike Spiegel is a deadly fighter. In many sessions, Spike is shown battling multiple enemies at once. Despite his profound mastery of martial arts, Spike is also a heavy smoker, as nary a scene passes where he isn’t seen with a cigarette.

RELATED: 10 Things That Prove Faye Was Not In Love With Spike

As most know, cigarette smoke is harmful to the human body and causes tremendous stress to the lungs. At this point in his life, with the amount of cigarettes Spike has smoked, it’s likely his fighting skills, and overall endurance, would be negatively affected by his habit, but there is no explanation as to how he is able to keep it up and remain so fit.

2 Spike’s Obsession With Julia

Spike is a character haunted by a lover from his past: Julia. As the series progresses, more details are learned about their previous relationship and it is revealed that before dating Spike, she was involved with Vicious, which explains the animosity between the two characters, and their antagonistic relationship.

Spike’s infatuation with Julia is puzzling because Spike should have moved on from Julia at this point in the series. He is a fashionable dresser, has great hair, and is the best character in the series. Although his profession often leaves him isolated, traveling aimlessly through space, he shares a ship with Faye, who is also single, recently heartbroken, and searching for love. There are plenty of cowgirls in space.

1 Spike’s Fate

The final moments of “The Real Folk Blues, Part II” confirms Vicious’s death but leaves Spike’s fate ambiguous. However, the common theory leans towards Spike’s death, seeing as how Laughing Bull predicted it in the penultimate episode.

However, in a 2013 interview with Red Carpet TV news, Shinichiro Watanabe, the show’s creator, said “I think people who watch [the ending] and think that Spike is asleep are probably right… just sleeping.” While it’s impossible to tell if Watanabe was joking or not, what remains true is that Spike is a survivor, seeing how in previous sessions he lived through multiple gun shot wounds and being thrown out of a window several hundred feet in the air. Hopefully Netflix’s live-action series will shed more light on Spike’s ultimate fate.

NEXT: Everything We Know So Far About Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop

The post 10 Things That Make No Sense About Cowboy Bebop | ScreenRant appeared first on undertheinfluencerd.net.

#Undertheinfluence #weed

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sage-nebula · 8 years ago

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Hydrangea and Lavender

Hydrangea: What inspired you to begin writing in the first place?

Hah, well, there were three stages to this!

The first story I ever wrote, as embarrassing as it may be to admit this, was Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction when I was in first grade. We had an assignment to write a story about anything we wanted, and, well, that’s what I wrote. I was super jazzed when we were first given the assignment because I loved reading and making up stories, and I enjoyed every second of writing it. I even drew some really bad illustrations to go with it. I mean, the story itself was bad too, I’m sure, but I was also about six or seven years old, so … I can be excused, I think. Either way, I knew at that point that I loved creating stories, although since I was so young it hadn’t really clicked in my head yet that I, too, could write books of my very own.

Fast forward to fifth grade. Stages two and three took place in that year. The first stage was when I was still attending my first elementary school, before I moved, and I was once again given a creative writing assignment. At my first elementary school, the fifth graders would write a short book every year that would be hard-bound and put in the school library. I was super mega psyched about this, because I had recently beaten The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask and I wanted to write a sequel to it. (Note: My sequel idea was horrendous, good god, self. But again, I was ten, so I think I can cut myself some slack.) My teacher vetoed this idea, saying that it was plagiarism to write a Zelda story, which I was very offended by because, hey, I was making the plot and the words all by myself, that’s not plagiarism! Either way, I moved out of state before the project ever came to fruition anyway, but my first fifth grade teacher and I both clearly had very different ideas on the legitimacy of fanfiction.

Either way, I moved out of state for the spring semester, and at my new elementary school I met a boy who … you know those kids who would always brag about having super famous relatives or whatever to seem cool? He was one of those. He found out that I really liked video games, and although I was a huge outcast nerd that no one actually liked (trust me, I was very unpopular, I’m not exaggerating), he made up this whole story to me about how his uncle worked at Nintendo and was looking for new game ideas and that, if I gave him one, he’d pass it along to his uncle and it would get made.

And I, dumbass ten-year-old that I was, fell for it.

So I spent ages writing in a notebook, coming up with this game that was basically a Zelda rip-off, except the protagonist was a girl, had a dragon that she rode around on, there was no princess (although there were four female oracles to represent each season who were basically like royalty / demigoddesses), and there were fifty temples. No, really, I had conceived something like fifty temples because I was sad that my games ended and wanted one that would last FOREVER. Anyway, when I finally had all of these (terrible) ideas written down I took them to the boy, who then told me that, oops, the deadline had passed. I got upset because he had never told me there was a deadline, but it had passed and there was nothing that could be done. I spent some time being bummed about this (I put in all that work) before I realized … wait a second … I could turn this into a book … I could write this …

And that, my friend, is when it finally clicked in my thick head that I could write my very own books and when The Dream™ to become a published and beloved author was born. My original plan, when I was an idiot child, was to have a book published right away. I am now twenty-seven and feel I am not even close to that, but I also feel that I’ve improved a lot, and I do have my original fiction project that I’m working on, so … maybe someday. I hope. I dream. Please let it happen, universe. (In truth the universe can’t let anything happen. This power lies within me. I just have to utilize it. I must.)

Anyway, I know it might seem like all I write is fanfic, but I do have that original project as well. Fanfiction just helps keep me in practice … when I actually write it, anyway. I have got to get back in the groove.

Lavender: What is the most important thing to you as a writer?

HMMMM, I don’t know if there really one “most important thing”. I mean, when it comes to actually constructing the narrative, I feel like there are two main things:

The sentences — These are the framework of the story. They have to have the right amount of snap to keep the reader engaged. It doesn’t matter how creative your ideas are; if your sentences are garbage, your reader will not be able to get through the story. You have to have the mechanics down in order to get the story told, and so the sentence quality is massively important.

The characters — Your story is nothing without fantastic characters. You can have a myriad of plot twists and beautiful themes, but if your characters are boring, flat, or exist purely to be tropes or devices, your story is going to be tossed aside in no time at all. Further, your characters are what carry your plot; if they’re not strong enough to carry the plot, the plot will not be strong enough to support the reader for the entire ride. Really allow your characters to shine; they are what make the plot in the first place.

The second one also contains things like character development, relationships, dialogue, overall characterization, et cetera. All of those things are incredibly important.

Don’t get me wrong, the plot is important, too—you have to make sure it makes sense, that there aren’t gaping plot holes, et cetera. But your sentences and your characters are what make or break your story, at least in terms of whether or not the reader is going to toss it aside on the next page. I mean, for instance, I cannot read Tolkien’s work because, in my opinion, his prose is godawful. I understand that he set the stage for many of the high fantasy works that followed, that he gave birth to a lot of the tropes that we still see in use today, that his works were incredibly important for the genre. However, the man spends two pages describing goddamn trees. I cannot get through his prose. Even when it comes to The Hobbit, which is supposed to be for kids, I found myself so bored I wondered if I was reading an encyclopedia instead. Similarly, Neil Gaiman’s writing isn’t necessarily terrible, but I ended up disliking American Gods by the time I was halfway through the book because he was using similes or metaphors every other sentence, and so it felt like he was trying oh so very hard to seem impressive, which had the exact opposite effect. I distinctly remember rolling my eyes during the sex scene with Bastet because of yet another simile (or maybe it was a metaphor, can’t recall). I felt so annoyed at how smart he was trying to sound, and so his writing style is simply not for me. (Terry Pratchett, on the other hand? That man could write. His writing style is what made Good Omens one of my favorite books. Thank god he tempered Gaiman on that one. Thank god.)

So your sentences are incredibly important, but so are your characters. Your characters are everything. I don’t care how brilliant you believe your theme is, or how many plot twists you have; if your characters are garbage, that plot is not going anywhere. You will either get stuck when trying to write it, or your readers are not going to care about it. Readers like interesting plots, yes, but readers prefer fascinating characters. I mean, look at fandom. Sure, people talk about the plots of their favorite narratives, but what do they draw fanart of? What do they spend countless hours writing meta for? What inspires them to write fanfiction? The characters do. We don’t care about the Harry Potter series because of the plot. We don’t watch Star Wars because of the plot. We don’t really care about the plot of the superhero movies that we see and gush over. Again, aspects of the plot can be interesting, but the reason why we care is because we care about and connect to the characters. If your story does not have well-written, lovable characters (at least some of them have to be lovable, unless you’re explicitly trying to write a story in which everyone is loathsome and that is what causes the fascination), then it isn’t going anywhere, no matter how intelligent or witty your plot may be.

(And note: This is not to say that your plot isn’t important, because it is, of course it is. You need to put care into maintaining your plot as well. But it is to say that your characters must come first. Your characters are why your reader sticks with your story. And it’s worth pointing out that there are plenty of television shows that have great cultural longevity despite not having much in the way of a plot (e.g. Seinfeld, or The Office, or Parks and Recreation, et cetera), whereas it’s much harder to think of one that has lasted and been thought of as wonderful because it had a deep and intricate plot, but absolutely boring and dreadful characters. So your plot still is important, no doubt about that, but you must tend to your characters first.)

With all of that said, aside from that, originality is also important. Everyone should write a story that is theirs. And I don’t mean that cop-out I often see going around, about how, “just take someone else’s plot, because if you’re writing it’s automatically unique!” because that’s not true. Idea theft / idea plagiarism does exist, and I’ve seen it far too often in fandom (often done to my own works; I’ve been plagiarized in at least three different fandoms and it hurts like hell every time) to feel comfortable. However, although there are certain stories which are told time and again in different ways, they’re told in unique ways. You can see the narrative similarities between Harry Potter and Star Wars, for instance, but they’re both so incredibly different that you’d never feel that one was a direct copy of the other. The same goes if you throw Lord of the Rings into the mix. And although the His Dark Materials trilogy was written as a Take That at C.S. Lewis because of The Chronicles of Narnia, the two are still so different that if you didn’t already know that beforehand, you wouldn’t see how Lyra has elements of both Susan and Lucy in her. So I do think that originality is very important, and that everyone should strive to come up with something that is very much theirs, rather than just taking another’s idea and copying it wholesale. Don’t plagiarize. It never ends well and it’s incredibly hurtful to the person you do it to.

So yeah, those three things: Sentences, characters, originality. I think they’re all pretty important!

#flower writing meme #mywaywardcupcake

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purplesurveys · 8 years ago

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101

#survey #surveys

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jessicakehoe · 5 years ago

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Meet Krow, the World’s First Transgender Male Supermodel

The first thing you notice about Krow is his fingers: thin, elongated digits that look as breakable as bone china. “Surgeon’s hands,” my bubbe would have called them, complimenting their fragile elegance. The second thing you notice about Krow is his gaze: dark-brown pools of intensity.

The rest of the things clock in quick succession. Krow is tall and lanky and has a broad face, perfectly symmetrical features and a swoop of dark hair tickling his eyebrows. He looks like the sensitive, soulful boy scribbling song lyrics in the back of every high school math class in North America, the subject of many an emotionally tortured crush. Actually, he kind of looks like Tuxedo Mask. Krow has the same granite jaw, linear eyebrows and emaciated frame (imagine the collective grandmothers of the world crying out “Eat! Eat!”) that captured Sailor Moon’s heart. His profound yet mischievous essence mimics the bad-boy intensity of fellow models Ash Stymest and Cole Mohr—wild-card personalities whose appeal can be traced back to a wicked glint in their eye.

Photography by Carlyle Routh. Creative direction by George Antonopoulos for P1M.ca. Stylist, Lucia Perna for Judy INC. Hair, Kirsten Klontz for p1m.ca/hot tools. makeup, Sabrina Rinaldi for p1m.ca/m.a.c. Model, Krow, Lizbell Agency. All clothing, Hugo.

Here’s where I’m supposed to tell you that Krow is a rising star in the modelling world, but that wouldn’t be entirely accurate. In the 11 months since legendary casting director Ashley Brokaw plucked the 23-year-old from relative obscurity to walk in Louis Vuitton’s Spring 2019 show, the Vancouver-based model has walked for Haider Ackermann, Proenza Schouler and Alexander McQueen and graced the covers of Dazed and L’Uomo Vogue. Krow isn’t on the ascent; he’s already on top. His career trajectory mimics the line on a graph that shoots straight up as soon as it appears. When I ask Krow why he has experienced so much success in such a short period of time, he has a simple answer: “It definitely has something to do with me being transgender.”

After being scouted at the age of 12 at a friend’s birthday party, Krow began to model internationally, landing gigs in Japan and China. “Modelling was basically my way of understanding how to act female,” he says. “I learned through fashion how to present myself, how I should dress and how I should do my makeup, but it still wasn’t enough.” After spending his teen years more or less in drag, Krow had had enough. At the age of 18, after a bad experience in China that he declines to describe in further detail, Krow hacked off his glossy ponytail and texted his mother a photo of the limp hair on the floor—a symbolic shedding of the womanhood that had never fit him.

“Modelling was basically my way of understanding how to act female. I learned through fashion how to present myself, how I should dress and how I should do my makeup, but it still wasn’t enough.”

Krow didn’t even realize he could be trans until he learned about cosplay. (Think of it as drag for nerds wherein fans create painstakingly elaborate costumes to assume the identities of their favourite genre characters.) Krow’s favourite characters to cosplay are Prompto, a sort of horny goth from Final Fantasy XV, and Sebastian, a demon who takes the earthly form of a butler, from the Japanese manga Black Butler. If modelling was Krow’s way of learning to be a woman, cosplay was his way of learning to be a man. “Cosplay gave me the freedom to experiment,” he says. Inhabiting male identities for fun in a low-judgment environment helped solidify Krow’s realization that he was, in fact, transgender.

Since the age of 12, he’d been harbouring a nickname that only his closest friends knew about: Krow. The clandestine name became an escape hatch from the outside world, where bullies slung hurtful names like “emo” and “cutter.” Krow found solace in his affinity with the misunderstood bird. “Throughout history, [crows] have been labelled as this bad bird, but they’re beautiful creatures and they’re intelligent,” he says. “Crows in different regions can have different dialects, and they can make tools. They have this amazing potential, but no one really appreciates that because they are scavengers. I always kind of related to that.” When it came time for Krow to pick a name for his new birth certificate (Sex: M), he went with the bird that had been with him all along.

Despite identifying with a misfit bird that populates the realm of gothic horror, Krow is nothing like his brooding, sad-boy persona. Instead, he’s self-effacing and sweet in an awkward way. He speaks matter-of-factly and with the natural ease of someone who has become accustomed to answering casual questions about what might be the most deeply personal decision of his life. Even when describing the pain of suicidal ideation that sucked the colour from his teen years, he doesn’t break, remaining earnest and engaged. He doesn’t care if the brands currently hiring him are doing so to add an LGBTQ-friendly sheen to their public image. “You know what? You can use me, as long as you’re actually helping the community,” he says, without any of the cynicism that often comes along with being the first.

For the past three years, Krow allowed his transition to be filmed for a documentary called Krow’s TRANSformation, which will open at the Raindance Film Festival later this month. Director and producer Gina Hole Lazarowich describes the documentary as a “how to transition” guide for young people. Though trans men have always existed—mid-century jazz musician Billy Tipton was not outed as transgender until after his death—they haven’t always been acknowledged. In contrast to the plethora of radical gay and lesbian literature that sprang forth in the ’70s, Original Plumbing, the first magazine by and for trans men, didn’t exist until 2009. Growing up, Krow says he didn’t have any trans male role models to look up to.

“You know what? You can use me, as long as you’re actually helping the community.”

So why, despite the crossover success of trans women like Andreja Pejic, Dara Allen and Hari Nef, is the visibility of trans men so much smaller? (That is, besides the fact that, according to an American survey, one in four transgender people surveyed have been assaulted because of their identity.) Because, Krow says, when a person comes out as transgender, they forfeit their right to a normal life.

“Once you’re out as transgender, you’re always going to be labelled as a transgender male, not just another man,” he says. “I think a lot of trans men aren’t as open about being transgender because they’re worried about judgment from other men about not being a ‘true man.’ Having confidence in yourself that you’re still a man regardless of what other people say is a really big thing to get over.”

Ironically enough, Krow’s decision to be public about his identity is the very thing that led to his burgeoning career. He had no interest in reviving his modelling post-transition, but Liz Bell, founder of the LizBell modelling agency, remembered that her friend Gina Hole Lazarowich was shooting a documentary about a trans former model and gave her a call. Within a few days, Bell was taking Polaroids of Krow to send to Paris; shortly after, he was officially cast in the Louis Vuitton show.

“I’ve worked with young people for the past 27 years, and I can say that I have seldom, if ever, come across someone as self-assured and confident as Krow,” says Bell, who signed Krow to her agency within hours of meeting him. Nicolas Ghesquière, creative director at Louis Vuitton, calls Krow “a beacon of hope to all generations” and says that “his courage and strength are empowering and force us to revisit the outdated way we once viewed dressing: suits, dresses, male, female.”

It may be odd to attribute Krow’s world domination to nothing more than a fluke, but sometimes that’s just what the universe has in mind. Whatever happens, Krow has already taken flight—it’s up to everyone else to keep up.

1/5

Krow

2/5

Krow

3/5

Krow

4/5

Krow

5/5

Krow

The post Meet Krow, the World’s First Transgender Male Supermodel appeared first on FASHION Magazine.

Meet Krow, the World’s First Transgender Male Supermodel published first on https://borboletabags.tumblr.com/

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iceamericanoventi · 6 years ago

Text

Love Will Find a Way, Well, Eventually : 1. Eventide

A complicated yet very simple slice of life of five different men, and the entire world rotating around them, and all the coincidence colliding among them, and all the shenanigans entailed.

One is a sneakers designer, one is a jazz cafe owner, one is a pediatrician, one is a photographer, one is a writer - and five are free souls finding what we called love.

In the world where Tinder exists, some chose to go vintage. Who said these days meeting people conventionally is out of date? What they thought a simple dinner, turned out to be the first encounter of more nights later.

Coincidence? Universe don’t think so.

cross-posted on my AFF

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“What?”

“You’re not deaf, don’t pretend to be one.”

“I’m not deaf. I just confirming, whether it’s true or not that my friend gone mad already after spending almost two weeks in Spain.”

“Mad? Try kind.”

Jinki only rolled his eyes and back to his scale and continued to weigh some coffee beans that just arrived to the store. It’s 8 A.M in the morning, the only thing he wanted to picture in his mind is how many new customer today he could gain. Business is not doing well lately, since lots of cute café appeared in the neighborhood, after some rich people found out it’s a very promising area.

It’s not like his café is less great, it’s just young people nowadays prefer to go to some instagramable places. And the rustic Scandinavian style he offered since four years ago is a bit out dated. Of course he got some regular, those people who stick to his coffee choices and live music performance, he just feels the needs to keep up with the market demand.

That’s why, Minho stupid dinner night invitation is not preferable at the moment. Dinner is always good, actually – it is a belief he walked by since he knew how to chew solid meals –, but his friend’s agenda entailed is too tacky for 35 years old Jinki.

“Come on, Jinki. You just need to be present.”

“For what?”

“Moral support?”

“Moral support doesn’t involve selling your friend soul to get what you need.”

“For God’s sake, stop using the term selling. I’m not a pimp!”

“Yet,” he moved to check the espresso machine and snapped his finger to call one of his employees. A young man walked closer, and when he pointed to the machine, he just nodded and started inspecting the machine, “You’re actually worse than my Aunt. She gave up finding a perfect spouse for me a while ago. And here you are trying to drag me to one of your wild hunting season because the other end wouldn’t show up with the prey if you didn’t bring me as the offer.”

“You made it sounds like thousand times worse.”

“It does!”

Minho massages his temples once again, clearly forgot that his friend is too hard-headed sometimes, “I just asked you to go for a dinner with me and my friend who happened to tell me he would bring his friend as well.”

“Who happened to be potentially the new man Choi Minho would take back home at night.”

“Only if everything went well of course!”

“And by well you mean I got matched with your friend then said friend would let you take his friend, am I right?”

“I always thought you’re the smarter one between both of us.”

***

It all started two weeks behind, at one night before Minho took the flight for a shoot in Spain. The editor in chief personally appointed him as the main photographer for the autumn spread for the magazine. He lived in Spain for almost six months for his ‘Iberian Rendezvous’ photobook released on January. Everyone fell in love immediately with the book. Not only because he did very good job on the story line of the book, but also because at some point he used the tripod and captured himself at the roof top of La Muralla Roja, giving all the summer vibe with the pinkish wall, vast ocean, and of course his all tanned sun-kissed skin. That one photo itself got the book on the bestseller shelf for six weeks nonstop.

After the last briefing before the team took off, he went to his favorite bar where he met Taemin, a partner he worked with on one project about street style.

“Spain?”

“Yeah, Barcelona supposed to be the main. But I’m still not sure about that decision.”

“Dude, but you’re flying tomorrow.”

“That’s what brought me here. I couldn’t shake that off of my mind, you know. I mean, they hired me because I’m more familiar with Spain. But then they came up with Barcelona, which couldn’t be more mainstream. If they wanted to do Barcelona shoot since the very beginning, any photographer will do! There’s no need to contact my agent and book me.”

“I would kill to go to Barcelona again.”

“Too crowded, too noisy, too many tourist. Just like you and your friend.”

“Leave me and my friend alone, you tall giant!”

Minho almost fell off his chair laughing his ass hard, “You’re really cute when you’re mad, you know that?”

“And you’re too ugly and nasty when you’re drunk. That’s it,” he took the glass from Minho’s grip which earned him some adult baby whining, “You got yourself a flight tomorrow, young man.”

“The flight is by midnight. And I’m not the one who flies the plane.”

“If you started the flight with headache, you’re going to have headache the whole trip.”

“Where and when did you learn all this stuff?”

“My friend who you’re always mocking is actually much better adult. And you should thank him he made me into quite decent human being.”

“Should I pay my respect, bow to him, or offer my heart to this noble man?”

Minho might still under influence of those bitter aperol, but in Taemin’s ears, his words sound like a perfect jingle of new world advertisement, lured him off just enough.

“You know what? I have an idea.”

“Sure you have an idea, if not, how can you survive in this hella competitive world? Your creativity so far saved your ass from starvation.”

“No, no, listen. My friend is nice and you’re not so bad,” Minho annoyed ‘hey’ halts him for a second, ��Why don’t I introduce both of you to each other? I don’t see any harm on it.”

“Surely you never had seen me in bed, Honey.”

“You wish,” Taemin gulped down his rum cola down and asked the bartender to give him any other stuff, apparently, rum is not for him.

“So what are you saying? You’ll introduce me to your dear friend?”

An apparent smirk appeared on Taemin’s face under the dim of light, “Baby, there’s nothing in this cruel world that is free.”

“When people said you are cunning, I didn’t believe it. Your innocent eyes are pretty convincing.”

“I learned from the best.”

“And I am very glad I could teach you whatever I got, truly a diligent apprentice.”

An apparent eyes-rolling scene landed on Taemin’s face, “Let’s say.. We can try this restaurant that I always passed every single time I went to my office.”

“Too fancy. I hate restaurant.”

“You should learn to like it, the man you’re about to meet very fond of night out involving tasty supper.”

“He can get tasty supper back home.”

“You and your squalid mind, intrigue me and disgust me at the same time.”

“My charm indeed, my darling,” Minho’s giggling too much he almost fell the tall bar stool Taemin needs to use his fast reflect to catch him by the shoulders.

“Anyway, I’ll let you touch his pristine skin if you brought some dishes to table as well.”

“You know I don’t coo—oh.”

“Get it?”

“You’re an evil, yet the most brilliant man I’ve ever met.”

“That’s why I don’t date you, Baby.”

“Fair enough.”

“So are we deal?”

“Sold. I’ll return from Spain by the end of the month. Text me whenever you’re available.”

“No, Minho. Text me whenever you’re available.”

So here he is, two days after landed and 24 hours jet lag, begging Jinki to be his sort of plus one. Not the ordinary plus one, because Minho’s coming for hunting. Taemin already at the top of his wits, told him not bother to come if he’s walking to the restaurant by himself.

But Jinki settled his mind only to the matters which gave him benefit. At this moment, taking care of his jazz café before the rustic theme eating up its own existence. Dating is not something he pursued these day, nor live action of Tinder.

“One last time, Jinki. One last time. If this one doesn’t work, I’d stop dragging you with me.”

“You said these at least four times already, Choi. You think I just befriended you yesterday? You don’t need me anyway. I’d be lump of rock there sitting restlessly and by the end of the night, would just embarrassed myself by spilling someone’s food onto their perfect dress shirt.”

“So your answer is no?”

“You heard that already twenty minutes ago.”

“I’m never been this desperate before.”

He is indeed, that’s what crossed Jinki’s mind when he saw the destitute looks on Minho’s face. His best guess, Minho is actually having issues on something else. The way he tried to get out from there though, is to vent everything up on completely different matters to divert his mind.

“True. And I barely know you at this very second. Why are you so distracted? Where is this composure you always talk me into it?”

“I don’t know, I really don’t know. This is the first time I feel helpless. And the idea of someone choosing the perfect option to me is too tempting. As if at the end everything isn’t ended as I expected, I could just blame someone else. Because it wasn’t me who picked them at the first place.”

Jinki hang the apron he had on the side of the tall credenza. He moved to the old piano by the corner and started to clean it, as gently as possible. He doesn’t want to ruin the only love evidence left from his grandfather.

“It’s always easier to blame someone else. But we won’t go anywhere near that way.”

“Too early for some lecture,” Minho parched to Jinki’s side, “If you help me this time, I’ll shoot your café and put it in my blog. How’s that?”

Any deal regarding his café always irked Jinki’s head. He knew what his friend’s talking about, that very blog, at least got 2000 hits every single day. And it’s probably the only way out from the slump catching his business at the rear end. But he’s also a man of his word.

“Don’t tell me we’re negotiating, because I’m not.”

“Your voice says different thing.”

“It’s just because I’m upset you’re ruining what supposed to be a new day for me to keep my business running. With the amount of fame you have, you’d have no idea how some people are struggling to meet every day’s end.”

“That’s why I made you this proposal. It’s a win-win solution. You came to the dinner, it’s on me, no worries, you only need to put some nice and clean pants, you probably meet some handsome faces, and I’ll take care of your marketing.”

“No wonder you have long list of people kissing your feet.”

“Is this a yes?”

“I’m only available on Thursday. No rescheduling because I got some employees to feed.”

“You are the actual best.”

Jinki starts to play some tunes from Tchaikovsky, “Tell me something I don’t know.”

***

“A date? You literally got me a date?”

“What’s with the tone of surprise?”

Kibum removed his notebook from his laps, almost flying he marched to the side of Taemin’s desk, a perfect disbelief expression washed all over his face.

“Tell me this is because you left the part of me being an odd certified day-dreamer who has his head at least ten hours per day on the clouds when you described me to this said person.”

Looking at his friend of seven years Taemin could only serve his trademark flat unimpressed forced smile to Kibum before returned to his Wacom and started to fill his sketches with some colors.

“Judge by your tone, I can tell already that you’re excited.”

“Try terrified,” Kibum scoffed.

“It’s not like your first date after you got rescued from some weird cult bunker.”

“Don’t play Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt on me.”

“You sounded you came out of it, though.”

Kibum doesn’t date. He does have several episodes of one night stands but in his life manual, none of those is considered a date. And imagining the scenario where he’s sitting in front of another person sober and without stuffing his own face on the other’s gave him goosebumps. How unreal. He sucks on dating, not because he’s an asshole. He just happened to get bored very easily. And if the company couldn’t excite him with the flow of conversation, there would be only two choices left, call it off or bring it home.

“You know I don’t date.”

“Hmm, you might as well start to. He’s a friend of mine.”

“Doesn’t guarantee he would make a very nice date.”

Taemin lazily looked up to meet Kibum’s gaze.

“What do you need? Face? Checked. Build? Checked. Wallet? Checked. Ass? Double checked, assessed thoroughly, approved and great quality certified.”

Sometimes Kibum wonders what’s inside Taemin’s head besides shoes and men, “Does he know already what I do for a living?”

Kibum is actually very particular with people he would deal with, he’s very proud of what’s he doing even though people sometimes look down on it.

“Besides being my pimp, no, he doesn’t.”

The man before him tossed one of the dinosaur figurines lined up on the desk.

“Ouch! What the heck?!” he stopped his activity and rearranged the dinosaurs back – no one should ever mess with his toy collection –, “Next Thursday, dinner is on the gentleman.”

“Oooh,” Kibum coos, “Fancy.”

He then detached himself from the chair and collected his MacBook Air from the couch where he left it since he arrived.

“He’s just being himself.”

“We’ll see. Gotta check my schedule first.”

“I’ve called your assistant. You have no event on that day.”

“You are a snake.”

“Proud Slytherin over here.”

“Whatever. Smooch you later!”

He walked towards the glass door of Taemin’s workspace, train of thoughts filled his mind for such out of nowhere date night.

“Bum.”

“Yeah?” his hand lingering by the handle of the door, ready to push it, but he cocked his neck in the direction of Taemin.

“I forgot to mention, it’s a double date night.”

“I should have known better that you’re a man with agenda.”

***

Jinki pushed the door of the restaurant after two times rechecking his phone, because, hell, the restaurant is too fancy for his preference. It’s not about what he can or cannot afford, but fancy restaurant tends to be overprice for something he knew he could get it in so much better offer. Plus, he needs to dress up on certain level. Again, it’s not about what he can or he cannot make a fashion statement, but overthinking about his outfit just not something he would use his time up for.

“Table for how many?”

“I have reservation.”

“Oh, which name if I may?”

“Choi Minho.”

“Ah, the gentleman arrived twenty minutes ago, Sir. Very draped, for sure. This way.”

Judging by the look of the usher, he already thought Jinki was Minho’s date. Unnecessary smug and scanning from head to toe over him, told everything. He doesn’t mind at all, he doesn’t care actually. All he needs to know is that friend of him going to pay all of the expense tonight and keep his promise to promote his cafe or he would cut the friendship right away.

“Five minutes ago I wasn’t sure you’re appeared before me. But look at you, killer turtle neck and even put your watch on.”

Minho smirked right away when Jinki dragged the chair in front of him. He gave his coat to the usher who took it diligently and wait for him to leave before flopped his ass down.

“Well, look at you. The symbol of tardiness itself already standby before the show time. I don’t know should I applaud on it or cry over your display of desperation.”

“Would it hurt you if just for once not to be sarcastic?”

“I’m just being honest. Courtesy talk tired me.”

“And being mean turned you on.”

“I’ll take that as compliment.”

“Compliment my ass.”

“Cannot see it unless you’re standing, but I’m pretty sure you prepared your best for whatever your friend will introduce you to.”

“So are you, I guess. Purposely wearing something that drawing some good lines of your pecks. You’re quite desperate as well.”

“Only because I need to save my business. That’s all,” a waiter come to serve him the wine Minho chose a while ago, “And this. If someone buys me drinks or dinner, I should be grateful. That’s how my grandfather told me.”

“Have no idea you gramp should be proud or throw a pity on you.”

“Neither, he would probably just read quietly by the corner of his room and ignored the whole universe happening around him.”

Minho failed to notice some resentment over his buddy’s tone, and Jinki couldn’t be more relieved. Silently he picked up the menu and studied it while Minho’s busy typing something by his phone.

Choi Kermit : where the heck are you?

Choi Kermit : I won’t hesitate to kill if you bailed out

The Taem : chillax dude

The Taem : coming over in ten minutes, fucken traffic

The Taem : you have the goods on your arm?

Choi Kermit : you have the goods on your arm?

The Taem : well played, Choi

Choi Kermit : stop blabbering and get your ass over here

“Can you speed it up?”

“Excuse me?” Kibum dramatically cocked his head to his left, almost losing himself trying to kill Taemin by pushing him far to the window, “You’re the one who still had a meeting until six!”

“In my defense, I had no idea that the artist already agreed to the design proposal and wanted to proceed right away talking about production and operational!”

The restaurant is only two blocks away, and Kibum taps the wheel rapidly, slightly more frantic than before. No, no, not because the traffic is getting worse, it’s because he’s going to meet someone who high potentially hurting him somewhere near the future. Mind the sappiness and angsty vibe, Kim Kibum is a writer after all. He got his bills covered by succumbing into his sadness and made words over it.

“Bum.”

“Yeah?”

“Relax. You’ll be okay.”

“What do you mean? I am completely okay. Just the traffic plus rain plus rush hour, why shitty hell like this had their gut ruining my mood? It starts to get on my nerves.”

“Dude, you’re just meeting my friend. He’s not some investor whatsoever who gonna judge your book poorly before betting his money to make a movie of it.”

“Heck it’s better if he’s an investor.”

“Point is, you have no need to impress some people. I know you did this to me, but if your date tonight makes you uncomfortable, then leave it. Have your meal and bye, no pressure, really.”

“Are you being serious?” Kibum scoffed and wheeled his car to the left, “I can see the front door of the restaurant already from here and you being oh-so-wise lecturing me about how I should behave tonight? Unbelievable.”

Taemin cracks while Kibum makes sure he parked properly. He didn’t say anything after turned off the engine and collecting his bag from the back seat. Those bow lips still perfectly zipped even when he checked himself on the rear mirror.

“Oh, so you give me silent treatment now?!”

“Zip it, Lee Taemin. I’m preparing my show. Who knows I’m going home with both?”

He winked, leaving his black Mini Cooper and loudly laughing Taemin inside.

***

When the usher pointing his hand to the table across the room where two men are casually talking to each other while sipping their wine. What makes him let out silent gasp is the fact that neither of them he could put on his shame-on-you box, an imaginary box he created himself back when he’s still 18 years old to put some people who by the face already looks like mean person. Both are equally gorgeous and seem friendly. He started to swallow all the curse he saved for Taemin.

“Which one you said you’re going to introduce to me, again?”

Taemin smirks, knowing that his friend is not mad anymore, “The one with the turtle neck.”

“You blind? Or stupid? Both of them wearing turtle neck.”

He closed the gap and whispered, “Torturing you gave me more pleasure, Kim Kibum.”

“Masochist.”

“That’s what I like, Baby.”

“You’re disgusting. Stop it before I lose my appetite.”

Both men by the table haven’t caught two people walking their direction yet. They’re still arguing the chance of Minho would deliberately forget their deal. Jinki bet his money on Minho bailed out because the man introduced to him is a moron. Minho on the other hand, still believed, Jinki would fall in love faster to the other man way faster than Minho would be able to land a kiss to the date.

“Am I interrupting?”

Taemin nonchalantly approaching Minho’s right’s side, making the later cocking his head in surprise. Jinki managed to keep his composure and stayed in one of his series of poker face.

“Stop your nonsense and come here.”

Minho wrapped Taemin in casual hug, leaving Kibum standing awkwardly between a warm affection happening on one side and cold dagger stare shooting from the other one.

“Sorry, we’re late. I had unexpected meeting and the traffic was no joke.”

“No worries,” Minho smiles slightly wider when he face Kibum, leaving the later flustered, and ducked his head quickly while taking the chair next to Jinki, who seems still out of place and keep it quite all the time, “This is my friend Jinki.”

The said man only smile, nodding his head a bit, he wanted to ask Kibum if he needs any help with his stuffs but refrain himself to say so for the fear interfering someone’s comfort zone.

“Hi, Jinki. I’m Lee Taemin, and this is Kim Kibum over here.”

“Hi, nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, too.”

For Jinki, the whole matchmaking shenanigan is a complete bullshit, still. But the smile just greets him, proves him that even if it’s way after the velvety dusk, sometimes you can still catch glimpse of rainbow after the rain.

***

#since i'm able to access tumblr again #here you go #my current obsession #not gonna reveal the pairing yet #because maybe i'd make a twist in the future #but anyway #enjoy for now #let me know what do you think about it #and also #while you're on it #do you think should i make ao3 acc or no?#shinee fiction #aya is writing again people #and hopefully this time works #love will find a way well eventually #LWFAWWE

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artsynanotech · 8 years ago

Text

The Hacker’s Job, Part 2

I think this has been the most whirlwind night of my undead existence in, well, the entire time I’ve been undead. In the span of six hours I botched an investigation, got kidnapped, fought a man twice my size, and got a date. Let me repeat. I have a date. Or the promise of one, at least. What strange alternate universe have I found myself in? Not that I’m upset about it. Obviously I’m not or I wouldn’t have agreed. What I am is mightily confused. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

After getting back to our domain from Khan’s arcade, we headed to Michella’s place and met up with Caroline. She was, as expected, not pleased with us at all. But she agreed to help us with the Leonard Problem™ all the same. We decided to start our investigation the next night, then headed back to our havens to get some rest. The next night we met up at the Italian place to discuss our game plan. I suggested we pull the fire alarm in Leonard’s building to get him out of his apartment earlier, and clear the place for a decent while so we could search to our hearts content. We also decided to introduce ourselves to one of the coteries who control that area of town. This is the part where I met my date. The interested party, a kindred named Ares, bumped into me on our way out of restaurant. He was flustered, I was flustered. Apologies were exchanged, then names. The whole conversation consisted of only a few phrases and some nervous waves. It was awkward. My friends and I had work to do, though, so even if I was good with strangers I couldn’t stay to chat. We took a cab to Leonard’s neighborhood and set about looking for one of the kindred in charge. We found him in a rather noisy park. A very… free spirited man by the name of Hank. His demeanor made me wonder if he only feeds on stoners, though I admit it’s unkind of me to say so. He was actually rather welcoming. We explained our plan to him and he gave us permission to attempt it, and even invited us back to visit whenever we wanted. He also warned us to stay away from kindred who live in the north side of the neighborhood. One of his coterie mates, a woman whose name I didn’t catch, showed up though and was less thrilled with us. She seemed bitter over Amelia’s situation. That didn’t surprise me one bit. I have a feeling convicting Amelia is going to be something we will never, ever live down. I’m going to be brief on this next bit. We failed. Hardcore. Leonard left his apartment ahead of schedule, we didn’t find jack in his apartment, and Michella broke a bunch of porcelain in the process so we had to bail early. Upon exiting the building and trying to regroup we were approached by the North Side Kindred, the lot of them anarchs, who pulled weapons and told us to follow them or face the consequences. One had a cricket bat dotted with nails. Another had a gun. They were… insistent. Uninspired, though. One of them called me a “fucking queer.” I mean, really? Are we in a high school locker room? I could come up with ten insults more cutting in less than a second. But after spending two years with my ex, I suppose most bullies seem tame in comparison. Rhett stood up for me. He didn’t need to. There was no sense in getting offended on my account over something so trivial. But it was… it was nice. The more I get to know him the luckier I feel to be his friend. They loaded us into a trunk and took us to their, well, I guess you could call it a base? It was a back room in a copy shop, set up with gambling and a fight ring and all that seedy underbelly jazz. The anarchs who captured us brought us to their boss, Xavier. He was just as immature as the rest of his crew. Of course the first thing Xavier did was hurl boring insults at us. Wretchid was “Fuckface,” which to Wretchid’s credit, he took in great stride. Michella was “nerd,” I was “the little queer boy,” and Caroline was a long string of female pejoratives that changed with every sentence. Xavier seemed especially hostile towards her. Maybe even a little bit jealous. I’m not sure, but I think the two of them have the same sire. Prince Maxwell did mention Caroline having a failed predecessor at our presentation… Wretchid couldn’t stop mouthing off, of course. Xavier found it amusing. His cohorts did not. Regardless, it was looking like Xavier was going to have us taken out back and shot. He was, surprise surprise, upset about Amelia. He said they had a good partnership going, and that we had to pay for taking her down. I decided to go out on a limb and try to clear the air about that situation. I know Wretchid thinks we made the right call. I’m not sure about Caroline and Michella. But I know that I didn’t like the outcome one bit. Honesty is the best policy, right? I tried to explain as calmly as possible how in over our heads we were. That we were happy to try and pick up some of Amelia’s slack, and in fact that was exactly what we were trying to do when we accepted Khan’s proposal. I told him that maybe, had we really known what was going on in the city at the time, we might have made a different call. I did make it clear I only spoke for myself on certain matters, like how terrible I felt about Amelia’s sentence. It honestly all came off as more than a ramble. Oddly enough it worked.

Well sort of. Xavier seemed pleased with my words. But he also asked me to back them up by fighting him. So that happened. The two of us stepped into the fighting ring. Michella was losing her mind with worry the whole time. I managed to hold my own rather well, all things considered. I did a passable job dodging. I managed to trip him and land a few hits of my own. They didn’t do much, but at least they landed. The crowd got really into it. Xavier managed to grapple me at the end. I tried to retaliate by grabbing his junk. It seemed like a good idea to get him to let me go. Unfortunately I couldn’t get a grip and ended up fondling him instead. Awkward. But he did let go. “I guess I’m prettier than I thought,” he said. Ugh. In hindsight, I could have followed up with a great one-liner. Something like “I was hoping your straight male ego was more fragile than the rest of you,” or “Sorry, but gay men generally avoid making passes at cunts.” Wretchid must be rubbing off on me. Not too much, though, since I said neither of those things and instead just said something about it at least getting Xavier to let me go. Xavier was satisfied though, as were his compatriots, and our exit from the ring was met with cheers and too many people that I did not know trying to ruffle my hair and give me congratulatory back pats. Xavier said that he wouldn’t give me or my friends any more trouble. Thank God. I was an absolute nervous wreck by the end. We made a hasty retreat and caught a bus back to our domain. Michella and Caroline made their way to their havens. Wretchid and I live in the same direction, so we walked together for a bit. Now here’s the part I was skipping to earlier. Ares was waiting for us at the Italian place. He said he’d been there for a while because he didn’t know where else to find us. Then in a nervous, roundabout way he asked me out for coffee. Or rather, to hang out in a coffee shop and enjoy the smell. Because vampires don’t drink coffee. Obviously. I know I’m not the most impressive looking of guys. What caught Ares’ eye in our split second meeting earlier is beyond me. But he doesn’t seem that different from me. He was obviously just as embarrassed as I was by the whole situation. I decided to take a chance and say yeah, coffee sounds good. We exchanged emails. Wretchid offered to let him stay over for the night, as it was getting rather close to daytime. Ares agreed, so I guess I’ll be seeing him tomorrow. I suppose we can hammer out date details then. I’m honestly not sure what to make of this. I haven’t been on a date since I left the ex. I had some rebound hookups immediately after the breakup, but that was just sex. Now I’ve agreed to go out with a total stranger. Someone stake me. On the bright side, he’s rather nice looking. Not my usual type, mind you, but attractive in his own right. And he’s tall. At least a foot more so than me. That is a definite plus. Here’s hoping this doesn’t turn out to be a total disaster…

#IC #Session recap #Under a cut because this one is LONG

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junker-town · 8 years ago

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Michael Jordan is the greatest hater of all time

We once knew MJ as the greatest basketball player ever. Now, we also know him as something else.

“I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.”

-some dude whose face the internet endlessly digitally imposes over the faces of losers

For as much as we know about viruses, they still largely remain an enigma. The greatest scientific minds in humanity’s history have only been able to speculate and hypothesize on how viruses originate and haven’t been able to even reach a clear consensus on if viruses qualify as living organisms or not. However, while we can only theorize on the origin and vitality of viruses, we have an extremely comprehensive understanding of how viruses are transmitted and spread.

Viruses cannot multiply without attaching themselves to a living, thriving cell. The exact same is true for trends on social media. Most viral sensations have the lifespan of the common cold, but the seemingly eternal ones have tapped into and latched onto something that resonates within us.

This is why Crying MJ is one of the most enduring memes we have ever seen. The Crying MJ meme never gets old because schadenfreude is everlasting. It is a universal language.

For instance, there’s a very high chance that if you show a Youtube clip of someone busting their ass and falling down an escalator to a seven year old American and a 77-year-old Lithuanian, they will both laugh. Laughing at the misfortune of others is a force that sustains and unifies us all. We did not create a new lane for the Crying MJ meme. The Crying MJ meme filled a void in our consciousness. We needed the Crying MJ meme long before we actually got it.

A newspaper actually used Crying Jordan for the pic http://pic.twitter.com/c3XLrvVdIL

— All Def Digital (@AllDefDigital) July 27, 2016

Friday is Michael Jordan’s 54th birthday. Friday also kicks off NBA All-Star Weekend, the event that gave us arguably the most iconic still photograph of Jordan’s career. To a vast majority, he remains the very embodiment of success who exists beyond reproach.

But the internet doesn’t give a damn about that whole “beyond reproach” thing, especially if someone happens to be a jerk. And over the years, MJ definitely methodically revealed to us that he was one.

Time, like MJ’s big ass Jack Sparrow hoop earrings that are big enough for a small child to hula hoop in and look like those big ass rings magicians do tricks with, is a flat circle. While the 1988 Dunk Contest displayed to many how remarkably talented he was, Jordan judging the 2007 Dunk Contest displayed to many how big of a prick he was. This slow hater reveal culminated in his 2009 Hall of Fame enshrinement speech, which gave us the photo that turned into the meme of all memes.

Here’s a rundown of some of the instances that resulted in Jordan’s ascension (or descension) into immortal memedom.

Jordan’s stint with the Wizards

Three years after the Finals clincher over Bryon Russell, MJ decided to shit all over his storybook ending to his phenomenal Bulls career and return to the NBA. MJ’s last shot of his career could have been a championship clincher on the road but when the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to play with Popeye Jones and chase 37 wins presents itself, then dammit you suit up and chase 37 wins with Popeye Jones.

Some view MJ’s return as a testament to his insatiable competitiveness. I saw a dude floundering at an office gig he took because he’d run away from basketball only to concede the possibility that basketball was the one thing he’s really great at and needed a way back in. Know how when you create a player on 2K and his attributes are all related? The higher you make one attribute, the lower the other ones drop? I think when God created Michael Jordan, God put his basketball attribute on 100 and left everything else on 0.

When God created Michael Jordan, God put his basketball attribute on 100 and left everything else on 0.

Granted, his average of 21-6-5 during his stint in Washington was amazing for a 40-year-old with no knees, but MJ was always evaluated on his own curve. This was the first time where he failed to meet people’s expectations. This was the pivotal moment where MJ ceased being Teflon in a lot of people’s eyes.

There’s also the matter of Kwame Brown. There are accounts of MJ keeping Kwame after practice to play him one-on-one. MJ would berate and demoralize Kwame during these sessions, pushing him to the brink of tears and going so far as to call Kwame a “flaming [homophobic slur]”. These asshole motivational tactics might have worked on a 30-year-old Steve Kerr, but a 40-year-old pulling this shit on a kid six months out of high school is about as lame as MJ’s 96 x 88 distressed denim jeans. I don’t know what type of shit Jordan was on, but just because he looks like Duke from Rocky doesn’t mean he had to act like him.

Jordan’s stint with the Wizards and his NBA career would come to an end in a road game at Staples. Kobe sent his idol off in to that sweet goodnight with 55 points. Kobe was wearing the Jordan 8’s.

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High school senior LeBron James was quoted as saying “There’s a new sheriff in town” after viewing that game.

Jordan judges the 2007 Slam Dunk Contest

“Michael done lost his damn mind. He’s the Russian judge” Charles Barkley exclaimed after Jordan handed out his fourth 8 of the night.

Jordan judging this dunk contest was one of the greatest moments in hater history. MJ showed up wearing a black turtleneck under a black leather jacket with a black hoop earring. He came to the dunk contest dressed like a Highlander because he probably thought he would have to engage in a battle to the death with the winner. There can only be one. Like the single, lone 10 that he awarded out of all the dunks that he saw that night.

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Jordan’s Hall of Fame induction speech

We’re all familiar with this phenomenal display of narcissism and axe grinding the likes of which we’ve never seen before at Springfield. Besides being the photo op that gave us the actual crying MJ meme, this was when a lot of people realized how much of an asshole the greatest basketball player of all time is.

Here’s a list of the casualties.

On Jerry Reinsdorf, Bulls owner: “I got to the Bulls and I was very proud that at the time Jerry didn’t own the team.”

On Jerry Krause, Bulls GM: “Jerry couldn’t be here. I don’t know who invited him. I didn’t.”

On Leroy Smith, the player who made varsity over him in 10th grade: “Leroy’s here tonight. He’s still the same 6’7 guy. He’s not any bigger. His game is about the same.” MJ invited the guy who made varsity over him 30 years ago to his Hall of Fame induction just to tell him he still plays basketball like a 16-year-old.

To Pat Riley on Jeff Van Gundy’s tenure as NY’s coach: “You had that little guy on your staff who became the coach after you.”

On Bryon Russell, Jazz guard: “When I was retired, Bryon told me he could guard me. You remember that, John?” He asked this to John Stockton. It was Stockton’s induction night also. It was also Jerry Sloan’s. MJ also kept pronouncing Bryon like Byron.

To his children: “You guys have a heavy burden. I wouldn’t want to be you if I had to because of all the expectations you have to deal with. I mean look around you. They’re charging thousand dollar tickets for this thing. It used to be 200 bucks.”

Unbelievable.

Jordan sues a grocery store over $4 in redeemed coupons using his likeness

Jordan’s Hall of Fame wrath didn’t end there, however. A Chicago-based grocery chain, Dominick’s, ran ads congratulating him on his induction and used his likeness (not even his face — just a Bulls 23 and a Jumpman logo that looked like a dude swatting a mosquito with a rolled up newspaper) to offer $2 off steaks at their locations. Jordan’s response? He sued the shit out of them. To the tune of $8.9 million.

Only two of these coupons were redeemed so there’s some people out there who ate a couple of $4.5 million steaks. MJ was quoted as saying "This shows I will protect my name to the fullest. It's my name and I worked hard for it and I'm not just going to let someone take it."

I get that. But come on. We all know this about MJ being damned if you motherf*ckers think you’re going to eat some steaks off his name. You must think he’s Byron-I mean Bryon Russell or something.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Golf beef with President Obama

Speaking of beef (please don’t sue me for $8.9M for that awful segue. I’m sorry) there was the time when MJ started a back and forth over golf with our then-president, Barack Obama. Golf beef!

In an interview with Ahmad Rashad, Rashad asked Jordan what his dream foursome would be.

Jordan: “I never played with Obama, but I would. But naw, that’s okay. I’d take him out. He’s a hack. It’d be all day playing with him.”

Rashad: “Do you really want to say that? That the President of the United States is a hack?”

Jordan: “I never said he wasn’t a great politician. I just said he was a shitty golfer.”

Obama went on to reply: “I think Michael is misinformed. But there is no doubt that Michael is a better golfer than I am. Of course if I was playing twice a day for the last 15 years, then that might not be the case. He might want to spend more time thinking about the Bobcats — or the Hornets.”

ZAPPED.

More golf beef with Keegan Bradley

MJ took over the Hornets’ twitter account and was doing the standard hum drum hashtag question and answer sessions that is the routine when these things go down. And then professional golfer Keegan Bradley talked shit.

.@hornets MJ how does it feel to get beat by me everyday at bears club?! #GoHornets

— Keegan Bradley (@Keegan_Bradley) October 28, 2014

MJ then took a break from his goodwill PR campaign to let Keegan Bradley know that he had him fucked up out here.

.@Keegan_Bradley Last time I looked, you were wearing MY shoes. You don't see me wearing Air Keegans...

— Charlotte Hornets (@hornets) October 28, 2014

Score one for Young Louis Gossett Jr. Face here.

Jordan goes peak #WellActually at his summer camp

At Jordan’s basketball camp a few summers back, some brave teenage soul mustered up the courage to ask the athlete with the most iconic sneaker line of all time “WHAAAATTTTT ARE THOOOOOSSSEEEE”. MJ the proceeded to go an amalgamation of peak dad and peak #WellActually by actually answering the kid’s question and telling him what Jordans he was wearing.

We are all aware of the adage “never meet your heroes”. Mystique is essential to idolatry. The more insight we got into Michael Jordan’s asshole ways, the less blasphemous it became to make him a punchline.

Meeting your heroes can prove to be a disastrous let down.

Just ask Byron — I mean Bryon Russell.

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