#it’s so outdated too‚ tempted to make an account on there just to tell the admin to update it (yk I’m her number 1 fan and promoter)

[pocima]

I’m convinced if you’ve breathed in the direction of East Asia and have been in a kilometer proximity of a musical instrument or practice room you’ll end up on Kprofiles… bc what the hell is Japanese alt non-idol 4s4ki doing there

[lexsssu]

Shall We Date: Worship Me AU - Uriel (Avatar of Chastity)

What if the MC gets transported to the Celestial Realm instead? What if the angels were the love interests?

GENERAL HCs

Uriel — “The Flame of God/God is my Light”

Has a penchant for perfection

Give him a task and you bet your ass he’ll come back finished with results so phenomenal you’re sure that if you did it, there’s no way it would turn out this great

Reserved, but not exactly anti-social

It’s not that he doesn’t want to talk about himself whenever people ask about him, but it’s just that he thinks there are a million other things that are worth more to converse about than his exploits or the things he enjoyed

Chastity doesn’t just mean staying pure by abstaining from sexual relations and the lack of temptations one experiences, but being placed in the face of temptation and yet staying true to one’s morals. This is why Uriel doesn’t condemn anyone who decides to engage in such acts, whether within the sanctity of marriage or not, whether it is done because all parties hold sincere feelings for one another or not.

Gone is the ancient time and the rules that once applied then cannot be the same for current times. This is why Uriel has made it his mission to continuously study about humans, to stay up to date with the way they thought and felt so as he can better serve as a guiding beacon to them

When he’s not busy with his regular duties, you would normally find Uriel at the Celestial realm’s library with stacks of reference books on his table. Time is nothing to them, which is why for him it felt as if humans changed too quickly in so little time

An ideology that may have taken decades or centuries to form is but a blink of an eye to them which is why Mr. Perfectionist can’t help but immediately want to be informed in the hopes that it will help him improve himself

If he doesn’t keep adding and updating to his knowledge then how can he even hope to be one of the guiding virtues of humanity with outdated ideals?

Ideals can and will change over time, but his morals are the one thing that Uriel will never change.

His mind and body may be corrupted over time, because eternity is such a long time indeed, but the morals that made him who he is, what HE is will always stay the same

Tbh you can’t tempt this guy with anything

If you do manage to “tempt” him, know that you didn’t actually succeed but he just liked/pitied you enough to go with whatever fuckery you wanted him to commit

That's why he normally agrees with whatever bullshit his twin brother, Gabriel, tries to wrangle him into

Uriel ain't doing it because Gabriel tempted him, but because he loved his twin so much that he's willing to indulge him whenever he wanted to fuck shit up

Gabriel is the one who starts messes and Uriel is the one who just lets him be, because he's a supportive big brother

...Much to most of the other virtues' ever increasing stress

Is an advocate of "actions speak louder than words"

He's a serial head-patter

Will boop your nose when he notices you're a bit too lost in your thoughts

Azrael is normally the victim of his headpats and nose-boops

Since he makes it his job to know all that IS known, he finds some modicum of interest in that of the UNknown

Things like extraterrestrial beings for example. Basically, anything that didn't belong to any of the 3 worlds was within his scope of interest

If you check his YouTube history you'll see it's filled with UFO sightings, conspiracy theories, UMAs, etc.

Probably joined that raid in Area 51 while undercover—

Asks Gabriel to bring him souvenirs and pictures whenever his job takes him to a location near hotspots for UMAs, UFOs, and other strange otherworldly phenomena

Reminds Azrael every now and then to inform him if he ever ferries a soul that had come across any UMA and ask them about their encounter

As the virtue of chastity, it's up to him to teach the little cherubims about the birds and the bees as part of their training to become full-fledged angels

More often than not, his terminology and clinical way of explaining has traumatized most of the little ones…

...much to Raphael's increasing stress

"And then the man will place his pe*** inside the woman's va**** where he would start thrusting continu—"

What's worse is that he even has diagrams for it

So many little cherubims lost their innocence to Uriel-sensei…

He doesn't purposely try to annoy Raphael unlike Gabriel, it's just that his actions and way of going about things aren't the way most people would fo it and what's worse is that he unintentionally traumatizes people

And it's usually up to Raphael to do damage control on all the virtues' behalf

Raphael almost killed him that day he had to give that talk to Luke and his batch

"...What's wrong about telling them what happens between a man and a woman? It's biology and something that's done frequently by humans"

He doesn't see the point of beating around the bush when their purpose was to teach the new recruits about humanity and everything about them, including how they reproduce

Favorite food is pancakes…

...because they look like flying saucers

Uriel enjoys stargazing at night, not just to look at the heavenly bodies but to spot any UFOs if he's lucky enough

He isn't particularly bad at cooking, but he's not great either

Pancakes are what he's most confident in cooking and he makes the best darn ones in all of the celestial realm

If he's the only one left at home and you're sick, don't expect chicken soup and be ready instead for a stack of warm and fluffy pancakes topped with some butter and generous helping of syrup, whipped cream, berries, and etc.

When the day finally comes that he falls in love with someone...the 3 worlds will know true fear—

But legit though, all those millennia of being a single pringle and practicing so much restraint flies out the window when this man finds himself utterly and deeply in love with you

JP VA: Daisuke Ono

ENG VA: Matthew Mercer

ROMANTIC HCs

He's read so much about the different forms of love and has felt them all except for romantic love so he's a bit rattled at first

Probably coops himself up in his room for a day or two to get his bearings

When he does finally step foot out of his room, there isn't any obvious changes at first but you can't help but feel that there's something different about Uriel

Uriel is now a man on a mission

As perfectly as he executed his tasks for millennia, as fierce as he wielded his flaming sword during the Great War against the rebels, and as ruthless as he was when he faced the truly wicked…

…Uriel will have you

Of course, regardless of how much he wanted you to become his that didn't mean he suddenly turned into some sort of barbaric brute that kidnapped women for sport

He will study you so thoroughly that at times it almost feels like he knows you more than you know yourself

The little mannerisms you make during your everyday life that escape your notice? It's a given that Uriel has seen and already safely filed them away in his mind for future reference

"...She likes pointing with her lips?...Cute…" What he wouldn't give to catch you doing that while he was with you so he could partake of your lips as well—

Once he’s interested in you, only God knows at this point what has to be done for him to even lose a small bit of it

You have essentially become a key figure in Uriel’s world

Uriel always has you at the back of his mind to the point that it could even be called obsessive

However, he’s still the virtue of chastity so you don’t have to worry about him ever forcing himself upon you or anything of that sort

He’s super clingy and sorta weird, but he loves you and the last thing he wanted is for you to become sad because of him or anything else

Though he honestly can’t deny that seeing the myriad of expressions on your face, from happiness to sadness, to surprise, excitement, anger, and etc. was one of his favorite hobbies ever since falling for you

Despite his earnest wish to make you his, Uriel surprisingly takes a long time to even confess

He’s a perfectionist so it’s a given that he’ll take everything into account, including how he’ll make you fall for him first before he even thinks about confessing

Bothers Raphael for some “research material” on how to woo you a.k.a. borrow some romance manga despite Raph’s initial protests

For the sake of his own sanity, Raph begrudgingly lends Uri his stash of romance manga

It’s both hilarious and somewhat disturbing to see how taken he is with something other than work and UMAs

Amused: Michael, Cainabel, Gabriel, Simeon

Scared/Disturbed: Raphael, Luke

Neutral/Confused: Seraphiel, Azrael

Secretly plays the alto saxophone, but doesn’t deem his skill worthy enough for you to hear so he practices when he’s absolutely sure that no one is there to hear him when his skills aren’t yet up to his standards

Lowkey jealous when you hangout with the demon brothers and tries to find ways to distract you from hanging out with them

“ I seem to have seen a creature most extraordinary earlier. I believe it was one of the UMAs detailed in the tome for mysterious dwellers of the nether. Mayhaps you’d like to accompany me on a hunt? ”

His face is as straight-laced as it always is, but if you knew him long enough and looked closer, you’d notice that his ears seemed to have the slightest twinge of redness to them.

Honestly speaking, he tries to be a smooth and cool boi when it comes to you, but this dork seems to lose all his tact when faced with the radiance of your eyes and the intensity of your smile

With how long it takes him to make everything perfect before he woo’s you, time and space itself will cease to exist before he finally deems himself ready

So you have to do the wooing yourself and show him that you love all of him, imperfections and quirkiness included

[lepus-arcticus]

OMENS: CHAPTER EIGHT one | two | three | four | five | six | seven trigger warnings apply

KICKING HORSE B&B JULY 23 - 10:15 AM

Mulder slipped into wakefulness to find Scully’s smooth legs tangled in his, her small body curled into him, her head tucked under his chin. He was momentarily overcome with elated confusion before the night came back to him⁠—the sound of the crow screaming through the wall separating their bedrooms, the sight of Scully under a flurry of black wings, her torn back, her tattoo, the salt of her single tear on his tongue.

He craned his neck, careful not to disturb her, fingering open the neck of the shirt he’d given her and checking to see if she’d bled through her bandages. They looked clean, so he assumed the stitches had held. He flicked his eyes up towards the clock, internally groaning at time. He listened for Rhiannon downstairs, but couldn’t hear anything.

He let Scully sleep a short while longer, savouring the autumn sunburst of her head underneath him, the scent of her warm hair, her dried blood. She fit into him perfectly. He watched her breathe, both awestruck and heartsick. As he shifted to unknot himself from her, she moaned in her sleep. The sound squeezed at his throat, but after the intimate events of last night, he knew she’d be more comfortable waking up with her own space.

He let his feet swing over the edge of the bed and onto the chilled hardwood.

She sniffed and gathered the covers to herself, and he looked back at her. Her small, bundled body reminded him of the dead crow. He’d felt the creature’s neck snap under his hands⁠—he was certain it was dead⁠—so where had it gone?

There seemed to be only one answer.

As he opened the door to the hallway, pulling on a fresh t-shirt, he almost tripped over the dog. She was lapping up a drop of stray blood from the floor, and she looked up at him with guilty eyes and she turned tail and trotted downstairs.

Mulder ducked into the bathroom and cleaned it up the best he could, careful not to make too much noise. He scrubbed out the sink, half-heartedly wiped at the floor, and piled the bloody towels in the bathtub.

As he returned to the bedroom, he found Scully stirring awake.

“Morning,” he said quietly, easing down on the bed beside her and placing a hand on the curve of her hip. She mumbled discontentedly. “C’mon, Scully, it’s almost 10:30.”

“Oh my God,” she said, delirious. She shook herself out of the blankets and sat up, then sharply inhaled, clearly forgetting about her injury. “Oh… Jesus,” she growled, palming at the bandages.

She looked up at him, impossibly girlish, impossibly gorgeous. The pillow had marked her cheek with a charming little landscape of wrinkles, and her eyes were swollen with sleep. She averted her gaze, ran her pink tongue between her lips.

“Rhiannon’s home,” he said, trying to save them from a post-mortem. “Go get changed and meet me downstairs. I’m gonna have her look at your stitches and get those antibiotics. And then I think she’s got a few questions she needs to answer.”

-

The smell of coffee lifted through the air, but he didn’t hear any activity. He moved carefully through the dim hall and down the creaking stairs, making a point to avoid looking at any of the faces staring out from the photographs. “Rhiannon?” he said to the quiet house as he descended, but there was no answer.

He poked his head into the kitchen. The breakfast table was set for three, and the coffee pot was full, but Rhiannon was nowhere to be found, He moved into the dining room, and then through to the living room, and that’s when he spotted her.

She was fast asleep under a patchwork blanket, curled into a tight ball on an armchair with her hair coiled and piled on top of her head. Hypatia had returned to her feet, her muzzle tinted pink with Scully’s blood.

“Rhiannon,” he said, but she didn’t stir. He approached her cautiously and laid a hand on her shoulder.

She was cold.

He recoiled, but just as he was about to call for Scully, movement returned to her, and she opened her eyes. “...Fox?”

Mulder had little time to react before she was up, her icy hands reaching for his face. “Oh my god, what happened to you?!” she gasped.

“We had a little visitor last night. Of the avian variety,” he offered, barely bothering to keep the hostility out of his voice as he pushed her arms away. “Where were you?”

“Fox, let me- let me- let me- look at those,” she stammered. “Oh my god, a crow? Oh my god… where’s Dana? Is she okay?”

“Agent Scully is fine, but I want you to look her over. She required stitches and they may need re-doing. And antibiotics, too, if you have them.” Rhiannon put her hands to her cheeks. Mulder asked again. “Where were you last night?”

“I… It was Salome Stoesz. Premature labour. The baby… the baby didn’t make it. Theo came with me.”

“And if I were to call him right now, would he tell me the same thing?” Mulder asked. Rhiannon paused and looked at him, one eyebrow cautiously lifted.

“Of course he would.” Her face was contorted with panic. She knew something. Mulder was sure of it.

What the hell was in that locked tower?

Scully appeared at the doorway, still in his t-shirt, her hair pulled back from her freshly-washed face, looking so young that Mulder had to steady himself so as not to get sucked into a fresh riptide of protective rage. Rhiannon took one look at her and made a noise of despair. “Dana, oh my god…”

Mulder watched as Scully hung back silently, letting Rhiannon approach her, tilting her head and pulling the collar of his shirt back to give her a better look.

“Come with me,” Rhiannon said, and led Scully to the kitchen, where she peeled off Mulder’s bandages and prodded around, hunching over Scully’s torn shoulder. “You did a fine job with the stitches, Fox…I won’t need to redo them.” Quivering, she sank against the counter, her face in her hands.

“Rhiannon,” Mulder said, warming a little to her in the face of her clear distress. “If you know anything… anything at all, that might shed some light on this… no matter how strange it might sound, you need to tell us. Before something else happens.” Rhiannon just shook her head, speaking through her hands.

“You think I wouldn’t do everything in my power to try to make this right? You think I wouldn’t give anything to have my daughter back?” Scully glanced at Mulder, lips pursed, stern disquiet in her features.

Rhiannon dropped her hands.“I promise you, on Anna, on everything I’ve ever loved... that I can’t help you.”

12:33 PM

She was finally alone.

From the living room window, she watched the agents disappear down the road, tires kicking up mud, uprooting the grass. She’d cleaned up Dana the best she could, helped her wash her hair in the sink, shot both her and Fox up with a dose of antibiotics.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. None of this should have ever happened.

Rhiannon walked through the narrow hallways of her home, trailing her fingers along the walls, tracing shapes between the portraits. She came to the small desk in the foyer where she stored her mail and her mother’s old rotary phone.

She picked up the receiver, and dialed.

“They came for Dana last night,” she said, as calmly as she could. “We have to stop them. I don’t know if we can… but we have to try. If not…”

“Rhi…” Marion said. “I have something to tell you.”

HORIZON POLICE STATION 2:40 PM

Scully sat, straight-backed, behind a hulking, outdated computer, cut off from the world by a pair of oversized headphones. Apparently, she’d never gotten around to transcribing her autopsy notes the night before, and she’d spent the last hour and a half dutifully typing away, avoiding Mulder’s gaze. The quick patter of her fingers on the keyboard and the constipated gurgle of the coffee maker were the only sounds in the station. A corner of her fresh bandaging peeked out from under the collar of her shirt, and she looked pale and drawn, probably gritting her teeth through one of her more and more frequent dizzy spells.

Mulder watched her from his chosen desk, half-hidden behind a stack of yellowed newspapers, chewing on a pencil and leaning back in his chair. His neck itched and burned where the crow shredded his skin. Balancing his glasses on his nose, he scanned the papers lazily for any mention of the Bishops, of Hugh, of Kicking Horse⁠—but he couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t shake the distracting image of Scully bleeding breathlessly against the footboard, or the memory of waking to her warm, tempting scent. He frequently caught himself reading the same sentence for the third or fourth time in a row.

Theo yawned noisily behind him. If his own account was to be trusted, Rhiannon had been telling the truth, and they’d spent a long night together at the colony tending to Salome and restraining a furious, distraught Abel. Salome was currently being ferried by a troupe of her numerous brothers to the nearest hospital in Cut Bank for observation, and Theo was looking into what he could do about Abel’s clear abuse.

Mulder thought Theo had seemed genuinely shaken when they’d arrived, both by the whole Salome situation and by the claw marks that marred both he and Scully’s faces. He hadn’t asked many questions as to the hows or whys of it all, but had taken it seriously, warning them to keep a close eye on one another. But despite his initial concern, Theo edged on the cold side towards Scully, throwing her suspicious, questioning glances as they worked. Mulder couldn’t help but wonder what he’d witnessed at that diner. Couldn’t help but wonder what the hell Scully had been talking about. I don’t want Theo putting ideas into your head...

What was most notable about the scene, Mulder thought to himself, was that Marion was nowhere to be found, and Theo didn’t seem to care, or even to notice.

Mulder shook out the aged newspaper he was holding and then refolded it carelessly, tossing it back into the pile.

“No luck?” Theo said from behind his desk in the corner. Mulder looked over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows in acknowledgement.

“Well, I know a hell of a lot more about annual weather patterns and the fluctuating price of fertilizer than I ever cared to. You don’t have any genealogical records available? No old gossipy biddy who’s appointed herself the town historian?”

“Why? Whadya need to know, kid?”

“Well, I’m curious as to whether Horizon has experienced this kind of phenomena before, even if the only surviving evidence of it is a fish tale or rumour. And, uh, I’m interested in learning a bit more about Kicking Horse. The Bishops, too.”

“The Bishops?” Theo stiffened, furrowing his impressive brow.

“Do they have a longstanding legacy here? In Horizon, I mean.”

“The Bishops have always lived here,” Theo said, dipping his head, clearly trying to figure out what Mulder was getting at. “At least since that house was built. Eighteen-something or other...”

“Do you know where they came from before then?”

Theo heaved himself up from his desk, and walked slowly over to Mulder. He leaned over him, his hands on his hips. “Now, Fox, just what exactly is this?”

Scully looked up at them from her screen, and slid her headphones off of her ears.

“Don’t waste your time nosin’ around an innocent woman,” Theo said, scowling. “Rhiannon’s done nothing but take in two lost and lonely girls that needed a home and somebody to love ‘em.”

“You two seem to be… close,” Mulder continued, testing the boundaries, noting with interest the flush crawling up the bulkier man’s neck. “I’m curious about Rhiannon’s father. Has she ever mentioned him?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“And while we’re at it, where’s Marion today?”

The red reached Theo’s face, and he became visibly flustered. “What⁠— why⁠— It’s none of your damn business,” he said. “She’s takin’ a personal day! And, and, you can’t just waltz in from the city and think you have the right to go digging into everyone’s personal lives⁠—you, you should be lookin’ at Hugh Daly, is what you should be doing, instead of wasting your time on Rhiannon, of all the damn people.”

“Theo, I’m just following a hunch here, there’s no need to get worked up.”

“Mulder… I’m inclined to agree,” Scully said from behind him. “Hugh likely has more information for us than what I was able to find out from our… initial conversations.”

Theo glanced over at her. “Oh, your conversations, huh?” Scully’s chest rose under her blazer, but her face remained carefully, gracefully arranged. “Like that sweet-lookin’ chat you were enjoyin’ at the Half Moon?”

“Hey,” Mulder said, moving to stand, but then Scully stopped him with a pointed glance.  

“Listen, Theo,” she said, moving her eyes back to him. “I know emotions are running high right now, but you need to let Agent Mulder and I do our jobs, and that includes letting us follow our instincts. I can assure you that we are only pursuing the avenues that have presented themselves as worthy of our attention. We are not accusing Rhiannon of anything right now. And if we were, we would expect your full cooperation, regardless of your personal relationship with her. Is that clear?”

Mulder found himself grappling with a strange sense of pride. Oh, his Scully. A pro ‘til the end.

“Hey now,” Theo started, raising his voice, but then the station phone rang, interrupting them and dampening the tension in the room. Theo grumbled incoherently before lumbering back to his desk to pick it up. “Horizon Police Department,” he said.

Mulder tried to catch Scully’s eye, tried to telegraph his gratefulness to her, but her focus remained firmly on Theo. In the silence of the station, he could hear a woman’s garbled voice on the other end of the line, but couldn’t make out what she was saying.

“Uh huh,” Theo grunted, and then held out the receiver. “Agent Mulder, it’s for you.”

HALF-MOON DINER 4:22 PM

Mulder pushed open the door to the diner and ducked under the bright, unexpected rattle of the bell. The place was nearly empty, other than a couple of denim-clad old timers in trucker hats, nursing their coffees and bickering over the daily crossword. Rich light from outside soaked through the windows, decadent as champagne fizz, gilding the drying mud on the checkerboard tile.

He eased down onto an empty stool, and the leather creaked unhappily underneath him. The diner was warm, and smelled of overspent deep-fry grease and the bitterness of old coffee. He slipped his suit jacket down his shoulders and folded it carefully on the stool beside him, busying himself with rolling up his sleeves and loosening his tie. He scratched irritably at his cuts.

Hank Williams crooned from the staticky radio, and Mulder found himself vaguely embarrassed of his expensive socks and his smooth palms. He cleared his throat, and surveyed the booths.

His mind played back ridiculous, self-indulgent fantasies of Scully sitting across from Hugh, her tiny stockinged feet slipping from their pumps and inching up the inseam of his Levi’s under the table. Or of Scully curled in Hugh’s lap in the corner booth, her nimble fingers threaded through his black hair, her eyes low and a soft, suggestive smile on her lips. He inhaled and tried to shake the images from his head. She’d never, of course. Never.

But then again, she had. Hadn’t she? Gotten all nice and cozy and boozy and one-night-standy with Edward Peter Jerse, 36, blood type A pos⁠—

“You that guy from the FBI? Mister Miller?” He was rescued from his thoughts by the waitress. She was young, 22 or 23 at the most, and a little too thin for her height. Her hair was the colour of carob, swept off her neck and twisted into a limp nest at the top of her head. She wiped her hands down the front of her outdated, citrusy uniform, and smiled politely.

“Yeah,” Mulder said, fumbling in his discarded jacket for his badge. He flashed it at her, watched her scrutinize it. “Heather?” he asked, answering his own question by looking at her nametag.

“Yeah. That lady didn’t come with you, did she? Your partner, or whatever?”

“No, she’s… it’s just me. Like you asked. And it’s Mulder, not Miller.” After the events of the previous night, he was deeply uncomfortable with the fact that he’d had to leave Scully behind. Especially with her plans for the afternoon unfixed, and her earlier assertion that she’d like to speak more with Daly.

“‘Kay. Mister Mulder. Good. You, uh, you wanna coffee or something? On the house,” Heather said. She was pretty, now that he was really looking at her; charming in an all-American sort of way.

“Yeah, sure. Thanks.”

“Pie?”

He glanced over at the baking display stand next to the register. The plastic dome was sweating, and the blueberries had a gooey, greyish tint to them.

“No thanks. I’m good. ”

Heather scoffed a laugh. “Probably for the best. Rog makes terrible pie,” she said, gesturing to the kitchen with her chin. “Like, I don’t even know how he gets it so bad. It’s kinda hard to mess up pie. Or they wouldn’t have that saying, you know? Easy as pie?” Heather plonked a thick glass mug down in front of him and poured him coffee from a brown-stained glass pot. Steam curled up into the air. “Hey, what happened to your face?” She asked, watching the liquid rise.

“Don’t worry about it,” Mulder said.

She raised an eyebrow at him, returned the pot to its home on a double heater, and set a ceramic plateful of cream pods and sugar packets down in front of him. She leaned over the bar, framing her tanned cleavage with her elbows. Mulder tried not to let his eyes sink downwards.

Heather studied him as he mixed his coffee, blinking coquettishly, waiting for him to ask. She clearly liked being Little Miss Informant ‘97. He could tell she felt special.

“So, Heather, why did you call me down here?” he said, bringing the coffee to his lips. A thin film of grease floated on top of it, but at least it wasn’t soy and honey.

“I think you oughta know about some things. About Anna. She used to work here, you know. We were friends, kind of.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. And you know what, Mister Mulder? I think that husband of hers might have killed her.” She leaned back with a satisfied grin, and crossed her arms.

“And why’s that?”

“Everyone knows about him and Marion. I think he wanted to get rid of Anna so that he could like, publicly be with her.”

“Why not just separate, get a divorce?” He asked.

“I mean, that’s the thing, right? Why not just get a divorce? So I’m thinking that like, maybe divorce wasn’t really an option, you know? Because of the way that Anna was. And even the way that Hugh is.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Anna wasn’t really like other people. And Hugh… he’s just kind of one of those guys who gets whatever he wants,” she said, “I mean, even that lady, your partner? That’s why I didn’t want her to come. I can tell that she likes him, that she wouldn't listen to me. They were talking about movies, Mister Mulder. Movies. When all the whole town can talk about is poor Anna.”

A snake twisted and flipped in Mulder’s stomach. He tried to drown it with a long, scalding guzzle of coffee.

“Alright,” he said, “That’s enough talk about my partner. How, exactly, was Anna different than other people?”

Heather tried and failed to hide a self-satisfied smile, and wiped her hands on her apron. She turned and yelled to the kitchen, “Rog, I’m taking my break.”

Rog peeked his wrinkled, bald head out of the back. He closely resembled a tortoise. “Kay sweetheart. Be good,” he said, and sent them off with a wink.

“C’mon, Mister Mulder,” Heather said, swinging a ratty blue knit sweater off of a coat hook just inside the kitchen and wrapping it around herself. “I need a smoke.”

Mulder gathered up his jacket and slung it over his arm, abandoning his coffee to follow her out. Heather walked around the building, swinging her lean hips, leading him to the dumpsters. The prairie stretched out behind her for miles and miles.

She drew a rumpled pack of cigarettes from her sweater pocket, and lipped one out before tilting the open box towards Mulder.

“No thanks,” he said, “I quit in ‘92.” He watched as she struggled with a match and lit her cigarette. In the natural light, she looked softer, younger. “Cancer’s a bitch, Heather.”

“Who are you, my dad?” She said, tired mirth in her feline eyes. “That trip to the corner store sure took a long time. 15 years? 16? Did you forget the milk, have to go back?”

Mulder, resigned, sighed and pressed his lips together. “Yeah, okay. So. Anna.”

Heather sucked in a deep drag, her fingers floating on either side of her cigarette. She looked over to him at a slant, and kicked at the dirt. “Well, she was from that colony, right?”

Mulder nodded.

“So I guess her brother was like, this huge abusive asshole. So she runs away, comes up here to town, and Rhiannon takes her in. And well, you know, Rhiannon’s a little bit… witchy. A lot witchy, actually. Which I dig, don’t get me wrong.” She held up her hands in defense, and a crumble of burning ash fell to her sweater. Mulder reached over and swiped it away, ignoring her small-town succubus smile. “But anyway, it’s kind of like, this open secret about her that everybody knows. She can just do stuff.”

Here it was. “Stuff?”

Heather leaned in, and looked up at him with a playful flutter of her eyelashes. “You wanna hear a story, Mister Mulder?”

“Always.”

“So when my mom was pregnant with Jessie, that’s my little sister, Rhiannon and her mom both came over to like, help with the birth or whatever. God, they looked the exact same, too, like twins. But anyway, Jessie was born, and she wasn’t breathing, no heartbeat, and she was all blue and stuff. I was sort of hiding in the hallway, but Rhiannon’s mom rushed by me, and I saw Jessie’s face. And I swear to God, she was dead. But Rhiannon’s mom took her out into the rain, and put her on the ground all naked and limp, and said some words⁠—and this whole time my mom is like, crying and freaking out, and my dad had already fucked off to go get drunk somewhere. But there’s this crazy lightning crack, and I’m blinded, right? So I couldn’t see anything for a few seconds. And then the thunder was rolling, and by the end of it, I could hear Jessie crying. Rhiannon’s mom comes back into the house, carrying Jessie all bundled up now, and she’s alive. Shrieking like a pterodactyl. She brought her back to life.”

“Wow,” said Mulder, a little enchanted. He could hear Scully’s voice in the back of his head⁠—Cyanosis, Mulder, the baby was never dead. And childhood memories are so rarely reliable, especially with the human tendency to mythologize meaningful experiences. But he remembered Rhiannon’s strange coldness, the quiet, persistent glimmer leading him up to the tower, the wall of faces, all with the same nose. “So have you ever seen Rhiannon do anything… like that… herself?”

“Well, not exactly. But Anna… I mean, she had to learn it from somewhere, didn’t she?”

“Learn what?” C’mon, Heather, he thought, chewing his lip impatiently, get to the good stuff…

“Well, honestly, I don’t know if she was weird before she got to Rhiannon’s, or if she started the weirdness because of Rhiannon. I was older than her, so we didn’t go to school together. But she started working here after she graduated, and lemme tell ya, as soon as she got here, some strange stuff started happening. This guy that used to come in, Gene? Real piece of work. Always grabbing at us and stuff. And a few weeks after Anna started, he just wouldn’t come in anymore. He’d park outside and like, stare, and look confused, but he’d never get out of the car, never come into the diner. And so, like, her brother started showing up too, right? And even though Rog would chase him off at first, after a while, he didn’t need to. The same thing would happen. He’d just sit there, in his car, and then drive away. Oh, and tips like, tripled.”

“Did you ever ask her about this? Did she ever give any indication that she might be responsible?” Mulder said.

Heather took one more drag and then stubbed out her smoke on the side of the building, smudging the brick with char. She tossed the butt into the dumpster behind her. “Not really. But whenever I’d talk to her about it, she’d get this weird smile, like she knew something that I didn’t.”

“So what about Hugh Daly?”

“Right. Okay. So then Hugh moved to town, and started spending a ridiculous amount of time here, and Anna was like, immediately on him. You know, I actually thought he was sweet on me at first, but then… well. I guess he changed his mind. Seems to do that a lot.” She looked at him pointedly. “You need to tell that partner of yours to be careful. He’s hot, yeah, but I really don’t think he’s safe to be around.”

“I’ll be sure to mention it,” Mulder said to his shoes.

“But um. Anyway. Anna had this really moody side to her. She was a sweet chick and all, but you really didn’t wanna get on her bad side, and not only because she could do stuff to you, you know? She would just get all quiet and cry a lot for no reason and wouldn’t let you go near her. I used to have to cover for her for a lot of shifts and stuff. I’m not sure how she kept this job. Anyway, I’m thinking Hugh didn’t like her moods too much, and that’s why he took up with Marion. Couldn’t make Anna happy, no matter what he did. That’s gotta be frustrating, you know? So anyway, that’s why I think he did it. Maybe he just snapped or something, got tired of dealing with her.”

“Her moods were severe enough that they’d drive him to kill her?”

Heather pouted. “Well, when you put it like that, it sounds so harsh.”

“Murder is a pretty harsh accusation, Heather. Are you aware of the state that Anna’s body was found in?”

Heather looked uncertain. “Well, maybe not, then. I don’t know. I just know that there was something weird going on with that girl, and that she and Hugh weren’t happy together.”

Something occurred to Mulder, something so obvious he was surprised he didn’t think of it before. “Now, you mentioned that you believe that Anna could make things happen. Do you believe the same thing of Marion?”

Heather shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe. I didn’t hang out with Marion much. Sometimes she’d pick Anna up from work. But like, if Rhiannon was teaching them stuff, I’m sure Marion would know it all too. Whoah, hey, maybe it was Marion! Do you have any leads or anything? Who do you think did it?”

“We’re pursuing a few different avenues of investigation.”

“Well I still think Hugh should be number one on that list. I just get skeeved out by that guy. I just gotta bad feeling,” she said with a resolute tone, looking into the distance. “Anyway, I hafta get back.” She tilted her head towards the door.

“Wait,” he said, “Heather, are you familiar with omens?”

“I mean, kind of. Like big black dogs and stuff, right? Supposed to tell you you’re gonna die?”

Mulder shook his head. “Nevermind.”

“Alright, Mister Mulder. You gonna come in and finish your coffee?”

“Nah, I gotta run. Thanks, though.” His fingers twitched towards his cell phone. He really should touch base with Scully.

Heather reached over and touched his tie with a chipped strawberry fingernail. “How long you gonna be in town?” Mulder reflexively grabbed her wrist and held her still. She met his eyes, and a corner of her mouth curled.

“As long as it takes,” he replied.

“Well, you know,” Heather said softly, “There’s not much to do around here, but if you find yourself needing a little break or something…” She swayed a little, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth with a smile. “You might be able to convince me to show you around.”

“Thanks,” he said again, releasing her. “I’ll be in touch if I need anything.”

“But you don’t have my number!” She protested as he turned towards the parking lot.

He didn’t turn around. “I’ll stop by if I need to.”

[roboticonography]

Idk how useful a prompt this is, but I think it could be cool to see a scene with FWNL Steve and Pepper? With or without other characters. Loved the new deleted scene!

Ahh! Thank you so much for this, anon. I had so much fun writing it!

This takes place concurrently with Chapter 4 of Flames We Never Lit.

Paper Doll

The text comes on a Wednesday afternoon.

Hi, Pepper. It’s Steve Rogers. I was wondering if I could ask you for a favor. Please let me know if there’s a good time to call you.

Pepper is in the back of a company car—because that’s where she lives now, it seems, shuttling back and forth from one appearance to the next.

Now’s fine, if you’re free, she writes back. She isn’t sure what kind of favour she could possibly do for Captain America, but her curiosity is piqued.

Her phone rings.

“Hi, Steve.”

“Hi. Sorry to ambush you.”

“It’s no problem, how can I help?”

“Well, it’s—I—so.” He takes a deep breath. “My friend, Peggy Carter, she told me about your shopping trip.”

“Oh! How is Peggy?”

“She’s fine, she’s great, yeah. Happy with the new clothes. I think it made her feel a little more like herself.”

“I’m glad.”

“That’s—kind of why I’m calling. I thought maybe you could give me some style advice.”

“Oh,” says Pepper, surprised. “Well, I could… sure. Did you want me to recommend some stores, or go with you, or…?”

“I don’t—whatever you think would…” He sounds deeply uncomfortable with either option.

“Let’s meet for coffee? We can go from there.”

“That sounds fine,” says Steve gratefully. “Thank you.”

*

Over coffee, Steve explains his difficulty: the only clothes he has are the ones SHIELD provided him, which were plainly chosen with the goal of making a man from 1945 feel comfortable. “I get a lot of looks,” he tells her.

Pepper doesn’t doubt it, though she’s willing to bet that he’s mistaken about the nature of the looks. Steve is even more handsome in person than he is on film, which is saying something.

But what’s even more striking is that he’s a very engaged listener. She never gets the sense that he’s just waiting for his turn to speak.

“Email me your measurements,” she tells him. “I’ll have my shopping service pick out a few things, and you can just pay them directly for whatever you keep.”

Steve looks at her with faint suspicion. “Do you get charged for that?”

Pepper remembers Tony telling a story about Steve counting out coins to pay for his share of a group takeout order. At the time, she’d thought he was exaggerating for comedic effect. Now, she’s not so sure.

“I have an account, so it’s a flat rate,” she assures him. “I’d pay it anyhow.”

She slides a sheet of paper across the table: a chart for taking measurements, with instructions. The accompanying line illustration looks like a paper doll.

He skims the instructions briefly before meeting her eyes again. “Okay,” he says. “Thank you.”

*

That evening, Pepper receives an email. Steve apparently has access to a scanner: he’s filled out the chart by hand, and sent it to her as a PDF. It’s mildly inconvenient, as Pepper has to copy out all of the numbers to send to her shopper. (His waist-to-shoulder ratio is ridiculous.)

However, the hand-drawn addition of a Captain America costume to the figure on the chart is charming enough to make up for it—especially the word balloon that has Cap declaring, This is what happened the last time I tried to choose my own clothes!

*

Pepper isn’t sure what she expected Steve Rogers’ apartment to be, but the reality is a little bit sad. It feels… temporary, like a hotel or a hospital. A liminal space.

He’s lined up the contents of his small closet on the bed for her inspection. She can see what he means about the clothes. The pants are high-waisted, with unflattering pleats; the shirts are boxy, in colours that don’t suit his skin tones, and prints that make him look like a picnic blanket.

“I’d put you in solid colours or muted patterns,” Pepper offers, pointing to one of the shirts. “Such a strong check on such a big canvas, it’s not...”

He nods emphatically.

She adds the contents of her shopping bags to the collection: jeans and khakis, t-shirts, henleys, button-downs, a pullover, a cardigan, a jacket. A pair of brown motorcycle boots, lightly distressed. She goes over the various possible combinations, and how to dress an outfit up or down.

“Try everything on before you decide. It should all fit, but the shirts may have to be taken in a little. Have you been to a tailor before?”

“You know I was born in 1918, right?”

“Fair enough.”

She hands him a soft grey t-shirt, and he immediately pulls off the shirt he’s wearing without an ounce of self-consciousness.

Pepper wills herself not to stare. Or burst into flames.

The t-shirt is appealingly snug, highlighting his broad shoulders and trim waist. “You don’t think this is too tight?” he asks, smoothing one hand absently over his washboard stomach.

Pepper is fairly certain that whoever originally pioneered the t-shirt as fashion rather than underwear had Steve Rogers’ exact proportions in mind.

“No, it’s a good fit.” She manages to sound credibly disinterested. “That’s what you should be looking for.”

Steve shrugs, and takes the shirt off.

When his hands move to his belt buckle, Pepper says, “I’ll give you a minute,” and flees to the living room.

*

Steve comes out wearing dark jeans and a cabled sweater. “I’m sorry if that was rude,” he tells her.

Pepper plays innocent. “If what was rude?”

He gives her a look.

“It’s fine. Don’t mind me, I’m just a little—” The word old-fashioned dies on her lips. “Shy,” she finishes, even though she’s nothing of the kind.

“I spent six weeks in a lab when I first got here. You can only get told to strip so many times before you stop waiting to be asked.”

“I’m not offended. But you should at least hold out until I buy you dinner.”

He grins. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

“How do you like the clothes?”

A shrug. “Everything seems to fit. Does it look right?”

In point of fact, it looks as though he’s just about to get his picture taken for the fall catalogue. Out loud, however, Pepper says only, “I think so.”

“And I can wear this for going out?”

“After work drinks, yes. Formal banquet, no.”

“Great. Thank you.”

He previews a couple more ensembles for Pepper’s approval. She has to remind him not to tuck his t-shirt into his jeans, but aside from that, he seems to be comfortable with the upgrade. He winds up keeping most of the clothes, and insists on paying her for them immediately, in cash, including a tip for the shopper.

Then he walks her to her car, even though it’s still light outside.

Just before they reach the car, he asks, “Do men still send flowers after a date?”

He looks so earnest that Pepper has to resist the urge to hug him.

“Depends. Was it a good date?”

Steve suddenly becomes very interested in his shoes. “Hasn’t happened yet.”

All at once, it comes clear:

Steve has been fine with wearing the clothes SHIELD provided him until now.

He didn’t ask for her help updating his wardrobe because he suddenly cares about what everyone thinks.

He asked for her help because he cares what Peggy Carter thinks.

“It’s not mandatory,” says Pepper carefully, “but it’s a nice gesture.”

“Roses?”

“They’re fine. Kind of outdated. A mixed bouquet is more...”

He frowns, his jaw tightening. Pepper wonders if this is what Tony means when he refers to Steve’s fuck-you-I’m-Captain-America face.

“Roses are fine,” she repeats.

“The house where she grew up had a rose garden.” It’s a banal observation, but he looks mortified to have let it slip.

“It sounds like you know what she likes,” says Pepper.

He nods thoughtfully.

“Whatever you decide, don’t go to the supermarket—the flowers are cheaper, but they’re not as nice. Actually, get Tony to take you wherever he goes. He’s good at flowers.”

“Thanks.” He hesitates a moment, then asks, “Do you find it hard to stay friends with him?”

“No. I mean, a little, sometimes. He can be… a lot. But—and I know this probably sounds weird, but—he’s still one of my best friends. And we’re a good team. We’ve worked together a long time. I can’t imagine my life without him now.”

“That’s not weird.”

It’s tempting to ask about Peggy, but she doesn’t. If he wanted her to know, he’d tell her.

As she drives off, Pepper thinks about the men she’s known who have claimed to be old-fashioned—usually to justify some unpleasant behaviour, or to avoid self-reflection.

Steve Rogers, a stranger in a strange land, has every reason to use his age as an excuse to stop growing. But he doesn’t.

*

A few days later, Tony texts her: Rogers just told me that you are, direct quote, “a class act.”

That’s nice to hear, she writes back. Same goes for him. You two should hang out more.

Counterpoint: you and I should hang out more. Dinner tonight?

Maybe. I’ll let you know.

Later that afternoon, a modestly-sized flower arrangement arrives at Pepper’s office: a colourful flutter of alstroemeria. She suspects Tony, until she reads the card:

Hopefully not too old-fashioned for your taste. Thanks again for your help. S.R.

Pepper smiles, quite certain that, wherever she is, Peggy Carter is enjoying her dozen roses.

[toloveawarlord]

Behind the Times (Ch.1)

You can find my Masterlist in my bio!

“Where is it? Come on!” Aspen muttered, checking under yet another rosebush for her lost item. Her day had ended on a strange and painful note, all because she took a detour through St. James Park instead of her usual route home. A night patrolman had spooked her, and she strayed off the beaten path to avoid detection. Jail time was not on her agenda.

One moment, Aspen had been snaking around a large Oak tree, and the next, the ground bathed in moonlight had fallen out from under her, sending her spiraling down a seemingly endless void. A rosebush broke her not so graceful fall. Even after crawling out, thorns still stuck into her skin, in places she could not reach on her own.

There!

The item she desired rested safely beneath the twisted branches of the bush. Her sigh of relief caught in her throat as the glint of metal next to her neck caught her eye. Aspen craned her head around and followed the length of the sword up to its owner.

The man’s intense gaze nearly stopped her heart. “Citizens are not permitted in the garden. State your name and intention,” he demanded. His crisp white uniform had to be a military one, but none like she had ever seen. Narrowing his amber eyes at her hesitation, he pressed the cold blade against her neck, a silent warning.

Aspen gulped. He definitely meant business. “Aspen Lancaster, and currently trying to reach my cell phone.” Was he a cosplayer? Just messing with her? The sword looks real. So real that she couldn’t bring herself to ask him on the off chance that he decided to murder her for talking back.

“Your what? How did you get in here? This is for military officers only, and high-ranking ones at that.”

Aspen tilted her head to the side, away from the blade. “I have no idea where here is so—”

“Is this what you’ve lost?” A second man interrupted, wearing a slightly different, but ultimately from the same group, uniform. In his hand was her phone, no cracks in the screen.

“Yeah, actually.” She hadn’t even heard him approach, let alone dig it out from under the bush. The only thing left to find was the satchel that she’d lost in the fall as well.

“Edgar. We have more important matters. I’ll only ask once more. How did you get in here?” He asked, straightening the sword in her direction once again. It was unheard of for anyone to enter the garden, especially when the two armies had only concluded their meeting a mere half hour ago.

Aspen glanced down at the blade. “I took a thousand-meter fall into a rosebush. It’s a wonder I’m not dead. Can you stop pointing that at me?” She asked. Real or not, it was sharp and threatening enough to keep her immobile.

“You expect us to believe that?”

Edgar raised his gaze from the device back to her. “Now, Jonah, let’s be civil about this. I don’t know many who would throw themselves into an actual rosebush for a simple lie.” He took her hand to help her stand, steadying her before asking, “What is this device?”

Aspen glanced between the two officers. “You don’t know what a cell phone is?” She started to laugh, softly and forced, but their confusion cut it off. They had to be cosplayers, and damn good ones at that, not breaking character even once.

“You’re very strange,” Jonah said, returning his sword to its sheath. He had no intentions of letting her leave but deemed her unthreatening enough to put his weapon away.

“You’re the one carrying swords,” she retorted. Staring at them a moment longer, Aspen decided to play along, explaining the phone as best she could. “It does a lot of things. Smartphones are crazy cool. It has thousands of apps you can download. It can play music, take pictures…” She trailed off, watching the confusion spread deep across their features. “You really don’t know, do you? Are you some kind of anti-tech groupies?” Heathens. Who doesn’t like technology? It’s so convenient. Jokingly, she muttered, “What century is it?”

Jonah answered with his scowl deepening, “The 19th.”

“Huh?” Aspen blinked. He wasn’t actually supposed to answer… or answer with an absurd century that wasn’t her own. He sure looked serious though. “What the fuck is going on?”

“A lady shouldn’t use such language if she wants to find a suitor,” Jonah chastised. His eyes raked over her, a hint of blush on his cheeks. He hadn’t noticed her strange attire until now. The amount of skin that she was showing made him quite uncomfortable. Her top must have shrunk, covering only half of her torso, and he couldn’t figure out what kind of undergarment she wore that loosely hung around her hips and fell to the tops of her thighs.

Aspen nearly stumbled back when Jonah thrust his jacket at her, demanding her to wear it. “But why-”

“How indecent,” Jonah muttered, the heat still present on his cheeks. “Have some self-respect.”

“How about you throw out your outdated opinions?” Aspen replied but slid her arms into the jacket none the less. The temperature had dropped, and a cool breeze drew goosebumps across her skin. On her small frame, the jacket was much too large, but very warm. “Though, I guess I’m the outdated one… postdated? Ugh.” She rubbed her stomach, a soft grumble at her words. “What I wouldn’t give for postmate.”

Edgar propositioned her with a tempting offer. “Why don’t you come along with us back to our headquarters, and we’ll treat you to a warm meal. You can tell me more about this smartphone. I’m very interested to learn more.”

“How do I know you two aren’t psychopaths who want to murder me?”

“You have our word, as the Queen and Jack of Hearts. That is plenty reason enough,” Jonah said, an almost crazy amount of pride in his voice.

Aspen tilted her head slightly. “Those titles mean nothing to me.” She couldn’t find any ill-will behind the invitation, and if they were murderers, then they probably would have killed her already. This is a secluded spot. Though, the odds of coming back from a secondary location were slim.

Edgar chuckled lightly, finding her to be the most interesting thing to come to Cradle. “You’ll only get your item returned to you after we’ve had a longer chat. So, I believe it’s in your best interest to cooperate.” His kind tone didn’t match the clear threat underneath.

She couldn’t very well just take the phone back. Her strength equaled that of a toddler. Plus, swords. “Fine, but only because getting a new phone is damn expensive.” Her head turned to scan the garden. “But I also lost my bag-”

“We’ll have someone search for your other things. This way,” He motioned for her to follow after him, leading her out of the building with Jonah close behind.

Aspen stopped so abruptly that Jonah narrowly missed running into her. The streets were lively, even this late at night. Many things had caused her to freeze. Their clothes were old fashioned. Horses were being ridden. Horses were hooked to carriages. The fountain looked to be the only normal piece, save for the large glowing crystal that by all accounts was floating. What fresh hell is this place?

“What’s the matter now?” Jonah asked, drawing all the attention of those around them.

All eyes were on her, whispering and pointing.

This didn’t make any sense. The entire town couldn’t be cosplayers. “What century did you say it was again?” Aspen asked hesitantly, taking a step back only to smack into Jonah. This is impossible. Insane. She had completely lost her mind.

“The 19th. We should have Kyle examine you. You’re beginning to look hysterical, not to mention the cuts and thorns from your self-proclaimed fall,” Jonah said, putting his hands on her shoulders to guide her forward. Only a few paces away, two horses were tied, beautiful saddles adorning their backs.

“Oh hell no,” Aspen muttered. Her escape was effectively blocked with Jonah’s fingers digging into her shoulders to keep her from moving. Edgar had his watchful eye on her as well, as if daring her to try and run. And where would she go? This most certainly wasn’t the London she knew. “Nope. I am not getting on a moving animal. Human kind didn’t destroy the environment and create manual automobiles for me to have to ride a horse.”

“You don’t have a choice. You’ll be riding with me,” Jonah announced. He’d already hoisted her up into the air and placed her on the saddle before she could attempt to get away.

The horse shifted its weight. Aspen clung onto the horn of the saddle, her body slipping backwards. It’s not even moving yet! Her squeal of terror cut short as Edgar steadied her from behind. Saddles are slick.

Edgar couldn’t help the laughter that broke out as he gently pushed her back up. “The more you move, the easier it is to fall off.”

“I didn’t move! The barn animal did!” Aspen shot him a glare over her shoulder.

Jonah mounted the horse behind her, caging her in with his arms as he gripped the reigns. “I’m not going to let you fall, so calm down,” he said. The cool tone of reassurance had her racing heart calming in seconds. “My title may not have meaning for you, but I promise that no harm is going to come to you while you’re a guest at our headquarters.”

Each step the horse took, made her body more tense. “Why do you care?” She asked, casting a suspicious glance up at him. Her hands were tightly gripping the material of his sleeve, afraid to let go.

“I could see how frightened you were when we exited the Garden. However you got there, whatever your intentions might have been, it’s clear that you aren’t familiar with this area.” Jonah stared straight ahead as he spoke softly enough that no one else could hear. “But don’t expect any special treatment from me,” He added swiftly at the end.

He’s very contrary. “You’re actually really nice, aren’t you?”

Jonah turned his nose up, but the hint of pink on his cheeks gave away the truth. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Aspen bit back a laugh. Though still filled with fear and worry, she felt at ease for the first moment since she collided with a rosebush.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I am in love with Aspen. I wanted to try a less serious fic series with a more humorous element to it. I didn’t have a suitor in mind for her when I started but I’m leaning toward Jonah now.

[kingdomstroops]

Are There Contradicting Bible Verses? Part 1

Are there really contradicting Bible verses?

Are there contradictions in the Bible? Christians believe that the Bible is God’s word, so if there are contradicting Bible verses, as some people claim, that’s a pretty big problem. God wouldn’t contradict Himself would He? Why People See Contradictions in the Bible One reason people may claim there are contradicting Bible verses is that they lack understanding of what they’re reading. One simple step to increase your understanding of the Bible is to read the verses in context. Don’t cherry-pick a verse here and there, but read the surrounding verses or even the entire chapter to understand what is being said. Another way to better understand the Bible is to know who is writing to whom, what they are writing, and the purpose of what they wrote. The Bible is actually a collection of sixty-six books by many different writers who lived in different cultures and different centuries. Historical narrative, poetry, parables, and prophecy are a few of the different types of writing in the Bible. With so many variables it may be easy to assume that somewhere along the line a few contradicting Bible verses must have slipped in. If this were an ordinary book, you’d be right. But the Bible is anything but ordinary. It is God’s divine revelation to us, and God is the only author, though He used many writers to pen His message. Personal Agendas Another reason people claim there are contradictions in the Bible is due to their own personal agenda. Something about the Bible or its message offends them, so they want it to be wrong. If they can disprove part of the Bible, they can throw the whole thing out as false, or pick and choose what they want to believe. A perfect example of a group with such an agenda is the American Humanist Association. If anyone would have done their homework to find contradictions in the Bible or contradicting Bible verses it would be them. So we took a look at some of these supposed contradictions as given in their article, “Some Reasons Why Humanists Reject the Bible.” By definition, a contradiction is: a fact or statement that is the opposite of what someone has said or that is so different from another fact or statement that one of them must be wrong. Other sources include the word inconsistent in the definition, which means incompatible. So a contradiction is in opposition or incompatible with something previously stated. Let’s dive into these supposed contradictions in the Bible and see what we can find. Supposed Contradicting Bible Verses According to their article, the contradictions in the Bible start in the very first chapter. Contradiction 1: “Genesis 1:2-3 says that God created light and divided it from darkness on the first day, but Genesis 1:14-19 tells us the sun, moon and stars weren’t made until the fourth day.” Can both of these statements be true? If I say I have light in my house on day one, and three days later I say I made candles and lit them in different rooms, have I contradicted myself? Are those statements incompatible? Not if I had a light source other than the candles to begin with. So if there was a source of light other than those created on day four, these verses are not in contradiction. Interestingly enough, a simple search for ‘where does light come from’ is all it takes. Without getting too complex, light is an expression of energy more commonly known as radiation. Even secular scientists agree there was light in the universe before there were stars. They call it ‘primordial radiation’ and attribute it to anything but a divine source. The Bible states it more simply. God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. For the Bible to state that light was created before the celestial bodies that give light to our planet is not a contradiction, but is actually a scientifically accurate statement that goes against what myths and outdated science once believed. Fancy that.Contradiction 2: “Genesis 1:20 says the fowl were created out of the waters; Genesis 2:19 alleges they were formed from the ground.” This one is definitely a contradiction, right? It would be if that’s what the verses actually say, but it’s not. Genesis 2:19 says: Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them… Genesis 1:20 says: Then God said, “Let the waters teem with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of the heavens.” From these two verses we learn that birds fly in the air and were created from the ground. Those are two different facts, but not an example of contradictions in the Bible. Unless you’re willfully misunderstanding the verse, these are obviously not contradicting Bible verses.Contradiction 3: “Genesis 6:19, God ordered Noah to bring ‘of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort...into the ark.’ Nevertheless, Genesis 7:2-3 relates that the Lord ordered Noah to take into the ark the clean beast and the birds by sevens, and only the unclean beasts by twos.” Remember the definition of contradiction? It means something is incompatible or in opposition to something else. Giving additional information does not mean I’ve contradicted myself. If someone asked you to bring two of each of your favorite foods to a party and then said, also bring seven of each of a few specific foods you both like, have they contradicted themselves? You were bringing two of everything anyway, but they also want to make sure there are seven of a specific subset. Are you unable to do both of the things you were asked to do? No. Having seven of something means you also have a pair, since two is included in that larger quantity. This is an example of personal bias and willful misunderstanding, not contradictions in the Bible.Contradiction 4: “Genesis 8:4 reports that, as the waters of the flood receded, Noah’s ark rested on the mountains of Ararat in the seventh month. The very next verse, however, says the mountaintops could not be seen until the tenth month.” Why do we have lighthouses and buoys around coastlines? To protect ships from rocks, reefs or other dangers hidden beneath the surface of the water. Ships don’t sit on the surface of the water like a rock on a frozen pond. Depending on how large the vessel is and how much weight it’s carrying, a substantial part of a ship is below the surface of the water. If the Bible is accurate, Noah’s ark was the size of a small cargo ship, over forty feet from top to bottom and carrying so much weight that the water line would have been several stories above the bottom of the ship. According to Genesis chapter 8, it took seven months for the flood waters to recede enough for the bottom of the ark to snag on the top of Mount Ararat. It took another three months for the water to recede to the point where those in the ark could actually see the mountains. These are not contradicting Bible verses, but an accurate account of what happened.Contradiction 5: “Genesis 8:13 describes the earth as being dry on the first day of the first month. But Genesis 8:14 informs us the earth was not dry until the twenty-seventh day of the second month.” When there is a massive flood and water covers everything, you mark the day you can see the ground again. That’s verse 13. “...In the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried off the earth.” In essence, “I can see land!” Does that mean the ground was dry? Is that how it works with the puddles in your yard? When you finally see ground and not water, are you surprised to get muddy if you walk over the spot that day or even the next? Of course not. Ask any farmer if not seeing water on the ground means the ground is dried out. They’ll tell you absolutely not. The amount of time it takes for soil to dry varies depending on how saturated the soil was to begin with, what kind of drainage the area has, and the type of soil. In the case of Noah’s flood, everything was completely saturated. It’s not a surprise and not a contradiction in the Bible when Genesis 8:14 states that the ground was dried out almost two months after the water was dried off the surface of the earth. These aren’t contradicting Bible verses, but a continuation of the events being recorded.Contradiction 6: “According to II Samuel 24:1, the Lord had caused David to take the census - which makes the punishment appear even more nonsensical. But an attempt was later made, at I Chronicles 21:1, to improve God’s image by claiming that Satan incited the census.” This one is not just about contradicting Bible verses, but also questions the character of God. If God incited David to take a census, how can a just God punish him for it? And if it was Satan who moved David to take a census, then why didn’t Samuel just say so? James 1:13-14 can help us understand this. It says: Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust.” God may test us, but He never tempts us. It’s important to distinguish between the two. A test is given with hope that you pass. Temptation is presented with hope that you fail. Satan is the tempter, not God. But ultimately we are responsible for our own actions. In the case of the census, David did what he wanted. He failed the test (from God) and gave in to the temptation (of Satan) to do what he knew was wrong. These aren’t contradictory Bible verses, but different facets of the same lesson.Contradiction 7: “At Jeremiah 7:22, God denies he ever gave the Israelites commandments about animal sacrifices. In contrast, Exodus 29:38-42 and many other verses depict God as requiring the Israelites to offer animal sacrifices.” Everything in the Old Testament is a foreshadow of the fulfillment we find in the New Testament. Sacrifice is an important theme throughout the Bible, culminating in the sacrifice that Jesus made for all of mankind at the cross. At the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, John the Baptist alluded to these Old Testament sacrifices when he said of Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29) Sacrifices are a very important part of the Bible. If Jeremiah denied that God commanded sacrifices, that would indeed be a contradiction in the Bible. What does Jeremiah actually say? For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. But this is what I commanded them, saying ‘Obey My voice, and I will be your God, and you will be My people; and you will walk in all the way which I command you, that it may be well with you. (Jeremiah 7:22-23) Jeremiah doesn’t deny God ever gave commandments about animal sacrifices. He says that wasn’t the first thing He commanded them to do. The first thing God wanted was obedience. Everything else follows. He said the same thing to king Saul, when he failed to follow instructions and chose to do his own thing, which included sacrifices God didn’t ask for. Has the Lord as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices As in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, And to heed than the fat of rams.  ~ 1 Samuel 15:22 The sacrifices that God commanded were important, but they weren’t the most important, nor were they the first thing he spoke to them. This is not a contradiction in the Bible, but a statement of priorities.What’s Your Motivation? These supposed contradictions in the Bible are not difficult to resolve when you have a desire to do so. When you approach the Bible with a desire to understand it, God will help you to do so. When your desire is to misunderstand the Bible or undermine it, you become willfully blind to the truth that is there if you are willing to see it. The examples above are from the Old Testament. What about the New Testament? In the next article, we will give the same examination to what some consider New Testament contradictions in the Bible. Do you know the Good News? Read the full article

[singapore-movers]

How to Save Money on a Long Distance Move by Professional Movers in Singapore

While Moving house, in general, is notorious for being quite an pricey affair, now not all residential movements are equally highly-priced. Moving across town, for example, offers you plenty of possibilities to reduce down the transferring expenses

You can move for your own, so that you won’t want to pay for expert shifting assistance – all you need to do is borrow a select-up truck or hire a small moving van for more than one hours to take your huge furnishings and bulky appliances for your new home and ask some friends to help you load and sell off your gadgets You can make numerous trips with your own vehicle to transport all of your smaller assets on your new vicinity – you can even empty the packing containers and use them again and again once more, so you can do without buying a whole lot of packing materials; You shouldn't pay for the cargo of your car and to buy expensive aircraft tickets, or to provide for street tolls, food and lodgings alongside the manner, etc. Many of these frugal moving tricks will paintings whenever you’re shifting locally, even if it isn't always inside the equal city. Moving long distance, however, is a horse of an exceptional color – you may should p.C. your earthly possessions safely enough to live to tell the tale a ride of numerous days or even some weeks, you'll want expert shifting help, and you will have very few possibilities to lessen the moving charges. So, if you need to store money on your lengthy distance flow, you want to get familiar with the cheapest ways to move throughout us a and do your satisfaction to cause them to paint for you.

1) Schedule your flow wisely

Choose the proper time to transport

Find reasonably-priced movers

Book your circulate as early as possible

Consider consolidating your shipment

2) Help your shifting finances

Pare down your possessions and sell unneeded gadgets

Use gift playing cards and coupons

Borrow whatever feasible

3) Pack smartly

Take handiest what you want

Pack your gadgets yourself

Get cheap packing resources

Use nice packing elements for valuables and breakables

Optimize space and substances

1) Schedule Your Move Wisely There are many important matters to take into account when selecting a moving date and making your moving timeline, but in case you also bear in mind some precise fee-decreasing factors, you can manipulate to preserve extra cash on your savings account: Choose the Right Time to Move: Flexibility is fundamental for organizing a reasonably-priced lengthy distance pass. The greater flexibility you're in terms of feasible moving dates and special requirements, the much less cash you will spend in your relocation. Avoid the crowd: It is no secret that shifting company rates growth in direct share to out of doors temperatures. So, if you want to move in midsummer expect to be charged as much as 25% extra than whilst transferring at some stage in the off-height season. If you can schedule your pass somewhere among September and May, you will now not most effectively be able to save a few cash however will even have a much greater preference of to be had in a position movers and handy transferring dates. Also, attempt to avoid country wide vacations and the final weekends of a month as movers are constantly busier on those precise days which mechanically consequences in higher moving costs Secure help: If you do not forget your pals’ and family’s commitments and free time whilst scheduling your pass, they will be able to help you out together with your shifting preparations so that you won’t have to pay for expert assistance. You will still must pay a moving enterprise to ship your items, however will shop the cash for added services along with packing your goods, disassembling your furnishings, etc. Find Cheap Movers: It is normally believed that the cheapest way to transport to a new home is to perform a DIY pass. While this is true beneath specific circumstances, self-movements are nearly out of the question when shifting long distance. However, this doesn’t mean that you have to rent the first shifting organisation you come across: Hire right Movers: Get numerous moving fees to get an concept of what’s fair inside the moving company in relation to long distance actions; Request binding in-domestic estimates from three or 4 low cost movers; Compare the offers: look now not handiest at the price, but also on the included services and special situations. Do no longer be tempted to automatically be given the lowest provide you get hold of, though – you can come to be paying exorbitant prices if you fall sufferer to moving scams or entrust your possessions to incompetent movers Carefully studies the moving business enterprise that appears to great match your relocation desires and your available price range – confirm the movers’ licensing and insurance information, take a look at the organization’s grievance history, ask for references, read online critiques left through previous clients, look at the corporation’s paperwork, etc. Keep your eyes open for feasible discounts – ask for ongoing promotions, special deals, coupons, etc. Book Your Chosen Moving Services as Early as Possible Hiring movers inside the ultimate minute is amongst the most pricey transferring errors you may make. The similarly earlier of your circulate you stable a transferring organization, the higher the deal you’ll get. So, book your chosen movers as quickly as you have made your final choice so that you can make sure your peace of thoughts and to spare your wallet. Consider Consolidating Your Shipment You will keep lots of money in your long distance circulate in case you percentage moving truck area with different clients however you may need to live on without your assets for pretty a while. The transferring truck will prevent several times to choose and/or deliver other people’s shipments, so the experience will take longer and you'll ought to look ahead to a few weeks to get hold of your objects. However, this will not be a problem, particularly in case you’re traveling on your new domestic for your own automobile and might take all your necessities with you. 2) Help Your Moving Budget Making an green transferring price range is an absolute ought to while making plans a protracted distance relocation. When budgeting to your pass, take into account all the factors of the high-priced transferring procedure and set suitable financial limits for each unique shifting undertaking. This manner, you will be able to decide if your savings will be sufficient to cowl all shifting fees and to keep music of your charges. If you discover your transferring price range too tight, you could inn to a few clever hints that allows you to deliver it a sizeable economic boost: Pare Down Your Possessions and Sell Unneeded Items When organizing your belongings to put together them for transferring, you'll truly come across many things that you won’t be capable of using for your new home either because they won’t suit in or because they won’t be appropriate for the climatic conditions for your new region or to your new lifestyle. Besides, there may be duplicate objects, outdated items, and objects you just don’t like anymore. Moving gadgets you won’t use ever once more or intend to update with greater elegant or greater convenient models on the earliest possibility is in reality no longer worth it. So, make sure to evaluate the practical, monetary, and sentimental price of each and every belonging of yours and take to your new home best what you actually need and love – the fewer items you relocate, the decrease your shifting fees may be (lengthy distance shifting charges are primarily based on the weight of the shipment). Be an actual wizard and flip your unneeded gadgets into extra money to your flow. See also: How to decide what to take and what to throw away whilst transferring Then, type out the things you won’t be shifting and locate a manner to do away with all your unwanted items previous to the move – throw away anything that is too worn out or badly broken, donate to charity useful portions in correct condition, give away to friends items they like or need, as well as gadgets of sentimental fee, and sell objects of higher financial price to make a few more money to your shifting-related fees and new domestic purchases There isn't any better time to cash in credit score card reward points and use any present playing cards, vouchers, and coupons you may have, than the weeks main to Moving day. Visa gift playing cards, for example, might also cover gas, tolls, and meals along the road; bargain coupons may be used for purchasing various items and offerings at promotional prices, etc. Borrow Whatever Possible Instead of buying items you'll simplest want temporarily at some stage in your circulation, you may try to borrow them. This refers especially to specialised transferring device and gear required to disassemble your furniture, move larger portions round, etc. (shifting dollies, fixtures pads, etc.), however might also observe to protective materials, including nook guards or plywood forums to save you belongings harm on Moving day, or packing materials you may borrow from friends or friends who have lately moved, etc. A penny saved is a penny earned, you know. 3) Pack Smartly The second to simply unleash your thrifty genius will come whilst you begin the packing process: Take Only What You Need As already discussed, it's miles highly encouraged to declutter your own home and % simplest gadgets of remarkable practical, aesthetic and sentimental value to your circulation. This manner, you'll keep each on packing materials and packing time, not to mention the reduced cost for transport your property. Pack Your Items Yourself The Herculean undertaking of packing all your earthly possessions via yourself might also seem quite daunting, but it will help you keep plenty of cash off your general moving bill. Don’t underestimate the significance of the packing procedure and start getting ready your property for cargo as far earlier as you likely can. Begin from the rooms and the items you want the least and spend multiple hours at the task each day until all your assets are smartly packed in anticipation of the Big day. If that is your concept of optimizing the use of expensive packing materials, your relocation costs may effortlessly undergo the roof. Be certain to offer the excellent viable safety in your objects – get familiar with the golden regulations of packing, use first-class packing components and safe packing techniques, use the maximum appropriate packing techniques for every form of item, etc. Be cautious to keep away from commonplace packing errors that may also result in broken gadgets or wasted time and, thus, in lost cash. Get Cheap Packing Supplies Estimate the kind and quantity of packing materials you are going to want well earlier which will have sufficient time to offer everything vital and which will get the desired packing components as affordably as possible: Take advantage of ongoing sales and promotions; Use coupons to shop for packing components at a bargain. Purchase gadgets, along with packing tape, packing paper, bubble wrap, stretch wrap, sealable bags, etc., in bulk – you may need lots of them and it is constantly less expensive whilst you’re buying in bulk; Stock up on loose resources in the months earlier than your move – preserve any huge, strong delivery containers that arrive in the mail, in addition to the packing peanuts and air pouches that are available in them Get moving containers at no cost from pals, friends, or colleagues who have recently moved, nearby retail shops, recycling centers, etc.; Look free of charge packing materials – ask round for your social circle for packing elements your pals and associates have no in addition use for, ask for give up rolls of newsprint at nearby printing houses, see if you can locate loose packing substances online (on web sites like Freecycle and Craigslist), etc. Use alternative packing materials – you could use suitcases, backpacks, bags, baskets, crates, etc. rather than packing bins and substitute packing paper and bubble wrap with newspapers, magazines, towels, antique clothes, etc. Invest in Quality Packing Materials for Your Delicate and Valuable Possessions While all the above ideas will help you save money on packing resources, have in mind that they will not be an awesome answer for all of your packing needs. Improvised packing materials and used cardboard packing containers won’t offer the reliable safety specialised items and brand-new shifting bins would make sure. Professional packing substances come at a better price, of course, however they will actually prevent money ultimately as they may assure the protection of your objects for the duration of cargo and will save you the problems and the financial sources required to repair or replace any broken possessions of yours (not to mention the misfortune of losing objects of high sentimental fee). So, invest in pleasant packing materials, at least in relation to breakables and valuables.

Optimize Space and Materials

Strategic packing will permit you to shop money on packing materials – the extra gadgets you can accommodate in one field, the smaller variety of shifting bins you’re going to want. Besides, leaving empty areas in a transferring field will boom the danger of harm to your possessions – your gadgets may additionally shift in the field and bump against each different for the duration of transit, the carton may additionally cave under the weight of different boxes or gadgets stacked on top of it within the moving truck, etc.

So, make certain you % your containers tightly, but be cautious not to make them too heavy – placed weighty items in small containers and use the bigger ones to percent as many lightweight items as feasible. Also, make certain to use smart packing tricks to optimize the space within the transferring cartons:

Your circle of relatives vehicle is the right transferring automobile for transporting essentials and valuables.

Arrange awkwardly-shaped pieces in change directions

Put thin objects on their sides

Place smaller articles into larger ones

Fill any remaining hollow areas with soft items that cannot be easily broken

Use revolutionary packing techniques to save as much space as feasible.

Needless to say, your game of packing tetris must be observed with ok safety measures – provide plenty of padding within the packing containers and upload layers of packing paper, bubble wrap, packing peanuts, foam sheets or other appropriate protective substances among the objects in one moving container to cushion them and prevent them from coming in contact with one any other all through transit.

Are you looking for a professional movers company for your Business, Contact Vincent Movers, your Singapore movers and packers expert at +65 9232 5581 or email to enquiry@vincentmovers.com. Move your house, office, piano safe and secure by the experienced professionals in Singapore at the best price. Visit: http://www.vincentmovers.com/

[ladyofstardust]

Thursday night is just okay for fighting

Word Count: 7k

Rating: T

Summary: In which Sarah just wants some freaking chicken piccata okay? Oh and also there are some witches when Jareth and Sarah Scooby Doo their way into hijinks with the local coven as Crocodile Rock plays in the background.

Notes: Apartment-verse fic.  Set some months after the events of This Forever I Keep Hearing About.  

Sarah let herself into her apartment's lobby and pulled out her keys to check the mailbox. As per usual, there wasn't much there save for a few bills and some junk mail. She also grabbed the pile of discarded junk mail her neighbours had left forgotten in the mailroom. If anyone ever wondered where all the junk mail went, they never asked. But the goblins just loved the bright colours and all the little product samples that sometimes came with them. She'd dole them out as rewards for good behaviour. She knew it was weird, like "good job Crumple, here's a Chinese food menu for not eating all my soap this week." But hey, it worked, so who was she to complain.

Jareth on the other hand was getting annoyed about the black market of coupons Sarah had unleashed upon the Underground but ever since he had more or less moved into her bedroom, (and kitchen...and living room) he was much more willing to tolerate goblin shenanigans.

She didn't bother unlocking her front door. Jareth knew what time she got home from work and would leave the door unlocked for her. She could smell the dinner he was cooking wafting through the hallway.

"Babe?" she called out as she walked through the door.

"In the kitchen," he replied. "I'm just doing up the leftovers from last night. Can you just grab the bag of asparagus I left in the living room? I want to toss it into the pan before I pop it back in the oven."

"You went...grocery shopping?" she asked confused. Sarah wasn't sure Jareth even knew where the grocery store was. She was struggling to picture him in full Goblin King regalia wandering through the aisle wondering if they needed more cornstarch. Though she knew that if he had gone to the grocery store he would have dressed in his human disguise. He only ever left the house dressed like an otherworldly fop from 1890 when he didn't have to interact with anyone but her. One of the benefits to living in the city, people just wrote him off as weird. Though they had no idea just how weird.

"No, I got it from the palace gardens. Your little dwarf friend does have a gift for making the plants sing."

She wasn't sure if he was being literal and gave the asparagus a second look to make sure it wasn't secretly sentient. It was near impossible to bring food over from Underground - unless you were a Faerie King that is. The first time Sarah had tried to bring leftovers home from a picnic with Ludo and Hoggle, they'd turned to dried leaves in her hand the minute she stepped through the mirror. Apparently it was part of the old treaties or the Goblin Fruit Law. If Faerie wanted to be left alone, it had to stop tempting people to go find it. This meant no more changeling babies, no more Goblin Fruit, and the free passages had to be sealed. Unless called on specifically. General thought was if humans wanted to be stupid, Faerie would let them. While Sarah didn't agree with their loopholes and semantics arguments, mostly Faerie kept to itself and she didn't want to poke that bear.

Which is why she'd rushed home to talk to Jareth.

"So I think something weird is happening down by the university," she said, bringing the non-sentient asparagus into the kitchen.

"Weird how?" he said with muted interest. He was busy fiddling with her oven again. Luckily she had a gas stove and he couldn't break that too. Or she hoped he couldn't. Jareth had a talent for frying her electronics in new and physically impossible ways.

"Yeah that's the thing. I don't know," she began rinsing and chopping the asparagus to throw in the pot. "It was just this feeling. I was taking a shortcut through the field behind the auditorium and it felt like there was something there that shouldn't be. It was an open field, and I could see there was nothing...but it kind of smelled and felt like magic."

He stopped playing with the oven.

"Well, are you sure?"

She nodded.

"Alright then, what would you like to do?" he carefully removed the "Kiss the Cook" apron he was wearing. She didn't own a Kiss the Cook apron, he'd just shown up one day wearing it.

"I want to go check it out, and stop it if I don't like what it is."

His grin could have split the city it was so wide. "There's my Sarah, nothing like a bit of magical mayhem to spice up a Thursday night."

He waved his hand and was dressed in a black leather jacket, dark jeans, boots, and his hair was pulled back. He had stopped putting the illusion over his eyes after she told him how she hated it.

"What about dinner," she asked gesturing to the bubbling pan.

"It'll keep," he waved a hand and the pan stopped mid-bubble. "Minor holding spell. Should last a couple hours at least."

He extended a gloved hand towards her and she took it. Jareth pulled her into a spin the way one might during a dance, and when he spun her back out they were a couple blocks from the field.

"I didn't want to get too close. We don't know who or what this is and if you can feel their magic, they might be able to sense mine. Best not play our hand before we know what the game is."

"Makes sense," she replied, heading off towards the campus. They'd discovered she got far less vertigo travelling with him if she moved into it. This often meant a dance or a spin. He'd said it wouldn't be necessary if she stopped fighting the magic so much, but at this point she didn't even know how. Jareth was pretty good at not being seen unless he wanted to be, normally he didn't care (and Sarah suspected he enjoyed the looks), but it was handy for popping into and out of places. People suddenly all got very interested in their phones and didn't notice two people spinning their way out of a back alley.

"So how was work? Did that pustule of a man try any of his foolish games with you again today?"

"Yeah, God, he's the worst. Today he dropped a bunch of papers on the ground and asked me to pick them up for him. I'm a hundred percent sure he was only asking me to stare at my ass while I did it."

"Want me to fill his bedroom with goblin feces?" Jareth growled.

"No," she said firmly, before someone could get any ideas. "I think Robert already suspects there's something weird about me. He's started making comments about how I never seem to fall prey to any of the petty misfortunes that the rest of the office suffers from."

"Like what?" Jareth asked, genuinely intrigued.

"Well for starters the copier is never jammed for me. I always find a fresh pot of coffee in the break room, I've never had any technical problems, a small miracle since our tech was outdated in 1986, and I can always find a meeting room when I want one. Stuff that doesn't seem like much but kinda starts to add up if you draw attention to it. Since he's always watching me, on account of being a giant creep, he's noticed."

"That's not...great," Jareth finally said with a bit of concern. "I suspect it's just a bit of magical interference. Though I should mention so that you are aware," he stopped walking and took her hand in his. Sarah's heart sped up. She didn't like where this was going. "When we began our...relationship, I placed an order of protection on you."

She was right, she did not like it.

"What does that mean exactly," she said carefully, trying not to jump to any conclusions.

"It means that you, and the life you lead, which I'll acknowledge my part in, attracts a certain amount of attention for the magical community. Humans aren't supposed to have this much contact with the magical world, it breaks quite a few of our laws and the punishments for that are relatively serious. Now I was able to hide you reasonably well, but if you were discovered there is a very real risk you could be taken Underground permanently, or have all your ties and your memory of the magical world...taken."

"Why didn't you tell me this?" she knew she was playing a bit fast and loose with the Rules sometimes, but figured if there was a problem, Jareth would have done something. Apparently he did, he just didn't tell her.

"Remember when your apartment started to bleed into the Underground? I tried to explain then but perhaps I was not as clear as I could have been. You however made your position very clear, you wanted everything. Just as you always have. And who am I to deny you?" he smiled wanly. "Parts of the Underground are still very antiquated when it comes to humanity, there's a lot of fear still there. When we began our relationship I had to publicly declare you as under my protection. This means that your ongoing existence with the magical world is my responsibility. If you cause any undue hardship for the Underground, it will fall to me to discipline you and the High Court to discipline me. The order of protection acts like a warning sign to other Fae. That you are not to be harmed and not to be ruled."

Sarah took a deep breath. She had known this. Deep down, she knew she writing checks she couldn't cash.

"Okay," she said placing a hand on his chest. "I do not like that. I don't like having stuff done to me without my express permission. But I know why you did it. I practically told you to do whatever it took before, so I can't really be mad, and it's my fault for just sticking my head in the sand assuming everything was hunky dory. Also this is basically the legal version of that no power of me clause but for the rest of Faerie yeah? Which, as you well know, is something I'm a fan of. But in the future, you do not put anything on me without my express consent. I can't consent if I don't understand and don't know. So I am consenting now to this order of protection, just like I would have before if you asked me. Do you agree?"

"Yes," he said quickly. "I was afraid how you'd react, hearing your fate was so tied to mine."

She shrugged and walked into his arms, letting him kiss the top of her head. "In a way our fates have always been tied. Plus you practically live in my apartment now so like, I figure this is just the fae equivalent of making ourselves Facebook official."

"Facebook official?" the relief in his face was momentarily eclipsed by his confusion and Sarah laughed.

"Don't worry about it. Also I'm not sure if this is one of those Big Relationship Defining Moments and while I'd love to keep kissing you in the middle of this street-"

She was cut off by Jareth kissing her properly this time. All heat and magic, pulling her in and taking her breath away. Feeling him pressed up against her, and the way his hands always managed to find their way into her hair. There were several other things she wanted very badly to do that were not kissing. That involved her dragging him into that alley. Letting him throw her against the wall and showing her just want it meant to be his. His hand snaking up her legs and, well. A lot of things.

She eased herself out of his embrace. "Yep," she said slightly more out of breath, slightly higher pitched than before. "Yep, like that. That was...good demonstrating. Good job, at the kissing of the me."

"Ah yes the girl with the right words, enough to bring down a kingdom," he laughed pushing a fallen strand of hair behind her ear.

"Shut up," she batted away his hand. "Come on, we've got a magical mishap to deal with. After that we can go home and you can kiss every word from my lips if you want."

"Impossible, but I promise to give it a good faith effort," he said wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"Loser," she poked him in the ribs as he slid an arm around her shoulders.

They reached the site of where Sarah had felt the disturbance. It was dark now but the lights from the nearby buildings provided enough coverage that it was plain to see there was … nothing. Just an empty dark field.

Except Sarah could still feel it. It passed over her like a chill and she shuddered, wrapping her arms around her.

"Yes," he said quietly. "You were right, there is definitely something here."

"What is it?" she whispered, just in case someone was invisible. There was a time when she wouldn't worry about invisible people, but that time was done now.

"If my instincts are correct, and they often are," she rolled her eyes but let him continue. "This is man made magic, which makes it infinitely more dangerous."

"Man-made?" she said, skeptically.

"Yes," he pointed to a lit window in a nearby dormitory. "And I think it's coming from there."

"Tell me more," she was intrigued now.

He turned over his gloved hand to reveal a crystal. Sarah could never see anything in them but he looked at the fogged glass intently.

"As I thought," he said finally, vanishing the crystal with a roll of his wrist. "We've got a coven on our hands."

"A coven - wait there are witches in there?!"

Jareth let out a low chuckle at her excitement. "Indeed. They're rare, though I'm not surprised to find them congregating around a university. Most witches I've found have been scholars who happened to stumble upon the rare text that actually has some practical advice."

"Well, what do we do? I'm not burning anyone at any stake," she said with a warning. "Also I didn't even know witchcraft was an option."

"It's not," he said darkly. "Some humans still carry a few latent magical traits in their genes. From their oldest ancestors who may not have been strictly human. Sometimes it pops up stronger in certain generations. Usually just results in a bit of general oddities, similar to those you're experiencing around your office. Though different because that is good magic that I control."

"You control the goblins on a technicality at best," she interjected. "They're controlled by chaos and two for one coupons mostly."

"As I was saying," he huffed. "This is uncontrolled magic that has now found an outlet. It'll burn right through them until there is nothing left. I'm impressed you were able to sense it, witch magic is very hard to find before it's too late."

"So basically we have to stop them then? Right well," she grabbed his hand and started marching off in the direction of the room he'd pointed towards. "Let's go then. I'm not bringing about the new Salem listening to you monologue."

"You asked," he intoned.

"I did, and now I'm gonna have to teach some wannabe Harry Potters that magic has consequences. They can count themselves lucky they're dealing with me. Last time you had to teach that lesson I had to run for 13 hours and get felt up by a tunnel of disembodied hands."

"What is a Harry Potter?"

"I'll lend you my copies," she said waving him off. "You can read them and then tell me all about how Draco is a sympathetic character."

"Do you have a plan Sarah?" Jareth asked, completely sidestepping her comments. Which was his usual.

"Yes, I'm going to talk to them and explain."

"You think that will work?" he asked, skeptically.

"No idea, but we're gonna try. If they don't want to listen, well then on their heads so be it."

"We cannot continue to let them practice Sarah, even if they do not heed your warnings," Jareth said with concern. "This is dangerous for more than just the witches themselves. They do not know what they are doing, and people could get hurt. Not to mention it weakens the already strained portals around this area. Magic does not like being on this side. Too much iron, it fights it and acts like a spoiled teenager destroying everything in its path."

Sarah side-eyed the little smirk he gave her. If he was still trying to bait her then he obviously wasn't too worried about the situation. "No I agree, if they don't listen then we're going to need to do what we need to in order to nip this in the bud. I understand if that means you need to put some sort of charm on them to forget all of this, thems the breaks. But we have to give them a choice."

They were able to get past the security desk with relative ease. Sarah, though she was well into her twenties, could still pass as a college student and Jareth may have let a very loud noise in the hallway distract the guard long enough to let them pass unquestioned.

She didn't need his guidance to find the right floor or room. The magic had its own kind of pull, Sarah just let it lead her to them. It felt different than Jareth's magic, or even the Goblin's magic or her friends' kind. She was beginning to notice how different magics had a different signature. Jareth's magic always felt like him. Wild and bright. Like staring directly into the sun. Goblin magic was more fickle and joyful, like jumping on a trampoline. This magic felt like the first chill of winter and getting tapped on the shoulder by someone who wasn't there. She didn't like it, it felt wrong.

When they reached the room in question Sarah held up a hand to Jareth indicating that he should follow her lead. He inclined his head slightly, and she thought he looked happy to have someone else dealing with this for a change. She knocked on the door three times in quick succession.

She was not expecting the small frizzy hair that popped out from behind it.

The girl could not have been more than five feet tall. She wore round wire rimmed glasses and had a mess of big beautiful black hair. She looked so young and innocent, but Sarah reminded herself that on balance, it probably would have been stranger if an old crone with a wart on her nose had opened the door.

"Hi!" Sarah said brightly sticking out her hand for the girl to shake. "My name is Sarah Williams and this is my boyfriend Jareth, the Goblin King. We're here to talk to you about your witchcraft."

Jareth waved cheerfully to the girl.

"Uhhhhhh," the girl looked confused, and Sarah dropped her hand and moved to walk into the room like they'd been invited in.

"Wait no you can't come in," the girl tried to block their way in but given that Sarah was a good eight inches taller than her, and flanked by a supernatural king, this didn't really work.

"Oh I think you'll find that we can," she said, keeping her tone light and airy. "You see, this is kind of a big deal, and you're going to want to talk to us."

"Sorry who are you again?" the girl snapped, backing into the room.

Sarah could see that she wasn't alone. There were two other people in the room with her. One of them was a tall and skinny young man who wore the same style of glasses as the girl. He was wearing a t-shirt from a popular cartoon and had on a pair of sweatpants which he'd tucked his tube socks into. The other girl had a short crew cut and was wearing an oversized t-shirt and pair of shredded black jeans. She had a burgundy sweater tied around her waist and a small hoop in her nose and eyebrow. Mostly, they just looked like younger versions of the people Sarah went to college with.

"Let me try this again. I'm Sarah Williams. I stop magical bullshit. And this?" she said gesturing around the room. "Stinks to high heaven of magical bullshit. Like it reeks you guys, I could feel it all the way out on the field over there. Jareth is magical bullshit and I have defeated him before," Jareth waved wriggled his fingers waving again. "Now we date. Any questions?"

"Yes a few," the short haired girl snarked. "Let's start with what the fuck you're doing here."

"Oh I'm here to stop this little coven you guys are running out of your dorm room. Pretty impressive you guys, in the decade plus that I've been in and out of the magical world, you're the first humans I've met who are not only aware of its existence, but are actively engaging with it. That's cool and something I'd like you to always have as you move on from this. But unfortunately if you cannot stop what you're doing and think back fondly on this as a distant memory of your misspent youth, my charming friend over here," Jareth waved a third time just to really hammer it home. "Will have to bespell you so that you forget. I'd like to avoid that, so let's see if we can't come to an agreement."

"Okay," the frizzy haired girl who opened the door spoke up. "This has been a fun little distraction from our exams but we have actual work to do. So if you wouldn't mind leaving before I call security? Maybe you'll listen to the cops."

"You can try," Jareth said just as cheerfully. "But I think you'll find that your technology is of no use. I've placed a bit of a blocking spell around this room for now. Nobody enters and nobody leaves without my express permission."

"I've had enough of this," the crew cut girl spoke again, pulling out her phone to dial 911. There was a few seconds pause before she looked at her phone again, with a mix of confusion and anger. "Hey someone want to explain why when I dial 911 I get nothing but Crocodile Rock blasting at me?"

"Elton John?" Sarah said cocking an eyebrow in Jareth's direction.

"Little trick I picked up from a couple of friends of mine...and I have been enjoying his greatest hits album," Jareth huffed. "He is a very talented singer you know."

"Kay well I'll be making fun of you for that later don't you worry," she said barely containing her laughter.

"I'm leaving," the scrawny boy said nervously, trying to make a break for the door. "It's stuck!" he cried pulling on the handle.

"Let me see," the frizzy haired girl tried pulling on the handle with him.

"It's stuck Margo!" the boy snapped. "They've trapped us here!"

"Okay Margo!" Sarah said clapping her hands together, ignoring their obvious distress. "That's a good start. So what are the rest of your names?"

"I'm Tommy, and that's Carmen," he said pointing to the short haired girl.

"Idiot!" Carmen cried, throwing her phone at him. He ducked out of the way, narrowly missing having it beam him in the head. "You don't tell them our real names!"

"They'd have figured it out eventually!" he yelled back. "They're fucking MAGIC!"

"Well actually just him," Sarah corrected gesturing to Jareth.

"Ah my darling, you are always magical to me," Jareth said with a wink.

"Aw thanks babe," she beamed, planting a quick kiss on his cheek.

"Are you guys seriously flirting with each other after holding us hostage in Margo's dorm room?" Carmen growled.

"I was not flirting," Jareth huffed. "I was simply correcting my beautiful girlfriend here."

"Yeah see listen," Sarah said, refusing to let herself be distracted by pedantic morons in tight jeans. "You interrupted our dinner and that holding spell won't last all night. I'm hungry and Jareth has been cooking all afternoon so let's cut right to the chase. We know you're doing magic in here, let me repeat that for emphasis, we know you know you're doing magic in here. Let's all skip the song and dance where you deny it and we prove it and then you say what are we gonna do about it. I'm asking you politely now to stop. You don't know what you're messing with -"

"You can't tell us what to do!" Carmen interrupted. "And who the hell are you to-"

This time Jareth cut her off. Carmen's lips were still moving but no sound was escaping. The girl began to panic and grab at her throat while Jareth just rolled his eyes.

"Please do not interrupt Sarah, she is trying to be fair. Never one of my strong suits you see. So you're much better off dealing with her in this matter. You'll get your voice back when she's done."

"As I was saying," Sarah continued. She didn't love Jareth's methods, but they got results so she was disinclined to argue with him, particularly because she was getting impatient. "What you're doing is witchcraft. Now I don't have any problem with some tarot cards or ouija boards here and there, but you've actually stumbled upon a real text with real magic. I know it is tempting to have all that magic and wonder at your fingertips, believe me nobody knows that better than I do. But you have to stop and hand over the text to us. It's dangerous, both to you and others. You don't know what you're doing and people will get hurt. Most of all the three of you. Humans aren't supposed to have magic. It'll burn through you like a flame until you're just ashes in the wind."

"How do you know all this," Margo asked her. "You just said you've never met another human involved with magic."

"I know it because Jareth says it's true," she answered. She glanced over to him and felt her cheeks flush slightly, thinking about how he'd hold her in the early morning just after they woke up. He'd said to her then that she could ask him anything and it would take multiple armies to keep him from answering her. "He would never lie to me."

"That's great for you, but what about the rest of us. How do you know it's not in his best interests as far as control over this magical bullshit to get us to stop?" Tommy argued with her.

"Well I'm sure it's also in his best interests," she said carefully raising an eyebrow in Jareth's direction. He simply inclined his head and indicated for her to continue. "But it's also in yours. As in if you keep this up you will die. Not maybe, and not on some vague unnamable future date. You will die, you will die soon, and then you will be dead."

"How can that be true?" Margo said quietly. "We weren't doing anything bad. Just trying a few things like levitating pens and stuff. Carmen did a bit to give herself a little extra time on an exam, and Tommy and I were using it to convince our roommates to share their snacks. Nothing big."

"So you're doing some time manipulation, compelling other humans, and flaunting the rules of physics and calling it nothing major," Jareth replied sternly, but Sarah heard the hint of humour in his voice. "These may not seem big to you, but I assure you they are. Those are complicated bits of magic, and all magic has a cost."

He walked over and plucked a strand of stray hair from Margo's head.

"Hey!" she reacted, grabbing her hair protectively.

"You see," he said showing her the strand. It was pure white. A stark contrast to her dark curls. "Your hair will go white, your teeth will fall from your head, your eyes will go cloudy and then blind. That is, of course, if your heart does not stop from the strain. Every time you cast a spell, you are taking a piece of your life force, your energy, and using it towards that magic. Soon the supply will run out. Do you understand?"

Margo nodded quietly, still staring at the hair.

"I had to dye my hair last week," she said quietly. "I just thought it was stress."

"It is," he replied putting a kind hand on her shoulder. Sarah noticed Tommy and Carmen glaring at Jareth. "Though not the kind you thought."

"Can you give my friend her voice back please," Tommy said sharply, not taking his eyes of Jareth's hand on his friend.

"That depends," Jareth said withdrawing his hand, making note of Tommy's stare. "Is she going to be polite?"

Sarah didn't need to be able to read lips to know what word Carmen mouthed at them.

"Unlikely," said Tommy wincing. "But this is about her too and she should get a say."

Jareth looked at Sarah and she sighed heavily. "You make a fair point, okay Jareth, give it back to her."

Jareth rolled his eyes before waving his hand in Carmen's general direction.

"Man screw you guys," the girl said in a much higher pitch than she'd spoken in previously. She clapped her hands over her mouth looking horrified. "What did you do to me! I sound like a fucking chipmunk!"

"You asked for your voice back," Jareth said with a smirk. "You did not specify in what condition. It'll wear off, but maybe this will teach you some manners."

Sarah bit her lip to keep from laughing. There was a certain labyrinth that she thought this girl could do with a run through. But that wasn't her decision to make.

"So what do we do now," Margo asked. "I don't want to die, I just wanted something … special."

"I know," Sarah turned back to the only person who seemed to be understanding what she was saying. "I wish it wasn't like this. Believe me. But I have to ask you to stop. Jareth is going to remove all the magical elements in this room, and my gift to you is letting you remember this all happened. That you do have magic, even if you can't use it. That's still pretty special."

"Why does he get to have magic and we don't?" Carmen interjected, voice still stuck in high pitch.

"Because Jareth isn't human," Sarah replied simply. "He's not from here and magic is as second nature to his kind as breathing."

"You're not human?" Tommy's brows shot up to his hairline. "Then what are you?"

"A story, nothing more." Jareth replied. "One that you will tell your whole lives. Normally at this point I would offer all of you a choice. The chance to live in my world. As humans of course. You couldn't do magic there anymore than you could do magic here. But you could live in a world with magic."

"They don't know enough to make that decision," Sarah hissed.

"I'm twenty years old I'm not a child," Carmen replied. The current state of her voice made the statement sound more ridiculous than Sarah was sure she intended.

"But the thing is you are," Sarah replied carefully. She remembered how much she hated being called a child just because she didn't understand something. "When the thing you're dealing with is older than not just this country, but the entirety of western civilization, you are a child. Jareth's world is not kind, it is not gentle. Humans are not treated well there. You would have no money, no home, no family, and no escape. There is nothing for you there."

"Well maybe there's nothing for me here either," the girl snarked back. "You have no idea what it's like to live in a world that doesn't want you."

"I do, in my own way. I won't pretend to know your struggles. Those are personal and your own. I'm sure it hasn't been easy for you, it won't necessarily get easier either. That's life. But you made it this far which means you don't quit easily. If you go to his world that's what it'll be, quitting. I want you to seriously think about what you have here, what you've accomplished."

"Sarah is right," Jareth said, sliding his hand into hers. "You did not let me finish. I would normally offer you a choice, but I am not doing that. Laws dictate you must be aware of the choice. I am making you aware. Finish your schooling, work to become the people you were always meant to be. If in ten years you still wish to give it all up to live in a world with magic, I will offer it then. Then you may call for me."

Sarah felt this was a good compromise. She wished she could tell them just how much they did not want to go Underground. She was special, she knew it wasn't fair that she got to keep both her human life and her magical life. But that's the way it was. These kids wouldn't get the same advantages.

"I'm...tired," Carmen said finally. "Just tired."

"I'm sure you are, it must have been exhausting keeping up that level of magic," Jareth replied. He waved a hand in her general direction. "I'm giving you back your tone. Please use it appropriately."

"Thanks," Carmen said, her normal voice returned to her. "I think, I just want to go home and forget this ever happened."

"She didn't mean that literally," Sarah whispered grabbing Jareth's arm to prevent him from getting any ideas.

Jareth inclined his head towards the door. "You may leave. But just yourself. Take nothing with you, else I will have to come and get it from you. I'll come alone and I promise, I will not be as generous as I have been tonight."

Carmen could not have shot out of there faster. She slammed the door so hard behind her that the room rattled and a piece of paper slipped onto the floor from underneath the bed's covers.

Sarah poked him sharply in the ribs. "No more threats. They get the idea. Let's get what we came for and go."

Jareth walked towards the bed, throwing the covers off. There was a book, a couple additional pieces of paper, and three vials of a dark liquid substance. Jareth vanished the pile save for the vials, which he slipped neatly into his pocket.

"Is that everything?" he asked them.

Tommy shook his head, and Margo sighed. She and Tommy removed their glasses and handed them to Jareth. Jareth, confused, turned them over in his hand before chucking to himself and handing them back.

"You can keep these. They won't cost you anything further and they're harmless."

Margo smiled and placed the glasses on top of her head. Sarah could see her eyes better now and noticed they had an odd white ring around them. She wondered if that was the magic starting to take them.

"Thanks," Margo said. "That was the last thing."

"Understood," Jareth nodded once. He walked over to Tommy and leaned in to whisper in the boy's ear. Sarah saw Tommy's ears go beet red before he nodded furiously. He suddenly seemed very intent on studying the carpet.

"We good here?" she asked Jareth trying to hurry him along. She could hear her stomach's grumbling threatened to reach seismic levels soon and she was dying to just eat some food already.

"Yes," he said dusting himself off to transform back into his regular appearance. Sarah knew Jareth was enjoying the chance to show off a little. He'd been good about backing her up tonight, so Sarah figured she'd let him have this.

"My dear," he said extending his hand towards her.

"Your room has been unsealed. Tell whoever you like about this, it doesn't matter. If you find another way to practice magic make no mistake, we will be back and I don't think anyone wants that. Be good, stay in school, eat your vegetables and all that," she instructed them. She placed her hand in Jareth's. "And remember should you ever need us-"

She didn't finish her sentence before Jareth spun her into his embrace and suddenly they were standing back in her apartment's kitchen.

"They'll call," he finished for her, kissing the top of her head. "Now this chicken piccata will not eat itself."

"Good because I am going to eat it all," Sarah said, grabbing an oven mitt to pull the pan out of the oven. "Crap, it burned."

Jareth sighed raking a hand through his newly restored hair.

"My domestic spells do need a bit of work I see; shall we order a pizza?"

"Yeah but make it a big one," she replied, pouring herself a glass of wine. Probably not the best idea to drink on an empty stomach but after the night she had, Sarah felt she'd earned a little irresponsibility. "Why'd you keep the vials? What was in them?"

"Blood," he replied, pulling one from his breast pocket. Sarah watched as it danced across his knuckles just like his crystals. "All mortal magic requires blood. I kept it because it is now ritual blood, and must be destroyed of properly to prevent say, its owners dropping dead."

"Yep, let's avoid that if possible," she nodded. She'd suspected it was blood but the idea of those kids bleeding themselves just to get a couple extra Cheetos and some pens in the air disturbed her a bit.

"What was up with their glasses by the way?" she asked, trying to change the subject.

"Ah, just a simple sight spell," he said lightly, vanishing the vial back into his jacket. "The glasses allow them to see through magical guises. It's why I removed my human visage. Seemed rather pointless."

"That's a neat trick," she said grabbing the last remaining pizza menu from the freezer. It was the one place the goblins wouldn't go, she had taken to keeping her valuables in there which definitely included the menu for Mama's Pizza Pie. "Could you make me a pair?"

"You don't need them," he replied, pouring his own glass of wine. "You can see magic just fine on your own."

"Because of you?"

"Because of you," he replied. "Don't you want to know what I told that young man before we left?"

She did, but she hadn't wanted to pry.

"I reminded him that faint heart never won a fair lady. That if he so fancied his friend with the curly hair, he must tell her so that she can decide if she wants him. Otherwise, he'll lose her."

"Is that what that was all about?" she laughed. "I thought he was eyeing you a bit."

Jareth barked out a laugh. "While I certainly am not one to spurn the advances of a handsome young man, I'm afraid my attentions are otherwise occupied."

She paused, before dialling the pizza place. "Yeah actually, about that. Your attentions are singularly occupied right? Like, please don't make me duel for you. I'll do it, but I've never been great with a sword."

Jareth's eyes widened in momentary surprise before settling into an expression of smug satisfaction that Sarah knew all too well.

"There is, nor will there ever be, someone else. Can I ask the same of you? I admit, I've never been fond of sharing."

Sarah snorted at the idea. "Yeah, like I'd have time to go date a regular guy. That'd work a treat, like hey no big deal but I'm also seeing an otherworldly all powerful king who kinda lives in my apartment most of the time, sometimes making me burnt chicken piccata. No babe, you're it I'm afraid."

"Good," he said, and Sarah saw the smile he was trying to hide.

"Oh forget it," she said sighing, tossing the pizza menu back in the freezer. "Lets just go back to yours tonight and you can send some food up from the kitchens. I'm not waiting for pizza, I'm too hungry for that."

"Hungry for food?" he said slyly, sidling over to where she was leaning against the counter, wrapping an arm around her waist.

"Don't you dare," she said batting his hand away. "You owe me one dinner Goblin King. After that, then you can dance magic dance your way into my pants."

"Pants magic pants," he said with a wicked glint in his eye.

She walked over to the mirror, such a fixture in her kitchen at this point it almost seemed weird that other people didn't have one in theirs.

"Come on Goblin King. Lead me Underground and feed me your faerie food and then I will yours evermore," she teased.

"You can count on it precious," he joined her at the mirror, kissing her lightly on the lips.

"I'm sure I can, Rocket Man, I'm sure I can," she whispered into his ear. "Now let's go raid the kitchens."

"As you wish," he replied with a chuckle, leading them both backwards through the mirror. Where the dinner was good, but the dessert was even better.

[cutegirlmayra]

I know you said you've done some stuff with Villain!Amy, but wondering if maybe you could write something of Villain!Amy flirting with Sonic? I think it'd be interesting. (Also could you let me know what's tagged for Villain!Amy prompts so I can find them. Thank you!)

It wasn’t a prompt, it was a fanfiction, season 2 of Sonic Supers features ‘Dark Chaos’ the negative energy of Chaos ends up taking over Amy and possession her into a villain. Upon which, it’s like the Chaos Emeralds are rebelling against the Master Emerald, and use Amy as their ‘indirect’ rebellion pawn. Kinda suppose to be deep and dark stuff, but I’ve been trying to edit it. (Fanfiction account: Cutegirlmayra1)

As for your request, I would love too! I’ve had an idea for it, it wouldn’t quite be Amy though… but it would be using Sonic’s memories and such to mimic her a bit.

World: AU

Couple: Sonamy

Summary: -listed above-

Prompt:

After entering the forbidden forest and making his way into the cursed shrine, Sonic made his way up the stairs and looked around at all the cobwebs and ancient evidences that proved this once was a working forest shrine.

Until… a trapped sirenic spirit was imprisoned here… that is.

“What have you come for?…Stranger…”

The voice was strangely familiar, and Sonic looked around.

His communication with Tails was lost already from the thick, dense forest around him anyway. Being in the middle of almost complete wilderness, but even still, he wasn’t the least bit worried about that.

He smiled, “I hear your people stored technology here that could stop an Armageddon. Me and my buddies would like to borrow it for some time.” Sonic walked around, enjoying the feel of the place, although an eerie mist formed around the shrine’s main attraction, a decorative offering table, still lined with faded gold and having plates and bowls upon it.

The Siren spirit took form then, and grinned, her voice more apparent then. “You don’t seem to be too phased by this place.”

Now the voice was very distinct, and Sonic’s ears turned back. “Amy?” In his surprise, he turned around, seeing her but…

“What the-?”

“Heh. I take the form of whatever your heart will most likely trust… and what you can’t resist.” She had Amy’s face alright, but she looked… older, or maybe her tight dress that draped along the floor just showed off her figure better. But the accessories she wore and such… a little outdated for Amy’s tastes.

She laid slightly across the table, having offering drinks and other such stuff upon it, and having an arm to support her leaning body.

“Uhh…uh… You sure it isn’t what’s most uncomfortable?” Sonic tried a nervously smile, but sweatdropped, seeing as he’d rather not deal with this situation.

“Hm, hmm… I’m afraid once the form is chosen… it sticks.” She got up and walked with such slow elegance, her eyes locked on his. When she finally got close enough, he leaned his head back, his smile disappearing.

Something definitely didn’t feel right now.

It wasn’t he atmosphere, it was just the difference in her eyes… they didn’t have the same life in them as Amy’s did.

“What?” she shook her head, giving him a funny look. “You act as though this displeases you.”

“It’s not my friend. That’s what’s unsettling.” he tightened his lips line, as if not liking that someone was impersonating her.

“Anger builds… inside of you.” Without hesitation, she looked down at his chest and put her hands to it, spreading them out as she said those words.

He suddenly felt a paralysis, and began to shake, “W-what’s happening?!”

“Heh. Did you think you could walk into a siren’s den and make it out without even a little effort?” She teased him, before removing her hands, having him drop down and cling to his chest, breathing hard.

“Eh, but you’re not really my type.” she lied, moving away and strategizing him up. “You’ve come for my treasure… a vast assortment of which could prove useful for your plight…. However…” she put her hands to her hips, facing him from behind, and turned seductively as she dropped her eyes, moving her draped dress to the side, and grinning wickedly as he looked up in slight realization of how powerful she could be over him.

“Scary. Isn’t it?” she spoke softly. “I feed off your emotions. I… unlock them… so speak.” she looked to her fingers, and fiddled with them in the air, before withdrawing it back to her and then letting her hands trail down her figure, stopping just below her torso.

“You know… they say this power is only enhanced by how much one has previously resisted desire…”

“Heh, I can assure you. This holds nothing I would want.” Sonic tried to remain in control, going off and giving her a run for her money.

He got up, taking a deep breath, before deciding to play along.

“I’m rather the solo-bachelor myself.” he grinned, as if tempting her to try her worst.

Her eyes widened at his play, not really a flirt, but as if he was enticing her to take her best shot.

This excited her.

He folded his arms, and gave her a confident look.

She moved back over, and watched as his look shifted into caution, his eyes shifting to see if her arms were going to paralysis him again or not, and getting ready to move at any moment.

“My… you must have little to no experience in love… if you think that little taunts can sway a woman’s charm from a man’s eye… heh, well, maybe you’re just trying to convince yourself of that.” she came dangerously close, but he held his ground, leaning back again, before this time she simply flicked her head up, closing her eyes as she did so before opening to see his reaction.

It was a simple show of how Sonic was defenseless to really keep her away, and how she could have power to look, ‘good’ even if he tried to convince himself otherwise.

“You’re not as strong as you think you are, hero.” she lowered her eyes, and attempted to move closer.

“I’m not here to talk about me.” Sonic bristly moved, not taking any nonsense, and turning away from his usual tactics of personal charm to now just getting the job done and getting out.

“Freedom is always fleeting.” she vaporized into mist, soaring through the ground like a swaying snake, before materializing back into Amy’s form, and holding him intimately. “I could help you get the treasure… but you’ll have to help me~” she cooed, as he reacted slightly to the shock of her just appearing in front of him, holding his hands out.

He glared, and pulled her off. “I’m not game for manipulation.” he narrowed his eyes, and moved her to the side, tapping her shoulders and giving her a tilt of his head, clicking his tongue as if saying, ‘tough luck!’.

He continued his way to the offering table, a round decorative stone that matched the rest of the white, pearly shrine, before looking around it.

She disappeared in mist after another deadly expression of sinister intent spread across her face, before reappearing leaning up against a pillar in his peripheral vision.

“My, is this rejection? The more you resist the more your heart will long… Oh, shame. If you don’t want to show your affections to your sweetheart… then at least play along with a wildcard.” Her actions near the pillar were mostly just gracing it with her fingers, pushing up against it, and then moving around it as if playing coy.

Sonic couldn’t help but stare at first, something pulling him, but he quickly blinked his eyes and shook his head, looking cautiously to the ground, seeming confused at why her actions interested him any.

He didn’t answer and kept working to look for anything that could help him find a way further in.

“Hee-hee!” she distinctively mimicked Amy’s laugh, and stood in front of the pillar, having her hands behind her, and leaning her head back to it.

Sonic’s head shot up, and he quickly looked back in annoyance.

“Stop it.”

“Was that a threat?”

“I don’t fall for phonies.”

“Oh, but you do fall for something.”

He jolted, and she grinned as she walked with a dance-like step in her feet, moving her flowy but tight dresses ends with her arms, and moving towards a gap between the back of the offering table.

“Not particularly.” he glared, not liking her continuing her act after he made it clear he didn’t want to engage her any further.

“Are you really so chivalrous that cheating leaves a sour taste in your mouth?”

“Considering you seem to know nothing about the person you’ve formed into, you obviously know even less about me, which means-” he turned to her finally, directly addressing her. “You can’t tell.” It was a little comforting to know she seemed to know very little about Amy or even himself, and that could help him see through her alluring illusion of her.

“…Amy?”

He closed his eyes and clenched his teeth and fists.

Shoot! He had given her her name back when he first heard her voice!

“But those shouldn’t matter..” she walked to the back wall, placing a hand on it, “Beauty trumps all other passions…” she spoke this as if it was a cruel fact of nature. “Even valor.”

“Not this time.”

“Heh. What manner of man are you then?”

“I’m just Sonic.”

“A hero?”

“A guy who loves adventure.”

“What greater adventure than this!”

“I’m trying too, sincerely, but you’re not helping.” he referred to searching for the technology, but she clearly meant another route…

Concluding he was only interested in progressing forward, she let out a little steam from her nose, much in the same element as her mist, and walked towards one of two lanterns on either side of the other walls across from each other, facing the other.

“If you light these two lanterns, I’ll surrender.” she cutely changed her approach, not even coming near him, as he turned to look at the two objects on the walls in question.

He raised an eyebrow. “Sorry to disappoint, but I’m not stupid. I know you caused some trouble in the past, and that’s why they trapped you in this ruined place.”

Her face shifted to disappointment, pouting. “I wasn’t that bad…”

He glared her way, turning his head slightly, showing he didn’t believe her.

“..I was wonderfully good at it…” she flirted, but almost in a dangerous tone.

“Heh.” Sonic turned, rubbing his head. “Not in that form, you’re not.”

She smirked, seeing him take more notice of her now that a hint to getting further into the shrine was given, and turned to mist, slithering to him before twirling back into her form as he moved to another section of the room. “I could show you what this form can do…” she lightly put her arm to his, and her hand to his shoulder, before he dashed out of her grasp, and gave her another warning look, before continuing to search.

“…It’s honestly beyond the two lanterns.” she rolled her eyes, and started to lift her hair up with her arms.

“Huh?” Sonic quickly looked to her, but soon figured out he couldn’t trust her expression and turned to the lanterns.

When she noticed his quick dismissal of her looks, she puffed another frustrated grunt, and continued to try and allure him to paying more attention to her.

“It was sealed away when they trapped me here… it’s what holds me in. So if you want it… you’ll have to get through me.”

She materialized over the wall between the two lanterns, and sprawled in the air against it. “Oh, Sonic. If your a real hero, you’d save me!” she perfectly projected in Amy’s tone of voice, her latter tone more deeper and seductive but still in Amy’s voice. This time, it was very much like she was mocking him by mocking Amy.

“Quit it! I mean it.” Sonic took a stance, and held his fist out, biting down on his teeth, getting more annoyed now.

He wasn’t at all realizing how much hearing Amy’s voice was affecting his want to help her, nor how it made him feel to hear it calling out his name…

She floated down and moved closer to him, touching his chest before he could react, and having her mist slowly begin to engulf him.

He felt his breath leaving him, and his body unable to move again.

“You know… you’re only making my power stronger by not giving in already…” She moved closer, whispering up to his lips. “Help me… and I’ll help you.” she tilted her head, looking at his mouth but then back up at his eyes, and moving away.

His body once again fell to his knees, and he gasped as the mist kept surrounding him, moving over him as he shook his body. “Stop it!!”

“The mist is cool… and yet warm… isn’t it?” she got wicked pleasure out of testing his will, having pride in her siren ways, she wanted him to come to her…

She suddenly got him to advance, moving swiftly all of a sudden, and darted at her, and in surprise, she cried out in what sounded monstrous, losing Amy’s light voice.

The shriek was obviously from her true sound, and it sounded hideous, as Sonic held his hand tightly around her throat up against the wall, as he breathed heavily, and moved his head right up next to hers.

“Swear to me you’re telling the truth… and loose my friend’s form… and I’ll light the lanterns.”

“How…” she looked genuinely shocked, and afraid. “How are you resisting me!?”

“…You really want to know?” Sonic finally smiled, but this time, in a quick and cruel way. “Practice. Amy’s a terrible flirt, but when I see you with her face, I don’t see her. I only see a woman trying to be her. And failing miserably.”

He felt the mist and quickly looked at his back.

“Call off whatever you’re trying to do. I feel my body. I know what you’re after. But it’s pointless. I don’t fall for cheap gimmicks.”

She smiled quickly, matching his cruelty, and feeling the offense of what he meant by ‘cheap’.

 Seeing as her attempts were getting her no where, and he wasn’t acting like an average man… Her mist, which caused the sensation of love and passion of touch, was pulled away from him, disappearing as he let her throat go.

“Good. Seems we’ve come to an accord.” he fakely grinned, before he moved away and shook off his body.

“Half an accord… I told you, I can’t change my form.” she pouted cutely, seeming to have not really been hurt by his grip. “I’m not lying…” she finally stated, and looking at her, deciding to believe her expression, he consented to at least that she was being honest.

“Now…Tell me how you resisted both my paralysis and mist.” She looked serious.

“Heh. You may sound like Amy, but you don’t smell like her.” He adjusted his glove on his hand, shaking it free from her trying to paralysis him again.

His hand was numb, but it hadn’t spread through his whole body like her last touch did. She seemed to control when she could do that or not…

“What does that even mean!?” she shouted out, her beast-like voice breaking through Amy’s sound again in her fury.

“The real question is, if my friend is what you were trying to allure me with, why didn’t you act like her? Or can you only mimic what my heart shows? Isn’t that where you’re getting this all from? Or from my mind?” He noticed her expression change. “Ah… so that explains it. It’s not my heart, but something to do with my mind… memories, maybe? What era are you looking at? Amy’s not at all like that.”

“Heh. Don’t think so hard about it. I’ve never met a man with such a strong will… maybe you are my type.” she flirted again, moving her head as he turned away.

He was strong, but he wasn’t going to be too cocky, not when he knew she probably had other tricks up her sleeve…

“My friend’s a good person… You clearly had other things in mind.” he faced away from her, before looking to the two lanterns.

“…So that’s it.” She smiled and closed her eyes, seeming to give into defeat. “It’s not her pretty face or even her squeaky voice… it’s her heart…” she swayed her body a moment, almost touched by her realization. 

“She’s your type of style.” she cooed.

Sonic turned, his glare not as intense, before realizing her power was weakened and felt his old ways coming back.

“Sorry for the directness. I’m usually more gentler with girls. But I don’t even know if your true form has a gender.” he shrugged, comically, “But I’ve got other things to do than have you analysis me so poorly again!” he bolted off towards the forest, jumping into the forest fire Eggman’s last machine had created after exploding from Sonic’s doing, and then, while his quills were on fire, he homing-attacked the lanterns back at the shrine.

In her excitement, the siren spirit turned and bounced a little, as she saw the wall open up, part, and finally move upwards as if cement banners, and she quickly turned to mist to go within.

Sonic then dashed onto the bowls of ancient water, and sprayed as much as he could on himself, before rolling on the table, saying, “Hot! hot! hot-hot-hot!”

Inside, the siren spirit began to feel her true powers, looking up at the ancient machine that had first sealed her power away, and now having it released, she turned back to Sonic.

“If this form was hard to resist… wait till you experience all I can do..”

(Like i said, not really Amy, but using tactics that Amy would (perhaps) use to try and lure Sonic to her, if she were evil or bad intent, lol. Obviously, Sonic’s will is canonally unbreakable. He would never hurt his friend, which enabled him to first resist the siren spirit, whose true power hadn’t been released yet. I tried to keep it more in character than I thought I would… Sonic’s anger is a direct result of him fighting her abilities and feeling her trying to strip him of his freedom and will of controlling himself wasn’t exactly a ‘walk in the park’ either. I hope that was self-explanatory XD Anyway! Enjoy!)

[localseotampabay]

John Mueller's Answers to Negative SEO Attacks - #Backlinking, #ContentMarketing, #Google, #LinkBuilding, #LocalSEO, #LocalSEOTampa, #NegativeSEO, #OnlineReputationManagement, #OrganicSEO, #SEO, #SEOCompany, #SEOTips, #SERP - https://www.localseotampa.com/john-muellers-answers-to-negative-seo-attacks-201906/

New Post has been published on https://www.localseotampa.com/john-muellers-answers-to-negative-seo-attacks-201906/

John Mueller's Answers to Negative SEO Attacks

John Mueller from Google recently answered a question about a suspected negative SEO attack. This question was based on a website’s owner’s belief that they were getting a lot of spammy links because their competition was attempting to lower their rankings. The website owner wanted to know whether they should continue to disavow these links every week. Mueller replied that Google’s algorithm is programmed to ignore spammy links altogether. This seems to work rather well since there doesn’t seem to be many issues.

Normal Spam Links vs Negative SEO

Mueller also said there’s a difference here. He says that Google sees a lot of normal spam links. They just happen naturally all the time since the very beginning of the search engine. He acknowledges that this often happens because spammers believe that if they link to a high-ranking website, they can make Google believe that they’re more of an authority than they actually are. These websites do this in hopes that they’re spammy links will be overlooked – something that doesn’t work. This is an outdated SEO myth, dating back to 1998. Mueller advises website owners not to worry too much about these links saying that Google will usually figure this out on its own.

Using the Disavow Tool

Google’s disavow tool is available to those who are still concerned that spammy links will lower their standing in the SERPs. While Mueller says that this tool is unnecessary, he admits that developers have left it here as a way to help calm webmasters’ nerves. Instead of losing sleep over these links you can use this tool to make sure that Google handles them correctly. Mueller says it’s perfectly fine to do so since you’re not admitting that you’re guilty or anything. Instead, you’re simply telling Google that these links shouldn’t be taken into account for your website. There are many reasons why you may want this to happen so Google’s algorithm doesn’t even try to figure out your reasoning here.

Google’s Disavow Tool

Another tool that Google has made available to webmasters is the domain detective tool. This tool makes it easy for you to handle spammy links by placing them in a disavow file, which is great if you have extreme cases of your website being spammed. Otherwise you shouldn’t use this tool much. In fact, Mueller recommends that you only use it in very rare occasions. This means that most websites should never have a need to use this tool, which is why Google has placed it away from the search console where you won’t be as tempted to use it.

Google and Negative SEO

The bottom line is Google is able to handle any of the normal spammy links that may come your website’s way. This is because since the very beginning their algorithm is set up to do so, allowing you not to worry too much about them. You can tell simply by looking at their business model that they want to get rid of as much of the irrelevant nonsense that exists online today as they possibly can. As such, they’ll always ignore any links that are located outside of the “normal” neighborhood. Instead, Google will concentrate on ranking websites with great content, that get rave reviews from visitors without any regard to the spammy links it may also receive.

Now that you’ve heard Mueller’s version of what to worry about when it comes to negative SEO you can move on and spend your time on what really counts: Moving your way up in the SERPs. For help with this you should contact the Local SEO Tampa Company today.

[stephmolliex]

Wipe your iPhone before selling it, because if you don't you might get your data stolen

Make sure you remove all your personal information before you sell or trade your #iPhone in because if you don't, the consequences can be creepy and dangerous as one Ontario teenager discovered. AppleInsider recounts the tale, and shows you how to avoid the same fate. There are those of us who hang on to our old iPhones and build up a stash of them for no reason that we can quite justify. More often, though, we can see our outdated devices as being cash to put towards a new phone. When even a broken iPhone is worth something in trade, you have to be tempted. You should do it, too. Not only could you save some money but you're getting someone the opportunity to own a cheaper, used iPhone. Just don't give them anything else by accident. Scary consequences In the fall of 2017, Ontario teenager Natalie Hall's iPhone 5s had a shattered screen and appeared broken. She traded it in and got a $11 toward the price of a replacement. That's hardly a fortune, but it's money coming in rather than going out and it appeared to be for a phone that was truly useless. In mid-July, Hall got messages from a man including this piece of prose: "All data is in the phone your to sweet your sweet dogii pic and your friend your tooooo to sweet plz join friend ship with me." This man was in Dubai and had bought stocks of old iPhones. He continued to press Hall to add him on Facebook and when she wouldn't, he did it himself. Right there on this discarded, broken phone he went into her Facebook account and accepted his own friend request. "I was overwhelmed," Hall told CBC's Nicole Brockbank "It's creepy having your pictures and your contacts and your social media, text messages -- all of that kind of stuff -- out there with just a random stranger." She changed all her passwords. The man has since told CBC that he's sorry for disturbing her. He claims to have now wiped the data from her phone. Hall had no reason to suspect there could be a way to get her phone working again but now that you know, there are some emergency steps you can take. And, there are also precautions you can take when you ever sell on any iOS device. Emergency steps Even if you can't use your phone, you can safeguard your data. For instance, Apple does let you remotely wipe everything using Find My iPhone from another iOS device. That has to be enabled: if you've never switched on Find My iPhone or you've actively switched it off, you can't remote wipe. You can still do things such as changing your Apple ID password. Then if someone gets into your phone, they won't know that new one and won't be able to use, for instance, your Mail to send messages. If someone has access to your mail, they also have access to every bank account or store login they can find: every login offers to email you a replacement password. Similarly, you can go to icloud.com and remove your Apple Pay details, you can de-register iMessage from the device. This all helps but nothing is as good as completely wiping the iPhone before you hand it over in trade. Protect yourself For in-depth detail on how to wipe your phone you can check out our previous guide to it or check on Apple's latest advice. The short version in either case is that you should back up your phone and then take a few steps to completely wipe your data. That wiping part is simple: it's the backing up first that takes a bit more thought. You can backup your iPhone either to iCloud or by physically plugging it in to your Mac and telling iTunes to perform a complete backup. Unfortunately there are advantages and disadvantages to both. Backing up to iCloud is quicker. It's also very handy when you get your new device and everything can rapidly be restored onto it. However, an iCloud backup isn't complete. It's intended to safeguard what Apple thinks is your most important data, such as your photos, your account settings, documents and so on. It does not backup your apps. The logic is that you can always get those again from the App Store but sometimes you can't and always you have to re-enter your login details. So backup via iTunes. Plug your iPhone into your Mac, tell iTunes to make an encrypted backup, and let it take all the time it likes to copy everything over. Then also do an iCloud backup for convenience and speed. Finally, when you're sure it's all backed up, go wipe the phone. OpenSettings on your iPhone, sign out of iCloud, iTunes, Apple Music and the App Store. Then go to Settings and choose General, Reset, Erase All Content and Settings. Naturally your iPhone isn't going to just shrug and let you do all of that. it will ask if you're sure, it will ask for your Apple ID and password if it needs to switch off Find My iPhone. Soon, though, you reach the last Erase button. Now you can get a cloth and rub all those finger marks off the screen, you're ready to sell it on. https://goo.gl/5XeKjY

[connecticut-seo-adwords]

The best ways to Run an SEO Project in 6 Steps-- SitePoint

This article is part of an SEO series from WooRank. Thank you for supporting the partners who make SitePoint possible.

So you’ve decided to start an SEO campaign for your website. Congrats! Unfortunately, you don’t know where to start. Or maybe you know where to start, but don’t know how to continue.

With Facebook, retargeting, AdWords and other PPC channels, setting up a campaign is pretty easy to understand. You build landing pages, create ad creative and then bid on your keywords/impressions. However, with SEO, maybe it isn’t quite as straightforward.

The good news is that it’s actually not too complicated, even for digital marketing novices and newbies. The even better news is that we’re about to tell you how to plan and execute an SEO campaign for your website.

1. Define Your Goals and Strategy

As the saying goes (and as college me learned first-hand), if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. The same goes for your SEO campaigns. The first major thing you need to decide is how you’re going to define success and how you’ll measure progress toward those goals.

When it comes to SEO, your first thought might be “This is obvious. I want the top ranking in Google. That’s what SEO is all about!”

Unfortunately, you need to dig deeper than just ranking in Google, or even website vanity metrics like traffic, bounce rate and engagement. What you really need to do is ask yourself three questions:

Who am I trying to reach by ranking at the top of Google? Answering this question will define your target audience and create your marketing personas. Just saying “digital marketers” isn’t going to be very helpful because that’s a very diverse group of people. Here at WooRank, we’ve got at least six different personas with their goals, challenges, wants and needs along with what messaging we will use to reach them.

Why am I trying to bring these people onto my website? What is the overall goal you are trying to achieve with this campaign? Again, don’t get sucked into focusing solely on vanity metrics like website traffic or engagement rates. Instead, decide what business goal you’re trying to achieve. Lead generation? Sales? List building? Be specific and concrete.

How will I measure progress/achievement related to my goals? These are hard numbers used to calculate how successful your efforts are. Common metrics here are conversion rate, or email and retargeting list membership. If you can’t come up with a metric here to measure goal progress, you probably need to pick a better-defined goal.

You might be tempted to skip this first step and move right to the nuts and bolts of an SEO campaign, but the importance of this part can’t be overstated. It will be really, really hard for you to succeed if you don’t even know what success will look like. If you need more help coming up with your SEO, we’ve got a handy guide for you.

2. Keyword Research

Keywords are still really important parts of search marketing and SEO. However, the way you go about researching and optimizing around them has changed. You can thank Google’s Hummingbird and RankBrain for that. These two algorithms are focused on interpreting the context of words used in a search query and what the purpose behind a query is. It’s how Google figures out if your search involving “apple” is about computers, records or a fruit.

In SEO, this context is known as search intent. There are three main categories of search intent:

To learn more about a topic: As you probably guessed, these people want to find more information on a topic, the answer to a question or the solution to/cause of a problem. Long tail informational keywords usually include words like “how to”, “do I need” or “what is”. Head keywords are typically informational keywords.

To evaluate their options: These people already know something about the topic those first searchers were looking for and are now weighing their options. They’re deciding which product or solution is right for them. These keywords typically use phrases like “review”, “top 10”, “best” or “comparison”. They also use words like “cheap” and “deals”, which are great indicators that they’re about to flip from this category to the next.

To complete an action: Whether it’s making a purchase, signing up for a service or creating an account, these people know what they want and are ready to make it happen. They expect to achieve their goal directly on the landing page. They typically have lower volume but higher conversion rates.

The great thing about this development in keyword research is that search intent helps inform you where the searcher is in the conversion funnel.

If you’re struggling to come up with good keyword ideas in any phase of the funnel, there are lots of great tools out there that will help you find the right keywords. Here are some of my favorites:

3. Audit, Audit, Audit

Ok, you’ve come up with your personas and goals, and done your keyword research to find the best ones for your audience and funnel. The foundation of your SEO campaign has been laid. So now it’s time to build. That first building block? SEO audits.

Technical Audit

Technical SEO is the process of building a website in a way that makes it crawlable to search engines. If it’s not right, a website could struggle, or even fail, to get indexed. That means no search results for you!

When starting your SEO campaign, you need to get off on the right step by making sure your site is setup correctly. When auditing your website, check the following technical SEO elements:

XML sitemap: Search engines use a website’s sitemap to find and prioritize your URLs, an important SEO function (even if it’s not a ranking factor).

Robots.txt: Like sitemaps, robots.txt isn’t a ranking factor, but it will help you influence how your site is crawled. Prevent unimportant, duplicate or otherwise less valuable pages from being indexed so search engines can spend more of their crawl budget on what matters. Plus, you can put a link to your sitemap here to make that easier to find.

Page speed: Load time is a crucial part of user experience and, therefore, SEO. No search engine wants to recommend a slow site. There’s a lot of reasons your site could be slow. With WooRank’s technical SEO audit, we’ll alert you to slow page speed and possible causes.

URL structure: Make sure you’re following URL best practices for SEO. Make them concise and accurate to the page content, and avoid using underscores to separate words. Use hyphens instead. If you use parameters in your URLs, use Google’s URL Parameters Tool in Google Search Console to help Google deal with potential duplicate content issues.

Meta tags: Page titles and descriptions are super important to your on-page optimization. Even though only titles work as a ranking factor, descriptions can still convince users to click on your link in search results and keep them engaged on your site. These are two very important parts of maintaining relevance to your target keywords.

Crawl Your Site

For bigger, more complicated sites that have lots of pages, it’s worth it to use a crawler to audit your website. Crawlers work by accessing every URL on a website and collecting information about those URLs. Which is how Google’s crawlers work.

With an SEO crawler such as WooRank’s Site Crawl tool, you can analyze the URLs on your website and receive an analysis of the issues that will impact how Google indexes your site. Use the crawler to uncover issues with:

On-page SEO: Issues with HTML can cause Google to see duplicate and/or empty pages. Having a large number of these pages on your domain will impact your whole site’s ability to rank.

HTTP status: Search engines can’t crawl pages that can’t load or sites on servers that don’t respond. These pages also disrupt your site’s flow of link juice and provide a bad user experience. This step should also uncover any issues you have with broken redirects, redirect chains or redirect loops. These are all bad for SEO.

Non-indexable pages: Having a properly written robots.txt file is just as important as having the file at all. Crawling your website will find URLs that are disallowed via robots.txt and meta robots tags. Incorrect, outdated or inadvertent meta robots tags are one of the leading causes of unindexable pages.

Canonical issues: Canonical URLs are your “main” URLs. They’re the ones you want humans to access and where you want things like link juice and authority to collect. However, if you mess up your canonical tags, or the URLs in your tags don’t match your sitemap, you can run into problems.

Once you’ve fixed the potholes you’ve found in your website’s technical infrastructure, you can move on to some of the more “traditional” SEO stuff in your campaign.

4. Create Content

In the next step of your SEO campaign, it’s time to put to use all that work you did creating your strategy and researching keywords. That means it’s time to create some content.

When creating your content, think about the user first. Who is the target audience for this piece of content and what stage are they in the conversion funnel? Those two factors will help you decide which keyword you uncovered in your keyword research to optimize around.

When optimizing your on-page content for SEO, focus on:

Keyword consistency: Thanks to advances in how Google reads content, the days of keyword density are over. Instead, make sure you’re using your keywords (and related words) throughout the page, and at every level. That means the body copy, but also the headers and subheads.

Value: Everyone’s talking about producing quality content as an SEO tactic. I’m sure many of you hear “killer content” and “content is king” in your sleep by now. How can you measure “content”? By focusing on the value you’re offering the user. This ties back to the intent of your keyword. Make sure your content solves the problem, explains the information or answers the question of the user.

Links: We’re not talking about backlinks here, we mean your internal and outbound links. Internal links are a great way to distribute link juice around your site by adding them to high-authority pages. And while it’s not certain, there has been some evidence that linking out to quality resources can also help your SEO. So take advantage of this by linking out to high authority websites when appropriate.

Images: Images are vital to user experience (no one likes huge blocks of text). But you can also use them as part of your SEO campaign. This is done by the HTML alt parameter in the image tag. Google uses the alt tag to “see” the image, so describe what’s going on in it. Only use relevant images and you’ll have another place to use your keyword. Alt text is also an important part of usability for people using screen readers or with slow internet connections.

5. Build Links

Just like you’ve probably heard all about content quality, you’ve probably heard about “link earning” replacing “link building.” Do not believe this. Most content doesn’t receive any shares or links without some sort of promotion, so just trusting in your great writing isn’t enough.

The key to successful link building is to, yet again, go back to your marketing personas and SEO strategy. If your content is useful for them, people catering to the same audience will be much more likely to link to it.

Use a link building platform such as BlogDash, or curate a list of influencers in your niche and collect as much information about them as you can. Then, start your outreach.

You can automate your blogger outreach if you want, but you won’t succeed. People can sense a form email a mile away, and you’ll likely get caught in spam filters anyways. Instead, send emails manually, using a basic outline or template to guide you. Focus on optimizing:

Value: If you aren’t saying something new, or providing a unique outlook on an existing issue, people probably won’t want to link to your content. Start off your email with a brief (one or two sentences) outline of what value your content will bring readers. Show that you know their audience.

Links: Don’t paste URLs directly into your email. It makes it look like a form letter. Instead, use hyperlinks in the text of the email. You’ll look less spammy that way.

Subject line: Everyone gets a ton of emails, and for bloggers, a large percentage of them will be for link building. What I’m saying here is that it’s hard to stand out. Make sure your subject line is attention-grabbing and specific enough that the recipient knows what you’re talking about, but vague enough they’ll be compelled to open the email.

Contact info: Sign off with real, accurate contact information. That means your individual contact info, not just business website and email address. Include name, your email, website, social media and even phone number to prove that you’re legitimate.

Don’t get too discouraged by low conversion rates. This step in your SEO campaign is as much about building a relationship for future links as it is about any one particular link. Plus, you should be targeting the big names in your niche, so even a few links should go a long way.

6. ABC – Always Be Checking

Alright, so you’ve set up the foundation of your campaign with a great strategy to reach your personas, you’ve got a great group of keywords on your topic, you’ve fixed the technical issues on your site, created some fantastic articles and built some links. Great job! But you’re not done yet.

First of all, there’s no guarantee that anything you’ve done so far has really worked. You need to be constantly checking to make sure any changes have a positive impact. Track your bounce rates to make sure your personas, keywords and funnel strategy are matching. Watch your rankings and website traffic to see how well your pages are optimized. Keep an eye on crawl errors and indexed pages to make sure the technical aspect of your site isn’t broken somewhere. And measure your link building efforts and tweak your subject lines, email body and recipient lists accordingly.

SEO, like most digital marketing channels, is a continuous process of testing, optimizing and testing again. Which is why you need to set up your campaigns correctly based on solid strategy, keyword research, website construction and content. If you combine these six steps correctly, you’ll see positive returns on your SEO campaign.

Source

https://www.sitepoint.com/how-to-run-an-seo-campaign-in-6-steps/

[ixvyupdates]

Rapper Vic Mensa Says We We Need More Therapists in Schools Not Guns

In a recent video with ATTN, rapper Vic Mensa makes the case for combating gun violence in schools with more therapists, not cops.

“Instead of adding more cops to schools where gun violence is the norm, how about we add therapists, counselors and other trained professionals who can help these kids survive their harsh realities?” he asks. “Because if you’re going to one of these schools, the mental health services that could put a student on the right path simply don’t exist.”

A former school-based therapist, I was fortunate enough to work at Philadelphia’s Freire Charter School, a 6-12 charter school network that offers free therapy to all enrolled students. Through community-school partnerships with graduate counseling and social work programs at local universities, every Freire student can access free individual and family counseling, provided by second-year graduate student interns.

During the 2015-2016 school year, 10 to 15 graduate students, including myself, interned at Freire High School, each of us with caseloads of roughly eight to 12 students. Collectively, our emotional support services staff had the capacity to serve 150 students, out of 250 students at our school.

Compare Freire’s counselor-student ratio to that of Harper High School, a school on the South Side of Chicago profiled by Vic Mensa. At Harper, there are 127 students, and one social worker. But because 29 students from Harper were shot in 2012, there are now seven police officers. This glaring disparity between counselors and cops is telling of our current education system’s outdated approach to violence prevention.

Hurting People Hurt People

Quick fixes like increasing the presence of school police officers are reactive measures, not systemic solutions which address the underlying cause of violence: trauma. It was simple enough for my students to understand, so why not politicians?

“Hurting people hurt people,” I often told my students, in order to explain rampant incidences of school violence and community violence. And because all of my students identified as African-American, our therapy sessions about trauma and violence often consisted of more than usual interventions like role-playing difficult conversations, restructuring cognitive distortions and unpacking self-sabotaging beliefs. Most of my students had witnessed community violence, had been harmed by it themselves, or had a caregiver or parent who had been incarcerated because of it.

Thus, we also discussed the ways in which structural oppression and systemic inequity perpetuated cycles of intra-community violence in their segregated, low-income neighborhoods—a phenomenon that the media often oversimplifies as “Black-on-Black” crime.

Supporting Black students who have experienced intra-community violence and trauma from other Black students, on top of racialized police brutality, required leveraging therapy as a tool to transform school into a site of racial healing, just as much as it did mental health intervention. This is one of many reasons why mental health literacy and therapy matters in all schools, but particularly those where sociopolitical circumstances often breed unsafe learning environments for students of color.

Walking the Walk

Corruption within the education system—an issue Vic Mensa has previously spoken on with regard to banning guns to prevent school shootings—is another reason why Mensa is shining light on the lack of funding for school mental health services. Mensa posits that banning guns in schools and funding school-based mental health services are simple to resolve, but greed tempts big lobbyists and other leaders away from prioritizing students and holding themselves accountable.

“In schools where at least 75 percent of students qualified for free- or reduced-lunch, 90 percent of principals admitted to using those funds for ‘professional development,’ which is to say, they didn’t go to mental health services,” Mensa reports.

Furthermore, Black children disproportionately attend schools where the majority of the students receive free- or reduced-lunch, and as Mensa points out, 55 percent of poor Black children who need mental health services don’t get them. Compare that to 40 percent of students overall. Most schools have the means to address this racial disparity in child mental health, but simply choose not to do so.

Fortunately, in my experience, administrators and teachers have walked the walk. They understood that a student in emotional distress is far better off attending therapy during class, rather than disengaging for the entire period. Yes, a student receiving counseling might miss a little instruction time, but at least there’s a chance that they’ll do their homework that night, or have the wherewithal to focus the next day. Some of my former students’ teachers even offered tutorials in lieu of missed class time because they recognized the value in my work to help students heal.

However, when weighing the pros and cons of school mental health services, it’s crucial that improved academic engagement and performance is not the only benefit considered. When students of color living in poverty don’t receive mental health services, they’re more likely to drop out, join a gang, abuse or sell drugs or attempt suicide. In other words, when our education system perpetuates and then exacerbates the structural violence and oppression that these students face, when politicians and leaders misuse funds or devalue mental health programs.

Sadly, this sense of betrayal is what many poor students of color have come to expect, and most educators are too burned out to prove them wrong.

These Things Are Preventable

When I first began as a school-based therapist, I remember that most of my students seemed guarded and skeptical upon meeting me. Though I saw myself as an Black, equity-minded educator and counselor, they saw me as an Ivy Leaguer, first and foremost.

Having ventured across the country to attend the University of Pennsylvania, a school that most poor kids in Philadelphia never step foot on, I seemed completely out of touch with their reality. Yet, because I understood the ways in which their sociopolitical reality had shaped their consciousness and mistrust of education institutions, especially elite ones, I realized that they owed me nothing. If anything, I owed it to them to earn their trust, so I got to work.

By the end of the year, students gave me high-fives in the halls and casually introduced me to their friends, with no shame about seeing a therapist—and more importantly, no mistrust about the fact that I went to Penn.

“You know Mr. Jeff?” I heard. “That’s my counselor, man. Oh, and he goes to Penn!”

I will remember the names and faces of those students forever, and I hope that I made a lasting impact on their lives. By no means was I their savior. But I hope they remember how, for possibly the first time in their lives, an educator fought for them. When I see folks like Vic Mensa using their platform to lift up the work that forever changed me as an educator and education justice advocate, I can’t help but hope that our society is moving a little closer toward justice.

“This isn’t an inevitable consequence of growing up poor. These things are preventable. So let’s prevent them. Share this video if you believe poor kids deserve mental health care,” Mensa signs off.

Rapper Vic Mensa Says We We Need More Therapists in Schools Not Guns syndicated from https://sapsnkraguide.wordpress.com

[theokbrowne]

12 Real Estate Winter Marketing Ideas To Slay The Holiday Season (For EVERY Agent!)

There are less than 100 days left in the year and it’s time to plan your winning real estate winter marketing activities!

Halloween is over.

The World Series has ended.

And Starbucks has a brand new cup design for you to behold.

Yep.

With the 1st of November came the start of the 2017 holiday season.

As tempting as it can be, there’s no sense in putting it off.

It’s crucial that agents market to past clients and prospects over the slower real estate season and make it a top priority to capture the best leads.

Of course, just because your schedule as started to open up, doesn’t mean your community is experiencing the same lull.

It’s all too likely that your past clients and future leads are preparing for their own holiday events.

So, where does that leave you and yours?

In order to ring in a stress-free new year and enjoy the upcoming winter holidays, you’ve got to get into the holiday spirit and join your community in ushering in the merry season.

And we’re here to give you everything you need to slay your real estate winter marketing efforts!

Here are 12 ideas to prepare for your best season yet –

3 Festive Blog Post Ideas

#1) 10 Ways To Beat The Freeze In (Your Area)

Depending on where you living, this winter could be a doozy. Tackle the cold by giving helpful tips on how to combat the chill and tell buyers and sellers exactly how the frigid temps could affect local homes. You can include suggestions on how to prepare pipes, clean out gutters, and a list of resources your community can consult when in a grinchy pinch.

Live somewhere warm? Luck you!

Read on for more real estate winter marketing blog ideas.

#2) DIY Holiday Decorating Guide

Snow or shine, most folks loving decorating for the holidays! And it’s easy to position this type of post for your community. Whether you’ve got palm trees or pines, your area will still be getting in on the cheer!

Throw in some extra safety instructions on how to hang lights without damaging the exterior or interior of a home. For DIY tricks, think back to your favorite childhood decorating traditions and share one or two family favorites with your audience. You can encourage them to do the same!

Want to add lead capture? Create an info form for leads to fill out so they can download the guide.

This is super easy to do with LeadSites!

Here’s an in-depth walkthrough on how to setup blog popups with Smart Popups 2.0:

  Want To Try Out LeadSites For Yourself?

CLICK HERE For A Free Demo And Exclusive Bonus!

  #3) A Year In Review

It’s always nice to reflect on our personal and business success over the past year, but you’ve got to put a slightly different spin on it to make this blog worthy.

Real Estate Winter Social Marketing Campaigns

#4) Host a Holiday Contest

Even if you haven’t had much success with contests or giveaways in the past, the giving season is the perfect time to try again.

Have your followers share a photo of their seasonal decorations and give a special prize to the the person whose photo gets the most likes.

You can test this out over Thanksgiving and do another round for Christmas or New Year’s.

For Thanksgiving – go beyond decor and encourage your network to post a photo of a special recipe or their Thanksgiving dinner spread.

When Christmas rolls around, you can ask folks to share a light display, the final results of a DIY family decor project, or their gorgeous tree.

For the prize…

There are a lot of different directions to take this. You can pick up some Starbucks or Amazon gift cards, or partner with a neighborhood family business to encourage people to shop local. A major perk of co-promoting your giveaways with a local business is that you’ll increase your reach.

For a giveaway, we recommend using Facebook. You can post on your personal account, business page and even share the post in community groups.

#5) Get On Instagram

If you haven’t already, create an Instagram account.

It’s a great way to connect with new people and add a very necessary visual storytelling component to your real estate winter marketing strategy.

As you collect photos throughout the season, add them to your Instagram feed.

You can include both community and property features.

A tree lighting ceremony, twinkling neighborhoods, a shared hot chocolate on a snowy day…etc., these are all great ways to stay top of mind, and heart, in your area.

Create These Two Pinterest Boards

#6) Holidays + Seasons In (Your Area)

If you’re finding little payoff in creating unique Pinterest boards for every holiday, season, and occasion, just make one.

You can then update it year-round. Include all four seasons and the major holidays within those months.

To get this board going, start with November – January and include Thanksgiving Inspiration, Christmas, and New Year’s with lots of winter inspiration sprinkled between the holiday goodness.

This is a great way to get your board organized because you really only have to focus on one season and one or two holidays per month.

Next, take on February – April and include Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, and Easter. Your board’s aesthetic will quickly change from a wintry wonderland to a fresh Spring. You can continue to share this board on other social platforms so your audience can follow along for all seasons.

#7) Join or Start A Holiday Decor Group Board

Group boards are exploding on Pinterest. With group boards, you’ll not only be sharing the “pinning” load with other Pinterest users, but you’ll be expanding your network with every new member that’s added.

Encourage pinners to join you and share new decorating tricks they’re going to try as well as to pin recipes they’re making. You can pin your related blogs to this board and this will encourage pinners to visit your website.

Spread Joy In Your Community

#8) Give Back

Start thinking about ways you can be in service during the cold months. Host a canned food drive, make your office a drop-off point for Toys For Tots, or take coat donation and give them to a local shelter or organization.

You can bake a batch of cookies and keep some cocoa or eggnog on hand to get conversations going with your area when they come to leave their contributions.

#9) Gingerbread All The Way

Reach out to a community center and setup a gingerbread decorating party. If you’re enjoying hosting contests, you can even give out some fun prizes to those who decorate the best cookies or houses.

This is also another nice opportunity to build community relationships. See if you can partner with a bakery or even local grocery store to sponsor supplies or give some decorating tips for the party.

Plus, building houses together is the perfect segway for you to deliver some information to buyers and sellers who attend!

#10) Send A Holiday Card And Ask For This In Return

Give Thanks for your clients on Thanksgiving or with them Happy Holidays by mailing them a card or e-card. Of course, you’re just showing your appreciation, but it doesn’t hurt to ask them to leave you a quick review.

It doesn’t have to be a long testimonial, though that would be great, you can just link them to your Facebook Page, Yelp Profile, or anywhere your agent profile exists online and ask them to leave a quick remark.

  Looking Ahead

Whenever you find yourself with some downtime, check these quick tasks off your list:

#11) Update CTAs

Majority of all online leads are going to come from your real estate website. So make sure you lead capture tools are ready to work.

Take a look at the various opt-in forms floating around your site, including landing pages, and make sure they’ve all got a strong Call To Action button.

With LeadSites, it’s incredibly easy to update any form for your real estate winter marketing campaigns and then swap them out again in 2018.

You can also track all your opt-ins in the backend of your LeadSite dashboard to see what pages are performing well and which could use a boost in conversion potential.

#12) 2018

You should also set aside some time to start planning for a great New Year.

Update your database, clean up any outdated information, and do the same with your social media profiles.

I mean, when was the last time you updated your profile or cover photo?

Or updated your bio?

The time and effort you put in now will have a huge impact next year, and you owe it to yourself, your clients and future leads to be prepped and ready for the best New Year yet.

These simply, yet highly effective real estate winter marketing ideas are perfect for any agent to up their lead gen game and define themselves as the leading community expert.

Get started today!

Want To Try Out LeadSites For Yourself?

CLICK HERE For A Free Demo And Exclusive Bonus!

Here are a few more resources to inspire your real estate winter marketing activities:

Get More Referrals With This FREE Thanksgiving Downloadable Flyer

How To Win Leads The Week Before Christmas With Kyle Hiscock

Free Christmas Videos To Market Yourself This Holiday Season

Use This Holiday Giveaway To Boost Leads (Free, Custom Landing Page + Email Inside)!

Primed For The Holidays – Boost Your Real Estate Business With Cheap Greeting Cards From Amazon

 The post 12 Real Estate Winter Marketing Ideas To Slay The Holiday Season (For EVERY Agent!) appeared first on Easy Agent Pro.

from theokbrowne digest https://www.easyagentpro.com/blog/12-real-estate-winter-marketing-ideas/

[garynsmith]

12 Real Estate Winter Marketing Ideas To Slay The Holiday Season (For EVERY Agent!)

http://ift.tt/2hBUALn

There are less than 100 days left in the year and it’s time to plan your winning real estate winter marketing activities!

Halloween is over.

The World Series has ended.

And Starbucks has a brand new cup design for you to behold.

Yep.

With the 1st of November came the start of the 2017 holiday season.

As tempting as it can be, there’s no sense in putting it off.

It’s crucial that agents market to past clients and prospects over the slower real estate season and make it a top priority to capture the best leads.

Of course, just because your schedule as started to open up, doesn’t mean your community is experiencing the same lull.

It’s all too likely that your past clients and future leads are preparing for their own holiday events.

So, where does that leave you and yours?

In order to ring in a stress-free new year and enjoy the upcoming winter holidays, you’ve got to get into the holiday spirit and join your community in ushering in the merry season.

And we’re here to give you everything you need to slay your real estate winter marketing efforts!

Here are 12 ideas to prepare for your best season yet –

3 Festive Blog Post Ideas

#1) 10 Ways To Beat The Freeze In (Your Area)

Depending on where you living, this winter could be a doozy. Tackle the cold by giving helpful tips on how to combat the chill and tell buyers and sellers exactly how the frigid temps could affect local homes. You can include suggestions on how to prepare pipes, clean out gutters, and a list of resources your community can consult when in a grinchy pinch.

Live somewhere warm? Luck you!

Read on for more real estate winter marketing blog ideas.

#2) DIY Holiday Decorating Guide

Snow or shine, most folks loving decorating for the holidays! And it’s easy to position this type of post for your community. Whether you’ve got palm trees or pines, your area will still be getting in on the cheer!

Throw in some extra safety instructions on how to hang lights without damaging the exterior or interior of a home. For DIY tricks, think back to your favorite childhood decorating traditions and share one or two family favorites with your audience. You can encourage them to do the same!

Want to add lead capture? Create an info form for leads to fill out so they can download the guide.

This is super easy to do with LeadSites!

Here’s an in-depth walkthrough on how to setup blog popups with Smart Popups 2.0:

  Want To Try Out LeadSites For Yourself?

CLICK HERE For A Free Demo And Exclusive Bonus!

  #3) A Year In Review

It’s always nice to reflect on our personal and business success over the past year, but you’ve got to put a slightly different spin on it to make this blog worthy.

Real Estate Winter Social Marketing Campaigns

#4) Host a Holiday Contest

Even if you haven’t had much success with contests or giveaways in the past, the giving season is the perfect time to try again.

Have your followers share a photo of their seasonal decorations and give a special prize to the the person whose photo gets the most likes.

You can test this out over Thanksgiving and do another round for Christmas or New Year’s.

For Thanksgiving – go beyond decor and encourage your network to post a photo of a special recipe or their Thanksgiving dinner spread.

When Christmas rolls around, you can ask folks to share a light display, the final results of a DIY family decor project, or their gorgeous tree.

For the prize…

There are a lot of different directions to take this. You can pick up some Starbucks or Amazon gift cards, or partner with a neighborhood family business to encourage people to shop local. A major perk of co-promoting your giveaways with a local business is that you’ll increase your reach.

For a giveaway, we recommend using Facebook. You can post on your personal account, business page and even share the post in community groups.

#5) Get On Instagram

If you haven’t already, create an Instagram account.

It’s a great way to connect with new people and add a very necessary visual storytelling component to your real estate winter marketing strategy.

As you collect photos throughout the season, add them to your Instagram feed.

You can include both community and property features.

A tree lighting ceremony, twinkling neighborhoods, a shared hot chocolate on a snowy day…etc., these are all great ways to stay top of mind, and heart, in your area.

Create These Two Pinterest Boards

#6) Holidays + Seasons In (Your Area)

If you’re finding little payoff in creating unique Pinterest boards for every holiday, season, and occasion, just make one.

You can then update it year-round. Include all four seasons and the major holidays within those months.

To get this board going, start with November – January and include Thanksgiving Inspiration, Christmas, and New Year’s with lots of winter inspiration sprinkled between the holiday goodness.

This is a great way to get your board organized because you really only have to focus on one season and one or two holidays per month.

Next, take on February – April and include Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, and Easter. Your board’s aesthetic will quickly change from a wintry wonderland to a fresh Spring. You can continue to share this board on other social platforms so your audience can follow along for all seasons.

#7) Join or Start A Holiday Decor Group Board

Group boards are exploding on Pinterest. With group boards, you’ll not only be sharing the “pinning” load with other Pinterest users, but you’ll be expanding your network with every new member that’s added.

Encourage pinners to join you and share new decorating tricks they’re going to try as well as to pin recipes they’re making. You can pin your related blogs to this board and this will encourage pinners to visit your website.

Spread Joy In Your Community

#8) Give Back

Start thinking about ways you can be in service during the cold months. Host a canned food drive, make your office a drop-off point for Toys For Tots, or take coat donation and give them to a local shelter or organization.

You can bake a batch of cookies and keep some cocoa or eggnog on hand to get conversations going with your area when they come to leave their contributions.

#9) Gingerbread All The Way

Reach out to a community center and setup a gingerbread decorating party. If you’re enjoying hosting contests, you can even give out some fun prizes to those who decorate the best cookies or houses.

This is also another nice opportunity to build community relationships. See if you can partner with a bakery or even local grocery store to sponsor supplies or give some decorating tips for the party.

Plus, building houses together is the perfect segway for you to deliver some information to buyers and sellers who attend!

#10) Send A Holiday Card And Ask For This In Return

Give Thanks for your clients on Thanksgiving or with them Happy Holidays by mailing them a card or e-card. Of course, you’re just showing your appreciation, but it doesn’t hurt to ask them to leave you a quick review.

It doesn’t have to be a long testimonial, though that would be great, you can just link them to your Facebook Page, Yelp Profile, or anywhere your agent profile exists online and ask them to leave a quick remark.

  Looking Ahead

Whenever you find yourself with some downtime, check these quick tasks off your list:

#11) Update CTAs

Majority of all online leads are going to come from your real estate website. So make sure you lead capture tools are ready to work.

Take a look at the various opt-in forms floating around your site, including landing pages, and make sure they’ve all got a strong Call To Action button.

With LeadSites, it’s incredibly easy to update any form for your real estate winter marketing campaigns and then swap them out again in 2018.

You can also track all your opt-ins in the backend of your LeadSite dashboard to see what pages are performing well and which could use a boost in conversion potential.

#12) 2018

You should also set aside some time to start planning for a great New Year.

Update your database, clean up any outdated information, and do the same with your social media profiles.

I mean, when was the last time you updated your profile or cover photo?

Or updated your bio?

The time and effort you put in now will have a huge impact next year, and you owe it to yourself, your clients and future leads to be prepped and ready for the best New Year yet.

These simply, yet highly effective real estate winter marketing ideas are perfect for any agent to up their lead gen game and define themselves as the leading community expert.

Get started today!

Want To Try Out LeadSites For Yourself?

CLICK HERE For A Free Demo And Exclusive Bonus!

Here are a few more resources to inspire your real estate winter marketing activities:

Get More Referrals With This FREE Thanksgiving Downloadable Flyer

How To Win Leads The Week Before Christmas With Kyle Hiscock

Free Christmas Videos To Market Yourself This Holiday Season

Use This Holiday Giveaway To Boost Leads (Free, Custom Landing Page + Email Inside)!

Primed For The Holidays – Boost Your Real Estate Business With Cheap Greeting Cards From Amazon

 The post 12 Real Estate Winter Marketing Ideas To Slay The Holiday Season (For EVERY Agent!) appeared first on Easy Agent Pro.

from Easy Agent Pro http://ift.tt/2A6orlE via IFTTT

[news-mashable-yahoopartner-blog]

Yes, that controversial Google diversity rant matters. Like, really matters.

Think you don't need to care about the super inflammatory Google diversity manifesto that dropped this weekend? Think again.

The tech community has been abuzz since Saturday about what the leaked document — which is full of all kinds of sexist commentary masquerading as an intellectual exercise — actually means. Plenty of people have argued it doesn't mean much. After all, it's just the thoughts of one exceedingly white tech bro, right? Wrong. So very wrong.

SEE ALSO: Silicon Valley's gossip app is all over the place on the 'Google Manifesto'

To review, the screed was reportedly penned by James Damore (a software engineer first officially identified by Motherboard), who engages in a healthy dose of mental gymnastics to make the case that a) women are biologically different from men and that's why they don't get tech jobs and b) Google is not welcoming of conservative viewpoints and isn't open to rethinking its efforts to diversify.

It’s 2017. The notion that your genetic makeup has any influence on what kinds of jobs you'll be well-suited to is exceedingly outdated and dangerous. And it's certainly not a legitimate set of ideas to be sending out to a huge swath of your coworkers. Yet here we are. 

Of course, the tech industry's lack of diversity is a known issue, as is the complete lack of any self-awareness that might lead to fixing the problem. Google itself is already being investigated for an extreme gender pay gap.

So, you might find yourself thinking, "Why is it a big deal what this one dude says? Especially when it’s been made very clear that not everyone who works at Google agrees with him?"

Do you hear that? That's the sound of thousands of non-white non-males who are too exhausted to even scream.

Image: giphy

While it's tempting to dismiss his take on the world as backwards and outmoded, don't — because this isn't an isolated incident and these ideas have very real consequences in the present moment. 

Mashable spoke with Elizabeth Ames, senior vice president of marketing, alliances, and programs at the Anita Borg Institute, which champions the advancement of women in the tech industry. She told us what exactly a document like this does:

"It really lays bare the challenges that women and underrepresented minorities face in tech today, when you have a coworker who writes something that says, 'I think you're genetically predisposed not to be good at this,' that's not really a great starting place."

SEE ALSO: Google's HR ambitions just keep growing

While one exceptionally ignorant guy might have taken it upon himself to create this particular document, he's hardly the only one espousing such views in Silicon Valley. Ames said it's all too common.

"Unfortunately, this is not unfamiliar to me and it's not unfamiliar to women who work in tech," she said. "And this is part of what makes the culture so incredibly difficult."

I can't help laughing at this Googler's misogynist manifesto because it reminds me of what one female Uber HR rep told me

— Susan J. Fowler (@susanthesquark) August 7, 2017

Likewise, she said, there were more white men in engineering because white men were simply more suited for engineering than others!

— Susan J. Fowler (@susanthesquark) August 7, 2017

Google is, of course, a gigantic company. It can't be held completely accountable for the actions of a single employee. But it's worth remembering that this gentleman clearly felt there were enough people within Google who would accept or appreciate these thoughts — and there are plenty of people who've taken the bait. 

Think about this: If you don't realize that expressing these kinds of things in writing will result in a serious internet dragging at the very least, that is an airtight little bubble you're living in. And the only way that's possible is if you're surrounded by other people who see the world in the exact same way. 

Of course those who have personal experience with Silicon Valley's lack of diversity have spoken out as well. Medium has lit up with posts outlining what it's like to work in this industry as a non-tech bro and calls to action.  

Plenty of other people have gone out of their way to say that not everyone at Google feels this way. And thank goodness for that. But it doesn't really matter.

As anyone who’s not a privileged white male can tell you, if you have to spend your days working with even a single person who believes you were born incapable of being truly good at your job, it’s impossible to feel like you belong. And, as Ames pointed out, that has long-term consequences for the industry.

"It chips away at you every single day," she said. "And you eventually say to yourself, 'What am I doing here?' And this is why we have talent leave the industry."

Image: giphy

So other than continuing to sigh heavily in frustration when each of these new stories breaks, what exactly can be done about this? Probably not that much, at least in the very short-term.

According to its latest diversity statistics, Google is 69 percent male and 56 percent white. That puts them toward the bottom of the pile when you compare them with the competition on diversity. And that's saying something. 

Obviously there's a lot of room for improvement there, but it also means that a sizable portion of its workforce has just been deeply offended by one of their colleagues. 

It's very clear that Google has to do something big.

"It creates a tremendously divisive situation within their organization. I think they have to take a stand here," Ames said.

They did issue an internal statement, but that's not going to be enough to hush those who've been pissed off by this incident.

After all, this isn't just an issue that's relevant to people who work at Google — or even in tech as a whole. It's a big deal to all of us who use the endless stream of products that are coming out of Silicon Valley.

If Google doesn't step up and fix this, a gigantic segment of the population might decide that we're just, you know, not genetically predisposed to enjoy using Gmail or that Androids simply don't feel good in our tiny little lady hands. Harumph. 

WATCH: Airbnb is giving away an epic experience to watch the solar eclipse