#it's already percolating in my brain now

[pastafossa]

instantly seeing the similarities between jane and maya's stories, and i just know they could end up having the most wonderful conversations with eachother.

this is why i love trt, jane feels like a canon character to the point that after 1 ep of a show i feel like she'd fit in perfectly

Thank you so much! And I noticed that too! There's definitely a resonance here with their backstories, what they became, and the roles they both individually sort of took on for Fisk and Ciro. Which I love since that was NOT planned. They'd absolutely have some stuff to talk about, and I'm already wondering if I can somehow weave in a reference to that flashback fight scene with Daredevil (since we're in his red suit era in TRT). Or have their paths cross somehow. There's just so much gd potential between the two of them as a scene! 😩

[crossbackpoke-check]

Dysprosium, Mary Soon Lee

dysprosium, AN 66, is a silvery-white rare earth metal. its name is derived from the greek dysprositos, meaning “hard to get at”, owing to the difficulty in separating and isolating this rare earth element. dysprosium is used to measure neutron flux, to fuel reactors, and to activate phosphors. terfenol-d is a magnetorestrictive alloy, meaning that it changes shape when a magnetic field is applied, and is used to manufacture underwater acoustic systems.

jason “robo” robertson, dallas stars #21 for @simmyfrobby’s nhl periodic table poems <3

[trickster-shi]

Hi! When you get this, list 5 songs you like to listen to, publish them, and send this ask to the last people in your notifications (but only if you want to!). 😊

My songs of the moment depend on what story I'm currently wrapped up in. Right now, I'm working on a western story with time traveling lesbians and dragons, and I'm listening to these five songs most out of their growing playlist:

Cowboy Killer by Ian Munsick, Ryan Charles

Years by Sierra Ferrell

A Bar Song (Tipsy) by Shaboozy

Between the Country by Ian Noe

I Tried by Matt Heckler

Honorable mention goes to Blue Eyes Dancing by Matt Heckler because that one ends up on multiple playlists of mine.

[potatoesandsunshine]

tried to start the first draft but we're not there yet i fear

[therainscene]

I think I might have figured out what the Mind Flayer really is.

This theory has been percolating in my brain for a while now; it hasn't really finished baking yet but I wanted to get the gist of it down before The First Shadow debuts.

Let’s begin at the Hawkins National Lab, 6th November 1983. For the second time in her young life, El faces terrifying and deeply traumatic circumstances which cause her powers to lash out and rip a gash in the fabric of reality.

Meanwhile, across town, Will is doing what every queer 12 year-old has done and finds an excuse to spend an extra moment alone with his crush.

His little gay heart is as aflutter as the garage lights.

(Strange, that. The lights, I mean -- considering that he's on the other side of town from the lab. Do you suppose the Demogorgon trekked all the way to Mike's house and quietly followed him home again?)

Will heads home, lost in thought as he cycles past the lab. Is he thinking about how sweet his new X-Men #134 is gonna be? Or is he thinking about something even sweeter? The lights flutter again.

And something in front of him notices.

Will has always been noticeable: his clothes, his mannerisms, his interests -- they've always attracted the attentions of bullies. Now something new -- or maybe something that was always there and is only now making itself known -- has attracted the attentions of a monster.

He runs home, he calls for help, but he's alone, there's no escape. He races to the shed and loads a gun like his father taught him -- but it's not in his nature to be violent. He freezes, petrified.

The lights surge as his terror wrestles control of his powers and uses them to puncture an escape route in the fabric of reality.

Why were we so quick to believe that the Demogorgon -- a minion of the guy whose whole thing is his inability to open gates -- was able to open its own temporary portals in S1 and then never again?

Will could plausibly have been responsible for every temporary portal in S1: he’s at the Byers house when the Demogorgon pushes through its walls; he's on the run to Castle Byers when Nancy stumbles across that portal in the woods; and he's plugged in to one of Vecna's vines during the finale -- something we see Vecna plug himself into when he remotely opens gates in S4.

There’s one exception though.

Barb likely slipped through a gate in Steve's pool, but how could Will have opened that one when he was in his bedroom at the time, talking to his mother through the lights?

Let me ask you this: isn't it interesting that of all the injuries Barb could have obtained in her passage to the Upside Down, she got a nosebleed?

I think powers are more common than we’ve been led to believe, and gates are a last-ditch self-defense mechanism for anyone with powers.

This is why the four curse victims’ deaths opened a gate: Vecna pushed them to their breaking point to artificially trigger the self-defense response. Those headaches and nosebleeds weren't caused by Vecna directly, but by their own powers acting up as they inched towards oblivion.

[Shoutout to @givehimthemedicine's underrated powers and blood theory for the idea of Vecna's Curse being the overcharging of his victims' own powers.]

It was already pretty obvious that Vecna's Curse is a metaphor for suicide, and this theory reinforces it: every kid who gets targeted by the horrors of Hawkins for being "different" tries to find some way to escape.

Willel's misfortune is that their powers are considerably more easily manifested than the average person's. Byler tells the story of visible vs invisible queerness, but that's just a reflection of the larger theme at play in the show: the visible and invisible ways kids are othered and abused.

Max's trauma was a quiet thing that came from within and festered until it was almost too late to save her... but Willel's trauma manifests as a giant monster that openly hunts them down.

And I'm being literal when I say the Mind Flayer is a manifestation of their trauma.

We know that Vecna fashioned the Mind Flayer from a cloud of black particles he found in the Upside Down, but where did that cloud come from? The Upside Down is a mysterious enough place that it's easy to assume the Shadow is native to that realm... but what if it isn't?

The Mind Flayer is heavily associated with repression -- Will gradually lost his memories while he was possessed, and El lost her powers when the sliver of Flesh Flayer wormed its way into her leg.

But Will has mysteriously been without powers ever since leaving the Upside Down, and we've seen El lose memories too: her memories of surviving the lab massacre, in which she didn't simply escape by opening up a gate, but by disintegrating her attacker into black particles.

The Mind Flayer doesn't cause repression -- it is repression.

There must have been countless generations worth of traumatized children who took the extra step El did and sent their abusers -- or at least their memories of abuse -- into that hidden realm beyond the gate.

(There's also the possibility that Mr. Time-is-Just-a-Social-Construct is stuck in a time loop of some sort -- maybe the massacre has repeated hundreds of times, and Dimension X is a timeless graveyard of El's attempts to repress her trauma. This would explain why Henry seems to have both disintegrated and survived: we were watching at least two different iterations of the massacre all along.)

Whichever way you slice it, it's a perfect fit: the tool Vecna uses to perpetuate the cycle of abuse isn't some bizarro alien from an alternate dimension, but a direct consequence of the cycle itself.

The Mind Flayer tells us that escape alone doesn't work as a long-term solution: it might help you survive the initial abuse, but if you don't address the effect it had on you...

...it will come back to wreck havok.

[Edit: Click here for post-TFS thoughts on this theory]

[spockandawe]

So there i was, jetlagged as shit, choking on surprise work deadlines, with a broken sleep schedule (9-1, and then 9-1 again) and an entire lost day of work catchup productivity. And rather than going to the office like a good engineer, i was like 'hmm. I wonder what would be a good book for that one casual discord competition.' Anyways! Not playing coy with this one, I've already done it as a single volume (with a rigid yapp edge), but i messed up my trimming and the size of my yapp edges was a little more intrusive than i thought.

So I changed up my typeset a little and I'm going back in. I dont know what exactly I'm doing with this one, but I'm going all out. Leather binding, hot tooled leather if it's enough leather surface area. Power sanded (looking for workarounds is where i fucked up the last one), rounded and backed, faux bands. Either sewn endbands or leather ones depending how it comes together. Maybe leather jointed endpapers if i feel ambitious. Illustrations on the head and tail, now that I know a bit more about playing to my strengths. I'd like to do *something* special with the endpapers, but i think ill have to match leather/paper/fabric before I can properly weigh all my options. Box, probably.

Enforced idleness on family trips plays real bad with my brain! I knew this, and did not do enough to mitigate it. Also probably doesn't help that two work projects are applying heavy pressure when i thought i had breathing room, and my new mortgage and moving logistics are Looming. And I was already antsy before the trip blew things up, haha. But I think this is a good step towards self-care. I'm two weeks behind on my start, but I'm going to let this percolate and see what I can do to swing for the fences.

[jennawynn]

I've had something percolating in my brain tonight about how Netanyahu's speech (or rather the Dem response to it) kind of illustrates the need to vote.

Half the Dems boycotted. Sure. So now all you see are pictures of pretty much everyone in the room (Republicans) giving the man a standing ovation.

But who didn't? Tlaib. She used the power she has (power that was given to her by... get this... voters.) to make a visible stand. To make sure he didn't only see support. To make sure WE didn't only see support.

If we don't vote, we give the power to Republicans to claim 'everyone was with us'. But if we vote, and vote up and down the ballot, we get more Tlaibs. We make sure we're heard.

We cannot just walk out and give up the power we already have.

[tsartistry]

I've been doing a lot of DoorDash delivery driving on the side after work too keep myself afloat. I wouldn't call it lucrative but it's certainly kept me from drowning as badly as I was before.

Unfortunately that hasn't left me a lot of time to draw or write. That said, it has left me with a lot of idle time with just me, my thoughts, and my music, so my ideas have had a lot of time to percolate, and a lot of that has been spent on that Niobe fic.

There's a dog now! Things shift and change constantly as I plot, but I am going to make a pointed effort to keep the dog in as long as it's feasible.

It's interesting how the needs of the narrative cause seemingly unrelated details to manifest. For plot & magical reasons it was a good idea to have a Friendly Creature of some kind constantly by Lester's side. The most reasonable option was a service dog. Which means, of course, that there needs to be a reason for Lester to have one. After mulling it over, I'm thinking the dog is a seizure alert dog.

I've mentioned before that Niobe's going at Lester's memories from multiple angles. She's already combining magic and psychology, she's not above messing with his brain directly. I'm thinking maybe something gets damaged in the process, and now Lester's got epilepsy caused by a TBI. It actually fits really nicely into the story, because Niobe's cover story for any of Lester's fuzzy and inconsistent memories is that he recently survived a brain tumor. That's been part of the plan for a while. Including an ACTUAL brain injury would just sell her lie more.

There's no guarantee that ANY of these details are making it into the final story; It's a lot of extra stuff to add on top of what is already a very complicated mish-mash of ideas. But I'm already researching to see if it's something I can portray accurately and in an inoffensive (or even empowering) way.

Anyway, i should figure out what to name the dog.

[gabessquishytum]

Hey, Gabe. I’m so happy you're doing better and taking time for yourself.

I've had this thought percolating in the back of my brain for a little while, for Dream and Hob, and their darling wives, Calliope and Eleanor to have a lovely poly/qpr style thing happening, because, as much as I love all the romantic, sexy, and unhinged shenanigans on here, I would like to see something similar to my own situation floating about.

Dream and Hob have been attached at the hip since childhood, when Hob punched another kid for trying to kick them out of the sand pit. They love each other fiercely and have been through all the ups and downs of adolescence: the conflict of who they were as individuals, the struggle to stay together in a world that told them they were too close, exploring sexual identities, mapping out their dreams of the future, and last, but not least, figuring out how to share with a dating partner.

It's surprisingly difficult to find someone that doesn't assume you're cheating on them with your best friend when you're so close. If they trust sex isn't happening, they tend to get angry about the casual intimacy. Feeling blocked by or jealous of the already established bond.

At one point, Dream and Hob's friends told them they were so close they should try dating each other. So they did. Sadly, it wasn't meant to be. The sex was fun and engaging. They learned a lot about themselves, explored kinks and the kink community. There wasn't another person's feelings they had to navigate, but beyond the lust there was no spark of romance, no passionate love, no mystery. There was comfort, devotion, and the soft, mellow love of their friendship.

They amicably broke up with a new, physical dimension to their friendship that only made dating harder in the end. Still, they persisted.

Eventually, Hob met a wonderful, dark-haired woman named Eleanor. She was fiery and beautiful, willing to barge into Dream and Hob's life and demand they make room for her. She was a raging river, filling in the ravines and creating estuaries where Dream and Hob had long ago learned they didn't meet. She was new life and new paths, and Hob fell hard and fast.

There’s a certain point, early on, in a relationship where you have to explain the complex dynamic between you and your best friend. It's the breaking point for many people. It's hard, to share, to be unintentionally excluded, to learn secrets from a third party, but the people that stand their ground and thrive are breathtaking.

Eleanor, when she is told, demands space. She does research, talks to people in similar situations, takes the time to suss out her own feelings, tries to feel out the edges of compromise and expectation she requires. In the end, she flows back into their lives with a willingness to try and an adventurous gleam in her eye.

She proposes a new dynamic between the three of them. She wishes to pursue a romantic relationship with Hob, but wants to learn how comfortable she can be with Dream in the bedroom.

Hob's quick to assure her that he and Dream don't have physical relations when dating.

Eleanor, brave woman that she is, tries to explain why she thinks that's part of the problem they have with dating. They're so entwined in each other's life that removing them from one area only causes more stress. “You're practically married already,” she snorts. “You just need to find people who can live with that. I’m willing to try. Are you?”

It takes work and patience, respect and communication. They still hurt each other. Life gets in the way. People judge them and cause problems. They make it, in the end, to a place where they are content and no one is left out. Eleanor and Hob are happily married. Dream has a special place in their hearts and marriage bed whenever he needs or wants.

Years pass, Dream has proof now, that he can have romance and his best friend. That he doesn't have to sacrifice a portion of his heart for love. He has taken lovers, tried to bring them into the dance that is his relationship with Hob and Eleanor. Reluctance, timidity, and selfishness ended those relationships. At some point, Dream starts to give up, maybe Eleanor was special, a miracle.

This is, of course, when someone new enters the scene.

Calliope, stunning and witty, drifts on the edge of their existence, darting forward and back to a tune only she can hear. She flirts, flutters, and flees. She's looking for something and she won't be caught until she wishes it.

Dream watches her from the corner of his eye, intrigued and wary. He watches, in the hopes of learning what he can before approaching. He knows what to look for now, those early signs that will tell him if she wouldn't be a good fit. He isn't nearly as subtle as he wishes.

It doesn't take long for to Calliope notice. She glides closer, flitting back when others pursue.

There are clues to be found in who she lets close, and why. The outline of what she wants takes shape as partner after partner fails to meet certain criteria.

They start to circle each other at parties, a corkscrew winding tighter and tighter. He waits with hard learned patience. She slowly grows bolder.

Eleanor and Hob poke gentle fun at him, waiting on the sidelines, wishing him well. No matter how it ends, he'll always have them.

When Dream and Calliope finally crash together it's quiet, a gentle brush of fingers, a soft touch at the hip or arm. There are walks and dinners and music. They go to theaters and museums and libraries. She slots into Dream's life seamlessly, confidently.

There are the typical growing pains of partnerships and cohabitation, discovering how to be part of a couple separate from Hob and Eleanor, and learning where the four of them line-up and interlock.

People outside the relationship try to cause problems at times. They look at Dream and Eleanor or Calliope and Hob and notice how visually similar they are and accusations of cheating fly around. Sometimes someone close-minded will notice their closeness and try to enforce ridiculous religious views. Those that are covetous and jealous try to tear them apart.

They've worked too hard to let such things tear them apart.

Dream looks up one day to realize he’s curled against Hob's chest, in love and happy. Eleanor and Calliope are plotting something a few feet away, smiling. The future is unfolding before him, full of laughter and affection, understanding and belonging. The long journey and heartache was worth it.

—🏵

This is such a delightful and loving depiction of a beautiful poly/qpr relationship! I particularly love the way that Dream and Hob manage to work out their situation in the way you've described. Because not all friendships are meant to develop into romantic relationships, and platonic love certainly isn't worth less than romantic love. I genuinely enjoy the idea of them trying out romantic dating for a week and mutually deciding that it just isn't meant to be! The way they express love (romantically) is so different - Dream is all wild grand gestures and extremes, and Hob just. Isn't about that life. It just isn't going to work, and that's absolutely okay because the sex is still wonderful, and they're still best friends. They still want to grow old together, doing kinky things occasionally. They've both kind of accepted that they're lucky to have each other, and wanting more is probably a bit greedy.

But it's okay to be greedy.

With Eleanor and Calliope, life is never dull. In the large house where the four of them live, there is always music. Always laughter too, unless somebody is upset - then the other three will descend on them, and do everything they can to make it better. There is always a queue for the bathroom (even though they have more than one bathroom, all four of them tend to gravitate together into one space - you'll find Hob trying to shave while Calliope does her makeup and Dream tries to shower and Eleanor sits on the loo singing along to the radio). Somebody is always available for a cuddle (it's usually Dream who wants a cuddle, or some kind of physical touch, and it's great because he never has to worry about being too much. there are three people to take the load). Sex is just... easy. Even if somebody doesn't want to participate, they're always welcome to watch.

Hob loves silly jokes, loves it when Eleanor says "this is my husband Robert, and this is my husband's boyfriend, Dream". But he also secretly loves arguing with people who are rude about their relationship. He loves it even more when he's able to throw a punch. Dream and Eleanor might try to hold him back, but he can always rely on Calliope to join him for a scrap. She's taught him some wonderful Greek insults.

And life is basically very good. Turns out that more partners DOES equal more happiness, as Hob loves to say. Dream will never admit it but Hob is generally absolutely right.

[sicksadlit]

An author stole my book idea

What do you do when someone else publishes your book?

I was scrolling on my phone, browsing a selection of soon-to-be-released books when one in particular caught my eye.

I read the blurb and let out an audible gasp. 

The author stole my book idea. 

This man who I’ve never met, somehow managed to reach inside my brain, pluck out my story idea, write the book I am writing right now, and turn it into a fully fledged novel. He beat me to print, and now the novel I’ve been working on for the last few months is headed for the trash because how can I continue to write a story that has already been written?

It feels like my “life's work” has been stolen, cruelly whipped away from me overnight. The story that has been building and percolating inside me for years, preparing itself to arrive in my brain and out onto the page.

An accurate depiction of me discovering someone else is publishing the book I’m writing

Although, it’s possible that he didn’t actually steal my idea. It’s probable even because he couldn’t have. I don’t even know the guy. The far more likely scenario is that it is just an astonishing coincidence. He happened to have the exact same book idea at the same time as me, but the difference is: he’s a well known, successful, professional crime writer who actually managed to finish the story (and probably did a fantastic job), and I am an unpublished novice writer, who punches out a few hundred words here and there when inspiration strikes.

The best theory as to what has happened is that I have become the victim of a phenomena known as “simultaneous invention”.

Simultaneous invention is the concept that inventions and ideas are conceived independently by different creators, but at the same time.

“Rather than being the products of the individual mind, multiples (aka - simultaneous discoveries) are said to prove that creative ideas are the effects of the zeitgeist, or spirit of the times. At a specific instant in the history of a domain, the time becomes ripe for a given idea. The idea is “in the air” for anyone to pick, making its inception inevitable.” - Dean Keith Simonton, creativity researcher

There are mind-boggling cases of simultaneous invention documented throughout history. Here are some of the most famous instances:

1600s: Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz both discover calculus.

1770s: Carl Wilhelm Scheele and Joseph Priestley discover oxygen.

1800s: Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace both describe natural selection.

1839: Louis Daguerre and Henry Fox Talbot invent the first photographic methods.

1869: Louis Ducos du Hauron and Charles Cros present the earliest workable methods of colour photography on the same day.

1876: Elisha Gray and Alexander Graham Bell independently, on the same day, filed patents for invention of the telephone.

1879: British physicist-chemist Joseph Swan independently developed an incandescent light bulb at the same time as American inventor Thomas Edison was independently working on his incandescent light bulb.

1950s: Jonas Salk and Albert Bruce Sabin invent the polio vaccine.

2015: Takaaki Kajita and Arthur B. McDonald are jointly awarded the Nobel prize for finding that neutrinos have mass.

It sounds like something from a Blake Crouch novel. The idea that two complete strangers, anywhere in the world could come up with the exact idea at the same time. It would be written off as pure science fiction if it weren’t so thoroughly documented. 

It came for Charles Darwin, it came for Alexander Bell, and now, it has come for me.

Since I’ve had a solid 48 hours to walk around the house moaning in despair, I figure it’s probably time to put my big girl pants on and think about what to do next.

What does one do when someone else publishes the book you were going to write?

If there’s one thing this sad experience has taught me, it’s this: Do not sleep on that creative idea.

I thought I had all the time in the world to write my story. Donna Tartt took 9 years to write The Secret History, after all. Maybe I could take 9 years to write my debut novel too. But modern life and our shared experience may lead to someone else coming to the same conclusions – or ideas – as you have, somewhere in the world. 

This doesn’t just apply to writing. It can happen in any field where creativity and imagination are at play. 

Where does this leave me and my manuscript? I think I’ll hold onto it a little longer before sending it to my computer’s trash bin forever. Even though the original premise and core of the story is no longer viable, perhaps there’s something there worth saving. Maybe a shift in perspective or narrative voice. Could it be a white collar crime thriller instead of a murder? Could I set it in a different era? Could I change the genre? Who knows. Maybe this whole saga is a good thing and will force me to pivot. Now, I’m compelled to look at how I can better improve upon what the story was set to become. 

One of the people in my writer's group said that this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If his book sells well, publishers will be frothing to produce more of the same. That said, I’m not sure how I feel about being the runner-up for the prize of cool and interesting story ideas. 

So what’s the solution to this confounding mystery of the human mind? How can you ensure your work remains true and original to you when at any point in time, some random person out in the world might be working on the exact same thing? 

Maybe the answer is to simply try and be the first to launch, and to do your best not to let perfectionism hold you back from getting started. Maybe done is better than perfect. Or, if you instead find yourself in the same boat as me, is there room to move and change your approach? Could you see it as an opportunity to pivot and find a fresh, unexpected angle?

The truth is, I was stuck in a bit of a rut anyway. I fell out of love with the story idea a few weeks back. When I started writing months ago, I kicked off with a hiss and a roar, smashing my daily word count goal and picking up steam until I hit a wall. I didn’t like the characters and writing became a slog. Instead of feeling inspired and excited by the story, I felt bored and disillusioned. It became something I thought I simply had to finish to avoid the “sunk cost fallacy”.

This uncanny coincidence has forced me to open doors to new possibilities with the story that I hadn’t allowed myself to consider before. Now that the original plan has gone out the window, the idea of returning to the old draft feels strangely exciting again. Like anything is possible and the book could go in any direction. 

But I guess you’ll just have to wait and see… Maybe I’ve already said too much.

[vidavalor]

So I was re-reading the Fish meta just now trying to figure out where taramasalata would go in all that, when the thought occurred -- I don't know if there are many sushi restaurants in the South Downs, so A. and/or C. might get into doing home-made stuff (e.g. from 'Sushi For Dummies or smth); do you think Ineffable Husbands speak would make a distinction between restaurant vs home-made sushi?

Hi, love! Your Asks always make me hungry lol. 💕 What I think your ask has to do with bacon, Hamlet, coffee, the "fomenting" of 597 AD, The British Museum Cafe, the kimchi that Brenda so desperately needed to bitch about to Her Ron in S1, and a hidden language joke related to Crowley's 1941 hat under the cut. (Sorry this one took a minute-- your Ask got my brain percolating a bit. 😊)

One of the reasons why I think it's sushi that Crowley & Aziraphale chose to go out for on their sneaky dinners circa 2008 is that sushi is predominantly made up of fish (usually raw but not always) wrapped up in fermented rice. I'm not an expert in the history of sushi but one thing I have learned about it is that it was originally invented as a way to preserve fish for longer back in ancient times when there wasn't a way to keep fish chilled. Then, it was called narezushi.

Narezushi involved salting fish after skinning and gutting it, then letting it ferment for a few months in the salt, before then removing the salt and stuffing and covering it with rice, and fermenting for even longer. Fish would be stored in rice for the better part of the year and, much of the time, the rice wouldn't actually be eaten afterwards-- just the fish. Over time, it evolved into the sushi that we know today, which is still made with a kind of fermented rice. Fermentation is the same process used to make alcohol and several different kinds of bread-- including black bread and sourdough, the two Crowley and Aziraphale are coded as being.

In bread, the yeast in the fermenting process is what causes the dough to rise and in alcohol, it's the ethanol fermentation that turns the sugars in the fruit or grain into alcohol. We know that bread, fish, and alcohol are all common sex euphemisms in different ways in their speak so what's with the focus on fermentation?

I think it's a couple of things at once. One is that fermentation is an analogy for arousal. Another is that, in talking about sushi and fish-- things like pickled herring, etc., as well that also are about preserving fish-- there's also a romantic sense to it. They've been together a long time. Food that can be made to age-- wine, cheese, pickled and preserved fish and other food, etc..-- is food that lasts a long time, if not as long as they do. It's bits of the past carrying into the present. Still another aspect to it would be a nod to delayed gratification. If a food involves fermentation and can last longer than most other food, it's analogous to aspects of things like edging that are alluded to in a half-dozen or so different scenes.

The last reason, though, could be because it reminds them of 597 AD and the brief bit of ferment/foment/frumenty wordplay confusion.

I wrote about this at one point I think already but the jokes in this scene are based around the fact that they both keep saying or thinking of words that sound like "ferment." Crowley says he's "spreading foment"-- a word that does mean spreading discord but also is used to describe oils/potions applied with warm water. Foment is bath soaks and Crowley is super uncomfortable in that suits and knows Aziraphale is too so he's all let's quit and go take a bath.

Aziraphale gets that Crowley is wordplay-flirting with him (showing up and posing with "and you have found your [little] death" made that a bit clear) but he is confused by what the hell foment is because they usually flirt in food terms. Aziraphale thinks Crowley is going for a food euphemism-- "is that some kind of porridge?"-- because there was a new porridge called frumenty that had come up around the same time and that sounds like a word that Aziraphale could see Crowley using-- it's food, it's phonetically linked to fruit, even!-- but Crowley clarifies that, no, he was using foment. What is extra-confusing is that both words link to ferment and the process of fermentation, which is already a thing for them.

Crowley makes his meaning more clear and they figure out what each other is saying but it's a fun scene because Aziraphale just assuming that Crowley was trying to food-flirt with him then makes this one of the scenes in the series that make it more obvious that they are, in fact, doing just that. (Otherwise, you have to think that Aziraphale thought Crowley got dressed in a knight's outfit and schlepped around a damp woods spreading actual porridge and why on Earth would Aziraphale think that was an actual answer to what Crowley was up to? lol)

Later scenes suggest that it's in 597 AD as a result of the ferment/foment/frumenty conversation that Crowley and Aziraphale experimented and figured out the truth about their ability to do miracles and this is suggested in a few places, like we looked at in other metas, as to be how they figured out they could have all the sex without killing each other. That... seems like it would place fermentation in a pretty revered position in Ineffable Husbands Speak lol so whether they're getting sushi from a restaurant or making it at home, fish with a history related to fermentation seems like it would be top of the list for sexy dinner night.

One of the other jokes about fermented food in the series is about one of the most famous examples of it-- kimchi-- and it's the one in the scene where Aziraphale possesses Madame Tracy during one of her "psychic sessions." Crowley and Aziraphale refer to possession in highly-sexualized terms, to the point that when Aziraphale appeared to Crowley after being discorporated and they started talking about Aziraphale needing to possess someone to get back to Earth, the "receptive body", etc. innuendo is just blatant and not at all coded.

Brenda chose to take the time Aziraphale gave her to speak to her husband to go on to Ron about how scandalized she was to be served Korean food at the wedding she recently attended and it's when she starts to talk about "the kimchi" being brought out, that is when Ron finally flips out and loses it at her from beyond the grave, right? Poor Ron never got any fermentation in life and he's not about to keep being tormented in death. 😂 Not exactly an example of true passion, Brenda and Her Ron were...

After the whole interlude is over, we hear King of All Fermenting Aziraphale pause and then dryly remark: "Wasn't that touching?" Hilarious in its own right and a comment that Crowley would have found even funnier, since neither touching sentiment nor physical touching seemed to be very prevalent in the sad marriage of Brenda and Ron. They could have done with eating a bit more kimchi.

I do think Crowley & Aziraphale would differentiate between homemade and restaurant sushi, if only for the fun with messing with the words-- because I think they subtly actually already are from some other scenes in the series.

We heard in S2 that one of their alternate rendezvous spots is The British Museum Cafe, which is pretty hilarious from an euphemistic standpoint. They had to pick a place that they could be said to have just been in at the same time should they get caught and also museums are the indoor versions of public parks in spycraft stories but we've also seen them use restaurant/cafe/place that provides food euphemistically for a lover. The two of them meeting each other in secret in the cafe of The British Museum when they are literally older than dirt is just very funny. What kind of cafes are they to each other? The kind related to the stuff that's been here forever-- the ones that provide coffee and lunch and snacks amongst all the fossils and ancient art.

Cafe and restaurant-- like rendezvous-- are also obviously French loaner words in English; they are French words that have been absorbed into common use in English. When you say them in a sentence, you are, technically, speaking two languages at once. There is a technical name for that and it's related to something that lives in plain sight in the bookshop so we'll come back to that in a second...

Cafe is also obviously the French word for coffee. Coffee, in GO, seems to live at the symbolic intersection of sex and America. (A very complicated intersection lol.) There are other posts around these parts about coffee and its role in the American Revolution and all the American symbolism in Give Me Coffee or Give Me Death in S2. Coffee as a beverage in the whole food-and-drink thing, though, is a drink produced by grinding together coffee beans, which are actually seeds, which really feels like another meta at this point so getting to that Seeds of Destruction post soon...

Crowley and Aziraphale are actually also drinking coffee after wine at The Ritz in S1 and Crowley is being pouty about Aziraphale having put him on half-rations of late while in his angel feelings and not talking to him about those feelings as much as Crowley would like when he tells Nina this is what he wants to drink:

Share them frozen peas, Aziraphale... Anyway, if that's restaurants and cafes, then do they also already have a concept of home? I think they do and we can see it in some of the words they're using.

The word home itself has a rather interesting history, especially from a GO-related perspective. It's related to the root words of ham and hem (food/seamstressing.) You can see some of that linguistic history still remaining to this day in what we call a little human settlement that isn't quite as big as a full-on town-- a hamlet.

Yes, really lol. Of all the plays for them to have attended, eh? Yet another reason for it having been Hamlet, in addition to the content of the play itself. (My favorite being that Burbage is mixed in louder around them at The pangs of despised love/the law's delay/the insolence of office and the spurns... Yep.) Whickber Street could also be described as a hamlet within London Soho and Aziraphale is largely responsible for having developed it. But what about the bookshop itself? Is it a home for both of them within the hamlet?

You've undoubtedly heard the idiom "home is where you hang your hat" and we've seen in several scenes that the in-universe explanation for Terry Pratchett's hat hanging on Aziraphale's hatstand in the bookshop is that it's Crowley's hat from 1941. This isn't just a visual, literal execution of that idiom but also a different joke related to the hatstand, not the hat, and wordplay.

One, old-time-y word for a coat rack/hat stand like Aziraphale has in the bookshop is a portmanteau. This word means a half-dozen different things, including also a large, old-fashioned trunk that would have been used as a suitcase. While these are literal things-- physical objects-- the word portmanteau also has meanings when it comes to languages.

In linguistics, the word portmanteau can be used to refer to two different kinds of language things, both of which involve words that are blended together.

When we use words from more than one language in a sentence together, the sentence could be defined as a portmanteau. Most of us make these kinds of sentences without consciously intending to do so and fairly often-- especially with relation to food. Like the use of the words restaurant and cafe in sentences spoken in English that we mentioned above.

Aziraphale is actually making a pun about portmanteaus in S2 when he uses jardiniere in his French sentence because the word jardiniere exists in French but is also a loaner word in English, where it has come to mean a garden box/flower planter. It's French that was adopted into English, which altered its meaning a bit, and then Aziraphale puts it back into the sentence he's speaking-- which is all otherwise in French-- but using its English-language-derived meaning to form the innuendo. He's made a portmanteau in the process.

This isn't the only linguistic meaning of portmanteau, though. The other is actually the even more commonly used one and it's a word that is created out of mashing up two or more words together. One example is popsicle (pop, as in soda pop + icicle = popsicle) which is the American word for one of the desserts they buy during the body swap scene in the park. Another relevant to Crowley and Aziraphale is breakfast (break + fast, the meal they're getting-- no matter the time of day lol-- when it's been a minute since they were together but which, ironically, it doesn't seem they actually have a lot when it comes to literal food itself, since there's suggestion that they're not usually together in the mornings.)

A portmanteau-the-hat-stand is also an umbrella stand... The S2 posters with the umbrellas... Frou frou cocktails with little umbrellas... All of these things-- hats, umbrellas, wings, etc..-- provide the same function as another word we've heard recently:

They're all canopies... and so is the bookshop, really, as it's a form of shelter that keeps them safe and under the roof of which they've probably had their share of vavoomy kisses... The portmanteau where Crowley hangs his hat in the bookshop-- a place full of words in books and wordplay with his partner-- is a physical representation of wordplay that relates to the word used to describe different words and languages blended together, like how they're trying to do together as best as they can through the bonkers circumstances we've seen them in.

But we're not quite done with a concept of home yet because let's go back to ham for a minute... So, we talk about fish a lot in these here parts but not so much about jokes related to meat and since ham is now home, let's get into the meat and potatoes of it. (*groan* I know... that one was beneath me lol.)

In S2, meat became a whole damn thing after we had the ox ribs scene, right? The first food Aziraphale ever ate was (a lot of) meat, which feels right and just for the self-proclaimed The Southern Pansy... but meat had been lingering around in the wordplay already for a bit-- including in God's intro to Crowley & Aziraphale in S1.

The word meat is, of course, a homophone for the word meet.

Just as God uses "quarter" twice in her opening monologue in 1.01 and encourages us to look at multiple meanings of words in doing so, She uses "meeting" twice in her intro to the St. James' Park scene that serves as a paragraph of language lessons in Ineffable Husbands Speak. The word is used in the first and last sentences and with relation to the multiple meanings of clandestine meetings that are happening on and under the surface-- secret agents, secret lovers, and secret language within the world of both of those.

While there's the secret agent comparison happening, there's also the other connotation of a secret meeting and God encourages us to bring in historical context to what's happening on the surface by saying that St. James' Park "is and always has been" the best place in London for a clandestine meeting. It doesn't take more than a brief Google search to learn that St. James' Park was originally one of the most notorious hookup parks of history-- making it then already amusing in S1 when God then finishes her intro by saying that Crowley and Aziraphale "have been meeting here" in St. James' Park "for quite some time." After S2, though, this is even funnier.

Meeting here, did you say, God?

Probably also worth mentioning that another way to have said that sentence is "Crowley and Aziraphale have been coming here for quite some time" since you go to a meeting and... yeah lol.

Or, in S2, when Aziraphale flirts with Crowley during the party they're having in their home by telling him that he was hosting a business meeting and then holds out a tray of vol-au-vents in a knowing imitation of how Crowley once did with the ox ribs.

As we all know, ham is meat that comes from a pig. When you crisp that meat up, it's called something else-- bacon. The word bacon comes from the same root words as that of the word back-- a word with two meanings that cross together when it comes to a sense of home made with a romantic partner.

We have bacon coming from the word back as a noun-- referring to a part of the body-- but the word back is also a verb that refers to returning to a place. This is referred to more frequently as coming back and now we've, well, come back to wordplay around the verb to come... not unexpectedly lol. Your home is the place where you hang your hat and to which you keep returning.

Crowley leaves the house during the 2.01 argument and then returns and dramatically announces: "I'm back."

The bacon has come back home, should Aziraphale wish for any makeup meating at any time. Glasses off and everything.

Aziraphale drolly replies: "Yes. I can see that."

"I can (container, often for food) see (homophone: sea) that (contains hat)." Welcome home, dear. Guess who will be doing a dance?

Remember Muriel in the tie-in notes describing Crowley as "grumpy + nice" and musing that this new word could be called "grice"?

As we looked at in another meta, the word already exists and a grice is a pig. And Harmony describing Crowley as "a swine" in 1941? It's from pigs that we get ham (home) and bacon (coming back, returning to that home) and Crowley and Aziraphale keep being tied to pigs... which is a word that can also be used to refer to those with a dirty sense of humor.

Furthering that, there is the other, non-pig definition of grice, which refers to being someone who is very enthusiastic about trains.

Within grice though is also, of course, the word rice...

...and ice, which replaced fermentation in fish preservation...

...and, so, back at the sushi we arrive. 🐠

Meta the Ask references for anyone who is wondering what we're on about regarding fish:

[goodluckclove]

Writer ask game, let's go. 10, 19, 38, and 39 please c:<

Shit. Oh shit, oh fuck.

Okay yeah let's do this, Mushy.

10. Do you set yourself deadlines?

I mean I definitely used to. I've said before that I got my start in National Novel Writing in a Month, or NaNoWriMo, where you write 50k words in 30 days. The org has since proven itself to be less than reputable with its recent scandal, but I still stand by the belief that endurance sprints like that are a great way to get the muscle formed to write long-form projects. And you can just do it too, you don't need the backing of a semi-scammy nonprofit.

But now? Not really. I kind of set goals to keep work moving. I'll be like hope I finish editing by the end of this week. But I very rarely make it a hard deadline with actual...I don't know. Stakes? My brain don't work like that.

19. How do you keep yourself motivated?

I stand by the methodology of giving yourself a little reward after writing sessions, although at this point I space mine out more than I would suggest newer writers to. For me this is usually a fun drink or nice little baked good - I'm especially fond of what I refer to as a medium-fancy cake. Something with mousse. But it can be anything really.

Small breaks also help, although I am less good at keeping up with that. I actually haven't taken a full day off in like three weeks but shh don't tell anyone. I'm also very fond of reading over what I've already written and just enjoying it. Or reading books that relate to my character's interests - I'm reading a very interesting book on bird lore that I know Edgar from Songbird Elegies would love.

38. Weirdest story idea you’ve ever had

My weirdest play is probably Naked Lunch: The Musical, which follows a happy-go-lucky, classic musical lover who gets roped into adapting the essentially grindhouse experimental William S. Burroughs novel into a musical and goes a little insane in the process. He imagines himself befriending the ghost of William S. Burroughs, and the ghosts convinces him that to adapt his work properly he needs to do a lot of drugs and have a lot of gay sex, both of which go very poorly. I think Lin Manuel Miranda is mentioned as an unseen side character that my protagonist sees in the audience and threatens to beat up?

And my weirdest novel turned play is Bloodletting, which is based from a dream I had when I was detoxing off of weed - I was like addicted, not a casual stoner. I essentially dreamt that someone made me drink their blood and the blood got me high again, and from that point I developed a sort of sci-fi world where street drugs are so potent that they turn the blood of addicts into a new intoxicant that they can then sell as its own drug. I think they can also sell their blood to major medical organizations and have it used in pharmaceuticals. I still like this concept and might reuse it since I can't find the finished play it turned into.

39. Weirdest character concept you’ve ever had

Bloodletting had a romantic couple made up of a drug dealer and the AI house he was squatting in. My second novel had a leitmotif of the characters experiencing a feeling of "static" in their heads that I later on made into a sentient side character. I think I wrote a short play with a cannibalistic Guy Fieri. I started writing another play based around Sonic the Hedgehog where it was planned for Shadow to non-ironically become a rabbi, but frankly if you consider his character I do not think that's too far from canon.

I'm still percolating a project to do either alongside or after Songbird that's like Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City but with an all-robot cast. And the main character eventually transitions from a human-passing robot to some form of non-human looking machine and is much happier for it. Which I'm excited to put to paper.

[prophecydungeon]

thoughts on the final shape now that i have Percolated (tl;dr net positive)

gonna get the cranky negatives out of the way first: it's been, you know, seven years of D2, and i'm still not happy with how often they pull the You Are The™ Guardian™ thing. like, the whole point is that we're a whole swarm of weird space zombies with science magic powers. yes this is about the cutscene after excision. at just about every point in time that the narrative has been all You Are The Only Guy! it would have been totally possible to either pull in an NPC to be The Guy or to be like, this fireteam, this cohort, whatever. i like the way in which cayde went away - it was obvious from the start that he wasn't gonna stick around, duh - but that could have easily been turned into something like... idk, ghosts across sol are fading and he steps in to do the thing to everyone all at once. now there's this weird narrative hole where 12 guardians all had their ghosts cork it and... 12 caydes all did the thing?

but overall the excision cutscenes were cheesy but sweet, and i cried during the ghost one because how can you not, and excision as a whole was fun and weird and chaotic. really cool way to wrap up a raid and i'd love to see destiny do this kind of thing again.

crow as a character has a weird shape in my brain because i feel like i've just gotten bits and pieces of his involvement with the vanguard, especially since i played through lightfall and like 2 weeks of defiance and then went "well this is shit" and put the game down for 10 months. in spite of that, i liked the way he was involved with this storyline - he's already doing the job, ikora and zavala already trust and depend on him to do the job, and he really just needed a nudge. the fact that the nudge came from the no.1 source of his guilt was fittingly done and i liked it a lot.

and cayde! admittedly i am kind of a cayde hater. i liked him when i played through vanilla D1, TDB, and HoW, and then in TTK he became Funnee Quip Machine and my interest in him dropped to approximately zero. vanilla D2 did not fix this. WM/CoO did not fix this. forsaken only sort of fixed this, in the sense that he was not in the game anymore. when the first TFS trailer dropped, a solid 80% of my lack of interest in the DLC was the fact that CaYdE iS bAcK and i was just. like. i was already done with him! the game and community had finally shut up about him and now we're dragging the dead horse back to center stage. AND i'm burnt out on this game and haven't enjoyed the stories or lore for a long time.

HOWEVER, by the end of the first mission i was fully sold on cayde's presence in the DLC. it really felt like he got to be a character again; he had his funny and charming moments, yeah, but he also got to be a whole person outside of Funnee Quip Machine and that immediately made me enjoy and respect this DLC. he got to be frustrated and freaked out and concerned and reckless, he got to be a mentor in a genuine way and a silly way, and he was enjoyable to be around.

other positives: the gameplay was fantastic and i had a great time on legendary with Fireteam One Braincell as usual, and the structure of the story missions felt exceptionally great this time around. they leaned a lot into the raid/dungeon playbook of "introduce mechanic -> complicate mechanic -> chaotify mechanic" in a way that i really enjoyed and that the three of us had a lot of fun with; probably the best legendary campaign we've gotten of the three in terms of gameplay. i also liked that there wasn't a lot of fetch-questing in between the story missions and that most of that was saved for the After.

i also like that, you know, as per usual, we really didn't get all the answers and nothing wrapped up completely. i'm only partway through micah-10's stuff but i'm enjoying her a lot as a character and also really enjoying the lore we've been getting. there's a lot to do post-story and the amount is honestly kind of overwhelming (and the UI is kind of a mess...) but i'm very interested in it all!

i'm curious to see how the episodes pan out, especially as someone who's disliked the seasonal storylines for uhhhhh a few years now. my primary beef with the seasons has basically been that like... each story has felt like a constant loop of "OH GOD THE WORLD IS ENDING OH FUCK YOU HAVE TO SAVE THE UNIVERSE okieeeee we're good this week :) OH GOD THE WORLD IS ENDING" and the stakes just don't feel like stakes anymore. i loved the first handful of seasons we got, back when bungie was still trying to figure it out; the black armory and gambit prime and the menagerie all felt like reasonable and realistic Happenings™ that deserved the vanguard's attention between massive events such as "holy fuck uldren killed cayde" and "the fuck you mean 'moon's haunted'". shadowkeep's slow progression of stakes felt really great, and then beyond light's seasons were kind of all over the place with stakes. other seasons have had decent stakes but i've disliked the writing for other reasons (eg. i'm also a drifteris hater, i HATED rasputin's "sacrifice", the less said about defiance the better, etc.), so... i guess we'll see. tentatively feeling positive! but we'll see how the season episode starts next week.

this DLC didn't completely rewrite my entire brain the way forsaken did, but it was still very good. i think i would have been a lot more into the post-story stuff in the witch queen if i hadn't been at the very edge of being totally burnt out on D2 (after, you know, playing nonstop since forsaken) but over the past few days i've found myself really excited to jump back in and keep exploring, so i'm gonna hang onto that feeling.

[because-she-goes]

waiting for you

warnings: swearing, alcohol, cowboy!matty, bartender!matty, pining for each other, slow burn. Enjoy!

The lights were dim and the air was filled with the smell of leather and smoke. The sound of electric guitar, people talking and glasses clinking percolated around the bar. Neon signs buzzed and hummed above you as you fixed your hat. The staw hat had become slightly more and more crooked as the night progressed and you became more drunk off the rum and cokes the bartender kept passing to you. Today had been a rough day, your boss had scolded you about leaving papers on his desk in front of the whole office, you spilled coffee down your brand new blouse, your heels were digging into your achilles tendon and that’s not even to mention how you had ran out of gas on the way to work and had to call your work friend Mona to carpool you both there. Needless to say, you needed to take the edge off, enjoy your Friday night in peace and forget about your 9-5 for a bit. Taking a long sip and finishing the rest of the rum and coke in front of you, letting the liquor burn your throat.

“How was the drink, darling? Want another or something different?” The voice grabs your attention. Looking up at the bartender, first noticing the chunky rings that adorn his hands. Then the salt and pepper curls being held back by a clump of gel. Then his eyes, holy fuck his eyes. And god his outfit was good, a tight white tank top with a seemingly vintage flannel thrown over it and some baggy blue jeans. Shaking your head to wake yourself up a bit and bring you back to reality, you remember he asked you a question.

“It was really good, but I’ll try something different! Dealer’s choice.” You answer him, eyes now locked onto his.

“Okay, do you like sweet, bitter or sour?” He asks, eyes taking a glance at your lips. You silently thank god you remembered chapstick and lipstick today.

“…sweet.” you reply simply, taking a glace at his stupidly perfectly pink lips. You take a moment to think how they would feel pressed against your pulse point on your neck, teeth nipping. You let out a sigh as he nods and gets to work.

You watch his skilled hands move around the bar as he grabs the different ingredients for whatever he has in mind… vodka, peach schnapps, orange juice, then cranberry juice. In a shaker with some ice, he puts one and a half ounces of vodka, a half ounce of peach schnapps, and then two ounces of each of the juices. You gulp as you watch his biceps flex as he shakes the cocktail around until you notice the condensation form around his knuckles. Oh dear fucking god.

He pours out the sunset-toned liquid into a glass with pebble ice and places 2 cherries on top delicately. “Here ya go, sweetheart. Let me know how you like it.”

You take a sip and barely hold back a moan at how sweet and lovely the drink is. “Oh my god, this is good! What is it called so I can order it next time I’m out?” You ask, going in for another sip.

He waits until the rim of the glass touches your lips and then says “It’s a sex on the beach, babygirl…” Your brain short circuits at that and you cough up a bit of the drink.

He giggles and hands you a napkin. “Everything okay, muffin? You alright there?”

“Yeah… yeah I’m good, just-just took me by surprise is all!” He laughs a bit more as you wipe your mess a little… noticing an orange stain blooming on his white tank top.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry about your shirt!” You damn near shriek, reaching over the bar to wipe it with a napkin before it dried.

“Oh it’s okay, babygirl. I always keep a spare in my car for times like this haha - wanna take a walk with me? I’m due for my 15 minute break now anyways.” He offers, already walking to join you in the front of the bar. He holds out a hand and you take it, walking out to the back with him as he yells to the other bartender to cover him for a bit.

In the parking lot, you see the most beautiful red vintage Ford Bronco. He unlocks it quickly and grabs the extra shirt out of his backseat, silently swearing to himself how the shirt got ruined and he had just washed it that morning. He takes a minute to make sure you’re still okay as you lean against the driver’s side door. He sees your green eyes gleam in the moonlight and his whole body relaxes - he could never be mad at someone so beautiful, so pure, so lovely.

He wipes his hands of the alcohol being spilled while he made drinks, mixed with the dirt under his fingernails from being at the ranch that morning - he helps where he can and plus the extra money doesn’t hurt. You take another look at his hands and arms as he’s distracted and notice the very slight farmer’s tan and warm honey toned skin that graces his forearms. He peels off the dirty tank top and your heart stops when you spot his slight happy trail and abdomen flexing as he stretches.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer, buttercup!” He speaks into the night sky, a laugh hidden under his breath. Swapping the shirts, he places the clean one on and throws on a baseball hat since the gel was starting to come loose and his hair began to fall in his eyes as he worked.

“S-Sorry, you’re just s-so pretty.” You admit bashfully, kicking the pavement below your sneakers. The drinks clearly now affecting your ability to filter your thoughts.

He steps towards you, taking your face in between his palms. Your breath hitches as you breath in his scent… marlboro reds, ginger and vanilla. Warm, spicy, a little sweet - heavenly. It takes everything in you to not just fall to your knees and collapse at his scent and him being this close to you.

“You’re prettier, angel.” His voice rough and thick with desire. You exhale shakily as he presses his body against you. A silence falls between you two, the only other sound cutting the tension being crickets chirping in the woods a stone’s throw away.

[drgnrder82]

Fictober (belated) Day 5 - Wake up call

Summary: Ali's nerves are getting the better of her with the new assignment and new partner.

Warnings: Violance (minimal)

Word Count: 814

Original Fiction

Based on characters from my serial Shutdown Syntax.

Prompt - "It's a new day, let's go!."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“It’s a new day, let’s go!” Harold Griffin heaved the mattress overhead, rolling Alison unceremoniously onto the floor. 

Patting around, bleary-eyed, Ali found a shoe under the bed, hurling it in the general direction of the damned jerk that woke her. "What time is it?" she groaned, using both arms to block the neon light cutting through the openings from the blinds. 

“6 am,” Mr. G answered. 

Does this man never sleep? 

"C'mon Ali, up and at 'em! We're already late, and I can't cover for you. Aalato's already…" 

"Oh, what stakeout? I was up all night on a stakeout," Ali continued blindly patting around for anything that would fit over her head. Pillow. Blanket. Plastic bag…

"You're on the stakeout with me. For the Coltier case." 

Finding a pillow, Ali buried herself under it and relished the sweet, sweet darkness it enveloped her in. Her brain chewed slowly on what Mr. G said. Stakeout? Stakeout. "I'm on the Miller case. Not… Coltier." If she turned just a little, he might get comfortable on the wood floor of Mr. G's apartment. Wedged between the bed and... a coffee table?

“Aalato assigned you…” 

“Because no one else can put up with your shit, Mr. G. But I’m on a case." Her mind chugged along, searching for rest. "Wait!" Ali sat up. She wasn't in her apartment... but this wasn't Mr. G's either. And this comforter? It was hers... but... looking around, Ali felt at home. This was home... so why... "Why the hell are you in my apartment!”

“The bigger question,” Private Investigator Harold Griffin sighed, “is why you’re only now asking questions.” 

BANG! 

Ali jolted awake, sweat soaking her sheets as the dream shattered. Nightmare, Ali corrected herself. Hair plastered to her neck and back. Her chest heaved, and the room slowly came into focus.

Though she was in her bed, Ali crawled to the edge, tapped the light panel on her bedside table, and… double-checked that her room was indeed hers. The pocket door separating her room from the living room lay half open like she'd left it, partially off the track. Her bundle of cords overflowed from the bin on her table. The picture of her and Mr G at her academy graduation came to life when the sensor detected her looking at it.

Ali's hand went to the new IrisLink port above her ear. Sore from the recent installation.  

Detecting her being awake, IrisLink inundated her with morning updates. Task force notes, messages, weather, traffic, and the latest bot bout news muted a moment later with an angry swipe.

Free weights lay hazardously in the middle of her claustrophobically small bedroom floor. Sensors in her room registered she'd woken, too. Faint lighting flickered to life on the ceiling, which would stay dim until the motion sensors detected more movement.

She must have woken during an approved time. Coffee percolated in the next room, even as Ali flopped back on her twin bed. 

There was no stakeout coming. But there was... a risk, for lack of a better word. Ali's first official undercover assignment… and the first time she'd rely on her new partner as her backup. 

IrisLink pinged again, wanting to show her the schedule for today. More testing at the Vanguard City Police Department's Biosecurity and Augmentation Oversight division. She had to get these nerves under control. If she couldn't… Biosecurity would call for a psych evaluation and throw the entire operation into jeopardy.

There was… one thing she could do. 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Ali settled her travel mug on the kitchen counter, considering Harold Griffin’s desk runneth over with papers—more than she ever saw in any precinct building combined. Shutting the window behind her, Ali double-checked that the fire escape remained empty, save for Mrs. Balla's bot charging via its solar panel two floors up. 

Morning sun overpowered the unnatural pink neon from Mr. Griffin's building sign. It was as invasive as Mr. G's old morning wake-up habit when Ali slept on Mr. G's couch. Morning traffic was already on the uptick; self-driving cars with impatient passengers layed on their horns. Delivery drones buzzed through the streets. Ali didn't creep but walked to Mr. G's room, practically stomping, threw open the door, and decided the edge of the bed closest to the door would be best. Good leverage. He might not hit his head on the bedside table. 

In one swift motion, she grabbed the mattress, grunting as she lifted it over her head. The springs groaned in protest as Mr. G tumbled from the land of sleep to the dismal abyss of the real world... and across the ancient, sagging mattress.

"It's a new day! Let's go!" she clapped, and the mattress landed with a heavy thunk on the box spring. "You need to drive me to my appointments."

“What the hell was that for?” Mr G complained. 

Ali shrugged. "Payback."

[phoenixfeatherquillwriting]

👻 ghost: can you tease some wip ideas that have been haunting you/something you want to write in the future?

Unfortunately I'm suffering from a curse right now where I don't so much as have full-fledged WIP ideas as I have "tropes or settings I think it would be fun to play with." Sigh. I'm hoping as I continue to get settled in my new job, I'll get some brain space freed up and the ideas will go somewhere, but for now we're just percolating.

Here's a couple of ideas I've had recently:

*Largely because of a historical fiction book I read not too long ago, I think it would be cool to write something set in ancient Egypt in the pharaoh's court. However this would require a lot of research to do right because while a lot of kids were having their ancient civilizations and associated mythologies phase, I was busy with the Greeks rather than the Egyptians. I'm used to worldbuilding-heavy projects but not as much with research heavy ones and I am...intimidated.

*I want to do something heavily based around dragons, and maybe some other mythical creatures as well! But I often feel like so much has already been said and done there, what could I add?

*Same as the above but something with vampires, return to some of my early fantasy roots.

*Sometimes I think about resurrecting older WIP ideas I posted about before, like Four at the Gates....