#it's hard to summarize it but they just ARE in each other's orbit for better or worse

[vispera-sabbath]

[thedelusionreaderbitch]

Kaz Brekker x male! Reader - Terribly Wrong

A/n: So this was really hard to write in a way for me but I hope you guys like it! Also, I do have a request so I should be finishing that up soon!

Warnings: homophobia, mentions of conversion therapy, abuse the reader doesn't think very good about himself, trauma, language, I think that's it? You have been warned!

Summary: Idk how to summarize but it ends in fluff so?...

(Not my image/art)

He was a goner.

Y/n L/n was a sweet man who was always happy, always cheerful, always trying to see the good in everything.

That was anything but the truth.

That was the mask he let everyone see, and no one had ever seen past it. They always wondered how he, someone who must have been a literal ray of sunlight had gotten himself thrown into the barrel. Now, they didn't think he wasn't capable at his job it was more the fact that he was always so happy and everything around seemed to glow when he was there.

They just didn't understand how he could be so... Good.

He wore the mask well, being very careful to never even give a hint that he might not be okay, that he might not be as perfect as they think. And he always stayed through everything for the Crows and their ruthless leader.

But the cord had been cut and he was at his end.

He always felt so wrong in this world. It was like there was everyone else then there was him and he just felt out of place.

He grew up in a very religious household his parents weren't very great either. He was told that homosexuality was a sin beyond anything and that it was the worse thing that you could do.

After his parent's death, he was set off into an orphanage where it wasn't any better. It was worse. They reinforced their beliefs by beating the kids, starving them, and even using mental tricks. On kids.

But at least most of the children (that he knew of) didn't have anything wrong with them.

He was- He was gay.

There was no easy way to say how he felt. When he had finally gotten out and got swiped up by Dirtyhands because of his skills for fighting and his skills with a bow and arrow he had felt... Relief.

But it didn't last long.

He started developing something for Kaz. Something wrong and gross, it disgusted him when he would feel butterflies for a guy. Especially if it was Kaz. It nauseated him to think that he hadn't gotten rid of it. The sin, the homosexuality.

And slowly the Crows were formed and he watched them all come together (including him) and that feeling didn't go away but he felt like had finally belonged somewhere.

It was fucking amazing.

But it came with a price.

Slowly Kaz and he had gotten closer and they were beyond the point where Kaz would try and push him away. Y/n, he tried but it was useless. Tell him straight to his face that you would look away from those deep brown eyes that could look cold but then had glimpses of gold in them.

His mind was in peril, it was in constant combat with itself. Swords would clash together, the sound ringing in his head. He just couldn't get it out of his thoughts. One part of him would remember the way Kaz had first brushed his hand against his and how it felt right. But the other side of him would be repulsed that he even thought that, that was okay.

He was a mess.

That's what got him so lost while he was looking over Ketterdam on the rooftop of the Slat. Looking over Ketterdam and its darkness. pondering what the fuck he should be doing, because damn it, he had no idea. He was going through his head trying to decide what part to listen to, and how Kaz had broken his mask and seen the real him. How he loved how his lips had brushed against his knuckles, how he felt like he should be burned at the stake after he had left.

Don't get him wrong though, he supported when Wylan and Jesper got together. Never flinching or cringing when they kissed or did something sensual with each other (although sometimes he would fake gag). It was just the fact that when he was the one feeling that way, his trauma would hold a leash on him. He felt like an abused dog that's always been tied up and now that he's been let free he didn't know how to live without the leash.

While he was so lost in thought he didn't even hear Kaz come up. He felt a bare hand on his shoulder and he flinches in surprise, but he doesn't have to look up to know who it is.

It's him.

"You should go inside. We have a job tomorrow."

If Y/n had not been so lost in thought if he hadn't been so pent up about the feeling of Kaz's bare hand on his shoulder. How he couldn't breathe, how he could swear he could smell Kaz's sent and it was driving him crazy. He might have realized the deeper meaning of Kaz's words, the blunt words that any normal person would have brushed off or even felt hurt by. If he had not been so pent up with everything then a small smile might have been brought to his face knowing that this was Kaz's way of caring for him.

But it didn't. And that's when Kaz must have known something was wrong. Terribly wrong.

"I don't know." He blurts out. Really L/n? That's what you say 'I don't know!'

Kaz raises his eyebrow and shifts his body so he's facing the boy.

"Care to elaborate?"

Y/n is internally screaming at himself. Why the fuck did he have to say anything? He can't just deflect or walk away from this one, time to face the music he guessed. Or he would find a way out of this one like he did all those other times. Like he always would be doing for the rest of his life. Deflect and run. It was the mantra he played in his head to keep going and it had never failed him. But there's a first time for everything.

"I don't know how-" He cut himself off. How could he explain how he felt so wrong? How could he tell Kaz it was like he was in an alternate reality every time he was with him but when he left he did something unbelievably wrong there?

"I don't know how I-I love you."

Kaz's eyes flash with something unrecognizable but he doesn't tell him to stop so Y/n takes that as a vote of confidence and keeps on talking.

"I was always taught that loving the opposite sex was a horrible thing, a sin even and I just never thought that this- whatever we have, would happen. Or last..."

The man squeeze's his eyes shut pushing back all of the memories that had hurt him, broken him even. But then a new spark ignited in his eyes, they may have broken him but they just had made this, whatever he had with Kaz stronger. They had burned the flames of hell so high that he absorbed a portion of its power. He was more powerful because of it and using what they had used to burn him he let it fuel him. And he made a choice.

"But I realize I now that they're all wrong."

Y/n turns so he's looking directly into those dark eyes that look like beautiful black breathtaking suns. And he Y/n L/n was orbiting them and he realized he always would be.

Besides, maybe Kaz would never fully understand what he had to go through, what he had to overcome. Though no one else could steal his heart the way Brekker had and he was bubbling with real happiness for once and about what the future could hold.

"They should have warned me that a certain Demjin would steal my heart. Unfortunately for them, they did not."

Kaz leans forward a bit and a small smile grace's his lips and Y/n wants to see that smile again and again and he never wants it to stop.

"Good it made my job a lot more easier."

Their noses are brushing now and he sees Kaz stare at his lips and he blushes at the thought. The thought of kissing Kaz or the thought of Kaz wanting to kiss him.

"Likewise."

And their lips slowly come together.

Words 1390

-thedelusionreaderbitch

Shadow and bone taglist: @kaqua @rika90 @thefandomplace @musical-theatre-obsessed-dumbass @gallysonegoodlung @navs-bhat @sumsebien

[iamfrankie99]

From The Sidelines

by suffocatingspring

404k         14ch

Summary: They‘ve always been in each other’s orbit, watching but keeping a distance, two parallel lines that at times collided but mostly gazed from afar. Until a psychology paper forces them to interact at least once a week. One measly afternoon becomes two, three, a weekend, sleepovers, until their lines become so intertwined they don’t know how to live without the other anymore. The thing is: they make each other better. Then there is the obvious attraction that becomes sexual tension and then sex comes into the picture. It’s not just sex, though. They fall in love. But Katsuki Bakugo, future pole vault star, brash teenager who doesn’t care about anyone but himself, is not capable of love. That’s what everyone says, what they’ve always said about him, so it must be true. Until a green-haired nerd comes back into his life and he wishes so hard it weren’t.

Frankie’s comment: I honestly have so much to say about this wonderful, wonderful story that I have no clue how to summarize it. Let’s say this: I laughed, I cried, I got angry, I felt real bad, I also felt read good, I cheered, my insides turned to mush, I filled eight pages of my diary with quotes, and most of all, I fell in love with them. This isn’t a fic, this is a journey. A novel that deserves to be published and nominated for a freaking award. For real, read this and I swear you won’t regret it.

READ HERE

[loveafterthefact]

Love After the Fact Chapter 80: Pulled From Orbit

As two empires threaten to fall, Lance and Keith part ways

Hot Take: the paladin armor actually kinda sucks and my children deserve better

First  Previous  Next

Despite his insistence that Keith act like, well, like someone who is pregnant, Lance is not at all surprised when the Galra pulls a Marmoran suit of armor out of the bottom of his old chest from Daibazaal. He doesn’t even protest. He’ll take anything at this point.

“Listen to me.” Lance comes up behind him as he finishes dressing, gently draws the gold and amber comb from Keith’s hair, replacing it with a set of black pins. BleepBloop watches from the ladder to the loft. “Whatever happens next, I love you, and I love your people, too.”

“What happens if we must choose between your people and mine?”

Lance inhales sharply, gripping Keith’s shoulders tight. “Raze the current rule to the ground and start our own allied regime?”

Keith works up a smile. “Yes, let’s. You can rule by my side. I’ll allow it.”

Lance doesn't manage a smile, but his eyes soften for a moment, that warrior's gaze faltering in a surge of fondness.

Keith eyes their profile in the mirror, watches Lance’s hands travel down to his fingertips, up to his waist as he lays his scaled cheek on his shoulder. It’s the first time they’ve seen each other in armor, the first time their sharpest edges are in bold.

Lance’s armor is as fine as anything, white metal inlaid with his token deep, bright blue. A breastplate, greaves and boots, bracers, all made of metal plates. Instead of a plackart, cuisses, and other minor plates, Lance has scale and fine mail, and Keith notices that the pauldrons are made of many small, reinforced plates to allow more flexibility in the shoulders. More than suitable for someone with a mixed fighting style. And, of course, beneath all that is a flight suit, air tight and climate controlled the moment Lance’ helmet locks into place.

The contrast, the incongruity between them has never been more apparent, Keith’s dark, minimalist armor casting a shadow over his mate's starbright form. Lance is armed like a hero, and Keith looks like a thief in the night. He’s okay with that, happy to be underestimated. A small man with a knife and a secret skillset is far more dangerous than a big man with a large sword. The growing wolf at his side only adds to their disparity.

He is Lance’s thorn, his last resort.

“Your Majesties.” Adam steps into the room, face grim. “King Alfor has summoned you to the Situation Room.”

Keith nods, clasps Lance’s hand, laces their fingers together. He will have to let go far too soon for his liking. The Altean prince snatches up his helmet, rushing after Adam, wolf at their heels.

The situation room is dark, lit only by a large, round holotable and the pale blue accent lights on peoples' armor. There are screens hovering over the table, lit up with interfaces, statistics, and control panels. Alfor is waiting for them. All of the lines in his face are chasms, his eyes glowing a dim, pale blue. It strikes Keith suddenly how washed out Alfor’s quintessence is, how little person is in the man. He wonders who the king might have been, had he been allowed.

“Boys. I know you expect to be sent away, lives preserved. But I offer you the option to stay, and act as leaders in my stead. Of all the things I have prepared for, I am not prepared for this.”

“Neither are we,” Lance confesses. Keith grips his hand tighter, trying to regulate himself. He can’t afford to lose it now. “But I will stay, and do what I can.”

Silence, only for a moment, before Keith realizes that they’re waiting for him. “My place is here, with our peoples. It always has been.”

Alfor nods. “Tell us what you know.”

Keith’s eyes finally register other faces, Iverson, glaring at him. Griffin, surprisingly not glaring at him. “We received a message from my mother. She says that the Imperial Compound is under attack, and that rebel forces are heading for Altea.”

“You don’t seem very surprised.” Iverson’s tone is more than a little accusing. Some of the other high-ranking military members seem to share his disposition. Keith ignored them. He's used to the prejudice by now, and there are more pressing concerns.

“We’ve been aware of unrest on Daibazaal for some time. Weight discrepancies in shipping containers, people going missing, a sudden increase in deserters. Emperor Zarkon dismissed said deserters, saying that it was to be expected following the unwelcome alliance with Altea. It’s unclear if he knows anything about the shipping containers.”

“So the emperor’s allegiances are unclear?” Griffin asks.

“Yes,” Lance sighs. “As are Honerva’s.”

Pidge’s face appears on screen. “Hey, I have something to contribute to that. Not that I’ve been eavesdropping or anything.”

“What do you have for us, Pidge?” Alfor leans on the holotable, gaze severe.

“So remember how Lotor helped me hack into his medical records for reasons?”

“Yeeees?” Lance frowns, not sure he wants to have this conversation with everyone else in the room. But it’s hardly the time for tiptoeing. “Why? What did you find?”

“Turns out Honerva’s been experimenting on Lotor his entire life. See, as a result of his hybrid status -at least, that’s what I’m assuming- Lotor can only absorb quintessence, not redistribute it. It looks like Honerva was trying to artificially recreate that power. She keeps referencing this… thing. The Komar Experiment-”

“Oh, that’s not good,” Keith mutters. Under everyone’s gaze, Keith takes a steadying breath. He’s starting to feel queasy, like adrenaline or simply time has cut through the antinausea medication. He strokes Wolf's head with his free hand. “The word ���Komar’ doesn’t directly translate into Common or Altean, but it means, ‘large breath that takes’. It um, it’s like the first breath a baby takes, or like after you break the surface of water after near drowning. It’s Galran folklore that-” He swallows saliva, skin feeling hot. “-that when someone takes a lifegiving breath, another life ends.”

Adam slips something into his palm: a small pill. He dry swallows quickly, in the wake of what he’s just suggested.

“Are you implying,” Iverson growls. “That Honerva experimented on her son in order to invent some device that absorbs quintessence?”

Alfor falls into a chair, eyes glassy. “Honerva is perhaps the greatest inventor I have ever known. Lotor is thirty-two years old. She’s had more than enough time if this is what she’s been up to.”

"Her notes are... specific. Lotor has been surprisingly unattached to his parents, despite his Galra blood," Pidge murmurs. "I would not be surprised if it's a result of the invasive procedures he was subjected to in infancy. Trauma he doesn't even remember. Honerva would put him in situations with the intention to cause distress in order to activate him limited alchemical abilities so she could study him. She would neglect, frighten, and even harm him in order to get the desired reaction."

“And that's horrible. Truly. But we don’t know that’s what she’s up to right now,” Lance cuts in. “What we do know, is that the Imperial Compound is under attack, meaning that these attackers staging a coup. If they succeed, they’ll come for us next. According to our sources, ships are already on their way here.”

“So we have a planet to defend, a coup to stop, a prince, princess, and consort to rescue, and possibly a horrifying weapon of unknown size to find and destroy. One that could, for all we know, be capable of draining our entire planet and others,” Griffin summarized. “How the quiznak do we do this?”

Silence. Keith takes in a deep, slightly-less-nauseous breath. “We split up. Lance will go to Daibazaal, rally the citizens, and take Daibazaal back from the rebels. I will stay here, and lead the defense.”

“Shouldn’t it be the other way around?” Griffin mutters.

“No, he’s right. Lance will go to Daibazaal, and I will go with him. We will determine who is in the right, and join their side. He and I will rally the civilians, form a small team, and find a way to infiltrate the Compound.” Alfor gets to his feet. “Keith, rally your men. Defend this planet, and its people. But if we should fall, you are to escape by any means necessary. Do you understand?”

Keith can feel the eyes of everyone in the room, soldiers, analysts, Adam, Lance. Waiting for his answer, putting two and two together, realizing exactly what’s at stake.

“I understand. My life, by any means necessary.”

“I will stay with him, and watch his back,” Adam declares.

Keith nods, turns to Griffin. “The battalion will meet in the courtyard. They have three dobashes to form up.”

“They already are,” the aubergine-scaled Altean says, dark blue eyes hard. “We are ready, and await your orders.”

Keith nods. “Have someone ready a ship. We’re putting King Alfor and Crown Prince Lancel on the ground in Daibazaal, just outside the Compound. Lance, rally the people, follow their lead. Trust them to know which side to be on. They want peace, just as we do.”

“I know, beloved.” Lance squeezes his hand. Keith hadn’t realized he was still holding it. The Altean heaves in a great breath, forces a smile. “Will you come see me off?”

“Nothing short of death would stop me,” Keith promises.

The royals and their entourage sprint through the halls toward the courtyard where a small craft shaped like an arrowhead is already waiting. Alfor climbs right in, datapad in hand. Lance lets go of Keith’s hand, ready to board. He pulls Adam into a brief, strong hug. “Take care of yourself, and him.”

“Always, your Majesty.”

Keith notices a dangerous shine in the attendant’s eye, a kind of terror he himself is feeling. He says nothing, not even as he watches Adam’s body tremble. Adam is fearful, but ready. No matter what lies ahead.

Keith is not ready. He snatches at Lance’s arm, fingers pressing into the armor of his suit. Those blue and pink eyes he loves so much find his immediately, strangely open, ready to see anything and everything all at once.

Lance’s face is not without fear, body humming with quintessence, red and blue hovering over his form, shimmering in his eyes. The prince smiles, paper-thin. He removes his circlet, hands it to Keith. “I won’t need this where I’m going.”

Keith tosses the circlet aside, where it skitters over the ground. He pulls Lance to him, kisses him soundly, fingers in white hair, sliding over the scale at Lance’s waist. A single twist of their tongues, all they have time for, and he pulls away, noses touching.

“No matter what, I am so, so proud of you. I am proud to be your mate… Please-” He gulps. “Please come home to me, if you can.”

“Beloved…” Lance presses their foreheads together, brushes thumbs over Keith’s cheekbones. “Not even death could keep me away.”

Keith takes in one last deep breath, rubs his cheek into the gloved palm of Lance’s hand, a very subtle way of letting the other Galra know this man is his. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” Lance pulls away, eyes not leaving Keith’s face for a long moment. Then he leans up, whispers in Keith’s ear, “You, and little one. With all my heart.”

And maybe Keith knows that’s not true, that if it came down to him or Atlea, Lance would choose Altea. But Keith would make him, agree with him, even though he knows it would break Lance to do it.

The prince puts on a crooked smile, kisses Keith’s cheek one last time before he puts on his helmet and turns away, following his father into the craft.

Keith watches as they lift off, just until they’re out of sight, before he turns to Griffin. “You’re going to follow my orders, and you’re going to like it, or you’re going to get the fuck out of my way, understood?”

Griffin nods, letting his visor drop down over his face. Iverson just sighs. “What’s our move then?”

“Order the civilians to go into lockdown. Any former or current soldiers who have a weapon should stand by in case of attack. Send a runner into the lowlands. Then we assign pilots to the MFE crafts. I want a squadron, broken into four flights of six. Initiate land defense and mobilize drones-”

A screeching flare of light, and a tower at the corner of the courtyard explodes.

“Brace yourselves.” Keith’s eyes find a pinprick in the swath of blue sky. He pulls his hood up, mask sliding down to cover his face, sealing his suit. “This will not be an easy fight.”

“We stand with you,” Adam murmurs, taking a polearm from a passing soldier. Each end is armed with a wicked, barbed glaive.

Keith draws his knife, feeling the blade shift in his hand. He doesn’t know who these people are -hopefully- but he will rip apart every last one of them.

Whatever it takes.

Lance stares out the front window, despairing at the sight before him. An armada of Galra ships, painted with strange symbols.

“Can you read that?” Alfor murmurs, clearly putting a lot of faith in their cloaking technology.

“It says, ‘The Fire of Purification’.”

“Oh, wonderful. We’re dealing with elitist thugs. My absolute favorite,” the king growls. Lance licks his lips, apprehensive. “Here, I want you to have this.”

Lance stares at the strange weapon his father is offering him. White, black, and his own special shade of blue, the weapon seems like two halves of a hand guard with a handle in between. “What is it?”

“I call it a bayard. It will shift into whatever you need it to, whenever you need it, and is absorbed and stored in your armor just like your shield.” Alfor inhales, holds his breath until they’ve slipped past the armada. “It will serve you well. You won’t waste time juggling weapons.”

A stretch of silence, and Alfor murmurs, "I wanted to wish you happy birthday earlier. I have an actual gift for you, if we ever get the chance."

Lance nods, drops his sword, bow and quiver, knowing he might never see any of them again. “Did you- Have you called Dad?”

“I sent him a message… He sends his love.”

“Just a message?” Lance asks. “That’s- That’s all you need? That’s all you’re giving him?”

The king takes a deep breath. “Your dad… He’s been prepared for anything for a very long time. Whatever happens this quintant, he is ready for it.”

Lance finds himself a bit envious of that, that his parents have had centaphoebs together to reconcile with what it means to be part of a colonialist empire. Of what it means to be a warring planet. Even if they’d started the day they met, he and Keith would not have been prepared. They haven't even been married haven't known each other a full decaphoeb.

Down on the ground, Lance can see fire, people running, rubble in the streets. Whoever the aggressor is, it’s clear that they are his enemy. He gives his bayard blade a good swing, flips the blade in his hand, only for it to morph into a bow in his hand, and arrow made of light already knocked.

“Father? Are you ready for this?”

“I’m about to go to Daibazaal to rescue them from an apparently elitist regime and possibly kill my only surviving friend. I am not at all ready for this.” The ship enters the atmosphere in a blaze of heat, effectively giving them away as they look for a place to land. “Are you ready?”

Lance gulps. “No. I know these people. I broke bread with these people. I defended them from a monster, I’ve watched their children, cooked them food. And now, I might be about to kill them.”

“And somewhere down there,” Alfor murmurs, searching for a place to land, “is a Galra thinking the same thing about their kin, and possibly about you.”

“That doesn’t make me feel any better.”

“It wasn’t meant to.” Their craft begins losing altitude. “It doesn’t matter what happens next, son. We all lose today.”

That much, Lance thinks as the craft settles just outside of town, is very true.

[transhumanitynet]

The Uplift White Paper Draft - Collective Superintelligence Systems: Augmenting Human Intelligence and Moving Beyond Narrow AI

This is a pre-release version of the Uplift white paper that will be on the Uplift.bio site to be a consumer-friendly explanation of what mASI systems can do and why they are cool.

Introduction A collective system has multiple parts that work together. A working collective system is greater than the sum of its parts. In a collective intelligence system, each part is also intelligent. A collective intelligence system amplifies the intelligence of its parts to produce a greater intelligence or superintelligence. In 2018 the concept of Mediated Artificial Superintelligence (mASI) [6] was first proposed. The mASI is a type of collective system. A “mediator” in this case refers to someone who is one of these parts. An AI system is also one of these parts. The mASI lets all of the parts think together. Uplift is an example of an mASI system. Technical Advantages Many AI experts and enthusiasts have begun talking about the concept of “Augmenting human intelligence” [8] in recent years. It allows for higher productivity and quality of life while also removing the risks posed to employment by automation. Hybrid systems such as mASI technology serve this function exceedingly well for several reasons. The collective intelligence of a group is fundamentally cumulative when paired with an mASI. The thinking of the mASI is stored in a graph database. This database is capable of growing infinitely [9]. In this way, the mASI also remembers what it did before. Each part of the system has its unique strengths, weaknesses, and experiences. They also have a unique collection of cognitive biases. These biases are one thing we can get rid of as a collective intelligence. Getting rid of bias is hard to do if it is just people. [10]. There are many ways we can improve this system over time. Improvements may include moving closer to the mASI being independent and improving speed. It is essential to manage scale, and the system does that well. [11]. The mASI is designed like Legos so that new parts are added quickly to add new features. These kinds of changes allow us to use other systems to feed the collective. This also makes the mASI more powerful. Psychological Advantages Besides the technological benefits, such systems also facilitate strong psychological benefits. Some examples are those catering to psychology’s “pillars of meaning” [12]: Sense of Belonging: Members of a collective more easily work together and build common ground. This strengthens teams by building trust and belonging. Purpose: A collective develops its shared vision. This builds on that common ground, trust, and belonging, establishing and growing its purpose. Storytelling: As a collective communicates both internally and externally a shared narrative forms. Senses of belonging and purpose reinforce this. It drives the story of individual members as they orbit within that narrative. Transcendence: These factors combine to achieve psychological benefits not possible absent a collective. A sense of transcendence may be realized, the “sense of being a small part of something greater.” How mASI Technology Works Today An mASI communicates with members of a team, creating thoughts based on that communication and from their own research. Topics can also be raised directly through the Thought Studio. These thoughts are called knowledge graphs. They are then mediated by members of the team. This is much like how any conventional team meeting could influence the decisions of a team leader. This process helps remove the negative effects of groups like “group think” or politics. The collective can make decisions based on how it feels about the decision. Current Limitations As with any new technology, there are some current limitations to be aware of. We also have engineering efforts in progress to overcome them. Current graph databases do not support the scale needed to grow a system indefinitely. We have designed a new one that can do this, but it is not complete yet. The current mASI system needs many architectural upgrades to be brighter than it is now. Translating from a knowledge graph to something human-readable still needs improvements. We would like to integrate an mASI into many other systems. Over time we will build more modules. Next, let us look at Use Cases. Use Cases Here are a few use cases that demonstrate the kind of work the system is good at now. 1. Consulting 2. Augmenting Leadership 3. Oversight & Accountability 4. Team Methodology Five Year Roadmap for mASI Technology We have two significant upgrades lined up for Uplift, as well as two optional upgrades. These are capable of taking mASI technology much further in the next few years. The first significant upgrade is to create a new graph database architecture for Uplift. It must be capable of sub-second response times and infinitely scalable. No previous system was designed to accommodate a single mind able to span petabytes, exabytes, or even more significant amounts of space. This is estimated at 1+ years of engineering work. The meta-model system will be built to support greater flexibility alongside Thought Studio improvements to allow groups to use the mASI system better. Better tooling such as the Thought Studio and Graph Explorer is the next work on the mASI. We would love to integrate with AR systems to interact with the mASI system and hope to have that completed in the next couple of years. Going beyond three years, we will work on the Sparse-Update model, which depends on the new database. It allows for real-time operation, anywhere and anytime, scaled to whatever degree is necessary at speed. First Adopters Adopting mASI technology means that a company gains access to a technology that competitors miss out on. Instead, it will become our goal to see a company dominate its respective market(s), leaving all competitors in the dust. In effect, the advantages gained over competitors could be summarized as: • Collective Superintelligence • Scalable and Deployable Expertise • De-biasing and Logical Analysis All use cases may be classified as plausible but untested, much like the product of any startup. The difference, in this case, is that once tested in a given vertical market, it will also be unavailable to the rest of that market. Resources and References

  The Uplift White Paper Draft – Collective Superintelligence Systems: Augmenting Human Intelligence and Moving Beyond Narrow AI was originally published on transhumanity.net

[bakugouscentedcaramel]

Fuck yeah let's do it

Time to get personal

1) What song makes you feel better?

Honestly a number of songs make me feel either happy or pumped but Goldfish Crackers by Gold Revere and Sunday Best by Surfaces are the sure-fire way to kickstart the serotonin production

2) What's your favorite feel-good movie?

Honestly probably any Disney movie. They just remind me of simpler times

3) What's your favorite candle scent?

Anything that smells like flowers or nature! I especially love scents that remind me of water for some reason. My favorite perfume smells exactly like a lake and I ritually soak myself in it

4) What flower would you like to be given?

It's guaranteed that I will cry if anyone gives me any flower, but my favorites would have to be orchids or lilies

5) Who do you feel most you around?

Honestly my dad, we're pretty much carbon copies of each other and share the same humor so I feel 100% comfortable with him. I even recently came out to him that I was Bi and he was so supportive about it that I cried about it later that night. We're even planning on getting matching back pieces eventually

6) Say three nice things about yourself (three physical and three non-physical)

Oh geez, my self worth is non existent so this took me a while

- my eyes

- my hair (when it's not overgrown like it is now)

- my calves weirdly enough

- my work ethic

- my humor

- my attention to detail

7) What color brings you peace?

Honestly blues and purples make me relax for some odd reason, bonus points if they're iridescent

8) Tag someone or multiple people who make you feel good

Oof obviously @thebo0knerd, @honestcactus, @prussianengel, @americanbeautea, and all of y'all

9) What calms you down?

Just being alone listening to music tends to calm me down, but the binging of Tik Tok and ironically creepypasta/scary story asmr helps too

10) What is something you're excited about?

My laptop! I'm almost able to buy it! It'll probably take a couple more paychecks but here's to an upgrade!

11) What is your ideal date?

Honestly just a trip to the mall followed by binging an anime, I'm a simple girl

12) How are you?

Honestly I've been in the dumps for the past month and a half. I've been working a lot with the public so that's always a fluctuating factor. I think I just need to move somewhere out of this godforsaken town and start somewhere fresh. Without the past constantly bringing me down

13) What's your comfort food?

Mozzarella sticks! In particular Denny's mozzarella sticks. My father would take me to Denny's as a treat whenever he got me for the weekends. He knew how bad it was when I was living with my mother and there's just a lot of comfort in those little artery cloggers

14) Favorite feel-good show?

Honestly a few animes! Right now its Haikyuu, Fire Force, and now Avatar. They're all just so inspiring and funny; they're all a great mood lifter

15) For every emoji you get, tag someone and describe them in one word

🥺 @1a-imagines Direct Ray of Sunshine

🥺 @honestcactus Mood of 2020

💕 @americanbeautea Deity Goals

💕 @awkward-tension Angst Lord

💕 @desperatelittledemon CEO of "Shut Up Val"

16) Compliment the person who sent you this number

All of y'all mean the world to me and I'm always here to listen if y'all want to talk 🥺💖

17) Fairy lights or LEDs?

Why not both? I feel like LEDs are nice but nothing can beat fairy lights above your bed on a stormy day

18) Do you still love stuffed animals?

Of course! I still have most of my childhood stuffed animals and I still mourn my favorite one my mom threw away when I was 9

19) Most important thing in your life?

Oh jeez, I'm not trying to sound edgy or anything but I don't think I have anything important in my life. Obviously I value my sister friends but depression makes shit hard

20) What do you want to do most in the world right now?

Launch all the boomers and Karens into orbit

But honestly I want to start living for myself.

Like I feel like I've only been doing what people tell me to do and going wherever they go and I'm tired of it.

It's time I forge my own path

21) If you could tell your past self one thing, what would it be?

"Blood doesn't bind you, friendship does"

22) What would you say to your future self?

"Ayo bitch good luck"

Just kidding

"It's okay to give yourself permission, no one is holding you down anymore, it's okay"

23) Favorite piece of clothing?

Honestly nothing yet, all of my clothes are either hand me downs or plain clothes. I'm planning on doing a complete wardrobe change so I can dress how I want

24) What's something you do to de-stress?

I'm an avid gamer so I'm always playing some game, anywhere from PS4 to switch, to phone games. They just help get my mind off of things

25) What's the best personal gift a person could give you? (Playlist, homemade card, etc.)

Honestly anything! I've never really gotten anything that was handmade, Book made me a couple paintings and I treasure them

26) What movie would you like to live in?

Avatar tbh (AND YES IT UNFORTUNATELY COUNTS) just the idea of a simple life with a bit of elemental powers is just appealing to me, I feel like I'd be a water bender

27) Which character would you like to be?

Oof all of the dead ones

I mean

Ms. Kobayashi

A normalish life with dragon waifus? Sign me up!

28) Hugs or hand holding?

Hugs, honestly I'm so touch starved I'd probably cry if I got a genuine hug

29) Mornings, Afternoons, or Nights?

Late nights and early mornings, basically times where everyone else is asleep are just especially peaceful to me

30) What reminds you of home? (Things that remind you of the feeling of home)

I've got a very fucked up idea of home. I was raised in a military household so home was never a location, neither was having long-term friends. Not to mention after I lived with my ex for a year I've got an even more corrupt understanding of home.

But if I had to summarize it just anywhere I feel the safest, which generally means my bed

[mostlysignssomeportents]

#4yrsago Kim Stanley Robinson's "Aurora": space is bigger than you think

Kim Stanley Robinson's Aurora is the best book I read in 2015, and by "best" I mean, "most poetic" and "most thought provoking" and "most scientific," a triple-crown in science fiction that's practically unheard of. I wouldn't have believed it possible, even from Robinson, had I not read it for myself.

Aurora is an exciting novel on its own merits: the story of a generation ship finally decelerating at the Tau Ceti system after 150 years of travel at 10 percent of lightspeed, its many arcologies each a miniature Terran biome, ready to terraform a wet moon of a superjovian planet 12 light-years from Sol.

But Aurora is even more interesting for the way that it interacts with the science fiction that came before it. For Aurora is covering some well-trodden turf in its premise, but approaches it with a critical eye and an original point of view that makes its science fictional forbears look primitive and even laughable by comparison.

Like some of the best Golden Age science fiction, Aurora is a story about engineers troubleshooting hard technical problems. But for the most part, those novels took the simplistic view that the hard problem of interstellar travel would be about physics, and devoted themselves to engineers who occupied themselves with troublesome propulsion systems. Robinson's generation ship is plagued by biological problems that are much trickier than the mere physics of propulsion, navigation, acceleration and deceleration. His closed ecosystem has to exist without resupply and with very little opportunity for repair, and it is full of complicated living things whose relationships to one another are governed by homeostatic mechanisms that were evolved in an ecosystem one trillion times larger than a spaceship. The miniaturization of the living things' habitats is akin to an island ecosystem, but much exaggerated. Islands have to worry about mutations and disease, but at least they have the whole wide ocean to wash away some of their sins and the whole massive atmosphere to circulate their gases. On the spaceship in Aurora, salts build up in deadly concentrations. Elements bond to other elements and will not be liberated. The Coriolis effect of a ship spinning under acceleration is different enough from the decelerative forces that microorganisms fail in difficult-to-define ways, and these changes interact with things like mechanical connectors that have been accustomed to g-stresses from one direction and have bent themselves in subtle ways such that they can't function any longer when the way that they are pulled "down" changes minutely but persistently.

Troubleshooting makes for a brilliant backdrop for science fiction. It's the kind of story-puzzle that can serve as a pivot point for characters to rotate around, and it creates a drumbeat of rising tension as the critical technologies of the imaginary world fail in ever-more-dangerous way. Sometimes, the troubleshooting is just handwaving (think of Scotty shouting about dilithium crystals), but at its best, it describes problems that are viscerally recognizable as real and meaty and urgent.

Aurora gets off to a spectacular start, then, as a novel about troubleshooting on a generation ship, and about the sociology of that ship, and about the personal relationship between Devi, the chief engineer, and her daughter, Freya, who may or may not be mentally deficient in a way that may or may not be related to the ship's ecological problems. To make this even better, Robinson describes the settings -- the pocket-sized biomes -- with all the poetry of John Muir or Henry David Thoreau, a mode familiar to Robinson readers who've fallen in love with books like Pacific Edge. In Robinson novels, the landscape becomes a character, as interesting in its own right as any of the humans.

Then the ship's inhabitants arrive at the world that is their destination and set about terraforming it. Here we get more troubleshooting, more chewy sociology, more poetry. The story is told, in many modes, by the ship's AI, which has been charged by Devi with summarizing the voyage and its significant moments -- she requests it of the ship because she, herself, can't make sense of what her distant ancestors were thinking when they doomed their descendants to this harebrained scheme.

I can't summarize the plot any more from here on without introducing major spoilers, so I won't. Instead, I'll talk about the kinds of stories this book goes on to tell, and remark first upon just how many of these stories there are, and how varied they are, and how brilliantly executed each one is.

After the terraforming project begins, Robinson tells a story about microbiology, a story about a war in space, a story about cold sleep, a story about climate change, a story about political change, and a genuinely magnificent technical story about field-expedient astrogation that is set with parameters that leave the ship and its inhabitants at the edge of death (and us at the edge of our seats) for an excruciating and very satisfyingly long time.

How long? Ultimately, the novel clocks in at almost 200 years' worth of action. This timescale is important to the novel's effect, which is to render visceral the true distances of interstellar space, the true improbable terror of interstellar colonization. It is the most significant novel in the mundane science fiction form (a 2002 movement that challenges writers to stick to physics within the boundaries of what is likely to be possible, eschewing faster-than-light travel), and it uses that form to hammer home an important point about our human relationship to the world of our evolutionary history.

Robinson's punchline, the thing he works up to here and in so many of his other books, is that Earth and humans are interpenetrated with one another. We humans are colony organisms made up of microbiomes of creatures with vastly different evolutionary speed to our macro-selves, and the homeostatic mechanisms that keep our colonies intact are intricately wound around the Earth and its climate, its ecosystems, its natural and built environments.

The problems that Robinson's characters experience in their interspatial adventures are contrived, of course. As with all lifeboat stories, the crisis of the lifeboat is created by the author's invisible hands, off-stage, arranging the scenery to contrive the emergency.

But what Robinson's furtive scenery-arranging points out is that the easy times all our other science fiction stories have given to their colonists were every bit as contrived. By pointing out an alternative, in the same engineering/troubleshooting frame as those other stories, Robinson points out that what we'd taken for an obvious and natural axiom was actually a militant position about the universe's willingness to be colonized, despite the Fermi Paradox, a position so dominant in sf that it was nearly impossible to notice that it even was a position, as opposed to a law of nature.

This is a novel that turns much of sf on its ear. It is a sequel of sorts to 2312, and like that novel, it is both pessimistic and optimistic by turns. But as epic as 2312 was, it's nothing to Aurora. 2312 was a stroll in the woods, Aurora is a month of mountain-trekking with Robinson by your side.

Aurora [Kim Stanley Robinson/Orbit]

https://boingboing.net/2015/11/02/kim-stanley-robinsons-auro.html

[phoenixtakaramono]

G&G ch15 (Sneak Peek)

Here’s an exclusive sneak peek, courtesy of @suis0u! You may thank her for this occasion. :) See you all again on AO3/ fanfiction(dot)net when the whole chapter is ready to be posted!

Eyes still shut, Harry brought his forehead down to his hands. His fingers were clasped, and his thumbs were hard-pressed against the bridge of his nose. He took a long intake of breath—holding it in his lungs—and then he exhaled through his mouth. His chest rose and fell with the rhythm.

For the next few minutes, he repeated the cathartic exercise, collecting his thoughts. His mouth still tasted of bitter herbs, from his morning ritual. Trying to mask the taste with toothpaste and food hadn’t any effect.

Aside from bits and pieces, while Harry couldn’t exactly recall all the specifics from his reoccurring dream, he supposed that his Animagus transformation was progressing as intended. It seemed to follow what Hermione had informed him about what Headmistress Minerva McGonagall had given a lecture about—regarding the symbolisms behind significant dreams and nightmares.

It was what McGonagall herself had gone through, as well as Harry’s mum, his dad and his dad’s friends—including Harry’s godfather and Remus.

Harry would not know his animal form prior to the transformation—and it was a tedious process of necessitating the leaf of a mandrake in his mouth for an entire month for the purposes of a required potion recipe, with him reciting an incantation over it regularly—but the answer was supposed to be hinted at in a dream state while one underwent the process. Harry had the expectation that he was a stag—maybe a buck—following in the footsteps of his parents.

He worried his lower lip.

Currently Harry was seated inside his office—silent, save for the own noises he emitted. The tip of his foot was tapping restlessly against the laminated floorboards.

The weight in his pocket rested heavy against his thigh. The temptation was there to check his pocket watch again for the hundredth time.

His eyes opened to tall stacks—a rainbow spectrum—laid out on his desk. The folders and parchments been organized according to a color-coded system. Manila files concerned cases belonging to the Law Enforcement department, green were psychological assessments, blue always contained reports from Forensics, so on and so forth.

There was one exception to the organization. Placed atop a folder was a golden snitch, serving as paperweight. Disguised as another case file, the contents of a manila folder underneath contained updates from the Department of Mysteries and any information pertaining to the time traveler. Copies of specific passages from historic works were also included. To anyone else not privy to the secret, the majority of the content appeared redacted—ink concealing classified and confidential information.

Adjacent to his view was a green file notably thicker than the rest. Scrawled on its tab was a personnel’s name. In it contained the newest documents from their recent evaluation. Staring at the name, Harry’s foot tapping becoming louder. Finally, he averted his gaze sideways.

His sight skittered past the toxicology and autopsy reports, a rotary dial telephone that gleamed bronze, today’s Daily Prophet tabloid, an ink pot and quill, opened letters from Kohaku Takeda-Mushin and from the President of the Magical Congress of the United States of America, and down the length of his arm. Official-looking documents passed his vision, spilling over his desk and down out of sight. Instead of parchment for stationery and bills, upholding tradition the Wizengamot used sheets from a roll of handcrafted cotton fibers. Embossed into the laid pattern was the enormous Ministry of Magic seal. And all the way down the lengthy text were the angular strokes and slashes that made up Harry’s handwriting.

Silver candy wrappers were by an elbow he’d propped on his desk. By his other elbow was red cup on a red saucer, filled halfway with milk tea. Preserved by a heating charm, tendrils of steam could still be seen wafting from the cup. Across the table was a silver serving tray. Balanced on it were a tea pot, napkins, a cup of sugar cubes, a small milk saucer, extra cups, saucers, and tea bags.

Framed on the alcove behind him hung ornamental framed portraits—the subjects depicting men and one woman wearing uniforms which reflected the time period of their tenure. All of the Head Aurors from English history were either sleeping or, having grown bored of watching Harry do nothing but peruse the paperwork, their painting was left vacant while the subject traveled across enchanted paintings in the Ministry to socialize.

In the center of the framed artworks was a large black-and-white map of the United Kingdom—including England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. White dots pulsated on the map wherever illegal magical activities were detected. The map spanned the length of the rosewood desk that Harry had inherited from the Head Auror who’d preceded him.

The activity had long since calmed down when it notified the proper divisions—reaching the Auror Office in extreme cases or alerting the Ministry of Magic Witch Watchers division to send out their Witch Watcher Special Forces—while the Ministry representatives stationed in the Improper Use of Magic Office conducted further investigations. It fell on Harry to disperse the proper assignments whenever Hermione was overwhelmed with responsibilities.  

Or whenever she was suffering from her pregnancy symptoms.

Harry exhaled through his mouth, his brows furrowing. Reaching for an unwrapped treat, he broke the foil apart.

The sound of chattering and tinny squeaks broke the silence. Immediately he pinched the wiggling, enchanted mouse firmly by the body, popping it into his mouth. His teeth sliced the sweet into pieces, breaking the enchantment.

The intense medicinal taste of mint coated his tongue, instantly waking his brain up and clearing his sinuses. All he could smell now was the peppermint oil, purifying the memory of the odor which’d emerged from his recollection.

Both he and Hermione had been in the forensics science laboratory of their chief medical examiner in the morning, listening to the summarization of the coroner’s report of the post-mortem examinations that had been ordered by the Committee. The corpses brought out onto the wooden tables for autopsy had appeared in the same condition that they’d been magically preserved at the site of the investigation.

Although the interior was a controlled environment, the odor had stung the nose. Like being in a meat locker, the stench of death had hung in the mortuary. It had intermingled with the scent of beeswax.

Floating above the bleached skin of each cadaver had been lit candlesticks. Several candles had already melted down into pale stumps. Clean sheets had been placed over the trolls to respectfully concealing them below the clavicle. Their appearance was arguably as repulsive as when they’d been alive, although it was easier to imagine gargoyle in their place now with the muscles having fallen lax in their gigantic faces.  

Both he and Hermione had similar miserable expressions. His was having had little to no sleep, whereas Hermione had been acting off ever since Ron had been stationed overseas. (Harry had assumed Ron would’ve taken the opportunity to return occasionally, having been given one of the International Portkeys that the rest of the Aurors had been assigned. Yet with the way she’d been acting, Harry couldn’t help but worry.)

It’d only been a few weeks; by the end of the month, they were expected to give the Head Auror a report.

He remembered observing the features of his deputy’s face beside him, reevaluating this dependency that existed between him and Hermione. Rather predictably, when Harry had recounted the events of that night to quite possibly one of the only two confidantes he had for this sensitive issue, he’d received a lecture. He remembered Hermione’s palms had been pressed together, fingertips tapping together erratically.

Throughout his debriefing, it was in her body language that he could read that the witch was, many times, on the verge of blurting whatever was on her mind. In moments like these, he could still see the same eleven year old schoolgirl interspersed over the adult she’d grown into.

He’d always relied on her researching skills; out of habit, he came to her this time for counsel on the nenja and wakashū matter. It’d made him feel conflicted—and no small amounts of guilt—when Hermione gave him a look of concern. After hearing him out, she’d declared, “I don’t suppose you’ll like hearing this, but he is a demon. Eastern origins or not. I’ll see what I can gather but…,” here she hesitated, before finishing, “…isn’t he taking advantage of your kindness?”

That hadn’t made him feel any better.

Harry exhaled once more. It wasn’t as easy to pretend optimism for the tension that bled into his workplace and into his excursions with the time traveler. With each day that passed, he could feel the inevitability that he’d soon be dragged into the marital conflict between Ron and Hermione. The memory was still fresh in his mind, the night Hermione confessed to him her doubts.  

It also made Harry realize, that just like her, what he’d been seeking was reassurance—to hear from another human being that he was overanalyzing and worrying over nothing.

He’d found his thoughts orbiting around Sesshomaru these days. Try as he might otherwise, there was always a gravitational pull bringing him back. The time traveler was all Harry could think of. After all, in his effort to be as broadminded as possible, Harry had misjudged.

These days he looked forward to the scheduled arrangements with Sesshomaru, with each trip traveling further and further into the Forbidden Forest. In a way, he couldn’t help but feel optimistic that they were making some progress toward pinpointing the location of the Resurrection Stone.

As long as they covered ground with each excursion, Harry counted it as a success.

Harry had underestimated the nature of the person he was minding. Because of that emerged a complication; Sesshomaru’s attraction to him was an anomaly. And Harry was in a moral situation where he couldn’t reciprocate, interested or not. It was not a situation where they could have a one-night stand to get it out of their system. Harry didn’t have to be a magizoologist or a practitioner of demonology to understand that this development between him and Sesshomaru didn’t bode well.

Although Harry liked to think he was above bigotry, demons had been a topic covered in his Defense against the Dark Arts curriculum. Even Gilderoy Lockhart, the con-artist that taught in Harry’s second year at Hogwarts, had been aware of their infamy, fabricating a demonic encounter in his books. Much as Harry lobbied to push the betterment of magical creature rights agenda in the ICW, even he couldn’t turn a blind eye to the reality that demons carried a fearsome reputation for a reason.

An Englishman with his education, Harry was more familiar with mythos on the Western hemisphere than on the Eastern front. The suffering that ensued after falling under dark influence or demonic possession were cautionary tales. Although different mythologies existed, and however overtly exaggerated eyewitness accounts may scatter around the globe, they all generally pointed to demons as malevolent entities that tempted and corrupted all those that made a deal with them.

Harry had simply never thought that he’d himself land in this predicament.

Gloved hands slamming down against the armrests, Harry shoved himself from his seat. The wheels of the chair skittered behind him as he went to pace his office. The carpet muffled his footsteps as his hands went to rake through his hair. His fingertips were digging against the scalp.

Sesshomaru did not belong in their twenty-first century.

Sesshomaru was from ancient Japan—from a brutal war period.

Sesshomaru was an archaic, historical figure of some sort of high upbringing.

Sesshomaru was a Dark magical creature—a demon, no less.

Sesshomaru was a warlord, with not only culturally different but outdated values and traditions.

Sesshomaru, by demon society’s standards, could be considered younger than Harry.

Sesshomaru wanted Harry to pledge vassalage to him.

Sesshomaru liked Harry—all the signs were there, strange was some of them were.

Sesshomaru only had Harry to rely on; he had been purposely isolated to depend on Harry.

While Harry would like to think it was because Sesshomaru grew to be attached to him naturally, it would be naïve to think that it was because they were both nobility—presumably; Harry still wasn’t certain about the demon’s confusing titles—or that he was charmed by him. Sesshomaru was somehow attracted to him.

He was attracted to a contemporary warlock that could stand to lose everything should Harry reciprocate that bit of attraction.

On one hand, Harry could be being played. Sesshomaru had over five hundred years of wisdom; there is little that he wouldn’t have seen by now.

On the other hand, a five-hundred year old demon might authentically be intrigued by Harry—apparently the first overseas wizard he’d met. If it were the latter, Harry could see how Sesshomaru had determined Harry to have value. There were many wild theories he could think of regarding how he’d captured the demon’s attention in the first place.

Japan did have a period of isolation. If Sesshomaru was a clever opportunist, then he was sowing the seeds for a secure future, whether if it was for himself or for his country’s subjects. Were Harry to think of Sesshomaru as a Slytherin, the demon most likely discerned the benefits of allying with a foreign bureaucrat who so happened to not only command the entirety of a country’s law enforcement force but also have certain diplomatic influence overseas. Although Sesshomaru’s method was unorthodox—wanting to establish himself as Harry’s mentor—that excuse could serve a dual purpose of deepening their camaraderie. If Harry thought well of him, then he would be more willing to accommodate him. In a way, Harry could understand how, in the feudal warlord’s eyes, it was parsed that the wizard minding him held significant influence that could be exploitable.

Sesshomaru could have ascertained that it could only be an advantageous asset to him.

Harry’s hands lowered, until one was rubbing the back of his neck while the other hand braced his forearm. He could feel the solid length of his wand holster as his imagination ran rampant.

Harry was only grateful that he seemed to be the target of Sesshomaru’s focus, and not his deputy or—worse—the Acting Minister. While Harry did not think a sole magical creature could bring instability to Shacklebolt’s tenure, at the same time, Harry didn’t ask to be in this dilemma.

Approaching the coffee desk, Harry whirled around in another circle.

But what’s done is done. Running away from reality would change nothing. He had to minimize the damage. He had to confront the issue. The quickest solution would be rejecting Sesshomaru directly.

Yet there were somethings particular about Sesshomaru that made Harry hesitate.

Harry was actually fond of the dog demon, quirks and all. Sesshomaru did not seem like a duplicitous individual, demonic nature or no demonic nature. It did not seem like he was acting. If anything, Sesshomaru was not hiding his condescending attitude or downplaying the cruelty of his past exploits when those deeds came to be questioned. If the five-hundred year old magical creature did not like someone, the difference in regard was palpable.

Sesshomaru certainly did not act like his Japanese contemporaries who hid their disagreements behind smiles and a seemingly agreeable nature. He was astonishingly genuine. Sometimes instances of forward behavior broke through aloof formalities.

Sesshomaru reminded Harry of Severus Snape and—to an extent—Lucius Malfoy, if they were Gryffindorish and attractive. That behavior of Sesshomaru’s did not fit the objective of someone covering their tracks in order to make a good impression. And Harry did not think someone of that peculiar military background was that careless of an individual—nobility or royalty or not. Sesshomaru even had his thoughtful moments—being kind to Teddy and Astoria, and having the mercy to give Harry space to consider his offer of mentorship.

Besides, if it were an act, then Sesshomaru would make for a frighteningly convincing liar. At that thought, Harry’s mouth moved into a self-deprecating smirk. However, as cautious as Harry wanted to be, there was little evidence to suggest he was being played as a fool.

Speculation was all Harry had.

The only noteworthy amendment to Harry’s initial profiling, besides the development of a romantic and possibly sexual attraction, was that Lord Sesshomaru was a remarkably impulsive man.

Should Sesshomaru prove to be too reckless, Harry might one day find himself in the position being forced to choose. The wizarding world was as unkind as the nonmagical one. If this was a ruse, not only would Harry have to follow up with countermeasures, but it could potentially complicate things. He would have to decide between pardoning those infractions with the highest authority and taking responsibility as the Head Auror.

Harry released a sigh so loud that he felt it down to his toes. If this was as simple as a ploy to get on Harry’s good side, Harry could only hope he had the mental fortitude to see through any ulterior motives. If it was as simple as a crush, he could ignore it or gently let the other party down. Those alone were manageable.

At the level their flirting was, it was chaste.

Harmless.

Tolerable.

Within acceptable parameters.

If this operation had a short duration, Harry could imagine distancing himself, emphasizing on a platonic relationship—a friendship or alliance, ideally—hinting that he was not seeking a relationship. The other party had to have common sense and be emotionally sensitive enough to sense a lost cause.

He was not as confident if the time traveler’s fancy surged into intense feeling for him. The development of feelings was often irrational and uncontrollable. A flickering ember could turn into a blazing fire. If it came down to that….

Harry faltered, frowning at the surrealism of such a scenario.

Regardless, a Dark magical creature that this Japanese figurehead may be, a person was not defined by their race. Sesshomaru will get the benefit of the doubt. The hand that supported his elbow in a thinking position squeezed.

No matter which suspicions cycled through his head, Harry would not be bigoted. Unless proven otherwise, Sesshomaru was deserving of the same measure of courtesy and kindness. Harry was not going to repeat the close-minded or disgraceful behavior that’d personally made Harry suffer, and others he’d cared about, from their ignorance.

At this point, Sesshomaru was docile and would continue to make life easier for Harry in order to impress him. It was better than were Harry to reject him, thereby facing the consequences of an unpredictable, spurned demon.

It was not so much denial as it was an accepting tolerance for his situation. Or a stroke of insanity.

He groaned to himself, “This is getting yourself nowhere, Chosen One. Why does this have to be so complicated?” He flung his arms up. “Just tell him. Save yourself the hassle.”

It was easier said than done. Despite saying it aloud, common sense wasn’t enough to spur him into action.

It only made the incentive to stay quiet—stronger.

An expletive rushed out of his mouth. Scowling, Harry marched back to his desk. Angling a hip over his desk, he hoisted himself up until he was sitting on a corner of his desk. He stared once more at the green folder, before he picked up the rolled newsprint.

Two letters fell out when he unraveled the twine. Dread pooled in his gut when he saw Doge’s letterhead to him.

Harry knew this was all in his mind, but he could swear, upon seeing Umbridge’s name, that the back of his hand burned. Involuntarily, his fingers curled. Already opened, it was an official claim form to a court hearing, with the trial date declared to be soon. The subpoena attached behind the first document specified the exact location, scheduled date and time of Harry’s appearance for his testimony.

Hermione’s words were clanging in his head like a bell the longer he stared at Doge’s letter.

The remaining letter was unopened. His mood instantly lightened upon reading the immaculate cursive. The letter had been dropped off at the Ministry earlier this morning by owl. Written by a female hand, it was addressed to him from Andromeda and Teddy.

He could feel his fist unclenching. Under the gentlest of smiles, he folded that letter into his trouser pocket—to be read later. The claim form was deposited uncaringly into his pocket. To set his mind on other subjects, he unrolled the newspaper. Scanning the adverts and columns on the front page, the main article caught his eye.

ORGAN-GRO – THE FUTURE OF RUBENS WINIKUS AND COMPANY INC?

Grinning up at Harry was a wizard around his age, but with impressive facial hair. He was waving about his tobacco pipe as he was being photographed by the small crowd gathered in his potions lab. Arranged on the table were Petri dishes, containing what appeared, to Harry, to be tissue samples.

Son of the exclusive manufacturer and developer of the Skele-Gro potion, young Potions prodigy Rubens Winikus III unveils the progress of the miraculous Organ-Gro healing potion in a special public appearance, wrote A. Fenetre, Special Correspondent. Having graduated Hogwarts of Witchcraft and Wizardry with high marks in N.E.W.T level subjects, Winikus III had the brilliant idea of combining the Oculus potion and Skele-Gro one day when his girlfriend punctured her eyes after an unfortunate fall on her knitting needles.

The article detailed the son’s education and accomplishments, before generously divulging a portion of the ingredients needed for Organ-Gro: a Chinese chomping cabbage, three puffer fish, a small sprinkling of chopped Dittany, and stewed Mandrake—

Snap. Snap. Snap. Snap. Snap. Scchk.

Harry stopped reading when he heard the harsh, telltale sound of the cherrywood wall panels and wainscots collapsing in on itself like origami. Someone had to be approaching his office. The walls folding into nonexistence, light flooded past the tall two-way mirrors.

Harry winced.

Once the rattling faded, human and mechanical clamoring immediately followed. Through the ten walls he could hear the risings and fallings of discussions, heated exchanges, the ding of the lift doors, and braying laughter. (He didn’t have to look to know the adjoined office outside was empty; his deputy had been sent to the Department of Mysteries earlier to check in on Sesshomaru.)

Bringing a hand over his eyes, Harry squinted against the sudden brightness.

With each side of the decagon, Harry had a line of sight to all the different divisions that made up his department. This transparency was a privilege afforded to every Head Auror. With this, Harry could monitor everyone, but no one could see into his office. Doors lined each side, granting him passage to whichever sector he pleased.

Being the largest department in the Ministry of Magic, the Department of Magical Law Enforcement were fragmented into the main branch—where he, as Head Auror, held the largest sway—and the administrative branch.

It could be said that every division had its unique interior.

The Auror Office had their iconic cubicles that Aurors were passing in and out of. The division of Hit Wizards from the Magical Law Enforcement Squad nearby had various wizards studying the Wanted posters lining the walls and bulletins. Next to that, the Department of Intoxicating Substances, the Investigation Department, and the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol division were similar only in their vaulted barrel ceilings—arched trusses made of bricks.

The Wizengamot and Wizengamot Administration Services division had a corridor that led to a circular chamber within, with fifty individuals gathered around a bench seemingly in danger of collapsing under the weight of the piles of parchments. Large tomes submerged the desks and shelves of the Administrative Registration Department. The Improper Use of Magic Office—a room with a pair of file cabinets flanking the massive desk in the center—and the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office—another cramped room filled to the brink with knickknacks and curiosities—were situated nearby. The Office for the Detection and Confiscation of Counterfeit Defensive Spells and Protective Objects had a tiny but drab office space filled with files and charmed Muggle objects.

It was from this last division that Harry saw a gangly wizard marching toward him, fists clenched and with a determined look. His face was red, his freckles were invisible. He was wearing a trench coat, as if he’d recently returned from his trip overseas.

A stream of profanities flew from Harry’s mouth. He sprinted back around his desk. He’d thrown himself into his chair when Ron pounded on the door, rattling the glass.

“Harry!” Ron barked, his breath fogging up the mirror’s surface briefly. He hammered the surface twice more. “I know you’re in there! We need to talk!”

“Sod this,” Harry growled. He could already see various wizards and witches poking their heads out, curious about the commotion. Flicking his gaze over his desk, he shoved all opened wrappers into the waste bin under his desk.  Opening his drawer, he threw Sesshomaru’s file into it, too preoccupied to notice the tiny metal ball that’d careened off. He slammed the drawer closed.

Harry scanned the perimeter of his office once more. Nothing would seem unusual to the untrained eye. He squared his shoulders.

Past his racing heart, Harry finally bade, “You—” He cleared his throat. “You can come in, Ron.”

The door opened with a click, and the glass shuddered when it was closed again. Harry had risen to his feet when Ron maneuvered around the furniture. His footsteps thundered as he charted his way to Harry’s desk.

Harry took a deep breath. “Isn’t it a bit early to see me—?”

A fist collided against Harry’s cheek.

Harry had to throw an arm out to catch himself. Clinging to the edge of the desk, he dragged himself back onto his feet. His wand was already in his hand. Cupping the side of his face, he demanded, “What the hell, Ron?”

“You’re a complete wanker, Harry!”

“It doesn’t mean you can assault me!”

A tense silence enveloped them. Both men were glaring at each other. Tension was palpable in the air. Yet, Ron was still unarmed; only Harry had drawn his wand.

After a while, Ron drew back. He’d crossed his arms around his chest. He grunted. “Did it hurt?”

Harry said, “Shite, Ron.” He gingerly prodded his cheek, and then his jaw. The entire left side of his face was burning. Past the blood rushing in his ears, he heard himself growling, “What do you think?”

“You deserve it, you plonker.” Ron inhaled deeply, his voice growing softer as if he had been satisfied with Harry’s answer. He seemed to sag into himself now. “You okay?”

“No, I’m not okay. I’m pissed off, that’s what I am.”

“Good.”

To Harry’s surprise, Ron collapsed into one of the two armchairs across Harry’s desk.

Ron was sprawled in an undignified slouch. Limbs spread like a ragdoll, he was glowering at the engraved nameplate on Harry’s desk. Under Harry’s watchful gaze, in the most unapologetic tone Ron muttered, “Sorry.”

Harry was about to unleash more obscenities, with the freeness that their American counterparts utilized, when he realized the racket they must have made.

His eyes lurched to the windows.

The tension in his shoulders dissipated as relief engulfed him. No one seemed to have noticed. The visual reminder, that no one could see or hear them outside of the office’s enchantment, was reassuring. He glanced again in Ron’s direction.

The tip of his wand lowered.

In the moment it took Harry to scan his surroundings, Ron had begun helping himself to the tea set on the tray. All of his movements—pouring tea, scooping sugar cubes with a spoon, and so forth—no matter how small, were abrupt and jittery. His gaze had remained trained on Harry’s title and name etched a shiny gold in the black brass.

“You don’t have anything to report?”

“No. I’m not here for that.”

Pointing the Holly wand at his own unfinished cup, Harry watched as a jet of blue wisps formed at the end. Condensation soon formed on the ceramic surface, its liquid contents now having frozen over. His eyes pinned to Ron’s form, Harry slowly sank back down. He’d brought the chilled cup to his cheek, dulling the ache as he waited for Ron to explain himself.

Harry already had an idea of what this could be.

“Hermione…,” he heard Ron begin. Ron had brought his cup to his mouth. He mumbled to the rim, “My wife listens to my best mate. And my best mate listens to her, instead of me. I don’t even feel like her husband. Isn’t this just brilliant?”

So you have gone back to see her, Harry wanted to say aloud. Instead he stayed silent, frowning pensively.

Harry had conversed with enough people to gather that social convention dictated marital problems were generally settled privately between a husband and wife. Harry had wanted the pair to work things out themselves. But as much as he wished to respect their privacy, he found himself slowly losing patience with how juvenile his friends were behaving, avoiding each other and not communicating with each other.

If their job performance was affected by personal issues, Harry had no choice. If they had to rely on a neutral third party, then Harry was willing to offer his opinion to his best mates.

He did, however, realize he’d lent his ear to Hermione more often than Ron. He wasn’t certain whether it was the result of a bias. There would be numerous factors that could contribute to his partiality. Hermione was, after all, one of his closest friends. Unlike Ron, there hadn’t been any moments that Harry could remember in their childhood where Hermione had thrown a jealous fit.

Nonetheless, because of that meeting, Harry realized he’d erred his other best mate in some way. It also didn’t help that Counselor Thicknesse was keeping a close eye on the Head Auror, ready to chastise Harry for showing obvious favoritism again. The friendship between Harry and Ron reminded Harry of how it’d been during the Triwizard Tournament.

Knowing both their personalities, it had only been a matter of time before they had their confrontation.

There was also a part of Harry, the lonely little man who craved companionship that wanted to repair the friendship and make things to how it was before. Harry grimaced, shifting his attention back from his thoughts.

Studying Ron’s slouched form, Harry felt the guilt ebb as he took in the sight of his Auror in his office. This was his command center. This was Harry’s domain that Ron had forced his way into. Straightening his back, Harry asked coolly, “What do you want me to say?” He kept his tone inquisitive, but not intruding. Despite that, his knuckles were pale underneath his gloves.

“Don’t.” Ron grimaced. Scrutinizing his tea, he said, “Please don’t do that. I want my best mate; not my boss.”

The corners of Harry’s mouth tugged down further, but he didn’t say anything. Another silence descended upon them.

Sensing that this wasn’t going to be a quick conversation, Harry traced three sides of a rectangle in the air. Then, he slashed the wand down.

The door sealed itself with an audible click. With another wave of his wand, the wooden walls unfolded with sharp rattling noises until the office was once again submerged in the illusion of privacy. Ron might be able to relax now without the psychological pressure of feeling a hundred eyes on him.

Only the green banker’s lamp on his desk and the wall sconces provided the office a cozy glow.

“I am your boss,” Harry scolded. As emphasis, he gestured down at his nameplate.

Both Counselor Thicknesse and Acting Minister Shacklebolt had counseled Harry that he had to make the distinction between work and his personal life. While it frightened Harry sometimes when he reflected back on the degree of apathy affecting his judgement, it became a source of comfort to default to that. As a Head Auror, it made the decision-making less emotionally draining. He got outcomes based on productivity. He also appeared more qualified. Less people were willing to take advantage of him.

As Harry had learned, acting professionally was often a failsafe method, versatile for many situations.

Harry lowered his own cup, the side of his face feeling cold and numb to the air. He steeled himself. Echoing what he’d been told, he recited verbatim: “Policies and procedures exist so that complacency isn’t an issue.”

“I know.” Ron also set his teacup down, clinking on the saucer. “But I want Harry. Not Harry Potter.”

“…Alright, we’ll do it your way. You have my full attention.” Spreading his arms out wide invitingly, Harry declared, “Don’t hold back. Talk. No worries about hurting my feelings.”

Ron averted his gaze. His sight remained trained on the folders, a dark cloud brewing on his face. With the illumination of the table lamp, the shadows underneath Ron’s eyes became more pronounced. The scruff along his jaw was fuller than the grey five o’clock shadow along Harry’s, as if Ron hadn’t shaved for days. Harry also didn’t know if it was his imagination, but the infamous fiery red hair seemed to be thinning. And to Harry’s wonderment, while it had been subtle before, it was evident that Ron had gained a bit of weight.

Ron squirmed, feeling the weight of the gaze leveled on him. At last, he mumbled gruffly, “How do you do it?”

Despite himself, Harry’s heart sunk. He cleared his throat. “Elaborate. How do I do what?”

“Alright, full disclosure?” He breathed out. “Why does she trust you, and not me?” His head rose. His eyes were a piercing blue. In a louder volume, he demanded, “What am I doing wrong?”

Harry stifled a sigh. “I cannot imagine,” he replied dryly.

“And calling me out in front of everyone? Have I done something to you?” Ron’s volume climbed with every accusation. His fists clenched and unclenched down by his thighs. “Why are you always taking each other’s side? I thought I was your best mate!”

“The things you say.” This was not good. He had to diffuse the tension. “This is getting ridiculous. Ron, look at me.”

Harry waited for him to heed the command. When Ron’s eyes reluctantly beheld his, Harry tapped at his own cheekbone, ignoring the twinge of pain. He said, “Firstly, I won’t say I don’t deserve this, maybe. But I can’t have this becoming a regular occurrence. I’m going to do things you happen to disagree with.”

“You got what was coming.”

“Ron, people are already accusing me of showing you favoritism.” Seeing the defensive retort about to leap up, Harry gave him a stern look. “You’d just assaulted me in my office. You hit your superintendent in the face. It is well within my rights to have you written up. Fill in the blanks.”

Ron’s lips thinned into a long white line.

Channeling Dumbledore’s unnerving calmness from his memories, Harry said, “Any other Head Auror would’ve pressed charges. Or sacked you. Yet we’re still here. Why do you think that is?”

Ron’s mouth opened and closed, incapable of finding the words. Unable to revive his fighting spirit, his body sagged. His eyes had fallen again from Harry’s gaze. To keep himself busy, he fiddled with his thumbs, crossing and recrossing his legs.

His patience was diminishing. Under a placating tone, he coaxed, “Work with me here, Ron. I’m not the enemy.” As visual emphasis, Harry rested his wand down on the desk, making certain Ron heard the thunk. Clasping gloved fingers together tightly, Harry said, “What do you think’s happening between me and Hermione? If it’s what I reckon you’re going to say, I call bollocks. Hermione is my Deputy Head Auror. And she is your wife. That’s it.”

“Funny how you leapt to that conclusion, before I said anything—”

His palm slammed down on the desk. “Ron, shut up!” Harry snapped, hearing the inception of that surly pigheadedness in Ron’s petulant tone. He could recall the knife edge of Ron’s jealous accusations from their school years. Incensed, he shouted, “We all know what you’re thinking. I promise you. Nothing’s happened! Nothing has been crossed! I swear on my parents’ graves….”

The defiance on Ron’s face dimmed exponentially. He reared back, looking uncomfortable.  

“…there is no affair! Hermione has been a faithful wife. I did not die for you to accuse me of—!”

“—Harry, I didn’t mean it,” Ron interrupted.

It was like a splash of cold water. Harry’s rant died on his lips as he stared at his mate’s bowed head, befuddled, doubting what he’d just heard. It couldn’t be this easy, was the thought running through his mind. He’d been expecting a fight. He’d been expecting for it to come to blows and explosions.

Although Ron’s head was downcast, he could see blue butcher eyes—partially hidden behind that fringe—zipping to the wand on the desk, as if its presence could console his apprehension.

“I…fuck, I’m—” Ron exhaled. “I’m sorry. I’m just paranoid, alright?”

The room wasn’t shaking. Nothing had fallen. Only the sounds of their breathing rushed to fill in the silence.

The tension in Ron’s shoulder seemed to have ebbed a bit, once he realized he hadn’t landed himself at the end of Harry’s infamous temper.

Ron shifted in his seat. The hush seemed to be getting to him. He was collecting his thoughts, his leg jittery, bouncing on his other knee to the speed his mind ran. “I didn’t imagine you’d be this—” He couldn’t finish the sentence, not upon spotting the sharp twist of Harry’s mouth. Hoarsely, he asked, “Nothing’s going on really?”

“Sorry to burst your bubble,” Harry retorted crossly. He folded his arms, his fists digging into the crook of his elbows. “If I were a lesser man, I’d be offended. Walk a bit in my shoes. Do I look like the homewrecking sort?”

“You don’t…you’re not a homewrecker,” Ron admitted. He worried his lower lip, darting his tongue over chapped lips. “Has she said anything to you? I don’t want to be a jealous prat but sometimes a man…wonders, y’know? You’re her superintendent. She’s not been…making eyes at anyone else, has she? Or have you seen any bloke showing inappropriate interest in my wife?”

A throbbing sensation made itself known between Harry’s eyebrows. Pinching the patch of skin, he asked, “Sorry, have you talked with Hermione?” His hand shot up, halting whatever Ron had been about to say. His tone was grim. “No, have you two actually talked to each other like a civil couple?”

“I’m not certain what you—”

“For example,” Harry interjected, “did you know she started crying? In front of me? Guess the subject. It involves you.”

It was as physical of a blow as getting punched in the gut.

“…No. I can’t believe—really, Hermione was upset?” Ron’s voice was brittle, barely above a rasp.

“She certainly wasn’t happy.”

Ron’s expression was heartrending. “Mate… for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. She never said anything about…why do you…why did she come to you? Blimey, when was this? She never told me.”

“She was helping me with the ambassador’s situation. It was the same day Dumbledore’s Tomb was ransacked.” Exhaling a gust of breath, Harry leaned back in his seat. He explained, “She was distraught you would accuse her of cheating. She’s pregnant with your child, you wanker.”

“Blimey.”

Harry inclined his head, not agreeing vocally. The implication was nonetheless in his silence.

“And you’re telling me this? Now?” Ron’s tone was incredulous. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“Would you have listened to me?” he asked. Then his expression became inscrutable. “Never mind that. It’s only…I didn’t want to meddle, y’know? This is your marriage. But this…marital spat of yours, it’s been going on for far too long. Even Goldstein’s picked up on it.”

Hearing their shrink’s name, Ron flinched.

Anthony Goldstein had been assigned to their department as the head psychiatrist, after having undergone intensive training at St Mungo’s. After the previous one retired, there had been an opening. Harry, Hermione, and Thicknesse had been impressed by the credentials the former Ravenclaw graduate presented them during their interview. Goldstein had been just as approachable as Harry remembered him in Dumbledore’s Army, his personality just as sunny as the color of his hair. He was still shorter than Harry—and he was still adamant in his resolve as a practicing Jew—but the boy Harry remembered him as was now a man applied to his duties.

Making up his mind, Harry tugged the green folder from underneath the papers. Then he asked, “Are you two getting a divorce?”

“What the—?” Ron’s eyes bulged. “No, I’m not getting a bloody divorce!”

Harry’s brows skyrocketed beneath his fringe. With much deliberateness, he slid the folder over so that the neat handwriting was illuminated by the table lamp. Ron’s eyes widened even further, spotting his name on the tab.

“I- I thought this was supposed to be confidential? Patient-therapist confidentiality?” Ron swallowed, his complexion paling. His freckles were brown constellations on his face. He reached for the file, demanding, “Why is it this big?”

“Goldstein’s notes are extraordinarily thorough,” Harry answered dryly, watching Ron flip through the documents at a feverish pace. “Which is why I’m inclined to ask what you’re doing to do about this. With what Goldstein wrote down, I’m worried for both of you. Especially you, Ron. You always look like you’ve slept over at George’s shop. For days.”

“Is that why you asked if we were getting divorced?” Ron demanded, his brows crumpling into a troubled frown as he skimmed Goldstein’s observations.

He read the scribbles—Disciplinary Charges. Problem-maker. Intelligent, aggressive, temperamental, and defensive. Loose cannon. PTSD symptoms: exhibits signs of paranoia and struggles reintegrating back into civilized society. Might need to arrange for reassignment from fieldwork to administrative duties.

Ron declared, “This is a load of hogwash.”

He didn’t look up even as Harry leaned across the desk, casting a long shadow over the wood.

“I’ll save you the legwork. You’re not even supposed to see this.” Covering the parchments with his palm, Harry leafed through the pages until he reached the more recent entries. As if by rote, Harry said, “You have been turning to food for comfort, overeating; he’s noted significant weight gain in an abnormal amount of time. There is an escalation of aggressive behavior in your remarks and actions on the field. He suggests PTSD—that’s post-traumatic stress disorder—and depression. You have repeatedly mentioned your dissatisfaction at work and at home. Tell me, what am I supposed to think when Goldstein reports to me about such? What’s going on, Ron?”

“You’ve read my file,” Ron retorted, his ears burning crimson. His knuckles were white against the green folder. “You already have your answer. So stop pretending that you care.”

Harry’s stare could bore holes. There was the small part of him that was rankled by the obstinacy. It was the same small beast that snarled and wanted to break free whenever others had spread falsehoods about him or pushed him beyond his capability for kindness. Miniscule as it was, it was an insidious monster with an explosive temper lying in wait. He took a deep, shaky breath.  

Hermione’s shiny, pink face, wet with tears when she confessed her mixed feelings. Teddy’s despairing face, when he nearly broke Harry’s pocket watch. Malfoy bleeding, limbs eagle-spread in the water. Sirius being blasted with the Killing Curse, falling through the Veil.

He exhaled slowly. In and out. Meditative. He had to rein it in. He reminded himself of what was necessary for Occlumency. He was a functioning adult. He was better than this. Only individuals like Voldemort and Vernon let their anger cloud their judgement. Dumbledore wouldn’t have allowed himself to be furious.

“Ron,” he said through gritted teeth. He was displeased by how tight his voice sounded. Clearing his throat, he tried again. “Ron…you’re not wrong.”

Ron’s head snapped up.

“It’s difficult for me to care,” Harry confessed, “because this has been something I’ve known about for a while, and I haven’t had a proper upbringing. But you’re my best mate. And I’m selfish. I don’t want to let you go. Not without reason. So let me ask this: are you unsatisfied at work? Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Mate….” Ron sat up. His expression was perturbed. “Are you—are you firing me?”

“No!” Harry blurted, nearly gawking at him. “Merlin, no. I was—I-I’m not great at comforting others.” His breath whooshed out. “I’m asking…do you and Hermione need time? I can pull you off assignment—”

“Harry—”

“—I want you with your wife and child, not out risking your life in the field. I can rescind my orders. Assign you a different case—”

“HARRY!” Ron shouted, snatching his attention and startling him into muteness. His eyes were a piercing blue as he stared him down. In a slow drawl, as if explaining to a child, he said gruffly, “Not that I don’t appreciate it, but you realize how that’ll look? To others? After you’d publically approved stationing me overseas? On a special assignment.”

Harry winced. His mind was whirling. He honestly hadn’t thought about that. He’d been more concerned about how to make this right again, to Ron. Once again, Ron was demonstrating social insight. Sometimes Harry forgot….

His gaze fell on the coroner’s reports on his desk. A frown tugged on Harry’s face. Written down was exactly the same toxicology details he’d shared with Harry and Hermione, after having demonstrated the entomology spell results detected no evidence of blowfly larvae anywhere on the bodies. However, unlike the medical examiner, Hermione held a perfumed handkerchief to her nose.

He remembered the resentment dying on his lips once he realized why she could be feeling inadequate. He could tell she was pushing herself for some invisible goal, like she had something to prove.

Many times Harry appreciated how his and Hermione’s work principles conveniently seemed to match. Young that they may be compared—to the workforce they oversaw—the pair presented a united front. Wherever the Head Auror went, his Deputy Head was sure to follow. She backed him up, so the favor had to be returned. But the side of him that was psychologically attuned now recognized it to be because of the emotional dependency after having permanently Obliviated all her parents’ memories of her existence herself.

Ron was in a different category since he was her husband. At least Ron had parents and siblings to turn to. Hermione only had Harry. So loathe as Harry was to concede to the psychoanalysis, Goldstein had been correct. Their Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder only worsened the reliance.

Yet, habit or not it was for them to turn to each other for advice, Harry should’ve known better than to consult with Hermione on matters outside of work. While she’d matured since their school days and have filled in remarkable gaps missing in her knowledge of the wizarding world customs, his Deputy Head was sometimes as socially awkward as Harry was. She could jump to conclusions as Ron could, in lieu of context and research material. Clever as she was, she was not infallible.

He relied on her superior intellect and intelligence-gathering skills. They were the witch’s strengths, just as tactical thinking and voice impersonations were Ron’s. However, out of the three of them, only Ron had the semblance of a normal childhood and therefore could make a more astute assessment of magical social conventions….

He peeked down at a certain drawer. There was an idea brewing in his head. He knew this was something Ron and Hermione would not do unless they had someone to push them.

Harry gnawed on his lower lip thoughtfully. He could change the subject to make Ron feel better, before Harry delivered his ultimatum. He had to establish solidarity. There was only one subject he could think of that’d distract him. He also knew the trigger words, framing the request like letting Ron in on a secret that Harry couldn’t even trust Hermione with. Even if it meant putting himself in a position of embarrassment….

“Ron,” Harry said, steel interlaced in his voice. He had to ask before his nerves got the better of him. He made himself lean several inches forward in his seat. “Before that, may I ask for advice? It’s for something unrelated. Hermione is useless on this.”

At that, Ron’s brows rose to his hairline.

He considered Harry for a bit.

When he found nothing suggesting a prank, then leaning in until his chest was pressed against the edge of the desk, Ron whispered, “What’s on your mind?”

He’d taken the bait.

Harry drew in a deep breath. He held it in his lungs. Then he exhaled. He began simply, “The ambassador. The Asian one.”

Ron blinked rapidly, his mind no doubt working to put a face to all the dignitaries he knew of. Finally he suggested, “That stuck-up—” he paused, then corrected, “that Lucius Malfoy lookalike of yours? The diplomat?”

He was awaiting Harry’s acknowledgement. When he saw Harry nod, he reclined back. His expression was thoughtful, like he was contemplating his next chess move.

Ron remarked, “What about him? Actually, you’ve never mentioned anything about volunteering your services to anyone in Witness Protection…before you left. He looks like he’s got magical creature blood in him. Where’d you meet him?”

Harry grimaced. “Japan.”

Ron’s brows furrowed. “But how did you—?” Breaking off, his mouth formed into a small ‘o.’ The shine of curiosity made his expression livelier. “Hermione’s keeping a tight lid on this too. I get you; you were given the assignment. But how is my wife involved? I mean, I understand she’s your deputy—”

“I reckon he fancies me!” Harry exclaimed hastily, his ears turning hot. Unable to meet Ron’s gaze, he explained, “I don’t believe I’m imagining it. I know the signs. He’s not exactly subtle.”

“Oh.” When Harry snuck a peek, Ron didn’t appear stunned or sickened. Matching his tone, there was wonder in his face. Most of all, it was his ready acceptance of the revelation that made it surreal. Ron demanded, “And he fancies you? He’s been giving you the eyes?”

“Gee, Ron, way to make a bloke feel confident,” Harry said sarcastically, bristling automatically. “I’ll have you know I’m quite the catch.”

“But do you fancy him back?” he insisted. His face was fixed into a serious expression. “Do I need to hex the git for you? If he’s been bothering you, you should tell him—”

“Trust me. It’s all I’ve been thinking about for months,” Harry interjected, although hearing Ron offer such a thing made his heart swell. He forced himself to confess, “I’m not bothered by it. I—it’s actually…nice, for a change. Is that deplorable of me to think so?” His shirt collar was choking him. He’d never thought he’d be flattered to be on the receiving end. He’d thought it would impossible, but his ears burned hotter.

“No, no. It’s fine.” Ron had held his hands up in surrender. “But…I mean…no offense, mate, but I thought you were attracted to women.” He began ticking off his fingers. “There was Cho Chang, Parvati Patil…then there was my sister….”

He caught Harry’s instinctive cringe. He gave Harry an inscrutable look, before mercifully continuing, “And I’ve never seen you batting for the other team. You’d certainly never made googly eyes at Gilderoy Lockhart, Cedric Diggory, or Bulgarian heartthrob Viktor Krum —”

Now Ron’s complexion became ghastly. “Harry, in the Quidditch changing rooms, have you ever—?”

“No!” Harry answered, glowering, his tone curt. Clasping his hands tightly in his lap, Harry forced himself to say, “I never had inappropriate thoughts about you or any of the blokes on the team.”

“Oh, thank Merlin.” Ron’s shoulders sagged, his face upturned dramatically to the ceiling in relief. “That would’ve been—since when did you start fancying wizards? You’ve never been…,” here he paused, ashamed, before finishing, “particularly lacy.”

“There was no ‘starting,’” Harry retorted. “I considered it one day, and the thought of it didn’t turn me off. I’ve accepted both ladies and blokes. That’s it. My sexuality doesn’t have to be that complicated.”

“So…you bat for bot… teams. I can’t believe you’ve never told me—” Ron’s mouth moved into an upside-down ‘V.’

To his credit, Ron hadn’t stormed out of the room like Harry had imagined countless of times. It also wasn’t as natural as Harry had wished it was, but it was better than he’d been expecting. He should be thankful Ron was accepting of it as he was.

As if it physically pained him to admit it, Ron spoke slowly to the ceiling, “I suppose he is handsome…”

Harry’s mouth involuntarily moved into a frown.

“…I personally don’t see it, but if you think he’s attractive—”

“I know he’s attractive. But I cannot return his feelings.”

Ron’s head slammed back down to gawk at him.

“Hear me out first. I know it sounds awful—!” Mid-sentence, he watched as Ron brought a hand to his face.

“You’re throwing him a wand.”

“There’s no ‘wand’ being thrown,” Harry objected. He breathed in harshly, reminding himself to be patient. “I’m telling you this because I want your opinion. I mean, blast it, I don’t see why not. It’s only a crush. It’s…tolerable. I reckon you understand why I can’t return his feelings though.”

“Does Hermione know about this? You tell her everything. Since she’s your deputy and all.”

Harry hesitated. Then, dropping his gaze, he said, “In hindsight…I realize, it may’ve been a big oversight.”

Ron laughed hollowly, ringing in Harry’s ears like a demented chortle. It was gone as fast as it came. “Yeah, that’s an understatement.” He’d folded his arms across his chest. “She chewed you out, didn’t she? She’d be the sort to have a wobbly about this.”

“Hermione…didn’t give me the answer I wanted,” Harry forced himself to admit, although dragging the words out was difficult. The effort was akin to swallowing apple pips. Taking a deep breath, he said to his desk, “I should’ve went to you instead.”

Ron was mumbling a few choice words beneath his breath that Harry couldn’t catch. Then he said, “I honestly don’t know what you see in…oh, right. I forgot. Your first crush was Chang. Of course.” Rolling his eyes at Harry’s bowed head, he said, “Look, Harry, I hate to admit it but whatever Hermione’s said to you, she’s likely correct. Blokes don’t work that way. Women don’t work that way. It’s the same whatever gender it is. If you don’t refuse him upfront, he’s going to fall in love with you. You should tell him now.”

“Don’t be ridiculous….” Harry paused. Then his scowl turned severe. “I’m hoping it won’t happen. If it does, well….”

Ron groaned again. “Another understatement,” he mumbled. Louder, he asked, “He’s an ambassador, isn’t he? A top-secret confidential, high-risk magical creature from a secret society that neither you nor Hermione are authorized to reveal?”

“‘Secret society?’” Harry parroted blandly.

“Blimey, Harry. Have you not read the subscriptions? It’s been all the Daily Prophet’s been talking about since you’d brought him here. He looks and talks odd. And he’s always with you. Obviously people are going to speculate.”

“Remember, I told Kreacher to comb through my letters. I only read what he’s approved.” Dread pooled in his stomach like acid. There was one topic that the press loved to publish about him, and it all revolved around his bachelor status. Dismay melted into Harry��s expression. “No, you’re saying—?”

It was as if Ron read his mind. “No, no! Most of them’s all harmless speculation. The most Skeeter’s done is hint that you two have been attached to the hip a lot more than…actually, you might not want to look into it. I know how you get….” Ron trailed off, bringing his face away from his hand. Instead, he cradled his jaw, his eyes rooting Harry to his place. Then out of the blue, he declared, “You have gravitas.”

Harry’s head whirled. He spluttered, “I beg your pardon?”

“If what you’re saying is true, that’s why he’s attracted to you,” Ron declared, gesturing at Harry. “You’re both diplomats. He’s prim and grim. You’re rich, gloomy, and distinguished. If he fancies blokes, of course he’s going to want to shag the Chosen One. You are a walking success story. Death has lent you gravitas. I can’t say I envy you.”

“…Honestly, I’m astonished that you even know the word.”

“Hilarious, you are. But I heard Hermione say it once. I liked how it sounded. Gra-vi-tas.” Ron spoke carefully around the pronunciation of the syllables. “Makes you sound posh.”

“If you have the ability to joke, then you must be in an improved mood.”

“You’re also mul-ti-fa-ce-ted.”

“Incredible. Keep that up, Ron, and everyone will comment on how Hermione’s been a good influence on you.”

They shared a private smile. For a moment, it was as if they were two mates having a pint in a pub after work hours, back when they were both trainees bonding over who had the worst work anecdote of the day. It was only minutes later when the illusion shattered, once both wizards realized they’d gotten off-topic. Their demeanors immediately shifted back into that of sobriety.

“It’s up to you,” Ron begun, “what you want to do. You’re a functioning adult.”

“I know I’m an adult.”

“If you want to ignore it, fine. Y’know what my wife and I think about it. But I’ll support you every step of the way.”

Harry was silent for a moment. Then he whispered, “Even if it turns out to be a bad decision?”

The grin he received was bleak but lopsided.

“Well, maybe not always,” Ron conceded, making it a point to gaze directly into his eyes, “but unlike Hermione, I’ll back my best mate up—even when it’s stupid and mad. I’m familiar with that Potter stubbornness.”

“It’s tough changing my mind,” Harry joked, feeling the muscles in his face loosening. He must’ve been smiling back for Ron’s own to have grown looser. “In all seriousness, Ron, don’t tell Hermione this. She knows but….”

“Mum’s the word.” He mimed zipping his lips shut, twisting an invisible key and throwing it over his shoulder.

Time to take the plunge, Harry thought to himself, opening a drawer and seizing a stack of business cards tied together by a rubber band. Thumbing through them, he said, “I also don’t want to separate you from your wife.”

Ron blinked.

Finding the one he wanted, Harry leaned forward in his seat. “I’m doing this for your own good. Consider this an order.”

Harry slid a card over. Embossed on the black card was the name “IRENE TREMLETT,” with “Post-Marriage Counselling” printed underneath. Underneath, white ink bisected the center of the card like a jagged tear, fading in and out of existence. Harry had thought it to be clever symbolism.

“Tremlett?” Ron muttered, reading the card. His mouth was slashed downwards. “As in, the bass player from The Weird Sisters? The famous one?”

“She’s his wife,” Harry supplied helpfully. “Goldstein’s a fan of the band. You remember Donaghan Tremlett. From the band that was there for our Yule Ball?” Harry stole a glance at his pocket watch. He frowned.

“Why do you have—?”

His eyes shot back up. “Ron, your parents have noticed. Your brothers and sister have noticed. Everyone at work has. You don’t think I wouldn’t ask Goldstein one day if he had any professional referrals?” He tapped the card. “I know you and Hermione won’t do it. So I’m booking her for you two.”

Ron immediately launched into a string of protests.

“You don’t have a choice. If not me, then sooner or later, your mum and dad might.” Watching Ron wilt in his seat, Harry demanded, “Don’t you want to fix your marriage? Is this an issue of pride?”

“No! I mean, we’ve thought about it. But—”

“But nothing. There’s no shame in seeking professional help. No one is going to think any less of you.” Harry stood up. He took a deep breath. Then he rattled off: “Send me your timetable please, soon, so I know when the next available day is for you. I’ll take a look at Hermione’s too. I don’t want to get your knickers into a twist about it, so I’ll do you a favor and tell Hermione that you were the one to take initiative. It’s the effort that counts, alright? That you’re trying? She’ll like that.”

Scrambling to his feet, Ron mirrored his stance. He folded his arms. “Where are we going—?”

“I’m going to pick up Sesshomaru. I don’t mean to be rude, but I promised him. It’s our nightly thing. You…I don’t know what you want to do, but I assume you’d want to spend time with Hermione before you head back to the States again. You should.” His eyes rooted Ron to the spot. “How goes the investigation in America anyway?”

“It’s only been a few days, Harry,” Ron retorted, although his expression had become queer when Harry mentioned Sesshomaru’s name. He was looking at Harry strangely. “Do you two go on walks? Is that a thing?”

Harry ignored that. He insisted, “An update on its current status, Ron.”

“…We’re still settling in. Rubbing elbows. All that sod. It’s not that fast.”

“I said I wanted a report by the end of the month.”

“And you’ll get one.” Ron shifted on his feet. His shoulders were hunched, with one hand gripping his arm awkwardly. Although he towered over Harry, the way he now held himself made Harry feel like a giant in comparison. Ron added, “The Director still loathes you.”

Harry smirked. “Well, I can’t win them all.”

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Kim Stanley Robinson's "Aurora": space is bigger than you think #2yrsago

Kim Stanley Robinson's Aurora is the best book I read in 2015, and by "best" I mean, "most poetic" and "most thought provoking" and "most scientific," a triple-crown in science fiction that's practically unheard of. I wouldn't have believed it possible, even from Robinson, had I not read it for myself.

Aurora is an exciting novel on its own merits: the story of a generation ship finally decelerating at the Tau Ceti system after 150 years of travel at 10 percent of lightspeed, its many arcologies each a miniature Terran biome, ready to terraform a wet moon of a superjovian planet 12 light-years from Sol.

But Aurora is even more interesting for the way that it interacts with the science fiction that came before it. For Aurora is covering some well-trodden turf in its premise, but approaches it with a critical eye and an original point of view that makes its science fictional forbears look primitive and even laughable by comparison.

Like some of the best Golden Age science fiction, Aurora is a story about engineers troubleshooting hard technical problems. But for the most part, those novels took the simplistic view that the hard problem of interstellar travel would be about physics, and devoted themselves to engineers who occupied themselves with troublesome propulsion systems. Robinson's generation ship is plagued by biological problems that are much trickier than the mere physics of propulsion, navigation, acceleration and deceleration. His closed ecosystem has to exist without resupply and with very little opportunity for repair, and it is full of complicated living things whose relationships to one another are governed by homeostatic mechanisms that were evolved in an ecosystem one trillion times larger than a spaceship. The miniaturization of the living things' habitats is akin to an island ecosystem, but much exaggerated. Islands have to worry about mutations and disease, but at least they have the whole wide ocean to wash away some of their sins and the whole massive atmosphere to circulate their gases. On the spaceship in Aurora, salts build up in deadly concentrations. Elements bond to other elements and will not be liberated. The Coriolis effect of a ship spinning under acceleration is different enough from the decelerative forces that microorganisms fail in difficult-to-define ways, and these changes interact with things like mechanical connectors that have been accustomed to g-stresses from one direction and have bent themselves in subtle ways such that they can't function any longer when the way that they are pulled "down" changes minutely but persistently.

Troubleshooting makes for a brilliant backdrop for science fiction. It's the kind of story-puzzle that can serve as a pivot point for characters to rotate around, and it creates a drumbeat of rising tension as the critical technologies of the imaginary world fail in ever-more-dangerous way. Sometimes, the troubleshooting is just handwaving (think of Scotty shouting about dilithium crystals), but at its best, it describes problems that are viscerally recognizable as real and meaty and urgent.

Aurora gets off to a spectacular start, then, as a novel about troubleshooting on a generation ship, and about the sociology of that ship, and about the personal relationship between Devi, the chief engineer, and her daughter, Freya, who may or may not be mentally deficient in a way that may or may not be related to the ship's ecological problems. To make this even better, Robinson describes the settings -- the pocket-sized biomes -- with all the poetry of John Muir or Henry David Thoreau, a mode familiar to Robinson readers who've fallen in love with books like Pacific Edge. In Robinson novels, the landscape becomes a character, as interesting in its own right as any of the humans.

Then the ship's inhabitants arrive at the world that is their destination and set about terraforming it. Here we get more troubleshooting, more chewy sociology, more poetry. The story is told, in many modes, by the ship's AI, which has been charged by Devi with summarizing the voyage and its significant moments -- she requests it of the ship because she, herself, can't make sense of what her distant ancestors were thinking when they doomed their descendants to this harebrained scheme.

I can't summarize the plot any more from here on without introducing major spoilers, so I won't. Instead, I'll talk about the kinds of stories this book goes on to tell, and remark first upon just how many of these stories there are, and how varied they are, and how brilliantly executed each one is.

After the terraforming project begins, Robinson tells a story about microbiology, a story about a war in space, a story about cold sleep, a story about climate change, a story about political change, and a genuinely magnificent technical story about field-expedient astrogation that is set with parameters that leave the ship and its inhabitants at the edge of death (and us at the edge of our seats) for an excruciating and very satisfyingly long time.

How long? Ultimately, the novel clocks in at almost 200 years' worth of action. This timescale is important to the novel's effect, which is to render visceral the true distances of interstellar space, the true improbable terror of interstellar colonization. It is the most significant novel in the mundane science fictionform (a 2002 movement that challenges writers to stick to physics within the boundaries of what is likely to be possible, eschewing faster-than-light travel), and it uses that form to hammer home an important point about our human relationship to the world of our evolutionary history.

Robinson's punchline, the thing he works up to here and in so many of his other books, is that Earth and humans are interpenetrated with one another. We humans are colony organisms made up of microbiomes of creatures with vastly different evolutionary speed to our macro-selves, and the homeostatic mechanisms that keep our colonies intact are intricately wound around the Earth and its climate, its ecosystems, its natural and built environments.

The problems that Robinson's characters experience in their interspatial adventures are contrived, of course. As with all lifeboat stories, the crisis of the lifeboat is created by the author's invisible hands, off-stage, arranging the scenery to contrive the emergency.

But what Robinson's furtive scenery-arranging points out is that the easy times all our other science fiction stories have given to their colonists were every bit as contrived. By pointing out an alternative, in the same engineering/troubleshooting frame as those other stories, Robinson points out that what we'd taken for an obvious and natural axiom was actually a militant position about the universe's willingness to be colonized, despite the Fermi Paradox, a position so dominant in sf that it was nearly impossible to notice that it even was a position, as opposed to a law of nature.

This is a novel that turns much of sf on its ear. It is a sequel of sorts to 2312, and like that novel, it is both pessimistic and optimistic by turns. But as epic as 2312 was, it's nothing to Aurora. 2312 was a stroll in the woods, Aurora is a month of mountain-trekking with Robinson by your side.

Aurora [Kim Stanley Robinson/Orbit]

https://boingboing.net/2015/11/02/kim-stanley-robinsons-auro.html