#just trust me you'll be fine;

[lucie-newman]

Precipitous.

It's a fitting word. It's the cliffs at Black Beach, California where the rocks drop twenty jagged feet into clear blue water. It's her bare wet feet and the balance and the moment she looked over the edge. It's the breath she took before jumping, stretching out all her limbs like a starfish, and dropping. Freefall. Unstoppable.

It's labor.

This isn't written about in advice columns, or played out on screen. Labor doesn't announce itself at the doorstep. The back pain she's struggled with all this last trimester hides a multitude of symptoms; is the symptom. And her water doesn't break right away, her contractions don't build slowly. There are no Braxton Hicks. She's three weeks early, she's alone when it starts, and, as her father would say:

"Give it what you got."

She's out by the old chapel Cage rebuilt taking pictures when it happens. When the back pain she's been rubbing at with increasing annoyance twists suddenly inward and something unspools inside of her and -

Oh!

Oh, fuck!

It's a contraction. It's pain squeezing her tighter and tighter until the camera drops from her hands. And when it loosens, when she can breath again, she thinks: that's fine. Just one. One strong contraction. Nothing to -

And then the second piggybacks the first.

Reception is a little spotty this far off the road. There's a voice in her head that sounds like her father, like her older brothers, like a drop of reason in a bucket of insanity. Not advised. But then, she didn't think she'd go early. When in all her life has she ever even been punctual? It's one day late on car insurance with an apology and a promise. It's two hours late to a party with a smile and a story.

But then, this isn't her entrance.

Panic makes a nest in her chest for a moment, scratches at her heart. She rests back against the bark of a willow tree and lets it play out. There's no use fighting it. The baby's awake, kicking at a rib urgently when a third contraction ripples through her. "Yeah, yeah," she tells them, breathless. She sweeps a hand from breastbone to hip. "I'm afraid too."

Of what's happening, yes. Of motherhood, surely. But of all the rest too. Age and boredom and bills and vulnerability. It's the pulse under her skin that she's been ignoring. The old unspoken fear, rare as it could be, that what happened to her mother could happen to her.

But honestly, fuck that.

She pushes herself from the tree and walks best as she can down the beaten path toward her car. She's left her backpack, her water bottle, and her camera behind clutching only at the phone in her hand and waiting for those signal bars. It's a journey made in broken acts. Halted by the contractions that take hold and squeeze. And damn if those classes don't mean shit. She can breathe. She does breathe. But none of that helps when she's being funneled downward. So she curses. Lot's of fucks and shits and then some more inventive things that would make her grams blush. She kicks at a fallen log, half bent over when one particularly strong one takes her under, and that helps too.

She thinks of birth playlists and the classical music some women luxuriate in - she thinks of epidurals and the sweetness of a warm bath right now. She thinks for one horrible moment that she's not going to make it out of the woods. She trips, cuts her knee open on the bits and brambles of the forest floor, and screams. Frustrated. Primal. Her throat aching from it. If there are hikers up this early, before the forecast showers they'd hear her. But there's no answer except the birds - scared mute for a moment - and then swooping back in to fill the silence. There's no choice though. She pulls herself up and keeps walking.

The hike out to the chapel took thirty minutes, the return trip takes just over an hour. She's coming out to the gravel parking lot when those bars flicker back and she could cry with relief. She's in no state to drive so she dials 911 as she drops onto a large rock near her car. The operator is a sweet, older woman that stays on the line with her for the twenty minutes it takes to get an ambulance out there.

"You got a name, Lucie?" she asks, talking her through a contraction.

"Several." She bites out. "Thinking I got to-" she grunts and the woman waits it out with her, "-see them you know? Got to see if they look like a Piper or a Ziggy."

"It's a good day this one. Great birthday."

"Yeah?"

"National Chocolate and Peanut Butter Day."

It makes her laugh, makes her unclench her fist just a touch. "You look that up?"

"I did. You want to know who they'll be sharing it with?" She does and the woman says "Woody Harrelson."

"Sweet."

"And Kathryn Hahn."

Lou huffs, tips her head back into the sun. "Legend."

The baby twists, moving fast beneath her hand. She almost can read their agitation. Wishes she could tell them it's going to be alright but her water breaks before the ambulance arrives and she starts to hyperventilate.

"It's okay Lucie. They'll be there any minute. Can you hear the sirens?" She does. "Your going to be just fine, mama."

Things move fast after that. She's loaded into the back of the ambulance and strapped to monitoring equipment. She watches the squiggles of her baby's heartbeat to distract from the pain, from the contractions that start piling up one on top of the other. This was supposed to be a long process. Hours upon hours, those were the words. But it's not. She asks is something is wrong, her voice thin with worry. Someone holds her hand. Someone else asks if they should call her partner. She laughs, tells them no, then thinks of her siblings. She pulls up the group chat and shakily types out two words.

Hospital. Now.

It's not eloquent. It's not joking. And she's speeding down the country road she learned to drive on when the urge to push hits. She thinks she should have called Ari. She thinks he should be here. She doesn't want to be alone for this. But then, she isn't really. She hasn't been alone for near on nine months.

In the end, none of her siblings will make it there on time. In the end, she doesn't even make it there on time.

Her son is born pink, angry, and loud two minutes before arriving at the hospital.

[thatonepikminperson]

Tomorrow bois, y'all get to see my oc's...

and like the essay I wrote about each one of them...

I'M NORMAL ABOUT THE LITTLE PEOPLE IN MY HEAD

[byanyan]

(whispering) byan cries when given homecooked food

[alongtidesoflight]

also on another note i just read through the cp2077 endings i didn't get the chance to play yet and i do think the tower ending is one of the worst endings to pick in terms of what it means for a very self-reliant and anti-corpo V (and maybe this has been discussed and disCOURSED to death already, but i had the tags blacklisted for years so i'm just adding my thoughts to the void). under the cut because i get ranty lately for some reason.

so you survive the relic. but as a tradeoff you can't keep your cyberware. on your way there you pissed off just about every faction there is to be found in night city for one reason or another. there is no surviving a city full of mercs and gangs decked out with cyberware when you don't have cyberware yourself. maxtac is gonna wipe the floor with your innards if you ever cross them. viktor says the FIA doctors are wrong, so let's put a pin in this i'm not done yet.

you hand songbird back over to reed. you lose each and every friend you've had in this city except for vick and misty who realistically can't protect you from any threats that might be headed your way, and there's mitch when you call panam, but realistically he's also too far away to help you immediately. kerry, the only one who's willing to catch back up with you is currently in space and won't be back in a while.

and sure you can say the FIA looks out for you, but let's loop back around to what viktor says. he thinks their diagnosis is wrong. whether that's just wishful thinking or he's right, i can't really determine. but for the sake of this argument, let's say he's right and there's a way for V to use cyberware again.

you're telling me the FIA doesn't know that? i don't buy it and i don't trust myers. it all seems very solid at first. they kept their end of the bargain, they kept you alive. there's a tradeoff but they did what they said they'd do. but let's look at how they acted with songbird and go off of that. songbird was only useful to myers as long as she could keep her in check. as soon as that went out of the window so did myers's goodwill. AND if V attempted to help songbird escape before handing her over to reed, what's guaranteeing that they don't try that again? i suppose there's no guarantee, unless she makes sure they too can't stand up to her anymore. and what better way is there to do that than to rid V of their cyberware?

reed being the one who relays all of that to you is as much a comforting presence as takemura is in the devil ending. you can grow really close with them. they're gonna break it to you gently, you're gonna be more willing to sip that poison. if you end up working for their respective factions, you essentially sign yourself away to the FIA or arasaka after they both influenced you to sign a contract in exchange for help (that doesn't even fully deliver on its promises. mikoshi kills you entirely and the FIA doctors take your cyberware. with both of them you lose johnny and your friends). and maybe there's Vs out there who are fine with that, or wanted that even and in that case all my points are kinda moot. like i said, i'm going off a V who isn't really about sympathising with them.

anyway, slight tangent. back to reed. you might want to think he's a friend to your V. maybe he is. but looking back at his history with alena and songbird... is he? like really? even if he truly considers them friends and i like to think he does, he DOES put duty above them every time. myers points and he shoots.

IF in the tower ending, myers is acting as i'd expect her to, and by that i mean keeping V on a short leash, then reed is helping her do that.

and IF viktor is right and the FIA doctors are wrong about you using your cyberware ever again, then they're only "wrong" because myers told them to feed you false information. and now you're working for her and how are you gonna get out of that when she's the president of the NUSA and everyone around you has cyberware but you don't.

i kept on hearing that the tower ending is one of the "best" endings if you want to hear - with certainty - that V survives. and maybe it is. but really, at what cost man. how much longer are you gonna keep going in night city when half of its citizens hold a grudge against you, your cyberware is gone, your friends are gone, and the faction you're working with might or might not have hired you and taken your cyberware from you just to make sure you don't ever act up again.

how fucking awful of a future would that be to a nomad V. spent 2 years in a coma? they didn't just choose the quiet life over a blaze of glory, they died in their sleep.

[girlivealwaysbean]

sometimes my bestfriend is like an angel in disguise istg

[ukulelegodparent]

It's so weird growing up how fast you get disinterested in eating sweet food. Like I've gone from 'I can eat a bag of Gummi Bears and drink a liter of coke and have a big bar of chocolate in one evening' to 'i'll have sweet things sometimes but I get so sick of like eg Gummi Bears so quickly. A handful is really on the verge of too much sometimes' in so little time.

[revvethasmythh]

almost entirely done with my veth cosplay with the exception of having to sew the collar onto my vest, and, not to toot my horn or anything, I make a fine ass mrs. brenatto

[tambovfox]

[lucie-newman]

MERROCK TASK #20

SOCIAL MEDIA

[the-acid-pear]

Need to finish my Dave design so I can draw him with Mori

[moonferry]

hate when u listen to a song and ur like oh my god thsi would make a killer amv/edit of this character and then u remember.. u do not have animation skills and all ur dreams are CRUSHED.

[storfulsten]

lol did I just lose 3 followers for mentioning a cool new song? ok

[izacore]

.

[yoonstudios]

.

[fazcinatingblog]

training new people is so annoying because if they can't do something by now/january, it's like "did laura not teach that??" no, she just doesn't listen to me and/or never does what i say

[whereisthedamndaddymanual]

A duo game of make believe works best if both are on the same wavelength