#long island satanic cult

[teedeekay]

Today in 2013, I celebrated my 200th They Might Be Giants show at Long Island's The Paramount and it was a great one 🙌

[morbidology]

During the 1980s, American pop culture was obsessed with the occult and many Americans believed that the occult was infiltrating the minds of the youth. Satanic panic was truly alive and well in 1980s America.

While satanic panic was a ridiculous notion with concerned parents contending that satanic cults roamed the streets, taking drugs and committing human sacrifices, there was one certain case that lent some legitimacy to the fear: the case of “The Acid King,” Ricky Kasso. Ricky hailed from Northport, Long Island, New York, and when he was a young boy, he was an energetic athlete that would wake up at the crack of dawn to play football with his friends. He was described by his parents as “the greatest kid in the world.”

Within five years, however, Ricky would be charged with an alleged satanic ritualistic killing and commit suicide in his jail cell. Where did it all go wrong?

As Ricky developed into a teenager, his ambition swiftly started to fall apart. He got mixed up with the wrong crowd and began experimenting with drugs. First of all, it was just marijuana and hashish but he would very quickly progress onto the harder stuff such as LSD and PCP. “I enjoy the fantasy world of drugs. You can’t stop me. I love drugs,” Ricky once stated to his father, Richard. “He became insubordinate to his teachers then joined in a house burglary and began to get in trouble with the police,” recalled Richard.

Ricky’s parents – both school teachers – tried desperately to wean him from drugs by sending him to South Oaks Hospital – which cost a hefty $45,000 – but to no avail. Eventually, Ricky’s drug use and behaviour became so erratic and he eventually moved out of the family home and subsequently dropped out of school....

𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐞:

[kiriekonamistan]

I was debating with myself over wether I should post this or not, but y'know what I like thinking about Fairy Tail and I'm gonna post it. Just incase it makes someone else as happy as it makes me.

NOTE: the words I bolded below the cut are words/terms I believe the Heartfilia women associate with their personal idea of Zeref.

So: What do the different generations of Heartfilia women associate with Zeref?

-Anna met him in the woods one day without knowing his identity for quite some time. He was a mysterious hermit mage with unbelievably high levels of magic power, and to Anna he had a lot of potential. Eventually he shared his ideas with her, a gate to connect the past and present, she instantly envisioned its usefulness and how it could save future generations.

To Anna he was a muse, a scholar and the guiding light who brought miracles into reality. But he was also a murderer, even if not by his own will or intentions, he had begun experimenting with the creation and manipulation of souls long before she met him. Her friend and teacher was the Black Wizard Zeref, she knew of him centuries before the terms 'Black Wizard' or 'Dark Mage' were conceived.

(Personally, I think Anna would also associate him with the Morning Star. The last star seen as dawn bleeds into a new day. He's a relic of the past even as far as Anna would be concerned because he's the last surviving student, and teacher, of the Mildian academy of Magic. Plus, the morning star is very closely associated with Lucifer. Depending on which interpretation of demonology you believe Lucifer either is a prince of hell who serves under Satan, or is Satan himself and Lucifer is just another name for him. I dunno, I can see connections between the two.) Also, Zeref's name is derived from the word Seraph as in the Seraphim Angels.

-Layla grew up hearing about the despicable actions of cults who claim to be following Zeref's last will. She knew that many scary stories about the dark mage himself were made up by parents to frighten naughty children into behaving themselves. But Layla wasn't a foolish woman, she knew he existed once and may still exist somewhere in the world she grew up in. Her ancestors' journal regarding the Eclipse Gate likely spoke of a brilliant wizard, one who Layla probably wondered about.

Could a man like Zeref, with all of his infamy and supposedly impossible accomplishments even be human? Chances are Layla thought he might be a God or Demon, maybe even a Demon God. Zeref was credited with creating a unique species of demons after all, and humans can't just make life so carelessly or easily as myths and legends said Zeref had. Maybe he was a Celestial Spirit, one who did something awful and was banished for his misdeeds? One who's constellation was no longer visible? Whoever and, or whatever Zeref had been and still might be, Layla would always feel like his name is a Dark Omen especially after having her daughter Lucy.

-Lucy knew of the scary stories that used Zeref's name. She knew about the legend of Lullaby, a death flute he had poured dark magic into thus creating a weapon of mass murder. He was the author of Demon Books and his name alone carries an Omen of Death.

Lucy saw Lullaby in person and nearly witnessed first hand its terrifying cursed power. Then on Galluna Island there was Deliora, another demon crated by Zeref who ruined the lives of so many people, including her own guildmate Gray. During her first year with the Fairy Tail guild alone Lucy encountered multiple demons made by Zeref's hand and nearly half a dozen groups of people (mostly dark guilds and cults) who were connected to his image in some way.

To Lucy Heartfilia, even before the incidents on Tenrou Island, Zeref was a real person. A monster in human skin, perhaps, but he had been real once.

And then Tenrou Island happens. Zeref is real in more than just a lingering image or some remnants hanging on from the Dark Ages of Magic. He's an immortal, who the members of Grimoire Heart believe to have mastered One Magic, the origin and completed form of all magical power.

----------------

Now I want to go into some speculation of what Lucy's image of Zeref; as a person and legendary mage, could've been if they had ever gotten some one-on-one interactions!! (Seriously, Lucy and Zeref could've had some very interesting interaction at any point in the series. There is just too much to unpack here, though.)

If Zeref and Lucy had met face-to-face (no, I don't count his unconscious body being manhandled across Tenrou Island. He was unconscious, she couldn't have gotten a read on his personality while he was unconscious...) at any point after Tenrou Island I feel like her impression of him would be similar to mine.

He's like a porcelain doll, empty and cold with unnaturally smooth edges. He fakes his smiles so often that they look natural now, but he's very good at pretending and I feel like Lucy would recognize this due to the environment she grew up in. He's unstable and unpredictable. Zeref is like a black hole he takes in so many things from knowledge, magic power, people, and even the essence of life which is stolen by his curse. In Lucy's mind he is a void that cannot give anything but death and sorrow. His curse makes him a cosmic force compressed down into a human body barely restrained by his own ability to compartmentalize his emotions.

Natsu, on the other hand, is like the North Star to Lucy. Her own guiding light always leading her back home to Fairy Tail. Natsu is Lucy's Polaris. (I need someone to write a fic with some of this imagery, please I am begging on my hands and knees. The huge difference in how Lucy views Zeref as a terrifying cosmic force in human skin with a sort of uncanny-valley appearance v.s. how she sees Natsu as everything that embodied her idea of 'home'! The way these two are brothers who are both so alike in certain ways but vastly different in others-!!)

I think about the Dragneel boys a lot. They are my favorite shade of angst and literary symbolism, I think. (Oh also, @spot-of-tea I'd like this to be seen by them.)

[inexplicablepeas]

So I realized that I never shared my Blood & Gold re-read thoughts due to shadow-ban issues on the old blog, thoughts under the cut! It's long!

It was interesting to read this immediately after TVA, it really highlighted Anne's talent for developing distinct voices for her characters as the two books are so different in structure and voice. Where TVA is fevered and rambling with tonnes of evocative metaphor this is logically ordered and somewhat detached. This has none of Lestat's conspiratorial chumminess interspersed with catastrophic existential crises, none of Louis' melancholy poeticism, we're just getting straight facts from Mr Marius . So Marius' voice is a bit drier than a lot of the other narrators in the chronicles but that does feel correct and it gives the book a bit of a cosier and more chill vibe than most of the other entries. It's like story time with Marius. 

It's interesting that this one isn't framed as a book being written for publication but as a quiet and private conversation between a lonely guy and a stranger who showed up on his door step happy to listen to him. I think that makes sense for Marius, he doesn't seem like he would publish his life story, he's too private and he would probably have been more tactful land less honest about certain things if it was for publication - less interesting for us!

You do still have to read a lot of his inner journey between the lines nonetheless. He's not really telling you how he was doing day to day after he abandoned Pandora entirely (following an argument about how to deal with the emerging cult of satan worshippers) then spent centuries in Rome pretending he wasn't dying for Avicus' (and Mael's?) company while letting partying mortals have run of his house as he painted the walls subconsciously with dozens of Pandora faces... but you can imagine, he's probably not feeling great!

It was fascinating to get more detail on how he was recruited to be keeper of the parents and to see his tense arms-length relationship with Mael play out over the years. Eudoxia is a great addition to the story as brief as her time in it is and getting his version of Armand's story is very welcome (and of course interesting to contrast with Armand's telling). Getting more Bianca was also welcome, she's such a big presence in TVA, I liked getting Marius' perspective there. 

I've got some of the same kind of complaints I had with TVA about what was left out. I guess that structuring a life story that spans millenia is no easy task and it's inevitable that some stuff is gonna get left out. Anne probably didn't want to rehash the same events form different perspectives over and over again but I really was disappointed that the narrative doesn't touch on his thoughts on his reunion with Armand in QotD, the brief Night Island coven times, how Daniel came to be in his care (???), his reaction to Armand's suicide attempt (!?), how was it that he and Santino ended up being the team on clean up duty together for that anyway (???), his reaction to learning that Armand was in fact alive(!) and his subsequent turning of Benji and Sybelle.

Marius:

And Pandora of course, I hadn't read her book at the time of reading this so I was disappointed about how little detail we get on the centuries they spent together. You can imagine his motivations for leaving a lot of this stuff out, it seems that some things are still too painful to talk about and he is also telling a specific story to a specific audience here (to influence a particular outcome, perhaps? *squints suspiciously at Marius*) so it makes sense for him to brush over or leave some things out entirely but it's not always the most satisfying result for a reader that's already invested in these characters and their stories.

The framing device with Thorne is great, I can't emphasize enough how immediately I fell in love with this guy, this stoic but sensitive viking titan of a vampire. I found the final chapter to be the most exciting really, I guess because where most of the story is Marius explaining from his perspective why he's alone (apart from Daniel who doesn't count because he's too obsessed with his model cities, sorry Daniel!), it's all a foregone conclusion where we're heading and we know what happens to most of the major characters but once we get back to Thorne's contemporary POV hey, anything can happen! And thanks to Thorne, stuff does happen! He's kind of the MVP of this book. We also get a teeny bit of Daniel in the framing chapters at the start of the book and hey, it's nice to see him alive and still sassy, if a little worse for wear.

Overall I find it a pretty enjoyable vampire chronicle. I do love the lore of Anne's vampire universe, how rich it is both with historical details and with her own world building and Marius is, of course, very key to it as guardian of the parents for millennia, so I do want to know everything about him and I'm glad this book was written to give us more of his story. His chronicle of his very lonely life, caused in no small part by his own stubbornness and terror of losing control is sad and often frustrating but I did find all of it a compelling read. He's a very strange guy and it really is fascinating to get more of his perspective, even if he doesn't quite have the zazz of a Lestat or the poetry of a Louis.

[mrspasser]

Finding solace in you

On A03

Listen. Steve is not an idiot. No matter how many times someone calls him stupid, he’s not an idiot. It’s not his fault his friends are all certified brainiacs and that the ones that aren’t on the honor roll have either supernatural (El) or supersarcasm powers (Max). Steve is just Steve. Not good enough to get into college, not good enough to hold his parent’s attention for more than a fleeting moment, not even good enough to make his first real love love him back. But Steve is Steve. He has some good qualities. He can swing a nail bat, for instance. And the person or monster who broke into his home at 2 A.M. and is making a ruckus in the kitchen is gonna see how well Steve can swing that bat. 

Steve is not an idiot. He quickly puts on jeans, a sweater and his tennis shoes, so he doesn’t have to face whoever it is in his boxers. He doesn’t make a noise when he tiptoes down the stairs. He doesn’t turn on the lights. He doesn’t call out a tentative “Who goes there?” and he most certainly doesn’t wait to raise his bat to a swinging position. 

Steve is an idiot.

Because Steve is seeing Eddie in his kitchen. Eddie Munson, who died in Dustin’s arms in the Upside Down and whose body they couldn’t bring with them when they returned to the real world. Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson, who fought off a swarm of Demobats with nothing but a spear and a shield. Eddie the Banished, who was hunted down by an angry mob because they thought he was a satanic, murderous cult leader. Eddie the Hero, who gave his life to save his friends. Eddie with the expressive face, who gave Steve his vest ‘for his modesty’ and hunts Steve’s dreams every night. Eddie with the doe eyes, who fills Steve with regret about things that never happened but possibly could have, if only if they had more time. More time together.

“Hey man, sorry to wake you,” Eddie says, like he has just seen Steve yesterday instead of four months ago. Like he had not died in Dustin’s arms, his lifeless body too heavy and limp to move with them through the portal. Like Steve hasn’t been living with an overwhelming sense of guilt that clamps down uncomfortably on his chest every time he has a moment to think. Guilt that has him making himself run haggard, keeping himself busy, tiring himself out to the point he can no longer think. 

“Sorry about the glass,” Eddie winces. He holds up the bottom half apologetically, the shards that formed the top half scattered on the floor by his feet. He’s bare footed, only wearing ripped jeans and a torn up shirt. The fingers around the glass are long and pointy, the tips dark. They look like claws. “I was thirsty, wanted to have some water.” He looks at Steve sheepishly, his eyes gleaming in the low light of the moon that comes in through the kitchen window. “I can replace it.”

“Don’t bother. We have a cupboard full of the same damn glasses.”

Steve is an idiot. He shouldn’t be talking to whatever it is that is standing in his kitchen, he should swing his bat and kill the damn thing that wears Eddie’s face.

“Okay.” Eddie moves to put the remnants of the glass back on the counter. It lands on its side, rolling into the sink with a clang. Eddie doesn’t react to it, he looks around the dark kitchen and asks where Steve keeps a broom and a dustpan. 

“Bottom cabinet in the corner,” Steve points.

Eddie nods eagerly and turns on the spot to go where Steve points him. One of the leathery wings on his back rakes over the kitchen island and mows down the decorative ceramic dish that Steve’s mom uses as a fruit basket. It’s been a while since she’s been home, so it’s only the dish that hits the floor, not any fruit. The ceramic shatters when it hits the tiles, small shards flying as far as Steve’s feet.

“Oh shit. I’m really not doing this on purpose, I swear.” It’s a strange thing to see Eddie so meekly, his clawed hands balled in front of his chest, his wings almost drooping.

Steve is an idiot. 

“It’s okay,” he says. “I didn’t like that thing anyway.” It’s true, he always thought the dish with the frumpy vines painted across the surface was ugly. “Stay where you are, I’ll get it.” 

Steve places his bat on the counter and flicks the light switch for the lights above the kitchen island so he can see better. Eddie doesn’t react to the yellow light that floods the kitchen. Steve moves towards the bottom cabinet that holds the broom and dustpan while Eddie makes himself as small as possible in the space between the sink and the kitchen island. He sweeps up the glass and ceramic, noticing that Eddie’s toes are as black as his fingertips when he crouches down by his feet to get the last bits of glass. The nails are longer and pointy. Claw-like. 

Steve sets the dustpan on the counter and gingerly fishes the broken glass out of the sink. Eddie follows him around the kitchen with his eyes, only speaking up when Steve has everything tidied up and puts the dustpan and broom away again. “I’m thirsty.” 

“Water?” At Eddie’s nod Steve grabs a glass from the cabinet - the exact same as the one Eddie broke - and moves over to the tap. It brings him close to Eddie again, who is still trying to take up the least amount of space as possible. He’s fidgeting with his rings, Steve notices, the blackness of his fingertips extending down to the large metal rings. Eddie’s wearing his Hellfire shirt, but it’s filthy and it has a large tear down the collar. Eddie’s collarbones and part of his chest are visible, covered in dirt and tattoos. He’s not wearing the guitar pick necklace, because Dustin took that with him when they left Eddie’s body in the Upside Down. Steve wonders if Eddie misses it. “Here you go,” he says, handing the other man a glass of water.

“Thanks.” Eddie shuffles a little closer and takes the glass gingerly, clearly trying to not break it again. He downs the entire glass in one go and makes a face. He thrusts the glass back at Steve. “More please.”

“Sure.” Steve fills the glass with water again, glancing over his shoulder at Eddie who keeps crowding closer, inch by slow inch. “Are you okay?”

“Sure,” Eddie responds, “just thirsty.”

“You have wings.” It feels like a stupid thing to say, so perhaps everyone was right and Steve really is stupid.

Eddie looks at him quizzically as he puts the refilled glass to his lips. “Wings?”

“Nevermind.” Steve is not surprised when he has to fill up the glass again. Eddie is standing really close now, he looks over Steve’s right shoulder to see how he moves the glass underneath the tap and fills it up. He toys with a lock of curls, twisting it around his black finger again and again. When he bites his lip his teeth are sharp and pointy like his nails. The skin breaks and a drop of dark blood pearls on his lip. Eddie doesn’t show any sign that he even feels it and licks the blood away with a quick flick of his tongue, his eyes never leaving Steve’s face.

It’s disconcerting how much the thing still looks like Eddie, still sounds like Eddie. It’s Eddie’s doe eyes that stare at Steve, it’s Eddie’s lips that curl into a grateful smile when he hands him another glass of water. It’s Eddie’s voice that thanks him, that tells him that he’s “still so thirsty.” And: “Can I have another one, sweetheart?”

By the fourth glass Eddie has moved from twisting his own hair around his finger to scratching his nails through the hair at Steve’s nape. He can tell it’s meant to be done gently, but the nails are sharp and they burn where they make red marks on his skin. He leans against his hands braced on the edge of the sink, his head hanging down between his shoulders. Eddie is a firm line against his back. He’s not exactly warm, but he’s not cold either.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“For what?” The scratching at his nape stops for a second and then it picks up again.

“For leaving you behind.” His voice catches in his throat. “For not being able to save you.”

The hand leaves his neck and two arms wind around his waist, mimicking a hug. It’s all done carefully, almost lovingly, yet the pointy nails still catch in his sweater and he can feel them lightly prick his skin when Eddie pulls himself closer against Steve’s back. His breath is hot on his neck when he speaks. “I’m here now, Stevie, aren’t I?”

Steve sighs, leaning into the treacherous embrace. “Yeah.” 

Steve is an idiot.

Eddie hugs him even closer, making Steve stand more upright and pressing him against the sink. Steve has one hand on the sink to brace himself, the other is holding on to Eddie’s arm where it is pressed against his chest. The hand with the black finger is splayed across his heart, rubbing the fabric of his sweater against his skin. Eddie noses behind his ear, nuzzling against him in lazy movements. “You smell so good, sweetheart,” he whisper-sighs. 

Steve is an idiot.

He closes his eyes, listens to Eddie telling him how nice he feels, how sweet he is, how he wants to climb inside him and live there. His nail bat lies forgotten on the kitchen counter. There’s a fleeting sense of regret when he thinks of Robin, of Dustin and the other kids, but it’s forgotten when Eddie’s hand caresses his throat, his lips traveling the line of Steve’s jaw.

“I’m so thirsty, sweetheart,” Eddie croons in a quiet voice, only for Steve to hear.

Steve doesn’t open his eyes. He feels drunk and lucid at the same time. “I know,” he whispers back.

The hand on his throat moves up, sharp nails scratching his cheek but only barely, coaxing him to look at Eddie. Dark, half lidded eyes catch his and cool lips press a kiss against the corner of his mouth. “I want you to be mine, Stevie, mine alone.”

Steve shudders, his breath catching in his throat. He doesn’t try to move away from Eddie’s hold, feels himself sinking into it instead.

“Do you want to be mine, sweetheart?”

“Y- you promise?” It’s more a breath than a whisper, but Eddie hears it anyway. More importantly, he understands. He breathes in deeply, humming softly, happily. 

“I will be so good to you, Stevie,” Eddie promises. “You will be mine and I will be yours.”

Steve knows that what Eddie is promising him is not good. That there’ll be pain and grief and despair. But that’s familiar. Steve knows pain and grief and despair. And he knows loneliness. So when Eddie asks him again: “Do you want to be mine?”

“Y-yes.”

Eddie’s teeth are sharp and it’s more tearing than biting. His blood is warm when it runs down his throat. Steve feels his body growing colder, his vision swimming. But Eddie holds him close, keeps pressing bloody kisses to his skin, keeps telling Steve the same thing over and over again: “You are mine and I am yours.” 

Right before everything goes black, Steve knows that it’s the truth.

“You are mine and I am yours.”

[queersatanic]

The Yank Who Became a God

Cevin Soling is the co- or sole owner of most of The Satanic Temple's various corporations but goes by the pseudonym "Malcolm Jarry" when associating with TST in public, including—alarmingly—on many of their legal documents.

We've talked before about how before and during the early years of the Temple, Soling (as "Cevin Soling") was visiting the South Pacific island of Vanuatu, filming  a documentation about himself as a would-be cargo cult messiah, fulfilling a prophecy of "John Frum".

And we've shared before that photographer Jon Tonks and writer Christopher Lord were on the island at the same time as one of Soling's trips, sharing some of the articles about the book they published.

And we've shared before that photographer Jon Tonks and writer Christopher Lord were on the island at the same time as one of Soling's trips, sharing some of the articles about the book they published.

And we've shared before that photographer Jon Tonks and writer Christopher Lord were on the island at the same time as one of Soling's trips, sharing some of the articles about the book they published.  

[Guardian] ‘There was a prophecy I would come’: the western men who think they are South Pacific kings 

[Blind Magazine] How to Be a King: a Beginner’s Guide

From the second link:

“I think as soon as we had met Cevin, we realised that that was the interesting thing,” says Tonks. “And we knew that if we spent a long amount of time there we would see all sorts of people doing the same thing."

But, until now we never had the full context for Tonks' and Lord's visit to Vanuatu or why seeing Soling arrive was so important.

We're sharing that excerpt below, but if you're interested and want more about the island, the John Frum movement, and other would-be messiahs, check out their book The Men Who Would Be King and Tonks' website.

For our narrow interests, the text suffices but the book it comes from primarily visual and covers several other would-be cargo cult messiahs as well as the communities those men visit, so if the below sparks your interests, pick up a copy.

The Men Who Would Be King by Jon Tonks and Christopher Lord £39.00 / $55.00 hardback (dewi lewis publishing) 200 pages, 72 colour plates & numerous illustrations ISBN: 978-1-911306-43-6

[catgirl-kaiju]

some folks have made a few additions that i think are worth bringing up, and i wanted to make some addendums of my own:

3rd US "Yellow Peril": there has been building animosity in the US towards China, and misinformation/conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic have only increased the xenophobia and racism towards people of east asian and pacific islander descent.

This is not the 2nd Satanic Panic in the US, but the 3rd. The 1st was in the 1950s and coincided with the 2nd Red Scare and 1st Lavender Scare. When I refer to the 3rd Satanic Panic, I am referring to the QAnon conspiracy cult and how their beliefs, accusations, and methods all mimic those of Satanic Panics in the US's past. One could argue that Satanic Panics have been going on for much longer than the 50s (the Salem Witch Trials come to mind). however, there are only officially two recognized historical Satanic Panics so far, with debate on the inclusion of QAnon as another Satanic Panic.

i've made a separate post about this, but i want to point out that the 2nd Lavender Scare that i am referring to is specifically the rising tide of violence and hatred towards trans people, gnc people, and drag performance. we are all, in the queer community, being affected by this rise in right wing violence, but it's important to acknowledge that the primary targets of this are those in our community who challenge gender cisnormativity, and especially trans women like me.

lastly, i don't really know what to call this other than a terrifying resurgence in antisemitism in the US and around the world. antisemitism has been around for a LONG time and taken on so many forms. in fact, i guarantee that if you look closely at many of these other scares/panics currently and historically, you will find a piece of antisemitism at their core. jewish people in the US are in danger, and many of them are scared. so, while we're fighting to protect all the other vulnerable populations affected by the scares and panics listed above, let's not forget that we need to protect jewish people too.

love living during the 3rd Red Scare, the 2nd Lavender Scare, and the 2nd Satanic Panic all at the same time. the political right is so normal and not unhinged at all

[cupidstwin333]

hello!! can i req a romantic matchup for obey me and diabolik lovers? my pronouns are they/them, intp, and virgo and 18 yrs old!! i would prefer to be match with men ty!! ^^ i have long black hair, dark brown eyes almost black and slightly chubby appearance. my personality is: kind of shy and awkward when socializing with others but once i warm up to them/when im with my close friends, im vv bubbly and always laugh at small things, im vv blunt with my own words, i observe other people, i tend to overthink and kind of moody sometimes and insecure too, also listens to other ppl's problems kind of like a therapist lol, very defensive when someone hurt me and my loved ones, im very observant too when it comes to my surroundings and people's behavior. my likes & hobbies: matcha green tea, astronomy, dark academia, ocean, books, watching haunted abandoned videos, horror in general, writing and making stories. my dislikes: worm, loud people, crowded and loud places, cheaters & playboys, fake friends. that's all!! ty!! 🍂

After a long time of thinking 💭your match is...

Leviathan

Background:

You were sitting on the sofa reading one of Stephen King's classic horror novels. Satan was sitting next to you and was reading just like you, Asmo was doing his nails, and Mammon was counting his money. There was a peaceful silence that you enjoyed. You weren't a big fan of socializing, and the demon brothers must've noticed since they stopped trying to have small talk with you. You thought back to your first day in Devildom. You weren't thrilled to be here and told Lord Diavolo how selfish and inconsiderate he was. Your words did not carry much weight for you since 1. it was true, he did it for his little side project, and 2. That was the way you spoke. You didn't bother to sugarcoat anything and you were very direct. You remembered how Lucifer tried to kill you on the spot, but Diavolo had to stop him. Your thoughts were interrupted by the doors being thrown open. It was Leviathan and he had a brand-new game. It wasn’t your typical online game, he started to explain. You had to enter this simulation and play it. It had different endings. You could only exit it if you had one of the good endings. However, if you had a bad ending, you'd be stuck there for quite a while. “So who is joining me?” He asked eagerly. You reverted to reading your book and so did Satan. He was ignored by the rest of his brothers as they continued their previous activities.

"Oh, come on guys if you get the right ending you get to make a permanent wish! You get to wish everything, whatever it is." You looked up and noticed how Mammon, Beel, and Asmo got intrigued by the sound of that. You observed Lucifer and saw that even he was interested. I mean a permanent wish, and it could be anything! "What is this game about?" you asked. Bored anyway, it wouldn't hurt to play it. You just didn't want to be the only one since that would mean you'd have to socialize and communicate, but now that you know about the wish. You were in! "It's about a group of friends that get stranded on a deserted island, or at least they think it's deserted. Later they find out a cult lives there that sacrifices outsiders and there's a lot of poltergeist activity." Leviathan responded to your question. His eyes lit up when they met yours. "So you're in?" he asks you and you nod in response.

How it started:

All of you sit around the table. Satan was the last one to join you because he had to grab some things. He arrived with a bag filled with survival tools. You follow the instructions written in the game and sit in a circle. After that, you hold each other's hands and say a short chant. You feel a cold breeze caress your cheeks. When you opened your eyes, you were in the middle of a forest and wearing different clothing. Your heart was beating faster. Was this what they call an adrenaline rush? It was something new but you loved it! Leviathan was holding a letter. "To-do list, for the free wish. First of all, don't be stupid! You really thought I would tell you, figure it out on your own." He read out loud. Wow, that was harsh, you thought to yourself. "Who am I paired up with?" you asked in an attempt to change the subject. "Me," Leviathan responded while raising his hand. "Lucifer and Beel, Satan and Asmo, Mammon and Belphie, and you and me. Those are the pairs." Leviathan said. You walked for a while until you heard people singing and smelled a fire. You saw what appeared to be a family sitting around a bonfire. The father was holding a loaded gun, and the mother was rocking a baby, but the longer you pondered, the less it made sense. The baby was covered in blood and the mother smiled while singing in unison with her husband. You also saw a girl and a boy between the ages of 7 and 14. Their mouths were sewn shut, and they wore matching outfits. And in the back was a house, or more accurately a shack. You knew that if they saw you you'd be dead and the game would start all over again for you and Leviathan. So you tried to enter it without them noticing. Before you could do anything Leviathan threw a rock deeper into the forest. This caught their attention, and the young boy and his father walked in the direction of the sound. Leviathan grabbed your wrist and ran towards the shack. Looking around, you saw that the mom was still rocking her baby while singing. And when you glanced at the little girl you made direct eye contact with her. Once you were inside, you looked around for things that could be useful. You took a first aid kit, a knife, and some food. You also found a book that resembled a Bible, and your gut told you to kill this guy. They referred to him as the almighty. You explained to Leviathan what you wanted to do and he told you it was a great idea. So you went looking for the cult leader but didn't realize that the father had found the two of you. The father was aiming his shot, and Leviathan noticed just in time, he knew that it would hit you. He jumped in front of you and took the bullet for you. Suddenly there was a bright flash and you noticed how Leviathan's wound was healing. Suddenly a voice spoke up "You have won the permanent wish because you sacrificed yourself in the name of love." You looked at Leviathan and saw how his cheeks turned into a light shade of pink. You also noticed how he avoided your gaze, your heart was beating faster again, but you didn't know why. He grabbed your hands and looked you in the eyes. "I wish for y/n's love." He answers the voice barely above a whisper. "You can't wish for something you already have.

General headcanons:

💘You two have movie nights where you watch horror movie and he buries his face in your chest when he gets scared.

💘He loves it when your bubbly around him he thinks it’s the cutest thing ever.

💘Loves to rant about his stressful days (when Lucifer forces him to socialize) and feels like your the only one that understands him.

💘Hates crowded places too, soort of your dates are indoors.

Other possible matches: Satan

And Azusa Mukami

Background:

You’ve been living with the Mukami brothers for a week now. You didn’t like how you and Yui were being passed around like a blunt. But if you had to be honest it was way better here than with the Sakamaki brothers. You remembered how the six of them had no chill and would attempt to drink your blood at least three times a day. The Mukami brother on the other hand kept on talking about this Adam and Eve thing you didn’t quite understand. And they were mostly after Yui, because she doesn’t understand what fighting back means. You have told her countless times that she should at least try to yell at them or use some form of physical violence but this girl was too dense to actually do something. Your relationship with the Mukami brothers wasn’t that bad either. You and Ruki got along quite well actually. It was like a parent-child relationship, Ruki did all the cooking and commanding and you did all the listening and complying. You and Yuma on the other hand got into a lot of fights, at first he kind of intimidated you but you quickly realized that you weren’t going to tolerate any of his disrespect. You also didn’t like Kou he was always loud for no reason and he is such a playboy in school. He thinks he is better than everyone when in reality he’s just a cocky and overconfident loser. And for the last brother Azusa. He was a bit different from the rest. You could notice it in the way the brothers treat him as well. He was more quiet and faint-hearted. You were kind of crushing on him. He had this spooky and scary vibe around him you couldn’t explain but you weren’t completely a lost cause (unlike Yui). Besides your occasional arguments with Yuma you didn’t really do much besides reading books and admiring Azusa from afar…

How it started:

It was a schoolday but you were feeling lazy and didn’t want to fall victim to Kou his fangirls trampling over you in the hall so you told Ruki that you weren’t feeling well. Surprisingly he didn’t interrogate you and told you to stay at home and rest but before you could celebrate he made Azusa stay with you to keep an eye on you. You felt offended if anyone had to be kept under watch it was Azusa not you. You quickly started to notice Azusa’s extremely masochistic and sadistic side. This man needed supervision 24/7 or he might just off himself. You didn’t argue it too much though, because you had decided to just read some books and enjoy your well-deserved alone time in your room. But those plans were quickly disrupted by a knocking on your door and Azusa entering. “Y/n I need to show you something,” Azusa speaks in a soft whisper tone. You look up confused. “What do you want to show me?” You ask putting your book to the side. All of a sudden he grabs your hand and guides you to the library room. “Wow, you’re showing me these books?” You ask with a scoff. You’ve read almost all of the books already and you were pretty sure Azusa hasn’t touched a single one. But before you could head back to your room his hand reached to a distinct looking book. It was a thick dark green colored book. You wonder how you’ve never noticed it before until now. Azusa pulls the book and to your surprise the bookshelf opened and showed a hidden passageway. This was kind off scary but you liked it. “Follow me Y/n.” Azusa says once more taking a hold of your hand as he guides you into the hidden passage way. You notice stairs made out of cobblestone that spiral down into darkness it looked unsafe and you hesitate for a second but Azusa holds onto your hand tighter and gives you a nod in reassurance. You both walk down the stairs and you almost fall but Azusa tells you to hold on to him tightly. You could tell that you were deep underground by how long you were walking. A hallway enters your field of vision as you’ve finally made it to the bottom of the stairs. You and Azusa keep waking down the dark hallway and on your right side you noticed cells and on the left you noticed a torture chamber filled with different torture devices, you look at the room in awe. At the end of the hallway you see a thick red book decorated in gold laying on top of a big wooden stand. You both stop in front of it. “What is this book?” You ask observing it. Azusa opens the book with his right hand, his left hand still holding tightly onto yours. “This book explains everything about the Adam and Eve project and the reason why I need you.” Azusa explains flipping through the pages. “But I thought Yui was Eve?” You ask dumbfounded you felt your heartbeat racing at the thought of Azusa needing you. “No Y/n look.” He points at a certain paragraph in the book. “There can be multiple Adams that need different Eves. And I know you’re my Eve.” Azusa says looking into your eyes. “I love you Y/n. Do you love me too? Prove it to me.” He demands with longing eyes. “How do you want me to do that?” You ask in confusion and surprise. He takes you to the torture chamber and points at one of the devices. “If you love me use this on me.” He says with strong determination. “You don’t prove your love to someone by torturing them!” You say in disbelief. “How would you do it otherwise?” He asks with an even softer voice than usual. You let go of his hand and turn to face him. He tilts his head in confusion but before he could ask you anything you silence him with a kiss.

General headcanons:

💘Azusa loves it when you read to him or tell him a story, while he lays his head in your lap.

💘He reassures you whenever you feel insecure and tells you, you’re the most beautiful person he has ever met.

💘He loves it when you listen to him and when you reassure him.

💘He loves it when you teach him all the different love languages.

💘You try to watch horror movies with him but Ruki always stops you.

Other possible matches: Shu Sakamaki

I'd appreciate it if you'd reblog this, and I hope you enjoyed reading this <3

[manie-sans-delire-x]

Who’s YOUR favorite vc vamp and why?

Sorry this took a week, I was on vacation and wanted to actually give a decent answer since you gave such a good one.

Armand as well!! Or my favorite name of his- Amadeo. I haven't actually read TVA yet, so once I do I'm sure I'll have a lot more to say, but basically I find him to be the most tragically beautiful and endearing, and I relate to him the most.

I love that Armand essentially “lost his god” three, four times. (Nice tragedy bro.) First being raised devoutly Christian as a child- “all he knew was [I forgot the full quote] and God”- then having that ripped away from him by the abduction, being sold to the brothel and sexually abused, being severely beaten and left for dead when he refused. Then Marius appearing to him like a god, saving him and whisking him away and teaching him all this fine art and education and giving him everything- (the cruelty and Marius’s narcissism in naming him Amadeo- “Loved by God”?)- then losing Marius, again in a traumatic kidnapping fashion. Then the Children introducing him to Satanism and brainwashing him- he gained a new God, getting that whole belief system, understanding of reality, and way of life (for 300 yrs!!) shattered to bits in one day by Lestat. He then basically wants Lestat to be his new god and show him a new way of life/give him a new identity. And for the first time in his long life, he’s left without one when Lestat calls him out on this and denies him (one of my favorite parts and, I think, possibly one of Lestat’s kindest and most selfless moments, even if Armand resented him for it.)

His Amadeo in Venice days and relationship with Marius also remind me of one of my OC’s- Kina Sintav from the Elder Scrolls universe. I made her before I ever read VC, but they have quite a few similarities. Namely, being in a dark, murderous cult and their almost childlike reliance and dependence on (due to childhood trauma), extreme loyalty and attachment to, sexual seduction of, submissiveness to, and genuine love, respect, and admiration of an older, occasionally abusive master, who is also their savior from a terrible situation and gave them much more than they ever knew before in their lives, who ends up being traumatically ripped away from them. Also the whole weird, kinda creepy sexual religious vibe and power dynamic going on. (She is an adult in her late twenties/early thirties though, and I want the relationship to be much more of a partnership and dark tragic romance than an abusive or predatory one. She’s also a lot less innocent than 17 yr old human Armand was.)

I don't want to write a whole essay so I'm just gunna list out the things I relate to him about:

1- Physical appearance- auburn hair, pale skin, big brown eyes

2- (seemingly) Eternally youthful appearance-we both look younger than our age (I also relate to Claudia because of this because I sometimes resent it lol)

3- Sexual trauma, although luckily to much different extents

4- Acting seductive to older men, general seductive behavior

5- Enjoying bdsm lmao and relationship control dynamics (in different ways too- Marius, Daniel)

6- Flat affect

7- Using people (Daniel) and items around him, general impulsive careless nature- devouring then throwing aside- his cult members, Lestat’s books

8- Having to be given an identity, lack of own identity

9- Becoming obsessed with certain people/things 

10- Need for control and previously having a lack of it

11- Childlike curiosity, strange innocence

12- Violence, sadism (at least emotionally)

13- Night Island!! If I were incredibly rich that's absolutely something I would create, I've thought about it before.

14- Style- I would definitely lure suicidal people if I were a vamp, just for the poetic beauty of it all. I actually thought about this before when I thought about if vamps had psychic power. Would kill them in a lot of other ways too though, try it all. I would also find a victim like Daniel, I adore that dynamic.

[mismagireve]

More Things I’ve Said On Discord

Guess I'll kill the child first to cut my losses

Stumbled dick first into the body of god.

She looks like a halfling animorphed into an owl and then gave up halfway through.

He's an evil tyrant but he's not like, an ass.

I have touch-tone telephone running through my head at all hours of the day right now.

Only instead of wholesome island getaways, it's blood.

Once I lived off of pork rinds and water for three days for no reason other than I was a kid and I felt like it.

@ is a summoning circle.

Gimme that dark matter dick and rearrange my atoms as well as my insides.

Gimme a second, I’m Ra Ra Rasputin.

Fuck being a pro gamer I want to watch James Bond die.

Why do the words "beep boop" give me so much fucking serotonin?

I.  Don't think Welcome To Night Vale is an accurate representation of. Anything, really.

It would be cozy if not for the whole rapidly approaching heat death and struggle to survive every day in a hostile environment.

Now she's a DOUBLE ORPHAN.

Holy water smells so fuckin bad, y’all.

Hey do you know any good fuck metal cause I’m making a monsterfucker metal playlist.

Look out the window and you can see the defenders of humanity hanging out in the sky, aggressively t-posing at each other.

So it's like frogs being brightly colored to advertise that they're poisonous, but with tits.

I don't remember Theseus being such a bitch.

What would a Cybertronian use in place of motherfucker, bearing in mind that neither mother nor fucker are in their vocabulary?

I will take any and every opportunity to make a pun.

Listening to a cover of black hole sun and I feel like the one true metric by which all iterations of this song must be measured is whether or not listening to it makes you feel like you're being inducted into a cult.

Referring to it as “meat” instead of “tissue” is both more viscerally upsetting, and more fun.

Tom Nook is a Satan archetype.

That's like knowing Homestuck is seven acts long and thinking you're almost done when you reach act 5.

I am now losing my mind at the concept of a city having depression. 

Vore for world peace.

How many dnd characters owe their appearances to Titania Fireemblem?

Like this is really fucking pretty from a coloring standpoint, and also it has dicks.

I'm genuinely wondering how you lose a custody battle with a robot.

I’m an everybitch bagel.

I couldn't be a lawyer because I say fuck too easily.

I imagine his motivation is to get enough money to buy a title and a castle and just live the rest of his life rich and lazy, and THAT I'm fairly certain you could not do with blowjobs.

[langdxn]

absolution | sojourn!michael x fem!reader

SUMMARY: Michael’s sojourn leads him onto a different path - the path to wedded bliss.

WARNINGS: Fluffier than a retriever after a bath. Domesticated Sojourn!Michael. 

WORD COUNT: 1.8k - the fluff writer is back! Feedback is welcome as always :D

Michael was lost. You found him.

So it made perfect sense to him to help you when you needed him the most.

“Allow me,” he cooed as he walked into the bright white room behind you, but not before he listened to your helpless grunts for a few more moments. The blinding light revealed your elegant silhouette in front of a full-length mirror, trying your hardest to fasten the zip trailing down your back when neither of your arms could reach that far behind you.

His words poured like honey into your ears every other day, but today they made you roll your eyes, knowing full well Michael couldn’t contain his curiosity of what lay behind your dressing room door. You clutched at the dress around you in a vain attempt to conceal the glittering gown hastily draped over your figure, refusing to turn to face him as if ignoring him would salvage the mystery on your big day.

“You’re not supposed to see me, not yet.”

His expensive shoes echoed across the floorboards towards you, you felt his strong hands graze the troublesome zip nestled in the small of your back. His gentle breath ghosted over your neck where you styled your angelic curls to swoop over your shoulder.

“That doesn’t matter, you need help.” Michael held still for a moment, regarding your exposed back as if it were the first time he laid his eyes upon your breathtaking form.

Fully aware of your dreams of a fairytale wedding regardless of your marriage being to the son of Satan, your fiancé politely suggested you wear white on your wedding day regardless of the times you had already consummated your relationship: over the kitchen counter, halfway up the stairs, even out in the woods where you found each other.

———

Your eyes first met over the pine needles and cones discarded by the humid autumn. The woods where he was desperately attempting to communicate with his father just so happened to be your regular walking path. Your golden retriever had rushed off ahead of you, choosing to carelessly dig right through Michael’s ritual circle.

“Barkley, stop that!” You chastised as you breathlessly caught up with your canine companion, your eyes settling on the bedraggled blonde man kneeling in the dirt. “I’m so sorry, he has a real thing for digging at the moment.”

The man was too exhausted to reply, his sunken cheeks clearly malnourished, fresh tear tracks coursing down his countenance and his reddened eyes on stalks; he let slip a dismissive nod without looking at the source of the voice breaking the agonising forest silence. Clumps of dirt rained from the dog’s paws and fell at Michael’s mud-stricken knees, once graced by flawless black denim.

“Are— are you okay sir?” You instinctively crouched closer to the drowsy form, curious concern choking at your vocal cords, unsure you would like the response. You lay a gentle hand on the dog’s head and it calmly ceased its underground mission.

Michael raised his head wearily, laying his eyes upon the woman in front of him, your tousled black curls framing your perfectly bronzed face, a shimmer of highlighter dancing across your cheeks. His eyes dropped to your black sleeveless shirt and jeans, far removed from the brilliant white, angelic figures that tormented him in the last three days.

Perhaps she was sent by my father.

“I don’t know,” he sighed into his grubby hands, thumbs grazing the stubble afflicting his countenance. The retriever huffed loudly as it edged playfully towards Michael, breaking his communication circle and the enclosed pentagram with its innocently reckless paws. Michael’s eyes popped as he watched the circle of pine needles fade in front of him.

You stepped towards him with an outstretched hand, stopping just outside the hastily scratched circle in the dirt.

“Can I help you at all? I don’t live far from here, you’re welcome to come for a coffee,” you offered with a smile from the corner of your lips, nodding towards your dog. “I’m not the best coffee maker but I’m a great listener, or so Barkley tells me.”

My father has finally shown me what to do.

Michael hesitantly raised his hand towards yours, his mud-stained neckerchief draping over his arm. There was no need for tears now, he knew exactly what lay ahead.

———

Michael fastened the zip of your dress agonisingly slowly, determined to savour every precious moment before you were to part again. He raised both hands to reassuringly cup your shoulders, his signal that his duty was done. Gently resting his chin on your shoulder, his breath caught in his throat as he glanced at the vision in white that appeared in the mirror in front of you.

You resisted the devastating urge to look at him in the reflection, determined to salvage some semblance of ‘good luck’ now the groom had already witnessed the bride in her dress on the happiest day of their lives. Dipping into his touch and clenching your eyes shut, you felt his effortlessly beautiful golden curls graze your cheek.

“You look heavenly, my angel,” he hummed under his breath, planting a delicate kiss on the nape of your neck. He couldn’t resist swallowing every centimetre of your appearance in the shimmering summer sun pouring through your dressing room window.

“Michael,” you pressed, “you still haven’t told me what our first dance is.” Your tone was both insistent and quizzical, trying your hardest to avoid his gaze in the dressing mirror in case it gave any signs of what surprise he had in store for the one aspect of the wedding he was entrusted with.

“All in good time, little dove,” he dismissed, determined to keep at least one thing secret from his future wife. Your mind flashed with dread, anticipating anything from his favourite classical pieces to the downright ridiculous Don’t Fear The Reaper he once threatened in the midst of a playful tiff. Had he mistaken your fit of laughter for genuine interest? Would you actually be dancing with your new husband to the unforgettable tones of Blue Öyster Cult? How would you ever live it down?

Suddenly, bounding thuds thrashed the wooden stairs beyond the dressing room, followed closely by the familiar frantic pants of Barkley making his way up.

“Oh no,” Michael tutted as he turned to spot the retriever bursting in with his tongue drooping sloppily out of his jaw, a single rogue strand of drool threatening to trail across the floorboards. “Barkley, you shouldn’t be in here.”

“Neither should you,” you giggled under your breath, scooping up your floor-length dress in a hasty effort to save the garment from the impending canine carnage. Somehow resisting the temptation to turn around and watch the man of your dreams wrangling your four-legged companion, you could hear the sounds of Michael frustratedly brushing stray golden hairs from his velour dress pants.

“Guess I’d better find a lint roller,” he scoffed, directing the dog back out to the corridor.

———

As long as you’ve known him, Michael dismissed your countless cleaning tools as “a waste of our money.” From the hand sanitiser you thrust towards him as you paced through the woods on your first meeting to the endless amounts of bottles he had to tame every time he prepared a candlelit bath for his bride, your Antichrist couldn’t abide your unnecessary products. The clattering of half-empty plastic containers and an ironic mumble of “Jesus Christ” became the telltale anthem to Michael wanting to spoil you after a hard day.

The only products he considered useful, however, were his. His skincare routine lined the sink as soldiers readying for battle on the frontline, organised neatly in order of application. He could always tell when you’d hastily cleaned the bathroom in his absence when he noticed his aftershave positioned ahead of his shaving foam. He’d lost count of the times he used Barkley’s dog shampoo by mistake, cursing the similarities with his high-end bottles and quickly incinerating them in a fleeting rage.

Ever since that day in the woods, Michael insisted on flawless skin and hair. Particularly now he had the love of a beautiful woman, he felt repulsed by the mere mention of stubble — a sign of his weakness.

One drizzly Wednesday afternoon, he stood in the kitchen emptying your shopping bags to find a curious rolling device, holding it aloft with suspicion as he spun it, utterly perplexed. You fought to stifle a laugh at the way he observed the lint roller as if it were an alien invention.

“Trust me, it’ll come in useful. Barkley sheds like hell in the summer,” you joked, playfully jabbing Michael in the ribs before sharing a chaste kiss over the kitchen island.

———

Michael returned to his feet to snake his arms around your hips. You clasped your hands over his, tapping your engagement rings together and breathing a comfortable sigh at the satisfying clink.

You chose his ring, a deep blood red garnet stone on a filigree band to begin a collection of devilishly handsome statements for his digits. In return, he chose your pitch black solitaire diamond, matching your hair. When he presented it to you, you remarked it reminded you of the shade his eyes turn when he gets rough with you in the bedroom. That revelation made you both smirk whenever you caught sight of it, a dirty secret only you two knew.

A curt beep of a sports car horn pipped from the road outside, bringing you rushing back into the moment.

“Ooh, that’ll be Madelyn,” you jumped. “Which reminds me, did her plus one RSVP? I’d hate to be the guy turning down Ryan Reynolds at the door.”

“Don’t worry my darling,” Michael pressed a reassuring pat on your abdomen. “If we run out of chairs, he can sit on Madelyn’s lap and that’ll keep her happy all night. That is, until everybody tries her spinach lasagna…”

A pang of trepidation washed over you as you remembered you left the catering responsibilities in the hands of the Church of Satan congregation. As much as you admired their fervour for your soon-to-be husband and their acceptance of you as his bride, they could be overbearing at the best of times.

Michael tapped his hands on your hips to signal his departure, taking a deep breath to prepare to leave your side. The next time he would lay his eyes on you, you would be walking down the aisle towards him.

“I’ll see you at the altar baby,” he whispered in your ear before turning on his heels as you whimper at the loss of his touch. Hearing his footsteps freeze at the doorway, you smiled to yourself.

“Not if I see you first, Boy Wonder.”

[tabloidtoc]

Globe, October 12

You can buy a copy of this issue for your very own at my eBay store: https://www.ebay.com/str/bradentonbooks

Cover: Devil cult burns JonBenet Ramsey’s grave 

Page 2: Up Front & Personal -- Kaley Cuoco and her dog in a stroller in New York City, Donatella Versace off the coast of Italy, Johnny Depp gets a gander at fans in Spain 

Page 3: Jude Law jogging in London, Mama June Shannon gets her roots dyed, Jon Stewart lends his voice to support U.S. military vets in Washington, D.C. 

Page 4: Man-hungry Kathie Lee Gifford has a mad crush on Craig Ferguson but he’s married and since she’s isn’t about to be a homewrecker instead she cast him to play her kissy-huggy love interest in Then Came You a flick she penned and released a couple weeks back 

Page 5: Tyra Banks has turned Dancing with the Stars into a miserable sweatshop behind the scenes -- Tyra is not only the host but an executive producer and she takes that title seriously and even with all these big personalities and egos Tyra wants it to run like a military operation which was how she did things on America’s Next Top Model -- Carrie Ann Inaba is seething and Bruno Tonioli is revolted and Derek Hough is huffing with displeasure, Chris Rock revealed he’s in therapy seven hours a week after being diagnosed with nonverbal learning disorder meaning he doesn’t understand nonverbal signals when talking to people 

Page 6: Fierce fights during lockdown have shredded strong-willed sweethearts Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell’s 37-year love in -- Goldie and Kurt recently had their worst-ever clash which led them to axe plans to finally get hitched this winter, you’d think filming Elf would have been a ho-ho time but bad blood between star Will Ferrell and writer-director Jon Favreau killed plans for a sequel 

Page 7: Shocked by the frighteningly gaunt and frail appearance of Bob Newhart friends of the hard-working star fear he’s working himself into his grave 

Page 8: Queen Elizabeth’s personal wealth is estimated at $450 million but she could wind up in the poor house because most of her wealth is locked in her two sprawling country estates which cost a king’s ransom to run: Sandringham and Balmoral 

Page 9: Prince Harry is sporting a choppy-sloppy short-cropped haircut that makes him look like a pauper apparently given to him by his wife Meghan Markle

Page 10: Kirstie Alley has been firing herself into a frenzy about everything these days from her weight to world affairs and her yo-yoing antics are driving friends batty and she’s also becoming more of a recluse 

Page 11: Joan Collins claims she was haunted by her sister Jackie Collins after the novelist died from breast cancer in 2015 -- Joan recalls upon learning her little sis had passed away the electricity went out putting her and husband Percy Gibson in the dark, country music legend Willie Nelson admits to being far from a model husband in his no-holds-barred new book -- the four-time married Willie admits to cheating and says his wandering ways were too much for any woman to put up with 

Page 12: Celebrity Buzz -- Gabourey Sidibe (picture), Lisa Rinna laughingly brushes off claims that her husband Harry Hamlin had a steamy 2018 affair near their Canadian getaway home, Jane Fonda believes in ghosts because she’s seen the ghost of her mother who committed suicide when Jane was 12, Kim Cattrall is still hot and heavy for her British boyfriend of four years Russell Thomas and the two start each day with a cup of tea, not even two weeks after testing positive for COVID-19 Robert Pattinson dropped his mask at a London park to kiss girlfriend Suki Waterhouse even though production on his big-budget flick The Batman was thrown into a tailspin when Rob tested positive for the virus

Page 13: David Harbour grabs a bite in NYC (picture), Rebecca Gayheart runs errands in Beverly Hills (picture), Michael O’Keefe of Caddyshack plays a real-life caddie on Long Island to raise money for charity (picture), Tiffany Haddish isn’t joking when she says she tried for years to be on The People’s Court 

Page 14: The People’s Court’s judge Marilyn Milian enjoys filming her show from her Miami living room where she sees litigants testifying from their homes via remote and she can see how they live, it’s a true kiss and tell by Adam Levine who’s getting loose-lipped about a wet wild kiss he shared with the late Kelly Preston in the music video for Maroon 5′s hit She Will Be Loved, Fashion Verdict -- Gabrielle Haugh 3/10, Paris Hilton 2/10, Keira Knightley 5/10, Tilda Swinton 7/10, Janelle Monae 9/10 

Page 16: Leah McSweeney of The Real Housewives of New York City is sporting black eyes after getting a nose job, Storage Wars star Rene Nezhoda bought a storage locker abandoned by Daniel Baldwin that houses $2500 worth of model trains 

Page 17: The coronavirus plague, natural disasters, the stock market crash, civil unrest, raging wildfires and gruesome death are all signs we are now living in the biblical End Times as predicted by Edgar Cayce and Grigori Rasputin and Nostradamus 

Page 19: 10 Things You Don’t Know About Drew Barrymore, Wendy Williams has come clean about using binoculars to get an eyeful of the naked dude next door in the shower, The Real Housewives of Potomac star Ashley Darby dishes that she and husband have engaged in threesomes 

Page 20: American Justice -- dentist Seth Lockhart jailed for yanking a patient’s tooth while riding a hoverboard among other crimes, it’s game over for a deputy sheriff Pasquale Salas from Texas who was convicted of grooming and exploiting young girls he met while playing Minecraft with them online 

Page 21: Blake Lively is fed up with husband Ryan Reynolds’ juvenile practical jokes and she’s ordering him to knock it off and after years of putting up with ridiculous Ryan’s weird pranks her nerves have been rubbed raw since COVID lockdown, dog lover Jon Hamm handed a twice-rejected rescue pup a new leash on life and now the pooch Splash is turning him to mush 

Page 23: NeNe Leakes won’t be returning to The Real Housewives of Atlanta after a tumultuous season 12 which saw NeNe feuding with most of the cast, Lady Gaga claims superstardom helped feed her deep dark depression and she was terrified to leave the house and she was often catatonic and says she’d sit outside and spend hours chain-smoking and crying, the $6 crown that Notorious B.I.G. wore in his final photoshoot sold at auction for $594,750 

Page 24: Cover Story -- JonBenet Ramsey’s family is facing new horror after the murdered child’s grave was defiled in a shocking incident investigators fear is linked to Satanic rituals 

Page 26: Health Report -- anxiety linked to thyroid problems 

Page 36: Lindsay Lohan has pulled a vanishing act while begging pals for much-needed cash -- she’s been living out of a suitcase for years and very few people know how to get hold of her or where she is -- now a high-profile book publisher has sued her after forking over $365,000 for a tell-all that she failed to complete so she’s hitting up all the big contacts she can and the word is she’s running on empty 

Page 38: Real Life -- Alzheimer’s stricken granny’s home of 50 years was seized by cold-hearted bureaucrats because she owed a paltry six cents in back taxes 

Page 44: Straight Talk -- we’re tired of scripted reality shows 

Page 45: Just months after the deaths of Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna his mother-in-law Sofia Laine says a shocking rift has shredded the close relationship she had with her daughter and Kobe’s widow Vanessa Bryant, Tom Petty’s kin have ended their feud that got so petty they sued each other over salad dressing and now the clan’s uniting to re-release his legendary 1994 album Wildflowers which was almost scrapped due to nasty infighting between Tom’s widow Dana and the grown-up daughters Adria and Annakim from his first marriage 

Page 47: Hollywood Flashback -- Jeff Goldblum as Tricycle Man in Robert Altman’s Nashville, Bizarre But True 

[tisthenightofthewitch]

THE NEXT CHAPTER: TOBIAS FORGE AND THE FUTURE OF GHOST

Their Kerrang! Award-winning fourth album Prequelle took Ghost from cult concern to global superstars. But the arena-filling congregation of fans is growing restless for clues as to what’s next for Cardinal Copia, Papa Nihil and the ministry. Let Tobias Forge, then, take you behind the mask and into the making of – and future plans for – a band like no other…

The WaMu Theater, Thursday 19 September. Last night this venue – attached to the side of CenturyLink Field, the home of the Seattle Seahawks NFL team – played host to the ‘Groover from Vancouver’ himself, Bryan Adams. Tomorrow it’s the turn of the Pacific Northwest city’s beloved sons, grunge legends Alice In Chains, for their last show in support of their sixth album, Rainier Fog. Tonight, though, Seattle gets the latest ritual on Ghost’s extensive Ultimate Tour Named Death.

Despite this morbid moniker, the scene inside the building is one of lively activity, with techs rushing around to finish the show’s elaborate staging. The house lights illuminate the stained glass window backdrop, while the seating, flat on the floor and sweeping upwards towards the back, furthers the illusion we’re in a vast church. Just then, Tobias Forge, the man whose job it is to address tonight’s 5,000-strong congregation appears. Kerrang! doesn’t notice him at first given the ninja-like silence of his approach, but there’s an intensity to his presence in these make-or-break moments of preparation.

“I’m interested in tour production, so I get to know a lot of these things,” he offers matter-of-factly. “I’m sure I only get to know about 40 per cent of it, but I notice if things aren’t in place.”

As a nine-year-old child, Tobias used to watch the documentary 25x5: The Continuing Adventures Of The Rolling Stones on repeat. The film charts the rock legends’ genesis in 1962 and their steep, heady ascent to becoming the biggest band in the world, circa their 1989 album Steel Wheels. Tobias considers their subsequent Bridges To Babylon Tour (1997-1998), which made more than $274 million and became the second-highest grosser of all time, to be the greatest ever piece of rock staging, and he was evidently taking notes even then. As a result of the level of professionalism he aspires to, you get the distinct impression he’s not a man who suffers fools gladly in this setting – an idea he doesn’t go to great pains to dispel.

“I want to know who’s in the shit today,” he explains. “Who has been put in the situation where his or her job is compromised, because I don’t want to start yelling if it’s a case of, ‘Oh my truck didn’t arrive in time today,’ because then I’ll know what the problem is. If you want to be a good boss, it’s very important you keep things on your radar.

“I’ve definitely got into trouble over the years by being too nice to people and giving them too much slack,” he continues, surveying the operation. “When you do that it’s like with dogs: if you don’t tell them what the rules are, they start making up their own. That sounds horrible, but there are 40 people on this tour, so there has to be a line and a curriculum. I’m adamant about getting my vision through, especially now we’re in this transitional phase between theatres and arenas.”

This increase in scale reflects the continued upswing in Ghost’s popularity, which has seen them go from misunderstood cult band to metal superstar status in the space of less than a decade. Despite this success, Tobias clearly isn’t taking anything for granted. Ghost haven’t played Seattle for three years, but this time around they’re doing two shows in Washington State, the other being the one they played at the Toyota Center in Kennewick two days ago, which has a capacity of 6,000 – almost eight per cent of the city’s 80,000 population.

Tobias may or may not be referring to that show when he discusses his unbridled joy at recently playing in an unnamed city that doesn’t get a lot of large-scale entertainment coming through town, save for appearances from KISS, singer-songwriter Pat Benatar and a touring production of the musical Wicked in recent years.

“None of us had ever heard of this place, and I’m pretty good at geography,” he explains. “But I loved being the singular moment somewhere, instead of the seventh show they’d had there on that particular week.”

And while Tobias describes the resulting night as “phenomenal”, earlier in the day there was an “unforeseen curveball” when the company who were meant to be selling merch at the show pulled out at the last minute, citing Ghost’s satanic image for their decision. This was, of course, a throwback to earlier shows, such as one in the Texan city of Odessa in 2018, when a minister attempted to dissuade people from attending because of the band’s threat to the morals of good God-fearing people. Unsurprisingly, this outburst resulted in an increase in ticket sales.

Despite this more recent – and, these days, more unusual – blip, Tobias’ desire to cover as much ground as possible on tour this time around is inspired by his heroes in Iron Maiden and Metallica, who have long provided him with the blueprints for achieving and navigating monumental success. In this case, the lesson he’s putting into practice is that every location Ghost visit, without exception, should be treated the same.

“The most important thing to me on this tour is that we bring the same production to everyone,” he says. “They all get the full-fucking-monty, whether they’re in Sioux Falls [South Dakota] or New York.”

The walls backstage at the WaMu Theater are lined with Seahawks jerseys, personalised with the names of acts that have performed here, including The 1975, Bastille and Nas, and the rockier contingent featuring twenty one pilots, Halestorm and Dropkick Murphys. Various rooms lead off from these labyrinthine corridors, providing sizeable production offices for the band’s tour management and crew, all of who wear dapper black shirts, trousers and braces affixed with silver broaches of Ghost’s upside down cross insignia. They affectionately address Cardinal Copia as ‘Cardi C’ when he appears later for a fan meet-and-greet. Here, too, are the dressing rooms for the headliners and the opening act for this tour, San Antonio rockers Nothing More.

On all of the doors is a distinct A4 page, the day sheet for this show, which not only details what’s happening, where and when, but also includes a different tongue-in-cheek quote for the occasion. Today, for example, in recognition of the touring party travelling overnight to Vancouver for tomorrow’s show at the city’s Pacific Coliseum, we get this gem courtesy of Britney Spears: ‘The cool thing about being famous is travelling. I have always wanted to travel across seas, like to Canada and stuff.’

Tobias, of course, has actually travelled over oceans to be here. Nowadays he lives in Stockholm, the capital of his native Sweden, with his wife and their 11-year-old twins, but he was born in Linköping, the country’s seventh largest city, where the steeple of its 13th century cathedral dominated the skyline. That’s not what the young Tobias was fixating on, though. Instead, aged five, when he already knew he wanted to transform into another person, he’d stand outside his childhood home and gaze down the street. The sun always seemed to be hovering between the buildings at the end, like a fixed but intangible hand beckoning him to get on a plane and go somewhere else and be someone else.

“The days and options seemed limitless,” he recalls today. “For some reason I always thought of the world as being there for the taking, even though I didn’t have any access to that world.”

In spite of this, he felt a deep affinity with his heroes, like the Rolling Stones and Queen, who also came from places you didn’t automatically associate with being breeding grounds for rock gods.

“I felt similar to them, even if they grew up in Dartford [Rolling Stones] or an island off the coast of Africa [Zanzibar, the birthplace of Freddie Mercury]. I, too, felt out of touch with my surroundings, and knew I had a higher calling.”

Twenty-three years later, in 2009, Tobias realised he hadn’t made much headway in heeding this call. He’d been in bands from a young age, from death metallers Repugnant to alt-rockers Magna Carta Cartel. The latter featured Martin Persner and Simon Söderberg, who’d later appear as Nameless Ghouls in the first incarnation of Ghost. Söderberg, along with some other ex-ghouls, is now embroiled in an on-going lawsuit with Tobias over what they suggest are the rightful shares of profits they’re owed from their time in the band. Tobias doesn’t volunteer any information on this topic today, which is perhaps understandable given the considerable column inches already dedicated to it.

Regardless, none of those early bands provided Tobias with the success he needed to, say, quit the day job. He had then been working in a call centre, aiding people having trouble with their mobile phones. Despite spending his childhood endlessly sketching elaborate stage designs and lighting rigs, he still has little interest in technology, particularly mobile phones. Back in 2009 his personal life was happy and satisfying, having welcomed children with his then-girlfriend – now wife – though this potent reminder of the finite time we have drew his attention to the area of his life he recognised as falling short.

“I had an epiphany,” he explains, raising his hands as if sizing up an imaginary canvas. “I found myself very far from the path, so decided in the limited time I have to invest everything in the one thing out of all my [professional] options I believed most in, which was Ghost. I understood wholeheartedly what it was, the music and the image, and felt I could do it without my vanity coming in, because I didn’t like how I looked in pictures or the sound of my own voice. But this would be fiction, so that was fucking cool. So I took all of my eggs and put them in one basket and was back on track. For the first time in my fucking life I was really focused.”

For evidence of the dividends this paid, you need only look at the fact that just a year later, with the release of their 2010 debut album Opus Eponymous, Ghost exploded on to the scene, taking the first step to becoming metal’s hottest new hope.

Further proof of this focus comes today from interviewing Tobias somewhere there’s a screen showing news channel CNN. We’re in the band’s pre-show warm-up space, which is decked out with guitars, keyboards and an electric drum kit he removes the stool from to sit in the centre of the room. He admits if he were in a hotel room now, he could easily watch CNN for 24 hours straight. He doesn’t so much as turn his head to look at it now, though, giving his full attention to the interview at hand.

Even at 38, an age he says his kids consider “as old as shit”, he remains remarkably boyish looking. His dark and piercing eyes, however, belong to an older soul – and it may be Kerrang!’s imagination – but they appear to moisten at several points during this hour-long chat, particularly when connecting the dots between his past ambition and what he’s achieved today.

“I’m trying to recreate a lot of things that aren’t necessarily real,” he says mysteriously. “In my head they’re real, and I’ve been given this fantastic carte blanche where I don’t have to sit in a fucking call centre anymore and am applauded for getting to be someone else. It’s perfect for someone like me who has a fundamental problem with functioning normally in society. If it wasn’t for the fact I was doing this, I would be completely useless.”

When Ghost signed with their American record label, their mythology wasn’t the deep well of fascination it is today. In fact, there was nothing to it at all. They had a unique aesthetic and a sound that didn’t necessarily go with that look, something that would wrong-foot new listeners in the early days, but Tobias didn’t have an answer to why Ghost were the way they were.

“They said the music was great but asked, ‘What’s the story? What’s the biography?’” recalls Tobias. “I said there was no biography because there was no story to tell. I wanted people to throw themselves into the vision and make up their own. But in the end I had to come up with one, which is second nature to me now. Even [Norwegian black metallers] Mayhem had a story. In the early ‘90s, before the internet, there was something that compelled us to want to find out more and listen to their music.”

This mythology Tobias has developed over the years was furthered with the release of Ghost’s fourth album, last year’s GRAMMY-nominated Prequelle, which introduced Tobias’ latest incarnation, Cardinal Copia, a character fans have come to love if the number of $40 plush toys sold at the merch desk tonight is any indication. More recently, a web series on YouTube has added to the intrigue, with the latest episode harking back to 1969, when a young Cardinal Nihil was fronting Ghost at the launch of their EP, Seven Inches Of Satanic Panic. That just so happens to be the band’s latest release in 2019, which will also be available as part of Prequelle Exalted, a limited collector’s edition of the album. Meanwhile, The Ultimate Tour Named Death has introduced the EP’s two new songs, Mary On A Cross and Kiss The Go-Goat, to its set list.

While Ghost’s music has always tipped its papal tiara to the ‘60s, particularly its psychedelic leanings, the latter song in particular sees them take this interest a step further. How much can we glean from them, then, with regards to where Ghost goes next? Not too much, as it turns out, according to Tobias, who suggests, as with the YouTube series, it’s a way to deepen the story of Ghost spanning from the ’40s to the present day, without necessarily providing clues to the sound of album number five.

“It’s just there for shits and giggles,” he laughs, before revealing that Kiss The Go-Goat, a song that’s been knocking around for some time, actually had the working title ‘The Throwback Single’. “I grew up listening to ‘60s music like the Rolling Stones and The Doors, as well as metal. People shouldn’t read too much into this direction, though. The next album is going to be something completely different from that.”

Can Tobias perhaps give two words to describe where, musically or thematically, album number five is heading?

“I’d choose the words ‘fifth’ and ‘album’,” he replies with a wry smile, before justifying what seems like a diversionary tactic. “I look at many fifth albums as a guide as to the urgency for what that record will need to be, with [Iron Maiden’s] Powerslave being a great example. By the fifth album you’re at a point in your career where you have this momentum built up, and you have the expectancy of people depending on you, so you have to put something special in those many spotlights. You need to step up and make a record that’s worth it and justifies all of these things.”

Who, then, can we expect to see fronting these rituals in future?

“I just know that person will have the name Papa Emeritus IV. It will be the fourth Papa Emeritus. But who that is, we don’t know yet.”

We’re not sure we believe him, so push for more. Might we see Cardinal Copia graduating to Papa status? The latest episode of the web series seems to indicate the ‘Sister Imperator’ character and Papa Nihil conceived a child. Wouldn’t that make him part of the papal bloodline?

“I think that what you will get over the next year are a lot of answers to a lot of questions,” offers Tobias, keeping things vague.

Like the question of whether Sister is pregnant? (In the latest ‘chapter’ of the web series, Sister attacks a woman at a Ghost show for smoking next to her).

“We don’t know that yet. It would blow my mind if she was now,” he says, clearly referring to the elderly Sister in the present day. This suggests she could well be with child back in 1969, though.

Has Tobias sketched what this new Papa will look like?

“Have you ever seen The Big Lebowski?” he asks by way of an answer, referencing the scene in the Coen brothers’ classic where Jeff Bridges’ character, The Dude, spots someone drawing on a notepad. When the man leaves the room with the piece of paper, The Dude rushes to scribble on to the page below to reveal the outline of what’s been drawn, only to discover it’s a doodle of a cock and balls. “It’s something along those lines.”

Sensing Tobias is in full evasion mode by this point, we change tack. Perhaps understanding his ambitions, and whether there’s a summit to them, can shed some light on the future – especially as he seems more focused on what Ghost’s next album will do rather than what it will sound like.

“I wouldn’t necessarily compare [my ambitions] to what the Rolling Stones have done, because that was a completely different time under completely different circumstances. For the last 40 years they have sold tickets because of nostalgic reasons, and maybe 40 years in the future there would be a nostalgia element for Ghost, but I can’t count on that.”

“I regard Metallica as colleagues and friends now, but they’re still Metallica,” he says of the thrash legends Ghost supported on their European stadium tour this summer. “I am an ambassador and they are presidents. But when I look to Metallica for influence, I’m looking at what they did in 1988. We’re on our fourth album, as they were on the Damaged Justice Tour, so the next stop is the Black Album.”

Spotting Kerrang!’s obvious joy at this admission, Tobias is quick to clarify exactly what he means by this.

“You have to make a responsible record,” he adds emphatically. “That doesn’t mean to expect riffs. It’s two different things – what the record sounds like and knowing to put yourself in the right spot at the right time. When I had nothing, and lived in a small apartment that cost very little because the ceiling leaked, the dream was to be able to live off making music. When I had kids that became even more important. Now it’s about something else. I’m responsible for showing my wife and my kids that all these years of waiting for me have been worth it. And that goes beyond money, because at the end of the day that’s just seasoning. One day my kids will be grown-up and I have to be able to show them that all this time playing rock shows had a real purpose.”

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Tobias loves touring.

“I’m like a sailor,” he says. “I just love being on the ocean. I’ve not always been on tour, but I’ve always been a transient person. And the road to achieving all this is endless, just like the road I looked down when I was five seemed to me at the time.”

Kerrang

[buzzdixonwriter]

If I Were King Of The Forest (Movie Edition)

…or if I were Serpentor.

Mi amigo Jim MacQuarrie posted a fun article a couple of three years back about Movies They Will Never Make… But Should! in which he listed several sci-fi and fantasy novels / series / comics that would make good movies.

Well, two can play that game, Jim, so here’s my list of books & stories that are long overdue for cinematic adaptation.

Harry Harrison’s Deathworld (the first book in the trilogy).  A nice little moralistic sci-fi fable set on a planet where flora and fauna live in harmony, becoming dangerous only in response to violent thoughts...such as those of the new human colonists.  (This would have made a great Ray Harryhausen monster flick back in the day.)

H. Beam Piper’s The Cosmic Computer a.k.a. Junkyard Planet a.k.a. The Graveyard Of Dreams.  In the aftermath of a galactic war, a cargo cult planet begins a quixotic search for the ultimate computer that can solve every problem (I'm convinced Douglas Adams read this before coming up with Deep Thought and the search for the meaning of life, the universe, and everything).  Piper plays it straight, however, and in the end it's the search itself that provides meaning and purpose, not obtaining the impossible goal.

Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination (UK title:  Tyger!  Tyger!).  What a dazzling, pyrotechnic / psychedelic novel, filled with such unique and vivid characters (and perfect for casting multi-ethnic actors across the board)!  Bester's sci-fi take on The Count Of Monte Cristo, this is arguably the greatest science fiction novel ever written (I certainly think so!). [Serialized in Galaxy Science Fiction 1 - 2 - 3 - 4.]

Samuel R. Delany's Nova.  Probably his most conventional science fiction novel insofar as it falls quite squarely in the space opera sub-genre but a marvelous book.

Jack Vance's The Dragon Masters and The Last Castle.  Two novellas that while not formally set in the same universe serve as companion pieces to one another.  (I'd suggest doing it as a double-bill the way Death Proof and Movie! Movie! were passed off as faux double-bills).

Roger Zelazny's short stories “A Rose For Ecclesiastes” and “The Doors Of his Face, The Lamps Of His Mouth”.  These would also make a great faux double-bill, the first a Bradburyesque story of human explorers encountering the dying Martian race, the second a Planet Stories-style extravaganza where Hemingwayesque sports fishermen of the future use themselves as bait to catch the sea monsters of Venus.

Roger Zelazny's Roadmarks.  Sticking with the Z-man for a bit, this would also make a great movie, an alternate history / time travel story where time is literally a highway that can be traveled by those in the know (f’r instance, a wild animal park in the future finances a supersonic jet car to go back to the dinosaur era to bring back a t-rex; the trip takes them a subjective month).  Doc Savage and Adolf Hitler make cameo appearances, and Zelazny came up with the concept of notebook computers long before the actual computer industry did.

J.G. Ballard's short story, “The Cloud Sculptors Of Coral D”.  Perfect for animation or a film with extensive CGI atmospheric effects since it's literally about sculpting clouds into huge works of art.

J.G. Ballard's novel Concrete Island.  A modern day Robinson Crusoe tale in which the survivor of an auto accident, thrown clear on impact, wakes up on a traffic island in the middle of a vast interchange of ultra-highspeed freeways with no way to safely cross them to the city they run through and is forced to come up with ingenious methods of finding food and water while trying to signal for help.

And I trust this doesn't come across as disrespectful, but now that Harlan Ellison has passed on, maybe the Kilimanjaro Corporation could license Dangerous Visions as an anthology program…and maybe even adapt the stories set aside for the legendary unpublished third volume in the series.

Finally, not really sci-fi or fantasy, more like weird crime, but A. Merritt's Seven Footprints To Satan done right, not that gawdawful silent era travesty but the grim, terrifying paranoid crime / cult / conspiracy novel it is.

  © Buzz Dixon

[queersatanic]

This Atlantic article just came, and we got quoted in it a fair bit:

[Non-paywall link]

"This is supposed to be a religion, but really, it’s a corporation run by two dudes,” David Johnson told me one night over Zoom. Johnson is a heretic from heresy. He used to belong to the Satanic Temple, and is now one of four American ex-members being sued for taking over two of its Facebook pages and using them to disseminate complaints about the organization. His concerns fall into a broad pattern echoed by other ex-members. When I interviewed them and dug into their complaints, many of the issues were managerial as much as ideological, centered on the assertion that the Temple’s leadership was undemocratic and overbearing. The dissidents disliked the nondisclosure agreements given to chapter heads, which the Temple says are necessary to prevent leaks “by former affiliates with poor intentions.” The Temple actively monitors the social-media feeds of critics and interested parties—my name turned up in an internal document for tweeting a comment request at a former member—and excommunicates those who, like the Sober Faction, challenge its authority. Its expertise in lawsuits is concerning to apostates who are contemplating taking their grievances public: TST’s suit against the four ex-members was dismissed, but the organization still has the opportunity to appeal. (TST also sued Newsweek for libel after it published a story reporting the ex-members’ claims; the suit is ongoing.) Another frequent complaint is about the centralization of power. The Temple’s org chart shows that decisions are made in consultation with the National Council. But in practice, former members told me, the final say goes to the “executive ministry,” made up of Greaves [Doug Misicko] and Jarry [Cevin Soling]. Local groups are expected to get clearance from Salem for their events and campaigns, and to pass on a percentage of their revenue. Greaves said that his critics “often seem to be under the delusion that the Satanic Temple makes a lot of money, and that if they just broke free of Satanic Temple management and had their own group, that money would be coming to them.” (The Temple’s accounts are not publicly available for review.) Joseph Laycock, who literally wrote the book on the Temple, told me that he couldn’t find a “smoking gun” to support the ex-members’ concerns about fundraising. Johnson and his friend Nathan Sullivan, who now organize under the name Queer Satanic, no longer defer to the air of mystery cultivated by the Temple. During our conversation, neither man used Greaves’s pseudonym, instead referring to him as Doug [Misicko]. They also endorse some critics’ description of the Temple as “Scientology for mall goths.” As for Greaves’s co-founder Malcolm Jarry, they pointed to a documentary that he made about a cargo cult in Vanuatu, in which he offers himself as the island’s long-prophesied messiah. (Jarry declined to be interviewed for this article.) Johnson and Sullivan despair over the counterintuitive narrative that drives so many articles about the Temple: What if Satanists were the good guys, actually? “That’s such a fun premise for so many journalists and so many writers and academics,” Johnson said. The real question, he continued, is “What if TST sucks for boring reasons?” ... If you came to Satanism because of a suffocating sense of conformity in your previous life, then you might well be on high alert for signs of incipient totalitarianism in your current one. This is what Johnson suggested was the real problem about the photo of Greaves with David Silverman. “There is no mechanism to remove him,” he said. “There was no mechanism to hold him accountable. I think that’s what pushed people away more so than the incident itself—yet another far-right figure, yet another transphobe, etc. That wasn’t the inciting incident so much as Lucien Greaves going out on Twitter and just saying, How dare you ask me to apologize.”

For more background and context on David Silverman, see also our article:

Hey, as someone who identifies heavily with Satanism, I really wanna thank you for the work you do. I wasn't aware of how bad TST was before, and your sources are incredibly thorough and detailed and I really appreciate it. I had bought into their act a few years ago, but luckily never threw them any cash. Thank you so much for the time and effort you put in to what you do, I don't have much to spare right now but I do wish you the absolute best

Thank you. If you can't donate, please do your best to keep letting other people know.

[ohblackdiamond]

little t&a (paul/gene, nc-17) (part 2 of 29)

part 1   part 2   part 3   part 4   part 5   part 6   part 7   part 8   part 9   part 10   part 11   part 12   part 13   part 14   part 15   part 16   part 17   part 18   part 19   part 20   part 21  part 22   part 23   part 24    part 25   part 26   part 27   part 28   part 29 

Four weeks before KISS gets back on tour, Gene discovers that Paul's been cursed by a groupie. For the sake of KISS' finances, Paul's comfort levels, and Gene's libido, this crisis must be resolved. Sexswap fic. In this chapter:  "What do you mean, what else was I doing? I woke up with tits! Don't you think that's a little fucking traumatizing?" Gene and Paul try to pinpoint the root cause of Paul’s predicament.

          Gene carried the groceries in for Paul. It felt like the lousiest apology, but he didn’t know what else to do. Paul looked as if he were seconds from tears—pretty horrifying, for Gene to try to realign his whole thought process, to try and reconcile the Paul he’d known for the last eight years with the pretty brunette currently slumped over the kitchen island—and Gene didn’t know how to mitigate that, either. Paul wasn’t much of a crier. Under the circumstances, though, Gene couldn’t exactly blame him.

           “I shouldn’t have done that.”

           “Forget it.”

           “Look—I thought it might be you from the tattoo, but I had to make sure—”

           “You made sure, okay? You definitely did that much.” Paul’s elbows were resting on the counter. His mouth was pressed against his clasped hands, muffling his words. “Fuck it, Gene. You were supposed to just write me back.”

           Gene rolled his eyes.

           “Yeah, you cut off contact with everybody a month before we go back on tour, and then you send me a two-sentence postcard and expect me to act like a fucking pen-pal. C’mon, Paul.”

           “Well, obviously, I didn’t want you coming over! You think I wanted anyone to see me like this? I already had to run Peter off!”

           So that had been him earlier. Shit.

           “How did this even happen?” Medically, it was impossible. Paul probably hadn’t had this little hair on him since he was ten years old. To say nothing of the drop in height, or the total reconfiguration of his body shape. He still looked pretty similar in the face, same big brown eyes, same slightly crooked chin and full lips, but the features were a little softer. Really, he looked like a good bit like his older sister, although Gene knew better than to mention it. Paul hadn’t seen Julia in at least three years.

           The guys had always made fun of Gene for his lack of discernment, and he knew there were plenty of women that looked like dogs dotting his photo albums, but Paul was—actually kind of pretty. Or would be, if his eyes, always a little sad-looking, weren’t all watery and his mouth wasn’t glued in that firm line behind his hand. Even Peter, who, oddly enough, probably had better taste in women, looks-wise, than any of the four of them, had said Paul was cute. And the tits—shit, Gene was distracting himself. Paul had taken his time answering anyway.

           “How should I know how this happened? I woke up like this!”

           “When?”

           “Wednesday morning.”

           “That’s five days. You’ve been like this for five days?” Before Paul could answer, Gene added, bewildered, “Have you gone anywhere?”

           It wouldn’t have surprised him much if Paul had holed up in the house the entire time. He did that enough normally. Gene could understand that, to a point. Gene never knew what to do with himself off-tour, either, except get laid, but Paul usually added a healthy dose of self-pity on top of the lays. Given what had happened to him, he’d probably been feeling sorrier for himself than usual.

           Paul surprised him by bringing his hands down from in front of his mouth and nodding.

           “I drove to Peaches yesterday.”

           “You drove?”

          “You think I could’ve convinced my chauffeur I was Paul Stanley?”

           “Might have an easier time with him than you would a cop.”

           “A cop? I’m a great driver—”

           “You don’t have a license right now.”

           Paul’s lips pursed and he went quiet for a while. Like the full magnitude of his situation had only just dawned on him. Not that Gene wasn’t sympathetic. This was going to screw him over, too. The new tour a month away, and their frontman not only entirely unable to prove his identity, but—really, assuming he got the other guys and their management to believe him, what was he supposed to do? Strut onstage in that sequin-studded jumpsuit, singing about the dick he didn’t even have? Even Bill Aucoin couldn’t spin a story about Paul getting a sex change into anything close to palatable for the magazines and papers. If they didn’t get this shit fixed and turn Paul back into a guy, KISS was sunk.

           Gene let the silence hang in the air rather than try to fill it up with small talk or reassurances. He got up and started taking Paul’s groceries out of the paper bags, just to give his hands something to do. A wrapped package of deli meat, several cans of Tab, a bunch of celery, and a loaf of sandwich bread were all that was in the first bag. The groceries of a depressed catalog model, not a rockstar. He put it all up in the pantry and fridge unceremoniously. Paul didn’t have a breadbox, so Gene left the loaf on the counter next to the sink. The second bag of groceries was just as dismal, maybe worse—peanut butter, saltines, apples, and, horrifyingly, a box of Kotex. Shit. Had Paul already given up on going back to normal, or—

           “You’re not on the rag, are you?”

           “Fuck, no. Put that back.” Paul was going crimson. Gene felt sorry enough for him to drop the Kotex back into the bag and return to his seat across from him at the kitchen island.

           “Are you planning to just wait around for it? Haven’t you done anything yet?”

           “Gene, I don’t know what to do. I did get some books sent over.” Paul got up and went to the living room, returning with some paperbacks under his arm, which he dumped on the kitchen table. Usually, Paul’s reading material consisted of teenybopper magazines with his face on the cover, contracts, and his own unflattering comics of his bandmates. Now Gene found himself next to copies of The Lesser Key of Solomon, The Secret Lore of Magic, and LaVey’s The Satanic Rituals. He could’ve sworn the hairs on the back of his neck were standing up just from cracking the spines. Gene tried to swallow his nerves as best he could, tried to look at the whole deal clinically, never mind what years of yeshiva and the start of rabbinical school had taught him, but every sigil-covered page made him feel a bit ill.

           “You haven’t tried any of this, have you?”

           Paul snorted.

           “Fuck, no. I’m already going to hell, there’s no point in expediting the trip.” He blew his bangs out of his face with a breath. They settled back in front of his eyes almost immediately, and he shook his head. “I just wanted to read up. I thought if I could figure out how it happened, I could get someone else to reverse it for me.”

           “Like a witch.”

           Paul flinched slightly.

           “Well, yeah, since that’s probably who did it in the first place.” He was standing behind Gene, reaching over him and pointing at the book he’d opened. “Oh, it’s in this one. Hang on.”

           Gene shifted obediently, trying to ignore the feeling of Paul’s bare chest pressed against his back. He knew Paul wasn’t coming onto him, not consciously, at least, but—fuck, the last several years on the road had spoiled him. Every chick he got near wanted to get laid, if not by him, then by one of his bandmates. But Paul wasn’t actually a chick, a fact made all the more apparent by how utterly oblivious he was to the fact that his bathrobe was halfway open, again.

           He handed Paul the book. Paul was thumbing through it before long, in his usual way, licking his finger with every pageturn. Gene could see the remnants of black nail polish on his fingernails—still aggressively manicured—and a couple of marks beneath his knuckles.

           “What happened to your hands there?”

           “Huh? I bit them.”

           “Why?”

           Paul shrugged and cleared his throat.

           “Anyway, found it.” He pointed to a passage alongside a lithograph of a lion head. “‘Marbas, alias Barbas is a great president, and appeareth in the forme of a mightie lion—'”

           “Paul, the e on the end of ‘forme’ is silent.”

           “Shut up—‘he bringeth diseases and cureth them, promoteth wisdom’…. It’s in here, I swear—there! ‘He changes men into other shapes.’ So that’s probably the demon that whoever it was conjured up.”

           Paul looked more than vaguely pleased with himself. Gene almost felt bad for not being impressed. Almost.

           “That’s all you’ve come up with this whole time.”

           “It’s only been five days, Gene, I—”

           “What else were you doing?”

           “What do you mean, what else was I doing? I woke up with tits! Don’t you think that’s a little fucking traumatizing?”

           “You had—” Gene just shook his head.

           “I don’t have anything, Gene. You said so yourself. I don’t even have access to my own bank account. I’m done once the cash runs out.”

           Gene started to ask how much cash Paul had on hand, then thought better of it. Probably not a whole lot. Paul had the annoying habit of charging everything he could to either the label or the KISS Corporation proper while they were on tour, and not letting anyone know until the following board meeting. Off-tour probably wasn’t much different.

           “Did you make a list?” he asked finally.

           “A list?”

           “A list of anyone you think could’ve done this to you.”

           Paul shook his head.

           “That’s the thing. Nobody I know would’ve wanted to do this to me.”

           “Then maybe it’s someone you don’t know.”

           “Like who? Gene, what good does it do anybody if I’m stuck as a girl?”

           “Revenge. You have any exes into the occult?”

           “Not that I know of.” Paul cocked his head, considering. “Mostly they break up with me, not the other way around.”

           “Groupies, then?”

           “Gene, I don’t—take notes on every girl I fuck, it’s not that important to me.”

           “Did you get with anyone strange lately? Maybe, I don’t know, a cult member or something?”

           “I don’t think so—”

           “Anyone ask you anything weird? Or try and get a lock of your hair?” Gene’s knowledge of the occult was limited, but he did vaguely remember needing—what was it, the person’s clothes or hair before any magic could be done on them. At least, that was how it worked on Dark Shadows.

           “That happens every tour at least three times.”

           “I’m trying to figure this out for you.” God. Paul had had almost a week that he could’ve spent seriously researching his predicament, and all he’d done was buy a couple of books, send Gene a postcard, and sit around moping. “Did—”

           “There was this one girl who yanked out some of my chest hair a couple weeks ago,” Paul said slowly. “I didn’t really think much of it at the time. I thought it was, y’know, a kink thing. It was cool, right, kind of a you’re the boss deal—”

           Gene winced.

           “Did she say anything?”

           “She said she was going to make me feel like she did.”

           “And you didn’t think that was strange.”

           “No! It was while we were doing some S&M shit!” Paul’s face was going slightly pink. “It was fun! You go on tour and you end up with a lot of real desperate virgins and groupies with V.D. and none of them really—they just wanna do what you want, they don’t wanna ever take the lead, and this girl, she had me up against the—”

           “I get the idea,” Gene snapped, although he didn’t at all. He wasn’t picturing the encounter as it’d happened, just Paul as he was right now, up against the wall, breasts heaving, one long leg hooked around his waist. Fuck, was it hard to look at him. Gene had never been ashamed of his own lasciviousness until faced with the one person who noticed it and needed it least. “Okay. We’re going to get this taken care of.”

           “How?”

           “I’m calling Ace.”

           “Ace?” Paul was almost squeaking. “Don’t call Ace!”

           “Relax, I’m not gonna tell him what happened.”

           “Then what are you—”

           “Just trust me, Paul.”

           Gene got up and walked over to the kitchen phone. Paul looked as though he were about to argue, but then he just shook his head, watching carefully as Gene punched in Ace’s number.

           “Hey. Hey, Jeanette, this is Gene. Is Ace around? Let me talk to him for a second.” Gene rubbed the back of his head with his free hand while he waited. He could hear Jeanette calling Ace over, and a little shuffling, just before Ace picked up the phone.

           “Hey.”

           “Hey, Ace.”

           “You find Paulie?”

           “Yeah. Yeah, he’s fine. I’m at his house.”

           “What was he pulling that prima donna crap over, anyway?”

           “He’s…” It was hard to talk to Ace casually with Paul staring at him. “He’s fine. Just paranoid.”

           “Paranoid? Why?” Ace sounded a little disbelieving. Gene couldn’t blame him. “He didn’t start on some shit, did he? Thought all he took was white cross.”

           “He’s not on anything. He’s worried about the tour.” Gene paused. “You still go to that psychic, don’t you?”

           “Sometimes. Why?”

           “Do you have her number?”

           “Gene, you don’t believe in psychics or any of that—”

           “Yeah, but Paul does. I thought I’d make him an appointment, ease his mind some.” Gene watched Paul’s brow furrow, one corner of his mouth lifting up in a wary expression.

           “You’d make it for him?” Ace’s tone was dubious. “I’ve got her number somewhere. Let me find it.”

           Gene heard rustling in the background, and Ace asking Jeanette where the address book was. Jeanette said something in return, and then Gene was almost worried they’d both forgotten about the call until he heard Ace’s high voice back on the line.

           “Okay. Her name’s Suzie, she’s got a little office over in the Bronx if you wanna pop over in person. I dunno the address, though, you’ll have to call.” Ace rattled off the phone number as Gene scrambled for a pen and paper. He had to settle for a napkin. “Hey, could you tell Paul to call up Peter sometime? He’s getting kind of worried.”

           “Yeah, I will. It’s nothing personal.”

           Ace laughed.

           “Pete ain’t gonna believe that secondhand, you know that. See you, Geno.”

           “Bye.” Gene hung up the phone. Paul got up from his chair.

           “You’re getting me an appointment with Ace’s psychic.”

           “Yeah. Do you have to check your dance card first?”

           “Psychics can’t reverse curses,” Paul said flatly.

           “Do you have a better idea?”

           “No.”

           “Then you’re going.” Before Paul could protest, Gene snatched the phone off the hook again and started dialing. “Get dressed. I’m pretty sure she’ll be willing to pencil you in quick.”