#long running russian tradition

[beardedmrbean]

The Russian defence ministry has been recruiting prisoners to fight in Ukraine, apparently taking over from the Wagner mercenary group which was the first to adopt the practice last year.

Such army units are commonly known as Storm-Z, the letter Z being one of the symbols of Vladimir Putin's so-called "special military operation" against Ukraine. It is also the first letter of the Russian word "zek", or "inmate".

The name Storm-Z is unofficial and can be applied to a range of Russian army units active in different parts of Ukraine.

Similarly to Wagner's prisoner units, Storm-Z detachments are reportedly often treated as an expendable force thrown into battle - with little consideration for the lives of their servicemen.

There are also indications that members of other army units can be sent to Storm-Z detachments as punishment for violations such as insubordination or drunkenness.

Wagner's role

Last year, Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin - known as "Putin's chef" - was allowed to recruit in prisons after tens of thousands of Russian troops were killed in Ukraine.

He personally visited numerous jails to promise convicted criminals that they would be able to go home free, and with their convictions removed, after six months of fighting for Wagner in Ukraine - if they survived.

The group, which employed experienced mercenaries as well as convicts, proved itself as a capable fighting force in locations such as the eastern Ukrainian town of Bakhmut.

But then Prigozhin very publicly escalated his criticism of Russia's top brass, accusing them of incompetence and of deliberately starving Wagner of ammunition. Two months after staging a short-lived mutiny, Prigozhin died in a plane crash in August 2023 together with Wagner's other top commanders.

The group has now all but disappeared from the battlefield in Ukraine.

Military takes over

Reports from Russia suggest that the defence ministry has taken over from Wagner as a recruiter of inmates for the war against Ukraine.

"It is the same scheme as with the [Wagner] private military company," said RTVI, a Russian news website. "Prisoners sign contracts with the defence ministry, and after completing them they can go home or continue serving."

One member of Storm-Z, a former prisoner interviewed by US-funded website Sever Realii, said defence ministry recruiters promised inmates lavish payments: a salary of 205,000 roubles (about $2,000 or £1,700) a month, a payment of 3m roubles ($31,000 or £26,000) per injury and 5m roubles ($52,000 or £43,000) to be paid to the recruit's relatives if he gets killed.

"It all sounded hunky-dory!" he said. But soon after being deployed to Ukraine the former prisoners realised they were being sent into a "total meat-grinder" without proper armaments or without even being told of the real situation on the front line, he said.

The man - whose real name Sever Realii did not give - lost a leg in battle, but he survived, unlike some of his fellow fighters from Storm-Z.

Even though the Russian military has not confirmed or denied recruiting convicts, there are numerous indications of them being sent to units known as Storm-Z.

For example, Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Russia-installed governor of the occupied city of Sevastopol in Crimea, on 17 October confirmed that one of the two Storm-Z members recently killed in fighting was an ex-prisoner who had "decided to atone for his guilt and signed a contract with the defence ministry in spring 2023".

Also in October, popular Russian newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets interviewed another member of Storm-Z, a convicted murderer who uses the call sign Bandit. He had served six years of his 19-year prison sentence before joining the Russian military.

"It doesn't matter if you're a contract soldier, if you've been mobilised or if you are even a convict. No, we're like family," Bandit told the paper. "I just hope the defence ministry does what it promised and secures a pardon for me."

'They're just meat'

The defence ministry in Moscow first referred to "storm units" on 25 January this year, publishing a video of them training, but without going into the detail of who their members were. It is possible that the unit mentioned by the defence ministry is different from Storm-Z units which comprise convicts.

It said that the "storm units' job is to break through the most complicated layered parts of Ukrainian defences".

In practice, this appears to mean that they are often readily deployed without much consideration for their chances of survival.

"Storm fighters, they're just meat," one regular soldier who has fought alongside members of Storm-Z, told Reuters. In its investigation, the news agency also said that, in an echo of Stalin's penal military units, servicemen from other army detachments can get sent to Storm-Z as punishment for disobeying orders or drinking alcohol.

Independent Russian website Agentstvo quoted a Russian soldier fighting in Ukraine's Kherson region (whose identity the website says it has confirmed) as saying that regular servicemen were sent to Storm-Z as a form of punishment. The man shared with Agentstvo a video of three masked men who he said were members of his brigade, one of whom says:

"This means they're running out of people, and our commanders plug these holes by sending people to Storm-Z. We think this is unlawful and illegitimate. This has to stop."

One Russian Telegram account believed to be run by a military instructor involved in training Storm-Z units claimed that some of their members had been driven to desperation and attempted desertion after being mistreated by their commanders.

"People can simply go berserk because they're being treated like dispensable meat which deserves no sympathy. And this attitude is in reality not uncommon," the account calling itself the Grey Zone Philologist said.

But then, it claimed, Storm-Z servicemen are not the only members of the Russian army subjected to mistreatment by "unhinged man-eating commanders".

The UK ministry of defence says it is possible that Storm-Z units were originally envisioned as "relatively elite organisations".

In an intelligence update published on 24 October, it says they have now effectively become "penal battalions, manned with convicts and regular troops on disciplinary charges".

[bruciemilf]

I will say, it is so fun thinking about the Waynes and their relationship with food. But specifically Bruce.

We get such little light shed on the Waynes before the Big Terrible happened. Like. How were Wayne dinners like?

Were they terribly posh and quiet with small moments of fun thrown in? Was Alfred scolding Thomas for telling a star eyed Bruce unnecessarily gory details from a surgery?

Did Martha help Bruce break into the cookie jar? Was there a lovely, playful gossip about Bruce's loud classmates and his adorable crush on Gray Ghost?

Because I like that! But I'd also like it to be a complete juxtaposition.

I want Bruce to talk about his family, to his children, with a smile that could melt the sun. I want him to tell them about the noise.

How the Wayne manor was permanently flooded with a noise and boister that could rival a packed 5 star kitchen.

How Thomas always cooked with a dry cigarette in his mouth, arguing with uncle Jacob about forks of all things.

Why were they smudged, why were they placed randomly and not organised with militaristic precision, while Martha watched with the fondest annoyance.

How Thomas would cuss filthy in Italian only when Bruce was around and only Oz could understand him, long before he was the Penguin, long before Bruce was Batman.

"It's about culture. Not that you'd understand, Jakey."

And uncle Jacob never entertained his father for long. He'd throw a dirty look, his obsidian eyes sharp as a switchblade, and mutter a 'bitch' in Russian, while Alfred sat there judging them both.

The Waynes were chaos with heartbeats. And Bruce's favorite event at these diners? The food fights. It's always uncle Philip who started them.

"Wow, Jay eating steak. Never thought I'd see this day."

" It's venison."

" Vinison?" Thomas would finally take a break from his unlit cigarette, holding Bruce in his lap like a king would a prized cat.

A collective sigh rang among the table. They knew what was coming. " What are you, fuckin' crazy? That's fuckin' cannoli, dipshit."

"With vinison."

"Jacob."

" Tom."

"Martha."

" Honey."

" You come into my house, not knowing what a goddam cannoli is? Fuck are you gonna tell me next, you don't put garlic in your Carbonara? I mean."

" Garlic is disgusting."

And Thomas would cover Bruce's ears like that's the most offensive thing uncle Jacob could utter at Thomas Wayne's table. And Uncle Oz agreed. Their favorite pastime was ganging up on Martha's oldest brother.

And it starts off as something minuscule and petty and mutates in something loud and ugly and breathtaking.

Bruce would watch with an open mouth in Alfred's lap, as his father's neck popped with veins, and uncle Jacobs pale complexion would blush something angry as the skin of his throat thinned from yelling.

"FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU, YOUR PRESIDENT IS A VODKA DRINKING, BALDING, COMMIE PIECE OF SHIT."

"YOU'RE AMERICAN. "

" I CANT HELP THAT, I WAS BORN LIKE THAT!"

And it wasn't a true Saturday dinner unless Thomas didn't leap across the table, running over all the food to smash whatever dish into Jacobs face.

But truly, the best part, was watching them go from fight dogs to eating outside in time-out. As different as his father and uncle were, they could always find agreement on one topic:

Defying Martha Wayne was painfully stupid.

They'd share a cigarette and eat in silence, which was as friendly as they'd ever get. But he loved it. Bruce loved Saturday dinner.

And when the batkids start the fighting tradition on Saturdays, Bruce thinks they do, too.

[thesecretsofthedivine]

Pick a Pile Reading | Who’s Coming Into Your Life Soon? 🌠 🌸

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*Disclaimer: This is a collective reading — take what resonates and leave the rest. If this resonates with you, please show support by reposting (with credit), tipping, or booking with me! :)

*Exchanges with other intuitives/readers are available via dm’s

PILE 1 COLLECTIVE

This is a person who is a lover of the arts! You may meet them in an artistic environment (think art class, concert, museum, etc.) or they’ll just enjoy visiting those places and have a knack for creative talents. They also seem to be a people person who is a smooth talker and has a very strong aura. They like to entertain and make people feel relaxed, which could inspire them to host a lot of parties or be an active member of their community. For some, the person coming into your life will be a part of the LGBTQ+ community or advocate for such causes. This person will have a romantic purpose for most of you, but some may choose to keep this connection as a lighthearted friendship or FWB. You may feel slightly reluctant to take them seriously because of how carefree and popular they are. They will be comforting, but some of you could feel like you’re just another person under their spell and may become resistant to these romantic feelings as a result. It’s important to mention this person‘s energy feels very sincere. They want to cater to you and can often struggle with people pleasing tendencies.

~ miscellaneous: blueberries. the color blue. a coquette aesthetic. whicker baskets. white snocks + sneakers. aries, capricorn, taurus placements (tons of cardinal energy). piercings. hair parted to the side. ripped jeans. a laugh that sounds like a scoff/sarcastic humor.

PILE 2 COLLECTIVE

For most of pile 2, the person coming into your life soon is a platonic feminine around your age. Their personality is very peppy, organized, empathetic, hardworking, and sensual. You will meet this person through school, work, mutuals, or shared goals. They seem to be a lover of animals as well so they may have pets or easily connect with them. The two of you will bond over music and the type of people you aspire to become in the future. They’ll make you feel lighthearted and bring out a more extroverted side to you. You may have moments where you let them put stickers or makeup on you just to have something silly to do together. For the people who have a feminine energy coming in, they may also be skilled in things like speech & debate, reading long/foreign novels (especially russian), playing chess — something traditional and academic. This person is an avid lover of film, especially vintage or historical ones. They could be multilingual or come from a different culture than your own. It’s clear that the two of you will never run out of things to talk about, making it seem like you finally found your perfect mental match!

~ miscellaneous: blonde hair. teal/blue crystals or blue eyes. the letters c, e, i, s, n, a, l, and p. scarves. whimsigoth/hippie/70s aesthetic. winter time. romeo & juliet. film major. coffee hangouts. mercury or 3h synastry.

PILE 3 COLLECTIVE

Pile 3 has an entire friend group coming into your life (multiple individuals)! Psychically, there’s a lot of overlapping conversations I’m tuning into 😅 so the people coming into your life will be a big part of your life/daily schedule. You’ll stay quite busy because of their presence in your life and may notice yourself becoming more talkative or that you all can be quite loud and rambunctious together. Parties, social events, clubs, concerts, and any other crowded environment can be relevant to how you meet these people or where you’ll spend time with them. You may notice that the group’s energy becomes more alive at night so a lot of these people could be night owls and extroverts. It’s the kind of thing where you’ll always have thousands of notifications blowing up your phone or will always have something fun to do. There’s a huge blend of masculine and feminine energies here so some people may encounter a friend group of 2-4 people whereas others will find themselves with 6-8 new people in their lives. Some of the masculine energies in the group could like to wrestle so be wary of breakables/fragile furniture that’s in their vicinity 💀. I feel that these people coming into your life will all enjoy sharing food, secrets, tips, and so on. There’s a very open and excitable vibe here so some of them may even be slightly younger than you.

~ miscellaneous: matching tattoos. karaoke. late night escapades. musicians. fire sign placements. the book everything i know about love — dolly alderton. bars. pinterest boards/pinterest aesthetics (especially for those who use it to manifest). gaming/dart boards. bets/dares.

PILE 4 COLLECTIVE

A family member will either become a bigger part of your life or start a new relationship with you entirely. For some, this will relate to a grandmother figure and/or deceased relatives watching over you/being around your energy. For others, it’s more of a mentor vibe. Older, feminines with a lot of advice and maturity to offer you. At this stage in your life, you could be feeling anxious or uncertain about your future/career. This person coming in is meant to be a support system for you during this specific transition period. They will help you to broaden your horizons, believe in your dreams/capabilities, and strengthen your willingness to take risks. If your mental health has been low, you feel like you’ve stepped out of alignment with your desires, or you’ve just been processing some heavier topics lately, this person will come in to soften those experiences while helping you to work through them. They will teach you how to validate your emotions without feeling disempowered by the weight of them. “Your depth is beauty” and they will make you into a stronger person by honoring this part of yourself.

~ miscellaneous: the barbie movie scene where she meets her creator (ruth handler). what was i made for - billie eilish. holding hands. traditional baking. words of wisdom/words of affirmation. bridges. feeling at the end of your rope when they come in. disco music. the 60s - 70s as their birth year. gardening hats. flowers.

[wizzdot]

The Patron Saint of One Way Trips

Ch14

Description: we get taken to Mexico and thrust into the Action!! Let’s go find Hassan and meet Graves in the next chapter!! Whoop!!

*Laika's (Y/N's) POV*

I'm sitting in the meeting room, my leg bouncing up and down due to anxiety. I start chewing on my finger nails. Laswell's voice crackles over the computer. "Captain, good to speak again. I've spoken with Shepherd. He wants your team in Las Almas by tonight. They are to link up with the Mexican Special Forces. He is sending his own Shadow Team with Commander Graves. They have air support and any further assistance will be at your disposal. This is important, Captain. Lieutenant - I trust you will be able to get results. Don't let me down. I will send through further details as soon as I am off of this call. Thanks for your assistance once again. It is much appreciated" and with that, she signs off.

Everything seems to move in a blur from there on in. The next thing I know, I'm sat beside Johnny in a helicopter, the lieutenant standing near the pilot. I had packed my bags in a rush - I hope I had remembered everything but it was too late now.. we are already in the air. I had made sure to tie my hanky securely around my arm. It was tradition at this point. My lucky charm. Kyle joked that he felt the same way about his baseball cap.

I close my eyes and count for the rest of the journey, starting again at zero every time I lost my position. Johnny speaks with Ghost, who still hasn't looked at me. I was worried about this trip - how long would we all last together without John and Kyle. Would Ghost try and kill me before they join us? My hands start tapping on my thighs, nervously.

All of a sudden, there is a crash and jolt and within seconds, the side door of the helicopter opens revealing a concrete landing pad with three black jeeps parked waiting for our arrival. I freeze when I see him and tuck myself behind Johnny. I don't look up from the ground. Johnny and the Lieutenant stride ahead, down the ramp of the helicopter.

"Alejandro!" Johnny shouts, over the whirl of the blades.

"Sergeant MacTavish" - the Mexican Alpha replies - "Call me Soap.." Johnny greets, confidently and with respect, shaking his hand. Alejandro nods once.

"Lieutenant - Laswell says they call you Ghost?" - "Actually, I believe he prefers to be-" Johnny interrupts before Ghost snaps over the top of him -

"That'll do!" he barks loudly at Johnny. Johnny slams his mouth shut so quickly, like a child being scolded.

"And you - Garrick, is it?" oh shit..oh shit.. he's talking to me. He must have read the name on Kyle's hoodie. I'd forgotten to change before we had arrived! Stupid, stupid mutt!

The silence stretches on for too long and Johnny cuts in, answering for me as I just stare wide eyed at the dark haired Alpha. He is the one I'd almost shot when I was still with the Russians... Him and his omega.. the one that had died in that mission. I swear he looked at me. What if he recognises me?! Ghost narrows his eyes at my, obviously terrified, reaction.

"This is Laika - or Y/N.. I - I don't actually know what she prefers..." Johnny thinks aloud.

Alejandro squints his eyes at the strange interaction but then shrugs. "Welcome to the city of souls.." he says, turning to walk back to one of the black jeeps.

"I've never been to Mexico.." Johnny says - god, how was he so friendly and confident with everyone he has just met..?

I notice that Ghost is striding slowly behind me - probably keeping watch that I don't run off. He had clearly clocked my reaction to Alejandro when stepping out of the helicopter.

"This isn't Mexico.. This - is Las Almas.." The Alpha corrects Johnny.

Ghost then starts talking Lieutenant jargon - something about weapons and backup from Graves - Alejandro replies "my base is your base.."

"Good - now, where is Hassan..?" Ghost asks in that gruff, aggressive voice of his. I had gathered from the intel sent over from Kate, that Hassan is an Iranian terrorist who had been dealing American missiles with the Cartel. We had to catch Hassan who had outran the Mexican Special Forces - they needed to catch him before he crossed the border.

"At a safe house, holed up - it's about ten clicks from here - now, get in" he gestures to the jeep. Johnny walks around the back of the car to get in from the other side. Ghost nods for me to sit in the middle and then he squeezes his massive body in last. I still hadn't looked up.

"This is my second in command - Sergeant Major Rodolfo Parra" - I glance up to see the Omega. The one I thought was dead.. I tense up and gulp audibly, and Ghost looks at me again with a look of confusion. Even Johnny looks unsure.

"tengo miedo de los fantasmas.." Rodolfo murmurs to his Alpha. Alejandro smirks before turning to face us from his seat - "You know Spanish..?" Alejandro asks.

"No" Johnny replies on behalf of all of us - "you will.." Alejandro chuckles..

I don't say anything to correct the assumption that I don't know Spanish - I mean - I know very limited Spanish, but enough to get by.

I feel a bit of warmth towards Rodolfo in that moment. For, I was also afraid of Ghosts...

*Ghost's POV*

The girl is acting oddly - ever since we stepped foot off of that helicopter she has been skittish. I hope she isn't going to be a liability. Even Johnny is giving her weird looks, so it isn't just me picking up on the weird vibes from her. Not to mention that she fuckin' reeks of anxiety and fear again, not that anyone else seems to be able to smell her properly yet..

I get the feeling that she is contemplating fleeing. I remember Laswell mentioning that she might try to go back, if the Russians came for her... does that mean she is a flight risk? I wasn't sure. All I know is that I have to keep a close eye on her.. I stay behind her in case she tries to dart off. I can feel her hesitation when Alejandro tells us to get in the car.

Her scent is rolling off in waves of sour fear. I try not to touch her but it's near on impossible with all three of us squeezed in the back like this. My legs press up against hers, she is trying to shrink - or disappear. Rodolfo says something in Spanish that none of us understand. The two men were a bonded pair. Alpha and Omega. I can smell it on them...

Laika's (Y/N's) POV*

Rodolfo - or Rudy - as Alejandro calls him, drives us through the streets of Las Almas. Some of them look eerily familiar from my last visit here - I try not to remember. Thankfully my memories of those days are fuzzy, thanks to the high dosage of drugs I'd been on. A white pick up truck drives by with several men and guns loaded on the back. Johnny immediately alerts Alejandro of the threat.

"Hey, hey! Tranquilo! Easy, that's normal here.." the Alpha replies with a heavy accent. The Alphas then begin to discuss the Corruption of the Police and Army in Las Almas. Alejandro tells Johnny that the locals call them 'Los Vaqueros' - the cowboys..

I remain silent for the entire drive. We slow due to a traffic block up ahead. I look the the right and see two dead bodies laying in a pool of blood, covered in the flags of the Cartel. I feel sick, but try not to show any reaction, I had seen this before when I last visited Las Almas, I heard the locals say it was how the local crime gang 'marked their territory'.

Alejandro instructs Rudy to go around the traffic block. The road was being blocked by the Mexican Army who were in the pockets of this 'El Sin Nombre' Cartel leader.

The car pulls into a smaller hidden area - Alejandro steps out and slams the door. "The Cartel are hiding Hassan in the village across the river. Get ready - we leave in five, amigos". I swear he eyes me with suspicion.

*Alejandro's POV*

I hadn't been told that the Brits were bringing a girl with them. A strange, shy girl. She had little to no scent, I assume she uses blockers. She seems familiar. I wait until the car pulls up at our storehouse and whisper to Rudy "vagila a la chica" - he nods, agreeing to keep and eye on the Garrick girl.

*Laika's (Y/N's) POV*

I quickly strap on all of my holsters, belts and put the heavy tactical vest over my head, clipping it tightly around my waist - I hate it when it is loose, I find that it throws my aim off. I follow Johnny to the car with all the weapons John had sent over for us.

I see the familiar case of the sniper rifle with a small ticket of paper sticking out of the lid. I furrow my brows. Johnny throws me an assault rifle. This would be the gun I use most - I then spot a smaller gun that I recognize from my time in Russia - some sort of pistol. It's labelled as a TYR, I make a grab for it and holster it, feeling pleased that I'd found a gun that I'd at least be familiar with using.

"The Captain said you'd want this.." Ghost grumbles, handing me the case. I look between him and the case, unsure. "Take it.." he growls. I do as ordered and quickly take the case.

How the fuck was I supposed to carry this fucking beast of a sniper?! I quickly kneel to the ground and assemble the scope and sights, making sure I take enough ammo for all of the guns. I stare at the Rifle for a few seconds, pondering how to carry it. I attach a leather strap to it and sling it around my back so that it settles between the rear pockets of my tac-vest. I shrug my shoulders and jump and crouch a couple of times with all of my gear to test that I could still move unrestricted with everything. It wasn't perfect, but it'll work. The last thing I do, is tie my hanky around the strap on my outer thigh. I glance back to the boxes of weapons and at the last minute, take a knife. I don't like using knives - always trying to stay far enough away to not engage in close range scraps.

I feel utterly terrified but fall back from the cars and stand behind the two familiar Alphas. Johnny glances back to me and for the first time in ages, speaks to me.

"You alright, Lass..?" - I just nod. He sends a tight lipped smile my way before we load back into the car and drive to the village.

The drive is short lived - we arrive within a couple of minutes. Soldiers leap from the surrounding cars. I just copy. I'd never actually worked on a team before - let alone a trained military unit like this. I hope I don't majorly fuck this up. I sense someone staring at me. I follow my instincts and look around, meeting eyes with Rodolfo. He doesn't look away, just raises an eyebrow.

"Weapons hot, Vaqueros!" Alejandro shouts at his men.

"Where are they hiding Hassan?" Soap questions, "White two-story building, back of the town" Alejandro says before fist pumping his Omega and splitting up to infiltrate one of the entrances to the village. I follow behind Johnny and the Lieutenant, assault rifle raised with the hope that I wouldn't have to use it.

I overhear Johnny asking about civilians, thankfully Alejandro responds saying that they'd all left when the Cartel took the village as a hideout. At least no families would be caught up in the fray. I sigh in relief.

We round another corner when the pop of gun fire erupts. A couple of houses' doors open and armed men start firing at us. I immediately take cover - hiding behind a wall. I take three or four deep breaths before popping back up to check beyond the wall. As I break cover, a bullet whistles past my head. I gasp and duck back down. FUCK, Careful mutt - that was almost a bullet to the brain..

The main group of Vaqueros, Johnny and the Lieutenant push forward up the middle of the street. I stay back trying to think about how to help. I couldn't just cower in fear. PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER, MUTT!

I turn sharp left and flank the group. I make sure I keep pace but on the opposite side of the village. I follow the gun fire and somehow manage to skirt around the village undetected. I reach the white two-story house. A ladder is leaning against the wall, just underneath the window. That'll do!

I quietly climb the ladder and enter silently through the upper floor window. I slowly work my way around the house, it was heavily guarded. I shouldn't have arrived here alone but I felt like I had something to prove. I pull the knife from my thigh holster and stare at it, turning it slowly, watching how the light flashes off of the blade. I have to be quiet so I will have to use the knife. I shiver slightly but concentrate on the task. Get Hassan.

I silently slice my way to the final back room on the upper floor. Dropping three bodies and dragging them to the side.

I move toward the final guard, not making a sound. I throw a piece of fabric over his head and then wrestle him down to the ground, straddling him before slicing his throat. Just as I finish clearing the upper floor, a huge ruckus sounds from downstairs. SHIT, they're here! I quickly notice that I'd been very stupid. If they see me, already in the house, they'll shoot before they realise that I'm on their side. I make a rash decision and elect to leap from the shot out window, rejoining the back of the team from downstairs - hopefully they think that I've been there the whole time. I can only hope nobody has noticed my absence. Hassan isn't even in the fucking house..

I quietly slot between two Mexican soldiers that I don't recognise - they line me up and down quickly with their guns, my eyes widen before one of them speaks "es solo la chica del británico" - I don't quite understand but gather that it's something along the lines of 'British girl' so I assume they know I'm on their side.. I smile nervously and wave. They just look at me as if I'm crazy before moving forward with the others.

As we begin to move forward, I eye the bodies I'd left in my wake from just five minutes earlier. I cringe slightly at what I'd done. I hear the Lieutenant's voice bellow from up ahead. "No Hassan.. Negative on Hassan" - "They must have moved him.. recently" Alejandro speaks.

I finally step into the room that I had already been in, Johnny notices me first and strides over to me quickly "I didn't see you for a while there, Lass - thought you'd done a runner!" he jokes, slapping me twice on the arm. I huff a soft laugh and look at my feet, what he doesn't know, can't hurt him... "Y'alright though..?" he asks, eyes trailing down my body, checking for any marks. His eyes hesitate on my legs before moving back up to my eyes.

I quickly glance down to check my own state - my eyes settle on my knees. They were covered in dark red - where I'd straddled the last guard and knelt in his blood. I feel like I'm going to hurl but keep an even face on in front of Johnny. "Not mine.. just slipped when coming up the stairs.." I lie through my teeth. Johnny laughs and accepts the lie instantly. I feel awful... guilty..

All of a sudden, a loud roar of engines sound from outside. "Commander! The Army is rolling in!" one of the Vaqueros shout to Alejandro. He curses and growls angrily, Johnny, confused, says "we've got reinforcements" - "Negative, Soap - we engage, cover my men" - "what? you want us to engage the fuckin' Mexican Army..?" Johnny replies, completely shocked.

"No, these men are paid by the Cartel - they are helping the Cartel protect Hassan.."

We all take position at the windows. I consider using my sniper but decide it is still too close range for that. "Wait until my men are clear before engaging!" Alejandro shouts.

I watch several Army vehicles roll down the hill towards the house. We are substantially out numbered. A gun fires and then all hell breaks loose. Grenades and flash-bangs are thrown back and forwards - they have light machine guns firing up at us but we eventually manage to gain the upper hand. Alejandro's radio crackles - it's Rudy. "Alpha, we are clear" - "Copy, rally at the safe house!" he shouts back before ordering us to fall back.

A grenade comes flying through the window, thankfully blowing on the opposite side of the room. It still causes Johnny and I to get thrown. I hit the wall hard with my shoulder, but quickly recover, ignoring the pain shooting up and down my arm. I whimper as I regain my footing. "Quickly lass, they're going to flatten the place.. the window! Follow Alejandro and Ghost" he gasps between coughs, pushing me back towards the window. The same window I'd already jumped from. I can't stop coughing and my arm is slowing me down, not to mention the pain that fires from my shoulder every time that I raise my gun.

I glance back to Johnny who shouts "Faster!! The Army is right behind us" - "Fan out! We will lose them in the mountains!" Alejandro shouts over his shoulder.

I wince again when I raise my arm. Fuck! Think Laika Think! I turn a sharp left and once again, flank the main chase. The Mexican Army run past my position as I use the trees for cover. I cover Johnny with supporting fire, although I can tell he thinks it is the Army shooting at them.

"Fuck, they're on us!!" Johnny shouts, loud enough for me to hear from where I was trying to find a good spot to cover them from behind.

Alejandro's men turn and set up positions to fire back at the quickly advancing Army. I quickly swing my sniper rifle from my back to the front and watch through the scope. Aim, one - two - click.. HIT. I hit four men cleanly, remembering to aim two marks to the left on the scope to make up for my slightly off aim thanks to my old rifle. It seemed to be working. The Army seemed to be thinning quickly. I throw the rifle back over my shoulder and lift the assault rifle, ready to try and rejoin the group without getting hit by friendly fire.

Alejandro's men start to move towards the cliffs while the remaining members of the Army look to regroup before giving chase. I try to sprint down the hill but the terrain is difficult. I manage to catch up to about fifty meters behind the main group. "Laika!! Where is she?!" Johnny shouts - "move sergeant, she'll catch up!" The lieutenant barks back - yeah.. he probably hopes that I'd been shot down...

"We need extraction - we can't take on an entire army.." Ghost shouts to Alejandro. "Copy that - Call for Extraction, Rodriguez!" Alejandro agrees.

I finally manage to rejoin the others and slide beside Rodriguez, who is madly trying to contact the extraction team. "The mountains are blocking comms.. we need to move!" He shouts, panicked, as the Army catch back up and start shooting at us again.

I run beside Johnny and squeeze his hand quickly before slotting behind him. He glances and smiles - "Lass, you've got to stop disappearing on me" he chuckles.

Alejandro leads us to some precarious looking rocks and cliffs. "What's the plan?" Johnny asks as we regroup at the edge.

"There is a bridge at the river - extraction will be there.." Alejandro explains.

"CONTACT - RPG" Ghost growls as a huge boom explodes a few yards to our left. I jump backwards into Johnny's chest. "We need to get away from here.." I whimper

Alejandro suddenly breaks cover - "Fall back! This way.." He runs towards a huge cliff. "WE HAVE TO JUMP THAT?!" Johnny shouts.

I stop dead in my tracks - there is no way I will make that...

"Do or die, Hermano!" Alejandro shouts back, leaping and easily making the distance.

Ghost jumps next and makes the leap, so does Johnny.

My eyes dart from left to right. There is no other way out. I hear the crashing of the Army gaining on us. "FOR FUCK SAKE, GIRL - MOVE!" the Lieutenant bellows from the other side of the gap.

Johnny steps forward "Lass, jump! I'm here, I'll catch you! C'mon - you need to move.. NOW".

I scream and sprint toward the gap. I feel my toes teeter on the edge, trying to get as close as possible to the edge to give myself the best chance of making the distance. I push off and close my eyes, still screaming. I feel arms grab me. I wince in pain, flinching away as the pain blinds me - my injured arm was carrying mine, and all of my gear's, entire weight. But at least Johnny had caught me..

"Argh Put me down, put me down NOW JOHNNY" I scream. He pulls me to safety and then drops me suddenly to the ground. I try to scramble back to my feet to keep running, but I stumble slightly. He quickly reaches to my painful arm and I flinch away. His eyes widen, is that sadness or pain I can see in his expression..?

"Don't touch me - don't Johnny.." I pant, stressed and in pain.

I clamber to my feet and we keep running. Alejandro tells us to push forward. The Army are trying to surround us so we have to go through the middle of them to find the river.

What feels like hours of excruciating pain, finally comes to a head when we reach a cliff edge overhanging the river. We have fought our way through hundreds of Army troops and what? Now Alejandro expects us to jump from a cliff into a fast flowing river. I give up...

"Extraction ahead!" Johnny shouts, spotting the vehicles in the distance.

Alejandro leaps from the cliff confidently, clutching his gun tightly. I wince and whimper. The lieutenant obviously notices my hesitance and fear because he unceremoniously lifts and throws me from the cliff and into the water below. I scream the entire way down until I hit the water.

I splutter and inhale water, weighed down by my guns. I'm fucking drowning. I start splashing and convulsing. What I think is my final thought is ' I knew Ghost wanted to kill me' - all of a sudden, I'm scooped from the water and pulled to the surface, getting dragged down stream. It's him. The lieutenant. I manage to catch my breath, coughing heavily. My lungs on fire.

He pushes me towards Johnny and tells him to keep me near.

I feel like I cough the entire way to the bridge.

"Vehicles on the bridge" Johnny shouts in my ear. "FUCK" Alejandro sounded pissed off "They aren't ours!!!"

"Hold the position, we will wait for extraction here" Alejandro instructs "We can't do shit against all that armour!" Johnny growls.

I notice that the water is shallow enough to support my own body weight again. I lean against the rock in front of us and test my arm by raising my gun towards the bridge. I wince but the pain is bearable. Suddenly, an American voice speaks smoothly over the Lieutenant's radio "This is Shadow-1, engaging the bridge North of your position. Sit tight, danger is close!" - he sounds all too calm for the current situation, i think to myself.

"Who the hell is that?!" - "Commander Graves - Shadow Company, he's with us.." Ghost replies to Alejandro's angry question.

Then, as if from nowhere, several airstrikes hit the bridge, destroying it. Whoops and cheers sound over the Lieutenant's radio. "Good to see you boys!" The American jokes.

We run for the car parked on the river bank, all of us climbing in, absolutely soaking wet. I start shivering despite the moderate heat from the Las Almas sun.

"We have a possible hit on Hassan two clicks north of your position" The American sings through the radio, joyfully.

I roll my eyes, not mentally - or physically - prepared for another fire fight..

Here we go again, I guess...

[pretentiousgayguyidk]

Hey Hi Hello!

I saw your requests are open so here I am!

I was thinking about Ran, Rindou, Hakkai and Mitsuya with an slavic reader? Male preferably could be gn!

Also could I be the 🥟 anon If your making a list?

Feel free to ignore this!

Pre writing thoughts - Yes!! I absolutely can, I've studied a small amount of Russian and Icelandic - but it probably won't be accurate as I'll have to use Google translate to fill the gaps. I hope you enjoy this 🥟 Anon!

Post writing thoughts- Okay... Well, I wasn't expecting to write so much, so I'll have to make other parts for the other characters 😭 but I hope this is good enough considering how long it took. (Also sorry it wasn't gender neutral, I completely blanked on it)

(Name) stuck out like a sore thumb, having moved to Japan half way into the school year; it wasn't often that foreigners moved to the area. The peculiar student had certainly caught Mitsuya's attention, piquing Takashi's curiosity... Well, (Name)'s caught the eyes of everyone not just Mitsuya.

One thing that stood out was (Name)'s accent, the mix of Japanese words with the addition of deep and throaty annociations strange yet amusing; the rolling of his r's and the emphasis of the ch's and k's pointed towards Slavic origins. That note inspired Mitsuya, and in an attempt to make (Name) more comfortable he started researching traditional Slavic clothing.

"What is that?" Yasuda questioned, her brows furrowed in confusion and slight judgement - as the current piece Mitsuya was working on was out of character for him. The red, black, white, and blue fabric stood out against his usual more casual colour choices - and the sketches of geometric embroidery patterns weren't at all like the usual Kanji he used.

Mitsuya sticks his pencil behind his ear, leaning back in his chair earning satisfying pops from his spine; he had honestly been expecting this question and was expecting it to be asked sooner. He gives Yasuda a tired smile, his arms lax as they hang by his sides.

"It's a uh..." He trails off, unsure how to properly pronounce the word - as it was either Russian or Ukrainian, he couldn't tell the difference even with the little research he did - all he knew was that it was a more traditional Slavic outfit. "Byshibanka?"

He felt a tad guilty, even though the certain Slavic student was nowhere near to hear his horrendous mispronunciation; it felt like a dishonor of sorts. Yasuda raises a brow, her hands on her hips as she looks down at her club captain.

"A what?" She asks, knowing for a fact that - one: Mitsuya mispronounced it - and that two: she would never remember to look it up later when she got home.

Mitsuya sits up, running a hand over his short silver hair; his expression filled with exasperation, not at Yasuda but himself.

"It's this like- traditional Russian or... Whatever... Outfit? I wanted to give it to the new guy." He explains, earning a knowing nod from Yasuda - who knew from her first meeting with Mitsuya that he liked guys... Even if Mitsuya didn't know it himself yet.

"Oh... So you like him?"

Mitsuya shrugs, not getting the implication - as it wasn't exactly the norm for guys to date other guys. He had no idea if he liked the new kid, he just wanted to do something nice... It wasn't like he found (Name) interesting or cute.

"I don't know, he seems like a chill guy - I've never talked to him." The teens nonchalant answer only furthered Yasuda's suspicions, she wasn't going to spell it out for Mitsuya just yet; but she was certainly coming up with a scheme.

"Well, I hope he likes it... And hopefully he's actually Russian... You do know there's other countries like that, right?" She narrows her eyes, doubting that Mitsuya actually did enough research; not surprising, many teenagers weren't all that informed of nations outside of Japan and the major powers.

Takashi's eyes widen, shifting away nervously as he realizes that he completely glossed over the fact that there are other Slavic countries; he didn't bother looking at a map or anything, just looked up some traditional clothing.

"I mean- I..." He trails off, glancing down towards the pile of cloth in front of him; he didn't consider looking beyond Russia, and he didn't even know for a fact that the Vyshyvanka was Russian or not. He shrugs, attempting to wash away his own mild concern over what could be a massive mishap. "I'm sure it'll be fine... Right? Maybe he'll appreciate the sentiment?"

"I'm sure he will... Whatever, I'll leave you to finish your little gift." She states, turning to pay attention to some of the other club members.

Mitsuya felt strangely nervous, holding a box in his lap as he waited for (Name) to enter the school gardens, a place where (Name) often stayed for lunch - since he didn't exactly have many people to talk to. Soon enough, the Slavic man rounded the corner; entering the school gardens, taking his place in the corner with his lunch. (Name) didn't even notice Mitsuya, far too focused on his hunger to realize he wasn't alone like usual.

The Japanese teen finally gains his confidence, standing from his spot on one of the benches. His steps were steady, and his expression showed a lack of interest - or rather calm despite his slight anxiety.

"Hey." Mitsuya calls out casually, causing (Name) to jump as he looks up from his food. It probably wasn't a good idea to interrupt someone in the middle of their lunch, but Mitsuya's mind was oddly scrambled when it came to (Name); his usual calm and collected self thrown out the window.

"Eh? Hi?" (Name) replies, glancing away as he rubs his throat; conscious of how he spoke. His accent has always been a problem, especially with the Japanese language; it's earned more than a few strange looks from locals - as if him being visibly not Japanese wasn't enough to earn strange looks on occasion. Yet, Mitsuya didn't seem to mind his accent, in fact - Mitsuya found it endearing.

"So uh... I just wanted to give this to you." Mitsuya states awkwardly, gesturing down to the thin box in his hands; which had his name written on it, which helped (Name) - as he didn't know Mitsuya's name till reading it on the box.

"Yeah? What's the reason?" The Slavic teen questions, shifting in his seat as he sets aside his lunch box; pulling one leg up in an attempt to seem casual - even though he was very confused and suspicious. Mitsuya glances away nervously, rocking back and forth on his heels; a nervous habit he rarely ever felt the need to do.

"It... It's just a little something I made- I just uh... Wanted to... I don't know-" Mitsuya chokes on his words, feeling his heartbeat speed up as his cheeks warm; he felt strangely embarrassed by his reasoning. "I just wanted to help you feel more welcome."

"Ah... Makes sense... I guess." (Name) mumbles, glancing down to the box as he accepts it; his mind racing for any sort of clue as to what this gift could be.

The silence that falls between them grows more and more awkward and uncomfortable by the minute, neither of them knowing what to say in the moment. Finally, Mitsuya mumbles a small goodbye before turning on his heel to leave the garden.

Once Mitsuya was gone, (Name) hesitantly opened the box - his eyes widening at the sight of familiar clothing. He can't help but smile, setting the lid aside as he runs his hand over the embroidered fabric; he wasn't Ukrainian, but he had childhood friends who were - they always leaned towards traditionalism. They often wore vyshyvankas, and some other clothing that (Name) couldn't remember for the life of him... But either way, the sight of the clothes brought back fond memories.

Lifting the clothing from the box (Name) notices something, there wasn't any sort of tag or label printed onto the fabric... Did Mitsuya make this just for him? There was a note at the bottom of the box, which (Name) quickly turned his attention to.

Hey, I just wanted to make you feel more comfortable and welcome here - we Japanese aren't always the nicest to foreigners or whatever. So I did some research and made you this, I hope you like it.

It was such a simple note, but it made (Name)'s heart skip a beat. It wasn't as if Mitsuya had bought him a gift, which would have been greatly appreciated as well... But the fact that Mitsuya made it - well that was a whole other level.

"I'll have to thank him later..."

[laylajeffany]

targeted ad ii - microfic

saw these on insta - ya'll might already know they exist sorry i'm old but they are for Wednesday and Enid for sure, so have a tiny scene of Enid convincing her moody lil gf to wear them

“You’ve already managed to convince me to join you in a cabin that doesn’t double as a hideout for family members running from federal agents. On the first full day of this trip, I’ve eaten your sugary version of breakfast, listened to your KPop morning stretch routine playlist, and now you expect me to wear matching clothes? I already wore a snood with you to hunt a monster.”

Enid wiggled her shoulders, holding a tie-dyed canvas tone in her hands with her bottom lip curled out. “Yeah, and you let it get all torn up! Come on, Wednesday – it’s practically a tradition!”

“This is our first time traveling together. The only tradition we’ll have is going to be you waking up breathing each day after the insufferable teenage whimsy you have me entertaining on this so-called vacation.”

“Okay, not so much a tradition, but it’s like, a thing that couples do together! At least all the ones on Instagram do it when they travel!”

Wednesday opened her own suitcase, a vintage piece assembled with fine leather. Whatever low-quality, polyester excuse for ‘fabric’ that Enid had likely ordered from a sweatshop was not going on her body.  “Good news, I’m not on Instagram; you don’t have to worry about meeting vapidly set expectations of social media on my behalf.”

“But I got them special for us, so that we could still be coordinating and you could keep your aesthetics up, even though there would be no one here to see it. And I promise, I won’t post it on my stories or anything, I’d just…maybe hope that you’ll let Thing take a Polaroid of us for our cute little collection of pics on the string lights...”

Once Enid was full-blown pouting, Wednesday gave her a glance after taking out her organic, linen, hand-dyed pants that were stitched by the family seamstress and sighed. “What garment-factory-fire-waiting-to-happen clothing have you obtained?”

Enid scoffed as she reached into her bag. “I’d think the idea of a factory fire would be exciting to you.”

“I support exploiting people for their stupidity, not their labor,” Wednesday muttered and crossed her arms as she watched Enid pull out sweatshirts. One as an offensive baby pink and the other was black.

Matching? Hardly.

“These are from a small business I saw on that social-media-app you hate so much -”

“Did you fall for targeted advertising again? Enid, we’ve discussed the need to more strictly adjust your privacy settings so that your personality can’t be packaged and sold to you-”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, breach of data – Russian bots, we’ve been through this. Anyway, this is a cute, women-owned online shop, not from some planet-killing application. I thought that these were particularly appropriate for us, and actually match this exact moment we’re in, right now.”

She turned them around, and Wednesday almost let out a puff of air in amusement, though she managed to conceal it before it could escape.

On the black sweatshirt was a pink heart, with a little spiderweb motif around it and the phrase ‘might bite,’ while the pink one had the same style, but the script read instead, ‘might cry.’

“Fitting,” Wednesday finally decided.

“Let’s see if they fit us!” She cheered, pulling the bright colored pastel top over her head and giggling, approaching Wednesday bravely, tugging the neck hole over her braids.

“Enid, it has pink.”

“Like, three inches of it on top! We’re alone in the woods, no one can see you. And I’ve got Benadryl for bug bites, if you break out in hives from your ‘color allergy.’”

Wednesday let out a long sigh through her nose as Enid actually took her arms one at a time and weaseled them inside the sleeves of the crewneck. She stared straight ahead, unfortunately – the maneuver long had lost the effect of unnerving Enid.  

“Eek! You look so cute.” Enid tugged her over to the mirror on the back of the door of the log-built lake house they’d rented for spring break (a place for her to wolf out during that night’s full moon and for Wednesday to have plenty of target practice with a variety of weapons she’d packed). “I mean, intimidating – of course, not cute. Never cute.” She let out a series of bubbly laughs yet again, hooking an arm over Wednesday, who stared at their reflection.

It was a bit chilly that morning – but certainly not cold enough for the jacket she’d packed in case the weather was uncooperative…

“I will wear this for exactly the twenty minutes it will take us to walk to the lake.”

Enid squeaked and kissed her cheek, squeezing their matching sweatshirts together in a hug before pulling back and admiring their attire again, rubbing up and down Wednesday’s back mindlessly as she stared in the mirror. “We look adorable. I mean, deadly. We look very deadly in these.”

“You’re going to be dead if you don’t take your hands off my black and pink sweatshirt,” Wednesday clarified.

“Oh, please. You love it when I touch you,” Enid teased and Wednesday nearly wrinkled her nose at how much that was true. “What, are you going to prove that true and bite me if I don’t stop?”

“You wish,” Wednesday retorted, working very hard on keeping her eyes from rolling all the way back when Thing managed to capture the moment with Enid’s instant camera as she’d hoped. Enid let go and brought her arms up in a victory pose before milling around and gathering entirely too many unnecessary supplies for their morning hike while Wednesday watched her intensely in the mirror. She would admit – she liked the oversized top, and how it fell over her hands and went mid-length down her thighs. Adding her more usual pair of pants to go with it, she laced up her boots and waited as Enid debated between tinted lip balm. “The mosquitoes are going to find you delicious no matter what color your lips are.”

“It has SPF in it! Very necessary,” She said, putting some on herself when she finally picked one, then approached Wednesday, taking her by the back of her head and putting it on her as well. The fountain of positive thinking and insane levels of bravery that was her girlfriend shocked her into allowing it. Even more boldly, she followed it up with a kiss to those tinted lips that Wednesday almost returned. “Now you can leave a cute little lip imprint when you bite me,” She winked.

Tugging her close, Wednesday wrapped her black-clad sleeves around her pink middle, tucking her cheek against the plush fabric. In a move indicating surrender, she muttered, “This sweatshirt is adequately warm.”

“I knew you’d like it,” Enid kissed the top of her head, giving her a long embrace in return.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You don’t have to. And even if you’re just entertaining me,” She pulled back to look her in the eye. “Thank you. Now come on, you getting all affectionate on me might make me cry happy tears if we don’t get moving!”

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Rick McKee, Augusta Chronicle

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

November 11, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Nov 12, 2024

The day after Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election, Afghanistan’s Taliban offered its congratulations to the American people for “not handing leadership of their great country to a woman.” 

Taliban leaders expressed optimism that Trump’s election would enable a new chapter in the history of U.S-Taliban relations. They noted that it was Trump who suggested a new international order when he inked the February 29, 2020, Doha Agreement between the U.S. and the Taliban. That deal cut out the Afghan government and committed the U.S. to leave Afghanistan by May 2021, closing five military bases and ending economic sanctions on the Taliban. This paved the way for the U.S. evacuation of the country in August 2021 and the return of the Taliban to power. 

The Taliban prohibits girls’ education past the sixth grade and recently banned the sound of women’s voices outside their homes.

In Russia, Russian thinker Alexander Dugin explained the dramatic global impact of Trump’s win. “We have won,” Dugin said. “The world will be never ever like before. Globalists have lost their final combat.” Dugin has made his reputation on his calls for an “anti-American revolution” and a new Russian empire built on “the rejection of [alliances of democratic nations surrounding the Atlantic], strategic control of the United States, and the rejection of the supremacy of economic, liberal market values,” as well as reestablishing traditional family structures with strict gender roles. 

Maxim Trudolyubov of the Wilson Center, a nonpartisan foreign affairs think tank, suggested Friday that Putin’s long-term goal of weakening the U.S. has made him more interested in dividing Americans than in any one candidate. 

Indeed, rather than backing Trump wholeheartedly, Russian president Vladimir Putin has been undercutting him. He did not comment on Trump’s election until Thursday, when he said that the power of liberal democracies over world affairs is “irrevocably disappearing.” Although Ellen Nakashima, John Hudson, and Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post reported that Trump and Putin had spoken on Thursday, Putin denied such a call as “pure fiction.”

Exacerbating America’s internal divisions and demonstrating dominance over both the U.S. and Trump might explain why after Trump became president-elect, laughing Russian media figures showed viewers nude pictures of Trump’s third wife, Melania, taken during her modeling career.

In an interview, Putin’s presidential aide Nikolay Patrushev said today: "To achieve success in the election, Donald Trump relied on certain forces to which he has corresponding obligations. As a responsible person, he will be obliged to fulfill them." Meanwhile, U.S. and Ukrainian officials report that Russia has massed 50,000 soldiers, including North Korean soldiers, to reclaim territory in the Kursk region of Russia taken this year by Ukrainian forces. 

Trump claims to have talked to about seventy world leaders since his reelection but has declined to go through the usual channels of the State Department. This illustrates his determination to reorganize the federal government around himself rather than its normal operations but leaves him—and the United States—vulnerable to misstatements and misunderstandings.

The domestic effects of Trump’s victory also reveal confusion, both within the Republican Party and within national politics. Voters elected Trump and his running mate, Ohio senator J.D. Vance, but it’s hard to miss that billionaire Elon Musk, who backed Trump’s 2024 campaign financially, seems to be “Trump’s shadow vice-president,” as Nick Robins-Early of The Guardian put it. Sources told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins that Musk has been a constant presence at Mar-a-Lago since the election, sitting in on phone calls with foreign leaders and weighing in on staffing decisions. Yesterday at Mar-a-Lago, Musk met with the chief executive officer of the right-wing media channel Newsmax.

Exactly who is in control of the party is unclear, and in the short term that question is playing out over the Senate’s choice of a successor to minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). In the new Congress, this Republican leader will become Senate majority leader, thereby gaining the power to control the Senate calendar and decide which bills get taken up and which do not. 

Trump controls the majority of Republicans in the House, but he did not control Senate Republicans when McConnell led them. Now he wants to put Florida senator Rick Scott into the leadership role, but Republicans aligned with McConnell and the pre-2016 party want John Thune (R-SD) or John Cornyn (R-TX). There are major struggles taking place over the choice. Today Musk posted on social media his support for Scott. Other MAGA leaders fell in line, with media figure Benny Johnson—recently revealed to be on Russia’s payroll—urging his followers to target senators backing Thune or Cornyn.

Rachael Bade and Eugene Daniels of Politico Playbook suggested that this pressure would backfire, especially since many senators dislike Scott for his unsuccessful leadership of the National Republican Senatorial Committee that works to elect Republicans to the Senate. 

Trump has also tried to sideline senators by demanding they abandon one of their key constitutional roles: that of advice and consent to a president’s appointment of top administration figures. Although Republicans will command a majority in the Senate, Trump is evidently concerned he cannot get some of his appointees through, so has demanded that Republicans agree to let him make recess appointments without going through the usual process of constitutionally mandated advice and consent.

Trump has also demanded that Republicans stop Democrats from making any judicial appointments in the next months, although Republicans continued to approve his nominees after voters elected President Joe Biden in 2020. Indeed, Judge Aileen Cannon, who let Trump off the hook for his retention of classified documents, was approved after Trump had lost the election.

All this jockeying comes amid the fact that while Trump is claiming a mandate from his election, in fact the vote was anything but a landslide. While votes are still being counted, Trump seems to have won by fewer than two percentage points in a cycle where incumbents across the globe lost. This appears to be the smallest popular vote margin for a winning candidate since Richard Nixon won in 1968.

While voters elected Trump, they also backed Democratic policies. In seven states, voters enshrined abortion rights in their constitutions. Two Republican-dominated states raised their minimum wage to $15 an hour; three enshrined mandated paid leave. In exit polls last week, sixty-five percent of voters said they want abortion to remain legal, and fifty-six percent said they want undocumented immigrants to have a chance to apply for legal status.

The gap between what Trump has promised MAGA supporters and what voters want is creating confusion in national politics. How can Trump deliver the national abortion ban MAGAs want when sixty-five percent of voters want abortion rights? How can he deport all undocumented immigrants, including those who have been here for decades and integrated into their communities, while his own voters say they want undocumented immigrants to have a path to citizenship? 

Trump’s people have repeatedly expressed their opinion that Trump was stopped from putting the full MAGA agenda into place because he did not move quickly enough in his first term. They have vowed they will not make that mistake again. But the fast imposition of their extremist policies runs the risk of alienating the more moderate voters who just put them in power.

In September, as the Taliban enforced new rules on women in Afghanistan, they also began to target Afghan men. New laws mandated that men stop wearing western jeans, stop cutting their hair and beards in western ways, and stop looking at women other than their wives or female relatives. Religious morality officers are knocking on the doors of those who haven’t recently attended mosque to remind them they can be tried and sentenced for repeated nonattendance, and government employees are afraid they’ll be fired if they don’t grow their beards. According to Rick Noack of the Washington Post, such restrictions surprised men, who were accustomed to enjoying power in their society. Some have been wondering if they should have spoken up to defend the freedoms of their wives and daughters.

One man who had supported the Taliban said he now feels bullied. “We all are practicing Muslims and know what is mandatory or not. But it’s unacceptable to use force on us,” he said. Speaking on the condition of anonymity because he feared drawing the attention of the regime, another man from Kabul said: “If men had raised their voices, we might also be in a different situation now.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[jamisonwritestf2trash]

How good are the ft2 mercs at baking and cooking respectively

TF2 Mercs Cooking And Baking Skills!

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Oh boy, you've asked a guy who loves to cook a bake, prepare for a ramble.

Moot appreciation: Thank you for your asks! I've had fun with the prompts you've sent it. Also, I love your blog!

Also, oops, a little Spy angst fell in, who would have guessed.

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Demo- I'm gonna go out on a limb and say most people think he can't cook. Wrong! He can cook. Just uh, unique dishes. This man has made haggis for the other mercs, Scout whole heartedly thought Demo was trying to kill them. (Little off topic but, did you guys know deep-fried Mars bars are a Scottish thing)? But in general he can cook, and cook well, it just depends on if what he's cooking is something your willing to try.

I don't think this man can bake, but that won't stop him from trying! He tries to learn, but always gets frustrated when things don't work. Like the cupcakes have been in the oven for well over two hours and are still not cooked? This man is pissed. But what he lacks in an ability to bake, he makes up for by being amazing at decorating cakes and cupcakes somehow? Like he can't bake a cupcake to save his life, but you bet your ass he can turn it into one of the prettiest things with a bag of frosting and sprinkles.

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Engie- This man is so good at cooking its not even funny. Like the he cooks for everyone one night and everyone begs him to cook at least once a month. Sure, is it the healthiest food? Not really. But it is good food! And for the mercs that's all they really care about some days.

I'm gonna be honest, he'd be a really good baker, but has never had any desire to. Never felt the need to. He'd rather just buy whatever he wants or needs. He can, however be convinced to bake, but even then he's indifferent to it. He thinks it's a fine enough hobby but would never find enthralled with it. Is always very proud of his work in either cooking or baking though!

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Heavy- He can cook! And really likes to do it too. He loves making traditional Russian food. Loves being able to share his culture through something so simple. Likes making anything really. Finds cooking to be relaxing. As long as he can be left alone while doing so.

He can bake too, he just choses not to. It's very precise, one wrong measurement and it's all going to hell. He'd love to bake, but at the end of the day I think it would stress him out more than it would calm him down, or more than it would be worth it for the final product.

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Medic- This is such a toss up for me. I want to say he can cook, and cook well. But the other part of me thinks that he'd be way too giddy to use cooking the team dinner to run a test or two. (What am I talking about he put fertility hormones in someone's rations, he'd take any chance to do it (lovingly)! To the other mercs). I guess I'll say he can cook, but be weary of what he's feeding you at any given time. Also I think if he's not in a testing mood he gets all happy at the idea of cooking traditional food as well.

Due to the fact that, may or may not be up to no good when cooking! The mercs are not super keen on letting him into the kitchen. But if Medic manages to convince (threaten) them into trusting him enough to bake, he's insanely good at it! Baking is a science, and he's incredibly good at getting measurements to be perfect. Plus even if he's not using baking or cooking as an excuse to run some tests on his teammates, it's still an experiment in it's own right. So he genuinely enjoys baking and cooking.

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Scout- You really think his mom would let him leave the house without knowing to cook? Sure, he's probably his mom's favorite, and the youngest child, so you'd think he'd be spoiled, but nope! His mom taught him from a young age the importance of having cooking as a skill, and now he loves it. He cooks when he's homesick, it reminds him of his mom, he looks at it as a connection with one another.

Same thing with baking, but I think he likes baking a bit more than cooking due to the presence of a shit ton of sugar. You'd also think this man would be chill in the kitchen. Absolutely not. He hates having other people in the kitchen when he's busy. He finds them to be distracting. Also, he's super cautious when people ask to try what he's baking specifically. He doesn't want someone to get E. Coli, because of the raw flour in the raw cookie dough. All in all, though, when he's alone (or with Pyro if they decide to join Scout). Then he's genuinely enjoying both baking and cooking.

————————————————————

Sniper- Mr. Runs off instant ramen and fairy bread. Has the basic skills. He could make rice, grilled cheese, and fried eggs if need be. But for the most part, he can't cook. He has a stove in his van, and it has never been used other than to boil water. He could learn how to cook if he was really persuaded by a certain team member, but it would take a lot, and it would take a long time to learn how to cook a decent meal.

————————————————————

Spy- Can cook, he has before. It was a life skill just like any other. I got pretty good at it. He can still make decently elaborate dishes, but he's not a fan of it. He doesn't really like cooking. He never had anyone to share his food with. He always wanted someone to share food with, someone to cook with. Was always too scared for said person to actually stick around, said person couldn't stick around.

He's never tried to bake, and I don't think he'd enjoy it. He'd complain about how messy it is. He'd be fine with the having to be careful and precise part. Hell He'd even be good at decorating and just baking in general. But he just wouldn't like doing it.

————————————————————

Soldier- This man can't so much as cook as he can grill. It's super weird, he'll make the most normal american food and it's like really good? Like he'll make steaks, hamburgers, and hot dogs for a 4th of July party and it's the best shit you've ever had. Ask this man to fry an egg and all hell breaks loose. He is only allowed to man the grill from now on.

Do not ask this man to bake, please, please don't. He cooks with cartoon logic. The recipe calls for three eggs? He drops in three fully-shelled eggs. A stick of butter? The wrapper is still on. And the scariest part is whatever he's baking always comes out looking, edible? Cartoonish? Like straight up looks like someone drew it into existence. For the sake of everyone's mental health, they don't let Soldier bake anymore.

————————————————————

Pyro- Teach them how to flambé and they're going to have the best time of their lives. They aren't horrible at cooking but aren't a master chef either. They have tried to use their flamethrower to cook on multiple occasions, but they have been banned from being in the kitchen alone due to "inciting panic." Whatever that means. They mainly will cook with Engie, as he's the most patient when it comes to Pyro's "help." (Standing menacingly until they can be trusted to do something. They do it with love, though)!

Speaking of flambé! They love to try and convince the other mercs to let them make bananas Foster, and when they eventually wear the other mercs down and are allowed to try it, they do well! It was a one-time thing, they all got too scared to let them do it again. Now they spend a lot of time helping Scout while he bakes. Overall, they can cook and bake, but should only be allowed to under supervision.

————————————————————

I hope you like this! Sorry it took me so long to write I've been exhausted all week. But it was fun to write :)

New fic tomorrow, someone asked about the mercs at Barbie, which is going to be so fun!

[generational-atrophy]

hello! how would netherlands, luxembourg and russia like to spend their honeymoon with their s/o? or, what would the wedding look like?

hetalia netherlands, luxembourg, and russia wedding / honeymoon headcanons

0.6k words ~ gender neutral headcanons

tw: none!

a/n: guys im trying to get back on schedule :sob: i have asks from almost a year im so sorry

Netherlands

When it comes to Abel, neither his wedding nor honeymoon would be big.

For the wedding, there’s no more than, like, 5 people invited. He would’ve preferred a sudden in-and-out wedding if it weren’t for how public it was, regardless of how un-romantic it is for you.

Instead, you can invite people if you want, and you’ll be having a quick, private ceremony in the woods. Probably only with nothing, except like, 2 chairs for “an emergency” (He won’t elaborate on that.)

He also wouldn’t dress up either way, unless it were vitally important to you. He wants to be as true to who he is when he vows to be with you for as long as you live, and he is not a tuxedo guy.

Weirdly enough, it’s how much he cares about the wedding that makes him so weird about it. It’s very important to him, and that means everything has to be as authentic and intimate as possible. So, that means a weird awkward wedding.

Of course, that’s just if he gets his way. But he’s surprisingly lenient with his S/O with most things (as long as it’s not too expensive.)

For future reference, he is most susceptible to puppy dog eyes and “pretty please.”

As for the honeymoon, there’s no way he’s putting any effort into it. You can plan it, but he’s not paying and he’s not helping you guys get there. His ideal honeymoon is a night in and watching a movie he pirated, but whatever you want is fine too.

What he wants to do though is a lot of cliche boring stuff, like going sightseeing, hiking, and visiting museums. Notice how all of it is free? That’s the main idea here. Although, he does love camping regardless of how cheap it ends up being. Lets him show you how much of a man he is <3

He’s not travelling though. Leaving the country is out of the question. The important part already happened, why are you making such a big deal out of it?!

Luxembourg

The exact opposite. Laurent is renting out a significant chunk of his capital city to throw the biggest, most extravagant, most expensive modern wedding in the world! He may be a busy man, but he’s always willing to put away plenty of time for his beloved.

If you like planning events, you two will work together for many months making sure everything is perfect. But if you don’t, he’ll take it all on himself to ensure everything goes perfectly.

But with that, he’ll become really stressed. He wouldn’t snap at you (because after all, it is all for you,) but he’s no fun when he’s that worked up. It’s better if you help.

Especially since he wants your wedding to have great symbolic meaning. Having it represent the shared vision of your future together is his first- well… second priority.

The honeymoon afterwards would be much the same, although he also wouldn’t want to travel too far. Once the spectacle is over, he just appreciates the excuse to do nothing but spend time with you without any pressure.

Preferably trying a bunch of new food, going shopping, and going to stereotypical couple-y activities, like dance classes.

He may seem upbeat, but Laurent is surprisingly melancholic around the time of your wedding. For as excited as he is (which is very,) he can’t help but feel worried about how much time he’ll have with you.

But it shouldn’t get him down too much. He's still riding the high of seeing you in your wedding attire <3

Russia

Ivan would want a very, very, very traditional Russian wedding if you’d be fine with that. Unlike a lot of other nations, he’s never been married before, so he’s very stressed about getting to do every single thing he never got to before.

You’d swear he abandoned you for months before the wedding as he’s panickedly running around the country trying desperately to throw everything together. Half the ceremonies he wants to do haven’t been done for centuries, and he really doesn’t understand why he can’t have live cannon fire at his wedding!

Maybe just pat him on the head and tell him you’ll love him even if you can’t sacrifice 20 goats during the ceremony.

But once the stress (and awkwardness as all of his former friends are forced to attend,) is over, he’s whisking you away for a months-long vacation. Preferably somewhere bright and warm but really; he doesn’t care where you want to go, anywhere is alright, as long as it’s far away from everything you two have to worry about regularly.

His favourite things to do with you while on vacation are really stereotypical, like going to the beach, going to scenic locations, and falling into every tourist trap.

He tries to be as romantic as possible through all of that, but he can’t help being awkward and giddy after you two are finally married.

[keysorsomething]

Everyone Has a Reason To Stay (Primireniye)

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 7

Hello everyone, I know it's been just over a month since I posted the last part, but I'm back with this one!

Cross-posted on Ao3

Velikan didn't have to think too hard about what to do. How to keep Nikto in check.

He didn't know much about the Russian man - he was always so distant. But he was there, on that mission in Africa with the Jackals.

It had taken a lot of bribery and over a week of following the Russian, but now he has his ace. He shushes the fluffy beast as it fights to be put down. He grumbles at it, telling it to calm down, but it doesn't listen. It probably doesn't even understand him.

Still, with all of the struggle, he manages to get the wild animal to the door. He places the beast down, straightening up to knock on the door before the thought that it will run off spoils it. He swings his leg over it, like how you get on a horse, using his knees to keep it from scrambling.

He grumbles - standing like this is not comfortable at all - before knocking at the door.

He hears the grumbles of Russian cursing, and the door swings open with a defined “Иди на хуй!” before the man stops. It’s a disturbing sight, watching him go from a full swing of movement to as still as a statue. “Oh, Velikan,” he mumbles, “We thought-” Velikan cuts him off with a grumble and pushes a small envelope into his hands, before shifting his legs to let the hyena held by them go.

The beast rushes forward, nearly toppling the Russian man as it begs for his attention. Velikan nods to him and is nodded to in return. The door shuts, and Velikan slips back to his own room.

He just hopes Dimtry was right with this plan.

Nikto is bewildered, reading over the pretty, collected Cyrillic writing on the letter. It tells him to be good - to not get in too much trouble. Sloppier handwriting tells him to save the nose-breaking for the field, encouraging him to show off some time and lamenting the writer won’t be there to see it. A third writer taunts him, telling him to keep the hyena fed and clean as it’s the only body that will keep his bed warm now - before telling him not to watch a film without them.

There’s a fourth paragraph, the shortest one, that talks about their time in the Allegiance. It tells Nikto how proud the author was. “There was a reason I picked you. You were a good soldier,” the writing is the most swirly - traditional Russian cursive burning the blue eyes that scan it. Nikto’s head is jumbled, it had been far too long since he had read anything in his language. He blinks in confusion at the names signed at the bottom of the page:

Дмитрий

МИНОТАВР

Нико

Коля)

Nikto is surprised at the dull ache in his chest. The creeping feeling of nostalgia at the edges of his mind. The smell of the dog shampoo Rodion used on Sputnik creeps up into his nostrils, seeping into the mask at a suffocating rate. His hands shake.

…Do they?

Is that blood in his mouth? Is he biting his lip? He can’t tell. Nor can he tell if that is the paper crinkling in his hands. Everything is silent. Or muted, like he had been hit with a stun. His brain is fuzzy, oh so fuzzy.

His brain is always fuzzy.

He can not tell what time it is in his room. There are no clocks, no natural light. He does not mean to keep it that way. Still, it feels late at night - 2am, or perhaps 4. Or maybe it feels like the afternoon, on a slow day. A day after a long mission, when he lays dully in his bed, eyes barely open. He can not remember when he’d done this - if he’d done this, but the thought is there.

He kneels down, placing the paper on the floor and letting fur meet him. The hyena laughs, standing on his knees. Its body twitches, sides pulling in and pushing out as it sniffs at his face. It is fluffy, the thick fur coat from its winters in the outskirts of Moscow yet to thin out. What season was it? Would he begin to shed, or was he just building it?

Where were they? Would he need such a thick coat?

Sound returns to Nikto as he thinks about the hyena. His other senses do, too. He blinks slowly, looking around. The hyena is heavy on him, and there’s pressure on his face, his mask pushing into him. His hands come up to the beast’s fluffy side, feeling the fullness of the being.

“Спутник,” Nikto whispers, turning to meet the snout pushing into his face. He lets out a sigh. “You are back with me,” He blinks, taking a moment as he studies the image of the animal in front of him. It squeals, tail whipping through the air enough to cause the sound of breaking air, the one you hear at the drop of a rollercoaster, or the sound of rushing wind past your ears, through your hair, as you ride through the streets with the windows of the car down.

Nikodim always used to do that. Nikto could remember, just enough. Just enough to make that ache more present in his heart. He does not remember it enough to see it, or does he? Can he see the image of the young man, much younger than the rest of the soldiers in the Allegiance, short hair whipping across his face and over the seat back, all four windows down as he drives far too fast with that awful American trash pop blasting out into the crisp air? Was that an image he had ever seen?

Nikto could not remember. He could not tell if the image he was seeing was one of his own creation, of his brain’s creation. He did not know if there was more than those vile blotches, empty spots in his head, hid.

He wanted it back. He wanted all of it back.

Well…. maybe not all.

Nikto swallows thickly, “I will not leave you behind again,” He announces to the beast. “We will be together. “всегда́,” He mumbles, pressing his face into the hyena’s. “We will get you ужин, Да?” The hyena pants as he stands, obeying the soft order of “Сидеть,” while the shadow of his owner slips into the darkness of the hall, once more melting into nothing.

The shape strikes again.

Luckily, the only casualty this time is a hunk of brisket Graves was set to cook.

Something the rest of the site is very thankful for.

(Translations:

Primireniye (примирение): Russian; reconciliation

Дмитрий: Russian; Cyrillic spelling of Dimtry

МИНОТАВР: Russian; MINOTAUR

Нико: Russian; Cyrillic spelling of Niko

Коля: Russian; Cyrillic spelling of Koyla (common diminutive of Nikolai)

Спутник: Russian; Cyrillic spelling of Sputnik

всегда́: Russian; forever

ужин: Russian, dinner/evening meal

Да: Russian; yes

Сидеть: Russian; stay)

(An hour or so before)

Velikan stands outside, eyes flicking around the dark corners every now and again. Oh, Graves was going to jump his ass tomorrow. But, you were so sad when you came to him. And Velikan was only so trusted to catch Nikto’s hands.

He was nothing like the men he had contacted. Nowhere near as important - not that that upset him. He could handle being underneath the men. Though he was very careful not to mention too much about you, he was sure that would just crush the little heart of the young man he was there to meet tonight.

Speaking of which, a nice car pulls into the dark lot. It was pretty much abandoned - no one goes to Arby’s this late. Well, do they ever? That doesn’t matter, right now. Velikan’s back straightens as he stands, stepping away from the truck he was leaning on. The car stops, the loud bass through it shutting off quickly.

“Блять, Niko!” The hiss of a familiar voice enters the air. “Ти мало не влаштував мені серцевий напад!” He scolds.

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” Nikodim’s reply came back, desperate.

“You drive like a maniac,” Yegor responds, stepping out of the car. His eyes settle on Velikan fast, approaching him calmly. Rodion stays behind, coaxing the hyena out of the car. Yegor watches, arms crossing. “До біса цей російський, making me babysit,” He mumbles to Velikan, shaking his head.

“Yeah, that was Nikolai’s favorite thing to do,” Velikan responds, nodding his head.

Yegor turns to him, brows furrowed, “Що?” He asks. Velikan lets out a loud grunt and nods more obviously to show that he is agreeing. Yegor nods too, before sighing. “But Rodion is not a bad kid, he is just…” He gestures toward the man, and Velikan nods.

“Godspeed,” He grunts out, patting Yegor’s shoulder. Rodion approaches, hyena on a leash. Oh, God, what was Velikan doing? This motherfucker was going to get him put on Fatal Attractions. He is compelled to agree with Yegor. Goddamn Nikolai for putting him in this position. For hiring him, so he had to meet Nikto, so he had to be the one you went to to keep him in check, so he had to talk to Dmitry, so he had to get a hyena from Rodion. This was too much. Why did he agree, again?

That doesn’t matter as he opens the back door of the truck to help Rodion load Sputnik into the back seat. The whole time, Rodion is fussing about making sure the hyena is happy.

“He takes his orders in Russian, he doesn’t know English,” The young man explains, going on to list things like sit and heel, before he turns to Velikan. The masked man was busy adjusting the blanket he had set down on the seats before he had his shoulders grabbed and he was whipped around. “And tell him Молодец when he follows an order, okay?” He speaks, eyes low. “Okay? He has to know he’s done a good job. He’s a good boy,” Velikan nods, grunting lowly.

“Rodion get in the car,” Yegor orders, causing the youngest man to flinch.

“Молодец!” He re-affirms to Velikan, before slipping away and taking his seat back in the sports car.

Yegor huffs, rolling his eyes, before approaching Velikan with a white envelope, “A letter, for Nikto. I… did not participate, we didn’t speak much. But everyone in the Spetsnaz wrote something. I even got Nikolai to write a little.”

Velikan grips the paper, “Krueger?”

Yegor looks down, letting the paper go, “немає,” he shakes his head. Velikan looks down at the paper. He uses his other hand to move the mask, slipping the bottom off. As much as he likes his mask, he needs this question answered.

“Is he dead?” He asks, hidden eyes flickering over Yegor’s face. The Ukrainian man shakes his head.

“Not as far as I know,” He responds, “Just… MIA.”

“Ah,” Velikan nods, “Good luck with the kid,” He mumbles, pushing his mask back into place. Yegor chuckles.

“Good luck with the beast,” Yegor responds.

Velikan chuckles, “The hyena or Nikto?”

They laugh together for a moment before they turn separate ways and enter their respective cars.

Now all there was between him and his good night's sleep is a good old military man-pet reunion.

(Блять: Russian/Ukrainian; Vulgar exclamation (akin to fuck! or shit!)

Ти мало не влаштував мені серцевий напад!: Ukranian; You almost gave me a heart attack!

До біса цей російський: Ukranian; To hell with that Russian

Що: Ukrainian; What?

Молодец: Russian; Well done

немає: Ukrainian; No)

[comphy-and-cozy]

Glittery - Andrei Svechnikov

Pairing: Andrei Svechnikov x Reader (f)

Summary: The holidays are an important staple in your relationship, and this year, you’re at the top of Andrei’s wishlist.

Word Count: 4.7K

Author’s Note: This was originally inspired by another hockey, but fits everyone’s favorite Russian winger all too well. Title by Kacey Musgraves, but definitely listen to this song for additional inspiration (s/o to @suitandtys for this discovery). Feel free to use your own imagination for the necklace/lingerie, but if interested, here and here are the links to what inspired them.

Warnings: Smut (18+ ONLY) & fluff. Hastily (and poorly) translated Russian, Christmas-specific celebrations/themes (minimal but still referenced), swearing, unprotected sex, choking, oral sex (m + f receiving), brief size kink, creampie. A few very poor holiday-themed puns that I will not be apologizing for.

Masterlist / Moodboard

December in Raleigh isn’t quite as magical as in Russia, or even further north in North America. There’s no snow, and the air is a balmy 60 degrees, which makes it very difficult to get in the holiday spirit.

Naturally, Andrei is busy, but when you started dating he’d made it a priority and a tradition to deck out his (now your shared) apartment to make it feel like more festive, even if it didn’t feel that way outside. Every year, he brings out the garland, the tinsel, the festive snowmen to place around the house, and, of course, going to pick out the perfect tree — and decorate it — is an all-day affair. He does it for you, to keep things feeling warm and cozy even while he’s away, but he’d be lying if he said it didn’t remind him of home with his family and brother.

Gifts quickly became a staple for the holidays, too. He’s a giver, always purchasing small little souvenirs for you from his travels, and he loves to shower you with gifts for holidays, birthdays, and really any celebration. Growing up with very little, Andrei knows how it feels to receive next to nothing, and now that he has the means, he wants to make sure that none of his loved ones ever have to go without a gift ever again. 

So, it’s safe to say that your gift exchange day is all but sacred within your apartment. He insists on both of you wearing matching pajamas, with holiday music playing through the speaker and the only light in the house coming from the string lights hung up all over the place.

This year, he’s gone all out, purchasing you a lounge set, a new purse, some books, and no shortage of skincare from your Sephora wishlist. He never fails to make you feel completely pampered — something you’ve long since insisted isn’t necessary, despite the fact that he is a multi-millionaire now.

The hot cocoa on your coffee table has gone cold, the marshmallows floating in the liquid melted into what’s left in the bottom of your mugs. There’s a trash bag full of torn open wrapping paper, an equally large stack of boxes of each of your open gifts beside it.

“I have one more for you,” Andrei smiles, reaching for a small box tucked away underneath the tree. It’s neatly wrapped – certainly not by him – with a small white bow on top.

The package is light, and while your fingers carefully tear the paper, not wanting to damage the elegant design, your mind is running with the possibilities of what could be inside the box.

Your brain registers the dark navy of the box before the gold ‘HW’ that’s stamped into it, and you gasp when you realize. Inside the box is a gorgeous diamond choker, sparkling brighter than anything you’ve ever seen, and you are helpless to do anything but gape at the jewelry sitting in your lap.

“What do you think?” Andrei probes, a smile flitting on his face as he watches your reaction.

“Andrei, this is — a Harry Winston is —” you swallow, suddenly nervous to even be holding the box in your hands lest you damage the necklace inside. The box alone surely costs more than what you pay in rent, and you shudder to think how much he’d dropped on this. “It’s so expensive.”

“Don’t worry about the price, baby,” he says. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. It’s the least I can do to show you.”

You can feel the tears welling up before you see them on the rims of your eyes, watery and emotional and overwhelmed. Carefully, you set the box on the table before lunging at him, wrapping your arms around his neck. He chuckles, the sound deep in his chest, rumbling against your own as the gratitude falls in droplets down your face.

“Andrei,” you whisper. “This is so… so generous. You — I — it —”

There’s a pause as you let out a sob, letting his hand rub soothingly on your back.

“I love you so much.”

“I love you, too, kisa,” is all he says back, his arms pulling you in to squeeze you tighter. 

He’s patient, allowing your sniffles to subside before he pulls away, smiling warmly at you as he wipes your happy tears away. Leaning to the table, he picks up the box and looks at you as he picks the necklace up out of the grooves to keep it in place, holding it toward you. “Want to see it on you.”

“Drei, I have my pajamas on,” you remind him, gesturing to your flannel set, far from complementary to a diamond necklace that’s worth a small fortune. 

“I don’t care. You’re still beautiful.”

With a bashful smile, you turn and gather your hair, allowing him to place the piece around your neck, fastening the hook in the back. It’s heavy as it rests against your chest, and when you look down, all you can really see is the brightness from the way the Christmas tree lights reflect in the diamonds. 

When you turn around to show him, Andrei’s lips curl into a grin, wide enough that you can see the missing tooth that you love so much. His eyes are warm, falling to the sparkle on your neck, before he looks back up into your eyes. “You look so beautiful, dorogoy.”

“Thank you,” you whisper, shy, your fingers gently touching the diamonds. Leaping up from the couch, you dash into the bathroom to look in the mirror. It feels entirely out of place in your regular bathroom and your dinky pajamas, but the sparkle makes everything else around it less vibrant. It’s beautiful.

“I thought you could wear it to the holiday party,” Andrei’s voice says from behind you. He appears in the mirror before his arms slip around your waist, his chin resting on your shoulder as he admires your reflection.

“Of course, Andrei,” you agree with a smile. “It’ll be perfect.”

Soon enough, the party day arrives. Your dress is hanging neatly on a hanger in the closet, carefully steamed by you the day before. It’s green, satiny smooth, falling at your mid-thigh and hugging your curves in all the right places. When you step out of the bedroom all done up, Andrei has to stop in his tracks to stare. 

“Malyshka…” 

Heat rises in your cheeks under his gaze, his eyes roving over your legs, up your body, over the deep red on your lips, finally coming to the Harry Winston necklace laying beautifully on your décolletage. The sound that leaves his throat is a combination of a groan and a whimper, speechless at the sight of you.

“You are fucking stunning,” he finally manages, his own cheeks tinged pink. “You look so beautiful.”

You step forward until you’re standing in front of him. Your hands find his tie, Windsor-knotted neatly around his neck, the deep green matching your dress almost perfectly. His breath hitches in his throat when you run your hands along the material, feeling the softness beneath your fingertips, admiring your man and how nice he cleans up.

Ghosting his lips with yours, you dodge him when he presses forward to kiss you, smiling when you hear his whine. “My lipstick is still drying, Drei. Don’t want you to get red all over.”

Andrei’s grumble is low, murmuring something like, ‘want you to get red somewhere’ that has you stifling a giggle. 

Eventually, though, you do grant him a kiss, a chaste one against his pretty lips to ensure not smudging your lipstick or getting it on his face. And as much as you’d love for him to smudge it and take off the dress you’d just put on, duty calls, and you begrudgingly put your desire to the side as you follow him out the door.

The party itself is festive and fun, string lights decorating the room that’s filled with a softly-playing Christmas mix. After a few drinks, Andrei does finally take his hands off of you, though he never strays far, finding your eyes over the sea of heads and offering a wink or a dimpled smile that never fails to melt your heart.

Before long, though, the gathering dies down as the consumption of alcohol increases. You and Andrei bid your goodbyes, unable to deny the desire to get home and take off your heels — along with all of Andrei’s clothes. 

When you step back into your apartment, he helps you shrug your coat off to hang it in the closet. Before you step too far into your living room, you turn to him with a smile.

“I have one more gift for you,” you purr, enjoying the intrigue in his eyes, lit up like the Fraser Fir standing in the corner of your living room. “Wait here.”

The way his eyebrows furrow is endearing, confused at your mystery, watching you disappear into the bedroom. The look on his face when you emerge a few minutes later is even more priceless, jaw dropping in shock at seeing your body encased in red silk, the lingerie doing very little to disguise your curves. Ribbons wind up your torso, culminating in a large bow that’s nestled between the swell of your breasts. On your neck lies the necklace, glittering against your skin while you’re wrapped up like the best present he’ll ever receive.

“Merry Christmas, Drei.”

Andrei exhales slowly, breath caught in his throat at the sight of you. He doesn’t know where to look, can’t get enough of your skin and your curves and the way the diamonds look sparkling underneath your smile. His breath is shaky, broken, as he rises to his feet to meet you, swallowing thickly against the collar of his dress shirt.

“Malyshka, you – wow.”

A large hand extends out to you, and you slip your own into his palm, allowing him to twirl you around for a full view of your backside that’s barely covered by cheeky lace and more silk. You can hear the growl that leaves his throat before you return to face him, his eyes darkened as he watches you.

“All for me?”

Your lips, painted red, curl into a smile. “Always just for you, Drei.”

His hum is a satisfied one, and suddenly the anticipation is fully palpable, practically tangible in the air, as he pauses and waits for your cue. It isn’t until you gently tug at his hand, pulling him away from the door, that he smirks, backing up until the back of his thighs hit the arm of the couch.

His smirk grows even wider as he watches you sink to your knees, your eyes never leaving his. The twitch he gives as your gaze moves toward his belt is involuntary, as is the groan that he emits as your hand runs along his length through his dress pants. 

“Is this my last Christmas present?” you ask cheekily, and he can barely choke out a laugh at your cheesy joke. He’s almost too focused on the warmth of your palm to give his own cheeky reply — almost. 

“This package is too big to gift wrap.” 

If it wasn’t for the way he throbs in your hand, you’d smack him playfully for the stupid pun, but instead you just laugh and roll your eyes before returning to your task at hand. After all, he isn’t entirely wrong. 

Andrei doesn’t breathe as you work on his belt, the smooth sound of the leather slipping through the belt loops, the buckle clinking as it falls to the floor. Your eyes glitter when you tug the zipper down, allowing him the space to hastily kick the slacks the rest of the way off. Before long, his sweater joins the pile of clothes on the floor, and his white dress shirt is unbuttoned, green tie hanging loosely over the cut lines of his abdomen. 

You can’t help the way your hand itches to run along the firm muscle, feeling each ridge beneath your fingertips and admiring his body. While you’ve certainly done your fair share of complaining when he’s up at 6am to workout in the summer, you can’t deny that there’s a very clear benefit that you take plenty of advantage of. 

When your hand trails back down his stomach, your fingers hook into the waistband of his boxers, pausing with a teasing smile. His erection is tenting in the front, more than ready for you to touch him, a small wet patch on the fabric that you yearn to kiss. So, you do, seeing the way his hands clutch at the duvet out of the corners of your eye. 

Eventually, though, your need outweighs your desire to tease, and you shed his boxers, too, feasting your eyes on your favorite appendage of his. It’s tall and proud, weeping at the slit in a silent beg for your mouth. 

The sounds Andrei makes when you take him between your lips are always otherworldly, usually a strangled groan or a sharp intake of breath. Today’s no different, with his bottom lip tucked between his teeth when your jaw hinges to take him deeper. He’ll never know how he got so lucky, to be able to call the beautiful woman who gives the best blowjobs on planet earth his. 

Your lips close around his length, working up and down in a practiced rhythm. If you like the sounds he makes, he loves the sound of you gagging on him, the wet sound of him hitting the back of your throat and the way he slides against your tongue. It’s sinful and sexy and never fails to make his balls tighten.

It takes all of his willpower to do it, but Andrei eventually nudges you, pulling you off of him with a grunt. He can’t afford to finish early, not tonight, when you’re looking so sinfully beautiful and dressed up just for him, literally wrapped underneath the Christmas tree.

When he shifts to sit on the couch, tugging you quickly into his lap, his eyes are hungry as they gaze up at you. You’re so close to where he wants you, and you can feel him — and yourself — throbbing at the proximity. 

His expression quickly changes, though, when your arms reach up behind your neck to remove the necklace, not wanting to damage it before the real fun begins, but Andrei’s voice stops you. “Leave it.”

Freezing, your eyes shoot to Andrei’s, frantic. “Andrei, we’ll damage it —”

He pulls you closer to him, closing the gap between your bodies and suddenly you’re distracted by the heat radiating off of his body and the darkness that’s swallowed his normally beautiful hazelnut irises. His hand moves toward your neck, fingers brushing delicately against the diamonds, feeling the way the glittering stones glide beneath his fingertips. Then, he repeats, “Leave it.”

Swallowing, you lower your hands obediently, sensing the shift in the dynamic with just two words muttered around a thick Russian accent.

Andrei’s hands continue their path over your collarbones, down your arm, sliding over your sides before coming to rest on your hips, a trail of goosebumps following. He’s gentle, like you’re a sculpture made of porcelain, a stark contrast to the rough hands he knows you love.

“So beautiful,” he murmurs. His hands move over your neck, coming to cup either side of your jaw, and you shiver when his lips ghost over yours in the same way you’d teased him earlier. “M’the luckiest man in the world.” 

When he finally presses his lips to yours, you can’t help the sigh that escapes your throat, the feeling of relief almost overwhelming as he kisses you hungrily. His tongue is quick to find the seam of your mouth, delving into it with the passion you awoke in him as soon as you stepped out in your party dress tonight.

His arms hold you, hands roving over your curves, feeling the smoothness of the silk in his hands. Painstakingly, he tears himself away in favor of looking at you. His eyes dart over your body, admiring the piece one last time, committing the sight of it to memory, before one hand reaches forward to slowly tug at the end of the bow on your chest. The material is soft, slippery, sliding apart with ease to reveal your cleavage.

Andrei grins, tipping you backwards gently until you’re on your back on the couch. The vibration in his chest transfers to yours when he hums, his lips pressed to your sternum. He plants kisses all along your chest, dotting along the hem of the bra — if you can even call it that — reveling in his ability to make you squirm. 

Warmth, followed by goosebumps, floods your skin in the path of his lips, your nipples pebbling. His lips itch to touch, torn between continuing their path south and attaching themselves to your breasts. He opts for the latter, wrapping his lip around a nipple while his tongue flicks at the bud, his hand massaging your other breast gently. 

Andrei’s mouth explores your chest, paying equal attention to each bud, before trailing his lips over your rib cage, your stomach, your hips. He leaves a wet trail, coolness overtaking each spot on your skin where the air touches it, a sharp contrast to the fire that burns inside of you.

The next thing you know, Andrei’s hands are roughly flipping you around, tugging you into a kneeling position with your hands resting on the arm of the couch. You’re exactly where he wants you, bent over, your lingerie half undone while he stands behind you admiring the view. 

His lips work their way up your calf, thumbs stroking the muscles in your legs until he finally reaches the place where your ass meets your thigh. He grips your ass in both hands, fingers running along the seam of the lace that barely covers your modesty. His mouth returns to his hands, pressing more kisses along the globe of your ass, and you whine impatiently. 

“Patience, kisa,” he murmurs. “Aren’t you going to let me unwrap my gift? My pretty little vixen.”

It’s only when you feel the bow at the base of your back loosening that you whine again. Both of his hands holding tightly onto your hips make you deduce that he’s using his mouth to tug at the fabric, teeth pulling the satin smoothly until the ribbons fall at your sides. He’s torturing you now, his warm breath cascading over your back causing a heavy throb between your legs.

All that’s left are the strap of your bra and the flimsy lace of your panties before Andrei gets to the gift he really wants: your molten center, dripping just for him. He can’t help but salivate as his fingers drag the material down, slowly, giving himself a last show before he gives into his desires.

Your pussy is glorious, he thinks, perfect and glistening as it’s revealed to him. He swears he can see the reflection of the lights on the tree in the wetness of your folds, and his dick twitches at the sight, itching to be sheathed inside it. 

“So fucking gorgeous,” he whispers, tongue darting out to taste.

“Andrei,” you moan. Your brain is fuzzy, trying to find the words to desperately beseech him to keep going. 

He does, because he always knows exactly what you need, and being the generous boyfriend he is, never fails to provide. It is Christmas, after all.

The sounds of his mouth slurping against your core are nothing short of filthy, grunting into your center at the taste of you. His tongue delves into your folds, probing you with the perfect amount of pressure, never forgetting to grant your clit the attention she desperately craves. Large hands grope and pull at the globes of your ass, holding you open for Andrei’s face to make its home between them, groaning against you.

It’s like this that he makes you come first, aided by two fingers that he plunges into your sopping core. Your cries are muffled by the cushion of the couch, which he doesn’t like, so once he’s let up, he’s quick to flip you around and pin your arms over your head.

“I want to hear you,” he murmurs, the remnants of your orgasm glistening on his chin. You taste it when he kisses you, messily, his tongue covered in you as he pushes it into your mouth.

Andrei shifts on the cushion, his large hands pulling apart your thighs so that he can gaze at his handiwork. Part of you thinks the rest of your tryst would be better suited in bed, but the seconds wasted moving into the bedroom are not worth sacrificing the opportunity to have him inside you now.

You can’t help the moan that falls from your lips when he lines up with your center, dropping a heavy wad of saliva onto your aching clit. His eyes are glittering when he looks back up at you, smirking. 

“Don’t even need it ‘cause you’re already dripping for me, Malyshka,” he breathes roughly. The swollen head of his dick probes at your entrance, teasing you, before he’s rutting between your folds with a groan. An obscene squelching noise sounds from the contact of his skin against your soaked slit. “Hear that, dorogoy? That’s how sloppy your pretty little cunt is. All for me.”

A whine bubbles in your throat at his words, your hips rolling to try and catch him, desperate to have him inside of you. His muscular forearms strain on either side of your head, silver chain dangling loosely on his chest, and you grip the cool metal in your hand to tug his mouth to yours in an attempt to goad him. He plays your game, kissing you back, humming into your mouth when your tongue desperately seeks him out, but he ignores the way your body rolls.

“Andrei, please,” you whisper, your eyes looking up into his, the warm brown in them now a molten chocolate. “I need you.”

“You want it, kisa? Need it?”

“Please, Drei.”

“Say it,” he demands, his voice firm but soft. It’s velvet, almost soothing when he runs the pad of his thumb over your lip. “Tell me what you want. You know I’ll give you whatever you want, malyshka. You just have to tell me.”

Your voice is shaky, though the ardor in his eyes gives you the courage to speak confidently. “Fuck me, Drei.”

Andrei smiles then, handsome in a way that would melt your heart if you weren’t throbbing for him. He presses his forehead to yours, a sweet gesture despite the lewd position he has you in, his breath puffing out over your lips while he runs his length over your entrance one more time. 

When he presses into you, all air in your lungs is quickly pulled out. You’ll never get used to the feeling of him, thick and throbbing, stretching you out in the most delicious, toe-curling way, one inch at a time until you’re stuffed completely full of him. He loves it, too, muffling his grunt in the crook of your neck as he holds himself still for a moment, like he’s hanging on by a thread.

You’re patient, taking the time to wrap your arms around his broad and muscular back. Savoring the feeling of his muscles beneath your fingertips, you admire how big he is – in all aspects of the word. Your skin feels like it’s on fire, warmed by Andrei’s love and heated under his touch.

Andrei begins to move without warning, your walls gripping him tightly as he pushes in and out. The action alone is enough to render you speechless, your entire body fluttering when his thumb brushes your cheek, his lips ghosting against yours. His breath is warm, as are his eyes, pulling moans from you with the finesse of his hips.

One of his hands slides down your body, his steady rhythm never ceasing. With ease, he tugs at your legs until they’re resting over his broad shoulders, then presses forward until you feel the stretch deep in the back of your thighs. He’s deep, almost deeper than he’s ever been, lodged completely within your snug walls.

Soft murmurs in Russian are whispered against your jaw, nonsensical fragments of a sentence that drive you wild. He knows you’re close by the way your hands clutch tightly onto his shoulders, leaving marks for you to admire tomorrow. 

He says something in Russian, then chokes out his own translation. “Come for me, Malyshka.”

You do, his words the final bit of permission you need to fly into your own bliss. Andrei grunts, feeling the way you contract around him, working you through it like he does every time. He grins, pleased with himself.

“So pretty.”

“Drei,” you sigh, not ready for him to part from you just yet. “More.”

For once, he doesn’t argue or make you beg, probably too desperate himself to bother. The way he can maneuver your body so easily will never not be hot to you, his muscles barely working to tug you back into his lap. He twitches against your center when his eyes latch onto the diamonds onto your neck. 

“Ride me, dorogoy.”

He doesn’t have to ask twice, your body scrambling to sink down onto his waiting length with a sigh. His hands flex on your waist, encouraging you to keep going, though his eyes never leave your neck. 

Your body moves up and down, hips moving so that his tip strikes just the right spot that has you throwing your head back. A low growl leaves Andrei’s throat, his hand moving to wrap around yours. Though you can’t see it yourself, you know the contrast between his large hand next to the dainty necklace is powerful, judging by the darkness that has seeped into his eyes. He’s never been particularly possessive, but he does show small flashes — particularly in the bedroom — that drive you wild.

“You’re so beautiful,” he mutters under his breath, accent making him barely comprehensible. “So perfect. All fucking mine.”

Andrei’s other hand grips your hip while his mouth latches onto your breast. He’s all over you, completely invading each of your senses and surrounding your body in everything Andrei. He curses in Russian, the vibration of his voice shooting through your body as you ride him harder, seeking out your crest that’s just over the horizon.

“Touch yourself,” he commands, unwilling to move his hands from your body to do it for you. “Make yourself fall apart all over me, kisa.”

You’re helpless to obey, hand falling between your legs and brushing at your clit. His grip on your throat tightens, and it’s the squeeze of his fingers that send you flying over the edge, vision going fuzzy as your body shudders on top of him. 

You’ve barely had time to recover before he’s finally moving his hands to grab onto your sides, holding you in place while he thrusts his hips upwards, rapidly, seeking out his own release. The red silk ribbons dangle from the bra that’s haphazardly tugged around your middle, forgotten as they ripple from his forceful movements. Involuntarily, moans fall from your mouth as he pounds into you, wordlessly encouraging him.

With a loud, forceful grunt, he stills when he’s buried completely inside of you, twitching as his release floods your center. His hands are still holding tightly onto your sides, forehead resting against your chest as he catches his breath. In an effort to soothe him, you allow your hands to run through his hair, earning a purr against your sternum.

“Ya tebya lyublyu, dorogoy,” he murmurs, the words falling from his mouth like he can’t be bothered to speak or even think in English. You’re still learning, Andrei teaching you when he can, but you know enough to know what he’s said, and you smile softly as you gently pull his head backwards in favor of pressing a kiss against his lips.

“Ya tozhe tebya lyublyu, Drei. Merry Christmas.”

[mx-lamour]

Costuming Strahd: Part 1 An "I thought too hard about this" adventure.

I recently picked up some fabric for Strahd (because you know I gotta dress up when my players eventually come to dinner).

A "fine black linen" for the shirt (from here if you want to grab some for yourself), and a black jacquard chenille (kind of a mid-weight upholstery fabric) for a classy vest.

I started doing some visual research on traditional clothing in Slavic and Southeastern European regions, hungrily compiling whatever I could find to build some pattern recognition.

Having a little bit of trouble reconciling traditional peasant garb with "but what would nobility wear" and "what year is it", plus the obvious influence of Dracula and his early cinematic adaptations on descriptions of Strahd von Zarovich (which are decidedly Western), and the need to remind myself that I am building a fantasy costume not some historical reenactment.

1937 print of a Wallachian peasant vs. a portrait of Vlad Țepeș noted 1466

The vague description from I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin gives me a neat little list of his layers: "cloak, outer coat, embroidered vest, and . . . a very fine black linen shirt."

The "outer coat" threw me. I suppose it shouldn't have. But it didn't quite mesh with the Ottoman influences in Vlad Țepeș portraits nor the stout vest and almost oversized coat ensembles I'd been looking at in peasant images from Romania and Hungary. Instead, that kind of layering really read Western Europe to me, so I was shunted directly back to Christopher Lee's portrayal of Dracula (in which his costume really is black-on-black-on-black, apart from the barest hint of a white shirt beneath the squarely Victorian suit, which easily consists of both a vest and jacket and, in this case, a cape).

Side note: Nowhere have I (yet) found mention of any sort of necktie. Just the Bela Lugosi style crest (but on a gold chain, not a ribbon).

There's just something about that 1930s white tie, folks. Mm.

Anyway, I figured it was safe enough to start with Strahd's shirt. Well... but, herein lies still the same conundrums: shirts aren't all the same spanning eras and regions. I did stumble on this, though:

I love me a pattern.

What I like about this in particular is that it's structured in a way that makes me believe Strahd was inspired by a man who lived in the 1400s. These sort of blocky, pieced shapes were how shirts were commonly built throughout much of history, with various amounts of gathering and whatnot, so it could be pretty versatile in terms of "what year is it".

I like the embroidery on the neck, cuffs, and over the shoulders. And I like that the split in the neckline is centered. I've seen examples with the split at the side of the embroidery panel that are really intriguing, but while a few have been noted as Ukrainian or Polish, most of the examples I've seen have been Russian, and I'm trying to avoid anything overtly Russian. (Russian garb is yummy, but it's not Barovian.)

The lighting on that third one is either ominous, suggestive, or both.

What I don't like is the open sleeve ends. There are certainly worse offenders (there are some HUGE open sleeves in some of the folk ensembles, like, unconscionably long and billowy), but even this kind of straight sleeve doesn't feel... I don't know... organized enough for Strahd.

I have a Viking style shirt with straight open sleeves like this, and it bothers me to no end. The material over the thin part of my forearms and wrists is floppy. It crumples and rides up (maybe they're just too big overall, but that's a risk to consider). I usually just roll them up to my elbows to have done with it, but that's a move for casual wear. I could see Alek Gwylim sporting open sleeves, but not Strahd. Strahd needs cuffs. Or if not cuffs, the kind of sleeve that narrows tight around the forearm and probably has at least a dozen buttons running up the length of it... but that's hardly practical, either, is it? Strahd treads that infuriating middle ground somewhere between comfortable and elaborate.

So anyway, I'm probably going to enlarge the sleeves. Not a lot; just enough to get a little bit of that "poet shirt" gathering on the shoulder and allow some extra movement in the elbow. And it's going to have cuffs that button around the wrist. Turning it into something a little more suggestive of the Renaissance (though I'm sure as hell not adding ruffles; I'm sure Strahd would think them frivolous).

Side note: Cuffed sleeves are not unheard of in folk garb from Romania and surrounding areas, but it still felt like a very deliberate choice to make. There's certainly a noticeable trend of open-sleeve styles, especially in Transylvania, if I understand correctly.

That first image is from I Do Declare. Great stuff.

Ultimately, the slightly tucked, cuffed sleeve should also bleed well enough into late-1800s suit territory, at least in spirit. The sleeves should have the approximate volume as (or perhaps a little more than) a modern button-down shirt.

Little concept sketches.

Building up from the body, the vest is the next most important thing (aside from pants, but I'm just looking at his torso for the moment; you can fake good pants, especially at the table).

Whatever happens, I knew the vest should be at least these two things: black, and embroidered. Why not blackwork on black fabric? And, since I've picked out a jacquard fabric that already has some texture to it, let's just keep piling on that subtle intrigue. That's right: get up close and personal, look at that mesmerizing detail... lol.

I do not have an actual plan for any of the embroidery yet. That's a problem for future me. (Good luck, sucker.) What I would like to do, vaguely, is take some of the traditional/folk embroidery from that southeastern region and combine it with more western Victorian elements. Haphazardly span worlds to mimick the elvolving lore.

Soutache, anyone?

The style of the vest I sketched out is based on the below examples of traditional Romanian outfits (from what region, I have no idea). The nubby little lapels reminded me of late Victorian waistcoats (which button up rather higher on the breast than modern suits), but with the added fun of a standing collar. That thick black embellishment also caught my eye, of course.

Look at that dapper little guy.

I would like the vest to be more fitted, though, rather than the boxy, open-front (and often sheepskin or fur-lined) style of traditional peasant dress.

Along a similar vein as "the man needs cuffed sleeves", having a more tailored vest seems practical and organized. Crisp might be the word I was looking for. And he's a lord, he can afford the extra effort. A fitted waistcoat would also play along with the little fantasy Renaissance lean and nods to Victorian fashion.

Strahd said trunk hose were a thing of the past, but made no mention of doublets one way or the other.

That's it for now. I was definitely just going to do a quick intro this morning, but here it is, evening again. Joy of joys. This is my work.

. . .

[Next - Costuming Strahd: Art Addendum]

[blackswaneuroparedux]

‘Pimpernel of the Hellenes’, ‘Major Paddy’, ‘Enchanted maniac’: Will the real Paddy Leigh Fermor please stand up?

Paradox reconciles all contradictions. - Patrick Leigh Fermor

So one evening I was baby sitting my nephews and nieces here in our family chalet in Verbier, high up in the Swiss Alps. It was my turn to baby sit as the rest of my family enjoyed the fantastic classical music concerts and events showcased at the two week long Verbier 30th Festival. The little scamps had gone to bed and my father and I watched an old British war movie on DVD, ‘Ill Met By Moonlight’ (1957). It was filmed by the legendary team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger based on the 1950 book ‘Ill Met by Moonlight: The Abduction of General Kreipe’ by W. Stanley Moss. 

I’ve seen the film a couple of times before, but until now never really paid attention to where the title came from. My father said it was from Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream’ And so it was. In the play, Oberon, the king of the fairies and the Queen are having a fairly bitter drawn-out fight over custody of a changeling Indian child, and this is how the pissed off king greets the queen when they run into each other, “Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania”. Oberon is basically saying "Oh Lord, it's you..." and Titania's response is basically a flippant middle finger. One of the best modern reasons to read Shakespeare: to throw playful erudite shade at others.

Anyway, the historical background of the film is the German invasion of Crete in May 1941.  After an intense ten-day battle, Allied troops were driven back across the island, and many were evacuated from beaches along the southern coast. Some Cretans and British officers took to the mountains to organise resistance against the occupying forces.  The German occupation that followed was especially brutal. Dreadful reprisals followed every act of resistance. The German commander, General Müller, insisted on taking 50 Cretan lives for every German soldier killed; he became known as ‘The Butcher of Crete’.

As a Classicist side note, there had been a close association between Britain and Crete since the early 20th century, when archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans had uncovered the sensational remains of a Minoan palace at Knossos. The headquarters of the British archaeological school in Crete was a large villa alongside the site, known as Villa Ariadne. Several archaeologists, who knew the island and its people well, went underground after the German occupation to aid the Cretan resistance. Continuing in this tradition, scholar and travel-writer Patrick Leigh Fermor, who had got to know Greece in the 1930s, joined the Special Operations Executive (SOE).

During the German occupation, Major Paddy Leigh Fermor travelled to Crete three times to help organise local resistance against the hated German occupation. On the third occasion, in February 1944, he was parachuted in with a specific mission to kidnap German commander General Müller, to boost morale on Crete along with his erstwhile SOE comrade Capt. W. Stanley Moss MC (aka Billy Moss) of the Coldstream Guards. However, just after they parachute in, General Müller was replaced by General Heinrich Kreipe, who transferred from the Russian Front. Thinking that capturing one general was as good as another, Fermor merrily go ahead with the daring kidnap operation.

It’s at this point that the narrative of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s ‘Ill Met by Moonlight’ (1957) picks up. Dirk Bogarde plays Paddy Leigh Fermor, David Oxley plays Moss, and Marius Goring plays the taciturn German paratroop general. Blink and you’ll miss the late great Christopher Lee making a cameo appearance as a German officer in the dentist’s room scene.

The film naturally takes some liberty with the facts but it’s a cracking yarn of high adventure and drama. Xan Fielding, a close friend of Leigh Fermor from the SOE in Cairo, was taken on as technical adviser. The fact the film was shot in in the Alpes-Maritimes in France and Italy, and on the Côte d'Azur in France, far away from the craggy valleys and mountains of Crete itself. The director Michael Powell spent some time walking in Crete to get to know the island, but decided that, with the confused and volatile state of Greek politics, it was not suitable to film there.

Looking back years after he had directed it Powell didn’t think much of his own film. By contrast, Paddy Leigh Fermor, who was on set throughout the film shoot, was very happy with Bogarde’s portrayal of him with Byronic glamour. Watching the movie again ‘Ill Met by Moonlight’ remains a classic and stands out from many British war films of the 1950s because of its realism. The British SOE men and the Cretan guerrillas look absolutely right for their parts. It is dramatic and full of suspense while filled with much boyish humour.

I was disappointed with one notable omission in the film that did happen in real life. According to Patrick Leigh Fermor, at dawn one day during the journey across the mountains, General Kreipe was looking at the mist rising from Mount Ida and began to recite, in Latin, the opening lines of Horace’s ninth ode:

Vides ut alta stet nive candidum Soracte nec iam sustineant onus silvae laborantes geluque flumina constiterint acuto?

Behold yon Mountains hoary height, Made higher with new Mounts of Snow; Again behold the Winters weight Oppress the lab’ring Woods below: And Streams, with Icy fetters bound, Benum’d and crampt to solid Ground

(John Dryden 1685)

Leigh Fermor picked up on the General, and recited the remaining stanzas of the Ode. ‘Ach so, Herr Major,’ said Kreipe when Leigh Fermor had finished. Both men were amazed to realise they shared a classical education and a love of ancient Latin poetry.

Leigh Fermor later wrote that it was as though the war had ceased to exist for a moment, as ‘We had both drunk from the same fountains before.’ It brought captor and captive together with a strange bond. The scene was not reproduced in the film, as Powell and Pressburger probably thought it would make the men sound too academic for a popular cinema audience.

Leigh Fermor and Kreipe met again in the early 1970s, on a Greek television show, and got on famously together. The General said Leigh Fermor had treated him chivalrously as a captive. They remained friends until Kreipe’s death.

After sharing a late night drink with my father after the film, I began to muse on the figure of Paddy Leigh Fermor, a family friend and someone I met along with his wife, Joan, as a little girl. My grandparents, and especially my grandmother, knew Paddy briefly from their days during and after the Second World War. 

My father shared a few stories about him when he and my mother visited his beautiful home in Greece, where even at his advanced age he remained the most generous of hosts and the most outrageous flirt. 

One of my memories was getting into his battered old Peugeot in the drive way and trying to drive it when my feet could barely touch the pedals. It wouldn’t have mattered in any case as the brakes didn’t work as he cheerfully said later as we careened around a dirt road to go around the mountains for a drive.

Many years later in April 2022, I tried to visit the home of the late Patrick and Joan Leigh Fermor - a sort of pristine shrine to their memory that one can also stay in any of the rooms as a vacation rental  - in the coastal fishing village of Kadarmyli in the Peloponnese, as part of a hiking and mountaineering sojourn around Greece with ex-Army friends. We couldn’t stay there as it was already rented out to other guests, and so we stayed higher up the mountain in a villa, but we swam in front of the Fermor’s home which was on the water’s edge.

You could never put your finger on Paddy Leigh Fermor. He hid behind his gift for telling yarns, and pulling Ancient Greek verses out of the thin air, as well as boisterously singing local Greek songs with a drink in his hand. 

Even after his death in 2011, the question keeps nagging as to who was Paddy Leigh Fermor?

The Dirk Bogarde film too seems to ask, who exactly is the ‘real’ Patrick Leigh Fermor - or the real anyone? Taking its title from a Shakespearian play concerned with dreams and disguises, magic and power, ‘Ill Met By Moonlight’ is all about questions of identity.

Under the film credits, we see Dirk Bogarde in uniform; then, unexpectedly, we see him in the flamboyant outfit of a Cretan hill-bandit. A title informs us that Major Leigh Fermor was also known by the Greek code-name “Philidem.” In other words, there are two of him (at least), and on one level the adventure the film is about to unfold reflects a conflict in his personality. It’s a conflict shared, unknowingly, by his Nazi opposite number, the fierce, arrogant General Kreipe (an unlikely “proud Titania,” but it’s true that he “with a monster is in love” – the monster of Nazism). Kreipe’s human side is so rigorously repressed by the demands of war and “glory” that he is genuinely unaware of it; ironically, this humanness, which constitutes the true manhood of this Teuton warrior, is revealed by a boy (equivalent to Shakespeare’s Indian Prince?) - who, in turn, is the most grown up person in the movie.

If “Philidem” appears under the credits, caped and open-shirted, a romantic dream-figure out of an operetta or a storybook, he is first seen in the film proper as a coarser, more down-to-earth version of the same thing – an ordinary Cretan peasant in a shabby suit, waiting for a bus. When he makes contact with the Resistance, his personality fragments further.

To some, he is the mystical Philidem, Pimpernel of the Hellenes and righter of wrongs. To others he is “Major Paddy,” the happy-go-lucky Englishman of popular movie myth conducting war as if it were a branch of amateur theatricals, a gentleman adventurer relying on breeding to get him through and making fun of the whole business. To Bill Moss (David Oxley), the newly arrived junior officer sent to assist him, he is the cool, fast-thinking professional soldier. And to himself? In his quietly passionate defence of Cretan life and culture, he seems someone else again: a scholar and aesthete outraged by the barbarism and folly of war, and by the moronic arrogance shown by his captive toward the Cretan people.

Whatever his persona, Leigh Fermor is a chameleon who never seems to change very radically in himself. Perhaps because he has this quality of seeming all things to all men – and being those things - he remains unfazed by the monolithic might of the German military machine. Fluent in Greek, he can also speak German like a German and is easily able to assume another disguise, that of a faceless Nazi officer. Although he and Moss make fun of themselves - “If only I had a monocle!” muses Moss when Leigh Fermor tells him he “looks like an Englishman dressed like a German, leaning against the Ritz bar” - they are able to effect the kidnapping with an ease that seems appropriately Puckish. General Kreipe is ignominiously thrust onto the floor of his own limousine, gagged, and sat upon by a couple of the peasants he so despises. Kreipe’s rage is compounded by his firm conviction that he has been snatched by “amateurs” - a belief Leigh Fermor and Moss slyly make no objection to, knowing how it will gnaw at his already shaky Master Race self-confidence.

Patrick Leigh Fermor, aka Major Paddy, aka Philidem, in the film’s closing moments, is far from being self-assured intellectual or dashing amateur adventurer or legendary outlaw of the hills. He’s just a tired man who wants to go home and rest up. “How do you feel?” asks Moss. “Flat” is the reply. “You look flat!” says Moss. “I know how I’d like to look …” murmurs Leigh-Fermor wistfully. Moss knows what he’s going to say, and joins in the litany: “Like an Englishman dressed like an Englishman – and leaning against the Ritz bar!” It’s easy to imagine them ordering drinks at that renowned watering-hole with all the suavity required by this little fantasy. 

Still, the film’s last images of Crete receding in the distance, until all we can see is the sea, suggests that maybe Major Paddy’s heart is really back in those hills in the “fair and fertile” land that has become as much a Powellian landscape of the mind for us as the studio-built Himalayan convent of ‘Black Narcissus’ or the monochrome Heaven of ‘A Matter of Life and Death’. And, as the film POV closing shots departs both Crete and this film, I began to think that being “dressed like an Englishman and leaning against the Ritz bar” would, for Patrick Leigh Fermor constitute yet another disguise. After all, he said he was of Irish aristocratic stock.

Traveller and writer Paddy Leigh Fermor is best known for two events. He’s known for leading the commando group in occupied Crete to kidnap General Kreipe. But he is also known for the boy who, at a mere 18 years old, set off with little money and a lot of nerve in 1933 to walk from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople.

Patrick Leigh Fermor was, in the words of one of his obituaries, a cross between Indiana Jones, James Bond and Graham Greene. Self-reliance and derring-do were lessons learnt from the cradle. When Fermor’s geologist father was posted to India, he and his wife left the infant with family in Northamptonshire and did not return until his fourth birthday. In retrospect, he took great delight in being sent to a school for difficult children and getting himself expelled from the King’s School, Canterbury, when he was caught holding hands with a greengrocer’s daughter eight years his senior. His school report infamously judged him ‘a dangerous mix of sophistication and recklessness’.

Sharing a flat in Shepherd’s Market, one of Mayfair’s seedier corners, Leigh Fermor schooled himself in literature, history, Latin and Greek.

He honed his character with the company of extraordinary people and the words of great writers - he had a prodigious memory for prose as well as poetry. He befriended literary lions such as Sacheverell Sitwell, Evelyn Waugh and Nancy Mitford. His travels began aged ‘eighteen-and-three-quarters’ when he rejected Sandhurst Royal Military College in order to walk the length of Europe from Hook of Holland to Constantinople. He took with him Horace’s Odes and the Oxford Book of Verse though Leigh Fermor could recite Shakespeare soliloquies, Marlowe speeches, Keats’s Odes and as he modestly put it ‘the usual pieces of Tennyson, Browning and Coleridge’ from memory.

Leigh Fermor was then a self-made man in the most literal sense.

Setting off from England in 1933, Fermor resolved to traverse Europe living like a hermit; sleeping in bars and begging for food. But his manly charms and boyish good looks found him being passed like a favourite godson from Schloss to palace by European nobility and he developed a lifelong penchant for aristocratic company. I his own words, ‘In Hungary, I borrowed a horse, then plunged into Transylvania; from Romania on into Bulgaria’. Having reached Constantinople in January 1935, Fermor continued to explore Greece where he fought on the royalist side in Macedonia quelling a republican revolution. In Athens Leigh Fermor met Balasha Cantacuzene, a Romanian countess with whom he fell in love. They were living together in a Moldovan castle when World War Two was declared.

Fluent in Greek, Leigh Fermor was posted as a liaison officer in Albania. Recruited as a Special Operations Executive (SOE), he was shipped from Cairo to German-occupied Crete where he lived disguised as a shepherd in the mountains for two years. On his third expedition to Crete in 1944, Leigh Fermor was parachuted alone onto the island and made connections in the Cretan resistance movement. While waiting for his compatriot Captain Bill Stanley Moss to land by water from Cairo, Leigh Fermor hatched a plot to kidnap German Commander General Heinrich Krieple. He liaised comfortably with Cretan partisans and bandits to pull off one of the war’s greatest coups de théâtre.

Disguised as German soldiers, Leigh Fermor and Moss stopped Krieple’s car at an improvised check point en route back to Nazi HQ in Knossos. Abandoning the General’s car after a two-hour drive, Leigh Fermor left a note indicating that the kidnappers were British so that there wouldn’t be reprisals against Cretan nationals. When the abduction of the unpopular commander was discovered, a German officer in Heraklion allegedly said ‘well, gentlemen, I think this calls for champagne’. It turns out that General Kreipe was despised by his own soldiers because, amongst other things, he objected to the stopping of his own vehicle for checking in compliance with his commands concerning approved travel orders. It’s why for instance the German troops, both in the film and in real life, dare not stop the General’s car as it drove through the check points at Heraklion.

Krieple was evacuated and taken to Cairo and Leigh Fermor entered the annals of World War Two’s most devil-may-care heroes. With characteristic panache, when he was demobbed Leigh Fermor moved into an attic room at the Ritz paying half a guinea a night. But his first travel book, ‘The Traveller’s Tree’, was not about the European odyssey or the Cretan escapades and centred on Leigh Fermor’s adventures in the Carribbean. Published in 1950, ‘The Traveller’s Tree’ was an inspiration for Ian Fleming’s second James Bond novel ‘Live and Let Die’ (1954).

As a host and house guest, Paddy Leigh Fermor was much sought-after. At one of his parties in Cairo, he counted nine crowned heads. He was a confirmed two-gin-and-tonics before lunch man and smoked eighty to 100 cigarettes a day. His party pieces included singing ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’ in Hindustani and reciting ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter’ backwards. In Cyprus while staying with Laurence Durrell, Leigh Fermor apparently stunned crowds in Bella Pais into silence by singing folk songs in perfect Cretan dialect. As Durrell wrote in ‘Bitter Lemons’ (1957), ‘it is as if they want to embrace Paddy wherever he goes’.

He struck up a partiuclar friendship with the famous Mitford sisters, especially Deborah Mitford, later ‘Debo’, the Duchess of Devonshire. It was at the Devonshires’ Irish estate Lismore Castle that ‘Darling Debo’ and ‘Darling Pad’ met and began to correspond. A characteristic letter from the Duchess in 1962 reads ‘The dear old President (JFK) phoned the other day. First question was ‘Who’ve you got with you, Paddy?” He’s got you on the brain’ to which Fermor replies of a broken wrist ‘Balinese dancing’s out, for a start; so, should I ever succeed to a throne, is holding an orb. The other drawbacks will surface with time’.

After the war he travelled widely but was always drawn back to Greece. He built a house on the Mani peninsula - which had been, significantly, the only part of Magna Graecia to resist Ottoman colonisation since the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Before his death in 2011 at the age of 96, he wrote some of the most acclaimed travel books of the 20th century.

His books contain some of the finest prose writing of the past century and disprove Wilde's maxim that "it is better to have a permanent income than to be fascinating".

Charm, self-taught knowledge and enthusiasm made up for the lack of a university degree or a private income. His teenage walk across Europe and subsequent romantic sojourn in Baleni, Romania, with Princess Balasha Cantacuzene are proof enough of that. But the difficulty of capturing such an unconventional and glamorous life is made harder by the certainty that Fermor was an unreliable narrator.

He was also an infuriatingly slow writer. Driven by a life-long passion for words yet hampered by anxiety about his abilities, Leigh Fermor published eight books over 41 years. 

‘The Traveller's Tree’ describes his postwar journey through the Caribbean; ‘Mani‘ and ‘Roumeli’ (1958 and 1966) draw on his experiences in Greece, where he would live for much of the latter part of his life. But it is the books that came out of his trans-Europe walk that reveal both the brilliance and the flaws. ‘A Time of Gifts’ was published in 1977, 44 years after he set out on the journey. ‘Between the Woods and the Water’ appeared nine years later. Both describe a world of privilege and poverty, communism and the rising tide of Nazism, and end with the unequivocal words, "To be continued". Yet the third volume hung like an albatross around the author's neck. As the years passed, Fermor found it impossible to shape the last part of his story in the way he wanted.

Leigh Fermor was that rarest of men: a man determined to live on his own terms, if not his own means, and who mostly - and mostly magnificently - succeeded. Always popping off on a journey when he should have been writing about the last one, always ready to party, he was forever chasing beautiful, fascinating or powerful women, even when with his wife, Joan Raynor. She was the great facilitator who funded his passion for travel and writing, as well as women, from her trust fund. His love affairs were discreet but legendary.

Leigh Fermor was happiest among the rogues. Over a lifetime on the road, he sought them, and in turn they responded to his charm, nose for adventure, and his famous wit. He was a keenly-anticipated dinner guest - once outshining Richard Burton at a London society soirée, who he cut-off midway through a recital of ‘Hamlet’. As Richard Burton stormed out, the pleading society hostess said, “But Paddy’s a war hero!” to which Burton grouchily replied, “I don’t give a damn who he is!” 

His partnership with and then marriage to Joan Raynor was an open relationship, at least on Leigh Fermor’s side. Paddy saw in Joan his kindred spirit. Like him, she spent much of her youth travelling to where she pleased; largely in France, where the photographer and literary critic Cyril Connolly became besotted by her. Joan was the daughter of Sir Bolton and Lady Eyres Monsell of Dumbleton Hall, Worcestershire. She was not only stunningly pretty but also 'a beautiful ideal, with the perfect bathing dress, the most lovely face, the most elaborate evening dress', as the Eton educated Connolly described her. Joan also stood out from the upper-class beauties of her day in that she supplemented her mean rich father's allowance by earning her living as a decent photographer.

In 1946, she met Leigh Fermor in Athens, while he was deputy director of the British Institute. Joan met him at a time when he was then in a relationship with a French woman called Denise, who was pregnant with his child, which she aborted. The pair would travel to the Caribbean together under the invitation of Greek photographer Costas, falling madly in love.

She was the only woman that - after decades of sexual scandals - matched his own erratic behaviour. Stories of how they dined fully-clothed in the Mediterranean, dragging a table into the sea, as well as their myriad cats and olive groves, paint a restless couple, who, when not out articulating the peoples of their adopted homeland, kept themselves very busy.

The attraction between Paddy and Joan was instant. So many love affairs that Paddy indulged in seemed about as brief as the flame from a burning envelope and you expected this one with Joan to be too. But somehow, miraculously, it lasts. 

The two were apart a great deal, but in their case, absence did make the heart grow fonder. While Paddy was staying in a monastery in Normandy, supposed to be thinking monk-like thoughts that he would eventually put into his masterpiece A Time To Keep Silence, he was also writing sexy letters to Joan: 'At this distance you seem about as nearly perfect a human being as can be, my darling little wretch, so it's about time I was brought to my senses.' And: 'Don't run away with anyone or I'll come and cut your bloody throat.'

She tantalised him with descriptions of Cyril Connolly making passes at her; but she, like Denise, sounded a rather desperate note when she wrote: 'I got the curse so late this month I began to hope I was having a baby and that you would have to make it a legitimate little Fermor. All hopes ruined this morning.'

Fiercely independent - a trait that must have enamoured Paddy - they were best imagined as two pillars of a Greek temple, beside one-another but capable of holding up the roof of the world that they had built for themselves through the lens of ancient history and Hellenic culture. Indeed, it was said that they had a special ‘pact of liberty’. It is this unconquerable aura that led poet laureate John Betjeman to declare his love for her (he called her ‘Dotty’ and remarked that her eyes were as large as tennis balls). For Cyril Connolly, the photographer she shadowed, and with whom she had a scandalised affair during her first marriage, she was a “lovely boy-girl” and Laurence Durrell named her the ‘Corn Goddess’ because of her slender figure and short hair. But of all of these worthy candidates, it was the warrior-poet Patrick Leigh Fermor who finally won her heart.

To Joan, who described herself as a ‘lifelong loner’ in her diaries, her companionship with the uncomplicated Paddy was a relief. They had no children, nor did they want any - or so Paddy claimed. But those who knew Joan suspected she did want children but it never came to pass; and so she became a devoted aunt or dotted on other friends’ children. For both of them their dozens of cats gave them the next best thing to paternal satisfaction. Still, her morbid fascination with photographing cemeteries painted a much darker side.

Joan Raynor’s inheritance subsidised his peripatetic life at least until the enormous success of ‘A Time of Gifts’ in the late 1970s, which in turn created a new market for his previous volumes about Greece, ‘Mani’ and ‘Roumeli’.

With Joan’s tacit consent, Paddy enjoyed amorous flings, discrete sexual affairs with high society women and sampled the low delights of the brothel. This activity rarely made it into his private letters, but the exceptions could be piquant. Writing in 1958 from Cameroon, where he was on the set of a John Huston movie, he told a (male) friend: “ Errol Flynn and I . . . sally forth into dark lanes of the town together on guilty excursions that remind me rather of old Greek days with you.” In a 1961 letter to the film director John Huston’s wife, Ricki, with whom Leigh Fermor had been having sex with (and would die in a car crash in 1969). “I say,” the passage begins, “what gloomy tidings about the CRABS! Could it be me?” Riffing on pubic lice and their crafty ways, he conjectures that, during a recent romp with an “old pal” in Paris, a force “must have landed” on him “and then lain up, seeing me merely as a stepping stone or a springboard to better things” - to Mrs. Huston, that is. As comic apologies for venereal infection go, the passage is surely a classic.

Like most high flying lives, it was far from blameless. Wounded women were littered in his wake. Some British visitors to Athens were less than impressed by this Englishman who posed as “more Greek than the Greeks”.

Some Greeks shared their disdain. Revisionist historians criticised his role in wartime Crete, and warned their fellow Hellenes that for all his fluency and charm, Leigh Fermor was no latter day Byron. His unoccupied car was blown up outside his Mani house, probably by members of the Greek Communist Party which he had vocally opposed. The accidental fatal shooting of a partisan in Crete led to a long blood feud which made it difficult for Leigh Fermor to re-enter the island until the 1970s, and possibly explains why he chose to settle in the Peloponnese rather than among the hills and harbours of his dreams.

His own books had already eclipsed those incidents, not only among readers of English but also in Greece, where in 2007 the government of his adopted land made him a Commander of the Order of the Phoenix for services to literature.

Travel writers such as the great Jan Morris have described Leigh Fermor as the master of their trade and its greatest exponent in the 20th century.

When ‘A Time of Gifts’ was published in 1977, Frederick Raphael wrote: “One feels he could not cross Oxford Street in less than two volumes; but then what volumes they would be!”

They are not for everyone. Leigh Fermor wrote that written English is a language whose Latinates need pegging down with simple Anglo-Saxonisms, and some feel that he personally could have made more and better use of the mallet. His exuberance is either captivating or florid. It is certainly unique among English prose styles.

Artemis Cooper, his patient and careful biographer wrote that “Paddy had found a way of writing that could deploy a lifetime’s reading and experience, while never losing sight of his ebullient, well-meaning and occasionally clumsy 18-year-old self … this was a wonderful way of disarming his readers, who would then be willing to follow him into the wildest fantasies and digressions”.

Those fantasies and digressions took decades to express. ‘A Time of Gifts’ had arguably been 40 years in the making when it was published in 1977. Its sequel, ‘Between the Woods and the Water’, did not appear until 1986. The third and final volume has been awaited ever since. Following Leigh Fermor’s death, a foot-high manuscript was apparently found on his desk.

Once he knuckled down to it, Leigh Fermor loved playing around with words. He was one of our greatest stylists and he was devoted to producing un-improvable books. But writing did not come easily to him, at least partly because it was something of a distraction from the main event, which was living an un-improvable life of unrepentant gaiety and fun.

For forty odd years, a legion of friends and admirers would beat a path to Paddy and Joan’s door. Artists, poets, royalty and writers came, all taking inspiration from their erudite hosts. A visit was an act of communion, a sharing of ideas and stories.

Leigh Fermor influenced a generation of British travel writers, including Bruce Chatwin, Colin Thubron, Philip Marsden, Nicholas Crane, Rory Stewart, and William Dalrymple. Indeed when Bruce Chatwin died, it was Paddy who scattered Chatwin’s ashes near a church in the mountains in Kardamyli. 

When I was there in April 2022, I went to that same church to pay my respects.

But some of Paddy’s life energy was sucked out of him when Joan died in Kardamyli in June 2003, aged 91. It was related that Joan said to her friend Olivia Stewart, who was visiting: 'I really would like to die but who'd look after Paddy?' Olivia said that she would. A few minutes later, Joan fell, hit her head - and died instantly of a brain haemorrhage. Joan had often quoted Rilke: 'The good marriage is one in which each appoints the other as guardian of his solitude.' Now Paddy Leigh Fermor was all alone.

Leigh Fermor was knighted in 2004, the day of his birthday which he delighted in like a giggling schoolboy. But he missed Joan terribly.

For the last few months of his life Leigh Fermor suffered from a cancerous tumour, and in early June 2011 he underwent a tracheotomy in Greece. As death was close, according to local Greek friends, he expressed a wish to visit England to bid goodbye to his friends, and then return to die in Kardamyli, though it is also stated that he actually wished to die in England and be buried next to his wife, Joan, in Dumbleton, Gloucestershire. He stayed on at Kardamyli until the 9th June 2011, when he left Greece for the last time. He died in England the following day, 10th June 2011, aged 96. It was reported that he had dined in full black tie on the evening of his death. Paddy had style even unto the end.

A Guard of Honour was formed by the Intelligence Corps and a bugler from his former regiment, the Irish Guards, delivered the ‘Last Post’ at Paddy’s funeral. As had been his wish, he was buried beside Joan. On his gravestone in Dumbleton cemetery is an inscription in Greek, a quote from Constantine Cavafy: “In addition, he was that best of all things, Hellenic.”

Although Joan had passed away at the age of ninety-one, after suffering a fall in the Mani. Her body was repatriated to Dumbleton, the place of her birth - ironic that her dream was to be as far as she could possibly go from the rolling humdrum Worcestershire hills. But perhaps she intended to return all along. When Paddy was buried beside her it seemed that the ‘pact of liberty’ that these two lonely souls had forged themselves could be tested in the great elsewhere. Joan was more than his muse (as many of her obituaries were at pains to declare) but his greatest adventure.

To come around full circle from the movie ‘Ill Met By Moonlight’ (1957) that I saw that night in Verbier, my father told me that rather poignantly, General Kreipe, the German commander Leigh Fermor had captured - once an enemy, and later a friend - left behind notes and photographs from across his life. On one of those notes, it was discovered, the following was scribbled from a brief visit to Greece: “Somewhere, amidst all the disarray, was the story of Joan and Paddy, and” it concluded, “…of their lives together.”

His life with Joan and all that she meant to him was one part of the mosaic of who Paddy Leigh Fermor was. But it’s incomplete. 

Paddy didn’t like the idea of a biography, and neither did Joan when she was alive. But friends had persuaded them that unless Paddy appointed someone to write his life, he might find himself the subject of a book whether he liked it or not. In Artemis Cooper they couldn’t have chosen a better writer to chronicle Paddy’s life as a man of action and letters. Cooper, was the daughter of another accomplished diplomat and historian, John Julius Norwich, and grand-daughter of  Duff and Diana Cooper. As the wife of the historian Antony Beevor, she became a trusted friend of the Leigh Fermors. Cooper was too good of a historian to let her friendship lead her astray from being a faithful but serious biographer. Knowing this, she was told she could go ahead, but she had to promise not to publish anything until after they were both dead.

Paddy did not like being interviewed, and would keep her questions at bay with a torrent of dazzling conversation.  He was the master at deflecting discussions away from himself.

He was also very unwilling to let Cooper see many of his papers, though the refusal always couched in excuses. ‘Oh dear, the Diary…’ It was the only surviving one from his great walk across Europe, and I was aching to read it. ‘Well it’s in constant use, you see, as I plug away at Vol III,’ he would say. Or, ‘My mother’s letters? Ah yes, why not. But it’s too awful, I simply cannot remember where they’ve got to…’ It was quite obvious that he and Joan, while being unfailingly generous, welcoming and hospitable, were determined to reveal as little as possible of their private lives. 

While they were more than happy to talk about books, travels, friends, Crete, Greece, the war, anything - they would not tell her any more than they would have told the average journalist. But she persisted and got closer than most. He showed particularly gallantry in not talking about his romantic entanglements. But she soon twigged that anytime he described a woman as ‘an old pal’ it was a sure bet that he had an affair with her.

Intriguingly, Paddy liked to claim he was descended from Counts of the Holy Roman Empire, who came to Austria from Sligo. Paddy could recite ‘The Dead at Clomacnoise’ (in translation) and perhaps did so during a handful of flying visits to Ireland in the 1950s and 1960s, partying hard at Luggala House or Lismore Castle, or making friends with Patrick Kavanagh and Sean O’Faolain in Dublin pubs. He once provoked a massive brawl at the Kildare Hunt Ball, and was rescued from a true pounding by Ricki Huston, a beautiful Italian-American dancer, John Huston’s fourth wife and Paddy’s lover not long afterwards.

And yet, a note of caution about Paddy’s Irish roots is sounded by his biographer, Artemis Cooper, who also co-edited ‘The Broken Road’, the final, posthumously published instalment of the trilogy. “I’m not a great believer in his Irish roots,” she said of Leigh Fermor in an interview, “His mother, who was a compulsive fantasist, liked to think that her family was related to the Viscount Taaffes, of Ballymote. Her father was apparently born in County Cork. But she was never what you might call a reliable witness. She was an extraordinary person, though. Imaginative, impulsive, impossible - just the way the Irish are supposed to be, come to think of it. She was also one of those sad women, who grew up at the turn of the last century, who never found an outlet for their talents and energies, nor the right man, come to that. All she had was Paddy, and she didn’t get much of him.”  

And I think that’s the point, no one really got much of Paddy Leigh Fermor even as he only gave a crumb of himself to others but still most felt grateful that it was enough to fill one’s belly and still feel overfed by him.

Paddy never tried to get to the bottom of his Irish ancestry, afraid, no doubt, of disturbing the bloom that had grown on history and his past, a recurring trait. “His memory was extraordinary,” Artemis Cooper noted, “but it lay dangerously close to his imagination and it was a very porous border.”

Within the Greek imagination many Greeks saw in Paddy Leigh Fermor as the second coming of Lord Byron. It’s not a bad comparison.  

Lord Byron claimed that swimming the Hellespont was his greatest achievement. 174 years or so later, another English writer, Patrick Leigh Fermor - also, like Byron, revered by many Greeks for his part in a war of liberation - repeated the feat. Leigh Fermor, however, was 69 when he did it and continued to do it into his 80s. Byron was a mere 22 years old lad. The Hellespont swim, with its mix of literature, adventure, travel, bravery, eccentricity and romance, is an apt metaphor for Leigh Fermor’s life. Paddy Leigh Fermor was the Byron of his time. Both men had an idealised vision of Greece, were scholars and men of action, could endure harsh conditions, fought for Greek freedom, were recklessly courageous, liked to dress up and displayed a panache that impressed their Greek comrades. Like a good magician it was also a way to misdirect and conceal one’s true self.

What or who was the true Paddy Leigh Fermor?  

Like Byron, Leigh Fermor appeared as a charismatic and assured figure. He was a sightseer, consuming travel, culture, and history for pleasure. He was an aristocrat moving in the social circles of his time. He was a gifted amateur scholar, speculating on literary and historical sources. Leigh Fermor, Byron’s own identity, is subject to textual distortion; it emerges from a piece of occasional prose in his books and is shaped by the claims of correspondence on a peculiarly fluid consciousness. 

There is no hard and fast distinction to be drawn here between real and imagined, only a continuity of relative fictions that lie between memory and imagination as his biographer asserted. If there is a will to assert identity here, to disentangle fact and fiction, to give things as they really are and nail down the real Leigh Fermor then it is somewhere between the two. This is where we will find Paddy.

For many his death marked the passing of an extraordinary man: soldier, writer, adventurer, a charmer, a gallant romantic. As a writer he discovered a knack for drawing people out and for stringing history, language, and observation into narrative, and his timing was perfect. Paddy often indulged in florid displays of classical erudition. His learned digressions and serpentine style, his mannered mandarin gestures, even baroque prose, which Lawrence Durrell called truffled and dense with plumage, were influenced by the work of Charles Doughty and T.E. Lawrence. But one can’t compare him. I agree with the acclaimed writer Colin Thurbon who said, “There is, in the end, nobody like him. A famous raconteur and polymath. Generous, life-loving and good-hearted to a fault. Enormously good company, but touched by well-camouflaged insecurities. I would rank him very highly. ‘The finest travel writer of his generation’ is a fair assessment.”

As a child I didn’t really know who Paddy Leigh Fermor was other than this very cheerful and charismatic old man was kind, attentive, and took a boyish delight in everything you were doing. Only later on in adulthood was it clear to that Paddy was not only among the outstanding writers of his time but one of its most remarkable characters, a perfect hybrid of the man of action and the man of letters. Equally comfortable with princes and peasants, in caves or châteaux, he had amassed an enviable rich experience of places and people. “Quite the most enchanting maniac I’ve ever met,” pronounced Lawrence Durrell, and nearly everyone who’d crossed paths with him had, it seemed, come away similarly dazzled. 

I am equally dazzled - more smitten in retrospect - for alas they don’t make men like Paddy any more. But every time I dip back into his books I think I discover a little bit more of who Paddy Leigh Fermor was because I find him some where between my memory and my imagination.

[themotherofhorses]

oc introduction: SilentDove Reyes

"It was my father who gifted me my name, y'know. He claims that, when I was born, I was silent. Him, my mother, my kokom, and the midwife thought I was a stillborn. They feared the worse. Guess I'm just naturally dramatic."

paloma (masterlist)

name: silentdove marie reyes.

age: 22 [july 13th, 2001].

pronouns: she/her.

gender: cisgender [female].

birthplace: near box elder, montana.

race: native american & hispanic.

nationality: american.

tribal affiliation: the chippewa-cree tribe of the rocky boy indian reservation.

occupation:

cryptological language analyst.

(milf-in-training) wife of simon riley.

languages: nēhiyawēwin, spanish, portuguese, russian, and french.

face claim: tanaya beatty

playlist.

electric pow wow drum — the halluci nation.

edge of seventeen — stevie nicks.

one woman army — porcelain black.

you driving me crazy (indian girl) — joey stylez, northern cree.

boss bitch — doja cat.

mother's daughter — miley cyrus.

celestial bodies — semiah.

mayores — becky g, bad bunny.

additional facts below the cut.

— dove is hispanic and lipan apache through her father. on her paternal grandfather's side, she traces her heritage to guerrero viejo, tamaulipas, mexico.

— through her mother, she has connections to the sweetgrass cree first nation located within treaty 6 territory.

— blessed with a learning tongue, she is a polyglot. her first languages consisted of a blend between nēhiyawēwin (the plains cree language), spanish, and english. during high school, she took on russian and french as a challenge, and later portuguese.

— on her right bicep is a traditional ojibwe floral design depicting bright orange tulips.

— she'll never kill a spider. in her mind, she recites the following: "if i am killed for simply living, let death be kinder than man."

— greatly enjoys the following:

contemporary jingle & old style fancy

ribbon skirts

ear piercings

beading

long distance runs

corridos

vines

scented creams & lip-glosses from bath and bodyworks.

notes: hopefully y'all find enjoyment in my dove :D with this now out of the way, i'll begin the main writing portion of the series <3

[atanerrum]

what brands of traditional materials do you use in your sketchbooks, may i ask?

currently I use Arrtx acrylic markers, mungyo oil pastels, koh-i-noor watercolor pencils that i have for 12 years now lol they will live forever. as well as some off brand alcoholic markers, you know those from aliexpress etc. Whatever graphite pencils i acquired over the years, I've never had one pencil run out ever... for lineart, i have pigma micron liners and brushpens, they're waterproof, but I can line with whatever, so. But they're good! I sometimes use gouache paints and watercolors and dry pastels, but they're from russian brands and not that much outstanding that I would recommend to seek them out, but yeah I use them sometimes in sketchbooks with thicker paper; I don't like the mess that comes with all the paint, so they're just somewhere over there, drying up lol! I'm not much of a high end branded materials guy, I can work with whatever, but I really wanna invest in some professional color pencils, I tried my friend's set not long ago, I don't remember the brand, but they were goood. Btw if you're interested how my pastel and high softness pencil works don't smear all over the pages, I set them with Mr. Superclear sealant!

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Nick Anderson

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

October 8, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Oct 08, 2024

“It’s been a tradition for more than half a century that the major party candidates for president sit down with 60 Minutes in October,” host Scott Pelley said to the camera last night before 60 Minutes aired an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. This year, both Harris and Republican nominee former president Donald Trump accepted an invitation for an interview.

“Then a week ago,” Pelley said, “Trump backed out. The campaign offered shifting explanations. First it complained that we would fact-check the interview. We fact-check every story,” Pelley said. “Later, Trump said he needed an apology for his interview in 2020. Trump claims correspondent Leslie Stahl said in that interview that Hunter Biden’s controversial laptop came from Russia. She never said that.

“Trump has said his opponent doesn’t do interviews because she can’t handle them. He had previously declined another debate with Harris, so tonight may have been the largest audience for the candidates between now and election day. Our questions addressed the economy, immigration, reproductive rights, and the wars in the Middle East and Europe. Both campaigns understood this special would go ahead if either candidate backed out.”

And with that, 60 Minutes aired its interview with Vice President Harris.

Trump broke a fifty-year tradition so his false world would not be challenged by reality. He apparently wants to make sure voters cannot base their decisions about the country’s future on facts. Hiding reality is in keeping with his continued refusal to release his tax returns or a medical report—even after the shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania—or the video from the incident at Arlington National Cemetery, instead insisting that people take him at his word about what happened. 

If voters trust his disinformation campaign, rather than thinking things through for themselves, who will his policies help? 

A bombshell story from a forthcoming book by veteran journalist Bob Woodward today revealed that in 2020, when he was president, Trump secretly shipped Covid-19 testing equipment to Russian president Vladimir Putin for his own personal use at a time when Americans could not get it.  

A Trump aide told Woodward that Trump and Putin have spoken as many as seven times since Trump left the White House, prompting Edward Luce of the Financial Times to comment: “What possible business could an out-of-office U.S. president have to call Vladimir Putin seven times?” Woodward recounts a moment when Trump told a senior aide to leave the room so “he could have what he said was a private phone call with Russian president Vladimir Putin.” 

The Woodward book also says that when South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham was visiting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also known as MBS, in March 2024, Graham said “Hey, let’s call Trump.” According to Woodward, an aide brought MBS a bag full of burner phones, one of which was labeled “TRUMP 45.”

This news highlights the fact that Trump retained classified documents when he left the White House, carrying them with him to Mar-a-Lago, where he tried to hide them from federal officials. A grand jury indicted him on 37 felony counts for those actions, but Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismissed the case in July after concluding that Special Counsel Jack Smith was improperly appointed.  

Trump’s campaign came out swinging after the story broke, with Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung calling Woodward “a total sleazebag who has lost it mentally.”

In contrast to Trump’s disinformation campaign, Vice President Harris is running a normal campaign, offering policy proposals. Today she proposed a plan to permit Medicare to help cover the costs of long-term home health care aides for seniors. Harris announced the plan on ABC’s The View, where she spoke of the so-called sandwich generation, people—mostly women—who are taking care of their elderly parents at the same time they are also taking care of children. “[I]t’s just almost impossible to do it all, especially if they work,” Harris said, adding that many end up having to leave their jobs. She also called for Medicare to cover vision and hearing care to enable seniors to live independently for longer.  

Harris said the money to pay for the new services will come from savings realized through Medicare’s new ability to negotiate drug prices—an ability Republicans are eager to end—and through cracking down on Medicare fraud. A fact sheet about the plan emphasizes that it will enable the government to work with the private sector to expand the home care workforce and provide more access to telehealth. 

Her plan also calls for stopping states from seizing family homes of recently deceased Medicaid beneficiaries to restore funding, a program called “Medicaid estate recovery.” Those seizures particularly hurt rural and minority populations, she noted, preventing them from building wealth. 

Reed Abelson and Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times note that both expanded home care benefits and drug negotiations are popular. KFF, which conducts health policy research, reports that Medicaid estate recovery has been criticized because it “falls primarily on individuals with limited incomes, raises little revenue, and is applied very unevenly across the states.” 

Deepa Shivaram of NPR noted that a relatively large percentage of middle-aged and older women remain undecided in this race and Harris’s plan speaks to their needs. The plan would also bring more money and care workers into rural towns with aging populations, giving those areas an economic boost.  

In a fact sheet, the Harris-Walz campaign noted that Trump is focused on tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, has repeatedly called for cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, and gave clemency to those abusing the system. As Amy B. Wang and Azi Paybarah explained in the Washington Post: “In his last year in office, Trump commuted the sentences of at least five people who collectively filed nearly $1.6 billion in fraudulent claims through Medicare or Medicaid.”

On The View, Harris said, “In this election, people are ready for a new generation of leadership that’s about fixing problems.” 

The 2020 60 Minutes interview for which Trump demanded an apology last week was the one in which he promised his health care plan was “fully developed,” then angrily walked out. His exit was apparently planned, for shortly after his departure, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany walked up to Stahl with a giant book, saying: “Lesley, the President wanted me to deliver his health care plan. It’s a little heavy.”

Trump and McEnany likely expected that the audience would remember their theatrical move rather than the reality, which was that the book contained no Trump healthcare plan because one didn’t exist. 

Four years later, it still doesn’t. Trump said at the September 10 presidential debate that he has the “concepts of a plan.”

CNN today set a deadline of Thursday for Trump to accept its invitation for an October 23 presidential debate. Harris has already accepted. 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON