#my characters: Joist

[possumcollege]

"Lookit that one."

[crittertongue]

Crittertongue no.36: Emissary

[willsonlmt]

Ruby: Hey Blake what's going on?

Blake: I'm okay, Ruby and you?

Ruby: I'm okay. So I was reading that book you recommended to me and it's really good. Are they a favorite writer of yours?

Blake: She's definitely up there. I find she has a great way of writing that makes the dialog feel like every character has a unique voice. Oh, hold on a second ruby.

* Blake whirls around in her seat and brandishing a pistol and takes two shots into the joists of the ceiling. After the shots, jaune fell to the ground.*

Ruby: Jaune! Are you okay?

*Jaune gives thumbs up and sighs.*

Jaune: You were supposed to distract her. Why didn't you keep her talking?

Ruby: I was trying to but she must of heard you.

*Blake walks over and offers a hand to help him up.*

Blake: That's 8-0 for me. Are you sure you want to keep going. I mean, this is a lot of fish dinners.

Jaune: No I can do this I will sneak up and get a hit on you.

Blake: Okay, but I'm still not going easy on you. Also, Ruby, how dare you. Betray your own teammate.

Ruby: I'm sorry, but he said if I helped him win, he'd bake me strawberry and chocolate cookies.

Blake: Okay, well, im gonna go somewhere else now. Do try your best.

Jaune: 'sigh' I'm really starting to regret asking her to help hone my stealth.

[writingquestionsanswered]

I've had ideas for stories I want to write, I write down a bullet point outline, but then I struggle with the actual writing bit. I can think and imagine a full scale plot with hooks, twists, etc but there's a block.

I've always struggled with getting my thoughts put into words that make sense for how I see it. Or just putting thoughts into words in general.

Do you have any advice that may help?

Plot Fleshed Out, Can't Write

When you understand plot and story structure, have the plot fleshed out and outlined, but still can't write, it's almost certainly because you're lacking one or more of the following:

1 - Inspiration - Your story's outline is sort of like the wooden studs, struts, joists, and beams that serve as the underlying structure of a house. You can have detailed instructions for how to build the actual house, but if you don't have ideas for what materials to use to build the walls, the kind of roof to put up, what type of floors to put in, what color to paint the walls, and how to decorate everything, you'll only ever have a structure. That's why one of the most important things you can do as a writer is make sure you have a full creative well at all times. If you're struggling to take a detailed outline and turn it into an actual story, it's probably because your creative well is dry. You have the structure, you just don't have ideas for what to do with it. So, spend some time Filling Your Creative Well and you'll find that ideas for what to actually write come pouring in.

2 - Motivation - Believe it or not, you can have a detailed outline and a full creative well providing you with lots of ideas for what to write, and you can still be unable to actually write anything. All kinds of things can hamper our motivation to write, from self-doubt and distraction to not feeling well or life getting in the way. My posts: Feeling Unmotivated with WIP, Worried About Writing Style, Delaying Writing Out of Fear, Writing and Depression, Would Rather Be Doing Other Things can help with some of the common motivation zappers.

3 - Excitement - Even with a detailed outline, a great story idea, tons of great ideas, and plenty of motivation to write, if you're not excited about your idea--about the characters, setting, plot details, all of it--you may find yourself struggling to actually write. My posts: Guide: How to Rekindle Your Motivation to Write, Getting Excited About Your Story Again, and

3 - Excitement - Even with a detailed outline, a great story idea, tons of great ideas, and plenty of motivation to write, if you're not excited about your idea--about the characters, setting, plot details, all of it--you may find yourself struggling to actually write. My posts: Guide: How to Rekindle Your Motivation to Write, Getting Excited About Your Story Again, and Getting Unstuck: Motivation Beyond Mood Boards & Playlists has some ideas for how to reignite the spark of excitement for your story.

4 - Practice - Knowing how stories work and being able to actually write one are two completely different things. Kind of like you can know how to read sheet music and understand how to play a piano, but that doesn't mean you can just sit down and play a beautiful, flawless concerto. Writing requires practice, and practice means you have to spend a lot of time writing not-so-great stuff before you can write great stuff. But if you never take the time to write the not-so-great stuff, or if you never start writing because you feel like what you write has to be immediately perfect, you'll never get the practice you need. So, just start writing. Do writing prompts. Write fan-fiction. Journal. Any kind of writing will exercise your writing muscles and get them into shape.

5- Energy - Having the physical and mental energy to write is just as important as everything above. If you're lacking in energy, you're not going to feel like writing when you sit down and try to write. So, self-care is super important when you're going to be writing. Make sure you're getting enough sleep, exercising, and eating right. Try to avoid doing things that sap your physical and mental energy if you know you're planning to write later. Take some time to figure out the time of day that works best for you energy-wise and try to schedule your writing time then.

Happy writing!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[loquaciousquark]

[Fic] Distant Skies, Timber Joists [1/1]

Rating: G Characters/Pairings: Zelda/Link (ZeLink) Fandom: Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Word Count: 5.5k Summary: Some days, she wakes with a dragon in her eyes.

Notes: My very dear friend @silksieve loves Link and Zelda, and after I finished my recent playthrough of TotK, I knew I wanted to write something for her. (Mostly in gratitude for her endless patience with the absolutely boneheaded way I played that game, but also because she's just wonderful and deserves it.) Little did I know she was working on something truly beautiful for me at the same time, and while she finished hers first, I'm still here to complete our little Fics of the Magi tradeoff.

--

Some days, she wakes with a dragon in her eyes.

The color never changes. Link checks the first time, and the second and the third—but no, still green, green as Rauru’s light, green as the paddock behind the house where the horses graze amid unchecked wildflowers. The color doesn’t change, but that doesn’t change his certainty that a dragon looks out from Zelda’s eyes, from Zelda’s face.

The right green, but not her eyes. Not her voice. No smile for him or anyone else, even when the neighborhood children come to visit. She sits at the nearest window quietly, placidly, her hands folded in her lap, and her green eyes turn up to the skies and stay there. Hours pass, sometimes, without the slightest shift; he looks over now and then to watch her watching the Akkala clouds, now dipped in the clear gold of a morning sun; now cast grey and shivering with a sudden thunderstorm, tumbling over themselves into greater and greater heights. The shadows pass over her face and vanish again, and again, and again.

The first time it happens, Link panics.

--

Links: FF.net, AO3

[vampirealpaca]

(ok ima rant abt my story problems; feel free to ignore)

I AM SO ANNOYED. I feel like i have ripped up an old musty rug that desperately needed to go only to discover the floorboards of my home are nigh-glued to the surface of aforementioned rug and the joists are full of maggots. so i have to now repair the joists and also the floor and ALSO make a new rug. I love writing so much ;-;

it's really just the beginning that's tripping me up. like. the motivations are not there enough, the pacing is messy, and i know theoretically i either need to A. have someone peer-review it and point out what i'm messing up bc i'm too close to it or B. walk away from it for at least a week bc i'm too close to it

and the solution to a previous plot hole lowkey makes one of my characters so much more evil than they were previously and like that's not a problem but it is a new consideration and just like. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

and i'm switching it from 1st person to 3rd for a myriad of reasons but dear GOD it is going to take forever...but first i have to figure out my weird pacing problem at the beginning. like. the characters aren't close enough to each other (physically and like goal-wise at the beginning) so it feels really dissonant until the plot really Starts, i just know if someone reads it they'll spend the entire time like "what the heck is this new character" which means i need to change the setup but aaaaaaaaaaaaaah

and the way i originally integrated the magic explanation was way better but NOW everything is scrambled bc i need to change the beginning and i think i should prob just rewrite it all and start from scratch maybe....

ok...rant over...thank u for supporting/reading my vent abt this hobby i swear i actively enjoy ;-;

[flownintothesun]

𝐄𝐍𝐉𝐎𝐋𝐑𝐀𝐒, 𝐎𝐍 𝐁𝐄𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐘 :

  "Whence should proceed that cry of love, if not from the heights of sacrifice? Oh my brothers, this is the point of junction, of those who think and of those who suffer; this barricade is not made of paving-stones, nor of joists, nor of bits of iron; it is made of two heaps, a heap of ideas, and a heap of woes. Here misery meets the ideal. The day embraces the night, and says to it: 'I am about to die, and thou shalt be born again with me."

⋆ ✰ ⋆ ─── **based on this anonymous ask** how does your muse view the gentler ,   daintier things in life ? as things worth preserving   &   caring for ,  or things only bound to wither & disappear ?

  Enjolras is very much an Achilles of a character. He’s strong, he’s the leader, a warrior, he’s utterly brilliant (if sometimes scary in that brilliance), but he is also described in the books as beautiful in a soft way, almost a feminine way. I think that he’s struggled with that, as well as the privilege he was granted at birth. Which, in and of itself is a bit problematic. He gave it all up, but he could never understand the way the people struggled. Not wholly. So in that sense, he disdains the beauty and daintiness of luxury, of who he is on the surface, of the loveliness bestowed upon him.

     He wants to atone. Wants to be at the bottom fighting beside the poor man as a brother. But he could never be that because of name and circumstance and all that glory that the wealthy call beautiful.

     When he looks outward at the people on the streets, the working people, and sees gentleness, goodness and kindness...there is nothing in the world that moves him more. This is what he fights for, his reason. Pride in his country, but a country that is made by and for the people at the bottom.

[chaoticincompetent]

In case anyone is interested in the saga of our floor nightmare, this is what happened.

Our 1920s house has, at some point, settled due to sitting on peat. This would be less of a problem if not for the small, inexplicable wall which had been built in the crawlspace under the floor. So the edges of the house went down and the tiny wall, which was not only unnecessary but also incredibly tenacious, stood there stubbornly holding up the centre.

Respect to the tiny floor-wall, to be honest.

The problem with this is, the entire floor, joists and all, bowed dramatically like this: ^.

Not optimal.

So not optimal, in fact, that when I sat at my desk on a rolling office chair, I would not-so-slowly roll into the corner. Husband put it down as "character" and I got used to firmly planting my feet while working. We could have played the neighbours at marbles and made a lot of money.

Then, more recently, serious damp appeared everywhere and husband put his foot through the hallway floorboards. Apparently, pit traps add character too, but eventually I managed to persuade him that we should probably get someone to look at it.

So a lot of builders came and sucked their teeth and drank all my tea and very nicely turned down the job.

Eventually, we found a very posh building place who were willing to fix it. They do church halls and schools, and the only residential jobs they take are, let's face it, not remotely from the same social bracket as we inhabit.

They were completely flummoxed by the fact that we were slumming it in a 10ft caravan on our drive and hadn't vacated to our non-existent second home in the sunshine, but did appreciate being supplied with frequent cups of coffee. They kindly found us boards reclaimed from a previous job they'd done, and promised not to go over budget.

Great! We get a floor!

No, not great. Because, you see, it was raining.

Tim the floorer (not his real name) ripped up all the floorboards and had a mild breakdown. Under our house, in the weirdly deep crawlspace, was about two feet of water, and it was rising.

Not only that, but the electrical wiring under the floors was dodgy, and he didn't fancy being fried. Luckily, a friend was able to swoop in and fix it so we didn't accidentally murder this poor man who was starting to seriously question his life choices.

We pumped the water out while Tim worked, and it just kept raining, and the water kept coming. "It must be a drain," he said.

Expensive Drain People came and put expensive green dye in the pipes, and the water kept coming. But it was clear. No green to be seen. What is this mystery river under our house??

Turns out, it is a river. Or, at least, it used to be. After some (metaphorical) digging, we found out that the pub at the end of the road used to be called "The RiverName Hotel".

Good to know. At least we know where all the damp was coming from.

The Expensive Drain People cheerfully told us it was groundwater and toddled off, leaving us to deal with it.

We continued to either stay in the caravan or leap across joists like mountain goats in order to reach the bathroom. The heroic Tim kept putting in new joists and I (non-metaphorically) dug out a hole in the crawlspace, in order to install a permanent pump. Our apparently well-meaningly-misogynistic floorer was shocked to see a 5'3" woman wielding a spade in a pile of rubble, but was quickly mollified with more coffee.

Eventually, the floor was in.

But the walls were so damaged by damp that everything needed stripping, tanking, replastering, and repainting.

"I'll leave you my big ladder until we come back to sand it all, in case your husband wants to use it," Tim said kindly, somehow managing not to notice that I was actually up a ladder at the time of the conversation, holding a wallpaper stripper and wreathed in steam and bits of paper. "Is it time for a cup of coffee?"

It's finally official: the builders arrive in a fortnight to rip up our entire floor and make a new (flat) one. Everything downstairs has to go upstairs and we, two adults, an 11-year-old and three cats, will be largely staying in a caravan in the garden.

A tiny, vintage caravan which is 10ft long.

In October.

Not going to lie, I'm starting to worry.

[anathemafiction]

Okay, so today I found myself in the unfortunate circumstance of being trapped in a terribly dull foyer, waiting for my turn to be tortured (I'm being dramatic here, I wasn't exactly tortured, it was a dentist appointment) when I realized I had forgotten both my book and my notebook at home ( ཀ ʖ�� ཀ). So I did what I always do to avoid awkward eye contact with strangers - I started to daydream.

About the outline of Book 2. And I'm so EXCITED. I always knew the important points the story had to hit, of course, but now I think I have a tangible map of the whole book in my head - which I'll transfer to paper the minute Book 1 is submitted. And... I can't wait to write it!

It is going to be an eventful ride. A ride akin to mounting Billy, with his lame gait and his wild temper and unpredictable moods.

Most of this first book is to set the world and set the mood and give the readers space to place both feet firmly on the ground. To connect with the lore of this bastardization of a medieval Europe, connect with how its people think and live. But, most importantly, connect with your own character.

But Book 2 onwards, I don't have to tread as lightly. All major characters would have been introduced, and I can start building upon those foundations. Rafters and beams, wall studs and floor joists are all well and good. But it's not those you focus on when you step into a cathedral. You notice the stained glass, the columns, the gold. The light falling on the silver cross. All of the painted saints, staring down at you.

Book One is the stonework. Book 2 onwards shall be the rest.

[13atoms]

Grit (Javier Peña x F!Agent!Reader)

This is my first time writing for Narcos, but I really liked Peña as a character, so here we are. I might do a second part of this, let me know what you think!

Friends-to-lovers, set during s2, no smut but canon-typical nsfw. [4.9k]

*

You sighed, then coughed out a delirious laugh, as the news crackled through Murphy’s radio.

It had been yet another trap, yet another informant you couldn’t trust, yet another victory for Escobar. You, Murphy and Peña were sat in a tense little circle, huddled around Javi’s messy desk. The evening had lasted forever, a whole carton of smokes crumbled into the ash tray, each of you nursing headaches from clenched jaws, palms sweaty, tired of the endless threats from Steve to go and join the agents in the field.

Each stutter of noise on the radio had signalled a new round of tense glances between the three of you, notes scribbled down, short fingernails carving half-moon into palms.

Then, it was over. No fatalities on any side seemed a small miracle, but you knew Javi took no pleasure in hearing that the enemy hadn’t lost anyone either. Shot and bleeding and bruised, every bastard who had walked into that fight managed to scramble away. The transmission from the scene finished curtly, and you felt the three of you deflate.

“Fuck,” Peña muttered.

Murphy slamming his closed fists onto the desk painfully hard.

You exhaled, reeling from the whole evening, stretching back in your chair and wondering what the hell this meant for tomorrow.

“Again,” you sighed, hearing the other agents grunt in shared frustration.

Leaning forward you perched your elbows on the desk, throwing your notes away from you in disgust, letting your head fall into your hands. Your eyes ached, your very bones feeling unimaginably fragile as your muscles untensed and your heart fought to restore calm to your body. It was no good. Adrenaline like this would last hours.

Murphy grabbed his gun from the desk, kicked his chair away as he stood, storming from the room. When you looked up to Javier, worried about what the stupid bastard might do, he just rolled his eyes.

You had a sneaking suspicion that the three of you would be spending your pay checks on whiskey that night.

“Fucking hell,” you declared, more to fill the silence than anything else.

Peña gave a strange little laugh, shaking his head. He copied you, elbows on the table, letting his forehead fall heavily to his palms with the weary exhaustion which had plagued all of you since you first heard the name Escobar.

“What a shit show.”

You nodded in agreement, aching eyes closed. Each blink felt like it would scratch, the darkness of the office only broken by the shitty fluorescent light which created a tiny island of life around Peña’s desk. Everyone else was on the raid, or at home.

Sensible.

“We have to get him. One day. That bastard can’t run forever.”

Peña’s hum of agreement had no conviction, it was as uncertain as you felt, but you liked to imagine he really believed you.

You could feel your body giving up on you, so deprived of everything human for so long in pursuit of a man who always managed to escape back into the shadows. Hunger gnawed at your stomach, the muggy heat parched your lips, your head ached from the smokiness of the room and the sleep which evaded you more and more these days. Your skin felt dirty, no matter how often you washed, stained with guilt and the rivers of blood which ran through Bogotá. It didn’t matter how often Peña told you it wasn’t your fault: you knew your guilt, your sense of inadequacy, would weigh on you for as long as the Cartel was alive and operational.

He felt it too, the hypocrite.

The hunt had drained everything from you. Every ounce of softness and humanity. How long had it been since you were hugged? Since you knew a peaceful night’s sleep or a kind touch? Since you entered a room without imagining the ceiling joists falling under the force of a car bomb? You had slept with a gun nearby since you had joined the DEA here, thinking yourself paranoid. Now, you slept with the damn thing loaded.

“I had such a good feeling about this one,” Peña mused, more to himself than anyone else. You knew he would go home tonight filled with guilt.

Maybe he would take it out on some poor sex worker, fuck away his guilt and fear and frustration.

Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he would call you, pretend the phone lines weren’t monitored as the two of you spoke in vague terms. Unable to discuss work on an unsecured line, desperate to hear something real from another human being, exchanging snippets of your shaking voices until one of you finally managed to find sleep.

With nothing else to discuss, the two of you would talk about yourselves.

You never knew how much was true. How much was omitted. You lied sometimes, out of instinct more than anything, and you knew Javi did too. People like you always did. Beneath it all, though, you got the strange sense that you were really hearing something honest about him.

In the deep grumble of his voice, his landline phone cord stretched to his bed as he took the distraction as a chance to drift off, you would hear something real about him. A story from his youth, some reminder that he was real and mortal, a complaint about an injury that wouldn’t heal, some grievance with a dry cleaner. Even the scratch of his stubble as he ran a hand over it sounded like a confession. A reminder you both had beating hearts.

Every word you exchanged, hitched breaths, waiting for reactions or hums down the phone to tell one another you were smiling.

That felt real.

You blinked, wincing at the horrid overhead lights, which seemed to flicker periodically, only when it would really piss you off. Javi was looking at you with concern, the deep lines of his forehead contorted over a raised eyebrow. His badge was in one hand – he’d been fidgeting with it for hours – but his over hand was extended towards you. Palm up, like he was offering it to you.

When you met his eyes you saw worry, mixed with sheer exhaustion, and tried to offer a weak smile.

Someone was moving in a corridor outside, and he waited for their steps to grow quiet until he spoke.

“Are you okay?”

He didn’t need an answer. The weak smile you offered felt like enough to make you cry, and he closed his open fist, nodded his head in understanding.

“Yeah,” he sighed.

He shared the same burden, the same burnout, pulling him to the ground with ten times the force of gravity, yet refusing to let him take a break in pursuit of these bastards.

“Go home,” he offered sincerely, raising that awkwardly hovering hand to clap onto your shoulder.

You closed your eyes. There was nowhere you wanted to be more than your own bed, but as you devoted a second to thinking about getting home, your body felt impossibly heavy.

“I’m exhausted,” you admitted, hoping Javi didn’t notice the tremble in your voice.

“You look it,” he agreed.

With a raised eyebrow and half-hearted glare you had him scrambling to apologise.

“I- I mean, you look lovely, doll. Always do. Just, shattered. I can barely see it –”

When you laughed, he realised you’d been joking, letting his head fall onto the desk braced by his exposed forearms. You glanced at the clock, realising it was gone midnight. None of you would be in the next day. You’d already gotten the time off, knowing the raid would run late.

They usually did.

Especially lately, everything the DEA did seemed to become an unmitigated disaster.

“Give me a minute, ‘til I can be bothered to walk to my car,” you mumbled, knowing Javi would understand your words.

You admired the mussed up back of his hair, looking worse-for-wear after a day of being tousled and pulled at by his twitchy hands. You wanted to fix the piece which was sticking straight up, but your arms felt too heavy to move.

Adrenaline was a funny thing. It left you jittery, pent-up, and yet completely stationary.

It would be fine once you moved, you knew. You’d forced your body through this gruelling pattern often enough.

You rolled your neck, moaning at the tightness in the muscles, and Javi looked up with that damn cheeky grin. He should be exhausted, but there he was, eyebrows raised, eyes gleaming with mischief. You groaned at him. That man could find an innuendo anywhere.

About to look away, you forced yourself to meet his challenge instead.

“I’m starting to see why you go to those fuckin’ brothels,” you drawled. “You think I could convince them to give me a neck rub?”

“I’m sure they’ll rub anything you want, sweetheart.”

You rolled your eyes, laughing as one hand remained on the back of your neck, the muscle rock solid from hours in this stupid metal chair. He stretched out his closed fists and stood wordlessly, taking his place behind your chair like it was the most natural thing in the world. You were about to say something when he commandingly rolled your head forwards, tugging your collar down. When his warm hands found your neck, you gave him a rumbling, contented moan far better than the one which had piqued his interest.

For just a second you felt the slow movements on your neck halt, before he continued to clumsily kneed at the muscle either side of your spine. It hurt, his strong hands against all those tender spots, but it was the best kind of ache.

His hands grew gentler, rubbing softly for a moment, before he spoke.

“Better?” he grunted, and you found yourself scanning the room for something reflective, disappointed that you couldn’t drink in the image of Javier behind you.

“Better,” you choked out, your voice unnatural as you felt the closeness of his touch affecting you.

It had just been too long, you told yourself.

Fuck, you wanted him to do that to the rest of your back. Your limbs. Those strong hands learning your body. And more, if he wanted it.

He cleared his throat and stepped away, and you rolled your shoulders, starting to collect your notes and belongings to leave. Javi slipped his jacket on, adjusting the collar and shaking the arms into place, and you fought not to watch.

“That’ll save you some money from the ladies of the night,” he teased, his tone just a little flatter than it ought to be.

You knew him well enough to sense awkwardness in that rough voice.

“Who said anything about ladies?” you shot back. “Are there male prostitutes? Must be.”

Javi seemed a little shaken, less steady on his feet as he took a second attempt to kick his chair under his desk. He was squaring up papers and stationary as if that was all it would take to tidy the mess around his typewriter, refusing to meet your eyes.

“I haven’t met any,” he ground out, “so I’m not sure I can help you there.”

“And I thought you were a connoisseur.”

You were a little taken aback when he didn’t laugh, and the playful smile fell from your lips. You hadn’t realised how much you were waiting for his deep chuckle, his silence forming a strange missing link in your conversation. Looking up at him, you found him staring at your shoes.

“I’m just teasing, Javi,” you started to apologise.

“No, no. No worries.”

He cleared his throat, playing with the notebook, badge, and keys in his grasp. Passing them from hand to hand. He walked abruptly to the door, toeing it open with his shoe, one hand on the light switch as he waited for you. As you joined him, he looked down, that handsome face distorted with a slight frown.

Frowning seemed to come a little to easily to his features these days.

“I’ll walk you to your car,” he rumbled, and you nodded gratefully.

He locked up behind you, and you felt a pang of guilt for ruining a perfectly good moment. You could still feel the phantom touch of his hands on your neck, the callouses of his fingers, experienced with women and yet inexperienced in such gentle touches.

The two of you strode down the dark corridors, and you wondered if he’d always walked that far away from you. He was walking a few feet ahead, and it felt like miles.

“I really didn’t mean anything by it,” you apologised, mumbling in the hopes he might not reply.

“No, I… I’m not upset. It’s fine. I’m just tired.”

You hummed, knowing he could sense your dissatisfaction with his answer. You were too dazed to find the right words.

As you stepped out into the muggy evening air, blinking against the flood lights, both of you froze. There was some commotion in the parking lot. Someone in plainclothes detained by a guard and another man dead on the ground, riddled with bullet holes. You weren’t sure why, but even after all the violence you saw every day, the puddle of blood around him made you clench your jaw with disgust.

Peña stepped in front of you defensively. He usually treated you as just another officer, but off-duty his protectiveness always seemed to kick in. Tonight, you felt your heart clench in gratefulness, as he approached the scene carefully, fingers on his holster. You were too exhausted to keep up with the rapid conversation between Javier and the guards, only tearing your gaze from the dead stare of the body on the ground when Peña called your name. A third time. He waved a hand in front of your face, and you blinked rapidly, apologising as you focused back in on the moment.

You expected the off-white flash of his teeth, laughing at your slowness, some snarky comment about seeming slow, doll. His solemn frown, his concern, was more startling than the flash of his palm in front of your face.

“That’s it,” he told you gruffly, one hand wrapped lightly around your bicep, “I’m driving you home.”

You laughed, half in surprise, and he smiled wearily.

“You’re exhausted.”

Ignoring his comment, you frowned, words tumbling from your mouth before you could stop them.

“Can you call me? Tonight?”

You knew it was pathetic. You sounded pathetic. You knew that.

He went to reply, and you found yourself unable to stop speaking to hear the answer.

“I just… I don’t know how I’ll sleep. I think… I want to hear your voice,” you stumbled.

Javier sighed, smiled slightly, gave a surprisingly bashful nod of his head.

“I’ll call.”

The two of you climbed into his car in silence, and you kept your focus on the moving dials of the dashboard as Javi crawled past the crime scene, joining traffic. The radio hummed quietly, indistinguishable from the noise outside, and you rest your head on the edge of the seat. As Javier drove you through the city streets you felt your energy return, as you knew it would. It always happened like this. You would be too exhausted to leave, be tempted to make a camp on the cool concrete floor of the office. Then, as soon as you were almost at your own front door, you would have the energy to run laps of the block.

You watched out the window, catching reflected glimpses of the flex of Javier’s forearms as he shifted gear, the columns of his neck as he shouted to other drivers, and deft way he handled the steering wheel.

Flashes of red and pink lights made you smile slightly as the car crawled through traffic. It wasn’t a part of town you’d visited outside of work, but you recognised the streets. Javi rolled down the window as you passed brothels, the darkness punctuated by flashes of beautiful women who cooed at Javi from their doorways. You refused to let yourself wonder how many he knew by name.

Then you wondered why you cared.

“Don’t want me to drop you off?” he teased, and you rolled your eyes.

You wondered if Javi had really taken this longer route on purpose, just to make a joke. From the smile on his face, you would believe it. He looked pleased with himself as you gave a groan, trying to hide your amusement.

“Any of them your type?” he goaded again, gesturing out the window, chewing his words.

You shifted in your seat, sitting up properly, blinking back a headrush as everything suddenly felt real again.

“None of them look much like John Travolta,” you noted, smiling as yet another gaggle of women gave the car flirty waves.

A few called out male names, fakes names you presumed, and you saw the man beside you wince. You waved back, smiling. Javier groaned, thumping his thumb against the leather of the steering wheel.

“Travolta? Really?”

You laughed, the lightest you’d felt all day, at the grimace on Peña’s face.

“Yes, Travolta! I’d totally pay a Travolta look alike. You got a problem with that?”

“He’s too soft. No grit.”

“He seems nice!”

Truthfully, there wasn’t much time for films out here. Even less American celebrity gossip. But you remembered him being very popular before you left.

“You could pick up a Travolta look-alike at any bar in this damn city, they’d be falling over themselves. You certainly wouldn’t need to pay them.”

You gave a private smile at the hypocrisy in his voice, as he scoffed over the idea of paying someone for sex. As if he was short on women who found him attractive.

“Yes, but unlike any old bloke in a bar, if I paid they couldn’t fall asleep on me after two minutes.”

Even as the traffic picked up speed, Javi rubbed a hand over his face in frustration, groaning yet again.

“That’s fuckin’ depressing.”

You could hear the unsaid pet name on his tongue, a strange stutter to the rhythm of his sentences, and you wondered why he held it back. The drawl of doll or sugar when he spoke to you was as natural as breathing at this point.

“Yeah.”

The red lights of brothels were far behind you now, and yet Javi was still driving the wrong way, taking a longer route to your place. You bit your lip, looking straight ahead and wondering why he was stalling taking you home.

Hoping you knew the reason.

Javier suddenly shouted, clutched the steering wheel as a car full of young guys cut him off, one hand reaching out like a safety harness across your chest as he slammed the brakes on. As soon as his arm was there, inches from your chest, it was gone again. He was changing gear and honking his horn and swearing under his breath, and you were trying to process the tight feeling in the pit of your stomach. He apologised as he swung the steering wheel, taking a side street to avoid the car ahead, wary of the guns and middle fingers waved from the windows by young men still convinced they were invincible under the cover of night.

You exhaled shakily, blinking away sleepiness as you tried to process what had happened, frustrated at yourself for your slowness.

He seemed to remember himself as the car crawled past sleeping houses, the headlights sweeping across cobblestone, finally in the direction of your place.

“Sorry, darling,” he muttered, fingers tapping on the wheel irately.

“No problem. Can’t be careful enough, at the moment.”

He hummed and nodded, gave you a quiet sideways glance before training his eyes on the road again. One hand rested on the gear shift, curved around so his wrist brushed your thigh as you uncrossed and crossed your legs. He glanced towards you again, something so inconspicuous you hardly recognised it, and you wondered if he knew you were trying not to stare.

The brakes complained under Peña’s foot as he finally rolled to a stop outside your building, the night as quiet as Bogotá ever got. There were a few lights on in your block, the faint shouts of an arguing couple muffled as they drifted on the late night air, a baby crying, faint sirens. All reminders that you were yet to settle this torn city.

Javier cleared his throat and reached for the handbrake, cutting the engine but leaving one hand on the ignition. No doubt it was one of those habits which had saved his life once, and then he could never drop it. You felt the slight movement of the car as his foot finally left the brake, and you smiled privately at how overly cautious he was, ready for anything to go wrong.

He shook slightly at the gear shift, checking it was in neutral.

“I’ll pick you up tomorrow, if you want. To get your car. Or the next time you need to be in the office. Whenever you need me, doll. Just be safe.”

He swiped at his moustache nonchalantly as he spoke then reached for a cigarette, leaving it between his lips unlit. He pulled a lighter from his pocket one handed, poised to light it as you spoke.

“Thanks, Javi. I really appreciate it, you’re too good to me.”

He froze up, before slowly moving the lighter to the centre console of the car, dropping it into the tray there with a clatter.

“Don’t say shit like that,” he grumbled around the cigarette, but you smiled anyway.

Seeing his prickly exterior come out only meant he was protecting himself from being vulnerable. He looked up at your building, ducking to survey the height of it. You knew it was rougher than where he and Murphy had ended up, but you liked the community of it.

“We gotta get you moved closer to us,” he muttered to himself, shaking his head for show, and you huffed out a laugh.

“I’m fine, Javi. Thank you for the lift.”

As you reached for the door handle he seemed to startle, the bubble of calm inside the car burst as a rush of hot air and noise swarmed through the open door.

“I’ll walk you in,” he declared, stashing his gun beneath his jacket and pulling the keys from the ignition.

“It’s fine, please, you can call me tonight,” you insisted, your feet finally hitting the ground as you got out of the passenger seat.

When you looked back into the vehicle for a gentle goodbye, you were surprised to see something sad on his face. Something disappointed, lonely, enough to make your heart clench.

“Unless you want to come in?”

He was beside you in an instant, the car needlessly loud in the click as Javi twisted his keys in the door to lock it.

“You’ve had a long day,” he reminded you, one hand hovering insistently behind your lower back, refusing to touch or grow further from you as you approached the entrance to your building.

It felt like forever ago, the failed raid, the violence at your office, the feeling of being fused to that bruising-hard metal chair as your heart raced in time with the static of the radio. The memory of Javi’s hands on you had finally vanished for just a second, until he brought it right back.

“You have too, Javi,” you muttered, looking away as you found your key.

“I’ll sleep like a baby tonight,” he grumbled, feet heavy on the stairwell as you ascended to the second story of the building.

“No other plans?”

Your question was supposed to be light-hearted, both of you breathing more heavily as you reached the threshold to your apartment. Key in the lock, you turned to see Javi leaning against the wall as casually as if he belonged there.

“None,” he whispered, “I’m here as long as you need me.”

Who said I needed you?

His arms were folded, fists clenched, and you wondered if he was stopping himself from reaching out.

He followed you inside quickly, taking the liberty of sliding over every lock on the door before you had the chance to. You could see him mentally sweeping the room, craning his neck to look for anything which might make his instincts rear up. You crossed to the small kitchen counter, dumping everything you were carrying down, as he gently paced the small space. He stuck his head into the bedroom, the bathroom, just checking.

Somewhere deep down, you knew why.

He would never forgive himself if something happened to you.

“Drink?”

Peña nodded, and you stepped back to let him raid the fridge himself, needing no permission. He’d been here enough times, though you couldn’t remember a time without Murphy. It was a different feeling, just the two of you. Calmer. Safer. You couldn’t meet his eyes as you moved around to switch on a couple of side lights. You knew you should eat, but you couldn’t walk back to the kitchen. Not while Peña was there.

The shouting had stopped, the baby had silenced, and yet you knew you wouldn’t sleep if you went to bed now.

Not a chance in hell.

You wondered if that was what Javier was doing too: distracting himself from the thoughts which would find him in sleep. By eating everything in your kitchen, apparently.

“I should cook for you, sometime,” he called, though his voice was quieter than you’d expected. Closer.

“You any good?” you teased, straightening up a stack of papers which would immediately slump into a mess again.

“Not really.”

You laughed a little, hearing his matching chuckle behind you. As you turned you found yourself suddenly between his arms, so close you could see the irritated red threatening the whites of his eyes. You wanted to stroke a thumb across those lines in the furrow of his brow, force him to relax until he turned back into the bright-eyed man you’d once known, who relished wasting government money on the finer things in life, and cheered like he’d won a star player when you were assigned to his team.

It seemed like a lifetime ago, and yet here he was, still in front of you. The same man, beneath the exhaustion and the things he’d seen since starting this damn job. As you were examining the lines of his face, the dark circles which never quite managed to overshadow the beauty of his dark eyes, he was staring at you.

He gave you warning, time to move away or speak or – something. He told you what he wanted with heavy eyelids and a light grip on your jaw, in the slight shuffle of his body closer to yours. Then he kissed you, like it had always made sense. It didn’t feel like the first time, he felt familiar. The slight tickle of facial hair against your face, the tensing of his fingers, seeming to engulf your whole skull and guiding you to lean into him as he groaned into your mouth.

The sound of your lips separating made your eyes open, staring wide at Javier like he was a new man. His grip on your face slipped to hands resting on your shoulders as he watched you, waiting for a reaction, bottom lip between his teeth as he bit down a grin.

You smiled openly, only able to look at his face, and he matched you with a laugh. He pulled you with him as he walked backwards, dragging you on top of him as he sat on your couch, muffling your apologies with a kiss as you fell heavily onto his lap.

The couch creaked beneath him as your mouths met heavily, but if Peña had even felt the weight of you, he didn’t flinch. He was kissing you like the world was ending, like he had seconds before the two of you would be gone forever, and he was determined not to miss a second against your skin.

It had felt like that, you supposed. That you would be ripped from one another too soon. Countless times together you had been seconds from death, an inch from bleeding out, hours from being blown up. It could all end soon, the two of you swallowed in flames or a shower of bullets. Perhaps he was making up for each and every time you had called for one another across a soon-to-be crime scene, desperately glad to see each other unharmed.

Peña’s hand on your waist grounded you, dragged you back into the moment, and you poured everything you had into kissing him so hard his lips would be reddened for days. You wouldn’t apologise for the roughness of it – he was determined to bruise you in response, sharing the kind of desperation which couldn’t be expressed in any other way.

Finally his second hand found your waist, gently prompting you to sit up in your straddle across his lap, staring at this new glassy-eyed, wild expression he wore.

“I’m no Travolta,” he panted, the words ghosting across you face.

You sighed. No living that one down.

“He’s not got enough grit for me anyway,” you promised, pressing a gentle kiss to the aquiline slope of his nose, before strong hands guided your lips straight back to his.

[whatdoesshedotothem]

Monday 22 June 1835

7

11 ¾

no kiss damp rainy morning F59° at 8 am in study - dusting there till 8 ½ - out ¼ hour - a few minutes with my father - breakfast at 8 55 - out at 10 for about ½ hour - a little while with my father and Marian - A- sat downstairs and I sat with [her] from about 11 to 2 reading the 1st 123 pages of ‘Lectures upon the Ecclesiastical history of the 1st 3 centuries from the crucifixion of Jesus Christ to the year 313 by the reverend Edward Burton, D.D. Regius professor of Divinity and canon of Xst church. In 2 volumes vole 1 Oxford printed by S. Collingwood, printer to the university, for the author; sold by J.H. Parker: and by J.G. and F. Rivington, London 1833’ 8vo vol. 1 pp. 391.

out with A- at 2 ¼ - she rode and I walked by her side to yew-trees, she to see George Sykes’s widow and to see the progress of the new barn for Hopkin - Henry Sykes, George Hartley and Midgley employed by Booth and getting on very well - the building will be ready for the roof on Saturday - sauntered about there perhaps ½ hour - Charles and James H- went this afternoon to lay the joists to carry the floor over the cowhouse - rain came on as I returned before getting to German house across the fields - stopt at Hannah Green’s for silver and for shelter near an hour and home at 5 ¼ - out in outbuildings till about 6 when A- returned from Cliff hill - 2 masons and the boy and Robert Schofield and his man this afternoon (not here in the morning afraid of rain) levelling for the stalls in the front stable - Carter set the posts - John Booth heard good character of Joseph Sharp from Mr Edward Emmett - saw the man asked why he did not come today as agreed - seemed uncertain - will let me know on Wednesday or Thursday .:. I will have nothing more to say to him - dinner at 6 ¼ - ½ hour with my father and Marian - coffee - sat downstairs - letter from Mr Harper dated yesterday - has engaged a young man in London as clerk of the works - Mr. H- will be tomorrow morning by the mail and with him Mr Grey, the landscape gardener - Read aloud to A- from page 124 to 148 Lectures on Ecclesiastical history - 20 minutes with my aunt till 10 5 - damp rainy morning till between 10 and 11 - then fair but dull till between 3 and 4 pm and afterwards rainy afternoon and evening tho’ fair about 8 pm - F59° now at 10 20 pm

[possumcollege]

Apparently I've only drawn all 3 sisters together twice. They should hang out more.

I love these scenes because they've got one of my all-time favorite drawings of Joist:

and a rare cameo by Silo's left eye.

[crittertongue]

Crittertongue no.21: Albatross pt.2

[ghoste-catte]

3,4,5 !

You didn't say which meme and I posted a couple last night, so I'm gonna go with this one. Thank you for the ask!

3. If you had to direct a scene from your fic, what would you choose? Why? What would it look like? What techniques would you use to convey certain emotions? What would the set look like?

Over the course of 90 fics, it's hard to pick one in particular, but there's a few where I'm, like, really into the imagery and can envision exactly how I'd want the "shot" to look. One of my faves is this little opening passage from 'i think we're haunted':

Lee stood awash in the golden light of his kitchen window, looking out over the dried grass of his backyard. The half-length curtains, crookedly hand-sewn by Tenten and speckled with cheery sunflowers, fluttered in the soft breeze drifting through the window screen.

It was autumn, and everything smelled of smoke.

Behind the thin spines of the maples that separated his yard from his one-street-over neighbor’s, the sun was starting to set. Gloaming light, stained orange by the leaves’ last dying hurrahs, filtered through the pale yellow cotton of the curtains and painted his fingers gold where they drummed on the steel behind the sink.

The house was old, narrow, taller than it was wide, and it seemed to tilt to and fro when the wind blew, the joists groaning and settling. It needed a lot of repair work, and the pipes spat rust before the water ran clear, the spigot juddering when Lee turned it on to wash the dust of moving day off his hands. But the house was his very own, his name on the deed and a mortgage looming in his bank account. Run-down though it may have been, his own house was the first sign of his true adult life opening up before him, perhaps a bit lately bloomed, but no less promising for it.

Lee grinned, and the shine of his teeth in the sunset flashed back at him from the windowpane.

This is definitely a moment where I can picture the establishing shot: a slow zoom over an autumn forest with a neighborhood tucked inside, focusing in on this crooked, narrow little house, passing over the dried grass of the backyard, zooming in past the fluttering curtains and into a focused shot of a sink full of dishes and lit-up hands turning on the faucet. The crisp, crunchy outdoor fall sounds transitioning into that sound that pipes make when they haven't been used in a long time--that buh-buh-buhbuhbuhbuh-shhhhh. Sort of the implication of something being above and not quite moored to this world, coming floating in to focus on this very quirky but ultimately mundane house. Panning around the kitchen to see the moving boxes and the pizza trash and the cups hung on their little hooks that have yet to be shattered--of course so later on that same pan could be used to show what a complete state of destruction the kitchen was in.

4. What are your main character(s)’ motivations? What do you consider their main drivers?

So, obviously this varies story-to-story, but I think it all boils down to one thing: love. Gaara and Lee both want to be loved so, so badly. They're just very different in what they consider love to be. Gaara equates love with a lack of fear, and with leaving a mark on the world (pre-reformation this is by killing people and asserting his existence, and post-reformation this would be by leading his village and changing the shinobi world for the better). Lee equates love with a sort of romantic ideal of adoration on a surface level, but from a deeper perspective I think he associates love with respect. The respect of a rival that you bested in battle, the respect of someone seeing you as an equal instead of something to look down on. I also think they're both--despite their bonds--terribly lonely people, searching for the other half of their whole. So I think that search for love and human connection drives both most of their canon actions and whatever they're doing in the fanfic I write.

5. What makes your main ship so compatible? Or, what makes them so incompatible? What do they see in each other?

Do people remember ship manifestos? Because I could write a ship manifesto on these guys. But off the top of my head:

Lee was the first person who touched Gaara, after years of not having been touched. I don't think it matters that it was in the course of a battle to the death, I just don't see any way for that not to have impacted Gaara's psyche.

Lee forgave Gaara without even having been apologized to. We can talk about whether that's an unhealthy approach to friendship or not, but I think in that moment of Gaara's life, where he was in the flux between being a monster and an ally, that sort of unconditional acceptance and forgiveness would have been exactly what he needed.

Gaara is someone that Lee sees as a rival and an aspiration, and we all know what the homoerotic underpinnings of the word 'rival' are in the Narutoverse.

And Lee calls him Gaara-kun. Gaara-kun. One of the highest ranking and most deadly shinobi in all 5 Nations, and Lee's like: Gaara-kun~ I mean. Come on.

Fun Meta Asks for Writers

[leapyearkisses]

O Captain, My Captain 2/2 - (m/m) Salem/Faughn

Part two of the soldier setting.

Lil’ bit of mess. Hair brushing. Yearning. Etc.

---

The bar was dim and full of smoke from the spitting of the fire in the grate.  Despite the proprietor’s efforts to shield against the storm, it was raining down the chimney, and the logs were hissing like hecklers at a bad variety show.  The haze collected in the ceiling joists with the smoke from the soldiers’ cigarettes. It was crowded and loud inside and stank of wet wool and spilled ale.  Could definitely have smelled of worse, though; Salem wasn’t complaining.  He tapped his lips against his empty mug, gaze lingering in the shadowed corner of the room.

“Another round for you, sir?”

He looked up, saw Maisie Harpe looking down her nose at him, serving tray under her arm.  Her expression was condescending.  Salem remembered it fondly.

“You don’t have to call me ‘sir,’” he said, but pushed his mug toward her.  “I’m still the same as I was.”

Maisie sniffed dismissively, picking it up.  “Gone off and joined the war.  Too good for a potter’s life.  You think you’re going to come out the other end of it?”  Her blonde curls shimmered around her round face with a flash of lightning.  “Pa says it’s like watching sausages get made.”

“Hold your tongue, girl!”  John Hadditch, the blacksmith of Yens Hollow, came up behind her and shooed her off.  “Bad luck talking of that over beer.  Go and bring us something better than this swill your Pa’s set aside for soldiers.”  He sat down across from Salem and lifted his wooden leg around the bench with a grunt.  “She still wants you to be pullin’ her pigtails, Sammy.”  He chuckled.

Salem cleared his throat, hiding a smile.  “She’s got better prospects than me.”

“Aye, maybe an officer?  I heard they’re keeping the brass nice and polished at Maven Broadmoor’s place.”  John leaned in.  “You got a roof over your head, Sam, or are you out with the poor suckers in the mud?”

“Well, I’m not really brass.  Maybe copper,” Salem said, accepting a new tankard from Maisie.  “Mrs. Broadmoor is letting me sleep in the horse loft with the other lieutenants. Better than the back pasture.” He tapped his fingers on the table.  When Maisie had walked away to another group, he leaned in.  “I need to know if it’s safe to talk.”

“Not in here,” said John, taking a long draught of beer.  “Come to my shop on the morrow, or I’ll come down to the farm if the bloody sky hasn’t fallen.”  Thunder shook the double-paned windows.  “My leg’s not as it used to be, though, and riding is a trial.”

“We can come to you.”  Salem had been given a small company of men solely for this purpose of meeting with the trustworthy locals… or at least those they hoped were trustworthy.  “On the morrow, if, as you say, we’re all still here.”  

—

It was still raining when he finished the night, snapping the neck of his raincoat closed at the door, as if that would help.  Maisie Harpe moved in the fallen darkness of the banked fire, turning out the oil lamps on the walls and drawing blankets over the men who had passed out at their benches from either drunkenness or exhaustion.  Salem kept his tongue to himself, just tipped his hat to her on his way out.

His horse was none too keen to be drawn out of the stable, digging her heels in while he tacked her up.  “I know,” he murmured, securing the saddle girth.  “But you’ll be home soon enough.”

The streets were the same as he remembered them, and he rode confidently toward the edge of town even in the storm.  He’d gone to school here as a boy, every morning hitching a ride on a wagon into town from the neighboring village.  His father had been a cooper, building barrels for beer, whiskey, fish, pickles… whatever the fur traders needed, and then when that started drying up, whatever anyone else needed.  His mother had been a potter.  Technically, he still owned the house and the workshops, but he’d given the plot to a cousin to manage.  He wondered absently, focused on the echoing of his horse’s hooves on the cobbles, whether he should go by the place while he was stationed here.  Surely no one would begrudge him the chance to see family.  …Although they weren’t close.

His mare moved faster on the dirt roads despite the muddy furrows, picking up her pace going out to the farmlands.  Salem hunched against the rain.  Water was running down his neck and his face, and an ill-timed breath sent a drip up his nose, too.  He ducked to the side with a loud sneeze.  “Hruuscht!”  His horse laid her ears back.

“Sorry, girl.”  He wiped his face on his wet sleeve and sighed.  It was very late, but he thought, maybe, he should try to meet with the Captain before he went to sleep.  To update him on the idea of meeting with Hadditch tomorrow, to tell him what Salem had overheard while drinking, …to inspect the state of him.  Salem sighed.

—

There was a lamp still burning at the Broadmoor farm.  Salem put his horse away and then slogged up to the main house, shivering on the back stoop.  Martha, the maid, let him in to the kitchen and took his jacket, scolding him for coming back so late.  She probably thought him a souse.  He let her chide him as she brought him a towel and a heel of bread.  He ate it after she’d returned to her bed, then left his boots on the hearth, hoping that the fire would dry them somewhat, before going upstairs.  He trod carefully.  Major General Wallace was staying here as well, and he was said to be a rough character when untimely roused. 

Light flickered beneath the door of the yellow bedroom.  Salem tapped lightly against the paneling and waited for an acknowledgement.

“Yes?” The Captain’s voice was hoarse.  “I don’t need another of your bitter infusions, Doctor.”  He coughed.  “I’ve had more than enough of them.”

“It’s Lieutenant Desidero, sir.”

“Come in.”

Salem stepped into the room.  The Captain had a candle burning and was writing at the desk, quill scratching over the parchment at a steady pace that was uninterrupted by Salem’s visit.  Captain Faughn was wearing his hair down for once.  It spilled down his back like blood, the same shade, tangled and damp with rain or sweat.  Hardly regulation, Salem could hear in his mind, the voice of his long-ago trainer barking away in memory.  His gaze followed the length of it to the Captain’s trim waist.  He was in his shirtsleeves.

“I have a report,” he forced himself to say.  “A short one.  I went to the village tavern tonight.”

“Tell me about it,” said Faughn, without looking up.

So Salem did, describing the state of the place, the bearing of the owner, Maisie Harpe, the blacksmith.  He talked about the bar’s stable, which had a new roof, and the men who had worked on it and dined there that night.  The church had burned two years ago and been rebuilt a little bigger, with a new back room, by the same men.  Men from trapper families with nothing to trap anymore, back in town since a few months ago.

Faughn listened to the report without commenting, though he did lay his quill down sometime in the middle.  By the candlelight, his eyes were heavy-lidded and thoughtful.  His cheeks were flushed high with fever.

“Nice job,” he said when Salem had finished, rubbing his hands together.  “I knew I was right to trust this to you.  If all goes well here, I will be sure to give you a commendation.”  He sniffed hard and Salem heard a liquid shift of congestion in his sinuses.  “Is there anything else?”

Salem swallowed.  “Your hair, sir?”

“My hair?”  Faughn frowned.

“I’d like to brush it for you.”

—

The Captain’s comb was made of whale ivory.  Salem sat on the bed behind him and drew the fine teeth carefully down through the Captain’s hair, trying to untangle it without pain.  The Captain’s hair was soft despite the rigors of the war.  Salem supposed he must keep it oiled under his hat, or some other way protected from the elements.  “I’m not hurting you, am I?” he asked.  

Faughn had made a small noise, but now he lifted a hand to dismiss concerns.  “No.  No, you’re fine.”  His fingers were slender and strong, but he curled them now under his nose.  “I’m going to hh-” 

Salem slipped the comb free as the Captain bent forward, crushing his nose to his knuckles.

“Nkktsch!  Ngktschx!”  His breath caught again.  “Hah- hahktschiu!”  Moisture shone against the smooth curve of Faughn’s nostrils in the candlelight.  He sniffed thickly and reached to the bedside table for a handkerchief.

“Bless you,” murmured Salem, gaze lingering.  He looked away when the Captain raised an eyebrow.  “How are you feeling?”

Faughn cleared his throat, low and irritated.  “I do wish people would stop asking me that.”  He dabbed at his nose but seemed hesitant to blow.  The corners of his dark eyes creased in uncertainty.

Salem traced his fingers over the comb, thumb pressed along the smooth edge from end to end.  The bedroom was warm from the farmhouse’s central fireplace.  Heat blossomed also in his belly.  He looked at his nail, snagged earlier on his horse’s reins, instead of at the Captain.  He could hear from the Captain’s breathing that he would sneeze again.  “My apologies.”

“Ngktschiu!”  Wet again, but this time enveloped by the folds of the handkerchief.  Salem could imagine how it might feel instead against his skin.  His arousal swelled.  Faughn groaned softly, a private sound.  Salem rose to his feet.

“I will report to you again tomorrow night,” he said, placing the comb on the clothes chest by the foot of the bed.  He could feel himself blushing.  Part of him wanted the Captain to turn and see it, too, but most of him knew to keep it close and hidden.  “Good night, sir.”

“Good night, Desidero.”

Salem closed the door behind him and then stood for a long moment in the empty hallway, listening to the rain.

[howtofightwrite]

Q&A: Broken Bag

This might sound silly but can someone actually generate enough force to break a punching bag or you have to be superhuman? My character is enhanced, thought.

No. It’s about wear and tear, poor construction, or improper use, not raw force. If you have a bag in good condition, which is properly set up, you won’t be breaking that by generating too much force.

So, where can this go wrong?

Wear and tear is the big killer here. Punching bags are designed to take a lot of abuse, but that does stack up over time, and they will wear out. Usually you would want to replace your bag when you start seeing damage before it fails catastrophically.

If you’re getting cheap bags, those will wear out much faster, and could could break under normal use. A major place to cut costs is in the shell materials. So, instead of leather, or ballistic nylon, you get nylon, or vinyl. This will start coming apart fairly quickly.

When you’re setting up a bag, unless it’s free standing, you’ll need to secure it to something. It may have a stand, or you may need to mount it into the ceiling. If it’s the ceiling, it needs to mount into a structural hardpoint, like a joist. For heavy bags, this could require holding over 100lbs. (The guildeline is that a heavy bag should be roughly half the user’s own weight.) Simply bolting that into “whatever,” won’t cut it, and the bag will tear free. If you’re lucky, it’ll come down when it’s first hung, though it’s theoretically possible you’d get the balance just right, and tear it out of the ceiling with your first hit.

One possible point of failure here is if a bag was properly mounted, but then replaced with bag too heavy for the rig. It would put extra strain on the mount, and potentially cause it to break.

There’s one specific kind of misuse that can result in all hell breaking loose: Replacing the bag’s stuffing with something much heavier. Most heavy bags are stuffed with scrap cloth (scrap leather is another popular choice.) If someone gets it into their mind that the they should replace it with sand, the resulting bag will be dramatically heavier and rock hard. This means the shell, stitching, mount, chains, everything will be under significantly more strain, and the chances of something breaking are much higher.

So, can you strike hard enough to break a punching bag? Not when you’re using it as intended. However, eventually, it will break, not because you hit it with superhuman strength but because it’s worn out. Punching bags have a fixed lifespan, and you’ll need to replace them as you use them up.

-Starke

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Q&A: Broken Bag was originally published on How to Fight Write.