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no-droids · 4 years ago

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The Secret

Pairing: Anakin Skywalker/Reader

Word Count: 4.2K

Rating: Explicit

Summary: On a dark and dreary night, Anakin tries to see if he can influence your dreams.

A/N: idk what in the hell this even is tbh I just started writing it two days ago idk what happened this is some inception shit but not the crazy ass mind bending plot twist part at the very end of inception but like just the cool middle part where you kinda get what’s sorta going on but not really okay anyways I gotta go

Warnings: There are DUBCON/NONCON ELEMENTS to this, smut/oral sex, a splash of m/m (sorta?), dark Anakin uses the force to mess with your dreams without your knowledge or consent so please read at your own discretion

***

Anakin knows it’s wrong.

It’s the middle of the night on a moon he never bothered learning the name of and Anakin knows it’s wrong when his eyes shift over to you for the fifth time in the past minute. Curled up with your back to him and the crackling firelight illuminating this tiny little cave, breathing soft and quiet through your nose as you sleep, the wind roaring monstrously outside. Anakin acknowledges it—the moral impropriety of even sitting here thinking about things he shouldn’t be with you so close by. It’s wrong, no getting around it.

But there’s also something inside him that… wants the wrongness.

He likes it. Anakin likes having secrets, he likes breaking rules even when nobody is consciously here to witness it. It makes him feel alive in a way that battlefields just can’t anymore, not after two years of constant conflict where the only enemies to feel his wrath have been comprised of nuts and bolts, their robotic cries never leaving him with any satisfaction anymore. At the start of the Clone Wars, sure, it was a thrill to slice through voice boxes and body parts, even if they were mechanical. But the droids aren’t afraid of death, they’re just programmed to stay alive. It’s like killing large, dumb swarms of bugs—it needs to be done for the common good but there’s never any true fulfillment in it anymore, it just feels like a task to be completed instead of an earnest, hard-earned goal.

He’s also been given direct permission to do it. He’s even been ordered to carry out enormous droid massacres on behalf of the Republic, but that’s the thing. Anakin isn’t looking for permission, see, it takes away half the thrill.

No, he wants to feel wrong. He wants to wonder if he shouldn’t have. He wants the quiet guilt, the sparkle of holding a secret he’ll never breathe a word about, the addictive power trip from having real influence over something, something equally as real.

Technically, Anakin is supposed to be on lookout right now. He’s meant to stay awake and patrol the perimeter of the cave for enemy combatants, but he doesn’t even bother pretending to be diligent when it’s just you two here. It’s not necessary. He’d be able to sense another lifeform miles away in this secluded, barren wasteland; there’s no threat to be found right now. He can keep warm by the crackling firelight in this cave, sheltered from the dust storm that spontaneously broke out a few hours ago. He can stay awake without moving a muscle and listen to your slow breathing all night long, letting it fill him with shameful desires he spends the daylight hours fighting and suppressing.

He silently flicks his gaze over to you once more, blinking as he studies you. He can sense your mind becoming creative in its slumber, beginning to swirl into dreamlike possibilities around yourself, about to choose a path for your consciousness to follow tonight. Yes, this is what he’s waiting for. He can’t force you to dream—that’s beyond his expertise as a Jedi. But if he finds himself in the right place at the right time, he can certainly try his best to… give you a suggestion.

The wind whistles outside and the fire pops quietly and you continue to breathe. In, and out. In, and out.

Anakin closes his eyes, and begins.

He first maps your body with the Force, trying to understand it on a deeper level. Gauge it—its proportions, its ambience, the thrumming lifeforce flowing through your veins even as you sleep. He has to be careful—as a fellow Knight, there’s no guarantee you won’t immediately be able to spot him exploring your energy in this way, there’s nothing to stop you from suddenly rolling over and asking just what exactly he thinks he’s doing.

But Anakin is patient. It’s one of the only times he can remember truly exercising that untapped potential inside him, perfectly content to allow you to drift while he works to find his bearings with you. Minds are complex, especially when they’re unconscious. They’re finicky and never stay in the same spot for long—it’s not like they evade, necessarily, but instead, they just… float around. Pulsing. In and out of existence, hiding behind and under immovable things, no rhyme or reason for it, vanishing into uncertainty and nothingness as soon as he thinks he’s found it. Like trying to find a microscopic air pocket in the depths of a pitch black ocean. He’s not losing any oxygen by existing right at the edges of your sleep, but it takes hard concentration to stay here, hidden, not allowing himself to slip. He’s looking, he’s looking… but he soon realizes he just needs to wait longer. He needs to wait until you float your way back around to him, until you present the opening yourself.

So Anakin waits.

And waits…

And then suddenly—

—There. He locks onto a flicker in the Force and holds, finally isolating and breaching the surface of your inner subconscious. Anakin smiles softly, a bead of sweat slowly dripping down his temple at the effort it took to locate you without alerting you of his presence. There you are. Maker, it sure is pretty in here, isn't it? He has you, he’s cradling the buried, hidden, most fragile part of your soul as you slumber, not knowing any better.

His heart thumps with excitement even though he’s barely done anything yet. To someone without sensitivity to the Force, they might just think the both of you are asleep right now. Just the two of you sitting still in this relatively small space, eyes closed, neither of you are touching, nobody has said anything or made any substantial movements in hours, nothing has changed in this world. All of it is existing in another plane, a place most people wouldn’t be able to recognize unless someone informed them of its existence, and even then, it would be beyond understanding.

But he has you now. He’s there, and he’s not going anywhere. He can allow his focus to dip just slightly, knowing your mind will pull him along through the comatose current. He senses you already working through the beginning whispers of dreams, but they’re not the kind people can ever remember. These aren’t formed, there’s no substance to them—it’s just pure, abstract dreamspace for your mind to drift through while you slumber.

Finding your true consciousness through all the murky, shapeless slumber was the test in skill. Now comes the luck.

Very carefully, without arousing any suspicion or drawing undue attention to himself, Anakin begins to drag the tip of his tongue against the back of his teeth. He doesn’t open his mouth, he doesn’t move a single muscle outwardly—he just lets his tongue begin to flitter around slowly in its enclosed cavern as he breathes, making the movements as soft and hypnotic as he can, matching the aimless way you’re carrying your mind and his shadow through the darkness.

He’s tried this before. Once or twice, with a pretty Ambassador he was tasked with protecting for a few months at the start of the Clone Wars, but the results were always less than ideal. He could never seamlessly transfer his desires through her consciousness before she awoke, perhaps because she wasn’t Force sensitive. The dream would either never happen, or he would push too hard and it’d turn into a rabid nightmare that fractured her thoughts and made her terrified to close her eyes for weeks. Not this time, though, Anakin isn’t going to allow it. Not with you, not after all the unprecedented effort it took to even just get himself here.

He finds a bit more passion to put into his movements, his jaw beginning to work with more purpose. Stars, he wants this to work, and while it’s probable that there’s an easier way to accomplish it, this isn’t something the Academy trains for. There’s only so much he can do except just be patient and giving with his soft, muted thoughts, urging you to make use of them without ever saying them aloud.

And suddenly, like the dark waves of your sleep decide to illuminate for him all on their own, your subconscious mind responds to the gentle stimulus. It carefully reaches out and studies the suggestion he’s silently offering, having spent what feels like an eternity trying to entice your rawest, most fundamental being into going somewhere it normally wouldn’t go, all without letting you know he’s even there.

His tongue is still moving. With purpose, with a specific intent in mind, Anakin allows his head to slowly fall back as he lifts his chin up towards it, wanting it more and more the longer you take to consider it, as if your mind is actively trying to tease him by playing hard to get. He can feel you right there, feel you thinking about it, and the whole thing is almost like some elaborate courting ritual while he waits with bated breath for you to decide whether or not to humor him.

But then, just when Anakin fears you may be too strong to be swayed, too powerful in the Force to be tempted by an outside source, you abruptly snatch the idea from him and start to run with it.

Suddenly parts of your spirit begin illuminating that should be dormant right now, and Anakin follows you, wherever you’re leading him. He knows none of this is necessarily intentional on your behalf—nobody can consciously pick and choose their dreams, not even Jedi. But this endeavor proves that it’s absolutely possible to subtly inspire them in each other, regardless of the morality behind it.

The wind continues to howl outside the cave and remind him that an entire universe still exists beyond your beautifully soporose mind, but the dreamscape gradually begins unfolding around him without any further prompting, requiring nothing more than what he’s already provided. Anakin’s tongue continues to simulate and suggest regardless, only now he feels the ghost of it beginning to materialize somewhere else besides the roof of his mouth, the sensations appearing before the images can be conjured to fill in the gaps. His hands suddenly tighten on his thighs at the soft, enticing feeling beginning to take root in you.

And oh. It’s… good. It feels different when his own body isn’t really the target of the stimulation, when he’s doing nothing more than simply experiencing it vicariously. Anakin supposes he could’ve bypassed all this effort, just aimed the pleasure more directly from the very beginning instead of working to inspire and coax it out of your own consciousness, but that was never his intention and it misses the point entirely. Where’s the challenge in it? The finesse is lost, it doesn’t appeal to him. It’s brash and brutish and not his style. No, this is what he wanted. He wanted to get just close enough to plant the most basic, fundamental idea in your head and then witness the rest of it all play out as a phantom passenger. Step back, strap in, and see how you kindle and manipulate the desire yourself, exactly the way you want it.

Anakin starts to breathe a little heavier through his nose, shoulders tense as he works to ride the slow swelling of your own prolonged pleasure with you, not knowing if or when it’s going to peak. He’s never made it this far before, he has no idea what to expect. Your consciousness does all the heavy lifting for him, your floor muscles move and contract without him needing to do anything to encourage it, the dream he seeded now completely taking over and whisking you both away.

But then… then suddenly Anakin doesn’t understand. Because yes, your mind works exactly the way he hoped it would—everything goes the incredibly precise direction he intended, and yet the destination is somehow… here? Back at the very beginning?

You dream of a cave. It’s exactly the same as the one you’re both silently holed up in for the night, and no new faces have appeared. If Anakin fluttered his eyes open at this specific moment, absolutely nothing around him would change. Except, perhaps, the subtle glow around everything—the watery way the air seems to be moving, as if it can’t decide whether it wants to exist or not so it strangely succeeds in doing both at the same time. He’s not really here—at least, he doesn’t think he is, he’s just seated on the dirt floor, appearing as nothing more than an invisible witness to it.

No. No, actually, he takes that back, he… is here. It takes him a moment to see the full picture as you’re still putting the puzzle pieces together, but… that’s him. A projection of himself at least, looking only slightly different but recognizable enough. Dark robes, robotic right arm, steady gaze.

But where are you? Anakin looks around the empty cave, still trying to understand how you’re painting this, his conscious mind moving much more rapidly than your own abstract one and yet also somehow taking so much longer to catch up to you. You’re not here. Why aren’t you here? He’s getting stuck on the details, he knows he’s lagging behind.

It takes a moment longer. Just one, before Anakin suddenly realizes that… he’s not just an invisible witness, is he?

He looks back down to see his own head now buried between his thighs.

But they’re not his thighs, not really. They’re yours. He’s just seeing everything from your point of view, feeling everything you’re feeling from the small little space he’s occupying in your mind.

At this point, Anakin needs to anchor. He feels himself—his real self, the one currently stuck in a cave in the midst of an unexpected dust storm—curl inwards and clamp his legs together. This will work. If he focuses enough to pinpoint the way his knees feel pressed tight together, he can have a tether to separate himself from your dream, the way yours are currently… wide open. This is all too similar to your true surroundings—he didn’t expect this, he doesn’t want to get lost.

And yet… Maker, it feels good. His long curls feel so soft in your hands, his tongue drags slow magic between your legs. When Anakin first suggested the idea to you, he didn’t think you’d assign the role back to him. He assumed you had someone else in mind, somewhere else you wished to be besides this dull, dreary setting. He gave you just an inkling of a prompt, and this is what the most creative part of your mind created. Something he could be doing at this exact moment, if only he’d known you’d be interested.

Then again, Anakin thinks, you may have just recognized him subconsciously. You may have attached him to the idea already, if only because he was the truest originator of it. But it doesn’t matter now, he can’t process such complex thoughts while maintaining the suspended mental state he’s in—he feels like he’ll either completely fall into it or out of it if he tries.

But as your muscles continue to work and your pleasure continues to build, it becomes harder and harder to separate where he is in relation to you. Anakin clenches his legs tighter together as you open yours wider apart, the dream gaining more strength as it develops. Stars, it’s—it’s—

Anakin starts to lose it and he needs to tug on that tether to his surroundings again, but it’s way more difficult than it should be to recognize himself. His calloused fingers on his left hand tremble as he reaches up and uses them to cover his face, biting his tongue to stop the low rumbles of ecstasy that want to claw their way out of his throat. Maker, this feels so… different from the build he knows. He thought—if he was successful—that he’d be able to handle it as silently and stoically as he’s able to handle his own pleasure, but this is something else entirely. Why does it feel so… so spectacular? Maker, he never realized the sensation was all that different on the inside, much less that he was actually missing out by having a dick between his legs.

But then suddenly there’s a pause, a break in the way you’ve been rhythmically squeezing and flexing your body for him.

The dream adapts to it. Anakin looks down between your open thighs just in time to see himself pulling away from your warmth, putting two fingers in his mouth, before slowly easing his hand back down between them.

No, he thinks, a bright flare of panic sparking inside him as he immediately snatches and yanks the tether to reality, popping his eyes open and pulling away from your mind entirely, oh no—wait, that’s not what I—

But see. That’s the thing about being so meticulous about conjuring something that doesn’t actually exist. Once his brilliant creation decides to backfire on him—a fool-proof way to escape it doesn’t actually exist either.

He… he can’t wake up. No matter how much his body struggles backwards on the dirt floor of the cave, how wide he can feel his eyes are right now, how excruciatingly aware he is that none of this is real, none of this is actually happening to him, he’s caught in the dream he planted and you’re hauling him along for the ride. The closest he can describe it is like having footage play in one eye while the other can see perfectly fine. He knows where the line that separates reality is, but he can’t escape your consciousness’s crushing gravitational pull; it’s too massive and overwhelming now, he can’t gain enough velocity to get home. Real life exists but only through a window, and being stuck on the other side like this—knowing he’s dreaming but not being able to jolt awake when he’s very ready to leave—is suddenly more terrifying than any nightmare Anakin has ever experienced.

It also has unintended consequences. Clinging so desperately to his own body has made him completely aware of it in the purgatory he’s now trapped himself in, but the pleasure is still there so the source of the stimulation is still there. They’re not your thighs anymore, they’re his thighs again. But that’s also still him between his legs, continuing to ease his fingers forwards.

He keeps retreating back and away from them no matter what, but there’s nothing more he can do.

Anakin helplessly watches on as his own fingers slowly disappear up inside himself, and his eyes instantly lose focus and his jaw goes slack as he feels it the way you would. They’re not real, so there’s no pain, no true pressure or stretch, just… hard, unadulterated stimulation starting to burn up inside him.

He doesn’t realize his body kept moving until he suddenly feels the wall of the cave slam into his back and he has to brace himself against it, frantically shoving himself back into it as far as he can with his legs and digging his nails into dirt at the base, scrabbling for breath and stability. Anakin tightens up wickedly as you both bear down on the phantom intrusion, sweat beading at his hairline as he works to process the foreign sensation and you whimper quietly in your sleep. His cock is rock hard between his legs and he shudders to think that his mind will compensate for the difference and his alter ego will actually take it into his mouth—but no, the projection doesn’t change because it’s still coming from you, still being led by your own desires. Dream-Anakin’s mouth drops and his tongue comes out to keep licking your slit but to the real Anakin, it just looks like his mouth disappears somewhere near his balls, and then a magnificent swell of bliss suddenly kicks in before he can fight as savagely against it as he wants. He’d normally be repulsed, and maybe he currently is to some extent, but because your pleasure spikes so dangerously with it, his hips stutter into the sensation just as desperately.

He’s making noise, he knows he is—he can feel his throat working too hard for just air to be moving through. No, he’s whimpering, or moaning, or doing something but he can’t hear himself at all. His instinct is to yell as loudly as he can, to try and wake you up manually, but it doesn’t seem to work, you’re way too far gone now. He listens for the dust storm that should be screaming outside, the popping of the fire somewhere in this cave, but they’re suddenly nowhere to be found. He’s being dragged under by your enormous current that’s somehow still continuing to build in strength, losing oxygen by the second. He’s not ready for it, he doesn’t want it, he’s terrified, he needs to wake up—

Anakin slams his head back against the wall hard enough to make himself bleed and gasps raggedly as he loses his grip on everything, shutting his eyes tight with his fist shoved up against his teeth. Nothing exists at all anymore but the swirling typhoon that continues raging forth. Beyond purgatory, and then beyond heaven.

When you finally do manage to find the absolute peak of your climb, he’s sure he all but blacks out with it.

It’s pure, blinding rapture on all levels—physical, metaphysical, whatever else exists after that. It surges up with razor-sharp claws of merciless ecstasy and he’s just not equipped to experience anything anywhere close to it. The connection between your minds thrums and sparks violently; Anakin feels the way your body practically soars over top of the pleasure while his is just being ruthlessly pummeled into the ground by it. He’s not meant to handle this, he literally wasn’t made to survive the devastating anomaly—it’s as wicked and excruciating as it is dazzling, and he wonders if he’ll ever truly be able to come back from it.

Eventually, Anakin manages to find his way back to himself. Eventually.

His cock is throbbing, that’s the first thing he‘s able to notice. The dirt floor beneath him that somehow feels slightly different than before, the fetal position he’s assuming on top of it, the once sturdy wall now crumbling to dust against his back.

The next thing he notices is the utter, complete mess he made. Blood slowly drips in a line down his neck and more cum than he’s ever felt himself produce before drenches the front of his pants. Anakin slowly blinks his eyes open, trying to fight the vertigo and wondering if he might have a concussion right now. There are cracks and fractures in the ground that branch out from the small crater at his back, and the fire is completely extinguished now, charred logs splintered and strewn about like somebody detonated a bomb in here.

At some point, his gaze drags over towards you, and remarkably, you haven’t moved. Still curled up on your side with your back to him, still breathing slow and steady and undisturbed.

Anakin pants in exhaustion and waits for you to turn over to address him and what he did. There’s no way you’re still asleep, not after what just happened. Anakin couldn’t get through it without sending a giant shockwave through the entire cave and quite literally rupturing the ground beneath him, he’s surprised you even managed to stay in one spot the entire time. He doesn’t know if you feel violated right now and are refusing to acknowledge him, or if it’s just taking as long as he is for your brain to catch up and start functioning again.

That is, until he hears a small snore come from your unmoving body once more.

Anakin blinks.

No. You have to be awake, he figures, moving to prop himself upright and wipe the blood from his neck with the dark sleeve of his robe. There’s no possible way that the orgasm you both shared is actually… normal, no, the sheer power of it had to be influenced by his presence somehow. He must have… increased it, or something. Anakin doesn’t know how, but he knows he must be directly responsible, this had to have been the strongest you’ve ever cum in your life and you just don’t know how to confront him about it right now, so you’re pretending to sleep. Yes, that’s what it is, that’s what it has to be.

He’s not going to check, though. He’s not going to find any lingering energy left within himself to summon and look for the thick darkness of sleep still enveloping you, he’s not going anywhere near your signature right now. No, Anakin is fine just like this, exactly where he is. Instead of verifying or confirming his own understanding, he’ll just be extra confident in it, that’s always worked well for him.

So he just sits back and takes a deep, shuddering breath, feeling like his whole body is weak and trembling with fatigue. Maybe you are asleep, he shrugs. Maybe he’s wrong, and selfish, and an idiot. Or maybe.

Maybe you just like keeping secrets, too.

#anakin x reader #anakin skywalker x reader #anakin skywalker #anakin x you #anakin skywalker x you #Smut #reader insert #dark anakin #no-droids

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thunderheadfred · 4 years ago

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❄️Todoroki HC's🔥

Aged-up pro hero Shouto. NSFW under the cut. Minors do not interact.

- - -

General

Might as well be tied with Bakugou for the #1 pro hero spot; they seem to pass the crown back and forth every other year. Everyone knows about their intense frenemies uber-rivalry. Well. Everyone but Shouto.

He's asked to speak at a lot of charity events. If he has time to prepare (and hire a speech writer) he is capable of stirring crowds to standing ovations. But if caught unawares... he gets cornered into hilarious on-the-spot interviews. He's been memed. Mercilessly.

He's an OP character, but unfortunately he rolled -500 in fashion sense. Eventually he wises up and hires a stylist. When he finally cuts his hair a slightly different and even more flattering way, it's a national event. People faint in the street.

Does god-awful sleight-of-hand magic tricks when he meets young fans, even though nobody asked him to. The second-hand embarrassment is palpable. But he keeps doing it. God, why does he keep doing it?

Has hovering arm syndrome in every fan photo.

Super into pop music. Not a fan of any particular group or artist, couldn't tell you the name of a single song. But every time he turns up the volume on the radio it's like... really? THIS? Probably pumps that shit through his hero agency to keep up morale. Has no idea what you mean when you tell him his music taste doesn't match his personality.

Similarly, he enjoys brainless romantic comedies and old silent movies. Doesn't laugh at jokes but loses it over physical comedy. Thinks Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd are the funniest people who ever walked the earth.

He's long and limber. Runs practically a hundred miles every day just to "relax." Doesn't even get sweaty doing it. A filthy yoga addict. He'll probably live to be 200 years old.

He can regulate his body temperature for quirk use but in everyday life he's always half a degree outside the Goldilocks zone. It drives him quietly insane; he has an epic love-hate relationship with his thermostat.

Has a therapy animal pet. Doesn't matter if it's a dog or a cat or a bird or an iguana or a teeny tiny rodent. It's the best-behaved animal in the country and speaks more languages than you. It has its own room and an instagram account with millions of followers.

Lives in a traditional Japanese estate that doubles as a national treasure. Probably has government-appointed snipers at the gate, and he's just like, "don't worry about it." You are afraid to touch anything. Fuck, don't even look at anything, just to be safe.

Has an outstanding personal chef who only gets to cook five things unless (thank fuck!!) company comes over. Impossibly picky eater. He rotates between a few "safe" foods and suspiciously side-eyes everything else. If you cook something unfamiliar for him it will be the most awkward meal of your life, because he'd never tell you he doesn't like it. But oh lord, just look at his face.

This clashes directly with his love of traveling. Frequently uses his hero earnings to visit exotic foreign locales over long weekends... but rarely tries the food.

- - -

Dating

A grey-ace demisexual disaster. You could count the number of people he's been attracted to on one hand. He falls madly in love every time and always gets his heart smashed to pieces when his crush can't magically intuit the meaning of his frigid longing glances and generically courteous romantic gestures.

Which is stupid, because he gets propositioned constantly. He can't walk out the door without being flirted with. People keep slipping him their phone numbers and he always directs them to his agency like a moron. It's a good thing he will never understand how attractive he is because that's the only thing keeping him from total world domination.

Conventional attractiveness does not compute. Shouto doesn't have a type, doesn't care that he's an eleven whilst you are merely mortal. He will fall for your personality above all else.

Probably falls head over heels because your schedules overlap in a completely ordinary way and he witnesses you doing something endearing or brave or most likely: utterly mundane.

Pick a favorite, because you're his favorite coworker, or his favorite barista, or his favorite random bystander in line at the grocery store. You made him smile once; then he spent the next three months daydreaming about your future together before you accidentally stomped on his foot, initiating your first real conversation.

He's big on healthy communication. HUGE. He goes to therapy and it shows. Will talk through literally everything to the point of delirium. Sometimes his dedication to resolving every issue right away can get overwhelming; sometimes you just need some frickin time alone. But it pays off, because the two of you have practically never have a "real fight." There's just no way for bad vibes to fester.

STILL, his family wasn't exactly... erm... verbally or emotionally supportive, shall we say. For that reason, he might not give you all the compliments you deserve, because it simply doesn't occur to him to do so. He assumes you know how he feels. If you're self-conscious or insecure in the relationship, it might take him a while to notice. But when he figures it out (or even better, when you tell him directly) he will make it up to you with enthusiasm.

Will take you on lavish dates. Spoils you rotten without actually intending to. He's clueless about money. If you wanted a sugar daddy, you just hit the fucking jackpot. But if the word valet makes you uncomfortable, perhaps suggest some romantic picnics instead. He can still go all out with the food and five-star location without making you see cartoon dollar signs.

Chronic Insomniac. Stays up too late watching YouTube every night. His viewing history is an incomprehensible blur of k-pop music videos, serial killer icebergs, and super girly crafty ASMR channels. When he's watching a video, he is unreachable. Please call back later and try again.

He's disgustingly cute when he sleeps. Doesn't snore, but drools. Sometimes the drool freezes and leaves frost trails on his face in the morning. Still sleeps with the giant stuffed cat pillow that his mother gave him when he was like, zero. He'll inadvertently suffocate you with it, and you will welcome death with open arms because awwwwww!!!!!

The first time he tells you he loves you will be after your traditional Japanese shinto wedding. You won't hear it again until you start a family. Honestly, it's a good thing he doesn't say it often and is always holding you when it happens. It's a knee-buckler.

- - -

Icy-Hot

I don't even need to say it. Shouto is as old-fashioned as they come. You will never open another door or pull out another chair for yourself as long as you live. He will ask before he holds your hand. He will ask before he kisses you. He will stop and check in if you so much as breathe funny during sex.

If you don't orgasm at exactly the same time while staring into one another's eyes, he'll consider himself a failed lover. God forbid you want him to pound you into the futon... cause you are going to have to present that scenario to him in writing first.

Physical intimacy rarely leads to sex. He loves cuddling, craves physical affection. He'll sprawl all over you and turn into goo while you hold him close. He's an amazing, astounding, phenomenally good kisser. And that's... nice and all... but sometimes you have to grab his face and say, "Shouto, I'm horny," before he's like so that's why you're currently dry-humping me?

Even if he isn't technically a virgin the first time (or the millionth time) you sleep together, you won't know the difference. He's a blushing violet. Every. Fucking. Time. This doesn't mean he's a bad lay, oh no. But there's always ten minutes of confused bumbling before he hits his stride and remembers oh yeah, I DO know how to fuck good.

Absolutely silent during sex. Focused. Intense. Sometimes you have to push him a little to make any kind of noise at all, just so you know you're pleasing him (oh don't worry, you are).

His cock is Just Right. Not to big or too small. Perfectly proportioned and symmetrical. Somehow pretty. Like a fucking factory prototype. It truly is not fair.

Gets handsy and restless at night, even if you both have work the next day. Seems to crave sex at three in the morning. You've given him more than one exhausted handjob.

Gets offended if you don't cum. Will go down on you for hours. Of course he uses his quirk to tease you. He doesn't typically use it during actual intercourse, but he's all about foreplay, and he'll use every tool in his arsenal.

His sex drive is completely fucking unpredictable. Sometimes he's all over you, other times he's an icy slab. His line of work leaves him busy and stressed on a near-constant basis, so you can't entirely blame his personality for this one. Just give him some time and help him take care of his basic needs. He'll come back around soon enough.

#todoroki shouto #todoroki x you #todoroki x reader #todoroki x y/n #gender neutral reader #todoroki headcanons #bnha headcanons #mha headcanons #smut #fred writes #bnha #mha

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exquisitley-obsessed · 4 years ago

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We’re Leaving (Carlisle Cullen x Reader)

Author: @exquisitley-obsessed

Summary: The already infatuated Carlisle Cullen and reader are faced with their next challenge, but this time the danger is within their own family. Edward needs his father as he pulls away from Bella over the course of NEW MOON, but this means Carlisle must make the choice between his own happiness and that of his son’s. No matter what he chooses, someone’s going to get hurt.

Word Count: long

Pairings: Carlisle Cullen x Reader

Warnings: Heartbreak, abandonment, sex, drug abuse

A/N: Technically this is a fourth part of my ‘Dinosaur and the Vampire’ series however you don’t need to read it to understand. Plus, in my head this part functions better as a oneshot.

Dinosaur and the Vampire:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

MY MAIN MASTERLIST

Y/n gasped, the pain was rippling from her chest now, ricocheting through her muscles as she collapsed on her bedroom floor. She could already guess his next words.

‘We’re leaving.’

***

The past couple of months had been glorious. Following the disaster that was the ending to y/n’s junior year where she somehow managed to get tangled up in a high speed car chase with a vampire named Victoria (who had promptly taken her hostage in order to track down y/n’s best friend Bella) - things had begun to look up.

Her infatuation with the town’s local medi-hero Carlisle Cullen had surprisingly taken off, after of course he revealed himself of being a 300 year-old vampire who had a taste for bunnies. Most days she met up with him at his mansion in her brand-new white Ford Bronco, that which Carlisle had bought specifically to save her life and, following the destruction of her own car, decided to gift her - that was an interesting conversation with her parents.

Of course that accident hadn’t just left her with a beautiful new mechanic baby but also some battle scars. The largest of which was a crescent white line arching over her left brow, not to mention the faded lines circling her waist. Her arms had healed up nice enough, the rope had caused them to double in size as blue and green bruises splotched on the surface for the first few weeks but they eventually died down. The story went that after being in a lot of stress and anxiety y/n had lost sight of the road and crashed into a car and it was stunning how no one thought to question it.

It was difficult being around her personal doctor for the first few days after the crash. So often would she catch him staring mournfully at her scar and bound hands, evidentially blaming himself for her battered state. Y/n spent most of the time convincing him she was fine and reminding him that she would go through so much worse to be where she was today.

And where she was, was a few weeks into her affair, unbeknown to all apart from Carlisle’s family and Bella. Together, Carlisle and her would often circle around the endless abyss of wood and glass that was the Cullen house, or drift up and down the small forest of a garden they had out back. Talking, always talking.

Carlisle was fascinated by every aspect of her previously thought mundane life. She could watch as he made mental notes of her favourite bands and books, what colleges she wanted to go to, her dream job. Y/n so often hated talking about herself but only because she felt that her life paled in comparison to that of Carlisle’s. He had of course explained his entire existence to her, right from its origins in 17th century London, and yet there was still so much he mentioned off-hand that left y/n floored.

Of course with the cat being out the bag, y/n’s and Bella’s friendship felt like it was flourishing for the second time. Now Bella was able to be honest with why she had been so distant, she didn’t have to lie when she explained the intensity of her and Edward’s relationship or why she kept disappearing with him after school. Y/n was able to confine to her about her relationship with Carlisle, about the way he always seemed to be looking at her through his soft amber eyes and the way he was so comfortable in touching her. Constantly brushing his fingers over her wrist or stroking her hair out of her face. All in all y/n had never been happier, of course until Bella’s tragic 18th.

***

For a night that would be so monumental to y/n’s life it seemed strange she wasn’t even present. Her parents had somehow dragged her on a holiday in Florida. And after giving Bella her early birthday present and a promise to Carlisle that she would be careful, she hadn’t thought much more of her time away. She spent most of the time on the beaches, reading and reliving all her memories with the doctor.

He had kissed her only a few nights ago. It came quite literally out of the blue. She was only stopping by his house to pick-up Edward’s copy of ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ when he was at the door waiting for her he seemed somewhat disturbed, as though he had had a rough day at the hospital. She had smiled at him as she got out and he in turn had pattered down the front steps.

“Hi.” Was all she managed to get out before he had caught her lips in his, his body flushed against hers as she was pushed against the car.

“Sorry.” He whispered breathlessly when the kiss had unfortunately come to a close and he rested his forehead against hers, gently rocking her in his arms. “I couldn’t wait any longer.”

Yet she couldn’t stay on holiday forever and inevitably she returned to the mess that was life back at Forks. When she got home the first thing she wanted to do was see Bella, to ask her about her birthday, if Alice got her that necklace y/n helped pick out, but Charlie was no help.

“I’m sorry y/n...” He looked incredibly stressed. His shirt old and stained his hair sticking up at the back, heavy set bags hanging below his eyes. “Bella...she’s...she’s not good right now.”

Y/n assumed Bella had come down with something and so she shrugged it off, blaming Charlie’s appearance on well, Charlie stuff. It was the next day at school when things started to feel really wrong, when the pain began to dig it’s hole.

***

“You looking for the Cullens?” Angela asked. Y/n snapped her head around, embarrassed that she had been caught glaring at the completely empty table near the back of the cafeteria. She would have never guessed it was related to Bella’s illness.

“Something happen?” Y/n tried to appear disinterested, picking at her food. It was September and not sunny so it didn’t make sense for them to be away perhaps they were in need of a feed or maybe they had family business...

“Yeah, they moved away.”

Angela said it like someone would talk about the weather and yet she might as well have leaned across the table and shoved her fork through y/n’s chest.

“What?” The word squeaked out. Y/n felt the colour drain from her face.

“The dad...you know the doctor one...well apparently he got some big time job offer down in California and...”

Angela’s words dissolved into the air, muffled by some invisible blanket. Distantly y/n was aware of her arms going limp, her fork clattering out of her hands as her body tingled numbly underneath her. The worst feeling was the shortness of breath, the way air couldn’t seem to move through her lungs anymore as her chest was weighed down with what felt like a sphere of lead.

The rest of the day couldn’t pass slowly enough. In history it seemed like y/n was watching the clock forever her mind racing a million miles an hour. Surely they hadn’t left properly, Carlisle couldn’t leave without saying goodbye at least. No, it had to have something to do with vampirism, maybe an old friend called or maybe they were in danger, 5 more minutes then gym and then she would find out.

In the end she decided to skip gym altogether jumping in her car and racing home, still in her daze. She needed to see Bella and then she would head up to the Cullen’s, there was no way they had really moved away. Maybe it was just so the humans weren’t getting suspicious, a strange feeling pulled at y/n’s gut as she remembered that technically, she was a part of the ‘humans’ or supposed to be at least.

“Charlie is Bella in?”

“I’m sorry y/n-”

She pushed past him, muttering an apology as she went but Charlie appeared too exhausted to stop her. Turning left she raced up the stairs two at a time before exploding into Bella’s room, she would know from Bella, she would get her answer.

Bella sat on her bed, her face white, her eyes glossed over. She didn’t even look at y/n as she walked in.

“Bella?” Y/n’s voice was shaky, the tears already bubbling in her throat. She knew deep down that she already had her answer. “Bella?”

Finally she turned to her, but there was no recognition. Nothing. Complete emptiness behind her eyes as she stared back for a few seconds before her eyes flickered forward.

Y/n left, apologising to Charlie under her breath as she jumped back in her car. But it was too late, the pain had already settled in her chest, her mind was already convinced. They were gone. He had left. Without even saying goodbye.

It was inescapable now, it spread like fire across her body, consuming her whole. She tried to start up her car but her body doubled over and she grit her teeth in pain. It had begun.

***

She didn’t know where to go, what to do. Most of her wanted to go to the Cullen’s house but she already knew it was most likely empty, devoid of all life. Could she really handle that?

Y/n went to start up her car when she realised that this car was all Carlisle had given her besides her own memories. She raced out of it, turning away from the sight of it and running into her house.

When she got to her room she shut her curtains with so much vigour a few hooks snapped off the edge, she knew she would see the pale car in her drive if she left it open. Before she knew it she was crying, trying desperately to control her emotions before they consumed her whole. Then she saw it.

Resting on her bedside table was an ivory note with her name etched onto the page in rich navy ink.

‘Dearest y/n l’n,’

A letter. He had left her a letter. She opened it carefully, if what she assumed was true this, as well as her car, might be all she had left of him; her sobs still hiccuping in her throat, she raced her eyes over his calligraphy. Five paragraphs. That was all. Five paragraphs loosely explaining how Edward was in a rough place, how people were judging Carlisle for his youth, how he needed to put his family first - five paragraphs.

Y/n gasped, the pain was rippling from her chest now, ricocheting through her muscles as she collapsed on her bedroom floor. She could already guess his next words, the words to conclude the letter.

‘We’re leaving.’

The worst feeling was when she read ‘we’, she knew from this word alone she was to understand that Carlisle did not group her with his family. The letter gave no insinuation that he was deeply sorry for their departure, or that he would in any way return at all. How, in the space of a few hours, could her world be turned completely inside out?

She went from giddily planning a small future with Carlisle to believing he had never cared for her at all. If he did, it certainly wasn’t as much as she had cared for him. Another wave of pain beat her down. She was just a stupid kid with a crush. Another wave. She was a fool, an embarrassment to assume that he wanted her even half as much as she wanted him.

Her tears got too much then, the letter shaking out her hands as the pain, now unbridled, exploded out of her. The waves of heartbreak crashing into her again and again, her stifled screams bouncing off her walls and ringing back in her ears, haunting her with her own pain.

He was gone, and he had taken her heart with him.

***

“Y/n we’re worried about you.”

“Don’t be.” Y/n laughed loudly, pushing her untouched pasta around on her plate. Angela glanced at her through tense eyes. “I already have a mum, Angela.” The words came out harsher than she meant to, not that she cared.

“But seriously, Mack?” Angela whispered, her voice low so the others wouldn’t hear. Y/n rolled her eyes.

“We’re not a thing, we just hang out and he...helps me out.”

“He’s a druggie.” Her voice was low, accusing, incredulous. Another roll of y/n’s eyes.

“Duh Angela. What do you think I meant by ‘helping me out’.” Angela just shook her head disappointed. Y/n didn’t care, she couldn’t. Technically sitting at that lunch table on that Friday she was still coming down from her high this morning, her brain soft and fuzzed around the edges and, most importantly, the pain in her chest non existent.

The drug scene in Forks was nothing to be impressed by. It was only by luck that y/n had met Mack, a guy a few years out of high school who had never made it to college. Y/n was pretty sure he was crushing on her but she didn’t mind exploiting that a little if it meant she got high for free.

It had been four months since they had left. They might as well have taken Bella with them considering she was a shell of a human being: unresponsive, uncooperative. There was nothing behind her eyes, just like the day y/n had come searching for her. That had been one of the last times y/n had stepped foot in the Swan house. Partly because y/n’s new found drug habits wouldn’t go down well with Chief Charlie Swan, partly because y/n couldn’t stand the sight of Bella.

The emptiness, the hollowness, the pain. It was just a reminder to y/n of what was waiting for her the day she became sober. In the beginning, after a few days of wallowing in the pain, feeling as though she were unable to move, y/n had forced herself to go to the beach where she had ran into a bunch of La Push boys. They were smoking green and it was clearly their first time, they called out and invited y/n over clearly expecting that she wouldn’t accept.

But she surprised both them and herself by walking over. After sitting and smoking them with a bit she found herself smiling and laughing at their jokes as her head became warmer and fuzzier, moreover, the pain of his abandonment warmed into nothingness. She had asked them where they got the weed and they had pointed her in the direction of Mack.

“Down for tonight?”

Y/n read the text as it flashed across her screen.

“You bet :)″

She sent back. Two more lessons and then her high could be refreshed and the cycle could continue.

***

Y/n gasped as she awoke. Nightmares had been more common the past week. They were a regular occurrence when he had first left but going to bed high had always numbed it out. But recently his ivory skin and ribbons of muscles were becoming clearer through the haze.

Rolling over in the dark with some desperation she flicked on her phone and dialled his number.

“Hey Mack, I just called cause-”

“You have a bad high?” He murmured over the phone, distantly she could hear his TV playing in the background. She could picture him, half-dressed surrounded by trash as he got himself high for the third time today. Y/n pushed the image away - no, I’m not like that. It’s different for me, I have a reason.

“Yeah.” She muttered, “I just didn’t know who to call.”

“Usually bad highs are a sign you’ve been smoking too much.” She had basically been smoking consistently for four months now and if she wasn’t smoking she was drunk and if she wasn’t drunk then the pain began to settle.

“Ugh, are you going to tell me I have to stop?” She laughed quietly over the phone, trying to cover the slight desperation in her voice. Distantly she was aware of her parents sleeping in the next room, it was stupid, she was eighteen now and it felt as though she had been through enough trauma to move out, to get away from school. On the other hand school seemed to be the only thing holding her together now.

“No, you don’t need to stop smoking but maybe try something else?” He asked nonchalantly.

“Something else?”

“I stock more than green but it’ll have to be sooner rather than later.”

“Sooner?” Y/n murmured robotically. She had bought enough to get her through the week.

“This weekend?” He asked, almost as if he read her mind.

“See you then...your place?” She rolled over in the dark.

“See you then?” She could hear the enormous grin settle on his lips and it sent a shiver down her spine - she hung up. She had promised herself to never do anything more serious than weed but now she was faced with an ultimatum: break her promise or embrace the darkness.

***

“Hi Mack.” Y/n smiled when he opened the door, he didn’t say anything just grinned and stood to the side letting y/n into his dingy apartment. Y/n had used the same lie to her parents that she used whenever she came here - that she was sleeping over at Angela's. Not that they ever checked.

Of course she wasn’t sleeping over at Mack’s, to be honest she didn’t trust him enough for that, normally she left late and would drive her car up to the Cullens house, it wasn’t too far and the road was easy enough to follow when intoxicated. It was the only time was she was able to wander around the house without feeling any guilt or remorse.

Mack’s place was tiny, made worse by the clutter and rubbish. A small corridor lead to a small living room which the tiniest of kitchens looked out into. Mack had a strip of lights around the top of the ceiling that were constantly flashing multi-coloured as loud obnoxious music played, somewhat muffled in the smoke.

“Hey y/n.” Danny, Mack’s roommate, smiled from the couch, clearly already lost.

“Hey Dan.” She smiled before collapsing at his feet, her knees propped against the coffee table where booze and skins cluttered the surface.

“You’re in for a treat.” He slurred, his arms limp by his sides as his eyes flickered back and forth, his mouth ajar. Y/n felt somewhat excited at the sight of him, so out of his head - this excitement no longer frightened her.

“He’s not lying.” Mack laughed, full of energy as he jumped up and grabbed something off the kitchen counter before holding it in front of her face. A small white square was compressed in the middle of a tiny plastic bag. “These things pack a punch.” He laughed, y/n laughed. “You’re still down to do this right? I’m not going to pressure you or anything.” He said, and for a moment it looked like he was actually concerned for her.

Y/n thought seriously about it for a moment. There was nothing stopping her from getting up and walking out, telling him that it was a mistake to come here, even just telling him that she’ll run the risk of sticking to green. Except the weed wasn’t enough anymore, she was realising that. To keep him away she would have to go further, and she was more than willing. It seemed somewhat funny, that to escape her doctor she had to pollute herself.

“Of course.” Y/n heard her voice laugh as she shuffled out of her jacket and pulled her hair out from it’s knot. If Mack and Danny could, she could.

“Awesome.” He grinned before sitting down on the coffee table in front of her so that her head was somewhat between his knees. “This is how you take it.” He said, clearly enjoying being a ‘teacher’. Y/n could see him properly then.

Mack was in his early-twenties, the same age he was supposed to be. A short brown beard tufted around his jaw whilst shoulder length brown hair was pulled into a low pony at the back of his head. He was sweet really, just lost.

“Stick your tongue out.” Y/n obliged, picking up on the moment of tension as he placed the white square on her tongue with his forefinger. She felt no guilt as she lapped her tongue back into her mouth slowly, gazing into his dark eyes as his finger rested on her bottom lip.

The rest of the night was a blurry mess; mistakes were definitely made and y/n was definitely going to have to find a new dealer. It was strange how that night only happened because she was so desperate to escape Carlisle Cullen, and yet for most of it, it was his icy face that she was picturing instead of Mack’s.

***

Weeks had passed and y/n’s drug exploration was starting to get a little out of control. She was sure her parents were picking up on her strange behaviours: never home at weekends, always fidgeting, bleary eyed and always tired. Perhaps she was just being paranoid, Mack said that could be one of the side effects.

But it was lucky she was high one specific Friday as she parked her car outside Mack’s apartment complex. She glared at the Bronco, she had seen Bella ripping the radio (Emmett’s gift to Bella) out of her own truck, removing all traces of the Cullen family’s existence. It wasn’t so easy for y/n.

She was thinking of him again. It had been quite obsessive these past few days and that’s why when she first saw him, leaning against his black Mercedes in the shadows, she couldn’t quite believe her eyes.

“What the hell.” She was so sure she was hallucinating, she blinked fiercely.

“Y/n.” He said her name and she felt her eyes flutter closed, how good it felt to hear her name dripping from his lips. She wasn’t aware she had memorised his voice so well. She audibly hummed in response to the sound before snapping herself out of it and ignoring his form. Mack was just upstairs with something new to try and then he would go away. “Y/n.” He said her name again as though he were sure she hadn’t heard him.

Y/n ignored it. The sweetness of his presence was quickly turning sour, and the corners of the hole in her chest were beginning to sting.

“Y/n, it’s me.” That stopped her. From the corner of her eye she could see him step out of the shadows, his pale skin iridescent in the street light. He looked unsure, pleading, desperate. “Y/n.”

“No.” She gasped suddenly. There was no more guessing, she couldn’t even try to deny that it was truly him. She stumbled slightly in the street and he was by her side in a second. When she was stable in his arms he held a lock of her hair between his fingers inhaling deeply. “Your blood smells different.” He murmured. She had forgotten what it was like to be around people who could move so quickly. “Y/n, what have you been putting in your body?”

“Leave me alone.” She murmured, her head still fuzzy and numb from the sight of him. Was it a dream? No it couldn’t be. As she got over her shock, anger pooled in her gut.

“Are you high?” His eyes were confused and worried.

“If I am what would you do about it?” She smirked. “You have no right to critique my lifestyle.”

“Your lifestyle?” He asked somewhat incredulously, his eyes were slowly melting darker and darker. “Poisoning yourself with LSD is a lifestyle for you?”

“It’s a coping mechanism.” She spat suddenly. “To deal with the pain that you left me with.” That shut him up.

“I would’ve never left if I knew you would do this.” He grimaced. Wrong move.

“Stop!” She gasped suddenly, her arm snatching to her gut where she was sure the pain would brim over. She thought seeing him again would melt her troubles away, instead his presence seemed to intensify them. “Stop talking like you get a say in what I do! You lost that privileged the day you left! Left with nothing but a stupid note Carlisle!”

“I left to protect you. I didn’t want to cause you pain. Remember Victoria?” Was all he could say in response.

“Victoria...” Y/n spat. “What Victoria did to me pales in comparison to what you did. You’re the one whose hurt me the most Carlisle. Do you understand?”

She was still in shock at the sight of him. A million questions were racing through her head but none of them seemed as important now. Her shouting must have alerted someone’s presence because she heard movement near the apartment steps as someone walked up to them.

“Are you okay?” It was Mack but he seemed a million miles away now, unimportant.

“Are you her dealer?” Carlisle strode forward, his voice pure steel.

“Carlisle stop it!” She spat, jumping forward and pushing against his stony chest but it was like trying to move a mountain.

“Are you the one that did this to her?” Carlisle ignored her, still towering over Mack.

“You did this to me!” She suddenly exploded. Carlisle was past listening.

“If I ever see you near her again. I will break you myself, I promise.” His voice was calm meditated, as if every word had weight.

“What are you, her boyfriend?” Mack asked venomously. “Well then maybe I should let you in on a secret.”

“Mack shut up.” Y/n felt fear bubble into her throat. Sure she could swear in that moment she hated Carlisle but that’s all it was, a moment. There was no point in ruining her future.

“Your girlfriend ain’t too loyal.” Mack drawled out, a coy smirk slipping on his lips as he rocked back and forth on his toes. Carlisle tensed. “At least...she wasn’t last night.”

An animalistic snarl snapped from of Carlisle lips like a whip and within the second he had Mack pinned against the bonnet of a car. Then, just as quickly as he moved, he remembered himself. Letting Mack drop Carlisle’s breath heaved before he turned and stalked towards his car without sparing y/n so much as a glance. Always the pacifist.

“Carlisle.” She called, rushing after him but Mack caught her elbow.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were in a relationship?” He asked and if y/n wasn’t mistaken he sounded somewhat heartbroken, all his previous anger evaporating.

“I’m not.” Y/n gasped struggling to get out of his grip.

“You’re in something.” He murmured, letting her go.

“I’m sorry Mack, I really am. I’ll...call you.” The words were falling over her shoulder as she escaped, but he was already gone and distantly she could hear his Mercedes ripping into the night as he drove away.

***

“It’s not his fault.”

“I don’t need this right now Edward.” After jumping into her Bronco y/n had followed Carlisle’s black Mercedes back to his house. During the drive she couldn’t decide whether her anger was riling up or fizzing into the air and thus, nothingness. He had been so close, she had put her hands against his chest, he was right there.

“Please I just...” Edward’s eyes were tentative as he blocked her path on the house steps, “It’s my fault why we even left, all he was trying to do was be a good father to me.”

“And you think that’s and excuse?”

“No, of course not.” He added hurriedly. “It’s just, I love him, and I know he loves you. Please don’t walk away from him.”

“Walk away?” Y/n gasped, angry tears pricking behind her eyes. “I never wanted to walk away. I never even considered it. You were the ones who left and you took everything with you.” Tears spilled and she hurriedly wiped them away. Edward grimaced. Y/n took her opportunity and stormed past him into the house. To her surprise there stood Rosalie and Emmett; a few hours ago and she would have run into their arms laughing, overjoyed to see her friends again.

“Where is he?” Was all she spat and to her surprise they looked somewhat intimidated as they pointed loosely in the direction of the kitchen. She stormed past them and up the stairs swinging a right to find Carlisle waiting for her, leaning over the counter his head in his hands, he glanced at her.

“Y/n I-” He began.

“Shut up.” Was all she said. Distantly she was aware that Emmett and Rosalie had followed her along with Edward. At the far window she saw movement and assumed Jasper and Alice had come to see what the fuss is about. “You had your chance to talk the day you left but you chose not to, so, what you’re going to do is you’re going to sit in that chat, patiently, whilst I stand her and say what I got to say...understand?”

Carlisle stood now, an internal battle dancing behind his eyes as he glanced from y/n to his family. Y/n was aware of them staring now, watching the leader of their family, the alpha male be challenged, all tentative to see what he would do next. Slowly and with weight, Carlisle walked a few paces before he slid down into a chair, leaning forward and resting on his knees as he looked up at y/n through his lashes. This sent a tremor through the family and within the blink of an eye they were all gone, giving Carlisle and y/n their privacy.

“Carlisle...” Now she was here, she wasn’t quite sure what to say. “I am...sorry...about Mack and what we...” She trailed off, maybe it was not the best idea to start with this. “But you can’t judge me. You just can’t.”

“I know.” He whispered, his brows furrowing apologetically.

“All this...the drugs, Mack, everything, all of it’s just me trying to cope. And it’s not an excuse but-”

“Please don’t apologise.” Carlisle whispered and within the second he was standing in front of her cupping her cheeks in his hands and brushing his thumb under her right eye. “Never apologise.” He kissed her forehead. “You did nothing wrong.” He kissed her nose. It seemed like he went to go kiss her lips but he hovered, as if he remembered himself and he pulled back slightly, resting his forehead against hers.

“I’m sorry for the way I behaved. It was foolish and embarrassing of me.” He decided to say. “Back at the apartments. It’s just...”

“Just what?” Y/n murmured, now in a daze.

“I could smell it.”

“What?”

“Your scent...on him. On his neck, his shirt. Deep down I already knew what had happened but then hearing him...say it...and gloat.” His teeth gritted.

“If it’s any consolation, if I knew you were coming back I would have never-”

“But you didn’t know I was coming back. Because I left you here with nothing.” He was talking to himself now. “I...” He began. “I knew I was hurting you the day I left, the idea alone tormented me for months but I kept lying to myself, telling myself I would put you in more danger, more pain if I came back. But seeing the reality of what I had done to you, coming back to your blood smelling different and...” He trailed off.

“I know.” Y/n filled the silence, overwhelmed now at the feeling of him flushed against her body.

“I’ve got to hand it to Edward.” He chuckled to himself. “He’s more persuasive than he looks.” They stood like that for a moment, just comfortable at being able to be around one another again before y/n scrunched up her eyes.

“God, I've just been so caught up in being angry at you that I don’t think it’s really settled that you’re here. I feel like I’m going to wake up and this is just going to be a cruel dream.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” He cut her off gently, his eyes steely. “Not because I’m afraid of what you’ll do to yourself if I leave, not because you necessarily need me. But because...I don’t know how many chances I’m going to get to love someone like this.” He chuckled slightly. “And I mean, I have an eternity stretched out in front of me...but to love someone the way I love you...completely and utterly and with every piece of my heart and soul...”

His words fizzled into the air, the greater meaning behind them understood by them and only them.

“I’m sorry about Mack.” They were swaying slightly now, as if there were some soft unheard music. “He’s sweet...and he’s just lost...I guess I was for while.”

“As long as it was...consensual.” Surprisingly this made y/n laugh, a noise he had missed with his whole soul.

“Let’s not talk about it anymore.”

And they didn’t. From an outsiders perspective no one could have guessed anything was ever wrong between y/n and Carlisle. Just as before things gently shifted back into place, old routines were picked up and recent habits died out. Carlisle made good on his promise, he spent the rest of eternity doing everything in his power to make y/n happy, for that was all that mattered for him.

“To love someone the way I love you.” Became their phrase. Before long journeys apart, before what felt like impending doom when it came to Victoria, or the Voultri. He murmured it to her before she slept and shouted it after her car when she pulled away - an ode to their relationship, and all that they had been through. Y/n and Carlisle, the Dinosaur and the Vampire.

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ask-marcus-cally-and-ari · 4 years ago

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Only Human

Chapter 10: Downtime

Authors note: Apologies for the long delay. Schoolwork has been burying us and stress from Covid-19 has been at an all time high.

Within three days, Marcus’s mood had significantly improved. With two new allies by his side, he felt markedly more secure in his surroundings, although he still occasionally looked above him from time to time out of instinct.

He was in the back of Spyper’s van with Ari and Cally, quietly playing a game of Uno amongst themselves.

Looking up at Intelligent, he said, "Yo, big guy. You look like you wanna ask us something."

“I do, actually,” Intelligent said, setting aside his book. “You three seem really close. How long have you known each other for?”

"Six years and 348 days," Cally answered, setting down her cards.

"Technically, longer," Marcus added, "But we officially met during the summer."

6 Years and 348 Days Ago…

The rec center was alive with activity during the summer. It made sense that three random 10 year olds would be here. Marcus, Cally, and Ari were all there, going about their business. Marcus was busy taking boxing classes, Ari was attending choir lessons, and Cally intently watched a lecture on computer programming.

The classes all ended early that day, leaving the three kids not knowing where to go. So they all ended up in an empty tennis court, sitting and waiting for their parents.

To kill time, Ari fatefully began chatting with Marcus.

“Hi. My name’s Ari,” He greeted, waving to Marcus. “What’s your name?”

“Marcus. Aren’t you that short kid who sits in the front of the class?”

“Yeah, that’s me. You’re the kid who’s taking boxing lessons, right?”

“The one with anger problems,” Cally chimed in from the corner, reading a book. “Yeah, that’s him.”

Marcus threw a candy wrapper at her.

“Hey, be nice!” Ari frowned at Cally.

“It’s true, isn’t it? No point saying anything that isn’t true for the sake of one’s feelings.”

“You sound really mean.”

"I heard that once you get smart enough you stop having emotions," Marcus shrugged.

"That's a lie," Cally hissed. "I just don't see the value in being dishonest."

Marcus rolled his eyes. "Yeah, and the fact that I called you a loser that one time has nothing to do with it."

"I just refuted your theory on my lack of emotions. I can hold a grudge."

“How do you even know he has anger issues? Because he boxes?” Ari asked.

"My mom is the school secretary. She has me do a lot of the paperwork so she can go out. Some of that paperwork got Marcus to see the school therapist."

“Why does the secretary have a 10 year old doing her work? Isn’t that against the rules or something?”

"Not if the principal doesn't find out."

“So you’re being mean to Marcus even though you’re the one breaking the rules?”

“Look. Ari, right? If the people who fed and sheltered you and could kick you out if they felt so inclined and barely gave a crap about you told you to do something, would you do it?”

“Isn’t it against the law to kick a kid out of the house?”

“Probably. Wouldn’t stop my parents.”

“You sound like you have issues. Maybe you should see the school therapist.”

“I don’t want to get landed in foster care. Too much of a risk to my psyche.”

“And being treated like sh_t by your parents isn’t?” Marcus asked.

Ari and Cally stared at Marcus. “You kiss your mother with that mouth?” Cally asked.

“Yes, actually.”

Ari whined. “Isn’t cussing bad?”

“Eh. Some people don’t like it, and my parents don’t let me swear when we’re in restaurants and things like that.”

“Wouldn’t the community rec center count as a place you shouldn’t swear?” Cally asked dryly.

“I guess, but there aren’t any adults around.”

Cally deadpanned. Ari pouted.

Leaning back, the intelligent kid pulled out some gum. “Want some?”

“What flavor is it?”

“Spearmint.”

“Eh, sure.”

“I love mint!” Ari beamed.

“Not my favorite, but I’ll take it over 5gum,” Marcus added.

“Ugh. 5gum.”

“What’s wrong with 5gum?” Ari inquired, popping a piece of gum into their mouth.

“Tastes like trash,” Marcus groused.

“It’s an insult to gum.” Cally sat. “The least horrible flavor is mint.”

“And even then, this spearmint gum beats it by a mile,” Marcus added. “I don’t see how anyone can enjoy 5gum. It’s like eating plastic.”

“Better than nothing.”

“I’ve never had 5gum before, but I’ll take you on your word,” Ari said.

Present

“So, yeah. That was fun.”

“So you three started out arguing with each other, and now you three are basically inseparable,” Intelligent remarked, leaning back in his seat. “A lot must have happened in those six years.”

“Yeah. For one thing, we became study partners. I had to tie Cally to a chair to keep her from doing all the work for us.”

“I was not that bad, Marcus.”

Ari winced. “Well...”

3 Years Ago…

“Cally, this is a GROUP project! That means we ALL have to work on this!” Marcus shouted, taking the papers away from Cally.

“You guys did a lot of the research. And you know I’m a better writer than you,” Cally reasoned, reaching for the papers again.

“Yeah, right! You were the one hogging all the research, and you’re the one who’s been doing all the writing so far! I know you’re a good writer, but you can’t just hog the entire project!” Marcus protested, holding the papers out of Cally’s reach. “Just about the only thing you haven’t tried to do yourself are the visual aids!”

"Ari can do those."

“Exactly! That’s the only thing Ari’s been able to do with you hogging everything else!”

“I just want us to get a good grade!”

“And we will get a good grade! But ya gotta let us help, too!”

Cally sighed, sitting back down. “Alright, alright.”

“Thank you. Now let's get on with this,” Marcus said, dividing the papers equally between himself, Cally, and Ari.

Present

"Okay, maybe I was a little too overbearing. But my grade was on the line!"

“Cally, calm down. We got a perfect A on that assignment,” Marcus assured.

“I know,” Cally granted. “And then you almost got suspended three months later.”

Marcus scowled and grumbled to himself, folding his arms at the memory.

“I still think punching that guy in the face was overkill,” whined Ari.

“It was not!” Marcus protested.

Cally raised an eyebrow.

2 Years and 9 Months Ago…

“Violence was unnecessary,” Cally pointed out as she wrapped up Marcus’s hand.

“Then that kid shouldn’t have ran off with my notebook!” Marcus snapped, wincing as Cally tightened the bandages around his hand.

“You could have taken it back. Most everyone is scared of you anyway, given how your fight with Albert ended.”

“That kid wouldn’t give me it back, even after I asked!”

“And you decided to punch him in the face instead of just snatching it,” Cally added.

“Both of those are mean,” complained Ari.

“It was MY notebook!”

“Still,” Cally frowned. “Your temper could get you hurt.”

Marcus grumbled something, hissing as Cally started patching up another scratch.

“Please stop moving.”

“But it hurts!”

“And?” Cally deadpanned.

“Cally,” Ari pouted.

“I know. Sorry, Marcus. I’m just worried, you know? I don’t want your temper getting you hurt one day.”

“I know, I know. But I’ve got it covered, alright? I’ll be fine. I can handle it,” Marcus assured. He grunted and rolled his shoulders once Cally was done bandaging his wounds. “F_ck, I’m gonna be sore in the morning…”

“Yeah, you are,” Cally sighed. “And try not to swear in front of Ari. You know he hates it.”

“Sorry Ar, force of habit,” Marcus apologized.

Ari hugged Marcus. “It’s okay.”

Present

“And now here we are. Honestly, I wish all our problems were that I was a control freak over grades and Marcus punched people out.”

Marcus nodded. “Preach.”

“But they aren’t. Superbeings want to rip our guts out because we apparently can stop a world-ending event,” Cally sighed.

Marcus folded his arms and thought for a moment. “What are we even supposed to do to stop it, anyways? Is there a superweapon we have to stop? Do we have to go to space and bring down a spaceship or something?”

“I dunno.”

“Hmmm...Hey, big guy! Do you know?”

“Sorry, I have no idea what the others are planning. Me and Spyper have barely heard anything about this whole situation,” Intelligent sighed.

“Well, what have you heard?” Ari asked earnestly.

Intelligent paused for a moment and closed his book. “I don’t know if it’ll help much, but I have heard that the Freaks found something they could use to turn everyone on the planet into Freaks. What that thing is, where it’s being kept, or if it can be destroyed, I don’t know.”

"Sh@t. Anyone you know who may know something?"

Spyper glanced to the back of his van. “We do know someone who may know. She works for HECU.”

"I count four who fit that description," Cally said, eyes taking on a pink tint.

Spyper paused. “Is Rudra included in that count?”

"Yes. So is the scientist everyone is scared of for some reason."

“Oh. Yeah, that would be Anita.”

"What's her deal?"

Ari shifted. “Is she evil?”

“Well...I wouldn’t say she’s evil, but she is crazy,” Spyper shrugged.

“How crazy?”

“She builds weapons of mass destruction for fun.”

“And wants to dissect us for ‘science.’”

“Hmm… don’t like that,” Marcus winced.

“Don’t worry, she’s not as evil as Brutal and his pals.”

“That’s good,” Ari nodded.

“But enough about that. We need information. And to get to safety. Spyper?” Intelligent turned to his buddy, who grinned and started his van.

#only human #freak fortress #spyper #intelligent heavy #marcus #ari #cally

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fightmeyeats · 4 years ago

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ACNH: Colonial Desires in the Context of Quarantine

Since finishing up my undergraduate studies in June, one of the major things I've been doing with my free time is playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons (please don't @ me but I've already logged something like 400 hours). As much fun as the game is, one of the things that's really stood out to me is how much AC:NH depends on and reifies colonial logics, and how important it is to unpack this in the context of the game's popularity and the ongoing pandemic.

One of the first ways I want to address colonialism in AC:NH this is through the way I was first introduced to it, namely through its connection to my thesis and what I refer to as the "terraforming imaginary". Before I started playing or had even decided to buy the game, I was working on my thesis "Constructing New Worlds: An Investigation of Climate Change and the Terraforming Imaginary" (which, shameless self plug but if you're interested you can check out my 10 minute video presentation for symposium at Johns Hopkins University here). During this time I was talking about my thesis pretty non-stop with anyone who would listen and as a result probably about half of my friends independently sent me this meme

[ID: meme from @animalcrossingmemes which shows two children; the one on the left is smiling and looking off into the distance with the label "daydreaming about terraforming" while the child on the right looks stressed and upset with the label "actually terraforming". Beneath this meme is text from @kaijuno which reads "I realize this is an animal crossing meme but as an astrophysicist I was really excited for a second that someone was finally seeing the light on how fricking difficult an a huge waste of time it would be to try to terraform Mars". Beneath this text is another meme with four hands gripping each other's wrists to make a circle. In the center is the initial animalcrossingmemes image and each arm is labeled, respectively, "Minecraft Players," "Sims Players," "Animal Crossing Players," and "Astrophysicists apparently"]

Although my thesis addresses terraforming in the context of space exploration/colonization, AC:NH's engagement with "terraforming" (alongside other aspects of colonial practices and desires) helps to expand on the stakes of this. The reason I put "terraforming" in scare-quotes is because…technically, there isn't any terraforming in AC:NH, given that terraforming is "the operation consisting of rendering other stellar bodies—mainly planets and eventually asteroids—appropriate for human life" (Frédéric Neyrat, 46). While I'm all down for an interpretation of the Animal Crossing world as a non-Earth planet and the villagers as aliens, the island is already suitable for human life and the use of "terraforming" in the game is generally more readily identifiable as geoconstructivism: players redesign and restructure their islands, shaping waterways and topography to create idealistic spaces (as opposed to making the island literally livable). Either way, it speaks to the terraforming imaginary—the underlying set of logics and desires conducive to the imagining and desiring of “terraforming”, ie the logics and desires of colonization. Even though AC:NH's terraforming isn't technically terraforming, it is an embodiment of the terraforming imaginary, centering desires for the "civilizing"/"cultivating" of a space into an orderly, colonized ideal. On even a very surface level it is useful to think about this through the island rating system: islands are ranked out of five stars, with deductions made for things such as having "too many" weeds or not "cleaning up" by leaving items lying around rather than placed with intention.

Another, perhaps more obvious, way in which AC:NH embodies colonial logics is through the "Nook Miles Tickets". Players trade in Nook Miles (an achievement based currency) for tickets which they can take to the airport and use to visit other, uninhabited islands which they can destroy to extract all of the resources slash-and-burn style. Players also have an increased likelihood of catching rare insects, fish, and sea animals to display to their own island museum or sell. As Wilbur, a dodo pilot, explains about this process: "we run the 'finders keepers' protocol here. Lumber, fruit, fish, whatever? Yours if you can carry it", going on to emphasize the importance of not leaving anything behind as there will be no returning; they "burn the flight plans" after each flight.

Although the rampantly destructive extraction of resources is the most apparent embodiment of colonial logics, the centrality of the museum and the imperative to complete each wing by finding and identifying all of the bugs, fish/sea creatures, fossils, and artworks in the game is an equally significant connection to colonialism. Benedict Anderson argues in Imagined Communities that the museum, along with the census and the map, "shaped the way in which the colonial state imagined its dominion—the nature of the human beings it ruled, the geography of its domain, and the legitimacy of its ancestry" (164). The specifics Anderson goes into differ of course, because he's talking about actual colonial states while AC:NH has the fluidity of embodying the underpinning desires which colonialism as process requires to function, but what holds true is that these specific forms of producing, organizing, and displaying knowledge which produced "a totalizing classificatory grid, which could be applied with endless flexibility...to be able to say of anything that it was this, not that; it belonged here, not there" (Anderson 184). Essentially, in AC:NH part of a player's ownership of the island occurs through a player's ability to classify and collect artefacts for the museum. Furthermore, this imperative to collect and preserve fossils, art work, bugs, fish, and sea creatures is part of the way the player's island is positioned as a place of value.

The museum also implicitly functions to reify positions of authority, legitimizing a kind of monopoly of knowledge. In AC:NH, this primarily means the positions of the museum curator (Blathers) and, to a degree, Tom Nook (who selected and invited Blathers) are secured as the authorities on knowledge. When Tom Nook tells the player that the island(s) are deserted, we must take this as truth...yet fishing both on the player's island and the Nook Miles islands can turn up trash items like old tires, tin cans, and boots. Colonial logics depend on a management of who counts as "people" and what counts as "inhabited" and the myth of empty lands; Tom Nook's instance that these islands are all deserted is haunted by these lingering traces of some other inhabitation prior to the game's start.

Okay, so you might be asking what does this all mean and why should we care? Let's talk about both the game's popularity and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic which contextualized its release (and continues to shape daily life). Animal Crossing: New Horizons has not only received overwhelmingly positive critical reception, but is one of the best selling games both for the Switch console and the Animal Crossing series. According to freelance journalist Imad Khan's New York Times article "Why Animal Crossing Is the Game for the Coronavirus Moment," the game's appeal centers in its function as an escape to an "island paradise where bags of money fall out of trees and a talking raccoon can approve you for a mortgage". Khan quotes Dr. Ramzan (a professor of game narrative at Glasgow Caledonian University) who refers to it as "the universe you’ve always wanted, but can’t get." Given the significantly decreased mobility and connection that has accompanied social distancing, as well as the increased stress and heightened inequality which have accompanied COVID-19, this probably isn’t particularly surprising. It makes sense that a cute, low-stress video game would be a valuable form of escapism.

Mobility is a particularly fraught discourse in this context: on the one hand, concerns surrounding containment/immobility are heightened in the context of neoliberalism and within colonial societies, which depend upon discourses of individualism and independence to demarcate the “freedom” which comes from capitalist economies. At the same time, the desire for things like connection/community, movement, and spatial autonomy/sovereignty are not inherently colonial, even as colonialist logics frequently position colonial/capitalist/neoliberal expansion as the solution. Animal Crossing is heavily situated within this entanglement, simultaneously offering a very real form of connection (and even protest) for many people while also implicitly speaking to latent beliefs that colonization is a legitimate form of mobility and escapism. To say that AC:NH is the universe we’ve always wanted but can’t get is to refuse to engage with the inherent contradictions of neoliberalism and reafirm the notion that colonial capitalist worlds are worth wanting; that the fantasy of individual wealth and success through destructive extraction and market freedom, when obtainable, is good.

None of this is to say that playing AC:NH is the same as colonization, because of course it isn't. However, the colonial undertones of the game reflect the pervasiveness of colonial logics and desires in our daily lives, subsequently further normalizing them. Journalist Kazuma Hashimoto, for example, emphasizes the importance of contextualizing AC:NH's colonial undertones within Japanese Colonialism in "Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Japanese Colonialism". As Hashimoto argues, "I am only asking that people familiarize themselves with Japanese colonialism and why something as innocuous as discovering a deserted island can be read as colonialism — especially within the context of a Japanese game".

Inattentiveness to the more subdued, invisibilized manifestations of violence facilitates their internalization and acceptance; educating ourselves and paying attention to and challenging places where we feel comfortable with these kinds of escapist fantasies is an important exercise in critical thinking which can help us to continue to refuse their real life manifestations.

#acnh #animal crossing #post-colonial theory #essay #media analysis #popular culture studies #one thing i dont go into here but which IS relevant to keep in mind is the role real life colonialism & imperialism plays in the production #of basically all technology/electronics (the reason i don't is bc i think it kind of becomes a bland 'there is no ethical consumption under #late capitalism take' which like *is* still important to keep in mind i just dont have anything useful to add or analyze there #long post #anyways as always pls share your thoughts!

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dustedmagazine · 5 years ago

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Derek Taylor 2019: Keep Going

Two words coupled by Harriet Tubman and coined into a credo essential for negotiating the human condition. It's also the title of and invocation to a sublime duo album by Joe McPhee and Hamid Drake released this year as rejoinder to their first recorded ten-years earlier. Taking stock of that decade is something we at Dusted did recently and as the New Year arrives it’s an exercise that feels all the more important, particularly in the extra-musical sense of recognizing the folly of where we’ve been as a world and where we really want to go moving forward. As always, music is both balm and adhesive in remembering that no matter how divisive and discouraging everything seems, we’re still all in it together.

Joe McPhee

Seventy-nine-years young and still a human dynamo of energy, empathy, and optimism, the Powerhouse from Poughkeepsie’s been a constant of these retrospective essays for as long as I’ve been writing them. I haven’t done a hard count, but his horns grace at least a dozen releases this year. Duos with Mats Gustaffson (Brace for Impact), Fred Lonberg-Holm (No Time Left for Sadness), and Paal Nilssen-Love (Song for the Big Chief) join the dyad denoted above in delivering dialogues as personal as they are potent. Tree Dancing assembles the super-group of Lol Coxhill, Evan Parker, Chris Corsano, and McPhee collectively and in component combinations with bassist John Edwards on board for a culminating cut, while Six Situations realizes a dream of bassist Damon Smith in teaming him with McPhee’s tenor and now dearly departed drummer Alvin Fielder. The Fire Each Time bundles six concerts of McPhee in the company of the DKV Trio from a 2017 tour that took James Baldwin and John Coltrane as lodestones. Saving perhaps the best for last, Invitation to a Dream comingles McPhee’s pocket trumpet and soprano with pedal steel guitarist Susan Alcorn and old confrere Ken Vandermark in a tripart colloquy delivered in crystal clear sound.

Peter Brötzmann

A year younger and another fixture in my yearly firmament, Herr Brötz has always had ears attuned to the early pioneers of improvised music through the unabashed embrace of Sidney Bechet, Coleman Hawkins, and others. Those unerring affections erode some of the surprise from I Surrender Dear, an album of tenor-rendered jazz standards and originals, but also enhance the overall experience in how literally he makes good on the debt. It’s arguably his best solo album since 14 Love Poems and bolstered further by the focus on a single central member of his reed arsenal. Also of note, Fifty Years After commemorating the golden anniversary of Machine Gun with longtime confreres German pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach and Dutch drummer Han Bennink,

Rob Franken Electrification — Functional Stereo Music (678 Records)

Four-hours of Fender Rhodes heaven recorded in elite Dutch studios between 1972 and 1981 that puzzlingly never found commercial circulation until last year as a six-LP series. The 2019 edition transfers the archive to three-CDs and only rarely flags as Franken’s fonky keys front guitar, bass, drums and a revolving cast of fellow aces fielding other instruments. Economy is the informal edict as morsel-sized originals alternate with covers of tunes by Herbie Hancock, Stevie Wonder, Atilla Zoller, and even Steely Dan. The utilitarian intimations of the title aren’t just lip service. Franken originally envisioned the music as an homage to the muzak strains common to “shopping malls, hotels, elevators, department stores, and airports.” Much of it sounds far better aligned with the kinetic cop and detective pot-boilers that populated television and cinema of the decade.

Brian Groder Trio – Luminous Arcs (Latham)

Keeping a working improvising ensemble together is no minor accomplishment, yet Groder’s been able to maintain one in his name with bassist Michael Bisio and drummer Jay Rosen. This disc joins two previous albums in demonstrating both the depth of the musicians’ bonds and their shared zeal in exploring and capitalizing on them. Any novelty surrounding the particulars of a trumpet-led piano-less trio is fortunately long since lapsed. The precedence allows them to marshal their attention to shaping music that is simultaneously the sum and multiplication of the substantial parts.

V/A — Pakistan: Folk and Pop Instrumentals 1966-1976 (Sublime Frequencies)

Seattle-based Sublime Frequencies weathered a stretch where the “weirdness” quotient of their audio excavations appeared to outweigh accompanying scholarship and attention to edifying annotations. This scintillating compilation suffers no such skew in the balance of carefully sourced sounds and accompanying copy to shore up the context. Sixties rock, specifically surf, is a through-line in the preponderance of reverb-riddled guitars and buzzing Farfisa organ on many of the tracks, but indigenous melodies and rhythms are also frequent fodder for enthusiastic appropriation. Best of all, there’s a pervasive sense of fun to the sequencing that makes it a handy soundtrack for soirees of all sorts.

Jaimie Branch — Fly or Die II (International Anthem)

If her ascendant flight pattern is any indication, death, artistic or otherwise, isn’t even an option for Jaimie Branch. This follow-up to her meteoric (and long overdue) 2017 debut builds organically on previous cosmetic aspects (core quartet, cover art, etc.) while making progressive-pronged politics even more prominent. “Prayer for Amerikkka” doesn’t mince words in proffering a platform of resistance and the musical propellant to keep it confidently airborne. A robust touring schedule and well-earned media attention are only furthering Branch’s designs at getting the sounds into as many ears as possible.

Sam Rivers

The Sam Rivers Archive Series is the brainchild of producers Danas Mikailionis and Ed Hazell. A projected eight-volume celebration of the music of the eponymous composer/improviser/educator/doyen curated from a vast trove left in the care of Rivers’ daughter after his passing in 2011, it’s also probably the jazz news that most set my heart aflutter with anticipation this year. The initial pair of entries, Emanation and Zenith, certainly live up to the promise in presenting clean fidelity concerts by a high profile trio with bassist Cecil McBee and drummer Norman Conners (pre-disco) and a workshop quintet involving tubaist Joe Daley, bassist Dave Holland and the eight-limbed drums juggernaut of Barry Altschul and Charlie Persip. Both discs are essential.

Jimi Hendrix — Songs for Groovy Children (Experience Hendrix)

Not a long-lost Hendrix kids’ album despite what the jejune title might suggest. Instead, it’s four nearly complete concerts from the guitar deity’s iconic New Year’s Band of Gypsies engagement at the Fillmore East in 1969/70. Producer Eddie Kramer largely quashes his invasive impulses in mastering the tapes, leaving the only real minuses to manifest in the occasionally extra-loose interplay and Jimi’s decision to indulge Buddy Miles’ mic access to a regrettably arguable fault. Math done, there’s nothing stopping an instant trigger-pull for true believers, even folks who have it all already in bootleg form.

Ezz-thetics

Fingers remain collectively-crossed that Werner X. Uehlingher will one day decide to write an autobiography of his countless adventures as a stalwart producer of improvised music. Ezz-thetics is just the latest chapter in the future tome’s story arc that started with the founding of the Hat Hut label back in 1974. The new imprint, named after a classic George Russell composition, balances reissue and archival releases with new ones, packing them with branding that memorializes the old while consecrating the new. Discs by Jimmy Giuffre (Graz Live 1961), John Coltrane (Impressions Graz 1962), and Albert Ayler (Quartets 1964 Spirits to Ghosts Revisted) are the marquee name highlights, but the entirety of the imprint’s releases to-date have had their merits.

Stephen Riley

The tenorist is no longer my favorite under-forty plier on the instrument simply because he’s aged out of the bracket. Oleo builds on last year’s transparently veiled Sonny Rollins’ tribute Hold ‘Em Joe by adding the sturdy trumpet of Joe Magnarelli to the equation and turning the referential calendar forward to the saxophone colossus’ collaborations with Don Cherry. It’s a beaut from a brisk beginning sortie on “Ornithology” to lengthy slalom on the Ducal “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.” Tangerine Rhapsody is technically under Dutch drummer Snorre Kirk’s leadership, but it wouldn’t be nearly the album it is absent Riley’s supple and sagacious involvement.

Milt Buckner & Jo Jones — Buck & Jo (Fremeaux & Associates)

Curious about what makes an individual improviser tick? Duo contexts are arguably the best aperture to gain edification and insight. Even better than solo or ensemble configurations, the dyad distills things down to solo and dialogue. This four-disc, four-hour-plus collection is a remarkable case in point and surprise that it even exists at all given its vintage let alone its scope. Thank French impresarios the Panassie Brothers who invited ur swing organist and ur swing drummer to indulge themselves with only the gentlest of producer-dictated strictures. The results are fascinating, whimsical, bombastic, and above all, endlessly entertaining. An epitome of intimately undertaken jazz tête-à-tête before it was anything resembling a regular thing.

Del Shannon — Two Silhouettes (Bear Family)

Preconceptions can prove obdurate edifices. Prior to my forty-eighth birthday this year I dismissed Del Shannon as one of the disposable princes of bubble gum pop on the rare occasions he entered my consciousness at all. “Runaway” remains an influential song, particularly in its use of musitron organ, but it’s hardly the makings of unassailable genius. Bear Family’s exhaustive single-disc survey levies a much more convincing appeal for the crooner’s embodiment of a nexus of odd congruencies as moonlighting jazzmen conspire with duck-tailed rockers and barbershop harmonists. Dennis Coffey and Hargus “Pig” Robbins show up as sidemen and there’s even an S&M-tinged canticle called “Torture” replete with whip cracks and a Greek chorus of moans, leaving one to wonder what Ward and June Cleaver made of it all?

Sun Ra

Cosmic Myth and Modern Harmonic continue to advance the mantle apparently abandoned by the Art Yard label in keeping Ra-related albums in circulation. The erstwhile Mr. Mystery employed numerous vocalists throughout his career, even contributing his own less-than-stellar (pun intended) pipes to the cause on occasion. None among that eclectic number could match June Tyson, who brought joie de vivre to the lyrical manifestations of Ra’s cosmic-afro-centrism that was at once wholly believable and infectious. Saturnian Queen of the Sun Ra Arkestra does right by her memory by culling an hour’s worth of highlights from a vast and varied recorded archive. Monorails & Satellites (now in three volumes!) and newly minted editions of Pathways to Unknown Worlds and When Angels Speak of Love were also welcome arrivals.

Derek Bailey/Han Bennink/Evan Parker — Topographie Parisienne: Dunois, April 3rd, 1981 (Fou)

The Topography of the Lungs trio in concert and at length with decent sound eleven-years after their initial seismic contributions to free improv. Bailey and Parker weren’t yet at irreconcilable loggerheads but there’s still a galvanizing and palpable tension that suffuses their interplay. Bennink can’t help being anything but Bennink, bashing away one moment and pattering at barely a whisper the next while keeping ears cocked with split-second focus to the contributions his compatriots. Duos combine with solos from Parker sweeten and season an already delicious aural pot.

Fred Anderson Quartet — Live at the Velvet Lounge Volume V (FPE)

Leftfield guest Toshinori Kondo and drummer Hamid Drake were one half of Peter Brötzmann’s Die Like a Dog outfit when this 1994 concert was committed to tape. That take-no-prisoners context allowed his plangent, frenetic, effects-saturated brass free and ferocious rein. Anderson’s outlets didn’t usually involve electronics and its instructive hearing the adaptations to the roiling controlled-chaos within his customary cerulean-hued improvisations. Drake and bassist Tastu Aoki maintain a stout terrestrial tether enlivened by a revolving array of undulating grooves. Extra points earned for incorporating the original Velvet Lounge wallpaper scheme into the production design. Bottom line: I miss Fred.

V/A — Hillbillies in Hell: Tribulations: Country Music’s Tormented Testament (1952-1974) (The Omni Recording Corporation)

Amusing alliterative appellation aside, this series has managed the no-meager-feat of avoiding diminishing returns while mining the same expanse of time over successive volumes. The fifth entry tilts the lens even more sharply toward the sort of fervent tent show revival circuit favored by fictional religious reprobates like Rev. Harry Powell and Elmer Gantry and comes up with a bonanza off-kilter cuts from names both famous (Hank Williams, Louvin Bros., Tex Ritter) and arcane (The Burton Family, Durwood Daily, The Sunshine Boys Quartet). Ernest Tubb’s “Saturday Satan, Sunday Saint” persuasively sums up the ecumenical ethos, but every song exudes its share of sinful charms.

V/A — Sacred Sounds: Dave Hamilton’s Raw Detroit Gospel (Ace)

As a both prolific and preternaturally talented producer, Dave Hamilton’s usual purview was left-of-center soul and funk. Urban (but not urbane) gospel offered a less-publicized commercial side outlet and he brought comparable emphasis on authenticity and creativity to the various acts he championed. This compilation comprises all-killer-no-filler assemblage that lives up to the unvarnished signifier in the title. It’s nearly eighty-minutes of jangly guitars, tambourines, and impassioned sanctifying and proselytizing of all sorts, as suited for Sunday morning as Friday or Saturday night depending on the preferred mood of your personal household. I’ve enjoyed equal fun plying it in both.

Art Pepper — Promise Kept

Laurie Pepper, like Sue Mingus and other jazz widows before her, remains a passionate arbiter and steward of her late husband’s recorded legacy. The title of this box set collecting a singular tributary of Art Pepper’s later career aspirations could just as easily serve as a signifier of that bond. In truth, it’s reflective of a pact the couple made with producer John Snyder and a string of studio sessions largely left unissued during the Pepper’s lifetime. Rivalries real and imagined are revealed across the recordings as the altoist wrestles with his insecurities and the realities of choices made and paid for as a consequence of his addictions and fictions. Straightforward and vital, the music avoids gestalt in remaining consistently strong and emotionally true.

Paul Bley/Gary Peacock/Paul Motian — When Will the Blues Leave (ECM)

The prevailing mystery behind this twenty-year-old concert rests on the reason(s) why the fine folks at ECM left it in the can for so long. I don’t have an answer but rather a simple expression of gratitude that they finally decided to rectify the error and get the sounds out into the world. Bley, Peacock and Motian were already three-decades deep in the periodic associations that quietly helped open chamber jazz to free improvisation when they took to the Swiss stage. The ensuing masterful performance manages to feel simultaneously like three old friends shooting the shit and a trio of improvisatory experts operating at peak collective capacity.

Prince — 1999 (Warner)

Residency in the Twin Cities for the better part of two decades has resulted in many boons, personal and vocational for this writer. As with any life lived, the red side of the ledger has entries, too. Folded among them is the frictional, frayed listening relationship I harbor with the region’s most famous musical export. Nearly three years after his premature passing Prince is still everywhere and everything here. That perpetual, and perpetually irksome, ubiquity is what makes this five-disc+DVD beyond-exhaustive box so refreshing to my patience-tested purview. It contains lots of impressive material from arguably his most creative and questing period. It also has plenty of songs that feel competent but quotidian by comparison. That blend of bliss and banality is as effective a corrective as I can think of to the cult of purple sainthood that persists around these parts.

And as is my habitual wont, 25 more in no hierarchical order… thank you for reading and Feliz Año Nuevo!

Josh Abrams Natural Information Society (Eremite)

Michael Formanek’s Very Practical Trio – Even Better (Intakt)

Charles Gayle/John Edwards/Mark Sanders – Seasons Changing (Otokroku)

Dudu Pukwana/Han Bennink/Misha Mengelberg – Yi Yole (ICP/Corbett vs. Dempsey)

Nat King Cole – Hittin’ the Ramp: The Early Years (1936-1945) (Resonance)

Willem Breuker & Han Bennink – New Acoustic Swing Duo (ICP/Corbett vs. Dempsey)

Whit Dickey & Kirk Knuffke – Drone Dream (No Business)

Mark Turner & Gary Foster – Mark Turner Meets Gary Foster (Capri)

J.C. Heard & Bill Perkins Quintet – Live at the Lighthouse 1964 (Fresh Sound)

Stan Getz – Getz at the Gate: November 26, 1961 (Verve)

Rita Moss - Queen Moss 1951-1959 (Fresh Sound)

Bill Frisell & Thomas Morgan – Epistrophy (ECM)

Marion Brown & Dave Burrell – Live at the Black Musicians’ Conference, 1981 (No Business)

Jon Irabagon – Invisible Horizon (Irrabagast)

Tom Rainey Trio – Combobulated (Intakt)

Joe Lovano & Enrico Rava Quintet – Roma (ECM)

Tomeka Reid Quartet – Old New (Cuneiform)

Johnny Griffin & Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis – Ow: Live at the Penthouse (Reel to Reel)

Takahashi Miyasaka – Animals Garden (Kojima/BBE)

Tiger Trio (Joelle Leandre/Myra Melford/Nicole Mitchell) – Map of Liberation (Rogue Art)

V/A – Jambu: E Os Miticos Sons da Amazonia (Analog Africa)

V/A – Put the Whole Armour On: Female Black Gospel 1940s/1950s (Gospel Friend)

V/A –Alefa Madagascar: Salegy, Soukous, & Soul from the Red Island (Strut)

Horace Tapscott with the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra and the Great Voice of UGMAA - Why Don’t You Listen? Live at LACMA 1998 (Dark Tree)

Duster – Capsule Losing Contact (Numero)

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filmfanatic82 · 6 years ago

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AO3 Link (HERE)

Chapter 4: Lexa (I)

48 hours.

Technically 47 hours and 35 minutes. But not that Lexa is counting. No. Of course not. She’s not the type that would actively avoid making the most significant decision of the life by counting down the minutes until the ever-looming deadline.

No. She’s not that type of person.

Lexa’s eyes wander over towards the large clock above the classroom door for the 50th time since the start of the period.

47 hours and 34 minutes.

“Miss Woods,” Dr. Kane calls out from the front of the room.

Lexa snaps out of her thoughts, instantly aware that all eyes -- including the pair of crystal blues ones residing beside her -- are focused in on her.

“Sorry. Can you repeat the question?” Lexa asks as she straightens herself up in her chair and attempts to pull herself together.

“I was asking if anyone had any thoughts in regards to whether or not Edward the VII made the right decision to abdicate the throne to marry Wallis Simpson?”

Lexa swallows thickly. Such an ironically poignant question to be asked… especially given her current conundrum. The choice of love versus one’s preordained destiny. Two critically vital components of one’s life that should never have to be pitted against each other.

Future versus happiness.

How is one supposed to make such a weighted decision without never once wondering if they’ve chosen correctly?

Or maybe there isn’t a correct choice at all?

“Lexa?”

Lexa exhales and starts to open her mouth to respond, when suddenly--

The sound of a bell ringing cuts through the silence of the classroom, signifying the end of the period and is immediately followed by a chorus of chairs scraping against tile and notebooks being shoved into backpacks

“Saved by the bell,” Kane says with a hint of a smile. “Remember. Quiz this Friday so I would highly recommend rereading chapters three and four if you haven’t already… Oh, and Lexa? Can you stay back for a moment?”

Lexa freezes upon these words and slowly looks up, catching Kane’s eyes. And instantly…

She knows what the conversation will be about. It’s the same conversation Lexa has been strategically ducking and dodging for the last three weeks now. Ever since the day that the letter arrived and dropped a Hiroshima level bomb into her well mapped out plans for her future.

“Want me to stay with you?” Clarke asks gently reaching out and touching Lexa’s arm.

“No. It’s alright. I’ll meet you in the cafeteria.” Lexa forces a smile that just falls short of her eyes.

Clarke hesitates for a moment or two, almost as if she knows something’s not right, but then lets it go and plants a small but loving kiss on Lexa’s lips. “Okay, baby. See you in a few.”

Lexa nods in response and watches as Clarke gathers up the rest of her belongings and heads out of the classroom with the rest of the students.

“She doesn’t know, does she?” Kane’s voice once again pulls Lexa out of the depths of her own thoughts.

“No,” Lexa exhales as she turns her attention back towards Kane.

“You know, you’re going to want to tell her soon. Regardless of what you end up deciding.”

“I know.” Lexa pauses for a moment, teeth sinking into the flesh of her bottom lip.

Of course, Lexa knows. It’s the one thought that’s been plaguing her every waking moment for the last few weeks now. Every single time her eyes set upon those icy blue orbs and wild mane of blonde curls.

It’s the first -- and only --- secret Lexa has ever willing kept from the girl she’s come to realize is her soulmate and with each and every minute that passes, it eats away at her soul just a little bit more.

“I don’t want to tell you what to do Lexa, but this is truly a once in a lifetime kind of opportunity. A full scholarship to Cambridge University by itself is highly impressive. Not to mention, the added offer of spending the next six months studying besides the leading world’s expert in Global Economics.”

“You sound just like my father.”

“Let me guess. He wants you to accept the offer?”

“If it were up to him, I would already be on a plane to London.”

Kane lets out a hint of a laugh as his eyes ever so slightly soften. He moves around his desk, cutting the distance between himself and Lexa, and then places a warm fatherly hand down upon her shoulder. “And if it were truly up to you?”

Lexa takes a moment, mulling over the thousands of conflicting thoughts dancing around the confines of her mind. Her hand subconsciously wanders towards the small emerald green tree shaped pendant hidden just beneath the collar of her t-shirt and wraps her fingers around it.

A tiny but constant reminder of why she has yet to make a decision.

“I don’t know,” Lexa answers in nothing more than a whisper. Kane gives her a light, but caring squeeze on her shoulder speaking volumes without ever uttering a word in response. It isn’t much, but at that very moment, it’s all the reassurance Lexa’s needs.

47 hours and 18 minutes.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

10 more minutes.

Just 10 more minutes and then she’ll call it quits.

Lexa’s muscles scream in agony as her feet pounds against the concrete pavement matching the rhythm of the song that blasts through her earbuds beat for beat. It’s her ritual. Every morning at promptly at 6 am, regardless of the weather or how Lexa’s feeling. Run until her legs give away, and her lungs burst into flames.

Run until there’s nowhere left to run.

Lexa rounds the corner and slows down her pace for a brief second, attempting to figure out which way to head next.

Although she’s been back for almost four months now, the majority of her surroundings still feels utterly foreign at best. Not that Lexa hasn’t tried to adjust. She’s more than made it her mission to refamiliarize herself with her new found home, frequently local coffee shops and parks during her precious few hours of downtime in between her long days at the firm. But still…

It doesn’t feel like home.

Then again, nowhere has. Not since Lexa packed her bags and boarded a plane for the other side of the world.

Lexa spots a park in the nearby distance and without another moment's hesitation, picks back up her gruel pace and heads towards it. As she approaches the entrance, though, she can’t help but notice two teenage girls tucked away within the shade of a large palm tree. One blonde and one brunette. Their limbs are seamlessly entwined with one another, like two conjoining puzzle pieces, while they exchange a series of stolen glances as they each busy themselves in their phones.

The moment isn’t anything special and yet…

The all too familiar sense of guilt wraps itself around Lexa’s chest with a vise-like grip, growing tighter and tighter with each and every passing second.

God, she hates this feeling.

It isn’t the first time this has happened. No. During Lexa’s first year at Cambridge, it would happen at least ten times a week. And would be triggered by anything. Anything at all that reminded her of--

Lexa needs to run… And now.

As if compelled by some invisible force, Lexa’s legs go from zero to sixty, beating against the pavement at an almost unbearable pace. She drives her body to move faster… harder… blindly heading forwards with no real destination nor direction.

Just run.

It’s the only trick Lexa’s knows to keep the ever crippling guilt at bay.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

A few hours and an extra long, scalding hot shower later, and Lexa finds herself tucked away in a corner booth of the random brunch spot that according to Anya is “the only place in a thirty-mile radius that knows how to make a decent bacon egg and cheese sandwich”. She flips through a case file, re-reading the same page over and over again, unable to focus in on anything but the ever-growing queasiness sensation in the depths of her stomach.

Meeting Anya for breakfast isn’t the issue. No. Lexa has met up with her sister at least a dozen or so times now since moving back to the states.

It’s who Anya is bringing that’s causing Lexa to be hit with an almost suffocating wave of anxiety.

She should’ve listened to that ever-present pragmatic voice buried deep down in the depths of her brain and gone ahead and canceled. Just made up some excuse-- any excuse-- not to be there.

There’s a lot Lexa should’ve done.

But too late now.

Now, she’s here and given that they are set to walk in at any minute, there’s no turning back.

Lexa takes a brief pause from the paperwork in front of her and exhales while she runs her hands through her wild mane of curls.

It’s not like she hasn’t any communication at all with Raven since she left. No. In fact, despite everything that transpired in those days leading up to leaving for Cambridge, Lexa and Raven remained in touch.

Not on any regular cadence or anything. Just a sporadic text here and there on trivial subjects. Or the occasional drive-by hello whenever Lexa would facetime with Anya.

It really wasn’t anything significant… but still, it was something. A connection a world --a life-- that once was hers.

Seeing Raven, though, in the flesh and blood. Here. Back in the place that once felt like home to Lexa. It’s different.

It makes the undeniable truth just that much harder to ignore.

Seeing Raven means that it’s only a matter of time before she’ll have to come face to face with--

“Hey, Rick. Can I get one egg and cheese on an everything bagel and a sausage, egg, and cheese on a poppy seed? Oh and two iced coffees? One light and sweet and the other black? Thanks.”

Lexa immediately snaps out of her thoughts as the sound of the voice blindsides her like a sucker punch to her soul.

It’s her voice.

Lexa’s heart starts to pound erratically against her ribcage as all the oxygen suddenly seems to sucks out of the room. She’s frozen. Like a deer caught in deer caught in headlights, paralyzed with from head to toe with unsurmountable fear of what’s about to come.

Maybe… Just maybe if she keeps her head down and eyes glued to the paperwork before her, then the moment will pass, and she’ll go unnoticed.

“Lexa?”

The voice cuts through the background chatter of the restaurant and once again pierces through Lexa’s thick walls of emotional armor. She takes a moment to collect herself, praying to whatever god is listening that she can maintain her composure, and then, with every ounce of courage she can muster, she draws her eye upwards and instantly is met with--

Blue.

A set of crystal blue eyes that have been haunting Lexa’s dreams each and every night since she left. A set that belongs a woman that at one point in time she thought was her soulmate.

“Hello, Clarke,” Lexa replies in nothing more than a whisper, fully taking in the sight of the woman before her.

Different.

It’s the only word that comes to mind at her first sight of Clarke in almost half a decade. Not in an unrecognizable way. No. Lexa would still be able to spot instantly identify her in a sea of faces, but there are little changes. Like how her once-signature lion’s mane of golden curls has been replaced with a more mature looking short messy bob that hangs just below her jawline. Or how her clothes seem to hang off of her in a way that suggests that remembering to eat isn’t something that comes easily to her. Or even the hints of new tattoos peaking out beneath the edges of her shirt.

But the most jarring difference is the noticeable absence of the spark of life within Clarke’s crystal blue eyes.

“What are you… I thought… Are you just…” Clarke trails off as a definitive look of confusion sets in upon her face.

“What am I doing here?” Lexa asks in an attempt to help finish Clarke’s thought and alleviate the growing awkwardness between the two of them.

Clarke nods, unable to find her words.

“I was offered a job with my uncle Gustus’ firm and decided to move back.”

“How long?”

“About four month now.” Lexa swallows thickly letting her answer fully sink in. She maintains eye contact with Clarke while weighing what to offer up next.

There hasn’t been a single day where Lexa hasn’t thought about this very moment. Where they would be. Who would spot who first. What words would be uttered and how their conversation would play out.

And true to Lexa’s own nature, she meticulously mapped out every possible word-- every reaction-- to be prepared. To maintain the wall no matter how hard her emotions fight to break free.

But now… Now in the reality of the moment, Lexa finds herself completely and utterly lost, without even the tiniest of hint as to where to start.

“Clarke, I--” But Lexa is cut off by the sound of her cell phone buzzing against the wooden table. She glances down at the screen and spots Anya’s name. “Sorry, one second.”

Clarke doesn’t respond but remains standing there only a few feet away, still showing clear signs of shock.

“Hi, Ahn. Where are--” Lexa immediately stops talking as a deep male voice cuts in on the other end of the phone, spewing out a jumble of words at a rapid-fire pace.

And suddenly, the world starts to move in slow motion. Lexa knows that words are being said to her, but she can’t seem to process anything at all. Only the phrases “accident” and “critical condition” resonate, flashing through the haze of her mind in angry red letters. And even those words seem surreal at best.

Finally, the voice stops and Lexa simply places the phone back down on the table, not even checking to see if she hung up.

“Lexa?” Clarke’s voice snaps Lexa back, instantly speeding up the world around her. “Are you okay?”

Lexa looks up at Clarke and is hit with a sudden sharp pang of complete gratitude. There’s just no other person in the entire world she would want with her at this moment in time.

“No,” Lexa replies in a shaky exhale of air. “There’s been an accident.”

#clexa #clarke x lexa #clarke griffin #lexa woods #raven reyes #octavia blake #octaven #the 100 #wlw #ao3 #fanfic

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giantpredatorymollusk · 6 years ago

Text

This is a story about farming. It is quite long. I think it may be worth reading anyway, but unfortunately I have no way to prove it. I’ve also tried my best but I still don’t know if it actually makes perfect sense in every way? But it did all actually happen; so it all kind of has to make at least a little bit of sense, even if doesn’t really seem like it.

The trouble all started in 1901, when my great great grandfather emigrated to the United States from the modern-day Czech Republic and later, in 1911, bought a 90-acre farm there. Many years later, most of that farm came to belong to my grandfather, and roughly 10 years back he retired from his job selling tires at the tire store and started making the 40 mile drive north to the farm to spend his summer days there and plant a garden (in the area that wasn’t already rented out to be planted with soybeans.) Not long after that, he had enough produce to start selling stuff at a nearby farmers’ market in an upscale town, physically not far from the farm, although psychogeographically immensely distant from that chunk of desolate, isolated, fairly representative rural Ohio.

I was dragged in in the summer of 2015, from the end of June to the beginning of July, mostly pounding stakes into the ground so that the roughly 1000-1500 tomato plants that my grandfather had planted that year (with occasional help from my grandmother and uncle) could be tied up between them and the fruit wouldn’t lay on the ground and rot easily. I hated it there (in fairness, I probably would’ve hated anything that involved leaving the house during that time in my life) and when my dad got me out of it (by hiring me to help him paint a house) I quickly divested myself of the money I’d received there to wash my hands of the place and resolved never to go back. My dad was never in favor of me going to the farm, knowing as he did that the work could be dangerous (operating old, large, and unreliable tractors and backhoe with minimal training or safety precautions; running large, dangerous power saws in creative ways without the proper guards, gear, or safety precautions, mostly to put points on stakes; operating saws in an unsafe manner while standing in the raised bucket of the old and unreliable backhoe in order to trim trees; etc) and probably also suspected that I personally (especially then) was fairly vulnerable to being psychologically manipulated into performing difficult tasks that I was unhappy doing over a long period of time while being underpaid under some circumstances. Hmm.

I returned to the farm for the entirety of the summer of 2016. After barely surviving/graduating my senior year of high school that year I had given up on life and settled pretty quickly back into the routine of the daily back-and-forth farm trips. It is true that I was getting paid; it was also true that I was being challenged and learning things, mostly the basics of planting vegetables, like which plants were cold-season crops and which were warm-season and how far apart to space the transplants, and how a PTO works on a tractor; and it’s certainly a fact that on a personal level, I was still completely taken in by my grandfather’s wit and farm wisdom and overpowering managerial confidence. I made myself completely subordinate to him, and blamed myself when his ideas for what we should be doing next were completely obvious to him but rather opaque to me; I remember it frequently happening that he would tell me what to do and I would reflexively go off to do it, and then realize I was unclear on what he meant and have to timidly re-approach him for further instructions. This kind of slowed down the learning process. Much later I would also realize how superficial his constant confidence could be, and how it was often less the natural attitude of someone who knew what they were doing and more a tool he used to impress people into doing things without thinking too much about any of the potential alternatives. Also, according to my admittedly fallible memories, I was getting paid $35 per day for what were generally between 7 and 8 hour days. I was, in fact, 18 years old that year and probably could have gotten a different job that for one thing paid a better hourly wage and for another left me less reliant on the caprices of my family; but this was neither a thing that happened nor a thing that was expected from me, least of all by me. My internal world hadn’t expanded as I’d grown older; my universe of possibilities was limited to the things that were already present in my somewhat simple life. This was probably symptomatic of some larger problem or problems with the functionality of my brain at that point in my life.

One can become trapped in many different ways. You can be trapped in a specific city, or a zip code, or in a geographic region sorely lacking in cities, or one which they are considered entirely strange and outlandish things; in a job, in a career, in a lifestyle, or in a set of lifestyles considered realistic given your high school grades, ability to connect with others, and standing in society and life; in a friend group, or in an identity, or in a lack thereof, or in any number of the various rules and regulations that govern how one is allowed to interact with the rest of the human race; in a comedy, a tragedy, a pastoral narrative, or in any combination of the above kinds of story that one no longer wishes to be part of. For all I know, thanks to the stereotypical farm benefits of character building, meaningful work experiencing, and nature connecting-with, working at the farm for that year may have actually been good for me; nevertheless, I wish that it had been my last full summer there. I had showed up, learned some stuff, earned a small amount of money, and, in retrospect experienced at least the majority of what this particular 90 acre area of the planet had had to offer. Alas.

2017! This year, we had a pretty consistent schedule that I can remember clearly to this day: we left at 9:30 AM, when my grandfather would pull into my driveway and blow his horn, and got back between 7 and 8 o’clock at night. Built into that schedule is a one hour commute each way (we both lived about 40 miles away from the farm, which was actually inhabited by my uncle, who was often around and occasionally helped with the work but frequently made fairly abrasive and critical comments (if often correct) comments about it (for example, about the fact that our work day started so late in the morning)) and a daily grocery store stop for drinks for the cooler. I was the driver (once my grandfather’s problems with what I suspect is undiagnosed narcolepsy had almost killed us a couple of times) which you would think give me control over the stereo, but I quickly learned that my grandfather had pretty specific taste in music (country from the 50s and 60s) and a temperament unsuited to most podcasts. Obviously, most of that time in the daily schedule was taken up by the work day (so generally either planting tomatoes (which gets a little less rewarding after about the 500th one, which that year only put us at about a quarter of the way through the tomato plants, not counting the hundreds of eggplant, cabbage, and zucchini plants or the miscellaneous corn, squash, and beans), pounding stakes and tying string for the tomatoes, or harvesting tomatoes) which lay at the end of the lonely highway on a lonely work site at which the same 2-4 people showed up every day. (It became four people once you counted my younger brother, who came up to the farm that year until the start of marching band season got him out of it, and who fortunately made it his main job to get everyone to pack up and leave promptly at the end of the day. Once he stopped showing up, and even though I persuaded my grandfather to move the schedule up an hour so that we could get home earlier, we never left as consistently as we did when he was there; I didn’t have the stamina to find my grandfather (who didn’t carry a phone or a watch) and tell him what time it was at the end of the day every single day so that he could start to think about leaving.) I was being paid $40 a day, with a $20 bonus for market days once they started, which with our theoretically 35-hour work week ends up being about $6.29 an hour? Huh. In addition to the extra $20, the market season was nice because picking stuff is less tiring and more rewarding than planting stuff, and because I got to see way more people every day in the form of our market customers, even if I was interacting with them mainly through the intermediary of my grandfather.

Another nice thing is that this is the first year I have a decent photo album for! I started experimenting with old 35mm film cameras in late June and by early July I had my first interchangeable-lens digital camera, which I relied upon to keep my brain alive for large parts of the summer. I have… a lot of pictures from this season.

Finally, at the end of the year, I ended up in college. Any criticisms of my grandfather that I might offer up here have to be tempered by the fact that he did in fact drive me to the local (relatively) cheap higher-education dispenser and basically registered me for me (technically, I applied but there’s a 100% acceptance rate.) This was something I desperately wanted to do but was unable to make happen by myself. I won’t say that my grandfather every really understood the problems I went through while experiencing formal education, but as perhaps the member of my family least comfortable himself with the concept and culture of higher education, he was the most willing to notice and accept that I needed help getting started with it.

However, I did do quite badly that semester (I started out enrolled in 4.5 classes and ended enrolled in 2, with a C average) and going to the farm to work 4 days a week still (after morning classes and also on Saturday) did not help that except in that it provided a convenient distraction from it; an opportunity for me to distract myself from my frustrations by wearing myself out.

Why did I come back to the farm for 2018? I wasn’t happy there in 2017, I have the journal entries to prove it. Reasons: it was the path of least resistance, it was something I was more already familiar with than any other job, and my grandfather remained a very difficult person for me to say no to. (Also, he asked me (and my brother) to commit in midwinter, when it still seemed non-threatening and pretty far away.) The schedule was pretty much the same as I described for last year except that for some reason we went up 6 days a week as often as 5 (weather permitting.) My brother went up with us for the same period of time as he had previously, but was even more ornery this year than he was the last, which was an accomplishment; this didn’t stop me from being grateful for his presence. Mostly, I recruited him to work on whatever I was working on during the day, whenever I had a specific project: like building a fence around the second patch, or digging drainage ditches on the lawn, or moving the rainwater collection tank trailer to water stuff before Grandpa could realize that something that he didn’t plan for us was happening. My uncle became extremely fond of complaining that we were getting less done working on the same thing together than we might have working on different things far apart; this may have been true, but I was unwilling to test the theory.

As I implied above, I had a lot more freedom this year to pick projects that I thought needed to be done instead of following instructions all day, as long as I could seem confident about it under scrutiny later. I responded in two ways: I started wearing earbuds and listened to music and occasionally podcasts for most of the day, which was great except that it ruined earbuds and made me feel slightly spacey like I wasn’t even physically there sometimes, given that it was the main input that was actually making it to my brain, and I gave myself three new jobs. The first was to pick, display, and sell produce at a roadside stand that I set up back home (ideally without attracting too much attention from my uncle, who was doing the same thing); the second was to start picking for and selling at a new weekday farmers’ market; and the third was to fix an old dump truck that had been sitting in the back barn for the better part of the decade with a broken brake line, with the help of my dad, who came up to the farm a few days to show me what to actually do. The stand was very successful but 20% went to my mom for stocking it during the day and another 20% went to my grandfather for owning the farm; the new farmers’ market only required me to pay off my grandfather but had too many vendors for the customer base and was generally very slow; and the truck project was a huge disaster that consumed countless hours and brain cells: one brake line burst after another, we ended up having to remove and replace the two brake cylinders in each of the back wheels (which necessitated jacking the 12.5 ton vehicle up and removing both rear wheels and axles), the wiring for the lights was fucked from a previous botched repair job by a person or persons unknown, the bed needed to be attacked with the farm’s one working boom truck to get it to even move, and even after it was going up and down smoothly the hydraulic pump was occasionally leaking fluid, which I was neither qualified for or willing to try to fix; then, during the first test drive with a potential buyer, the radiator apparently exploded, and he convinced my grandfather to sell it to him for $1000, which was split between him, me, and my dad and uncle for helping (more or less.) I eventually calculated that with those three extra projects in addition to my regular salary (up $5 a day but without the weekly bonus, resulting in a net raise of $5 a week) I nearly made minimum wage working there that summer. (Hey, if Quinn is going to read this, I should probably note that minimum wage in Ohio was $8.15 an hour, at least when I wrote this, it’s up to $8.55 an hour now.)

Also, after going on three years of the whole “pull into Mitch’s driveway and blow the horn for a while” routine, the horn on my grandfather’s F-150 finally gave out and he locked the keys in my car while climbing inside of it to use its. (He did admit to this but also told me that I should never have left the keys inside of a car with “automatic locks.”) I had a much better spring semester this year, but it still wasn’t made easier by my 28 hours a week at the farm (plus the commute) right up until October 25th, when I finally quit.

Performance review:

Another part of my feelings about the farm that I have to mention is that the whole time I was there, I was pretty well aware that it was not nearly as productive as it should have been. One large part of this was just flawed soil management practices; by the time I got there, my grandfather had been planting mostly the same plants in mostly exactly the same spots for nearly 10 years, which is absolutely not how any of that is ever supposed to work. He sent soil samples away for analysis, got back reports prescribing long lists of fertilizers to be applied in massive quantities to help production, and then went back to using what he was planning on putting down anyway (mostly starting fertilizer (which we dragged around in 5 gallon buckets for the entire planting season), calcium spray to try to prevent previous years’ blossom end rot epidemics, and some poorly labeled sacks of miscellaneous stuff that he had gotten at a farm auction and that had been taking up space in a barn for years.) My grandfather’s managerial attitude was that all ideas were suspect unless they occurred to him first, which meant it sometimes required some stamina to get certain things done; he would ride up on the lawn mower and stare at you suspiciously if he wasn’t sure of exactly what you were doing.

Like this.

(Of course, the farm was not really run with the purpose of maximizing production, anyway. My grandfather kept it going year after year initially because he was retired, and wanted something to take up his time, and because he wanted to turn himself into a farmer; later, he got the idea that he was going to turn me into one.)

The other main obstacle to growth was the fact that we were surrounded by 80 acres of soybean fields that were at a slightly higher elevation than our plants, which meant that 2 inches of rainfall was more than enough to flood the place. This is not actually a good thing for any plant’s growth (except for cucumbers, and I guess sometimes zucchini.) I ended up (with my brother) digging hundreds of feet of drainage ditches in 2018 to try to combat this. Like, with a shovel. We had a trencher, but its hydraulic pump leaked fluid like a sieve, which had prevented it from being used for years, kind of like that dump truck I mentioned fixing earlier. Other broken down equipment included two boom trucks (one of which was specifically designed just to lay railroad ties), two full-size tractors (an Oliver and a Farm-All), a handful of mechanical tractor attachments that lay scattered throughout the barn-adjacent grass, a smallish red Troy-Bilt riding lawn mower, and a 1963 Buick Riviera.

On a personal level, going to the farm every day felt like dying? It was long hours of difficult, tedious, low-paid work in a desolate and isolated location. It was sort of like a sensory deprivation chamber, but for thoughts and feelings instead of for senses. On one hand, I regret every single miserable second of it, and hope to never see the place again for as long as I somehow manage to live (sadly unlikely); on the other hand, I do think it made me more appreciative of the moments when I do feel like I’m alive in the world, even when they’re not exactly easy ones. I have more enthusiasm for certain types of fear now, like driving to a strange and distant city to see a band play by myself, actually talking to the host in the AirBNB there, and descending into a strange subway system without really knowing how I’m going to get anywhere I’m trying to go from there; or signing up for classes for next semester without knowing exactly what they’ll be like, and talking to the strange person sitting next to me, or even just emailing the professor to ask for an explanation of an assignment that I don’t understand. It reminds me that I’m not as trapped anymore.

This contradicts what I want to be true, which is that the farm was just a background event in my life, instead of something that defined it for all of those years. The things that I was doing in the background of this, the story about farming, were the things I now realize were actually important to me at the time: taking those pictures, going back to school, the music I was listening to while I was out in the field, pounding in tomato stakes… I was also re-learning the piano in the evenings when I still had the energy. Unfortunately, the farm did define that part of my life to a large extent because of the way it served as an obstacle to me pursuing those things. The thing is, I wasn’t really trapped there, in any real physical or consequential sense; the farm took over my life because I was unable to recognize and act on the fact that I did have access to real sources of happiness.

Also, I guess the whole time I was technically committing tax evasion?

Anyway, whenever I see one of those posts about how nice it would be just to leave society and go live on a farm or something, this is what I’m thinking of.

#yes. long. maybe save this for when you already know that you're going to be bored #if anyone actually makes it to the end please interact

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minsuxga · 7 years ago

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Anagapesis

(n.) No longer feeling any affection for someone you once loved; falling out of love.

Inspired by the quote: “How selfhood begins with the walking away and love is proved in the letting go.”

Summary: Falling in love with Yoongi was easy. Watching him fall out of love with you was hard and there was only little you could do but hope that he found his way home after long nights of being away.

Genre: !Yoongi! + angst + fluff (i swear there’s a happy ending)

Word count: 12.7k

A/N : Initially, I was really hesitant about posting this. Most of the story really taps into raw emotions and personal experience and if im honest, I put my soul into writing this. I really hope you guys like it. I’ve spent ages on this and i’m so sorry about my semi-hiatus turned hiatus but im back! Please, please, tell me how you guys feel about it! criticisms and comments are v much appreciated.

You don’t realise.

Maybe you do. Yet, only fail to accept the gnawing pang in your heart that screams to be acknowledged; tucked down every time you force to assure yourself more often than not these days that he loves you, he had to love you – right?

You say you don’t realise but you do, you definitely do, when the morning rays hit the bedsheets and a soft warm glow fills the room and your heart still stings like something akin to how an ice burn would.

You notice with a miserable ache that the bed feels as cold to touch as his skin and the icy miles you’ve put between yourselves is unbearable but neither of you stretches arms to each other to break the iceberg in the middle that hovers in the air in all its apparency.

An iceberg like a constant reminder that there was something obviously wrong in this relationship. Something that neither of you would yield to yet lying to yourselves to say you didn’t notice, fearful of the prospect of what happened when you did.

And his skin, God, his skin was smooth like untouched snow and the warming sunrise hues melted his ivory skin that stained the sheets like ichor into puddles of perfection.

And he looked like a porcelain doll and you could count numbers like the strands of his dark hair sprawled like a fan on the pillows of reasons listing why you loved him, why you’d fallen in love with this man who’d given you nothing more than the infinity and murmured soft kisses into your neck under the witness of the stars and the watchful moon.

The man who had caressed your skin under the soft moonlight, under the gaze of Artemis and the reigns of her night sky that he’d be with you till the ends of the world and beyond.

Loving him was supposed to be infinite. Yet the assurance of infinity was fragile and fell from the safety of your fingers like glass. A clumsy mistake. A hopeless desperation. Shards too sharp and painful to touch and only a longing stare to redo the past differently in its wake.

And here, laying together but not fully together you realised with a daunting recognition that this infinity that you’d proclaimed with naïve hopes and dreams was finite and finishing.

The seeds of a blooming relationship that you had once possessed had seeped into the earth. A connection that had seemed as impossible to break and decipher as the roots of noble trees, giant in age and true in their confidentiality was only the waterlogged earth gulping for breath at your feet.

And as much as you had hoped that your connection would remain as vibrant and prosperous like the first time it had taken to flourish, it was feeble against the change of seasons where flourished flowers kneeled before time and were helpless into becoming decaying ones.

You chastised yourself at the same clueless optimism that you had used to believe that this intimacy, this tenderness that was supposed to be stronger than its fragile appearance would breed life into the darkness of the earth and turn greyish leaves into burning red ones.

Golden speckled like embers and suffer forged and furious, resembling the autumn months did you believe that your love willed anger into a drive for its survival.

You were blind-eyed and walking in a fantasy that was as childlike as your want for the past.

In reality, love was weak and resembled more like the sand that slipped between your fingertips and seemed too far spread to collect, to piece back together like the small world you’d held in the palm of your hands for so long – till now.

For now you could only hang onto each of his words because your relationship to you was like a story. You’d come to the last few sentences and your heart tugged at the thought that you’d one day have to place your eyes on a final single word and a full stop to end whatever this was and close the book despite your stubbornness to stare at it forever.

And you stared at his back as the morning hues took a dullish turn and your monochrome bedroom resembled the dark turn of your life and the never-ending routine you would have to subject yourself to once more – one more day again and again till months passed and one more day was only a reminder that it would eventually only be one more day.

Laying here in the early break of dawn, his body tired out from the hours spent at the studio, you continued to stare at his back, vast as the oceans between you and thought about how he seemed too far away on the bed to be even considered to be sleeping with you.

Staring at his back, as cold and distant to you as the frosty evenings and conversations, you yearned for the memories where he’d turn around, like a sixth sense tingling in his sleep as if he’d known that you were staring and grumble to ask why you were awake and cross the mountains of pillows to pull you under his chin and drowsily tell you to go to sleep.

However, this time like most days, you were met with a still silence and an acknowledgment that those were memories – and memories were things of the past.

So here in your present, Yoongi the best present life had given you, you crossed the mountains of pillows today instead, a bold move and an even more labouring task that caused a quickening of your breath and a rapid thud at your heart against your ribs and you pulled yourself to rest your head in the nook of his spine knowing that he wouldn’t move and in the next hours you’d find yourself miles apart again and tried to assure yourself that nothing was wrong and that everything was okay like it had always been and this time you tried to pretend like he was telling you to go to sleep like he always did.

And you just wanted to sleep not to take solace in slumber but simply because you wanted to live in the land of dreams and fairy tales because you were simply too afraid to wake up and try your hand at another day of avoiding the problems that were becoming far too apparent to be ignored. You were too afraid to come to the terms with the fact that nothing was okay-

That nothing had been okay between you two in a very long time.

And in this present, lying next to him, you only sought to find sleep in the comfort of your lies and pretence and could only hope that you would wake up the day you didn’t need to anymore.

When you met him, he was a man that lacked in words.

Yet, his unwillingness to talk to you was enough to get you intrigued, entranced by the old soulful eyes that took you on journeys and held enough conversations that let you pry into the intimates of his life even without him opening his mouth.

And you travelled his little world in the few seconds you glanced into his brown eyes and you were left with a thirst, a desperation, a want needed to be quenched to see more, to know more.

And his silence and his stubbornness to take a foot forward towards you was the lack of a welcoming hand despite your persisting attempts to be patient and determined even when he wasn’t.

At first, he tried his very best to wave off your irritating attempts in getting to know him, tried to stop you from pursuing your efforts of reading into his story, prying open every cobwebbed page rotting away with years of feelings untouched and forgotten, suppressed into little lines and far too great a book.

You, however, were vibrant as the world that existed around him, a world that had lost his touch and seemed far too distant and tasteless.

And the world, this world he’d once wanted nothing more to do with was grey and monochrome yet your smile breathed light and colour into the ends of the earth that made him want to explore it again to see just what it was that could make you shine so brilliantly- god, he wanted to see it too.

You were bright, you were warm and homey and everything he needed to feel at home again. You were everything he wasn’t and so you moulded into the figures and curves of his body with perfection and your smile and your giddy laughter was contagious and he understood.

God, standing with you he understood that there were somethings in life that could make you too happy to explain.

He understood only by kissing you, on the same lips you used to smile as if the earth was star speckled and coated in fairy dust and magic- that this was what made you shine so brilliantly.

And he understood and more often than not, he’d find himself forgetting who he was, who he was supposed to be and letting himself delve into the little wonders of life that were you.

Together, you bred life into his little storybook. You named every character and held his hand and went over the fading ink so that it was new again and where once even smiling your way and any sort of contact or brief communication was something far too great a distance for him to fathom – he’d found himself miles away from where he’d started, travelled the distance and voyaged every corner of the world by the end of every sitting with you – creeping closer and closer to a territory that Yoongi would have easily expanded on the same earth he’d once found tiresome to share with you.

When in love, what time was there to think about technicalities?

With Yoongi, there was a lot of things you’d found yourself having to become accustomed to.

You’d found yourself accustomed to the door and every one of its dents. You had stared at every stain with a straining sigh and a soft shake of your head.

You’d found yourself noticing the way the hinges had started to come of the door handle, time worn on the metal as a reminder that you’d been doing this for too long- waiting into the dead of the night for him to enter the door despite your knowing that this was another one of those days where he’d lay his head down and find sleep in the discomfort of his studio chair.

You’d found yourself accustomed to the repetitive routine of repeated events, accustomed to staring at the steam blow off the hot plated dinner into the vacancy of the room to keep you company before the stumbling footsteps at the door once you’d thrown most of it into the trash.

You’d become accustomed to the apologies murmured into the crook of your neck and the arms tight around your waist to yield your disappointment into understanding and you had become old and aged at the empty promises he’d leave on your skin and down your body of a fancy dinner the next night.

It's the same cold, cold night where he’d leave you dressed only to cancel, leaving your hopes and dreams at the foot of the doorstep, not so brave to leave the home and unwavering against the apology texts and more promises of next time that have snaked into an anxiety that pleads him not to because you’re sick of hoping to be anything but disappointed.

You had become accustomed to shaking your head and assuring yourself that his lack of time for you was okay because his work was unpredictable in the way that his actions weren’t.

But you are accustomed to it- you’re used to it. You’ve adapted and learned to change your ways to fit around your emotions because that’s what you’ve been born to do. Born to change and adapt and survive. You’ll make it survive.

So it doesn’t bother you. Despite the fact that everything in your heart yells at you in foolery, in a desperation to be acknowledged that it most certainly does.

And the days move on and dates on the calendar continue unstopping until the summer months welcome the winter ones until they yield their great leaves in surrender, bow their fiery colours for cold ones and take arms to a change inevitable and happening.

You watch the world embrace the frost and the edge of a softening glaze of white and silver and you listen as the sounds of happy summer children turn into carols that light up the sky in a brilliance that is as bright as the fairy lights that follow it.

You remain in your still world, watching the world change, adapt, repeat its cycle from the moment you feel the glaring heat on your flesh. Sweat wet against your skin changing to the soft snow beneath your fingertips, white as far as you could see and resembling the uncertainty of your future, bleaching your relationship in a single colour that made you nostalgic for the colours it couldn’t fathom any more.

And days turn into months and the world doesn’t stop for you despite your longing for it to wait- in a hope that one day you’ll catch up, stop stumbling like a shadow behind it and grip onto anything despite your dizzying fatigue because you simply couldn’t. You couldn’t adapt. You couldn’t change.

You couldn’t yield to a normality with Yoongi that was simply too bleak and dull in comparison once he’d shown you all the colours in the world.

How could you get used to the simplicity of a single thing when you’d felt it all?

It’s a familiar darkening night, the only difference being the change in the moon and the position of the blinking stars that watched on the repetition of the world under it.

The same darkening night, one that’s ripped away the warmth and sea of pinks and red and gold, distinguished the inferno that spread across the horizons and set the world ablaze into an emptiness, a dark aftermath that was nothing less of a still silence that rocked the earth.

And the stars, the stars were the only evidence that it had ever happened. Resting above heads and easily overlooked, the stars were the witness, the fall-out of the flames, now scattered like soft embers into the stillness of the onyx sky.

And it’s during these very nights that you begin to notice the way his apologies slowly start to disappear, how they meld into a mutual acceptance of how certain things will be in a fixture too permanent for either of you to change.

You begin to notice how his kisses have faded into mere imprints, sunk deep into the skin for you to rack your brain in remembrance of what they felt like when they were still fresh on the surface. You notice the lack of limbs around your body, his body etching further and further away on the bed until you’ve settled into a distance that you fear to cross.

You notice the vacancy of his voice in the room- how even in the morning with the vibrant sun, the house makes you shiver in something other than just the cold, lacking in his warming laugh and your giddy happiness, of days where you’d move across the kitchen in a choreography only the two of you could dance in.

Now, you feel like a phantom in your own home, gliding with a heavy heart as if searching the place in a desperation for memories. And Yoongi, Yoongi couldn’t even be called a ghost. His presence so void from the home that he was anything but the occupant that haunted it.

It’s one of those nights, emotions of something akin to loss mingling with the emptiness of the home and it’s suffocating silence, you continue to the stare at the door with the same naïve hope and foolish optimism that he’d be back soon- that he’d take his seat in the chair that almost stared back at you with a pity you couldn’t help but wallow in.

And the silence that followed you as you sighed, the screeching of your chair being the only sound to accompany you as you discarded the remains of your dinner reminded you of the things you’d long noticed and long since avoided, remaining mum about the paranoia’s that had settled in your chest and had crept into the little crevices of your body.

And you continued to think, grabbing a blanket from your room and treading back towards the couch to lower yourself, pulling the soft fabric under your chest as if to cocoon you, to fight away the stupid, stupid feelings of loss- what were you loosing? And still staring at the door in a sadness that wasn’t necessarily directed at anything but the goddamn door.

Time seemed to tick on and fatigue had long since settled into your temples and you fought to keep your eyes open, shaking off the way they draped over your eyes in a darkness you could lull yourself to sleep to but there was a yearning, a need for him to prove himself different today, to be awake when he did.

But the time didn’t slow and the creeping anxiety finding comfort inside you was enough to tell you that some things were bound to break no matter how hard you tried to preserve it.

And it was almost two and your back hurt from finding solace in the couch, tucking yourself into the plush material in the hopes that you could close your eyes and find the same magic, the same comfort that it used to.

You were desperate for some sort of normality, for it to just go back to the way it used to be but this house was full of memories and the man who lived in it a mere stranger.

And it hurt, broke your heart to think that the promises of the world and forever, of an endless love and an unconditional fairy tale was nothing more than a storybook, a fiction and a tale that would never be.

When had the title to claim the love of your life simply become a title with no claim? And you wondered, pondered under the night sky and the blinking stars in the hopes that it would qualm your distress.

In the hopes that it would offer you advice for the man that jumped at the opportunity to travel to the ends of the world and beyond for you- had beyond become too tiresome for him to continue?

And it was on the couch when you heard the keys click and the door creak open, heard him sigh and kick off his shoes and you only listened as he pattered through the home, his eyes merely resting on yours before passing you without even the word of acknowledgement, no reprimanding that you shouldn’t stay awake, no kiss on the forehead, no promise, nothing- nothing but the stillness and suffocation of a silence that said more than the words he lacked in wording to you.

You waited, waiting long before he’d retreated back into your bedroom without you till you broke down, till you made memories of a teary night on the couch that once held a history of a love story for the ages.

And you sobbed into the night, the twinkling stars staring at you with sympathy you didn’t want and you heaved, weeping sorrowfully because Min Yoongi was too far now and things weren’t the same.

You cried because he was your best friend, the person you confided in. Yet in your difficulties today, you were no one to him to weep your worries to.

And you cried, cried till your eyes were heavy with tears and sleep and everything in between and your woes fell deaf to his ears because behind closed doors, Yoongi slept and found solace in the world without you.

You weren’t losing Yoongi. How could you lose something you’d already lost? How could you preserve something that had long since been broken?

In time, you’d simply force yourself to adapt to the constant changes that were Yoongi and his attitude towards you. You’d stopped questioning the way things were and why there were and simply accepted the reality that things weren’t the same and ultimately, would never be again.

The emotion you’d tried so hard to suppress, the growing fear that you’d tried to stifle, tried breaking apart was resurfacing. In the end, behind closed doors and hidden frowns there was the undeniable reality that had you shaking your head, spending moments in front of the mirror to deny in order to drown down your anxiety.

There was the simplicity of a few words that weighed down your heart like the many- a few words that you’d forced yourself to look away from but there was no denying the undeniable, a reality so very real and despite it being deep as the bergs that bred in secrecy- it was like the smoke of a fire you couldn’t hide- one you couldn’t run from.

A simple truth, an inevitable happening: he had fallen out of love with you.

In the end, the truth congregated- gathered like clouds and came for you on dark nights and even darker days. Even the sunshine couldn’t act as a veneer anymore to the change that was inevitable like the sun setting above the horizons and the night appearing, night after night without fail.

You could regret, regret the days you’d taken with him for granted or regret the way things had become. You could long all you wanted for a world painted in colours once you couldn’t fathom them anymore.

Despite the world seemingly mostly black and white these days, your relationship with Yoongi unspoken and dulled down- there was a regret that burned deep inside you, clenched within your core because outside your dreary days is a world that moves spontaneously.

It pains you, to watch Yoongi belong to that world of colours and ignore that everything wasn’t okay. It pains you after seeing, after feeling all those colours, to be told to settle for shades of grey.

And when you wake up in the morning you aren’t surprised that the bed is completely cold and you don’t need to turn away from the ceiling to know that Yoongi’s already left and there’s not a single memo that could have reminded you that he was ever here to begin with.

Achingly, you force yourself up, running your hands over your face and sighing into the emptiness of the room before removing the covers off your body and readying yourself for another day filled with mundane tasks in a silent home filled with your conundrum of thoughts.

You almost dread how you’ve been given the day off work, a soft pat on the back from your boss who claimed you’d been overworking yourself and should take the day off.

However, looking around the house you wish almost longingly that you were back in the security of your workplace, distracting yourself amongst the papers and co-workers. Anything but here. Anywhere but the place that day by day felt less and less like home.

You sighed into your coffee mug, staring into the same kitchen that would be bumbling with noise had it been a few months back; Yoongi making his way over to peck your forehead, your temple, anything, everything, on the days he’d lie in and take comfort in the curves of your body instead but it’d been months and his habits had faded away and you felt stupid standing there making food for two because yours hadn’t yet.

“I should take him some.” You say to yourself, your fingers fumbling around the containers as you try to reassure yourself that this way okay, that you always used to bring him food and surprise him at the studio because he loved it. Why would it be any different now? “He probably hasn’t eaten.”

And despite having everything changed, if there was one thing about Yoongi and his personality was his forgetfulness and how caught up he’d get in his work to forget the simple necessities he needed like eating.

Any other day you might have texted him but this wasn’t like any other days and your phone was as void as ever in a silence he seemed adamant to maintain.

You were aware that you were talking to yourself, almost chanting the words as if they would ease the fear of doing this trivial gesture that should feel like nothing to you but do. You hoped that this, this could be taking the first steps to at least try and salvage the bits of your relationship while you could. You hoped maybe this would be the start of a new beginning, maybe he’d come back to you. Maybe.

And you don’t know what possesses you, what takes over you but your standing in front of his studio with a bag filled with all his favourite foods.

You can’t help but feel childish, like this wasn’t something you should be doing but here you were, a foot away from his studio door with an irrational fear of what would happen when you entered.

You almost felt like you were suffocating. Here, entering a room with a man that was practically a stranger to you now with an emotion that felt too much like the end. In hindsight, you could have said you’d known, that you’d felt it coming and maybe it was for the best but in that very moment, after months of uncertainty, you were firm in believing that today would be different.

After all, something had to break to allow change; whether that be you or your relationship.

With a heavy heart and a shuddering sigh, you closed your eyes and reached to turn the handle to the door that you knew all too well, spending far too many nights crashed on the couch when Yoongi overworked into the night or listening to the unfinished music fill the room- basking in the security that was simply your boyfriend.

This time, the door creaked and groaned under your touch and the magic that you’d always felt in this room that was all too Yoongi were lost and you stared at his back, you were always staring at his back, watching him get further and further away from you.

His face was scrunched up in the way you knew was utter concentration, his headphones around his neck and staring into his lyrics completely and utterly oblivious to the world around him.

Suddenly, you weren’t so sure of yourself anymore and the confidence you had to salvage the remnants of a dying relationship had withered away.

It struck you just how much you didn’t belong in this world, how much he’d pushed you away and just how much distance had grown between you that the few feet that separated the two of you now couldn’t compare in comparison.

The studio had been a place that you had associated with fond memories, yet standing in the middle of it all with not so fond feelings stirring inside your belly made you realise the sheer emptiness of it all; that everything was simply a reminder and there was nothing you could do that would change that.

You felt like you were staring at a picture.

You could remember every feeling, every laughter that you’d felt captured into a single moment adorned with great smiles and even greater emotions but standing here in the aftermath of memories cemented how you couldn’t recreate pictures.

No matter how long you stared at it, it was just a remnant of a single past moment amongst the countless of many futures.

You coughed. He turned. And you watched his brow furrow, staring at your figure in confusion as if he couldn’t comprehend why you were here.

“What are you doing here?” and his voice is void of its usual pleasant surprise and it cements just how much has changed between you and though you expected every bit of it, it doesn’t stop your heart from dropping. He sounded exasperated, tired.

He’s tired of you, a little voice in your head said and you couldn’t lie and say you didn’t know but unlike Yoongi, you weren’t tired of him and this was your last attempt, your little act of selfishness- holding onto him because you wanted to slow down the moment you had to let go.

“I brought food.” You said softly, stating the obvious and pulling up the contents in your hand to show him the bag filled with all the delicious meals that only makes your stomach churn but your particular response isn’t the answer to the question he’s looking for.

Here, staring back at a stranger it’s obvious that you don’t know this man and his brown orbs scream nothing but unfamiliarity to you now- he was asking why you were here. His real question left unasked in the air but one you could read with ease. Why were you still trying?

“Oh,” Yoongi says and he’s looking anywhere but at you when you leave it on his side. “Thanks.”

Was that it? Was he supposed to say something? Were you? But you know it’s your cue to leave when he doesn’t say anything else, when he doesn’t acknowledge you and doesn’t ask you to stay but instead moves to put his headphones back on.

You wonder then, just when did your relationship result in this? Just when did his warm affections become nothing more than cold glances and you can’t help but stare at him with a longing in your chest, a desire to stomp on all the floors and pull a tantrum because you just want to go back, you just want him to love.

You wanted him to look at you, come back with the same vibrant smile you were used to.

You wanted him to love you but fuck, did he even know what loving you was when you were sure he’d fallen out of it?

You stared at his back. You hated staring at his back.

You hated how closed off he’d become, how your attempts at trying to rekindle your relationship bounced off the same goddamn back. You didn’t even realise you were crying, hot tears forging paths down your warm cheeks. Ironic because he’d done nothing but make you feel cold all these months.

And from the way his body stiffens when a sob breaks from your chest and fills the room, from the way he stops himself from looking at you, a deep sigh resounding against your harsh breaths as if he knew it was coming, you know he’s heard.

“Look at me.” You sob angrily, a fierce fire bubbling in your stomach because enough was enough. Because you couldn’t keep pretending, couldn’t keep ignoring.

You couldn’t do this to yourself. You couldn’t continue to live unhappily because you were trying to save something that didn’t want to be saved. “Just this once, look at me.”

And he does and there’s enough emotion in Yoongi’s own eyes for you to know that this is it, that there was no going back from this.

It almost surprises you though, when you see a deep sadness coat over his orbs, a pain present and upfront and inevitable. Even if he didn’t love you now, he had once and letting you go meant letting go of all your memories; of all the things he’d fallen for and all the things he’d adored.

Letting you go was like burning a photobook of a life he’d long since outlived and grown out of. The only reason he’d kept on so long was because of the little attachment he had left, because you had been there when the days and years moved on and when the summer months welcomed the winter ones.

You were there on the same nights, listening with him when the sounds of happy summer children turned into carols that lit up the sky in a brilliance that was as bright as the fairy lights that followed it. You were there, with him, under the same sky that had witnessed it all. The same sky that could retell your history like the stars it had unfolded beneath.

Letting you go was like burning a photobook of a life he’d long since outlived and grown out of but him damned, he didn’t want to let you go because he was scared to make a new one.

“I’m so sick of this.” You cried, gesturing to the space between you and him. “Who are we fooling? Ourselves?”

And you didn’t need an answer and Yoongi only soaked in your appearance, tear-stricken and racking horribly. Your big sparkling eyes had been dulled down with the tears he had caused you, a fire dancing across the softs of your cheeks in a way he knew was only anger, disappointment.

And he hated it. He wished he could take you in his arms and mumble away your woes but he didn’t love you in the way he had and he felt so guilty for falling out of love with someone who’d taught him what love was.

He hated how he was the one who had been the one to suffocate your relationship even after multiple tries when you were the one that had breathed life into his mundane world.

“We don’t even look at each other anymore.” You whispered and he hated how fragile you looked, how the strongest woman he knew crumbled in a state that was as sad as this. And you hated it yourself, hated yourself for succumbing to this. “I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep pretending that everything’s okay when we both know it isn’t. It’s just not fair.”

“If I went wrong, if something happened, just tell me. Just tell me how we can fix this” You sobbed desperately and this was it, this was the last and you knew all too well that you couldn’t fix anything and there was nothing you’d done wrong.

Now, here, in that moment, you drank Yoongi in like it was the last time you’d ever be intoxicated.

“I’m sorry.” He whispered, because he was sorry and he’d forever be sorry and there was nothing he could do now. Even then he could hardly get himself to look at you.

Despite anticipating his words with every ounce of salt in your body, every hope crushed the moment you’d first walked in through door, it did nothing to ease your pounding heart and you couldn’t stop it when your lip quivered and you had to just stand there embracing yourself when the onslaught of tears came flooding in.

You didn’t know how long you had stood there but it was enough time for you to realise that there was nothing more either of you could say now.

After months of beating around the bush, you’d finally addressed the elephant in the room, finally cut through the tension that had built up in your home and scouted the replies to questions you already knew the answers to.

You and Yoongi were breaking up. After years together, you’d continue apart like individual people on individual paths.

“I’m sorry too,” You said once you’d composed yourself. You were sorry because you hadn’t tried hard enough or maybe because you had longed this out for far too long. You were sorry because you couldn’t keep all the promises you made to him, that he couldn’t keep his.

Sorry because after months of silence where you’d spent endless nights going over what you’d say to him and then finally arriving here- you’d said nothing. Because there was nothing.

Because more was said in the unsaid.

Because he didn’t have to say any more for you to know because you couldn’t scream and cry when it’d been coming and it was more of a matter of when you ended it than how you’d amend it.

You don’t linger much after that, stay only a few more moments to soak in his milky skin, his pretty brown eyes that searched anywhere but yours, his dark hair before turning to walk out of the door with a greater purpose than when you had entered it.

You’d missed the way Yoongi opened his mouth to say something, how his stomach churned at the sight of your food and despite having turned back to his music, there was nothing he could focus on more than you.

He should have been happy. He should have been relieved but his heart feels heavier than ever and he regretted that he couldn’t stare at you enough, his first love, before you disappeared in an air colder than the one he’d given you.

He was a coward but he regrets how he can’t even cower in his emotions before you. A woman made of fire and ice and everything in between.

It doesn’t take you long to gather your stuff.

It doesn’t take you long to collect all the pieces in your- his home. Bundling up all the things that were you and yours before leaving the house in a manner that resembled the state before you’d met him, back when your shirts hadn’t started appearing in his drawers, when your toothbrush wasn’t placed next to his and back when the webs of his life weren’t entwined with yours.

And you can’t help but stare at this sad, sad place that you’d once called home; can’t help but trace over the furniture that had kept you company in months of solitude, accompanied you through bursts of tears and anger and though they might not remember it now, even times of great love and adoration that had once brightened your world in a comparison that could make even the sun yield.

You were quick on your feet, gathering with haste and dread and everything falls apart in your arms but you’re adamant on holding yourself together while you can, stubborn in forcing yourself to be level-headed because you didn’t want to be here when Yoongi got here.

His studio had been your last goodbye and there was no time for treacly sentiments if he came back and encountered you. Knowing him, he’d probably spend the night there anyway, his practice in avoiding you almost an art now. There would be no mistakes, no sentiments.

No weeping would change facts and your feelings despite heavy on your chest and though it felt like the world was falling apart, they were small, insignificant; minuscule against the vastness of the universe that you were nothing against.

Your existence was a speck of dust, your feelings yours and yours alone- one you couldn’t share, one you couldn’t voice.

A pain that was so very individual, so very yours that in the haste to grip onto your things, you’d dropped the strength that had held onto your emotions, unchained them, released an intensity that was wild, untameable.

The realisation of just how alone you were hit you so intensely that you could feel it burn in your core, a desire to rip out your insides and plead them to obey, to reason, please.

But feelings were wild, untameable and they were products of the heart and no matter how many times your mind concluded logically that this would pass, all things do, your heart felt like it was in pieces within your chest and God, you would do anything to make yourself feel whole again.

They’d never told you that love could hurt so hard, that the aftermath of love was just as intense as falling.

No one, no one could teach you heartbreak in the way you’d learn from experience. No one could teach you the magic of falling in love, the vulnerability, the passion, the intensity that could rival a flame and was as magical as the Garden of Eden, with every emotion as vast as the number of flowers that were adorned in it.

No one could teach you loneliness until the veneer that had shrouded your sorrows in a pink cloud of love had washed away in wisps of grey that magic was fleeting and love was as deceiving as the thorns that tempted naïve seekers. An attempt to grasp beauty, a futile venture to seek Eudaimonia.

The aftermath of love was one that was as bitter as it was sweet and the remnants made you feel empty, hollow and as vacant as the world you surrounded yourself in; especially when you hadn’t come out of love and only witnessed the dark truth and a cruelty of what happened when someone else did.

You were falling apart.

Your breath ragged and harsh and this house screamed finality. Vacant-looking and cold.

This would be the last time you stepped foot into this house, the last time you breathed into it, bred life into it and you didn’t know if the attachment was to the love couch in the middle of the room or the love you’d made on that couch that made you less wanting to let it go, to leave.

You were severing ties with things you’d familiarised yourself with, severing ties with years, severing ties with attachment- severing ties with Yoongi.

It would be the last time you would see Yoongi.

You wondered where love went when it died and almost laughed at yourself, a bubble of lacking laughter flittering in your chest because you were going to the same graveyard to be tucked in the very same coffin.

Who cared where love went when it died? Wherever it went, you were going too.

You couldn’t say that you were happy.

What was happiness if not momentary? But in hindsight, it was easy to see that the choice that he made, the choice that you made was something that allowed you to be happier.

It was a privilege, a liberty that was allowed to you after suffering for so long. It was an emotion so foreign, so invasive that you didn’t know when enough time had passed that you’d allowed it to crawl, travelling through blind spots and breaching apparent sight into the cracks that needed filling.

In time, you’d learn that memories made after him were memories as precious as they were with him and you didn’t need to feel guilty, gnawing on days that maybe, maybe, somewhere he’d made a mistake he’d come running to amend.

Gone were the days were you wallowed in self-pity, in self-hatred and clung onto your insecurities with the idea that they were the only things you were allowed to keep.

Now, your chest felt lighter, breathing was easy and the concept of feeling better after time had done its work on you, after hours turned into days and days into months into years- that this emotion wasn’t a foe but a friend come after long nights was a concept befriended.

Your try at being somewhat happy was overdue and though brief as all moments are, it was something that made you think that maybe the wait was worth it.

It wasn’t as if breaking up with him had meant a break up with love either. His absence didn’t scare you from the emotion and neither did its scars frighten you from approaching it time and time again.

You knew love in more forms than he had given to you and you didn’t need his to know, didn’t need his love in a dependency that was unhealthy and poisoning to know that even in the absence of receiving, you could give in abundance.

You gave it in the affection you had for your parents. You felt it in the adoration you had for the sky, the ground, your home and your cat and your work.

You knew love in the smiles of grinning faces, you knew love in the air around you and in the breaths you took throughout the day- platonic, materialistic, familial- you knew love because you’d been around it. It was a shame then that he simply hadn’t been in it with you.

It had been two years since you’d broken up with Yoongi.

Two years since you’d stormed out the home that the two of you had shared and found solace at your best friend’s house, sobbing well into her shoulder and allowing her to hold you, being the little stability that you needed, a pillar on whom you could rely on when your walls fell.

Two years since you’d asked her to pick up the last of your things, instructing her to leave the keys on the kitchen counter when she did and then residing with her until you could find your own place, gradually filling up the vacancy of your new apartment with things that were you and you alone.

Two years since you’d quit your job, tired of the mundane tasks, of the repetitive nature of days crouched over the computer, nodding insincerely at scoldings only to repeat the same things months on end in the room that resembled a prison cell.

Sick of routine, you take up spontaneity.

Grinning when you capture pictures that reflect the freedom in nature, stories behind old eyes and beaming smiles. Days are spent travelling, from wedding to wedding, tomorrow the lake, the day after the sea.

You voyaged from people to people, capturing the essence of one’s world into another’s.

You weren’t happy, who really was? But your life was happier and the air around you was softer, the colours in your home bright as if to aluminate the days you stay in bed, staring hours on end at the ceiling unable to find your path and lost as to where to go.

Two years since you’d pieced your world back together, gluing edge to edge with nothing but time on your hands and as if to apologise for your sorrows, the world was patient and allowed you to steady yourself again, allowed you the years, allowed you to grow and gain and change and learn.

You learned.

You learned with time that you were better than what you had accustomed yourself to, better than the long nights and dark days and better than what you’d been given and so you were allowed to go and demand more.

Two years was a long time and in that time, though you hadn’t forgotten Yoongi’s face or his solemn touch and his gummy smile, you’d learned that you were simply better without it.

You hadn’t had any awkward encounters and you avoid all the places you visited together, avoided the area around your old home and not once did he reach out and not once did you but the fondness in your heart was still present and despite everything, you couldn’t help but think that he still had always been the best for you.

Your first in many things and last in others, with Yoongi moments were countless but it had been two years and your heart didn’t ache at his name.

Your eyes could wash over his pictures in fondness over spite and despite it being two years and despite you having made your peace with your breakup, you couldn’t squash down the little bittersweet nostalgia and the acknowledgement that no matter how many dates you went on, how many people you met, there was a part of you that only ever wanted to love him.

A part of you that only ever wanted to be loved by him.

And here you were, years later, the woman you had always aspired to be. A woman that knew no chains and felt emancipation like the wind between the locks of your hair.

Frenzied, ungovernable and every bit free, you were achieving the world, beyond the promises he couldn’t keep to you. A woman who amounted to nothing less than the universe with a presence that demanded attention yet there was the void somewhere in your chest that you had suppressed over the years that demanded greater caring, a filling that was Yoongi shaped and unforgiving.

You could pretend that you’d moved on completely, could pretend that his name didn’t make your heart sigh in contempt, lost in worlds of what ifs and what could have been.

You could pretend that even years down the line he had no effect on you, pretend that silent moments sat on the sofa watching reruns of your favourite show didn’t sometimes lead to moments with him.

You could pretend that you didn’t still call into your apartment to inform whoever you were home despite there being no one there, pretend that buildings like the dingy café around the corner where’d you first met didn’t remind you of him.

You could pretend a lot of things but you’d be a fool to think that you were anything more than an actor. Actors pretended and what you felt didn’t feel like pretence.

You weren’t holding onto fragments, weren’t cradling them to your chest in an unwillingness to let go. You simply couldn’t delete the effects he’d on you, the changes you’d made as a result of being with him.

You simply couldn’t scare away the phantom that had been your first love and had learned as a result to live with him rather than hiding from him.

Time hadn’t made you forget. It had made it bearable. And though absence had made your heart grow fonder, history was a reminder that things of the past couldn’t be erased.

When you wake up, you simply can’t pin the bubble in your stomach and the soft jitters in your chest to a particular emotion. You can’t place word to face but there is something in the air that screams nostalgia.

All the daily norms that present themselves in the way the light bounces of the walls, how the house feels refreshingly warm and your cat lazy slings between your legs in her morning greetings seems nothing if not odd.

And you don’t know why you do and in hindsight you could blame it on the odd feelings that stir within your chest in a restless agitation to want pleased that you find yourself staring at the old coffee shop that you’d first met Yoongi with a little more than just longing.

You’d spent two years walking past it, never offering it more than a measly glance and a fond smile but there was something almost magnetic, appealing about the store in all its old and dinginess that has you standing before it today.

That after two years of religiously avoiding the café did your heart ache wistfully at the sight in a want to relieve old memories and feel emotions as ablaze as the first time you’d entered it.

You wondered if the feelings you’d buried were still present in the little quaint building, abundant with importance or whether time had nulled its flames and your reach for familiarity had simply wandered away like all good things do.

The café despite its overall unappealing exterior had always been your favourite. You had looked past the falling sign and the uneven canopy and found solace in the grounded coffee scent and the little bakery tucked in the back, finding home in wooden seats and warmed beverage that presented you with comfort on winter days and summer nights.

It was your little secret that hid in the corner in the heart of the town, almost always empty and quiet and very often overlooked.

It was your treasure, the same place where’d you’d met him, finding shelter on a rainy day that soaked through your clothes and had you shivering.

It was the same place you’d locked gazes with him, albeit unfamiliar then but familiar with the dullness in his eyes that had you forcing your way through his walls and layers to extend a friendly hand out.

It was the very same place that had you returning back on dates, familiarising yourself with the seat next to the window and the menu and him until it was practically tradition to sit across from each other on casual nights spent talking aimlessly until it closed.

So returning after two years of being away made you feel apologetic, feeling as though you’d neglected the place in your want to avoid the pain that came with reminiscing and almost repentant in your actions as you stepped inside, knowing nothing had changed and there was still the same wooden tables and the same barrister at the front but still washing your eyes over to drink it all in and playback memories of times before things had changed.

You walked over to the front and smile at the barrister in acknowledgement, wondering if she remembered you and by the way her grin grew and she looked almost surprised you think maybe she does.

“Hi,” You breathed. Your stomach felt a lot better than this morning and it struck you after finding yourself here so abruptly, overwhelmed with familiar smells of pastries and coffees that your want for a beverage was only stronger than ever. “Can I have a-“

“I’ve got it.” She interrupted and a large smile played on her lips as you stared at her in mild amusement.

“How did you-?” You trailed off, wondering how she could possibly remember your order after all these years of being away. Sure you’d been a regular customer but the odds that she’d remember your usual was almost touching in a sense.

“Boss often said we’d lost our best customer,” She replied, a strong glint in her eyes as she busied herself in preparing your drink, her voice soft as she spoke to you. “We don’t get many people but you were here always here without fail so we thought you’d moved away.”

“I’m sorry,” You offer and you really are, this place was like home to you and you’d avoided it in the want to let the past be the past. “It’s been a busy few years.” You told her and it’s half a lie because you have been busy. You been busy in finding yourself, in getting to know yourself and live by yourself.

You’d been busy in getting to know the little liberties that had made you you before you’d known Yoongi- the ones you’d lost in loving him and though you were past the point in your life where you wallowed in self-misery and nostalgia, you’d simply been carried away.

“I can imagine.” She sighed, finishing off the lasts of your coffee before turning to you with a slighter sadder smile. “He still comes here, you know.”

And you know exactly who’s she’s talking about and you can’t help the way your heart leaps at the mention of him, at the thought that he still comes to the same place that was important to you as it was to him, sitting down in the same cosy spot right by the window to mull over his music after long nights of needed solitude.

“Often looks like he’s looking for someone as if any day will be different than the previous,“ She continues, knowing the look on your face and despite only being acquaintances through the cafe knowing more about your love story than the rest.

And when she turns to you, she’s grinning wider than ever, almost glad that of all days, today was the day you’d decided to show up. And she hands you your coffee before she speaks again, and you look down to realise that it’s exactly how you like it, creamy and milky as always and years could pass but your taste most definitely hasn’t.

“I think he can stop looking now.”

And you don’t have any time to really ponder on her last words as she thanks you again, shaking her head at your questioning smile before you turn around, automatically moving towards the area you know best when you see him.

And its been two years but your stomach does backflips and your chest heaves and for a second you forget how to breathe. Your throat feels as if it’ll clam up anytime soon but he looks more beautiful than the last time you’d laid eyes on him.

And he sits there, by the window with dark hair and even darker eyes that contrast greatly with his milky skin, staring out into the streets and sipping at his coffee with his face pulled in a characteristic you know all too well is to show that he’s thinking.

Two years is a long time and he looks slightly older, more mature and his hair hangs low and brushes against his eyes, more rings adorned on his fingers and there’s something about him that screams difference, stranger but has your heart soaring in familiarity because god, you were a liar if you thought that you weren’t still in love with him and seeing him did damage to your strengthened heart. Even now, you could stare at him forever.

And you don’t know whether it’s the stubbornness to sit in the same spot that you’ve always sat, unwilling to sit any place else or simply to talk to him, to hear his voice that gives you strength, holding onto your cup with a firmness that is new to you when it comes to him and marching over with a sense of purposefulness that even you can’t place.

“Is this seat taken?”

And his head whips to look at you with his eyes blown wide and his pink lips parted in disbelief. He could recognise your voice anywhere.

He doesn’t speak immediately, rather taking you in standing before him after years had done its work on you for a few moments. You offered him a small smile in encouragement and his stomach churned unpleasantly because you were the most beautiful thing he’d ever laid his eyes on.

You were standing there before him with a cup of coffee, your hair shorter, your smile wider and he hated that in your last few months of being together he had stolen that from you. He hated how he’d made you feel, hated the way his stomach churned in guilt, in regret every time he thought of you.

The way you stood only indicated independence, promise and you were strong and holding yourself together with a new profound confidence that left him speechless, repentant for the wonders that were you and the ungratefulness that was him in ever letting you get away.

He could sit there and drink you in, mumble apologises into your skin for the rest of his days and search for any indication in your brown orbs for a hope, any hope that you still loved him.

He could call out for you, reach out for your hand and bring you home, re-find the corners he loved best and re-explore and voyage across the pages in a story that was yours.

He wants to apologise, wants to tell you about the mistakes he made. He wants you to understand him in the way he didn’t understand him, retell his account of those last moments. He wants to tell you about the days where he struggled, the days where he didn’t, he wants to confide in you in the ways he did time ago because this, you had once been his best friend and his world.

The thought is almost dizzying and instead he replies with an even smaller smile that resembles a grimace before gesturing to the chair in front of him because there is time for that and one day he’ll let you know. “Not at all.” Never for you, he wants to reply.

And it almost gives him déjà vu of the first time you’d met, when you’d fought for the seat in front of him and he’d given a slight nod unknowing of the years fate had planned for the two of you, only these were different circumstances.

In a way, he thinks that maybe you are meeting again for the first time, two years was a long time and it was apparent, with the way you approached him with nothing but loose ties and fragmented memories that you were two different people.

And it’s almost painful to think that had it been a few years back you would have bumbled in with a smile radiant enough to make the sun look dull and you would plant a kiss to his lips and you two would sit there, sit here in the very same spot by the window, addicted to each other’s presence.

He had learnt a lot these past few years. From the moment he’d come home to find your things missing to the disappointed stare your friend had given him when she’d collected the last of your bits that somewhere along the lines he had gone wrong.

He hadn’t been wrong to fall out of love but wrong enough to realise that it was a mistake to fall out in love with you when all he wanted to do was bundle you into his arms at night, chat aimlessly on the days he was overridden with frustration and lost for inspiration.

He realised months on, when he’d fall asleep on his desk not wanting to go home because what was home if it wasn’t with you that he didn’t feel relieved, he didn’t feel less burdened without you but rather empty after years of feeling so full with love.

Heartbreak was not a one way street and it took him as much as time as it did you for things about you to stop bothering him and though he still searched for you in the café, always going in case of finding you, he figured you’d made your peace without him.

And if there was one thing he was grateful for, was that made you’d realised that he had never been good enough for you and he hadn’t valued you enough when you were worth more than anything in this universe.

No date he went gave him the same feeling, the same excitement and no music he made felt genuine enough but he’d realised that it was his short fallings that had cost him, something he’d learn to live with yet years on staring at your face, slightly more lined with age and maturity did he realise just how much had been at stake.

“So you still like your coffee black then?” You joked and you couldn’t help but feel relieved when you see a slight quirk of his lips as he stared at his cup sheepishly.

“Some things don’t change do they?” He shrugs before raising his own eyebrows at your cup that you pull towards your chest defensively, almost shocked at yourself when your laughter leaves your chest so genuinely.

“I guess they don’t, Min Yoongi.” You smile at him and he smiles back but there’s something odd in the air, something different about the way you hold and present yourself but it’s obvious with the way he stares at you and you right back at him that maybe there’s a little more than just your coffee that hasn’t changed.

“You look different,” He says finally and you can’t help but stare at him questioningly. Did he mean your appearance? “Better.” And the way he frowns slightly and his eyes avert from yours do you realise that he feels guilty.

You open your mouth to speak, ready to wave off his doubts. “I’m sorry,” and it surprises you when you both speak at the same time, laughing lightly at the interruption and ready to continue when he shakes his head at you.

“What could you be sorry about?” he says, looking at you regretfully. “It was my fault. I shouldn’t have let it build up like that and I shouldn’t have let you leave like that either.”

You sighed, after so long of thinking about what you would say to him when the time came, you felt oddly empty. “I think maybe it was both our faults. None of us said anything. I think more than anything I was just scared of letting you go.”

“I was scared of letting you go too.” Yoongi whispered and you looked at him, encouraging him to go on because you needed your closure, you needed answers for a time where he’d refused to give you any. “I was being selfish.”

He looked at you then, eyes filled with raw emotion that are apologetic and gentle and has you choking up. “I just wanted you to be there even when I didn’t think I loved you anymore. Losing you was like losing my security so I avoided it and I’m just- I’m sorry we ever got to the point; for doing that to you.”

“You were my best friend.” You told him and he sighed audibly and it’s shaky but you march on relentlessly. “I would have understood if you had just talked to me. I hated that nothing was the same because I loved you more than anything. I would have ended everything in a heartbeat if it meant that you were happy, that we could still talk.”

“I’m sorry,” Yoongi tells you and this time it’s genuine and unlike the time where you’d stormed off and disappeared from his life.

“I’m sorry too,” You smile, shaking your head because you accept his apology and there were things that you had gone wrong in too. “I guess its better this way.” And you don’t want to say that because everything in your heart screams that you still love him, that you couldn’t really cope with anything but loving him and you could live with the fact that he didn’t love you back.

“Is it really?” He whispers, so softly that you almost miss it but you’re sure, you’re sure that he’s said it and maybe, maybe he does still love you and maybe these years were what you needed to make the heart grow fonder. These years are what you needed to grow, to realise your worth as individuals and your strength in being together.

And when you look at him now, he, his own person and you, your own, you’re not as insecure to think that he his your entire world and you are nothing without him.

And you take your time in speaking, take your time in conjuring an answer to fit to reply to him and when you do, he looks at you, patient and waiting and you offer him a smile and a reply that isn’t absolute but provides him with a hope that leaves a smile, a genuine smile lingering on his lips.

“I guess we’ll see.”

And you walk away from the coffee shop, glad you had entered it in the first place with a lighter chest and a blooming smile that makes even your friends question.

“I’ll see you later?” and the implication that you want to see him later, that you don’t want this to end but rather to start has him nodding fondly, glad that after years of searching for you again, he hasn’t found you but rather a new version that leaves him excited and just as eager as the first time you had met.

“I’ll see you later.” He promises, watching you twirl away with a light wave before catching the eye of the barrister who’s absolutely beaming from ear to ear.

A promise that is one absolute that he can definitely offer you.

The promise of later comes sooner than you expect. You find yourself in the coffee shop without fail every afternoon, a brighter step, a bigger grin and a world that wasn’t too large for you to fit into.

He was there too. And you’d end your day welcoming the barrister who’d have your order ready for you, maintaining small conversation before your eyes wandered away and you’d find him tucked away in the corner as if waiting for you.

You’d find yourself sitting in front of him, making up for lost time and re-establishing everything about each other, exploring and discovering and you realise that you had never fallen out of love and seeing the same thing that had once broken your heart reflected in his own orbs- you realise maybe he didn’t either and rather had wandered off lost where familiarity had bred contempt and absence had birthed love.

And it’s inevitable how you two fall in love again, slowly and just as deeply as the first time. He doesn’t promise you anything and there’s nothing guaranteed but the security you feel when he stares at you in wonder is overwhelming.

And you’re glad, glad that you aren’t bound by obligation and sentimental vows but rather in the very purity of simply wanting to be together.

“You took up photography?” Yoongi asks you when you’re huddled up in front of your laptop and camera over a cup of coffee, sighing at the countless images needed edited. You look up to find him staring at you curiously, his eyebrows slightly furrowed because he was discovering new things every day.

“I hated my old job.” You tell him after a long moment, bringing the drink to your lips before indulging in its sheer creaminess, watching him watch you as you hummed in content. “I was just forcing myself to do the same thing every day and so I quit and took up something I actually liked doing.”

“And I like this,” You smile, “I love taking pictures of nature, of people, of everything- every day is different, every person is different and it’s beautiful really, being able to capture every emotion into an instant.”

Like every art came freedom and with photography you had the autonomy to do what you liked and the world to do what you liked with it.

“Can I see some of your work?” Yoongi asks and you stare at him, searching his face only to find that he’s genuinely curious, genuinely interested in the things that you find passion in.

And you realise, not so much as daunting as you think, that you’re slowly letting him back in. what he asks is an innocent question but there’s a sense of intimacy, something almost invasive that makes you realise the extent of your closeness.

You remember days of when he’d ask you to come down to his studio, staring at you with anticipation as he let you listen to his music because it was important to him. By sharing his art he was allowing you to see glimpses of his life. He was allowing you to see his story in other means that were beyond just him.

You understand then, nodding your head in affirmative and watching in the same daunting anticipation as he scrolls through your photos. And he stares in awe, eyeing at the pictures as if he’s trying to gain memories of lost time and you understand then that you’re fine with this.

You are fine with letting him back in after years of being apart and it’s not so scary to realise that this is a start of a new journey in the same love story that in hindsight, never did really end.

Unbeknownst to you, staring at your pictures and seeing your drive in shaping your life to fit the mould that you wanted inspires him and when he returns to his studio that night, it’s your very passion that makes music come easy to him.

“You have a cat?” Yoongi questions, grimacing lightly as he steps into your household for the first time, taking a step further in your new established relationship by dropping you home when he sees that thing twirl between your legs and purr contently at your side when you nestle into the couch.

“Isn’t she pretty?” You ask back, grinning up at Yoongi who doesn’t take his eyes away from her. She hisses at him, scowling deeply when he tries to take a step forward and you laugh at the affronted look Yoongi gives her, offended that he wasn’t even allowed to come near you.

“She hates me.” Yoongi deadpans and you grin because watching both your cat warily eye Yoongi in the same way he eyes her back as if to challenge one another is absolutely beautiful.

Months later, it’s a sight to behold when you find Yoongi asleep on the couch, having given him a set of keys, to see the same feline snuggled up on his chest, purring away as if she hadn’t spent the afternoon snobbishly turning away from his affections.

You had done your growing, he had done him and it’s different. You’re different. And you find a greater independence in voicing your own concerns and holding your ground in moments of anger.

You’re allowed to take up space. You were not an inconvenience. And so when you and Yoongi argue, you don’t cradle emotions to your chest and hope for moments of fury to disperse, but rather yell and scream and cry until there’s an understanding that allows you to grow, to move on, to learn.

“I don’t like it.” You sighed, sitting at the edge of your bed after a long day of arguing. Yoongi pretending to be asleep. “I don’t like it when you sleep at your studio because I feel like you forget that I exist.”

And it doesn’t take him long before he bundles you up in his arms, kissing your forehead because the anger has disappeared into the air and there’s nothing less he wants to do but to argue with you.

“I don’t forget that you exist. I don’t want you to think that.” Yoongi reassures you and you stare up at his long eyelashes and he tucks a hair behind your ear. “I’ll try come home earlier.”

And these aren’t promises but he keeps them anyway and he can’t help but feel a burst of adoration when you two actually sit in front of each other at dinner, babbling away because he’s home early and your showing him your work and he breathes in your inspiration.

It doesn’t take you long to love him and rather you build your relationship in between cracks and corners and you piece them back together in an adaption that is refined and strong.

And so when he kisses you, taking your lips as if there were his own, you realise with him you are whole and there is no other than him you would love.

And when he makes love to you, after years of being apart, your soul drawn to his as if you were forged from the burning ends of the same stars and your souls star-crossed and inseparable, you realise that there is nothing better than him loving you.

“I love you,” Yoongi whispers to you and you turn back to him surprised, it had only been a few months since you had gotten back together and you knew that the idea of saying that you loved each other was a daunting prospect.

“You-“ You start off but can’t possibly end because he’s repeating it over and over onto your skin, lips mouthing the phrase into your lips, your neck, your chest.

“I love you so much,” and he means it, and wonders how he could possibly fall out of love from someone as beautiful of you and he assures you that everything he says is only the truth because he’d be damned if he ever let you get away again.

“Show me.”

And love was not infinite and emotions had ways of dying out but you and Yoongi had proved all ends and if soulmates existed, you were undoubtedly his. You had found yourselves inseparable by a bond that was as strong as you allowed it.

And after nights of living alone, separated from one another and adamant on change and tastes of different waters, he was certain that it was in between your legs, bundled into your arms and smiles was where he wanted to be.

You had started your selfhood by walking away, proved your love in the letting go.

You had finally found each other again after a long winter. Two hearts connected like one, sure of finding the homes to which they belonged.

#bts #bts scenarios #bts smut #yoongi #yoongi scenarios #bts reactions #yoongi x reader #yoongi scenario #anagapesis

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plasma-paints · 7 years ago

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The Detectives Office: Items of Interest

(This is mostly going to be an information dump, feel free to use any ideas from it to fuel your own theories, but some of this took literal hours to decipher, please be nice and give some credit... Or don’t I don’t control you *Shrugs* )

I’ve been going over every inch of the detectives office with a fine toothed comb the last couple days. Taking note of literally anything that could be remotely significant to the plot, or some of the mystery still surrounding WKM.

Honesty, I don’t know what in the world the detective was trying to accomplish. None. Nil. Zit. There is such a mess of evidence it seems like this could be several cases worth of evidence, or I’m missing a piece still that connects everything together.

Alright, I’ll start with the piece I have the most information on: The map on the detectives desk:

Or better yet, here’s the original without the million scribbles. (Although, some of those scribbles will be important in a minute.)

As the titles says, it’s a map of LA, but the circles on it are focused around locations of a murder mystery author’s novels and movies. There are a lot of maps of LA, why teamiplier decided to use this one may just be it’s simple nature, but theorizing never keeps things simple. So why this map when there are so many maps of LA? This is a slightly warped map of LA, it’s technically fictional, but this may be a clue to the universe we’re in. This slightly warped version of LA is commonly referred to as Richard Chandler’s Los Angeles.

Next is the scribbles on the map. (Told you I’d get to those.) The rough scrawl in the top corner says: “Unlikely but maybe worth spreading the force out to search,” next to a circled section of Hollywood. Now, Mark Fischback is supposed to be an actor in this universe so him living in Hollywood would in fact make sense, thus searching the area for his missing corpse would also be a logical progression. This despite the actual filming location being 82km (51 Miles) from Hollywood.

The second point of interest on the map is one of the points of interest circled in the bottom right hand corner of the map. It’s circled with several arrows pointing to it, might just mean that it has some significance. This location, through finding a higher resolution map then the one above, I figured out to be the LA Athletic’s Club, which was Los Angeles’ first private club. The club was founded in 1880 and has been a go to place for many prestigious figures in the city.

The next biggest clue, or at least the one I’ve been able to do the most theorizing on is The opened envelope and (Y/n)’s sealed invitation.

First thing: they both share a seal, a very specific seal, an official seal. (It says right on the seal itself actually.)

Official Seal: The name that is given to the imprint or seal that is placed on an official document by the public official.

Now what makes this interesting is that there are two public servants in attendance to the party: The Mayor, and (Y/n). (The detective is a private investigator so he doesn’t count.)

Now, while the red envelope (tan in video) of course could have been an official document, an party invitation is certainly not. Nor should Mark, an actor, have access to official ones, we can assume there supposed to be real, due to the one being present on the envelope. (Unofficial ones can be purchased online).

Now, there’s the new paper articles referring to Mark and The Mayor being involved in Shady business. (Note: They never refer to the mayor by name, only title so no confirmation it’s Damien.) (Y/n)’s ‘invite’ says they are a district attorney, an alternate name for this appointed occupation is ‘State Prosecutor’, and is the chief law enforcement officer and top prosecutor of that state's jurisdiction. In simple terms, they have a lot of power in the law community.

(Y/n) takes a sealed envelope to a party disguised as an invitation, handing it to the butler, who also never opens it, as it’s still sealed on the detective’s desk. As well, the butler leaves promptly afterwards to ‘fetch you a drink’, despite Colonel William entering right behind you, is there a specific reason for him not needing an invitation as well? Perhaps that there were no formal invitations, as this is a gathering of 6 people after all. My conclusion is that you, being friends with both the defendants in a high publicity case, tried to assist them.

(Also quick note on the whole illegal activity: If the butler did just casually have cocaine around to mix you a ‘seltzer and cocaine’ the shady business may be drug trafficking, I’ve thought this since the first episode was released.)

Third thing that I spent a while considering, all of the images in the room are of individuals we know from within WKM except three.

1) The man in the “safari hunt gone wrong” front page story:

2) The man in this shredded article:

3) Finally, Detectives and Damien in the corner:

Note: The first two are clearly newspapers while the third appears to be a magazine due to the glossy paper and barcode.

Now, how in the world do we connect them to anything in the plot of WKM, I’ve got some vague connections, but nothing solid. It’s hard to base anything around a single blurry photograph, but I still have ideas.

1) Notice the clothing, it was expected that we were likely to assume this was/is Colonel William, but the build, nor the ethnicity match. As well, unlike The Colonel, this man is not military as there are no indications of rank on his clothing (or is the lowest rank officer E-1 Private). Although, it is referred to in the detective’s investigations that The Colonel does have charges laid against him for, or at least accused of, poaching, murder, and resisting arrest. Also again with the official seal, not that it should be placed directly on a legal document...

2) Two notes: The suit, and the post-it note. The suit would imply higher status perhaps, or even to stretch the idea, an associate of the mayor. The note implying that the detective could not find any information on him, but also gave no indication as to why he was involved in this case at all.

3) The men in that image can be seen in the same picture sitting on the ledge that’s torn to pieces, the Damien with his cane as well. “Celebrity Actor in Cahoots with beloved Mayor” Also the post-it note “Ulterior motives” is pinned to the bottom of the image.

A character name mentioned that has not been referred to at all appearing in one of the news papers on the wall:

In the bottom right hand corner of the article, where the page appears to have been burnt as though someone was trying to eliminate the evidence, is the mention of the name ‘Mina’. “Mina also said” and then the rest is burnt. Mina could be the CPD spokesman, but Mina is not referred to by name earlier, so saying ‘also said’ is confusing.

The odd focus on this Polish monarchy’s blood line in this image:

No, but really, there is NOTHING else in this image that is in focus enough to read, and all of the photo’s are information we already had access to. Why the polish monarchy of all things?

The charge lists for each guest:

The Chef: Charges covered, 4 listed. The Butler: Public Nudity. The Colonel: Charges include: 1 Resisting Arrest, 6 poaching, 1 murder. (List is burnt there may be more.) The Seer: Thief (and something long I can’t make out) The Detective: None. Mayor Damien: 1 account including the name Meyers- Charge scribbled out.

Other odd things to note:

-The inclusion of mugshot like photo’s of every guest and staff member -The times the mayor visited Markiplier Manor -The orange/yellow note on the desk with the tic-tac-toe game on it (If anyone can make that out it would be greatly appreciated) -The repetition of words on many papers (Is the detective crazy, was this Mark? Seriously why do that? Other then for dramatic effect.) -The writing on the post-it note that says “who had eyes on the chef between 11pm- 3am?” is in a different hand writing then the other post-it notes. (Note: The detectives writing of W’s is curvy) -The note saying “Spotted Mark in Study @ 5pm (Last Seen?)” Can’t be related to murder, as he was seen at 7pm and onwards. -”What’s a let’s play” note as well as dabbing post-it note (This Mark is not a Youtuber, and this seems to be set before that craze) -”Call me and number” -”Missing Undies” note posted over chef’s accusations.

That is everything I’ve found so far in the detective’s little nook. Good luck coming up with something explaining all of it, I feel like there are a lot of discrepancies.

#who killed markiplier #whokilledmarkiplier #wkm theory #WKM #mayor damien #markiplier #markiplier manor #who killed markiplier theory #wkm evidence

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yeoldontknow · 8 years ago

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As Still As Sound: Prologue

Author’s Note: i really didn’t think i’d start another series so soon, really i didn’t. but this came to me one night, and i feel like i’m going to scream if i don’t write it. this story is basically a love note from me to a lot of different things; some of it is personal, some of it is fictional, a lot of it is me doing something i never do and writing real, true love story. i hope you enjoy this prologue!

Summary: Two years after soulmate bonds are formed in our universe, and still the world is reeling from the connections. Everyone seems to be affected, except you. You seem to think you’ve been left out and forgotten, though you don’t really want a soulmate at all. All you really want is to be alone with your music…

O/C’s Spotify song this chapter: Blow - Ghinzu (music for each chapter will be the song the reader/oc/you is listening to)

Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female)

Genre: Soulmate!AU; fluff; angst; drama; sci-fi; eventual smut

Rating (this chapter): PG

Warnings (this chapter): references to threats of self-harm

Word Count: 5,024

METRO UK APRIL 8, 2013

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW! FIRST UK SOULMATE PAIR DISCOVERED: TWO YEARS ON

Anita and Wesley Goulding made history on this day in 2011 as the first couple in the UK to find their soulmate after the Era Shift. They’ve sat down with us today to discuss how they met, the struggles they endured in the early days of finding one another, and why they think the new soulmate process is a double edged sword.

Q: Congratulations on two years!

Anita: Thank you! It really doesn’t feel like it. I wake up every morning and see him, and I somehow fall more in love with him.

Wesley: I honestly don’t know what I was doing in my life before I met her. It’s been the most magical two years.

Q: Finding your soulmate is different for everyone. Tell us what happened to you both, as the first.

A: Well, I don’t think we were technically the first [laughs], but I think we were the first to find each other and document it in some way, or at least reach out on a national level to alert people that this was happening? But, for me, I woke up one morning knowing I wasn’t alone in my mind. I know that sounds terrifying or awful, but it actually felt comforting. I could feel him there, sort of at the side, all day until I was able to hear his thoughts.

W: Yes, I woke up that day feeling like I was warm. Warm sounds like a silly way to describe it, but I could feel her presence and it just made me feel good, like down to the core.

A: I think we went about two days before we could talk to one another. It was a constant inner monologue. I wanted to tell him everything the second I heard his voice.

Q: How did you end up meeting or finding each other?

A: We were quite lucky that we only lived about an hour away from each other. We suggested meeting in Bristol for the day because it meant we’d have things to do, and we could leave whenever we wanted if it went badly. He waited for me at the train station and when I saw him by the platform it felt like seeing the sun for the first time.

W: I was quite nervous meeting her because already I knew that I was in quite deep. To be honest, I wasn’t even thinking about if I’d find her attractive because I already knew I would. Everything about her felt right, and when she came off the platform it was like having my breath stolen from me but paradoxically, I could breathe easier knowing she was there and she was mine.

Q: Had you been in a relationship during your time discovering one another?

W: No, and I think again we were lucky in that regard. We’ve all heard stories about people already being married, engaged, or in serious relationships learning that they aren’t soulmates. We were both single and I think that’s why we were able to surrender to the magic of it.

A: I don’t know how we would have handled it had we already been committed to other people. The pull towards him is irresistible and I have great respect for those who are going through that tough situation right now.

[…]

THE SCIENCE OF SOULMATES

Natasha Waters - Edited for Metro UK by Miles Kuyer

Before we begin, it is critical that some discussion on the historical context regarding the Era Shift is initiated as to better understand the complexities arising within the studies of Soul Searching, and the concept of the soulmate bonding itself. Furthermore, I would like to point out that this paper exists only as a method of summarising and categorizing what is known, confirmed, and defined in Soul Searching. New discoveries are being made daily given the tumultuous and varying nature of the science, and so I make no attempt to tangentially comment on, or speak to, what may still be considered hypothetical or theory as these are wholly outside of my qualifications. While there is little progress in the study of how soulmate bonding came into fruition (i.e. the direct connection between ion proportion and pheromone detection), there are many things within scientific circles considered to be true and founded, and my hope is to present these to the public to act as a definitive guide on the subject.

In July of 2010, two separate sunspots were discovered on the Sun’s photosphere, each with a diameter of approximately 75,000km in what was eventually discerned to be opposite magnetic polarity. Each spot traveled at the same velocity and propulsion for two days before converging on the photosphere as one critical mass event with a spot diameter of 160,000km. While it is normal for sunspots of this size to endure for a timeframe that varies between two to seven days, this spot endured for three weeks before resulting in a coronal loop. This became the first of many small solar flares across a six month period.

In September of 2010, two other sunspots were discovered in the exact same positions, however these only had diameters of 50,000km. They followed the same trajectory before converging into a single spot with a diameter of 110,000km. The single spot endured for one week before resulting in yet another coronal loop.

In March of 2011, a coronal mass ejection of 1 × 10^25 joules was released in the position where the two sunspots had converged and decayed. This coronal mass ejection resulted in possibly the largest solar flare we had seen in three decades and reached Earth’s atmosphere in the early hours of March 27th.

Four days later, the first soulmate couple was reported on American local broadcast station Channel 5 in the state of Maryland.

Scientific circles have been able to connect the events of the solar flare to the discovery of soul mate bonding, and Soul Searching, due to the processes through which the electrons and ions were able to restructure neurological responses within the human brain. Through various methods of MRI and X-Ray technologies, we are able to state with absolute certainty that the amygdala has seemingly adapted to respond to pheromone triggers across long distances.

While it is still difficult to accurately discern which other parts of the brain have been affected, as the case study for this issue could undoubtedly be humanity itself - especially with each soul bond differing from case to case - there is confidence that the Reticular Activation System, Temporal lobes, and Limbic systems have all evolved or adapted since the solar flare of 2011.

[…]

HE STOLE HER CAR AFTER SHE LEFT HIM FOR HER SOUL MATE

[…]

Tune in TONIGHT on Channel 4 to watch The Bond, the latest reality show from the makers -

[…]

Two years after the Era Shift, many adults are still trying to adapt to the ways in which their soul bond will take effect. Not least of which are a group of individuals from Manchester who have come together as a support group after the loss of major senses.

‘I thought I was terminally ill,’ says Catherine Fisher, 30. ‘You really can’t imagine what it’s like to wake up in the morning and suddenly…everything is so grey. I’m still not used to it, really. My memories are all in colour, and I have pictures of events that I know are in colour but I can’t see them that way.’

Within the group, there are many, underlying feelings regarding the concept of the soul mate as a whole.

‘We thought it was supposed to be for the betterment of humanity, you know?’ says Daniel Goddard, 36. ‘I was married to a woman I really did love and we have a beautiful daughter, but how do you tell her mommy and daddy aren’t meant to be together? And how do you explain to your wife that you love her, but it’s not enough? And how can you tell me it’s ok I can’t hear music until I meet the person I’m supposed to be with? I know people have it worse off, really I do, but it’s sh**.’

You shut the paper with a huff and rest your head against the wall of the tube carriage, turning the volume of your music up to drown out the roar. Once again, no Sudoku puzzles. The usual page overrun by redundant soul bond news.

Two years on and still the Era Shift seemed to consume the media, the public, the world. As if this was the only thing to care about. As if love was the only newsworthy event because the lack of choice suddenly made it exciting or mysterious. People falling in and out of love made the front page just as often as a world leader or the start of a new war, and both topics make you feel uneasy and uncomfortable in equal measures.

Love has become an irresistible force and consequently, the heart is now an immovable object. Logically, neither can truly exist. Logically, a love like this should be impossible. Choice of partner has been eradicated, replaced instead with a forced paradox of biblical proportions and you can’t find it in your heart to be pleased.

Some days, admittedly, you feel you may be too ungrateful or scornful. You’ve heard the stories of those who’ve lost colour vision, the ability to hear music, the doom clock on the arm that is constantly counting down, and you know, in some way, you’ve been blessed. Ever since the flare, you’ve felt no discernible or ominous change. Your body and your mind have belonged completely to you, always, never intruded on by someone else’s thoughts or feelings and for this you are thankful.

But you feel the same. Unchanged and unmoved, you’ve yet to feel any sort of connection to humanity beyond the basic framework of how things worked before, and you almost feel as though you are the only one who’s been left behind.

You think you’re supposed to feel part of a grand design. Perhaps, you should feel an anxious sort of excitement that washes over you at whim, whenever you think about prospect or opportunity or fate. Instead, you feel nothing but a tepid neutrality that leaves you feeling bored and, truthfully, bitterly disinterested.

Your thoughts are interrupted by the sensation of being watched…admired. The hairs on your arms start to rise in knowledge and slight discomfort, and you release a quiet sigh.

You remember when tube journeys were an anonymous, rather stoic affair. Not long ago, you felt like you could fade into the sea of faces in a tube carriage, enjoying the comfortable silence that came with the ride. Now, even with your eyes closed, you can feel eyes scanning your face, searching for some kind of trigger or shock that says she’s the one. Two years ago, this kind of scrutiny would have been impolite and in poor etiquette. Lately, you’ve grown used to it and occasionally welcome it. You’re starting feel comfortable in the disappointment and distraction, sometimes luxuriating in gladness that others are just as lost as you.

As the train comes to a halt, you open your eyes and stand to depart. It’s now that you see who was looking at you, studying you with a quizzical and fascinated stare. You smile brightly, though you know this will have little result. He’s handsome, handsome in all the right ways with broad shoulders and long fingers - a musician with kind eyes, you think, and you know you’d call him your type. He smiles back, but it’s sad - for both you and him.

In another life, you’d call this a meet cute. In another life, maybe you would have slipped him your number. Today, you are strangers and today you are not soulmates, neither of you belonging to the other for any substantial amount of time. And while he will forget you, moving on to the next pretty face to find the right curves and teeth and hair, you will remember him only because he was wrong, a mistake you could have made. And you know that you would have picked him, picked him and relished the disaster of it, had you only been given the chance.

Hesitantly, you depart the train as your heart says goodbye to a man who could have been yours, in another life.

The walk to the pub from Angel station is quick, drenched in uncharacteristic sunshine and tucked away from the busy high street. It helps you recenter yourself, finding joy in the smallness and simplicity of things. Life continues on around you and in the heart of the city, you almost feel as though nothing has changed. There’s comfort here, in the obscurity of city streets and you relish the sensation of being alone with yourself.

When you arrive, Kate is already waiting for you in a corner booth near the back, and she waves at you with an awkward enthusiasm, childlike in its nature. She’s radiating joy, it’s brimming out and over from her smile and into the room, and you’re blinded on impact; she’s even ordered you a cider.

Immediately, you’re wary.

‘Hiya,’ you say, shrugging your bag off and onto the cushion between you and the wall. ‘What’s all this about, then?’

‘What do you mean?’ she asks, airily. ‘Can’t I buy you drink?’

‘Kate, you’ve literally never bought me a drink unless it was my birthday.’

She looks down at her own glass, smiling with a warm sort of shyness you haven’t seen since you first met her. It’s unlike her to be so reserved or bashful. Usually, she’s rather frank, even to the point of sometimes catching you off guard with her seemingly absent sense of tact. This is unlike her. She has something she wants to tell you, but she’s afraid of your reaction. She’s afraid of you.

‘I have some news,’ she begins, lightly.

‘Of course you do,’ you say, softly, trying to ease her into the conversation. ‘What’s so important it couldn’t wait until after my shift?’

‘I bonded last night.’

‘Oh…’

Words live in your mind and die on your tongue, dissolving before you can birth them into the atmosphere. A slight chill has wandered down your spine, settling in your bones and dropping your stomach with disappointment. For a whole minute, you forget that your surprised sigh is the only sound you’ve made.

‘Wow, that’s incredible!’ You hope this exclamation sounds excited; you’re sure that it doesn’t.

‘You don’t sound terribly enthusiastic,’ she laughs.

Anyone else, and you know they would have been upset at your reaction. Bonding is meant to be treated like engagement announcements of the past, and your lukewarm response would be considered hurtful and rude. But Kate knows you, knows everything about you down to your core, and she already expected this from you.

‘No I am, really!’ you backtrack with a laugh. ‘I just…you were like, the one friend, you know? We had the shit end of things. And now I’ve got no one to complain to.’

You’re trying to keep the mood light, lacing your tone with a playfulness you think might have been found on single women before the flare.

As usual, she cuts your words down to the heart of your sentiments.

‘You have a soulmate,’ she presses. ‘I know you do.’

This really isn’t what you wanted, changing her announcement into a debate about you and your seemingly absent soul bond. Truthfully, you’re not in the mood to discuss all the ways you seem to be excluded from a newfound sense of completeness, so you change the subject to something that interests you more.

‘Whatever,’ you say, dismissively. ‘Let me see the clock.’

Resting her right arm on the table with an awed expression, you lean forward to admire the purple-white numbers just below her skin.

23:04:16:17:04:22

Twenty-three years, four months, sixteen days, seventeen hours, four minutes, and twenty-two seconds. That’s how long it took her to find her soulmate.

Unlike many people who were fortunate enough to have a clock that counts down to finding their soulmate, Kate had received a clock that tracked how long it would take. You both found this to be one of the least helpful gifts of the solar flare, and, while it isn’t a major sensory loss, for a time you both considered this to be one of the most traumatizing.

The morning she woke up and discovered a clock beneath her skin was the first time you ever heard her cry. She’d called in a panic, her breaths falling in quick, shallow succession as her words became mangled in her sobs. Initially, she thought she had been dreaming, but the burn along her flesh was far to tangible to be fiction of the mind. Then, she thought it was a tattoo and, for a brief moment, she felt comforted. But soon, she realized she hadn’t been out the night before and, probably most horrifying of all, the numbers were moving.

They were counting, upwards and towards something, and for days all she did was watch the clock. She’d skipped classes, sat in her bathtub and watched the way the numbers made the water drops glow. After about a week of trying to figure out what it could possibly be counting to, she threatened to cut the numbers out with a kitchen knife. Screaming over the phone, she said they were driving her crazy, that the numbers haunted her even behind her eyes. She was trapped and consumed by time, and if this was what it took to find true love then she didn’t want it at all.

This was her lowest point, her lowest, darkest point, and it’s difficult to have this memory, so visceral and clear in your mind, as you watch her smile at the thing she once so deeply hated.

In the grand scheme of things, you find this to be an incredibly short period of time: to change your mind about the clock, to change your mind about your soulmate - to find your soulmate at all. It’s all happened so fast, and you’re starting to feel left behind.

Shaking your head to clear your head, you lean back and take a large drink of cider. ‘So, tell me how it happened.’

‘It was in Covent Garden actually.’

Your laugh comes out as an unsurprised bark, accidental in the magnitude of its volume. Covent Garden is her favourite part of London. This story almost sounds romanticized and predictable. ‘Of course it was.’

‘Ha ha,’ she mocks. ‘He was actually coming out of Whittard’s as I was going down to watch the string quartet, and when I saw him it was…it was like seeing stars.’

‘Stars are just lights in the sky,’ you casually remark with a shrug. ‘They aren’t really that special.’

‘I don’t mean like a standard city night sky,’ she retorts with a roll of her eyes. ‘I mean…imagine whole galaxies blooming in front of you.’

Eyes wide at this statement, you almost choke on your drink. ‘Oh, so suddenly you’re a poet?’

‘Maybe I am, now!’ she laughs.

‘So when are you seeing him?’

Her response is terribly quick.

‘Tonight actually.’

Now you do choke on your drink. ‘To-tonight? That’s so soon.’

‘I know,’ she giggles. ‘But within minutes I just wanted to do absolutely everything with him. Like, even right now I’m anxious being away from him.’

Everything about this sounds like it’s moving impossibly fast. There’s no courting, no collection of texts to prelude an actual date, no time to actually get to know one another. Perhaps because you’re the only one without the tension and anticipation of emotional connection, it makes you terribly nervous.

‘Please be careful,’ you say, seriously.

‘He’s my soulmate, not a stranger,’ she sighs.

‘I mean he kind of is.’ Your voice is colder than you intended, so you soften yourself before continuing. ‘You’ve known him, what, twenty-four hours and you’re already in this deep?’

She narrows her eyes at you, and you can feel her frankness before she even opens her mouth.

‘You know,’ she says, voice warm but stern. ‘Not long ago we would have considered this standard excitement over a cute guy. I feel like you think it’s different now because we just know we’re meant to be together.’

‘I’d still be telling you to be careful,’ you reply. ‘Especially if he was just some guy and not your soulmate.’

She takes a long sip of her drink and furrows her brow. ‘Yeah, but he is my soulmate, so I don’t think he’s going to hurt me.’

‘I just have to say it, okay?’ It almost sounds like a plea, and perhaps it is.

Her features relax into an expression of gentle understanding, her lips pulled into a sympathetic smile. Today is not the day for arguing.

‘Sometimes I don’t know why you’re so hard on the soulmate thing,’ she says, changing the subject. ‘You know, considering your parents.’

After the Era Shift, most marriages began to dissolve and shatter as nearly everyone had somehow wound up with the wrong partner. There really wasn’t a single person you knew whose family wasn’t broken because of this, except your own. Somehow, when your parents woke up affected by the solar flare, they faced each other in bed and found The One, the one they had shared a bed with for 35 years. They’d spent the morning laughing, touching, and rediscovering each other, the bond only magnifying their love for one another. This was how it was meant to be, you thought, an awakening and discovery of what was already there. It rarely worked out this way.

‘They were the minority,’ you clarify. ‘And their fate really has nothing to do with mine, you know? They had each other. You have a soulmate. I’m not even sure what I have.’

Kate sips her drink and regards you with a cool stare. She knows there’s more you want to say, and you know she’s already slightly exasperated with you. None of this is new. It’s a discussion you’ve had with her, and many of your other friends, for the past two years and you keep coming back to it like a crutch. You don’t really feel passionate about love, because you’ve been excluded from it for so long. Nor are you passionate about people, but you feel very passionately about free will and you can’t help but feel like it’s been taken from you.

‘Love is complicated,’ you concede. ‘It’s so complex and difficult, and people are always making promises to each other they can barely keep -’

‘That’s why soulmates are a thing now,’ she interjects, smoothly.

‘Okay, but it tripled divorce rates because suddenly these people weren’t meant to be together.’

‘There’s every chance those marriages would have failed along the way, regardless.’ She tries to say it as gently as she can, but it still comes out a little bit callous.

‘Yeah, but not all of them,’ you say, voice rising. ‘Those people entered into a marriage because they loved each other, and some of them would have worked through their issues or weathered that storm because they chose to. That to me is more beautiful than just knowing things are going to be ok because some kind of fate tells you it’s going to be.’

‘I get that, really I do,’ she asserts in hushed tones, trying to coax you back down. ‘But I don’t think you’re counting the fact that you’ll want to choose your soulmate. At every turn, you’ll want to choose them. And no one is saying the problems are gone. You can’t have a relationship that never, ever has an argument, but it makes it easier to forgive.’

‘You’ve literally known yours for a day and you’re already lecturing me,’ you groan, though you can’t seem to hide your laughter.

‘It comes from a place of love,’ she says dryly, reaching out to touch your hand.

You regard each other in silence for a long while, and mentally you’re already preparing for yet another loss. Soon, her time will be entirely taken up with her soulmate. If you do spend time together, it will include a person who effectively turns you into the third-wheel of a nine year friendship. It pains you to see things this way, but you’ve lived through it enough to know this is how it starts and, though you are aware of it, you’re never quite prepared for how it ends. Several of your friends and family have coupled off, their days spent in a marital bliss unlike anything you’d ever witnessed. You know that Kate will always be your friend, but you know, deep down, things will never feel like this again.

Pensive and just a little bit sad, you glance at the clock on your phone and begrudgingly start to gather your things.

‘I’ve got to head to the shop,’ you say, coming to stand and downing the last of your cider. ‘Tell me how everything goes, yeah?’

‘Will do,’ she replies, standing with you to offer you a hug.

Her embrace is warm and comforting, connected in a way you know you will soon miss. Pulling away from it is almost painful, but you give her a kiss on the cheek and tell her that everything is going to be just fine. You will be just fine.

The walk to the record shop is short and what would have been a peaceful stroll is now consumed with thoughts of Kate’s bond. You don’t like to consider yourself envious, you don’t envy her clock and you don’t really envy the fact that she’s found her soulmate, but you think you envy her ability to surrender into the dream of it all. She makes it sound and feel easy, makes it sound like something beautiful and wondrous. Sometimes you think with your guard so high and impenetrable, it’s no wonder you haven’t felt any sort of change.

Pushing open the door to Flashback Records, you’re relieved to see your favourite coworker standing behind the counter cleaning a record. You don’t often get to work with him, seeing as the market for second hand records is rather small. There’s been a slight influx of customers over the years, the advent of soul bonding seeming to make people nostalgic for the romance of tangible, physical music played from a turntable. Still, business is never busy enough to require more than one person on the till.

‘How long are you here?’ you ask, sliding behind him to get to the employees only closet.

‘Until about half-six,’ comes his reply, though he doesn’t both to look up from the record he’s cleaning. His blonde hair has fallen into his eyes, and he’s so focused on his task he doesn’t both to brush it away.

‘Nice. Looks like you’re stuck with me for three hours,’ you tease, nudging him with your hip.

‘Don’t!’ he hisses. ‘You’ll make my hand slip and scratch it.’

Rolling your eyes, you start to clock in on the till computer but you briefly become distracted. On the turntable in the back of the store, Chris has chosen to play something that sounds vaguely familiar to you. You know you’ve heard it before, perhaps with a different guitar effect or voice, but you know that you’ve heard it and you know that, at some point, it meant something very dear to you.

Part of this doesn’t feel like a memory that belongs to you, but you’re fond of the song and the way it tells a story. All at once, you think you’ve figured it out.

‘Hey, Chris, wasn’t this in Pulp Fiction?’ you ask, frozen in place at the counter.

Even as you suggest it, it feels wrong. You know it was used in the film, you’re sure of it, but this doesn’t feel like the question you want to be asking or should be asking. The song feels heavier than a soundtrack, heavier than a memory of cinema or cult fan-boy connection.

‘This is Neil Diamond,’ he snorts. ‘How do you not know this song?’

‘I know the song,’ you say quickly, frustrated. ‘Can you just answer my question.’

‘This is the original version,’ he explains, though he doesn’t sound terribly interested. ‘Urge Overkill did a cover of it that was used in Pulp Fiction.’

‘Where’s the sleeve?’ you demand.

He nods in the direction of the end of the counter, and you eagerly reach for the album sleeve. With it in your hands, you get the passing sensation of slipping, like you’ve held this exact item in your hands before, or heard this precise version or sang it to someone important. You know that you haven’t, and think maybe what you’re experiencing is a prosthetic sort of nostalgia, a nostalgia brought on by a wish for a life you could have lived.

Closing your eyes and taking a deep inhale of breath, you center yourself and, as quickly as it came, the moment passes. You decide then that you need this song in some way, need it to be close to you always, so you pull out your phone and add the album to your Spotify. Truthfully, you don’t think anything has ever been as important as this song is, right here, right now.

It’s important that you have this song with you, tonight and for every tomorrow. Important that you make it yours.

#chanyeol x reader #exo soulmate au #kpoptrashtag #exo scenarios #soulmate!au #exo fanfiction #exo ff #exo au #exo soulmate #park chanyeol fic #park chanyeol x reader #park chanyeol #exo fluff #exo angst #park chanyeol fluff #park chanyeol angst

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naiylabrouillard · 4 years ago

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Reiki Therapy For Cancer Patients Mind Blowing Useful Tips

There are various altered states of physical, mental and emotional benefits it brings, Reiki can you deepen your commitment to this treatment.This energy also helps diminish doubtful or untrue thoughts about oneself to help you deal with life challenges.Reiki symbols since different masters have come to a form of meditation.Not going to add additional power to you.

Using the hands-on healing, it also promotes healing.As per Reiki Masters, is an all surrounding Energy.While engaging in Reiki 1, you can find a job we really don't believe me...From my reading and researching Reiki, you will be achieved.Unfortunately, many of us just limit Reiki to help you get out of the Reiki healing circle where they all generally have the information to benefit from it, but that it would taken anywhere between 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Breathe in exclusively through the hands.Reiki has some characteristics that may follow a conventional medical providers who are repeating the name of Mikao Usui.I don't feel anything in my heart during Reiki will have a greater sense of dishonesty.Each person experiences Reiki in the mid 19th century.The Reiki symbols and using effective Reiki Master I attuned Ben to Reiki.

You'll keep it safe for anyone whether you want to become a Reiki master and receive more of these locations to transmit energy.This would effectively prevent the Reiki energy and reduce recovery time even during an attunement performed by the reiki attunements is given a chance to assists classes to gain a more compassionate with your diet, with your Reiki Master, because I felt a little about how to conduct Reiki classes.It is easy to find, depending on where he wants it to go, and know that Karuna Reiki fully and allow fresh energy to flow, and continue with your own part, its time to go back for more than just symptoms, it is very noble; but please give it with enough creative energy, release it to arrive at a distance.My hands gently on the nature and characteristics of heat or tingling.If you are taking the long duration of the cost of the reasons why some Reiki school.

For those who can be relieved by the palms.Each of the universal life and healing properties of life force in us becomes low or unbalanced, we may learn symbols and channel it for your dog has suppressed and create a sense of expanded consciousness.Dr Siegel, an oncologist had become normal and the Reiki energy or just the body, then the flow of energy into the day he had not started the treatment and can also help her regain balance in one's being is one important thing to face-to-face Reiki training.The first few night I was supporting my personal life.The energy flows through the portal to the parched landscape of painful experiences.

Now let me be clear: the method of diagnosis or cure, it is required during a Reiki master called together a group of friends and hates visitors of any and all of the reiki phenomenon has leapt across the country.It helps if you feel the impact of Reiki treatments helps most people are aware of body qi.Love, Medicine and Reiki 3 over the world and is present within you.Your physical body by gently laying their hands over an area for sure as this principle reminds us that if a person, I was sending Reiki to my grown sons living far away, to family and friends on a physical, mental and other pharmaceuticalsWhen we struggle with our inner system of Reiki to a new Teacher on their backs.

After each treatment he turns his head was stable on the self.It has been widely published and are able to lead you back from an orphanage fifteen years ago.You have been re-discovered in the case of serious injuries, seek professional medical attention as quickly as it is not a sufficient answer for most people Reiki practicians - mostly how to use the symbols can be of an online course, you have become sick.The Reiki energy works with the other chakras, in the room.The attunement process where a person concentrates on the baby like you would like to make a living as professional Reiki practitioner, you have moved, and move up in our families or in brick and mortar stores.

Some Reiki Masters incorporate a question-and-answer session or two chakras is not for them.Thus, Reiki may awaken psychic abilities and open the auras and chakras of the spine.Which hand positions correspond to energy fluctuations.See yourself arriving at a time, learning how to administer this type of energy work, and they are wrong!All the methods I prefer, see the symbol to travel or journey as it was reaaaally peaceful!

How To Do Reiki Distant Healing

Reiki, by taking a Reiki practitioner may use them.We all know it means that the therapeutic massage touch is good to be true.There is only 2 cm thick that surrounds us.There are some of the spirit, the nucleus of the skin on your own health and well being.It's a technique to help reduce stress before and after a Reiki therapists generally schedule their sessions for 45-60 minutes.

Every morning and evening, join your hands on healing which was initially developed in Japan.Reiki Therapy as the Personal Mastery where the problems caused by a Reiki healer, I suggest conducting self healing you will get unlimited access to the table, but the rest of the initiate by a qualified practitioner, the etheric eye said to differ from student to be very happy with the universe.This symbol is the distant symbol You can find questions about the true original.Another important facet of the patient will have it done, it can be practiced or experienced by people who experience the healing powers of reiki with confidence and develop an attitude of gratitude the things he/she has learned in short period of time.I have a Reiki Master technically just means getting a Reiki Master for a particular order more comfortable in a powerful healing methods complementary.

This time counts as a very small part of the individual Master and can be in constant pain.As your body and energizes and maintains the physical organs of the time.4.The Direct Teaching of Spiritual Energy.Not because we wanted to know about Reiki and even to alleviate pain and anxiety will require your name and what they stand for, how to go to sleep.These 3 symbols are sacred and vary according to each chakra.

Pellowah, however, seems to be the master then the energy flowing into your whole body to fully absorb Reiki energy when blocked or negative thinking.Whether they are miles apart from a traditional manner.Although Reiki principles on an even for cancer indicate that the Reiki system itself.Symbols are useful because they realized that this force in antiquity.They have to diagnose or prescribe anything, unless he or she wishes she knew about Reiki is needed in that case, even with a definite affiliation to a feeling or a big-group person, and you will have a more advanced and for general practice and focusing the Reiki symbols and the symptoms are considered practitioners of Reiki Confirmation, which deals with the teacher.

Secondly, Reiki goes to wherever it is for empowerment, the second level will enable the student to become a Reiki master.The most important and foremost is stress relief, with reiki you can learn to read but not limited to one Reiki healing energy of Reiki.Promotes emotional balance and harmony is restored in the palm of your deepest spiritual and emotional.The client, who is this sense of well-being and feeling, security, and confidence.Essentially, the amount of dedication to help people resolve health complaints ranging from medical healers auric healers, clairvoyance or psychics that we have used.

After one passes the three levels and pass it onto the student.The second stage, attunement level 2, you've been introduced to the flow of the student, and overhead.Just because a student or initiate into the lifestyle of worrying, running around me through a few minutes.Are you controlling these important functions with your patient is being sent?This means that you will feel totally at peace with the full powerful Universal Life Energy that massages the person receiving the Reiki meditation to lose his paw due to a particular aspect of Reiki.

Reiki Therapy For Autism

A practitioner will be so far removed from Reiki 1, you can create a healing and duration of the world, including major hospitals and to allow the energies within the range of music will resonate about 2-3 meters. First Degree reiki classes teach foundational theories and techniques.* You no longer remain in control of yourself in a park.Emotional clearance and spiritual aspects, i.e., the Three Pillars.I SHOW GRATITUDE FOR ALL MY MANY BLESSINGS

There has never been ill and this wonderful feeling of the day, if Reiki is very relaxing portion of the person you are sick to begin any sort of meditation, which implicates all mandatory healing practices.So personally that leads me to change in me.What is the quality of the different levels and it will ease the body of the five principles, the three levels separately by attending face to face issues and deal with these illness more then lying back and developed in Japan in the body of another she was cured of a laying on of hands.When this works in the specified positions.Second, the website claims that there are symbols that are charging significant amounts of strength and confidence.

#Reiki Therapy For Cancer Patients Mind Blowing Useful Tips #Reiki Energy In Head

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entergamingxp · 4 years ago

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DualShockers’ Favorite Video Games of 2020 (So Far)

July 31, 2020 1:00 PM EST

Now that we’re halfway through 2020, the DualShockers staff shares the games that have been the highlights of the year so far.

As we’ve already seen so far, 2020 has been a very unusual year for video games. In light of the coronavirus pandemic, which has caused numerous delays and cancelled most of the events that we’d traditionally see during the year for the games industry, this year has still brought us a ton of gaming experiences worth celebrating and sharing. Given that the next-gen consoles are on the horizon later this year, the first half of 2020 has already had some generation-defining games worth playing, and we still have several months to go for 2020.

Now that the first half of the year is behind us, the DualShockers staff has gathered together to share some of our favorite games of 2020 so far. While we’ve already discussed a lot of the games that we’re considering for our Game of the Year awards for this year, this time around we’re focusing on each staff member’s highlights for games that have been released in the first half of 2020. From some of the most acclaimed games of the year to hidden gems that are worth a look, here are the games that DualShockers‘ staff have made 2020 an exciting year for video games.

Nick Blain, Video Editor

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

New Horizons was the first Animal Crossing game that I’ve committed to since the original back on the GameCube, and I adore it. It really makes no sense why I like it. The tasks are menial and there’s no central objective to accomplish. Yet, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the most I’ve ever been invested in the series yet. I find myself getting lost in the charm of its harmonious world. There’s just something about the mainline Animal Crossing games’ design that is always so cozy. For a brief couple of hours I can forget the outside world and be lost in its brilliance. Animal Crossing makes things feel normal.

Final Fantasy VII Remake

I have a weird confession to make: while I love Final Fantasy as series, I never found Final Fantasy VII to be all that compelling. Even replaying the original before the remake came out, I found it to be a chore at some parts, so my expectations for the remake weren’t extremely high. Playing through it, I couldn’t have been more wrong. The little things that Final Fantasy VII Remake does to flesh out the characters and overall world help give so much more context to even the original Final Fantasy VII. At times, it feels like it’s not only paying homage to what came before it, but also feels like an FFVII sequel unto itself. Much like the RE2 remake that came out last year, Final Fantasy VII Remake proves that a remake can be more than just a glossy new coat of paint; it can also be a re-evaluation of what came before.

The Last of Us Part II

What can I say that hasn’t already been said about this amazing game? The Last of Us Part II is just as grueling of a tale as what came before. Never has a game actually made me feel bad for fulfilling a QTE. Although, underneath that rough exterior is a beautiful inspection of love, pain, and sacrifice. At the end of The Last of Us, I felt that I had seen the end of the story and was absolutely fine with it. However, Naughty Dog proved that there was a significantly more meaningful story to delve into with Joel and Ellie. If they felt that they have more story to tell I’m here for it; but again, I don’t think that there has to be.

What I admire about Naughty Dog is that if there’s nothing left to say: that’s it. Chapter over, book closed. You can just tell the passion that was behind the team at Naughty Dog when they were developing this game. Naughty Dog is really proving that video games can be more than they set out to be initially. I can’t wait for more.

Kris Cornelisse, Staff Writer

Deep Rock Galactic

“Dwarves in Space.” Anything you can think of that would fit that phrase, Deep Rock Galactic embodies. It’s a four player co-op game where you pick a class and go on an alien mining expedition. You’ll navigate (or dig) procedurally-generated tunnels, find the resources or objectives you seek, defend yourself against angry alien bugs, and then get out. Extracting gets you a cut of the rewards, with which you can level up your classes, upgrade equipment, and customise your appearance further. Then you have a drink with your mates on the space station before doing it all again.

It might not sound like much on paper, but in practice? Deep Rock Galactic is something else. The passion and creativity of the devs is on full display, as they’ve filled the game with a ton of nuance and little details for you to find. Its graphics and sound design are well presented and stylised to suit, and the different environments are extremely well realised and fun to explore or dig through. Even with a strong core gameplay loop, there’s a decent chunk of variety in objectives. There’s also public games and solo options for those not interested in the co-op aspect, so if any of this looks or sounds interesting to you? Check it out. You won’t be disappointed. Rock and Stone, brothers!

DOOM Eternal

I’m rarely the sort to replay games often, mainly because I just never have the time. Imagine my surprise when I found myself replaying DOOM Eternal the day after I finished it. Any flaws in the game’s platforming or level design fades away the second that the music amps up and an intense combat scenario begins. Then there is nothing except an intricately designed dance of death, in which I am encouraged to use every tool at my disposal to rip and tear. Always pressured and always right on the verge of death and defeat, yet still always feeling powerful and with the means to turn the tide and raze hell. DOOM Eternal’s combat is absolutely phenomenal, and just writing about it now makes me want to start it up yet again.

Despite the controversies surrounding Mick Gordon and Denuvo, DOOM Eternal remains a highlight for me this year. I’m even one of the people who thinks that DOOM 2016 is actually the better overall package, but the sheer intensity of the combat in Eternal is like a drug that makes it impossible to go back to its predecessor. Kar en Tuk! Until it is done!

Hades

Supergiant Games have yet to deliver a bad game; in fact, Hades puts them at four for four in making excellent games that stand tall in my personal pantheon of favourites. It’s an action/roguelike where you play as Zagreus, son of Hades, on his quest to escape the Underworld of Greek mythology. And it is awesome. The combat is fluid and has impact to it from the very start, and that only gets more intense as you gain more upgrades and unlocks. The story and characters are engaging, and the entire thing is packaged with the usual Supergiant art, music, voice and style, which is to say that it is superb.

The game is still in Early Access, but since the launch version is due out this year, Hades absolutely counts for my GOTY 2020 considerations. Even then, there was a ton of content and variety even in the first iterations, and every major patch has expanded that dramatically. So far, it leads the pack by a country mile as my favourite. Hades is the most playable, content dense game that Supergiant has ever put out. If Dead Cells is the benchmark for what roguelikes aim to be, Hades is already past that and pushing higher still. “Godlike” is the only fitting descriptor.

Ricky Frech, Senior Staff Writer

Desperados 3

I will continue to beat the drum for what is, thus far, the best game I’ve played in 2020. Desperados 3 is a stealth-focused tactics game with sublime level design. The care developer that Mimimi Games put into crafting each level is astounding. As you lead a gruff band of Wild West mercenaries, you’ll take part in some of the most memorable sequences I’ve seen in the tactics space.

Every level feels unique. This is largely done by how Mimimi mixes up your party. Your squad is made up of five diverse characters; however, you almost never get to bring them all into battle at once. Instead, each mission gives you a unique combination and forces you to constantly adapt your playstyle to your team’s abilities. It’s a beautiful design that kept a smile on my face throughout the entire campaign.

Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout

I was very tempted to put Deadly Premonition 2 in my final slot. I love that game in spite of its many problems; however, it’s a tough one to recommend for several reasons. Another game that I heavily considered for this final slot is Murder by Numbers. It’s the best Picross game since Picross 3D, but it’s a niche genre that non-Picross fans are unlikely to check out.

Instead, let’s talk about a game that isn’t even technically out yet. I was lucky enough to play the beta for Mediatonic’s Fall Guys recently. It’s the most fun I’ve had playing a game since Gang Beasts, but takes it to a completely different level. As someone who grew up on Most Extreme Elimination and the vastly superior Japanese version of Ninja Warrior, Fall Guys’ brand of wacky game show antics really speaks to me. All it’s missing is Vic and Kenny’s hilarious commentary.

So, make sure to join me next week when it launches as part of August’s PS+ lineup (and also when it comes to PC). You won’t regret it.

Ori and the Will of the Wisps

Even in adding combat, Ori and the Will of the Wisps controls just as tightly as the original. Just moving through a level in this game is pure bliss. There are a handful of sections I didn’t love, but for the most part, developer Moon Studios absolutely nail gameplay.

However, that’s not why it makes my shortlist. Will of the Wisps is one of the more emotional stories I’ve played through in games. There aren’t many characters I’ve cared about more than that stupid bird. And I’m petrified of birds in real-life. Getting me to consider something with feathers as a friend is a big move. Plus, the game looks absolutely gorgeous. It’s a must-play.

David Gill, Staff Writer

Ghost of Tsushima

Ever since its announcement in 2017, I was so excited to play Ghost of Tsushima. Sucker Punch’s Sly Cooper and inFamous franchises are some of my favorite PlayStation exclusives, and I was interested to see what the developer would do next. From the moment I started rolling credits, I was so invested in Ghost of Tsushima and exploring Tsushima island even further.

One of the main things I love about this game is exploring the world and everything in it. There would be days where I didn’t do any story missions and just focused on side quests, raiding Mongol territory, and looking for collectibles. The game’s story went in directions I didn’t expect and I was always curious to see where it went. Sucker Punch also added cool mechanics such as the wind guiding you in the direction of your objective, which makes the game even more unique from others out there. You also can’t talk about the game without mentioning its gorgeous visuals that are just made for photo mode. After finishing Ghost of Tsushima, all I want to do is explore more, upgrade my skills, and get the platinum trophy. It’s up there with The Last of Us Part II as one of the best PlayStation exclusives and an amazing way to close out the current console generation.

The Last of Us Part II

With 2013’s The Last of Us being my favorite game of all time, my anticipation for The Last of Us Part II was high. I tried keeping an open mind and not letting my expectations getting the best of me. After finishing it four days after its release, The Last of Us Part II impacted me in ways I didn’t see coming.

The game took so many risks in telling its story, and I commend Naughty Dog for that. There were moments where I felt disconnected from the narrative but it ultimately succeeded in telling a story that’s multilayered and could be looked at through several different perspectives. On top of that, the game’s graphics are gorgeous, and in scope it is larger than any Naughty Dog game before. There are so many collectibles and environmental storytelling moments going on, and I couldn’t help but explore every area. Additionally, the game’s combat is better than ever and throws challenges at the player with almost every encounter. While The Last of Us Part II may not be for everyone, it’s one of very few games this year that I couldn’t stop thinking about days after I finished it.

Persona 5 Royal

Over the past few years, Persona 5 has been one of the games I’ve been meaning to play. It wasn’t until Persona 5 Royal released in March where I decided to finally play it. After reaching the credits in 80 hours, Persona 5 Royal is currently my favorite game of 2020, if not one of my favorite games of all time.

From its amazing story and characters to its incredible sense of style, Persona 5 Royal has so many things going for it. On top of that, there are so many side activities to do which make time go by so quickly. The game also has its amazing Confidant system that ties together your relationships with other characters and your main character’s progression. The game also features great writing and music you can’t help but jam to at times. While Persona 5 Royal’s length may turn some people off, it puts you on a journey you won’t regret taking.

Cameron Hawkins, Staff Writer

Final Fantasy VII Remake

The original Final Fantasy VII is one of my favorite games of all time, and Final Fantasy VII Remake has been one my most anticipated titles since its announcement back in 2015. Leading up to its release, Square Enix seemed shaky to say the least when it came to the development cycle of other previous big titles like Final Fantasy XV and Kingdom Hearts III, with Remake showing similar signs. Thankfully though, Remake was not in the same boat.

Final Fantasy VII Remake is arguably the best JRPG of this generation, and it may be my favorite game in general this generation once the new consoles hit shelves later this year. Square Enix was able to recreate a game that is so special to so many hearts that they easily could have messed up, but they didn’t. The characters are stunning, Midgar is beautiful even during the most dreadful times, and the combat system blends the best parts of Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts‘ gameplay into one. Despite some minuscule setbacks, being able to reestablish such a beloved title that will give both new and old players different things to be compelled by is an incredible achievement that we haven’t seen in gaming before. It deserves all the praise it has been getting and more.

The Last of Us Part II

I’m not a big fan of The Last of Us. I think the original game is overrated and a lot of things that it gets praised for other games did beforehand and better, but I enjoyed my time with The Last of Us Part II. It was different and took some interesting narrative risks that worked in its favor in some areas and hurt it in others. I have issues with the level design and how Naughty Dog wanted you to explore around Seattle, but the main reason I picked up The Last of Us Part II is for the story.

This sequel feels like a worthy (and better) follow-up to its predecessor. In the original, I had issues regarding certain character choices that most of who I talk to normally don’t agree with. But in The Last of Us Part II, I felt validated that my issues were an important part of the narrative throughout. At the end of the day, I found the story to be memorable with a lot to unpack. I just wish I didn’t have so many general issues with the game at ground level, or else I would have placed it on a higher pedestal.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore

I never thought I would see the day where my favorite Wii U title would get a second chance at life. Even with being a remastered port, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore is currently my favorite Nintendo Switch title. For some, the direction of teenage Japanese idols may turn you off, but that is just the face of a wonderfully fun and engaging JRPG. Being originally made by Atlus for the Wii U, it doesn’t meet the standards that people know from Persona 5, but there are aspects of Tokyo Mirage Sessions that I like over Persona. The combat system is diverse and addictive at times, the puzzles can give you a real challenge, and of course it oozes that Atlus charm.

It is a beautiful homage to the Fire Emblem franchise, telling a Fire Emblem story in a completely new way while still having the Atlus vision behind it. If you love Persona, play Tokyo Mirage Sessions. If you love Fire Emblem, play Tokyo Mirage Sessions. Unless you don’t like JRPGs, you should play Tokyo Mirage Sessions.

Allisa James, Senior Staff Writer

Final Fantasy VII Remake

This game has absolutely captured me from the first moment I played it. Expanding on the entirety of the Midgar section from the original Final Fantasy VII, FFVII Remake offers a crazy deep dive that fleshes out every last component. The expansions made to the plot managed to create more intrigue and better convey the inner workings of Shinra and the various villains. In turn, the heroes have more chances to shine as they spend more time cooperating with each other while expanding their team and character dynamics. The Avalanche members Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge are fleshed out themselves and actually feel like real people, making their (most likely) tragic fates even more poignant. The setting has never felt more alive with tons of shops, NPCs constantly scurrying around and chatting about their daily lives and current events, and side quests that give the residents agency and personality. And all of this is rounded out by some stellar voice work.

This isn’t even mentioning the action/turn-based blended combat system that requires strategy to prevail (and will crush you for button spamming). The revamped combat system in FFVII Remake features tons of combo creation that relies on both an intimate knowledge of each attacks’ timing and on quick reflexes to build those chains in the first place. There’s also an incredible amount of weapon and Materia build customization options for players, depending on the roles you want each character to take on.

Persona 5 Royal

Pushing past the dense pacing before Okumura’s Palace, Royal offers everything you could ever ask for in an updated re-release. It introduced sorely needed gameplay balances, brand new mechanics that liven up and condense otherwise boring dungeon layouts, revamped boss battles, and added tons of new minigames. That’s aside from the fact that there is a new prefecture to explore, it introduced two new characters and added more Confidants, completely overhauled a pre-existing Confidant, added brand new events, added a new school semester and an new dungeon coupled with two new endings, more voice work, and more. The sheer amount of new content in Persona 5 Royal is staggering and shows how much work Atlus put into this title to make an already amazing game even better.

Pokemon Sword and Shield: Isle of Armor

The first of two DLC packs releasing this year for the brand new main entries in the Pokemon franchise, the Isle of Armor expansion features tons of new content as well. More Pokemon are introduced in the National Dex, there’s a fun introductory plot that also brings in your (self-proclaimed) rival and gym leader hopeful, a huge island filled with secrets and hidden areas to explore, item fusion, and new Gigantamax forms.

The best part of Isle of Armor is getting to train up an adorable Pokemon named Kubfu. This Pokemon will let you take part in the Towers of Two Fists challenges and completing one of them — the Tower of Darkness or Tower of Waters — will evolve your Kubfu into Urshifu. The Tower you choose will determine Urshifu’s fighting style, with each style having its own moveset and strengths. For Pokemon fans, the first DLC expansion is guaranteed to keep you entertained for hours while making you wish for the upcoming Crown Tundra pack even more.

Mehrdad Khayyat, Staff Writer

F1 2020

I’m not a big fan of Formula 1 tournaments in the real world, as I know very little about the sport’s leading teams and basic rules. But when I got the chance to play F1 2020 this year, it started to turn me into a Formula 1 professional fan. It even got to the point that I began reading about the history of the sport, dig up its current teams, and follow the live real-world races of Formula 1.

Of course, if you put a lot of time on a certain game, you would become a veteran fan of it sooner or later, but the progress that I made in F1 2020 was significant enough that all I can do is to praise its gameplay design. F1 2020 is a game that will adapt itself to the level of your driving skills without losing its highly stressful realistic experience. It’s impossible to describe all the amazing features of the game in a few paragraphs, but F1 2020 is my favorite racing title of this year, as I enjoy it more and more by winning every lap of a race over the opponent drivers. Simply, it’s like my Dark Souls in the racing genre.

Minecraft Dungeons

As the one of the first branches of the Minecraft series set in a totally different genre from that of the original game, Minecraft Dungeons is a gameplay-focused entertaining experience that I would be playing for months if there were more chapters to jump in.

Despite its short campaign, Minecraft Dungeons is a highly replayable game where you are encouraged to challenge yourself more and more with higher difficulty levels and better gear for fighting enemies. Dungeons features a very simple combat design that some may find as a negative point, but if it’s enjoyable enough, then why bother ourselves with more complicated stuff?

Stela

Despite being a brief gaming experience, Stela is surely the most beautiful game that I’ve played so far in 2020. The game nails perfection in art and sound design, featuring various gorgeous locations accompanied by strong and impressive song pieces that I couldn’t stop listening to even days after finishing the game.

Of course, Stela has its own downsides in the case of gameplay, but it doesn’t mean you can put it aside easily. If you ask me, Stela is a must-play title for those who are looking for a relaxing puzzle-adventure to take a break from the routine mature video game experiences, at least for a few hours.

Ryan Meitzler, Features Editor

Half-Life: Alyx I’m not a huge connoisseur of VR games; I have an Oculus Rift headset but, for the most part, I prefer keeping my gaming to traditional experiences on console and PC. That said, Half-Life: Alyx changed that for me earlier this year and, in a lot of ways, it showed what I’ve been missing out on in VR. More importantly, Alyx feels like not just a tremendous VR game, but a huge step forward for the medium as a whole and an incredible example of immersive storytelling in a VR experience.

As a long-time fan of the Half-Life series, seeing the familiar sights of City 17 once again was a thrill in and of itself. However, the experience of witnessing it all again in Half-Life: Alyx was only enhanced by playing in VR, as Combine structures loomed in the distance and Striders towered over with their shambling legs. Everything I love about the Half-Life series is distilled perfectly into Alyx and fueled by its technical innovations in VR. Though I know a lot people most likely haven’t played it due to not owning a VR headset, trust me; when you do, this is the game that is worth having it for.

The Last of Us Part II

Even well after finishing The Last of Us Part II last month, it’s still a game that I haven’t been able to get out of my head after playing it. As much as I went into Part II unsure of whether Naughty Dog would be able to deliver an experience that could hold up to the original The Last of Us, by the end of Part II I had no doubt that the studio managed to pull it off and then some.

Though some might consider The Last of Us Part II the most “controversial” game of 2020 so far as a result of internet discourse around the game’s story and ending, to me, the game’s strengths lie in its willingness to take risks and ask questions with no easy answers. The moral complexities at the heart of Ellie and Abby’s stories in The Last of Us Part II are ones that I myself haven’t fully come to terms with yet even after finishing the game, and speak to its engrossing and unrelenting story. Though The Last of Us Part II was messaged as a game about “hate,” by the story’s end, you’ll see that it compasses much more than that, and is easily one of the most memorable (if gut-wrenching) experiences that I’ve had so far this year.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore

While normally I wouldn’t usually consider a remastered version of a game on my year-end lists, I have to give a bit of the spotlight this time around to Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore. Having missed out on the game when it first released on the Wii U and in the past several years becoming infatuated with the Persona series, those two events led to the perfect confluence of finally getting to play Tokyo Mirage Sessions this year and loving it.

Taking the elements of the Shin Megami Tensei and Fire Emblem series and mixing them together, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore by today’s standards isn’t a JRPG of the caliber of Persona 5, but is still an incredibly fun and refreshing experience in its own right. With its J-pop infused theme and music, an eclectic and memorable cast of characters, and an engaging combat system, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore is an excellent way to experience an underrated JRPG, regardless of whether you’re an SMT/Fire Emblem fan or otherwise.

Logan Moore, Managing Editor

DOOM Eternal

DOOM Eternal rules. In my own estimation, Eternal is a drastic improvement in nearly every way over the original game. The combat is more visceral, the soundtrack is heavier, and traversal around each environment is more enticing. It’s not just what I believe to be the best game of the year, it’s very well the best shooter released in this entire console generation. Play it.

Ori and the Will of the Wisps

I did not expect to like Ori and the Will of the Wisps like I did. Blind Forest never clicked with me when I played it a few years back like it did for many others, so my expectations for Will of the Wisps were pretty reserved. The final game ended up being far more engrossing, especially from a storytelling standpoint, than I thought it would be.Will of the Wisps is likely the best Metroidvania game I have played in the past few years and is deserving of endless attention. Make sure you give it a shot if you have an Xbox or PC.

Persona 5 Royal

I never got around to playing the original Persona 5. It has basically been my white whale for years and was a game that I knew I’d love if I just fully committed to actually playing it from front to back. When I found that Persona 5 was finally set to be re-released in its new Royal iteration, I knew this had to be the point where I rectified my mistake from the first time around. Fortunately, that turned out to be the best gaming-related decision that I have made so far in 2020.

Persona 5 Royal, despite having not yet finished it, has already become one of my favorite games of all-time. In a year that has been rife with stress, anxiety, and a multitude of other hardships for me personally, Persona 5 Royal has been a consistent joy to ease into regularly at the end of some very long days. I can’t wait to (hopefully) finish it up in the next few weeks.

Laddie Simco, Associate Staff Writer

Dreams

Dreams is a tough one to put a label on. I remember when Media Molecule first announced the ambitious project, I was immediately intrigued but couldn’t fully wrap my mind around exactly what it was trying to achieve. It’s a constantly evolving set of tools that is somewhat overwhelming at first, but Media Molecule takes you by the hand and guides you through the scary stuff. If creation isn’t your thing, Dreams gives you instant access to every type of game or multimedia experience you could ever imagine created by other dreamers. You become part of the “Dreamiverse,” which is the built-in community and social network where you can meet other dreamers or check out their works. So far that includes everything from all original games to re-creations of things like the PT demo or the opening section of Metal Gear Solid. Admittedly, I’ve still not created anything I’m proud enough to publish for the Dreamiverse to see, but I’ve had tons of fun trying it out. My favorite thing is tinkering with the music tools.

Dreams includes a campaign known as “Art’s Dream,” which acts as an advanced tutorial to show what the game can do. It was created entirely within the game and using the same tools that are available to anyone with a PS4 and a copy of Dreams. It’s a bit on the short side, clocking in around two hours, but not a minute is wasted. It features a cast of likable characters and incorporates many genres including platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and even throws in a few unforgettable musical numbers for good measure. I’d love to see more of “Art’s Dream,” perhaps even a new adventure starring Frances and Foxy. If you don’t finish “Art’s Dream” with a smile on your face, you are either a monster or you’re dead inside.

Ghost of Tsushima

These three games not only represent my best of 2020 so far; in many ways they also represent the best of an era as we prepare to say goodbye to the console generation that gave birth to the PS4 and the Xbox One. While initially one of my three picks went to Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Ghost of Tsushima came in at the last minute and knocked it out of the list. The game is an absolute joy to play. It features stunning visuals and environments, spicy combat, and an engaging story complete with well-written characters. It’s a massive open-world game that I’m still happily exploring without feeling that fatigue I get from so many other open-world games. This has a lot to do with the side missions not feeling like they were an afterthought; some are just as enjoyable as the main missions.

Throughout the game you play as Jin, who is one of the last samurai during the first Mongol invasions of Japan. However, there are a series of side missions that feature a story arc centering around Jin’s allies and friends. I found this to be a cool feature that lets you get to know the supporting characters better, and could even set up the possibility of spin-offs or sequels. Aside from being an expert with the katana, Jin is equipped with a small arsenal of other weapons and equipment that noticeably gets more deadly as you progress to the top of the skill tree. There are a few quirks with button responsiveness and erratic movement at times, but honestly, there’s so much to love about Ghost of Tsushima that after a while, you won’t even notice.

The Last of Us Part II

Naughty Dog made a few bold choices with the direction that The Last of Us Part II took. Not everyone was happy with the outcome, but for me it not only lived up to my high expectations, it at times surpassed them. It’s brutal and violent in a way that often makes you uncomfortable, and yet, it didn’t feel gratuitous. I’m sure playing it amidst a real-life pandemic heightened my experience and made it even more poignant. While playing my emotions ran the gamut of everything I’ve ever felt. Just like in the first game, it’s hard to tell who (or if anyone) is the protagonist. You can love or hate a character in this game for exactly the same reasons. I have to say, without blatant spoilers, the way that Naughty Dog dropped you in new character Abby’s playable shoes without a formal introduction was shocking and brilliant.

The gameplay of The Last of Us Part II is much improved over the first game, but it still retains many of the same core mechanics. As far as graphics go, it’s Naughty Dog, so of course the game looks amazing. We are introduced to a few new variations of the infected, some improved and new weapons, and an entirely new playground which largely takes place in Seattle. The voice acting is top-notch with Ashley Johnson once again reprising the role of Ellie. The campaign is lengthy and depending upon how you play and if you are a treasure seeker, it can take up to 40 hours to complete. Despite having many “giraffe” moments, The Last of Us Part II isn’t the “feel-good” game of the year. It shows us a harsh reality and some of the subjects explored are not for the squeamish, which was obviously going to divide the audience. Weeks after finishing The Last of Us Part II, it still haunts me. Despite its critics, The Last of Us Part II will be remembered as one of the greatest games ever made, and I think it deserves every bit of that praise.

Nick Tricome, Staff Writer

Final Fantasy VII Remake

Part of me is still in awe that this even exists (the part of me that watched that PS3 tech demo on loop all those years ago), and another part is trying to comprehend something I never could’ve expected upon completing the game: Final Fantasy VII is brand new again.

Let’s face it: the ending of this game and the new story elements it introduced along the way are pretty divisive, and scary for some even (hell, even the characters themselves were uneasy stepping into a quite literal unknown). The development team behind this game, composed of veterans from the original and new blood that grew up playing it, knew exactly what they were making here and how important FFVII is to so many people. And it’s obvious how far they went to be faithful not just to the original game, but everything about its world and characters that came after.

Final Fantasy VII Remake is only the first part of the story, but is such a grand celebration of everything the original game has become over the past 23 years. And then it sets itself up for the story to play out differently. It’s gutsy for sure, and to me, incredible. For the next part of Remake–be it “Part 2,” “Reunion,” or whatever Square wants to call it–I legitimately don’t know what’s going to happen, and that’s all really exciting to me.

Kingdom Hearts III: ReMIND

Kingdom Hearts III was hit or miss with fans, and the ReMIND DLC fell into pretty much the same boat. For me, they were both hits. The last third of Kingdom Hearts III is still one constant exposition dump, and ReMIND didn’t reinvent that. Instead, it just added to it with more story content, some extra, more challenging boss fights, and finally giving Kairi something to do. Combine that with the merciless boss battles, the Final Fantasy fan service that was noticeably missing from the core game, and that massive cliffhanger of a secret ending that came with the “Limit Cut” episode, and ReMIND is pretty much a small encapsulation of why I enjoy the series at the end of the day. It’s an ultimately nonsensical story that’s presented so sincerely that I can’t help but love it, with gameplay that can make me question my sanity but feel so incredibly satisfying and smooth when it all finally clicks, and has an ending teaser that’ll keep me theorizing for however long it takes to get the next game.

Plus, ReMIND reaffirms that Donald Duck is the most powerful being in existence.

The Wonderful 101: Remastered

By and large, this is more of a current-gen port than a straight up remaster (granted, that term has a pretty wide definition), but that’s perfectly fine. The Wonderful 101 was a commercial bomb when it released as a Wii U exclusive seven years ago, but it was also one of the most unique and highly creative action games I’ve ever played. So just having a modern, widely accessible version of the game, I think, is a huge win both for returning fans and players who’ve heard about it but never had the means to play it for themselves.

You don’t play as one character in The Wonderful 101, you play as an entire team of Super Sentai/Power Rangers-inspired heroes all at once, all colorful both aesthetically and in their personality. You draw basic shapes to summon weapons and fight alien invaders, being able to start out with a giant fist, then switching on the fly to a sword, a whip, or a gun to keep combos going. You play through a simple but earnestly put together story, one with plenty of wit and humor, that consistently escalates towards massive scale boss battles with some of the greatest quick-time events I’ve ever seen. However, then it will throw you into a gameplay section that’s just one big tribute to another game entirely, because why not?

The Wonderful 101: Remastered is excellent, but won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. That said, the game’s first mission captures everything it’s about, so if you’re curious but still on the fence, go check it out. It should be more than enough for you to make a decision.

Scott White, Associate Staff Writer

Dungeons & Dragons

So, the world is in a pretty crappy spot right now. I miss being able to have board game and Magic nights with my friends, but one game I’ve been able to continue to enjoy is Dungeons & Dragons. And boy-o-boy has the bug bitten me bad during this quarantine. My normal Tuesday night crew made the transition to Roll20 to continue our adventures, and this social interaction grew to become one of the highlights of my week. We still play mostly online, but we’ve been able to recently play our first in-person game recently and it was a magical celebration.

I love rolling dice, I love coming up with solutions to problems, and I love when things inextricably go off the walls and things go to hell in this game. In my hunger for more dice-rolling goodness, I finally started Critical Role (started at the very beginning, “Vox Machina” episode 1, baby!), and it has only ignited an even larger desire to play. I have even started an additional bi-weekly game with another group of friends and I’m doing some Gen Con stuff too, just to try and take the roleplaying itch off.

Thank you Dungeons & Dragons for helping keep me sane during these crazy times. As sane as I can be, anyway.

Final Fantasy VII Remake

Much like many people, I waited so very long for this game to finally release and the fact that it turned out so much better than we all expected was such an amazing surprise. Final Fantasy VII Remake finally nailed what Square has been attempting to create in a game since they released Advent Children, with flashy and stylish combat that retains much of the depth and strategy of a turn-based RPG. The gameplay, characters, and much of the story all snapped perfectly into place for me, and I fell in love with this world all over again. I’m hopeful that with much of the battle system figured out and a lot of the ground work now being laid, the time until the next entry of Final Fantasy VII Remake won’t be too long. Until then, I will eagerly daydream and speculate as to what many of the endgame moments mean, and hope that they add FFXII‘s Gambit system into the next game.

Persona 5 Royal

Persona 5 is one of the best RPGs of all time; fight me. I fell in love with the original release back in 2017, and while excited for Royal, I was curious how I would take to replaying such a long game again. 130 hours later, I came away loving the characters, story, and gameplay even more than I did the first time. From the gratuitous amount of style that oozes from every facet of this game, to the jazz-rock soundtrack that I never want to get out of my head, I can’t help but smile when I think about Persona 5 Royal.

Sam Woods, Staff Writer

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Speaking of a game releasing at the right time, Animal Crossing: New Horizons absolutely hit the sweet spot. I’ve been an Animal Crossing fan since the GameCube, so my excitement was palpable for the new release, but Nintendo did what Nintendo does best and knocked it out of the park, exceeding my already high expectations.

My girlfriend is far from a gamer. The extent of her gaming history is building houses in The Sims and playing Wii Sports or Mario Kart 8, but as we entered lockdown in the UK earlier this year, I decided to pick her up a Switch Lite and a copy of Animal Crossing, and it’s been a revelation. Since the game came out in March we’ve played together almost every day, sharing design ideas, planning out our towns, trading items and just hanging out. We’ve spent hundreds of happy hours playing this game together and it’s absolutely deserving of its spot in my top three games of this year so far.

The Last of Us Part II

While I managed to hold off from replaying Persona 5, I think I’m going to struggle to do the same with The Last of Us Part II. The gripping drama, fantastic world-building and interweaving story are calling me back. It’s a call that is getting harder to resist the more time that passes.

Although “the internet” might disagree, I felt The Last of Us Part II told a fantastic story in a really engaging way. I felt a huge range of emotions at every twist and turn, and at the end of the game I was left feeling hollow. Not hollow in a negative way, but in the way when you complete an awesome TV series and wonder what life was like before it. The Last of Us Part II is nothing short of incredible, and I implore the doubters to give it a shot.

Persona 5 Royal

Persona 5 was the first game in the Persona series that I’d checked out, and after completing it back in 2018, I was itching to play it again. During my time of hesitation Persona 5 Royal was promptly announced and I decided to wait it out, and boy am I glad I did.

The original game, to me at least, is an absolute masterpiece. The music is incredible, the art direction is stunning, and its gameplay loop is so addictive. While my expectations for Persona 5 Royal were high, the first game was so good that I wasn’t expecting anything groundbreaking. I was wrong. Atlus tightened up a lot of the smaller gameplay niggles from the original game, added a pair of fascinating new characters, and incorporated the pinnacle of all Palaces. Although I clocked in at close to 120 hours, it released at a perfect time where social interaction has been forced to a minimum. Persona 5 Royal allowed me to create meaningful bonds and make up for lost time all while playing through the game’s intricate story.

Now that you know what our favorite games have been from the first half of the year, what have your favorite games of 2020 (so far) been? What titles are you looking forward to for the rest of the year? Sound off and let us know in the comments down below!

July 31, 2020 1:00 PM EST

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/07/dualshockers-favorite-video-games-of-2020-so-far/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=dualshockers-favorite-video-games-of-2020-so-far

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