#one time from the capitol records thing i think????????

[robertreich]

10 Worst Things About The Trump Presidency

Donald Trump left office with the lowest approval rating of any president ever. But some people now seem to be suffering from amnesia.

Let me jog your memory. Here are 10 Worst Things About the Trump Presidency — in no particular order.

#1. Trump fueled division and sparked a record uptick in hate crimes.

#2. Murder went way up under Trump. He presided over the largest ever single-year increase in homicides in 2020. A number of factors might have contributed to that, but a big one is…

#3. Gun sales broke records under Trump, who has bragged about how he “did nothing” to restrict guns as president in spite of…

#4. Under Trump, America suffered more than 1,700 mass shootings.

#5. Trump said there were "very fine people" among the neo-Nazis in Charlottesville.

I’m halfway to ten. If you think I’m missing something big, leave it in the comments.

#6. Trump allied himself with the Proud Boys, a violent hate group who helped orchestrate the Jan 6 Capitol attack.

#7. Trump’s not wrong when he says…

TRUMP: I got rid of Roe v. Wade.

It is entirely because of Trump’s judicial appointments that 1 in 3 American women of childbearing age now lives in states with abortion bans.

#8. One of Trump’s Supreme Court justices was Brett Kavanaugh, a man accused of sexual assault by multiple women.

#9. Trump’s White House interfered in the FBI’s investigation of Brett Kavanaugh’s alleged sexual assaults.

And now: #10. Trump has been convicted of committing 34 felonies while in office. The criminally false business filings he got convicted for in New York? All of them were committed while he was president.

I’m sorry, did I say the 10 Worst Things About the Trump Presidency? I meant 15.

#11. Trump’s failed pandemic response is estimated to have led to hundreds of thousands of needless deaths. By the time Trump left office, roughly 3,000 Americans were dying of covid every day. That’s a 9/11-scale mass casualty event every single day. How did Trump screw up so badly?

#12. Trump’s White House discarded the pandemic response playbook that had been assembled by the Obama administration.

#13. Trump disbanded the National Security Council’s pandemic response team.

#14. Trump repeatedly lied about the danger of covid, saying it was no worse than the flu or that it would go away on its own.

But behind closed doors, Trump admitted he knew covid was deadly.

#15. Trump promoted fake covid cures like hydroxychloroquine and even injecting people with disinfectants.

After Trump’s “disinfectant” remarks, poison control centers received a spike in emergency calls.

That’s fifteen things. Should I keep going? Ok, I’ll keep going. The 20 Worst Things About the Trump Presidency.

#16. Trump presided over a net loss of 2.9 million American jobs — the worst recorded jobs numbers of any U.S. president in history.

#17. Trump profited off the presidency, making an estimated $160 million from foreign countries while he was president.

#18. Trump also billed the Secret Service over $1 million for the privilege of staying at his golf clubs and other properties while they protected him. That’s your money!

#19. Trump caused the longest government shutdown in U.S. history when he didn’t get funding for his border wall, which he said Mexico was going to pay for.  

#20. Under Trump, the national debt increased by about 40% — more than in any other four-year presidential term — largely because of his tax cuts for the rich and big corporations.

You didn’t really think I was stopping at 20, did you? We’re going to 25 —

#21. Trump separated more than 5,000 children from their parents at the border, with no plan to ever reunite them, putting babies in cages.

#22. The Muslim Ban. Yes, Trump really did try to ban Muslims from entering the country.

#23. Trump sparked international outrage by moving the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem while closing the U.S. mission to Palestine.

#24. Trump tasked his son-in-law Jared Kushner with drafting a potential Middle East “peace plan” with zero Palestinian input.

#25. And finally, Trump recognized Israel’s occupation of the Goh-lahn Heights, which is considered illegal under international law.

So there you have it, folks: The 25 Worst — Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Did I mention the impeachments? We’ve got to do the impeachments. Let’s go to 30.

#26. Trump broke the law by trying to withhold nearly $400 million of U.S. aid for Ukraine in an effort to extort a personal political favor from Ukraine’s Pres. Zelensky. Trump wanted Zelensky to interfere in the 2020 election by announcing an investigation into the Bidens. Delaying this aid to Ukraine weakened Ukraine and strengthened Russia.

#27. Trump personally attacked and ruined the careers of everyone who stood in the way of his illegal Ukraine scheme, including Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman.

#28. To cover up the scheme, Trump ordered the White House and State Department to defy congressional subpoenas.

#29. For these reasons, on December 18, 2019, Trump became the third U.S. president to be impeached. He was charged with Abuse of Power and Obstruction of Congress.

#30. Even while he was being investigated for trying to get Ukraine to interfere in the U.S. election, Trump publicly called for China to interfere in the election.

So those are the 30 Worst Things —

I’ll go to 35.

#31. Long before Election Day, Trump started making false claims that the election would be rigged.

#32. After losing, Trump falsely claimed the election was stolen, even though his own inner circle, including his campaign manager, White House lawyers, and his own Justice Department and attorney general told him it was not.

#33. Trump kept telling his Big Lie even after more than 60 legal challenges to the election were struck down in court, many by Trump-appointed judges.

#34. Trump ordered the Department of Justice to falsely claim that the election “was corrupt.”

#35. Trump and his allies used threats to pressure state leaders in Arizona and Georgia to falsify the election results.

We may go to 40.

#36. When none of the previous schemes worked, Trump and his allies produced fake electoral votes cast by fake electors in multiple swing states. His former White House chief of staff and Rudy Giuliani are among the many members of his inner circle who have been criminally indicted for this scheme.

#37. Trump tried to bully Vice President Pence into obstructing the certification of the election.

#38. Trump invited a mob to the Capitol on Jan 6 with his “be there, will be wild” tweet.

#39. Sworn testimony alleges that when Trump was warned that members of the crowd were carrying deadly weapons, he ordered security metal detectors to be taken down.

#40. Knowing the crowd had deadly weapons, he ordered them to go to the Capitol and…

TRUMP: …fight like hell.

#41 — Yes, yes, I know, bear with me.

Trump betrayed his oath to defend the nation by doing nothing to stop the Jan 6 violence. Instead, according to witness testimony, he sat and watched TV for hours.

#42. On January 13, 2021, Trump became the only president ever to be impeached twice. This time he was charged with incitement of insurrection. It was a bipartisan vote.

#43. The majority of senators — 57 out of 100 — voted to convict Trump, including 7 Republican senators.

So that’s the two impeachments and the Big Lie, but wait, we haven’t dealt with Russia, right? So we’re going to 50.

#44. In a likely obstruction of justice, Trump pressured then FBI Director James Comey to stop the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s National Security Adviser, Michael Flynn. This was documented in the Mueller report.

#45. When Comey didn’t bend to Trump’s will, Trump fired him.

#46. Trump tried to shut down the Mueller investigation by ordering White House Counsel Don McGann to fire Mueller. McGann refused because that would be criminal obstruction of justice.

#47. When news got out that Trump tried to fire Mueller, Trump repeatedly told McGann to lie — to Mueller, to press, to public — and even create a false document to conceal Trump’s attempt to fire Mueller.

#48. Trump ordered his staff not to turn over emails showing Don Jr. had set up a meeting at Trump Tower before the 2016 election with representatives of the Russian government.

#49. Trump convinced Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about Trump’s plans to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, and Cohen served prison time for lying to Congress.

#50. Trump was not charged for criminal obstruction of justice because it’s the Justice Department’s policy not to indict a sitting president, but more than a thousand former federal prosecutors who served under both Republicans and Democrats, signed a letter declaring there was more than enough evidence to prosecute Trump.

So those are the 50 Worst Things About the Trump Presidency. Now I could go on…

And I will! The 75 Worst Things About the Trump Presidency.

#51. Trump said he’d hire only the best people, but…

His campaign chair was convicted of multiple crimes.

So was one of his closest associates.

His deputy campaign chair pleaded guilty to crimes.

So did his personal lawyer

His National Security Adviser

The Chief Financial Officer of his business

A campaign foreign policy adviser

And one of his campaign fundraisers.

They all committed crimes, and Trump pardoned most of them.

#52. Trump said he’d drain the Washington swamp. But he appointed more billionaires, CEOs, and Wall Street moguls to his administration than any administration in history

#53. Trump intervened to get his son-in-law, Jared Kushner top-secret clearance after he was denied over concerns about foreign influence.

#54. Trump hosted a Russian Foreign Minister to the Oval Office, where Trump revealed top-secret intelligence.

Oh, and Trump’s economic policies!

#55 Trump promised that the average American family would see a $4,000 pay raise because of his tax cuts for the wealthy and big corporations. How’d that work out? Did you get a $4,000 raise? Of course not! Nobody did!

#56. Trump vowed to protect American jobs, but offshoring increased and manufacturing fell.

#57. Trump said he would fix America’s infrastructure, but it never happened. He announced so many failed “infrastructure weeks” they became a running joke.

#58. Trump said he would be “the voice” of American workers, but he filled the National Labor Relations Board with anti-union flacks who made it harder for workers to unionize.

#59. Trump’s Labor Department made it easier for bosses to get out of paying workers overtime, which cheated 8 million workers of extra pay.

#60. Trump repeatedly suggested he might serve more than two terms in violation of the Constitution — and continues to do so.

#61. Trump called Haiti and African nations “shithole” countries.

#62. Trump tried to terminate DACA, which protects immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. Luckily this was struck down by the courts.

#63. Trump called climate change a “hoax.”

#64. Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement.

#65. Trump rolled back more than 100 environmental protections.

#66. Every budget Trump proposed included cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

#67. Trump tried (and failed) to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which would have resulted in 20 million Americans losing insurance. And striking down the ACA’s protections for the roughly 130 million people with pre-existing conditions could have driven up their insurance premiums or led to a loss of coverage.

#68. Trump made it easier for employers to remove birth control coverage from insurance plans.

#69. By the end of Trump’s term, the number of people lacking health insurance had risen by 3 million.

#70. Trump lied. Constantly. He made 30,573 false or misleading claims while president — an average of 21 a day, according to Washington Post fact-checkers.

#71. Trump allegedly took hundreds of classified documents on his way out of the White House, reportedly including nuclear secrets, which he then left unsecured in various parts of Mar-a-Lago, including a bathroom. He was even caught on tape showing them off to people.

#72. Trump seriously discussed the idea of nuking a hurricane.

#73. When Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico, Trump delayed $20 billion of aid and allowed Puerto Rico to be without power for 181 days.

#74. Trump suggested withholding federal aid for California wildfire recovery and said the solution was to “clean” the “floors” of the forest.

#75. Trump pulled out of the Iran deal, placing Iran on a path to developing nuclear weapons.

Honestly, there’s so much more, from exchanging “love letters” with North Korea’s brutal dictator to publicly denigrating a Gold Star military widow and making her cry, to the way he attacked journalists, to late night tweet binges.

Look, I can understand why a lot of people want to block all of this out of their memories. But we cannot afford to forget just how terrible Trump’s time in the White House was for this nation.

And we sure as hell can’t afford to put him back there.

[casualhedonists]

✩ it don’t need your loving, it just needs attention ✩ (chapter two)

pairing: Coriolanus Snow x reader

chapter: 2/?

MASTERLIST

warnings: NSFW (18+), snow being snow, themes of sex work (not the reader), cuckolding, eventual smut, fake relationship, unprotected sex, themes of voyeurism & mild exhibitionism, murder mention (but no actual murder) (not yet at least?), MAJOR manipulation/gross power dynamics + generally darkish themes, some power play, oral sex, thigh riding, eventual piv, i’m new to full on smut bear with me here (and pls tell me if i forgot anything!)

i do not give permission for my work to be reposted/translated anywhere, under any circumstances.

a/n: first off, THANK YOU for the love on chapter 1. wasn’t sure how I’d fare since I’ve done a lot of writing in my life but little to no smut. with that said! longer chapter incoming. also I just know he’d give insane head okay i just do,the guy looks like he fucks and he definitely does

You weren't sure exactly how you slipped away from Snow’s room that night, but you could somewhat piece it together in flashes. First a head rush, then the fire in the pit of your stomach practically having gasoline thrown on it.

You remembered a quiet gasp escaping your lips, then panic, a flash of white, and suddenly you were stumbling away, head spinning as you tried to catch your breath, pacing unevenly down the hallway, any chance of a stealthy escape long thrown out the window.

Back in your room, once the door was bolted and your back was against it, making sure nobody could get in if they tried, you had your first shot at clear-headedness since you’d heard heels scuffing the hardwood.

You’d soaked your panties through and were dripping down your thighs, but you’d be damned if you could get into the headspace to take care of it. Panic flooded your veins, ice-hot as you tried to catch your breath. you slid down the door and sat there, legs numb against the cold wooden planks.

Who was she? A million questions filled your head all at once. Was she from the Capitol? Could she be one of Snow’s friends, one of your friends? The thought made you sick. What if you’d dined with her before? Talked to her? How long had this been happening? Who knew about it? Were you being played?

Had he seen you watching him?

Unable to help yourself, your one-track mind took you back to the way he’d groaned your name, though you were half sure that had been a fever dream of some kind. Still, you kept replaying it. Over and over, like a broken record.

It didn’t make any sense, you were so fucking confused. All this time you’d been hoping he would make a move, you’d practically begged him to. Why hadn’t he? When you were clearly on his mind, and yet he made you believe he didn’t think of you that way at all. Was he just respecting your agreement?

You fiddled with the lace on the hem of your slip as you mulled it over. You stayed sat like this for almost an hour, trying unsuccessfully to wrap your head around it. When you ended up right back where you started, and you were sure enough time had passed that if someone was coming to get you, they would’ve already, you finally stood up. Your caution led you to drag a chair from across the room, propping it up by the door to jam the handle. That left you with the sliver of peace of mind you required to shower off this cold sweat you’d formed.

The next morning, you dreaded breakfast. But you knew you had to face him, as well as the fact that this could very well be your last meal. You should at least try to eat well.

You made your way downstairs, a few minutes later than usual, enough for Coriolanus to already be sipping coffee, a few pages through his newspaper. You’d not got fully dressed yet, not wanting the contrast to be too obvious, but you’d wrapped a silk dressing gown around you so you were a little more covered up. You knew one thing for certain, you wouldn’t be trying any more of your tricks until you knew just what you were dealing with.

He didn’t look over at you, which you took as a good sign. The urge to hide from him, from what you’d seen and what you now knew, overwhelmed you. You didn’t say a word, and picked silently at your breakfast, but despite your best efforts, not managing to keep more than a few bites down.

“You’re quiet today.” He muttered, and you started.

“Um.”

He lowered his paper.

“Something wrong?”

How about everything?

“Oh, no, I’m okay. Just uh…” you glanced up at him, and met his sharp gaze. Fuck. You’d hoped you’d go unnoticed. You felt like a deer in headlights, like he could read your mind.

“Well?” He prompted, gaze unwavering. You blinked.

“Headache.” You managed to breathe, faking a small, pitiful smile.

He brought his paper back up in front of him, crisply turning the page. You both thanked the new barrier between you for cutting off his stare, and resented it as you looked at the tiny printed words you couldn’t make out from where you were sitting.

“I’ll have Lucille bring you up something.”

“Thank you.” you said quickly, almost too quickly, and you feared he might lower his paper again to watch you as you stumbled over another excuse. But you fell lucky this time.

The week seemed to pass in a blur, Monday’s gala being one of the only times you really left your room when Snow was around, other than meal times, which you spent in a similar state as that first breakfast. You cursed yourself for throwing out your longer dresses, and settled for the least suggestive of them, the white one you’d been thinking of pitching to Snow as a backup plan in your panicked state outside his bedroom. That all felt worlds away now. What you’d seen had shifted the tides, marking a solid, definitive line in your head between the before and after.

The gala went as well as it could given the circumstances. You danced, Snow was charming to you in front of the guests, but held your gaze no longer than usual. It was simultaneously terrifying and thrilling to feel his hands on your waist, knowing what you knew. It felt like you’d been tapped with a cattle prod and had to hide it every time his hand brushed yours on top of the dinner table, as unsuspecting guests smiled at you, the happy couple.

If only they knew that in the same breath, you were scanning the crowd, wondering who the blonde could’ve been, how close she was to Snow, if at all, and hating the way every touch he placed on your hands and waist served as a reminder that he’d been touching her instead of you.

Your stupid brain had formed a highlight reel of what you’d witnessed behind Snow’s door, and it tortured you with every passing moment. To know he was thinking of you. To think that maybe, he wanted you there instead. It put a strange sense of possessive pride into you, that weaved between your jealousy. Because yes, you’d seen another girl on her knees with her mouth around him, but you hadn’t heard any name other than your own while it happened.

You carried this strange hope, dwindling to start off, and then building each day that you were left un-hanged and very much alive, slowly chipping away at your fear of the worst. And yet, you knew the game, unbeknownst to Snow, had been fundamentally changed. You’d stopped your antics altogether, now barely meeting his eye as you passed each other in the hallway, covering up more at breakfast, and only talking just enough to avoid another interrogation. Avoiding touch, and conversation, and all-around keeping yourself away from him.

You were quieter still at night in your room. After a few days, you’d finally felt safe enough to move the chair away and sleep with the door locked as you normally would. But while your games had stopped, your want for him had only been amplified. Fuelled by jealousy and frustration, you had to bite down on your hand so that not even the slightest noise made its way out as you pictured him, not as you used to in your fantasies, but as you’d seen him that night, undone with your name on his lips. It was much easier, in your head, to picture yourself as the one on your knees. Any other fantasy just failed to make the cut now you’d seen the real thing.

Thursday rolled around and you’d made a new habit of pacing the downstairs library when Coriolanus was out of the house. That way, if he got home and stepped inside, you could pretend to be lost in a book. But the hours seemed to stretch out and you became bored, and with no Snow in sight, you decided to head down to the servants’ quarters.

This wasn’t a common occurrence, but it wasn’t unheard of. You were known for your gentleness among the house staff, less harsh than Snow, but firm nonetheless. It had led you to a respectful friendliness with the maids and servants, and once every so often you’d check in on them.

Today’s objectives, however, were purely self-motivated. You found Lucille, who dressed you, at the kitchen table, chopping vegetables.

She stood upon seeing you, and curtseyed (Snow was rather old fashioned that way). You nodded, then took a seat at the foot of the table.

“Do you need any help with that?” You glanced at the cutting board.

Lucille’s eyes widened. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Ma’am.”

You laughed. Lucille chopped and diced, and you asked questions. At first, they were after her family, her brother was sick and despite your offers, she wouldn’t accept help. So instead you listened, and slowly but surely, your questions got a little more directed toward the object of your interest.

You were good at playing the long game, so you started by asking about the company he kept. What she thought of them, with the promise that it would stay between the two of you, cross your heart.

She wouldn’t say much but she knew a little more than you; Snow kept very similar company as you did, and rarely went out for social visits. Any trips were strictly work-related, and when you eased into the topic of his past, Lucille mentioned, in very polite terms, that he had left a small trail of women heartbroken after a short period of time. That not all of them had been pleasant, and that she was pleased you seemed to have a positive effect on him.

She knew about your arrangement, practically the whole staff did, but they were kept on a very tight leash and were thoroughly reminded to not say a word acknowledging it, not even to you. It was with a knowing glance that Lucille told you she was happy you’d stayed around.

You smiled. Knowing that was likely all you were going to get for now, you let her be. By then, it was late enough to have gone dark, and you headed up to bed.

You awoke to creaking outside your door, and the shadow of footsteps from underneath it. You’d been tossing and turning for the last - you checked your watch - two hours. Excellent. You rolled onto your back wondering who it was, and then you heard it again. At first you wondered if it was just a sleep-deprived hallucination, or a sense of deja-vu, but then you focused, and there it was. The sound of heels. Again.

You sat up in bed, pushing your hair out of your face. You were enraged the first time, but if this was becoming a Thursday night tradition, it would be a serious problem. You were tired, you reasoned, you could just try to go back to sleep. Ignore it. Not let him have this power over you, a power that he didn’t even know he had. All the more reason to ignore it, and make it tomorrow’s problem.

But you just couldn’t let sleeping dogs lie, no matter how hard you tried. Your mother used to say it was a problem, always sticking your nose in places it didn’t belong. But it had got you this far, hadn't it?

You knew you were going to follow her to Snow’s room again, it was just a matter of time. You had to at least pretend you had an ounce of self-control, whereas really your head was thrumming and you knew it would take getting hit by a high-speed train to send you back to sleep now.

So you held off. Five minutes passed. Then ten. You had to know, at least, what they were doing. Maybe you could get a look at her face, see who it was, and answer some of the questions you had.

So you went. With a purpose this time, knowing full well what and who you’d end up seeing, trying to take steady breaths and focus on your plan. Check who it was, then leave.

You’d never been that great at execution. Call it hedonism, call it a morbid fascination, or living vicariously, but when you walked up to the door - which was ajar again, strangely even more than last time, by at least an inch or two - you looked inside, and your feet planted. The last shred of your self-control allowed you to take in the room first, the desk and chair that was right within your sight, and as you tucked yourself into the room, half hidden behind the door, you finally looked back at the bed where you’d seen Snow with his blonde girl last time.

Neither of them were sitting now.

Thirty seconds ago, you would’ve believed the hottest thing you’d ever seen was what played out in this room last week. But that was before you saw Snow turned away from you, still fully dressed with his sleeves rolled up, stomach on the bed and face between the blonde’s thighs, eating her out like he was on death row and she was his last meal.

You’d gotten head before. You knew it felt good, but the boys you’d slept with before your arrangement with Snow were selfish and inattentive. They would try, but they were far more interested in getting their dicks wet than showing you a good time. But Snow - you’d never seen anything like it. You didn’t know it could feel that good, or at least, not as good as the blonde girl - who you noted in the back of your mind, wasn’t anyone you recognised - was making it look. Her hips were bucking so hard he was having to pin her down with both hands around her waist.

She was just moving so much, wriggling and crying out and gasping and - you didn’t think you’d ever truly known jealousy until that moment. You couldn’t look away, knees weak and hands shaking, letting yourself get sucked into this headspace again, losing all trace of rationality. You’d think she was playing it up for him, but you knew what that sounded like. You’d faked enough orgasms to know if she was, but this? This was real. As she got close, grinding into him, writhing, running a shaky hand through his hair then getting louder, you managed to snap out of your trance.

In a flash, you ran back down the hallway.

If you thought you were avoiding Snow before, this week was about to give you a run for your money. You took breakfast in your room, and kept only to the parts of the house you knew he never entered. You only touched yourself in the shower, silent cries washed away by the water and steam, paranoia backing you into a corner.

You feigned illness the one time Snow sent a maid to inquire after you. Nothing too major, but enough to put him off. When he left the house, you snuck into the library to smuggle books back to your room, a pile forming as you tried ceaselessly to distract yourself.

You wrote home, you studied art and history. You attempted a few terrible sketches. You tore apart your room, then put it back together.

Before you knew it, Thursday rolled around again. On longer days like this, when Snow had been away working for hours at a time, you’d doubled down on your efforts to get information, and after chipping away for just long enough, you finally managed to squeeze some tidbits out of Lucille. Namely that there was a certain gentleman’s club in the city that he used to frequent before his election as President. Snow’s old driver might know its name, she said.

“But that was long before he met you, ma’am, rest assured.” She added hurriedly.

“Of course. Thank you, Lucille. I think I’ve kept you for long enough. Goodnight.”

Snow had been gone for the whole day, and you weren’t sure if he’d come home yet, so as you headed up to your room, you quietly wandered a little further down the hallway, to check if there was any light beneath his door. There wasn’t. Good. You were glad he wouldn’t be continuing this routine of his. Maybe this Thursday night, you could sleep peacefully.

With a sigh, and mulling over what you’d learned today, you returned to your room, poured a drink, then collapsed into bed.

This night was as sleepless as the rest, and you’d been drifting - not uncomfortably - in and out. A storm was brewing outside, and the sounds of howling wind began to keep you alert. You rolled onto your back and stared at the ceiling, then glanced towards your door. Snow must’ve come home at some point, and very late at that, because dim lights had been turned on in the hallway. Paranoia crept into your mind, slowly poisoning your thoughts and turning you inside out.

It didn’t take long before the feeling pushed you to roll out of bed, slide on a dressing gown, and crack open your door. This time, you couldn’t hear footsteps, or anything that might arise suspicion. You closed the door again. Waited. Then looked around your room, at the messy sheets and the half finished glass of liquor on the nightstand. You rarely drank alone, but these past few weeks had been getting to you, fucking with your head. Coriolanus Snow had driven you to this.

The wind got louder, and you knew you were too wired to sleep, so you stood by your window and finished the glass.

You’d never been good with mysteries. You wanted to know everything, all the time. Know who had power over you, know precisely how to take it away. Know exactly what was happening around you at any given moment. But most of all, you didn’t like being played for a fool.

And sure, the ethics of it had never been discussed between the two of you. Your business was strictly professional, but when you weren’t allowed to sleep around, why could he?

In fact, how dare he?

You poured another glass, straight whiskey. Downed it, pacing your room, back and forth between the door and the window, running your fingers along the ridges of the crystal glass. You thought about him, comfortably in his room, not a care in the world.

How dare he.

You weren’t sure if it was the drink or the buildup of your situation that had your blood boiling, but it didn’t matter. You were incensed. His behaviour was an insult to your name, to your family’s name. Sure, this relationship was a sham, but all the more reason for him to act with basic fucking respect. Sleeping with - and very obviously, at that - a whore, who had a bad habit of leaving the door cracked open, was unacceptable.

You were running hot, and if you knew one thing for certain, it was that when Snow met with fire, he was going to melt. You’d make sure of it.

Your feet took you into the hallway, with the decidedness that this would be the last time.

You rushed down the corridor with a tightly bottled rage that was about to burst, words hot on your tongue and demanding to be spoken, until you turned the corner and saw Snow’s door half open. You stopped in your tracks. Reassessed, then stepped closer, slowly, steadily. Remembering what you were there for.

Then, as you got close enough to see inside - right there, without you even having to step past the threshold, were the two of them, lit by a table lamp, Snow sat on the desk chair as the girl rode him to high heaven, obscene noises getting louder. As you approached you saw Snow’s face again, eyes shut, breath laboured, and you couldn’t believe that anyone just walking by would be able to see this. They were fucking like animals, out in the open. You didn’t know how or why you drew closer still, closing in on them. The girl’s head was dropped down to his shoulder, back facing you, and couldn’t see you unless she turned, but Snow? He was practically facing the door, almost as if he’d been…

No. It couldn’t be. Could it?

But you didn’t have time to think it through, because Snow’s eyes blinked open, and you knew. He was looking right at you, blue eyes piercing into yours, sharp and dangerous like he was going in for the kill. You stood there, jaw dropped, unable to look away. In what world could you walk in on someone like this, and feel like they held all the cards, and you none? That was how he looked at you; like you’d been there watching the whole time, and this was all a show, playing out exactly as he’d planned it. Like somehow, despite all your best efforts, he’d landed on top.

It was like he read your mind, because he wet his lips, unblinking as the blonde writhed on his lap, and fucking smirked.

a/n: can’t wait for them to hate fuck after this (oh sorry forgot i’m the author for a sec) thanks for reading <3

taglist: @superchatnoir07 @itsrainingreid @nycweb-slinger @lookclosernow @etfrin @resibunn @serving-targaryen-realness @harmfulb1tch @demonsnangels @superb-icarus @julesandro @gracieroxzy @slyhersophia @shadowsepiphany @ben-has-arrived @unclecrunkle @zerotwo-sciencequeen @itsleniiilosers @thesiriusmap @ooooglymoooogly @darkqweenn @going-through-shit @loverw1tch @stinkii-boii

if you’d like to be tagged, please leave a comment on the masterlist!! 💌

[lqveharrington]

Holidays | C.S.

summary: your first holiday/christmas outside of the districts

pairing: politician!coriolanus snow x fem!reader

includes: mainly fluff, reader is from district 12 (this is very important in this one-shot), coriolanus is manipulative in this (not a lot, but still), angst if you squint.

a/n: happy holidays 🎄

Despite living in the Capitol, your spirits were up when the holidays came around. Those living at the Capitol had many decorations up and participated in festivities that would certainly get those in the districts in trouble.

As the chosen wife of — the sudden rise to power and wealth — Coriolanus Snow, you were also put into the impression that you were to make this holiday season the best for you and your husband.

On the morning of Christmas Eve, Coriolanus told you that he was to work late, strategizing to help his campaign as he was running for president next year. Of course, you were used to this and gave him a kiss bye as you started your day with the festivities that you used to do back in your home.

By the time Coriolanus came home, it was late and he assumed you were sleeping already. What he did not know was that you were still in the kitchen baking cookies and decorating gingerbread house while playing music from your record collection.

“Why are you still up so late?” Coriolanus wrapped his arms around your hips, resting his head on your shoulder.

You grin at his presence, shifting to meet his eyes. “I wanted to surprise you with cookies and a pretty gingerbread house.”

“Aren’t you sweet?” He kisses your cheek.

“I would like to think so.” You pop a gum drop into your mouth, taking one of your earlier cookies you made from the counter. “Want some?”

He hummed, opening his mouth. You broke a piece off and gave it to him, waiting for a reaction of some sort.

“Well?”

“It’s delicious.” He swallowed, reaching for the rest of the cookie in your hand. “I think I should take them all.”

You let out an airy laugh, handing him the baked good. “I think you should help me decorate this house so we can go to bed. I’m sure you’re tired, Coryo.”

———

“What are you doing now?” Coriolanus asked you as he got out of the bathroom, hair still wet. He brought the a towel to his head, watching you stand outside on the balcony. “My love, you’re going to catch a cold staying out there.”

“I know…” You mess with your silk robe, rubbing the sleeve with your thumb. “Just give me a few more seconds. I want to check off the last thing I used to do back in 12 for Christmas Eve.”

He refrained from scoffing at the mention of District 12, slipping one arm around your waist. “You don’t remember how bad it was back there before I saved you? Why do things that bring back memories of those days being treated like a peasant?”

You stayed quiet, listening to his words intently.

“I believe you should be grateful you aren’t spending time in the freezing weather and instead participate in the fun activities in the Capitol. Where you belong.” He pecked your cheek. “Unless you want to go back… Then that can easily be arranged.”

“No, don’t.” You frown, looking up at the shining moon. “I love it here. A lot. And, I’m really grateful for it, really.”

“Good answer.” He runs his hand up to your chin, tilting it so you would face him. “Just this one thing and then come to bed, okay?”

You nod, pecking his lips. “Thank you… Love you.”

Coriolanus smiles at you, pressing one last tentative kiss to your lips and leaving for the bed, not bothering to take the time to understand what you were doing.

Leaning against the cement railings, your focus moves back to the bright moon, smiling sadly at it.

“I promise I’ll be back and see you again…” You whisper into the crisp, night air, the wind lightly blowing at your skin. “We’ll be okay. Just watch over mom for me. I’ll see you both again.”

You check your watch for the time, the second hand hitting the twelve. “From your somewhat cool older sister: Merry Christmas, Dante Everdeen.”

read more about coriolanus snow here !!

a/n pt2: MING BLOWING 🤯 she’s related to katniss, isn’t that silly :)

©lqveharrington - all rights reserved. do not copy, translate or share my work on other media platforms

[gogobootz1]

The Mentor pt. 2

Finnick Odair x Reader

Summary: Your mentoring tasks persist as you and the newly crowned victor tackle a Capitol party- with some help.

part one | part three

"So you’re stealing from me now?” 

You jump at the sudden sound of the voice behind you. Luckily, none of your champagne spills. 

“Pardon?” You look over your shoulder, only to see a pretty face coming your way. 

“Intellectual theft is serious, you know,” Finnick says with faux sincerity, and takes a sip of his own champagne. 

You lazily roll your eyes, “Please, one of my cows could have come up with the momma-bear angle.” You pick at your nails again, gaze drifting back to where District Ten’s Capitol escort parades Darla around. Before the group of you had even arrived, she’d forbidden you from sticking by Darla’s side the whole night. Said the president wanted people to get to know her- which made you reluctant to separate from the girl you’d taken under your wing. 

You’d settled for watching her like a hawk, prepared to intervene if you recognized any bad apples. 

"Blue suits you, by the way," he starts, and you cast him a suspicious sidelong glance. "Much better than brown, or so I'd assume." You prickle with embarrassment, catching the reference to what he'd overheard the other night.

You cross your arms, "Don't be a jerk." The words sound sad rather than snippy- like you intended them to.

"I was trying to compliment you," he insists. "Really, you look quite nice. This is a far cry from your outfit the other night." Your pajamas. They were the closest thing in reach when you were paged to the recording studio during Darla's breakdown. The reminder makes you shift awkwardly, suddenly even more uncomfortable.

"How kind of you," you say flatly, smoothing the non-existent wrinkles of the dress your stylist had placed you in. At least this interaction is slightly less mortifying than the one, or two you suppose, you had with him the other night.

Finnick doesn't respond, and you don't bother looking at his face to gauge his reaction. Instead, you find Darla in the crowd and start picking at the skin around your nails again. She seems okay for now, but it doesn't do much to ease your worry.

”You seem nervous,” Finnick says, without his former mirth. You startle again, assuming he'd walked away. 

 “Do I?” You briefly let your gaze flick up to him, eyes wide, before turning right back to your task. 

“Well, at the rate you’re going, your hands will be bone within the hour,” he lightly grabs your wrist, drawing your attention to the blood (both fresh and dried) that sits on your cuticles. "Have you been at this all night?"

“Thanks for your concern,” you snatch your hand back, trying to shield it from his gaze. It takes you a second to spot Darla again, and when you do your shoulders drop in relief. 

“You didn’t answer my question,” he doubles down. 

“Did you ask one?” You bite back. 

“What are you nervous about?” He asks. 

You turn fully toward him, “What do you think?” You extend an arm out, gesturing to where Darla is. 

Finnick follows your gesture to spot Darla being dragged around. He huffs, "She'll be alright, you know. Like us."

"Speak for yourself," you laugh, but it's a hollow sound.

His face falls, "You know what I mean."

"I do, but I don't like it," you snap sourly. Closing your eyes, you take a deep, albeit shaky, breath. When you open them, you face the front again. "The way I feel all the time," you shake your head slowly, "I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Let alone Darla, so if I can- if I can just keep her close enough, I can spare her from some of this."

He quietly says your name, almost like a warning.

"No!" You cut him off, "No, I know how I sound. I can do it." The look in his eye says he's not buying it, but you double down, "I have to. I have to... try." Your voice breaks a little, but there's no time to be embarrassed over it when a different voice calls out your name.

Finnick watches as you pull yourself together. The change is visible. It's almost like you're a new person, the one the Capitol adores. Sweet and pristine, bloody hands hidden neatly behind your back.

"I wanted to thank you for coming in this week. The kids love your visits," the middle-aged woman says, smiling at you. Her attire is far less ostentatious than her fellow partygoers, but she's clearly Capitol-born and bred. Her gaze shifts to Finnick, and he stiffens, recognizing the look in her eye.

It seems you notice it, too, as you're quick to intervene. "It's my pleasure, Mrs. Montgomery," he almost cringes when he recognizes the name you call her. "If I could, I'd come often enough that they'd be sick of me." You're good at this, though, he notes, grateful for being off the hot seat. Quick and clever, just like in your games.

"Impossible!" The Capitolite laughs, "In fact, they're already asking me when you'll be back. When are you free?"

While your facade is impressive, it's not perfect. He sees you tense before replying, pleasant as ever, "I'm actually heading home soon, but I'll let you know when I'm back." It's enough to appease Mrs. Montgomery, at least. She eyes the buffet table.

"Please do! I'll see you soon, love," she waves as she walks away. You wave back, picture-perfect smile lighting up your features.

It drops as soon as she turns, and he does his best not to laugh at the contrast. "If that's who I think it is, I hate her husband," Finnick tells you.

You echo the sentiment with a scoff, "Me too."

"I thought you were sweet to everyone but me," he turns toward you in surprise, and you shrug. "Here I was thinking I was special," he shakes his head in faux sadness.

A small grin emerges on your face at his antics, though it's clear you're trying to hide it. He spots it, however, and smiles a bit, basking in his victory. Suddenly, your poorly concealed grin drops, and he follows your gaze to see who stole the humorous moment you'd been sharing.

Darla, of course, but someone else is with her. A large man, probably a few inches taller than Finnick, towers over the sixteen-year-old. She looks terribly uncomfortable, and the District Ten escort is missing from her side. When his eyes flick back to you, he finds your expression mirrors Darla's. It's worse, even, and far worse than when Mrs. Montgomery came around.

You turn to face him, eyes wet and blown with fear. He's never seen you look so vulnerable, not on TV and not in your limited interactions. You looked worried the other night, sure, but this is different. This is a look of terror.

"Dance with her," you practically beg, suddenly grabbing his forearm. Your voice trembles, "Please. They'll- I can't take her away. Please just go dance with her." Tears threaten to spill over, and you get more upset as you go on.

Finnick's reluctant to leave you so distraught, but he's sure that whisking Darla away from whoever this is is the only way to assuage your worry. "Of course," he nods, ducking his head a bit to be on eye level with you. His hand covers yours, subtly removing himself from your grasp so he can attend to your request. "Keep an eye on us, okay? It'll be fine."

He holds your gaze for a bit as he departs, but he can feel your eyes on him even after that. Quickly, he comes upon Darla and the large man that you apparently know and abhor enough to ask him this favor. He spews some of the charming bullshit everyone in the city eats right up and steals Darla away without issue.

Finnick looks back to where he left you as he leads her onto the dancefloor, hoping that seeing Darla safe will ease your panic. He's caught in the act, though, "Sent by my guardian angel, then?" The teenager asks him, pulling his attention back to the dance floor.

"How'd you know?" His eyebrows knit together, and the girl laughs.

"She's been watching me from the same spot all night. It's kind of creepy," she jokes.

"I think she's just worried," Finnick says defensively.

"I think if she stays there for much longer, they'll install her as a statue," Darla quips. It's funny, but he fails to chuckle since he wouldn't put it past the people here. She sort of cringes, realizing the joke didn't land. "I'm really grateful for her, don't get me wrong," Darla tries, "it's just- sometimes I wonder about her."

"How so?"

Darla inhales, "I don't know. She disappears and just seems... different when she comes back. And I swear she lies about where she goes since there's never any press coverage, but cameras constantly follow her." His face falls as Darla goes on, "Sometimes when she sees random people, she instantly clams up."

It's a little too familiar to him. Paired with your reaction to both his comment about Mr. Montgomery and seeing that man with Darla, he's starting to understand. Maybe he has more in common with you than he'd originally thought.

"Finnick?" Darla says, and he realizes he's left her in silence for too long.

"I was gonna say I wonder about her too, but I was thinking more- favorite food, favorite color," he tries to lighten the mood.

Darla looks pleased as punch, "Well when it comes to you, I have her pinned."

"Yeah?" Finnick asks, amused.

"Yeah," Darla nods, "she’s clearly head over heels for you.”  

His eyes nearly bug out of his head, “Excuse me?” 

“Yeah, no, she’s totally in love with you,” she reaffirms.

“Are we thinking of the same person?” He asks, extremely skeptical.

“Yes!” Darla insists, lightly slapping the side of his head. 

“Well, it just seems like she doesn’t like me,” he defends himself. 

“You make her nervous,” Darla affirms. “She’d make a fool of herself if she wasn’t being rude. She told me the other night, this is a quote by the way, 'he's so gorgeous, I can't say anything to his face.'"

“You’re kidding.” 

“Nope,” she pops the P. 

“I struggle to believe that Capitol’s loveliest victor won’t talk to me because she thinks I’m pretty,” he scoffs. 

“It’s more than that,” Darla chides, “she thinks you’re too good for her, so before you can reject her, she tries to beat you to the punch.” 

“And when exactly did she tell you all this?” He asks skeptically. 

“Oh, we had a sleepover the other night and got super drunk. Boy, was she an open vault,” Darla laughs, but it's clear to him you'd kept some secrets to yourself.

“And you don’t feel bad telling me?” He inquires skeptically. 

“Please, I’m helping her help herself.” She scoffs, “She’d pine over you until her dying day without ever saying a word.” 

“Whatever you say, kiddo,” he says. Finnick's not sure how reliable a source the teenager is, so he decides to refocus on his original goal. "I meant to ask if you were ok, by the way. You know that guy?” 

Darla’s face sours. “No clue. But let’s just say I was glad for the interruption.” 

He raises a brow, hoping she’ll elaborate. 

“I felt like he was … looking at me,” she huffs. “Like, trying to see below the dress.” Finnick's jaw clenches at that. He knows the type. He deals with the type. And now he's almost certain you do too, hence your big reaction.

"Well, if he bothers you again, just come find me. I'm quite comfortable on the dance floor," he tells her as the song comes to an end.

Darla pats his bicep, "Thanks, but you should really be getting comfortable with someone else." She nods her toward where you'd been standing. "The bar will take good care of me." She only gets a few paces before he calls out after her.

“Hey!” She turns to catch his words. “Moderation,” he points at her, emphasizing the word.

She smirks, “Yeah, yeah, whatever, Dad.” A smile twitches at his lip, and he shakes his head as he turns to find you. 

When Finnick finally circles back to where he'd left you, you're nowhere in sight. He sighs, disappointed, though he can't quite blame you when you've revealed more about yourself tonight than you probably intended.

He wonders if you've left the party or just found a better observation spot, but either way, something tells him you don't want to be found right now. He remembers something you said earlier about shielding Darla. You seem to be doing alright so far, but he's suddenly wondering how far you'll go.

———————————————————

Once again- super unedited. I'm just having fun on my holiday break at this point. I feel like this leaned kinda sad? So... sorry for that. <3

[asterias-record-shop]

𓆩[in our next life]𓆪

𓆩[join the taglist!]𓆪 𓆩[request/ask me something!]𓆪 𓆩[join the main taglist!]𓆪

𓆩♡𓆪 CHARACTER - Finnick Odair x Fem! District 4 Victor! Reader

𓆩♡𓆪 TYPE - fluff, smut, slight angst

𓆩♡𓆪 WORD COUNT - 23K

𓆩♡𓆪 SUMMARY - Peeta and Katniss weren’t the first to fall in love after the games. That title went to you and Finnick, your mentor after you were Reaped at the age of fifteen two years after Finnick. After being dragged back into the Games with the Quarter Quell, you both are determined to stop it, no matter what- especially if one of you would gladly sacrifice themselves for the other.

𓆩♡𓆪 STORY WARNINGS - Use of Y/N || i promise I do not write like this in the fic- || reader was also forced into prostitution, but Finnick forced Snow to make them a pair || reader is definitely bi but has no (sexual) relations with women in the story || Finnick’s hand around your throat can be seen as sexual but it’s mainly just a comfort thing at this point || a lot of mixed timelines, sorry want it to play in my favor || mainly based on the movies bc I haven’t read the books in forever || Reader and Finnick are titled the Princess and Prince of the Capitol || you basically replace Annie || inspiration of your story from other characters || weird baby names inspired by the sea (cuz District 4, sea fishing etc) || This is so going to be a series- || smoking, smoking opium || This actually takes place in several different times, first the drawing for the Quarter Quell to the carriage rides where you meet Katniss and Peeta to the interviews to the literal Quarter Quell, being rescued, then skipping to after the rebellion is won (my darling doesn’t die, he didn’t deserve it &lt;3). || Cinna isn't dead and he’s your stylist, and you and Finnick get married twice (once before the Quarter Quell, another after the rebellion) and of course he designs your wedding dress. || Finnick pulls a stunt like Peeta, turns out to be true later on || first marriage is televised a few days before the games, second of course is private || marriage ceremonies inspired by cultures, yes I’m giving District 4 marriage ceremonies and no I’m not basing this off the wedding in the movie, and this is my own little spin on the fic - I didn’t want the wedding to be boring || the party Peeta and Katniss go to in the second movie is your wedding || ngl, with these plans, I’m hoping this is long- || slight rift between you and Katniss at first, but you end up being best friends quickly || you make Katniss question her sexuality bc you top her for a minute- || CPR & mouth to mouth || Classic warning such as cursing, fighting, blood, death, and more to be wary of. || mentions of Finnick’s forced prostitution (brief, my baby has suffered enough) || smut is included in this; mentions of voyeurism and exhibitionism (explained in the story), breeding kink, size kink, oral (♀ & ♂), fingering, spit, slight choking, slight dom-sub dynamics, sex is definitely a coping mechanism, degradation, name calling (slut, whore, cumslut, maybe more?), probably dirty talk if you think about it that way, praise, mentions of a hazy mindset that could be seen as a subspace, definitely a soft dom turned pleasure dom turned rough dom Finnick, and more- just be wary.

—𓆩[CHAPTERS]𓆪—

𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER I 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER II 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER III 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER IV 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER V 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER VI 𓆩♡𓆪 CHAPTER VII 𓆩♡𓆪 EPILOGUE

ALL CHAPTERS ARE UP!!!

—𓆩[DRABBLES]𓆪—

𓆩♡𓆪 N/A

—𓆩[EXTRA FICS]𓆪—

𓆩♡𓆪 N/A

© asterias-record-shop

[ghcstao3]

been on a hunger games kick lately so. ghoapifying time!! yippee yahoo

(edit: extra because i felt a little silly)

-

Simon isn’t much when his name is reaped, just days after he’d turned 18. He’s scrawny, starved, scarred—being from District 10, the only thing he’s ever known is butchery, so maybe he’s of use with knives, but it really means nothing to him. Not when his older brother Tommy had gotten killed by Peacekeepers, not when his mother had died of illness, not when his father couldn’t give less of a shit when his youngest son is sent to die.

So all he can do is accept his fate. All he can do is listen to his mentor, train in the fleeting days he has left, and try to survive. No matter if the odds would never, ever be in his favour.

Simon doesn’t remember much from the days leading to the games. All he can really recall is the absurd pageantry and the lack of privacy, though it had been nice to be freed from the stench of blood, if only for a few days. It was nice, not having grime beneath his fingernails.

If he’s honest, he doesn’t remember much from the Games, either. Simon hadn’t made allies, didn’t need to—even his necessary loyalty to the girl from his district was tentative at best. She would still come down to being another competitor, in the end. Simon didn’t want to die, he couldn’t. Wouldn’t.

And he doesn’t. He wins, somehow—maybe out of spite. Maybe out of fear, or out of vengeance. Simon doesn’t know.

All he knows is that he hates the man he’d become in that arena.

* * *

Johnny was born and raised in the Capitol. Maybe not in a family that was the richest of the rich, but still much better off than anyone found in the districts. He’s only ever known some sense of luxury, has never encountered the cruelty of the real world, and continues to stand to benefit from the pain of others.

But even then, he does eventually recognize the faults and evilness of the system.

Eventually.

Because as a boy, he had loved the Games. Before having any sense of consequence or the realness of these people and their deaths, Johnny had been just as enraptured by it all as everyone else. He watched with interest, just as entertained as he was meant to be. The Games had been awe-inspiring to him as they are to most other Capitol children.

He still remembers Simon’s game. Ghost, as the boy from District 10 had been called, having earned the nickname from an uncanny ability to seemingly appear out of nowhere and make that cannon fire one more time. Johnny had been 15, then, still an avid watcher of this slaughter-show—but he’ll always recall that game the most, because of Simon.

Simon was shy, and awkward—but the Capitol had loved it. Loved him. And Johnny had just as well, albeit for some different reasons. Because along with everything the Capitol admired about Simon (which was mostly superficial), Johnny admired his resilience. His persistence, his triumph. He had thought, back then, that he could only ever wish to be like the boy from District 10. He’d never been so enamoured with a tribute, a victor like that before.

That was seven years ago, and things have since… changed. Not enough to be different, but enough for Johnny to notice. Enough for him to finally understand that these Games are far more than he had ever been led to believe. He just didn’t know to what extent.

Johnny is freshly 22 when he meets Simon. A friend of Johnny’s (in the loosest of terms), Philip Graves, tells him that he’d gotten a special birthday gift for Johnny that year—and while usually Johnny might be skeptical or uncaring, given Graves’ track record, it’s what he says about this gift that has Johnny… panicking?

“Remember that victor you used to have a crush on? Well, I finally managed to get in a request.”

Before Johnny can ask what he means, two Peacekeepers—escorts—are entering the room with Simon in tow.

Graves grins almost predatorily before standing and patting Johnny on the shoulder like he means to be friendly. Like he thinks he’s given Johnny all he could ask for.

And in maybe some sense he has, but not like this. Not like this.

“Enjoy the next few days, Johnny,” Graves is saying. “He’s all yours.”

Johnny thinks he might be sick. The threat of bile in his throat only grows more intense one he’s left alone with Simon.

The victor looks… different, since his time in the public eye. Bulkier, likely from a steady supply of food for the first time in his life; objectively healthier. Skin smooth, porcelain, like he hadn’t seen a day of suffering in his life. Every aspect of him perfectly tailored, manicured, prim, like a clean slate for his current proprietor.

He still has that rugged kind of handsomeness to him, though. The Capitol could change many things, but they could never take that look of fierce determination from his dark, knowing eyes.

“How do you want me?” Simon asks softly. Johnny can tell there’s still fight thrumming beneath his skin, but they both could guess what would happen if that were to be let free.

“I… don’t,” Johnny says before he can help himself. At the shift in Simon’s expression he feels his heart drop, so he adds quickly, “Sorry, that’s not—I don’t mean it like that. I just never realized…”

Simon tilts his head, curious, assessing. “Never realized what?”

“That you…” Johnny swallows hard. He takes a shuddering breath, nervous, like he isn’t the one with more power here. Like he’s the prey—and maybe he is. “Could be bought.”

Simon shrugs a shoulder, nonchalant like the idea of being bought and sold like an object is hardly a bother to him. There’s hurt in those eyes, but it doesn’t live anywhere else on his face. “There’s a lot of things you might not know outside of your world of luxury.”

Johnny’s gaze falls the floor. “Yes,” he sighs. “I’m sure there is.”

A tense silence falls over them, for just a moment, before Simon is shuffling across the room to join Johnny on the sofa. He sits close, but doesn’t touch.

“So,” Simon’s insisting, “how do you want me?”

Johnny doesn’t know if he’ll survive these next few days.

Perhaps he should at least be grateful that the transaction is on Graves’ hands.

[coniferouspines]

Been thinking about a Stan twins hunger games AU. Throwing it out here because I’m not sure if I’ll ever actually write anything for it, since I’m working on other stuff, but it’s been rattling around in my brain and I must get it out.

More of a dark!Ford type of AU because I’m into that. Possessive, protective Ford my beloved. Love it when he gets to be a little bit deranged.

Anyway.

The twins are separated at birth. Born in a poor district, Ford is adopted by an influential, wealthy capitol family. At the time the plot of the AU begins, he’s in his early twenties and on his way to becoming head gamemaker. He is set to intern/test run the next game mostly by himself, while still under the eye of his mentor, the current head gamemaker. Ford is still a genius, and is well known for being close to the capitol president, Bill Cipher. He has no idea he was born in the districts and was adopted by his otherwise infertile parents.

Stan on the other hand, was raised in the districts by the twins’ bio parents. He becomes a tribute the same year that Ford runs the games. In this AU, the age for potential tributes ranges from 12 to 25. Having tributes in their early adulthood helps with population control. The capitol wants enough people in the districts to keep them running, but not too many people that they start realizing they vastly outnumber the capitol.

Having the tribute age go up to 25 means most people don’t form families and have children too early. Doing so would be risky in the case that one is selected as tribute and taken away from a spouse or a baby. As few are willing to risk such a thing, it means most people in the districts don’t try having kids until they pass the age of 25, when they are no longer eligible as a tribute.

Anyway, Stan gets dragged into the games. Either by getting selected as tribute himself, or by volunteering to take the place of his little brother Sherman as tribute. Either way he gets shipped off to the capitol. And of course, as future head gamemaker, Ford is there during the initial tribute assessments once they all arrive, and he is shocked to see a tribute that shares his face.

Cue the intrigue.

Ford wonders if perhaps it’s simply a case of a doppelgänger, since everyone is said to have another person out there that resembles them. But… The tribute looks far too identical to Ford to be a simple doppelgänger. So Ford starts to wonder if perhaps—outlandishly—he somehow has a twin. He isn’t sure how that would be possible, but he goes about checking Stan’s medical records after the tributes all go through their medical checks. Ford gets his hands on some of Stan’s DNA and secretly runs a few tests.

The results come back showing that Ford does indeed have a twin. But as shocking as the information is, and as much as Ford would like to know more about his newfound brother, the games must go on. Stan must compete.

But Ford is going to make sure Stan wins. No matter what it takes to make it happen. Though he knows he’ll have to be subtle about it. Can’t show too much favouritism—although he can get away with a little, since he’s favoured by president Cipher. Others tend not to mess with him because of that. Though the resemblance between Stan and Ford is probably obvious to the other gamemakers.

Being the head gamemaker for this year’s games, Ford throws everything into making sure Stan wins. And once he does, Ford throws everything into making sure he can have Stan for himself. A good thing he’s close to president Cipher, as Ford simply asks for Stan and Bill gives him to him. Likely Bill in this AU has been manipulating Ford for a while, wanting him to be his second in command. So he allows Ford to keep Stan despite Stan’s victor status, as giving Ford what he wants will make him more likely to be obedient to Bill.

Meanwhile Stan is confused as to why he’s not being allowed to go back home, and angry that he’s being kept from his family. When he meets Ford however, he’s shocked. Post-game is his first time seeing Ford, and Stan has no idea why this guy looks so much like him. But he certainly isn’t a fan of Ford. Both for being a gamemaker and for being “capitol scum”.

Ford is determined to figure out the mystery behind his previously unknown twin, and is determined to make sure Stan stays with him forever. He will not let Stan go back to poverty in the districts, nor have anything to do with the games anymore. Stan is his to keep safe. He wants to get to know his brother and not lose him again.

And perhaps when the truth comes out, when the twins figure out what happened and how they were separated, Ford goes and collects the rest of his biological family from the districts. Or perhaps he doesn’t. Maybe he has a good relationship with his adopted parents and doesn’t care about the rest of his biological family. They gave him a good life. Now he can give Stan a good life.

[galaxythreads]

unhinged, unconnected thoughts about the Hunger Games 1-3:

Katniss is one of The best female characters I have ever read in my life

Peeta is the definition of sad, wet paper man

I AM SO GRATEFUL THERE WERE CONSQUENCES From the games!! Like Katniss has permanent hearing damage. PEETA lost his LEG

Katniss' severe PTSD was so harsh and brutal and so so so good

Haymitch was such a little guy and I adored him for that. What I really liked about his character was that like -- he survived the Hunger Games. This was not a good thing. He was devastated by the fact that his family was killed and the only way he coped with that was by drinking. There was no getting better. There was no magic fix. It didn't just go away. Then he had to train and prepare 20 kids to go fight in the Games just like he did, knowing that he was sending them all out to die or survive like he did, and I have to imagine that toward the end, Haymitch probably hoped they died. It was easier than living

The Capitol was absolutely horrifying

The PTSD from the Games was vivid and it was so nice to see that this horrible bad thing that happened to the characters didn't just go away because they were in another book. Like it impacted their choices forever

Katniss and Peeta about to take the berries reminded me of Romeo and Juliet and I think that was probably on purpose. Neither can live without the other.

KATNISS IS FREAKING SIXTEEN AND ACTS LIKE SHE'S SIXTEEN

Katniss runs off and screams and cries and breaks down and fails and makes selfish decisions and selfless decisions and like she is SUCH A GOOD CHARACTER. Like I Honestly didn't think there would be a female character that competed with Joan Watson for #1 female for me, but Katniss is like. She's up there.

Gale was overall meh to me. He was There, but the emotional impact he had on Katniss was overall... yeah. just dots.

I'm really glad that Katniss was able to heal enough after 15 years from the Games to have kids. She wanted kids, and the mothering instinct is there, but she didn't want to bring them into a world where they wouldn't be safe. But Katniss having kids means that she does feel safe.

"you love me. Fake or real?" "real"

"sweetheart"

I literally did not realize the Hunger Games was science fiction until I got like halfway through the second one and was like oh yeah, yeah this is science fiction.

I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT THEY SENT THEM BACK TO THE GAMES IN BOOK 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH

like all I'd heard about the Hunger Games was book 1, so everything after that to me was just ?????? and I was SO MAD but it made so much sense from the Capitol's perspective and I so wanted to strangle Snow.

District 13 overall annoyed me tbh, but I did get where they were coming from.

Everything in this series is so heavy. Like you feel the weight of the entire world just seeping down on you and it's actually kind of nice. I feel like the Hunger Games decided yeah, this is a dark, gloomy kinda world and then kept that tone. Books that keep the tone are SO RARE and i adore them.

PEETA PEETA PEETA

BREAD BOY

AMNEISA

PRIM DYING LIKE ???????????????????????? so good. So good. Like the whole reason Katniss went into the Games was to save her and like. She died anyway. Tragedy my beloved.

Katniss being so bad at speeches was absolutely hilarious. She is very much a speak from the heart kinda person and I'm glad that was never "fixed"

I love how a running theme in the series was that they have to document everything. There are video cameras everywhere, recording, always recording, and if they aren't it didn't happen. But Katniss is screaming IT HAPPENED IT HAPPENED anyway. Like with Rue's death.

I love that Peeta is so protective of Katniss, but would wholey hold her bow while she punched someone in the face. Like he's protective of her while respecting her strengths.

this series is dark, but I am going to reread this 4000000 times.

[muzaktomyears]

The man who was there the day the Beatles broke up

Mal Evans was the Fab Four’s roadie, fixer and friend. Paul McCartney confided in him when the band split, while John Lennon relied on him to guard his life. A new book tells his story

The Beatles’ lingering tensions finally caught up to them during a meeting among John, Paul and George at 3 Savile Row on September 10 1969. As Mal and Neil [Aspinall, who ran the Beatles’ company Apple Corps] observed, John took particular issue with what he perceived as Paul’s megalomania, saying that, “If you look back on the Beatles albums, good or bad or whatever you think of ’em, you’ll find that most times if anybody has got extra time it’s you! For no other reason than you worked it like that.” For Mal, the conversation must have been pure agony. He idolised Paul, who bore the brunt of the meeting’s vitriol.

In his own defence, Paul protested that he had “tried to allow space on albums for John’s songs, only to find that John hadn’t written any”.

With the idea of recording a new album seemingly off the table, John suggested that they produce a Christmas single instead. After all, he reasoned, their annual holiday fan club record would be due before long. When this idea was met with silence and indifference, John soberly concluded, “I guess that’s the end of the Beatles.”

As horrible as the experience must have been for Mal, panic hadn’t set in just yet. During the past 15 months, Ringo and George had quit the band at various times, only to be coaxed back. But ten days later it all spilled out again at a meeting at Apple. Mal and Allen Klein (their manager after the death of Brian Epstein) were there, along with Yoko, Neil and the boys. For his part, George was on speakerphone from Cheshire, where he was visiting his ailing mother. The topic at hand was a new agreement with Capitol, which Klein was understandably eager to ink.

As Mal observed, Paul began to enumerate the group’s upcoming opportunities, including a series of intimate gigs and a possible television special. In each instance, John said, “No, no, no,” before telling Paul, “Well, I think you’re daft.” Eventually, he blurted out that he wanted a “divorce”. “What do you mean?” a stunned Paul asked. “The group’s over,” John replied. “I’m leaving.”

At this point, Paul recalled, “Everyone blanched except John, who coloured a little, and said, ‘It’s rather exciting. It’s like I remember telling Cynthia I wanted a divorce.’ ”

Afterwards, Mal and Paul returned to McCartney’s home, where they retreated to the garden, still trying to process what had transpired. Paul remained hopeful that John might change his mind, that the Beatles would continue unabated. But Mal knew better. As with George, Mal had reasoned that “all of them had left the group at one time or another, starting with Ringo’’. But when “John came into the office and said, ‘The marriage is over! I want a divorce,’ that was the final thing. That’s what really got to Paul, you know, because I took Paul home and I ended up in the garden crying my eyes out.”

That night with Lennon and Phil Spector in 1973, when happiness was not a warm gun

Mal took great pleasure in spending long hours in John’s company, enjoying the Beatle’s undivided attention, as opposed to sharing him with Paul, George and Ringo. “It was fascinating,” said Mal, who by this point was living in LA and writing his own songs, “because John was talking to me like I was a songwriter, and that was incredible. For the first time, John and I really communicated, whereas, when it was the four of them, John was always the hardest to talk to. I always thought that when John stopped insulting me, we had fallen out as friends.” But, he added, referring to John’s teasing, “The more he likes you, the more he takes the mickey out of you.”

Yet, as Mal soon discovered, working with John during this period would prove to be a chore — incomparable, in fact, to their touring years together, when the Beatles were often confined to the relative safety of a hotel suite. When he was in LA, John could often be found at the Sunset Strip’s Rainbow Bar and Grill, which had emerged as his de facto headquarters [during a period of heavy drinking which Lennon ironically referred to as the Lost Weekend but actually lasted 18 months.] With musicians like John, Harry (Nilsson), Ringo, Keith Moon, Alice Cooper and Micky Dolenz adopting the Rainbow as their regular watering hole, they had taken to calling themselves the Hollywood Vampires, a nickname that evoked the night hours they spent guzzling hooch in the bar’s loft space.

On one of his most harrowing evenings in Los Angeles, Mal had accompanied John and Phil Spector to the Rainbow. At one point, John walked Phil to his car, assuring Mal that he would return shortly. “About a half hour goes by, and I start worrying and go outside looking for John — no sign,” Mal later wrote. “I’d lost track of a Beatle for a day. What had happened, I found out the following evening, was that when he’d seen Phil off, a few hippie fans of his took him in tow, and John, who had just moved into a flat, couldn’t remember the address, nor his or my phone numbers. [John] eventually turn[ed] up, but not before I’d had a few irate words from Yoko, who phoned me from New York shouting, ‘I thought you were John’s bodyguard — why don’t you guard his body?’ ”

At a loss for words, Mal admitted that “I never really thought of myself as a bodyguard to anybody, but I suppose over the years that had been part of the gig. Anyway, they were all grown up, with very strong minds of their own as to what they wanted to do, and I certainly didn’t expect them to hold themselves accountable to me.”

That December, as work on Back to Mono proceeded, John and Phil shifted their project to the Record Plant West. The change of recording studios had everything to do with John’s and Phil’s antics having gotten them evicted from their previous studio, A&M. At one point, Nilsson and Moon, in a drunken stupor, had urinated onto the recording console, leaving the electronics in an ungodly mess.

Things began innocently enough after John and Phil completed their December 11 session at the Record Plant West, where they took a pass at Chuck Berry’s You Can’t Catch Me. As Mal looked on, the two men, drunk to the gills, were horsing around the Las Vegas Room. In a nod to the early days of Beatlemania when the Beatles would climb on Mal when they heard they were at the top of the charts, John decided to hop onto Mal’s back for a piggyback ride. Unfortunately, Phil opted to get in on the act, too. Mal’s physical dexterity in late 1973 was a far cry from that of the early 1960s, and he had difficulty sustaining the weight of two men atop his aching back. As always, Mal observed, “Phil goes a little too far,” and in the ensuing ruckus, “he karate-chopped me on the nose, my spectacles went flying, and I got tears in my eyes I can tell you. I turned around with a real temper and told Phil, ‘Don’t ever lay another finger on me, man.’ ”

And that’s when Phil, “maybe to re-establish himself in his own eyes”, Mal thought, pulled out a handgun. To the roadie’s surprise, the producer “fired it off under our noses, deafening us both, the bullet ricocheting around the room and landing between my feet”.

John was understandably incensed, exclaiming to Phil, “If you’re gonna kill me, kill me, but don’t take away my hearing — it’s me living!”

Until that moment, Mal and John had believed that Spector’s handgun was a toy. At one point earlier in the evening, Phil had cocked the trigger and aimed the weapon at John’s head. As a result of the incident in the Las Vegas Room, “John’s fear of guns generally was doubled.” For his part, Mal vowed to stay clear of Phil. He would attend the recording sessions in deference to John, but that was it.

In nearly the same instant that Mal decided to banish Phil from his world forever, he and John were hustled off to [co-founder of the Record Plant] Gary Kellgren’s house for a lavish going-away party in honour of Mal, who was preparing to make his return to Sunbury. For the occasion, Phil had arranged for Mal to receive “a beautiful large cake, which must have measured four feet by three feet, so nicely decorated with a large bottle of Napoleon brandy, [and] a lot of comic figures like Superman and Batman,” Mal wrote. The sumptuous dessert was inscribed, “To Mal, my pal, love, Philip.”

As it turned out, the madcap producer’s greatest gift to Mal that night came in the form of his absence. “Phil, to show the most understanding side of his nature, did not come to the party,” said Mal. “He knew if he had, he’d be outrageous and spoil it for me. But he set it up and didn’t come — a true mark of affection from a friend.”

The party came to a sudden close, though, when John, having grown blind drunk, planted a telephone into the sticky remains of the cake.

Meet the Beatles: four days in Mal’s life with the moptops

Paul (1962) In July 1962, Mal and his family attended the celebration of the “Wavertree Mystery”, an annual event held to commemorate the anonymous donation of a local playground back in 1895. Mal later recalled that, “Lil and I were proudly pushing Gary in his pram when she turned to me and said, ‘There’s a weird guy over there — keeps staring at us. Now he looks like a real Cavernite to me.’ On turning, I was to see Paul standing there, unshaven, with a denim jacket thrown over his shoulder and chewing on a toffee apple.” After engaging in the niceties of introducing his wife to the scruffy musician, Mal took Paul for a jaunt. “We spent the rest of the day together,” Mal wrote, “Paul and I daring each other to go on things like the parachute drop and other displays that took nerve, neither of us accepting the challenge.” At one point, they stopped in front of an automobile exhibition. Paul announced to Mal that “one of these days I’m going to own one of those cars’’, pointing to one very humble saloon-type car.

George (1962) After shows at the Cavern, Mal would introduce his wife Lily to the rest of the band. “On one occasion,” Mal recalled, “Lil and I bought the fish and chips for the group and ourselves, as they could only muster enough money between them to pay for the teas.” Although she had her misgivings about Mal’s involvement in their lives, she enjoyed getting to know the bandmates. “After gigs,” she later recalled, “George would come back to our house for bacon and eggs. He sometimes came back before Mal to keep me company. I’d be washing baby clothes and nappies or ironing. I liked him the best.” Lily fondly remembered the time she pushed the bangs from Harrison’s face, saying, “Let’s see what it looks like with your hair back. I like that better.” But George wasn’t having it. He combed his hair forward, telling her, “That’s the way I have to wear it; it’s the Beatle cut.”

Ringo (1965) Driving up the M1, Mal and Ringo stopped at a roadside café for lunch. “We were sitting at the counter,” Mal recalled, “and the chap next to me had obviously been trying to make up his mind whether it really was Ringo with me. Suddenly, he turned to me and said, ‘I don’t care if it is him or not.’ Ringo nearly choked with laughter as I teased the fellow, saying, ‘No, it’s not him. But it gets terribly embarrassing taking him anywhere because everybody mistakes him for Ringo!’”

John (1964) John held no illusions about the Beatles’ behaviour, later admitting that, “We were bastards. You can’t be anything else in such a pressurised situation, and we took it out on Neil and Mal. They took a lot of shit from us because we were in such a shitty position. It was hard work and somebody had to take it. Those things are left out, about what bastards we were. F***ing big bastards, that’s what the Beatles were. You have to be a bastard to make it, and that’s a fact. And the Beatles were the biggest bastards on earth. We were the Caesars. Who’s going to knock us when there’s a million pounds to be made, all the handouts, the bribery, the police, and the hype?”

During a flight to Massachusetts for the September 12 show at the Boston Garden, Mal’s long-standing feelings of intimidation around John came to a head. Sitting at the rear of the plane, he broke down in tears, telling a reporter that “John got kind of cross with me — just said I should go f*** off. No reason, ya know. But I love the man. John is a powerful force. Sometimes he’s rough, if you know what I mean, man. But there’s no greater person that I know.” In many ways, it was as if Mal’s lack of self-confidence, a key aspect of his persona for the balance of his life, had returned with a vengeance. Later John approached Mal and embraced him.

Extracted from Living the Beatles Legend by Kenneth Womack (Mudlark £25), published on November 14.

(source)

[jurakan]

I got a weird prompting to ask for a fun fact about someone who came up with a whole system of writing and then just disappeared. Odd, I know.

Well, you came to the right place, friendo! Today You Learned about Sequoyah.

[I had hoped to do this around Thanksgiving, or for Indigenous Peoples Month, but no one asked for it then so better late than never!]

Okay, maybe you have heard of the man. But if not, here ya go: Sequoyah was a Cherokee man born in Tennessee around the year 1770. When he grew up, his day job was actually being a silversmith, trading with trappers and merchants that came through Cherokee territory. He was pretty darn good at it too, and signed off on all of his work.

Something he noticed, though, was that the Europeans who went through had a written language, and that it was helpful for recording information and talking to people far away. That’s handy, Sequoyah thought. We should have our own written language. Because at that point, Cherokee didn’t have a written language. So, apparently, this man decided to just… make one up.

I say “make one up” as if he came up with it on the spot without thought. No, that’s not what happened. In 1809, Sequoyah began to study English, Greek, and Hebrew, and developed a written system for the Cherokee language. Each symbol represents a syllable, rather than a letter like in the English writing system, leading to a total of over 80 symbols for the alphabet.

Everyone thought he was crazy, but I want to be clear: he did it. This man, a silversmith by trade, created a written language system that within twenty years of its creation became the official written language of the Cherokee Nation. 

That’s insane, guys! Where is this guy’s biopic? If you lived in a place with heavy Cherokee history, like the Carolinas, chances are you’ve heard of him–the NC Museum has a small exhibit on him in their section on Cherokee history, and we covered him in school in an article/essay/non-fiction story (I don’t know what we call those things) called “Sequoyah and the Riddle of the Talking Leaves”, but it’s nuts to me that he’s not a more famous figure in American history, considering this.

Sequoyah actually taught the language to his daughter Ayokeh first, so that he could prove that it worked and made sense. Then he spent a ton of time traveling through Cherokee territory to get people to see its usefulness and learn it. Apparently, it worked.

So the US government thought this was awesome and gave Sequoyah a mansion to live in, right? [/sarcasm] No, you can probably guess from the timeline what happened. He went to Washington D.C. to protest and argue with other Native American leaders against the Indian Removal laws the government was enacting, but wasn’t successful, leading to the Trail of Tears. His interactions with other nations led him to decide to try to create another system of writing for all indigenous Americans to use. I don’t think it ever got completed, but someone with more knowledge on the subject can probably tell you more.

He died in Mexico, on an expedition based on the rumor that some Cherokee had gone there–the reunification of the Cherokee people was a big deal to him, after all.

We think he died there, anyway.

See, we don’t actually know where his body is. Officially, he died in 1845 of a lung infection; we don’t know where his body is. The Cherokee funded an expedition to find his grave in the 20th century, but while they found a grave in Coahuila, Mexico, they aren’t sure if it’s his. In 2011, a newspaper argued that actually he wasn’t buried, his skeleton was found in 1903 in a cave in Oklahoma. 

I found this out by seeing that he’s listed on Wikipedia’s “List of People Who Disappeared” (which I do not recommend reading if you are sitting alone in a house at night).

Well, he’s still an important national figure. He’s got some recognition–his statue is in the US Capitol, he’s got a sculpture in front of the Cherokee Museum in North Carolina, and! Along with several figures from world cultures credited with inventing/teaching writing, he’s on the doors of the John Adams Building of the Library of Congress.

YMMV may vary on whether or not it’s good that he’s on there with a bunch of mythological figures.

[mitsuki91]

Okay, just so you all know, daddy!Coryo live now in my mind permanently, and of course the only reasonable thing to do is set him free by writing something...

I will share one little wip I wrote in my tiny lunch break:

Coriolanus dropped another piece of meat with the classic clang and watched the hybrid devour it. 1.57 seconds. A new record.

"Tell me," replied the professor, his tone neutral to mask his irritation, "What should I do?"

He heard Dr Gaul's clang.

"I have decided that your little songbird will sing at the opening ceremony of the next Games. You remember, don't you? Lucy Gray Baird."

Coriolanus' heart lost a beat.

Determined not to show any emotion, he slammed his tongs back into the funnel. Clang.

She won't find her, he was thinking, frantic, trying not to panic.

She won't find her, and so…

"The girl is already on her way, with all her family," something detached itself inside him, like a piece of floating soul as he struggled to carry on his mechanical gestures. Another piece of flesh. Another clang. The stopwatch. 2.17 seconds. "I thought, as her former Mentor, you were the right person to host the Coveys... And convince your little Lucy Gray to play and sing for us in early July." 

She found her.

His heart was beating furiously in his chest. Clang. 2.54 seconds.

She found her.

When did she return?

"... With a smile on her face, possibly. Accompanied by her family so that the world can see how much a Victor is able to enjoy life, after being pardoned from Panem” 

She's bringing her to me.

Lucy Gray... To his house? With the Coveys? Little Maude Ivory... CC... Tam Amber? Barb Azure?

Oh god.

If she was back... What had she told the others?!

Would they hate him, all of them?

And he was supposed to convince her to sing for Panem? With a smile on her face?

Another clang. His mind raced in circles, and Coriolanus had to force himself to maintain a neutral expression, to carry out his task, to feign indifference...

Could this have been a second chance?

"Ah, there's one small detail," Dr Gaul continued, indifferent to his inner screams, "I don't think it will be a problem for you, however it's better that the public doesn't know... You see, as a matter of reputation."

"What?" asked Coriolanus, his tone always neutral.

Clang. That ugly rat face again. 1.97 seconds.

"Your songbird had a baby," replied Dr Gaul, tone as always sing-songy. Coriolanus stopped with the tongs in midair, rigid. Had he understood correctly?! “It's not good for Capitol City to be aware of the... Poor composure of the people of the Districts. Beasts that mate without even waiting until they come of age…”

Coriolanus felt himself rocking and had to appeal to every last ounce of self-control to remain upright and still. Not to be seen. Not to collapse.

Lucy Gray, with a child?

Lucy Gray... Lucy Gray with...?

"... Are you all right, Mr Snow?"

Coriolanus widened his smile and beat the tongs into the funnel with a loud clang. He took the time. 2.80 seconds.

"Well, I'll be getting baby items," he replied, posed and courteous and light as ever.

Inside, he was filled with fury.

Who dared?!

Let me know if you are curious 😂😂

[somefanficrecomendations]

December Monthly Roundup

Here's December's fic round up!

DC/BATMAN

Worlds Saddest Breakfast Club by motleyfam   (gen)7k, Hurt/Comfort, Jason Todd-Centric Following a couple of Very Bad Weeks™ (which may or may not have involved being kidnapped and mildly tortured), Jason decides the best way to cheer himself up is to break into the Manor for a 3 a.m. snack. Turns out he isn’t the only one awake.

Batstream by RandomReader13 (gen), 6k, Bats on social media, Humor   “I want it on record that I think this is a terrible idea and I’m only doing this to mitigate the damage." AKA Red Robin decides it's a great idea to livestream patrol while Batman's off-world. It goes about as well as you'd expect.

cards on the table by wesslan (gen) 67k, WIP, Fortune Teller AU, Tim Drake-Centric  Tim's parents faked their deaths and fled the country years ago, but neglected to take him with them. He spent some time on the streets, and now at 16, he makes a living as a fortune teller, stalking and hustling the shit out of Gotham's elite by telling them eerily accurate fortunes based on the information he gathers about them.  His life is peculiar but he wouldn't change a thing. When he gets booked for the big Wayne Halloween party, however, he finds himself getting all tangled up with the Waynes, and the more fortunes he tells, the tighter the snare becomes.  or: Tim just wanted to scam Gotham's elite, not end up on the Batfamily's watchlist. But it seems they just won't leave him alone..

(a not so) lonesome town by wesslan   (gen), 10k, 2-part series, Sentient Gotham, Jazz music. Two works in which Gotham City is sentient and adopts enough kids to rival Batman himself (Batman is one of them).

Banshee in a Well by liverobinreaction (bugbee) (gen), 43k, Meta Tim, Resurrection Powers   Tim is five years old when he drowns in his parents' pool. He dies quietly, waiting for parents who love him, but will never be there, to realise that something is wrong. They never show up, and he sinks into oblivion.  When he wakes up and claws his way out of the water, the sun has set, and the lights of his house are on. He is cold and wet and his lungs burn.  But most of all, Tim is alone.  (If you die and no-one is there to see it, were you ever alive in the first place?)

HUNGER GAMES

right here in the old therebefore by californianNostalgia (Katniss/Peeta) 14k, Canon Divergence, Ghosts There’s a ghost at the Hanging Tree. Katniss sees him first when she’s six, her hair in braids, the song about the growing gallows fresh in her mind. This changes nothing. This changes some things. (In which Lucy Gray killed Coriolanus at the lake.)

How Rue Became the Mockingjay by aimmyarrowshigh (multi) 5k, Different 74th Victors AU Katniss Everdeen and the girl from Eleven are ruining their best-laid plans – the Capitol’s and the Rebels’. So Caesar, they say. Announce the change. An alternate chronology for The Hunger Games.

CROSSOVERS

Annabeth and the Nine Step Career Plan by feeling_the_aster_9145 (Annabeth/Percy), 76k, PJO x DCU, Annabeth gets Lex Luthor arrested, BAMF Annabeth. Annabeth Chase does not accept limitations. Everyone knows that. If she wants something, no matter how impossible, she will find a way to make it happen. Though, perhaps she will allow Bruce Wayne and his ridiculous paranoia-induced company restrictions a small portion of the credit. Actually… now that she thinks about it, the man may have had a point in his worries. Wayne Technologies does not accept college interns. Annabeth always has a plan B.

A Lesson in Superiority by Nation-Ustria (gen), 96k, WIP, Batfam x Harry Potter, Damian Wayne is Harry Potter, Wizarding Politics “The good news is, he’s not cursed,” Constantine says. “And the bad news?” Dick asks sharply. Constantine squints. “I wouldn’t call it bad news so much as, er, news.” He turns to Damian with something like a grimace. “You’re a wizard, kid.” “...I’m a what?”

[f0rlorn]

motivation → coral

coral!tbosas x reader

notes → in which coral always finds a way to leave you wanting more.

warnings → not edited & uploaded via iphone

     you had watched from afar as your brother, festus creed, tried interacting with his tribute. the scene was laughable, both parties having no desire to be there. but alas, festus was a sycophant who wanted to score points with dr. gaul, whereas coral was reaped and taken to the capitol against her will. you could almost feel him roll his eyes in surrender despite facing the other way and decided that this was your time to try and help him. besides, you would need the practice. if the mentor gig was successful, you would likely get chosen to be one next year, nepotism and all.

     “look, i don’t want to be here any more than you do, so why don’t you just take the food-“ his voice gradually got more forceful, growing louder before you decided to intervene.

     “may i?” you popped up next to festus, causing him to almost jump out of his skin. coral laughed and you turned to face her. “hi there, coral. y/n creed, his little sister. the superior sibling, might i add.” you joked, sticking your hand out to her, not quite through the bars of the enclosure, but close enough for her to accept. she eyed you up and down, her arms crossed, but nevertheless she took your hand, giving it a firm shake. her hand was dirt ridden and covered in callouses, and the feeling of her hand engulfing yours send a jolt through your body. “i really think you should eat. going into the arena without food isn’t the best idea. and look, i know festus is incredibly annoying-“

      “hey!” festus objected, crossing his arms. you side eyed him, then continued.

     “but you should listen to him. he knows what he’s doing, for the most part, at least. we’re here to help you win, coral. and, if i may, the odds might just be in your favor here. if we didn’t think you could win, we wouldn’t be here trying to coerce you into taking our food.” while it was somewhat a stretch, she seemed convinced.

     “well what’d you bring me, sweet thing?” you couldn’t contain the expression of delightful shock that spread throughout your face as you heard her speak for the first time, as well as use a rather flirtatious nickname. you stuttered for a moment but quickly shook out of it as you heard her amused chuckle.

     “right, um- let’s see here…” you began. festus swung the bag over his shoulder, unzipping it and allowing coral to look over the items once more. he was extremely agitated that coral would listen to you but refused to give him the time of day. festus, being the bum that he was, packed rather lightly. the food he made was distasteful, including a not-so-grilled cheese, an old banana, and the leftover omelette the academy had served for breakfast. “jeez… alright, festus. a little hard to work with.” he rolled his eyes once again. “well, um. sorry about that, coral. don’t worry, i’ll make sure you get something digestible tomorrow.” at this point, your dear brother was glaring daggers at you.

     by the time you left the zoo, your brother in tow, you had left a lasting impression on coral. she was amused by your wit and entranced by your good looks, as well as your charm.

     the next time you interacted with coral was the day after arachne’s funeral. festus had told you all about how the interview went with coral, how he barely filled out half of the page because she refused to talk to him. the extent of his knowledge about coral was her name, her age, and her job. you decided to check up on your girl again, giving her a visit at the zoo.

     “your brother’s an idiot, y’know.” she remarked, letting you know how the interview went.

     “i can’t believe you just realized that!” you laughed in agreement with her.

     “so what inspired you to pay me a visit, princess?” coral queried, leaning against the bars that separated the two of you.

     “grilled grouper sandwiches. thought the fish might remind you of home. handmade!” you replied, as if you were advertising the food to her. she nodded, smiling.

     “well thank you for thinking of me, sweetheart.” you smiled back, handing her the food. she accepted, of course, but not without making sure she grazed your hand first. immediately, your breath hitched. gosh, you were putty in the hands of a district girl. your family would freak if they even saw you this close to her. but you couldn’t get her out of your head. you looked up at her, and she was staring down at you, completely unashamed about her method of flirtation. she held a rather smug look on her face regarding the effect her touch had on you. 

     “you holding up okay in here?” you asked her, moving the focus away from your embarrassing reaction.

     “better than ever.” she replied, sarcastically joyful. mentally, you pinched yourself for the dumb question. she was locked in a cage about to fight for her life, of course she wasn’t okay. but coral took the question lightly, bidding you goodnight as she strode away calmly.

     it was now the last time you would see coral before the games. you had snuck into the zoo late at night, hoping to see her before she was taken away to the arena. “night before the games… how’re you feeling?” you fidgeted anxiously with the hem of your skirt as you posed the question.

     “confident.” was her short, vague reply. 

     “that much?” your face contorted in  concern at her answer. she reached her hand through the bars, grabbing yours and holding it firmly. it was the first time that contact between the two of you lasted more than a few seconds.

     “don’t psych me out, princess. you were the one who said you thought i could win anyway.” coral laughed. “but yea, i got this in the bag. don’t you worry your pretty little head about me, darling. in a few days, you’re all mine, i’ll make sure of it.” coral left you with a wink, squeezing your hand before promptly walking away to her claimed rock, mizzen already dozing off on top of it. you sighed, leaving the zoo while the girl consumed your thoughts. she always had you on edge, leaving wanting more. and hopefully, you’d get more.

[pocketramblr]

Au where quirks exist ever since the beginning of humanity but thought the last 200 years they started becoming rarer for no explainable reason

"for no explainable reason"? Not "because someone born two hundred years ago started eating them all"? Well, both can be true I suppose

1- humans have always had quirks so just go ahead and disabuse yourself of the idea that world history looks anything like ours now. Any boundaries humans have drawn between themselves or their spaces are totally different. Anyway, our story is set on the island nation of Akitsuba, which has begun to receive reports of children who are born without quirks- it seems impossible, but apparently the child born in Canton Province to two glowing parents but had no light himself was not the result of an affair. He is genetically both his parents child - just, without any unique plus alpha factor at all.

2- when the news breaks, Setsuji looks over at his twin brother. The two stay in a group home, and on the record, they have a spike quirk, just like their mother did before she died at their birth. In truth, Setsuji can take others quirks. He assumes he took his brother's in infancy, which why the boy can't use them, but now he wonders if his brother was in fact simply born without. He doesn't say anything, but his brother does- whispering it at night, apologizing for assuming his brother took it all this years ago and refused to even try to return it, but there's simply nothing to return, is there?

3- more people are born quirkless over time, and more people lose their quirk to AfO over time. Ujiko theorizes that quirks would get too strong, so both quirklessness and AfO are evolutions to prevent plus alpha self destruction. That is, sadly, a generous view- quirklessness is largely viewed as a horrible strange disability, and suddenly quirks become more important. Few people before had jobs that specifically used their quirks, but now no one wants to be mistaken for not having one. Many people campaign to treat and 'fix' quirklessness, trying to force activate one, study and prevent it, etc. Just go ahead and assume all the terrible things that can happen with this mindset, it all happened.

4- by the time of canon, however, quirklessness has been around for two hundred years, and it isn't going away- clearly the opposite. about half the population of the world has no quirk, and the number's hanging around 45% in Akitsuba when our main character, Akatani Mikumo is born. He's quirkless, and lives in the capitol of Higakyou, as schools there are required by law now to no longer require certain or any quirks. It's an election year, so his first semester of high school all anyone can do is talk about the candidates- especially Yagi Toshinori, a bit of a symbol for quirkless politicians and one people thought would run years ago. Mikumo, who helped Yagi carry groceries home one day and didn't recognize him outside of the bright suit, camera lights, and makeup, makes friends with a few kids at school. (Ochako, and the twins Tokoyami Fumikage and Kuroei- while the latter has a quirk, the former does not).

5- Then one day, Yagi is kidnapped, vanishing on live tv through a smokey warp. Mikumo doesn't know what to think about that, until he runs into the man on his way home from school- clearly in bad shape, with strange dark eyes that glow with some quirk he shouldn't have. Mikumo helps Yagi hide, and asks what happens, and how he can help. (AfO decided to end Yagi's use as a symbol by forcing a quirk on him and controlling him, but one of his brother's successors managed to break Yagi out first and give him his brother's quirk, allowing him to fight against AfO's quirk and withstand them safely. As for what Mikumo can do to help... he's done far more than he should already, a kind boy, but that answer isn't going to be good enough for him- he's determined to do more anyway.)

[littleeyesofpallas]

Oh hey so here's a thing that we never really got proper follow up on, and in fact if anything some late additions to canon just kind of... not quite "contradict" the implicit world building but kind of just exist without addressing the existing hooks?(i hope that makes sense) I'm talking around the subject... I mean the dual zanpakutou and what that actually seems to say about their wielders and how Ichigo absolutely does not fulfill that same criteria with his bullshit final zanpakutou, either played straight or as a subversion.

I have sort of talked about the zanpakutou names themselves but I didn't really stray into the territory of character analysis too much. Kyroraku and Ukitake both have implicit dual personas that are reflected in their swords, at least at first. And Ichigo pretty distinctly doesn't, not in the same way at least, although there is sort of a caveat to that, but I'm already getting ahead of myself...

I'll start with Kyouraku since his is probably the least consequential, and the most overtly addressed... On the one hand Katen[花天] probably comes from the more specific Chinese phrase Huā tiānnǚ[花天女], I specify because it has much more concrete artistic associations than [花天] does, either in Chinese or Japanese, and is a minor figure of Chinese celestial bureaucracy often depicted as a beautiful young woman flying thru the heavens scattering flower petals from a bouquet or basket of flowers. The garden she tends is comprised of all the most beautiful and exotic flowers, posses magical qualities such that the fruits of her garden can grant immorality or magical powers, and the petals she scatters all over the world bring happiness and good fortune.

Clearly her evocation here is an allusion to Kyoruaku's outward demeanor as a kind of pampered, decedent lover of good drink, music/poetry, and women. There are a few things in his name that all point to this as well, beyond just his visual design: Kyoraku[京楽] reading as "(Imperial)Capitol + Music/pleasure/comfort" and Shunsui[春水] as "Spring(the season) + Water," the associations with spring somewhat implicitly involving cherry blossoms, making the phrase sort of analogous to "rose water" or "sweet water."

And then Kyoukotsu[狂骨] is a yokai that takes the form of a skeletal old man that haunts the bucket of an abandoned well. It's got some weird uncertain regional etymologies that sort of suggest it could be any of a number of euphemisms, but I'm not certain which if any are relevant to this. There is one i stumbled into that, given the casual nature of all this, i did not think to record like a citation as i didnt think it'd be so hard to track down again... that said it was used as a kind of slang towards a crazy person or a raucous drunk. I don't want to lean too heavily on that when I can't corroborate it, but it did feel like it made a lot of sense: you drink(from a well) something you shouldn't(i.e. cursed) and it makes you violent and/or crazy.

And more over, their release call is,

Hanakaze midarete Kashin naki, Tenpuu midarete Tenma warau

[花風紊れて花神啼き, 天風紊れて天魔嗤う]

"FlowerWind in disarray FlowerSpirit(s) cry, HeavenWind in disarray Tenma* laughs/ridicules."

There is a distinct bit of poeticism here with Hana... ka[花... 花...] referring to "flowers," Ten... Ten[天... 天...] referring to "heaven," midarete[紊れて... 紊れて...] referring to things "in disarray," and kaze... fuu[...風, ...風] referring to "wind." And notably while there are obvious thematic links back to Katen, there's not actually much reference to Kyokotsu, apart from vague tonal implications. Still, the message seems very clear: The pleasant scent of flowers and aesthetic of petals on the wind are disrupted, flower spirits/god(s) cry/wail in pain or otherwise distress. And at the same time, in the same way, a divine wind/winds of heaven, something that is implicitly a blessing or relief, a kind of god send, is disrupted and the evil spirit Mara laughs or jeers. A good thing is spoiled and divine forces make noises of distress and malice.

This just reinforces the names' dualistic themes that suggest there is a dark side to Kyoraku's penchant for unrestrained revelry. While that could be taken a number of ways, the most surface level one would seem to suggest that for all the boisterous drinking and partying he does, he in fact has a violent abusive drunken side to him as well, past some certain point.

Mara btw is a sort of "demon" in buddhism with a lot of associated themes, not the least of which being seduction, and the derailing of one's path towards enlightenment --in Japanese in particular his name is associated with sexual temptation and masturbation, and yeah he's the penis chariot summon in SMT. He is very specifically the giant demon featured in classical art of the samsara --the cosmological wheel of reincarnation within which all living things exist. So when Mara laughs, it's not just a matter of generic evil, it's the victory of base material temptation over enlightenment. By all rights this makes it sound like Kyoraku's shikai is a matter of trading in his easygoing demeanor for a more violent and darker side.

But as we know that isn't quite how things panned out... Rather, the reveal of that very change in tone just got sorta kicked down the road a bit and became a part of his bankai rather than his shikai. But the implicit themes of the zanpakutou's name, and the zanpakutout themselves, suggests that Kyoraku has two swords because he has two truths, two inner selves rather than one: the one that is personified by heavenly flowers, and the one personified by malice and drink.

And I guess just to clarify, I find it really weird that Kubo went and canonized Masashi Kudo's zanpakutou filler arc designs that way he did, and I still sort of regard them and even their inclusion in the manga proper to be kind of non-canon? I know that's a weird bold arbitrary claim, but even as he used the designs they don't feel like they contribute at all to their own theme or shtick. Like, they were clearly designed with no insight to the shikai's actual powers, the designs are nonsensical (the swords printed on her kimono? european oujo drills on a japanese design? the frills on a kimono? the nonsense exposed midriff on kyoukotsu? it's just a mess) they aren't even named accordingly, you'd think the light tone of Katen would lend itself to the shikai's children's game theme and thus the diminutive one of the pair, and Kyoukotsu the darker themes and thus the noh and bunraku theatre thus the older of the two, splitting them between children's play and adult play. But no.

Anyway... that just being part of the set up for the fact that...

Ukitake's got a whole daoist yin-yang thing going on. His theming is a little less obvious at a glance, but pretty distinct in the broader context of things, and eventually ironically nailed down a little more firmly by Kudo's still not especially canon design work for the anime filler: The courtly heian robes the kids are put in are part of the iconic onmyoji image of daoist mystics who served the imperial court as advisors in spite of their non samurai/nobility status. The yin and yang motif is alluded to in the "twin fish" aspect of Sougyo no Kotowari[双魚理]: "Law of Pair(ed) Fish" which is itself later alluded to in the Hell Jaws Wailing/Christening oneshot. Unlike Katen Kyokotsu, there aren't two distinct facets to the sword name, and unlike Kyoraku's katana and wakizashi set, Ukitake has a single sealed katana that splits into two for shikai, all suggesting that the nature of the two fish is that they are a singular unit rather than distinct facets. This makes sense of course because the nature of yin and yang as positive and negative elements is that they are in constant struggle but balanced, and cannot exist without one another.

But the nature of the zanpakutou, again, suggests that Ukitake's soul exists as both sides of that balance, that he is is innately capable of just as much "evil" as he is good. And this underlying tone of something sinister beneath his kindly demeanor is something Kubo sort of tries to paly with but never really fully pulls the trigger on. This theme is where the Fullbringer arc's underutilized bit where Ukitake has been using the substitute badge as a means of surveillance, and where Ukitake is implicitly the one who stripped Ginjo of his powers in the first place, having also monitored him during his tenure as substitute. It implies that, like Kyoraku's two sides to his drink and revelry, Ukitake's inner truth about being an agent of cosmic balance comes in a dark and a light form.

So then there's this thing about Ichigo's stupid new zangetsu(s) where he both has two swords now like Kyoraku and Ukitake, but also doesn't because we get the janky sort of excuse that "oh they're not really two different swords one's just a sheath and their true form is one sword."

And to be fair, while I find the explicit use of that line to try and handwave... i don't know what exactly, but it definitely felt like Kubo thought he was patching up some kind of plothole when he brought it up... we technically already knew that was the case leading up to the first time he addressed it with the final getsuga thing.

In the first inner world fight, the hollow was just a part of Zangetsu that he was able to sort of produce and later reabsorb, and implicitly the opposite was true when the hollow appeared alone during the Visored training: they exist as two sides of the same coin, and can just kind of flip flop control as needed. This made sense as an expression of Ichigo's misguided struggle to deny and rid himself of his hollow --he didn't have two spirits he had one, which again we already knew, but it needed to be confirmed and addressed to cap off Ichgio's arc of self discovery.

Then Kubo tried to sort of rehash this dynamic with the whole the hollow is the sword, and Zangetsu is actually Yhwach's quincy blood just holding the hollow/shinigami side back, but it makes distinctly less sense because when Nimaiya forges the new sword(s) the two spirits show up as separate entities, one per sword. Plus the stupid retconned excuse that, oh no they weren't ever actually the same thing, the whole absorbing thing was just Yhwach actively suppressing the shinigami side. So then what does this really say about Ichigo's nature? Does he have a dualistic nature or doesn't he? Are they two facets of his inner truth, or are/were they always the same singular truth and realizing that was the entire key to self actualization and his true power?

At face value the new explanation divides his identity into shinigami and quincy, despite him having no actual functioning identity as a quincy factionally or culturally, and on a personal level he never actually does anything to reconcile this identity crisis. I know it's a long way around to just point out that it fumbles the theming a lot here, when that was fairly evident even without the context, but I guess I just wanted to bolster that. In the first place i think everyone reading at the time understood it to feel very inauthentic as a twist? like most of the developments of the late arc. Just another case of Kubo phishing around fandom chatter for stupid ideas he could play into to siphon ratings out of.

But again the bottom line being that we had precedent for Ichigo to have two swords in one of two ways: Ukitake's style of having a single identity that encompasses both the best and worst of his inner truth, or Kyoraku's suggested style in which his two facets exist in distinct and separate entities but ultimately both reflect him as truths about his nature. But Ichgio doesn't really do that. His original balance of shinigami and hollow seemed to be a satisfactory solution in the style of Ukitake's, and if he'd just had one shinigami/hollow sword and one quincy sword, that might have been acceptable in Kyouraku's style, but the flipflopping between the two by making the final form just a big sword inside a different big sword where one of the big swords is a sword, but the other sword is just a sheath to hold the first sword(???) is just this bizarre gibberish of themes and symbols.

(I've had this thing sitting in drafts for so long i forgot abotu it. and I swear I had some kind of actual conclusion I was working toward across various rewrites but i don't remember what it was anymore... anyway it's taking up space in my drafts that could be better used, so out it goes..)

[harrisonstories]

The magazine this article came from is unknown, but it was written in Feb. 1964 by Nora Ephron.

Transcript:

The Youngest Beatle

"The other day at a Beatles press conference for fan magazines, a young lady raised her hand and said, 'Mr. Starr is known for his rings, Mr. McCartney obviously for his looks, and Mr. Lennon for his wife, and then there's Mr. Harrison. What about you, Mr. Harrison?'

George Harrison looked up from his chicken sandwich, batted what have come to be known as his 'adorable eyelashes,' and said, 'As long as I get an equal share of the money, I'm willing to stay anonymous.'

Beatle George has little to worry about. If he didn't have those adorable eyelashes, and a long unbroken unibrow curving across his upper face, it would be almost impossible to distinguish him from the other three mopheads. Beatle fans have no difficulty however; a random sampling of them at the Ed Sullivan Show the other night indicated that more Beatle fans were madly in love with George than with any other Beatle. 'He's just, well, he's, well, I can't explain it,' said one young admirer of George.

Those who know the group find it easy to describe the young man. 'George likes people to be very blunt,' says disc jockey Murray the K. 'He likes them to tell it like it is. No shilly-shallying. He's very definite.'

Harrison's sister, Mrs. Louise Caldwell, agreed. 'He's very direct,' she said. 'He's very much like our mother. Be it bad for her or good for her, she's always direct.

George's bluntness is refreshingly implicit in the few things he says in public. At one press conference, the group was asked why their records had succeeded in the past few months in the U.S., when they had flopped so miserably a year earlier. 'The thing is,' George said, 'Capitol promoted the record.'

At 20, George is the youngest Beatle, and the youngest of four children. His father works for the transport company in Liverpool; his brothers are now tradesmen.

He attended a private school -- 'the best in Liverpool' -- the Liverpool Institute, where his record was spotty. 'George had a "devil-may-care" attitude towards school,' said one friend. 'He was bright, so he didn't apply himself.'

When he was 14, his mother gave him a $5 guitar for Christmas and that more or less finished any thought he might have had to become a scholar. He and Paul McCartney, who also attended the Institute, spent their free time improvising on the guitar and singing together. Occasionally, they would set off on long camping trips, hitchhiking over the countryside with knapsacks on their backs and guitars on their arms.

Midway through school, George dropped out to become an apprentice electrician. 'I had to stop trying to be an electrician because I kept blowing everything up.' he said once. In fact, he had to stop being an electrician when he became deeply involved with being a Beatle. He and Paul had met John Lennon, who attended school nearby, at a local coffee shop. The three began to play guitars together, and The Beatles began.

Why have The Beatles succeeded? 'We're different,' says George, 'and we came along when everyone was ready for a change.'

'In this business, I think you've got to broaden yourself, adapt yourself,' Harrison told the London Evening Standard's Maureen Cleave. 'If you're surrounded by a band of screaming girls, you adapt yourself to that. You don't think they're all lusting after you.'

'If we fizzle out -- well, we fizzle out. But it will all have been a lot of fun.'"