#pre-algebra notes

[er-cryptid]

Imaginary Number Values

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[smallpwbbles]

She didn’t get that sketch book back

Quick fic for my Biolizard shadow au taking place pre Ark incident, just some nice fluff between Maria and Shadow

Feel free to criticise the fuck outta this, haven’t written a fic since I was like 13, did feel nice to write this though, hopefully I can turn write a longer fic for the au like I said I wanted to do

Maria was beginning to get restless, it had been a long week full of tests, resting, recovering and just a general sense of stagnation. The days were beginning to phase into a repetitive cycle and while she could manage with it, she couldn’t say it wasn’t beginning to get boring.

Her studies were just finishing up, she had once again been bested by her least favourite subject, math. Maria was quite smart for her age, a symptom of being a Robotnik no doubt, however math had such a way with turning her brain to mush. She was sick enough as it was, she didn’t need the subject doing away with her mind too.

Her notebook and sticky notes were packed away in a cute little cubby adorably stuck with a tag with her name on it, next to hers was an empty cubby addressed with the name Shadow, it was unfortunate that with the monstrous hedgehogs seemingly unending growth spurts came the ability to not fit almost anywhere on the Ark, apart for his enclosure of course.

Maria put a hand to the unused cubby, she very much missed studying in the classroom with Shadow, but her grandfather did allow for studies to be taught with Shadow in the enclosure when they were both on best behaviour, the old man may be a stickler but was an absolute softie at heart.

Gerald was erasing the algebra on the blackboard with a content smile, Maria could see he was in quite a good mood today which was especially great as the week of tests wasn’t just unfortunate to her. As Shadow was due for many tests to check on the state of his growth, Gerald and his team spent many weeks trying to get it under control right after Shadow had begun to increase in size rapidly.

The scientists had all done their best but to an ailing Shadow, who had to be okay with needles and diagrams shoved in and around him, he was at best irate and at worst, down right hostile. One of the testing scientists was still recovering in the first aid section of the Ark after a particularly vexed Shadow struck out. He was “grounded” after such an incident, which doesn’t mean much when you’re 35 feet and can kill a person with minimal effort, but it meant Maria couldn’t see him at the moment.

That wasn’t gonna stop her from trying.

“Grandfather! Studies were absolutely wonderful today, I feel maths gets easier and easier each time you teach it to me” Maria lied. Her plan was to butter him up, get him in an even better mood, maybe then he would feel lenient enough to let her stay in the enclosure with Shadow.

“It makes me glad to hear that Maria my dear, maths has always been an essential subject matter in the world of education, why I’ve loved maths ever since I was a young tot, you know I solved my first problem when I was just 3 years old-“ Gerald kept on. Oh no, she got him rambling, maybe she could shoot her shot and just ask outright. The last time he rambled it put her right to sleep on her desk, it hurt his feelings but the second she started hearing percentages her brain shut it down.

“May I see Shadow today!?” She hadn’t meant to blurt it out so outright but she felt the ramble was about to edge towards fractions and decimals and she quite had enough of those today

Gerald’s animated ramblings stopped in an instant and he faced his granddaughter who was doing her best to charm him with her childish adorable appeal

He hummed and hawed for a moment before shaking his head “Now Maria I know you miss Shadow very much but he is in trouble at the moment”

A wave of defensiveness washed over Maria as she recounted Shadow was currently punished due to actions he did in a moment of stress and anger, she felt in the same position she would have struck out or at the very least gave that scientist a good old raspberry, she was still proud she taught Shadow that, Gerald didn’t need to know that though.

“Oh but Grandfather, it’s been more than a week, I’m sure Shadow has learned his lesson” Maria begged.

“He growled at one of our scientists who came for a check up this morning, one he particularly likes mind you” he retorted

“I mean it could be a bit of that teenage rebellion you’re always claiming me to have when I’m not happy to see you in the morning” She countered.

“I-“ Gerald stopped himself and put a finger to his lip, honestly he couldn’t dismiss that. As Shadow continued to grow he picked up more behaviours Gerald could attribute to the traditional development of adolescence. It still had him flabbergasted as he recalled Shadow sticking his tongue right at Gerald one time during studies.

“None the matter, I don’t want you getting hurt in there because of the irritation he’s at right now” Gerald commanded. Maria deflated, this definitely wasn’t going out the way she has planned.

“He would never! Shadow absolutely adores us, he wouldn’t hurt us” Maria argued, she trusted this 100%. Although around most people some could say Shadow could be careless, Maria and Gerald were of a select few that Shadow handled with the upmost care and caution. Maria could just about get away with doing anything around Shadow, if not for her sickness she would most definitely use the gigantic hedgehog as a playground.

At quiet times before lights were out, when allowed she would curl up in Shadows large claws, it amazed her how still and gentle he could be, she felt like a glass doll in his hands as she deducted he was so still in fear of jostling her. It saddened her that Shadow was at such a state he felt even the slightest movements would hurt her.

Gerald put a palm to his head, “I know he wouldn’t hurt you on purpose Maria, but Shadow can forget himself sometimes, need I remind you of Steven, who is in the infirmary because of Shadows actions?” He scolded. Maria didn’t have a retort for that, she could defend shadow as much as she liked but it didn’t change that he had indeed hurt someone.

She looked down to her dress skirt and gripped the fabric of it, she knew better than to act like a brat not getting their way but she was getting irate, one more plea, and if no results she would would back down, lest she get into an argument with her grandfather and end up in trouble herself.

“I’ve just felt absolutely restless. I understand he’s in trouble grandfather but he always behaves around me, I could even go in there and get him to apologise! He’s usually nicer after I give him a good talking to” Maria gripped her skirt harder, she was honest about getting him to apologise, she didn’t want him thinking what he had done to that scientist was okay.

Gerald studied her for a moment before letting out a defeated sign, the softie in him had won, he hated seeing Maria as desperate as she was, and she was not wrong. Maria’s presence seemed to greatly improve Shadows mood the most

“Fine, you can see him” Maria almost jumped up in excitement but steeled herself, it didn’t stop her from looking absolutely giddy “but you are not to rile him up in any way, and if I feel you are in danger you are to come out, understand” Gerald instructed.

Maria gave a silly salute, she couldn’t help it knowing her plan came around “loud and clear!”

——————————————————————

He was clearly pouting when she got to the viewing windows of Shadows enclosure, he was lying on his side and had his back to the large reinforced windows, so nobody could see his face. It was cute to Maria, he always did this getting in trouble.

He was also very still, she actually couldn’t tell if he was asleep or not in that position, a second later when he turned his head slightly to notice her presence confirmed he was indeed awake. Shadow had quite the ability to sense the people around him without anyone else knowing they were there. He glared at her before immediately curling in on himself, she had no idea how someone that big could make themselves look smaller but he was managing quite well.

She put her hands to the window, the glare he just gave her hadn’t put her off, he clearly wasn’t as happy to see her as she thought he would be but that was her gigantic, hedgehog, lizard buddy in need and she hadn’t almost got on her knees and begged to see him for nothing.

3 little taps to the glass, Maria did this just to give him a warning whenever she was coming in, in response Shadow seemed to curl further in on himself, he almost looked like a gigantic spiky ball.

Maria made a small trek down a compact set of Stairs to some steel doors that led into the enclosure, there was a code box right next to the doors that needed an input only Maria, Gerald and some trusted scientists knew. Quickly putting in 4 digits, her birthday as predictably done by her grandfather, Maria bounced in excitement as the doors painstakingly opened.

The chamber was quiet and smelled of lavender, Maria had recommended a calming smell might tide over Shadow to act nicer during testing, while it hadn’t, he still very much enjoyed the smell.

Maria encountered the big ball of black and red quills and scales, he was very much still pouting and didn’t seem to want to acknowledge her. She gave a couple pats to what she could assume was his tail but it was quite hard to tell as curled up as he was.

Shadow gave no response to indicate he felt the pats so she grabbed a few quills and gave a small tug, she didn’t want to tug hard as she’d definitely get cut if he bristled his quills in response, yet he still gave no reaction.

Oh he was really having quite the tantrum today. She put her hands to her hips and gave the giant wall of quills a tired look

“Shadow it’s me! Are you not happy to see me?” Maria yelled up at him.

If he was, he gave no reciprocation. It humbled her quite intensely as it was a first for Shadow to completely ignore her.

She looked down at her shoes and decided if he was gonna be the Debbie of downers she would use other means of entertainment. She pulled out her small sketch pad that conveniently fit in her skirt pockets. It was a great source of distraction when she had nothing to do or nobody to talk to.

She walked over to some worn down chairs that were placed carefully far to one end of the enclosure, they were initially placed there for observation of Shadow but it was an overestimated idea as most scientists didn’t have the nerve to be in the same room as Shadow for more than 5 minutes. Maria abused this section of the enclosure to benefit her creative devices and made Shadow the subject of most of her sketches.

It was about 5 minutes into drawing when she had stopped drawing Shadow as doodling a curled up spiky ball hadn’t been as fun as she thought. She looked up from her sketch pad as Shadow began to unfurl, as he stretched out she heard some of his bones crack back into place, bones cracking was already an unnerving sound to her, hearing it at Shadows size was something entirely else so she couldn’t help the look that came on her face.

Shadow stopped his stretching to study her, he smirked at the unsettled face Maria made as it was quite an amusing expression for her to pull, the smirked made her a little irate considering how rudely he was to ignore her just before.

“I see you got tired of pouting” Maria huffed, Shadow simply stuck her tongue at her, she gasped in shock and stook up immediately, absolutely aghast he would use such a move on her of all people, she kind of wish she hadn’t taught him that now.

“That’s absolutely- why I never- you are such a rude-“ she couldn’t make up her mind what to say in response. Shadow sat on his hind legs and looked at her in amusement, to anyone who could have been outside the enclosure, the sight of a young blond girl yelling and scolding the near 40 foot giant beast was bewildering.

“It’s no wonder grandfather didn’t want me to see you, with you acting like such a brat I have half a mind to walk out of here, are you even sorry for what you did?!” Maria furiously turned her back to him and folded her arms, if she looked back she would have seen Shadow flinch at the question. “The scientists are doing the best to help you and you had someone sent into first aid!” She grumbled.

Maria heard some loud shuffling then the room shook for a moment, she steadied herself and looked back to see Shadow had repositioned himself with his back to her. She didn’t know why the sight infuriated her more but it just seemed like he wanted to be insanely difficult today.

She began to march over to him, about to give him a peace of her mind. However when she traversed enough to get a even look at what she assumed would be a unremorseful smug smirk, she was met with a regretful furrowed brow, his red crimson irises met her blue azure ones and he instantly looked away and brought his arms up to hold himself. He wouldn’t look back at her.

Maria began to calm herself, one look at him told her what she knew, of course he felt bad for what he did. She wanted to give herself a right slap for forgetting herself, he obviously found it hard to talk about what happened, she shouldn’t have expected him to be right and ready to talk as soon as she walked through those doors.

She slowly came closer and put a hand to his ankle, that was as much as she could reach at his current sat up stance. He dared a glance down at her tiny form and again looked away, she could feel the giant begin to tremble, she then heard as an unmistakable voice rasped out “…didn’t mean to”.

His voice rumbled throughout her body as her heart wrenched at that statement. She believed it without question, he was gentle and caring, she was tired after the week long tests. Maria could only imagine what it was like for him after being poked and prodded for hours on end.

“I know” she comforted. She really did wish he was at least a little smaller, it was really hard to comfort someone who has a hand as big as your entire body.

She could attempt to climb up his leg but she really didn’t want to risk getting Gerald upset with her if she was to exacerbate her already strained lungs. She motioned at shadow with her hand and got his attention “Shadow your hand please” she gently commanded

He knew what she was asking and took a hand off his person to reach her, only seeing his claws near her had him stop for a moment which Maria noticed. “You would never hurt me” she assured. He gently scooped her up and cupped his other hand to the one holding her.

Shadow brought up a safely secured Maria up to his face in which she at once assaulted him with a full face hug, it surprised him for a moment but he instantly melted into it. She did this when she knew he was even a bit upset. He did find the gesture embarrassing but appreciated it all the same.

Maria nuzzled into his muzzle harder, she’d be finding fur in her dress for ages but she didn’t mind, the priority was Shadow. She was glad he was remorseful, it would have been alarming if she had to explain why it’s wrong to send someone into the infirmary but Shadow seemed to grasp the consequences of the event that transpired.

“You are going to apologise once Steven is out of the infirmary aren’t you?” She left his muzzle alone finally and looked up at him, he seemed embarrassed at such a request but knew he couldn’t argue with something that was the least he could do. He nodded firmly and hoped it would be enough to satisfy Maria.

It definitely was as she once again came full force with a hug to his muzzle, he did wish he could return such a gesture properly but he’d definitely crush the poor girl with such a return, instead he just leaned his face into her arms, she was such a tiny thing to him but the action warmed his heart so immensely he’d almost forgotten why he was mad in the first place.

Maria plopped back into his palm, content with her job as “the Shadow whisperer”, as she had oddly dubbed herself in her mind. She wished she could converse with him about all the events that transpired while he had been “grounded” but it mostly included tests which was the furthest thing she was sure both of them wanted to talk about. In that moment she remembered the little notepad she was doodling in earlier.

Shadow watched as she fought to relieve her pocket of the sketch pad and as she flicked through a few pages of quite nice and detailed drawings of him and a few familiar faces he’d seen on the Ark, his interested peaked as he watched her turn to her recent pages and she chortled, Maria shakily stood up on Shadows surprisingly soft palm and held the sketch pad to Shadow, who’s interested promptly died when he saw a drawing of a spiky ball which had been nicely detailed with an annotate to tell whoever was reading the ball was a “grumpy pouty shadow”.

Maria watched Shadows face fall flat and couldn’t help that roar of laughter that immediately escaped her, this only continued to irritate the humongous hedgehog. He brought over his other hand that didn’t have a laughing Maria in it and swiftly brought it over his palm, Maria yelled out a panicked “NO WAIT-“ as he did so. He didn’t hurt her, he just gave her a quick squish to shut her up. That seemed to do the job as he opened his palms to a silence Maria who had her hair adorably scruffy from the attack “I hate it when you do that, I totally deserved it though” she concluded

He snickered at that and she gave him a quick punch to his pinkie finger

——————————————————————

Maria had lost track of the time she had been in the enclosure after 2 hours. She wasn’t worried she’d been in too long as her Grandfather had cameras in the chamber and would have called her out if he wanted her out.

She had returned to her drawings while she was cradled in Shadows palms. She was absolutely engrossed in her current drawing and hadn’t noticed Shadow wasn’t giving input or feedback on her drawings anymore.

The palm she was in suddenly jerked and she had to grab one of his fingers to keep from losing balance, her sketch pad had fallen to the ground when the motion happened. She looked up when she was steadied and saw Shadow, he seemed to have not noticed what he had done. Honestly he seemed quite out of it, she quickly realised the poor thing was fighting sleep and must have accidentally jerked back to being half awake.

“Shadow” Maria called, his eyes opened fully to address her but immediately went back to being half lidded. “Are you tired? I can leave so you can get some rest” she offered.

He stubbornly shook his head and cupped his other hand under her, normally he would have let her go off when she wanted and went back to doing as he did alone in the enclosure but she was sure it was his sleepy brain not wanting her to leave and he was acting upon that.

“Alright alright, don’t have a fuss I’m not going anywhere, even if I could” he had brought his hand close enough that she could reach a particular spot under his muzzle, she gave it a few scritches and had to steel herself when he began purring, it was an intense and loud sound that she feel sending waves through her entire body but she bared it.

He leaned into it, and began to literally lean his entire body’s forward when the feeling of the scratches began to calm his already tired mind, Maria had to stop and immediately grabbed onto anything she could, which was his ring finger as Shadow fell forward, the enclosure shook from the weight of him falling and Maria waited for the vibrations to die down, she hoped her grandfather was not watching the cameras at that moment as she could of accidentally been hurt, she could hear and feel the vibrations of Shadows quiet snores as it confirmed he has simply fallen asleep.

She hopped off his palm to trek to his face, give him a quick hug. Her mission was to now find her sketch pad, that last drawing she was engrossed with had come along really well and she wanted to show her grandfather how her art skills were coming out. Her face turned grief stricken when she realised her sketch pad had fallen where Shadow lay asleep right now, if he rolled over which she knew he was guaranteed to do, it was completely over for that drawing as well as her entire sketch pad.

Maria inhaled and then exhaled. The stories of the superheroes her grandfather read to her had to go through sacrifice, and right now as the shadow whisperer, she could definitely say she was going through sacrifice right now.

[thaliagracesgf]

i hail a cab with a goat, and make some questionable decisions at a party

next

author’s note: i want to make it, like, really, really, clear that this is not a fic glorifying sa or being a victim. what the reader goes through here is a horrible experience, one that’s happened to me and countless other women (and other people!!). this fic is for anyone who, in the words of rachel sennot in bottoms, has been “gray-area-d,” and felt completely lost afterwards, not knowing how to feel or what to think. this is one example of how you deserved to have been treated, and i’m sorry if this or something similar wasn’t your experience. 

content warnings: sexual assault (not graphic and not by luke! r is sort of tied down and has their shorts undone), violence (luke is not happy about this situation), alcohol (r is drunk), talking about it afterwards?, talking about monsters (on a regular pjo level), swearing. 

word count: 6.6k. i had a lot to say. so sorry.

this is the first fic i have written in a while, i hope you enjoy it!

⭑

seven a.m. in the camp half-blood dining pavilion saw the same faces every morning. you, silena beauregard, clarisse larue, and annabeth chase. your little group of friends spanned six years, at seventeen, fourteen, thirteen, and eleven, and your best friend, who had been off at college all year, made it eight. 

you didn’t remember becoming friends with silena and clarisse, although you figured hannah, your best friend and silena’s older half-sister, must have introduced you, and clarisse came along with her. 

you had met annabeth and hannah when you were just thirteen, when you had followed a friend to connecticut in the middle of pre-algebra. 

“do you understand any of this?” you whispered to grover. he gave you a look as if he had never seen a fraction before last week, and you sighed. your teacher, a kind old woman named ms. lucy, gave you a look. when she gave the class a new problem to work through, she came and knelt by your desk, looking over your shoulder at what you had managed so far. which was a whole lot of nothing, unless you included a sketch of grover that would make picasso proud. you shrunk sheepishly in your chair. 

you looked to your right, as if trying to see how bad it really was compared to your model, but he was gone. you turned back to ms. lucy. 

“did you see grover leave?” 

“hmm?”

“grover. did he go to the bathroom?”

“i assume so, dear. if you convert the decimal—" but grover’s things were gone. you felt terrible. you knew you were a terrible student, and ms. lucy was so kind to you anyways, but it wasn’t like grover to walk out of class like that. he was terrified of authority.

“i have to go,” you mumbled to ms. lucy, throwing your things in your bag and slinging it over your shoulder. “stomachache.” 

she looked genuinely concerned. “would you like me to let the nurses know you’re coming?”

“no… no. that’s okay.” and you ran out the door. 

it wasn’t too hard to find grover. he was sitting in an empty classroom just a few doors down, but what was weirder was that he was watching a video on the projector. weirder still, he was talking to it. you knew it was rude to eavesdrop. it didn’t stop you from doing it. 

“chiron, i can’t just leave. she’s here, and she’s in danger. she needs a protector. anything could come for her at any moment—" was he talking about you? 

a deep voice over the projector, whose face you could hardly make out through the low-quality image, answered: “i will inform her mother and she will go home. she will stay there until we can send gleeson to collect her and—"

“why can’t you send gleeson for these kids?” 

“he’s too far, it would take him a day at least to reach them. i already told you, this was a request from hermes himself. he wants his son and his friends collected as soon as possible, and—" 

who the hell was gleeson? and hermes… who names their kid after a greek god? at least choose one with a better name than hermes. it sounded like a disease. your mother had named your brother after some greek hero, but he didn’t go by it. and at least it was, like, a human name. 

“he’s the god of travelers.” you were starting to worry that grover might be on drugs. what on earth had they put in those enchiladas at lunch? “can’t he get him, like, a car? a day could be too long for—"

“grover.” the voice boomed. that shut him up. “you will go. you will escort the son of hermes, the daughter of athena, and the daughter of zeus to camp, and then you may return to the city. this is not up for discussion.” you were really starting to think that the booming voice might have been two booming voices, but the door was closed and the audio was already crackly, so you decided it didn’t really matter. 

you heard grover’s voice say, “alright,” defeated and almost mournful, and then the message cut off. your eyes widened as you realized that grover would probably step outside any second, and you would have no excuse as to what you were doing with your ear to the wall. you turned slowly, and winced as your shoe squeaked on the linoleum floor. you started speedwalking. no sense in trying to hide anymore, you were just interested in getting as far away as possible before-

“oh, gods.” grover’s voice echoed between cinder block walls and metal lockers. “how much did you hear?”

you turned, your fingers nervously twisting the straps of your backpack. “i mean. not everything. just. you know.”

“almost everything?”

“yeah.”

“this is not good. this is really not good.” grover wasn’t talking to you anymore. he was pacing the short ways of the corridor, head in his hands, muttering to himself. “my first mission and i’ve already messed it up completely.” 

“how could you have messed it up completely? you haven’t even met these kids yet.”

“oh, gods,” grover groaned.

“woah, dude. are you like, hindu or something?”

“what?”

“you said gods. plural. i read this book—"

“okay,” grover interrupted. “you need to go home.” 

“okay. that was rude. also, it’s like the middle of the day. my mom’s at work and my stepdad will kill me if i come home early.”

“your stepfather. perfect. just climb in the back window of your room, and when your mom gets home, tell her that chiron says you need to go to camp immediately.”

“what? what the hell are you talking about? who— is that who you were talking to on the phone?”

“what?”

“the phone call. the one you were mad at me for overhearing…”

“okay. first of all, that was not overhearing, that was eavesdropping. second of all, i’m not mad. this just complicates things slightly. third of all—"

“dude, you need to—" grover glared at me, and i shut up. 

“third of all,” he repeated, “that wasn’t a phone call. it was an iris message.”

“a what?”

“nevermind. not important. ask about it at camp.”

“why do you keep talking about a camp? i haven’t been to camp since music camp in second grade, and they don’t want me back. i was really, really, bad at the recorder.”

“you played the recorder?” grover looked suddenly very interested. “nevermind. you need to go home.”

“dude. i’m telling you, i. can’t.” 

“you have to—"

“take me to connecticut,” you suggested. 

“what?”

“isn’t that where you’re running off to?”

“you can’t come to connecticut with me—"

“why not? you seemed pretty adamant on the phone—"

“iris message”

“that you needed to be with ‘her’. based on how insanely you have freaked out, i’m guessing that was me. so take me with you.”

“i know you have no idea what is going on right now—"

“thank you for finally acknowledging that important part of this conversation.”

“- but taking you to connecticut would be an astronomically bad idea. like i-would-get-fired kind of bad idea.”

“you’re twelve. how on earth would you get fired? child labor laws are—"

“i’m nineteen.” 

you laughed at that one. “yeah, sure.” 

grover rolled his eyes. “look, i really, really, wish i could explain more, but i need to go. and i really, really need you to go home.”

“ok.”

“like really, really need you to listen—" he paused. “okay? great!”

“if it means that much to you, i’ll go home.” grover sighed with relief. 

he was eating his words. and a tin can he had picked up off the street. you had followed him out of the building, watched him call a cab, and then, at the last second, jumped in after him, slammed the door, and told the driver to drive before grover could figure out what was going on. 

after your initial panic, when you realized you were hurtling up fifth avenue at three-hundred miles per hour with three old ladies behind the wheel, you had straightened yourself out, and made grover explain everything. he had, reluctantly, when he came to terms with the fact that you were in too deep to back out now.  

he explained camp, the greek (not hindu) gods, and the ladies in the front (who had one eye between them) were very helpful about filling in the details. so, so many details. he explained that he didn’t know who your parent was, just that you were powerful, and that he was planning on asking your mom before everything went up in flames.  

he explained that he was going to connecticut to escort three (now four) demigods to camp half-blood, and that they would likely be tailed by monsters the entire way back. four demigods as powerful as you, and one forbidden child — a child of zeus, poseidon, or hades, as he had mentioned — would attract a lot of attention. 

and you did. it took you a month to get to camp after you found thalia, luke, and annabeth, constantly being thrown off course by monsters, over which you got to know them better than any friends you’d had in your life (with the exception of maybe grover and your little brother). your mother was worried sick, but you iris-messaged her (grover finally got through on that one) every so often, letting her know you were okay. she was surprisingly understanding about camp. she apologized that she hadn’t been the one to take you herself, and that she had been forced to hide the truth from you for so long. the calls always ended though, when she tried to tell you who your father was. the water would shut off suddenly, the rainbow disappearing along with your mother, so you learned to avoid the topic if you wanted to continue talking. 

when thalia died, you were in shock. you sat at the edge of long island sound at camp for three days, staring into the ocean. you didn’t speak, even when you were claimed, as you sat, by your father, poseidon, and shuffled your things from the hermes cabin into cabin three. it was just another loss — you could no longer sleep in the bed next to luke’s. there were no familiar faces in cabin three — no faces at all. you were completely alone. 

eventually, an older aphrodite girl came by the cabin. she introduced herself as hannah, and she showed you around camp, forced you to sit with her and her siblings at dinner, dealing with chiron and mr. d’s disgruntlement herself, and at the campfire. she dragged you to the center of the amphitheater, dancing slowly at first, and then faster, until you were laughing and finding luke and annabeth in the crowd and dragging them to dance as well. 

you missed hannah so much. she wasn’t that far, a first year at barnard this fall, where you would hopefully be in a couple of years. you weren’t ready for college yet, you thought, so you would take a gap year (though you hadn’t been in school for years) and stay at camp, while chiron would help you convince the admissions committee (using the mist) that you had a perfect gpa, excellent extracurricular activities, and a stellar recommendation letter from a highly admired ancient greek scholar by the name of professor c. brunner.  

sitting at breakfast with you was probably miserable, you could admit. you were counting down the days until hannah came back, and your friends were definitely tired of it. but for some reason, this morning silena was practically jumping up and down with something. 

“will you stop?” you asked. “you’re shaking the entire table.” 

“i can’t, i’m sorry.” she seemed sincere in her apology. “i just— oh, you’ll see.”

you didn’t see, in fact, as someone jumped out from behind you and wrapped their arms around your head, their sweatshirt covering your eyes. “who—" you started, before you got a whiff of lavender-vanilla perfume and jumped up from the table. 

hannah. you shrieked, probably waking up half the camp. you spun around and tackled her to the ground, hugging her so tightly you would probably cut off her circulation. 

she pushed you off, laughing, and got to her feet. “it’s good to see you too, babe. what’s up with all of you? you never call, i feel like i’ve been completely cut off.” (you had iris-messaged her last week for five hours). 

“your sister is still absolutely obsessed with beckendorf,” you said, sitting down.

“hey!” silena protested.

“but of course he has no idea that he likes her.” silena turned pink. “no one here is good enough for annabeth, obviously—"

“i never said that, clarisse doesn’t let any boys near me.” you stick your tongue out at her. 

“i don’t know what you’re talking about,” clarisse said, feigning obliviousness. “you hang out with luke all the time.”

“he’s always hanging out with that new kid.” she grumbled. “or—"

“speaking of, clarisse definitely thinks this hermes boy is so cute— you haven’t met him, he got here a few months ago, but his name is chris, and i think they would be so cute together. she’s out of everyone’s league, obviously, but if anyone would be good for her—" 

“gods, you would think you’re the aphrodite kid, listening to you.” hannah smiled. she stole a bite of your french toast. 

“i’m just excited to see you,” you said, laying your head on her shoulder. silena and clarisse smirked. 

“she’s leaving somebody out here,” silena said, smiling. 

“i know, it’s weird, she never shuts up about him otherwise,” clarisse added, narrowing her eyes at you teasingly. 

“oh, who could you possibly be talking about?” hannah twirled a piece of hair. she hasn’t even been here, but one doesn’t forget their best friend’s crush of four years in a few months. 

“i do not,” you protested meekly. 

“you knew who we were talking about, though” 

“i spend a lot of time with him, that’s all. there would be a gaping hole if i told you about my day and didn’t bring him up.”

“would you stop pretending as if you aren’t in love with each other, please?” annabeth interrupted. “you’re worse than them, at least they can admit it.” she gestured at clarisse and silena. 

“i am not in love with him, annabeth.”

“you’re always starting at him.”

“i’m in conversation.”

“with your eyes. that is literally textbook romance.” 

“i could so admit if i was into him,” you say, cutting her off. “i admit things like that all the time. i told you i thought jack was cute. you know that kid from demeter?”

“we all know you made that up,” annabeth said, crossing her arms over her chest. silena gave her a light push. 

“don’t be so quick to accuse, annie.” only you and silena ever called her that. “i don’t think she made it up. i just don’t think she’s as into him as she is into him.”

“would you drop it, about luke, please?”

“hey, you said his name, not me,” silena smiled. “but sure. i don’t believe that you’re not into him, but i’ll drop it if you can prove that he isn’t into you.”

your heart sank. you weren’t sure why, but you suddenly felt nauseous at the thought. hannah’s hand rested on your knee, as if she could sense it. 

“how am i supposed to do that? i can’t read minds.” 

“hook up with jack at the campfire.”

“what?”

“flirt with him! you were just talking the other day about how you’re eighteen and you haven’t even had sex yet.” hannah covered annabeth’s ears, to which she shoved her off and glared. “jack’s, like, really hot. i saw you staring the other day.”

“when luke wasn’t around,” annabeth added, one eyebrow raised.

“you want me to have sex with jack?” 

“i’m not saying that. just flirt with him. see what happens. we’ll— she gestured between herself, clarisse, annabeth and hannah— see how luke is doing.” 

“okay, he isn’t going to be doing anything,” you said. “i don’t see what this accomplishes.” but even as you were saying it, your mind betrayed you. you thought for a second and conjured an image of strong arms holding you, soft lips kissing yours with the bonfire light in the background. maybe you were near the beach.

“we’ll see,” silena smiled. 

you didn’t want to go all the way, or anything. you knew that. but… jack was really hot. and sweet. he was always catching little kids falling off of obstacle courses with soft bushes, and growing them flower crowns. it couldn’t hurt to talk to him, see what happened. maybe he’d ask you out, or something. bring you flowers on a date. and you guessed you wouldn’t mind making out with him. 

the campfire roared in the middle of the amphitheater. the only people there were the older campers, and some counselors trickling back in from tucking kids into bed. you had helped luke with the hermes cabin, because he had so many kids to take care of, and you had none. 

you pulled the covers over katie, a girl a little younger than annabeth, who had gotten to camp a few months ago. she was still unclaimed, but with the way she spent all day in the strawberry fields, and the plants tended to shoot up around her, you were fairly sure where she belonged. 

you kissed the top of her head, and stood up, looking around the dark cabin for luke, seeing him kneeling beside a little boy, probably about the same age as katie. the boy sounded like he was crying. 

 “hey, connor,” luke whispered, rubbing circles on the kid’s back. “it’s okay. it’s okay. i get them too.” you realized that the boy must have been afraid to fall asleep. “travis is right above you, he’ll protect you, okay? nothing bad can happen to you here.”

he looked over at you, before turning back to connor. “and we can play poker tomorrow, you’re getting pretty good.”

“are you leaving?” the boy whispered, choking a bit on his tears.

“just for a little bit, kid. i’ll be back soon, i promise. i’ll be here when you wake up. i’m not going to leave you anytime soon.”

“okay,” the boy mumbled. luke pulled the covers over his shoulders, and ruffled his hair before turning to you. 

“let’s go,” he mouthed, gesturing at the door. the two of you crept outside, luke much more stealthily than you, closing the door silently. “god of thieves,” he shrugged, but he didn’t grin as he usually did when he bragged. you didn’t have to ask why, but you played along. 

“yeah, yeah, i know,” you said, rolling your eyes. “can we go now?”

“yeah, ‘course,” he said. he slung his arm over your shoulder, pulling you into him as you walked, and you couldn’t help but think of silena’s words as you rested your head on his chest.

arriving back at the campfire, you pulled yourself away from luke, walking over to hannah. she smirked at you, pulling you in for a hug. 

“you don’t have to do this, you know,” she said. 

“i know,” you replied. “i want to. he’s cute.” 

and he was, you thought, as he led you away from the campfire. you’d sat for an hour, letting the flames dance over your skin as you talked with him. he made you laugh, even blush when he grew a flower out of the stone to tuck behind your ear. when he grabbed your hand and pulled you to your feet, you felt dizzy, though that might have been the alcohol. 

as you walked further away from the amphitheater, you spun around in the grass, laughing, and he laughed with you. or at you? you couldn’t really tell, and you didn’t really care. you just wanted to kiss him. you didn’t notice that you weren’t heading near the cabins until he stopped in a little cove at the edge of the forest. 

“why are we here?” you asked, a little dazed. 

“come on,” he said. “you know why.” 

and then he was kissing you. it was messy, and made you kind of uncomfortable, but you told yourself to get over it. you couldn’t expect it to live up to the time luke had kissed you, on a dare, when you were thirteen. nothing would ever live up to that, because you couldn’t have him. he hadn’t even cared when you had left him at the party, talking up some girl you couldn’t really see on the other side of the fire.

you blinked, pulling away from jack. you hadn’t realized as you were thinking it, but you had admitted to yourself for the first time that yes: you did want luke. really, really, wanted him. you pushed back on jack lightly. 

“i’m sorry, i don’t think i can do this right now,” you mumbled, wiping your mouth on the sleeve of your hoodie — luke’s hoodie, that he had given you that night after he kissed you, when you were shivering outside, staring into space because you couldn’t understand what you were feeling. 

“come on, it’s fine,” jack replied, pulling you back into his arms. they weren’t like the arms you were picturing earlier. no, you could admit to yourself new that those had been luke’s. your mind was reeling— you knew that you couldn’t have him, that he would never like you like you liked him, but kissing jack felt wrong. not that you had really been kissing him back. 

“i want to go home,” you said, and you weren’t sure where you meant. back to the campfire, to luke and hannah, back to your cabin? maybe even back to your mom on the upper east side, who you missed every day but couldn’t live with during the year for the sake of your little brother, who was too young to know that he, too, was a son of poseidon. 

“really? you were flirting with me all night,” jack mumbled into your lips. “stay a little longer.” it was true, you had been flirting with him. you figured you could at least make out with him for a bit. you resigned, letting him lower you onto the grass, and reluctantly letting him run his hands along the hem of your shirt. 

hannah was getting worried, and luke could tell. he had forced himself off when you were clearly interested in that demeter guy, who luke knew and was friends with but suddenly hated with all his guts. he had forced himself to be interested in getting the details on silena and beckendorf, which he didn’t really realize he was getting to share with you later, resigning to glancing too often through the flames of the fire at your face, and the way the flames made you look like a goddess. no, he thought. you always looked like a goddess. 

but hannah, who had just arrived back at camp for the summer that morning, was biting her lip, and looking around with a bothered expression on her face, and luke had a horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, that he needed to know you were safe immediately. 

he walked over to hannah, probably too quickly, and didn’t waste time asking how she was, or how college had been. “where is she?” he demanded, too forcefully. he would have to apologize to hannah later, but he only had one thing on his mind.“what’s wrong?”

“oh. hey, luke,” she said, still in a sort of trance. he snapped his finger away from her face, shaking his head.

“hannah? where is she?” 

she shook her head and widened her eyes. it was clear to luke that you had picked up that habit of staring out at nothing when you were deep in thought, usually not about pleasant things. “she’s with jack,” she said. “they left a little while ago. i just… i don’t know. i should go check that she’s back at her cabin by now.” 

“yeah, yeah we should,” luke grumbled, and started taking the steps out of the theater two at a time in an effort to get out. hannah followed— you had told him that his stress could be contagious. 

you weren’t in your cabin. you weren’t in the demeter cabin either, and the pair of them woke up a bunch of kids as you barged in, which he was sure mr. d would have a lot to say about in the morning, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. 

he ran across the basketball court, hannah close behind. 

“i have an idea of where they might be,” hannah said, pointing in the direction of the woods.

“how do you know?” 

“because i showed jack that spot when we were fourteen,” she said, grumbling. luke clearly wasn’t the only one who cared about you. 

“i thought you were gay?” luke questioned, not slowing down. 

“yeah. like i said, fourteen. people explore things, figure themselves out.” gods, she thought, men could be so incredibly stupid. 

they ran faster than ever to the edge of the woods, where sure enough, they found you, lying on a mossy stone with jack hovering over you. luke wanted to run to you immediately, but hannah held him back — no easy feat, but she managed. 

“hold on, romeo,” she strained. “you can’t just barge in there and—” then she heard it— the unmistakable sound of your voice, and the word stop.

“jack…” you mumbled. you were so drunk. you weren’t sure where you were anymore, and you didn’t really remember walking over here, though you knew you had. “jack, we can do this later, i’m tired—” 

“you’re fine, it’s fine,” he said quietly, starting to undo the zipper of your shorts. you reached down to stop him, but he pushed your hand away, and as it hit the stone, moss started growing over it, holding it there. 

“jack, stop it,” you said, more forcefully this time. you realized that he didn’t even know what he was doing, and for some reason that scared you more. he wasn’t doing it on purpose, but he wanted it— he wanted you held down, and he didn’t care that you didn’t. 

he shushed you, but looked up at a rustling in the trees, and a familiar grunt. 

luke broke out of hannah’s arms, but it didn’t really matter, because she had been letting him go anyways. he stormed across the clearing, and while you were still dazed and confused, you couldn’t miss the entirety of jack’s weight being ripped from on top of you, and you thought you saw a fist collide with his face. 

hannah, however, rushed to your side. she didn’t particularly want to see luke end up bloody and beaten in the infirmary, but she had bigger fish to fry right now: namely, you. she tore up the moss, no longer strong as jack’s focus was elsewhere, and redid your shorts for you. there were tears on your face as she pulled you to your feet. 

there was so much noise. jack was shouting at luke, but you couldn’t make out the words. you could hear the music and the gleeful sounds of counselors from the amphitheater, but it seemed worlds away from you. 

as hannah led you out of the woods, much faster than you could really manage, your head began to pound behind your eyes. a splitting pain hit your forehead, and your vision went black and spotty. you stumbled forward, relying entirely on hannah to keep you upright, but one stray tree root took you down. you swam between consciousness and a dark, dark sleep. there was screaming, it was hannah, and then the familiar deep voice of clarisse, barking orders. you thought you heard annabeth’s name, and then two strong sets of arms lifting you up, and carrying you away. 

you woke up at the bottom of the sea. no. that wasn’t right. the bottom of the sea was soft, covered in mud and sand. you tried to stretch your body, hitting plastic walls. as your eyes focused, you could make out cartoon fish swimming entirely too close to your face, and you sat up with a start, splashing water all over a corner of the infirmary. 

a kiddie pool. they had filled a kiddie pool with salt water, and left you in it overnight to soak, like one of those colorful dinosaur toys that grew in water. and the worst part was that it seemed to have worked. you felt brand new, like you had slept for a hundred years, and at the same time followed a very strict workout regimen, taken a juice cleanse and eaten like a king. you groaned, and slipped back under the water. 

you stared at the ceiling, watching wooden beams ripple with the surface of your personal ocean. you wondered if your father ever felt like this is in the pacific, if he could be that big if he wanted to. your camp necklace floated up before your face, crossing a familiar face lurking over you. 

you sat up. cara fletcher, hannah’s friend, held out some nectar. you shook your head. 

“i’m okay.”

she raised an eyebrow. 

“fine,” you sighed, taking the flask and drinking. it did help. you felt like you could take on the minotaur. 

“your friends were here all night,” she said. i kicked them out around ten because they were falling asleep on each other, and i didn’t need any more cracked skulls when they fell off the stools. 

“more?” you asked. she sighed, looking over her shoulder. 

“your boyfriend beat that kid up pretty bad last night,” she said. you didn’t see jack lying on any of the cots, but a head of dark curls lay a few beds down, and the body attached to it did not look to be in great shape.

“he’s not my boyfriend.” you answered quickly, not taking your eyes off of luke. “is he okay?”

cara seemed to make out which he’s you were referring to. “i wasn’t talking about him,” she said. “hannah told me what happened. if you ask me, luke didn’t do nearly enough damage.” 

“don’t tell him that,” you said. “and he’s also not my boyfriend,” you added as you processed her words fully. 

“not yet, he’s not.” hannah said, strolling in with three bagels in hand.

“i thought i told you to go to bed,” cara scolded, taking her bagel. “you’re going to drop dead one of these days.” hannah smiled, ignoring her as he sat down next to her and put her arm around her shoulders.

you glance between them, ideas churning in your mind, but they were quickly interrupted by the bagel being shoved in your face. you had always thought that the harpies must have spent some time in the city— they made a dam good bagel.  

“so.” hannah started. “you are going to tell us everything you’re thinking right now, because i see you looking over at him every two seconds, and don’t think you’re getting out of any of it.”

“i’m eating,” you grumbled. hannah reached to snatch the bagel away, but cara swatted her hand back. 

“she’s recovering.” you stuck your tongue out at hannah. 

“i don’t care,” hannah said. “spill.” 

“look, i don’t even know what happened last night—” 

“because you were really, really, drunk,” she interrupted. 

“do you want me to speak or not?” you demanded. 

“okay. fine. but just so you’re aware, he swooped in and defended you, and beat the shit out of that little asshole, who, just between us, mr. d is fucking fuming with.” trust hannah to get distracted two seconds in. demigod adhd was no joke. “he dragged him to the big house this morning himself, severe concussion and all, and according to lee, chewed him out for about an hour. something about the sanctity of drunkenness and how it is not to be weaponized… even chiron was surprised.” she paused for breath. 

“anyways, the point stands— he,” she nodded her head at luke, “was quite literally your knight in shining armor, and if you still don’t think he is absolutely enamored with you—” and you were pretty sure you heard a cot creak— “then i swear on my mother i will call her down and force her to do something about this because i cannot take it any longer.” 

“he was just being a good person, hannah,” you muttered. “he’s just like that.” 

hannah looked as though she were about to scream, but cara rubbed her hand along her thigh, calming her before she spoke herself. 

“there’s something more than that, isn’t there?” she asked softly, and you thought she was staring directly into your soul. “there’s a reason you don’t think he likes you.”

you hesitated, splashing the water around in your pool and making eye contact with a cartoon fish as you worked up the courage to say what it was you knew you had to get off your chest.

“before last night,” you started, your voice cracking as you spoke, “it was just me thinking i wasn’t pretty enough, or good enough for him. that he wouldn’t look at me because there are so many other girls at this camp who are obsessed with him. and i don't think i realized that i liked him either. but now…” a sob came from the back of your throat, and you looked up at hannah, tears streaking your red face. 

“why would he want me now?” you sobbed.

“hey. stop that,” hannah started. “what jack did to you wasn’t your fault, and everyone knows that.” she was trying to make you feel better, but the news that your pathetic love life was the talk of camp wasn’t exactly reassuring.

“it was, though,” you said quietly. “i led him on. i never told him no that strongly, and i was flirting with him all night. what reason did he have not to think… not to…” you were hyperventilating now, your words coming out in broken syllables. 

“i’m a fucking slut, and now everyone knows it,” you managed. you sank back into the water to slow your breathing, but tears still streamed down your face. 

“that’s bullshit,” came a voice from elsewhere in the infirmary. you could have thrown up then and there. you pulled yourself up by the walls of the kiddie pool, looking down the aisle as luke castellan limped towards you. his scarred eye was bruised and bloodshot, and he had a massive scrape running up his left arm, and that was just what you could see. the tears began to fall faster. 

“luke…” 

you were thirteen years old again, at the top of half-blood hill, holding grover upright. you were watching desperately as he stumbled upward, through the pouring rain, carrying a screaming little girl who was trying with all her might to run back and help her friend. all four of you were sobbing, exhausted and beaten. seeing them all like that was ten times more painful than the gash in your side. 

“that’s bullshit,” luke repeated. you got up from the pool and held his face in your hand, inspecting the bruise. you took the rest of the nectar cara had given you, holding it to his lips, but he pushed it away. “you’re not a slut,” he said. suddenly everything about your conversation came rushing back to you, and it hit you that you had just admitted to him that you were in love with him. 

you turned your head. hannah and cara were gone, slipped out the back door. you turned back to face luke, face red and tears pouring over your skin.

“that wasn’t your fault. you didn’t owe him anything. he‘s disgusting, and deserves to have his fucking dick cut off.” you laugh, despite everything. 

“i think mr. d may have actually taken care of that,” you whispered. 

“good.” you looked at him for a while. his eyes were so beautiful, a deep, deep, brown that reminds you of the otters that hung mysteriously around your upper east side apartment when you lived in the city.   

“why did you have to fight him?” you asked, reaching up to his face again. 

“you were in trouble,” he said. 

“luke.” the tears were threatening to fall again. “you could have seriously hurt yourself. i just… why? why not just pull him off of me?” you needed an answer. you needed to know why, why on earth he had put so much of himself in front of you, in front of jack’s fists.

he looked down at you, a pained expression on his face. “you know why,” he whispered. 

he looked down at your lips, and you shook your head softly. you looked down at your feet. you were so afraid, afraid that he wouldn’t be interested now that you didn’t want… that. from him. yet— that you considered looking up and letting him kiss you.

he shocked you when he wrapped his arms around you and held you close to him, holding the back of your head into the space between his chest and his shoulder. 

“okay,” he whispered. “that’s okay.” then, softer. “i love you.”

you couldn’t say it back. not yet, not now. but you held him tighter, holding on to him like he was the only thing stopping you from falling into tartarus. 

“i’ll be here forever,” he spoke into your hair. and you believed him. 

the hermes cabin hosted a movie night that night. you were watching the incredibles two, at a request from connor stoll, who was currently involved in an intense argument with annabeth over which installment was better.  

“i think i’m going to start calling you that,” luke whispered in your ear. “jack-jack.” you glared at him. “‘cause, you know, your last name’s jackson-” 

“yeah, dude, i got the joke,” you said. you rolled your eyes, nuzzling your head into his chest. you could stay like this for a while, you thought, and as you closed your eyes, you felt him press a kiss to your head — something you had told him was okay. you couldn’t wait to bring him home for a weekend. maybe annabeth, too. you couldn’t help but think she would get along great with your brother.

⭑

a/n: hello loves! i hope you enjoyed this, please please leave any feedback or anything, and let me know if you would like me to continue this story/write more of luke and the reader's past. i hope people enjoyed the little hints at percy! so excited for this reader and to explore all her relationships.

[perfectfangirl]

notes after rewatching fallout s1 ep3

• almost certain that is sugarfoot cooper is dismounting in the scene from the movie he is filming 🥲 • the film cooper was filming here is called "the man from deadhorse", a clear play on the concept of "beating a dead horse" • just realized he [presumably] shot the bad guy character twice • i also noticed that the duster the bad guy character is wearing looks an awful lot like the duster cooper wears as the character he “plays” in the wasteland to cope. is... cooper playing a bad guy character based off one of his movies?? • saw a couple of different variations of "feo, fuerte, y formal" [all saying mostly the same thing] cooper says "he was ugly, strong, and had dignity" wikitionary says it denotes a conception of masculinity. very curious about this these words and the scene because cooper is obviously viewed as a concept of masculinity in hollywood, to the point where he's being asked to essentially engage in statecraft via propaganda as this movie scene is making his character do something completely antithetical--- killing the bad guy instead of solving another way, he basically says a line about "commies" then shoots the him in the head

• what's more is that some are viewing the three concepts of "ugly, strong, dignity" to mean either a variation of cooper, lucy, and maximus or of cooper himself, didn't even think of this and it's a particular interesting trichotomy of cooper pre and post war • "well, joey, i'll give you two out of three on that front" and now i don't know which two out of three • cooper goes out of his way to thank the actor jorge for playing the bad guy in his film • cooper presumably read the script, probably had a table read, rehearsal, and still didn't want to film his good guy character killing the bad guy [perhaps after cadillac bob got fired, there were rewrites and cooper was not told until then] out of context, this is charming, he values his characters so much that they mirror his own values [walton has argued with writers, directors, actors about his characters too!] but in context, it is either the beginning or yet another chapter is cooper's conflicting and morally challenging struggle of "right" and "wrong" in this show • need to know more about cadillac bob! he was doing the moral good type of writing on cooper's programs and i am curious if the firing was an ousting [as being labeled a communist is career over here] because the wiki says he was fired for refusing to write this storyline for the "new america" and then they wrote this character change for cooper to have a firmer anticommunist stance to influence the public. cooper wants to change the scene so bad, he asks for a writer and i find it amusing the director thinks doing a 180° on his character would be good because "the audience knows you're a good man. they want to see that even a good man as yourself can be driven too far sometimes" idk but this is about all the horseshit i can take • [this is precisely post war cooper's arc and character if that wasn't obvious enough] • enter barb. i love the sensual "married couple flirting like strangers" energy behind this scene • lavender flowers are supposed to represent purity, silence, grace, devotion, serenity, calmness--- just a little something for you romance girlies to think about with this scene • "tastes like someone touching you for the first time" and they make it a point to show cooper and barb's hands and cooper purposefully touching barb's fingers as they exchange the candy • hands and fingers seem to be important motifs here and it also seems like hands and fingers are particularly worthy of note for cooper • they kiss each other and they're like "sorry, makeup" and "sorry, lipstick" 😭 • looks like barb secured cooper some vault tec contracts • cooper winds up on siggi's headless body and i can almost see the algebra and trigonometry floating around his brain trying to make heads or tails of this shit • from my understanding, there's no chems that keep a ghoul from going feral within the game universe but there are chems that can and have turned people into ghouls, i see speculation that cooper may have a chem addiction and what we see are withdrawal symptoms, as when lucy finds him outside the super duper mart, he's still on the ground and not acting much feral but [of course coughing, drooling, etc could be the show's symptoms for ferality] i digress • almost think because it's dry and arid af out there, that's why he need a chem

• literally howling because of how lucy was handling siggi's head, she got over the shock and disgust quick 😭 • lucy is crazy for lighting another [camp]fire at night like that • lucy putting a tracker on siggi's head was smart though • lmao did the brotherhood of steel not know lord titus' regular speaking voice or • maximus lying to the brotherhood of steel, maximus selling his teeth for caps instead of literally anything else, maximus thinking he can leave his power suit uncovered and unattended without it being pulled for scrap--- like lord, maximus, please make a sensible step 😫 • the voice modulator mechanic person was very sci fi though • took me a second watch to realize maximus' tooth extraction resulted in a bit of a lisp glfgd • not maximus getting bullied again 😭 • maximus getting a wrench and toilet seat and beating the shit out of them wastelanders with them rotf • crushed that man's head like a watermelon❤️ • thaddeus being sent to inadvertently squire for someone he helped bully is his karma lol • "remnant from the old world" directly implying the enclave is a continuation of the us government • lucy arriving on the serene scene of a fawn near a lake where hollywood boulevard once stood [lucy being a parallel of the innocent doe, doe eyed, and this is bambi ok 🥲] • an undamaged, normal appearing fawn representing beauty and purity can grow in the wasteland and then it being snatched by a gulper likewise demonstrating that it can all be taken away in a blink of an eye • lucy once again being crazy for walking around with the barely contained rotting head, like of course the abomination snatched that too 😭 • cooper conveniently appearing with a cocked gun in her face and she just smiles and says "hello again" like excuse me?? 😭 • cooper's head tilt gets me every time, oof • he ain't have to lightly pistol whip her like that 😭 • lmao poor chet • betty to some degree i keep wondering if she knows extensively about the vaults of 31, 32, 33 or if she is just doing what she is told • norm using the word "escape" instead of perhaps "leave" when describing lucy's departure from vault 33 is intriguing, i think • it took me a minute, and i don't think i've seen much talk about this but i legitimately think norm's lack of enthusiasm and drive for life in the vault is directly connected to his mother's death but i have seen no clear age for him--- they don't show his memories like they do lucy's and i would want an explanation or exploration on his lore here because... he already uncovered vault 31's secret but i don't think he knows what hank has done and him finding out will be huge as well like for lucy • norm is rightfully angry at the raiders for what they did but i am almost willing to bet he might be implicated in their poisonings as a diversion tactic by someone like betty but it's all just a theory [a film theory gldfgldfl] • because someone in the fucking kitchen and handling the food poisoned them raiders... • ghoul prejudice being loud and clear and amongst the brotherhood of steel 😭 • ghouls leaving radiation trails is insane • lmao maximus and thaddeus coming upon siggi's headless body and then trying to compare his mugshot • maximus thinking it was the ghoul who beheaded siggi when it was lucy at siggi's request lol • dogmeat barking up a storm because she wanted cooper's foolishness upon lucy to cease • "you know, they use to do these things called "studies"" like lucy doesn't know what a study is? she's a teacher! 😭 • rads going up because of the water or cooper or both? • ok so i now get why when lucy told cooper torture was wrong that he went into a whole spiel--- not only was cooper in the military but for thirty years post war, dom pedro kept him in a coffin confined on an iv drip to keep him alive but would dig him up and slice pieces of him off and then put him back. cooper's behaviour using her as bait [but not torture] is of course not excusable but cooper is coming from a deep place of hurt and bitterness, this monster was whittled

• cooper goes on to say "it made sense. i mean a man hurts me, i wouldn't want to do him any favours. and yet the practice of torture failed to vanish from the earth. in fact, as time marched on, i've personally noticed a decided uptick in the amount of torture being doled out across the board." oh, cooper 😞 • he says this as he picks what looks like giant leeches off lucy [didn't have to do that] • "well, i ain't torturing you, sweetheart" here go the first instance of familiarity with a patronising pet name in the style of cowboyism and southerness gldgldlf • almost looked like lucy started cooperating when cooper told her he was using her as bait gldgldl • ok so it looks like cooper cut the rope? so lucy could get free i guess idk but then the gulper got ahold of the anchor so he couldn't reel it back? [not sure, anyways, he botched this lmao] • he starts striking at the gulper with what looks like a harpoon i guess when it catches lucy's leg [could've definitely let her get ate but didn't] • lucy basically saves herself with dogmeat biting the gulper and scaring it off • cooper empties lucy's bag and destroys her stuff so it's only right cooper's karma is his vials getting smashed in the process of using lucy for bait lol • cooper getting mad and taking out his gun and cocking it at lucy like it was her fault his shit got smashed 😭 • "oh, i'm sorry, i should just let you use me as bait in the poison river!?" the way she says it always almost brings a tear to my eyes like get his ass 😭 • for the first time in the show, cooper realises he was wrong and/or messed up [and to his detriment] • lucy protests her treatment, "do unto others as you would have done unto you" and cooper starts mumbling to himself "those gulpers digest real slow. you got time." because he already going through withdrawals, help • so he ties her up like a dog and says the wasteland got its own rule and it's "thou shalt get distracted by bullshit every goddamn time" 😭 this is so a reference to gameplay and how they themselves are going on a fucking side quest lmao • lucy asking about dogmeat 😢 dogmeat staying because that gulper has siggi's head ☹️

• lmao maximus masquerading as lord titus asking thaddeus to say something about him • you know? it's good writing to me to explain why a [secondary] character would bully or behave as thaddeus has to maximus--- he's not merely a side character and wanted to say nothing but nice things about maximus when he thought he died, i'll give him that • "we can judge a person and a society by how they treat their enemy" goes boom because of the game lore and also because somebody kills all those raider prisoners lol • this disconnect between the vault dwellers and wastelanders--- they're talking about teaching these people shakespeare when some of them eat people for survival • norm wants the raiders to die and they keep showing steph and this might be a red herring but i think she poisoned them mfs, personally • hmm why does steph know what hank would do in this situation like that flgdlgdl • maximus trying to protect thaddeus from danger • thaddeus calling cooper an abomination because he's a ghoul 😭🖐️ • the little scream thaddeus makes as the gulper gets him ❤️ • dogmeat really loved siggi ☹️ • cooper and lucy walking near an incinerated hollywood tour bus is so lmao why cooper walk past that • at first i thought cooper was displaying cruelty by not letting lucy drink his water but then it occurred to me it might be irradiated, the next scene with water like this, she gets sick from radiation from drinking water • lmao when he emptied the last drops of water in his canteen out in the sand in front of her 😭 • "ain't much stays clean up here, vaulty" he is talking about himself • lucy gazing at a billboard of vault boy, cooper shooting the face, then they cut to vault boy's origins being cooper--- • symbolism and parallels like this can kill a man but i did want to just say there's so many layers to this. to be short he has such contempt, shame for what he thinks he's done, people hundreds of years later worship this thing that represents the end of civilization and he feels responsibility because he was deceived as well. lucy none the wiser. she just thinks he's crazy and horrible for no reason. if only she knew. • the road to hell is paved with good intentions

[13a07s]

Ovulation Week

(Koshi Sugawara)

[Artwork is not mine! Credit to SUKJA]

Requested by: Myself, duh

Word Count: 3,478

Warnings and/or Pre-Notes:

[Reader]'s being a horn-dog (sadly, no smut)

Hickeys

Mentions of Scratch Marks

Dry Humping/Sex

Sorry it took so long to get another story out. It's been hectic trying to balance work and moving :(

———————————————————————

My speaker leaks into Koshi's room when I open the bathroom door, painting his everything-in-its-place bedroom with a soft melody. Despite everything being kept perfect, my things are spread across the room. Textbooks and homework decorating his magazine-style perfectly made bed, my weekend bag hanging off his closet door, and my bookbag resting in the lounge chair in the corner.

     I slowly make my way over to Koshi's bed, tightening the towel hugging my body before I sit on the edge of it; a leg curled up under me as the other one dangles. My mind is preoccupied, putting my after-shower things on pause long enough to scroll through the school's homework app in search of Friday's lecture from my college algebra class.

     When I find the video, I boot it up making my teacher's monotone voice quickly replace the artist I was just listening to. My mind hangs onto every word of the lecture, dropping my phone to the bed before wandering off to coat my skin in lotion.

     I let my towel tumble to the ground, picking up the strawberry lotion Koshi keeps on his dresser for me to use. I hate the feeling of lotion on my hands, my skin instantly feeling like needles, but I like the smooth feeling it leaves everywhere else.

     I try focusing on my lecture, using it to ignore the feeling of lotion on my hands. I rub it into my skin as quickly as possible, rushing to coat my body in it and get it off my fingers. Once I'm done, I shake my hands around, rubbing them over my neck again to try and get the icky feeling off. When that doesn't work, I pick up my towel to rub the residue off; that does help.

     Slowly, I float over to the closet, tossing my body towel into Koshi's laundry basket before slowly shaking my hair out of the towel it's wrapped in; adding my second towel to the basket.

     My focus is back on my lecture, trying to visualize what the professor is saying. I was working on homework before my shower, trying to make a dent in it well Koshi was at volleyball practice.

     I always tease him about it, begging him to skip to spend more time with me, but I know he can't. A part of his scholarships is linked to the college's volleyball team so he has to go, hence why it's just teasing. I ended up getting frustrated with my math homework, so I decided to shower as a short break.

     I dig through my weekend bag, taking out my hairbrush before making my way back to the bed. I settle on the bedding again, crisscrossed on the mattress before I flip my phone the right way. My eyes stick to the screen, watching the different numbers shift and work their way through their equation.

     As I'm focused on the video lecture, I work my brush through my hair, carefully detangling it. My fingers work through my hair too, chasing after my hairbrush to help weave the knots out.

     The doorknob turning catches my attention, tugging my eyes away from my phone. "I don't know. Take out probably," Koshi's voice rings out, most likely answering his roommate.

     My boyfriend finishes opening his bedroom door, turning around to walk into the room. He freezes halfway through the frame, hand still clinging to the doorknob, eyes blown out as he stares at me, and mouth gapped open a bit.

     Small noises spill from Koshi, his cheeks quickly reddening. "I... um... Gorgeous, I..." He lets out a puff of air, eyes jumping around my body. His cheeks are as red as chili peppers at this point, almost painfully standing out against his pale skin.

     "I'm sorry," he finally pushes out, turning away from me. Koshi hurries back out of the room, slamming the door behind him, and making the whole doorframe shake. "Sorry, Gorgeous!" He yelps, the words a bit muffled.

     I stay still on the bed, slowly blinking at the wooden door as I finish brushing my hair. The sound of his roommate cackling snaps me out of the small trance I'm in, my head shaking at Koshi's behavior. I swear, that man acts like we didn't spend last night committing sins. "Koshi?" I call, rolling out of the bed.

     "Gorgeous?" He calls back, his voice a bit strained. "Are you... um..."

     This time I roll my eyes at the man, quickly making my way to his closet. I tug a shirt out of my bag, pulling on a set of underwear before I tug the cloth on over my head. As I'm situating my shirt, I make my way to the door. "Koshi," I repeat, opening the door enough for me to peer out.

     The man in question slowly turns around, his eyes instantly falling to my thighs where the hem of the shirt rests halfway down. "That's... uh... hi?"

     "Hello," I greet back, turning to walk away from the door. Koshi slips into the room, fully this time, before closing the door behind him. "You're such a weirdo," I tease, plopping back on his bed.

     "I'm not a weirdo. I just... panicked," he grumbles, buzzing around the room to put his shoes and bag in their places. "I didn't think you were going to be naked when I got home."

     "I didn't either," I giggle, flicking my eyes away from the lecture long enough to catch a glimpse of Koshi. "I thought you had practice until noon."

     "Coach let us out early," he shortly explains, a weary kiss being plopped to my head before he flutters away, flusteredness still lingering in his movements. "I'm going to go shower." I hum an acknowledgment toward him, pulling my textbook closer to me. "Can I borrow your phone or can you disconnect your phone from the speaker?" I hold my phone out toward him, too lazy to either one of his requests. "Thank you," Koshi mutters, taking my phone from me.

     Again, I hum, this one a 'you're welcome' instead of a simple acknowledgment. My lecture is cut off, replaced by whatever song he wants to listen to. Soon after, the sound of the shower running mixes with the soft music.

     I slowly melt off the bed, dragging my textbook with me until my knees meet his floor, the expensive book settling on the edge of the bed. I stay hunched over the mattress, eyes carelessly scanning the algebra I don't have a desire to understand. I bet I could talk Koshi into doing my math for me if I offered to do his history assignment.

My head lulls to the side, resting against the heavy knowledgeable but confusing writing, my mind repeatedly reading the same paragraph. "It would be easier to read if your head wasn't lying on the text," Koshi lectures, startling me a bit. I didn't notice his shower ending, or him leaving the bathroom.

Slowly I pick my head off the book, tilting it backward to look at my boyfriend. "It would be easier if you just did it for me," I murmur, most of my mind and my eyes preoccupied. Koshi is standing right behind me, a towel loose and low on his hips. My eyes eagerly follow the water droplets dripping from the ends of his hair, landing on his shoulders, sliding down to his chest and quickly trailing his torso before disappearing under his towel.

"You won't learn anything if I keep doing it for you," his lecture continues both hands on his hips, one focused on keeping his towel in place. How disappointing; an accidental towel drop would be enjoyable.

"Are you going to give yourself the same lecture next time you ask me to do your history assignment?" I ask, eyes jumping to find another droplet to tail.

"Touché," Koshi mutters, a lopsided smile on his face. "Still, math it's important."

"So is history."

     "You got me there," he softly chuckles, turning to walk away from me. First no towel drop and now no eye fucking either. How boring. "You can admire me after your homework is done," Koshi calls over his shoulder as if he can read my mind.

"Or I can admire you while I do my homework," I try to counter, turning so my eyes can roll across his back. Koshi's back is still littered with proof of last night; four beautiful scratch marks smoothly running across the dips and hills of his shoulder blades and a few hickeys littered here and there across his shoulders.

"We tried that last night and well... we both still have a mountain of homework to do," he mutters, checking himself over in the body mirror hanging on his wall before finally letting his towel drop.

My eyes quickly fall, admiring the hard work of receives and the standard volleyball stance. They sure have done wonders for my boyfriend's ass. I'm up on my feet within seconds, strolling my way over to the beautifully slim setter. "So?" I murmur, wrapping my arms lower than needed on his torso.

"So," Koshi teases, a wider smile on his face as he stares at me in the mirror. "We have homework to do."

"I want to do you," I tell him, suctioning my mouth to a lower section of his shoulder.

"Can do."

"Yes," I softly cheer, the word dragged out as I celebrate.

"After all our homework is done."

"No," I whine, stringing the word out in a similar fashion.

     "Well one of us has to be responsible and it's not you, Gorgeous," Koshi teases, a hand settling on top of where my wrists cross over his stomach. He softly squeezes my wrists, tipping his head to gently knock it against mine.

"You don't always have to be responsible," I murmur, letting my fingertips toy with the v-lined muscles that stretch down his stomach and aim toward his dick.

A shiver rattles through Koshi, his hand tightening around my wrist from the soft touches. "Gorgeous," he mutters, cheeks red again, paired with a weary smile as he looks at me through the mirror. "We have homework to do."

"And I have you to do," I tease, latching my mouth to his shoulder again. "You're so tense from practice. Let me help you relax a bit before we work on homework," I add, letting my fingers trail the outline of his abdomen again.

Koshi shivers again, his eyes fluttering closed as he enjoys the soft touches of my fingertips and the gentle sucking of my lips. Hissy breaths spill from him, chest pumping a bit quicker. "Kosh," I purr, sliding my tongue over one of the bruises I placed on him last night. The bruise isn't left alone for long, my mouth instantly replacing my tongue to deepen the coloring.

"Gorgeous?" He calls back, my pet name coming out staggered from Koshi's attempt to hide his noises. "We... we have... homework. Homework," he mutters, tugging my hands off himself.

I pout, but detach myself from his shoulder and let him tug my touch away from his stomach. "I don't want to do my homework."

"You have to, Gorgeous. How else am I supposed to have a high-positioned sexy sugar mama to take of me?" Koshi teases, raising my hands so he can press a few kisses across them.

"You could pick a different field to go into," I joke back, a soft sigh leaving my body because of the gentle loving he's always quick to offer. Koshi's wanting to be a teacher is part of why I love him. It's always so cute seeing him so excited about becoming a teacher. So, as long as he enjoys being a teacher, I don't mind being the future breadwinner of our home.

"Never," he mutters, pecking my knuckles once more before dropping his hold on my hands. "Go start your homework while I get dressed."

I whine as I slouch back over to the bed. I don't want to do my homework, I don't want to be responsible. I want Koshi buried between my thighs; his head or his dick, I'd be happy with either. I flop on the bed, careful to avoid all my stuff littered on the covers.

My eyes are back to trailing over my boyfriend, not hiding my thoughts or the fact I'm sure I'm looking at him like a slab of meat. I wonder if I'm ovulating. Maybe that's why I'm so wrapped up with Koshi.

My sights trail his every movement, watching as he tugs on a pair of boxers, hiding his delicious v-line and his dick I feel like I'm melting over. I'm definitely ovulating. A disappointing sigh spills from me when a shirt is pulled over Koshi's head, hiding my hard work from the night before. "We should have sex."

His cheeks flesh for a second, another shaky smile on his face. "Gorgeous, I enjoy having you in that sort of way, all the time. I'd even enjoy it now, but we should get our homework done."

I groan, letting myself slide off the bed again. My head lulls to the side, watching my boyfriend make his way to me, to his bed. "It's only Saturday. We could do it tomorrow."

"We said that last night but guess what? We spent the whole night pleasing your hormones," he softly chuckles, crouching down to be closer to my height. "You're a needy thing during your ovulation."

That makes my face heat up. I've been with Koshi long enough that I shouldn't be embarrassed about my cycle but I still am; some parts of it more than others, of course. "You don't know that's what's going on for sure," I mutter, snapping my head away from him.

"Of course I do," he murmurs back, toying with the ends of my hair, a cocky smile on his face. "Do you honestly think I didn't check your cycle app after you tried to fuck me in the parking lot last night?"

My cheeks heat up more at Koshi's soft teasing; partly because I'm embarrassed and partly because it's true. I was ready to fuck him in the back seat of my car if he would have let me. "Stop being so hot and maybe it won't be such a problem."

He leans down, shoving his nose into my neck to hide his heated cheeks. "Come on, let's do our homework," Koshi mutters, his arms wrapping around me to help pull me to my feet. I continue to groan, letting him tug the both of us upright. "Homework, Gorgeous, then I'll do whatever you want."

"Whatever I want?" I ask, cheering up at the offer, a million different ideas already flickering through my mind.

"Within reason," he backtracks, a soft pink dusting his cheeks once again. Koshi continues tugging on me, placing me back on the bed. As soon as my back hits the mattress, I wrap my legs around his waist, keeping them tight over his hips. His cheeks grow darker and his breath a bit huffy as I pull him against me. "Gorgeous, this isn't homework," he mutters, hands gripping my thighs as he looks down at me.

"Sure it is. It's an anatomy lesson," I tease, arching my hips up to press against his slowly growing hard-on.

A soft noise bubbles from the boy between my legs, the sound coming out muffled from him trying to shove it back down his throat. "Neither of us are taking an anatomy class this semester," he babbles, eyes closed tightly, and hands tight on my flesh.

"So?" I ask, tightening my legs again, keeping Koshi pressed against me.

A muffled whine falls from him, his fingernails digging into my thighs. "Just... a few assignments, Gorgeous. You only have like... four or five, right? It won't take that long. I'll even do your math homework for you."

"What a sweet boy I have," I coo, jerking my hips upward once more before dropping my legs off of him.

Koshi doesn't move away from me though, in fact, he pulls me closer, the imprint in his boxers rubbing against my panties. He's softly panting, working his hips against mine as his eyes bounce around the textbooks spilled out on his bed. "You'll... you'll do my history for me... right? Since I'm doing your math homework?"

"Of course, baby," I mutter, my hands shooting forward to cling to the hem of his shirt. My back arches a bit, helping Kosh rub against the right spot. My perfectly kept, strait-laced boyfriend is as much a sex fiend as I am, he just hides it better than me.

His movements stall every few thrusts, freezing for a moment as he whines before he picks them up again. "Temptress," Koshi whimpers, pressing his hips against me once more before jerking away from me.

He rolls over, lying on the bed next to me as he tries to calm himself down. Koshi's eyes are closed, his panting slowing down as he unwinds the workup he caused himself. Well, I might have had a hand in it too. "Gorgeous temptress," he teases again, opening his eyes and turning his head toward me.

"You love it," I poke back, rolling on top of him, my knees on either side of his body as I settle myself pressed against him. Instantly, Koshi's hands jump up, clinging to my hips.

"Temptress, temptress, temptress," he babbles, helping me to rub myself against him. My eyes tumble over Koshi, watching the slow build-up of his needs again as I fake-ride him.

"Homework," he suddenly yelps, flipping us over. He's quickly parted from me, cheeks bright and movements flustered as he works his distance from me. I can't help the soft giggles from spilling over, my flustered Koshi fixing his penis in his boxers as he mutters to himself about me being a 'temptress' and a 'distraction'.

"You loved every second of that and you know it," I tease, sitting upright, my knees situated under myself as I watch him walk circles in his room. "It wouldn't hurt to just slide yourself in."

"Stop that," he yelps, shooting me a stern look. "Stop trying to distract me. We're doing our homework. No sex until our homework is done, am I understood?"

"Yes, Sugawara-Sensei," I continue to tease, faking a nervous twirling of the hem of my shirt. "I won't let it happen again, Sensei. I hope my misbehavior doesn't get me detention. I would just hate two hours alone in a room with you. Absolutely hate being bent over your desk while you spank my ass with a ruler - "

     "Homework!" Koshi yelps, cutting off my teasing role-play. Maybe that's why I'm so delighted that my boyfriend wants to be a teacher; it'll make for a fun reoccurring role-play. His cheeks are on fire, the reddest they've been all day as he stumbles around the room, reaching for my math textbook so he can do my homework for me.

     I can't help the smug grin on my face or the chuckles that spill from his reaction. Who says we have to wait for Koshi to get his degree before he's a teacher? He can teach me. "Alright," I pretend to give in, mischief already being plotted.

     He settles on the bed, propped up against the headboard as he glances through the chapter. I go into action, handing him my notebook with the pencil through the spine and the neglected calculator so he doesn't have to move from his spot. Koshi is quickly sliding into productive mode, mumbling to himself as he looks over the homework assignment doodled on the top of the page. Thirty questions from the last page of the chapter; not a lot quantity-wise but a lot time-wise.

     My eyes stay stuck on him, waiting for him to start working through the first question. When the pencil hits the paper, I start inching forward, slowly making my way under his arm and into his lap. "Koshi?"

     "Gorgeous?" He mutters, eyes flicking back and forth from my textbook to my notebook. I jerk my hips, Koshi's hand shooting down to grip my hips as he stifles a whine. "My darling gorgeous woman, I'm doing your homework for you so you don't have to."

     "I know you are," I hum, setting a slow pace to my hips. "But you said I 'won't learn anything if you keep doing it for me' so, teach me, Sugawara-Sensei," I start up my flirting again, pushing my hips down harder to add more pressure to his still-hard dick.

     "I swear, your ovulation week is going to be the death of me," he breathes out, breath shaky and strained as he shoves my hips into a faster pace.

     "You enjoy my ovulation week."

     "Ya, ya, I do."

[kells-studies]

August 9th 2024, Friday .ᐟ .ᐟ

Accomplished:

• Pre-Algebra Unit 1: Factors and Multiples — completed and mastered all lessons via the unit exam

Notes for Today:

• Felt quite sick once I started studying, didn’t get much done today unfortunately but there’s always tomorrow and at least I finished a unit in Pre-Algebra :’)

[my-autism-adhd-blog]

Hi so I’m an incoming freshman I have autism and ADHD I was wondering do you have any tips for high school specifically for people with autism and ADHD like me? Thank you for your time!!

Hi there,

It’s been out of school since 2015, so I’m rusty with tips. However I did find one article listing 12 tips that might help:

1. You don’t need ONE study space.

A well-stocked desk in a quiet place at home is key, but sometimes you need variety. Coffee shops, libraries, parks, or even just moving to the kitchen table will give you a change of scenery which can prompt your brain to retain information better.

2. Track more than HW in your school planner.

Keeping a calendar helps you plan ahead—but you’ve got more going on than just homework assignments! Make sure you’re marking your extracurricular, work, and social commitments, too. (Tests, band practice, away games, SAT dates, half-days and holidays are just a few examples of reminders for your planner.)

3. Start small.

If you’ve got a big assignment looming, like a research paper, stay motivated by completing a piece of the project every few days. Write one paragraph each night. Or, do 5 algebra problems from your problem set at a time, and then take a break.

4. School supplies (alone) don’t make you organized.

Come up with a system and keep to it. Do you keep one big binder for all your classes with color-coded tabs? Or do you prefer to keep separate notebooks and a folder for handouts? Keep the system simple—if it’s too fancy or complicated, you are less likely to keep it up everyday.

5. Get into a routine.

When will you make the time to do your homework every day? Find the time of day that works best for you (this can change day-to-day, depending on your schedule!), and make a plan to hit the books.

6. Learn how to create a distraction-free zone.

A study on workplace distractions found that it takes workers an average of 25 minutes to return to what they were working on pre-interruption. Try turning off your phone notifications or blocking Twitter (temporarily) on your computer so you can concentrate on the homework tasks at hand.

7. Get real.

When you’re looking at the homework you have to get done tonight, be realistic about how long things actually take. Gauging that reading a history chapter will take an hour and writing a response will take another 30 minutes will help you plan how you spend your time.

8. Use class time wisely.

Is your teacher finished lecturing, but you still have 10 minutes of class left? Get a jump on your chemistry homework while it’s still fresh in your mind. Or use the time to ask your teacher about concepts that were fuzzy the first time.

9. Look over your notes each night to make sure you've got it.

Fill in details, edit the parts that don’t make sense, and star or highlight the bits of information that you know are most important. Interacting with your notes will help you remember them. You can also use Homework Help to get your questions answered 24/7.

10. Study a little every day.

Cramming Spanish vocabulary for a quiz might work in the short-term, but when comes time to study for midterms, you’ll be back at square 1. You might remember the vocab list long enough to ace the quiz, but reviewing the terms later will help you store them for the long haul.

11. Don’t let a bad grade keep you down.

A rough start to the semester doesn’t have to sink your GPA. Take proactive steps by checking your grades regularly online and getting a tutor if you need one.

12. Make a friend in every class.

Find a few people you can contact from each of your classes if you have a homework question or had to miss class (and do the same for them!).  Then when it comes time to study for exams, you'll already have a study group.

The article will be below:

I hope this helps. Thank you for the inbox. I hope you have a wonderful day/night. ♥️

[cassiopedias]

@cassiopedias’ studyblr introduction

all images are by sleepydaze

a little about me:

name’s cameron, but you call me cassie :)

eighteen years-old

from the united states

college freshman

social work major

classes this semester:

principles of microeconomics

english composition ii

elementary arabic i

pre-calculus algebra

sociology: global perspective

hobbies & interests:

reading/listening to podcasts

recreational swimming

taking walks/hikes

abrahamic religions

semitic languages

coming soon:

@thereadingchallengechallenge’s “#booklr reads australian” challenge

100 days of productivity challenge

@caramelcuppaccino’s “#languagelearningwithlunlun” challenge

my inspos:

@notetaeker @lottiestudying @learnelle @socstudies @bookspinesandspectacles @mackademic @isasarchives @notes-and-chronicles @lacaffeina @phantomcardigan @equinesandeducation @owlchimedes @medstudentblues @emgoesmed @micadomi @juliistudies @princesastudies @slythdiaries

seriously you all are amazing <3

[moralesmilesanhourlibrary]

school days

summary: bumping into miles on the first day of school. originally posted: sept. 18, 2019 a/n: I apparently originally planned for this to have multiple parts...? But clearly that did not happen lmao.

Physics was your first class.

Everyone was lined up in front of the classroom and asked to "enter silently".

Guess who had to sit in the very first row?

Each student received a black, college ruled notebook for labs and note-taking. Absently, you stare into the blue horizontal stripes of your notebook.

Vacant.

Taunting.

The thought of how each line would eventually need to be filled by the end of the year creates an abyss in your stomach.

You sat for what felt like years into the clean, white, uniform notebook paper until you're startled out of your trance by the woman standing at the front of the classroom, clearing her throat at you.

She sharply gestures towards herself, meaning "I'm up here".

Snapping your head back up, you realize that everyone had been rapidly setting up their notebooks, numbering pages and writing their names. You'd have to finish at home.

The next three classes floated right past you then, suddenly, you were making your way downstairs to the lunchroom.

You didn't know what you expected the cafeteria to look like, but it sure wasn't this!

The lunchroom was emmaculate. The white tiled floors were freshly waxed, the walls painted blue and yellow with stenciled murals of various historical figures. The windows above the cafeteria let in some afternoon sun let in just enough light to almost convince you that you'd had a great day.

What you were most interested in, though, was the smell of tomato sauce and cheese that wafted from the serving area.

You grab a seat at one of the long white tables on the right of the room; it was the emptiest table available,

but not for long.

You recognized that afro immediately.

It was the kid that almost injured you earlier! You intentionally turned your head away so that he knew you were NOT tryna talk, but Locker Kid unfortunately did not get the message. You feel a tap on your shoulder.

" 'Scuse me"-

The kid also had the audacity to touch you! Great!

You violently turn your entire body to face him and give your best glare.

"Uh, you dropped your pen third period?"

Your posture relaxes as you take a second to register that it was, in fact, your pen that the boy held out to you in his palm.

Were you being too mean..?

Avoiding eye contact, you take the pen and force out a quick "thanks" before getting up to go pick up a tray of food.

This school may look nicer, but all schools have the same cardboard-and-cheese they called pizza. Still, you made an attempt to take a few bites so that you didn't COMPLETELY starve later.

Out of curiosity, you examine Locker Kid while he wasn't looking. His complexion was a couple shades lighter than your own mahogany skin. You both wore the same starched royal blue blazers and white shirts, as did everyone else.

God, you hated that uniform.

He took a paper bag out of his backpack, containing a chopped cheese sandwich wrapped in tinfoil, the sight of which only made you hungrier. Lost in your thoughts about food, the boy catches you staring.

He asks with a nervous grin, "want a piece?"

You? ASK for food from a STRANGER?

In an attempt to salvage some dignity, you shake your head no.

The kid insists.

"I owe you for slamming into you earlier," he awkwardly laughs.

You shrug and decide to take half of the sandwich. Admittedly, it's way better than the school pizza.

"Thanks," you tell him, meaning it this time.

The boy gives you a grateful grin, and the two of you eat in peaceful silence amongst the clamor of the rest of the cafeteria.

Before you know it, the bell rings and you make your way through a sea of students upstairs and to your last three classes.

Peering at your schedule, you see that you have literature, pre-calc, then algebra 1. The majority of said classes consisted of teachers introducing themselves and previewing coursework, you were relieved to find.

Leaving your final class of the day, you abruptly halt your quick steps as you nearly bump into someone.

Looking up from your shoes, you're met with a familiar set of brown eyes:

It was the boy who'd shared his lunch with you!

His expression lights up as he recognizes you, "Hey! We stay bumping into each other huh?"

A grin ghosts your face as you start to warm up to him. None of your friends had transferred to this school, so you might as well make yourself a new one, right?

"Well since we pretty much know each other by now, I never caught your name?"

"Miles."

Miles. You tried to remember that name as you made your way home.

[phykios]

Review: "I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher"

It was a long wait for the Black Sails reunion tour–but it was worth it!

Jokes aside, I first started to really get excited for Percy Jackson 2023 once I saw the news that Jonathan Steinberg had been tapped as showrunner. (This is the first weekly plug to go watch Black Sails if you haven’t, btw.) Despite a rough and rocky start, Black Sails surpassed the usual limits of a “boobs, blood and sex” costume drama and pivoted into some seriously excellent character-driven drama, and I’m hopeful that Percy Jackson can do the same. Awkward preamble completed, allow me to jump right into the good, the bad, and the as-yet-unquantifiable: 

(Because I know this fandom has a tendency to get, uh, wacky, let me preface this by saying that these are my opinions, and they are just opinions. Any comments on acting, writing, directing, etc., are not attacks on the people behind them, and should not be treated as such. I firmly believe critique is an act of love, and that the best reviews don’t change minds, but treat readers to another point of view instead.)

Percy Jackson opens in a dream. Slowly, against the backdrop of thunder and french horns, our hero emerges from the storm, walking slowly to the foreground. This dreamlike quality continues as we are treated to a minute and a half of flashback, the diegetic noises of the world muted in favor of Percy’s narration, and further into the beginnings of the adapted book content. Percy is, of course, immediately drawn to the statue of his namesake, but it’s a motivation more deeply underpinned by Sally, played by the frankly phenomenal Virginia Krull, before the warm, golden memory is rudely interrupted by the present, and the first real glimpse of the mythological world.

As Percy force-shoves Nancy Bobofit into a fountain (the CGI is pretty bad, honestly. But CGI has been bad everywhere, so I’ll let it slide), Megan Mullally’s Mrs. Dodds makes her grand, 30-second appearance. This little encounter–it feels like an overstatement to call it a “fight”–is over almost before it begins. I would have liked this scene to have a little more weight to it, given that it is the first encounter with the mythological world… but at the same time, I think the understated nature works in two ways: first, I am so, so glad to see something other than bog standard action flick fight, and second, the way she moves through the crowd without them noticing her adds to the feelings of isolation and “brokenness” that Percy struggles with. No one else even notices the monster making her way towards him. I think it’s a direction that speaks on multiple levels, recalling particularly the underlying theme of useless/abusive adults in the books. 

Which makes it all the sadder when Grover briefly turns on Percy and gets him expelled. I have to commend Aryan here for this scene–he’s clearly struggling with the decision to get Percy out of there, keeping him safe at the expense of their friendship. I really like how Aryan plays Grover’s more anxious side, but also as someone who can step up and push down his fear in order to do his job. It would have really been easy to play him as a one-note, terrified sidekick, and I’m glad Grover has some spine. 

And speaking of one note–Gabe. I understand why they downplay some of his more blatantly abusive aspects, and I think they make up for it with the surrounding shots, especially Percy sighing in the hallway as he hears him yelling, and Eddie the plumber apologizing for putting him in a mood, but I’m not sure I’m sold on it, yet. Right now, he doesn’t come off as someone who deserves death-by-Medusa-head, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they dial him up later on. 

Also, Virginia Krull is incredible. She was, far and away, my favorite performance of the premiere, particularly in the scene at Montauk. Krull’s Sally has the toughness that the books always implied, at least in the early days, but never really demonstrated until much later in the series, layered beneath an easy sweetness that makes it really, really easy to forgive her for keeping secrets. Ironically, Krull’s performance makes Gabe somewhat more palatable, as it seems like she can go toe-to-toe with him, instead of acting like a more stereotypically “docile” battered spouse. 

The Montauk scene is easily an episode highlight. Whether it’s Sally forcing out her unbelievable truth, or visibly crying while Percy pours his heart out to her about being broken, Walker and Krull are fantastic together, even in an exposition-heavy scene like this. 

I’m going to gloss over the drive and the Minotaur fight scene, because otherwise I’d just be repeating stuff I’ve already said, namely that Aryan and Krull are great actors, and the CGI is pretty ugly. Instead, I’ll just briefly touch on the fight–very well directed, and I appreciated that they were able to have both the visual of the sword with all its associated gravitas, and also the more visceral stabbing from the book–and point out that we end where we begin, in a hazy, dreamlike state, with the mysterious, shadowed figures of Chiron and the gang welcoming him to camp. 

This series feels different than a lot of TV. It definitely has a more cinematic feel, and the tone is much, much less jokey than I had feared. The books have a lot of humor to them, but ironically, the show leaning into the more “magical realism” which Riordan almost studiously avoids in the books helps to keep it balanced and un-cartoonish. Visually, I think the lighting is really emotionally effective, but only for the daytime, and suffers from the same “can’t light night”-ism that plagues modern television. Compare in particular Percy before and after Grover, Percy with his mother at the Met, and then the three of them running from the Minotaur at night. 

All in all, a really solid premiere. A little exposition-heavy, which is unfortunately something that carries over into the next one, but when it’s delivered with some excellent performances, it’s easy to overlook. 

Stray thoughts:

I need more Mythomagic. I need more Mythomagic

The marble statues are pretty ugly imo, but that might just be because I am currently spoiled for marble statues in my day-to-day

Percy and Grover swap sandwich fillings 🥺 Percy takes Grover’s lunchmeat

Sally bullfighting with Percy’s red coat… so good

Thalia’s tree with lightning crashing overhead!

Hopefully I can get the next review up tomorrow? And I’ll talk more about Walker in that one, along with some other thoughts on costume, set design, and other more technical stuff

[er-cryptid]

[thevestigeofvanillaan]

Dreary.

Sasuke Uchiha x Fem Reader.

angst. nerd reader, sasuke is a jock. highschool au. good ending? smut 18+ minors please do not interact!! pre-relationship. secretive. somewhat public sex. cervix kissing. spanking. mention/underage use of alcohol and drugs.

"Out of my way loser." Shikamaru, a tall, handsome jock in uniform shoves me into a locker as he walks past with several similarly uniformed jocks.

"Aren't you excited? You look so bummed out.. Big football game tonight!!" My friend, Ino says enthusiasticly, walking up to me.

She's a hot blonde, who's tall, and a cheerleader. She's gorgeous.

And I'm just me. In a big school. A nobody compared to others.

Ino and I have been friends since we were younger since we lived close.

"Yeah, I guess. Why did they choose today? It's so muggy out." I ask.

"Because by tonight it'll be dark and foggy. The field will be more stiff by then. It looks so pretty out there."

"You cheering tonight? I'd wish to have someone in the stands with me." I fake a smile.

"You know.." She pauses. "You can come sit on the track where we cheer. Perfect view of the game, and you'll have some friends to talk to!" She proposes.

I contemplate whether I should or not.

But eventually decide.

"I'd love to. I can get some work done since there won't be so many loud people shoving me up on the bleachers.." I giggle a bit.

"Loosen up, have fun.. You're so stressed about school work. There's a party after the game I want us to go to. Come on.. it's our senior year! Have fun with us!" Ino places a hand on my shoulder with a genuine expression on her face.

"I guess I could take ONE night off the notebook." I enunciate the one, showing no mercy of not doing it again.

She hugs me and squeals. "I'll see you tonight at the game!" She shouts as she walks off to her class.

I sigh and walk to my next class too, as passing time is almost over.

I sit down at my seat in last period, which is algebra.

"Hey Mrs. Eddie." A deep voice sounds.

I look behind me only to roll my eyes when I see Sasuke enter the room.

I don't like Sasuke. He's so rude and pushy. He thinks everything is about him.

He's a gorgeous jock. Everyone loves him.

Except me.

"Well hello Sasuke! Are you excited for the game tonight?" Mrs. Eddie, a young, and very attractive young women walks over to his desk, behind mine.

"Sure am, comin' to watch me?" He asks her.

"Well of course! Only for my favorite boy out there!" She giggles and walks back to her desk.

Barf.

He kicks the back of my seat as he usually does.

"What do you want Sasuke?" I turn around and ask him this same repetitive question I ask him almost every day.

"You goin' to the game tonight?" He asks.

"Yeah. And I'm sitting on the track." I turn around.

But he continues the conversation, curious.

"Oh? And what are you gonna do there? Cheerlead?" He laughs hysterically at the thought of a nerd cheerleading.

"What if I was?" I ask.

"I wouldn't believe my eyes. What are you actually gonna do?" He asks seriously.

"School work." I ask bluntly.

"Lame. You goin' to that party?"

Why does he ask so many questions?

"Yes."

"Seriously? I thought that shit wasn't your type of thing." He asks.

"It's not. Ino convinced me since it's senior year to loosen up and do something fun for once."

"Of course she did." He adds.

"Alright class. Open your math books to page 245." Mrs. Eddie says to start class.

Time goes by quickly when I hear the end of day announcements about the game.

I stretch and crack my back from the annoyingly uncomfortable position I was sitting in while taking notes.

Sasuke grabs my wrist and pulls me to stand up.

"I hope you slip on that field, Uchiha." I whisper when our faces are almost touching from how he pulled me up.

"You weigh as much as a feather." He ignores my previous statement, getting out of my face and releasing my wrist. "I'll see you tonight."

And off he goes with his book bag, out the classroom to his car.

I notice he forgot his reading glasses that he never wear on his desk.

I grab them and run to go find him.

Damn that kid is fast.

Already at his car?

I went to his car and there he is, talking to Naruto.

I walk up to him. "You forgot your glasses."

"Oh." Is all he says before he grabs the glasses from my loose grip, getting in his car with the window rolled down.

I walk off to my own car, getting ready to go home.

I receive a text from Ino.

"I can pick you up so you have an easy ride to the party after, come wearing a dress. The theme for the game is formal wear anyway." She wrote.

That's stupid. Why should I go to a football game wearing a dress?

"Okay." I type back to her.

I start my car and hear the load engine roar, the radio turns on and starts playing some sort of 2000's rbnb music as I drive out of the parking lot.

I don't live too far from the school. So I arrive at home and park my car in the driveway.

I make my way inside, my father greeting me.

"Hey honey! How was school?" He asks, preparing some sort of food for himself.

"It was fine. I'm going to be with Ino tonight at the game and this party she wanted me to go to." I smile to him, placing my bag down.

"Be safe please. And no drinking or smoking. I was your age once, don't you forget!"

"I know dad. You know I'm not into this stuff." I chuckle.

"Just be safe.." He places his hands on my shoulder and I nod.

He brings me into a hug.

We let go and I head upstairs to my room to get my homework done.

I get all of it done and decide to take a shower, getting ready for the game which starts in about an hour and a half.

I grab a towel and go to the bathroom connected to my room.

I turn on the shower.

Warm temperature causing a bliss of warm clouds fogging the room.

I undress myself. Slipping out of my top. Unclipping my bra. Taking off my converse, then my socks. Unbuttoning my jeans and pulling down the zipper. Shimmying the uncomfortable, tight material down thick thighs. Stomping my ankles out of the pant. Looping my thumbs in my thong straps and pulling the underwear down to pool my ankles. I step out of them and kick the dirty clothes to the side.

I walk over to my walk in shower, feeling the mist of the water hitting my naked skin. Engulfing the hot air on my goosebump covered skin, making it all go away. I step in. Feeling my hair flatten, and my muscles relax.

I take shampoo and work it into my hair, closing my eyes, the sweet smell of the shampoo arousing in my hair. Rubbing my scalp. And washing it out just to do it again with conditioner before I grab my brush and begin to brush the wet hair. Knots effortlessly leave my head. Painlessly.

I turn and slip out a slight whimper when the warm beads of water hit my areolas. I cup my breasts for a moment before I grab body wash.

Putting the substance on the pink loofah before I run it under water quickly. Then I begin to rub it on my body.

I feel so relaxed. Everything I was worrying about had just faded away into the hot steam collecting on my mirror. The condensation that sticks to my floor, making it slippery, but not completely wet. Just dampened.

I let my head rest back, all the weight on my shoulders flowing off with the water. Creating a pool at my feet.

I rest for a moment before brushing my teeth and deciding to end my shower.

I open the translucent door to my walk in shower and immediately feel cool air rushing to stick to my skin, causing goosebumps to form. My lips quiver, and my teeth begin to chatter when I quickly grab my bath towel and wrap it around my cold body.

The most calming experience I've had in whiles - was that exact shower.

The cold weather outside fighting to beat the warm temperature of the water I was under.

In the end. It won that battle.

Because when I leave I enter reality once again. That it's late fall. And I still have things to do tonight.

I walk out of my bathroom, into my bedroom.

I look in my closet for a dress that wouldn't be too uncomfortable.

I found this tight black dress, it was long-sleeved, and reached to my mid-thigh.

I got a black bra and black underwear to wear as well so that nothing could possibly slip out.

I grab a black puffer coat that I've been waiting to wear for the longest time, but until now the weather has been so warm.

And now it's cool, and dreary out.

I get dressed quickly and receive another message from Ino.

"I'm outside." She wrote.

"Be right out." I text back.

I throw on some black doc martens and grab my purse before walking out to Ino's car.

I see her in her cheer uniform, and Sakura, another cheerleader that I'm also friends with sitting in the back seat. Ino sits in the passenger seat, alongside her boyfriend Sai. Sai is another quiet kid, but Ino really liked him throughout middleschool. They've been a thing since freshmen year.

I enter the backseat next to Sakura.

"Hi!!" Sakura yells, wearing her cheer uniform, giving me a quick hug.

"Hi guys! The uniforms are so cute!" I smile and try to yell over loud music.

"Thank you! Don't worry we brought dresses too for the party. I love your outfit!" Ino yells, looking back at me as Sai begins to drive to the school.

We arrive in a short amount of time. We get out of the car and I notice that it's real foggy, and dark out. Just like how Ino said it would be.

We walk up to the football field.

I see the other team, and then our team on the other side of the field.

The big scoreboard all lit up.

The blinding lights that light up the field.

We walk over to the track that surrounds the football field, making our spot almost right next to the other cheerleaders.

But we are right in front of the student section, where the many, many bleachers are already almost full.

"People must've been really excited for the big senior football game, huh." I say, placing down my purse near the gate where I'm going to be sitting.

"Yep! It's always a huge deal every year. But especially this year since the senior are just so dreamy.." Sakura says, admiring the team.

"They look so good in uniform.." Ino adds. "Baby, you would look really good in a uniform. I'd go wild." She smirks and hugs the taller figure.

"Thanks." He says quietly.

I couldn't deny.. they do look really good.

And although I hate Sasuke, he stands out. In a good way too.

I see Mrs. Eddie in the crowd smiling with her husband.

I scowl at the fact that she went to watch Sasuke but is with her husband.

Weirdo.

"Baby can you go get us some snacks from that consession stand?" Ino asks Sai.

"Yeah of course." He says before hopping over the gate and walking over.

"He's the best." Ino smiles, watching him go.

"You're so fortunate." I giggle at her.

"When are you gonna get a boyfriend?" Sakura asks me.

And without thinking I quickly say "When are you?"

There's silence.

"I didn't mean it like that hun.. it's just that I feel like it's nice to have someone like that." Sakura smiles and sits next to me on the ground against the gate.

I look at her and give her a sympathetic look.

She smiles, showing that she didn't take it like that.

Sai returns with some food and hands some to Ino and places the rest on the ground near us.

"You guys can take whatever you want." Ino smiles at us.

I smile back but politely decline her offer.

I'm not really hungry.

The foot ball players are let off after their stretches to come hang out before the game starts.

Sasuke and Naruto walk towards us.

"Hey!" Naruto waves and runs over here.

"Hi Naruto." I say.

"Surprised to see you here without a notebook." He laughs.

"Surprised to be here." I smile and stand up.

"I'm really cold." I say.

"Come inside, your wearing a tiny little dress, of course you're cold." Sasuke says, looking me up and down.

I follow him inside, waving my friends goodbye since they have to warm up with the cheer team.

"So, you really are coming the the party tonight." Sasuke says, looking at me.

I look back at him when we lock eyes. I quickly look at the ground awkwardly, but I can still feel his eyes on me.

"Yeah, I guess so." My hands are in the pockets of my puffer coat.

We enter the school and I take my coat off.

Sasuke takes the coat from me and carries it himself.

"Where are we supposed to go?" I ask.

"If you want to we can just roam the halls." He says.

I look up at him and nod assuringly.

We walk together in the desolate hallways of our highschool.

"Are you going to college for football?" I ask.

"That's the idea." He responds. "Can't believe this is my last highschool game though."

"I bet." I smile at the floor.

He leads me up the stairs.

"I don't seem to understand you.." He begins.

But he stays silent for a moment.

"And why is that?" I ask him to keep talking.

"Because everyone is so attracted to me. And you're just.. different. You little nerd." He chuckles deeply.

I wanna squeeze my legs together after that hardy laugh of his came out.

"What do you mean? You're saying I'm not attracted to you?" I ask.

"Yeah, pretty much." He summarizes.

"I mean.. You're pretty annoying."

"You callin' me pretty, princess?" He looks at me and smirks when I look back up at him.

"No.. I never said that!" I giggle.

"Oh but you're thinking about it aren't you."

"No.. maybe." I blush slightly and look down.

Since when was he so... charming.?

We walk in silence for a few more minutes before he leads me back downstairs and he hands me my coat.

"Thanks." I say, putting on the puffy product.

"You're welcome." He says before opening the door, leading us outside.

He led me back to the track where the cheerleaders are before running onto the field.

Before the game begins, they congratulate the seniors on their final game and for the time and effort they've put into making the team a greater one.

"Welcome to the annual senior football game, or the last football game of the season." The speakers sound a raspy male voice.

"I'd love to congratulate the following senior football players. Naruto Uzamaki, Sasuke Uchiha, Shikamaru Nara, and Kiba Inuzuka. Thank you all for contributing to making the football team not only great, but remarkable. You guys may collect your flowers and name bomber jackets after the game tonight. I hope everyone enjoys the final game of the season." He concludes the announcement.

Everyone begins clapping and getting extremely hyped up and the game begins shortly after.

The game goes by quickly. Almost too quickly.

Our team winning within an hour due to mercy rule.

Their team hadn't even scired a touchdown.

Each time we scored a touchdown the band in the stands would play victory music.

And at the very end to celebrate our victory they played the entire song.

He wasn't lying when he said the team was great and remarkable.

I've never seen such a thing.

By the end we all get ready to leave. Which I'm excited to do as I was fucking freezing.

Before we leave, I admire the dreary atmosphere.

It's gorgeous.

Foggy. Dark. Desolate. And Dreary.

It's everything.

It'd the end too. I'll never be able to experience this again.

"Hey, Ino. I'm really glad you had me come out tonight." I smile as I catch up beside her, walking to her car.

"Of course honey. It sucks that this is the last time we're ever really going to have an event like this happening." She frowns, but then she smiles. "But at least we can still party!!" She yells, causing Naruto, Kiba, Sasuke, Sakura, and even Sai to start shouting too.

I laugh.

Sasuke comes over to me. "Wanna ride with me? I'm lonely!" He yells over the shouting adolescents around us.

"Yeah sure!" I yell back and he grabs my arm, leading me to his car.

We're laughing and running together in the soft mist falling from the leaves above us.

And it's then that I realize that I think I've fallen in love with him.

This has always been my dream.

Being able to laugh and have fun with someone like this in the dreary world we live in.

We get to his car and just stand there, both hands in eachothers.

"I wanna try something.." He says.

I giggle "Try what?"

"Kiss me." He says before letting go of my hands and putting them on my waist, pulling my cold body closer to his.

Without a word, I bring my hands to his jaw and pull his face closer to mine.

I stand on tippy toes so I can reach the already slightly bent over man.

I feel hot breath hit my face, and can see the white clouds from the hot air hitting the cold atmosphere.

I sit for a moment and smile. He smiles too before closing his eyes.

I follow him and close my own eyes.

I pull him as he pulls my waist and our lips collide with one another.

The sultry feel of his lips is not only breath taking, but addictive. I can't get away from it. I want to feel it forever.

We release before he pecks my lips once more and I let go of his jaw. I get off my tippy toes and he straightens his posture, looking down at me.

I look back up at him.

My face feels so red and hot.

My lips feel wet and puffy.

I smile at him.

He smiles back before almost snapping out of a trance.

He coughs then proposes "We should get going." And walks to the driver side of the car.

I walk to the passenger seat, frowning.

Wishing, no, wanting that moment to have gone on longer.

But it was just a kiss.

In this dreary parking lot.

With someone who meant nothing to me yesterday.

I buckle my seat belt and he begins driving, not bothering to put on his or even turn on music.

"Where is the party?" I ask.

"Shikamaru's house, he lives pretty close to the school." He responds, pulling out of the school property.

"Oh, yeah, he lives on my road." I say.

"So it'll be easy to get you home then won't it." He smirks at me. "Just don't get drunk princess."

I smile back at him.

We make in there in the next two minutes.

"I'm gonna change in the bathroom, come with me?" He asks.

"Yeah, sure." I say.

"Great." He says, parking and opening his door.

We both exit the vehicle and go to the front door, where we enter what's already a shit hole full of teenagers.

He grabs my wrist so he won't lose me and leads me to the bathroom.

Luckily no one is in there, so we can easily go in.

We go into the bathroom and Sasuke takes off the football gear he had on.

Right in front of me.

I covered my eyes.

"What are you, a virgin? You don't have to do that." He chuckles.

"Well I am a virgin, one, and two do you want me to open my eyes and watch you change?" I take my hands on my eyes to see him in boxers and no shirt.

I instantly blush and go to cover my eyes again when he grabs my wrist before I can.

"You're a virgin?" He asks.

"Yes..?" I question why he would ask that when I just said I was.

I mean.. yeah, virgin at 18 is kinda weird. But listen, I want it to be with someone I actually really like and wanna marry one day.

"How are you a virgin when you look like this?" He puts his hands on my waist.

"I just wanted it to be with the right person.." I say.

"I could be your right person." He says immediately after, almost cutting me off.

"Sasuke, how could you be the right person when we aren't even dating. We weren't even talking like that before what? Five minutes ago? I don't think so."

"Wow. You wound me. You don't want this baby? We could have this.. we could have everything." He rolls his eyes dramatically and holds his heart.

"Sasuke.. it's not like that. I would love that but.."

"Then why won't you let me fuck you?" He cuts me off.

"You know what Sasuke. Maybe I will." I walk up to his placing my hands on his bare chest.

He takes my jacket off me.

"Yeah? You want me to punish you for arguin' with me?" He brings his hands to the bottom of my skirt before rolling it up, up, and further up..

Until it's up to my belly button.

"Huh?" You want that?" He brings his hands to the hem of my underwear, slowly pulling them down. "I want an answer."

"Yes, Sasuke." I nod, tears prick my lashline at subtle realization of what I'm doing.

But those tears of sadness turn to tears of neediness.

He pulls them down to pool at my ankles and turns me around violently, bending my over the sink.

"Now you can watch in the mirror as I fuck you since you're just such a naughty little virgin f'me."

Tears that were once stuck in my eyes begin to roll down my cheeks.

"Look at yourself." He pulls my hair back to make me look at myself in the mirror in front of me.

"Sasuke.." I moan softly.

"What?" He asks.

"Please.."

"Please what baby?"

"Please fuck me good.. wan' a remember you.." I moan when he messes with my clit.

"I will baby.."

I see in the mirror him pulling down his boxers and I can see his large cock spring from his boxers.

It bends downward from sheer mass weighing the large head downwards.

He leads it to my puffy and neglected cunt and I start to grind myself into him.

"Patience honey.." He flashes a toothy grin as he covers his tip in my essence before gently putting it in and completely out before repeating that motion.

After a few times, I suddenly feel more going into me.

It hurts.

It hurts so bad at first when he begins to fuck me with half his length.

Until that pain turned into an unbelievable wave of pleasure.

"Fuck-." I manage to moan out. "S'good.."

When he begins to fuck me with his full length I can feel it against my cervix.

"S'big Sasuke.." I moan out to him.

"It's okay baby.. doin' so good for me.. fuck. So tight!" He groans, kitting his head fall back with pleasure when he breaks me in.

I'm seconds from cumming already as I squeeze around him..

"Fuck! Are you about to cum?" He asks, fucking me harder as I suck him in.

My clit begging to be played with I reach my hand under and begin rubbing it in slopping circles.

"Mhm.." I respond to his previous question.

"Fuck me too baby.." He says, slapping my ass hard enough to leave marks.

"'M cumming!!" I moan loudly to warn him.

"Fuck!" He groans meeting his own climax.

His thrusts become slow and sloppy until it stops.

"Fuck.. Sasuke.." I breathe out heavily.

I watch his bare chest fall up and down as he's out of breath as well.

"I'm gonna.. stop by your house tomorrow.. with plan b.." He says inbetween breaths.

I giggle and stand up, pulling my dress down.

"I need to go home." I say, looking at my mascara covered under eyes and my messy hair.

He walks up behind me and hugs me.

"Look at us baby.. maybe I won't buy you plan b. Maybe I'll just keep you forever." He holds his hands on my stomach.

I giggle. "Keep me forever? You were just gonna leave me?"

He chuckles back. "I'm moving to go to college babe." He turns me around.

"But.."

"I know honey. But I'll still be right here." He pokes my heart.

"Was that your plan?" I shout at him. "To fuck me into remembering you and being attracted to you because I was the one fucking virgin girl who wanted a fucking future without you in it!?"

"Well now I'll be in your dreams and your future." He winks and had been putting on his sweatpants and a tight black shirt, along with his bomber jacket. "Now.. imma go party. But.. I'll always be with you okay? You're mine now. I'm no one else's. I'll visit you." We walks over and puts hands on my hips, kissing my cheek.

"I fucking love you but hate you so much for this." I chuckle and peck his lips.

"I love you." Is all he says when he walks out the bathroom.

I walk out after him, with no underwear on and go sit outside, away from the party.

The dreary outside world.

That I couldn't just live my dream in.

I hear someone open the door walking outside.

"Let's go home." I hear Sasuke say behind me. "My place. Stay the night with me."

I get up and go down the steps and enter his car.

He enters after me.

"I have your underwear." He chuckles and holds them out in front of me.

I go to take them but he pulls them back towards himself.

"They're mine now. Just a little something to have when I don't have you at college." He winks.

"So the reality is.. you fucked me so I could remember what you feel like while you're off at college.. and now I'm yours and only yours forever huh." I narrow it all down.

"Pretty much. You're my princess."

"And you're no knight in shining armor." I smile at him.

He begins driving his to his home, in the foggy, desolate, dreary nighttime weather.

I'm not even gonna lie rn, that was probably the most descriptive shower writing piece I've ever written/even seen.

But um yeah this is kinda based on a relationship I had in highschool but obviously most of it is not real.. because I would've not acted like that.

But I hope you guys enjoyed it lol it took me like 3 hours to write but I actually was really into this one and think it had some reality to it.

[fehtism]

Hello! I just reinstalled FEH after a few years (I dropped off during Book 4), and someone pointed me to your blog for help with figuring out the newer skills because DEAR GOD

I’m going to start digging through your posts, but if you take requests(?), I’d really appreciate a breakdown of how Smol Chrobin’s kit works because it consistently takes me 2-3 teams to take them down in Tempest Trials, my old blue mage haters don’t seem to work on them, and I have no idea why or what I should be doing better.

hiiii thank you for your ask!

you seem to have encountered the problem of duo f!robin being Unfair.

luckily you have some things going for you !

1) the youngins cannot counter at 1 range, if you smack with a strong melee unit you should be able to take em out

2) a good far save can take One hit and get some good damage on duo robin

there are also quite a few things against you

1) threat range is larger than you think due to getting another action after using reposition + orders warping

2) has after combat healing + healing with flare

3) hits like a truck

4) stupid fast ... if you haven't played for a while most if not all of your units will get doubled

...

the tldr of young chrobin kit

after using reposition buffs self. gets atk/spd stat stack , extra damage , and canto 1. also after reposition debuffs any of your units within 3 rows and 3 columns . has tempo to make sure you get pranked by special. also has a really stupid "solve for X" stat stack formula which in short gives more stats if foe is equipped with low cd special. also gets bonus damage from multiple parts of kit.

for the long explanation ...

duo chrobin prf weapon has a stupidly long description so lets see if i can break it down in a way that makes sense

duo chrobin has a exclusive debuff called "hush spectrum". the effects of hush spectrum are as follows:

1) afficted units get -5 to all stats in combat

2) afflicted units get affected by scowl at start of combat. (scowl is special cd +1 at start of combat. this happens before your first attack and regardless of who initiates. this means even if you attack with a pre charged special you will not be able to activate it on your first attack. scowl does not affect aoe specials or defensive specials)

hush spectrum is a mid turn debuff and activates after duo chrobin uses an assist skill. this will occur practically every turn in practice due to duo chrobin getting a second action (similar to legendary chrom's "to change fate") after using an assist. using an assist will also grant special cd -1 to duo chrobin allowing them to easily precharge specials.

as for other effects of the weapon, duo chrobin gets 30% pierceable damage reduction on first hit (similar to skills like remote sparrow) as well as a bonus to all stats.

feh is making you do algebra here so the formula for the stat bonus is as follows:

X = 16 - (foes maximum special cd x2) min 8

in practice the stat stack is:

+14 to all stats vs foe with 1 cd special , +12 for 2 cd , +10 for 3 cd and so on.

important to note that the current weapon description is incorrect and states that this formula is for stat debuffs on foe rather than in combat stat buff for duo chrobin. the feh twitter account stated that this would be corrected in a future update.

as for the rest of the kit...

reposition is a standard movement assist

flare is a relatively new infantry mage locked special (released with brave soren in ... august ?) it has a dynamic effect based on the user's hp when special activates.

if hp is at or above 70%, increases damage based on 60% of foe's res stat. if hp is below 70%, increases damage by 40% of foe's res stat AND heals for 30% of max hp. unlike skills like sol and aether which heal for a percentage of damage dealt, flare heals a flat 30% regardless of amount of damage dealt.

the damage increase from flare is incredibly variable making it less reliable than specials like glimmer. however, flare is a high scoring special in arena and the healing has some use case.

duo chrobin has a prf A slot skill called "Fell wyrmscale." this skill has a bunch of effects that only trigger if units hp is at or above 25% at the START of combat. (meaning that if you start below 25%, heal to above 25% with flare, you still do not receive the effects). the effects of fell wyrmscale are as follows:

1) grants unit +8 to all stats in combat (woo ! no solving for X this time)

2) deals bonus damage = 15% of unit's atk (in practice this is generally around 8-12 damage)

3) fully pierces damage reduction when special triggers (does NOT apply to flat damage reduction from sources like laguz friend 4 or brave dimitri's weapon refine. also does not apply to defensive specials or to damage reduction from specials like armored floe/beacon. also does not apply to the damage reduction provided by emblem ike's engage effect)

4) heals 7 hp after combat

i miss when prf skills were simple...

duo chrobin's b slot skill is atk/spd link 4 which provides buffs to unit and minor debuffs to foe in combat after using a MOVEMENT assist (will not apply after using rallies) the effects granted by atk spd link are as follows:

1) grants visible atk/spd +6 buff. (this visible buff means that after receiving it, unit is ineligible to receive additional atk/spd buffs provided by sources like rally atk/spd+)

2) grants canto (1) to unit and ally targeted by the movement assist

3) inflicts atk/spd -4 and def/res -2 on foe in combat

4) (more solve for X sorry) grants + X bonus damage where X = highest bonus on atk+spd among unit and allies with canto (1) active. (in practice, X usually = 12) (bonus damage does not apply to aoe specials)

luckily, the C slot skill is rather simple in comparison. inf. null follow 4 grants null follow up effect to unit and infantry allies within 2 spaces. also grants unit "orders" warping (orders warping gets its name from the skill "ground orders" allows unit to warp to a space adjacent to any ally within 2 spaces.)

i am sorry that this unit is Unfair and i am sorry for the current state of feh. i hope this explanation is thorough but if there are any terms that i did not explain feel free to comment or send another ask.

[takaraphoenix]

PJO Episode 1 Thoughts

Spoilers ahead, huh.

Positive things first:

I love that Percy draws, and draws pretty well (for a 12 year old). I don't remember him being an artist in the book series? But the idea of him coping with his strange monster visions by drawing them is a nice addition.

Sally is a treasure, the actress brings such a motherly warmth to the role.

I loved Sally sitting in the rain with that expression on her face, you could feel the yearning for Poseidon. Never really got the "still hung up on Poseidon"-vibes in the books, but I still loved that moment for how well it was conveyed.

I do think that Grover is perfectly cast. That kid embodies the anxious and nervous energy I want from my Grover.

For very obvious personal reasons, I will be cherishing and including the fact that Percy plays Mythomagic from hereon out.

And, on that same note, I wonder what's up with the di Angelo name-drop. Maria is dead, her kids are in a magic casino, so is this just completely unrelated to our di Angelos and a bit of a wink wink nudge nudge, or is this actually going to pay off once we get to the di Angelos...?

I did love the "Why is there half a goat in your pants?" line and enjoyed the whole "getting to camp/expositioning" scene. It had the needed dramatic gravity. And Sally making Grover swear an oath. I liked how it was all played, enacted and written, it bodes well for the dramatic moments in the future.

Also the credits are stunning. The art, the designs. Honestly made me feel a lot of disappointment that we didn't get a cartoon adaptation of PJO, because I do still think that would have been a more fitting medium for this.

Now here's the things that bothered me:

Considering that this was episode one, titled "I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher", the vaporizing was... not very central to be quite frank? She jumps him in broad daylight, one stab later she's gone. A little bit of a chase, more of a confrontation, to make this seem a bit more significant, would have been nice.

Also damn, the gaslighting of a 12 year old hits way harder when it's live action and with actual kids, than when it's written in a book.

My biggest problem so far: I hate, hate, hate what they've done with Gabe. I hate it. They neutered him so hard.

It's been a couple years since I read the first book, but I remember how utterly uncomfortable Gabe made me. I know this man abused Sally, and it was always implied also Percy.

But this man? Is... just a pathetic loser. He lets Percy completely walk all over him, he gets pushed around by Sally. I remember the "I'm borrowing your car"-scene from the book, because it was a tense scene, because it didn't feel like a given, but this...? This was just... pathetic. That's the only word I have for it.

The character of Gabe Ugliano is so formative to Percy pre-series, and the way they changed him to make him look silly and non-threatening is... frustrating.

I honestly had no idea who got cast for Chiron, that one somehow went fully past me. I think the actor is... a little old. He has the warmth that Chiron needs, but with his 76 years he brings it more in a grandpa way than in a mentor way. Chiron should have been in his 50s, if pushing it in his 60s.

And while I did like the dramatic weight of the parting scene, I also do think that... Sally's sacrifice is... less heavy than in the books? Like, they stand there and yap for minutes, while they could have just gone ahead and been safe at camp in that time, and then Sally dies and Percy and Grover still just stand there and watch instead of going to the safety of camp. It felt very avoidable...

[andiv3r]

So. I need to make a whole post about lots of things but I've decided that dermatillomania is one of them. Cw for blood and lots of skin-picking stuff below.

Story time. I remember in eighth grade, my religion teacher pulled me out into the halls to talk to me, and my first thought was, "Oh shit, another one," because the previous religion teacher had put me through hell and back for being queer (which was information I had not even shared with her). I braced to have an awkward conversation about my love life and gender identity for the second time in two years. Instead, she pointed at my arm.

"What's that?" She asked. I glanced down at my arms, covered in scabs, red and radiating heat from where I'd been picking for hours. "Your skin, I mean. Why is it... like that?"

Oh. Right. She was new. She didn't know.

"Genetic skin condition." I replied. "It's not really that bad on its own, but I pick at it whenever I'm nervous or upset or sad or bored or... just kind of whenever." She opened her mouth and I interrupted before she could say it. "I've tried to stop, and I've tried wearing long sleeves, and I've tried medicine, and I keep my nails short, but it doesn't help, so... yeah. Don't worry about it. It's not contagious or anything, it's genetic."

Her face scrunched into a frown, but she didn't say anything else and told me to return to my English class. I did.

Later that day, I had to go to Science class. The worst of them, at least in terms of places I picked at my arms. The teacher was nice enough, but I fucking hated science as a class. So, while everyone else was taking notes, I ran my hand along my arms. They were warm. Wet in some places, from the blood that had pooled around some bumps. But most of all, they were so... bumpy. So easy to just... pinch. Squeeze. Scratch.

I walked out of Science class that day with my left arm covered in bloody spots. Shit. My mom was gonna kill me.

No.

Don't think about her.

Don't do it, or else you'll get nervous, and when you get nervous you-

Too late. The fingers that had been rhythmically tapping my desk in Pre-Algebra were now tracing my jawline, searching for...

Ah. There.

Pinch. Squeeze. Scratch. Move my fingers up a bit to my cheek. Pinch. Squeeze. Scratch. Move. Pinch. Squeeze. Scratch. Move. Pinch. Squeeze. Scratch. Move, pinch, squeeze, scratch, move, pinch, squeeze, sc-

"[deadname], your face is bleeding!" I jerked my hands away from my face and stared down at my fingers, their tips stained crimson. So it was.

"Ah. Yeah. D'you have a kleenex?" I replied to the alarmed blond beside me.

"Uh... yeah." He passed one over with a frown. He knew about my skin-picking, so I'm not sure why he was so surprised. Maybe it was the blood. I licked my fingers, wetting them so that the blood would come off. It didn't.

The bell rang.

I swung my backpack onto my back and felt the fabric rub against my raw and open skin.

Well that fucking hurts, but I did it to myself, so I ignored it. I could've just stopped picking, as my mother so often reminded me. I should've just stopped.

I mean, it's not like I had some mental condition I didn't know about that was fueling this, right?

When my mom picked me up from after hours that day, both of my arms were red, both from blood and inflammation. Scabs littered every place in my skin that I could reach. The first thing she did was pull up my sleeve and her frown turned into a scowl.

"Really, [deadname]? Seriously? After all I told you about how that's horrible for your skin? Do you want to be so ugly no boy will want to date you?"

That did sound pleasant, actually, but I didn't need to tell her that. Besides, that wasn't why I was doing it. To be honest, there wasn't really a why. I didn't even realize I was doing it, usually, until I had. I zoned out as she ranted about how I'd never be able to wear a swimsuit, I would have permanent scars, and as I did, my left hand trailed up my arm, grazing the warm, itchy, painful bumps.

Pinch. Squeeze. Scratch.

[stormartsies07]

XFOHV but I write 1,000 words for every individual frame on the YT video.

Frame 1.

Darkness, emptiness, nothing to note, really. Other than how all encompassing it is, similar to how other things are ever so all encompassing in life, like death, or chaos, or life itself. But this is no darkness of an ending, this is the darkness of a beginning, the darkness an unborn mind witnesses before they are birthed, when they cannot even process a unfathomably tiny smidgen of what their life will be like. No matter who, or what you are, the sight of true darkness is something we are all familiar with. This is the darkness that comes with the vacuum of space, the darkness that comes when you close your eyes in the comfort of your own home. Some are afraid, others are not. But this is no warm, or cold darkness, it is simply black. An all encompassing black, and the experience of a true blackness, was never something us humans were ever equipped to handle in its truest three-dimensional form. We were simply meant to witness false darkness, like this one that is ultimately, contained in a safe box, unable to truly harm anyone, even if it wanted to. 

But it doesn’t, because it has no soul. It has no life like we humans do. No sentience, no purpose other than to be a transitory space for us to pass through into the beginning of a new era. But alas, we linger here, our existence in this darkness is unnatural, we were never meant to stay here like we are doing right now. We were never meant to discuss the darkness, only take it for granted. People tend to take many things for granted, it is simply a function of human nature. So, we decide to ignore all of the details, all the nuances in this existence. But that is what this thing was made to be, an appreciation for the little things. This may not be about a controversial topic, or something that genuinely needs discussion, but I simply wish to showcase this as a form of honesty. Through detailing the events the darkest sections of my mind can finally light up again, in a spree, to bring thoughts on how to even go about describing a black screen. There haven’t even been five-hundred words and I feel like I’m going insane. But I’ll keep going on with this frame anyways, because it’s no fun to simply stop at this point. It’s just like willpower, isn’t it? I tend to forget a lot of my dreams, and thus a lot of my mind probably just imagines this darkness, but it probably doesn’t, I do definitely have dreams, but never dreams of darkness. I just forget everything and thus all of the things I do not remember are simply replaced with darkness, a pure black. 

Maybe Cary Huang himself dreamed of this animation after that pre-algebra class back in middle school and said to his brother, “Hey, hey Michael!” 

“Eughhhhh, what is it?” Michael Huang probably said after getting up, fairly groggy.

“I just had the perfect idea for what we're going to do for the math project! We’re going to make an animation about a sentient number helping a sentient variable with finding their value!” Cary Huang exclaims at the top of his lungs, positively excited to start working on the animation.

Or perhaps they weren’t as excited about the event, simply coming up with the idea on the fly and deciding to work constantly at their computer for the time it took to make that animation and finally publish it on YouTube. Maybe they worked on shifts, like for one hour they decided to take a break watching YouTube videos at the time, whatever those videos were, or maybe they went on Newgrounds. Either way, they probably had a good enough time making it considering this animation has real possession behind it. More passion than the AI-generated slop nowadays. Yes, shockingly, these words were not just something that came after Chat-GPT after I typed in, “describe a black screen with 1,000 words,” because that would be a cop-out. What would I be as an artist if I did not go out of my way to subject myself to the process of writing down every single thought I had on the black screen. Speaking of that black rectangle, I have a drawing pad that is black and is right next to me right now, it was given to me for art purposes but I never really use it, even now, I just use my finger since I simply have better control with my finger.

I guess it’s just an old habit now, and that’s the same thing here. I tend to struggle writing 1,000 words since I tend to lose motivation by the first 1,000. That’s another reason why I’m speaking of this animation in such an arbitrarily detailed and word filled way. But I know if I publish the entirety of this, if I complete this, then I could have this potentially be my legacy. Thus, I do not see the black screen as the end of all description, the end of the text, I see it as a new beginning, a challenge to simply overcome like all things in life. Funnily enough, this reminds me of BLM and how people tended to put black screens on their IG stories for solidarity with the black community against police brutality. The black screen is not just used as a symbol for darkness, whether it be one of a new beginning or not, no, it is also used for solidarity, and to bring a community of like-minded individuals together for a common goal. That is a very inspiring this for me as an artist, the fact that one color, or one symbol can bring everyone together against a common cause is amazing to me, it is a wonder how the human mind can be so complex, so thoughtful, so amazing. Next frame pretty please!