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secretmellowblog · 2 years ago

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On the subject of the Titanic ‘submersible’ that was lost in the deep with all its wealthy tourists— it’s so insane/eerie in hindsight to read this article from the Smithsonian that interviews the CEO Stockton Rush long before the disaster.

Despite the Smithsonian supposedly being an organization that cares about science and truth, and the fact that there were SO MANY obvious red flags from the beginning and so many people criticizing the company…..the article is a puff piece uncritically glorifying the CEO’s obviously terrible submersible project. It compares him in glowing terms to Elon Musk. It is an article about how private ventures like those of Stockton Rush and Elon Musk can and should be the future of the world.

We’ve obviously learned now that there were whistleblowers at the company who were warning for a long time that Stockton Rush’s submersible was unsafe— only to be fired and then sued. It makes sense the submersible was so unsafe, because the CEO in this interview is open about how he has no background in underwater engineering and is annoyed by quote “regulations that needlessly prioritize passenger safety.”

Soon after, the private [submersible] market died too, Rush found, for two reasons that were “understandable but illogical.” First, subs gained a reputation for danger. Working on offshore rigs in harsh locations like the North Sea, saturation divers, who breathe gas mixtures to avoid diving sicknesses, would be taken in subs to work at great depths. It was the world’s most perilous job, with frequent fatalities. (“It wasn’t the sub’s fault,” says Rush.) To save lives, the industries moved toward using underwater robots to perform the same work.

Second, tourist subs, which could once be skippered by anyone with a U.S. Coast Guard captain’s license, were regulated by the Passenger Vessel Safety Act of 1993, which imposed rigorous new manufacturing and inspection requirements and prohibited dives below 150 feet. The law was well-meaning, Rush says, but he believes it needlessly prioritized passenger safety over commercial innovation (a position a less adventurous submariner might find open to debate). “There hasn’t been an injury in the commercial sub industry in over 35 years. It’s obscenely safe, because they have all these regulations. But it also hasn’t innovated or grown—because they have all these regulations.”

The fact that Stockton Rush (who was piloting the submarine when the disaster happened) is on record complaining about the evils of regulations that prioritize people’s safety, and the Smithsonian uncritically regurgitated that rhetoric in their glowing puff piece about how rich tycoons like Elon Musk and Stockton Rush are going to save the world is just…..in hindsight of how everything ended it’s just so much horrible black comedy? It’s like a satire about the dangers of uncritically worshipping the rich.

It is mentioned in the article that Rush chose to make his submersible in a different shape, and with a different (cheaper) material than is usually used for submersibles. The article frames this as a result of daring innovation, and not of negligence/ignorance. This passage in particular, which in context is supposed to portray Rush’s critics as joyless naysayers who were proven wrong by the noble tycoon, is pretty foreboding in hindsight:

Rush planned to pilot the sub himself, which critics said was an unnecessary risk: Under pressure, the experimental carbon fiber hull might, in the jargon of the sub world, “collapse catastrophically.”

And then!!

The exact problem that happened to Titan this weekend, happened on Titan’s very first test voyage to the Titanic! The experimental carbon fiber hull had an issue and it caused communications to break down!

The dive was going according to plan until about 10,000 feet, when the descent unexpectedly halted, possibly, Rush says, because the density of the salt water added extra buoyancy to the carbon fiber hull. He now used thrusters to drive Titan deeper, which interfered with the communications system, and he lost contact with the support crew. He recalls the next hour in hallucinogenic terms. “It was like being on the Starship Enterprise,” he says. “There were these particles going by, like stars. Every so often a jellyfish would go whipping by. It was the childhood dream.”

Both Rush and the article writer treat this as a fun quirky story, instead of a serious safety failure and red flag with his experimental macgyvered regulation-flaunting submersible.

Other highlights from the article include:

Stockton rush saying that if 3/4 of the planet is water, why haven’t we monetized it?

Stockton saying we will “colonize the ocean long before we colonize space”

Lots of weird pro colonialism stuff in general??? This article loves colonialism and thinks it’s cool

Rush saying he plans for this to eventually help find more underwater resources for the US to exploit and profit from

Elon musk comparisons. The article writer does not mention that Elon Musk’s rockets explode and therefore it would be a bad idea to get in one of them, because that would imply it’s a bad idea to get into the submersible

Stockton rush seeing himself as Captain Kirk

The article writer comparing the tourists who plan to join Rush to Englishmen who went on colonialist journeys to Africa as if that’s like, a good thing. So much pro colonialism stuff in this article

So many sentences about Stockton Rush being handsome when he literally just looks like some guy

The article beginning with an editor’s note from years later disclaiming that the extraordinary submersible they’re advertising in this article is uh. It’s now uhhhh

But yeah it really does just bring home how so many organizations that supposedly care about scientific truth or journalistic integrity are willing to uncritically platform propaganda for wealthy CEOS. It’s frustrating how easily people fall for the fake myths that careless wealthy people invent for themselves, and even more frustrating that supposedly respectable institutions will platform irresponsible lies that end up getting people killed.

Rush is such an obvious and simple example of this, and his negligence is “only” killing five people including himself. But to me it feels like a cautionary tale to bear in mind when it comes to uncritical puff piece media coverage of similar “daring tycoon innovations” by people like Bezos or Musk.

#titanic #oceangate #titanic submersible #sorry this is just so fascinating to me #it’s like a parody or piece of satire #if it were in a novel it would feel like the symbolism was too obvious and on the nose

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butchvampireheimerdinger · 25 days ago

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okay hear me out…butch4butch Sevika where Sevika is a power bottom???👀 reader is taller and stronger than her but very shy and intimidated by her🙈

Pairing: Powerbottom!Sevika x gentle giant-service top! reader

Warnings: ns/fw, fingering, cunnilingus, grinding/dry humping, smoking, mentions of violence, and horny lesbian activityyyy

Word count: 3k

A/N: Love you. Love this. You have come to the right place for this one, my friend. The lack of butch4butch Sevika content is criminalll if that woman has a type it begins with D and ends in Y-K-E-S. Anyways, how appropriate is it that my first fic is butch4butch Sevika smut. Checks out. (that being said, it is my first fic so you freaks betta be NICE) Now without further ado…

You Have No Idea

By ButchVampireHeimerdinger

It was the slow ending to an eventful shift at the last drop. Customers were in good spirits all night, likely due to a sudden influx of Piltie goods some gang had rattled up through more or less honorable means and was making its way through town. In any case, the energy was contagious and it had you, the buff and generally even-tempered server/bouncer, doing things you didn’t normally do. Like drink on the job — just a beer you had been nursing for over forty minutes — and fraternize with patrons. Y’know, other than the obligatory how are you, do you wanna pay out now or open a tab. Real actual conversations -- which led you to number three on the list of Things You Don’t Normally Do; you were hunched over the bar playing Texas Hold ‘Em with three regulars. Two were men, you didn’t remember their names, but they always came to the bar at about this time. A package deal — they snickered in your direction as a nearby shady-looking customer walked out on his tab.

“Hey, isn’t that your cue, tough guy?” The man gave you a patronizing sort of eyebrow raise as he dealt the next round.

Technically, it was. You got hired pretty much on account of your physique — you were 6’3” and a tank, always had been. Broad shoulders, biggest girl on the playground growing up, you gained muscle at the drop of a hat. You didn’t even try. But it was all for show. You were more of a lover than a fighter. Sometime in the first few months of the job the staff discovered you were better equipped to work inside the bar. Customers liked you because you were polite, a breath of fresh air from the culture of animosity that permeated the undercity. Still, it didn’t help your ego in situations like this. ”Hey, you don’t know what she’s got under her sleeve.” The third voice at the table spoke up. The right hand of Zaun. Sevika.

She had been a regular since before you started and probably would be long after. You had heard some pretty nasty stories about her and the things she was capable of. But when she came up to your counter for a drink, she came without malintent, always respectful to the waitstaff. It was disarming. Tonight, especially, your eyes lingered over her toned shoulders and sharp collarbones.You wanted to run your hands over them, to see how her body would react. And maybe it was the house IPA you had been drinking, but probably not.

Sevika gestured toward your dwindling pile of poker chips with her chin as she looked down, analyzing her hand. “Clearly, she must be the type to play the long game.” This earned her another light fit of snickers from bar idiots one and two, but they were easily impressed. You rolled your eyes.

Sevika raised two chips. The table matched. She spoke again.

“So, tough guy, do those arms of yours get you any female attention? Since you’re obviously not using them for any other tactile purpose,” her eyes traveled to the empty seat where the tab-skipper had been sitting.

You shrugged, suddenly warm and very aware of your body and not sure where to rest your gaze. “I get around.”

For some reason, tweedles dum and dee found this hilarious, and howls of laughter followed. You slapped your hand over your heart and feigned a look of deep hurt, to mask the bit of real hurt you were feeling. Yeah, it had been a while, but surely not long enough to warrant that response.

“Is it that implausible?”

Sevika chuckled and shook her head, but her expression was good-natured.

“Just make your move, Casanova.”

You had a full house. Three aces. Two kings. You matched, and didn’t raise.

Sevika raised, the men matched, and you folded.

The table revealed their hands and Sevika won the pile with a straight. Not a bad hand, but the round would’ve been yours if you had taken the risk. Sevika clicked her tongue, scolding you, which made your palms sweat. You averted her gaze and became suddenly interested in wiping down the bar.

Following your pitiful defeat, the two guys payed out, leaving the bar empty save for you, Sevika, and a couple stragglers who always stayed until morning and probably didn’t have anywhere else to spend the night. To your surprise, the woman beckoned you over once more. Something in your heart lifted. Something in your pants dropped.

“Blackjack?” She pushed the cards toward you, and her dominant sort of gaze made you feel, once again, compelled to do what she asked.

You won the first few rounds. Sevika was risky to a fault. If it wasn’t 21 exactly, trust she would draw. And she always made you the dealer, watching your hands intently, hungrily, even, as you shuffled. The third round was a tie, but she didn’t have anything left to raise.

“Tell you what,” she said. “You win this round and I’ll spread it around that I walked out on my tab, and you chased me down and kicked my ass for it. Should prevent other situations like our friend earlier, at least for a while.”

“Are my bouncer abilities really that pathetic?” You picked at the side of your nails. Sevika’s gaze pierced through you and you found it difficult to meet her eyes. But you didn’t necessarily hate the way her eyes took you in. Slowly and deliberately, like you were a battle map and she was trying to parse out her strategy.

“And if you win?” You looked up, all innocent. Maybe you imagined it, but your doe eyes seemed to rile her up a little bit. Something in the way her jaw shifted, the way she rubbed her flesh palm on her pants.

“Already planning for defeat? See, this is exactly your problem. You’re talking through a universe where you lose before we’ve even started.” She shoved her pile towards you again.

“Deal ‘em.” She commanded, you obliged.

“I’m serious! I just wanna know what I’m agreeing to. Fools rush in, and all that.” Your voice made everything sound like a question. With her, it was. Sevika was hard to figure out.

“You’re cute. If I win, I want…” The woman took a hit of the blunt she was holding and used it to gesture, her movements creating little loops of smoke that rose and dissipated. Her eyes followed them, and not you. For once.

“I want an hour. With you. N’ those arms.” You jerked while shuffling, accidentally knocking over your beer in your surprise. You picked it up quickly, hoping she didn’t notice.

“You serious?”

“Deadly. Fuck me up, Casanova.”

She won. Wasn’t even close. Three sevens, if you could believe it. As soon as you slapped the last seven down, you both shot up from the counter at light speed and she followed you to the back.

“A little eager, aren’t we?” Her voice was low and husky, but with a little something else.

“Sore winner,” was all you could think to respond. You shoved her lightly. She shoved you harder with her prosthetic arm. The two of you kept at it, pushing and shoving back and forth as you practically raced to The Last Drop’s back office. Play-fighting, like you were “one of the boys,” but it had a bit of a bite to it. Like you wanted to eat each other alive.

The office was hardly used except for the rare moments when staff wanted to crunch numbers. Or, of course, engage in extra-professional affairs like this one. That couch had seen some things. You fiddled with the key for what was apparently a moment too long.

“I’m getting bored out here, Casanova.” You looked into Sevika’s eyes through her thick brows, a couple inches below yours. You slammed your shoulder into the door and it gave way immediately, with a satisfying bang as it swung open. Sevika followed, grabbing you by the shirt as she brought your lips down to hers, hard, and kicked the door shut behind her without looking.

She dragged you toward her, her back pressed against the peeling drywall. Her tongue dragged against your bottom lip and something deep in your pelvis vibrated in anticipation. One of your hands reached up to the wall, to keep you both steady. Sevika grabbed your other hand and guided it under her tank top. You squeezed her breast, tracing over her nipple with your thumb. Your bodies pressed together and you brought your knee in between hers, rolling your hips forward and pressing your leg into her crotch. She moaned into your mouth. Like her voice, it was deep and gravelly.

You set a pace. Her hips seemed to agree with it, bucking upwards to get that friction where she needed it most. Her hands gripped your waist and hips as she started to manhandle you, making you move faster against her. Your kissing was frantic and sloppy, like there was anger behind it. Your lips shined with her spit, and you moved to kiss up and down her neck. She reacted with a throaty panting noise when you got to a sensitive spot — a fleshy and soft area where her jaw met with her neck. You twisted your head to the side and downward to get better access, to fully exploit that weakness. Without fully thinking through your actions, your sucking collapsed into biting. You drove your teeth into her neck and Sevika’s jaw shot upward as her panting became gasping. She grabbed the back of your head and pushed it harder against her neck to say what she couldn’t; more, more, more.

Your hands fumbled with her belt and she noticeably did not help you with it. It was like she got a kick out of watching you struggle. You finally got them unzipped and you reached under to start palming her through her boyshorts. She had already soaked through. Good.

You pulled away to look down at her again while tugging lightly at her waistband. You raised your eyebrows to ask, May I? Chin still tilted upward, she nodded, huffed out a “yuh” sort of noise, and hooked her leg around the back of yours to bring your chests closer, all rough.

You pulled down the panties and your fingers dipped into her folds. Sevika’s eyebrows knitted even closer together, if that was possible. You continued sucking and working that spot on her neck. Her lips were against your ear and you heard her panting grow more desperate, more melodic; whines and vocalizations mixed with the gruff and grainy rhythmic in-and-out of her breaths.

Your middle and ring finger sort of skated all around her entrance, just barely avoiding her swollen clit. You took in the sight — Sevika’s heaving chest, her eyes closed as she chased the pleasure you were giving her. Her moans grew to something not exactly desperate, that wasn’t like her, but deranged and shameless. She panted like she was breathing fire. And like she didn’t care if all of The Last Drop could hear her, even though they probably couldn’t.

The pulse of her hips grew a little more erratic and she shifted her legs like she was ready to switch positions. You gestured subtly with your head toward the couch, and she dragged you toward it.

The woman collapsed on it and rested her arms outward, elbows relaxed on top like it was a throne. She leaned as far back as she could as you helped work her pants and boyshorts all the way down until they dropped to her ankles. She pulled her shirt off with both hands, pulling it up and over from the back of the neckline. She threw the tank top to the side and all of the air left your lungs, as you took in the sight of her upper body. Where you were buff, she was cut. Unlike you, Sevika didn’t have the type of figure that was imposing simply by nature — her physique came from blood, sweat, and tears. She had the body of a bruiser, of someone who spent their life fighting. The Sevika before you made you realize why some of the patrons kept their distance. But it somehow made you want to get closer. It made you want to please her, and to be good at it.

Sevika had a manspread going and you dropped to your knees in front of her. But she wasn’t having that — not yet. With her flesh hand she grabbed you by the throat and dragged you up to her lips for another messy kiss. Your teeth clashed together and when your tongues made contact, you felt those butterflies low in your pelvis. You moaned into her mouth instinctively, and it came out higher and breathier than you expected. You felt her lips form a slight smile against yours and she released her hold on your neck, making you drop down to your knees. You were certain the impact must have shook the entire city block.

Breathing heavy, you went to start kissing and sucking at her inner thigh, but she tilted your chin upward to look at her. Breathless, she commanded,

“Take your shirt off for me, Casanova. I wanna see those arms while you… Yeah.”

You fought the smile forming and stripped for her. You took off your tank top and sports bra the same way she had — in one fluid motion, from the back. You were caught between a sudden wave of self consciousness and the urge to draw it out, to put on a show for her. You settled at maintaining eye contact as you subtly flexed for her, and placed your broad hands on her knees. Sevika smiled, all smug as she reached over to a nearby discarded vest, brought out the rest of her blunt, and lit up as her eyes poured over your exposed upper body. She inhaled deep using her metal arm, and with her flesh hand she traced over your biceps, satisfied.

All confident, you started on her inner thighs, taking your time. When your lips finally connected with her wet cunt, you heard her make a sharp exhale through her teeth. You kept going, first going over it all with a flat tongue, drinking in the moment, then using your tongue to explore her folds. Sevika let out a satisfied hum as you started sucking at her swollen, neglected clit.

That was when you brought your fingers up to her entrance, casually tracing, nothing else. That pissed her off.

Sevika slapped the top of the couch to get your attention. Your eyes snapped up to hers as she leaned forward to get all up in your face, with her signature sneer on.

“Did someone pay you to waste my time?”

You froze.

“That wasn’t rhetorical, I’m seriously asking you if some outside party with an interest in distracting me paid you to bring me here and do absolutely nothing with me.” You raised your eyebrows, eyes all wide and innocent. That made her groan, and she covered her face with one hand, your puppy eyes making her feel horny and desperate and a little guilty about snapping at you.

“Just. Fuck. Me.” She collapsed backward and you didn’t respond, just immediately did what she asked. You pushed your two fingers inside her without warning — hard. Again she exhaled through her teeth.

With your mouth, you continued giving her clit attention, and you pushed in and out of her, fingertips maintaining contact with her front wall, the one closest to you.

The sounds she made were pornographic, and it made you aware of the pool of slick that had established itself in the crotch of your boxers. Listening to her body, you gradually picked up the pace and you found Sevikas hand weave through your hair, grabbing you roughly at the scalp and pressing you closer and closer still.

Her face was angled toward the sky as she whined, her metal hand gripping the cushion tight enough to create what was probably going to be permanent ripples in the fabric. You brought her closer and closer and her grip on your head tightened as she bucked her hips upward, essentially fucking herself on your tongue and fingers. She occasionally let out a depraved vocalization that a trained ear might recognize as “fuck,” “don’t stop,” and “faster-FUCK faster.”

Until the pulse inside her cunt became erratic, and you felt a familiar tremor in her legs. You didn’t let up. You started fucking her deeper, with more pressure, using your tongue to play with her clit faster. Sevika’s thighs involuntarily snapped up to trap your head and you brought your hands up to brace them. Your tongue still moving as she cried out, loud and animalistic as she rode out her orgasm. Her thighs held you so tight against her pussy that you couldn’t escape if you tried, and the strength would probably have suffocated someone more petite.

Eventually, Sevika’s cries retreated back into deep panting and her legs dropped back to the floor, still trembling and spasming. She looked down at you, eyes half lidded, and gave you what could have been interpreted as a smile. She spread her arms back out on the top edge of the couch cushions, somehow still holding the half-smoked blunt. You shook your hair and a bit of ash fell out, which made you giggle. You were so invested in fucking her, you hadn’t noticed the active fire hazard against your skin the whole time.

With her chin, the woman gestured to the spot on the couch next to her. You settled in, your sides touching and your head leaning back against where her bicep was resting. She wrapped that arm around to bring the blunt to your lips.

“You can finish it, I don’t like the roach,” she said, and you obliged. You took a deep hit from her fingers and the last fiery bits assaulted your lungs, but you liked it. Sevika ashed it out on the couch, as if you hadn’t already desecrated it enough. You settled into a comfortable silence and she allowed you to lean your head on her pec, still uncovered. Until she spoke up.

“Promise me something, Casanova.” Her voice hoarse and gravelly from the earlier activities.

“Mm?” you responded. She wrapped her arm around you to reach up and ruffle your hair.

“Promise me you’ll never get good at cards.” You sucked your teeth and sneered back at her, giving her a hefty shove, which she gladly returned with equal force.

#arcane league of legends #arcane #arcane headcanon #arcane s2 #sevika #sevika arcane #sevika x reader #sevika smut #arcane smut #sevika headcanon #arcane fanfic #arcane fanfiction #sevika fanfic #sevika fanfiction #vampdoessmut #vampdoessevikasmut

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