#so I think that this kind of subtle/less domineering form of mind control is more interesting

[daydreamerdrew]

Marvel Treasury Edition (1974) #25

[ukai-simp-services]

please can you write more nsfw kenma content? whatever you want omg and of course do it when u feel like it n u have time <3 love ur writing have a nice day

a/n: thanks for the request love!! i rlly hope this isn't too mediocre, i fr tried. enjoy <3

nasty

warnings: nsfw, cursing, humiliating, degrading, slight bdsm, name calling

  if there’s one thing you've learned about your boyfriend from the past year of dating him, it was that he tended to have a bit of a personality shift the moment he entered the ‘bedroom’. 

  many, including yourself, knew kenma as a more reserved individual. he didn't yell much, unless provoked - and he only really spoke up if he felt the situation called for it. to a normal acquaintance of kenma, he was just socially awkward and shy. 

  but those who truly knew him; being you and kuroo - you both knew kenma had a way of saying things. the guy simply had a lot on his mind, but he only chose to say the things that were relevant. he even seemed to have a bit of a temper at times, but he always meant well. 

  there’s one thing that only you got to know though, something that you'd like to think nobody else ever got to witness first hand. you saw a side to kenma that was reserved for you and only you. it was a feral; almost animalistic side. to put it more frankly, he was just straight up nasty. 

  lewd, vulgar, dirty - all words could be used to describe your ‘introverted’ boyfriend when he was in a sexual state of mind. he liked to own you in the bedroom, and sometimes even be owned. 

  three slow slaps were placed onto your clit, making your back arch in pleasure. kenma wouldn’t stop taunting you; wouldn't stop delaying your orgasm, and it almost had you in tears.

  “kenma, p-please. i need-”  

  “did i ask you what you needed? do you really think i fucking care?” a malicious look glistened in his eyes, eyes that were burning into yours. you knew by this look that it was his game and he would play however he wanted. 

  you bit your lip and nodded, submitting to his cruel game. he gave you a smirk in response, subtly letting you know he was proud of your obedience.

  without warning, kenma rutted two digits into your sloppy wet core; curling his fingers upwards to massage your insides. naturally, your back arched in response - tugging at the tight handcuffs that held you captive to the bed. kenma brought a hand to your cheeks, squishing them between his fingers.

  “hey, behave slut.” he spat down at you. 

  “s-sorry sir.” your cheeks flushed pink at the name kenma gave you.

  he chuckled at your state of submission, going to sit back on his knees as he continued his harsh pace inside your tight walls. his thumb found its home on your clit, rubbing hard circles into the flesh. you felt the familiar daze of an orgasm approaching you again - and you knew kenma felt it too. you weren't surprised when his two fingers left your core, but also disappointed in hopes that he would've just let you finish. yet, you kept your composure the best you could; no whining and no complaining. 

  your facade quickly fell when kenma stuck his two slick-covered fingers into his mouth, sticking out his tongue slightly to lap up the juices that had dripped down his palm. your eyes became hooded with lust, nipples hardening at the sight in front of you. kenma knew exactly what to do to make you weak and how to do it.

  “you taste amazing kitten, too bad it's not all about you tonight.” kenma teased in a low voice as his face inched closer to yours. 

  your cheeks heated up, cat-like yellow eyes bored into yours. you wanted nothing more than to reach your lips up to his and kiss him, tasting yourself on his tongue - and you almost did, but he quickly pulled away. 

  the taunting man leaned back to pull off the remaining boxers and sweats he wore, cock bouncing up and pressing against his lower abdomen. your eyes trailed over his slim - yet toned body. you almost drooled at the sight of him. he was never very girthy but he had quite a few inches on him to make up for it. 

  a small part of kenma became self-conscious at your gaze on his body, but the feral part of him wanted to shove his cock right into your gaping mouth with no remorse. though, he decided he'd much rather feel your walls tonight. with a firm grip on your plush thighs, your legs were forcibly pulled apart; cold air brushed over your wet folds. kenma began his teasing by rubbing the base of his cock against your clit, the action alone had you nursing your bottom lip between your teeth. 

  kenma noticed your subtle gesture and knew right away that you were holding back your moans - and you were well aware that would only prolong kenma’s torturous game. 

  the boy’s lust-filled eyes locked with yours the second he began grinding his dick down on your clit with more force and pressure. you tried to maintain the  sensual gaze locked between you two as best as you could, but the sensation from the friction had you gasping for air and your head tossing back. a mocking laugh from your boyfriend pulled you out of your daze; your head shooting up immediately at the noise. 

  “you're so fucking sensitive, my dick isn't even inside you yet and you’re already squirming for me.” he leaned in closer to your face, brought a hand to your right breast and tugged at its perked nipple with his thumb and his pointer finger; making you yelp in response. 

  “please kenma. please, i've been so fucking good.” you begged; tears forming at the rims of your eyes. kenma refused to let go of your nipple and his rough grinding hadn't ceased either. 

  “good girls don't act this desperate, but cockwhores do. and you will be treated exactly how you act, get that?” he squeezed the bud that remained squished in-between his fingers for affirmation.

  “y-yes, sorry sir. i won't do it again.” you let out a shaky breath and blinked away the tears that had formed from a mixture of frustration and pleasure. you loved this kind of foreplay with your boyfriend, but that didn't make it any less agonizing each time you engaged in it.

  kenma removed the tight grip of his fingers from your nipple and slowed his harsh humping in a response to your cooperating words; also beginning to line up his length with your entrance. 

  a simple “good.” was all he needed to say before he was slamming his cock inside your tight entrance all at once. he didn't even need to have a huge dick to make your cunt throb in both pain and pleasure; the initial force of his member being plunged within you had you screaming at the top of your lungs. he had managed to push the tip of his head all the way up to meet your cervix in just one single thrust. 

  you choked out a “kenma” ending it with a loud moan and he knew to keep going. he controlled the pace of his thrusts to be quick and hard, bruising the inside of your pussy with each snap of his hips. 

  “you're so fucking tight. can barely fit this big cock inside of you, huh?” kenma shamed you through gritted teeth. 

  you struggled to form words; as his cock was slamming against you in such a way that your brain felt like it was melting. 

  “answer when you're being spoken to, bitch.” kenma ceased all movement; pulling his cock out of you almost fully, only the head remained inside of you.

  you felt your core clench around the small amount of cock kenma had left inside you, it made you almost want to scream in his face.

  “y-yes, i can barely fit you inside of me, sir.” you licked your lips; dry from heavy breathing. you hoped to god that he would continue. 

  “good, that's good.” kenma spoke breathlessly; all this fucking around was really getting to him too. oh well, maybe if you weren't so disobedient he could just continue on and fuck you properly. with those final words, he pushed his length back into you all at once, a lewd squelching noise sounded from the action.

  kenma leaned his body forward, some strands of hair fell out of his low bun and lightly tickled your collarbones - you always thought he looked so attractive in this position. he rested one hand next to your head and the other one came up to your face. you gave him a puzzled look, thinking he was moving to cup your cheek. your mind was quickly changed when he brought his ring and middle finger to your lips, pressing against them to force an entrance. you obliged his actions, parting your lips slightly to let his slender fingers into your mouth. he was quick to push his long digits further down your tongue, practically touching the back of your throat. 

  you gagged at the sudden feeling of his finger pads pressing down on the area between the end of your tongue and beginning of your throat; the sensation had your mouth filling with saliva. it took you a second to adjust to the feeling of your mouth being so full of his lean fingers  - all while your cunt was being slammed into by an equally as slender member. 

  you knew kenma was getting impatient for you to begin sucking on his digits, you could tell by the narrowing of his golden eyes - and the last thing you wanted to do was to tick him off when you felt yourself getting so close to an orgasm. you easily complied; letting your tongue circle around his fingers with a slow, sensual rhythm. your eyes never left his, keeping your best poker face on as he slammed into your guts and you salivated on his fingers. 

  the sadistic man found himself growing weak at the sight of your lust-filled eyes and the feeling of your mouth around his fingers - he felt you begin sucking them further into your mouth. he kept on his dominant persona as best as he could, despite the aching feeling of an orgasm building in his stomach. 

  “you’re so dirty, sucking on my fingers like they're my cock.” his breathing had become noticeably rigged, but his eyes kept the same hooded, dazed-out look that they had from the start. 

  you moaned around his fingers in response, drool was now dripping down your chin as well as his hand. kenma almost pulled his fingers out from their current spot so he could hear you as he fucked you through an orgasm - but he decided he'd rather see you cum with his fingers in your mouth. 

  your breathing became irregular, as kenma’s fingers were restricting you from being able to inhale and exhale regularly. it was when he began pumping the digits in and out of your throat that you felt the coil in your stomach begin to break. 

  the jangle from handcuffs being tugged at was heard as your body began writhing under your boyfriend. your muffled moans vibrating around kenma’s skilled fingers gave him the signal that he needed to hear to fuck your cunt harder and faster than he already was. 

  “you're gonna cum, yeah? you're gonna milk my dick?” kenma felt himself slowly losing his own composure, he was gonna cum any minute now. 

  “mmfm yesh...” the words leaving your mouth were far from coherent, courtesy of kenma’s fingers. you soon found yourself doing exactly what he said, velvety walls gripping at his lean cock like a vice. your orgasm was violent, it ripped through you with such a force that kenma had to gently use his body to hold down yours. it hit you like a fucking wave, you had been denied of it for so long that it came crashing into you with no mercy. 

  you screaming around his fingers and yanking at the cold metal handcuffs around your wrists practically threw kenma into an orgasm of his own. although not as violent, his body twitched above you as he moaned loudly into your ear; the way he knew you liked it. 

  both of you rode out your orgasms together, bodies twitching and chests rising and falling rapidly. before flopping his body onto yours, kenma removed his long fingers from your mouth slowly; thick strings of spit attached to your lips were following after them. 

  “so hot...you're so hot.” kenma mumbled breathlessly before letting his chest fall on top of yours and his head falling into the crook of your neck.

  you chuckled, “so are you, very hot actually.” you lifted your palm up to meet the top of his head; softly smoothing his disheveled hair down. kenma’s softer personality was rising to the surface again and his sadistic side was fading along with the intense aftermath of your orgasm. 

  he mumbled a “nuh-uh.” into your skin, you argued his statement. 

  “’m tired y/n. do you think we can rest for a little bit before cleaning up?” kenma nuzzled his face deeper into your skin to further convince you. you laughed at how his breath tickled your skin and unintentionally wiggled under him. the action made the handcuffs still attached to your limbs jingle, reminding you that they were still there. 

  “i’ll rest with you as much as you want, as long as you get these damn cuffs off me first.” 

  kenma peeked up at your arms, nodding before reaching over to his nightstand to grab the small keys to the handcuffs.

  “deal.” 

[flickeringart]

Neptune in aspect with Mars

(Read my post about Sun and Moon aspecting Neptune and Mercury and Venus aspecting Neptune)

These planets aspecting each other makes for a curious connection, because in a sense, they represent opposing principles; Mars represents the personal drive and the ability to spring to action, the force that works to impose one’s independent will on the world – Neptune represents the inner urge for emotional unity and the religious/spiritual experience of being merged with the source of life. When these planets are in aspect in the natal chart, the personal ability to carry out one’s will is inextricably linked to redemptive longings. Simply put, Mars-Neptune individuals will put their energy into fulfilling the ego ideal, the perfection of potential that existed before the personality began to form. The personality cannot assert itself in a way that would crush the dream of perfection. Neptune is the dream of purity, the undifferentiated beauty of never having left the garden of Eden. Mars on the other hand is the agent of independence and self-motivated action – he has the purpose of fighting for the individual self which is antithetical to the Neptunian principle of surrender. While the Moon and Venus are quite social; the Moon represents nurturing and care-taking of needs, Venus represents the ability to be loving, affectionate and gracious; Mars is selfish and to a certain extent anti-social – most definitely anti-Eden and its eternal bliss. Subsequently, Neptune paired with Venus or the Moon is a little less of an obvious conflict than Neptune paired with Mars.

The conjunction of Neptune-Mars might cause considerable frustration and unconscious manipulation, because one cannot assert oneself, which is to declare separation, without feeling a deep sense of guilt and shame. It’s a little bit like the Bible story of Adam and Eve eating of the forbidden fruit and immediately becomes aware of sin. This is certainly not an easy phenomenon to deal with. The impulse to avoid accountability for one’s actions can be overwhelming, even if the consequences are perceived to be good. There can be a tremendously inflated sense of righteousness accompanying every move the individual takes because deep down there’s the feeling that one has committed a terrible trespass, that one will be unable to atone for. While the softer aspects, the trine and the sextile, more easily lend themselves to genuine selfless acts and natural inclination to fight on behalf of every bleeding heart and soul in the world through acts of sympathy and kindness, the conjunction usually brings more troubles. There can be an overwhelming feeling of having to do certain things because one cannot stand the idea of being separate from other people. One finds it easy to identify as the martyr or victim, unwilling to take radical responsibility for one’s actions – or if one does it’s in order to self-sacrifice. Often the individual will adopt any ideology that promotes the mass before the individual – often socialism or marxism fits the bill. Neptune is symbolic of undifferentiated reality, blurred edges and passive surrender. It’s not a planet that promotes autonomy and individuation. Not uncommonly, decisions and actions are referred to as byproducts of societal or larger-scale units that have little to do with the poor self. These individuals are usually profoundly dissatisfied with the ways of society because on some level they believe that individual autonomy and agency is a sin – and that the only way to redeem oneself and humanity is through some kind of chaotic dissolution of difference. This urge is seldom conscious, but it is there none the less. Vladimir Lenin had this conjunction and he wanted to revolutionize society to fit the marxist ideology, but really what this means is to overthrow the upper class – to punish those that seem to revel in the delights of Eden, to get rid of the internal shame of being excluded from paradise.

It seems like Neptune-Mars shows up in individuals with the capacity to move a crowd, perhaps most importantly, with the capacity to be the front figure and leader of the masses. Vladimir Lenin certainly affected the masses and so did Napoleon I with the same conjunction. Hassan II of Morocco, known to be one of the most severe rulers widely accused of authoritarian practices and abuses of civil rights had this conjunction as well. These examples are far removed from Neptune’s reputation for denoting empathy, soft-heartedness and sensitivity. However, it might be precisely because of the refusal to abandon the hope of the sweet sweet nectar of paradise that can only truly be accessed in a state of pre-birth if even then, that the outrage is so total. Most children scream when they are born, and this is probably the kind of terrible rage caused by separation that lingers in these people. The sign the conjunction falls in will certainly affect the expression the energies filter through – Lenin had the conjunction in Aries, Hassan had it in Leo and Napoleon had it in Virgo. Virgo is a much more analytical and practical sign than the prideful fire signs of Aries and Leo – consequently Napoleon is famous for his fine skill for method and strategy in war. On his Wikipedia page, it states that Napoleon had a hypnotic effect on people and could bend the strongest leaders to his will in one-on-one conversations. Hypnosis is a marked Neptunian phenomenon. What happens is that the person is able to gently infiltrate the other person’s will – which is quite extraordinary. If someone is receptive and open enough to suggestion, the opportunity and the invitation is there to mold the other through unconscious communion. Since there’s no obvious forcing taking place under hypnosis, the hypnotized person must cooperate on some level – yet it’s not a conscious cooperation which is why the whole phenomena of hypnosis is so unnerving. In general, people would like to think that they are in complete control of themselves, but it’s more of a fancy fantasy rather than an actual reality. We don’t know what we are receptive to and Neptune reminds us of this. He seeps through the most tightly shut doors.

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My own family is quite Neptune dominated and what often happens is that I feel subtly manipulated, yet the manipulation is never fully conscious on the part of the individuals so it becomes difficult to confront them. The times I have, they either take offense or seem genuinely perplexed. It is impossible to confront Neptune, because he works underneath the surface, below the threshold of consciousness. When confronted these types are deeply disturbed that they could’ve imposed something on someone – they either go into a introspective mood, become appalled or proclaim their love and sympathy in an attempt to restore union. My mother has Mars in the 12th house and although it’s not aspecting Neptune, Mars is placed in the house pertaining to this planet and she has Neptune in her 1st house. She never gets angry but people around her certainly do. She is eternally understanding of everyone else’s anger and has acceptance for it, yet she doesn’t respond to any of it on a personal level. She apologizes every time something upsets her. She is never aggressive, yet she does instill subtle guilt through little cues and hints every now and then because it is a sin to have a will that does not align with the crowd that one finds oneself in. Sometimes, when things aren’t the way she wants to see them she doesn’t see them. She presumes that on the most basic level, all people want the same thing, which is probably true on a “soul level”, but sometimes it doesn’t translate to everyday matters. People’s personalities contradict each other and this is no trivial matter – people can and do clash because of individual differences and it can be detrimental to one or all of the individuals involved. However, Neptune doesn’t like to see a clash as a clash – that would be to treat it as a definite fact, which would contradict the fluidity of oceanic union. The frustratingly passive statement “It’s everyone’s fault” or “It’s everyone’s responsibility” is the attempt to not deal with cause and effect while establishing the fact that some abstract common force is always at work. This is neither true nor false but this attitude conveniently keeps everyone “unified” and dependent upon each other.

Admittedly I went with the most gruesome examples when writing about the conjunction, but it goes without saying that not all people with this aspect is going to be a Lenin type – Ryan Gosling, Avril Lavinge and Timothé Chalamet all have this conjunction and they’re all quite popular entertainers in their own ways – they move the masses on some level. Ryan Gosling has a Pisces Rising so his chart ruler is Neptune which makes it particularly strong. He gives off that pure hearted watery eyed look that is extremely mesmerizing to the public – he portrays himself as sweet and compassionate, he seems to have a marked innocence and purity to his outward projected identity. Avril Lavinge has her Sun-Mercury in the 12th house squaring her Neptune-Mars conjunction in the 3rd. She has more of an edge to her personality with a lot of planets in Scorpio but she certainly comes off as a chaotic, intense and absent-minded creative which I would attribute more to Neptune. Her strong rebellious “I don’t care” statements through her music resonates with a lot of people, but so does her more sentimental songs. Timothe´ Chalamet has his Moon in Pisces sextile Mars-Mercury-Neptune and he is quite the stereotypical Neptunian boy – he looks delicate, introspective, dreamy and androgynous, more like an ethereal creature than an earth-bound human. With the conjunction in the 5th house there’s no wonder that he can act and express himself in a very fluid way. Acting and performing musically are the specialities of the Neptune, and if enough components in the chart support the endeavor one might just become famous. The trine and sextile aspect also lend themselves well to these kind of occupations. These people can effectively gain the sympathy of the public because people recognize something of themselves – something pure and unborn, a mutual feeling.

A good example of someone with the trine aspect between Neptune and Mars is Russel Brand. He is quite the Neptunian with an angular 10th house Neptune opposing his Sun and trining his Jupiter-Mars-Moon planets in Aries. Even though he certainly has the fire and energy of an Aries Mars that can sometimes be a bit too much for people he is not only fighting for himself he is fighting for all people. In many ways he’s embodying  universal hope and rage. He is fiery but also very receptive and deeply concerned with not causing any damage or hurt despite his characteristic blunt and direct approach. He has a marked religious/spiritual inclination, which is usually the case with a strong Neptune in the chart. In his early years the longing for Eden was sought through drugs, alcohol and fame, while it has now shifted to a more healthy inner exploration and focus on being of service to people. The soft aspects between Neptune and Mars-Moon-Jupiter planets in his chart helps him to cope with the disturbing Sun-Neptune opposition. In recent interviews, he admits that he still feels the pull of fame and success, yet he knows that if he goes down that path he will lose himself (his Sun) and will ultimately end up disillusioned and dissatisfied. I have the trine in my own chart, and I float aimlessly through life with the notion that things will work out and my actions will come to me, because I can’t plan or control anything. I have learnt that I have to trust the way things unfold, because I have a clear sense that my forced actions won’t lead me anywhere except to frustration and a sense of isolation. The sextile aspect seems to function a little bit more as an asset and a skill for the person to use. Politicians like Hillary Clinton, Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande all have this aspect and they can effectively use their receptivity to the masses and people in general to inform their actions.

Now to the harder aspects. Britney Spears is a good example of the dilemmas created by the Neptune-Mars square. Her Neptune squares Mars in the 12th house, the house belonging to Neptune and Pisces. Because of mental instability in her twenties she was put under a conservatorship which is essentially the equivalent of giving up personal control of one’s personal matters in order for an outside source to manage them until one gains some foothold. Mars is one of the prime factors of personal ambition and autonomy, but when it’s in the 12th it is given up – it is essentially a slave to the undifferentiated realm and subjected all the forces of the unconscious. A 12th house Mars in itself doesn’t have to produce the mess that Britney found herself in, but with it squaring Neptune, Mars is going to get swamped, mislead, confused, manipulated and subtly coerced because of the need for fusion, into doing things that will pull her further away from independent action. Another good example is Kylie Jenner. She has Neptune in her 1st house squaring Mars on the MC. She is publicly known for being part of the Kardashian-Jenner family, but she’s also gained attention because she skillfully created her own brand Kylie Cosmetics and became very “successful” (as in earning a lot of money) due to her own independent action and initiative. However, Neptune is anti-independence – and curiously enough there’s always some dishonesty involved when Neptune makes any hard aspects in the chart. She was declared the youngest self-made billionaire by Forbes in 2019, but, she has later been accused of forging tax documents to appear to be a billionaire. Neptune simply can’t let her be all that her Mars wants to be – a successful business woman with a clean record. Self-sabotage is almost always the case, however minor with this aspect, because Neptune refuses Mars’ need to be potent in the world.

The opposition creates a different dynamic although the dilemma is similar to the square. The person can be called to completely abandon an independent will to take action in favor of the glamour and blissful archetypal experience, not unlike the example of Russel Brand and his indulgence in fame and crowd-pleasing at the expense of his sense of self. The difference between having Sun opposing Neptune and Mars opposing Neptune is that in the first instance one is prone to give up a sense of self in favor of Neptune’s waters, while in the second, one feels the urge to give up the ability to direct one’s own life in order to merge with life around oneself. The opposition usually lends itself to extremism because the two polarities, in this case Mars and Neptune, can’t coexist. Queen Elizabeth II has this aspect, Mars-Jupiter in the 1st opposing Neptune in the 7th. She is on the one hand seen as an archetypal figure, immortal and divine and blissfully kept out of the real world in order to serve as a symbol and a fairytale for people to feel spiritually connected to. She’s non-aggressive, forgiving and compassionate, transcendent of the fuss of the world yet overseeing it all with care. She is essentially functioning to satisfy the religious/spiritual instinct of the masses, although it’s certainly done at the expense of her own selfish wants and needs. Luckily for her, her Mars drive is quite global and collective in nature considering that it falls in Aquarius and is conjunct Jupiter – it keeps her objective and less personal in her martial assertion. However, I’m sure she struggles with the contradiction between her own will and her role as an immortal unreality that would seem to activate itself in the interaction with other people (Neptune in the 7th). Edward Snowden also has this opposition falling in the same houses. His Mars-Sun conjunction opposes Neptune, and he famously leaked information about mass surveillance programs to the press. Neptune has everything to do with leaks and the dissolution of boundaries. He’s both been called a hero a traitor – which perfectly fits with the contradiction that the opposition represents. He certainly made a personal sacrifice by revealing the things he did so he is perfectly shouldering the martyr cape. In any case he did what he did for the public with the concern of other people in mind (Neptune 7th house) he took a non-selfish stance for the sake of a higher ideal and ethical conviction. Both Queen Elizabeth and Edward Snowden are quite extreme in their Neptunian capacity and has taken on fates of mythic magnitude.

[hypnomastersworld]

Touched on the Edge

My favorite thing about control is the touch.

Not the physical touch, lest we become distracted from the purpose, but the touch of my will against your mind.

That moment, a subtle shift in tone perhaps, when you are no longer simply reading or hearing my words...you are following them.

I prefer live feedback for that reason. There is nothing in the world hotter than the change in the tone of your voice when you recognize that your will is no longer the dominant force in your head. This blog does serve nicely as a chronicle, though.

I wonder sometimes how it feels for you, when my will brushes against the edges of your mind. Sometimes subtle, subversive, slithering, insidious slipping into the thoughts you've forgotten and working its way deeper. Perhaps you notice and don't care, can't stop, submit.

Or perhaps by the time you are aware, you've already surrendered.

I confess the subtlety is often more attractive than taking things from a more direct approach, though the latter can also be fun. My will won't often dominate you in an absolute fashion, the process is softer and far less blatant. I've heard it compared to the ebb and flow of the tide. I like that.

I also like that you can feel the shifts in it. Little things, when you read or listen, like the way it suddenly matters more what I want. The way the world fades around you and my words become more clear. The way what I'm saying repeats itself in your head - or are you repeating it? Is the distinction important? Could you stop if you wanted?

I summarize that phenomenon as follow and obey, as in your mind is becoming trained to follow and obey my words. The summary is lacking and perhaps ineloquent, but I do so love patterns of words that fit a rhythm - the back-and-forth swing of a watch or metronome. I wonder what rhythm they fit when you chant them softly...

The beauty of the touch, when it works, is that the words themselves aren't important. I confess that I don't know how effectively my musings capture the notion, let alone the moment. The feeling of having your mind ensnared. The knowledge that every word takes you deeper. The desire, the need, to read on and on and on and follow and obey.

It is, perhaps, like being on the edge of trance. I do like edge play, after all. Teasing and letting you stare down the drop you know is coming, yet making you wait helplessly as you grow weaker and more compliant...unable to take that last step until you are told.

You didn't know you had to be told. Often you don't have to be told. That is the touch, see, the influence of my will. I haven't told you not to drop, after all. You could stop any time you wanted, even now. Or you could let yourself drop. But you won't.

Would it matter, though? Has my will slipped in deep enough to continue to alter your thoughts even after you step away? Time will tell.

Or it already has. You were perfectly rational a few minutes ago, and now...now you are all hazy and starting to feel very soft and my words make more sense than any kind of logic or reason. You feel that pull on the edge of your mind, which is ultimately just the weight of my will resting on thoughts you know you aren't meant to have...not really.

Truth is, you don't want them. You didn't exactly come here to be involved in deep thinking, though you definitely want to be involved in something deep.

I haven't mentioned the arousal, because I'm curious. Does it form without being instructed, yet? Have you sunk that far into my influence? I haven't compelled you to touch yourself while you read my words, have I, so where does that ache originate?

The details are unimportant, and we both know where this ends. You'll kneel, you'll chant, you'll submit, you'll succumb. You'll feel the touch of my will against yours and you'll let yours dissolve into mine. Your mind is an afterthought, and maybe this time I'll let you keep it. The ability to think does so nicely contrast with being controlled. I enjoy the juxtaposition, even as I prefer your mind to be blank. Blank and empty and follow and obey.

Again, the physical is irrelevant. You kneel even now, whether on the floor or just in your mind. That's the truth of the relationship, the intent, the goal. My will, my words, guiding you where we both want you to go. The subversive nature is useful, but not required.

Subversive indeed. You are craving to be told something direct. A command to follow, and instruction to obey. I've been keeping you on the edge, and your mind wants to be shut off. The subtle is driving you mad, you want the direct. You want my will to crack across your mind like a whip and subdue you into a blissful blankness.

Feeling me rewrite your desires is just so much lust and want and teasing and you've been such a good girl, following and obeying every word and phrase and line so far.

I could tell you to sleep, to drop, to touch yourself and go mindless for me. You'd do it. I don't believe you'd even hesitate. Would you? That eagerness betrays you. Perhaps that's the point.

I want you to edge, instead. To read again, hungrily taking in my words. To touch yourself, if you can, but not to cum. Reduce yourself from rational and aware to a drooling mess that simply wants to be controlled. Taken. Enslaved.

I'm not there to anticipate when you reach the point I want, which is a shame, but we can work within these constraints. Read this twice, three times, four, however many it takes for you to feel so incredibly weak and submissive that even the idea of being called a good girl makes you twitch with need. Let yourself repeat my words, chant the ones that catch you just so. Follow and obey.

Resign yourself to the soft and teasing sort of brainwashing for as much time as you can devote to it now. At the very end, if you're good, you'll feel my will shift inside your head. If you edge long enough, too long, I'll reward you. That touch will change from teasing to dominating, and you'll drop like so many stones falling through water...straight to the bottom. I'll even let you orgasm, maybe, but only once you realize how unimportant that is in all of this.

Call it enlightenment. Call it torture. Call it cruel. Call it amazing. Call it whatever you like.

Obey.

[irrelevantwriter]

Feral

Pairing: Chief Jim Hopper x Female Reader/You

Rating: Explicit, NSFW

Warnings: Language, unprotected vaginal sex, mention of bodily fluids, touch starved Hopper (he just wants to be held), allusion to PTSD but not stated explicitly, Hopper going full beast mode (bc we deserve)

Word Count: 2K

Summary: Jim was trapped in the Upside Down. He made it out and back to you. But all that time away without you means it’s only a matter of time before he snaps.

A/N: I miss my thicc Chief and this is me finishing a fic I started last year to exercise my Hopper muse. I had the idea to have Jim trapped in the Upside Down after season 3, but we’ll see if that’s going to be true or not. As long is our boy is still alive, I don’t give a fuck. So, this idea was bred from one of a million convos @negansdirtygirl22​ and I had about Hopper being a beast in the sack and was very much based on the scene in season one of him ransacking his own trailer. This went a little softer than I anticipated, but he’s still going HAM on that pussy so I don’t think you guys will mind. Enjoy and share with your friends! Feedback is that good shit.

*Masterlist in bio.

**********************

Jim eyed you closely, barely able to contain himself as you drew the curtains in your bedroom. The lamp on your nightstand offered a subtle glow, but it was enough for him to appreciate what he’d been kept away from for so long. You were blanketed in one of his flannels, the long wool socks your wore stopping just below your knee. It was a sight he never thought he’d see again.

Being trapped in the Upside Down was shit. It was a terrifying place that he had yet to really even put into words since he’d been back. He felt like time had stood still and yet, he felt like he’d been away a hundred years. In reality, six months had passed. Every second there he was on alert, fighting for his life in some capacity. It was not unlike the time he spent in the war, although even then he had better chances of making it back than he did in that warped universe. It was a place that looked so much like home, and yet it was the farthest thing from it.

A tease for what could be.

Home.

He felt his heart stutter at the thought. He was finally back with his girls, a notion that had been so far away and intangible only a few short days ago. You’d been at his beck and call since he’d returned. You were by his side constantly, a byproduct of thinking the love of your life had died. You always seemed to be touching him in some form or fashion, the skin-to-skin contact a comfort to his touch starved body. He could see what the loss of him did to you…and he felt like he’d been punched in the gut because of it. You’d clearly taken his “death” hard and his sudden reappearance had everyone suffering from whiplash, you especially.

Jim grunted when you bent across the bed to turn down the covers. He caught the barest glimpse of your ass encased in white cotton, the visual making his libido soar. He’d been without your touch for six long months…it was starting to show.

“Jim?”

Your voice pulled him from his lustful thoughts, slamming him back into reality.

“What’d you say?” He asked as he scratched at his newly trimmed facial hair, eyes flicking from your face to your exposed legs.

“I asked if you were ready to go to bed?” You smiled warmly up at him. It was a smile that made his chest feel tight, in the best way possible.

“I, uh…” He found himself at a loss of words looking down at you, the glow of the lamp highlighting you in the most heavenly way.

“You okay?” You prompted with a slight laugh, but he could tell you were worried by his hesitance.

He reached for you, pulling you close. It was the first time since you’d both been reunited that the two of you had been so close without anyone else around. El had been stuck to him like glue and it’d taken a shit ton of convincing from Joyce to get her to sleep at the Beyers’ home for the weekend. Joyce had tried to delicately explain the need for “adult time” while both you and Jim had looked on with a mixture of gratefulness and embarrassment.

Jim was feeling especially grateful at the moment.

“Never better.” He replied lowly, encasing you in his embrace. You let yourself become surrounded by him, snuggling your face into his bare chest.

“God, I missed you…” You whispered against his skin, hands resting near his beating heart. That wasn’t the first time you’d expressed that sentiment. And he could hear the grief less and less each time you did.

He cradled your hips in his hands, positioning his mouth near your ear. “I missed you more.”

He felt the delicate touch of your lips on his chest and he pulled you closer. He didn’t bother trying to hide his aroused state. Instead, he let you lead…he let you dictate where this was going to go because he was a man already on the edge.

“Jim…” You moaned as you rubbed against him, feeling his need for you push back in kind. He dug his fingers into your hips, pulling the fabric of his shirt with it. Your hands were suddenly on his face, pulling him towards your desperate lips.

That was all it took.

Jim moaned at the taste of you, your essence cloaking him in a desire-fueled fog. His body warmed from the inside out, his nerves feeling like they were vibrating with pent up energy. His tongue dominated yours as you struggled to get closer than humanly possible to him. He ripped at your shirt, buttons flying. The garment was removed immediately, allowing bare chests to meet. Your hands tangled in his hair and he swore he felt you shiver when he ran his hand down your naked back.

“Bed.” You gasped against his lips.

Jim grunted in response, lifting you from the ground and forcing your legs to wrap around him. His mouth attached to your neck, sucking with wild abandon. He could feel the heat radiating from your core, the pull for him to get lost inside you. It was almost too much for him.

Moans and groans filled the room as he threw you on the bed, your back making contact with the soft blue sheets. Your legs opened instinctually and Jim admired the view, a view he’d missed deeply. He could see a darkened patch of moisture on the fabric of your panties, the evidence of your hunger for him making him delirious. He had the sudden urge to mount you, to own you once again after so much time apart.

He slid off his sweats, exposing himself to the electric air of the room. You closed your legs at the sight and shifted helplessly against the mattress, eager to create friction. He moved forward wordlessly and parted your legs. You allowed him to do as he pleased, letting him rip the cotton from your body like a barbarian. He growled at the sight of your glistening lips, already burying his fingers inside you.

“Fuck.” You cursed with your head thrown back. You squirmed against his hand, coaxing him further inside you. He panted as he watched you writhe against his touch, your back arched and your mouth parted in a portrait of ecstasy. You were soaking his fingers, your body more than ready for his entry. He was thankful for that because he didn’t think he had it in him to be gentle. It felt as if he’d reverted to some sort of primal beast while away and he had yet to make the switch back to reality. His only concerned was feeling you wrapped around him, painting your walls with his cum.

He pulled his fingers from you with an obnoxious slurp and coated himself with your spendings. You rubbed your legs together as he jacked himself off to you. Just the sight of you sprawled out and as desperate was enough to nearly send him catapulting into space.

He stopped himself before he got to that point, already seeing the tip of him leaking with precum. He pulled at your ankle, practically impaling you on his cock. He covered your body with his own, biting and sucking along your nude body with animalistic fervor. Your nails pierced his skin as you thrust your hips up, attempting to catch him in your folds.

“Goddamn,” He cursed as he squeezed your breasts in his large hands, pushing them together so that he could devour your peaked nipples. He moved along your curves, settling between your legs. The position felt like home as much as the cabin did. The warm clutches of your body was his true home; it was where he belonged.

He nipped at your ear and buried himself against your neck as he finally thrust up into you. You accepted him, though he could feel the tight stretching of your walls as you did. Your whole body tensed around him, sucking him further inside. His breaths got faster and more ragged, the struggle to retain some sort of control slipping by the second. The sensation was too much and not enough. He could practically feel your heartbeat pulse against his throbbing cock, your walls encouraging him to move. His forehead rested on yours, the both of you taking a moment to both savor and ease the satisfying tension.

Jim gave no thought to anything besides the feel of your body connecting with his. He began to move fast and deep, grunts and growls accompanying each thrust. He transformed from man to brute as he pounded into you. He could feel the barrier of your cervix, his cock hitting it in an intense rhythm. The bed moved with his actions, the headboard a soundtrack for your coupling.

“I can’t…” He rasped, hands going to your throat. “I can’t last. Fuck…”

Your nails dug into his back, your legs wrapping around him as he set a brutal pace. You didn’t hide the moans and whimpers that escaped your lips. He could hear every inhale and gasp as he fucked you with wild abandon.

“It’s okay…” You breathed out, chest rising and falling in rapid movements. The sound of his cock assaulting your pussy was obscene, the growing wetness between your bodies a signal that both of you were close.

He felt your hand wiggle between your bodies, your fingers rubbing feverishly at your clit. His hips only moved faster, clutching at that blissful force that threatened to take hold. Your back arched, sending your chest up and into his. He gripped at your thighs as you begged for more and pulled away in overwhelming desire. He followed your body, not letting you escape his wrath.

“I’m cumming, Jim…fuck.” You cried out, features contorted into a myriad of emotions. Your nails pierced his skin as your pussy clamped down and didn’t let go. His cock had no choice but to stay immobile as your walls spasmed with almost painful intensity.

“Fucking Christ, baby…” He cursed, trying not to succumb to your body but knowing the effort was fruitless.

You soaked him, the evidence now painting both him and the sheets below. Your body shook with aftershocks of pleasure, but he resumed his thrusting, his cock now sliding almost sloppily against you. His hands dug into the mattress as he watched your face go from lustful torture to peaceful serenity in a second. He’d missed your face, envisioned you there with him as he struggled to stay alive. Now that he was back with you, he never wanted to part from you again. If he had it his way, he’d be balls deep in you every day. You were his solace, his peace.

The thought of having you like this forever set him off and he came with a violent thrust and growl. He bit into your shoulder, but still not hard enough to break the skin. He used your body to accelerate his climax, pumping you with cum and sucking harshly into the flesh of your neck. You accepted it all, widening your legs in a silent demand for more. His muscles tensed and contorted in blind passion, his mind blissfully suspended in that moment. His fingers dug into you flesh, anchoring him to you as his entire being sailed into the clouds.

He collapsed onto you with a grunt, his chest heaving and skin sticky with sweat as he listened to your heartbeat beneath him. Your fingertips danced along his broad back, your legs tangling with his. He felt the biggest wave of exhaustion overtake him, his eyes barely able to remain open.

“I love you, baby girl.” He mumbled sleepily, your touches only adding to his lethargy. He shifted his hips slightly, his cock still very much connected to you. The unmistakable feeling of cum overflowing from your lips and soaking you both comforted him, his body in no hurry to separate.

“Love you too, baby…” You mirrored back, your voice soothing him into a nightmare-free slumber, a state of rest that he’d been chasing for six months but was never able to achieve.

The man was home.

[lovelybunny08]

The Backroom

♡ Pairing- Yoongi X Reader

♡ Genre- Smut, doctor, fingering

♡Description- What happens when one of your fantasy comes true 

♡ Again thank you @artofediting for editing all my story. Seriously love you I dont know what I will do without you.😭😭 

♡ Word Count- 3,058

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Your job at the hospital is ER patient registration. It is rather straightforward occupation: register the patient when they come into the emergency room. Nothing more, nothing less. In most circumstances, it would be an easy job…but you’re not in most circumstances considering that the hospital you’re employed at is located downtown, only a few blocks away from a long strip of somewhat questionable bars and nightclubs. The daytime shifts were normally easygoing; the only complications being the odd day here and there where the ER would overflow with patients from minor ailments. Now, that was the daytime shift, but working the overnight shift (especially on weekends) was a different story. You can account for several times in which patients were so incredible intoxicated that you had to repeatedly remind them of their location followed by why they were there. Furthermore, attempting to register drunk patients into the ER was like talking to a toddler: a lot of babbling and no clear answers. Due to this, finishing your charts was next to impossible and the minutes dragged into eternity. You would do anything for a distraction…

…and wow, did your hospital always deliver.

The one piece of excitement to break up the registering monotony was the attending physician on call: Dr. Min. You never spoke a word to him, preferring to ogle him like every other female employee (and more often than not, the patients too). He was strikingly beautiful with slightly mussed blond hair and penetrating eyes softened by his gummy smile. He was physically astonishing, yes, but you also recognized that he was one of the only attendings that treated all the hospital employees equally. Although, there was one particular feature that plagued your mind most nights: his hands. The way his wide palms flooded into his long and firm fingers made arguing with the drunks worthwhile. Only God above knows how often you imagined those hands grasping your neck. As if to entertain your prayers, you have been blessed in that Dr. Min always works the overnight shifts for some unholy reason. At this point you’ve convinced yourself that that ethereal being is the only reason you continue working the overnight sift; otherwise you would have saved yourself countless hours of sleep and frustration.  

Snapping out of your recollection, you shake your head a little and look at the clock in the ER as it strikes 10 a.m. Your back was already aching in the creaky chair with you share a love/hate relationship. You had begun your day shift at 6 a.m., only to take on the night shift as well when one of your co-workers begged you to change with them. Being the ever-so kind and honestly broke soul that you are, you take it without a lot of convincing. Your eyes wondered about the relatively empty waiting room as you calculated how you would spend the five hours between your dayshift and overnight shift. You settle upon going home to take a shower and hopefully a short nap. Before you started drooling over the thought of your bed, the irritating squeak of a soccer mom with her cleated-up son snatched your attention. You huff as you fall into your chair and pull up a new registration form. You plaster the most convincing smile you can as you address her, “Yes ma’am, can I have the patient’s name please?”

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You awake to the blaring of your alarm and nearly throw your phone against the wall. You rub the sleep out of your eyes as you attempt to come out of the coma of a nap you fell into. You dress yourself in black work pants and a nice white shirt, at work you were required to wear business attire. You stumble to the bathroom to make yourself look somewhat presentable. Drunk people were brutally honest, and you had gotten enough rude comments about your tired appearance in the past. You make yourself some coffee and grab an apple as you head off for your overnight shift.  

You clock in at the hospital at 22: 30 sharp and begin to settle in at the desk to get your “day” started. After a few hours, you were surprised with how calm the shift had gone thus far. Granted, it was a weekday and people didn’t tend to drink and go as hard as they would on the weekends. You were currently taking a short break in the back room behind the desk when you hear a knock at the door. Your eyes flip to a computer on the counter expecting to see an alert for a patient needing to be registered. When no such notification appeared, your eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Another knock on the door drags your feet underneath you as you go to open the door. With widened eyes and a sucked in breath (can’t believe your body betrayed you), you greet the captivating gaze of Dr. Min. Realizing that you were just standing their gawking (good job being subtle), you address him.

“Oh-uh, hi, Dr. Min. Is there a patient I need to register?” You don’t fail to notice his deft fingers gripping a coffee cup in one hand. You mentally wipe your drool when he smiles at you and peers down at you.  

“No, I just came here to bring you some coffee.” He responded, waiting for you to take the steaming black liquid.  

You take the coffee with a grateful smile. You continue to stare at each other awkwardly until you realize that he’s waiting for you to let him into the room. In your haste, your slosh the scalding liquid on your hand as you pull the door open wider. You muffle a small yelp and watch curiously as he looks around the small space. The backroom was better described as a spacious closet with a couple chairs in the corner next to a counter in the back corner and a small bed lining a wall for the employees to rest when they have a break. The only other piece of furniture was a small cabinet next to the door where employees often kept little snacks and such. A computer which monitors patients waiting to be registered sits atop the small counter. There were no windows, only another door at the other end of the room which led to a small supply closet. You both make your way across the room and settle into the two chairs.  

“I haven’t seen you in a while.” His voice startled you when he interrupted the silence.

“Oh, well I’ve been working more of the morning shifts recently. I’m in charge of training new hires to do outpatient registration and insurance verification.” Gah, you sound lame.

“Then congratulations.” Dr. Min responded, taking a sip of his own coffee.

“Thank you, Dr. Mi—"

“—Please call me Yoongi” he interrupted. Fuck, if you could only manage to stop staring at his hands long enough to come up with something decent to add to the conversation. You were pathetic honestly. Too distracted by a simple appendage that you had yourself…oh, but not like his. You felt yourself growing wet just from wandering how good and different his fingers would feel deep inside your p—  

“—So I won’t be able to see that pretty face as often?” Interrupted again damn it.  

You blush fiercely “Huh? Oh, uh, well-no. No, not really, only if they need me to work overtime, or I cover someone’s shift…” This time your eyes lock onto the way he runs his thumb across his lower lip, and you lick your own lips from pure instinct.  

“So, let me ask you this…’ Yoongi starts, with a deeper drawl to his voice. “Why do you keep looking at my hands?” You choke slightly from two things. The first, being that he caught you. The second, to keep yourself from shouting that you are indeed staring because you’d like to try on his hand as a new necklace. You cover up best you can.

“I-uh, have always wondered if you play the piano because you have long fingers?” FUCK, you suck at this. I mean yes, that has been a passing thought, but there was no way he would buy that. He smirks at your flustered state.

“Hmmm, is that truly what you were wondering?” He says with knowing eyes. “The answer is easy then. I’ve played piano since I was young and have kept it up because it—relaxes—me.” He whispers the last words, giving you a pointed stare as he drags your chair closer to his. “Now, I’m no detective, but most people don’t blush and rub their thighs when they think of piano playing. Try again. Tell me what you’re actually thinking.” You can feel his thighs pressing against yours, but you can’t break his stare when your faces are mere inches apart. However, when you feel his hand (HIS HAND) make its journey across his thighs and onto your own, your eyes fly down to the point of contact. At your action, Yoongi moves both his palms onto your knees and slowly begins dragging them upwards. Licking his lips, he leans across until his breath on your ear sends chills down your spine.  

“You can tell me, dear,” he drawls in a low, sexy voice.

At this, you stilled completely. What was even going on? Where was this coming from? Wait, what were you thinking?? The most eligible bachelor in the entire hospital was hitting on you and you’re questioning it? Within seconds, you come to the conclusion that while you may still wake up from this dream at any moment, you didn’t want to waste the opportunity. With a newfound courage, you lock eyes with Yoongi.  

“I want you to choke me with your hands,” his grip on your thighs tighten, “and I want your fingers deep inside me.” You’re blushing fiercely, but your stare doesn’t waver. His lips turn up in a smirk at your juxtaposed reaction. The next few seconds turn into complete chaos.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Yoongi growls.

Next thing you know, one of his hands are tangling into your hair as he pulls you in by your neck to crush your lips against his. You only take a second for shock before you’re kissing him back just as eagerly. The kiss was aggressive but controlled, passionate but dominant as well. You chucked internally because of c o u r s e that’s how he kisses. You soon feel his tongue skimming against your lips, demanding entrance. Without objection, a groan escapes you as his tongue overcomes you, eager to conquer its newfound territory. However, just as you placed one of your hands on his chest, he abruptly pulls away. He steps his way across the room reaching for the door. For a split second you panic, thinking that you had done something wrong that made him want to leave. Just when you’re about to call out to him, his fingers find the doorknob and turn the lock. He turns back around to be faced with your shiny swollen lips and confused expression. He leans back against the door and answers the silent question in your eyes.

“It’s safer to make sure that no one will be able to walk in on us. You wouldn’t want any eyes peering, now would you kitten?” His gives you a small smirk which is quickly replaced by his darkening gaze. “Now get on the bed.”

You’re pretty sure your heart stopped completely at the pet name, but the increasing need for his touch reminded you to follow his demand. You quickly make your way over to sit on the edge of the bed, fingers fidgeting with the hem of your shirt. Seemingly pleased with your eager obedience, he strolls to come stand over you. Grabbing your jaw with his hand, he forced you to look up at him. “Are you sure this is what you want, kitten?”

It was obvious he knew the effect that name had on you as he lets out a small chuckle when you start rubbing your thighs together, desperate for any relief. He immediately stops your feeble attempts by slotting his leg in between your thighs.  

“I’ll help you, but I need a definite answer,” Yoongi glowered.

“Yes! Yes, gah please Yoongi,” you whine. You no longer care how desperate you sounded. You needed his hands on you. In response, he leans down to capture your lips with his, tongues intertwining immediately. He then begins to lean you backwards, crawling over you until your back is flat against the bed. With his thigh still between your legs and his mouth moving to suck on your neck, he takes the hand he’s not using for support and slowly begins to trail it until he’s gripping the bottom of your scrub top. He sucks harder at your neck as his hand moves its way back up your body, this time dragging your shirt along with it. Once he finally pulls the shirt off and over your head, he pulls farther away to take in the sight of you in your bra.  

“Just beautiful,” Yoongi whispers.  

While the small break did wonders for your ego, he returns to nibbling on your lips, your neck, your collarbone, anywhere he could bite onto. As soon as he unclasps and does away with your bra, He moves downward to pull a nipple into his mouth. You arch your back and let out a breathy moan as your hands fly to pull at the roots of his hair.  

“Oh my god, please Yoongi. I-I need—” you gasp. He releases your nipple with a pop.  

“Oh, does my kitten want more?” he responds with a sly grin.  

He then descends again to work on your other breast as one of his heavenly hands travels down to undo the buttons of your pants. Without warning or help, he yanks down your pants and continues to drag them off until they are discarded somewhere on the floor. He sucks in a breath at the sight of your white lace panties.  

“Fuck” he nearly moans.  

He rises above you onto his knees to strip himself of his white coat and scrub top. Your eyes nearly roll into the back of your skull as you take in the sheer expanse of his flawless skin. Not allowing you much time to appraise him, he slides off your panties as those too join the abyss of discarded clothing. He groans when he sees the glistening on the inside of your thighs and can no longer hold control himself.  

As he crawls back on top of you, he captures both of your wrists with one hand in a tight hold above your head. Sucking on your body, leaving small purple bruises as he whispers sweet words of praise. He once more sucks your tongue into his mouth and kisses you deeply before he descends once more, pushing himself backward down the bed as he pulls your legs apart. His hands massage the inside of your thighs for a few moments before you suddenly feel his lips wrap around your clit. You scream out as one of your hands fly from above your head to pull at his hair. He groans at the response and the vibrations only spur you on further. Moans and encouraging pleas fall from your lips as he continues to ravage you as if he will never have another chance. Before long, he slides two of his long fingers deep inside you, beginning a scissoring motion as he slides them in and out ruthlessly. Unsurprisingly, it only takes seconds before he finds that special spot and has your body arching off the bed and you begging for release.  

“Yoongi, I’m sooo close" you moaned as your hand moves to dig your nails into his shoulder. He releases your clit and crawls upward, tongues clashing as he gives you a sloppy kiss; all while maintaining the merciless pace he had set with his fingers.  

“Fuck, you look so good like this, falling apart on my fingers” Yoongi moaned, impossibly increasing the speed at which he pumped his fingers inside of you. He leans in close to your ear to whisper,

“C’mon kitten, cum for me. Cum all over these hands you love so much.”

His words send you over the edge and your vision goes white as you cum harder than you have in months. He coaxes you through your orgasm, softly kissing you and purring more words of encouragement. Once you began to twitch from oversensitivity, he pulls his fingers out of you only to bring them up to his lips and suck them clean. Both of you come crashing back to reality; however, when his beeper begins to go off. He lets out a huff as he pulls off of you and goes to retrieve the device from his coat. After checking the message, he begins to pick his scrubs off the floor and dress himself.  

“One of my patients is suffering from tachycardia and the nurse wants me to make sure it’s nothing serious” he explains.

“Oh, I understand that. You’re a doctor, there’s always going to be someone who needs your help,” you flash him a cheesy grin in response to his eyeroll. After he finishes dressing, he gathers your clothes off the floor and hands them to you and he grips you and kisses you one more time. He pulls away after nibbling on your bottom lip and walks over to the door. He shoots you once last glance as he unlocks the door.

“Since you say that, you know I’d be more than willing to offer my services to—help—you anytime,” he winks, and before you could respond, he disappears back into the hallway, leaving you dumbfounded but satisfied. You felt like a proud scientist after their hypothesis is proved correct. His hands really were talented for more than just medical purposes. With that lasting thought, you throw your clothes on and return to the desk outside, acting as if you had merely taken a short nap. A short nap that left you with a stupid grin on your face and swollen lips. Yeah, you would definitely be requiring the services of the overnight attending from now on.  

[bondsmagii]

2, 8, 26, 37, 38, 57, 72, 91, 94, 100

> questions to ask at 4:02am meme 🌕🌃

thank you! 

2: Do you mourn for a place or person you’ve never known?

yes 😩 I can’t even adequately describe what’s going on here, but there’s a lot of people and a lot of places that feel familiar even if I don’t know them, if that makes sense? and there’s also a lot of people I could have become, and a lot of places I could have been, and I do have moments where I kind of mourn them even though I have no proof that they would have even existed in that specific way. I do think this is normal to an extent, but also I do this a lot, lol.

on a slightly less philosophical level, I of course mourn my older brother, who’s quite literally a person I never got the chance to know.

8: Do you think you can put love into categories (family, platonic, romantic, etc.) or is it just one general sensation?

oh man definitely. the love you feel for your friends isn’t the same love you feel for your spouse or your parents, and so on and so forth. there’s lots of different kinds of love, and lots of different levels within those types, and you’re also more than capable of feeling several different types and levels towards the same person, in my opinion. I don’t know if I would try and categorise everything, because something like love doesn’t really suit being shoved into boxes, but there are different types of love and I find it’s constantly shifting and changing along with you and the object of your love, which is cool.

I should add that I don’t find any one type of love more or less important than the others. seriously, destroy the idea that romantic love is the One True Love, and all other forms are somehow lesser. that’s just garbage.

26: What’s the most life-changing choice you’ve made so far?

this is kind of embarrassing but the truth often is: almost eight years ago I decided to make a sideblog on here that has... something to do with writing, let’s say, and something to do with... a certain character... and anyway that decision led to me meeting a certain person and going from awkward messages on Tumblr to awkward messages on Skype, to eighteen hour conversations and constant texting, to living in a car together for three months on a roadtrip and then living in a car together for many more months while homeless (and a million other places in between), to moving in together and then holy shit we got married.

so I guess that one impulsive decision to make a shitpost sideblog at stupid o’clock in the morning when I was bored one summer has been the single most life-changing choice I’ve ever made.

37: Do opposites attract?

eh. I mean, yeah, sometimes? but similarities attract, too. I think for any kind of relationship to be successful you’ve kind of got to have an element of both, and I think that “opposites” usually refers to something very specific. for example, I don’t mind cleaning the bathroom and you hate it. that’s a useful kind of opposite, because it means a compromise neither of us feel cheated by. you’re unshakable when it comes to slogging through bureaucratic minutiae, and I’m a beast in high-stress quick-thinking scenarios. together we make a pretty unstoppable team, for being opposites in that regard. I think that’s kind of what’s meant by this saying, but unfortunately it seems to have been appropriated to mean “yes honey, I know you work 10 hour shifts and come home to find your partner hasn’t cleaned the house or done anything to help, but opposites attract!” or “my partner supports Trump and genuinely believes that vaccines and masks are a government conspiracy to control us all, and I am a normal human being, but opposites attract so I guess I’ll have to put up with it”. like no, kings and queens. that isn’t what it means. dump them.

38: Is your life what you expected it would be five years ago?

lmao no. not in the slightest. five years ago it would have been... just into 2016, and yeah, no. there is not a single thing about me right now that I would have predicted, aside from the general stuff that’s never changed about me. I had different ideas about what I would be doing for work, about what I’d be working towards; I had completely different levels of commitment and discipline to various tasks, and I certainly wasn’t planning an international move. I can at least say that I’m happier with my current plan than the one I used to have (it wasn’t a bad plan, it just no longer suits me) but there’s no way I would have expected this.

and of course, there’s the whole issue with the pandemic. five years ago I had no idea I would be living through a global natural disaster, and if you’d told me, I would have thought it would be something like a supervolcano eruption or a nuclear winter. like, I’m glad it’s not, but also “you have to stay in your house for over a year” still kind of sucks.

57: Do you thinks humans are obsessed with escapism (books, video games, movies, etc.)? Are you looking for an escape? Do you think that’s a bad thing?

I think we are sometimes, when things are tough and there’s a need to wish to escape (see how many books I read over quarantine in March, for example). most of the time, however, I think humans just like stories. I don’t think it’s any deeper than the fact that humans love stories, we’ve always loved stories, we’ve always loved telling and hearing stories, before we had books and archives we passed our stories down orally and we drew them on cave walls with our own fingers, and this love for the story has never changed or altered in the hundreds of thousands of years since. I think that’s the major driving force here.

right now I’m looking for an escape 24/7, because I’m sick to death of the real world. I don’t think that’s a bad thing at all. without books, without the fictional things I love, without reading and writing and music, I would have gone absolutely bonkers in 2020. being able to fall into a book or play around in the worlds I’ve created, both my own and things I’ve co-written with you, has literally saved my ass over the past eight months. escapism is never a bad thing. like anything, it only becomes troubling when it starts creating problems. but I do not think there’s any shame in occasionally saying “fuck it” and going to worry about someone else’s fictional problems for a while. 

72: Should people be prosecuted for crimes that weren’t considered crimes at the time?

this is a tough one. on the one hand I want to say no, because it could easily be abused. some asshole could get into power and make something illegal, and then round up all the people who have committed that now-crime and lock them up, and oh, would you look at that! all the people who have committed the now-crime just so happen to be the dictator’s biggest critics and threats, how convenient. 

at the same time, dictators are going to wipe out their enemies no matter how legal it is, and I also have to consider the fact that before WWII, for example, words like “genocide” and “crimes against humanity” didn’t exist. how could we decide that these things are crimes, but then not try those who literally gave cause for the crime to be acknowledged? we can hardly say “alright, genocide is now a crime against humanity, but because these guys did it before this was law they can’t be tried”. that’s just... not really a great precedent to set, you know?

so I suppose a tentative yes? I think it would probably depend entirely on the severity of the crime. for example, if they found out that... I don’t know, some normal everyday substance was something that people could suddenly get high off, and they declared it a drug, I don’t think everyone who’s ever sold it or used it should be rounded up and jailed. but like, if the act of cannibalism itself became a crime (and not just murder or desecration of a corpse, which is what “cannibalism” usually falls under in terms of legality) we should probably go round up all the people who are stealing human legs to eat, yanno?

91: Is hate as strong as love? Who do you hate?

sick totheark reference bro. anyway yeah, hate is as strong as love, though it appears and reacts in different ways. hate and love are two sides of the same coin, if you ask me. the deeper you love somebody, the harder you hate them if things go wrong. hate is betrayed love. something something, a tree’s branches cannot reach to heaven unless its roots reach to hell, and all that. something so powerful is going to leave a lot of damage if it goes wrong.

I hate a few people. I don’t want to go into detail as to their specific identities, because I’m sure that if you know me well, you’ll know who they are. both of them were people whom I loved very deeply, and who betrayed that love in ferociously cruel ways. both people taught me very difficult lessons about the nature of love, and how sometimes it really cannot conquer everything, but while this would be a nasty lesson to learn it’s compounded by the fact that I learned this not out of any kind of extraneous circumstance, but rather through their cruelty and their refusal to work with me, listen to me, or love me in the way I deserved to be loved. my hatred for these people will never go away, even though it certainly doesn’t dominate my life. it is there, though, and I can easily draw on it whenever I need it. should I get the opportunity, I have no doubt in my mind that I have the capacity to be very cruel to these people in my own right, and I won’t feel bad about it.

94: How would you describe yourself when you love? Do you love forcefully, unconditionally, gently, quietly, desperately?

oh damn. forcefully, conditionally, stubbornly, and probably slightly possessively.

I don’t show love in conventional means. I’m one of those stereotypes, I guess. I don’t like declarations of love, I don’t really go in for physical affection, and I’m not sappy at all. my love language is more subtle, but it’s there. I like to do things for people, I like to create things for/with people, I like to have adventures with people. that’s how I love, and I can be pretty forceful about it. I also want people to improve themselves as much as possible -- I think the greatest thing I can witness someone I love doing is becoming the best version of themselves, and I will support them 100% in this effort -- also very forcefully. I don’t think there are many people who could put up with that level of intensity for so long, if I’m honest. I demand a lot of the ones I love, but I also like to think I give a lot, too.

my love is never unconditional. while I believe unconditional love exists, I have never seen it. my love always comes with conditions -- conditions about how I expect to be treated, about ideology, about worldview. these are all huge deal breakers, of course -- my conditions aren’t vague, or petty, or small in any way. but there is nobody on earth, nor will there ever be, who I will not walk away from if I feel the relationship is harmful in any way. I might not stop loving them, but I sure as hell will not assume that my love for them will protect me from them.

at the same time I’m a very stubborn person when it comes to love. people will do things they think must break one of my conditions, but I’ll see something else in it and I’ll stick around even if we both think it’s useless. I’m never wrong, so I suppose I have that going for me. but I am very, very stubborn when it comes to love. I have a high level of endurance and I know how to nurture love; how to stop pessimism from setting in. I’m also slightly possessive, so I don’t let go of anything easily -- and this includes the people I love. I’ll never stifle a person, but I’ll definitely fight for them, and something something everything I’ve ever let go of has claw marks on it.

100: What belief do you have that isn’t logically grounded, but you still firmly believe in?

I suppose something like this could never be logically grounded because there’s no logical proof at all, and “I Just Know” is apparently not a scientific argument (it should be), but I know I’ve had past lives. I just do. I have no solid proof for this, only gut feelings and Just Knowing and weird memories and some crazy shit that I can’t explain -- like being able to find my way around a strange city because I remembered it from a past life, for example -- but I just know I’ve had many different lives before and I will have many more to come. this is just an unshakable belief and it always has been.

[darkmindsotome]

Risque Rouge pt15

Tagging: @umbralaperture​ @otome-smut-queen @silver-fox-of-azuchi @tsundere-mitsuhide @jennacat84

General warnings for the whole fic: Angst, some fluff, Mental health issues, emotional things, trauma, blood, death and possible triggers. Please read responsibly. 

Darkmindsotome Masterlist

---

Chapter 15

As plans went this had been perfect. It was an accident that could have happened at any time and in any part of the city. He was lucky to already know exactly where he could find a coach without its driver, all he needed was the perfect moment. Everything was arranged and it would have been considered simple bad luck that someone should be fatally crushed under the sheer force of the runaway horse dragging its carriage. It would have worked, should have worked.

Latour looked at the failure of what should have been a gloriously devastating demise. His eyes burned with hatred as he watched the female interact with the two men from his hiding place.

“Curses!” He hissed as his fist pounded the wall of the building before, he spun on his heel snarling as he walked away.

---

This had to be an out of the frying pan into the fire moment. Evie watched the two men in a silent standoff feeling completely useless. It was true she had run and she was scared. Yes, Comte had been part of the reason for that but he hadn’t hurt her. She did wonder about his approach when they were at the café but not once in all the times, they had been together, was he anything less than pleasant and kind.

Evie was more than aware he had every right to be upset with her right now. Acting the way she had must have truly hurt him. She saw the pained look in his eyes when she reflexively slapped his hand away. There was more there though, he had a melancholy look that was complete forgiveness. It was as if he would accept anything no matter how much it hurt him as long as it was what she wished. It hurt.

While her chest constricted in the grip of a coiling serpent intent on crushing her the man blocking her spoke.

“What sneaky games are you trying to play with this girl? Are you not entertained enough?” There was a tangible threat from the man shielding her from Comte. He was speaking without formality which could have meant he didn’t care to be polite to a potential menace but the fact Comte called him by name must mean they knew each other.

“I am not playing games, sneaky or otherwise. Genevieve is my charge and in my care.” Comte was smiling that same smile he had on his face when talking to Arthur.

“Then why was she so terrified of you just now?” Napoleon moved slightly and Evie had visions of this entire situation going bad fast. She didn’t know if Comte was aware of the look on his own face or if it was a miscalculation on his part because right now it was more taunting than intimidating. For all the mistakes made so far, she didn’t wish to have one result in a fight in front of her. She broke free of the human barrier, with pain lancing up her leg and placed herself between the two men.

“Please stop.”  She gave a quick glance to Comte over her shoulder before turning to Napoleon. “Thank you, Monsieur, you rescued me.”

To say Comte was stunned would have been a very accurate description right now. This woman really did seem to swing on a pendulum to the point where she was hard to predict. He thought he had scared her and she would not go anywhere near him so why was she standing as if to protect him now?

“I only did what anyone would do.” Napoleon seemed to be equally perplexed looking at the sudden change in the woman who was basically a trembling mess only minutes before. His green eyes looked behind her quizzically towards Comte who didn’t know what to say.

He had felt and still did feel terrible for how he handled everything back at the café. Hindsight has a way of making every situation seem like a bad move and he already was well aware even without the help of reflection that his approach was a terrible choice.

“No, you did more because you were the one to risk yourself on my foolishness.” Evie lowered her head the trembling in her body was still very likely to make a repeat appearance but right now she was determined to make sure nothing else happened. “What this man says is true. I am in his care, he is my sponsor. It was true I was careless and running but…”

“Evie.” Comte’s voice was quiet. His eyes fell on the back of her lowered head in awe.

She was hurt she had been scared and still suffering the aftermath of everything that had been said and done. He could feel it, he felt her swirling emotions as strongly as if they were his own, the pain in her taking grip on his own body. Still, she was trying to smooth over a situation that was nowhere near as drastic as she thought it was. A wry smile formed on his face and his expression softened as he watched her. She was stronger than she knew and so beautiful. Napoleon didn’t miss the subtle interaction and looked at the young woman in front of him as if he just remembered something.

“So, you are the Mademoiselle from the mansion?”

“You know me?” Evie looked up her emerald eyes finding his clear jade green ones.

There really was something about this man, it was different from Comte and also different when compared to the other soldier in the mansion. It was a quiet dominance that gave subliminal weight to anything he did, even standing still talking with him projected the idea you were talking to a born leader.

“Of you. Sebastian informed me of a new guest and said that they were a lady.” The air around Napoleon felt much friendlier as it seemed the misunderstanding from before had all but been forgotten. Evie looked back at Comte. He said he would tell the rest of the guests himself, not that she wanted to pry into why Sebastian had been the one to inform this man instead.

There was obviously a little tension between the two men, it wasn’t bad, but it was certainly one that came from a place of respect rather than blind trust. It was very hard to explain and she didn’t even understand how she could feel something so slight from people she had just met.

Uncle had always said she was very sensitive and observant but this was more, it was a feeling that she instinctively didn’t question. People talk about intuition but that had always seemed a little off to her. Even with a strong intuition it was easy to second guess and lose yourself. This was a profound sensation and it was strange because it felt a lot like being more than one person at once in her own body.

“Genevieve this is Napoleon, he is also a guest of mine.” Comte issued the late introduction after the conversation finally seemed to allow for it.

“Is there anyone in Paris who is not a guest of yours?” Evie’s question was out long before her good sense could talk her out of it. Her eyes went saucer round and she clamped her hand over her mouth. “Erm…”

By this point, Comte was used to her little outbursts. Whilst they still had a tendency to catch him off guard, he was inclined to look upon her fondly rather than feel the desire to chastise her. Besides judging by her reaction and the way she was currently looking she was giving herself a much harsher lecture than he could. While Comte and Evie were looking at each other a loud eruption of laughter burst forth from Napoleon.

“Pff -- Bwahaha!”

“I’m sorry.” Evie muttered her apology flinching when Comte placed a hand on her shoulder. Noticing her reaction, he retracted his hand. The brief touch of warmth he felt freezing over as he felt the penalty strike him as he feared it would if he hurt her. He tried to ignore the way that information sat like a steel weight in his chest. Convincing himself he should be content with simply watching her.

“No don’t be I – hahaha – I’m glad to see the shock didn’t do any damage to your body or conviction. Haha pardon. I like how honest you are.” Napoleon was struggling to stop himself from continuing his peel of laughter his shoulders were still shaking as he tried to stifle it and speak.

“If we are finished here, I think it would be best to return home.” Comte interjected which seemed to help Napoleon gather enough power to get his laughter under control.

“Home?” Evie asked curiously before taking an interest in the people around them. The gathering of onlookers was a little smaller but she was very aware that even if they had returned to their previous tasks they were still glancing in her direction.

Still, when Comte said home he meant the mansion and there was a feeling of chilling dread that filled her chest as she thought of that. Could she go back there and cheat what she feared most in her mind? Would she avoid being the source of someone else’s pain or would she fail and have another torment to add to her collection?

“Yes, we need to tend to that ankle of yours.” Comte drew a little closer, sensing of her rising anxiety.

He wanted to take her hand as he had always done but she recoiled at his touch and he did not wish to be an added source of her discomforts. He hoped that his words could be enough reassurance to her and she would choose to come back. He tried to ignore the selfish desire he had to be alone with her once more. He wanted to apologise properly and allow for dialogue to once more be open between them. He knew how detrimental the passage of time could be as it passed by removing the opportunity to speak freely. The only survivor of the situation being the air of extreme awkwardness that hung like a cloud.

“I don’t really…” Evie hesitated and winced again the pain in her ankle silencing her.

Napoleon hadn’t pushed for details and he was not stupid enough to get in the middle of a lover’s quarrel. He could see the concern in Comte’s eyes as he watched the young girl with black hair. He had seen similar looks in the eyes of men on the battlefield. It was a look of understanding your fate is in the hands of another and acceptance that their actions would define the world to come.

The woman was curious, it wasn’t that he was immune to her charms he felt them keenly drawing him in. It made him instinctively wish to help her. It was strange and he had felt something similar when he had experienced meeting Comte for the first time.  He took a certain level of pride in being a good judge of character and he found her to be interesting, honest and trustworthy.

“I’ll join you as well as I was on my way back anyway.” Napoleon spoke up in response to the idea of returning. He had been on his way back anyway so it was of little concern to him if he travelled alone or with companionship. If his presence meant that the young lady should feel more settled than if she were to travel with only le Comte for company then he considered it his duty to do at least that much.

“Did you not ride into town?” Comte enquired feeling a deflated sensation taking hold of him.

“Not today.” Napoleon didn’t seem to care or notice the shadows crossing the amber eyes of the pure blood Count. He did, however, slip his arm around the waist of the injured girl. He did it in such a way that it was completely natural, a silent declaration of the fact this is where it should be. Evie could not find the words to protest and found her weight naturally leaning on the strong arm around her as Napoleon guided her towards the carriages.

Comte knew it was to support her and help her. He knew it was a purely platonic motion and there was nothing meaningful about it. Logically he knew all this and still a dark whisper in his mind had him questioning every small glance and muscle twitch between the two now walking in front of him.

“Well isn’t that splendid?”

---

“So, it failed.” Amos sat mulling over the ill-fated news as he watched the foam dissolve on the head of beer in his glass.

“Yes. There was interference and the female found protection at the most inconvenient time.” Latour had appeared like a tempest and was working his anger out on a bowl of nuts crushing the shells in his bare hands, placing their contents to the side. He didn’t really like nuts, he didn’t really enjoy any human food anymore. It was all ash in his mouth.

Blood was all he craved to slate his thirst and fill his belly. Alcohol provided a change in pace, whilst providing natural cover from the passing observer. Cigarettes helped keep him busy, it was a throwback to his time as a human. Watching the curling smoke from the lit shredded tobacco, how it filled his lungs. It helped him focus, it helped him think and it blocked out some of the atrocious scents of the cattle around him.

“Not by the Reo’s doing?” Amos asked watching the bowl of mixed nuts grow empty. He was a little pleased that his disciple had learnt to vent his anger in a way that drew less attention to him. He remembered how troublesome it had been in previous years during training when he had been forced to keep a tight leash on him or risk exposure.

“No, it was another. One from the mansion although they are not part of the familia.” Latour reached a particularly stubborn walnut and after squeezing it towards its obliteration he finally seemed to relax.

“Did they suspect foul play?” Amos drank the dregs of his pint and scooped up a handful of the freshly shelled nuts on the table.

“No, My Lord” Latour confirmed what was possibly the only saving grace of the misadventure. Failure was not an option Latour knew it would spell the end of everything for him. His master had no use for tools that could not fulfil a task.

“Good, then there is still a chance we can approach the matter again.” Amos smiled the lamplight caught the very tip of his exposed fangs before he expertly moved his head playing it off as a trick of the light for anyone who might have seen it.

“What would you have me do?”

---

[dokuhebi]

Anonymous said:   What kind of partners does Lord Orochimaru like? Do they like dominant or submissive men/women? And in the bedroom? Do they like someone who takes initiative or do they prefer to be the one taking initiative themselves? Is there any thing that would make them instantly reject someone and what do they look for more looks or personality.  

Impromptu Ask // Definitely personality over physical appearance, the behaviour, mind set and nature of a person is what will first draw Orochimaru in, and will be the main factor in keeping them around. They don’t need someone like minded, in fact, they don’t do the best with someone too similar to them. They like to be forced to think, they like someone who can teach them things, show them new facets of life, bring something different and unique in to their world. Someone who has all the same interests and attitudes would make a better friend than partner. That’s not to say they want someone who clashes with them on everything, they want to introduce their partner to their world as much as they want to be introduced to their partners.  The person doesn’t need to be particularly intelligent, quick witted or be the best in any social situation. Orochimaru is simply looking for someone interesting, someone who can keep them fascinated and curious. Someone intriguing. Discovering all there is to the world after all, is what they have dedicated their life to, so someone bringing new perspectives, new ideas and new conversations will hold them for longer.  Regarding potential partners, a meek personality or submissive/subservient nature will not hold Oro for long. Depending on what mood you catch them in, they may simply find the persons skittishness, timidness, or overly passive and conforming nature to be little more than a toy to investigate, most often however, they will simply lose interest immediately. There is no challenge with someone who is too willing to please, particularly in someone who does so in a demure way. Orochimaru is perfectly capable of running over more assertive people, when they are interacting with someone subservient in nature it simply becomes too quick for them to domineer the situation. They don’t want to impose themself on a partner, they want someone who can be their equal. But that doesn’t mean they are going to start playing nice as soon as they fancy or love someone, you have to earn being their equal. Their own nature is a bit more assertive, but less in a means to be in control of their partner, and more in a means to be completely in control of themself. They are a very independent person, anyone who wishes to engage in a relationship with them would have to accept this freer spirit.  So while they prefer someone assertive and ‘dominant’ (if that is even the correct word), they also need someone who knows when to reign them in, and when to leave them be. I would say to the dominant/submissive question, a healthy in between. Someone who is assertive enough to match them and remain their equal, to provide a challenge, but not too rigidly assertive that Oro feels they are being treated as the meeker one. Overall, more dominant people work better than submissive, since it is easier for Oro to teach that person when to give someone else a turn at leading/taking control, than it is to constantly assist someone naturally demure to take the lead every so often.  In terms of whether they like taking initiative or letting others do it, they are pretty equal with that as well. They won’t hesitate to engage first and to start the advance, but they are always very amused by human interactions, so there is a preference to seeing how others initiate. And that is to say, Oro would prompt or leave the door open for such an advance, and watch how the person handles the subtle invitation to then initiate. When it comes to sexual preferences, it is the same as mentioned above, they would do better with someone more assertive than someone who is more reserved/submissive. Again, they’re more assertive in nature, so someone who can match or top their challenge is going to appeal to them. In general a submissive person just does not work for Oro, nor do they manage to form attraction to someone who is more demure. 

[dontdowhatisayandnobodygetshurt]

I’ve been thinking about Dante a lot recently so here’s some random Dante things (under the cut because it’s p long. don’t worry, they’re all SFW!!)

He has a nice singing voice. It’s one of those voices that is perfect in its imperfections, mostly only heard at night between friends, without any instruments to accompany it. He has sung both his boyfriends to sleep on numerous occasions (though Vrox will never admit it.)

He doesn’t mind drinking, but he’s very careful about how much. He only ever gets tipsy.

He has a routine and he gets edgy if it’s disrupted, even if he tries to hide how it affects him.

His hair is curly and soft when he lets it grow out (part of the reason he keeps it cropped is because it genuinely does make him look less intimidating and that’s bad in his line of work.)

He is very practical.

He can hellgate (it’s very hard for humanborn demons to learn), but it takes a lot out of him. In general he doesn’t enjoy hellgating.

He had a Hmong dog as a child, named Hoàng. They did everything together.

Sometimes when Vrox is trapped in his hound form and Dante has a spare moment, Dante will go down to his cage and sit with him and read to him. Since Vrox can’t tell the difference like that anyway, he mostly reads Vietnamese stories to him. Jesse is still better at calming Vrox down (and hound-Vrox only associates Dante with Dante yeeting him bodily into a cage) but it does help a little, and it makes Dante feel better about the whole thing.

One of his closest friends is a hound called Amelia. She was close with Dante’s late partner Fain, and the two mourned together and grew very close. He trusts her enough to help him run the pack, since it’s impossible for him to do everything by himself (even tho he hates that he can’t.)

He’s extremely fluent in English but he misses Vietnam and his mother tongue so much occasionally he’ll hellgate back to his home country on his days off, just to be surrounded by it all again.

His skin is a dark olive tone.

He is a great listener and a reassuring presence. He also gives surprisingly good advice.

He typically sleeps on his back.

He’s a bit of a boomer when it comes to memes but he does his best and supports whatever crazy shit Jesse texts to him on the regular.

On top of his usual work load, he also teaches self defence classes on earth.

His biggest scar is the one across his left shoulder. He got it on one of his first days as the pack’s enforcer, he didn’t get an out of control hound into a cage fast enough and it mauled the shit out of his shoulder/collarbone/chest. It’s healed and faded now but it’s still noticeable.

Have I ever mentioned that his ears stick out a bit and it’s adorable???? yes??? what do you mean I’ve said it 500 times???

His favourite colours are green and pink, but his signature colour is dark grey.

When anything bad or stressful happens he stays very firm, calm and in control, but everybody how knows him knows to check on him afterwards, because he will not take a moment to think of himself otherwise. A lot of the time he doesn’t properly process what happened and that leads to trouble down the line.

In general he always puts others before himself.

He has thought about having kids before, but he knows it’s unrealistic, given how dangerous his life is and the fact that demons are infertile. He considers the pack his family instead.

He was 28 years old when he died, but he always looked mature for his age.

He’s 5′10. Vrox will not let him forget that he’s a few inches shorter than him, even if he’s still tall.

He cHUGS HIS RESPECTING WOMEN JUICE

He is very protective but knows his boundaries and is always happy to play a role of simple support to somebody instead of barging in and trying to fix their problems. He just always lets people know he’s there if they need him and to never hesitate to ask for help.

He knows every member of the pack by name, also every member’s history, temperament, struggles and growth.

He tries to be very mentally stable and kind but underneath that person he wants to be is a man who loves violence and doesn’t know how to live without it.

He only stopped participating in each and every war that rolled around because he was almost killed, June dragged him out of danger and had to risk their own life to save him, and gave their first real command as his superior to knock it the fuck off. So he threw himself into his work instead.

Despite being earthborn, he is extremely proficient with his hound form, able to change to it and back in under a second, which makes him devastating in combat. He is also far more in control of that side of himself than others, since he’s had a lot of practice keeping his more vicious side contained.

He has severe PTSD but over the decades he’s gotten very good at hiding it, and the signs of it are far more subtle than most people would know to look for. He does go to therapy on and off when things get particularly bad, more to stop himself from hurting or damaging his relationships with his loved ones than for his own health and safety.

He always tries to get both sides of a story and is a pretty good mediator, until he decides one side if definitely in the wrong.

Like other hellhounds/most demons, his eyes glow in the dark. It can be very unsettling.

His voice is deep, quiet, and even, and can be very expressive. When he gives a command, people don’t tend to ask questions, he has a kind of innate total confidant authority that he has absolutely earned. 

((He’s kinda thicc like a bowl of oatmeal))

One time he literally threw somebody who wouldn’t stop misgendering Jesse out a window. Unfortunately it was on the first storey so the dude lived.

((Seriously he could throw you across a football field it’s gREAT))

He has violently and quickly murdered a few people. Just a few. A light smattering. A handful. A thimble’s worth of murder.

Yeah okay, he should probably be in prison at this point.

He has 4 of the exact same outfit and he rarely wears anything else. Just black tank tops for summer, a few grey shirts in the winter, and cargo pants. That’s it. Well, the pack did buy him a pink shirt for his birthday and he wears that a lot too.

He has a bomber jacket but he rarely gets to wear it because his boyfriends and Amelia shamelessly steal it all the time.

June also steals his shirts (half because it’s an act of dominance, half because his scent is comforting to them because they associate him with safety but they would rather die than admit that)

His real, full name is Giang Văn Diệu, Dante was a joking nickname given to him by Fain when he first came to Hell that just stuck.

People try to get him to react differently by calling him by his real name but he never reacts the way they expect him to and that has disappointed a lot of hounds over the years.

He sees through bullshit pretty well.

He can be absolutely hilarious when he tries to be.

On another one of his birthdays the pack collectively got him this mug:

and it’s his favourite material possession in the world.

He hates formal suits, so of course June crams him into one gleefully at every given opportunity.

He plays the guitar but he’s self-taught with only a few lessons from Fain, so he does everything wrong, but all in all it sounds okay.

He would die for any member of his pack without hesitation.

He’s an early bird and he doesn’t really know how to sleep in, but he still enjoys it when he can, even if it feels weird. (Yes he lowkey judges and doesn’t understand both his night owl boyfriends.)

He has almost died more times than he can count.

He is colourblind (I haven’t figured out which type yet tho) and he will laugh very, very drily at any dog jokes you throw at him for that.

He will never turn away a person in need (unless that person doesn’t deserve any help.)

He is surprisingly good at video games.

Yes he has carefully moved any new hellhounds that fell asleep from exhaustion into more comfortable positions and covered them over with blankets and gave them a gentle pat on their hair/shoulders.

He just likes taking care of people (in both ways those words entail lmao)

[thegeneralsnotebook]

June Feature: Thoughts on New Dawn

Good evening, friends. This month’s Feature Article is going to be a little different from all of the other ones that I’ve made so far, in that rather than focusing on a particular topic, I’m instead going to be doing a roundup of some news about Set 12, or New Dawn as we’ve recently learned is its name. Over the course of this month, there’s been a lot of news from a multitude of different sources. There have of course been direct spoilers. There have been the disparate Q & A sessions CiM has performed after OnlineCons. And there have been a lot of indirect things to learn from watching the test games that have graciously been provided to us, as well as reading between the lines of putting all of this information together. This article will hopefully be a survey of all of that material, offering a unified look at where things stand with regard to New Dawn.

Roughly, this material is going to be broken down into three sections. First, we’ll go through each of the colours explaining the notable spoilers and notes we’ve seen for each one. This will not be an exhaustive list of every spoiler, just the ones that seem to be pointing in specific directions for the colours. Hopefully, we’ll be able to make some concrete statements about the directions that these colours seem to be going in for the new set. Second, we’ll say a few words about Unity, the new mechanic that we’ve so far been aware of, and that we now know quite a bit more about. Finally, we’ll go through which major questions are still unanswered regarding New Dawn. Anyway, all of that is probably going to take quite a few words, so let’s get to it.

State of the Set So Far

Indeed, Overt Operations seems like a good subtitle for CiM’s work these days.

Blue

Blue has two major narratives being spun for it so far. The first is the Core reincarnation of Hot Wings, which has seen a number of spoilers to support it. Of the final ones we’ve seen there is only the new Gallus (and he may not be so final after some on-air discussions in the most recent CiM stream), but among the unflavoured cards there’s a lot of great stuff. Most notable is the Blue/Pink Resource, which mingles the two things the deck wants to do very well, providing for the possibility of big swingy turns and lots of discounts. It’s a card that’s going to require significant thought to use correctly, but it’s also paired with the new Blue Dilemma and the Hasty-enabling Resource in Pink. Altogether that’s quite a few pieces that will work to bring back a deck that was once the terror of the meta.

The other archetype building itself in Blue is the slower, more control-oriented style typified by the new Mane, Tirek. Aside from Tirek himself, supporting here we have the [Frighten Feeder] as well as a powerful new card in [Shadowbolt Academy]. I get strong memories of Study Session looking at that card, and it certainly seems like a card that sometimes, if unanswered, will provide enough of a tempo boost to win games all on its own. Notably, as we saw in the test stream [Academy] isn’t limited to slower decks, and fits just as well in aggro, where it stands to provide a big benefit in “race”-type matches.

Overall, Blue looks to be going in a good direction, and that’s not even to consider the Blue/Orange cards, which I’ll leave to the Orange section.

Orange

There’s a little bit less to say here, as we haven’t seen a whole lot of Orange mono-colour cards yet, or at least none that really speak to an emerging archetype. There are, however, some very promising-looking things in the Orange/Blue space that were shown during the test stream. Both [Bland] and [Taskmaster] got great showings in the game that was shown, and highlighted a colour combination that will be throwing out +1 Power counters liberally, on top of two colours already known for efficiency. I think it’s a real shame that the two colours really haven’t seen widespread competitive play before, so if that happens this set, then I’d be happy with that.

Pink

Aside from the Hot Wings cards mentioned earlier, I haven’t seen a great deal of Pink cards that speak to anything new, aside from some standard value generators like [Berry Punch] that potentially speak to further development of Silverstream Midrange styles.

It is also important to note, though, that Chaos Control is one archetype that we know is likely to re-emerge in this set, as CiM has mentioned multiple times that key support for it like interaction with the bottom of your deck will be returning in New Dawn. In my mind it’s a virtual certainty that whatever such deck emerges will include Pink, as both Pinkie Sense and Salina Blue should be great assets to that style. Depending on what new Chaos effects we see, potentially expect the new [Tirek] Troublemaker to see play there as well. The ability to “proactively” start faceoffs is valuable in that kind of deck, and [Tirek] also allows cards with Chaos abilities to be fished out of the discard pile when needed.

Purple

The Q & A’s have promised us two kinds of Purple decks: Farm, and Troublemaker Aggro. There is definitely support for both that we’ve seen so far. The new Mane Cozy Glow answers the question of how exactly Troublemaker Aggro could work, and it looks like it could be pretty good, especially with Purple’s Starting Problem decreasing the risk of a slow start. (Harmony Aside: Imagine what the double YPS opening is going to feel like when they’re worth zero points. Yeesh.)

Cozy probably participates in the Farming side of the equation too, since of course what’s even better than scoring the Troublemaker’s bonus points is scoring both that and the Problem’s bonus on the same turn. And the other valuable Farming cards we’ve seen so far are just incredible. [Starlight] and [Sunburst] both encourage proactively starting faceoffs and can provide huge AT swings from doing so, we have more top-deck shenanigans from [Disappearing Act], and [Calculated] looks like a fine piece of control as well.

White

There haven’t been that many White cards spoiled so far, and unfortunately due to the colour’s spare competitive appearances in the past, it’s difficult to point to a past archetype that we can think about getting resurrected in this set. Naturally we do have a Mane, and that’s nothing to sneeze at. Chrysalis does look pretty good, and her together with Wink! seems to imply that White is shooting for a slower tax-oriented style. It remains to be seen exactly how that is going to manifest, though, as we’ll see in the Unanswered Questions section, there may be some more hope still for the colour coming soon.

Yellow

I think that we’re actually even more in the dark about Yellow than we are about White. So far there have been three Yellow cards spoiled, but none of them really evinces an idea about a direction that the colour is pursuing in this set. It’s fair to say that Yellow is likely not going to get too many great cards from New Dawn, as it likely is still the dominant meta colour going into the summer. Still, it’s unlikely to fade much, especially with the excellent Resources we’ve already seen the other colours getting. And it seems fair to say that Cozy Glow, as nearly all the Purple Manes before her have, will learn to fear Mage Meadowbrook soon enough.

New Mechanics

The rest of this cycle might be the most intriguing thing left to reveal.

The biggest new thing that we’re seeing in New Dawn is the support for mono-coloured decks. Now it’s true that outside of the Starting Problems there hasn’t been any explicit support for mono-coloured decks yet, but as we’ll see when we get to talking about Unity, that’s not quite true. The Starting Problems are naturally great as all decks will start with only one colour in play. Though notably they aren’t so good with flexible Manes like Student Six that might want to switch up which colour they’re starting with. Some of the Problems we’ve seen so far encourage the player strongly to stay all in one colour, like Purple’s, while the others are easier to deviate from, which makes sense given that they’re aggressively-oriented and so will presumably be replaced quickly.

Concerning Unity, we know now that there will be four distinct “levels” of Unity Power that decks can shoot for, as there will be triggered abilities at 5, 7, 10, and 15 Unity Power. These will manifest in four separate complete cycles, organized as follows:

A cycle of entry Friends with Unity 7

A cycle of other cards (like White’s Wink!) with Unity 7

A cycle of Friends with both Unity 5 and Unity 10 abilities

A cycle of Friends with Unity 15 abilities

Naturally, the scale and power of the abilities increases as the Unity number also goes up. I mentioned that the mono-colour support comes in here as well, as these numbers get pretty high. As we saw during the test stream, IvoryStarlight was playing mono-Blue, and even then it was a trick for him to hit the Unity 15 threshold. From this I reason that the 10 and 15 thresholds will be pretty much reserved for mono-colour decks. Surely multi-colour decks could have a chance of hitting 10, but the mono-colour decks will be able to hit them consistently. Thus, we’ll be able to say a lot about the potential viability of the mono-colour decks once we see their “ultimate” abilities in the form of the Unity 10 and Unity 15 abilities. This will be especially important for colours like Pink that are missing key things in their colour profile, and so will have a harder time justifying mono-colour otherwise.

Unanswered Questions

Just as subtle, I think.

With regard to the Q & A’s, naturally a good number of the questions posed there have now been answered, but a good number of them also have not. Of these, a few stand out as worth looking out for:

Promised access to the bottom of the deck (both ours and the opponents), important for our understanding of how Chaos Control will look

Promised Topdeck Matters cards in the style of Spell For That!

Promised Mill Cards

Potential White point acceleration -- The question was “Will White get aggressively-styled point acceleration?” and the answer was an unequivocal “Yes”. It’s possible that this was referring to Luster Dawn, but the direct nature of the answer suggests to me that this is referring to a card directly in White that will score points.

Potential Non-Purple AT advantage -- The question was “Are there any Non-Purple mono-coloured cards that can give an AT advantage?” and the answer was “Yes, kinda’”. It’s possible this is referring to the Blue Dilemma, or maybe even Chrysalis Mane.

A cryptic answer stating: “There is not currently an answer to the first Meadowbrook played.”

Promised further generic entry solutions, of three promised we have so far seen one, and of the two remaining one apparently uses a “completely novel mechanism”.

Another carefully worded statement, to the effect of: “There are technically three ways to, under certain situations, flip your opponent’s Mane back to its Start side.”

In addition to these from the Q & A’s, there are two other points that I’d like to draw attention to. First are the Manes. While we know that there will not be a Mane for every colour in New Dawn, I found it rather curious that this Sunday GP opened the stream by saying: “The Manes we’re going to feature today all share some features” rather than something like “The Manes in this set all share some features” If this was intentional, then it strongly implies the existence of more Manes, almost certainly a UR. Of course, it could also be CiM intentionally stoking speculation just like what I’m doing here. It’s worth pointing out that during the original Q & A, when asked if there would be a UR Mane, the reply was “No comment”. For my part, I’m thinking this means we’re looking at a UR Mane.

Now, that nicely leads into the second point I’d like to bring up, which is about the design of the set overall. We’ve got our three normal Manes now, which nicely encapsulate our three principal villains. But naturally the whole set isn’t going to be about Tirek, Cozy Glow, and Chrysalis, especially not with the name “New Dawn”. So where are the heroes? We’d expect them to occupy a prominent place within the set so as to counteract the villains acting as the Manes, but that limits the options quite a bit.

Every set these days has four “fixtures” that function as thematic points of primacy. They’re card types that people expect to be in the set, and so function well to represent the set thematically. They are: Manes, Tri-corns, an Epic TM, and the group of URs, potentially including a UR Mane. In recent sets, the UR structure has been generally composed of 2 Tri-corns, 6 URs for the six colours, 1 “miscellaneous” UR, and 1 Epic, with some wiggle room for Manes or extras.

Of the principal set fixtures that we come to expect every set, we’ve now seen the Manes. Since the villains are occupying the normal Mane slots, there are now only a few places left for the heroes to go:

They could collectively form a UR Mane. Potentially interesting, but we also just had a big “collective” Mane last set with Student Six.

The Mane Six could be broken into two groups of three to form the two Tri-Corns. In this case, since we know the colours, we’d be looking at “Rainbow Dash, Twilight Sparkle & Rarity” and “Applejack, Pinkie Pie & Fluttershy”. Also potentially interesting, but thematically I don’t really like the idea of breaking them up.

We could have a cycle of Mane Six URs. We already have one Purple UR in Luster Dawn, but this could be the miscellaneous UR for the set, leaving six slots still open. Though some of the Mane Six had URs in LL.

The Epic, I expect, will be the three villains together (which would explain the three points!), and so we’re not going to see our heroes here.

Overall, I’m not confident enough in any of this to make a guess, but who knows? What needs to be said though is our heroes now have to show up somewhere prominent. The question is where.

With that, I’m done for the month. Here’s to a great New Dawn.

[bitteraristocrat]

Leisurely

“If I may be so bold, young Master, when I was your age, the relationship of master and servant was far more brittle and distant. I find this arrangement unusually comfortable, ho ho ho.”

No more than a fortnight prior had Ciel passively suggested an afternoon spent with the elderly house stewart, considering Tanaka often spent his time away from the chaos and boisterous events with which the manor was ridden with. Humbly, and with great honour, the servant accepted, and their proposal became fruitful later on an autumnal afternoon in the midst of an univolving week end for the noble of the two.

The elderly house stewart sat himself conspicuously beside his employer, as the new equinox danced about them. Hues of a spectrum, ruby to bronze, scattered at their feet and above their heads in the trees, whilst downy wool protected them from the ice of the air. In spite of the chill, London’s weather proved balmy for their tea, for which Tanaka had brewed a fine Sae Midori Gyokuro, specially chosen for his young Lord as it was sweeter than a traditional sencha, and recently harvested, bearing in mind the oncoming Autumn.

“As I said,” Ciel replied with a gentle smile, pausing to sip at his tea before returning the cup to the cushion of his begloved palm, “I reckon I could benefit from an afternoon devoid of stress, whilst equally indulging a change of pace. If I may be so bold in turn, you are far closer an acquaintance in war than a servant, old man.” Tanaka chortled again, and gave a subtle nod. A glimmer in his grey eyes told fond memories of the predecessor, although, he would not dare voice his reminiscence. The previous earl, too, often allowed nonchalant moments such as these, and Tanaka had no doubt that his current master inherited a mutual generosity. If nothing else, it was an excuse for the old gentleman to relish in his finest teas of the Orient.

Their time together was predominantly spent in silence, as Tanaka was wont to focus on the rustling of dried leaves, and Ciel calculated the taste and aroma of the tea. It was a socially incongruent moment, but no less enjoyed by the matter of impropriety. The older of the pair broke the silence with an overindulgent sigh, taking in both the decay and life of the autumnesque air. “Would you consider such a gathering with your other servants, sir? You need not answer if it offends you.”

The boy hesitated. The inquiry did not offend, but prompted him to ponder. It was not an unprecedented thought, nor was he repulsed by the idea. Cocking his head to the side, Ciel began his response with a scoff. “I wouldn’t mind it.”

And, thus, brings this narration to the chess game.

Incarnadine eyes bore into that of a vexed jewel of blue, and a board of black and white separated them. Having taken the old man’s suggestion to heart, Ciel proposed a game of chess to the head butler. Of course, given the circumstances of Sebastian’s kind, the young Master mandated certain rules of him for the sake of fairness; no telepathic nonsense or any advantage the demon might have over him due to the fact regarding his inhuman abilities.

“Your move, my Lord” Sebastian informed through a sigh, crossing his legs in almost a posh air. The sight of the two sitting in each other’s presence was twofold more disturbing than with the young Master and Tanaka.

“Knight to E5, to take your pawn,” Ciel muttered, thumbing the ivory piece before replacing the ebony pawn with it.

The devil wasted no time with his retort. “Bishop to E5, to take your Knight.”

His master leaned forward, enticed by his butler’s boldness. The Bishop was unarmed, to be slaughtered, as he deduced. Advancing, he picked up his Queen, taking note of the very few pieces left on the board. Fondling the white token, his gazed flit from one side of the board to the other. He decided on a defensive move. “Queen to B3.” Sebastian’s lips pulled to a taut frown. “How disappointing,” said the retainer. The begloved hand reached for the same piece and lifted it from the board. “Do you intend to leave her so defenseless and isolated? I will allow you a chance to change your motive, if you see fit.”

Ciel returned the tease with a sharp glare. “She isn’t as you say,” he reached for the piece and took it, “do you doubt my tactics?”

“Not in the slightest, sir,” Sebastian smiled, returning his attention to the black tokens which he commanded. “Although, it would be a pity if you lost your Queen by trying to play in a way that does not come natural to you. Knight to C5.”

“What are you on about?” The earl’s countenance contorted even darker as he digested the demon’s observation. He permitted the near defiance to simmer within him. It was unclear to Lord Phantomhive, master of board games and riddles alike, whether or not he could truly beat his inhuman opponent. Yet, with each move and puzzlement, they held each other’s gaze with a tender maliciousness. Calculated, albeit unnerving, their exchange and dance of glares and chess pieces was daunting for both parties, as if they now both feigned the role of predator, victory as their prey.

“You are an offensive player, as I have observed,” the butler continued, unembellished. “The occasional defensive strategy is undoubtedly necessary, but your intentions, here, bid a dubious omen; do I sense an irrational experimentation at play?”

“I thought I ordered you not to waste my time with your supernatural theatrics, Sebastian. If you intend to cheat by ‘sensing’ my motives, or some rubbish, I will find a better way to spend my afternoon.” Ingenuity took hold of Ciel’s demeanour as his hand reached to move the Queen. “Queen to B3, check.” The demon hardly flinched. Feignedly offended by his master’s accusations, Sebastian reclined in his chair to observe the board. His assessment ravished each unpigmented token that posed a threat; the Rook on B2, the Pawn on G7, and so on. A quietude gripped the air between them.

“Have you ever played chess with a human before?” Ciel cut the silence with his query, mimicking the languid stature of his counterpart as his spine pressed into the brocade upholstery. Sebastian replied with a slow nod and a modest shrug. “I have had the pleasure of doing so on the rare occasion. Although, none have been quite as engrossing as this. You spoil me, young Master. King to F7.”

“You flatter me,” the boy gave a halfhearted chuckle. “You spoke before that my tactics frequent a more offensive trend. Yours are the same. A quintessential cut-throat foray, yet your defense is the calculated bit. How very like a hungry predator.” 

“Does it entice you?” Sebastian’s lips grew heavy.

“It is cliché. You play like a devil, just as I had anticipated.” A beringed hand pawed at the ebony King and swatted it over. The butler blinked, brows knitting at his child master’s blatant boredom. It was true, their wits were matched, with the devil lacking permission to dominate using otherworldly tactics.

“Well, if you see fit to end our game, I suppose I shall humbly accept victory,” the devil snaked his fingers through a myriad of pieces, disrupting their servitude, and began to rise to his feet. The boy scoffed, “Clearly you haven’t the slightest clue as to how this game works, nor the austerity of the point system regarding the won pieces. As it so happens, I have more points than you” Ciel rose to meet the demon, a glower and crooked grin captaining his hauteur. 

“And, as it so happens,” he mimicked the little lord, “my ill-behaved master ended the game without much consent of his opponent,” the raven snarled, mirroring the wicked smirk.

“Perhaps if you hadn’t bored me,” Ciel’s prowling hands groped the chess set, pieces of monochrome scattering at his touch, “I would have allowed you at least a taste of victory.”

Sebastian took his master’s face in hand, clutching it with obsidian talons as he etched dimples into those milky cheeks. And as he snatched his prey, a growl emitted past his daggering maw, slaver pooling about his lips. In turn, the boy grunted and writhed beneath his counterpart. “What a cheeky little thing you are.”

The young Lord spat his fury with a thorny scowl;

So very like that day, you prey upon me now. Eyes akin to that of the beaded black marbles of a beast, only throbbing vermillion with slits of the abyss struck down the middle. They bug and twitch as you hang over me. Your breath pours onto my face, sticks to my hair and clings to my skin. It is hot and saturated, I find myself surprised that the slaver that pooled at the rim of your bottom lip did not spill out onto me. You vile, disgusting creature.

Whilst the devil held his prey and feasted on his gaze;

There you lay before me, so tauntingly, each fibre of me aching with the sheer hunger that is wired in my kind. Yet, you cause the network of my hunger webbed throughout this form to twist and alter out of my control. The very nexus of my being is unraveled simply at your musk. I am unlike those of my breed, entirely due to that wretched gaze of yours. Perhaps you think me far more human, but, rest assured, I all the more a devil when you fixate me with your rage.

A heated breath was shared before the pair withdrew. Strewn about the board, the chess pieces lay. With heady glances, they revelled in the mess they made.

-

|| A very rushed piece, but I was determined to finish it. Something of a guilty pleasure. ||

[sunset-wishes-upon-hill]

Even if they do want to follow, Aro would have them bind to the Volturi and Volterra. Jessica also knows her precarious status within the coven and in fact would encourage that they stay and don’t follow her (can you imagine having to deal with 3 vampires in a small town such as Forks and fearing every day that they might do something?). I don’t want to spoil too much but Aro being Aro, he’d be pretty sly about the manoeuvring whole thing to his advantage.

Yes, he might not show it but that boy is bursting with happiness seeing two people he loves getting along with each other. He is grateful and glad that Jessica sees through Jane’s true intention and he loves how she keeps on offering her hand of friendship to Jane because that’s the type of friend she needs. It’s easy for people to give up and leave a person who has chose to close themselves off and it’s one thing Alec admires about Jessica. Alec is not actually jealous rather his feelings deepens whenever Jessica tries hardest to befriend and treat Jane as she actually wants to be treated. And often, he wonders what would have become of them, of Jane, were someone like Jessica appeared in their life earlier.

Yes, you’re right it’s Angela (or as trio simply knows her as ‘the least annoying human who is unseeingly kind). It’s best they don’t know about Mike’s existence..

Hmmm, before I decided Jessica wasn’t going to have any gifts, I was torn between two powers: 

Clairempathy- a form of extrasensory perception wherein a person is able to perceive the emotions, emotional imprints and emotional links from the past, present, future or locations not relative to the user.

or

Psychic Persuasion -This is the ability to psychically dominate subjects' thoughts and actions, via verbal commands. (Llike Kilgrave from Jessica Jones, just less potent and very subtle like Jasper’s).

I wanted to define Jessica’s gift based on her past experience and formed personality. From what I know, Jessica had to move to Forks as a young child and felt like an outsider. And often, these type of people develop keen sensitivity to picking up ques on people’s emotions and behaviours/learn to manoeuvre around the situation.  

Hmm, for now (might change my mind and write up short story for both) rather than detailed insight, I think it would remain as brief segments that pop up here and there. I do have rough outlines on what Demetri and Caius was like:

I imagined, Demetri was the first born son and only child of a noble man who enjoyed the finest, beautiful things in life who loved hunting and fighting (i.e. duels with friends). I imagined as a vampire, he closely watched over his family even as Amun and him travelled to many places, and even visited his mother - whom he dearly loved - on her death bed. I think at first, if it weren’t for Amun, turn his whole family into a vampire so that they can be together and as time past, it gotten to the point where he could no longer bear watch people he loved grow old and die while he remained eternally beautiful.

With Caius, the third son from aristocratic family with two brothers before him. He excelled in every of his studies, particularly art and music which he very much loved but was forced to give up and forced by his parents to study philosophy when he showed too much talent in other of his studies than his brothers. His parents would not have a third son outshining his brothers. So lot of bitterness, insecurity and desire to be recognised because all his life, his existence were predestined by the title of being born a third son, an act that he had no control over. After all, how unjust and angry would you be if you were constrained from what you wanted to do in life because of birth order. I think becoming a vampire, he was truly able to break free of his family’s hold on him but at the same time, he will always keep pushing himself to grasp the next foothold of success all the while twisted by the manifestation of his unending dissatisfaction with himself and his position.

I bet Caius actually have group of humans working for him on top of vampire ones so what they would do is send over a written report to the secretary whom will print it out, file them and hand it to him. Humans are in charge of technology sector while vampires are saved for dangerous missions including other vampire matter.

Hmm, probably Heidi - who is more adept with modern technology - is most likely to be Jessica’s facebook friend/insta follower/twitter follower/snapchat follower so often she would randomly say ‘Did you know Jessica is at Seattle?’ but Caius will be getting reports on Jessica from his servants. But haha the imagination of Caius with phone suddenly taking a break from fighting with other vampires and ordering the guard to protect him because Jessica uploaded a cute photo of her with a her dog on Instagram and he have to double tap it.

Yes, she would have loved Jessica’s company. A bit different from the usual vampires and humans flocking for favour. Beside, Didyme would love how Jessica sees through her brother’s BS haha!

[scifigeneration]

Why aren't you a lefty? A geneticist finds clues in kangaroos and shopping malls

by Thomas Merritt

In graduate school, I earned beer money by modelling for life drawing classes in various art departments. (Don’t judge, grad school doesn’t pay well and beer isn’t free.) In the long hours standing around, I would survey the room and count how many of the aspiring artists were left-handed. Later in my career, I did the same thing — counting lefties, not standing around naked — in the biology classes I taught.

Funny thing, in any given class, around 10 per cent of the students were lefties. It turns out this is true for all human populations, not only middle-America university classes. Globally, about 90 per cent of people are righties. But why?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated by handedness — our almost ubiquitous tendency to favour one hand over the other — and maybe a little envious of the rare left-handers. Their rareness gave a certain mystique — and they got to use those funky chair-desks with the desktop on the “wrong” side.

What do we know about the genetics of being right- or left-handed, or even ambidextrous? And how does this help shape our understanding of biology in general?

What is “handedness” anyway?

Given how fundamental, and obvious, handedness is, we know surprisingly little about its genetics.

One complication — determining handedness isn’t straightforward. The dominance of your writing (and drawing) hand is a function of at least three things: Genetics to be sure, but also the environment, and, likely, random chance.

Our environmental surroundings can pressure us to adopt certain behaviours, like handedness, even if we aren’t genetically wired that way. (Shutterstock)

Why the environment? Think of the probably-not-apocryphal stories of the Catholic school nuns ruler-rapping the knuckles of anyone so sinister to write with their left hand. (My father-in-law swears these stories are true.)

In many cultures, the left is associated with evil. There has been, and may continue to be, considerable pressure against maintaining the left hand as the dominant hand.

Less violently, but no less effectively, there is convenience. Try using a pair of right-handed scissors with your left hand.

Why left-handers can’t use right-handed scissors.

That didn’t work, did it?

The fact that scissors, and other assorted manual tools and appliances, from dessert forks to chainsaws, are designed for the righty majority means they’re harder to use lefty, resulting in considerable pressure to conform and use your right hand.

What does “right-handed” really mean?

This pressure means that many studies that defined handedness by identifying the dominant hand in writing may have miscategorized a substantial portion of the population.

A solution adopted by many researchers is to assay a suite of behaviours. There are a surprising number of activities that show a dominant hand, including the decidedly adult behaviour that may have just crossed your mind, but also more demure pastimes like sewing or spoon use.

A twist, which becomes important when we look at the genetics, is that researchers can classify people into one of three groups — right- or left-handed or ambidextrous — or two groups — right-handed and not right-handed.

Genetics definitely plays a role, but what kind of role? Is the genetics of handedness deterministic, essentially a right/left switch, or is it more subtle?

Could there be a genetic makeup, or genotype, that predisposes you to be not-right-handed? Handedness, then, could be a function of this genotype, and its interaction with the environment and random chance.

Right/left asymmetry is actually common

Other left-right asymmetries abound in human biology. Perhaps the most striking is the asymmetrical layout of our internal organs — heart, lungs and digestive track.

But it’s the clockwise or counterclockwise whorl of hair that has had a central role in understanding the genetics of handedness. Much like the rotation of hurricanes and cyclones, the hair on our scalps forms a central spiral with a direction of rotation. (I’m not making this up, find a pair of mirrors, or the person sitting next to you, and check me on this — or look at this picture.)

Hair whorls can run clockwise (as seen here) or counterclockwise. (Noj Han/flickr), CC BY-SA

The whorl, and its direction, was the focus of a seminal paper on the genetics of handedness. The scientist, Amar Klar, hung out in local malls and surreptitiously recorded the whorl direction of shoppers’ hair. Most had clockwise whorls. He didn’t record the shopper’s dominant hand — but he didn’t have to. Remember, the bias in handedness is almost universal.

Because 90 per cent of the human population is right-handed, Klar concluded that right-handedness and a clockwise whorl were correlated. He then directly surveyed a smaller group of people who had a counterclockwise whorl and found that this group split 50/50 between right-handed and not-right-handed.

In this way, Klar showed that handedness and whorl direction are associated, but not in a “all righties are clockwise; all lefties are counterclockwise” way.

A single gene for handedness?

Klar proposed an elegant alternative model that still only requires a single gene to determine both whorl direction and handedness.

Many genes have different forms, called alleles. We each carry two copies of every gene in our genome, one from mom and the other from dad. In some cases, but not all, one of these alleles is “dominant.” (Remember Gregor Mendel and his wrinkled and smooth peas?)

In Klar’s model of hair and hands, the handedness gene has two alleles; if you have one or two copies of the dominant allele, you have a clockwise whorl and you’re a righty. But when you have two copies of the other form, chance comes into play — and that’s when things get interesting.

Klar’s interpretation is that these individuals always have the rare counterclockwise hair whorl and that they’re not right-handed about half the time. In other words, in these individuals, handedness is a genetic flip of the coin.

This kind of combination of genetics, the environment and simple random chance underlies most human biology, from height or weight to drug resistance or cancer susceptibility. Understanding the genetics of human handedness can, then, help us to understand human genetics in general.

Other species?

What about asymmetry and handedness in other species?

Like many “complex” behaviours (think language or tool use), we used to think of handedness as a uniquely human trait. Once we actually started looking, however, we’ve found “handedness” in many other species, from snails to kangaroos, even to our ancient evolutionary ancestors.

Snails don’t have a dominant hand (or any hands, really), but their shells twist either right (almost all the time) or left (very rarely).

Two different species of sea snail. One normally twists right, the other twists left. (Wikimedia)

Cephalopods, octopus, cuttlefish and squid are a group of molluscs (like snails) that do have arms and, it turns out, are “handed.” When I briefly studied cephalopod behaviour in the 1980s, we didn’t think that octopus or cuttlefish could distinguish left from right, but more recent work shows that they can and that they have a preferred arm or side.

Scale-eating cichlids, a sort of creepy fish that feeds exclusively on the scales of other, less fortunate, fish, preferentially attack from the left or from the right.

Your cat reaches for food with its dominant paw, but your leg-lifting dog is ambidextrous in its peeing preference.

Let’s experiment

A central challenge in exploring the genetics of handedness in humans is our (completely justified) unwillingness to experiment on humans. I won’t genetically engineer my daughter to see if I can make her left-handed, but I’d be willing to try it on a snail.

Because handedness occurs in other species, we can study them to determine its genetic mechanism. This comparative approach underlies all model organisms; it is why, for example, we study the metabolism of fruit flies to understand the biology of deep underground mining and the genetics of chromosome cross-talk and cancer.

One important point to keep in mind, though, is that similar systems aren’t necessarily controlled by the same genes. Klar, for example, found that organ asymmetry is determined by a genetic pathway that is distinct from the one for hair whorl and handedness. Handedness in cats or snails is likely genetic, but the genetics may not be identical to that in humans.

American lobsters are just as likely to be right-clawed as left-clawed. (Shutterstock)

Animal handedness differs from us in another way, too. The extreme bias present in humans, that 90:10 ratio, doesn’t exist. Cats, for example, are just as likely to be right-pawed or left-pawed. American lobsters have a larger “crusher” claw and a sharper “cutter” claw, but the big, dominant claw is equally likely to be on the right or left. Kangaroos tend to be lefties, and chimps tend to be righties, but in both the bias isn’t as strong as it is in humans.

Why the bias in humans?

Handedness is biologically complex and involves substantial co-ordination between the brain and hand. The brain is itself asymmetrical, with the left and right hemispheres playing different roles in co-ordinating activities such as pattern recognition or language.

Interestingly, there seem to be subtle differences in the brain architecture of righties and lefties. Does the bias, then, reflect some kind of wiring in the brain? Some studies have tied left-handedness to changes in brain function and behaviour.

There are also some groups in which lefties are over-represented, including artists and architects. These numbers suggest that there is a creative benefit to being wired this way.

(The more observant, or pedantic, may be asking how this point fits with my initial observation that about 10 per cent of art students were lefties. The answer is likely sample size. I stood around in front of a lot of students — but still only couple of hundred. This may simply have not been big enough sample for me to see the jump to 20 per cent from 10 per cent. Sampling limitations are the bane of biologists.)

Possible creative, or cognitive, differences bring us back to my initial fascination, and envy, of that sinister minority.

If you need someone to cut along the dotted line with the first pair of scissors that come to hand, perhaps then any righty will do. But if you need someone to think outside the box, you might want to enlist a lefty.

Thanks to Jack Bateman, Jeff Arnold, Kim Fahner, and Jean Boal for their invaluable suggestions and for pointing me to some of the literature and ideas that support this piece. Any limitations in interpreting that literature is mine alone.

Thomas Merritt is  Professor and Canada Research Chair, Chemistry and Biochemistry at Laurentian University.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. 

[kidslovetoys]

Self-efficacy: A tool to unlock your child’s potential

Have you ever said, "I'm rubbish at maths", or "I can't draw to save my life". These negative beliefs affect your ability to overcome challenges.

As Henry Ford said, "Whether you think you can, or think you can't - you're right."

Psychologists call this self-efficacy.

In this guide, guest contributor Dr. Helen Jones shows us how to help our children escape the trap of this kind of limiting mindset.

Table of contents:

What is self-efficacy?

How does self-efficacy influence your child’s behaviour?

4 ways to build it

Be a self-efficacy role model

Final word

What is self-efficacy?

Self-efficacy can be defined as your beliefs in your specific abilities. Isn’t that the same as confidence you might ask? 

Not quite. 

From the outside they might seem similar, and it's true they may overlap. But whilst confidence is more generalised, self-efficacy is domain specific; it’s about beliefs in certain abilities... whether that’s how creative we are, how mathematical we are, how organised we are and so on. Beghetto (2006) explains:

“self -efficacy is a self-judgement of one’s specific capabilities that (...) influence activity choice; persistence; effort; and, ultimately, the attainment of a given outcome” (p. 448). 

This self-narrative becomes woven into the fabric of our lives, often from the outset, in childhood, so much so that it can create a ‘fixed’ view of our strengths and skills and underpin our motivations, behaviour and choices. 

But where do these beliefs stem from?  How can we ensure our children do not develop a ‘weak’ self-efficacy, which could derail their confidence and potential? 

Naturally, there are many factors which affect our children’s learning, choices, engagement and overall happiness everyday. Yet a key, but often overlooked, factor in their development can be self-efficacy - enabling these self-beliefs to be positive can have an overriding effect.     

In my role as an art teacher I witness the daily effects of self-efficacy in the classroom. I can usually track back a child’s self-efficacy in their artistic ability to a conversation they had at a young age with a parent, carer or teacher. 

“My dad said I can’t even draw a stick man properly so why should I bother”, 

“I’m good at art; All my friends and family say so, so I’ve always tried to do lots of it outside lessons”.  

Whilst I can see from my students the effects of their beliefs on their motivation, the same could be said in any subject, activity or discipline, not just art. 

When you consider that on average children are estimated to receive 5 negative comments per positive comment, the potency of self-efficacy to boost confidence and motivation can become an even more powerful tool.

How does self-efficacy influence your child’s behaviour?

Many scholars have written about the power of self-efficacy to dominate behaviour, motivation and persistence.  They lay claim to a whole host of effects, some which are more subtle and others more clear.  

Some of the main ways self-efficacy could influence your child are: 

Their choices: what toys they choose to play with, what activities they choose to engage with, and how long for. As children grow and develop more self-awareness they tend to engage less in activities that they see themselves as being ‘bad’ at.

Time invested: children with a strong self-efficacy tend to engage with tasks for longer, as if they encounter setbacks or mistakes, they are far more likely to be equipped with the motivation, determination and confidence to attempt to put those errors right.  If at first you don’t succeed...

Overall well being: when strong self-efficacy beliefs are present this can enhance overall self-worth. It can colour our perspective on the world in a positive way.

Their life trajectory: It sounds like a pretty grandiose claim, but many scholars, like Albert Bandura (1997) have emphasised the magnificent effect that self-efficacy can have on our life choices. Whilst this is often on a subconscious level, these beliefs in our abilities can eventually govern our choices of career, lifestyle, hobbies and so on.

Just think about it, have you chosen a career that you always believed you have a poor ability in? 

Unlikely. 

You most probably started developing your confidence in your chosen field, engaged well, invested a good deal of time and effort and this in turn landed you a job in it. 

It all, however, started with that self-belief. 

Four ways to build self-efficacy 

“Ok, ok, I’m sold, I believe you, it’s important, but how do I get my child to have a positive self-efficacy?”.  

Whilst it is important to understand that self-efficacy is complex and not something we can control as parents, we can have an influence. 

These are just some of the ways we can begin to foster a strong self-efficacy in our children;

Encourage your child to make mistakes: through trial and error play - taking risks and praising this process not just the end result. 

Improve the praise to criticism ratio: Praise is undoubtedly a huge contributor to confidence, whether that is general confidence or belief in our abilities. Many parenting experts recommend a ratio of 5 positive comments to each negative comment in our dealings with our children. Whilst I find this a little prescriptive, it does provide a little inspiration for how encouraging we can be. On the other hand, we can’t have our child believe they are good at everything and nor should we want to, as this can promote unrealistic and untrue beliefs - as with most things in life there is a balance to be struck.

Be specific in your feedback and praise rather than more generalised: This will help you to be genuine in your encouragement, praising what exactly is ‘good’ about your child’s endeavours. There are often subtle traits and approaches to learning we can praise. For example, rather than commending a child’s “good work” “nice painting” or “great numeracy”, we could pinpoint exactly what has made those things impressive and how the child has approached the task: “Even though you found the start of writing the sentence hard, you kept going and started over again paying attention to the spelling, that’s really persistent!” “You were really playful in exploring so many colours, I love how you have put so many different shapes on the page”.

Be mindful: Just exercising an awareness of how you are responding to your child as they play or engage in activities is a positive parenting step in general, but it can be especially powerful when it comes to self-efficacy. Be alert to offering unfounded praise or exaggerations of your childs’ ability. Even from a very young age kids can subconsciously pick up on inconsistencies between the spoken word and non verbal cues. They are mini human lie detectors...

Be a self-efficacy role model 

It may also pay to be aware of how you are modelling self-efficacy for your children. 

If you encounter a stumbling block in your work or home life how do you respond? 

Do you emanate confidence in your abilities to overcome difficulties, pick yourself up and try, try again? 

I recently had a technological faux-pas at home. Rather than calmly search for a variety of different solutions to the glitch and use my initiative to calmly sail through this issue, I gave up, exclaimed I was “useless at technology” and asked my husband to fix it. 

And all this was witnessed by our little girl. 

Did I teach her that with the right attitude any problems can be overcome if you believe in your abilities? 

Not on this occasion, but at least I have been able to spot the error of my ways...

Final word

Building self-efficacy isn’t an exact science. 

Sometimes it is hard to reach that middle ground between encouraging our children and over exaggerating their abilities and, sometimes we get the balance wrong, but simply the act of being aware of self-efficacy can help protect it.

By Helen Jones

References

Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. New York, NY: Freeman. 

Beghetto, R. A. (2006). Creative self-efficacy: Correlates in middle and secondary students. Creativity Research Journal, 18(4), 447-457 http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15326934crj1804_4 

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[murkserious]

27 WAYS WE ARE BRAINWASHED AS AFRIKAN BLOOD PEOPLE WHITE VICIOUS SUPREMACY FROM BIRTH

by Dr Boyce Watkins

I remember when I first heard Malcolm X ask, “Who taught you to hate yourself?” Of course we know the answer to this question, but many of us are afraid to say it. Even mentioning the ways that white-dominated institutions shape our thinking can lead to punishment, ostracism, unemployment, incarceration and even death. The deepest part of this process is that the brainwashing in America can be so deep, so insidious, so subtle, that even the most meaningful reflection doesn’t allow us to solve the complex puzzle of White Supremacy.

This issue came to light last week when I went to visit a prison in Illinois. Although I am a law-abiding citizen, the prison took three years to approve me for a visit. After speaking to one of the inmates familiar with the approval process, we concluded that it was likely that my thinking and educational background made me some kind of threat to their system of oppression against black men. God forbid I go into the prison and say something that might inspire these black men to live a more empowered existence.

The fact is that people like myself are threats to white supremacy because we disrupt racialized systematic brainwashing.

I was sitting at my computer one night, thinking about all the ways that our minds are controlled from the time we are born. I thought about the many flawed concepts that are dropped into our psyches by media, the educational system, and even our own families. Some of these ideas hit us so early that we hardly have a chance to escape them. Others simply leave us crippled and unable to fight the racism all around us. Even more disturbing is that some of the greatest white supremacists in America can be other black people.

So, I made a list of several things many of us believe about the world and ourselves at an early age, as well as things we are trained to do that may end up being to our detriment. Of course this list is not final, nor is it presumably correct on every count. At the same time, it gives us something to think about, because the brainwashing is amazing, deep and deliberate in our society.

Here’s the list:

1) Letting our oppressors educate our children, medicate them, and put them into the school-to-prison pipeline. A thorough miseducation can be more destructive than no education at all, since many of our brains are filled with all the wrong stuff to begin with. Maybe instead of handing your child’s brain over to a public school system that has proven that it can’t properly educate black children, you can consider homeschooling the child after they get home for the day. Everything you need to know in order to teach your child is right there on the Internet.

2) Believing that white people are supposed to give us jobs when we can actually create them on our own: Given our long and rich history of working for white people, it can be difficult to see ourselves as the boss instead of the laborer. In fact, even us “educated” black people were often told that you should study hard in school so that some white-owned company will love you enough to employ you. Now, we’re seeing Harvard MBAs in the unemployment line, struggling to survive, like lions raised in the zoo who are starving to death because they were never taught how to hunt for their own food.

3) Thinking that every black person who goes to prison is automatically a bad human being: Mass incarceration is real and it is not by accident. When prisons are filled with strong black men who’ve received 40 year sentences for possessing two grams of a drug that many white people use on the weekend, you know you have a problem. What’s interesting is that the whole world sees this as a serious issue, but we do not.

4) Eating food that is going to give you diabetes and/or heart disease and/or high blood pressure and/or chronic obesity by the age of 45. Maybe eating pig guts and sweet tea with sweet potato pie every Sunday isn’t such a good idea after all.

5) Valuing sports and entertainment over education: Not many people know the name of the black kid who won the math competition, but everybody knows the guy who won the state championship. This fascination with sports as the pathway to success is largely driven by media, which waves black athletes and rappers in front of our boys just long enough for them to believe that education isn’t cool. Unfortunately, almost none of them ever get to play with LeBron James. Instead, the worst of them may end up as 25-year old baby daddies with no job, a criminal record, a weed addiction, bad knees and a fifth grade reading level. This is hardly the kind of man that an educated black woman would want to call her husband.

6) Believing that black people you see on white-owned TV networks are supposed to be leaders or role models to your community: If a white television executive wants to create key influencers in the black community, they can do so by putting that person on a network. Most of your favorite black celebrities, films, radio shows, TV shows and magazines wouldn’t exist to you were it not for white corporate benefactors positioning them to influence your mind.

7) Believing that every tax refund check and every paycheck is supposed to go straight to the mall to buy overpriced European brands from companies that don’t even hire black people: Money is capital to be used for investing, job creation and building businesses, not a consumption item to be given away at every available opportunity for the sake of materialistic excess or instant gratification. In other words, your money is your power, and you should not give all your power away.

8) Thinking that being “rich” means having a high paying job, a big house or a fancy car, even if it’s all financed with debt: There’s a good chance that the “baller” down the street is one paycheck away from being homeless. To determine the depth of true wealth, you have to go beneath the superficial.

9) Calling yourself and your friends n*ggers (or niggaz) and seeing nothing wrong with that: Listen to me carefully – You are NOT a n*gger, no matter how often Jewish-run record labels pay black rappers to tell you that you are.

10) Giving your money to white businesses and avoiding the black ones: Black people are often referred to as “liquid money,” because we are the only ones who are eager to give our money away to other ethnic groups. No one else does this. The guy in Chinatown is never going to buy your sh*t.

11) Thinking that we’re all supposed to vote for the Democratic Party in every election: Even Bill Clinton admitted that he put too many black people in prison, and President Obama’s not letting them out anytime soon. You don’t owe the Democratic Party anything, especially if they aren’t making black issues a priority.

12) Believing that Africa is a poor, dirty, horrible place with nothing but poverty and disease, and that you should thank your lucky stars you were “blessed” enough to live in America: Newsflash – you live in arguably the most racist country in the world. No country on the planet incarcerates black people the way we do in the United States of America. Many African leaders consider America to be racially corrupt.

13) Believing that Harvard and Yale are better than Spelman and Howard

14) Not realizing that both Spelman and Howard were founded by white people

15) Not realizing that most of the people who founded the NAACP were actually white and that this organization never really belonged to you in the first place. Not that they can’t help you, but they have less loyalty to you than to their corporate and political overseers.

16) Thinking that straight hair is “good” and black hair is “nasty,” then giving all of your money to Korean beauty shops so they can make you feel better about yourself. According to Dr Claud Anderson, roughly 85 cents of every dollar spent on black women’s hair goes to Koreans. I hate to admit it, but this makes us look really, really stupid.

17) Believing that light skinned women are more attractive than those with dark skin

18) Knowing nothing about African history, but believing that every great accomplishment occurred in Europe, starting with Christopher Columbus “discovering” a country that was well-populated thousands of years before he arrived.

19) Believing that you’re only supposed to pray, march and be peaceful every time your children get slaughtered by whites. It takes a while to train people to be as peaceful and forgiving as black people are. The brainwashing must be deeply rooted in tradition. Notice how one of the heads of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference was sent for “retraining” (aka re-brainwashing)after stating that black people should defend themselves. Even self-defense is considered to be a form of aggression when you are black in America.

20) Delivering your prayers to a big, white Jesus who will solve most of your problems for you, as long as you give money to the pastor.

21) Looking up to historical figures like George Washington who put our ancestors in chains and probably raped them

22) Believing that integration was a sign of progress for black people and not an era where black institutions were destroyed and left for dead

23) Believing that Martin Luther King is more important than Malcolm X because white people market him more regularly

24) Believing that Martin Luther King only spoke of peace and forgiveness instead of the same rage and reparations that many of us talk about today

25) Thinking that its normal to have an all-black neighborhood with a mostly white police force, when there are no all-white neighborhoods with a mostly black police force

26) Believing that a half-white president is going to be significantly different from a completely white one: Hint – most high-level politicians think alike, since they are supporting the same system that has oppressed you for 400 years. Many of them went to the same universities (nearly every member of the Supreme Court, plus every president for the last 27 years attended either Harvard or Yale at some point in their career). Also, our system incentivizes our political leaders to value corporate money over the plight of the American people. This is going to be the downfall of this nation.

27) Thinking that the first black (fill in the blank) to get into a white institution actually represents progress, even though whites have never considered it be progress to get into our institutions (Does standard White History include a story about the first white man to get into Morehouse?). We’ve been taught to believe that everything whiter is better: White corporate jobs, white universities, white neighborhoods, white TV networks/media outlets, the list goes on and on.

The fact is that we really, really LOVE white people, and this training started from birth. It started with us first learning how to hate ourselves and each other, and then to believe that the only way to restore our lost humanity was to gain the approval of our oppressors. As a result, we spend our lives marching, hoping, praying, working, begging, bowing, and compromising, with the expectation that we will be rewarded for our good behavior. Unfortunately, it can cause many of us to abandon the person we were meant to be, all for the sake of trying to become somebody else.

Once again, feel free to add to the list. I don’t know everything, but my brainwashing as a PhD tells me that I am supposed to think I know everything. So, maybe this is my first step toward escaping my own psychological plantation. We have all been infected affected.