#someone did dig up the post to add their two cents

[pseudophan]

I wonder how people coming to see your Tumblr for the first time bcs of that post on twitter feel seeing toenail discourse

it's actually a bit of a curse that any time a post of mine gets likes on twitter the topic currently being discussed on my blog is just absolutely fucked. though i suppose it may just be that most of the topics on here are a bit fucked

[damnlance]

Klance angsty prompt 6 please 👀

Klangst Prompt #6

6. “You’ve never hurt me. Ever”

Summary: Lately, Lance has been stressed beyond the point of breaking… The end of the war was 3 years ago and yet, it’s not enough time to pass for Lance to feel better. Not even close. Everyone has always called him a hero. And since the day they landed back on earth, everyone has gone so far to ask for photos and autographs and all that. These days Lance is sick of it.

Or; the pressures of being the ‘savior of earth’ has been building up inside of Lance, causing him to erupt on any and everyone.

Good thing he has his amazing boyfriend.

-there’s a slow start, but I PROMISE it’s klance so just keep reading!

-also galra (kitten) Keith ?? I love him

-

It all started with a fangirl just a few weeks ago.

Lance decided to walk to his favorite coffee shop one chilly afternoon. He woke up really late and was immediately craving something sweet yet bitter. And since he lives with most of his family, running out of coffee five days after buying a brand new pack of it is very common, especially when no one wants to buy more for whatever reason.

So there Lance was, walking down the street. Hands tucked into his blue lion hoodie (thanks to all the merch the fans of voltron have made over the years), making his way to the closest coffee shop near his home. And then he hears the high pitched squeal of a girl at least 10 feet away from him. Then 9 feet.. then 6.. then 4 because she’s literally running at him with the speed of a hundred cheetahs chasing a gazelle until she’s right there, face to face with Lance.

“Oh my god!!” She yelled, jumping up and down like some 5 year old girl getting a puppy. She was about 5’7, short brown hair and huge blue eyes that almost resembled Lance’s. She wore this giant faux fur coat and beanie to match, and her phone was IN LANCE’S FACE.

She was all over him and it was attracting others to stare their way. Lance tried to calm her down by smiling and using a little of his charm but it was just making the girl fangirl even more. So he took a picture with her to be on his way before the coffee shop got too busy. But she wouldn’t back off. Apparently she wasn’t satisfied with the picture, something about how her eyes were closed? Or how blurry it came out? Lance couldn't remember, he just wanted his coffee.

The girl kept hounding him and following him, demanding that he retake the picture with her. Lance let her down easy, saying how he needed to be someplace important and that he was running late. The girl kept pushing him. Following his every move, right on his heels. Begging, pleading with him to take more pictures because she ‘needed them,’ whatever that meant. Lance tried his hardest to be nice and polite because as a former paladin of voltron and as one of seven someone’s who have saved the entire universe, his image is everything. Without him or his former paladins, there would probably be no earth. So he stopped in his tracks and took a better picture with the girl.

He felt good to see her happy because of something that he had done. Plus he looked really good in that picture, who knew the earth’s natural lighting at 1pm could make his skin look so smooth? Once he gave his approval of the better pic, he was on his way again, hoping that the line to the coffee shop wasn’t even longer now. As he started to fast walk down the busy sidewalk, something yanked him back by the neck and he came crashing down. Literally. He fell right back on his ass and when he looked up, this same crazy girl was looming over him like a mad woman. With his blue hand-knit wool scarf dangling from her grabby hands. The anger that had been simmering in Lance’s gut was at a full blown boil and he was just about ready to explode. So.. he kinda did..

Long and embarrassing story short, Lance yelled at her. He snatched his blue scarf out of her hands so fast, it scared her, and as he rubbed his most likely bruised tailbone, he got in her face and began blaming her for the world's most horrible fan interaction. He was so angry, that he balled his fists, stomped his foot and had veins protruding out of his neck and forehead. He called her names and most likely spit in her face, but he didn’t care. And when he was done, he took a step back and examined the girl in front of him. She was folded in on herself, holding her arms close to her body as her bottom lip quivered and fat, giant tears rolled down her cheeks. She looked so.. mortified. And actually.. scared of him. Like if Lance were to say anything or move a muscle, she’d flinch.

Seconds later, Lance’s face softened into something regretful and he went out to reach for her, to apologize. But, like he knew she would, she flinched. And then hurried away like he was a mad man. All the while crying and clutching her phone to her chest. Lance felt absolutely demolished inside. He tried to go after her but his feet were glued to the cement of the sidewalk. He didn’t even want his coffee anymore.

Thankfully, there were no viral videos or photos or posts about the incident. Lance ended up tracking the girl down a few days later and showered her with all the love he could muster, even taking as many pics as she wanted and liking them on Instagram when she tagged him. But.. something inside him still felt so horrible about the incident. For a moment, Lance had realized that he genuinely hurt that girl for no real reason. He just wanted some coffee but is coffee more important than the people who are thankful and want to show their gratitude for him for everything he did with voltron? If the roles were reversed and he stayed on earth, he would be bending over backwards to let all the paladins know just how thankful he was to live another day on their planet. That girl probably had family, friends, maybe a spouse and kids, and in the midst of that horrible battle 3 years ago, she most likely thought that one of those days would be her last with them.

It broke Lance’s heart thinking about it. He really hurt her. Sure, he made it right and she forgave him, but in that single moment, he actually hurt someone enough to make them cry, to make them run away from him. It was a terrible feeling. It wasn’t Lance. He never wanted that to happen again.

And at the same time.. he.. kinda never wanted to be the savior of earth. Not really.. he just wanted to feel like he had a place in the universe, and to know that he played an important role. That he mattered.

Guess he really matters now..

He sends a long text to Keith with shaky hands.

Message delivered..

The second he walked through the door, his phone rang. It was a three-way call with Hunk and Pidge. Lance pressed the green button to answer and placed the phone to his ear. Immediately, Hunk starts going on and on about how much he misses Lance and when the next time they’ll see each other will be. Lance smiled at his best friend’s inability to ever take a breath between sentences and replied with a warm ‘I miss you too, buddy.’ They got to catching up as Lance ordered his garlic knots and sat down at a private booth near the back of the place. He didn’t want to draw any attention to himself, especially when he got the call from his best friends.

Hunk tells him all the great things that’s been happening at the Garrison and even on the Atlas. He tells him how his restaurant is doing and how his family is doing and how Shay is doing. Pidge catches him up on things with her family, some new inventions she’s been working on, and how being the youngest teacher at the Garrison is going. Lance listens and gives his two cents on everything his friends tell him and honestly, he couldn’t be more happy for them. The way they were able to just get their lives together 3 years after the war is.. incredible. It made him think about everything he’s done since the war ended. Which wasn’t much.. he took over his family’s farm and brought it back to life, he helps out Colleen, Pidge’s mom, with medicine and finding cures to strange space illnesses with plants she has him grow on his farm, and his family’s market wouldn’t be as popular or swarming with business if he didn’t work there. Sad but true. And that’s really it. He hasn’t done much else. Nothing life changing or breathtaking like his friends.

But Hunk and Pidge don’t need to know that. So he simply replies with: “Oh, ya know.. same old, same old,” and hopes it works enough to keep the conversation flowing and follow up questions at bay. It does.

30 minutes into their conversation and Lance is starting to feel a little.. agitated. With the garlic knots consumed and digesting in his stomach, he sits in the booth, alone, listening to his friends go on and on and on about their perfect jobs and their perfect little lives. He gets lost a few times and at one point has literally no idea what they’re talking about. When he tries to ask what or who or even get the slightest details, Pidge lets out a sigh that Lance can’t help but feel like is out of annoyance. Lance sighs back and continues to stay silent because obviously he’s not getting anywhere. Why even bother putting him on a call that Hunk and Pidge could have just had on their own??

Balling his fist, Lance let out a loud, overdramatic sigh. He didn’t care if his friends heard it or how they took it. He was upset. The conversation between his two friends comes to a halt and then awkward silence. Pidge is the first to speak up with a:

“Something you wanna add, Lance?” The annoyance in her voice is very much there and Lance doesn’t miss it. He scoffs loudly and grits his teeth.

“No.” He says, voice deepening in anger.

“Oh really?” Pidge asks, poking the sleeping bear that lies dormant in lance. “Cause it sure sounds like it to me. Why don’t you stop being such a fucking child and tell us what’s bothering you this time??”

Lance damn near growls.

The line has gone quiet now. Hunk’s unsteady breathing is audible but other than that, silence. Lance digs his nails into the skin of his palms and tries to keep the angry tears in his eyes from falling down his cheeks. With a deep shaky breath, he smiles through the pain.

“You know what, Katie,” Lance spits and it makes Hunk gasp. “Fuck YOU and this stupid, shitty attitude you have all the time!”

“Oh, god..” Hunk winces.

“I don’t know what the actual fuck crawled up your ass,” Lance continues, “but I’m sick of it! I've been sick of it for years! I’m sick of keeping my mouth shut and quite frankly, I’m sick of YOU!”

Lance is standing up out of his seat now. His chest heaves up and down as the angry tears have fallen past his face and down his neck. His voice is two octaves deep from anger and the skin of his palm is bloody from how hard he’s digging his nails into it. The place has gone quiet now and Lance can feel multiple pairs of eyes on him. So much for not drawing any attention to himself.

The line is quiet. Then, the sound of a huff of breath. A small laugh.. And then:

“Wow. Nice one, McClain..” Pidge’s voice is small, but so full of something. “Go screw yourself, you asshole.”

The call ends. Whether Pidge or Hunk ended it, is unclear.

Minutes pass, and Lance is still standing in the same place with the phone to his ear. Tears are running down his face, and his Altean marks are buzzing so loud in his ears. His heart is pounding in his ribcage and ice cold sorrow runs through his veins..

He sends a long text to Keith with shaky hands.

Message delivered...

Now, exactly 3 months since that little incident, Lance sits alone in his home. In his childhood bedroom he can’t seem to rearrange because he’s still holding out hope that one day he’ll turn back time and be his child self and get a redo on his life. But hey, it’s better this way. After the whole dilemma with Pidge, Hunk tried to call Lance to help but ended up getting his feelings hurt. Yep. By Lance. Because Lance is a big jerk and can’t stop hurting everyone around him.

So he hasn’t talked to Pidge or Hunk since then. Mostly out of guilt and shame because those two are supposed to be his bestest friends and he hurt them. Nothing he could say or do could make up for his selfish mind and stupid mouth. Lance had this whole plan to go to Shiro about it, to get his advice so Lance could make it all better.

But Pidge being Pidge.. texted the whole thing in their group chat and.. well.. everyone saw it. Shiro, Hunk, Matt, even Keith possibly! It got so bad that Lance’s phone kept going off with alerts from everyone asking what happened and what he said. Curtis tried calling him and left a few messages. Shiro left him a long voicemail. And of course the word traveled so fast that it reached New Altea and Coran got involved. Which caused Romelle to be involved, too. She gossiped to Acxa, who told her girlfriend, who happens to be Lance’s sister, Veronica. Veronica blabbed to Rachel, who blabbed to Marco, who blabbed to Luis.. who blabbed to Lance’s dad.. WHO BLABBED TO LANCE’S MOM. And boy did she have some interesting words for him in the SEVEN, LONG voicemails asking exactly ‘what happened’and ‘why The Holt siblings were so angry with him.’

Everything escalated so fast. Lance can’t even remember what he said. Or why he said it. Since the war ended, it’s been so hard on him. Sure, it’s been hard on everyone, but for Lance it’s been different. Everyone looks up to him for some reason and expects him to do so good and be the hero they all think he is, when in reality? He was just a leg…

Exactly what did he gain from being a paladin of voltron anyway?? Get banged up and bruised almost everyday he was out there? Have people on his case, constantly reminding him how unimportant he was to the team? Pointing out all of his flaws and mistakes and focusing on those when there’s a million other good things he’s done that towers over all the bad shit?? Sure, he returned home to his family who he literally missed and cried for every single day, but he lost the love of his life in the process.

To put it all out there, Lance didn’t really gain anything. He got to travel through space, which was his dream since he was a little kid, and then space chewed him up and spit him out as some fake hero with PTSD and other trauma that will haunt him for the rest of his pathetic life.

So.. these past 3 months.

Lance has been sitting up in his childhood room.

Wishing he could use the power of Altea or something to turn back time.

And be his younger self.

His innocent self.

His happier self.

Back when he wasn’t so fucked up and had dreams and goals.

Back when everyone was proud of him.

Back to when he didn’t know who Allura was or that she even existed. Back to when Voltron didn’t exist either and everything was fucking fine.

Staring up at his ceiling, Lance counts the glow in the dark stars that he’s had up there since he was six years old. Somehow they’re still glowing and Lance is thankful for that because at 3 in the morning when the world is fast asleep and everything is pitch black, he could use the light.

It comforts him. Reminds him of a simpler, more happier time in his life.

Something sharp digs through Lance’s chest as he stares at those fake neon stars, and it hurts really bad. His breathing begins to quicken, matching the beat of his heart, and a lump finds its way up his throat. Tears pool in the rim of his eyes and spill down the corners, streaming down the sides of his face.

And they don’t stop. The stars get blurrier as Lance’s breathing gets heavier. His body begins to tremble with every hiccup of a sob that pours out of him and he’s crying so hard that his brain throbs in his head.

He curls in on himself in his bed and wraps his arms around his torso, crying uncontrollably into his space themed pillow. His Altean marks begin to buzz and glow and he can’t bring himself to care because all he wants to do is disappear.

Disappear from this game called life.

He types a text to Keith with teary eyes and a quivering bottom lip.

Message.. deleted…

As 3 in the morning turns to 4, a pod lands in the grass just a couple yards away from Lance’s farm. Boot covered feet step out of said pod and touch the wet grass waiting for them. It’s still dark out and the only light visible are the fireflies that buzz around a pair of cowboy booted feet. Those booted feet begin to walk, carrying a tall, broad, raven haired stranger up a hill to Lance’s home. The frogs and crickets seem to grow louder as the stranger in black cowboy boots makes their way to the front porch and pulls back the creaky screen door to a cold, locked doorknob. A set of keys are pulled out and a specific blue key is pushed inside the lock, turning and unlocking the door. The stranger walks in and is instantly met.. with..

Crying??

“H-Hello??” The stranger calls out. “Lance?”

The crying stops.

It’s dead quiet..

The door shuts on its own and the echo around the house is eery.

Light footsteps descend the stairs and before they know it, the stranger is being tackled to the ground in a bear hug.

“Ah-! Lance!?” They yell as the duffel bag from their hand falls to the ground.

“Keith!!” Lance yells out, voice rasped from endless crying.

Keith can immediately hear it and wraps his arms around Lance so tight, holding him close. His eyes glow yellow, something that usually happens out of fear, anger, or protectiveness, and his lips protrude to make way for his double set of fangs that are ready to bite any and everyone.

“Lance!” Keith tries to sit up but is pinned to the ground with all of Lance’s dead body weight. “Lance, honey, are you hurt? What’s wrong??”

A hand through curly brown locks and Lance’s crying dies down. He snuggles his face into Keith’s neck and hiccups through a response. Something too incoherent for Keith to make out, but he feels it has something to do with why he was told to go home ASAP.

A few weeks ago, Keith was contacted by Acxa via video chat. They talked and caught up for a few minutes before Acxa told Keith the real reason for her call. She explained that Veronica was having a tough time reaching out to Lance and that he might be in some kind of trouble. Not knowing the full extent of the story, Acxa only told Keith what she heard from Veronica and others. Fearing the worst, Keith packed up his shit and set a course for Earth as fast as he could.

Unfortunately, there were some setbacks on his way over where he had to make a few stops to tend to aliens in need because after all, that’s still his job as a blade member, but when that got finished, Keith hightailed it over. His Galra instincts wouldn't allow him to stay away for much longer anyway and having accepted his galra side a long time ago, it would have been best for everyone to let him go home.

Keith now lays in Lance’s bed, every inch of Lance’s body wrapped up around him like a snake. Keith strokes Lance’s hair soothingly and holds him close to his chest, right over his beating heart. A deep, soothing purr emits itself from Keith’s body and calms Lance’s nerves right down to the bone. Keith knows how much Lance adoreshis Galran features and at this point, Keith would do absolutely anything for Lance to feel better.

They talked about everything that happened and are now in the cuddle stage. Lance has his eyes shut, listening to Keith purr just for him. Long limbs wrapped around every inch of his boyfriend while Keith’s long nails scratch at his scalp, life is so good.

Life is so good with Keith around.

“So,” Keith says, voice as calm as ever. “What exactly did Pidge say?”

“Oh,” Lance answers, his voice quiet as a mouse. “You didn’t see the messages in the group chat?”

“No.” Keith shrugs, laying his cheek against Lance’s forehead. “Been kinda busy.. And I actually don’t understand how a group chat works.”

That rises a chuckle out of Lance as he sits up a bit to reach for his phone on the bedside dresser.

“Idiot,” he whispers with a small smile on his face and it makes Keith light up, his purring becoming a bit louder.

Lance lays back on Keith’s chest as he scrolls through the messages on his phone. When he finds the message from Pidge, Lance clears his scratchy throat and sniffs.

“From Pidgeotto,” he starts, looking at Pidge’s name in their ✨Paladudes✨ group chat. “Just an FYI lance is a.. a total fucking jackass and I am no longer friends with him..”

Keith immediately frowns at that.

Lance continues. “He can suck my big toe for all I care. I’m done with him. Have fun being a lonely loser @LanceyPants.”

“What the fuck?” Keith says, eyes glowing yellow in the dark room. “Why would she say that!?”

Lance shakes his head, tears forming in his eyes again. “Because she was right. I am a jackass..”

“Lance, no!” Keith sits up, bringing Lance with him. They sit side by side as Lance holds himself and looks down at his space blanket. He shrugs once and sniffs.

“Keith, stop,” he says, wiping a tear from his eye. “Look, I said some very hurtful things to her and she lashed out in a perfectly normal way..”

“Normal!?” Keith scoffs, grabbing Lance’s phone and rereading the message again. “Jackass? Loser?? Come on, Lance, she’s completely bullying you and you know it!”

Lance whips around with an angry expression on his face “Because I deserve it!”

The room grows quiet. Keith takes a deep breath and reaches over to grab Lance’s shoulders.

“Calm.” He says, taking a deep breath for Lance to mimic. Lance takes a deep breath with him and lets it out. Keith begins to purr again and it calms Lance even more.

“I.. Sorry..”

Keith nods. He reaches up to cup Lance’s cheek and rubs his thumb across Lance’s tear stained eye.

“You know I would never hurt anyone on purpose..” Lance sniffs. “That’s not who I am. I’m just.. I’m tired of being this symbol of everything strong and good and brave.”

“Mhm,” Keith rubs Lance’s back, leaning in closer to him to nuzzle his forehead. Lance nuzzles back and Keith’s purrs.

“I keep.. I keep hurting everyone I care about..” Lance whispers in a voice so low and fragile, it nearly shatters Keith’s heart.

“That’s not true.” Keith pulls back a little to look into Lance’s teary blue eyes. “Lance, you are the most incredible, selfless, honest person I’ve ever known. You are strong and good and brave even if you don’t mean to be. Or want to be.”

Lance pulls away and stares at his hands. Keith keeps his eyes focused on Lance.

“I know you think you hurt that fangirl from a few months ago.” Keith continues. “Or Pidge. Or Hunk. Or your parents or friend or family or whoever, but you could never hurt anyone.”

“Yeah, right,” Lance shakes his head. “I already did. I hurt everyone.”

“And even if that’s true,” Keith grabs Lance’s hands in his own, “which it’s not, you’re not doing it on purpose. You have a right to your own feelings! And you have a right to speak your mind.”

“And what if that hurts people??” Lance looks up and meets teary eyes to indigo ones. “What if I accidentally hurt my mama or my sisters or brothers, or nieces and nephews because I can’t be who they want me to be, who they think I am!?”

“Lance,” Keith shakes his head.

“What if I hurt you???” Lance’s eyes go wide. He looks Keith up and down and exhales a panicked breath. “God, Keith.. wh-what if I hurt you??”

“Oh, Lancey,” Keith sighs that lovey-dovey sigh where his eyes go all big and black like a cat’s, and the purr in his chest gets louder. “You’ve never hurt me. Ever.”

Lance stares into Keith’s eyes like they’re his lifeline.

“B-but.. but what if-?”

“No more what if’s!” Keith cuts Lance off by covering his mouth with his hand. “Listen to me, Lance. Are you listening??”

Lance nods repeatedly.

“Good,” Keith smiles, all crooked and cute and beautiful. “The only person you ever need to worry about hurting is yourself.”

And there it is. The one thing Lance has been dying to hear without knowing he’d been dying to hear it. It’s like a breath of fresh air, or cool rain on a hot and sweaty day. The permission he needed but didn’t really need. He has a right to care about himself and put himself first but whenever he tries, the guilt eats him alive. Why should he care about himself when he has to care more about others???

No. That’s not the case. It’s never been the case.

“You’ve gotta stop doing this to yourself,” Keith finishes, stroking the endless sea of tears that are falling from Lance’s eyes. He strokes Lance’s glowing Altean marks and leans forward to kiss one softly. Lance trembles slightly, closing his eyes to bask in the moment.

“I’m sure Pidge has gotten over it by now,” Keith reassures. “She just has too much pride to make the first more and apologize. You know how she is.”

“Y-Yeah,” Lance hiccups, nodding.

“And Hunk?” Keith scoffs. “I bet your mailbox is full of letters from him, explaining how sorry he is and hoping you’re doing alright. You know if he can’t reach you from your phone, he has other ways.”

That makes Lance smile.

“There’s probably cookies on the way right now.” He looks into Keith’s eyes, exhaling a small laugh.

“Oh, yeah,” Keith agrees, laughing that angelic laugh and showing off his perfect pearly fangs. Lance’s heart skips a fucking beat.

“And your fangirl?” Keith’s purring stops. “Well, she never should have gotten all up in your space that’s for sure. You had every right to punch her.”

“Keith!” Lance squeaks, face contorting into shock and confusion. “I-I didn’t punch her!”

“Really?” Confusion etches itself all over Keith’s features and he puts a finger to his chin. “I could have sworn I read that in your text.”

“No way, man!” Lance defends, waving his arms around. “Why would I ever in my life-!” He stops mid sentence to see the shit-eating grin plastered on Keith’s face.

“Just kiddin, lil lady,” Keith says in his best southern accent, smiling big and wide.

Lance bursts out into a fit of laughter, hitting Keith’s chest and arms and back. Keith shields himself and laughs, grabbing Lance’s arms and bringing him down onto the mattress. They fall back with Keith looming over Lance, his long raven hair surrounding their faces.

Lance stares up into those beautiful, indigo eyes and sniffs, unable to look away. He reaches up and cups Keith’s face, rubbing his thumb over Keith’s Galran stripe.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?” Keith asks in his softest voice, eyes roaming from Lance’s teary blue eyes to his luscious lips.

“Yes,” Lance nods, not even bothering to blink because if he does, he’ll miss Keith’s everything.

“Don’t let anyone get you down, my sweetheart.” Keith whispers, leaning in closer. “Ever.”

Lance nods.

“And if they do,” Keith’s face turns serious, indigo eyes going dark. “I’ll bite their throats out and hand them to you on a silver platter.”

“Keith,” Lance exhales, going red in the face and ears. “Holy shit, you can’t just say things l-like that.”

Keith’s hard demeanor falls as he giggles and leans in close. Before they close the gap between their lips, Lance whispers, “And hey. I thought pet names were my thing?”

And Keith kisses him to shut him up.

They kiss like they haven’t seen each other in years and it’s the greatest Lance has ever felt. Keith kisses like he’s starving for it, craving it so much more than air and it’s hot and powerful and so, so damn good.

Lance wraps his arms and legs around Keith’s body and kisses him back with fervor. He allows Keith to make him feel better, and kisses his pain away. Keith pulls away slowly, licking into Lance’s mouth before he does so. Lance lets out a small groan and smiles before he opens his eyes.

“I love you,” he whispers, tucking some hair behind Keith’s ear.

“I love you, more,” Keith whispers back, settling himself between Lance’s legs. “Feeling any better?”

“A little,” Lance looks away, sniffling a little. His eyes focus back to Keith’s and a small smile appears on his kiss swollen lips. “But I know a great way you can make me feel all the way better.”

“Oh, yeah,” Keith smirks, burying his face into Lance neck to start kissing slowly. “And what’s that?”

Lance giggles like a little kid, running his hands up and down Keith’s sides. When Keith pulls back, he trails his kisses up the side of Lance’s face and stops at his Altean mark.

“Make love to me,” Lance whispers, rubbing his nose against Keith’s. “Touch me all over and hold me until the sun comes up and just.. love me. Please..”

Keith’s face softens into something full of love and adoration. He moves forward to peck Lance’s lips, then his chin, and then his other Altean mark.

“Anything you want, my sweet..” he kisses Lance’s cheek. “Beautiful..” he kisses Lance’s jaw. “Amazing.. wonderful..”

“Alright, enough!” Lance laughs, slapping Keith in the back. His cheeks are on fire as he closes his eyes when Keith starts nibbling on his neck with his fangs. A chill runs down Lance’s spine and tingles to his toes, making them curl.

Keith sits up one last time and stares at Lance like he’s the world.

“I’ll take good care of you, baby.” He says with the utmost truth in his sultry voice. “I promise. We’re in this together.”

“Yeah,” Lance nods, letting his tears fall down his face and glowing Altean marks. “Together.”

And as Keith kisses Lance so lovingly, Lance can’t help but be glad that he can’t turn back time to be his younger self. Because with Keith around, he feels all the happiness in the whole world just like he did when he was young.

-END-

(send me a klangst prompt)

[mrswhozeewhatsis]

To stop the accusation that I’m dragging this out to please the drama llamas, I’ve studied everything I got (and spent a fair amount of time searching for things on blogs), and managed to whittle things down to their bare essentials. I’ve also tried to talk to everyone about everything, which took time. I won’t address everything that everyone has said on both sides, just a few points that are either concrete, or I can’t address them privately for whatever reason.

The timeline as I’ve been able to piece it together is like this:

Vanessa made a post about more popular writers complaining about lack of feedback. 

Beka messaged Vanessa wanting to know why Vanessa had a problem with her.

Vanessa responded in a way that upset Beka.

Beka blocked Vanessa.

Vanessa got around the block and sent anonymous asks to Beka.

Beka outed Vanessa by responding to the asks publicly.

Vanessa deactivated her blog.

Friends of both proceeded to attack each other.

Claims about Beka (this is not a complete list):

Only supports her friends on her blogs and in Pond Angel Fish Awards

Although it’s been a couple of months since Beka has reblogged fics from other writers at all, by going back through her #read with me tag, I see reblogs of fics from at least a dozen different writers just in May and June. I’ve only been tracking Angel Fish Awards since February, but since then, Beka has nominated 8 stories by 8 different writers.

Ignored asks for Big Fish advice sent to her blog

If there were a way for me to prove this, then I wouldn’t be listing it here. As it is, it’s impossible to prove. As a Pond admin, I’ve experienced the weirdest stuff with asks. I spent one evening chatting with a member while they repeatedly tried to send in asks, and we didn’t get a single one. I do know that asks sent via the app seem to be more likely to be eaten than asks sent via desktop, but asks sent both ways have disappeared. 

There are other claims, this is not a complete list, but I will be addressing them with Beka personally (I have already started doing this, actually). I’m only including these two because they can be proved or disproved with facts. Some of the other claims have been leveled against Big Fish in the Pond other than Beka, as well. The Pond will deal with those privately, but we hope you will see an improvement in these areas when the Pond returns from hiatus.

Claims about Vanessa:

I’ve talked to Vanessa about these, without anything constructive coming from it. I tried. I tried to explain to her that she could have gotten further by using less provocative language and offering constructive suggestions. We ended up having the same old arguments about unrelated issues and going around in circles. The only thing Vanessa ceded was that she should not have continued to reach out to Beka after Beka blocked her. She has apologized for this. I don’t need to list the rest here, just know the conversation happened and nothing came of it.

Claims about Beka’s opposition:

Made unsubstantiated claims about Beka sending herself anon hate

I’ll be the first to tell you that I don’t have a single clue how to figure out who has sent an anonymous ask on Tumblr. However, what I do know is that it requires access to the inbox the ask was sent to. In order for someone who is not Beka to say that Beka sent herself an anonymous ask, they would have had to have hacked into her account, somehow. I don’t know much about this, but it sounds illegal. Since there was proof of this offered, it’s a useless claim.

Picked apart posts on her personal blog and said they were intended for her writing audience when they were not

Beka’s personal blog was, she thought, relatively private. It was not meant for her readers to see. (There is an argument to be made about how it’s still a public blog that the world can see, but the charge is that she intended for her readers to see it and respond, and that is not the case.) Yet, someone took it upon themselves to stalk it, and then match posts between the two blogs, making it look like it all came from one blog. They then took their argument to the absurd and claimed she was using her mental health issues to drum up patrons on her Patreon. If that were the case, then it all would have been on her writing blog. But it wasn’t.

Belittled Beka’s cries for help, and then attacked her further

I don’t care if you didn’t believe her when she said she was on the edge, you just don’t do that, folks. That right there is the point where you either walk away or report her to Tumblr as a threat to herself. The last thing you do is double down on your attacks. Take a break, walk away, find a kinder, gentler way to make your point. I don’t care who they are or what they believe or have done, when someone puts the gun to their head, you do not tell them they are an awful human being.

Dissected every post, word by word, including auto tags, using intentionally provocative language

Not every post made was like this, but a lot were. This is high school stuff, guys. To rip apart words used by someone obviously in pain instead of reaching through and looking for the meaning behind it is petty and cruel. Not to mention it takes so much more energy to dig into things like that than to just respond to the meat of things. To take someone’s blog name and twist it into a degrading moniker is sickening. To attack words used in an effort to distract from the topic at hand, or to just add on to the already heaping pile of anger you’re throwing around is unconscionable and pointless. This is not what people who are coming from a place of love or kindness do. This is what you do when you hate someone, and that’s just not cool, guys.

Brought up old issues thought to have been settled a long time ago

My husband calls this “stamp collecting.” There’s a statute of limitations on things, and it depends on the thing, but my personal limit on Tumblr is about two weeks. If nothing has been said about something for two weeks, I assume it’s in the past and I try to move on. I say this because, if it weren’t settled, then we’d all still be working on it, right? If something is bothering me, and I work on it with someone, but I’m not happy, then I’m gonna keep working on it with that person. If they seem to forget (which happens because we’re all human), then I’m gonna send them a quick message. “Hey there! I’m still working on this thing. Can we talk about it again?” I do this with contractors who work on my house. I did this with clients when I worked in an office. To bring up something that happened a long time ago like it’s still an active issue is pointless, and goes against one of the main tenets of effective arguing.

Taking obvious glee in tearing down another person

Do I really have to talk about this? If you had any care for the other person, even enough to just care that they are a person, you would not gloat about how you’re going to tear them apart.

Really, all of this stuff comes down to if you are approaching the world and everything you do from a place of love or from a place of anger and pain. Even if you are angry and in pain, treat other people like you love and respect them, and you will find that everything is just better. 

If you feel like I’m coming down on one side or the other of this situation, just know that I’m not. Pretty much, I don’t like things that were done by both sides. These are just the things I feel more comfortable talking about in a public post like this.

Other stuff that’s come up in the course of all of this:

Complaining about notes/followers

So many writers, lately, are frustrated. Tumblr sucks balls on a good day when it comes to notifications and the whole algorithm mess, and that’s still being generous. In an effort to keep the porn blogs at bay, they’ve stifled all creators. Add to that how tags seem to never work when you’re searching for something, and disseminating your work is nearly impossible.

I could tell you all the different ways you can change your focus on the readers you do have, give you lists of things you can do to expand your audience, and offer advice about not comparing yourself to other writers. But you’ve already heard all of that. So, I’m just gonna say it.

If you complain publicly about a lack of notes or followers, you’re gonna look like a dick.

That doesn’t mean you are a dick. You’re just gonna look like one. You’re going to look like you’re ungrateful for the readers that you do have, which is going to turn off those readers, and you’ll end up with even fewer notes and followers. If you manage to disparage other writers while you’re complaining, you’re gonna look like an even bigger dick. So, just don’t do it, unless you don’t mind looking like a dick. 

Need to vent about it? Find a close friend and send it to them in a private message. Have a funny thought about it that you want to share? This is exactly what private messages are for. Create a group DM in discord. Heck, I think even Tumblr has a group chat option, now. Just, don’t put it on your blog, unless you want to lose followers. 

The number of admins at the Pond

Some folks seem to think that the Pond needs to add more admins in order to react more quickly when something goes down. Honestly, I have talked to Mana and Kale about stepping down as admin because I believe the opposite is true. We have a policy that we all must agree on the big things. However, we are separated by 8 time zones. There is a rare hour every few days (sometimes it’s weeks) when all three of us are awake and not occupied with caring for family members. We have a private group chat thing where we each toss ideas and questions and such into the pot when we’re doing things. When the others get to it, they add their two cents. Usually, there are two of us active at a time, and then we wait for the third to stop by for approval. Often, the third has a question or argument that then needs to be addressed, but the first or second one isn’t available. More admins would only be a good thing if we were all in the same time zone. But we’re not. We are an international group, which I believe is a good thing, but the downside is that it slows us down. Sometimes, being slow is a good thing, too. Generally, at least one of is calm and level-headed at any given time. It shifts on who that one is, but they keep us from doing anything rash.

The whole problem is that no one feels like they can tell you when there’s a problem

I’ve heard this so many times, now, but I haven’t responded to it publicly, so here goes. 

Most of you don’t know what I’m like in person, but I’m built like a linebacker. I’m tall, I’m heavy, and I have wide shoulders. I have literally scared small children. Take Jared Padalecki, add another Jared Padalecki on the side, and then take away all the pretty, and you come close to what I’m like when you see me walking down the street. 

I don’t want to be a scary person that anyone is afraid to approach. My goal in life is to be kind and fair. I will give you second and third chances, because I know how awful it feels to be written off. 

My ask box is always open. My chat windows are always open. My email address is mrswhozeewhatsis@gmail.com. I’m the same on discord and skype. I don’t care if you think your thing is stupid, if it’s something that’s bothering you, and I can help, then I want to help. I can’t always help, but I always want the opportunity to try.

If I have ever done anything that made you feel like I didn’t care, then I give you permission to tell me. I’ll hate hearing it, but I need to hear it. 

If I have forgotten to follow up on something for you, PLEASE REMIND ME. Holy, cow, I have a TERRIBLE memory. It’s really bad. I have tricks and stuff that I do to try to make sure I don’t lose track of things, but it still happens. Please, come back to me and remind me that I promised you something. I guarantee that I will not be mad or upset. I will be glad, because you’re helping me to be the person I want to be.

I think that’s about it. The Pond is still on hiatus, indefinitely. We have a lot of things we’re talking about for if/when we come back, and some of them are really exciting to me. I hope we come back. I hope we can make the Pond what we always meant it to be. We’ll need help, and constant feedback from our fishy family, but I still have hope.

[deltacomerade]

so, i’ve been a lil confused by this since it was posted: why did the MCR accounts post about Umbrella Academy? like, okay, obviously Gerard wrote the comic and produced the show, it’s their project, but it’s strange that both the band’s account posted about it and the show’s official page tagged MCR in the post teasing Here Comes The End (which is honestly fucking great, not perfect, but great).

i know a lot of people have naturally assumed it means that the boys will make new music for the soundtrack, which if it is the case Hell Yeah Sign Me Up, but i’m a lil hesitant to believe that.

some others are thinking Gerard just posted to the wrong account on accident (which sounds like something they would do), but if they did, why would the post still be there, and then followed up by a thing for Here Comes The End? i know Gerard doesn’t give a flying fuck about social media 8 times out of 10, unless its about some cool rocks they found, but still. ((EDIT: I haven’t seen solid proof of this, but someone mentioned the reason MCR was tagged and why it posted there is Maybe because Ray is in charge of the acount, and that was their way to include him since he helped out on the song with Additional Guitars and (also weirdly) Bass, which kinda makes sense, but last i checked, or simply assumed, i’m pretty sure all the of the guys have access to the account, since both Ray and Frank posted stuff about their experiences in the band, so i’m not entirely sure about it. Also, while about as active as Gerard, Ray does have his own Instagram, so that doesn’t help support this theory.))

and some people have also said it’s just Warner Bros. wanting to get some free publicity, which definitely sounds like something they as a corporation would do. BUT Umbrella Academy isn’t owned by them, the show itself is owned partially by Dark Horse (who published the comic) and Universal, who bought the rights waaaay back in the day to make a movie out of the comic, but then changed it to a show. so it could be Them wanting to get publicity (maybe as “repayment” in a way for Dark Horse doing the Killjoys comic for Gerard and MCR or some dumb shit like that, who knows) this honestly makes the most sense out of everything else, but a lot of people, unfortunately myself included, just naturally assumed it was Gerard’s idea alone. which is a great transition into;

at the top of this Weirdness Heap (which is probably gonna be Gerard’s second solo album name. back off Moss Lord, i call dibs), someone mentioned years ago when the band was originally together, Gerard wanted to keep the two projects seperate. and, to add onto the last point, as a producer, does Gerard actually have the power to choose where to advertise the show, or are they just going along with what Netflix marketing decides to do because Netflix is in charge of the whole shebang? either way, it still don’t make a lot of sense to me.

ALL THAT BEING SAID, it isn’t the first time the MCR social media accounts were used to promote the members’ individual projects, the FB account promoted Frank’s album last year in May, but weirdly not Mikey’s work with Electric Century on either FB or IG. (again, Devil’s Advocate, there has been publicity on the other members’ Personal Accounts on different platforms and such, but not that i remember on the MCR page) ((EDIT 2: After a bit more careful digging and some assistance, i did find that the MCR account DID help promote Mikey’s new album, i just overlooked it a bit...in hindsight, i’m realizing maybe i didn’t work hard enough on this, and am kind of an actual dumbass? honestly though, this was All just a personal thoughts thing, not actually a criticism of Gerard or the band, so it doesn’t really matter.))

in summary...i honestly don’t know. like, obviously Frank, Mikey, and Ray knew about it ahead of time, they showed and voiced their support. and honestly, i fucking love how they all support each other with their own projects, its kinda sweet. (and yeah, i know some douchehole is gonna chime in with “Free Money”, but I DONT CARE THIS YEAR IS A FUCKING CESSPIT GIVE ME THIS ONE THING) and also, while i know they aren’t a perfect person, and they’ve acknowledged that themselves, i really truly firmly don’t believe Gerard did it to be selfish and abuse their power as the band’s leader to make a quick buck. while they obviously need to support their family, Gerard still does their best to stand by what they believe or oppose what they’re against, including selling out. i know some of you would disagree and think i’m just stupid, but i stand by that.

in the end the best answer may be the simplest one; since the virus started, maybe the band didn’t want the account to be stagnant until the tour starts up again, and thought they would use it to support each other’s work. it’s honestly possible once they start posting things related to their own work collectibely rather than just as individuals, they could just take both posts down.

[ So Bottom Line Here Is Don’t Go And Try To Bully, Accuse, Or Make Fun Of Gerard Again Of/For Something As Asinine As This, It’s Literally Not That Big Of A Deal, They’re Both Things They’re (G) Passionate About You Shitheads] (i’m not saying Stop The Memes, cuz i know that most of them are not made to be mean-spirited and some are honestly a lil funny, just...Dont Be A Dumbass, thats all i’m saying)

like i said, i dont know, maybe i’m overthinking again? it’s not a huge deal, i’m excited for the new season and for whatever things the Emo Gang summon in the future after this hellhole of a year blows over, just my two cents.

[maladaptive-ninja-returns]

Kira

Loki x fem!Reader (Kira)

Series: Will contain fluff, bloodshed, violence, anxiety, tears and the cries of my wilted soul.

Chapter content: Not much. Just characters coming together.

Warnings: Representation of anxiety, curse word(s).

Word count: Sometimes I feel like my mind teases me irrespective of the setting around us. It’d be like, oh you’re sitting in your office, too bad if we had a new fic idea, right? riiiight? *deep inhale*

MASTERLIST in bio, my love

CHAPTER 1: The End

Everything moves in slow motion. The water coming down the silver faucet. The gasp escaping your lungs. The whimper being born in the heart of your heated throat. The water dripping down your nose into the spotless white sink. Your hands running across your face mixing the tears with the tap water over your skin. Everything moves at a snail’s pace. Everything except your heartbeat and your shallow breaths. One, you start counting, trying to trick your brain into taking in one long gulp of air while your moist eyes close themselves for the fear of losing your balance. Two. Your trembling hands grab the edges of the ceramic sink to ground you. Three. You bend your knees and get close to the outer space shade of black tiles beneath your grey block heels.

Four. You start to whisper to yourself. It's okay. You're okay. Remember. Just try to remember. Five. Your eyes open and look at the objects around you to recount them inside your head. Faucet. Hand towel. Mirror. Hand dryer. Purse. Phone. Six. You get up and pick the hand towel from the pile neatly stacked beside the sink to pat your face dry, pressuring your shaking fingers hard into the fabric pressing onto your skin. Seven. You whisper the list you just made out loud to your reflection in the mirror. Eight. You clench and unclench your hands, repeating the ritual till you can no longer feel the shiver as evidently as before. Nine. You pick up your brown-rimmed glasses and put them on, adjusting them over the bridge of your nose using the help of your reflection. Ten. You straighten your back and square up your shoulders, smoothening the rebellious hair strands over your head back till the bun. Breathe. Tugging your royal blue blouse to get rid of the wrinkles, you swipe off some invisible dust bunnies away from the fabric before picking your grey purse. Your eyes lock for a moment with your reflection's, creating a minuscule swerve of a latent pain rising somewhere behind those pupils. And just at the speed at which they met, they look away from the mirror to walk towards the door. The click of the washroom door alerts your body and you move out into the gallery of this glass building, mingling into the crowd going about their daily lives. Everyone who walks by is in suits. Monotones. Nothing lighter than a plain white, nothing darker than an abyss black and nothing more colourful than the stainless steel grey. The walls wear the same shades as the concrete they were made with. The massive beams running to the top at the entrance add a bright hue of white to the structure. The reception desk right by the wall whose corner you came out of is decorated in black. You almost feel out of place in your blue before your mind realises that you actually are. "Miss Kira?" The receptionist with fiery ombre soft curls running till her shoulder calls out to you as you approach her, "Miss Donatella will see you now." You try to pass her a smile but hurt your muscles in the process. Taking the yellow guest ID you follow the receptionist's instructions to go the twentieth floor. Between the ground level and floor twenty, half a minute of silence is a rare opportunistic gift that your mind takes to breathe away the episode in the washroom before the ding echoes around the elevator covered in mirrors on all sides. You step inside the destined floor and just one thought crosses your mind. Why am I still surprised? The walls here are the same as any other part of the building. Concrete. Naked. Dull? And where there aren't any walls, there is glass frosted to a level desired by someone who wants to keep their private sections of the offices private indeed. The absence of any footfall in this part of the building makes the clack of your heels louder than supposed to be. The corridor seems deserted and you really cannot tell if any human is breathing on the other side of that glass. It feels like an eternal walk through a cement maze till you finally spot the glass door marked Conference Hall C and turn the handle. A blonde, pale woman- paler than what you're accustomed to seeing usually- sits behind a grey table huge enough to accommodate a buffet for a family of twelve. She smiles at you and asks you to come in. Now that is a surprise. Not the smile. Not the setting. The fact that she is wearing beige in the world of grayscale is what shocks you a little. "You must be Kira..." a raspy voice greets you from her raspberry painted lips before turning towards the file to look for the last name. "Just Kira, please," you respond, stopping by the lone chair that stands on your end next to the table in this hall, "and you must be Miss Donatella." She nods and passes just a hint of a smile before requesting you to sit down. The air around her smells of lavenders. You don't like lavenders; not recently. Maybe it's this premeditated thought that sets a tiny itch in your nose as you sit down. Donatella opens a white file with your name on it. "So," she begins as she shifts in her comfortable black swivel chair and you know she's crossing her legs under that table, "Miss Kira, you have an impressive resume." You try to smile better this time. You are forced to. This woman practically holds the cards to some very important, life-changing events in your life right this moment in this room. "I have to say," Donatella raises her brows in a little grim speculation while eyeing the contents of the file, "it is so impressive that you should not be applying for the post of an assistant." Pressing the pulsation in your lips you take in a lungful. "My academic qualifications are elements of education that I deemed necessary on my way, Miss Donatella, if their degree of complexity is your concern. Now, as far as my application for the portfolio of an assistant goes, I'd say my qualifications along with my extracurriculars are actually one good example of me being able to handle multitasking, work decently under pressure and get the results on time." You can see Donatella's lips curve up a little before she plants her fingers over her lips, trying to cover whatever positive emotion she is feeling while her other hand sifts through the pages scrutinize your life as seen on those pieces of paper. "It says here you worked at Rein Industries for six months," Donatella bends her voice in a question. "That was a mandatory internship I did during my college course," you reply, feeling your ears heat up. You do not realise when you left thumb starts to move along the right wrist, trying to feel the bone beneath your skin. "They didn't present you with an offer?" "They did. I had to decline for some personal reasons." "Must be some reason," Donatella quips, her hand resting on her chin while her mix of grey and honey eyes look right at you, "because you do not have any work experience for an entire year after that. Which...was last year." The movement of your thumb does not stop. The smile plastered on your lips stretches a little as you look down at your hands for a second before meeting her calculating gaze. "I, unfortunately, had some health issues last year. Hence, the little gap in my resume. If I had joined any company at that point of time I'm sure you understand how that would have affected not only mine but the company's performance as well." "Why Sun Corp?" Donatella does not even wait for you to breathe out the last word when the question drops on you and you realise your fingers digging into the skin of your palms right on time. "It's hardly been a year and Sun Corp has been expanding throughout the country with its extended subsidiaries. That's unlike any private corporation I have seen." "And this is what attracted you?" You can almost hear Donatella's scoff. "I wasn't finished yet, Miss Donatella," you mention before continuing, not waiting for her brows to retain their composure, "Sun Corp has been working within third world countries just like ours and unlike any other multinational company, which basically want a monopoly with a huge profit margin, it has been working on the grass root level with a comparatively low but evidently stable profit index. And the reason this corporation has been having one successful industrial arm after another is that someone in here knows exactly what the population needs in our country." You pause for a moment to let the air around you ease the heat flurrying through your body. Donatella takes that one moment to glance at her phone, moving it little to make it light up. "Now unlike other companies who are content in fulfilling the bare minimum required of their corporate social responsibility and hiring agencies to research on how to market their product to the general public, Sun Corp's management has been using its resources on actually finding the necessity and working on building the bridges hereafter...with the people who actually are in need of those bridges." The silence that follows is satisfactory for one side and shifty for the other. "All you have given me till now is pretty much a really generic reason though I must say you seem to have done some homework, if not all," Donatella is quick to remark before scribbling something down on your file. "Twelve per cent." "Excuse me?" You inhale before repeating the figure. "Twelve per cent. That was the increase in the yield of crops when my family took up Sun Farms' aid. I'm sure it does not seem like much to someone who doesn't have a background in agriculture but it helped pay for my sibling's tuition so there's that. Now, this is the twelve per cent that I know. I haven't included the percentage of sales that increased by word of mouth publicity after that. And considering how environmentally conscious and cautious my family is about the chemicals going into their crops, I can assure you the word-of-mouth thing was huge." The image of your grandfather going on about the better health of the mustard growing in the vast field brings the first genuine smile on your face today. But Donatella, on the other hand, seems unphased. The silver watch on her wrist peeks from inside her cuffs- reflecting the soft golden lights of the room right into your eyes- when she sits up and close to the table, throwing a quick look at her phone. Her elbows barely rest on the table; as if she's preventing herself from being at ease. "And that is the only reason you are here. Out of a sense of-" she raises her hands a little with a light shrug- "gratitude. Is that so?" "I am here because this company seems to have farsightedness, Miss Donatella. Not regarding what it needs to do to stay in the game but regarding what the people would want now and in the near future. And I feel that it forces you to believe in some kind of a direct or indirect moral compass that comes with the corporation's work," you are quick to answer. Donatella's chuckle is like the one that comes out of actors portraying the Victorian era aristocracy to show the restraint the women would be put through even when having fun. Why it reminds you of those actors is something you find both amusing and confusing in that instant. "Moral compass." Donatella's mutter is more for herself than for you, spewing the words out in mockery. "I have to say, sweetheart," she shakes her head while her brows try to imitate an emotion of sympathy, "this was good. Really good. The first such answer I have heard but, really? Are you sure?" Now you are really confused. "I beg your pardon ma'am?" You try not let the pricks of fear show over your face, your thumb digging into your wrist for some reason unknown to your consciousness. Donatella intwines her fingers together as her honey and grey fixate on you. "How many interviews do you think I've taken for this position? Hm? Ten thousand applications came in for just this post. The post of being the assistant to the company's founder. Out of those ten thousand, two hundred people were shortlisted for the interview. And even in those two hundred candidates was barely a person who actually wanted to apply for the post." You feel the space between your brows get heavier with every passing second. "If they didn't want the post then why did they apply?" "For the same reason you did, young lady. They all want to get close to the man himself," she declares before muttering, "Cheapskates." "Excuse me?" You can almost see her roll her eyes at you. "Oh don't give me that look," she huffs tiringly with a wave of her hand, "a pretty girl like you giving up all of this hard work of so many degrees just so you can satiate your desire to meet him. Some of you even have the audacity to think of getting into his pants. Take my advice and get out of here. Girls like you have a better chance of stalking him on the internet than getting to even kiss the floor Mr Odinson walks on." The next few seconds are filled with the ticking of the watch on Donatella's wrist. The ringing in your ears is mind-numbing for the first ten seconds before it transforms into something else. An ember of rage lights up somewhere inside you, heating up a spot right in the centre of your chest. Your thumb rubs the back of your palm through the silence before coming to an abrupt stop with the one long breath you take in. "I am flattered Miss Donatella, that you think I'm pretty," you begin, with just a hint of a smile this time, "And also surprised, because you are being so straightforward with...what you think about me." You abruptly push your chair forward to keep your arms on the table, openly offending Donatella, who gasps at your guts to do so. "But it does make me wonder that almost all one hundred and ninety-nine people might actually be having evidence to get you fired before you leave this company, ma'am." Donatella blinks, faster than she'd supposed to, as her one leg that had so comfortably been resting on the other goes down. "Ex-" "You should be more wary of...people who want to get into his pants, that's what you said, right? Be wary of such people discreetly taking pictures of your boss while you make deals with his rivals behind his back, Donatella. Because I can assure that these people have a drive more intense than the number of zeros you were offered on your paychecks to leave Sun Corp." The stoic and cold demeanour she had been maintaining till now starts to crumble bit by bit. "Don't make accusations you cannot prove, Kira," she nearly hisses. "Don't make judgments you cannot justify, Donatella," you softly throw the words her way. "And I'm not making this up, something which was just proved from your facial expressions. The entire Instagram has proof of your meeting with some private military corp that's been trying to find a way to enter the country through some other businesses." The fear in Donatella's distant gaze is hard to miss. But you barely feel any empathy for her. Picking up your purse from the floor you begin to get up but pause. "Oh and one more thing, Donatella DeMorgeaux Bellasario-" you tap your finger on the smooth steel table surface- "your boss hates it when anyone addresses him as Odinson. At least his assistant should be aware of that," you enunciate before getting up, looking at that lingering rage in your reflection in the mirror covering the wall next to you before going for the door you entered from. "How do you know all this? What are you, some kind of a-" "No, I'm not a spy Donatella," you spew at her from the door, irritation brewing up over your features, never looking back at the woman, "just like you said, I did my homework." "Bitch," you mutter under your breath before exiting the room. Donatella sits there, her hands covering the creeping disbelief over her face. Behind the mirror, you had caught your reflection in, a pair of emerald eyes glisten in the filtered light entering the darkness they are engulfed in. Having seen the entire thing unfold in front of them, they turn towards a camera resting in a corner of the dark space near the ceiling, a smirk glimmering through those green eyes showered in the soft foreign golden light. "Be careful, Balder," the man in the black suit warns the blonde guy with a soft face, "you so much as put a scratch on anything in this house, I'll make you pay it from your pocket." The blonde looks at the man in command. Balder cannot help but feel both scared and excited to look at him, his dark skin reflecting the blue sky outside with such flawlessness. As if that wasn't enough, the weight in the British voice is enough to make any manly man weak in his knees. "Yes, sir. Sorry, sir," Balder apologises softly before carefully planting the miniature camera behind the book stack, his pale nimble fingers working carefully with the rosewood he had drilled to make way for the device. The man in the suit walks around the tiny studio apartment space, taking in the citrus smell of a body spray that was used in this space this morning. The bedroom is a five-step walk from the main door that opens into the living room-cum-open kitchen-cum-study. A violet coloured quilt lies on the bed in a mess, half-covering a Bulbasaur plushie. His long gloved fingers trace the edge of the headboard to collect the dust over the latex for examination. "José," he speaks without looking away from the dust bunnies over his fingertips, "put one on the headboard too." "Yes sir," comes another voice as a tall dusky man dressed in a cleaner's uniform walks into the bedroom space. The huge, calculated steps walk back into the living room, hands resting inside his pant pockets. "All the cameras and listening devices are in position, sir," the olive-skinned woman sitting on the carpeted floor with a laptop in her hand declares as she types away some codes on her screen, "we're going live in three, two, one." A press of a button later, the screen floods with Balder and José's faces- adjusting the cameras- along with the man's back to the one device planted above the apartment door. "Good work, Torra," the man announces, "now route that feed to my account and remove the access from yours and anyone else's. Make it a level seven clearance feed." "Ooh! They must someone really important we're spying on. Yes, sir," woman quips happily before typing in a serial number and pressing enter, allowing the screen to show the rerouting before going blank. "Mission accomplished." Within the next five minutes, the apartment sees the two men and woman trickle out of its space as if they were never there. The man in the suit takes one last look around before he eyes land on the nine figures resting on the side table near the door. The nine protagonists of One Piece sit there facing the kitchen opposite to where they stand. The man looks at them all in some deep thought, his honey eyes lingering for some time on one figure before moving over to the next, before he takes one hand out of his pocket and moves the figure of the woman with long black hair to face his direction. Content with his work, he walks out of the apartment, allowing the silence before his arrival to take back its place as gracefully as he had. The walk back to your place is heavy and slow. The noise from the passing subway train behind you does not help the piercing pain going in and out of your throbbing head. Picking up a sandwich and fresh juice from the local deli you stop by the twenty-four seven store to grab a bottle of Jägermeister. It is only when you've reached the front of your building do you take an effort to conceal the liquor bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag inside your purse. The walls might only have ears, but the old women living around your place had heightened senses when it came to young single people living in their vicinity. Your building's elevator feels like a good change from the mirrored one you had been trapped in on your way in and out of the building today. The chime is welcomed too as you step out on your floor, your keys ready to open the door and lock yourself in your comfort zone. Your neighbour- a young man a year or two older than you- tries to wave your way and before he can even blurt out your name, you have bolted the door and thrown the keys into their designated bowl on the side table. Keeping your purse down on the carpet gently, you take in one long breath. "Breathe," you whisper to yourself. "Just breathe. Forget everything else. Right now, just breathe. Please." Your eyes take in the familiar soft space. The kitchen, The Tempest lying on the two-person dining table, your quilt still the same mess you had left in the morning. The oil painting of a sunflower hanging on the wall you are leaning over, your One Piece figures sitting right next to you on the table. Luffy, Brook, Zoro, Franky, Nami, Chopper, Sanji and Robin. A blank minute passes as you stand there, frozen in time, looking at the figures in a confused daze. And then something dawns on you. Your hand, with a life of its own, moves to turn Robin towards the direction she usually faces before coming back to your side. A cold prickle passes through your spine as your eyes go about the familiar space with a scrutinizing gaze shrouding the fear behind those eyes. Someone was here, your mind sets off all the alarms in one go. And this time, when it actually seems appropriate to feel the panic erode you, you stand there breathing normally. No shivers. No sweats. The vibration and loud chime of your phone makes you jump where you stand eventually. Your fingers take out the device from your pant pockets to click it open. Another chime comes. A message from your bank stating the recent deposit that had been made into your account. Another message congratulating you on getting the position of Assistant to the founder and head of Sun Corp, requesting you to join the post tomorrow. Donatella clicks her phone close and places a grey file on an oakwood desk before walking out of the lavish office space and into a room with a fire pit separating the space into a lounge area and a living room with its length. The clack of her pencil heels stops as her eyes catch the figure standing by the glass wall that opens to the view of the city beneath and mountains beyond them. "I have narrowed down some candidates to come as my replacement," she speaks in the direction of the figure, never bothering to close the distance between them, "but I still need to go through another batch tomorrow." The figure stands there. Still. Like an old tree. Donatella can feel a tiny chill rise up somewhere inside her, which she tried to suppress as she shifts her eyes away, her hands coming together in front of her while her shoulders move a little to shake away a lingering stiffness. "Burn them." A soft voice- like a warm brandy laced with honey going down your throat, heating it up in ways unknown- commands the room. "I'm sorry?" Donatella fears her ears didn't catch that right. The figure's shoulders finally shift a little but the pale arms exposed through folded up black sleeves do not move away, the hands resting inside the pant pockets. "I said burn them," the voice says again. "Why?" "Because none of those letters spells out Kira." An arrow seems to have pierced Donatella's chest as her eyes go wide before her entire body tries to find its composure. The fact that the figure doesn't move still amplifies the fear crawling over her skin. "I-I think-" "Pack your things and never show your face within a hundred meters of my empire. You're fired." The voice never rises. Not once. The delicate smoothness lingers throughout the words even when the threat is delivered. Donatella brings her rage over features, about to spit some words into the ice-like air surrounding her. "Before you say something you'll regret I suggest you look at the table in front of you, Donatella." And she does. All the heavy rage folded in her wrinkles disappearing within a flash, replaced by nothing but mortal fear as the photographs on table show her meeting with an unknown man before displaying her in a compromising position in high-resolution grayscale. "Mr Odinson, I-" The head turns a little in her direction, making her cracked voice stop at once. Even with a distance of at least twenty feet between them, she can see the green embers burn from where they stand. And before she knows it, her lungs are trying to find air to breathe. "I'm sorry Mr Loki, sir," are her last words before she hurriedly walks out of the space that has been chilled to the core by that one traumatising side glare. It's done. The man in the black suit closes his phone and walks across the length of the dark room that has nothing in the name of lights except for the endless skylight revealing the infinite stars above him and the twelve screens lit up on the wall he is walking towards. Grabbing the top of the swivel chair, he sits down before pulling up two screens on the monitors in front of him. His hand goes in the pocket of his jacket to take out two marbles with hues of orange, golden, fiery red and black trapped in them, seemingly similar to a pair of golden eyes. And like a ritual known to his hands, he starts moving them around in his fingers while his eyes are fixated on the two figures on those separate screens, considerably apart, sitting inside the space of their homes, eyeing the alcohol bottles sitting next to them. One of them shifts their gaze away to look at the phone in their hand before closing it and moving out of the camera's view. A chime comes on this side. The man takes out his phone to see the message displayed on the screen. Thank you, Heimdall. He looks back at the screen and clicks a key on the keyboard to reveal Loki's figure laying down on the bed. The other screen shows you under your quilt, your back halfway down the bed and halfway supported by the soft headboard, looking at the Jager bottle resting by your bedside before you turn off the lights and take off your glasses, throwing them in the little space between the empty pillow next to your head and the headboard. Heimdall watches neither of the figures closes their eyes, just lying in there on their beds in the dead of the night, waiting for some distant memory to either kill them with dried out tear ducts or tire them enough to put them to sleep.

(I don’t know where I thought I’d be going with this but it’s here.)

TAGLIST

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(tags are open. Lemme know how you found this chapter and if you’d like to read more of this AU)

[didon]

My two cents on this whole Taylor Swift drama

I normally only reserve my rants for tv shows, but I’ve seen enough crap in the last day that I kinda want to add a little to it.

First of all, I’m not a swiftie or whatever her die hard fans call themselves. Do I like some of her music sure, but there are other songs that make me cringe the same way there are things that happened with her that made me dislike her and others where I’m now looking back at and thinking that it was just me wanting to fit in and that it was ‘’cool’’ to hate on her. Cause I think that there really is a movement where you have to hate on successful women because they are not perfect until the point where they are no longer human beings but actual mythological creatures that we must revere or die otherwise (Beyonce and the Bee Hive come to mind). Has Taylor always been right? Nope. It’s that simple, she has done some not so great things and instead of trying to understand them, I just went with the motion of hating her because I thought it made me special (it did not).

Secondly, to the people saying that he didn’t bully her, that it was his client, remind me his job again? Dudebro is a manager. His job is literally to MANAGE people, to make sure that the celebrities he has under his care not only receive the best but are also perceived as great. Seems like him allowing Bieber to post a dig at a woman for no reason and then not issue an apology right after was a bad managing decision because the only thing it did is make him and his clients seem like pissy little boys that can’t take people not agreeing with him. Him allowing Kanye (because tell me how he could not have vetoed that whole video that I’ll talk about later) to show someone that he knew Kanye had a troubled relationship with naked WITHOUT that person permission is a bad management decision. Especially since it could have led to more than one lawsuits toward his client. I feel like a manager normally tries to avoid his clients getting sued. So either he allowed her to be bullied by his clients and probably had his own hand in it or he’s shitty as his job and should not be allowed to manage anybody. Because it has to be one or the other, there is no third options where he didn’t advise his clients not to do bad things and had no knowledge of it. If anything, he could have at the very least if that was the case wrote his own appology for being in Bieber instagram. No instead he chose to stay silent, giving his approval toward it and to keep people that were attacking a female celebrity for pissy reasons as clients.

Thirdly, concerning the whole Bieber thing. Dude has to stop talking. He is not someone that can truly speak having grown up being influenced by Dudebro. Didn’t he sign Bieber when he was still a minor and everything? And yet he allowed him to make a fool of himself more than once, to be agressive toward more than one person knowing that it could cost sales. Dudebro was both a bad manager and a bad friend toward Bieber. Bieber who seems to act as if a lot of his fanbase isn’t young influencable girls that he is pushing toward not only bad decisions like bullying someone else because the friend of a friend doesn’t like them and also supporting people that are homophobic. Because let’s remember that for a long time (and I think still now but I’m not 100% sure), Bieber was friend with this pastor who was known for being homophobic. You can’t call someone coming at your friend a bully, but then have one of your close friend be someone telling others that something they have no choice in makes them bad, evil in some cases and that the one person that is supposed to love them (I’m talking about God here for the Catholics) hates them. How many queer people are we going to lose to suicide because they are constantly told by some biggots that God hate them, that they are going against everything that is good, that they shouldn’t be allowed near children, etc.? And no saying that just because you attend his congregation and hang out with him doesn’t mean you don’t agree with him. This isn’t the same as someone prefering strawberry milk over chocolate milk, this is someone spewing hate to who not only are you giving a platform by being near them (because yes it does), but are listening to. How many young teens are going to see that guy and go ‘’hey Bieber follow him so maybe he’s right’’? When you chose to be a celebrity, yes it means that you lose part of your privacy, but it also means that you should be obligated to lend your voice to those who aren’t listened to. Taylor Swift did that with her letter against homophobia, with her video and her support of queer artists. Bieber does that by giving a biggot relevance and then getting mad when his ‘’friends’’ are called out on their bad behaviours.

Fourtly, the whole Kardashian/Kanye thing. I can’t believe it’s 2019 and it has to be addressed but it is NEVER okay to showcase somebody else’s naked body even if it’s for ‘’Art’’ without their permission. His video was not only revenge porn, it’s an attack on her. Revenge porn is mostly defined as sharing private pictures of someone. This isn’t the case. She didn’t send his a naked wax art of her body. As far as I’m concerned, this is straight up violating her privacy and her body. And not only hers but the one of everybody else included in that video. Sure he probably has the signed statement from his wife saying it was okay, but does he has the one from every single other person? Also stating where their wax double would be placed? Because I’m pretty sure that Rihanna wouldn’t have said yes to her body being exploited by a man and placed next to someone who’s biggest relevance is the fact that he ABUSED her. It’d be the same as a celebrity asking fans to stop drawing porn of them and then getting backlash from their fans because they believe that they own that celebrity body. Your body is your own and no egomaniac should be allowed to have a naked wax statue made of it and put it in his video. Speaking of videos, Kim’s one is void. Not only is it clear that the video has been edited, but it was ILLEGAL!! A court would not take it as proof of anything just based on this alone. This is the same as a cop breaking and entering to get proof to arrest someone because a warrant takes too long and he’s sleeping with the other suspect. I don’t care if she actually agreed to one line and not the other or whatever. The whole video is void and should never be mentionned because it’s something illegal that again violated someone’s privacy which a celebrity should really know about. Especially Kim. The whole claim that Kanye made Taylor famous is ridiculous too. Bitch didn’t make her famous, he made an ass of himself. She became famous with her own hard work and good strategy (something her manager might have a hand into). What he did at that award show was just stealing a moment from a woman because he was prissy he didn’t get his way. There’s a reason why Beyonce gave the stage to Taylor and that everybody got mad at him. He took a young woman achievement and try to ruin it because it wasn’t what he wanted. That shows clear immaturity and if anything it made him more famous that it made her. She wasn’t known as Kanye’s victim, she was known as a singer while he was known as the guy that made an ass of himself and ruined a 20 years old big moment. I don’t care who deserved the award more or if he was right, nobody else does it and for a good reason. I may not have always have agreed with award winners, but you haven’t seen anybody stopping Matthew McConaughey speach saying sorry to interrupt but Chiwetel Ejiofor had one of the best performance ever. It’s almost like his manager should have stopped him from making a fool of himself.

Fiftly, just a little mention for Demi Lovato that came to Dudebro defence. Girl is coming out of a very emotional situation, is probably not 100% okay yet so don’t send her hate. Plus, she has known him about two months and he makes money off her so he has probably not been a dick to her. Her entire defence may even have his hand in it since people around her may be employed by his company. I almost killed myself over a year ago and I know that I’m still very emotional and that people can still have a big influence on me depending on how I’m feeling. I can’t imagine being around people that may not have your best interest 24h/7. On her claim that he is not homophobic because he signed her though, I will say that she can’t refute somebody’s experience with the man simply based on her own especially since she’s a famous artist that probably brings him a lot of money. Plus, while she’s a queer woman that consider herself fluid (and good for her tbh), it doesn’t mean that she has the same experience as a gay person. She has (mostly) dated men in the recent years and biphobic people will use it as an excuse to say that while she is ‘’fluid’’ she’s mostly straight (which is bull, but that might be how they see her in her mind). She can’t come at a gay man and say that because she’s also queer, the man cannot be a bigot toward anybody in the queer community. Heck, queer people in the queer community are bigots toward other members. How often do we hear transphobia or biphobia coming from queer people? The answer is too often. Especially black queer people who are often erased from their own history (*cough* stonewall and camp *cough*)! My own father was super friendly toward a trans tennant he had, calling her by her name and the right pronouns like it was nothing, only using her deadname on the official papers since it wasn’t officially changed, but to me he told me that if I came out as trans he would kick me out because I am his daughter not his son. If you asked that woman than yeah my dad is a great ally, but she wouldn’t know how he interacts with other queer people including his own daughter.

Finally, on the whole master thing. Shut up. She wrote the songs so I don’t care who owns the right right now or if they gave her a chance to ‘’buy’’ them back. This is her own work. When Devianart started selling artists art without their consent because they ‘’owned’’ it, how many people did I see on this website calling for a boycott? How many people were pissed and swore that it was horrible and that no artist should ever lose the right to their own art? Well, it’s exactly the same for her. Yes even for those songs of hers I hate. She put her time, her effort in them and so they should be hers. The idea that some white dudebro has right over them is ridiculous. The fact that he will own her feelings, a part of her soul should be upsetting especially since one of his artist already violated her body by showing it naked without her consent. I would be furious if I was raped and a friend of my rapist got the right to some of my writing. Heck, I would probably be a lot more agressive than she was in that post. The fact that she managed to stay polite and calm is a miracle if you ask me. Especially since he will be making money of a video that his friend and client didn’t even deem good enough to win an award!! Cause let’s remember that as cringy as it might be to look back at how we were all obsessed with some of her music video (god knows I was even though I would have never admitted it at the time), a man representing someone who put her down for one of them is going to make money off them. 

This is in no way acceptable and I encourage people to raise their voices against this and to keep those boys (because they are not men let’s be honest) accountable for their actions. Cause when Kesha needed help getting away from her rapist, Taylor Swift gave it to her and no matter how famous you are, you deserve to have people stand up for you. I’m not saying send hate, but keep holding men accountable for their shitty behaviours and for the creepy thing they say about women. We are not their objects, they do not own us in any way and we need to unite to stop them disrespecting us!! No matter your feeling on Taylor Swift and her music or her previous actions, this is something hateful that’s happening to her and women need to stand up and support each other! We own it to each other!!

[animaopen]

logan facts™ that i’m going to add to over time

— swears a lot. she’s grown, she can do what she wants.

— loves to take risks (just about lives on them) but only under her terms. control is important to her.

— likes to understand how things work, and likes to fix things, tinker around. can’t say for sure if this also applies to people.

— very self-contained, doesn’t like depending on others.

— pattern fixation. when she gets tired, she focuses on rhythms, made by her, by someone else, whatever. tapping or humming or ticking. anything with a beat blanks her out, and then suddenly it’s been ten minutes.

— talks to inanimate objects. don’t ask her about it.

— curls into a tight little ball to sleep, one hand under her pillow, heavy on her gun. very easy to get into work mode, hard enough she will sleep through days, but regularly operates on naps and light sleeping. constant vigilance. 

— preferred weaponry is heckler & koch, specifically the P30L, sometimes retrofitted with a suppressor. depends on her mood.

— once, chen made a statement that no one would ever be able to startle him. naturally, logan spent the next year purposely trying to find ways to do so. perfectly capable of slipping into small, cramped places, to then jump out, chen got away with mild surprise and nothing more. until one day she hid herself in the dryer of the rangers hq. chen hadn’t sworn so loudly since then.

— doesn’t like bugs. and not in a flippant, they’re gross, no, she knows what they feel like. to crawl. she doesn’t want them on her skin.

— always has food on her person. always has food stashed somewhere in the nearby vicinity. why? layover habit from the farm, of not ever having just enough to eat. once she got free, and was able to eat what she wanted, she is the one carrying snacks, juice boxes shoved in her jacket pockets, fruit bars pulled out of her sleeves. ortega finds varying pot plants carrying different kinds of kitkats.

— despite the resets and rewiring, her memory is pretty good. can remember quite minute details, which was expected when being brought back to do mission reports. double whammy, as she remembers just about everything she has ever done, even if she doesn’t want to admit it.

— whilst logan isn’t entirely a neat freak, post operation she is very careful about how she slows down. cleaning up is precise, such as taking apart the gun, getting the blood out of her suit. lay it all out and work through the motions to get her mind in the right place.

— doesn’t mind heights so much, even in the face of heartbreak, but it’s the weightlessness that gets her. hanging. that’s the point of letting go.

— there’s a fine line between realistic approaches to conversations, and over exaggerated. she goes either way very quickly. too stiff, too expressive. talks with nothing, not even blinking, talks with her hands, knocks something over. 

— covers her mouth with her hand when she laughs genuinely. 

— she can’t swim.

— her first closet was a lot of hand-me-downs from the rangers. she loved it, truly. made her feel like she belonged, even if she was the one to turn down a chance to join.

— logan is trying her best. she swears she is. good life? truth? revenge? the whiplash even strikes her too hard, too fast. she wants out, but she can’t get out, unless she exposes the truth. but there’s costs and time and she wants to do good. be good. go back.

— when she gets in the zone, she forgets to eat. sleep. everything becomes secondary. won’t even talk. and then it’s over, and she crashes. shovels junk food and caffeine into her body, sleeps for nearly a week, back at it again next monday. quite frankly, it terrifies some people.

— the cigarettes used to be just a cover, something to do with her hands. always had to look human, so keeping hands busy meant less attention. she stole the first packet from her handler just before her last mission. but now she has the fancy kind, coloured and flavoured cigarettes. still keeps that old packet. one smoke left. she’ll get through it at the end.

— she hates hearing secrets. being told them is one thing, but having them leap at you, like gossip in the morning, pisses her off. if only because she’s very good at keeping them. 

— survivor’s guilt. from getting out of the farm (twice). from heartbreak. from surviving heartbreak. she doesn’t know why, but it eats her up. she shouldn’t be here.

— drinks juice, milk, soft drinks, whatever, straight from the bottle, no matter who is watching. will spray whipped scream straight into her mouth. has eaten an entire tub of nutella in one sitting. don’t think about it.

— she’s on a lot of pain medication. isn’t taking most of it around rebirth, but it’s for her limbs. the joints mostly. the replacement organs. her back. last lot of surgery before getting out went alright, as best as it could, and whilst everything matches, it’s her, it’s stiff. she doesn’t get the regular upkeep outside the farm. no doctors to turn to. stares at the bottles and shuts the mirror. 

— lies about injuries terribly. she’s fine. forget about it. 

— she can’t tell you if the ballet memories are real, or the violin ones. hasn’t tested the theory, even though she’s fairly sure the ballet might be real from how she fights, and something holds her back from picking up the instrument just because of that.

— logan may not claim to be suicidal, but she keeps reality in check. statistically, she’s going to die at some point. be it tomorrow or next week, or christmas in three years time. have to keep on top of the game, by accepting the fact that in a year, she could be gone. next year, tomorrow, that could be the day too.

— she’s a damn good pickpocket. so much so, it became a game to put the most ridiculous things on their person, and get her to take it. even taking to the skies with it. made anathema’s week she pinched exactly five buttons off the front of ortega’s shirt, the crumpled receipt from last night’s shout from sentinel, and the twelve cents from the front of chen’s coat. 

— in saying that, time with the rangers introduced reverse pickpocketing. putting things in place. and it was harder, logan found, because it meant that moment of being a little closer, instead of just walking on. from ortega’s personal money clip, as once he found about the excursion, he was more than willing to get involved, they distributed quite a lot of funds to those having a bad day around los diablos. 

— logan went to exactly one (1) congratulatory dinner, post nanoswarm, and it was a disaster. absolutely. not only did she wear her mask, even with a fancy dress on, but a reporter got a little too handsy and she not only blasted him into next week mentally, oh no. she kicked him so hard, that he cracked through a window and landed on the balcony, shoe lodged in his gut. it actually got her a place on the fridge because it was so stupid.

— on that note, during her time as sidestep, she got some of the stupidest injuries to date considering her level of skill

impaled by a fork

fell off the kitchen counter, smacked her face, split her lip and knocked out her tooth

scaled a tree to hide from ortega, unintentionally climbed through poison oak

dropped over a tear gas canister in rangers hq

fell down four flights of stairs, relatively unharmed, but slipped on a welcome mat at the bottom

jammed hand in car door and subsequently broke a finger

— she’s a magpie. likes shiny things. obnoxious things. maybe she does it on purpose, to get the most ridiculously brightly coloured things and leaving them everywhere as a reminder, but ortega spent a long time finding pens laying around his office. put them all in a jar eventually, in the office that was hidden from anyone else. 

— there’s another jar with stones somewhere in rangers hq as well. ortega is convinced it has it’s own life, as he sees it sometimes, and never again for nearly two months. but there’s a couple of stones, etched with all their names.

— she loves to be warm. loves to stretch out in the heat. hot showers that are damn near scalding, hair up and out of her face. maybe it’s because it helps her joints, maybe because it gives her a reason to face herself.

— but that’s only because she’s always cold. can feel the outline of metal if she digs her fingers hard enough into her sides. a con of not being all that human is that nothing really needs to be organic. she doesn’t need to be warm, all the time, but she wants to be. means she can feel something other than cold. 

— logan is actually an alright cook, but feigns ignorance whenever someone offers to cook for her. has she ever set something on fire on purpose, just so she could have an excuse to sit back and watch? no, never! perish the thought!

— if she’s being honest, a lot of time spent in ortega’s company was in silence. that she remembers anyway. like there was this easy way of living, just then, convincing herself she deserved it. his mind is soft and comfortable when quiet, and it’s like a warm hug, thinking about it. being near it. being near him. she misses him, misses the quiet they had.

— once upon a time, logan loved scented candles, and all those funky little things. but now it reminds her of heartbreak, of anathema, and her stomach drops.

— honestly logan can’t even place her own accent, even though it’s remarkably subtle, as she has that many languages literally ‘on file’, is english her first language? she can’t say. somewhere vaguely european, maybe a little slavic depending on how angry she gets. or maybe that’s on purpose, to through people off. 

— adopting three dogs was the best decision she had ever made for herself. the triplets, as she calls them, are big bundles of love. she was definitely inspired by spoon, but hadn’t expected to literally drop on them. tilly, teddy and trixie honestly do give logan more time, whether she wants to admit it or not. 

— trains them in multiple languages too. although it can be argued, even by herself, that as she mentally connects with them, maybe they just understand her thoughts. or maybe they just trust her. too many branching ideas there.

— a lot of her early training was about exploitation. she tries to change that for herself, around early sidestep days. one of those things was physical affection. she had only ever known it to be used to twist people, so she doesn’t really touch or hold someone. except, if she trusts them deeply. if they trust her. once they cross that bridge, it’s over for them. it’s a big thing for her, to find that comfortability for both parties, to then be able to move into something that’s a little more human.

— this also kind of developed into tugging on jackets, to get attention. to signify she was close. her footfalls are remarkably light, and she always forgets that these people like to be told someone is nearby. only so many times she could cough, announce her presence. so it’s a tug, four times, left side. she’s here. 

— logan is disgustingly good at noticing little things and twisting it around to make it seem like someone is forcibly doing something for her for their own benefit. like on the anniversary of marshal hood’s anniversary, not only did she set up a week in advance a conveniently placed series of photos and accolades that chen would have to walk by, but it meant that he would have to talk to ortega. or how anathema was off put by something said by a reporter, and sentinel happened to find out through a series of well placed whispers, meaning that he would end up talking to them. she will win the game of the rangers taking care of themselves.

— she doesn’t remember what the last song on her iPod was the day she died. ortega could probably tell her. it was likely stuck in his head for a couple of months.

— that said, she wonders if it would be rude to ask for it back. these days, she doesn’t wear headphones so much anyway, because she’s ready. ready for what, you may ask? anything. not just her mind on high alert. it’s everything else. but back then, when she was nice and safe and sure? it meant she could relax. 

— phantom pain fucking sucks, and she wants a refund. like how she can feel the glass cut into her face, the way her ribs are jammed back in place. how the constraints tighten and needles press in and god, she hates it so much. only when her mind gets too quiet, not enough noise. 

— her sweet tooth actually puts many people off because they’re sure that coffee is more sugar than anything else but i dare you to tell her off.

— logan isn’t allowed to take care of succulents anymore, because she killed exactly eight of them in the space of a week. she claims that so called indestructible plants are actually very sensitive, but. there you go.

— ortega sings a lot, and it kind of introduced logan to a wealth of music. he was her primary source of a lot of stuff, actually, whether he realised it or not. you can download information into a chip and call it a day, but actually knowing what it is, is something entirely different. just like how when he gave orders, it never meant logan had to change. just be herself. ortega was a lot of firsts for her.

— do not dare her to climb something, because she will, repercussions be damned. nine times out of ten, it was a mild comment, that got turned serious, but logan had climbed both rangers hqs several times over, both in and out of costume. she will scale that apartment building with her bare hands, don’t test her. 

— maybe she just likes to be tall

— even though she’s like 5’9

— she’s a horrible artist, really. but she doodles in borders, and on official documents, and whenever her mind so much as wanders. ortega keeps them all.

— she can and will break into things to prove she can. ties in with quick fingers, old habits. gotta break and enter and get a lay of the land. only place she never broke into was ortega’s. literally, the only place.

— a lot of her layover habits, are not even really layover. still actively utilised and honed. logan just boxes them into the then and now. makes her separate the person easily. herself. if she can keep an eye on the days, it means that that time is further away. who she was doesn’t need to come back out and be remembered. but those habits, those abilities, they’re just as much a part of her as the memories and the person. she knows she’s an idiot for trying to ignore that.

— her and anathema got so good at high fiving each other during their time together, they were able to do it without looking at each other. ortega used to tease it was because logan read their mind, but they were just on another plane of friendship he could never achieve.

— hand-me-downs were a thing, but she’s also outright a clothing thief. daniel ends up being on the receiving end of this later, as his clothing is softer than ortega’s. but he doesn’t mind, because there’s something about her seeing an old sidestep hoodie, washed too many times, and not frowning. she actually looked happy, seeing it.

— during her sidestep days, her hair was long and brown and curly, no reason to hide her identity. she left behind the contacts and the makeup and anything else, that would help transform her face. the red during rebirth was partially a mistake, from not reading a bottle properly and just rolling with it, because it was done poorly and who would look twice at someone like that, right? but she misses her hair. misses what it meant. the extensions and dye just aren’t quite the same. maybe she should just start again.

— on many separate occasions, she had been caught napping in places around rangers hq. anywhere from the linen closet, to on top of lockers, to underneath the infirmary beds. politely, most people don’t comment. 

— she’s also responsible for several broken dummies, all of which she would vaguely blink at, and refuse to explain as to just how she managed to behead one with her thighs alone. what do you mean she kicked it so hard it cracked down the middle? no, sir, she did not in fact punch it with enough brute force to rip it from the ground. you’re mistaken.

— she’s good for roughhousing. for play fighting. can’t turn away from a tumble. fighting’s good because she doesn’t need to think, and instinct takes over. granted, again, found herself tightening a chokehold a little too well, and then having to laugh it off. it’s all luck.

— but fighting is dangerous, and the one time she had been pulled into it while angry, there was a swear. never again. dislocated her opponent’s shoulder and walked out for two weeks. ortega had found her smoking then, acting like nothing had happened. but she could tell you in exact detail how it felt. how it sounded. 

— logan claims she can’t drive, if only to see how far she could get ortega to try to teach her just because it was hilarious when she pretended not to know what the brakes were. but she had a motorcycle, anyway. prefers the low turn. just barely touching the ground.

— that motorcycle was probably one of the only material things she owned. that’s not to say she didn’t have things, especially when outside the farm. and that she won’t in future. but it was hers, paid and bought for by herself. she loved that thing. doesn’t know where it went when she died, but damn if she doesn’t want it back.

— she was banned from the rangers hq for some time for the following offences: 

threw a spoon at anathema and shattered a window with the sheer force of it being thrown (seriously, logan, what the fuck), 

learned all the words to cell block tango but would purposely utilise inflection around chen with ‘he had it coming’, 

broke into the security system because she wanted to find out how it worked and subsequently shut down electricity on the block, 

had to unpack all weapons on her person after setting off one of the newer, more sensitive scanners. was there for nearly an hour, 

challenged sentinel to a duel, 

which was accepted, 

which started a betting pool of ridiculous outcomes, 

challenged marshal charge to a duel, 

locked marshal charge in an octopus hold and refused to let go until he said she was pretty, 

changed the wifi password, 

changed the screensaver on the computers to marshal charge’s award winning grin of ’08, 

every time marshal charge would say something would respond with a lightning pun for three weeks, 

placed a fake suggestion box in the lunchroom and encouraged responses, 

bled out on the weight bench and when provoked about it, gave her worst new york accent (fuggehhda abotit!), 

bought one of every ranger doll and would leave them in the worst places, may have actually replaced the eyes on them to glow

— stick her in a patch of sun, and she will start to fall asleep. guaranteed. she claims she’s photosynthesising. 

— whilst she hasn’t done this since her sidestep days, once she decorated her ceiling in those glow-in-the-dark stickers. with as much accuracy as feasibly possible, it was damn near a star map. mostly because ortega insisted on pointing out all sorts of stars, and she didn’t quite believe him, but it helped her sleep, staring up at that little star map of hers. she hasn’t quite committed to the idea of repeating it, because it’s a tender memory and she’s not that person anymore.

— there was a “it has been __ days since our last incident” board in the old rangers hq. mostly involving her, and ortega, and sometimes anathema, getting up to all kinds of bullshit. was just a big black smudge by the end of its use, as not a day went past without incident.

— her eyes were retrofitted post heartbreak with micro optic cameras, constantly filming and recording. once logan escaped, she turned the devices off with some effort, but ultimately rendered her eyes dark (when they’re on, her eyes get a red shine in most lights). some days she still wish she left them on, if only because filming from behind her villain helmet just isn’t the same as watching the trajectory of a hero with your own two eyes. 

— the eye cameras though were also unfortunate because it meant she could rewatch every little thing that happened. stuck with the memories in more way than one whenever she closed her eyes.

— prior to sidestep days, logan was continually reset, wiped clean, to serve as the perfect soldier. post heartbreak, that wasn’t her reality anymore. if anything, the intention to keep her memories as reminders served purpose better.

— whilst not in the habit of invariably mimicking voices nowadays, at one point in time, she was very good at not only throwing her voice, but imitating. it meant for some funnier times, but also naturally quite dangerous to those unaware. she did have her limits though, of course.

— at one point, she took up skateboarding. claims it was part of her cover for pre-sidestep to explain how she could get around so fast without a car. one of the first few things she actually enjoys by herself to do, and one of the easiest ways for her to just lose herself in the city and listen in.

— being handy with technology means several things, such as she’s good at breaking and entering, not having much of a traceable footprint, and helping with effectively mod related issues. but it also means that she has had a hand in quietly upgrading security of those she cares about, and fixing something mundane like a car radio or the air conditioner. 

— she had a some efforts in local life to improve it, be it anonymous donations, a sudden drop in crime rate, or general attempts to at least get kids to school safely. ortega referred to it as her stomping ground as a vigilante, and a lot of her accounts left open to supply money were kept by him, as well as food donations. ortega made a regular effort a year after her death to visit the area and keep on top of her work.

— logan, once far more comfortable as sidestep back in the day, had been caught more than once moonwalking or something similar post mission upon a successful detainment of a villain.

— one time chen returned to rangers hq to find that ortega had been duck taped to his office chair. politely, he had declined to comment. she proclaimed innocence, and subsequently was banned from hq for a week for “leaving the marshal in a position of lowered security”.

— never was much of a laugher, until her sidestep days. and even then it was hidden behind her hand right up until the end, when she finally started to let loose.

— betting pools were all the rage for her. constantly about mundane things: “i bet you can’t eat this in one go”, “i bet you don’t know all the lyrics”, “i bet you can’t do a flip from the roof”. the best ones were trying to get certain phrases slipped into conversation. most food related ones are banned however, due to spikes in food poisoning. 

[janiedean]

(Ciao, sono italiana ma scrivo in inglese perché purtroppo internet parla solo inglese, e ci dobbiamo arrangiare) I saw your posts on the great Italians are POC/white discourse and I felt I needed to offer my point of view, because while I'm absolutely sure that Italians and Europeans that are not children of immigrants are not POC, I also feel that defining us white is not correct. (Follows in the next ask)

(From the ask before) I always feel that "whiteness" as a concept was born to describe the US society, and applying it to the European (and especially Italian context) disregards the different history and culture, putting it in boxes that weren't made for it. Not to say that there's no racism, nor that there aren't people who hold a privilege above others. Just that "whiteness" is a different phenomenon and to define Italians "white" to me has always felt a bit wrong. (Grazie e scusa, ciao!)

(anon in realtà visto che sto discorso farlo in inglese porta solo delirio avrei preferito lo chiedessi in italiano così la gente non lo capiva ma vabbe X°DDDDD)

... anon while I see your point... you’re actually being extremely us-centrist here? because I mean, I 100% agree that *whiteness* as a privilege indicator in US society (and anyway it’s in itself extremely flawed, more on that later) is only a thing that exists in the US context/to describe US society, but why should I not call myself white when I am and when the entirety of the content has used it to describe its inhabitants’s skin color since way before US society was a thing? if helen in the iliad had white/pale arms in the description and she was GREEK, now we can’t say greeks were white or are white because it’s automatically become the same as whiteness in the US, and therefore.... we are pushing a US value on this entire continent?

like.

no.

the point is that white in the US does not mean white in europe and we don’t have their concept of whiteness-as-an-automatical-privilege and that we don’t use it as a sociological parameter as much as they do and our racism discourse is a lot more nuanced and based on nationality other than skin color.

but like. POC does not count either because in the US = anyone who’s not *white*/possesses *whiteness*, here poc = black person. period. so what do you call someone with a filipino parent and an italian parent, poc? any person I knew who wasn’t *black* or mixed with a black parent that I’ve ever known in my life (and I’ve known more than a few) would have never described themselves as a person of color. no chinese person in italy describes themselves as a person of color. it’s not that we put US whiteness in european contexts, it’s usually US-american people who do and we don’t, and literally no one has ever said that being white here = being white in the US, but like............. why should we automatically use US sociological terms and parameters to talk about us? the US-americans shouldn’t - and that’s what we spent years discussing before realizing it was a lost fight - and we shouldn’t do that either. like, of course **whiteness** isn’t an european phenomenon. but being white and having **US-american whiteness** are not the same thing and like since I can’t be either white nor poc according to this reason what the heck am I?

like: you can’t discuss US racism and european racism in the same terms because they work on different parameters and if a word means a thing in our context and another in their context, we all can learn to use them correctly instead of saying that one category cannot use it. so like... I really don’t agree with the fact that we should use US terms to describe us in the first place nor with the fact that we should stop using terms we always used to describe us because in the US societal discourse they mean something else. like, US discourse doesn’t own social justice discourse and I’d really prefer if it never did. /two cents

(also add-on under the cut but I don’t feel like discussing THAT too so)

also, I honestly would like to point out that the *whitness* concept in the US is actually extremely specific and only applies to WASP people not necessarily all of the famed white people TM, and anyway the white anglosaxon protestant privilege tends to stick if you’re rich, because if you look at how *poor* (uneducated) white americans in rural areas live/have lived in the last thirty years or so, you’ll find out that these people wouldn’t know privilege if it hit them in the face and that their whiteness didn’t stop them from living in tents or losing their houses and jobs all over and/or riding trains to find jobs during the eighties or living in their car. never mind that if you read any steinbeck reportage or the grapes of wrath, you’ll end up seeing white people from freaking oklahoma being called slurs and treated like third-rate citizens by white californians and if you look around and dig into some reportages (I’ll recommend dale maharidge’s until I die tbqh) you’ll see that the same situation happened at least throughout all of the eighties in texas with ppl from northern states ie ohio or wisconsin who tried to go to texas bc there were supposedly more jobs and the economical crisis left them without choices. I mean in the US white people are automatically privileged when they have money/are rich/in the position to gain money, if they’re poor their life is shit anyway and it’s exactly 90% of the reasons why the american left lost the elections last round so if I were them I’d think long and hard about it.

[cksmart-world]

The Completely Unnecessary News Analysis

by Christopher Smart

July 23, 2019

Cognitive Dissonance By Any Other Name

Hey Wilson, do you know what cognitive dissonance is? No, it's not when you get too loose to trek and trek anyway. It's more like a brain cramp. For example, if you are a Trump supporter and he says something that's regarded negatively, like a racist comment, then your brain gets confused. Part of your brain is saying, Trump is good, while another part is saying, that's not good. So to keep from going crazy, your brain says, that wasn't racist, all he said was go back to where you came from. Or, if it comes out that Trump said he likes to grab women by the crotch, your brain says, oh well, everybody says that. And when an FBI investigation reveals he made hush-money payments to a porn star, your brain says, that didn't really happen and Michael Cohen is a lying shithead. Well, yes, Wilson, it kinda does explain Teflon. But we digress. Maybe your brain is saying all those examples are based on lies — fake news. It didn't happen, period. Voilà, no brain cramp. Just filter out everything you don't like — it makes life a lot easier. As for Republicans in Congress, you're right, Wilson, it's just another term for “chickenshit.”

Just Say, No, To Killing Embryos

Thank goodness the city council in that Utah County bastion of righteousness, Highland, has come out against abortion. OK, yes, it was a non-binding resolution, but it adds steam to the mass hysteria here in Utah surrounding the killing of embryos. Merrilee Boyack, chairwoman of the newly formed group, Abortion-Free Utah, says every Utah lawmaker is paying attention. "It gives them, I believe, courage to move forward aggressively to end elective abortion when they see the will of the people are moving very strongly in that direction." Earlier, the city of Riverton took similar action, proving that not everyone in Salt Lake County is an embryo killer. Sure, some might say, what do these part-time city council people know about abortion? Well, what's there to know? You're either making women take unwanted pregnancies to term, or you're not. It's time, once and for all, for the government to completely force its way into women's personal health decisions. Women just cannot be trusted to be responsible for their own bodies. Each and every embryo is important until it is born — then it's someone else's problem. Free agency, and all that.

Minimum Wage Is Un-American

Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour would be a travesty. The minimum wage is now $7.25 an hour, as it has been for a decade. That is plenty for a family of four — it's an entire $290 a week or $1,160 per month. And all those people who work two minimum-wage jobs are just greedy complainers. They should stay home and take care of their children. We're talking family values here. That's why every member of Utah's delegation to the Houses of Representatives — including Democrat Ben McAdams — voted against this ill-advised blunder by Democrats. Just imagine if everyone got $15 an hour. Why heck, that's $600 a week — $31,200 a year. What would happen to corporate profits, say nothing of CEO salaries. Despite Utah congressmen, the bill passed out of the House. Fortunately, the Republican-dominated Senate will spike this blatant act of socialism. The Democrats are set on destroying the economy by giving consumers more money. Next thing you know, they'll want affordable health care for everyone and turn this country into Venezuela. Poor people should just shut up and show some gratitude for all they have.

Men Of Principal vs. Jon Stewart

Sens. Rand Paul and Mike Lee are men of principal. Jon Stewart just does't get that. See, here's what really happened: There was a bill to extend benefits for 9-11 first responders who suffer from many maladies, including cancer. It was stalled in Congress but Stewart went to Capitol Hill and shamed the House and Senate into passing it. But at the last minute, Rand Paul and Mike Lee put a hold on the legislation, because there isn't enough money in the budget. Sure, Congress just passed a $733 billion budget for defense. And yes, they passed a tax cut for corporations and the wealthy that added $1 trillion to the debt. But that's beside the point. What Rand and Mike explained to dumb people, like Jon Stewart, is that in order to give the ailing first responders more funding, a similar amount of money has to be cut elsewhere, on account of they are men of principal and excessive spending goes against their Republican creed. Rand Paul is right, Jon Stewart is nothing more than a lying sack of you-know-what. Who does he think he is, anyway? As Republicans, they must do everything they can to balance the budget for our children and grandchildren, because after tax cuts and military spending, it's important.

Post Script — Neil Armstrong and the Apollo 11 crew proved 50 years ago that the moon is not made of green cheese. This whole green cheese-thing, it turns out, was bogus from the get-go. Our crack research team here at Smart Bomb did some digging and found that the phrase had its origins centuries ago when someone compared the full moon to a round of green cheese. But that's not all — green cheese isn't green, it's just unripened. Who knew?

A half century is a long time and things have changed. The average cost of a new house in 1969 was $15,550; the average income was $8,550; the average cost of a new car was $3,270 — and you could get a brand new Toyota Corona for only $1,950; and gas was 35 cents a gallon. “Hot Fun In the Summertime” by Sly and The Family Stone was the #1 hit that July. Richard Nixon was president and we were bogged down in Viet Nam, where thousands of Americans were dying each year. Ah, the good old days.

Well, that's it for another broiling July week here at Smart Bomb, where Wilson and the band are tuning up to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Woodstock come August. If you remember that rock festival in upstate New York, you probably weren't there. All right, Wilson, pick it:

By the time we got to Woodstock / We were half a million strong / And everywhere there was song and celebration / And I dreamed I saw the bombers / Riding shotgun in the sky /And they were turning into butterflies / Above our nation...

[icharchivist]

kay now i’m just huh bc of that post i reblogged so i’ll just add my two cents on d/a di/scourses and why i want nowhere near in it and feel free to ignore and even more to unfollow if it’s somewhat bad or anything but like,

(also please d/o/n’t re/b/log)

d/a di/scourse ultimately really fucks me up because 1) there’s a lot of it, especially in jokes that strench from far far away, I end up checking every blogs i reblog from bc i don’t want that near me 2) All side tends to have characters they like and dislike and be noisy about it and it’s very hard when down to it you just really love all the characters even when you don’t agree with them bc they’re fictional and i’m interested in the emotional reaction i get from them in game

but on a personal level it also fucks me up bc my mental health had been going bad and stuff are out of my controle, until i discovered D/A and the thing that had really, really helped me recover is that playing D/A asks me to use my skills i’ve learnt mostly to deal with my issues in a way i don’t find disagreeable (most precisely: how to weight what someone is telling you in order to not have it backfire at you) and stimulates my curiosity, passion and creativity in a way i hadn’t felt in forever. It makes me want to connect the dots, it makes me want to be involved, it makes me want to draw, to write again. (I started writting things again after 5 years and it’s so silly how it’s helping me out). Hell I started modding. I did an internship in a video game school on which I was actually pretty good and passionated bc just that had me make more research and understands more easily, so i started handling the logicials quickly for the timespawn and had a lot of cultural and technical knowledge backup just from swooping around trying to learn fun facts (and i would have got into this school easily bc i had a very good file but i lacked the money and my parents fucked it up, so i’m still extremely frustrated at that because I actually had really great chances to be taken in this school) It stimulates me in a way where I can healthily forget for two minutes that my world is crumbling, that for a moment it had me consider different future path, (see again up there), if there’s a path to recovery to be had it started with it.

I’ve known for years this fa/ndom was deemed toxic and I knew of the controversial characters by name before i started the game so i sillily paid more attention to them bc “how bad can they fuck up” only to realize then “oh no i love them” bc i paid attention to them. And i’m in circles where I see more hates than others and sometimes just hear of some hate by hearsay.

I’ve wanted to keep healthy distance as much as possible but once i got in d/a i noticed i already had d/iscourse on my dash from blogs i followed from others things and it was. Huh.

And I was thinking about not letting it get to me, or regularly take breaks, i blocked the d/iscourse tags, then the main tag to avoid it (doesn’t stop some posts to slide through though so that’s not helping), i don’t feel comfortable talking about it, and hey at least i owe to that that i’m less onto this website and i’m grateful at least for that

And it’s unhealthy to be this affected by f/andom stuff, i know that, god do i know that, but i’ve been in fandom for what, 11 years now, I’ve seen some fan wars, i’ve seen and participated in w/anks, but the whole holier-than-thou attitude in really insidious way is damaging, and i can’t recall a time i was this uncomfortable being part of something. (and i was in s/uperw/hol/ock at the fandom’s heigh and in the n/aruto’s fa.ndom when it ended for christ’s sake).

And idk how much is just current fa/ndom bc i know there’s far worse on this damn website, or really this game but this is. very damaging.

Anyway point is that my biggest problem is that i’ve seen some “Hot takes” that had been more damaging for my mental health bc i didn’t even know i could expect them (that’s a fun part of depression no one talks to you about, next i’m gonna tell you again that seeing one more posts about “how siblings are if you don’t see it like that you don’t have a real sibling” and variation sent me in some very bad mental spirals and i’m that close to unfollow anyone that posts those, so hey, that’s fun)

and some of them were 1) “Green!Ha/wke is a manipulator and it is far less sincere than Red or Purple” which really, really fucked me up not because I fancy Green this much but because saying being diplomatical in times stuff are going down is manipulative is super damaging and as someone who is always calculating how to be true to myself while also not triggering a fight around short tempered people, calling it “manipulation” had drove me to major anxiety thinking i was no better than my family, 2) the whole discourse about C/ullen which is the w o rs t bc i get where people come from when they dislike him and they have cause but i see a lot of my reactions to my own trauma and self-destructiong numbing addiction (i mean my self h//arm before anyone think anything) in his storyline in an unflattering way, and it’s something that really drove me to him in a way no other characters did (and i mean it especially bc, in term of experience? I relate to L/eliana more. But in term of reaction on a personal level on oneself? I couldn’t even start without getting uncomfortably personal about how dear C/ullen’s writting is to me. C/ullen’s reaction to trauma is extremely personal on the way also how he takes it on himself and it’s so, so important to me). and this one i kinda expected bc i love others characters that can follow this sort of patern and i know they have tons of w/anks about it but boy it is far less vicious than i’ve seen there (and i know others chara have tons of others d/iscourses but like i said i happen to be following people who will bring this one much more than any others)

Or maybe i’m just far more sensitive than i used to be, but therefore it triggers my fight or flight stuff and since i refuse to involve myself into fight it makes “flight and think about it for hours until it makes you feel terrible for liking it in the first place” so that’s fun.

And I know. I know it’s unhealthy to be this affected on f/andom stuff, and i’m not going to change anyone’s mind, nor do i want to. 

Bc in the end those games requires a lot of personal involvement and therefore our sensitivities to shine through, and i refuse to let my view affect others when the emotional journey is far, far more interesting when you take it with your own heart, even if it means i must fundamentally disagree with all of the experience others may feel,

But ye. I know. And i’m trying to work on that, it’s been a year i’m trying to work on that, and as i said earlier, i’m taking breaks from this website every once in a while lately, which is far more healthy anyway, and i think i’ll carry on doing that.

And I still will not posts d/iscoursy stuff of saying “this interpretation of the character is wrong here how you should interpret it” even if i agree bc i’m too tired for it, and anyway i don’t even want to learn what’s the fa/ndom’s opinions on the characters are at this point, i couldn’t care less, I care about how i feel for them and I don’t even want to hear how people discuss it.

(and tbh so i feel for the lore in general too bc i really like the lore of the game, sue me, and as much as i love to dig for details i’m too tired for opinions)

but that last post is the first time i see a post specifically written on the very topic that makes me anxious about C/ullen stuff, i didn’t feel like letting it past, i want to keep it on my blog.

Anyway also if you’ve stuck this far, i’m also going to be far more ready to unfollow stuff that really makes me spiral down now, the last few breaks i took from this website made me feel like i don’t want to deal with it anymore. I’m still anxious about what i post and i doubt i’ll still share a lot about it, bc at this point i don’t even feel like sharing this much either so there’s that, 

but therefore if you’ve stuck there you’re also welcomed to unfollow for whatever reason you feel like and especially if you don’t want to deal with my bullshit, bc god knows i don’t want to be dealing with it either. Don’t let things you can controle upset you, that’s not worth it.

Anyway, icha’s out, didn’t want to talk much about personal stuff more but here i am! and i’m taking my leave bye

[kpopreactionstoruinyourlife]

Hello

Y’all, I am finally able to stop lurking on this site and once again start contributing beyond my occassional feminist, political, cynical, sarcastic drabble you have been dealing with.

But! Let’s just update y’all on where I’ve been for the past many months. All info under the cut for those who care, plus the date I expect to be able to return to posting!!

For the most part, I’ve been working and in school. In the fall, I was working two jobs, 30+ hours a week, while taking a full course load and applying to advanced programs, and managing to get regular sleep and go out sometimes (it was a major help that one job was basically me doing my schoolwork in between pointing people to the bathroom, with a smile of course). In the spring, I only had one job, working half the hours per week, BUT I struggled the whole time with lack of motivation and academic frustration (I do not do well in unstructured courses and all of mine were unstructured, or lead by people who were frazzled). I did ok, but not great (looking so fantastic for graduate school smh). I upped my perscription medication with my psychiatrist but I’m not sure how much that helped, I still feel more blah than I normally do and admittedly, I am worried the family dysthymia has caught up to me (it’s chronic, low-grade depression, could also be the school stuff and not seeing my friends as often and how can you not be unmotivated if you have no idea how to succeed or what you’re expected to do?)

Additionally, there has been personal stuff outside the dysthymia. The guy I liked decided I was needy, but this was months ago and there’s only lingering bitterness. Then, just last week I had to put my cat down. 

But enough about the sad and frustrating things. I want to dig myself out of it now. This could also be the lovely effects of changing my birth control. I hate being a girl sometimes - when things go wrong you have a litany of things it could be when it’s your body, hormones, diet, water intake, actual emotions, life events, mental illness...I should probably re-evaluate my diet, too.

BUT THERE’S GOOD NEWS!!

On the boy front, there is a boy who likes me, which is nice, and he likes that I know things, and enjoys my feminist rants (or at least says he does) and we share a sense of humor BUT there is a problem! He is not academically motivated, loves the outdoors, dropped out of college, and I cannot see any form of functional long term relationship with him and while I’m only 21, I’m not starting a relationship with someone I know I could not marry, I’m too old for that.

Besides that conflicted stuff, after putting down our princess, we have found two cats we think we could adopt, and all of this will be more formally arranged when we return from our trip west for a wedding (it’s the same day as the royal wedding, but it is not the royal wedding). I want new fur babies!!

Otherwise, I got a promotion! It adds up to a nominal (think 50 cents) pay increase and actual responsibilities beyond pointing people to a bathroom.

And finally for my good news, I am able to return to my second job (that actually paid money and has fantastic people) next month! I danced when I heard this!

And then for Katherine’s good news - she will be spending a semester in London (and I’m a bit jealous) and she’s applied to several theater internships (Costume departments) and will hear from her top choices this week! Cross your fingers y’all! 

As for my return date....

I am leaving on a trip soon where I will have sketchy internet connection *Cries* but I will be at my job where I do nothing on the 24th, so that is when you should expect a slew of posts! 

Hope you’re all well!!

[sibillascribbles08]

Everyone making posts on this so I might as well dump out my two cents on this whole mess about Reaper being around for 20 years, but honestly until we get more info who tf knows.

First of I rly don’t think the whole Reaper title is something Gabriel took after this “death”, I don’t think someone else was Reaper mostly cause that would be fucking boring lbr we already have that title business with Doom Fist and if he does become a playable character I don’t want to deal with that trope twice.

We don’t have any kind of clear timeline, but listen, I’d like to take a guess that 20 years ago was roughly a little after the omnic crisis ended and Overwatch was turned into a bigger super power, and Blackwatch was formed.

And honestly, what I’m thinking is Gabriel had this persona of Reaper eons ago, a role he was possibly assigned to take out dissenting overwatch members without it being traced to Blackwatch (yeah that’s already fucked up)

But he took it in stride, believing the people he was sent after were truly dangerous, possibly they were. He was able to keep a clean line between his identity as Gabriel and Reaper (hence why he’s still friendly and social at the halloween party)

And honestly Reaper being a role makes a lot more sense when u consider how fucking dramatic he is with his voice lines and shit. It’s a role he’s playing up, being so god damn hammy you can’t put a pin on who he’s supposed to be.

Although, I think by the time the game takes place the line between Gabriel and Reaper is very very blurred

Some people are asking if he always had his wraith powers at this point and honestly I’m starting to think he did, to a certain point. And I’m wondering if it wasn’t something given to him in order to end the omnic crisis. Like, consider he took on extra power to put an end to the war, and at the time it seemed fine. But then the UN dodged him for the promotion partially because they didn’t want the world to find out. Keeping him out of the public eye would be the best option.

I can’t say for sure when he started picking up on the corruption going on. Maybe someone he was sent to kill made him realize these assignments weren’t being given for good reasons. He started digging into where his orders were coming from, who was in charge, and in the meantime went a bit rouge, taking out corrupted agents on his own.

Also I say the UN or whoever it was gave him his abilities because in the comic Old Soldiers he literally states that Overwatch did this to him. Strangely enough actually, he blames Jack, which just adds an entire new list of questions.

Do I think Jack intentionally turned Gabriel into that?? No, he seems way too out of the loop to have done anything like that intentionally, but I have to wonder if he didn’t play some role in it.

All those powers and abilities started going wrong, paranoia was getting to him, maybe he was already dying from the start and with no way out he decides to take it all straight to the top and burn it all down. I mean, this would explain why he might have gone in there with the intention of killing Jack.

Maybe he also feels like if the UN had wanted to promote him in the first place they never would have turned him into that. He took on such a risky upgrade in order to save the world and was never even properly thanked for it.

And then when the bomb went off, and he actually “died”, that’s when he really turned into a ghost. He’d had some of the abilities before, but now they were as natural as breathing (if he even does that).

And I think the worst part is is that he must not have told anyone, either because the higher ups wouldn’t let him or because he was trying to protect others (for a time). I mean Ana clearly has no fucking clue about it, and I’m dead certain her death is one of the major things that caused Gabe to turn away from Overwatch and Jack. Like me and my friend actually theorize that Gabe was trying to recruit Ana. I mean, he was sent there to take out whoever was taking down Talon agents. Maybe he knew it was Ana (or not) which is why he took the job. He wanted to get to her first, tell her the truth, let her do with it what she liked.

But then Jack showed up and ruined everything.

(And also like ?? I don’t think Ana knew Reaper was Gabe until taking off his mask, which is why she didn’t hesitate to fire at him)

Also whether reaper was a thing or not back then I’m still clinging to dad!gabe like nothing else and blizzard can fight my ass. Gabe was a good guy forced into an awful role and while I don’t think it excuses his actions I can understand why he’s fucking pissed™

And honestly, please give me a villain I can 100% understand the motivations of it makes them so much more interesting. We already have complete brainwashing with Widowmaker I don’t want that trope a second time either.

[dailyaudiobible]

08/03/2019 DAB Transcript

2 Chronicles 33:14-34:33, Romans 16:10-27, Palms 26:1-12, Proverbs 20:19

Today is the 3rd day of the month of August. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is wonderful to be here with you today as we take the next step forward and get ourselves fully moved into this new month that we have before us. And we need to start preparing for some new territory in the Scriptures. Today when we read from the New Testament, we will be concluding Paul's letter to the Romans and then tomorrow when we read from the Old Testament, we’ll be concluding the book of second Chronicles. So, as we move into this new month we’ll also be moving into new territory in the Bible but were not quite there yet. So, from the Old Testament second Chronicles chapter 33 verse 14 through 34 verse 33 and we’re reading from the Common English Bible this week.

Commentary:

Alright. So, we gotta talk about the Proverb today. And it's a buckle up moment, it’s like a brace yourself and take it like a man or take it like a woman kind of moment. “Gossip goes around telling secrets.” That’s what the proverb says. So, if you're the kind of person that here's a secret, like a little juicy morsel of something, a little private information that you can't wait to share and if you take that hot little juicy morsel and you share it to make yourself look concerned and in the know and connected, here's where you need to brace yourself - then you're a gossip. Yeah…I know…I mean…I know that's harsh, but I'm not the…I didn't make this up, I just read it. You might even take offense to the idea that you might be a gossip but believe me, your offense is not as offensive as gossip is. I've been in ministry long time. I hate gossip because I have watched gossip gain the power to destroy people's relationships. And when that begins to happen then erosion begins to happen and communities can be profoundly affected. And this is why it's a regular theme, it’s why we’re counseled to completely avoid it in the Scriptures. We’re just reading this proverb again. “Gossip’s reveal secrets; don't associate with those who talk too much.” So, what we realize in this just very, very brief proverb, a lot is being said because it's not only about the gossip-per. It's also about the one who’d willing to listen to the gossip that carries the burden in this proverb. We’re not supposed to be in that environment according to the Bible, but let's just take a step back from the Bible, and I would rarely say something like that, but let’s just take a step back from the Bible and look at our lives because we have all probably experienced the effects of gossip. And, so, we just have to ask, like has anything ever good happened because you gossiped or because you consumed gossip? Like in what way you enriched? How did you fall deeper in love with Jesus and find clarity from the Holy Spirit through gossip? Actually, it's gossip that is driving us underground because we do not think we can confess our sins to each other, that we can pray for each other so we can be healed, which is what the book of James tells us. So, if we’re people that gossip a lot or we’re participating by listening to it than we’re part of the problem. And that's it's hard to take sometimes, but it's stifling growth in our communities. It's stifling our own growth in our hearts because it's forcing us to make all kinds of assumptions that may or may not be true, but false realities are created and then when it's turned back on us were driven underground and isolated. So, we may not realize it in the moment because it's juicy, but the voice of wisdom found in the Proverbs invites us to be part of a healing rather than part of a problem. And, so…and, so, yeah, I don't know what else to say.

Prayer:

Jesus, come. We’ve all participated. We've all been on the receiving end. And yet, as painful as that has been, we still do it and it's so unhealthy and it's so unhelpful. Forgive us. Forgive us for the ways that we use our words and why we use our words the way that we do. We’re only revealing our own shortcomings. And, so, Holy Spirit come. May this be the beginning day that we stopped carrying around these little pieces of information that we just have to share with each other and have long conversations about people who are not even present making all kinds of assumptions that we cannot know creating all kinds of false realities that we live in as true, and then we crash and burn and shake our fist at the sky and ask You why You let this happen to us. We need to see things as they are. And things are as they are because they begin with our words. Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, it is indeed where you find out what's going on around here.

The Daily Audio Bible shop is there where a number of resources exist to aid in the journey that we’re on, this adventure through the Scriptures in a year in community. So, be sure to check out the shop. The Prayer Wall, of course, lives at dailyaudiobible.com as well, where people are praying for one another, asking for prayer. And it's a great place to be in community.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you, thank you, thank you humbly as we move through these summer months for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment 877-942-4253 is number to dial.

And that's it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hey DAB family it’s Albanita from Kentucky, now in Maryland. I am so far behind in the DAB. I think I just listened to June 13th and I’ve been trying to catch up before calling in but today is the day __ to call in. So, we are, my husband David and I are, 8 ½ months pregnant with our baby girl. It is intense. It’s our first baby and I don’t feel ready at all. I know you can never feel really ready, but I’m just asking that you all please pray for us. Pray that we are the parents that God is calling us to be, that we can keep her alive, that I’m sure…I’m sure we can…and that we remain strong as a couple. My husband is also a pastor and so there are many stressors that he is currently dealing with on top of being a first-time father. For those of you that called in June, just know that you still have someone that is praying for you as I pray as I hear your requests. So, I love you all. I will keep you posted on her arrival. It’s supposed to be September 4th. We’ll see how it goes. Love you much. Bye.

Hello this is Jackie from __ Colorado. I’ve listened for years but this is the first time I’ve called. I’ve recently been diagnosed with cancer – liver, ovary and possibly colon. So, I would like prayers on that for healing and strength to take whatever is coming. Also, I have a sin in my life that I don’t seem to be able to get past no matter how much I pray, no matter how hard I try. So, if you could pray for me to have victory on this, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

He Demetrius, how you doing? It’s the Prodigal. I heard your call. I heard a bunch of people call in to support you. I just wanted to add my two cents brother. I was where you are and am still. I’ve __ lost everything except my faith in Jesus. That’s the only reason that I keep going. And all I can do is encourage you brother because I’ll tell you, the bottom is an interesting place. You’re gonna find out who your friends are or more importantly who your friends aren’t. You also get a look over and see that when you’re at the bottom you look over and there’s another shovel there if you choose to pick it up and keep digging. So, I’d encourage you my friend stand up stand strong stand in the light of the Lord and let Him give you strength. I was gonna…I’ve been here six months beyond where I was planning to be here dude. So, he’s gotta give Him every day and He will give you…He will give you grace, He will give you love, He will give you __. Nobody said it was going to be perfect brother, but just want to tell you  I’ve been there man. __ in my lap, the whole 9 yards, pills that would choke a horse. But just keep plowing, keepo plugging, that’s what he’s got you here for brother. He just wants you to have an impact on somebody else’s life. I think I was here because I was supposed to have an impact on your life but I don’t know. I won’t presume. Anyway, love you brother. Stay strong. God bless and take care.

Hi, good morning Daily Audio Bible, my name is Kay I’m calling from Los Angeles California. I’m a new listener and I’ve been meaning to call in but today my spirit was just feeling very very vext. I am experiencing trials on every side. My seven-year-old was just recently diagnosed with colitis and during that time in May when he was admitted into the hospital, I was also arrested in the emergency room and charged with battery due to a false claim made by one of the staff members. So, now I have a criminal case that I’m fighting. I am…I don’t have the resources to pay for an attorney but I do need legal representation to prove my innocence and for the attorneys to subpoena the hospital to get the surveillance so they can see that I never touched this staff member. The devil is a lie. I’m also dealing with a 16-year-old daughter who is not necessarily rebelling, but I just feel like our relationship is kind of going south. You know, she blames me for a lot of things. She kinda does what she wants. She’s not been very honest, and I just want my little girl back. Needless to say, I’m walking in this alone and sometimes it feels like God has forgotten about me. I know He is able, I know that He is a restorer. He’s a lawyer, He’s a father to the fatherless…

Well hello family, I sure love you all. This is Robert Learning to Serve, and I’d like to add something to that name - in Love with Love and through Love. I’m still having a hard time with that but since there’s Father, Son and Holy Ghost, I think it kind of fits together. I really am so proud of this program. I’ve been able to be with y’all for 12 years and was so sick before with rheumatoid arthritis and being so sick I was able to listen about 40 times and maybe a little more now but it’s something I’ve been with y’all every day and I’ve heard all your prayer requests and I just so humbled by what Brian and China and the rest of the family have done here and all the people behind the scene. I found out two days ago that I have cancer real bad in my liver and my adrenal glands and I’ve been through a lot. This last year’s been a real trial for me to deal with all the things I’ve been dealing with. And, you know, I would like all the honor and glory to go to God in what happens, but I am, you know, I’m dealing with this new thing and I’m…I’m positive that it’s all gonna, you know, be okay. I’m not worried about it, but my sister’s been on hospice. I’ve requested help for my sister Jeannie. And, you know, it’s getting hard with her…her organs are failing too and, she’s been on hospice now for about six months and continues to go and we’ve always been so close. I just love you all and I…

[todaynewsstories]

I’d do it all over again, says founder of failed start-up Fastbee

SINGAPORE: Starting his own business has been such a stressful process that Khoo Kar Kiat lost 10kg over the past two years. 

It has also set him back by almost S$200,000. 

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But Mr Khoo does not regret taking the entrepreneurial plunge, even as his start-up ended last week and he did not get to prove his naysayers wrong. 

Back then, he was told by some that he had made the wrong move to leave the civil service. 

He was already 33, they said, and should not be taking risks given that he had a “good, stable job” at the Economic Development Board (EDB). 

Some did not mince their words: “Can (your idea) make money? Why do something stupid like that?” 

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The idea that he had was a food delivery service called Fastbee, which allowed people to order hawker delights via an app and collect their food from nearby vending machines. 

Mr Khoo believed that this would incur lower costs than a conventional point-to-point delivery model and in turn, be more sustainable and scalable. 

At the end of last year, Fastbee expanded to 10 vending machines across various industrial and business parks in the West. More than 800 deliveries were made per week from a team of just seven people. 

Unfortunately, it could not withstand a double whammy of competition from new players and fundraising difficulties that soon came along. The start-up had its last day on Aug 14. 

But nothing ventured, nothing gained, said Mr Khoo. 

“Maybe I should be happy that I lasted for about two years,” he quipped. “After all, statistics out there say about 90 per cent of start-ups fail in a year.” 

THE ENTREPRENEURIAL ITCH

A former student of the Anglo-Chinese Junior College and Nanyang Technological University, Mr Khoo described himself as someone who rarely veered off the beaten path. 

Taking a risk, such as entrepreneurship, never crossed his mind until he was introduced to the Lean Start-up methodology at work. 

Coined by Silicon Valley entrepreneurial guru Eric Ries, the methodology emphasised experimentation, like quickly launching a product then change it based on market feedback, instead of elaborate planning. 

He was tasked to adopt this innovation philosophy to build a new industry for Singapore but felt “something missing” and that he needed more than just reading materials to fully grasp the concept. 

“Innovation, the Lean Start-up methodology – these were often discussed but how do you get answers about starting something from scratch and making it work? Do I ask my boss or do I read more books?” 

Disruption becoming the new normal and technology changing jobs also got him thinking if he had become too comfortable in his work.

“I was somehow semi-cruising and contented with life,” said Mr Khoo. “But the world is changing and there’s actually so much to do and learn.” 

He considered applying for an MBA but eventually concluded that the answer lies in getting his hands dirty. So in October 2016, he left his eight-year career at the EDB. 

A steep learning curve awaited him in the initial months as he took the dive into entrepreneurship. 

From lacklustre demand for his “primitive version” of Fastbee (a breakfast delivery service in the Central Business District), new guidelines for vending machines to manpower and logistics issues, Mr Khoo recalled having “a reason to close down almost every month”. 

“There was once when I was going to launch a new machine at a new location but the third-party logistics provider I was partnering couldn’t deliver. I suddenly find myself with no drivers to fulfil orders,” he said. 

“It was such a stressful day that I nearly felt like throwing in the towel.” 

Each time, he tweaked his model and soldiered on. 

With its focus on the underserved market of delivering humbler local fare to non-CBD areas, business grew and Mr Khoo felt confident enough to add new vending machines by end-2017. 

“After surviving the initial months, I thought nothing else can kill me,” he recalled. “But I was wrong.”

READ: From hawker centre to home: Is delivering cheap, local food a recipe for business success?

At its core, Fastbee relied on aggregating orders and eliminating point-to-point deliveries to stay lean and keep costs down. Unlike other food delivery services, it does not take a cut or have a minimum order requirement. Its main income is a S$1.50 delivery fee. 

While it does have lower manpower costs, it required economies of scale to turn profitable. At its peak, Fastbee only had a footprint of 10 vending machines. 

By early 2018, its capital of S$200,000, consisting of S$100,000 from Mr Khoo and the rest put in by an angel investor, was fast running out. Months of fundraising, however, yielded little results. 

“Eventually, I realised that we were simply not growing fast enough,” said Mr Khoo. “We may be growing 10 to 20 per cent in our customer base but venture capitalists are looking at super-normal growth of 100 to 200 per cent.” 

Investors also questioned the exportability of the start-up. “We are a solution for Singapore where manpower is expensive, but that’s not the case for the rest of Southeast Asia. So they were sceptical.” 

At the same time, new entrants with deeper pockets have begun targeting its stronghold of industrial and business parks in the West. With its coffers running dry, Mr Khoo said Fastbee could not match the extensive marketing efforts, such as dishing out promo codes, that some of its rivals have done. 

Fastbee’s vending machine at Mediapolis. (Photo: Tang See Kit)

To hold on, it began reducing its vending machines while tweaking operations to have one delivery man for four locations. 

“We always needed about 30 packets for breakeven but with that, it took just eight to 10 packets.” 

That kept the start-up going for four more months until talks with an investor fell through on Aug 9. By then, Mr Khoo knew the time was up. 

“I sat in front of my laptop and wept a bit. Even though I had been preparing myself, it wasn’t easy when the realisation hit.” 

When asked if he had been too confident on Fastbee’s lean model, Mr Khoo’s face turned pensive. 

“I still believe in the concept of using a vending machine because right till the end, we were breaking even operationally. But we needed investments to keep going. 

“With the consolidation going on in the market, interest was low. Nobody wants to invest in a small start-up and hope you can survive against the big guys.”

READ: Promo codes, lower minimum orders: Is a price war brewing among food delivery apps?

NO REGRETS

Without a salary and having to dig deep into his savings for his daily expenses, Mr Khoo estimated that he has spent about S$200,000 on his entrepreneurial pursuits. 

But there are no regrets, he said, as he’s gained valuable lessons in return.

For instance, he should have kept a tighter lid on spending in the initial stages of the business.

“Everyone told me that I needed to bootstrap. You will try but you won’t do it until you are desperate,” said Mr Khoo.

“We were not overspending compared to many start-ups but we were not stingy enough. Only when we ran out did we realise that we could have slashed a lot of spending by becoming even more efficient.”

This will involve walking the talk on embracing innovation and out-of-the-box thinking, added Mr Khoo. For this, he credited his young team for constantly reminding him of the value of taking a chance on something new.

“Towards the end, I told my team that we needed to radically change our operations. They took it and we started brainstorming together. That’s how we pivoted our model when we needed to.”

Having family support would be crucial for any entrepreneur though Mr Khoo admitted that his mother disapproved of his career switch.

“My brother had a business failure in his 30s and lost a similar amount of money. My mum went through that with him and she obviously didn’t want me to end up the same.”

He added: “Plus, I was doing quite well in EDB so she could not understand why I wanted to quit.”

His business has been a taboo topic at home for the past two years. But there was once after an argument, Mr Khoo received a text message from his mum reminding him to take regular meals and rest when he can. 

“I remembered being on my way back to the office. When I saw the message, I stopped and cried uncontrollably for 10 minutes. 

“I know she’s been very worried about us failing and having a tough life as a result of that.” 

Bringing up the deep-seated fear of failure in Singapore, he added: “The older generation still views entrepreneurship and the risks involved very differently and I know from here, there will be certain pressure that my family and I will have to face.” 

“So when the realisation hit, I did think about what I should do for the next Chinese New Year. Should I still go for visiting?”

Mr Khoo also candidly let on that he initially thought it would be rather “paiseh”, which means embarrassed in Hokkien, to do an interview but he now hopes to help dispel that fear of failure. 

“I’ve previously given a few talks on entrepreneurship. Obviously now, I can’t tell a success story but perhaps I can tell the other side of becoming an entrepreneur given that so few people talk about failures and what we learn from them.” 

On his next step, Mr Khoo admits to feeling some trepidation though he was quick to add that there is no time to wallow in failure. 

“After spending S$200,000, I need to build up my nest again,” he said with a laugh. 

But more importantly, he has come to realise that life is not a race and that one failure does not mean losing out forever. 

“Bouts of ‘I’m single, turning 35, don’t have a career and probably can’t afford a HDB’ definitely went through my mind but I really don’t think I’m in the worst place. 

“If I compare myself with my peers, I may be a few years behind but this is not a race. I still have many years ahead of me to make the best out of my life.”

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[mikemortgage]

Trump says the stock market would crash if he were impeached. Here’s what analysts say

President Donald Trump said he doesn’t see a reason for Congress to impeach him but that the stock market would plummet and Americans would be poorer if lawmakers did so.

“I don’t know how you can impeach somebody who’s done a great job,” Trump said in a wide-ranging interview with Fox News broadcast Thursday.

“I’ll tell you what, if I ever got impeached, I think the market would crash,” Trump added. “I think everybody would be very poor. Because without this thinking you would see numbers that you wouldn’t believe, in reverse.”

Trump vs the Fed: Central banks are only one populist uprising away from losing cherished independence

‘I’m not thrilled’: Trump blasts Fed for raising interest rates, not doing enough to help him boost economy

Trump complained to wealthy donors in the Hamptons about Jerome Powell's rate hikes

How seriously should people take Trump’s claim that stocks would crash if he were kicked out of office? As you mull over an answer, consider what someone in the other party would say.

Maybe there’s a less subjective way to judge — with earnings estimates, perhaps, which have changed a lot during his presidency. Or maybe valuation. Neither is perfect, but nor is any quest for science in the stock market.

Before digging in, acknowledge that stocks have enjoyed unusually strong gains since Election Day, with the S&P 500 rising at an annualized rate of 20 per cent, crushing the historical return of 9.4 per cent since 1927. At the same time, note the Trump return is only about 1 percentage point higher than the yearly gain since March 2009, an era mostly overseen by Barack Obama.

Changes in earnings forecasts under Trump have been stark, compared with history. Last December, analysts were predicting S&P 500 earnings of about US$146 a share for 2018, forecasts that, thanks largely to the president’s tax cuts, soared over the next two months, rising four times as fast as any period Bloomberg tracks. And companies made good: S&P 500 operating income jumped 24 per cent in each of the last two quarters and analysts see combined EPS of US$159 a share for all of this year.

Predictions for 2019 profits also soared, going from US$163 a share at the start of the year to US$177 a share now, an upward revision that dwarfs any since at least 2012. Add to that a small bump in valuations: the S&P 500 fetched 20.07 times annual earnings on Election Day 2016 and 20.7 times now.

So say what you will about intangibles, if you believe corporate earnings and valuation call the stock market’s tune, it’s hard to say the equity market doesn’t owe at least some of its altitude to the president.

Still, looking at earnings in isolation ignores a dozen other factors in speculating on how impeachment would affect stocks, from policy to sentiment to potentially catastrophic consequences for the country’s social fabric. Any one of those could easily eclipse anything having to do with corporate profits. But without an obvious framework for gauging those outcomes, the income lens is what’s left.

In examining Trump’s claim about a crash, investors might reasonably ask how much of the policy benefit would be rolled back if his presidency were threatened. Analysts were mostly skeptical the president is in any real danger and not sure there’d be any major impact should he be.

Kristina Hooper, chief global market strategist at Invesco Ltd.:

“First of all, it is very unlikely that President Trump would be impeached. If an impeachment did happen, we’d experience volatility and perhaps a significant selloff, but I believe any such market moves would be short-term in nature. There are two reasons why: 1) We have already gotten the best of his agenda — tax reform and deregulation. Other elements of his agenda which he is currently pursuing, particularly his trade policies, are not supportive of growth and actually worry many business leaders. 2) Tax reform is the gift that keeps on giving. It will add to GDP growth for years to come — in fact, the CBO projects it will have an increasingly positive impact on GDP growth in the next several years. Also, if he were to be impeached, Mike Pence would assume the mantle and he has a strong track record of stimulating growth in Indiana. We can’t forget that the stock market is surprisingly resilient when monetary policy is accommodative, and it arguably is still accommodative.”

Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda Corp. in London:

“The market isn’t hinging on anything substantial that hasn’t already been carried through. The markets have largely rallied on tax reform and we’ve seen that reflected in company earnings. But if there’s political instability and the U.S. economic growth slowed significantly, that would have global implications.”

Greg Valliere, chief global strategist at Horizon Investments LLC:

“The economy, amped up on stimulus, is growing by close to 4 per cent, and unemployment is below 4 per cent. If the trade wars cool off a little this fall, we still think stocks can grind higher. It’s not a pretty picture here in Washington, but as long as Trump doesn’t go totally off the rails, investors can compartmentalize. With two more Trump associates now facing jail time, chances have improved that the House will flip back to the Democrats, who in private concede that an impeachment debate probably will begin by late winter. But we’re sticking with our call — while the House might indict Trump, Senate conviction still looks unlikely, unless there’s a major change in the second point.”

Past instances of presidential turmoil showed contrasting stock returns. In February 1974, when Congress initiated impeachment proceedings against Richard Nixon, the market was in the midst of a 1973-1974 bear market that was punctuated by an oil crisis and an implosion of the world’s foreign change rate system. The S&P 500 tumbled more than 30 per cent through October that year.

In December 1998, when the House launched impeachment on Bill Clinton, stocks kept rising during the last stage of the Internet boom. The S&P 500 climbed for five straight months till Clinton’s acquittal in February 1999.

S&P 500 futures were flat as of 9:20 a.m. in New York and the index barely budged Wednesday in the aftermath of convictions of the Trump associates that sparked renewed discussion of a potential impeachment.

“Equity markets don’t seem to care, and we think they are right,” Nicholas Colas, Co-founder of DataTrek Research, wrote in a note. “Rates are low, the dollar is strong and corporate earnings remain robust. Those are the only things stock prices can (and should) actually discount.”

–With assistance from Dani Burger.

Bloomberg.com

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373 – What is the "dark night of the soul?"

Rainbows and butterflies are enchanting.

Laughter, silliness, and good times with friends and family are magical too. 

These things and moments are especially beautiful when we’ve had enough life experience to realize that they can be fleeting things and moments, so when they happen … we soak them up like a heart-shaped sponge. However, in order to truly appreciate the joyful times we most likely need a taste of the sorrowful ones, some that may feel impossible to escape.

A reader asked The Mystic Hairdresser …

The “dark night of the soul,” is this something that’s real? Advice?

The “dark night of the soul” is certainly an ominous grouping of words. The Mom was kind enough to include her research on this phrase in her email to me, which I very much appreciate. From that, I learned that over the centuries, many gifted people, including Eckhart Tolle, have eloquently expressed their ideas on this subject through poetry, prose and music. Since someone has asked me to, I will humbly add my layman's two cents to what's already been said. Thank you in advance for your patience.

Hot blooded creature that I am, it's rare for me to ever get cold. For years, I've dreamt of moving to Alaska where the snow is endless and the cold of winter lasts for eight months. Winter is my favorite season and I love the snow! So, if I say that I am cold, it's serious. “I'm cold” means that I'm chilled all the way to the bone; my innards are shivering; and my brain even feels sluggish. In fact, it means that my entire state of being feels chilled thoroughly, completely, through and through. A measly sweater or blanket isn't going to fix that. The only way for me to get warm is to lie submerged, neck deep, in a steaming hot bath for however long it takes to thaw out. Most of the time I have to partially drain and reheat the water several times before I feel truly warmed up inside and out. 

When I saw the line, “dark night of the soul,” it reminded me a little of how I feel when I'm cold. To me, “dark night of the soul” is a state of being that permeates all the layers of your entire being from the physical, mental, and emotional levels, all the way into the spiritual aspects of self. The permeation is so insidious and complete that it eventually and naturally seeps into your soul, sometimes without your even knowing when or how it happened. The “dark night of the soul” is a state that goes far beyond loss of faith; easily surpasses depression and throes of despair; and even goes well beyond every deep sea of hopelessness until it finally blinds the spirit, casting the soul into darkness. 

Meeting the “dark night of the soul” is an experience of incomprehensible nothingness, faithlessness, meaninglessness and all encompassing darkness. It's the place where one loses oneself and it's the place where suicide is manifest and becomes a sane course of action in a mind that sees no objection from a spirit that's been shrouded in the dark night and been completely lost in darkness. 

I think that the road to this place is obscure and easily lost in the smallest light. For those who do find it, the commencement of their journey often must be triggered by an event or an obsessive idea that the person cannot reconcile within themselves. People who have even a glimmer of faith within their hearts will not be able to complete the journey even if they start down the road. But, I think that those who do reach this destination rarely return. For the few that do come back, I don't know how they do it or even if it is them that does it. 

I recently heard a man tell a story about his own near death experience. When he died, he was cast into hell. Although clinically dead, his descriptions were explicit. He related memories of having many of the same feelings and sensations that I associate with the “dark night of the soul” concept.  This man did not rise up from hell and save himself. Rather, he saw a finger, and eventually a full hand, stretch and pierce the dark reality of hell that he was in; the hand pulled him out. He said that he felt, even knew in his soul, that the hand that saved him was the hand of God. He did not know why God saved him. Perhaps he had a speck of faith that God could see and he could not. 

Happy Wednesday! — The Mystic Hairdresser

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