#talk to the union bitches. not in my contract

[bloogers-boogers]

~Marriage au~ (part two)

So, I was drawing this post when the idea strikes me kabdksdhsls and now it’s a thing.

We all know the whole idea of Adam becoming a sinner, well that’s basically the start of the story. He becomes a sinner, he gets in the hotel, he manages to make a deal with Lucifer in exchange of his soul, BUT, that’s like way after. Why? Because in this au Adam soul was trapped to some random overlord, no, it’s not Alastor, Vox or Valentino. It’s somebody else just as powerful. The whole reason Adam gave his soul to him wasn’t outta free will, it was because this demon in peculiar has this ability to make people do things they don’t want to do (hypnosis?? Idk similar to Vox ig), which Adam was a victim of. He made Adam “willingly” exchange his soul for an offer. This was before he managed to get to the hotel. So now he’s trapped to this guy.

The only ones who can see Adam being chained are demons that are also on a leash that includes Alastor. And this is how Lucifer found out about it because he overheard Alastor taunt Adam about it with very subtle words but Lucifer caught on immediately.

Which is where the plot begins.

Lucifer takes Adam aside and starts making a huge deal about it which Adam refused to admit it was even true.

Somehow in the long run Lucifer managed to get Adam to blurt out the truth after many attempts to gain his trust or at least make Adam accept his help (didn’t take long tbh, kinda like 2 hours after the confrontation).

So they both went to talk to the demon who owned Adam and Lucifer wasn’t planning on leaving there until he managed to have Adam’s soul free. The bad thing was that this overlord was quite power hungry and the fact that the KING of hell seemed desperate for this soul alone was an opportunity he couldn’t let down (he kinda figured being the first man his soul would be priceless in comparison to other sinners which is why he caught him in the first place but he wouldn’t have guessed that King Morningstar would want it after the battle they had it was shown those two didn’t get along.) but anyways.

So he offered Adam’s soul for the exchange of Lucifer giving up on the throne which was laughable. Lucifer denied, obviously, and Adam just kinda accepted defeat. But Lucifer didn’t give up on that, they tried other methods from ancient scrolls to old rituals but nothing worked to set Adam’s soul free. Lucifer didn’t want to resort to this but he had no other choice by the looks of it. A soul contract is a very powerful thing which is why it’s almost unbreakable, but he was the king of hell. He had an immense power that COULD break a soul contract. But thats only if…

Adam spiritually gives himself to Lucifer in marriage in a holy union. Aka upon the eyes of God.

Which of course this is beyond breaking everything Lucifer stands for and his pride.

So this is where their deal commenced.

“Adam I will set you free, I will put my faith in God again to break that contract, my union with Lilith; everything I fought so hard to keep. I will sacrifice it all, myself, just for you to receive freedom again. But the only thing I ask for in exchange is your soul.”

“Seriously?! After literally everything we did to get myself free from that asshole you’re gonna get my soul stuck to you seconds after?! Speak of the fucking devil.”

“Adam for the love of my damn father! I’m literally sacrificing my marriage, connecting with my dad, throwing my pride away. Literally fucking marrying you! For a whole damn year! for your selfish underserving ass! I must get something back for it. Take it or leave it.”

Adam thought for a bit before shrugging. Yeah, it was a bitch, but it was unlikely for Lucifer to do something that bad when Charlie is involved in Adam’s self growth as a person.

“Okay. Deal,” he extends his hand towards Lucifer assuming it was a normal type of deal and the devil sigh.

Unfortunately for them, a holy marriage is supposed to be set in the tradicional terms.

He summoned a box with a golden serpent ring and kneeled down swallowing his pride and accepting Adam as his spouse.

“Adam, would you, the first man accept me; King Lucifer Morningstar as your faithful and loyal husband?”

This startled Adam of course, cause what the fuck was Lucifer doing.

Adam huffed incredulous, “Loyal I doubt it.”

Lucifer tsk sourly already regretting this but held it in. That could wait after their stupid church wedding.

“But sure, whatever…” Adam blushed embarrassed by the whole thing (after all he never experienced something like this before, a marriage proposal; considering he was already born married or given wives), offering his hand while Lucifer looked up a bit before his gaze fell back down to Adam’s fingers and gently slid the ring on his wedding finger.

Suddenly Lucifer and Adam appear in a church house with the grim reaper as their priest and the wedding begins.

“In the name of God, I, Lucifer Morningstar, take you, Adam, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until parted by death. This is my solemn vow."

Adam blushed some more, he wasn’t sure why he was being an emotional bitch about it when all of this wasn’t entirely willing but still, he was actually experiencing a wedding in the point of view of a groom.

Adam wasn’t sure what to say but to replicate Lucifer’s vows.

“In the name of God, I, Adam, take you, Lucifer Morninstar, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until parted by death. This is my solemn vow."

Lucifer bit his lip, feeling unsure all of a sudden. Was he really gonna do this just for Adam? He looked at his wedding band; the memories, the only thing he had left linked to Lilith. Once he accepts Adam as his, his ring would evaporate and his soul would forever be bounded to Adam.

He winced his eyes shut letting the reaper finish the ceremony.

“So I will repeat this again, in case someone is already rethinking this and wants to flee to the nearest exit which is right at the left end,” the grim reaper side eyes Lucifer, “Do you Lucifer Morningstar accept Adam to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I do.”

“Do you Adam accept Lucifer Morningstar to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I-“

Adam also had his own doubts, his promises to Eve, the connection he once had for her, the faithful and love for the mother of his children. All of that smacked him in the face with each passing second of the ceremony. He hasn’t even thought of Eve in so long.

“I do.”

The reaper gestures Lucifer to give his ring.

Lucifer winced harder feeling a tear wanting to slip out as he starts.

“Adam, I give you this ring as a symbol of my vow, and with all that I am and all that I have, I honor you, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” he slid the ring on Adam. Already sensing the ring that belonged to Lilith turning into dust as he stepped back, falling off his fingers ready to be replaced with Adam’s. Shit.

Adam was given a ring to place it on Lucifer’s wedding finger. He gulped, awkwardly getting ready for his part.

“Lucifer, I give you this ring as a symbol of my vow, and with all that I am and all that I have, I honor you, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” he places it on Lucifer’s finger, sealing their bound.

They both watched as the gold of their rings brightened and tightened in their skin.

“I here by declare you; Lucifer Morningstar and Adam Morningstar: king and king consort of hell. You may kiss the groom.”

Adam flinched disgusted, Lucifer cringed while swallowing and mustering the courage to peck Adam quickly.

And that sealed it. In the eyes of the holy spirit they were married. The holy light washed over them as the church bells rang announcing their strong union. Adam’s contract with the overlord broke as the power of their holy union broke it.

After Adam’s little scene of being set free from his contract was done, everything vanished and suddenly they were at a hotel room, lighted by candles and seductive music.

They both looked around, Adam confused, Lucifer just startled by the abruptness.

“Yeah. This is where things get awkward,” Lucifer admitted.

So a week passes and they act like all of that never happened. Everyone at the HOTEL was oblivious of the whole thing but eventually the news spreads around and Charlie finds out from a sinner.

“King Morningstar! Congratulations for your beautiful groom,” he then bows at both Adam and Lucifer.

Lucifer tenses when it happens and notices Charlie’s odd stare.

“I don’t know what he’s talking about, haha, he must be a little cookoo,” he swirls his finger next to his head, nervous. Adam just face palms by how awful Lucifer is at lying.

Of course Charlie doesn’t seem to believe his bullshit so Lucifer quits it.

“Okay, it’s not what you think and it’s absolutely TEMPORARY,” he explains in a quickly fashion, “Adam was trapped, I offered my help, the guy wanted the throne I denied. Only method to get Adam free was something more powerful than a soul contract and that was a holy marriage. And now, we’re married. Temporarily.”

Somehow, and as weird as it was, Charlie and the rest kinda swept it udder a rug. So the whole incident was kinda not a big deal (bc it’s not legit if they don’t actually like each other, still weird tho), both acted like normal and normally they’d just tried laughing off any comments about their marriage. Until it actually becomes a big deal.

When Lucifer starts feeling awkward or annoyed when someone approaches Adam with all intentions on trying to fuck him.

“AHAHA! Wowie! How fun, now get your filthy hands off my husband.”

And everytime Adam would question that, Lucifer would shrug it off as.

“I have to keep the part.”

You can imagine the drama, mix and confusing feelings and new found jealousy. And all of that in this.

So yeah. Thats the au 😭

[supermaks]

gentlequeers a short look into Johnny Herbert lmfao

This herb mf fascinastes me because he’s clearly besotted wid Verstappen on some old school level due to his driving and his general verstappen-ness but he can’t fucking get over that giant fucking chip on his shoulder that max 1) owes him nothing 2) isn’t British 3) prolly not particularly fond of him either.

Like every Max fan who heard about FIA giving max community service for swearing collectively turned to a camera like in fleabag to be like 😐 ‘Herbert was in that room’ it wasn’t even a meme it was just like. Of course he was .

And even in the statements he’s putting out defending that insane fucking decision hes still doing the usual Herbert ‘hot and cold’ shit wid Max like this is FROM his justification on the extreme nature of the punishment:

“That (swearing?) showed Max's rebellious streak. I love that side of him, it is what makes Max, his honest and outspoken character.”

This shit sends me out the stratosphere bro like he’s a FAN he a fan he fan he’s just fucking so British he can’t fucking function wid an shooter like Max that won’t ever put the Union Jack around his shoulders and tap dance for his side of the pond.

Same in Austria. Just an example . U go to Austria (hold my hand. Baby we must) where he was 1 of the stewards responsible for Max’s 10 second penalty in that contact against lando ((while coincidentally haha, not penalizing lando for going over track limits like 49 times before they had contact, then when he finally did he considered that time served post race and Lando never dealt wid those consequences during the race. Just wanted to . Say that 🫶🏽.)) but yeah this is was a penalty that was applied immediately without doubt and where the burden of responsibility regarding the crash was placed 100% on Max. About this decision Herbert said, freely, sober i assume, I swear I’m not making this up,

“That intimidation is something that Lewis [Hamilton], Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna have always done. When you come up against Max as he is driving today, there’s a point if you’re Lando that you have to say: ‘I am here. I am at your side. You are trying to squeeze me off the circuit. And I am not going to move.’

“Lando did the right thing. He did not move. He did not have to. Some people said he could have moved. But that is not how you beat Max or how you win the Grand Prix.”

So while the burden of contact falls 100% on Max and he MUST be punished for racing hard, Lando is doing the ‘right thing’ racing him hard to the point of contact and nearly taking them both out, because it means there was a chance of beating Max. Do you see how brazenly fucking biased that is? How one drivers hard racing must be stopped but another’s is to be celebrated and encouraged? I’ve talked Austria and the literal unhinged witch hunt that followed not just from fans but mclarens top bitches and the media in general at length before. And how it got so fucking bad drivers old, retired and very much active had to come out the woodwork like ayo y’all being weird now fr lmfao WTF is going on ((It was beautiful tho.))

I think Johnny .. like Nando once put it, kinda, paraphrasing 😭 became a cop because he cud not win a title. He was a good driver too, he won races, he’s one of the few loud voices in that room that has the credibility to back up his stewarding calls. But that doesn’t mean he’s objective, or even normal, when it comes to Max. In a sport that employs Ted kravitz and is proud of it Herbert might be the most deranged fucking person under contract rn. And as a max fan yk I have to respect the nerve . The commitment . But I’ll never respect the man, as f1 fan, not even as a max fan. And I think part of what’s pushed his decisions towards the extreme this past few years is that he knows that too. He knows , like the aftermath of Austria showed, like the whole circus in Singapore put on BLAST and made a fucking mockery of not just his lilly ass but the whole FIA, that Max doesn’t need or care for his approval. Max has his flowers. Herb just a cop wid a laminated card . And good for him yk. Keep fighting the good fight brother . Maybe you’ll get him one day

[yeats-infection]

you've organized a union?? bro how are you consistently this cool, like one human being shouldn't be able to contain all this coolness...rock on

i thank you my friend but organizing a union has nothing to do with being cool... organizing is also the easy and fun part compared to bargaining and stewarding!! i also have not done and am not doing anything on my own. i was asked if i wanted to help early in the organizing process and then was part of the bargaining committee and am now the shop steward. we have sort of a three-person union leadership committee with a vice-steward and somebody who works more externally with the broader labor movement. we also have a five-person labor-management committee that helps out a lot with larger actions when we do them.

all you have to do is start quietly talking to the coworkers you bitch about work with and explore if a few other people are interested. ANY employee at ANY kind of job can form a union and it's okay if the union is really small!! ours is about 50 people. others in our local are as small as 5-10. and others are thousands of people!

once you have a small group you can look into local unions in the area and reach out to them to talk about organizing. there are unions that cover lots of different kinds of workers (united auto workers is one, i'm a UAW member) and unions that cover specific kinds of workers (nonprofit professional employees union, communications workers of america, service employees international union, etc). you would look for a "local" (a smaller regional affiliate) of one of these unions that is based in your area. the employees of the local can help train you on how to organize a larger group toward an election and they'll also train you on bargaining and be with you in bargaining. keep in mind that it is illegal for management to retaliate against you for union activities!!!

my gentle words of advice would be that if you are going to do this you have to be in it for the long haul. it doesn't end with organizing, and it gets much harder after that. for that reason, hating your boss is not enough of a reason to organize - by all means hate your boss and laugh thinking of their face when they get the notice of election... but that will not carry you through literally years of fighting over every penny and every letter of the contract. i will recommend trying to reframe your thinking to come at it from a perspective of 1) building solidarity among the lowest-paid and least powerful people at the workplace and redistributing some power to them and 2) being solutions-oriented to repair problems in your workplace and have a say in your conditions.

another exciting piece is that a union is a 501c4 organization under the US tax code - so you can lobby federal, state, and local governments on your issues :)

i think overall the moral of the story is that if any of us want to actualize any progressive ideas in this world we are going to have to do more work. and i mean more work in real life. tweeting about leftism and yelling at each other on tumblr about which gay pirate show is more politically righteous (not to accuse you of doing this anon, lol) has literally zero impact on the material conditions of reality. bringing about any real redistribution of power in society is going to take MORE WORK from ALL of us!! forming a union is an important way to do that work, especially as the more of us that have unions the stronger the labor movement is, and organized labor has the power and built-in solidarity to make headway on a number of other progressive issues...

[bellewintersroe]

Can I get a BoB ship please? Love your writing btw.

I’m 5’9 broad shoulders, Im plus size but with an athletic build. I have curly blonde hair, blue eyes, and a ruddy skin tone. I’ve been told that I have an intimidating resting rbf.

Personality wise I’m pretty shy and anxious until you get to know me then I will talk your ear off. I have a bit of a temper, especially when it comes to someone doing me or the people I care about wrong. I’m super loyal and family oriented.

I work at a daycare as a teacher but I went to school for welding technology. I also help my dad do demos for his contracting business.I do a lot of things that would be considered men’s work. I love going on hikes and going camping. I also play the bass. I also love history especially history about the working class. Im super pro union and blue collar worker. Sorry I suck at writing this kinda stuff. Thanks so much!!!!

thank you so much for your request!

I ship you with… Dick Winters!

Wooohoooo the man himself. I immediately thought of Winters when I read your info!

I think Dick would immediately be taken back by your beauty, he’s kinda go all quiet and get a little smile on his face when he hears you talking.

this is a daily occurance, even if you two are good friends/ know each other well he’d smile to himself every single time you walk into the room. Without fail.

of course if you’re a little shy and anxious at first, plus if you have a resting bitch face at times (relatable) Winters might be a little taken a back? Maybe he’s a little worried you don’t like him? But I highly doubt that would last for long, Winters is sooo gentle and kind, that I can imagine you’d open up to him super quick.

loves listening to you talk, he’s definitely a listener, and adds into the conversation when necessary.

I think he’d ask lots of questions about you, he’s so interested in what you do as work and it’s so fitting because he thinks you’re so lovely and patient.

You come across very family orientated and this is what really draws Dick to you. He loves hearing about all the times you work with your dad and you two sound like you have a close bond. Just like he does with his parents.

he’s sooo respectful, and blushes a lot because I think he can be a little shy- but being in the army has really built up his confidence, so I think he’d initiate your first kiss- but only after taking you out for a date first.

I think he’d be very traditional, you know with the whole dating thing. He’s not huge on PDA but overtime he grows to become more affectionate.

I think he likes the idea of marriage and settling down with you, after the war he’s experienced so much chaos and trauma that you’re his safe haven. You with children and pets (if wanted) on a plot of land in a peaceful part of the world would be Dick’s dream.

like you he’s very loyal, to you, his friends and his family. He won’t take anyyyyy shit from anybody, whereas you’ve got more of a temper, he’s so cool and straight to the point. I think he outsmarts anybody who says anything negative towards you.

would enjoy taking long walks with you, or just chilling in bed together whilst you’re both reading your books. I think spending time with you after work or on his days off is such a good way for him to unwind.

I think he’d be soooo good at calming you down if you’ve got heated. Let’s say somebody’s said something rude to you at work or something, and you come home vexed, he’s immediately settling you down on the couch, keeping an arm around you or a hand on your lap to soothe you.

gets upset when you’re upset.

finds it super sexy that you do things that’s considered ‘mens work’ he knows your worth, he’d NEVER doubt it for a second, so he’s super proud to be like ‘yeah that’s my girl doing that’.

admires you. You’d turn over and he’d have a hazy gaze lingering over your face, and then he’d kiss you so gently omfg he’s so soft.

never raises his voice, never really does much to make you angry. I think he’d bring out such a peaceful side of you.

I think your hikes would turn into games, like you’re quite athletic and you do it often, but he’s run frickin’ Currahee, so he’d be able to outrun anybody.

races you to the top but let’s you win on purpose just he likes seeing the smile on your face.

[direwolfrules]

You know, I can’t believe I need to say this but don’t fucking interact if you’re a scab or anti-union. Comparing unions to a protection racket, like this fucker does later on, is just a zero out of ten behavior.

First, protection rackets don’t put your money into services for your benefit, unlike unions. Unions can provide a variety of benefits, some provide health insurance and/or life insurance. Some provide legal aid for workplace related disputes. And they fight for your rights in the workplace. They negotiate contracts and the like so you’re not relying on a fucking handshake as your guarantee that your boss won’t be a fucking bitch baby and claim since he had his fingers crossed behind his back, he doesn’t actually have to adhere to previous agreements.

Also, yeah, unions have member dues. How the fuck do you think they pay for all those benefits? For lawyers and shit? It’s like paying taxes. Because everything costs money in this society.

Framing this as them “not wanting to work” is so reductive. Writers are currently not making a living wage, being overworked, and writing rooms are understaffed amongst so many other issues. Residuals are being purposely cut off using loopholes in how streaming residuals work. Collective bargaining is one of the best tools in a worker’s pocket, but it needs to be a collective effort.

Don’t come onto my posts and start quoting fucking PragerU. Anti-union propaganda spread by idiot fuckheads who’re too worried about “the liberal plague” to read a fucking history book and who probably have no clue how fucking deregulation adversely affects the market and the hoarding of wealth by corporations prevents sustainable participation in the economy don’t get to come here and brainlessly repeat conservative talking points.

Maybe go back to whining about how artists aren’t all drawing swizzle-sticks for you to jerk off to. Can kinda see why you got banned

The way I've already seen uncountable "Netflix is hiring!" Ads. They're really just gonna hire scabs and pretend the WGA strike isn't happening....

[nosnexus]

I love reading about other people's ttrpg campaigns. Could you talk about yours if that's okay?

OF COURSE ITS OKAY! THank you! I literally am always down to talk about this campaign because we have such an amazing group. We're following an adventure path, so if you're planning on playing you might not want to read too much (it's a fun adventure so far, play it!)

Our party consists of Gnelwynn (Gnome Rogue), Chadrum (Human Swashbuckler/Champion), Narek (Hobgoblin Alchemist), and Wren (Aasimar Sorcerer) ((That’s my kid!)). The Extinction Curse adventure path SO FAR has involved Circus shenanigans, beating up Zulgaths/dinosaurs that want to destroy beacons of Aroden, and inadvertently having to become heroes to save the Starstone Isles from an Extinction Curse. And pie making contests.  Lots of pie making contests.

Alright folks, buckle up. Shit be going down. Here’s the state of our motley crew from the circus of Wayward Wonders!

In our last few sessions our party has finished clearing out the temple of Aroden beneath the city of Escadar. Our party went through a couple of encounters, searching for more concrete evidence of Mistress Dusklight being the worst that we can hand in to the police, before findinga room with a stone golem holding a grail. Red flags all around to be honest. We’ve got no reason to grab that damn grail. We’ve been warned. But dammit, some of us were cocky. And that grail looked hella shiny...

For context, here's the current state of the union leading up to this:

The Celestial Menagerie is our rival circus being run by the tyrannical Mistress Dusklight – two of our members ran away from the circus because of reasons and Dusklight was actively abusive towards pretty much everybody

Things apparently had gotten WAY worse there after they left. Like…Devil contracts level of way worse. Oh and Dusklight is in cahoots with Zulgaths (who are fucking up Aroden’s long begotten shit). And she’s got a rat in the police force. Also she’s sent people to kill us a couple of times. And she’s a dick. (with a +25 to her intimidation check)

Our Swashbuckler’s ex is in deep shit apparently because he was supposed to jump the party and refused – now he’s in the circus equivalent of a Goulag, beaten and starved to think about his life choices of not being a dick (like Dusklight)

We’ve witnessed more circus horrors happening to people and animals alike within the Celestial Menagerie and it makes everyone want to burn the place to the ground and give everyone therapy afterwards.

We’ve been had by Dusklight when we went to scope out the circus the previous day and NOW we’re in a time crunch before Dusklight starts retaliating

Oh and we have a show of our own the next day. Nice.

Now back to the golem.

Half the party wants to push the big red button. Wren is freaking out because we're in a time crunch; but majority rules and Wren already made an impulsive decision a few rooms back that has them vibrating - so they don't try to argue further. That button gets pushed and boooooooy howdy it went as well as you’d think.

SOOOOOO…we’re all cursed.

None of us are able to heal kind of cursed. Wren exhausted most of their healing spells, and due to the level of the curse, it would take multiple crits in order to fully break it on multiple party members (the curse would lift if you magically heal to full health after a counteract check, or a high enough remove curse is used). And since we were planning of hitting the Celestial Menagerie later that night, we're in trouble. It takes us more time than we’d want to (and more gold than we wanted to spend) for us to remove the curse – but hey, we get an hour “beach episode” while the curse is lifted thanks to a helpful Druid in the city. Thanks Soothing Spring!

Less great - as we leave the druid’s place, we see smoke rising from the outskirts of the city, where our freaking circus is.

The bitch got us. It was bad.

No one was killed, but it was close for a lot of the major acts. One of them was almost drowned in her escape tank, some of the animal acts were murdered, a bear that Wren loves has been bear-napped, and our Swashbuckler had a severed finger placed in his quarters with a note stating: “a new contract has been signed”.

Andera – the police captain - had deputized us earlier that day and asked us to arrest Dusklight. Alive.

Yeah, that wasn’t happening.

We just finished up our big bad fight with Mistress Dusklight, with some interesting outcomes that will be unravelling our next session. A LOT happened in our lead up to the big bad and I honestly wished I had live blogged it but I was SO STRESSED.

Highlights from my kid tho - Wren beat up Dusklight’s aasimar boytoy, double flipped off a devil (that will have no consequences whatsoever), found out said devil may know their dad?!?, SAVED THE DRYAD they were worried about, and accidently?Notaccidently helped two of the gate guards set up a lotion stall at their circus so they can make money to take care of their grandma. It’s probably an MLM… Oops.

[bitchesgetriches]

Hi bitches, I'm a bit nervous to ask this but I'm being genuine I promise. I don't want you to think I'm some biggoted old fool.

Could you please help me understand how sex work isn't exploitative? I hear a lot of people saying "it's just the same as normal work, it's better than my job at Amazon/target/wherever and no one is calling that work exploitative" or "well you wouldn't do YOUR job if you didn't have to either" but like, checkout work IS hella exploitative??? Most work IS hella bullshit that only exists to feed the capitalist machine. I DO fight for a world where work is a choice. I understand why The Right would love onlyfans, but why is The Left lining up to defend it?

Sex work - especially things like onlyfans - is overwhelmingly done by the poor or as a way to escape poverty ("I was being paid shit in my previous job, now I can afford an apartment" is something I hear a lot). But in doing so it transfers all the risks to them, it's essentially turning sex work into the gig/hustle economy, isn't it? You end up on a zero hour contract with no union, health, benefit, maternity protection, in a job that can be hella dangerous and have serious emotional repercussions and requires huge emotional labour and/or disconnect and I don't really understand why we're just cheering this along?

I don't object on moral grounds. Sex is sex. Consenting adults do what you want. People are well within their moral and legal rights to choose to sell sex, (or the emotional labour that comes with it), or photos, or whatever they want - just like they are free to go work for target. I absolutely understand the need to - and support - decriminalisation of sex work, the need to make it safe and secure for sex workers, but I just can't see why ~the world at large~ sees huge numbers of young 18 year old women being herded and encouraged into joining Onlyfans - in several cases with people saying "can't wait for you to turn 18 so you can have an OF" so the patriarchy can pay £3-4 a month to see their tits and people cheer this along? One or two get rich, I'm sure, but who is getting REALLY rich? It's the old white men that own onlyfans and take a 20% cut, as always. It's the patriarchy working as it always has. Allowing one or two women to succeed while holding the rest down for exploitation. Except now it's mixing with the worst bits of 21st C capitalism, too. Surely all OnlyFans is is Uber for Sex work, using the gig economy to de-unionise and isolate workers, strip them of benefits, make them into independent contractors and profit off them?

Sure, it's a step up from kidnapping girls from Romania to have them do porn, but is that really the bar? Can we maybe just stop for a second and imagine a world where rich white men don't get richer off the emotional and physical labour of women? Where the other available work options aren't so shit that a zero-hour career with no employment protections, a limited lifespan, in a dangerous industry doesnt look like heaven in comparison? Sure, you can work for three years, sell your emotional labour, and pay for college. But why are we cheering that instead of asking why this has to happen in the first place? We're fiddling around the edges of the system, giving it a makeover, and rebadging it "female empowerment" instead of actually changing anything fundamental. Poor women sell sex. A few are allowed to break out. Men get to leer at naked women for pennies a year. Rich men get richer. Plus ça change. Not even to mention that because of the ~emotional~ connection that onlyfans gives beyond porn, we're embedding the idea that women are "money in, girlfriend out" machines. I know several girls that won't even *talk* to men in any situation without a minimum $50 fee. And apparently the fact we also have a crisis of men so lonely they're willing to pay this isn't a problem either? Where's our luxury communism dreams bitches?

Bitches, I trust you. What am I missing?

I don’t think you’re a bigoted old fool. Nor a prude! I think you’re incredibly enlightened about the dangers of unfettered capitalism and labor exploitation.

Almost all of the issues you highlight about exploitative sex work can be said about exploitative labor in any industry. Poor people taking shitty jobs that don’t pay enough and enrich capitalist, patriarchal corporate overlords? That happens all over the world in industries from meat packing to clothing sweat shops to, yes, sex work. The exploitation of a person’s body for labor is an ethical stain on our culture at large. It’s why we’re so in favor of labor rights advances including a higher minimum wage, unions, and humane work environments. 

Raising the Minimum Wage Would Make Our Lives Better 

Are Unions Good or Bad? 

Coronavirus Reveals America’s Pre-existing Conditions, Part 1: Healthcare, Housing, and Labor Rights 

Sex work is not unique in that it opens desperate and poor people up to labor exploitation. It’s not even uniquely dangerous to the bodies of workers--John Oliver did a bit on the US meat packing industry recently that made me faint with body horror. 

So we agree that labor exploitation is bad. And it’s something that we should work towards ending in every industry. But I can see why some people would view exploitative sex work to be a different kind of bad. Because sex is sensitive! It can be used to punish and hurt. See revenge porn and the way synonyms for “sex worker” are stigmatized and used as insults throughout society. 

Now, a few clarifications. When I refer to sex work, I’m not just talking about cam work on OnlyFans. There are lots of other outlets for many different kinds of sex work. And I’m also not just talking about women sex workers. People of all gender identities and sexualities do sex work, and we should advocate for fair labor practices and safety for all of them. I am firmly pro- decriminalizing sex work so that the industry can be made safe, regulated, and destigmatized in an effort to reduce exploitation. I want sex workers to have the power of collective bargaining! I want them to be protected by law enforcement and our justice system, instead of targeted by it! I want them to pay taxes and have the privileges associated with all tax paying workers! I want them to have the power and protection of a regulatory industry that will purge abusive and violent clients from their field!

I also disagree with the characterization that choosing sex work freely, even out of desperation, is a “step up from kidnapping a girl from Romania to have them do porn.” Human trafficking is not sex work. It’s slavery and torture. Even when the choice is between making $7.25 an hour working at WalMart and making $7.25 as a cam girl, there’s still a choice involved, even if it’s a shitty one. There’s consent. Trafficking victims have no choice, no consent, only violence. 

I honestly don’t want to start a debate here. We’re all on the same page that labor exploitation is bad. So I’ll just end with this: not all sex work is inherently exploitative. Which I guess is your real question!

I’ve mentioned before that I have friends who are former sex workers. Specifically strippers and a specialty dominatrix. As with any job, they had their ups and downs, their good nights and bad nights. But they all agree that they freely chose the work not out of desperation or a lack of other options. And they even enjoyed the work in some cases. If someone prefers sex work, thrives in giving that emotional labor to others, I’m not going to judge and I’m certainly not going to tell them they’re being exploited. It would frankly be insulting, condescending, to tell someone that their choice of work (when it truly is a choice) is bad for them. 

It’s a fine line, but the line does exist. Sex work CAN BE exploitative. But it is not inherently exploitative, as far as I’m concerned. 

[mythiccheroacademia]

My Vow to You

A/N: Dragon King!Bakugo has my heart and so I wrote a little something based off a dream I had awhile ago. I like writing Bakugo with a spouse that’s just as much of a hardass as he is :’) I’m not sure if I’ll make a part two. This could stand alone butttt we’ll see. 

Important things to note: ~*Aurea: It means golden in Latin. This is your family name that is used in public. Even though you’re married to Bakugo, I made it tradition that you keep your last name for distincition purposes, but you’re a Bakugo when I addressed elswhere. That’s based off something from my own culture. Also, it’d be kind of weird if Bakugo said his own name lmao. You’ll get it as you read.  ~*You and Bakugo have dragon-like traits? Idk man. I just thought the red eyes and fangs added flare.

Word Count: 1.6k Pairing: Bakugo x Fem!Reader Warnings: blood, injury, death, there’s a severed head in there but the description isn’t gory, cursing

All Characters are 18+

My Vow to You:

You remembered the day you were wedded to your husband. It was one of the most treasured days between both the Crimson and Golden Tribes. A day so powerful and glorious in meaning that it was named the Holy Matrimony of the era.

That day, two of the most powerful tribes in the nation joined in hand to rule. Their people prospered, their land grew rich, their army went by the hundreds, and best of all, this would happen out of true love.

There was no contract—no arrangement. The only reason the two tribes had encountered was to trade. When you and Katsuki had first met during the primary meeting, the next day, he brought you his most precious stone to begin courting. From then on, it was like destiny took ahold of the reigns. At the wedding, you wore it proudly upon the crest of your head.

The dress, the decorations, and the gifts were all beautiful, but nothing could compare to the sight of your groom. When the warriors parted, revealing his path to the alter, you almost forgot how to walk.

Matching ceremonial tattoos were painted across his bare arms and chest. He stood tall under the weight of precious stones of ruby and gold and led the length of his white fur coat across the floor. And despite his heavenly appearance, his crimson eyes, full of love, regard, and dignity were what led your feet to stand before him.

Katsuki was as gorgeous as he was powerful. There was a moment of reverie between the two of you before you both kneeled, bowing your heads when the past Kings and Queens walked to the alter.

You remembered when you shared your vows, words of strength to affirm the sacred bond the two of you would never break. When you both spoke, each word was a threaded swear into the other’s heart. From that moment, you were not two, but one. You were no longer just a couple, but a union. Once the religious leaders had said their prayer, you two shared a kiss, anointing the other with the love you were ready to boundlessly give.  

That promise was seared into your heart. You would act on it every second you were married.

So, even as your guards worriedly rushed you into the infirmary, blood dripping from the open wounds on your body, you wickedly grinned in triumph. No one would be able to take this away from you.

Not that foreign king. Not his weak ass army. Not your worried parents.

And certainly not your raging husband.

“What the hell were you thinking? Damn it, Aurea*! You could’ve been killed!” he roared.

Honestly, he looked worse for wear. If it wasn’t the dark circles underneath his eyes, it was the obvious stiffness in his neck. Apparently, he had been at your bedside every minute during your three-day coma. He was worried to say the least. Bless his heart.

You tried to lighten the mood with a smile. “Aww, you do care. How kind of you, my beau~”

Evidently, the joke wasn’t appreciated. Katsuki’s face soured into an expression only a mother could love. His eye twitched and the guards winced.

“You want me to put you back in your shitty coma?”

“Bakugo, I’m fine,” you sighed, relenting to the seriousness of the situation. “I know you’re worried, but I made it out. I’m here, aren’t I?”

“That’s beside the point!” he snapped. Perhaps you wouldn’t have felt so attacked if it weren’t for the harsh glare he gave you. “I told you the Black Fleet was dangerous and yet you still acted foolishly! If Kirishima hadn’t found you—“

“I endangered no one—“

“No one but yourself, and that’s what you fail to understand!”

Despite your conscious telling you to calm down, his scolding got the better of you. And your temper rose like an ugly beast. “And if it were for the safety of you and any one of our people, I’d do it again; because when they threatened to put your head on a platter, it was personal! I won’t be scolded like a child for doing my duties as Queen!”

In better circumstances, Bakugo would’ve treaded lightly. He would’ve empathized with your sentiment. However, he had done nothing but stare at your bloody bandages and bruises for the past three days and his patience with just about everything ran thin.

“And I’m doing mine as King! If I tell you to stay away, what I fucking say goes!”

“I don’t know what kind of women you dealt with before me, but if you think that you can just order me around like some bitch, you’ve chosen the wrong woman to marry,” you seethed.

Bakugo’s furious scream thundered the hall and the guards jumped as his fist hit the wall. “ARGH! FUCK Y/N! WHY CAN’T YOU JUST LISTEN TO ME!?”

The use of your personal name in the presence of guards made you reel. Now he was just being disrespectful.

“YOU ARE NOT MY MASTER!” you shouted.

His eyes glowed with rage as he grew in size, a feat that would’ve sent anyone running. “NO, BUT I AM YOUR HUSBAND!” he boomed.

Your eyes turned to blood and fangs shot out from your lips as you roared, “AND I AM YOUR WIFE!”

Katsuki tried to subdue you with an intimidating growl, abnormally large canines bared towards you. However, you only matched it with your own. There was an intense moment between you two as your energies nearly bubbled over. However, one of the nurses at your bedside reminded you of your injuries.

“Please, my queen. If you’re not careful, you could reopen your wounds,” they softly spoke.

The gentle hand on your abdomen reminded you of the ache. You winced and sighed away the sizzling anger as you were led back into the comfort of the cot. The weight of your husband’s glare fell upon you for a moment more before he frustratingly blew out of his nose and turned on his heel, out the door.

Once the door slammed shut, you rolled your eyes. If he wanted to throw a tantrum, then so be it.

“Ungrateful brat,” you muttered. Just then, a sharp pain shot up your leg from one of the nurses changing your bandages. “Ow!”

They shrunk back and gave you a shy smile. “My apologies, your highness,” they giggled.

Despite your sour attitude, you just huffed a laugh from your nostrils. “Careful there,” you sighed. They ducked their head again in slight embarrassment and went back to tending to your wound with a softer hand.

The silence gently settled in the air as the atmosphere returned to its once lax state. When the nurses had finished patching you up and left you and the guards stationed in your room, you found yourself finally able to process the harsh exchange of words between you and your husband.

You couldn’t believe he would just order you around like that! Talking to you as if he didn’t know the type of woman he had been married to for the last five years. And to use your first name in the presence of non-family members? Mitsuki would have his head if she knew!

Regardless of that, you thought back to when you two truly lost your cool and frowned. You hated acting out of character, especially in front of a crowd, but you couldn’t help it. His words were an insult to your pride and abilities.

He was being ridiculous. You were the Dragon King and Queen, damn it. The fiercest rulers the earth would know, governing over two tribes with armies that sent shivers down their enemy’s spines at the mention of your name. And just as their people stood strong, their leaders were stronger, and that meant protecting their honors to no bounds.  

When the enemy sent your kingdom a severed head of a deceased warrior as a threat to have Bakugo’s next, there was nothing left to be said. You saw your chance to humble your foe and took it. And you succeeded. That should’ve garnered celebration, not a dispute.

You carefully turned on your side and noted your crown with the lone jewel he gifted you before you courted. Memories of your spoken vows ran across your mind and reinforced the stubbornness in your heart. You remembered the way his eyes, brighter than any precious stone, glowed with pride and love as he swore his life over to protect you by any means necessary.

You could still feel the warm squeeze he gave your hands when you repeated those same words back to him.

So if it was an apology he wanted, then tough luck. You wouldn’t apologize for defending his honor.

Not when you knew he’d do the same for you.

[rosethornewrites]

I posted 18,056 times in 2021

414 posts created (2%)

17642 posts reblogged (98%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 42.6 posts.

I added 59,073 tags in 2021

#the untamed - 9854 posts

#mo dao zu shi - 9744 posts

#miraculous ladybug - 7635 posts

#miraculous art - 7366 posts

#wei wuxian - 6282 posts

#lan zhan - 5363 posts

#untamed art - 4904 posts

#marinette dupain cheng - 2960 posts

#adrien agreste - 2541 posts

#chat noir - 2424 posts

Longest Tag: 69 characters

#but maybe i'll find someone i'm interested in eventually sexually idk

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Nie Huaisang, as he’s bowing and glaring at Jin Guangyao behind his hands...

It’s bad enough you killed dage, but now I have to be sect leader, which as you know I am far too indolent to be bothered with. Joke’s on you, cuz I’m gonna make you run the sect by crying and being generally obnoxious at the most inconvenient times for the next decade, and I will use all the time I am not spending on being sect leader to construct and carry out a plan to destroy your reputation, and then you will die in disgrace. Bitch, you ain’t seen petty like me.

130 notes • Posted 2021-02-17 03:43:27 GMT

#4

Seven Sentences Game

Rules: post the last 7 sentences you wrote and tag 7 people

Tagged by @merinnan

From the next chapter of “the thread may stretch or tangle but it will never break.”

“I think you will agree with me that A-Xian deserves a real wedding, at Lotus Pier, as soon as it is possible.”

The image of Wei Ying sitting on a bed in Nightless City in his red underrobes, the joy of his waking mixing with the wish they were wedding robes… that Jiang Yanli wants to ensure they receive that, that their union can be celebrated, if belatedly, in the way Wei Ying deserves to be honored. 

“Yes,” he says softly. “I agree.”

She nods, clearly pleased.

“It will happen, A-Zhan; I’ll make sure of it.”

Lan Wangji has absolutely no doubt she will. 

Tagging: @ao3bronte, @alexseanchai, @kdramama, @hamsternamedmarinette, @chrissysky, @norakwami, @fix-it-luciano

187 notes • Posted 2021-05-04 13:57:42 GMT

#3

Sect Leader Ouyang and Yao: [loudly talk shit about Wei Wuxian at a discussion conference]

Lan Wangji: [silent anger]

Ouyang Zizhen: [whispers] Please don’t ruin my sect.

Lan Sizhui: Remember, Zizhen is sect heir.

Lan Jingyi: Ruin the Yao sect instead, Hanguang-Jun!

Lan Sizhui: [sips his tea]

Jin Ling: You’re not gonna cite a rule?

Lan Sizhui: No one would notice if the Yao sect was ruined.

Lan Wangji: Mm.

Lan Jingyi: Let me make popcorn first.

Chief Cultivator Petty!Ji and the ducklings he has led to the Petty Side.

Also, I wrote fic about this.

285 notes • Posted 2021-04-26 23:09:48 GMT

#2

If you want to know how bad it is…

I’ve not been shy about the fact that I’m a professor. I work in a red state that basically has no more hospital beds because people are morons.

This week, a colleague received an email in which a student self-identified as having tested positive for Covid… and then showed up for class anyway, masked, but coughing all over.

The colleague is now awaiting word from the Dean of Students on what to do, and has a child too young to be vaccinated.

A high school teacher at a school adjacent to the high school I graduated from (in a blue state) died of Covid yesterday. They were only a year older than me. When I commented that schools should go remote, I was ridiculed because the teacher contracted it during the summer and lingered in a coma for two months before dying.

Another friend works at a district in Texas—you know, the state where the governor threatened to withdraw funding if districts/schools issued a mask mandate. The teachers in their district pressured administration to institute one. The next day a judge ruled they had to drop it or lose funding.

People are sending their kids to school knowing they have it. A teacher, unvaccinated with Covid symptoms, took their mask off to read a story to their elementary school class and infected nearly all of them. Something like 5600 students in the Chicago Public School system have been quarantined in the first two weeks of class.

This is the reality we live in. I’m an educator and I’m terrified. I love my students, and I love teaching face to face, but most of them, if they’re paying attention, are fucking terrified.

We don’t think we’ll go remote unless someone dies, if then.

For goodness sake, get vaccinated and wear a fucking mask, and stay home and quarantine if you have possible symptoms.

357 notes • Posted 2021-09-15 23:56:32 GMT

#1

This may come as an absolute fucking shock to some people, but...

You can like all the characters in Miraculous Ladybug.

You don’t have to choose. If you like Marinette, you don’t have to hate Adrien, and vice versa. If you like Kagami, you don’t have to hate Marinette. If you like Luka, you don’t have to hate Adrien.

Like, you don’t have to salt characters to prove you like other characters.

Blows your fucking mind, right?

406 notes • Posted 2021-05-02 03:05:52 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[deafwestnewsies]

the most dangerous woman in new york

To be the best- that’s all he wanted. To help others, that’s all she needed. 

hades x persephone, orpheus x eurydice 

read on my ao3!

The room was so fucking fancy for no reason. Plush, green velvet couches with golden lining and carved feet, chests made of real pine and polished so much that it shone under the dim glow of the lamps swinging above them. She noticed that, just like she noticed everything else, that they all swung above their heads to the same gentle beat, an underground chant that no one could hear. Her head eventually matched the even sway of the song and helped her lose herself in the thoughts that swirled in her head, thick as the cigar smoke lazily pouring from the men at the doorways. Should they even be smoking? Seems like men of this stature should want to stay alert at all times- especially when they have New York’s most dangerous woman sitting right in front of them. Of course, they were employed by the city’s most dangerous man. They were probably pretty fearsome themselves. 

Eurydice, only Eurydice, no last name, was something of a legend around the streets of the lowly and working class. She had a habit of appearing out of thin air, walking into a union meeting unannounced, and spinning her magic tales of victory and justice that left her audiences enraptured. No one really knew where she came from or where she went, only that she was the best in town if you wanted someone to organize your strike- the truly lucky ones were simply picked by her, no pleading necessary. Now she sat perched on the edge of a plush green couch, heavy overcoat and dark circles under her eyes emphasizing the scrappy look that made her so effective on the streets. No one wanted to argue with the girl who was one hundred pounds soaking wet, demanding the rights of service workers in an even, calm voice. 

She was intercepted outside of a deli where she was buying a can of lemonade when a group of men asked her to get inside of a limo. After pouring the drink on one of the men’s expensive looking shoes and calling them “crazy sons of bitches,” they picked her up and placed her inside, ignoring her suddenly violent protests. It was a comical image, she was sure, her sitting with her arms crossed and shoulders raised high in between two men that looked straight out of the president’s secret service, black suits and all. They wouldn’t answer any of her many, many questions, and eventually the driver just turned up the radio to cover her shrill voice. 

Now inside, it was very evident to her where she was. It was plastered everywhere, not to mention decorating all of the flower bowls and men’s suit jacket lapels. A single red carnation etched into the wood of the wall, groups of them on the coffee table in a crystal vase. His name was Hades, only Hades, no last name. 

Mr. Hades was a mighty king, and he was always making some mighty big deals. 

Eurydice did not understand what he wanted from her. They did not run the same circles, Eurydice did honest work for people who deserved honest reward, and Hades was a thief, stealing from businesses that lived in fear of the other mobs in town. Hades capitalized upon their fear, and Eurydice used it to everyone else’s advantage. 

She ran through a list of things she had done recently- money she had taken from organizations, contracts she refused to sign, people she had done business with. If Hades had arguments with any of them, she could be in really hot water, and she couldn’t afford that right now. There was an apartment contract waiting to be signed and her landlord had made it very clear- he could ignore her line of work as long as she was not in trouble with the law. Eurydice had a feeling this would be enough for him to withdraw on his end of the lease, and she needed a more permanent place to stay. A home.

So there was nothing that she could think of in the moment, no one with any shady deals, when a man opened the door. “Eurydice?” He questioned, and she was on her feet in a flash. Simply gesturing her inside of the office doors, oak paneling with the same red flower carving, Eurydice noticed that he did not follow her into the room. 

Almost comically, a man sat in a high back chair spun to face the wall, and Eurydice expected him to turn around holding an evil white cat and a maniacal grin. When he made no movement at all, another man coughed slightly into a handkerchief, causing Eurydice to jump. This man sat tucked away in a corner, perched gently on a chair in a gray silk suit. He was old, gray hair neatly arranged in an afro on his head, wrinkles framing his dark skin, but old in a dignified way. In a way that Eurydice, although she knew it, felt it in her bones that she would not grow old, wanted to seem when people would look at her and think “Hmm. She is old.” He was the only other person in the room, and did not offer an explanation, just simply cleared his throat once more. “Hades, do not keep the girl waiting. You are here for her.” 

“Eurydice.” His slow drawl crept up her spine. “Thank you for joining me.” 

“Hades.”

He finally turned in his ridiculous chair. “I’ve heard quite a bit about you, young lady.” She bit her tongue and held back the insults. She hated being called young lady, woman, or girl. “Your work with the employees over at The World- most impressive. There are some men who will talk higher of you than their poker buddies, and I would consider than quite an accomplishment.” 

“Lee wasn’t hiring any woman on the investigative staff and because of that, their numbers were down. It’s simple economics, I don’t think I deserve any praise for that job.” The heat in her cheeks told her everything that she needed to know, she was blushing. Modesty had always been a difficult task. 

Another woman emerged from the shadows of the room, draped in brocaded green silk and black buckle shoes. Her low, gravelly chuckle filled the room as she stepped into the light. “It took more than that, don’t undermine yourself. Lee’s a stubborn son-of-a-bitch.” 

“Persephone-” Both men chastised her in unison. 

“Am I wrong?” She lazily held up a cigarette, smoking on the end like a loaded gun. 

“You’re not-” Eurydice spoke quickly. “He was terrible. Nearly took my left hand in exchange for the newest batch of female truck drivers.” 

Persephone draped herself across Hades’ lap. “Stubborn son-of-a-bitch. A lady knows.” Eurydice felt warm under the woman’s heavy gaze and wink, delivered directly from her husband’s lap. Persephone Ceres, a statuesque Greek woman with a face that looked drawn from a heavy hand, all sharp lines and smudged edges. She was famous for simply being her husband’s wife, a rich broad who came through city attractions and slept with all of the workers, men and women alike, and then returned home to her adoring husband who held a soft spot for only her. If Eurydice was nervous around Hades, she was downright terrified of Persephone. 

Hades cleared his throat, dropping his crossed knee to create a more comfortable spot for his wife. “We’ve brought you here for a very specific issue- one that’s proved to be quite challenging for us.” She bit back the snark that lived on her tongue, what’s too challenging for the almighty Hades? “I’m sure you’re aware of the Calliope Theater?” 

“Ye-e-es.” The hesitation in her voice was more than apparent. 

“There’s a strike being held by the musicians. They can’t perform without the orchestra and they’re also under our… special protection plan. Money, albeit from a theatre troupe, is still money, and it's as good as any in my eyes.” 

Eurydice scoffed. “Hire more musicians. I work with pre-existing unions, not the merry band of fools.” 

The words died in her throat when Hades’ gaze turned to ice and fire, locking onto her. A quiet sniffle from the corner reminded her of the second man, still un-introduced, and at least there would be witnesses to her murder. Although she had a feeling that these folks wouldn’t go running to the cops- hell, she wouldn’t either. She’d die a true strike worker’s death. 

“But I could always check it out.” Her chicken-shit soul winced as she conceded, but she was halfway through a really good book and didn’t want to be the character that died before the end came. 

“Delightful.” There was no delight in this man’s voice. He clapped his hands together. “Let’s talk business.” 

&&&

The older man’s name was Hermes Mercurius, “A conciliate of sorts,” he had chuckled. He wore blue, wing-tipped shoes that Eurydice couldn’t help but privately admire. After Hades had laid out the details of the situation in front of her, Eurydice saw the clear hole in his original problem.

“They just want stability,” she whispered, tracing her finger across the names of the orchestration line-up. 

“Pardon?” His voice boomed down her back. 

Her throat was cleared, a frightened squeak disguised by a cough. “Stability,” she offered. “They aren’t hired for every single production. Technically the management isn’t breaking any laws, the contract they’re under is about as shitty as every loading dock agreement, but that’s your answer. If your men hired them more often, there wouldn’t even be a strike to worry about.” She spread her fingers over the invisible map on the table, her mind filling in all the gaps. “Contracts happen to be my specialty. If you send me, I can fix your problem.” 

So Eurydice walked alongside Hermes, both of them taking the stroll over to Broadway and 4th, the block home to the Calliope Theater. She had tried to opt for the subway, but Hermes gently pulled her elbow away from the stairs and nodded towards the busy sidewalks. “I’m afraid I don’t take the subway,” he sniffed. “My nose is so temperamental.” Who the hell lives in New York and can’t take the subway? She grumbled in her head. And of course, in keeping with this bizarre expedition, she held her tongue. 

Thankfully the walk was short and the day was long, so the pair arrived with time to spare. Hermes took a moment to adjust his suit jacket (they were an awfully strange pairing to be seen in public together) and then walked through the arched doorway, Eurydice trailing hesitantly behind him. While she was seen as a warrior of the people, she was simply another loud mouthed girl with a passion for whatever issue was thrown in her lap. The jobs she received were usually working in labor-heavy areas, shipping docks and construction sites. This theater, while in need of a good dusting, was much fancier than what she usually got to work in. 

“Mr. Orpheus, I presume?” Hermes walked towards a group of people gathered together, a pile of instrument cases littering their feet. A tall, skinny boy with a sweep of dusty blonde hair looked up at the mention of his name, and leapt to his feet. He held out his hand, trembling only slightly, and Eurydice was charmed by the red bandana knotted around his neck. She knew what that symbol meant, she had adorned herself with the fabric more than once before, but she wouldn’t out a fellow resistance member in front of one of Hades’ men. They were both here to do a job, not talk politics and run the risk of getting killed. “This is Eurydice. She’ll be negotiating the contract between your group and the Fate sisters.” 

The boy raised an eyebrow. “We need to hear the terms before we sign anything. That’s why we wouldn’t do business with you in the first place, Hermes.” 

“You’d be the on-site orchestrations for every show, with the exception of travelling groups.” Eurydice blurted out. Orpheus’s curious eyebrow dropped and Hermes’ raised, both looking expectantly at her. “If... everything works out.” She was blushing. Damn. 

Orpheus scratched the back of his neck abashedly. “That sounds… really good. Let me introduce you to the team.” 

After pleasantries were exchanged, the group gathered around a small table where both Eurydice and Orpheus were sat. She knew that her contract she had drawn up was popular among the musicians by the nodding and jostling happening behind her, but she kept her eyes locked on the leader. If he found even one flaw the entire deal could be called off, and she hadn’t had dinner in days. Hades’ paycheck could buy her a damn steak if she wanted it. 

“Everything looks in order, no?” Hermes chimed in from the corner. 

“Yes.” Orpheus muttered under his breath, skimming the document one more time. He cleared his throat finally. “We’ll sign, but you also have to go through the old lady Fates. And they won’t be as easy as I am.”

Cocking an eyebrow, feeling much more relaxed, Eurydice leaned back in her chair. “Easy?” Now his face was stained red and Eurydice made a mental note to laugh later on. “We’ll take these to the Fates and Hermes here will contact you further about what will happen next. Thank you for your time, folks.” 

Hermes was already making his way towards the door when Orpheus called after her. “Eurydice? Can I talk to you for a second?” 

&&&

Ultimately she was very grateful for the fact that Hermes was a quiet man, because he didn’t ask her what the boy had to say to her on the walk back. She might’ve been a public speaker by trade, but she was a terrible liar and knew she would immediately blow the entire operation- the Resistance, that is. 

Anyone who understood what it was like to struggle in a city such as theirs understood what the Resistance was. A mass organization committing acts of disarray that negatively affected the larger companies and businesses, most of whom employed the very members. A modern day weapon of the weak attack, Eurydice had been involved since she was a teenager. Her specialty was rumors, spreading them like nasty vines across the city until they twisted around someone’s neck and left them worse then dead, ruined. As she travelled from union to union, her vicious and carefully placed words about a former boss, a union leader with no morals, a landlord only after your money, and suddenly people distrusted them with such a fervor they could go out of business. Eurydice was a valuable cog in this organization’s machine, and it seemed as if Orpheus had recognized her. 

“What are you doing?” He had asked, pulling on her hand forcefully and tugging her behind a corner. Once released, that same hand curled into a fist that she was prepared to throw. 

“What the hell do you mean?” She shot back. 

“Do the words ‘It sounds like drumming’ mean nothing to you?” 

Eurydice inhaled sharply, immediately looking behind her for Hermes. “Are you crazy? Not here!” 

There was a common identifier between members of the Resistance. One would ask ‘What’s that sound?’ and if the other replied with ‘It sounds like drumming,’ they knew that they were in safe company. So those words meant a great deal to her, especially in a moment where they could be killed for knowing them. 

“Why are you working with Hades? Just last month you were saying that he doesn’t-” 

She was this close to slapping a hand over his idiotic mouth. “I know what I said.” Eurydice hissed. “He didn’t exactly give me a choice. And what does it matter, you’re getting a good deal out of this- and wait a minute, you work somewhere under his protection!” Her eyes danced with fire, angry that this boy would accuse her of being a traitor when he was close to being one himself. 

“Work where you can get it,” he replied. “Being a musician doesn’t exactly equate to a strike leader.” 

Fighting the urge to roll her eyes, she drew her coat around her shoulders tighter. “Well, if you’re done yelling at me, I have to go. Hermes will get suspicious.” 

“I wasn’t yelling. I’m just making sure you’re safe. You… You are, right? Safe?” Orpheus’s face softened, his hands fiddling together. He looked bashful all of a sudden, embarrassed about the entire situation. 

“For the time being. If you keep throwing the damn words around though, I may not be.” She turned on her heel before stilling herself for a second. “If I don’t turn back up, you’ll tell them I was with Hades, won’t you?” Before she could hear his confirmation, Eurydice had walked away. 

The interaction kept playing back in her head. She was astonished that he had recognized her, that he had come up to her like that and so confidently talked about the most secret organization in the city. He was bold, bolder than most, and Eurydice couldn’t decide whether she admired it or found it stupid enough to get him killed. Before she had decided, they were back in front of the homely-looking restaurant entitled “Poseidon's Plate.” Inside were a few booths and a very empty looking register, but behind the kitchen doors was the offices of Hades and company, and Hermes and Eurydice found themselves once again in the lap of luxury. 

Hermes went to knock on the french-breasted door when it swung open, Persephone’s calculating smile waiting on the other side. “We’ve been waiting.” She purred, the sound making Eurydice shiver as she passed through the doors. Hades had forgone the dramatics and now sat plainly in his chair, scribbling down something in a handsome leather bound notebook. 

“Eurydice. Sit.” She followed his orders without a second thought, once again captured by his presence and the mild fear of being murdered. She had heard nasty rumors about the way he took care of his enemies. “So the contract business went well.” 

“Yes.” Her mouth was a desert. 

“Very good. I’m glad we could count on you.” He was still writing things down, almost at a worrisome pace. Persephone clucked her tongue from the corner, where she was perched on the arm of a red brocade couch. “We have one more thing to discuss. How long have you been involved with the Resistance?” 

If what she had felt before was fear, this was a new type of terror, one that seized her entire body and wiped her mind blank. The most dangerous woman in New York City now sat as the most vulnerable person in the world. She managed a few sputters, a weak denial, but Hades waved away her excuses. “I don’t like beating around the bush. We’re aware of your involvement with the group, and this is why you were chosen for this specific assignment. You’re smart, Eurydice. Far too smart to be working for those silly children who think spreading lies and stealing will ever make a change in the way this city is run. If you want to do something, to be something Eurydice,” He finally looked up from the notebook. Their eyes caught in a piercing gaze- one that Eurydice couldn’t help but be enraptured by. “I have a proposition for you. If you choose to accept, of course.” 

hello i haven’t written something for a musical in a long long while but i am back! from outer space! just walked in to find you here with that sad look upon your face i should’ve changed that stupid i should’ve thrown away the key

[cathcrtiic]

starter for @sinsoakedsaints​

the wedding had been so pretty and picturesque, that had anna been slightly less of a stone hearted bitch she might have cried. unfortunately, she’d been to enough third, fourth and fifth marriages to have a slightly bitter taste in her mouth even at the sweetest of matrimonial unions. her best friend had been radiant, glowing unashamedly in the love of her new husband. that was the last one of the group now, other than anna herself, off in a legally binding monogamous contract. if she kept spouting off bitter phrases about the concept in her head, she’d be able to ignore that nagging bit of her brain that kind of wanted a bit of the pie too. finally though, the reception ( and wine ) began. anna was already drinking her second glass of champagne, having taken her friend’s advice of ‘drink it, it’s free’ very seriously. there had been multiple other pieces of advice about the wedding that anna had had drilled in to her in the lead up; stay away from uncle ron, don’t fuck the best man, make sure you’re available when i need to pee, don’t start talking politics with my mum... eh. she’d follow most of them. she’d found herself stood to the afore mentioned best man as the couple cut the cake and took a sip from her glass before opening conversation with, “which one of them do you reckon is going to get more drunk? my bet’s on tom - lily is way more likely to crash and fall asleep.” 

[scrumptiousalpacadeer]

A Note on the ‘F’ Word - (Forgiveness is Willy Wonka)

I’ve come to think that forgiveness is a bit like the scene in the original Charlie and the Chocolate Factory film where Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory is opened to the public after years of secrecy. In this classic scene, the crowds are gathered at the entrance of this most magical of places - a place that grandparents told their grandchildren of at bedtime in hushed tones; a place of flowing nectar-chocolate and sweets that burns like heaven in our hero Charlie’s imagination; a place they had never truly dared to believe in but dreamed of many times; a place run apparently run by some weirdo eccentric that the cynical masses had given up on long ago. 

That is until five Golden Tickets are sent out into the world...Willy Wonka is opening his factory again.

In the scene, Gene Wilder approaches the eager crowd, leaning and limping heavily with his cane along a red carpet; a look of grim severity on his face. The whole falls silent; all that is heard are the regular steps of Wonka and the taps of his cane. What the hell? This is not what anyone is expecting; this God-like man of mystery and invention  a miserable invalid? The opening of the Chocolate Factory is meant to be an epic event; the whole world is watching.. 

Wilder suddenly stops walking right next to his baffled fans and the world stops, holds its breath; locked in Wonka’s charismatic spell. Then something very weird happens; he begins to topple forward away from his cane - as if he’s had a stroke, or has suddenly died or fainted.... the crowd gasp, utterly horrified. Its the end of everything and it was meant to be the beginning. 

And then....well, Willy Wonka does a perfect forward roll and springs up beaming from ear to ear: it was all a façade of ill-health; a silly joke. The crowd goes wild with relief and joy and the factory’s golden gates open for the day, signalling a new era. 

 The other day I had a phone call out of the blue from an old friend; a friend I hadn’t seen or heard from for eight years. Rahul; my party hard philosopher; he who introduced me to the basics of meditation in my student digs 1996, whom I’d shared hundreds of fags with and laughed and danced hard with at house/techno nights ‘down the Student Union in my final year at London University, 1997. Rahul who I’d watched Sideways with and had half a lager with when I was seven months pregnant. Rahul who often got so insanely drunk and gobby at a party that no-one knew what to do with him. Rahul, wild man of peace; loose canon. Rahul who years became a Maths teacher as I became an English teacher. 

I very nearly didn’t answer the phone because I didn’t recognise the number, but I was in a care-free mood, listening to Radio 3 in the kitchen (how times have changed since 1997), so I picked up. 

One of the first words I said to him was ‘sorry’. ‘Sorry, Rahul!’ - It was weird because I’d been thinking of getting in touch with him for a while to ask his forgiveness. I hoped for an opportunity to say sorry to him for being such a crap friend; for taking him for granted; for being a selfish shit-bag; for not answering his calls, for the years of silence; for draining his resources then abandoning him when I found new pastures. I needed to say thankyou to him for being there for me at times in need; times I’d been hollow in spirit and he’d stepped in, but I hadn’t grasped it at the time. 

“What do you mean? You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, “ he said. “this is how it works with you. Years go by.” That's the thing with forgiveness; it hurts. It pained me that he forgave me without a second’s thought when I knew full well I hadn’t played fair. One time, in our mid-twenties, Rahul had bought me a ticket to go and join him in Atlanta America where he was working in I.T. His generosity was always off the scale.

Since our last meeting Rahul had lost half of his family and was now an orphan. His younger sister had died from a ‘cancer thing’ he told me; his mother crossed the threshold in April this year after contracting Covid in hospital. Her death was a relief, he said. “She was so happy to get the virus; all she wanted was to join her two children.” Apparently there had been a cot death. Rahul was the only one left alive now. He was talking to me from his flat in Hounslow, looking out over the town. 

I had to steady myself on the windowsill as he told me how his world had imploded. I felt the disappearance of his world in my stomach; and a sudden revelation of the nature of our connection. I hadn’t realised it before, but Rahul and I were conjoined by our exiled status. He, more visibly - a boy of high Indian descent inhabiting a West London life of hedonism, doing the drugs and the booze but also somehow accepting an arranged marriage foretold in his stars - a marriage that ended in disaster...Me; a girl from a house of shame and smutty lies and buried criminality, trying to climb the ladder and be so gleaming white and impressive... We both knew how hard it was to play the game in this world; feeling all the time we could only exist outside it.  Perhaps that's why, back in the 1990s, filled with the possibilities of our lives - born out of joint as we were - , we could feel the beat so keenly and dance so crazily together. Rahul and I knew the art of getting wasted and causing trouble.

I enforced the point that I’d been a real bitch and I told him how and why and that he deserved better. I told him of my stark memory of his mother singing sweetly to my baby daughter in Summer 2012, distracting her, so that we could sit and chat in his garden.  I told him I lived in the country now; that so much had changed. “Are you comforted?” he asked. “Are you still Chrissy Woo?” It was always his nick-name for me - a nick-name I didn’t mind. “I don’t think I am,”  I said. “I couldn’t go on like that.” 

Did he know that my father had died...that I was an orphan too? Rahul and my father had met many times so I didn’t inform him of my father’s subtly racist jibe after he’d come over for fish and chips one time. I didn’t tell Rahul about my revelation that my father was, on one level, arguably, as far as I was concerned, often, a ball-less sack of shit (that’s a W.O.P.E. Whole Other Post Entirely - very much related to the ‘F’ word) Out mutual disappointment of our hopeless fathers was the subject of a much longer conversation.  

I think the thing that’s so frickin’ scary about forgiveness as I am just as the very beginnings of understanding it, is the sheer unknowability of the space that comes after it. For my part, all the resentments, angers, prejudices, judgements, pulsing hatreds at times, these were very loyal friends that I woke up with each day without even having the faintest idea I was doing so. Sure, they were ugly and they caused merry hell enough, but, well, at least I knew where I was. At least I was livin, and sometimes that's really hard to do. They were the furniture I manoeuvred around; the reliable chairs I sat in for comfort when I was never good enough; when I just couldn’t keep my head above water. What happens if I let that all go? What will I hold onto? If I know longer want to stab my father with a screw-driver in the manner I meant to stab the lawn today as a form of irrigation for my new grass seed (see previous post and the WOPE I referred to earlier is coming soon) what the fuck happens then? I will have absolutely no idea who I am. Everything has the potential to start looking like Wonka’s Oompa Loompa Land with giant toadstools and chocolate rivers and that’s just too much happiness for anyone, surely, to stomach. I will know that I don’t know anything, and I’ve spent my whole life pretending to know everything. Surely the space will swallow me up, won’t it? How on earth do you start something entirely new? 

There’s that terrifying moment of suspension before something new comes in - like Willy Wonka topping over his cane. There’s those seconds when, learning a new guitar chord, our fingers hover in space over the fret; the new contortions our fingers must make to strike a new sound feels so awkward; so wrong; the muscles tearing into a new shape.. There’s that burning second that we leap out in the dark, blind, towards the possibility of a new tune, we take a mad punt and see where our clumsy fingers land, risk making a new sound... Chances are first few times around we’re gonna fuck it up. It’s agony. Forgiveness feels to me, when it comes in, like a hard grounding grief, a thunderstorm of reluctantly received understanding that wipes out the old and invites me to the chocolate factory. And some days it leaves me entirely and I feel like I’m back in the dumb days again. 

But, and I’m riffing here, I think the answer partly has to do with a belief in change and a steady embracing of transformation; or at least a basic faint belief that it might just be possible. Cynics and miseries say ‘people don’t change,’ ‘things don’t change’, but this is of course undiluted horse-shit. People  transform utterly on a daily basis, all the time...One of the tricks, I’ve learnt, is to spend as large a proportion of time as possible with people who also believe in change and progress - a bit like stocking up on sunlight for those dark hours that must be spent with angel eaters - ( translation: rampant materialists/misery guts who refuse to believe in magic of any sort).

But oh the rewards; oh the sheer mad silly fun of Wonka’s gates opening and guzzling on that chocolate.. The ecstasy of hearing a G major chord sung from your own fair hand. 

I hope to meet up with Rahul this Summer - to see him in the flesh. No doubt it will be somewhat awkward; he’s forgiven me - in fact; he doesn’t see what the problem is. I’m a different person; I’ve had some chunks taken out and they’ve been filled in with wholly different colours. He’s a different person too; I made him promise me on the phone that he would look after himself - so he’ll be made of different colours too. How will we talk to each other? What words will we use? How will we navigate such unknown waters? How do you build something new with someone who looks the same, but is wholly other?..

I have no idea. I think we might just have to chuffing well make it up as we go along; trying to forgive ourselves for all the mistakes we make along the way. 

                                                    *    *   *   *   *

As a random and seemingly unrelated end-note - I went out for a walk down the lane to catch some air mid-blog. What with it being a Saturday night and me being a party fiend, I thought I would ‘pick up some litter’ for fun. I picked up a can of cider and a paper plate. Two cars zoomed past. It struck me that had the drivers of these vehicles happened to take a passing interest in the woman in a camel coat walking alone along the side of the road with an unsteady gate (wellington boots rub my right heel real bad!) and an empty can of cider in her hand they would surely been able to draw only one conclusion: PISS-HEAD!.. OLD SOAK! lonely Saturday night Sussex forty something alcoholic staggering along the lanes with empty cans of cider for company... 

Ah the deception of appearance...

And so, dear reader; Happy Saturday and judgeth not a lady who walketh with a can of cider down a country lane. She might just be a blogger on a break.

I hope you enter the chocolate factory of your choosing some time soon or are already there sampling the delights....

Love from Christine x

[bitchesgetriches]

(1 of 2!) Dearest Bitches, I'm looking for job advice or maybe a pep talk. I moved to LA a few years ago to work in film or photography. I landed an elusive full-time photo job for almost 2 years then got laid off. Since then, in between applying to 150 jobs and sending cold emails and LinkedIn requests, I've gotten PA jobs on TV shows, aka finally getting my foot in the door of the industry. I've enjoyed being part of the production, but HATED other aspects of the job. It’s all grunt work, goes

        ��  (2 of 2!) into overtime pretty much every day, and is a contract job so when it’s over I’m unemployed again. If I could move up to a higher position, I could join a union, yay! But I don’t know how long that would take and if that’s what I want to do. These are jobs where you don’t really have a life, and I’m not about that. But this feels like it’s the only opportunity that’s knocking, so it feels wrong to not seize it, and I don’t know if I’m just psyching myself out. Any thoughts? Thank you!!             

Kitten, you need to find yourself a crystal ball to see into the future. Find a more experienced film/photography professional and invite them out to coffee to discuss your career. Tell them what’s bugging you, and ask them questions about a) how to move up in the industry, and b) if things will be more bearable once you move up.

They’ve been through it, so they’re in the best position to tell you what to expect and how to get ahead.

But be warned: they might be just as miserable as you, if not more so. Be prepared for them to discourage you or otherwise express regret. Just weigh what they tell you against your own goals and expectations, and make a decision from there: should you stay or should you go?

If you do decide to switch career tracks... don’t feel bad about it. Yes, it has taken a lot of blood, sweat, and tears to get where you are. But quitting this industry and moving on to something else isn’t “wrong” or a waste. Look up the Sunk Cost Fallacy to absolve you of any guilt you might have for moving on if that’s what you decide to do.

Life is long, kitten. You have plenty of time to course correct.

Ask the Bitches: Is It Too Late to Get My Financial Shit Together? 

Ask the Bitches: What the Hell Else Can I Do to Get a Job? 

High School Students Have No Way of Knowing What Career to Choose. Why Do We Make Them Do It Anyway? 

The Actually Helpful, Nuanced, Non-Bullshit Way to Choose a Future Career

[bright-haired-teacher]

i legit feel like an island right now. depression below the cut

i may have mentioned this (may not have, idk) but my 8th grade team is me and two new people - both of the people on my team last year left for other schools. which, i know was for their own opportunity, but it didn’t put me in a good headspace from the start. 

but the two new people are afraid to make waves so they’re not standing up to this. and so i look like the Difficult One if i show even the slightest bit of dissent. but when they talk to me away from the influence of the admin, they tell me they feel the same way! yet if i bring this up i’m sure i’ll be thrown under the bus. because honestly it feels like i’m the targeted one simply because i’m resistant to being told i must change what i was doing, what i already know works. 

and who can i talk to about this? these walls have ears, and i can’t trust anyone. i can’t talk to the principal, as he’s pushing this. the AP - same thing. the literacy coach? oh god she is the biggest fucking shill i’ve ever met and she stands so firmly on the party line and refuses to make any sort of waves whatsoever, but she’s the first one to bitch if one of us so much as questions what it is she wants us to do and the worst thing is she’s not even our boss, at all, but she’s been fucking empowered to tell us what to do by the people who are. she’s a fucking literacy coach. she’s supposed to coach, not micromanage the shit out of us. where’s my instructional support that doesn’t include you coming in and rearranging everything i’m doing. 

then there’s the department head and while she’s great to talk to, she has literally zero power. none. the union reps? maybe? but i looked at the contract and there doesn’t seem to be anything about us being micromanaged into teaching what we’re told and not what we think is best for our kids, unless i’m reading it wrong... 

i don’t know man. i’ve never felt this isolated before. and it’s absolutely a contributing factor in the way i’ve been feeling. 

so the only people i have who i can talk to are people outside the profession, and all they can do is lend an ear because they don’t understand fully what i’m going through and they can’t help change it anyway so yeah. here i sit in my classroom crying for the first time because this job has gotten me, it’s gotten me to my core and i don’t know if i’ll be able to shake it. 

[27dragons]

Name of Piece: No Fellow in the Firmament Square Filled: S5 - [image: iron patriot] Rating: G Warnings: None Summary: Some moments in Tony and Rhodey’s history. Created For: @tonystarkbingo

“But I am constant as the Northern Star, of whose true fixed and resting quality there is no fellow in the firmament.” --Julius Caesar, Shakespeare

Contrary to popular belief, Rhodey didn’t meet Tony at MIT.

Technically, it was off-campus. Jim was walking down the street, looking for the little bodega that a ROTC buddy had told him about that didn’t card for beer, when something exploded high above him.

Jim ducked and ran half a block, pursued by the tinkle of glass hitting the pavement. When he stopped and looked back, the window had fallen out of the top-story apartment, and there were plumes of smoke billowing out.

Jim set his teeth and ran back toward the building, ducking through the door and jogging up the stairs as fast as he could go. The top floor only had two apartments, and it wasn’t hard to guess which one the explosion had come from, given the loud swearing going on behind the door.

Jim lifted his hand to knock just as the door opened, releasing even more smoke and a startled teenager a few years younger than Jim. “Oh! Uh, hey, are you the neighbor? Because I swear, I didn’t do it on purpose.”

“No,” Jim said, “I’m--”

“Listen, if management sent you, I’m good for the window. In fact, it might be best if we just replace all the windows with something a little sturdier, because--”

“I’m not from management,” Jim interrupted. “I was walking by and saw, and I wanted to make sure no one was hurt.”

The teen pulled up short and stared at Jim. “The window didn’t fall on you, did it?”

“I got out of the way in time,” Jim assured him.

“And then you came back to the building where something had just exploded?”

“It seemed like the thing to do.”

The teen smiled. “You’re my kind of stupid,” he said and offered a hand. “Tony Stark.”

Bemused, Jim shook the kid’s hand. “Jim Rhodes.”

“You’re my new best friend, Rhodey,” Tony said, and tugged Jim into the apartment instead of letting go. “I’ll get this cleaned up and we can make another mess.”

[’ware the readmore!]

When Rhodey heard the news, he ran all the way from campus to Tony’s apartment, taking the stairs two at a time. He burst through the door to find Tony sitting cross-legged on the floor, tinkering with DUM-E’s chassis. He glanced up, said, “Hey, Rhodey,” and went back to work, sticking the screwdriver between his teeth.

Oh shit, Rhodey thought. He hasn’t heard. I’m going to have to be the one to tell him.

Then Tony looked up again and said, “Oh. You heard.”

“Yeah,” Rhodey said, and tried not to feel relieved. “It was on the TV at the Student Union. What... Tones, what are you doing?”

“Fixing DUM-E’s sticky wheel,” Tony said. “It keeps making him spin around in useless circles and I thought I should do something about it. Also I think I might be in shock.”

“Yeah.” Rhodey knelt next to Tony on the floor, running a hand down DUM-E’s arm. “You want me to go with you to talk to your professors?”

“What for?”

“So you can get an extension for your classes.”

“Oh, that. No need.”

Rhodey stared at his friend. “You’re going to withdraw?”

“What? No, of course not. We’re only a couple of weeks from the end of the semester.”

“Tony, I think when the shock wears off, you’re going to want some time.”

Tony actually stopped working and sat back on his heels to look at Rhodey. This close, Rhodey could see the red rimming his eyes. “I can’t,” he said. “Me at MIT, this was... This degree was the thing that was supposed to make Dad proud.”

“Oh, Tone.” Christ, it was enough to break his heart. Rhodey sighed and pulled Tony into a hug. “Okay, man. Whatever you need, I’ve got your back. You know that, right?”

Tony endured the embrace for a moment, then pushed away. “You can come with me to the funeral,” he said. “But right now, what I need is for you to hand me that can of WD40.”

“I don’t think I can do this.”

“You can totally do this.”

“Easy for you to say.” Rhodey’s voice was reedy and thin across the phone line. “You’ve been doing product demonstrations for like twenty years already.”

“My first was at thirteen,” Tony said, “so more like twelve years.”

“Whatever. The point remains--”

“The point remains,” Tony overrode Rhodey’s nervous blathering, “the point remains that you got this. You know these systems inside and out, you know what the cost-benefit charts look like, and if you’re still anything like you were at MIT, you’ve been dreaming about this presentation for the last week.”

“Yeah, dreaming I walked in naked,” Rhodey grumbled. Tony could practically hear the pout over the line.

“You’re not going to walk in naked,” Tony huffed. “You’re going to blow them away. They’re going to wonder why they didn’t switch to Stark guidance systems five years ago.”

“And I’m going to tell them that five years ago, these systems were just a scribble on the back of your doctoral thesis,” Rhodey said.

“There you go,” Tony said. “You got this.”

“I got this,” Rhodey repeated. “Okay. Okay. I can do this. Thanks, Tones.”

“Anytime, sugarbear. Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“Tell ‘em if they make you the official liaison to Stark Industries for the duration of the contract, I’ll come down another five percent on overhead costs.”

“Tony, that’s going to be over half a million dollars. Per year.”

“Not enough?”

“Obie’s going to murder you if he finds out.”

“Nah. He’ll be glad I’m finally taking an interest.”

The less said about Afghanistan and Obadiah Stane, the better.

Tony was dozing off into his schwarma when JARVIS murmured into his ear, “Sir, you have an incoming call. It’s Colonel Rhodes.”

Tony rocked to his feet, startling several of the other Avengers. “Sorry,” he said. “I have to take this.” He put the helmet on and cued JARVIS to connect the call.

“You son of a bitch,” Rhodey said.

“Honeybear--”

“An alien army, Tones? And you don’t even call? I had to find out from radio chatter?”

“Platypus, you are literally on the other side of the Earth right now. Even at top speed, it would’ve taken you a solid eight hours to get here. And that’s ignoring the time it would take to get clearance from your chain of command.”

“And you were positive you could wrap up an entire alien army in eight hours, were you?” Hoo boy, Rhodey was livid.

Tony closed his eyes. “I needed you to be the second line of defense.”

Rhodey was silent for a moment. “How bad?”

“Rhodey--”

“I’m watching some shakycam footage of you flying a missile into a portal, Tones. How. Bad?”

“Bad,” Tony admitted. “They were going to nuke the city.”

“I’m coming,” Rhodey said, his tone admitting no refusal.

“I’ll heat up the sake.”

“How’s that?” Tony asked. “Need any adjustments? Does it pinch?”

“It’s fine, Tony,” Rhodey said. “Ease up. You’re like an old woman.” He braced his hands on the arms of the chair, bracing himself to stand up.

“I just want it to be perfect.”

Rhodey grunted. He hadn’t seen Tony this manic and wracked with guilt in years. “Hey,” he said gently. “Tones. I’m alive, okay?”

“I know,” Tony said, too fast, too sharp. “And we’re going to get you up to code in no time. Come on, hop to it, there’s walking to be done.” He held out his hands.

The far end of the parallel bars might as well be in Timbuktu, Rhodey thought, but he’d rather break his back again than admit it to Tony. He grasped Tony’s wrists, let Tony pull him carefully to his feet. The braces Tony had built stabilized him, redistributing his weight with each subtle shift. “Not bad,” he said.

“It’s just the initial prototype,” Tony promised. “I’ve got Friday recording both externally and with sensors in the braces for stress and motion analysis.”

Rhodey put his hands on the parallel bars, holding himself up. Tony ducked out of the way but hovered, ready to catch Rhodey despite the thick mats to either side of the bars. “When are you going to tell me what happened over there?” Rhodey asked.

“I know you watched the suit footage,” Tony said, not looking at him. “Come on, take a step, now.”

Rhodey huffed and twisted, dragging his right foot forward a few inches. The braces whirred softly as they compensated for the weight shift. “Sure,” he said, “but when are you going to tell me?”

“As soon as you’re off the painkillers so we can get drunk,” Tony said, surprisingly honest.

Rhodey thought about what he’d seen on that unsteady footage and nodded. “Fair. I’ll buy the first round.”

“You’re on.”

Rhodey stood at the window and looked out over a city in mourning.

The shock of Thanos’ victory was beginning to lift, and despite the wave of heartbreak and panic, people were beginning to rebuild their lives, to take care of each other, to help each other. Humans, Rhodey thought, not for the first time, were an amazingly resilient race.

He missed Sam.

“Rhodes.”

Rhodey didn’t answer, didn’t turn to look as Romanov came up beside him.

“Do you think he’s still out there?” She didn’t need to specify who.

“Absolutely.”

He could feel her looking at him, but kept his own gaze on the city. “What makes you so sure?”

Rhodey could almost feel sorry for her, never having known the kind of constancy that he’d had with Tony. He shook his head, smiling, just a little. “If you have to ask,” he said gently, “I can’t explain it. He’s out there. He’s coming back. And when he gets here, y’all had better be ready to work, ‘cause he’s gonna have a plan.”

[arcticdementor]

I was raised Christian.

When I was a teenager, I regularly attended church youth group. We did generic Christian things. We sat around and read milquetoast bible verses and then talked about how to be good people. We occasionally volunteered at charities. We played a bunch of party games. Generic fun things.

Then one day a new youth pastor started. This was a source of consternation for our church, as our church was an ethnic church and this pastor was not a member of our ethnicity. Still, we want to be openminded and she came highly recommended, so we let her start.

She turned some heads when she gave some sermons in church that pretty directly contracted our particular denomination's theology. I forget what the points were, but I mean these distinctions are just shibboleths and don't really matter. She was an outsider, so of course she wouldn't understand these things. It's not a big deal.

But then... our youth group started getting a bit more... radical.

First, she stopped teaching us Bible stories and started teaching us about history. Specifically, the history of activism. Gandhi, Mandela, and Martin Luther King. I should mention at this point that I am Canadian, and so all references to US race relations were completely foreign to us.

She started dropping these breadcrumbs, pointing out how all of these activists and movements only succeeded because of the power of the youth. About how we are the people with real power in the world to change things, if only we wanted to. You kids want real power, don't you?

I should mention now as well that my particular denomination of Christianity put an extremely high value on pacifism. Both pacifism as in a disavowal of violence, and pacifism as in a disavowal of activism. They believed in a very strict separation of church and state/politics, out of a fear that politics would taint the church.

Then, she started doing this weird new prayer technique. Previously, we would engage in silent, private prayers, as the church believed that each person's relationship with God was their own personal, private relationship, and it's none of anybody elses business. But now, what she had us doing, was that we would sit in a circle, she would turn off the lights, light some candles, put on some emotional ambient music, and encourage us to pray publicly. Prayers were encouraged to involve bearing our souls to God, talking about our sins and our fears.

In hindsight, I recognize this dynamic as being extremely similar to a Marxist struggle session. And, for the record, my referent for "Marxist struggle session" comes from a 60 year old friend who grew up in the Soviet Union, who was too smart and autistic for his own good, and who was on the receiving end of many such sessions. Told to me over beers straight from his mouth.

Finally, she started staging full on activist training in youth group. She taught us chants and we would practice protest chants while watching video of youth protests. She taught us techniques for engaging in 'non-violent protest' which included things like teaching us how to lie in front of stuff to block things off while making our bodies into deadweight, and getting into peoples face while shouting passive-aggressive things that were intimidating while being plausibly deniable.

It was at about this time that I had a mini freakout and stopped attending youth group. Not over any of the above, but rather because i was an aspergic kid with an overly literal understanding of the Bible and couldn't reconcile some dumb random doctrinal thing she said with my understanding of things.

A few weeks (months?) after I stopped attending, she was fired. Nobody ever talked about why.

In hindsight this is obvious: an honest to god Marxist activist tried to infiltrate our church and subvert the youth. She slowly turned our youth group from a glorified daycare/chaperoned hangout (which, despite being a church youth group, I would not characterize as 'indoctrination' at all; insofar as there was any religious content at all, most of the youth thought it was stupid, and to my knowledge every single person who attended those meetups are atheists now), to an activist indoctrination session. It happened slowly, so that it took a while for people to notice what was happening, and she did it to children (ages 12-16), who were not world-wise enough to understand what was going on. To be honest, to us it felt like she was rescuing us from the same boring old basic bitch party games and giving us some actual excitement.

Ever since realizing what happened there and reflecting on it, I've used this as my main point of reference regarding radicalization and indoctrination. This gives me a decent framework to compare generic 'teaching' of values (which I am ok with, regardless of what those values are) vs 'indoctrination', which causes knee-jerk horror for me. It's given me a reference to differentiate teaching vs indoctrination even between churches (there are definitely some scary churches out there engaging in indoctrination). It's also given me the ability to be able to look at non-religious groups, such as progressive youth clubs, to identify which of these are engaging in frightening indoctrination, and to be confident in my judgement calls.

—“GPoaS”