#the hidden POTENTIAL in the XX is like. Dangerous. Do they know what else xx could be. I get the romanisation n all but.

[sunburnacoustic]

girlies the Absolution brainworms are SO hereeee

I personally haven't actually had the brainspace to listen to XX yet because it Will take me out and I'm already a bit out of commission with a big cold (tissue count: 4)

But because I can think about literally nothing else, I've got the Muse Absolution listening party (listening party? Annotation section?? Group study??) radio broadcast that @killedbythegroove and I did when we were losing our minds about the 20th anniversary of the original release back in September!

Tune in if you want to, I'll be in bed mustering up the strength to be completely obliterated by Abso XX

[artificialqueens]

I'll explain later (Biadore) -Burgundy

AN: I… honestly don’t know where this came from. I’ve had a lot of emotions in me so I decided to take it out on Adore? This also has the potential to go somewhere, and I might continue it.

Just 2k words of bloody Adore and concerned Bianca. TW for blood, violence, implied murder and it’s just a bad time in general.

Hope you enjoy! xx <3

Adore sank to her knees. It was so cold. She could feel the chill seep in through her leather jacket, but that was about the only thing she could feel. Her fingers were numb and also still gripping the knife so tightly. Of course she carried a pocket knife on her, she was a young attractive female with bright blue hair. She was bound to attract some unwanted attention. He was just too strong, too close, too much.

Her apartment was so far away, she mentally complained. The voice of reason in her head was telling her to suck it up, and just walk there. The voice that kept repeating the last few events were telling her to stay there and just wait for someone to find her. She knew her legs weren’t going to hold her up for much longer, but she also knew that being there was a danger to her.

Who even lived close by? Where even was she? Her mind couldn’t think but a face popped into her mind.

Bianca.

Like hell she was about to bring Bianca into this, however. The repetitive voice kept telling her to walk to Bianca’s, and have her fix all of her problems and wait for it to be over. It would all be over soon.

She’d heard that before.

She thought that the voice of reason was stronger, and so she picked herself up and started walking, feeling her stomach churn and grumble and argue with her but biting her lip and closing her eyes. Her legs were wobbling underneath her and her eyes threatened to start pouring but she would just seem suspicious to anyone out this late. What time was it?

…

Bianca wasn’t quite sure what to think when a knock at her door reverberated through her house. Her eyes fluttered open, waiting to see if another knock would follow. For a while, there was complete silence and she let herself fall back asleep. However, another knock made her sit up and grab her phone. Checking the time, she sighed deeply. It was two in the morning, so whoever was knocking better have had a damn good reason.

The floor was cold on her feet and she couldn’t wait to tell the person knocking at her door off, so she could slip back under her warm covers. She opened the door, trying to give her best bitch face while still being half asleep.

“What?” she asked, not quite registering what was in front of her. The voice of the person in front of her made her snap her eyes open. It was a startling scene.

“B,” Adore’s voice was wavering, and she swallowed hard. Both of her hands were shoved in her jacket pockets, and her white Budweiser shirt was covered in blood splatters. Her lip still managed to quiver, even while being busted and bleeding down her chin, though that blood mixed with the blood of her nose ring being pulled out. Bianca could tell that Adore’s bare legs were shaking, and that could be from the cold but she doubted it.

“Get inside, what happened?” Bianca spoke quickly, pulling Adore in and sitting her on the couch, “Fuck, do you need anything?” and she could feel her own throat start to dry up, a small knot twisting in her stomach.

“I didn’t-” the younger spoke quietly, pulling her hands out of her jacket pockets. One was empty, the one with the tattoos on it, and the other held on tightly to her pocket knife, stained in blood that looked dry, yet some of it looked a bit more fresh, “I swear I didn’t mean to.”

Bianca had no fucking idea what she was supposed to do, never really expecting to be put in this situation in her life. Sure, she had seen Adore get into many fights and Bianca herself had been in many, too, but this was different. So much different. There was one thought that kept being shoved to the back of her mind. Adore couldn’t. She could never. She wouldn’t hurt anyone unless they hurt her first. Bianca knew that trying to pry out answers would just make Adore clam up more, so she focused on what needed to be done first.

“Fuck, you need to get cleaned up,” the younger looked up, her green eyes spaced out. They were almost blue, icy, and Bianca knew that they only turned that shade when something was wrong. Really wrong. “can you get up?”

Adore started to stand up, dropping the knife to the ground and grabbing onto Bianca. The older started to lead her to the bathroom, shutting the door behind them and watching Adore just stand and wring her hands. She started to take off her boots, and Bianca caught Adore about to chew on her bottom lip but stop once her teeth made contact with the blood on her lip.

“You think you can take a shower?” Bianca asked, pretty sure she already knew the answer but didn’t want to spoon feed Adore. Her thoughts were correct, and Adore slowly shook her head, her eyes darting around the room. “Okay, I’m gonna run a bath. Take off your clothes. I’ll leave once everything’s ready.”

Adore nodded, feeling her eyes sting. She didn’t deserve this. Her mind kept going back to what happened just across the street and how she was useless at defending herself and worthless and a disappointment and she let this happen. She started to strip, feeling the wet with blood part of her shirt peel off of her and it felt like a weight being lifted off her shoulders. Her eyes that needed to keep shifting or else would spill caught Bianca put in some bubble bath to the streaming water.

After a couple seconds of no noise except for the filling tub, Bianca stood up and nodded at Adore. The younger closed her eyes and nodded back, still extremely cold and now, her jaw trembled and she felt tears threaten to spill onto her cheeks but she couldn’t. The lump in her throat was suffocating as Bianca walked out, shutting the door behind her.

…

Adore finally felt warm, but didn’t feel any better. She splashed her face a couple of times, watching the water that went back into the tub come back a slight red tinge from the blood on her face. Her hand stayed a little too long on her face, and she felt the giant gap where her nose ring had been ripped from. That made her heart start to quicken, and tears finally started to fall freely down her face. They didn’t seem to fall fast enough, and she was choking on her sobs and watching blood and tears fall from her face and into the now tainted bath water.

She hadn’t noticed her nose ring had been missing. The pain in her face was in her general mouth and nose area, so she just assumed her lips were fucked up. Hell, she could’ve thought that her nose was broken. Nope, her nose ring was just gone and now she couldn’t stop crying.

It wasn’t just the nose ring she was crying over. She was crying because she had done something and nobody knew except her and she could keep the secret to herself. However, she knew that she had a loud mouth and she was going to end up telling Bianca, no exceptions. She closed her eyes, trying to quiet her sobs and focus on the peacefulness of the warm water with small bubbles in it. The bath that Bianca had run for her. The overall welcoming nature of how Bianca had acted this entire night was enough to make Adore emotional, because her mind was screaming at her for not being deserving.

When she opened her eyes, the water was a deep blood red.

She almost screamed, but it got caught in her throat as she looked up to the ceiling and felt more hot tears pour down her face. Her eyes trained themselves on a little crack in the ceiling, not big enough to be a worry, barely big enough to see. It was anything to keep her mind distracted. When she looked down again, it was normal bath water, just with tinges of red in patches. Her body wanted to curl up in itself, fall asleep and deal with this later. She brought her knees up to her chest, and rested her face on her lap. Even though she could see little droplets of blood fall from her face, she kept her eyes open and tried to steady her breathing.

…

Bianca wasn’t quite ready to finally talk to Adore about what happened. She was mildly hoping this was all some weird fever dream she had from eating something that gave her food poisoning. That had happened before, but it wasn’t as fucked up as this. Her nervous habits started to kick in, and she soon started cleaning up her place, picking up little things and organizing her dresser. It was her nerves that made her keep checking the time, watching as one, two, five minutes passed by so slowly. She wasn’t sure if she expected Adore to dress herself, knowing that on some of the worse days Adore really couldn’t dress herself. Those were the Adore proclaimed dark days where all Adore wanted to do was sleep and let people braid her hair.

Deciding that waiting was probably a bad idea, she carefully opened the door. Adore was still sitting in the tub, her knees pressed against her chest and her face hidden. Her head lifted a little when she heard Bianca enter, and her eyes searched for her. Bianca didn’t quite know what to do, and her stupid brain said distance.

“Are you done?” she asked, and Adore made a small sighing noise.

“I think so,” Adore answered, and Bianca would’ve smiled at making progress, but the younger seemed like she was not in the mood for one of Bianca’s cheesy smiles. Adore started to get up, pulling the plug as she stepped out of the tub. Her hands lazily grabbed a towel and pressed it to herself, making sure to get most of her body. The older just watched, her mind going back to wondering what happened. What the hell damaged Adore that badly?

“You can borrow some of my clothes for the night,” Bianca said, and Adore nodded, following to Bianca’s room, “I can get the guest bedroom ready if-”

“Can I sleep with you tonight?” Adore’s voice sounded like a child’s, small and weak and full of fear. Bianca looked behind her at the still bare girl, and nodded, muttering a small ‘yeah’ as they kept walking. Once they finally reached Bianca’s room, she started digging through her once organized dresser, pulling out some underwear, baggy shorts and a plain shirt for the night. Something they had found out a while ago, is that they were almost basically the same size, so thank God for that.

Adore put on the clothes slowly, which was a good word to describe any of Adore’s actions from that night. It seemed like all the energy had been drained out of her and she was just tired. It showed on her face, her eyes half-lidded and drooping. It was also a very sad expression, like she had witnessed a death. Maybe she had. Bianca made sure to remind herself to grab the antibiotic ointment that she had grabbed out of the bathroom off her dresser, and present it to Adore. Adore’s expression stayed the same, blank eyes looking up at her. The older took it upon herself to squirt some out on her finger and approach the younger, grabbing a cloth to wipe up some extra blood before placing it on her lip.

Adore winced, shutting her eyes tight. Her lip was sore, and stung in the middle. Once the medicine was being applied to her nose was when Adore felt like she could cry again, a sharp pain of the medicine seeping into the wound that was still pretty fresh. Her mouth was dry as Bianca sat down next to her on the bed, not speaking. She noticed how chapped her lips were, and how thirsty she was. That was a problem for the morning, when she was hopefully a bit more functioning than she was now.

“Can you tell me what happened?” Bianca asked. Adore tried not to physically flinch at her words, them seeming to cut into her. Like a knife. She tried not to think of what might happen if she were to actually sit down and try to explain what all had happened to her. Her mind scoffed at the wording of that, as if she was the victim.

“Not right now, please,” Adore said, fidgeting around so she was close to laying on the bed, gesturing for Bianca to join her. The older nodded, and started moving around the blankets so they could both be under the covers, until she settled down with her hand under the pillow.

Adore sank down into the mattress, trying to let her body calm down, but her heart was beating so hard against her ribs that it hurt. Her mind went to when she was a kid and her mom was explaining some breathing techniques for whenever her anxiety got bad. She closed her eyes and suddenly she was in her childhood house, arguing with her brother until a phrase echoed within her mind and her stomach flipped.

“I’m gonna murder you!”

It was said as a joke and now kept repeating in her mind. Suddenly, she was in high school and swooning over the cutest girl in school, or at least in her opinion. That was fun, when it was just her and her close friends that knew she was gay. Those were truly the days.

And then her eyes opened and Bianca was still next to her, it was still dark outside, and where the fuck was her phone? Just another thing to add on to the list of reasons why Adore had utterly fucked up and no one could help her. Bianca had tried. Knowing her, she would probably keep trying. Bianca could be stubborn sometimes. She closed her eyes again, wanting to go back to when she was younger, even if it was by a week. Last week was one of her first gigs as a musician in New York, she remembered, and it didn’t even matter if the crowd didn’t know the song she was singing because she did and they were eating her up.

When she opened her eyes, it was bright outside, and Bianca wasn’t in bed. Fuck.

[borisartamonovblog]

The people's mob.

    From the outset it would be better to note that, either it is the origin the human from an ape or there are other aspects of Darwin's theory, all this is only a hypothesis actually, not facts proved scientifically. However the likeness of the conformist behaviour can be observed among different species of animals, not only the mammals. The instinct of conformism works efficiently and smoothly. It takes only a member of a pack to notice a danger and to be frightened by something, this fright just is transmitted instantly to all the pack which either runs away or takes one's stand to defend itself, depending on the danger. If to take a space of the time about hundred years, no evolution would be observed, so this instinct of a wild pack, it cannot harm to anything, because there is nothing to be harmed. It would not be unnecessary to note that the conformist behaviour in an animal pack has no any compulsion above it. Nobody pays attention to a becoming separated individual, even nobody would notice it. Also the behaviour of the primitive men, I doubt whether it could differ appreciably from one of the herd animals, it is independently of the human's origin, which is unknown to us in fact.      It could devote a huge number of pages describing the gradual transition from the primitive, savage and herd condition to such one, that is named civilized one, which already is continuing several latest millenniums. Perhaps there would be those who are willing to research from the modern point of view and to describe this transition from the wild condition to the civilized one, even it is possible that it would be some benefit from the researching, but we have not a time machine that we should return in the past to add our own changes, and most likely it is for the better. It's for the better, for an interference in the natural course of events, as a rule, it leads to no good. But we are faced in front of the fait accompli: we are dwelling just in the very taking shape civilized world, unfortunately, with the instinct of conformism remained entirely, and everyone is able to make adjustments into his fate and is free to do it. Therefore we go examine the civilization and the society existing several millenniums we have found, we have been born in the epoch.      Whatever space of time is taken in the historical period of the civilized humanity, it is seen as a regularity, the same model of an interesting aspect of social relations: the model of the confrontation a developed gifted personality and a mediocre and backward crowd, that is the people's mob.      In the Gospels Jesus Christ mentioned over and over again about the persecution the Teachers and the Prophets in the past and after all He Same found Himself as a victim of such the persecution. It seems, that part of the humanity had come to believe in Him, the Christians like in God, and the Muslims like in a Prophet, all of them would get an instructive lesson for the future and make up a right conclusion. But the mob of all the times and of all the peoples, it twists surely all the things on his own way. In the given case it was formed a social opinion, supposedly this is the Jews who are guilty in persecution of Christ. However in fact, there wasn't a nationality that time on the Earth, where Jesus Christ would not be persecuted anyway by the people's mob. Accusing the Jews, practically all the peoples continued no less to persecute those who was cleverer and nobler than they, those who pushed forward the history and the progress. In the critical epoch of the Renaissance under cover of the "hunt for witches", Jan Hus, Jean of Arc and many others outstanding persons were burned at the stake. In every historical epoch of changes this confrontation became aggravated.      In the XX century this confrontation aggravated like never formerly. The prophetic words of Christ came true: " I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; but if someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him". And they came in his own name: Lenin, Stalin, Hitler. And they attempted to spread a hell on the Earth, but the humanity has won this round against the forces of darkness. The people's mob bowed down before the murderous dictators, spread runners for them, applauded them, believed in their unsubstantiated promises. It's inevitable, the evil seems as all-powerful one, but it has its own foibles. The first foible: the forces of evil cannot be in peace together. The second foible: the life according to the lie, it will affect negatively, sooner or later, on the economy. Just that two factors have saved the humanity.      Let's return to the late Middle Ages, that is the Renaissance. Right in this moment of the history it was laid beginning of the progress not only technological one, but it is more important, that this progress is social too. And here it's time to mention briefly the psychology of a man of the crowd, that is of the people's mob, that is one of a "cog"of the system.      For a man of the crowd it is unthinkable to be opposed to a common opinion. He has not got accustomed to think independently. He has the same developed brain, but he doesn't make use of it practically. Because of this, in most cases it is hard and awful to be alone for him. On the contrary: finding in a crowd, any support of this crowd is able to bring to naught so powerful forces as the instinct of self-preservation and the sexual instinct. Indeed, it's exist a Russian proverb: "In the world, even the death is red" (На миру и смерть красна) If he goes with a crowd together there where it is a danger, the same presence of the crowd how would lulls, sings to sleep, calms him. If anyone fell as though dead beside him, he doubts whether he would have such a misfortune, as the crowd continues to go, so one may. Certainly he doesn't reason this way, this way he feels. Thus he isn't in need of heroic effort to overcome his instincts because the conformist instinct helps him. If he starts to reason, to think, he would understand that he is deceived, that many things aren't right, but he doesn't think, he doesn't reason, because of this he makes possible to use himself as a pawn in some doubtful game. In what way a man of the crowd doesn't feel a danger, in the same way he can do any evil, not diminishing it. In this case beginning to doubt, but he needs only to look at the crowd and if they don't condemn him, but the contrary, they themselves are doing the same thing, he feels himself beforehand justified, the instincts of evil before were hidden in the depth of the subconsciousness, but now they are tearing themselves away with all the possible consequences. The force of the people's mob is really a large one, but it is unreasonable, like a  blind one, but one can rule over this force and different demonic characters use it.      What by to account then the aforesaid material and social progress? I would even say not social but social-moral, it would be more exact, but the sense of the word "moral" (Russian "нравственность") during last centuries was a lot devalued and distorted. Now the sense of the word doesn't reflect what was originally inserted in it, but the puritanical prohibitive moods of the people's mob. Instead the real purity in freedom, now the meaning of the word renders a sham purity in servitude, that is the submissiveness to the opinions of the foolish crowd. When refusing the word "moral", the adjective "social" applied to the word "progress", must embrace more broadly different positive accompanying concepts, because we are talking about progress, not about degradation. We are reaching, I would remind you, to explain the paradox: at the time of the dominance of the people's mob the humanity tears himself away from the medieval stagnation and progresses. Why is it going like this?      Everyone knows that in any country, without exceptions, the people's mob lives according to a certain well-established mold, without meditate deeply. This mold is called as the traditions. It would not a grave error to concede that the traditions are formed by accident, as a consequence of an accidental collection of circumstances, which either one or other nation has experienced, that is which it has gone through. It is an enough acceptable comparison as every nation is or is not lucky with a geographical situation and territorial budgets, in the same way one may speak about a good luck or a bad luck with the formed traditions. So not in all the nations it was reprehensible to be a bad mixer, to withdraw into the circle of the family and the friends with the same interests (in the broadest sense), and it gave the possibility for certain persons to develop and as a natural consequence to use for the good of the progress his developed potential (without the deterrent inhibiting by the society). But the countries which in it was acceptable to turn into the slavery their own citizens, contrary to all the doctrines of the world religions, there was formed a tradition of the compulsory collectivism and the total control above a person. These countries are fated to stay in the Middle Ages for as long as their traditions will change in trend of the freedom of person, and these things as the slave labor of millions prisoners, the abundance of minerals, the plagiarism of inventions even for military purposes - all this will not help them. The individualistic manners (this is the true morality) are trended to the freedom of Person, to the Truth, to the love for one's neighbor and the countries, where these manners are prevailing, solve well the problems which seemed insoluble one in the recent centuries, for example, such problems as one of the national or racial discrimination, the problem of the misery and the malnutrition, and finally the problem of dominance the puritanical moral which was distorting the veritably Christianity during many centuries.      God gave the mind to human not for failure to act. A man being based on the tradition but not thinking with his own head - this is the same thing like a man with healthy feet but going on crutches. Throw out the crutches and move your own feet! If your gait is the same one - it will be well. If after this your gate is changed - it will be good too. The main thing is that it will be YOURS. If your behaviour go on to fit into the traditions of the social surroundings - okay. If it exceeds the limits of the traditions - it will be nothing terrible too. Just in the last case you have better to look for an environment which will treat you tolerably. To remain free, you have better don't worry about the progress of humanity. You have better to look care of your own personal progress. Realizing yourself as a personality, you would help to all the humanity to become more perfect with only this thing, so this is enough. One needs nothing else from you for the common wealth. If you've stoped to be a part of the people's mob, a cog of system, already you may consider with confidence that all the humanity has moved just a little to the Light because of this.      Entitling this work as "The people's mob", I didn't imply at all a certain estate or a caste. A man burdened with the class, national or racial prejudices, he is a typical member of the people's mob. Such a member can be everyone: a vagabond, a savant, a head of government. To be a free personality can everyone too, and how the historical practice has shown, everywhere, even he can be in such slavish conformist states like the Soviet Union, China, North Korea. To go out of the slavish condition, one doesn't need in money, one doesn't need to falsify his membership of a class or to change a religion (Because all the Teachers of humanity and the Prophets, from whom the different religions had originated by mistake, but in fact they talked about the same doctrine. This is a long subject and it occupies a separate book "The question of the eternal life and the eternal death" and if God allows, soon I'm going to translate it from Russian into English). In fact, nobody can keep you by force in the slavish condition for the simple reason that nobody can read your thought, except God. There is nothing disgraceful or irreparable that you were a member of the people's mob in the past. All the people passed through this because all were brought to the society since childhood. A disgraceful thing can be only an unwillingness to go out of this condition. It depends from only one factor, whom you are going to be, only upon your own choice. It needs only one thing to stop being a part of the people's mob: one has to begin to think with his own head. And at first one must check without fail: is this or that idea yours or it is imposed on you by anybody from outside? Later on, when you will get accustomed to think with your own head, the need in this self-verification will fall away.      So everything is in your hands: to make your life as lively and interesting one (and it remains like this, as the practice shows, even in harsh conditions) or to drag out a miserable and pointless existence where is a still worse chance to become a pawn in strange satanic games.      The conformist instinct once helping to wild human herds, so been quite useful long ago, in the moment of the transition to the civilized condition it becomes a venom spoiling the life. This instinct itself as well as the fire is not evil. The fire can warm, light up, but if it goes beyond the limit of its place, for example, if it spreads over candle to a curtain, so it becomes an evident evil. The conformist instinct becomes a root of evil in the civilized world. And the civilization is not an evil in itself. Just humanity was not ready to go on the civilized way of development. To step on this way, it ought immediately decline the herd thinking.      This essay I'm going to finish with my favourite citation. A. I. Herzen in his book "From the Other Shore" wrote: "Don't look for a recipe in this book. They are not here". But it is enough possible, it was perfectly unwittingly for himself, he had given a very valuable recipe:      "If people want instead of saving the world - to save himself, instead of liberating the humanity - to liberate himself, how much they would have done as for the saving of the world, as for liberating of the humanity!"      To liberate yourself it is enough only your own wish.

The original Russian text:

https://www.proza.ru/2010/06/11/588