#there is no reason to get freaky about this exercise stuff

[ghostgirl-22]

heyy i literally love ur work and i’ve been seeing some posts abt this on tiktok but do u think u could write a professor!mike faist or art donaldson x student!reader and make it so he’s tutoring the reader but things go south and things get freaky 👅👅

hmm okay so i did peep the mike faist of it all but I couldn’t bring myself to go full rpf. So here’s theater professor!Mike Faist Art Donaldson. Or whatever <3

Pairing: theater professor!art (imagine these clothes but dilf!art hair lol) x afab!reader

cw: heed the warnings. NSFW, MDNI, age gap— Art is at least in his 40s reader early 20s, power imbalance— student/teacher, tw: dubcon if you squint. reader definitely wants this but also arts definitely perving. Improper use of Shakespeare. what it says in the ask.

—-

Theater professor!Art tall, a bit nerdy, he’s chronically late so he walks fast. He’s always a little flustered as he enters the theater, crossbody messenger bag slung over his shoulder, with his helmet tucked under his arm (for his scooter ride to work, he’d never ride a motorcycle…too unsafe). He wears some variation of a long sleeved button down with the sleeves rolled up, tucked into some varied color of khaki pants nearly everyday and he’s everyone’s favorite teacher. And it’s not just because the class is easy. 

Lots of students take his course who have little to no respect for the fine arts. All different majors and minors. He knows why they enroll.  He’s used to pretty girls (and boys) basically half his age sitting up front to try and get his attention and he knows what the student body says about him. He knows all about the PILF list (professors I’d like to…) he even happens to know he’s sitting quite near the top of that list. Just behind his ex Tashi Duncan who teaches classical literature and oscillating back and forth with his other ex Patrick Zweig who happens to be every business major’s favorite Economics professor. He still finds it odd that they’re dating now. Whatever. 

It’s not an easy class by the way. 

Especially not for you…

Intro to Fine Arts is impressively difficult. You’re pretty sure you’ve probably become Shakespeare's biggest hater over the course of the semester. You don’t understand a word of it and what’s worse is that you don’t care. 

Art can tell. 

Usually it wouldn’t bother him. He doesn’t care if his students don’t like Shakespeare. He’s usually not involved in his students' lives at all. He’s never crossed that line. He’s not that kind of professor.

But for some reason you bother him. God. You get under his skin.

Maybe it’s because you’re so loud with your wrong opinions. You’ll argue that things mean what they don’t mean just for the fun of it. And with such confidence that you have some of your classmates believing you more than him and he has a fucking PhD in this stuff. Then you’ll sit there smug and self satisfied because you won the argument. 

It’s frustrating.  

You’re frustrating. 

And not that he notices at all. But you are hot…in a filthy, carnal sort of way. Your lips always wet with gloss, your clothes too tight, showing off way too much skin. And he’s not looking… but honestly you know the theater is always cold. You really should start wearing padded bras if your shirts are gonna be so tight.  Maybe with more support so you don’t jiggle as much during the warm up exercises that he chooses for that specific purpose. Actually you could stand to cover up a lot more, all over. 

But thats not why he made you stay late for his office hours. Really. Its not. He just needs to tutor you a little. One on one. He can’t have the other students getting wrong information from you.

But even now, when you show up in his cramped windowless office, perched on the other side of his desk which is littered with playbooks, you have him stressed. you’ve been wearing that dress all day and honestly it's just too short.  If you bent over his desk, even a little bit, he’d have a full view of whatever you’ve got on underneath. He shifts in his seat. It's just inappropriate. 

God. He should focus on what he can teach you.“Okay try it from right here. And stop being so literal.”

You roll your eyes and glance at the Much Ado About Nothing playbook at the line where his finger is pointed. “I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap…” You laugh. “How can you die in a lap?”

“I told you the words we say today had different meanings in Shakespeare's time.”

“Well no kidding, i know that.”

Art scoffs, you know everything. 

“I know we don't say thy and thou and… thent…anymore.” You continue.

”We never said thent.“ Art points out.

“What I don’t get is why any of this matters?” You keep going as if he didn’t speak.

You don’t know why you’re so combative with Professor Donaldson. You think you just like to get him worked up so you can make him remember you. You love watching his jaw tighten, his skin flush, hearing the way he passionately defends old dead playwrights. It turns you on actually. Not the dead playwrights but the way he lights up. Little bits of arrogance peeking through that sweet “aww shucks” persona everyone loves. You think it turns him on too. It makes you wet. Sometimes during class you press your legs together and slip your hand between your thighs just to ease the tension a little. Keeping your gaze fixed on him, while you tease yourself. You wish you could touch yourself right now, watching his Adam’s apple bob while his soft gaze hardens. 

“It matters because the themes matter. It matters because humanity matters.” He explains trying to keep his tone measured.

“So find new themes, this guy’s been dead for a thousand years.” Also wrong.

Art can’t believe what he's hearing. And it doesn’t help that you seem flustered, breathing harder, chest rising and falling, the thin fabric of that short dress showing him everything… fuck…you might as well be naked. He’s losing his patience.

“Get up.”

“Why?”

“I'm going to show you what it means.”

You look like you want to argue (pre-law you always want to argue) but you get up from your chair anyway. “Okay?”  

“Come here…” he pats his thighs. “I think you’d learn it better if I show you.” He says softly. He knows he shouldn’t… knows it’s inappropriate. But you really need to understand what words mean. He’s just teaching you, really. 

You don’t even hesitate. Settling right on top of him, your back to his chest. 

“Good girl. Now grab the play.”

You take a breath and wiggle a bit your ass grinding along his swollen cock. God you knew he fucking liked it.

“Don’t worry about that...” He says lightly. It’s not his fault, your dress is too short, making him hard for no fucking reason. He needs to put his hands somewhere and your bare thighs are right there. He sets his palms down and feels the way your breathing changes. 

“Mmkay now read it again.” 

His voice is soft and directly in your ear now, it makes you shiver. You wiggle your hips again. 

“Go on,” he coaxes. 

“I will live in thy heart…” you feel his hand move up to your chest. 

You chew on your lip, wiggling some more as he cups you, before slipping it just inside your dress to play with your nipple. He squeezes it gently, before circling it with his fingertips. “What’s next?” 

“D-die in thy lap,” you swallow. 

“That’s a little more complicated, isn’t it?” He moves his other hand down your thigh. He really shouldn’t be doing this in his office. The door is closed but it isn’t locked. Anyone could walk in and catch you both. God it shouldn’t make him harder. He knows he’s not gonna stop, he’s finally had a taste of you,  felt one of your full perky tits, your perfect ass wiggling along his swollen cock. He’s just itching for more. He eases his way down along your inner thighs and you start to open up for him, the little dress riding further up your thighs. He presses two fingers against your panties, already soaked through and clinging to your warm cunt. 

He takes a sharp breath. “Fuck, it’s so wet for me already…maybe its not that complicated.” He eases your panties to the side and slips his long thick fingers inside you, you can feel the folds of your pussy beating your pulse around his intrusion and you moan. 

“Shh I know…” he hums. “Fuck its so easy, huh? You're so ready. Do you get it now?”  He’s rubbing gentle circles inside you, the pressure and intensity of the sensation rising and falling as he moves closer and closer to your clit. “Or do I need to fuck you?” 

You moan and open wider, hooking your feet behind his ankles. Hips starting to rock as your head lulls back against his shoulder. 

“I still don’t get it Professor Donaldson,” you whine. “I think I need more guidance.”

“Mmhm… I can tell.” He presses little kisses along your throat while you ride his fingers.

“Oh fuck..” you moan, voice pitchy and loud. “professor, it feels so, so good.”

“Shhh,” Art breathes working them a little faster. “You have to be a good girl and keep it down unless we’re talking about school work.” 

“Yes sir.” You gasp. 

Fuck. He can’t pretend he hasn’t thought about doing this to you. He thinks about it every day, you’re so goddam tempting, but he was trying to control himself, trying so hard to be good. He is good. He’s not doing anything wrong. He’s just teaching you… helping you understand Shakespeare. He should probably replace his fingers, just to really drive it home… so to speak. 

He unzips while trying to keep your squirming to a minimum. He’s so close. By the time he sinks into your heated cunt he nearly blacks out for how good it feels. “Holy shit, so fucking tight for me,” he grunts as you moan for him. “Fuck… start again. Read the whole scene.”

Your hands are all shaky gripping his thighs as you try to focus on Much Ado About Nothing. You can feel him thrusting in and out of your dripping cunt as you bounce on his lap. All while trying to recite the stupid scene. He whispers “good girl” between each line. Humming his soft little grunts of pleasure in your ear. God this is insane.

“I will l-live… I w-will live in thy… in thy heart…” you’re practically panting, his fingers playing with your clit while he fucks you.

“Mmhm.”

“Fuck professor… I’m so…. ‘m gonna cum.” 

“Almost finished, come on,” he pushes. 

“In thy heart,” you moan as the dam suddenly bursts and you make a mess all over his lap. 

“Fuck, oh fuck,” He gasps… pushing you off in a hurry as he starts to spill. You watch as he jerks himself through climax, some of it splattering on your dress and the old wooden desk. 

Even after he’s help cleaned you up, he’s still pretty sure you learned nothing. “Die in thy lap…like Le petit mort… the little death” he tries, but you never studied French and you’re not particularly impressed by the French either. 

And maybe he feels a little bad that after all that you still don’t get it. You’ll never be a true artist in any sense of the word, but after a few more evening tutoring sessions you definitely come to appreciate how good Art can make you feel so… a win is a win. 

(Kinda sucks i know but its x reader and i wrote it at midnight after recovering from a migraine. Cut me some slack y’all)

[frownyalfred]

i LOVED the new eye in the sky chap! of course, you have the soul-crushing rage-inducing angst pile on bruce's end, but i also really appreciated the duke-hal moment; he's so level-headed about the situation that you don't really build up too much stress over him, but then you brought in a different kind of heartbreak with the realization that he's been in this position enough times to know that the least provoking thing he can do is to do nothing at all.

and the FUTURESPEAKING jesus CHRIST — it’s a different type, but your time manipulation fuckery is almost equally as hard to wrap your head around as the stuff in tenet (the nolan movie), it's genuinely so impressive. (sorry, i'm just gonna run my mouth here for a minute, but the idea really caught me and now i Have to share all my thoughts just to get them out of my brain, though i hope that you'll be generous enough to weigh in as well😅) i'd imagine that there's actually relatively very few people, in-universe, who can do this so that duke hears it correctly, because you have to be able to focus your mind and put enough intent into the idea that you're about to say something that it "registers" as the imminent future—which means that you have to, at the same time, be completely repressing your knowledge that you're NOT going to actually vocalize whatever it is, because that intention would obviously counteract the first. and THEN, to make what's already quite a tough mental exercise even more impressive, bruce is: thinking of a futurespeak-response, putting enough focus/intent behind it for that future to crystallize (and again, it's a double-headed task, because of the repression required as well), and then cutting that off in order to think of and say something completely different, *all in about just the same amount of time a normal person would take to respond naturally in a conversation.* (also, slightly less mind-boggling but still quite impressive to me and i want to give him his props: duke, in that last bit at the end at least, is maintaining both his awareness in the present and the mental effort of using his powers to see the future, in order to hear the exact same voice say two different things at the same time, and is able to not only maintain the background effort needed to hear both things, but is taking in enough detail to see/hear/notice "both" bruces' tone and body language. ...i mean, maybe that's not so impressive to people without auditory processing issues lmao, but as someone who's constantly asking people to repeat themselves, or really having to focus on the sounds when somebody's speaking to me, even in one-on-one conversations, it certainly impressed me!)

anyways, yeah, this just inspired a lot of interesting trains of thought for me and i wanted to share lol. your fics are always such great reads, can't wait for your next update! Hope you're well💜

Thank you so much!!!! You absolutely nailed what I was trying to get at with Duke’s powers. I really didn’t want over explain it and have people roll their eyes, but I also didn’t want to leave readers mystified as to what he was doing.

Duke and Bruce are supremely well matched in this fic for that reason among many others — Bruce has a freaky brain and understands time/intention well enough to be able to think, speak, and re-speak that quickly.

He can compartmentalize like no one else. I am not obviously that smart, but the way I thought about it was playing competing melodies on the piano with two different hands - once you find the rhythm, the way they work off each other, you can maintain both easily. Where they gap, where they overlap, where they compete for your attention.

Duke is good at glimpsing a few seconds forward/back but definitely not for long periods. Like Bruce said, he’s going to need help to train that and avoid burning himself out! Luckily he’s just listening and not double speaking like Bruce is.

Someone on ao3 left me this in the comment section and they’re so right lol:

I feel bad for Hal, just a little, just like Duke does. He was tortured by Kal essentially, and where he does want to hurt Bruce (a lot) there are still some lines he won’t cross. I don’t know if that makes him redeemable or just not entirely beyond redemption. I think Bruce seems to know this too — teasing him with that moral code he used to hold so tightly to.

It was definitely a fun space to play around in! Writing this fic is difficult for me (agh worldbuilding) but whenever I try I’m pleasantly surprised by how much fun I have. Thank you so much for reading!!

[studentbyday]

don't ask me to analyze poetry but sometimes i get the last lines stuck in my head bc it's a long road to get to where i wanna be in life...

D-37 & D-36 DAYS TO FREEDOM

yesterday i studied for 3h and 36 mins. i was supposed to study for 6+ hours. today i will try to make up for it bc yesterday was just not enough time to finish everything i was supposed to. i wonder how long it will take me to figure out (and be okay with) a reasonable to-do list. i really feel like i keep overwhelming myself with things to do that i just keep feeling defeated and demotivated every day bc it's impossible to finish it all in 1 day...

learning:

finish 2nd biochem discussion reply (took 2h 😑) ✅ (why is it *so* *hard* to read and understand biochem papers without reading at a snail's pace?? 😩)

finish 1.5 psyc ch for this week ✅ (OMG THE NEUROSCIENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS IS SO COOL and also really freaky bc many different brain regions are so dependent on each other so damage may mean you don't actually perceive smth??? unfortunately to allow my brain to osmose the info, i need to slow down 🥺 i wish i could go faster.)

finish biochem sec 1, start sec 2 ✅

self-care:

physio exercises x2 ✅

journal x2 ✅

laundry ✅

update: i could not stick to pomodoro for more than 3h today and i didn't study anymore after that. i could not focus very well after the first hour and a half. i think it's because i didn't sleep well last night. so i'm gonna finally try to be consistent for a week and go to bed between 9-10 even if i don't feel like it and even if i can't fall asleep right away for the first couple of days. also, i think i'll try to reduce the amount of stuff i write on a day's to-do list. i'll still be aiming for 6-8h of studying per day, but we're gonna go with 4 or 5 tasks a day if 2 or 3 of them are small (takes an hour or less) and 3 if all the tasks are big (i.e. takes 2 hours or more) and if i finish early, then everything else i do will be a happy bonus, and if not, that's fine as well bc i'm still gonna get it done within the week, just not this instant. maybe tmr's update will feature a new bujo spread? (i changed it from the 2-page weekly to a super basic 6 column thing that would allow me to timeblock my days but...ofc that didn't help for very long bc all that space allowed me to overwhelm myself every day!)

🎶 liebesleid/love's sorrow - kreisler/rachmaninoff (yes the same set of songs keep getting stuck in my head. it seems to stay like that until i'm able to play them myself. so we're gonna be with this set for a while 😅 as a sidenote, this was a great song to listen to as i journalled about imposter syndrome 😂 it really fit the vibes 😎)

[jennhoney]

I need to make some nickels soon, for continuing survival, but I guess I need a nap sooner.

[golbrocklovely]

so this video was interesting to me for a lot of reasons. i definitely liked it more, i think, than tommy and foolish's but i think that's also bc so much more happened.

first off, i think the girls did excellent for their first investigation. they weren't too freaked out, even tho they had every right to be, and i liked their overall presence in the video. they seem pretty cool :)

now… as for the place they went to….

ngl, it seemed a bit freaky, for sure. i'm a little confused how all of the documentation of a place can be burned and yet ppl still know everything about it, but i digress lol

god knows there's probably some stuff that slipped thru the cracks and found it's way into history books.

i think the main issue i had with this video is the lack of physical evidence. i'm not one to discount other ppl's experiences. i believe them all when they say they felt something was there, or was watching them, or they saw something that the camera didn't catch. i'm not gonna argue that.

what i am gonna argue is this: if you truly feel like you are hearing things when no one else is, feeling touched or pressure on your body…. leave. step outside and center yourself. and if it seems to be a reoccurring issue, don't stay there. i feel terrible for niki bc she was getting the worse of it. but girl… walk outside. there's no way i would be chilling in a set of caves allowing ghosts to cop a feel for an hour lol i would be such a bitch about it, they would want me out of those caves asap.

but she's nicer than me so i get why she stayed.

i just feel like in places like that, where it's mostly feelings rather than evidence like devices going off, it becomes an echo chamber. one person freaks out, and bc you care about them, you start freaking out as well. and so on and so forth. and i think that's why investigations that take place in those type of locations, you need to have some form of grounding exercise or something that can center you. and not just being saged outside before walking in.

i always carry or have on two crystal necklaces that i've had for years now. i don't even know if they're real crystals, but bc they make me feel at peace, i make sure to always have them with me regardless. and i think bc none of them had anything like that, things spiraled very fast.

hell, i usually have my crystals on when i do tarot, let alone if i went into a place like this.

i don't fault any of them (except maybe snc bc they should know better by now) for not knowing what to do in situations like this. i can only imagine how fucking weird it must have felt.

the only point i want to argue is that when they were talking about "oh i feel this pressure on my chest, like it's hard to breathe"…. you're hundreds of feet down in the earth. that's gonna happen. the air in the caves is probably from the 1800s. literally body juice (ew) is leaking into the caves. it's not the healthiest air down there.

but aside from all of that, i think the video was really good. the estes methods were both interesting and creepy all at the same time. i hate when colby did the estes method and it was all sexual and pervy… no thanks. i also DESPISE that colby went into a trance for a minute when they went down into the lowest part, or hell. absolutely FUCK NO BABYYYY lol

i think the medium/guide they had was an interesting character, and i feel bad that she felt so emotional towards whatever was following them. also, it was very weird to see something want to attack colby, bc that usually happens to sam. so… i wonder why that was the case. but i have an idea as to why that happened (i'm gonna be answering an ask that talks about it in case you want to know).

overall, great video. enjoyed the collab. maybe if snc are in the uk again, they can collab with niki and gee. can't wait for the next video, which should be daz !

let me know what you guys thought about the video :)

[writing-in-april]

MGG Characters Masterlist

This is my Masterlist for characters that Matthew Gray Gubler portrays. They are sorted by fluff, angst and smut and from first posted to last. Requests are open for this actor. Upcoming fics are on my main Masterlist. ♥️=Author’s Favorite⚠️=Major trigger warning Main Masterlist

Spencer Reid x Reader

SERIES (2+ chapters):

Chronological series:

The Five Stages of Grief : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer going through the stages of grief after the death of the Reader. (ANGST) ♥️⚠️ —completed—

- Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader meets a mysterious man at the library during book club. ♥️ -in progress- -prompt/request—fic swap— (18+)

Unlinked series:

Spencer Reid & Letters: Group of fics exploring how Spencer and different types of Readers correspond through letters and their relationships.(Fluff- may contain angst & smut in the future) -in progress-

Fluff:

Oneshots:

- Ghost Story : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer tells Reader a ghost story before the power goes out.—request—

- Curl Recovery : Post Prison Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Curly Hair Reader: Spencer’s hair took a beating in prison along with the rest of his being. Reader helps Spencer gain a little back of what he lost. ♥️-Hurt/Comfort-

- 9 o’clock : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Barista Reader: Reader is an owner of a coffee shop and learns the identity of her late night regular as well as the reason why he likes so much sugar in his coffee.

- Dahlias :Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer over analyzing what type of flowers to get for Reader for their first date ♥️-fic swap-

- Happy Coincidences : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: You keep running into Spencer before work will you ever get his number? -request-

- The Best Time To Wear a Striped Sweater: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Where does Spencer’s striped sweater go after the first episode?—1000 follower celebration—

- My Knight in Shiny Armor: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Reader is a fantasy novelist and writes Spencer into their story. ♥️ —fic swap—

- The Melody Lives On: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Seeing Spencer after so long apart makes past feelings come to the surface again.

- Cinematic Coincidences: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer can’t bring himself to go on another date that’s been set up for him- so he stands his date up. Spence seemingly can’t catch a break and runs into the date he stood up. -30 fics in 30 days-

- Origins: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader (Reader is from a specific geographical location): Reader feels homesick after a particularly gruesome case. Spencer can’t buy a plane ticket, but he can try to help recreate part of home with them. -30 fics in 30 days-

- Question and Answer: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Garcia gets Reader to answer some questions about their feelings for Spencer. -30 fics in 30 days-

- Shining Bright Above You: Spencer Reid x Male Reader: Spencer finally gets to go out with his boyfriend after getting out of prison and gets to see the light despite the overwhelming darkness. ♥️-30 fics in 30 days-

- Unwinding in the Vines: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Reader can’t get enough of cuddling Spencer. -30 fics in 30 days-

- Manicured: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer finally lets Reader paint his nails. -30 fics in 30 days-

Blurbs/Ficlets:

- Lactose Intolerant: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader : Spencer loves dairy despite his allergy, it comes back to bite him and reader takes care of him. ♥️

- Spooked: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Reader really wishes Spencer hadn’t picked a haunted house as a team bonding exercise.

- Four More Months & No More Months Spencer Reid x Pregnant Female Reader: Spencer talking to their baby while Reader pretends to sleep.-1000 follower celebration-1250 follower celebration-request-

Angst:

Oneshots:

- Jinxed : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader : Reader is deeply affected by a case and is comforted by Spencer, at the end of the case Reader gets injured. (ENDS HAPPY)

- Too little Too Late : Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer isn’t sure what he’s fighting for anymore and feels abandoned by Y/N and his team. Set post Revelations. Major Trigger Warnings ⚠️ (SAD ENDING)

- A Greek Tragedy: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader (Masc. coded) :Spencer and Reader’s lives now resemble a Greek tragedy after Spencer returns from his kidnapping. ♥️⚠️(Hurt Comfort) (Light at the first of a tunnel sad ending)-prompt/request-

- Off the Table: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Based off the Ariana Grande song off the table. Reader wants to ask Spencer- I’d love off the table? ♥️⚠️ —1000 follower celebration— —request-

- Converging Parallels: Spencer Reid x Female Single Mom Reader: Spencer goes to a support group Penelope suggested after the death of Maeve. He quickly connects with a single mom who’s experiences have been similar to Spencer’s. -30 fics in 30 days-

- Tiny Vessels: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer is done lying to himself about his true feelings for reader, but isn’t done lying to them. ♥️-30 fics in 30 days-

Smutty (not full on smut, smut is further down):

Oneshots:

- Yeah: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: When Reader’s favorite song comes on while they’re out at a bar with the team, Reader can’t resist wanting to dance with Spencer even if it outs their secret relationship. -request-

- Training Wheels: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Years ago Spencer taught Reader to drive despite the fact that he hates driving. When they become good at driving enough to learn how to ride a motorcycle they get Spencer to come along for a ride.

Smut:

Oneshots:

Sub!Spencer Reid x Reader:

x Gender Neutral Reader:

- Georgia Peach: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: Spencer sees reader eating a peach and goes a little crazy. ♥️ -request-

- Helping hands: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader: After a bad case Spencer needs help shaving after getting injured, he gets help from the least likely person to help in his life. ♥️ (Enemies to lovers) -prompt/request-

- Slapped: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader x Elle Greenaway: impromptu little fic that @sparklinspence and I ended up writing quickly in the reblogs about Spencer getting his cock slapped while away on a case. ♥️

x Female Reader:

- Surprise Pretty Boy  :Sub!Spencer : Spencer Reid x Female Reader : Reader hasn’t had any sex in what feels like forever, so she seduces Spencer. When they get to Reader’s apartment she has a surprise waiting for him.

- Solaris: Sub!Spencer : Spencer Reid x Female Reader : Spencer and Reader finally get a vacation, so they go and see a Russian film called Solaris. Reader coxes Spencer into getting freaky in the theatre.

- Painted Nails: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer’s dom paints his nails for date night and she goes crazy at the sight of them.—-request—-

- Plot twist: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader buys a new pair of heels but they aren’t for her. ♥️ —750 follower celebration—

- Keep Reading: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader brings a surprise for Spencer at their picnic date. -♥️—750 follower celebration— —prompt/request-

- Braided Brat: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer lets Reader braid his hair, he can’t help but tease her. —750 follower celebration—

- Pleasent Surprise: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader asks Spencer if she can try to be more dominant in the bedroom. —750 follower celebration—

- Guest Lecturer: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: gets Spencer riled up during class while he’s guest lecturing. ♥️—750 follower celebration—

-Taking care: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer needs Reader to help him relax after some people were unkind to him —750 follower celebration—-request-

- Good in Red: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer really likes the color of your lipstick. ♥️ —1000 follower celebration—

- Green with Envy: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer gets mad over something reader can’t control and a fight ensues- plus heavy makeup sex after the fight.

- Soured Nostalgia: Sub!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: When Reader moves their stuff in to Spencer’s apartment they find photos that he kept over the years. One photo of the past springs up memories of Spencer’s precious relationship with Elle. ♥️-30 fics in 30 days-

-Erotica Explained: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer finds Reader’s erotica writing. ♥️-30 fics in 30 days-

Dom!Spencer Reid x Reader:

- Star Trek vs. Star Wars: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader Smut: Spencer and reader get into a heated argument over which is better Star Trek or Star Wars, Reader in turn breaks some of Spencer’s rules. —fic swap—

- The Case of the Missing Coffee: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader Smut: Spencer gets on Reader’s nerves just a little too much one day.—fic swap—

-Occupied: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer and Reader get caught in a bar bathroom by one of their coworkers after Reader couldn’t keep their hands to themselves. -500 follower celebration- -prompt/request-

- Birthday Spankings: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: A normally shy reader decides to tease Spencer on his birthday thinking she could get away with it —request—

- Poker Face: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader thought she could get away with speaking her desires out loud as long as they were in a different language. Turns out, someone could understand her. ♥️

- April Fools: Dom!Spencer (not as harsh as others): Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer needs to one up Reader just as he’s about to loose a prank war. —30 fics in 30 days-

- Dressed in Crimson: Dom!Spencer: Spencer Reid x Female Reader:(Royalty AU)Spencer is a stable boy with a passion for learning and Reader is the princess of the palace that he serves in. They’ve been in a secret relationship, the two grow restless about not being able to be out in the open. ♥️ -30 fics in 30 days-

Non specific dom Spencer Reid x Reader:

- Russian Roulette: Non specific dom: Spencer Reid x Female Unsub Reader: Reader and Spencer formed a relationship during an investigation, turns out she was the unsub they were looking for. Spencer finds the Readers hiding place cornering her, but he can’t let her go yet. Major Trigger Warnings ♥️⚠️ (SAD ENDING)

- Mismatched: Non specific dom: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader is Spencer’s roommate and they have been pining after each other for a while. One morning they finally get to act on their feelings.

- The Big Bluff: Non specific dom: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Spencer goes up against a professional poker player. ♥️-500 follower celebration-

- Any Iteration: Non specific dom: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: Reader is nervous that this new iteration of her won’t be something Spencer will like. ♥️

Blurbs:

- A Snowy Morning After: Part One, Part Two: Non specific dom: Spencer Reid x Female Reader: After being snowed in after a one night stand, Spencer wants to go for a round two. -1000 follower celebration—30 fics in 30 days-

Chip Taylor x Reader (MGG character from 68 kill)

Fluff:

Oneshots:

- Chipped: Chip Taylor x Gender Neutral Reader: Chip Taylor watching Beauty and the beast for the first time with Reader. -500 follower celebration- -prompt/request-

Angst:

Smut:

Oneshots:

Sub!Chip Taylor x Reader:

- Party Play: Sub!Chip: Chip Taylor x Female Reader: After Reader gets Chip to voice one of his deepest desires Reader takes him to a play party Reader’s friend hosts. ♥️-30 fics in 30 days-

Raymond Wadsworth x Reader (MGG character from Suburban Gothic)

Fluff:

Oneshots:

- Unsolved: Raymond Wadsworth x Gender Neutral Reader: Raymond runs into the buzzfeed unsolved duo investigating the same place he is, plus their cute camera operator. -500 follower celebration- -prompt/request-

Smut:

Oneshots:

Sub!Raymond Wadsworth:

- Spooks: Sub!Raymond: Raymond Wadsworth x Female Reader: Raymond starts sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong at the next haunting he’s investigating. ♥️ -30 fics in 30 days-

Angst:

Oneshots:

Blurbs:

- Birthday Blues: Raymond Wadsworth x Gender Neutral Reader: Raymond wants his partner to come back from the dead.

Franklin x Reader (MGG character from Beginner’s luck)

Fluff:

Oneshots:

- Bowling Ball Baby Franklin x Pregnant Female Reader: Franklin and Reader get into a fight about him not being there for Reader’s pregnancy. He has a unique way of apologizing.♥️-Hurt/Comfort-

- Gutter Balls Franklin x Male Reader: While meeting up for a friendly game of bowling with Franklin’s team some very rude people try to insert their opinion on yours and Franklin’s relationship. (Has some angst but is v happy). —request—

- Chili Cheese Fries: Franklin x Gender Neutral Reader: Franklin tries to make bowling alley food taste better during a first date. ♥️ -30 fics in 30 days-

Angst:

Smut:

Oneshots:

- The Owner’s Office: Dom!Franklin: Franklin x Female Reader: Franklin won’t stop pestering the owner of the alley about getting a discount. —1000 follower celebration— —prompt/request— ♥️

Lesley Smith-Juniment x Reader (MGG in Hot Air)

Fluff:

- Unintentionally Unrequited: Lesley Smith-Juniment x Gender Neutral Reader: Reader holds in their love for Lesley after his broken engagement. -30 fics in 30 days-

Angst:

Smut:

-Will be adding more characters in the future-

[yuvon-writes-letters]

To, Yu

Okay, I was gone, and the moment I came back, i [The sentence randomly stops]

I’m, not upset at the fact you lied, i actually had an inkling for awhile now while you were describing the rooms for the first time, it looked like you wanted to continue, but stopped yourself at the last second. I understand why you lied, seeing all of those things must’ve been hard, but Lis and I can’t help you if we don’t know anything, ok Yu?

It sounds like, you found ways out, but both are, not good for you? I don’t know, my brain’s all fuzzy and I can’t comprehend words right, maybe I’m getting something wrong.

My point is, when you build up the guts to, please please please explain to us, or at least me, on what’s in that North room, I don’t care if it’s bad we need to know everything we can about the realm so [The sentence stops again]

Sorry, I’m just, kind of on the edge. Of course you don’t have to tell me now, but

If, it’s not intruding on personal space, what the hell happened between you and Jake? I’m assuming that Jake lied about something, but I don’t think we would do any good if there’s bad blood between the two of you. I sent my Jake the letters too, and he agrees as well.

We’re both worried about you, so, don’t hide anything, alright? [The rest of the text is blacked out]

Rai and Jake

|Hello, real person behind Rai here, I wanted to clarify some things because I don’t think I made it clear before (I’m sorry about that). Rai is a complete OC, their not a self-insert at all, and they have their own life completely separate from mine. Although it is true that I’ll be busy on July and won’t write letters frequently, I wanted to give an in-character Roleplay reason as to why Rai is not as active as the first few letters, hence the panicking at the last letter.

I, the real person, am completely alright, Rai, is not, not at all :)|

Rai,

Thanks for understanding. I'll try to hide as little as I can from now on.

What I think are the two ways out are sitting still and looking pretty, which I despise the concept of, and killing the MWAF by paying an even price, which I hate the idea of even more. (Blacked out) I checked out the altar room a little more, and the phrase "An eye for an eye" (or something approximate because Google Translate) was on the back of the altar in Greek. Jake helped me translate it before we argued.

Mixing mythologies yet again. So far we've got Egyptian, Greek, and... Biblical? I think that's from the Bible. Sue me, it's been a while since I took World Religions.

Actually... no. I guess it hasn't. It just feels longer than it actually was.

I'll try to be a little more specific about what's in the north room. It's not... quite as bad as I made it out to be before, but I was already freaking out and in a bad headspace from remembering the freaky stuff, and I blew it a little out of proportion. I'm not sure how I'd even explain what it really is, though.

It's something similar to a hologram, transparent enough that you can see the trees through it. There's some text in white that doesn't seem to be addressed to me, implying that I'm stuck between the end of something and the beginning of another. Then there are a couple bars— five, to be exact —and two of them are filling with orange very slowly. The others are untouched so far. It's implied I'll be out of this place when all the bars fill up to full. I'm not sure this text was necessarily written by the entity, though. If it was, I think it'd address me a little more directly.

I don't think the argument Jake and I had is necessarily all that useful to the investigation, but since I'm trying to not keep secrets anymore, I'll say it regardless. The cause is tangentially related to the case, anyhow.

I asked him a little while ago whether he could find out if there was a missing person's out for me or not, so we could figure out the extent of the stasis. Then drama happened and I completely forgot all about it until two days ago. I asked him again then, and he sort of acted a little cagey while telling me that he was still in the process of investigating, and told me to wait another day. So I did. I don't think he expected me to remember, since I forget things all the time, but I don't forget things I'm really invested in and I REALLY wanted to know the answer to that question.

Jake made an excuse and went offline when I tried to ask again, which sort of made me think the worst. In hindsight, thinking that anyone who could've reported me missing was dead was pretty stupid, but you try being rational in the face of an unknown like that. In any case, I got anxious, and that sort of blew everything out of proportion, and then that made me more and more upset, and given all the other bullshit inherent in this place and the stress I've been through lately I just completely broke down. Had to sit down and put my head down so I was less likely to pass out from my hyperventilating. Luckily, I knew what was going on and I know breathing exercises, so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

In any case, when I was back to being semi-functional, I unlocked my phone again, meaning to close out of the chat, but apparently my last few texts before I had to stop had managed to get across to Jake at least a portion of how freaked out I was. He probably figured it out based on all the typoes and the lack of punctuation or something, his "flaw" (if you can call it that) only seems to make him oblivious to tone and not to outright out of character writing styles.

So he finally told me that there wasn't a missing person's out for me, and not only that but everyone who might have put one out pretty much forgot I existed. He got my fucking parents to answer a "survey," and they only filled out that my half-sister existed, not me. Legal documents and stuff were still all in order, but literally the only people who seem to remember I fucking exist are the Duskwood crew and you and Lis and he had the nerve to tell me that he didnt want to tell me because it wasnt essential information and it would affect my judgement

Back now. I screamed abuse into the woods for a couple minutes, so I feel a bit better now.

I can see his point, logically, but for fuck's sake, there are some things that don't have much to do with the case that I do need to know regardless. This is one.

I'm not going to cut contact with him forever. To put it callously, neither of us can afford that. But if I talk to him now, I'm going to end up saying something or other I'll regret.

Right. Other topics.

Rai, are you doing alright? I know you've got personal issues going on, and I'm not trying to pry into them, but your writing is sort of disjointed and you mentioned being "fuzzy" and "not comprehending words right". Are you getting enough to drink and to sleep? I know weird shit happens to me when I get dehydrated. If you ever feel like you're about to pass out, sit down and put your head between your knees. If this continues, maybe you should see a doctor. Do you feel like your head is stuffed with cotton balls, at all? Any other symptoms?

Feel better :(

—Yu

(The letter tucks itself into the paper clip with the others.)

[flying-nightwing]

Dark Fox (5/7)

Yoooooo I love this chapter, I think it’s my favourite so far. 

Previous - Next 

Pairing: Jason Todd x League!Reader

Word Count: 5836

Warnings: same as previous

Your eyes were closed but you could feel Jason growing restless. 

It was already the middle of the day and you had not gone out once to train. He kept shifting his position, crossing and uncrossing his legs, and opening one eye to see if yours were still shut. He would also occasionally let long sighs of impatience, like a child stuck inside on a sunny summer afternoon. 

It wasn’t that far from the truth, actually.

“Alright” He spoke up, slapping something on his skin. probably a fly. “This is pointless”

You slowly opened your eyes and stared at him. He was sweaty and swatting away bugs around him, and an all too familiar frustration was growing in his eyes. Although you didn’t do this exercise to spite him off especially, you had to admit you did enjoy to rile him up that way. 

“I know that face” He grumbled, and you raised an eyebrow. “You’re enjoying this too much. Is there even a purpose to this?”

“Yes” 

“Then what is it?” He yelled, throwing his hands in the air. “We’ve been sitting here in silence for more than two hours!”

“Should I make it two hours more?” 

“You are evil”

“I’m making you do this because” You began after an over exaggerated eye roll. “This kind of meditation, when done well, allows you to take control of everything in you. When you feel conflicted, angry or need to find strength, you can tap into that power. But you need to find it first”

“Yawn” He pretended to sleep. “When I made the joke about making tea, I had no idea you’d take it literally”

“Don’t act so smug, you could use it” You replied. “And the tea technique as well”

He gasped.

“Now get back in position, palms up resting on your knees” You instructed, and he only crossed his arms against his chest in defiance. “Jason”

“I’m not doing it anymore” He shook his head like a toddler. “It’s as hot as the devil’s asshole and your little bowl of water is turning this hut in a sauna. And how the fuck are you not dying?”

He gestured wildly at your short sleeve base layer and tactical pants, which you thought was already a wild improvement from what you usually did. In fact, winter or summer, you had always worn your full League suit no matter how uncomfortable it could get. You had learned to ignore it a long time ago.

“Because I’ve been dead since 2004” You deadpanned.

It took him some time to react. “Sorry did you just make a joke?”

“No. I’m always serious” You didn’t concede, but you did suppress a smile. “Now focus”

“C’mon” He groaned. “For once let’s do something fun! I’ve earned it, don’t you think?”

You held his stare that had become wide and almost… Pleading? In a puppy-that-wants-treats kind of way. And thinking of it, he did work all for almost a year without really choosing what to do. You guessed you could make an exception for this once.

“What did you have in mind?” You asked tentatively.

“Let’s go swimming” He grinned, and it sparked an idea in your head. 

“Swimming you say?”

--------

“What do you think they’re doing?”

“I don’t know” Dick muttered, glancing at Tim with a bewildered expression. “But I’ve never seen Jay sitting so still for so long before”

“Do you think they can hear us?” Tim asked, eyes still on jason and you. “Pssst, Jason”

“Hey Jason!” Dick called, louder this time. Still no reaction.

“Jaybird!”

“Earth to Todd?”

“What are you idiots doing now?” 

Both men turned around at Damian calling them out.

“Jason and Foxy are sitting face to face on the floor like statues” Tim replied, crossing his arms against his chest. “It’s kind of freaking us out. There are herbs burning or whatever”

“If you call her that to her face she’ll kill you” Damian pointed out, pushing off the wall he was leaning on. 

“I know, she already pushed me out of a window” He sighed as Damian walked past him to look into the room. He noticed the positions, the shallow bowl of water and the sage burning next to it. It clicked in his head it was something his mother had taught him years ago, still the never ending sitting session in silence were hardly forgettable. You? He wasn’t surprised to see you do it from what he had gathered about you so far. Jason, however, he was surprised he would even considering let alone last so long. He was impressed.

“They’re meditating, you morons” He rolled his eyes. “League stuff. Lets you in into your own soul so deep you can tune out the exterior world”

“Sounds freaky” Dick hummed.

“I’m going to test that theory” Tim smirked, taking a few steps in the room.

“And if you do that it’s Jason that’s gonna kill you” Damian shouted as he walked away. 

“Can’t be worse that being thrown out of a window” 

“I swear one of them is actually going to kill you sooner than later” Dick sighed as he followed his brother nevertheless. He figured Tim would stand better chance at living with backup.

Tim tiptoed to Jason, taking good care to stay far away from you and your range. He had no idea if you had a blade hidden somewhere--you probably did--and exactly how fast you would hurl it at him. He needed to give himself a margin of manoeuver. He extended his finger and slowly, so slowly got closer to Jason.

“Don’t. You. Dare” 

He froze mid air, eyes widening. Jason’s eyes were still closed, but apparently he was aware enough to know he was close. He shared a glance with Dick, not willing to run away just yet even though Jason had quite literally blindly deducted his intention. He moved a bit closer again, and just before his finger came in contact with Jason’s ear, he snapped his eyes open and glared so hard at Tim it made him and Dick scatter out of the room. He help his glare a little longer on the room’s threshold before sighing. 

“I kinda miss the quiet of the hut”

You slowly opened your eyes to meet his stare. You would have given him a smile if your mind wasn’t so far away of your head. 

“Found anything?” 

You shook your head at his question, looking away from the concern that was growing on his face. You had tuned into your mind to find how in the hell and back you didn’t just let the arrow fly and ended it for Luthor. You had hesitated, something you didn’t even know was possible for you. Moreover, you had deviated from the only personal goal you ever had, for what? For the lives of people that didn’t matter to you. It was a good thing you didn’t work for the League on that one, because you wouldn’t have made it out alive. 

It was also a miracle Tim hadn’t ratted you going outside of the plan to go after Luthor. You had fully expected a fight when you met with the rest of the group, but he had kept his mouth shut after what went down. It worried you, because the only reason you could think for him doing that was for leverage, and well, you certainly didn’t like the idea of any of these people here having leverage on you. And with the warning Jason gave you about his detective skills, none of this settled right within you. 

“You’ll get another chance”

It was like he was reading your mind. It wasn’t like he didn’t know you better than anyone, and it was not like you were well guarded right now. You were too distracted to hold up your defenses. Still, you were angry at yourself.

“I let him go” You mumbled through gritted teeth. “I’ve never…”

“I know” He breathed out. “Are you okay?”

“Yes” You snapped. You didn’t need his pity. “I just need to remind myself of who I am”

He held your stare for a second, betraying no emotion. “And who is that?”

You gulped, hesitating despite your better judgement. “I am Thaelib fi alzalam, child of the darkness and servant of the demon”

His jaw clenched ever so slightly, but he didn’t say anything more.

--------

“Am I the only one who noticed Jay’s been… Different ever since he brought back the ninja here?” 

Dick looked up from his paperwork and grinned at Tim. “Right? He’s around all the time now”

“Do you think they’re together?” He asked in between two glances at the files in front of him. They were still on the Luthor case, and he had his own side quest to figure out. “She would seem like his type. Cold, snarky, slightly to very murderous, you know”

Dick laughed. “I mean something definitely happened between them, especially since they allegedly spent all this time together. But actually together? Meh”

“Don’t you have anything better to do that gossip about me?”

Both men’s eyes snapped up at the voice that joined the conversation. Jason was standing in the doorframe of the cave, arms crossed against his chest and a scowl on his face. A steaming cup of coffee was rested on his bicep, but he didn’t seem bothered by the heat of the ceramic container.

“Absolutely not” Dick sniggered, making Jason scoff. “So, you two together?” 

Jason’s eyes went from his older brother to Tim, whose head was cocked on the side. He was watching intensely for a reaction, and it made Jason shift on his feet. He did not like when Tim went all detective on him, especially since he had no idea of the reason why he would do it. It was creepy and invasive, and even him wasn’t immune to Tim’s hyper perceptiveness. Jason cleared his throat.

“You think I’m going to answer this?” He challenged Dick, doing his best to ignore Tim’s weird as fuck behaviour.

“Oh come on Jaybird, do a girl a favor and spill the beans!” He pleaded. “We barely know anything of what went down with you two”

“And I intend it to stay that way” He replied, walking to Dick’s rolling chair. “Now move. Alfred sent me to replace you. You’ve been here for hours and he wants you to take a break”

“Aw, okay” He complied as he stood up. “Can’t say no to Alfred”

“What about me?” Tim finally spoke with a small pout. Jason rolled his eyes and walked to his desk, putting down the steaming mug of coffee in front of him. Everybody knew it was pointless to try and pry Tim away from his work, so Alfred had instead sent him down with about seven shots of espresso in a mug. That was enough to change his expression from betrayed to content. 

Jason waited for Dick to leave and propped down in the seat, keeping watch on Tim from the corner of his eye. His fingers skimmed over the paperwork left behind, but he wasn't very interested in it. He only agreed to replace Dick because like his older brother, saying no to Pennyworth was not an option, not a moral one anyway. 

“So” Tim began nonchalantly, pretending to be interested in whatever was in his face at the moment. Jason braced himself for more invasive questions he would not answer. “How did you not kill each other in the first week of training?”

Jason blinked in surprise at the question. He did not expect something so… Impersonal? He seemingly referred to his and your character, which he must have witnessed while being paired with you the previous night. However, he still remained on his guard, because Tim was being weird. Well, weirder than usual that is.

“I guess… We tried?” He said carefully, frowning. “Didn’t work”

“Interesting” He nodded, taking a sip from his coffee. “I’ve noticed her fondness for violence, which makes sense why you would get along”

“Okay just say what you want to say” He sighed, making a vague hand gesture. 

“No it’s just--” He paused and took a breath. “Something weird happened the other day, after she pushed me out of the window”

Jason raised an eyebrow.

“She landed after me and then she just took off” He said with a shrug. “Naturally I went after her because nobody walks out on me. And imagine my surprise when I saw her facing off with none other than Lex Luthor”

Jason’s muscles tensed, but he gave no other reaction. Fuck. 

“I mean she could have killed him, she seemed pretty obsessed with going there or whatever” He kept talking, obviously noticing his brother’s subtle change of attitude. “But then they just held the stare off until the explosion went off and she instead saved a bunch of people that would have otherwise been crushed to death by concrete. Anyway. Now tell me if I got it wrong, but she doesn’t seem like the type to just hesitate, or care about the others, right? I tried to piece it together, the obsession, the hesitation, her weird knowledge of Luthor’s modus operandi, her whole involvement in this for that matters, but I still come short of the little missing piece to the puzzle. It bothers me”

He watched Tim with his mouth slightly agape. He knew it had been a bad idea for you to go after Luthor with Tim nearby, but he didn’t think he’d put the pieces together that quickly, or rather, that you’d let such a slip go noticed. Nonetheless, he wiped away his astonishment away and replaced it with yet another scowl.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“I don’t know, I’d believe you know more than anyone about her”

“I think you’re looking way too much into this, Drake” He dismissed, going back to his papers. “She was raised by the League. Going after a target is her basic instinct, and are you really going to judge her for doing the right thing and saving people?”

“Mhhh” Tim simply hummed, also going back to his own work. Jason gave him one last glance, knowing his deflection wouldn’t hold him back for long. The truth was about to come out, and he feared it wouldn’t be pretty when it did.

--------

“Go on”

Jason narrowed his eyes, his glance slowly going from you to the plank you had lowered above the water and to the post farther into the middle of the river. It rose about seven feet above the surface, and Jason didn’t trust it or your intentions for that matter.

He adjusted the quiver strap and the bow on his shoulder and began carefully reaching the post. Nope, he definitely didn’t trust that setting at all. However, as much as he was mad you had twisted his swimming idea, he was also curious as to what hellish stunt you would make him do this time. He knew you by now, so whatever it was, it would be both dangerous and entertaining. 

He grabbed the post and hoisted himself up by the only step that was carved in the middle of it. He stood up on the small surface, barely large enough to stand comfortably on both feet. He looked at you, and you had already pulled back the plank.

“Hey!” 

You smirked and brought the plank to the other post about twenty feet further down the river. You climbed on it and faced Jason.

“So what now?” He called from his position. “We shoot each other?”

You grabbed an arrow and nocked, but left your bow aimed down at the water. Even from the distance you could see his face drop.

“You’re fucking crazy!” He shouted. “How is this not ending in one of us being dead?”

“You found static meditation too boring” You shouted back. “This should do it to find your balance and inner strength”

“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” 

“Dodge the arrow” You said, lifting your bow and shooting straight at him.

The arrow flew at him, and in his attempt to dodge it, lost balance and landed in the water. He came up with a gasp, and swam back to the wooden post before the strong current could drag him away. He climbed again, all drenched and glaring at you.

“Or fall and get wet”

“Oh, because you’re so good at dodging arrows from a upright tree trunk without falling” He snarked back as he took off his tank top and threw it on the shore.. “I’d love to see you on the other end of these”

For emphasis he raised his own bow. You shrugged and slipped your bow through your arm and head to rest it on your back, and waited for him to shoot. In a blink he nocked his first arrow, aiming from your left shoulder. You leaned out of the way, stable on your post, then slowly returned to your position. You raised your eyebrow in challenge, and oh did he not like that. The next arrow went to your feet, and you simply jumped, landing back solidly on your feet. He shot at the same place again, you jumped, then aimed for your mid section rapidly after. You landed on your left foot and crouched so your right slipped along the post, resting on the step in the middle. Jason paused a moment, eyes wide, before shooting straight at you. You propelled yourself up, then saw a second and third arrow coming your way before you had the time to stabilize yourself. You saved your eminent fall with a side vault and landed gracefully.

“Oh you must be kidding me!”

“Don’t act so surprised” You teased. “You can do that too, Jason. Close your eyes and take a deep breath, don’t think about it too much. Empty your mind and trust your instinct”

You waited as his shoulders went up and down, and his eyes slowly opened. Without waiting you shot an arrow, an easy one to dodge and he did, seemingly on instinct. You shot another, he jumped over it. His landing was wobbly, but he didn’t fall. His eyes lit up like when he found out a game he liked, and he began shooting back at you. You exchanged hits, not once falling, well, until one of you did. 

Two quick arrow of yours managed to make Jason land a bit too far to the right, and he fell in the water. However, he didn’t resurface immediately, which made you lower your bow and search the water for him. You frowned, and only noticed too late the wave of water coming on your side. Jason then climbed on your post and tackled your waist, throwing you straight into the water with him. You hit the water on the side, and swam back to the surface with a gasp.

Jason stared at you with a devious grin, daring you to do something about it. You hooked your bow on your shoulder and lunged. 

You had to admit, sparing in water wasn’t something you had ever done, and the resistance was getting to you. Jason was already better at hand to hand, but now he had the absolute advantage. His longer limbs allowed him to move better and to pull himself up on the river ground if you were to push him down, and the fact that he was only in shorts didn’t impede his movements as much as your heavier clothing. The current was rolling you down the river, and when you hit a shallower part, you couldn’t see the posts anymore. 

You now had water to your midsection, and Jason took the opportunity from your stumbling on the higher river floor. He caught you in his classic headlock, pressing your back against his chest. You stopped struggling then, knowing it was over for you. But he didn’t release you, and you didn’t move either when he slightly loosened his hold.

Both of you were panting from the effort, his chest was heaving quickly on your back. The water made your and Jason’s skin cold, but his breath was warm on the crook of your neck. Usually you would have tapped out, or flipped him over. But you were like in a trance, and you didn’t understand why you couldn’t move away.

Why you wouldn’t move away.

“Gotcha”

His voice sent shiver down your spine.

“Fuck, Jay”

It took you a moment to realize what you said. His breath stilled on your neck, and you gulped. You had never called him just “Jay” before, you didn’t do nicknames. And especially not with that voice, and in that kind of circumstance. You cleared your throat, and he dropped his arm and took a step away.

"I'll…" You trailed off. "I'll go change"

“Sure” His voice wavered in a weird way. “Uh, go on, I’ll catch up later”

You turned around, raising an eyebrow. “Is... Everything alright?”

“Yeah" He said. “I’m just, uh, going for a swim real quick. Another one”

Without another word, he submerged himself in the water.

---------

You had Damian in a headlock when the trail of bat family rushed down the batcave in a hurry, Jason trailing behind seeming way less bothered than the others. You looked up, and this moment of inattention gave Damian the opening to send you flying over him. Your back hit the ground flat, and your confused stare at your own distraction was met by a grimace of disbelief from Damian. Okay, you were truly out of it. 

“Luthor has devanced his plan, we got intel he would move tonight”

You pulled yourself to your feet, suddenly interested in the rush they seemed to be into. You followed Damian out of the cage and met the group halfway, glancing at Jason. He only briefly met your eyes, returning his attention on Bruce afterwards.

“He is going to move the weapon in an underground facility just outside the city, which means we will lose the signal from the tracker” He briefed. “The classic, three vans, only one carrying the package”

“Do we know what it’s even for?” Jason asked.

“I found something about yersinia pestis being injected in certain areas of Gotham” Damian stepped up. “So basically, a plague weapon”

“A plague weapon?” He frowned. “Why would Luthor would ever be interested in bringing back the plague?”

“Wait” Dick perked up, running to the working tables and looking around for something specific. He grabbed a stack of papers and came back. “Here, I saw he made the recent acquisition of a pharmaceutical company that produces, wait for it, gentamicin. It’s a plague treatment”

“So he’s gonna drop the virus on Gotham with that little device?” Jason raised an eyebrow.

“I don’t know--”

“Last year Luthor made the acquisition of a low income housing company mostly operating in the Bowery, Crime Alley and Otisburg” You spoke up, a wary look on your face. “My bet would be that device is to slip the bacteria into the ventilation systems, or the pipes”

“... He did” Dick confirmed, looking through the papers. “That would make sense. He spread the plague at a little scale, he provides the medicine, he wins at every steps”

“He IS trying to slither in the city council” Bruce hummed. “Trying to steal Wayne Enterprises’ seat”

“We need to go now if we don’t wanna miss our shot, Bruce” Dick warned.

“Yes” He snapped out of it. “Three vans. Nightwing, Red Robin, you’ll be assigned to the car that will go down through City Hall District. Robin and I will follow the car going through Gotham proper” He paused, looking at you and Jason. “You two work better together. You’ll go North. I’ll send Dick and Jason the trajectories. Gear up”

Wordlessly, you all went to your own dressing area. Yours was simply a plastic box in a corner with your suit folded, and your weapons on a nearby table. You took a moment longer than usual at the black uniform, but nevertheless put it on piece by piece. The tactical pants, the gloves, the undercoat and the protective layer on it, the belt and the spiked arm bracers. Then the belt, your sword on your back and the arrow quiver crossing above it. You reloaded the shooter on your arm and strapped the sheath on your thigh with your blades, then put on the comm in your ear. 

You grabbed your bow and returned toward the others, who were finishing gearing up as well. Jason came and stood beside you, an unreadable expression on his face. Well, it could be, but you refused to look at him in the face. You instead put on your helmet, the black visor hiding your face. 

“There’s no time to waste, let’s go” Bruce called. “Whatever team finds the van, you stop it and bring back the weapon here”

And with that, you went out. Bruce took the batmobile, while the rest were all on bikes. You and Jason left the cave last, shooting out on the road like two blurs in the night. Your comm was on, tuned on the channel with him only. It took him about five minutes to start talking.

“Tim knows” He said. “Or at least he is close enough to know”

“Doesn’t matter” You clipped back, swerving easily around cars on your way. “This will end soon enough one way or another”

“And you’ll go back to the league?” His voice was bitter, and you could only imagine his expression.

“... Yes” 

“Whatever”

You rode in silence until you reached your hideout point. There was still five minute before the van was scheduled to turn the corner and engage on the one way avenue, and you would execute the plan from then. You both turned different directions to hide in alleys, turning off the lights of your motorcycle. You put one foot down, leaving one hand on the handle. The engine was purring softly under you, warm and ready to take off.

“We’ll attack from the sides” Jason spoke again through the comm. You could see his red helmet on the other side of the street. “We take off the doors quick and clean, if it’s not there we lose them. If it is, I take the van and you cover me”

“Copy that” 

“They should be there in one minute, get ready” 

You adjusted your helmet and readied your explosive arrows. You then crouched on the bike and waited for the van to pass in front of the hideout. You counted the seconds in your head, five, four, three, tw- 

“What the fuck?” You frowned when not one, but three vans heavily escorted with motorcycles sped past you. You and Jason engaged on the road nevertheless, coming up side to side at a safe distance from the vans.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen” He mumbled. “Alright, change of plans. Keep your distances behind them without being seen, I’ll cut them upfront. When I start drawing the escort, blow the doors of each vans. Fuck being subtle”

With that, he parted ways into a smaller street on his right. You remained hidden into traffic, making sure the bikers did not spot you. Not long after, you heard gunshots and they all were drawn at the front, like Jason had planned. You accelerated closer of the last van at the tail. With one hand, you grabbed your bow on top of the handle, waited for the bike to get back straight and slowed down a bit. In a quick movement, you grabbed an explosive arrow and shot on the van doors, immediately regaining your grip on the handle afterwards. The doors flew open, revealing it empty.

You cursed, but swerved nonetheless around the slowing down van and paused in the driver’s blind spot. You knew they’d look for you to pass them, so you got ready with a blade in your hands. You waited a bit more before rolling up to the window and throwing the blade in the guy’s throat before he could shoot you. You repeated the same operation with the next van, also taking down two rogue bikers that had left Jason’s distraction to get to you. That van ended up empty as well.

“Two down, one to go” 

“Alright, hurry up, those fuckers just keep coming from I don’t fucking know where-- FUCK”

“Hang on, I’m almost done”

Nothing in the last van either. You frowned, thinking how easy it had been for you to bust the vans. The bikers guarding the vans surely couldn’t be that stupid to still hover around Jason while you were clearly open, even if there was nothing. But you chased the doubt aside, and instead tuned in the frequency with everyone else

“Our vans are empty”

“So are our” It was Tim who replied a few seconds later. “Wait, vans in plural? B, did you get more vans too?”

“Only one, empty too” 

“Where did your intel come from again?” Tim asked. A moment of silence followed. 

“You and Jason should get out of there, something’s not right on the monitor--”

You lost contact when you were violently hit from the side by a black car. You were projected off your bike and sent rolling down several meters away. Your suit and helmet took most of the fall, ripping and breaking with the rough friction on the asphalt. You visor cracked and the protective plastic lining broke at the base. Your vision was blurry for a second, and your muscles barely responsive. You pushed through the pain anyway and carefully took off your helmet, throwing it away. You looked up and tried to focus on the figure in black coming toward you, and when you did, you gathered your remaining strength and managed a kneeling position. It was Luthor. 

You were about to shoot one of your dart when he shot first, sending  a shockwave through your already weak muscles. You fell forward on all fours with a barely contained scream tearing through your throat. 

“We meet again” His voice was deeper than you expected, and way too calm. You didn’t like it. “I knew if I organized this little parade, you’d come back out there following the masked clowns”

So, it was a setup.

“Where’s the weapon?” You rasped.

“Safe in my underground storing since this morning” He replied smugly. “Don’t beat yourself up, you had no chance. You came too close last time at the lab”

“Kill me now and get over with it”

“Now why would I want to do that? I just wanted to see you from up close” He smirked. “I knew those eyes the second I looked at you the other day. And now that I have you here without that stupid mask, I can see you took more after your mother than I had planned”

You gritted your teeth, panting from the pain of the electrical shock that had gone through you. Hairs were falling out of your braid and sticking to your forehead, yet you didn’t care. You could only glare at him.

“But you’re still my daughter. You belong to me” 

You lunged, but another electric shock sent you back on your knees with a strangled cry. It had been a reflex on your part, since you were usually pretty good a pushing your pain aside. But you had been off ever since your last encounter with him. He got in your head so easily, and now he wouldn’t leave. 

“I am Thaelib fi alzalam” You rasped out. “And I don’t”

“Ah yes, I figured you would deny your name when we finally met” He seemed amused. “And you do, legally speaking. Your mother were under contract to deliver you and walk away. Instead she stole you from me. She stole years of work, for what? So you could become no one”

“You killed her!” You belted out, eyes wide with rage. “You forced us into hiding, she sent me to the League to protect me from you”

“Is that what you think? Or what she told you?” He was becoming impatient. “You were special. You were my first successful genetic clone, but her own selfishness got in the way”

“She wasn’t selfish” You tried to reach for a blade on your thigh, but another shock forced you on your hands. “You were”

“I was?” He put a hand on his chest. “I gave you your superior skills, I gave you your speed, I made you like this. I gave you that gift, that power, that strength, all of it so you could make it out in this world. I did it for you, from a father to his daughter”

You lifted your head a frown on your face. You skills? What was he talking about?

“You didn’t think the League’s training gave you those skills, did you?” He scoffed. “As I told you, you’re special, my girl. I only wished for you to thrive”

“No” You mumbled, narrowing your eyes. Your mother never specified you were enhanced. Did she even know? All that time you thought your successes were from your hard work, but they were really from a genetic modification. You always knew there was something peculiar about you that made you feel like you didn’t exactly belong with the others, and it had just been revealed to you. And what else could he have put inside of you, you weren’t aware about? It made your head spin.

“You’re not one of them, you realize it now” He stalked toward you. “Not the League, not the vigilantes either. Your mother stole you away from what you were made for, and the League merely repressed it. But you can’t fight your nature”

You didn’t look up when he stooped in front of you. You only glanced at your black gloved hands, realizing that all you had suffered only delayed the inevitable. If your mother hadn’t ran away, maybe all of your struggle and pain would have never happened.

“Come with me” He offered. “This internal conflict you have will subside quickly enough once you’re back home, you’ll see”

You ears were ringing as his proposition replayed in your head in loops. Maybe if you agreed he’d stop tormenting you then, maybe he’d leave your head and you could finally rest without obsessing over him. You slowly looked up, but something coming on your side made your eyes widen. Only then the sound reached your ears, and in a quick reflex movement, you rolled away.

Jason was walking toward you, shooting his bullet in rapid fire in Luthor’s direction.

Luthor noticed him half a second later and jumped away, running away and climbing in his black car. He drove away as Jason reached your, his eyes trailed on the retreating black cadillac. Then, he turned to you, the glossing red of his helmet staring back at you.

“You okay?”

You shook your head no.

[randomfandomfamily]

One-shot idea. Gary has a nightmare about his father and refuses to talk to anyone at all, meanwhile the rest of the team squad is worried and scared shitless about him.

Gonna kinda combine these three ideas because I want to and they go great together, but first I gotta say something real quick because SOMEBODY BROKE THE RULE.

I said No criticizing your own asks. This request is not “sludge” and I will have NONE of that in this house. Now stop it. Stop it right this instant.

Now back to your regularly scheduled fic.

Sheryl wasn’t sure what was going on with Gary, but he seemed off.

Not that she knew much about her son’s behavior–or anything about him, really. But in the short amount of time that she had known him, he had been a pretty expressive, outgoing, happy person.

There was something different about him today. He was too quiet, too withdrawn. It was making everyone uncomfortable. “Hey, kid.” She nudged Little Cato. “You’ve known my kid for a while. What’s going on with him?”

Little Cato shrugged. “I dunno. He just gets like this sometimes.”

“Quiet?”

“Sad.” Little Cato said. “He might just be thinkin’ about some stuff, I don’t know. I just know he’s sad.”

Sheryl frowned. She didn’t know why it bothered her so much to know that Gary was upset. Is this what it was like to be a mother? To be worried? She wasn’t so sure she was equipped for that yet.

“You know,” Little Cato interrupted her thought, “You could always just go ask him.”

“Well, why don’t you?” Sheryl asked.

Little Cato deflated. “I already tried. So did Quinn. And Dad.”

Sheryl crossed her arms. “So what makes you think he’ll talk to me?”

“I don’t think it matters if he does or doesn’t talk to you,” Little Cato mused, “But when he comes out of whatever slump he’s in, he’s gonna remember that you tried.” He tilted his head. “And that’s what you’re going for here, right? Trying?”

The kid, frustratingly, was making sense. “Alright, you’ve made your point.” She started heading in the direction Gary went. The closer she got to Gary’s room, the more she doubted herself. What did she know about sympathy? What did she know about Gary? What did she know about anything?

Gary didn’t answer when she knocked, but she kind of figured that would happen. “Gary, your friends are worried about ya. ‘Cause you haven’t been talkin’ to anyone and… you’re not answering the door, so…” She was the most notorious criminal in the universe and she couldn’t form a complete sentence? God, this was pathetic. “I’m uh- I’m exercising my right as your parent to… ah, screw it.”

Sheryl opened the door without waiting for an answer. Her son was simply sitting in the floor, knees pulled up to his chest. His eyes were closed, not asleep, but he didn’t seem to have heard her come in.

“Gary?” She knelt in front of him and waved a hand in front of his face. “Sweetheart, can you hear me?” She grabbed his arm. “Gary!”

He still didn’t answer, or give any indication that he could even hear her. Sheryl didn’t exactly know what was happening. She didn’t know how to fix it, but she didn’t feel comfortable leaving him like this either. So she took a seat next to him and leaned against the metal bed frame.

“Alright, fine,” Sheryl said to her unresponsive son, “Guess I’ll just… wait here, then.”

And wait she did, for five whole minutes, which is when Gary suddenly gasped and jolted so hard that he ended up bumping into her. “”What the- Mom! What are you doing in here?”

Sheryl rubbed her arm where Gary had elbowed it. “I was about to ask ya the same thing. Been cooped up in here for a while now.”

Gary narrowed his eyes. “You’re… checking on me?”

“Yes. I know it’s thirty-two years late, but I’m checking on my son.” She ran a hand through her messy hair. “Look, I’m new to this, alright?”

“No, that’s… that’s great.” Gary managed a sarcastic, “I’m so proud of you.”

Sheryl rolled her eyes. “Oh, hush, you.” Now came the harder part. “Now, do you wanna talk about what that was, or…?”

The smile immediately fell from Gary’s face. “If I’m being real here, this is all over some freaky dream I had a couple of nights ago. It’s dumb. Honestly, I’m pleasantly surprised you came to check on me at all, you don’t have to sit here and talk to me.”

“But I want to.” She wasn’t sure what she was more shocked about: the fact that she said it, or the fact that she kinda meant it. “So are ya gonna tell me what’s goin’ on in that head of yours or not?”

Gary hesitated. “Do you know… where we are? Like, what’s outside?”

“Final Space,” Sheryl said, “And for some reason, there’s a lot of corpses of you out there.”

“Right, well, there is a reason for that.” Gary fidgeted. “You remember Nightfall?”

Sheryl nodded. “The older version of your girlfriend.”

Gary shrugged. “Yes, but also no. She was from a different timeline. Actually, she went through a bunch of different timelines trying to save me.” He gaze darted to the window. “Because uh… my timeline’s the only one where Quinn set off the anti-bomb. Every other time it was…”

Realization struck. “You?” Her stomach twisted at the thought of Gary setting off a bomb, knowing the end result was right outside the window. “Why? How?”

“I don’t know. Not all the timelines are the same.” He chuckled under his breath. “I mean, in Nightfall’s timeline, I was actually part of the Infinity Guard. Wild, huh?”

Sheryl remembered the images HUE had shown her, specifically the one where she had watched him graduate. “Maybe not so wild.”

“Well, in any case, I never made it. Obviously.” He frowned at yet another rotting corpse. “But Quinn and I weren’t the only ones who set off an anti-matter bomb.”

Oh. This was about… “John.”

“Dad, yeah.” Gary took an unsteady breath. “I mean, I know he’s dead. I was there, I saw it happen, I watched him set off the bomb.” Before Sheryl could question it, Gary waved her off. “Bolo shot me back in time, I was literally there. And then there was the time I almost- well, I guess I did die.” Again, Sheryl was tempted to question, but refrained. “But I saw him there. And we were definitely dead, him and me both.

“But I can’t help but wonder, like… did he die immediately or did he survive for a while after? Was he just… floating around in here like Quinn? Did he see the Titans? Did he see Invictus? Did he see…” He gestured vaguely. “Those?” He let his arm rest on his knees. “And that’s basically what the nightmare was, I guess.

“I just pictured him in here, alone. Surrounded by corpses of me. The guy he knows is his son because I had just come to him from the future to help close the breach in space.” He looked at her. “You don’t think he was stuck in here, do you?”

Sheryl shook her head, completely mystified. “I… I hope not,” she said finally, “That’d be… Christ.”

“Awful,” Gary finished. “And I can’t stop thinking about it.” He tugged at his hair anxiously. “I know I shouldn’t think about it, but I can’t… it’s not going away and I can’t-”

“Gary,” Sheryl reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re not gonna slip off again are ya?”

“I uh… I mean I-I don’t want to,” Gary answered shakily, “But um…”

Sheryl tried to think of something to keep Gary talking. She didn’t want him going back inside his head. “Tell me about your father. Tell me how you remember him.”

Gary looked like he was struggling to focus. “H-how I…” He shook his head. “Um… he was a really good cook? Especially-”

“Baking!” Sheryl exclaimed. “That man loved baking more than anything in the world! John was the kindest person I ever knew, but I swear the man would kill for-”

“Chocolate chip cookies?” Gary asked hesitantly.

Sheryl laughed. “Always chocolate chip. He looked at me like I was crazy because I suggested butterwheat crunch once.”

Gary’s face scrunched up. “Well duh, that’s not a cookie.”

“It is so!” Sheryl protested. “Don’t tell me he’s passed that along to you now.”

“He did,” Gary said, “And he’s right! It’s not a cookie!”

“Is so!”

“Is not!”

“Is so!”

“Is not!”

They stared each other down for a few seconds before dissolving into laughter. It was a desperate kind of laugh, the kind people could only share in the wake of a lost loved one.

Maybe this was why Gary wouldn’t talk to his friends. Maybe he needed somebody who knew John. Like, really knew John. Not the hero, just the kind, caring person that he was.

And then Sheryl thought… maybe Gary didn’t need just somebody.

Maybe he just needed her.

[tastycitrus]

The Powerpuff Girls (SRW) get their souls trapped in dolls and then stranded on Dr. Quandary’s Secret Island

Or, Meme Dwellers play The Secret Island of Dr. Quandary (except not really, I never wrote anything more for this). A joke story I wrote for some reason like two years ago that I’m now putting on here for some reason? It’s just a shitpost, lol.

Who thought it was a good idea to force the Steel Dragons to attend a carnival? The only culprit that came to mind was Excellen, but as crafty as she was there was no way she could’ve convinced the higher-ups to turn a carnival trip into a “mandatory team-building exercise” for the Steel Dragons and their associates.

Now, normally being forced to attend a carnival wasn’t the worst thing ever. But this carnival was really something else. I mean…really something else.

It was clear at first glance that the people behind this horrible place pretending to be a fun carnival didn’t care a single bit for their patrons’ safety. They also probably cared even less about making it actually fun.

The Ferris wheel was stopped for what had to be the fifteenth time that day, leaving the unfortunate victims who were dumb enough to get on trapped inside until the maintenance workers could get it moving again. The bathrooms smelled like rotten ass and probably had seventeen different STDs infesting the seats. The food was tasteless at best and looked like they had failed every bit of health inspection out there. All the games looked uninteresting and were probably rigged anyway.

To top it all off, even the atmosphere itself seemed to be as bleak and gloomy as this parody of a carnival. How the hell did this place manage to stay in business?

Katia, Melua, and Tenia thought long and hard about that question as they wandered around this travesty that called itself a carnival.

“Where’s Touya, Calvina, and the bland twins?” Tenia asked. “How’d we lose them in this place? I mean—I can understand losing Akimi and Akemi, but Touya and Calvina are pretty distinct, you know?”

Melua glanced around. “Yeah, usually Calvina’s the one who loses us, not the other way around.”

“You’d think we’d be able to keep track of the four people we were supposed to be exploring this ‘carnival’ with.” Katia scanned the premises for a familiar face. “Also, where the heck is anybody else? This place can’t be that big.”

She sighed, pulling out her phone. “You know what, why don’t we just try calling Calvina instead of wandering around like lost kids—”

Suddenly, a carny shouted very loudly in their direction, “Step right up! Have a try at this game! It’s free!”

Katia coughed after a moment. “Well, I’ll call—”

“Come on, don’t be shy! Try your hand at Troggle Shoot! You win a prize every time!”

“…I’ll call—”

“And yes, I am talking to you, trio of girls who look like lost children and whose color schemes are blatantly ripping off the Powerpuff Girls. Come here and play Troggle Shoot!”

The three girls sighed and turned to look at the carny shouting at them. He was a man dressed in purple robes and a funny hat manning a stand that no one seemed to be paying much attention to. His stand was evidently his game of Troggle Shoot, judging by his earlier shouting and also the flashing neon pink sign that said “Troggle Shoot” on top of the stand.

The three exchanged glances.

“What if it’s a kidnapping attempt?” Katia asked.

“Surprisingly, we haven’t run into that in this carnival yet,” Melua replied. “I don’t see any of the others, but if we shout loud enough someone should come running…”

“He doesn’t look so tough.” Tenia glanced at the carny. “He looks old and scrawny. I bet even we could beat him up. And he did go through all the trouble of calling us out.”

Katia sighed. “I swear, you two are going to land us in a shallow grave out on the side of a road one day.”

They reluctantly headed over to the carny’s stand, because he was a creepy old man being incredibly insistent on having three girls play his probably terrible game. He gave them what was likely supposed to be a disarming smile as they approached. Unfortunately, it just made him look creepier.

“Welcome, girls! I am the ingenious Dr. Quandary, the quintessential quizmaster! But you may call me Doctor Q.”

Oh great, alliteration. How wonderful—I absolutely adore the amazing appeal of alliteration. It’s immensely impressive to implement.

“You must be so happy,” Katia whispered to Melua. “You’ve finally found kin.”

“Shut up, Katia.”

Doctor Q continued on. “It’s your lucky day! I am offering you three a free game of Troggle Shoot! If you win, you can have these three dolls.”

He gestured to three dolls sitting atop a shelf in the stand. One was of a babyish blond child dressed in blue overalls. Another was a pink-skinned…person dressed in blinding yellow clothes. The last was aptly described as a horrific pumpkin-headed mutant wearing a popped-collar shirt and Hawaiian shorts.

“Excuse me, did I say dolls? I meant to say…Lifelike Action Figures!”

“…Just call them dolls, dude.” Tenia gave him her best impression of Calvina’s “what the fuck is this shit” face. “We’re not even boys—trying to play to that stereotype doesn’t make any sense!”

“Also these dolls are the ugliest things I’ve ever seen,” Katia added.

Melua grimaced. “Trying to offer them as prizes just makes me want to play this game even less!”

Doctor Q waved his hands. “Hey, hey, don’t be like that. Who knows? Maybe you’ll grow to like these precious faces!”

“I doubt that,” the three girls said in unison.

“…Look, it’s a free game and you get free stuff. Didn’t your parents teach you not to look a gift horse in the mouth?”

“Our parents are dead.”

“…Well, why not distract yourself from the grief and sadness with a little game of Troggle Shoot! It’s free! See that Troggle in the box marked TARGET?”

“We don’t want to—”

He pointed insistently at an LCD screen built into the side of the stand that showed an image that was probably supposed to be that Troggle thing he was talking about.

“Shoot as many of them as you can.” He set three BB guns on the table. “You each have 20 bullets. You can start firing whenever you’re ready.”

The three girls sighed. What a pushy guy. Seeing as he probably wasn’t going to leave them alone until they played his crappy game, they took the guns he offered them. Doctor Q’s smile widened as he stepped aside to activate the game. In the back of the stand, Troggles of all shapes and sizes began to roll across the shooting gallery’s three rows, but the girls were aiming for only one type.

One such Troggle came out first from the right on the middle row. Katia aimed and fired first. However, she aimed where it was instead of where it was going to be, so the Troggle rolled onward unharmed while her bullet looked stupid as it hit nothing.

“Oops. Well, at least Calvina isn’t here to complain about how much I suck at shooting.”

At least her mistake taught Tenia and Melua that they should aim slightly ahead of the Troggles to hit them. With that lesson learned, the girls began to shoot down Troggle after Troggle with relative ease. The game was surprisingly simple with no bullshit rigging involved, and they each had some experience in shooting because during their little venture in space Calvina decided to give them lessons since they had nothing else to do most of the time.

Once they used up their 20 bullets, their total Troggles shot came up to 53. Doctor Q shut off the machine and applauded them.

“Bravo, girls! Nice shooting! You’ve won your prizes.” He paused. “Though I must warn you; the prize you choose may have a dramatic effect on your future. These are not your ordinary Lifelike Action Figures. In fact, you might even swear they were alive sometimes!” He let out a deep laugh.

“Are you seriously still calling them Lifelike Action Figures?” asked Tenia. “And why does this sound incredibly foreboding?”

Doctor Q ignored her. “Let me tell you about them.”

He first gestured to the babyish one on the far left. “This is B. Ginner. It’s harmless, mostly.”

He moved on to the pink one on the far right. “This is O. D. Nary. A nice, middle of the road fellow.”

Finally, he motioned to the tan one with the pumpkin head. “And this is D. Fee Cult. It can be a real pain in the posterior. Which one will you take?”

“What’s with the punny names?” Katia asked. “And also the foreboding descriptions? Everything about this whole setup is incredibly suspicious and I don’t think we should accept these dolls.”

“Even if this whole thing didn’t scream danger, I still wouldn’t want these things,” Melua muttered. “They’re all so freaky.”

Doctor Q slammed his fist on the stand, making the girls jump. “You’ll accept these Lifelike Action Figures and you’ll like it!”

“Okay, fine! We’ll take the stupid dolls!” Melua turned to the others. “I’m…going with B. Ginner. It’s the least freaky of the bunch.”

Katia shrugged. “Alright, I’ll go with O. D. Nary then.”

“Wait, but that leaves me with D. Fee Cult!” Tenia whined. “It’s so freaky with that swollen pumpkin head!”

“Too late, Tenia. At least it looks like the ultimate dudebro with that outfit.”

She groaned. “Fine. Maybe I can freak Touya out by sticking it in his room…”

The three girls reluctantly accepted their prizes. God, they were so freaky and ugly.

As they studied their freaky prizes, the dolls decided to make themselves more horrifying by suddenly opening their eyes.

“AHH! WHAT THE FU—”

The dolls began to glow, blotting out their view with bright technicolor light. The girls heard Doctor Q laugh maniacally before they blacked out.

__________________

Katia awoke with a splitting headache. She rolled onto her side and pushed herself off the sand, rubbing her head with a groan. Thankfully, her ears didn’t get any sand in them—they were however filled with the sound of the ocean’s grey waves, destined to seek life beyond the shore just out of reach. Er, wait—I mean she heard the ocean lapping against the shore.

…Wait, when the hell did she get to the beach?

Katia looked up and nearly fell over when the first thing she saw were two of those freaky dolls she, Tenia, and Melua had been given moving around like they were alive. Also, they had somehow become as big as she was.

“AHH, HOLY SHIT!”

Her outburst drew the attention of the dolls, who also startled back and screamed. Their voices sounded an awful lot like—

…Wait.

“Tenia? Melua?” Katia asked tentatively as she looked down at herself. The clothes she was wearing certainly weren’t those she had on at the carnival. And her skin was definitely not pink before.

The only thing she knew that had this ungodly pallor and disgustingly bright set of clothes was…that doll…

Looking back up, she saw that the other two seemed to have drawn the same conclusion as her. Their expressions slowly shifted into that of surprise and growing horror. Faced with this terrible realization, the girls reacted the only way they knew how:

By screaming about it.

“NOOOOO! THE LAST THING I WANTED WAS TO BECOME THIS FREAKY PUMPKIN-HEAD DOLL!”

“Dammit, I knew we were going to wind up in some crazy situation one day!”

“This is the last time I play crappy carnival games or accept ugly dolls from strangers!”

Their freak-out session was interrupted by a bottle washing up on the shore. Inside was a rolled-up paper. The three girls looked at it and then at each other.

Tenia walked over to the bottle, uncorking it and pulling out the paper inside. She unfurled it as the other two came over to read the message written on it.

Dear suckers:

Ha! You have fallen into my trap! I have implanted your minds into these DOLLS and transported you to my Secret Island! Unless you can solve all my puzzles and meet all my challenges, you’ll never see your bodies again! You’ll be real nobodies! Get it? NO BODIES! Ha ha ha ha ha

Yours Q-ly,

Doctor Quandary

“…Well, that explains how we got in this situation,” Tenia muttered.

“What the heck is wrong with this guy? Who the hell thinks ‘I’m going to go trap random kids into ugly dolls for shits and giggles’? Literally what does he stand to gain from doing any of this?”

“…Katia, I think we should be more concerned about possibly losing our bodies forever at the moment,” Melua said.

“Yeah, but how are we supposed to get our bodies back? What, is he going to make us make some fixer elixir by completing his stupid challenges?”

As Katia spoke, Tenia walked over to the recycling bin that was conveniently placed nearby and dropped the message inside. Recycling was a habit she gained after Calvina got really angry at her for littering. Surprisingly, Calvina cared a lot about the environment.

Much to her surprise, a receipt popped out after she recycled the message.

“Wait, what? I got a receipt for recycling?” She picked it up and read the big words printed on the top. “…Doctor Q’s Fixer Elixir?”

Katia stared at her. “Are you kidding me.”

She and Melua went over to read the list with Tenia. They went through the entire list in silence.

“…What kind of an ingredient list is this?” Tenia asked. “What do you mean, ‘under-the-table decoration’? Who writes a recipe in riddles?”

Melua pointed at the directions. “The directions aren’t better. ‘Heat it up until it’s too hot to drink’? ‘Drink it’? Screw you too, Doctor Q.”

Tenia groaned. “This is gonna suck. We’re gonna need some major help with this one.”

She pulled out her phone from…somewhere and dialed a number. Katia stared at her pocketless shorts.

“…Where did you get your phone from?”

__________________

The Ferris wheel had been stopped for a whole ten minutes with no signs of moving yet. Heck, the maintenance workers hadn’t even shown up. Trapped in one of the compartments at the top were Calvina, Touya, and the Akatsuki twins. Calvina glared at everyone else as they all sat in awkward silence.

“I told you this thing would break down.”

Touya looked at the floor while Akimi and Akemi stared out of opposite windows.

“…Worth it.”

“Was it? Was it really?”

“…A little.”

Calvina sighed. “This is almost as bad as that time we were stuck in that escape shuttle meant for only two people at best.”

“I wouldn’t say it’s that bad,” Touya replied. “At least this time we have breathing room and you don’t have to steer with Akimi’s ass in your face.”

Akimi coughed. “Yeah, this…is a lot better than that.”

“And we also don’t have any space malaria to worry about.” Akemi frowned. “How did we even get into that situation to begin with?”

Akimi shrugged. “Beats me. We just kinda…woke up like that. Anyway, I hope the ride starts again soon. Don’t freak out yet, but I kinda have to pee.”

The others stared at him.

“…I hope they get the ride fixed soon,” Touya muttered.

“I’ll beat the shit out of you if you piss yourself,” Calvina said flatly.

Akimi lowered his head. “Uh…got it…”

Akemi patted him on the shoulder. “If it comes down to it, you can probably pop open the compartment door and pee out there.”

“Ew, I’m not going to do that.”

Suddenly, Calvina’s phone rang.

“…Really, Calvina? Your ringtone is Megalovania?”

“Shut up, Touya.” She took out her phone and checked the caller ID before taking it. “What is it, Tenia?”

“Calvina, we need your help. Some old fart named Dr. Quandary forced us to play his crappy game and then stuffed our souls into these ugly ass dolls. Now we’re stranded on his secret island and he’s making us solve a bunch of puzzles to gather ingredients to make what sounds like a very unappetizing drink to cure our dollness. We gotta do it, because otherwise we’ll be stuck like this forever and I don’t want to be an ugly ass pumpkin-head dudebro forever, this doll is the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen. So can you please help us solve these puzzles when we get to them?”

“…What?”

“What did Tenia get into?” Touya asked.

“Apparently she, Katia, and Melua played a suspicious carnival game in the ten minutes we were separated and then the guy running the stand stuffed their souls into some dolls. Or something.”

“…What?” the other three said at the same time.

“Yeah…” Calvina frowned. “Wait, if you three are stuck in dolls without your bodies how do you still have your phone?”

In the background, she heard Katia shout, “That’s what I asked!” Tenia on the other hand was silent.

“…I don’t know, but it’s convenient, shut up. Are you going to help us or not?”

Calvina rubbed her forehead. “I mean, I guess…it’s not like the four of us are going anywhere, since these idiots wanted to ride the Ferris wheel so damn badly.” She glared at the others once again.

“What? But that thing was obviously going to break down!”

“Yeah, that’s what I said! But nooo, we just had to ride it. Look, I’m putting you on speaker now so everyone can hear what you’re saying.”

She did exactly that before setting her phone on her leg. “Okay, what are we dealing with? Where are you right now?”

“Uh, we’re on a beach. I got a message in a bottle and recycled it to get a recipe for this ‘Fixer Elixir’ which is probably the thing that’s supposed to turn us back to normal. The recipe is weird as shit though. Here, I’ll send Touya a pic.”

Touya’s phone buzzed and he pulled it out. A moment later he held out his phone to show Tenia’s pic. Everyone leaned in to read.

“…What the hell is ‘under-the-table decoration’ supposed to mean?” Akimi asked.

“That’s what I want to know!”

“Well…this seems like the start of a whole bunch of ‘what the hell is this shit’ shenanigans,” Akemi muttered as she went over the list. “Maybe we’ll get a better idea what the heck any of this is supposed to be once you start getting things.”

“I guess…I see a forest nearby so we’re going to head there first. Come on guys, let’s go.”

Calvina sighed. “This is going to be a long day…”

[jennhoney]

I feel uneasy. Just in general. Things are relatively fine but I can’t shake it today. I guess I will go do stupid exercise.

[countessofbiscuit]

At Ease

For @celebrate-the-clone-wars‘s “Revisiting Old Themes” Writing Wednesday Prompt: A Teaching Moment Rating: T Words: 1422

Ahsoka teaches Rex about Tog hygiene and they learn a thing or two about each other in the process. 

“Do you need to see Kix? Your scratching is making me itchy.”

“Sorry,” Ahsoka replied, listing back towards her captain as the battalion fell out of formation. “None of his creams can fix this.”

“What is it?” Rex craned forward to examine her montrals, his chin slightly upturned in case the answer was disgusting.

Ahsoka bent her head, obligingly, content not to see his reaction.

“You’re … peeling.”

“Yeah, it’s gross, I know. They’re growing faster now.” A little bounce of her shoulders to emphasize her lekku left a flaky residue all over her top. The right one now had a good half-inch on the left, and Ahsoka wondered if they’d ever be visibly even again.

“So you’re not sick?” Rex peered a little closer as they walked, now that he wasn’t looking at something she’d picked up in the Mimban mud.

“Nah, they just do this. Molt. Shed. Itch like a banthaf—” She broke off to give a section under her beads some violent treatment with the hydrospanner she’d been carrying around all morning.

Rex had noticed that. But he hadn’t picked up on her dandruff days before, and it bothered him. He was supposed to be aware of physiological tempos like this. It was part of his unusual Jedi attaché job spec—part of his own specs. Having two to mind was not, in his exacting opinion, a good enough excuse.

“Is this the first time?” he asked, trying not to betray his ignorance and uncomfortable with the idea of apologizing for it.

“No, I just haven’t had time to get it sorted.” There was a war on, after all.

Rex frowned. “Haven’t had time? But you’re miserable.”

“It’s … a really involved process—takes forever.”

“Will this at least help the itch?” Rex plucked a tube from his belt box. It had worked for crotch rot, and he’d have sawed himself in half if he’d taken up with a hydrospanner during that nightmare.

“Not for long. And I can’t just lather up here, Rex,” Ahsoka replied. The corridor was empty now, but anyone might walk by and get the wrong idea. “It’d be obscene.”

The commander had spent four hours rasping herself with a metal stick and shedding all over the ship while muttering words that sounded like Hutt genitals looked, but there was apparently a firm line at public moisturizing. Rex had to respect that.

“Then let’s get it sorted,” he said. “Now.”

“Orders, captain?” Ahsoka crossed her arms archly.

“Volunteering. I know it’s the sort of thing only sergeants get stiff over, but as my commanding officer you can pretend to be impressed?”

“If you’re willing to help—and you do it half as well as Padmé—I might be more than just impressed.”

Ahsoka winked, Rex flushed in spite of himself, and just like that, it seemed they were in for some textbook fraternization. Neither was too sure, but both produced reasons to justify pushing jetpack shakedown and duty rostering until the morning so they could find out.

It still wasn’t clear when Rex rocked up to Ahsoka’s cabin later. She’d removed her akul teeth and felt kind of naked, making her distractedly self-conscious, and he was suddenly uneasy about fitting his hand into a gritty nanowave mitt and taking a rotary device to his CO’s head. But Rex had never known a gentle learning curve for new gear, and nothing here looked explosive.

Except the aforementioned CO.

She’d traded in her spanner for a steel brush, and at times could hardly hear herself as she walked Rex through the program:

Frst came a scrub with the exfoliating mitt—gentler on the horns, firmer on the tails, like skinning a womprat—but he wasn’t supposed to go past these lines—it’d get dusty, so he should put the sheet over his legs—then he needed to wipe everything down with the damp chamize cloth—no, he couldn’t have one for drying unmentionables in the field, they cost like 300 credits a pop and were made from the lethris of flying Alderaani goats or something—the chamize was followed by a deep moisturizing session using this jar of jellied blubber—why did it smell like a longneck’s armpit? she didn’t know, she’d never gotten that close to a Kaminoan, but probably because it was made with beldon fat—sustainably sourced, of course, the whole kit was a gift from Padmé—if he kicked off his boots off, she’d put some on his calluses and his feet would feel as smooth as a senator’s backside in the morning—again, these lines marked where he should stop—since he’d kindly pointed out her freaky forehead, once she was oiled up, he could be the one to go pop open that wonky panel down the corridor and grab the wet towel she’d draped over the pipe—she’d heat treat her head for a couple hours while they watched limmie or something—if he took back the forehead comment, maybe she could stream the Galactic All-Stars game and save him some funny money, caf patches and one grovelling call to CLINT for the HoloNet access—

“Scouring the dead layer off is the final step, and the hardest. The jelly does most of the work, but you’ll need to take breaks,” Ahsoka said, holding up the rotary device that could’ve passed for a Nubian blaster if not for the bushy metal attachment, one of its many interchangeable heads. “But I’ll come to that.”

“Sounds painful,” said Rex. It sounded dangerous to somebody who still had nightmares about taking a fastcutter to a bucket when one newly brevetted and stupidly curious commander got her head stuck and no amount of bantha butter was gonna get her out again.

“It’s all dead, I can’t feel it until you hit the new stuff. I trust your trigger finger.” She made finger guns at Rex’s heart, which was level with hers from where he was sitting on her cabin table.

“These lines,” said Rex, pointing at where her white headtails gave way to blue at the tips—or were they blue with white stripes? “You keep pointing them out. Why?”

“Are you my betrothed? Or my mother? Or a shaman?”

Rex blanched. Absolutely not—he could never live up to the first; he had no experience with the second; and although known to commune with the caf machine, he was no spiritualist. He shook his head.

“Then don’t go past them,” Ahsoka replied. “Shilian custom says I can’t be held responsible for my actions if you do. Didn’t they cover anything about social grooming on Kamino?”

“No. Guess they thought we’d never get close enough to civvies to need it.”

“Not even between yourselves?”

There were a lot of social other things, but Rex wouldn’t have called Kamino communal. It was too competitive for that. He thought about it for a while, until her hands on his knees reminded him of something.

“We used to keep each other up at night, moaning about the pain in our legs. Couldn’t really hear it in the pods, they had sound dampeners. But during an exercise or out in the field? It drove everyone crazy—especially if you were the unlucky sod run down a motthole with someone whose shins decided to grow two sizes that day. We learned fast that no one was really watching us out there. Yeah, they were using live ordnance, it was easy to get popped, or see half your squad dropped … but we could at least touch each other, make the pain go away for a while, and not get voltage up our asses and out our ears.”

While Rex was recalling the screams of shells, Ahsoka blinked back tears, trying not to imagine what the cries of a youngling Rex or Fives or Scooter or Patch or any of the boys sounded like. Once the Force heard it, she’d have an earworm that burrowed in her tips and echoed through time.

“Does that count?” Rex asked innocently, when the silence had started to make a third in the room.

Ahsoka nodded without looking up. “Yeah. It counts.”

She almost dismissed him, then—officially and proper-like, with an apology for tasking him with something so frivolous. Most of her head was within reach, and maybe if she retrofitted a droid or just asked Skyguy to swipe her out and beg a visit from Master Ti—

But then Rex gently placed his gloved hand on hers, conscious that some shells could be defused before they went off.

“So, when can I become the first captain to earn his grooming quals?”

[cyanpeacock]

considering My Functionality again? 

i can’t, uh, explain how i actually work any other way than... well, i’m... there is... we’re (pronouns???!) a system, but a reasonably well hidden one, one that can function and broadly pass as One Person? 

as in, i don’t require a diagnosis of DID to navigate the world, so i’m not talking about DID itself here. but yeah, it’s not infrequent that my body is walking somewhere having a whole conversation, that i’m not consciously creating every part of. 

used to feel like the whole, Voices In My Head, Uncontrollable Speech And Actions thing made me, you know... Dangerous, Insane, the whole stereotypical shebang. and, yeah, ngl, i was more than unpleasant to be around for a while, before i done went and learned Emotional Regulation Skills, and stuff like that. appreciative that those are increasingly accessible to whatever the hell the rest of my brain is doing. still work to do, but that’s okay, there always is.

so now i’m like... damn, who is it hurting? this way of understanding the functioning of my brain has been very helpful to me, actually. it’s interesting, now i’m increasingly comfortable with the undeniable (in terms of Human Averages) weirdness of it.

there are just, entities in here that i don’t consciously control? some are even friends! they just... Speak And Act Through This Body. i didn’t consciously make them. they just sort of, show up, and grow and change with time, go dormant, wake up again, sometimes respond to being prodded. 

the characters i consciously make? turn out weird, and flat. they’re just Designs, pretty pictures, shells really. the people that just Show Up? i’m like, oh, man, if i think hard enough i see sort of how you got unconsciously made, but... i didn’t choose to do that. it just fucking, Happened. ok. alright. 

it’s... perhaps frightening, to some people, who happen to see my body apparently Crazy(tm) in the street, or gesticulating wildly to thin air through my apartment window? but then, that’s societal prejudice against obvious neurodivergence and/or mental illness talking, and i know i’m not going to physically harm them, my body is just... Doing That Thing Again. they might be frightened, but they’re gonna walk past physically unharmed, and emotionally uninjured except for a bit of a scare, which, many things can scare you. 

i don’t mean to frighten anyone! but i’m aware it’s gonna happen regardless, even if the only cause was my appearance and not my Odd Behaviour - e.g., some people are going to experience fear of my body alone, even Acting Normally(tm), because i’m a white man in a tracksuit, who is inevitably going to cross paths with women and folks of colour when i take walks at night. 

i don’t know, part of me wonders, should i even be using the word system if i’m not, like, Professionally Diagnosed With DID? i’m aware lots of systems hide, i’m aware of iatrogenic systems with no evident history of trauma, i’m aware that some people contest the existence of DID at all and place it as a phenomenon created by psychiatry, i’m aware that some people with DID contest the existence of iatrogenic systems... it’s all very complicated.

if you ask this (iteration of?) me, self-determination is just as important as any external determination. people only self-determine, self-identify, self-label, self-categorize, because it helps them in some way. maybe not always a “healthy” kind of helping! but there are many stages of unhealth on the way to health, and health is extremely variable in presentation, so, who am i to speak against anyone’s identity and feelings of health, including my own? 

oh, boy, yeah, it’s confusing. 

my hypothesis (a bad one, because it’s untestable) is that this brain/body was already predisposed to strong emotions, “vivid imagination,” and a propensity for gathering information and making connections. it then went through a duration of traumatic experiences, and had to Really Use those functions in order to make sense of the experiences in order to survive (and ideally, Live). these factors in combination result in a brain that unconsciously went about creating compartments and structures that would eventually help the entire bodily unit understand some things about itself and Other People(tm)?

for the purposes of this post, one of those things being, of course there can be multiple, long-standing, truly discrete Selves within one body. and, of course there can be One Self in a body. and of course, there are many states in between.

uh, back to the concept of an engine, that’s useful for this thought exercise again, very imperfect, but useful to me.

so, lots of people are going to understand an engine as An Engine. it’s one functional unit. they don’t even know the names of the parts inside it, it’s just, An Engine.

me? baffled by engines. there are so many parts, and i’m always like, well, how does that bit work? isn’t that a separate machine? aren’t these loads of separate machines, with separate functions, that exist and perform independently, but also together? not exactly missing the point of the engine, but tending to look on a smaller scale...? so, yes, like, i understand, you put them together and it’s An Engine, it drives the car. but... that’s (also) a system. every engine can be regarded as a system. 

so, by my logic, what really matters is... well, whose engine is it, and how/on what level do they best understand it, how can you get it to drive the car as smoothly as possible? meaning, every brain is an engine (one Unit), or a system (many Parts). it depends how hard you look at it, and what helps you or the other person understand how best to make it function in harmony with the body it’s sat in. 

i mean... well. shy and tentative as ever, but i can talk about some of the other people in here. but it’s my blog. it has to stay that way. but i’m coming to realize i kind of need these guys for Happy Independent Functioning, even if i can’t talk about them everywhere.

mark has been around for YEARS. it has not always been a good relationship. he is a troublesome bastard. he says shit that absolutely embarrasses the hell out of me. he is RUDE. freaky bastard. he’s kind of a capitalist. Fake Posh (he is insecure about his scumminess). i hate him but i live with him and he’s not awful, even he thinks jeff bezos is a hoarding twat. and yeah, he doesn’t yell abuse at me any more, and i don’t yell back, because i Did That and Went Out There and Got Emotional Skills Up In The Brain. he was slower to pick them up than me, but it’s pretty good now. 

amy has also been around for years! less years than mark, but yeah, years now. amy is very bright, she doesn’t really give a shit about School the way i do, she just likes fun things like sunshine and flower crowns and (the idea of) being a Party Girl. she’s never even been a douche to me like That Other Bastard, Mark Fuckdick Mcgee. i hate him, lovingly, hatefully, etc etc. oh bastard fuck, fine, i’m in love with him now, gayly, and it’s embarrassing. disgusting man.

BUT YEAH back to amy. i’m aware i’ve found that in practice, parties like That are bodily sensory overload. so, yes, the nightclub Exists In The Mind. but yh... when amy showed up, she was Miles better than me at like, emotional support, comforting stuff? took me to an ATM i was like, beyond terrified of going to, lmao. i... suppose she trusted and integrated some experiences of positive, healthy interaction that i was still Super Suspicious of at that point?

like... yeah. in practice, shit, i run this operation, i’m realizing i’m kind of a control freak about understanding my brain/body, communicating things about it (and in general) effectively, and Getting It To Work BETTER (i.e. happier, more independently). it requires lots of thinking and lots of feeling and lots of practice, particularly in the art of When To Just Let Shit Go, which... well. these two help me with that, when i’m not able to help myself, usually because i got myself stuck in a thought loop.

there are others! dormant, or predominantly living in the world(s) within. also... well, it’s like, Younger Mes, that still exist, that can be triggered out in dire circumstances, but it’s best to let them rest. 

yes. well. i think very hard. maybe too hard, in some opinions, but exactly as hard as i need to think to reach a place of improved understanding and contentment. 

neurodivergence Wack.

[karltface]

A brief rant about old toys.

It's 3 in the morning, I'm tired as hell, and all this just popped into my head while I was taking more photos and writing up more posts about toys in advance. For some reason, I feel compelled to type it out and post it.

A lot of people look at toys from the 80s and 90s and see something goofy. It's all so perfectly odd, and hard to take seriously on the surface. And yeah, a lot of it is pretty shallow or underdeveloped. Full of throwaway story elements, strange creatures that only show up in one episode, and action figures with no fictional representation and vague bio information.

But this isn't a limitation, it's a jumping-off point. It's a framework upon which a great deal of speculative storytelling and expanded history can be built. Connect a few dots the original storytellers didn't get around to for whatever reason, and there's a whole universe out there, with so much world-building fun to be had.

For example, here's Skull, from Tonka's Supernaturals. Lacking a cartoon or comic, the toys were expected to sell mostly by virtue of their hologram stickers, and not given enough thought to qualify for any particularly detailed storyline.

This is about all we got. 2 factions wielding some sort of magic, battling for the leadership of a kingdom. One of the leaders has apparently found a source of great power, and must be stopped if good is to triumph. Not terribly well fleshed out.

But the implications are where it's at. The heroes are a Viking, Native American and European knight, all with totemic powers linked to animals or nature. How did they come together? Who are the reptilian sorcerer and animated suit of armor (full of flames, no less) who fight alongside the degenerated zombie that was once the knight's half-brother? Why did they ride griffons, but also have a monster truck? What was the mysterious pocket dimension within the Tomb of Doom, and what power lay within?

This doesn't even touch the Ghostlings, legless phantoms with entire half-sized characters just standing in the blackness of their open robes. That's some freaky shit if you try to explain it in story terms.

And that's just one obscure toyline, with a lot of room for interpretation. Even something as famous and competently written as He-man or Transformers would be limited by the standards of the time, leaving a lot of gaps to fill. Sure, Tri-klops has his various eye-beams and whatnot, but is it magic or cyberware? And how did he end up working for Skeletor when he can fight He-man almost to a standstill through sheer swordsmanship skill?

From the often-overlooked ecosystems of alien worlds to the rich but generally unexplored backstories of particularly odd characters, it's just fun as hell to sit down and brainstorm in-universe explanations for stuff like an entire desert made of rust flakes, or a bunch of sentient snakes in a man suit. This is the lens I view these things through. It keeps me occupied, and seems like a fun exercise for anyone who enjoys writing fiction. Go on, Google a vintage toyline, learn what you can, and just go nuts filling in any blanks you find.

[lykaonimagines]

Positive (Part 8) - Loki x Reader

Thank you to everyone following this story, you’re the best 💚

Paring: Loki x Reader

Part #: 8

Word Count: 2,000 (How I managed this, I have no clue)

Description: A mutant member of the Avengers finds out she’s pregnant with her boyfriend Loki’s baby, are they ready for this?

Warnings: Pregnancy

Previous part       Next Part

Requests & Upcoming  Masterlist

(gif doesn’t belong to me)

“Just been running some errands,” he responds swiftly working his way out of her embrace under the guise of setting the rest of the table. Then walking away to their dresser. “You should sit down and eat darling.”

She raises an eyebrow suspiciously, but sits down in front of her food still looking over at him.

Pulling his shirt off to toss into their laundry hamper, he rifles through his drawer looking for his comfortable home clothing. Feeling her gaze on him, he looks up with a mischievous grin and flexes his arm, “See something you like Y/N?”

Her face immediately flushes red, her mind going blank at his words and the sight before her, “I- uh…” She clears her throat embarrassed, “It’s just been a little while since I’ve gotten to enjoy that sight properly.”

“Oh love,” he responds with a smirk, walking over to her with his clean shirt in hand. He leans in so his mouth is next to her ear, “I will positively ravish you the moment I am able,” he presses a ghost of a kiss on her neck as her eyes close.

He backs away with the grin still on his face, and proceeds to pull his shirt on as she looks at him through hooded eyes, “Damn you Loki. Let’s just eat.”

She starts picking at her food, her eyes lifting back up to him as he sits down across from her, a light blush across her cheeks still.

He gives her one last flex before tucking into his own food, “To be quite honest love, the blush you get over me doing the simplest things is the greatest compliment. Not tired of me yet hm?”

“Never,” she replies with a shy smile. “I don’t think it’s possible to get used to a fucking God stripping and flexing in front of me. The most attractive God imaginable at that.”

Leaning over the table he presses his lips to hers suddenly, before pulling back licking his lips, “Tasty. The sauce was good too.” He gives her a quick wink.

Once again her face flushes as she raises her hand to wipe her mouth as he laughs, “You’re just teasing me Mister.”

“I beg your pardon? He asks with mock surprise. “Me? Tease you? Never Ms. Y/L/N.”

She rolls her eyes continuing to eat her food, “So we have something we need to start discussing more seriously don’t we?”

“What?” Loki asks looking up, holding his breath. Had she found out? How could she, it’s only been mere hours.

“Our daughter’s name,” she responds watching his expression.

He slowly lets out the breath he was holding, keeping his emotions neutral, “Of course love, we were on Lavinia or Luciana correct?”

She finally decides to let his weird behavior slide. He wouldn’t hide anything serious. “What are you thinking?”

“I like taking the names from Shakespeare,” he responds. “It’s very… us,” he responds with an almost embarrassed smile. “I like both names. It just feels odd to think one of them might be what we actually call our daughter, picking a name for another being.”

“L Lokidottir we have so far then,” she says with a smile, reaching to brush some of his hair away from his face. “The soon to be most spoiled girl in the land.”

“Only the best for the princess,” he agrees with a grin and nod.

-32 Weeks Pregnant-

Another morning Y/N awakens alone and cold in bed. Reaching out to Loki’s side of the bed she finds it made and long abandoned as had become the norm. Sighing, she glances at the clock before grabbing her phone from the charger.

As she scrolls through her social media, a loud bang on the door pulls her from bed, opening the door to reveal Tony, “Hey there dad.”

“Time for another check up kid,” he announces grabbing her by the arm. “Not going to let you weasel your way out of another appointment. We need to keep an eye on that injury and the baby.”

“Tony I’m-“ she begins before his hand slips from her sleeve to her wrist, sending them both into the jarring memory of that day.

Jotun Loki standing over a man. Skin burnt, beaten badly. Sword through his chest cavity. Steve yelling out. Loki’s eye full of rage, yelling. Panic. So much panic. Is she dead, is she alive. Racing to her body discarded on the ground, flipping her over and praying for a pulse as one is detected. She’s alive! “He’s DEAD Reindeer Games!” Loki’s skin paling. Holding her stiff form. Worry. So much worry thick in the air.

Shaking herself from the memory, they both stumble back from one another, “I-I’m sorry I wasn’t prepared, I didn’t think you’d touch my skin… I…” she looks up at him with a crestfallen look. “I made everyone like that.”

Tony runs his fingers through his hair trying to shake the memory himself, “It’s alright kid, I should know better than to just grab you. And don’t blame yourself for this. Blame the bastard that Loki turned into a pincushion in the forest. We just want to look out for you. I just want you to be safe.”

She gives him a careful smile before latching onto his arm, “Then let’s head to the medical ward for that checkup I need right?”

He chuckles giving her a quick kiss on the head, “If only you were always this reasonable.”

“Hmm,” she hums quietly. “Not going to happen.”

“Of course not.”

-

As Y/N exits the medical ward, she nearly runs into Natasha waiting for her. “Hey, how are you feeling?”

“Cold and achy,” Y/N responds with a laugh. “But I’m clear to get some exercise as long as I don’t overdo it. Mutant abilities have some perks.”

“Speaking of mutants,” Natasha says, “There’s one waiting for you in the lobby, she said she’s your friend and wanted to make sure you were alright. Apparently you haven’t texted her in awhile..”

Y/N’s eyes light up, “Kitty! Oh fuck I was so busy with all the baby things and well… my mind on other things. I hadn’t even thought about it.”

“Old friend from your X-Men days?” She smiles at her friend’s sudden happiness.

“You can say that,” she laughs. “At the time neither of us were exactly X-Men material yet. She was one of the only other kids that gave me a real chance. But then again she could just phase so it didn’t matter if I had control of my memory powers or not.”

“Phase?” Natasha questions with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, through solid objects,” Y/N says with a shrug. “Pretty cool, can walk right through walls, destroy different system by simply walking through them, and as young me learned the hard way, render living being unconscious.”

“So you’d accidentally touch her, and she’d phase to avoid your memory power and then you’d be knocked out cold?”

“When you say it like that, we sound like idiots,” she laughs but smiles fondly. “She was a ray of light in a really dark park of my life.”

“Well how about I bring her up here?” She offers. “Seeing as you’re still in what you wore to bed.”

Looking down Y/N realizes she’s right and nods, “Yeah can you bring her up to my room? Loki’s gone for the day again anyway.”

-

“Y/N!” Kitty yells as she rushes her friend, arms wrapping around her tightly as some tears drip down her cheeks. “I heard what happened! Are you ok!?”

Holding back her power, Y/N catches her friend with a grunt, “Still some stitches and a baby here Kitty.’

“Oh god sorry,” she whispers immediately backing up to hold her friend at arm’s length. “I still can’t believe you’re going to be a mother!”

“You and I both,” Y/N says with a smile. “So how do you like the tower?”

“This is crazy cool,” Kitty responds, “All this high-tech over the top Avengers stuff is pretty badass I must say.”

“It’s home,” she says sitting back on the bed. “Where a lot of memories and my family reside.”

“I’m really happy you found a home here,” Kitty says softly. “Though I still miss you being my roommate to stay up all night talking with.”

Y/N nods with a laugh, “Some of the best times of my childhood were with you for sure. I miss it too, though my new roommate wouldn’t like to be replaced.”

“Mine either,” Kitty laughs as well. “Though Piotr takes up a lot of space to be quite honest.”

“Man, I still can’t believe you and him,” Y/N says looking to her friend. “I never would have saw that one coming. Mister big tin can.”

Kitty lightly punches her friend’s arm, “Oh come on he’s the sweetest. And you can’t talk shit, you’re dating and having a baby with a god from another realm that tried to take over New York. You. Can’t. Say. Shit.”

“Oh the one the X-Men conveniently ignored trying to take over New York?” She winks at her.

“The Avengers handled it,” she announces flopping back onto the bed.

“That we did. Though poor Piotr missed the opportunity to have a true hero moment.”

Kitty quickly grabs Y/N’s arm yanking her back to hold her down, “Still shit talking huh?”

Y/N looks up at her innocently, “Who? Me? I was simply commenting on your taste for the heroism, justice, and doing the right thing in metal form.”

Kitty rolls her eyes flicking her friend’s forehead, “Ok ok, miss ‘I love the bad boys with the tragic backstory,’ your boyfriend wears golden antlers on his head.”

“Hey, you haven’t lived until you’ve had golden handles to hold on to for something else,” she wiggles her eyebrows.

“Oh god NO,” Kitty shrieks covering her face. “You did not!” She leaps from the bed. “Oh god I’m laying on the bed you share with him. I can’t right now Y/N. Let’s just go get food or something I just can’t.”

Laughing hysterically Y/N grins up at her friend, “If you think that’s freaky, boy do I have some stories for you!”

“NO NO NO,” Kitty chants as she pulls her friend back up from the bed and toward the door. “We’re now going out into public where you can’t poison my brain and ears.”

-

Their arms locked together walking the streets of New York, Y/N chews gently on her smoothie straw taking in the sights with her friend.

“The city really is beautiful in it’s own way,” Kitty mumbles looking up at the skyscrapers. “They look like they never end.”

“Yeah,” Y/N agrees with a smile, leaning into her. “Thanks for coming in to see me. It’s been forever.”

“Anytime Y/N,” Kitty responds pulling her in for a hug. “We need to do this more of-…” She stops mid sentence.

“Is something wrong?” Y/N asks going stiff in her arms. She pulls back quickly to scan the area seeing nothing out of the norm.

“I… I just thought I saw something maybe concerning,” Kitty forces a smile. “I’m sure I was mistaken.”

“What?” She presses, but Kitty just shakes her head.

“I’m sure I’m wrong.”

“Kitty. What did you see?”

Kitty frowns, but holds out her arm, “Just look. I think I was wrong. I hope I was wrong.”

Y/N tilts her head studying her face before grabbing her wrist.

Bustling New York streets. Herself. People. More people. Skyscrapers. Hotel…. Loki? She watches the memory as her boyfriend looks around before racing into the hotel across the street alone.

Letting go of Kitty’s arm, Y/N swallows hard looking over at the hotel in question, her eyes slightly burning.

“Y/N? Are you ok?” Kitty asks quickly grabbing ahold of her shirt.

“So… that’s what he’s been hiding for weeks.”

----------------------------

More of Y/N’s snaps of her life with Loki & the team

(really glad everyone liked them last time! so here’s a few more ^_^)

Part 1      Part 2     Part 3   Part 4  Part 5    

Part 6      Part 7    Part 9   Masterlist

Tag List: Sorry if some didn’t tag properly, some were giving me issues :$ And hopefully I didn’t forget anyone. Thank you all of you for following this ❤️

@ihavenofilter @zombiefied-gay-ghost @talinalani @chloe-skywalker @shanetoo @shitty-imagines-95 @roryomxlley @afangirlamongotherthings @servamp-addict @moonfaery @thefallenbibliophilequote @arielletheavenger @lucacangettathisass @draconicyeet @i-love-loki-its-unhealthy @tokoyamisstuff @whennoonethinksyoucanyoumust @ximi27 @throughartistseyes @islaylivesinshire  @starfox-92 @ink-and-starlight   @markusstraya @peacefulfall @maximofos @hiddlestoner3059 @theartsypoetess @heart-shaped-hell @twiling-lady @beaisahuntress  @my–heroine  @starlight-in-the-universe @imnomundanenoramuggle @h3artshaped-box  @sarahivi @the1weliveinnow @em0594 @mtb04308

[vocalfriespod]

Transcript 10: Down in the Holler

MEGAN: Welcome to the Vocal Fries Podcast, the podcast about linguistic discrimination.

CARRIE: I’m Carrie Gillon

MEGAN: And I’m Megan Figueroa. We have one housekeeping item: another email. It’s our third email. We’re just gonna keep counting. That’s how exciting that is. And it’s from the Ivory Coast. “Hello Carrie and Megan, I was listening to your Freaky Friday episode today and you gave a shout out to the Ivory Coast. So I figured I’d say “hi” and introduce myself as your listener in the Ivory Coast.” Wait. We have more than one, right?

CARRIE: Unless she’s downloading 50 copies of each episode or something, yeah, no, she’s not the only one.

MEGAN: To each their own. If that’s what she’s doing. Back to the email. “You probably looked at your stats and thought ‘huh, that’s weird’.”

CARRIE: Yeah, I did! That’s why I said it!

MEGAN: Yeah. That’s what Carrie did. Ok. “Anyways, I’ve listened to all but your most recent episode now, and I really enjoy them. I found out about you through Lingthusiasm.” Thank you, Lingthusiasm!

CARRIE: Thank you!

MEGAN: “And I’m really glad you have a show about this topic since it’s once I’m passionate about too. Although I usually come at it from a different angle. I’m an English teacher and teacher trainer and linguicism - the term I usually use for linguistic discrimination, although I usually have to include a gloss, since it’s unfortunately not in common use yet - is one of the areas I’m passionate about. Especially how it intersects with race and gender. Within TESOL, Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, there are a lot of linguistic discrimination issues that come up, both in the discrimination that English learners face, but also in hiring practices that favor native speakers over non-native English speaking teachers. If you’re looking for new areas to cover for future episodes, the linguicism faced by language learners and language teachers and the role that native speakerism plays in perpetuating standard language ideology seems very much connected to the type of things you talk about on the show. Earlier this year, I actually wrote an article about this. If you’re interested, it’s online here.” And we’ll link to it. “Anyways, I thought I’d say “hi” and let you know I appreciate what you’re doing and enjoying listening from here in the Ivory Coast.” Thank you very much, Riah!

CARRIE: I like how she adds the pronunciation for us.

MEGAN: Yes, like rye bread, I love it.

CARRIE: I love it too. Thank you so much for that.

MEGAN: Yeah, I have to do that with my dog. My dog’s name is Rilo [rye-lo]. But it’s spelled like “real-o”.

CARRIE: Yeah. It could be pronounced either way.

MEGAN: Especially if you’re a Spanish speaker, right? Cuz there’s no ‘I’ sound in Spanish.

CARRIE: Or basically any other European language.

MEGAN: True.

CARRIE: English is the odd one out.

MEGAN: Always.

CARRIE: I also want to point out that Riah’s suggestion was also given to me by one of my former students, Edward. So this is clearly a topic that needs to be discussed. And it’s not just about native vs. non-native, it’s also about which varieties are acceptable and which are not. So you could be, say, an English speaker from India and that would not be the kind of dialect that schools would want probably.

MEGAN: Right.

CARRIE: So: yeah! I do think we should talk about it. It’s on the list!

MEGAN: Isn’t the British accent favorable?

CARRIE: English, North American.

MEGAN: Oh it is?

CARRIE: It depends on the school, depends on location, but there definitely - a lot of schools want American or Canadian teachers over some other varieties.

MEGAN: Well this is definitely something we should talk about, since _I_ have a lot of questions about it. I’m sure other people do too! Cuz I think from Twitter, from what I can tell, we do have a lot of TESOL English teacher-type listeners.

CARRIE: Yeah.

MEGAN: Very exciting. Alright!

CARRIE: And today we’re gonna talk about Appalachian /æpəlɑʧn̩/ or Appalachian /æpəleɪʧn̩/ English and we’re gonna ask our guest how it’s actually pronounced.

MEGAN: Yes. He’s from Appalaycha-lahcha.

CARRIE: This kind of reminds me also of Copenhaygen-hahgen /koʊpn̩heɪgn̩hɑgn̩/ [CG: Copenhagen]. Apparently, everybody pronounces it incorrectly. The way that they mock us for pronouncing it incorrectly is saying Copenhaygen-hahgen /koʊpn̩heɪgn̩hɑgn̩/.

MEGAN: Ohhhh. That’s fun. It’s also like - thinking about Arizona - if you say Prescott /pɹɛskət/ vs. Press-cott /pɹɛskɑt/.

CARRIE: Yes.

MEGAN: If someone says Press-cott /pɹɛskɑt/, you’re like, “oh, where are you from? It’s not Arizona.”

CARRIE: Speaking of that, there was an episode of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend where there was supposed to be a character from Prescott, and he pronounced it like Press-cott /pɹɛskɑt/!

MEGAN: No.

CARRIE: And I was like, “nope! Nope.”

MEGAN: See. Ya gotta get an Arizonan in the room. That’s what that means.

CARRIE: Yeah. Or even just ask.

MEGAN: Yeah!

CARRIE: If it’s just one word, one name, you don’t have to have someone in the room.

MEGAN: That’s true.

CARRIE: But maybe you should make sure that you really know how to pronounce the place names. Cuz place names are the most variable, I would say.

MEGAN: Yes. Don’t think that the easy obvious spelling is actually how you pronounce it. Cuz Prescott is like pretty obvio- it looks like “Scott”. I got you. Alright. I’m going to introduce our guest. Dr. Paul Reed is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communicative Disorders at the University of Alabama. He researches phonetics and sociophonetics, sociolinguistics, speech perception and language processing and other aspects of Southern and Appalachian /æpəlɑʧn̩/ or Appalachian /æpəleɪʧn̩/ Englishes. We want to ask you, Paul, how do you say that?

PAUL: For us, it’s always Appalachian /æpəlɑʧn̩/.

MEGAN: It’s always Appalachian /æpəlɑʧn̩/.

PAUL: Yeah. Now granted, if you go a little further north, if you go past West Virginia, then you may get some /leʃn̩/ and stuff like that, but it’s a bit of those that - so, growing up, the reason it’s always /lɑʧn̩/ for us - so, during the war on poverty, the Appalachian Volunteers, the AVs, they came into our region and they wanted to help. And so this was usually college students, but they also came with a bit of a “we know how to fix you”. And so a lot of them had /leʃə/. So growing up, it was always a marker of an outsider, usually with a particular view of our region that said /leʃə/. So it’s kinda one of those shibboleths for certain areas of the region, especially in southern Appalachia, where it’s a little bit more - it’s more rural and the poverty was more widespread. It didn’t get so much of the effects of the war on poverty until much later.

MEGAN: Ok so.  Appa-lachia /æpəlɑʧə/.

PAUL: Yes.

MEGAN: Ok.

PAUL: We won’t kick you out or anything.

MEGAN: No, I mean I know. I’m sure it’s - I just do not want to signal that I think any less of anyone. But we’re so grateful for you to be talking with us today.

CARRIE: Yeah, thank you.

MEGAN: Thank you for being here.

PAUL: I’m thrilled to be here, thank you so much.

MEGAN: First off, I can put the two together and figure out what it is, but tell us what sociophonetics is.

PAUL: Sure. Sociophonetics is a branch of sociolinguistics. Sociolinguistics is looking at the intersection of language and social groupings, or language and society. Sociophonetics takes that and it brings it down to a phonetic level. It looks at how different groups of people, people with different identities, people from different areas, how they phonetically manipulate their production. Something as finely grained as how do your vowels change, the slight differences in consonant articulations, and things like that. It’s sort of this same kind of idea, but it’s done in a phonetic level. The only thing that makes it a little harder is - so, sometimes we want to exercise as much control over the stimuli or the recording as someone in a phonetics lab. But we also want the most natural speech possible. You try to use as much control as possible, in a way to - but at the same time, trying to get as natural. You try to move someone to the quietest room in their house, preferably with lots of curtains and carpets, and get away from things like fridges and air conditioners and stuff like that. And you might come up, and you hope for the best. I did have one recording - it’s funny, it’s a 94-year-old participant and she was great. But she was on an oxygen machine. We talked for a long time, but certain things I couldn’t do with her recording because - obviously I can’t ask her to turn that off. But I was able to use the qualitative stuff. It was one of those where I was like, “aw! So close!”

MEGAN: Isn’t it that the problem - well, I mean, not a problem - just like something to overcome a bit for all sociolinguists? The natural vs. are they - what is it called? speaker - when you’re there with them?

PAUL: Observer effect.

MEGAN: Yes. Yes, that.

PAUL: Yeah. That’s sort of an issue for everyone, but if someone - you could just unobtrusively set a recorder down, and people can forget about it. If you’ve miked them up and even if you - some people even put a mic connected to with the little over the ear thing, it’s harder to get them to forget about that, because they’re literally connected to. Although, the one thing - so, in my work, I was able to go back home. I was sitting across from people that knew me, that knew my parents, knew my grandparents. There was a bit of time where people just sort of forgot. Because they were sitting with someone they knew. They were sitting with Little Paul Reed, which, if you guys have ever seen me, that’s kinda a funny misnomer, cuz I’m about 6’8”. So it’s sort of - it’s kinda funny. Cuz everyone from my hometown calls me that, because my dad is Paul too, and he was Big Paul and I’m Little Paul. Even though I haven’t really been little for 20 years.

MEGAN: I’m guessing he’s shorter than you, too, at this point.

PAUL: Yes. He was about 6’4”.

MEGAN: Ok!

PAUL: So he was big, he just didn’t wind up as big as his son did.

CARRIE: You’re like Little John.

PAUL: Exactly. Exactly, yes.

MEGAN: So then would you say then that you speak Appalachian English?

PAUL: Yes. Yeah, I would say that I’m definitely a native speaker.

MEGAN: Ok.

CARRIE: One of the questions I have is: what are the boundaries for Appalachia vs. the rest of the South? And connected to that also is how is the language different from this region vs. the rest?

PAUL: That’s a great question. It’s always one of those that - so there’s the official designation of Appalachia, which is set forth by the Appalachia Regional Commission, a division of the federal government. There’s 410 counties over 13 states, stretching literally from about Jackson, Mississippi all the way up into western New York. People hear that and they’re like, “that’s huge!” But of course when most people think Appalachia, they don’t think all the way from Mississippi to New York. They think usually about - and we call it the core region. The whole state of West Virginia, southwest Virginia, eastern Kentucky, east Tennessee, western North Carolina, and a little bit, a smidge of the other states connecting. Northeast Alabama, north Georgia, maybe a little cut of South Carolina. That’s the core region and where people - that’s where the features are, there are more of them, that’s sort of the core region where people inside and outside the region would say, “that’s definitely Appalachia”. And as far as what differentiates it from the rest of the South, it’s really, honestly, most times, a quantitative rather than qualitative difference. Things like the Southern Vowel Shift, where you have the monophthongization of /i/. So in words like “price”, “pry” and “prize”, you’ll have monophthongization in all of those contexts at a much higher rate than in other areas. In large parts of the South, you’ll only get it in prevoiced and open syllables, so “prize”, “pry”. But in Appalachia, you’ll also get it in prevoiceless conditions, so “price”. And you’ll have it approaching categorical. There’s a lot of individual variation, which is what my work looked at. So that’s one of the features. But also, you have a few grammatical structures that occur more often or in more contexts. Things like double modals. That’s combinations like “might could” and “might should” “may can”.

MEGAN: Love that.

PAUL: You have those all over. “Might could” is pretty widespread. You get that from almost to Arizona all the way to-

MEGAN: I have it yeah.

PAUL: Yeah, all the way to the East Coast. But in Appalachia you have more of them in more conditions. I personally have “might could” “might can” “may can” “may could” “might should” “may should” “will can” “used to could” “used to would” “should oughta” “oughta should” “might should oughta”. And then I can also make questions. Things where - and this is where some of the work I’ve done starts to tease apart the difference between the core area and the periphery. When you make a question, usually you’ll take the second modal and move it. It’ll be like, “mmmm… should you might do this?” That’s the sort of typical way. Some people are just like, “no. That’s terrible. What are you doing, you’ve just butchered the language.” That’s sort of one of the things - being able to - all of the different combinations in a lot of different contexts. In more of them. And able to do things like form questions. Or where you put the negation, cuz you can say “might not should” or “might should not”. “Might couldn’t.” So how much contraction you allow and where you allow the negation to appear is sort of one of the features that starts to distinguish the region. Along with, of course, a lot of lexical items. This is where it gets fun. Because it’s a region with a lot creativity. People do a lot of things that aren’t necessarily completely unusual, but it’s very creative. I remember growing up, people would say things like, “man, he’s he workingest man I ever saw.” And you’ve basically added a superlative to “working”, which is interesting. And of course people can immediately parse what you mean. But it’s not necessarily something you’re gonna produce. And some other lexical items, there’s all sorts of terms for things. I was teaching this a couple of weeks ago to my students. Most of them are from the South, cuz we’re at the University of Alabama. Lot of people are from the South. One of my students is from northeast Alabama. In Appalachia. She said, “Dr. Reed, do you know all the words for ‘moonshine’?” I know some of them. So we started comparing the words we have for “moonshine”. So of course you’ve got “shine”, “moonshine”. This is my personal favorite: “Oh Be Joyful”.

CARRIE: That is great. I’ve never heard that before.

PAUL: So people will say, “you got any Oh Be Joyful?” That’s another one. One other - and this one I didn’t even realize until I was in graduate school. That not everyone uses this. It’s called the “alternative one”. It’s very common to say something like, “yeah, you know, we should probably do that Monday or Tuesday one.” In the sense of “one or the other”, but you put both options and then “one” after it and the interlocutor would understand “oh, you’re giving me a choice here.” But not everybody does that. I remember saying that to a friend of mine and got this blank look of “I don’t think I know what you mean.” There are some features that are not necessarily unique but they’re quantitatively different. There are some that are probably on the border of being qualitatively different, but it’s kinda hard to say because the borders are definitely sort of fuzzy. And the closer you get to the core, that core area that I was talking about, people will have more of them and in more contexts.

MEGAN: So then would you say that non-linguists, or people just listening to a Southern American English speaker and then an Appalachian English speaker, would they be able to tell the difference? Or you have to be more of a trained ear.

PAUL: You can tell the difference, but what you often get is somebody’ll say, “you sound REALLY Southern.” Or “you sound REALLY country.” Or for whatever reason people will also think you’re from Texas. So you get, “are you from Texas?” No. We Tennesseans, we saved Texas. The only reason that they’re - we saved them. When I lived in Texas, I made sure I brought that up as much as possible. Which was probably a faux pas, but it’s alright.

MEGAN: Ok. So their dialect is gonna be different from yours.

PAUL: There’s some - in east Texas, cuz there were a lot of people from the mid-South that went to Texas. East Texas, in and around Houston and a little further north, there were a lot of Tennesseans and eastern Kentuckians and those that went. So there are some similarities. It’s not completely off the wall, but it’s definitely something that’s shifted and morphed, cuz we’re talking about the 1830s and 1840s. There’s been a lot of change. But people will say things like, “you sound REALLY Southern.” That’s usually what you get. It’s not necessarily that they don’t recognize - they recognize there’s a difference, but they don’t really know what that difference is. Sometimes within the South, you may get the “country”. Somebody sounds really country. And that’s what you get a lot. Because in the South as a whole, there’s a big urban/rural divide. A lot of the cities have really grown in the last 50 years. The distinction between urban/rural has grown. You get a lot of that, “you sound really country, are you from the sticks?” or “Are you from the boonies?” That kind of stuff. There’s some notion that it’s not necessarily associated with urban areas. Very rarely does somebody say, “are you from Appalachia?” Usually you’ll get “are you country?” In a lot of people’s minds, it’s kind of the same thing.

CARRIE: Also, mountain folk, right?

PAUL: Yes. You’ll get some mountain folk, but that’s usually from people very close to the region that live and they’ve been able to see that distinction. Even though, for example, where I went to college in Knoxville, Tennessee is considered part of Appalachia, very close by, people would know that “oh you’re from the mountains.” Knoxville’s in the valley, and within Appalachia, the valley and mountain or valley and ridge distinction is pretty salient. As Appalachia was settled, people settled in the valleys first. That was where there was better land, and you had people of a certain means, you could get some land in the bottom land along the rivers and valleys. If you came a little bit later, or if you didn’t have as many resources, you had to get higher and higher, cuz the land was cheaper. And so there’s a distinction. Even to this day, there’s a little bit between the valley and the ridge. My wife is from they valley and she’s not - we grew up maybe 50-60 miles apart. Not very far. But there are certain things that I say that she doesn’t say. Certain idioms and sayings, and sometimes the way that we say things is a little distinct. Which is kinda funny, cuz again, we’re both from east Tennessee, we’re not from that far apart. But there’s definitely some distinctions.

CARRIE: Cool!

PAUL: I mean like anywhere, anywhere has distinctions. But in people’s minds, people are like, “oh, you’re both from east Tennessee, you’re both gonna sound the same.” No, not really.

MEGAN: Do you think people are picking up on the phonology, the lexical items, what is it that they’re picking up on when they say “are you from the boonies?” What is it that they’re picking up on?

PAUL: I think, the times it’s happened to me, it’s usually been a combination. When I’ve said something with my phonology, but it’s a saying or a grammatical structure that they’re not familiar with. Another time when I was in college, one of my teammates, he was - I played basketball - so he needed a ride to the airport. And I said, “sure man, I don’t care at all to take you.” He’s like, “ok, I’ll go with somebody else.” I’m like, “why would you do that? I just told you I’d take you.” “No you didn’t, you said you don’t care to take me.” And I said, “exactly. I don’t care at all. I’d love to take you.” He just gave me this blank look, that doesn’t compute, man. It was one of those - we had sort of a misunderstanding. I thought, with my intonation and facial expression, that he knew that I was gonna take him. Things like that. That’s when he was like, “you country people.” Which was a joke. My teammates would call me the mountain man, or Paul Bunyan. That’s sort of part of that, is it’s literally a joke. But there was something like that. I think a combination of the phonology and something that took a minute, there was a little bit of a miscommunication.

CARRIE: Yeah, I would have interpreted it the same way he did.

MEGAN: Yeah, me too.

PAUL: So if someone is from Appalachia, potentially other parts of the South, “I don’t care to” is not always negative. Especially with a “I don’t care to take you at all!”

CARRIE: That’s interesting. One of the things - one of the reasons we wanted to talk to you is because - whatshisname - JD Vance was back in the news.

PAUL: Yes.

CARRIE: Do you have any feelings towards his work?

PAUL: I have lots of feelings about JD Vance. Some of them will probably need to be edited slightly. No, I'm just kidding.

CARRIE: You can swear if you want. We swear on this.

MEGAN: We have an explicit rating.

PAUL: JD Vance is, he’s full of what makes the grass grow green in lots of ways. Because the main thing is is that if his autobiography were his own story, the story of a child from a broken home that got access to education, had some people that mentored him, and made good. He was able to attend some fine colleges and he did well for himself. If that were his book, then it would be great. But the fact that first and foremost, a 30 year old is writing an autobiography - and not an autobiography. He’s writing an elegy for an entire region. And a region, he didn’t grow up in. He’s from Ohio. He grew up in Ohio. He spent summers and he spent time back in Kentucky, but he did not grow up in the region. And trying to put his experiences, and the experiences of his mother, with all of her demons and all of her issues, as somehow indicative of an entire region - even if you’re looking at just the core region, you’re talking about 6 states. Millions of people. And basically saying, “hey, this is what they’re all like. They’re all fighting, and they’re all violent, and they’re all drug addicts.” That part is infuriating. Because that is the same trope that’s been going on for 150 years. In the period after the civil war, there was this kind of literature called Local Color. It was journalists from urban areas, like Baltimore and DC and other places, and they wanted to write about interesting places around the country. And because Appalachia wasn’t that far away, they would go, and they would seek out the people who were the most different. And so of course, it’s looking at people who were impoverished, people that were barely scraping by. They would write stories about them. And those stories would be very the same thing, how some people make good, some people are able to escape. But it’s the culture of poverty, it’s the culture of deprivation, it’s the culture of this. And that’s painting this brush. And even though people just up the holler from them are completely different, their reality is completely different, they paint everyone with the same brush. Some of these stories sold like wildfire. Because they were in Harper’s, they were in the Atlantic, and other things, so these magazines that we still have to this day, but they sold. It’s literally the exact same trope of it wasn’t drugs, it wasn’t opioids back then, but it was the moonshiners, and the impoverishment. Because they were Scotch-Irish, they liked to fight, cuz they were all clannish. And it’s stuff of just like - this is like a zombie trope. We just need to slay it and let it die. But it just won’t. That’s my biggest issue. Again, his story is incredible. What he faced and the way he was able to overcome it was very inspiring. But when you try to say that the way that you grew up is the way that everyone grows up and the demons that your parents, and his mother faced, are the same demons that everyone faces, that’s where it gets annoying. And then also the fact that he footnoted his own autobiography. You don’t footnote an autobiography. You’re not pointing out research when it’s about your own life. That’s the thing that’s irritating. And then the fact that he’s somehow become the voice of the region. And there are scholars that have been working in the region and are from the region that have been writing for 50 years, people like Dwight Billings at Kentucky, and people like Anita Puckett at Virginia Tech, Mimi Pickering at Appalshop. There’s just so many people that have written and told a story and a nuanced story and a complicated and complex story. But that doesn’t sell as much. And it’s - no one likes to hear “hey, it’s so difficult because you’ve got extractive industries, you’ve got poverty, you’ve got rampant capitalism.” And then you’ve got other things that - frankly the fact that JD Vance has become our voice just pisses most of us off. In a way that is - so I’m a member of the Appalachian Studies Association and I think he’s been invited at least twice now and has yet to appear. I don’t know if it’s just that he - if it’s one of those - he just can’t fit it into his busy schedule. Strangely enough he’s still able to be on other networks and stuff. But anyway. JD Vance is - he’s not - he’s irritating.

MEGAN: These tropes that he’s reinforcing, it wasn’t just - they were persisting before him. If feels just kinda like - he’s bringing it into a national spotlight even more. Is that true?

PAUL: Yeah.

MEGEAN: Ok.

CARRIE: And it’s keeping it - it’s still perpetuating now. Everyone goes and interviews all these Trump supporters from the particular region and it’s all the same kind of - or at least intersecting tropes. It just keeps happening.

PAUL: Yes.

MEGAN: Right.

PAUL: And again, people in certain parts of Appalachia, their lives haven’t changed in 50 years. They’re worse off than their grandparents were. Or on par. Because of stagnant wages and with the decline of coal and the decline of timbering and things like that, certain industries are dying. And it IS sad. But at the same time, that’s not everybody. Some of the stories and the way that they’re written are so patronizing. That’s the thing that’s irritating. It’s like, “oh, we’re gonna go find some of the towns in West Virginia that have been decimated.” Because once the coalmines closed, people had to leave. If they didn’t have a way to make any more income. So they did leave. So some of these towns are hurting, and hurting badly. But, that’s not everybody. You don't see anyone rolling into Knoxville or to Chattanooga or to Asheville or to Lexington or other places that are thriving - Greenville, South Carolina, which is technically part - those cities are doing very well. And not just the cities, their suburbs, and you don’t get the stories from there of the successes that are going on. Or the thriving small towns that are making a difference. That’s the story that’s not told. And that part is sad and frustrating, because the region has been exploited for 300 years, particularly the last 150 years, and so much of its wealth and its beauty have left because of absentee ownership and other things that - it was almost - some writers have described it as an internal colony. Because so many of the resources were taken away and the riches produced weren’t reinvested back in the region. And there’s lots of reasons for that. The natural resources were taken but the people were not - they didn’t reap the benefits of that.

MEGAN: So do you think that that’s the biggest stereotype or misconception about people from the region is the impoverished kind of trope that’s -

PAUL: I think so. Normally - there’s kinda two big tropes. They’re sort of flip sides of each other, but you’ve got the degenerate hillbilly, poor, no shoes, no teeth. Shiftless, lazy. All of those. Then you also, on the flip side, sometimes when you say “Appalachia” people think tradition, it’s almost a positive thing, like “ooh, it’s pretty, traditional values” in some ways. So you get - sometimes there is some positive thing. They are obviously outweighed by the negative, but you can get this yin and this yang or this Janus idea of two sides. But if you were ever to google search “Appalachia”, and look at the images, for every 10 hillbillies there’s one “ooh, look how pretty”. Or you get these obviously all of the caricatures and stereotypes. So I think that that’s - the impoverished and the hillbilly, kinda go hand in hand. You do get some positive things, and those are - even in Vance’s book, he talked about the family togetherness and the independence. Some of those, even though as is portrayed in his book are negative, you can pull positive things from that. I guess I should - my small caveat, it’s not all negative in his book. Just mostly.

CARRIE: One of the words that you used in that discussion was “holler” which I definitely associate with Appalachia.

PAUL: Yes! Yes! I think it can be called a “hollow”, but if you say “hollow”, no one knows what you’re talking about. So it’s a “holler”. And it’s a - I don’t exactly know the strict definition of what a “holler” is. I can point some out to you but I don’t know.

CARRIE: I always interpret them as small valleys. But maybe I’m wrong.

PAUL: It’s a small, long valley that - usually there’s one way in but there’s land that’s arable and useable and people can live close or far. And usually as you’re going in, you’re going up too. So if you’re deep in a holler, you’re probably moving up the ridge.

CARRIE: Oh! That’s interesting.

MEGAN: It’s good that that was cleared up because I heard it and I was like “I don’t know what’s happening!”

CARRIE: The first time I ever heard the word was in - not Longmire. What’s that tv show about the federal agent. From Kentucky? Right? Tennessee?

PAUL: Justified?

CARRIE: Justified! The first time I ever heard that word, I think, was Justified. And I had to look it up.

PAUL: Yup. Now Justified is actually decent. I will say that’s a show that I can watch and reasonably enjoy. Obviously some of the bad guys are so over the top and it’s almost like, really? But for the most part it’s a reasonable display of the region. It’s obviously not perfect, but it’s pretty good. As far as-

MEGAN: What about the dialect?

PAUL: It’s decent. They did get a lot of extras from the region itself and so a lot of those are fairly good. Obviously, some of the stars aren’t necessarily from the region, so theirs is - most of the time, any time you get an actor and try to teach them, certain things’ll be really good. And then other things will be “meh”. It’s oftentimes like - the Southern accent just as a whole is hard, just because there’s a lot of nuance there. A really good version is Jude Law in Cold Mountain. A really terrible version is Jake Gyllenhaal in October Sky. I almost had to stop watching the movie. I’m like, “this is terrible.” Oh man. It was - he was giving it a decent try, but it’s like man. As linguists, we gotta do some more work. We gotta some work. Cuz it was not good. Not good at all.

CARRIE: What do you think people are judging when they judge you or other Appalachian speakers for their dialect?

PAUL: I think it’s two things. Obviously, first and foremost, you’re - we’re all raised in this culture, we’re all presented with these stereotypes, we’re presented with these ideas - because not everyone has experience with the region. And so just like most human things, we try to categorize. Based on what we’ve been told. If you are inundated with this idea of hillbilly and poor and backwards and Trump country to the nth degree, with a little sprinkling of very pretty and traditional and things like that. Which, some of those are even reinforced. I think that’s what we do, the same way that those of us who grew up in the region that may not have had any experience with New York or Boston or the Midwest, what do you have to default to, what have we absorbed from our culture. Some of that is positive about certain areas and some of it is also negative. Sadly for Appalachia, a lot of it is negative. We’re inundated with a lot of negativity, sprinkled with some positivity. But that’s what we default to cuz that’s the only thing we have. And of course we like black and white answers. We like good or not so good. But when something is complex and nuanced and there’s lots of gray and not just black and white that’s what people - so for example, people hear me sometimes, and they hear that I’m a PhD and I wear my shoes and I have my teeth, there’s some cognitive dissonance there, like, “what happened? Wait a minute, you’re not a blatant racist, or misogynist, or things like that. What do we do with that? And you’re not poor.” Not that I’m rich, but “you’re not dirt poor, living on a dirt floor.” It’s weird. I was on an athletic visit to New York City, and I was there and one of the guys was like, “hey man, so you’re from Tennessee!” And it was like, “yeah.” And he looked at me and said, “do you guys have phones there?”

CARRIE: HA!

PAUL: And I just kinda look at him and I said, “nope! We got two cans and a big long string.” But it was - granted, this is a guy that grew up in - I think he may have been from the Bronx - he had no notion. So the only thing that he had was the caricatures. And so he asked somebody literally in the year 2000 if they had phones. Which is obviously an absurd question. But it’s indicative of what did he - I was the first person from Tennessee that he knew that he had met. So what is he gonna do? He’s gonna default to what he’s been presented. And sadly that picture from a lot of pop culture and the cultural milieu is negative, and so that’s what he did. And of course back then I didn’t have any notion of how to answer this so I also proceeded to insult him about New York and thoity-thoid street and things like that. Again that was my first trip to New York so I had to default to my stereotypes too. That’s not my proudest moment, but that's just being transparent.

CARRIE: Well sometimes when you’re put in these situations, you just don't know how to respond.

PAUL: Exactly.

CARRIE: I wouldn’t have known.

PAUL: I was 17 so I really didn’t have a lot of world experience in how to navigate something like that. Although I will say I do have one funny story about a guy, a good friend of mine. He’s probably the smartest guy I know. He’s an agricultural engineer and he’s basically figured out ways for us to feed to the whole world, this is what he does. We were at this McDonald’s, we were on a trip and we were coming back from Saint Louis. I don’t really remember where we were. But we weren’t very close to home. My friend has a pretty pronounced Appalachian accent. He just lets it fly cuz that’s who he is and that’s who he wants to be. He ordered his food. And this guy behind him starts laughing. Then my friend turns around and says, “can I help you?” And the guy said, “what rock did you crawl out from under?”

CARRIE: Oh my god.

PAUL: And my buddy - he’s so funny, he’s so quick with this - I don’t know how - but he’s like, “let me ask you something. Do you know what an algorithm is?” And the guy’s like, “uh, no.” He said, “can you tell me what a derivative is?” And he’s like, “no.” He said, “I didn’t think so.” He said, “just cuz my mouth move slow, doesn’t mean my mind does. But apparently yours does.” And then he walked off. And it was kinda like - that was-

CARRIE: Wow.

PAUL: Terrible and amazing at the same time. Both really insulted and then I’m like, “dude, that’s like the best comeback I’ve ever heard and how did you think of that?” And he just walks with his tray and sits down. He’s like, “*sigh* we get all kinds.” And it was funny cuz he was not really upset after that, and I was like, “wow.” But what did that guy - what was his stereotype. It was, if you hear someone talking like that, they’re from so far country, so deep in the country that they live under a rock. That’s what he defaulted to. It was a really just eye opening - it’s kinda like - I wanted to be his yes man but I didn’t really know what to say so I’m like, “YEAH.”

CARRIE: TAKE THAT.

PAUL: That’s my friend!

CARRIE: Yeah. One of the things that I hear a lot is that people from the South and Appalachia, they talk lazy.

PAUL: Oh yes.

CARRIE: Can you explain why it’s not lazy.

PAUL: So it’s not lazy because no native speaker speaks lazily. It’s just sort of like that’s - it’s funny because what it is is typically Southern vowels - there’s this thing called the Southern drawl and what happens is some vowels get lengthened and they change a little bit over the articulation. So you get something like, “fri-end” /fɹeɛnd/. So what happens, is where most places would be “friend” /fɹɛnd/, that middle vowel stays roughly the same as you say it. But in the South it’ll change over time. Even though the speaking rate isn’t any different, you get the perception of more or longer because it’s changing over time. So when people get that, they’re like, “oh they talk slower.” And you get the rationale, because it’s hot. Because it’s humid. No one wants to move fast. But at the same time, when something is done slower you think, “why are they doing it slower?” They’re just not as fast or they have ability but they’re choosing not to. Typically, usually, stems from that. There’ve been some studies that look at speaking rate at various places and everyone speaks roughly, on the average, roughly the same speed. There are obviously fast speakers in the South and there are slow speakers in the South, same as there are fast speakers in the Midwest and there are slow speakers in the Midwest. Because of that perception, particularly the vowels, that usually - and then also the same thing, the canonical, the caricature, the monophthonization of “I”. That also gives you the percept of being longer, even though it’s the same amount of time, it gives you the percept of being longer for the opposite reason: you’re expecting it to change and it doesn’t. So you’re like, “oh, that person just isn’t raising their tongue because they are choosing not to because they’re lazy or it’s hot or humid or something.” I think that’s probably where it stems from.

CARRIE: Thank you. I agree. It’s just good to have a phonetician actually explain it, rather than me.

PAUL: You can always say, “you know, everyone speaks roughly the same rate. There are faster and slower people. But on the average, everyone’s roughly the same.” Cuz we’re still understandable, no one’s lazy. It’s not like it takes that much effort to move your tongue. We just have a different system.

CARRIE: Yeah. Thank you. Alright do we have any other questions, Megan?

MEGAN: I don’t think so. Do you have any last words or anything that you would really wish our listeners - which, I mean, we have listeners on the Ivory Coast, so.

PAUL: Yeah!

MEGAN: Anything you would want them to know about the region or about the dialect?

PAUL: Sure. It’s a region that is - it’s very complex. It’s one of those that are - there are some of the greatest people. There are some traditions that are still maintained. There’s a lot of complexity. It’s a region that’s very beautiful. I am completely biased in that assessment, but I’m ok with that. It’s beautiful, the people are some of the finest people you could meet. The language is - it’s creative, it’s playful. It’s a way that people have connections to their roots. Because of the idioms, some of the stories. The Jack Tales. The creativity of the language evokes an earlier time. Even though it’s a completely modern instantiation of the language, it does have some evocative features of an earlier time. But it is - it’s awesome. It’s glorious. Please come. See it. Meet people, shake their hands, hear their stories. Make your own opinion. Don’t listen to everyone in the media. Make your own opinion.

CARRIE: Can I ask you what a Jack story is?

PAUL: Oh so a Jack Tale. Like Jack and the Beanstalk.

CARRIE: Oh.

PAUL: Where it’s about Jack and normally Jack is little scamp. He gets into mischief and finds his way - usually through his own intuition, finds his way out. That’s the most famous version of Jack and the Beanstalk. But there are all of these Jack Tales that everyone hears growing up. Every holler and pocket and region has their own variations on the Jack Tales. That’s one of the other stereotypes, is that Appalachians are storytellers. Which, that one is pretty true. I know lots of people and they can tell some really good stories. I guess we’ll accept that one. It’s tales about Jack. He usually gets in some kind of trouble and figures his way out. There’s mixes of magic and fantasy and stuff. But some of them are also very down to earth. He’s supposed to go do something and decides not to and how is he gonna make it up to his parents. Some things like that. Some thing that can be magic beans that grow up to this giant thing in the sky to he went to the swimming hole rather than doing his chores, something like that.

CARRIE: That’s cool. Ok, thank you so much!

PAUL: Thank you all very much. This was great.

MEGAN: Thank you so so much.

CARRIE: Yeah, this was really great.

MEGAN: It was. I learned everything. Cuz again I had lived in Arizona my entire life. So I have not been to Appalachia.

PAUL: Well you are more than welcome to-

MEGAN: I look forward to it.

PAUL: We can send you an Appalachian card, so that way you’re accepted as one of our own.

MEGAN: Yes! Well I say Appalachia /æpəlɑʧə/.

PAUL: Yes. You are in. You’re in.

MEGAN: Yes.

CARRIE: I have been to Nashville, at least.

PAUL: There you go. Nice. Nice.

CARRIE: It was really nice!

PAUL: Go get some hot chicken.

CARRIE: I didn’t eat any hot chicken. I did buy some hot chicken spice though, so I can make it on my non-chicken food.

PAUL: Oh there you go. There you go.

MEGAN: We always end our show with our tagline, which is: Don’t be an asshole! Because that is the message - if you haven’t heard it.

CARRIE: Yeah. Do not be an asshole!

PAUL: Right!

MEGAN: Thank you so much.

PAUL: Thanks guys.

CARRIE: Thanks again.

PAUL: You’re welcome, thank you.

MEGAN: Bye

CARRIE: K, bye!

MUSIC: O' be joyful Is that what you're brewing Does your daddy know that's what you're doing His little girl's got a reputation out for ruin She was givin' them the country away

Machete in the tree stub, hound dog on the chain Wooden-legged woman playin' a banjo in the rain. Can't recall the tune but the song's always the same "Jesus give me strength"

But babe, it's alright I'm gonna wrap you up tonight, Carry you out right on time

CARRIE: The Vocal Fries Podcast is produced by Chris Ayers for Halftone Audio. Theme music by Nick Granum. You can find us on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @vocalfriespod. You can email us at vocalfriespod@gmail.com.