#they genuinely balance each other so well

[ceratedfish24]

There are SO many negative nancys this season. Y’all need to cut it out. You’ve gotten so entitled.

“This was a bad wildcard” I don’t know how old you are, but I was in 3rd grade when I was taught how to give constructive criticism, and I was way younger when I learned that most people don’t like receiving unsolicited criticism. All of the players have loved the challenge of each of the wild cards. They have loved staying on their toes. If they genuinely hated it, they would have said something. Changes would be made. If it’s not interesting to you, then you can stay quiet and leave. You’ve gotten way too comfortable disrespecting people from behind a screen.

“The teams are unoriginal” Making sure that the players are having a good time is among the top priorities of this series. They are naturally going to link up with people they’re comfortable with. If you have a problem with that, then maybe you need to be put in a room with your best friends and some people you kind of know and be criticized when you gravitate towards your best friends. I don’t understand why you all are having such a problem with the concept of seeking comfort in a scary and unpredictable environment.

“Pearl shouldn’t be on a team with Cleo and Scott” well, she made her choice, didn’t she. That’s not up to you. She is an adult. She can choose who she hangs out with. Cleo and Pearl have not had significantly more of a rivalry than any other two players on the server. It seems like you’re just paying more attention to them because they’re women. Don’t try to take away from Pearl’s autonomy. Don’t try to conduct who she hangs out with. It’s really fucked up, what happened to Grian and Scar. Don’t let it happen again. Additionally, Pearl doesn’t care if you don’t think her character should be getting along with Cleo and Scott. The lore is made to fit the events of the server, and never the other way around. If you’re not creative enough to come up with a lore-reason for Pearl, Cleo, and Scott to be getting along, then I really don’t know how you’re still alive.

“Scott’s going to kill Pearl” why. Why would he do that. What record do you have of Scott betraying Pearl for no reason. The only reason he didn’t want to accept her as his ally in Double Life was because he just teamed with her in Last Life, and you all have proven just how much you’re gonna whine about a repetitive team. What history does Scott have of killing his own teammates. The biggest concern on that team is Impulse, who is notorious for holding grudges and betraying alliances. And yet your focus is on the catty two who are loyal to the core. Does that not sound like stereotyping to you? Do you even watch their perspectives? Cause you don’t act like you do.

It is a legitimate miracle that Grian is giving us another season. Be grateful, or we’re not getting another. You try coming up with balanced ideas that will last 6-8 episodes with ~15 people. See how many you come up with.

[detectivesvu]

Flirtatious Fate

Rafael Barba x Fem! Detective! Reader Tags: Near smut. Lots of flirting. Barba and Reader almost get caught. Sonny being a great advice giver. Word Count: 6.5k "And what if we are? Would that be such a bad thing?"

It wasn't at all uncommon for the counselor to work overtime.

Rafael more than likely worked more overtime hours than any of the attorneys in the whole building. He lived for his work, so it was no shock that it was nearly 8:00 o'clock and he was still buried in his work with no intention of going anywhere anytime soon. Most of the building had thinned out. All the people who were much better at maintaining a work-life balance had left hours ago - leaving Rafael as practically the only one left. Not that he minded, he could always work better alone.

But he didn't mind having some company. There were a few faces that he always was always welcome to and would always make time for...especially one in particular.

His attention was stolen away from his work when there was a knock on his open door, obviously indicating that someone was there to see him. Clearly, he wasn't the only one who pulled a lot of overtime hours.

He knew exactly who was at his door just by the specific sound of the knock. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he did - and his heart fluttered at the knowledge of the person at his door.

Their relationship was complicated, although neither of them realized that the way they acted toward one another made things a gray area. They simply believe they were colleagues...friendly colleagues at best. Somehow, neither of them really realized that their dynamic came from a much more personal and emotional place.

Nonetheless, he was happy she was there...even though he didn't realize it.

"Come in, detective." He said, without even giving a glance up from what he was working on.

A genuine smile was on the detective's face at the sound of his invitation. She entered the room with a cup of coffee in each hand, her foot kicking the door closed behind her as she entered. She was alone in her entrance, and the fact that her partner wasn't with her let him know this wasn't a business visit.

“Counselor,” She greeted. “Do you have time for coffee and a chat?”

If there was any single person in the world who could outdrink Rafael Barba when it came to coffee - it was [Y/N]. She could drink coffee at any time of day and could put down at least four cups a day. That was one thing they shared - they worked a lot and ran on nothing much pure passion for their job and heavy amounts of caffeine.

Rafael looked at her then, curious and intrigued. He wondered where her partner was, considering she was still dressed in her work attire, which also let him know she wasn't done working for the day.

"Be my guest," He gestured to the chair opposite his desk, leaning back in his own seat knowing he was about to be distracted completely. "What brings you here?"

She approached him, handing him a hot latte that was fresh and just to his liking. As coffee connoisseurs, they had entertained plenty of coffee conversations in the past. He wasn't really at all shocked that she knew his preference in coffee. He watched her from over the rim of his cup as she sat down with her own drink, clearly very comfortable in his presence.

"Carisi is upstairs talking to someone, so I figured I'd stop by and say hello." She said casually, but the sparkle in her eye let him know she had come by for more than a quick greeting.

A small smirk appeared on his face when he caught that look in her eyes. He knew her too well. She was here for a bigger reason. They were always usually very to the point with each other. They saw no reason to waste time when she was here with a purpose.

"Is that so? You came all this way just to say 'hello' to me?" He asked, a hint of playfulness in his normally dry tone.

She shrugged, a knowing grin appearing on her face as she ran her finger absentmindedly around the lid of her cup.

"Well..." She began. "I might have something interesting to tell you."

Now this made more sense. The coffee, the late visit, the giddiness. She was here to gossip - a habit that she frequently and flat out denied that she ever took part in.

"Okay," He nodded, his smirk now turning more curious. "Don't keep me in suspense."

She set her coffee down on his desk, now sitting up completely straight as she used both her hands to talk. He knew she had something big if she was this focused.

"You know how I'm kind of friends with the secretary on the fifth floor of the precinct?" She asked, jogging his memory. "Remember how I was telling you she had been acting strange?"

Rafael's eyes darted around the room as he racked his brain. mentally sorting through hundreds, if not thousands, of conversations the two of them had shared until he placed it.

"Yeah, you said she was acting secretive or something like that." He remembered, albeit vaguely.

"Right! You know I'm not one to gossip," She said, and Rafael had to fight the urge to roll his eyes at that comment. "But she's pregnant!"

Let the records show, Rafael had never met this said secretary before. The only things he knew about her were things that [Y/N] had disclosed to him, but evidently she had shared just enough with him for him to be all in on this revelation.

"No way," He tilted his head. "How do you know?"

"She told me!" She remarked. "I really couldn't believe it. I knew something was different about her. I had to come tell you when I could because you were the only person who agreed with me that something was up."

His heart fluttered again at that. It was purely just convenience that had brought her to his office that night, but it still made him shudder to think she had reserved a conversation solely for him.

"It seems we were right then," He took another sip, his eyebrows knitting together when he realized something. "Didn't you tell me she was single?"

There was a brief silence as she only shared a certain look with him. Her silence answered his question completely.

"Ah, so that's the crux of it all," He said, figuring he might as well fully emerge himself in this gossip session. "So, I'm guessing you have information on who the father is?"

"No," She shook her head. "I'm still working on that one...but I have a few guesses."

"Let's hear them." He encouraged her.

Normally, it would've been so unusual for Rafael to engage in this kind of talk. He didn't rightly care what a stranger to him had going on in their personal life...but he didn't like them the way he liked the detective sitting pretty in front of him, genuinely enjoying conversing with him on any given day.

"The rumor on the fifth floor is that it's a cop over in narcotics..." She took a quick glance over her shoulder to make sure no one was listening. "But that said cop has been gone for nearly six months. I don’t think the math adds up.”

Rafael considered her statement, nodding in agreement and urging her to continue.

"My other guess is a bit far-fetched, but not unreasonable," She said. "A few weeks ago she went home to Chicago to visit her family, and I remember her mentioning to me that she was thinking about paying an old flame of hers a visit..."

"Oh, that's interesting...and certainly a possibility, I suppose." He replied. "Is that all?"

"Yeah, that's all I got," She shrugged. "I am being unfair. I shouldn't be making a conversation out of her business."

Rafael chuckled, shaking his head.

"Well, we all indulge in a little nosy talk here and there." He said, feeling a pang of disappointment knowing this conversation was coming to an end.

“I know, I know. That’s really all I know," She reached for her coffee cup again. "But enough about me. How are things going here?”

He chuckled when she changed the subject, noticing her eyes lingering on his. He should've known she had something else locked and loaded.

"Things here are…as expected," he said, gesturing to the stacks of files on his desk. "Too many cases, too little time." He picked up his coffee, taking a sip before continuing. "But I always manage, one way or another."

“That you do, counselor.” She grinned. “This case has been a tough one…how are you holding up?”

He leaned back in his chair, a weary smile on his face.

"You know how it is." He said, and that was all he needed to say for her to completely understand.

"That I do," She sighed. "After all these years, I've never quite mastered dealing with everything we see."

"It's not easy, that's for sure," He said. "But I must say, you've handled yourself quite well in difficult situations, detective."

“I try my best,” She shrugged. “Some days I wonder if I should've stuck with my college job."

"Which was...?" He probed.

"Bartending," She confessed. "Also a stressful job, but nothing like doing police work."

This was new information to him. He actually didn't know that about her. He chuckled, imagining her in a bar apron, wiping down tables and listening to drunken rants.

"I could see that." He teased, a playful smile on his face. "But then we would be missing out on your skills as a detective."

She gave a small laugh, but didn't respond just yet. They sat in a comfortable silence, the conversation fizzling out before a new one blossomed.

"Maybe I need a vacation." She said in a way that seemed random, but this was usually how their conversations went. They would start on one topic and then end up somewhere completely different within minutes.

He took the opportunity to tease her, something that was also very common for their interactions.

"From SVU or from me?" He joked, the playful banter coming easy between them.

"Oh, never from you, Rafael." She matched his tone, his first name sliding off her tongue like it was something she said often.

He felt a brief flash of surprise when she used his first name, but he quickly recovered and played along with the banter.

"Careful, detective. That sounds almost affectionate." He teased.

She scoffed at that, an entertained smile on her face.

"We work for the law. We hardly have time to be affectionate in any regard." She said, and it was completely true.

"Yet here we are, two busy people making time for each other." He took a sip of his coffee, then looked at her with a more serious expression. "But you're right, it's not easy to balance work and personal life. Especially in our line of work."

“I can relate. Somehow you and my co-workers are the only people I really talk to,” She spoke, her voice soft. “Not…that I mind talking to you. Who else is going to tell you the neighborhood gossip?”

He smiled, genuinely flattered that she considered him one of her few friends.

"I must admit," he said, a hint of jest in his voice. "I do enjoy hearing your neighborhood gossip. It breaks up the monotony of the legal jargon."

“I imagine it does,” She returned a smile. “Maybe eventually we’ll figure out how to balance work and personal lives. Figure out how to do something other than work.”

Clearly they often toed the line between being professional, being casual, and being flirtatious. This was their norm. Everybody who knew them wouldn't even bat an eye at this conversation between them. But what Rafael said next would've raised a few brows. He wasn't sure what made him say it. Maybe it was the late hour or the moment just felt right, but he made a remark that couldn't have been confused as anything other than personal.

"Maybe we will. It's about time we started making time for ourselves." He paused, then said with a teasing smile. "And each other."

Her gaze fixed on him, her eyes slightly squinted as she smirked at him. She wasn't sure if he was being serious or not. Neither of them had ever crossed this line before. They were both aware that this was a new level of comfort with one another.

“Counselor, are you flirting with me?”

A sly smile tugged at the corner of his lips as he held her gaze.

"And if I was, detective?" He retorted.

“Mark me as surprised,” She said. “But flattered.”

They were both confident people...stubborn at times too. There would be no backing down from this. He chuckled, enjoying the back and forth banter. He leaned a bit closer in his chair, his smile growing wider.

"Is that so? You're not going to accuse me of being unprofessional?"

“That would make me a hypocrite. Me waltzing in here and gossiping about my coworker is unprofessional,” She leaned forward. “I consider this a flirtatious and pleasant conversation.”

He raised an eyebrow, intrigued by her words. He leaned closer as well, his voice a little lower now.

"Just a pleasant conversation, hm? You're not going to tell your other coworkers about this little chat?"

This situation was turning and it was turning fast. It had gone from casual to playful, and now they were trodding in a territory they had never ventured to before. This was different, but neither were backing down.

“Not at all, Counselor, if the thought of someone knowing bothers you so much.” She stood from her chair, eyes locked on him.

His smirk grew wider as she stood up, his eyes never leaving hers.

"It doesn't bother me at all." He assured her, rising to his feet as well. He moved around the desk, closing the distance between them. "In fact, I quite enjoy these little chats of ours."

“If we aren’t careful, we might become the precinct gossip.” She looked up at him, eyes sparkling.

He chuckled, finding the idea of being the source of gossip in the precinct strangely amusing. He took a step closer, his voice a low murmur as he spoke.

"And what if we are? Would that be such a bad thing?"

“Well, I would be getting a taste of my own medicine I suppose,” She said, realizing their noses were nearly touching. “Amongst other things.”

He let out a soft exhale, feeling his heart rate quicken at her close proximity. The air between them felt electrified.

"And those other things would be?" He asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Whatever you suggest we do to ‘make time for each other’?” She said smoothly. “What did you have in mind?”

He chuckled, his gaze locked with hers. He reached out with a slow, tentative hand, gently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. The feel of her skin under his fingers sent a shiver down his spine.

"I have plenty of ideas," he said, his voice low and filled with promise, "but we should probably discuss them somewhere more… private."

“Are you thinking private thoughts, Counselor?” She replied.

He leaned in a little closer, his voice dropping to a sultry whisper.

"What do you think, detective?" His hand moved to her cheek, his thumb tracing a gentle line along her jawline. The proximity was intoxicating, and he couldn’t resist the urge to toy with her a bit more.

“I’m thinking a couple of drinks over dinner,” She said, her voice supple and sultry. “Dessert at my place.”

He chuckled, his eyes darkening with desire at her words. He lifted his other hand, gently cupping her face, his thumbs brushing against her cheeks. He leaned even closer, his lips grazing against her ear as he whispered.

"Sounds like a perfect plan."

“Don’t you want to know what you’ll be having for dessert?” She asked, her control getting close to wobbling.

His lips curled into a sinful smile, the double meaning behind her words and the shiver in her voice were all the invitation he needed. He moved even closer, his breath hot against her ear, his voice huskier than before.

"Show me, detective. I’m absolutely starving."

She smiled an awfully sultry grin, her teeth toying with her bottom lip as she whispered.

“You’re looking at it.”

His eyes darkened with a mixture of restraint and desire, a low growl rumbling in his chest. He was losing control, his hands gripping her face a bit tighter now.

"Careful, detective. If you keep talking like that, I'll have you right now on this desk."

Fire was burning between them. Their minds were racing and hearts were pounding with the knowledge of where this was going. Neither cared to try and figure out how this was happening so fast. Neither of them needed to. They just knew something between them was mutual and it was coming out in full force.

He backed her into the desk, the backs of her thighs pressed against the edge of the desk. Her hands came to start working on getting his tie off, his hands planted high on her thighs underneath her skirt. Her lips brushed against his as her breathing became heavy, the two of them mere milliseconds from going at it when there was a knock on his office door and it creaked open.

Both Rafael and the detective froze, the moment shattered by the intrusion. Rafael took a moment to compose himself, his face flushing with a mix of annoyance and embarrassment as he attempted to conceal the fact that they had been just seconds away from being intimate on his desk.

He cleared his throat and took a few steps back, allowing some space between them. They both were quick to readjust themselves, totally coming back to reality of what just almost happened. Her heart was hammering away in her chest, her cheeks tinted pink as she adjusted her skirt. The intruder was none other than her detective partner, Sonny Carisi, who was blissfully unaware that he was just barely seconds away from walking in on his partner and his squad's counselor going at it.

Sonny stepped into the office, his expression serious. However, he hadn’t yet noticed the tense atmosphere in the room or the telltale signs of intimacy that were still evident on Rafael and the detective’s faces. He approached Rafael, his eyes fixed on the district attorney.

"Counselor...we have an issue with one of the witnesses in the case. Can I have a word?"

She was trying to hold her composure, acting like she wasn’t just about to get down and dirty with the counselor. Rafael took a deep breath, attempting to compose himself. The interruption had cooled the heat between them a bit, but the tension in the room was still palpable. He cleared his throat and addressed Sonny, his voice slightly strained as he tried to keep it together.

"Yeah...w-what's the issue with the witness?"

She could hardly stand to be in the room anymore. She was having a hard time processing how an innocent conversation turned so hot so quickly. Rafael had never expressed that kind of feeling with her. They had never gotten that close before. Sure, they faintly flirted, but never so outright before. She was overwhelmed, and now she felt like she needed some air.

“Sonny, you finish up here,” She said, her voice a bit shaky from the adrenaline. “I’m…I’ll meet you downstairs.”

Sonny's eyes flicked between Barba and the detective, sensing that there was more going on than he was aware of. He was puzzled by her shaky voice, and something about the tension in the room felt odd, but he didn’t have time to question it. As the detective made her way out of the room, Rafael's gaze followed her, a mixture of disappointment and concern etched on his face as she left.

Rafael had never shared that kind of moment with her. To be honest, he wasn’t sure where it had come from. Sure, he liked her and favored her, but he had never made a move on her before. But in all fairness, she had never reciprocated quite like that.

Rafael couldn’t deny that the moment with her had been explosive, a spark igniting between them that he hadn’t expected. He had always liked her, but this was a whole different level of attraction. Her response to him had triggered a deep, intense desire that he couldn’t ignore. As Sonny continued to talk, Rafael struggled to focus on the conversation, his mind going back to the moment they had shared just moments before.

He just wanted to help Sonny and get him out of his office so he could handle this. But of course, Sonny always needed to know everything.

“Is…everything alright between you and her, Counselor?”

Rafael flinched, snapped out of his thoughts by Sonny's question. He blinked a couple of times and cleared his throat, trying to hide his preoccupation.

"Yeah, everything's just fine, Carisi," he said, his tone a little guarded. "Why do you ask?"

“I’ve never seen her run out like that. Especially when you’re around,” Sonny remarked.

Rafael shifted uneasily in his chair as he sat down, the observation not being lost on him. He tried to play it off as nonchalantly as possible.

"I suppose she just had something to take care of. She seemed… in a hurry." He said, his words sounding unconvincing even to him.

Sonny didn’t believe him. He knew his partner, and he could tell when someone was lying. Something had happened in this office before he came in.

Rafael realized that Sonny wasn’t buying his response, and he silently cursed himself for not being more convincing. The air in the room felt heavy, and he knew he had to change the subject or risk further questioning.

"Is there anything else you needed to discuss regarding the case, Detective Carisi?" Rafael asked, trying to sound as impassive as possible.

Sonny caught the way Rafael changed the subject. He wasn’t getting anything from Rafael, so he decided to try his partner, who was downstairs waiting for him.

“No...alright…” Sonny said. “We’ll…we’ll be in touch.”

Rafael nodded, a slight look of relief on his face as Sonny seemed to accept the change in topic. As Sonny turned to leave, Rafael couldn’t help but feel a pang of worry about what might happen once he spoke to the detective.

He took a deep breath, trying to gather his thoughts, but his mind was still buzzing from the encounter that had just taken place, and the uncertainty of what would happen next gnawed at him. Sonny wasted no time getting to the elevator, taking it to the ground floor. Sure enough, she was standing just outside on the sidewalk, her hand resting over her chest as she took slow deep breaths of the cold New York air.

She let the cold air of New York City fill her lungs, the chill helping to clear her mind. She tried to steady her rapid heartbeat, still shaken by the intensity of the moment she and Rafael had shared. The thought of what might have happened if Sonny hadn’t walked in sent a shudder down her spine. What was she thinking?

She was so distracted by her thoughts that she didn’t notice Sonny approaching until he was standing beside her.

“Sonny.” She nearly gasped, her heart lurching in surprise.

Sonny chuckled at her reaction and raised an eyebrow, a sly smile on his face.

"Whoa, easy there. You almost jumped out of your skin." he teased, trying to lighten the mood.

“I’m sorry, you scared me.” She sighed. “Are you ready to go?” She gestured toward the SVU car they had taken.

Sonny nodded, and as they headed toward the car, he shot her a sideways glance, curious about what had just transpired upstairs.

He wasn’t a detective for nothing, and he could sense that there was more to the story. Something was off, especially given her demeanor and the flushed look on her face.

She slid into the passenger seat, feeling a bit less shaky now that she had a few minutes to calm down. Her mind was still reeling, but she didn’t feel like she was going to pass out anymore.

Sonny walked around the car and got behind the wheel, his gaze flickering to her every now and then. As they started driving, he decided to go for it and ask the question that had been on his mind since he walked in on his partner and the Counselor.

"So, what was that all about? You left his office looking like you’d seen a ghost." He said.

She took a subtle deep breath, trying to center herself for a round of questioning that was no doubt coming.

“It was nothing really,” She responded as coolly as possible. “I’m just tired, I think. I just needed a second to gather myself.”

Sonny gave her a skeptical look, her response only adding to his suspicion. She was obviously trying to brush it off, but he was not convinced.

"Come on. You know I wasn’t born yesterday," he said, his tone laced with mild irritation. "Something happened up there."

“I don’t know what you’re talking about…” She said, reaching for her phone that vibrated in her pocket.

As she checked her phone, Sonny gave her a knowing look. He could sense that she was dodging the question, and it only fueled his suspicion further.

"Oh, really? Then why won’t you look me in the eye?" he asked, his voice a bit challenging now. "Who’s sending you text messages, huh? The Counselor?”

Her heart dropped, because despite the fact that Sonny’s question was a joke — he was right. She stared at the text message that had just come in from Rafael.

A sly smile crept onto Sonny's face as he spotted the change in her expression, a clear indication that he hit a sore spot.

"Bingo," he said, his tone dripping with smugness. "That’s what I thought. What did he say?"

Sonny glanced at her, his curiosity piqued. He could tell she was reading a text message, but he couldn’t see what it said.

"So, are you planning to share that text with me, or are you just going to keep me in suspense?" he said, his voice filled with playful annoyance.

She didn't even really mean to, but she read the text out loud for herself and Sonny to hear.

Call me when you can. Please.

Sonny raised an eyebrow, a smirk spreading across his face. He couldn’t help but feel a little amused by the situation.

"‘Please?’" he repeated, a hint of mockery in his voice. "Sounds like the counselor is desperate to talk to you."

Sonny had her cornered, and she knew it. There was no getting anything past Sonny, especially since they worked so closely every single day.

“Sonny..." She whined, knowing he was more on to her than she realized.

Sonny chuckled at her response, thoroughly enjoying the teasing. He knew he had her now.

"Come on," he said, feigning innocence. "Don’t sound so surprised. I’ve seen the way you two look at each other when you think no one’s watching."

“Now I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” She huffed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Sonny took his eyes off the road for a moment to shoot her a sidelong glance, a knowing smile on his lips.

"Oh, please. You really think you’re discreet?" he said. "The tension between you two is so thick, a blind man could see it."

She rubbed her eyes stressfully, unsure of how to respond to Sonny, and even more unsure of how to proceed with Rafael. Seeing her stressed out, Sonny’s playful tone softened slightly. While he enjoyed teasing her, he could see that the situation was weighing on her.

"Hey, relax," he said, throwing her a gentle smile. "It’s just me, alright? You can talk to me, you know?"

“No, I can’t…” She sighed. “Not about this.”

Sonny’s smile faded slightly at her response. He could tell that whatever had happened in Rafael’s office was more serious than he initially thought. It wasn’t just some harmless flirtation between her and the district attorney. He cleared his throat and spoke with a more serious tone now.

"Why not? Come on. You and I have been friends for a long time, haven’t we? You can trust me."

“I trust you,” She said. “It’s not that, it’s just…complicated.”

Sonny furrowed his brow, his interest piqued even further. The way she said ‘complicated’ made it clear that there was more to this than he initially thought. He knew there was something she was holding back, but he wasn’t going to let it go that easily.

"Complicated, huh? In what way?" he asked, his voice calm but filled with genuine curiosity.

At this point, she knew Sonny wasn’t going to let this go. Sonny could keep a secret better than anyone, so she figured she might as well give it up. She told him the story, leaving out a few graphic details, but she told him enough for him to get the picture.

Sonny listened intently as she spoke, his expression stoic as he absorbed the details of what had transpired between her and Rafael. He didn’t say a word as she recounted the encounter, his gaze steady on the road ahead of them.

When she finished her story, he was silent for a moment, considering everything that had been said. Then, he spoke up, keeping his voice neutral.

"So, let me get this straight. You and the Counselor got hot and heavy in his office, but things got interrupted, and now you don’t know what to do next?"

“That about sums it up,” She sighed again. “If we had gone all the way…I don’t even know. I don’t know where to go from here and I don’t know if I can ever work with him again…”

Sonny exhaled softly, his jaw tensing slightly. He hadn’t been expecting it to be that serious. He could sense the internal struggle she was having and understood her confusion. He knew it wasn’t easy, juggling personal feelings and professional responsibilities.

"Whoa, whoa. Hold on," he said, trying to get a grip on the situation. "First of all, it didn’t go that far. Nothing…happened, right?"

“It was close,” She admitted. “But no. Sonny, Olivia will kill me if she finds out. She would flip if she found out I got cozy with the counselor…”

Sonny nodded slowly, processing her words. The fact that she was worried about Olivia’s reaction spoke volumes about how seriously she was taking this. He respected her devotion to the job, and he knew how highly her superiors thought of her.

"Okay, first of all, Olivia’s not going to ‘kill’ you. Besides, this isn’t exactly the first time a relationship has happened between coworkers."

“Yeah, but it’s different. It’s…me. You know how she is with me. I’m the youngest on the squad,” She took a deep breath. “If she knew Rafael made a move on me…”

Sonny could see the weight of the situation pressing heavily on her. He understood her concerns.

"I get that you don’t want to disappoint her," he said in a reassuring tone. "The thing is, this whole thing with Barba…you didn’t exactly pursue him, right? He’s the one who made a move. And as far as I can tell, it sounds like it was completely out of the blue for you."

“It…wasn’t really out of the blue,” She confessed. “I mean, I didn’t go in there expecting what happened but…like you said we’re pretty…flirtatious. And I didn’t push him away.”

Sonny chuckled slightly at her confirmation that she hadn’t exactly shut down whatever had been going on between her and the Counselor. He knew they’d had a spark.

“So, let me get this straight: you and Barba have been flirty with each other for a while, and eventually, things got heated in his office. Is that about right?”

Sonny nodded when she confirmed it, the situation starting to make more sense to him now.

"And now you don’t know what to do because you’re worried about your job, your relationship with Olivia, and whatever might happen next with Barba?”

“Right,” She replied. “It happened so fast…I don’t know how I got here.”

Sonny chuckled softly as he listened to her concerns.

"You got here, because you and Barba have chemistry," he said bluntly. "The question is, what are you going to do about it?"

“I don’t know what to do about it,” She read the text from Barba again. “How do you even move forward from something like this?”

Sonny shot her a sympathetic glance, understanding her anxiety.

"Hey, it sounds like you’re feeling a bit out of your comfort zone here, and that’s alright." He said reassuringly. "You’re usually more reserved, and this situation’s a bit more intense than you’re used to. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It could mean that something about Barba really does it for you."

“Yeah, I could’ve told you that. I guess I need to respond,” She stared at her phone. "He wants me to call him later. So he will probably reject me and tell me it was a mistake and it never should’ve happened and then things will be awkward and then I’ll have to leave SVU and then I’m back to making traffic stops-“

Sonny reached over and grabbed her arm firmly, stopping her mid-rant. He chuckled slightly at her panicked ramblings.

"Slow down there," he said, a hint of amusement in his voice. "Take a deep breath. You're getting way ahead of yourself."

“Maybe…” A smile appeared on her face without realizing it. “I’ll just…tell him I’ll call him when I can.”

Sonny chuckled along with her, enjoying the lighter tone of the conversation. He was glad to see that his teasing had lifted her spirits, at least a little bit.

"Hey, you never know," He said with a shrug and a smirk. "Stranger things have happened. Maybe Barba’s completely smitten with you and can’t wait to see you again."

“Alright, alright…” She replied. “One step at a time. Let’s finish this workday.”

Sonny chuckled at her response, sensing her determination to get through the last couple hours of their long workday and not let the situation with Barba consume her. He nodded in agreement.

"You got it," he said, his tone back to business. "I've got your back, no matter what happens next."

___

They returned to the precinct, tying up their loose ends for the day so they could get the day finished. She tried to put Rafael in the back of her mind. She just needed to get through her shift and then go from there. She hoped she would feel better once she and Rafael talked, no matter what the outcome was.

Sonny shot a few glances at her, sensing her attempt to keep her mind off the situation with the Counselor. He knew she was struggling to focus on work when her mind was preoccupied.

As the day came to an end, Sonny casually looked down at his watch and spoke up.

"You know, we're just about done for the day. You…uh…have plans for the rest of the night?"

She gave him a look.

“I’m going to call him as soon as I leave,” She said. “If he’s still at his office, I might swing by.”

Sonny gave her a reassuring pat on the shoulder, his eyes filled with genuine concern.

"You're gonna handle this, one way or another." he said, his voice firm and steady.

“Okay,” She nodded. “I’ll text you when it’s over.”

Sonny waved her goodbye, and she didn't waste any time getting out of the precinct. She dialed Rafael's number on the way out of the building.

The phone rang a few times before the familiar voice of Rafael Barba answered on the other end.

“Hey.” His tone was calm and composed.

“Counselor.” She greeted as calmly as she could.

There was a hint of surprise and relief in Rafael's voice as he recognized her on the other end of the line. He had been hoping she would call.

"I wasn’t sure if you’d call." He said plainly.

“Of course I did,” She let out a silent sigh. “Are you…still at your office?”

There was a slight pause before Rafael responded, the anticipation heavy in his voice.

"Yes," he replied. "Do you…want to come by?"

Her heart fluttered, there really was no turning back.

“Yeah, I figured I would come by so…we could talk. I can be there in 20 minutes…”

They sorted out the details before the call ended, and she knew this was going to either be a pleasant or brutal talk. She knew she might be losing one of her best friends by the end of the night. She had never felt more unsure, but she couldn't even deny that maybe she was curious to see how this developed...if it developed at all.

Her mind raced as she made her way to Rafael's office. She thought of every possible outcome in this scenario...the best case, the worst case, and everything in between. She felt the knot of anxiety in her stomach getting heavier by the minute. She laid eyes on her destination and knew it was now or ever. She needed to compose herself and pull it together. She wanted to walk out of this situation with him still an important part of her life.

The building was closed down for the night, all the offices dark and closed...except for his. It was now or never. If there was ever a moment where she felt like she was about to seal her fate...it was right now.

She took the elevator to the floor of his office, her brain actively controlling her breathing to be as calm and slow as possible. Her heart was pounding away, and she wasn't sure if it was the nerves or the knowledge of seeing him again after what had happened.

His office door was closed, but a glow of light was shining from behind the closed blinds on his windows and under the door. She gave a light knock on the door, a slow exhale escaping her as she waited for him to answer.

She heard some shuffling from behind the door, knowing he was undoubtedly trying to quickly straighten up his desk before he allowed her inside. A few seconds passed before he opened the door -- his tired eyes meeting hers with the same look of anxiety and curiosity of what was about to happen. There was no turning back now, and they both felt like they were prepared.

But little did they know, their night was about to get far more interesting than they planned for.

[anarachussy]

DAN AND PHIL TERRIBLE INFLUENCE TOUR REVIEW. NO MAJOR SPOILERS (but you have been warned)

General: Absolutely hilarious, even if you have no clue who they are. The humor is very well balanced between goofy and raunchy.

Technical elements were incredible. If you have epilepsy uhhh well.. The set was very fitting for the purposes of the show. They had an aesthetic in mind, and they killed it.

One of the biggest draws of the show is their dynamic. I have never seen two people build off each other on stage as well as they do. You can very clearly tell they are partners before performers, and the level of comfortableness they have with each other enhances the experience.

Another huge selling point of the show is its interactive nature. The audience is literally vital to the show, and that is an incredibly good feeling to have as a viewer. They make you feel special, because to them you are special. It’s very fitting to have that level of engagement as influencers, especially ones with such a dedicated fanbase.

The atmosphere is absolutely unreal.

Before the show I had lost excitement over seeing it, as I had no friends that really watched them, so I thought I’d be lonely. Every video advertising the show Dan and Phil said something along the lines of “meet new people!” “You can go alone and still have a great time!” “You could bring your mom!” I kinda brushed it off as them trying to encourage sales.

They are telling the truth.

I have never witnessed such a level of kindness, friendliness, acceptance, and overall joy in one room in my life. I sat down and immediately the entire row started introducing themselves. The people next to me commented along with me. I sighed a copy of YWGTTN and took pictures with other fans. (I was somehow in the TikTok where it’s like: I hope they “play hot to go!” And I was like “this is Dan and Phil”.)

The connection between fans is hands down the most important part of this show. If you are going to see the show and you are maybe a little self conscious, you have absolutely nothing to worry about, you will feel loved.

Individually:

Dan is a phenomenal performer. He has a MASSIVE presence on stage, even when he isn’t yapping. His movements, especially his dancing, are VERY clean, you know he knows what he’s doing. He is a master at crowd work. You can tell he loves it.

Phil’s it factor is his energy. He perfectly balances out Dan’s chaos, sometimes with his own chaos. He is effortlessly funny, and his comedic timing is impeccable. He is genuinely such a lovely person, and he radiates the level of positivity people need. Incredibly infectious. You can also tell he loves it.

Minor criticisms:

I personally would have liked the confession segment to last a little longer.

I feel like Act 2 could have had maybe one more segment, but hey man it was also 10:45 at night, Phil needs to get to bed.

That’s it. The show was great.

[sleekervae]

Wicked Games ❅ 9

Masterlist

Pairing: Coriolanus Snow x socialite!fem!reader

Summary: Sable meets Coriolanus' Competition

Warnings: politicians being politicians, some angst

Word Count: 6,096

A few days had passed since that quiet night in Coriolanus’ penthouse, but Sable couldn’t shake the way she’d felt in the warmth of that room—the fire crackling, the soft rain pattering outside, and the strangely comfortable silence between them. She had woken up the next morning to find herself still tucked under the blanket, Coriolanus already awake, moving quietly so as not to disturb her. Since then, they hadn’t spoken much beyond what was necessary for their professional dealings, but something had shifted.

As she stood in her family home, staring up at the old wooden attic door, Sable let out a quiet sigh. She hadn’t thought about painting in so long, but the memory of their conversation had been replaying in her mind. There had been something almost vulnerable in Coriolanus' curiosity, a genuine interest in this part of her life she had left behind. And now, here she was, standing at the precipice of her past.

With a small smile, Sable reached for the ladder and climbed up into the dusty attic. The light filtering through the small, circular window revealed old boxes, forgotten trinkets, and memories. She knew exactly what she was looking for—the faded cardboard box filled with her old art supplies, her brushes, her sketchbooks, and half-finished canvases. It had been years since she’d touched them, but as she carefully opened the box, the familiar smell of oil paints hit her like a wave of nostalgia.

Her fingers ran over the bristles of a paintbrush, and something stirred in her—a sense of renewal, a craving to create again. Without overthinking it, she gathered her supplies, her mind already buzzing with colors, ideas, and images. Coriolanus’ words echoed in her head.

Maybe it was time to start painting again.

Sable carefully descended the attic ladder, balancing the dusty boxes in her arms, one by one. Each trip down felt like unearthing a small piece of herself, long buried under the weight of other responsibilities, other ambitions. By the time she had gathered everything in her room, a sense of anticipation had begun to bloom in her chest.

She arranged her brushes, tubes of paint, and old sketchbooks along her desk. A large, empty canvas sat on the easel she had almost forgotten about, leaning against the far wall of her room. Sunlight streamed in through the window, bathing the space in a soft, golden glow, and she couldn't help but smile. It had been so long, but it felt right.

Sable opened a tube of paint, squeezing the rich red onto her palette, and dipped her brush into it. For a moment, she hesitated, the tip of the brush hovering over the blank canvas. What would she paint? She wasn’t sure yet. But then, in one smooth motion, she began.

The first stroke was bold, confident. Her hand moved instinctively, filling the canvas with broad swaths of color, blending and layering, each movement freeing something within her. Time seemed to slip away as she worked, the outside world disappearing into the steady rhythm of brush against canvas.

“Sable?” Seline called from the doorway, pulling her from her focus. She glanced over to see her older sister standing with one eyebrow raised, her curiosity unmistakable.

“What are you up to in here?” Seline asked, stepping inside to get a closer look, "I saw the attic ladder was down..."

Sable set down her brush and wiped her hands on a rag, chuckling softly, “I guess I’m painting again,”

Seline’s eyes flicked to the half-finished canvas, a thoughtful expression crossing her face, “Wow… I didn’t think you’d go back to this. It's been nearly a decade,” She leaned in closer to examine the strokes, "What made you start again?"

Sable shrugged, though her thoughts briefly wandered to Coriolanus and their conversation, “I don’t know… just felt like it was time,”

Seline smiled knowingly, "Well, it's nice to see you pick it up," she said, "Is that why you'd disappeared so the other day?"

Sable paused, her hand hovering over her palette, “No, I was with Coriolanus. I wanted to make sure he was alright,” she said, her focus returning to mixing colours.

“After the… debate,” Seline said thoughtfully, her eyes narrowing slightly, “Is he okay?”

Sable nodded, though she kept her gaze on the paints, “He’s fine. His advisor cleared his schedule, so he’s taking it easy for now,”

Seline’s interest was clearly growing. She perched on the edge of the bed, her gaze never leaving Sable, “You were gone—what, all day—with Coriolanus Snow, just to make sure he was ‘fine’? How fine was he when you left him?”

Sable laughed softly, not looking up from her work, “Nothing salacious happened, if that’s what you’re getting at. We just spent some time together. It was nice.”

Seline tilted her head, studying her sister’s concentrated expression. “I'm sure it was... ” She paused, then added more pointedly, “What did you guys do?”

Sable hesitated, her brush momentarily stilled, “We went to the movies, had lunch. It was… normal. Nothing out of the ordinary,”

Seline raised an eyebrow, leaning in a bit, “So, you’re telling me that you’re just painting again because of a nice day out with Coriolanus? Seems like more than coincidence,”

Sable’s eyes darted to Seline’s, a flicker of surprise in her gaze, “I don’t know what you’re implying,” she said quickly, though the quickness in her response was a bit too pronounced, “It’s just a coincidence. I’ve been wanting to get back into painting for a while,"

Seline’s eyes remained skeptical but friendly, “Just asking. It sounds like you had a pretty good day with him,”

Sable forced a smile, feeling the warmth in her cheeks. “Yes, I suppose I did,”

Seline gave her a knowing look, then grinned, “Well, I’ll let you get back to it. Just remember, if you need someone to talk to about more than just painting…” she let her words trail off, a teasing note in her voice.

“I thought you'd be busy with wedding planning,” Sable said, her voice slightly elevated.

Seline chuckled, her expression shifting to a mix of amusement and impatience, “Oh, I am. But I can always make time for my little sister,” she said, giving Sable a quick hug before heading toward the door, "I'll be around if you need me,"

As Seline left, Sable turned her full attention back to the canvas, the earlier conversation a quiet hum in the background of her mind. She dipped her brush into a vibrant shade of blue, her strokes tentative at first, as if she were trying to capture the delicate layers of her day with Coriolanus. The abstract forms began to emerge—swirls of color and fragmented shapes that hinted at the complexities of their interactions.

The rain outside had softened to a light drizzle, its rhythmic patter barely audible over the rustling of her brush against the canvas. Sable’s thoughts drifted to the quiet moments with Coriolanus: the way he’d looked at her, the soft laugh he’d had in his casual clothes, the ease of their conversation. These memories seemed to manifest in her painting as gentle curves and overlapping hues, a visual echo of her internal musings.

Her brush moved with increasing confidence, laying down bold streaks of color juxtaposed with softer, more obscure tones. Each stroke was a reflection of her attempts to understand the depth of her feelings—an abstract representation of the connection she felt was forming between them. The shapes on the canvas were fluid and elusive, much like her emotions: clear in some areas, obscured in others.

As she took a step back to assess her work, Sable could see a turbulent yet harmonious composition emerging. The painting seemed to encapsulate the tumultuous beauty of her emotions, blending moments of clarity with areas of uncertainty. She hoped that as the paint dried, her thoughts and feelings would similarly settle into something more comprehensible.

Coriolanus stood at the edge of his bathroom, his hands gripping the cool marble sink as he stared into the mirror. His reflection offered nothing but the same polished exterior, the one he had mastered over years of careful crafting. But beneath it all, something inside him simmered—frustration, confusion, and, to his dismay, desire.

He had barely been able to focus all morning, his thoughts repeatedly trailing back to Sable. The way she looked at him, the melodious sound of her laughter, her sharp wit that kept him on his toes, and the way her eyes held a captivating spark that ignited something deep inside of him. And how could he forget her alluring physique, the mere thought of it sending a surge of desire through his veins. He was helpless to resist her pull, completely consumed by the intensity of his longing for her.

With a deep breath, he turned on the shower, hoping the water would clear his mind, help him regain control. The bathroom quickly filled with steam, the hot water cascading down his tense muscles as he leaned against the tiles. He closed his eyes, willing himself to calm down, to return to the cool-headed strategist he was known to be.

But instead of cooling him off, the heat of the shower only stoked the fire within. His thoughts wandered, unbidden, back to Sable. He could picture her perfectly—the curve of her smile, the way she had pulled the blanket over both of them, her smaller body pressing snugly against his. His pulse quickened as the water cascaded over him, failing to wash away the vivid, salacious images that flooded his mind.

The more he tried to push the thoughts aside, the stronger they became. He could imagine her close, her warmth melding with his, her lips brushing lightly against his skin. The idea of it consumed him, driving him to madness. It was a sensation he wasn’t accustomed to—dangerous, reckless, and utterly intoxicating. She wasn’t supposed to be this; she was supposed to be a partner in his calculated game of strategy, a necessary piece in his campaign. Yet here she was, invading his mind, the source of desires that refused to relent.

Without thinking, his hand moved instinctively to his semi-hard length, the need for release overwhelming him. He held back, aware of just how easily those thoughts of her could spiral, threatening to push him into a place where control was no longer an option.

His hand moved with a rhythm born of longing and desperation, fingers tracing patterns of imaginary touch upon his skin. He could just imagine her fingers, everything she could do to him, the way she would make him lose control completely. He thought about how good it would feel to push himself inside her, hold her hips down so he could feel her shake beneath him, satiate himself in her heat while she’d wrap her legs around his waist, her slick dripping down her thighs. He hated how hard she made him when she wasn’t even here, how easy it was for him to be reeling over the mere thought of her when she wasn’t even trying and he sped up his motions over himself, the sensation too much to deny.

His body betrayed him, eagerly responding to the fantasies that played out in his mind. The rhythmic movements of his hand brought satisfaction, but his body was also tense and shaking with desire for her. As the water continued to fall on him, it only intensified every sensation until he felt like he was teetering on the edge. In that moment, it wasn't just physical release he craved, but an escape from the torment of his own thoughts.

He leaned against the shower wall with a thud, closing his eyes as he imagined her and only her. He thought about Sable's hands on him instead of his own, picturing her delicate fingers with their beautiful french manicure wrapped around his muscles, caressing his chest and locking fingers with his. His attraction to her was undeniable, but now it was purely carnal. He wanted to make her tremble and writhe underneath him, hear her moans echo through the tight space they were in, and be the sole reason for her losing control

Still, as the water pounded against him, he found himself surrendering to the thoughts, letting them spiral further than they should. His hand was tight around himself, while the other pulled at his balls in a desperate attempt to achieve the throbbing sensation he craved. He moved his hips against his palm, feeling pained by how much power she held over him without even knowing it. Suddenly, a low growl rumbled from his throat and his lips trembled slightly as he felt himself shake with release. He stroked himself until he felt drained and messy.

His breath was ragged and his face flushed as he realized what he had just done for her, without her even knowing. He closed his eyes, trying to steady his breathing and calm down. The hot water washed over him for longer than necessary as he tried to rid himself of thoughts of her, but she still lingered in his mind like a snake coiled tightly around him. He needed to clear his head and remember who he was and what was important. But in this moment, under the raging shower, all he could focus on was her.

Coriolanus stepped out of the shower, feeling both physically relieved and emotionally unsettled. He grabbed a towel and ran it across his skin, the warmth of the steam still clinging to him as if trying to pull him back into the indulgent thoughts he’d just indulged in. His mind, however, fought to reassert control. This was nothing but a necessary outlet, he told himself. A distraction from the mounting pressures of his campaign and the personal chaos that seemed to be creeping in around him.

This wasn’t about Sable. It couldn’t be.

He dried his face and stared into the fogged-up mirror, the blurred reflection staring back at him like some distorted version of himself. With a swipe of his hand, he cleared the surface and looked into his own eyes. What he saw was someone desperate to regain control, to rationalize this moment and keep it separate from what really mattered.

"This is just the game," he murmured to himself, "It's a game..." He’d been in high-stakes environments before, seen how partnerships could blur into something else, but that didn’t mean he had to let it happen here. Not with Sable.

He moved to the wardrobe, pulling on his usual attire with a precision that matched his thought process—careful, deliberate, removing any trace of the intimacy that had slipped into his mind. He couldn’t afford to lose focus, not when Garrison was breathing down his neck about the next stage of his campaign. He buttoned his shirt with renewed determination, the motions grounding him as he mentally recited his goals, his purpose.

This thing with Sable—it wasn’t real.

It was the tension of the work they were doing, the late nights, the emotional stakes of the election. He could compartmentalize it, lock it away like every other weakness that had threatened to distract him over the years. That’s what he did best—push aside anything that didn’t serve the ultimate goal.

He fastened his watch and took a deep breath, a sense of normalcy returning with each step. By the time he was fully dressed, the memory of the shower already felt like a distant indulgence. Coriolanus squared his shoulders and straightened his collar, mentally reinforcing the walls he had just rebuilt around his feelings.

He couldn’t let his emotions—especially ones as messy and uncontrollable as desire—jeopardize everything.

As he walked out of the penthouse, he reminded himself of the path he was on. Politics wasn’t about passion, it was about power. And no matter what happened between him and Sable, it was his power that would define him—not the fleeting distractions of attraction.

Coriolanus had always admired Tigris’s focus and dedication to her craft, but he rarely visited her studio. So when he found himself standing in front of the sleek glass doors of the large building, he hesitated. It was odd, really. He never had reason to visit this place—she usually came to him. But today, his thoughts were a tangled mess, and the need to talk to someone, someone who understood him, was overwhelming.

Pushing open the door, he was met with the familiar scent of fabric and the hum of machines. Tigris was hunched over her work table, meticulously stitching a delicate seam. The space was scattered with swatches of fabric, sketches pinned to the walls, and half-finished garments hanging from racks.

When she looked up, surprise flashed in her eyes, "Coriolanus," she said, straightening, "What are you doing here?"

He forced a smile and gave a nonchalant shrug, "Thought I'd see what you're working on,"

Tigris raised an eyebrow, clearly not buying the casual tone, "Really? When do you ever want to see what I'm working on?"

"I'm just full of surprises, I guess," he walked further into the studio, trying to distract himself by looking around at her work, but his mind kept wandering back to Sable, to the way her eyes had lingered on him, to the way he felt when they were alone. It was ridiculous.

"You’ve been… preoccupied lately," Tigris said, her voice gentle as she continued sewing, "How are you feeling?"

Coriolanus picked up a piece of fabric, running it through his fingers, “I’m fine. Just, you know, the usual—campaign, meetings. Trying to recover,”

She paused, eyes narrowing slightly, "You don’t come to me unless something’s really on your mind. So what’s going on, Coriolanus?"

He stiffened slightly at the his name on her tongue; it sounded so stoney and chilly, just as Sable as said, “Nothing,” he muttered, turning to face her, "Why would something be wrong?"

Tigris leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms, "Because you're avoiding the question, and you never avoid questions unless you're hiding something,"

Coriolanus laughed, trying to deflect, “You’re reading too much into this,”

But Tigris wasn’t swayed. She tilted her head, studying him, “Is it about your partnership with Sable?”

His posture stiffened, and for a moment, he debated brushing it off, pretending that the thought of Sable hadn’t been consuming him. But he knew better—Tigris wouldn’t let it go.

“What about it?” he asked, trying to sound indifferent.

“You’ve been spending a lot of time together,” Tigris said, her tone careful, “And from what I’ve heard, not just for the camera, either. That’s not something you’d normally do, especially not for someone you’re just ‘working’ with,”

Coriolanus scoffed, shaking his head, “I had to take a break. We went out for the day. So what?”

Tigris cocked her head, her voice soft but direct, “Are you catching some feelings for her?”

The question hit him harder than he expected. For a brief second, his mind flashed with images—Sable sitting beside him, her quiet laugh, the way she looked at him when she thought he wasn’t paying attention. His heart skipped a beat, but he forced himself to push it all away.

“No,” he said, too quickly, his voice firm, “There are no feelings. I don’t have time for that—love, relationships… I have no need for a real partner, not now, not ever,”

Tigris didn’t say anything for a moment, watching him with a knowing look that made him feel exposed, “You sound so sure of that,”

He met her gaze, trying to hold on to his conviction, “Yes,” he replied, almost angrily, “I don’t need anyone. I have a campaign to focus on, and she’s part of that. Nothing more,”

Tigris frowned, crossing her arms, “Then why are you here?”

Coriolanus blinked, momentarily thrown off by the directness of her question, "What do you mean?"

“I mean, you never come to the studio, not unless there’s something bothering you,” Tigris said, standing from her desk, “You’re frustrated, Coriolanus. I can see it all over you. You’ve always been good at hiding things, but not from me. So, what’s really going on?”

He shifted uncomfortably, running a hand through his hair, “I just needed to clear my head,” he muttered, “That’s all.”

Tigris took a step closer, her eyes narrowing in concern, “Clearing your head… or running from it? You can tell yourself it’s nothing, that you don’t feel anything for her, but I think you came here because deep down, you know that’s a lie.”

“I’m not running from anything,” he snapped, the frustration spilling over, “I don’t need to… talk about this.”

Tigris studied him for a moment, her gaze softening, “You don’t have to admit it to me, Corio, but at least be honest with yourself,” She paused, letting her words settle in, “You’ve always been so focused on winning. But at what cost?”

He felt the tension tightening in his chest. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have. He didn’t come here to dissect his feelings, but the truth was, Tigris was right—he wouldn’t have sought her out unless something was gnawing at him. And now that he was here, it felt impossible to deny.

“I can’t afford to be distracted,” he finally said, his voice quieter now. “Not by her, not by anyone. This campaign is too important,”

Tigris shook her head. “And what happens when it’s over? What will you be left with?”

Coriolanus didn’t answer, the question lingering between them like a weight he wasn’t ready to carry. He turned away, staring at the half-finished designs scattered around the studio, searching for something, anything, to divert the conversation.

But the truth had already been spoken.

Coriolanus sat stiffly in the sitting room of the Hanover residence, his gaze fixed on the ornate clock on the mantle. Every tick of the second hand seemed louder in the quiet space, filling the awkward silence between him and Phillip Hanover, who sat across from him, arms folded and eyes narrowed in thought. Coriolanus felt the weight of the man’s silent judgment—he didn’t need words to know that Phillip wasn’t planning to vote for him in the upcoming election.

Phillip was seated in a high-backed armchair by the window, his gaze lingering on Coriolanus with an unreadable intensity. The older man hadn’t said much since Sable had gone upstairs to finish getting ready, but his silence spoke volumes.

Coriolanus cleared his throat, his posture a careful mix of confidence and politeness, "It's a beautiful home you have here, Mr. Hanover," he said, trying to break the tension.

Phillip finally looked away from the window, his expression unchanged, "It's been in the family for generations," he replied stiffly, as though that piece of information was more important than anything Coriolanus had to offer, "I assume your place is... different."

Coriolanus didn’t miss the slight edge in the man’s tone, but he forced a smile anyway, "Quite different, yes. More modern," he offered.

Meanwhile Eleanor Hanover shifted in her seat, her polite smile doing little to break the tension, “I’ll just go check on the tea,” she said with a faint, almost nervous chuckle, not quite meeting Coriolanus’s eyes as she hurried back out.

The silence returned, heavier this time, and Coriolanus found himself checking the time on his watch, hoping Sable would return soon. He wasn’t used to being uncomfortable in any setting, let alone with someone’s family. But Phillip had a way of making him feel like an intruder in this world, and it was beginning to wear on his carefully maintained composure.

Phillip leaned back in his chair, his arms crossing as he scrutinized Coriolanus again. "Sable doesn't bring many people here," he commented, the words slow and deliberate, "You must have made quite the impression,"

Coriolanus gave a small nod, unsure of how to respond without sounding too forward, "She and I have a quite a bit in common, turns out,"

Phillip’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly, "I’m sure you do..."

Before Coriolanus could answer, the sound of footsteps echoed down the stairs, and both men turned to see Sable descending, dressed in a sleek, elegant outfit that perfectly balanced sophistication and subtle allure. The sight of her brought an immediate wave of relief, but also a flicker of something more intense. Something he had yet to fully admit to himself.

"Sable," he greeted, rising to his feet, his tone carrying just the slightest edge of relief.

Phillip’s expression softened as his daughter entered the room, but only marginally. There was still an air of protectiveness about him, though he said nothing as Sable crossed the room toward Coriolanus.

"Sorry to keep you waiting," she said, her tone warm. Then, with a playful glance at her father, she added, "I hope you haven’t been scaring him, Father,"

Phillip gave a small, humorless smile, the type that barely touched his eyes, "Just a polite conversation, nothing more," he replied, his tone still carrying that edge. He looked back at Coriolanus, the weight of his scrutiny unmistakable, "I trust Mr. Snow can handle himself."

Sable let out a quiet laugh, though the tension still hovered in the air. "He can," she said lightly, stepping closer to Coriolanus and giving her father a gentle but pointed look, "Anyway, we won’t be too late,"

"Take your time," Phillip said, though his tone suggested otherwise.

Coriolanus felt the shift in atmosphere as soon as Sable stood beside him, her presence offering some respite from the quiet inquisition. He gave a quick, polite nod to Phillip before turning to Sable. "Shall we?" he asked, offering her his arm.

She took it with a smile, and as they walked toward the door, the car was already waiting for them outside. Coriolanus leaned in just enough to whisper, "He's quite an intense man,"

“He's... protective, but don’t worry, he’ll come around,” she assured him.

Coriolanus smiled faintly, though a part of him wasn’t so sure. As they stepped outside, the weight of Phillip’s stare still clung to him, a subtle reminder of the scrutiny that came with every part of this delicate partnership.

The Capitol buzzed with anticipation as Coriolanus and Sable arrived at the grand event. The venue was draped in the opulence expected of such an occasion, with shimmering banners depicting the new arena hanging high above the entrance. The scent of power and ambition lingered in the air as Capitol elites gathered to catch a glimpse of what was to come: the next Hunger Games. It was a showcase of Capitol dominance, a spectacle designed to remind every district of their place, and it was Coriolanus’s chance to prove his unwavering loyalty to its values.

As they stepped out of the car, cameras flashed from all angles, capturing the perfect image of the pair—Coriolanus Snow, the up-and-coming politician, and Sable, his poised and graceful companion. Coriolanus could feel the weight of expectations pressing down on him as he adjusted his coat, his expression calculated to project power and confidence.

Beside him, however, Sable shifted uncomfortably, her gaze scanning the crowd and the large screens previewing the tributes' profiles and shots of the arena. Her lips pressed together in a faint frown, betraying the unease she had managed to hide earlier. The cheering of the crowd, the excited chatter about the tributes, and the palpable thrill that hung over the event—it all seemed to grate against something deep inside her.

“Are you alright?” Coriolanus asked quietly, leaning in just enough to keep the conversation between them as they strode toward the entrance.

“I’m fine,” she replied quickly, though her voice lacked conviction. Her eyes lingered on the images flashing across the screen, the tributes’ faces illuminated in vivid, unnerving detail, “It’s just… a lot.”

“We need to stay on-brand tonight,” he reminded her gently, though his tone carried an edge of authority, “This is important for both of us,”

"I know," Sable nodded but didn’t look convinced. As they passed through the gilded doors, a murmur of excitement rippled through the attendees. Coriolanus straightened his back, reminding himself of the stakes. This event was crucial for his campaign, a chance to prove that he was as committed to the Capitol's future as anyone else.

But as the spectacle unfolded before them, with Capitol officials reveling in the upcoming Games and the political maneuvering hidden beneath the pomp and circumstance, the divide between them began to widen. Sable’s unease was palpable, and Coriolanus knew it would only grow as the night went on. Yet, they had to play their parts.

Lucky Flickerman's voice boomed across the event hall, filling the air with excitement as the festivities kicked into full swing. His signature flamboyant style captivated the audience, his wide grin never wavering as he introduced the tributes one by one. Their names and faces flashed on the massive arena screens, each tribute forced into the spotlight before the Capitol’s hungry eyes.

Coriolanus sat rigid, his gaze locked on the screen as each tribute’s face appeared. He paid close attention, his expression stone-cold and analytical. These were the young lives that would compete in the upcoming Games, a key piece of the Capitol's power reigning strong. Beside him, Sable sat quietly, but he could sense the tension radiating off her. She shifted in her seat, her movements small but telling.

As Lucky announced the girl from District 3, a close-up of her face appeared, her eyes wide with fear. The young girl couldn't have been older than fifteen, her hands shaking as she clutched her district token. The Capitol crowd roared with approval, feeding off her terror, but Sable’s breath caught in her throat. She glanced away, trying to focus on anything but the screen, but the image of the girl’s fearful face was burned into her mind. That could've easily been anyone... it could've even been her...

Sable's discomfort deepened with every passing second, the oppressive atmosphere around her becoming unbearable. Coriolanus, absorbed in the political gravity of the event, didn’t seem to notice her growing unease until she suddenly rose from her seat.

“Excuse me,” Sable muttered, her voice tight as she excused herself, slipping away from the row of seats. Her steps were quick, but she did her best to keep her composure, though the weight of the crowd’s cheering gnawed at her. She needed air—anything to get away from the spectacle unfolding in front of her.

Coriolanus blinked, taken off guard by her abrupt departure. He watched her weave through the crowd, her figure quickly swallowed by the opulent decor and flashing lights of the event hall. Puzzlement washed over him. Sable had known what this evening would entail. She had seemed composed, prepared to play her role, yet now she was fleeing the spectacle. He was left with a decision to make—should he follow her or stay where he was?

The crowd was still enraptured, cheering and laughing as the tributes continued to be displayed. Lucky Flickerman's voice was barely a hum in the background as Coriolanus’ mind raced. His instinct told him to stay—this was too important an event to abandon. Yet something gnawed at him, pulling his thoughts toward Sable and her discomfort.

Across the room, Coriolanus caught a glimpse of Eldrige Barbery. Barbery was watching him, his gaze sharp and calculating, as if taking note of Coriolanus’s every move. The pressure weighed heavier on Coriolanus’s shoulders—this was an opportunity to solidify his place in Capitol politics, to show unwavering loyalty to the Games and the Capitol’s cause. But the memory of Sable’s tense expression lingered.

His jaw tightened. He couldn’t afford distractions, not now. Not when so many eyes were on him.

Yet the thought of Sable, her unease, and the crack in her composure tugged at him in a way that was hard to shake.

Beside him, Garrison grumbled under his breath, "Where the hell is she going?"

Coriolanus simply shrugged, "The bathroom, perhaps?" he tried to focus on the show before him. However, with one more quick glance, Coriolanus noticed that Eldridge too was gone.

Sable leaned against the cool marble sink in the bathroom, her hands trembling slightly as she tried to regain her composure. Her chest felt tight, and her pulse thrummed loudly in her ears. She stared at her reflection in the ornate mirror, the dim lighting casting a soft glow on her flushed cheeks. Her eyes, watery and red-rimmed, betrayed the emotions she had worked so hard to suppress.

"Calm down... calm down" she whispered shakily, grabbing a tissue and dabbing carefully at the corners of her eyes. The last thing she needed was anyone noticing she had been upset. The Capitol’s events demanded perfection—composure at all times, no matter what was happening inside.

But the image of the girl from District 3 lingered. The terror in her eyes, the helplessness of someone who knew they were walking to their death. Sable had seen that fear before. In herself. She wasn’t in the Games, no, but every time she saw the spectacle paraded in front of the Capitol, she was reminded of how fragile life could be, even for people like her. There was no real safety. No true escape from the Capitol’s insidious grip. It could destroy lives, or twist them in ways that left you hollow inside.

She took a deep breath, forcing herself to think of something else—anything else. Her hands fumbled with her makeup bag as she touched up her foundation, smoothing the edges and reapplying her lipstick with precision. No one would know she had been crying. She wouldn't let them.

And then, almost involuntarily, her thoughts drifted to Coriolanus.

He was an enigma to her. A man of ambition and control, but beneath that, there was something else. Something tortured. She had seen glimpses of it, when he wasn’t so guarded, when his gaze softened, and his armor cracked. It confused her, how one person could be so hardened and yet so… human at the same time.

When he had held her gaze during their conversations, when he had smiled—not the political, rehearsed smile he used for others, but the quiet one he reserved for moments of sincerity—she had felt something. Chosen. Protected. As if in that fleeting connection, there was a safety in him she hadn’t known she craved.

But it made no sense. Coriolanus wasn’t the type to offer safety or comfort. He was strategic, driven, always focused on his goals. And yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe, just maybe, he saw something in her that went beyond their shared ambition.

The sound of footsteps echoed in the hallway outside, and she realized how long she had been standing there, lost in her thoughts. With one final glance at the mirror, she steeled herself and stepped out of the bathroom, her heels clicking softly against the polished floor.

As she walked back toward the main hall, her path was blocked by a tall, imposing figure—Eldridge Barbery. His eyes gleamed with interest as he smiled, clearly having noticed her retreat from the event.

"Miss Hanover," Eldridge Barbery greeted smoothly, his voice rich and pleasant, though there was always an underlying edge to it. He stood tall, his lean physique and sharply tailored suit accentuating his commanding presence. His slate-gray eyes, sharp and discerning, studied her with an intensity that made her skin prickle, "Are you alright? It seemed like you needed a break from the festivities,"

Sable's heartbeat quickened, her guard rising instinctively. Barbery was a powerful figure, and she was well aware of his role in Capitol politics. The last thing she wanted was for him to notice her weakness.

"I’m fine," she replied, offering a polite smile, though it didn’t reach her eyes, "If you call that... that freak show out there 'festivities', I'd hate to see what your idea of a 'party' is,"

Barbery tilted his head slightly, his dark hair impeccably styled, as he observed her with a calculating gaze, "I understand. These events can be overwhelming at times. How about a drink? Something to calm the nerves, perhaps,"

Her first instinct was to decline, to find an excuse to leave and return to her seat. But Barbery wasn’t someone easily brushed off. His refined, almost regal demeanor made it clear that subtle refusals could be seen as offensive.

She nodded slowly. "That sounds… nice, thank you,"

[newliveries]

Random bits from an older McLaren vid for the 2023 car-launch. ☀️

I fell back onto this video and thought that it was so cute so I edited this small part. Oscar almost knocking off the water bottle is so painfully relatable. 🥸

[icewindandboringhorror]

Little bright colored outfit with a fun vest ~

(shoes from ebay like 10 years ago. everything else is thrifted)

[undead-moth]

I know I've been on about this for a while now and I'm being a hater but you're telling me SydCarmy was "always meant to be platonic" even though there are two seasons of writing making use of tried-and-true explicitly romantic tropes, themes and writing signals, and SydLuca is going to be romantic because...he was nice to her on screen for a few minutes?

I don't even care if people ship SydLuca, or if they just prefer it, but you can't honestly tell me that you believe Carmy was always meant to be a friend but Luca is an obvious love interest.

Just because Syd and Carmy haven't kissed or confessed their love to each other doesn't mean that isn't very obviously the direction this show is going. The Bear has already shown you who is endgame. It has shown you every episode of the show so far.

Honestly I really don't think The Bear fanbase understands this show or cares about these characters or the story being told here, which is unfortunate because this show is shockingly well-written in comparison to most shows right now, and we should be so grateful for it but all we're doing is complaining that the writers led us on by not making a ship canon fast enough. It's just. Sad.

[noonewilleverknowistealkneecaps]

Look they are anxious golden retriever x mental support black cat coded

P. S. Ignore the amount of different signs, it just that i have different signatures for different art accounts on different platforms, confusing i know, i think ill have to unite them sometime soon.

[mariocki]

New Scotland Yard: The Palais Romeo (1.4, LWT, 1972)

"We haven't had a PM yet. We haven't gone over the suspect's possessions, we haven't got the results from the trunk. We haven't seen this man Sawyer yet, the man who helped him carry it. There are five hundred things we haven't had time to examine. How can you make an arrest? You said yourself: a conclusion is a conclusion established when all the facts have been brought to light."

[thedreadvampy]

it's been a strange arc so far

when I was 19-21 and having an extremely imbalanced relationship with someone in their mid 30s I was like 'we are both adults so the fact that this is fucking me up is my fault'

when I hit my late 20s and saw how young people in their late teens and early 20s seem now I was like 'oh wait I was so fucking young I didn't know shit about my own limits or about managing relationships and I don't know why someone in their mid to late 30s would be into that except for nefarious purposes'

the weird bit is now I'm into my 30s - not even that far into my 30s - and while I still wholeheartedly believe that last thing about how young (and self destructive) 20 year olds are, I'm also kind of like 'huh, actually nobody I know that age has their shit remotely together and frankly the reason this fucked me up is because NEITHER of us knew what the fuck we were doing it how to cope, for different reasons and at different life stages, and there probably wasn't any malice or intent to control as much as there was Blind Flailing.'

[objectosexual]

Tumblr objectum nation send me good vibes that everything regarding my car will end up okay

[end-orfino]

droners might have some flaws but i really think that if someone wants to write a proper rivals to lovers dynamic then they should study whatever hannah and corto have as a reference

[mariautistic]

Like here's the thing. M3GAN is just an extremely funny movie

[arolesbianism]

Sigh sorry for the ranting I rly did want to be positive abt this update but unfortunately there's just too much negatives and too little stand out positives

[palant1r]

im sorry but the reveal that chilchuck is only there because he was paid in advance is so fucking funny. because like. he stays on the adventure WELL beyond what i would consider the reasonable expectations of his contract. but chilchuck will Follow his Professional Obligations right up to the letter and not a step further. we goof on him a lot for (rightfully!) putting Himself before Work and being a union man but lets be real mans is dedicated to his fucking job and obviously takes it very seriously.

ok i was gonna make a joke but honestly i think this is such a refreshing take on work and labor. like, in a lot of fiction, someone taking breaks, refusing to go beyond their obligations, and insisting on payment upfront is used as shorthand for them not taking their work seriously or not caring or cutting corners. but like. a responsible work life balance is absolutely essential for anyone who actually genuinely cares about their work. it's the only way to stay productive and healthy in a field you love.

its just. man. dungeon meshi has so much to say about life and passion. about health. about how taking care of yourself and pushing yourself to your greatest heights, either personally or professionally, are not two choices in conflict but essential to each other.

what was this post about again

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Google’s enshittification memos

[Note, 9 October 2023: Google disputes the veracity of this claim, but has declined to provide the exhibits and testimony to support its claims. Read more about this here.]

When I think about how the old, good internet turned into the enshitternet, I imagine a series of small compromises, each seemingly reasonable at the time, each contributing to a cultural norm of making good things worse, and worse, and worse.

Think about Unity President Marc Whitten's nonpology for his company's disastrous rug-pull, in which they declared that everyone who had paid good money to use their tool to make a game would have to keep paying, every time someone downloaded that game:

The most fundamental thing that we’re trying to do is we’re building a sustainable business for Unity. And for us, that means that we do need to have a model that includes some sort of balancing change, including shared success.

https://www.wired.com/story/unity-walks-back-policies-lost-trust/

"Shared success" is code for, "If you use our tool to make money, we should make money too." This is bullshit. It's like saying, "We just want to find a way to share the success of the painters who use our brushes, so every time you sell a painting, we want to tax that sale." Or "Every time you sell a house, the company that made the hammer gets to wet its beak."

And note that they're not talking about shared risk here – no one at Unity is saying, "If you try to make a game with our tools and you lose a million bucks, we're on the hook for ten percent of your losses." This isn't partnership, it's extortion.

How did a company like Unity – which became a market leader by making a tool that understood the needs of game developers and filled them – turn into a protection racket? One bad decision at a time. One rationalization and then another. Slowly, and then all at once.

When I think about this enshittification curve, I often think of Google, a company that had its users' backs for years, which created a genuinely innovative search engine that worked so well it seemed like *magic, a company whose employees often had their pick of jobs, but chose the "don't be evil" gig because that mattered to them.

People make fun of that "don't be evil" motto, but if your key employees took the gig because they didn't want to be evil, and then you ask them to be evil, they might just quit. Hell, they might make a stink on the way out the door, too:

https://theintercept.com/2018/09/13/google-china-search-engine-employee-resigns/

Google is a company whose founders started out by publishing a scientific paper describing their search methodology, in which they said, "Oh, and by the way, ads will inevitably turn your search engine into a pile of shit, so we're gonna stay the fuck away from them":

http://infolab.stanford.edu/pub/papers/google.pdf

Those same founders retained a controlling interest in the company after it went IPO, explaining to investors that they were going to run the business without having their elbows jostled by shortsighted Wall Street assholes, so they could keep it from turning into a pile of shit:

https://abc.xyz/investor/founders-letters/ipo-letter/

And yet, it's turned into a pile of shit. Google search is so bad you might as well ask Jeeves. The company's big plan to fix it? Replace links to webpages with florid paragraphs of chatbot nonsense filled with a supremely confident lies:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/14/googles-ai-hype-circle/

How did the company get this bad? In part, this is the "curse of bigness." The company can't grow by attracting new users. When you have 90%+ of the market, there are no new customers to sign up. Hypothetically, they could grow by going into new lines of business, but Google is incapable of making a successful product in-house and also kills most of the products it buys from other, more innovative companies:

https://killedbygoogle.com/

Theoretically, the company could pursue new lines of business in-house, and indeed, the current leaders of companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Apple are all execs who figured out how to get the whole company to do something new, and were elevated to the CEO's office, making each one a billionaire and sealing their place in history.

It is for this very reason that any exec at a large firm who tries to make a business-wide improvement gets immediately and repeatedly knifed by all their colleagues, who correctly reason that if someone else becomes CEO, then they won't become CEO. Machiavelli was an optimist:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

With no growth from new customers, and no growth from new businesses, "growth" has to come from squeezing workers (say, laying off 12,000 engineers after a stock buyback that would have paid their salaries for the next 27 years), or business customers (say, by colluding with Facebook to rig the ad market with the Jedi Blue conspiracy), or end-users.

Now, in theory, we might never know exactly what led to the enshittification of Google. In theory, all of compromises, debates and plots could be lost to history. But tech is not an oral culture, it's a written one, and techies write everything down and nothing is ever truly deleted.

Time and again, Big Tech tells on itself. Think of FTX's main conspirators all hanging out in a group chat called "Wirefraud." Amazon naming its program targeting weak, small publishers the "Gazelle Project" ("approach these small publishers the way a cheetah would pursue a sickly gazelle”). Amazon documenting the fact that users were unknowingly signing up for Prime and getting pissed; then figuring out how to reduce accidental signups, then deciding not to do it because it liked the money too much. Think of Zuck emailing his CFO in the middle of the night to defend his outsized offer to buy Instagram on the basis that users like Insta better and Facebook couldn't compete with them on quality.

It's like every Big Tech schemer has a folder on their desktop called "Mens Rea" filled with files like "Copy_of_Premeditated_Murder.docx":

https://doctorow.medium.com/big-tech-cant-stop-telling-on-itself-f7f0eb6d215a?sk=351f8a54ab8e02d7340620e5eec5024d

Right now, Google's on trial for its sins against antitrust law. It's a hard case to make. To secure a win, the prosecutors at the DoJ Antitrust Division are going to have to prove what was going on in Google execs' minds when the took the actions that led to the company's dominance. They're going to have to show that the company deliberately undertook to harm its users and customers.

Of course, it helps that Google put it all in writing.

Last week, there was a huge kerfuffile over the DoJ's practice of posting its exhibits from the trial to a website each night. This is a totally normal thing to do – a practice that dates back to the Microsoft antitrust trial. But Google pitched a tantrum over this and said that the docs the DoJ were posting would be turned into "clickbait." Which is another way of saying, "the public would find these documents very interesting, and they would be damning to us and our case":

https://www.bigtechontrial.com/p/secrecy-is-systemic

After initially deferring to Google, Judge Amit Mehta finally gave the Justice Department the greenlight to post the document. It's up. It's wild:

https://www.justice.gov/d9/2023-09/416692.pdf

The document is described as "notes for a course on communication" that Google VP for Finance Michael Roszak prepared. Roszak says he can't remember whether he ever gave the presentation, but insists that the remit for the course required him to tell students "things I didn't believe," and that's why the document is "full of hyperbole and exaggeration."

OK.

But here's what the document says: "search advertising is one of the world's greatest business models ever created…illicit businesses (cigarettes or drugs) could rival these economics…[W]e can mostly ignore the demand side…(users and queries) and only focus on the supply side of advertisers, ad formats and sales."

It goes on to say that this might be changing, and proposes a way to balance the interests of the search and ads teams, which are at odds, with search worrying that ads are pushing them to produce "unnatural search experiences to chase revenue."

"Unnatural search experiences to chase revenue" is a thinly veiled euphemism for the prophetic warnings in that 1998 Pagerank paper: "The goals of the advertising business model do not always correspond to providing quality search to users." Or, more plainly, "ads will turn our search engine into a pile of shit."

And, as Roszak writes, Google is "able to ignore one of the fundamental laws of economics…supply and demand." That is, the company has become so dominant and cemented its position so thoroughly as the default search engine across every platforms and system that even if it makes its search terrible to goose revenues, users won't leave. As Lily Tomlin put it on SNL: "We don't have to care, we're the phone company."

In the enshittification cycle, companies first lure in users with surpluses – like providing the best search results rather than the most profitable ones – with an eye to locking them in. In Google's case, that lock-in has multiple facets, but the big one is spending billions of dollars – enough to buy a whole Twitter, every single year – to be the default search everywhere.

Google doesn't buy its way to dominance because it has the very best search results and it wants to shield you from inferior competitors. The economically rational case for buying default position is that preventing competition is more profitable than succeeding by outperforming competitors. The best reason to buy the default everywhere is that it lets you lower quality without losing business. You can "ignore the demand side, and only focus on advertisers."

For a lot of people, the analysis stops here. "If you're not paying for the product, you're the product." Google locks in users and sells them to advertisers, who are their co-conspirators in a scheme to screw the rest of us.

But that's not right. For one thing, paying for a product doesn't mean you won't be the product. Apple charges a thousand bucks for an iPhone and then nonconsensually spies on every iOS user in order to target ads to them (and lies about it):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

John Deere charges six figures for its tractors, then runs a grift that blocks farmers from fixing their own machines, and then uses their control over repair to silence farmers who complain about it:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/31/dealers-choice/#be-a-shame-if-something-were-to-happen-to-it

Fair treatment from a corporation isn't a loyalty program that you earn by through sufficient spending. Companies that can sell you out, will sell you out, and then cry victim, insisting that they were only doing their fiduciary duty for their sacred shareholders. Companies are disciplined by fear of competition, regulation or – in the case of tech platforms – customers seizing the means of computation and installing ad-blockers, alternative clients, multiprotocol readers, etc:

https://doctorow.medium.com/an-audacious-plan-to-halt-the-internets-enshittification-and-throw-it-into-reverse-3cc01e7e4604?sk=85b3f5f7d051804521c3411711f0b554

Which is where the next stage of enshittification comes in: when the platform withdraws the surplus it had allocated to lure in – and then lock in – business customers (like advertisers) and reallocate it to the platform's shareholders.

For Google, there are several rackets that let it screw over advertisers as well as searchers (the advertisers are paying for the product, and they're also the product). Some of those rackets are well-known, like Jedi Blue, the market-rigging conspiracy that Google and Facebook colluded on:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jedi_Blue

But thanks to the antitrust trial, we're learning about more of these. Megan Gray – ex-FTC, ex-DuckDuckGo – was in the courtroom last week when evidence was presented on Google execs' panic over a decline in "ad generating searches" and the sleazy gimmick they came up with to address it: manipulating the "semantic matching" on user queries:

https://www.wired.com/story/google-antitrust-lawsuit-search-results/

When you send a query to Google, it expands that query with terms that are similar – for example, if you search on "Weds" it might also search for "Wednesday." In the slides shown in the Google trial, we learned about another kind of semantic matching that Google performed, this one intended to turn your search results into "a twisted shopping mall you can’t escape."

Here's how that worked: when you ran a query like "children's clothing," Google secretly appended the brand name of a kids' clothing manufacturer to the query. This, in turn, triggered a ton of ads – because rival brands will have bought ads against their competitors' name (like Pepsi buying ads that are shown over queries for Coke).

Here we see surpluses being taken away from both end-users and business customers – that is, searchers and advertisers. For searchers, it doesn't matter how much you refine your query, you're still going to get crummy search results because there's an unkillable, hidden search term stuck to your query, like a piece of shit that Google keeps sticking to the sole of your shoe.

But for advertisers, this is also a scam. They're paying to be matched to users who search on a brand name, and you didn't search on that brand name. It's especially bad for the company whose name has been appended to your search, because Google has a protection racket where the company that matches your search has to pay extra in order to show up overtop of rivals who are worse matches. Both the matching company and those rivals have given Google a credit-card that Google gets to bill every time a user searches on the company's name, and Google is just running fraudulent charges through those cards.

And, of course, Google put this in writing. I mean, of course they did. As we learned from the documentary The Incredibles, supervillains can't stop themselves from monologuing, and in big, sprawling monopolists, these monologues have to transmitted electronically – and often indelibly – to far-flung co-cabalists.

As Gray points out, this is an incredibly blunt enshittification technique: "it hadn’t even occurred to me that Google just flat out deletes queries and replaces them with ones that monetize better." We don't know how long Google did this for or how frequently this bait-and-switch was deployed.

But if this is a blunt way of Google smashing its fist down on the scales that balance search quality against ad revenues, there's plenty of subtler ways the company could sneak a thumb on there. A Google exec at the trial rhapsodized about his company's "contract with the user" to deliver an "honest results policy," but given how bad Google search is these days, we're left to either believe he's lying or that Google sucks at search.

The paper trail offers a tantalizing look at how a company went from doing something that was so good it felt like a magic trick to being "able to ignore one of the fundamental laws of economics…supply and demand," able to "ignore the demand side…(users and queries) and only focus on the supply side of advertisers."

What's more, this is a system where everyone loses (except for Google): this isn't a grift run by Google and advertisers on users – it's a grift Google runs on everyone.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/03/not-feeling-lucky/#fundamental-laws-of-economics

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!