#this is a totally healthy strategy i swear guys

[sarahreadsdccomics]

Shame blog #6

guys im lowk screwed. my parents are making me go to bed earlier even tho im honestly chilling :((( my essays for my app is collecting dust and no studying whatsoever is being done for my history and sci comps. my hair is going to be wet when i go to bed which is going to be so shitty for me when i wake up tomorrow because im going to look shitty. i need to get off the internet my attention span is god awful and im so brainrot i need to go on an internet free vacation for like 2 months. i still have not given my lizard his special treat bugs. so sad.

start a shame blog so u too may shame urself on the internet to get ur shit together and be motivated.

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

how do you come up with fic/series titles?

most of it is really leap frogging along vibes until I find a combination of words that I think sound cool

i’ve included explanations of how i came to the titles i did below, because i am avoiding doing any actual work

nature has taught her creatures to hate: this is the first one I named, and also the one that I’d probably change if I could. Technically I can, this is my city, but I don’t actually want to change it—it’s been nhthcth for too long and it’s set. For this, I knew the “vibe” I wanted, and that was a sort of learned desperation/defensiveness. Like, that was key to nhthcth underlying messages—people aren’t naturally doing the things they’re doing in it, they make choices, and a lot of the choices are coerced under extreme pressure. I just googled around for poems until I found this poem, which is a poem about climate change, and how nature had been taught to hate by mankind’s disregard to it. It had the exact vibes I wanted—of this sort of uncaring capriciousness that made monsters of previously innocent things, and that may turn around and bite it’s creator in the ass. But I’ve abandoned the practice or like, using lines of poetry entirely, I dunno, it feels too long and clunky and pretentious now

gaslight gatekeep girlboss/it’s not a whore HOUSE it’s a whore HOME: these were just memes whose tongue-in-cheek vibe were perfect for the vibe of the fic/series. like, guillermo and nadja are the gaslight gatekeep girlboss of the main cast. the sequel (which will happen i swear to god, i started writing it ages ago and will one day return) will showcase where lazlo, nandor, and colin robinson have been and it’s going to be manipulate mansplain malewife, which like--obviously nandor and lazlo of the main cast. the series title was also a meme that had the right vibes. like, they’re awful little nightmare sluts, all of them, but god bless this whore home. they’re a family and it is a bad one. 

flee from your ghosts (burn your house down): this is actually wirt’s and beatrice’s problem solving strategies. god, i love beatrice and wirt. they’re both such ludicrous people. they’re so bad at life in opposite ways. wirt is a total waffler. he sits and he composes poetry and he makes deep philosophical musings and he’s soooo fucking late to the party every time. he spends too long thinking things over and misses the right moment to action. like, he had to literally almost die before giving an oboe mixtape to his crush. part of his journey is overcoming that, but i like to think he retains that quality to a more healthy degree.  beatrice, meanwhile, rushes in and is extremely effective--and then realizes too late that she fucked up. she chucks a rock at a bluebird and now her whole family is bluebirds. sure, let’s rob this fucking guy, the horse wants to do it too. let’s sacrifice this young boy to a witch, I have no qualms about this plan of action--whoopsie, now i like him and his brother, but i’ve spent this whole time lying to them and sort of leading them to doom. She takes immediate, drastic, and decisive action and it is always solving problems and making more problems. she’s the “burn your house down because there’s a spider” of women. I adore her. Wirt spends the entire fic tip-toeing around confronting his problems head on, because fundamentally, he’s running the entire time--from his memories of the unknown, his loss of beatrice, his concerns about whether he did right by his kids. he has to call his brother to come help him instead of telling the stans that it’s his fucking kids and they need to fess up like, yesterday. Beatrice, meanwhile, would have immediately burnt the fucking town to the ground until she got answers. she created more problems but by god she got the solution to the first one. and that’s immediately what she does upon her entry to the fic. she gets like, one scene and fucking immediately stabs someone. she asked no questions. she had no background information. she didn’t even know that this was a situation that like, called for stabbing. she is so lucky this wasn’t a minor disagreement she misread and killed a man over. i love them both. as people they should not exist.  

these stupid hells we keep: this one didn’t take much thinking. The key underlying vibe I wanted throughout this was that we trap ourselves. So much of stick’s brainwashing is about changing how you think in order to get you to effectively do his work for him and isolate yourself, hurt yourself, get yourself stuck in an extremely damaging mindset. But it’s also about how our traumas can effectively trap us inside ourselves, and how it can be really really difficult to let go of it even when we know they’re hurting us. Like, neither Matt nor Lisa want to let go of stick or his teachings. And, at the same time, a part of them doesn’t want to let go of the people they lost, no matter how hard much pain and suffering goes towards exactly that. They’re in this perpetual hell of self-conflict--not able to let go of stick, but also not able to let go of the people that they lost, who stick wants them to let go of. eventually, frank’s joining this party, and his own torment, guilt, and trauma over his family has effectively trapped him in a hell of his own. I added the word “stupid” to sort of trivialize and add a sort of self-frustrated element to their suffering, because that’s what they do themselves.

ghosts haunting other ghosts: the vibe I wanted was one of Frank and Lisa constantly serving as each other’s hauntings. In the punisher, micro calls both him and Frank “ghosts” from their mutual legal state of deadness. Lisa, in that sense, is a “ghost,” because the DA effectively falsified the reports. but, in another very real sense, frank is the one haunting lisa. The moment of watching her father get shot is the one that repeats throughout the story. he was holding her when he died. he was trying to protect her. he’s the one that she carries with her. and we know, in the same way, Frank’s carrying lisa with him, and is haunted by her in an identical way. he thinks she died in his arms. he thinks that he refused to read her bedtime story on her last day on the planet. lisa’s father telling her that she’s going to be okay is her functional equivalent of frank’s penny and dime rhyme. so you have these two people who are effectively haunting each other with deaths that never happened--ghosts haunting other ghosts

therianthropy (and other goddamn lies): this required more bouncing. this fic's vibe was like, werewolf but the problem is it isn’t a werewolf. snake oil salesman for werewolves. like, stick effectively promised them a transformation. that, at the end of his training, they wouldn’t be the people who were hurt anymore. that got me to the werewolf vibe of like--physical transmogrification into something else. so i went to the wikipedia page for werewolves and found out the process of magical transformation is called therianthropy. that’s a fun word. let’s use that. but the problem is the fic isn’t about the transformation, it’s about the fact that there was no transformation. the promised transformation was a lie, and matt’s still grappling with that. he will always be the person who got hurt. there is no way to undo that. the word “goddamn” added a certain bitterness to it. a part of matt still wishes that stick’s promises were true. 

the first step of kintsugi: so, this entire fic came out of a general dissatisfaction with how MCU peter parker existed, but specifically with how infantilized he became in fandom and how interpersonal relationships were handled. Like. His relationship with happy and Tony really weren’t healthy, particularly at the start. And they could have been healthy if it their problems were actually addressed and like, fixed. I’m also a big believer in catharsis? Like, air out your shit. Break down the bad shit and rebuild it to be better. get a good relationship out of it. So the vibe was “breaking and rebuilding to be better” and there’s a very pretty real-life thing that’s evocative of that--kintsugi pottery, where you fix broken pots with pretty gold lines and it looks cooler and better than the original pot. but, before you can get to the gorgeous gold pottery, you have to complete the first step--which is to break the fucking pot. 

pottery shards: I named the series after i named the first story. I realized that this would follow like, three complete, self-contained arcs--breaking, rebuilding, and an aftermath arc. i called it pottery shards because that’s the consistent part throughout--whether it’s breaking it into shards or gluing it back together, that’d be the unifying feature. 

porcelain chips: so, the character study divergences weren’t really planned. but the ones that we have so far are all part of the “breaking” part--showing how characters ended up the way they did, how they got to the flawed, imperfect, messy bit. porcelain chips was titled because it was meant to be all the little moments that became peter’s origin story. and i didn’t think it was just the one, definitive, climactic loss of ben that made spider-man--i think it was a thousand little things chipping away at him until he became spider-man. porcelain is something that has such lovely, delicate, beautiful vibes--and it’s something that may get chipped with little imperfections over years of use. It ends up with years of little moments sort of embedded into it. And having too many chips is a reason why someone may make the decision to smash it once and for all, and repair it with kintsugi. 

glaze defects: so, a glaze defect is a mistake that happens while it’s in the process of firing pottery. it’s also a reason why someone may make the decision to smash pottery for kintsugi repair. but, unlike chipped porcelain, it’s more of a “inherent” defect. It was a way of distinguishing peter’s struggles from matt’s. peter was a collection of little moments in his life--the cost of the epi-pen, wanting ben to be proud of him, etc--whereas matt’s always been treated like he was inherently defective. Peter is hurt externally, but matt is treated like he’s internally flawed, which is why we spend so much time talking about buck v bell. 

acts of contrition: so, i have no idea how much of catholicism is like, common knowledge, but an act of contrition is the name of a prayer. it’s the last prayer you say in a confessional, before you’re forgiven. that was the entire vibe of this story, because se this is sort of the last act before forgiveness. it’s jack finding matt and matt finding jack again. and a big theme throughout the entire series is going to be forgiveness and the feeling that you don’t have it yet. so we ended up with the title being named after the prayer that comes before forgiveness. 

toy rosaries: so there’s a bunch of different versions of the act of contrition (almost all prayers have multiple versions, I think it’s a translation thing), but the one I grew up with had this part that had some variation of “and I have greatly sinned, in what I have done, and in what i have failed to do.” and that sentiment was another huge vibe of it, because these are two people who are deeply sorry for everything they’ve done and the things they didn’t do also. But, i hated it. I didn’t want to call the title “what i have done and what i have failed to do.” it’s too long and clunky and pretentious sounding. so i just spent a really long time jumping around vibes until i found the title i liked. i wanted to keep the prayer theme, because catholicism barfed all over this story. i toyed around with like, bedtime prayers or something for a while, but it just didn’t fit. i feel like most people know what a rosary is, but that may be the catholic upbringing, so for those who don’t know, a rosary is a prayer counter. you have to say the same prayer ten times in a row, and you have five sets of it, with a few other prayers interspersed. the rosary beads just tell you what prayer you’re on. and i really liked that vibe of repetition, because looking for matt is borderline a repetitious act for jack. it’s the same thing on repeat. read the same files, have the same nightmares, look for him down every street. and it has a certain prayerful fervor to it that i thought felt well. i added the word toy because it had a sort of childhood vibe to it, and the fear  that jack expresses throughout this, the fear of being unforgivable, is very young--and i want to be clear, that’s not synonymous with childish or immature. he’s dealing with complex, adult emotions and guilt, but i feel like this idea that we’re beyond forgiveness is something that we first experience at a very young age. like a little kid hiding because they broke something and they don’t think they can be fixed. the idea that we are forgivable is something that’s taught to us--and sometimes parents, like jack’s parents, don’t teach it to us. so i added the word “toy” to give it that sort of young aspect--and, it’s important to note, that there’s really no such thing as a toy rosary. you have tiny kid rosaries that are made of rubber or something, but prayer beads are just prayer beads. it’s not gonna suddenly be a toy. and a lot of jack’s guilt isn’t real either. he has all of these fantasies of matt rebuking him the moment he has him back, and he repeats them to himself again and again like a prayer, but that’s not real. so it made me really like the vibes, and i ended up with that title. 

[pretoriafics]

One Night With... Derek Hale

Remember: My requests are open. Remember²: English is not my main language, so I’m sorry if my writing maybe sounds bad for you.  

Let’s get started?

Word count: 2.553 Contain: Hunter!Reader, arguing, a little bit of fluff... Warnings: Inappropriate language +16 only Inspired by the music 3 nights, by Dominic Fike Versão em português aqui

You were a famous hunter. Everyone knew your name. Feared and respected, you asserted your authority, strength, and respect for every hunter you knew. You have an entire collection of surreal stories in the hunting world, who everyone knew.

And, now, you were in Beacon Hills. In a hunting, of course. Hunting was your life.

You were suspicious about a pack of werewolves, which a hunter's family who was your friend, the Argent family, alerted you. That particular hunting was a werewolf attack case, and you went investigating that werewolves pack. You hunted them, relentless, but then, the Alpha called you to a talk. You accepted the conversation, of course. It would be interesting to listen to what the hell he would talk with you.

You arrived in a cafe and recognized him immediately. He was tall, with dark hair and a dangerous aura. Without ceremonies, you sat close to him.

"Derek, huh?" You said, without the need to be polite. "Trying to get more time to live?"

"Unlike the other packs, we don't have afraid of you." His arms were crossed in front of his chest, and his gaze was glacial. You smiled at him.

"You should have. It would be even more intelligent. So, I need to recognize that call me for a talk is a brave gesture of yours, Hale. I'm impressed."

His eyes narrowed to you.

"I think it would be smarter if we unite our energies. This way, we can get the Alpha who is attacking the city."

You arch your eyebrows. I mean, is he talking seriously? You let escape a short smirk between your red lipstick lips.

"Are you saying that..."

"It wasn't us doing all this shit."

Derek exposed all the points that were another werewolf. Yeah, you need to admit that everything was making sense. He was a smart guy, and it seems like he's not a threat to you. After so many years as a hunter, you developed a kind of sense about psycho supernatural ones. That's was not the case with Derek.

Ok. You decided to give a chance for Derek.

"Alright. But if I find out it was you, I swear that I'll go until hell to cut your head off."

You had met the pack and find out that the idea of talking with you came from another Alpha, called Scott. They seem like not only distrust you, but fear you too. Derek was always being cautious about trusting you, but you totally understand him. You're were also being cautious.

Together, you and Derek had elaborated a strategy to catch that Alpha. Despite argue sometimes, after all, you and him were a good match. Your plan was brilliant and infallible. Your body was moving like a work of art when you were fighting, brutal and elegant, who prooved for everyone in the pack why you were so famous. With a flawless execution, you had killed the Alpha.

But then, you heard a shot. Derek fell to the ground with his shoulder bleeding: Chris, Victoria, Allison, and a few other hunters were pointing their guns to the pack.

"It's time to solve this." Chris's voice echoed in the woods. And before anyone do something, you put yourself in front of all pack. The Argent's was noticeably surprised by your presence.

"It was not them, Argent. It was another Alpha."

They looked at each other. Victoria's voice was the next to be heard.

"You don't know what you are doing, and you don't know them. They are killers. We thought you would be smarter than this. It seems like all of your stories were fake."

"I need to assume that people talk too much, sometimes. So, yeah, a few of them are fake. But look, I know what I'm doing here." You cross your arms in front of your chest and get one step closer to the Argent hunters. "From now on, Hale's pack is my business. If you had any issues with them, talk with me, and I'll solve them personally. And I'm serious. You don't want me as your enemy."

"Okay." Chris put down his gun, and the group did the same. He exchanged gazes with his group. "We will remember that."

Thwarted with the situation, they got in their cars and ran away. That night sealed an alliance between you and the Hale pack, even if you and Derek didn't have the best relation at all.

You went to Derek's loft after that, just you and him. Both of you were on the couch, and you were holding a first-aid kit.

"I told you I can take care of-"

"Shut up, Hale. I need to talk with you. Take this shirt off." You were staring at him. Derek arched his eyebrows at you, and you rolled your eyes, with your face turning into red. "Don't take this to the sexual side. Damn! How do you expect I take this bullet off from you? Stop thinking with your dick."

He takes his shirt off, allowing you to focus on the wound - or try, at least. Focus on the wound, focus on the wound!

"The Lumen will be auctioned in Los Angeles next week." You said, taking the silver bullet off of him. Derek looked at you with a surprised gaze. The Lumen was an ancient book, with a silver cover and pages with wolfsbane. It's the most complete and trustable bestiary ever, and both of you have a chance to get it. "I have the money to get it. You can't touch the book for obvious reasons, so I thought I could get to take the book with you. No one will suspect if the book stays hidden with you. Both of us will use the book. It's a valuable thing, you know."

Yeah, it was important information. Derek knew if he had unlimited access to the Lumen, he would have an advantage. Even if he cannot touch on the book, Stiles would help a lot doing this.

"Let's get the book, then."

And the auction was tense.

You had never seen so many hunters and supernatural ones reunited in one space before. It was like a war zone, but fortunately, you and Derek got the bloody book. The Lumen was in the car trunk, and both of you were going back to the city However, in the middle of the road, you saw a few officers. When you get closer, Derek stops his car.

"Good night, officer. What's wrong?"

"Good night, sir." The officer was with a soft voice. "I need you and your girl to turn around and go back. No one will leave Los Angeles for now."

"What?!" You was almost freaking out. Derek blinked his eyes a few times. What the hell was happening? A little bit nervous, the Alpha asked:

"Wait, wait. What are you talking about?" 

"We're in a pandemic moment, and the Coronavirus cases increased a little on these days. We're trying to avoid more cases, and we're without the tool to do a sanitary barrier. Until we got more of them to guarantee the people are healthy, and without the virus in your bodies, no one will leave the city."

The weather reflected the feeling of both of you. A heavy rain began to fall from the skies, and Derek just breathed in. He nodded in approval to the officer.

"Okay, we will go back. Thanks."

Derek turn around his car and begun to drive back to L.A. The plan of yours was doing all fine until now, but just in the part who should be the easiest one, everything goes down. You stared him, totally bothered with the situation.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Hale? We can't go back. We need to find another way to go to Beacon Hills!"

"Oh, really?" His voice had an ironical ton. "So what the fuck do you think I should do?"

"Look for another route!" Your voice was louder, and you were saying like it was so obvious. "It is so simple!"

"How do you expect I could do it? I can't see a hand under my nose with all this storm!" He said, angry. The rain was heavy, and the dark of the night wasn't helping. "Furthermore, did you really think this is the only barrier? Are you serious?"

"But-"

"Damn, shut up! We can't go back to Beacon Hills now. Stop acting like a spoiled kid."

Your mouth opened, quite raging with him. How dare! Your face was red in rage, and that's one of the moments you just want to punch his face until he become unrecognizable. You crossed your arms in front of your chest, staring at him with a mortal gaze.

"Why men never do something to solve an issue? That's why women will dominate the world."

"I told you we should participate in the auction via the internet, and you didn't listen to me. It's your fault, I mean, come on! We are in the middle of a fucking pandemic."

You rolled your eyes. He said that it was your fault, commanded you to shut up, and called you "spoiled kid". Damn! Sometimes, Derek Hale has the power to get you so pissed off!

"Stop the car, Hale." You were staring the road trough the window. When he listens to you, Derek stared you totally astonished. You repeated, looking at him with mortal eyes. "Are you fucking deaf? Stop the goddamn car, or I'll open the door!"

"Shit!"

Derek stops his car in the middle of the road. You came out of the car and begun to walk in the street without a look back. You weren't caring about the heavy rain that was falling from the sky and was putting you and your clothes entirely wet. You just don't wanna stay in that fucking car with that stupid alpha.

"(Y/N)! Get back to the car!" Derek yelled from the window, watching you walk away. You didn't look back. Without choices, he drove his car until you slowly. His window was close to you. "What the hell do you think are doing?"

"I'm going to get a ride with someone who's going to Beacon Hills."

"Oh, great, sounds a nice plan to get a ride with someone who could simply rape you, or worse!"

"Leave me alone!" You yelled, looking at him. "Argh! Stupid werewolf." He ignored you.

"Look: It's raining, it's cold, and it's dangerous. Stop being so stubborn. You'll become sick."

You were entirely wet, embracing your own body as a way to become warmer. Your pride was yelling in your head. No, you will NOT get in that stupid car.

"Get out, Hale."

"You're shivering cold. Stop to let everything so hard!" Argue with you wasn't rare. It was a usual thing, actually. However, despite being so freaking pissed off with you, Derek tried to calm down. He breathed in and, calmly at this time, he said. "I promise tomorrow I'll find a way for both of us to come back to Beacon, okay? I don't want you sick."

Then, you finally stopped walking. You need to admit: Derek is completely right. You can't just wait for someone who will accept to give you a ride, and under the storm. You even couldn't think straight because you were so angry! Then, you just sighed. Swallowing your pride, you just turned around and entered the car.

"Sometimes, I really hate you, Derek."

You were not looking at him. Your gaze was focused on that huge storm outside. You were wet, shivering, and freezing. Spend the night out of Beacon Hills wasn't on the plans, but you and Derek know you had no choices. The only clothes you have are completely wet, and you were tired as hell.

"I know. Take this." When you look to the side, on the driver's seat, you saw something who let you a little bit anxious: Derek was shirtless, and he was giving his shirt to you. "You can't stay with these clothes. They're wet. You'll get-"

"I know."

With your cheeks burning, you take his shirt and go back to the back's seat. A lightning cut the skies, announcing that the storm was far from the end. Derek's gaze went to the storm outside, giving you the privacy you need to change your clothes.

A little bit shy about the situation, you were fast: You took your wet clothes off and, quickly, you put Derek's shirt on your body. It was just like a dress for you.

And smells like him.

You have a code that you do precisely: You wouldn't bang with any supernatural. You have a reputation to care. If you have sex with anyone who you should be hunting, you will lose your credibility with the other hunters. Actually, you even never had this desire before for no one of the supernaturals you'd met. Since you met Derek was passed a few weeks, and you really never felt any kind of attraction by him. He was a rude and annoying man. 

But that night, something changed.

He was taking care of you, and you really had a chance to meet him better on this trip. You notice that you have a lot of things in common with him. Also, he smells like danger and something forbidden. All of that Is really a big turn on.

You weren't the only one who was in that way.

Derek was watching you since you met. Your independence and strength sounds really sexy, especially when he saw you fighting. He wasn't trusting on you at the same time, of course. You're still a hunter. However, you earned his trust not only when you talked with the Argent's, but when you took care of him even when he said that he wouldn't need it, and, of course, when you were looking for that insane alpha.

And then, there you are, taking off your clothes so close to him.

His pride was preventing him flirt with you. I mean, come on, you are a hunter! He wouldn't do this. But that situation made his imagination run wild, thinking about your body.

"Thank you." You said for him, with a low voice. "I'm sorry, I think I'm-"

"It's okay, take a rest. I can't see the road with this storm, so I think we'll need to wait for a while. Are you with cold?"

"I'll be-" A sneeze interrupts your words. Derek sighs, annoyed.

"Great, you become sick. And just when the car's heater is broken."

"Look, I just don't want to argue now."

He looks at you. Quickly, Derek goes to the back seat, and rub your arms in a way to warm your body. Your skin was so soft... You get closer to him, to feel the warmth of his body, and, soon, he embraced you. Your head rests on his chest, and you were feeling a little bit warmer now.

Be in his arms was really good, and not because of the warmth. It was feeling like home for you. It was so comfy, so good...

"Are you feeling better?"

You didn't respond to him, and Derek arched his eyebrows.

"(Y/N)?" He calls you. But when he heard your peaceful breath, he knew that you fall asleep. It took a soft smile from him.

That was your first night.

[4haechie]

son of apollo!donghyuck

pairing: son of apollo!donghyuck x child of athena!reader genre: fluff, comedy, some adventure/action, pjo au, e2l au words: 3,173 warning: couple of curse words here n there a/n: i reference a bunch of pjo characters in this so if u haven’t read pjo *crowd booing*

so donghyuck’s the son of apollo right

there’s like no arguing when it comes to that

he’s extremely talented at singing and making music, dancing, rapping, songwriting, so he’s no doubt apollo’s offspring

and he’s naturally gifted at archery as well

you can’t spell haechan without ACE teehee

u on the other hand

you’re athena’s child

you love to read and write you’re incredibly smart ofc

you love competing and winning and taking part in strategy making to bring your opponents DOWN 💅🏼

athena’s the goddess of wisdom as well as warcraft so needless to say you’re exceptional in both fields

you’re not just textbook smart, no no, you’re able to apply all the knowledge you learn…well…irl

not to mention you’re good with all kinds of weapons

ur fave weapons include swords and spears :D

you’re okay w knives too!!! and daggers!!! you’re not picky

but you’re better w longer blades just cuz u have more experience w them

fun fact: you’re the head of the athena cabin and donghyuck’s the head of the apollo cabin

you’re both great leaders, always doing your best to make the best strategies to win capture the flag, the chariot races, and other fun activities chiron plans for the campers 😁

but . you guys are Sworn Enemies

actually the better term to use would be “rivals”

you guys r So competitive to the point where you actually developed a rivalry during your first few years at camp half-blood

donghyuck LOVES to win but so do you… so obv he’s gonna go out of his way to make sure he/his cabin wins

that doesn’t mean you’ve ever backed down from his challenges…

if he’s competitive you’re twice as competitive

one day after breakfast during your fifth year at camp when you’re both about 18, chiron decides to host a good old game of capture the flag

u know . for old times’ sake 😼

once he makes the announcement you immediately turn to your cabin mates

“we have to win no matter what”

“y/n, it’s just capture the flag. we’re not fighting gaea”

“bitch are u in or not”

the entire dining hall is buzzing with excitement

nothing makes a demigod’s day like a capture the flag announcement 😌

chiron suddenly grabs the megaphone again and calls out “this time however there’s a little twist,” he chuckles as everybody goes silent

you raise an eyebrow

“you’ll be in teams of course. everybody has to play. there’s twenty cabins, so there will be ten teams of two cabins each. i’ll pair you guys up myself. each pair gets a flag–so there’s ten flags in total. the game will be won by the pair who manages to collect all flags and brings them back to their base before anyone has the chance to steal their own flag.”

the demigods burst into intense chatter and discussion once more

you turn your head back to your siblings and tilt your head in slight confusion

you’ve never played capture the flag in teams before

“anyone but apollo. i’m literally begging. sam, pray to athena right now”

“y/n RELAX”

“i think if we’re partners with apollo’s cabin i’ll actually jump into tartarus”

“…”

“what? percy and annabeth survived” 🙄

chiron pulls out a scroll and calls out the pairings one by one

poseidon and demeter, hades and ares (good luck to them), so on and so forth

your heart keeps racing . athena’s name has not been called out yet

and just like that your worst fear comes true

“athena cabin with apollo cabin. the game will commence in thirty minutes, which is how much time you have to prepare. good luck and stay safe!”

you drop your head into your palm (aka head in hands meme jpg)

“this is the worst day of my entire life”

“y/n, you’re hands down the most dramatic person i’ve ever met”

maybe it’s just you–bc your siblings seem fine with the apollo kids

they have so many apollo cabin friends :(

curse u and donghyuck’s little rivalry that the entire camp and chiron knows about

so him putting yall together definitely was not a coincidence cough cough

can u blame him

🌤🌈 he just wants all of u to get along 🌈🌤

he’s seen w his own two centaur eyes what happens when demigods fight between themselves

it’s not healthy

he needs u guys to get along bc u and donghyuck are some of the best demigods at camp rn

ur quick wits and amazing sword skills

his position as the camp’s best archer

imagine how powerful yall would be if u two worked together

if only you got along from the start.. but nooooo

ur egos r just too high F

but anyway, back to the present

you’re sitting there, head in your hands, dreading this already when some of the apollo kids swagger over to your guys’ table

donghyuck is in front of them as he scoffs after seeing your dreadful state

“why the sad face, y/n?”

you lift your head up to see him hovering over your seat and roll your eyes

you get up and your siblings follow

you’re just gonna have to make do. you don’t have time to complain

the thing is

you’ve only lost capture the flag once 👎🏼

a few summers ago the apollo cabin defeated the entire camp leaving everybody speechless

it’s true they didn’t defeat JUST you but somehow you thought it was personal

you had the PERFECT record 😕

zero losses . only wins

but bc of the apollo kids your cabin’s record was tarnished

which is sorta why you started hating them (esp donghyuck their leader) so much

donghyuck caught on immediately and made it a point to compete just as hard as u

so yea. that’s how you became rivals

he knows how much ur gonna hate working with him but u don’t really have a choice now do u :/

so he knows exactly why u have a sad face

but this is donghyuck we’re talking about

just bc yall r “rivals” doesn’t mean he’s not gonna tease u 😂😂😂

(or maybe he teases u bc he thinks ur cute and he hopes one day u realise him teasing is actually donghyuck for flirting 🤭)

“you know damn well why, lee donghyuck”

“oh c’mon i think it’ll be fun! if we combine our skills, we definitely have a hundred percent chance of winning”

you cross your arms and glance at your siblings who just shrug in agreement

you sigh loudly

“don’t even think about fucking this is up, donghyuck. and just so we’re clear, i’m in charge”

he laughs, “yup! got it”

so you start talking strategy

you only have 30 minutes so you need to make the best of it

you divide the two cabins into pairs so that an athena and an apollo kid will be paired together and in charge of smth diff

you have plenty of people on your team – 5 in athena’s cabin and 5 in apollo’s cabin

some will handle weapons and safety gear, some will handle mapping out the playing area which was basically the entirety of the woods, some will be setting up traps near your team’s flag to prevent others from coming close

30 minutes quickly pass and after dividing the work and planning your strategy with donghyuck and friends you turn your attention back to chiron who has his megaphone in hand

everyone’s told to gather outside the dining hall at the open field before the game commences

you, donghyuck, and your teammates briefly talk strategy once more . just to make sure everybody knows what they’re supposed to do

“let the game begin!” chiron blows a loud whistle and the demigods scramble out of the field, going to their designated flag locations

your spot is near a little creek, but the forest around your flag is quite dense so u figure it’s relatively hard to locate

it’s not that late so the afternoon sun makes your skin glisten with sweat

“damn, can you tell your dad to chill tf out for a while,” you tell donghyuck jokingly

he just rolls his eyes but on the inside he’s kinda glad you’re being casual with him rather than 😡😡😡😡😡 like u normally are

u don’t know what it is about him today but u swear he’s acting different around u

he wasn’t… as annoying while discussing strategy ????

he actually ?????? listened ?????? to what u had to say 🤔🤔🤔🤔

he didn’t argue, he didn’t even throw around witty burns like he usually does w/o hesitation

u were like… is he ok

little do u know!!! he actually l*kes u 🤭🤭🤭

well… it’s not a 100% fact that HE himself knows as well

but his siblings caught on to his weird behaviour n figured smth was up

mark being one of hyuck’s closest friends n siblings in the apollo cabin, realised he was acting weird ever since yall got grouped together

he seemed nervous ⁉️ which he never ever is

he’s like the most confident person mark’s ever known

so mark was like *thinks*

after putting two and two together mark came to the conclusion that he might have a small crush on u

bc hyuck kept glancing over at u, kept talking abt how ur a good leader (he’s never gonna tell YOU that tho. he crossed his heart on that one)

mark was like i didn’t even ask but ok

mark was confused at first tho cuz everybody and their mom knows about your guys’ rivalry so why tf would hyuck have a crush on someone he considers his rival

mark decides not to get ahead of himself bc hey!!! maybe he doesn’t have a crush, maybe he just thinks ur a good leader

like that’s it u know?

LMAO 🤫

so anywayz where was i

ah right

the flag

OK SO ur team’s flag is yellow ! :D

it’s like the colour of sunflowers

you and donghyuck r in charge of guarding the flag while ur team members scout around for the other flags

easy peasy

you and donghyuck are at your base now, weapons drawn just in case

the flag is hung on a poll couple feet taller than you

you’re dressed in ur usual training clothes – a pair of washed out shorts, a very old orange camp half-blood shirt; your sword’s sheath hanging from one of the belt loops of your shorts

donghyuck’s dressed similarly – a pair of blue ripped jeans, the same orange camp shirt tucked into them, but he has a purple flannel on, which he takes off and ties around his waist

“it’s so freaking hot,” he says, mentally agreeing with the comment u made about apollo earlier

“tell me about it”

there’s a silence that follows, the only sound heard is the subtle flow of the creek water

you’re thankful for the silence

it’s easier to keep an ear open for opponents on their way to steal your flag

just as you think about it, an ares and a hades kid approach your base

they’re on the other side of the creek, less than ten to fifteen feet away

“hi y/n,” the hades kid you’re kind of close to says

you shoot him a fake smile before holding your sword in front of you

donghyuck pulls out an arrow from his quiver and nocks it in his bow, aiming for the two demigods in front of you

the creek isn’t that deep, so the two demigods cross it with ease

they have their weapons drawn; they’re now a couple of feet away from you and more importantly the flag

no words are said as donghyuck lets his arrow fly and knock the hades’ kid sword out of his hands

he didn’t use an arrow with a sharp tip, you note

the hades’ kid stumbles backwards, imbalanced after he gets unarmed

you stand your ground as the ares’ kid scrambles forward, attacking you with her sword

your blades clash defiantly

you continue to spar with all your might

from the corner of your eye you see that the hades’ kid, sword back in hand, is battling donghyuck on your left

the flag is right behind you and donghyuck; you can’t let the two demigods get near it

you and the ares kid are still battling each other, putting all your strength into making sure she surrenders

but u should know better

ares and athena kids have many similarities like their love for winning, their confidence in battle, etc.

it’s like looking in a mirror

you don’t have anything against this particular ares kid, though

“c’mon, y/n, give up already”

that REALLY makes your blood boil

you never give up, no matter what

with one final blow of your sword, you knock her sword out of her hands, making her think she distracted you with her words

she goes flying back, half her body landing in the creek water

her sword lies in between you and her, but you doubt she’ll have the courage to fight again

the hades kid sees this and quickly scrambles away from hyuck, picking up the ares kid’s sword and giving her a hand up

“this is why i hate you and your siblings–your huge ego always gets in the way,” you hear the hades kid grumble to his partner as they run away from you, shame written all over their defeat

hyuck laughs and wipes sweat from his forehead

you can’t help but laugh either

you love it here at 🧡 camp half-blood 🧡

a few moments pass as your teammates emerge from the dense woods, each pair with a different colour flag held between them

you smile in victory

you quickly bring down your flag from its pole and give it to hyuck

“me? it was your plan…”

“yeah, but i couldn’t have done it without you, hyuck”

he almost passes out at your choice of nickname

back at the main hall, chiron announces your team as the winner, and that the prize yall being excused from doing chores all week long!!!!

it’s not much, but hey, at least you and hyuck ended up working together and winning the game, right?

later, hyuck pulls you aside from your cabin mates, and walks you to the lakeside

you two sit at the deck, side by side, watching the water doing nothing in particular

you watch as hyuck swings his feet lightly, his toes barely touching the water

“y/n, do you hate me?” donghyuck asks out of the blue

you’re like 😳 what

now that he asks you that . like straight up . it makes u think

do u REALLY hate him

or do u just hate losing to him

“why would i hate you?” you question back

“i don’t know? i guess because of our, um, rivalry thing i thought you can’t stand me”

you play with the beads of your camp necklace

“i don’t hate you, donghyuck. i just hate losing. i guess it’s the athena in me,” you laugh at how lame you sound

“i hate losing too, but i don’t hate you, in case you’re wondering.”

he takes a deep breath

“i know we started going against one another ‘cause of that one time my cabin won capture the flag, but i don’t want things to stay this way,” he pushes his hair back

“i guess what i’m saying is… i like working with you.” he pauses

“yeah,” he says, as if more convinced now, “and i would really like to get to know you better,” he clears his throat, very clearly embarrassed

you laugh at his flustered state

“stop laughing at me,” he stretches the last syllable as he lightly shoves you with his shoulder

you’re trying even harder to not laugh now, but for his sake, you hold it in

“that’s probably the cutest thing you’ve ever said”

he crosses his arms, “i’m always cute”

you’re like. THE NERVE?????? 😒😒😒

“how ‘bout we go slow? i mean, we just became un-enemies, we’re gonna need to be friends first, right?” you poke his shoulder

“you make a good point”

“i’m literally athena’s child, but okay”

“shut up!”

✨ time skip ✨

both u and hyuck stay at camp over the holidays which means more bonding time!!! yay!!!!!

a year has passed and u and hyuck r basically bffs, attached at the hip, and everybody except mark is surprised as fuck

rmb the days when hyuck thought u were “cute”?

welp 🤭 he’s at that point where everything u do makes his heart flutter

yeah… he likes u Like A Lot

u have no clue abt his feelings for u and he has no clue abt ur feelings for him either

exactly a year after the iconic capture the flag game, ur both seated at the deck by the lakeside, side by side, again

“y/n…there’s something you need to know”

“if you’re gonna tell me about the mixtape you’re dropping with mark, i literally don’t want to hear it”

“THAT WAS ONE TIME”

“YOU GOT THE ENTIRE CAMP’S HOPES UP FOR NO REASON”

both of you burst into fits of laughter

after calming down, he shoves your shoulder lightly with his shoulder, like he always does (only to u tho)

“no, seriously, i need to tell you something”

“what’s up?”

“i,” he pauses, clears his throat, “like you. a lot–i have for a while now.”

you swear your heart stops beating and your brain explodes

HE? LIKES? U?????????

he continues, “i don’t know if you like me back, but i’ve been wanting to tell you this for so long–guess i didn’t have the courage until recently,” he lets out an airy laugh

you’re looking at him in the eyes now; a subtle shimmer of the afternoon sun sparkling in his eyes

“hyuck, i like you too. how could i possibly not?” you chuckle at his shocked expression

he goes :O

he’s genuinely speechless when you lean forward and press your lips ever so softly onto his

you literally feel him freeze, which worries you for a second, but your worry is washed away when he slowly kisses you back

you melt right then and there

he takes your hand in his, interlocking fingers, as you pull away, a faint pink blush painting both your cheeks

“wow”

“really, y/n? that’s all you have to say? what happened to being wisdom’s child, huh?”

“donghyuck, i SWEAR to ALL THE GODS–!”

your sentence is cut off when he presses his lips onto yours again, you smile into the kiss which causes him to smile with you

he kisses you again and again, and then again, until you’re both a giggling mess

“let’s stay like this forever, yeah? what do you say?” he says, bringing his lips to your forehead, lingering there for a moment before pulling back and looking at you

you look at your intertwined hands, and then back up at him, “i’d like that”

[robo-writes-haikyuu]

Meeting Oikawa in Rio

Summary: Reader is a travelling photographer who encounters Tooru Oikawa in Brazil. 

Words: 2.6k ( i went a little overboard I’m so sorry) 

Warnings: none; strangers to friends to lovers kind of idea, slow burn, beach vibes, idk that’s mostly it 

a/n: This is a request for the lovely @trash-revel​!! 💖 I’m so sorry this took forever it’s probably filled with typos and grammatical errors! That said, I loved writing this 💗 Also, sorry if it’s a little too long, I felt a little too inspired! I tried to sprinkle a little bit of Portugese in it with the help of google translate (if anyone here speaks portugese I hope I didn’t butcher it and hopefully did it some justice).

As a travelling photographer, you were living like a nomad, always on the move without a home base to call your own. Instead of renting a house or an apartment, you usually stayed in hotels or airbnbs. Your goal was to travel the world and capture all of the beauty you could find in it… and little did you know that the most beautiful thing you were going to find was on your travels in Brazil.

You woke up early that day, unsure if you were actually on a healthy sleeping schedule or if it was the jet lag talking. You were enjoying your morning coffee out on the balcony of your airbnb in Rio as you watched the sunrise over the beach. The water of the ocean gently tumbled into waves onto the shore as it reflected the vibrant gradients of the morning sky. If you squinted hard enough, you could faintly see Christ the Redeemer in the distance on the mountain. After a yawn and a deep stretch, you decided that it was time for you to get ready for your daily adventure. 

You prepared yourself for the unforgiving heat by slathering sunscreen all over your body and wearing loose-fitting clothes. As you got dressed, you could immediately feel the fabric cling to you from the humidity. You made a note to bring deodorant with you because you knew way too well that chafing was only inevitable on hot, humid days. You packed your bag with your camera lenses, a couple of water bottles, some snacks, an ice pack, sunscreen, and other things that will help you navigate your new temporary home. You finished off your look with a hat and your camera slung around your neck so you could have easy access if you see anything interesting to shoot.  

After reading up on some of the attractions in Rio, you decided to visit Tijuca national park. You’ve been wanting to get out on your feet after an incredibly taxing, twenty-one-hour flight from Australia, plus there was no way you could pass up getting shots of all of the diverse flora and wildlife. Your plan was to hike as deeply into the forest as you could and then stop at the botanical garden to relax and do some sightseeing. 

You sat at the bus stop, just minding your own business and intermittently reference the bus schedule on your phone, when a voice pulled you from your thoughts. 

“Erm… perdão,” said a voice that was very much not from around here. 

You peeked over to see a Japanese man, probably in his mid-twenties, trying to talk to an elderly man sitting on the bench at the bus stop. 

“Este carro... uh... é para o lugar da árvore?” the Japanese man said tentatively, clearly struggling with the language barrier. 

The elderly man blinked a few times, and responded with “Que?”

You were equally as confused. Based on the little bit of Portuguese that you knew, you were pretty sure he was asking for a car to drive him to a tree. 

The Japanese man grew a bit frustrated and scratched the back of his neck. You could tell the poor guy was embarrassed, so you tried to see if you could help him out. 

“Do you speak English?” You ask the Japanese man. 

He locks eyes with you, and it hits you how handsome he is. His smile is disarming and his eyes are gentle. His physique is well-built like a professional athlete, and he was dressed like one too. 

"I do," he responds. "Maybe you can help me. I'm looking for the bus that goes to Tijuca national park." 

"You're in luck," you say, gesturing to the map on your phone. "That's where I'm headed."

You both boarded the bus, which was packed like sardines, and made some small talk along the way. 

“Tooru Oikawa,” he says with an outstretched hand. “I’m a volleyball player.”

“(Y/n) (l/n),” you reply with your hand in his and give it a shake. “I’ve never met a professional athlete before.” 

“It’s been a dream of mine since I was a kid,” he smiles and proudly runs his fingers through his tousled hair. “Are you a photographer? I just noticed your fancy camera.” 

“Yeah,” you cradled your camera in your hand and fiddled around with the lens. “I wanted to check out the wildlife here and maybe try out some new techniques. I figured the national park would be a good place to start.” 

“You know, shutterbug,” he says, striking a pose. “ I have some experience in front of cameras. Not to brag or anything, but I’ve been in a few local magazines back at home.” 

You roll your eyes and chuckle; this man really is something else. He’s definitely charismatic and charming -- not to mention very handsome -- although there’s something else to him that you can’t put your finger on. There was something about his smile that just didn’t sit right with you. It reminds of you of how you were at family dinners; despite how much was on your mind, you just kept smiling to avoid rocking the boat. But, maybe it was just your imagination.

You arrive at your destination, depart the bus and find an uphill path that leads deeper into the forest. The two of you decide to walk together and continue to get to know each other. You tell him about how you were a travelling photographer and you had a lot of your works published in different magazines. You also tell him about your travels and all of the places you’ve visited. 

“What’s one place you haven’t gone to yet?” He asks as he kicks a stray pebble. “Where do you plan on going once you’re done here?”

“Definitely Japan,” you say. “That’s up there on my list, especially the countryside. I just think the scenery there would be amazing to see in person.”

“I’m from the country, you know” he said with a wink. “Maybe we’ll have another fateful encounter there and I’ll show you around sometime~” 

You can’t help but hide a blush from hinting at your cheeks. 

Despite how flirtatious he is, he seems genuinely interested in you. And you’re equally impressed by him; the way he talks about his history with volleyball demonstrates his deep passion for the sport. He talks about volleyball as if he was knight preparing for battle; he goes into detail about strategies, formations, techniques, everything that makes a good volleyball player. He also goes into detail about his past rivals, although there was an edge to his voice when he talked about them. You decide to not pry too much on the subject. 

“So what you’re saying is that you’re kind of a big deal,” you say. 

“I mean,” he responds with a wink. “If you think so, then I won’t argue.”

That’s when a toucan flutters out from the bushes and nests into his hair. Oikawa panics and flails his arms, trying to shoo away the bird, but it seemed to have no intention of leaving his locks. 

“Wait,” you say, steadying your camera in front of your eye. “Don’t move.” 

The look on Oikawa’s face jumps from surprised, to angry, to embarrassed. He crosses his arms and pouts with red cheeks; it seems he was trying to make a good impression on you and the toucan sabotaged his plan. His pout slowly relaxes when he sees the look on your face; you were so mindful about the angle, the lens, and the lighting; it reminded him about how he is with volleyball. He also had to admit, you had a really cute smile; he simply smiles and accepts his defeat. 

“Sorry,” you say, snapping a few more. “I’m almost done.”

“No no,” he says. “Take your time.”

That’s when you notice something different about him; this smile seemed totally different from how he was smiling when the two of you were on the bus. The way he smiled then seemed routine or rehearsed. This smile, however, was enough to make your chest flutter. You swear if more people saw a smile like this from him, the world would be a much better place. 

“You better send me a copy of those,” he teases, sticking his tongue out at you. “Someday, people might pay good money for them.

“You know it,” you say with a giggle. Although, you couldn’t tell if he was complimenting your work or if he was just that full of himself. 

You walk up to him and gently lift the toucan off his head and toss it into the air for it to fly away. 

“Well, I hate to leave you like this,” he said, pulling out his earbuds from his pocket. “But I need to get my afternoon run in. I look forward to bumping into you again soon, shutterbug~” 

With that, he jogged away, leaving you in a small cloud of dust. The nickname sticks with you and endears you more to him. You stand there with a smile on your face, as you hoped that this wouldn’t be your last encounter with him. 

And it wasn’t. As a matter of fact, bumping into Oikawa became a near-daily occurrence for the two of you. You always took the same bus to the national park where he went for jogs and you went for photo ops. Although, the two of you eventually exchanged numbers and made plans to hang out somewhere else. 

Every time you talk to Oikawa you always learn something new about him; you learn that his favourite food is milk bread, that his best friend, Iwaizumi, is taking sports science in college, and that he was captain of the volleyball team in his third year of high school. You tell him about your home country and what it was like growing up there, and how you’ve been pursuing photography since you got your first DSLR camera. You tell him about your favourite foods, your favourite music, and your favourite movies. 

One evening, after Oikawa was done practice, the two of you decided to make plans to grab dinner and go for a walk on the beach. At dinner, the sun was still high enough in the sky that it wasn’t quite sunset, but it was low enough in the sky that the temperature started to cool off.

The more you think about it, the more it starts to feel more like a date. 

“What kind of photos do you take?” he asks. “Now that I think about it, I don’t think you’ve shown me any of your work.”

You take out your phone to open up your digital portfolio and you hand it over to him. He scrolled through your gallery and saw various shots from nature, urban settings, and studios.  He came across a folder in your gallery labelled ‘100 Strangers.’

“What’s this all about?” he asked, flipping through the images. 

“Oh, that’s just a long-term project I’m working on,” you said. “My goal is to take portraits of 100 strangers that I meet in my travels and post little blurbs about them.”

“I’d offer to pose for a picture for you,” he says, leaning in as he rests his elbows on the table. “But it seems like we’re not really strangers to each other anymore.”

You can tell he’s flirting, but you don’t let him get away with it that easily. “I still have those shots of you and the toucan, you know.”  

He flinches and hunches over in embarrassment. “You’re a meanie, shutterbug~”

“What?” you say as you take one last bite of your food. “I love that picture. It’s cute.”

He suppresses a grin as he digs his fork into his food. He tries to act nonchalant, but the blush on his cheeks betray him. 

“So,” he says, bringing his food to his mouth. “You think I’m cute?”

A blush sneaks onto your cheeks and you avert your eyes from him. From the corner of your eye, you see him grin to himself in satisfaction. You avoid answering him entirely and just ask the waiter for the bill. 

It’s now sunset and the two of you were walking on the beach. You decide to take off your sandals and just enjoy the feeling of the warm sand in between your toes. The breeze was perfect, and it was enough to take the edge off the humidity. You then take out your camera and start adjusting the settings on it. It was golden hour, after all. 

You glance over at Oikawa, who ‘s just at the edge of the water and dipping his toes in. He looks out onto the horizon, where you could barely make out the silhouettes of the mountains, and takes in the balmy breeze. The wind swished through his hair elegantly, sweeping it just the right way that made it look effortlessly styled. You steadied your camera and snuck in a couple of shots. 

He looks over his shoulder at you upon hearing the shutters and grinned. “Couldn’t resist a photoshoot of me, shutterbug?” He held up a peace sign and placed a hand on his hip, awaiting more shots from you. 

After getting a few more shots in, you join him at the shore and dip your toes in, jumping at how surprisingly cold the water was. 

“You didn’t answer my question, you know,” Oikawa says, turning to face you. 

“Huh?” you chuckle nervously and tuck a few strands of hair behind your ear. “What question?”

“Do you think I’m cute?”

You hesitated and wiped your clammy palms on your shorts. You definitely developed feelings for Oikawa, and you were sure he felt the same way about you. The problem, though, is that you were hesitant to jump into a serious relationship, given all of the travelling that you do. 

“I...” you murmur, nervously wiggling your toes into the sand. “Listen, I don’t want to get your hopes up. I travel a lot  and I get so busy with work that I--”

“Hey,” he chuckles while scratching the back of his neck, trying to mask his disappointment. “It’s totally alright if you don’t think so, I just thought--”

“N-no it’s not that,” you blurt out. “I don’t want to jump into anything serious only to have it ruined when I eventually start travelling again. I really do like you, Tooru, but I don’t think that would be very fair to you.”

Suddenly, you found yourself merely inches away from him. He softly chuckles and places his hand underneath your chin to tilt your face up to meet his. You look up at him, your face hot from both nervousness and excitement. 

“You put a lot of pressure on yourself, don’t you?” he says, as if he wasn’t one to talk. “Don’t worry about all of that stuff. How do you feel right now?”

You feel his fingers gently combing through the ends of your hair, sending tingling sensations all through your body. Your pulse quickens as he places a hand on the small of your back; he doesn’t go any further though. 

“I…” you murmur, leaning in and placing your hands on his chest. “I think you’re really cute.” 

He lets out a hearty chuckle and wraps both of his arms around you to pull you in closer to him. 

“Well, that’s a relief,” he says, inching closer to you. “Because I think you’re very cute, shutterbug.”

You close your eyes and meet your lips with his. From that day forward, the two of you spent everyday together until you left for your next destination. You always kept in touch with one another through text, video chats, and voice calls. Even through the challenging times, the two of you wouldn’t have wanted to be with anyone else.

[diyunho]

The Joker X Reader - “Ghost Driver”

When The Joker says you’re his, it means you’re essential to him because he needs your services for his own gain; it literally has zero affectionate connotations. Turbo is The King’s Ghost Driver and although she’s a legend, her life is far from perfect.

Part 2

“Where’s all your stuff?!” Frost asks since the apartment is pretty much empty.

“Gave it to Adam,” you sulk. “He wouldn’t sign the divorce papers so I gave in; I don’t even care… I’m glad he’s out of here.”

Jonny gazes at you in silence, a million words rushing through his mind and The Joker’s henchman can’t articulate anything close to what he would like to vociferate besides foolish small talk:

“How are you holding up?”

“Not sure… I don’t even know what the hell happened to us…It used to be so great and then he started making comments about my weight, gossiping with his friends behind my back, then cheated… I couldn’t handle it,” Y/N confesses although Frost is already acquainted with the dreadful story of her crumbled marriage.

“Not what the hell happened to us,” he decides to underline his personal opinion. “I think the question should be what the hell happened to him: you didn’t do anything wrong. And I believe you look perfect,” he mumbles the last sentence.

“What was that?” you search the fridge for his favorite soda.

“Nothing... nothing…”

“Here you go,” you offer the cold Fanta to a distraught companion.

“Thanks, Y/N. Here’s the money for tonight,” he gives you the envelope. “As usually, half now , half after the job is done.”

“OK,” you accept the terms without issues because it’s how The Clown Prince of Crime pays for your services. “Jonny, why is there an extra thousand dollars in here?!”

“Ummm…” the man tries to find a reasonable explanation yet Y/N can’t accept his strategy.

“Should I text Mister Joker and thank him for the bonus?”

“Nope,” he bites on his lip.

“I appreciate it,” you return the extra cash to Frost. ”I’m fine. Really.”

“Well…” he takes the bills and stashes them in his wallet, “… let me know if you need anything, alright?”

“I promise I will, “ you smile. “I swear on my Turbo honor,” the joke makes him smile also.

“Hey Y/N… I was thinking… maybe one of these days, if you feel like it, we could… and it’s entirely up to you, no pressure… maybe you would want to… ”

Frost’s phone keeps ringing and he retrieves from his suit’s pocket, annoyed about the interruption.

“It’s Audra,” he huffs while declining the call.

“Might be important,” you sort of urge him to answer.

“Meh, I doubt it. She will chew my ears off regarding our relationship that ended 3 months ago. I’m not interested,” he strolls towards the exit due to another pressing matter he has to attend. “I have to go, Mister Joker has a meeting soon; I’ll see you later, Y/N.”

“See you,” you wave and lock the door when your cell alerts of an incoming text from The Joker.

Downloading two pictures… Pictures?!

“Oh…my… God…!” you hold your breath when the first image depicts a totally naked King of Gotham reflected in the mirror at his gym and squeal when the second one shows a close up of his mid-section.

“Oh my God!” you burst out laughing as you admire the unexpected missive. “Heeeelllo Mister Joker,” you mutter and actual phrases pop up on your screen.

“I sent these to the wrong number, Y/N. Ignore and erase them!”

“Of course, sir!” you immediately reply with no intention of doing it for the moment.

Why?

The hilarious error shook you up from apathy and it’s worth saving those pics for a bit longer since you can’t remember the last time something got your attention after the messy divorce.

***************

11:49 PM

The Joker is the first one to get in the car next to you, firmly clutching to his suitcase full of diamonds freshly stolen from “Diamond Emporium” store on Glissan Avenue. You notice the other goons sneaking to the cars deliberately positioned around nearby streets for tonight’s robbery. How come J doesn’t go with them?

The dilemma is simple:

The green haired menace typically arrives with his regular crew when he plans heists but has Y/N pick him up after the job is done.

“Hi Mister Joker,” you greet your employer.

“Hey,” he acknowledges your presence. “Did you delete the pictures?” The Joker gets straight to the point.

“Yes,” you lie and tell the truth in the same time: you erased the whole body image but kept the close up one for future reference.

“Good. What did you think?” the hasty interrogation prompts a careful chosen response.

“You look very…,” and you pause in order to find the correct term since a tiny mistake could set him off. “… Healthy, Mister Joker.”

“I do,” he huffs quite pleased with your statement.

You wish to add more but Frost and the new hire squeeze in the back seat awaiting orders.

“You’re in luck kid,” Jonny places a box filled with precious gems at his feet. “Your first assignment and you get to meet Turbo.”

The young man opens his mouth in amazement as you move the fingers from your right hand in the air instead of a proper introduction.

“You’re Turbo?! I thought you’re a guy!” Nick blurs out and Frost punches him in the head, displeased with the observation.

“Sounds empty,” you growl while The Clown snorts.

“My Ghost Driver A GUY??!! Ha-ha-ha-ha!” the unnerving, screechy noises make the newbie shrivel up. “Turbo, A GUY!” he continues to amuse himself before giving Nick a psychotic glare.

“I’m…I’m so sorry, I meant no disrespect,” he nervously stutters especially since J called you “his”.

The poor bastard’s oblivious about what the label implies in The Clown’s universe: when The Joker says you’re his, it means you’re essential to him because he needs your services for his own gain; it literally has zero affectionate connotations.

“Where the fuck did you find this buffoon?” you chew on your gum, irritated.

“He’s Richard’s nephew,” Jonny sucks on his teeth.

“Uncle Panda is infinitely smarter,” Y/N barks at the revelation.

“I’m truly sorry,” Nick apologizes again and you cut him off.

“Save it!... … I hear sirens,” you slowly inhale and The King calmly articulates:

“I forgot to mention I accidentally triggered the silent alarm.”

Translation: he did it on purpose.

You snicker at the first lights blinking in the distance, excited to have some fun after stressing so much in the past weeks. The vehicles belonging to the gang scatter in different directions as you step on the gas pedal, accelerating towards the numerous police cars answering to the 10-64 code.

“That’s my girl!” J cracks his neck, already hyped at the adrenaline rush burning his veins: The Ghost Driver is perfect to offer him what he craves and she always delivers.

That’s why Turbo is his.

************

4:37 AM

“Hi…Mister…Mister Joker…” you attempt to talk without slurring.

“It’s Ella,” his girlfriend snarls.

“Why…where is he?” you guzzle down half of glass of wine, adamant in having a chat with your boss.

“Well, after you two had a merry time being chased by cops all over town, he came home and now he’s sorting out the diamonds,” the woman bitterly reports.

“I wanna talk to him,” you sniffle and drink some more alcohol.

“You just saw him. I’m sure it can wait until tomorrow.”

“I’m sure it can’t!” you shout. “I just received important information he’d be i…interested in,” you finally make it through the whole sentence.

Ella stomps in the living room, vexed at your behavior.

“It’s Turbo,” she shoves the phone in his fingers. “The bitch is wasted!”

“What did you call me?!” the appalled Y/N is about to burst when The Joker’s deep voice resonates I her ear.  

“Yeah?”

“Sir,” you correct your bitter tone. “I h-have very important news!”

“I’m listening,” J ignores his woman as she cusses you out.

“I have to tell you in person, sir. Let’s go on a date and I’ll reveal the entire shocking...”

“Huh?!”

“I have crucial information…”

“Quit repeating yourself!” The Joker interrupts. “You’re not making any sense. Go to sleep and we’ll catch up after you sober up.”

“But I wanna go on date Mister Joker,” you gulp the rest of the wine and prepare for a fourth round.

“Why, because I look healthy?” J mocks and Ella sighs, not understanding the odd conversation she’s witnessing. “… …. … Hello?”

A loud thud, then dialing tone at the other end of the line.

“I think she passed out,” The King of Gotham concludes, not particularly worried at the sudden halt of your monologue.

***************

3 Days Later

The late meeting is almost done: the buyers already purchased the diamonds J had for sale, among them your ex-husband Adam that has a small crowd gathered next to him; he’s supposedly famous for his crappy attitude enjoyed by jerks sharing the same ludicrous humor.

“You know I’m sensible when it comes to challenges and I couldn’t grasp why she doesn’t want my help in shedding a few pounds. What’s the harm in that?! I love curves but sometimes I don’t, ya’ know?” he winks and the group laughs.

The Joker is arranging money in duffle bags, his concentration diverted by the impromptu comedic performance. What the heck are they yapping about?

Frost is certainly in a foul mood: J can guess his trusted henchman is worked up since the usual chilled Jonny can’t control his anger.

“What’s wrong with being voluptuous, hm?” he addresses Adam and it clicks for The Joker: this is about Y/N.

“Nothing at all,” he smirks and the laughter around the room dies out because not too many dare screwing with Jonny Frost. “I was merely emphasizing that if a woman can’t lose weight, she’s doomed. Y/N lost me, how is she going to get another stud if she…”

“Perhaps she’s not interested in pieces of shit; definitely had her share!” Frost grumbles at the absurd remarks.

The Joker has no clue about what’s going on, yet he won’t deny today’s entertainment is far from boring.

“Give me a break!” Adam scoffs. “Who’d sniff her tail if she refuses to get skinnier? Ooohhh, wait a minute, we might have an admirer,” he arrogantly slides your cell out of his coat. “I was browsing her pictures and what do you know? A gentleman sent Y/N a picture of his junk three days ago. I am deeply sorry, my bad. She does have somebody sniffing her tail. What kind of loser sends images of his dangling goodies to another dude’s wife?!” 

“Ex-wife!” Jonny sneers whilst J’s calculation leads to an easy verdict: you kept one pic.

“Whose junk is this?! Is it yours?” your estranged spouse accuses Frost without any evidence.

“It’s my junk,” The Joker’s serene revelation makes everyone freeze: they have no idea how to react at the puzzling escalation of events.

Is he bluffing?!

“I wasn’t aware I require permission in order to text whatever I desire to whomever I want.”

Awkward silence and Frost approaches Adam, boiling with indignation.

“Why do you have Y/N’s phone?”

Your husband doesn’t have a chance to justify his action: Jonny’s punch throws him to the ground, immediately followed by his unsettling ultimatum.  

“You son of a bitch, what did you do to her?”

Your former husband gets on his elbow ready to attack when The King’s stern inquiry stops his motion:

“WHERE.IS.MY.TURBO?”

****************

After 1 hour

Frost lifts you higher in his arms while you keep wheezing, trying to regain control.

“I’m sorry…I attacked you,” the weakened Y/N whispers. “I thought you were Adam...”

After being abducted and left to starve for the last 3 days, you had one clear purpose: to kill the guy that did it. Adam surely crossed the line with his despicable plan of making you lose weight: he creeped in your apartment, kidnapped you and took you to his home where you were chained in the cellar until Jonny found you. The basement was dark and you couldn’t see, that’s why you used whatever strength you had left in order to attack the individual responsible for your misfortune.

Turned out it was actually a rescue party although Frost is now the proud owner of a beautiful bump courtesy of Y/N.

“No problem,” Jonny takes you to his SUV, carefully laying you down in the passenger’s seat. “How’s your head?” he wipes the dried blood on your cheeks since Adam knocked you out unconscious while you were talking to The Joker after the heist.

“I’m OK,” you start crying, mostly mad at yourself for being such an easy prey, yet you didn’t see it coming.

“You know… It’s OK not to be OK,” Frost opens a bottle of water and gives it to you. “I’ll take you home, you can take a shower and I’ll have the doctor come for an emergency evaluation. Are you hungry?”

“I’m so hungry,” tears stream down your face and Jonny has a great proposal.

“I’ll order some food and if you want me to I can stay with you. After you feel better, we could… and it’s entirely up to you, no pressure… maybe you would want to…”

The Joker rolls his eyes, deciding to emerge from the shadows.

“Wow, this is painful to watch. Frost believes he’s still in high school: basically he’s asking you on a date. There, done. No need to beat around the bush. Jesus!” J scolds about a subject he shouldn’t mess with. “I have a heist next week, you better be good to go by then!” he gestures at the confused duo. “If you’ll excuse me, I have my own date to honor. We’re done here, yes?”

“Yes sir,” Jonny replies for both, unwilling to split hairs with The Joker and his obnoxious aberrations. “Here’s your cell,” he returns the item to you and you snatch it, relieved. You seem to have an outburst of energy as you unlock the secured folder.

“Where’s Adam?”

“I don’t know, we had an altercation at the warehouse then he scrammed,” Frost reports, ogling a strange looking Y/N typing on her phone.

“He won’t be able to hide,” you grin and send the attachment to The Joker.

*************

“We’ll be late for dinner,” Ella kisses The Clown. “I’m not a 100% positive why we had to waste precious time and come for her,” she pouts and drags him after her towards their vehicle.

J’s phone chimes and he stops in his tracks, not expecting a message from you seconds after the encounter.

“Mister Joker, you were very generous to share pictures with me.

Allow me to do the same.

Your Turbo.”

Imagines downloading and he’s not sure what to do when pics appear one by one: frames taken by the private investigator you hired to follow Adam when you suspected he was cheating. The bastard was diligent, but he was eventually caught in the act three days ago.

Who’s the woman he’s with?

The Joker’s Queen.

“What’s wrong?” she frowns at the visible switch in his temper.

The Clown ruthlessly slams Ella against the hood while her cell also receives a text from Y/N:

“Who’s the bitch now?”

 Also read: MASTERLIST

You can also follow me on Wattpad and Ao3 under the same blog name: DiYunho.

[gothamdetected-a]

an idiot’s guide to the wayne family.

now complete with new diagrams! i wish i wash kidding, ive really made a diagram to help illustrate this.

[ follow the link here for actual visible quality. thanks tumblr.]

some points to make quickly -

• this is not complete. there were probably more siblings and wives and children, but i just focused on the main lineage i could piece together from DC knowledge

• apologies for the lack of knowledge on the women in the family past the last century. this is unfortunately common in real life too, as women were not landowners etc, and without a marriage certificate they basically don’t show up on records. dc happily talk about the male line but not about the wives and daughters so :/

• the dates are fairly made up, and especially at the bottom are just me twisting things to fit my own personal canon

• and finally, i just wanted to say that while this is pieced together from what DC have told us, there are a lot of holes that i have filled with headcanons. not all of this is canon. sometimes i just want to give a person a cool life that dc are too cowardly to do.

so, although this varies by “earth”, i have tried to combine the various histories given for pre- and post-52 waynes into a full comprehensible timeline. i’ve probably failed, but this is what i’m sticking with.   

to start with we’re supposed to believe that there was a norse guy calling himself the Bat-Man, running around in the 10th century killing frost giants. is it plausible? yes. is it exaggerated? most definitely. am i wiping it from existence because it was one issue in a faintly terrible run that has technically been retconned anyway? absolutely. ignoring that makes the earliest recorded ancestor of the wayne family a man called gawayne de weyne, a french crusader in the 14th century. on some earths he’s called lancelot wayne (too on the nose) or harold wayne (thanks i hate it), so im personally going to retcon that and just say gawayne is it. also because i love the etymological aspect of the name beginning as de weyne in old high french and it slowly changing through out the centuries. gawayne, also sometimes written as gevain, was one of the knights sent to retrieve the holy grail, but, as knights tended to do, he died. sorry gawayne. the weirdest part about all of this is that he asked for his heart to be embalmed, and there’s a plot line revolving around this (batman: scottish connection). now i’m not saying that madness runs in the family, but the waynes absolutely do not get a good head start in history. 

gawayne must have had at least one surviving heir who goes on to have babies etc etc, and eventually we get to the 16th century, and the next instance of the waynes. specifically, contarf wayne. which, i have to say, super dumb name. if i ever have a kid, im calling it contarf. so it’s now the 1500s and the waynes have somehow become scottish, probably from getting given land after crusading and that. apparently gawayne was aknight of the scottish court, despite being french, which actually happened a lot back then. literally the only notable thing contarf does with his life is build castle wayne, and i swear these people are all born with both madness and a flair for the dramatic. yes at some point bruce does go to this gloomy scottish castle where it’s always rainy and stormy and fits right on in, so that’s terrifying.

around a hundred years later nathaniel wayne tries to emigrate across to the “new world”. nathaniel likes witchhunting, and has come over to what will one day be the US following a witch fleeing from england - annie. annie who he may have dated. annie who may be pregnant with his child. good on you nathaniel, that’s a healthy relationship you’ve got right there. after the baby is delivered, he finds her and. you know, people were not kind of witches back then, so she dies. and with her dying breath, curses nathaniel and all his descendants. which includes her OWN BABY (super punk move), and one day bruce wayne. this curse manifests in very few of the extant waynes surviving beyond 40, often going mad, and absolutely tuning on each other. nathaniel’s particular grisly end comes when his is the fateful colony that ends up in what-will-one-day-be-gotham (see my idiots guide to gotham for more juicy details), releasing the deacon blackfire from his little cave and ending up missing, presumed dead. (definitely dead). this is the start of the “waynes probably should avoid gotham” saga. spoiler alert - they don’t. 

somewhere in the interluding 100 years, a branch of the waynes do actually successfully make it over into the americas. 2 brothers, caleb and thomas simon wayne, reach the east coast from britain, and go their separate ways. caleb joins a convoy heading out west, leading a wagon train, and, as so many pioneers do, he also dies, while trying to make this trip. but caleb really isnt the interesting brother here (sorry man), because what thomas gets up to is far more exciting. he settles in, lo and behold, the newly formed town of gotham, and for some strange reason (probably because all the waynes are fairly nuts, as we’ve established at this point) decides to give devil-worshipping a go. maybe its fucking curse. maybe its something in the water. maybe its maybelline. but whatever it is, thomas wayne tries to summon and ensnare the demon barbatos by killing some innocents, in a wild, but understandable, attempt to gain immortality. he doesn’t succeed. or does he. it half works - instead of summoning the bat-demon (yes the same bat-demon that the founding fathers later summon and also trap beneath gotham) he gets one of darkseid’s hyper-dimensional bounty hunters, and some how, through some space age magic, the energy of this event corrupts him into agelessness/slowed ageing, we’re not totally sure. later dear old tom pops back up as the villainous dr simon hurt, and literally fights his own descendant. DC give no fucks. 

after the whole corrupting not-magic thing, but before he disappears, thomas/simon impregnates one of his cult’s disciples. a lot. (is this why the waynes can look 30 at 50? more on this at 10) and between 1747 and 1771 (because immortal people also have immortal sperm apparently), she bears him 3 sons. probably some daughters too but again, who cares about that. not DC, that’s for damn sure. these sons are all absolutely fucking insane, just like daddy dearest. the eldest, who is LITERALLY known as “mad” anthony wayne, is said to be the spitting image of bruce, which is confirmed through some time travelling bs that we’re not going to think about. anthony and horatio wayne, the middle brother, both sign up to fight in the revolutionary war. unfortunately THE CURSE STRIKES AGAIN and horatio perishes while burning british ships. anthony goes on to becomes a brigadier general, serving directly under george washington and pulls some crazy good strategies that help to kick the british out of new jersey, earning his nickname of “mad” anthony, because only someone fucking nuts could come up with these plans, and pull them off. the youngest brother darius wayne is only 4 when the war breaks out, and is therefore too Babey to fight, but does later become notable for being the man to start construction on wayne manor. in 1795, using the money inherited from his brother horatio on his death, he hires an architect nathan van derm, to begin planning and building. sadly darius will never see it completed, with funds dwindling and his older brother’s death, eventually darius takes his own life. 

not to worry, he leaves behind 2 sons - herkimer and charles wayne. literally herkimer’s only notable feature is that he fights in the war of 1812. sorry my guy, DC hate you. charles, on the other hand, is a businessman, who manages the failing company his father had left behind and starts to grow the wayne fortune. charles buys more land surrounding the manor, as well as a lot of general gotham real estate, and is the man accrediting for starting wayne enterprises as a series of several small business, ranging from merchant trading to land ownership to mining, in 1845. however charlie contracts tuberculosis at the ripe old age of 62 and shuffles off the mortal coil. 

the oldest of his sons, charles lincoln wayne, also known as charles junior, does 2 things - begins construction on the wayne manor again in 1855 after purchasing it back from jerome k. van derm, the destitute son of the original architect, who had been living in the bones of the construcion, and uses a considerable portion of his inheritance to build the gotham botanical gardens in 1870. the next son, winslow wayne, is another enigma - the only thing mentioned about him in the comics is that he fought alongside teddy roosevelt, which i’m guessing is in the spanish-american war. but the youngest two brothers, joshua thomas and solomon zebadiah wayne are the real spicy pair. not only do they tackle the bat infestation on the manor grounds, but the pair work to change the federal system of america - joshua, when he’s not managing the wayne companies, is an abolitionist who engages in secret missions to free slaves by getting them across the border into canada, and solomon, the vaguely more sensible of the two, becomes a judge, attempting to be as fair and incorruptible as possible. sadly joshua is killed due to his slave smuggling antics (THE CURRSSEE), and this sends solomon slightly nuts, and causes him to contract the architect cyrus pinkney, who is even more nuts, to basically. build gotham. these two men are the reason 97% of buildings have gargoyles on them. 

solomon has only 1 child before he dies, who fortunately, grows up to be a very shrewd businessman capable of growing wayne ent even through with the advent of shipping and rail sectors. this man, alan wayne, constructs the original wayne tower in 1888, and it completely swamps the gotham skyline. he also marries catherine van derm, the great granddaughter of the original architect of wayne manor, and finally manage to complete and move in to the building in 1895, exactly 100 years after the project was started. for a while they are very happy, and catherine falls pregnant. but this darn curse just won’t leave these wayne boys alone, and in 1897, catherine dies giving birth to their son, kenneth wayne. a year later, lost and traumatised and going insane thinking about his wife’s death alan wayne mysteriously disappears (read as: fell down a well and was maybe or maybe not tortured and killed by the court of owls). 

kenneth wayne, raised as virtually an orphan, turns out to have his papa’s business management skills, and, foreseeing america's impending industrialisation in the 20s and 30s, makes some risky moves that pay off, including the advent of wayne chemicals, and wayne ent expands yet again. kenneth, like the recurring pattern that you can see here, dies fairly early due to WW2 however, leaving his wife laura to care for their 4 sons AND the company, which she does like a boss ass bitch. seriously, women barely had the vote and she was already a titan of industry and raising 4 teenage boys like. massive props to you babe. these boys are

ishmael wayne, a whaler who is an incredible parody of captain ahab and also dies trying to catch a white whale, elwood wayne, who goes and reclaims what is now called waynemoor castle in scotland, living there until his death, silas wayne, who may or may not be a thief posing as a wayne because the real silas died, AND at long last, patrick wayne - bruce’s granpappy, who founded the wayne tech arm of the company at 20 years old, aiding the war effort, and where this stupidly long post ends, because there is 0 point in me recounting the lives of thomas, bruce, or any of his children. everyone knows them. could i write more about thomas’ siblings and the kanes and how they tie in? yes. but this post is like 2100 words long and i want to sleep at some point today so this will have to do askjdbjsdhgf

[bevioletskies]

everybody wants to rule the world [5/8]

characters: peter/gamora, guardians-centric

summary: peter is the one and only heir to the celestial throne. gamora is expected to successfully lead the titans to conquer the galaxy. a political alliance is in the works, and there may or may not be wedding bells in the air.

alternately: peter and gamora find themselves in an arranged marriage and want nothing to do with it, but might need each other more than they think if they want to escape their genocidal fathers forever.

word count: 11.2k

a/n: warning for creepy/abusive behavior from both thanos and ego towards their respective children throughout the entire fic. also note that this AU is very heavily based on the MCU versions of themselves, where things are basically only different because yondu took peter to ego after all.

fic title is from the song everybody wants to rule the world by tears for fears.

help me to decide...help me make the most of freedom and of pleasure...

ao3 | tag

To Gamora’s surprise (and relief), Ego had, for once, not been exaggerating when he proclaimed she had become something of a hero. Word spread quickly across the galaxy of the new Celestial princess and how she had saved everyone’s lives - especially that of her new husband’s. Leaders and common folk alike were practically singing her praises for how she handled the Kree invasion, not that she remembered much. The rest of the wedding night was a blur - even with her accelerated healing, blood loss was still blood loss - and she spent the next few days on bedrest, letting her body modifications do most of the work.

Unfortunately, the gash in her leg wasn’t the only injury she’d sustained, also having a sprained ankle, a couple cracked ribs, and bruises that made every muscle twitch and every cough burn like wildfire, but it was hardly the worst she’d ever experienced. In fact, she would almost consider them a minor inconvenience in the grand scheme of things, if not for the other consequences of her injuries, such as -

“I’m perfectly capable of getting my own meals, Quill, it’s only a limp,” Gamora groaned as her bedroom doors swung open to reveal, for the fourth time that week, Peter, whistling cheerfully as he brought in a serving tray laden with food. The guard standing by looked like he was trying not to laugh at her plight.

“Morning to you, too,” Peter chirped, sitting by her feet. Rolling her eyes, she still turned over so he could place the tray on her lap. “Look, you said you wanted to stick to your super healthy diet, but that doesn’t mean I have to, so they have to prepare this separately. Really, this is just me bringing the chef’s personalized meals so they don’t have to come to you, and you don’t have to go to them. I’m doing you both a favor.”

“And gracing me with your presence at the same time,” she drawled.

He grinned. “Exactly! Wait, are you being sarcastic again? Because I can’t tell sometimes.”

She swatted at him with her book before picking up her fork. “What’s on the agenda today? Were you at breakfast with the others?” Peter looked at her, suspiciously doe-eyed, before she got the message. She let out an annoyed huff, pushing the tray towards him. “For someone who claims to not want to eat the same food as me, you’re very insistent on stealing it.”

“Food tastes better when it belongs to someone else,” he said defensively through a mouthful of grits. He began coughing. “Oh, never mind, what is this, soy? Ew.” Wrinkling her nose, Gamora leaned forward to slowly push his jaw closed. The sight of Peter chewing did wonders for killing her appetite. “Nah, nothing’s going on today. Dad’s doing his usual thing, which is who knows what, and Mantis is at that school-opening ceremony in the capital. You got any ideas?”

“I’m still confined to this bed for another couple days,” she said forlornly. “I’d get up and walk out right now if it wasn’t for your doctors. I swear I’m fine, but they’re acting like I’ll keel over the second I’m on my feet.”

“You wanna hang out with me, then? I could keep you company.” Peter tilted his head sideways in what she supposed was meant to look endearing. Personally, she thought he looked like he had a neck injury. “I could bring you more books. Or we could talk strategy, not that there’s really anything left to plan, I mean, you were super thorough in those meetings we had. Or maybe a holoscreen! We can watch a movie, I found a bunch of Terran videotapes at one of the Nova trading posts…” He trailed off when he noticed she wasn’t responding, looking at her expectantly.

Oddly enough, the incident at the wedding had brought them closer, despite the confusing conversation - or more accurately, confrontation - they had moments beforehand. After she had woken from her medical treatment, Peter remained by her bedside, both to apologize profusely for his childish behavior and to proclaim her status as the “kingdom’s resident badass”. Gamora, of course, had accepted, knowing he only meant well, and apologized in return for being evasive - he had a point; she couldn’t expect him to trust her if she wasn’t going to be straightforward herself. Ever since then, things were surprisingly smooth. No confrontations, no accusations, no secrets. She had even told him about Thanos’s order for her to seduce him.

“Seriously? What is this, a movie?” Peter had chuckled. “And, what, it ends with you having fallen in love with me for real, but me thinking you’re lying when you say so because you were lying the whole time, and I don’t know if I love you or just the fake you, and it’s all a bi-i-ig misunderstanding - yeah, I’ve seen this before.”

“I have no idea what you're talking about, but I also find the idea of me being in love with you laughable,” Gamora had retorted.

“I’ll have you know that I’m super lovable. Just ask anyone. Literally, you could fly into any city on this planet, ask some random stranger - ” If Gamora hadn’t been so comfortable under her bedsheets at the time, she would’ve been tempted to sit up just so she could smack him on the shoulder.

Now, she stared back, wondering how she could possibly pass the time. Peter was right - everything they needed for the inevitable “pseudo-revolution”, as he liked to call it, was ready to go at moment’s notice. She also couldn’t exactly get up and walk out, what with the guards following the doctor’s orders to keep her confined. “If you spend all day in my room,” she said slowly, “do you think your father will interpret it as your newfound devotion to me, and mention it to my father? Keep him placated?”

“Well, when you put it that way, it sounds like we’re a bunch of schoolkids passin’ notes,” Peter laughed. “So is that a yes?”

“Oh, sure,” she relented, cracking a gentle smile. “I’ll go stir-crazy in here otherwise. But if you make so much as one bad joke, I’m sending for Nebula to keep me company instead.”

“No bad jokes here.” He exaggeratedly puffed out his chest, chin held high. “I’m hilarious.”

“You’ve already done it. Get out,” she deadpanned, taking a long sip of her drink.

“Too late! I’ve claimed a pillow.” He threw himself down on top of the duvet, staring up at the underside of the canopy hanging over them. “Y’know, this bed’s never been used for sleeping.”

“What else would it - oh, Quill,” Gamora groaned, recoiling. “You’re disgusting. And your actual bedroom is just one door away, why didn’t you use that instead?”

“Privacy reasons,” Peter said defensively. “No one gets to be in there but me and my family. And oh man, if you think that’s gross - and it’s not, it’s totally normal - never use a blacklight on the Milano. Looks like a Jackson Pollock painting in there.” She blinked. “He’s like an artist...guy. I, uh - yeah.”

“Is it too late for me to move back into the guest quarters?” she sighed.

Despite herself, Gamora spent most of her recovery in Peter’s company, with occasional visits from her people (Peter was always mysteriously absent whenever Nebula was around). Though she was much more used to them, they were rather macabre in comparison to Peter’s cheerfulness. She didn’t exactly want to deal with Nebula’s attitude or Drax and Rocket’s squabbling when she was so lethargic from being stuck in bed. Peter was quite adept at entertaining her, telling her stories about his Terran childhood or creating random objects out of thin air for fun. It was a good distraction for an otherwise droll recovery.

Once the doctors finally let her go, she was back to her training regimen, pleasantly surprised to find Peter hadn’t slacked in her absence. Apparently, he had gone to Drax and requested his help (“Big mistake - I can’t count all the times he accidentally dislocated my shoulder”), and trained with him for at least an hour per day.

“Discipline,” Gamora echoed, smiling. “Good to see that we’re making progress in more ways than one.”

He managed to disarm her a few times on their first day back, practically knocking the wind out of her as he slammed her down into the mat. He was sharper, quicker, more precise than before - though admittedly, the one that had gotten her the most was where he was up to his usual tricks.

“Shit - I think you broke my nose - ”

“Hold still, let me see - ow - ” Gamora was flat on her back, Peter straddling her with a triumphant grin on his face, his nose completely untouched. She stared up at him, unimpressed. “Are you trying to crack my ribs again?”

“I’m sorry, I thought this was supposed to be serious, disciplined, combat pra - OW!” Now he was bleeding. A couple drops ended up on Gamora’s shirt, but as far as she was concerned? Worth it. “Okay, I deserved that one.”

As glad as she was to be back on her feet, they soon settled into something a bit too routine even for her liking. Gamora would wake early, have breakfast alone in her room, then train with Drax and Nebula before being joined by Peter. After their one-on-one session, she would shower and spend the rest of her day either reading, studying up on the kingdom’s history and policies (Yondu had been a great help in that regard), or in the company of her people. Dinner was always in the dining hall, where she and Peter mostly chatted with each other about nonsensical topics in order to satiate Ego’s little domestic fantasy. Evenings, once again, were either spent alone, or, increasingly more often, with Peter.

He had taken to sprawling himself across her bed after dinner, sleepily satisfied from the food and looking for a peaceful way to close out the night before eventually returning to his own room. Gamora wasn’t sure what to make of it at first - was this what friends did? - but after the first post-wedding month had passed, she came to expect him on a regular basis, even finding herself disappointed whenever he was absent.

One particular evening, Gamora walked into her bedroom to find Peter already there, looking more downtrodden than usual, clutching his Walkman over his chest. She could hear faint strains of a song playing through his headphones.

Everybody plays the fool sometime...there's no exception to the rule...listen, baby, it may be factual, may be cruel...I ain't lyin', everybody plays the fool...

“Something wrong?” she asked, disappearing into the wardrobe to change.

“I had a fight with Mantis,” Peter grumbled, pushing his headphones away from his ears.

Gamora paused before quickly changing into her sleepclothes and walking back out, staring at him in disbelief. “What? When? You seemed fine at dinner.”

“Yeah, only for Dad’s sake,” he sighed, settling into the pillows. “She’s just been actin’ real weird lately, so this morning after breakfast, I asked her what was up. I dunno, I thought she was stressing out over the plans or something. Changing her mind.”

“And she didn’t tell you anything, did she,” Gamora guessed, joining him on the bed.

“Not a word,” he replied. “I pushed a little harder, and maybe I shouldn’t have, but...I worry about her sometimes. I try not to baby her, but it’s hard when Dad still does it, y’know? And she doesn’t really have friends, other than the local kids. Sometimes I do weekend trips off-planet to have some fun, and whenever I invite her, she always says Dad’s got stuff for her to do. Don’t make any sense, considering he never has stuff for us to do. Ever.”

Gamora pursed her lips in consideration. “Have you ever looked into it? Maybe it’s related to that thing she wouldn’t tell us about at the wedding.”

He shook his head. “She’s always gone and done her own thing, and I usually leave it alone, but it’s like...it’s like ever since we started this whole plan, she’s got more to hide from me. We grew up together...spent so much time together. But now it’s like she isn’t around anymore. And I don’t know what I did wrong.” He lifted his head to meet her gaze, half-expecting her to make a crack about how he was always wrong. Instead, there was a sense of sadness reflected in her dark eyes.

Falling in love is such an easy thing to do...and there's no guarantee that the one you love...is gonna love you….

“Well, if I’ve learned anything recently, it’s that keeping secrets only makes it worse in the end,” Gamora said softly. “She’ll come around to you, Quill. You’re much too close to let this get in the way of your relationship.”

Peter smiled. “Thanks. And I hope you’re right.” Clearing his throat, he straightened up. “Hey, so, I was gonna ask you for a favor - ”

“That doesn’t sound good,” she said, eyeing him suspiciously.

“It is, I promise. I was thinking, we’ve been sitting on our asses for almost two months now, waiting for Thanos to show. Meanwhile, he keeps insisting - ”

“ - not until your father starts showing signs of desperation, I know, I was there for all of those awful weekly calls,” Gamora shuddered. “What’s your point?”

“Maybe we gotta get it going ourselves, and get you some good publicity at the same time,” he suggested. “You’re stressed out about what might happen after we - y’know - if you’re just gonna get shoved into jail forever and never be free again. I say, we go pay Xandar a visit, show off a little and do an event or something. Maybe hang around the Nova Corps so Nova Prime keeps you in her good books. It’ll boost your reputation and make Dad all stressed out.”

“That’s...actually a pretty decent idea. And much better than sulking around here forever,” Gamora agreed, nodding slowly.

“See? I’m totally a genius.” Peter pumped his fist in the air triumphantly.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” she shot back. “But let’s do it. Are we bringing the others?”

“Might get me and Mantis back on the same page. So, yeah. Let Dad stew all alone for a few days. It’ll be fun!” ______

Once the Milano had settled in, cruising along smoothly through space like they had all the time in the world, Peter shooed Rocket and Yondu away, telling them he would join them and the others in a few minutes for breakfast. It was an early Sunday morning, and they were en route to Xandar to meet with Nova Prime. Their public personas would have to be on display for the entire trip, but Peter was confident by now that the others would be able to handle the pressure.

He leaned back in his seat, staring out into the cosmos in an almost dream-like state as he thought about what had transpired over the last little while, ever since the wedding. Some good, some bad - Mantis becoming increasingly distant, definitely bad. He liked the camaraderie of his new friendships (okay, friendship, singular, with Gamora), but he also missed the old days of just him and his sister. They were such opposites in so many ways, but it was what made their bond so strong. Now, she barely talked to him for more than five minutes before excusing herself to go do something else. And Ego, he was a tough one to crack as well, not that that was anything new. Peter considered confronting him about Korath, but what he could he possibly say? Gamora was almost certain Korath had been hired by Ego to go after Peter as a publicity stunt, but Peter wasn’t so sure himself - in what world did Ego think he could trust the Kree to not actually hurt him, especially one that worked for Thanos? He was lucky Gamora had been there to save him, to fight back in ways that no one else would.

Gamora. Peter smiled to himself, almost giddy. He couldn’t help it. Thinking about her made him happy. She’d been coming out of her shell very slowly, allowing herself to laugh more often, to sleep in longer and take bigger portions of food, to tease him and talk with him for hours at a time. She wasn’t quite the harsh, militant, no-nonsense girl he had met two months ago. Sure, she was every bit as confident and disciplined as ever, but the tension in her shoulders had all but vanished, the formality of her vocabulary loosened. She was still confused by his Terran references and became easily irritated by his antics, but there was a gentleness to her that hadn’t been there before. Or maybe it had been all along, and she was only letting it show now.

“Quill, are you daydreaming up here?” He nearly fell out of his seat at the sound of her voice. “Breakfast was ready ten minutes ago, your food’s going to go cold if you don’t come down.”

“I know, I was just...looking.” He gestured towards the glass. “It’s real nice, getting to see space like this. And not to be a big Terran cliche, but I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid. And now, here I am. Peter Quill, next-level astronaut.”

“I’ve only seen glimpses of it, if I ever cared to look out the window.” Gamora took measured steps forward, her hands coming to rest on the back of his chair. “I didn’t exactly take the time to stop and observe. I had a job to do.”

“Do you want to someday?” he asked. “Get out there and explore?”

“It’s a nice thought, I suppose,” she agreed. “Where I lived, on Sanctuary, it wasn’t exactly a haven. And everywhere else I’ve been for more than a day was either a safehouse or a jail cell.”

“What if...what if that’s what we did, after all this?” Peter lifted his head to look at her. Her gaze was firmly cast outwards, among the stars. “Go on an epic adventure.”

She looked back at him. “Where?”

“Everywhere. Wherever you want.” He gestured wildly, arms spread wide. “I’ve only ever gone to planets that I can reach within a couple days, but imagine where we could go if we had our whole lives ahead of us!”

Gamora smiled sadly. “It’s a nice thought,” she repeated, turning and walking away. “Breakfast, Quill. Come on.”

They touched down in Xandar by the late afternoon. It was already getting dark, but still, Gamora found herself silently admiring her surroundings as she made her way down the landing ramp. Xandar was the complete opposite of Ego’s planet; modern, slick - stylish, even. There was something strange about being in a new place without having to immediately hide or establish a cover, and it left her feeling somewhat exposed. The rest of her people looked just as uncomfortable as she felt, especially as Nova Prime approached the landing pad in her usual brisk stride, flanked by two Nova officers.

“Good to see you again, your highnesses,” she said, shaking their hands firmly. “I hope you had a comfortable flight. You have a very...unique-looking ship there, Prince Peter.”

“She’s a beauty, isn’t she?” Peter beamed, turning to admire the Milano briefly before looking back to Nova Prime. “I’d love to hear what you have in store for us, ma’am.”

“Why don’t we get you all settled in first?” she suggested. “Denarian Dey and Denarian Saal will escort you to your rooms. We’ll have dinner in my suite at eight and discuss everything then.”

The Nova officers led them into an elevator and then through a series of winding hallways, providing them with specialized access passes that would allow them into the common area of Nova Prime’s private floor, but keep them away from the work floors. Denarian Saal eyed Rocket pointedly as he mentioned the weapon laboratories (clearly, there was a story there that Peter was itching to know more about). Gamora was dismayed to find out that she and Peter would be sharing a room.

“At least it’s two beds,” Peter pointed out as he lugged his bag onto one of them. “There, we’ve avoided another cliche.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Quill,” Gamora sighed. She debated whether to unpack at all, considering they were only here for a few days. If something went wrong, if she needed to make a quick getaway, having to throw everything back into her bag would only slow her down. She then dropped her bag unceremoniously on the floor, by the nightstand. “Did you see the way Denarian Saal was eyeing me and my people? And he thinks we’re uncivilized.”

“What do you mean?” He flopped onto the bed with a satisfied exhale.

“You may be innocent at the moment, Quill, but we’re already criminals, remember? And now, here we are, with access to Nova Prime’s private rooms. He probably suspects we’re here to make an attempt on her life, or at least, commit some sort of petty crime. He’ll sweep our rooms when we’re not here to make sure we haven’t stolen anything. Scan hours of security footage to ensure we never went anywhere we weren’t supposed to be.” She shrugged. “It’s how everyone acts around us.”

“Well, hopefully, after this week, he’ll change his mind. Hopefully everyone changes their minds.” Peter sat up, his back against the headboard. “That’s the whole point of this trip! And you saved my life, that wasn’t nothing. People believe you’re one of the good guys. Now they just have to like you as a person, too.”

“Being likable is such an overrated quality,” she complained, sitting at the foot of her own bed. “It’s only ever people who are already liked who think it’s important, because they already have it. But if you’re unloved, unwanted...the desire to be liked can turn into desperation very quickly.”

He gave her a rueful smile. “You said once that my people look at me like I’m a hero, instead of some all-knowing master. You’d rather be the master?”

She shook her head, staring intently at the floor. “I’d rather not be anything to anyone at all if it means I’ll finally be left alone.”

Peter fell silent, mulling it over. “Y’know, if...if I was being too pushy earlier, about going on, like, adventures together after this, I didn’t mean to. You don’t have to stick around. It’s your life. It’d be fun, but...I understand if you just wanna leave. Even I annoy myself sometimes,” he added jokingly.

“Now you know why I don’t bother with friendships, or even alliances. It creates obligations,” Gamora chuckled softly. “I don’t like loose ends, unanswered questions. And relying on intuition...it’s just not me.” At his frustrated expression, she quirked an eyebrow. “What?”

“Nah, it’s nothing,” he said, waving her off.

“Quill, you can’t lecture me about keeping secrets and then - ”

“It’s not a secret, I just - I don’t think you wanna hear it.” He relented once she glared him into submission. “Fine, fine. I just wish you’d gotten your childhood back somehow. Then maybe, you’d have dreams like the rest of us, instead of thinking about worst-case scenarios all the time. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good that you do that stuff, but...I dunno.”

“So I was forced to grow up fast. That’s not exactly unique. You had to do the same thing,” Gamora pointed out.

“Yeah, but I live in a big fancy palace with tons of people lookin’ after me. You had to deal with so much crap, Gamora, all on your own sometimes, and I don’t know how you did it and still came out...normal. Sane.” He shuffled a bit closer, his knees swinging around the side of his bed so he could properly face her.

“Sanity is subjective,” she reminded him. Peter laughed, the corners of his mouth turning upwards in something of a half-smile. She found she liked the sound of it - his real laugh, not that odd, forced sound that escaped him whenever he was with his father or in the company of people who knew nothing about him. She wanted to make him laugh more. “I dream of being able to choose my own future, I guess. Do more than just survive. Beyond that, I have no real big ambitions.”

Before Peter could reply, a harsh knock-knock-knock cut through, followed by “Hey, idiots! Do ya check your messages or what? Nova Prime’s callin’ us up to her place, like, right now!” Gamora glanced briefly at her communication device, startled to realize it was already 7:45.

“Give us a minute to change, Rocket,” she called back, yanking out clothes from her bag at random before slipping into the bathroom without a second glance. Still, Peter smiled to himself before reaching for his own. ______

Gamora was grateful to find that Nova Prime, for the most part, steered clear of addressing her alone, considering they were yet to have a conversation in which Gamora didn’t run off. Rocket was a little ruder than Gamora would have liked, and Drax’s blunt nature made the Nova guards twitch, but at least Nebula stuck to her promise to be seen and not heard for the entire meal.

“I was surprised when you reached out to me, Prince Peter,” Nova Prime admitted by the time dessert came around. “Especially so soon after the wedding. I figured your sister would have come alone, since she’s been handling all of your interplanetary affairs lately.”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” Peter said, glancing over at Mantis. She seemed very invested in her pudding all of a sudden. “What affairs?”

“The...outreach center,” Nova Prime replied slowly, furrowing her brow. “Have you not been...you haven’t, have you?”

“I was going to surprise Peter with the news today, Nova Prime, do not worry that you have overstepped,” Mantis said reassuringly, finally lifting her head so she could address Peter. “We have been talking for a while now about setting up an outreach center that will help reformed criminals prepare for rehabilitation on our planet. Most are still unaware of what we do, but Xandar has one of the biggest holding centers in the galaxy. If we partner with the Nova Corps to provide them with a second chance - food, shelter, healthcare, education - they will be prepared to join us on Ego and expand our population.”

“I wasn’t aware we were lookin’ to expand,” Peter frowned. “Does Dad know about this?”

“Of course he does!” Mantis exclaimed. “He provided the funding and set one of his advisors to task in assisting me. But this is mostly my project.” She was practically glowing with pride. Still, both Peter and Gamora couldn’t help but be a little wary. Where was this coming from?

“And why wasn’t I in on this?” Peter demanded, leaning across the table. Nova Prime glanced briefly between the siblings in worry.

“The opening ceremony is tomorrow morning, your highnesses,” she interrupted a little louder than necessary. “I was originally expecting Princess Mantis by herself, but now that you’re all here, well, we might as well proceed with everyone. You can give a few speeches, explain the rehabilitation program and its relation to your planet’s social work system. Of course, you’re free to do whatever you would like afterward, but if you’re interested in good publicity, I’d recommend spending your time here volunteering to help.”

“And by all of us, that includes my subjects as well,” Gamora said. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Peter, who looked significantly more irritated than he had been five minutes ago. Sometimes, it seemed like his temper was worse than hers. “My people are non-negotiable.”

“Yes, of course,” Nova Prime promised. Groot looked pleased at being included. The others were scowling at Gamora as if she committed a great offense. “You are all distinguished guests of mine, Princess. We’ll have extra security for everyone’s protection, given what happened at your last public event.”

The moment dinner ended, Mantis practically flew right out the door in a hurry. Peter ran after her before Gamora could intervene, grabbing Mantis by the arm and pulling her aside, next to the elevator. “Really? An outreach center. When you know that we’re...you know, what’s about to happen,” he said quickly, furiously, his voice dropping to a whisper. “What’s this all about?”

“I just wanted to be of use for once,” Mantis replied evenly, her eyes darting sideways as the others entered the hallway. “Prove that I am not just a sleeping pill for Father, or a playmate for the brave, powerful prince.”

Peter blanched like he’d been hit. “What’s that s’posed to mean? And where is this coming from, Mantis? Did Dad say something to you?”

They were interrupted by the quiet ding of the elevator, its doors sliding open to invite them back to their rooms. Everyone filed in, Mantis immediately retreating into the furthest corner. Gamora slid neatly between the Celestial siblings, glaring at Peter in warning. To her surprise, it seemed to have no effect. “This was not his idea, if that is what you are thinking. Why have you been so suspicious of me lately?”

“Because you’re actin’ suspicious!” Peter exclaimed. He took another step forward, but Yondu reached over to clap him on the shoulder firmly, yanking him back.

“Quill, c’mon. Don’t fight now,” Yondu warned. “You been drinkin’ too much tonight, ain’t you?”

“And you, you know somethin’ I don’t, don’t you?” Peter snapped, shoving Yondu away. Yondu’s shoulder banged into the elevator wall with an unceremonious echo, causing the entire carriage to rattle precariously. Mantis let out a quiet gasp of surprise.

Yondu straightened his coat lapels, his eyes harder than they had been before. “You’re gettin’ paranoid, boy. I suggest you keep your hands to yourself,” he said cooly, jabbing a finger into Peter’s chest. “And you show your sister some respect. Don’t make me ask again.”

Before Peter could retaliate, Gamora grabbed Peter’s arm, pulling him away. “Quill.” He turned to look at her, his eyes colder than she’d ever seen. “Let’s go to the roof. You need air.” The others exchanged dubious looks before silently stepping out onto the guest floor, leaving Peter and Gamora behind.

“What if Mantis is turning her back on us?” Peter demanded once the doors had closed. “She could’ve been feedin’ Dad information on everything we’ve been doing this whole damn time, settin’ up this ‘outreach center’ so he can have his own personal army of criminals.”

“Get some air, Quill,” Gamora repeated, sighing. “You’ve had too much to drink.”

Upon reaching the rooftop level, they found a quiet spot away from the hum of the generators, settling down onto the gravel and staring out into the pitch black of the Xandarian night sky. Despite the fury that was practically radiating off Peter, he leaned into Gamora somewhat, their knees and shoulders brushing. Though she could smell the alcohol on his breath, his eyes were focused, his speech clear. No, he wasn’t exactly drunk. It was something else. “Look, Quill, you and I, we’ve had our fair share of fights. And from what I can tell, you like people, but you have trouble trusting them sometimes. Don’t let your anger towards your father become anger towards everyone else. I know what that’s like, and it doesn’t get you anywhere.”

“So, what, you don’t think Mantis is being weird?” Peter’s voice was quieter than before, almost sobering. “Even you think I’m crazy.”

“No, actually, I think you’re onto something,” Gamora replied. “And I want to question her, badly, same as you. But it’s late. We’re tired, and stressed. You think yelling at her in front of everyone else will get the job done? It’ll be direct, sure, but it won’t be effective.”

“And you’re all about results,” he snarked, though he seemed to regret it the second it left his mouth. He hugged his knees into his chest, blinking slowly into the darkness. Gamora’s clothes and hair were so dark, he could barely see her, save for the slight silvery glint of the metal in her skin. He had never asked her about it, but he hoped he would be able to someday. “What do we do?”

“If it’ll ease your mind - and your temper - I’ll keep a closer eye on her,” she promised. “Maybe she’s been conning us the whole time. Or maybe she’s just withholding information out of ignorance, and not contempt. We’ll figure it out. In the meantime, maybe try to not be so hostile?”

“Gotta say, never thought I’d hear you of all people give me that advice,” he laughed. “And thanks. For helping me outta there tonight. I owe you, again.”

“A working relationship isn’t a business deal, Quill.” Gamora gave him a reassuring smile. “We owe each other nothing.”

“Friendship,” Peter corrected, grinning. “And right, no obligations, got it. Can we head back now? It’s so freaking cold up here.” ______

After an unceremoniously brief breakfast in their own rooms - Peter spent most of it pestering Gamora on how to speak to the media, to which she retorted that he didn’t exactly have that much experience, either - they all piled into one of the Nova-issued secured vehicles, with two more boxing them in for safety. The short drive to the outreach center was filled with mundane conversation, mostly prompted by Nova Prime, while Peter and Mantis seemed to be trying their best not to make eye contact. Everyone felt horribly uncomfortable by the time they stepped outside.

“And I thought I looked ready to kill,” Gamora murmured as she looped her arm with Peter’s. There was a steady crowd of photographers and media already forming by the entrance, especially eager to catch photos or get quotes from the newlyweds who hadn’t been seen or heard from since the wedding. “I also thought our talk last night would’ve taught you something. Seems like I was wrong.”

“Prince Peter! Princess Gamora!” One of the reporters squeezed their way through to the front, sticking his recording device right under Gamora’s nose. She blanched before straightening, trying her best not to look so disappointed. “How have you been, your highnesses? Are you well, princess? We heard you were on bedrest - are you already pregnant?”

“I was stabbed - ” “Hey, hey, no one’s pregnant - oh god, are people saying she’s pregnant? - ”

“But there are plans for children in the future, yes?” another reporter prompted.

“Guys, guys, c’mon, our visit today is about the outreach center. It’s not about me and Gamora,” Peter laughed somewhat uncomfortably. “We’re lookin’ at how we can improve our policies and resource allocation, rehabilitate people who deserve a second chance. We’re not thinkin’ about babies.”

“But if you don’t continue the family line, the Celestial legacy dies with you, your highness,” the second one said snidely.

Gamora scowled. “And that’s none of our concern right now, thank you,” she shot back cooly. “Now will you let us pass? We have a job to do.” Peter wasn’t sure whether to wince or laugh as Gamora practically dragged him to the doors and nearly knocked the reporters over in the process, where everyone else was standing, watching them bemusedly.

In many ways, the opening ceremony was reminiscent of all the things Gamora had hated most about their wedding - the pomp and circumstance, the empty words, the stiff, insincere smiles that left her cheeks aching for relief. But there was a genuine happiness that positively radiated off Mantis once she began addressing the crowd. She had clearly found her calling, her passion. Once more, there was an explosion of sound and movement as everyone clapped and cheered at the very end, Peter reaching around Gamora so he could squeeze Mantis’s shoulder in congratulations. She smiled tightly at him before turning back to the cameras.

Afterward, they did an open tour of the facility, guided mostly by Mantis and Nova Prime. Gamora found herself genuinely interested in what they had to say. She had seen her fair share of criminals who had been led astray through no fault of their own, herself included, and a place like this could very well work miracles for them.

“Hey, I could give you a tour of the city if you’d like.” Gamora turned, not realizing Peter was right behind her, his fingers ever-so-slightly brushing her waist in an attempt to stay nearby. The event was over, and everyone was filing out of the building neatly, chatting to themselves and bowing as they passed the royal family members. “Not like we’ve got anything else to do today.” Raising an eyebrow, Gamora gestured wordlessly to Mantis nearby, who looked unsure of what to do next. “Oh, right - hey, Mantis! You, me, Gamora, the city? You wanna come?”

“I suppose,” Mantis said quietly. “I will have to check with Yondu.” Peter looked at Gamora pleadingly as his sister began walking away. Gamora rolled her eyes in disbelief - really, this was the extent of his effort? - before jogging after the other girl.

“I could use another tour guide. Your brother isn’t very observant, after all,” Gamora added, looking over at Peter with a smirk. He seemed half-offended, half-agreeable. “Either that, or you’ll be returning to Nova headquarters, where you’ll likely spend the rest of your day in the company of my people. I’m sure they would love to have you.”

Mantis looked disturbed by the prospect. “A tour sounds like a great idea!” Mantis said quickly. “Where shall we start, Peter? What do you think Gamora would like?”

He hummed thoughtfully, reaching for Gamora’s hand when he realized the nearby photographers were still snapping away, watching them, waiting for them to do something interesting. “Why don’t we start with a bookstore?” ______

“You and Peter get along much better than I would have expected,” Mantis admitted several hours later. The three of them were sat in a quaint homestyle restaurant, watched closely by Yondu, who was sat by himself a few tables away. Peter had disappeared to the bathroom after they had finished eating, leaving the girls by themselves. “I do not need my powers to see that you enjoy each other’s company.”

“Is this what we’re going to talk about while he’s gone? How gauche.” Gamora sipped her water. “He worries about you, Mantis. I doubt that’s news to you, but he does. You’ve been acting strange lately, and the fact that I can tell when I hardly know you is a testament to your odd behavior. He may have been rash last night, but he wasn’t entirely wrong.”

“He no longer trusts me. He thinks I mean to turn against him because I have been spending time with Father,” Mantis whispered. “It...it hurts. Knowing that after everything we have done together, he would still think so little of me.”

“Quill thinks the world of you,” Gamora insisted. “That’s why this weighs so heavily on him. And it’s no secret that Quill and I only get along about half of the time. But we know we can trust each other. And you both think you’ve lost that. All we ask is that you tell the truth.”

Mantis couldn’t help but grin, something rather awkward, yet endearing. “You and Peter have become a ‘we’, haven’t you?” she said slyly. “Are you not a little curious about what he thinks when you are around?”

“He’s almost too easy to read, so no, I don’t. And don’t change the subject,” Gamora said sternly.

“I am not, I just know he will be coming back soon, and - do you really not want to know?” Mantis blinked innocently.

“We are not having this discussion, not now, not ever - ”

“Discussion? What’d I miss?” Peter seemingly popped up out of nowhere, leaning against the back of Gamora’s chair with an easy smile.

“Mantis wanted to tell me stories of your shared adolescence, but I think it’s time we address some of our interpersonal issues instead,” Gamora lied easily, gesturing for him to take a seat. Peter obeyed, though he looked very much like he was regretting having returned to the table. “Your relationship with each other really isn’t my business. But clearly, you have unresolved issues, and I have no interest in letting anyone’s emotions get in the way of our plans. So either deal with it like adults and drop the issue, or talk it out like adults and solve it. We are not leaving until this is behind us, and there are no other choices.”

“Of course you’re giving an ultimatum,” Peter muttered under his breath, ignoring the dirty look Gamora sent his way. “Right, um, Mantis. Do you feel like...like you wanna back out?”

“No, not at all!” Mantis exclaimed. “You see how Father treats me. I mean so little to him compared to you. I had...I had absolutely no one until Yondu brought you home. You remember what I was like.”

“You were scared, like, all the time. You didn’t know how to read or write, ‘cause Dad didn’t think it was important.” Peter shook his head, disgusted at the memory. “And you were confused the first time I tried to hug you.”

“I thought you were going to strangle me.” Mantis let out a tiny, awful laugh. “I thought I had started to trust someone who wanted to hurt me instead. That I was stupid for thinking I could.” She glanced at Gamora, whose eyes were suspiciously glossy. Her arms were folded tightly across her chest. “This was probably not what you wanted us to talk about, was it?”

“No, this is...it’s good.” Gamora swallowed, clearing her throat harshly. “I just wasn’t expecting it. Maybe you and I aren’t as different as I first thought.”

Mantis smiled weakly in return. “I know what everyone thinks of me,” she replied. “Quiet, sweet, naive Mantis. She feels feelings, she helps people sleep. She is not very clever, or brave, or interesting. She just...is.”

“Mantis - ” Peter protested.

“I’m guilty of thinking those exact things when I first arrived,” Gamora interrupted. “And I also worried about what your powers would mean for my privacy. I trust you now. At least, enough to get this done. But that trust won’t last if you continue to evade us.”

“I would not betray your privacy,” Mantis frowned. “And I would not go out of my way to hurt you. Either of you.”

“Then where do you go when you say Dad’s got a job for you?” Peter asked, beginning to grow impatient. “All those times where I ask you if you wanna hang out, and you’re busy. Sometimes you’re both gone for days, Mantis. Where do you go?”

Mantis remained silent for a moment, staring into the candle flickering in the middle of the table. The warm yellow light cast an eerie, almost sickly glow over her face, illuminating her enormous, dark eyes. “The only secret I can tell you,” she said quietly, “is that there is a secret that Father and I share. And it is something you must never know about, or it will kill you.”

“Wait, literally?” Peter leaned towards her in concern. “Mantis...what has he got you doing?”

“Please,” Mantis pleaded, trembling. “I can see that it is frustrating you. And I hate not being able to tell you what it is. But if you still trust me at all, you will not ask me about it again.” She smiled weakly. “You are such a good brother to me, Peter. And you have always been so protective. So let me protect you for once.”

Peter looked over at Gamora then, who was watching Mantis carefully, her brow furrowed in contemplation. She was still so new to the Celestial siblings’ dynamic, knew far more about Peter than she did about Mantis, and there was still so much left to learn about them both. And yet, for someone who had been raised in such a barbaric, animalistic environment, she did indeed seem far more “sane” than Peter would have ever guessed her to be. He still remembered when she first arrived - practically stomping into the throne room, decked out in full armor, her mere presence demanding to be seen and heard. Her reputation preceded her, making him almost certain his future wife was going to be, at best, cold, calculating, devoid of feeling. And maybe she had started that way, or at least, appeared that way. But now?

“I believe her, Quill,” Gamora murmured quietly, leaning back in her seat. “What she said sounds ominous, but it also sounds true. Your father seems like the kind of man who would coerce his own child into carrying out his immoral deeds. This isn’t Mantis’s choice. This is his doing.” She turned to the other girl. “If we follow through with the plan...will it free you from his secret? Will you tell us everything that he’s done, so we can undo it and make things right?”

“Undoing what we have done will be impossible,” Mantis murmured. “But yes. It will, and I will.”

Gamora nodded sharply, a smirk beginning to form. “Good. Not that we needed another reason to take him out, but I suppose we’ll all sleep better at night, knowing you’ll be okay.”

Mantis smiled brightly in return. “Thank you, Gamora. I am very glad you are on our side. We would be forever stuck in our old ways, if not for your bravery.”

“That’s an exaggeration,” Gamora scoffed, though she looked pleased.

“I mean it,” Mantis said firmly, patting Gamora briefly on the arm. It was a testament to Gamora’s newfound comfort that she didn’t immediately pull away. “I was uneasy about the idea at first. And I did not know what to think of you, either. But it is something we must do, not just for us, but for everyone in the entire galaxy. Neither of us would have ever thought to do so, but you did.” Gamora faltered a little, glancing off to the side. Before Peter could ask her about it, Mantis spoke again. “Also, I think Peter is very glad to have you around.”

Peter let out an undignified squawk. “What’re you tryna say?”

“Just that you are friends.” Mantis blinked innocently once more. “What did you think I was talking about?”

“Hah,” Peter said weakly. “Right.”

“So are all settled then? No more secrets, no more anger. We let nothing get in the way,” Gamora said, glancing between them.

“Yeah. And sorry that I lost my temper, Mantis,” Peter said gently. “For yellin’, for grabbin’ you...that wasn’t cool. I won’t do it again, I promise. I never wanna hurt you, ever.”

“And I am sorry for being so secretive.” Mantis reached across the table to grab Peter’s hands. “I want to tell you absolutely everything, but it is not safe. I should have just said that the first time you asked, instead of pushing you away. I could feel your distress, your anger, your sadness. I like you best when you are happy, Peter.”

“So do I,” he replied quietly.

They smiled at each other, relieved. Gamora couldn’t help but smile herself. “Are we ready to pay the bill?”

“Pay the - Gamora, we haven’t had dessert yet!” Peter exclaimed. Mantis squealed in delight, volunteering to flag down a waiter for the menu.

Sighing, Gamora slouched in her seat, unsure if she had the energy to keep up with their double act for the rest of the night. “Here we go.” ______

Mantis said something kinda weird to me before she left,” Peter said as he and Gamora returned to their hotel room. It was nearing midnight, and he was pleasantly tired, though there was an underlying fuzziness in his brain that he hadn’t quite been able to untangle since Mantis had spoken to him.

“What’s that?” Gamora kicked off her shoes, stretching luxuriously.

“That she thought you were one thing before today, and now she thinks you’re something else entirely.” Peter paused. “Then again, she’s been acting real cryptic all night. Maybe she just drank too much - ”

“She was having carbonated water, I highly doubt that affected her cognition,” Gamora snorted, though she couldn’t help but be curious as well. “Was that it?”

Peter flushed. “Yes,” he said quickly.

“Really?” Gamora deadpanned. “Your face says otherwise.”

Peter crossed the room quickly to stand by his bed, his back to her, heart pounding as he began undoing his tie. She thinks I like you. “C’mon, Gamora, Mantis and I might be back on track, but it don’t mean I understand everything she says and does.” She thinks I wish this was for real. “She hasn’t been around other people much, so getting to spend time with another girl - woman - is a good thing. And now she knows you're a friend. That’s probably what she meant.” She thinks I want you to stay. “She’s glad you’re here.”

I think she’s right. ______

Peter was sprawled across his bed, staring intently at the high ceiling with long, dangling lights that formed a geometric pattern his brain couldn’t comprehend at eight in the morning (or really, ever). He screwed his eyes shut in frustration. It was the last day of their Xandar trip, before they would have to return to a different kind of reality - one where his father ambled about, lurking like some affable, old-school Bond villain, where Gamora’s father sat comfortably in a stone throne millions of miles away, contemplating destruction like he was deciding what to have for breakfast, and where he and Gamora were friends with a marriage certificate and an expiry date.

“You seem very fascinated with the ceiling. Should I even ask?” His eyes flew open to see a fully-dressed Gamora standing over him, looking mildly amused. “Come on, Quill, we’ll miss the car if you don’t get ready right now.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m getting up.” He sat up slowly, watching her as she took a couple steps backward to give him space. “Hey, uh, thanks.”

“For what?”

“For dealing with all that stuff with me and Mantis. And all the other times you’ve, I dunno, helped me out.” Peter smiled at her, something soft, a little crooked, but entirely endearing. Gamora bit her lip to stop herself from smiling back. “Uh, not that it’s your job or anything, but...I’m glad you’re here. For me. With me? You know, like…” He trailed off awkwardly.

She paused before shaking her head and walking away. “Now who’s being cryptic? Get dressed. We’re leaving in ten.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He saluted half-heartedly at her retreating back.

All things considered, their days at the outreach center were going quite smoothly. Gamora worked in the back with her people, where they carried out odd jobs here and there, chatting amicably. It was busy work, but it was better than the kind of jobs they were usually given. Peter and Mantis were out at the very front of the building, greeting and subsequently charming everyone that walked through the door. It was what they were good at - the sunny smiles, the friendly small talk, things Gamora could only muster on her best day. She couldn’t help but eye the group of young women who swept into the building first thing every morning since they had opened, who insisted on practically swarming Peter, asking if she really existed. It made Gamora itch, though she wasn’t sure why.

“She’s real shy sometimes. Not really a people person,” Peter would say with a wry chuckle. “But she’s great! I’m glad I married her.” Gamora would then feel silly for eavesdropping in the first place, retreating quietly before Peter could notice.

Today, however, was a different story. Nova Prime briefed them on the press’s perception of Gamora, how they had seen so little of her that they were starting to suspect she was as cold as her reputation implied. It resulted in Gamora and Mantis switching places, much to her dismay.

“This can’t be good,” Gamora murmured. She and Peter were stood side-by-side in the lobby, near the reception area. “Quill, these are ex-criminals we’re dealing with. Someone’s going to recognize me from what was likely their worst memory, and it won’t end well.”

“There won’t be that many people. First day was super busy, but now? Nah,” Peter said, waving it off. “Besides, I’m here. I’ll fend ‘em off if you want me to.”

“Yes, because a few training sessions makes you an expert at combat all of a sudden,” Gamora said dryly.

“I mean if they start acting like assholes. They’re not dumb enough to start a fight,” Peter corrected. “And hey, gimme some credit. I’ve been doing pretty awesome lately, you said it yourself!”

“You throwing me on the mat every now and then doesn’t mean you can actually beat me,” she teased, relaxing.

“Give it a few more rounds and I just might,” he grinned, gently nudging her with his shoulder. Gamora smiled back, shaking her head with a soft huff of quiet laughter.

“Hey, Quill! Quit flirtin’ with your wife and help me move these boxes ‘fore everyone gets here!” Yondu hollered from down the hallway.

“I’m not - oh god,” Peter groaned. “I’ll be right back, ignore him - ”

“I always do,” Gamora called as he jogged away.

Once the facility had opened for the day, Gamora found herself keeping her guard up, smiling tightly at everyone who came through. Peter did most of the talking, shaking hands and explaining what the outreach center was for. To her surprise, many of the visitors weren’t ex-convicts, but rather, affluent society members looking to provide donations or sponsorship. “You look confused,” Peter whispered after yet another sweet, older couple dropped by to hand over a stack of blank cheques.

“Sometimes I forget...some people are just inherently good.” Gamora looked at him with a rueful smile. “Maybe these people have ulterior motives, maybe they’re seeking a monument in their name. Or a way to cover their sins. But maybe they just want to help.”

Peter paused. “You projecting a little?”

“Maybe,” Gamora repeated, shaking her head. “It’s things like this that make me wonder if...if going after your father will do more harm than good. This could be your and Mantis’s legacy - well, hers, mostly - and I’m just ruining the potential of it by asking you to help me kill my father.”

“Our legacy,” Peter corrected, “will be stopping him, once and for all. Don’t mean this place will be going anywhere. Don’t mean any of us have to go anywhere. I really like doing this, this helping people thing. Makes me feel useful. And hey, you’re welcome to join me.”

“You really want me to stay, don’t you?” Gamora said, biting her lip.

“You’re my friend, Gamora.” Peter’s eyes were earnest, sincere. “I like hanging out with my friends. And if I get to do cool stuff with my friends, like kick some ass and help save lives? Sounds like a pretty awesome legacy to me.” Before Gamora could respond, the door swung open. A pair of familiar-looking Nova officers marched in, dragging a trio of handcuffed convicts along between them. She inhaled sharply at the sight. Here we go.

“Your highnesses,” Denarian Saal droned, sounding as bored as ever. “Nova Prime has requested we register these prisoners for the high-level rehabilitation program. We have their biometrics and IDs.”

“Sign in with Bereet,” Peter replied, gesturing behind him towards the Krylorian receptionist. “I’ll go see if any of the counselors are available for consultations, though I think they’re pretty booked right now.”

Gamora watched him rather nervously as he left, now alone with the officers and the snarling prisoners, who were rattling their chains like they were still behind bars. It was a familiar sound, some grotesque melody that she had hoped to never hear again. One of them, a particularly ugly-looking Badoon, growled at her, deep and guttural.

“Princess Gamora,” he sneered mockingly. “What a joke. Who could look at a monster like you, and call you a princess?”

“Your words will not phase me,” she replied calmly. “So save your voice for your counselor. You will need it.”

“Did you feel like royalty when you tore apart my village, princess?” the Sneeper with pointy teeth hissed. “You must have been so proud, driving your sword into the heart of my child.” The chains rattled again, this time more threateningly.

“You really are wasting everyone’s time,” Gamora said, plastering a fake smile as one of the donors waved goodbye on their way out of the building. “Officers, are you done yet?”

“Does your husband know you leave death everywhere you walk? He must, since you killed your brother at your own wedding!” the Badoon chuckled gleefully.

It was then that Peter returned, followed by one of the counselors. “They’re ready for ‘em, officers,” he said cheerfully before joining Gamora once more. “What’d I miss?” he asked, completely oblivious.

“Do you share a bed with your wife, Prince Peter?” The last prisoner, a smug-looking Rajak, smirked lecherously.

“That’s - super inappropriate to ask, what the hell,” Peter grimaced. “Have you been dealing with these jerks while I was gone? I shouldn’t’ve left, sorry - ”

“It’s fine, Quill, it’s nothing I haven’t heard before,” Gamora said cooly.

“She doesn’t even call you by your name!” the Rajak hooted. “And here I thought, maybe the little princess found someone as bloodthirsty as she was. But you’re just her pet, aren’t you? Do you roll over and show your belly, your highness? Or maybe you get on your knees instead, I bet she likes that - ”

“Officers, I don’t think these prisoners are ready for the rehabilitation program,” Peter said loudly, looking to the receptionist’s desk. “Tell Nova Prime to send them back. Maybe we’ll get a counselor over to you instead.”

“One second,” Denarian Saal called back impatiently, clearly uninterested in anything Peter had to say.

“You should know, your highness, that your precious wife takes great pleasure in everything she does,” the Sneeper simpered, yanking especially hard on his chains. “There was a Levian I shared a cell with, back on the Kyln. He told me of the time a mysterious traveler appeared in his town, seeking shelter. The lord of the land took her in, thinking she was a fragile young woman. She seduced him, of course. Made him feel special. She left within the week, and took all of his money and heirlooms with her, but not before killing the mysterious life force that powered their hearts.”

“I - ” Gamora began, but the Badoon interrupted next.

“Did you ever hear of her last mission before she decided to settle down with you?” He smirked. “You must have heard of Ronan the Accuser, your highness. They were on their way to Morag, seeking the Infinity Stone together, but I guess that didn’t mean much to her. She practically tore him apart for looking at her wrong, before Thanos got there and decided to finish the job himself. Though can you blame him? Your wife is quite the looker, your highness, even when she’s drenched in blood.”

“Alright, that’s enough!” Peter said firmly. His hands were held high, the light glowing rather menacingly from his fingertips. “What, you think telling me that stuff is gonna make me change my mind? Or that talkin’ shit about my wife helps your case? You think it’s gonna make your lives any easier?”

“Quill, it’s not worth it,” Gamora insisted, reaching for him.

“You speak of good deeds while you stand beside the woman who carved the galaxy’s history with her sword,” the Rajak spat. “We’ve all heard tales of the infamous Prince Peter, the powerful, charismatic do-gooder, but from what I can see, he’s either a coward or just stupid.”

“Hey!” Gamora barked, stepping in front of Peter. She wasn’t sure when she had drawn her sword, but it now weighed heavy in her hands, ready to strike, and now he was the one attempting to pull her away. “Choose your next words wisely. And keep our names out of your filthy mouth.”

“Well, I - ” With an unceremonious cry, the three prisoners jolted violently before collapsing to the ground, revealing Denarian Dey standing behind them, brandishing his stun baton. Denarian Saal was stood nearby, looking even more unimpressed than usual.

“Sorry about that,” Denarian Dey said cheerfully. “We always thought these guys weren’t really ready yet, but Nova Prime seemed optimistic. Back to the Kyln they go!”

“You guys need to do a better job at screening these dudes,” Peter said, staring down at the unconscious bodies sprawled awkwardly on the floor. “Did you hear all that crap they just said about Gamora?”

“Well, it’s not like they were entirely...wrong,” Denarian Dey coughed awkwardly, looking nervously at Gamora. It was then that she realized he was eyeing her sword, still held high, and she quickly tucked it away. “Um, no offense, your highness.”

“None taken,” she said, letting out the breath she didn’t realize she was holding, though her heart was still hammering wildly in her chest like some sick adrenaline rush. “As I said, nothing I haven’t heard before.”

The Nova officers dragged the unconscious prisoners out the door as the receptionist stared on, open-mouthed. Peter stepped closer to Gamora once the doors were shut, his hands coming to rest on her shoulders. “Hey, you okay?”

“I don’t need reassurance after every confrontation, you know,” Gamora said with a wobbly smile. “I’m fine. I can handle it myself.”

“I was thinkin’ you don’t have to,” Peter said, reluctant to let go. “You need someone, you got me.”

“I just...I need a moment. Alone.” Gamora pulled herself out of his grasp, though not unkindly.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.” Peter nodded sharply. “Uh, there’s a storage room back there that’s basically empty, so no one’s gonna barge in. I’ll come find you later?”

“Okay,” she repeated. She felt like she was operating on autopilot, her mind overwhelmed with all the images, the absolutely awful images that had come flooding back to her. The smell of blood was more familiar to her than the smell of flowers, the feeling of a weapon in her hands more comforting than the touch of another person. She wanted that to change - no, needed it to change.

Gamora looked up at Peter, wondering what he was thinking. What had he pictured in his mind when he first heard of her? Did he think she took pleasure in what she did? Did he know how far she had gone, how far gone she was? All she could see in his face was concern, not of her, but for her. She wasn’t sure what to make of it. “I’ll cover for you if Nova Prime asks,” Peter added. “Though I think once she hears the story, she’ll probably apologize to you. Again.”

“She had hope,” Gamora shrugged. “She thought they were ready, and they weren’t. They were just as hungry and reckless as before.”

Peter looked at her consideringly. “You’re projecting again,” he said, though not accusingly. “You sure you wanna be alone with your thoughts?”

“Up until recently, they were all I had.” She took another step back, giving him a tight smile. “See you later, Quill.” ______

Hey.” Peter entered the storage room once Gamora had allowed him in, silently closing the door behind him. “Denarian Dey says they don’t have anyone else comin’ in, so you’re good to go back out whenever. Or, y’know, never. If you wanna just sit here.”

Gamora was sat, curled into herself, on the floor of the room, the fluorescent light only further emphasizing the exhaustion in her eyes. She looked... sad. Angry, hurt, even guilty, Peter thought he had seen it all on her before, but not like this. “Okay,” she said quietly.

“You want me to leave?” Peter asked. Wordlessly, Gamora shook her head. Peter approached her slowly as if she were akin to a spooked animal before sitting down across from her, legs folded beneath him. “That stuff they said about you - ”

“It’s all true,” Gamora interrupted. “And it’s like I told Nova Prime - having my record wiped doesn’t make me any less of a criminal. Marrying you doesn’t make me any less of a coward. I lost control again. I almost killed someone, and for what, for taunting me? For trying to get to you? Thanos was right. I am weak.”

“No, you are the bravest person I’ve ever met,” Peter insisted. “You came up with this plan all on your own because you couldn’t stand the idea of watching anyone else die. You betrayed Thanos by coming to me with your own agenda. You taught me about stuff I didn’t know I had in me, and you saved my life. That don’t sound weak to me.”

“A stronger person would have confronted Thanos from the beginning,” Gamora replied. “A stronger person would have accepted death, instead of being the cause of everyone else’s.”

“You were a kid,” Peter exclaimed. “You were scared, and alone. You had to fight for yourself. C’mon, Gamora. You wanna be a good person?”

“Yes, but - ”

“Then you start by giving a shit.” Peter said it so bluntly that Gamora couldn’t help but choke out a laugh. “I’m serious! And you’ve already done that by showin’ up here and tellin’ me you want to stop Thanos from destroying the galaxy. So don’t give up. I haven’t seen you do it yet, and I don’t think you’re about to start.”

Continuing to chuckle softly, Gamora unfurled her arms from around her knees, stretching out her legs until they brushed against Peter’s. He shivered a little at her touch. “Survival is what I’m best at,” she said. “And I’ll make sure to keep everyone safe, too. That’ll be my job.”

“There you go,” Peter grinned. “And Gamora...all those things you’ve done...you’re just tryna make them right. Doesn’t that count for something?”

“I guess I won’t know until it’s done.” Gamora stood slowly, brushing the dust off her pants. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I actually miss being on Ego. Xandar feels like a place I could never survive in.”

“Survive?”

“I meant live,” Gamora corrected, though even she didn’t look so sure. She paused. “Maybe there is no home for me after all. I could just be a wanderer after this. Float among the stars.”

“As weirdly poetic - and morbid - as that sounds, my offer is still on the table, if you aren’t sick of me yet,” Peter said half-jokingly, also getting to his feet.

“If I left the moment I was getting sick of you, I would have been gone within the first ten minutes,” Gamora said, rolling her eyes. “I’ll consider it. Ask me again after our fathers are dead.”

“Now there’s a sentence,” Peter whistled. “I’ll go grab Yondu and let ‘im know. Let’s go home.”

a/n: hey, all! not sure why i said i'd be posting this in the first two weeks of march when i knew very well that i had midterms, but i hope you enjoyed this (both late and short-er) chapter! next chapter will be late april, as I have a non-au peter/gamora oneshot that i'm hopefully posting on my birthday (second week of april) and i've got finals in mid-april.

the song peter was listening to in gamora's room is everybody plays the fool by the main ingredient. also, i’ve been getting requests for chapter previews lately, so feel free to do so by sending me an ask (though not right away, I just barely started writing chapter six, haha).

thanks so much for reading, likes and reblogs would be much appreciated, and i'll see y'all in the next one!

[jenncognito]

The Nine Spell Sisters You’ll Meet in the Cactus Garden of Insta

If you've found this blog lovely, deep down you already know you have a serious problem. It’s cool. As useless as reading this will be to save your wallet, you’ll find some peace in knowing we’re in this together. So let’s get on with the first step in solving acknowledging our shared problem by admitting that some or all of the following shit has been going on lately:

“We”* have been frantically Googling Spell and the Gypsy Collective, Joplin Jacket or worse Spell Xanadu eBay... or even more hopelessly tragic Spell Folktown. We've been waking from dreams of blue skies and going to bed fantasizing about Lotu...actually we don't go to bed - at least not lately. We’re not sleeping much are we? No. We’re up sweating; obsessing over the one that got away... or in all probability will, at the next drop - because our internet isn't fast enough; because 7 seconds is suddenly an eternity during check out; because XS sells out first. Every. Fucking. Time. What we have is full blown PTSD - Post Traumatic Spell Disorder, with more than a healthy side case of drop anxiety.

* Please note the use of the ‘Spell sister we’ here.  Much like a ‘spousal we’ this in fact means you.

Sound about right?

Welcome friend. It's nice to have you. You’re safe here. At least until the end of May, when Lotus drops.

Ever wonder how this started? I do (and so does my husband, my wallet and all my abandoned hobbies.)

Since science is ignoring me won’t explain the root cause of my condition, I've been working on a few conspiracy theories to help explain how one innocent retail therapy sesh, consisting of a Route 66 dress, turned into a full blown brand dependency that has me mapping out intricate buying strategies a full 48 - 72 hours before every drop:

Conspiracy Theory 1: Spell infuses their hand drawn fabrics with Stevie Nick's breath which they have bottled into microscopic nanotubes that fit into the heads of sewing needles. After the Australian TGA denied approval on a Stevie Nicks Vape pen, wherein the user would actually inhale the muse’s vocal chord filtered CO2, Spell had a shitload of unregulated gypsy breath on their turquoise encrusted hands. As Spelly and Lizzy are committed to sustainability, they quickly found a way to repurpose this rare and precious resource. The result? Once you start wearing a Spell piece, Stevie’s magical gypsy breath whispers into your pores, delivering you an effortless high that obviously demands you chase it again and again... on the wings of an enormous owl, obviously. Why this is probably true: Look no further than yourself - yes or no, you increasingly find yourself totally down with multiple layers of lace you would have never considered wearing at this age (or since that rad 1990 Jr. Prom dress)? Yes or no, you have found yourself with both a Stevie Nicks and Fleetwood Mac Spotify Channel on endless rotation? Yes or no, when someone mentions the word leather, you blurt the lyrics “take from me my laaaace?” (note: There is actually a Spell Sisters 70’s Festival Jamboree playlist on Spotify. You’re welcome from Lulu Mey, the goddess who created it.)

Conspiracy Theory 2: Spell runs a genius instagram account 782k followers strong and just when you think you can ‘totally survive without another piece from Festival ‘17 BAM - you see it styled on a muse that could easily be you. You could be in Thailand, in that backless Lolita, in front of that waterfall, with those lovely beachy waves in your hair and no shoes because you floated there (on the owl - duh.) In fact it probably IS you… because they plucked that image straight out of your unicorn mind, put a 72% Lark filter on it and fed the ‘travelling you’ right into that instagram channel. They did this as a courtesy ICYMI; you know, all the retargeting ads the other gentle signs reminding you that you actually do NEED this piece in your life and it’s no longer optional. Why this is probably true: because it is true. See: @spell_byronbay.

Pick your theory but the FOMO (Folktown Obsessed Must Own) is real. Obviously, they have put a serious Spell on us - sorry not sorry, pun was too obvious. Show me another brand tribe that feels compelled to share their instant bond on insta when they show up full twinsies at a party (Who wore it best? Both of us! Yay! Love you! Love you more! #twinsemoji) Show me another brand tribe that has women from ages 18 - 81 searching for a magical unicorn in the shape of a mumu. Show me another brand who has more authentically gorgeous UGC. See: #myspellcollection #spelldesigns #spellskirtswish #vintagespell #spellluxelace #spellfestivalstyle

While we share a familiar ache in our wallets and art museums for closets, we’re a globally diverse tribe to be sure. Still yet, with every Spell Sister you meet, you connect with a little piece of yourself, right? Just in case your affliction is fresh and you’re still trying to find your cactus rose footings... Here’s the short list of the nine Spell Sister’s you’ll meet fall in love with in the cactus garden we call Insta (ps, I’m @jennvonhagen )

1) The Unconditional Lover: She buys something from every drop, and even if she's secretly not 100% sure it works on her, she's committed to making it work and her tribe is there to help her rock it hard. Queue the extra large knotted hemline and for God’s sake woman - just belt it. Spell can do no wrong - not even a dress recall phases her - she kept that Blue Skies Maxi Wrap dress, and she wears a kimono made of bubble wrap over it - and somehow it actually works for her - because she belts it.

2) The Fresh Collector: She "just found this new brand OMG" Bae got woke somewhere right after Hotel Paradiso and she can't shut the fuck up about her OZ obsession - because she DISCOVERED it you guys. We don’t blame her for the misconception, we felt EXACTLY the same way. Her insta is full of ‘lowered gaze’ shots that have you wondering WTF she’s staring at. Educated guess - it’s 16 trash bags full of labels she’ll never wear again. Regardless, she looks amazing in that dress, so we don’t give a shit - we welcome her with open kimonos.  Babushka was her first ‘fully aware drop’; her collection has a shit ton of it. We’re simultaneously proud and worried, because she has no idea what she’s gotten into.

3) The Hider: Everything is NWT. She hasn’t even worn what she's got, and the challenge of justifying the spend is getting exponential. With her towers of white boxes getting harder and harder to conceal, the Husband is now on to her. Busted a few times during a delivery, she now sends the white boxes to the neighbors house and swears:

“It’s from Target/ I’ve had this forever/I’m borrowing it/Yay Swapped!”

(Rejoice hiders: the boxes are being transitioned out. You’ll no longer have to hide them - now you can simply obsess over collecting the cute new calico bags.)

4) The Girl Next Door: Nobody knows what she does for a living, but apparently she lives at Spell. I mean right inside the fucking Byron store... 12 minutes after a drop goes live, she's #spellswishing in the latest sold-out-soon-to-be-Unicorn. We hate her. Just kidding we love her. Just kidding we want to be her. Just kidding, we’ll settle for a sleepover - in her bohemian yurt, which is probably located right outside Spell’s cactus garden. 

5) The Historian: Her collection dates back farther than Gypsy Queen and she probably has that first Sugarhigh+Lovestoned tee they styled the early jewels with in a safety deposit box. She can recite the name of every collection and every piece in it. She can spot fakes too, because she knows exactly when the logo lock up changed thanks to Rachel Pony Gold (circa April/May 2012). She indulges in the bootstrapped sisterly romance of it all. Damn right she owns the book; it’s signed - obviously.

6) The Cheerleader: She likes EVERY photo with Spell in it, and she will tell you you look GORGEOUS every single time she sees you on Insta because she believes that you have a beautiful unicorn soul. “You in that Sunset Road + Festival ‘16 mashup = AMAZING!”

She imagines you in your private cactus garden teaching your children how to hand letter affirmation mantras and macrame their own diapers as you sip organic kombucha and braid your bestie’s hair. She loves you. So. Fucking. Much. Her pronouns are heart eye emoji and kiss emoji.

7) The Impulse Buyer: constantly swears to God and all that is will-powerful that she WILL. NOT. CAVE to the next drop. She is going to be practical for fuck’s sake. (Yah, Lotus has alot of yellows and olives.. I’m more of a “summer”) But then she buys the Joplin Jacket because Florida winters are “brutal”. She has a large return shipping bill, admits that this is merely an endless paypal exchange and knows the Customer Service Angels by name (Oh, hey Angela). She uses the RA form and chat feature to send them love notes and see how they’re holding up after each drop.

8) The Wing-Woman: you either are one, have one - or both. She’s as hardcore as you are and she doesn’t judge your illness. You both have issues. This is the person you spend hours strategizing with before every drop. You two have your own kind of math and it’s harder to follow than ‘conceptual math. But this secret Spell math is a thing of fucking beauty: no matter what the equation, you always get the answer you want: 

”Ok, I returned my Blue Skies Wrap, so I have a credit, plus what I saved on the Babushka Midi equals the price of the Joplin …. I’m net zero!” 

You size up the line, screen shotting Snapchat and teasing each other via text. You pro/con every piece based on some fictional, rational version of you that “doesn’t need another gown, but needs to go with 2 piece sets you know, for more daily use.” (Um, sure - whatever you need to tell yourself hun.)  If you’re on vacay during the drop, she’s got your back - as in your paypal payback - unconditional support is just a click away. She’s also hunting unicorns for you on the side and blowing you up on text in the middle of the night with buyer’s guilt (note the lack of remorse. There is never remorse, just fleeting guilt and temporary indulgence shaming for going overboard with both the Stardust Cami AND the Jacket “I’m a living Goddamned disco ball, WTF have I done? But I lurrve them.Yay me!)

9) The Unicorn Hunter: She’s next level obsessed, willing to throw cash and half her current Spell stash at the "last ever of it's kind, ever." ‘Evil-bay’ is alternately her nemesis, and her reluctant savior. After multiple talks off the Buy It Now button and pleas to her practical side, she eventually caves for her Unicorn, pays an obscene price and then never takes it off. See: Anything Folktown or a Xanadu Maxi Dress on eBay/Poshmark/Depop/Facebook Swap & Sell insert streaming tears emoji + unicorn emoji

As different as we may be - there’s something beyond swirling around in art that pulls us together. Perhaps it’s the addictive cocktail of anticipation + adrenaline + winning. Even as we’re confident that Spelly, Lizzy and all the Angels are sorting through the surprise growing pains, deep down we know there’s a small part of us that will miss bonding/sweating/crying over the chaos. More likely though, it’s the authentic friendships formed while supporting each other. ( I just heard a story from two best friends who met via a hashtag. They live a world apart, but talk every day.)

While I can't offer a cure (because Lotus/May/God help us), we can still justify our spending take comfort in knowing we’re not alone. (Or maybe that just adds to our stress because at least 20K+ of us have the notifications turned on for an intense Facebook page where we channel our obsession into smarter ways to buy/sell or swap more pieces.) Either way - rejoice in the Spell Sisterhood - our love runs deep, our tribe is epic and your OOTD is eternally on point.

PS - does anyone have a Turquoise Folktown Skirt and Top set in XS? Seriously, I die.

Note: You can follow more of the saga on Insta @jennvonhagen After I wrote this blog, I stumbled upon a hilarious thread on the Facebook Spell Designs Buys Swap and Sell page where fellow sisters are sharing their legit addiction and proven survival techniques. I’m currently interviewing for a follow up to this post, where I’ll share stories from all nine types of sisters. If you identify with one or more of the above, comment with your number(s) and if you’d like to be a part of the next post, message me here, on Insta or email me at jenn@ambidustrious.com

[philipfloyd]

How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months

This is a TRUE & SUCCESSFUL story from Jibran Qazi – Founder of Hunter Canada, a cognitiveSEO long-time customers and SEO experts with almost 15 years of expertise.

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential traffic growth. Enjoy his story, written and documented by himself, and see how he managed to grow an app in the Fintech space, increasing its number of monthly visitors from 4000 to 420K+ in just 6 months.  All organic traffic from Google, no PPC, no paid ads.

    Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

Social Proof

The Numbers

First 30 Days

First 60 days (2 months)

First 120 Days (4 Months)

First 180 Days (6 months)

How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

The SEO Process

Negative SEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains

Build Citations

Add Your Link to Reliable Directory

Add Text

Moving Forward

Using Phrases As Anchor Text

The Link Building Strategy

Forget About NoFollow Links

Conclusion

  1. Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

  The length of our contract was 6 months which started on May 29th, 2018 and ended on Nov 29, 2018.

  Let’s start with some social proof, shall we:

  1.1 Social Proof

    If you zoom into the email, you’ll see I got them on the first page for “Invoice” and “Receipt”.  Two massive keywords. Not sure if they are still there but during that time, they sure were.

  1.2 The Numbers

    For obvious reasons, I can’t share the exact numbers but this should give you an idea.

    Which lead to over 350K downloads of their app.

    Let’s break down the month by month increase.

  1.3 First 30 Days

  Success to these guys was a 30% increase in the first 3-6 months. I handed this to them in the first 30 days.

  In fact, I more than doubled it. Over 60%.

    1.4 First 60 days (2 months)

  During these months and pretty much every month after I started, the growth was (As expected) simply exponential.

370%+ increase in traffic in just 2 months.

    Over 1200%+ increase in just 3 months.

  1.5 First 120 Days (4 Months)

  Over 3000%+ increase in traffic. In fact, this was the first time the traffic went over 140K.

    1.6 First 180 Days (6 months)

  This is where I took them over 8000% in organic growth and had over 420k people in total. All in 6 months.

    2. How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

  To get such results in your own niche, you must rank for some high volume keywords. I got this Fintech company on the first page for the following massive keywords:

Invoice;

Receipt;

    Considering they weren’t even close when I benchmarked everything in the beginning, these are pretty solid results.

  I literally beat out sites like Wikipedia, Shopify, Office.com and many more established sites with massive advertising budgets.

  3. The SEO Process

  Since I can’t share exactly what I did for legal reasons, let me share some “general tips”. I just applied my 3 step formula again:

Fix what’s wrong (Site Architecture).

Optimize Site (On-Page SEO).

Build Links (Starts from day 1).

  If you’re new to SEO, or not sure what ‘link juice’ is, start here.

    The only difference is instead of approaching these steps in a sequence, you should perform all 3 steps at the same time in a holistic way.

  Now you can use lots of tools for the first two steps (Depends on your preference really) but the main one that really helped me get this site (Plus my other clients/sites) to the next level was hands down, Cognitive SEO.

  Here’s why:

If you want the deepest backlink data, there is just no comparison.

For the past 3 years, I’ve been using it for the initial NegSEO cleanup and then ongoing monitoring.

When I’m considering getting a backlink from somewhere which looks a little odd, CognitiveSEO allows me to take a deeper look.

  Guys, the thing is if you want great results, you have to use quality tools. CognitiveSEO is one of them. So generally speaking, here is how you should usually approach a site.

  3.1 NegSEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains (help.mysite.com)

  Always do a NegSEO check on your main domain and any subdomains first. Sometimes spammy links from your subdomains can kill your traffic over time. I love how CognitiveSEO allows me to look up subdomains for NegSEO as well. Very important.

    When disavowing, always make sure you manually check the metrics of the sites you want to disavow. Sometimes you can disavow good ones as well and that could hurt you a lot.

  There is a world of difference between a spammy site vs a low quality site. You need to disavow spammy site not low quality sites.

  According to Cognitive SEO, 97% of Google is made of low-quality sites. Check out Google’s very own backlink profile below:

    3.2 Build Citations

  Citations are links from local business directories. It is surprising how so many businesses (Established or not), have not paid any attention to these.

  Quality citations are a great source for backlinks and another great way of diversifying your backlink profile.

  3.3 Add Your Link to JoeAnt

  If there is one directory that I swear by to this day, it is JoeAnt. Love how they’ve maintained their quality throughout all these years. So always make sure you are present on JoeAnt.

  It will give your site two things. A quality backlink and another diverse source that your backlinks is coming from. In this case, it would be from a directory.

  3.4 Add Text

  Try your best to turn your main pages (Pages you want to rank), into long copy.

  These days, you need to have around 3000+ words. You don’t have to do it right away but keep adding text little by little.

  3.5 Moving Forward

  Most of these changes that I’ve mentioned here take the first 30-60 days. Usually 60 days as all the changes you are making need to get re-indexed as well. I used a service called One Hour Indexing for this.

  Oh wait … What about backlinks?

  Again, nothing special here either. Just you typical, manual, white hat link building (Blog comments, Forums, Directories, etc).

  When it comes to SEO, it’s link building that takes most of my time. 2-4 hours a day at the very least. I recommend getting 15-20 links a month and see how your site reacts to it. Then you adjust your numbers accordingly. That’s really it.

  3.6 Using Phrases As Anchor Text

  Forget about one or two-word anchor texts. Most of the anchor texts that I use are between 5 to 7 words. Yes you read that right. It looks natural and it works.

  In most cases, using the keywords isn’t necessary either.

  4. The Link Building Strategy

  Now, this is something I haven’t seen anyone discuss so I would like to share this. After finding quality link opportunities, where and how do you point them?

  Well first, never link to the homepage. As the homepage usually already has enough links coming in. I’ve read case studies where they only link to the homepage and get great results. Like I said earlier, everyone has their own style and this is what has worked for me.

  Once I reach the top, I randomize this pattern every 30 days so it all looks natural for Google as well. Think of link building as putting different coats of paint. Just make sure each coat (link building cycle) is different.

  4.1 Forget About NoFollow Links

  Forget about NoFollow or not. Just get links that fall in your pre-determined metric’s range (One I mentioned above).

  You need both kinds of links (Heck I say get all kinds of links from all kinds of CMS’s) so you get quality links from diverse sources. That’s the key to successful link building.

  Please stop ignoring ‘NoFollow’ links. If they are coming from a good authoritative place, get them. Nofollow links from Forbes or Wikipedia are still world-class links. Never check if a backlink is NoFollow or not. Haven’t done that in ages.

  Conclusion

  At the end of the day, if you do the following, you’ll get great results:

Pay attention to where and how the ‘link juice’ of a site flows. Be obsessed with link juice.

Make smart changes that work for you and Google. A healthy balance here can always be achieved.

Write about things your competitors aren’t.

Never stop getting backlinks.

Use proper tools to get a deeper look at your backlinks (Current and the ones that you want to acquire).

Run your own tests.

  That’s pretty much it.

  Disclaimer

This is not a paid post. cognitiveSEO made no agreement with the author. This is Jibran’s success story, written and documented by himself.

  Please feel free to share your thoughts on this story with us.

  About the author

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential growth. 

The post How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months appeared first on SEO Blog | cognitiveSEO Blog on SEO Tactics & Strategies.

from Marketing https://cognitiveseo.com/blog/22747/how-to-increase-website-traffic/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[krisggordon]

How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months

This is a TRUE & SUCCESSFUL story from Jibran Qazi – Founder of Hunter Canada, a cognitiveSEO long-time customers and SEO experts with almost 15 years of expertise.

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential traffic growth. Enjoy his story, written and documented by himself, and see how he managed to grow an app in the Fintech space, increasing its number of monthly visitors from 4000 to 420K+ in just 6 months.  All organic traffic from Google, no PPC, no paid ads.

    Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

Social Proof

The Numbers

First 30 Days

First 60 days (2 months)

First 120 Days (4 Months)

First 180 Days (6 months)

How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

The SEO Process

Negative SEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains

Build Citations

Add Your Link to Reliable Directory

Add Text

Moving Forward

Using Phrases As Anchor Text

The Link Building Strategy

Forget About NoFollow Links

Conclusion

  1. Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

  The length of our contract was 6 months which started on May 29th, 2018 and ended on Nov 29, 2018.

  Let’s start with some social proof, shall we:

  1.1 Social Proof

    If you zoom into the email, you’ll see I got them on the first page for “Invoice” and “Receipt”.  Two massive keywords. Not sure if they are still there but during that time, they sure were.

  1.2 The Numbers

    For obvious reasons, I can’t share the exact numbers but this should give you an idea.

    Which lead to over 350K downloads of their app.

    Let’s break down the month by month increase.

  1.3 First 30 Days

  Success to these guys was a 30% increase in the first 3-6 months. I handed this to them in the first 30 days.

  In fact, I more than doubled it. Over 60%.

    1.4 First 60 days (2 months)

  During these months and pretty much every month after I started, the growth was (As expected) simply exponential.

370%+ increase in traffic in just 2 months.

    Over 1200%+ increase in just 3 months.

  1.5 First 120 Days (4 Months)

  Over 3000%+ increase in traffic. In fact, this was the first time the traffic went over 140K.

    1.6 First 180 Days (6 months)

  This is where I took them over 8000% in organic growth and had over 420k people in total. All in 6 months.

    2. How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

  To get such results in your own niche, you must rank for some high volume keywords. I got this Fintech company on the first page for the following massive keywords:

Invoice;

Receipt;

    Considering they weren’t even close when I benchmarked everything in the beginning, these are pretty solid results.

  I literally beat out sites like Wikipedia, Shopify, Office.com and many more established sites with massive advertising budgets.

  3. The SEO Process

  Since I can’t share exactly what I did for legal reasons, let me share some “general tips”. I just applied my 3 step formula again:

Fix what’s wrong (Site Architecture).

Optimize Site (On-Page SEO).

Build Links (Starts from day 1).

  If you’re new to SEO, or not sure what ‘link juice’ is, start here.

    The only difference is instead of approaching these steps in a sequence, you should perform all 3 steps at the same time in a holistic way.

  Now you can use lots of tools for the first two steps (Depends on your preference really) but the main one that really helped me get this site (Plus my other clients/sites) to the next level was hands down, Cognitive SEO.

  Here’s why:

If you want the deepest backlink data, there is just no comparison.

For the past 3 years, I’ve been using it for the initial NegSEO cleanup and then ongoing monitoring.

When I’m considering getting a backlink from somewhere which looks a little odd, CognitiveSEO allows me to take a deeper look.

  Guys, the thing is if you want great results, you have to use quality tools. CognitiveSEO is one of them. So generally speaking, here is how you should usually approach a site.

  3.1 NegSEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains (help.mysite.com)

  Always do a NegSEO check on your main domain and any subdomains first. Sometimes spammy links from your subdomains can kill your traffic over time. I love how CognitiveSEO allows me to look up subdomains for NegSEO as well. Very important.

    When disavowing, always make sure you manually check the metrics of the sites you want to disavow. Sometimes you can disavow good ones as well and that could hurt you a lot.

  There is a world of difference between a spammy site vs a low quality site. You need to disavow spammy site not low quality sites.

  According to Cognitive SEO, 97% of Google is made of low-quality sites. Check out Google’s very own backlink profile below:

    3.2 Build Citations

  Citations are links from local business directories. It is surprising how so many businesses (Established or not), have not paid any attention to these.

  Quality citations are a great source for backlinks and another great way of diversifying your backlink profile.

  3.3 Add Your Link to JoeAnt

  If there is one directory that I swear by to this day, it is JoeAnt. Love how they’ve maintained their quality throughout all these years. So always make sure you are present on JoeAnt.

  It will give your site two things. A quality backlink and another diverse source that your backlinks is coming from. In this case, it would be from a directory.

  3.4 Add Text

  Try your best to turn your main pages (Pages you want to rank), into long copy.

  These days, you need to have around 3000+ words. You don’t have to do it right away but keep adding text little by little.

  3.5 Moving Forward

  Most of these changes that I’ve mentioned here take the first 30-60 days. Usually 60 days as all the changes you are making need to get re-indexed as well. I used a service called One Hour Indexing for this.

  Oh wait … What about backlinks?

  Again, nothing special here either. Just you typical, manual, white hat link building (Blog comments, Forums, Directories, etc).

  When it comes to SEO, it’s link building that takes most of my time. 2-4 hours a day at the very least. I recommend getting 15-20 links a month and see how your site reacts to it. Then you adjust your numbers accordingly. That’s really it.

  3.6 Using Phrases As Anchor Text

  Forget about one or two-word anchor texts. Most of the anchor texts that I use are between 5 to 7 words. Yes you read that right. It looks natural and it works.

  In most cases, using the keywords isn’t necessary either.

  4. The Link Building Strategy

  Now, this is something I haven’t seen anyone discuss so I would like to share this. After finding quality link opportunities, where and how do you point them?

  Well first, never link to the homepage. As the homepage usually already has enough links coming in. I’ve read case studies where they only link to the homepage and get great results. Like I said earlier, everyone has their own style and this is what has worked for me.

  Once I reach the top, I randomize this pattern every 30 days so it all looks natural for Google as well. Think of link building as putting different coats of paint. Just make sure each coat (link building cycle) is different.

  4.1 Forget About NoFollow Links

  Forget about NoFollow or not. Just get links that fall in your pre-determined metric’s range (One I mentioned above).

  You need both kinds of links (Heck I say get all kinds of links from all kinds of CMS’s) so you get quality links from diverse sources. That’s the key to successful link building.

  Please stop ignoring ‘NoFollow’ links. If they are coming from a good authoritative place, get them. Nofollow links from Forbes or Wikipedia are still world-class links. Never check if a backlink is NoFollow or not. Haven’t done that in ages.

  Conclusion

  At the end of the day, if you do the following, you’ll get great results:

Pay attention to where and how the ‘link juice’ of a site flows. Be obsessed with link juice.

Make smart changes that work for you and Google. A healthy balance here can always be achieved.

Write about things your competitors aren’t.

Never stop getting backlinks.

Use proper tools to get a deeper look at your backlinks (Current and the ones that you want to acquire).

Run your own tests.

  That’s pretty much it.

  Disclaimer

This is not a paid post. cognitiveSEO made no agreement with the author. This is Jibran’s success story, written and documented by himself.

  Please feel free to share your thoughts on this story with us.

  About the author

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential growth. 

The post How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months appeared first on SEO Blog | cognitiveSEO Blog on SEO Tactics & Strategies.

from Marketing https://cognitiveseo.com/blog/22747/how-to-increase-website-traffic/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[wjwilliams29]

How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months

This is a TRUE & SUCCESSFUL story from Jibran Qazi – Founder of Hunter Canada, a cognitiveSEO long-time customers and SEO experts with almost 15 years of expertise.

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential traffic growth. Enjoy his story, written and documented by himself, and see how he managed to grow an app in the Fintech space, increasing its number of monthly visitors from 4000 to 420K+ in just 6 months.  All organic traffic from Google, no PPC, no paid ads.

    Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

Social Proof

The Numbers

First 30 Days

First 60 days (2 months)

First 120 Days (4 Months)

First 180 Days (6 months)

How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

The SEO Process

Negative SEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains

Build Citations

Add Your Link to Reliable Directory

Add Text

Moving Forward

Using Phrases As Anchor Text

The Link Building Strategy

Forget About NoFollow Links

Conclusion

  1. Success Story of 420K+ visitors increase 

  The length of our contract was 6 months which started on May 29th, 2018 and ended on Nov 29, 2018.

  Let’s start with some social proof, shall we:

  1.1 Social Proof

    If you zoom into the email, you’ll see I got them on the first page for “Invoice” and “Receipt”.  Two massive keywords. Not sure if they are still there but during that time, they sure were.

  1.2 The Numbers

    For obvious reasons, I can’t share the exact numbers but this should give you an idea.

    Which lead to over 350K downloads of their app.

    Let’s break down the month by month increase.

  1.3 First 30 Days

  Success to these guys was a 30% increase in the first 3-6 months. I handed this to them in the first 30 days.

  In fact, I more than doubled it. Over 60%.

    1.4 First 60 days (2 months)

  During these months and pretty much every month after I started, the growth was (As expected) simply exponential.

370%+ increase in traffic in just 2 months.

    Over 1200%+ increase in just 3 months.

  1.5 First 120 Days (4 Months)

  Over 3000%+ increase in traffic. In fact, this was the first time the traffic went over 140K.

    1.6 First 180 Days (6 months)

  This is where I took them over 8000% in organic growth and had over 420k people in total. All in 6 months.

    2. How To Get Exponential Results For Your Own Site

  To get such results in your own niche, you must rank for some high volume keywords. I got this Fintech company on the first page for the following massive keywords:

Invoice;

Receipt;

    Considering they weren’t even close when I benchmarked everything in the beginning, these are pretty solid results.

  I literally beat out sites like Wikipedia, Shopify, Office.com and many more established sites with massive advertising budgets.

  3. The SEO Process

  Since I can’t share exactly what I did for legal reasons, let me share some “general tips”. I just applied my 3 step formula again:

Fix what’s wrong (Site Architecture).

Optimize Site (On-Page SEO).

Build Links (Starts from day 1).

  If you’re new to SEO, or not sure what ‘link juice’ is, start here.

    The only difference is instead of approaching these steps in a sequence, you should perform all 3 steps at the same time in a holistic way.

  Now you can use lots of tools for the first two steps (Depends on your preference really) but the main one that really helped me get this site (Plus my other clients/sites) to the next level was hands down, Cognitive SEO.

  Here’s why:

If you want the deepest backlink data, there is just no comparison.

For the past 3 years, I’ve been using it for the initial NegSEO cleanup and then ongoing monitoring.

When I’m considering getting a backlink from somewhere which looks a little odd, CognitiveSEO allows me to take a deeper look.

  Guys, the thing is if you want great results, you have to use quality tools. CognitiveSEO is one of them. So generally speaking, here is how you should usually approach a site.

  3.1 NegSEO Check on Main (Mysite.com) + Subdomains (help.mysite.com)

  Always do a NegSEO check on your main domain and any subdomains first. Sometimes spammy links from your subdomains can kill your traffic over time. I love how CognitiveSEO allows me to look up subdomains for NegSEO as well. Very important.

    When disavowing, always make sure you manually check the metrics of the sites you want to disavow. Sometimes you can disavow good ones as well and that could hurt you a lot.

  There is a world of difference between a spammy site vs a low quality site. You need to disavow spammy site not low quality sites.

  According to Cognitive SEO, 97% of Google is made of low-quality sites. Check out Google’s very own backlink profile below:

    3.2 Build Citations

  Citations are links from local business directories. It is surprising how so many businesses (Established or not), have not paid any attention to these.

  Quality citations are a great source for backlinks and another great way of diversifying your backlink profile.

  3.3 Add Your Link to JoeAnt

  If there is one directory that I swear by to this day, it is JoeAnt. Love how they’ve maintained their quality throughout all these years. So always make sure you are present on JoeAnt.

  It will give your site two things. A quality backlink and another diverse source that your backlinks is coming from. In this case, it would be from a directory.

  3.4 Add Text

  Try your best to turn your main pages (Pages you want to rank), into long copy.

  These days, you need to have around 3000+ words. You don’t have to do it right away but keep adding text little by little.

  3.5 Moving Forward

  Most of these changes that I’ve mentioned here take the first 30-60 days. Usually 60 days as all the changes you are making need to get re-indexed as well. I used a service called One Hour Indexing for this.

  Oh wait … What about backlinks?

  Again, nothing special here either. Just you typical, manual, white hat link building (Blog comments, Forums, Directories, etc).

  When it comes to SEO, it’s link building that takes most of my time. 2-4 hours a day at the very least. I recommend getting 15-20 links a month and see how your site reacts to it. Then you adjust your numbers accordingly. That’s really it.

  3.6 Using Phrases As Anchor Text

  Forget about one or two-word anchor texts. Most of the anchor texts that I use are between 5 to 7 words. Yes you read that right. It looks natural and it works.

  In most cases, using the keywords isn’t necessary either.

  4. The Link Building Strategy

  Now, this is something I haven’t seen anyone discuss so I would like to share this. After finding quality link opportunities, where and how do you point them?

  Well first, never link to the homepage. As the homepage usually already has enough links coming in. I’ve read case studies where they only link to the homepage and get great results. Like I said earlier, everyone has their own style and this is what has worked for me.

  Once I reach the top, I randomize this pattern every 30 days so it all looks natural for Google as well. Think of link building as putting different coats of paint. Just make sure each coat (link building cycle) is different.

  4.1 Forget About NoFollow Links

  Forget about NoFollow or not. Just get links that fall in your pre-determined metric’s range (One I mentioned above).

  You need both kinds of links (Heck I say get all kinds of links from all kinds of CMS’s) so you get quality links from diverse sources. That’s the key to successful link building.

  Please stop ignoring ‘NoFollow’ links. If they are coming from a good authoritative place, get them. Nofollow links from Forbes or Wikipedia are still world-class links. Never check if a backlink is NoFollow or not. Haven’t done that in ages.

  Conclusion

  At the end of the day, if you do the following, you’ll get great results:

Pay attention to where and how the ‘link juice’ of a site flows. Be obsessed with link juice.

Make smart changes that work for you and Google. A healthy balance here can always be achieved.

Write about things your competitors aren’t.

Never stop getting backlinks.

Use proper tools to get a deeper look at your backlinks (Current and the ones that you want to acquire).

Run your own tests.

  That’s pretty much it.

  Disclaimer

This is not a paid post. cognitiveSEO made no agreement with the author. This is Jibran’s success story, written and documented by himself.

  Please feel free to share your thoughts on this story with us.

  About the author

  Jibran Qazi is an SEO consultant, growth hacker, and founder of Hunter Canada, a company that helps tech firms achieve exponential growth. 

The post How A Company from the Fintech’ Space Grew from 4000 to 420K Visitors in Just 6 Months appeared first on SEO Blog | cognitiveSEO Blog on SEO Tactics & Strategies.

[antiagingsol-blog]

Some Of The Earth 's Most Powerful Anti-Aging Foods

Study researches have been focusing a terrific bargain in recent years on determining which sort of foods have one of the most comprehensive anti-aging attributes. One variable which has aided this process has actually been the innovation of the ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbing Capability) rating for food items. This sophisticated-sounding name just indicates to the total antioxidant degrees for a certain food and it 's hidden potential to take in the numerous cost-free radicals which are in charge of so muc cell damage as well as early aging. Specific foods that we consume which have been selected as having a very high antioxidant include such things as black beans, strawberries, wonderful potatoes, irish potatoes, pomegranates, the majority of leafy environment-friendly vegetables, pumpkins, zuchini, squash, cherries, raspberries, blackberries and also several various other type of berries. One berry that definitely attracts attention from the rest is the goji berry, clearly where goji juice is made. It 's Latin name is Lycium Barbarum or simply Lycium. Goji berries are so fantastic due to the fact that to their balanced polysaccharide account. In fact, Dr. Earl Mindell, R.Ph., M.H., Ph.D (among the world 's top nutritionist) claims that the Goji Berry is just one of our most powerful anti-aging foods that we have available to us. He likewise says that scientific study has confirmed that several of our earth 's longest living individuals injest regular day-to-day portions of this reasonably small fruit which could in fact be the most potent food of it 's kind. Goji berries as well as therefore goji juice come from the ' Rooftop of the Globe ', the hills of western China where water as well as air top quality goes to it 's most immaculate. Dr. Mendell, who is not only one of the highest profile nutritionists on the whole earth however additionally the writer of some fifty-odd publications pertaining to health and wellness & nutrition such as ' The Vitamin Bible for the 21st Century ', ' The New Natural herb Scriptures ', as well as ' Peak Performance ' to call simply a few has mentioned that The role of goji berries and also juice in the body has been clinically studied with solid results. After gathering goji berry examples from across the globe, Dr. mendell and also his clinical personnel have actually made use of a spectroscopic evaluation, which is essentially a molecular fingerprinting strategy, to select the highest-quality as well as most nutritionally abundant wolf berries that have the highest possible absorption prices in individuals. Some people ask yourself what does it cost? Goji Juice they must consume daily, and also Dr. Mendell has asserted that between one to 3 ounces each day is ideal for a lot of folks. The good news is, there are no well-known adverse effects from consuming alcohol way too much goji juice. It is just natural to wish to restore out bodies with healthy and balanced food. Goji berries as well as naturally it 's juice is simply one of one of the most respected anti-aging foods that we have offered to us on the planet today. As Rodney Collin was quoted as stating from ' The Concept of Conscious Consistency ':. " A physique was provided to us by Nature at our birth. Somewhere exists the initial Divine spark launched from God as well as which refound, will be his aware spirit. ". Additionally, an ancient saying goes something similar to this: ' The happiest of individuals do not constantly have the greatest of every little thing however they simply make the many of whatever that pertains to them. The brightest future will always be based upon a forgotten past as well as you will certainly not relocate onward up until you let go of your previous failings as well as heartaches.

You can read more informations here lifecell all in one anti aging treatment reviews

 Hey, guys. Dr. Josh Axe here. Welcome to "Ancient Medicine Today." I'm going to be going over the top 10 superfoods that support anti-aging. If you want to look younger, feel younger, if you want to have healthier skin, thicker skin, hair, and nails, then I'm going to be going over, again, the top foods and herbs. They're going to help you do just that. And I'll tell you I notice a lot of people who start to age faster than they should. Now a lot of that's emotional stress. Some of it is due to not getting the right type of foods in your diet. Have you ever seen anybody who was in their 60s but you could swear they were 20 years younger and vice versa someone who are in their 40s that looks 60? There are reasons for that. A lot of it has to do with diet toxicity, the things you're eating on a daily basis. And hey, help me spread the word. Today's episode I'm going to be talking about how to use food as medicine for anti-aging. Take a second right now. Punch your share button. Click your love button. Help me spread the word on how to use food as medicine. All right, I'm going to dive right in and start talking about these top 10 foods. Number one are figs. Now figs are incredible. And figs in Greece and in Israel we're known to be an anti-aging food. Now figs, specifically, you can see this reddish color in there. Those are flavonoids and different types of antioxidants. And the largest amount of antioxidants that are found in figs are actually on the skin, okay? On the skin area, figs are incredible for their health. Even those little seeds you'll see in there are full of omega-3 fats. But the biggest benefit of figs is that they contain a proteolytic enzyme called ficin. And ficin actually reduces inflammation throughout the body and supports anti-aging. It's good for so many things but it's loaded with antioxidants, some omegas in the seeds, and also these proteolytic enzymes. So figs, when you can get them fresh or dried, one of the best anti-aging foods out there today. And I'll mention, as well, another great fruit to go with figs to be pomegranates. Pomegranates contain similar antioxidants and flavonoids which help with that anti-aging process. So again, get figs in your diet to support anti-aging. The next thing in here is collagen protein. You can take a collagen protein supplement or a bone broth collagen protein supplement on a daily basis add a scoop to a smoothie and the benefits are tremendous. We know when your skin starts to sag, it's because your body isn't producing as much collagen. As you age your body produces less collagen over time. And remember this, collagen is the glue that holds your body together. It's the glue. It's that adhesive that tones and tightened your skin. When your body produces less collagen and when you get less collagen in your diet, it's what will start to cause premature wrinkles and sagging. If you're getting sagging in different areas of your body, collagen can help that. Collagen help support firmness and tonus in the body, and that's why two of my favorite protein powders are a bone broth powdered protein and a collagen protein on a regular basis. So again, make sure you're getting plenty of straight collagen in your diet every single day. And you'll notice this in anti-aging creams. Many of them contain collagen. Some of them contain hyaluronic acid but they contain compounds that help tone, tighten, and firm the skin. You got to get collagen at least one to two servings in your diet every single day to support anti-aging benefits. Number three superfood is chaga. Chaga is the prized medicinal mushroom from China. Now there are many beneficial medicinal mushrooms. Reishi would be the other one I would put on this list. Now reishi is prized in Chinese medicine as being the mushroom of immortality. It extends the life. It does that because Reishi and chaga actually helped in working as adaptogen. So they helped reduce stress on the body. Also another key factor you'll find with a few of these is they actually support stem cell production. Another really advanced treatment people are using for anti-aging is getting stem cell or PRP. That's platelet-rich plasma done on the skin as a holistic treatment. But listen, internally, chaga and reishi help your body produce more healthy amount of stem cells. They help reduce stress on the body. So what I would recommend is drinking a chaga tea daily or supplementing with reishi mushrooms but doing one of those or both in combination or alternating, an absolute must for anti-aging. And also chaga actually helps support your body's own collagen production. So not only can you get collagen in your diet, your body can produce more collagen with chaga and with reishi mushroom. Number four here, wild-caught salmon. Salmon is loaded with fat soluble antioxidants that help protect the body from aging. In fact, the antioxidant found in salmon, you'll see if you find that bright, like sockeye, salmon or king salmon has this bright reddish orangish color, those antioxidants are called astaxanthin. They're actually really strong what are called carotenoids. So they're fat soluble antioxidants that specifically help reduce aging in the body. And remember this, you need both water soluble antioxidants and fat soluble. You know a water soluble antioxidant would be something like a vitamin C or flavonoids that are found in fruits. Fat soluble antioxidants are going to be things like astaxanthin, is going to be a big one or turmerone found in turmeric oil or different essential oils are going to have more of those fat soluble antioxidants, like cinnamon is another good example of one. But salmon contains astaxanthin, amazing producing aging. And then the other big one is salmon is really high in the omega-3 fatty acids EPA and DHA. And I can tell you, the EPA and DHA are incredible for reducing inflammation in the body but also for hydrating the skin. Remember this, your cells are made up of mostly fat. You've got to have healthy fats in your diet and omega-3 fats are the most fats, in terms of clinical studies that have been shown, to increase lifespan and fight disease. So get more of those omega-3s in your diet on a daily basis. Now number five here are berries. My favorite being blueberries. I'd also throw raspberries up there. Raspberries contain ellagic acid which has been shown to actually fight skin cancer and help your body look more young. And blueberries contain bioflavonoids and resveratrol. The same antioxidant found in grape skins are also found in the skin of blueberries. Blueberry's one of the ultimate superfoods because remember this, if you want to age slower you need more collagen, you need more antioxidants, you need to reduce inflammation, you need more stem cells. Those are some of the key factors your body needs in aging slower. Berries, one of the kings of antioxidants in terms of an overall fruit. And let me mention this, wild and organic blueberries tend to have three times the antioxidants as conventional blueberries. So again when you're buying blueberries or buying fruit, going organic is actually definitely worth the price of it as triple the amount of antioxidants in certain circumstances. So again berries but especially blueberries followed by raspberries. Blackberries are actually really great too in terms of their antioxidant content. They can really slow the aging process. You know one of the recipes I love to do every morning, I'll tell you even what I had for breakfast this morning. I had one cup of blueberries. I had one scoop of bone broth powdered protein I put in a smoothie. I also put in a scoop of collagen. I did a little bit coconut milk, some cinnamon but I was getting all of these things in a single smoothie. So again berries are great. Number six here is turmeric. And turmeric actually contains two compounds, curcumin and turmerone. Now curcumin is the one that is getting so much press today. So curcumin is one of the top selling supplements in the world today. And curcumin helps reduce inflammation in the body. So that's a big benefit of turmeric. Did you know though that turmeric essential oil or . . . turmeric has both but you can also buy turmeric essential oil that actually has a compound called turmerone, as this turmeric, and that's been shown to increase stem cells in the body and actually protect your body. So whereas curcumin is a really strong anti-inflammatory, it also fights cancer--that's curcumin. Turmerone helps more with tissue regeneration and with your body producing its own stem cells--incredible. So again when you're doing turmeric powder you're getting the best of both worlds. Also turmeric oil is going to have more turmerone, but in general add turmeric to a burger meat, add it to a taco mix, add it to some hummus. Get more turmeric in your diet. You can also get it in supplement form but again turmeric, one of the ultimate anti-aging foods because of curcumin and turmerone. Number seven here is bone broth. I love doing bone broth. In fact today for lunch, I'm going to be doing a turkey bone broth that I made at home in my slow cooker at home. I mean for breakfast I actually did two scoops of a chocolate bone broth powdered protein that I had this morning. So doing bone broth and powder form incredible as well. But either way, here's all the benefits of bone broth for anti-aging looking younger. Number one, it is your number one source of collagen. And I want to mention this that there are many different types of collagen. There's collagen Type 1, Type 2, Type 3, Type 5, and Type 10. The most important types of collagen for anti-aging are Type 1 and 3, all followed by Type 2, Type 5, and type 10. When you're buying a collagen or a collagen supplement, you want to look for one ideally that comes from bone broth and that contains multiple times of collagen. So Type 1, 2, 3, 5, and 10. You want to get a collagen that has all of those but the same thing goes with bone broth. Bone broth has multiple types of collagen which helps with the skin. Also, bone broth contains hyaluronic acid and today there are anti-aging clinics that actually go and inject hyaluronic acid into the skin to actually help people look younger. They're even doing this in joints. They're doing it knees that are arthritic. Hyaluronic acid has so many benefits. The number one food source in the world of hyaluronic acid is bone broth. So again it's great whether you make it yourself at home, or order it, or take it in a powder form, whether it's liquid or powder, bone broth has incredible benefits because of all the collagen, all the hyaluronic acid, not to mention all of the other benefits from having glucosamine, chondroitin, and a whole lot of other nutrients, and actually even potassium which is great for toning and firming the body. Number eight here is the adaptogenic powder, maca. Now maca root is actually known, especially in certain areas of Asia, and in fact it's typically stands for or is called the strength of the stallions. So this is used as a libido booster over the years. Also, maca is known to naturally increase your energy levels, but maca because it helps work as an adaptogen which, again, helps lower those cortisol levels, helps reduce stress on the body, is really powerful. And I'll say this maca works great as a powder or a food because remember, I'm talking about foods today. Maca is typically used as a food. I do want to mention though a couple herbs that are probably just as beneficial or more than maca. Now these are known more as pure herbs but ashwagandha is probably even higher up on that list for anti-aging as are holy basil and rhodiola. So those herbs are very powerful but maca is pretty powerful as well. And maca is typically added to smoothies in powder form. So again, get some maca in your diet to age slower. Number nine, avocados. The thing I love about avocados is, again remember, if you want to age slower, you need to hydrate your skin, you need to get more fats, you need more antioxidants, you need more collagen, and you need your body to produce more stem cells. Those are the things your body needs to age slower. Avocados, great source of healthy fat. Also great source of minerals like magnesium and potassium. Magnesium and potassium actually help your body with your fluid ratios. Most of us today get way too much sodium in our diet. When you get too much sodium that'll cause your body to hold excess fluid which can also be inflammatory versus if your body can have the right amount of fluid in your cells, it actually will cause you to look leaner and have more tight and toned skin. Avocados, because of their high levels of potassium and magnesium which helps with muscle tone, absolutely help do that. So an avocado a day will keep the dermatologist away. Remember that saying, all right? So avocados, great for your skin, great for your cellular health. One of the truly great anti-aging foods. And number 10 here, this one might surprise you, animal fats. Okay. Now I'm not saying that you want to get a very large amount of animal fats in your diet, but some animal fats, if it's from grass-fed organically raised animals. Because remember this difference if a cow is eating grains, a lot of grains or GMO corn or soy for instance, their fat tissue is full of more omega-6 fats and other different types of fats so it changes their body. So those fats, more omega-6s and others, those are going to become really inflammatory to the body, okay? So very inflammatory. If a cow eats grasses, it has more CLA, more healthy saturated fats, more omega-3s, so that's the important thing to remember is, you are what you eat, what they ate. If cows are eating grasses and greens and things like that, they're healthy. If they're eating a lot of grains or GMO, they're not healthy. But that goes for animal fat. If you have a healthy, healthy animal fats that come from grass-fed animals, they're very high in the right types of saturated fat. And here's how this can help you age slower. A lot of you today are using oils on your skin that are plant-based. Those plant-based oils don't necessarily match the exact same types of fats or oils that are found in your skin. Did you know that animal fats, if we're talking about chicken fat specifically or tallow, a clean tallow, which is beef fat, if we're talking about chicken or beef fat, those oils have the exact same type of membrane, the exact same type of fat ratios that your own skin and body have? Did you know that our ancient ancestors would have rarely used plant-based oils for moisturizers? Now, yes they may have used some olive oil, so they may have used them some, but if you look at the Indian tribes, for instance if you go to certain of the areas of the country or look at our ancestors, they actually would use tallow and schmaltz or chicken fat. They would actually use that to hydrate their skin. They would mix those with essential oils and other things. So actually animal fats are the ultimate body moisturizers. If you really want to hydrate your skin perfectly with the exactly . . . really with the thing that gives your skin the exact hydration it needs, you get those from animal fats. So again, the place that I love to get animal fats is through bone broth. If you're making bone broth that fat that settles at the top, that fat, if it's from an organic animal, can be very, very healthy. And again, I'm not saying you need a lot of this fat, but a small amount of animal fats in your diet, from grass-fed animals, can actually give your body great health whether you take them internally or even get some of that oil, a healthy clean tallow or schmaltz, and rub it on your body topically as a natural moisturizer. Now I know, I'm probably getting comments and that's surprising some of you, but I'm telling you, it's the exact same fatty acid ratio that you have in your body, in your skin that you're going to get from some of those animals. And so guys these are the top anti-aging foods. What I would encourage you to do this week is take this list, write it down right now or type it out, and really focus on getting these foods in your diet. You know maybe the first thing you change is your breakfast smoothie. So I get it for breakfast. What I would recommend is a scoop of bone broth powder, of a protein bone broth, maybe a scoop of maca, a cup of berries, and you can do a little collagen protein in there too. But start making this healing smoothie for lunch. Start doing a big superfood salad with salmon and avocado on it. Get some more herbs in your diet like turmeric. Do a chaga or a reishi tea for breakfast. Implement these things into your diet this week. I know it's going to help you get healthier and look and feel younger. And if you want to learn more about these principles of anti-aging, also feel free to check out my website. Do a google search for Dr. Axe anti-aging foods. I have a whole article on this that goes in-depth as well. I want to hey, thanks so much guys for watching remember. I'm here every Monday through Friday 10:30 a.m., Central Standard Time. Have a great week, guys. I'll see you tomorrow at 10:30 a.m. Hi. Dr. Axe here. I want to say thanks so much for checking out this YouTube video, and also don't forget to subscribe. If you want to get more great content on things like herbs, essential oils, natural remedies, and how to use food as medicine, also check out more of our content on my YouTube channel. Thanks for watching.

[vileart]

BlackCatfishDramaturgy: Dylan Coburn Gray @ Edfringe 2017

Award-winning Dublin theatre collective brings a double-bill of technology, sex (and sex with technology) to this year’s Edinburgh Fringe!

LOVE+ and BlackCatfishMusketeer a double-bill by MALAPROP Theatre

Two stand-out hits of Dublin Fringe will have their international debuts at The Red Lecture Theatre, Summerhall alternating from August 2nd - 24th at 7.10PM.

BlackCatfishMusketeer is about trust, doubt, closeness at a distance, worrying about your nudes being leaked, and fearing that you'll die alone and your cats will eat you. You meet someone online. All you know is their name and that they seem to like you as much as you like them. In fact, you think you love each other. But do you? Can you? What even is love, anyway? Maybe we not only don’t know, we can’t know; we can only know what love isn’t. So, let’s say what it isn’t.

What was the inspiration for this performance?

1.  Blackcatfishmusketeer is the result of three impulses.  First, I wanted to make something about uncertainty.  Second, it had to acknowledge that uncertainty is nothing new, but that the internet puts it front and centre in interesting ways.  Third, it had to not lean too heavily on any one interface or idiolect we currently all dig because they age very very quickly.  

That film The Spectacular Now was just on the telly and misogynist; it was also made 4 years ago and all of the messaging interfaces already look dated.  Our go-to line throughout the process has been that it's supposed to feel like the internet, even if it doesn't look like it.    

Is performance still a good space for the public discussion of ideas? 

2.  If it ever was then yes!  Performance can be a public discussion or it can spur public discussion.  I don't know that I see any huge difference between the two.  Is it a good space?  

If so, how good?  I don't know, but I'm tempted to quote Churchill quoting that guy no one's heard of and say that performance is the worst space for public discussion, except all the others.  How good is it supposed to be?  It's slower and in-depther than Twitter and faster and punchier than encoding poems in DNA.  At least one of those has to be a plus.  There's a lot of moving parts in this question.  

Is it secretly asking whether performance is a good space given Everything In The World Right Now?  That I REALLY don't know.  

How did you become interested in making performance?

3.  I was an art baby; my mother is a writer/director and my dad runs a contemporary dance company for boys.  I failed to run away from the circus to become an actuary, so performance in some discipline or other has always been a part of my life.  I think a bit of mishmash is healthy, it reminds you that discipline boundaries are squishy and it ultimately comes down to offering the audience something.  

A Start From First Principles kind of vibe.  Will there be music?  Movement?  Text?  Whatever is needed.  Reverse engineer the specifics from the desired audience experience.  Which is not me throwing up my hands and saying Wahey Everything Should Be Collages All The Time, you can make a cake or cook bacon but a bacon cake is a bit weird.  

Is there any particular approach to the making of the show?

4.  It's hard to know how to characterise an approach, not least because MALAPROP have made our shows under very different circumstances every time.  I suppose I'd say the key for us is to get everyone in a room.  Rooms are the enemies no plans survive contact with.  Rooms are where you learn to hate your great idea, and your other great idea, and that other slightly less genius but still totally genius idea, before the really exciting bit where you collectively hit on something that actually works and no one person could have arrived at by independent reckoning.  

Does the show fit with your usual productions?

5.  As above, we've made each of our shows under very different circumstances.  Our first show was co-written, as are our third and fourth shows, so in that sense Blackcatfishmusketeer is the odd fish out.  It's a script I sat down and wrote on my own, but it fits with the others in that the staging process was very collaborative.  It also very much fits in with our stated ethos of work that challenges, delights, and speaks to the world we live in.  

What do you hope that the audience will experience?

6.  I hope that the audience will leave having laughed at least once and gone quiet so as to listen better at least once.  I hope they'll think at least one new thought about their online life.  I hope they'll go home and google at least one thing.  I hope they'll realise two seemingly disparate things are actually connected, which is the experience I go looking for in art a lot.  The title Blackcatfishmusketeer is a riddle posed in that spirit; watching the show equips you to figure out how and why those words belong together.  They do, I swear.   

What strategies did you consider towards shaping this audience experience?​

7.  I mentioned above that we tried to capture the feel of online spaces, not their appearance.  The play itself happens in a number of real locations, none of which you see.  Rather than showing the internet as it appears in real life, we show real life as it appears from the internet.  We put the audience inside looking out.  Similarly, the people in the show are known entirely through the things they do online.  That's a partial image, of course, but it's interestingly partial.

There's also a character who talks the way we pay attention to things online; engaged but not exclusively, getting the idiosyncratic gist of lots of things rather than the whole of anything, passing that idiosyncratic gist on to the audience in an idiosyncratic way, leaning heavily on their presumed familiarity in that way that internet humour does.  Encountering a meme for the first time is like walking into a room in time to hear the punchline.  If you stick around and pay attention you'll pick up enough to laugh next time, and that's how we tried to have the show work. 

Best New Play Nominee, Dublin Fringe 2016

BlackCatfishMusketeer 

Production Credits Directed by Claire O’Reilly Written by Dylan Coburn Gray Set & Costume Design by Molly O’Cathain Lighting Design by John Gunning Performed by Catherine Russell, Aoife Spratt & Ste Murray Produced by Breffni Holahan & Carla Rogers

MALAPROP is a Dublin-based theatre collective that aims to challenge, delight, and speak to the world we live in (even when imagining different ones). Previous work includes: LOVE+ (Winner of Spirit of Fringe & Project Commission Award 2015), BlackCatfishMusketeer (Best New Play Nominee, Dublin Fringe 2016), and JERICHO (Bewley's Café Theatre commission 2017). 

from the vileblog http://ift.tt/2thOUfY

[giveuselife-blog]

Most controversial and banned Apple Iphone apps

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Most controversial and banned Apple Iphone apps

Be it Google or Apple, app shops are flooded with inappropriate tries to capitalize on drollness or wittiness. With clean specs About the content of the app not being obscene, pornographic, offensive or defamatory, a few builders create whacky apps that get away censors and internet regulators. If technology is to be blamed, customers are always on the quest of finding apps that ease their lives in some way or the other. And then, those curious heads come across matters that want a filter out.

From the raunchiest to the directly absurd, we’ve unveiled the apps that may depart you outraged. It’s hard on our component to believe that these apps certainly made it via the stern guidelines of the corresponding stores. Most Debatable iPhone Apps Ladies Round Me

This app has taken creepy to some other stage. This geo-place app helps you to discover, or need to I say, stalk ladies on your close by region, based on public Foursquare test ins and Fb posts. It then helps you to hook up with them via Fb. The app became straight away taken off from the shop for violating API’s coverage.

Baby Shaker

That is one of the Most despicable iPhone apps launched. Created by means of Sikalosoft, it allows customers violently shake their iPhone so as to prevent the Child’s loud noises in which, red Xs (crosses) might appear over the Baby’s eyes and he would end to cry. Apple and Sikalsoft later apologized, and the app became removed after they realized their mistake.

Ghetto Tweets

This Twitter-primarily based app, filtered your buddies’ tweets in an try to cause them to greater ‘urban’, however, ended up creating slang sounds that have been found to be racist. After being flooded with complaints, the ghetto translator becomes pulled from the shop.

Me So Holy

This Debatable app permit users take a mugshot and superimpose snapshots of faces onto various nonsecular figures including Jesus Christ. The app became soon removed by Apple, declaring it to be objectionable. To which the writer, Benjamin Kahle published on his website: Is religion without a doubt to be placed in the identical class as these violent apps? Intercourse, urine, and defecation don’t seem to be off-limits, yet a totally non-violent, religion-based app is.

Door Of Wish

A gay man or woman can be cured in only 60 days with the aid of an iPhone app. Are you able to beat that? If it sincerely needs to be cured is a problem too deep to dig in right here. but this app claimed to kill the demons that motive identical-Sex sights to your frame. Apple without delay pulled the app from their app store.

I am Rich

That is one of the Maximum ostentatious and pointless apps on this list. With a retail rate of $999.ninety nine, this app does truly not anything aside from displaying a static picture with a crimson jewel, saying “I’m Rich.” Two of the clients who by chance offered this app were paid returned. This app led the author, Armin Heinrich a groovy $6,000 in his pocket till it changed into yanked off through Apple.

Splendor Meter

As the call suggests, this app assists you to upload pics and get grades to your Splendor; customers may want to charge the face, body, and clothes from 1 to 5 stars. This loose app had no restrictions as some distance As the age or apparel that would be worn was involved. matters had been pretty harmless till the photo of a nude 15-yr-antique lady showed up, prompting Apple to ban it.

Swearport

Apps which are devised to bring disparate people collectively are always endorsed. And the writer of Sweat post idea he is including one to the listing. So he created this app that lets you say swears in almost 45 different languages, making you a global swearing master. Well, Apple did now not appear convinced; it banned the iOS model for its crude and offensive content.

Maximum Debatable Android Apps

Secret SMS Replicator

This app is for all the ones jilted lovers, scorned exes, and determined stalkers. The little bit of spyware you put in in your buddy’s or loved one’s telephone that runs overlooked inside the background. As soon as the app starts of evolved running, it could ahead all of the incoming textual content messages to the stalker’s wide variety. At closing, it was given a boot from the Android marketplace for privateness worries.

Make Me Asian

Even the great of the fine comedians hesitate while which includes racism in their humor. It is able to get that complex! However the developer’s concept they might cope with this. This face-morphing app shall we customers to import photographs and upload stereotypical Asian facial functions to them. The writer Kimbery Deiss took this to another degree by using launching spin-offs that focused Indians, African-Americans, and plenty of extras. Can it get any more racist?

Lulu

Lulu is a sexist app that we could girls rate guys they Recognize from Facebook on the basis of their romantic, non-public, and sexual enchantment. It does not quite right here, it also permits them to hyperlink their scores to their Fb pages with hashtags starting from #BigFeet to #OneWomanMan. Notwithstanding the criticism, Lulu remains to be had for download, gaining thousands and thousands to Alexandra Chong.

Is My Son homosexual?

So we were given an app in order to assist harassed mother and father in determining the sexual orientation of their kids via answering a hard and fast of questions! The app turned into launched for promoting a comedic novel by using the same call. Google become bombarded with complaints from LGBT advocacy agencies, prompting them to pull it off the Android marketplace. Ass Hunter

This game existed as a web flash sport since 2006, however, got noticed while it was moved to the Google Play save. It offers players the control of a hunter, asks them to kill naked gay guys. And if they do not shoot those men, they’d have homosexual Intercourse with them. The description examine, “Play and do not be homosexual!” Once more, a successful Twitter campaign caused the removal of this app from Google Play store.

Carrot Courting

This app has been addressed as a shape of virtual prostitution time and time Again. The tagline is going, ‘messaging may additionally get her interested, but bribery gets you a date’. It allows users to offer ‘carrots’ to different humans; lets them send incentives like goodies or dinners and receives them to conform to a primary date. The app has been categorized as ‘sexist’ and ‘misogynistic’. The author says It’s been evolved for less-attractive men to conquer hurdles inside the online Courting world and believes in bribing ladies with items. And it made its way to the iPhone App shop as Well.

SkinniePix

This Arguable app claims to make you sense higher About your appears. All it does is take your selfie and edit it, providing you with the option to subtract five, 10, or 15 pounds out of your weight. However, customers are not very happy with it. It makes scrawny people appearance starved, and weighty people sense terrible Approximately themselves. All this comes to the value of $zero.99.

Bang With buddies

Created via Colin Hedge and Omri Mor, this popular app does precisely what you believe you studied it does. It guarantees to make it easier for human beings to invite their Facebook buddies for informal Intercourse. With intentions made clear, the provider notifies both parties if there’s a healthy. It was taken off the App keep for being too vulgar; But, it’s miles still to be had at the Play keep. some Contentious Apps That need A Mention • Weed Farmer• SpoofApp • Drawings Of My Stupid Brother • Annoy-A-Youngster • Pocket Lady friend • PSX4droid • Exodus Worldwide • Obama Trampoline • Tinder • Wikileaks • Yik Yak

Brief Hacks on How to Come across and Get rid of adware out of your iPhone In recent times, there may be no need to rent a personal detective to Recognize the whereabouts and linkups of someone, way to the release of the alarmingly excessive charge of cellphone adware. Buzz will let you know A way to Hit upon and Get rid of adware from an iPhone.

Jailbreak in iPhone Jailbreaking is a method in which you run changed firmware on the iPhone, which otherwise, the iOS does not permit you to get admission to due to ability malware. Jailbreaking allows the person to run the unsigned software program on his iPhone. spyware is established on iPhone via jailbreaks. This text is for all those humans whose iPhone is being accessed by means of their jealous or possessive extensive other, or with the aid of a pal, boss, or relative who has always been nosy into their personal affairs. there may be a wonderful possibility of your iPhones being jailbroken, for you to use it to secret agent on you.

Installing adware on an iPhone can provide access to the victim’s textual content messages, name logs, e-mails, banking passwords, and even the cutting-edge location may be traced with a spyware.

an era has stepped forward and upgraded to such a volume that nowadays, human beings do not even Recognise via whom are they being watched. Did you realize that individuals who secretively installation adware software on the phone, are in Most cases, those whom the victim trusted the Maximum and least anticipated to spy on his or her non-public lifestyles? The fact that iPhone does no longer have any software program, that can Locate such adware, is all of the greater threatening.

but hiya, loosen up! here we will no longer best inform you How to recognize in case your iPhone is getting used to spy on you, but additionally strategies for removing spyware out of your iPhone. The Maximum vital aspect while detecting spyware on an iPhone is to recollect if the iPhone had physical get entry to via a 2d person. adware may be mounted by a person with a median know-how About jailbreaking. This manner does no longer take extra than 5 mins. Symptoms that Your iPhone has an adware hooked up ☞ Watch out for unexplained heating up of the iPhone even when not in use and poor battery backup in spite of frequent charging of the phone. The reason for negative battery ranges is that numerous facts have to be monitored by the adware and despatched to the installer’s telephone. This precedes the battery existence. ☞ take a look at in case your show display screen shows a records transfer icon even when the statistics switch is ticked ‘off’ and the internet isn’t always in use. If it does, the possibility of the adware being installed shoots up all the more. ☞ Freezing of the iPhone, surprising shutdowns, slow restarts, immoderate utilization of net information, and large bills for texts and calls, which don’t match the rate of software of the iPhone, is some other shout opt-out of your cell phone, indicating that some thing’s wrong. ☞ Look for Symptoms of jailbreak and search for the Cydia App (software which permits the jailbroken iPhone to put in apps) icon on your private home screen. If this app does not show on the home display screen, then look for it in “packages.” Although, in case you your self-have jailbroken your cell phone within the beyond, then this pointer for detecting adware must be avoided. display the spyware its way Out ☞ They are saying, prevention is better than therapy. So, always preserve your iPhone password included. from your display screen to all of the different programs, make certain which you maintain the whole thing covered with a password. And if possible, strive to maintain your telephone to yourself and don’t let it out to human beings, unless there is an emergency.

☞ Delete programs and programs that are not mounted by way of you. however updating or clearing records will no longer clear up the whole trouble. Sync your facts, as an example, your contacts, and pix (now not your programs) with iTunes. Now, with the assist of iTunes, restore your information. This way, all of your statistics and acquired applications can be restored. The cause for now not syncing your packages with iTunes is that doing so will take a backup of the spyware as Well.

☞ Keep away from jailbreaking your iPhone. iPhones which are jailbroken are greater prone to adware. constantly have an antivirus mounted to your iPhone.

☞ To finish at the recommendations of elimination of adware from an iPhone, remember that a simple update of the iOS will paralyze the adware, rendering it vain. So the following time you experience that you are being spied on, you, in reality, Recognise How to ward off the hassle. putting off adware from an iPhone is easy, but we advocate that always cozy your cell phone with complex passwords and stay far from your possessive exes.

[doedipus]

LP D&D: Tumble in the Tundra

It’s like the Rumble in the Jungle, except not in central Africa.

Something about the concept of magic items really tickles my fancy, moreso than a lot of other fantasy tropes. Stuff like the Moonlight Greatsword from the Dark Souls games, Link’s heaping arsenal of hyper-specialized tools, and Guts’ berserker suit and robot hand strike me as being super cool. If I had to rationalize it, I guess it comes down to gadget-based heroes being more fundamentally human in my mind than someone with the innate ability to light things on fire with their brain, and in the context of tabletop games, magic items can provide some more flavor to combat and river crossing puzzles than a party of totally mundane humans. Like, the time when Coy ended the battle at the late Lord Hier’s dinner party by crashing the airship through clever use of the teleport hat was wayyy cooler than the dozens of other encounters the party just brute forced their way through.

One of these days, I really want to run a campaign in a low-genre game like Call of Cthulhu, Delta Green or something, and use quadcopters or smartphones the same way our DM in this game uses the helm of teleportation or the cloak of the bat.

I’m bringing all this up because the map the party had been carting around this whole time is basically a smartphone. As usual, content under the break.

Teller redrew the map

While he was drawing, a woman’s face appears in the map and speaks to the party

Her name is Natalie

She’s the map

Of Amarak //The last empire to control western Faerun

Natalie is having none of our berk questions

Connie asks about the sisters, Natalie gives an info-dump

They were anti-imperialist

Minnia formed a pact with some demons

Amarak successfully repelled them, and recorded their strategies in Natalie

Lucas asks about Minnia’s location

Apparently she was split into 5 pieces, and her remains scattered

One near Luskan and Syrup Leaf

One near Calimport

One near Shulk

One near Amathar

One in Winterkeep

One in Candlekeep

Natalie can give the party more detailed advice as we get close

“You seem kind of full of yourself. I like that. I’m also kind of full of myself”-Lucas

Coy asks Natalie what she knows about what’s-her-name

My responses are limited. You must ask the right question.

Max works through his headache and remembers names

Natalie has an image of her on file

Graham realizes something is off about the map

Coy and Graham take a closer look

The kingdom of Demara was apparently bigger in the past

It was slightly smaller than Amarak, and its ally

Graham puts his ear to the map

Natalie recommends he clean his ears

He does. On Natalie.

Natalie is violated

Lucas tries to concuss Graham, but he’s doing the dance of his people

Natalie dislikes being called “Map”

Coy recommends the party go check out the giblets at Syrup Leaf

Lucas is confus. What’s a syrup leaf?

Coy attempts to explain

Natalie wants to map out a relationship chart for the party

Esmeralda is a lady

no srs guys

Telepathy sex dungeon //from Sigil trip one

Lucas denies any knowledge of this “Rolen” //Rich also denies any knowledge of this “Rolen.”

He literally has no knowledge of Rolen

Or the drow attack on Amnswater

Graham reveals he’s never learned anyone else’s name

Coy considers storage options for Natalie

Can we laminate her?

Can she survive in a bag of holding?

Natalie the smartphone can keep track of our quests. How convenient! //Not like we tend to think in terms of “quests” anyway. We mostly just bumble around and then things happen

Connie asks about the Sigil portal

The ruins of the Sigil-Amarak trade hub is nearby

It’s by the crags

Graham has a question for Map

Where’s Catarina?

There isn’t one lol

It’s recently independent obvs

What’s the dog to milk ratio?

It’s 3:1, Rap

Coy asks for a brief overview of the war

Amarak allied with nearby kingdoms

They cornered Minnia in Beydale and dismembered her

There was also a golem army, which Natalie can activate

Escrima asks about extraplanar creatures

They came out through the underchasm

He asks about mother

Apparently, she patroned a few generals during the war

Callie Thorngage, Nedda Brushgather, and Escrima Smith

Natalie shows images of said generals

They bear a striking resemblance to Graham, Connie, and Escrima Smith, respectively

//From what little we know so far, Callie Thorngage was ostensibly a cis woman. The implication is pretty clearly that the members of the current party are reincarnations of these other three folks, with Escrima being the Gordon Freeman to MOTHER’s G-man. So like, why would Graham’s previous incarnation be a cis girl? Wouldn’t it make more sense if the old Graham was also a dude, and the trans thing happened because he was literally a dude dumped into a girl’s body? I swear, cis folk have no idea how to write this sort of thing.

They made it out of the war okay, and joined mother in the ether

Escrima accuses Natalie of tripping balls

She is a map. She does not trip

Amarak awarded mother some sort of reward for its assistance

Other team photos are revealed

There’s doppelgangers of Greg and Eva too.

Greg’s clone being the son of Theodin, King of Amarak

In a painting of the dicing of Minnia, a soldier uses The Cleaver to cut up Minnia’s body

The Cleaver is stored near the Sea of Fallen Stars, in a vault

Vaults are scattered around the continent, full of puzzles and treasure

Well ain’t that somethin’!

Graham and Escrima develop a plan to shoulder check the sisters and the bits of Minnia into the ocean, and then burn down the ocean. They will play their victory jingle on a triangle made of snakes

The hammer is also a snake

Coy accidentally lets slip that she has a soft stummy

Graham wants to touch it

Coy tries to be intimidating, but fails

Lucas prays to Oghma to try and figure out all that Rolen nonsense

All his memories are starting to get fuzzy, come to think of it

Eva’s are getting pretty strong, though

Lucas decides to take a look

She kept a Lucas shrine back in Candlekeep

She reduced it down to a drawing of Lucas, hidden in her cape

Lucas finds the picture. It’s of the two of them getting married.

The gang interrupts Lucas’ meditation session

He’s crying a bit, so he tries to use thaumaturgy to cover it

He makes flames come out of his eyes (by accident?)

Coy throws a potion of healing in his face

He feels very healthy

Coy explains to Lucas about the information the gang gleaned from the map

Lucas would rather Natalie just give him the information herself

Natalie recalls MOTHER as the “entity of dreams”  

Lucas wants to know if it’s good or evil.

Natalie gives him a cryptic answer

It’s a force of stability more than anything

Lucas asks Natalie if the Escrimas are the same

The one in the painting was 23 at the time of the war

Escrima always assumed he was 18

Natalie displays the group portrait with the generals, not-Greg, and not-Eva

not-Greg was named “Silifrey”

not-Eva was named “Merla Terlef,” and was married to Silifrey

Coy is irritated she doesn’t have a double

Lucas Explains Proskur to the party

He regrets getting involved, and blames himself for Eva’s pseudo death

Lucas goes to bed, as does Coy

Connie goes to the bathhouse

There’s a human man and an elf woman in the bath already

They’re married. Damn.

They’re here to open their business selling devices, gadgets and things

It’s a clock, but portable. Astounding!

Escrima wants to talk to Natalie

Coy opens the map, and prudently decides not to let Escrima touch it

Escrima asks about the generals

They were adventurers before joining the war

Lots of dragons killed, innocents saved, etc.

He wants to know about Callie Thorngage

She was a lady knight in the army of Amarak

Part of the agreement between Theodin V and mother was for the three to become generals

He asks to see the stats of the sister’s army

Several million gnolls, orcs, drow, and, oddly, fiends

The sister’s army had some generals too

They’re doubles of Lucas and legacy edition Coy. what?

//Again, why would Coy’s past-self-apparent be a dude? Grumble grumgle grumble

not-Coy was named “KUNG” in all-caps. Most dragonborn were on the sisters’ side. KUNG was killed in battle

not-Lucas’ name was Cefrey, who was the lead mage in their army. He was a necromancer who led a legion of undead

He looks like edgiest Lucas

Escrima and Coy go show Lucas

Lucas is appalled at Cefrey’s fashion sense

Lucas contemplates joining Minnia

The trio contemplate soul recycling, and realize it’s totally possible

Something or other did this intentionally

Natalie points the gang towards the planes

Lucas asks Natalie who put her in the box

It looks like Rocky. It’s probably Rocky.

Torix resumes control

Zerander heads for the bathhouse

The gang manages to sleep soundly for once

Lucas dreams about spiders

Connie has her recurring dream again

The next morning, Lucas goes to the scroll place. He spends the day copying spells

Zerander visits the blacksmith

He wants to get a silver zweihander

The smith agrees to make it out of the silver the gang sold to the armorer

Connie wants to take Nat 20 to the library

She tracks down Coy, and retrieves Natalie

She makes her way to the library in the main castle

Nat 20 has limited space, and can only absorb like 50 books

Connie feeds her a bunch of atlases and encyclopedias

She takes a bit too much pleasure from absorbing books

Zerander and Coy continue shopping

He visits an apothecary looking for alchemist’s fire

Coy bought all the fire in town

Graham goes looking for a way to upgrade grey matter //His hammer

Most of the people he asks are kids for some reason

He ends up at the blacksmith anyway

The smith upgrades it a dice class

In order to reduce the price, he spends the day working under the smith

Zerander goes looking for firearms

A shop sells old-timey hand cannons

The cannon and five rounds are 650gp

1d12 + 6 blunt damage!

Zerander talks the shopkeeper down to 600

He also goes to buy some basic supplies

He gets some holy water from the temple of Oghma

The priests want a donation of knowledge as payment

Zerander tells them about the time he fought a bear

Escrima spent the day swimming in the boiling hot river

He finds 5gp

He also finds a constitution saving throw

The water he drank is... not great

His goal was to get all wrinkly, and counts that as a success

During the night, Graham goes to check on Escrima

There’s puke everywhere. It smells disgusting

A maid tries to clean it up

Escrima asks Graham how he’s handling Nat 20’s info dump

Graham can barely understand a ham sandwich 

Escrima suggests they go to the bathhouse and turn it into puke water

They instead decide to try to become frogs

For some reason, they are unsuccessful

They’re not even green

Mother tells Escrima that she has more things to do

Escrima feels rebellious. He wants a piercing.

Graham considers having the blacksmith make Escrima a lily pad-shaped helmet

Lucas tries to relax in the hot spring

Distracted by current events, he fails to notice Coy and Zerander in the springs when he got in

Zerander explains the boomstick

Lucas doesn’t pay attention, and is instead transfixed by Zerander’s giant dong

It’s like, the size of his leg

“Eyes up here!”

Lucas comments that Coy looked better when she was a guy //Damn it, Rich

Lucas and Zerander fail their diversity training courses miserably

//Specifically, Zerander calls Coy “it.” Of all the shitty things to call a trans or intersex person, “it” stings the most in my mind. We’re human too, damn it. I’m still a bit sore about this whole interaction, but I guess this is the sort of thing that happens when you hang out with cis people in stealth. Since opening up to the players about being trans, it really hasn’t been an issue.

The gang goes to retrieve the items they ordered

Graham also has the lily pad hat made

He dubs Escrima “Sir Escrima of the Lotus Helm”

He tries to remove the hat, and fails

Lucas is informed of the frog plan, and polymorphs him into one

Graham kisses frogscrima, returning him to normal

Lucas turns him back in the middle of this

Lucas then polymorphs Graham

Graham attempts to pee on Lucas

REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Coy buys a crossbow that she can fire grappling hooks out of

Zerander goes to find a boxing ring

He meets a half-orc boxer named “GGrumsh”

GGrumsh wants to fight. The organizer sets up a match for that night

The whole of Neverwinter will be there

Connie asks Nat 20 about airships

Invented by dorfs on the continent of shulk

Big business in Neverwinter

Denyr’s Mechanical Marvels

The gang heads over to the shipyard to check things out

Their couches are okay

The boss mentions that they’re manufacturing ships for the sisters of dawn

Coy remarks that the sister’s ship was poorly made, having had firsthand experience

Coy has Connie message Rocky about the appraisal of the diamond

Janice, Rocky’s secretary answers back, which is odd

It was worth 1,125,000

The gang asks about types of construction

They gravitate towards rune-fueled, heavier than air flight

They pass a few of the sister’s ships on the way out

As Lucas wraps up, he hears some murmurs about the fight between GGrumsh and a foreigner. It’s starting soon!

The gang goes to watch the fight

Zerander strips down to boxing gear

The crowd cheers for GGrumsh

They boo Zerander as he enters. He flips them off

Graham bets on Zerander, and Lucas bets on Zerander’s dick

Battle against Ultraheavyweight GGrumsh of Neverwinter

Zerander pulls a “Well! What is it!” to try and goad his opponent into attacking

...which he does.

Zerander trips GGrumsh

GGrumsh regains his balance and attacks

He calls his attacks like a true monk

Zerander tries to trip him again, but sneak attacks only work once!

He then tries to grapple GGrumsh, and again fails

GGrumsh releases a flurry of blows, wounding Zerander

Zerander pins GGrumsh to the ground and slugs him several times

GGrumsh tries to get up, but is unable to get out from under the goliath

Zerander continues to pummel GGrumsh

GGrumsh manages to land a solid hit from his compromised position

He continues to try to escape the grapple, but fails

Zerander continues to pulverize GGrumsh

Zerander pulls out an elbow drop!

GGrumsh yields to nobody

Zerander picks him up, and slams him into the ground, knocking him unconscious

Zerander is awarded a belt adorned with the crest of Neverwinter

It grants +1 CHA

Also 250gp

Graham won 80gp on the fight

Escrima christened him “Dong, Champion of the Crucible”

The crowd begins calling him that, angering Zerander

The next day, Zerander goes to the smith, and asks about melding it into his armor

You can’t do that

Coy has pancakes

The gang heads to the old trade hub

It’s abandoned

They venture deeper into the castle, and find a courtyard

The castle is covered in seals of Amarak and other kingdoms

The party is curious as to why the castle was abandoned, and consult Nat 20

It has teleportation circles to Calimport and Baldur’s Gate

Lucas asks Natalie whether or not we could easily travel back and forth from Calimport

Probably, if the return portal is still active

Escrima expresses distress at the idea of going back to Calimshan

The temple Escrima was living in was ransacked, and the perpetrators are likely still there

He fled with another acolyte from Calimport to Candlekeep

“Now I gotta go take a shit in that bush”

Lucas opens the door to the portal rooms

There are a number of safety measures in the complex designed to brutally murder invaders

DAE acid?

As they go deeper, they hear a deep moaning noise coming from the portal room

Lucas uses an arcane eye to see into the portal room

There’s a beholder in there!

END