#to those who have enriched my time here: I thank you from the bottom of my heart

[auggietheautisticvampire]

[clarionglass]

gang,,,,, gang. i am honestly still reeling from The game changer account reblogging the comic,,,, my god. my god.

for newcomers: welcome! thank you for being here!! for those who may have only seen the part of the fic linked to the comic, this is part 6 in the series (because truly i cannot stop myself). all the other parts are linked in the lil game master cinematic universe blurb i've got down the bottom of the post, and the whole thing is now on ao3!

and speaking of my lil blurby thing, if anyone else wants to play around in the game master cinematic universe, tag me so i don't miss it and i'll add whatever you make to the list!! and if you just want to chat about the crossover, hit me up! truly i am so happy to have as many people playing in this sandbox as want to be here :D

but anyway, without further ado:

a selection of correspondence (game master cinematic universe, part 6) | read on ao3

From: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Group <Dropout cast and crew> Subject: Announcements and info

Hi all,

Just a quick announcement that we have a new member of the team joining us at Dropout! Some of you have met him already, although you may not have realised it—he worked on A Game Most Changed and Escape the Greenroom in season 5, and Bingo, Deja Vu, Beat the Buzzer and Sam Says 4 in season 6, doing some of the hosting in my place.

And before you ask how that can be, this man is my exact doppelganger! He’s a time traveling alien who, for the moment, we are calling Other Sam, because we’ve agreed that the name he’s chosen is not exactly appropriate in a workplace setting. He’s here on a kind of rehabilitation program, as shows like Game Changer provide the sort of enrichment that he needs, without him having to resort to things like planetary conquest and murder. We also have him to thank for our new studio—he has kindly allowed us to use his (currently grounded) spacetime machine to record in, seeing as he did blow up our original studio. On an operational basis, nothing should have changed with the studio, but I do recommend you don’t go poking around in cupboards, just in case.

I promise on everything dear to me that this is not a joke.

I hope you’ll all make Other Sam feel welcome! So there’s minimal confusion between the two of us, he and I will be taking care to differentiate ourselves (he says he will try and look, in his words, “more evil”, although I’ll admit I’m not quite sure how that will work).

Series leads and producers, if you would like to include Other Sam in one of your shows, please let me know. He’s a lot of fun to work with, and he’s promised us his best behaviour, so I can guarantee there will be none of the aforementioned planetary conquest and murder. Of course, the wellbeing of all Dropout cast and crew is my highest priority, so if any of you are not comfortable working with him, please let me know as well, and production and I will ensure you are not cast in the same episodes. In future seasons of Game Changer, we will be sharing the hosting duties, so if you’re on an episode, it’ll be made clear which of us you’ll be working with.

On a related note, you know I hate being the bearer of bad news about mandatory seminars, but there is a training seminar next Monday on psychic defence techniques. This seminar is a requirement if you’re going to be working with him, and even if you’re not planning on that, I’d strongly advise coming along anyway.

As always, if you’ve got any questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch!

Cheers, Sam

---

[Note: many responses with the general sentiment of “what the fuck?!” have not been included in the selection of return correspondence.]

---

From: Brennan Lee Mulligan (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

I need this man in the dome immediately. 

---

From: Siobhan Thompson (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hi Sam,

Many thanks for your email, and for letting us know about Other Sam. You don’t need to confirm or deny this, but I’m assuming he did something to us during the Deja Vu recording. I haven’t felt entirely comfortable around you since then, and until now I haven’t been able to find a logical reason why. You mentioned psychic defence techniques in your email, so I take it that there was some kind of mental fuckery involved—perhaps a memory wipe? 

I don’t know what he did, and I’m not sure I want to know, but whatever it is, I don’t think it’s good. I would very much appreciate it if I don’t have to work with him.

Best wishes, Siobhan

---

From: Grant O’Brien (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hey Sam,

I’m already digging up info for a Breaking News segment. There’s someone on reddit called scarfytwin who says they might be able to give us some good info, but I might need to sign a few things first? Looks like it’s tangled up in some British government stuff, which is wild. Sounds juicy, whatever it is, and I reckon it would be good payback…

Best, Grant

---

From: Lou Wilson (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Man, are you telling me that Samuel Dalton was kind of a real fucking thing?? No way. If you let me punch him *hard* one time I’ll go on any show with him.

Cheers, Lou

---

From: Brian David Gilbert (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hi Sam,

This explains a lot about the weird feelings I’ve been having since Deja Vu! I know something terrible probably happened during that recording, but I’d love to just sit down with Other Sam and have a chat. Do you recommend we just meet in a professional context, or would that be something you’re able to organize?

Thanks, Brian

---

From: Zac Oyama (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Cool.

---

From: Ally Beardsley (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Absolute freak behavior and i love this for you, sign me up for anything!

---

From: Mike Trapp (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hi Sam,

Huh, that sure explains some things. This will probably be cool in future, but for right now, I think I need to do a bit of processing. I’ll let you know!

Cheers, Trapp

---

From: Vic Michaelis (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hi Sam,

Intriguing! If you think he’d be up for the prosthetics, I’d love to have either of you on Very Important People next season. Both of you together would be even better!

Vic

---

From: Lily Du (@gmail.com) To: Sam Reich (@droput.tv) Subject: Re: Announcements and info

Hey Sam,

I’ve had a chat to Grant, and I would love to put this guy on Dirty Laundry. Grant says he’ll share what he finds out from the reddit person with me, and we might be able to make a good episode happen.

Cheers, Lily

---

From: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Fwd: Announcements and info

Well, most people seem to have taken it well! Looks like we’ll be having some fun…

---

From: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Re: Fwd: Announcements and info

“Not exactly appropriate in a workplace setting”?

---

From: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Re: Re: Fwd: Announcements and info

We discussed this. You agreed.

---

From: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Re: Re: Re: Fwd: Announcements and info

I most certainly did not. I said “hm”. “Hm” does not count as agreement.

---

From: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Fwd: Announcements and info

You do know this is a group of people who I can guarantee, on hearing the word “Master”, would react the exact same way Grant did?

---

From: Other Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) To: Sam Reich (@dropout.tv) Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Fwd: Announcements and info

Fine. “Other Sam” it is.

---

missed an installment of the game master cinematic universe?

original idea by @ace-whovian-neuroscientist: x

art by @northernfireart concept: x scissor sisters sketch: x sam and his doppelganger: x escape the death beam: x

by @bloopdydooooo drawing collection: x

writing by me (!) part one (escape the greenroom): x part two (deja vu): x part three (sam says 4): x part four (you think you know someone): x part five (point and counterpoint): x part six (a selection of correspondence): you are here!

[amrv-5]

Today (March 13) is (unbelievably) the first birthday of Somewhere to Get To (the first chapter’s post-date, anyway), an anniversary about which I’m still (evidenced by sheer parentheticals-per-sentence rate) trying to decide how to talk (talking about it, by-the-by, because (earnestness…) it is pretty important to me, it turns out, still, one year on. Who could’ve guessed…?). Mostly I’m floored anybody reads the damned thing at all. Long. Absurd reading commitment. Amazing to me people have dedicated some of their time and attention to something I made — and unbelievable to hear on occasion that it’s emotionally connected to people, or impacted them in some way. Such an honor to be party to that sort of connection thru (fan)fiction. Thank you—really!! Wow!!! 

And, speaking of connection (pretty personal, and decidedly earnest, musings on the fic/anniversary/my relationship to both under the cut, avoidable if you’d like, you’ve been warned) — 

Been rereading some of S2G2, idly, sporadically, as I’ve been considering its first post-iversary. What’s coming to me repeatedly, as I read at a year’s distance, is a strong sense of autobiography—not in terms of event, but in tone, in concern, in most of all a very palpable sense of reckoning with the less-than-ideal that runs through the whole thing. There are some plot beats or details I’d do differently today, and I have a hard time continuing to like the things I make after they take on some distance from me, but (if I can say this about my own silly little fan fiction) I think the urgency of the thing, its emotional intensity and clear desire to try to grab hold of Something (hope? a foundation for belief in others? meaningful good?) remains affecting / effective, or does for me, despite my own work typically striking me poorly. 

Long way to say that I’ve found, reading in March 2024, that the thing’s a pretty clear if entirely unintentional record of the things I was thinking about, trying to work into my worldview, trying in some cases to excise from my worldview, things I was looking for or giving in to, and so on, in the months leading up to March 2023. One of those points of concern (transparently) was the strain of loneliness, the value of connection. With a year’s perspective, it’s important to me to say how grateful I am to have found such a welcoming, lovely, friendly, supportive, all-around-brilliant community in the fandom. I owe so much to the kindness and enthusiasm of the wonderfully talented people I’ve met on here, and I can say confidently that a large part of the reason I can read the terrifically lonely thread running through S2G2 and sense a degree of emotional distance from it—still resonant, but not immediate, identically-felt—is because I have made so many friends I value here, who enrich and enliven my days so beautifully…! So thank you all!

And, relatedly: Another central concern of the fic is the difference between happiness and un-sadness, the value and place of each, struggling to help oneself face hard truths and sort of cosmically-ordained and unavoidable suckiness—the repeated stress on how “[t]here were some things a person could fix, and others one had to live with the best they could.” 

Without wading into details (because who cares and also the What is unimportant) 2022 thru 2023 was the worst span of time I’ve ever experienced, what I retrospectively have been internally tagging the Lost Year(s)—have not before or since been so profoundly, uninterruptedly depressed. I wrote S2G2 in a frantic little burst from the bottom of a hole I sort of assumed at the time I would not get out of (dramatic!). And obviously the seductiveness of despair is a big focus in the course of the fic, but I’m struck on re-reading how ironclad the thing’s grip on hope (or hope in hopelessness) is—reassertion, continually, that experiences are worth having, that some things are worth sticking around for, and so on.

A year on, I’ve by no means solved the problem or perfected the art of balancing That Which Can Be Fixed against That Which Must Be Lived With, but I can say that the Living With is lately going comparatively so well most days it has not been the Central, All-Consuming Concern of Every Waking Moment—living with, tolerating, carrying, and so on—not even an hourly concern, or much of a conscious one, so much as something to check against, watch for, a diligent quiet awareness and work, when necessary, that has been (knock on wood) getting much easier with time, better life circumstances, and people to be around. Aware how significant that change is, on rereading what I was writing when that fixing-vs-living-with was so crushing it sort of tabula rasa’d my sense of self—meaning, mostly, that I’m unbelievably grateful to feel like somebody real again, and I owe that, too, in no small part to a fandom community that is on the whole so positive to be a part of—made it worth it to write, and try to put something into the world, and express passion for something I loved, and feel that passion reflected back to me when it was most needed.

And from that: just wanted to say, from my point of view a few tentative steps into what is beginning to feel like real and meaningful recovery—it gets better!! At the time of initial composition in late 2022/early 2023, I was trying hard to write hope for a few characters I adored, so I could maybe see it for myself, edgewise (truth thru fiction…?). I heard in the course of posting chapters from people who said that the fic resonated with them, that they related to or saw themselves in how I was writing Hawk or Beej, and drew some degree of comfort or catharsis in reading—wonderful, and I don’t think I could ask for more than to believe maybe some people who felt like I did at the time felt a little better because of something I wrote. and if there’s anything I hope people get out of thinking about S2G2 on this year-iversary it’s that uhh it gets better, and stubborn hope + whimsy + sense of humor + enjoyment of the absurd is ur most powerful tool as a human person probably, and also I’m stupid grateful for and very fond of fandom community, and the friends I’ve been so lucky to make thru this space (much love)!! Thank you for reading—fic, or this weird scrawl on my blog, or both—anyway, thanks! means a lot and always has! have a wednesday treat of some kind + treat urself nice ! who knows how to end these things. Alexa turn off earnestpost. Earnestposting end. Stop Post

[handyowlet]

I’ve seen a lot of discourse lately about the newer parts of this (and other) fandoms. Some of it is just calling out people for bad behavior, but some of it seems downright hostile to people just for being new, and that seems unfair to me. Anyone who is being a dick to others should ABSOLUTELY be dragged for that, whether they’ve been around for 6 months or 6 years. Common decency should be the baseline.

But we can’t control when we became aware of a fandom, or when a new world was opened up to us. And trying to lock people out, devalue their opinions, or refuse to engage with them at all simply because you were here first is just mean.

For example, I was obsessed with My Little Pony back when I watched The Glass Princess (1986) on VHS multiple times a day. But it’s been a long time since then, and while Friendship is Magic is not the same, I don’t begrudge anyone loving it and I don’t think I would be a more important fan or that my opinions would be more valid just because cause I loved it before a newer fan did, especially because I am (probably much) older than a lot of those fans. I only got there first because I was born first and my mom bought that tape. This isn’t exactly the same as some of you because I’m not into MLP any more, but my daughter’s starting to love it, and I’m not going to keep her from watching the new stuff just because it isn’t the old stuff.

I was only 5 when GO was published, so of course there are people who read it and fell in love with it before I did, because I was a child and didn’t know it existed. I didn’t know about a lot of things- I didn’t know anything about Star Wars, Star Trek, LOTR, etc. until college because my parents didn’t let me. I only learned about Rocky Horror, Eddie Izzard, RENT, Queer as Folk, etc. because of the people I met in Creative Writing and drama club in high school, because they had been given access to those things and shared them with me. Drag Race was several years old before someone introduced me to that.

I am relatively new to this fandom, even though I did read the book many years before the show came out. I didn’t even know there was going to be a show until suddenly there was, and I loved S1, but circumstances in my life kept me from becoming obsessed. I also had no idea S2 was coming until right before it came out, and by then I was in a place where the brain rot was able to take hold. I thought Tumblr was like Tindr until around then as well, and I had no idea AO3 even existed. No one else I known IRL knows what these things are either, except for what I’ve told them. I don’t think my participation in this fandom should be any less valid just because I didn’t have access to it before now.

I have dived into this fandom headfirst and unabashedly. I still don’t understand all of how Tumblr and AO3 work, but now that I’m here, I participate as much as I can (sometimes I don’t respond to those tagging posts because I haven’t figured it out yet). I post on Tumblr when I think I have something to say, and try to boost others who say things I think might enrich someone else’s life too. I devour fanfic on a daily basis, leaving kudos and comments and recommending anything I’ve liked to anyone who will listen because I want to support the amazing artists in this community and spread the happiness they’ve brought to me. I try to engage with anyone who engages with me, and I’d like to think I’ve been respectful to you all (but I know I can be blunt too, so if ever I am a twat waffle, feel free to drag my ass for that).

I guess my bottom line is, while I’ve mostly felt very safe, loved, and accepted jn this fandom, the anti-newbie discourse is disheartening. I will absolutely join you in blasting anyone who chooses to be an asshole, but I’m never going to support the unnecessary gatekeeping. I don’t think Aziraphale, Crowley, Michael, David, Terry, or Neil would either.

Thank you to all of you who have shown love and acceptance to me. I’ll strive to return it and pay it forward to every chance I get.

[lady-of-imladris]

Results of the "Where would you hide a Silmaril" post!!!

Hello everyone, sorry this took a while. But here are the results of this post. PLEASE READ THE UNHINGED RANDOM ONES. I will put them [HERE] in a separate post, as well as at the bottom of this post.

There will be charts for nice data representation (I used pie charts because I was taught NOT to use them and... fuck the rules)

We had a hot total of 127 people who either commented or reblogged with their opinion in the tags. Thank you to everyone who participated!!

Here are the numbers

31: give it to them

1 draw a sad face on it

1 in exchange for marriage proposal

2 in exchange for money

1 “I’m not dying for Feanor’s kidney stone”

1 in exchange for protection

11: body of water

5: people who accused me of having a silmaril

9: eat

after 23 hours

eaten by dog

6: volcano

7: NSFW edition

my ass

“up my… no I shouldn’t say it… the ocean”

“… either they wouldn’t look there or I’d have a good time while they’re looking

“I can’t bring myself to say it”

“In my pussy. Those gayboys wouldnt have the guts to retrieve it. Thank god Celegorm isnt in the picture”

“In my pussy. Sorry but 2 fine af war criminals in my house??! sorry not sorry daddy”

“I’d rather not say what my first thought was”

4: nope, not touching that

And now for the unhinged answers:

Here are the numbers:

54 unhinged answers:

5: Higher entity

“Give it to melkor because good luck getting it from that guy”

Ulmo

Tom Bombadil

Bilbo [Yes he counts as a higher entity]

Yavanna

3: Mess

Brother’s room

Wardrobe of the boys’ room (underneath lego)

Deepest darkest part of the woodshed

5: object permanence (it will disappear on its own)

parents’ basement between tomato sauce and baked beans

“I’d probably just lose it anyway”

“Wherever my left sock is”

“One of my “safe places”. It magically disappears within 24 hours”

“My special powers would kick in and it would never be found”

4: Proximity (hide it where they least suspect it. Close to them.)

Reverse pickpocket one of them

Maedhros’ underwear drawer

Near a Feanorian house

Under their own floorboards

2: cast it into the void

11: Urban

Hospital storage room

Toronto union station (a literal maze due to construction)

Go to a carnical and replace one of the lightbulbs with it

Gravel mine

Archives of a museum

“School or McDonalds, neither of these places feel like they exist on the mortal plane”

Bell tower

2: Ball pit

The trash

A random train station

Flush it down the toilet

4: Angband or Valinor

Bury it underneath the roots of the two tees

give it to Cirdan so he ships it off to valinor

3: Wear it

2: Wear it as a necklace

“Wear it and pspsp the Feanorians, dying in the process of trying to pet them”

RANDOM

Rig my house with cameras, assemble all light sources and plug them in, hide the silmaril inside a lamp, withdraw to a friend's place and watch them wander through my house like confused moths. Optional popcorn #noldor enrichment

Bury it in the garden with the potatoes. Good luck with the geese

Hide it in the middle of millions of other shiny rocks and run. Probably after drwaing a smiley on it

Feed it to a chicken and throw the chicken into the depths of khazad dum

Drive into a random direction and chuck it into a landfill

gollum-style underground, wrap it in a dozen bags and dump it into a deep but narrow crevice

Panic, try to eat it, spit it out, panic, dig a hole, throw myself into hole, panic, climb out, wait for them, throw it in their face while panicking

My pocket

Inside a washing machine, they would never look there

Wheel well of my heelies

Behind an army of therapists with a burning commitment to family gruop therapy. Either we'll scare them off or make some progress

Hand it to a little kid on the street

Inside a water mellon and say I gave it to a friend

British museum, god knows they'll never give it back-.

Box of tampons under the sink

inside a large rubber duck

Give it to deadpool

Buy a wedding dress and wait

Bring it to the shire. Even the Feanorians can't come after hobbits without looking like total dicks to a level even they aren't okay with

[glagger-true]

Introduction:

Howdy, dear reader! I'm your host, Glagger, and today I'm here to present you the master post containing all installments of my medal analysis series for Password the Visual Novel.

This is a long running passion project that has been in the works since after path P dropped to the public in full. The prime (ha) goal of it, is to discuss and analyze in-depth the astrological theme used in Password.

Each of its parts contains a full analysis dedicated to each medal and its associated character, where I attempt to show how the astrological meanings and connections enrich the writing of the game. There's also a few intermissions where I discuss interesting parallels between certain medals and their characters.

Thank you for your help:

Despite starting out solely as my own, this idea became a shared project between me and Xernok down the line. His work as an editor and artist, alongside all the encouragement, has made this evolve far beyond what I could have imagined. And for that, I'm very grateful to him. Our project, is only what it is now thanks to him.

I'm also grateful to Arran, Boigers and Gyrack to reviewing the original document that spawned this project. Your suggestions, advice, and in Arran's case, proof-reading, were of immense help, thank you. I'd also like to add Endersvoid as an honorable mention to this list. Even though you weren't able to review the original doc, the fact you accepted to read through it meant the world to me, thank you very much as well.

I'm also thankful to every artist that allowed me to use their wonderful pieces of fanart in this project. You're all talented and amazing, and your contribution to this has made it look even better than I could have dreamed. Each post that contains a piece done by you has your profiles linked, but I can't help but make a list here as well.

https://twitter.com/mrjosh47

https://twitter.com/terrantitanium

https://twitter.com/harushipanda

https://twitter.com/mikeowolee

https://twitter.com/butchii123

https://twitter.com/orbitpaws

Ghostlink on Discord

https://twitter.com/_Gabu4Play_

https://twitter.com/CaitNyz

https://twitter.com/hhsyan

https://twitter.com/PantsOnRams

https://twitter.com/UnsafeScapewolf

https://twitter.com/fxw93907805

And of course, Xernok on Discord.

Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart 💙.

The metaphorical wheel:

Before delving into the main content, in order to help those with zero knowledge of astrology not to feel lost or confused, we'd like to provide you with a simple reference sheet that was created to aid the reader in understanding the basic concepts of this pseudo science as they read:

Credits to Xernok for being its creator.

With these concepts in mind, let's delve into Password's zodiac wheel! (For those who never used Tumblr, the underlined sentences are hyperlinks, just tap or click on them).

1- The revolutionary noble Aquarius.

2- The patient and indulgent Taurus.

3- The devoted sensitive Cancer.

4- The solid and resilient Capricorn.

5- The forgiving dreamer Pisces.

Intermission one - The sinners.

6- The harmonious and honest Libra.

7- The passionate and determined Leo.

8- The stubborn and driven Aries.

9- The empathetic and manipulative Scorpio.

10- The unified and mutable Gemini.

Intermission two - The victims.

11- The wise and hopeful Sagittarius.

12- The rational and kind Virgo.

The final intermission - The villainous hero and The heroic villain.

13- The mysterious and ambitious Ophiuchus.

Conclusion:

We hope that this was as much of a fun read to you as it was to us to write and edit it. And that by the end of it, you feel like you learned something new about this wonderful cast and story.

I love Password, and want to share as much of that love as I can through my writing with anyone who's willing to listen. I hope that you were able to feel that love through this project, and that it has multiplied whatever fondness you had for the game tenfold.

Lastly, I'd like to thank you for your attention and time. After all, this project is only relevant because you're on the other side of the screen to read it. I shall see you again soon, dear reader. In whatever project my obsession with this story will spawn next. Buh bye! 👋💙.

[twilightmalachite]

Machina - Dues ex... 1

Author: Kino Seitaro (with Akira)

Characters: Shu, Natsume, Sora, Mika, Makoto

Translator: Mika Enstars

"And also. It is rude to assume I am “simply unfamiliar with” this matter."

Season: Winter

Location: Cafe

After a while…

Sora: Ohh, so that’s the situation?

So that’s why Mika-chan-san was inspired to create with more sparkling colors than Sora’s ever seen~. Sora understands now!

It’s true, Sora was the one who extended the invitation to the Test World.

But, it was something that Mika-chan-san wanted… There was no fraud or anything that Shu-ni~san speaks of!

Shu: It’s a new technology, so there of course will be its merits and demerits. You say that there is no intent of fraud, but there lacks a safety perspective.

Kagehira and I are already recognized artists even without the use of utilizing new tech. What reason is there to enter such dangerous territory?

Natsume: FuFU, you’re worried for Mika-kun’s well-being from the bottom of your heaRT, hUH, Shu-niisan?

HowevER, are you sure you should be rejecting new technology that you’re unfamiliar wiTH? It seems to me that you’re simply imposing your vested interests in the name of aRT—

Shu: It is only natural that I will be criticized. However, art requires context.

Who is creating the art, what is their background, what is the concept behind the piece? Digital art lacks this perspective.

The use of innovative technology does not make it superior. They are each of their own respective phenomena, and cannot even be compared.

Those sorts of things belong at corporate trade shows. Enriching lives with new technologies… That is not what the role of art is.

Natsume & Sora: ……

Shu: And also. It is rude to assume I am “simply unfamiliar with” this matter.

This new wave of digital art is surging in Paris as well, naturally. It is not a topic irrelevant to me.

Could you cooperate with me in bringing Kagehira away from SSVRS, Natsume?

That technology is dangerous.I need to bring Kagehira to his senses as soon as possible.

Natsume: DangeroUS, hUH…

Got iT. If you believe sO, then I doubt anything I say will change your miND, Shu-niisan.

Do I have your cooperatiON, Sora?

Sora: Mhm. Sora does feel bad for Mika-chan-san. It’s not good to get into a game that makes those around unhappy, right~?

Sora’s going to go call someone from the game company.

Because, if Mika-chan-san’s taken from the Test World, it might not just be Mika-chan-san’s problem.

Shu: …? What do you mean, little one?

Sora: HaHa~, exactly what Sora said!

As it is, it no longer concerns just Mika-chan-san anymore.

If Mika-chan-san’s going to be separated from SSVRS, appropriate arrangements will need to be made~!

Location: Saison Avenue (SSVRS)

At the same time, in the main street within SSVRS…

Mika: ♪~ ♪~

Makoto: Kagehira-kun, Kagehira-kun! The auction results are in!

Mika: Nnah, it’s that time already? I was so focused on my work I completely forgot, thank ya! ♪

Ya didn’t have to come all the way over here just to let me know though, Mako-kun.

Makoto: Well I mean, I also wasn’t planning to butt my nose in at all and mind my own business, but after seeing the results, I felt like I had to let you know.

It looks like since the digital artwork in the Test World’s attracted a lot of attention, lots of people are investing for speculative purposes. The value of the VL$ has skyrocketed!

Oh, and just as I said that, it just hit another new high for its exchange rate…

Mika: Ummm. I don’t really get what all that means. So what does that make the value of 1VL$ now, then…?

Makoto: Well, I don’t think you’d believe me if I told you, so go see for yourself. You can see it on the exchange screen right there…

Mika: One, ten, one hundred…

Wha, this is way more digits than I thought!

So in the Japanese Yen, that’d make it worth… Nnah, o-one hundred million?[1]

Makoto: Yup. Which makes the amount of the winning auction bid to be equivalent to hundreds of millions of yen, Kagehira-kun! To be honest, I can barely believe it either…

Does this mean that… Your digital art is now worth as much as the works done by the world’s most famous artists?

Mika: Eh…

EhhHHHHHHHH!?!

← prev | story directory | next →

That’s a conversion rate of 1VL$ to approximately $715,000 USD.

[silksworn]

So first things first: only hot takes i want to hear. Full stop. You have made me think of nuances and grounded realities beyond my blorboifications that make me so so so much more smart and powerful and cool bc my brain meat has been enriched by ur hot takes

It is so easy to be like "nyahaha Wario vc I am going to write a villain!" And then they just come off as weird and cringe and like. Poorly written and thought out. But iraestra is so fucking cool, with so many layers. Still thinking about her turning to try to tell her sister about her latest discovery. Still thinking about how she was a MOTHER and she was going to have a LEGACY and she was a legacy in and of herself and now she's all that's left. Still thinking about how she thinks her family would hate her and be sickened by her for not resurrecting them with evil ass magic. How at least as I understand it, they would come back wrong (tm), but were they ever right in the first place?

She is so complicated, rhere are so many aspects and motivations inside her to keep track of, and she beautifully stays true to the lore and themes of the game! Its so unique to have a villain companion! And you are so GRACIOUS plotting with us bastwrds who are too anxious to make the mean choices in video games. (Im gonna do it for minathra now tho, u have shown me the light.)

Ur writing is evocative, and it is touching. I feel a pang in my chest thinking about all those things about ira, and the way you have written them

And her voice is so clear and she is so competent. Like a really good villain, and ur also a really great imrover, and person to talk to and and and

Bye lol

!!!!!! crying because this may be just about the nicest thing anyone has ever said about my writing & portrayal of characters. Thank you, from the bottom of my black little heart. And I'm also glad that you enjoy listening to my silly little rambles borne of obsession with actively making characters the Worst that they can Be. I AM SO INTENSELY FLATTERED that you think so highly of Iraestra!! and that you remember so much about the random lore I just dump on the dashboard from time to time. You're soooo right about 'come back wrong but were they ever right in the first place?' (the answer is no and you worded that BEAUTIFULLY, my friend!). Part of her resents & hates her family & is glad that they are gone as much as she feels a failure for being so utterly unable to do anything about it, despite being the next in line to be Mother Matron. You are just about the 3rd person I've convinced to play Minthara's route, at this point I'm pretty much unstoppable :3c She's good fun and I've personally rather enjoyed the 'evil' route of the game, but I understand and respect why for many players it's too hard of a decision to make. I've been writing villains for a while now too, but I'm sooo relieved to hear that I do so successfully. I'm going to pin this letter to my fridge, slap a gold star on my forehead, and probably cry about it. I've read this over 3 times now and I just -- You are a delight to know and so sincere and enthusiastic in everything you do. And so passionate about your characterization and headcanons! You're such a friendly person to have on the dashboard, I'm glad we're here in this rpc at the same time <333333

[whatdoyouneedsugar]

Hello Bunny (If that’s what you go by on here) I’m kind of new to the kink scene. I’ve been doing research on kink and bdsm for a year or two now and I’m finally feeling comfortable actually talking to people in the scene instead of just watching videos and reading articles/posts.

I understand that kinks come on a bit of a spectrum and kink and bdsm is a very personalized experience that is different for different people.

My thing is I feel like I don’t belong here because I have a huge thing for soft doms and ‘softer’ bdsm practices. I feel kind of out of place because I don’t exactly relate to other people’s wants and desires. Do you have any tips to overcome this kind of internalized shame? Thank you for any advice you have 🫶

-🍰

Hi 🍰 nonnie 🥰 first of all, I think it's awesome that you took your time to observe and research and are now reaching out to people, I think that's a great way to start.

Full disclosure, I don't have personal experience in the bdsm scene irl, only by reading and interacting online.

But this is actually such an important question and something that needs to be made very clear: the way you want to experience kink and bdsm is absolutely valid and no one has the right to tell you otherwise.

I am not sure on specific tips to overcome feeling shame abt this, but I think you should try and follow blogs that have those softer themes, search for tags that reflect your preferences, read stories where characters engage in plays that you prefer... basically expose yourself to that content in a way that it normalizes it for you and helps you see softer kink and bdsm plays as equally worthy.

From personal experience, my tastes changed a lot since I started engaging more with kinky content and part of what keeps me so interested in bdsm is the versatility in dynamics, in plays, in scenes. Breaking certain stereotypes and pre-conceived notions just enriched my experience more and I think I not only know my tastes better, but I am able to better communicate to someone what I want, what I like. I personally love softer play, I am soft as a dom and I know for a fact a lot of people in the bdsm scene prefer softer play too.

I know some people would try and make you feel weaker or unworthy as a sub/dom/top/bottom for enjoying softer play. Or like you're not serious abt liking bdsm... If you do encounter those people in your path, remember that they don't deserve you as a partner or to interact with you anyway, if they judge you like this, and that you should be with people who respect you and your boundaries.

I'll be here if you wanna talk 😊

[shorthistorian]

Hey Jordan, @antique-symbolism referred me to you for a history question I've got about a story I'm writing that might help out some other writers as well. I've got a pseudo-historical setting that lacks telecommunication and a formal postal system, but the narrative requires a good deal of messages being sent back and forth between characters. I've got couriers and pages in the story, but they're a little overworked! I was wondering if you had any insights into historical postal systems and how people sent and received messages and packages before standardized addresses, or between people who were traveling/lacking a permanent residence. How on earth did pages and couriers find people w/o modern ways of tracking people down? Thanks!!

Hi! I love questions like this and @antique-symbolism knows that. They are like pumpkins full of ground beef she tosses into my enclosure for enrichment.

Precise answers to your questions are going to depend on time and place, but since you are in a pseudohistorical setting, we have some wiggle room. I’ll be leaning on the work of Professor Lindsay O’Neill, who I had the pleasure of being a TA for during my grad work at USC. You’ve already identified the big issues at play here. A formal postal service is a pretty crazy and modern thing that we take utterly for granted. For a small fee (for letters at least) you can send something ANYWHERE in the world, even to very remote or unpopulated places. That’s wild and it doesn’t happen overnight or without a lot of organization and investment. For a long time, governments had their own couriers and postal routes, but they were not supposed to be carrying personal correspondence. (An analogy here would be ARPANET, the precursor to the modern internet developed by the US Department of Defense.)

Prior to true postal services, a letter writer had a few options. One could pay a carrier to transport a letter or ask a friend to carry one along with them if they were going the right direction. As today, a letter might need to make multiple stops along its journey or be passed between multiple people. The farther off the beaten track someone lived, the more time and money it would take for the letter to arrive -- if it did at all. O’Neill mentions in her book The Opened Letter that writers regularly made reference to letters “finding” their recipients as in, “when this letter finds you” (24). It was far from a guarantee that it would! [Side note: It is worthwhile to consider how letters and goods are moving. Overland travel, at least until the wide implementation of railroads, was slow and expensive. Water transport was far cheaper and far faster, like months faster, even when moving longer distances. One could easily imagine a setting where post offices only sit along water routes and inlanders need to travel to pick up their mail.]

So what about your story? Details will have to depend on your exact setting, but here’s a few ideas. If letters are as important to the story as you say, maybe that is a reason to beef up the postal infrastructure. This doesn’t have to be a full, government-run, continent spanning postal service, but if your characters are associated with a larger organization, maybe that body invests in regular carriers. Alternatively, your characters might just be willing to pay the money required for quick couriers.

Door-to-door postal service is a more modern development (starting in a handful of major cities in 1863 in the US, for example), so in your story, travelers or people without permanent addresses aren’t at as much of a disadvantage as you might think. Anybody receiving mail would have to retrieve their letters or packages at the post office. Alternatively, if you wanted to reach a wandering friend, you could send a letter somewhere else like a hotel or a business where they could check for it.

As I see it, here’s the bottom line: the mail is, by default, slow, expensive, and unreliable. If it isn’t those things, then there must be some systems in place to improve it. What those systems are and how your characters interact with them will reflect the details of your setting.

I hope that is marginally helpful. If you have more specifics of the time/place you want to emulate, I’d be happy to answer more questions or direct you to other resources. Thanks for getting in touch!

[ruki--mukami]

Thank you for writing. Thank you for running Ruki's blog. Thank you for making Ruki a real Vampire that can be both cruel and soft when needed. That is so unique.

Thank you for caring for all these different livestock around Ruki.

And thank you for making Ruki's blog a safe place to interact, no matter if through asks or rps. I really feel safe and comfortable in your space.

Anyway, thank you!

🧩 AAAAA OMG idk what I did to deserve all this praise so suddenly, ahahaha. Thank you so much for the kind words, Anon, and portraying each facet of Ruki’s personality has always been loads of fun for me. Not to reminisce or get too sappy in this post, but I’m really proud of how much this blog has evolved over time. When I first made this blog, I honestly didn’t put too much thought into how I wrote his actions and focused entirely on the dialogue, but thanks to everyone I roleplay with I’ve learned many new ways of enriching my writing, so I must say thank you to everyone here as well. 

Truth be told, I never took roleplaying this seriously until this blog. I’ve learned that roleplaying as a canon character can be very serious business to some, with different websites requiring whole applications and writing samples as to why you should be qualified to play your canon character. Some even go through extensive research and dissecting of the character they wish to roleplay as, and let me tell you, I totally made this blog on a whim HAHAHAHA. No research, no dissecting, nothing like that. I just made it because it seemed like a fun “side hobby” and I figured reading all the Ruki content and simping for all those years was all I needed to portray him, and I’m so proud of how it has paid off. 

I sure am glad to roleplay in such a chill space like Tumblr where no one really tells me how to run my blog whatsoever. I love, love, LOVE that kind of freedom, and I’m also so grateful I happened to join the DL RP community at a time where everyone is so chill and nice. From the horror stories I’ve heard, I’d probably quit my blog if it felt like I was babysitting people instead of having a fun, chaotic time. So far everyone has been so supportive of each other and I haven’t seen a full on ship war which I am very thankful for. Of course I will continue to accommodate the needs of all OCs and muses who visit this blog in an attempt to make some of the best threads and stories you’ve ever read (not to sound dramatic). Each relationship has such a drastically different dynamic and it’s always a blast for me. And you don’t know how glad I am to here that I’ve been maintaining a decent balance of cruel and soft for him, because believe me, I thought I made him too cruel at one point but it felt very relieving that people actually enjoy it very much, ahaha. 

Now and from here forward, I intend on making this a safe place for everyone to come and interact with me as well as other wonderful people in this community who frequent this blog. Again, thank you and I will cherish these kind of messages from the bottom of my heart!! Take care and as always, Ruki looks forward to your next ask. 🧩

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

July 23, 2021

Heather Cox Richardson

On July 20, 1969, American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin became the first humans ever to land, and then to walk, on the moon.

They were part of the Apollo program, designed to put an American man on the moon. Their spacecraft launched on July 16 and landed back on Earth in the Pacific Ocean July 24, giving them eight days in space, three of them orbiting the moon 30 times. Armstrong and Aldrin spent almost 22 hours on the moon’s surface, where they collected soil and rock samples and set up scientific equipment, while the pilot of the command module, Michael Collins, kept the module on course above them.

The American space program that created the Apollo 11 spaceflight grew out of the Cold War. The year after the Soviet Union launched an artificial satellite in 1957, Congress created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to demonstrate American superiority by sending a man into space. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy moved the goalposts, challenging the country to put a man on the moon and bring him safely back to earth again. He told Congress: “No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.”

A year later, in a famous speech at Rice University in Texas, Kennedy tied space exploration to America’s traditional willingness to attempt great things. “Those who came before us made certain that this country rode the first waves of the industrial revolutions, the first waves of modern invention, and the first wave of nuclear power, and this generation does not intend to founder in the backwash of the coming age of space. We mean to be a part of it—we mean to lead it,” he said.

[T]here is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people…. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills….”

But the benefits to the country would not only be psychological, he said. “The growth of our science and education will be enriched by new knowledge of our universe and environment, by new techniques of learning and mapping and observation, by new tools and computers for industry, medicine, the home as well as the school.” The effort would create ���a great number of new companies, and tens of thousands of new jobs…new demands in investment and skilled personnel,” as the government invested billions in it.

“To be sure, all this costs us all a good deal of money…. I realize that this is in some measure an act of faith and vision, for we do not now know what benefits await us.”

Seven years later, people across the country gathered around television sets to watch Armstrong step onto the moon and to hear his famous words: “That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind.”

President Richard Nixon called the astronauts from the White House: “I just can't tell you how proud we all are of what you have done,” he said. “For every American, this has to be the proudest day of our lives…. Because of what you have done, the heavens have become a part of man's world…. For one priceless moment in the whole history of man, all the people on this Earth are truly one…in their pride in what you have done, and…in our prayers that you will return safely to Earth.”

And yet, by the time Armstrong and Aldrin were stepping onto the moon in a grand symbol of the success of the nation’s moon shot, Americans back on earth were turning against each other. Movement conservatives who hated post–World War II business regulation, taxation, and civil rights demanded smaller government and championed the idea of individualism, while those opposed to the war in Vietnam increasingly distrusted the government.

After May 4, 1970, when the shooting of college students at Kent State University in Ohio badly weakened Nixon’s support, he began to rally supporters to his side with what his vice president, Spiro Agnew, called “positive polarization.” They characterized those who opposed the administration as anti-American layabouts who simply wanted a handout from the government. The idea that Americans could come together to construct a daring new future ran aground on the idea that anti-war protesters, people of color, and women were draining hardworking taxpayers of their hard-earned money.

Ten years later, former actor and governor of California Ronald Reagan won the White House by promising to defend white taxpayers from people like the “welfare queen,” who, he said, “has 80 names, 30 addresses, 12 Social Security cards and is collecting veteran’s benefits on four non-existing deceased husbands.” Reagan promised to champion individual Americans, getting government, and the taxes it swallowed, off people’s backs.

“In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem,” Reagan said in his Inaugural Address. Americans increasingly turned away from the post–World War II teamwork and solidarity that had made the Apollo program a success, and instead focused on liberating individual men to climb upward on their own terms, unhampered by regulation or taxes.

This week, on July 20, 2021, 52 years to the day after Armstrong and Aldrin stepped onto the moon, former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and four passengers spent 11 minutes in the air, three of them more than 62 miles above the earth, where many scientists say space starts. For those three minutes, they were weightless. And then the pilotless spaceship returned to Earth.

Traveling with Bezos were his brother, Mark; 82-year-old Wally Funk, a woman who trained to be an astronaut in the 1960s but was never permitted to go to space; and 18-year-old Oliver Daemen from the Netherlands, whose father paid something under $28 million for the seat.

Bezos’s goal, he says, is not simply to launch space tourism, but also to spread humans to other planets in order to grow beyond the resource limits on earth. The solar system can easily support a trillion humans,” Bezos has said. “We would have a thousand Einsteins and a thousand Mozarts and unlimited—for all practical purposes—resources and solar power and so on. That's the world that I want my great-grandchildren's great-grandchildren to live in.”

Ariane Cornell, astronaut-sales director of Bezos’s space company Blue Origin, live-streamed the event, telling the audience that the launch “represents a number of firsts.” It was “[t]he first time a privately funded spaceflight vehicle has launched private citizens to space from a private launch site and private range down here in Texas. It’s also a giant first step towards our vision to have millions of people living and working in space.”

In 2021, Bezos paid $973 million in taxes on $4.22 billion in income while his wealth increased by $99 billion, making his true tax rate 0.98%. After his trip into the sky, he told reporters: “I want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for all of this…. Seriously, for every Amazon customer out there and every Amazon employee, thank you from the bottom of my heart very much. It’s very appreciated.”

—-

Notes:

https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-space-flight-passenger-revealed-wally-funk-2021-7

https://www.businessinsider.com/blue-origin-auction-spacecraft-jeff-bezos-winner-seat-astronaut-2021-6

https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-launches-to-space-blue-origin-first-human-spaceflight-2021-7

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/06/08/wealthy-irs-taxes/

https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-thanks-amazon-customers-for-paying-trip-to-space-2021-7

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LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[From comments: “When you’ve been able to amass your money by not paying your fair share of taxes, your “privately funded” venture is a diversion of rightfully public funds. This new space race is publicly funded, but absent public controls and alignment. Socialize the expenses, privatize the profits.”

“After May 4, 1970, when the shooting of college students at Kent State University in Ohio badly weakened Nixon’s support, he began to rally supporters to his side with what his vice president, Spiro Agnew, called “positive polarization."Combined with the unsubtle racism of Nixon's Southern Strategy, thus began the decades long Republican policy of dividing Americans against each other that has led us to what we have today; two Americas that reside in different universes, and our national wealth controlled by a handful of unelected, supremely, in some cases psychotically, self-centered white men.Jeff Bezos could not have existed in Kennedy's America. We must make that so again.”

[prettywordsyouleft]

Yellow Bells

Pairing: Kim Yugyeom x reader

Genre: florist au / fluff

Warnings: none

A/N: this is for the lovely @mrkimyugyeom​ for her birthday today. Thanks to the anon the other day who mentioned the florist! concept, I realised it fits this present for my dear friend perfectly. Thank you for everything you have done for me over the last year, Nora! I’m so grateful for our friendship Xxx

Word count: 2136

“Are you sure you can manage on your own, Yugyeom?”

He nodded, ushering his parents eagerly to the exit of the store. “Mum, I’ve grown up in this shop. I’m pretty sure I know every type of flower in here from your little songs you sing as you care for them. Go, I can handle it for a week.”

“He’s right, darling. The florist will be here when we return from our vacation,” Yugyeom’s father assured, tugging his wife outside. She turned to look forlornly at Yugyeom.

Or, probably the row of baby azaleas behind him.

“Make sure you water-”

“I will and I’ll feed those in the tropical part and check the temperature for the lilies and honestly Mum, I can handle this.”

She reluctantly nodded, stretching to place a kiss on his cheek as she hugged him. He waved his parents off as they drove away for their first vacation alone since he was born over twenty years ago. And as soon as they were out of sight, he stepped back into the house of flora and slumped visibly.

Sure, he wanted his parents to have a good time. And he wasn’t exactly lying; he had spent more time within this florist growing up than in the apartment above it.

But Yugyeom wasn’t born possessing a green thumb like his parents. He was even somewhat affected by pollen and since his mother was deeply attached to her flower children, he had only minded the store a handful of times.

“I can do this,” he reaffirmed, nodding his head and slipping his hands deep within his pockets, eying the succulents’ table carefully. “We’ll do this together, right guys?”

He then grimaced, wondering how his mother could speak so fondly to everything in here without any problem. So, maybe he wouldn’t be singing the bushes down the back to sleep as he locked up later on.

But he’d at least be able to keep the store running for the next five days.

Hopefully.

The first day started well. Yugyeom followed the pages of instructions his mother left behind for him to follow, the step by step guide foolproof. He managed to serve a couple of customers and take an order for next week for an event when his mother would be back to make new intricate arrangements.

But that was where he was failing the most. Staring down at the stack of cut-offs lying on the decorative paper he had chosen, Yugyeom groaned out loud. There was no charm to the arrangement he had made. They all clashed and he knew even he wouldn’t buy this to give to anyone.

“You need a different colour palette to balance out all this pink,” you called and he glanced up, his breath getting caught in his throat.

You smiled politely and pointed to the flowers. “You have pink roses, pink tulips and pink carnations. Monochrome is nice but I think if you changed the carnations for a white, it would make the arrangement more interesting.”

“I can do white,” he slowly replied, soon grinning at you. “Thanks!”

“Anytime. I have an order to pick up under the name Y/N,” you stated and Yugyeom nodded, turning to the computer to look up the details, keeping you in his peripheral as he did so.

You glanced around mindlessly. “Mrs Kim isn’t around?”

“Nope, she’s on vacation this week.”

“Oh so you’re Yugyeom then,” you commented and he stopped looking up your order details, blinking rapidly at the fact that you knew his name. You chuckled. “Your Mum talks about you a lot.”

“Really? Are you sure you didn’t hear her say Yellow bells instead?”

You grinned. “I sense some jealousy here. The plants will be offended.”

“You really do know my mother,” he retorted with a breathy chuckle, hiking his thumb in the direction of the storeroom. “I’ll just get your order.”

He returned with a bag of fertiliser and some seeds, sliding them up onto the top of the free counter space. After ringing up your order and accepting your card, Yugyeom then held onto it a little longer than he should. You eyed his lack of action curiously.

“So white?”

You nodded. “White. Don’t stress too much, someone will buy them.”

“Easy for you to say, you’re not the one jealous of flowers,” he teased when he handed back your card.

“Who knows, if it’s still here tomorrow, I might buy it.”

“You’ll be back tomorrow?”

Shrugging, you reached for your purchases. “Perhaps.”

Yugyeom waited for your return the following day. He had managed to empty out the clearance table to a kind elderly couple, stacked the new batch of supplies that arrived just before lunch and even got a start on another mediocre bouquet of flowers when the jingle of the bell over the door made him look up and find you walking inside. He dropped the roll of ribbon he had been fumbling with and then yelped when it landed on his foot.

You laughed. “And a hello to you as well, Yellow bells.”

“I’m going to regret saying that to you yesterday, aren’t I?” he grumbled, bending down to retrieve the ribbon. When he stood back up, you were holding his first arrangement. Yugyeom sighed. “You don’t have to.”

“Why not? I want to be the first person to have one of Yellow-”

“I swear, Y/N if you keep it up!” he cut in with a hearty laugh, your own soon joining his. When the moment was over, Yugyeom then waved you off. “You can have it.”

“Well, I plan on that.”

“No, I mean, for free.”

You grew curious. “Don’t businesses require financial backing?”

“They also require creativity and some sense of pride in their work. That sad bunch has neither. I can’t expect you to buy it.”

“I will. And I will continue to keep buying them until you have just that!”

“What did you say?”

“Ring it up for me, Yellow bells.”

By the fourth day of your regular appearances to the florist, Yugyeom was certain of two things. One, he really liked you. There was just something about you that captivated him and he wanted to talk to you endlessly. Even if it was all about the species of one plant family, he was certain he would listen to every word you said.

Secondly, he knew his mother was behind all this.

“She told you to come and check on her babies, didn’t she?” he asked pointedly when you appeared, looking rather inconspicuously at the indoor houseplants section.

“Who?”

“My mother,” he said and you smiled. “I knew she didn’t trust me!”

“She does actually, like I said, all she talks about is you, Yellow bells.”

He clamped his eyes closed momentarily to clear out the nickname that he was growing rather attached to and then rounded the counter, coming over to your side. “Then why are you turning up every day?”

“Have you made another arrangement yet?” you wondered and Yugyeom rubbed the back of his neck, nodding shyly. “Where is it?”

“It uh, it sold.”

You almost looked upset. “You’re kidding me! Then you’ve done it!”

“I think the old lady felt sorry for me. Something about going home to pretty it up in one of her fine vases.”

“Well, your colour choices are improving so you never know.”

“What’s the deal about you anyway? You always talk about colour.”

You grinned. “I study colour theory at the local university.”

“Huh.” Yugyeom moved over to look at a baby fern, inspecting its leaves. “You’re majoring in art?”

“Business management. I just take it as an extra paper.”

“What’s the end goal for you then?”

“Really?” you asked, biting at your bottom lip as you grinned. “Is Yellow bells interested in where I end up?”

“I’d laugh if it was a florist.” Your eyes sparkled as your lips twitched and Yugyeom gaped at you. “A florist?!”

“I’ve been helping your mother make changes to the business marketing part of the shop for three months now. So it would be this florist.”

“I’ve never seen you before.”

“You moved out, remember.”

“You know too much,” he breathed and you nudged him.

“Not everything.”

“Enough,” he lamented and moved back to the counter in a slump. “You’ll come and work for the family and then you’ll not see me for anything more than Yellow bells then.”

“Were you hoping I’d see you for more than that?” you questioned, unable to hide your intrigue.

“I’m glad the old lady bought the bouquet now.”

“You’ll just have to make me another one,” you concluded, heading towards the door. You stepped out, only to stick your head back around the corner. “Make sure it doesn’t sell before I get here again tomorrow.”

Yugyeom was discouraged. With the knowledge that you were being primed to join the family business, he couldn’t see how this would separate him enough from the son of your future employer. He barely said a word to any of the plants as he locked up that night and grunted in greeting the following morning. He only had to get through today. Tomorrow, his parents would be back and he would be able to return to his apartment downtown and forget all about the way you smiled whenever you called him your preferred nickname.

The day felt like it was dragging. He completed all the morning chores, ensuring the plants that needed watering or fed an enrichment mixture had been checked off his list before he approached the arrangement station. Yugyeom had gathered an assorted bunch of flowers earlier in the morning. There was nothing special to them, just cut-offs that didn’t seem to fit in with others. Together, however, they seemed aesthetically pleasing. Choosing to wrap them in simple brown paper to enhance their beauty, he placed the bouquet into the front stand, going back to working on some multi-coloured roses.

The doorbell jingled and he didn’t even look up. He knew it was you.

“Afternoon flower babies,” you called out, sounding just like his mother. He huffed petulantly, trimming off the excess stem of the rose he was readying for the arrangement. You were soon in front of him. But instead of greeting him with his nickname, you didn’t say anything.

Yugyeom looked up to see what was wrong, his eyes narrowing when he found you staring at something in awe. “What’s wrong with you?”

“You made this?”

“Oh them? Yeah, I felt sorry for them since they didn’t match with their other batches so I put them all together. It’s a bit wild, huh?”

“I love it,” you confessed shakily, blinking a few times. You then glanced up at him and he could see how moved you were. “It’s beautiful, Yugyeom.”

He was overwhelmed. He hadn’t expected this reaction to the bouquet, or within himself. Your words bounced around his insides, shooting off spikes of warmth. He was certain he was madly blushing and cleared his throat awkwardly. “Oh uh, well.”

“I can’t buy this,” you murmured, still clutching the bouquet despite your statement. Your eyes searched his and Yugyeom eventually grinned bashfully.

“Good, I can finally gift you some flowers, Y/N.”

“One of many bunches, I hope.”

“You forget, today’s my last day here.”

You faltered. “You don’t plan to visit?”

“Well, yeah I come and see my parents most weekends.”

“Then you can make me some flowers then.”

“You won’t be here every day, will you?” he wondered, trying not to stare at you too much. He felt there was more to what you were expressing and his palms started to sweat as he thought over what next to say. “You… you wouldn’t come here looking for me, would you?”

“I have every day this week, haven’t I?”

Yugyeom frowned. “That’s because of my mother’s-”

“Actually, she just asked me to come in on Wednesday. I was curious and couldn’t wait until then.”

“Curious about what?”

“You,” you confessed, burying your face into the flowers you held to hide your expression. You then gazed up at him once more at ease. “You’re kind of handsome, Yellow bells.”

He sighed heavily. “It was going so well.”

“Don’t tell me you don’t like it,” you mused and Yugyeom laughed.

“I’ll need to come up with a nickname for you then too,” he announced and you tilted your head to the side.

“You seemed so sure we wouldn’t be crossing paths after today.”

He grinned. “Didn’t you say I needed to make more flower arrangements?”

“I did.”

“Well, I’ve got some new ideas. I need to try them out when I come by. Since you’ll be here, after all.”

You seemed to bloom then, brightening up entirely. “Well Yellow bells, I can’t wait to see what you come up with next.”

_________________

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(psst... did someone say Mikey whump? guys I think someone said Mikey whump…) 

Frisky February Prompt: Electricity~ (yes it’s 15 days too early shush)  @slashthedice

synopsis: Michael gets served up some nasty, nasty revenge by someone who really, really has it out for him.

warnings: torture in a medical setting, sexual assault, mikey has a bad time ok

foreword: the opinions expressed here by the POV character about certain sensitive topics in no way reflect my own beliefs <3

No Faith in Medicine | Michael Myers x Reader | NSFW

The hospital corridor is long and grey and stretches onward toward a single bolted door, labeled by the rectangular sign hanging above it as Therapy Theater No. 5.

This deep within the bowels of the sanitarium, below the patient wards and the enrichment centers and the checkered courtyard, there is hardly any of the familiar clamour; so as you stride closer to the door the clack of your bootheels over the beige linoleum carries like thunder.

Smith’s Grove was never the sort of place you had pictured yourself ending up during all those sleepless nights studying for your Ph.D, and truthfully, you can’t stand it here. The deliberate blandness of the hospital, with its color palettes limited to inoffensive whites and blues and greys—meticulously designed so as not to provoke its residents—wears on you more than anything else.

You feel like you’re suffocating here; but it doesn’t matter.

This job was never about you to begin with. It was never about some commendable interest in the healing of troubled minds, either; oh-no. There are two-hundred-and-forty-nine permanent patients living inside these sound-proof walls, and while it may not be a very doctorly thing to admit, you don’t give a rat’s ass about two-hundred-and-forty-eight of them.

...and as for that last “troubled mind,” well…

The breezy summer afternoon that Michael Myers was sentenced to life imprisonment exists in your head as vividly as a snapshot picture.

Almost as vivid is your memory of the Halloween that a policeman had come knocking at your front door to inform you in a strictly-business-voice that your sister was found dead in her kitchen, her throat slit open from ear to ear.

You remember watching from your couch as the gavel came down and the judge ruled the man who had taken your sister’s life away as criminally insane—and not responsible for his actions on that fateful October night—and therefor not legally a candidate for the death penalty.

You remember the burning, frustrated tears streaming down your face, the shatter of glass as you hurled the remote at the television screen, and then sinking down in a heap on the floor and screaming until your lungs were raw and your voice was in tatters, because it wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair.

So when the news came out that Myers was to be transferred back to Smith’s Grove—hardly a forty minute commute from your own house—you had been out the door that very same day, speeding in your car down the highway, ready to accept any available position the Sanitarium would offer you for your credentials.

It had been your one shot at revenge on the sick, evil fucker who had ruined your happiness; and you were prepared to move heaven and earth just to bring Myers hell.

It had taken eight months before you even laid eyes on the man for the first time.

You’d landed yourself a patient therapy position, but only had the clearance to treat patients who fell under the “medium” and “high-risk” categories. In the entire hospital there were only two patients who fell under the third and final category: a spitting lunatic of a man, who couldn’t be safely approached without first being drugged half-asleep with antipsychotics...

...and Myers.

You had possessed the patience of a saint, climbing through promotion after promotion.

And the very minute that you were handed back a fresh copy of your I.D, now with a little red stamp at the bottom, the stamp that meant you were cleared to work with Myers, you had raced down to the front desk to file your recommendation for treatment.

Three days later, after hours of debriefing by Dr. Ashton, Myers’ new court-assigned psychiatrist, you came face to face with the worst criminal the sanitarium had ever known.

You had seen Myers’ face pictured in black and white on newspaper articles and in fuzzy low-definition on T.V. 

And absolutely none of that could have prepared you for witnessing him in the flesh.

The thing that had startled you most when you were led by Dr. Ashton into Michael’s barren, cramped room—the thing that practically had you reeling when your eyes fell on the motionless figure sitting on the cot in the corner, chained at the wrists and ankles by a metal link fastened to the floor—the thing you still despise yourself for thinking—

—is that Myers was jaw-droppingly, stunningly handsome.

His were the kind of ethereal good looks that you might expect to find in some renaissance painting, or a Grecian statue, or a fantasy book.

You had stood staring across the room at the motionless young man, drinking in all the features of his vacant, pretty face; overcome by complete and total disbelief that this was actually the person responsible for all your grief.

And the very next second, that disbelief was shattered like a dropped vase; when you looked into Myers’ stare.

It brought down the temperature in the room like a cold-snap. It was not directed at you, only at the floor, yet it had you shuddering anyway, had all the hairs on your arms standing straight up. It was not a lights-on-but-nobody-home sort of gaze, the kind you were expecting from how Myers had been described by his former psychiatrist. His face was blank, yes; that was accurate enough.

But his eyes, they were the furthest thing from it. 

Michael Myers had the eyes of a ruthless, calculating, viciously deliberate predator.

The longer you had stood there, gawking at Myers as if he were a tiger in a cage, hardly listening to Dr. Ashton’s rambling about his admiration of your interest in his patient’s treatment, the more you became aware of the charge crackling in the air; like the moment in a thunderstorm just before lightning rips through the sky. It was as if every fiber in your body could sense the danger radiating from this man; you could all but see and smell the invisible blood staining his hands.

It had turned your vision into a seething cloud of red. 

Here was a murderer—the worst kind of murderer, who was perfectly, undoubtedly aware of his crimes, a fact you could tell from just his eyes—who carried in his heart not a single shred of remorse for the lives he’d ripped away. Who, when he was unable to kill, had resigned himself to sitting and anticipating the day when he might once again have his hands around a warm throat, the day when he would pick right back up where he left off and take another life as carelessly and thoughtlessly as one snuffing out a candle.

And this man had been allowed to keep breathing.

You think of all these things as you reach the end of the corridor and swipe your I.D card on the door to Therapy Theater No.5. Hidden locking mechanisms whirr and click open.

You place your hand around the cool metal handle. For a moment, you just stand there. Feeling your pounding heart in your chest.

It pounds not because you are fearful; you don’t care if you get caught because of what you are about to do. You don’t care if you get fired, or if you get your license taken away, or even if you go to jail. Those are the most trivial, unimportant things in the world. No. Your heart does not pound for those reasons.

It pounds because, finally, there will be justice.

Finally, the evil son-of-a-bitch who slaughtered your sister is getting what he deserved all along.

And you get to be the one to flip the switch.

You turn the door handle and step into the room.

Therapy Theater No.5 is bathed in bright fluorescent light and smells strongly of antiseptic and sterilization. Three people are already in the room: two armed guards, who nod in acknowledgment at you when you enter.

And laid out at the center across a white padded table, dressed in a pale blue hospital gown, strapped tightly down at the wrists and ankles by hospital-grade cuffs, looking up at the ceiling as if utterly uncaring, motionless save for the rise and fall of his ribs—Myers.

A nurse had come in before you to prepare the room for treatment. The therapy you’re meant to be administering is simple and painless: electrodes are fixed to the patient’s body and a weak electrical current is passed through, stimulating choice muscle groups—and in more recent cases, even parts of the brain.

You had emphasized that part specifically in your pitch of the therapy to Dr. Ashton, referencing a study which showed how violent tendencies could be soothed in patients who underwent the treatment.

And no, you’d reassured him, it was nothing like electroconvulsive therapy.

The electrical current used in E.S.T is never strong enough to induce seizures. The only thing the subject feels is a mild, if not pleasant, buzz...

·…or at least that’s how it’s meant to be administered.

Tampering with the wattage of the machine had turned out to be laughably easy. A few snipped wires here, a few crunched numbers there, and now the bulky device sitting atop the roll-around table beside your “patient” can deliver a shock nastier than a taser with every throw of the switch.

It’s not strong enough to stop a human heart (god, you wish.) But it is enough to make Myers hurt.

Enough to make him writhe on that table.

Maybe even enough to make the heartless bastard feel something for a change.

You thank the guards before dismissing them. They leave the room but you know they won’t go far; no further than right outside in the hall, waiting through the entire session with their hands on their batons in case Myers gets out of hand.

Their security would be a welcome thing, if you were actually about to /treat/ Myers instead of torturing the living daylights out of him. But now, the guards are just another problem in need of a solution.

Though you are almost confident that Myers will retain his silence throughout the ordeal—that he’ll uphold his veil of distance and aloofness and total lack of care with the stubbornness of an ass—you’re not about to bet your shot at justice on it.

That’s what the ball gag in your coat pocket is for.

Reaching down to check that it is still there, excitement swells in your belly as your fingers graze the black silicone.

On the table, Myers is still motionless. He doesn’t tilt his head to regard you. He pays you no attention at all, in fact, as if you aren’t even there to begin with. Never do his steely eyes move from their fixed place on the ceiling light hanging above him.

As you walk up to the roll-around table, plucking a pair of latex gloves from a box stashed on the shelf beneath before snapping them curtly on, for a reason that you can’t put into words, you find yourself hesitating to look Myers in the face.

It doesn’t matter that he’s restrained; it doesn’t matter that there are two armed and capable guards standing watch right outside. Despite both these things, that vitriolic, charged aura you had felt in his cell still surrounds him now, polluting the room, hanging like a storm cloud over your head. 

It’s as if some submissive animal instinct has gripped your brain and now screams warnings at you: Predator. Danger. Don’t look it in the eye. Don’t provoke it.

You do your damndest to dismiss the feeling as nerves.

In a little white tray next to the E.S.T machine sits a filled syringe; a sedative. Dr. Ashton has insisted on it to better ensure your safety, as well as Myers’ cooperation. In the psychiatrist’s exact words:

“These days Michael is, ah, fussier about this kind of treatment—you know, the kind they gotta bring in the guards for, the needles, the cuffs, the whole nine-yards. 

It’s a theory of mine that, after living with the sort of power Michael did, the loss of his own control doesn’t sit as nicely anymore. He doesn’t like it. And he’s not afraid to let us know just how much he doesn’t like it.”

Fussy. That was the word Ashton had used to describe Myers. 

It had taken every shred of self-control you possessed not to scoff in the Doctor’s face at that; as if the man laid out before you now were some sort of stubborn, overgrown toddler, and not a remorseless, murderous psychopath.

You don’t spare the sedative a second glance as you unravel the bundle of wires and nodes connected to the E.S.T machine; Myers is going to be awake to feel every goddamned second of what you do to him.

Only after you’re finished with him will you finally send him under.

You can picture the conversation with Ashton now: Yes sir, the sedative worked like a charm, he was out like a light the entire time; no sir, no complications at all.

You take your time setting up the machine because you’re still hesitant to even look at Myers, let alone touch him. But when the wires are all connected, the red power button flashing idly in standby, there is nothing left to do except attach the electrodes.

You force yourself to look him in the face as you approach. You should not be afraid of this man; you should resent him, should despise him, but should not fear him. He doesn’t deserve to hold that sort of power over you, or anyone else, ever again.

So you look.

Michael is still watching the ceiling. According to his eyes, he does not acknowledge you.

But just from how the hair on your nape stands on end you know you’re being watched.

Myers is regarding you coolly in his periphery with the curiosity of a feline, feigning detachment and disinterest; but the weight and pressure of that penetrating gaze could not be more obvious if it were a ton of bricks coming right down on your head.

With a deep breath to rein in your resolve, you reach down, your fingers working to undo the first knot on Myers’ hospital gown.

Quickly, you discover that it is one thing to look at Myers; to feel for yourself his ruthless awareness, the raw intensity of his presence.

But to touch him is another thing altogether.

He draws a breath of his own as you fidget with his gown, his strong rib cage expanding beneath your fingers. You shudder at the sudden pressure of his body; whether out of disgust, or anger, or some fucked up fascination, you aren’t sure.

After undoing the ties on both sides, you lift the front of his gown up and off—

—and find that Myers is totally naked underneath.

Standard hospital procedure for a therapy like this one. Nothing new.

But it’s different when the patient looks like this.

You hate yourself for ogling him. You detest the way your eyes rove across Myers’ body, lingering on all the features that your lizard-brain decides it likes; from the stark tendons in his neck to his sharp and angular collarbones, from his broad, rounded shoulders to the beautiful definition in his abdomen, and down even further than that before you can stop yourself.

To the V of his obliques—to the trail of curly brown pubic hair on his pelvis—and all the way down to his flaccid penis.

You snatch a towel from the roll-around and drape it hurriedly over his hips. Not for the sake of his modesty; just so you don’t have to worry about your eyes straying down to the cock of the man who murdered your sister.

As far as the placement of the electrodes on his body, you honestly haven’t given it much thought. It seemed like the sort of thing that would come to you like an epiphany, as if suddenly, in the moment, you would know exactly where to hit Myers to really make him suffer.

But no such epiphany comes. Oh well; you have an hour to experiment.

Grabbing the two nodes off their holders, you run the wires across his chest and press the little round circles down flat against his pectorals.

When your gloved fingers graze Myers’ skin you nearly jerk back your hand, startled. The man is hot like a stove.

Your medical fascination is instantly piqued—Myers must have the hottest resting body temperature you’ve ever encountered. You have to force away intrusive thoughts of sticking a thermometer in his mouth to see that number for yourself.

Focus.

Tugging up on the wires, you test the integrity of the node’s suction. They don’t budge from his chest, lifting his skin with them as you pull. Perfect; It’s nearly time. 

Now for the gag.

You just have to cross your fingers and pray that you can actually get it in his mouth.

Looking Myers in the face a third time proves to be no less jarring than it had been the second or the first. You’re just relieved that even after all your poking and prodding he is still pretending not to be interested in you, or in the things you’re doing to his body.

You clear your throat before speaking to him because you don’t trust it enough not to crack.

“Open up,” you command him, mustering every authoritative bone in your body and sounding very official even to your own ears.

Removing the gag from your pocket, you hold it up as if to show him, taking care to conceal the black silicone ball with your hand.

“Mouthguard.”

You doubt that Myers has seen this sort of gag before. Or that he even knows what a gag is. Still, you’re not taking that risk. If this doesn’t work then you’re going to have to drug him just to get the damn thing in place, then wait for him to sober up again—a colossal waste of time.

For a tense second, Myers does not respond to your command. He just lays there on the table, inhaling and exhaling, looking incredibly bored with you, with his nakedness, with the electrodes strapped to his chest.

Your jaw goes tense. You nearly repeat yourself.

But then, he opens up his mouth.

Beneath the harsh overhead lighting his teeth gleam wetly. You suspect immediately that he’s going to try and bite your fingers off the second you get too close.

Game on, fucker. 

From the shelf below the roll-around you snatch up a small blotting rag. Walking around to stand at the head of the table, you gaze down at Myers again.

“The strap goes underneath.” You inform him. “I need you to lift your head up.”

He does.

And you strike. Faster than you had thought yourself capable.

You drape the rag over his eyes so that he can’t see what’s coming. Thrusting the gag hard into his open mouth, you wedge it firmly between his teeth. In the corner of the room, Myers’ heart monitor spikes suddenly, the electronic beeping speeding up momentarily—a sound that has you beaming with pride.

You’ve actually managed to startle him.

As you clip the strap into place around the back of his head, a strange sense of accomplishment floods your body—you’ve done it. You’ve actually done it. Everything is ready. 

Every sacrifice you’ve made in these past eight months, every hour spent in this godforsaken hellhole, it was all worth it just to bring about this single moment.

The moment is made only sweeter when you rip the rag away from Myers’ face.

Oh. Now you have his attention.

Those pale eyes are looking straight up at you. Considering you with the cutting gaze of a hawk. Working out the situation. 

You glare right back down at him. You stare deep into his eyes, the triumphant fire now raging in your chest burning hotter than the ice in his stare, more furiously than all the danger—and you find that you are not afraid of him anymore. Like this, Myers is nothing. He’s not a boogeyman. Not a phantom. He’s just a man—stripped of all his mysticism. Strapped to a table. Naked. Gagged.

Powerless.

Just as powerless to stop what you’re about to do to him as each and every one of the people whose lives he took away.

“Hello, Michael.” You hold his fierce eye-contact as you speak. “Ten months ago you broke into my sister’s house and murdered her.”

Myers doesn’t blink. But neither do you.

“When they tried you, you were supposed to leave that courtroom a dead man walking; you were supposed to die. That's how our justice system works—when you do the things you did, you don’t get to keep on living.”

Nothing changes on Myers’ face as you speak. Nothing changes in his eyes. Not one molecule in his body has an atom of care to give about the words you’re saying. He breathes around the gag, his heart monitor beeping slow and steady.

“I don’t give a single fuck about what that judge said,” You continue. “And I don’t care how sick in the head you really are. You knew exactly what you were doing that night. I can see it in your eyes, Myers—you loved every fucking second of it. And that’s the only thing that matters.”

You draw a long breath. One that you hold in your lungs before letting slowly out again.

“You’re the evilest son-of-a-bitch on this entire fucking planet; and you deserve to die.”

Walking over to the E.S.T machine, fighting back with tooth and claw against furious tears now threatening your eyes, you place your finger over the power switch.

Myers watches you; and you notice something flicker to life in his glacial eyes. Not an emotion. Just a realization.

Good. He understands now. He understands what you’re about to do to him.

“Someone has to make you pay. Someone has to.”

Michael just stares. Watching you. Watching your finger on the switch. His pulse on the monitor ticks as leisurely as if he were about to fall asleep.

“And guess what, you sick fuck?”

Still staring—not blinking—breaths coming slowly.

“I’m so fucking happy that it’s me.”

You throw the switch—

—the wires crackle with live electricity—

—and all of Myers’ deliberate, calculated control is shattered like a dropped glass.

His body seizes. His eyes snap shut. His fingers curl into fists that turn his knuckles whiter than the table beneath him. The tendons in his neck and forearms jump out, straining beneath his skin. His heart monitor beats erratically, the little green line on the screen spiking sharply, racing out of control.

Your eyes are glued to the grisly scene. You devour each and every involuntary reaction, relishing in the complete and utter breakdown of his control.

Fifteen gorgeous seconds pass before you remember that you were supposed to be counting to ten. Whoops. You might be frying his brain into an unfeeling stupor at this point. You flip the switch off in an instant because you need him awake, aware.

Myers’ back falls flat against the table, the current cutting off as abruptly as it began. The muscles in his chest continue to contract and seize beneath his skin long after the electricity is gone; you count the spasms as they tear through his pectorals like sets of waves.

When the spasming stops, his chest heaves up and down, winded. His breaths around the gag come heavily. His eyes are still shut; but no longer are they /squeezed/ shut.

For a moment, you really think that he’s passed out.

Then his eyes twitch beneath their lids and flutter open again. Blinking. Focusing—

—flitting right back on your face. Right back to the spot where he had left them before the current forced them shut.

Myers’ eyes are devoid of care. He is entirely unperturbed by what has just happened to him; entirely unthreatened. But now, that murderous intent—the charge which until now you’d only felt in the air around him—is written in his stare as plain as day.

I am going to kill you, says Michael’s gaze, as nonchalant as if he were stating some trivial fact about the universe, like water is wet, or the sky is blue.

It makes your blood boil.

Adding insult to injury, the speed at which Myers regains control of his body is nothing short of infuriating. You fume as you watch the way his breaths level out again, the beeping from his heart monitor falling back into the former slow, rhythmic pace.

You feel as though you should say something to him; like you should retaliate to this defiance in some way that isn’t staring, because you’ve already lost that battle; you cannot possibly hope to match the severity of Myers’ gaze.

But you don’t.

In your heart of hearts you know that your words will go right through his skull, unheard. There is only one language that Myers understands; only one language that he can comprehend down to his marrow. So you’ll speak it to him.

Without wasting another breath, your fingers find the power switch again. And those defiant eyes of his snap shut a second time.

When you shut the current off the results are the same as before; Myers is heaving on the table. But he takes back his control just as quickly, his stoicism prevailing.

By the third time however, his breaths have begun to linger in their heaviness—

—by the fourth he draws them as shallow as a winded sprinter running a race—

—by the fifth, the intervals between the violent seizing-up of his body are too brief for him to catch his breath—

—and the way he now gasps around the obstructing gag, fighting and failing to suck in air past its silicone, his nostrils flaring rapidly to compensate, is the most beautiful display of desperation that you have ever witnessed.

The sixth time you throw the switch, Myers actually does pass out.

When the current stops his body loses its tension with the abruptness of a cut wire. You wait impatiently for him to open his eyes again with your finger lingering over the switch, preparing to meet that steely gaze with another brutal jolt of electricity.

You wait; and Myers’ heart monitor chugs away like a freight train going up a hill.

Still waiting… waiting...

...and nothing happens. Myers is out cold.

The contentment now pulsing through your veins is what you imagine a shot of heroin feels like. Snapping on a fresh pair of gloves, you walk up to the side of the table to admire your work.

The first thing you notice is the sweat. Myers’ body is drenched in it. It beads up on his chest and clavicle, on his biceps and shoulders, on his brow and cheeks, the skin there flushing a shade of stark, exhausted pink. Gorgeous.

Your eyes travel down his body to continue the examination; you stop at his hands.

Myers’ hands are bloody.

Crescent-shaped cuts litter the skin of his palms, marking the place where his own blunt fingernails had dug in uncontrollably, over and over and over again. The fresh blood streaks in little rivulets down his hands and pools on the white padding of the table beneath. 

You chew the inside of your lip as you stare at the mess; these cuts might be tricky to explain away. You’ll have to gauze them and tell Dr. Ashton that his patient did it to himself; maybe recommend that he be switched to a higher Thorazine dosage to really sell the lie.

Luckily, that’s a problem for the future. As for right now, you’re rather enjoying the irony of Myers’ own blood staining his hands for a change.

The inspection continues. Further down his body, you finally notice it; the bulge beneath the towel strewn across his pelvis. 

Oh my god, he isn’t. You think, lifting the side of the towel for a peek.

And oh my god, he is.

Rather frustratingly, just like the rest of him, Myers is pretty down here, too. Pretty and big. Which is not a compliment, you reassure yourself. Just a medical observation. You let yourself stare this time, because you’re not ashamed anymore. You’re not threatened by the notion of admiring Myers’ physiology anymore.

Not when he’s so completely at your mercy.

Somehow, Myers doesn’t seem to be the masochistic type, so you highly doubt that actual arousal is responsible for this. Sheer adrenaline coupled with his frantically pumping heart are probably to blame, his brain mixing and misinterpreting the signals, resulting in this little accident.

The longer you stare down at the “accident,” the more you find yourself wondering what Myers would look like fully-erect.

You cannot rip the electrodes off his chest fast enough. Plucking the towel from waist and discarding it on the floor, you stick the two nodes down flat against his obliques, then hurry to rig up a third. That one you plant just above his penis; as close to its base as the curly dark hair will allow.

You stand with your finger ready on the go-button again, opting to let Myers’ still-racing pulse dip out of the red before you pull the trigger and plunge him back into hell. Bloodied hands you can explain away, but cardiac arrest? Not so much.

The beeping slows. The green lines on the monitor settle. You throw the switch.

Myers’ pelvis bucks uncontrollably up from the table—

—and he grunts.

The sound makes your heart sing. It is muffled by the gag, low and reverberating, not very loud to begin with. Most definitely not on purpose; just a reaction that’s managed to slip through while his barriers are down.

Myers’ groin is still quivering when you cut the current off. His cock stands upright, stiff and swollen, totally erect. A line of saliva now dribbles down the side of his mouth, trickling between the gag, collecting in a shimmering mess on his shoulder. He blinks sluggishly up at the ceiling light as if transfixed; still dazed, you would guess.

Something twisted occurs to you as you drink in the scene. Something that you can’t deny.

Seeing Myers like this—fighting for his very consciousness, struggling to retain some sliver of control—is the single most arousing thing you have ever witnessed. You want nothing more in the entire world than to climb onto this dangerous, wounded man’s hips and claim him. 

You want nothing more than to give him a taste of what true powerlessness feels like.

It’s a lovely fantasy, a beautiful temptation, and a real shame that it can’t happen. You don’t feel like getting knocked up with the child of your sister’s murderer today; or ever, for that matter. Instead, you think you’ll make a game out of guessing how many more shocks will have Myers coming on his own thighs.

Striding up to the head of the table again, you plant your arms on either side of his shoulders, leaning over him, hardly ten inches from his face.

“Looks painful Myers.” You jest. “How about I make you a deal?”

Michael looks up at you. Unfocused. Blinking slowly.

“I flip the switch,” you continue,

“—and I keep it flipped until you’re covered in your own semen, and after that I jam a needle in your arm, pump you full of drugs, and you get to live out your next eight hours as an unfeeling fucking vegetable. Fair?”

You wait for Myers to do something. For your words to register in his brain. For some flicker of a response to let you know that he’s even still in there.

To your immense disappointment, Myers does nothing. Absolutely nothing. He just...

...well, you can’t even call it staring anymore.

He doesn’t seem able to manage that sort of focus, you realize, inspecting his face closer. His eyes are alarmingly barren; there really isn’t much of anything there, now. None of the ruthlessness, none of that predatory awareness, none of the murder.

You’ve actually shocked the bastard totally, one-hundred-percent out of it.

Whoops.

Back at the roll-around, you snatch up a hand light. Returning to the table, you shine it in his eyes, assessing the damage. His functioning pupil is slow to dilate. Worryingly slow. You click the light off with a contemplative frown.

Half of your mind begs whatever force might be listening that this isn’t a passing affliction, that whatever damage that’s done is done. If the courts insist on keeping Myers alive, then maybe reducing his brains to soup is what it takes to keep him docile. To keep him from hurting another living thing ever again. You can only hope.

As much as you’d love to do so, electrocuting the living daylights out of him some more isn’t likely to bring Myers back to awareness; and the session is supposed to be over soon.

You glance at the clock on the wall—

—Shit. Very soon.

You need to find out right the fuck now if you’ve just rendered Dr. Ashton’s patient catatonic.

Walking around the side of the table, you take Myers’ swollen cock in your gloved hand—trying not to think about the fact that you’re jacking off a condemned murderer—and pump hard, stroking him all the way from the shaft to the swollen tip, squeezing the head, massaging your thumb over it, rubbing all the way back down again.

“Come on, asshole,” you spit. “That can’t be all the fight you’ve got.”

Myers’ hips jerk slightly up from the table as you touch him. Probably just an involuntary reaction. You’ll need him to do better than that. Stroking him faster, squeezing even harder, you pray that the friction of your latex glove against his cock feels just about as pleasant as a rug burn.

As you watch his vacant face like a hawk you see him begin to blink harder, his eyes squeezing shut, twitching beneath their lids, staying closed for a beat before opening up again, like he’s struggling to wake from a deep sleep. A much more deliberate motion; he’s coming back to it.

“Can you feel that? Hurts like a bitch, doesn’t it?”

He breathes hard around the gag. His knees lurch up from the table, the cuffs around his ankles straining, holding him in place.

You give his cock another hard squeeze.

“Forget where you are Myers?”

His jaw goes absolutely rigid with tension.

Ah. He heard you that time. He’s back.

How unfortunate that his brain isn’t fried after all.

You can see it all coming back now as his eyes flit down, locking on your face, rebooting within him like a program on a script; the chilling intensity, the sharpness, all the things that had made your skin crawl in the days past. Despite the torture, nothing at all about Myers’ demeanor has changed.

“Welcome back.” You state dryly. “We aren’t done yet.”

As if to make your blood boil on purpose—as if the battered state of his body means less to him than dirt, as if he hasn’t spent the better part of the hour being brutally, mercilessly tortured by you—

—Myers just watches you. Damning you with his eyes alone to the same grisly demise as before.

An odd sense of something, not quite admiration, sparks in your gut. Looking into Myers’ eyes, there is one single thing that you are willing to give this monster credit for:

What sits before you is a creature that cannot be broken. One that will never be dissuaded from its primal, violent nature. To try it is an impossible task. You suspect that you could stand in this room for days, flipping the same switch, delivering the same current, knocking him to and from consciousness, and into all the states in-between.

And the result would never change. Not ever.

He’d still be looking at you with that same deadly stare. A stare as cold and sharp as the blade of a carving knife.

And it would only get more piercing.

And what a relief it is that your goal in the first place was never to break Myers,

just to bring the gates of hell down on his pretty, curly head.

And you have. You can hear it in every breath he takes; he’s struggling. Although he draws his inhales slowly, with mechanical control, the ragged wheezing in his chest is no longer possible for him to hide. Myers is hurting—he’s hurting bad.

As much as you would love to stay and twist the knife in even deeper, it's time to wrap things up. You’re all out of time.

Pulling the electrodes from his groin and thighs with one hand, you let two of the nodes dangle freely off the side of the table.

The third you stick against his cock.

“Count your lucky fucking stars that not everyone in the world is as heartless as you are.” You tell him, walking back around to the E.S.T machine.

Myers follows you with eyes the entire way, stone-faced, impassive. Like the fact that you’ve just fastened a live wire to his dick is about as boring to him as watching paint dry.

Flick goes the switch.

His back arches off the table like a bent bow. He scrunches his eyes shut, breathing hard around the gag, tugging furiously at the cuffs, the muscles in his calves and biceps straining dangerously, pulling upwards with a brutish force that has table whining beneath him.

You’re transfixed as Michael comes. His mess shoots out in thick ropes, reaching further than you thought possible, coating the table, getting on his legs. The sheer power of his body is a stunning thing to witness. You keep the current running to milk him down to the very last drop.

When he stops coming, you power off the machine.

The node comes away from Michael’s skin in a “pop” that is all-too satisfying. Bundling all the wires and electrodes back into place on the machine you listen to the only measurable signs of the man’s distress; the tortured intake of his breaths, the elevated beeping of his heart monitor.

Then, picking up the needle from the little white tray, you cross back to Myers’ side.

The vein in his forearm is thick and pronounced and the needle slips in beautifully. You press slowly down on the plunger, grateful when he doesn’t try to yank his arm away, relieved when he accepts the drug without a struggle. He must be exhausted.

The sedative works its magic quickly. You pull up a stool and sit down beside him to watch.

The vitriol in his eyes begins to melt and soften. One by one his strained muscles are allowed to relax again, the tension ebbing away; from his jaw, his shoulders, his abdomen, his legs. The electronic beeping on the monitor slows and slows until its powerful rhythm beats steadily again.

Evidently, Michael has decided he isn’t ready to go under just yet. Though sleep pools in his eyelids he blinks it away, clinging in a death grip to his consciousness.

Just to leer at you. Just to picture in his mind the day he will have his hands around your throat; as if it is already set in stone. As if it is just a matter of when.

Then, Michael’s eyelids flutter—

—fighting to stay open, still staring—

—closing, for just a beat too long—

—lingering shut—

—staying shut.

You move to clean him up quickly. The gag comes out first. Lifting his head to unbuckle the strap, you tug out the black ball, letting his strained jaw fall shut again for the first time in an hour; then carelessly drop his head. It thunks satisfyingly as it comes down hard against the table. Glancing at the gag’s silicone, you notice the deep markings worn into it, perfect impressions of Myers’ top and bottom teeth. You almost shudder; a bite from him would have been nasty.

You blot away the drool dribbling down his chin and shoulder with a rag, and then move on.

The last thing you expect as you begin to clean Michael’s bloodied hands is the tears that spring to your eyes. Even with your fear of the man gone and buried, you wish that you didn’t have to touch these awful hands; let alone treat them, bandage them, heal them.

You wipe away the tears on your sleeve as you gather your supplies together on the roll-around.

Grabbing each of his wrists just above the restraint cuffs and turning them so that his palm is facing upward on the table, you hastily swab him down with alcohol pads, wiping up the clotting blood from his skin, squeezing out a blob of antiseptic from a tube to smear across his cuts. As you wrap Michael’s palms tightly in gauze you try your hardest to snuff out that invasive thought when it comes searing like a bullet through your skull—

—these are the hands that killed my sister.

You simply can’t afford to linger on those thoughts right now. Maybe when you’re at home tonight, alone in your bed, you will let yourself cry; but not now. Not while you still need to clean up after Myers’ unfortunate mishap.

Toweling him down from his forehead to his calves, you soak away the sweat. And the semen. Then, you fasten back up the front of his hospital gown, knotting each and every tie.

And just like that, the job is done.

You knock on the door. The guards come in and wheel Myers’ unconscious body out of the room.

The next day, you have a debriefing session with Dr. Ashton. You feed him your meticulously rehearsed lie: that the therapy went without a hiccup, that you firmly believe this treatment could be the key to alleviating Michael’s tendencies for violence.

The moron laps up your every word.

Ashton ends the session with a delightful little surprise; he’s pulled some strings to allow for Michael’s therapy to be carried out bi-weekly. He is so impressed by your drive to treat his patient that he’s offering you a position as Michael’s secondary caretaker. He only hopes that you’ll accept.

The smile you give him is bright and sincere, one that beams from ear to ear.

“Doctor, believe me when I say that nothing in the world would make me happier.”

[marvelite624]

What they say

(RANT TIME: Please, bear with me)

You know, they say the internet is a great place to make friends. Really? So far, my experience has been mostly liars, swindlers, gimme-gimme two-faced crud who, if they aren't trying to take your money somehow, are at the very least, hoping to verbally and/or visually molest you any way they can. I'm not here for all that.

I know I make suggestive posts, referencing all sorts of sexual behaviors...perhaps, even somewhat "deviant" at times but, at the same time, I try to keep things light, simple and humorous whenever I can. I talk about other things. Art and music , social issues, jokes...I try to mix it up some. It's supposed to make you seem well-rounded, more interesting. That's what they say.

And I'm not here to hurt or take advantage of ANYONE. All I ever intended was to make the acquaintance of a few like-minded individuals I could call "friends". That's it. They say you can find a friend anywhere if you just look hard enough. I'm on the side of a mountain, at the ass-end of nowhere. We still drag our knuckles here, though we like to think we're better than that. I live in an environment where being "different" can still get you killed if you're not careful. Thus, my search for said, like-minded individuals.

For various reasons, I don't get out much. Maybe it's because I can't feel my feet any more or breathe worth a damn...and these eyes are about shot too. Whatever. I needed to point this out so when they say it's my own fault, I can strongly disagree and feel wholly justified. Getting back to the point, people aren't exactly beating down my door to say hello these days. I thought it would be better here.

It's rather simple-minded when they say, "just be yourself you'll do fine". It seems "they" don't want real people being themselves. They're looking for people who are willing to pretend to be whatever they think is required to "meet the need". It's mind boggling to think, how many people spend their time acting out their little dramas, lying to one another. After all, those who don't know the real you can't in truth BE your friend. They'll pass in the illusion and, as can be expected, fade when the mirage has ended. Right or wrong. I tend to be more demanding.

Now I don't expect anyone to come beating down my doors here, any moreso than the ones I actually live behind. I only hoped that they would be honest and, for lack of a better word, "real". I "feel" doors are shut in my face all the time here. Maybe I should just...stop...feeling. They say you shouldn't let it get to you. I can't help it. That's who I am and I AM going to be me. Likewise, I want you to be you. I want you to be a friend.

Don't let the avatar fool you. I'm no spring chicken. (those WERE the days, *sigh*) As they say, I've got one foot in the grave already. I'm looking for something to enrich and uplift me in what time is remaining, not be callously in a rush to push me on in and fill up the hole. I have a heart and a mind that's filled to bursting with things I'd like to share and room for those things you might care to add.

For those of you (and you know who you are) who have courteously responded in kind to my meager attempts to befriend you, from the very bottom of my heart, I thank you. For those of you who have simply ignored me or slammed one of those doors, remember what they say, "What goes around, comes around." or maybe, "Karma's a bitch!"....take your pick.

I'm just sayin'

(I feel a little bit better, getting that out)

[mattchase82]

PRAYERS TO SAINT ANTHONY OF PADUA

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A Prayer of Petition

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O wondrous Saint Anthony, glorious by reason of the fame of thy miracles, who hast the happiness of receiving within Thine arms our blessed Lord under the guise of a little child, obtain for me of His bounty this favor that I desire from the bottom of my heart. Thou who wast so gracious unto poor sinners, regard not the lack of merit on the part of him who calls upon th6ee, but consider the glory of God, which will be exalted once more through Thee, to the salvation of my soul and the granting of the petition that I now make with such ardent yearning.

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As a pledge of my gratitude, I beg Thee to accept my promise to live henceforth more agreeably to the teachings of the Gospel, and to be devoted to the service of the poor whom whom Thou didst ever love and still dost love so greatly; bless this my resolution and get me the grace to be faithful thereto even until death. Amen.

(An indulgence of 300 days)

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Prayer to St. Anthony as Intercessor

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O my chosen intercessor, Saint Anthony, refuge of the afflicted! I come to Thee, with the fullest confidence, to receive Thy aid in this my necessity. Holy father, let me be numbered among those devoted to Thee whose petitions have been heard through Thy powerful intercession. I confess that I am unworthy of Thy intercession on account of my many and varied sins; yet, as as Thou didst seek during Thy life to lead the greatest sinners to know and love God, I now place my trust in Thee, and commit my petition to to Thy hands. Lay it, I beseech Thee, before God, and obtain for me, if it be in accordance with His holy will, its fulfillment, through thy merits. Assist me during my entire life, and especially in all things conducive to the salvation of my soul! Amen.

.

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A Prayer of Thanksgiving

O Glorious wonder-worker, Saint Anthony, father of the poor and comforter of the afflicted, Rhou who hast come with such loving solicitude to my assistance, and hast comforted me so abundantly: behold me at Thy feet to offer Thee my heartfelt thanks. Accept, therefore, this offering and with it my earnest promise which I now renew, to live always in the love of Jesus and my neighbor. Continue to shield me graciously with Thy protection, and obtain for me the final grace of being able one day to enter the kingdom of heaven, there to sing with Thee the everlasting mercies of God. Amen.

(An Indulgence of 300 days.)

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Prayer to St. Anthony as your Patron Saint

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Saint Anthony, whom I have chosen as my special patron, pray for me that I, too, may one day glorify the Blessed Trinity in Heaven. Obtain for me Thy lively faith, that I may consider all persons, things, and events in the light of almighty God. Pray, that I may be generous in making sacrifices of temporal things to promote my eternal interests, as Thou so wisely did.

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Set me on fire with a love for Jesus, that I may thirst for His sacraments and burn with zeal for the spread of His kingdom. By Thy powerful intercession, help me in the performance of my duties to God, myself and all the world.

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Win for me the virtue of purity and a great confidence in the Blessed Virgin. Protect me this day, and every day of my life. Keep me from mortal sin. Obtain for me the grace of a happy death. Amen

.

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Indulgenced Devotion to St. Anthony

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The faithful who devoutly recite the Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory be, thirteen times in honor of St. Anthony of Padua, may gain: An Indugence of 300 Days once a day.

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Prayer For Protection

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O very loving Saint Anthony, Thou hast been enriched, by the infinite goodness of God,

with particular graces of those who turn to Thee in their needs. I pray:

Have pity on me, console my wretched heart, be my advocate before His Divine Majesty that I may be filled with an ardent love towards Him that loves me so much, that I may always do His Divine Will, that I may have peace of soul, purity in my action, fidelity and perseverance in the Divine service; keep away from me my spiritual and physical enemies, let me share in Thy consolation and finally I ask Thee to assist me at the hour of my death to secure everlasting happiness with Thee and all the Saints in Heaven. Amen.

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Prayer For Control Over Your Tongue

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Dear St. Anthony, once again I greet Thee and thank Thee for Thy readiness to come to my aid in my necessity. Slowly and surely my disposition improves. Thou has helped me to understand that my real fault lay in pride, preoccupation with myself, and lack of real concern for others. Now that I see this more clearly, thanks be to God, I do not think of myself as so hopeless. Thou used thy tongue to give praise to God, to preach in defense of the Faith and bring His message of salvation to sinners and to call down the blessings of Heaven on others. Please continue to help me so that I may use my tongue rightly, to be charitable when speaking of others and to others, to be ever ready to support them rather than wound them.

Because of Thy powerful intercession with God, I am confident that that Thou wilt continue to assist me in my daily work. In the Name of Our Lord, Jesus, I ask Thy aid. Amen.

Pray for us, St. Anthony,

that we may be made worthy of Christ.

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Litany of Saint Anthony

(For private devotion)

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Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy.

Christ have mercy. Christ have mercy.

Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy.

Christ, hear us.

Christ, graciously hear us.

God, the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.

God, the Son, Redeemer of the world, have mercy on us.

God, the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.

Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us.

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Holy Mary, pray for us.

St. Anthony of Padua,

pray for us. *

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St. Anthony, glory of the Friars Minor, *

St. Anthony, lily of virginity, *

St. Anthony, gem of poverty, *

St. Anthony, example of obedience, *

St. Anthony, mirror of abstinence, *

St. Anthony, vessel of purity, *

St. Anthony, star of sanctity, *

St. Anthony, model of conduct, *

St. Anthony, beauty of paradise, *

St. Anthony, ark of the testament, *

St. Anthony, keeper of the Scriptures, *

St. Anthony, teacher of the truth, *

St. Anthony, preacher of grace, *

St. Anthony, exterminator of vices, *

St. Anthony, planter of virtues, *

St. Anthony, conqueror of heretics, *

St. Anthony, terror of infidels, *

St. Anthony, consoler of the afflicted, *

St. Anthony, searcher of consciences, *

St. Anthony, martyr in desire, *

St. Anthony, terror of the devils, *

St. Anthony, horror of hell, *

St. Anthony, performer of miracles, *

St. Anthony, restorer of lost things, *

St. Anthony, helper in need, *

St. Anthony, Purveyor for God's Poor, *

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Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world,

Spare us, O Lord.

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Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world,

Graciously hear us, O Lord.

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Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world,

Have mercy on us.

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V. St. Anthony, pray for us.

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R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

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Let us Pray:

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O God let the votive commemoration of Blessed Anthony, Thy Confessor, be a source of joy to Thy Church, that she may always be fortified with spiritual assistance, and may deserve to possess eternal joy, through Christ our Lord. Amen

.

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Responsory to St. Anthony of Padua

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If miracles you fain would see;

Lo, error, death, calamity,

The Leprous stain, the demon flies,

From beds of pain the sick arise.

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The hungry seas forego their prey,

The prisoner's cruel chains give way;

While palsied limbs and chattels lost,

Both young and old recovered boast.

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And perils perish; plenty hoard,

Is heaped on hunger's famished board.

Let those relate who know it well,

Let Padua of her patron tell.

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The hungry seas forego their prey,

The prisoner's cruel chains give way;

While palsied limbs and chattels lost,

Both young and old recovered boast.

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Glory be to the Father, etc.

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The hungry seas forego their prey,

The prisoner's cruel chains give way;

While palsied limbs and chattels lost,

Both young and old recovered boast.

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V. Pray for us, blessed Anthony.

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R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

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Let us Pray

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O God, may the votive commemoration of blessed Anthony, Thy confessor and doctor, be a source of joy to Thy Church, that She may always be fortified with spiritual assistance and deserve to enjoy eternal rewards. Through Christ our Lord. Amen

(Indulgence 200 days, once a day)

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Prayer for the Restoration of Things Lost or Stolen

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O Blessed St. Anthony! the grace of God has made Thee a powerful advocate in all necessities, and the patron for the restoration of things lost or stolen; to Thee I turn today with childlike love and heartfelt confidence. Oh, how many thousands hast Thou miraculously aided in the recovery of lost goods! Thou wast the counsellor of the erring, the comforter of the afflicted, the healer of the sick, the raiser of the dead, the deliverer of the captive, the refuge of the afflicted; to Thee do I hasten, O Blessed St. Anthony. Help me in my present affliction. I recommend what I have lost to Thy care, in the secure hope that Thou wilt restore it to me, if it be to the greater glory of God, and to the spiritual benefit of my soul, that I may praise and thank Thee, in time and eternity, for Thy glorious intercession in my behalf. Amen.

.

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Ejaculations to St. Anthony

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St. Anthony, whom the infant Jesus loved and honored so signally, grant us what we ask of Thee.

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St. Anthony, powerful in word and work, grant us

[here mention intention].

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St. Anthony, attentive to those who invoke Thee, obtain for us the grace of holy purity, meekness, humility, and obedience.

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St. Anthony, pray for our priests, relatives, and benefactors, and for all in authority in Church and State.