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market-news-24 · 8 months ago

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"In the ever-volatile world of cryptocurrency, investors are on the edge of their seats as Bitcoin, along with its counterparts like Ethereum and XRP, faces a significant downturn. This latest Market tremble comes amid growing anxieties over the Federal Reserve's impending decision on inflation, a move many are calling a 'Perfect Storm.' With the crypto Market already reeling, the looming Fed inflation flip could either spell disaster or present a unique buying opportunity for the brave. Stay tuned as we dive deeper into how this critical moment could reshape the landscape of digital currencies." Click to Claim Latest Airdrop for FREE Claim in 15 seconds Scroll Down to End of This Post const downloadBtn = document.getElementById('download-btn'); const timerBtn = document.getElementById('timer-btn'); const downloadLinkBtn = document.getElementById('download-link-btn'); downloadBtn.addEventListener('click', () => downloadBtn.style.display = 'none'; timerBtn.style.display = 'block'; let timeLeft = 15; const timerInterval = setInterval(() => if (timeLeft === 0) clearInterval(timerInterval); timerBtn.style.display = 'none'; downloadLinkBtn.style.display = 'inline-block'; // Add your download functionality here console.log('Download started!'); else timerBtn.textContent = `Claim in $timeLeft seconds`; timeLeft--; , 1000); ); Win Up To 93% Of Your Trades With The World's #1 Most Profitable Trading Indicators [ad_1] In recent news, the world of cryptocurrencies, including big names like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP, has seen a bit of a shakeup ahead of a key decision on interest rates by the Federal Reserve. This anticipation has led to a significant drop in their values, posing questions and concerns among investors and crypto enthusiasts alike. For starters, Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency, has witnessed a fall back to the $60,000 range. This drop has had a ripple effect, bringing down the prices of Ethereum, XRP, and the broader crypto Market, erasing about $500 billion in value from its recent $2.9 trillion peak. This Market turbulence comes despite rumors of a new Bitcoin ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund) making rounds, which could potentially shake up the Market even more. Adding to the mix, tech mogul Elon Musk's company, X, hinted at a crypto payments initiative, sparking speculations about its impact on the prices of major cryptocurrencies. However, a series of unfavorable developments, including stalled Bitcoin ETF inflows and doubtful approval of Ethereum ETFs, has cast a shadow over the crypto space. Furthermore, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East and uncertainties around Federal Reserve's interest rate decisions have contributed to the tense atmosphere. Market watchers are on edge, waiting for the Fed chair Jerome Powell's announcement on interest rates, which could either spell relief or further turmoil for the volatile crypto Market. In the midst of these challenges, some Market analysts remain optimistic. Notably, Standard Chartered's head of FX and crypto research, Geoff Kendrick, predicts a bullish future for Bitcoin and Ethereum, projecting significant price recoveries within the year. This optimism hinges on the belief that the current downturn might already reflect all the bad news, with hopes that positive trends will soon resurface and dominate the Market narrative. As the crypto community braces for the Federal Reserve's decision, attention is also on U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen's upcoming announcement on the Treasury's financing plans. This move is closely watched by investors, with some believing it could have more profound implications on the crypto Market than the Fed's interest rate policy. In summary, the crypto Market is at a crossroads, facing pressures from various fronts. While the immediate future seems clouded with uncertainty, the long-term view for cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum remains tentatively optimistic.

As developments unfold, stakeholders eagerly anticipate clear signs that could dictate the Market's direction in the days ahead. Win Up To 93% Of Your Trades With The World's #1 Most Profitable Trading Indicators [ad_2] 1. **What's causing the 'Perfect Storm' for Bitcoin right now?** The 'Perfect Storm' for Bitcoin is being caused by worries that the Federal Reserve (Fed) might change its stance on inflation. This is creating nervousness in the Market, affecting not just Bitcoin but also Ethereum, XRP, and other cryptocurrencies which are all seeing a price drop. 2. **How could the Fed's actions impact Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies?** If the Fed decides to tackle inflation more aggressively, it might raise interest rates or take other measures that could make riskier investments, like cryptocurrencies, less attractive. This can lead to a decrease in their prices as investors look for safer places to put their money. 3. **Is only Bitcoin affected by the current Market conditions?** No, not just Bitcoin. Ethereum, XRP, and basically the whole cryptocurrency Market are feeling the heat from these current conditions. They're all experiencing price drops as the Market reacts to potential policy changes by the Fed. 4. **What exactly does 'Fed Inflation Flip' mean?** 'Fed Inflation Flip' refers to the Federal Reserve potentially changing its approach towards handling inflation. If the Fed decides inflation is a bigger issue than previously thought, they might implement policies to reduce it, which can impact financial markets including cryptocurrencies. 5. **Could the situation improve for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies?** Yes, it's possible. Cryptocurrency markets are known for their volatility. While they're currently facing a downturn due to these external economic factors, they could bounce back depending on future decisions by the Fed, changes in investor sentiment, or other global economic factors. As always, it's important for investors to stay informed and make decisions based on their risk tolerance and investment goals. Win Up To 93% Of Your Trades With The World's #1 Most Profitable Trading Indicators [ad_1] Win Up To 93% Of Your Trades With The World's #1 Most Profitable Trading Indicators Claim Airdrop now Searching FREE Airdrops 20 seconds Sorry There is No FREE Airdrops Available now. Please visit Later function claimAirdrop() document.getElementById('claim-button').style.display = 'none'; document.getElementById('timer-container').style.display = 'block'; let countdownTimer = 20; const countdownInterval = setInterval(function() document.getElementById('countdown').textContent = countdownTimer; countdownTimer--; if (countdownTimer < 0) clearInterval(countdownInterval); document.getElementById('timer-container').style.display = 'none'; document.getElementById('sorry-button').style.display = 'block'; , 1000);

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my-weird-news · 1 year ago

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🚀 Decoding Elon Musk's Unbelievable Success Secrets!

Musk: The Quirky Space Cowboy 🚀 Elon Musk, the real-life mad scientist and rich dude extraordinaire, is like the modern-day version of Ozymandias – just without the ancient ruins and desolate wastelands, and with way more Twitter followers. This guy is like the king of the nerds, ruling over a kingdom of electric cars, reusable rockets, and memes that sometimes make even less sense than his grand plans. Picture this: one moment he's dancing like no one's watching (but everyone is) at a Tesla event, and the next he's launching a car into space like it's just another Wednesday. He's so rich that his net worth could buy you a whole fleet of Teslas, yet he tweets like he's just discovered the internet. Elon's CV reads like a superhero origin story. He's the CEO of not one, but two major companies. He owned the social media platform that birthed keyboard warriors, and oh, by the way, Marvel used his swag to craft Tony Stark. Talk about goals! Remember when Elon first sashayed onto the scene? He had this epic to-do list: end climate change, make Mars a vacation destination, unravel the mysteries of the universe using AI, and maybe just save humanity in his spare time. No biggie. For years, Musk's fan club treated his plans like gospel truth. Sure, he hadn't taken anyone to Mars yet, but he did make rockets that are basically the Energizer bunnies of space travel. And let's not forget how he jump-started the electric car scene – he basically made electric cars cool, like James Dean for the environmentally conscious. To decode the enigma that is Musk, we turn to Talulah Riley's book – not because Musk was her second and third husband (seriously, that's more commitment than I have to finishing a bag of chips), but because her romance novel Acts of Love sounds suspiciously like Elon's life. It's all about a misandrist writer who falls for a biotech billionaire on a mission to save the world. Sound familiar? Musk's public image is like his secret sauce. Back in the day, he was as socially awkward as a penguin at a disco. He even worried he wasn't as glamorous as the competition. But this dude turned things around – he morphed from "Shai Agassi, Founder of Glamour" to "Elon Musk, Lord of the Universe." Elon's social ascent was like a rocket launch. He needed people to know him to buy rocket parts, so he decided to become Mars' number one hype man. It worked, and suddenly everyone was like, "Hey, there's that dude who's all about Mars!" Then came the infamous year of 2018 – Musk called someone a "pedo guy," smoked weed on a podcast, and tweeted that he had "funding secured" to take Tesla private. Whoopsie daisy! Lawsuits rained down like confetti at a New Year's Eve party. But wait, there's more! In 2020, Musk said, "To hell with nice," and ditched his PR team. Now he's the press release king, and his favorite email response? The poop emoji. I kid you not. You know how they say a new Musk scandal a day keeps the actual news away? Well, it's kind of true. With a Musk controversy buffet, it's hard to focus on just one serving. It's like trying to pick a favorite ice cream flavor at Ben & Jerry's – you end up with brain freeze and no answers. So, is Musk a bad boss or are his employees just slackers? Acts of Love's Radley Blake could clear this up. Radley's a control freak who only fires people who don't give "maximum effort." His employees are so motivated they don't even need Red Bull to sprout wings. But in real life, Musk isn't exactly the "Employee of the Month" poster child. People report him stomping through Tesla factories, red-faced and firing folks like it's a carnival game. One executive said they had to stoop in meetings to seem smaller than Musk – like they were at a toddler tea party. And don't even get me started on workplace safety. Tesla factories were apparently more dangerous than your grandma's staircase in a haunted house. Musk's dislike for the color yellow (yellow tape, yellow paint) led to some questionable safety practices – it's like he's running a risk assessment in a Tim Burton movie. But Musk is a romantic hero in his own right. He's got a tragic past and a longing for love. Childhood bullies, check. Troubled relationship with his dad, check. He's like a wounded bird in a billionaire's body. No wonder he's looking for someone to save him from all that money. The dude's been married more times than I've accidentally sent screenshots to the wrong person. He's got enough kids to start a soccer team, and he's probably planning to send them to Mars for summer vacation. But hey, at least he's not alone, right? He's got Twitter, his second favorite significant other. So there you have it – Elon Musk, the eccentric entrepreneur who turned himself into the star of his own romantic novel. One minute he's making rockets, the next he's tweeting like a kid who just found out they can use their teacher's chalkboard. Will he save the world? Maybe. Will he keep us entertained? Absolutely. 🚀🎉# Musk: The Quirky Space Cowboy 🚀 Elon Musk, the real-life mad scientist and rich dude extraordinaire, is like the modern-day version of Ozymandias – just without the ancient ruins and desolate wastelands, and with way more Twitter followers. This guy is like the king of the nerds, ruling over a kingdom of electric cars, reusable rockets, and memes that sometimes make even less sense than his grand plans. Picture this: one moment he's dancing like no one's watching (but everyone is) at a Tesla event, and the next he's launching a car into space like it's just another Wednesday. He's so rich that his net worth could buy you a whole fleet of Teslas, yet he tweets like he's just discovered the internet. Elon's CV reads like a superhero origin story. He's the CEO of not one, but two major companies. He owned the social media platform that birthed keyboard warriors, and oh, by the way, Marvel used his swag to craft Tony Stark. Talk about goals! Remember when Elon first sashayed onto the scene? He had this epic to-do list: end climate change, make Mars a vacation destination, unravel the mysteries of the universe using AI, and maybe just save humanity in his spare time. No biggie. For years, Musk's fan club treated his plans like gospel truth. Sure, he hadn't taken anyone to Mars yet, but he did make rockets that are basically the Energizer bunnies of space travel. And let's not forget how he jump-started the electric car scene – he basically made electric cars cool, like James Dean for the environmentally conscious. To decode the enigma that is Musk, we turn to Talulah Riley's book – not because Musk was her second and third husband (seriously, that's more commitment than I have to finishing a bag of chips), but because her romance novel Acts of Love sounds suspiciously like Elon's life. It's all about a misandrist writer who falls for a biotech billionaire on a mission to save the world. Sound familiar? Musk's public image is like his secret sauce. Back in the day, he was as socially awkward as a penguin at a disco. He even worried he wasn't as glamorous as the competition. But this dude turned things around – he morphed from "Shai Agassi, Founder of Glamour" to "Elon Musk, Lord of the Universe." Elon's social ascent was like a rocket launch. He needed people to know him to buy rocket parts, so he decided to become Mars' number one hype man. It worked, and suddenly everyone was like, "Hey, there's that dude who's all about Mars!" Then came the infamous year of 2018 – Musk called someone a "pedo guy," smoked weed on a podcast, and tweeted that he had "funding secured" to take Tesla private. Whoopsie daisy! Lawsuits rained down like confetti at a New Year's Eve party. But wait, there's more! In 2020, Musk said, "To hell with nice," and ditched his PR team. Now he's the press release king, and his favorite email response? The poop emoji. I kid you not. You know how they say a new Musk scandal a day keeps the actual news away? Well, it's kind of true. With a Musk controversy buffet, it's hard to focus on just one serving. It's like trying to pick a favorite ice cream flavor at Ben & Jerry's – you end up with brain freeze and no answers. So, is Musk a bad boss or are his employees just slackers? Acts of Love's Radley Blake could clear this up. Radley's a control freak who only fires people who don't give "maximum effort." His employees are so motivated they don't even need Red Bull to sprout wings. But in real life, Musk isn't exactly the "Employee of the Month" poster child. People report him stomping through Tesla factories, red-faced and firing folks like it's a carnival game. One executive said they had to stoop in meetings to seem smaller than Musk – like they were at a toddler tea party. And don't even get me started on workplace safety. Tesla factories were apparently more dangerous than your grandma's staircase in a haunted house. Musk's dislike for the color yellow (yellow tape, yellow paint) led to some questionable safety practices – it's like he's running a risk assessment in a Tim Burton movie. But Musk is a romantic hero in his own right. He's got a tragic past and a longing for love. Childhood bullies, check. Troubled relationship with his dad, check. He's like a wounded bird in a billionaire's body. No wonder he's looking for someone to save him from all that money. The dude's been married more times than I've accidentally sent screenshots to the wrong person. He's got enough kids to start a soccer team, and he's probably planning to send them to Mars for summer vacation. But hey, at least he's not alone, right? He's got Twitter, his second favorite significant other. So there you have it – Elon Musk, the eccentric entrepreneur who turned himself into the star of his own romantic novel. One minute he's making rockets, the next he's tweeting like a kid who just found out they can use their teacher's chalkboard. Will he save the world? Maybe. Will he keep us entertained? Absolutely. 🚀🎉 Read the full article

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sasquapossum · 3 years ago

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Two discussions on the internet collided for me this morning. The first started with this, on here.

In the notes, someone opined that the Boomers got older and their mental faculties declined. Close, but not quite. The other discussion was on Slacker News, about how to break an “addiction” to low-effort low-reward activities like social media or video games. So let’s put these together. The problem with Boomers (to the extent that “Boomers” is a meaningful category or that their aggregate behavior qualifies as a problem is that they have two things together.

A lot of free time.

No “immune system” for the internet.

These are people who didn’t even have cable TV growing up. Many of the oldest didn’t have TV at all until their mid teens or later. Their recreation was reading, listening to music on radio or record players, playing outside, maybe working on cars or driving them around just for the hell of it. I know that last seems like a totally alien concept to many of you, but it really was a thing. Of course there were sex and drugs, but that hasn’t changed nor will it. We can factor those out of the discussion.

So these Boomer kids grew up, got jobs, had kids, etc. Cable TV came along, then the internet, but - and this is key - these folks had already grown up without them. They didn’t have life long habits and community knowledge about how to avoid the ills we now know so well. Much of the psychology and technology behind our current tracked-everywhere optimized-for-engagement world hadn’t even been worked out. Comparing TV ads to what we have today is like comparing pot to fentanyl. Eventually the Boomers retired. They suddenly had tons of free time, and spent much of it on the internet. Now let’s look at how that experience might differ for them vs. the rest of us.

I’m a GenXer who got into computers early. I saw the evolution of the internet (even helped a bit here and there) so I was able to build up my defenses to its darker side. Zoomers - like my daughter and many of you - have similarly “thick skins” but aren’t even aware of it. As young folks have always done, they assume simultaneously that they are the first to discover things like sex and music but also that nobody older has any excuse for not knowing what they know ... and that second part is the problem. You see, the Boomers had none of this knowledge, these habits, this immunity. They were plunged into this toxic stew of commercial and political manipulation with no defense whatsoever. Is it any wonder that they - statistically speaking - have turned into the fearful, angry, misinformed cadre that the manipulators want them to be? And not all of those manipulators are themselves Boomers BTW. Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson are solid GenX. Lauren Boebert is solid Millennial. Josh Hawley and Madison Cawthorn (sticking to US politics for a moment) are on the cusp at each end. None of them are anywhere near Boomer years.

I say this not to defend or excuse Boomers. Florida Guy still is and always will be the archetypical Boomer. His same-age enablers (hi Sammy Alito) and followers are and always will be a despicable lot. Among those I include Boomer hives like the Federalist Society and most evangelical churches. As a group they have a lot to answer for. On the other hand, I think it’s important to understand why and how this happened, and not blame individuals so much. Many of the reasons and mechanisms apply just as much to you, however young or old you are. Believing that your own generation is specially immune only increases the chance that you too will become the next century’s equivalent of a MAGA. Some already are. As a famous cultural icon of the Boomers (though technically a Silent himself) once said:

There's nothing in the street Looks any different to me And the slogans are effaced, by-the-bye And the parting on the left Is now parting on the right And the beards have all grown longer overnight

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. To use a more recent cultural reference (or two), the wheel keeps turning and it makes no difference who’s on top. Those who do not learn the lessons of history...

#long post #us politics #internet #pop sociology

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alienisticxo · 3 years ago

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X Angel - Chapter 4

Elon Musk x Reader

{Authors Note} Sorry for taking so long! I’ll be updating more regularly now! You can also find this story on AO3 and Wattpad, the links are in my description. My asks are also always open for general Elon chat and requests. <3

Warnings: None yet!

“So what’s the verdict? We don’t got all day,” Jett pushed as he strode through the doors once more, irritated and impatient.

Elon backed away from me then as the other men walked in with a ferociousness in their stride, clearly champing at the bit to hear what their most valuable colleague had to say about the cash-robot.

“She truly has no recollection of anything, and not being aware of how her programming works can be dangerous, especially on Earth,” one man said to another, seemingly continuing a conversation from outside.

“However,” the other began even louder, loud enough for everyone to hear, to assure I could hear. “We’re willing to pay the price. Earth needs someone new for the public to idolize or they’ll waste away. Perhaps they’ll listen to the people who know what they’re talking about if someone like {Y/N} tells them what to do from their televisions. What did you find, Musk?” He finished, turning to Elon with interest.

But Elon only shook his head with conviction, confident in his findings.

“I’d like to investigate further before this purchase is made. Something isn’t adding up here, and I agree with the danger it could pose.”

“Nonsense,” the man replied brashly instead, suddenly not treating Elon as though he were their most valuable player in the room.

I wondered why they’d asked him for his opinion at all as the suited man took a holographic card from his own pocket then.

“Whatever the price, we’ll take her,” he demanded.

I could hear Elon breathe a disappointed laugh as he shook his head and turned away, sliding his hands into his suit jacket pockets, then. He very obviously deemed my purchase to be a terrible idea, though I know not for similar reasons I did. Still, the sentiment stung me more than I’d like to admit. He was my hero, after all.

But he was in no position to argue with them, as I wasn’t his pop star to claim. For another moment, I also wondered why they’d asked him to tag along altogether. If they weren’t going to hear him out, there was no reason for his presence. Even though I was sure he saw me more as a threat than beneficial, I was still glad I got to meet him, at least once in my lifetime.

Regardless of that, there was no denying it felt like the entire universe fell apart around me all at once, leaving me spiraling into the galaxy with no direction. I couldn’t go back to Earth— I wouldn’t go back to Earth. I would rather jump out of the window in front of me and disassemble my entire being, than go back there. But I had to stay quiet. I had to remain calm. My teeth ground together behind my lips as every inch of my body tensed up. They didn’t notice, but it was possible Elon had with each occasional glance he took back at me.

I kept my eyes right back on him this time, only averting them when he looked in my direction. When they gathered around the large table to sign the contract, which appeared in mid air at the press of a button on a phone by Jett, Elon stayed behind. He watched me intently as my {e/c} eyes burned holes into the man whose own eyes made steady and confident contact with the contract as it scanned his retinas. Within seconds, it disappeared, my life slipping from my own fingers as it was sent through cyberspace back to Astra. Crypto exchanged cards as Jett, and who I found out to be Mr. Bauer, held them against each other.

The purchase had been made.

It felt like an execution more than anything else.

I had a week to bid farewell to Planet X and all who inhabited it. Their label, something boring like Spinn Records, worked with Jett to plan a facade as to why I was leaving to feed to my adoring public. I was to follow it as per Astra’s orders. Once the official date on the contract arrived, I was to hop a flight with SpaceX and hurdle towards the one place I vowed I’d never return to, and take orders from Spinn instead. After that, I was no longer Astra’s responsibility. Silent rage and hurt and a plethora of other emotions came bubbling to the surface, but I kept them at bay, turning near catatonic as my eyes shifted focus to Elon once more.

Deep down, I was hoping he might be the fairytale hero I needed at the moment; might pick up on my silent distress and come up with a bulletproof excuse for me to stay on X, devoted to Astra. Mention anything from the danger I could pose to simply being uninteresting enough. But he didn’t say another word. He stared at me from time to time. And each time he did, I could see the cogs in his mind working away from my peripheral, as he valiantly attempted to unpiece the puzzle that was myself.

They didn’t even say goodbye to me when they left, and I didn’t dare look up at Elon, though I noticed his hesitation to depart. My emotions were on overdrive— I didn’t trust myself to make eye contact for fear I might break down on the spot.

The ride back to my penthouse was quiet on my end. It wasn’t unusual, as cybernetic stars were usually seen and not heard behind the scenes. I sat in the back of the Cybertruck as Jett prattled on to the head of Astra about the deal he’d just made for them from the passenger seat. I was drifting in and out, but caught something about how he wanted more than his usual ten percent. Who would be paying him now?

I smiled to myself for just a second as I looked around inside of the vehicle. They were rare on Earth, but one of the status cars on X. Everyone who was anyone had one despite Elon’s standing in the social world.

Self driving, stereo system like a major recording studio, and built like a tank. Despite the autopilot though, we preferred to drive the beast ourselves. I mean, who wouldn’t? But as I thought about the Cybertruck’s creator, and our brief encounter today, I couldn’t help but feel slighted. It wasn’t his responsibility to save me from such a disastrous deal, sure, but I could tell he wanted nothing to do with my appearance on Earth. They didn’t listen to him when he’d tried to speak up, but he didn’t try hard enough, either. Something told me he wanted them to realize their own mistake, but he didn’t know at what cost that was to me.

I shook myself out of the thought. How could he know, really? Why would he even care? Why did I care so much? His small act of slight compassion in the boardroom didn’t mean I was entitled to his entire arsenal of kind deeds. It was absolutely insane to think that. I questioned my own sentience before trying to push my thoughts away altogether. My emotions were jumbled, no one in particular feeling better or worse than another. It was to the point that the only thing I felt was nothing at all.

When I’d finally arrived home, there were no flashing cameras, no screaming fans or journalists and no security guards surrounding me from every direction I looked. I made my way through the lobby of the building and onto the teleportation pad, dying to finally have some privacy in my own space. The damn thing couldn’t work fast enough as I impatiently waited for it to read my code. Eventually, though it was really only mere seconds, I found myself in my penthouse.

Once I locked the door for no outsider entry, I immediately leaned back against it, the soft clang of metal ringing lightly through the space and tainting my view of my life, the sound bitter and empty as it fell on my ears. My line of sight was glued to an onyx black rug in front of me as I recounted the latter half of the day's events. It all replayed to me like a movie I was forced to watch, all of my hard work unraveling for a little currency that didn’t even mean anything just a few years ago. As invincible as I felt to Astra, after all I’d done for them to save their name countless times, to push their agendas when I didn’t necessarily agree with them, to keep them relevant, they felt as though I was disposable.

My label deemed me disposable and my hero considered me a threat.

Then it hit me.

All at once everything I’d been feeling hit me like a swirling hurricane, and I began to near hyperventilation as I let myself truly feel again. The wall I had to build up every day cracked and crumbled as a million different sensations escaped into the ethos from my small frame. A roaring war within my body swept me into a moment that felt tumultuous, everything suddenly chaotic, loud and heavy though it was just myself in an otherwise quiet room.

My chest rose and fell as it all came rushing back like a wave of water, tears forming in my eyes as sobs pushed their way through my throat. It was as though everything else I had ever been fell away, stripping me bare to nothing but my own resolve. My cold hands immediately reached for my head and I started to sink to the floor, the dramatism of the moment not at all underplayed or over exaggerated when compared to how I felt as I began to tear the beautifully detailed chrome pieces from my face— and then my chest— and then the rest of my body, tearing my clothing off along with them. I threw each piece across the large entryway, the sharp echo earsplitting as each one clattered and rolled through the space. The intricacy I’d hid behind for what felt like ages now, meaning nothing and everything all at once. My heart pounded in my chest, a familiar ache I’d not felt since I left earth reigniting my passion, my need to escape. Inside, I was dying to escape the hell I had to endure, pretending to be a body I wasn’t day in and day out just to stay alive.

The jet black mascara I still liked to put on despite no one seeing it dripped down my cheekbones in messy streaks. My soft, warm skin was exposed in the evening's hazy sunset that wasn’t quite like anywhere else in the two worlds I knew. The small tattoos, scars and beauty marks I’d acquired on Earth, a stark indication of my true humanity, revealed to no one but myself and my thoughts. I embraced the way I could feel the blood coursing through my veins, supplying my carbon based vessel beyond what the most complexly built form of artificial intelligence could comprehend. I tasted the salt of my tears on my flushed rose petal lips with slight relief that I still existed as I was, if only for the time being. I reminded myself of who I was— who the world didn’t know me to be, who I’d often forgotten or left behind for the sake of my safety; of my family’s safety.

And as I sat there, naked and distraught, I briefly wondered if I should reveal my secret to the world now that I found myself at an impasse; if I should risk it all to stay on Planet X and continue the life I’d worked so desperately hard for. To use exposing my humanity as a playing card that no one saw coming was a thought, absolutely. Astra would be in shambles if I decided to expose myself as nothing more than a mere mortal after boasting to X and Earth that they had the most realistic A.I. lifeform in the game. While it didn’t seem like such a big deal, it was in the eyes of the public and their competitors. It would tarnish their reputation forever. But the label didn’t exactly play fair, either. My lifeless body would be hurdling into the universe within the hour I told them, and they’d be after anyone else who might be affiliated with me or related to me. It was one thing to outcast an individual to the outskirts. It was a whole other to wipe out any trace of their existence at all. But they had no issues with it, so long as they saved face and crypto.

Earth hadn’t been kind to my family or me in its downfall. I didn’t come from wealth of any kind and we’d made due with humble living while we could. But we’d gotten caught in the grime the moment it all began to fall apart on a grand scale.

X was my escape.

Our escape.

I barely managed to make it out of Earth as a stowaway, let alone alive.

#elon musk #elon musk x reader #elon musk fanfiction #fanfiction #elon musk fanfic #spacex #cyberpunk #tesla #fanfic #x angel #futurism #darklydreaming #grimes #slow burn #writers #Fanfic writer #writer

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samingtonwilson · 5 years ago

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A Bid on Bucky

Summary: You spend thousands of dollars at a bachelor auction for Bucky when you could’ve had him for free this entire time.

Pairing: bucky x reader

a/n: this fic is damning evidence that idiots in love is my favorite genre, your honor. i’ve more likely than not used this gif before but idc because im lov it

Tony Stark is a humanitarian— a fact you have neither forgotten, nor will he allow you to forget.

Oftentimes, he’ll remind you verbally and, other times, a visual reminder will be posted on the team’s social media accounts. The pictures of him at the elephant sanctuary he helped found in Thailand are your personal favorites.

If news of his latest cause is not filling the pages of The Times or showing up on CNN’s special segment of Billionaires Who Care with Christiane Amanpour, it’s being distributed via monthly text reminder of reasons to leave Tony’s special coffee alone— last month you were told, “His donations allowed the doors of Planned Parenthood to remain open in developing nations such as Burkina Faso, and all he asks for in return is that his teammates do not finish his goddamn coffee.”

Of course, because you all live for him sniffing out your mugs at morning meetings to discover the culprit, his reminders only lead to greater coffee theft as it, in turn, increases the redness in his face when he finds the morally corrupt heathenous criminal— who is usually Clint.

In true Tony Stark fashion, though, his favorite way to remind you all, and the rest of the world, is through a gala. A gala where champagne flows like water, money is no object, extravagance is to be expected, and, as a member of the team, attendance is mandatory.

At first, you hated the damn things. It’s not like you’ve ever cared about the private island one guest owns which another guest is so obviously jealous of, or if the deal to buy a chunk of land on the light side of the moon before that hippie Elon Musk usurps it all has successfully closed.

But now? Now that you’ve learned how to direct the money those snots brag ostentatiously about into causes you truly care for with a couple little sly techniques, you fucking love the things.

You and Natasha have a game, actually. Whose Shameless and Absolutely Disingenuous Flirting Will Lead to More Money Donated to (Insert Tony’s Latest Cause Here)?

Natasha is the current titleholder as Smelly Von Oil Tycoon’s wife shooed you away before you could close the million dollar deal and Cowboy Hat McFast Food Franchise would have given up his entire company if Natasha kept batting her eyelashes at him. But in the end, just as every other time the two of you have played, you both felt like winners because the almost obscene amount of money was helping fund housing for Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh. The competitive edge to it is just for entertainment.

This time, though, seeing as this event is an auction and you are in no mood to flirt with red-faced old men with paper-thin skin, you have taken to auctioneering with Sam.

Motioning to a projected photograph of a luxurious Paris hotel room with a view of the Eiffel Tower in your best Vanna White impression, you grin as brightly as you can. “And the last item Sam and I will be auctioning off together is a two-night stay at Plaza Athénée in Paris. First class airfare for two is included, as are two tickets to the Louvre. You’ve been to Paris, haven’t you, Sam?”

“Why, yes, baby girl, I have,” he replies with a grin as broad as yours, the spotlight and his natural charm causing his deep brown eyes to sparkle like diamonds. You think for a second that you can actually hear Bucky scoffing in the audience. “A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, but I will say that it is called the City of Love for a reason.”

“Of course, our unlucky-in-love Sam shared those kisses only with every bit of bread and cheese he came across but you can share it all with someone special.” At that, Sam elbows you gently in the ribs with a fond roll of his eyes. “We’re going to start the bidding at twenty-thousand dollars.”

Immediately, paddles shoot up and Sam begins calling out higher bids and paddle numbers while you lean your hip against the podium and take a long sip of your champagne which has since, unfortunately, gone lukewarm and flat. Your face pinches and you scan the crowd for a wandering waiter.

Before you can, though, your head tilts just as you spot Bucky, a large button reading “BACHELOR #4” pinned to the lapel of his tux.

He’s laughing. Not openly and loudly like he usually does when the two of you are alone, but his shoulders are shaking and he’s grinning so the skin beside his eyes wrinkles. You think fleetingly that his cheeks might even be dusted in pink as he ducks his head.

The sight makes you smile, too, and you set your champagne aside. It’s secondary now.

“Congratulations to Mr. Baldwin and all the other winners of these wonderful vacations,” Sam says once the winner has been announced and ushered backstage. “Sadly, our time is up for the night.”

You nod and pick up your microphone again. “Yes, but you will be seeing Sam again tonight as a part of the Bachelor Auction. Give the crowd a spin, Sam, show them what they could be going on a date with.”

Sam unbuttons his wine-colored tuxedo and spins slowly, a slight swing in his hips. He’s met with several wolf-whistles, a rose thrown on stage, and a brief retching noise courtesy of Clint, to which Sam replies with a wink and a scoffed, “The glory is too much to handle for the insecure and faint of heart, ain’t it, Barton? We got a doctor on retainer in case you pass out.”

Sam holds out his elbow to help you down the stairs and you gratefully loop your arm through his, your other hand hoisting the hem of your dress above your ankles.

You sigh after meeting one of the bid winners, smile falling from your lips the moment you turn away. “I should’ve bid on that Marrakech trip.”

Sam cocks an eyebrow. He doesn’t seem to mind one bit that you have yet to release him and simply follows you as you head to the bar. “Enjoy it last time?”

“You mean when I was there to locate stolen Chitauri weapons?” you let out a bark of sarcastic laughter. “Steve didn’t even let me glance in the relative direction of a souq when that was the only reason I volunteered.”

“So that’s a no?”

You take the fresh flute of champagne a waiter offers and nod your thanks. “That’s a hell fucking no.” A pathetic pout and, “I deserve to love Morocco.”

“Makin’ that face at me won’t help your cause. Makin’ that face at Pervert Santa Claus over there,” he points to a man, rosy-cheeked with a white beard and wandering eyes, who you recognize as the winner of the trip. “That’ll get you what you want.”

You make a face, tongue sticking out as you gag, and set your glass atop the bar. “First of all, even the prospect of sex with me will make his heart give out.”

Sam laughs into his tumbler of whiskey and rolls his eyes.

You grimace openly when the eyes of an elderly man— his arm around a woman who looks to be barely in her twenties— linger a bit too long and smile when he visibly shrinks. “And B., I only flirt with them to get donations. I’d sooner never leave this tower again than get with one of these ‘I only donate money to boost my public image’ types.”

He hums and a slow, lazy smile curves his lips. He nods his head in the direction of something behind you. “Barnes’ got a different ideology.”

As casually as you can, you turn your body to lean your elbows atop the bar and tilt your head ever so slightly to glance where Bucky is standing.

Standing and laughing. How is he still laughing?

Arching an eyebrow at the woman he speaks to, you lift your glass to your lips. “Doesn’t look like she fits the bill.”

“You’re joking,” Sam laughs, shaking his head as he sets his elbows on the bar as well. His shoulder brushes yours and, despite the itchy fabric of his tuxedo, you don’t mind. “That’s Maris Scheufele.”

Long, chestnut brown hair swept over one shoulder to keep her back bare, her gown is silky, liquid gold. Dripping in wealth.

You purse your lips and turn back to Sam. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

“Chopard heiress.”

“Chopard like—” with wide eyes, you point at the sapphire and diamond earrings borrowed from Pepper on your ears and the matching ring on your left index finger. “Like Cannes Film Festival Chopard? Like that Chopard?”

“Yeah, that Chopard.” He has to stop from laughing at the look you offer him. He thinks he might see your skin turn green in a matter of minutes. “She’s more loaded than Cigarette-Breath Du Rideshare-App-CEO from the elephant benefit.”

You manage a small smile and a quick roll of your eyes, only to have them once again land on Bucky and the Chopard heiress. Maris.

You aren’t jealous— per se. Jealousy is an ugly emotion, after all. Childish, and inconsiderate, and rooted in insecurity.

Sure, she’s cuddled up next to someone you’re in the midst of denying feelings for out of fear and the prospect of being undeserving. And, sure, she’s covered in diamonds and you’re usually covered in dried blood, dust, and dirt from HYDRA facilities. But you aren’t jealous.

You know you’ve wasted your time, his efforts, and your emotions being anything but happy with Bucky. Chances lost never come around again, right? So you’ve made your peace with it. You’ve had to make your peace with it.

With how much you’ve messed up, how many chances you’ve lost. With how perfect she is and how perfect he looks laughing with her.

Perfect.

So perfect that your teeth grit and the grip you have on your champagne flute tightens.

“He’s gonna bring in the big bucks.”

You snort. “I thought he had different ideologies.”

“He does. But you know she ain’t gonna let him get auctioned off to anyone else.” A corner of Sam's lips turn up in disgust as he, too, stares at them with little stealth. Nick Fury would be ashamed in you both. “Lookin’ at him like he’s a piece of jerky.”

“Jerky?”

“Old, dried up beef.” He then hums in agreement with his own words. “Nasty, hundred-year old beef.”

With a laugh— a laugh that has the cadence of a sob— you drop your head into your hands.

You meet Bucky’s eyes when you pick your head up, his head tilted in silent question. Perhaps at your wet, ironic smile, perhaps at the pull of your eyebrows.

You shake your head in response and it’s when he almost immediately returns to laughing at whatever Maris Scheufele is saying that you straighten with a frown.

What the hell kind of name is that anyway? Maris.

“What the hell—” you pause to take the glass from Sam’s hands and polish off his whiskey. “What the hell is so funny?”

The glass is snatched back. “Not you finishing my drink, that’s for sure.”

Shrugging as you continue to stare at Bucky and Maris, you mumble, “Put the next one on my tab.”

Sam snorts as he asks for another drink, facing you as he adds, “S’an open bar, you cheap ass.”

Once you’ve been able to secure a fresh, much stronger drink for yourself, you loop your arm through Sam’s again and set your chin on his shoulder. Your noses nearly bump when he looks at you and you both laugh softly. “I fucked up, didn’t I?”

“You did.” He yelps and laughs when you pinch his side, lightly knocking his head against yours. Gentle eyes meet yours as he says, “Not tryna be harsh, but you had him and you let him go.”

“I know.”

“He spent weeks moping about it, you spent weeks moping about it.”

“I know.”

“It was miserable comforting both you idiots.”

“Yeah, you’re the real victim here.”

Despite your dry tone, he nods in agreement. “You could tell him right now. Get all this bullshit over with and out in the open.”

Just the idea makes your heart rate spike. “He might reject me. Exact revenge for what I did.”

“Barnes is a lotta things. Greasy, geriatric, testy, fuckin’ annoying as shit—” Sam hisses when you pinch him again, “— but vindictive ain’t one of ‘em.”

Before Sam can convince you to move even an inch from the part of the bar you’ve dubbed yours for the night, warm fingers wrap around your elbow and tap your arm five times in quick succession. A secret identification code.

A secret identification code that makes you smile despite yourself. You lift your head from Sam’s shoulder and hope you don’t look too eager as Bucky leans back against the bar, facing you entirely. “Look who it is.”

He waves vibranium fingers and grins, a bit of that thirties charm you’d heard so much about shining in his blue eyes as he looks at you. “Hi, sweetheart. Wilson,” he adds with a playfully curt nod, chuckling when Sam returns it. “You were great up there. Prettiest MC I’ve ever seen. Almost had me buyin’ the trip to Morocco to make up for the shit Steve put you through.”

You feel Sam shaking in silent laughter and sigh when you hear his whispered, “For fuck’s sake.”

“Only ‘almost’?” you ask with a pout Bucky grins at and wide eyes that have him swallowing over a dry throat. “What does a girl have to do for you to actually bid?”

He shakes his head after a moment of simply staring, chuckling. “These poor bastards don’t stand a chance against you, do they? They’d probably sign their entire companies over to you and not think twice about it.”

“Just doing my part to save the Amazon,” you shrug. “Like you’re doing with the Bachelor Auction.”

“‘Bout that,” he begins as he straightens his jacket and tie— all black. You trace his jaw, sharp and angular, when he glances away for just a second. “How long d’you think it’ll take Stark to put me out of my misery when nobody bids on me?”

“I wouldn’t be so negative. I know of one person who’ll definitely bid on you.”

His lips quirk up on one end, eyes dreamy as his head tilts in indulgence. “Yeah? Who’s that?”

“Your heiress.”

Bucky doesn’t seem to notice Sam jabbing his elbow into your ribs and cocks an eyebrow in confusion. “My what?”

Though you weren’t planning on replying, Tony’s voice over the speakers doesn’t allow Bucky to question you further and you heave a sigh of relief. He calls all the bachelors to the stage and Sam pulls his arm from yours, bumping your shoulders together before he departs just as Tony begins telling a story of his first bachelor auction and how much he went for.

Bucky remains still, however. Leant against the bar, eyes on you.

“Bachelor number 4,” you say, pointing at the button he wears. You smile softly. “You’re needed on stage.”

That seems to jolt him out of whatever stupor he was lost in and he stands straight. He takes a step forward and pauses, so close you can feel the heat radiating from him and smell his subtle cologne. “Bid on me if no one else does.”

“I won’t need to.”

Natasha finds you just as the bidding begins and orders herself a drink. She doesn’t say much, simply looking at you as you stare at Bucky standing next to Steve and Sam, and nods to herself. She remains a quiet, comfortable presence until Steve is brought to centerstage and nearly every paddle in the room shoots up. “You tell him yet?”

“Nope.”

“Thought so.” She nods her head to her left and you follow the movement to where Maris sits, back straight as she, too, looks at Bucky— but she’s grinning, paddle poised to be raised. “Scheufele being a cock block?”

You’re visibly surprised when you turn back to Natasha, her ginger hair falling in loose waves over her shoulders. “How did you— How the hell could you possibly know that?”

With the crooked curve of blood red lips, she smiles. “I��m just that good. And Sam texted me about it ten minutes ago.”

She continues to watch you as the excited winner of a date with Steve rises from his seat. “He’s next.”

“I know that.”

“You gonna bid on him?”

You snort, though unconvincingly, and shake your head. “And go against an heiress? I’ll save myself the embarrassment.”

“Stark pays us buckets,” she tells you with a frown, picking a stray piece of lint off her silver dress. “You could afford to go against an heiress.”

Bucky’s eyes are narrowed as he looks over the crowd of people seated at their tables. The light bounces off diamonds and sequins, gold and shiny leather shoes. It stings his eyes, it makes him scowl.

“And next, ladies and gentlemen, feast your eyes on Bachelor Number 4,” Tony announces, turning a bit to glance at Bucky as he trudges over, not bothering to look a bit more appealing. “James Buchanan Barnes, truly the human equivalent of a cat.”

Bucky openly glares at Tony now.

“James enjoys silence, brooding, eating like a fuckin’ horse, and telling the same story more than once,” Tony continues, ignoring the roll of Bucky’s eyes. “Cute, cuddly, and a little dangerous, we’ll start the bidding at one-thousand.”

Three paddles shoot up. One from Maris, and two toward the center of the room. Your shoulders tense, Bucky’s relax.

“Okay, do I see eleven hundred?”

Two paddles remain lifted until Maris shouts from her seat in a lilting voice, “Three thousand.”

Your jaw clenches, Bucky grins.

Tony set his hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “Alright, three thousand going once—”

“Thirty-one hundred!”

It feels as if the entire room turns in their seats to gape at you, but you try to pay them no mind. You, wearing your jealousy and determination like armor, stand at the bar with an empty glass in your hand, waiting for Tony to call your bid. But before he can—

“Thirty-two!”

Your eyebrows furrow as you look at Maris. “Thirty-three!”

“Four thousand!” She’s smiling. A perfectly manicured eyebrow is raised in challenge.

You see red. “Forty-three hundred.”

“Six thousand!”

“Sixty-five hundred!”

“Seventy-five hundred!”

When you look at the stage in a bit of a panic, Tony grins expectantly at you and Bucky— Well, you don’t think Bucky’s ever looked so shocked in all the time you’ve known him. But when his eyes go from Maris to meet yours, you find yourself yelling, “Ten thousand!”

The room goes silent, or maybe you’ve just tuned it all out, and Tony is shaking his head in amusement. “Ten thousand going once.”

You turn toward Maris as she sits and tosses her paddle onto the table. “Ten thousand going twice.”

You face the stage again. Bucky’s expression is unreadable. “Sold to our beautiful teammate in blue.”

A bright spotlight shines on you and you fight the urge to run from the room, from the Tower, from New York, and give your best smile.

—

It’s four in the morning, all the lights on the residential floors of the Tower have been turned off, and the world is peaceful. But your mind continues to race.

You sit at the kitchen counter, container of Sam’s leftover cheesecake from your lunch out with him open before you. You twirl a fork between your fingers and stare at nothing in particular, your soft breaths the only sound in the room.

You’d changed out of your dress hours ago, washed off your makeup and taken the pins out of your hair. You could barely meet the eyes of your reflection out of fear of judgement and you didn’t ask FRIDAY to dim the lights or lock your door just in case she laughed at you.

Tony had yet to talk to you about paying the ten grand you bid on Bucky and you left the ballroom before anyone could so much as snicker. You knew you couldn’t hide forever, you just needed the night to come to terms with your own stupidity.

Yet as you prop your chin upon your palm and sigh, you think you might need a day or two, too.

Quiet steps down the hall are made purposefully louder as they grow closer so as to not startle you, the lights dim as bulbs flicker on to about ten-percent of their full brightness. You fear your heartbeat might be audible to everyone in a ten mile radius at the sight of his blue eyes, messy brown hair, and wrinkled black t-shirt, and take a deep breath through parted lips in a futile attempt to calm it down.

He offers you a small smile and walks to the fridge. “You want some water?”

You shake your head— even though he can’t see you. “No, I’m fine.”

There’s a beat of silence and you take a breath to steady yourself. “Buck, I think we should talk.”

He takes out a glass bottle of water for himself and shuts the fridge, leaning against the sink. He’s still smiling. “I know.”

“I—”

“I’m not gonna hold you to this thing,” he interjects, rolling the bottle between his hands. He watches as you sit up straight and set your fork down. “I know you made the bid just to donate the money and save me from that married heiress—”

“Married?” you repeat to yourself.

“And you’ve made it clear you just want to be friends,” he continues, undeterred. “So it’s okay. Hell, I’ll pay for half of it so I’ll feel like I’ve actually done somethin’ to save the sea turtles.”

“The Amazon.”

“Right, the Amazon,” he amends with a quiet laugh. He takes a sip of the water and sets the botte aside. “So whaddya say, huh? We’ll go half and half, help this cause out a little, and you don’t have to go on a date with me.”

“Bucky, you don’t understand—”

“No, no, I get it,” he says, walking around the narrow strip of granite separating you to sit on the stool beside yours. Features soft but a little sad, he shrugs as warmth rolls off him in waves. “I told you to bid on me in case no one else did and you saw how much more Steve went for. You tried to raise the bids on me and got stuck since those billionaires didn’t want to shell out more than ten grand on the Winter Soldier. I get it!”

“That’s not why I did it, Bucky. Not at all.”

He lowers his eyes to his hands, staring at mismatched palms, and says nothing.

“Honestly, I—” You stop yourself when it feels as if your heart’s lodged itself in your throat and struggle to swallow over it. “When I saw that Chopard heiress talking to you and laughing with you, and when she bid on you and almost won that date, I— Something happened.”

He looks at you now, eyebrows pulled together. “What happened?”

“I— I don’t know. I guess I was a little jealous,” you say with a laugh only to shake your head. There’s a subtle sting behind your eyes, at the tip of your nose, and you pray to every deity you can think of to stop any tears. “No, I was very, very jealous. You two looked so happy and perfect and I wanted to scream, and cry, and— Fuck, all I could think about is how much time, and energy, and emotion I’ve wasted pushing you away so neither one of us ends up heartbroken when I already am.”

You sigh, unable to meet his gaze as he gapes at you, his mouth hanging open as you laugh mirthlessly. “It probably seems so stupid to you and I know you’ve moved on, but, holy hell, I wish you still had some kind of crush on me because I’m dying here, Buck. I mean I just spent ten thousand dollars to make you go on a date with me.”

“You did,” he agrees. He’s smiling when you manage to look at him, “You spent ten thousand dollars on me when you could’ve just had me for free this entire time.”

He grasps your chin between his flesh index finger and thumb and jostles you a little, gaze so adoring. “And what punk ass told you I moved on from you? Huh? That same goof who said it’s just a crush?”

He leans forward and pauses just before his lips meet yours, as if waiting for you to pull away only for you to close the distance first.

What starts off as just a light brush of your lips against his quickly turns into a deep, hungry kiss that quiets your mind and forces your heart into overdrive. The warmth of it reaches your toes and every hair follicle, especially as both his hands cup your face while your fingers tangle through his hair, the rasp of his stubbly beard against your soft, sensitive skin stealing your breath even more.

You pull away first and your voice is small, a bit hoarse as you ask, “So you still like me?”

He sets his forehead against yours and his lips pull into a smile. “I’d say it’s a li’l more than that, sweetheart.”

It’s hours later when the sun is up, the cheesecake slice is long forgotten, and Bucky’s pulled you onto his stool to straddle his lap, your lips swollen and a little painful, that you groan in embarrassment.

He immediately leans away from your neck and looks up at you in concern, lips full and cherry red. “What? What’s wrong?”

“I have to pay Tony ten thousand dollars.”

Chuckling, he rolls his eyes and presses a kiss to your chin. “I’ll pay it.”

“Then I’ll owe you ten thousand dollars.” You withhold a moan when he nips at a part of your neck that has your hips rolling into his, the hitching of his breath felt more than heard. “That— that just transfers the problem.”

You feel him smile, arm tightening around you. “I think I know of a way you can pay me back.”

“Sounds like you just discovered the world’s oldest profession.”

A punishing nip under your jaw and you gasp as he laughs. “I’m still all for going half and half to save the sea turtles.”

“The Amazon.”

He sighs and leans back. “Fuckin’ Christ. Someone needs to save the fuckin’ turtles already, then.”

#i wish i could show y'all the dress i imagine her wearing but alas #bucky #bucky barnes #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky x you #bucky barnes fic #bucky barnes x reader fluff #bucky barnes x reader angst #well. mild angst #VERY mild

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grimes-claireboucher · 6 years ago

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GRIMES | WHO KNEW WORLD-BUILDING WOULD BE SO DIFFICULT?

BY SID FEDDEMA

APRIL 23, 2019

You can hear it, can’t you? The pulsing, panning synth bass, ingenious and instantly memorable. A gossamer coo, almost a sigh. And then a voice in an unusually high register singing  lyrics full of menace, at odds with a calculated syrupy-sweet, faux-naive intonation: I never walk about after dark / It’s my point of view / If someone could break your neck / Coming up behind you always coming and you’d never have a clue.

Seven years later, its power remains unmitigated. “Oblivion” turned horror into art, and, while drawn from a personal, particular experience, it spoke to a universal pain, a sense of predation and vulnerability all too familiar for women. Most importantly, it is a defiant act of resistance, a steadfast insistence on Grimes’ ownership of her own experience, and a refusal to be silenced. Pitchfork named it the best song of the decade so far. NPR named it one of the “greatest songs by 21st Century women.” Grimes was suddenly a cultural touchstone, a feminist symbol, a cherished member of the resistance. Everyone was watching.

They still are. Look at the Twitter fusillades, the talmudic readings of even the most flippant utterance, the team-joining. Feuds! With contemporaries, the media, her label. Gossip! A storm of it, following her spacetime-warping appearance with Elon Musk on the Met Gala red-carpet. And to hear Grimes tell it, being caught up in all this has been excruciating. She’s said that 2018 was one of the hardest years she’s endured.

When we speak, Grimes is in flux—emotionally, artistically, career-wise. But that’s nothing new. If I was to describe her with one word, I think it would be '“mercurial.” Or “protean.” She never stands still, never settles. She feels less like one person than like a collection of occasionally-combative creative spirits inhabiting one body. Hence the wide cast of characters in her albums, the fashion experiments, the accretion disk of material spanning mediums and genres. As I was writing this article we got word that she has changed her name—to c [lowercase italic], rather than Claire Boucher, and that the Grimes identity she’s built up over the course of her career could be next to go. For a journalist, she’s a tough subject: not only is she encyclopedic in conversation, but by the time you finish your draft, half of what you’ve written may no longer be true. While this capriciousness is a powerful creative resource, it can also make things difficult. She is a hell of a lot of fun to talk to, though—a whirlwind of ideas, opinions, wisecracks, and puckish self-deprecation.

I was given four tracks from the new album to prepare. But when I bring up the first, the disarmingly raw, strange, and lovely “Shall I Compare Thee,” she laughs. “I hate all these songs now. I might even replace them all. I’m supposed to be finishing the album this month or whatever, but I’ve been making a shit ton of new music instead. Which is a really bad idea.” She sighs, thinks for a moment. “But I’ll probably put out the songs that I said I’ll put out.” I tell her that her fans would surely appreciate seeing what she’s been working on. “Maybe, maybe not,” she replies, grinning. “I think the fans want me to stop making metal, nu-metal. Which I will! I have, I have stopped making metal!” Meanwhile, she’s dropping demos for an augmented reality side project under the moniker “Dark,” scribbling away on a novel, and thinking about a suite of “hymns, like glossolalia vocal music,” but which she “probably won’t release as ‘Grimes,’” as she explains it. She has changed her artistic approach, and is intent on unshackling her creative impulses. “I read a book on speed painting, about how you just lay it down and become satisfied with it. So I’m trying to do a bunch of stuff like that right now. It does feel better, because it just contains more life,” she explains. “Shall I Compare Thee” embodies this speed-painting creative methodology: DIY production, recorded in “like, two hours.” But the other single from the album, “We Appreciate Power,” is the opposite. It’s polished to a shine, conceptual, accompanied by a well-produced video. “‘Power’ is sort of the end of the old music I was making,” she says. “This era of super-produced and perfected sound—it’s sort of a thesis on that, a bookend.”

She’s eager to explain the concept of the new album. However she feels about the songs at any given moment, she’s clearly excited about the story that they’re telling. “Miss Anthropocene” is a character, essentially an anthropomorphization of the concept of climate change. The name is a witty pun on “misanthropy” and “anthropocene”—the geological era defined by humanity’s irrevocable impacts on the planet. “All the media about climate change is like one big guilt trip. It’s super depressing, like, here are some facts that make you wanna go home and kill yourself. It sucks and it sucks to look at, so people just kind of look away from it,” she says. “I want to change that. In ancient Greek culture you have these gods that represent abstract, terrifying concepts. Like a God of Death. So I wanted to make Miss Anthropocene this idea of, like, the God of Climate Change. She wants the world to end and she wants to bring about the end of humanity, but she’s fun. She’s fucking fun and evil!” Grimes laughs. “Also, climate change is beautiful, even if it’s terrifying. It’s so nice to look at. The sunsets are brighter and more beautiful. Volcanoes, oil rainbows, hurricanes... destruction is gorgeous—people are drawn to it.”

Miss Anthropocene marks the end of an era for Grimes. When it’s released she’ll be finished with her obligations to her label, and she’s excited about the prospect of working without contractual restrictions. “I’ll never sign with another label. I’ll never have to put out another album... If I didn’t have this whole requirement to release an ‘album,’ I would have just dropped a bunch of music ages ago.” The album format, she says, feels increasingly ill-suited for her shape-shifting, experimental style. “Albums are trash unless you sit down and make a really good album. I’m not really that consistent. I feel like I would work better in like EP-ish formats.”

It’s not the only departure from musical tradition that she’s considering. Touring, she tells me, has increasingly become a stressful obligation. “I wanna retire from touring. I wanna do a hologram tour. Why do we keep doing them for dead artists instead of living ones who have stage fright?” Does she still get stage fright, this far into her career? “Oh my god, yes. It’s nightmarish. Apocalyptic. Terrifying, horrible. I can’t hear clapping or cheers—I just hear an echo chamber of death. I black out. Dissociation—I can’t tell what’s happening. After a show I’m always thinking, What happened? And people are like ‘It’s ok!’ I know people like the authenticity of live performance, and I do too. But I’m not a good performer. I’m a director who accidentally fell into this position, and now it’s too late to change. So I need to Gorillaz it—I need to find a way to not have to do the Beyoncé thing as much.”

The sense is that Grimes is finished with facades, done pretending, done jumping through hoops to meet our expectations for what a ‘pop-star’ should be. Coming to terms with all this has been a messy and difficult process, but she’s finally feeling like herself again. She’s optimistic, if wary. And she’s ready to let it all out. Her forthcoming album, to hear her tell it, is Grimes unleashed. “I feel like at times there is an extreme rage that I haven’t been able to lay down,” she says. “A rawness that I have withheld from the public, because people always told me to make it more accessible. I’ve given that up for this, and it’s been freeing.”

She’s confronting her past as well. Miss Anthropocene was written during a period of intense self-reflection, and in the midst of personal tragedy. After losing others to addiction and overdoses, yet another close friend had passed. She hints obliquely at her own struggles with substances. It’s hard for her to talk about, but she has confronted it head-on while making this album, and is ready to be honest with the public. “I had early disturbing experiences with kids coming up to me and admiring things that were self-destructive. I was like, fuck, people think it’s cool to cut yourself or vomit or do crack. That’s not good! But then it became this stifling thing,” she says. “I don’t know. I’ve lived this hard, fucked-up life. I can’t pretend I didn’t. It started feeling like I couldn’t express myself properly, because I was so worried about being a good role model. It scares me to be hyper-honest, but we never see women getting to be that way. There should be someone out there that’s messy and fucked up—for some people this is how it is. It scares me because I don’t want little kids to romanticize certain things that are not cool. But I also don’t want to lie about the reality of my existence. I can’t make super honest or super emotional art if I’m always pretending to be cool and chill all the time.”

Grimes’ fans, who love her rabidly, have expressed worry at times in the last few years. If it seems she’s been self-sabotaging, whether online or in her relationships with collaborators and partners, it’s because she really has struggled. But unlike most of us, every step of her journey has been seized upon by a fascinated public and a cynical press hungry for headlines and clicks. And her reticence to tell us what she was really going through left all the more room for speculation. “Two of my best friends died before I was 18, and I lost like five friends to opiate-related deaths. Really close friends. I had one die when I was on a shoot, and found out while filming the second day. All this stuff, fucked up stuff, is happening. Before I would just not mention any of it. I feel like I’ve been through war when I think that all these people around me are dead. In 2016, my good friend died. They were a friend of 15 years, and I felt nothing. Just nothing. And it was so weird. But, you know, there you go. So you start removing yourself from everybody because you don’t want to face it. Life becomes too shockingly fragile, you know?”

It hasn’t been easy for Grimes to engage with her past, but talking about it—in her art, in interviews like this one—is helping. “I’ve gotten better. I was really fucked up in 2016 when I wrote this album, but now I’m doing much better. When I was going through the Art Angels cycle, I was having severe PTSD, and everyone was like, ‘Don’t let the public know!’ I know there are people who think I’ve fucked up the last year, and I do need to be more organized and reasonable and thoughtful at times, for sure. But I feel my art is better.”

Grimes’ favorite part of her job comes before she records a single note. “Dreaming it up feels so easy. The making and releasing can be horrible, but the dreaming is always fun,” she sighs. And that’s why she’s such an interesting figure, right? She’s a prodigious dreamer. We may love the music—I still blast “Oblivion” on an almost monthly basis, revisit the strange and compelling world of Art Angels—but it does sometimes feel almost beside the point. Grimes is building a universe, and she’s shedding the strictures that get in the way of that grand vision—the album format, her label, even her own carefully-crafted identity. “Part of what I’m doing is setting up the world-building. Reverse Harry Potter it. Soundtrack comes first, then the fashion, then everything, everything, everything. Then the book, right before I die,” she says, not really joking. Reaching this point of liberation hasn’t been a smooth process. Grimes is unfailingly honest with herself, her own worst critic. But she feels free, she’s happy with what she’s creating, and her ambitions have only grown. We just need to get out of the way and let her dream.

#grimes #claire boucher #actuallygrimes #interview 2019 #flaunt magazine #sid feddema #2019 #zoey grossman

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midnightswithdearkatytspb · 5 years ago

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Everything’s Gonna Be Alright

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x OFC Stark

Rating: PG

Warning(s): Mentions of Character Death, Fluff & Angst

Word Count: 2,235

Info: I entered @littledarlinhavefaithinme Sebastian Stan Summer Song Writing Challenge. I choose to do it based off of Lullaby by Shawn Mullins. So I loosely and I mean loosely based it off the song, where she grew up with Tony, and Bucky does quote my favorite line of the song at the end. Also big thanks to @coffeebucko for making my moodboard!

Synopsis: Bruce snaps everyone back into existence and Thanos is gone. 5 years have passed and many things have changed for Remedy Stark, she’s an older sister, her dads gotten married to her mother figure and she isn't sure where she fits in it all.

Remedy Stark was born at the tail end of the ’80s, her father couldn't tell her much about how she was born but he could tell her about her mother and the story of how she was brought to him. Remedy could recount the story of being dropped off at her dad, Tony’s front doorstep by her mothers grieving friend. How Tony took one look at six-year-old her and cursed under his breath.

Remedy started showing her mutant abilities just a few months after she had moved in with her father. Tony had been working with some tools when he cut his finger open, feeling bad Remedy walked over grabbed her father's finger and kissed it. After telling him it was all better Tony looked down to find it healed with not even a scar left behind. That night they sat at the breakfast nook where Tony made Remedy promise she would keep her powers to them, and she did till she fixed Uncle Rhodey’s broken arm.

Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp, Bono, Mariah Carey, 2Pac, Elon Musk, Madonna, Michael J. Fox, Kevin Costner, Liv Tyler, Whitney Houston, Richard Branson, Steven Tyler, Bruce Springsteen, Celine Dion, and Leonardo DiCaprio were among the few who partied at the Stark mansion, getting to see Remedy Stark grow up. She learned to speak many languages, her best friend was an artificial intelligence named Just A Rather Very Intelligent System, or Jarvis for short, her father created, till she went to a private charter school.

Now Remedy, wasn’t as smart as her father, but she did skip a few grades here and there, graduating at the age of 14 in 2001. The same year Pepper Potts entered both her and her father's life, she watched them dance around each other in fawning, praying for the day when either her dad grew mature or one of them made a move. That was also the year her second mutation activated, all Remedy had to do was think of a place she wanted to be and she would end up there, unfortunately, it happened in front of both Pepper and her father. It became a family secret.

Years went by, she watched the only woman she ever saw as a mother figure dive in love with her father, while he became a superhero. Aliens it turned out were real, a frozen super-soldier her father spent his entire existence in the shadow was alive, assassins could have their own family and be a damn good friend, also Nazis it turned out were still around.

Being called an Avenger was pretty amazing, but what felt even more amazing to Remedy was saving lives. Fixing the wrongs in the world that you could. Remedy found a family in the Avengers. Wanda was someone who was her own and that could relate to the pressures of being someone with powers. Steve soon after the battle New York, became her best friend, a brother she never she wanted, along with Clint and Sam. Natasha, well she was another Aunt and another mother figure of sorts who brought along Bey. Bey was Natasha’s child, her pride and joy, but also Remedy’s best friend.

Turns out when you get shocked by Thor when trying to save a small nation, well it can awaken hidden powers where you can open portals. Soon everyone knows your secrets and governments well they don't care that you are a Stark, or that you save lives, they notice the fallout you leave behind.

Remedy knew Steve and her father Tony getting along was never going to last, they always had a fallout but they always came together in the end. This time Remedy wasn't able to foretell the destruction, Thunderbolt Ross would have on the group. Remedy left to go bury her Godmother Peggy Carter, then the next thing she knew she was a wanted fugitive.

Tony wanted her to hate Bucky, for killing her grandparents she barely knew, but she couldn't find it in her. It wasn't Bucky’s fault it was the men behind the controls. She could be angry at Steve for not telling her father but she could easily forgive him attempting to protect his best friend, she would do the same for Wanda and Bey.

When it was all over, said and done, T’Challa welcomed Remedy along Bey to lay low in Wakanda when they weren't trying to be vigilantes. Pepper would meet up with Remedy behind Tony’s back, updating her on her father as well as her godfather. Always going their separate ways with a hug and tears in their eyes.

Than Thanos happened and one moment she was assisting Natasha to get up after healing her broken arm, getting ready to open a portal, next she saw her body turning to ash before her very eyes. Next, she was standing between Sam Wilson, Bucky with Bey who was transformed into a Mammoth with both Princess Shuri and Spiderman on their back, as they were being portalled back to New York.

Remedy fought long and hard, the burning feeling in lungs, long since came a constant reminder she was alive. Working back to back with Wanda most of the fight, sending people her way, or defending Spider-Man, or well Peter, he had stopped to introduce himself and to apologize for the black eye back in Germany. Yeah, she could grow to like the kid and could see why her dad did too.

Seeing her dad again for the first time in what felt like forever, was crazy, especially when Remedy half expected him to yell at her, instead he hugged her. Remedy honestly couldn't remember the last time her father had hugged her. He held her tightly to the metal suit he had long lost his helmet it seemed, Remedy could have sworn she felt tears hit her scalp.

“You are so grounded young lady, I don’t care if you are 30 years old, you are grounded! No television, phone, no boys, we are going to have a long talk about what it means to be a vigilante and not talk to our parents.” Tony broke the silence that surrounded them, trying to make his daughter laugh, while she tugged him down to dodge a laser beam heading their way.

Remedy wasn't sure how long the fight even lasted but for her, it ended with her on Bey’s Polar Bear form a few yards away from Bruce Banner who was in possession of the gauntlet. Bruce snapped and the next thing she noticed was the aliens they had been fighting were turning to dust. Thanos was defeated and all of a sudden it felt like a weight was lifted off their shoulders. Exhaustion hit Remedy hard and it was expected so the last thing she remembered was the white fur, hitting her face before she was caught by Clint.

The drive to wherever they were going seemed to drag on as Remedy got stuck between the two super soldiers, a guy named Frank Castle was driving and he wouldn't let anyone touch for stereo. Somehow Sam had won a coin toss and got to ride shotgun, while in the very back Bey was sharing their iPod with Wanda and Karen Page, was snoring.

When Remedy came to in the back of a truck that belonged to Castle, Pepper had been pushing her hair back. Tears had been cascading down her face even though she was smiling, Remedy had tried to smile but everything in her body has hurt. Pepper was in her suit of armor, Remedy remembered choking out the colors were far better than Dad’s, making Pepper laugh. Tony had leaned over the side of the truck kissing the crown of her head, reminding her favoritism sucked.

Soon they were invited back to Stark-Potts household because of course they got married, but it turns out they no longer lived in the city but out by Lake George. The two-hour drive listening to classic rock and alternative rock, barley any legroom, the constant sniff, and cough was starting to get to Remedy. Almost making her wish she had taken up the Peter Quill guy, or even Scott Lang offers up for a lift.

As Hozier’s voice crooned about how he should have taken better care of his lover, the road Frank had turned on to suddenly became bumpy. Steve sat up straighter, suddenly elbowing Remedy in the ribs with his sharp elbow, causing her to take a deep intake of breath. Bucky reached around Remedy smacking his best friend on the back of the skull, getting a laugh out of Wanda and Bey in the back. Steve gave her an apologetic look as they drew closer to a cabin that looked almost luxurious, right away Remedy knew this was one of her Dad’s places.

As the Range Rover came to a slow stop, Remedy noticed Happy, Pepper, and Rhodey standing on the porch together, with drinks in their hands. Remedy followed Bucky out of the car and saw the lake to her left, it's beauty was serene, she could see why Pepper and her Dad would settle here. Suddenly arms were around Remedy’s legs and holding on tightly to her, with no foreseeable plan to let go it seemed.

“Remy, Daddy said he would bring you home and he did! Mom said you would teach me how to play guitar and you’d Dutch braid. I’m so happy your home.” Remedy stared down at the little girl at her legs in confusion before she heard footsteps nearing, and a hand was placed on top of the little girls head. That hand is turned our belonged to her father and beside him was Pepper, both of which were smiling at her.

“Remedy, this is Morgan, we had her shortly after the snap. Morgan this is your older sister Remedy.” Tony was now holding Morgan in his arms, who continued to stare at Remedy was adoration.

“I know who Remedy is Daddy, I have her picture at my bedside, I tell her goodnight every night and I read to her. Well not her, the picture of her, but now I can read to her because you brought her home to us, as you promised!” Remedy felt her heart rate skyrocket, she had a sister, she had been gone five years and so much has changed. To the right, she could hear Bey screaming no, as Clint was saying sorry, everything felt louder, her breathing more shallow.

“Remy?” Pepper put her hand on her shoulder like she used to do when she was a teenager, and she felt the world was out to get her, but Pepper always reassured her, she was stronger than those who brought her down. Remy tried her hardest to smile at Morgan, but she felt perhaps it still came out more like a grimace than anything else.

“Morgan, it's so good to meet you. If you don't mind, I just need a second to catch my breath.” Remedy had reached over and squeezed her little sister soft delicate hand in a loving gesture before she turned away from her family. Her legs taking her out towards the edge of the dock of the lake, hands-on her hips she found herself struggling to breathe as her mind raced.

Where did she belong now? Why did she have to leave all those years ago, she should have come home with the tail tucked between her legs and signed the accords, they could have been a family. She had missed out on the wedding, the one she had wished for since she was a pre-teen, on her birthday cakes and falling stars. Tony had taken in Peter Parker, Spider-Man who was a pretty cool kid, but still, she missed out on seeing them interact. Here she was a big sister and she missed five years of bed life and yet she seemed to know everything about her, acted like she was the best thing in the world. What would Morgan think when she found out that she wasn't all that great?

An arm around her shoulder, the scent of metal, tea tree, sandalwood, amber, leather, and moss hit her nose, indicating Bucky was the one at her side. He ran his flesh hand up and down her arm, as he put his face in her hair shushing her as she began to cry. Remedy didn't need to be told that Natasha was also gone, along with Vision, people they lost in the war. Her family was falling apart and she felt so broken, yet here was a man she spent weeks on the run, months in Wakanda with, comforting her.

“I’m not sure about you, but I feel a little lost right now, but that's because we are in a strange place, but I promise you Remedy, you got me. You aren’t alone and we’ve got Sam and Bey as well as Steve.” Remedy kept her head in the crook of Bucky’s neck as the vibrations of his voice soothed her along with the smoothing up and down motions of him rubbing her back.

“Everything’s going to be alright.” Bucky kissed the crown of her forehead and looked out at the water while he just held Remedy in his. He vowed to keep her safe and maybe they could help each other piece themselves back together in this messed up world.

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starksnack · 6 years ago

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For @stony-week Day 1: Identity P*rn

Tied Together // Stony // 2.4k // AO3

Tony played with the red string tied into a tiny bow around his fourth finger, a precursor to the wedding ring that would sit there someday if all went according to fate’s grand plan. Everyone got a little red thread that only they could see, a cord that tied them to their soulmate across space, time, and the ephemeral fabric of the vast universe.

He ran his thumb over his finger meeting skin where the thread was tied to him. The string would only disappear when Tony found his soulmate so, for now, it was a reminder of the happiness that was to come. When Tony was younger, he used to think it was silly. Afghanistan had changed that, the thread becoming something to live for.

With a deep sigh, Tony settled into his new penthouse. Stark Tower was now a beacon of clean energy. It was a major environmental success and Tony couldn’t help the pride he felt at being the first name in renewable, clean energy. He just wished he had someone to share it with.

That’s when the phone rang, Agent’s name flashing across the screen.

***

It was a crazy and hectic week, from learning thermonuclear astrophysics to battling Loki’s angst and his army of alien misfits all while keeping his identity a secret. He gritted his teeth as he touched down on the tower landing pad. Meeting Steve Rogers was both the highlight and the lowest point of this whole endeavor. It was great to finally meet the subject of his childhood wet dreams, but his delight was eclipsed by memories of his father who always compared him to the great and powerful Captain America. This didn’t even mention the fact that Rogers hated him. A recipe for big fucking yikes.

On the bright side, it hadn’t taken much convincing to get the Avengers to move into the tower. They had all been the for the giant wormhole that opened up above the city and apparently that had been enough to get them to each claim a floor in Stark Tower.

When things finally settled down, Tony got back into the workshop and stepped out of his suit. His heart stuttered to a halt in his chest. The string around his finger was gone. He stared at his left hand, willing his vision to shift the red thread back in place around his fourth finger but nothing changed. Somewhere in the last week, he had met his soulmate, and he hadn’t even noticed.

Tony sat down in his chair, hard, blinking away the wetness in his eyes. There was no use crying over spilled milk. He had been so focused on trading quips with Rogers and battling an emo demigod that he had missed the most important moment of his life.

He shook his head, rattling his marbled back into place. He needed to get a grip before Dum-E hit him with a rolled up tabloid and beeped at him to pull himself together. He was Tony Stark. If he could build the Iron Man suit in a cave with a box of scraps, he could find his soulmate.

“Jarvis, you up?” anxiety colored his words and he kissed his teeth as his desktop booted up. The Stark Industries logo flashed across the glass and Tony’s fingers beat an impatient rhythm across the metal casing of the arc reactor.

“Always,” Jarvis responded, the holograms throwing blue light across Tony’s features. The glow wrapped Tony in a bright cocoon and he relaxed. It would be okay, Jarvis would help. “How can I be of assistance?”

“I need a record of everyone I met this last week and whether or not they have registered soulmates. I’m looking for anyone whose thread disappeared. Scan social media postings and soulmate announcement feeds.” Tony splayed his hands out, looking through the generated lists to see if there was a face he recognized. Someone with whom he had made eye contact and formed a bond. So far, no dice. He frowned, “Sort by the likelihood of being my soulmate.”

Jarvis pulled up the feed from the armor running facial recognition while pulling up a guest list from the event in Germany and a roster of all the Shield agents on the Helicarrier this past week. With the hundreds of names crossing his screen, Tony felt his eyes glaze over, hopelessness pulling at the back of his skull and swelling into a headache.

A knock on his workshop door drew him out of his thoughts and he turned to find Rogers standing on the other side, shifting from foot to foot. He was dressed in civvies, a dreadful looking button-down tucked into khakis.

Tony waved him in, turning back to his project. A small list was forming and it looked fairly promising. It was still a lot of names to sort through.

Rogers cleared his throat pointedly. “Can I speak to Iron Man?”

Tony frowned casting a glance at the suit in the corner. There was no way he could play off someone being asleep in there. “He just left for the day but I can take a message.”

“He left?” Rogers raised his brows incredulously, “I thought all the Avengers were staying in the tower. What if there’s an emergency and we need air support?”

“I gave him the suitcase armor to take with him while I repair this one. There’s no need to get your panties in a twist.” Tony rolled his eyes, turning back to his screen, He nearly let out a frustrated groan when he found the list had doubled in size. Significantly less promising. He needed time to think without the big blond distraction hovering behind him. “Is there anything else you needed?”

“No thanks, I’ll just talk to Iron Man when he comes back.” Tony nodded, expecting him to turn around and leave. Instead, Rogers just followed with another pointed throat clearing and Tony resisted the urge to throw the nearest tool, a socket wrench it appeared, at his head. He whirled around in his seat and bit out an irritated, “Yes?”

“I just wanted to apologize for what I said on the helicarrier,” Rogers twisted his fingers in front of him, mouth screwed up in distaste. “It wasn’t right of me, I really appreciate you letting us into your home, and giving us Iron Man.”

Tony nodded, “I didn’t mean what I said either.” He turned back to his list, eyes nearly popping out of his head as he found hundreds of names filling up the screen. “I have a really important experiment running, can you excuse me?”

“Of course,” Tony didn’t need to turn around to know that Rogers was nodding earnestly at him. “The team is going to go out for pizza later, I would love it if you joined us.”

Tony thought about it a moment. If this whole list turned out to be a bust, comfort food would probably be his best bet so he could eat his sorrows away. Tony squeezed his eyes shut, willing the list to get smaller. “Sure, I’ll be there.”

***

Tony never did figure out who his soulmate was. He did get a laugh at some of the names on the list though. Taylor Swift and Elon Musk were apparently candidates, though Tony dismissed those quickly. The biggest laugh was Rogers though, Jarvis thought he was most likely to be Tony’s soulmate but that was pretty much impossible considering Rogers didn’t really like him. Sure, he included Tony in all their group outings and they were friendly, but seeing how Rogers interacted with Iron Man, the ease in their partnership on the battlefield and the relaxed line of his shoulders when they spoke, something he never did with Tony, proved that Rogers didn’t think of him as soulmate material.

One whole year had come and gone and Tony still couldn’t look at the fourth finger of his left hand with anything but longing. Somewhere, someone else was suffering the same despair of an unknown bond and there was nothing that upset Tony more.

And then Rogers had to go and ask Iron Man out.

They were just finishing up a joint training exercise, working seamlessly to take out the targets Tony had painstakingly created when Rogers approached, a broad grin on his face as he pushed his sweat-soaked bangs off his forehead. “Heya Shellhead.”

“Hey Winghead,” Tony responded fiddling with a loose plate on the armor. This one needed a tune-up anyway, he might as well just design a new suit. “Good training session.”

“Yeah,” Rogers replied, shifting from foot to foot in a way that Tony knew meant he was nervous. “I worked up quite the appetite and I was wondering if maybe you wanted to go and grab a bite, just the two of us?” Rogers trailed off, eyes trained on his red leather boots.

“Uhm,” Tony frowned. “I’m not really feeling like a smoothie right now,” he pointed to the faceplate to indicate that he couldn’t really put food in his mouth. “So, that’s going to have to be a no.”

“Oh,” Rogers nodded dumbly, the beginnings of a frown pulling his brows together. “I’m sorry, maybe I was just reading into things.” Rogers scrubbed at the back of his neck with his hand, a blush spreading furiously across his cheeks. “I really like you and I was wondering if you liked me back.”

Tony’s heart hurt because of course Rogers had to go and fall in love with Iron Man when he hated Tony.

“I really don’t think that’s the best idea,” Tony responded, standing up in one fluid motion and forcing Rogers to take a step back. “There’s the whole issue of my secret identity and the Avengers and don’t we have a policy against fraternization-”

“Iron Man,” Rogers cut him off, stepping forward so that they’re face to face. “I don’t care who you are behind the mask, I love you.”

And then Steve’s hands were on either side of his face, pressing a kiss to the slit of the mask. His eyes were open, as though he could see through the glass of the faceplate, gaze heavy with desire. Tony could see every stroke of blue in his eyes, the perfect slash of green and the long flutter of his blond lashes when his eyes finally slid shut.

Steve pulled away, breathing heavily. “I think you’re my soulmate.”

Tony was out of the gym in under ten seconds.

***

When Steve showed up to the workshop the next day, looking totally miserable, Tony almost felt bad for him. And then annoyance overcame him when he remembered that somehow Steve had gotten it into his head that they were soulmates. Well, not them. Him and Iron Man. Tony didn’t know what was worse.

“Hey,” Steve mumbled. There was a giant wicker basket cradled in his arms, the smell of Tony’s favorite muffins, blueberry, wafting up from underneath a red napkin. “Can you give this to Iron Man.”

Tony resisted the urge to just accept the basket and cram the muffins into his mouth while watching reruns of the Bachelor. “He’s not going to be back for the while, the muffins will go bad, just drop them off at the homeless shelter on the corner.”

Steve’s lower lip wobbled and he looked a second away from crying before he nodded, backing out of Tony’s workshop and to the elevator.

Tony tried not to feel bad.

He felt bad anyway.

***

It was a fight that revealed Iron Man’s identity to the world.

Everything started out fine and dandy, some angsty teens had gotten ahold of some Chitauri tech and built robots that were wreaking havoc at a bowling alley downtown until it got out of hand and spilled out onto the street. Some civilians, a bowling team it seemed by the garish matching shirts, were chucking bowling balls at the robots. Tony learned the hard way that when the robots exploded, they spewed acid that kind of melted through metal. And then one exploded in his face.

His first instinct was to protect the reactor. He didn’t know how the metal casing would react to the acid and the last thing he needed was to go into cardiac arrest during the fight when the rest of the team didn’t even know that the same reactor that powered the suit also powered his heart. He didn’t even notice the faceplate had melted away until he felt the cool heat of the midday sun on his face.

Tony took out the rest of the robots with an extreme vengeance before dropping down by Clint to give him a lift to where the rest of the team was gathering in the street.

“Oh my god, Tony?” Steve’s jaw dropped and then he was cupping Tony’s face, eyes wide as his fingers ran over where the acid had singed his skin. Tony waited with bated breath for the insults, fully expecting to be kicked off the scene. He least expected Steve to pull him into a hug asking if he was alright.

“‘M fine,” Tony mumbled back, the words muffled in the kevlar of Steve’s suit. He pulled away turning to the other Avengers but none of them looked ready to tear into him. Instead, there were encouraging smiles all around.

Tony’s suit was still flight-capable, but he chose to ride back with the other Avengers, still shocked that no one was telling him he was unworthy to be Iron Man. He was sitting closer to the back of the quinjet, thinking about how he would handle being kicked off the team when Steve sat beside him.

“Hey so. I know we got off on the wrong foot,” Steve started a bashful smile s spreading across his face, “but I woke up in this new century wondering if I would ever find my soulmate and the night we met in Germany, my string faded away.”

“Oh,” Tony said intelligently, the pieces falling into place in his mind. Maybe Jarvis was right and they were actually soulmates. Who would have thought?

“Yeah,” Steve laughed, a rich beautiful sound falling from his lips. “Anyway, now that there isn’t a faceplate in the way, I was wondering if you wanted to go out to dinner? The two of us, on a date?”

Tony finally allowed himself to think that maybe, the team was okay with him being Iron Man and Steve was possibly his soulmate. He grinned up at Steve, brown eyes lit up.

“I would love that.”

#steve rogers #tony stark #stony #stevetony #marvel #starksnack writes

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the-desolated-quill · 6 years ago

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Doctor Strange - Marvel Cinematic Universe blog (as requested by 1000+ followers)

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this movie yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Before I start, I just want to say thank you again to all one thousand of my followers (still can’t believe it. That number just doesn’t seem real. LOL). And, as promised, here’s my review of Doctor Strange. I chose to review this movie to mark getting one thousand followers because people have been wanting me to do this review for a long time now (nearly three years in fact) and also because it was this movie, or rather my harsh criticism of this movie, that arguably cemented my reputation on this site. So here we go. Hope you feel it was worth the wait. Enjoy :)

2016. A year of ups and downs to be sure. While it will forever be infamous for the Brexit referendum result, Trump’s victory in the presidential elections and many much beloved celebrity icons dropping dead like fruit flies, it was also the year where two of my all time favourite comic book characters would finally make the jump to the big screen. The first was Deadpool. The second was Doctor Strange. Two characters I thought would never get movie adaptations on account of them both being somewhat niche products. Deadpool was a violent, anarchic parody of antiheroes like Wolverine and the Punisher, while Doctor Strange was a psychedelic fantasy story focused on existentialism and Zen philosophy as well as having its themes and influences deep rooted in various Asian cultures and mythologies. Not exactly mainstream. And yet, against all the odds, both movies found great success at the box office. The difference being Deadpool managed to stay true to the tone and themes of the source material, whereas Doctor Strange... oh dear.

Now my long term followers will be very much aware of my stance on this movie. At the time I refused to watch it due to the casting of Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One, viewing it as not only racist erasure, but also demonstrating a severe lack of understanding on the filmmaker’s part. East Asia isn’t just used as window dressing. It’s vitally important to the story as a whole, so discarding it would be incredibly moronic as well as deeply offensive. Now I’m not going to go into all the reasons why the whitewashing of the Ancient One is racist and why all the excuses Marvel gave at the time was bullshit as I’ve already explained these reasons ad nauseum various times before. If you’re curious, read Doctor Yellowface And The Bullshit Machine, where I explain it all in excruciating detail. Here I’m just going to say that this movie is racist. That’s not my opinion. It’s demonstrably, objectively, scientifically, factually and literally true. If you think otherwise, you’re an idiot. Period. Full stop. End of discussion. Do not pass Go. Do not collect £200. With this in mind, when I sat down to watch this for the first time, I expected to be angered and outraged by it throughout. But I wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a bad movie and a bad adaptation of Doctor Strange, but honestly the most remarkable thing about this movie is how unremarkable it is. Which is a problem in more ways than one, but now we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Lets start with the things I liked. Don’t worry. This won’t take long. There really isn’t that much to like about this film frankly. Even the bits I like have massive caveats to them.

My first shiny gold star has to go to Benedict Wong as Wong. Now as much as I love the comics, I’ll be the first to admit it has massive problems when it comes to how it presents Asian characters. So I’m pleased to report that Wong is the only aspect of the film that’s actually better than the source material. Whereas comic book Wong was Doctor Strange’s manservant, movie Wong plays more of a mentor role in Strange’s story. He’s the librarian of Kamar-Taj, guarding the sacred tomes, and is actually at a higher rank than Strange, which I love. It’s a good shift that refreshes the dynamic between them, and Benedict Wong’s deadpan delivery is exceptional. I just wish we could have spent more time with Wong and Strange. Maybe see Wong actually teach him something.

The second praiseworthy element of the film is the visual effects. This film was nominated for an Academy Award and... yeah, can’t argue with that. The CGI is fairly good for the most part. My favourite part of the whole film was when the Ancient One shows Strange the multiverse for the first time. The visual effects team clearly had a lot of fun coming up with weird and wonderful worlds that we only get a short tantalising glimpse of. (the dimension of hands gave me the shivers). This sequence came the closest to realising Steve Ditko’s vision in my opinion. Beyond that all we see for the rest of the movie is the poxy mirror dimension, which admittedly is cool at first, but quickly becomes dull and repetitive each time its trotted out. There’s even an entire fight sequence between Strange, Mordo and Kaecilius in a distorted version of New York, which would have been impressive if Christopher Nolan hadn’t done it first in Inception. And the less said about the technicolor monstrosity that was the Dark Dimension, the better.

Finally there’s Benedict Cumberbatch as Strange himself. I know some people were disappointed that Marvel didn’t racebend the character and I would have preferred that to, but if we must have a white guy in the role, I’m glad it’s Cumberbatch. He does a decent job in the role and there are moments where Strange almost leaps from the page and onto the screen.

Almost.

Because that’s the problem. Cumberbatch does the best he can, but he’s ultimately let down by the script. This film has a lot of issues, but by far the biggest is the title character. He may be called Doctor Strange, but he’s really Doctor Strange in name only. I was a massive fan of the comics growing up and I’m telling you this guy isn’t Doctor Strange. At least not the Doctor Strange I remember. And the weird thing is this seems almost by design. In order to show him to a mainstream audience, Marvel seem to have felt the need to completely sanitise the character, removing everything about him that made him unique and interesting in order to fit the expectations of the lowest common denominator.

Let me explain.

People often compare Strange unfavourably to Iron Man, and I can understand why to a certain extent. Both represent the epitome of white privilege and materialist obsession and their origin stories focus very heavily on criticising and deconstructing these inherently selfish and unlikable characters. Iron Man is about forcing a capitalist industrialist to take responsibility for the consequences of his actions, whereas Doctor Strange is about forcing an egocentric man to care about the wider world outside of his own bubble of privilege. Both may sound similar, but there’s a key difference between the two. Iron Man’s origin revolves around responsibility whereas Doctor Strange’s origin revolves around relativity. This needs to be understood if you’re going to attempt to adapt Strange and director Scott Derrickson doesn’t seem to understand that at all.

The fatal mistake Derrickson makes with this movie is that he’s trying to make Strange like Iron Man without fully understanding what made the first Iron Man movie good and what sets Strange apart. He’s clearly hit upon the arrogant, egocentric thing, but the problem is people exhibit arrogance and egocentricity in different ways. The comics understood this. Iron Man’s arrogance takes the form of this charismatic, devil may care kind of attitude, whereas Strange’s arrogance was more along the lines of an Ebenezer Scrooge type figure. Someone who’s cold and uncaring. Someone like...

Yeah! Someone like Dr Gregory House from the TV series House M.D.

See, if Iron Man is like Elon Musk, Doctor Strange is like House. Both are arrogant, but in different ways. So to see movie Strange acting all smug and making quips and one liners just didn’t feel right. Which is not to say Strange can’t be funny. The comics had their humorous moments, but it’s not the same kind of humour as Iron Man. Strange should be more cutting. More snarky. He needs to have more of a bite to him. Instead we get the poor man’s version of Robert Downey Jr.

But wait, because it’s actually worse than that. It’s not just Strange’s personality that’s different. Our perception of him is different too. The first Iron Man movie was extremely clear in how we should view Tony Stark. The gambling, the drinking, his lack of responsibility and the way he takes his friends and co-workers for granted. We’re clearly not supposed to like him. That’s why his character arc works. We’re seeing this selfish individual realise how selfish he is and try to make amends. Strange should be similar. He’s a callous arsehole who won’t lift a finger to help someone if the case isn’t interesting enough, seeing it as beneath him. So when the car accident occurs, him getting nerve damage in his hands feels less like a tragedy and more like karma. The universe punishing Strange for his selfish behaviour and forcing him to change. In the movie however, he doesn’t seem like that at all. In fact kind of the opposite. He doesn’t object to helping his ex girlfriend get a bullet out of a patient’s head and he seems to get on well with most of his colleagues, including his ex. Sure he’s a bit of a dick, but he still seems nice enough. The only time we see his Scroogeness come out is after the accident, at which point it’s hard to hate him even after he berates his ex because he’s a decent guy who’s understandably frustrated, which absolutely should not be the case. Strange is a bastard who cares for no one but himself. We’re not supposed to like him. But Marvel and Disney are so preoccupied about getting bums on seats that they’ve actually managed to strip away all the elements that make Strange Strange.

And then there’s the origin story itself, which the film gets completely wrong. Sure the basic elements are still there. Strange, in a last ditch effort to save his hands, travels East to see the Ancient One (except the Ancient One is now in Nepal instead of Tibet because of the Chinese market, but apparently they still can’t cast an Asian person as the Ancient One even though the film no longer has anything to do with Tibet and therefore there should be no issue. Marvel are racist dicks. Case closed), but beyond that everything is changed. In the comics, the Ancient One refuses to heal Strange’s hands because he’s a selfish arsehole who deserves no pity or help from anyone, but then when Baron Mordo tries to assassinate the Ancient One, Strange does the first selfless thing he’s ever done in his miserable life and tries to warn the Ancient One despite having his mouth magically sealed shut by Mordo. Then it’s later revealed that his mouth wasn’t sealed shut at all, and that the Ancient One knew all along Mordo was planning to assassinate him and was merely testing Strange, at which point he invites the good doctor to practice magic in order to stop Mordo in the future. In the movie however, Strange gets kicked out by the Ancient One only to then promptly get let back in after banging on their front door for several hours and gets taught all these spells despite showing no sign of selflessness or willingness to change whatsoever. Oh yeah, and Strange and Mordo are now total besties.

Do you see what I mean about this being a bad adaptation? There’s no longer any conflict. No character arcs. No one learns anything. Everything is just hunky dory and Strange is just magically a good person now. This is truly shit writing.

Everything about this movie seems to have been designed to be as bland and uncomplicated as possible. All the Asian influences and philosophies have been surgically removed to make way for a generic, knock-off Hogwarts for Dummies. The interesting plots and themes have been replaced with a by-the-numbers save the world plot. Even the lore has been simplified to an almost insulting degree. Take the Eye of Agamotto for instance. A powerful magical artefact created by and named after the most powerful sorcerer that ever lived.... reduced to a fucking Infinity Stone.

Oh and the Cloak of Levitation now has a mind and personality of its own because why the fuck not? Who wants to watch something intelligent or philosophical? Lets just make a shitty cross between Harry Potter and Mr. Bean.

And then... there’s the white saviour stuff.

Now I confess I haven’t read the comics for quite some time, so correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure Strange didn’t have a photographic memory. Yet in the movie, that’s the convenient explanation we’re given for why Strange is somehow able to learn complex spells in a matter of days. Spells that are apparently meant to take years to learn, like astral projection and time manipulation. Now the comics had this problem too, what with proclaiming that Strange is not only the Sorcerer Supreme, but the most powerful Sorcerer Supreme that’s ever lived, as though his white skin were like the star power-up from Super Mario Bros, but the movie seems to go out of its way to double down on this bollocks. Oh sure, we see him struggle to create magic portals every now and then, but it doesn’t hide the fact that he’s somehow able to create mirror worlds and time loops despite having little to no training whatsoever. He’s like Rey from Star Wars. He can just pull any random super power out of his arse when the script requires him too.

So having completely botched Strange’s characterisation and journey, how are the rest of the supporting cast? Well like I said, I like this new Wong, even though he’s criminally underused. As for the other characters, it’s a pretty forgettable bunch.

Lets start with the elephant in the room. Tilda Swinton. Having heard all the excuses under the sun as to why Marvel and Disney simply had to cast a bald white woman wearing a bathrobe in an Asian role, I was expecting something pretty spectacular from Swinton, especially after all the praise critics gave her. Instead we get... well... a pretty dull character actually. In fact I’d go as far to say that this is the blandest and most uninspired performance I think I’ve ever seen Swinton give. There’s just nothing there. Now admittedly the Ancient One wasn’t all that complex or well developed in the comics neither, being little more than a racial caricature, but I thought the whole reason they whitewashed the character was to make him/her ‘enigmatic and ethereal.’ Instead we just get the same generic mentor figure we’ve seen dozens of times before. All the stuff about her tapping into the powers of Dormammu to increase her lifespan could have made her more interesting, but the film never fully capitalises on this revelation before she kicks the bucket.

Baron Mordo is pretty much just dead weight, with the great Chiwetel Ejiofor utterly wasted in the role. He’s essentially reduced to being yet another black sidekick for the white lead. Again, the comic book version isn’t all that great neither, but the movie replaces this camp pantomime villain with absolutely bugger all. We don’t get to see any real conflict between him and Strange until the very end and even then it doesn’t really make sense. Mordo is a stickler for rules and so gets pissy with Strange when he breaks the rules in order to save the world, to which I can only ask... what else could he have done? I didn’t see you come up with any bright ideas Mordo, you fucking moron.

Rachel McAdams... exists.

Seriously, why is she in this movie? Why does Doctor Strange need a love interest? Why not just wait and introduce Clea? I could get behind using an ex girlfriend to display how selfish and narcissistic Strange is (a bit cliche I admit, but this is an MCU film we’re talking about. I’m not exactly expecting Citizen Kane here), but as I said before, the two seem to get on quite well. And other than stitching up a stab wound, Christine Palmer pretty much does nothing throughout the majority of the film. So what is she even doing there?

Also it appears the film’s racism doesn’t just extend to Asian people because it turns out Christine Palmer is actually Night Nurse in the comics. The same mantle Claire Temple has, who appears in Marvel’s Netflix shows. Not only does this come off as quite alarmingly racist, it’s also just plain weird. For all their boasts about wanting to create a shared universe, Marvel seems to spend every opportunity it can find to keep the Netflix stuff at arms’ length, to the point where you question why they’re even in the same continuity in the first place. If Strange must have some human connection, why couldn’t it have been Claire Temple? For one thing, Claire’s character is much more interesting than Christine’s (and Rosario Dawson is a much better actor than McAdams. Sorry, but it’s true), and it would be a great opportunity to bridge the gap between the movies and Netflix shows without having to bog the narrative down with exposition. But as I’ve said numerous times in the past, Marvel are more interested in creating a BIG shared universe than a coherent one.

Finally there’s the villains. Nearly always the worst aspect of any MCU film and Strange is no different. We have Kaecilius, played by Hannibal’s Mads Mikkelsen whose performance is more wooden than Pinocchio, and Dormammu, played by Benedict Cumberbatch who seems to be competing with Andy Serkis as to who can play the most CGI/motion capture characters. Both, unsurprisingly, are shite. Kaecilius wants to save the world from death by allowing Dormammu to destroy it.

I don’t get it either.

So you’re probably wondering who was Kaecilius in the comics. I mean I’ve explained everything else, haven’t I? And honestly, I haven’t the faintest idea. Turns out he was a henchman of Baron Mordo who I completely forgot about because he barely ever shows up in the comics. So... they turned Baron Mordo into the black sidekick so that the villain could be played by a white guy. Oh. And guess what race Kaecilius is in the comics.

YYYYYep. He’s Asian. I guess all the Asian actors were sick that day, so they had to cast a white guy.

Oh and you’ll never guess what his backstory is. You’re right! He has none! Other than references to some tragedy, we know absolutely fuck all about him. Critics actually liked this movie?!?!

Oh and don’t get me started on the humour.

Kaecilius: “Mr...?”

Strange: “Doctor.”

Kaecilius: “Mr. Doctor?”

Strange: “No, it’s Strange.”

Kaecilius: “I guess so. Who am I to judge?”

Dear God, someone was paid to write that.

Then there’s the Big Bad Dormammu from the Dark Dimension. (Yes, the same Dark Dimension from Agent Carter and nope, that’s never referenced. In fact this doesn’t even look like the same Dark Dimension as the one from Agent Carter. Although, to be fair, I’d want to forget Season 2 happened as well considering how fucking terrible it was, but come on guys!). In the comics Dormammu is a mystical entity that has a quote ‘unnatural obsession with our material universe’. Could be interesting to explore. Oh but I forget, this is an MCU film. They don’t want interesting. They want safe. So instead we get a purple, floating CGI head and the generic destroyer of worlds archetype. (In fact Dormammu weirdly has more in common with Galactus than the actual Dormammu. Sometimes I wonder if anyone at Marvel Studios have ever even so much as glanced at one of their own comics before).

In conclusion, is this the worst film I’ve ever seen? Admittedly no. It’s not that bad. If you switch your brain off, I can imagine someone having a good time with this film. But you see that’s the problem. You shouldn’t have to switch your brain off to enjoy Doctor Strange. If anything the opposite is true. The comics, despite their faults, were intelligent, surreal and thought provoking, asking questions about our universe and our place within it. Steve Ditko (and only Steve Ditko. The late Stan Lee may have put pen to paper, but it was ultimately Ditko’s ideas and vision, which makes the gratuitous Stan Lee cameo in this film particularly galling to me) created something truly captivating in Doctor Strange. Despite the racial caricatures and white saviour tropes, I still love these comics because of how it explores the world and our relation to that world. How we are just small cogs in a massive and intricate machine. It’s truly groundbreaking and would influence many other comics to come. The Doctor Strange movie doesn’t even begin to do that. It won’t influence anyone. It won’t make anyone think or question their role in the cosmos. In fact, three years later, despite being a huge box office success, it’s largely been forgotten. And that’s a crying shame because Strange deserves so much more.

Doctor Strange may not be the worst comic book movie ever made, but it’s a terrible adaptation of the source material. Anything that made it unique or interesting was carefully removed with surgical precision under the guise of making it more progressive, when in reality they just wanted to make it profitable. But profitable doesn’t mean good, and Doctor Strange doesn’t even come close to being a good movie. I would love to have seen what a director like David Lynch or Ang Lee would have done with this psychedelic material. This movie could and should have been the most intelligent and surreal comic book movie that’s ever been made. A perfect opportunity to allow a visionary filmmaker to go wild and express themselves artistically. Instead it’s just another MCU movie. It’s such a shame.

And people wonder why I’m worried about Deadpool joining the MCU.

#doctor strange #marvel cinematic universe #review #spoilers

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cannachiefsmedia-blog · 6 years ago

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#1 Chuck Rifici, Chairman & CEO at Auxly

Corporate Bio

Chuck Rifici is a pioneer of the North American cannabis industry having created and managed opportunities that have positively impacted the Canadian landscape. Chuck has founded and been involved in the creation of some of Canada’s largest and most successful cannabis efforts. He is best known for having co-founded Canopy Growth Corporation (formerly Tweed Marijuana Inc.).

Today, Chuck is Chairman and CEO of Auxly Cannabis Group, a platform spanning the entire cannabis value-chain, minimizing risk while simultaneously maximizing exposure to multiple, geographically-diverse cannabis companies through a single source, and Founder and CEO of Nesta Holding Co., a private equity firm that creates wide ranging partnerships and brands within the cannabis industry. He is also the former Chairman of National Access Cannabis/Meta Cannabis Supply Co., a global leader in medical and recreational cannabis retail.

Chuck is a chartered professional accountant (CPA). He obtained his MBA from Queen’s University and holds a BASc in Computer Engineering from the University of Ottawa.

Social Media Links: TWITTER LINKED IN INSTAGRAM

Exclusive Interview

How did you get involved with the Cannabis Industry?

My relationship with cannabis dates back a number of years and looking back I can pinpoint a pivotal moments that sealed the deal for me. I knew there would be a future for cannabis in the business world back in 2010, when California voters considered legalizing recreational cannabis, the ballot failed by 2%, but I realized I almost missed the boat and I vowed that I wouldn’t miss that opportunity again. That’s what got me scanning for new regulatory changes in Canada, and ultimately, that gave me a head start on others. When the Harper government released the draft regulations (creating the MMPR, now ACMPR) on a Sunday, I spent the whole night reading and stopped everything I had going, so I could put all my focus into this. I don’t think I slept a full night again for 6 months.

What is your biggest accomplishment to date in the Cannabis Industry?

Yeah it's a tough one, I mean there's been lots of interesting things, certainly being a Founder of Canopy, it's hard to escape that and its been positive for me and obviously they've grown to be pretty big but I think the second time is always sweeter and creating Auxly and pulling the team I pulled together there and as we ramp up for the next wave of products with infused products, vape pens, edibles I am really excited with what we put together and the team we built and so that is what I am most proud of right now.

What are your future goals?

In the next five years looking forward to the normalization of cannabis in Canada and the acceleration of global expansion and I guess what I mean about that is looking forward globally to the trade of cannabis where we start seeing countries being able to export large quantities of cannabis and cannabis molecules for both medical and recreational use and really see the industry grow as we see additional countries legalize. On the path towards that I am really looking forward to the next country to legalize federally whether that is Mexico or a European country or maybe the United States, if we get an early surprise. I think once we have 3, 4, 5 countries, you know very quickly we are going to have 10 to 20, and then 40 -50. I think it's inevitable and that's the most exciting part.

Do you think that inevitable globalization of federal legalization will put more emphasis on the Cannabis Industry partner ecosystem?

Yeah I think as the industry grows and matures the nice part is you don't have to do everything, and as a company if you try to do everything, you're not going to be good at everything, you really can specialize to some degree and so its nice now, we see it today with oil processing licences, we have people specializing in extraction, we have people who are pure play retailers, and as the industry keeps growing it allows businesses and entrepreneurs possibly be specialized and really go after a very specific market or market opportunity. I think it's exciting as it makes the business more accessible because you don't have to be a massive public company to get involved in the business. You can choose the piece you want to work on and there will people you can sell to and people you can buy services from to enable that business, so I think there will be more and more opportunity that is going to get created as the industry gets bigger.

Who/What inspires you?

It's funny I have never really been asked that before, or at least not for a long time. Let's see, for me, I am a big fan of people like Elon Musk and entrepreneurs taking huge risks. I find inspiration from people who tackle really big ideas and try to change the world. I think the Cannabis Industry is certainly not the most important thing in the world but doing our small part, and I think as Cannabis is Legalized in Canada and the industry grows, it allows for the dismantling of the drug war and all the negatives that can from that and so I really like that positive effect of everything we work on in the business.

Do you use Cannabis products? If yes, what are your favorite Cannabis products/brands?

I do. I like vape pens I think it's a great product. I think it will be the largest segment in the recreational space. Although I tend not to smoke too much flower, I am really excited for what we have coming with our Robinsons product in Auxly which we know tests very well against other products from their medical product and we are really excited to unveil that to the rest of Canadians when we hopefully get our sales license for that facility later this year.

#auxly #chuck rifici #cannabis business #canna chief #cannabis industry

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cryptobrownie · 3 years ago

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Forget Dogecoin, the future of crypto is DeFi | WIRED UK

Last week, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announced that Square, the financial company he also runs, will be launching a new platform for creating decentralised finance projects using bitcoin. Amid the customary, constant online noise surrounding cryptocurrency – looking at you, Elon Musk – these days, you would be forgiven for not giving Dorsey’s move the time of the day. Still, Square’s project might end up being remembered as a watershed moment – the moment decentralised finance, or “DeFi”, finally entered the mainstream.

In recent years, DeFi has emerged as one of the most consequential developments reshaping the cryptocurrency world. Rather than bitcoin, its ascension has been tightly linked to Ethereum, the world’s second cryptocurrency, whose decentralised network – or blockchain – allows for the provision of services and the execution of more complex tasks than just sending and receiving payments.

Arguably, it all started just after the ICO bubble of 2017, when thousands of entrepreneurs and chancers raised billions by selling cryptocurrency tokens online as if they were stocks in – often non-existing – companies. After the crash, Ethereum started crawling with a host of services – DAPPs, or decentralised applications – offering a wide range of financial operations, from loans, to futures, to exchanges, to algorithmic trading.

The selling point, as usual when it comes to cryptocurrency projects, was disintermediation. Users of these services would be unshackling oneself from real-world financial intermediaries, but also from cryptocurrency-focused institutions that had evolved into gatekeepers – from corporate cryptocurrency exchanges like Bitfinex and Coinbase to Tether, the company behind the stablecoin USDT (a digital asset whose price is theoretically pegged to the dollar). Ethereum’s decentralised financial apps allowed users to trade without undergoing the identity checks, anti- money-laundering regulation and other limitations of centralised alternatives. Plus, it was much more fun.

What is cryptocurrency? How does it work? What impact will it have on finance and on society? Get the WIRED guide now.

“The advantages that DeFi has are multifold. Number one: it is in theory up 100 per cent of the time, right? So because Ethereum is always up, so is DeFi,” says Lex Sokolin, the co-head of decentralised protocols at blockchain software firm Consensys. “And then there is composability, the ability to layer.”

That means that, on the blockchain, different applications can be programmed to work in sequence, one after another, in a single transaction – their individual operations arrayed and stacked together like LEGO blocks. One can easily design a program that would automatically borrow cryptocurrency from a lending platform, dump it on a decentralised exchange in the hope of making its price plummet, buy it back and return it, possibly pocketing a short margin – in a matter of seconds. Investing strategies become puzzles, jigsaws of software commands to compose on the fly.

“You can build the portfolio and when you have the portfolio, you can build margin, and when you have margin, you can build interest, and when you have interest, you can build an aggregator of fixed income, and then tokens and so on, and so forth,” Sokolin says. “This accelerates everything, and makes it go really, really fast – I think 50 to 100 times faster than if it were not built on DeFi.”

That is exciting, but not complication-free. “People are building really interesting – but mostly experimental – tools. These are being built mostly by amateurs who do not understand how actual finance works,” says Emin Gün Sirer, an associate professor of computer science at Cornell University. “So some of these ‘LEGO building blocks’ are quite interesting and do things that Wall Street cannot do. But some of them end up interacting in unforeseen ways.”

One of the first and most infamous manifestations of this unpredictability is the “flash loan” incident that sent waves through cryptoland on St Valentine’s Day 2020. On that day an anonymous trader managed to get away with a profit of $350,000 in Ether from lending platform bZx, after deliberately pumping asset prices on the exchange bZx relied upon to get its pricing data. The best bit? The money used in the coup de main had been borrowed from a platform that allowed users to take cryptocurrency loans – for a very short period of time: hence ‘flash loan’ – without providing collateral. The trader had transformed no money into a lot of money. Cue a debate about whether the trader could be labelled “a hacker” or simply someone who had read the fine print, realised that bZx could be gamed and acted accordingly.

This content was originally published here.

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freenewstoday · 4 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://freenews.today/2021/04/23/live-updates-spacex-hours-from-launch-of-astronauts-for-nasa/

Live Updates: SpaceX Hours From Launch of Astronauts for NASA

Here’s what you need to know:

youtube

For the third time, astronauts are set to hitch a ride on a private rocket to space.

The launch is scheduled for Friday at 5:49 a.m. Eastern time from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Both NASA and SpaceX are offering marathon live video coverage of the mission from the astronauts’ suiting up through the moment they launch. Or you can watch it in the video player above.

This is the latest mission for NASA by SpaceX, the rocket company started and run by Elon Musk. It will be carrying two American, one Japanese and one French astronaut to the International Space Station. That will be a continuation of a successful effort by the space agency to turn over to the private sector the business of taking people to low-Earth orbit.

SpaceX conducted a demonstration mission with two NASA astronauts, Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley, a year ago. The two men then splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean in August. They traveled in the same capsule, named Endeavour, that will fly on Friday.

Months later, SpaceX conducted what NASA called the first routine operational missions for the Crew Dragon spacecraft with four astronauts onboard. That mission, Crew-1, launched in November, and the astronauts are still aboard the station.

Now comes the second operational mission, known as Crew-2.

The Crew-2 launch had been set for Thursday morning, and weather at the launchpad was favorable. But mission managers had to also take into account conditions in the Atlantic Ocean where the Crew Dragon capsule would splash down if something went wrong during launch. There, NASA and SpaceX decided, the winds and waves were too high.

The weather report for Friday morning foresees a 95 percent chance of favorable conditions at the Kennedy Space Center. Conditions in the Atlantic are predicted to be better than on Thursday.

Should Friday’s launch be postponed, SpaceX can try again on Monday.

The four astronauts visited with Elon Musk of SpaceX, front right, and Steve Jurczyk, NASA’s acting administrator, on Friday after they finished donning their spacesuits.Credit…Agustin Paullier/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

About four hours ahead of the launch on Friday morning, the four astronauts had put on their spacesuits. Masked SpaceX suit technicians in black uniforms attended to the four crewmates, who sat in models of the seats aboard the capsule that will carry them to orbit.

Once the astronauts completed suiting up, they were seen off by Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, and Steve Jurczyk, the acting administrator of NASA.

John Insprucker, a SpaceX engineer said “things were looking good” with the spacecraft and the weather ahead of the launch.

About three hours and 15 minutes before liftoff, the four astronauts and other crew sat down in Tesla Model X SUVs with license plates that read “REDUCE,” “RECYCLE” and “REUSE.” Before the cars drove toward the launchpad, they said socially distanced goodbyes to their families.

The four crewmates arrived at the launch site and were soon on board the Crew Dragon capsule with about two hours and 30 minutes to go before launch. Shane Kimbrough, the mission commander, and Megan McArthur, the pilot, boarded first, and were followed by Thomas Pesquet, Crew-2’s specialist and Akihiko Hoshide, the flight’s engineer.

The night before the launch, the astronauts shared some of the last meals they’d enjoy on Earth. “6 months of space food after this!” Shane Kimbrough of NASA said on Twitter.

The astronauts also posted the playlists of music they said they planned to listen to during their drives to the launchpad.

The four astronauts ahead of their departure to the launchpad on Friday.Credit…Joe Skipper/Reuters

Hours before the launch, the astronauts start to get into their trademark SpaceX spacesuits with the help of technicians. They then bid farewell to their families and head out to the launchpad in Tesla Model X S.U.V.s. (A bit of cross-marketing between SpaceX and Tesla, both run by Mr. Musk.)

After they arrive at the launchpad, the astronauts board the capsule and spend hours working with mission control to confirm that its systems are ready for flight.

The launch is timed to when the space station’s orbit passes over Florida. When the capsule reaches orbit, it will be directly behind the space station but traveling faster in a lower orbit. That allows the Crew Dragon to catch up for docking at 5:10 a.m. on Saturday.

During their 23-some hours in flight, the astronauts will change out of their spacesuits, eat a meal or two, rest and provide updates to mission control.

Once the capsule docks with the station — an automated process — it then takes a couple of hours of checking to make sure there are no air leaks before the hatches open and the Crew-2 astronauts disembark.

From left, the astronauts Thomas Pesquet of the E.S.A.; Megan McArthur and Shane Kimbrough of NASA; and Akihiko Hoshide of JAXA, during a dress rehearsal for the Crew-2 mission launch.Credit…Aubrey Gemignani/NASA

The Crew-2 astronauts are to spend six months at the International Space Station.

Akihiko Hoshide of JAXA, the Japanese space agency. Mr. Hoshide, 52, has made two previous trips to space. He was a member of the crew of the space shuttle Discovery in 2008, and in 2012 he spent four months on the space station.

Shane Kimbrough of NASA. Mr. Kimbrough, 53, is the commander of Crew-2. He has made two previous trips to space, once on the space shuttle Endeavour in 2008 and then spending more than six months on the space station from October 2016 to April 2017.

K. Megan McArthur of NASA. Dr. McArthur, 49, is the mission’s pilot and previously flew on the space shuttle Atlantis in May 2009 on the last mission to refurbish and upgrade the Hubble Space Telescope. During that mission, Dr. McArthur, an oceanographer by training, operated the shuttle’s robotic arm to grab the telescope and place it in the cargo bay.

Dr. McArthur is married to Bob Behnken, one of the astronauts who traveled on the first astronaut flight of the same SpaceX capsule last year. She will sit in the seat he occupied during that flight.

Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency. Mr. Pesquet, 43, previously spent six months on the space station from November 2016 to June 2017, overlapping with Mr. Kimbrough for most of his stay. He is from France.

In the past, NASA led the design and operation of the vehicles for its astronauts, including the first Mercury capsules, the Apollo spacecraft that went to the moon and the space shuttles.

But that was expensive. And since the space shuttles stopped flying in 2011, NASA has had to pay Russia for pricey rides to orbit using the country’s Soyuz rockets.

By choosing a commercial provider, NASA hopes to save money and to spur development of new space businesses, as SpaceX can also sell seats on its Dragon capsule to non-NASA customers.

NASA also selected a second company, Boeing, but Boeing’s offering, the CST-100 Starliner, suffered serious software glitches during an uncrewed test flight in December 2019. A redo of that uncrewed test is to occur later this year, and the first trip with astronauts may not occur until next year.

The Crew Dragon is a gumdrop-shaped capsule — an upgraded version of SpaceX’s original Dragon capsule, which was used to carry cargo to the space station. This particular capsule, named Endeavour, was used in the first demonstration trip with two astronauts aboard last May.

The spacecraft is roughly comparable in size to the Apollo capsule that took NASA astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s. SpaceX says the Crew Dragon can be configured with seating for seven people. But for the NASA trips, there will be just four astronauts at a time.

The four astronauts who launched to orbit in November during the Crew-1 mission are still at the space station. Those four astronauts and the Crew-1 capsule are scheduled to return to Earth on April 28.

The Crew Dragon is far more advanced than what NASA astronauts sat in 50 years ago and even sleeker than the space shuttles. Fancy touch screens replace the buttons and joysticks that were used in earlier spacecraft.

If you think you’re able to fly a Crew Dragon yourself, SpaceX provided a web version of the system that the NASA astronauts would use if they needed to override the spacecraft’s automated systems. Some YouTube users have helpfully explained how to actually complete the docking.

François Adamski, corporate chef of Servair, with a pouch of crepe suzette.Credit…Servair

The era of astronauts subsisting on toothpaste-like tubes has long past, and food in space is much more appetizing than it once was.

Indeed, Thomas Pesquet, the French astronaut on Crew-2, will have some fine dining options prepared by renowned French chefs awaiting him in space. Here are some of the foods that Mr. Pesquet and his fellow astronauts will enjoy during his six-month stay in orbit: lobster, beef bourguignon, cod with black rice, potato cakes with wild mushrooms and almond tarts with caramelized pears.

Alain Ducasse, a chef who operates renowned restaurants around the world including Benoit in Manhattan, and Thierry Marx, another Michelin-starred chef, are among the masters of gastronomy on Earth who have worked with space agencies to produce these meals.

That’s part of efforts to have meals available that astronauts can share with their colleagues to celebrate special occasions. But even everyday space cuisine that NASA now provides for astronauts these days is “pretty fantastic,” said Shane Kimbrough, the NASA astronaut who commands Friday’s SpaceX mission.

Ryan Dowdy, who just left NASA after managing food on the space station for more than two years, says there are some 200 items on the menu to ward off monotony. “There’s no grocery store,” he said. “You can’t DoorDash anything. You got to make do with what’s there.”

He says the pulled beef brisket and the macaroni and cheese are particularly scrumptious.

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cheddarjacked-blog · 7 years ago

Text

Statements Final Update

Connor Curlewis 15895195

Contextual Statement

Our project encompasses technology, art and collaborative design within the umbrella of post-human; human enhancement. I and Amal Chandrasena are working towards an art installation that looks into human physical enhancements, while bringing people together to make art. We understand at this point in time that we may be so limited technically that we may have to divert our efforts into creating a mock-up of this installation, here follows our plans and research.

We have begun research in the areas of collaborative and live art. From looking at people and programs being used we began by planning an exhibition that would bring people together to make art with other people on the spot. We found that our idea was unique and so far we haven’t found anyone who’s created this before. We found a few artists working with live art; Beo Beyond, LeRoy Neiman and artists like Paul Sermon (2009) using technology to create art and look at human psychology. Aaron Koblin (2006) bringing many people in to collaborate on simple art pieces. Taking inspiration from these artists we started looking for a platform we could use to allow multiple people to work together, we found CoSketch. CoSketch is a program like MSPaint, where the user has a free canvas, it’s online and anyone on the website at the same time can paint with the other users. We’ve so far failed to connect CoSketch to a system that can overlay the drawings in tandem with a live video of a user. We’re currently in our third stage of prototyping where we’re trying to find ways to solve this issue.

Our underlying theme for the project is human enhancement. The artwork is a metaphor for how people in the future might design babies before birth. Enhancing them with abilities, deleting and adding genes and crafting their appearance. According to Harravi (2018), when we engineer life we become post-human, we become Homo Deus: man-god. The users in our installation will be playing the designers. Soon, however, we will indeed be able to change our genetics. Glannon, W. (2018). The British Institute of Post-human Studies (2014) discusses how abolitionism will take us to abolishing suffering through genetic modification of our makeup. We’re currently set up to be more overly anxious about our surroundings because our bodies believe that we’re still being hunted by lions. When we see images of threats we react to stress hormones and physical reflexes. (Bradley, Margaret 2001) By changing our systems to factor in our new environment we could be happier. Our model isn’t about genetic modification but more about the basic idea of tapping into ourselves and how the regular layman will go about in that process. It’s about finding out how what the regular person would do with the power of a god.

In this installation we hope to connect multiple people to a single canvas, that canvas being a person to see how they would change that persons features given the control. Although we have been struggling with technical solutions we envision a video stream of a person being viewed on multiple tablets, these tablets would be equipped with software capable of manipulating and enhancing the person on screen, think illustrator and hand cut collages. The twist is that everyone holding a tablet can see the changes being made by everyone else, there is only one canvas and all users would work together to create an idea. These users would not be told that they’re connected and would only discover the shared space after they had started to use the software. At this stage, we can’t connect the stream to a canvas so are planning a video in which we conceptualise this installation with programs that fill the purpose.

The installation design has been creative and filled with opportunities, we have now narrowed ourselves into a path filled with technical obstacles and may have to create a mock-up. In the process, however, we have learnt about new styles of art and how close humans are coming to changing themselves genetically. The process has been a great example of sandboxing, the ability of our team to move forward and to create new ideas.

HARARI, Y. N. (2018). HOMO DEUS: A brief history of tomorrow. S.l.: MCCLELLAND & STEWART.

Sermon, P. (2009, June). Picnic on The Screen. Retrieved from http://www.paulsermon.org/picnic/

Koblin, A. (2006). The Sheep Market. Retrieved from http://www.thesheepmarket.com/

Bradley, M. M., Codispoti, M., Cuthbert, B. N., & Lang, P. J. (2001). Emotion and motivation I: Defensive and appetitive reactions in picture processing. Emotion, 1(3), 276-298. doi:10.1037/1528-3542.1.3.276

(2013, November 05). Retrieved June 17, 2018, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTMS9y8OVuY&t=537s

Glannon, W. (2018). Genes and Future People Philosophical Issues in Human Genetics. Boulder: Routledge.

Chapter 3

Conceptual Statement

The future has been a central topic to all projects I’ve undertaken here at COLAB. This semester when we were ushered into the theme of post-human I wanted to look at the different ways we will be living in the future. This began with reading about artificial intelligence and a possible changing age into one of joblessness, which took me to new forms of communication and then to human enhancement. We set out to make an art piece that reflected these points.

In this project, we have done little amounts of iteration. Our idea quickly emerged as one that captured a sense of human enhancement in a fun and interactive fashion. Beginning with an idea to capture people’s use of labels, as we wanted to see if a post-human world would be one that increased or decreased the use of labels within society. We moved on from here to create an installation that could create a new form of communication, inspired by Elon Musk’s Neuralink (2018) we were confident that in the future people would be transmitting data through each other's minds, instead of their mouths or keyboards. This is where we started to design the canvas idea, in which multiple people could all draw on a canvas simultaneously and be part of a feedback loop that shows the user all of the other user's expressions. This would make for unique expressions and communications as users experimented with live crafting with strangers on the canvas. This was our final iteration and from here we moved forward into making it become a reality.

We’ve been using the design thinking process to realise our human enhancement artefact. After conducting research to develop an understanding of our goal of collaborative design, We had looked at many artists and installations before we combined this research to find the best way ideate. The idea became solidified when we understood that we were going to replace our canvas with a person, this embodied the separate paths of human enhancement and collaborative design. From here we could prototype the canvas and figure out how it would work best and what needed to be refined. With the first prototype, co-sketch, we understood the potential of two people coming together to make something without any parameters. In this prototype we were not using a person as a canvas, it was only in the second prototype that we moved this element forward. It seems that in the first the users would have much more freedom and in the second would be encouraged to interact more with the person on screen ie outlining the person, adding artefacts to them or manipulating their features. It was here that we started to bring the expressions inline with human enhancement.

In terms of constructing this project, I have played the role of researcher and idea generator, a minor role compared with the most fundamental sector: programming. I was inspired by Yuval Noah Harari's Homo Deus (2016) which lead us through the post-human definition process, then looking to Dr Gorilla for live art and how we could do it differently and further to Edward T. Hall on his observations on behaviour in The Silent Language (1959). The project is fleeting. The art in each piece in my eyes is the making of each piece of art, the coming together of strangers to work together to make art in that moment. It could be seen within the realm of the carpe diem religion, discussed by Kuo (2012)

Urban, T. (2018, April 13). Neuralink and the Brain's Magical Future. Retrieved from https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/04/neuralink.html

HARARI, Y. N. (2018). HOMO DEUS: A brief history of tomorrow. S.l.: MCCLELLAND & STEWART.

Hall, E. T. (1959). The silent language. Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday.

Kuo, A. T. (2012). A Comparative Study of Jack Kerouac & Ernest Hemingway as Representatives

of Their Respective Generations. The Department of Literature, Area Studies, and European Languages, 25.

#ctec708

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