#what was happening re: the relativity and time dilation and all that

[oflgtfol]

theyre literally not searching for foreign life in interstellar though like theyre quite literally looking for planets that may be habitable for human beings. if there’s life already there is irrelevant other than that it could be a sign for human habitability. theyre quite literally not even thinking about aliens at all

[musictheory]

Time warp song analysis

This was part of the mega theory but im aware some people would like it on its own so here you go! Also sorry for the hiatus still working on shock treatment kinda lost my notebook ):

Time Warp is one of the most well-known songs to come out of the Rocky Horror Picture Show even a first time Rocky Horror watchers can do a jump to the left and a step to the right. But putting dance moves aside the song shows how the Transylvanians arrived on Earth and the foreshadowing to the backstabbing of Riff Raff and Magenta. 

Riff Raff line “I’ve got to keep control” initially read to me as Riff Raff trying to grab Brad and Jannet’s attention however, through my countless re-watches of the movie I’m believing Riff Raff saw Brad and Jannet as a stop to his and Magentas plans. For example, in the film's entirety we can see Riff Raff and Magenta plot with each other through a hand signal they do repeatedly. We also see them sabotage Frank N Furter's plans letting Rocky go while indirectly stopping Frank from “entertaining” Brad. Another theory I have for Frank N Furter's original mission is to enslave humanity and the reason he made Rocky was to be desirable for all, making it easier for him to manipulate others for the benefit of the Transylvanians. Here, Brad and Jannet would be the test subjects and I believe if Frank wasn’t interrupted his mission would have been successful as he would have blackmail to hold over Brad and Jannet’s making them his new human slaves which could allow him to use them as bate for the rest of humanity.

“The blankness would hit me and the void would be calling” is a reference to the time warp/ Blackhole they traveled through to get to Earth. For example, for around 100 years physicists have known of time warp in fact the space between the Earth and the sun is a sort of time warp. Einstein argued that gravity is the property of curving space and time. Blackholes can dilate time however once you get to the point called the event horizon whatever you brought with you can’t come back. The following line “let’s do the time warp again” shows the Transylvanians wanting to go back but waiting on Franks “audio vibratory physio-molecular transport device” to get them back waiting for him to finish (ha) so they can regain control and go back to Transylvania shooting their matter through space and time.

Another bit of evidence into enslaving humanity is the quote “in another dimension with voyeuristic intention”. Voyeuristic is a word which wasn't priorly in my vocabulary but the definition goes: relating to or denoting sexual pleasure gained from watching others when they are naked or engaged in sexual activity.  

Now Columbia's verse is a can of worms. In summary, it explains how Columbia became a groupie for Frank N Furter. “A snake of a guy gave me an evil wink” Could link to the biblical story in the Garden of Eden. God warns Adam and Eve not to take from the tree of knowledge lying to them both saying they would “surely die”. However, the serpent tempts Eve stating “your eyes will be opened and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil” Eve eats from the tree and gives some to Adam. God bans them from the garden of Eden. This mirrors what happened to Brad and Jannet, seeing only the good in the world but being exposed to the restricted, increasing their curiosity and changing their life forever. Which makes me think Columbia was a relatively normal person before she got abducted. “time meant nothing never would again” allows us to infer that Columbia can’t remember how long she’s been there falling into a depression as everything gets ripped away from her or time moving differently in the mansion.

Richard O'Brien is a master of foreshadowing. What else could we be missing in his writing?

[loonatism]

WHAT IS THE LOONAVERSE? PART 1 – THE SCIENCE

LOONA is special among K-pop for its immersive storyline. These girls are not just k-pop idols performing a song, they also perform a story and that story is what we call the Loonaverse.

So, What is the Loonaverse? In a few words: The world and story that LOONA inhabits.

Yeah. Duh. But what is it?

Well… it’s complicated.

The Loonaverse is a fictitious story that borrows elements from real science and fantasy to build its world but also uses allegories, metaphors, allusions and other literary devices to tell its story. Our job as spectators (and specifically us theorizers) is to look beyond those devices to understand the message they are trying to send. In this post I’ll attempt to explain the science of the Loonaverse: parallel universes, time loops and the mobius strip.

PHYSICS VS FICTION

The Loonaverse can be described as the physical universe where the characters of LOONA live and where the events of the story happen.

By physical universe I mean that literally: its own universe. There are multiple theories that explain the existence of multiverses; from infinite universes theories to bubble theories to parallel universes to daughter universes; all incredibly interesting readings and all with fundaments in real physics.

On the other hand, the Loonaverse is a fiction story. Created by the creative minds of the people working in BlockBerry Creative (The company LOONA is under) and specifically by Jaden Jeong (who is a polarizing figure amongst Orbits). As a fiction story it is undeniable that the Loonaverse takes elements form science fiction and fantasy to build its story so going hard into the nitty gritty physics of how it works is ambitious at best and purposelessly time consuming at worst (though if you are interested in the nitty gritty of multiverse theory by all means go read about it, is mind-blowing). Nah, for the purposes of this (really not that long once we get to it) theory, we’ll focus only on a few key science related aspects:

MATHEMATICAL UNIVERSES

This particular multiverse theory debates whether math is a tool used by us to describe our universe or a fundamental truth of the universe itself. If it were the latter, then the possibility of multiple universes with vastly different mathematical structures is possible. This implies a different set of physics working in those universes. Basically: physics and mathematics themselves may work differently in different universes: It is as simple as is sounds. (Yeah, 2+2 may = fish in another universe, or flying is possible and even normal).

Using this admittedly long explanation for a constant in science fiction and fantasy, we now have a physics approved explanation for all the odd things that happen in the Loonaverse: super powers, climbing in air, destroying the moon, walking in the moon and most importantly: time disruptions.

 SPACE/TIME RELATIVITY

So… time is weird. Physicist can’t decide what exactly is time. Is it a dimension? A physical force of the universe? An illusion we humans use to perceive existence? Does it even exist at all? We’ll just assume it does and use Einstein’s theory of relativity to explain it.

So… The universe is composed of a 4-dimensional fabric called space-time. (Like, picture an actual tablecloth). When anything with mass falls into that tablecloth it creates a bend, that bend is what we call gravity. This gravitational pull modifies both how space and time are perceived. Everything close to that gravitational pull will move at exponentially slower time than anything outside of it. In simpler terms: Time varies depending of your relationship with another object. But if gravity can modify the way time is perceived, so can speed. The explanation for this is long and complicated and involves a difficult choice between speed not being absolute for anything except that light has an absolute speed and those two statements don’t match. But Einstein, being the clever guy he was, came up with Time dilation: The faster you move the slower time moves for you.

A simpler way to understand all this is to just watch the movie Interstellar. They did a really good job of conveying Einstein’s theory.

Of course, physics haven’t been able to prove the possibility of moving through time backwards, only forward. But hey! We are dealing with a different universe where the laws of math and physics don’t abide by Einstein’s theories. Well let’s unify science and fiction and talk about time travel.

 TIME DONUTS AND THE MOBIUS STRIP

Yeah, we finally got here.

The Mobius Strip. The one constant in the Loonaverse is the Mobius Strip. It’s importance has been confirmed by BlockBerry Creative and you’d be hard pressed to find any theory that doesn’t include it somewhere. So, What is a Mobius strip?

Also called the twisted cylinder, it is geometrical shape that has one side, one curve and it’s non orientable, forming a loop on its own. The properties of the mobius strip come into play in the sense that if you were to travel through it, you would go through you starting point once but from the opposite side of the strip before returning to your original starting position.

Here’s a 3D model of the thing: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:239158

Curious things:  If you were to cut down a Mobius strip through the middle you would end up with long mobius. If you were to cut it twice at 1/3 the size each cut, you would end up with one long ass loop and one shorter loop that surrounds it.

Here’s a video that shows that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlQOipIVFPk&ab_channel=ThinkTwice

Okay one more schiency term to explain:

Time donuts (not really called that way) is a time travel/time machine theory  that claims that a donut like vaccum that envelopes a sphere of matter and surrounded by a strong gravitational pull would create a void where time/space would collapse into itself, crating a sort of time loop where the closer you move to the sphere the bigger the gravitational pull to the point where you could even start going backwards. Here, space/time is the time machine (yeah, trippy). The physics to this theory are quite debatable at best but it is a theory nontheless, and perfect one for our purposes.

A new time-machine model with compact vacuum core by Amos Ori: https://arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/0503077.pdf

IT ALL COMES TOGETHER

Okay I read all this sciency stuff and I still don’t get it: How do all this relates to the Loonaverse? Well, my patient reader, all this science mumbo jumbo helps us understand the main conflict of the Loonaverse: escaping a never-ending time loop.

The theory states that the Loonaverse happens in a parallel universe where the laws of physics don’t abide to our own. In this universe the girls (LOONA) inhabit a space (moon maybe) that moves through time inside of a Mobius Strip, which itself envelopes a large dense sphere of mass, thus creating a time loop. The closer the girls get to the sphere the slower time moves to the point it may go backwards. Because they move through time in a Mobius Strip, the amount of time it takes them to re start the loop is long (though I am not sure how long). In the mean time they will go though their starting point but in the opposite side of the loop.

This means the girls are essentially trapped in a never-ending loop. Think Groundhog Day, Palm Springs, Russian Doll, Happy Death Day; and if time loop movies have taught us anything is that time loops kinda suck after a while.

But this also gives us the tools to possibly escape this loop. Our physics don’t abide in this universe, there are super powers, and mirror images and the possibility of escaping if we understand how it all works in the first place.

With all this science talk, doesn’t that make the Loonaverse a ScyFi story? Well… No.

Science Fiction as a genre uses technological and/or scientific advances to investigate and/or explain a human reality. It usually comes in the form of a warning (Brave New World) or as an exploration of what makes us human (Blade Runner). Science Fiction explores the possibilities of humanity in a technologically advanced future. Because the story LOONA tells us doesn’t explore the possibilities of a technologically ridden future or focuses on our relationship with these advancements, it cannot be called ScyFi.

TLDR:

The Loonaverse is the world and story that LOONA inhabits. It borrows form real life science and fantasy elements to better tell its story. It exists in a universe where the laws of physics differ from ours and where there is a set time loop in the form of a Mobius Strip, which the girls are trying to escape.

REMEMBER: This is all my interpretation of some very complex theories, theories I am unabashedly morphing to my will to fit a certain narrative (like scyfi and fantasy often do). Also, I didn’t come up with the idea of escaping the time loop, it’s kinda the oldest theory out there. It may even be confirmed by BlockBerry Creative. I am just explaining it the way it makes sense to me.

 Next: How does all this science help explain the narrative conflict of the characters in the Loonaverse?

[league-of-thots]

For You, mae amare

Pairing: Shouto x reader

Warnings: sensory deprivation (mild), little bit of food play, nipple clamps

Word Count: ~3.3k

A/N: This is a rather late bday fic for the wonderful @burnedbyshoto im sorry its late!! I really wanted to get shouto as well as i could so i may have re-written it a few times LOL. in all seriousness im so happy to call you my friend and i hope you enjoy!!

         It’s a normal day when you decide to ask your boyfriend to try a little something new in the bedroom

“Hey Shouto,” you start. He looks up from his book, the hand that had been stroking your leg gently stopping as he quirks an eyebrow at you. “I’ve been thinking about something, and I’d like you to hear me out before you decide on anything.” You’re a little nervous at what he’ll think, given its outside the normal range of your activities, but mostly you’re excited to see if he’ll agree to it.

         “That’s something you say before you suggest something that is probably dumb, or something I’m not going to like.” He says with a pout, and you have to crush the urge to reach out and brush the longer strands of his hair above his undercut back into place.

         “Shouto, how was I supposed to know that the ropes would snap, they said they were quirk proof!” you say exasperated, having been over this multiple times. “You’re too hot baby.” You smirk at him and he groans at your words.

         He sighs, “Fine. I’ll listen to it, but I swear if it’s anything else where I’m off the ground I’m putting my foot down.” You knew he meant it, Shouto was a man of few words, but one that stuck to them. You remembered how long it took to convince him that changing his hairstyle would not drastically alter his fighting. Midoriya had been close to tears by then end when he’d finally decided that he wanted to spite his dad more than he cared about miniscule changes in his fighting style.

         For a pretty quiet guy, he got his point across when he wanted to and was oddly stubborn about certain small things.

         So, you’d explained to him, a couple times having to reassure him there was no chances for him to fall, your idea. To your surprise, he actually seemed interested in it, you could tell from the way he bit the inside of his cheek and the slight quirk of his eyebrow.

         People that thought Shouto Todoroki didn’t show his thoughts with his body were wrong, you could read him like an open book. Right now, that book was telling you that he found the idea of you much smaller frame dominating him and taking away his senses and movement was extremely interesting to him.

         You knew that you had him on board with you even before he gave his verbal consent, and you were exhilarated at the possibilities that would be open to you. You sit up straight and pull him over by his shirt to give him a quick kiss in your good mood and immediately got back on your phone to start doing some more in depth research on what you could do to him, and what you should possibly stay away from.

         Something that was intriguing to you was how easily you’d be able to incorporate kinks that the two of you already had and fulfilled quite often. Apparently, it would also feel different for Shouto, who during the time would be deprived of a few senses, which was something else to consider. You wanted to use the familiarity Shouto would have with the normal motions to calm him through the sensory deprivation so he’d enjoy it, but if it would also feel new to him, you didn’t want to overwhelm him.

         Another thing stressed was that aftercare had to include slowly and carefully giving him back his senses and to make sure he was well comforted afterwards. That wouldn’t be a sweat for you, you liked to think that you gave damn fine aftercare and you feel like Shouto would agree with that.

         After research and planning, you decided to check if you still had ample supplies for your ideas, which was a good idea because you realized you were low on lube, candles and sauces. You wanted to stick to only touch based ones because you wanted to take away his sight, and didn’t want to startle or turn him off with harsh sounds. It was also the reason you decided to only do it with his eyes completely covered, you know that Shouto prefers being eased into new ideas in the bedroom, one of his own personal requests that you always make sure to follow.

         You don’t have time during the next few days to actually head out to the shop and restock on supplies and buy a few new things. It makes you impatient and Shouto can tell and it amuses him to no end.

         “I mean I could just fuck you normally? I know it’s not as, ah- thrilling?, as your idea. But I’m not a bad lay.” He nearly hides the laughter in his voice but you catch it, and give him an unimpressed look. But you take him up on the offer anyways, not being one to turn down sex with your amazing boyfriend.

         It also made you a lot less antsy to get your idea rolling, you decided to just go with the time would show itself when it was ready. Besides, having it come about naturally would be way more fun for the both of you. So, you placed some order online instead of rushing out and waited.

           Just over a week later, you came home to your house with a package sitting on your front porch. At first, you’d forgotten what it was, but were quickly reminded when you thought about it, and you jogged up to your door with some pep in your step. Shouto wouldn’t be home until later that evening, had already told you not to wait up for dinner, and so you’d have time to prepare.

         You knew it’d been a few tough weeks on him, so this was bound to be a way to relieve some of that pent-up frustration. He did the same for you after all. Until then though, you had a few hours to kill, so you ordered some Thai take out and sat down to watch some Netflix on your couch.

         While you were eating you got a few texts from Shouto saying he almost got out early, but there was an emergency that he had to go help with. Sending back a quick “Stay safe, I love you,” you turn off Netflix in favour of the news, trying to see what was going on that had taken him away from home.

         You turn it on to see that a villain had caused a truck to crash with a gas station, creating a large explosion and setting fire to the surrounding buildings. You saw some sheets of ice going up to cover the building and you knew that was why your boyfriend had been called in to help. He had a good quirk for helping to contain the damage and helping to rescue civilians from the buildings.

         Part of you wanted to watch it, but part of you hated seeing your boyfriend throw himself into dangerous situations. You couldn’t turn it off though, you had to watch as he saved person after person, teaming up with his sidekicks to make sure that the most unstable zones were taken care of first.

         Luckily, everything seemed to go fine, and the news eventually switched over to something else. You tried to relax, easing your mind with the fact that you saw the entire thing taken from an emergency zone to a relatively stable situation. You give him a quick text, telling him you saw him on the news, asking him if he was all right. He quickly shoots you back a quick thumbs up and a “be home as soon as I can”. Sighing in relief you go to grab a drink from the liquor cabinet, craving some alcohol to calm the rest of your nerves. Gin is the way to go tonight, you think, quickly draining a first glass and pouring yourself another.

         By the time Shouto comes into the house, you’re mildly tipsy and you run up to greet him as he hangs his jacket up in the front closet.

         “Shoooou-!” You throw yourself into him and he reacts with reflexes befitting a tired pro hero, quickly turning and catching you. “Missed you, babe!”

         “Yeah, I missed you too- wait, are you drunk?” his eyes narrow in concern.

         “No, hun, just a bit tipsy.” You bring him down and start kissing him intensely, the excitement, anxiety and love you felt today just tipping over into your actions. He responds easily to you, pulling back only when he needs to breathe.

         “What’s gotten into you tonight?”

         “Just missed you today, I was stressed about you, and excited ‘cause the toys came in. You’ve had such a hard week and I’m so excited, I think you’re going to love it Shou, I really do!” you’re babbling a bit but he follows your words, eyes never leaving your face as you talk.

         “I’m sure if you thought of it for me that I’ll really enjoy myself, love.” He presses his lips sweetly to yours, and lets you take control. You lick into his mouth, he tastes like strawberries – he must’ve had some before he got home – and you slowly guide him to the bedroom. Your lips never leave his until you’ve gotten him onto the bed.

         “You trust me, right?” You know he does, but you want him to verbalize it.

         “Of course.”

         “You’re going to tell me if you need to stop then, alright?”

         He gives you a look that clearly says ‘let’s get on with this, then’ and you roll your eyes.

         “Fine, fine, I’m getting the stuff now. Get your clothes off.” You hurry over to where you’d kept them all put together.

         “I thought you’d want to rip them off given you’re being the dom tonight, babe?” You can hear the teasing tone of his voice and you ignore him, slowly turning around.

         “Get them off. Now.” Your hand is on your hip as you glare at your boyfriend from across the room. You see him take a deep breath, eyes taking you in. His pupils are dilated, betraying his excitement he’d tried to hide with his teasing.

         You toss the things onto the bed as he scrambles out of his clothes, you slowly taking them off as you walk towards him. You’re wearing the pale blue that happens to be his favourite. Sitting down in front of him on the bed, you grab the rope from beside your body and you crawl over him. You kiss him deeply, hands grabbing his as the two of you get lost within each other. You pull away panting when you’ve managed to maneuver his hands above his head, grinning down at your dazed boyfriend.

         You quickly tie his wrists together, tying his wrists to bedpost behind him as you go back down to kiss his neck, slowly, sensually. He groans, trying to grind his hips up from underneath you. You move to sit down above his hips so he can’t do anything, the tent in his boxers obvious.

         “You don’t get anything yet Sho, don’t be impatient.” He whines a bit at that, but stops wiggling around. You go back down, pressing open mouthed kisses to his chest, leaving marks every few kisses and he grunts in approval.

         After marking him up a bit, you ease off of him, looking to get the thick and soft eye mask you’d gotten and turn to him.

         “Ready?”

         “Yeah, let’s do it Y/N.” You love how dishevelled he looks just from the small make out sessions the two of you had, his cheeks red and breathing thinner than usual. You carefully ease the blindfold over his eyes and kiss him gently. You admire your handiwork and stroke his hair. You can feel him shudder beneath you; he loves it when you stroke his hair.

         “Feels ok, Sho?” He nods once in assent. “Alright then let’s see how this feels then.” You begin working you way down his body, hands smoothly going down caressing the taught muscles of his sides. You leave marks all down his body and he groans in pleasure at the sting of the bites. You love to mark him almost as much as he likes to mark you, and you love the way the red and purple bites look on his pale skin.

         When you reach his boxers, you’re unsurprised to find them stained with precum, his length still straining against the fabric of his clothes. You slowly wiggle them down and his cock springs up to slap his stomach. He lets out a sigh of relief that turns into a stifled moan as you like a stripe from the bottom of his cock to the tip, teasing the tip with swirls from your tongue.

         You take the head into your mouth and he bucks his hips upwards, trying to get you to stop teasing him. You pull off completely and he groans in frustration.

         “Be good and just sit there Sho, or else I won’t let you cum at all, how’s about that?”

         “No, don’t do that, I’ll stay still. Just please get on with it, it feels so good…”

         “Don’t make me stop you again.” You warn, and he shakes his head almost frantically.

         Taking him once again into your mouth, still slowly, you notice he’s straining so hard against his impulses to fuck upwards into your mouth. Seeing him do this for you fills you with power and lust, and you suddenly take him deep in your throat, your nose tickling his neatly trimmed pubes.

         “Fuck!” he shouts out in surprise. “God you feel so fucking good babe, you’re so good to me!” Bolstered by his praise, you continue to bob your head, quicker than before. You feel your own slick dampening your panties and you hear the noises he’s making, loving how wrecked he sounds. You look up to see his head thrown back and your hand goes up to play with his balls.

         He must like that, because he cums without warning, leg muscles tensing up as thick ropes of cum shoot down your throat. You swallow it all with a little difficulty and pull off of him. He’s breathing heavily, his dick now soft again, but you know with what you have planned, that won’t be the case for very long.

         “That’s just the start Sho. I have a bit more for you.” You say, grabbing the nipple clamps from beside you. You circle the cool metal around his nipples until the pebble up and you clamp the first one down, which he takes stoically. The second one however, elicits a soft whimper from him. “Ah, but you’ve done this a few times before, babe. Does it feel different now?”

         “Better,” he chokes out. “It feels better.”

         “Well that’s what I was hoping for, so that’s good for me to hear.” Having said that, you grab the chocolate sauce you’d gotten and click open the cap. “You know what I have, don’t you Shotou?”

         “Something in a bottle, I don’t think its lube?”

         “It’s not.” You then start to pour some of the sauce down his stomach, putting some up by his collar bones and neck. “Keep your mouth closed.” He nods once more as you pour some of the sauce onto his lips. Leaning down, you start kissing him, tasting the sweet chocolate, and he takes that as an open invitation to open his own mouth and get a tast for himself.

         You stay there, making out with him, the sweetness making it more fun, until you pull back and start licking away the sauce on his neck.

         “Ah, your tongue shouldn’t be allowed to move like that! How am I supposed to stand a chance?” His voice is pitched low with arousal. You smirk against his skin, but don’t answer, continuing to enjoy the sweet moans – and sauce – as long as you could.

         However, after moving down to his stomach, his noises, cut off. You look up and see the reason why, he’s bitten his lip to keep from crying out anymore. That won’t do.

         “Shouto, I want to hear you, pretty boy. Stop biting your lip please, or else I won’t ride you like I planned and you can use your hand.”

         “No, no. Alright fine. You’re picky today.”

         “I’m going to do you a favour and ignore that one.” You slip off your panties, seeing as he’s hard again as you straddle him. You loved riding him, it was so fun to set the pace and make a mess of him.

         You line yourself up, and ease yourself down slowly. You wince a little from the stretch, so caught up that you’d forgotten to prep yourself, but with a few rolls of your hips you got him completely inside you. The vein on the underside of his cock felt as good as always, and you teasingly clenched your muscles and Shouto let out another set of curses that would have his PR team in tears had he said that in public.

         Laughing slightly, you begin to bring your hips up slowly, and slam them down all the way. As you set a pace, Shouto catches on and starts bucking up into you as you slam down, hitting deep into your pussy, and you let out a cry of surprise and pleasure.

         “Shit, Shouto! Just like that!” you can feel yourself clenching in pleasure around him, the entire situation and the stimulation of your clit slapping against his hips bringing you closer and closer to your own orgasm.

         Shouto must sense this, because as you falter, he thrusts up into you harder, grunting at the exertion, having to do it without much help with his arms. He manages to hit that spot inside you that has you seeing stars and crying out his name as you clamp down on his cock and cum. With a final thrust deep inside you, Shouto comes as well, releasing once again and then sinking into the mattress.

         You ease yourself off, whispering sweet nothings to your boyfriend and lying down beside him, running your fingers through his soft and silky hair. You feel blissed out from you orgasm so you forget that he’s tied up and can’t take off the blindfold.

         “Hey, Y/N? I do love having you snuggled against me, but I think it’s way better when I can actually hold you.”

         “Oh my god, I’m sorry Sho!” you quickly scramble up, untying his wrists from the bedposts and each other. You hold his much larger hands in your own, kissing at the slightly irritated skin that came from the bindings. You do the same thing, showing lots of love and care to his chest as well after removing the clamps. Throughout this, you hear sighs of satisfaction and pleasure from your boyfriend.

         You slowly take off the blindfold as look into his eyes. He grabs your face gently, guiding you in for a kiss that’s all sweet and slow. You sigh as he pulls away, and you set your head down onto his chest, looking up at his face. He stares back at you, lovingly.

         “So? Yes, no, maybe?”

         He chuckles. “Yes, way better than the swing.”

         “When are you going to drop the damn swing already?”

         “Hey, I didn’t drop it, it dropped me.” You groan and stick your face into his chest. “In all seriousness, it was really different. But in a good way.”

         “I’m glad. You feeling a bit more relaxed?”

         “Yes, but I’m sure I’ll feel even more relaxed if we can clean up and cuddle a bit.” You laugh at the rather pointed suggestion.

         “Alright, princess. Let’s go get us all cleaned up then.”

[katkonstant]

Harrow the Ninth: Act 1 Analysis - Local Bone Lady Newly Single and Ready for Mental Breakdown

I am so scared! so confused! and so turned on by the sepulchered mystery of Harrow the Ninth’s Act 1! And because it’s quarantine time, it’s organizational mapping and near-obsessive theorizing time baby. 

I’ll warn you: this got LONG. 

Spoilers galore. 

This post is to try and organize my own thoughts as well as preserve in time that I don’t know shit when HTN finally hits. All to answer the big question: What in the necro-hell is going on? Here’s what we know as fact:

Gideon the Ninth was about Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter and Badass Emo Princess, and her not hugged enough but grinning through the pain sword lesbian cavalier, Gideon Nav. A catalogue of their romp of death in Canaan House.

Harrow the Ninth is currently cataloguing two things: (1) Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter and Mentally Unstable Concussion, and her cavalier, Ortus Nigenad and their guided tour of Canaan House. AND (2) Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Baby Lyctor, aboard His Imperial and Unending Magic School Bus.

Similar to @Siadea‘s wonderful post (x), I am all aboard the Timeline Fuckery Theory (TFT). Operating under the TFT, I will refer to our cast of characters accordingly. To summarize the TFT, the major point is thus:

In the prologue of Harrow, I think the Harrowhark of Gideon the Ninth (hereby Harrow1) settled in, swan dove into the River, somehow backstroked in time to when she woke up on the Emperor’s ship, and then she resurfaced (with Ianthe’s help), stripped of all memory&detection involving Keyword:Gideon. 

Gideon  [ORTUS]

It appears Harrow1 has programmed Harrow2 with a find+replace formula for ‘Gideon’ and replacing it with ‘Ortus’ on a pure, sensory input level. I have NO idea how she (or something else) did this. Prologue Ianthe Tridentarius telling Harrow, “I know what you’ve done, and I know how to reverse it” makes me think Harrow did this to herself. 

It scrubs the past as well as the present. Proof - (1) When Harrow2 gets the Emperor’s invitation to Canaan House, we gather from context that Ortus asks her if she’s considered someone else. Only we read it as Ortus saying, “have you considered ORTUS NIGENAD?” AND THEN THE SCENE STARTS OVER, but rewound to moments before. Like a glitch in the Matrix; (2) The Emperor’s lips distort when he says “Ortus Nigenad did not die for nothing” and is confused when Harrow2 says it back to him; (3) When the Emperor later says the name of the third Lyctor ‘Ortus’, Harrow2 starts bleeding from the ears and passes out.....We’ll get to him in a sec.

The three syllables Prologue Harrow dies on: Could be ‘Gideon’ and the mark of her successful mindflaying from recognizing the word. Could also be ‘Alecto’. Hell, could even be ‘Nigenad’. Inconclusive.

The Chilly Weirdo Harrow Has the Hots For (alternatively, who tf are you?)

The Lady of the Locked Tomb is appearing and disappearing in Harrow2′s mind, both at her recall of Canaan House and in her (current?) stay with the Emperor. 

She has Griddle’s Eyes. As we’re familiar with the lyctors, we know that when their cavs are “eaten”, necromancers’ eyes change to their cavalier’s colors. OR the Lady has simply taken on Griddle’s eyes to put Harrow2 at ease.

She has the voice of who Harrow2 needs to hear. We’ve heard the Lady sound like Pelleamena (Harrow’s mommy dearest), Crux, and Aiglamene (Captain of the Ninth guard). Both of these are people who loved Harrow1. 

These characteristics ^ lead me to believe that the Lady can see Harrow1′s obsession with her and is either Manipulating Harrow2 by manufacturing her voice and eyes, or is genuinely trying to love Harrow2 in return. (She may have been present for Harrow’s entire life. See my Ch.3**)

What does she want from Harrow2? --> I think, without support or proof, that the Lady wants to Rise Again (as villains entombed are wont to do). As she doesn’t have a corporeal form, she’ll likely need Harrow’s help. Underlying idea being: the Emperor dies when his Unholy Other Half returns. It would be a little contrived to have the “beautiful lady revealed to be the big bad” device be the GTN and the HTN twist but we’ll see. 

Interesting point: The Lady doesn’t like His Holy Frumpyness & Co. “Lie. Lie now.” She’s either protecting herself further down the line, or the Lady thinks that Mercy would have harmed Harrow2 because of this info. It’s possible this is the same interest if she needs Harrow’s help to free her. 

Now Let’s Talk about Swords

AKA the sexiest part of this dissertation. 

Harrow the Concussed is carrying Griddle’s Two hander. Not just any two hander. It is in fact and distinctly, Griddle’s sword. This is supported by (1) Harrow2 was given the sword by the Emperor “as a gesture” implying he knows Griddle and the sword’s significance to Harrow1. And (2) The severe physical reactions Harrow2 has to the sword’s loathing. In GTN Harrow1 mentioned to Griddle, “I have always felt like that sword hates me”. (this in and of itself is mystifying but I’ve got bigger occult fish to fry)

Either Griddle’s Sword or Cytherea is alive. The fade to black of Harrow rekilling Cytherea is a mystery within a Christmas light tangle of other mysteries and I’m not fucking with it. BUT. There are Five lifeforms aboard the ship that traversed the River: Mercymorn, the Emperor, Ianthe, and Harrow. Harrow2 tells us that the Body/the Lady isn’t in sight. That leaves inanimate objects: Cytherea’s body, or the two hander that hates Harrow. 

Harrow2, the Concussed, is not carrying a rapier. Only in the Prologue does Harrow have a rapier on her hip. Ortus the Alternate cav carries a rapier. See the next theory for why this is significant. 

The Events of Canaan House Two are Not Real. 

These are my weakest theories. They’re all weak, but these ones are chief weaklings. The Time Fuckery Theory’s biggest snag is ‘Canaan House: What’s Real?’, and I think only the events with Harrow2 on the ship with Ianthe are actually occurring. 

I think someone is soul/spirit guiding Harrow2 on this Canaan House Round II to show her something. Proof: (1) The repeated “Is this how it happened?”/”This isn’t how it happened.” Clearly indicate that this IS a repeated experience for Harrow, and not the original. (2) Ortus glitches a bit, looks at Harrow2 and says “You never did have much of an imagination.” Someone who knows Harrow1 made him say this. I think. (3) If we count who possibly could spirit-guide Harrow2 on this quest, we have to find the denominator candidates: the only people who knew Harrow1 at Canaan House and at Drearburh are Gideon, and Harrow1 herself. And - if the Lady really has been following her around, the Lady of the Locked Tomb. (4) This theory cannot account for the strobing red egg hallucinations on paper Harrow2 is being delivered. 

Second explanation: it’s all happening in Harrow’s head, and Harrow1 is the spirit guide. In support: There is a surprising amount of explanation and character depth from Ortus. I believe Harrow1 knows Ortus enough from childhood to be able to project him onto Harrow2 this way. 

Third explanation: Because the people Harrow2 is interacting with are all dead, it’s microscopically possible Harrow2 is tripping some soul-shrooms in the River and having the souls of Canaan House teach her something via flashback. In support: Prologue Harrow says five pairs of eyes close to submerge into the River, but hers would not open again. Incredibly vague, but could mean she was going to be spending a significant amount of time in the River. This theory is unlikely, as Harrow is a bone adept. Souls are squishy and freaky to her. Unlikely also from what we saw of the River. Ie; the River is an inhospitable predator which ripped Cassiopea apart and scares the hell out of Mercy and the Emperor. Not an ideal destination spirit-walk vacation spot. Plus, the only clear reasoning we get from Harrow about why she’s descending into the River is because she knows she’s going to die (although she tells Ianthe she has no plans to die)

Things to Note: (1) Teacher immediately spills the Sleeper beans, lets the laboratory cat out of the bag, and unmasks the key mystery. I think who/whatever is guiding Harrow2 around makes this happen legitimately just to save time. (2) Harrow2 is learning things from Ortus, Teacher, Abigail Pent, etc that Harrow1 and Gideon didn’t know.

If the Events of Canaan House Round Two ARE Real. 

If the Great Value Canaan House timeline is actually happening and are physically influential, the implications are fucking vast, because now we’re considering the multiverse of how time works. I am not about to get into that shit because I do (contrary to this post’s existence’s suggestion) have a life, and I don’t feel like rededicating it to the theory of relativity and time dilation. 

The biggest question though would then become: How would events have unfolded if Ortus had gone to Canaan House and not Griddle? The only conclusion to that is: everyone would be dead and Cytherea would be alive. Which does not jive with the happenings of Emperor Frizzle’s Magic NecroBus and Harrow2 (many are alive, and Cytherea is dead). It could be that Cytherea is, in fact, alive and needs re-killing via the Act 1 end of Harrow2 stabbing her. I can’t say.

What does freak me out about Canaan2 is Harrow herself. 

Not her insanity, mind you, but the fact that Harrow2 is hilarious. She’s always been acidic and funny, but Harrow2 is crude and funny. This is very, very bad. She makes a remark about the term ‘bone frenzy’ that Ortus says only someone who’d prefer ‘prurient magazines’ would think of. Can anyone guess who might be more incline than Harrow to prefer prurient magazines? Say a messy sword necrolesbian with a subscription to Frontline Titties of the Fifth?

Harrow2 is also not chasing Palamedes Sextus around the grounds of Canaan House in a near-suicidal race to Lyctorhood. 

Not only is she not working herself to death, but Harrow is doing the opposite: she is socializing. With the Fourth and Fifth! She’s caustic and rude while she does it, but she’s still spending time around them for whatever reason. 

All these behaviors are Griddle behaviors and they make. me. nervous. 

Is Harrow2 Actually a Lyctor?

Harrow’s Dramatis Personae section lists ‘Harrowhark the First’ with a huge and glaring and delightful redacted section below her name. If someone truly had the time, I’m sure they could sleuth out the layers of the censorship and find out what it says. However, it’s plain that the underlying text does NOT say ‘Gideon Nav, her cavalier’. So we’re left with more questions - who or what died to give Harrow her power? .....As a point of interest, it looks like the original writing has been overlaid with even more text. 

Ortus’ eyes were black - the same shade as Harrow’s. Harrow2 wouldn’t be able to confirm or deny that she had successfully eaten her Canaan Redux cavalier.

In the prologue, Harrow1 calls herself “half a lychtor” implying that either 1) she’s simply not trained, or 2) something went wrong in her lyctorhood creation

And then we have this weird Chapter 3** internal narration of Harrow2′s childhood without Griddle. And she’s.. absolutely bananas. She grows up a ghoulish, lonely, nut job. But she still says she had committed the indelible sin halfway. That she hadn’t been able to choke him (Ortus) down. 

Her manifestations of power don’t add up. First, Ianthe (undisputedly a lyctor) shoves Babs’ knife through her hand and has no problem with it, or healing right up. Harrow2... isn’t so lucky. Prologue Harrow is also in the process of dying. Conversely, while in the River, Mercymorn dismisses the idea that Harrow2 could possibly be using theorems and freaks out when she discovers Harrow can. Conclusion being: Either Harrow2 is incredible weak, or incredibly powerful but untrained, or she is Something Else Entirely*.

Harrow2 isn’t experiencing lyctoral indigestion. Cytherea tells Ianthe right after she eats Babs, “I can see him fighting you. Mine [meaning her cav, Loveday] came willingly, and it still hurt for a century.” We know Babs still fights Ianthe in HTN, as her eyes are usually swapping shades. It’s not something Harrow1 or 2 mentions as a problem. 

* My working theory is that Harrow2 is kind of lyctor-ish and being protected by the Lady, the Sword, or Griddle (who might be incarnate in either).  

Side note: It might be too far into the weeds to wonder about but I want to know what pregnancy would do to a lyctor. If we follow the Die Young but Beautiful and Powerful practices of the Seventh House, Dulcinea’s family uses their crappy genes as internal combustion engines: cells dying within them allow a perpetual source of thanergy. On the opposite end of that same theory, a necromancer constantly producing thalergy (life and cell growth) should therefore be significantly weaker, right?

This^ is only relevant when considering the other theory:

Papa Gideon [ORTUS] knocked up a fellow Lyctor. 

While it would explain the creepy “egg” texts Harrow2 is hallucinating, as well as why Cytherea spared Griddle multiple times at Canaan house, I doubt this theory for a few reasons: 

Of the available lyctors able to carry children, there is Cassiopeia, Anastasia, Mercymorn, and Cytherea. We only know Mercy and Cytherea.

It’s strongly implied that Cytherea and her cav, Loveday, were in a relationship. Since Loveday is technically still inside of Cytherea, I doubt she wanted to date around. 

The Emperor strives to present the Lyctors as siblings. This a) props himself up as the holy and imperial papa bear to guide and govern them, b) perpetuates the eternal and indestructible bond of siblings, and c) kills any idea of inter-lyctoral hooking up. Can you even imagine the destruction a Jersey Shore: Unholy Power bar fight would wreak?  

I’m not fully convinced Lyctor Gideon [ORTUS] is Griddle’s father. While it would make sense in terms of stature (Lyctor G/O is a single rippling muscle and Griddle’s biceps are... noteworthy), Silas Octakiseron told Gideon that her mother had hair just the same shade as her (source: Sister Glaurica’s toiling soul). Could be that Griddle’s Mom’s soul screaming “Gideon!” was her calling for the Lyctor, her brother/other relation. 

However, I DO believe Griddle is... more than. She wasn’t killed by the nerve gas, and Harrow2′s eyes are not Griddle Gold. 

As a second side note, Lyctor Gideon [ORTUS]’s cav was named Pyrrha Dve. This is exciting to me because of my slutty fandom tendencies and because a name like ‘Pyrrha’ begs for Tragic Backstory, and I’m here for it. Also, I want more interaction with Augustine as he’s who Ianthe says “won’t come save” Harrow. Eye emoji.  

Alecto

As far as I’m aware, there are no solid leads on who or what Alecto the Ninth is. Casting about in wildly unwarranted guesswork, I can throw a few baseless theories out; 

Alecto is Griddle’s truer name (possibly birth name or even what she’s called if when she is brought back);

Alecto is the Lady of the Locked Tomb; 

Alecto is the Emperor’s Cav. In Harrow’s ‘Dramatis Personae’, The Emperor is listed as well as his lyctors and their cavaliers. Except, the Emperor does not have a deceased cav. He has “A.L.”, his guardian. A.L. =Alecto, mayhaps?; 

Alecto, a combination of (2) and (3). The Lady is supposedly the Emperor’s death and who he could not kill twice. If she were his ‘guardian’ she would be a) more powerful than him, and b) someone he was emotionally attached to which he couldn’t bring himself to kill again. 

Things I Cannot and Refuse to Account For:

Ianthe Tridetarius became a sewn tongue as a favor for Harrow1. Wtf. 

Ortus Nigenad’s self-insert cavalier epic of Matthias Nonius. Wtf. 

**The entirety of Chapter 3 is either true or it’s not. Wtf was that shit.  

The psychotic “You lied”/”Egg” texts Harrow2 is hallucinating. Wtf.

This is.... all probably incorrect, and I applaud you if you made it this far. I could keep going, the material of Act 1 is that dense. But in answer to The Great Big WTF that is Harrow Act 1 - my theory is simple. 

TLDR; I think Harrowhark Nonagesimus is tearing down the laws of the universe to bring back Gideon the Ninth.

[emeraldtawny]

[Sex Worker AU] Kenshin x MC: What Is Love? (Pt 1/3)

Welp...you guys wanted him so he’s up first~! Of course you guys HAD to choose the boi I’m the least confident in writing for, but hey I can only improve, right? ;3

Who knows when the next part will be out, but hopefully this sets everything up nicely for you all. Hope you enjoy~! ^w^

Gigolo. It wasn’t a title he could honestly say he hated; it was more the connotations that came with it.

Everyone automatically assumes his work involves sexual favours, sexual appeasement - everything sex. But that isn’t Kenshin. The beauty of his work means he doesn’t have to deal with the bother of appeasing women in that way, something he purposefully distances himself from. He saw no benefit in physical attachments, his past a canvas awash with heartache and discord, hues of reds staining and seeping in to leave him tattered and saturated in the mistakes of his past.

No matter how hard he tries, he can’t bring himself to throw away the ruined canvas, the constant reminder of his distress is his self-destroying way to make sure never to go back - never to let anyone get that close to him again.

But then, there was her.

…

The day is mild as she readjusts the scarf wrapped snugly around her neck to banish the chill. She clicks her phone to life to check the time, the photo background of her and her friends never failing to bring a smile to her face: Sasuke’s insistence on flashing a peace sign, Yukimura’s confused expression pointed at him, Shingen’s playful wink as he plays up to the camera. And Kenshin’s stoic, uninterested stare, his eyes piercing her every time she meets them, the effect his stare has on her still strong even without his physical presence.

(Where is Kenshin? The guys have said he’s been busy lately, but work for a whole week without a break?)

She frowns slightly at her phone, letting her gaze linger on her lock screen before pocketing it. In the short couple of months since she first met them in the cafe on that fateful day, she likes to think that they’ve all grown pretty close. Sasuke was right - despite their taboo work, they are all wonderful people she has come to truly care about. The nature of their work still makes her uncomfortable despite herself, but it’s a hurdle she knows she can overcome.

The streets are relatively sparse as she continues on her way, her eyes naturally wandering to glance at the shop windows and their immaculate displays. The stagnant thought of Kenshin’s absence remains idle in her mind, and she lets her mind drift back to an earlier conversation.

~

[ “Hey, Sasuke? Kenshin said he was a gigolo, right? Do you...happen to know what that entails?”

“Hmm, I myself haven’t asked about details, but from what I gather he acts more like an escort than as a traditional male prostitute. He has mentioned that despite working in the sex industry, he personally stays away from anything of the sort.”

“Huh? But then, why is he in the industry if he doesn’t even like it?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know, ___. That would be something you would have to ask him yourself.” ]

~

(An escort, huh? Like, arm candy for women? I can’t imagine Kenshin being like that.)

So lost in her thoughts, she barely registers the person in front of her until after she bumps into their shoulder. Blinking in shock and stumbling slightly to regain her balance, she whirls around.

“I’m sorr--oh!”

Her apology dies on her lips and her eyes widen as hues of the sea and forest meet hers, his own gaze flickering with shock in return.

The shoulder she bumped into belonged to none other than the very man on her mind. Dressed in a royal blue button-up shirt with a black blazer and jeans, he looks like a contemporary model, the way his blonde hair perfectly sculpts the unfairly chiselled line of his jaw only strengthening the case.

A small cough purposefully made to draw one’s attention does just that, her eyes meeting those a woman, her arm looped comfortably - and in a very showboating way - around Kenshin’s bicep. She is an older woman - around her mid-40s - and dressed to the nines. Her hair is pulled to the side in an elegant bun, the cut of her dress showcasing her slender collarbone and fitting her shape beautifully; one wouldn’t guess she was an older woman from afar, only up close could the subtle crow’s feet etched into the corners of her eyes be noticed, giving an indication of her experience in life.

“I understand he’s handsome, my dear, but you should at least finish the apology before letting your eyes wander.”

Her lightly reprimanding teasing tone makes her blink, a wave of embarrassment rushing through her.

“Uh, sorry. I wasn’t stuttering because of that. I--”

“Oh?” She cuts her off, her eyes crinkling as they narrow, analysing her closely.

She sinks back under her scrutinising gaze, unsure of where to direct her own.

“I would ask you not to intimidate her, Madame.”

Kenshin, who has remained silent, finally speaks, tugging his arm softly to draw the woman’s eyes up to him.

“She’s...a friend. We met outside of work and she knows nothing of my work except in name.”

The woman’s lips purse. Meanwhile, she lets out a silent breath at Kenshin’s saving words, scared she was about to be death-stared into the ground by a woman she had never met. After a moment, the older woman’s lips curl into a refined yet jovial smile, a small reserved chuckle leaving her.

“Ah, what was I thinking? Of course you’re not a client of his. I could have easily guessed that from your appearance alone, but professional jealousy got the better of me.”

Both she and Kenshin blink at the woman’s words, unsure if they heard her correctly.

“Excuse me?”

She meets her gaze, her rouge lips maintaining a kind smile but her eyes dance like a snake’s, taunting and circling its defenceless prey, “Oh, I mean no offence, my dear. It’s just that this man is quite highly sought after by the elites of this city. Someone of your...calibre wouldn’t be lucky or rich enough to afford his services.”

Her aimed jab is precise as it sinks into her heart, piercing in and letting her emotions loose to consume her being. Sadistically predatory eyes crinkle her crow’s feet further as she watches the young girl drop her gaze to the ground.

Her arm around Kenshin’s tightens as she pulls him with an authoritative air, “Come now, Kenshin. We have more to do.”

The clicking of her heels against the pavement echo for one step, then two. Then they stop, the additional two clicks less graceful as her feet stumble to keep herself upright. Kenshin stands steadfast, his form refusing to budge as the woman tried to walk away, his eyes trained on the younger woman still staring at her feet.

“Kenshin. Don’t forget what I’m paying you for your services and the conditions in place.” The silent threat in her tone has Kenshin looking over his shoulder to meet her eyes, his heterochromatic gaze as contrasting as the icy burn of his glare aimed at the woman.

“That gives you no reason to insult ___ so callously. I already told you she has no place in my work life, so leave your petty jealousy aside when you speak to her.”

The woman baulks, eyebrows shooting up in clear shock. “You...you used her name. You--”

Her stuttering halts at his hand resting atop hers to re-secure her grip on him, “Enough of this pointless chatter. You had more to do, didn’t you Madame?”

“Y-Yes, I did.” The woman clears her throat to compose herself, but the shock dilating her pupils still remains, “Let’s go, then.”

“Of course, Madame.”

Kenshin casts one more cursory glance at his friend, her face still cast down yet her eyes peek up at him through the veil of her hair. His eyes narrow, his facial expression complex and just before he turns his back and walks away--

“I’m sorry, ___.”

She blinks, her face frozen in shock. The softness of his voice, she wasn’t sure if it was the same man she has known with how frail his words fell from his mouth. Compared to the robotic monotone of his voice as he addressed the other woman, she wasn’t sure if what she just heard was something her confused brain conjured up just to toy with her more. Left gobsmacked and confused, the only thing she can do is watch him walk away.

(He...apologised?)

Kenshin wasn’t one for the flowery language of compliments and apologies, so having those words - words seemingly unheard of in Kenshin’s vocabulary - leave his lips, she knew he was genuinely sorry for what happened.

She wills her legs to turn around and carry her home, determined to put the entire incident behind her. Yet the encounter plays like a broken record on repeat in her mind and she reaches up to tug the scarf tighter still around her neck, hoping in vain that this will somehow cut off the thoughts from crawling into her mind and infesting her every thought.

Unbeknownst to her, he was hoping for the same, his sculpted lips pursed together in both thought and irritation as he grasps at reason to keep his attention on the woman he adorns for the day. The words she speaks go mostly missed by Kenshin, as they so often do, but this time his focus is infinitely more clouded; his mind is back with her, her downcast expression, the glimmer of shock highlighting the bright hues of her eyes. He can’t get her out of his head.

The two will never know how perfectly they share their turmoil, nor how both of them reach the same conclusion:

(I need to know more.) (She needs to know more.)

[astranemus]

So then what do you think time is and how it functions then, if not linearly? (Different anon, and i agree that time is non linear but im curious of your thoughts)

Apologies for taking solong to answer this anon, things have been fairly hectic with mystudies recently and I wanted to give this question the attention itdeserves.

So I think to begin it might befruitful to examine the image of temporal linearity itself. We imaginetime to be linear, certainly, but interestingly, we take thatlinearity to be horizontal, and running from left to right. This is alargely arbitrary assignation, of course – there’s no reason wecouldn’t talk of time running from right to left, or down to up, orvice versa. Yet these strike most of us as deeply unintuitive, I’dimagine. I suspect this may result in part from our use of language,and more specifically, the written word – much writing,particularly in the West, is written and read from left to right;this may implant some kind of temporal ordering into our minds whichmight otherwise not be present, that that which comes “before” is“to the left of” that which comes “after”. I’d be interestedin reading up on notions of temporalisation in pre-literate culturesor individuals, or cultures which do not conform to this left-rightstructuring of writing; I know Arabic reverses this, and some Asianlanguages occasionally write vertically. So I am perfectly open tobeing entirely wrong on this point, but I think it gives a littlepeek into the constructed nature of our time-as-linear metaphor as anice starting point.

We could alsofruitfully imagine time to be vertical, instead of horizontal. Inthis way, the past lies beneath the present, beneath our feet –both metaphorically and literally. The sediment-layer of the presentvanishes as it passes into the past and is covered over by thenow-present. Memory is thus an archaeology – a matter of diggingbeneath the surface of the now to find the traces of the past whichstill exist within the present, buried, compressed and distorted bythe passing of time, the piling of layer-upon-layer of the now-present upon theonce-was-present. Here we have time-depths; that which is mostdistant from us in time is hidden deeper in the darkness of the pastbeneath the visible layer of the present. At this point, however, itmight be worth noting that the “past” does not have to be a realthing at all on this model –instead of the past being a real timewhich is other-than-present, we instead have a progressive layeringof present-upon-present, whereby the “past” which is theinvisible present of earth-beneath-our-feet conditions the visiblepresent as the surface upon which we walk; the topography of thepresent is informed by the presenceof the “past” - nothing ever vanishes entirely but instead comesto constitute the non-visible portion of the visible immediacy of ourexperience.* Past things and events do not continue to “exist” inany meaningful sense as past,but remain present in altered form, as other than that which we taketo be presently-existing objects and events; the past is the hand inthe sock-puppet of the present, to take a ridiculous example I justthought of – both are present, one is simply removed from view andfrom that hidden place directly influences the shape of the visible surface which we take to constitute the totality of the present.

(This is quite long, so more below the cut.)

Whatis worth noting at this point is that all of these metaphors areinherently spatial.This, of course, leads us to general relativity and the notion ofspacetime. We know for a fact that observations of more distantobjects are in fact ghosts of those objects – the light receivedfrom a distant star actually occurred in that stars distant past; thelight may already have gone out. Space and time are thus inextricablylinked, for to be distant in space is also to be distant in time. Butspace, and thus time, are relative to the observer – the closer Itravel to the speed of light, the less the Earth appears to be aglobe and the flatter it becomes, in actuality, to me. Thus I cantravel distances in durations of time which, for me, are less than should bepossible judging from my velocity and the distance I travel foranother observer; time slows locally/space dilates for observers travelling athigher relative velocity. (See muons in relation to relativity for some illustrations of this.) Thus, spatial location, temporal durationand relative motion within the spacetime structure appear to beinextricably linked – space and time both warp as I travel faster,what is “Now” for me is not “Now” for you if we are at greatdistance or travelling at greatly variant velocities.

Whatthis tells me is that both space and time are functions of being anembodied entity existing within the world. My “Now” is onlymore-or-less congruent with your “Now” because we are nottravelling at dramatically different speeds, are not particularly farapart, and exist within the same gravity well (since gravity alsowarps space-time). In other words, what appears to be the reality ofthe situation is collective bubbles of “Nowness” which occuraround different celestial objects – there is a “Now” ofrelative Earth-time, a “Now” of relative Sol-system time, and soon.**  The greater the size of the “Now”-bubble, the less coherentthat “Now” appears to be, whereas if we collapse this“Now”-bubble down to the smallest possible point, we arrive atthe presence of an observer for whom “Now” is simply theimmediacy of experience. To use another spatial illustration, “Nowness” on this account is radial, rather than linear - what is further from the centre of my experience-observation is more distant in both space and time, less immediate and real for me; “Now” does not move along a line nor do I travel through a separate time-dimension, but “Now” is simply that which is most immediate in my experience. What is not present for me has no causalimpact upon me – it simply does not exist for me, Hereand Now. That star I see exists for me, here and “Now”, while if I were “there” Iwould know that it has in fact gone supernova, and did so some timeago. Any and all implications of that fact of the star’s “actual” non-existence can only evertravel at the speed of light and are therefore not immediate for me “Now”, thus we are restricted to “Now” asa reality constituted by a bubble of space-time localised upon my centre of observation within whichchanges will meaningfully affect me in a relevant time-frame – whathas no effect on me, what is not observable, is not “Now”, not “real” in anymeaningful sense of the term.

This notion of a relevant time-frame is an important one, however. Wemight imagine an entity for whom a thought occurs every thousandyears, at which point events which appear distant (spatially andtemporally) and “unreal” to us, such as a supernova somethousands of lightyears away, would have a perceptible impact uponsuch an entity’s immediate experience, as it would occur relativelyquickly within such an entity’s relative time-frame. Meanwhile,things which move at a faster pace at a closer proximity would belargely irrelevant and equally “unreal” to it; anything whichoccurs at a resolution finer than the grain of perception of such abeing would simply not register as really existent, somewhat as we donot notice the moments of temporary blindness which occur as our eyesflit from point to point in saccades.

Theupshot of all this is that there is no absolute time dimensionthrough which everything moves at a consistent rate. What is “Now”in one place and time is many years distant for those places whichare also many lightyears distant in space, or moving at great relative velocity.There are only localised bubbles of Nowness which occur around largegravitational bodies or rapidly moving observers – in other words,time is the way an observer parses change in the local environmenti.e. the way a mind interprets re-arranging circumstances. Time islocalised because perceptible change is localised, which is truebecause we are embodied beings existing at a particular nexus ofspace-time with limited sensory capacities which operate at a givenfrequency (given by the movement of your particles); we can onlyobserve the small circle of Now which our senses allow for. Time is change, the movement of particles at a given frequency; up therelative frequency of your particles and the world slows down relative to your perception, reduce the frequency and theuniverse flies by. Dive into a black hole and watch the universe endbefore your eyes (assuming you’ve worked out a way not to be torn topieces); since the rate of apparent change is a function of your frequency as the relative movement of your particles, entering deeper gravity wellsexerts a greater pull upon your particles, slowing them down and thusslowing your frequency, making everything else appear faster.

We exist within arelative Here-Now space-time bubble, and the further you move in yourobservations from this centre, the less “present” thingsbecome for you. Each relative gravity-well has its own relativeHere-Now, from person, to planet, to solar system, to galaxy, tosupercluster, to the universe in toto. The only point of view fromwhich everything happens simultaneously in an absolute peresent isthe point of view of the universe, and from that perspective,everything has already happened – an absolute Now is a finality; having no localised perspective, everything simply occurs all at once, ending in an instant.The only point of view from which time flows at all is anembodied one situated within the space-time matrix, at which point,Now becomes a relative concept directly tied to Here, both of whichonly have meaning because of “I”; I am Here, Now. No observer, no Here,no Now, no time, no motion, no space, no time. Nothing. The presenceof the observer is what makes the observable possible – time is notan absolute, linear dimension through which we move or which movesthrough the present, but it is a direct result of our beingperceiving beings which exist in the world; time is part of theprocess of sentient life, not an objective feature of the universe.

*I believe David Abrams discusses this in his book Spell of the Sensuous - the past is the present which is refused (unavailable, inaccessible, beneath our feet) whilst the future is the present which is withheld (behind, the “other side” of an object) accessible by motion and change. It’s a great book which I very much recommend reading.

**(Therewould also be relatively localised “Now”s for observerstravelling at great relative speed within these bubbles; say I’m zoomingaround at near light speed within the solar system - if I do this fora year and then stop, far longer than a year will have passed outsidemy movement-induced Now-bubble.)

P.S. Forthe more scientifically minded amongst you, I highly recommend thislecture by Carlo Rovelli, The Physics and Philosophy of Time. WhilstI haven’t studied physics for some time and may be misunderstandingand/or misapplying some of his concepts, I believe the account I havejust described is relatively consistent with the current science ifnot being its direct implication. He does a good job of not being over-technical but the nature of the subject requires a certain degree of familiarity with physics from what I remember.

Apologies also if I’ve butchered any of the science - feel free to correct me, physicists!

[marginalgloss]

toybox mentality

The thing about Milkman by Anna Burns, if it was described in the abstract, is that it might sound a bit dour. A bit unsettling. A bit difficult. This is a book about the Troubles, sometime in the late 1970s; it's written from the perspective of a woman who is being stalked by a man who may or may not be an intelligence agent; and the prose unfolds in long paragraphs dense with clauses. It is lucid, and sometimes exacting. Is it difficult? Kind of. 

Certainly it was a surprising choice for winning the Booker Prize last year. 'Experimental' novels are sometimes nominated for that prize but frequently don't win. A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James is perhaps the closest recent comparison – both are historical novels, both have a decidedly post-imperial slant, and both have a playful approach to their own textuality. But that's about where the similarities end. James’s novel was a comprehensive take on a very specific set of real events, shaped a great deal of the creative licence that we expect from historical fiction. It was a big, engrossing novel as they might have recognised it in the nineteenth century. Milkman is a very different beast. A more apt comparison might be with James Kelman's How Late it Was How Late, which won the Booker back in 1994. That, perhaps, was one of the last truly controversial prizewinners, with one of the judging committee threatening to resign if it won.

Bizarrely, wikipedia currently describes Kelman's book as belonging to the 'stream of consciousness' genre, which seems like a peculiar sort of inverse elitism. If we accept that description (though it is more or less meaningless) one might well file Milkman alongside Kelman’s book even though they are written in very different styles. What they do have in common is a certain way of thinking about life as it exists under a state of imperial power and near-constant conflict. The causes of said conflict are so far removed from the lives of ordinary people so as to be rendered incomprehensible to the reader. Clearly there is an occupation of some sorts but how it came about might as well be the stuff of legends. But for both authors, language becomes a refuge for the spirit of the individual, and a means of passive resistance.

There are a couple of mistakes it is easy to make with books of this nature. The first is the 'stream of consciousness' misconception – the idea that in scanning each line we are somehow plugged straight in to the narrator's thinking, talking, acting, being. Joyce has a good deal to answer for in this regard, but the blame oughtn't to be laid at his feet; the problem is more to do with what is done to Joyce than what he actually did, since there is a great deal more to Ulysses than Molly Bloom's chapter. Describing a thing as a 'stream of consciousness' is invariably reductive. It assumes that what we're reading is the sum total of an individual, more so perhaps than if they were telling us a story in a sort of campside voice. And it's a convenient way of treating language that might appear disorderly or unconventional as if it were a kind of aberration. 

This leads us on to the second mistake one can make with a book like Milkman – mistaking the music of the text for a written recording of speech. Rather than looking at the words as words, if one takes this approach there's a tendency to become mired in concerns about historical and cultural accuracy. We start to make judgments line-by-line about accents, class, and status. Questions of meaning become sublimated to thoughts of whether or not what we read is accurate. And in most cases the only guide we have for this kind of accuracy is our own prejudice. Language is thus reduced to a signifier of authenticity.  

Questions of authenticity sound throughout every page of Milkman. It begins with the title: the 'Milkman' himself is the aforementioned spy-stalker, and not really a milk-delivering-person at all; the narrator is careful to differentiate him from the 'real milkman', a totally different man who actually delivers the milk and maintains an active belligerence towards local partisan groups and, in fact, pretty much everyone in the community. Most of the other characters in the book aren't properly named, and are referred to only in relative terms – from 'maybe-boyfriend' to 'third brother-in-law' and all varieties of familial relations in between. The point is that in this community, naming names puts a person beyond the pale, or worse – but since gossip forms the metabolism of the community, talking about things without using their true names becomes an essential part of everyday life. 

This creates a sort of puzzle for the reader. Part of the work necessary is in unpicking the narrator's oblique references to what has come before, and what will come after; we have to work a bit to decipher, to cross-reference. A family tree would have been helpful for the reader, if dangerous for the narrator: we get the impression that all this obscuring with name-confusion is part of the point. The impression is of a text that has been coded for safety. Yet it isn't coded in such a way as to truly anonymise everything. Ireland itself is never explicitly mentioned here, but it would be impossible to mistake this for a book about anywhere else.

This raises a question which I feel entirely unequipped to answer: does this process of un-naming render the book more equivocal than it would be otherwise? I found it hard to find much in the way of politics in Milkman. There's little here of the outright anti-imperialism we can find in James Kelman. Instead, the narrator maintains a sort of light contempt for both sides in the conflict. Their motivations are always obscure. History is expressed mainly in a record of tragedies, most of which seem more or less gruesome and inexplicable. The present conflict is a heap of local dogs with their throats cut by the state forces; it is the scurrilous rumours about a car part from a Bentley, which may or may not bear the British flag; it is the local agents threatening a group of second-wave feminists, before the local women calm them with a show of practical contempt for the ‘toybox mentality’ of the renouncers. 

All of this seems horrible and absurd, all the more stark because it is stripped of much of the context that would enable an understanding of how the world came to be like it is. Everyone is about as bad as everyone else, except for the few who aren't. It is all only boys playing with their toys. Another unanswerable question: is the pursuit of this literary effect only a way of side-stepping awkward questions about cause and effect, or is it a sincere representation of how it felt to grow up in such a society? Milkman isn't exactly apolitical, but it doesn't seem especially invested, or interested, in any kind of ideology outside the survival of an individual consciousness. 

Black comedy is very much the dominant tone here. At first something will happen that seems as though it's going to lead to disaster until (in most cases) the author slowly deflates the issue. There's a sort of tension between the constant aura of threat and the linguistic thicket thrown up by the narrator's incessant thinking and talking. Language becomes her only means of defense, and sometimes her means of attack. Absurdity is part of the comedy at play, but it's a very specific sort of absurdity. Flann O'Brien feels like a fair stylistic comparison: we have here the same relish in verbosity, that same arch, dilated, expansive use of language. 

And yet for all the tension there is no quietude. The narrator is not actually threatened into silence. The overwhelming presence of the text is proof of that. There is no anxiety here – quite the opposite. In life we're given to understand the narrator is bookish and somewhat solitary but in her own story she is in absolute control. This is not a surreal novel in the way of O'Brien. The narrator here is always specific. Words are used to say precisely what they mean, but the narrative could be called a literal interpretation rather than a transcription. To put it another way: we are told exactly what the characters say, think and do, but we aren't told it in their own words. The question of reliability never seems to come up. We trust her, I suppose, because we must trust her. In a meaningful sense there isn't really anyone else in this novel.

Sometimes this feels suffocating. This is a long book: a tad under 350 close-set pages in paperback. It feels its length. I have sympathy for criticisms I've read that take aim at the narrator's tendency to repeat the same adjectives under slightly different names. This kind of repetition, recollection, raking-over (for that is what she does) isn’t the literary maximalism it could be mistaken for; I think it has more in common with a certain kind of minimalism, given the focus on a relatively small, specific quadrant of human experience. 

It is exhausting to read because it attempts to be exhaustive. What we're left with is a book which tries obsessively to re-word, re-frame, re-cast a certain very specific sort of strange experience in a strange place in a strange time – a young powerless woman being followed obsessively by a powerful older man. Until eventually the sheer weight of the thing itself – the book – wrenches the situation around until this dynamic of power is neatly, effectively inverted. Would it work if the book weren't so weighty? I'm not sure. 

[jilisilver]

The lazarus effect cast

DOWNLOAD NOW The lazarus effect cast

#THE LAZARUS EFFECT CAST MOVIE#

She has by far the most intriguing role, taking Zoe from voice of reason to demonic hellbeast. Even playing a vaguely villainous nerd, Duplass remains loose and natural, riffing his way through ludicrous exposition and bantering with the very game Wilde. It’s all deeply unsatisfying.Īt least the actors valiantly labor to breathe life into the limp narrative. A dash of “The Thing” here, a dollop of “The Fury” there - topped with cardboard characters and superficial treatment of Big Questions involving life and death, science and religion. As zombie Zoe develops crazy powers (telekinesis, mind reading, the ability to fully dilate her pupils at will), everyone including Frank just sits around waiting to see what happens next. The answer turns out to be a whole slew of horror tropes (one half expects “Flatliners”-era Kiefer Sutherland to show up ranting, “Our sins have come back in a physical form!”), but no genuine scares, and certainly nothing visceral enough to threaten the bloodless PG-13 rating.Ĭredited scribes Luke Dawson (“Shutter”) and Jeremy Slater (the upcoming “Fantastic Four” reboot) clearly aim to reimagine Frankenstein (down to the name of Duplass’ sorta-mad scientist), but the script is quite literally made up of recycled parts.

#THE LAZARUS EFFECT CAST MOVIE#

That’s when “The Lazarus Effect” morphs from the kind of pseudo-intellectual science thriller that forces its cast to recite meaningless technical jargon in an attempt to sound smart into a full-blown horror movie forcing the same characters to act as dumb as humanly possible. The stakes soon escalate past the point of no return when a covert attempt to re-create the resurrection results in Zoe losing her life, and Frank taking extreme measures to bring her back. Meanwhile, the couple’s support staff - computer whiz Niko (Donald Glover), who nurses a crush on Zoe, pothead idea man Clay (Evan Peters) and newly hired videographer Ava (Sarah Bolger) - don’t seem particularly fazed by the fact that they’ve brought a formerly living creature back from the dead, though Clay has his reservations after a late night alone with the dog. It doesn’t help when she notices the undead pup isn’t exactly acting normal. Zoe is a little more conflicted, thanks to a strong dose of Catholic guilt and mysterious recurring nightmares from her childhood. At least, that’s what Frank hopes to achieve by hooking up various deceased animals, including a pig and a dog, to an elaborate machine and injecting them with a fancy resuscitation serum. When the ongoing trials actually succeed in reanimating a departed canine, Frank is thrilled. Still, even a modest opening weekend will ensure a profit before toxic word of mouth kills this stinker for good.Īs a follow-up to the heralded foodie documentary “Jiro Dreams of Sushi,” this is certainly an odd selection for director David Gelb at the very least, it’s the strangest doc-to-horror left turn since Joe Berlinger’s “Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2.” But as with that notorious disappointment, the offbeat choice of helmer isn’t reflected in the anonymous final product (though “Lazarus” leading lady Olivia Wilde does nosh on sushi in one early scene).įor reasons never made entirely clear, romantically entangled scientific researchers Frank ( Mark Duplass) and Zoe (Wilde) have spent several years at a California university getting closer and closer to their ultimate goal: resurrecting the dead. Completed back in 2013 and originally set for release via Lionsgate, the low-budget pic subsequently landed at Relativity, which just last year teamed with producing shingle Blumhouse to distribute the imaginative and unsettling “Oculus.” No such luck this time around, as “Lazarus” shamelessly steals from superior genre efforts and lacks any distinguishing traits beyond a wildly overqualified cast. Appropriately enough for a horror-thriller about raising the dead, “ The Lazarus Effect” has spent the past few years sitting on a shelf, developing quite a stench in the process.

DOWNLOAD NOW The lazarus effect cast

[scepticaladventure]

25  Gravity, Time and Light  6Sep18

Introduction In essence, Special Relativity is a systematic attempt to describe the physics of things that move fast, based up on postulates about light, and General Relativity is an attempt to include gravity. Hence a good question at the core of it all is “How does gravity affect the speed of light?” You might think this is a simple question but have a look at the Internet. Confusion reigns!

Sources of Confusion I think a lot of the confusion comes from lack of precision in the question. If Relativity has taught us anything it has taught us to be wary about simple questions about time, distance and speed. We have learnt we must first specify “Who is the observer and what is their situation?” We have learnt that the answers to simple questions about lengths, durations and speeds depend on how they are measured and in what circumstances are they measured - everything is relative.

Hence the speed of light in a strong gravitational field as measured by a local observer who is also embedded in that field might be different from a result obtained by a distant observer well away from the massive object creating the field.

It turns out that the speed of light is affected by a gravitational field, but so to (in fact hence) is local time keeping and so the local speed of light as measured by that local observer is the same as usual. The slowdown is undetectable. But from a more distant perspective the slowdown in the speed of light does become detectable.

Another source of confusion comes from the interrelated complexity between time, distance and speed. In a world where time can run fast or slow, distances can contract and Euclidean geometry may not hold true, the meaning of measurements and hence the quantification of physical properties becomes treacherous.

A third source of confusion comes from confused people teaching confused or confusing messages to innocent student, often with absolute conviction e.g. that the speed of light is a universal invariant that its always and everywhere the same.

What is Time? I was watching a science program the other day and the reporter asked a group of astrophysicists attending a theoretical physics conference in Ontario – what is time? Well they um’d and ah’d and said it was a difficult question and so on. They could not give a ready answer in plain English.

So let me have a go. Firstly the word itself covers two sorts of concepts – a way of tagging a river of events which may or may not be linked causally, and durations between events. Or to take a simple example – If you ask a time keeper at a sports event “What is the time?” she may reply “Do you mean the time of day, or the result of some competitor’s performance in an event?”

The underlying concept is causality. If an event A causes an event B then we say that A occurs before or simultaneously with Event B. No-one has ever witnessed causality running backwards, so we assume that it is a strictly one way affair.

When we come across physical phenomena with a repetitive regularity about them, such as the vibrations of a quartz crystal, we can use it to create a useful clock and hence create a measure of local time durations.

If we standardize such clocks to each other we can start to talk about the time more generally, and we can give an elementary answer to the question “what is the agreed exact time of day?”. But this is a man made convention. We have to be careful not to assume that our concepts can be applied well beyond the scope in which they were created. For example, we cannot assume that the whole Universe is embedded in some sort of all embracing river of time with a Universal standard clock somewhere.

Once we start to consider events on a cosmological scale, or in fast moving situations, we have come to understand that our normal day-to-day concepts of time do not suffice. Different observers can measure different time durations for the interval between the same two events. Time can be observed to run slow, not because clocks are distorted but because the finite speed of light means that the very concept of ‘what happens when’ needs to be reconsidered. Over and above that it turns out that time also runs slow in a gravitational field.

So time is nothing more than mankind’s attempt to quantify intervals between events. It is a manmade construct overlaid on reality, nothing more. It has no independent reality. In fact it can be considered to be a widely shared illusion. And a treacherous one at that.

Definitions and Standards of Measurement Let’s look at the simple equation c = D/T where c is the speed of light, D is a measure of distance travelled and T is a measure of time duration. For this to have any meaning we need an agreed way of measuring D and T and we need agreed units of measurement for both D and T. But where to start?

In the modern world our standards of measurement start with time.

Since the 1970’s there has been an international agreement that a standard second is defined by a set number of oscillations in the electromagnetic radiation (i.e. light) emitted by hyperfine transitions within Caesium 133 atoms held in certain conditions. A standard meter is then defined as being the distance travelled by this light in 1/299,792,458 standard seconds.

It then follows axiomatically that the standard speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second. If nothing else this helps to pin down some terminology. But it does not mean that the actual speed of light will always be the same as the standard speed of light. A trivial example is if the light is travelling through glass. It’s slower. A more complicated example is if the light is travelling across a spiral galaxy.

Note that this whole approach to the definition of standards could have started in a different way. For example, a standard meter could have been defined as the distance between two scratches on a bar of metal held at a precise temperature in a specified location (e.g. Paris), and a standard second could then have been defined by the time taken for light to travel a set number of meters. Or a standard second could have been defined using an atomic clock and the speed of light could have been left out of it altogether, which is what used to happen before the current system was adopted.

There are three spatial dimensions and only one time dimension, so a democratic approach suggests we should start with defining distance and then move on to define time. Seriously though, length is a lot more observable and tangible than time. We can see and touch and run a ruler over the length of a thing. Time is invisible and intangible.

Timekeeping is always (as far as I can tell) based on motion of some sort, whether this be vibrations in a quartz crystal, the swing of a pendulum or the rotation of a planet. And since motion involves both distance and time, defining time durations based on the motions of things seems a little bit tricky. If time did not exist, how would we know anything was moving? The answer is that we could see things happening – things doing things to other things. Causality at work. But this would offer no guarantees about the nature of time. For example, if everything in the Universe speeded up by 10%, how could we tell?  

Furthermore, we know from experiments that time is affected by motion (Lorentzian time dilation) and by gravity (gravitational time dilation). So time is a rubbery phenomenon and in some situations it is a deceptive illusion.

Length is also affected by motion (Lorentzian contraction). This is a small effect in extreme circumstances, but it is nevertheless quite real. It was realized from experiments on the speed of light and came to become a key feature of the Theory of Special Relativity. But nobody, as far as I know, has been able to demonstrate length contraction in a simple experiment or demonstration. And I have never seen a photo-montage showing a Lorentz contracted object.

It is very difficult to hold up ruler against a physical object travelling at relativistic speeds in a straight line and be  able to record both ends at exactly the same time. The closest experiments I know of come from studies of high speed collisions between atomic nuclei at the Brookhaven Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. The heavy nuclei have a non-zero radius and the dynamics of the collisions give the results expected if the nuclei are Lorentz contracted into disks. However, the Brookhaven accelerator is not a linear accelerator and this brings into play the theoretical complications of rotating and accelerated systems (see for example the Ehrenfest rotating disc paradox). Determining the effective radii of the ions is also problematical.

The three spatial dimensions of an object in spacetime are tangible. You can see and touch and measure lengths, widths and heights. You can put a ruler next to them. Time durations on the other hand are anything but simple, especially if the object is moving. You need to specify the situation of the observer very carefully. You need to carry the same clock from one event to the other or else to use a carefully synchronised set of clocks.

Time is a consequential parameter. It is the consequence of causality. At heart maybe the only thing you can be sure of is that Event A causes Event B, then Event A occurs before Event B. This also creates the Arrow of Time. In other words time is a one way phenomenon. You can never re-measure the exact same time interval, nor can you ever measure a time duration in back to front order.

The usual way to bridge from the world of tangible spatial dimensions to a world that involves time, motion, momentum and energy is to involve the speed of light.

What is an Inertial Reference Frame? After studying the results of experiments by Bradley, Eotvos, Roemer and Fizeau (and presumably Michelson and Morley, which he failed to acknowledge) Einstein simply postulated that that the speed of light in vacuum in an inertial reference frame is always the same (299,792.458 km/sec).

By inertial reference frame he meant one which is not accelerating, rotating or in a gravitational field. A frame in which test particles weigh nothing and stay still or travel in straight lines unless compelled by a force to do otherwise.

I think that an inertial reference frame is a an idealized concepts which is impossible to find in practice. Everything in the Universe is either spinning, accelerating or affected by gravity.  It was and still is common to say that an inertial reference frame is aligned to the “fixed stars”. However, no-one ever clarifies whether such stars are in our galaxy or beyond it, and what such stars can possible have to do with local physics anyway.

I all my reading I cannot find clarity about whether a satellite in orbit constitutes an inertial reference frame or not. The satellite is undoubtedly within a gravitational field or else it could not be orbiting. But the apparent effects of gravity are undone by the fact that the satellite is in free fall. Or you could consider the force of gravity to have been annulled by the effects of centrifugal acceleration. Either way you look at it test particles inside the satellite will be weightless. So are atomic clocks in this situation subject to gravitational time dilation or not?

I think this is a good question. If the answer is that the gravitational potential at which the satellite orbits does slow down the onboard observers’ clocks then they can determine whether they are free falling in gravity field by measuring the frequency of signals received from deep space, a pulsar say, on their local clock. If the signals are coming in too quickly then their clock is running slow. So they can tell that they are in fact free falling in a gravity field. This violates the Einstein Equivalence Principle, even though some authors will try to wriggle out of it by saying that the experiment is not a local one.

If the answer is no then it suggests that gravitational time dilation only occurs when matter has weight. It also suggests that a centrifugal acceleration can undo gravitational time dilation. Both aspects would be worth deep consideration. There would be interesting implications for the Clock Postulate (see an earlier essay).

As far as I can tell the answer is yes, clocks aboard an orbiting satellite are still subject to a degree of gravitational time dilation, quite apart from Special Relativity effects.

Apart from that an orbiting space station is still a potential candidate to be a localized inertial reference frame. But we have to worry about possible rotational effects.

Sagnac interferometers could be used to detect any spinning of the satellite. If the satellite is managed so that there is no spinning detected in any direction then I guess that the satellite is pretty close to being an inertial reference frame. Now let us look out of the windows of the satellite. It is generally accepted that if telescopes were positioned so that they point at very distant galaxies then those telescopes would remain pointed at those distant galaxies.

But then observers on board the satellite would perceive the Earth going round and round the satellite every orbit. And the Sun and nearly stars would all be going around and around too. So is the satellite spinning or not?

You can see that inertial reference frames are not easy to define in practice!

Einstein and the Speed of Light Between 1905 and 1911 Einstein concentrated on generalizing his description of physics and developed an approach/model that has become known as the Theory of General Relativity. By 1911 he had concluded that in the presence of gravity the speed of light is not a fixed invariant. His model of Special Relativity had to be qualified and elaborated upon. The measured speed of light in a gravitational field becomes a variable depending upon the reference frame of the observer.

His logic is contained in his paper On the Influence of Gravitation on the Propagation of Light', Annalen der Physik, 35, 1911. This predates the full description of his General Theory of Relativity by four years. The result he came up with was expressed mathematically as c’ = (1 + Φ/c2).c   where Φ is the gravitational potential relative to the point where the speed of light is measured.

In other words, light appears to travel slower in stronger gravitational fields. There is a more complete description in Section 3 of ‘The Meaning of Relativity', A. Einstein, Princeton University Press (1955).

In 1915 Einstein revised this calculation to be c’ = (1 + 2Φ/c2).c  In other words he decided the effect was twice a great as he first thought.

Unlike in the inertial reference frames of Special Relativity, the measured speed of light in gravitational fields depends upon the reference frame of the observer. What one observer sees as true, another observer sees as not true, or at least slightly different.

If you wanted to be mischievous you could say that Einstein’s Theory of Special Relativity is based upon his proposition that the speed of light is invariant, and his Theory of General Relativity is based upon his proposition that the speed of light is not invariant.

Time in a Gravity Well We know from the impressive achievements made in recent decades in developing GPS systems that atomic clocks at rest on the surface of the Earth run slower than identical clocks on orbiting satellites.

For GPS to work, atomic clocks on Earth have to be very well synchronised with identical clocks aboard specially designed satellites. There are a variety of relativistic effects in play but the main one is due to the fact that the earthbound clocks are in stronger gravity than the orbiting satellites. The effect of gravitation is slightly reduced by centrifugal accelerations caused by the spin of the Earth. The overall gravitational effect is about 45 microseconds per day.

The gravitational time dilation effect is then adjusted for smaller relativistic effects, the main one being a Special Relativistic time dilation because the satellites are moving fast relative to the earthbound clocks. This offsets the gravitational effect by about 7 microseconds per day, giving a net relative adjustment of 38 microseconds per day.

When the satellites were first deployed the scientists in charge were not totally confident how much fine tuning would be required to get perfect synchronisation, so they allowed for a large degree of post launch adjustment. Now they make most of the adjustments before launch.

Of course gravity can have a direct physical effect on clocks. For example, a pendulum clock could not work without it. But that it not what we are talking about here. We are talking about an impact on time itself.

The way I prefer to think about all this is to start with the experimental fact that gravity has an effect on the speed of light. Then I remind myself that the measure of time can be thought of as physical lengths divided by the speed of light. Hence time durations are affected by gravity. And then every physical quantity involving time, notably every form of energy, is also affected.

Shapiro Time Delay The Shapiro time delay effect, or gravitational time delay effect, is now regarded as one of the classic tests of General Relativity. Radar signals passing near a massive object take slightly longer to travel to a target and longer to return than they would if the mass of the object were not present. The time delay is caused by the slowing passage of light as it moves over a finite distance through a change in gravitational potential.

In “Fourth Test of General Relativity”, Physics Review Letters, 20 1265-1269, 1968, Irwin Shapiro wrote, “Because, according to the general theory, the speed of a light wave depends on the strength of the gravitational potential along its path, these time delays should thereby be increased by almost 2x10−4 sec when the radar pulses pass near the Sun. Such a change, equivalent to 60 km in distance, could now be measured over the required path length to within about 5 to 10% with presently obtainable equipment.”

This test was first confirmed by experiments that ‘bounced’ radar signals off the planet Venus when it was just visible on the far side of the Sun as seen from Earth. It has since been measured using Mercury as well, and also using satellites such as the Cassini probe.

Note that seen from afar the path taken by the photons is a curve in both directions. You might think that this is what makes them take longer, but that is not the best way to think of it. The photons are taking the quickest route possible, but they are still delayed by the presence of the gravity field of the Sun. They do actually slow down in the stronger gravity closer to the Sun.

Light in a Gravity Well If we throw a ball upwards in a gravity field the ball decelerates, comes to a temporary stop at the top of its trajectory, and falls again. If we throw it faster than the Earth’s escape velocity the ball can overcome the overall gravitational attraction of the Earth and fly off into space with a certain amount of residual velocity.

What happens to a photon ejected from the surface of the Sun? Several essays ago we discussed and decided that the photon arrives at its destination detector in a weakened state. By comparison to other photons we can deduce that it has less energy and momentum than when it started and the frequency of its effects upon being absorbed are slower. In other words it reveals that it has become red shifted.

Does this mean that photons must travel slower as they climb higher – just like the ball? No – not at all! In fact the opposite is true (to a tiny extent). In the above section we discussed that the speed of light is faster in a weak field than it is in a strong field, and this is an experimental fact. Therefore the speed of photons (as measured by a distant observer) actually increases as the photons move into a weaker and weaker gravitational field.

This seems paradoxical. The arriving photon is travelling faster when its arrives than when it started, as measured from afar, but it arrives with less energy than when it started.

To understand this I think it is useful to note that the speed of a photon (as observed from afar) has no bearing on its energy level. See my earlier essay about energy remaining the same when photons travel in media with different refractive indices. I think the energy of a photon is embodied in the packet of physical properties it takes with it rather than in the speed of that packet as deduced by an external observer.

So how then does the photon become weaker? And where did the energy that is no longer contained in the photon end up? In the example of the thrown ball, what is going on is that as the ball gains in potential energy it loses kinetic energy until eventually it stops moving for a moment and then starts to fall again. There is a tradeoff between potential energy and kinetic energy. The potential energy can be thought of a being stored in the gravitational interaction between the Earth and the ball.

Much the same thing seems to happen to a photon. As it gains potential energy it loses electro-magnetic energy so that when it arrives it is weaker (i.e. redshifted).

I think this is a partially adequate description of what happens. However, if you want to adopt the Einstein Equivalence Principle as literally true and in some ways a better description of reality, and if you want to replace the greatest force in the Universe with the mathematical trickery of curved spacetime, then you can also explain the result using the language of Doppler shifts related to accelerations in curved spacetime. It also gives the right answer, so it becomes a matter of choice which point of view you want to adopt.

If you do use Einstein’s General Relativity model then note that it is only the perturbation of the time term that is needed in order to come up with the observed results for gravitational redshifts. The full field equations are not needed and there is no need to call upon any warping in the spatial aspects of the spacetime geometry.

Textbook Conventions Textbook explanations of Special Relativity invariably adopt Einstein’s postulate that the speed of light is an invariant constant. Many go further and tidy up all their equations by putting c = 1 and measuring all distances in light-seconds. They then drop c out of all the equations. They also carry over this convention into General Relativity.

However, most of the interesting predictions and effects of General Relativity depend upon the speed of light not being an invariant constant. So (in my opinion) writing c=1 and then omitting it from the equations obscures and confuses the physics of interest. Likewise, defining the speed of light to be exactly 299,792,458 meters per second is confusing unless we call this the standard speed of notional light and allow for the fact that the actual speed of light is slightly different from this in nearly all situations of interest and experience.

Conclusions Light slows down in the presence of gravity and so it is not invariant. But what you measure as its speed depends on how you measure it. A local measurement will not detect any difference. The speed of light is fundamental to the concept, meaning and measurement of time. So unless you can get this sorted out in your own mind, your physics is destined to end up in a muddle. And you would not be alone!

[sciencespies]

There’s Only One Way To Beat The Speed Of Light

https://sciencespies.com/news/theres-only-one-way-to-beat-the-speed-of-light/

There’s Only One Way To Beat The Speed Of Light

In our Universe, there are a few rules that everything must obey. Energy, momentum, and angular momentum are always conserved whenever any two quanta interact. The physics of any system of particles moving forward in time is identical to the physics of that same system reflected in a mirror, with particles exchanged for antiparticles, where the direction of time is reversed. And there’s an ultimate cosmic speed limit that applies to every object: nothing can ever exceed the speed of light, and nothing with mass can ever reach that vaunted speed.

Over the years, people have developed very clever schemes to try and circumvent this last limit. Theoretically, they’ve introduced tachyons as hypothetical particles that could exceed the speed of light, but tachyons are required to have imaginary masses, and do not physically exist. Within General Relativity, sufficiently warped space could create alternative, shortened pathways over what light must traverse, but our physical Universe has no known wormholes. And while quantum entanglement can create “spooky” action at a distance, no information is ever transmitted faster than light.

But there is one way to beat the speed of light: enter any medium other than a perfect vacuum. Here’s the physics of how it works.

Light is nothing more than an electromagnetic wave, with in-phase oscillating electric and magnetic … [+] fields perpendicular to the direction of light’s propagation. The shorter the wavelength, the more energetic the photon, but the more susceptible it is to changes in the speed of light through a medium.

And1mu / Wikimedia Commons

Light, you have to remember, is an electromagnetic wave. Sure, it also behaves as a particle, but when we’re talking about its propagation speed, it’s far more useful to think of it not only as a wave, but as a wave of oscillating, in-phase electric and magnetic fields. When it travels through the vacuum of space, there’s nothing to restrict those fields from traveling with the amplitude they’d naturally choose, defined by the wave’s energy, frequency, and wavelength. (Which are all related.)

But when light travels through a medium — that is, any region where electric charges (and possibly electric currents) are present — those electric and magnetic fields encounter some level of resistance to their free propagation. Of all the things that are free to change or remain the same, the property of light that remains constant is its frequency as it moves from vacuum to medium, from a medium into vacuum, or from one medium to another.

If the frequency stays the same, however, that means the wavelength must change, and since frequency multiplied by wavelength equals speed, that means the speed of light must change as the medium you’re propagating through changes.

Schematic animation of a continuous beam of light being dispersed by a prism. Note how the wave … [+] nature of light is both consistent with and a deeper explanation of the fact that white light can be broken up into differing colors.

Wikimedia Commons user LucasVB

One spectacular demonstration of this is the refraction of light as it passes through a prism. White light — like sunlight — is made up of light of a continuous, wide variety of wavelengths. Longer wavelengths, like red light, possess smaller frequencies, while shorter wavelengths, like blue light, possess larger frequencies. In a vacuum, all wavelengths travel at the same speed: frequency multiplied by wavelength equals the speed of light. The bluer wavelengths have more energy, and so their electric and magnetic fields are stronger than the redder wavelength light.

When you pass this light through a dispersive medium like a prism, all of the different wavelengths respond slightly differently. The more energy you have in your electric and magnetic fields, the greater the effect they experience from passing through a medium. The frequency of all light remains unchanged, but the wavelength of higher-energy light shortens by a greater amount than lower-energy light.

As a result, even though all light travels slower through a medium than vacuum, redder light slows by a slightly smaller amount than blue light, leading to many fascinating optical phenomena, such as the existence of rainbows as sunlight breaks into different wavelengths as it passes through water drops and droplets.

When light transitions from vacuum (or air) into a water droplet, it first refracts, then reflects … [+] off of the back, and at last refracts back into vacuum (or air). The angle that the incoming light makes with the outgoing light always peaks at an angle of 42 degrees, explaining why rainbows always make the same angle on the sky.

KES47 / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain

In the vacuum of space, however, light has no choice — irrespective of its wavelength or frequency — but to travel at one speed and one speed only: the speed of light in a vacuum. This is also the speed that any form of pure radiation, such as gravitational radiation, must travel at, and also the speed, under the laws of relativity, that any massless particle must travel at.

But most particles in the Universe have mass, and as a result, they have to follow slightly different rules. If you have mass, the speed of light in a vacuum is still your ultimate speed limit, but rather than being compelled to travel at that speed, it’s instead a limit that you can never attain; you can only approach it.

The more energy you put into your massive particle, the closer it can move to the speed of light, but it must always travel more slowly. The most energetic particles ever made on Earth, which are protons at the Large Hadron Collider, can travel incredibly close to the speed of light in a vacuum: 299,792,455 meters-per-second, or 99.999999% the speed of light.

Time dilation (L) and length contraction (R) show how time appears to run slower and distances … [+] appear to get smaller the closer you move to the speed of light. As you approach the speed of light, clocks dilate towards time not passing at all, while distances contract down to infinitesimal amounts.

WIKIMEDIA COMMONS USERS ZAYANI (L) AND JROBBINS59 (R)

No matter how much energy we pump into those particles, we can only add more “9s” to the right of that decimal place, however. We can never reach the speed of light.

Or, more accurately, we can never reach the speed of light in a vacuum. That is, the ultimate cosmic speed limit, of 299,792,458 m/s is unattainable for massive particles, and simultaneously is the speed that all massless particles must travel at.

But what happens, then, if we travel not through a vacuum, but through a medium instead? As it turns out, when light travels through a medium, its electric and magnetic fields feel the effects of the matter that they pass through. This has the effect, when light enters a medium, of immediately changing the speed at which light travels. This is why, when you watch light enter or leave a medium, or transition from one medium to another, it appears to bend. The light, while free to propagate unrestricted in a vacuum, has its propagation speed and its wavelength depend heavily on the properties of the medium it travels through.

Light passing from a negligible medium through a dense medium, exhibiting refraction. Light comes in … [+] from the lower right, strikes the prism and partially reflects (top), while the remainder is transmitted through the prism (center). The light that passes through the prism appears to bend, as it travels at a slower speed than the light traveling through air did earlier. When it re-emerged from the prism, it refracts once again, returning to its original speed.

Wikimedia Commons user Spigget

However, particles suffer a different fate. If a high-energy particle that was originally passing through a vacuum suddenly finds itself traveling through a medium, its behavior will be different than that of light.

First off, it won’t experience an immediate change in momentum or energy, as the electric and magnetic forces acting on it — which change its momentum over time — are negligible compared to the amount of momentum it already possesses. Rather than bending instantly, as light appears to, its trajectory changes can only proceed in a gradual fashion. When particles first enter a medium, they continue moving with roughly the same properties, including the same speed, as before they entered.

Second, the big events that can change a particle’s trajectory in a medium are almost all direct interactions: collisions with other particles. These scattering events are tremendously important in particle physics experiments, as the products of these collisions enable us to reconstruct whatever it is that occurred back at the collision point. When a fast-moving particle collides with a set of stationary ones, we call these “fixed target” experiments, and they’re used in everything from creating neutrino beams to giving rise to antimatter particles that are critical for exploring certain properties of nature.

Here, a proton beam is shot at a deuterium target in the LUNA experiment. The rate of nuclear fusion … [+] at various temperatures helped reveal the deuterium-proton cross-section, which was the most uncertain term in the equations used to compute and understand the net abundances that would arise at the end of Big Bang Nucleosynthesis. Fixed-target experiments have many applications in particle physics.

LUNA Collaboration/Gran Sasso

But the most interesting fact is this: particles that move slower than light in a vacuum, but faster than light in the medium that they enter, are actually breaking the speed of light. This is the one and only real, physical way that particles can exceed the speed of light. They can’t ever exceed the speed of light in a vacuum, but can exceed it in a medium. And when they do, something fascinating occurs: a special type of radiation — Cherenkov radiation — gets emitted.

Named for its discoverer, Pavel Cherenkov, it’s one of those physics effects that was first noted experimentally, before it was ever predicted. Cherenkov was studying radioactive samples that had been prepared, and some of them were being stored in water. The radioactive preparations seemed to emit a faint, bluish-hued light, and even though Cherenkov was studying luminescence — where gamma-rays would excite these solutions, which would then emit visible light when they de-excited — he was quickly able to conclude that this light had a preferred direction. It wasn’t a fluorescent phenomenon, but something else entirely.

Today, that same blue glow can be seen in the water tanks surrounding nuclear reactors: Cherenkov radiation.

Reactor nuclear experimental RA-6 (Republica Argentina 6), en marcha, showing the characteristic … [+] Cherenkov radiation from the faster-than-light-in-water particles emitted. As these particle travel faster than light does in this medium, they emit radiation to shed energy and momentum, which they’ll continue to do until they drop below the speed of light.

Centro Atomico Bariloche, via Pieck Darío

Where does this radiation come from?

When you have a very fast particle traveling through a medium, that particle will generally be charged, and the medium itself is made up of positive (atomic nuclei) and negative (electrons) charges. The charged particle, as it travels through this medium, has a chance of colliding with one of the particles in there, but since atoms are mostly empty space, the odds of a collision are relatively low over short distances.

Instead, the particle has an effect on the medium that it travels through: it causes the particles in the medium to polarize — where like charges repel and opposite charges attract — in response to the charged particle that’s passing through. Once the charged particle is out of the way, however, those electrons return back to their ground state, and those transitions cause the emission of light. Specifically, they cause the emission of blue light in a cone-like shape, where the geometry of the cone depends on the particle’s speed and the speed of light in that particular medium.

This animation showcases what happens when a relativistic, charged particle moves faster than light … [+] in a medium. The interactions cause the particle to emit a cone of radiation known as Cherenkov radiation, which is dependent on the speed and energy of the incident particle. Detecting the properties of this radiation is an enormously useful and widespread technique in experimental particle physics.

vlastni dilo / H. Seldon / public domain

This is an enormously important property in particle physics, as it’s this very process that allows us to detect the elusive neutrino at all. Neutrinos hardly ever interact with matter at all. However, on the rare occasions that they do, they only impart their energy to one other particle.

What we can do, therefore, is to build an enormous tank of very pure liquid: liquid that doesn’t radioactively decay or emit other high-energy particles. We can shield it very well from cosmic rays, natural radioactivity, and all sorts of other contaminating sources. And then, we can line the outside of this tank with what are known as photomultiplier tubes: tubes that can detect a single photon, triggering a cascade of electronic reactions enabling us to know where, when, and in what direction a photon came from.

With large enough detectors, we can determine many properties about every neutrino that interacts with a particle in these tanks. The Cherenkov radiation that results, produced so long as the particle “kicked” by the neutrino exceeds the speed of light in that liquid, is an incredibly useful tool for measuring the properties of these ghostly cosmic particles.

A neutrino event, identifiable by the rings of Cerenkov radiation that show up along the … [+] photomultiplier tubes lining the detector walls, showcase the successful methodology of neutrino astronomy and leveraging the use of Cherenkov radiation. This image shows multiple events, and is part of the suite of experiments paving our way to a greater understanding of neutrinos.

Super Kamiokande collaboration

The discovery and understanding of Cherenkov radiation was revolutionary in many ways, but it also led to a frightening application in the early days of laboratory particle physics experiments. A beam of energetic particles leaves no optical signature as it travels through air, but will cause the emission of this blue light if it passes through a medium where it travels faster than light in that medium. Physicists used to close one eye and stick their head in the path of the beam; if the beam was on, they’d see a “flash” of light due to the Cherenkov radiation generated in their eye, confirming that the beam was on. (Needless to say, this process was discontinued with the advent of radiation safety training.)

Still, despite all the advances that have occurred in physics over the intervening generations, the only way we know of to beat the speed of light is to find yourself a medium where you can slow that light down. We can only exceed that speed in a medium, and if we do, this telltale blue glow — which provides a tremendous amount of information about the interaction that gave rise to it — is our data-rich reward. Until warp drive or tachyons become a reality, the Cherenkov glow is the #1 way to go!

#News

[renwritesstuff]

Samantha Traynor Appreciation Day 1

Day 1- Colonist Upbringing:  I chose the Skyllian Blitz as a focus on Samantha Traynor’s colonist upbringing. With a 26-year-old Sam, the Blitz would have occurred when she was around 16. I imagine the Skyllian Blitz as a September 11-type of event, especially for other human colonies: something to watch unfold while hugging your family tight.

Shouting, Samantha Traynor burst through the front door. “Mum! Dad! Are you watching?!”

A 16-year-old Sam was clad in a burnt orange school uniform, a shield embroidered on the front left pocket. The black slacks were dusty around the ankle cuffs from her abrupt exit out her friend Nicole’s skycar at the end of the cul-de-sac. Her short—normally neat—bob of black hair was tousled from the impromptu run.

Running was highly out of the ordinary for Sam (and not just because she was an asthmatic). As was Sam home at noon on a school day (she wasn’t known to bunk off school. Ever.)

Sam’s schoolbag was already half-slung over her shoulder before she abandoned it by the coat rack. Black (dusty) shoes were kicked off next to the door as the girl tore down the hallway of the prefab.

“No running in the house!” Priya Suresh-Traynor barked back, more strain in her voice than usual.

Then again, it also wasn’t usual for Sam’s mother to be home this early in the day.

Nothing about today was usual.

Geoffrey Traynor called over from the wide living room at the end of the hall. “In here, sprog!”

Sam came skidding to a halt, already breathless from running up the stairs of the unit of prefabs. Wheezing in ragged breaths, she fumbled around in her pockets for her inhaler. A few deep puffs soothed the burn in her chest as she fell into the open spot on the sofa next to her dad.

On the screen covering the wall, a news program was already in progress. The Alliance News Network reporter on the screen was an older gentleman in a crisp black suit. His handsome face was lined with seriousness as he continued his broadcast.

[“—ports are still scattered at the moment, but the Human Systems Alliance has confirmed an attack was repelled from Elysium early this morning, around 05:21 GST. Again: the human colony in the Skyllian Verge, Elysium, has been under communications blackout for the past seven hours after a large-scale attack. Estimates of the dead are upwards of 10,000 and may be as high as a tenth of the colony, humanity’s oldest in the system.”]

“Oh shit fucking hell. It’s true.” Sam sighed as she tucked her knees up under her chin. She coughed slightly as the burning in her chest cleared.

I was hoping—hoping—the other kids had just gotten it wrong. Some fake news chaining its way around the colonies like some sick, shitty joke.

And knocking off school early? Was the entire school, or all of Horizon, in on it?

Just—uhhh—shut up. Let me have my denial.

An arm wrapped around her shoulder gently shook Sam as Geoffrey admonished, “Don’t swear. Especially like that. …Good lord, what are they teaching you in that high school?”

“All the essentials, clearly,” Sam quipped back, her eyes still trained on the screen.

A small crawl feed trailed in the corner of the screen. [“Targeted bombings reported at key locations around Illyria. Wall breaches in five sectors. Coordinated attack leaves colony in chaos and stock futures for Baria Frontiers and ExoGeni Corporation remain in freefall.”]

Thousands of people are dead, probably by pirates, and these arseholes are worried about their bloody stocks? Samantha scowled into her knees. God, I hate arseholes. I hope I never become one.

Gotta get rich first. Then become an arsehole.

Priya’s voice was faint in the other room, clearly on a call with the hospital. “—re we taking in any of the survivors? …then what about volunteers? …when we will know when it’s clear to offer assistance? …Look, Mark, I know we’re all overworked as it is… But this could have been us… I disagree, who are we to know if they’d ‘do the same for us?’ …This isn’t about what-if, this is about—“

A feeling of pride swelled in Samantha’s chest as she listened to the ferocity in her mum’s voice.

“I see the uni got dismissed before the high school,” Sam observed to her father out of the corner of her mouth, eyes still glued to the screen.

“I was still in office hours before the announcement went out. Didn’t even make it to my first class,” Geoffrey returned with a sip of his tea before placing it back on the side table.

“That’s such bollocks.” Sam scowled. “Everyone knew by first period and they didn’t dismiss finally til third. …what’s the time differential?”

A smile curled under Geoffrey’s beard. “Don’t be lazy. You know the time dilation formula. Three relay jumps. Galactic standard time adjustment. Horizon operates on a 37-hour day, Elysium on a 27-hour day. What is the time differential? Tell me my tax dollars haven’t been an utter waste.” The professor’s eyes sparkled in challenge.

Closing her eyes, a series of math formulas popped into Sam’s head. Her fingers drummed on her shin as she worked through the equation. “Ugh, this is such bollocks. Time is utterly absurd on a galactic scale… Because technically they’re like seven months in the future. But—carry the four—the attack occurred around like… lunchtime? Noonish?”

Geoffrey checked his Omni-tool. “Correct.” A hand stroked his chin in pride while his other arm squeezed Sam’s shoulders. “Batarians are already taking credit for it.”

An irrational stab of hatred flashed in Sam’s eyes, her nostrils flaring. “What do those nasty four-eyed buggers have against us?? Bloody slavers who wouldn’t—“

That arm rocked Sam’s shoulders again. “You forget we weren’t here first, Sam. And you forget your human history. Israel and Palestine ring any bells? Land promised to one civilization then given to another? Years of conflict as a result?”

Ughhhh…

This is what happens when your dad is a professor. Everything is a bloody learning experience.

…Can’t I just be upset?

“…can’t I just be upset, dad? This could have been us.”

“You’re right. It could have been. And this was symbolic and they knew it.” There was a hardness to her father’s words, an edge he was trying to keep dulled.

The reporter on the news chimed back in after a few stock videos of past Alliance skirmishes.

[“The Alliance has just confirmed one initial rumor: the communication blackout was broken by a team of heroic off-duty soldiers led by an N7 marine. This team stormed a bunker and managed to activate the emergency beacon system. The SSV Agincourt war frigate is already credited with an unconfirmed 42 ships brought down around Illyria of pirate bands attempting to hold the colony. That number is still climbing as other Alliance Navy ships have arrived.”]

“This is like a movie. I didn’t think this happened in real life,” Samantha remarked. Since she’d heard the news this morning, there had been this heaviness in her chest. A sense of smallness and disbelief.

It seemed so absurd. An entire colony going dark? All communications offline?

Communication is all we bloody have out here. Without it, we’re not the Human Systems Alliance. We’re just Another Backwoods Colony Trying to Make It On Our Own.

And lambs to the slaughter, apparently.

The rumor mill at school had been unstoppable for hours. A few upset parents had swooped in to pick up their kids before any formal announcement had been made. Sam had been hunkered down in the hallway with a pair of friends, Omni-tools out and combing through reports. A few clever custom filters had screened out some of the more ludicrous claims (“Third Contact War with turians nigh (Citadel Council does nothing)!” or “Geth returned from quarian space to conquer galaxy!” or, Sam’s personal favorite, “Civil War breaks out in Elysium over Illyria’s loss in the bioti-ball play-offs!”) all seemed to agree on one thing: a human colony had been attacked.

Nicole had chewed her lip, a number of relatives from (or stationed on) Illyria.

Victoria next to Nicole had tried to be reassuring. The brunette had put a hand on her girlfriend’s wrist. “It’s probably some training exercise gone awry.”

Nodding, Sam tried to feel optimistic. “Or they’re blowing it out of proportion. You know how those gits love their ratings.” She’d snapped her mouth shut at Victoria’s withering glare.

Only when Ms. Steinhold had released them from Applied Statistics had the news started to feel real to Samantha. But the epiphany wasn’t immediate. It was deadened by numb disbelief even as she hitched a ride home from Nicole and Victoria. Even as the car radio repeated the claims back. Even as Sam gasped for breath across the brown dirt of her street and saw other families home, their own wall screens tuned to the news in rapt attention.

Everyone on Horizon—maybe even every human on every colony—had gone home to hold their breath.

It was some analyst who came on later who coined it the “Skyllian Blitz.”

A blitzkrieg. “Lightning war.”

Geoffrey Traynor had nodded at the aptness of the phrasing. “Not a movie, sprog. History repeating itself.”

“I don’t see turians or asari dealing with this sort of ‘history,’” Sam retorted, indignant. It was all she could to keep the smallness at bay, the hopeless misery of feeling hated by the entire galaxy.

Are they really that much more advanced than the lowly humans? No one picks on them? No one tries to wipe out their colonies?

“Maybe it will bring the galactic community closer together,” Geoffrey suggested, his tone neutral.

It took all of Sam’s energy not to scoff. She was filled with childish indignation at this point, an impotent rage that mirrored the latest fire-and-brimstone retired Admiral calling for swift and immediate action against the batarian hegemony. Definitely a better feeling than despair, but without any outlet: what could Sam do?

Mum is organizing off-world volunteers to take care of the wounded. Dad will probably counsel his students and fellow faculty.

And I’m 16 and all I do is go to school and play chess. I can’t enlist for two years, and even then I’d be too bloody terrified to pick up a weapon. Does the galaxy really need someone like me on the front lines?

God, I hope not. Because humanity is fucked.

A fresh face interrupted the latest speculation, much to Sam’s relief. She felt herself getting wound up by all the aimless rage. Some calm heads and facts would be a welcome respite.

[“This is Artermis Kingston, reporting live from Arcturus Station. We have acquired ground footage from Elysium in this firsthand report from a survivor in Illyria. This footage made be disturbing to some viewers due to its violent subject matter. Discretion is advised.”]

A jerky Omni-tool video proceeded to play. It followed a heavily breathing camera operant, a young Black man with terrified eyes. His uniform bore the logo of the monorail corporation of Illyria.

The view swung dizzily back below him, his frantic breathing a constant background sound. A smoldering train could be seen down the line as the man crawled around the raised platform. Occasionally, his frantic breathing formed words of prayer under his breath.

Popping gunfire could be heard in the distance along with the crackle of fires. The noonday sun was oddly cheery in the background as dozens of smoke lines drifted lazily to the sky.

Just below the man, an explosion drew his attention and the camera jerked. The sound decayed to static from just sheer overwhelming noise. It died down though the crackling persisted. The camera ducked for cover for a moment before peeking back up to look.

The central ring of the inner wall of Illyria had just caved in as a swarm of pirates fired into the colony. A dozen Alliance soldiers crouched behind blockade walls below the camera and attempted to repel the invaders. One by one they were picked off.

It sickened Samantha to see their bodies fall limp. She leaned into her father’s side, occasionally burying her face into his sleeve when the camera lurched forward for a close-up of a soldier’s lifeless face.

Zooming back out, one lone soldier with a red stripe on the arm shouted for backup. But when they realized the man next to them was dead, the person clenched their fists in anguish. Pinned down by at least 15 pirates, the last soldier standing should have been dead.

Sam felt fear catch in her throat. This wasn’t a movie. This was really happening. She was watching people die.

Oh God, please be okay. Why would the ANN show this??

…I can’t watch.

Suddenly there was a flash of blue and the soldier wasn’t there anymore. The camera was just as confused as Sam was, the screen panning around trying to find the subject again. Another flash of blue as the camera found and zoomed in on the fray of pirates being torn to shreds by a flashing Omni-blade and surging biotics.

What should have been a massacre was quickly turned against the advancing pirates. They were torn to pieces by a lone combatant who was faster, fiercer and better trained than them. Every moment of hesitation from a pirate or a missed shot was an open opportunity for the soldier to strike and move on.

Sam squinted at the footage.

Is that… red hair? Is that… a woman?

A total badass woman, that’s for bloody sure.

The camera/man sighed with relief as the soldier rummaged through the bodies and found whatever they were looking forward. A moment later, charges were set and a large billboard jutting up next to the hole collapsed into the space, blocking at further incursion.

The video paused as the soldier stood overlooking the rubble, a shotgun primed over one shoulder. Just like at the end of a movie.

Except real life. This woman, this soldier: she was real.

[“The Alliance confirmed the hero in this footage was off-duty N7 marine Lieutenant Annelise Shepard, 22. The Alliance has also confirmed the team that activated the emergency beacon system was also led by Lieutenant Shepard.”]

22… 22??

I’ll be 22 if—when I graduate university… and she—she fought off an army of pirates??

Bloody hell.

How—what could I ever do that would even come close to that? Win the Kepesh-Yakshi Grand Tourney on Illium?

Ms. Kingston winked at the camera before quickly regaining her serious composure. [“The ANN will have an exclusive interview with Lieutenant Shepard—and the other heroes of the Skyllian Blitz—as this story unfolds.”]

The male newscaster returned to the screen with a sober smile. [“Thank you, Artemis. The Citadel Council has condemned this horrific attack on human soil and has dispatched goodwill ambassadors—along with aid ships—to the Skyllian Verge to assist in the recovery effort. The Human Systems Alliance has opened up comm lines for charity and volunteer organizations as well. There is a—“]

Geoffrey patted his daughter’s head, ruffling her hair affectionately, before joining his wife in the kitchen. The Traynor parents quietly discussed the Elysium attack.

Sam feigned interest in the news while also attempting to eavesdrop. Her father was muted with worry, fearing for Horizon in the wake of the attack. Priya was more fiery in her resentment. They’d been through hell to move out to this colony and no one was going to take their home from them.

Something nagged at Samantha that started her down a rabbit hole of extranet articles. It kindled something within Sam that was different from outrage or despair.

It was curiosity.

How could a coordinated attack bring down an entire colony’s communications network?

What sort of comms don’t need a buoy network to function? A buoy network that can be assaulted and brought down so easily?

Sam came across a stub of an article in the research section of the Alliance R&D tab.

“Quantum Entanglement Communication: Practical Applications.”

And started to read.

[northamptoncouplestherapy]

We turn on the news for the latest update on COVID-19 or check social media. Immediately we're inundated with information, images, and confusion. For parents, it's stressful, navigating a flood of challenges, as Covid-19 promises to come in turn to each of our communities. For separated or divorced co-parents, the challenges of "social distancing" are compounded with different social-emotional layers than our partnered friends face. And we feel that difference.

Because co-parents live apart, we face unique challenges. Making parenting choices in the context of a divided family can be extremely fraught, as any pressure to reach consensus or compromise is far less than when you lived together. Meanwhile, the loneliness, frustration, and grief provoked by the current reality may remind us acutely of the reasons we separated, adding to our distress. New loss has a unique way of reviving old loss. We are less able to stay calm, think, and communicate from a grounded place. We may panic; we may become emotionally overwhelmed.

Fortunately, we already possess an abundance of tools that can help us slow down, take a deep breath, and have success with navigating the heightened turbulence of co-parenting during COVID-19.

In this two-part series, we will offer up some helpful ideas to support you and your family during these challenging times. But to begin with, let's take a moment to acknowledge and honor what may seem obvious to you, but not to your partnered friends and family:

Co-parenting while simultaneously handling the crisis of COVID-19 hurts.

First, there's grief. As humans, we're wired for connection. We long to belong and grow in relationships; they're the arena where we learn and access comfort. When our social connections are disrupted, we feel the heartbreak in our bodies. We are distressed. So what happens when Covid-19 forces a community to hunker down to its most basic elements – family units? We come face to face with how our family units are different from "the norm," the marital construct, the nuclear family. We wake to feel separate, stigmatized, alone. We experience a deep and unrelenting panic. It may rise without warning in our throat, our shoulders, jaw, or belly.

Even if you have lived apart from your ex for years, you may begin re-experiencing waves of fear, loss, and sadness. And if you have not re-partnered, the reality of being un-partnered in uniquely trying times is front and center. This feeling of difference is a type of loneliness. It can leave you feeling adrift or resentful as you consider juggling childcare on top of additional professional obligations or even job loss that your partnered friends or family are not facing. You may feel self-conscious or "less-than," telling yourself, "at least they have each other," or "they obviously have something that I lack." In these moments, know that you are not alone; these reactions are normal, even predictable, especially in uncertain times.

Remember, you're already an expert.

John Gottman, a leading researcher in the field of relationship distress, talks about "love maps." Love maps refer to how well we know the internal and external worlds of those closest to us. It asks whether we have "owner's manuals" of those we love. While you likely don't have a love map of your ex, you probably know more than you realize concerning what works and what doesn't in dealing with them. And equally important is cultivating your own personal owner's manual, and knowing yourself.

When you're in distress, do you tend towards anxiety or problem-solving? Do you overthink – googling and polling friends and relatives? Or, are you prone to distraction, losing yourself in unrelated issues or projects? Maybe you tend to minimize or talk yourself out of your concerns. How about your former partner – what do you know about how they manage distress?

You are already an expert in this arena. You probably have these answers at your fingertips. But what good does that do you? Whether you're looping in your head with worries, seething over a disagreement concerning whether your child should attend a birthday party, or rolling your eyes at your ex's concerns over handwashing, it's all versions of the same thing: ways to avoid feeling grief.

Your first job here is to hang out with your grief, because in these rough waters, acceptance is your bright red, bobbing buoy.

Our stormiest emotional times can trigger what Gottman calls "diffuse physiological arousal (DPA)." DPA is how your body reacts to a sense of threat: heart rate speeds up, pupils and blood vessels dilate to prepare for action, and your breath gets shallow and fast. This reaction impairs taking in information and limits your capacity to communicate well.

Remember, you have what you need to captain your ship as those of us who have navigated separation or divorce are already veterans of upheaval.

Here is where we learn to hang out with our grief, put our arms around it, and let our acceptance become a buoy. If acceptance is the buoy in the water, your breath can calm the waters. Even taking 60 seconds to close your eyes and imagine yourself holding onto the red buoy with a slow out-breath, can help. When you slow your breath, other aspects of DPA slow down in response.

And do not underestimate the power of giving your mind and body an intentional reprieve and shifting gears. During the insanity of COVID-19, cultivate islands of the ordinary and find windows of calm where you can rest your gaze. Notice the crocuses emerging from the earth while walking your dog. Write, cook, face-time with a friend, or have a much-needed cry. Give yourself permission to rage. You got this.

The bottom line is that information, tools, and mindfulness can help you keep your head above water while you embrace (or even cling to) the big red buoy of acceptance. And if that's not enough, know that insurance companies are covering teletherapy for the vast majority of us in light of COVID-19, providing a lifeline for individuals, co-parents and couples seeking online therapy.

For ideas in maintaining calm through co-parenting communication and negotiation, please check out Part 2.

[dreammeposts]

Is it fate? (Ch. 5)

Finally the 5th chapter! Sorry for so long delay. A lot of work. Just tonns of work, a deadline of very important task and, of course, I must catch a cold in august:/

“The Defender of Justice and his assistant are here to save the world,” Saeyoung announced right at the moment I opened a front door to him and MC.

“Hi!” I moved to the side to let the couple in my apartment, or, to be more precise, my ex-apartment starting from tomorrow morning.

“Are we late?” MC asked, while was looking around the hall, which was filled with cardboard boxes.

I wondered why her voice sounded so disappointed.

“No, actually you are even a little bit too early,” I reassured them. “You can wait in a living room while I'm packing last cooking utensils in a kitchen.”

“We can help,” Saeyoung offered enthusiastically.

I worriedly looked at him. Sometimes he and MC seemed too easy distracted and full of strange ideas. It wasn't like I didn't trust them, but I wondered was it wise to call them to help.

Are you kidding? As if you have anybody else, who can help, except of your cousin and her fiancé.

My inner voice was right. I just had to be grateful that MC agreed so gladly to waste a whole day, helping me. Yes, my cousin and her fiancé looked a bit strange in their matching blue jeans, red t-shirts and even matching sneakers. The only differing detail was that MC wore a red baseball cap, and Saeyoung had a cross necklace on his chest. And even before meeting Saeyoung my cousin weird jokes and some questionable ideas made me worry. But who cared when both of them were nice enough to offer their help. And what probably could go wrong in the living room?

“Okay,” I sighed, “if you're really want to help, you can pack books from last two shelves in the living room.”

“Hooray,” Saeyoung jolted his hands up to the air, “the mission 'Moving out' has officially started.”

A timid knock at the door interrupted that little show. I nervously looked at a clock above the door. It was too early for a rental truck driver.

“I guess, it's the last member of our rescue team,” MC smiled. “We asked a friend for a help. I hope, you don't mind.”

“Why would she?” her fiancé said, opening the door instead of me.

I wasn't even surprised to see, who was standing outside. And still I couldn't say a word, quietly staring at my new guest.

Hyun's look was something I needed to accustom, and I hadn't seen him for three days since our walk in park. Nor following his accounts in social networks with bunch of selfies (Oh, god, seriously, this guy has mania of taking selfies!), nor re-watching for several times every video of his performances in internet couldn't prepare me for how godlike he looked even when he wore just a simple faded blue jeans, a white tank top and sneakers.

I was dazzled and lost for words again. But the moment I heard his cheerful “Hey, Jia!” all changed.

For the last three days after our walk in the park Hyun called me every evening. We sent 'goodmorning' messages to each other or made just random calls, when we had a free minute at work. His voice became a part of my life. So hearing him right now in front of me woke up something warm inside me.

“Hey,” I gave him a tentative smile, “why are you here?”

“Saeyoung said that you need a help,” he shrugged. “How could I say 'no' when you've helped me so much in the last few days.”

I've helped him? How?

His words made no sense to me. It was him, who helped me to have the last several nights without nightmares. It were his calm voice and distracting stories about his day that made me fall asleep without worries and without dreams. I wanted to say all that to him, but I couldn't do it in front of Saeyoung and MC. So I only looked gratefully at the most handsome human being standing in my hallway and quietly said my thank you.

“So why are you moving?” Hyun asked, picking up one of boxes to put it in the hall.

All my 'rescue team' refused to wait with help till the rental truck arrived, so now we divided our forces in two groups. My cousin and Saeyoung were fighting with amazing amount of books in the living room, while Hyun and I were packing the rest of cooking utensils.

“The same reason as anybody else,” there was no mystery in my decision, “The owner of this apartment suddenly wants to increase rent, and I can't longer afford it.”

“Yeah, that sucks,” my conversation partner agreed. “And the new place?”

“The new place...” I said thoughtfully, “The new place is good. It smaller and don't have such good access to transport, but it is closer to my workplace,” I stood on tiptoe, trying to reach one of pots at upper shelf of the cupboard, while describing my future apartment, “And it still is in a very safe part of the city.”

I heard an unexpected long sigh near me. Suddenly a warm and well-toned body was pressed against me. My pulse quickened. Frozen I watched, how a long hand took the pot from the shelf and put it in front of me on a table.

“You know, you always can ask for help,” I heard Hyun's voice almost near my ear.

His words sounded a little bit annoyed. But I was so overwhelmed by his closeness, that I couldn't think about any answer to him. I nervously shifted my weight. Hyun got a hint and took a few steps back. I could still feel his warmth near me, but now my head was able to think about anything else except actor's chest and hips pressed to me. I turned around.

“Why didn't you ask me to help?” Hyun repeated his previous comment as a question, getting me back to reality.

“I thought, I can reach this pot by myself,” answering, I tried to look as calm as it was possible.

“You know, I'm not talking about the pot,” the actor sighed again. “I'm leaving nearby, you knew I can help as well as Saeyoung. Why did you call him instead?”

Is it my imagination or I heard a hint of jealousy?

I stopped my self before that strange thought got me to any other conclusions. Hyun couldn't have such feelings, because we were just friends and knew each other only for a less than a week.

Maybe it is some kind of men's competition: to be strongest, the most helpful, etc.

“I called MC, not Saeyoung. She is my cousin, you remember this, right? And Saeyoung is her fiancé. And it's only my decision, what I do with my relatives,” my answer sounded a bit irritated. “Anyway, how come you are here? Didn't you tell me that you have a date with female lead of your play today?” I reminded him.

“What?” he exclaimed nervously. “It's not a date, it's just a rehearsal.”

The tips of his ears were slightly red now.

“A private rehearsal,” I noted. “Only she and you in an empty theatre.”

“It won't be empty,” the guy disagreed. “There is always a staff or actor's casts for other plays. And we supposed to have this rehearsal only for play's sake. We still didn't find the right way to play our romantic scenes.”

“So why are you here? Why aren't you working for a right atmosphere of your love scenes?” I interrupted his explanation. I was not sure why this was bothering me so much.

“It was cancelled. My partner from play, she needs to attend an important party tonight, so she can't find time for a rehearsal. Though, she invited me to go with her,” the actor confessed.

“And you say that she is not interested in dating with you? Private rehearsals, an invitation to attend a party together...” I was surprised by Hyun's unobservance.

“She is a star, she's dating celebrity. Why would she be interested in an mediocre musical actor.” Before I could object him, Hyun added another explanation, “Anyway, I'm not interested in her this way. Actually I'm...”

A thud and a following muffled shout interrupted the guy in the middle of his words. We heard something like 'no, no, no' exclaimed by someone and than quiet, but well-recognizable 'shit' that certainly was said by Saeyoung.

Hyun and I exchanged worried looks and hurried to the living room.

The living room was a mess. Of course, there had been a slight mess caused by my moving earlier, too. But now, covered with paper, the room looked like after a little tornado. White sheets of paper was on the floor, on furniture, on boxes, and even on Saeyoung.

Yes, the strangest part of a view of the living room was the couple, responsible for all that disaster. I wasn't sure what exactly surprised me the most. Maybe that was MC, holding one side of the shelf, where a half an hour ago were my books. But maybe it was Saeyoung, lying on the floor under the second side of that shelf and buried under papers and books from that shelf.

Seeing me, MC's eyes dilated, and she let out a nervous laugh.

“Are you okay?” I exhaled worriedly.

Hyun had already rushed to them to take a shelf from MC's hands. He put the wooden board near a wall and gave a hand to Saeyoung to help him to get out from the pile of books. The other guy got up with a groan. Thankfully, he didn't look like he had serious injuries.

“What happened?” I asked curiously.

“Well,” MC wiped her hands by her jeans and apologetically looked at me, “Saeyoung came up with a plan, how we can pack books faster...”

“Not a very good plan,” Saeyoung admitted, rubbing his butt.

“That must be an extraordinary stupid plan,” Hyun commented, “You could kill yourself, and hurt MC, and god knows what else could went wrong!”

“I know, I know,” Saeyoung agreed. “But we are okay, and I am sorry about all this.” He looked around.

“We’ll clean up the mess,” MC promised, bending over to take papers from the floor. “I hope, we didn’t ruin any important documents.”

“Don’t worry,” I reassured her. “It just sketches.”

I sat up near MC and started to pick up papers, too.

“Sketches?” Hyun repeated curiously. He and Saeyoung also joined to our cleaning.

“Just some drafts for my amateur comics, nothing special,” I shrugged.

“I love comics,” Saeyoung noted with a grin and turned a sheet of paper, he was holding, to look at it. “No way… MC, you have to see it.”

MC followed his suit and looked at other drawing in her hands.

“Is it… is it Stella?” I noticed a slight signs of worship in her voice.

“Who is Stella?” Hyun asked curiously. His eyes also drifted to a drawing in his hands. “Achew,” a loud sneeze, followed his questions, was so unexpected that I almost jumped.

Hyun’s eyes looked so shocked.

“Wha- achew!.. why, for a sake of... achew!.. are you drawing cats?” he managed to say between his sneezes, still looking at the drawing.

“Because the comic name is ‘Stella The Spycat’ obviously,” Saeyong stated. “Can’t believe I know the creator of Stella! This kitty is my third biggest crush!”

“The third?” I repeated.

“The third,” Saeyoung confirmed, “after MC and my dearest and loveliest Elly!”

“Elly?” lost I looked at MC.

“Elly is our friend’s cat,” MC explained, “Elizabeth the 3rd. She's Saeyoung's first love.”

She chuckled.

Of course, my cousin must find as crazy guy as herself.

“Achew! Don't mention this furball!” Hyun exclaimed between his sneezing.

I darted my gaze to him with concern. The actor looked really bad, constantly sneezing, with reddened face and tearing eyes.

Is he okay? Maybe he inhaled some dust?

“Hyun, are you okay? Maybe you need to get outside?” I asked worriedly.

“I'm sorry. I'm just allergic to cats,” he sneezed again. “Maybe you are ri- achew- right. I'll come back after a few minutes.”

He pushed his part of collected papers in my hands and rushed out of the room.

I stared at door perplexedly.

The allergy to drawn cats?

“He'll be okay,” MC reassured me. “It's just an allergy. To cats.” She soothingly patted my arm when noticed my astonishment, “I think it's something psychological, like a childhood trauma.”

“It became so bad only after Jumin brought Elly to that party,” Saeyoung mentioned.

“He is used to it and knows how to deal with that,” my cousin tried to convince me, but I still doubted if Hyun was okay.

“Maybe you just have to see yourself if he is okay,” Saeyoung offered.

I guess, my worries are too obvious.

I had to feel embarrassed, but I didn't care. Not right now, when all my thoughts was with the certain musical actor somewhere in my house.

“I guess, I'll do it,” I agreed and darted out of the living room.

”Are you feeling better?” I asked Hyun sheepishly.

I found the actor in the bathroom, washing his face. He rose head from a sink and looked in my direction. Guy's face was still red, but he wasn't sneezing anymore.

“Did you come to torture me with cat drawings more?” Hyun suddenly asked.

I followed his gaze and found out that I was still holding my sketches. I nervously hid them behind my back.

“I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring them here,” I stuttered, mentally I cursing my forgetfulness.

“Don't worry, I know, you are not sadistic," the guy smiled at me, sweetly, "It's just a coincidence. But I wanted to tease you a bit.”

“So, how are you?” I rephrased my question, handing Hyun a towel.

“Thank you,” the actor muttered, wiping his face. “I feel much better. I'm sorry if I startled you.”

He shouldn’t apologize to me, and I didn't know what to say back. Unfortunately the silence felt even more uncomfortable. It looked like Hyun was searching for a new subject for conversation too. His gaze travelled from one piece of bathroom’s furniture to another till it stopped on my hands.

“The way, you talked about my performances… I was sure that you can feel a beauty of art,” guy smiled again, looking at drawings in my hands. “But why of all wonderful things of this world you should choose this… fur… creatures?” he wrinkled.

“They are cute,” I defended my choice, “I had that great idea to make a comics about spies, and it was so easy to imagine a cat, working as a spy.”

I smiled at the memory of how I'd started to make my comics and noticed Hyun's frown. It was clear that he had a hard time to imagine, how I could like cats so much.

“Don’t worry,” I decided to assure the actor anyway. “My comics is not that famous. It won’t hunt you on billboards and buses,” I added with a smile.

“Seven… I mean Saeyoung... knows how to make things viral in internet. Maybe he can help you to promote your work.”

That reaction wasn't what I expected, making my small joke.

“Why, thanks,” I smirked, but it didn't sound too cheerful even for me, “actually I don't want anybody's help.”

I was rewarded with an interrogative glance from Hyun.

I guess, he needs some explanation.

“I just don't want to get fame or money only because I have good friends. I want that my comics became popular because of my talent, because it was special to my readers,” I sighed, wondering how to word that better.

“You are right,” the actor agreed enthusiastically, “there is no need for help if you work hard to reach your goal. And your drawings are so amazing! Of course, it'll pay off.”

It is nice to hear that, especially from Hyun, but I don't need sweet lies too.

“You haven't even seen my drawings to say that,” I pointed out.

“Why are you doubting me?” I heard notes of offence in guy's voice. “My allergy wouldn't become so bad if I didn't look at that furball for too long. No, no, not a furball, your character,” he corrected himself, giving me apologetic glances. “But if you don't mind, I rather won't look at it anymore. We don't want this beautiful face to be swollen tomorrow, and my eyes all puffy after so much sneezing.”

“Well, I have some non-cat drawings,” I found myself saying.

You just can't ignore the chance to get more compliments from him, you, greedy girl?

I mentally sighed in disgust of myself.

“Really? Can I see them?” I heard a sincere interest in Hyun's words.

It was impossible to resist. I instantly forgot about my self-loathing and rummaged into pile of drafts in my hands. I was sure I'd seen some usual (non-cat) drawings while collected papers from the floor. I felt a sudden jolt of excitement when I confirmed that I was right. With a smile I stared at a simple drawing of a vase at the window's sill.

“Here is one,” I passed it to Hyun, keeping dig through papers.

Unexpected excitement was bubbling in me. All my drawings without cats gradually travelled to hands of the guy in front of me. It worked almost like a conveyor: I found a safe drawing, passed it to Hyun, and he gushed and prised me about it.

So I followed the same scenario, when I found my next non-cat artwork. With an exclamation 'Oh, another one!' I was ready to give it to the guy in front of me, when my mind finally proceeded what is drawn there. My cheeks became red, and I tried to put the sheet of paper back in the pile, before the actor near me could get it in his hands, but I was to slow. Next moment Hyun was already looking on that embarrassing drawing. I held my breath, too afraid to look at guy's reaction and at the same time dying to know what he thought.

“Is it me?” finally Hyun asked. Actor's voice was too quiet to tell what kind of emotions was hidden behind his words.

I gazed at familiar lines on the paper. It was semi-finished draft of white siberian husky. As all my comics' characters it was drawn on two legs. Even husky's clothes, leather pants and a jacket, and a tank-top underneath, and background, a motorcycle, gave a hint, who exactly inspired that drawing. But dog's bright red eyes and a ponytail on its head left no doubt, who was that character prototype.

“I...” it was hard to find the right words for an answer. “I was too inspired with some of our conversations,” I admitted still embarrassed about that situation. “If you don't like it, I can change the character. I haven't used it in comics yet.”

Of course, he don't like it! It's not very flattering to be drawn as a dog.

“No!” unexpected emotions in Hyun's voice made me finally rise my head and meet his eyes.

I was stunned with how much various feelings I could see in guy's gaze. Astonishment, disbelief and delight wavered in his gaze, mixed with something else.

“It's so amazing,” the actor said almost with awe. “Nobody ever draw me, and this guy is so cool. Can I keep it?”

Does he really like it?

“Of course!” I answered still doubting that it was really happening.

“Thank you,” Hyun's eyes lit up even brighter, and his wide smile made me catch my breath.

How is it possible to look more beautiful than he was a second ago?

“Are you planing to draw this character more? If you ever need me to pose for it, just say a word,” he added, looking confusingly shy.

I froze. Just the idea of Hyun, posing for me made me dizzy.

Oh, no, no, no, I'm not doing this. Friends don't have such thoughts about each other!

"Would you really like to be a model for my drawings?" the question sounded uncertain. I still couldn't believe the actor might like such idea.

"I would love to," the guy reassured me.

And he did it again. He smiled at me. He smiled so brightly that I met his sparkling gaze and couldn't take my eyes off him. We both fell silent. Hyun looked at me, and I stared back. All my thoughts and wishes now concentrated in only one need - to see those scarlet, magical eyes forever. Something pleasantly shrank in my stomach, and I felt sudden impulse to touch that marble skin in front of me, to check its softness, delicacy. My hand almost rose to do it immediately. That was a moment when a sudden, long forgotten memory of other pair of shining eyes broke that magic.

'I love you, Jia. Will you be my sun, my stars and moon? Please, stay with me forever,' I heard in my head a familiar voice.

That's was it. That was a moment when it clicked in my head and I finally understood, what happening, why I was thinking about Hyun so much, why I could look at him whole day, not even getting a break for lunch or for sleep.  

Shit, shit, shit! Of course, it is it! I'm so stupid!

I was falling for him. Deeply. Miserably. And I knew where such feelings could lead.

I don't need lies in my life anymore.

Yes, I didn't need it. And I wouldn't let it happen again.

I lowered my head and shut eyes. The hot covered my cheeks, when I turned away from the actor.

"I guess, I have to get back and finish the packing," I dropped and hurried to the living room.

I won’t be able to write the next chapter for a couple of weeks. So there will be another delay in updates for a while. I’m sorry. Hope, you still liked it. Thank you for reading!

Ch. 1 | Ch. 2 | Ch. 3 | Ch. 4

[chuyenvienmatrixfield]

IF YOU CAN FIGURE OUT SOMEBODY LIVED IN TIME DILATION AND TIME OSCILLATION FOR 8 HOURS 51 minutes 35 seconds , THEN  SOMEBODY MIGHT LIVE 10 YEARS ON EARTH IN SUN-EARTH TIME EQUALLY, then you are deserved to have more information to build a device that run the system of 8 hours to 10 years  system in time,THEN YOU CAN CONTACT ME to learn more information about TIME DEVICE THAT MIGHT HELP YOU understand better about space time quantum time or QUANTUM FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE TO LEAD TO THE MATRIX UNIVERSE-NOTE IMAGINATION: AMAZON, FACEBOOK, ALIBABA,AOL, YAHOO, EBAY,WALMART,INTERNET,HUAWEI,baidu . . . THEN NEXT IS YOUR QUANTA FIELD OR QUANTUM FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE NOTE: the matrix is far more advance in apps than anything you know before you can do many things those you cannot do in life and in normality; for example , TELEPORT or stop cancers with quantum time or go with quantum states in your matrix or switch your realities in your choices with n.nnx 10^400 possible realities or control time with the matrix or spaces with the Matrix It is why today science and today physics have missed translated why MUONS have reached earth with life time is only 2.2micro second= 2.2 x 10^-6 second with speed of light(almost) TO GAIN MAXIMUM DISTANCE OF 66O METERS, then they said because of time dilation, then MUONS have their ways to reach earth from sun. ACTUALLY MUONS REACHED EARTH DUE TO OSCILLATION TIME NOT DILATION TIME as today science and today physics have wrongly claimed for the last 50 years, now Fermi lab is trying to prove oscillation muons to say there is a need for new physics!!!!!!!!!!!Actually, there is no need for New Physics, but better Physics and I am SURE FERMI lab can prove MUONs, 2.2 micro second life time, 660m max distance can reach earth thru travel from sun to earth in distance =144,000,000,000 m it is about 90,000,000 miles in OSCILLATION TIME AGAIN AS i REPEAT ABOVE i WOULD SAY " Albert Einstein is still alive today, probably he will complaint  that today science and today physics did not understand relativity in the last 2019-1920 = 99 years until I came along, it is even worse, They found out science and Physics did not go anywhere yet for the last 2019- 1643=376 years!!!!!!!!!!" IF 2019-1920= 99 YEARS AGO EINSTEIN DID NOT MISS QUANTUM TIME, THEN HUMAN MIGHT BE IN MATRIX REALITIES NOW!THE CHANCE FOR THE WORLD REACHES THE MATRIX UNIVERSE IS GREATER THAN EVER BEFORE. HUMAN CAN DO MANY THINGS WITH THE MATRIX THAT HUMAN CANNOT DO normally  IN NORMALITY OF LIFE WITHOUT THE MATRIX; HOWEVER, HUMAN MIGHT SENSE THE LOSS OF SOME PARTS OF FREEDOM( NOT PHYSICALLY, BUT SENSES), WITH THE MATRIX HUMAN CAN EVEN RUN THE UNIVERSE(BUSINESS TALKING, NOT SCIENTIFIC TALKING, POSSIBILITY ONLY for now!UNTIL THE QUNATUM QUANTA FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE IS HERE, THE MATRIX IS HERE)!!!!!!!! IF YOU ARE INTERESTING ABOUT QUANTUM TIME TO STOP CANCER, THEN YOU SHOULD COME TO SEE ME FOR INFORMATION AND EXPLANATION ABOUT THE WAY IT WORKS TO STOP CANCERS. IF I DECLARE CANCERS ARE AS INDUSTRIAL DISEASES, THEN CANCERS WILL INCREASE MORE AND MORE BY TIME GO ON DUE TO ENVIRONMENT HAS BEEN REACHED ITS LEVEL OF CANCERS THOSE MIGHT CAUSE BY INDUSTRIES ARE OUT OF BALANCE UNTILL THE LEVEL THAT MIGHT BE MORE DEATH , "IT MEANS DEATH IS FASTER THAN LIVING" ; FORTUNATELY, THE ENVIRONMENT DID NOT REACH THAT LEVEL YET; EVEN THOUGH, WATER POLLUTION HAS BEEN BY PLASTICS MIGHT INITIATE CONDITIONS FOR "DEATH IS FASTER THAN LIFE" TO HAPPEN and AIR POLUTION IS AS ANOTHER INITIATED CONDITION. ANOTHER INITIATION IS POLUTTED SOIL, AND HOTTER AIR; HOWEVER, i DID NOT KNOW ANY FACT ABOUT SOIL POLLUTE AND  HOT AIR TO REACH LIMITS OF " DEATH IS FASTER THAN LIFE"; HOWEVER, PEOPLE SHOULD PAY ATTENTION TO GRASS, PLANTS, TREES, AND ANIMALS AS SSOON AS THEY SHOW SYMPTOMS OF "DEATH IS FASTER THAN LIFE" Note: keep in mind there are n.nnx10^400 possible realities, then you can change realities as many as you like to do so just by a button to switch realities within n.nn x10^400 Possible Realities; however, you must know enough how the Matrix Universe might be !!!!! HUMAN IS STILL FAR BELOW THE LEVEL OF SWITCHING BUTTON NOTE: I DID NOT WRITE THESE WORDS BASED ON ALBERT EINSTEIN THEORY, BECAUSE TO ME ALBERT EINSTEIN HAS MISSED  OSCILLATION TIME IN HIS DILATION TIME!!!!!!THEY SUPPOSED TO BE TOGETHER AS THE WHOLE SET OF TIME, IT IS EVEN WORSE IT LED HIM, ALBERT EINSTEIN MISSED SPACE TIME "QUANTUM TIME", HIS WHOLE SET OF TIME DILATION TIME AND OSCILLATION TIME DOES NOT EXIST IN HIS RELATIVITY, SO RELATIVE THEORY MIGHT BE BALONEY WITHOUT THE WHOLE SET OF TIME; BESIDE, TIME IS AS MAIN CHARACTER OF RELATIVITY, IT IS REASON I MIGHT SAY EINSTEIN MIGHT BE BALONEY WITHOUT TIME SET! HE DID NOT EVEN KNOW 2019-1955= 64 YEARS AGO!!!!!!!! KEEP IN MIND THERE ARE MANY MOTIONS OF NATURE IN FORMS OF OSCILLATION TIME! IT MEANS OSCILLATION TIME MIGHT BE MORE COMPLEX THAN DILATION TIME!!!!!!!!!! Note: when i am talking about the Matrix, I did not talk about the movie Matrix, I am talking about REAL MATRIX of Quantum Physics, or Quantum Universe, or Quantum time, or Space Universe, or Time Universe, or Space Time Universe etc, etc, etc I just borrow the name from the movie to call for Quantum Quanta Field of the Universe, I meant The Real Matrix of the Universe NOTE: I might say Human had 2 parts, different 2 parts: visible parts and invisible Parts I will call visible parts as Human Physical Body HPB, and Invisible Parts as Human Space Body or TAM lINH is as alive or in Human Space Body or ALIVE LINH it is in your body when you are still alive.Tam LInh is in you right now as I am writing these word about IT VONG LINH is as Tam Linhis out of Human Space Body, maybe I call it as empty Human Space Body and it is out of your Physical body and it is as OUT LINH, IT DOES NOT HAVE ANYWHERE TO GO YET!!!!! IT IS WONDERING IN THE OTHER WORLD TO LOOK FOR THE WAYS TO COMEBACK TO THIS WORLD OR YOUR Human physical Body, HPB VONG LINH MIGHT BE TRAPPED WITH HEAT OR ENERGY OR LIGHT FROM SEXUAL INTERCOURSE BY HUMAN OR BY ANIMALS TO BE BACK ON EARTH AS HUMAN OR AS ANIMALS DEPENDED ON VONG LINH LEVELS OF SPIRITS! IF VONG LINH HAD HIGH SPIRITS, THEN VONG LINH WILL NOT BE CONFUSED BETWEEEN HEAT OR LIGHT OR ENERGY FROM SEXUAL INTERCOURSE HUMAN TO SEXUAL INTERCOURSES BY ANIMALS NOTE: VONG LINH HAD VERY SHARP AND VERY SENSITIVE TO LIGHT, HEAT AND ENERGY AND SOUND, I AM TEMPORARY STOP HERE, I WILL BACK TO EXPLAIN MORE ABOUT VONG LINH and TAM LINH CONTINUING TAM LINH, VONG LINH, HPB ANH HSB ARE IN THE SAME UNIVERSE QUANTUM QUANTA UNIVERSES; HOWEVER, THEY ARE IN DIFFERENT FORMATION, STRUCTURES, WAVES, PARTICLES, LIGHT, DARKNESS, SOUND LIMITS, SENSIBILITIES, FREQUENCIES, ETC, ETC, ETC . . . THEREFORE, THEY CANNOT COMMUNICATE TOGETHER, BUT THERE ARE ACCEPTIONS, AND IF YOU WANT YOU MUST BE TRAINED, SPECIAL TRAINING  YOUR TAM LINH OR IN LINH TO COMMUNICATE WITH VONG LINH OR OUT LINH NOTE:TAM LINH IS AS PART YOU HAVE IN YOU AS YOU ARE READING THESE WORDS AND IT IS AS ALIVE LINH VONG LINH IS AS PART NO LONGER IN ANY HSB OR HPB AND IT IS AS OUT  OF LINH AND THEY ARE AROUND WHERE YOU ARE ""IT IS THE KIND OF TRAINING YOU SHOULD NOT DO IT BY YOURSELF(SELVES) AT HOME" TAM LINH SCIENCE IS VERY DIFFERENT FROM NATURAL SCIENCE KEEP IN MIND I AM NOT TALKING ABOUT META PHYSICS, DO NOT ASSUME, UNTIL YOU UNDERSTAND IT, i AM TALKING ABOUT TAM LINH SCIENCE LIKE LOVE YOU CANNOT CALL LOVE IS AS META PHYSICS,  NIETHER TAM LINH SCIENCE WHEN VONG LINH IS IN YOU, VONG LINH WILL TAKE OVER YOUR 18CEO SUPER VIRTUAL REALITIES GOGGLES YOU ARE ALL WEARING, THEN YOU CAN SEE IT PHYSICALLY, THEN WHEN IT IS OUT OF YOUR 18CEO VIRTUAL REALITIES GOGGLES, IT DOES NOT MEAN IT IS AS METAPHYSICS, BUT IT IS AS OUT OF YOUR 18CEO SUPER VIRTUAL REALITIES GOGGLES PHYSICS! YOU GOT TO LIVE A COMPLETED LIFE, NOT JUST VISIBLE PHYSICAL 18CEO SUPER VIRTUAL REALITY GOGGLES LIFE AND FORGET ABOUT INVISIBLE PARTS OF LIFE !!!!!! DO NOT JUST LIVE 1/2 OF LIFE IT  GOT TO BE WHOLE LIFE DO NOT LEAVE YOUR TAM LINH BECOMES YOUR VONG LINH IN MY WORDS: HUMAN SPACE BODY=HSB OR TAM LINH                               HUMAN PHYSICAL BODY= HPB OR 18CEO SUPER VIRTUAL REALITY GOGGLES VONG LINH IS TAM LINH OUT OF YOUR BODY AND OUT OF YOUR 18 CEO SUPER VIRTUAL REALITY GOGGLES YOU ARE ALL WEARING WITHOUT EVEN KNOWING AND UNDERSTANDING IF DEATH IS AS TAM LINH BECOMES VONG LINH, THEN DEATH DOES NOT MEAN END, BUT VONG LINH, WONDERING VONG LINH FOR 49 DAYS OR LONGER AS VONG LINH, IT DEPENDS ON WHOSE VONG LINH IS ; FOR EXAMPLE, THE END OF MR X DOES NOT MEAN END, BUT IT IS STILL VONG LINH MR X, THEN VONG LINH MR X BECOME TAM LINH AGAIN AS MS Y, THEN END OF MR X DOES NOT MEAN END, BUT IT DOES NOT MEAN STILL EITHER, BECAUSE MR X VONG LINH NOW IS AS MS Y , NO LONGER MR X EVEN in DIFFERENT  GENDER as MS Y KEEP IN MIND VONG LINH IS VERY SENSITIVE TO LIGHT , HEAT, ENERGY, VIEWS, TAM LINH VIEWS, TAM CANH, THEY HAVE BEEN MADE BY SEXUALITIES OF INTERCOURSE BETWEEN HUMAN OR ANIMALS. IF VONG LINH DID NOT HAVE STRONG SPIRITS TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN, THEN VONG LINH MIGHT BE TRAPPED IN SEXUAL INTERCOURSES BY ANIMALS, THEN COMEBACK HERE ON EARTH AS ANIMALS. THE GOOD NEWS ARE  MOST THE TIME VONG LINH WILL END UP AS HUMAN IF TAM LINH IS AS HUMAN BEFORE BECOME VONG LINH FOR 49 DAYS OR LONGER; unfortunately, it does not mean it is as always the case that Vong Linh becomes Human Tam Linh again!!!!!!! Note: There are processing for Tam Linh to tie to your 18CEO Super Virtual Reality Goggles you re wearing, then there are processing to open your Tam Linh off your 18CEO Super Virtual Reality Goggles to become Vong Linh!!!!!! to separate your Tam Linh from 18CEO Super Virtual Reality Goggles then become 2 independent entities dead HPB and  VONG LINH! I will give more details later: how KARMA played its roles in Tam Linh, Vong Linh, and Life Vong Linh might be attracted by light, sound and vision from sexual intercourse by Human or by animals that Physical Human Body cannot see thru naked eyes or physical organs. Vong linh might move faster than sound, hearing sharper than physical human body, vong linh might be very sensitive to heat and cold, for vong LInh the sadness might be deeper and very deep and feeling of lost is very tremendous and incredible loneliness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! in some case , VOng Linh might be stuck around with its physical dead body without knowing where to go !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CAN VONG LINH TAKE OVER YOUR TAM LINH???? THE ANSWER IS YES! HOWEVER, IT IS VERY DIFFICULT FOR THAT TO HAPPEN, IT DOES NOT MEAN ABSOLUTELY NOT, IT IS STILL A POSSIBILITY FOR VONG LINH TO TAKE OVER TAM LINH IN VERY FEW CASES AND DEPEND ON WHO YOU ARE AND YOUR TAM LINH VONG LINH MOVEMENTS ARE MAINLY IN NIGHTS AND THEY CANNOT SEE THE WAYS THAT TAM LINH CAN  SEE THRU 18CEO SUPER VIERTUAL REALITY GOGGLES YOU ARE ALL WEARING WITHOUT KNOWING OR UNDERSTANDING!!!!!!!! VONG LINH and TAM LINH might even more complex and complicated than meta physics, but they are not meta physics, they are tam linh physics I will use Solar system and universe to explain Tam Linh: Solar system had 9 planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth,Mars,Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranius, Plutos and 9 planets moving around the sun, they will change space within solar system , they will change forces within solar system, they change gravity, they change the volumes space of solar sytem, many different kinds of invisibilities within solar system are as TAM linh of Solar system those might be as good example how your Tam Linh Look alike. if you can can even imagine your Tam Linh is as connection between you and the UNiverse, then your Tam Linh might be as the smallest scale of the universe one together with all connections between them: your scale of universe to universe . . . . . .      Now you can see how fast your Tam Linh might change in time, it might be even faster  than light!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! for 9 planets Tam Linh time might be upto nanasecond for universe tam linh time might be up to n.nnx10^-32second or even t=0 it is scary with t=0 Tho Huynh Smallest Particles Dynamics (Tho Huynh Top Paradox "Smallest Particles are not Smallest, something else is!") Final Particles Mfg (Former is as THE THO SCIENCE since 1998) You might learn how to transfer, transform, transmit Hydrogen to Gold; for example, then you get 103 other Elements Principles for Free! Dark Matter Maker. (I can show you the easy way to make Dark Matter that Today Science does not even know yet!) Matrix Field Expert (ThoH Particles Field of the Universe Expert) Matrix President. (ThoH Particles Field of the Universe President) ( or Simply as Particles Field of the Universe President) Quantum Quanta Field OF THE UNIVERSE Founder. 3 Different Sizes of Quantum Quanta Universes have been found by THO HUYNH on November 26 2018 Thanksgiving. Monday, at 8:40 AM (n.nn x 10^120 Quanta, m.mmx10^140 Quanta, and q.qq x 10^190 Quanta) 85x2=170 more particles after particles of standard model (THEORY OF EVERYTHING AS THE NAME I REFUSED TO USE) Dark Waves Founder (It might lead to some kind of MAN MADE LIGHT PARTICLES and then questionable Maxwell Equation about Light Waves) Science of Reincarnation (Brand New Science in the World on Earth) (Reincarnation has been known for Thousands of years in Buddhism and Hinduism, nothing new, however, Science of Reincarnation is Brand New first day in 2017, Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, 23 USA by Tho Huynh as Founder) (Everybody deserves to know Where and Who He/She will be next scientifically and physically!) Teleport First Information From Reincarnation Science. "Teleport is as Reincarnation in short cut" "Reincarnation is as Life Time Teleport" Tho Huynh Science of Reincarnation First. Birth and Rebirth Processing Book for $11.00 USD. Mojo Books & Records   Address: 2540 E Fowler Ave, Tampa, FL 33612, USA. Hours : 10:00–22:00 Telephone: (813) 971-9717***************************** Universe of Time or Time Universe a newest discovery from The Matrix Field. Time T = 0 is as instantaneous Time that Universe of Time can use to make things beyond Human Imagination! or something for Time Travel ability that not seen in the world before! "Nothing is neither created nor destroyed in Physical Conditions Universe" "Everything is formed or gone by Preconditions or/and Conditions continuously!" "Everything is Formed or gone Dynamically or/and transformally continuously!" Tho Huynh Newest Law of Nature and Life. 18CEO, 18COE, 18ECO, 18EOC, 18OCE, 18OEC SUPER VIRTUAL REALITY GOGGLES Copies PRODUCER! (Quantum States and Time Universe) Isaac Newton Gravity another Missing Half. Tho Huynh PUSH GRAVITY There are: 8.1 x 10^200 Possible Combinations of 121 Different Kinds of Mind = 8.1 x 10^200 PCo121DKoM. 121DIFFERENT KINDS OF MINDS MIGHT LEAD TO 7.89 X 10^370+ - 10^3.58 POSSIBLE REALITIES. Mind and Possible Realities are Both Larger than MAX UNIVERSE at n.nn x10^140 QUANTA quantitatively in QUANTUM FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE (MAX QUANTUM FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE IS ABOUT n.nn x 10^120 Quanta up to m.mmx10^190 Quanta in Quantum Universe by the way) THERE ARE 6 FORCES; INSTEAD OF 4 FORCES! thhnfl@aol.com viendongthoicuoc@yahoo.com thoithe@ymail.com Note: (#1)Science of Reincarnation I mentioned above is at Limit Scientific and Physical only, I did not observe anything about Spiritual yet! Even if I might learn something about Spiritual Part, I still did not want to say anything about it! Only Scientific and Physical Parts of Science of Reincarnation for now !!!!!!!! (#2) THERE ARE 6 FORCES: 1a) Electromagnetic Force. 2b) Weak Nuclear Force. 3c) Strong Nuclear Force. 4d) Isaac Newton First Half of Gravity (1643-1727) Pull Gravity. Isaac Newton Might have mistaken PULL GRAVITY is as GRAVITY, Due to Rotation; Unfortunately, REALITY might say PUSH GRAVITY before ROTATION (Motion) and AFTER ROTATION (MOTION) might be as REAL GRAVITY  . . . . . . . . . Isaac Newton has missed Causality and Effect (Results) to Proceed and Process back and Forth to Double Checks on Forces and Gravity, even Today Science and Today Physics have missed such Causality and Effect to Proceed and Process Back and Forth to Double Checks on the Observation OF FORCES & GRAVITY after 2018 - 1643 = 375 years if I used Isaac Newton Birth Year as my Mark of time! It is even worse Isaac Newton has mistaken PULL GRAVITY is as GRAVITY; instead, PUSH GRAVITY supposed to be as REAL GRAVITY before Rotation and After Rotation (Motion in General) !!!!!! Galileo Galilei and Isaac Newton cannot and could not and Fail to realize that Gravity is more complex and Complicated than what they could see at their Time. IT involved: Equilibrium and Rotation (Motion), Plus (+) and Minus (-) in Electric Domain, Pull Gravity and Push Gravity, Positions and Timing, Planet Field and Solar Field . . . . . May be Isaac Newton should have some visions in terms of Yin and Yang . . . . Let use some movements of Jet System in Space to analog about Pull and Push Gravity along the way Earth Move around the Sun in its Orbit, it is about 904,778,684.2 km = 565,486,677.6 miles . . . .  It turns out to be sometime Push and sometime Pull and sometime Push and Pull Gravity together or sometime none, etc, etc, etc . . . . Do not forget Mars and Venus! Besides, Isaac Newton and Today Science and Today Physics have missed a very Important Law of Space for 375 years as I list below:      "There are always 2 sides of Space to begin with, No Matter What!"-Tho Huynh Law of Space I take examples to explain: Front Space-Back Space, Above Space-Below Space, Left Space-Right Space, Top Space-Bottom Space, Up Space-Down Space, Inside Space-Outside Space, In Space-Out Space, etc, etc, etc . . . There are more Laws of Spaces; however, it is enough for Today! It is even more interesting with Projection Earth Motion on Suface to see Cycloids defined Earth Gravity and Forces . . . . . . Note: Do not think or misunderstand PUSH GRAVITY is as EQUAL FORCE and OPPOSITE REACTION of PULL GRAVITY as I have pointed out above and as ISAAC NEWTON THIRD LAW has pointed out 375 years ago!!!!!!!! THEY ARE STILL HAVING TO OBEY ISAAC NEWTON THIRD LAW, BUT THEY ARE INDEPENDENCE FROM EACH OTHER Relatively!!! DO NOT LET THE NAMES FOOL YOU OR PROCESS OF THINKING FOOL YOU . ..!!!!!!!      As I expose above, now we can say Rotation or Motion in general has caused PULL GRAVITY and Isaac Newton has explained Parts of it 2018 - 1643 = 375 years ago; however, with QUANTUM FIELD has been found, then M = 1kg might mean M = n.nn x10^27 Quanta and it will change F = ma for better with Forces in Quantum Field Universe; besides, RELATIVE MATHEMATICS IS AS ANOTHER FACTOR TO CONTRIBUTE FOR BETTER FORCES IN PHYSICS, TODAY PHYSICS AND TODAY SCIENCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!      The Next Question is :      "What Causes PUSH GRAVITY and How PUSH GRAVITY works on its objects?"      IT MIGHT BECOME A GREAT QUESTION IN 21 st Century TO BE ANSWERED BY TODAY SCIENCE AND TODAY PHYSICS! The Answer might be Full of Surprise in Modern Science and Today Physics in 21 st century!!!!!!!!!!!!! 5e) Tho Huynh Second Half of Gravity (2018) PUSH GRAVITY. 6f) The 6 th Force (Temporary Name Called to keep my secret and copy right) (#3) Mind is as Medium for Universe, Universe is as Medium for Life, and Life is as Medium for Mind, so on and So forth . . . . The Mind might project the Universe, the Universe project Life, and Life Project mind . . . . AND VICE VERSA . . . They are all the same and they are Nothing! Life might have 500! Facts of Life might lead to Possible Combinations of 500 Facts in Life, PCo500FIL: PCo500FiL = 500! = 1.220136825 x 10^1134 It is Larger and Bigger than 10^200 Possible Combinations of 121 Different Kinds of Minds and Max Universe 10^140 Quanta and 10^370 Possible Realities Quantitatively in Quantum Quanta Field of the Universe; however, Life is Limited Space if I base on Facts of Life on Earth and Observe facts of Life on Earth, then Life Space is smaller than Mind Space and Max Universe Space and Possible Realities 7.89 x 10^370 PR Space, then Limited Space will put Life facts in some compacts and Limits to develop or Developments!!!!!!!!!!!!! Note: Please do not say what I have said if you are not me, because it might cause Negativity on you! Nothing does not mean 0 or Empty Space or Absolute 0 or Nihilism or Emptiness or NO from YES! (#4) MY COMMENT------THO HUYNH COMMENT BELOW: As I said before some where else, I would say again HERE with My List Below: 1) Einstein Space Time missed Quantum Time. 2)Einstein Gravitational Space Time missed Equilibrium States! 3)Einstein Ring missed Dynamics (Transition) from Cubic States to Spherical States! Not Just By Only Gravity, But Combination of Both) 4)Einstein Knew Time Dilation, but Einstein did not know Time Oscillation! It is even worse, Albert Eintein has confused about Space and Speed, Distance Functions and Space Functions! Albert Einstein is also confused about Dynamics and Observations and Observers within "All Laws of Physics should be the same for all Observers and Observations"; he missed Direct Dynamics to Indirect Dynamics! Time Dilation is Right Idea; however, Einstein manners to explain Time Dilation with Speed Of Light is not as OKAY!!!!!! It is terrible Manner! Einstein supposed to have Time Dilation and Time Oscillation together to have whole set of time in his Relativity; unfortunately, he missed them together! 5)Einstein Vacuum Medium and Aether (somebody else proposed and Einstein accepted) did not work! 6) Einstein did not Realize Isaac Newton Missed PUSH GRAVITY! 7) Einstein did not realize Space 0 is not Equal Quantum 0 Basically and Dynamically ! ! ! 8)Most of All, Einstein failed to reach THE MATRIX or ThoH Particles Field of the Universe or Simply as Particles Field of the Universe OR IT IS JUST AS QUANTUM QUANTA FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE OR IT IS AS THEORY OF EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!!! (NOTE: Without THE MATRIX or THOH PARTICLES FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE or simply as PARTICLES FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE or it is just as QUANTUM QUANTA FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE, then there is no such thing is as THEORY OF EVERYTHING! With THE MATRIX, there is no need for THEORY OF EVERYTHING; however, if you can call SPACE IS AS THEORY, NOT A REAL THING, then you can call THE MATRIX is as THEORY OF EVERYTHING! If you call Space is as A THING, REAL THING, then THE MATRIX is not as A THEORY, THE MATRIX is as A REAL THING!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Due to Business Lately! I would call THE MATRIX IS AS THEORY OF EVERYTHING any way; even though, I did not agree WITHIN MYSELF in some Data and facts related to THE MATRIX FIELD NAME and THEORY OF EVERYTHING . . .) (#5) NOTE: Law of CAUSALITY and EFFECT (RESULTS) has existed in the Universe for Billions of years, it might be long as the Age of the Universe. Siddhartha Gautama, The Buddha, has found Laws of Causality and Effect 2600 years ago today, I am as the First to look at CAUSALITY and EFFECT in Manner of Science, I am as the First Person who use Science to observe CAUSALITY and RESULTS. I am also as the FIRST PERSON to Observe CAUSALITY and EFFECT Scientifically!!!!!! However, Siddhartha Gautama way is better than Scientific way, because Siddhartha way is for Happiness, Enlightenment, and Free; meant time, Scientific way will lead to Dead End one way or the other way, simply this Universe or Quantum Quanta Universe is BIG, really Big, Bigger Universe, but it is Limited, Really Big Limits for Time Being!!!!! Tho Huynh-thhnfl@aol.com-QUANTUM QUANTA FIELD OF THE UNIVERSE FOUNDER Florida, Brooksville, USA, 34602. ‎Sunday, ‎September ‎30, ‎2018, ‏‎12:50:37 PM Above it is as First Day AND BIRTHDAY for Science of Natural Law Causality and Effect (Results) on Earth. (#6) Scientists, Science, and Physics said Higgs Field gave Mass to the Particles. Tho Huynh said: "Higgs Field is not Quantum Quanta Field of the Universe!                           " Quantum Quanta Fields of the Universe are not Higgs Field      "Quantum Quanta Fields are the Mass of the Universe.       "Quantum Quanta Field gave Mass to Particles, simply because Quantum Quanta Fields are the Mass of the Universe! (#7) Life is Suck! Suck is Good! Good is Life! -- 3 Steps to Life Good! Life Sucks! Suck Good! Good Life!- 3 Steps to Good Life! What is Life? Life is Like Atoms, you do not know them, they will lead you where they supposed to! Life is as Atoms, you know them, you will lead them where you want to or set them Free! Tho Huynh-Life Good-Florida, Wednesday 12 December 2018 USA      (Page 8 of 8)

[anonthenullifier]

The Adventures of the Maximoffs - Chapter 1

Sequel to What to Expect ( http://archiveofourown.org/works/9636128/chapters/21768647)

Overall Summary: Wanda and Vision encounter the ups and downs of being parents and Avengers.  This is a sequel to What to Expect, but you can read this without reading that one, or at least I’m trying to write it that way. 

The First Night At Home

Chapter Summary: Wanda and Vision struggle with their first night at home with the twins. (http://archiveofourown.org/works/10923573/chapters/24295809)

Hope you enjoy!! 

It is exactly fifty-six steps from the foot of the bed where Wanda sleeps to the side of the crib currently housing the twins. Vision knows this because he has walked it exactly eighteen times already and they have only been asleep for twenty minutes, thirty-five seconds, and twenty-six, no twenty-seven milliseconds. Phasing from the bathroom into the nursery would save him roughly thirteen steps but he made the unfortunate discovery that the movement of his body through the wall stirs the air around the stars hanging from the ceiling and startles both boys awake. So he must consciously remember to use the door as he steps quietly into the nursery, shifting his density until he is partially incorporeal, the wooden plank under the carpet that is closest to the crib has an annoying tendency to squeak with too much pressure.

Even though the master bedroom has a monitor transmitting from the camera he so carefully hung on the wall, angling it for the optimal view of the crib, he finds that every time he checks the monitor he is only able to confirm the twins have not left the crib. What the monitor lacks is enough clarity to zoom in close enough to determine the rise and fall of the boys’ chests. Thus he finds himself trekking between the rooms.

Slowly he approaches the crib, pupils dilating with a subtle click as he assesses the current status of their slumber. Their tiny bodies are wrapped tightly in the velcro-reinforced (and helpfully monogrammed for easy identification) swaddles Natasha gifted them that are essentially tiny straight jackets for babies. Billy fussed initially, elbows weakly fighting against the constraints but as soon as Wanda began rocking him, humming a rolling Sokovian lullaby, his body went limp. Tommy, on the other hand, screamed until Vision finished adhering the velcro, and then, once the snugness of the swaddle and the warmth of the delicate fleece was in place, he calmed instantly, eyelids growing heavy and breath slowing into a steady rhythm. Now they lay side by side and Vision is fairly certain he can see the intake and exhale of breath, but, his feet shuffle a bit more forward, he’d rather be sure, and so he reaches out his hand and brings it to hover just above Billy’s mouth. The brush of air is welcome against his skin. Satisfied that one child is alive he moves his hand towards Tommy’s mouth, smiling when shallow, hot breath crashes against his palm.

“Still alive?”

The voice startles him, sympathetic nervous system activating in under a second as his body prepares to fight off the intruder, but then a hand to his back and a kiss to his shoulder kickstarts his parasympathetic system, easing him back into a relative calm as he turns to lay a kiss on Wanda’s head. “Still alive.”

Her arms snake around his torso, fingers gripping the waistband of his sweatpants as she pulls his body closer. “You’re being too paranoid, nothing’s going,” a yawn cuts off her sentence, face coming to rest against his chest so that the rhythm of her next words whip across his bare skin, “to happen. Come back to bed and please,” her arms tighten in emphasis, “stop pacing, it’s driving me crazy.”

Vision finds himself torn at the request, fingers absently running from the roots of her hair down to the tips as he contemplates his response. “My apologies, I am quite restless.”

“No shit.”

“Language Wanda, we have children now.”

The soft, exhausted chuckle tugs at the corners of his mouth, a playful smack to his side accompanying her “Shut up, Steve.” She pulls on his body until his feet respond, arm wrapping around her shoulders to help support her slow and hesitant steps, worry building in his mind at the way she winces when she takes too long of a stride. When Wanda walks with him the trip is seventy-four and a half steps. “Can you,” they stop at the edge of the bed, the mound of pillows he had so recently built up for her decimated and spread across the floor, “help me again?”

“Of course.”  Her palms press hard into his chest as he helps lift her onto the mattress, hands skimming along her legs until he reaches her knees, hooking his fingers and swinging her lower body until she is straight on the bed. “Pillows the same as last time?”

“Please.” Which means he wedges one between her thighs, one under her ankles, one half under her neck and shoulder, and the last along her stomach. The pressure of fingers curling around his wrist brings his gaze back to her doleful, pleading eyes. “Can you actually stay this time? I’ll even bring,” the monitor floats across the bed, over his head and her body, until it comes to rest on the nightstand across from her face, the black-and-white image of their sleeping twins clear on the screen, “this over here so we can both see.”  

Vision smiles down at her, hand brushing a strand of hair from her forehead, leaning down to brush his lips against the newly revealed skin. “Of course.”  He walks through the mattress, re-solidifying his body once he reaches his side of the bed. Slowly and deliberately, so as not to disturb her comfort, he lays his head on the free corner of pillow next to Wanda’s head, legs stretching until the balls of his feet push against the wooden frame of the bed, and he drapes his arm around her middle, fingers splayed across her stomach. “Sleep well.” A shift forward allows him to press a kiss to her neck, heart singing at the barely audible sigh from her lips and the way her body shivers when he pulls away. He closes his eyes, toying with the idea that perhaps one day he’ll sleep, but all that he is accomplishing is a few seconds where he wars against his desire to sit up and stare at the monitor again.

“Vizh?”

His eyes pop open, arm tightening to draw her closer, “Is everything okay?”

An uncertain silence hangs in the air causing him to shift onto his elbow, eyes studying the profile of her face, her eyes flicking to the side to glance at him before she sighs and turns onto her back. “They haven’t moved, do you,” she hesitates, “think they’re okay? Should we check on them again?” Silence resumes between them, only this time taking on a much different quality as he attempts to determine the best response. Before he can speak, Wanda brings a hand to rub at her eyes as her mouth forms an embarrassed arc, “Maximoff, put away the I-told-you-so eyes.”

“I would never utter such a phrase.”

“Still counts if you think it.”  

Vision laughs, not denying the accusation which earns him an exaggerated eye roll, and he bends down to kiss her once more, relishing the way her fingers cup his neck to keep him in place before he phases through the bed.  Once he is standing next to her, he reaches out his hands to help her out of the pillow cage he so perfectly crafted. They proceed to take the seventy-four and a half steps back to the crib, where Wanda leans forward, the board creaking under her feet, and lays her hands on each of the boys’ chests, smile growing at the subtle lift and fall of their breathing. It is clear that the current set-up of their family is not conducive to a restful evening, even for his own sleepless life. A quick search of solutions reveals a compelling and quite easy fix. “Wanda, it appears that the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests infants sleep in the same room as the parents for at least the first six months, perhaps-”

“Yeah,” she nods, hair swaying in a mesmerizing pattern as she bends forward to check on the twins again. “Yeah, I think that would help a lot.”

“I believe the Bartons gifted us a travel crib, I can set it up in our room.”  Another nod of assent greets his words and he steps out of the nursery, turning to take in the image of Wanda standing in the room, fingertips trailing along the top rail of the crib, eyes soft, and a beautiful, graceful smile on her lips, before phasing down through the house into the basement. Thanks to his obsessive cataloguing of the location of every item in the house, he finds the box containing the travel crib in under a minute, gripping it in his fingers as he travels back up into the master bedroom.

Vision opens the box, eyes scanning each item he removes from the packaging, unfolding the instructions and smoothing out the creases so he can assess the steps, organizing each piece into the appropriate pile. The first step requires he set up the base of the crib, a crab-like folded up structure that wobbles and then collapses into itself when he tries to stand it up. Three more tries and he frowns at the unstable structure. “Hmm.” His fingers skim over the instructions. “Oh, yes, I see now.” Vision grips the edges of the base, snapping the rail into place on the short ends and then doing the same to the side rails, phasing his arm through the mesh sides to push the middle portion down until it is rigid. Now it looks like a crib, of sorts. Next he picks up a mesh basket, plastic clips lining the outer edges that he snaps into place before laying a trifolded, padded mattress down. He steps back, eying the contraption, scanning the joints and assessing the stability, calculating how the combined weight of the twins might impact the give of the mesh cradle holding the mattress. Gently he reaches out and shakes the crib, feeling more at ease when it doesn’t crumble up and fall down.

Satisfied he walks back to the nursery. “Wanda,” he whispers her name, drawing her attention away from the sleeping infants, “it is ready.” When Wanda doesn’t waver from her vigil, Vision joins her in staring at the twins, Tommy somehow managed to tilt onto his side, head resting against Billy’s shoulder, and he finds himself worried that moving them now goes against the number two rule of having children: Never disrupt their sleep. “Do we-”

“I don’t know, Vizh.” Hesitantly Wanda rises up on the tips of her toes in order to reach inside the crib, sliding her hands under Tommy, one below his neck the other under his bottom. The instant she touches him he flinches, a pathetic and upset whimper causing Wanda to pause in her movements. “Do you,” she lowers her voice to the point that he needs to boost his auditory receptors and lean down so that his face is level with hers in order to make out all of the words, “remember the hot potato mission?”

It was one of their first missions as a couple, though at the time the team was not aware of their relationship, and involved the removal of hazardous and highly unstable radioactive tubes. Sam insisted on calling it the hot potato mission but even to this day Vision finds it difficult to understand why, never inquiring as it seemed to make inherent sense to everyone else. He realizes his thoughts have strayed from the intended meaning of bringing up the mission and so he works backwards until he has the image of Wanda cradling a glowing tube in her heavily padded hazard suit and the intense, disquieting fear he had watching her walk slowly across uneven ground. “Are you suggesting they are equally as volatile or more volatile than the radioactive substance?”

Wanda carefully shifts Tommy, supporting his weight fully now and then stops at the sharp, high-pitched angry cry that comes from his mouth. Their worried eyes travel to Billy who continues to sleep. “More. I really need you to talk me out of this before I wake him up.”

“Well,” every argument clicks through his mind, each one garnering the same weight of thought and consideration, and yet he’s not certain which way he falls. “It is deeply illogical to move them while asleep.” Wanda nods in agreement, lowering the baby back towards the mattress. “But,” she stops, turning confused and intrigued eyes towards him, “though illogical now, the logic of having them in the room is flawless. We could wait until they awaken next but if that is not for several hours then you will not be able to sleep. If, however, we move them and they stay asleep then you will rest. If we move them and they rouse, then you would still be lacking the same amount of sleep as you would if we wait.”

“So…?”

Vision finds himself shrugging as he continues, embracing the emotionally driven side of the argument more than the logical one to reach his final conclusion, “I would be more at ease to have all three of you in the same location.

“Hot potato it is.” A slow, calming exhale precedes the quickness she uses to snatch Tommy up and into her chest, a soothing shhh and the sway of her body miraculously keeping him asleep. Which means it is Vision’s turn, arms trembling slightly as he follows Wanda’s lead, placing his hands under Billy’s head and bottom, not hesitating in picking him up and bringing him firmly against his chest. “Nice job.”

“You as well.” Slowly they shuffle to the bedroom, this trip taking a meandering ninety-six steps, and ease the boys into the travel crib located right next to the bed. Once the mission is successful with no explosions of tears or thrashing of bodies, Vision aids Wanda back into bed, repeating the same process of the pillows and snuggling close behind her, the very clear sound of tiny breaths and the motion of equally tiny chests rising and falling much more reassuring than the static image on the monitor. Within minutes he even feels Wanda’s muscles relax, breath elongating into the song of her slumber. It is the most serene moment they have had in three days.

This serenity, however, lasts for all of fifteen minutes before Billy erupts in a tearful, panicked cry followed almost immediately by Tommy, and then Wanda’s drawn out, defeated “Nooo” joins the chorus of unhappiness.

At the hospital they devised a plan for such wakings, Wanda remaining in bed to feed the boys and Vision changing the diaper of the baby currently not eating. Though they hadn’t discussed the continuance of the plan, Vision determines to follow it regardless, phasing through the bed until he is able to lift Tommy. He attempts a “Shhh” and a light bounce to settle the crying but finds it only intensifying.

“Here, I’ll take him,” Wanda reaches her hands out, a pillow already balanced on her lap and nursing camisole unclipped.

Tommy is transferred to Wanda, Vision moving the pillows from her legs up behind her head for greater support “Do you need anything?”

“No, I’m good, thanks.”

Vision picks up Billy, cradling him in his arms, turning to look back at the bed before leaving the room. “I will be back, let me know if anything changes.”

“Will do.”  Vision leaves, noting the soft gasp and muffled cry of Wanda, divising that it means Tommy successfully latched.  The concern bubbling up in Vision at the sound has to be clamped down or else he knows he’ll journey back to check on her and not accomplish his end of the mission. So he keeps walking, developing a slightly exaggerated bend in his knees as he bounces on every other step, the movement seeming to keep the crying at bay. But, unfortunately, Billy is wholly unhappy when the swaddle is removed and Vision unsnaps the legs of the monster-footed pajamas, the late evening air no doubt cold against such fresh skin. “William, this is not necessary,” the reasoning has yet to work, thin, pale legs flailing along with the upset wails, eyes scrunched and fingers gripped into fists as the diaper is removed, the diaper cream applied, and the new diaper is fastened into place. “William…” Vision whispers the name, hoping his plea will be heard as his fingers struggle to close the annoying number of snaps lining both legs of the pajamas, whoever designed the garment clearly not understanding the mechanics of an upset child and the dexterity of a tired parent. “William I am almost done if you would cease this behavior I would be able to complete the task much faster.” One day, he figures, such words will make a difference, hopefully, but it is clearly not today as he wrestles Billy’s limbs.

Once Billy is re-swaddled (a relieved sigh exiting unannounced from Vision’s mouth) they head back to the bedroom, standing awkwardly to the side watching as Wanda strokes Tommy’s cheek, tears still fresh on her face but a brief reassuring smile flashed towards him a sign that he doesn’t need to interfere right now. After several minutes they switch, Vision balancing Billy against his chest as Wanda places Tommy into the crook of his other arm before grabbing Billy. Luckily Tommy sleeps through the diaper change and is easily transferred back to the travel crib, joined shortly by Billy.

All is quiet again.

Unfortunately the process repeats itself every 57 minutes, almost on the dot, all night. Cry, feed, change, rock, rest, cry, feed change, rock, rest. It is exhausting for Vision and he cannot comprehend how Wanda must feel (though her pained groans and insistent “I’m dying, Vizh, dying” offers a small glimpse into her experience).

Vision contemplates the experience during each 57 minute period of calm, coming to the conclusion that one, they most definitely took for granted the almost omnipresent nursing staff at the hospital who would often change diapers whenever they stopped by or rock the babies back to sleep to allow them a chance to breathe. That they allowed this to lull them into an exaggerated sense of efficacy in dealing with the twins. And two, it’s almost as jarring of a culture shock as it was to emerge from the cradle, only this time Wanda is just as confused as he is with the expectations.

When the sun begins to peek into the room, slivers of pale white glinting off the stars hanging in the nursery, Vision is re-velcroing Tommy’s swaddle, a proud “Good job, Thomas,” reinforcing his gratefulness that his son slept through the diaper change yet again. Leisurely he takes the fifty-six steps back, feet stopping on step forty-eight as an affectionate smile pushes his cheeks up.  Wanda is fast asleep, head haphazardly leaned against the pile of pillows behind her, a quiet, relaxed snore filling the room and mixing with the almost inaudible breathing of Billy curled against her body, asleep as well with one hand out of the swaddle and resting against her chest. It is the most relaxed he has seen her in months, all weariness falling away from her face with each snore. She is, unsurprisingly, stunning.  

Vision shifts his density, feet so light there is no sound as he tiptoes to the crib, kissing Thomas on the forehead before laying him down. He then swivels towards the bed, gliding just above the floor until he reaches the edge of the mattress. Delicately he rearranges the bedsheet to cover Wanda’s exposed chest, certain she’d not appreciate his next action if he didn’t, and then he steps back, phone raised in his hand. After triple checking that the sound and flash are off, he takes a picture of the entire room, Tommy in the crib and Wanda and Billy in bed.

Despite the exhaustion from the never-ending theatrics of the night, he finds himself basking in the odd, impossible turns of his life, lips rising ever so slowly into what must be an idiotic grin. If Wanda was awake she’d likely roll her eyes and throw a pillow at his face. But she’s not and so he allows himself this luxury, committing every single detail to memory so he can easily recall this feeling during what will likely be a lifetime of challenges and continued exhaustion, but all tempered by this blooming warmth in his chest, of the joy he feels so profoundly right now.

This is his family.