#which doesn't seem like that much of a problem right

[glasratz]

I just finished reading Anselm von Feuerbach's early 19th century account of remarkable crimes (and just realizing that those 500+ pages were actually just volume one) and this reminds me of one of the cases described there.

A miller's wife went to the local court reporting that her husband made off with a significant portion of the family fortune. This is recorded, but nothing can be really done about it. Soon after, rumours spread that the husband was actually murdered and is buried on his property.

So the court starts an investigation, which goes nowhere. Again rumours come up that the family of the missing miller has bribed the local judge.

Years later, the Bavarian state starts persecution said judge for several unrelated accounts of corruption. During this investigation, the court archives burn down. As the damage is assessed, the unfinished case of the missing miller gets discovered and reopended.

It quickly comes to light, that one of the miller's sons has paid a day labourer and his wife to assist him in killing his father. The body is found.

Now, here it gets horrible:

Before the whole thing happened, the court has gotten complaints about the miller for years. His wife and son had tried to throw him out of the house several times. They complained about his constant violence and how he wasted the family's money on alcohol, gambling and prostitutes.

The court wanted to hear nothing of this and forced the family to take the father back as "head of the household", since this was his god-given right.

This had made the situation worse. The older son realized that now his father was simply going to throw him out, as was his legal right to do. But that young man was the only one physically strong enough to keep his father from abusing the other siblings. It is also well recorded that the mother was once beaten that severely, that she suffered permanent brain damage.

This was, when the plot to kill the father was made.

The story did not end well. The mother, one of the daughters and the labourer's wife were sentenced to long prison sentences. They did not appeal the ruling, because they hoped to be pardoned by the king. They weren't.

For the labourer and the son, the death penalty was out of the question since it couldn't be determined which wound actually killed the father - just one of the quirks of the law back then.

However, in the eyes of the court, the crimes of killing ones own father and in the case of the labourer, killing for money, were so severe that life in prison wasn't enough: Both were permanently forged into chains, paraded through the town, put on public display with signs around their necks and finally put in permanent solitary confinement.

I can't determine whether von Feuerbach thinks this judgment was justified. He just indicates that it was generally lawful. He also doesn't give a clear indication why he included this case in his collection, but he doesn't always do that.

To me, von Feuerbach seems like a reasonable man. He shows compassion as well as reason. He does believe that there are "born criminals", but much more often explains how someone was driven into crime by circumstance and poverty.

So I'd like to think that von Feuerbach saw the problem here. Maybe he though that the main fault was on the local judges side, for not acting against the miller. But I can't say for sure.

i fucking hate it when a movie or a tv show does some shit where a character has a shitty dad and another character tells them to forgive him because. "it's your dad". that means nothing. more people should be killing their fathers.

[cressidagrey]

The moment I could see it - Part 2

Pairing: Max Verstappen x Ariel Cane (Original Character)

Summary: 5 Times that Gianpiero Lambiase thinks that Ariel Cane and Max Verstappen are weirdly similar…and 1 time he is just happy that the two of them are no longer pining after each other. 

Warnings: 

GP's POV, mention of cancer, mention of parent's death

Author Notes: I am back to my old tricks...which means I write from the most random of POV's just because. (I once wrote a chapter from a dog's POV so like, GP doesn't even really count.

About 3 months later, GP once again returned home from Race Weekend. 

This time for good. Abu Dhabi had gone off well enough, Kvyat ending with a respectable 9th place... and Max Verstappen had ended up with enough penalty points on his special license that he was just 4 points away from a one race ban.

GP shook his head in weary disapproval as he thought of the young driver’s antics. Max really seemed to have no sense of when to stop. 

Still, GP had some sympathy. Driving at that level was a high-pressure experience, and Max was still so young.

Well, he wasn’t GP’s problem. Thank god for small mercies…

Though that gritty determination and bravery bordering on stupidity… well, that was something that GP both admired and dreaded. 

But…F1 was finished for the year, and he got to go home for christmas. So he would also get to ban all thoughts of Max Verstappen from his brain for the foreseeable future. 

It wasn’t a very christmas-sy sight that greeted him as he turned his car into their street though. 

Instead it was a hearse.  

 Parked right across their neighbour’s house. 

In front of the house with the red front door. 

In the three months since he had first met the Cane Family, Laura and him had indeed taken up Ariel on her offer to babysit twice. Both times Franny had been more than happy with her caretaker for the evening. 

There also had been an ambulance at the house twice, once ending in a two week hospital stint for Paul Cane, as Laura had told him over the phone while GP had been in Singapore and Japan…

And now there was a hearse.

Immediately the fatigue of the weekend's race and travel seemed to vanish, replaced by a sudden sense of dread.

He parked and then climbed out of his car, his stomach in knots, and quickly crossed the street to his own house.

He walked up his front steps, forcing himself to take deep, slow breaths. He wasn't going to jump to conclusions. Not yet.

"Honey, I am home!" he called out for Laura. He found his wife in the living room, cuddling a sleeping Francesca. But she wasn't alone.

Emma was sitting on the couch, legs pulled up to her chest, staring emptily in front of her. 

"Hey," Laura greeted him, a forced smile on her face, putting Franny down, as she came to hug him.

"Their father died this afternoon," she whispered. "Ariel dropped her off, so that she could deal with the..."

Laura didn’t need to say anything more.  GP wrapped his arms around Laura, pulling her close. 

"How is she?" he asked quietly, his eyes flicking to the girl sitting almost in a daze on the couch.

“How would you be if your only remaining parent died?” Laura gave back softly. 

"Ariel?" he whispered. 

Laura shrugged. “I think she is handling this with more maturity than an adult twice her age would,” she said quietly. “I offered to take Emma off her hands for the night, get her out of the house…”

GP smiled sadly at his wife. It was typical of her to be so generous. Despite the fact they had their own baby to look after, she wasn't about to leave the thirteen-year-old alone.

He looked back at Emma, who was still sitting on the couch, looking small and lost. It made his heart ache.

"Ariel refused. Said their older brother is on his way as well," Laura said quietly. "But he seemed...pretty much useless, to be honest."

GP felt a flash of anger at her words. Useless? How could their brother, a grown man, be useless in such a time of need?

He forced himself to take a steadying breath, reminding himself that he didn't know the details. It wasn't for him to judge.

"What do you mean, useless?" he asked, trying to keep his voice calm. He cast a glance at Emma again. 

His wife sighed, looking rather frustrated. "He just...he just doesn't seem to be able to deal with any of this," she said, her voice low. "Ariel basically has to walk him through how to actually get here..."

Gianpiero shook his head, his respect for Ariel growing even more. She was already dealing with so much, yet she had to handle her brother as well? 

"She's got enough on her plate already," he muttered, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

Laura laid a hand on his arm, giving it a slight squeeze. "I know," she said. "But she's doing all she can to keep things together."

He looked over at Emma again, sitting so quietly on the sofa. She was just a child, watching everyone around her fall apart. It was all so wrong.

GP took a deep breath, trying to push down the feeling of powerlessness. "When will her brother get here?" he asked his wife, struggling to keep his voice neutral.

"He said he'll be here within the hour," Laura replied quietly, her expression one of concern. "I can start dinner for everyone..."

GP nodded, knowing that his wife was trying to do whatever she could to help. But as he watched Emma sit on the couch, still looking so lost, he couldn't shake the feeling of helplessness.

He walked over and sat down next to her, careful not to crowd her. For a moment, he just sat there in silence, not sure what to say.

He stared at his own daughter, asleep and content…once Franny was asleep, nearly nothing was going to wake her up again. 

Emma didn't say anything, just continued to stare out into space. Her eyes were dry, but her face was pale and stricken.

"Hey Kiddo..." he said softly, trying to draw her attention.

She turned her head slightly, casting him a quick glance before returning her gaze to the distance.

He continued in a gentle voice, "How are you holding up?"

Emma didn't respond, just pressed her lips together tightly, but the way her chin trembled betrayed her effort not to cry.

He had no idea what to say to her. What could he possibly say to comfort a child who just lost her father? Nothing, really.

"I remember when Mom died," Emma said suddenly. GP started slightly at the unexpected words. Hearing her bring up her mother's death so suddenly was a bit of a surprise.

But he quickly composed himself, keeping his own voice soft. "You do?" he asked quietly.

"Yes," Emma said simply. "Ariel was as old as I am now. I was 8. She took care of us. Dad was useless. But Ariel took care of us. Just like she takes care of everything now."

Gianpiero felt a pang of sadness. Emma was so matter-of-fact about her sister taking charge of the family, as if it was an expected outcome. 

"Percy dissappeared afterwards. Left us alone," Emma continue weakly. "I don't think he wanted to be around us anymore."

Gianpiero felt his heart break a little at her words. "Why do you think that?" he asked gently. 

"He went off to university.." Emma said softly. “Doesn’t come home until it’s christmas anymore. Some people say he's some kind of genius," she said with a roll of her eyes. 

Gianpiero was taken aback by the scoff in her voice. It seemed like Emma had an opinion about her brother.

"You don't agree?" he asked curiously, keeping his voice gentle.

"Yeah well...I guess he's smart and all that," Emma said sullenly. "Good with numbers. Bad with people."

GP could hear the distaste in her voice. It seemed like there was some resentment there, towards her older brother.

“He just left us. Like we didn’t matter.”

He was tempted to ask her more about it, but the sound of a car starting pulled his attention...and then Emma was up from the couch, sprinting outside. 

He followed after her, after a glance to Laura. 

The hearse was pulling out onto the street. 

By the time he was outside, Emma had already collided with Ariel on the sidewalk. 

GP felt his heart ache as he watched the two girls hug, Emma clinging to her older sister as if her life depended on it.

Ariel hugged her back, her mouth set in firm line, as she watched the hearse carry their father's body away.

GP didn’t want to watch this. He felt like the worst kind of voyeur to see this…to bear witness to this moment, where he could see their grief laid bare like this…

And still he was rooted in a spot watching… He felt an odd sense of awe watching the girls. They were so young, so vulnerable, and yet so strong.

Ariel was clearly holding back her own tears, putting on a brave face for her little sister. Emma was sobbing quietly on her shoulder, her slender frame trembling against her sister's strength. 

He felt a sudden rush of anger towards their older brother, Percy. How could he not be there when his younger sisters needed him so much?

He tried to push down the emotion; there was no point in being angry right now. He was about to turn away and give the girls some privacy, when he noticed a car pulling up onto the street, and then stopping.

The man that got out of the cab was clearly their brother, his red hair a dead giveaway. GP couldn't help but notice the lack of warmth in his movements.

Percy Cane seemed…nearly detached as he took a few steps towards the house, but his steps seemed slow, as if every step he took was something he didn't want to do.

Here were his younger sisters grieving over their father's death, and Percy Cane acted as if he would rather be anywhere else.

"Perce," Ariel greeted him, her voice soft.

Emma turned in her sister's arms, staring at him. "You came," she said, her voice somewhat…actually surprised.

"You are my sisters," Percy responded, nearly robotically. 

There was something...off about the way he spoke...so emotioneless...so controlled… 

He watched as Percy nodded somewhat mechanically at his little sisters, avoiding making eye contact with them. "Of course, I came," he added after a moment.

"For how long?" Ariel asked him.

"I am finished. I don’t need to go back."

GP was quite sure that he was missing some of the context. 

"Finished with what?" Ariel asked him, staring at her brother. 

"My doctorate," Percy answered. "I am finished."

Gianpiero's jaw nearly dropped. The boy had finished a whole damn doctorate? How old was he, twenty-two, twenty-three at most? And here he was, talking about it like it was a minor inconvenience…

"What do we do now?" Percy asked Ariel, and for the first time...GP heard something like shaking in his voice.

And suddenly it made sense. 

Percy Cane wasn't an unfeeling monster. Even when he sounded like a robot or an emotionless asshole. 

GP would have bet nearly everything that Emma's assessment of "Good with numbers, Bad with people" also involved "horrible with feelings”. Clearly, the young man was out of his depth dealing with the emotional fallout of his father's death.

GP couldn't help but wonder if his detachment was just a way of coping, a wall to shield himself from the overwhelming emotions. But it wasn't helping his sisters right now.

But Ariel didn’t let that stop her. Didn’t let it make her hesitate. 

GP was struck by that fierce determination that crossed her face. She was taking on the responsibility for her family, no matter what.

"We'll get through this. We have done it before. We'll do it again."

It was a lot for a young woman her age, but she wasn't backing down. She was going to see her family through to the other side of this.

No arguments were heard...not when Emma buried her face against her sisters shoulder...and then for the first time...GP saw Percy Cane's hard shell break.

The usually emotionless young man looked utterly lost.

It was clear Percy hadn't quite figured out how to handle his own feelings about the situation. But his sister's words seemed to break through the walls he had built around himself.

And then…then suddenly he was hugging both of his sisters.

"You hate hugs," came Emma's muffled voice. 

"You don't," was Percy Cane's simple answer.

He watched as the three Cane siblings embraced each other, their arms tightly wound around each other.

But it was Ariel...Ariel that was the tower of strength. Who was the center. 

And the center must hold, regardless of anything else.  Ariel was the foundation, the one who kept them from falling apart. 

He could see how hard this was for her, how much she wanted to cry and grieve like any other girl her age. But in her mind, she couldn't. Not now. Her little sister and her oler brother needed her to hold it together so they had something to hold on to.

She was supposed to be a carefree college student, not the responsible head of her dysfunctional family.

Other kids her age only worry was from where to get cheap booze for the next night out. 

Being the strong one, the one who had to hold everyone together, was one of the hardest roles to play. It took strength, resilience and a ton of emotional stamina.

And determination. 

Ariel Cane seemed to have that gritty determination in spades.

[tetric-electric]

tbh I think that the way Ashley Graves is so mischaracterized by the fandom says a lot about how people view grooming survivors (and autistic people). Let me explain:

Obviously, huge spoilers for Chapters 1 and 2 of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley. This is just a psychoanalysis of Ashley, however to do so involves a LOT of lore.

To start off, I'm just gonna put a trigger warning right here for LOTS of talk about grooming, as well as neglect and ableism. If you feel uncomfortable reading about these subjects you are more than welcome to click off. Please stay safe.

What made me decide to do this rant:

A few months ago, I got a text from someone who was upset about me having Ashley as my PFP. I was initially like "okay, they don't like TCOAAL, so what", and then immediately after I got a text from them responding to an Instagram story I had basically saying that Ashley was "so me fr fr".

"Let me guess, you also kin Valentino"

Valentino, from Hazbin Hotel, as in the blatant physically + verbally + sexually abusive piece of shit who is in no way redeemable.

I had brushed this off as "maybe they just don't like Ashley", until they listed why.

...all of the reasons they gave fell under the main categories of "she's clingy, she's flirtatious with Andrew, and her sprites are made for the male gaze."

The male gaze thing was because she didn't appear to be wearing a bra. Which like... sexualizing much? For fuck's sake, she's locked in an apartment about to die, do you think wearing a bra would be a priority?

Secondly, her behaviour.

Admittedly, she's not a great person. But that's because she never learnt how to be.

In-game there is so so so SO much emphasis on how she acts childish, and how literally no one gives two shits about her. It doesn't take a professional psychologist to figure out that she never was able to develop properly. That's why she's so clingy, because Andrew is the one person who at least pretends to care about her. And then there's her flirtatiousness.

It's revealed in several flashbacks that the only way she could ever get Andrew's attention is to do something fucked up, as seen by her as a child killing Nina. Andrew then gives her attention for this, which establishes the connection that homicide -> attention, and attention = care and love and affection.

Due to the fact that she never had any friends, she never was able to have any type of love (whether that be platonic, romantic, etc.) reciprocated. Except for Andrew.

Andrew, throughout the game, proceeds to subtly encourage Ashley's flirtatiousness. She has no reference of this type of stuff not being okay, and thus her social isolation made her the perfect target.

Social isolation, gaslighting, coercion, threatening to hurt the person if they don't do the desired behaviour. You know what those are?

Textbook signs of grooming.

I realized that people hate Ashley so much because since she's not aware of her situation being bad, she's unable to come to that realization. She's not perfect, let alone a 'good victim'. She only sexualizes herself because that's how she learned she can get affection and care.

So... where does the whole "Ashley is autistic" theory come from, then?

As stated by Renee Graves, Ashley was "a lot of work" as compared to Andrew (guess what, kids take work). Now, this alone wouldn't be any indicator. However...

It's shown that she was unable to make friends because she was "weird" and clearly didn't have an understanding of social cues and rules (which honestly hit close to home for me). It's also shown that she problem-solves differently (or at least differently than Andrew, who is seen as the "logical sane one") and also seems to be more of a hands-on learner (I forget if there's any actual proof of this, however upon analysis she is an ESFP, and ESFPs tend to be more hands-on (yes I'm aware that MBTI types are the psychology equivalent of horoscopes, but there is some truth to them)).

Not to mention how she's shown to have extreme emotions, and tends to have meltdowns (I apologize if this isn't the right word, I'm not sure what the term would be). The extreme emotions part can be part of how blatantly of a pwBPD she is, but BPD also tends to have a higher frequency of showing up in autistic people, especially autistic women.

In conclusion, people hate Ashley Graves because of how well-integrated ableism is in society, as well as the concept of a 'perfect victim'.

[ghoulfuckersincorporated]

any thoughts on charon and virgin reader??

As with most questions to which this should not be my response, I have many. This actually isn't the only ask for Charon x Virgin!Reader content, and I'm happy to give you a taste of what I think he'd be like while I finish up the one-shot I have for it.

Charon (Fallout 3) x Virgin!Reader NSFW Headcanons

Pretty terrified of the idea of fucking a virgin. Charon does not fetishize virginity or inexperience, but he won't be disappointed if he finds out you're a virgin...per se. He's disappointed for you that you're choosing him to be the one to take your virginity, even if the concept doesn't mean anything to you. You deserve better than him. Then again, you'd deserve better than him if you weren't a virgin, and you want him anyway, so it's not a deal-breaker by any means. Just don't be shocked if he seems nervous or distracted.

If he doesn't see you take Rad-X with his own eyes beforehand, he'll make you take some, even if you already have. If there's none around, well. Tough. You won't be doing more than fooling around. He's stubborn, and if you've never had sex before, then you've definitely never had sex with a ghoul before and have no way to know how your body will respond. If there's no Radaway for you to use afterwards, same story. No radiation countermeasures, no love.

Tries his best to be sweet, or the closest he can get. It doesn't come naturally to him, kind words and soft touches and such. It never did in his pre-ghoul years so long ago, and the life he's lived since then has only made him harder, colder. Still, he can kiss you softly, pet and caress you as gently as he can. Maybe think of something nice to say (though that is a hard "maybe"). He'll hold your hand when you get nervous and even cuddle with you a little when it's all over, another move that isn't typical of him.

He's worried about how big he is, but he's also just worried about his lack of finesse in general. He's a large, lumbering guy with big, clumsy hands...hands it isn't hard to forget the strength of in the heat of the moment. That looming fear of his own strength isn't an unfounded one; you'll likely come out a little bruised no matter how gentle he tries to be. Spends a lot of his energy during sex holding himself up off of you so he doesn't crush you with his weight if he's on top.

He'll guide you if you want (or need), but by and large, he'll prefer if you're the one in charge. What do you like? How naked do you want to be? What position do you want to be in? If you're so virginal that you're both unknowledgeable as well as inexperienced, and thus unable to provide much input that isn't right in the moment, he's gonna keep things as simple as possible.

Secretly spends the entire first time the two of you have penetrative sex assuming you'll regret it sooner or later. You'd think that would ruin it for him, and it certainly...colors it, but overall he's determined to make the best of what he's been offered and try to show you a decent time. Hopes that if he can at least make it good for you, you might regret it a little less.

Has difficulty finishing. He normally does anyway, as he has trouble relaxing enough to be in the moment a lot of the time. But the problem multiplies tenfold if he knows it's your first time; all the fixating he's doing on you, monitoring you for signs of distress or pain, distracts him from his own pleasure. He might be able to relax enough to cum if you finish him off with your hands or mouth, but he likely won't climax otherwise.

Won't touch you again for at least a few days afterwards. Wants you to have time to properly recuperate more than he wants to feel you wrapped around him again (which is a LOT). Even if you came out of that first time rather intact, he'll treat you like he absolutely savaged you.

The possessive animal part of his brain is suddenly a lot more attached to you afterwards, and he's even more protective than he was previously. It's probably just a coincidence.

[bringbackmaes14]

My mom has her TV on in her room almost 24/7 and it's always on some news outlet or other. We talk a lot about politics and world/national/local events. And we do have a lot of varying views on a lot of things but we're both adults who are capable of saying "well we've both stated we have differing opinions and it's clear that we're actually arguing at this point and not just talking so let's put away the topic for now." But there are also other times where I'm just too overwhelmed by my own life to think about what's going on in the bigger world around me, so my mom knows to be hesitant to bring up news stuff with me (i.e. she doesn't just start talking about politics/world events with me rather she'll ask if I'm in the mindset to discuss things when she wants my opinion on something). This is all relevant.

We've always been able to talk about nearly everything from the economy to the school system to human rights to human tragedy and we've never tried to censor ourselves around each other (outside of getting too emotional with our language). But about two weeks ago when the United Healthcare CEO was assassinated, my mom, who is in her 50s, came to me and she said "Did you see that the CEO of United Healthcare got unalived?"

And I just sat there and looked at her completely confused and she was like "did you not hear about it? It's all over the news. It happened in clear view on the street." Like the problem was that I hadn't heard of the event not that my Gen-X mother had just in a real life conversation said the word "unalived".

And I told her as much. "Yes I've heard that. Why did you say 'unalived' instead of 'murdered'?

And she told me that she just thought that since I'm touchy about heavier topics sometimes (which is definitely true, that does occasionally happen) she thought it would be better to just not use the "heavy" words. I asked her if she realized, honestly, how stupid that was because regardless of the word she used, she was still talking about a murder, it didn't change the subject matter, she was only making the subject matter seem less significant and severe by changing the word to baseless internet lingo that a bunch of misguided, clout-chasing influencers spread.

She hadn't. She's doesn't use the Internet replacement words a lot, online or otherwise. This was a first. She thought this was a different situation, and a fine one to use it in, and like the above stories people shared, it's still not.

I'm allowed to say there are days where I want to avoid heavier topics because I'm overwhelmed. I'm allowed to not ever really discuss certain topics because they actually trigger me based on my own experiences. But people who are out here living their whole lives like just talking about about difficult or controversial topics, or asking questions about it, or enjoying media where it's portrayed (especially when it's actually portrayed respectfully) are being ridiculous, and they're handicapping themselves. They're never going to learn how to talk about hard things, or how to handle hard things. And honestly I feel bad for them.

Luckily, in my case, once I explained why my mom saying what she said was incredibly weird and honestly devaluing to the conversation, she backtracked and told me that (like I said above) she doesn't talk like that regularly and she has no intention to start; it's just that this was a huge news event and that day had been particularly rough for me emotionally and she wasn't sure how to approach it. So her intentions were good and I'm very lucky that she understands and also agrees that the Internet censorship language is incredibly unnecessary.

we have GOT to kill tiktok/twitter self-censorship i just witnessed a grown adult say the word “smex” out loud to our professor

[lunarmothim]

shadowbound- john price x reader

part ii: soon - the truth comes out.

word count: 4.5k tags/warnings: language, abduction, canon typical violence.

It's quiet. Too quiet- all you can really hear is the creak of footsteps against the flooring downstairs, a small indication of your captors moving about. If they speak they don't do it at a volume you can hear no matter how hard you strain your ears. 

It's fine. This is fine. You've gotten out of worse situations, haven't you? You were supposed to die in Al Mazrah, a bullet in your head while the Russians made off with your cargo. You didn't. You were supposed to die back in Texas, locked in a cell deep underground with no hope of escape. You didn't.

You can make it out of this. 

Your options are limited, though. Breaking out of your zip cuffs would require an injury, something that would require medical attention and slow you down, and that's not even considering your chances of making it past the four men downstairs. Talking your way out of it is even less likely especially now that they know you're a former Shadow, something they don't seem to like all that much. So what's left?

You don't know. You've been in survival mode the last few months, no time to plan or prepare- not that you have that luxury now, but it's still a situation that requires some thought, and that alone gives you pause. What do I do? Figure a way out of here, obviously, but you can't quite figure out where to start, not when every thought you have has a counter-plan staring right back at you.

Well, when in doubt do what you know.

It's awkward, the shift to shimmy your wrists down to your ankles, bringing your bound hands in front of you, and for a second you worry your hips won't allow you to move your arms the way you need to. You make it somehow, immediately reaching up to yank the bag from your head. 

Which brings you to the next step you're not a hundred percent sure of. You have your sight back but limited use of your hands- do you run? You're fast enough you could make it, but your mobility could present a problem until you're able to get the cuffs off. The city would be easy enough to disappear into until you could get new documents, but how hard would it be for them to find you? The military has resources, a lot more than you do at this point, and you imagine it would take them no time at all to locate and apprehend you again.

So what the fuck do you do?

You have no fucking clue, and you're not given a lot of time to think about it. The door slams open and you're looking up at the captain again. He doesn't look entirely surprised by the state you definitely hadn't been left in.

"We're moving," is all he says, stalking forward to yank you up out of your chair. Think. Think. Formulating plans on the go is your specialty, but everything you'd ever been taught is a vague memory on the edges of your subconscious, just out of reach, as he leads you through the house, down the stairs and out the front door. He doesn't bother with a blindfold when he throws you into the back of the van again, at least, nor does he change your cuffs to rebind you behind your back. 

You're not sure if you should find that comforting or not.

You decide on not when it's Ghost that climbs into the back after you, his dark eyes boring into your soul.

"So," he says, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, lurching slightly when the van starts moving. Your patch is in his hand, the worn edge peeking between his fingers. "Wanna tell us what you did to Graves?"

Oh, you're not fucking ready for that. The silence between Ghost leaving you and you being dragged out to the van clearly hadn't been empty- they'd dug, found something you weren't entirely prepared to address if they know about Graves. 

"Dunno what you mean," you croak out, voice breaking slightly on the syllables. He doesn't look like he believes it. 

"Try again." His hand catches you by the jaw again, refusing to let you look away, refusing to give you even a second to gather your racing thoughts. They know you're a Shadow, they know about Graves. What else do they know? Do they have your file? His fingers tighten when he says your name- your full name, not just the first name you'd given the captain at the train station. They have your file. 

Graves burned the files of anyone he lost. He clearly hadn't burned yours.

There's no use pretending anymore.

"You're taking me back to him, aren't you?" you whisper, staring up at him. If he's going to lie to you, you're going to make him look you in the eyes while he does it. You think of your last interaction with the commander, the barely healed scars scattered across your body. The days spent in a cell before he'd released you with the false promise of safety.

"It's just how we have to do things, doll," he drawled, dragging his palm over the deep cut on your shoulder even when you flinched away. "Gotta make sure you know how not to talk, no matter the circumstance."

You knew how not to talk. He knew that you knew how not to talk. He chose to torture you anyway.

So if this group is taking you back to Graves, you'll find a way to make them kill you along the way. 

And if they won't? You'll just do it yourself.

You lunge before Ghost can react. The knife strapped to his thigh is in your hands, slicing through your cuffs in one fluid motion. In the same breath you have the back door of the van open, tucking in on yourself as you roll out onto the street- you can hear the screech of the tires, the van jerking to a halt, but you pay it no mind, leaping to your feet and sprinting back down the road. It's lined with sparse trees on either side and not much else, not a lot of options to hide.

Don't hide, your brain chides you, urging you on. Keep running.

You'd run track in school, a sprinter through and through. Always the fastest, taking first every time. It's been a while since you've needed it, but it's easy to fall back into old habits, keeping your elbows close to your body and your frame tilted slightly forward, your center of gravity kept low. Keep it close, keep it tight. Sprint like your life fucking depends on it.

The tree you pass catches the bullet shot after you. You hear it thud into the wood seconds after you duck around it, inches from your head. Too close. Keep running. There's a wheat field in the distance, tall golden stalks swaying in the breeze. Make it there and you can disappear into them, hide until they pass. Find your way back to the city, find your way out.

If only things were that simple.

A heavy weight strikes the center of your back, driving the air out of you as you crash into the ground. Your stolen knife tilts up, digging into flesh that doesn't even get a reaction beyond the hot spurt of blood across your knuckles before your arms are wrestled behind your back again. You feel the scratch of his balaclava against your cheek, his weight pinning you to the ground with ease.

"Makin' my job fun," he pants low in your ear, a hint of amusement in his tone. You struggle against his hold when he stands, hauling you up to your feet, but his grip is unrelenting. "C'mon then. Let's go."

The van is waiting in the same spot you'd left it. This time, after zip-cuffing your hands behind your back again, Ghost keeps hold of you.

"Slippery little minx, isn't she?" The captain's voice as you're shoved into the back of the van again has you bristling, wanting to rip free and strangle him with your bare hands. "You good?"

"M'solid," Ghost grunts, and you hiss when he brackets your shoulders between his knees. "Sit fuckin' still."

"Fuck you," you can't help but growl, wrenching forward until your shoulders ache. "Let me fucking go-"

"Not a chance." His tone brooks no argument, and you almost howl when he grabs you by the back of the neck, fingers digging into the sides of your throat. "Sit. Still."

What else can you do but obey? You don't relax against him, body tense against his calf and ready to run again- not that his hold on you would let you. 

"Talk." It's the captain that speaks, and when you look up at him he's twisted in his seat, staring back at you.

"Eat shit, captain," you spit back, and his eyes narrow in response. "I'm not goin' back. Just fuckin' kill me."

That, it seems, gives him pause. Narrowed eyes widen slightly, really taking you in for the first time. The defiant set of your shoulders, the way you're ready to spit acid despite your captivity. He sees you, sees the way you're ready to run again, how you're ready to die. His voice drops.

"What happened." It's no longer a question, his hand twitching toward his gun. You're out of chances.

What can you do but tell him the truth?

DELIVERY ROUTE AL MAZRAH 12 AUGUST 2022, 0300

The road is dark, quiet. Not uncommon in the deserts of Al Mazrah this time of night, but still unnerving as you navigate toward the drop off point. The SUV follows a large cargo truck with a blue shipping container on the back, two more with similar cargo in front of them in the convoy. You don't know what you're transporting, but a nagging feeling in your gut tells you it's big. Important. Behind the wheel, Erikson seems to think the same.

"What are we carrying this time, Graves?" he asks, glancing at you in the rearview when you make a small noise of agreement, slightly narrowed eyes telling you to keep quiet. One curious team member asking questions is one thing, two becomes an irritation. No one likes it when Graves gets irritated.

The radio crackles with static, followed by that smooth southern drawl that to some is probably charming, but to you just feels slimy. "If I told ya, I'd have to kill ya."

"I bet he'd do it, too," Vance mutters, and you hum in agreement as you flick your gaze between the two men in the front seat and the truck in front of you. Of the members of your team Vance is the one you're closest to, the one who shares your whispered concerns about what the hell it is you're even doing these days and why you seem to be so far up Shepherd's ass you know what meal he's currently digesting. Concerns he'd only brought up to you over a stolen bottle of whiskey on the HQ rooftop, the haze of a shared cigarette hanging between you. 

He's a good man, a little softer around the edges than the rest of the hardened soldiers that make up the Shadow Company. He'd told you once that he'd wanted to be a teacher, before a terrorist attack had taken down planes in New York. That he'd enlisted the next week and before long his hands were so bloody he could barely look anyone in the eye. To this day, he refuses to tell you why he decided to go private, how he'd ended up on this dark desert road transporting who the hell knows what to who the hell knows who. 

Classified, Graves had told you all at the meeting before you'd shipped out, with some vague story about delivering some aid to your allies in the area. The rest is need to know. 

Need to know always raises interest, makes you speculate when there's little else to focus on but making sure you aren't being followed. You can't speak for the dozens of Shadows that make up the convoy, but you know for sure that you and the other three in this SUV are all wondering what's so important that you have to transport it in the dead of night through hostile territory.

"This's nothing but a milk run, boys," Graves answers after a moment, sounding a little too smug as always. He enjoys having the upper hand, knowing things that others don't. He does throw you a bone though, edged with warning - "Guns for the good guys - you'll be back at HQ for breakfast. Don't shit the bed and there'll be bonuses all around. Find me when you're back."

While the other three answer in the affirmative, Vance and Erikson bumping fists, you stare out the window at the black windows of the abandoned buildings you're driving past, eyes scanning for anything out of place. Something about this just isn't sitting right with you, even more so when the radio crackles again and Graves informs you that Shepherd's waiting for a sitrep.

"Three containers..." Vance muses, and when your eyes shift to him, his own gaze is fixed on the shipping container in front of you, contemplative. His face is obscured by his balaclava and shadows, but you can see the corner of his jaw working behind the black fabric, slowly clenching and unclenching. He's on edge, too.

"That's a lotta fuckin' milk," Dipaolo agrees from where he's sitting next to you, and you can see his wry grin bunching up the balaclava at the corners of his mouth.

"Thirsty friends," Erikson responds with a slight shrug, radioing in to Shepherd with the sitrep, who warns them much like Graves had not to fail. That alone rings alarm bells in your head, but before you can voice them Vance beats you to the punch.

"Do not fail...? Told you this shit was important," he says, and when his green eyes meet yours in the rearview, you can see the worry buried in the furrow of his brows. You're sure his mouth is pressed into a tight line beneath the balaclava.

The cargo truck in front of you comes to a sudden stop, drawing all of your attention forward. You weren't supposed to stop, had been ordered to keep moving no matter what. Doesn't matter if there's a civvy, just drive through them, Graves had said. Fucking sick, you'd muttered under your breath in response.

"What's this?" Dipaolo asks, his grip tightening on his rifle as he glances between the stopped truck and Erikson, white-knuckled on the wheel.

"Three, this is Erikson, what's up?" the driver demands into the radio, fingers of one hand loosening to twitch toward the sidearm strapped to his thigh. Nothing but a crackle of static for two very long seconds, before 3-1's voice comes back.

"Got a vehicle in the road," he reports, followed by voices calling out loudly in Arabic.

"Stand by, comin' to ya." Erikson spins the wheel and carefully pulls around the cargo truck, and if the alarm bells weren't sounding before, they're practically screaming now - it's only you and the SUV behind you bringing up the rear of the convoy, and all of this feels like a trap. But Erikson is the superior in this car, it's his call. Still...

"Is this the best idea?" you ask quietly, shifting your rifle in your lap as you creep up alongside the stopped convoy toward the commotion at the front. "Weakening the rear like this?"

"Not your call," Vance warns, a flash of green in the rearview again. You can see the same unease you feel reflected in what little you can see of his face as he picks up the radio. "Graves, Vance - be advised, we're held up, sortin' it out now."

"Handle it - keep the line movin'." The look Vance gives as he acknowledges Graves' response says see? We're solid. You don't feel solid. You feel like the earth is about to open up beneath your feet, even more so when you reach the front and see the brake lights of 3-1's armored truck, doors open as he stands in the road trying to coax the driver of the heavy cargo truck blocking the road at an angle out of the way in broken Arabic.

"I don't like this," Erikson says quietly, glancing back at you. For the first time since the convoy had stopped, you can see a hint of unease in his brown eyes. 

"Something's wrong," you murmur in agreement, fingers tightening on your rifle as your wary eyes stare ahead at the vehicle blocking the road, the lone Shadow trying and failing to convey the urgency with which he needs them to move. His Arabic is atrocious, an obvious fact that probably isn't helping matters, but even his bastardized accent and butchered words are clear - the person in the vehicle needs to move, and move now. But he doesn't, and that alone has the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end. 

"Dipaolo, Harbinger, lean out and cover him," Erikson orders, and without hesitation Dipaolo hauls himself up into the open window, leaning out to raise his M4 at the situation in front of them. You mirror him on the opposite side, staring down your sights as the people blocking the road continue to refuse to move.

"We need a 'terp out here, what's the call sir?" 3-1 asks, sounding frustrated as another yelled order goes ignored. Your finger shifts off the trigger guard, wary eyes taking in everything - from the lone man standing near the tailgate of the truck, his two friends peering casually over the back to the man in the road... wrong. Something's wrong. Your instincts are screaming at you, but you tamp them down as you wait for orders.

"Vance, Dipaolo, go help him out," Erikson orders, gesturing to 3-1, who's yelling again. "Harbinger, cover from here."

"Aye sir," you answer, tensing as the door starts to open - and then gunfire erupts. You can barely tell up from down as you return fire, zeroing in on a man who's emerged from a hatch on the top of the body of the truck. 3-1 goes down in the mayhem, and several more enemies pour out of the surrounding shadows.

You barely hear your teammates yelling around you over the rush of blood in your ears, the explosive sound of gunfire echoing off the nearby buildings. The muzzle flash has a strobe-like effect, making you nauseous as you duck back down into the SUV to reload.

"Back up, back up!" Vance is yelling. His voice distant, like it's coming from the far end of a long tunnel. You can't focus on it, can't focus on anything but slamming the magazine into your rifle and leaning out the window again to cover your retreat from the truck that had driven into the road in front of you, full of enemy reinforcements. 

Above it all, two voices stand out - Graves ordering you to eliminate the threat, and Shepherd... prioritizing the cargo. Something is wrong.

And then everything explodes in a spray of metal, fire and blood and body parts. Ears ringing, you throw yourself back into the vehicle as Erikson tries to maneuver you out of there. You can see the muzzle flash, your team's mouths moving, but all you hear is the ringing. When you reach up to touch your ear, your gloved fingers come away bloody.

Your eyes meet Vance's when your escape route is blocked off, the car jolting as Erikson throws it in reverse, and the last thing you see is Vance's masked face as the flare of the RPG lights the interior of the car, sending it end over end.

141 TRANSPORT PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC 06 DECEMBER 2024, 1830

"I was the only survivor," you tell the Captain quietly. The van had been silent as you told your story. You hadn't wanted to share it at all, but now that you had, it feels almost... cathartic. An outlet for the trauma of what had happened then and what had come after. "I woke up at a field hospital in Urzikstan two, three weeks later? Still not sure, it's all pretty fuzzy. Graves was there, which seemed pretty normal at first. He's a smarmy asshole but no one can say he doesn't care about his team. He was livid with Shepherd for not sending backup. We lost a lot of good men that day.

It wasn't until we were back on base that things started to change. He got quiet, even more secretive than before. Had a lot of closed door meetings with Shepherd, and one fine Thursday morning, he called me into his office. Wanted to hear again what I remembered about the attack. About the cargo. I, like an idiot, voiced my suspicions. Earned myself a one way trip to a cell for it. He did fight Shepherd about killing me, but in the end Shepherd won. In his words, I knew too much.

While the rest of Shadow Company headed out for a mission in Mexico, a dozen of them stayed behind to deal with me. I killed them and dragged their bodies into his office before I escaped. Little message for him. If I had to guess, he decided to just kill me in retaliation. Knew he'd never be able to find me, so he sent someone else to do his dirty work." 

Wringing your hands, you stare out one of the two small windows set in the back doors of the van, watching a middle-aged woman in the sedan behind you yelling into her phone, swerving slightly in her anger. It seems so... normal. So mundane. You wonder what has the woman so pissed.

"Why give us so much attitude then?" It's the Captain that speaks. You glance over at him again, note the way his brow furrows as he studies you from beneath the brim of his boonie hat. You can't read his expression fully, but he looks conflicted. 

"Don't know you, don't trust you," you answer simply, holding his gaze steadily. Your fear from the train station is long gone, and now you're just tired.

His expression flashes with understanding before smoothing into something unreadable again. "I see."

"Yeah." You study him for a moment, watching the corner of his jaw twitch, the way he rubs at his beard. "I'm not your enemy, you know."

"Do I?" His eyes are exhausted, deep blue staring into yours.

"You should." You want to go home. You want to sleep for a week, take a second to gather your thoughts before you have to move again. You can't help the way it bleeds into your words. "I'm fuckin' tired, Captain. I miss home."

"Where is home?" It's an innocent question, innocuous. It's a window into your soul.

"I don't know anymore." It comes out a whisper, a quiet breath. You haven't had anything to call yours beyond a small room on base in a very long time, the Shadows the only home you'd cared about. You rip your gaze back, staring out the window again. "Born in Minnesota, moved around a lot growing up. Had an apartment in Texas, near Dallas. Didn't much care for it, if m'honest."

"That why you joined the military?"

"S'pose." You don't want to answer the captain's questions but his voice makes it hard, deep and gravelly and demanding answers. "Family's more likely, maybe. Dad was a Marine, made me want to be one too. Went through MARSOC training with Graves. Fuckin' asshole, if m'honest-"

"We know." The Scot is the one to reply, surprisingly, and you glance up to find icy blue eyes staring back. "Nearly killed us."   "Bit of a habit of his, isn't it?" you muse, glancing back down again. You hadn't been expecting to find a kindred spirit in this, spewing as much vitriol as you already felt toward Graves. You almost wonder what they'd say if you told them what Graves had threatened to do to you. "Heard he went a bit nuts after Mexico."

"My doin'," the Scot murmurs proudly, and your eyes track over to him once more. Up close like this you can see a scar on his head, the starburst of a gunshot wound. "Blew 'im up."

"Shame it didn't stick," you reply quietly, and his grin drops. They obviously have some kind of connection with Graves too, just as contentious as yours. You won't question it, but you're glad for that little bit of camaraderie. "Next time."

"Next time," Mohawk agrees, and you can't help the tiny smile that splits across your lips at the promise, vague as it is. 

It's a flicker of hope. You can't help but latch onto it.

"Can't keep callin' you Mohawk," you murmur out loud, glancing between him and the black man sitting next to him opposite you, your shoulder still pressed into Ghost's knee. "You know my name, sems fair I know yours."

"Soap," he answers after a moment. You don't miss the way his eyes flick between Ghost and Mutton Chops up in the driver's seat. "Captain Price, Gaz, Ghost." You catalogue the names with the men- it's easy with what you know already. Price. The captain's eyes meet yours in the mirror, stormy blue.

"Harbinger," you reply quietly, drawing your legs in. They know it already, if they have your file. It still makes you feel at least a little better, makes you feel like you have even the smallest iota of control.

You keep your hold on the captain long after he's looked back at the road. He looks like he's in charge, turbulent eyes and tense shoulders. If you have even a chance at freedom he's probably the one that will decide, the one that will either order his men to kill you or let you go. You're not holding your breath either way.

"I'm not goin' back." You don't mean it to be rude, but it's true. "Graves can eat a bag of dicks."

"Not takin' you to Graves," Soap tells you, and you almost believe it. Almost.

"Then where?" They won't keep you in Prague. You know that, know the playbook they're working with. Their base is the most likely option, or some kind of middle ground with the agencies that wanted you in the first place. So where? Their accents scream UK.

The van stops. Ghost confirms it, his hand tightening on the back of your neck several minutes before he hauls you out of the vehicle and on to the tarmac. You see the plane you've been brought to, small and private, and it brings you back to the thought of who'd brought you here- you're a hot commodity and you know it, but the question is which three letter agency wants you the most? 

They don't tell you. You're given no idea of your destination, no clue who blocks your path. All you know is the firm hold on the back of your neck, Ghost keeping you close. You want to throttle him for it.

Soon.

part one - masterlist - part two

please like/reblog if you enjoyed! :) top/bottom divider by: me line divider by: @/saradika-graphics

[librarycards]

Hi! I have a question for you if that's ok. You mentioned hating places that focus on iq and I agree that iq how it is measured and thought of is incredibly flawed. But I also know that there's research that supports that the brains of so called "gifted" people work differently, and have much in common with ADHD and autism. What's your stance on that?

I personally think that "gifted" (hate that term) brains work differently and are neurodivergent but I don't think iq is an at all adequate way of measuring that. From my experience and what I've read "gifted" people are often also highly sensitive, can have difficulty finding social acceptance, have a very developed sense of justice, and have trouble functioning in the world. There's also a lot of overlap between people who are "gifted" and those who have ADHD and/or autism.

giftedness is a social construction tied, you're right, to constructions of a certain kind of 'high functioning" neurodivergent person. as someone marked as gifted and certainly framed as "highly sensitive" as a child, who received an autism diagnosis in adulthood (and should have as a child but did not due mostly to psychiatric misogyny) I'm familiar with this line of thinking.

i disagree with it. what value is there in reifying some kind of binary between the "non-gifted" and "gifted" brains, or the racist and anti-poor metric of "IQ," which is better described as a measure of certain types of reasoning and problem solving than of something as nebulous as "general intelligence"? it seems that the only value society would derive from some definite separation of different cognitive types would be to 1) better exploit them for profit and 2) better segregate the cognitive haves from the have-nots. see: special ed kids being relegated to futurelessness, whereas autistics who happen to be good at niche tasks gain conditional access to abled 'success' so long as they/we perform exceptionally.

i am not interested in the unique intricacies of my brain in comparison to some imagined non-gifted or non-autistic counterpart for the same reason i am not interested in finding imaginary genetic markers for "homosexuality" –– these ontological obsessions are actually very dark & sinister & eugenic at bottom, something you yourself refer to when you claim "autistic senses of justice" (as it were) are "very developed". (i won't go into an analysis of international development discourse in relation to individualized human development, but like....read about colonialism and so-called 'child races' ok?).

sure, i have difficulty functioning in a social world ableist by design, but this doesn't mean i am simply an alien who ought to be living in 3025. it means i share the responsibility of each person to use my unique gifts to improve the world as it is. that is how i want to think about the word "gifted." beyond functioning labels, iq, or these weird delineations between "smart kids and dumb kids". we all have gifts, abilities, and talents unique to us. we have the chance in our lives to learn to use them to build the world we want. but it's only by abolishing hierarchies of intelligence that we can each be the best versions of ourselves and show up for each other.

[kerosene-saint]

my bad memory effects me in such weird ways.

[lyricwritesprose]

So I've known Winter since she was a weird little goth egg who borrowed my jewelry, but she's never asked for my expertise as a large animal veterinarian before. Winter doesn't have large animals. Winter has three cats, brothers, named Sauce, High Fructose Corn Syrup, and Bobby. (Bobby is the ginger one.)

So I wasn't sure what was up when she told me to bring my "hoof stuff" and not to tell anyone, but you know, she's my friend. An hour's drive and a little secrecy is nothing.

She met me at the door and escorted me upstairs and into her bedroom, and there was a demon lying on the bed. Red. Horns. Tail. Winter's grandma's quilt over him. Very confused expression.

"He says he hasn't had hoof care for a long time," Winter explained. "Apparently conditions in Pandemonium kind of suck."

Well, that, at least, was straightforward. "Yeah, I'll take a look at them. You owe me an explanation or five."

"Not really much to explain," Winter said apologetically. "I needed help with biochem."

"There are about ten thousand ways that statement does not lead to this situation."

"Oh, come on, like you've never tried to summon a demon to do your homework."

"No, as a matter of fact, I haven't, because that's academic cheating and as a vet, it could be a life or death matter for me to actually know stuff. Also demons aren't—" You can't exactly say demons aren't real with one watching you. "Necessarily any better at biochem than I am. So you tried some spell and—oh. Ouch. Yeah, that's a gnarly looking hoof, you're going to need some treatment on that. Looks like maybe you haven't been walking around much?" That was to the demon. "Because the edges should wear down if you have proper room to move."

"I don't." His voice was softer than I expected. "What are you going to do to me?"

"Hoof trim," I said, "first of all. Have you had anything to eat? Do you need anything to eat?"

"I ordered door dash from the Indian place half an hour ago," Winter said. "Should be any minute. It's the only decent vegetarian place around here and I really don't want to deal with the whole question of which critters are acceptable to eat across cultural differences, so—yeah. See, the problem is, Asgrvanisaghl has been through a lot since some asshole 'higher demon' put his name in a grimoire, which means that we've got to find a way to block summonings as necessary or at least keep him from getting controlled when they happen."

"I don't do magic," I said, laying out my bag of tools, "I do comfortable hooves. Although, you know, you could call in Shawn. He's got that mythology special interest going on."

"I texted him. He can come by tomorrow but he's doing a thing."

I nodded. "You are probably," I told the demon, "going to have to repeat the name you want me to use for you several times before I get it. I'm not great with pronunciation. Right, so hoof trimming tools probably look different where you're from, but the principles should be the same. This is—"

"Why are you doing this?"

I shrugged. "I mean. We're humans."

"But—no. Humans want great wealth, or they want their rivals removed, or they want the love of the most beautiful woman in the land, or they want—other things—"

"Humans are bastards sometimes and they should not have treated you like that."

He didn't seem to know what to do with that statement.

"But the main thing about humans is that we clump up in groups. You wanna guess what group me and Winter were in, in high school?"

He shook his head wordlessly.

"The group of kids that didn't fit in. Queer, autistic, whatever. And believe me I'm going to call in all of us until we can make sure you're safe."

"But. I'm not one of you."

I shrugged again. "You are now."

The demon collapsed onto your bed. A vacant stare in his eye as he uttered “this is the 10,000th time I’ve been summoned. can we make it easy? Please?”

[fedoraspooky]

I haven’t been here long. What irritating changes have been made?

Credit where it's due, some changes have been good, like polls and stuff! But the big recent changes thus far that I would classify as irritating are:

- The UI change. This one may be less irritating for newcomers because it's basically the same layout as twitter and instagram, but for a lot of folks who've been here a long time, it feels cramped and like a loss of identity for the site. For many, the appeal of tumblr is that it ISN'T an algorithm hell like twitter or insta. Also, there's the annoyance of having to relearn where everything is, because it all got moved around.

- The users being lab rats for various tests the devs wanna pull out of nowhere without consenting to beta testing new site features- like the one that took away user icons on the dash for like half the site. They finally put them back after getting enough feedback that said NO, but users were so used to their feedback being disregarded that they were half expecting the change to be pushed through anyway.

- The Netflix tie-in advertising being pushed even to people who had PAID tumblr for a no-ads experience. Complete with them somehow thinking it would be a good idea to put an unescapable-by-scrolling spooky clown on peoples' dashboards that u had to use ublock to get rid of. While I'm not scared of clowns and often find them quite charming, it sucks that staff didn't take coulrophobia being a common fear into account.

- A wave of fully sfw trans posts being wrongfully marked Mature and staff doing little to nothing about it. Not sure if this is still ongoing, but it destroyed a lot of trust and good will. (LGBT+ users have been having to fight a constant war against censorship ever since the adult content ban on tumblr, so yeah... Nevar 4get the list of banned search words that would bring back no results, like 'girl')

- The site gradually moving away from customization. Tumblr is a BLOGGING site. But it seems to have lost sight of that fact, because most new users don't even know you can fully customize your blogs with css and stuff (an option that is now off by default for new accounts!), because of the in-dash viewer giving you only how blogs look on mobile, which is a lot more uniform. There, it's more like every other site- you get a banner and icon. Oh, but you can change colors and fonts from a drop-down list too, that's cool I guess. Though they recently took away custom color schemes on Message windows, just another little bit of personalization taken away.

- TUMBLR. LIVE. Basically tumblr teamed up with a skeevy dating app partner to allow for livestreams- but not the cool kinda livestreams like on twitch where you can draw or play games, no- to a site full of people who value anonymity, they decided to push phone cam only livestreams. Not only that but by agreeing to the terms, you're giving out tons of personal data including your location to said skeevy dating app partner and all of THEIR third-party ad partners. Needless to say, most people didn't wanna use it, so instead of users it's flooded by p*rn bots (which is ANOTHER issue we've been dealing with for a long time and have been getting an even bigger influx of FROM tumblr live) and scammers. And thus, since tumblr likes to put a carousel of current streams on people's dashes, you often get softcore p*rn thumbnails from the bot streams with no way to avoid it except for toggling off tumblr live entirely.

- Oh wait. That's right. You CAN'T toggle it off. Because you can only snooze it for a while until BAM, you're jumpscared by a carousel of ladies licking your screen again! But hey, at least they made the snooze 30 days instead of the 7 it used to be, right? Yeah, except for the fact that you can't get rid of the tumblr live button itself on the app anymore, and now it's front and center with a NEW notification tag on it, overlapping your dash and cramming useful stuff like the search button out of the way.

NOW- A lot of this stuff CAN be at least mostly fixed on desktop by installing ublock and xkit and tampermonkey + dashboard unfucker... But that's a lot of stuff just to make the site usable, you know?

[faunabel]

apparently i also put tolerate it by taylor swift on my playlist for vene....... i also see it. perhaps in a looser sort of way.

[red-the-dragon-writes]

Fishing Habits

Summary:

“I know what you’re doing,” Dan said without preamble. “Huh?” Jay said. “Oh, right. I know you work for the school, but I didn’t think you’d be that much of a hardass.” “What?” Dan said. Jay paused, looking Dan over for a moment. “Actually, what are you talking about? I don’t think we’re on the same page.” “With the fish,” Dan clarified. Jay raised the odd ridges of flesh over his eyes that functioned as eyebrows. “I’m mer, you asshole. I can talk to them. They told me what fucked-up shit you’ve been pulling. What’s your problem?” “Sometimes I get hungry,” Jay said. “Can I see your notes now?”

Dan is an ordinary merman-pretending-to-be-a-human. Jay is... something else entirely. He seems like a really pleasant guy, except for how freaked out all the fish are. And Dan's college has just opened a new aquarium...

On Ao3 here.

There was an understanding, which had been in place as long as Dan could remember, that meant that one must not reveal the existence of The Supernatural to human society, and if one did the people they made the reveal to needed to be dealt with in some way—sworn to secrecy, brought into the fold of the Oceanic, or even, at absolutely worst, killed. Dan didn’t want to deal with it. There was a lot of paperwork involved in fucking up the order of things, and it was a huge hassle, and also there was a lot of risk involved. It wasn’t like Dan had any real need to reveal he’d grown up under the Pacific rather than in it, anyway. And his parents were living off the coast of Oregon now anyway, so he didn’t even have to do that much lying about it. It was easy and he kept it well under wraps.

He did five years of field work before they told him they were going to require him to come back to the university and teach at a handful of classes before he’d be allowed back out into the field or he’d lose his position, which also meant losing most of his source of funding and the grant he was working with. They offered to let him teach it remotely, of course—the department chair apologizing profusely the entire time—but Dan was doing altogether too much of the work from six hundred feet below the surface of the Atlantic and that just wouldn’t work out. No way to maintain The Secret. Instead he resigned himself to another few years living on land and away from the fishes, rented an apartment, and returned to Spokane to teach two sessions of classes about saltwater ecology in the Pacific to incoming students and one class on field work to older biology majors. Oh well. At least he could visit home on the weekends.

Since his own research was put on pause and the college did promise to pay for his tuition, Dan opted to take a handful of classes, too. What else was he going to do? He was still in touch with the rest of the field crew, and when they finally started writing, sure, he’d refocus onto that, but at the moment he wasn’t going to be of any help. And in one of the classes was a gray man.

You weren’t allowed to do that, but he was doing it. Dan was perfectly certain that there were laws against being out in the open with visibly-discolored flesh across all the major out-of-sight jurisdictions, and he was also pretty sure the Sideways Court was still offering free glamours for anyone who desperately needed into human society and also could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they couldn’t just change their colors themselves, though Dan had also heard that the paperwork to prove either was a nightmare and the Sideways Court sounded just kind of awful to boot.  The Oceanic North-Pacific Authority was a lot better in a lot of ways. God knew applying for his visa was a nightmare of bureaucracy. But the point was: the gray man was openly flouting the rules. And worse than just being gray alone, he also had horns. His fingernails were blue, his teeth were sharp and needle-shaped, and his eyes had no pupils, just scleras and black centers that looked like hollow glass marbles. He had ripples crisscrossing his skin like vines growing just beneath the surface, and though Dan couldn’t be sure, he thought his body was a weird consistency, too, that he bent further than Dan expected when he bumped into things or wore a heavy bag over his shoulders. There was no way his appearance was legal. Dan felt for him, because it had to be difficult doing all that, but it wasn’t allowed. He’d probably get in trouble for just being around it, if someone came and found out and reported the guy and Dan hadn’t said anything.

Still. Dan had to respect it. And it was interesting to see how fast the other students got used to Jay and his gray skin and his horns and his eerie pupil-less eyes. Honestly, Dan was kind of disappointed in himself. His initial anxiety was unfair, wasn’t it? It was the laws that were unfair. Human society clearly wasn’t the problem it was cracked up to be.

Eventually Dan worked up the courage to tell Jay that he was mer. He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting. Jay had just nodded, shrugged, and said, “Cool.” That was it. And, honestly, as far as Dan was concerned, that was plenty. He didn’t need to be friends with a twenty-something nonconformist—or however old Jay was; he hadn’t asked, really—and just because they were both in the same class didn’t mean anything, really. They knew each other’s names, and Jay occasionally asked Dan for notes. That was plenty.

-

Dan wasn’t much of a partier and he wasn’t much of a night owl, and he didn’t’ spend a lot of time out of the house. What he did was usually at a river somewhere. Spokane was gorgeous and full of lively fish, and by virtue of his heritage Dan could chat. Fish didn’t usually have a lot to talk about, but something had them in a tizzy when Dan finally made it out to his favorite spot, and they were particularly anxious to tip him off.

At first, he couldn’t make heads or tails of why it mattered to him that someone had developed new lures (aside from how his job was kind of to keep an eye on what people were doing with his rivers and all). But it came together eventually. Jay had something weird about him. He’d started coming to the water just like Dan had—here and elsewhere—and chatting, just like Dan had. And Dan had lured them into a sense of security. They should’ve been secure, talking! Even when Dan was hungry he didn’t eat the fish he talked to! But to talk to Jay was dangerous. Fish that talked to Jay too long vanished. And he had strange lures, luminescent sweet blue worms that made fish dizzy and sick if they bit them off and which moved even when torn apart until they were eaten. The fish insisted, almost en masse, that this strange gray man who chatted up their waters was bad news, and on the whole they badly wanted Dan to find him and make him cut it out.

Dan didn’t even know what to make of it at first. He asked question after question, trying to understand what they meant first and then after to try to ensure they weren’t actually talking about his classmate. The fish were convinced he was unfathomably ancient, even though he was taking first-year classes. But it became too clear that they were the same person after not long at all. A handful even had his name to relay, and even though they pronounced it a little differently, there was no question that he was the same person with the same name. Brazen.

The fish generally knew what predation was and it—well, it bothered them, sure, but it was an understood way of life, and they knew Dan himself ate fish and was part of human society where fishing was done. They’d never come to ask him to put an end to regular fishing before. The first and last time any of them had banded together like this, it was six fish, and they wanted him to handle a chemical mess that he’d been almost completely useless about. The fact that he had nearly forty fish across a whole host of species asking him to put a stop to Jay’s hunting meant that something about that guy was very, very off.

At least, when it came to the fish.

Still, Dan didn’t want to jump to conclusions. Maybe he was just a weirdo. But he had access to most of the college labs, and there were fishtanks in several buildings, and so—nervously and feeling like he certainly looked a bit out of his mind—he went around, talking to the fish there. He didn’t like what he found. All the fish knew Jay. There was no doubt he could and did talk to them, often at odd hours when the fish said that they were typically bored, which meant he was on campus late at night and early in the morning sneaking in to talk with them. Several tanks were apparently head-over-heels charmed. Others, these fewer and further between and, Dan noted after a short while poking around, more likely to have deaths in the fish population waved off than more carefully-managed tanks, told Dan nervously that Jay wasn’t what he seemed. That he had been charming and pleasant and had these magnificent worm lures that they’d never seen before, and then without warning he’d coaxed one of them into his hands and ate them, just like that.

These were domestic fishes, indoor fish. Pets, practically. It was alien to them that a person would do that, and it scared them. But it didn’t seem Jay would willingly strike too many times in the same place, rotating tanks out at random. And what for? Sometimes, they said, he’d come back, and chat like nothing had happened even though they all saw him kill one of their number without a thought. There was something wrong with him. Dan, if Dan knew him, should be cautious.

These fish didn’t seem to understand that there was a world of difference between eating a human (or a mer, really) and eating a goldfish, but Dan promised to take the warning under advisement anyway.  

-

Upon the day that Dan decided to confront Jay about his weird, creepy fish-eating behavior, several interesting things happened.

The first was simple. A colleague from the Environmental Sciences branch had invited him to downtown Spokane for no clear reason just before when Dan typically took his lunch. Alicia had been a close friend when Dan was doing his dissertation and she was currently working on her own postdoc research a little ways outside Spokane, just far enough from where Dan lived that they only got together so often. She told him that it was a surprise, and ot to look anything up about the location, so he obligingly didn’t.

It turned out to be an aquarium. More than that, it was an aquarium owned and run jointly by the college and a handful of others, and while it was still in the final stages before opening, Dan—by virtue of his employment with the school and his own degree focus in fish care and fish wellness—was welcome back whenever, provided he told them what he was doing and didn’t meddle unexpectedly. They wanted him to give his thoughts on a couple of tanks. And the tanks were fascinating. For some reason, whoever had done the design of the building had had a vision and they’d executed it; the tanks looked like classrooms-turned-reefs, replicas of desks and tables cast in plaster and then given coral to grow over them, furnished with lighting that looked like fluorescent strip lights in classrooms and even sometimes sporting false windows out to the street. And all the while, inside, sharks and huge groupers and small brightly-colored reef fish and schooling fish and others besides serenely went about their business. It was inspired, it really was. His parents would’ve gotten such a kick out of it.

Alicia had shown him around, and then they’d gotten food.  It was a very nice afternoon, all things told.

The second was less pleasant. Just as he and Alicia were going their separate ways, Dan got an email from the school about a missing student, a request for more information if anyone had any. They had last been seen about a week before, and their car had just turned up abandoned at Lake Wenatchee, a state park a little ways outside Spokane. Dan hadn’t seen that happen before. Unfortunate, but not anyone he knew. He filed it away mentally and had pretty much stopped thinking about it by the time he got back to his apartment.

The third, and most objectively inconsequential, was that his first afternoon class had been canceled. His professor had come down with the flu.  

And, finally, though they didn’t have class together today, Jay had called Dan and asked to meet with him. Evidently Jay had missed a lecture, or maybe several, and wanted to see Dan’s notes. The timing was just right.

“I know what you’re doing,” Dan said without preamble.

“Huh?” Jay said.  “Oh, right. I know you work for the school, but I didn’t think you’d be that much of a hardass.”

“What?” Dan said.

Jay paused, looking Dan over for a moment. “Actually, what are you talking about? I don’t think we’re on the same page.”

“With the fish,” Dan clarified. Jay raised the odd ridges of flesh over his eyes that functioned as eyebrows. “I’m mer, you asshole. I can talk to them. They told me what fucked-up shit you’ve been pulling. What’s your problem?”

“Sometimes I get hungry,” Jay said. “Can I see your notes now?”

“Sometimes you get hungry?” Dan echoed. It took him a moment to remember how to form sentences properly. “Go to the—fucking—there are vending machines all over campus, there’s a cafeteria, you’re an underclassmen, don’t you have a meal plan—you get hungry? Hungry?”

Jay looked at Dan as though he were completely unimpressed and completely unmoved. “Okay. Can I see your notes now?”

Dan took a deep breath. “Jay, I’m here on behalf of the fish to ask you to cut the shit.”

“Huh,” Jay said. “Are you, like, going to let me see your notes, or was this just, you know, pretext to yell at me?”

Dan sighed, pulling his knapsack around to see if he could find his notebook. “No. As much as I think the way that you’ve started going after these fish is creepy as all fuck, I don’t really want your grades to suffer. Stop eating the fish.”

Jay shrugged. “I guess I can go out of campus and—”

“No,” Dan said, cutting him off. “Not the campus fish, all the local fish. I first heard about this from the fish in the Spokane. Everyone at Riverside Park is sick of your shit. It’s creepy, Jay. What’s the point of getting all buddy-buddy with fish you’re planning on eating?”

Jay’s eyes narrowed. “What, should I kill without a thought, then? What if I catch a fish with obligations?”

“That’s not why you’re doing it.”

“You’re right,” Jay said. “It’s not. But it is a consideration, among many. I don’t think it’s as bad as you think. And, no, I won’t be stopping any time soon.”

Dan shook his head and threw the notebook at the table. “Give it back to me when we have class again. And after that, I don’t want to hear from you.”

“What’s the big problem?” Jay said, suddenly sounding much more concerned. “Acanthis, they’re just fish.”

“They’re not just fish to me,” Dan snapped. “I’m mer, you asshole. It’s not the same. And—the way you do it is creepy. I don’t like it. Just because I know fish aren’t people to you doesn’t mean they don’t matter to me.”

“Oh,” Jay said. “The issue is that I eat fish?”

“I eat fish!” Dan said. “Are you being—are you being willfully stupid now? The problem is that you’re making friends with the fish you eat!”

“Ah,” Jay said. “Yeah, no, sorry, there’s nothing you can do about that. It’s been good knowing you, Acanthis. Thanks for the notes.”

“Fuck yourself,” Dan said, rather charitably, as far as he was concerned, and stormed back out of the library.

-

Jay did not stop preying on the fish. He did stop asking Dan for notes. He did also return Dan’s notebook, in about the same condition as he’d taken it, but there was an odd blue stain on one page.

 And life continued as it normally did. The class continued. Dan got familiar with the professor, a lovely older woman called Dr. Bernadotte Maragou, who was very sweet and worked in the Health Sciences department but was still nonetheless teaching an ecology course because the school was lacking a professor to teach it and she had the necessary bioinformatics background. Unfortunately, Jay did, too. He was—to everyone else, at least—charming, or at least something like it. To hear Bernie speak, he was sweet and helpful and wouldn’t hurt a fly.  But if she could hear the fish, she’d think he was the devil. All everyone else’s adoration served to do was make Dan like him even less.

Still, the end of the semester approached apace, and Dan kept his focus on himself and his friends as much as he was able. Most of the fish that Dan was familiar with knew better than to trust Jay by now, and he heard that Jay was venturing further and causing trouble in different places instead, but he left it alone. Realistically, what was he going to do? It was the only reasonable thing. He stopped by the aquarium on occasion, which was a delight in and of itself, and he got his work done, and he kept in touch with his colleagues in the Atlantic and they kept him posted on what they were seeing with the shark populations they were monitoring. There were some instances of bad news—the missing student never showed up, and another one or two, Dan wasn’t sure, joined them in vanishing off the face of the earth, but it was a city and these things happened and it didn’t happen to anyone Dan knew. At the end of the day, all was as well as it could really be.

Until it wasn’t.  

One week before the end of classes, Bernadotte announced to the class as a whole that the university was going to launch the aquarium publicly, explaining briefly what it was and much more rapidly turning to something worse: that, as a pre-opening event, the Environmental Sciences college was hosting an event and anyone enrolled in an CoES class was welcome, for free and everything. Dan watched Jay perk up, visibly interested. Absolutely not.

It was one thing to be eating goldfish from the tank and wild fish out of the river. It was something else entirely to start eating out of an aquarium. Dan couldn’t help but feel protective over a project he’d helped with, too, even if it hadn’t been that much help. He knew a lot of those fish. He was absolutely not letting this rule-flaunting, skeevy asshole fuck it all up.

He accosted Jay outside class. “You are not going to that aquarium.”

“The one with the art installations?” Jay said. “Yes I am. Do you want something, Acanthis?”

“Would you quit calling me by my last name? Stay out of those fucking fish tanks.”

“No,” Jay said. “I have another class to be at, Acanthis, would you get out of my face?”

“The second anything goes wrong at that aquarium, I’m pointing the finger at you,” Dan said. “Don’t even fucking think about it. I’ll know if even a single fish is fucking hurt. If you even speak to them.”

“Acanthis. I have places to be,” Jay said. “Move, or I’m pushing you.”

“This is the only warning I’m fucking giving you,” Dan growled. “Take it. Stay out of the fucking aquarium.”

Jay scoffed and shouldered past Dan. Dan made no effort not to be pushed out of the way, but called after Jay, “I mean it!”

Jay shook his head, like he was rolling his eyes where Dan couldn’t see them, and kept walking.  So the aquarium was screwed, basically.

-

Dan knew he was being a little unreasonable. He wasn’t going to let that stop him, though.

Asking around turned up that Jay likely didn’t have a car, so Dan figured that he was going to try to catch a ride with someone else to the aquarium. It was hardly walking distance, from campus to the center of downtown Spokane. Trying to stop Jay from getting a carpool was going to be hard, but not impossible, of course. He’d figure something out. If he could even figure out who was bringing Jay…

…which turned out to be easier than Dan had expected. Two days after the announcement in class, Bernie had announced that she’d gotten some students who were struggling to make it to the aquarium location, and she would be organizing carpools. That just meant that Dan needed to see who got Jay’s name and somehow convince them not to bring Jay. These were students. He could probably bribe them, or ply them with cookies and alcohol, or something. Wouldn’t be too hard.

It wasn’t to be. Bernie ended up with three kids on overflow, and Jay was one of them. Bernie was a really lovely lady, and sweet as they came. And there was absolutely no way Dan was going to be able to tell her what the issue was without having to answer difficult questions about himself, and besides, she’d probably insist that he was being too hard on Jay and there was a good reason to eat goldfish after telling them you thought they were the best individual fish on the planet or something. So just telling Jay’s transportation to leave him behind unexpectedly was out of the plan.

Eventually, in a fit of desperation, Dan asked Bernie if he could catch a ride with her along with the other three students. She said that he could, and that it’d be a little cramped but there would still be room for everyone.

The night before the event, Dan started asking around again, trying to find Jay to warn him off a second time. This time he didn’t succeed. Everyone knew who he was, of course, but no one could quite find him. One girl even asked Dan if he thought Jay was ”next”—baffling Dan, and when he asked what she meant, she started carrying on about mysterious disappearances and serial killers like she thought they were living in a movie of some sort. No one else Dan spoke to was any more helpful. Jay had to be off-campus somewhere, or maybe he’d vanished into thin air. Dan wasn’t optimistic enough to trust in the latter, but he crossed his fingers anyway. That would be one disappearance Dan wouldn’t mind, that was for sure.

The inexorable march of time went on, as it always did. Tomorrow rolled around. Dan woke up on the morning of the aquarium event and knew that this was it. He was out of time. He just had to find some way to make it happen.

This time, he succeeded in waylaying Jay. It was by chance, even—he caught sight of Jay’s stupid gray horns just barely peeking out over the sea of faces at the front doors to the library and zeroed in on Jay as fast as he could. He grabbed Jay by the arm and couldn’t suppress a second of distaste at the texture of Jay’s flesh—strangely squishy and stiff all at once, like a very full water balloon instead of flesh with bones in it—and then Jay whirled around. “Acanthis?”

Dan opted not to call him on the name thing this time. “This is the last time I’m going to say it. Stay away from the aquarium.”

“Didn’t you say last time was going to be the only warning?” Jay said.

“I am so serious,” Dan said. “You do not want to test me on this. Stay away from the aquarium! Do I make myself clear?”

“Uh-huh. Enjoy the rest of your day, Acanthis.” Jay started to pull away from Dan, and Dan grabbed his arm tighter. His odd glassy eyes narrowed. “You’re going to want to let go of me right now.”

“Tell me you’ll stay away from the aquarium.”

Jay wrenched his arm away from Dan’s grip, much harder than Dan expected. His knuckles ached at the sudden force; he could swear he heard one of his joints crack. “I told you to let go of me, didn’t I? I don’t know how to say this politely, Acanthis—stop telling me to stay away from the aquarium. I’m allowed to be curious about it just like everyone else is. Just because you have a problem with me doesn’t make it my concern. I’m tolerating this, because you work here and I’m probably leaving after another semester. But if you push me, I’m going to start pushing back. Do I make myself clear?”

“I don’t have a problem with you, I have a problem with you eating—” Dan realized abruptly that they were in public and lowered his voice. “Eating the fucking fish! I think that should be fucking understandable.”

“No, you also have a problem with me,” Jay said flatly. “You are not the only one, and I do not care very much. But you will never be able to dictate what I do and don’t do. You had better get that through your head right the fuck now.”

Dan, disbelieving, shook his head. “I can’t fucking believe you.”

“Great,” Jay said, shoving past Dan. He hit Dan in the chest with his shoulder, clearly intentionally. “See you at the aquarium, Acanthis.”

“No you fucking won’t!” Dan called after him, but he vanished seamlessly into the crowd before he was even done speaking.

Fucker.

-

Finally, out of ideas, Dan called up a local friend who did some contract work with the Sideways Court and asked them to temporarily hex Bernie’s car. He felt bad about it, but it wouldn’t be any real harm done, and it’d just keep the car from starting for a while. It would stop the other two students from getting to the aquarium either, but Dan was willing to call that an acceptable loss. He turned up at the parking lot next to the cafeteria at the appointed meeting-time even though he knew it wasn’t going to get him anywhere; it seemed only fair to miss it, and besides, that let him keep an eye on Jay.

Jay gave Dan a very dubious look when he arrived. “You’d better not be waiting here for me, Acanthis.”

“Nope,” Dan said. “Carpooling.”

Jay gave him a long, hard look, and then shrugged and pulled out his phone. “I assume you’ll be dogging my steps all night?”

“You’d best believe it.”

“I don’t mean to insult you, Acanthis,” Jay said, “but this strikes me as a phenomenally stupid plan.”

“I keep telling you, my name is Dan,” Dam said. “And my plan is fine.”

“I’m sure it is,” Jay said, not looking up from his phone. “Look, for all anyone knows, you’re the concern here. Everyone at the library saw you getting handsy and aggressive with me. You have fuck-all in the way of evidence. And I’m—”

A car pulled up along the cement, and Jay cut off, picking his head up. “Ah, there’s Doctor Maragou,” he said, in exactly the same casual tone.

That was weird, and eerie. “Hey, Bernie,” Dan called, trying to keep any sort of distrust out of his tone of voice. “How’s your day been?”

“Oh, hi, Dan,” Bernie said. “Hi Jay! It’s great to see you both. Have you seen Sophia and Luke?”

“Not yet, but there’s still plenty of time,” Jay said, smiling warmly. “Dan, I know you’re closest with Doctor Maragou. Do you want to sit up front?”

“Generous of you,” Dan said, “yeah. Bernie, should we get in now?”

“Yeah, why not?” Bernie asked. “I think I see Sophia coming over now, anyway. It shouldn’t be too long.”

True enough, Sophia was cresting the small hill between the walking path and the parking lot. As Dan watched, Luke, the fourth student, walked over as well. So that was the whole crowd.

Dan didn’t need to jostle around, not in the front seat, but in the back Sophia, Luke, and Jay had to work out seating arrangements; Jay had volunteered to sit in the middle, but there was a little bit of difficulty with the seatbelts, and it took a few minutes of shuffling about before Luke finally announced to Bernie that they  could start driving. Bernie nodded, smiling, and made to pull out of the parking lot. And then her car made a terrible backfiring noise.

“What the hell was that?” Luke blurted. “I mean, um, sorry Professor.”

“What the hell was that?” Bernie muttered, stepping on the gas again. Nothing happened.

“That’s… weird,” Sophia said. “Professor M., has that ever happened before?”

“Nope,” Bernie said. “I’ve never had any car do that before.”

“I can take a look at it,” Sophia said, already opening the door. “I’m good with cars.”

“Hang on a minute,” Bernie said, turning her key in the ignition. Nothing happened. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

“Yup,” Sophia said.

“How sure?” said Bernie, pressing on the gas again.

“Very sure,” Sophia said. “I like cars. Pressing on the gas isn’t going to do anything good if it‘s not igniting, so maybe stop doing that.”

Bernie stopped pressing on the gas very quickly. “Okay. You can look under the hood, if you want. Let me come out and look at it with you.”

The two of them stood outside the car looking at the hood for a good ten or eleven minutes. Jay made dubious eye contact with Dan through the rearview mirror. Dan pretended not to notice.

“Um,” Luke, the other classmate, said awkwardly after about two minutes of sustained silence. “So, uh, you’re Professor Acanthis, right?”

“You can call me Dan,” Dan said.

“Yeah, but you teach the fieldwork for nonmajors class, right?”

“Yeah,” Dan said. “Why?”

“Is it particularly hard?” Luke asked. “I mean, work-intensive. I’m setting up my schedule for next semester.”

Dan paused, trying to think about that. “I just started teaching it this semester. I think it’s pretty light, but you’re better off asking one of my students.”

“He means it’s very easy,” Jay said tonelessly. “Acanthis, tell him your late work policy.”

“It’s Dan,” Dan said. “As long as it’s in before the end of the semester, I don’t take points off late work.”

“They meet once a week, there’s a lab report due but you can work on it in the class, and it’s for nonmajors,” Jay added. “Very easy class. If you want an easy A you should take it.”

“Huh,” Luke said. “Thanks… Jaaaaaames?”

“Jay,” Jay said, but now that Dan was listening he pronounced it a little oddly, sort of more like ‘Joy’ than ‘Jay’. “Luke, right?”

“Yeah,” Luke said. “Are you planning on taking it next semester? I thought you and Professor Acanthis had… um.”

“Drama?” Jay asked, and laughed under his breath. “No, it’s nothing serious, but I’m on the pre-med track. Have to take macrobio field instead. I’m only in class with Doc Maragou because it qualified as an elective.”

“What’s the deal, actually?” Luke said. “Like, if you don’t mind me asking, because I heard you guys were really, uh… but you seem chill now.”

“Like I said,” Jay said, “it’s nothing serious. Me and Acanthis have a couple disagreements over… I don’t know, I don’t want to get into it. And a friend of a friend was talking shit about me that he believed, but I think we’re over that. Mostly it’s personality clash.”

“It’s not personality clash,” Dan said. “He’s fucked over a few friends of mine and won’t stop doing it.”

Jay raised his eyebrows at Luke, who smiled rather tightly back. “It is really not that serious. He doesn’t like that I don’t do what he tells me. I get it. I don’t like to be told what to do. It’s a personality clash. We’re working it out. This time next year, I imagine you won’t even hear that me and Acanthis were arguing.”

“Huh,” Luke said. “Right.”

Dan willed himself not to argue, even though that was blatantly untrue. He didn’t need to hash the whole thing out in front of a human audience. Fortunately, about that point Bernie came back around. “We can’t figure the problem out,” she said through the driver’s-side door, “so you three might as well come out. I’m not sure what we’re going to do here.”

“Damn,” Luke said.

“It’s a bit of a walk,” Jay said, “and it’ll get us there a little late, but we could take the Six over to Riverside.”

Dan turned to look at him, uncomprehending. He could see the other three do the same.

“The bus,” Jay said. “Don’t any of you go anywhere?”

“I only take the campus shuttle,” Luke said. “Sorry.”

“Huh,” Jay said. “Anyway, if that’s the plan, we should probably get moving. If we miss the bus we’re going to be waiting for a good hour for the next one.”

“I think the event ends at eight,” Bernie said.

“And it’s, what, six now?” Jay said. “So we’ll basically miss it. I don’t particularly want to do that,” he said, making eye contact with Dan with a weird little sedate smile on his face, “so unless anyone has objections, let’s get moving.”

“How far of a walk is it?” Bernie asked.

Jay shrugged. “Maybe a few miles? It’s at the transit center. Do you know where I mean?”

“Oh!” Bernie said. “Okay, I think I can do that.”

“Fan-ta-stic,” Jay said. “Luke, Sophia, you two on board?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sophia said.

“You didn’t ask Dan,” Luke said.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Jay said. “He’s going to follow me no matter what I ask him.”

“Oo-kay,” Luke said. “Yeah, I’ll come.”

Jay smiled, waving a hand and starting to walk rather briskly. “Alright. We have half an hour. Let’s move.”

Dan had never walked between the campus and the transit center like this before. This part of Spokane—of Washington, really—was gorgeous. Jay kept them hurrying along the side of the road, but Dan and Sophia kept slowing down to look at the trees or the rock faces or the rivers and falling behind. Dan wished he could say it was intentional, but it really was just that beautiful. And because they kept stopping at the same things, he and Sophia had started talking, aimlessly commenting on the trees and the water.

Then the road they were walking along turned into a bridge, high over a wide waterfall. All of them stopped, even Jay.

“This reminds me of where I grew up,” Sophia said to Dan. “I was walking distance from Wairere as a kid.”

Jay turned as though that had caught his attention. “Wairere Falls?”

“You’ve been there?” Sophia asked, looking a bit surprised. “Yeah.”

“They were more impressive than this, I think,” Jay said. “I don’t know, the last time I was in New Zealand was nearly thirty years ago.”

“Aotearoa,” Sophia said.

“Couldn’t have been,” Luke said, at about the same time. “How old are you?”

Jay laughed. “You think someone with a face as plastic as mine looks my age? I appreciate the vote of confidence. I’m pushing forty.”

Was that his cover? That he’d just undergone a bunch of surgeries?

“Oh, wow,” Bernie said. “What did you do before you decided to go into medicine?”

Jay glanced sidelong at Dan. “Professional fishing. Do you still need a moment to ogle?”

“Not hassling us to get moving again already?” Dan asked.

“We’ve got a little time,” Jay said.

“You were on us the whole way here,” Sophia said, still staring at the falls.

“Yeah, because I knew you were all going to stare here. It’s a nice waterfall. Take your time. I’ll tell you when we really have to get a move on.”

Dan turned that one over in his head for a moment. Was Jay expecting him to have delayed more intensely? Was that what that actually was? Or was this actually a moment of… what, generosity in disguise? Jay was such a strange person.

It was a nice waterfall, though, and the water below it looked deep and clear. Dan walked to the part of the railing Jay was leaning on, trying to look subtle, and leaned over. “Between the two of us, we’re the only ones who can breathe under water.”

“I can’t, actually,” Jay said. “I don’t breathe at all.”

Dan stopped, looking at him properly. Jay shrugged. “No lungs. Don’t breathe.”

“But you can  live under water, right?” Dan did his best to clarify.

“Yeah, that I can,” Jay said. “What about it?”

“Have you ever gone over a waterfall like that? If you’re here, and you were in New Zealand around waterfalls.”

Now it was Jay’s turn to look at Dan oddly. “I have, actually. Not often, but I have. Are you about to ask me for advice?”

“I just… wonder, I guess,” Dan said. “Does this one look like it’d be good to jump off of?”

Jay was quiet for a moment, studying the water. “Well, depends what you mean by good. You’ll probably get spun really hard. Impacting the water will probably hurt, but you don’t want to dive or anything here, or you’ll risk hitting the bottom, I think, it doesn’t look that deep to me.”

“You could’ve just said no,” Dan said.

“Those are the only problems. If you don’t like being disoriented, that’s on you,” Jay said. “The water is clean and clear and there’s no rocky outcroppings to hit yourself into. It’s pretty damn good, as far as these things go.”

“Sounds kind of unpleasant.”

“It’s  one of those things,” Jay said, turning toward the other three. “If you liked it, you’d probably already know that by now, and if you don’t, you’ve never thought about it. I’m not sure what kind of thrill-seeking mer adolescents get up to, though.”

“Me either, really. I lived most of my life on land after I turned twelve.”

“Huh,” Jay said. “That’s why you’re like this.”

“Like what?” Dan started, but Jay was already walking toward the other three. “Jay!”

“We’re going to get moving again, guys,” Jay said, waving. Bernie, Luke and Sophia reluctantly fell into step behind Jay again. Dan, for his part, hurried up to stand next to him so he could ask what the fuck Jay was talking about.

“What do you mean, that’s why I’m ‘like that?’”

“Do you want them hearing? I thought your being here meant you had to be super hush-hush.”

“Honestly, I’ve been wondering this whole time. Why don’t you?”

Jay gave him a disbelieving look. “Obviously I’m supposed to.”

“Well—you’re not, and no one’s tried to arrest you yet.”

“You’d be surprised at how low-profile I can be. Plastic surgery,” he said, tapping the ridges of flesh around his eyes, “tattoos, nail polish, and sometimes I can pass the horns off as a headband. Sometimes, if I’m really worried,” he glanced back at the other three, “they’re not looking. Watch this.”

Dan turned toward him, not sure what he was about to do, and was completely unprepared for his horns to just—sink back into the top of his forehead seemingly of their own volition. “What—?”

“It’s uncomfortable, though,” Jay said, replacing them with a gesture that looked more like spitting something out than horns protruding through his face. They were now streaked with some sort of bluish, viscous fluid, like dish soap. Jay ran his hands over them, and then rubbed his hands together, and when he went back to talking neither the horns nor his hands were wet.

“Neat trick,” Dan said, totally astonished.

“Handy, yeah,” Jay said. “Look, not that I’m not appreciating the conversation not suddenly being you yelling in my face and all, but can I ask what prompted the change of heart?”

“No hearts have been changed. I don’t want you to eat my fish,” Dan said. “But I can’t see a way to stop you getting to the aquarium, so I guess I’ll just have to tag around all night like you said I was going to. Might as well make it a little fun, right?”

“I suppose that makes sense,” Jay said slowly, not looking as though he understood at all.

-

The bus was miserable, but the aquarium was fantastic, so it balanced out. Dan did tail Jay the whole time, though Jay obligingly let Dan pick over the remnants of the sushi bar before they went around to the exhibits instead of trying to lose Dan so he could go start snatching schooling fish or something. Dan asked him if he wanted anything, concerned as he was for the live fish in the exhibits; Jay demurred. Something about a food allergy, or something; Dan wasn’t sure exactly what he meant but he sure made it sound like there wasn’t anything at the table that wouldn’t somehow make him sick.

Jay was fascinated by the first-floor exhibits that looked like classrooms. Eventually they made it to the second floor, after Jay had done a long loop around the expansive ground level and spent a lot of time in the touch-tank mumbling to a nervous epaulette shark until he could coax it up toward him. Dan didn’t like it then, but it hadn’t been sinister after all, and he was trying to relax. But just after they made it to the second floor, Jay slipped off into the shadows, and Dan just barely caught up to him before Jay—with Dan’s keys—slipped behind the Employees Only door and beckoned for Dan to follow.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing,” Dan hissed, as soon as he was inside. “They’ll kick you out if you’re back here.”

“Not if I’m with you,” Jay said, which wasn’t true.

“Yes, they will. And they’ll revoke my clearance.”

“Come on. I want to talk to the nursery sharks.”

“Absofuckinglutely not,” Dan said. “I’ll tell on both of us.”

“What the fuck is the big idea?” Jay said. “Look, you can hear both sides of the conversation. And they’re nursery sharks, and I’m not even hungry. I’m curious about living in those drowned fake rooms. Do you know which tank we should be looking for?”

“We’re not doing this,” Dan said.

“Alright, I’ll find out without you,” Jay shrugged, and started walking. Dan reached out to grab Jay’s arm, and—

Well. Dan didn’t actually know what happened, only that his hand closed on solid-ish flesh, and then it was suddenly not solid under his hand at all, and Jay had sort of just pulled away around his fingers. Weird.

“You can come with me or you can stay there, but you’re not grabbing me in private,” Jay said. “I’m not interested in being yanked around, I don’t give a damn how worried you are about the fish. I’m not even going to put my face near the water.”

With deep misgivings, Dan hurried up and followed behind Jay. “It’s, um, door seven. The exhibit you want.”

“Thank you,” Jay said, sounding legitimately a little bit surprised. “Appreciate it.”

“Don’t expect a repeat,” Dan said. “And I will be warning them about you later.”

Jay hummed, pushing through the door slowly. Beyond, they could hear the pump and the water splashing.

Jay bent down by the side of the tank, reaching out with one hand. “This is going to look strange.”

“Everything you do looks strange,” Dan started, but he was right—it did look real fucking strange. The palm of his hand… uncoiled? Rippled and widened? And from the inside came slightly luminescent blue tendrils, about a half-inch wide each and visibly very soft, and slick with some sort of fluid with the consistency of honey, or maybe laundry detergent. He stuck these into the water without a worry, and then said, not too loudly, “Hey. Up here.”

Abruptly Dan remembered the lures. “You have those inside you? You feed them to the fish!”

“Sometimes they’re hungry,” Jay said.

“What are they, worms?” Dan asked. “Some sort of… fungus?”

Jay looked up from the water to squint at him. “Are you trying to fuck with me? Like, is that a joke?”

“What?”

Jay reached over with his normal hand and grabbed one tendril firmly, and then pulled. Hard, actually, hard enough that Dan thought it looked like it had to hurt, and then with a quiet squelching sound a small octagonal segment of his gray skin pulled free from the side of his hand and so did the tendril, still moving freely. “It’s me. I feel like that should be obvious, if the fish were reporting on me to you. That one bass got a good mouthful of my leg a few months ago.”

“What are those?” someone else said, and Jay and Dan both jumped and turned to see that there was a small nursery shark staring up at the both of them. Dan wasn’t terribly familiar with her, but he thought her name started with an s sound, or maybe an m. “Can I eat them?”

“Sure,” Jay said.

“They make fish sick,” Dan said quickly. “Better not.”

“They make fish sick?” Jay repeated. “They shouldn’t. Just drowsy, maybe.”

“Dizzy and sick, is what they told me.”

Jay looked down at his own hand curiously. “So, I’m Jay.” He said it oddly again. Maybe Dan was mispronouncing it. “My friend here is Dan.”

“Danistei,” Dan said, because he gave his real name to the fishes, thank you, and then registered that Jay had said his actual name.

“What’s your name?” Jay continued, as though nothing had happened.

“Svisa,” said the nursery shark.

“Nice to meet you, Svisa,” Dan started.

“We’re delighted you’ll speak to us,” Jay continued, coming very close to cutting Dan off. “I have a couple questions about the environment.”

“Oh, like he’s always asking,” Svisa said.

“Probably,” Jay said. “Do you know what your environment is a replica of?”

“It’s a replica?” Svisa said.

“It’s a replica of a human classroom,” Jay said, rapid-fire. “Thank you, Svisa. What do you think of the lighting on the side of the wall?”

“Oh, he really is always asking that one. It’s fine.”

“You come here from anywhere interesting?”

“Not really,” Svisa said.

“Captive-bred,” Dan cut in. “Svisa, are you bored?”

“A little bit,” Svisa said. “Nothing left in here to catch, and I know all the hiding places. When it’s light out, I can watch the other tank, but they’re dimming everything now.”

“They’re dimming everything,” Jay repeated. “Okay, Dan, up, let’s get out of here before we get caught.”

“Caught,” Svisa repeated.

“We’re not technically supposed to be back here right now,” Dan explained hastily, getting up. “Thank you so much for chatting, Svsia. Jay, was that what you wanted to know?”

“One last question,” Jay said. “How dark are the hiding places?”

“Dark enough,” Svisa said, delicately closing her jaws on a big chunk of Jay’s exposed tendrils. They sheared off cleanly, and started to leak thinner, less viscous blue fluid into the water; Jay rapidly curled them back up without even a hiss. “You’re leaving, I’ll see you some other time.”

“Me, maybe,” Dan muttered. “Jay, if she gets sick, I’m holding you to account for it.”

“She should be fine. It’s like weed,” Jay said. “Bye, Svisa, thanks for talking. Might see you again, might not. I’m curious about the way it feels down there. Dan, hitting the road?”

Dan sighed and followed behind Jay, and the two of them stepped out of the tank room and then into the Employees Only hall and then back into the rest of the museum. It was dim. “What time is it?”

“You have a phone, don’t you?” Jay said, but he was pulling his own out as he said it. “Eight ten.”

“They closed up fast,” Dan noted, a little surprised. “I wasn’t expecting them to kick everyone out and turn the lights off ten minutes after the event ended.”

Jay shrugged. “Maybe they’re just efficient. Let’s make sure they didn’t lock us in.”

They hadn’t, so the two of them walked out the doors and tried not to look suspicious. Or at least Dan tried; Jay looked casual as anything, sauntering out confidently.

“Stop looking over your shoulder,” Jay murmured out of the corner of his mouth, and Dan straightened up. “No, that’s worse, you look even more like you’re sneaking into the pantry to steal cookies or something. Do you just not do this sort of thing?”

“No, I don’t,” Dan said.

Jay paused. “Why were you messing with me so much, then? Starting out strong for your first few bits of mischief?”

“I,” Dan said, trying to wrap his head around that. “It was about the fish. It has always been about the fish.”

“But you had to know I wasn’t going to go after the fish in a new aquarium,” Jay said, sounding almost stupefied. “Right?”

What? “What? No.”

“If I’m going to an aquarium, there’s going to be close monitoring, people around,” Jay said. “And it’s not like they’re filling, anyway. Obviously I’d just go pick someone off in an alley beforehand, if it was that big a deal.”

“I told you, I don’t like you eating the wild fish either,” Dan said. “But I guess—”

“Fish?” Jay repeated. “No, I mean—” And then he stopped, and turned to gesture Dan toward an alley. “Come take a detour with me.”

“What do you mean, not fish?” Dan said, following easily.

Jay looked Dan up and down, still walking. The alley was longer than Dan expected. “I know you said something, at some point, about the ‘patterns,’” and here he made air-quotes with his fingers, “of the way that I ate the fish being ‘creepy.’”

“Yeah, because they are,” Dan said. “I mean, I might’ve been judging you wrong, but it still seems real fucking creepy to me. I don’t really get—”

Jay raised a hand and cut Dan off. “And I read into that, I think. I thought you meant the patterns I ate everything with were creepy.”

“I mean,” Dan started. “I don’t know.”

Jay smiled oddly, waving for Dan to walk a little faster. “And I thought to myself that that was fair, because you were right. And I didn’t know how much you’d told anyone, or how much trouble I’d be in if you had.”

“Jay. What are you getting at.”

“Fish are very unsatisfying, you know.” Jay sighed. “They don’t have much to talk about. Their secrets are inconsequential and not very interesting. And, now, I have a problem, the kind you’re not likely to have heard of. “

“Where are you leading me?”

“You’ll see,” Jay said. The alleyway had gotten so dark that it was difficult to make out anything except for the points of light reflecting off his eyes from the distant billboards on the street. “I need a secret—given freely—before I can eat my fill. Makes it had to order off the dinner menu. Told myself, hey, hospice care, that’s got to be the gig for me. But it doesn’t leave me a lot of time to hunt. So I’ve been scavenging the fishtanks. But do you know what one of the first things you told me was?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Dan stopped walking.

“This explains why threatening you didn’t seem to do anything,” Jay said. “Did you even know I was threatening you?”

“When the hell were you threatening me?”

“That’s what I mean,” Jay said. “I’m full, now, I’m not eating anything. Or anyone. But you know what I’m getting at, don’t you?”

Dan shook his head. “You eat fish, and you’re implying you’ll eat me.”

“About the gist of it, yeah,” Jay said. “Keep walking, we’re going to get to the bus stop a few blocks early. I didn’t want to take you through here if you already knew I was likely to maybe eat you. Didn’t need that kind of thing getting me in trouble, you understand. You cannot do anything about me, but if you decided to start running and screaming it would’ve made my life inconvenient.”

“Are you,” Dan said, trying to find the polite term for it. “Are you a… person with a vamparasitic affliction?”

“Am I a what?” Jay said. “Vamparasitic affliction? Can you not say vampire now?”

“I think it’s offensive,” Dan said.

“If I were a vampire I wouldn’t be offended,” Jay said. “But no. I’m an obligate carnivore under a curse, but it’s a different one. You’ve seen me walk in the sunlight.”

“Can you eat garlic?”

“I can’t eat any plants.”

Dan could start to see the lights at the end of the walkway now. “Why do you eat people, if you can just eat fish?”

Jay looked at Dan for a moment, and despite the low light Dan thought he could see Jay’s needle-sharp teeth glinting in a very sharp smile. “Why does anyone prefer to eat anything? Just tastes better.”

[pa-pa-plasma]

kind of frustrating that people took "fat does not equal unhealthy" to mean "fat is not unhealthy." sometimes being obese IS unhealthy & excess fat can cause a lot of problems. ignoring health issues isn't progressive. real "oranges kill people with depression" moment

[lurking-latinist]

🐈

[coolspacequips]

Have been reading this sci-fi romance and like UGH u ever really wish a book was just at least a little better??? There's stuff in this that's interesting but also a lot about it that's so... Juvenile and kinda undercooked lol...... But it's so hard finding good romance bc for a lot of romance readers this is enough, except even then not really since they prolly didn't fuck nasty enough in this book for the ppl that just need the merest pretense to read smut (which is fine if that's what u like there's just an oversaturation of this, esp when you can have a light plot/heavy smut story with slightly better writing and internal world building without having to explain and describe the 'boring' parts 😅)

[thedreadvampy]

guess who's in 🎶troooouble🎶

New Boss does not appreciate my Vile Insubordination (giving an informed opinion in an email chain where she said some factually incorrect things and got called out on it - I said hey yep you're right that what she said isn't true but here's why it's still important to listen to our team)

and now we have to have a Quick Chattette about my Behaviour and Unsatisfactory Response (didn't apologise for being correct)