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morsking · 5 years ago

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And so we have concluded Lostbelt 2! Now that I’ve experienced it for myself, I have a much clearer picture about how I feel about this chapter. As I progressed one thing became very clear to me, and that was that Hazuki Minase likely did NOT have any influence with this chapter, and its weakest points can be attributed to its main writer, Hikaru Sakurai, once we more closely scrutinize her work.

For starters, I would like to apologize to the people who kept trying to tell me Minase had nothing to do with the writing of Losbelt 2. You were correct, I simply acted stubbornly because I was terrified that one of the writers I loathe the most had returned to haunt and corrupt the franchise I hold very dear to me. I insisted on blaming him for any flaws because he was an easy scapegoat and a bogeyman, and while we all agree he is a pervert and a hack who should be fired, it is simply not fair to point fingers at imaginary criminals. A person should always be held accountable only for the misdeeds they have actually committed. Indeed, we may now explore Lostbelt 2 and the integrity of its writing with a more objective perspective, or rather as objective as I can manage to be.

The overall theme of the Lostbelt is “acknowledging one’s emotions as a vehicle for personal growth”. The issue persistent in the setting of Lostbelt Scandinavia was that it was a place where only young humans were allowed to survive. These humans would be oblivious to what real growth and prosperity were really like. They were innocent, and emotionally and intellectually stunted groups of people who only knew to live for the truth of their eventual demise. They lived short, rushed lives where they would stay ignorant of basic human experiences, such as love, grudges, aging, vice, hate, competition, and companionship because they devoted themselves to living how Scathach-Skadi ordered them to. They were unable to think or decide what to do for themselves, and were thus incapable of not just taking the reins to decide their own evolution as we do in Proper Human History, but also of fathoming doing such a thing in the first place.

This is a mirror to Ophelia Phamrsolone. Ophelia was conditioned to only listen to others for purpose and direction. Ophelia doesn’t actually know how to listen to her own feelings or even what those feelings even are because she was never allowed to connect not just with herself but with anyone. Ophelia, like Surtr points out, is still very much a little girl terrified by everything around her because she has no balance, no capacity for finding her center as a healthy and normal human being would. Unbeknownst to herself, all her interactions with others are a plea for help. Her very first interaction with Mash in 2017 was asking her if she’d like to have lunch with her and Pepe because Ophelia is terrified by male strangers and wishes to connect with other women as well. Ophelia’s conversations with Kirschtaria are also her not knowing how to proceed with challenges and therefore appealing to authority both for comfort and advice. Finally, her monologues with the Alien Priestess are Ophelia venting about how she feels, as if she were unaware of what to really think of herself as her helplessness and indecision drown her in a lake of self-loathing.

These cries for help extend to the way she summons her Servants. Ophelia is noted to be incredibly proficient at evocation. Some might even call her a genius. In fact, she is such a genius she unknowingly managed to contract not just with one, nor two, but three different Servants all at once. The first Servant to answer her summon was Sigurd, the King of Warriors from Nordic mythology. The second Servant was Surtr the King of Giants and Scourge of Ragnarok (titled by yours truly), who hijacked the summoning and took over Sigurd. The third, and most pivotal, was Napoleon Bonaparte, the French Emperor whose Spirit Origin was modified to embody the “ideal Good Fellow who could make dreams come true” rather than the actual historical Napoleon.

What these three Servants have in common is that Ophelia wished for all of them from the darkest depths of her heart. Ophelia desired capable Servants who could give her some form of direction and stability.

Sigurd, for example, is a hero renown for rescuing Brynhild and giving brand new meaning to her life by showering her with love and devotion. Love and devotion are things that Ophelia not just desires to be shown but actively struggles to adequately express to others because she has never known what it’s like to experience those things. To Ophelia, Sigurd represents “being given that which you have never known and finding fulfillment”.

Surtr, on the other hand, embodies a darker type of direction: the terror stagnation, conformity, monotony, inaction, and eternal suffering. Surtr exercises control over Ophelia by threatening to destroy the world if he is released, prompting Ophelia to flash to her childhood locked away by her abusive parents every dreaded Sunday. Surtr locks Ophelia into a state of helplessness and indecision where she has to carefully consider how she will proceed with dealing with Surtr. Ophelia has decided to lock herself in with him as a way to prevent him from breaking out of both Sigurd’s body and the physical prison inside the Lostbelt’s sun. This is a situation where Ophelia is in a constant state of stress and fear, since as a Crypter the last thing she could ever want to see is the destruction of yet another world by her hands. More personally, the death of the Lostbelt would also mean death for Ophelia, as she has failed her purpose once again and thus would have no worth as a person. However, what Ophelia cannot understand, because Surtr himself does not, is that Surtr’s destructive impulses are how he wants to show love and devotion towards her. Surtr has reasoned that since their worlds abandoned them after they failed to perform their ordained tasks, the only thing left is to annihilate them completely as retribution for their suffering. Surtr does not wish to hurt Ophelia, but because he is a being defined only by his overwhelming desire to burn everything, he cannot help her heal or grow in any way that matters. All he can offer is annihilation. To Ophelia, Surtr represents “self-destruction through a static state of being”.

Finally, there is Napoleon. Napoleon represents a pronounced antithesis to Ophelia’s entire personality. He is an upbeat, improvising, confident man who chooses to not stress over things because what he is seeing is only what lies ahead, not what lies in front of him.He also breaks her defenses by asking something so ridiculous and unexpected as her hand in marriage when they have only just met. Napoleon refuses to give in to any negative outcome regardless of how much the odds are stacked against him, as he demonstrated in Scathach-Skadi’s throne room where he refused to let Sigurd kill his Master despite being restrained by Skadi’s paralyzing rune. He demonstrates this once again when he blows his final shot at Surtr during the final battle, sacrificing his own life to give Chaldea the opportunity to regroup and bombard Surtr to bring him down. He is called the Man of Infinite Possibilities precisely because he faces the unknown head on and finds the best path to walk for his comrades to advance. He does not let fear take over his heart and judgement, he creates a rainbow as a bridge connecting the present to the bright, shining future. He is precisely the hero Ophelia needs, because he embodies “the bravery to grasp your own future and find your own direction”.

But analyzing these characters further is a post for another time. What I want to get into are the gripes I have with this Lostbelt.

Now, I could lead you on through a couple more paragraphs before I wham you with what this all means in a much higher metatextual level, but I don’t have the time nor the creativity to do that so I’m just gonna give it to you straight. This square between Ophelia, Sigurd, Surtr, and Napoleon is the storyline that matters most in Lostbelt 2. Scathach-Skadi matters little despite her own parallels with Ophelia and being the Lostbelt King, and the situation with the Lostbelt’s inhabitants matters even less. Why?

Because Lostbelt 2 is Sakurai coming full circle and writing an otome game like Fate/Prototype was meant to be before Fate/stay night became a thing.

SHOCKER!! SOUND EFFECTS OF SURPRISE!! DRAMATIC KAZOOS GALORE!!

Now, that’s exaggerating a little. Or maybe not that much, actually.

What Sakurai was doing was applying conventional otome game tropes into the setting not just what she’s familiar writing for, but because Lostbelt 2 is inherently an incredibly self-indulgent project.

There is a classic trademark otome fantasy at play here: the fantasy of multiple men being devoted to a female main character a player can relate to. There is no denying there is a certain appeal to the idea that there are several handsome men all willing to devore their entire lives to a person. Sigurd, Surtr, and Napoleon all embody certain otome game love interest archetypes. Sigurd is the cold, composed, intellectual man who is actually earnest, just, affectionate, and wise. Surtr is the dark-hearted troubled man with fiery disposition struggling with expressing love. Napoleon is the strong, confident, borderline pixie manic dream boy with almost zero brains but plenty of empathy and... *ahem*, physique to make up for his seeming lack of tact and intelligence (he’s a himbo is what I’m saying but that comes as no surprise). The problems arise with Napoleon himself, however. Napoleon hounds Ophelia with marriage proposals she refuses time and time and again. When he proposes to her in front of Chaldea for the first time, the narrative has Mash take Napoleon’s side and urges you to do the same because Sakurai believed the reader would’ve caught on to what’s actually going on between Ophelia and Napoleon.

The issue here is that Sakurai’s clues up to that point had been far too hidden for the player to make a proper connection, and it’s not until AFTER the proposal that the player discovers Napoleon is predisposed to fall in love with whoever summons him because that’s what Ophelia wanted out of an ideal Servant. Because of the poor execution in presenting all these factors that completely recontextualize the relationship between Napoleon and Ophelia, when Sakurai has Napoleon say “You did not reject me therefore you DID agree,” we jump to the conclusion that Napoleon is engaging in extremely reprehensible behavior and ideology reminiscent of dangerous and abusive men IRL rather than take it as harmless flirtation from a well-meaning oaf of a man as he tries to break the shell of his beloved. Sakurai invokes a very dangerous trope that does more to excuse misogynistic behavior when done incorrectly rather than successfully appear as a romantic gesture of attempting to liberate a loved one from the clutches of isolation and victimhood.

On a larger scale, the application of these tropes is where Lostbelt 2 starts to suffer, and that’s where Sakurai’s writing further begins to resemble Minase’s. Sakurai spent so much time building these interpersonal dynamics that she spent the least amount of effort actually building upon the situation of the Lostbelt and Scathach-Skadi’s character and motivations for keeping the Scandinavia the way it is.

Upon scrutiny, it’s not very difficult to pick apart the setting and make a mark out of the glaring logistical inconsistencies of maintaining a population of only 10,000 humans for a span of 3,000 years by having them reproduce at 15 years old at the latest to execute them at 25. Anyone with a passing understanding of biology would know that forcing children to carry babies to term can lead to terrible health and psychological complications that would certainly end up in a lot more miscarriages, stillbirths, and failed attempts at impregnation than actual successful births. The problem here then is rather evident. Sakurai wanted to use the fact that all these children are young, innocent, naive, gullible, and ignorant to draw a connection to Ophelia’s own psychological and emotional circumstance. However, she realized that because she was writing a setting that obligated her to work around a 3000-year gap between Ragnarok and the present day. She needed something that would compromise the need for a realistic system that would ensure the reproductive viability of a human population through such a long period of time and the thematic vehicle of childhood and repression of growth as a way to connect Ophelia to her environment. This compromise ended up working for the absolute worse because she chose the worst possible system she was aware was the worst possible system she could’ve come up with and therefore decided to forsake that part of the plot without going through the implications of it and leaving the specifics to the reader’s imagination so they could sort it out in her stead.

This unwillingness to properly explore the problematic implications of Scathach-Skadi’s system not only deprived the player of a possible engaging storyline where child endangerment, a common theme in the Nasuverse, is explored and criticized through a different angle, but also actively hurts Scathach-Skadi’s connection to the player because we never get the opportunity to debate with her about her ideology and the state of the Lostbelt. We never hold her accountable for enforcing such a brutally predatory and dehumanizing system that targets children, instead Sakurai opts to build her up as a flawed, self-absorbed mother figure desperately trying to combat the extinction of the remnant of her world who also never really learned how to deal with the revelation there is an entire life she did not get to have in this universe that we MUST sympathize because she occasionally sees through the characters and acts kind towards them until the time comes for us to fight her in earnest as a matter of principle completely divorced from the question of how she’s managed her Lostbelt. The fact Scathach-Skadi’s model of sustainability does not work is made obvious by the fact it takes place in a Lostbelt, what we are trying to get at here is that it does not work from a writing standpoint because of all the different holes you can poke on it before you’ve punched through the paper screen entirely and revealed the superfluousness of it all.

There is nothing inherently bad about self-indulgent storylines. If I’m being honest, if Sakurai wanted to use Ophelia and Musashi as self-inserts to fantasize about romancing the different kinds of characters she finds attractive, more power to her. But the problem surrounding Lostbelt 2, which is the same problem that plagued Septem and Fate/Extella, is a veritable lack of restraint from her part as a professional writer in charge of a multi-billion dollar mobile game. What the writing room over at Type-Moon has to realize is that they are no longer a small doujin writing circle that can get away with whatever they want because they operate under obscurity. They are visible to the entire world and will be held accountable and criticized as professionals by consumers and their peers in the industry. A little bit of self-fulfillment in a published work never hurt anyone, you can cater to yourself most of all with your professional work (I mean, just look at She-Ra), but you must be sure that in your pursuit of indulgence your work does not suffer for it and ends up alienating and disappointing your fanbase and giving them the wrong impression of what you stand for.

Anyway we’re popping the biggest bottles when GudaMoth becomes canon this December.

#fate series #fate grand order #fgo #fate/grand order #fate go #homecooked meta #WOW THIS WAS LONG #for some reason sakurai ends up bringing the best in me even at her worst #IF I MISSED SOME THINGS IT'S WHATEVER IT'S 4:20 AM

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chaoticgremlinwholikescheese · 4 years ago

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Cars Suck

TW: Blood, near-death

JACK’S POV:

I love date nights. Just me and Alex spending time together. We rarely get any privacy with all the newsies around, so it’s nice to finally get some alone time. The restaurant we went to tonight was really good. It just opened up, a new pasta place. Affordable and delicious.

“I’m telling you, Race and Spot are a couple. I caught them holding hands!” Alex insists. “No way. Spot’s the big tough guy and Race is a hyper golden retriever with a kazoo.” Spot and Race are two very different people. But, I guess opposites can attract.

“I guess I could see it. Race does have a sort of charm-” I never get to finish my sentence. A car comes barreling down the street and runs the red light. Alex pushes me out of the way. I hit the ground with a thud. There’s a terrible screeching sound. Silence. Then people start yelling. I sit up and rub my head. What the fuck just happened?

“Alex?” I don’t get a response. Then I see her. She’s laying on the ground, eyes closed. Blood is seeping from a wound on her head. It’s already starting to pool beneath her. I scramble over, panic racing through my veins. “Hold on. It’s going to be alright. Someone is probably already calling for help.”

I put pressure on the wound. The blood is warm against my hand. It runs down my fingers, illuminated by the glowing street lights. “Jack.” Alex chokes out. “Yeah, honey. I’m right here.” She reaches a hand up to my cheek. “Why are you crying?” I didn’t even realize I was. I wipe away the tears with my free hand. “It doesn’t matter. Can you keep your eyes open for me?”

She nods. “I’m fine, baby. Don’t cry. It’s going to be alright. I’ll see you soon.” Her eyes flutter closed. “Alex? Hey- hey, talk to me, please- Alex, I need you to stay awake. You can’t leave me. Open your eyes. Open your eyes, Alex!” She doesn’t stir. “No! No, Alex, please wake up. I need you. I love you!” My shouting doesn’t do any good. Why isn’t she waking up? She should be awake.

Someone pulls me away from her. I fight back with all the strength I have. “I need to stay with her!” She needs me. I can’t leave her. I see paramedics loading her onto a stretcher. They start chest compressions. I’m ushered onto the ambulance with her. I can’t move, can’t speak. Everything is frozen.

The paramedics yell around me. They shock her. She jerks but doesn’t move. They attach an IV to her arm, hanging blood above it. I see her heart beat on a monitor. It’s flat. A constant beep. “Hand me the defib! Charge to 200!” They place the paddles on her chest. “Clear!” Her body jerks, but she doesn’t wake up. They begin chest compressions again. “Charging to 300! Clear!”

Her body jerks again. And this time the heart monitor beeps. Her heart is beating again. “We’ve got a pulse.” The paramedics begin bustling around her, bandaging and stitching. They give her a shot. I can only watch as my love is being pulled back from the brink of death.

When we reach the hospital, they take her away again. They lead me to a seperate room. I try to go with her, but two nurses pull me away. They lead me to a cubicle. “We need to get a look at the wound on your head.” One says. She dabs it with some alcohol and I hiss. “It’s not going to need stitches, but I’m going to bandage it.” She places some gauze on the cut and raps a bandage around my head. She tapes it in place.

“Let’s get you to the waiting room. You can wait there.” She gently leads me to a chair. It’s plastic and uncomfortable, but I barely feel it. All I can feel is shock. Fear. I saw my girlfriend die. Then come back. And she might be dying again, and I’m not there. I should be holding her hand. I should have told her I loved her one more time.

I place my head in my hands and sob. I notice that my hands are still covered in blood. Her blood. I shakily stand up and walk to the nearest bathroom. I rinse my hands off. The water turns red. I look at myself in the mirror. I look like a haunted soul, wandering the earth. That might be what I might become if Alex doesn’t survive.

I wait in that chair for two hours. I watched the clock. Counted every tick. 7,200 ticks. People mill around me. Some laugh. Some cry. Everyone here is hurting in some way or another.

“Jack Kelly?” I stand up and run over to the doctor. “Is she okay?” The doctor gives a faint nod of his head. “She’s not conscious yet. She has a very serious concussion and several fractures. She lost a lot of blood. She’s lucky to be alive.” The world starts to move again. She’s alive. She’s hurt, but she’s alive.

The doctor leads me to her room. She’s still asleep, pale as the sheets that cover her. I sit by her bead and hold her hand. I watch her heart monitor and count the beats. She wakes up just a little bit after she hits 6,000 beats. Her eyes blink open. She turns her head to face me. She smiles.

“Hi, Jack.” I almost cry in relief. “Hi, sweetheart.” She asks what happened. I recount it, leaving out a few details. “You saved my life. Never do that again.” She weakly laughs. “You know I can’t promise that. You have the survival instincts of a squirrel.” Even after she almost died, she’s still got her humor.

“I’m so glad you’re okay. You had me scared there.” I admit. “Going to take more than a car to kill me. I’m basically superman.” I nod in agreement. “Why don’t you get some rest, superman. I’ll be here when you wake up. I promise.” She squeezes my hand. “I love you.” She says. “I love you too.” I mean it. So much. I love her more than anything.

You never really realize just how much you love someone until you almost lose them. I’m never letting Alex go again.

#newsies #newsies oneshot #jalex #jack x alex

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bananagrin · 5 years ago

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𝔾𝕚𝕧𝕖 𝕄𝕖 𝕒 ℂ𝕙𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕣

*medieval arrival trumpets BUT in ~kazoo tones~!*

Why I like them

IT’S QUACKERJACK!

Well first of all, fools are my jam. Jesters have the best costumes, hands down. Clowning is a neat art, too.

(I’m aware that jesters and clowns are not exactly the same thing, but they do both take a lot of the same kind of skills to perform. And comparatively, I’m more familiar with clown training than with however it is fools train.)

And then?? His thing is toys. He’s a mechanically-inclined wonder and he chose to make toys. He may be a criminal but his passion is real.

And then there’s his design. And his personality. And his voice. And the way he’s animated. Listen, he’s super fun, ok? He’s a fun character. Which I think is what they were going for

My favorite thing about him, though, might be how he can effortlessly fling himself between being goofy and loony, and being witty, sarcastic and aware. It shows that all his buffoonery is definitely a personal choice - and he’s not ashamed of it at all. I like this guy

Why I don’t

Well, he did kidnap a bunch of kids and essentially force them to work in a sweatshop...

Digging deeper, the way his history stacks, he seems to have tangled a bit with pride.

Can’t help but notice he’s a little competitive - even his brand name, Quackerjack, is derived from “crackerjack,” a word with a “wow” factor that means “excellent quality” or “the best.”

For a guy who loves games this isn’t very surprising. But it gives clarity on what turned him towards villainhood. From his anger at his toys not being stocked on shelves to the rivalry with Whiffleboy - all of that packs more punch if he’s been playing to win this entire time. How do you lose a company via designing a dangerous toy? Getting carried away from being too excited? Or by going overboard trying to crush the competition?

This perspective makes him a tad more villainous, but it makes much more sense to me. His backstory never clicked with me until I considered his character from that angle.

Favorite episode (scene if movie)

The Haunting of Mister Bananabrain and Stressed to Kill

Favorite season/movie

I’ll give you a riddle three.

Favorite line

“IT’S pLAyTImE!” “You wouldn’t hold a little thing like sanity against a guy, wouldja?”

Makes me laugh, every time.

Favorite outfit

The... one... he never takes off ever? (The googly glasses his Negaverse counterpart had were adorable though)

OTP

If I had to choose it’d be Megavolt, but I’d think it’s pretty one-sided. (To be clear, it doesn’t have to be tragic - ace/aro+gay relationships can exist, all you need is consent.) I’m not a fan Claire. Or the comics in general, really.

Brotp

Megavolt 1000%. I know I just said that, but jeez, the compatibility between these suckers... They’re gold.

Head Canon

If he’d be given some housing, some food and a therapist, he’d return to society faster than anyone else. I said earlier that Megavolt would be the easiest to redeem, but Elmo probably wouldn’t mesh well with society - he’s kinda weird, and he’d still believe lightbulbs are enslaved, after all. But I can see Quackerjack living more or less normally if he could have another chance.

Also, he L O V E S Christmas.

Unpopular opinion

Don’t like the comics? Does that count?

When I found them, I was okay with the comics. But that deteriorated over time, and I just... I don’t like ‘em. I don’t like the ~dark~ overtones that scream Edgy Early 2010′s Joker, I don’t like Claire, Quackerjack isn’t himself... I don’t like the way his bill is drawn - which is petty, I know, but still. The comics were a joy at first but left a bad aftertaste.

A wish

Make him fun and loony in DT17. I don’t want duck Joker. I want Quackerjack. Also more team-ups with DW

An oh-god-please-don’t-ever-happen

Uhh... I don’t know??? Please don’t kill anyone??? Idk

5 words to best describe them

Zany, perceptive, nimble, childish, skilled

My nickname for them

Uncle Jack is a term I use

#quackerjack #darkwing duck #fearsome four #meme

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blondecarfucker · 6 years ago

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Bed of Roses (Chapter 12)

Roger Taylor x Reader

BoRhap!Roger Taylor x Reader

Fic Summary: It's 1971. You just moved to London to study, and you find a band on a local pub after a bad date. The encounter doesn’t go the way you expect it, and neither does what follows this evening as you try to deal with loving Roger Taylor.

Fic Note: So I’ve had this story in my head for the last three weeks and finally decided to write it down. It’s completely planned. It will have 21 chapters and it’s divided in three acts: Dusk, Night and Dawn. It’s will be a bit angsty in the future, and it will most likely have some smut as well. I hope you guys enjoy it! Tell me what you think about it in the asks/comments/messages. PLEASE REMEMBER THIS IS NOT THE LAST CHAPTER OF THE STORY. If this is your first time stumbling upon Bed of Roses, thank you for stopping by! The rest of the story is in my masterlist, the link is in my bio - can't put the link here or else the post will disappear from the tags.

Chapter's notes: So this is a bit of a more introspective chapter - a bit shorter as well. I love writing these too - mostly set up as it was a few chapters earlier. But what is being set up in this chapter? Well, I guess only time will tell... lol I sound like an asshole. Sorry guys. Hope you enjoy this as well, and sorry again for not posting yesterday

Words: 1866

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ACT TWO - NIGHT

“Everything is more intense at night.”

Chapter 12

You murmured the lyrics to White Queen (As It Began) as you kept on reading On The Road. The constant view of fields bored you in the first few minutes of your ride back to London on the bus, since you told Roger to keep his car around - and visit you when he got the chance - and now you were missing class on this Monday morning, hoping to make it in time for your work in the afternoon.

You were annoyed at yourself again - how you, once again, was unable to balance your relationship with Roger and your professional life. Your parents asked you about this sometimes, when you told them you would be out for a week to accompany him on tour, and you pretended to have everything under control. They sent you to England to study, and you did so - but you also loved Roger, and loving Roger was an activity that took a lot of your time and energy.

Those two sides of your life were usually in friction, conflicting, and sometimes you were scared you'd have to choose. But when you were wrapped around Roger's arms, it was easier not to think about it. Now, that you were alone, missing class and about to go to work without makeup, with dirty hair and casual clothing just so you wouldn't have to lie and call in sick - something you had to do many, many times before - it was harder to avoid these thoughts.

Also, you quickly found out that your work at the Sir John Soane’s Museum was uninspiring, unlike it would be if you actually got to work to the British Museum. You were not an Architecture major, but you were hired because your professor was close to the manager, and said you were one of his best students. And you could provide background to the neoclassical art, so it was fine. But it was far from what really got you studying Ancient History, and you were still working there just so you could network your way to the British Museum.

You knew that you could probably use Roger for this, and he would definitely try to help, using Queen's influence. But just the thought of this made you want to disappear; you were already known in your university and work as The Drummer From Queen's Girlfriend, and not that it was something that you were embarrassed of - you loved Roger and you were close with the rest of the band - but you wanted to be known as your own person. You even knew that most people thought that you were recommended by your professor for your job because he liked Queen and you arranged for them to meet, which was obviously not true, but if you acknowledged the rumours enough to deny them, they would only get stronger.

And Roger did everything he could to get you out of the spotlight, knowing how much you hated it. Unlike Mary, you weren't mentioned in interviews, Roger only saying that he's taken when asked directly, and only saying your name in interviews when he did them drunk. But people always found out you dated him, somehow. And treated you differently as soon as they found out, always being nicer to you, in the hopes they can get something from the band, until they realize you were not gonna do that, and then being cold to you, saying that you were a snob.

You always considered yourself a loner, but dating Roger really took that away from you as a choice; it was now something you had to be. You never knew when someone really wanted to befriend you for your personality or for Roger, so you were not able to trust anyone that came close to you. That distance that you had to keep from others made you even closer to Roger and the band, and that was a bit scary to you - they were all quite different from you. You sometimes craved not having to worry about all this.

But the moments you were with the band and especially with Roger made you hopeful; hopeful that your professional life wouldn't mess up your love life, hopeful you would get the job you've always dreamed of. Both things were deeply associated in your head, your two ultimate goals.

And it was easier to be around them and not think about pessimistic stuff; yesterday night, after you and Roger got back from the woods and went swimming naked on the pond - immediately regretting it when you had to walk back in the cold wind completely soaked - you both showered and went back to the studio, where Roger and Freddie tried to emulate the sounds of an orchestra with their voices for a song called Seaside Rendezvous. You were all outside of the recording booth, laughing as Roger did his best to sound like a kazoo. Usually, you loved to watch Rog as he did a high note or one of his famous falsettos; his control over his voice was always impressive. But now, he sounded like a cat screeching. "It's a work in progress, dear. You know how it is", Freddie told you while you laughed non-stop with Brian on the couch.

You got back to reading the book for a while, and as you read "I think of Neal Cassady, I think of Neal Cassady", you realized you just finished reading Roger's favourite book. You were both always trying out things the other one liked, like it would help you get a better insight to each other. A writer you liked once said that there are questions that haunt every relationship, sooner or later: What are you thinking? How are you feeling? Who are you? What have we done to each other? What will we do?

You always thought about how dramatic that sounded, but it actually made sense to you after being with Roger for three years now. What's the point of a relationship if not trying to figure each other out and say, with certainty, "I choose you before anyone else in my life"? Belonging. Relationships are always about trying to belong with someone else, you thought.

The bus stopped and you grabbed your duffel bag. You moved to through the station and found your way to the underground, and you looked at your watch as you found a place to sit on the tub. It was a thirty minute ride to your work from where you were, and you were supposed to be in a meeting with an international researcher alongside your boss in ten minutes. "Fucking hell", you said to yourself, and an old lady looked at you, pursing her lips.

You looked like a teenager, in a button up skirt, a loose Fleetwood Mac shirt tucked in and yellow Chuck Taylors. You definitely didn't look like a respectful historian about to have a serious meeting.

You got to the museum, accidentally hitting one of the interns with your duffel bag as you went to the locker to store it and brush your hair. You said sorry, but you could still hear her talk to someone else outside the bathroom. "She's already twenty minutes late. I don't know how she keeps the job", the other intern says. "Well, she's a groupie. This is just her part time job. I doubt she's ever late to suck Roger Taylor's dick if he tells her to do so", the one you hit with your bag says. "I know I wouldn't. It must be nice to know you don't have to work, just look cute and have your legs spread open every night and boom, your life is easy. That's why she doesn't care if she's twenty minutes late. She has her boyfriend to pay for anything she wants", the first one answered.

You wanted to punch them in the face until your knuckles were bruised just to relieve the stress. At that moment, they represented everything you hated about your life; your stupid architecture museum job and the people that will never take you seriously because you're Roger Taylor's girlfriend.

But you had a meeting to attend, so you breathed in, looked at your visibly tired face - you wish you had some makeup on - and tied your hair up, so it would look less messy. You went outside, saying excuse me to the girls, and walked to the room the meeting was being held in.

When you opened the door, you saw your boss, a look of annoyance in his face, but you were soon distracted by the man across his office desk. He had really short hair, even shorter on the sides - that was a bit of a shock to you, used to seeing guys with long hair - and icy blue eyes. He was wearing a plain maroon sweater, his shoulders filling it perfectly, and fitting dark jeans. He also looked older than you - he was probably in his thirties. His smell filled the room and hit you - he smelled like cologne. Drakkar. It was a perfume you haven't smelled ever since you moved from New York.

"This is my Greek history specialist, Y/N. She's usually on time", your boss said, and you shot him a shy smile. "Sorry, I had a bit of a problem with my commute today", you explained, and you felt the two men analyzing you; your boss was not approving your look for the meeting, and the man was just mysterious. "Y/N, this is the researcher I told you. He works at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. His name is William Antigonos Argyros", he said, and that caught your attention. Antigonos and Argyros are greek names.

"Or, you know, you could just call me Will. But it's up to you", he said, and you had to hold a laugh. But something else caught your attention. He had an accent you knew very well, even though you only heard it from your own lips, nowadays. He had a Manhattan accent. "Sorry for asking, but are you from New York?", you said, and he shook his head in agreement. "Born and raised. But my parents are greek immigrants, so that's the reason for the weird names. William was chosen so I could fit in more nicely", he said with a smirk. You laughed a bit.

"You sound like you're from New York, as well. Odd to meet another fellow new yorker in London while talking about neoclassical architecture. But I guess Ancient History was never Manhattan's strongest suit", he said, and you agreed. "Where did you study?", you asked, and he answered. "I actually studied in Greece. It was easier, knowing the language and such", he shrugged his shoulders. You were admired.

"Mr Argyros is here for his research on Ancient Greece's influence in architecture. It's for a new exposition at The Metropolitan" your boss said, and you and Will corrected him at the same time. "The Met", you said, and looked at him when you realized the coincidence. This could be interesting, you thought to yourself. You really needed a friend - just a friend, you reminded yourself. Just one friend that was actually like you.

---

Chapter 13

Masterlist

Taglist:

@taylorroger-s @sarai-ibn-la-ahad @its-nessi @anamcg317 @frenchieswiftie @queen-danielle-dani-dan @minihemo @shutup-sorry @theyrealllegends @killerqueenisthebest @ashagracelove @hardy-s @fuckinghurricanesoul @secretsweetscollectionblog @mrswinterhater @11mb0 @tamtam-go92 @derptatosaur @patrick-the-stumping @phantom-fangirl-stuff @the-hysterical-queen @rogerofmylife

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aquaburst3 · 6 years ago

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One of the oldest ongoing debates in the anime community is, “Which is better, Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 or Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood?” Both series have their strengths and weaknesses. As for which I prefer and think is better personally, Brotherhood hands down.

My main issue is that the 2003 adaptation was that it was super melodramatic. Like so melodramatic that it took me out of the series and became super cheesy levels. The biggest example is when Edward get’s exasperated by the slow progress of studying the notes. There is a super long speech with dramatic music. I just felt that was really melodramatic and that they should just get a short, firm word about giving up. There were plenty of others times where similar situations happened like bringing in real world issues like WW2 in a super forced way and that time a super dramatic moment was backed by the theme song played on a kazoo.

Brotherhood does a better job at balancing the tone. It carried enough weight and had enough depth that I took the series seriously, but had enough levity to break up the tension. Telling jokes and trying to lighten up the mood is something that is more common in war and military situations then what some might think, because you hear about that from war vets a fair bit. Wouldn’t be surprised if that’s another reason why the manga author added those sorts of jokes in.

Outside of that, the ending and the main villain just weren’t all that great in the 2003 series.

Dante always came off like a one off minor foe that the Elrics would come across on their travels, not the “Final Boss.” Her being a mastermind hellbent on using others just to stay young just seems underwhelming and nonsensical considering the acts committed by that point like genocide.

On top of this, the manga was trying to tell a grander and epic story, which tend to have powerful villains. The 2003 series is more character focused, which have villains with smaller or more personal goals. However the 2003 still has the elements from the other story, but yet has a villain with a personal goal…which doesn’t add up or fit well. While I can understand why the 2003 series had a villain like this, because the author was still writing the manga around that time, but the villain still falls completely flat.

Father, on the other hand, has a grander presence about him like Darth Vadar, Sauron or Fire Lord Ozai at that point in the story. He also serves as a better foil to Ed. They both seek to further their own goals by using Alchemy. Ed learnt the hard way while he stayed immature. They also have tempestuous relationships with their “father” Hohenheim. His goals made far more sense considering what happened in the series by that point.

The 2003 series also had a botched ending. It was bittersweet, which is fine since a lot of my favourite series end on that sort of note like Cowboy Bebop, Eva and TLGL. However, it make a lick of sense and was rather ill fitting, playing into the aforementioned melodrama.

I also have some other minor complaints like Mustang killing off Winery’s parents rubbing me the wrong way and the art is kinda bland.

Like I said before, I think the 2003 series has its strengths….

The first 20 episodes or so are a lot stronger and more fleshed out.

The Humonculi are better villains. Only Wrath and Greed are good characters in Brotherhood while everyone else seems rather bland and only served a purpose in the plot. The idea of them being humans brought back to life is far more interesting to me then them being parts of a guy’s soul, giving them more agency and character. They serve as foils for the brothers as well, being like mistakes coming back to haunt them in a way. (Lust has one of the most epic deaths I’ve seen in an anime in Brotherhood, give it that.)

Some of the interpersonal relationships are more developed due to the smaller cast.

More focus is placed on the Elric Brothers and their struggles.

More focus is placed on the more moral grey aspects of the story like the Ishval Genocide.

At the end of the day, this is all personal preference. If you prefer the 2003 series, cool. More power to ya. This is just my two cents.

#aqua rambles

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greatprocrastinationgodsledyouto · 7 years ago

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Ghost emoji ratings

Until the day my cute and precious aye-ayes get much-deserved love and are #blessed with their own emoji, the next best emoji to rate is my beloved Gothic Ghostie.

***

Imma just start this saying that I don't get why the ghosties are constantly plagued by the notion that sticking their tongues out is the same thing is haunting. I want spooky, not spoopy. On the other hand, Tito would love his stink eye. You can tell this is a sincere stink eye. You best-a believe that the creepy taunting ghostie you're hearing down the hall rattling his chains is calling you, "sssSSSHHHOOOOOOBBBBBIIIIIIEEEEeeeeeee!!!" for all eternity. Killer insult aside, I don't understand why this ghostie is so opaque and given a gradient to create the illusion of depth. Who does he think he is? A politician? 3/10.

Damn, ghostie. Back at it again with sticking your tongue out at me, ghostie. This ghostie would be bffls with Blooregard Q. Kazoo, and I will fight you on this if you disagree. Points for mischief. Deductions for intense gradient shadows. Overall, I don't mind this ghostie. In fact, I rather like him. 7/10

This looks like if you took the soft vanilla ice-cream you got at your local ice-cream shop out of the cone, and made a face with some sprinkled toppings. Not a ghostie. Much disappoint. However, points for carefree attitude and for also looking like the cousin of a dollop of Daisy. 3/10

Back at it again with sticking your tongue out. Back at it again with the gradient. Stink eye is not overwhelming, for which I am grateful. BUT WHAT'S WITH CASTING A SHADOW. WHAT'S WITH THE LIGHT REFLECTING OFF YOUR BLACKHOLES FOR EYES. YOU INSULT STEPHEN HAWKING. YOU INSULT COSMOLOGY. YOU INSULT ME. POINTS FOR KNOWING HOW TO CONTOUR AND HIGHLIGHT. 2/10

This is the carefree sticking out of tongue done right. Look at that slanted smile. Look at the subtle but careful contour and highlight. Look at the optical illusion of a stink eye that magical combination has created. This ghostie would out-haunt Bloo any day and not even give a schmer. 11/10 stars. You get all the awards.

This ghostie is coot, but he's clearly having an identity crisis, trying to pick up local babes on snapchat. This ghostie isn't giving you the stink eye. This ghostie was on his way to say hi to his crush, before realizing he stepped in dog poo. This ghostie is having a hard day, and I support him. But don't show too much support, because then he'll become that annoying friend who thinks he's your close friend because you talked to him before gym class once, and now he thinks you're his Sun, Moon, and stars, but really he's just gum on your shoe. We all know this ghostie. If you don't, you are that ghostie. Sorry not sorry. 5/10

That's not a ghostie, that's a pacman character who got rejected from a Ghostbusters arcade game. Older annoying brother of dollop of Daisy. 1/10

Either a ghostie who wants to be a skull or a skull who wants to be a ghostie. It's 2018. I support this ghostie's journey *and* destination. Points of appreciation for unique gray tone. 8/10

A pumpkin dressed up a demon for Halloween trying to get pictures to send as headshots to be an extra on Danny Phantom. I respect this demonic pumpkin. Not a ghostie. However, since it glows ember on the inside, you will remember its name. 1000/10 because maybe demons can be ghosties too??? Idc, it's my rating scale

MESSENGER, WHAT ARE YOU DOING. YOU HAD A PERFECTLY SWEET LITTLE GHOSTIE, AND YOU GAVE HIM ANXIETY. H E H A S B A G S U N D E R H I S E Y E S S S Z, AND THEY AIN'T DESIGNER! I SUPPORT YOU, GHOSTIE. IF YOU WANT TO GO INTO ACCOUNTING, YOU GO RIGHT AHEAD. IF YOU WANT TO SLEEP WITH YOUR TEDDY BEAR MR. WUGGLES AT NIGHT, YOU GO RIGHT AHEAD. MESSENGER MIGHT SAY YOU'RE GIVING UP YOUR DREAM, BUT I SAY NO. YOU'RE GIVING UP *THEIR* DREAM. LITTLE BROTHER OF DOLLOP OF DAISY. 6/10

***

I reached my picture limit, so... to be continued. Part 1 of 2.

#emoji rating #emoji review #ghost emoji

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just-come-baek · 7 years ago

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Chills, Scares, and Cold Sweat

Pairing: Kim Taehyung x Reader ft. a pinch of platonic Yoonmin and implied Kryber

Themes: smut | angst | haunted house!au

Word count: 12.7k

Summary: Ghosts and demons don’t exist, so how bad can it really get? In the worst case scenario, we’ll end up on YouTube screaming like a bunch of pussies. Taehyung’s words, not mine.

Warnings: late BTS Halloween special! Scary! (Not really) Backseat smut!

Masterlist

Okay, chill, you got this, I delivered myself a mental pep talk, as I stood in front of the house, my grip tightened around the suitcase handle, head high. The sun had already descended behind the horizon, grey skies casting a spine-chilling aura, the thick fog only intensifying the effect, putting everyone into long-awaited Halloween's mood.

The last days of October are just like that; everyone is hyped about Halloween, preparing slutty costumes, throwing amazing, unforgettable parties, trick-or-treating, and, obviously, scaring the shit out of friends, sometimes even posting the horrendous pranks online.

This year, though, my Halloween was going to be different. Not necessarily better, but definitely not like all the previous ones. I mean... it's not an everyday occurrence to participate in a paranormal experiment. Or in other words, being locked up in a supposedly haunted house for a couple of days. Thankfully, they pay quite handsomely, and I seriously need this money.

What's the worst that could happen?

It's not like demons or ghosts or other spooky creations exist.

That’s what I call; easy money.

With lips pressed together in a thin line, back straightened, I made a confident step toward the house; only to shriek a second later when I felt a hand on my shoulder.

Instantly, I turned around, my hands raised in a defensive manner, ready to attack whoever dared to touch and frighten me out of wits.

“Your backpack is so cute,” stated the man around my age, beaming, his boxy smile making everything brighter. “It has those cute kitten ears,” he added, his hands stretched, as if he wanted to touch it, “utterly cute.”

“Don’t sneak up on people like that,” I preached, my palm firmly pressed against my rib cage, my heart beating rapidly, as he almost put me through a severe heart attack. “Anyway,” I started dismissively, “are you participating in the, hmm... project as well?”

Smiling down at me from under his hood, he nodded, “of course, I’m Taehyung, and you are?” he introduced himself, his arm outstretched, so I could shake hands with him. Quickly, I greeted him and gave him my name, his wide beam never fading. “It’s gonna be so much fun, isn’t it?”

“It depends on what you’re into,” I promptly replied, giving him a faint smile, “if you like being conned and pranked, since this ‘experiment‘,” I didn’t hesitate to draw a quotation marks in the air with my fingers, “is obviously some kind of a sick hoax taken to a completely different level then yes, it’s gonna be a blast,” I grinned innocently, studying his expression.

“Oh,” he pouted slightly, “so you’re a disbeliever. Interesting,” Taehyung spoke, and I could feel his glance on me, as he looked at me from head to toe.

“What about you? Do you seriously believe in all of that crap?” I asked, my eyebrow cocked upwards, as I impatiently anticipated his reply. He’s something; if he really thinks that horror monsters are real, it’ll surely be interesting. “I mean... whatever is gonna pop out of nowhere must be staged.”

“I don’t know what’s gonna happen; in the worst case scenario, we’ll end up on YouTube screaming like a bunch of pussies.” Taehyung replied, shooting me another smile, as he rubbed his hands in excitement. “We probably should get inside, I think we’re late.”

“Right,” I agreed, and Taehyung quickly grabbed my suitcase, “thanks.”

The porch squeaked the moment we stepped on it; from the outside the house looked terrible, only still in one piece due to a magical spell cast upon it; maybe even a curse, given the particular time of a year and sinister atmosphere around. From the inside, it didn't present any better.

“Finally,” a voice said as Taehyung grabbed the knob and pushed the doors wide open, a loud creak announcing our arrival. Slowly, he looked from above his tablet, his lips arched into a polite smile, his dimples on full display. “I started to think that you guys ditched,” he added, clearly glad that he was mistaken.

“Are you kidding me? Pass on such a sweet deal? Never,” I quickly assured him, as I accepted his hand shake when he greeted us, “nice to meet you, too, Namjoon.”

“Okay, before we start anything, you both have to sign this up,” Namjoon announced, showing us the terms of the agreement which were roughly thirty pages long, “basically, it states that we can record anything that happens here, and use it for further research. Also, we do not take any responsibility for any damage caused during your stay.”

Taehyung scrolled through the pages, his eyes moving quickly from left to right as he quickly skimmed the text, reading one every five words.

“Sounds legit,” he commented, as he looked at Namjoon, “where do I sign?”

“Just draw your signature with your finger at the bottom of the page,” Namjoon instructed Taehyung, the latter leaving an illegible squiggle under the date.

“Are you for real?” I asked, still unable to process what Taehyung just did. Did he seriously endorse the contract without thoroughly reading it first? Is he that reckless and irresponsible? For all we know, they could have a permit to legally harvest his organs, or worse.

“Don’t worry, there isn’t anything funny, it’s a routine procedure.” Namjoon reassured me, his arm outstretched toward me, the blank space at the bottom of the page waiting to be signed.

“Fuck it, let’s do it,” I replied casually before I left my signature in the right place. Right now, I seriously needed this money, even if the contract consisted of something I was against, it’s not like Namjoon had time to renegotiate the terms with me; it’s either all or nothing, and I really didn't want to leave empty-handed.

“Okay,” Namjoon locked his tablet, “since we got this covered, you guys must want a short tour around the house,” he simply stated, mentioning for us to follow him and carefully listen to him. Taehyung and I looked at each other, and he let me go first, as he slowly trailed behind me.

The reconnaissance was quite short; Namjoon showed us round the house and introduced us to the four fellow housemates. At the very end of the tour, he led us down the corridor, telling which room was whose. Mine happened to be across from Taehyung’s, squeezed between Jimin’s and Amber’s.

“I should get going,” Namjoon stated, as he glimpsed at his smart-watch, “shit, I’m late,” he added, his eyes roaming around the house as if he was in a panic. “Anyway, see you all on Wednesday.”

"What took you so long?" Taehyung asked as I walked downstairs to the living room. "And here I thought a ghost already ate your disbelieving ass," he snickered, and I immediately stuck out my tongue at him before I politely bowed at the rest and sat on the couch beside Taehyung since he's the one I was the most familiar with; Namjoon had introduced them to me, yet their names slipped my mind almost as soon as I heard them.

"Yeah, totally," I deadpanned, slightly jabbing Taehyung's side; that boy had it coming, why did he look so astonished? "Anyway, I have a treat for all of you," I started, as I placed a plastic bag filled with Chinese fortune cookies.

"Did you rob a Chinese restaurant on your way here?" A man with golden, fluffy hair smiled and reached for the ziplock bag, taking a cookie.

"No, but it's a funny story, actually." I started, obtaining his attention before he managed to crack the cookie and read whatever wisdom was inked inside. "I used to write quotes for the fortune cookies; the manager wanted them to be original and I kind of got carried away. In the end, I got fired."

"What does it say?" Taehyung asked, wondering what could be written there, as he couldn't imagine what kind of sentence could anger the manager to the point of wanting to sack me. "Come on, Jimin, read it out loud!" He encouraged, when the man scanned the piece of paper, his eyes squinted, trying to decipher the message in a tiny font.

"Oh my God, this is gold," Jimin declared, as he strived to refrain himself from ugly-laughing. "You will die alone and poorly dressed," Jimin read, and Taehyung almost choked when he heard the fortune. "Geez, thanks, that's exactly what I wanted to get."

"She must really possess some kind of power, I mean... what are those?" Taehyung asked angrily, as he pointed at Jimin's hideous sneakers. Everyone laughed at Taehyung's remark, and Jimin stuck his tongue out, acting calm and collected, although he couldn't understand the criticism; they were incredibly comfortable, who really cared that they were last season?

"I want one, too." A woman in boyish clothing interjected Taehyung before he got to diss Jimin more, and reached for the bag, eager to read her fortune. "Life is a symphony, and you are playing the kazoo," she read out loud, "why would anyone fire you for that? This is ridiculous; if anything, you should get a raise!"

Later that night, we're still chilling in the living room; demonic presence never making oneself known. It was just a simple get-together; six people in their twenties, a bag of delicious unfortunate cookies and a bottle of rum passed among them.

"Okay, let's lay our cards on the table," Taehyung started casually, wriggling on the couch beside me, brushing his thighs against mine all the time. "What made you guys take part in this? You go first Jimin," he asked with curiosity, his body leaned forward, his elbows digging into his thighs, waiting for the reply patiently, his eyes fixated on Jimin.

"The girl I have a crush on just got together with my friend, and I didn't feel like third-wheeling them, especially when they're in that honeymoon phase," Jimin stated, gladly accepting the bottle of alcohol Yoongi offered him. It wasn't easy for him, but hopefully participating in this experiment would take it off his mind. "Fuck couples," he added, and raised the bottle, taking another gulp.

"Salute to that!" I cheered, smiling at Jimin, completely supporting his views on relationships. It was solely envy speaking, but yeah, fuck couples!

"What about you Amber?" Taehyung inquired, as he looked at the girl, the bottle of alcohol in her hands.

"Actually, I'm just tagging along. Krystal wanted to go, because she thought her Instagram followers would love it, and I'm just accompanying her."

"That's true," Krystal suddenly interjected, tearing her eyes off the screen, "and they just love it," she added, every word just beautifully rolling off her tongue, "by the end of the experiment, the number of my followers will at least double."

Taehyung nodded his head, registering all the new information about other participants. "Yoongi?"

"Boredom, I guess." Yoongi answered dismissively, drinking alcohol as if it was water. "Also, I've been told I am dead inside, so hopefully, this near-death experience will stir some emotions within me." He added, placing an empty bottle on the carpet, "have any of you brought booze?" He asked, looking at fellow participants, hoping he wasn't the only one who had thought about getting wasted.

"I have," I quickly replied, unconsciously raising my hand as if I was still in high school, "but it's clear vodka, and I don't think we should drink it straight from the bottle," I added, and everyone except Yoongi agreed with me with a simple nod.

"I'll grab the cups and some juice, and you go get the alcohol," Taehyung proposed, and quickly, we stood up and went our separate ways to get what all of us needed. Within two minutes, we got back to the living room; swiftly pouring the drinks, each different with accordance to one's request.

"What about you, kitten?" Taehyung carried on, his gaze fixated on me, our cups clinking in a simple toast. Refraining myself from cringing at the nickname he had given me, I smiled at him and cleared my throat.

"I want to throw an amazing birthday party, and invite all of my friends, but I don't have money, so I signed up for this." I sincerely confessed, all of them staring at me, since mine reason must've been the most trivial one. "What about you, huh?" I boldly asked Taehyung, alcohol in my system giving me confidence and courage.

"What about me?" Taehyung questioned stupidly, grinning at me like an idiot, "Aww, look at your blush, is it me, or the alcohol?"

"Alcohol, definitely alcohol," I answered immediately, being perfectly aware that my cheeks turned scarlet red whenever I was drinking. I was attracted to Taehyung, but it didn't have anything to do with my blush at the moment; it was solely alcohol. "What about you? Are you avoiding my question?"

"I'm not, I just like teasing you," Taehyung stated, leaning forward, and I automatically lay back a little. He surprised me with all the attention he gave me, but I just didn't want to openly flirt with Taehyung in front of everyone. I hated PDA, and even Taehyung's handsome being wouldn't change that. "But to answer your question, I guess I joined the experiment because I felt like it?" Taehyung said, yet his statement came out as a question, almost as if he didn't know how to explain his decision. "I mean... I thought it'd be cool to try something new."

"Okay, since we've already established why we're here, why don't we get drunk?" Jimin spoke, trying to change the subject for which I was much than simply glad, considering the way Taehyung stared at me, waiting for a perfect moment to strike again with his playful remarks.

"Finally!" Yoongi cheered, as he reached for his cup and a fortune cookie. "You are all going to die here," Yoongi read the sentence with furrowed eyebrows, and I almost choked on my drink in horror; I didn't particularly memorise all the quotes, but I was certain that I hadn't written that. "Spooky."

"Are you okay?" Taehyung asked in concern, as he hit my back gently, evidently worried about me, yet intrigued by my reaction. "What's the matter?"

"It wasn't funny, Yoongi," I reprimanded the man, obviously not amused by his prank.

"I don't understand," Yoongi replied, his eyebrow cocked in a questioning manner, as he had no clue what made me act the way I did. "What wasn't funny?"

"The note," I quickly said, pointing my finger at the piece of paper lying on the coffee table, "I didn't write that."

"Who did, then?" He challenged, and I immediately reached for the note, eager to see what was written there. Yoongi's prank wasn't humorous, not even the tiniest bit. Quickly, I flipped the note in my hands, squinting my eyes as I tried to read it in my tipsy state. What threw me off first was the font; the one I held in my hands was hand-written, whereas the ones I had written were not. Someone was messing with me, yet I couldn't really tell who. It had to be one of the fellow participants, it couldn't be a ghost, obviously.

"You guys are the worst," I whined, crumpling the note in my hands, not giving them the satisfaction; they tried to prank me, but it failed.

Around two a.m. we called it a night. Unfortunately, when I got to my room, I didn't feel the tiniest bit tired, my eyes were wide open, not even a single yawn leaving my mouth. Perhaps, it was alcohol that they had poured me, or the cruel prank that affected me much more than I originally thought; either way, I wasn't feeling exhausted, anticipated dream way beyond my reach.

Having kicked off my shoes, I jumped on the bed, sitting up, my back pressed against the headboard. Quickly, I unlocked my phone, keen on reading whatever I had missed during the day. Slowly, I scrolled down the content, either liking or reblogging everything that caught my attention, or made me smile. It didn't keep me busy for long, though.

"Eh," I murmured to myself, as I rolled down, lying on the sheets. The brightness of my phone was blinding me, although it was set the darkest as it was possible. Thankfully, there was a working lamp on the nightstand, which engulfed the room with tangerine, weak light.

Suddenly, I felt cold; it lasted for not longer than ten seconds, yet it was enough for goose bumps to rise in my arms. Shivering, I turned my head toward the window, the curtain fluttering in the chilly breeze. It was strange, especially when I didn't leave it open. Sighing, I jumped off the bed and walked to the window to close it, only to furrow my eyebrows in confusion when I realised it was closed. There had to be a scientific explanation; the draft just didn't emerge from nothingness.

Before I got a chance to ponder the occurrence, I heard a faint knock on the doors, interrupting my train of thought. My head immediately turned, Taehyung's head picked inside my room.

"You're not asleep, thank God," he spoke casually, a sheepish smile decorating his face. Slowly, he pushed the doors open, gingerly entering my room, his pillow in his grip. "Would it be a problem if I slept here tonight?" He asked boldly, his gaze drilling holes in my eyes. "My room stinks as if someone has died in there," he clarified honestly, and I just nodded my head in comprehension.

"You can stay, I guess," I replied nonchalantly, as I wondered if I was his first choice. Didn't he prefer to stay with one of the guys? Or Krystal? Or whoever else?

"Thanks, you're the best," Taehyung beamed at me, quickly plopping on the right side of the bed, "you're my life saver."

"No problem," I muttered and gave him a faint smile, before I turned my head around, examining the window again. It bothered me that I couldn't come up with a logical explanation, even when I knew one existed; surely it wasn't Casper the ghost, playing with the curtains for crying out loud!

"What are you doing over there?" Taehyung asked, his deep, worried voice pulling me out of my thoughts. "Have you seen a ghost? You look unhealthily pale."

"What...?" I furrowed my eyebrows, as I didn't register what exactly he asked me about. "Oh, it's really nothing. I thought I saw something, but it must be nothing. It's just the house, everybody says it's haunted, and even if I don't believe in that, it still makes me feel a bit edgy." I explained, smiling sheepishly throughout my whole reply, as I analysed his concerned expression.

"Don't worry, it's a natural reaction in these circumstances, everyone a bit scared even though they may not outwardly admit that." Taehyung assured, trying to provide me with comfort of some sort. "Hell, even I'm a little frightened." He confessed, and I let out a faint chuckle. The thing was, I wasn't scared, what I felt was confusion without any sort of fear.

I knew better than to believe in that lies Namjoon had fed us with; the supernatural beings don't exist. Period. He might've fooled the rest of them, but I had never been easy to convince.

"It's not I'm scared. Maybe a little uneasy, but that's all." I replied, striving to look as confident as I possibly could. "Anyway," I started, rubbing my hands eagerly, "do you want to check out your room?"

"Not really," quickly, he brushed me off, his body comfortably lying on my bed, his arms tightly wrapped around the pillow, his lips puckered, "when I said that it stank, I meant it. Actually, I'm pretty much surprised you can't smell it from here."

"Okay, let's just stay here." I gave in, not really trying to force him to leave. I truly liked his company, and if he wanted to stay the night, I'd let him even if nothing was going to happen. "But if you hear me talking in my sleep just ignore it, I am not being possessed." I warned him, but Taehyung just beamed at me.

"And if you feel as if a boa snake is trying to kill you, don't panic, you're not being attacked. It's just me." Taehyung announced, holding his pillow tightly between his arms.

"Sure..." I replied, sounding not convinced, "I'll remember that."

"Aren't you tired?" He asked, his head propped on his elbow, as he stared at me. I was still standing next to the window, almost as if I was too shy to lie down beside him. "It's like seriously late," he yawned loudly, not even covering his mouth.

"I was, but sometimes one moment I'm super exhausted, only to be hyper when I should go to bed." I explained, slowly approaching him, the eerie curtain occurrence almost forgotten.

"Yeah, I get it." Taehyung nodded his head, as he closed his eyes, and snuggled tightly around the sheets, making himself absolutely comfortable. "Amber must be suffering like you right now. When I was standing in front of your doors, I could swear I heard moans coming from her room. And if I'm not mistaken, they were Krystal's."

"Whoa," I said, unable to disguise my perplexed reaction. They hadn't made it obvious that they had any romantic strings between them. Moreover, if I had to tip who were in a relationship, I'd nominate Yoongi and Jimin; Krystal hadn't held Amber’s hand when rain started to hit the windows, it was Jimin who had got scared, seeking safety in Yoongi's tight grip.

"At least someone's getting some," I added absent-mindedly, the depressing thoughts of my painfully long singlehood resurfaced.

"I'm very sorry that we're not having sex right now. If I knew sooner that you're down to fuck, I'd save my energy. Not today, kitten." Taehyung teased me, his mind almost in dreamland.

"That's not what I meant!" I replied defensively, shooting him a disapproving glance, which much to my dismay, got unnoticed. "I'm thinking long-term here," I added, although I knew he wasn't listening.

"Good night, Taehyung." I whispered, as I sat on the bed beside him, ready to return to reading on my phone.

When I woke up, Taehyung was gone. Lazily rubbing my eyes, I reached for my phone to check the time and other notifications; it was past noon, and I must've been the only person still in bed. Despite a hot affair between Krystal and Amber, I doubted anyone had stayed awake to 4 o'clock to finish reading.

A loud growl of my stomach pulled me out of my thoughts, demanding food. However, no matter how hungry I was, I had to shower first.

Swiftly, I got out of bed and approached the suitcase, fishing out everything I needed: a clean set of clothes, a bathrobe, and shower necessities.

The bathroom down the hall, thankfully, wasn't occupied, so I quickly sneaked in, locking the doors from the inside.

Instantly, I noticed a camera attached to the ceiling; everybody knows that in horror movies, ghosts just love scaring the shit out of people in the bathrooms, so I can't say that I am surprised. God bless the shower curtain and toilet stall!

Once under the hot steam of water, body coated in a bath foam, I spoke in confusion, "what the fuck?" It was weird, at night, when I had gone to bed, I didn't have any bruises, yet right now, my hips and thighs were covered in a handful of dark marks. How did that happen? These weren't hickeys, obviously. I hadn't knocked into anything, either.

Furrowing my eyebrows, I stared at the marks, still unable to recall how the hell I got them. Once again, something odd happened, and I didn't have an explanation for it; perhaps I am not as smart as I thought I was.

Having pushed the bothersome thoughts aside, I swiftly finished the shower and put on my outfit which consisted of black, ripped jeans and a simple band T-shirt.

"Look who we have here, the Sleeping Beauty finally came downstairs." Taehyung snickered, as soon as I entered the kitchen. Taehyung was alone, doing the dishes, while the rest lounged around the living room, either sipping coffee, or looking at their screens. "How was your sleep?" He asked, looking at me over his shoulder, sending me a simple smile.

"Short," I retorted, as I sat on the stool by the table, looking at the remains of their breakfast. "What about you?"

"I slept like a log," Taehyung admitted, as he turned off the tap and threw the sponge into the sink before he took a seat beside me.

"Taehyung, did we... you know... do anything yesterday? I have these... weird bruises, and I have no idea how I got them. We didn't sleep together, did we?" I mumbled, playing with my fingers. I realised I must've sounded crazy and confused, and thankfully, he didn't laugh at me. "It's really strange, but I seriously don't know how to explain that. I wasn't that drunk, and I was conscious the whole time." I tried to formulate a reasonable explanation, and Taehyung, despite me sounding batshit crazy, he just grabbed my hand and gave it a comforting squeeze.

"Trust me, kitten, I'd remember that." Taehyung answered playfully, rubbing his thumb against my skin in a soothing manner. "And are you sure you haven't knocked into anything?" He asked, and I shook my head confidently. "Then, it must be the house. It's haunted, remember?"

"I'm being serious here," I whined, and Taehyung tightened his grip around my fingers.

"Don't look at me like that, something's wrong about this house. At breakfast, Yoongi told me that during the night, he felt the draft in his room, although the windows and the doors were closed." Taehyung started, and I looked at him with my eyes wide open; Yoongi had experienced the same thing, and it seemed a bit too coincidental for my liking. It was strange, but it didn't mean that the house was actually haunted.

"It doesn't mean the ghost assaulted me."

"You're right, but tell me when you come up with a better explanation."

"Does anyone know the history of this house?" Amber asked out of the blue, obtaining everyone's attention. "I googled it, and it's pretty messed up."

"Better keep it to yourself, she's already paranoid," Taehyung interjected, pointing his finger at me, earning a jab between his ribs. I wasn't paranoid, I was just puzzled. "What?" He asked loudly, his grip on my wrist, protecting him from me.

"Shut up, you're not better yourself. Who came to my room yesterday? You're the scaredy-cat, just admit it." I fought back, wriggling my arms from his grasp.

"Okay, we get it, you're both chickens," Yoongi commented, as he gave us a judging look. "What does it say?"

"Basically, whoever moves in dies." Amber summed up, as everyone stared at her, eagerly waiting for more details. "The legend says that the family who built this house was brutally murdered by robbers. It is believed the man, right before his death, swore to take vengeance on anybody who comes inside."

"That story's lame," Krystal criticized, shaking her head in disappointment, "I can't believe that's what you came up with, pathetic."

"I didn't come up with anything!" Amber defended herself, but Krystal didn't seem the tiniest bit convinced. "I found this article from a couple of years ago, and it says that over twenty people died in here; adults and kids, everyone cruelly butchered, no survivors. Just read it yourself." She sat up and stretched her hand, passing her phone to Krystal.

"Still lame."

In the evening, when Yoongi found a stash of alcohol, the atmosphere loosened up; no one was thinking about the urban legend, our minds hazy.

"Do you guys wanna play? Krystal and I deserve a break," Amber asked, as she pointed at the table where Yoongi and Jimin were refilling cups for another round of beer pong.

"Sure," Taehyung replied for the both of us, as he smiled at Amber and grabbed my hand, pulling me off the couch. "Come on, kitten, we're gonna fucking destroy them," he added, and I shook my head at Taehyung's confidence. I didn't doubt his skills, mine, however, left a lot to be desired. Especially, when I was already after a couple of drinks.

"Don't get ahead of yourself, Tae," Jimin warned, as he smirked at us, "we crushed them, and we're most definitely gonna crush you."

"I probably should tell you that I, Kim Taehyung, have never lost, not even once, at beer pong." With a hand pressed against his heart, Taehyung admitted, while I tried to fight the urge to start laughing at his serious approach. He wasn't going to play to have fun, he was going to beat them out.

"What about you, kitten?" Yoongi asked in a mocking tone, infuriating me even more with that annoying nickname he had caught on from Taehyung.

"What about me? You better worry about yourself because Taehyung and I will beat the crap out of you." I exclaimed and high-fived Taehyung before we cheered together, being confident about our victory. Hopefully, Taehyung had his self-proclaimed skills, otherwise, we're pretty much screwed.

"Feisty." Yoongi hissed under his breath, a lopsided smirk decorating his face. "In that case, we should arrange a bet; what do you think?"

"Bring it on," Taehyung replied confidently, as he sent a determined glare at Yoongi and Jimin, "what's the punishment gonna be?"

"We'll have that figured out by the end of the match, okay?"

Having cracked my knuckles, and heaved a sigh, the game started, me being the first one to throw the ball, as the boys insisted that ladies first. Surprisingly, I managed to score for our team; unfortunately, it was the first and also last point I notched up. Amongst the four of us, Taehyung was definitely the best player, yet with my awful contribution, it wasn't enough to win against them.

"In your face!"

"There's a first time for everything, Tae!" Jimin mocked, as he approached our side of the table, and patted Taehyung's shoulder with artificial care. "What are we gonna make them do, Yoongs?"

"Don't worry, shit happens." Taehyung spoke, trying to cheer me up when Yoongi and Jimin were conferring our punishment. "It's not a big deal."

"Sorry, Tae. It's all my fault. If you want I can do the punishment alone. It's fine with me."

With everlasting smile upon his face, he shook his head. Of course, he'd do that, given how much of a sweetheart I knew he was.

"Don't be ridiculous," Taehyung spoke, as he spared me a short glance before he focused on Jimin and Yoongi who're bending their backs backward, desperate to come up with a sinister punishment.

"Today's Halloween, maybe we should send them to the basement. If the ghosts don't hunt them down, we'll know that Namjoon has been bullshitting the whole time." Jimin announced, and Yoongi enthusiastically clapped his hands and nodded his head, agreeing with Jimin's idea.

"Oh my God," Krystal whined and rolled her eyes, as she took a short break from her Instagram profile, "you guys are so lame! Unbelievably uncreative. A sponge would generate a better punishment."

Krystal was right; the guys didn't possess even a whit of creativity. They were also dicks, picking a dull cliché from every horror movie ever. Going to the basement with Taehyung wasn't a problem to me, yet when Jimin and Yoongi opted for clichés, I'd rather make out with my game partner. Their idea was neutral, and I didn't really mind spicing things up.

Hopefully, Taehyung didn't either.

"Just let them, they tried their best," Taehyung replied casually, yet I didn't miss the sly, subtle smirk that he sent me. He was up to something; it was obvious, and although I didn't know anything about his revenge plan, I could only assume that Yoongi and Jimin would regret messing with us. Or at least, making fun of us. "It's really nothing, we'll crush them in the next round. It was just a warm-up."

"Yeah... sure....," Yoongi hissed, sounding unconvinced, as he knew we didn't stand a chance to win against them. Not in the next round. Not ever.

"Finish your drink, Tae." Jimin said casually, as he looked at Taehyung's cup which was half full.

As soon as Taehyung emptied his cup with only three gulps, Yoongi and Jimin walked us to the basement doors, eloquently calling our mission 'Seven Minutes in Hell'. Frankly, despite all the alcohol in my blood, it still made me cringe.

"Okay, what was about that look?" I asked straightforwardly when the doors closed behind us, Taehyung and I in the embrace of darkness, occasional squeaks of the floor above us heard whenever someone moved.

"What look?" Taehyung asked, as he batted his eyelashes at me, trying to trick me into believing in his innocence. I had caught his smirk, he couldn't deny it, and I wouldn't fall for that. He was definitely up to something.

"Don't act like an idiot, Tae. That look, I know you have some sort of a revenge plan." I explained, and although I couldn't see his face, I knew he was smirking. We're going to bite back at Jimin and Yoongi, and if he really thought I'd step back, he was awfully mistaken. We didn't know each other very well, but the playful competitiveness that had surrounded us fueled me even more, not really wanting to stop the battle now. It was fun, and I couldn't stop. Taehyung had to feel the same way.

"Well... I can't say I have a particular idea in my mind, but it would be funny if we managed to pull a prank on them, don't you think?" He started, and I nodded my head, agreeing with him. It was harmless. Moreover, the house was obviously a ghost-free zone, they deserved to experience something exciting. If the ghost didn't want to scare them, Taehyung and I would take care of it instead. "Do you have an idea? Hopefully, you don't lack creativity as much as Yoongi and Jimin do."

"I don't know, we don't have much time left," I spoke, as I reached into the back pocket of my jeans to pull my phone, getting blinded by its brightness. "We have like six minutes, I doubt we manage to pull out an epic prank. Unless..."

"Unless what?"

This time, I was the one who had a lopsided smirk upon my face, "let's see," I spoke casually, as I grabbed Taehyung's hand and led him downstairs, trying to omit random objects which were scattered all over the place.

"Do think that's where all these people died?" Taehyung asked, as he followed behind me, his warm hand resting in mine, his gaze focused on the back of my head.

"No, of course, not. If anything, I'd bet they were killed in our beds." I replied casually, and Taehyung tightened his grip, as he heard my statement. I'm not surprised, it came much darker than I originally intended.

"That's really messed up," Taehyung muttered under his breath, obviously crept out by my bold remark. Damn it, I really should've known when to bite my tongue and just shut up. Even if I had the slightest chance to get it on with Taehyung, I just botched it up. The prospect of any form of intimacy just sank like a stone. "Why would you even say that?"

"Sorry, sometimes I forget it's not the Internet, and that I just can't say whatever comes to my mind." I replied, smiling at him sheepishly, knowing the situation I put myself in was miserable, and it couldn't get any worse. At this point, Satan himself could crack the surface of the Earth and set my dumb ass on fire, and I'd probably thank him for saving me from this embarrassment.

And since I was already a lost cause, I could play a little prank on him.

Abruptly, I turned off the flashlight on my phone, yanked my hand out of Taehyung's grip, and screamed, sounding quite naturally. No wonder, given how many times I had popped out of nowhere, scaring the crap out of my brother. Just as I expected, the second the light went out, Taehyung let out a shriek, which was followed by a fit of my laughter. Taehyung and the guys upstairs must've just lost their minds, some of them maybe even convinced that a vengeful spirit just finished us off.

"Holy shit, it wasn't funny." Taehyung gasped with a hand pressed against his chest when I switched on the flashlight. He looked utterly terrified, and I seriously felt like the worst person in the world. Maybe I really was the worst person in the world, yet the temptation was way too strong to fight. I couldn't waste this chance. "You almost got me a heart attack!"

"Sorry," I apologised, trying to refrain from giggling, even though it was truly difficult; his voice normally is really deep and raspy, yet just a while ago he didn't sound like himself. I wouldn't be surprised if the guys thought that high-pitched wail belonged to me. "You have to understand me, though. You'd do the same, you wouldn't be able to fight that sort of whim."

"Yeah, you're probably right," Taehyung agreed, scratching the back of his head, as he admitted his playful intentions. "I'm still angry, though. I almost pissed my pants, you know..."

"Sorry, but look at the bright side; you're gonna be prepared when the real ghost conjures up in front of you." I expounded, yet Taehyung didn't buy it. I just knew it, and the skeptical look he was giving me only validated my point. "Ugh, fine, let's make a deal. If anything supernatural happens, I'll shield you with my very own chest. Let's say, it's my token of atonement, okay?"

"Not okay," Taehyung crossed his hands across his chest, as he flat out rejected my proposition. That was unexpected. Who normal would pass on such a sweet deal? "First of all, it'd really hurt my ego if a girl jumped between me and a fucking ghost. That's highly unnecessary, kitten. It'd much rather you kissed it better." Taehyung asserted, as he poked his cheek with his long, slender forefinger.

I couldn't believe he actually said that; I thought he hated me.

Because of me we had lost the beer pong game. Moreover, I was the one who had made him scream like a little girl. Was he attracted to me the way I was attracted to him? Was he so interested in me that he actually was capable of turning a blind eye to me basically doing a one-eighty to his image?

"You're serious?" I asked, my eyebrows raised, as I still couldn't process that he, I'll be jiggered, requested a kiss.

Immediately, his gaze met mine, and I just couldn't look away. I was irrationally fascinated by him, and he, surprise, surprise, reciprocated my attraction.

"What? You don't want to?" Taehyung inquired, heaving a sigh.

Normally, I'd panic and lie, fleeing from the basement as soon as I could. Right now, however, I didn't even think about escaping. I just stood there, gawking at him, digesting his words. It still felt surreal; my cheeks probably scarlet red by now, his eyebrows furrowed in anticipation.

What the hell was I thinking? I had to be an idiot; why, on Earth, was I pondering over his statement? I ought to have smashed my lips against his the second he prodded his cheek. The guys could call us any minute; we didn't have much time, why the fuck was I wasting it?

Having come to my senses, I eagerly took a step forward, his arms wrapping around my waist the second I was within his reach. Nothing really happened yet, but my heart was already beating abnormally in excitement. Taehyung had amazing influence on me, or was it the consumed alcohol? Either way, I wanted him, and Good Lord, I should not have been satiated with just a peck!

"You know what to do, kitten," Taehyung urged, and I rolled my eyes at the nickname which I heard like the hundredth time tonight. It was really irritating, yet I just couldn't formulate a witty remark, as my mind completely shut off once I found myself in Taehyung's embrace. Almost as if we were in our personal bubble where nothing mattered, the sinister surroundings long forgotten.

Gently, I placed my arms around his neck, pressing my lips against his cheek.

"That's not even a kiss, do it properly," he whined, his fingers delicately digging into my skin, as he pulled me closer. Immediately, I replied with a smirk, trailing innocent pecks across his cheek, only to hover my lips over his, enjoying teasing him. If we went any further, I wouldn't be able to stop myself. For a short while, Taehyung and I looked into each other's eyes, as we breathed the same air, tinges of lust racing between our bodies.

"Kitten," he started, as he licked his lips, the tip of his tongue lightly brushing against my lips.

"Hmm?"

Slowly, I closed my eyes and leaned in; Taehyung's lips were incredibly soft when he moved against me. It wasn't anything extraordinary, yet it felt just heavenly; no tongue, no biting, no sucking—it was just a kiss in the simplest of forms. Why did he taste so marvelous, then?

It must've been his natural charm, as no other explanation came to my mind.

Gradually, I started to trace the outline of his lips with my tongue, and Taehyung responded by slightly opening his mouth, welcoming my tongue with his. Taehyung's hands roamed around my body, squeezing my hips and drawing small circles with his fingers on my skin. I, on the other hand, was pressed against his frame, my breasts rubbing against his chest, his thigh between my legs.

"Mmn..." I purred quietly, when I pulled away for a second to catch a breath. "You're an amazing kisser, Tae," I confessed and immediately captured his lips in a heated kiss, slipping my tongue inside his mouth. Taehyung instantly replied with a grunt, as he grabbed my bottom and gripped it, excitingly yanking me toward him, the outline of his semi-hard cock poking against my stomach.

No matter how long we made out; lust only amplified with each passing second. Taehyung tasted so addicting, it completely shut off my brain. I could only focus on the kiss and ways how to prolong it; the revenge plan the last thing on our minds.

My excuses went down the drain at once, as Jimin's worried voice echoed, his head stuck through the doors.

"You dead?"

Ever since we left the basement, Taehyung and I kept stealing glances at each other; the kiss had been amazing, and neither of us wished to pull away. However, we both felt quite uncomfortable making out in front of the rest. (Or was it just me, and Taehyung just didn't want to force me into anything. Especially when I confessed it was me who had shrieked at the top of my voice when I had thought I saw a ghost.)

Taehyung owes me.

Big time.

The tension between us was driving me crazy. It was utterly ridiculous how much I craved to return to Taehyung's embrace to score every base with him. Shamelessly, I needed his arms on me, bending me to his will as he wished.

"God, I'm so bored," Yoongi whined, as he locked his phone and rubbed his eyes. "I'll just go to sleep. Wake me up when a ghost decides to show up."

"Maybe, it's not that bad of an idea," Amber commented, yawning ostentatiously.

"That's official, this is definitely the worst Halloween party ever," Krystal criticized, looking around the room, everyone either exhausted or drunk. (In Yoongi's case, both.) "At least, I am being paid to be here."

"What the hell are you guys talking about?" Taehyung asked, sounding confused and disappointed at the same time. True, we hadn't witnessed any paranormal activity, yet it didn't necessarily mean that the party was horrible.

It was fun.

Especially my time alone with Taehyung.

"We're all tired, Tae." Jimin said casually, smiling at the latter, as he didn't want to hurt his feelings. "I don't know what about you, but I couldn't fall asleep; I didn't blink an eye yesterday."

"Fine," Taehyung groaned, plopping down onto the couch beside Krystal, "it's just that Namjoon will come get us in the morning, and we will probably never meet each other again. I thought it'd be fun if we used the time we have to the fullest. You're like seriously an awesome entourage."

Taehyung's words stung. The really stung, and although I didn't get to know them as thoroughly as I wanted to, I knew I'd miss them. Everyone was different in many ways, and we, as a group, complemented perfectly.

Also, I didn't particularly delude myself; I knew that Taehyung would be a very short chapter of my life, and despite that, I still felt bitter that tomorrow we would go our separate ways and never see each other again.

When everyone went to their rooms, Taehyung let out a heavy sign, and pinched the bridge of his nose, "are you going to go, too?" he asked, as he changed his position, leaning in, his elbows pressed against his thighs, his eyes seeking mine, almost begging me to stay.

"No," I firmly replied, sending him a faint smile. I wasn't going anywhere; Taehyung was right, we didn't have much time left, and I didn't want to leave him. "I'm not even the tiniest bit tired," I stated, as I stood up, and approached him, sitting down beside him. Our little moment in the basement was more than just energizing; it was so refreshing I couldn't remember when I felt this good.

"Thank you, kitten," he spoke softly, and grabbed my hand, placing a gentle peck on my knuckles, "so what do you want to do?" he inquired, turning to me, resting his head in his hand, as he propped his shoulder on the backrest. "I believe we were interrupted just a while ago," he remembered, and with a lopsided smirk upon his face, he leaned slowly forward.

"Yeah, we were," I agreed, yet just when he was about to kiss me, I pressed my forefinger against his lips, stopping him. Quickly, Taehyung arched his back and looked at me in confusion; I had to be out of my character to push him away. "You have no idea how much I want us to continue wherever we left off, but look around, Tae, cameras are all over the place. Namjoon pays quite handsomely, but it's not enough for my sex tape."

Taehyung laughed.

Loudly.

"Oh, kitten, you amuse me so much," he added, and I sulked. Was my assumption really that far-fetched? That hurt — a lot. "Hey, hey, hey, it's not what I meant, please, don't brood. It's just that I don't sleep around, kitten."

"I don't either," quickly, I replied, making him smile again, yet at this point, I couldn't tell what it meant. "I really want to fuck you right now, though."

His smile disappeared only to be replaced with lustful glance, his eyes slowly undressing me.

Abruptly, he stood up and yanked me with him, "my car's in the driveway."

The second we entered the car, I slammed my lips against his in a fervent, needy kiss; our disappointingly short make out session had only ignited fire with me, and I immediately had to share it with Taehyung before I completely burned out.

"I'm not really that kind of a guy," Taehyung defended himself when he managed to pull away. I had my hands on his broad shoulders, my fingers slowly roaming around his neck, giving him the best massage I was capable of.

"I know, you've already said that," I simply stated and smiled at him before reconnecting our mouth again in another passionate lock. "I'm not that kind of a girl, either, but I really want you, so why the hell not?"

Taehyung didn't need another assurance. I just gave him a green light to do whatever he wanted to do, and he couldn't be more ecstatic about it. His mouth could be shut, but his eyes were pure sin, glancing at me with utter lust.

"Oh, kitten," Taehyung groaned, throwing his head back against the headrest. He was enjoying it, although I barely touched him. "I don't deserve you," he added before he formed a pleased smirk.

He was wrong, though.

I didn't deserve him.

However, it didn't stop either of whom to take what we really wanted. We desired each other, itching to reach that high together, even though we knew it wasn't the right thing to do.

"Shut up, Tae," I reprimanded him, tugging at the bottom of his shirt. "Are we doing this or not?" I challenged him and before I managed to take a breath, Taehyung kissed me quite desperately. His hands stretched and landed on my sides, as he pulled me onto him, his cock poking against my stomach.

"I'd never forgive myself if I rejected you," Taehyung stated in a serious tone, his eyes fixated on me as if he was going to eat me alive. His stare was of a starved predator, and I was about to devote myself to him, willing to obey his every, even the kinkiest one, command.

"I'd never forgive myself if I let you reject me," I snickered and rocked my hips against him, earning a throaty moan from him. His cock, still restrained in his jeans, was throbbing for more friction, yet he'd have to wait for the main course a bit more.

I loved foreplay and I wasn't going to give up on that, even when I ridiculously wanted to feel him inside of me. My patience was going to be rewarded, it always is.

"Not even once it struck me you're such a bad girl," he spoke with a smirk, as he kneaded my ass cheeks when I was busy raking my finger across his chest and peppering his jaw and neck with damp kisses, nipping on his skin in an urge to mark him.

"Because I am not. I just met a guy who brings the worst out of me," I teased, and Taehyung tightened his grip on my sides, giving me a slight spank.

"I wouldn't say the worst... I kinda like that new image of you," Taehyung confessed, and I smiled shyly, quickly hiding my face in the crook of his neck, leaving stamps of my plum lipstick on his skin.

"Oh, Taehyung," I breathed out, as I unbuckled his jeans and put my hands in his pants.

Taehyung hissed the second I touched him, "damn, your hands are fucking cold!"

He was right, yet I was certain they would warm up quickly with a few strokes on his rock-hard cock. "Better?" I asked when his lips turned into a pleased smirk.

"You have no idea," he murmured, his eyes close shut, as he completely focused on my gentle touch, caressing his sensitive skin. Right now, I felt so powerful, straddling him; his body was reacting to even the slightest movement of my hand. "Kitten," Taehyung murmured on the exhale, as he grabbed my bottom and forced me onto him, so I fell on his chest, nuzzling my nose in his neck.

Uncontrollably, I giggled, and Taehyung stretched his arm, turning on the radio, and although I didn't mind the current mood, the soft ballad that filled the vehicle created a semi-romantic setting.

Without any comment, Taehyung looked me in the eyes, as he unzipped my jeans and forced his hand in my panties. "You're so wet, kitten," he snickered, and I rolled my eyes at his obvious statement. If only he knew I had been this excited for him ever since our kiss in the basement.

"Don't blame me, I really want to feel that cock inside of me," I stated nonchalantly, pulling him into another round of lustful and wanton kisses. Grunting, I slammed my lips against his, and he responded in an instant, poking his tongue against my teeth, demanding entrance.

"I'd never think you're into dirty talk," Taehyung spoke casually, as he played with my clit, flicking it between his fingers, making all my muscles tense, my hips grinding against his hand. Slowly, he ran his forefinger across my fold, smearing my juices all over my pussy; God, even the gentle caress of his digits got me trembling for more. At this point, I couldn't wait to feel what his cock was going to do to me.

"Because I am not, but with you it just seems suited," I confessed, and Taehyung reattached our lips together, pushing his middle finger inside of me, making me almost bite my tongue. His hands were perfectly sculpted and his fingers were just right, filling me just the way I need him to. "Fuck, Tae, keep doing that," I moaned, my voice louder than the radio in the background. Taehyung added another finger, and began to rub my clit with his thumb.

"I really do bring the worst out of you," Taehyung sneered playfully, pumping his fingers within me, making me squirt on his hand. He really had no mercy when it came to pleasuring me; if he kept the pace, I'd come before the song ended. "Shit," Taehyung spat, as I started to shamelessly ride his hand in desperation for more.

"I seriously need your cock right now."

"Fuck," Taehyung pulled out his fingers, and his hands quickly landed back on my hips, squeezing my flesh roughly. "Get your cute ass on the back seat," he ordered sternly and pushed me upwards, helping me get off of him. With the grace and elegance of a noddle-legged zebra, I followed Taehyung's command, almost falling face-first on the seat in my tipsy state when he spanked my ass cheekily.

"Hey," I whined as I sat on the cold seat, waiting for Taehyung to join me, "it wasn't nice, what would you do if I spanked you?"

"I'd ask you to do it again," he replied wittily, and I roared with laughter, as I watched him crumble in the seat beside me, his movement almost as clumsy as mine. "Spread those pretty legs for me kitten," he whispered, a devilish smirk decorating his handsome face.

I didn't have to be told twice, I obeyed his order in an instant, whereas Taehyung hooked his fingers under the waistband of my jeans, and pulled them off my legs agonizingly slowly, and at this point, I didn't know whether he was torturing me, or himself.

Quickly, I pushed the leather jacket off his shoulders, and grabbed the hem of his T-shirt, pulling it over his head, revealing his naked chest and broad shoulders; maybe he wasn't ripped like a hockey player, but I liked his proportional frame. Without any hesitation, I could admit that he was ridiculously attractive despite anything.

"Take off your shirt, kitten," Taehyung cooed, and as if compelled, I got out of my jacket and band T-shirt, not leaving much to the imagination, since I was only in my panties and a violet bra that beautifully shaped my breasts. His eyes were focused on my cleavage, while his general expression was actually blank. "Wow," that's all he managed to voice before he grabbed me by my thighs abruptly and pulled me toward him, so in the process, I lay down on my back on the back seat, Taehyung already positioned between my legs.

"Taehyung," I purred when I felt his lips on the inner side of my right thigh. He was taking his time teasing me, and although it was nice, I couldn't wait for him to slam his cock inside of me until I come around him. Slowly, his kisses wandered upwards; gentle pecks all across my stomach, cleavage, and neck before he captured my mouth.

"Please," I mewled when he pulled away to catch a breath.

"Please what?" Taehyung smiled at me, rubbing his hard cock against my folds. Fuck, why do we still have so many clothes on?

"Pull out that cock and fuck me," I spoke rather tenaciously, as I placed my hands on his sides and pulled him closer, and he almost fell over on top of me. Didn't he understand how much I desired him?

"I really wanted to eat you out, though," Taehyung announced and licked his lips, as if trying to seduce me.

Didn't he realise I was already allured?

Twice.

"Oh my God," Taehyung tugged my panties to the side and tongue flicked his tongue against my clit, and I immediately buckled my hips upward against his face and clenched my fists, grabbing his fluffy hair. Every muscle of my body was tensed, my eyes tightly shut, and I only concentrated on Taehyung's tongue lapping and delving inside of me.

"What the fuck? Did you hear that?" We both instantly pulled away from each other and glanced at the radio which a second ago roared with deafening white noise. Strangely enough, it only lasted a few seconds, and I could swear I heard Jimin's scream.

"I did," Taehyung admitted, as he looked at the radio, and then at me, his frame supported on his arms, his hands pressed against the seat. "It must be nothing," he shrugged, and leaned in, kissing my abdomen, slowly pulling my panties down my legs. "The radio program must want to scare its listeners, that's all."

Taehyung's reasoning didn't convince me, yet I decided to follow his example and just shake it off; I had to be actually possessed to stop right now, put on my clothes back and check if Jimin's safe. Besides, he's a grown-up and he's not alone; he ought to be fine.

"Where were we?"

Quickly, a smile appeared on my face and the occurrence from a moment ago was the last thing on my mind.

"You were going to fuck me," I replied quickly, smirking at him. Obediently, Taehyung pulled down his pants to his knees, giving his thick cock a few strokes, "do you have a condom?"

"Shit, you're right," Taehyung cursed, but quickly reached into the car compartment where thankfully was a pack of condoms.

"You ready?" he asked the second he rolled the condom on his cock and positioned himself in front of my entrance.

"Fuck me, Taehyung."

Without any trouble, Taehyung eased himself in, and although I was soaking wet, he grunted as my walls wrapped around him tightly. Slowly at first, gradually increasing his pace, Taehyung snapped his hips, making me moan with every thrust. My breasts, although still in the bra, rocked in Taehyung's rhythm.

"Fuck, you're tight," Taehyung grunted under his breath, as he slammed his cock inside of me, his balls hitting against my body. His forehead was covered in sweat, and I was panting in exhaustion even we just began; his performance was amazing, short waves of pleasure running to every inch of my body.

"Just like that," I moaned, almost melting in front of him. He fucked me so good that it made me wonder how could he know my body better than I did. No one had ever made me feel this heavenly so soon; even myself. "Damn, Taehyung, you're killing me," his cock felt so amazing that it almost hurt. "I want to ride you, Tae."

"Fuck, come here." He hissed, as he pulled out of me, and I whined already missing his cock. It felt so empty that I almost felt bad for asking him for a change of position. Raggedly, Taehyung sat on the seat and placed his hands on my hips, helping me to sit down on his lap. "Ah, kitten," Taehyung purred when my sex brushed against his twitching cock, "I already miss that tight pussy."

Running my fingers through his fluffy hair, I raised my hips, and Taehyung positioned his dick against my entrance. Slowly, I sat down on him, my walls once again stretching around him. "Fuck, it makes me so full," I moaned, my eyes closed, my breath hitched.

Sensually, I rocked my hips back and fro, while Taehyung was decorating my cleavage with damp kisses, his large hands under my bra, fondling my breast. His touch wasn't too gentle, nor too rough; he knew what he was doing to make me feel desired and striving for more.

"Let me see them," Taehyung grunted, as he reached behind my back, unhooking my purple bra, tossing it onto the dashboard. "Beautiful, just as I imagined them," he confessed and before I got to give him a questioning look, his lips landed on my nipple. Hungrily, he sucked on my sensitive bud, his left hand kneading the other breast, making me slow my moves, as I savored the feeling of his tongue.

"Oh God," I moaned, digging my fingernails into the skin of his broad shoulders. "Taehyung," his name rolled off my tongue, and Taehyung immediately grasped my chin and tilted it down, pressing his lips against mine in a deep, haste kiss. His tongue swirled around mine, as he swallowed each moan that left my mouth.

"I hope you're close because I'm fucking coming," Taehyung warned me before he placed his hands on my sides, helping me increase my pace. The sound of our bodies, the skin slapping almost got me loose my balance. His fingertips dug into my hips, and I threw my head back, nearing my orgasm.

It was our first time, and although we both wanted to last as long as we could, I'd gladly reach my high now. I didn't really mind it as long as he was down for another round. Maybe not today, but generally. On my side, it was too fantastic to settle on a one night stand.

Hopefully, Taehyung thought the same.

"Just come, Tae," I breathed out, almost unable to speak, "I'm coming, too."

With a final thrust, Taehyung growled in ecstasy, releasing himself into a condom, while I fluttered my eyes when the shattering sensation nearly ripped me apart. For a brief moment, the orgasm overwhelmed me; my vision faded to black, and I was lying on my back, desperately trying to catch a breath, listening to Taehyung's irregular breathing.

God, how much I wished we could stay in his car a bit longer.

"Jesus fucking Christ," Taehyung gasped the second we entered the house, "what the fuck are you doing Jimin? It's not funny, bro." He added, and I looked over his shoulder to see what frightened him so much. Apparently, Jimin thought it'd be a good idea to stay up all night, sitting in a chair in front of the entrance with his hands entwined on his laps, just to catch us sneaking inside.

"Not cool, Jimin. Not cool." I added and shook my head disapprovingly.

"Are you gonna answer us?" Taehyung asked, crossing his arms over his chest, while I was just staring at Jimin, crept out by him as he not even once blinked since we had entered the house.

Hesitantly, I raised my hand and waved in front of Jimin's eyes, but he didn't move an inch. "That's creepy—" I spoke and shrieked in astonishment when the doors behind us slammed spontaneously with a loud bang. "Okay, Jimin, that's not funny anymore," I urged him, snapping my fingers before his face, yet Jimin remained unresponsive.

"Hey," Taehyung shouted, as he placed his large hands on Jimin's shoulders, trying to shake him awake. Unfortunately, his method also failed.

"Taehyung, look," I said, lightly elbowing Taehyung's side, wanting to obtain his attention, "there's blood," I added, pointing at Jimin's hands.

The second we examined his palms, Jimin shot a sinister glare at us, curving his lips into a creepy smirk. "Look who's finally here," Jimin started, his voice oddly different, as if an octave lower and raspier. He didn't sound like himself, and I was completely alerted. "I hope you liked your stay," Jimin continued and raised from his seat, turning his head in a very uncomfortable angle, as his eyes was drilling in our faces.

"Ha, ha, ha," Taehyung laughed awkwardly, as he scratched the back of his head.

"Taehyung," I whispered, as I tugged at his sleeve.

"What's the matter, kitten?" He asked, as he stared back at Jimin who licked the blood off of his hands, "that's nasty, bro."

"I don't want to break your moment over there, but I'm pretty sure it's Yoongi who lies on the floor over there in a puddle of blood." Taehyung's eyes immediately followed the direction I pointed at, and the second he spotted Yoongi, he pushed Jimin backwards. Jimin chortled as we tried to run away.

Oddly, the kitchen doors shut close almost in front of our faces, and this time, I doubted it was caused by the aeration.

"Okay, plan B?"

"Not really," Taehyung shook his head, his mouth wide open as he stared at Jimin in panic. "I must admit I counted on you in that area, kitten."

"Fuck," I cursed, as I tried to come up with a solution. I like working under pressure, but this case was quite extreme, as Jimin behaved like someone else, and Yoongi was lying on the floor, blood slowly seeping out of his head. "Stay back," I told Taehyung as I took a step forward, so he could hide behind me. I wouldn't generate a better idea if I knew that Taehyung was directly exposed to danger.

"What are we gonna do?" Taehyung asked, and I shook my head, as I didn't come with anything yet.

I was silent, observing Jimin. However, as soon as Jimin started to levitate a foot above the ground, my eyes almost popped out of its sockets. Like how I previously thought that all of this was a staged prank, I began doubting myself. Like before I knew a logical explanation existed, right now, I wasn't so sure anymore.

"Run!" I screamed and pushed Taehyung in front of me, so if Jimin wanted to dash after us, Taehyung had more chances of getting away.

"Over here!" Amber's voice echoed through the corridor, and we immediately followed the sound, running into the last bedroom on the right. "Krystal and I thought that Jimin finished you off like he did Yoongi. Thankfully, we were wrong." She spoke, and Krystal barricaded the doors.

"What happened to Jimin?" Taehyung asked, as he managed to catch a breath.

"I wish we knew," Krystal started, as she sat on the edge of the bed, her phone in her tight grip. "One moment we were going to rest in our rooms, and another, we heard Yoongi's scream."

"Quickly, we ran to see what the hell was going on. We saw Yoongi flying across the room, knocking his head against the wall." Amber finished, and Taehyung and I were equally crept out.

"That's messed up," Taehyung commented, and everyone nodded, agreeing with him. "What are we gonna do?"

Everyone was in deep thought; without a plan, we'd end up like Yoongi. It was three o'clock at night, and Namjoon was going to come get us at dawn. Right now, we had to be smart to last until then.

"Where are you hiding?" Jimin's sneer echoed behind the doors, as he strolled slowly, looking for us. He was taking his time chasing us, yet I suspected that he already knew where we were; he just played with us, making us think we stood a chance.

Suddenly, he heard a loud thud. Almost as if someone fell onto the floor.

"What the hell was that?" Amber asked in a raised voice, as she pointed at the doors. "I didn't like that sound."

"We should open the doors and see," Krystal spoke, and everyone looked at her, not knowing whether she was ridiculously brave or simply stupid. In our circumstances, the attack wasn't the best option; we would have to be batshit crazy to face the opponent, especially when we didn't have the foggiest idea what the fuck we were battling against.

"Nah, we're not gonna do that," I replied, trying my best not to offend her. I might've come a bit mean, yet Krystal's proposition wasn't the smartest option. No one in a right state of mind wouldn't willingly leave the sanctuary we were currently in. They might think I am a bitch, but at least, we would be safe. "Let's just stay here."

"What if Jimin's hurt?" Taehyung asked in concern, taking Krystal's side. It wasn't the place, not time for choosing sides, yet it happened. Taehyung was like me, no matter how stupid he was, he was worried about the rest. Without any doubt, he'd sacrifice himself if the group would make it without him. "We can't leave him like that."

Of course, we couldn't! Did he seriously think I didn't know that?

"Let's just go," Krystal added and smirked, and I immediately caught the difference in her voice. Amber realised it, too. Whatever possessed Jimin took over Krystal right now—that's why it was oddly quiet on the other side of the doors.

"Run!" Amber shouted, as she threw herself on Krystal, tackling her down on the floor. The second Amber's voice rang in my ears, I pushed the barricade as quickly as I could, and Taehyung and I escaped the room.

"We can't just leave her," Taehyung said when he looked over his shoulder, looking at Krystal, who was lying on the floor beneath Amber, chortling evilly.

"You're not gonna leave this house alive," Krystal threatened, as she laughed in Amber's face, effortlessly pushing her off of her. Taehyung and I gawked at Krystal whose eyes changed its colour to a very eerie shade of white.

With great dexterity, Krystal threw Amber across the room, smashing the old wardrobe with Amber's unconscious body.

"Run!" I shouted at Taehyung, pulling him with me, as we ran downstairs.

"What's your plan?"

"To get the fuck out of here!" I quickly screamed back at him, my hands instantly fidgeting with the knob. The doors just wouldn't open.

"Let me try," Taehyung proposed, and I took a step back, allowing him to try to break the doors down. Everything in vain, though. We were locked in. "Do you have a plan B?" Taehyung asked, as he hit the doors with his clenched fist in irritation.

"Tools? We need some tools," I said the first that came to my mind. I knew it wasn't the smartest solution, yet that's all I could postulate.

"Okay, just stay here, and I look for something," Taehyung stated and kissed my forehead before he ran off. It was very irresponsible to split up, yet I didn't even get to scold him, since he was already out of my sight. How could he leave me like that? I understood that he didn't want to put me in danger, but as a duo, we were stronger. I had watched way too many horror movies to know that splitting up was the worst thing that we could do.

Trying my best not to panic, I paced around the hall, playing with my fingers. I was left alone, and I didn't like that feeling; that monster that was terrorizing us could come at me anytime.

"Holy shit," I shrieked when I heard a loud thud. Thankfully, it was just Taehyung, and he had found a crowbar. "What took you so long?" I asked, relief washing over me, seeing him safe and sound. I had a bad feeling about it, yet it was only my paranoid suspicion.

"I returned in a speed of light, babe." Taehyung snickered, sending shivers down my spine.

Babe?

Oh, no. Taehyung exclusively called me kitten. He knew how much it annoyed me, he'd not change the pet name; at least, not until it grew on me.

It wasn't him anymore.

Taehyung was gone, and I was, now, face to face with a parasite that lived off him. I was scared beyond common sense, and I had no idea what to do. However, I had to figure something out real quick unless I wanted to be discovered.

"Yeah, maybe you're right, I'm just really scared, you know," I spoke, trying to sound natural. My hands were trembling, all covered in sweat, yet thankfully, my voice didn't break. "Are you ready to get the hell out of here?" I asked, smiling, as I reached for the crowbar.

"Are we really going to leave them behind?" Taehyung asked, as I turned on my heels, facing the doors. With my eyes tightly closed, I bit on my bottom lip, feeling the copper on my tongue. I had to be cautious with my words. I couldn't get busted.

"Don't worry, they'll be fine. Namjoon will pick them up at dawn, and we wait for him outside," I explained, tightening my grip on the crowbar.

"I guess that's reasonable—" Taehyung replied, but before he managed to finish his sentence, I swung the crowbar, and hit him in the head. The blow wasn't powerful enough to kill Taehyung, yet it was sufficient to knock him down. A thin stream of blood seeped from his head, but I didn't worry that much about him, being sure he was going to be alright.

"Shit," I cursed the second lights started flickering.

Using all my strength, I tried to break the doors down with the crowbar, but they didn't even budge. Desperately, I looked around, thinking of another escape way. A broken window had to suffice right now. Even if I was about to break my leg, I wouldn't stand another minute in this fucked up house.

Quickly, I swung my hand, shattering the glass into a million pieces. While clearing the sharp pieces from the frame, I heard a quiet groan. Immediately, I turned around and saw Taehyung who tried to raise his head.

"Careful," I warned him, as I approached him and crouched by his side.

"What the hell happened?" He asked, when he touched his head, wiping the blood off his forehead. "Why does my head hurt so much?"

"I'll explain later," I announced, helping Taehyung to stand up. "We have no time, Tae. I smashed the window, we're getting out of here." He nodded his head before I helped him walk to the window. "You go first."

Taehyung wanted to argue with me, but he couldn't do anything to change my mind. He was wounded, and although it wasn't anything serious, I was still going to force him out of the window if he wouldn't jump out willingly. Nothing would convince me, so he better complied with me.

"Quickly," I urged him, when Taehyung swung his legs over the frame.

"Come on, kitten," Taehyung spoke, waiting for me to join him outside. Shooting one last glance at the interior, I heaved a sigh, and squeezed through the window, landing on my feet beside Taehyung.

Naturally, he entwined his hands with mine, and we jogged away from the house, pressing our backs against the side of his car, slowly sliding down onto the ground. We were both panting, our breaths slowly evening.

"It's 4 o'clock," I stated, as I looked at my phone, "I should probably call Namjoon, but given that the house is packed with cameras, he's already on his way over here."

"Yeah, with a fucking exorcist," Taehyung added and laughed loudly in relief. "What are you doing next weekend?"

I giggled before I turned to look at his face, "I was going to throw an amazing birthday party, but right now, I think I'm gonna treat myself. I fucking deserve it." I uttered, and Taehyung nodded his head, comprehending my words. "Why?"

"I'm gonna intrude that little celebration." Taehyung announced, and I smiled at his bold words.

"Please do."

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shineethinks · 8 years ago

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hi im a new shawol!! what are some shinee inside jokes? i only know onew sangtae helP i dont get milk and etc

hi bebs WELCOME TO SHINEE WORLD, i’m your mom now. this got v long with loTS of links so i put it under a read more!disclaimer: by no means a comprehensive list, i am but one human and i do not own any of the videos, credit is where credit is due!

onew:

onew sangtae: something that’s renowned in fandom and it’s basically onew makes these situations or says things that people don’t know quite how to react to LOL shinee even has a song for it (starts at 0:23 but the beginning is the infamous rap from their song shinee world (doo-dop) and you should NOT miss that) he just kind of does things and carries on

chicken mania: dude really loves chicken

ex: a lot, like a LOT, A LOT, (a lot)

ttakbam: this is a forehead flick that koreans use as a punishment for losing a game/bet/etc. onew is literally KNOWN for this in korea, it’s funny bc it strikes fear and panic in the hearts of his enemies (and members)

ex: here, here

can’t find his drink or man: from shinee’s performance of lady gaga’s “just dance” in 2009

pinee: during shinee’s “one fine day” onew went to krabi where he introduces us to pinee

jonghyun:

michael jackson voice: dear god this joke has been running since the dawn of shinee. in their song 산소 같은 너 (love like oxygen), jong drew influence from MJ in his singing and onew mocked him

(ex. here and here) and has been mocking him ever since. in their song excuse me miss (amazing performance) shinee continues the joke and imitate him as well

is this the reality you wanted: jong’s catchphrase during their reality show “hello baby” where they took care of a toddler named yooguen. as they were all v young during this time (ring ding dong era) there were a lot of situations that jong was like “is this real life / are we really doing this” and that’s when he’d say it to the camera @ the viewers

shortness & insoles: let’s be real, jongie is not a very tall man; he is smol and adorable and it’s fun to tease him about his height (honestly it seems like he’s fine with it as he seems to tease himself as well in the lyrics of “young and rich”)

about insoles: here

young and rich: here

his kazoo: just….. he would and it amuses me to no end that he got shawols kazooing as well

key:

girl group dances/wild dances: he’s the king of girl group dances; key’s able to memorize dances very easily after just watching them and he became pretty infamous for that. he has a lot of fun with them and with dancing in general

girl group dances: here

general insanity: here

possibly my favorite 7 seconds ever like you are idols p l s contain yourselves (during shinee world III in seoul): here

savagery: here

scared of heights&haunted houses: and they did this and this to him

key’s daily life as a living breathing meme: key’s know how!

my gucci burned: during shinee world V in dallas, key explains it here (he’s talking to jong when he’s talking about the drier). what a guy, what a meme

minho:

dibidibidi my name is minho (shinee world (doo-bop)): the iconic shinee rap where the famous dibidibidi was born and shinee gets their nicknames: bling bling jonghyun, powerful dancer taemin, dubu leader onew, almighty key, flaming charisma minho; it is ridiculous and hilarious and they kept it for nine years woaw

flaming charisma: from the aforementioned shinee world rap but they always make jokes about it equating minho to fire

ex: here, here

his fkin loud-ass sneezes: he sneezes loudly; but on yang nam show, he explains (for the first time in 9 years) that he sneezes loudly bc he has allergies, he used to hold it in but the doctor said that it’s not good for him so he just let it out; after the members heard that there’s a medical reason, they feels bad man

dabho: he dabs and infected his members

taemin:

milk: this is from ring ding dong where taemin is drinking milk for no apparent reason (which is incidentally where i x’d out of the music video when i first saw it LOL); shawols joke that it’s because during this time taeminnie was 16 and still a growing child

everlasting struggle against bugs: he��reALLY hates bugs and recoils away (from the lovely @nothingbutsoulmatesjongkey) from them which is a source of amusement to both shinee and shawols alike. boy is a damn professional but when he spots a bug he will freak out even if it is during a performance LOL sos save him

more examples: here, here (there are a lot)

GUCCI SLIPPERS: probably the bane of shawols’ existence, a cursed image

pics: here, here

mockery: here (also check out all of valentae’s stuff, you won’t be disappointed)

everyone shames him and they are the real gucci that should have been burned

magic hands: a condition that afflicts him that causes him to lose/break everything he touches; sometimes while he’s performing his rosary bracelet flies off into the crowd and a fan holds it for him until he can get it afterwards, he also just … breaks things like trophies and once on the set of “view” there were motorcycles that everyone was sitting on and looking at and when taemin touched one, it fell over and part of the plastic cracked (from 2016 weekly idol)

ex: here (sorry i couldn’t find an eng sub so i just did it here 1. he had to get a new rosary ring bc he lost it during running man when he threw something; 2. a moment after a fan gave a present to him, it flew out of his hands while he was waving; 3. during one fine day, when he was in switzerland, he misplaced his train ticket, 4. tries to open sugar packet, fails; 5. once shinee had to wait at the airport for a few hours bc he lost his passport; 6. broke his name sign)

hot chocolate??: from shinee’s “one fine day” he just looks lost and v cute and we mock/love him for it

this video: i saw it and cried from laughter and my roommate was so concerned

does not like cucumbers: same with onew

when cameras are off: why is he like this

ot5:

bbu-syeo (뿌셔뿌셔): this is a korean snack where you pour the power flavor on the noodle crackers and break it (it’s name literally means “destroy destroy” or “crush crush”).

shinee are models for the snack so they did a commercial in 2009

for that one there’s a parody that some of the members uploaded themselves on social media (i believe it was key and jong)

in 2015, minho, onew, and jonghyun came out on korea snl and also parodied it

they also have another commercial released in 2016

school of rock: a horror parody that boys did where they are girl students (this is where their names for GIRLnee come from though jong (jongmi , knowing brothers) and key (eungyo, snl) have different ones from other shows as well

harry potter parody: a parody they did in 2008

the video: here

shinee reaction 8 years later: here

monkey magic: from an snl skit in 2015, “dangerous manager”

“show us a cool pose”: from shinee’s 5 second interview, from the part the video starts, it asks them to show a cool pose and all of the shinee members did the peace sign and taemin…… did that (also key speaks in japanese for his answers)

jams sadly: after a married to the music win, they decided to mock their own crying when they win an award

honestly they’re just super sav bc they’ve been around for so long they don’t give a fuck and it’s hilarious to watch

they’re the best group

stan them, stan talent

#HUGE post #wow i know a lot about shinee #about shinee #get to know shinee #if you have questions about something shinee-related #feel free to come ask me!#all creds to their respective owers #shoutout to valentae and nothingbutsoulmates #bc i love their shit #did anyone get through this entire list?#shoutout to you too #shinee

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futuresandpasts · 8 years ago

Text

Futures & Pasts | MRR #410

From Maximum Rocknroll #410 (July 2017): much-needed reissues of the Performing Ferret Band & Look Blue Go Purple, plus two new cassettes from the Australian underground via the Stroppies & Blank Statements. There’s also an interview that I did with early ‘80s No Wave/post-punk heroines Y Pants in #410, so if you’re looking to pick up an MRR back issue, you could do a lot worse than that one.

The history of the PERFORMING FERRET BAND should sound pretty familiar to anyone with even a cursory interest in scrappy, flipped-out late ‘70s/early ‘80s DIY in the UK: art-minded school friends acquire a reel-to-reel tape recorder and try their hand at making music inspired by the dryly absurd sensibilities of Monty Python and aided by “a broken tambourine, a mandolin case for a drum, a kazoo, and a pair of plastic sandals.” Some more friends ultimately come into the fold, the band morphs into something more closely resembling a standard post-punk combo (now with guitar, bass, and legitimate drums), and in 1978, they record a cassette that finds its way to John Peel’s radio program (naturally). The first three songs from that EP became a 7” single on the Dead Hippy label in 1980, which has just been reissued by Germany’s Insolito Records with the addition of a fourth track called “Convenience” that had been previously unreleased until Hyped to Death’s PERFORMING FERRETS CD anthology in 2008. There’s that infamous quote from Mark E. Smith that “if it’s me and your granny on bongos, it’s the FALL,” and if you were to add some shaky organ and amateurish melodica to that equation, it might as well be the PERFORMING FERRET BAND. Flatly-delivered vocals, seemingly non-sequitur lyrics, clattering drums, trebly guitar lines usually consisting of two or three notes at most, the textbook Messthetics band, really. The group’s impossibly rare LP from 1981 is apparently also getting the reissue treatment soon (courtesy of Spain’s Beat Generation label), so all of you FALL/HOMOSEXUALS/SWELL MAPS freaks out there will have twice the cause for celebration - you need both records, trust me! (Insolito, insolitorecords.bandcamp.com)

Everyone I know who heard those TERRY records from last year was completely taken by them (rightfully so), and if you also count yourself among the TERRY true believers, the new self-titled cassette from fellow Melburnians the STROPPIES should have you similarly smitten. There’s an obvious reverence in these seven songs for many of the same foundational texts studied closely by the current cohort of Australian underground popsmiths that includes the likes of CHOOK RACE, DICK DIVER, and TWERPS - not surprisingly, the STROPPIES have some personnel overlap with the latter two. The unassuming dual vocal melodies and freewheeling keyboard in “Go Ahead” are descended straight from the bright-eyed jangle of Flying Nun’s “big three” (the CLEAN, the BATS, and the CHILLS), while the comparatively moody “Celebration Day” pays tribute to the shambolic MODERN LOVERS-isms of the GO-BETWEENS’ early singles, and “No Joke” recalls the sort of US indie rock/slacker-pop championed in the early-to-mid ‘90s by fanzine writers and college radio DJs with multiple BUTTERGLORY and PAVEMENT records in their collections. DIY pop perfection, because Australia really does it better.

Half of the STROPPIES are also in BLANK STATEMENTS, who have their own new tape on Melbourne’s Hobbies Galore label as well. Signs Are Rampant largely dispenses with the chiming melodicism of the STROPPIES’ more overt Kiwi influences, instead putting minimalist, super-rhythmic bass lines and wobbly, droning organ at the forefront of their skeletal songs. At their most raucous, BLANK STATEMENTS sound like a lost femme-punk band in the KLEENEX tradition, like on “Accelerate,” which consists of little more than a minute of choppy snare hits, synth squealing in the background, and a delirious, repetitive group chant of “accelerate and break!”. But overall, Signs Are Rampant leans much closer to the homespun, paper-thin aesthetic of the bands that occupied the fringes of the pre-C86 Rough Trade/Cherry Red post-punk milieu - the MARINE GIRLS especially, but with traces of DOLLY MIXTURE and YOUNG MARBLE GIANTS hiding just beneath the surface, and more than a few nods given to the K Records-backed primitive-pop of fellow Aussies the CANNANES. Both cassettes are limited to 100 copies each, and I’d jump on them if you get the chance. (Hobbies Galore, hobbiesgalore.bandcamp.com)

Speaking of Flying Nun and the whole Dunedin sound, the brilliant all-female quintet LOOK BLUE GO PURPLE have often been lost in the shadow of some of their more well-known (and largely all-male) early-to-mid ‘80s contemporaries, although in my world, they’ve always been just as important as, say, the CLEAN, if not even more so. The three 12” EPs that they released between 1985 and 1988 have been incredibly hard to track down at non-collector scum prices for some time now, so Still Bewitched, Flying Nun’s new LOOK BLUE GO PURPLE double LP anthology, is honestly a dream come true (and this particular dream even includes seven previously unreleased live songs!). As you’d probably expect from any band that was a part of Flying Nun’s more pop-oriented faction, there’s plenty of frenetic guitar jangle in the mix, but LOOK BLUE GO PURPLE’s haunting multi-part harmonies, propulsive drumming, and flashes of darkly psychedelic organ paid one of the most sincere tributes to the VELVET UNDERGROUND in the 1980s, putting them on a similar wavelength as the FEELIES over in New Jersey at roughly the same time. The overlapping vocal melodies and knotted, shadowy post-punk undercurrent running through songs like “Hiawatha” and “Safety in Crosswords” also make it easy to understand why the band were often hailed as New Zealand’s version of the RAINCOATS (especially during the latter’s Odyshape/Moving era), while LBGP were never quite as spiky and ecstatically raw as their English counterparts - see the plaintive minor chords and ethereal flute centered in “As Does the Sun” or “Days of Old,” which aren’t very far removed from the atmospheric drones of late ‘60s acid folk. We’re barely halfway through 2017 and I’m already going to go ahead and call this one as the reissue of the year. (Flying Nun, flyingnun.co.nz)

#performing ferret band #the stroppies #blank statements #look blue go purple #futures & pasts #maximum rocknroll

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oneweekoneband · 8 years ago

Video

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Ninety One, “Yeski Taspa Bii’,” from Qarangy Zharyq, released as a single June 2017

We’ve talked about the social and political significance of Ninety One recording in Kazakh, but we haven’t yet discussed the implications of their not recording in English. And yet it’s clearly something the group and Juz Entertainment has been thinking about, since all four of the Qarangy Zharyq singles were posted to the official YouTube channel with built-in English and Russian subs, as well as the lyrics printed out in Kazakh, Russian, and English.

How much non-fluent fans should care about the nuances they’re missing is going to remain an individual decision. For my own part I think generally you’re better off finding a translation, if you can; there are certainly songs for which having a translation at hand has influenced my perception of the song, positively or negatively. But I also will freely concede that lyric comprehension is sometimes beside the point. Any English-fluent listener who enjoys Duran Duran, whose lyrics are legendary in their total muddle-headed-ness, has no business getting pissy about translations.

(You own the money, you control the witness / I leave you lonely, don’t monkey with my business / You pay the prophets to justify the reasons / I heard you promise but I don’t believe it / That’s why I did it again, and I love that song but WHAT.)

Now: “Yeski Taspa Bii’” is not one of those songs for which lyric comprehension is beside the point, and not just because presumably AZ and ZaQ (again) worked hard on the lyrics. There is a lot going on, maybe even more than in “Su Asty”: a throughline that melts away when the rapping starts, and sections that sound as if Bala were sent into the recording booth to do a kazoo solo sans kazoo, and also a particular minor key that somehow grips my heart and twists it, and thus every time Alem starts with that Ескі таспа жиі nonsense I want to bang my head against a wall.

(also God help us all, five music videos in and now Alem reveals that he actually does know, quite well in fact, how to look at a camera. Congratulations, good sir. Now leave me alone so I can wail and rend my garments in peace.)

“Yeski Taspa Bii’” is ambitious, and possibly a mess, and even if it is a mess I am incapable of dismissing it, and I want to poke at it and prod at it and make it make a little more sense, a bit more of a case for itself. And thus, after the jump, some rudimentary, ill-informed attempts at translation.

Let’s just take Ace’s opening verse, for now:

Original Kazakh (Cyrillic text):

Байланған тілім сөйлемейді, Айналама неге сенбеймін мен? Кімге кіммін? Білмеймін, бермейді бір мұң тыным, Бермейді тыным мұңның үні күні-түні

Official provided English translation:

I got tongue-tied as if I numb why my environment seems deceitful. Who am I? I do not even know what sadness does not give me peace, that sadness haunts me day and night.

To my ear, as a native speaker of a watered-down version of Classical Southern American English, three of the four translated lines are hard to sit with: the missing verb in “I numb,” the double negative of “I do not even know what sadness does not give me peace,” the fact that American English speakers generally use “deceitful” to describe actions rather than settings. Of course there will be differences in reading between English speakers, native or not; and in trying to translate the verse into something that reads as less confusing and more illuminating of AZ’s and ZaQ’s intentions I’m of necessity imposing my understanding of English. Translating is politically difficult, too, it turns out. (You’re all shocked.) Fortunately I have the official provided translation to balance against, without having to worry that I’m speaking over Ninety One.

Google Translate has been letting me down but let’s give it a chance:

Linked slices speak, Why do not believe in and around? Who am? I do not know, not one of sorrow, peace PAIN tone rest not day and night

...go home and think about your algorithm choices, Google Translate.

Okay, let’s back up a bit. What is this song about? It’s a breakup song, sure, but there’s a lot going on here to contort the narrative. There’s that repeated non-kazoo interlude, for one thing, that cuts hard against the singers’ wallowing in their own misery; the music credit this time around goes to Alem and Bala plus Boss Yerbolat, and I find it hard to believe that all three of them heard that distorted sample and said, “Yes! Romantic misery!” Meanwhile there are multiple repeated mentions of time and of music, but the chorus’s “Your music heals all my wounds” leads to AZ’s laments over a “dusty record” that warps and stains as it plays. Not to mention a seeming thread of self-loathing. I mean. Why should I carry the corpse of happiness? There’s more than mourning here; there’s annihilation.

The video actually does less to help explain the lyrics’ intentions than I expected. Occam’s razor says that Ace’s scenes represent the idealized past and the other four are acting out the wall-smashing, milk-spilling, clothed-shower-taking misery of the present. Or the girl dumped the other four on her way to the beach with Ace. Or, given that she looks sad and wistful first, the self-loathing is her internal narration; maybe she’s the one whose psyche was laid waste by a bad breakup, and Alem and Bala represent the first stage of her showing her mine-strewn internal emotional territory to sympathetic new man Ace, AZ and ZaQ the second stage. (Or it’s the group lamenting the difference before the more innocent time of debut and the present, filled with tour bullies and entitled fans.) That’s a reach, admittedly, but you see how the video doesn’t actually help explain whether the sadness of the lyrics is just sadness or something more corrosive. Corpse of happiness may be overstating the case. Or may not.

Back to I do not even know what sadness does not give me peace: is the double negative supposed to be there? Is the narrator simply too sad to find peace? Or is the narrator saying that his inner turmoil is so great that mere sadness would be a relief?

So what I’m going to do next is try and translate word by word, paying attention to the repetition of бермейді бір мұң тыным in the third line and Бермейді тыным in the fourth. This is actually more difficult than I thought it would be: Kazakh-English dictionaries are not plentiful even on the so-called World Wide Web. (I miss Babelfish.) In the end I used Translatos, Glosbe, and Meta.ua. And got:

Байланған = tied, linked, strung together Тілім = tongue / slice / language Сөйлемейді = Meta.ua has this as “cannot speak,” Glosbe thinks it’s closer to “unable to lie.” Айналама = surrounded (there may be an implied speaker in this: more like “[I am] surrounded”) Неге = why, what was the cause of Сенбеймін = don’t believe Мен = I, me, my, mine Кімге = to whom Кіммін = who am I Білмеймін = I don’t know Бермейді = Meta.ua says “gives not”. Glosbe and Google Translate say “does not”. I’m guessing it might be closer to denoting that something does not happen than a verb in its own right. Бір = one Мұң = longing, sorrow Тыным = rest, peace, tranquility Мұңның = of sorrow Үні = sound / voice / noise Күні = day / date Түні= night

So there’s a link in the third and fourth lines of the idea of sorrow, the idea of peace, and the negation of Бермейді -- hence the double negative of the official translation. Also there’s the potential of a contrast between the not-speaking of the first line and the use of үні in the fourth. Given all that, here’s my shot at a translation that would read as more “natural” to a native American English speaker:

Tongue-tied, unable to speak, Why is everything around me a lie? Who am I? I don’t know. There’s no peace to be found, No rest from this pain that screams day and night.

If I had more time I’d continue this exercise all the way up to the corpse of happiness, but I think one verse is enough for y’all’s purposes. Obviously the rhythm’s all off, with the one-syllable English words more plodding than the original, and the repetition within Білмеймін, бермейді бір мұң is completely lost. And just perusing the Wikipedia entry on the Kazakh language gives you an idea on how much I’m not taking into account.

So to summarize: “Yeski Taspa Bii’” is a powerful song in its own right, but more so to Kazakh speakers; emo is emo in any language; even if you can’t understand the words there’s plenty of symbolism to go around; and translation is hard! Fortunately, next up you get to meet someone who’s better at it than I am.

introductory post / all Ninety One posts

#ninety one #qarangy zharyq #yeski taspa bii #translation #kazakh language

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transcripted-podcasts · 6 years ago

Text

Monarchs & Malarkey - Episode 1

Medieval Monks Recommend You Do This One Thing to Keep Skin Young and Fresh

Come with us as we dive into what led to Edward the Confessor becoming a saint…

* * *

[Kazoo fanfare] Danielle: This podcast contains swearing, drinking, lame dad jokes, descriptions of gross body problems, and lots of history. Consider yourself warned. Mike: Medieval monks recommend you do this one thing to keep skin young and fresh. [Intro music]

Danielle: Welcome to Monarchs and Malarkey! The show where we take an alcohol-laden dive into the weird and quirky health histories – and deaths – of leaders throughout time. I’m your host, Danielle!

Mike: And I’m your co-host, Mike.

Danielle: And, it’s our first episode!

Mike: Whoo!

Danielle: Whoo! We’re here, we did it!

Mike: We did it.

Danielle: Well, maybe we did it. If we have listeners, we did it.

Mike: We listen.

Danielle: We listen. My mom will listen.

Mike: Your sister will listen.

Danielle: No, she won’t.

Mike: She’ll listen to one episode.

Danielle: Maybe. But, my friend Britta will listen. And my friend Alyssa will listen. And…my boss will listen. So, thank you, Leann, Alyssa, Britta, Mom! [laughs]

Mike: And everyone else.

Danielle: And everyone else. Since this is the first episode, shall we describe a bit about what we’re doing?

Mike: Yes.

Danielle: Do you want me to do that?

Mike: Yes.

Danielle: Okay. We love podcasts. We didn’t know we loved podcasts ’til we finally got roped into starting to listen to some last year. And, we got hooked! We don’t have a whole lot of time to listen to a whole bunch of millions of podcasts, but there were a few that really grabbed our attention and they mostly revolved around true crime, haunted happenings, and paranormal experiences. There are also some really good history podcasts out there. My dad loves those. But we couldn’t find one that delved into history and really weird deaths and really weird health problems, specifically about leaders around the world. I, being a history nut and a…is there such a thing as a Britiophile? Because I’m not an Anglophile, but I love Great Britain.

Mike: I don’t know.

Danielle: Whatever term that would be, I’m totally into that stuff. And I’ve got free time on my hands now that I’ve finally graduated, so we thought, hey, we could create our own podcast looking at the cool, weird stuff people don’t usually talk about on podcasts! Like, what happens after somebody dies?

Mike: Because there’s a lot that happens, apparently.

Danielle: Yeah, so like, with true crime podcasts, you’re looking at convictions and detective work and stuff like that. But people don’t really tell you about what happens when a monarch dies. Not just with government and future reign and stuff like that, but with the monarch.

Mike: And what happens to their bodies?

Danielle: What happens to their bodies? Why are the English so into digging bones up and losing them?

Mike: They lose a lot. Spoiler alert.

Danielle: That’s what we’re going to do! And, this is it! Let’s get started. In honor of the first podcast we ever listened to together, Wine and Crime, hi gals! We are going to do our own really shitty, cheap version of pairing alcoholic beverages with our episodes. Not necessarily because we think there’s anything unique about it, but because it gives us an excuse to drink while we’re recording!

Mike: It makes recording so much more interesting.

Danielle: It does! And, I mean, there’s certainly not just the Wine and Crime gals. We also super love And That’s Why We Drink! and Em and Christine have their milkshakes and their alcoholic beverages and stuff. So it’s definitely not something only a couple of people do. But, here’s the thing: we’re cheap.

Mike: Very cheap.

Danielle: Very cheap. And we have kinda crappy taste in alcohol. So tonight we are talking about somebody who was eventually made a saint and, in honor of that, we are drinking a wine called Saintsbury. This one was not too cheap, I mean it was like $8, which I guess is cheap to most people.

Mike: Kind of depends on your version of cheap.

Danielle: Yeah, for sure. But, we’re going to be drinking our Saintsbury, and we’re going to tell you about…

Mike: Edward the Confessor.

Danielle: Edward the Confessor, yes. Edward the Confessor was one of the first kings of England as England. Do you want me to dive a little into that background before you start telling us about Edward?

Mike: Yes.

Danielle: Okay. In 927, England, as a kingdom, became a thing. up until that point, you had 7 different Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to remember all of them, but you have Wessex, Essex, East Anglia, Mercia, Strathclyde, Northumbria, and then the Welsh Kingdoms. I feel like I’m forgetting one and I’m really embarrassed if I am. But, the person we’re talking about tonight, although he technically ruled the seven kingdoms, there were still a lot of people who were very autonomous in the kingdoms they were living in. The majority of his reign happened in the Wessex and into the Essex area. Most of the kings, also, they spent most of their time in Wessex and Essex. But, I mean, obviously, they would do stuff in other places because there was still a lot of fighting and a lot of arguing, and people didn’t always agree with who should be king.

Mike: And this was really kind of the first time they were all brought together. They weren’t used to the idea of being all considered one nation.

Danielle: Right. The Anglo-Saxons had come in and mostly lived along the shores on the east and up towards the north, but they started spreading out. But you still had Celts and you had Picts in that area. You still had some Roman remnants because, even though Rome had left in 200 AD, there were still people who had stayed behind. So you had this really big conglomeration of different languages, different people. English as we know it today was not being spoken, but English was being rooted in that time period, but it was not yet an official language. Latin and French were the most common languages among the not-little people.

Mike: Among the higher-ups.

Danielle: Yeah, among nobles and barons and earls and things like that.

Mike: Because they needed a common language to communicate to each other.

Danielle: Well, and the educated went to school as, well, not really school, but were educated in, especially Latin. A lot of them didn’t read or write, though. So, kind of an interesting little twist there. So most of the records of the time were made by monks and archbishops and people like that. There’s a little bit of background there. Just as an FYI, I am an anthropologist and Michael is…what is your title? Literary studier?

Mike: Well, I’m a ginger.

Danielle: You’re a ginger.

Mike: And an English major.

Danielle: Yeah, he graduated with his degree in literary studies. And I graduated with mine in anthropology with a minor in religious studies and now I’m in grad school for creative writing, which is going to be a surprise to my family because they thought I was going to do anthropology. Ha, ha, changed my mind, guys. I’m going to go for creative writing and literature.

Mike: So let’s dive into Edward the Confessor. Edward was the 7th son of Æthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy.

Danielle: And I love that name. Æthelred the Unready. Like, what was he not ready for?

Mike: He wasn’t ready for a lot of things, apparently. But you don’t get to pick your own nicknames, they’re just kind of bestowed upon you.

Danielle: I know, I know! But, I’m just saying, why Æthelred the Unready?

Mike: I don’t know. I didn’t research into him. But Edward himself was born between 1003 and 1005 in Islip near Oxford. We don’t have the exact date because records back then were pretty spotty at best, and this was over a thousand years ago. not all records are going to survive that area. England has a climate that isn’t very good for keeping records in.

Danielle: And, like we said, a lot of people weren’t even making records, so we are researching to the best of our abilities with the material we can get our hands on. But the fact of the matter is, a lot of the records are old and gone and, even the ones we get, a lot of them were written sometimes centuries after the fact and I think a lot of people are aware in this day and age, history is written by the victors, so take it with a grain of salt. But I just discovered why he was the unready, if you want to hear.

Mike: Why was he the unready?

Danielle: Okay, so it’s a play on his name. Back then, it wasn’t “unready” the way we think of it, it’s just kind of turned into that. But, it comes from the Old English world of unræd which means “poorly advised”. And it’s-

Mike: Oooh!

Danielle: Yeah, and it’s a pun on his name because his name Æthelred actually means “well-advised”. So there you go.

Mike: So he was Well-Advised the Unadvised.

Danielle: [Laughs] Yep.

Mike: So he was the mediocre-advised.

Danielle: Yeah, yeah. So, there, we learned something. High five. [Sound of high-fiving]. All right, carry on.

Mike: His family spent several years in exile because there was a Danish invasion in 1013, so they fled over to Normandy. Æthelred himself was briefly reinstated as king, but died in 1016, leaving Cnut, who was the Danish invader, as king. Cnut then married Æthelred’s widow, Emma, and this was to secure an alliance between the two families where Æthelred already had a strong sense of leadership and tradition in ruling that area. Coming in as an invader, you need to marry people to get those alliances.

Danielle: Right, because, even though it’s been a “kingdom”, I put it in air quotes, since 927, it’s still really unstable. And, also, I have a really important question.

Mike: Shoot.

Danielle: Do you think Cnut ever looked at his mother and said ‘she turned me into a Cnewt?’

Mike: Then they got better.

Danielle: I got better. I’m just wondering.

Mike: Yes, it happened.

Danielle: I hope so, I hope so.

Mike: When Cnut died, he was succeeded by his son Harthacnut in 1040. Following Harthacnut’s death on June 8th, 1042, there wasn’t a clear line of succession. Harthacnut didn’t really have a whole lot of time to set that up. He was only king for two years.

Danielle: Well, what a loser. Jeez!I you’re going to be king, at least do the job right and do it for a while.

Mike: Well, he was still in his partying, honeymoon phase.

Danielle: Yeah, yeah, but still! He wasn’t Henry VIII whose one sole mission in life was to have sons?

Mike: Exactly.

Danielle: By any means necessary?

Mike: By all means necessary. So Emma and Godwin, who was the Earl of Wessex, wanted Emma’s son Cnut, from Cnut, to take the throne, but Æthelred’s children made a claim for it as well. And so, as we’re going to talk a lot about in this, they fought about it. The king died, you had two rival factions vying for the throne because there was no clear line of succession, and another war broke out. This becomes a running theme in English history. Æthelred’s children won against Cnut’s children, but all of them died except for Edward. Edward was the lone survivor. So, naturally, he was crowned king and Godwin then flip-flopped sides and decided to throw his support in for Edward to be king. And Godwin was supported by the people as well, so now we have Edward as having all these powers behind him so that he can actually rule.

Danielle: Although, Edmund Godwin, or Godwine, don’t exactly always get along.

Mike: No.

Danielle: There’s a lot of struggle back and forth between them. They’re frenemies more than anything, I’d say.

Mike: Definitely. Edward was crowned at the cathedral of Winchester on April–

Danielle: It was Winchester! I was right. Okay. You can keep that because I was right.

Mike: Yeah, you were right.

Danielle: I’m a little drunk already, sorry.

Mike: And that was in the year 1043. Two years later, Edward married Godwin’s daughter, Edith. I think that’s probably part of the agreement that Godwin made with Edward is ‘I’m going to throw my support behind you’–

Danielle: ‘But I want to have grandchildren who take the throne eventually’, yeah.

Mike: Exactly. Soon after, more of Godwin’s family were awarded Earldoms in southern England. Now, Edward himself did not have any children. This was believed because Edward wanted to live a conventional saint’s life of celibacy.

Danielle: Which, I really wonder about this, because my research indicates that he wasn’t especially pious. He wasn’t especially a good religious person. And part of me wonders did he just hate Edith so much for some reason that he was like ‘well, this is a good way to get out of having to have sex’. Because they didn’t talk about consent and things back then.

Mike: And my research showed that he was very devout in his religion, hence why he was a saint. And, while he was in exile, he even made a vow that, if he were able to make it to England safely, that he would make a pilgrimage to St. Peter’s in Rome.

Danielle: Oh, I forgot a kingdom. I forgot the kingdom of Kent. Sorry. Yeah, well, I mean, the research is kind of spotty, obviously, but it’s not that he wasn’t devout, it was that he didn’t really live a life of saintliness himself until he took this vow that happened after he got married.

Mike: The vow he made, it was when he was in exile back in 1013.

Danielle: See? And this is why I’m saying the research is all over the place because the records I saw indicated he just really wasn’t as saintly as people made him out to be after his death. But, whatever the case may be, he didn’t want to have sex with his wife, so.

Mike: The pope gave him clearance.

Danielle: Eventually. But we’ll get to why.

Mike: After Edward became the king, he realized that he was too busy to make a pilgrimage to Rome, a pilgrimage to St. Peter’s as he had taken a vow to do. There are probably a couple different reasons for this. One is his kingdom was still fairly unstable and, if he left, then who knows what would have happened. Someone else probably would have come in and tried to take power or splinter groups would have formed and started rebellions. It just wouldn’t have been a very good idea for him at the time.

Danielle: Yeah, because some of Cnut’s family still in Denmark were like ‘we actually have a claim to the throne’ so that was a concern.

Mike: Exactly.

Danielle: The other little kingdoms, especially Mercia, Mercia was just volatile, they were like ‘we want power back!’ so, gotta be careful.

Mike: He wrote the pope and said ‘totes sorry, I’m not going to be able to make that pilgrimage that I totally promised to do’ and the pope said ‘don’t worry about it, bro, I will release you from your vow on one condition. And what you have to do is, you have to build a new Norman-style cathedral to replace the Saxon church, St. Peter’s Abbey’. So between 1042 and 1052, Edward began rebuilding St. Peter’s Abbey to a royal burial church known today as Westminster Abbey.

Danielle: Westminster Abbey! We’ve been there.

Mike: Yes.

Danielle: I’ve been there a lot.

Mike: We’ve seen it with our very own eyeballs.

Danielle: So let me explain Westminster Abbey just for a moment because it’s actually a really important building in British history. The Saxon church that he was building on top of, it wasn’t even really a church. It was an abbey, even then, but it was very small, and it was a very quiet, simple place like you expect a place to be where monks and abbots live. And, if you ever go there, and you see the cathedral today, it is enormous, it is beautiful, it’s really, really extravagant though, and it’s a place that makes you feel good but also angry at the same time because it’s really impressive, there’s some really amazing people buried there, the history is so rich, there’s a coronation chair there that’s been there since the 14th century…I mean, it’s a really important, beautiful place. But the problem is, it’s lost something of that early Christian thought process of simple, pious, poverty, you know? We know monks and priests and people take vows of chastity, but also that say I’m not going to be wealthy, I’m going to live simply, like Jesus did. And, the inner courtyard is filled with the bodies of monks who died there over the centuries. They don’t have any markers of any kind. They don’t have any beautiful tombs, they’re just under the grass. And the abbots are buried alongside the parts that you can walk between the different places inside the abbey, kind of the arches that you go through. I can’t think off the top of my head what they’re called, but if you walk through there, there are some almost bench-looking things on the side, and all that’s left of their tombs aren’t even really tombs. They’re just rocks that had been formed in the shape of their bodies that have been worn down over time. So it’s a really neat place, but also it’s a really sharp contrast between nobility and quiet, worshipful people. And that’s what he built. On top of the quiet, he built the extravagant.

Mike: And he’s buried there, and you can even see his tomb.

Danielle: Yep, his tomb is, we’ll get into that.

Mike: So Edward, he didn’t have any children, so he didn’t have a direct heir and this would lead to issues for his line of succession. But Edward did become a saint. Do you want to tell us about how Edward died?

Danielle: Yes, I do! We don’t know. [pause] I mean, [laugh], everything that I found just, if it said anything, it all said natural causes. But, I mean, he was pretty old by this point, so that’s completely normal. His buddy there, Edmund Godwine, the two of them had been fighting just a couple years before he died, and then they kissed and made up. And while they were having dinner together, Edmund actually died of a stroke. So, there’s that. [laughs] That’s not so great. He died of natural causes, and he unfortunately did not get the funeral most kings would have gotten. He was buried very quickly. He did not lay in state. But what’s really interesting is what happened after he died.

Mike: So what happened after he died?

Danielle: Okay, it’s kind of a long story. Let me talk first about some of the stuff he was buried with and then we’ll get into some of the stuff that led to him being canonized as a saint. He was buried, first of all, with a ring. And this ring, allegedly, had belonged to St. John a.k.a. the John of the Bible. The story, the legend of it is that this ring was given by St. John to a really super poor person because John did not have any alms, any money to give. So he gives the poor man this ring and somewhere along the way, several centuries later, two men were on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and St. John’s ghost appeared to them and said ‘take my ring.’

Mike: So where did John’s ghost get the ring back from?

Danielle: Well, I don’t know. And, more importantly, what I want to know is how the hell does a ghost carry a ring? Don’t get me wrong, spooky shit happens and I don’t know how a ghost carries a ring, I just, I’ve seen some spooky shit in my life, so I know they sometimes move objects, but carrying a ring to two people and then appearing before them, I have no idea. But he did, according to this legend. And he tells the two men ‘take this ring and in six months time, return it to paradise’ which I couldn’t find anything that indicated what exactly that meant. That’s just what they reported, that they were told to return it to paradise. So maybe their mission was actually to die and take it to Heaven? I don’t know. But whatever the case may be, Edward the Confessor ends up with this ring and it gets buried with him. And he was also buried with a gold crucifix around his neck, and that’s important, that comes in later. The ring of St. John ended up eventually being placed with a bunch of other relics by Henry II, but we’ll get to what relics are in a second. Let’s talk first about how one becomes a saint and we’ll talk a little bit involved with that why it is that he was put up for sainthood. There was, in 1089, a question of whether or not he was worthy of sainthood because, all of a sudden, people were super into Edward the Confessor. This is where my research kind of veers off from yours. He was being made out to be much holier and much more devout than he had probably been in life and, again, records written after this time period are going to show him that way. In 1089, people were like ‘let’s check him out! let’s go look!’ So they opened up his tomb and, I’m going to read for you what they found. This is from a chronicler named Aelred of Rievaulx and says…oh, by the way, the person opening it is Gundulf, bishop of Rochester; ‘There issued out such aromatic odors as filled the church with their fragrance. In the first place the burial cloths were clean and substantial. Next, unfolding his vestments, they found his underhabit (aka underwear) and ornaments in the same state. They stretched out his arms, bent his fingers, and found the whole body sound and flexible. They next examined the flesh, which was firm and pure as crystal, whiter than snow. But when, after a long a suspense, none durst ventured to touch his face, the bishop, Gundulfulus’ I really hope that was actually Gandalf.

Mike: It was.

Danielle: It was totally Gandalf, I knew it.

Mike: There’s even a ring involved.

Danielle: I know! Hobbits are real. “Bishop Gundulfus [I’m just going to call him Gandalf], Bishop Gandalf laid his hand upon his forehead cloth and, stroking it over the face, drew it over the beard, which was white as frost. surprised at this, he attempted to draw a hair from the beard.” See, it is Gandalf, he wants to do magic with that hair. “Draw a hair from the beard, but that adhered strictly” which is kind of weird that he couldn’t pull a hair. “For which, being gently reproved by the abbot, he owned his fault which excessive love occasioned. After this, they preserved the grave dressings and clothed him a new, and re-interred him.” So in other words, they opened up the tomb, and he’s in excellent shape. This is what is known as being incorruptible, which is one of the aspects a body must have in order to be turned into a saint. The body must be so well-preserved that it has not gone through the decaying process. So, the fact that he looked healthy, he looked fresh, this is why they were like ‘okay, we can start this process’.

Mike: So, they basically buried him in the medieval version of Tupperware.

Danielle: Yeah. Let’s talk a little bit about that process.

Mike: Do you think they have to burp him every couple of years?

Danielle: Well, they did in 1089, clearly. And they’re going to do it a few more times, too, actually. So, he’s in his Tupperware, which, it’s stone and it’s kind of hard to get oxygen and bacteria and insects and things like that through stone inside of a building. He’s in a really temperate climate where it’s really cool, and the humidity isn’t really going to get into the tomb with it being so well-sealed. We’ve seen these tombs. They are really well-built. Also, it mentions the aromatic odor. He smelled good.

Mike: So they Frebrezed him.

Danielle: They Frebrezed him. When he died, he would have had his body most likely cut open and had his entrails and things removed because, usually, like I said before, usually you’re going to have a king laying in state for a while before the burial, so they don’t want him to get all stinky and gross, to the best of their abilities.

Mike: But Edward didn’t lay in state.

Danielle: He didn’t, but they would have still most likely prepped the body while Harold was off doing his thing to try to take the throne, but we’ll get there later. They would have opened him up, most likely, taken out his organs, his entrails, and then stuffed him with straw and with herbs and then also stuffed his clothing with herbs to help cover the yucky smell of a dead body.

Mike: Because dead bodies smell bad.

Danielle: They small bad, especially when you don’t have any way to embalm them the way we do now. Although I don’t like embalming. I don’t want to be embalmed. But, they didn’t have any way to really preserve it, so that was the best they could do. This was the first step to becoming a saint.

Mike: It’s fine that they were uncorruptible.

Danielle: Incorruptible.

Mike: Incorruptible.

Danielle: Incorruptible. Yes. Next, the bishop of the diocese is going to start an investigation. He has to gather evidence and testimony to see if this person has lived a saintly life, including any writings, and since, after his marriage, at least, he was very much into being that pious, devout man, always closeted in prayer and reading his scriptures and things like that, that part, the archbishop was able to do. Because he saw he lived with sufficient holiness, he then asks something called the congregation for the causes of saints to make a recommendation to the pope. If the pope accepts the case, then the person is called a servant of God, because it means the pope’s at least given the approval that they were a good Christian.

Mike: Right.

Daniella: The next step is verified miracles. There has to be evidence of a miracle and it has to be gathered and investigated. This has to be something that’s verified as unexplainable scientifically, but in this point in time, in the 1060s, that’s like…science? They don’t know very much. They can’t actually explain things, so back then it was a lot easier to be like ‘we don’t know, so it must be a miracle’. But, it can take a long time to get this all done, especially the miracle portion. So here’s what had to happen: because he had not performed any miracles before death, he has to perform miracles after death.

Mike: I mean, it’s hard enough to perform a miracle before you die. But after you die?

Danielle: Right, and this is where relics come into the picture. A relic is something belonging to a saint that is said to have specific properties of usually healing or other miraculous things: I touched it and all of a sudden I was able to afford to eat, things like that. relics often tend to be a body part from a saint, and almost every Catholic church in the world has at least one relic. It’s not always body parts, but it often is a bone. It can be something that belonged to the saint, so the ring of St. John is a relic already.

Mike: Or things like a piece of the true cross.

Danielle: Right. Pieces of the crucifix, the Shroud of Turin, things like that are considered relics.

Mike: Ark of the Covenant.

Danielle: Gotta find that Ark, God. Anyway, the miracles he performed, well there are only a couple, but they’re pretty impressive. After William the Conqueror takes the throne, the bishop of Worcester, Wulfstan, was told by Primate Lanfranc to give up his ring and staff to the tomb. Now, a primate, by the way, is another word for an archbishop. At first Worcester’s like ‘no’…Wulfstan, sorry it’s Wulfstan is bishop of Worcester, it’s kind of confusing. Wulfstan’s like ‘no, man, I don’t want to give my stuff up’ and they were, Primate Lanfranc was like ‘do it! just do it!’ so he’s like, ‘fine’. According the miraculous legend, his ring and staff became embedded in the tomb. So really, what they’re doing is inventing the legend of King Arthur because all these dudes come and try to pull the staff and pull the ring out of the tomb, and they can’t. But, lo and behold, newly coronated King William comes along and pulls them out.

Mike: Instead of the sword in the stone, it’s the stick.

Danielle: It’s the staff in–

Mike: The staff in the coffin.

Danielle: The staff in the coffin. This is considered a really extremely impressive miracle, and that’s enough. The next step is that he’s now called ‘blessed’. Canonization is the final step to declaring a deceased person a saint, and that is completely on the heads of the Vatican. They’re the ones who have to decide for sure. He was the first and only Anglo-Saxon king to be canonized. In fact, he was the only king to have ever been canonized, so that’s kind of cool. And after he gets canonized, he gets a new tomb. Henry III actually built a whole new shrine, but then the tomb gets pillaged to hell and back. Part of it is from people sneaking in, grave robbers were a real thing. Part of it was Henry VIII went through his hissy fit of ‘churches should not have nice things’ and so it got badly damaged when his good buddy Thomas was out there, busting up all churches and taking relics and destroying property inside the churches. But, King Henry VIII’s daughter Mary actually ended up restoring the tomb, and when that happened, there were some holes in the tomb at that point, so they looked in there [laughs] and they said–

Mike: I mean, I would, too.

Danielle: Right? And they said the body was still firm and whole. So my guess is, being inside the stone tomb–

Mike: Inside the Tupperware.

Danielle: Right, inside the Holy Tupperware, it leeched out any fluids that were left and this almost mummified him rather than skeletonizing him. That’s actually not my area of expertise, but from what I have learned in bio-archaeology, I’m guessing that it’s something like that. In the 17th century, you remember that gold crucifix I told you about?

Mike: I do!

Danielle: Okay, you want to hear the horrible thing that happened to it?

Mike: Yes.

Danielle: [laughs] This is bad. A Mr. Henry Kean found the crucifix, he stuck his hand in there because, again, the tomb was falling apart, and he finds the crucifix, he’s got his hand in there, reaching around, and he’s like ‘oh, there’s something here’ and he takes it.

Mike: That’s how curses start.

Danielle: That is absolutely how curses start and here’s the curse, this is what happens: James II ends up with the crucifix. Mr. Henry Kean’s never heard from again. And then, James II, after getting this crucifix, ends up having to flee England in 1688 and, on his way to France, the fishermen rowing him to France steal the crucifix from him. And it’s lost to this day. Nobody knows where it is.

Mike: Probably because the fishermen then drowned because it was cursed.

Danielle: Because it was cursed! Right! But if you have a gold crucifix in your family that’s been there for the last 300 plus years, and you notice a lot of really horrible, tragic things happen to the portion of the family holding onto it, please return it to Westminster Abbey at London, UK [laughs] and don’t touch it, you might want to get it blessed first, even though it’s a gold crucifix [laughs].

Mike: Yeah, put some gloves on.

Danielle: Yeah. my question is: did St. John ever go to the tomb and take his ring back?

Mike: I don’t know.

Danielle: Do you think those two men are going to have to be cursed to hell because they did not follow the promptings to return it to the paradise?

Mike: Well, you had one job. When a ghost comes down and give you instructions to take his holy ring somewhere? You gotta do it, otherwise, you’re going to be cursed, too.

Danielle: Guys! You had one job. I know, it’s tragic. So that is the really cool and rather lengthy history of Edward the Confessor and stay tuned next time to hear about King Harold.

Mike: Thank you for listening. And where can they find us on social medias?

Danielle: On social medias? [laughs]

Mike: There are many of them.

Danielle: There are. We’re on Twitter @monarchmalarkey. We’re on Facebook Monarchs&Malarkey. And if you have trouble listening on your current podcast, you can also find us on all the others. We’re on iTunes, we’re on Stitcher, we’re on Spotify, we’re on iHeartRadio, we’re on…what else are we on?

Mike: We’re on Google and Tunein.

Danielle: And Tunein. So look for us there.

Mike: And if you have any ideas about monarchs or leaders that you would like us to cover, you can shoot us an email at [email protected].

Danielle: That’s Monarchs and Malarkey, AND, all one word. And don’t worry, we will not only be covering British history, we will be expanding out.

[Outro music]

#podcast #podcast transcript #history podcast #history #transcript

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qorillas · 8 years ago

Text

a comprehensive humanz listening experience

henlo friends i wrote this as i listened to the entire humanz album for the first time. here are my thoughts and revelations written in real life as i went through this life-changing and at times harrowing experience. i hope you enjoy

intro: i switched my robot off

is that russel’s voice

that FUCKIN TRANSITION INTO ASCENSION??? damn

7/10 im fuckin ready

ascension

gets me fuckin pumped as always

BE A PUPPET ON A STRING HANGIN FROM A FUCKIN TREE

9/10 after like 50 plays over the past few weeks it’s still great

strobelite

oh this is a cute intro. very bouncy

sounds like a hip and trendy remix of the seinfeld intro. im digging it

this is the type of song you go swaggering down the street to wearing ur fancy new 70s disco duds

just had a mental image of murdoc dancing disco to this

i feel like this is gonna grow on me in the coming weeks

noodle’s falsetto is so cute she’s going so hard i love her

7/10 i like how happy it was

saturnz barz

honestly after how joyful strobelite was this tempered the album really nicely

i still can’t listen to this song without thinking about murdoc’s dick. minus one point

honestly i’m only four songs deep and the album already has got a really strong electronic pulsing haunting vibe going and i love how well it all goes together

death by 2d. those vocals? WHACK and by whack i mean i want to cry it’s so beautiful

6/10 always a classic and gave us THE BATH but honestly i’ve always liked the other singles a bit more and i don’t want to think about murdoc’s dick

momentz

what is happening

MOMENTZ that scared me

HOLY SHIT

HOLY SHIT HHOTLY SHIT

THEY’RE GOIN OFF

DAAAAAAAMN 2D

dirty

im gonna SCREAM THIS IS SO FUCKING GOOD THIS GOES SO FUCKING HARD GOD FUCKIN DAMN

whose voices are those?? the high voices saying plastic on the ceiling

is that 2d and noodle omf

honestly the fact that this is in a major key makes it like. really psychedelic party hard i can see people headbanging and on hella drugs listening to this

i think i liked the intro part more than when it got all dreamy at the end

7/10 kind of petered off at the end but the intro was really amazing

interlude: the non-conformist oath

i promise not to repeat things other people say lmao

4/10 obligatory weird shit from damon

submission

ohhhHHHHhh the vocals

OOOHHHHHHH THE BACKING VOCALS

ohhHHhhHHHHHHHH fuck fu cku fucK i love the backing choir it’s so gorgeous

all the choir backings make me think of the whole band just singing quietly together in the back and. idk it’s such a good image of them all being so deep into their music and jamming together and on the same wavelength

what the hell kind of noise is 2d making in the background of this

i feel like this is gonna get stuck in my head in the next week

HOLY SHIT THE RAP i like his rap style very erratic

the choral vocals behind the jumpy rap is so good

this is honestly something i think of when i think of the word celestial

8.5/10 this is gorgeous but i’m saving 9s and 10s for things that really knock me off my feet

charger

is this the orange juice lady

super tough leather jacket vibe murdoc def wrote this

fuuuuuuuuuuck stu’s lil breathy speaking voice. honestly im weak for high pitched breathy stu voice he’s so cute fuck me up

a cha cha cha

i feel tough listening to this like walking into a gritty bar and smirking at everyone. the beat is really stalky

idk normally i don’t really like songs without very much melody but its p well done

OHHHHH the electronic whistles that’s good

murdoc probably was fuckin his bass for this one

okay more melody at the end!!! choral backing vocals are back too i like it more now

6/10 2d’s vocals got me wet ngl

interlude: elevator going up

wait that was so short

uh 5/10 because the guy says going up like gooOOOooing up which is nice

andromeda

ohhHHHh okay honestly with the interlude before it it’s nice it feels like im taking a fast glass elevator up to space

OH I JUST GOT WHY THERE’S LIKE AN ELEVATOR SOUND AS THE FIRST NOISES

this like. cleansed my palate and calmed me down after charger.

the drum? ?? poppin. smooth backing instrumentals. noodle’s little humming in the background? adorable. 2d’s falsetto? magnificent

the little melody right before take it in your heart now lover always gets me it’s so dancy i always bounce around to it. so great

andromedaaaaaaaa (andromedaaaaaaaa)

when does damon cry

8/10 another hit single and it reminds me of like neon signs and retro roller rinks

busted and blue

OH FUCK IT TRANSITIONS

OH FUCK THIS IS THE ONE THAT MAKES EVERYONE CRY ISN’T IT

ohhhHHHHHhhhhh god oh god this is gonna fuck me up

FUCK

death by 2d

ohh. oh my god. fuck. fuCK. fuck the vocals. fuck. the vocals.

my heartstrings

is it about 2d? because if it is. oh god that’s so sad

amplify the sirens more like amplify my sobs because there are tears

so deep and ethereal i feel like i’m sitting on a roof staring up at the stars about to fall into space

I CAN’T GET BACK WITHOUT YOU

this is another love song on par with to binge or on melancholy hill

murdoc niccals or stuart pot or SOMEONE IN THIS BAND is in LOVE WITH SOMEONE and it’s BREAKING THEM APART

THE BACKING VOCALS oh noooo oh noo oh no

fuck i’m really actually tearing up i [note: i had to stop here because my breathing was getting funny and i was tearing up and my rommate is asleep so i had to calm down]

he sounds like a lost little child looking at the stars through his window

the deep bass sounds and the minor chords and the gentle snapping. im floating

THE SLIDING NOISES this is what it feels like to be in space my heart is so cold and empty but so full

the ending satellite. the gentle rain noises. the setting down of the music. goodbye i am dead tell damon albarn that he has killed a person on this day

10/10 this song is one of those rare ones that catches me by the heart and reminds me of dark blue and stars. thenks damon albarn for my life and someone please comfort 2d

interlude: talk radio

why are there so many interludes in this damn album

wtf

uhhhhhhhh

is this guy okay

2/10 what the fuck

carnival

what the fuck

oh okay that opening beat was cool

is someone knocking on a door. let them in

the keyboard in the back is cool i guess

someone please let whoever’s knocking in

very bobby womack-y vibe. pretty intense between the dark instrumentals and the KNOCKING WHICH DOES NOT END

hyeAUp

3/10 i didn’t really like it. very spinny tho and it goes well with the rest of the album as like a filler song

let me out

MAMA MAVIS OH MAMA THEY TRY MY PATIENCE

OH OH OH IT’S GONE WHO IS LEFT TO SAVE US

OH OH OH WE MOURN IM PRAYIN FOR MY NEIGHBORS

THEY SAY THE DEVIL’S AT WORK AND oh IS CALLIN FAVORS

honestly the little electronic oh oh oh’s in the beginning are what i live for

plus they bleep out trump which is hilarious drag him damon

let me out let me out let me out it’s DEL LET HIM OUT

fuck this was my favorite out of all the singles i listened to it 15 times today

2d’s vocals are adorable yeah yeah yeah

the whispering gets me SO MCFREAKING PUMPED im ready to OVERTHROW THE GOVERNMENT

the build up gives me legitimate shivers. the whispering and the choral vocals ugH i love it

you gotta die a little if you wanna live

the ending is so haunting

let me out

9/10 i love this song so much please let del out. my only problem with it is that i sound dumb when i try and sing the first lines with the electronic oh’s

interlude: penthouse

REALLY ANOTHER ONE

damn someone’s goin hard

ding

5/10 sounds like one of those audio posts where people do some song but heard through the wall

sex murder party

just looking at the title i know murdoc wrote this

oohhhhh nice beat

this is like going to a cool underground house party with lots of smoke and colored strobe lights somewhere in germany

is someone playing the kazoo

idk i don’t think 2d’s sleepy sad vocals really go with this it sounds like he’s mourning while walking down a runway

on that note: model 2d walking down a runway. he would fall off the stage almost immediately

this sounds like something that would play in forever 21

the deep voice has some cool lyrics

why are they whimpering the words sex murder party

the kazoo is back

murder murder murder muuurder

4/10 didn’t love it but it was better than carnival and it had a kazoo

she’s my collar

ohHHH i like this very punk pop

oH SHIT damn stu those vocals tho

wait what is he talking about a collar

DID HE JUST SAY SHE’S MY FURSONA

i likE IT IT’S VERY DARK AND BOUNCY AND ETHEREAL BUT UHHHHH IS THIS A REFERENCE TO ALL THE BDSM AND FURRY SHIT GOING ON THIS PHASE

the panting .. . . mmmmmm

2d’s tryna get some

KALI DAAAAAAAMN

this is a really sexual song but i really love it

i really love when 2d speaks quickly and semi-raps

kali’s vocals are gorgeous. also her snapchats were great

she’s my collar she’s the one i’m running with

im jammin out this is gonna be my new jam

FUCk the panting came back i. wasn’t expecting this

9/10 2d’s into some kinky shit but i’d still let him fuck me

WAIT THE PANTING IS A REFERNECE TO DOGS FUCKING SHIT IT’S A PUPPY PLAY REFERENCE WITH ALL THE 2D DOG STUFF THIS PHASE FU ck

i am. kinkshaming. minus one point for making me suffer through this realization

interlude: the elephant

COME THE FUCK ON THEY’RE NOT INTERLUDES ANYMORE IF THEY TAKE UP THREE QUARTERS OF THE GOTDAMN ALBUM

uhhhhh again. what the fuck

2/10 these are getting annoying

hallelujah money

so unsettling and weird but that’s what it’s going for i guess

ben clementine’s voice is so good and it sounds like a sermon esp with the choir in the back i love it

idk it makes me sad because it reminds me of the night of the election and how everyone cried and was so scared

i love the chord progressions

haaaaaaallelujah moneeeeeeey

again 2d’s vocals kill me i have been slain thrice

we are still humans, how will we know, how will we dream, how will we love

what fantastic lyrics. the crux of the album tbh i feel like i’m being told a story

this song terrifies and creeps me out but makes me feel warm and strong like i can face the scary things it brings up?? i don’t like it as a song per se but as a piece of art with a message it’s absolutely amazing

HALLELUJAH MONEY

where is my spongebob scream

8/10 i never loved this song but i appreciated the chord progressions a lot this time around and it adds a lot to the message of the album. also it fuckin destroys donald trump lmao damon what is ur damage i love it

we got the power

honestly it’s upbeat and i like that but it’s a little bit too cheesy for me

the claps in the back remind me of that shitpost where it’s like the people in the 80s doing that weird dance yoga

this is a good song to do jazzercise to. imagine murdoc doing jazzercise

never mind don’t do that

“on the m1″ is that a reference to m1a1?

oh oh oh stu ur so cute

the backing instrumentals are so powerful i feel like i am being propelled through the stratosphere on russel’s back

5/10 it’s cute and happy but i never really ever got into it even after having had time to

interlude: new world

P L E A S E N O M O R E I N T E R L U D E S

this sounds like an electronic soap opera intro theme song

the elevator? ? i guess the elevator is the new thing this album

oh fuck this is creepy

yikes yikes YIKES

honestly it has an actual uhhhh music ish thing going on so?? ? i guess there’s that

i just wanted to be close to you BITCH NO GET THE FUCK AWAY

2/10 because i don’t want to be close to whatever’s whisperin in my ear and also because apparently damon albarn does not understand what an interlude is

the apprentice

so great. so jazzy. so cool and suave.

clap clap clap cla-cla-clap i love the beat

I AM A BROKEN SCREEN I’M A MAP ROUTINE

this is also going to get stuck in my head isn’t it

I’M INSIDE YOUR HEAD ya u are

oooohhh the electronics are so bubbly

THE FEMALE SINGER’S VOICE? ? ? SO SMOOTH SO GOOD so gorgeous im dead

this song reminds me of a lava lamp

YO NEW BLACK KING NEW YORK DREAM

IM THE FIRST BLACK PRINCE OF A NEW WHITE KING

god this rap is so great

normally i don’t like slower songs but this one just. takes its time and jams out and knows exactly what it’s doing. what a bop

8/10 a solid addition to the album and holds its own really well

halfway to the halfway house

this album is so long but i’m not complaining. actually i am a little because i have a writing sample due in an hour and a half and my computer is dying but this is more important

nice spaceship sounds

2d’s really jamming out on those bloopy keyboard sounds isn’t he

it’s like floating in a pool of static kinda

i like the chorus esp since everyone in the band is singing together which i still think is so cute

everyone singing on it has really good voices but idk the fact that there’s no real melody kinda distracts from that

it sounds like a congregation or a gospel choir which is super cool

3.5/10 it was pretty cool but a little too aimless for me

out of body

pipe down pipe down

tHIS IS CREEPIN ME OUT

oh SHIT WAIT THIS IS SO COOL DAMN

i don’t know who’s rapping right now but i love her and her voice

THIS GOES OFF DAMN

i love it. i love this song this is so bouncy and cool and it’s so cute too with the lyrics telling you how to dance

noodle wrote this. noodle 100% wrote this

i feel so cool listening to this

this is definitely going to be in a commercial for like. fashion or makeup or something

this is the new runway song

this is something you listen to right before going out to some fancy european club with like models and weird plastic architecture

oH SHIT OH SHIT 2D’S RAPPING IM SCREAMIGN

FUCK

FUCK IM YELLING his voice is so high im screeching

they made this fucking dork into a suave motherfucker

9/10 i was briefly transformed into a european model and stuart “two-dents” pot makes his debut as a falsetto rapper and also establishes himself as the coolest baddest hippest raddest mofo out there despite not being able to tie his shoes

ticker tape

it’s almost over :(

very dreamlike and chill

awwww the way he sings ticker tape is so cute

the whistling!

okay this one’s cute it’s like. very dreamy and sweet

cauterized and beautiful wow i like those words

i can see stu or russ singing this gently under their breath while just doing work. what a cute and sweet song

it’s about healing? maybe they’re healing their relationships with each other. i hope so

a sudden draft and quick chill, a single snowflake falls and that is all damon your imagery is fantastic as always

ohh the acapella is so nice. this means murdoc had to go buh buh buh in the back which is cute

the sudden stops are so quirky

again i love the crackling of vinyl at the ends of some of these

7/10 super cute and not what i expected at all from such a dark album

circle of friendz

the final song? ?? i hope it’s good i wanna give it a 10

ohhhh what’s gonna happen with this buildup

who’s breaking shit

aw these lyrics are cute even though they’re a little juvenile

a circle of friends :))))))

the growing instrumentals in the back are so sweet

stu and noodle singing my circle of friends as the last thing in the album rotted my teeth and gave me diabetes

a cute ending!!!! even though it didn’t wow me it made me smile

7/10 they are a happy family

faves: ascension, saturnz barz, momentz, submission, andromeda, busted and blue, let me out, the apprentice, out of body

overall: not going to give it a numerical rating because i would just give it a 10 because i was so excited for it. honestly i think it was a pretty solid album there weren't any breakout hits like feel good inc. or whatever but they did a really solid job on it in total. thenks damon albarn for my life please tell 2d and noodle and russel and murdoc i love them

#humanz liveblog #humanz #gorillaz #gorillaz humanz #gorillaz phase 4 #here it is i spent 2 hours on this and now i'm behind on homework rip #also my computer is about to die send help #mine #meta #breaking news

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