#women of noise fest

[womenofnoise]

WOMEN OF NOISE FEST

CHATTANOOGA, TN

SEPTEMBER 20TH - 21ST

8 PM BOTH DAYS

NO COVER, BUT DONATIONS HIGHLY NEEDED FOR TRAVELLING ARTISTS

LINEUP IS FINAL. NO OTHER ACTS WILL BE ADDED

DM FOR MORE DETAILS

POSTER BY @kaltsektion

[genderqueerdykes]

2024, yet another year where I see my local city's pride fest have a day specifically to "celebrate femininity" (called "She+ Fest") and then have no such day dedicated to a celebration like that that for masculinity, or gender neutrality/gender beyond the binary spectrum folks. there is a non-binary pride flag on the poster for this event, and yet it's only for feminine people. there's a lesbian flag on the poster, and yet it's only for "femininity", meaning butches will feel alienated and not want to attend.

it actually made me just want to cry because yet again masc & neutral/other gendered queers are made to feel like we're nothing special, like we're nothing worth celebrating, like we're meant to just blend into the crowd and be background noise, like there's nothing to be proud of and like we don't need community. if this event is for lesbians, where the hell do the butches go? where the hell do the femmes who aren't women and don't want to be seen as one go? why do we claim to love lesbians and then RACE to leave out butches and non woman identifying lesbians as fast as we fucking can?

the big issue here is this is yet again leaving masc and other gender queers with nowhere to go. no space to occupy. no way to meet each other in a concentrated and guided fashion. its great to uplift feminine people and women, i'm not complaining about the existence of this event; what I'm saying, however, is that it's glaringly apparent what people are implying by having an event only for "celebrating" femininity and then having so such events for other trans people. the message is deafening and hurts like hell.

to the people who say "the generalized pride events are made for you, why can't you just celebrate in those?" my answer is this: WHY do we need a day specifically dedicated to femininity, then? why can't femme queers celebrate in the generalized events, too? why are non-binary people only being recognized in a feminine context? why are we making it easy for feminine people to interact, but not masculine or gender neutral people? why do masc & neutral people have to wade through a sea of people to find other people just like us, but we create space after space for "feminine" nonbinary people and women. please create spaces for masc and other gender queers. we are begging you. we are tired of being told we're oppressors or that we're inherently dangerous to femme queers and women. we're sick of being told we don't deserve to be celebrated, or that we are nothing special.

our community can't keep going like this. masc & neutral queers need community, too. we need to be able to find and support each other, too. how is it 2024 and we're STILL only acknowledging non binary identities in a feminine context. our community is suffocating. masc & other gender queers are drowning. include EVERYONE and allow EVERYONE to find support from people just like them. this shouldn't be something we afford to just femmes and women. fuck out of here.

[darklydeliciousdesires]

Regal Fever - An Aemond Targaryen/Reader One Shot Story.

You are a whore within Madame Sylvi's brothel, and Aemond is your customer. It's literally a smut fest and nothing more, so enjoy, my loves!

Words - 3,804

Warnings - Smut below the cut, minors DNI!

The house of pleasure run by Madame Sylvi is perhaps the nicest of the brothel’s littering Silk Street, where whores ten a piece of silver can be found, each of them ready and waiting to spread her legs for her paying customer.  

You, however, much like the women you share the space with, are most certainly not ten a piece of silver whatsoever. 

“Oh, yes, dear,” Sylvi told you upon your seeking work within her establishment, many moons ago now. “You are a pretty one. Many a gold coin would be offered to lay with you.” 

And so there you are, whore to the highborn, the noble and the royal. Well, no regal gentlemen have lain with you as yet, but you often quietly wonder whether the princes of the realm might ever cast their gaze in your direction. They visit fairly often, after all.  

The attentions of the ailing King Viserys’s eldest son, you could do without, Prince Aegon a rude, boorish and cruel young man. His younger brother, however, hmm. The quiet confidence Prince Aemond carries himself with, paired with such chiselled, immaculate features, with him you would certainly keen to feel his Targaryen fire beneath your skin. 

Alas, he seems to gravitate towards the madame exclusively, unbothered by the wanton looks and lustful promises whispered to him by any other whore. With the night of the full moon seeming to bring out more in the way of clientele, your fellow working girls all parading themselves in swathes of silk that leave little to the imagination, some teasing the audience with decadent fan dancing, you think little of it when the younger prince himself arrives. 

Much like always, you simply continue to work the room looking ravishing for anyone but him, unmoved by his presence. After all, his visits are more frequent than most, and he rarely pays attention to anyone other than Sylvi herself. Although tonight, with Sylvi already hosting a man within her bed, it seems that the prince must make another choice. 

You cannot help it, though, to observe out of the corner of your eye, seeing him speaking with Lexia, a beautiful woman with endless braids of spun silver creeping down her back, contrasting like stars dotting a midnight sky against her deep, caramel flesh. Some whisper that she is a bastard of Targaryen lineage, rumours of her being fathered by Baelon the Brave abounding.  

Fitting, that he should be drawn to her. The Targaryen’s are known to sometimes favour their own blood, after all. 

However, after she has spoken with him, likely making him privy to the fact that Sylvi herself is otherwise engaged, he nods and moves on, Lexia continuing to tantalise the patrons with her soft, exotic dance moves. 

Your heart skips a beat as his gaze sweeps the room, searching for something, or rather someone. You busy yourself with refilling goblets of wine and laughing at jokes that aren't particularly funny, your mind whirling with the thought of the prince choosing another tonight. But then the air shifts, a palpable tension building as footsteps draw nearer. You dare not look up, even when the other women’s whispers grow louder. 

In the corner of your vision, you see the prince’s boots stop before you, and your breath catches. Slowly, you raise your eyes, your own curiosity overpowering your attempt at indifference. Your nerves send little tremors to your face, though, feeling your cheeks and lower lip gently begin to quake. 

He stands over you, casting a long, imposing shadow. The room seems to fall away, the noise of laughter, instrumental chimes and conversation fading into an indistinct hum as your entire focus narrows down to the prince before you. 

“Your name?” His voice is smooth, yet compelling. Also, deeply arousing too, you note.  

“Jasmine,” you reply, trying to keep the nervous wobble out of your voice, though you know the prince likely catches it. 

“Jasmine. Like the tea,” he repeats, savouring the taste of it on his tongue, as he likely would upon tasting the flower you named yourself after. It isn’t your born name, merely one you chose for the job. Something a little exotic, as Madame Sylvi suggested. 

He steps closer, the scent of leather and a hint of something spicy filling your senses. “I have been watching you.” 

You blink in surprise. “You have?” 

He reaches to you, tucking your hair behind your ear. Immediately, you flinch, and you aren’t sure why. Whenever Sylvi makes brief mention of him, she utters nothing to make anyone believe he’s anything less than gentlemanly. As a Targaryen, he’s likely still tyrannical and power thirsty, he certainly exudes that, but for women, perhaps something may soften.  

“Sweet thing, I mean you no harm.” Still, you aren’t sure whether or not to believe his statement, held fast in the bewitching stare of his lone violet eye. His presence carries with it a weight of dominance, after all, the prince reaching to trail a tapered finger along the curve of your jaw. “Quite the contrary, in fact, since I am told that Sylvi is otherwise occupied.” 

His lips curl, tilting into a roguish smile, watching as you gape, words not immediately coming to you. “You... y-you choose m-me?”  

Your stutters amuse him, yet there is a slither of impatience there in his silky drawl, you note. “I would not be standing here before you with my cock half-hard already if I did not. After all, one whore is as good as another, or perhaps you might be better, hmm?” You drop your gaze a little, the prince hooking his fingers beneath your chin, forcing your eyes to return to his. 

“Take me to your bed, Jasmine.”  

Setting the wine jug down upon a nearby silk swathed table, you turn back to him, extending your hand. He doesn’t notice to begin with, too transfixed by the soft round of your bare breasts to see you ready and waiting to lead him away.  

“My prince...” 

“Hmm?” He clears his throat, his cheeks flushing a little, fingers gently curling around your dainty hand. A cocky smirk tilts his mouth, not ashamed at all to have been caught falling into his lewd thoughts. “Pardon me. I was quite enjoying the view.” 

Your reply is but a seductive smile, leading him through the throngs of people over to the back of the brothel. Your bed area, much like the rest, is bordered by lacy curtains that give privacy between the little den of inequity and the main room itself.  

Reaching to part the fabric, you both enter, Aemond seating himself at the end of the round bed, fashioned with sumptuous velvet sheets and many large pillows made of the same. You��re about to ask him what he desires of you when his large, elegant hands come to bracket your waist, pulling you near, his mouth pressing a kiss between your breasts. 

The silks knotted at your hips come undone in his hands, gliding to the floor, his tongue licking a circle around your nipple. His mouth closes, sucking until it furls against his tongue. It makes arousal spark into life, a plus in your job, to be genuinely wet and keen for the man you are to lay for, rather than slicked ready with the assistance of exotic oils. 

“I was about to ask what you desired, my prince,” you purr, Aemond looking up at you, his eye glinting amethyst in the glow from the candlelight.  

He hums quietly, releasing your nipple, blowing upon it gently before his teeth snap in a soft bite, that glint in his eye turning a little wicked. “I desire your nipples in my mouth presently.” He then turns his attention to the other, his hands wandering in slow glide up your back. “Gods be good, you have perfect tits.”  

Perfect is how he touches them, too. Nothing less than you’d expect from a man who has lain with Sylvi herself for as long as he has. The madame shows a man how to pleasure a woman, should he be willing to learn, and from her cries of ecstasy throughout the brother whenever she has the prince within her bed, you know for certain that he has indeed been willing. You also recognise the difference between genuine ecstasy and a fake performance; if anyone has an ear for it, it is a whore. 

His hands creep around, stroking the swell of each breast, his mouth still delighting the left with sucks, the pebbled peak circled by his tongue as he reaches to your mouth, pushing two fingers against your lips. 

“Suck them,” he orders huskily. “Get them nice and wet.”  

Obediently, you open your mouth, receiving them against your tongue, sucking them with all the sensuality you would show should it be his cock between your lips. It's a little hint for him, a preview, if you will, over what he will soon enjoy.  

Pulling them away, he fixes you with an intent gaze, hand moving down your body, his other grasping the back of your thigh. “Move astride me, sweet girl. Splay those pretty petals for your prince.”  

You do, and he shifts a little further back upon the bed. “That’s it. Good girl.” His praise sends your insides to flutter, his wettened fingers pushing between your legs, breath catching in his throat. “Oh, I needn’t have bothered,” he grunts, your dew bathing his digits, Aemond bringing those gloss-slicked fingertips to his mouth and sucking with a faint, hungry moan. “Plenty wet enough for me already, I see.” 

“My prince cannot be surprised,” you purr, your fingers moving to his hair, weaving through the endless strands of cascading silver. “Not with how handsome he is, nor with how aptly he sucks upon a pair of tits.” 

Something darkens those handsome features for a fraction of a second, almost like he cannot believe there is any sincerity behind your assertion that he is handsome. It’s a tiny little dip in the confidence he has exuded in shades thus far, but you catch it.  

Any man likely would suffer such, being maimed at such a young age as he was, still a young man of only six and ten in years. Why should a prince be any different? Beneath the confident way he carries himself and royal title, he is but mortal flesh and blood. 

“I am not,” he begins, recovering himself, “merely pleased over how keen the little whore is to receive her prince.”  

His fingers return to the soft wet of your folds, teasing until the petals of your sex splay further for him, long strokes making your breath hitch. You gasp when those long, tapered digits meet your swollen little pearl, a shaky sigh fluttering from your mouth, Aemond gently clasping your jaw and guiding your lips to his.  

“Gevie,” he mutters against your mouth, kissing you again, his tongue gently rolling in silky swirls against yours. 

“What does that mean, my prince?” you ask, your fingers curling at the nape of his neck. 

His mouth moves to your throat, hot kisses pressed lightly. “It means beautiful. For you are, little whore.”  

Your lips curl into a crescent, his words and the pleasant stroke of his fingers causing your insides to hum, those fingers then slipping, teasing where you stream for him before pushing inside. While he seeks out a spot within that has you clenching tight, he uses the heel of his palm to press against your bud, gently rocking his hand into the sweet cavern of your sex, his mouth returning to your throat as you moan softly. 

“That’s it, sweet thing,” he moans throatily. “Let me hear you.”  

Your cadence trills in the air like song, and it is no amped up performance for the sake of his ego, his fingers working pure magic in the soaked mess of your cunt, while his palm grinds so deliciously against where you spark for him.  

“Tell me, Jasmine. How much do you ache for this to be my cock within you?” A little hint of teeth at your neck has you gasping, his dirty words even more so. “Or perhaps, you yearn for me to lick at the honey of this sweet cunt before I fuck you?” 

And you thought it was you who had to ask of his desires...  

“Whatever my prince wishes, I will be willing,” you whisper, lightning beginning to softly flicker at the base of your spine. “But if I may be so bold, my prince?” He raises an inquiring eyebrow. “You are overdressed. Allow me.”  

He continues to touch you around the removal of his clothes, a perfectly chiselled physique beneath blemish free, alabaster skin revealed to you. Gods, he is utterly divine, a creation almost too perfect to be real.  

Once he is as bare as you, he takes you at the hips, moving your body to the centre of the bed, settling himself before you. His hand smooths a stroke down your legs, widening your thighs, his lips following until his tongue begins lapping at your apex. 

Oh, gods. He’s good.  

Rarely do you find a man who thrives on giving pleasure to you when he is the one paying for your services, but the keenness Aemond goes about it with, you are left in little doubt that burying his mouth between your legs is exactly where his pleasure lies. You can always tell when a man genuinely enjoys it, thirsts for your womanhood.  

Thirst Aemond does, sucking upon you like you are sweeter than a ripe, Dornish peach, pressing the flat of his tongue against your tingling bud, wide licks having the sonnet of your cries rending the air. The amber of the candles glinting in his eye make the violet hues burn like purple fire, the prince watching as you lose yourself to his mouth. 

“That’s it, sweet thing,” he praises, “fall apart for me.”  

His mouth closes over your tender bundle, his cheeks hollowing as he sucks. It snaps through you like the heat of a summer storm, balmy and heavy, glimmers fizzing up your spine.  

“Oh, oh, you are incredible, my prince!” you wail, one hand clutching the velvet beneath you, the other tangling in his hair. “Gods be good, how I am going to repay the favour until your knees knock.”  

He sits up slowly, licking the sheen of you from his lips. “And who am I to refuse such a pledge? Although it would be a shame to give up this.” His thumb swipes through your folds, his eyebrows rising. “Maybe I do not have to just yet, though.”  

Moving, he settles upon his back, jerking his head. “Come here. You know exactly how I want you.” 

Indeed, you do, moving to arrange yourself in the way he desires, facing away from him as you straddle his chest, bending forward, feeling him tug your hips. He brings you to his mouth, sucking upon you as you take a hold of his cock, reaching beneath the pillows to locate your bottle of almond oil. You need it not for your own lubrication, but gods, how men love the feeling of their cocks worked with a slippery hand. Plus, it tastes nice. An added bonus.  

Decanting it, you push the stopper back in, returning your hand to him, slicking his entire length from base to tip. His cock is much like him, long and well-formed, Aemond groaning low around his suck upon your folds as he feels your hand working him in a slow, deft glide.  

That moan only deepens when you bring him to your mouth, sucking his cockhead, tongue working the tip in the kind of serpentine flicker that has his chiselled abs tensing beneath the press of your breasts. Steadily, you allow him into your mouth inch by inch, tightening your lips around him, your hand pulling at what remains and cannot fit, feeling him pulse against your throat.  

By the stars, the sounds it pulls from him. An aroused man is truly a feast for the senses.  

While your head begins to bob slowly, tongue touring every vein and ridge of his hardness, he continues to thoroughly attend to you with his mouth. The blade of his tongue stiffens, letting you grind against it, removing it only to suck upon you with hunger. 

The crest you felt near to before arranging yourself atop him is reignited, ecstasy pulsing, your muscles cording as you moan around his cock. Sinful fever reaches its peak, his tongue fluttering over your bud rapidly, big hands grasping your arse, a well-timed and equally well-placed smack to the left cheek the catalyst to your topping.  

“Fuck... gods... oh!” He brings you to a skittering, wailing eruption, hips quaking as they drive back against his mouth.  

“Mmm,” he groans, his tongue gentling against you. “You taste even sweeter when you come.” Moving his mouth, he scatters kisses to the back of your thigh, hands massaging your arse. “I want you on my cock. Now.” 

That little hint of dominance from him brings you back instantly to who he is, moving obediently to his command, straddling his hips.  

“No,” he speaks, his hands grasping your waist. “Turn around. I want to watch you, see your eyes as you ride me.”  

He shuffles back to lean against the mass of pillows, welcoming you onto his lap with smouldering kisses as you steer him to your streaming hole, gliding down on every last girthy inch of him with a soft mewl. Gods be good, he feels amazing, stretching your cunt, your folds splaying around the thick of him, your mouth hanging open in exclamation.  

“I’m going to dream of this cock, you know, when I have to fuck someone who’s lacking. It’ll be you who I’ll be thinking about.”  

He smiles, all arrogance and pride. “Of course. Feels good, doesn’t it?” While he might’ve let his demeanour slip momentarily earlier, not truly believing your compliment over his handsomeness, the same does not extend to his cock, it seems. He knows exactly what he has.  

“Good? My prince, it is divine.”  

Satisfied by your answer, he leans to you, sucking your nipples, hands stroking up your back as your body rocks against his. It’s contained for only a short time, your hands moving back to support yourself on his thighs, feet pressing flat either side of his hips as you begin working yours in a figure of eight.   

His cock hits you at every angle, scraping your depths at you watch his brow crease, mouth agape, groaning as you fuck him with all the finesse you’ve learned in reducing a man to a quivering wreck beneath you. You can feel yourself streaming down his length, his eye fallen to watch you split wide around him, the sounds of your groans and flesh smacking together filling the air as you begin to ride him hard.   

“That’s it. Gods, fuck, that’s it, my sweet little whore,” he rasps. “Fuck me.” 

By the gods, how you do, moving your hips in the way that has him entranced, tethers him, yanks him to mindlessness. You watch his eye focusing on you before it rolls back, his mouth dropping open as his head thuds against the pillows, unmoored for a few moments. 

His gaze then returns to watch you sinking up and down his thick length, your cunt glossing his shaft, the wettened sheen glinting in the candlelight. You slow a little, giving him a moment to truly enjoy the sight, every vein and ridge of his cock dragging your walls beautifully, your hand smoothing over your skin to reach where you’re joined with him.  

Stroking where you are fused, your fingers dampened adequately, you rub little circles upon your bud, glimmers suffusing, Aemond focusing on the sight only momentarily before bringing his thumb to his mouth, sucking it, reaching to knock your hand aside. 

“Allow me, sweet thing,” he rasps, his smirk growing wicked, “trust me, you shall need both hands to hold on.”  

When his hips buck up, the power behind the movement almost unseats you, and you reach to draw his thighs up behind you, leaning back, your hands tightening in their clutch. He arrows your cunt with vigour, the sound of his cock slamming into your sopping walls filling the air, the voracity of his fuck knocking the breath from you. 

“Look how well you take it,” he praises, loving the sound of your frantic wails as he continues to assail you, spearing up into you rapidly. “Yes, that’s it. Let me hear those helpless little cries.”  

He’s sending you to the edges of the heavens above, the pleasure almost biting, your verbal exclamations seeping beyond the confines of your bed, adding to the erotic choruses of the brothel. Each snap of his hips has heat misting up your spine, shocks of lightning breaking from strikepoint to strikepoint, your walls beginning to flutter madly around his shaft. 

By the time he’s grunting hard and spilling thick and hot into you, you’re falling apart upon the deep punch of his cock, his thumb rubs sending pulsing skitters through your clit. The nirvana of it flushes wild through your blood, all that was frantic slowing, his hips coming to rest down once more as you both pant furiously. 

It’s still ebbing away gently as you dismount him, your thighs shaky, lying down beside him. By all the gods... he’s nothing short of a truly magmatic fuck.  

Turning to you, he skims the apple of your cheek with his thumb. “Yes, my pretty little whore. You will be sweet for me again before I am to leave.”  

You are twice more, in fact, Aemond leaving a pouch of coins behind plentiful in weight. He glides from the brothel just as fluidly as he entered it, leaving you counting out Sylvi’s cut, swathing yourself in your silky robe before going to locate the woman herself and pass her a fistful of gold.  

She eyes you, a small smirk tilting her mouth. “Did you enjoy him?” Looking down, she examines her fingernails idly, picking at a stray cuticle. “It sounded as if you did, girl.” 

Little flashes from your night with him replay speedily through your mind, your heart quickening. “You taught him very well.” 

Sylvi’s knowing smirk grows, lifting her head a little before she turns to walk away. “You’re welcome.”  

Welcome, and completely spent. It’s a very good job he left you with enough gold to needn’t worry about taking another customer that night. As Aemond returns clandestinely through the streets back to the Red Keep, you fall down to your bed and into slumber upon sheets that still bear his scent.  

How you cannot wait for the day he might return to them again.  

[honestsycrets]

HELLO, HELLO! Okay, so this drabble prompt/idea is kinda sorta in the vein of Querido (I only think about Old Western Miguel now I cannot help it pls forgive me head empty only man and hörse), so pls skip if you're not inspired or in the mood for more in this genre!

Still, I offer you this: Sheriff Miguel.

He's someone all the women have their eyes on, and he'd have his eyes on them, too, if he were younger. But he has a baby girl to worry about, a runaway wife to forget, and a town to keep an eye on, especially when a woman from the big city pays the little down a visit.

He meets her when he loses Gabriella in the market's crowd, only to find her tugging on a fine dress belonging to a fine woman.

(P.S. reading your writing has inspired me to get back into writing my own reader insert stuff 💖 really love your work, keep it up!!)

bumblebee | sheriff!miguel x dressmaker!reader

❛ pairing | sheriff-singleparent!miguel o'hara x dressmaker!reader

❛ type | extended drabble, not-explicit, wc: 2600ish

❛ summary | miguel loses his daughter-- and finds a part of himself he thought was long past dead.

❛ tags | self-edited, querido au, f!reader, sheriff!miguel, dressmaker!reader, implied parental abandonment, some mention of thievery, widowed!reader, mostly fluff, some mention of death, spanish not translated.

❛ sy's notes | i intended this to be a drabble but... it's quite a bit longer. anon, i hope you end up writing to your heart's content.

Miguel ain’t the kinda man women really need. He’s the kinda man they think they want. A big man with a big name, sure, but he’s saddled with what their fathers colloquially call baggage. A little three-year-old girl with ambitions of rolling on out of this little town by rolling on out of his fingertips. 

“Oye, Gwen,” he catches the arm of his deputy. She’s out on the town just as he was, making rounds about the grassy plain where the market was booming. With too few stalls, the marketgoers visit full wooden wagons chock-full of goods. This year, there were new boxes of small circular chocolates. Once every year, his quiet little town became a bustling fuck fest with foreigners running a muck of it all. As sheriff, he just had to deal with it. 

“What’s it, sheriff?” she asks. “Something wrong?” 

“You seen my littlin anywhere? Swore she was right here.”

This is his penance for fooling around with the hearts of pretty women: chasing him his own little girl and minding the crowd. His long, slicked-back hair was all kinds of out of place, whirling over his wrinkled forehead. He shoves a strand of grey hair back in place out of his dark eyes and scans his little town. She could’ve slipped into any creaky old building that wasn't locked up or hitched a ride on a wagon she didn’t belong on. Or, alternatively…

“Miguel! Rio saw her by the sweets.” Former Sherriff Morales tells him, standing by his son’s stall of sweet roasted corn. Ordinarily, he’d give it a begrudging visit. Miguel whirls around on his muddy leather boots, throwing him a nod of thanks with Gwen short on his tail. 

“Sounds promisin’,” she says. “Could be searchin’ for Lyla or Peter.” 

“Thank you for the help, Sheriff,” he grumbled, shoving his way past a sea of cream, brown, and black dresses. Gwen could spider her way through the groups of people with her comparatively slender frame. As a consequence of Miguel’s hulking frame, he’s markedly slower in his search.

“Ain’t here either,” Gwen hops back to his side. “You sure she wandered off?” 

"She had to."

The alternative was… well, he didn't want to think about it. Out of his periphery, he caught the glimmer of polished metal. He spots his daughter’s peachy dress, bundled up with a fat white bow complete with a bell. He put the thing on thinking that, ideally, his little girl would jingle up some hell of noise if she got lost. Some good that bell did. 

“You lost mi amor?” 

Lost. The word stands out to him first, all dressed up in a sugar cube of a voice. His Gabriella tugs on a stranger’s long gown, eyes pricked with tears streaming down her cheeks. Of all the people-- she couldn’t just pick on someone she knew? Head to Rio’s hostel, find Deputy Gwen stalking around, or even Hobie’s bum ass strumming a tune on the old stage. No, she’s with a strange woman. 

“Now don’t you cry,” you dab away the stray tears with an embroidered handkerchief. “I’ll find you home.” 

You’re not from here because you’re all done up like a buttercup in spring when the women here only broke out color for church. Corset sucking in the finest assets, a buttercream bustle underneath that buttercup yellow skirt. Hair up in a waterfall of curls and covered by a small slouched hat of flowers. You held a parasol for the evening sun, keeping it off your tanned skin. 

“There,” Miguel set his hands on his hips, catching his head in a shake. Gwen leans over on the ball of her feet and stares straight down the barrel of a path. 

“My my,” she says. “Ain’t she a looker. Why are you-- You look good, Miguel.” 

She’s caught on his frantic fiddling. The way Miguel straightens his tie into his waistcoat and checks the chain that drapes along his side. He checks the time on his cracked pocketwatch and spins it between his fingers. Gwen leans up to flick a stray strand of hair away from his face.

“Think so?” 

“Entirely presentable.” 

"¿De veras?" Miguel clears his throat, “Best be on my way to get her.” Miguel loops his fingers on his fine leather belt and waltzes right on up to your stall of hand-sewn dresses. 

For once in his life, he feels underdressed. A man sets some coins in your hand, plucking up a small communion dress for his daughter. With ruffles, lace, and the occasional ribbon. He’s not sure how much luck you’d have selling more than scraps of ribbon in this little town. You set the coins aside, turning your attention back to his daughter who-- somehow, got a brand new ribbon bundled in her ponytail between his fiddling and the walk over.

“Buenas tardes,” he clears his throat, whipping out his metal badge. “I’m Sherriff O’Hara.” 

“Encantada, Sheriff O’Hara. You’re looking as pretty as a penny this fine afternoon. Can’t be wanting any of my dresses. My name is… well, how can I help you?” 

“Papa,” Gabriella coos as if this whole mess wasn’t on her tiny little shoulders. He wasn't sure if that was good or bad, not yet.

“Yes, mami, Sheriff O’Hara. Do you know old Sheriff O’Hara?” Miguel suppresses his delight as you lift her up onto your hip. Most days, he didn’t notice his own melancholy. Coming home to his little girl soothed all that like a good helping of booze after a bad wound. “She likes you.” 

You sure talk pretty. He clears his throat, pulling on the sloppy tie that feels a whole lot hotter all of a sudden. He shouldn't be acting like this. Has it really been that long since he’s been with a girl? He couldn't go to the saloon and pick any one of those lovesick girls. The town wouldn’t continually elect a loose man. Miguel’s eyes catch the flickering gold of a bumblebee locket on your chest. He traces the curve of its wings, wrapping around a crusted gem.

“‘Course she does, she’s my girl. I lost Gabi up in the crowd flow.” 

“You lost her? You can’t tell me you’re the kinda man that does it all. Where is your wife?”

Where is your wife? The question tormented him. He could do it all. Managing the sloppy, slow thieves and putting down the occasional drunken brawl. At the end of the night, he came home to his empty home and saw his little girl. Miguel’s gaze danced along the puffy clouds in the sky. The fluffy clouds drift the same as usual, the same old slow draw, unknowledgeable about the change in his life. He suppresses the distant melancholy in his voice in surfacing old memories. 

“Ain’t got a wife. She ran off on me with some wolf. Usually, I got a sitter for my girl but, she came down with a fever.”

“A wolf?” you repeat after him, “Why, you mean a gentleman?” 

A gentleman, he scoffs under his breath.

“If you wanna call him that. He was an outlaw.” 

“I’m mighty sorry, Sheriff.”  You looked at the little girl in your arms. Gabriella’s small fingers fiddle with the glimmering gold pendant on your chest. He throws her a look-- behave. She’s not paying attention one bit. You set your parasol down, freeing the necklace and setting it in her tiny fist. “I’m a whole widow myself. Lost my man in the war and never got the chance to have one’a my own.” 

“You don’t say. You on the market?”

“On the market like cattle?” you teased. If he’s not mistaken, that shy smile of yours was all his. Maybe you like him. It's a signal that he could keep going. 

“Coño, no. You’re too fine for that,” the words are buttery smooth, but upon discovering how the words may come off, he realizes he might be sliding into a trap on the back of those words. Your lips are slightly agape, half in shock. “Pretty. You’re too pretty.” 

“Oh, Sheriff, don’t worry your head,” you adjust Gabriella on your hip, swaying in place like it was natural. “I ain’t one to take offense to pretty words. Suppose you want your niña back?” 

There went his chance.

"That'd be best," he slides his hands underneath Gabriella’s tiny arms to pick her up. The pendant she held clattered free from her grip, nestled in the deep grass. You were about to pick it up when a scrawny thing of a man swiped it from the grass. For an instant, Miguel thought it might be Pavi, who loved to be helpful in the most annoying ways. Catching doors even when it's men, dropping his scarf on mud for girls, a charming and shy kid. It isn’t, though, it’s that weasel he seems to be throwing in the pin every damn week, bolting off in a full-on run. 

“Ay, not my locket!” you gasped, plucking your skirts over your boots. 

“Maldito niño--” Miguel stops you, sliding Gabriella back into your arms. Not that she was complaining, tiny hands slapping together in a rendition of applause as Miguel darted after him, his booming steps beating the ground. “Get back here, kid!”  

“Dios, you sure have a busy papa. I'm sure he’ll back in two shakes of a lamb's tail.” You looked between the little girl nestled comfortably in your arms and the parting sea of the crowd. Gwen zooms past, eliciting another round of jovial laughter from Gabriella O’Hara. She does love a good game.

It ain’t that Miguel wants to leave his girl with any old fool that waltzed on into his town. But he knows his community, knows they’d not leave him out to dry, and knows that taking his daughter on a town-wide chase with a skinny little weasel around town is not the move. Especially not if he has a gun, which he did, because of course he did. Now, the man has a jail cell and Miguel has a crook in his neck from where the buffoon fell through the crooked second floor of the post office.

He works the sore muscle the whole way back to your wagon. It’s high time for eating. His stomach was raging after the scent of someone’s pulled pork, the roasted sweetness of corn. If we wanted to be presentable then, he sure wasn’t now. Dust was a second skin on his pants and aged boots. He walks past the platform where Hobie plays a tune with his banda. Most vendors were wrapping right on up for some proper debauchery.

He finds you there, swaying to the beat of the music with Gabriella hanging in your arms. Her tiny hands were around an ear of elote already. Guess she extorted a snack out of you. 

“One gold locket,” Miguel heaves out the words as he digs in his pocket, whirling the golden chain into your small hand. You flip it over once, then twice, examining it for any defects. “Better to keep that tucked away out here. Puts a target on your back right quick.”

“Muchísimas gracias, sheriff. You're a sweetheart,” you reach out, grazing his scratchy cheek with your supple lips. Gabriella is flatly squished between his sweaty chest and yours. She’s fallen asleep flat against your chest. “You don’t know how much this necklace means to me.” 

There are whispers from the women he’s turned down. The viejitas who have been trying to set him up for a full-on year now, those who told him he needed to find a girl as soon as possible to marry. He didn’t want to. Not unless it made sense. 

“Yes, well, you could tell me,” Miguel finally picks his daughter from your arms. She’s out like a light. “If you want.” 

“It was my mami's, once upon a time. She gave it to me on my wedding day," you explain. "It's all I got left of her. I wonder what she'd think of me these days, travelin' town to town like I got secrets."

"You ever think of settlin' down again?" He turns his gaze past Hobie’s banda, to the yellowing sky. The sun is setting out over the horizon, casting warm orange and soft pink into the air. The road is full of wagons. The clip-clop of horses running their way to the next town, some checked in to the hostel.

"A veces," you explain. "If it feels right, I think I will."

"Yeah?" He settles on the bed of your wagon. The dresses were packaged and kept in locked chests, kept away from the bed of the wagon where your blanket was. Most of the foreigners have left, but you. He doesn’t have to guess to know that it was his fault. “You off to Rio’s hostel?” 

“‘fraid I’m out of town,” you smiled at him. “She ain’t got any rooms. Next city over might.” 

“Stay with me,” he says. “The night. Bit too late to get robbed on the road with all them pretty dresses you make. Wouldn’t be right to be sheriff and let a young thing out there without company. Some'a them outlaws take wives that way, y'know.” 

“Oh, Sheriff O’Hara, ain’t no one care about widows on the road,” your hand finds your chest. It’s said with a laugh, as though someone, somewhere, made you feel less than. It wasn’t going to be Miguel.

"Ain't a widow if you're carried off." He reclines, watching the figures of couples dancing to whatever the hell Hobie was playing on his guitar. His eyes track over Hobie’s gloved fingers that prance across the strings, waiting for you to walk back on that stupid comment. You do, snapping out a fan in the waist of your heavy dress to fan yourself.

“You really sure? I don’t mean to be a burden. I’m sure you got better to do than take care of company.” 

“You took care of my girl. Least I could do. Long as you go to church in the morning.” 

“Oh, now he’s askin’ me to church. When’s the wedding, Sherriff?” 

“Miguel. Soon as you want it,” he returns, half a smile pulling at a normally closed-off face. Miguel turns to set his Gabi down on your blanket, throwing you a look for permission. You nod, watching her roll on the wool thing, setting her hands under her cheek until she gets into a position that isn’t as bad as laying on her back. He tucks her hair back over the shell of her ear, exhaling a breath. Somewhere between his ex-wife’s flight from the town and today, she began to look more and more like him. He’s thankful for that. He doesn’t need more memories of her. Only needed to get through each day, and make the next better than the one before.

“She’s tuckered out,” you lean down, just by his face. “All that escapin’ papa work.” 

“Si,” Miguel hums as he massages his sore shoulder. “Tell me about it. I’m getting too old for this.” 

He lifts his head from his daughter’s tiny body, reminded of all the times someone told him to get married. If not the women chasing him around his jail at all hours of the day, then the women at church who, at the moment, were gossiping away. He could hear the prattle already: sheriff likes rich girls. The type to have a golden locket and French silk. The luxury of hopping from town to town like some no-good woman. He’d wager, your husband ain’t had the money to take care of you but for these light luxuries. Traveling town to town wasn't no small feat.

Tch. He’d deal with it tomorrow when he took you to church. Scandalous as that was.

“Fancy a dance?” he offered up his hand. 

You remove your gloves, skin is soft and supple against his, only marred by the pricks of a needle. Your gloved fingers grazed his scarred palm, tracing the long strike that marred his open palm. There’s a thought there, just behind the reach of your playful eyes. He couldn’t quite reach it. 

“I’d love to, Miguel.” 

Something tells him he has time to.

[melanieph321]

Ruben Dias x Reader - Not Ready Part 5/12

Part 6 and Part 7 are out on my Patreon!

Readers sister dies in a tragic car accident, leaving reader and her boyfriend Ruben in the urgent custody of her niece and nephew. Readers' life is suddenly flipped upside-down since having children hadn't been the plan for her and Ruben's life together. At least not now, when his football career was reaching great new heights.

Enjoy! 💞

If Manchester City were playing at home you were expected to be there, supporting your boyfriend. At least that's what the other players' girlfriends were doing.

You sat amongst the WAG's without a ring. But after sitting through ninety minutes of comparing vacation pictures on Instagram, you felt that you might have more in common with the married women and their children. Although you and Ruben hadn't talked about starting a family yet, your relationship felt closer to that stage than a stage where the two of you are only in it for a good time.

"It's a victory. Everyone's going out to celebrate, are you coming?" One of the girl's asked you. Perhaps she was Joško's new boe. She was sweet but a real party girl. You ended up accepting her offer, for the subconscious reason that letting loose on a dance floor might be enough to fill the emptiness inside of you. At least for the moment.

"I'm gonna get another drink." You shouted in Ruben's ear.

"You sure?"

"Yes, I want one. I can handle it." He let you go, but kept an eye on you as you made your way across the dance floor towards the bar. The club you had gone to was a real Posh Fest, playing none of the music that you liked. However, all Ruben's friends were there and they seemed to be having a great time.

"One shot of patron please!" You felt ridiculous, peering over a dozen heads just to hand the bartender your debit card. He swiped it, the price outrageous for one shot, but at least tequila was handed to you with a complementary slice of  lime. You carried it across the room, carefully balancing the glass as not to spill its content. But that's when you felt your phone buzz in your purse, forcing you to down the shot right where you stood, before answering the call.

"Hello, mom?" You exited the club just to get away from the noise. However, no one was heard on the other end of the line, or at least they weren't saying anything.

"Emmy?" A feeling in your gut told you that it was her and when a low sniffle sparked in your ear, you just knew. "Oh Emmy."

"Auntie Y/N, can you please come and get us?"

"Sweetie, you know I can't do that. We've been over this." 

The children lived with your parents in Bournemouth now and they were expected to start school soon. You often called to check on them, no doubt missing having them around.

"I wanna live with you and Uncle Ruben."

"Baby, I know you do." You crossed the street, a Seven Eleven up ahead. There you took a seat by a table near a window, with a view of the club and the many people fighting to get in. "We promise to come visit you in the summer." You said, trying to sound as cheerful as possible.

"But summer is so far away." She cried. A squeal that cut like knives in your ear.

"I'm so sorry Emmy,  but you and your brother are going to have to get used to it down there with Grandma and Grandpa. At least until your dad feels better." Or better yet, check himself out of rehab. Turns out that Liza's husband had struggled with alcohol addiction for most part of his life. However, your sister had never mentioned anything about it to you before. It was not like her. Nevertheless, Emmy and Vale's dad was not allowed to see them until he had gone through a rehabilitation program, completing it.

"Auntie Y/N...." 

"Yes, sweetie?"

"I miss mommy."

Your heart ached. A painful throb. However, you had to compose yourself. For Emmy. "I miss her too." You spoke with no air in your lungs. All of you empty. "So much."

"I have to go to bed now. Goodnight."

"Goodnight baby. Talk to you—" The line went flat before you could finish the sentences. A silent beat drumming in your ear.....

Read full chapter and more on my Patreon

[fan-goddess]

For your k!nktober fest, could we please get Osferth x mutual masturbation? Maybe mutual pining for one another but they both are painstakingly pious and it eventually just...spills over?

Authors Note: I AM SO SORRY FOR HOW LONG THESE LAST REQUESTS HAVE TAKEN I GENUINELY AM SO SORRY ABOUT IT! Here it is now I hope you can enjoy it!

Warnings: masturbating from both people, sort of perving on osferths part, simp osferth, short praising, kissing, marriage talk, they moving fast (if I miss any let me know so I can add them!)

Taglist: @sofiyathecunt, @marvelgirl123, @sylasthegrim, @mochi-rose, @valeskafics, @humanpurposes, @watercolorskyy, @blue-serendipity, @omgbrcat

As a child, ever since you had been brought to the nunnery, the church had been all you’d ever really known.

You were taught the life of Christ and the life of the church, and that it would be the only life you would ever truly know.

The worst part about it all, was that you truly believed it to be true. That is however, until you met Uhtred and his men one afternoon.

You had never thought of them as savages, rather just men simply protecting their country, regardless of the individual faiths they each followed.

Which, was probably why you found yourself so fascinated and intrigued by the warrior monk called Osferth, who almost every night joined you and a few others women in the monastery to pray.

You’ve conversed with him very little times outside of the monastery. Only speaking to him on small meaningless topics, such as the words of Christ or other things similar.

And yet a part of you burns for more than that.

You know the monk is not as pious as the others are. The whispers of his visits to the brothels leave your ears burning in a mixture of embarrassment and longing every time you hear them uttered by the other women.

You’ve watched him from afar for so long, and yet you know it would never feel the same as if you were with him. His touch, whenever you managed to feel the roughness of his skin on yours as he passed you sometimes, somehow made you weak in the knees without him even trying.

You cannot deny either that the weakness prayed upon you whilst you laid in bed at night. Your hands trailing down to your core that leaked with evident arousal for him.

It was so sinful, and yet it was way too enjoyable to stop yourself from doing it.

The images of Osferth coming to you in the dead of night, treating your body so carefully yet so sinfully. It leaves small gasps panting from your sore lips where you had been biting to try and keep the noise down.

It was embarrassing to realise, that the sound of your fingers pleasuring yourself can be heard by you with how wet you are. But no one was around to hear them, right?

Osferth has never truly felt like he belonged anywhere, apart from with Uhtred and the others. They were his new found family. His brothers. He never felt like he could truly connect so easily with another person. That is what he thought for a years. Until however, he met you.

You were kind. So kind to him and the others when you met him at the gates. You offered a smile so bright he could believe the heavens had been brought to earth, and offered food and water to him and the others for their travels, even though your fellow sisters looked at you bewildered, surprised you were so kind to the savages he and the others were so used to being called.

And yet you didn’t call them that. You’d asked for his name, and have kept calling him that the entire time you’ve conversed with him. It was almost strange, that for the first time in a long while he was called his name. Yet Osferth did not deny how nice it sounded coming from your lips. How angelic is seemed to be.

Which is why late at night when his sins consumed him, it made him so angry with himself when it was your angelic smile he saw before him, imaging your lips as you smiled and allowed him to take you as a husband takes a wife.

He prayed for forgiveness whenever he could, and yet that didn’t seem to be enough to keep himself restrained. If anything his longing for you was increased more than ever.

He’d feel your soft hands brushing his own as he passed you something, whether that be a basket of bread, or even simply passing you your bible that you’d left in the pew, and find himself hard and throbbing in his trousers, begging for the feel of your wet walls around him.

The whores, were no help in quenching his desire. No matter how much he indulged himself in the warmth of their flesh. His body only craved yours.

Which is why Osferth feels such hate and resentment for his actions when he arrives at your door, hand raised ready to knock and alert you if his presence.

Yet as his fist is about to make contact with the dark wood, certain noises force his body to stop. Certain, familiar noises he remembers hearing only from the pleasure from the pleasure house.

They were moans. Osferth is in shock with his mouth hung wide, as he swears he’s hearing feminine moans coming from your chambers.

He feels like a pervert standing there, just listening to you as you seemingly pleasure yourself. Only what he begins to wonder, is if there’s someone in there with you, making you feel that way. So he moves, and knocks at the door, regretting everything he’s ever done to lead to this moment when he hears hurried movement from inside the room, before the door opens and you greet him with bight red cheeks, no doubt your previous activities.

“Osferth? What are you doing here at this time?” You ask, voice breathless as you try to take deep breaths without seeming obvious.

His hands clench themselves into fists by his side, as it takes everything within him not to lunge at you and kiss you right there and then. To give you another reason to have bright red cheeks. “I-I came to see you.”

Oh fuck him. Your checks seem to have gotten darker from blush and your eyes trail to the floor quickly. Osferth never thought the meek look would affect him this much, and yet here he is, affected so easily like a virgin all over again.

“To see me? Why would you wish to see me at this time of night?”

“I heard you!” He blurts, his restraint slowly coming undone before his very eyes. Your own eyes though, look up and quickly widening before looking straight back down to the floor. Your whole form practically closing in on itself in embarrassment. A strange silence taking over the corridor as the only noise he can currently hear is the rapid beat of his heart in his ears.

“I’m sorry…” He can hear you murmur. A strange sight really, seeing you meek and so out of character for the first time he’s met you.

“You, you do not have to be-“ He coughs, his own deep blush taking over his face and neck no doubt as he realises the predicament hes found himself in, and how much he strangely likes it. “It is a normal thing! To, to self pleasure.”

It’s an awkward moment, but Osferth swears he can feel something brewing between the two of you. Something bubbling over that waits to be spilled.

It’s no surprise to him though that he’s the one whose feelings cannot be contained, and his lips find themselves on yours, claiming them passionately and possessively, his hands never being able to find purchase as they roam your whole body to map out everything.

The sound of a clicking door goes unnoticed as the two of you can only feel each other in that moment. Oblivious to the fact you were both a man and a woman passionately embracing each other in a closed room, away from those who could hear you.

“I find myself caring about you,” The words spill before he can stop them. Like the feeling of your lips on his own have cast a spell on him. “And thinking of you in ways a husband should only think of a wife. But my restraint is strong, as I do not wish to tarnish you before our wedding night, if we are lucky enough to have one. I do not wish to betray who has brought us together. Is that okay with you?”

“Osferth….” You place a hand on his cheek, and he can’t help himself from leaving into the feeling of your warmth. His need for your body showing itself clearly to you. “Its okay understand. Our faith, has its boundaries and restrictions. But…”

You step closer, and his breathing becomes ragged as your face comes closer to his than he’d ever think it would be. His head screaming at him to kiss you again when he feels your breath teasing his lips.

“But we can do other things…” That is all Osferth needs to hear, as he lunges forward to cup your head in his hands, and connect his lips to yours once more. A fire burning within him that burns only for you.

“So beautiful…” He murmurs, unable to keep himself away from your hold. Adoring the way you preen at his words and move against him. He knows you can feel his cock aching in his trousers, and as much as he wants to claim you, he knows he cannot.

So Osferth has another idea in mind, that’ll no doubt bring the both of you some satisfaction.

“Get on the bed my lady…” He mumbles, watching your body carefully as you do as he says. Standing there whilst you lay on your back, looking at him with anxious eyes, your lips stuck between your teeth.

“You look beautiful…” He murmurs, allowing himself to stand at the edge of the bed and admire you while you lay there. “I cannot allow myself to besmirch your body in sin. But as you said…” His hands move to undo his robes, revealing himself to you and blushing slightly as he sees you staring at him, seemingly unable to look away. “There are others things we can do…”

His hands shake as he clasps one around his cock, groaning slightly as he begins to work it with his rough hand. Arousal practically dripping from his tip as he sees your own hands travel beneath your night clothes to your cunt, where you unknowingly tease him from the slight. He is unable to see what it is you are doing, and even still, pure groans of pleasure stumble from his lips as he pleasures himself. His eyes are unable to look away from your whole body, wishing he could imprint the noises and the sight of you in front of him in his head to forever remember.

If it wasn’t blasphemous to say, he’d say this was the most heavenly thing on earth.

“Such a good girl…” Osferth groans, a slight barely audible whimper escaping his lips, your own sounds only tightening the coil of his orgasm in his stomach.

“I-I’m so close!” You whine, and it’s all over for him, as his seed spills into his hand and onto the bed. Your own peak crashing down on you not long after, and a strange yet comforting silence overcomes the two of you as Osferth moves to lay beside you, your body already moving to hold his own.

His hands clasp around your waist and pulls your close, leaving a small affectionate kiss on the crown of your head. “I wish to do this properly. I want to court you, in the traditional was. If- if that is what you want of course!”

Your lips move into a kind smile as you make a small giggle, and Osferth can’t help but find himself adoring the sound already.

“Of course I would wish to court you Osferth! I would want nothing more!”

“Good.” He smiles, moving so he can slowly push his lips on yours and savour the warm feeling he knows is love that is brewing his chest. “I refuse to allow my lady to go unsatisfied for long.”

[howlingday]

Silvers Republic

Summer: "Oh, Summer~! You sure have a lot of sway as a leader. Kiss me~!"

Summer: Okay!

Summer: (Mashes Summer and Raven dolls, Making kissy noises)

Ruby: Hey, Mom?

Summer: (Eats dolls) Hello, Ruby! I'm just reading this book! What can I do for you?

Ruby: Well, you know how you say the Silver-Eyed Kingdom is the greatest kingdom in the world?

Summer: It sure is!

Ruby: Well, I was just wondering... What makes us so great? How did we come to be?

Summer: Wow... My girl~! Ruby, let me take you on a journey...

Summer: ...to the other side of this room.

Summer: (Starts slide show) The Story of Silvers! It all begins with these beautiful baby girls drinking from some she-wolf mommy milkers~!

Ruby: That's gross.

Summer: YOU'RE GROSS- I'm sorry! I'm sorry! (Pets her) You're not gross. You're my daughter and I love you. These two girls were Sylvia and Salem and when they grew up, they founded Silvers. But there was just one problem; they couldn't agree on which of them should be the Queen.

Ruby: But they worked it out peacefully, right?

Summer: Oh, heavens no! Salem blasted a hole through her sister's chest! Here's a picture~!

Ruby: Our first queen committed sororicide?!

Summer: I know! Look at her face! She's all... "WAAAGH~!"

Ruby: At what point do we become the greatest civilization, Mom?

Summer: Well, at first, Silvers was full of women. I'm talking a real clam fest, y'know what I mean?

Ruby: Yes, ma'am.

Summer: So we invited some neighboring kingdoms over for a big feast and then we literally kidnapped ALL of their men! Here's a picture~! HA! Look at that one's face! He's all like, "BAAAAAGH~!" HA HA HA!

Ruby: This is messed up.

Summer: YOU'RE MESSED UP! Agh! Sorry! Sorry. () I'll... be a better mother. I promise.

Summer: So then, finally, after centuries of monarchy, including the disappearance of our Queen, Salem, her successors started getting a little too big for their britches. So we overthrew the queendom and established Silvers as a republic!

Ruby: Is that when the killings stopped?

Summer: Oh, heavens no! That's when the killings SOARED, baby~! We went wild and drove off the Schnees, crippled the Nikos, and enslaved the Arcs! WOO! What a rush~!

Ruby: Mom, the Silver-Eyed Kingdom seems pretty barbaric.

Summer: YOU'RE BARBARIC! Oh! I almost forgot about the time a prophet told The Sister of Darkness that her sister would overthrow her, so... so, she grabbed her sister and she literally ate her own sister! Seconds after making up with her!

Ruby: ...I don't want to see a pic-

Summer: Here's a picture~!

Ruby: MOM! LOOK AT THAT! That's messed up, dude! Are we really this uncivilized?!

Summer: HEY! If we were so uncivilized, would we use communal toilets where we all fart and poo together in one big, stinky, steamy, dirty toilet room?!

Ruby: YEAH, MOM! WE WOULD!

--------------------------------------------------

It gets gross.

Summer: Clean your butt with the sponge, Ruby!

Ruby: But all these ladies just used it!

Maria: What's wrong with you girl, Summer?

Ruby: I don't want to be here! This is so weird!

Summer: YOU'RE WEIRD! Argh! Sorry... You're not weird. I'm sure you're (Pets her) probably fine.

Summer: (Looks over)

Ruby: (Smeared with nasty) ...BAAAAGH!

[softguarnere]

I've never participated in the lovely @blind-dates-fest before, so we're actually trying two new things this weekend: a new writing challenge, and writing for The Pacific for the first time. This OC has been banging around in my head for months now, so this seemed like a good time to introduce her - especially since she'll be making a cameo or two in one of my ongoing BOB fics. Without further ado, I hope y'all will enjoy Samantha "Mandy" Majors ♥️

The Deception of Appearances

Realistically, Mandy is aware that these are the men who are fighting for their country. The heroes of Guadalcanal can do as they please. But as MacDonald pushes his way through the bar’s crowd of wild, drinking men and boisterous women, dragging her along behind him, only one thought runs through her mind: What the hell am I doing here?

She knows, of course. She’s making money. She’s carving out a little space in journalism because, as her publisher always so kindly reminds her, the market is always changing, and fantasy stories will not be in fashion forever.

With that pleasant reminder, she lifts her chin and continues her walk into the unknown.

MacDonald struts ahead of her, openly ogling the men as if they’re an attraction at the zoo. There’s something distinctly unprofessional about the wide-eyed look that he’s always giving his subjects, like he’s got them trapped under a microscope and is poking around in their thoughts. He doesn’t seem to realize that he has a habit of making other people feel utterly invaded. Which, if Mandy had to guess, is probably why the Metropolitan Express has had her acting as his assistant for so many months. Well, that and, if she’s being honest, the fact that Duncan MacDonald cannot write to save his life.

As if reading her mind, MacDonald grabs her arm and hisses loudly in her ear to be heard over the celebrations, “Look at them! We’re bound to get a good story out of them.” Then, quietly, more urgently, “And quickly, too, because I don’t like the looks of this place.”

For once, Mandy finds herself agreeing with him. But, as is the way of the world, these things are easier said than done.

They manage to find a small table that’s miraculously unoccupied to set up shop at. Despite the look that MacDonald gives her when she orders a drink, Mandy settles in. Her boss might not want to spend any longer in this place than he has to, but that’s only because he’s not a real writer, and he doesn’t understand that the best stories come to those who are patient. These things can’t be forced, no matter how intent he seems on bending them to his will.

Besides his writing – or lack thereof – there’s the small matter of MacDonald himself. He’s too forthright, strutting up to the men and asking them bold questions with no sense of boundaries. Most respond by giving him a blank stare instead of a quote, and those who are willing to share any thoughts only give them the kind that cannot be put into print.

“Well I never,” MacDonald splutters as dark haired man with a wide smile answers his question – a completely tone deaf What’s been your favorite part of the war so far? – with a curt Wouldn’t you like to know, jackass? and a wink thrown at Mandy. MacDonald uselessly swabs his face with his handkerchief before sighing, “I don’t think this place agrees with me.” He mutters, perhaps thinking Mandy can’t hear him over the noise of the bar. “I should have stuck to vaudeville.”

I’ll drink to that, she thinks to herself as she surveys the man who’s supposed to be a war correspondent.

“He seemed to like you, though,” MacDonald says. He gives Mandy a curious look that she’s all too familiar with – one that suggests that she do all the work while he rests his delicate little mind. “Maybe you should try talking to them, without me.”

He’s throwing her to the wolves – or, more accurately, the Marines. But strangely, she finds that she doesn’t mind this time. After all, she came here to write about the war. Write about it accurately, honestly. People back home need to know what’s being fought for. And if she can lend her pen, her camera, and her typewriter to the cause, then by golly, she will. 

She nods. “Not such a bad idea.” And then she leaves him there, alone at the table, before he can change his mind.

Looking for a good story is not so different from hunting, if you think about it. At the edge of the room, Mandy surveys the scene before her. The Marines may be wild, but most of them are also intoxicated, which means their lips will be loose. She can use that to her advantage. Especially now that she’s free of MacDonald.

There. From across the bar, her eyes land on the dark-haired man who winked at her earlier. He’s one of the few men not entertaining one of the bar’s local Australian girls. An easy target.

As if to prove her point about patience, someone taps her on the shoulder just as she’s about to march through the fray to reach her intended target.

A different man, this one with blond hair, blushes slightly when she turns to him. “Um, excuse me, Miss,” he says, his thick accent taking her by surprise. For just a second, she mistakes him for one of the locals before she realizes that he’s wearing an American uniform with the name Phillips on his chest.

Maybe getting a quote will be easier than she thought it would be. “Yes?” 

Phillips nods across the bar to the man that was her original target. “My friend over there said you were a reporter, looking for quotes?”

Mandy nods, smiles, trying to make herself as bright and warm and trustworthy as possible. “That I am.” She holds up her notepad and taps it with a red fingernail. “You don’t happen to have one for me, do you Phillips?”

He’s not blushing anymore. He only smiles and shakes his head. “I’m afraid not. I don’t think I’m good enough with words for that kind of thing. But my friend is,” he adds before she can lose interest.

“Oh?” Mandy raises an eyebrow. “Do you think he would give me an interview?”

“I’m sure he would,” Phillips replies. “In fact, he was writing the entire time we were on Guadalcanal. He’ll probably give you some of his original notes.”

Mandy has to take a breath, remind herself not to get her hopes up. This could all be a rouse, after all, by some stranger.

But then again, even though she doesn’t know this Phillips, he doesn’t give off the energy of someone trying to pull a fast one on her. Maybe it’s just his southern charm, but she’s tempted to trust him right away.

“That would be great. Mind taking me to him?”

“Sure thing.” Phillips starts to weave through the crowd, leading her through the bar. He looks back and extends a hand part of the way through their walk. “I’m Sid Phillips, by the way.”

She accepts his hand. He’s got a firm shake. More of that southern charm, perhaps. “Samantha Majors. But my friends call me Mandy.”

As they push deeper into the bar, several men call out greetings to Phillips, slapping him on the back and palling around as they pass. Phillips returns their handshakes and smiles, only stopping to ask if anyone has seen the Professor. Most men shrug off the question, but one man finally points toward the farthest part of the bar and announces over all the noise, “Lucky is over there! Guess he needed a place to think.”

Lucky. The Professor. She’ll have to remember to ask about these nicknames during their interview. No doubt there’s a good story behind them both.

She slips her notebook out of her pocket as they walk, readies her pen as she turns to Phillips, ideas already churning in her head. “What’s your friend’s name?”

“There he is!” Phillips nods to a table in the bar’s far corner, where a small group of men sit drinking, partly obscured by shadow. “That’s him in the middle, with the curly hair. Robert Leckie.”

At the same moment that Phillips says his name, the man in question leans forward, throwing his face into light so that Mandy catches a glimpse of him for the first time. The sight makes her heart drop, and she freezes as if she’s just been caught red-handed.

“No,” she whispers. Then, in her head. It can’t be.

For a split second, she thinks that maybe her luck will be good, that she’s changed so much since their school days that he won’t recognize her. They’re not kids anymore. Maybe he’s forgotten her.

But the second that his eyes land on her, she knows that it’s no good. His expression changes quickly as he drops the thread of conversation with his friends to stare at her in confusion, then recognition. A small smile crosses his face and he stands, not frozen the way that she is.

“Sammy Majors?!” He calls, voice slightly too loud with the excitement of someone who has been drinking.

Phillips’ brow furrows as he glances between them. “You two know each other?”

“Yes,” Mandy whispers at the same time that Leckie announces, “We grew up down the street from each other!”

“Well, that’s good, right?” Phillips turns to her when he asks. “No awkward introductions to hold back your interview.”

Mandy has to force the words out of her mouth; they feel like they’re stuck to her tongue with paste. “Yeah. I guess so.”

Leckie, as usual, seems undaunted by everything before him. He shoves the man sitting next to him over and uses a grand gesture to indicate the vacated seat to Mandy. “Come join us!”

The confident demeanor that she’s worked so hard to build up all these years is slipping. With every step she takes towards him, Mandy feels like she’s clinging to it for dear life. She has to remind herself that she’s no longer Sammy Majors, the little girl who sits by the window writing fairytales because she couldn’t go out to play. She’s no longer Sammy Majors, who entered every writing competition their school hosted in vain, always losing out to lucky Robert Leckie, whose stories and poems were always so much better than hers. Robert Leckie, who had a job at the local newspaper before they had even finished high school.

As she takes the seat he offers her, one of the other men at the table laughs when he asks, “Hey, Lucky, does Vera know about this?”

Robert Leckie, who always so obviously had a crush on Vera Keller from across the street. Robert Leckie, who never seemed to realize that she existed . . . but who recognized her at first sight after all these years, and on the other side of the world, to boot.

Leckie smiles at her, so warm and open, as if his success in writing didn’t come so easily to him that it always crushed Mandy’s heart, her hopes, and her dreams. “What are you doing here?”

In response, Mandy raises her notepad and purses her lips, resetting her usual, casual demeanor that she has spent so many years working on. “I’m with the Metro Express, and my source tells me that you might be good for a quote.”

Several of his friends ooh and aah like a Greek chorus, jostling him as they laugh.

“He’s got more than just a quote for you!” One of them hoots.

“Yeah,” another man adds. “Try a whole novel!”

Mandy raises an eyebrow. “Is that so?” When Leckie shrugs in response, she allows herself to smile, to be friendly, even though it goes against her better instincts. “Robert Leckie, ever the writer.”

“Fight by day, write by night.”

She makes a small scribble on her notepad to make sure her pen still works. “Well, Private Leckie. Do you have time for a quick interview?”

Leckie leans back in his seat and takes a drag off his cigarette. A smirk plays at the corners of his mouth as he exhales the smoke, nods. “Fire when ready, Miss Majors.”

[jentlemahae]

Just found out that there will be no female idols at smtown la and Mexico city concerts, literally 0 women on that stage when this whole year their gg was the one making the most noise 💀 ik sm has always favored ther bgs more but this is too much now, 30th anniv concerts and no female idols! Amtown concerts are usually a sausage fests but atleast we get 30min of rv and aespa with a sprinkle of taeyeon but this time they just ditched all the women.

WHAT ???? i thought aespa were gonna be there for sure ??? honestly the entire smtown tour is useless but it’s just ridiculous if u don’t even have the entire smtown performing at the shows ????

[womenofnoise]

Women of Noise Fest, Night II

Giltvein

Moth Eater

Domesticatrix

Glad I Didn't Get My Stupid Wish

Pulsatile Tinnitus

All photos by Leperwitch.

[littlexstarlightx]

@therabbitbehindtheslaughter cont from {x}

☀️ There was no warmth to be found in the dilapidated building. It was as if the atmosphere was always a foggy graveyard and in a way it was. Not another living person had been in here in several decades at this point aside from recently when the property was signed over to the gingers father for 'safe keeping'.

He was the new warden of this hell on earth.

She pulled the hood of her jacket down; a jingle of metal off the stiff cotton bunny ears that accented the soft black coat. This would help so that they could both get a better look at one another. He probably wasn't expecting such a small rescuer, and she wasn't expecting....what had she expected?

The grinding and squelching were unsettling, but it wasn't what set her on edge. Those cold eyes and his height. So tall. Pulling down her safety-pinned decorated face mask with bright pastel fingernails bright electric purple painted lips emerged.

"Yes, freedom. Don't worry I put some of the children down for a nap so we'll have to be fast~" She still didn't know where some of the other animatronics had gone in this hovel of a building but she was ready for whatever they had to throw at her.

Melissa couldn't get anything from her father about the last few decades. Not even her 'uncle' Henry would open up to her about the long-standing lore of their failing business chains. The young woman chewed her gum and blew a bubble flinching at the sound of the cough and the hard slam of the mechanical jaw.

That smell, however, was far more metallic than the rabbit himself. It was permeating in this dusty hole in the ground. The ginger was left to snap the face mask back into place the rainbow beads bouncing a bit as she did so. She would not breathe in the air down here more than she had to.

" You were pretty loud about it. Tall tale heart up in this rather quiet building. My father kept telling me that it was just the building settling.... bullshit. You're one noisy skeleton in his metaphorical closet...." The ginger pointed to the groaning joints of the dingy yellow rabbit.

More painful coughing, it was hard to believe he still had the lungs to do so but the ginger sighed and heaved the large worn leather satchel from her shoulder. It hit the ground with a cacophony of metallic noises.

Given it wasn't like the rest of the black and pastel barf fest on her it was safe to say it was work equipment. Pushing back the sleeves of her coat her wrists were then filled with beaded bracelets. Pulling out some rubber gloves the women then produced pliers and a flat head screwdriver.

"Here, let me help you with that really quick. It will be one release from that constant pain." Melissa stepped forward with her platform shoe not giving her too much height to counter his. He'd have to keep his head bowed for her to work the ring to a looser fit.

"From here, I'll take you in my van to the safe house. I own a studio apartment ....once an old factory ....so no more small spaces for you. We have to move quickly I'm sure that other then the other security measures my absence has been noted..." Even at her age her father would 'ground' her and she'd come so far to find the 'yellow rabbit' only whispered about.

"Oh...before I get overly handsy...I should introduce myself. I'm Melissa. You can just call me Missy though if it's too hard to talk ...I understand it has to be difficult and a lot of work. You don't have to humor me...." An odd child that was for sure but at least polite. 🌙

[ashesandhackles]

Rarepair Tag Game

Thanks for the tag @danpuff-ao3

Rules: List the top rarepairs that you like outside of your OTP, and why you ship it! (Criteria for what makes a rarepair is up to your own discretion.)

My current OTP is Sirius/Severus and I have made enough noise about them. So here is my other small favourites:

Ginny/Hermione

They are SUCH a good ship? Immaculate friends to lovers. They enjoy each other's company, share secrets, and there is enough tension and complements in how they interact with each other and the world for it to work. Also cannot get over how Hermione says that Harry would notice Ginny if she was bit more "herself"? For Hermione, the very simple but strong belief that Ginny would catch attention of the boy of her dreams by simply being herself. Hermione sees the sun. (I also greatly enjoy the idea of Ginny/Cho and Ginny/Blaise, thanks to @bluethepineapple work for Winter Sun fest)

Rolf/ Luna

Listen, there were few years in my life that I worked for an outdoor company and was surrounded by outdoor guides. These boys (women started coming into the industry very late and in small numbers) are some of the best people you can hang out with: funny, bright, very practical, conscientious. They also have deep rooted anxiety and need for control all the time, and to me, it really fit with the outline of Rolf given in extra canon. He was a good POV to discover Luna, a character who is defined by not being in her physical reality all the time. I wrote them together in an adventure fic and I unashamedly ship my own version of them.

Andromeda/Any Morally Grey Man

Listen, I love Andromeda/ Ted as much as the next person, but I recently read Andromeda/ Rufus Scrimgeour and my jaw dropped? Andromeda is such an interesting outline of a character in canon, and I love the directions fandom has taken with her: keeping her very much an intimidating Black sister, but with softer edges to play with. So here I am going to recommend the incredibly smartly written : A wilder beast from West than all were by eldritcher/ and the interesting take on Andromeda/Rodolphus : Till We have Faces by TeddieJean. I also greatly enjoyed the Andromeda/Lucius from @decemberistafic wonderful "I Awaken With Your Name"

Snape/ Petunia

I read and enjoy lot of Snape fics with various permutations and combinations with him (he is very shippable, and each new characters brings a different side of him) - but I recently read @maria-de-salinas Regretfully Yours and I am utterly charmed by this pairing. I really loved how skillfully the story was written, and how very vulnerable it was! These are the rarepairs I enjoy off the top of my head. Tagging anyone who would like to do this!

[crowmero]

An updated note about my stance in the whole "False accusation" plot that happens during LL.

1. The whole plot is horrible and ridiculous and should not exist.

2. This plot is fucking unrealistic. The true is that if Rayan was accused like that in the real world... nothing would have happened to him. Is true that the people at the city learns about the case because Renata leaks the story on the news, but to be honest, I can't imagine people making too much noise about the situation, at most the students, and probably the people more likely making noise about the case and demanding justice would be women and feminists groups. The true is that the general public cares more about men's feelings than women's feelings. In the real world I have watched how women get burned and demonized for the most stupid things but men who kill and rape, barely get some heat.

3. Also it was a FALSE ACCUSATION, so of course, Rayan was in all his right to be the poor victim here, poor little meow meow was suffering. This is the narrative that a lot of misogynistic men are salivating to happen to them, this is a fucking male fantasy. Some men want to prove so much that women are evil to all cost. On side note: I have to guess and think this was done to clean a bit his image since the hate he was getting during UL was harsh, but I think women who where calling out how uncomfortable this character was, was justified. Because I know and I know a lot of women had seen this happening in their own school, happening to their classmates, living this experience and I don't think all the teachers doing this (trying to get into a relationship with a student) are as good as Rayan.

4. The writer representing Beemoov really sacrificed and burned four women (three of them are POC) FOUR WOMEN for the sake to save one man. You can't tell me this is not a very misogynistic thing to do in a game that is aimed for women.

5. I totally can see why Priya and Miss Paltry act the way they act if you decide to side with Rayan. It makes more sense why they don’t feel that sorry for Rayan after what happened: they were choosing to give priority to a woman over a man. Because is a feminist principle "I rather believe a woman even if she is lying, over a man that could be a potencial abuser"... because statistics says that 75% to 90% of the people perpetrating violence over women are men.

6. I think this is a good post and food for thought to talk about Renata. I understand that the women involved in this plot committed wrongs, but I think is good to question their motives and why they act like this (Aside from the writer doing a shit job).

7. What was really realistic was the amount of hate that Marina, Miss Paltry, Priya and Renata got from the fandom and because it was justified for the false accusation and because we knew from the start that Rayan was innocent because we're are watching everything as spectators, but this characters just faced the normal outcome of someone speaking out. The writer representing Beemoov did a excellent job demonizing four women and the fandom was more than happy to participate in this misogynistic hate-fest.

8. Misandry does not exist, because misandry doesn't have an actual weight or influence in the real world. Misandry is just the normal outcome of women having to endure abuse for many years and realizing later that they are done putting with that. No woman is born hating men and they don't teach us to hate them either but to prioritize their feelings. But Misogyny, that sure is really doing good and well and normal in the real world, even some women love to be misogynistic and think is the most normal thing to do.

9. This is just my own point of view about this whole mess. I have changed my mind over the years because I learned more and this is the way I see this plot now. I'm not looking for debate or people to convince me about changing my mind. I don't really care if people disagree with me either, everyone is entitle to their own opinion. If I missed something I'll probably update the post.

10. If you hate Priya I really don't want anything to do with you, this is not the place for you and you're more than encouraged to seek for some other place that can accommodate your misogyny.

[safereturndoubtful]

Fetlar

Wednesday 26th July

I spent five days on Fetlar in the end, the van not moving from its wonderful setting just above he beach, and in that time probably met most of the islanders. Each day I wandered past the cafe, which acts as a shop, post office, and information centre also, and sat inside for a coffee and a chat with whoever was around. The owners are typical of islanders, from the south of England, in their late fifties, and taken to Fetlar as an escape from the noise, pollution and lack of space in England. Only five of the sixty seven residents are from Shetland since birth. The English have brought with them a high level of organisation. Despite the remoteness of their residences things happen efficiently; the food deliveries to the shop from the mainland, the postal service, the regular meetings at the community hall. The arrival of strangers, or rather tourists, is noticed by all. It’s not possible to creep in undetected.

The island is well-supported in terms of infrastructure, probably too much so. For its regular postal service, the island has its own red Royal Mail electric van, which four islanders work in shifts with deliveries, and get paid to do so. The ferry, which is free for island residents, calls at least four times a day, which seems quite unnecessary, as most times when I was there it was empty, but the crew come for their lunch at the cafe. Garbage is collected by a truck that comes from the mainland once each week. A mobile library, hairdresser, and various other services call in for a few hours fortnightly. A doctor or nurse will visit when requested, and a dentist calls in monthly.

In that sense, it’s not as remote as other mainland communities.

Though I knew nobody by name, everyone knew me, the guy with the red dog and the porthole van on the beach.

Though the first days I was there were fine, the second half of my stay on Fetlar the weather turned wild. There were occasional showers, but the wind howled and came from the north. Rather than gusty, it was a steady thirty five mile per hour gale, and as it was from the north it took the temperatures down to single figures, with an added chill factor. These are the most unwelcome conditions for outdoor activity, and even indoor activity is with an unsettling rocking and a constant reverberation.

On the windy days Roja and I headed out in the morning as usual, but no further than the couple of miles to the cafe and back, then settled into an afternoon of reading, podcasts, and even completing the VAT return for work..

A few locals walked their dogs on the beach, and over the days Roja got to know them all. There weren’t many visitors, but two young women came over to say hello one afternoon, sheltering from the wind behind my van. They were students from UCL, a woman of Sudanese descent, and a Nepalese lady. The former was a geography student hoping to be a lecturer, hence the reason for the visit. They were on Shetland for two weeks, and were tough enough not to even mention the weather.

We were one of just two vehicles on the 3:30 pm ferry to Unst earlier today, the wind had at long last dropped, and the sun broke through. I drove to Baltasound, Unst’s equivalent of a metropolis, and stocked up on water, and from the supermarket. At the leisure centre I paid £1.50 for my weekly shave and shower, and the guy told me, at 5 pm, the showers would need to run a bit as I was the first person in today. Unst has as many visitors in Fest week (last week), a few hundred, as it does in the other 9 weeks of summer put together.

I drove to Uyeasound to park-up, at the far south west of the island. I had hoped to visit here, but it had quite a few people around the marina last week, so I had postponed it. From that howling three day northerly wind to a completely calm night - it was appreciated.

[kinetic-elaboration]

November 2: The Substance

Spent most of the day doing laundry and a bit of other cleaning—not very interesting, but probably a good idea. In the evening, impulse-watched The Substance. My overall feelings about it are positive. My more specific feelings are… uncertain. The more I read (skim) other people’s opinions, the less certain I feel of my own. Like I’m not sure if the Emperor has clothes here or not, I suppose.

The movie is about 2 hours and 15 minutes not counting the end credits, which is frankly a ridiculous length of time for a movie to be, so let’s start there. For most of it, I was like, yeah, okay, maybe this is good enough to warrant this run time. Then it came to what seemed to me to be a reasonable conclusion, at just shy of 2 hours I believe, decidedly did not end there, and swerved off to continue for another 20-30 minutes. And that last sequence felt, to me, as I’d been following along with the plot so far, like it was from a totally different film. My primary thought was that the writer did not know how to end, so just kept going and going. There didn’t seem to be anything more to say at this point and nothing else to focus on but increasingly over the top body horror and gore. It was so much that I was honestly mostly bored. My experience on this first view was that it had gone off the rails.

After watching, I skimmed over some reviews and responses… Some of them seem to categorize the film as a horror-comedy—like oh what campy, satirical fun—and that take seemed to coincide with an appreciation for that last gory 20 minutes. And… see… I did not laugh. I was not smiling. I am not sure if that is a defect in me somehow, that I took it too seriously and that’s why I wasn’t on board for that final arc. I did see the horror references even on this first viewing—I know Carrie, I know Carpenter, I know Cronenberg, I mean come on. And I’m trying not to be too full of myself and just outright dismiss a large portion of the film, by which I mean, if it only works as a whole if you view it with a certain lens, then maybe that is the right lens, objectively.

But. I don’t know. I’m not convinced. If it was supposed to be funny it didn’t hit for me—I found it most effective and striking when it was a pure horror, and the primary emotions I had from the very beginning were disgust, disdain, and fear. And then after that probably sadness. And while I’d agree it wasn’t exactly subtle… I don’t know, it was way more subtle before that last sequence than during it. It gave me much to think about—up until that point.

I would have ended it, if it were me, at the point where Elisabeth terminates Sue. I see why she couldn’t fully do it, that was decidedly part of her character, and she’s very obviously addicted and I understand why even hitting what appeared to be rock bottom wasn’t enough. So I would have kept her having second thoughts, and I would have kept the line “I need you because I hate myself.” But I would have the attempt to revive Sue not work. First of all, having the two awake at once seemed to me to be physically impossible given the rules we’ve already established, and that was my first indicator that the film seemed to have run out of ideas and was just… spewing blood at this point. And second, I still don’t fully get what anything after this moment did to contribute to the POINT of the film. I think I’ve heard everything I need in that line, and having SO much run time after dilutes it.

I think there’s an alternate ending for Elisabeth that is… maybe too sweet for what the film was going for, but which I think would still fit with the rest of the movie and maybe pull out certain themes more strongly than an extensive gore-fest does. The movie is so silent. And most of the talking is done by men, by which I mean men get to ramble and women (Elisabeth/Sue) use an economy of language. Elisabeth makes herself small, quiet, and unobtrusive a lot. But the older/more deformed she gets, the more noise she makes. The more MESS she makes. The fewer fucks she gives. She’s yelling at people to shut up and pushing them out of the way as she goes to get the termination package to take back her life. I just think there’s something there, and maybe it’s a little sappy, about how the damage to her physical body is permanent but perhaps it is also freeing. She simply cannot strive to be the next young, hot thing anymore—but it was that striving that destroyed her, so why miss it?

Anyway. I’m not usually a body horror person but I wanted to see this and it wasn’t too much… it was a lot, but I handled it. There’s also a lot of ‘I am looking respectfully’ lingering shots and one thing that was interesting about the watching experience as a queer woman is that the two were not so distant from each other: the female body cut up into (beautiful) pieces for appreciative consumption* and the body horror of the female body literally unzipped and split open and drained are all on the same continuum. They are the same.

*Male gaze etc. etc. yes I know.

[whatsonmedia]

Music Monday Spooky Sounds: Your Halloween Playlist!

Presented by Adam Humphries, get in the spirit with a lineup that'll give you goosebumps. From SUPREME UNBEING's bone-chilling 'Scarecrow' to DEADSET's raw and thought-provoking 'Bleak,' these tracks are not for the faint of heart. ALL THE BEES debut with the haunting 'Wildflowers,' while NEWMOON's 'Fading Phase' transports you back to 90's Brit-Pop. Turn up the volume, and let the music haunt your senses this Halloween! SUPREME UNBEING return for Halloween with nightmarish new single - 'Scarecrow'! After just a couple of minutes I absolutely love it. Everything about it fits the theme of Halloween Horror themes perfectly, from the video all the way to the song. The lyrics are actually quite cleverly written as it has that Freddy Kruger vibe to it about not being able to escape the nightmare. A joy to listen to and the video pays amazing homage  Listen  https://open.spotify.com/track/16oP012ycIGWXukgC7tYz2?si=276e41de94554759 Watch  https://youtu.be/qGDQYJv9bWU?si=iyDeeC4ABw95yomI Hull's DEADSET release cacophonous new noise-rock single -"Bleak" Now if you were familiar with 80's band Joy Division you might very well find this just as appealing. Guitarist James Massey and vocalist Sam Mellors seem to make quite the combination in this thought provoking song about life in toxic environment. Bleak doesn't hold anything back with the nitty-gritty, something I find captivating  Listen  https://open.spotify.com/track/3nupmbMtD6cTMwhFJw3It3?si=491b40a388e742bd Catch Deadset playing the following live dates: 13th October- The Fulford Arms, York // Soundspheremag Showcase https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/soundsphere-showcase-2023-york-tickets-589657209587 14th October- Divehu5, Hull // Soundspheremag Showcase http://www.divehu5.co.uk/ 29th October- The Adelphi, Hull // Twisted Nipple Events https://www.theadelphi.com/events/twisted-nipple-events-presents-tarantino-fest-pt-3/ 28th November- Polar Bear Music Club, Hull // The Sesh https://www.polarbearmusicclub.co.uk/ ALL THE BEES release stunning debut alt-folk single - 'Wildflowers' I have always been a fan of the 'piano, guitar and strings' combo as firstly it's completely stripped back and raw, also you can't hide it behind anything technical. For me, this is one of the reasons why I genuinely enjoy Wilde as its raw and stripped back and the women's vocals are captivating yet have that raspiness which creates a beautiful yet haunting feel  Listen  https://open.spotify.com/track/07V24N2qSSerYKM3uh1EOa?si=18b3fbcdd9f244dc Watch  https://youtu.be/zzPjDd4kIf0?si=01_cBmXPB6piryix Acclaimed shoegaze band NEWMOON return with mesmerizing - 'Fading Phase' As someone who grew up during the Brit-Pop era in the 90's Fading Phase is one of those that echoes the vibes, sounds and the feel of then. For me, this is something that I just got within seconds of listening and heavily admire it in all its context. The lyrics have that happy/sad feel where even though they're sombre they offer sympathy  Listen  https://open.spotify.com/track/2fNTTwMbfEm3ayybnBaXcP?si=36b2245d67194dce Watch  https://youtu.be/yunU08TJtcc?si=-DB4cKD4jAVB0bN- MYRKVI - Icelandic Artist Releases 'Early Warning' Today || Listen Now Miserable People, Lunatic and Postpone, and that's three of the songs that I can name from a handful taken from MYRKVI's latest album. Now I have heard of a few artists from Iceland, all of them great, so I wasn't disappointed in the slightest. Hope to hear them in the UK next year. Songs are impressive and if I was to even try and find fault I'd be completely lost with no words  OUT NOW, VIA BAGGABOTN STREAM IN FULL  HERE https://open.spotify.com/album/2jSGnMzXEolh7lDI3EnThn?si=va267u4ZQpuEbmWEtirLIQ WATCH THE VIDEO FOR FEATURED SINGLE:  "MISERABLE PEOPLE"  HERE https://youtu.be/utdm_Q27HwM An entertaining video from start to finish and barely miserable at all. More of a video diary of the guys as they go on the road including chilling out, recording, driving about and performing  Read the full article