#Cluster sampling steps

[marketxcel]

Cluster Sampling: Types, Advantages, Limitations, and Examples

Explore the various types, advantages, limitations, and real-world examples of cluster sampling in our informative blog. Learn how this sampling method can help researchers gather data efficiently and effectively for insightful analysis.

[neurotica-tales]

Yandere Tighnari Headcanon

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Up Next: Yandere Gorou Headcanon, Yandere Xiao Headcanon, Yandere Baizhu Headcanon, Yandere Zhongli Headcanon

If you liked this story, don't forget to also check out my other Genshin Impact stories HERE!

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Tighnari doesn't fall in love easily, or often. He’s too practical for that—too logical, too rooted in routine. He keeps his heart focused on the forest, on research, on responsibilities.

Romance is inefficient.

Unstable.

Irrational.

But when you arrive in Gandharva Ville—gentle, curious, respectful of the land in a way most outsiders aren't—he takes notice. Not because you’re flashy or loud. But because you’re quietly thoughtful.

You ask genuine questions. You step lightly over moss. You wait for squirrels to cross your path.

At first, he’s distant. Courteous but clipped.

He treats you like any guest—gives you the basics, warns you about the local flora, and assumes you'll be gone within a week.

But then you stay. And he finds himself watching.

He tells himself it's just vigilance. You’re not used to the jungle. It’s natural to keep an eye on you.

Completely normal. Sensible.

But he starts noticing more than he should—how your eyes linger on blooming flowers, how you fidget with your sleeves when nervous, how your voice sounds when you're excited about a rare plant sighting.

He starts adjusting his schedule. Not obviously. You won’t see it at first. But the forest will.

Your walks seem to always intersect with his now. You’ll go out to collect herbs, or to admire a cluster of fungi, and suddenly he’s there—“monitoring spore dispersal” or “observing squirrel behavior.” He’s always got a reason. Always rational.

But he’s always there.

He tells you forest safety is important. He offers to walk with you. He explains the medicinal uses of the leaves you pick. Sometimes, he gives you ones he’s already prepared—always specific to your needs.

You never asked for this level of care. But you never feel burdened by it either. He makes it feel... natural.

As if it's simply what he does.

As if you are just part of the forest now—something he tends to like everything else.

You find small things by your door.

A bag of crushed herbs for tea when you mention a sore throat.

A cloth pouch that smells like cedar and mint when you complain about headaches.

He never takes credit. But you know it’s him.

He never oversteps—at least, not in a way you can point out. He's polite. Gentle. Always composed.

His eyes never leer. His hands never linger. But there’s an intensity there that’s difficult to ignore, especially when he looks at you too long and doesn’t blink.

He’s emotionally grounded, even when his feelings deepen.

He never erupts. He studies. Listens. Waits.

He wants to be someone you trust before he ever confesses what you really mean to him.

But as his feelings grow, so does his desire to keep you close.

When other visitors speak too fondly of you, he listens a little too closely.

When they ask if you’ve been to Sumeru City, he interrupts with reasons why the forest is safer. 

“The air there’s drier. You’ve only just adjusted to the pollen levels here. Best not risk it.”

You never hear him raise his voice. But if someone tries to get too close—emotionally or physically—he changes.

Subtly.

Sharply.

The kind tone remains, but the words come clipped.

Controlled.

“I think they’re better suited to the city, don’t you?” he’ll say of someone you're fond of.

“They don’t understand how things work here.”

“They wouldn’t know what kind of plant can paralyze someone just by touch.”

Always said calmly. Always with that distant smile.

He doesn’t lie. He just... steers the truth.

Your paths never stop crossing. Even when you try to leave the forest earlier one day, he appears on the trail—startled, but smiling.

“I was looking for a beetle sample. I didn’t expect you here. Lucky coincidence, hmm?”

But it’s not coincidence.

He knows your habits down to the hour.

The forest speaks to him, and he listens for you in every rustling leaf, every footprint in the moss.

He presses your favorite flowers between pages of his old journals, logs when you smiled last, memorizes how many cups of tea you drink per day.

It’s not obsession in the loud, frenzied sense—it’s quieter. Rooted. Like vines crawling upward without anyone noticing.

If you talk about leaving—even briefly—he grows still. His tail stops moving. His tone softens even more.

“You’ve only just started adapting. The city could set back your progress. I’d feel better if you stayed a while longer.”

And if you insist, your plans begin to unravel—naturally, of course.

The guide you needed is unavailable. The bridge ahead is temporarily out. Rain makes the slope too slick.

Nothing suspicious. Just misfortune. And he’s there to comfort you whenever it happens.

You start to feel like the forest itself is nudging you back into place.

He would never hurt you. The very thought is unbearable to him.

But he’ll reshape the world around you if that’s what it takes to keep you safe.

And near.

And his.

He doesn’t confess with grand declarations. He waits until you’re tired, until you’re frustrated, until the city feels far away and he’s the only calm in the storm.

Then he says, “You’re happier here. I can see it. You don’t have to pretend. You belong here—with me.”

You never realized how deeply rooted his love had become.

It’s not possessive in the traditional sense.

He’s not clinging. He’s not begging. He’s simply there. Always.

Soft-spoken. Steady. Immovable.

And in time, you begin to wonder if leaving was ever really possible.

Because Tighnari doesn’t trap you.

He makes you feel like you were never meant to leave at all.

[honeysickledream]

Stellate (sex pollen) | Johnny 'Soap' MacTavish x F!Scientist!Reader

NSFW (minors + ageless blogs DNI) CW for dubcon / dubious consent, sex pollen, fuck or die (possibly?), oral (f!receiving), fingering (f!receiving), squirting, panty stealing, dead dove do not eat [if i missed anything, lmk please!] w/c: ~1.3k a/n: I needed more sex pollen fics in my life so I tried my best to fulfill that need—now i’m gonna see if I can get some work done now, byeeee [edited: this was my first attempt at smut in ages, sorry if it's rough]

You and Soap had been tasked with receiving samples of a plant from a remote enemy research facility that had been reported abandoned. Soap was to act as your bodyguard in case the intel was faulty and a few enemies, or traps, remained while you collected the samples that the head researchers from your lab needed. You accepted the mission, you had no choice but to, and didn’t fuss about Soap’s talkative presence on the journey to the facility. His stories were funny and almost as charming as his blue eyes, and the sense of security he gave you was welcoming.

The intel had been accurate: the research outpost was abandoned, and based on appearances, it had been a hasty abandonment. Partially full gas cans sat beside trucks that had been haphazardly loaded with various crates. In the offices, personal items remained littered on the desktops. The floors of the general labs were stained with various chemicals, research notes and glass from beakers and full titration sets scattered across the floor. Soap pressed forward to the hydroponic labs and you followed him nervously, keeping six feet between you just in case something went wrong ahead.

The hydroponics lab was dimly lit with a faint haze that hung dimly in the air. Florescent tubes flickered randomly behind the glass covers. State-of-the-art hydroponic tables stood in perfectly measured rows with clusters of leafy plants in wide, black plastic pots. The flowers that bloomed in clusters on top were beautiful: stellate petals colored lilac, slashed with a deep orange down the center.

You got to work as quickly as you could, gloving your hands and laying out your equipment on the empty space beside your chosen plant. With a steady hand, you gently plucked a few petals with a pair of long tweezers, placing each one into its own marked specimen pouch. You collected a few leaves, noting that the margins were dentate. You snipped one of the stamens, being sure to not jostle it too much as you lowered into a pouch.

The plant…shuddered when you looked back at it in preparation to swipe a sample of the stigma. You gave the plant a long, hard look. It had shuddered, you knew it had, yet there had been no breeze, and Soap was across the lab doing his own thing. There was no evidence that something was alive in the lab, either: no cocoons or webs, droppings or bite marks on any of the leaves you’d looked at. You pressed the cotton tip of the swab to the stigma and twisted it once for your sample.

It moved again and you took a step back, calling out for Soap. The flowers turned to you—actually turned—and a faintly pink substance sputtered from the stigmas and into your face. A short coughing fit overcame you as your lungs started to burn, your eyes watering and clouding over with a pink haze.

Panic bloomed in your heart and the blood in your veins shot cold before a wave of painful heat slithered through your veins and settled into your bones. Your heartbeat became erratic as whatever compound in the flower’s pollen mixed with the chemical components in your brain, which was no doubt accelerated by your panic.

Soap’s voice, muffled by the faint ringing that had settled in your ears, partially registered in your mind and you looked toward him. His broad form was vaguely recognizable through the pink haze over your eyes. A painful throbbing perfectly in time with your heartbeat settled between your legs as he fussed over your pollen-covered face with a dampened rag. Need. God, you needed something. Him, that’s what you needed.

The little logical voice in your head was long gone, silence by another voice. Its eerie whispers filled every nook and cranny of your mind as it planted image after image of Soap fucking you in every position you’d read about and watched on those lonely nights that had become far too frequent. You fisted the straps of his tactical vest, pulling him closer. “Help,” you panted. You grabbed his hand to guide it between your thighs. He froze and blasphemed under his breath as he felt how wet you were through your slacks. “Help me, please. Do something!” His fingers crooked against your clothed cunt. “Evac’ll be here soon,” he rasped.

Your head shook ‘No’ quickly. “Not soon enough. You gotta help me now!”

“Lass—“

“Please,” you sobbed. “I need it—I want it!”

His hands settled on your hips as he shushed you. He walked you back to the edge of the edge of the hydroponic bench. You’re pressed into the edge and then you were on your back, your slacks and underwear yanked down and tossed aside. Your legs were thrown over his shoulders as he knelt on the concrete floor. His rough thumb worked quickly against your throbbing clit while his tongue moved against your leaking slit. Your hips bucked, pathetic whimpers and breathy moans falling from your lips. All the heat in your veins suddenly moved towards your belly, coiling tighter and tighter. It wasn’t enough all of a sudden. You begged for more as you carded your fingers through his hair and pressed his face harder against you. His hold on you shifted, his tongue replacing his thumb against your clit as his slowly pressed his middle finger into you. A dizzying mix of praise laced with fond degradation was panted against your clit as you clenched around his finger that crooked against that spot that made you see stars behind your eyelids, that spot very few men you’d been with cared to focus on. His ring finger slipped into you and his pace quickened. The stimulation, the stretch, those filthy sweet words he panted against you was quickly becoming your undoing. The coiled tension that sat low in your belly tightened suddenly. You tried to warn him that you were about to cum but all that came from your mouth was a sharp gasp as you gushed around his fingers. You whined when he pulled his fingers from you as he stood. The fog in your mind had begun to dissipate quickly. That eerie voice that told you all the ways you needed Soap had been silenced, you vision cleared of the pink haze. Soap placed your slacks beside you as he licked his lips and fingers clean of you. That image was going to stay with you for the rest of your life, not that you minded. His radio crackled to life, announcing the arrival of the evac and quarantine team. You He carefully slid your specimen pouches and tools into your satchel while you shakily pulled on your slacks— “Where’s…my underwear?” you asked. Soap shrugged and turned on his heels to make his way out of the lab. Your eyes caught the bunch of familiar black fabric sticking out of his back pocket when you call into line behind you. You didn’t mention it. Not after he cured you of whatever that pollen did to you. He deserved a little reward for all his help. You took in a sharp breath as you exited the building. The air was crisp, cool. Soap nudged your side and you looked to your left. A small team of contamination personnel worked to set up their screening tent and laid out PPE for your return to base. “We’re gonna be in quarantine for a while,” you told him. You felt his eyes drift to you, and out of the corner of your eye you noticed him smirk. “Aye. Reckon it’ll be together?” “Hm…Possibly.” “Quarantine can be borin’.” Your lips pursed as you try not to grin. You fail. “That it can. Got some ideas to keep the boredom at bay?” He snorted. “Aye, plenty.”

[aro-culture-is]

Aro culture is I do not know how to state this plainly but

aromantic person is to amatonormativity and atheist is to religion? Like I've seen atheists question religion a lot and they seem unusually well read compared to their religious counterparts and despite knowing more about it, they also have a whole lot of questions most religious people dare not to ask or think about at all. And then there's aros! Between allos and aros, the aros are likely the ones who have read about amatonormativity and I do not think allos even know about the word at all, neither do they question (and probably challenge) it as much as we aros typically do.

Yes I am also atheist! Another A to the list of As that I am.

I'm gonna be totally real, I am leery of takes like that about "religion" because 90+% of the time in atheist spaces I've seen or heard of, it's like... only actually talking about Christianity with a smattering of other religions as viewed by a christo-centric cultural lens.

I think any time someone starts making broad claims about any group being "unusually well read" it's time to take a step back and consider your sampling bias and clustering bias. You likely specifically seek out people who are well read, and end up with sampling bias. Additionally, that sort of community often references within itself, and especially if you follow a group, you see the cluster around that group, which inflates the perceived impression.

Please note, i'm not saying you are like... 100% wronger than any person alive. I'm just saying that's not easily studied by experts, and it's actually quite hard to say anything about these types of metrics without bias.

The point you are making though, I think, may be better expressed by talking about people who leave a common belief system or never belonged to a common belief system in their life. In general, people who intentionally or unintentionally fail to comply with a commonly held opinion could be more likely to spend more time thinking about the nuances of it and related subjects. I think that is a point I could concede is generally true.

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

New SpaceTime out Friday

SpaceTime 20250516 Series 28 Episode 59

Possible Martian biosignatures continue to perplex scientists

Scientists are continuing to examine the fascinating possible detection of biosignatures on Cheyava Falls rock samples collected by NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover in the red planet’s Jezero Crater almost a year ago.

The odd family of stars desperate to leave home

Astronomers have discovered a strange cluster of over a thousand stars acting very strange – and no one knows why.

Artemis II Orion Moon Capsule delivered to NASA

The return of humans to the Moon is a step closer with the Orion capsule to be used for the manned Artemis II lunar mission officially handed over to NASA.

The Science Report

Warnings that parents using phones and tablets, around their kids may be affecting their kids health.

A man who injected himself with snake venom 856 times helps create an antivenom for all snake bites.

Claims that growing peas and potatoes could help; feed a city in times of global catastrophe.

Skeptics guide to Gestalt Therapy

SpaceTime covers the latest news in astronomy & space sciences.

The show is available every Monday, Wednesday and Friday through your favourite podcast download provider or from www.spacetimewithstuartgary.com

SpaceTime is also broadcast through the National Science Foundation on Science Zone Radio and on both i-heart Radio and Tune-In Radio.

SpaceTime daily news blog: http://spacetimewithstuartgary.tumblr.com/

SpaceTime facebook: www.facebook.com/spacetimewithstuartgary

SpaceTime Instagram @spacetimewithstuartgary

SpaceTime twitter feed @stuartgary

SpaceTime YouTube: @SpaceTimewithStuartGary

SpaceTime -- A brief history SpaceTime is Australia’s most popular and respected astronomy and space science news program – averaging over two million downloads every year. We’re also number five in the United States.  The show reports on the latest stories and discoveries making news in astronomy, space flight, and science.  SpaceTime features weekly interviews with leading Australian scientists about their research.  The show began life in 1995 as ‘StarStuff’ on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s (ABC) NewsRadio network.  Award winning investigative reporter Stuart Gary created the program during more than fifteen years as NewsRadio’s evening anchor and Science Editor.  Gary’s always loved science. He was the dorky school kid who spent his weekends at the Australian Museum. He studied astronomy at university and was invited to undertake a PHD in astrophysics, but instead focused on a career in journalism and radio broadcasting. Gary’s radio career stretches back some 34 years including 26 at the ABC. His first gigs were spent as an announcer and music DJ in commercial radio, before becoming a journalist, and eventually joining ABC News and Current Affairs. He was part of the team that set up ABC NewsRadio and became one of its first on air presenters. When asked to put his science background to use, Gary developed StarStuff which he wrote, produced and hosted, consistently achieving 9 per cent of the national Australian radio audience based on the ABC’s Nielsen ratings survey figures for the five major Australian metro markets: Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, and Perth. That compares to the ABC’s overall radio listenership of just 5.6 per cent. The StarStuff podcast was published on line by ABC Science -- achieving over 1.3 million downloads annually.  However, after some 20 years, the show finally wrapped up in December 2015 following ABC funding cuts, and a redirection of available finances to increase sports and horse racing coverage.  Rather than continue with the ABC, Gary resigned so that he could keep the show going independently.  StarStuff was rebranded as “SpaceTime”, with the first episode being broadcast in February 2016.  Over the years, SpaceTime has grown, more than doubling its former ABC audience numbers and expanding to include new segments such as the Science Report -- which provides a wrap of general science news, weekly skeptical science features, special reports looking at the latest computer and technology news, and Skywatch – which provides a monthly guide to the night skies. The show is published three times weekly (every Monday, Wednesday and Friday) and available from the United States National Science Foundation on Science Zone Radio, and through both i-heart Radio and Tune-In Radio.

[scotianostra]

30th May 1889 saw the birth near Kirkliston of Isobel Wylie Hutchison.

Isobel overcame the constraints that the age, her class, and her own personality placed upon her, to become a solo adventurer in the far North, an accomplished plant collector and a successful poet and writer.

Carlowrie "Castle", a Scots baronial mansion near Kirkliston in West Lothian, was the comfortable upper-middle class home into which Isobel Wylie Hutchison was born in 1889. It was there her father, Thomas Hutchison, a successful wine merchant in Edinburgh, looked after his gardens, and passed on to Isobel his fascination for plants and his habit of meticulous note-taking. I put the commas round castle as, although it is known as a castle by it's name in the old sense of things, having only been built in the mid 19th century, to me a castle needs to have a lot more history than that, Isobels grandfather had it built from scratch, nowadays it is top wedding venue and voted one of the top three venues under 200 bedrooms in Europe.

Back to the lady in question, three deaths were to shatter Isobel’s youth. From 1900 she went to school in Edinburgh where she studied a curriculum suited for a young Victorian Lady. After her sister married a naval officer and saw very little of him for long periods Isobel decided that marriage would restrict her life.

Three deaths were to shatter Isobel’s youth. Her father died suddenly, shortly before her 11th birthday; and her two brothers when she was in her early twenties – one in a climbing accident in 1912, and the other during the First World War. The deaths however meant she has an independent lady of means, affording her the luxury of leading her own life without restrictions.

She travelled to the Arctic, filming the things she saw around her, the landscape and the wildflowers growing there and the daily lives of the indigenous people. Other travellers of the time who wrote of their discoveries did not dwell on the domestic detail that makes Hutchison's work unique. Her first exploration was to East Greenland in 1927, followed in 1928 by a year in Umanak, North Greenland. She filmed eskimos collecting ice for water and hunting seals from a kayak, the wild flowers of Umanak and the Governor's coffee party! Scottish whalers had taught reels and other dances to the locals, Hutchison filmed them a century later still dancing with enthusiasm.

In 1934 she set out for Alaska, travelling by coastal steamer from Vancouver to Skagway and then overland to Nome. Here she found a very small freighter to take her along the north coast of Alaska, ending with 120 miles by dog sledge and returning on mail plane to Alberta. Hutchison brought back samples of the plant life for the Royal Horticultural Society and the Natural History Museum. She had a long connection with the Royal Scottish Geographical Society as Honorary Editor of the magazine and as a fellow and Vice President.

She was awarded the Mungo Park Medal as a tribute to her explorations and in recognition of her original and valuable researches in Iceland, Greenland and Arctic Alaska. She wrote several travel books including 'North to the Rime-Ringed Sun' and 'Stepping Stones from Alaska to Asia' and four volumes of poetry.

In later life she gave frequent lectures, using films and lantern slides, describing her travels for film-making and writing articles for National Geographic' magazine. She died in 1982.

Of her poems I have chosen one I can resonate with, having spent my childhood on the doorstep of the Pentland Hills, south of Edinburgh:

Lament for the Pentland Men.

Oh early grey of morning-time! Oh Pentland Hills! The bracken white with frosty rime, The brown peat rills, Home of the wild-bird wet with dew, Heard ye the sunrise yearning For the eager beat of Pentland feet No more, no more, no more returning?

Up from the city’s clustered spires, Up from the glen, The thin sweet bugle-call inspires The Redford men. Home of the wild-bird wet with dew Heard ye the bugle yearning For the eager beat of Pentland feet No more, no more, no more returning?

From high Caerketton’s pebbly ridge, From Kips to Castlelaw, From Loganlee to Redford Bridge, From Dunsyre to Cobbinshaw, Braes where the sheep-dog watches lone Fling wild the echo, yearning For the eager beat of Pentland feet No more, no more, no more returning.

Oh fallen hearts of Pentland gold! Oh bleeding feet that roam The long grey silences that fold The Hills of Home! Hear ye no sobbing faint and far? The grey old Pentlands yearning For the wistful beat of children’s feet No more, no more, no more returning.

You can read more about this little know Scottish explorer here https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/.../isobel.../

[lexydakitten]

rot rot rot rot ... this particular kind infests the grounds of my iterator oc one step ahead / osa, and inevitably him as well. time for me to ramble yayy yayy

meant to post this earlier i just was fussing over names. i have concluded that the colloquial name for all these together is inflorescence longlegs because that means that i still get to use the acronym ILL and thats cool i thinks. proto-rot is creeping longlegs, then in order of size smallest to largest is sprout longlegs, flowering longlegs, and wilting longlegs. they're a sort of mutated vine, one which was pretty common on osa's grounds, but he got just a Little screwed over by astronomically low odds. vine turned into rot naturally as certain background environmental conditions on his grounds make that something that happens from time to time (in more than just vines - any organism). the atypical and astronomically low odds part comes from the fact that it did not resolve itself, because when this occurs on his grounds it's usually such a small sample produced that quickly dies or is otherwise destroyed. in this case, by the time it becomes noticeable to him, it's already grown too quickly to be easily fixed.

because of it occurring naturally, a lot of properties and behaviors are retained from what it was originally. this is mostly because it's scarier that way and i made osa for me to project my nightmares onto👍

for visual - osa's grounds are mostly a tight thicket of bushes and shrubs that are adapted to a higher latitude environment. the thicket provided a fair amount of shelter for the ILLs until the infestation had a sizeable population. a common behavior seen in all ILL specimens, proto or not, is that they try to climb up other plants as they infest them, something retained from being a vine. additionally, when they have infested a significant amount of one shrub, they will start trying to spread to find another by growing on the ground in arches (top right) which is another thing based off of certain vines. they're green because they also can still photosynthesize, though because of high energy needs this is only sustainable for smaller specimens and really only means they can survive longer in a starving state. also, they're very thorny, which makes mobile cysts move slower, and they typically prefer not to move much anyways aside from the wilting longlegs. because they originate from a plant, they're all weaker physically, i think a sprout longlegs you could probably spear to death very easily in one cycle if you had enough spears to expend, and none of them are explosive resistant. fighting any of them with explosives in a particularly large thicket of rot though (or a wilting long legs) is something i would not advise though ;3c.

while slls are parallel to blls, flls to dlls, etc, there's a few distinctions worth making. sprout longlegs and flowering longlegs are very small, with sprout longlegs being probably roughly a bit larger than the size of a squidcada and flowering longlegs being the size of blls or a small dll. wilting longlegs are dll/tll sized. flowering longlegs don't break down into sprout longlegs when starving either (though a wilting longlegs may break down into a group of flowering longlegs), and they occur differently. sprout longlegs are commonly found outside of or on the edge of rot thickets and are common in clusters, as they are all cysts that were broken off the main patches by rain, and very few became mobile through normal means. sprout longlegs are though, like blls, completely senseless, and they don't pose a significant threat - i like to imagine they do have a tendency to fall when they start moving as they have the least amount of thorns though, so the majority of their threat comes from falling from above. flowering longlegs occur via normal means, just cysts that became mobile. they have the ability to hear, and in particularly heavy thickets of creeping longlegs they can also have what is effectively telepathy. think orange lizard. wilting longlegs are similar to flowering longlegs here, they're just much much larger cysts that became mobile, in some instances they may even be cysts that have completely consumed a shrub or bush and then became mobile, hence their size.

wilting longlegs.. :3. they can hear, and regardless of where they are, they're large enough to exhibit telepathy towards each other. wilting longlegs are the most aggressive as their ability to photosynthesize is entirely unsustainable for them - a sprout longlegs will last fine consuming things minimally, a flowering longlegs can last though will eventually start starving, wilting longlegs MUST consume however. their size and energy need is too costly and they're practically always on the edge of a starving state. an additional ability is that their toxicity is extremely concentrated - all ILLs produce toxins, as the vine they originate from did. in most instances, it only becomes a significant threat when consuming them. sprout longlegs are a similar effect to the ingame mushroom effects, flowering longlegs would be similar to the effects hunter experiences when rotting. wilting longlegs, due to their size, produce it the most, and it becomes dangerous to creatures that are grabbed by them. because they are covered in it, even if the creature breaks free, they will experience effects of the toxin shortly after. it's not life-threatening, but it would cause temporary immobility, like spitter spider spit does, alongside the psychoactive effects. wilting longlegs are escapable, but they present a greater hazard than a tll does.

said effects also apply to iterators. which osa learns pretty hard. because he can't ever find a fix to the issue, and his group members become too scared to put effort into helping him, he ends up having to deal with it alone. and the infestation reaches him initially through his intake system, but he can flush it out to prevent it from taking hold. it still damages his systems when it does get in, in very small amounts, and the damages accumulate until there's nothing he can do about it getting in. as more and more rot grows and damages him, he also becomes poisoned by it, and suffers from that as well. and the entire time he's terrified of it, even before it starts reaching him, that combined with the negligence of his group members is why he's a vicious jerk. not evil but he isn't in his right mind from the pressure of how terrifying his situation is from his perspective + inevitably becoming sick too. he was pretty unremarkable before, especially considering he's the oldest one in his group - i'd say senior but i'm still not sure if that's a fanon thing or not? i dont wanna accidentally take someone else's ideas by referring to him as that lol

but. i figured i'd make this as a reference and then also as an excuse to ramble about my nightmares goober🙌yay. it didnt make sense to not have significant depth to the nightmare-inspired parts so i fixed it :3

nvm just remembered the thing i forgot to put. also while their starving colors are not shown here, they shift into a more autumnal/stressed set of colors and become significantly lighter and more desaturated as well. wilting longlegs are the ones you'd find with these colors most often and they're already somewhat adjacent to it. just cuz i think it's cool

[riverxsong-ao3]

The Knights of Walpurgis: The Knights, Ascending

“Well then, Bella,” he hissed. “It’s just you and me now. It’s time for the real fun to begin. I wonder – just how long has it been since you’ve tasted your own medicine?” “Wha –” “Crucio!” Bellatrix, who had started to pick herself up from the ground, fell to her knees anew, screaming with the agony of his curse. He ended it quickly and crouched to lift her chin. “There. That wasn’t so bad, right Bella? Just a little taste, a little sample. Or would you like more?” “You’re nothing,” Bellatrix spat, wrenching herself away from his touch. “Your magic is paltry in comparison to what the Dark Lord can do. You may be able to block the Cruciatus, but to cast it you have to truly mean it!” “Oh, I meant it,” Tom said, stepping backwards and levelling his wand at her once more. “On the contrary, that was me holding back. If you’re so eager to see the depth of my power, I can certainly oblige you. Crucio!” Bellatrix shrieked as the full brunt of Tom’s curse hit her, knocking her backwards and onto the cobblestones where she writhed in agony. “There you go,” he purred. “Is that what you were looking for? I can provide even more, of course, but I’m afraid you might just lose your mind – what’s left of it, anyway.” He held her under the curse for several more seconds, allowing himself to wallow in the pleasure it engendered within him until her screams turned to sobs for mercy – mercy, please. Then, bending down low, he met Bellatrix dead in the eye. “Let it not be said that I cannot take pity upon those who oppose me,” he said, drinking in her terrified expression. “But now, I think, it’s time for a little cat and mouse. I do have to maintain an image of a perfectly normal Hogwarts student, even if it’s clear to all those who meet me that I am exceptional – extraordinary, even. So – I’m going to run, and you are going to chase me. Or do you no longer wish to kill me?” “You’re dead,” Bellatrix replied, wiping the sleeve of her robe across her mouth. Like rouge, it left a crimson smear across her cheek. “You’re dead, Riddle!” “Ah, that’s the spirit, Bella,” Tom smiled. “Do try and keep up. And Bella – remember my face.” He took off running in the same direction Harry had, instinctively following the tether that connected their souls. Something didn’t feel right, he realised, his mind clearing from the intensity of the fight. Harry was scared – terrified, even. He skidded to a halt as a small cluster of his Knights came into view: Fred, George, Luna, Pansy, and Longbottom. Fred was stretched out across the road, though his brother was helping him to sit up as Luna ran the tip of her wand over his back. Both Pansy and Longbottom looked fearful. “What is this?” Tom demanded. “Where is Harry, and why isn’t he with you?” “He went after Ron,” Luna said simply, pressing her wand into Fred’s side and eliciting a sharp wince from him. “A couple of Death Eaters dragged him off, so Harry went off to look for him.” “What?!” Tom shouted. “And none of you thought to go with him?! If you’re not going to keep him safe, what is the point of you?!”

[sergeifyodorov]

POLL RESULTS JUST DROPPED!!

My hockeyblr experiences are largely catered to my own personal tastes -- mostly Leafs, a little Penguins and Stars, one or two who post about Stevie Y and Sergei Fedorov. These are obviously not the only teams out there.

This study was designed to survey as much of hockeyblr as it possibly could, gathering data on which teams people like and to what degrees. There were five questions and a free space -- my attempt to ask people to rank the teams they enjoyed in three levels, from religiously followed to casually affectionate, and an additional couple of questions on love for players versus team. I received over 500 responses. Here are the results.

Yeah, yeah, you all want to know: The most popular team is the Penguins, by a long shot, then the Leafs.

Because my sample size (n = 523) is actually fairly small compared to the number of NHL teams there are, I find definitive rankings tend to be difficult. It’s also worth noting that, as a mainly Leafs blog, my numbers are definitely going to be skewed a little in favour of the Leafs.

Your Guys

These are the teams closest to your heart: the ship you go down with, metaphorically or, depending on how married your old men are, literally. For me, I picked just the Leafs.

The average respondent had 1.9 teams in this category. The most popular, by far, was the Pittsburgh Penguins. Below is a table of teams, arranged roughly into tiers by the number of respondents. Each team has the number of respondents in brackets next to their three-letter code.

I allowed people to pick as many teams as they would like; the average person picked 1.9 teams, but here’s a distribution of how many teams they picked:

4 people picked 0 “your guys” teams, and 2 people picked seven, nine, or ten each teams. Just about half of people had one main team.

I then wondered: what teams were people most likely to only follow? That is, if you hold [x] team in the closest part of your heart, are you more or less likely to also hold any other teams? Almost exactly 25% of picks were solo; I wondered if there was any correlation at all.

Only a little bit! Of the samples large enough to actually consider (so: nothing in that cluster at the bottom left, who all received fewer than 10 picks total, and a few of whom -- CGY, CHI, NSH -- received zero solo pickers), the most devoted fans chose the Sharks, the Bruins, and the Leafs. The fans who liked the most other teams chose the Avs, the Kraken, the Canucks, Panthers, Sens, and Ducks.

Probably a next step would be to look for correlations: if people are a fan of one team, are they more likely to be fans of another? THAT BEING SAID that’s a lot of regressions. Maybe keep an eye on that for the future, but I don’t know!!

Objects of Enjoyment, and Generally Nice

These two were successive tiers meant to distinguish teams that people like from the ones in the category above. I admit I probably could have phrased the questions better; I received several comments saying that they’d watch any hockey when they wanted to put a game on. The dynamics between Your Guys versus Objects of Enjoyment versus Generally Nice would best be described as devoted fan of versus casual fan of versus favourable opinion towards. 

As I said a few paragraphs back, people picked 1.9 “devoted fan” teams on average. Again on average, they picked 4.7 “casual fan” teams and 6.5 “favourable opinion” teams. Not all ratios are equal, though! Some teams had significantly more casual than devoted fans, and others still were much more liked generally than average.

I gave each team’s “devoted” count an index number of 1 and measured their casual and favourable count as a ratio against the index number. The teams assembled themselves into a few groups.

No Commitment

Arizona and Anaheim have decided to be soulbonded (Excel refuses to let them have different-coloured dots) and it took me three hundred million years to attempt to (and unsuccessfully) fix, so let’s ignore that. These teams all have a fairly high slope of interest -- a range of casual interest at about five times the pace of fervent interest, and good opinion at about ten times fervent interest. The Calgary Flames are an outlier on the entire graph, not just here. 

Casual Interest

I gave up on trying to colour teams according to their real colours shortly after the Anaheim/Arizona debacle. Please employ the legend. Nashville is included on all five graphs for reference. These teams all have a casual interest factor of about 3, and a favourable opinion factor of around 5; the same ratio as the casual fans of the teams in the first category to their fervent fans.

Saturated Market

These teams have a much lower ratio of hardcore:casual:favourable fans, at about 1:2:3. 

We Get It, Those Are Your Guys

Pittsburgh and Toronto; these teams have an almost equal ratio of all three categories.

...Whatever This Is

Every other category is defined by its ratios; this category is defined by its shape. While all teams have their rate of hardcore fandom set as 1, the other two tend to increase in a roughly linear form, without too much significant difference between the first interval and the second interval.

These teams, though (again, Nashville is for scale) don’t do that: they have a set increase between hardcore and casual, and a significantly smaller increase (or, in a couple cases, a decrease) between casual and favourable. This suggests perhaps some kind of divisiveness; if you’re not already in there, do you really want to get in further? Either that, or it’s something closer to what the Leafs and Penguins have: that is, a devotion. Like you’re in or you’re out.

Taking these values together

Because the casual:hardcore ratios are measured as indexes and not absolute values, they say nothing about the actual popularity of the team in question -- Calgary is one of the least popular, which is why I assume it’s so weirdly high up; small sample sizes lead to higher error values!

But we do have the absolute values, so we can measure them against each other.

If we consider the “In or Out” to be a category of its own while the other four are along more of a continuum, then we can absolutely see a correlation here -- larger fandoms tend to have more involved fanbases.

Players or Teams?

I also asked participants if their guys tended to be players or teams -- and if those they liked at a more casual level tended to be players or teams.

The results are… not particularly surprising.

On a hardcore level, people tended to prefer teams, although the variability was pretty slight. On a casual level, individual players were much more popular.

I also wondered if people who chose more teams in the hardcore fan question tended to do that because they prefer players.

On average, people who picked players on their hardcore level chose 2.1 teams. People who picked teams chose 1.7 teams. That’s definitely a difference!

Fun Shtuff

I got way more write-in responses on the hardcore player/team question than on the casual question, including this:

Three separate people answered “Minnesota Wild” for their guys and chose no other teams on any level. Hell yes. (One person also did this for the Kings.)

It took about 300 responses before the first Flames fan (at the hardcore level.)

On all three levels, the Seattle Kraken are really popular -- they’re in the top five in each.

What's Next?

If I were to update this survey, I would probably include a question about where all of you are from -- some people (like me) follow their hometown team, while some people most certainly don't (shoutout to the one person from Edmonton who dislikes the Oilers) and others still don't have a hometown team (shoutout to my brasilian + european + etc mutuals and everyone else!!)

Feel free to shoot me an ask if you want me to do anything else with this data -- examine a specific team, give actual casual fan/etc counts and total aggregate rankings, anything else!

[roseamongroses]

eggheads | en

Shuri/Riri Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Summer Camp Teacher!Riri, Auntie! Riri, Auntie! Shuri, Plot Device Rainstorm, Sexual Content, Missed Connections, Riri Williams is a Hot Mess, Shuri's into it

Summary: Sometimes smart people can be a little dumb when it comes to matters of love.

-

Shuri picks up her nephew from summer camp and meets his rather interesting teacher. Sparks fly--or at least they could, but it'll take a little more effort for them to get to the first date.

ao3

“Science camp?” Shuri repeated outloud, baffled—floored—befuddled even.

She swung her carry-on over her shoulder, her wide, glossy sunglasses sliding into place as she stepped outside the airport, “You paid…American dollars... to send my nephew—my cherished blood— to an…" she tasted the words on her tounge, disgust plain, "American, science summer camp? You could have sent him home for free. Is he being punished?”

Nakia’s holograph flickered over the left lens of Shuri’s sunglasses, “Not at all,” she said with a light-hearted chuckle, “You must understand, he practically begged to go. He wants to be like his auntie,” she teased, eyebrows raising pointedly, “Every kid his age apparently goes there for the summer, so I thought it’d be a good experience.”

And at that—Shuri’s heart warmed a smidge with smug satisfaction, “What does he even do there?” she asked, signaling her driver.

“Well, last week they learned about rock formations and visited a river to collect samples. This week they’re learning about circuits and— ” Nakia paused, squinting a bit, lips pursed as she thought, “He wants to show you himself, so I can’t spoil all the fun.”

“Bah--keep your secrets then,” Shuri said, popping the trunk to her car and throwing her suitcase in without a second glance. She accepted the keys from the driver, passing back a sizable tip in return, “What’s the address again?”

-

Miles away there was a little brick building across from the East Shore Public Library. It was a community center that had seen better years, but it wasn’t any less lively. Rainbow paper-chains threaded through the metal chain-link fences, green cups peppering the front window sills that were filled with budding sprouts, and a faded mural of stars and planets spanned the wall facing the street.

Several kids burst out of the front doors, capes tied around their shoulders as they clambered after one another. They all sprinted towards the jungle-gym out back--an adventure has begun it seems.

Inside, chipped, sickly-yellow walls were littered with peeling flyers. The words were bright, demanding you remember that--and dream for this--and volunteer for that. Little heads slouched along one wall, dark eyes staring ahead--the lot scowling, pouting, and grumbling as they waited to be freed from time out.

A line of colorful doors dotted down the hallway. Inside each classroom there were equally colorful tables, chairs, and walls. The kids clustered around each one--voices overlapping like a chirping nest of birds, grubby fingers reaching for the many tools and materials sprawled across the surface of their respective table. Scissors, wire, little light-bulbs and batteries--they all fought for their weapons of choice.

Their teacher moved about the classroom with ease. She stood tall--which wasn’t saying much, but she stood tall enough. Her grown-out, auburn braids were gathered in a messy bun, sitting crooked at the top of her head. She wore a long, cargo skirt that dragged behind, the sound of her beat-up work boots catching your ear long before you saw her face. The kids dutifully worked on the project, following her instructions.

Well…most of the kids did.

Toussaint stared at the scattered pieces in front of him. Clunky, disconnected--looking nothing like the cartoon diagram. He frowned, mouth shrinking into his face, hands crumpling the instructions as his frustration grew. It tickled his throat and clogged his breath.

“I…don’t get it,” he mumbled to himself, lip wobbling a bit.

What was he doing wrong?

Everyone else understood the instructions just fine. Little lights flickering on one-by-one, each one leaving him behind.

“But it's so easy? I’m done--” Demitrius boasted next to him.

He was a boy who was more afro than face. He had been doodling on the paper and table for most of the time, his project hastily put together long-before they even got instructions. It looked equally wrong and was covered in pudding--gross.

Across the table, the only girl at the table was slumped over, snoring away. Lunella had spent a total of five minutes putting together her project with little difficulty. She didn’t follow the instructions at all. There were parts moving, blinking, and whirring away--most of which she had grabbed from her bag.

She was most likely closer to being a scientist then any of them--then him.

Toussaint flinched at the realization, blinking rapidly as those little drops flowed.

He stared at the paper--it started right back.

Why didn’t it make any sense? Why couldn’t he do something so simple--

Looking up again, Demitrius did a double take, crayon falling as panic flashed across his face. His hand shot up, waving a bit, “Uh…Titi?” he called out, eyes darting around the classroom.

Riri let out a long, drawn out sigh, pinching her nose, “No, lil-man you cannot eat the wires. I done told you this--” she turned around, face falling.

No matter how long she's done this--she could never get used to the face of a crying child.

Toussaint sniffled quietly, tears running hot down his cheeks. They fell onto the instructions, blotting out the words like scattered shadows-- his hands shaking. He didn’t hear the footsteps nor the dragging skirt. He doesn’t know when, but he blinked and the sickly, yellow walls of the hallway were around him.

Riri crouched in front of the child--speaking low and unhurried.

Toussaint didn’t catch a word of what she said, but he pretended to hear. He wiped his nose, “...I’m okay,” he said, voice small--easily swallowed by the noise of the classroom and hallway, “I’m okay, I promise,” he repeated, hoping she’d believe him. Hoping she wouldn’t bring it up to his mom--she was busy enough. He didn’t want to worry her because he was being stupid. At that thought, he let out another choked up sob.

“Hey-hey, hey, I believe you,” Riri reassured softly, nodding as she wiped his face, “We’re jus’ gonna chill for a bit, that’s all.”

Toussaint nodded, sniffling as he blinked back the remaining tears.

After a while they finally returned to the classroom.

Miss Riri eyed the remains of his project curiously for a moment.

Toussaint fidgeted in his chair, looking off, embarrassed, but by the time he looked back--the light was blinking. It didn’t even look all that different from how he had it before and yet it worked.

Bright eyed, Toussaint looked up, “You fixed it,” he said, awed, prodding the project carefully.

“There wasn’t much to fix,” Riri said with a small smile, pointing to the two wires--purple and orange--he had unintentionally crossed, “You were on the right track, you just got a little mixed up.”

Demitrius nodded along, afro bobbing with the movement, “Of course she fixed it, my Titi’s the smartest in the world” he boasted, flashing a toothy grin.

Miss Riri snorted, ruffling his hair, “Well I guess I-”

At that, Toussaint’s nose scrunched up, “She’s not the smartest,” he said, matter of fact.

Demitrius scowled, head whipping around, “Yes she is-”

“No she isn’t-” Toussaint huffed, eyes narrowing as his chin raised, no lingering tears to be seen, “My Tati is the smartest.”

“No my T--”

“I’m sure we’re both smart,” Miss Riri said, cutting them both off with a no-nonsense look, “It’s not a competition, so--" her words were cut short as loud shrieks erupted from a nearby table--a kid threw up. Riri rushed over, conversation long forgotten as she tried to settle down the chaos.

In the meantime, Demitirus and Toussaint stared at each other, eyes glinting as a new challenge had been issued.

-

Afternoon pick up was a shit show like always.

Kids forgetting shit-- the shoes on their feet and the beads in their head. Parents acting tough for no good reason. Xavier had to break up several fights in the parking lot already. One kid crawled behind the front desk and scribbled over the entire sign in/out sheet in metallic sharpie. Then when she went to confiscate the sharpie, he threw up on her.

So yeah-- a normal, shit end to a shit day.

Riri didn’t hate her job, per say, but it certainly wasn't something she ever imagined doing. Wiping noses, breaking up fights, teaching the planets through song. It wasn’t exactly the filthy rich, inventor, astronaut she always envisioned herself becoming.But...it wasn’t like she had many options at this point. It helped that she liked dealing with kids better than undergrads, but she wasn’t sure that a consistent check was worth the biohazard-ass conditions.

After the first wave of pick-ups--the usual stragglers were left. The rest of the summer staff began to either clean up or supervise the remaining kids playing out back.

Riri manned the front desk, busying herself with the mountains of paper-work. She flipped through the sign in/out sheet, wincing as she noticed the sharpie was bleeding on everything else in the stack. Knowing her boss, he’d expect everything to get reprinted. She’d been bugging the man about setting up a digital sign-in, but he was averse to anything that wasn’t invented before the 1900s.

The bell on the front door rang, but she didn’t bother to look up, eyes darting between her open laptop and the stained paperwork.

Light footsteps approached the front desk and someone cleared their throat, “I’m here to pick up Toussaint,” they said with an accent she couldn’t quite place immediately.

Riri was briefly annoyed about the lack of a last name, but then remembered Toussaint was actually the only kid enrolled with that name this summer. She glanced up, before doing a double take.

That...was not Toussaint’s Mama.

Slim fingers with neatly trimmed nails rested against the counter, a long line she couldn’t help but follow up. Tall, lean, with tightly cropped curls. Shades blocking her eyes, dark and glossy like the athleisure set she wore. Expensive. She stood out—then again, she’d stand out anywhere. The stranger smiled—a cheeky flash of silver and dimples. Riri’s stomach flipped--funny—distantly she heard children laughing.

“Uh, right,” Riri blinked, brain doing a hard reset as she set aside the papers she was sorting through, “Can I see some I.D?” she asked, mouth on autopilot.

Reaching behind the desk, she found a beat-up binder, bursting at the seams. She flipped through the pages and accepted their Passport I.D comparing it to the student’s file. Very professional, calm, mature--fuck she looked a mess. She confirmed the information and picked up her walkie-talkie, notifying them to send Toussaint up.

Riri inhaled, putting on her best customer service smile, “You must be the famous Tati,” she mused as she handed back the I.D. She then adjusted her top, hoping to hide the stains.

Shuri raised her sunglasses, perching them on top of her head—distracting, dark eyes, catching the fluorescent glare like unearthed, precious stone, “He talks about me?” she asked.

“You’re all we can get him to talk about,” Riri shared, unconsciously tugging a braid loose from her bun and twirling it as she spoke, “He had us thinking you're the Queen of England.”

“Oh?”

Riri looked her up and down, eyes taking great care to take in every detail. She leaned against the counter, “I can believe it,” she said, looking around before her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper, “You’ve got a presence--real regal like.”

“Uh-huh,” Shuri murmured with a creeping smile, “What? Are you saying I'm intimidating?”

“Something like that…” Riri said with a low laugh, fingers tapping against the counter.

Everything about the teacher was--distracting.

Those hands, always in motion. The little cartoon band-aids around her thumbs, a bright, vibrant orange that matched the chain of little flags looping around the marbled, front desk. Gold hoops and a matching chain hanging above her collarbones, moles dotting the curve of her neck. Those broad shoulders and toned arms. Cropped tank-top and that long skirt that hung low on her hips--nothing indecent, but enough to be appreciated. The way her eyes never hesitated to meet her own--a silent challenge—a question.

Then Riri smiled again or rather her smile changed. It became smaller—less polished. Crooked—shy almost. The front gap in her teeth peeking through her lips. Distantly she heard children laughing.

Shuri was unable to decide where her eyes should land.

It was hard to describe--that lingering, something. The air tense, but not unfriendly as they stared at each other-- expectant. As if they were both waiting to see who’d be the first crack--the first to exhale--the first to ask--

Riri stiffened as her walkie-talkie went off again and she remembered herself--her job. She cleared her throat, “Yeah, Toussaint is a sweet student, but…”

At the mention of her nephew, Shuri's attention sharply pivoted, “Did something happen?”

“He had a tough time in lessons today,” Riri gently explained, “He got overwhelmed and had to step out of class for a little bit. Otherwise, he had a pretty good day.”

“Overwhelmed…?” Shuri repeated, uneasy, “Are the lessons difficult?”

After a certain age, she never saw the boy get upset at much. He was always a bright, cheerful child.

Then again, the same could’ve been said about her growing up. More often than not, she became rather adept at hiding the nastier feelings.

Riri sent her a sympathetic look, “The lessons are age-appropriate, but sometimes kids get frustrated and that makes it harder for them.”

Sometimes it wasn’t a matter of being smart enough. Humans are far too complicated to be ruled by logic alone. She knew it unsettled some guardians when their kids struggled. Knowing that it wasn’t something that’d be a quick fix or easily brushed under the rug. Sometimes she’s even had parents pull their kids out of the program--accusing her of all sorts of things, before eventually re-enrolling once they realized the options in the area for affordable S.T.E.M programs were slim to none.

Shuri looked a bit concerned, but she nodded her head, “I’ll be sure to inform his Mother. Thank you for letting us know," she said, making a mental note for later, “So... do you help plan the lessons?” she asked, conversationally.

Riri barked out a laugh, “Nah,” she said, shaking her head, schooling her expression quickly.

Shuri raised her eyebrow, “Not a fan, then?”

Riri hummed, looking off to the side, “The lesson plans are...fine,” she reluctantly admitted, “But, some kids are further along then others, so they get bored and…act up.”

“I’m sure they keep you busy.”

“Mhm," Riri's mouth pinched at the thought, muttering under her breath, "It’s my karma for all the shit I pulled in school growing up.”

“You? A troublemaker?” Shuri asked, leaning against the counter.

“You don’t believe it?” Riri's eyes squinted, cocking her head. A clean scent crept into her space--she didn't entirely mind.

Oh, Shuri believed it.

The teacher was trouble. From that ever elusive smile, to those dangerously sharp eyes--all carefully tucked behind that flimsy professional demeanor.

Growing up, the elders always said that where there was trouble, Shuri would follow.

Today wasn’t any different.

Shuri considered this for a moment, knowing what her next move should be, but--

“Tati--!” Toussaint shouted, sneakers squeaking as he rushed to greet his aunt.

The pair jumped at the sound, pulling away from each other.

Shuri cleared her throat, glancing back uncertainly, but she was quickly distracted as Toussaint jumped into her arms with a bubbly laugh. He was as bright as she remembered. Her worries eased, if only for that moment. It seemed as if her nephew had already forgotten his difficulties.

She lifted him up, the squirming boy falling into another fit of giggles as she tossed him about before setting him down.

Toussaint grabbed her hand, pulling her along as he chatted away. He tossed a careless wave behind, “Bye-bye Miss Riri, ” he called back, pushing through the doors.

Shuri sent Riri one final, lingering look before she was dragged away.

Once the door slammed shut, Riri sucked in her teeth, body slumping against the front desk. She pressed her head against the cool countertop, knocking it a few times for good measure as she collected her thoughts. She let out one, lengthy groan--disappointment rolling right into frustration.

Fucking dammit.

Sure she was sleep-deprived, covered in questionable stains, and looked a mess, but she definitely still had a chance.

If she was lucky, maybe she’d get to see her again.

-

Shuri swung that baby-blue, back-pack decorated with pink cats over her shoulder. She walked slower then normal, eyes glancing back towards the building every-so-often before inevitably returning to her nephew who was skipping, full-speed ahead.

She was confused, to say the least. They were interrupted, but Shuri had some time to at least ask for her number, give her number--something. But her mouth was dry, intended words lost and easily swept away by her nephew’s excitement.

It was undeniable--she froze.

That big brain of her--faltered, lingering far too long to get to the point. That never happens. She’s been attracted to women in the past. It certainly wouldn’t have been her first time initiating and yet she hesitated.

Riri was working. She was clearly exhausted. It didn’t…feel right to hit on someone when they couldn’t easily reject her advances.

That was probably it.

That was all there was to it.

Shuri shook her head, annoyed at herself. Regardless, the other woman was clearly interested. She should’ve taken the chance, but there was no point in getting too hung up over it. She was leaving in a week anyways.

She settled into the car, starting it up. She glanced into the rear-view mirror, making sure her nephew didn’t forget to put on his seatbelt as he continued to talk his head off.

“Did you go to college--” Toussaint randomly asked in the middle of describing the latest episode of that cartoon series he’s been watching.

Shuri took a moment to process the change of topic, pulling out of the parking space, “...College?” she echoed, confused, “No, I haven’t. Why do you ask?”

At that, her nephew’s face crumpled. He fiddled with his hands, mumbling, “Demitrius says you can’t be the smartest if you don’t go to college…”

Shuri paused at that, eyes narrowing ever so slightly.

Demitrius?

It must be one of the kids from camp.

“Our education system isn’t structured the same as western institutions,” she said, meeting his gaze in the mirror.

Toussaint straightened up at her tone, recognizing it as another one of her haphazard lessons.

Seeing that she had his attention, Shuri continued, “A good percentage of our population resides in rural areas, so our education system is relatively decentralized and the other tribes--”

Shuri’s built more schools then she’s attended to be honest. Over the years she’s even expanded beyond Wakanda to set up outreach and educational facilities. It was the reason she was in Chicago to begin with--she was overseeing the final touches of the newest facility.

Toussaint listened avidly as she detailed the various tribes and their educational systems. Sometimes she worried if she was going too fast or using too many words he didn’t understand, but he never balked at their discussions. He always took everything in, drinking in each word. Later on he’d usually quietly ask her to elaborate or explain anything he didn’t catch the first time. She figured that he preferred not to be babied. And considering the fact that he was their future King--she knew it was best to inform him the best she could.

Then out of curiosity, she asked what they were even talking about to bring up college to begin with.

“Oh, Demitrius said Miss Riri was smarter then you cause she went to MIT,” Toussaint explained, scowling at the reminder.

“She did?” Shuri asked, interest stirring once more, “Do you know what she studied?”

Toussaint scratched his head, nose scrunching up for a moment before he shook his head--no.

Shuri sighed, a little disappointed, “...Anyhow, you can’t quantify intelligence based on education alone," she said, deciding to move on, "There're far too many variables that can impact that and it can be difficult to compare across regions. Do you understand?”

Toussaint nodded, arriving to a conclusion. Although it probably wasn’t the conclusion Shuri anticipated. He stared out the window, watching the raindrops scatter towards the bottom, envisioning his raindrop beating the rest to the finish line.

[deardaichi]

chapter three: spoken over glasses

wc: 0.8k series masterlist: found here

By the end of the week, Satomi stops smiling.

Not in a dramatic way. She still speaks politely. Still attends fittings, still nods through council meetings, still walks the garden paths with Toru at dusk. But something sharp begins to settle behind her eyes — a thin, glinting thing that doesn’t go away.

The problem, apparently, is the flowers.

“These are wrong,” she says, gesturing toward the table where petals in glass bowls have been arranged in careful, color-matched clusters. “They’re too…bridal. I don’t want soft. I don’t want fragile.”

Toru exhales slowly, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Then tell me what you want.”

“I don’t know.” Her voice flickers, not quite angry. “Something different. Something not like everyone else.”

The silence stretches. Wakatoshi stands at a polite distance. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t leave either.

“Then we’ll look together,” Toru says finally. “There’s a collection of botanical prints in the eastern library. They’ve been sent from all over the continent. We’ll pick what feels right.”

Satomi eyes him carefully, then nods. “Fine. But I don’t want to be rushed. I want peace while we do it.”

Toru only lifts a brow. “I was born for silence.”

⊹₊♕₊⊹

The eastern library smells like wood and dust. Scrolls and thick books line the desk, floral diagrams nestled between the pages like forgotten notes. Light from wall sconces casts shadows on the floor, golden and flickering.

They open the windows. Let the breeze in. The night settles around them like a second skin.

The prints are spread between them, old ink sketches and vellum sheets pinned with delicate labels: primroses, camellias, snowbells. Wax seals still clinging to the corners. Some are fragile enough to crack under breath.

Satomi sits cross-legged on the floor, leaning back against a stack of bound archives. Her sleeves fall over her hands. She brushes them back absentmindedly as she flips through the pages.

Wakatoshi doesn’t sit, but hovers close enough to lean in when they hold something up. His shadow falls over Toru’s shoulder. Neither of them acknowledge it.

Satomi selects and discards flowers quickly. Too pale. Too sharp. Too romantic. Too forgettable. She mumbles critiques without apology, fingers brushing pages with growing impatience.

Toru takes his time. Flipping through the older collections. Ones handwritten in dialects that haven’t been spoken in years. Margins crowded with pressed samples and careful notes. Some of the pages are beginning to fade at the edges. 

One sketch catches his eye: a stem of silver-white lilies growing from between stones. No name. No note. Just that.

He says nothing, but folds it carefully and pockets it.

Outside, a night bird calls once. Then, quiet.

The door creaks open — not a servant this time, but Iwaizumi himself. He steps in without a word, a tall bottle of shochu in one hand, cups in another, and a quiet look in his eyes.

He sets them down on the table with a soft clink, gaze resting on Toru just a moment longer than necessary. There’s no speech, no teasing. Just something like understanding — the kind that only comes from watching someone carry too much for too long.

He doesn’t ask to stay. He doesn’t ask for an explanation. He just gives Toru a nod — sad, maybe. Sympathetic, definitely. He leaves without waiting for thanks.

They drink.

Not to celebrate. Not to toast. Just to make the silence lighter.

At first, the conversation continues — shallow, meandering. Satomi points out ridiculous illustrations. Toru jokes about an overly dramatic rendering of a forget-me-not. Even Wakatoshi lifts a brow at a drawing that looks more like a seaweed than a rose.

But after a few cups, the silence starts to stretch.

Satomi slouches. Her sleeves loosen. Her hair slips free in a few places. She doesn’t fix it.

“You two,” she says, picking up a faded drawing of a hydrangea, “you’re so concerned about the perfect flowers and the perfect wedding. Maybe you should marry.”

Toru chokes on nothing. He doesn’t laugh, though he thinks he’s supposed to.

Wakatoshi shifts — barely — and looks at him.

It’s not a long glance. But it’s not a normal one either.

Something burns in Toru’s chest. He takes another drink.

Satomi watches them both. She sighs.

“I don’t see myself marrying,” Satomi says, setting the sketch down. “Not in the way people expect. Not in the way that ends in a shared bed. Or even a shared life.”

She tilts her head. “But I do see the way you two look at each other. And I know it’s wrong — gods, I know — but that doesn’t make it any less true.”

The words settle between them like dust, and no one brushes them away.

Toru doesn’t answer, but he can feel his heartbeat in his throat. Wakatoshi doesn’t move either, but his hands curl slowly around his knees.

No one says anything for a while.

The candle on the table burns lower, flickering shadows against the floor. Satomi leans back against the shelves behind her. Her head tilts up. For a moment, she just closes her eyes.

The silence stretches until it folds in on itself. 

“I don’t want to do this wrong,” Toru says quietly. “But I don’t know what right looks like either.”

Satomi opens her eyes again, looking at him. Then at Wakatoshi.

“I don’t think anyone does,” she says.

Still, they sit there.

Not arguing. Not planning. Just existing in the kind of stillness that follows truth.

Wakatoshi is the first to breathe.

And when Satomi finally speaks again, it’s slower, softer.

Satomi’s voice drops. “So let’s figure it out.”

She leans forward. “You want peace. I want freedom. And you want each other. I’m not stupid. I’m not angry. But I am tired.”

Toru’s hands rest in his lap. Not shaking. But not steady either.

“There’s a nation in the south,” he says slowly. “Karasuno. They’ve ruled with two kings for almost a decade.”

Satomi blinks. “That place? They’re practically shunned. The courts talk about them like they’re a joke. No decorum. No legitimate heirs. No alliances anyone takes seriously.”

“And yet,” Toru says, “they still rule.”

Wakatoshi finally speaks. “Their peace has held longer than some of ours.”

The candle between them burns low.

Satomi looks between them. “If we do this… if we even entertain this… it could cost everything. The marriage. The alliance. Our crowns.”

“Then we don’t say anything,” Toru says. “We go in secret. We ask questions. Quietly. No fanfare. Just an unofficial visit. We say we’re going to Nekoma to consult with their florists.”

Wakatoshi nods once. “Yamagata can drive. Matsukawa too. Keep the detail light.”

Satomi sighs. She looks at both of them again. Long. Measured. Like she’s memorizing them in this moment, just in case.

“We’ll go at dawn,” she says. “Tell no one.”

Toru nods. “Just a consultation.”

“But we’ll know,” Satomi adds, “what we’re really looking for.”

A pause. Then she lifts her cup again. “To other ways.”

Toru clinks his cup against hers. Wakatoshi follows.

And for the first time that night, the silence doesn’t feel so heavy.

© everything here is written with care — please don’t repost, copy, or alter my work without permission.

taglist (open): @tangerinelovr @godhainerammsteiner @oligbia

[pencil-inc]

Do you want to know the funniest* thing about toon blood?

It is notoriously hard to clean. It might look like regular ink, but it has the properties of superglue and paint, combined.

We already had rules in place for that reason; when working on autopsy duty, direct lab samples, or even in the room with an injured toon, you wear your damn lab gear.

Every employee had monogrammed labcoats for identification. But you would also be issued your own goggles and pants to wear when working up close. Shoe covers were in every lab. There were a handful of employees that provided their own gear, but not that many. I remember one guy had these bright orange lab goggles for whatever reason.

Anyway. I'm getting off topic. Lab gear.

That's an example of one of our labcoats. I don't have mine; I burnt it when the company collapsed. Just in case.

Back to the blood, though. One day, we had an incident in one of the test rooms; our equipment was malfunctioning and our Stretch Armstrong-like subject had been caught in the machinery.

One of our technicians, Jamie (false name, as are all the other ones I'm mentioning here), hit the emergency stop button and ran inside to try and fix it directly, a labcoat on their back, crouching beside the equipment to fix the faulty sensors.

This was an emergency. If we kept our subject in that position long than they had to be there, we could kill them. Before we needed to kill them, at least. Jamie was light on their feet, and a fast worker, well respected by their department head.

But they were not fast enough.

The subject exploded 7 seconds after they stepped in.

*it's not funny. Sorry.

Jamie’s hair, eyes, and hands were coated in a wad of pitch-like black that sent them stumbling. It seeped into their roots and their half-trimmed fingernails, while they tried to plant one foot in front of the other, unable to see, unable to think, unable to walk straight. In it’s fresh state, it dribbled down in large glops of shiny tar, already hardening fast like magma.

With an uncovered mouth, their screams registered at an average of 101.4 dB inside the chamber, occurring every one to five seconds when they froze in pain and fear. A very, very founded fear.

They were later sedated and brought to our medical team. They looked pale, according to reports.

While the more covered staff collected what samples they could from the accident, Jamie spent the next 6 hours under varying amounts of sedatives, clustered by doctors and nurses who tried to dissolve, cut, grease, leverage, and pick away the ink lodged to their face, their eyesight long gone. Their world was a cacophony of sound, of hurrying, worrying people muttering reassurance into their ears while they silently begged for tears. The “crust” of the ink grew thicker by the hour. They were running out of time. All of them.

At one point, one of the doctors on duty lost their temper. In the early hours, on attempt 15, Jamie had been given an anaesthetic for a procedure when someone pushed Dr. Shelby McGuire (Head of Medical) aside. Her scalpel tumbled to the floor while Dr. Cal Chauncey— one of the stronger members of the department— grabbed a fistful of hair encased in tar, pinning their head down, deaf to the sounds of collective distress.

He pulled.

And pulled.

And pulled.

Until he fell back to the floor from his own strength, panting with effort.

He vomited, 12 seconds later, from the sight of Jamie’s eyeballs, hair, and outlined face glued to the black shell, dripping with wet, dark blood. Human blood.

Urgent reminders to keep equipment on at all times were then displayed in Research & Development, Chemical Research & Distribution, and the cells. It was talked about for a long time; one of the first lethal injuries for staff as a result of a failed test.

Not every story will be this explicit, or this gory. This one stuck in my memory for the way it went so wrong, from the unchecked equipment to the rush of emotion to the untimely death of a twenty-something engineer. I can see their face in my mind, even now, in split-second shock.

As years went on, the most people remembered of Jamie was that lanyard, hung in the Security and Maintenance office. Event became rumour, rumour became warning. Dr. Cal Chauncey's ID photos looked a lot more lifeless, and nobody got a straight answer as to why.

You fuck up sooner, you make less mistakes later. That, I think, was the only positive.

More soon.

— Reference

[uberstrainerseo]

What Is PluriCell? Everything You Need to Know About This All-in-One Cell Culture and Filtration System

In laboratories that handle tissue digestion, live-cell assays, and organism tracking, combining cell separation and cell culture steps can save time and reduce contamination risks. That’s where PluriCell, a multi-well Lab Cell Strainer system, offers a game-changing solution. It allows filtration and culturing within the same plate setup—minimizing handling, maximizing throughput, and supporting high-precision assays.

Whether you're working with nematodes, single cells, or small multicellular organisms, PluriCell simplifies the workflow by integrating size-based filtration directly into multi-well plates. For labs looking to improve efficiency without compromising on accuracy, understanding how PluriCell works—and why it’s different from standard cell strainers—is the first step to adopting a better solution.

What Is PluriCell? A Quick Overview

PluriCell is a sample preparation and assay tool designed for researchers working with single-cell and multi-cellular organisms. The system includes nylon mesh-based strainers pre-fitted into standard well plate formats (6-, 12-, 24-, and 48-well). Each strainer plate fits snugly into corresponding well plates, allowing size-based cell separation and in-well culturing to occur simultaneously.

The mesh comes in multiple sizes—ranging from 5 µm to 500 µm—offering flexibility for diverse cell types or organisms. From isolating parasites to preparing single-cell suspensions for screening, PluriCell covers a wide range of applications while maintaining a compact footprint and simple setup.

Most importantly, PluriCell is not just a cell strainer—it’s a complete in-well assay platform that supports live tracking, treatment, and endpoint measurement of cultured samples.

How PluriCell Combines Filtration and Culture

Traditional workflows require multiple steps for size separation and cell plating. Samples are often strained through mesh filters, transferred into culture plates, and then moved again for drug testing or analysis. These transfers increase the risk of losing viable cells, introduce inconsistencies, and lengthen protocol times.

PluriCell changes that. It enables the particle separation process to occur directly in the same environment where the culture or assay will take place.

Key Benefits:

One step to filter and culture: No more transferring between mesh filters and plates.

Reduced sample loss: Cells or organisms are never handled more than necessary.

Higher reproducibility: Less manual handling leads to more consistent results.

Supports live assays: Migration, paralysis, and viability studies can be done without removing the sample.

Plate Format and Mesh Options

The PluriCell system is compatible with common lab equipment and comes in a range of configurations:

Multi-Well Plate Formats:

6-well

12-well

24-well

48-well

These options allow labs to scale up or down based on throughput needs, from small pilot studies to large screening assays.

Mesh Sizes Available:

Fine Meshes: 5, 10, 20, and 40 µm for single-cell filtration and smaller organisms.

Intermediate Meshes: 70 and 100 µm, ideal for cell clusters and small larvae.

Coarse Meshes: 200 and 500 µm for nematodes and larger multicellular samples.

This mesh variety allows labs to select exactly the right tool for their target sample. Instead of compromising by using an oversized or undersized filter, labs can match mesh size to assay requirements, enabling more accurate particle separation techniques.

Cascade Straining in a Multi-Well Format

One standout feature of PluriCell is how easily it enables cascade straining. Cascade straining refers to passing samples through a series of filters with decreasing pore sizes. This technique is especially helpful when dealing with tissues or samples containing a mix of particles, cell types, or organisms.

With PluriCell’s multi-well setup, each well can hold a strainer of a different mesh size. Researchers can load the sample once and allow gravity or light pipetting to filter the sample through wells in a defined sequence.

Example Workflow:

Start with a 500 µm mesh to remove large debris.

Next, use a 100 µm mesh for small tissue clusters or larger organisms.

Finish with a 40 µm mesh to isolate single cells or small larvae.

This setup provides fast and easy cell separation without repeated sample handling or multiple filter tools. More importantly, the entire cascade can happen within a single plate—saving time and preserving sterility.

Applications in Research and Screening

PluriCell isn’t just about convenience. It also enables entirely new types of experiments. Because cells or organisms remain in the well after filtration, they can be directly exposed to drugs, dyes, or environmental changes.

Common Use Cases:

Parasite migration assays

Viability and toxicity testing

Stem cell and primary cell culture

High-throughput screening (HTS)

Live imaging of multicellular organisms

Labs that handle fragile specimens like C. elegans, planarians, or patient-derived cell types benefit most. The system minimizes stress on the sample while maintaining clarity and access for measurement tools.

Why Mesh Integrity and Build Quality Matter

For labs used to standard lab cell strainers, PluriCell may appear similar—but its mesh quality sets it apart.

Uniform nylon mesh ensures consistent flow rates and pore sizing.

No deformation or mesh slippage, even after repeated handling.

Sterile and single-use to maintain culture conditions and reduce contamination risk.

PluriCell vs. Traditional Culture + Filtration Setups

When comparing PluriCell to standard lab filtration and culture workflows, several distinct advantages stand out:

Filtration Method Traditional workflows rely on external tools like syringe filters or cap strainers for filtration, which must then be manually transferred to culture plates. PluriCell integrates filtration directly into the well plate, eliminating the need for separate filtering devices.

Sample Handling and Transfers Conventional methods involve multiple handling steps, increasing time and risk of error. With PluriCell, filtration and culture occur in the same well, streamlining the process into a single step.

Contamination Risk Each manual transfer in traditional workflows increases the likelihood of introducing contaminants. PluriCell reduces this risk with its sealed design and sterile, ready-to-use format.

Assay Readiness In standard setups, separate tools are required to move from filtration to culturing or assays. PluriCell is fully integrated—after filtration, samples remain in place for immediate treatment, observation, or analysis.

Scalability and Throughput Traditional methods require manual adjustments and more consumables to scale up. PluriCell supports high-throughput formats with 6-, 12-, 24-, and 48-well options, making it easy to expand workflows without adding complexity.

How PluriCell Saves Time in Lab Workflows

Time is a valuable resource in any lab. The fewer the steps, the less room there is for error, delays, or sample loss. PluriCell’s design reflects an understanding of this.

Here’s how it streamlines your process:

Quick setup: No assembling mesh tools or transferring between formats.

Fewer consumables: Plates, filters, and supports are combined in one product.

Immediate use after filtration: Cells or organisms are already in place for assays or culture.

This speed and simplicity are what make PluriCell a practical upgrade from standalone lab cell strainer tools.

Conclusion

PluriCell offers more than filtration—it transforms how researchers approach cell preparation and culture. By combining mesh-based separation with multi-well assay formats, it simplifies complex protocols and supports more reliable data generation.

Its compatibility with various mesh sizes, plate formats, and cell types makes it a versatile tool for modern labs. Whether you're filtering single cells, tracking nematode migration, or running live-cell drug response assays, PluriCell delivers consistent, clean, and assay-ready results.

For labs serious about improving throughput and reducing variability, Lab Cell Strainer like PluriCell represent a powerful upgrade over traditional tools. Explore the full range of PluriCell systems today to streamline your workflow and make every assay count.

[voidsumbrella]

huevember day 2: h @ 12 - clay - mangan-diaspore

mangan-diaspore is, as the name suggests, a manganese-bearing form of diaspore. the most "perfect" diaspore crystals form in long hexagonal spikes, sometimes twinning into little hearts, but most of the mangan-diaspore samples ive seen are clustered together in a tangle, or layered in blobs that kinda look like raw meat. clay is haven's next older brother by about a year, and is the one who stepped up to take over the annoying parts of raising everyone when their parents died, this had... limited amounts of success, and mostly just gave him stress-induced health issues and seething resentment towards everyone in his life older than him. he picked up smoking in college (when this drawing is set), which he didn't manage to kick until he had a kid. mangan-diaspore is his assigned mineral, because his theme color is vivid red and im pretentious about picking niche minerals.

day 3: h @ 24 - flint - lithiophilite

lithiophilite is a lithium-manganese-phospate mineral commonly found in lithium deposits (hence the name- lithium + philios, greek for "friend"). it rarely forms crystals, but when it does they show up in these tiny elegant starburst structures, which i find extremely charming. they're also symbolically relevant to the character they're aligned with: flint is haven's youngest brother, and is one of the true Protagonists of their Destined Story, which took place when he was 11. he has spent the rest of his life trying to live up to the precedent that set. he's wondering if everyone's "faith in his abilities" will outweigh their desire to make him a celebrity enough to let him drop out of school and run off to live in a remote cabin in the mountains somewhere, never to be seen again.

[shootybangbang]

[Talking Bird] Chapter 22: In which swallows are shot

[Ao3 link]

[Content Warnings]: implied/referenced sexual assault, implied/referenced incest

I'm immensely grateful to @reddeaddufus and @verai-marcel for editing this. Without their support, I could not have gotten nearly as far in this fic as I have.

Note: dialogue that is spoken in Chinese will be denoted with 《sample text》

Note for people who speak Chinese: for the sake of clarity, all Chinese names have been transcribed in western fashion as [given name_surname] instead of the customary [surname_given name]

————

“One more favor? Last time, I promise.”

“And what might that be,” Trelawney asks stiffly. He keeps his eyes fixed on the green rush of fields and forest streaking across the train’s smudged window, and crosses his arms as he settles into the cracked leather seat opposite your own. 

The man is obviously still miffed by the state of his cheese supply. He’s taking up now the practice he always defaults to when feeling resentful: taking great pains to pretend that he isn’t. But you’d seen the way his face had fallen when he’d caught sight of his depleted reserves, heard what censures he’d hissed at Arthur when he thought you out of earshot— judging by the effort it’s currently taking him to keep himself civil, he’ll be quietly sore about this for a month, at least.

“Would you kindly ask the police to give Martin Street a wide berth on Tuesday? The Chinatown patrol on weekdays is still just old Bertram, I think. Five dollars should do it.”

“Martin St? That’s—”

“My former place of employment, yes.”

“Lee.” Trelawney’s superficial disdain drops the second he realizes the implications. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“I could’ve said the same thing to you about a hundred times by now,” you retort. “But I never have. Because it’s not my business.”

“This is different.” He puts his hand to his temples like he’s incurred a migraine. A show of genuine regret. “This is my fault.”

”What’re you talking about?”

“Arthur can sometimes be… shockingly altruistic when it comes to women and children.” He pauses a beat, then amends, “When he thinks nobody’s looking, that is. I told him your situation thinking it might spark some sympathy in him, but if he’s decided to rope you in on some reckless scheme, then—”

“It’s the other way around.”

Trelawney looks at you sharply, with that analytic gaze you’ve always done your utmost to avoid— like he’s peering through a glass house containing all your faults. You stare instead at the small cluster of belongings nestled in your lap. The sum of all your present earthly possessions: the blue notebook, the keyring, and a handful of nickels and dimes you’d managed to wheedle from Morgan before he’d let you step into the train and out of sight.

“I ran an idea past him,” you explain, still not meeting his eyes. “He said he’d think about it. I’m eighty percent sure that nothing’s going to happen at all. But… I’d like the street clear anyway. Just as a precaution. And also the… y’know, the…” Lightly, you chew the inside of your cheek. “The contingency plan.”

“The contingency plan in the event of your death.” He sounds like he’d like to seize you by the shoulders and shake some sense into you.

You nod. “I don’t think it’ll come to that. But if it does, that claim’s gonna need to be filed as soon as possible.”

“And if I say no?”

“Then you’ll have two dead women on your conscience instead of just one.”

He stays silent so long that the pressure of that quiet builds and builds until the sigh he lets out, bereft of any theatricality, hisses rather like the defeated wheeze of a punctured balloon. “There’s no talking you out of this.”

“No. But when have you known me to be reasonable?” You offer him a smile in an attempt to lighten the mood. He does not return it.

“How exactly were you planning on setting this up?” he asks. “Because if you’d like me to serve as a distraction, or—”

“What? I don’t want you to serve as anything.” The confusion in his face confuses you. “You’ve got a wife. Your two boys. And besides, you’ve got no stake in this.”

You can see that irritating shine in his eyes spark up— the one that he always gets when he thinks he’s found a compelling argument, like he’s turned a pin and cracked open a difficult lock. A kindness in his countenance that might disarm you if you let him, and you know you have to shut him up quick.

“Well, you can at the very least tell me what time you —” 

“Trelawney,” you interrupt. “You’re forgetting something. We’re business partners, not friends. I’ve owed you things. You’ve owed me things. This is the very last of it.”

He raises his eyebrows and sinks back against the cushioned seat with his hands folded in his lap. And he observes you now like he did in those early days, when every conversation had in it a deliberate and carefully delineated quid pro quo. “In any case,” he says. “I still don’t want to see you dead.”

“That makes two of us, then.” 

But the words ring hollow even to you.

———

The tenement buildings on Mulberry Avenue are lined by rows of windows cracked and broken like poorly kept teeth, spilling out snippets of the lives they contain on a tepid suggestion of an autumn breeze. Their private melodramas float inconsequential as dead leaves: snatches of disembodied conversation, both tender and fraught with tension, and through the dispersed Babel of languages you can discern the disparate threads of base human existence. Two women bicker from across their respective balconies. A man laboriously practices English phrases in a thick, unrecognizable accent. A child sings brokenly in what might be Polish, and when her mother sings a fluid verse in response, you have to squeeze your eyes shut against the pang in your chest. On the back of your tongue, a phantom sip of river water lingers like a meal sampled from a nightmare.

You keep walking.

These days, crossing beneath Chinatown’s red and gold gate feels like just another level of damnation. You keep your head down as you walk, knowing how much you stand out even here: an Oriental woman walking freely in a white man’s attire. Your clothes are faded and torn, but even now are easily worth more than a laundryman’s monthly wage. A tattered condemnation of bygone ambition and broken aspiration. You glare down at your stained pants and, while deciding between whether to entertain self-hatred or its gentler cousin, self pity, nearly collide with a man hauling a cartful of hens to the butcher’s. The birds are placid in their wire cages, either ignorant of the knife that awaits them or utterly indifferent. As they pull past, a flutter of feathers settles atop the grimy cobblestones like flakes of auburn snow.

You climb up the corridor of an ashy bricked four-story building whose damp, dark stairwells never seem to dry out completely. The narrow window set in its turn lets in a creak of light in which motes of dust glint like suspended chips of gold, sanctifying the patch of black mildew that it falls upon in a meaningless blessing. When you trudge up to the third-floor landing, the guard sitting in his rickety hallway chair takes his cigarette out of his mouth and scrutinizes you with obvious suspicion. Prematurely returned and empty-handed as you are, you can hardly blame him.

《The shipment—》

You interrupt him. 《It’s been taken care of.》

《Lee,》 he says, not unsympathetically. 《You look like shit. What happened?》

《Got robbed.》 Before he can ask for details, the appetite for fresh gossip evident in the straightening of his back, you add, 《I’ll talk to Huang after I’ve gotten some food and a cup of tea in me.》

You plod to the last tenement in that unadorned corridor and slot the key to its lock, but the door catches when you try and pull it open, and you see the brass glint of the slotted latch chain still in place through the skinny gap. Heaving an irritated, bad-tempered sigh, you holler. 《Mei! It’s me!》

《Lee?》you don’t hear her footsteps– never have been able to, with that mincing way that she’s forced to walk. 《You said you wouldn’t be back until Thursday. Is everything—》

《Everything’s fine. Just open the door.》

She starts fretting over you before you can even sit down to unlace your goddamn boots. Her hands flutter a nervous cadence as she restrains herself from touching the bruise on your cheek. To compound things, Baoyu comes out from behind her skirt to curl his small hand tight in the fabric of your trousers, like he’s trying to anchor you before you can leave again. 

The kid looks up at you with wide, unblinking brown eyes uncharacteristically serious for a four year old. He clutches his cloth sheep doll to his chest and asks, “Present?”

Fucking hell. Through the commotion of getting kidnapped, manhandled, and shot at, your customary duty of scrounging for some trinket with which to placate him had completely slipped your mind. “Ah, shi—” 

He perks up. Seems to have a sixth sense for picking up the English words you don’t want him to learn, this kid. So you bite your tongue before it can flick out that damning last consonant and pivot. “I mean, sure. I uh…”  As you rifle through your pockets with the ludicrous hope that something might miraculously manifest, a fit of inspiration strikes you like a conciliatory slap from god. You flip to Morgan’s sketch of Cotorra Springs in your ledger and begin ripping it out.

《He asked you for a present, didn’t he.》

《Yeah.》

《Baoyu.》Mei’s voice is stern, but she sounds more tired than upset. 《What did Mama say about begging Miss Lee for presents?》

Baoyu, already well-learned in the art of petitioning for leniency, looks up at you beseechingly. You sigh, then intercede upon his behalf. For chrissakes, it’s your fault the kid’s in this situation to begin with. 《I’ve been giving him acorns and shiny rocks,》you say. 《It’s fine.》

When you finish tearing the sketch free, you look it over one last time before the kid inevitably scrawls all over it with green crayon, same way he does over near everything he can get his hands on in recent days. There’s a new, and very verdant stain on the wall beneath the kitchen table where Mei had obviously tried very hard to scrub away a doodle of a lopsided forest.

The kid frowns and flips the paper up and down, squinting at it dubiously. 

《What do you say?》 Mei prompts him.

《What is it?》he eyes the drawing with the critical eye of a disappointed patron at the Galerie Laurent. 

His mother’s voice is clipped with expectation. 《Baoyu.》

《Thank you, Miss Lee.》 he says, dejectedly.

《You remember how to say it in English?》 you ask.

He frowns and furrows his brow. He looks angry when he’s deep in thought— a trait he’s somehow picked up from his father, despite the man’s gravedirt tenure for a full quarter of the kid’s life now. 

“Thank you,” you enunciate.

“Thank you,” he repeats, already distracted. He looks longingly towards the corner of the room, where wooden blocks bearing penciled in capital letters on their sides line the wall in crooked, tottering constructions.

“Good.” You give him an absent pat on the shoulder. “Now shoo.”

Mei dogs your steps as you begin ransacking the kitchen cabinets for something other than dry beans and rice. 《You drew that?》

《No.》 You pick up a tin of sardines, consider it for a second, then firmly slot it back.

《I’m sorry, there’s not much. I was planning on going to market today—》

《Don’t bother. I’ll do it later.》

《No, you should rest! And besides—》

《I’m faster,》you interrupt, glancing conspicuously at her feet.

They’re half the size of your own, and bound with bandages beneath the tiny slippers she wears. Crushed beyond recognition into what was considered, she had once informed you bitterly, a lotus bud shape. Back in the motherland (that dream-wrought Avalon to which you owe your eternal classification, that country whose name you have heard sighed and cursed and whispered like a lover’s lament on the yearning tongues of so many workmen), she had murmured, clenching a cup of baijiu so tight that her knuckles had been moon-pale, girls from wealthy families have the bones in their feet broken and set again and again, folded inward and solidified with the distortion of healing. Suffering with it an education whose primary teachings lay in the art of transformation. How to wind golden silk over a ruin of mangled flesh until it resembled the newborn furl of a flower. How to thread a smile over the teeth-clenched rage of one’s own pinioning. How to limp and totter a cripple’s stuttering gait and call it a dance.

It was an education which Mei, the youngest daughter of a failing merchant family, had been bestowed at the tender age of six. And which she had continued to receive, owing to the metastasis of misfortune, through the later ordeal of having been exchanged to a pimp for just eleven silver sycees. The light had glinted off the ingots like shards of white fire, and she had seen the distortion of her own reflection in the rounded curve. A reminder that what was then warped could be contorted further still, the shape of her life twisted beyond reckoning.

She relents now at the reminder of her own debility, thins her lip and lowers her eyes as she crosses her arms tight. And the worst part of you, that which houses the old instinct to pinpoint ways in which you outcompete her, feels a vicious jab of satisfaction.

Well. The larder’s as good as empty. But there’s still tea left in the kettle. You reach for one of the painted china cups you still can’t bring yourself to sell, and Mei notices at last the bandage beneath your sleeve.

《Lee, your arm—》

《I’m fine.》

《Will you at least tell me what happened?》

You do not want to talk to her about this. You do not want to talk to her about any of it, really, and your heart clenches like a fist at the mere prospect of catching a glimpse of that lovely, sympathetic face of hers. The concern there, the genuine worry that brims like a perfect inverse of every hateful impulse you still keep primed for her— it makes you feel vaguely sick, for all your deliberate standoffishness.

Since Feng’s passing, there have been times where the two of you have nearly gotten along: halfway amiable conversations after Baoyu’s been put to bed shared over a draught of cheap rice wine. It’s always you who takes a step back before any real semblance of friendship can develop. And it’s always her who tries to smile and furnish some sort of excuse to allow you the opportunity to awkwardly slip away.

And when Feng had been alive? You’d been polite, but distant, much to his chagrin. Optimistic fool that he was, he’d constantly try and cajole you into conversation with her. Invite you over for dinner, then go out for a long smoke on the balcony, thinking perhaps that by merely stepping out of sight he might loosen the linchpin of your resentment. A fool through and through. 

《Please, Lee.》

But considering what might happen next, you owe her at least the skeleton of the truth. 

《Got robbed a day after I dropped off shipment.》You rattle the words off fast, as if clustered together they might conceal what you’ve chosen to omit. 《Looked pathetic enough that someone paid for my fare back. Walked back from the station, and here I am.》

Even an idiot can tell that you’ve left enough holes in your story that the entire legitimacy of it has been sieved out. Mei frowns. 《And your arm?》

《Got cut while I was getting robbed.》

Her eyes narrow. 《Who drew you that picture?》

《The man who found me pathetic enough to send home.》

《What was his name?》

You fill your cup and keep your eyes fixed on the amber stream of jasmine tea that trickles from the kettle spout. 《Don’t remember.》

《Listen,》 she says. 《You lie to me all the time. And I let you, because I know that if I say anything otherwise, you’ll tell me even less than you do now. But you’ve never come back hurt like this.》

《I’m just a little banged up—》

《I-If someone…》

Her voice breaks, and when you glance at her from over your shoulder, you can see a red rise of fear creeping up her cheeks. Guilt tightens your throat with the unrelenting grip of a hand at your windpipe. She speaks now like a flagging autumn wind. 《If a man hurt you like that…》

If someone did to you what your father did to me—

《... you don’t have to tell me. But everything you’ve gone through, I know it’s for me and Baoyu, and I— I’d like to know the cost of what that—》

《I don’t do it for you,》 you snap.

The retort comes out sharper than you’d intended it to. Mei blinks as though batting a speck of dust from her lashes.

《And not for Baoyu, either,》 you continue. 《I do it for Feng. So it’s him that owes me, not you. And that means it’s none of your business what the… ‘the cost’ or whatever is. And just so you know, it’s very annoying when you constantly pry into my affairs, but it’s even more annoying when you get all pathetic like this, so I’ll just fucking tell you, alright? The man who robbed me is the same man who brought me back home.》 You nod towards the door, where the kid is diligently coloring in Morgan’s sketch with purple and green crayons. 《And he drew me that picture on the way.》

Mei seems to be unsure exactly what kind of emotional response you’re currently trying to get out of her. She tries to settle her face into her usual placid, pretty mask of unbroachable porcelain, but the facade cracks as she looks silently from the drawing, to you, to the drawing again. 《Lee. I don’t… what?》

《You remember those bonds I brought back last time.》

She nods very slowly.

《I stole them off a man called Morgan. I ran into him in Strawberry the morning after I dropped off shipment, and…》

Maybe it’s the way that the ripening noon light filters through the burlap curtains, casting the magnified shadows of coarse fiber against the wall like latticework. Or maybe it’s the deferential tilt of your head as you mark the abstract pointillism the tea sediment settles into, as if reading the minutiae of existence will reveal to you some esoteric path. Or maybe it’s the cadence that runs through it all, the holy repetition inherent in all ritual, most of all the mundane, as you drain and refill the cup again and again. In any case, there’s a distinct air of confession in the arrangement. And accompanying it, an almost sacrosanct relief.

Through the better part of an hour, you tell her nearly everything. The mechanical resistance of the shotgun trigger against your pointer finger. A man’s bewildered profile caught in a halo of evening muzzleflare. Morgan’s promise of cruelty, his failure to follow through. Firelight and peaches, and cold tubfuls of soap and blood. The silhouette of a luna moth slicing a pale green streak through the dark.

You say nothing of the plan, though you give its tenuous outline a certain soundless consideration in the pauses between sentences. If she notices— and no doubt she does, she knows you far too well by now not to recognize the presence of what has been left unsaid, the unknown shape that casts its anonymous shadow when all else is lit— she says nothing of it.

《And,》 you conclude lamely. 《That is why I look like shit.》

Mei nods sagely and, with a thoughtful, contemplative air, offers up the worst idea you’ve ever heard. 《We should invite him to dinner.》

《A man kidnaps me and ties me to his horse, and that’s your reaction.》

《He brought you back to us,》 she says simply, and tilts her chin meaningfully at her son, who lies on his stomach as he embroiders a stand of graphite trees with bold blue scribbles, small legs kicking the air idle as a pendulum. Wholly oblivious to the grim alternative his mother leaves unspoken. As he should be.

《Too late for it now. Morgan’s long gone.》 You shrug as though that possibility doesn’t sting. Your chair skids screechily against the scuffed floorboards as you get to your feet. 《Anyway, I should be going. Huang’ll never let me hear the end of it if I keep him waiting much longer.》

After you’ve pulled on a jacket and swiped your cap from its crooked nail on the wall, something less than half your size and adamant as a small elephant barrels against your leg, nearly knocking you over. Baoyu hugs your shins with all his four-year-old might and sits down, anchoring you.

You groan. 《Oh, Bao. Come on.》

He shakes his head, glaring sullen daggers at the door. Too young to understand that his father is dead, but wise enough by now to glean that what crosses that threshold doesn't always come back.

《Not again,》 Mei hurries towards you as quickly as her bound feet will allow her. 《And he’d been so good about it recently, too.》

《Bao, I’m just going to the market this time.》

《Dun’ wan’ you to.》 His small fists are wadded so tightly in the canvas of your pants that you’re concerned they might tear. The poor kid’s as firm and persistent as bramble. 

Mei kneels beside him, gently tries to pry his fingers loose. And though she shares with you a private glance of exasperation, you hear no trace of it in her coaxing. 《Hey,》 she says, soft and solicitous. She rests her palm on top of her son’s head, angles her head down to look him in the eye. On her lips is that madonna-like smile that seems solely the provenance of doting mothers. For not the first time, you feel the quiet surge of jealousy that always comes with seeing wanted children. The tendrils of that which was denied, that which was lost inching out again from what you’ve tried again and again to keep buried.

《Remember what Mama said about Miss Lee this morning?》 she asks.

Baoyu answers with a furious shake of his head and buries his face against your calf. He clings even tighter. 

《Mama said that Miss Lee always comes back. And she does, doesn’t she? Every time. I bet this time she’ll be back again before you even know it.》

No response. 

《Bao,》 you say. 《That present I gave you this time was pretty terrible, wasn’t it.》

His muffled “mm-hmm” is immediate. Mei turns slightly pink. 《Lee, you really don’t have to–》

You raise your voice to drown hers out. 《So how about I get you a better one?》

The kid peeks partway from behind the crook of your knee, his revealed eye bright with wary interest. He’s precociously shrewd enough to give you his attention by degrees. His father’s son, indeed.

《Maybe… one you can eat?》

He peeks out a little more, but his arms do not loosen.

《It’s been a while since we’ve all had meat for dinner, hasn’t it,》 you remark, and from the reluctant tug of the boy’s smile, you know you’ve won. 《And even longer since we’ve had pork belly.》

《Pork belly,》 he says, with a shine in his face like you’ve dangled something precious on a string, and the black tangle of guilt in your heart twists another snarl.

《Pork belly?》 Mei repeats, doubtful. She puts her hand up and flicks her pointer finger a few sideways strokes, counting off the beads of an invisible abacus.

《There’ll be enough. I’ll get Huang to pay me today.》 You reach down to unhook Bao’s fingers from your trousers, and this time he comes away easy as anything. But his smile falls away when you pick up the market bag and pull open the door, and as you turn the key to click the lock shut, you hear his high, thin whimper. It turns to a wail that loses volume with every rapid step you take from him.

The guard calls your name before you can round the bend in the stairs. Six steps down, with one foot on the seventh, you swivel back to give him your attention, and from the dark of the corridor you imagine you must look like a pilgrim halfway to hell.

《The kid’s cryin’ again, huh?》 he asks.

《Yeah.》

He flips you a dollar coin that spins like a silver star through the gloom. 《Get him a pastry or somethin’,》 he says, and before the last word is out of his mouth, he’s already given you his shoulder in a show of apparent indifference.

How many times have you seen it? These little gestures of pity, presented like indulgences— shameful, secretive. As if with each token one can bury their own complicity. And how little you can judge them for it, seeing as you were a keen patron of it yourself in your lapsed past life. 

In any case, a dollar is a dollar. You nod to him, and continue your descent.

— — —

《They’re called swallows,》 your mother said, and tried her best to describe to you, a five-year-old girl at the time whose only reality consisted of the narrow confines of the brothel, the swift, dark swathe that those fork-tailed birds could cut across the sky. How at times they seemed to plummet downwards like stones, only to swoop upwards mere inches from certain death.

You sat cross-legged on her bed, back turned to her as she wove and unwove intricate plaits through your hair. Your eyes watered every time she pulled a strand too tight, but you uttered no sound of protest. At even that tender age, you knew that the slightest disturbance might shatter this rare, fragile show of intimacy.

《They have black feathers.》She tugged the brushlike end of your long, dark braid and dusted it over your nose until you’d giggled. 《And red throats.》Her fingers briefly alighted to your small mouth, momentary as dragonflies. 《And they fly so quick that nothing can touch them.》

She squeezed your thin shoulders. 《That’s why I named you after them, Yan.》

It’s difficult not to think of her each time you walk towards the man who had owned you both, and it is during these small purgatories that she haunts you most. Though it is just a wisp of a haunting, as if even her ghost has largely abandoned you.

Remember the desperate way she had sometimes tried to love you, her averted-eyed affection. The wasted relief on her young face when she’d passed in her bed, dead of typhus at scarcely twenty-five. The twin poles of what she left you to reconcile.

You never mourned her. Not properly, at least. Hadn’t known how to, back then. But when the missionaries taught you to write— both English script and Chinese characters, back when the assumption that you’d continue their work among your countrymen seemed as absolute as the word of god— her name was among the first characters you’d learned. Mingyue Lee, named for the moon, but in perpetual wane for the six short years you’d known her. Her bones interred in some pauper’s grave on the outskirts of San Francisco, sleeping in the soil of a country she had died cursing. When you were nine, you scratched her name into a large stone in the courtyard with a knife you filched from the kitchen, so that on grave-washing day you’d have something to scrub.

The magnolias that dot the route to Viceroy Street are shedding their blooms. Their white petals have been blown to the edge of the sidewalk, where they collect in lovely, dying heaps. When you tread them underfoot, they muddy to the same indistinct shade of brown that collects between the cobblestones of this place. Horse shit and swamp muck and god knows what else, a pervasive filth so deeply entrenched that it has become its own strata. You count down the bronze-plated numbers affixed to storefronts and houses as you walk the path down to 33, and in the steady subtraction there brews a dread that makes you feel far too young and far too old all at once, trekking the twilight road between memory and present. 

The Chuan Li Benevolent Society is housed in a nondescript building flanked between a curio store and a laundry, with nothing but a weather worn plaque beside the door to proclaim itself. Its peeling blue paint is flecked by the mud-sprays of passing carriages, and the awning that stretches over its entrance is missing so many shingles that it puts you in mind of a poorly scaled fish. 

Putting it simply, it looks like shit.

But its innards are timbered and paneled with red lacquered wood, and from the ceiling of the parlor a chandelier hangs like a luminous octopus, each golden limb dripping with crystalline light that fragments prismatic across the ceiling. Furnishings alternately gilt and velvet, in a theme of burgundy as deep as wine or blood. Both things you’ve known to be spilled here in excess. An altogether gaudy depiction of a poor man’s conception of wealth. 

Putting it simply, it also looks like shit. 

You step over the neat doormat laid in front of the threshold, and proceed to trail a fading mosaic of mud across the floorboards.

《You know you’re just making more work for the maid.》Yulong, who is lying lengthwise on the parlor chaise with his shoes on the cushions, addresses you without looking up from the English primer he is reading. The other man in the room, some underfed grunt who you’ve never seen before, rudely asks who the hell you are. He marks a show of reaching into his jacket for the hatchet you know they all carry.

《Calm the fuck down, Wei. It’s just our railroad mule. Our railroad mule who’s, what… five days early? Ain’t you supposed to be in Strawberry right now?》

《I need to talk to Huang.》

《So you finally fucked up good, huh? Guess you lost the shipment.》

《Shipment’s fine. Tell your goddamn boss I’m here to see him.》

《Should watch that mouth of yours, boy, if you know what’s good for you,》Wei growls at you, hardly more than a boy himself. His cheeks and chin are scraggly with the proud, patchy growths of a first beard, and you glancingly wonder whether he’ll live long enough to see it fill in, this jumped-up kid with criminal notions. 

Yulong closes his book with a snap of its pages and sits up like a man unjustly roused from sleep. His narrow eyes gleam as they always do— like he’s just been privy to some secret joke at your expense. Huang’s right hand man, and easily the most untrustworthy looking creature you’ve ever met. Each time you’ve met with his boss, he’s been standing in the corner, pretending like he doesn’t have his hand on his knife. He approaches you now with his lips drawn in an unfriendly smile.《Naw, that ain’t a boy,》he says. 《Just a woman playin’ at bein’ a man and failin’ at both. How you doin’, Lee?》

《Fuck you.》

《Bet you’d like to, since you ain’t gettin’ it from Feng no more.》

You slap him so hard that his head jerks sharply to the side. Yulong hesitates for a split second looking nearly remorseful, then backhands you with such force that you stagger against the wall, tasting blood.

《Tell the boss she’s here,》 you hear him say. Gingerly, you touch your split lip.

Wei’s voice is unsure, tentative. 《She’s bleeding. Shouldn’t we—》

《Just do it.》

— — —

Huang welcomes you into his office with an amiable greeting and an offer of chrysanthemum tea. His pleasant demeanor does not falter when you roundly refuse him, all the attempted disdain in your rejection about as effective as shooting a gun at an ocean wave. A bullet negated instantly by the cold, infinite dark beneath, the shapeless and breachless indifference of water to that which it drowns. The bastard pours you a cup regardless, slides it across the table on a painted porcelain saucer where it steams like a sigh.

He asks after your health, expresses polite concern over the evening-hued contusion (already fading nicely to a sickly dawnish green) on your face, putting on now the fatherly airs he’d withheld from the entirety of childhood. These days, he speaks to you as though those days of subjugation were an unfortunate accident. A misunderstanding that can surely be forgiven because it’s all in the past, and what’s the point of tallying sins? Be reasonable, Yan.

He folds his hands on the table like he’s guarding a hand of cards and says, 《I understand you and Yulong had something of an altercation in the parlor.》

From his place by the door, Yulong scoffs.《Teachin’ her some manners, more like.》

《Perhaps next time you might find a more delicate means of instruction.》 The fond look Huang gives you then sickens you like the first strains of an ague. Fever and chill that will not douse the other as the man peers tenderly at the only unrotted thing that still carries any trace of your dead mother’s existence. An apparition encased in flesh and bone.

You look just like her, but you have my eyes.

He continues, 《A woman’s face is her life, after all. And we wouldn’t want to ruin Yan’s, would we?》

As if he hadn’t already. 《It’s Lee,》 you remind him, teeth clenched.

He ignores this the same way he’s ignored it every other time you’ve corrected him. But you’ve persisted regardless, speaking your mother’s surname as though it might serve as an incantation to dispel the remnant of your former self. That flinching girl so eagerly servile, hoping that another task completed might be another beating deterred. Terrified little Yan, who had crawled under a table and hid when the city police busted that Frisco brothel, thinking that she’d been rudely introduced to another means of punishment. A white woman had found you there and knelt beneath your wooden shelter, gently asking your name in broken, halting Chinese. When she reached her hand out for you to take, you misread her intention entirely and curled up isopod-like, figuring that a blow to your back would hurt far less than one to your front.

Huang pulls a fresh linen handkerchief from a desk drawer, proffers it like reconciliation. 《Here. Clean yourself up.》

You lick your lips and the tip of your tongue locates the shallow cut at the edge of your mouth. Iron and organic rust, half-clotted. With a slow swipe of your forearm, you smear away the congealing blood with the back of your hand.

《Suit yourself,》 he says. The drawer rattles shut like a threat being withdrawn. 《So tell me then, Yan. What’re you doing back five days early?》

You pull your journal out from your satchel and thumb free the proof of sale tucked inside, then lay the receipt bearing Cheng’s ornate red seal (ridiculous how every one of these smugglers fancies himself a veer of legitimacy) on the heavy, oaken table that separates you from Huang like a bulwark or a gate, possibly both. 《The delivery went fine,》 you say. 《I went to Cheng right after I got into Strawberry and had him sign off on the paperwork. He’ll wire you his usual fee at the end of the month.》

《Very good.》

As a child, you would have worked yourself to the point of collapse at the prospect of that simple praise. And as an adult, there’s still a fragment of you that receives it with idiotic pride. Infuriating really, how those infantile hurts persist even now, as if the past lingers still in your ruminating blood. From a chamber in your subterranean heart, down the catacomb of every iteration of self you’ve laid to rest, Yan stirs from slumber and peers briefly through your eyes in a dark flash of memory. 

You detail the rest of your ordeal with vagaries and half truths. Nothing outright false— walking that middle path again, as you always do. Lacking even the conviction to construct your own lies, you pathetic piece of shit. Dodging commitment the same way a bird dodges a shower of buckshot: which is to say that it can’t. Try to outfly the cluster of pellets all you like, but one is sure to find you and bear you down. And isn’t it fitting that it would be the pierce of the only real promise you’ve ever made that lodges in your breast, sends that dual pronged swallowtail fluttering bannerlike as it drops, red sash of blood ribboning upwards in the wake of that earthward plunge.

An outlaw accosted you in an alleyway, you tell Huang. He marched you up the stairs of your hotel with the cold barrel of his gun jammed between your shoulder blades, then tied your arms behind your back as he ransacked your belongings. Tied your ankles too, for good measure. He left you like that for hours, until another man found you and cut you free from your captivity. You cried and became hysterical and made him so uncomfortable that he had arranged an immediate means to get you back to St Denis, if only to get you to stop your tears.

 You make no mention of the events surrounding the bandage on your arm. Or of Morgan’s sketch, which is currently being meticulously ruined by a four year old’s artistic renderings. Or how in a span of hours before, with the first touch of dawn spreading its dustlike penumbra over the floorboards, you had lain in bed for a full five minutes studying the accumulated shadows of the outlaw’s sleeping face, wondering whether under different circumstances you might have enjoyed the view.

Yesterday in the caravan, you scrubbed clean the bandana that he’d used to bandage your cut as you waited for your clothes to dry, wrung out the rust-colored droplets of your own loosened blood over the basin and watched as they broke perfect, circular lakes through a topography of soap suds. You laid it next to the furnace and watched the moisture wick away, folded it up, and only remembered to return it this morning, while waiting for Trelawney to finish buying train tickets at the station’s front booth.

Morgan had stood beside you in a secluded corner beside a rusted water pump, regarding you with the stiff formality of a spurned gentleman. All stilted vagaries and dismissive affect as he glowered there with his arms crossed and his hat tipped low. He leaned his back against a brick wall still damp with dew and seemed loath to even acknowledge you. Asking whether he’d given your proposition any further consideration seemed at that point only an excellent way to further his scorn. In the hollow of your chest, a setting, a sinking. Something bright clipped beneath a horizon, and only the quiet expectation of inexorable night accompanied it. You drew out the black square of his bandanna from your pocket like a flag of farewell, and said, “Hey. Morgan.”

“What.” His voice was flat as a board. Still wouldn’t look at you, the arrogant prick.

“Forgot to give this back last night. I, uh… I washed it for you. Here.”

He made no motion to receive it. Your proffering arm stretched towards him like an insufficient bridge as he shook his head. “Keep it,” Morgan said. “I got another.”

“Well thanks, I guess. I’ve always dreamt of having a raggedy old bandanna to call my own—”

“Tell you what.” At last, he lifted his eyes to meet your own, and the blue of his irises seemed a softer shade than you’d remembered. The hue of late spring blooms, forget-me-nots. “I’ll take it back next time I see you, alright?”

 And when will that be? you hadn’t asked, all the better to ration out your own specious hopes.

God, but you are stupid, aren’t you. Thinking that there is any chance in hell that he hasn’t crossed the state line by now, leaving the city and the swamp and you behind to fade like a forgotten mirage in a torrent of road dust. Nary a backward glance, as is the nature of his kind. Loyal only to the promise of a payout, and for all his talk of coming back to collect, there’s hardly any chance of him doing so when the certainties surrounding you are slim to none.

Yet his bandanna rests in your pocket like a chivalric favor, and as Huang stares you down with reptilian stillness, saying nothing and blinking seldom, you slip your hand there and clench the frayed black fabric tightly in your fist. Black as mourning, black as swallows’ wings.

You had expected an interrogation. Questions and accusations lobbied, a showing of the straightforward suspicion that most tong men jump to when things go askew. Feng had been like that. At the slightest twitch of another man’s confrontation he’d be afire, the tension in him crackling like a live wire and at once the visible measurement preluding potential violence: how many words until we come to blows, how many steps to close the distance. No patience for subterfuge, no eye for subtlety. No foresight as to what deals might be germinating behind his back, what bargains struck with him at their center. 

But a pimp is a kind of purveyor, and though he occupies a different role now, Huang’s merchant instinct has not left him. He knows well the maddening coax of silence, the expectant desolation that will drive a man to say more than he ought in an attempt to shape a foothold for himself in the midst of that emptiness. He lets you weave your narrative without interruption, and regards its component stitches with a masklike placidity that had frozen you to the marrow when you were Yan, but which crystallizes now as only a passing skin of frost. You brush past the tightening knot of unease wending in your gut and forge into the essentials of what you came here to haggle.

It always snaps a sinewy strand of disgust in you, the way this part comes easy. Flexing the muscle that you and he have in common, the parlance of transaction. There is a rhythm to this that you know how to trace like a finger to a pulse. Open by asking too much, backtrack, pivot, chip at his offers with the knowledge that he is doing the same. Retreat and entreat, and pretend that you don’t see the approving acknowledgment in his face. That you are indeed your father’s daughter.

Huang is unusually agreeable today, and you get the disconcerting impression that he is placating you for something. The spoonful of sugar before the cupful of medicine, as they say.

He’ll have a new valise made within the week. No cost to you— these things happen, he says, nodding in artificial sympathy, and it’s far easier to replace equipment than personnel. A miracle, actually, that you were able to escape in one piece. You want your pay early? Well now, there is protocol to this sort of thing, figures to be kept. The treasurer will certainly be cross… but an exception can be made, just this once. And how very kind of you to offer to host the Tuesday morning poker game! Yes, of course you’ll be compensated. Really, Yan. All this suspicion, and for what? Has he not always played by the rules? Has he not always operated within the bounds that the tongs have set?

Even Feng’s murder, says the seething silence that stretches between you, had been sanctioned. Sam Wah himself had signed off on it in red ink, executioner’s ink. In the cold aftermath, as you stood bloodless and blank and senseless as new paper, the old man had met with you one last time in the Hop Sing drawing room and explained the terms of your expulsion, laying out his justifications as cleanly as black and white weiqi pieces on a game board. 《He should have known what he was courting,》 the old man had said. 《Two Chuan Li men dead. Another beaten so badly he can’t even hold a pair of chopsticks. There were calls for war, Lee. And if I could sacrifice just one man to stay that war…》

Damn it all, the shifting labyrinthine sprawl of custom and regulation and ceremony that governs this hell. And you, aimless and hopeless as a minotaur, wandering these unnavigable halls and waiting for the inevitable blade that will run you through. 

Your negotiation with Huang seems to be drawing to a close, winding into insincere niceties that make you faintly ill to have to receive and resentful to have to reciprocate, when he says (magnanimously, as if he’s gifting you with some great benevolence),《And by the by, I thought you should know— I’ve arranged a new escort for you.》

You draw back in your chair. 《What?》

《I believe you’ve met before. Sam Bennett.》

《Sam Bennett? Sam Bennett?》 Jesus fuck. No. 《You can’t pair me with him. Last year, when I was still with Hop Sing, I—》

《You had him dismissed from the police force for upping his payoffs. Yes, I’m well aware. But the man has agreed to let bygones be bygones in the interest of commerce, and has promised to be on his best behavior.》

《That doesn’t mean shit—》

《Language.》

Shifting again, the corridors of the labyrinth. Reconfiguring into a straight arrow path to Theseus and his golden sword. And you have no recourse but to make your way forward. It wells up in you like a scream, the shivering skitter of a suppressed year’s worth of dread. Racing through your veins like a million frantic ants, your very blood on the trembling verge— and in the midst of this, Huang has the nerve to politely ask you not to curse. You would tear into him and bite open his fucking heart with your own teeth and nails if it would not bring the entire wrath of his tong upon your dead man’s promise. You would gnash him to splinters. You would shred him until he were nothing but insensible meat, until he resembled at last the miserable pile of bloodied and putrid rot you have always known him to be. 

Yulong is here. Yulong is here. Calm down. 

《He’d hurt me,》 you say, your voice shaking the same way your fist in your pocket does, wringing Morgan’s bandanna the way you’ve often imagined wringing Huang’s neck. 《The second he gets me alone. He will.》

《As I said before. He has given his word.》 Huang picks up his teacup and takes a long, savoring sip. Your own sits waiting still on his desk, the steam gone, the liquid that rests inside the sweet brown ochre of a dead leaf. 《But if you’re yet unwilling to continue playing courier… the original proposal still stands.》

The slavemongering bastard opened a parlor house on Harrison Ave when he came here. You have heard talk of it from some of the men. Dead-eyed girls in fine linen and closed doors from which fume the haunted soundscape of your childhood. He would add you to their number, noose you round the neck with a contrived contract and add with each day new debts with which to fetter you. And he would shut you in with him. He would have you take your mother’s place.

《And I suppose if that’s not an option, then I’ll have to take poor Meilan back. But such a shame for a child to grow up without his mother, and you’d know that better than anyone, wouldn’t you.》

His bland, nondescript shopkeeper’s face is as mild as ever, yet there in the pits of his eyes shines a cold and calculating light that you might have named satanic in your missionary days. But it is a child who cannot comprehend that the blackest quadrants of cruelty come not from the divine but are rooted instead in what is altogether too human to bear.

《It’s not a decision to be made lightly, by any means. I believe the next delivery is scheduled for—》Huang fingers the calendar set on the corner of his desk, looking thoughtful as if he hadn’t personally engineered your predicament.《— the 15th. I’ll give you until the 13th to give me your answer. But in the meantime…》

The drawer rattles open again. He withdraws a thick wad of new bills and laboriously counts out a portion with neatly manicured hands, then places a crisp green stack on the center of his desk. You have to stand up and lean forward to reach it, and you shouldn’t be surprised when he closes his fingers round your wrist— his grip tight and cold, the smile on his face still deceptively kind— but you freeze as though your very blood has done the same, rooting you there through the branching of ice through your veins, and you stare up at him rabbit-eyed, and you’re Yan again after all, you always have been—

From his corner, Yulong coughs conspicuously. He follows it up with a loud and truly impressive mustering of tobacco-tinged mucus, which he spits neatly into a nearby spitoon. It pings like the most disgusting and simultaneously blessed bell in existence.

Huang gently places your wages into your open palm. He releases you, and says nothing when you stumble a few steps backwards, then grind the heel of your boot against the floorboard so hard that it squeaks as you turn and propel yourself out the room, into the hall, through the door, and past the front of the building, the laundry, the shops, the faces of jostled onlookers whipping past in murmurs and blurred shouts of indignation, until you reach the iron water pump on the corner of Spruce Street. Its worn handle lets out a series of frantic and angry squeaks as you work it, and a gaggle of girls bedecked in French Quarter finery looks on in vague bemusement as you scrub at your wrist under its torrent of rust-specked, tepid water.

Your sleeve is still damp with it when you reach the butcher. And as you stand there watching the scale’s silver needle quiver as the man weighs out a strip of fat-striped pork, your eyes drift over the tubs of fresh viscera resting behind the glass. Kidneys gleaming a deep cabochon red, pale coils of intestines bunched up like fleshy snakes, a slab of cross-sectioned liver that shines as dully in the afternoon light as unburnished copper— the parceled out fate of a creature sectioned to its most valuable parts and bought piece by piece. The curtain to the back room has been swept aside, and in that blood-reeking, windowless dark dangles a meat hook thronged by a lantern’s eerie flicker. A dead sow hangs from it snout down, her insides hollowed out and her ribs starkly white in the dripping cavity of her chest.

Her ear has been slit. Beholding it, you recognize that notch for what it really is. A prelude to slaughter.

— — —

The more he thinks about it, the worse he feels.

Arthur flicks a scavenging fly off the lip of his soup bowl and stirs what’s left of the sludgy minestrone like he’s sifting for gold amongst bobbing chunks of string bean and gristly pork. In the far corner of the saloon, the piano player struggles through a rendition of Maple Leaf Rag, and the jarring, imprecise notes that litter the score seem appropriate considering the utter mistake that he seems hellbent on walking himself into.

If you were anyone else, I’d have never opened that door in the first place. 

What a fucking joke. 

You had said the words sincerely— he has no doubt of that, those clear eyes of yours so devoid of artifice— but they had obviously been meant for someone else: the avatar of the dead man you seem to see in him. Fong or Feng or Fang, whatever the hell his name was. Arthur lets his spoon drop against the rim of the bowl and gestures towards the barkeep for another shot of bourbon, figuring that the fire of it down his throat will burn away the foul taste at the back of his mouth.

From down the road, a work whistle sounds off and a gate opens like an unhinged maw, loosing from its depths an outpour of workers who stream down the city streets dusty as moths. Worn down men clothed in grease streaked shirts pungent with sweat, and boys among them lively with a youth that dilutes daily with each lever pulled, each heap of coal shoveled in these ashen-hued factories.

A cluster of dark-skinned teenagers, none of them much older than thirteen, runs past the saloon window as they jostle each other for sidewalk space. Exuberant still, the cruel cogitations of the city they inhabit not yet fully manifest for them, they are bright and loud and painfully earnest with an incandescence that will only ever dim in the years they have left. One of them cracks a joke that makes his fellows laugh, and as they make their way towards the slums a white man several feet away casts a disgusted look in their direction and crosses the street. Above it all, the smokestacks like funereal columns holding up the blue catafalque of sky spew soot indiscriminate.

“More of ‘em every year,” the man sitting beside him at the bar grunts.

“More what.”

“You know.” He nods at Arthur with the beleaguered camaraderie of a fellow soldier, huddling miserable in the trenches. “Coloreds. Blacks and Mexicans and god knows what else. Come in like a trickle, but before you know it the water’s at your neck and you’re just barely keepin’ afloat.”

Arthur scoffs. “You say that like the white folk round here are any improvement. They ain’t.”

“Don’t tell me you’re one of them equality minded types—”

“Quit it, Pete.” The bartender sounds weary. “Don’t need you proselytizin’ to every new patron I got.”

Customers come and customers go, and their chatter flows about him like a stream rippling round an obdurate stone. The light that shines through the oily glass begins to take on the ruddying tint of early sunset. A man with a scraggly blond beard and a laborer’s look about him sits down at the bar, begins making idle conversation with the bartender. New in town, and staking out watering holes. Still acquainting himself with what distractions the city has to offer, and might he recommend whereabouts a man might find a decent place to play a hand of poker?

“Prob’ly Chinatown,” the bartender says, polishing a glass with a rag so filthy that the action serves only to counter his efforts. “Only thing worth venturin’ there for. Whole place reeks of piss.”

“Ain’t worth it, if y’ask me,” says Pete, whose opinion has been sought by nobody. “Them chinks’ll cheat a man outta every penny they can get.”

“Parlor on Martin Street’s decent.”

“That the one with the Chinese hostess?” the newcomer asks. “I heard of it. Too bad the ante’s steep as hell.”

“What you think her pussy looks like.”

Arthur nearly spits out his drink. From the corner of his eye, he sees Pete’s yellowed smile, his conspiratorial glance as he spills out his own dubious brand of wisdom. “Because from what I been told, chink pussy’s slanted just like their eyes.”

“Bullshit. What would that even look like.”

“Ask Jonesy. He says he’s had her.”

“I don’t believe a single word outta that bastard’s mouth.”

“Well if anyone knows, it’d be him. That degenerate’s mad for exotic pussy like no one else. Anyway, he says when that chink girl spreads her legs, her gash is sideways—”

When Arthur slams Pete’s face against the blunt edge of the bar, the brawl that ensues has a flavor of confusion to it, like the other man can’t understand what he’s done to deserve it. 

As he stalks down the darkening streets with his knuckles smarting and his hair still dripping with cheap beer, he finds himself approaching the margin between the city and the swamp, where the lines of houses grow in grandiosity until they cease at the muddy wash of the wetlands. A breeze kicks up, carrying in its stream strains of insect song and mallard calls, the repetitious melodies of creatures so caught up in the business of rut that they will cry out incessant amidst a landscape rife with predation. Short-lived, they are. The breadth of their days narrow, and with the horizon of things held in each precarious hour, they have no heed for caution in the face of desire.

In the descending close of day the wooden bridge that leads into the Lemoyne wilds stretches into the rising evening mist like a structure half imagined. How easy it would be to ride towards that merciful anonymity, how freeing to leave every bit of this idiotic sense of obligation behind. 

Arthur sighs. He adjusts his hat and turns back towards St Denis, where the lamplighters are kindling their metal forged charges one by one, glass-amplified fires sparking up in silent welcome.

— — —

Sunday morning, and the Christians are flocking to their god. From the alley off of Calliope Street, Yulong shades his eyes with his hand as he scans through a sea of starched collars and pressed linen dresses. All those good little worshippers so intent on saving the souls of the heathens, and so heedless of that which lies shattered in the wake of their compassionate imposition— they stream towards the stone cathedral that juts from the city square with its spires sharp as icicles, and in their midst he spots a brown-hatted figure weaving through the edge of the crowd.

Oh, Lee. Pretty as a knife. 

Dressed like a boy again, and in a way that certain other men have utterly failed to recognize, it does suit you, given how well it shows the turn of your waist and the quickness in your step. You glance over your shoulder as you approach the alley. A rather futile act of caution, given how loudly the heels of your boots clack against the cobbles.

《Sound like a goddamn elephant stomping over here like that,》Yulong remarks when you come close.

《Oh, shut up.》

《Lemme see your face.》

《Really, Yu. It’s not that bad.》But you let him tilt your head up with his knuckle and squint at the cut on your mouth, though you fold your arms across your chest and roll your eyes as he does so.

The second Wei had left the parlor to inform Huang of your arrival, Yulong had crouched down and tried to help you up. 《Motherfuck,》he whispered.《You okay, Lee? I didn’t mean to hit you that hard—》

You swatted away both his hand and his offer of assistance with an impatient flap of your wrist.《Meet me tomorrow morning.》

《Where?》

《The alley. Eight o clock.》A bright bead of blood ran down your chin as you spoke and he had remembered with a plangent pang like buried regret the bygone days in which you would have welcomed him to tend you. That year which had held in all its seasons the lazy contentment of deep summer before its inevitable fall. 

Your bottom lip is streaked now with a vertical scab the width of a horsehair, and your cheek holds in it an asymmetrical blush of rupture in the shape of his own hand, marked with a small white stripe from the imprint of the ring on his finger. He winces, and instead of the awkward apology that he’d spent all morning stringing together, blurts out,《The hell were you thinkin’, smackin’ me in the face like that. You knew I’d have to hit you back. Woulda looked suspicious as all fuck if I hadn’t—》

《That thing you said about Feng.》Your voice is reproachful, but not angry.《It was mean.》

He concedes this with a rueful twist of his mouth.《It was.》

《Yeah.》

《You wanna take another crack at me now, you’re welcome to it.》

You manage a bleak little smile. As you roll up your sleeve and bop your fist lightly against his shoulder, he sees the pink ring of chafed skin at your wrist— ligature mark the width of his thumb, striated like strands. Rope. His mouth goes dry, his throat tightens. He tries to force away from his mind’s eye the thousand haunted hypotheticals that had plagued him the night before. Lee hurt. Lee crying. Lee broken beneath some faceless white devil leagues away from retribution.

That last image had struck up such a blaze of inconsolable rage that Ruolan had sleepily sat up beside him, blankets rounding over her swelling belly as she pressed her lips to his shoulder. Was he worried about the baby again, she asked him, her voice husky in that way that made his heart and loins wound in sympathetic ache. She was nervous too, she confessed, crossing her arms around him in the soft warren of their bed. But she had a good feeling this time, and especially so far along…

He rolled over and hugged her with such sudden ferocity that she had startled. Ran his palm over the new life that beat in tandem within her and buried his face against her soft neck, and would not worry her by speaking his fears aloud.

《Lee,》Yulong says.《The sonuvabitch who robbed you— gimme a name. Or if you ain’t got that, go down to Kuang’s and give ‘im a description, get ‘im to draw you a picture. He’s good at th—》You shake your head, and it is not shame or revulsion or even simple dismay that clouds your face, but rather the sheepish embarrassment of a moonstruck schoolgirl.《Ah no, that’s not… I mean, it wasn’t exactly a robbery, it was more like a misunderstanding. As in he did take my money, but he also saved my life, and— god, it doesn’t really matter. It’s not why I’m here.》The breath you take rattles through your lungs like nervous conviction, and you close your eyes through the long duration of your exhale. When you open them again, the resolution contained there is thin and weary but nonetheless solid, and it plucks a chord of apprehension in him to witness. 《Yu,》you say simply. 《Help me.》

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Astronomers discover first pairs of white dwarf and main sequence stars in clusters, shining new light on stellar evolution

Astronomers at the University of Toronto (U of T) have discovered the first pairs of white dwarf and main sequence stars – “dead” remnants and "living" stars – in young star clusters. Described in a new study published in The Astrophysical Journal, this breakthrough offers new insights on an extreme phase of stellar evolution, and one of the biggest mysteries in astrophysics.

Scientists can now begin to bridge the gap between the earliest and final stages of binary star systems – two stars that orbit a shared center of gravity – to further our understanding of how stars form, how galaxies evolve, and how most elements on the periodic table were created. This discovery could also help explain cosmic events like supernova explosions and gravitational waves, since binaries containing one or more of these compact dead stars are thought to be the origin of such phenomena.

Most stars exist in binary systems. In fact, nearly half of all stars similar to our sun have at least one companion star. These paired stars usually differ in size, with one star often being more massive than the other. Though one might be tempted to assume that these stars evolve at the same rate, more massive stars tend to live shorter lives and go through the stages of stellar evolution much faster than their lower mass companions.

In the stage where a star approaches the end of its life, it will expand to hundreds or thousands of times its original size during what we call the red giant or asymptotic giant branch phases. In close binary systems, this expansion is so dramatic that the dying star's outer layers can sometimes completely engulf its companion. Astronomers refer to this as the common envelope phase, as both stars become wrapped in the same material.

The common envelope phase remains one of the biggest mysteries in astrophysics. Scientists have struggled to understand how stars spiraling together during this critical period affects the stars’ subsequent evolution. This new research may solve this enigma.

Remnants left behind after stars die are compact objects called white dwarfs. Finding these post-common envelope systems that contain both a “dead” stellar remnant and "living" star – otherwise known as white dwarf-main sequence binaries – provides a unique way to investigate this extreme phase of stellar evolution.

“Binary stars play a huge role in our universe,” says lead author Steffani Grondin, a graduate student in the David A. Dunlap Department for Astronomy & Astrophysics at U of T. “This observational sample marks a key first step in allowing us to trace the full life cycles of binaries and will hopefully allow us to constrain the most mysterious phase of stellar evolution.”

The researchers used machine learning to analyze data from three major sources: the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission – a space telescope that has studied over a billion stars in our galaxy – along with observations from the 2MASS and Pan-STARRS1 surveys. This combined data set enabled the team to search for new binaries in clusters with characteristics resembling those of known white dwarf-main sequence pairs.

Even though these types of binary systems should be very common, they have been tricky to find, with only two candidates confirmed within clusters prior to this research. This research has the potential to increase that number to 52 binaries across 38 star clusters. Since the stars in these clusters are thought to have all formed at the same time, finding these binaries in open star clusters allows astronomers to constrain the age of the systems and to trace their full evolution from before the common envelope conditions to the observed binaries in their post-common envelope phase.

"The use of machine learning helped us to identify clear signatures for these unique systems that we weren't able to easily identify with just a few datapoints alone,” says co-author Joshua Speagle, a professor in the David A. Dunlap Department for Astronomy & Astrophysics and Department of Statistical Sciences at U of T. “It also allowed us to automate our search across hundreds of clusters, a task that would have been impossible if we were trying to identify these systems manually."

 “It really points out how much in our universe is hiding in plain sight – still waiting to be found,” says co-author Maria Drout, also a professor in the David A. Dunlap Department for Astronomy & Astrophysics at U of T. “While there are many examples of this type of binary system, very few have the age constraints necessary to fully map their evolutionary history. While there is plenty of work left to confirm and fully characterize these systems, these results will have implications across multiple areas of astrophysics.”

Binaries containing compact objects are also the progenitors for an extreme stellar explosion called a Type Ia supernova and the sort of merger that causes gravitational waves, which are ripples in spacetime that can be detected by instruments such as the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO).  As the team uses data from the Gemini, Keck and Magellan Telescopes to confirm and measure the properties of these binaries, this catalogue will ultimately shed light on the many elusive transient phenomena in our universe.

Contributing institutions include the David A. Dunlap Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, the Dunlap Institute for Astronomy & Astrophysics, the Department for Statistical Sciences, and the Data Sciences Institute at the University of Toronto, as well as the National Technical Institute for the Deaf and Center for Computational Relativity and Gravitation at the Rochester Institute of Technology, the Department of Astronomy & The Institute for Astrophysical Research at Boston University, and the Department of Astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley.

About the Dunlap Institute for Astronomy & Astrophysics

The Dunlap Institute for Astronomy & Astrophysics in the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto is an endowed research institute with over 80 faculty, postdocs, students, and staff, dedicated to innovative technology, groundbreaking research, world-class training, and public engagement.

The research themes of its faculty and Dunlap Fellows span the Universe and include: optical, infrared and radio instrumentation, Dark Energy, large-scale structure, the Cosmic Microwave Background, the interstellar medium, galaxy evolution, cosmic magnetism and time-domain science.

IMAGE: This image from the ALMA telescope shows star system HD101584 and the complex gas clouds surrounding the binary. It is the result of a pair of stars sharing a common outer layer during their last moments. Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), Olofsson et al. Acknowledgement: Robert Cumming.