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stokesy55 · 15 days ago

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Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Only that they were hoping to pay to keep his fame when they didn't really want to use him? I don't get it at all honestly.

^^ Just saw you answer asks about the Yash vs Royals situation going on in the IPL, and came here to say actually RR were wicked smart with the timing of their snub to Yash. It does seem like Yash would want to leave after he was promised captaincy then denied it, but trust me, he won't. At least not this year. I'll explain why.

Okay, first of all, yes you're right that Yash is currently RR's only big-name player and going forward, he'd be their best crowd-puller and money-maker, so RR can't afford to offend him much. I don't think RR will tread on his toes any further either, the captaincy drama has upset him enough. But the timing of the snub is such that Yash can't really do much but grind his teeth and tolerate it at this point.

So the IPL works in the way that there's a mega auction every 3 years, during which every team is allowed to retain only a limited amount of players, the rest of the squad is dismantled and rebuilt through the players you buy in the auction. In the next three years, you're supposed to persist with the majority of your squad, there's a limit on the amount of players you can release. Mini auctions, which occur annually for 3 years after the mega auction, thus have smaller player pools, franchises have smaller purses, and overall less players are bought compared to the mega auction.

If Yashasvi left RR and went under the hammer during the 2025 mega auction, I have no doubt he would've won big there. But I'm not so sure about the mini auction. Sure, Yash is a great batsman, but he's an opener. Almost all the IPL teams have their opening combinations set. RCB just won the IPL, they're not going to change their batting order anytime soon, especially not when one of their openers is Kohli. GT struck gold with their opening trio of Sai, Shubman and Jos. The only teams who struggled with their opening combinations were KKR and CSK, so the most Yash can hope for is getting picked up by one of them in the upcoming mini auction.

There are a few teams whose number 3s did not perform great and they might be looking for replacements in the mini-auction, but I can't see Yash agreeing to bat at a position that's not his first choice.

But even if KKR and CSK express interest in buying him, he'd likely have to settle for lesser money than he is receiving at RR. Generally, players earn more when they put their names for the mega auction, because teams have bigger purses and more spots open then. During mini auctions, less teams are likely to be interested, and they don't have as big of a purse they had in the mega auction. So Yash would likely have to resign himself to a pay cut if he enters himself for the mini auction.

On top of that, Yash has captaincy ambitions, and for most franchises that is a dealbreaker because they're pretty set with their captains. Especially since Yash has no previous captaincy experience, at youth, domestic or franchise levels, an IPL team is very unlikely to offer him the captaincy. RCB won't sack their captain just after winning the IPL. Shub just led GT to the playoffs. PBKS and MI also reached the qualifiers under their respective captains. LSG aren't going to let Rishabh go despite his poor season, not after they paid millions for him. SRH would be silly to sack Cummins, an international captain. CSK have Ruturaj, DC just appointed a new captain in Axar, they won't sack him after just one season. KKR had a horrible season, but likely they'll persist with their captain, Rahane, since he was in good personal touch. Plus, Rahane and Jaiswal have beef, so even if KKR are in need of an opener, these two might not want to play alongside each other, especially under each other's captaincy.

Plus, Yash seems like he wants to be the sole star of whatever franchise he's in, so that narrows his prospects terribly, since almost all franchises already have their select star players around whom their marketing campaigns revolve. Yash would have to content himself with being in their shadow if he moves from RR. At least at RR, he's the face of the brand, which he might not get if he goes elsewhere.

So there you have it: If Yash really wants to leave RR and enter himself for the mini auction, he would either have to compromise on his pay, his opening position, or his captaincy. Honestly, I think he'll have to compromise on the captaincy irrespective of whether he goes or stays bc as I mentioned, most franchises are already firm on who their captains are. And well, if he's leaving for the captaincy and there's no guarantee he'll get it elsewhere, he'd be smart enough to stay where he is.

So RR have technically got Yash right where they want him. As of now, they're giving him a great pay, his favoured opening position, and most importantly, they're making him the centre of their marketing and ad campaign, which no other franchise will probably offer him. If he wants all that, his best bet is to stay at RR. Rejecting him the captaincy was never as big of an insult as it was painted, because even if Yash left RR, the way team combinations are as of now, it doesn't seem likely he'll get the captaincy at any other franchise either.

And actually, the deal between Yash and RR was about the vice-captaincy. The thing with Riyan getting the captaincy cropped up only because Samson, the original captain got injured. Otherwise, Samson would've captained throughout the IPL, and neither Yash nor Riyan would've gotten a whiff of the captaincy.

So what RR will do is try and pacify Yash with the vice-captaincy, since that was the deal agreed upon. He was never getting the captaincy ahead of Samson. And then they keep their fingers crossed that Samson manages to remain fit for the whole season. It's not great for Yash, but he'll take it, because if he goes to another franchise, he might have to compromise upon one of batting position, money, or stardom. At least at RR he's only having to compromise upon captaincy, which he's not sure of getting anywhere else either. 3/4 is a better deal than 2/4.

Maybe 3 years down the line, when the next mega auction approaches, Yash will leave RR because by that time, he would have greater stats than now, more experience, plus he'd probably wield more clout as he becomes a mainstay in all the international teams. Then RR as well as other franchises might be willing to give him the captaincy. But for the short-term, his best option looks like staying at RR.

Interesting

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speedercheats777 · 18 days ago

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ESP not displaying correctly while in a vehicle has been fixed. I've added the dynamic string %dist% if you want the ESP to display distances for entities. You can combine both %hp% and %dist% if you want. Line 44 example:PLAYER (%hp%)|OBJECT (%dist%) The mob vacuum is actually much more effective than I realized. There is no distance check. You just have to be careful not to teleport the mobs too far in front of you. Otherwise, you can't hit them. I've reduced the default distance from 100 to 25. I've also added an "angle offset" parameter to the mob vacuum settings that allows you to offset the teleport position slightly so that you can shoot the vacuumed mobs. The order of the settings is||||such as114|115|0|25|0The "angle offset" is a radian value, so you will want a number between 0 and 6.28, with 1.57 being 90 degrees, 3.14 being 180, and so on. It occurred to me that with the new auto-block commands, it is also possible to detect whether your own character is attacking and use this to automate the speed hack (rather than having it triggered by a keypress). Here is a macro I came up with:keys=ia|ps3|gt*keys2=ps1keys3=s10endkeys=dbg % OFFrepeat=2This macro uses two new commands: - "ia" — If you are currently attacking (i.e., swinging your weapon or shooting), the rest of the keys line will process. The inverse is possible with "!ia." See the example macros for usage. - "ps" — Your player speed will be increased by "speed," where 2 is a 100% increase to your speed, 3 is a 200% increase, and so on. This is the same hack as line 4 in config.txt. This command allows you to have more granular control over when you want the hack active. See the example macros for usage. These changes require Speeder version 7+. Read the full article

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secretcatpolicy · 4 months ago

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A slightly controversial opinion: the BMW i8 is really cool. It's pretty popular to hate this car for a number of offences, chief among them being its fraudulent engine noise, which I absolutely agree is a bad idea, the 'weedy' 3-cylinder engine of a BMW Mini, and the fact it's not really a 'supercar', whatever that means. Some also scorn its styling, and it is, I'll admit, a bit of a marmite car in the looks department. And, inevitably, there are those who don't like it because it's a hybrid.

Those thickies are the worst ones, and it's through them, or rather it's through demolishing their idiotic position we can start to argue the car's case. Hybrids are widely misunderstood and have gained a bit of an undeserved negative reputation, especially in the US, which is ironic; the US loves its pick-ups, arguing they are the most versatile vehicles available in terms of application (even though the Transit van is, like, right there), yet many Americans scorn hybrids, the most versatile in terms of keeping them moving. The fact Toyota's gone with hybrids over pure EVs is a revealing choice too. Would you want to bet against Toyota? There are many flavours of hybrid, but the i8 is a 'through-the-road' parallel hybrid, meaning it has two entirely separate drivetrains which drive different wheels. In this case, the rear wheels are driven by the petrol engine, and the front wheels are driven by the electric motors, making it amazingly flexible.

The fact it's a plug-in hybrid also means you can charge it from a charger or just from driving on petrol, and that it'll run in EV mode, petrol mode or combine both drivetrains for 4wd hybrid driving, and you get very good fuel economy with no range anxiety and maximum flexibility. The two drive modes allow each powertrain to excel in its own forte, so the electrics can assist with acceleration and recoup energy while assisting with braking, whereas you can use petrol while driving on a motorway at a constant speed; and while I don't like the BMW Minis, I respect them, because a turbo 3-cylinder is nothing to sneer at, just ask the WRC-winning Toyota Yaris. The i8 does 0-60 in 4.2 seconds and has an electronically limited top speed of 155 (which I'm sure a decent ECU programmer could improve on) so there's clearly more to it than economy. You'd think it would be really heavy with two separate powertrains, but in fact it's 200kg lighter than a Nissan GT-R. It isn't quite as high performance as the GT-R but the fact is, it isn't trying to be.

The i8 had several concept iterations which help reveal what it is trying to be. Early versions were called the BMW Vision EfficientDynamics; if you've seen Mission: Impossible 4, you've seen one version of it. Conceptually, then, it began as an exercise in making an eco-sports halo car to show off BMW's new direction. Thankfully almost all the ugly, gaudy blue lights and stuff (why do hybrids all have a bunch of blue stuff?) went away and for production it was remixed at the last minute with another concept: the BMW M1 Hommage [sic]. The appearance of a futuristically curvy take on the M1 makes it a very striking car, but it sets up a problematic expectation.

It makes people expect the i8 to be a purebred racer, a lunatic car built for the track like the M1, but the hybrid should give it away: it's just an exotic-looking sporty road car with cool new tech. It's not trying to be the fastest thing out there, just be fast enough and pretty enough to give the driver a smile on the twisties and in the car park, while making less environmental impact than the average sports car. People compare it to Rimacs and the like when they should compare it to the Honda CR-Z.

I just got the Hot Wheels i8 roadster, which I skipped originally, but which bothered me when I did. I would have bought it straight off but my thought process when I found it was "oh, cool, the i8 roadster…Oh. Eww. Nope" as soon as I saw the incorrect colouring (all i8s are twotone, colour + black, but this model arrived in monochrome dark silver) and plain black wheels. I may yet get the black one if it comes my way. I've mostly remedied the colouring, although not really as well as I would have liked, and will likely find some decent wheels eventually, but there's nothing I can do about the window contours. I cant decide which the windows most resemble, a '70s speedboat windscreen or 2000s Matrix-esque sunglasses. Nice though the brown interior is, it's overall not remotely as good looking as the coupe. Of those, I have two, a silver Tomica (wheelswaped, the best by a wide margin) and a white Siku (oversized 1:55, rubber tyres, pretty good), having evaded the nasty orange metallic colour scheme that BMW seem to have liked using to promote the car.

I used the past tense there, as BMW seem to have given up on the i8. Even though the roadster only debuted in 2018 they stopped making them in 2020, having sold 20,000 or so, and for some reason they haven't replaced it with anything else that uses similar or better tech, although I'm sure this car and the equally late i3 helped get BMW's other i-branded models working that much better. But who knows why BMW do anything these days; I certainly don't. They were among the first out of the gate among traditional European marques with electric cars, but they've largely squandered that lead; clearly their priority was developing larger and larger kidney grilles, and these lean little i8 pseudogrilles just didn't cut it.

#diecast #model cars #hotwheels #tomica #siku #bmw #i8 #hybrid

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abyranss · 3 years ago

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Charlotte Shimeji 2.0 Now Completed!

All sprites overhauled and new behaviours added.

Now totalling at 334 sprites.

As part of the new art style, her outlines are purple like they are in the movie to make her less harsh. She's also slightly bigger, rounder, and softer-looking. Also, she now has a separate set of sprites for facing right so her eye colours don't switch.

Her animations are also smoother with in-between animations for things like switching positions between sitting, standing, and lying down.

She can self-multiply like before, but previously she would do that until reaching the cap and then stop. Now, they also have a method for reducing their numbers to balance it out.

Idle animations so she can do more than just walk around and climb the edge of your screen. Running in circles! Flapping her hands and feet! Requesting cheese to eat! Singing! Other things that I haven't shown!

Download Link and How To Use

This requires at least version 1.0.18 of Shimeji-ee.

Download the zip above and extract it. Within is a folder titled "Charlotte"

Download the latest version of Shimeji-ee here. Check the FAQ if you need to know how to update an older version

Place the "Charlotte" folder within the Shimeji-ee "img" folder and run the program

Once running, you can open the Shimeji menu and navigate to Settings > Choose Shimeji, and then select Charlotte.

With that, you should have a Bebe running around on your screen, multiplying, singing, eating cheese, eating each other, or whatever else they choose to do.

Adjusting the total count limit

I've set them by default to only multiply up to a maximum of sixteen and only begin eating each other after there are at least five of them, so the count should fluctuate between those numbers, but if you want to adjust that to allow more or less Bebes on the screen, I can instruct on how to do that.

Within the "Charlotte" folder is a "conf" folder, and within that is an "actions.xml" and a "behaviors.xml". Open "behaviors.xml"

With Ctrl F, locate the behaviour "PerformMitosis"

This behaviour has a condition that reads "mascot.totalCount < 16" what this means is that it is checking whether the total shimeji count (of all types, not just Bebe) is below sixteen before it attempts to multiply. You can change that number to adjust the max.

For the minimum, locate the behaviour "PruneNumbers" which has a similar condition that reads "mascot.count > 5" (checking that the total number of this type of shimeji is greater than five) and that number can be similarly adjusted.

Although, if you just want a single instance of many Bebes and not to let them grow to that number whenever they please, clicking on the shimeji icon in the tray (the one that accesses the menu when you right-click it) will summon an additional Bebe. You can spam this button.

And if anything isn't working, let me know.

#pmmm #puella magi madoka magica #mahou shoujo madoka magika #nagisa momoe #momoe nagisa #bebe #charlotte the witch #shimeji #art #fan art #my art

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townofcrosshollow · 4 years ago

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Twine Sugarcube 101

AKA, all you need to make a Twine game (I swear to god)

I’ve seen a lot of people go “Twine is too complicated for me :(” and give up before they’ve even started. And that makes me sad, partly because they’re giving up on a really cool hobby, and also because that’s false! It’s absolutely not too complicated for you!

I think the problem is that people look up Twine, see the documentation, and go “There’s way too much there! I can’t learn all that!” Well guess what- you shouldn’t learn all that, at least not yet. As a beginner you can skip pretty much all of this:

(Ignore <<linkappend>> too, forgot to crop that one out)

That’s a lot more manageable, right? Below the cut, I’ll let you know how to use all those remaining important things to make your story! Warning- it’s quite long! You might want to read it in sections! And while I’ll try to keep it entertaining, it’s also a coding tutorial, so... y’know. Might not be the most exciting read if you aren’t trying to learn Twine.

Welcome to below the cut!

First off, make sure your story format is set to Sugarcube 2. On the right side of the home screen (with all your stories), click format and choose the one labeled “Sugarcube 2.x.x” then open a new story with the green button! Here’s what you’ll see and what it all means:

Passages are all like individual web pages that you navigate between to play the game. When they’re linked together they’ll be shown like this:

Anything you write in a passage will just be shown on screen as plain text, no code required! But if you want to make anything more than just one passage with a bunch of text, you’ll have to link passages together with...

Links!

A link is composed of two parts- the text you see on screen, and the name of the passage you’re attaching it to. These are enclosed in [[double square brackets]], with a vertical bar | or a little arrow -> between them. If you want to show the passage name instead of alternative text, you can just put the passage name in square brackets alone! So this in the editor:

[[Visible text|Passage name]]

[[Visible text->Passage name]]

[[Passage name]]

Will look like this in the story:

Visible text

Passage name

And all of them will lead to the passage labeled “Passage name.” You don’t even need to create the passage- when Twine sees that you’ve linked to a passage that doesn’t exist, it’ll add that passage for you.

That’s all you need to know! Technically, all you need to do to make a Twine story is add those fancy links between passages. If you add your awesome writing skills, that story will be super cool!

...but you want to do some fancy shit, right? Well let me introduce you to the next step up in complexity,

Variables!

“Variable” is a fun, code-y way to say “a bit of information that can change.” You could say they... vary.

Variables are useful for keeping track of information. If the player chooses to be blonde instead of a redhead, you might want to bring that up again- but you probably don’t want to write an entirely separate story based on that choice, right? So instead you save that information as a variable.

In Twine, variables are written as words with a $ in front of them. So my hair colour variable might be “$hairColour.” If you just write the variable out without any code, Twine will print the information you put into the variable. So if $hairColour is set to “blonde,” this...

She had $hairColour hair.

Will become...

She had blonde hair.

The value in a variable can be a boolean (ie. true or false), a number, or a string (like “blonde” or “any other string of characters”). They can also be fancy stuff like arrays, but we won’t be touching on that.

You can use variables to keep track of a lot of things! For instance...

How much money the player has

Whether a player has a key

What the player’s name is

I keep mentioning the value of a variable or “setting” it, but how do you do that? Well, one way is to add it to a link. If you want a link to set hair colour to blonde, for instance, you could write [[Blonde|Next passage][$hairColour to “blonde”]]. Clicking on that link would forward the player to “Next passage” and set the value of $hairColour to “blonde.”

There is a better way of doing it, however, but we’ll need to talk about...

Macros!

A macro is a snippet of code that runs when you put a special code word inside these <<spiky boys>>. You can write your own macros with JavaScript if you’re smart, find them on the internet if you’re even more smart, or just use the ones that come built in with Sugarcube.

The ones we’ll be talking about, and the ones that are the most important for most Twine games, are <<set>>, <<if>>, and <<link>>.

<<set>>

The <<set>> macro allows you to, you guessed it, assign a value to a variable. For instance, if you want to set $hairColour to blonde... well, that’s all you need to do! It’s just:

<<set $hairColour to “blonde”>>

It’s important to remember with the <<set>> macro that strings (collections of different characters) require quotation marks around them to show the code that it isn’t a number or a true/false value. If you put quotes around a number and try to do math with that variable, you’ll get a big ol’ error message.

If you’re using numbers, you can also use JavaScript operators in place of “to.” Each one will perform a calculation on the variable if that variable is a number, and then replace the variable with the result. If you want to add $5 to the player’s $money, you could use this:

<<set $money += 5>>

The “+=“ will add the number on the right to the variable on the left. “-=“ will do the same for subtraction, “*=“ for multiplication, and “/=“ for division. Easy enough, just don’t forget the = sign after the usual symbol!

By default, the <<set>> macro will be executed as soon as the page it’s on loads. Sometimes that’s useful, but sometimes you would rather the player click a link that sets a variable- like if they choose a hair colour. You might also want the same link to set multiple variables, like subtracting money and giving them an item when they use a shop. How do we do that?

<<link>>

The <<link>> macro is also pretty simple. All it does is create a link, and when that link it pressed it executes whatever is inside of it. Here we’ll be using it with <<set>>, but you can use it with all kinds of different macros and even nest some of them to do really complicated stuff!

As an example, we want the player to click “buy key,” give the player the key, and subtract $5 from their money. Here’s how we do it:

<<link “Buy key”>>

<<set $key to true>>

<<set $money -= 5>>

<</link>>

The text the player will click is in quotation marks, and after all of the macros we need to execute we have to close off the code by adding <</link>>. Easy, right?

But other than printing them on the screen, what can you actually use those variables for? Well, for that we’ll be using...

<<if>>

The <<if>> macro is my favourite, hands down, because it’s an easy way of accomplishing hard stuff. Simply put, <<if>> will check if the thing you asked about is true, and if it is, it will do whatever you put inside of it.

Here’s a simple example:

<<if $key is true>>

[[Use the key|Progress]]

<</if>>

Whatever is inside the <<if>> macro will be executed if the “if” statement is true. In this case, the link “Use the key” will be printed on the screen only if the player has the key. This also applies to code- if you put a <<set>> macro inside, that macro would only set a variable if the player has the key.

Now here’s a more complicated example, to show everything the <<if>> macro is capable of. Here we also want to check if they’ve already opened the door, and display alternate text if they have no key and the door is locked.

<<if $key is true>>

[[Use the key|Progress]]

<<elseif $doorOpen is true>>

[[Walk through|Progress]]

<<else>>

You need to find a key.

<</if>>

I’ll break it down line by line to tell you what each thing does.

<<if $key is true>>

This line is the only necessary one- it checks whether $key has been set to true. You can check for any value that a variable can be, like a number, true/false, or a string. You can also check for other things with this macro- for instance, “isnot” will check that the variable isn’t equal to the value on the right. “gt” or “lt” will check if the variable is greater/lesser than the value on the right, and “gte” or “lte” will check if it is greater than or equal to the value.

<<elseif $doorOpen is true>>

This line allows us to check for something else within the same <<if>> macro. Once the game has checked the original <<if>> and found that it is false, it will move on to checking each <<elseif>> until it finds one that is true. You can have as many <<elseif>>s as you need, and they can check the same variable or different variables, but only the first true one will be executed! And, of course, you can’t use <<elseif>> on its own- it’s stuck to the <<if>> macro!

<<else>>

This line is the last resort- if the original <<if>> and any <<elseif>>s have all been false, the game will execute whatever is after <<else>>. Because of this, there can only be one <<else>> line within any <<if>> macro! If you don’t have an <<else>>, nothing at all will be executed, so whether you include one depends on the situation.

<</if>>

This closes off the <<if>> macro. Nothing special, but very important! Put it after the last piece of code or bit of text you want the macro to control.

Phew. That’s it! That’s all I wanted to show you!

Now, HOMEWORK!

Okay, not homework, just practice. Here are some things you can try building to practice all these tools and get comfortable with how they work!

A store system with different items for different amounts of money

A character creation screen, followed by a description of your character (with variables!)

A puzzle that requires you to choose the right answer to proceed

If you have any trouble, need to ask any questions, or if something in this tutorial wasn’t clear to you, please let me know- you can DM me or send me an ask anytime and I’m happy to answer any Twine questions you have. I hope this was of use to you, and have fun making games <3

#told you i was making a tutorial!#not crosshollow #tutorial #game dev #twine game #twine #interactive fiction #gamedev

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not-a-space-alien · 3 years ago

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Watch Your Step: Chapter 12: Welcome to the World Wide Web

HAPPY MERMAY!!! A certain merman may appear later in this chapter, and in his honor I got a commission made, which you can see here.

Another update since my last chapter, we made a gt discord server! There are many servers like it, but this one is ours :p You are ABSOLUTELY allowed to join even if we've never DM'd before, I see some of you in my notes a lot but for the life of me I can't remember all of you to send you an invite. If you're over 18, just message me if you'd like to join.

EXTRA big thanks to @appelsiinilight for their help with this chapter. Their willingness to share their perspective has helped me throughout this whole story to make the narratives about disability and English as a second language more respectful and authentic.

As usual I also have @static-stars for helping me hash out worldbuilding details, who convinced me to add mermaids in the first place >:3c

the next "chapter" ended up being way too long, so I split it into three parts. I also decided this triple-barrel chapter will be the ending to this story (so total of 14 chapters and an epilogue), HOWEVER! don't fear, because I will be continuing to write and the sequel will pick up right where this leaves off, I just thought this was the point where it made the most narrative sense to insert breaks. This story #1 as well as the series is called Watch Your Step....the next story....well, you'll just have to see >:3 I also started a series on AO3 to reflect these changes, which you can subscribe to if you don't want to miss the continuation.

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoy!

Story masterpost.

AO3 link

Thistle was excited by his new little castle; in fact, he was thrilled to bits with everything he’d picked out from the store, once he realized they were his to keep. They represented a step forward in his life, transitioning to a more dignified life than the one he was living now: one in which he had privacy and personal belongings. However, he soon became much more enamored with something else they’d brought home: the phone.

He wasn’t really interested in it at first; he’d seen Marcy, Teddy, and Colin all absorbed by these mysterious, possibly magic rectangles at various points. He’d even been shown images and scraps of writing on them before, but they’d always been yanked back away from him eventually. He still wasn’t really sure what they were, or how to use them for anything.

Marcy was determined to help him figure it out. She set up the device on her own, then lay down on the floor next to Thistle and demonstrated how to pull up the contacts list. He had three contacts, each with a picture next to them. He seemed delighted by this, reaching out to touch Marcy’s picture. He seemed surprised when the screen changed, calling Marcy’s phone.

Marcy got up to the other side of the room and answered her phone. “Hello? Who is this?”

Thistle giggled, tilting his head towards the top where her voice was coming from. He skittered down to the bottom where the microphone was. “Me.”

“Me who? How did you get this number?!”

Thistle wiped the smile off his face, furrowing his brow.

“It’s a joke,” said Marcy, giving an exaggerated laugh.

He mirrored her, clearly not understanding, but relieved that they were joking around.

She spent the next few hours with the internet disabled on the device, showing him the various functions he could access, the flashlight, the calculator, the camera, the messaging app. She held her phone next to his and let him see that anything he typed in and texted to her would show up on her phone. He went absolutely wild for this, and slapped the screen in an uncoordinated way to put together a string of gibberish that he then sent to her.

He’d need a little bit of practice. It was made for someone with much larger fingers.

Marcy was starting to get afraid of what would happen when she finally let him use the internet. He seemed like he was going to explode from excitement just leaning over the phone and tapping the icons, gasping with delight at the moving sounds and colors. After about the fourth or fifth time he called her and demanded she go answer his call elsewhere in the house, she took it from him and discretely moved some of the more…purchase-oriented apps off the home screen, disabling them so he could only access the ones she set with the parental controls.

She leaned the phone in the corner where his castle was, plugging it in. She disabled the lock screen and demonstrated how to tap the power button to turn the screen off and on. He nodded along, then immediately zoomed in on the contacts list again and called Colin.

“Hello?”

“Colin!”

From the dining room, Colin’s face appeared, leaning over the table. “Hey, bud! You sound so big!”

“Phone! Sui ovaudio? Min? M’ova aun!”

“Yeah! You got it!”

Marcy gave it a day for the novelty to wear off. He lost interest after a while, probably thinking that he’d explored all the features the phone had to offer and there was nothing left to discover. At this stage, Thistle privately thought it was a little stupid that the three humans were on their devices so frequently. What could they be looking at so often?

He found out soon enough. Marcy took the phone and turned the WiFi on. He clung to her shirt, leaning over her shoulder to watch her comparatively huge fingers swiping and tapping way faster than he’d been doing with the width of his microscopic hands.

She used parental controls to disable everything except YouTube kids, a dictionary app, and an encyclopedia app. Still, paranoia got the better of her as she put it back down in the little corner in the living room Thistle was making for himself.

“If anyone asks for credit card info–the numbers on these little cards–see, here? These numbers. Don’t give it to them. Don’t tell anyone where you are, or how old you are, or how big you are, or–You know what, I don’t think anyone is going to be able to DM you on wikipedia or the thesaurus…But remember that some of the stuff on here isn’t necessarily true. Well, most of it is. The stuff you’re looking at is mostly reliable. Well, except for the kid’s shows and whatnot. Oh God, YouTube kids has comments disabled, right? Yes. Okay, you can have an account to save videos to watch later, but that’s it, okay? You can’t type any comments in. No comment boxes. Don’t talk to anyone. Well, you need to type in to search for words. Well…”

Thistle received all her instructions absolutely bewildered. She plugged the phone back in and set it up for him. “Okay. Go ahead. You’re gonna learn English way, way faster this way, and it’ll keep you from being bored.”

Baffled, he cautiously leaned over to examine the phone, his miniature knitting still clutched to his chest. “Ko?”

“Uh… L-Lem… Lemu? Lenu.”

He brightened up. “Learning?”

“Yes!”

“Reading?”

“Yes! And watching.” She pointed to the TV.

Thistle eagerly scuttled over, standing before the device, practically the same height as him. He reached out one delicate finger and tapped the encyclopedia app.

A smattering of article previews came up, an assortment of pictures, and the blinking cursor on the search bar. He furrowed his brows.

“Here,” said Marcy. She demonstrated how to bring the on-screen keyboard up. “Write what you want to read about here, and it’ll give you something to read.”

She typed in clown fish. A wall of text came up, broken by colorful pictures and clickable links.

Thistle’s face lit up, and he sat, stretching his arms out to put one on either side of the device, an extra large TV. She advised him to sit back slightly, thinking vaguely that being close wasn’t good for someone’s eyes, right? And then left him to it.

***

Marcy turned out to be right. Thistle’s language skills skyrocketed, as did his understanding and knowledge of the human world. He absorbed vocabulary like a sponge, so despite his imperfect grasp of syntax, his speaking went from broken, frustrated fragments to fuller, richer, more confident sentences shockingly fast.

He spent most days reading or watching educational programs with subtitles on, seemingly determined to make the most of this new tool he’d been given. Marcy would occasionally check in to give him something else, kid’s literature, books on tape, podcasts, materials written for ESL learners. She could see the delight on his face when it clicked, when he actually started to understand what was being said, the change of noise and nonsense becoming words and sentences that meant something.

They fell into a routine of sorts. Usually there was at least one of them home to sit with him. When he wasn’t reading, learning, listening, or watching, he did activities with them. On the days when he was alone with Colin, they watched movies and sports games. When he was alone with Teddy, he did crafts and art. He painted his wooden house, a nice little scene with green paint for grass and sky blue with clouds up above. When he was alone with Marcy, he chattered excitedly about whatever articles he’d been browsing and what he’d learned. Sometimes all four of them were together, and she could feel Thistle radiating happiness, seeming like he was about to burst. It was starting to feel like they had another roommate, who just happened to be five and a half inches tall. Five point five six, Marcy declared when she measured him with a ruler, or 14.1 centimeters.

He kept a journal, crafted from Post-it notes bound into a book, written in Pixish. Marcy watched him write in it almost every night, feeling a twinge of sadness. The immersion of having no one and nothing that shared his native language was certainly conducive to learning a new one, but the isolation must be heart-breaking. She made attempts to reciprocate his effort and learn, but she had never been very good at picking up new languages, and of course he didn’t want her to read his diary. She also had her attention split because she was still trying to learn her own things in grad school…her dissertation was starting to stress her out again.

She never let the dregs of everyday life distract her from making time for him, though. She paid close attention to him. Franz Kafka be damned, if someone she cared about was a bug, she would love them all the same.

As his language skills increased, his accent also noticeably changed. Before, his English had been accented in a way that sounded vaguely Italian, or some other romance language. It suddenly veered very heavily into sounding more British.

Marcy suspected this was because of the amount of Peppa Pig he had been watching. This was confirmed when she had to gently explain to him that oinking at the end of your sentences wasn’t a standard manner of expression in English.

He also seemed to be embarrassed to learn that the language he was learning was called English. When she pressed him, he sheepishly admitted he’d been calling it “Giantese” to himself.

All three humans found this uproariously funny. Marcy asked what his own native language was called, thinking surely it must not be named after the species, right?

It turned out it was. This was when she found out it was called Pixish. He seemed to think this was normal. His hours with Dora added Spanish to his vocabulary as well, and he peppered it in sentences sometimes. He didn’t seem to grasp instinctually that there were multiple languages that humans spoke, instead thinking that he was learning some universal, pan-cultural language.

Marcy was gobsmacked by this, because it implied to her that wherever Thistle came from, there was just one language per species, or that there weren’t foreign languages at all. She had to pull up the encyclopedia entry on human languages and try to explain it to him. He seemed to get it eventually, and he seemed embarrassed, as though he should have known all along.

That seemed to be a big theme. He was very, very excited to learn, and eager to ask Marcy questions, but no matter how gently and encouragingly she answered, he usually seemed frustrated to not know. The amount of knowledge he was jamming in that little head of his over such a short period of time was impressive, and she made sure to tell him, but he had bouts of frustration, seemingly fed up with being adrift in an environment he barely knew anything about.

He also expressed the desire to go outside a few more times, but Marcy always gently rebuffed. Outside would be an environment he knew more about, and would be more comfortable in, but she was still rattled from what had happened last time…She knew she wouldn’t be able to put it off forever, though, so she always promised him they could try again soon.

Just…not right now. Especially not when she heard that damn dog loose outside again.

It was safe inside, though. There was usually at least one of them home to keep an eye on him, and Marcy was nervous about leaving him home alone. But they all agreed that it should be fine if they put Mochi in the basement.

***

“You sure I can't cat up?”

Marcy turned from the basement door, where Mochi was pitifully sticking her paws under the door and meowing, to Thistle, standing on the banister by the stairs. The little fairy had his hands in his pockets, watching her.

“Yes, I’m sure,” said Marcy. “Sorry.”

Thistle got down on his hands and knees, peering down at Mochi’s pleading paws. “Awww, Marcy! Sad cat! She wants playing with me!”

“Right,” said Marcy. “That’s what I’m worried about. She also wants to play with her toys.”

Thistle pouted, stretching his emerald eyes wide.

“Nope,” said Marcy. “Sorry. If no one is home to keep an eye on things, there’s a locked door between you and the cat. We agreed on that. No exceptions.”

Thistle folded himself into a sitting position, crossing his arms and looking sour. “Uhn, fine.”

“You have done nothing besides cuddle her for the past three days. I saw you.”

“Not true!” Thistle stuck one finger in the air. “I also read everything in the encyclopedia about fishes in Percomorpha.” He tossed his hair over his shoulder, then put one fist on his hip and the other to his chin. “That's tuna, seahorses, anglerfish, and pufferfish.”

“....right.” She gathered her backpack and lunchbox. “That’s great, sweetheart, but why don’t you read something a little more, uh…”

Thistle rocketed to his feet, vaulting over Marcy and landing on the coat rack. “Useful? You're saying useful? It’s not useful to, ko ae vi, fish? Know fish?"

“No, no,” said Marcy, feeling obligated to backpedal, as a biologist who worked in a field many people thought was useless. “It just seems like you might want to prioritize reading about, like, society and language and stuff.”

“...but they named one the jellynose.”

Marcy very gently bumped him into her hand, raising him up and giving him a kiss, planting it right on his chest. “You are adorable.”

He giggled, pushing her away. “Go to work.”

“Maybe I should make you get a job now. Pay rent.”

Thistle twirled a strand of his shiny black hair around his finger. “Sorry! If the…ehm…Ko ea vo…? Government! I'm not exist.” He stuck his tongue out. “No driver’s license. No security number. No ID."

She smiled at him, delicately brushing his hair back. “I think Colin will be back at 3 today. You feel okay about that? Being by yourself for a while?”

He puffed out his chest, putting one hand on it regally. “Of course, Marcy. I can alone. I don’t scared.”

“Right. Well, if you change your mind, you can always call me, okay? I might be able to come home early, anyway. I have a lot of computer work to do, so I can probably work from home.”

“Okay.”

“Man, I really don’t want to go….They’re giving me more instructions for that video project I told you about, I really don’t want to do it…” She sighed. “Well… I’ll call you when I’m on my lunch break to check in, if I can find the time.” She thought about saying I love you again. She hadn't said it since that first time, and now she was too scared of what would happen now that he might actually understand what it meant.

He didn't notice her lingering indecision. He was preoccupied with thoughts of someone he could talk to now that he was left alone in the house. “Okay. Talk you later."

Thistle stood in the window, watching her walk to her car. She occasionally looked at him over her shoulder, waving. He waved back. She mistook his interest in her departure as nervousness, and gave him another reassuring reminder she would call him at lunch, shouting muffled through the glass.

He gave her a cheery thumbs-up, and she beeped her horn as she pulled out of the driveway.

As soon as she was gone, he dashed into the living room, practically leaving skid marks, and hurled himself up at the fishtank.

He misjudged his landing slightly and ended up banging into it, conking on the glass and scaring away the fish that were lounging nearby.

He shook his head, then looked up. The merminnow was still on the anemone where he spent most of his time, and he’d rolled over to give Thistle a deathly glare.

“Sorry! Hey! Hey, look!” He held up his rubber fish, pressing it against the glass and pointing to it. “It’s you! That’s you! See? You! Ria! Ria! Ari! Hey!”

Nemo closed his eyes, mouth slightly ajar, and let out an inaudible sigh that released bubbles from his nose and mouth. He rolled over and shielded his face with his hand, as though to block him out.

Thistle tossed his rubber fish off the end table; it bounced and rolled across the carpet. He crossed his arms sourly. “Hey! You hearing me?”

The tailfin flicked at him dismissively.

Now was the time to break out his new weapon: his more advanced grasp of Giantese….or should he say, English. “You’re rude. I’m favoring you! Ee…. aralvi faon. Doing a favor. Maybe I’d tell Colin you’re here? He’ll back at 3.”

Nemo’s fins stopped their idle rustling.

“I want t’tell. But I don’t.” He twirled a lock of hair around his finger. “So maybe you’ll talk t’me?”

Nemo rolled over, face scrunched up in a hostile expression. Thistle suddenly doubted himself.

Nemo lifted off the anemone and pumped his tail to get up to the top of the fish tank. Thistle heard the sound of the flap of the lid opening, and felt a slosh of water from up above. He craned his neck to see Nemo leaning out from the top, locks of his sopping wet hair pointing straight down at the Pixie, framing a scowling face. “What do you want?”

Shaking with excitement, Thistle flickered his wings and leapt up onto the half of the lid that was still closed. “I just want to talk!”

Nemo retreated back into the water slightly, only leaving his chest above the surface. He crossed his arms and rested them on the lip of the tank, hunching over. “Okay, fine. Talk to me then, if you’re going to threaten me over it.”

Thistle suddenly felt guilty. “Er–I’m not going to tell actually.” He knelt, bouncing with excitement. “I just–I just want to talk really! Please!”

Nemo sighed. “Well, why don’t you give me a worm, then?”

Thistle blinked. “A worm?”

“Those worms they get for you! I only get to eat the fish food, and whatever they happen to leave close enough for me to climb out and get!”

“Oh!” Thistle was suddenly delighted by the opportunity to share his bounty. “Okay! Wait right there!”

He leapt down and jogged into his little castle, where he’d stashed the plastic cup of worms. He snapped it open and took one out, then rushed back over.

“Here!” he said, panting as he alighted on top of the tank again. “They’re good really!”

Nemo snatched it and dove back down into the water.

Excitement fading, Thistle leaned over, peering into the water, watching the shaky, wobbling shapes beneath the surface. He watched as Nemo sunk into his anemone again, snarfing down the worm.

He waited. And waited. Finally, Nemo’s orange face reappeared at the top of the water. “Oh, you’re still here?”

Indignant, Thistle said, “Wh–Yes?!”

“I figured since you talked to me, you’d got what you wanted.”

What? He’d barely said two words! “Talk–I only–”

“Can I have another one?”

“What?” He hadn’t even said thank you the first time! “Why would I even?”

He leaned back in the water, hands laced behind his head. “Well, they’re really good, and I can’t get them on my own. Only seems fair, doesn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah I guess you…Wait! No, no it doesn’t!”

Nemo chuckled, slapping the water with his tail languidly. “Whatever. They are really good, though. I can see why you’ve gained weight eating them.”

Thistle put a hand to his belly. “Huh? Weight?”

“Yeah. You’ve definitely gone up a pants size or two.”

“Well, I….so what?” He’d said it like it was a bad thing. To Thistle, being fat meant you and your hive were good at foraging.

“The humans think it’s bad. They think it makes you ugly. They think it means you’re lazy.”

Thistle’s cheeks flushed hot. “What?!”

“Doesn’t it make it harder to fly?”

Thistle flickered his wings, looking over his shoulder at them. “I can fly, it’s okay. Wait…Lazy, you said? Ko, ne, Marcy is….”

Nemo grinned impishly. “You think she’s fat?”

Thistle flushed again, unsure if that was rude to say. He did think Marcy was fat, but he also didn’t think that was a bad thing…but the way Nemo said it… “She’s work all the time! Always! More than…Pilio iuan…anyone else…any other human I know!”

Nemo rolled his eyes, idly squirting a drop of water out between his two front teeth. “You only know three humans.”

“...So?! She doesn’t ugly!” Thistle knew that what humans considered attractive was different from what pixies considered attractive, but to most pixies, it was desirable for females to be large. Marcy–and Teddy too, for that matter–therefore represented a cartoonishly exaggerated archetype of the pinnacle of femininity, which he honestly tried not to think about too much, lest his mind start wandering in indecent directions.

Nemo looked at him tiredly. “Well, whatever. If I talk to you, will you give me more worms, then?”

Why was he being so mean? Thistle almost regretted working so hard on his language skills, just to understand his one potential friend thought he was annoying. His eyes watered. “Why would you hate me? Ceve… neo pao…Nemo, surely you like a talk at least a little?”

“You don’t think my name is really Nemo, do you?”

That caught Thistle off guard. “Uh…? Well, what is it really, then?”

“Hah! Wouldn’t you like to know!”

“Well….Yes, that’s why I ask.”

They stared at each other in silence for a second.

The fishman sighed. “You can’t pronounce my name. It’s only pronounceable underwater, by someone with gills.”

Thistle perked up. “Oh! It makes sense! Your language does under the water!”

“Yeah.”

“You learn to speak…ahm…” He pointed to the TV. “You watch a lot like me, to learn?”

“Yep.”

“So you also have to have…” Gah, what was the word for it? He’d just read this. He sucked in a few breaths in an exaggerated way.

“Lungs?”

He nodded and pointed.

Nemo flared his gills and sucked in a breath at the same time, making a weird popping sound. “Of course I have both. What kind of chump breathes with only lungs or only gills?”

Thistle found himself oddly embarrassed now, as though he’d chosen lungs only in a moment of arrogance thinking he wouldn’t need gills. “Well, ehm…” Suddenly all the questions he’d so desperately wanted to ask had slipped out of his grasp, mind coming up empty. “How are you….ehm…How did you get here?”

“How did I get here? I put myself here.”

“Well, yes, but–but how? Where did you come from?”

“From the ocean.”

“...And??”

Nemo held out his hand. “Worm.”

Thistle scuttled down back into his little house and came back with a worm. Nemo took it and bit its head, chewing and savoring with his eyes closed. “Mmmm…”

“Well?”

Nemo nibbled on the wiggling legs, pulling one off and rolling it around in his teeth. “It’s not that hard if you know what you’re doing. A lot of aquarium fish are caught in the wild by humans, who bring them back to give them to other humans to put in their aquariums.”

Thistle tightened his fists. “They kidnapped you, too.”

“For the last time,” said Nemo. “I did it on purpose. I’m here because I want to be here. I could leave if I wanted to.”

“Nuh-uh!” Thistle shook his head. “You’re lying! How would you?”

“I’d go out through the mail slot.”

“Hm?”

“The slot in the front door. I’d just climb out of the tank and out the mail slot. Boom, I’m outside.”

“Okay…and then what?”

“Then whatever I want!” Nemo slapped his tail on the water in a frustrated way. “I don’t know! Why do you care so much? I don’t want to leave.”

“Don’t you have a family?”

“I don’t need things like that. All I need is what I have right here. Plenty of food, a nice anemone, a nice place to live with clean water, and best of all: no predators.”

Thistle looked sad. “Yes. Predators are scary really…with no family to help.”

“I told you I don’t need a family or anything like that.”

“But you said no predators was best of all. You came here for to be safe?”

Nemo flared his nostrils angrily. “I can take care of myself. I got in here by myself, I like living by myself, and when I want to leave, I’ll leave by myself.”

Thistle suspected he was more scared than he was letting on. “But you’re not alone. Colin cares for you.”

Nemo grit his teeth.

“And you’re afraid of Colin knowing you’re here.”

Nemo flipped his tail and sent a cascade of water at Thistle, who jumped back. “Okay, fine!” he yelled. “I’m small! I’m very small, and easy to eat! Is that what you wanted me to say? Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“Uh…”

“And if Colin found out I was here, it would be easy for him to pick me up and carry me around and do whatever he wanted to me! I’ve seen you crying about Marcy doing the same thing to you! How are you going to say that stuff to me like you don’t understand?”

“I do understand!” said Thistle. “But you don’t have to pretend–”

“I’m not pretending anything! I really don’t need anyone else! I’m only pretending to be a clown fish!” Nemo’s voice had started to wobble. “And I don’t want to talk to you because you’re going to get me found out! Don’t draw attention to me! Just stay away from me! I don’t need anyone else!”

Thistle knelt again, tucking his hair behind his ear. “That fish in the movie, the one that’s you... A predator killed his family. Right?

“Shut up,” said Nemo.

“Did you–”

“I’m done talking to you.” Nemo lunged, muscular back bending as he dived down, flashing into his colorful tail giving one final slap on the water. Thistle got a last faceful of droplets showering over him as he leaned forward to plead with him.

He sat on the lip of the fish tank for a few moments, dripping, disappointed. I suppose I kind of deserve that.

But Thistle was nothing if not persistent. He flickered down onto the floor, feeling in command of the living room. The creature in the tank could say whatever he wanted, but he still had to wait a full six hours alone with Thistle until anyone else came home. Thistle would just try again later…. Maybe he’d start with a worm next time.

———————————–

Tag list

@cloudwatchingtoday @theepiccreatorofmagic-blog-blog @waitisthatgt @itssmoltime @ratcatcher0325 @alarcomet @borrowerbecca @crazytinygirl

#gt #g/t #gianttiny #giant/tiny #fairy #fluff #angst #hurt/comfort #angst with a happy ending #size difference #my writing #my original writing #watch your step

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hamliet · 4 years ago

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You’ve answered how to write a good tragedy....So how do you write a good redemption story?

Hi! So, I’ve addressed this before, primarily here. If you’ll notice, all the predictions for how this would play out in Enji’s arc have come to pass, soooo. We’re now in the “acceptance” and “more suffering” phases for him. He’ll likely get to penance via what I’ve been also predicting from the start (see Hawks stans this is not a new prediction for me).

If we wanna break these down even further, the thing about Dabi and Shigaraki (less Toga because, well, Hori and the female character dilemma) is that their arcs are systemic. So let’s examine these arcs, because you can see a pattern in these steps between fathers and sons. (Idk what’s going on with the numbering thing but w/e).

Initial crime:

Endeavor marries Rei and forces her to produce children whom he plans to use to further his own ambitions as a hero.

Touya helps kidnap Bakugou.

Nana Shimura abandons her son, Koutarou, and then dies a hero but alone.

Tenko kills his family and is left all alone.

A worsening of the crime:

Endeavor abuses his family.

Touya targets his family with Natsu and Shouto, kills 30 people, etc.

Koutarou abuses his children.

Tenko becomes Shigaraki and targets kids at UA, spirals as a villain.

Reckoning/refusal of the reckoning:

Endeavor: Touya dies and he locks Rei up and refuses to accept that it might just be his fault. Continues to treat Shouto awfully.

Touya rejects Shouto on the battlefield and rejects himself.

Koutarou’s wife tells him she’ll leave him if he hurts Tenko again . Three seconds later he attacks his son.

Tenko rejects his family (this isn’t bad since they asked him to die) but emerges from his coma to control Gigantomachia and kills a bunch of people.

Suffering:

Endeavor’s family doesn’t accept his attempts to change and his reputation is now trash after a Dabi Todoroki reveal.

Touya’s all alone and more burned than ever.

Nana’s legacy is utterly trashed because her grandson is being used against her by the man who murdered her.

Tenko is having his mind literally controlled and not allowed to be his own person/establish his own legacy.

Acceptance:

Thank you Rei Todoroki. We’re at that moment with Enji right now. He knows it is all his fault and will not deny it.

Touya: now he’s finally outed himself as Todoroki Touya. We’ll see what this looks like for him in the future.

All Might and Gran Torino are showing a bit of this what with GT wondering if they did the right thing, as is Deku through his musing that Shigaraki looks like he wants to be saved (as carriers of OFA, they carry on Nana’s legacy). There’s more to be done.

Shigaraki’s gonna have to accept AFO sucks. He’s already showing signs of this through not wanting him to take control.

More suffering:

Buckle up buttercup Enji’s suffering is just beginning. He cannot deny his son in the media,

Touya’s probably going to Go Through It with AFO and the League and perhaps Hawks going after him.

All Might is probably going to have to suffer a bit and realize that his cowardice in not tracking Shigaraki in the first place makes him somewhat at fault.

Shigaraki’s probably going to wrestle for control of his very essence.

Penance/Sacrifice

See this is where my Enji-Hawks prediction comes in. I really think Enji needs to sacrifice himself to save Touya from something (it doesn’t have to be Hawks, but that’s my current theory); however, he will probably survive.

Shouto will probably get through to Dabi, and Dabi will probably help in the final battle. Yes, he’s going to have to do something to fight.

All Might might sacrifice his life to reach Shigaraki in a Han Solo/Kylo Ren type way, or he might not. He might also live, but I’m less optimistic.

Deku will probably get through to Shigaraki, who will use his quirk to destroy AFO and perhaps quirkdom entirely.

Forgiveness.

The integration of the separate arcs of father and son: Endeavor and Touya will probably both get a chance to heal and be a part of their family.

Deku will probably be the last OFA holder and establish the legacy of heroes with Tenko’s help. Hopefully they will establish a better society with the help of Touya and Toga, a society that saves victims.

I also think that, while there are very valid criticisms of why the trope tends to be this way, often the more suffering=the better the chances of not having a character die. The reason I think Dabi and Shigaraki have good chances is that their entire lives have been suffering. It’s just not particularly thrilling for their suffering to mean just death in the end. Enji is more of a risk than they are because afawk he hasn’t suffered all his life, but he’s still probably not gonna die imo.

#ask hamliet #redemption arcs #shigaraki tomura #dabi #todoroki touya #shimura tenko #dabi redemption #shigaraki redemption #endeavor #todoroki enji #shimura nana #all might #deku #midoriya izuku #todoroki shouto

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veenaspakistanlitblog · 4 years ago

Text

Ten Interesting Pakistani Novels

Under the Persimmon Tree by Suzanne Staples (Summary by Amazon)

Najmah, a young Afghan girl whose name means "star," suddenly finds herself alone when her father and older brother are conscripted by the Taliban and her mother and newborn brother are killed in an air raid. An American woman, Elaine, whose Islamic name is Nusrat, is also on her own. She waits out the war in Peshawar, Pakistan, teaching refugee children under the persimmon tree in her garden while her Afghan doctor husband runs a clinic in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan. Najmah's father had always assured her that the stars would take care of her, just as Nusrat's husband had promised that they would tell Nusrat where he was and that he was safe. As the two look to the skies for answers, their fates entwine. Najmah, seeking refuge and hoping to find her father and brother, begins the perilous journey through the mountains to cross the border into Pakistan. And Nusrat's persimmon-tree school awaits Najmah's arrival. Together, they both seek their way home.

2.) The Diary of a Social Butterfly by Moni Mohsin (Summary by Amazon)

This is the hugely entertaining journal of a socialite in Lahore. Pakistan may be making headlines - but Butterfly is set to conquer the world. 'Everyone knows me. All of Lahore, all of Karachi, all of Isloo - oho, baba, Islamabad - half of Dubai, half of London and all of Khan Market and all the nice, nice bearers in Imperial Hotel also...No ball, no party, no dinner, no coffee morning, no funeral, no GT - Get-Together, baba - is complete without me.' Meet Butterfly, Pakistan's most lovable, silly, socialite. An avid party-goer-inspired misspeller, and unwittingly acute observer of Pakistani high society, Butterfly is a woman like no other. In her world, SMS becomes S & M and people eat 'three tiara cakes' while shunning 'do number ka manual. 'What cheeks!' as she would say. As her country faces tribulations - from 9/11 to the assassination of Benazir Bhutto - Butterfly glides through her world, unfazed, untouched, and stopped short only by the chip in her manicure. Wicked, irreverent, and hugely entertaining, "The Diary of a Social Butterfly" gives you a delicious glimpse into the parallel universe of the have-musts.

3.) Maps for Lost Lovers by Nadeem Aslam (Summary by Amazon)

If Gabriel García Márquez had chosen to write about Pakistani immigrants in England, he might have produced a novel as beautiful and devastating as Maps for Lost Lovers. Jugnu and Chanda have disappeared. Like thousands of people all over England, they were lovers and living together out of wedlock. To Chanda’s family, however, the disgrace was unforgivable. Perhaps enough so as to warrant murder. As he explores the disappearance and its aftermath through the eyes of Jugnu’s worldly older brother, Shamas, and his devout wife, Kaukab, Nadeem Aslam creates a closely observed and affecting portrait of people whose traditions threaten to bury them alive. The result is a tour de force, intimate, affecting, tragic and suspenseful.

4.) A Season for Martyrs by Bina Shah (Summary by Amazon)

October 2007. Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returns home after eight years of exile to seek political office once more. Assigned to cover her controversial arrival is TV journalist Ali Sikandar, the estranged son of a wealthy landowner from the interior region of Sindh. While her presence ignites fierce protests and assassination attempts, Ali finds himself irrevocably drawn to the pro-democracy People’s Resistance Movement, a secret that sweeps him into the many contradictions of a country still struggling to embrace modernity. As Shah weaves together the centuries-old history of Ali’s feudal family and its connection to the Bhuttos, she brilliantly reveals a story at the crossroads of the personal and the political, a chronicle of one man’s desire to overcome extremity to find love, forgiveness, and even identity itself.

5.) Karachi, You’re Killing Me! by Saba Imtiaz (Summary by Amazon)

Ayesha is a twenty-something reporter in one of the world’s most dangerous cities. Her assignments range from showing up at bomb sites and picking her way through scattered body parts to interviewing her boss’s niece, the couture-cupcake designer. In between dicing with death and absurdity, Ayesha despairs over the likelihood of ever meeting a nice guy, someone like her old friend Saad, whose shoulder she cries on after every romantic misadventure. Her choices seem limited to narcissistic, adrenaline-chasing reporters who’ll do anything to get their next story—to the spoilt offspring of the Karachi elite who’ll do anything to cure their boredom. Her most pressing problem, however, is how to straighten her hair during chronic power outages. Karachi, You’re Killing Me! is Bridget Jones’s Diary meets The Diary of a Social Butterfly—a comedy of manners in a city with none.

6.) How It Happened by Shazaf Fatima Haider (Summary by Amazon)

Dadi, the imperious matriarch of the Bandian family in Karachi, swears by the virtues of arranged marriage. All her ancestors including a dentally and optically challenged aunt have been perfectly well-served by such arrangements. But her grandchildren are harder to please. Haroon, the apple of her eye, has to suffer half a dozen candidates until he finds the perfect Shia-Syed girl of his dreams. But it is Zeba, his sister, who has the tougher time, as she is accosted by a bevy of suitors, including a potbellied cousin and a banker who reeks of sesame oil. Told by the witty, hawk-eyed Saleha, the precocious youngest sibling, this is a romantic, amusing and utterly delightful story about how marriages are made and unmade---not in heaven, but in the drawing room and over the phone.

7.) A Case of Exploding Mangoes by Shazaf Fatima Haider (Summary by Amazon)

Intrigue and subterfuge combine with bad luck and good in this darkly comic debut about love, betrayal, tyranny, family, and a conspiracy trying its damnedest to happen. Ali Shigri, Pakistan Air Force pilot and Silent Drill Commander of the Fury Squadron, is on a mission to avenge his father's suspicious death, which the government calls a suicide.Ali's target is none other than General Zia ul-Haq, dictator of Pakistani. Enlisting a rag-tag group of conspirators, including his cologne-bathed roommate, a hash-smoking American lieutenant, and a mango-besotted crow, Ali sets his elaborate plan in motion. There's only one problem: the line of would-be Zia assassins is longer than he could have possibly known.

8.) Home Fire: A Novel by Kamila Shamise (Summary by Amazon)

Isma is free. After years of watching out for her younger siblings in the wake of their mother’s death, she’s accepted an invitation from a mentor in America that allows her to resume a dream long deferred. But she can’t stop worrying about Aneeka, her beautiful, headstrong sister back in London, or their brother, Parvaiz, who’s disappeared in pursuit of his own dream, to prove himself to the dark legacy of the jihadist father he never knew. When he resurfaces half a globe away, Isma’s worst fears are confirmed. Then Eamonn enters the sisters’ lives. Son of a powerful political figure, he has his own birthright to live up to—or defy. Is he to be a chance at love? The means of Parvaiz’s salvation? Suddenly, two families’ fates are inextricably, devastatingly entwined, in this searing novel that asks: What sacrifices will we make in the name of love?

9.) She Loves Me, He Loves Me Not by Zeenat Mahal (Summary by Amazon)

Zoella didn’t know whether she was devastatingly happy or happily devastated. Zoella has been in love with Fardeen Malik, her best friend’s gorgeous older brother, since she was ten, but he’s always seen her as a ‘good girl’—not his type—and he can barely remember her name. Besides, he’s engaged to a gorgeous leggy socialite, someone from the same rarefied social strata as the imposing Malik family. In short, Zoella has no chance with him. Until a brutal accident leaves Fardeen scarred and disfigured, that is. Suddenly bereft of a fiancée, Fardeen is bitterly caustic, a shell of the man he used to be, a beast that has broken out of the fairy tale world he once lived in. And a twist of fate lands him his very own beauty—Zoella. This man, however, is a far cry from the Fardeen of her dreams. Stripped of her illusions, Zoella creates her own twist in the fairy tale, beating him at his own game. Order now and read this modern, unusual interpretation of the old-age fairy tale, in which Zeenat explores the themes of love, longing, and arranged marriages.

10.) Undying Affinity by Sara Naveed (Summary by Amazon)

Twenty-two-year-old, Zarish Munawwar, has everything in life she could ever ask for; an elite family, a high profile status, a bunch of good friends and a childhood sweetheart. Being childish, stubborn, imperious, extravagant and a bit impulsive at making important decisions pertaining to her life, is what perfectly describes her overall personality. She takes life easily and can get anything she desires. To her, life is a bed of roses. It is only when she meets, Ahmar Muraad, her mentor and finance professor at university, her perspective towards life completely changes. He looks quite young for his age as every girl at the university thinks he is attractive, seductive, intellectual and rather intimidating. This charming man is every girl's fantasy and Zarish also finds it hard to resist him. But is he fascinated by her? Little did Zarish know how one little interaction could bring about so many twists and turns in her life. After continuous unsuccessful attempts to avoid him, she feels that she is gradually falling for his charm. Ahmar, however, remains oblivious to her feelings. She is ready to abandon her childhood sweetheart for him. Eventually, there comes a time when only he matters to her and nobody else. Awestruck by the sudden revelation, she is dazed to find out that he feels exactly the same for her. Before their love blossoms, a slight tragedy falls into their lives. Zia Munawwar, her father, has some other plans for his daughter. Will Ahmar fight against the world for his lady love or step back? Do not miss this romantic tragedy as it will encapsulate you totally and will stay in your heart forever

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sweetestlamb · 5 years ago

Text

I Still Get Jealous

Summary: Gang-tae comes to terms with his feelings for Mun-yeong and acknowledges that feeling he tries so hard to suppress, jealousy.

Author's notes: Just a little jealous GT drabble that popped in my head that become something longer, I've been very busy with real life so writing has been difficult. Hope you enjoy, it's not too deep just a cute little story about an adorable jealous boy lol.

Turning in the bed, he pounds at the pillow supporting his head remembering his talk with Mun-yeong, even mentally and privately he couldn't admit that the possessive anger betrayed feeling that churned in his stomach was....jealousy.

Why would he be jealous? He didn't own her and they weren't anything. Just housemates, he was merely someone she knew. But hearing that dismissive title leave her mouth in front of someone that was visibly interested in her made him..uneasy. If a little protective. That was a much better word, he cared for Mun-yeong so it was natural to be protective of her, it had nothing to do with his potential feelings for her. Those didn't exist. At all.

He would act the same way with anyone, if an unknown man was trying to harass Ju-Ri, he would do the same because she was an acquaintance that he cared about.

That's all it was.

With a resolute nod, he turns once more finding a comfortable position before drifting off to sleep.

Meet me at the pizza shop.

He stares at Jae-su's message, as he walks through the hospital doors, hopping into the car and driving off to the pizza shop.

Walking through those doors with a smile, he searches for his best friend only to feel cold chill roll through his body at the sight before him.

She had informed him this morning that she'd be out, demanding that he meet her for lunch but he had declined, brushing her off. It was easier that way, he was still wrestling to get his wayward emotions under control.

But he feels the ropes loosening as he watches her smile that enigmatic smile across the table, glossy hair lightly brushing her creamy collar. She looked beautiful in a short green summer dress, her bare legs peeking out from the table.

Across from her sat a man he's never seen before, tall with thick brown hair dressed in a pressed navy suit. Outlandish in the casual setting of the shop, they both looked too expensive for the space.

The man leaned closer to her, stretching himself across the table although the shop was quiet and it was hardly a struggle to converse easily. His jaw tightened as those hands stopped mere inches away from Mun-yeong's which were folded primly on the table.

She smiled at his words, head tilting slightly showcasing her beautiful neck line. He could only imagine those hungry eyes devouring her and it made him feel.... protective.

Was this another fan that she was forced to entertain because of Sang-in's incompetence? Did she need him to save her? How long had they been sitting there?

"There you are! I thought you weren't coming." Jae-su claps a hand on his shoulder forcing his eyes away from the table. He turns around trying to exude nonchalance, forcing himself not to look over.

"Why are you just standing there with that sour face? Let's get you some pizza!" Pulling him to a table that perfectly aligned with hers, before Jae-su was blocking his view. His friend already has the pizza on the table, warm and delicious and he begins to feed Gang-tae spewing out complaints of how Gang-tae had abandoned him and he should be his number one.

He chews at the pizza thoughtlessly, Jae-su's voice droning away in the background, nothing more than white noise, eyes locked on Mun-yeong and her companion.

They are chatting animatedly, all hands and smiles, before the stranger glances down at his watch and looks back up. He begins to collect their garbage, before offering a hand to her. She lets herself be pulled up and that hand slides into a subtle grasp on her waist. He waits for her to push the hand away.

That moment never arrives, instead they leave the shop as his eyes pierce into the side of her face.

Dashing out of the chair, he hastily chases after them with a loud goodbye to Jae-su who sputters after him, whine in his voice as he actually abandons him the very thing he had been complaining about.

Bursting outside he whips his head around searching for that familiar figure, before finally landing on her. The man chats as he escorts her to his car, racing forward he runs around the lot so he can accidentally run into them, just to make sure Mun-yeong is not being coerced.

Mun-yeong sees him almost immediately and his heart soars as he waits for the blinding smile he'll receive. Waits for her to pull away from that unwanted touch and run over and cling to him as she often does, linking arms despite his protests.

Instead she she looks away as if their eyes never met, as if he's the stranger and not this man invading her personal space. Anger burns his sensibilities away and with a glare he stomps over, blocking their path.

"Mun-yeong, is that you?" He calls out, refusing to let her ignore him although he doesn't know why her doing so makes him so infuriated. It's just rude, that's all he tries to convince himself.

The man answers for her, "Ah you must be a fan. I'm sorry, we're in a bit of a rush right now. She can't take any photos." His blood boils at the gall of this asshole, a fan?

Ignoring him he stares at Mun-yeong, taking in her passive gaze and that hand so boldly settled on her hip.

"Do you need a ride? I drive our car here." He doesn't know what possesses him to say that, our, such a small word but the implications it carries are massive.

Shifting uncomfortably the man turns to look at her, "Mun-yeong ah do you know this man?"

"Yes we live together." He answers, satisfied with the grimace that runs across the man's face.

"He's a housemate, his older brother also lives there. He's my illustrator and he-" she juts a thumb in his direction, "is his caretaker. They were a packaged deal."

His heart thuds at those words that wedge an unimaginable distance between them, limiting their roles in each other's lives. He blisters at her callousness, at times he was her destiny and they were a set but now he was simply a housemate.

The sound of a phone ringing breaks the uncomfortable silence, with an apologetic glance the man answers his phone. It becomes clear that he's being called away, trying to contain his glee he stares at the ground, smile itching to come out.

"Mun-yeong ah I'm being called on business, so we'll have to cut this date short."

He bristles at the word date, jaw clenched so tight he fears lockjaw.

"But I'll call you and we can keep discussing what you mentioned earlier. It was brilliant seeing you, you're as gorgeous as the day I first met you. I'll drop you of--"

"No. I can drop her off."

The man jolts as if he'd forgotten he was there. Pompous imbecile.

Their eyes narrow as they both stare the other down. Mun-yeong's cough pulls them away from each other before she finally speaks, "As much as I'm enjoying this dick measuring contest, I don't intend to stand here all day."

With a furious blush, he jumps at her words, turning away wholly ashamed of himself.

"Joo-young oppa, thank you for the meal. Thank you for meeting me. Drive safely."

He watches in horror as she's pulled into a hug, her arms remain at her side but his larger frame almost swallows her entirely, gently squeezing her into him before he releases her.

With a smug look and a cheesy smile, he finally leaves and Gang-tae can breathe easily once more.

She walks away, striding to the car not parked too far from where they're standing. He rouses himself from his anger and trails after her.

Once they are safely buckled up and driving he sneaks glances over at her, but her eyes are peering outside the window oblivious to his turmoil.

He coughs loudly but that doesn't garner her attention. He clears his throat, but still nothing. Finally he snaps, "So who was that? He seemed very familiar with you." He can't tamper the bite in his voice, emotions far too close to the surface.

Those piercing eyes land on him, penetrating into his soul, curiously fills them to the brim. With a rye smile she speaks, "An old friend."

He waits to see if she will continue, but that's all she deigns him worthy of knowing.

Protectiveness pushes him on, "Why were you having lunch with him?

"Why do you care? I asked you to meet me, you didn't answer. So I ate with someone else, is that a crime?"

He knows he's behaving irrationally, he has no right to question her or get this riled up because she was dining with someone else but his heart doesn't want to hear reason. He just wants to lash out.

"What about his hand on your hip? How many men are you letting hold you? Are you two meant to be as well?"

He can't stop pushing, so furious with her for being on a date, for making his heart ache this way, for smiling at someone else and allowing them to touch her, was this thing between them just another one of her games?

He pulls up to the castle, parking the car with a deep sigh.

Unbuckling her seat belt she opens the door, pausing for a moment to stare at him, "Are you.... jealous?" Something soft flashes in her eyes, a glint of hope before a familiar smirk slides across her face.

It raises his hackles and defensively he cries, "No! Why would I be jealous? I don't care who you talk to!"

With those vicious words he rips the warmth from her eyes leaving behind cold lifeless pools of darkness. Those eyes that haunted him when they were kids.

"You're such a coward. Get out of my sight before you piss me off more." She opens the car door slamming it close in a thunderous bang. He watches her storm away from him with his heart in his throat.

He yearns to follow her, to finally actualize those feelings that percolate when she's in his presence. However fear renders him motionless.

He drives back to work with a frown etched on his handsome face. Absently nodding in apology when he's reprimanded for his tardiness. Head heavy with thoughts of her.

Nothing comes of their disagreement, Mun-yeong is tight lipped about exactly who that man was and he lets his feelings fester, pushing them down until they are buried deep beneath the surface.

He learns from Sang-in after accosting politely asking him about Joo-young Oppa that they are old friends, business friend and one of Mun-yeong's biggest investors. He'd exploded at the manager when he admitted that he's insisted that Mun-yeong meet with him because he knew the man had a crush on her. She would be able to secure his investment into her newest book.

How dare he use Mun-yeong like that? She wasn't a bargaining chip. Damn incompetent idiot.

Jae-su invites him out for drinks and he agrees after a moment's hesitation. He hasn't seen much of Mun-yeong lately and he'd been planning on talking to her, try to move past this awkwardness that still plagued their interactions. In all actuality, she seemed to be fine and was as assertive and distracting as usual, but he couldn't help picking at her, lashing out when she claimed he was what she wanted. Rejecting her love.

But thoughts of her with that man made his skin crawl and his fist tighten.

What he needed was a night of drunken disregard to firmly push those emotions down.

As if the universe is conspiring against him, he's greeted by a horrifying sight. Jae-su laughing at the table, guffawing as he slams back a shot of soju. Across the table Ju-ri giggles cheeks already flushed red and her eyes glossy. But it's the dark figure beside that renders him speechless, Mun-yeong looks at them at them from the corner of her eye, exasperation rolling off her in waves.

Since when were they all friends, close enough to go drinking together? From his knowledge Mun-yeong didn't particularly like either of them, calling Jae-su an idiot most of time and declaring Ju-ri as a two faced bitch.

Yet, there they were laughing and drinking, Mun-yeong picked up her glass with dainty hands pouring the liquor down her throat in a fluid motion.

"Oh Moon Gang-tae!! What are you doing? Come sit down we started without you." Jae-su waves him over, flailing in his seat as he gestures to the empty chair beside him.

His eyes flutter over to Mun-yeong sidetracking Ju-ri's wide eyes and her welcoming wave, she looked surprised to see him-had this not been planned?- and with a small mysterious grin she turns back to her drink.

Sliding into the empty chair he quietly greets everyone accepting the glass that Jae-su eagerly presses into his hand.

Needing it now more than ever, slamming it back then hissing at the burn that erupts in its wake.

Biting the bullet he turns to his friend, "I didn't know you invited anyone else..." He glances over at the girls, who are both too focused on eating to hear his comment.

Jae-su nods before replying, "I ran into Ju-ri and then Mun-yeong text her saying she was bored so we invited her to come with us. She's...not so bad."

He stares at him blankly, all of the rants and warnings playing back through his head.

"Yeah, yeah. I know what I said. But she's okay when she's not stabbing my best friend. Plus she's paying for everything, so I think she's great!"

Mun-yeong perks up at the last of the sentence watching them suspiciously and Jae-su shoots her a blinding grin and a thumbs up, "Cheers to Mun-yeong for paying!"

Ju-ri surges up drunkenly shouting a little too loudly, "To Mun-yeong ah!"

She glares at them both snidely replying, "I didn't think you'd order so much you damn mooches. Last time I try to do something nice."

But he can read her like a book, she's having fun, the relaxed lines of her body curving into the chair.

He can't help his answering grin.

"Well I better order something too before your graciousness warns out."

"Aish! You little...!"

They are melt into comfortable conversations, discussing their days and swallowing shot after shot until endless bottles litter the table's surface.

When he pours the last drop of soju, he watches Jae-su waving someone over. It has to be the waitress.

A new voice enters the fray, decidedly male voice, the timber low and flirtatious. Despite Jae-su's outstretched hand the waiter makes a clear bee line for Mun-yeong. Focusing all his attention on her, eyes trailing down her neck before settling on her face.

"What can I get for you?" His tone is far too suggestive for such an Innocuous question.

Mun-yeong bites her lip thoughtfully and he watches as the waiter's eyes fixate on her mouth.

He coughs loudly, answering with a frown "We need more soju. And I want noodles."

Without breaking his intense gaze on Mun-yeong he nods at Gang-tae, "If you need anything else, anything at all. Let me know. " He stresses the words before stalking off with a smile.

He glares at the retreating figure, unaware of the Jae-su's knowing gaze at his clenched jaw.

It takes all of his willpower not to shout in frustration when the waiter turns around, making his way back over to their table.

"I don't mean to bother but could I ask your name? I can't keep calling you gorgeous customer in my head." Once again his eyes are unwavering as they latch on Mun-yeong as though she is the only occupant of the table.

His anger flares up, who was this punk and why was he so unprofessional? He didn't need to get a customer's name to serve them and why did he only want Mun-yeong's name? Gorgeous customer? He shouldn't be thinking of her at all! His only job was to get their food not flirt with his.....

His what?

What was she to him? He was the very one who'd been adamant that were nothing. So what was wrong with him? Why did he want to leap across the table and punch the waiter in his smug mouth?

"Gorgeous huh? Do you flatter all your customers like this or am I special?" He bristles at the playfulness in her voice, glaring at the small coy smile on her lips.

"You're special. I've never seen anyone like you."

Gang-tae's knuckles burn from his punishing grip on the chair.

"And you probably never will. What will I get if I give you my name?"

Ju-ri admonishes at her question, lightly shoving at her shoulder as her eyes dart over to him. He grips his chopsticks in his hand, tempted to stab the man in front of him.

Mun-yeong shrugs, staring up from under her dark long lashes.

"Anything you want."

She licks her lips in response and he can't take anymore, his frustration erupts like a dormant volcano, pushing his chair back in a loud screech he ignores Jae-su's calls as he stomps to the bathroom.

Splashing cold water on his hot face and taking deep breaths to combat the rapid beat of his heart.

When he eventually makes his way back, Mun-yeong is the only one at the table. Aimlessly scrolling on her phone, when he sits down she looks up. That same infuriating smirk on her face.

"Are you done with your jealous tantrum?"

"I'm not jealous! I just needed to use the bathro--"

She cuts him off with a dismissive wave of her hand, "Save the lies. Chicken boy left and took the two faced bitch. I already paid the bill so we can go."

He follows after her as she leaves the restaurant the clicks of her heels deafening in his ear drums.

"Good night Mun-yeong ah, please come back very soon." She winks at the waiter before striding out the door.

He makes a mental note to never return to this restaurant. Glaring at the waiter, accidentally knocking his shoulder as he passes him to the door.

The drive home is tense, both quietly staring out the window. Surprisingly he's the first to break the thick silence.

"Why did you flirt with him?" Anxiety fills his heart as he glances at her from the corner of his eye.

Those eyes fill his vision again, "Why wouldn't I?"

He grips the steering wheel tighter, no rebuttal.

She staggers to her room on wobbly legs, waving good night over her shoulder.

Sleep doesn't find him easily.

There are men everywhere, approaching her at all times, while they're on line waiting for their coffee order, as they walk down the street, even at the hospital, there is no escape from the men who want to sweep her off her feet. All looking at her with hunger eyes and beckoning grins.

He doesn't know if this was always the norm, if men were always bombarding her and he simply never noticed but now he's hyper aware of every instance. His teeth hurt from how much he's been clenching his jaw.

And she doesn't do anything to deter them, none of her usual prickliness or abrasiveness, no threats or assaults. Instead she smiles mysteriously, dancing out of their reach but never outright shutting down the flirtations. It's driving him crazy.

She was still adamant that they were destined, sending him teasing smiles when they were alone, constantly asking him, "Are you jealous?"

He denied her at very turn, rejecting that there was anything more to their relationship and loudly denouncing his supposed jealous.

Admitting it would be too real. Too vulnerable.

In a turn of fate that nobody would predict it's Cha-young who wakes him from his willful oblivion.

He's changing in the locker room when he overhears the lazy nurse on his cellphone, he's supposed to be searching the patients beds for dangerous contraband and Gang-tae stalks over to reprimand him. Irritated already, as he'd seen one of the hospitals donors chatting up Mun-yeong.

He'd stormed off and ended up here in his fit.

"You're supposed to be--"

Cha-young's frustrated yell cuts him off, "What do you mean why am I upset? You were flirting right in front of me!"

He stops short, air vacuumed from his lungs as he molds himself into the wall, eavesdropping.

"But you didn't tell him you had a boyfriend. That's all you had to say and he would have stopped."

He watches him pace around the room, arms flailing as he shouts into the phone, "Well you are! We've been going on all these dates, you know I like you! It drove me crazy to see you with him."

"Yes! Okay, I was jealous. How could I not be? I thought you only acted like that with me. I want to make this official."

Then in a much softer tone, almost a whisper, "Do you want to be my girlfriend?..."

The victorious pump and whoop that he lets out makes the answer on the other line more than apparent.

"Good so now we belong to each other. No more smiles, you have a boyfriend. No, it's fine I can talk, I'm just at work I'm not busy."

In a daze, he leaves the room. Leaving him to his phone call, avoiding the nurses in the hallway who are inquiring about Cha-young's whereabouts. He has a lot to think about.

He doesn't get an abundance of time to ponder what he overheard before he turns a corner and sees Mun-yeong and the wealthy donor. The man in question, smiling and pressing into her space.

Instinctively he walks over catching their conversation, "You're even more beautiful in person. When the director told me you'd be here I thought he was bluffing. What would a best-selling author want with a psychiatric hospital but here you are, as selfless as you are gorgeous."

Gang-tae saddles up to Mun-yeong, shoulder to shoulder, internally smirking at the look of confusion that mars the man's face as he unexpectedly joins them.

"Yes?... Can I help you? We're having a private conversation." The donor looks at him in annoyance, reaching out to grab Mun-yeong's arm.

And he doesn't know what comes over him, but he's been suppressing himself for weeks now, swallowing his anger and frustration and...hurt. And it all comes crashing out as he watches yet another man encroach on his... Mun-yeong.

"Actually I do mind, you don't need to have private conversations with hospital staff. " He slaps the land away, prepared to fight now.

He scoffs at Gang-tae rolling his eyes, rubbing his hand, "How is this any of your business, huh? What are you two together?" He says the word like it's impossible, unfathomable that a mere caretaker would get someone like Mun-yeong.

But confidence swells in his chest. She wants him, has been vocal about their destiny despite suitors pouring in from all directions.

We're a set, a bomb and its safety pin.

He finally stops deceiving himself, stops suppressing his emotions and says what he knows to be true. The one thing he's been running from.

"Yes. We're together."

He hears the small gasp fall from her lips, in his peripheral he sees her head whip around to face him.

That smug smile falters minutely on the man's face but he regains his composure spitefully biting out, "You? With her? Why would she want a caretaker? You aren't on her level."

Ugly shame festers in his bone, he knows the picture they make when they're together. She is so far out of his reach it's laughable, he has nothing to offer her. Penniless and barely cognizant of his own emotions with too much baggage for one person.

She steps in front of him, shielding him with her slighter body, her voice cold and chilling, "Watch your tongue before I remove it. He doesn't need to overcompensate for anything. His face alone is worth more than anything you've have to offer."

He blushes at her words, shuffling behind her stupidly smiling at the man stands baffled and sputtering.

"Excuse me!"

"You heard him, we're together. So stop pestering me already." Grabbing his hand Mun-yeong struts off, never taking a second look back, but he does and in a childish move he sticks out his tongue, grinning at the searing glare he receives. The donor’s face angry red as he fumes behind them.

"Gosh took you long enough." Mun-yeong sighs pulling him to a bench outside, dragging him down to sit with her.

He stares wordlessly at her. She's so gorgeous, all smooth skin and plush lips.

"How long did you know?"

"Since the beginning, you hide your emotions very good. But not jealousy, that one was obvious."

He sighs hiding his face, burning scarlet cheeks.

She pries his face away, smiling sweetly at him, "Did you mean it?"

Without a doubt he knows that is hope in her voice, the seeds of hope planting themselves in her skin as she looks steadfast at him, demanding his honesty.

He couldn't fight this if he wanted to.

"Yes. I meant it. You're mine and I'm yours, it's just like you said we're a set."

Her radiant smile eclipses the sun in the sky.

Suddenly she jolts up breaking their hold, starting to race off, but he grabs her wrists holding her in place, "Wait where are you going?"

"To tell everyone, everyone needs to know that you're mine. I saw one of the new nurses looking at you. I need to tell her you're off limits and Ju-ri and I are better but I still see her looking at you, I'll just remind her."

Catching him off guard she slips into his lap, pressing a hard kiss to his lips, short circuiting his brain functions.

Caressing his cheeks she smirks at him, wiping at her lipstick now branding his mouth, "Mine."

Warmth blossoms throughout his body and his arms tighten on her waist.

Mine.

#its okay to not be okay fic #its okay to not be okay #psycho but it's okay #ko mun yeong #moon gang tae #jealous GT #denial is not just a river #supposed to be a drabble #thats why it is not as detailed #I thought i could write a quick 1k drabble #I failed

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giant-sketches · 5 years ago

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Hello everyone and thank you again for enjoying my Mass Emotions AU narrative. As promised I made a little animation for this one. I also want to let you know that this is not a full on story that I plan on finishing, but is something I’d like to keep open ended for us all to explore together. If you’re caught up with all my posts on this then please keep reading to see what I plan next, if not please check out the #mass emotions ts tag and return here later. I plan on putting some spoilers to events that have taken place already and about how I’ve portrayed the sides.

1. While the biggest and most shown relationship is Virgil x Patton they all have more of a polyamorous relationship that can be romantic and platonic. Even if I haven’t shown it yet Roman and Logan actually get along quite well too.

2. They live in a fort/castle where they have their own rooms and a number of facilities. The lab that the testing was done in contains equipment needed to repair any damage the Dark Sides cause and they need to remain at a stable temperature when not on. These devices were all designed and built by Logan.

3. They do live in a kind of mental realm with other people. If you’ve seen the anime Cells at Work it’s kind of like that where the other people are not warriors, but normal workers and civilians. Usually only their environment is affected by the Dark Sides, but say Thomas has an episode or constantly indulges in bad behavior it can begin affecting the people.

With that being said I’d like for all of you to ask me questions and send prompts for what you all would love to see next of this world. I think it would be fun for us to create our own narratives for this open-ended story of mine. I do still plan on drawing more, but the beginning is complete so there’s no real order to follow anymore. Additionally, I have a short story idea I’ve been working on to share with you all soon that’s something completely different from this current AU. Please look forward to it! Enjoy this current post as well!!!

- Virgil had now grown large enough to slide himself into the covers next to Patton in the bed. He was still pretty small, maybe the size of a child he thought, but he could still get closer to Patton without worry. As he curled up next to Patton, Virgil extended his arm to try and hug him, but didn’t quite reach to his dismay. Instead he thought back to when he was in Patton’s hand and the soft, warm feeling he felt from Patton’s lips pressing up against him. He wanted Patton to feel the same, but at his current size that wasn’t possible.

He would have to get bigger, still he hesitated. If he grew too fast he’d wake Patton up and if he couldn’t stop for any reason it would become dangerous. Still his heart wasn’t calming down at the thought of completely embracing Patton entirely. Virgil shifted upwards a bit in the bed and layed a small kiss on Patton’s forehead to reassure himself. When he was always with Patton he felt so safe. He wanted to protect Patton, Logan, and Roman always. He loved them all dearly as his family. With those feelings flooding his thoughts Virgil began to grow. At first it started slow, but quickly accelerated from his excitement.

He simply couldn’t help himself. He loved the feeling of towering over Patton and holding him close as his arms and hands touched every ounce of his form in a warm embrace. When Virgil was like this he felt like he could keep Patton safe from anything. It gave him a sense of power and confidence in himself. Although, the sudden growth and creaking of the bed had woken Patton up. It didn’t take long for him to notice that Virgil had grown back to a normal size and far beyond as well.

Patton: “Hey kiddo, looks like you’ve grown since I last saw you.”

- Virgil was surprised, but remained still as the bed continued to creak under his weight. Virgil was a little embarrassed to be found by Patton in such a position, but relieved by his joking behavior.

Virgil: “Sorry I woke you up Pat. I tried my best not too, but I guess I grew a little too fast.”

Patton: “It’s alright!”

- Patton scooched closer to Virgil and stretched his arms out to give him a hug back. Patton’s figure was now completely covered by Virgil’s form. Virgil’s face flushed red in response and he slowly brought his hands closer to Patton’s back to hold him even closer. Patton could hear Virgil’s heartbeat pounding throughout his entire being as he was pressed up against Virgil’s chest. It was a comforting sound he could lose himself in.

Patton: “I guess you growing so big was your idea then?”

Virgil: “Well I did grow back while I was asleep, but once I woke up I did want to keep growing.”

Patton: “Do you like being big?”

- Unlike last time when he felt bad about admitting he enjoyed growing and being big, Virgil didn’t hesitate to answer. Instead he held Patton even closer and curled his body around him.

Virgil: “I do. It makes me feel like I can protect you and everyone from any danger. I felt really safe when I was being carried in your hands earlier and I want you to feel the same when you're with me.”

- Patton was overcome with joy at Virgil’s words. He was thrilled to see that Virgil no longer saw himself as a monster, but as a guardian. Patton worked his way closer to Virgil’s face as he pressed his own face against it. He then began nuzzling Virgil’s face in a comforting manner. Virgil noticed and titled his head down a bit in order to nuzzle back softly. However, Patton still worried if Virgil could remain big all the time. He definitely wanted him to feel comfortable, but the thought of a mini giant roaming around the realm or even inside the fort was just unrealistic. Perhaps a compromise could be met.

Patton: “I’m really happy to see you being so comfortable with yourself now, but I can’t help thinking that this size might be a bit too much for daily life. It’s already too much for the bed you’ve outgrown.”

Virgil: “I guess you’re right. My legs are technically on the floor and my back is nowhere near the bed anymore. Still...”

Patton: “Listen kiddo, I want you to be comfortable and I also like our big bear hug times like this one. So how about we make a deal where you only get this big or bigger when you're with me and for most of the time you can stay tall, but not big...deal?”

Virgil: “Deal.”

Patton: “Awesome! Now then, think you could shrink back down to that new size of yours before the bed finally kaputz?”

Virgil: “Sure.”

- Virgil closed his eyes and imagined the size he was going for. He wanted to remain tall, tall enough to still pick up Patton from time-to-time and big enough to still give him lots of hugs that completely covered his frame. Virgil rested on 6’10 and opened his eyes to a now astonished looking Patton.

Patton: “I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of seeing you do that! Anyway you still seem pretty tall, what size did you set on?”

Virgil: “I went with 6’10.”

Patton: “Wow! That’s more than a foot taller than me!”

Virgil: “Really? How tall are you? I noticed the three of you are pretty much the same height or close to it.”

Patton: “ I’m 5’9 actually. So I’m shorter than Roman who’s 5’10, but taller than Logan who’s 5’8.”

- Patton yawned as he listed off the trios height. Virgil saw that Patton was still tired from the long night.

Virgil: “I had no idea Logan was the shortest.”

Patton: “Uh-huh, he says all his growing energy went to his brain instead.”

- Virgil gave a light chuckle at that remark as he began working his arms back around Patton. Patton had begun fading in and out of consciousness.

Virgil: “We should get back to sleep Pat.”

- Patton was too tired to answer so he just closed his eyes with a slight nod and laid his head up against Virgil’s chest. Allowing himself to fall asleep to that all familiar heartbeat. Virgil pressed his face into Patton’s hair and whispered him a sweet good night as he too closed his eyes.

To be continued.

@avenirunknown @paranoidgurl @enby-phoenix @pattonvirglsanders @suckedinfandoms @crystalk17 @just-some-gt-trash @gentlegiantdreamer @sanders-sides-virgil @bluegreeninbtwn @notkolaidoscop @lgbtqiaemo

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dreamsofwhatlifemighthavebeen · 5 years ago

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Fun times dealing with the equestrian center’s radio net. For the director of the equestrian center - who is here on a work visa, doesn’t have a car, and uses one from the equestrian center to take home - they just a few days ago retired a 1985 Chevrolet Chevette she had been using previously, and replaced it with a 2015 Chevrolet Sonic transferred over from one of my employer’s other companies. The Chevette did not have a radio installed in it, but they decided that the Sonic does need one. I don’t know if you’ve ever looked at the interior of a Sonic, but there really isn’t space for any sort of add ons in the interior. It could be installed on the center console on the passenger side and leave room to open the glove compartment, but I really don’t like the idea of having her look way down and to the right to see the radio if she has to switch channels and such, especially as she’s not a particularly fantastic driver to begin with. Even though we sell radios to the equestrian center at a much lower cost than we would for commercial customers, the owner of the equestrian center rejected that idea on cost, as she already knows she can buy TK-860 or TK-880 radios from us for substantially less. So, it looks like it’s going to be a Kenwood TK-880 (mobile radio to the left) mounted on the dash. Which, I don’t like doing dash mounts because I think it looks sloppy and I like my work to be professional, but it’s ultimately her call.

Honestly, I never saw any need to install a radio in her car... even the company which used it previously never saw a need to. So the owner says, “Well, she might drive it to events”. But never has she (the director) ever shown any interest in driving herself to those... if they’re taking the bus, she much prefers that, as she pretty much has a work center there which was made by taking some seats out of the bus and installing a small desk. Otherwise, she’d ride with someone else, even when given the opportunity to take a newer vehicle, and even when offered someone to act as her personal driver. She’s not into driving, and she’s not going to be now. But I lost that argument.

The equestrian center uses an organizational GMRS license which they had originally obtained in 1984 and have maintained since; thus, it was grandfathered in when the FCC stopped issuing organizational licenses in 1987. Originally, they had used the Motorola MR-355R (bottom left) and MR-356R blister pack radios. Problem is, they were buying these things at whatever big box retailers everyone else was buying them at, so we ended up with hordes of unlicensed users getting on the equestrian center repeater (there’s also a sorry saga of how GMRS users were screwed out of exclusivity on Channels 15 - 22 on account of squatters who bought the 22 channel “hybrid” radios en masse and completely ignored the blurb on the packaging which stated use of those channels required a GMRS license).

When I was given charge of the equestrian center’s radio net, I changed a lot of things. First, I limited who accessed the repeater. Crew and barn leads, admin staff, etc. Everyone working under the leads could use simplex, as they were never a far enough distance from each other to require a repeater. So, we were initially going to use BaoFeng BF-888S radios for the crew members who weren’t accessing the repeater, but we had difficulty finding a seller who could guarantee the radios they sold us had the FCC ID on them (a legal requirement in the US for operating transmitting on any service outside of Part 97 rules). We found one who could guarantee it if we bought the BaoFeng GT-1 (second from the left on the bottom row), which is internally the same as the BF-888S, but uses a different battery and case. For the crew leads, barn leads, admin staff, and those who were going to access the repeater, we went with the B-Tech (BaoFeng) UV-82C (not pictured), which is a commercial Part 90 type accepted variant of the UV-82 series radios. The dual watch feature also allows them to monitor both the repeater and their internal crew simplex net simultaneously without having to go into scan mode.

As the blister pack radios used a standardized list of CTCSS and DCS tones, I changed the repeater to split tones, with separate DCS tones for the transmit and receive side, and also used a mixture of non-standard and inverted DCS tones throughout the entire equestrian center net. So while someone running a police scanner or radio on carrier squelch can still hear our traffic, they won’t be able to talk to us or interrupt us with the blister pack radios, Midland radios, etc., as we had problems both with people intentionally getting on our repeater and also those running simplex who “coincidentally” used the same frequencies and DPL tones which we did. Once the FCC co-banded all of the FRS simplex and GMRS frequencies in 2017, we were left powerless to do anything about it (not that we really could before... the FCC was always pretty lax on their enforcement when it came to GMRS). If we run into a matter of getting disrupted by someone who successfully finds our DPL tones, then I have the means to require the radio’s PTT-ID to be on an approved list to trip the repeater.

For the riding instructors, we felt that perhaps something more durable was in order after one of the GT-1s broke. Initially, I took of the Motorola HT750s (second from the right on the bottom row) from the rental side of our business and loaned them to the equestrian center until we could figure out something more permanent. The permanent solution came when I happened across some Kenwood TK-350s (center of the bottom row) which were sitting in a bin and pretty much unwanted. So, after finding batteries for them, I was allowed to take those and donate them to the equestrian center. I actually had to lean how to use DOS in order to program them. Surprisingly, only one ended up preferring the HT750 over the Kenwoods. In the end - since she rents a room from and lives with me - I purchased one at cost from the business and donated it so that she could continue using one.

All the way to the right on the bottom row is one of my Kenwood TK-3180s, which I use both for the equestrian center’s GMRS net as well as the LMR radio net at my regular job. I was using one with the 16 key DTMF keypad (and the Tactical Features Set), but the owner of the equestrian center wants all radios labeled... while crew radios will tyically have only a number, the equestrian instructors wanted their names to be displayed on the radios they were issued, and I was instructed to do the same with mine. The running joke with it is, when we’re doing fundraising events (the equestrian program is a registered nonprofit), tours of the equestrian center, or other events, then husbands can try claiming they were only looking at the nametags on the radio to try remembering our names when their wives catch them staring at our asses. Since the DTMF keypad didn’t leave space for a label, I took one with the four button keypad and used that.

GMRS is regulated under Part 95E and requires a Part 95E radio. However, due to a lack of viable Part 95E radio options, many users have taken to using Part 90 LMR radios, as many of the UHF models cover GMRS frequencies. For example, the Motorola HT750 can be programmed with frequencies from 403 -470 MHz, and GMRS (as well as FRS) is a collection of 22 frequencies in the 462 and 467 MHz range. The use of Part 90 radios in GMRS plays fast and loose with the law, but acts in the spirit of the law, even if not the letter of it. The FCC has acknowledged the practice and has been leaving it alone, but they haven’t actually given approval to do that. To that end, we ensure that all radios are Part 90 (or Part 95E, as some employees have bought their own radios).

Which of course brings us to other problems in dealing with the radio net. A number of licensed GMRS users are quite upset about our use of a repeater on GMRS, especially given a lack of viable ones in the area. Some have identified the tower and have threatened to report us to the FCC (to which we tell them to go right ahead, as our use of that frequency is 100% on the up and up), some have tried to get us to make it a public use repeater (and typically suggest we use travel tone).

Then, of course, a number of the male employees - not content with the little GT-1 radios - always want something more “badass”. So I had one come up to me asking me if I could program his radio to the equestrian center net, and he hands me a BaoFeng UV-5R and told me the equestrian center owner gave her approval. Problem is, the FCC ID on that one - 2AJGM-UV5R - only shows Part 15 certification for 134 - 174 MHz and 400 - 470 MHz. So, outside of Part 97 (ham radio) use, it’s only legal as a receiver and scanner in those band splits. The ones which don’t have an FCC ID aren’t even legal for that. Had another one come to me with what looked like a Kenwood TK-3207... great 16 channel UHF radio, and the TK-2000/3000 series are becoming one of the mainstays of our rental service. When I removed the battery, it showed the model as TK-3000, but there was no FCC ID on it, so I asked him where he’d gotten it from. He said his brother used it for his business and had some extras. Just out of curiosity, I tried programming it with the KPG-137D programming software and was unable to. So I asked the brother where he’d gotten it from. He said he bought it off of Ebay. When I searched Ebay, I found a bunch of TK-2000/TK-3000 series radios from a seller out of China. So I installed KPG-137D on another computer and this time used the serial number for the UK/European version, and it successfully programmed the radio. All fine and dandy, but I gave it back to him and told him it’s not a legal radio for use in the US without an FCC ID being present.

I swear, I wear too many hats sometimes.

#two way communications #two way radios #walkie talkie #gmrs #gmrs radio

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