#compare web hosting

[wopsa]

Everything You Need to Know About Free Website Hosting - Wopsa Web Services

Considering free web hosting? Learn why it might not be ideal. Limited space, security risks, ads, and ownership issues can impact your site. For reliable web hosting solutions, explore Wopsa Web Services in Sweden. View this infographic to compare free vs. paid hosting options for your website.

[omegawolverine]

The Host Club + Family. for @bttrcoup

Does The Universe Fight for Souls to be Together?, Jamie Varon / UNKNOWN / On The Intimacy of The Mundane, Eve Lion / The Raven King, Nora Sakavic / So We Must Meet Apart, Gabrielle Bates & Jennifer S. Cheng / Sex Education (2019-2023) / True Blue, boygenius / Our Beautiful Life When it’s Filled with Shrieks, Christopher Citro / Extraordinary Attorney Woo (2022-) / UNKNOWN / Toxic Game, Christine Feehan / Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, Ross Gay / In Another Universe, We Are Together, Bianca Sparacino / Matilda, Harry Styles / Le Malentendu, Albert Camus / Ouran High School Host Club (2006)

[tech-research-24]

Bluehost vs Hostinger: The Ultimate Web Hosting Showdown for 2025

Hey Tumblr community! 🌟

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[ahdor]

am I just idk not recognizing it, but Madame Web was filled with mediocre acting and a mild storyline...

[megaport-media]

Choosing the right web hosting service is critical for your website’s success, whether you’re running a blog, an e-commerce store, or a business site. The best web hosting providers deliver speed, reliability, and security, while a poor choice leads to slow load times, downtime, and frustrated visitors. In this guide, we rank the top 5 web hosting services for 2025, dive into key selection criteria, and share real user reviews to help you pick the perfect web hosting solution. Keep reading to find the best web hosting for your needs!

[hokusu]

#dabihawks 🍑🥞

Peach or pancake, Hawks fat ass or Hawks flat ass? The internet splits in outcry.

His fans faction off—between the bubble butt truthers and the firm pancake believers.

Is it photoshop or a trick of light? Is it an illusion, a trick of an eye? Something of a phenomenon between the internet breaking over the gold or blue of a dress?

The answer is unclear. Inexplicable. Debated, between the ages of kids on the streets comparing the bounce of their handballs to the shape of Hawks' bubble, to the grandma and grandpas across the streets, adjusting their glasses to squint and ask 'what ass?'

The forums explode. Hawks' rankings and public approval skyrockets. Is it Hawks' FLAT ass or Hawks' FAT ass?

Hawks laughs with talk show hosts, gossips with magazine columns. Cheeky grin and another line about he's certainly eaten enough pancakes to become one, that leaves the world wondering—is he serious, or is it another joke?

And Hawks will be seen flying across the city from one pancake house to another, enjoying another delectable stack.

Hawks winks in front of cameras too, a juicy ripe peach bitten through in one hand, to announce to the world that he's doing just "peachy" and the cameras will follow him as his unfold to uncover the round shape of his very own peach, as he takes off for another flight.

There are photoshoots of Hawks from all his modeling gigs paired side by side like perfectly realistic detective boards across the web. Snaps of perfectly round globes of flesh shot from high quality camera lens of those who caught a fluttering Hawks across their skies, body hunched over as he lazily passes by. And then there are modeling shoots released on myherogram, some new pair of jeans for Best Jeanist' line and he's so painfully flat from every shot of an angle, every swipe of the post—an arguably perfect flat pancake.

It's the baggy give of his hero costume, it's not Hawks' actual ass.

It's the reality of Hawks' actual ass, the costume just hurries that fact along.

'Hawks got ass. Seen it in person,' HawksPlumpAss writes. 1451 ButtLikes. 578 Rebutts.

'Hawks got no ass. Accidentally brushed past me once and didn't feel a thing. That man is flat as a board,' User AForHawksStandsForAssless writes back. 1454 ButtLikes. 524 Rebutts.

'Pics or it didn't happen,' User HawksOneTrueAss demands. 3769 ButtLikes. 1769 Rebutts.

'Top-hero. Plush ass. You'd best believe,' User HawksUnsuspectingAss writes.

'mfs out here thinking pro-hero hawks has got nothing when he's constantly flying and saving lives...YOU KNOW BIRD BOIS GOT ASS' User HawksBirdAss screams into the void. 2170 ButtLikes. 727 Rebutts.

'Who you calling bird boi like he's yours or smthg???' User HawksOneTrueAss comments. 4069 ButtLikes. 2569 Rebutts.

And then there are those who swear, upon the fan sight meetings of Hawks on the streets that they know ass when they see it. The debate takes the heroic world by a storm, and Hawks never confirms or denies the rumors, never justifies or settles the matter.

On an unsuspecting afternoon after months and months of Hawks peach vs pancake, villain Dabi dubbed user HawksOneTrueAss across the socials, snaps a shot, uploads it. Puts the discussion to rest.

The photo shows what is undeniably pro-hero Hawks' familiar golden locks, framed against the bare of his muscled back and a pair of ruby red wings. A pair of pants are slipped half way up to his thighs, undeniably plush ass hanging out and scandalously--a purple scarred hand grabs a fist full of the delectable globe, middle finger stuck out.

"Hawks true FAT Ass," User HawksOneTrueAss comments. 6969 ButtLikes. 6969 Rebutts.

The internet goes off its rails.

//

Shout-out to @hawks-flat-ass for the name that started this to begin with 😂💛

[monsterfuckerconfessions]

I'm a mimic enjoyer through and through, here to spread the word.

That said.

Rejoice, adventurers, for it is mimic mating season !

Mimics whether they reproduce asexually or sexually often need living lures during mating season, and what a luck to become a lure !

Mimics often keep a prey alive as a way to lure in more preys, as they need more nutrients as to produce a progeny. It is not uncommon for mating mimics to simply swallow an adventurer only to keep them alive as a lure once their clothes and equipments are dissolved.

Most living lures are often fastened to one of the mimic's tongue or sexual apendage, acting like an angler's fish light as to draw in more prey. The lucky adventurer who is kept as a lure gets to be throughoutly spread and used by the mimic, mostly as a way to draw in horny adventurers or helping hands with their moans. But most of the time the lure is far too drunk with sex to even process it's function. Anonymous Adventurers who survived as a mimic's lure describe the experience as "pure bliss", saying they enjoyed being "fucked ass to mouth like a cocksleeve" or "having their cervix spread like a glove around a giant's hand" during the entire maying season.

Living lures are also used by mating mimics to attract partners if they reproduce sexually, as their pheromones mixed with the mimic's are a potent aphrodisiac for potential partners. But since the lure is usually tightly fastened to the mimic's reproductive organ through one of their holes it is not uncommon for observers to find multiple mimics mating through the body of a living lure or mating through their respective lures.

It is also a commom occurence, wether the mimic reproduces sexually or asexually, for the mimic to stuff it's egg, or eggs, inside of it's lure before letting it go, as a way to spread the specie and it's genes. Although mimic birth from humanoid subjects are relatively undocumented because of the dangerous nature of a mimic offspring. It is unknown if the mimic child eats it's human host or simply keeps it as a living lure as well. Fortunately mimic eggs can be disposed of before they reach maturity.

When multiple mimics mate through one lure, it is not uncommon for said lure to be kept as a seedbed by the now bonded pack of mimics. Which is why seasoned adventurers recommend to not fight sexually reproducing mimics during their mating season.

Futhermore, while most mimic that reproduce asexually often let go of their lures once the mating season is done, the mimics that sexually reproduce have an habit of keeping their lures for the entirety of their life cycle, during which they stay fastened to the mimic and usually keep being used as a distraction or lure by the mimic, even after the end of mating season. This behavior has been compared to the way giant spiders can sometimes keep "pets" bound in their web, "pets" through which they reproduce as well or use as a way to raise their youngs.

For the unlucky ones, the mimic can eat them as a way to regain energy after mating, but one anonymous reanimated adventurer still says it is still "worth it." Immortality amulets or reanimation statues (multiple uses not single, mimics are playfull like cats when it comes to food) are recommended.

There also has been rumors of mimics who bonded with their lures, a phenomenon referred to as "mimic brides" but not enough proofs are available as of now. The fate of the brides is thought to be similar to the one of the seedbed although with a singular mimic, whether it be asexually or sexually reproducing one.

This mimic mating season, if you want to keep out of trouble, avoid moaning objects and moaning adventurers in the dungeon !

.

[colin-crossing]

venting about personal things related to being an artist on the world wide web

if i can vent for a moment, i do feel a certain degree of discouragement artistically with how much of my output to the people i would like to represent myself as an "artist" too is my commercial work. I learned anime style specifically to make Miracle-chan and a few explorational pieces of similar themes but thats about it. Thankfully because of what I learned from Miracle-chan im able to use those skills to do commissions in an anime style (which is lucrative compared to non-anime). In a vacum that is fine and dandy, it's a very fun style to work with (so many fun designs that offer technical challenges i find a lot of joy in figuring out!) and I like the degree of separation between it and styles i find more personal to me artistically, especially if im using it in soley commercial circumstances.

my problem comes with how, as a self employed artist paying for his rent and living off of commissions and freelance from disparate sources, i need to be posting the commercial work I do to my main socials as it contributes an intense amount to helping me get more work. But having my commercial work regularly put in the same space as my very personal work (and in the case of twitter - my face, life etc) associates me too much with it, especially when most of the work i post now adays can only be my commercial work as thats what i have to prioritize to get by.

my TLDR here is more or less, I like the commercial work i get to do, but having to constantly post it publicly for the sake of self-advertisng eventually makes that work represent me as an artist when i'd rather not be represented by commercial work that is so different then my artistic goals. however I don't really see a work around for this

another problem along these same lines is that I struggle an intense amount with figuring out how to translate my "personal style" and tastes into 2d drawings (the medium i am most proficient in). most of what i like the most is photography, film, sounds, textures, furniture, clothing, bits of tangible ephemera. it makes it so I take great pleasure in decorating my living space, dressing myself or even hosting a dinner party all in ways that align with this imaginary world of aesthetics in my head. ( if you follow me on @colin-crossing this should make a little more sense) it's why a lot of the 2d art i post aside from commercial work is outfit drawings . I just don't know how to make all these things translate to 2d art and animation. there are times when it works, partially why i was so proud of myself for my short BONEHEAD, while very simple and crudely drawn, it felt very from the Bone (ha ha) stylistically. theres a similar film ive been trying to make for half a year now but it is so so much work and will still take so much more time if i do continue, but i still want to make work in the meantime that feels like mine but I don't fully know how and that leads me to just not drawing anything except my commercial work

[wopsa]

Why Free Website Hosting Isn't Always the Best Choice

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[smellslikebot]

"how do I keep my art from being scraped for AI from now on?"

if you post images online, there's no 100% guaranteed way to prevent this, and you can probably assume that there's no need to remove/edit existing content. you might contest this as a matter of data privacy and workers' rights, but you might also be looking for smaller, more immediate actions to take.

...so I made this list! I can't vouch for the effectiveness of all of these, but I wanted to compile as many options as possible so you can decide what's best for you.

Discouraging data scraping and "opting out"

robots.txt - This is a file placed in a website's home directory to "ask" web crawlers not to access certain parts of a site. If you have your own website, you can edit this yourself, or you can check which crawlers a site disallows by adding /robots.txt at the end of the URL. This article has instructions for blocking some bots that scrape data for AI.

HTML metadata - DeviantArt (i know) has proposed the "noai" and "noimageai" meta tags for opting images out of machine learning datasets, while Mojeek proposed "noml". To use all three, you'd put the following in your webpages' headers:

<meta name="robots" content="noai, noimageai, noml">

Have I Been Trained? - A tool by Spawning to search for images in the LAION-5B and LAION-400M datasets and opt your images and web domain out of future model training. Spawning claims that Stability AI and Hugging Face have agreed to respect these opt-outs. Try searching for usernames!

Kudurru - A tool by Spawning (currently a Wordpress plugin) in closed beta that purportedly blocks/redirects AI scrapers from your website. I don't know much about how this one works.

ai.txt - Similar to robots.txt. A new type of permissions file for AI training proposed by Spawning.

ArtShield Watermarker - Web-based tool to add Stable Diffusion's "invisible watermark" to images, which may cause an image to be recognized as AI-generated and excluded from data scraping and/or model training. Source available on GitHub. Doesn't seem to have updated/posted on social media since last year.

Image processing... things

these are popular now, but there seems to be some confusion regarding the goal of these tools; these aren't meant to "kill" AI art, and they won't affect existing models. they won't magically guarantee full protection, so you probably shouldn't loudly announce that you're using them to try to bait AI users into responding

Glaze - UChicago's tool to add "adversarial noise" to art to disrupt style mimicry. Devs recommend glazing pictures last. Runs on Windows and Mac (Nvidia GPU required)

WebGlaze - Free browser-based Glaze service for those who can't run Glaze locally. Request an invite by following their instructions.

Mist - Another adversarial noise tool, by Psyker Group. Runs on Windows and Linux (Nvidia GPU required) or on web with a Google Colab Notebook.

Nightshade - UChicago's tool to distort AI's recognition of features and "poison" datasets, with the goal of making it inconvenient to use images scraped without consent. The guide recommends that you do not disclose whether your art is nightshaded. Nightshade chooses a tag that's relevant to your image. You should use this word in the image's caption/alt text when you post the image online. This means the alt text will accurately describe what's in the image-- there is no reason to ever write false/mismatched alt text!!! Runs on Windows and Mac (Nvidia GPU required)

Sanative AI - Web-based "anti-AI watermark"-- maybe comparable to Glaze and Mist. I can't find much about this one except that they won a "Responsible AI Challenge" hosted by Mozilla last year.

Just Add A Regular Watermark - It doesn't take a lot of processing power to add a watermark, so why not? Try adding complexities like warping, changes in color/opacity, and blurring to make it more annoying for an AI (or human) to remove. You could even try testing your watermark against an AI watermark remover. (the privacy policy claims that they don't keep or otherwise use your images, but use your own judgment)

given that energy consumption was the focus of some AI art criticism, I'm not sure if the benefits of these GPU-intensive tools outweigh the cost, and I'd like to know more about that. in any case, I thought that people writing alt text/image descriptions more often would've been a neat side effect of Nightshade being used, so I hope to see more of that in the future, at least!

[the-timewatcher]

A disgruntled Tumblrina (gender-neutral) made a website and why you should too.

Or "reject social media, return to personal websites".

PART 1: THE PART WHERE I CONVINCE YOU TO MOVE TO PERSONAL WEBSITES

So, the Web 2.0 social media infested landscape seems to be crumbling before our very eyes. Reddit's leadership is increasingly greedy, Twitter is sinking under the weight of Elon's massive, yet increasingly fragile ego, Tumblr is slowly turning into another lifeless corpo-fest, complete with the layout, Instagram continues to be vapid and soulless and Facebook seems to be going the way of MySpace.

(feel free to check the alt text on these, btw)

In these troubling times, where everything looks the same and you're expected to be milked for every dollar you're worth, what is a disgruntled Internet surfer such as yourself to do? Move to an untested alternative that's bound to get overrun by fascists thanks to poor moderation? Stay the course on the sinking ships you're used to?

Well, what if I told you that we've solved this problem way back in the 90's and early 2000's and were merely duped by the Big Zuck into forgetting our legacy? What if there was a cure for the sanitized, dull social media hellscape?

It takes a bit of work, when compared to just using a social media site, but even if your particular use case makes switching difficult (ex. an artist looking to promote their work), it's still a good secondary option to consider.

The core appeal is the ability to customize and individualize, make a corner of cyberspace unabashedly yours,

It can also be an exciting avenue of creative expression, giving whatever you want to say a unique coat of paint,

Most website hosting services are a bit more lax about what you can do on them, due to changes in the profit structure (rather than depending on advertisers and investors, they either have a premium option to give supporters perks, have another product, or, in the case of paid services, you renting that space IS the product),

If you want your website to be more accomodating and accessible, you don't have to file tons of feedback - do it yourself,

If you'd like to connect with other webmasters and promote each other's websites, we have webrings - sets of circular links that connect websites with something in common, be it a topic, aesthetic or friend group,

You're less likely to have your stuff purged by an ill-advised change in policy (especially if you have a backup of your files somewhere),

The more people do it, the less power those massive social media corpos have over the internet,

It can be a load of fun!

If I have you convinced, keep reading into part 2. If you just wanna see what I did, skip to part 3. If neither, feel free to continue scrolling. I won't hold it against you. You'll be missing out, that's all.

PART 2: SO, YOU WANNA MAKE A WEBSITE!

Good choice, here's some resources!

sadgrl's absolute beginner's guide to Neocities - what it says on the tin!

W3Schools - a more in-depth tutorial site, a learning resource so excellent it substituted for what I was supposed to learn in technical highschool (because our teacher just told us to go on W3Schools instead of teaching us shit)

A list of free layouts for your website - whether to use as a base to learn from or to simply take for yourself,

Neocities - the posterchild for free website hosting for personal websites. Doesn't allow video or audio, but you can get around that by linking those files from elsewhere. Beginner-friendly to a fault - once you have an account just drag and drop your files in,

Gitlab (& Gitlab Pages) - a more advanced option, but it has a few advantages of its own. Gitlab is a website hoster second and a version control service first - which is programmer speak for "keeps track of changes in your code and stores a backup of it online". it helps a lot when working on multiple devices or co-writing with a friend. And secondly, you can use Gitlab Actions to automate putting your website up (even on Neocities, like I do!)

My askbox - I am not joking, if you have any questions about any of this, I'd love nothing more than to help you out!

But with most of my indie web propaganda out of the way, it's time.

PART 3: Welcome to Timewatcher OS.

Of course, because I couldn't be normal when it comes to making a website, I had to turn it into a fake operating system. Each subpage is an "app", opened in a separate embed window. It has unlockable wallpapers (no pay2win, prommy). There's bideo games on it! I even made a music player for it so I can share my incongruent music tastes!

Like I said in my Tumblr bio, if I ever go radio silent for more than a month, it means I've gotten fed up with this hellsite and moved to my own homepage permamently. And I highly advise you make an option like this for yourself too! Lastly, if any of y'all would like to start a webring, do let me know in the askbox - I'm down to manage it if I'm not alone in there.

Anyways, I hope I convinced you to make a website, or at least check out some of the cool sites you've been missing out on! Hope to see you on the Old Web!

[homestuckreplay]

Webcomic 'Homestuck' Canceled For Promoting Bad Password Security

(page 456-459)

8/10/2009 Wheel Spin: Parent Bad :( Verdict: INCORRECT

8/11/2009 Wheel Spin: being silly :3c Verdict: CORRECT, but behind at least 10 layers of irony

In the far future, somebody might call this update a time capsule of the 2000s. If computers change significantly, or something. page 456 comments on Dave's bro's computer being password protected, suggesting that this isn't a cultural norm - the newly-released Windows 7 still doesn't require user accounts to have a password. In Homestuck, the password is used to protect 'incredible top secret shit,' so password protecting a personal home computer might be associated with shadier online behavior.

Bro's password is six characters, and is 'the most awesome thing it can be' according to Dave and his bro, so it's probably lilcal. (It could also be puppet, but personally my passwords are always specific characters, song titles etc, not general concepts. I don't know if other people are different. for what it's worth lilcal is also a slightly more secure password than puppet which is A SINGULAR DICTIONARY WORD). Bro also trusts Dave with his password - either because he doesn't think Dave will do anything to mess up his computer, or because he's daring Dave to use it, similar to leaving the Xbox switched on mid-game.

On page 457 we see Bro's desktop, which we can compare to Dave's desktop on page 323. They both have wallpapers from And It Don't Stop, showing us a chain of game recommendations from Bro -> Dave -> John. Dave, like Rose and John, has some character in the names of his desktop folders, while his bro has seven identically named New Folders scattered around the screen. This adds to the sense that Bro is paranoid about people looking at his computer - he's purposefully making it impossible to navigate. The hidden-identity hat and dark glasses iconography on the password entry screen has the same effect.

Bro also has a program called Delirious Biznasty, which has a rad skater dude for its icon. This could be a web browser, but I think it's more likely some kind of torrenting application, I think that'd fit his vibe. The web browsers we know are Typheus, Cetus and Hephaestus, which are all Greek mythological references with cartoon-styled icons, and Delirious Biznasty doesn't fit the pattern. Based on Dave's relationship to his bro, Bro probably uses Hephaestus too and just doesn't have a desktop shortcut.

Dave and his bro both use the Complete Bullshit content aggregator, which we are forced to witness on pages 458 and 459. Content aggregators are pretty common customizable feeds that people use to keep up with a lot of websites at once, when checking 20+ separate sites a day gets too time consuming. RSS readers are a common form of this that can host a lot of different types of content, but there are also aggregators specifically for webcomics. These are controversial - they're generally well intentioned projects made for free by webcomic fans who want to check for updates easily and keep up with a lot of stories, and want to help other fans do the same. However, they can redirect traffic away from actual sites that host webcomics, meaning that independent webcomic artists might miss out on ad revenue or merch sales, or are less likely to sell ads because their sites don't look as well-trafficked as they are. I don't know if Andrew Hussie has a strong opinion on comics aggregators, but it's possible this terrible to use, unstable and unreadable version is a criticism of the concept.

Complete Bullshit also feels like Dave's bro's equivalent of Serious Business, as they're both digital programs with adjective-noun titles. I wonder if Rose's mom will get her own software.

It's sweet that Bro keeps up with Dave's projects, including Sweet Bro & Hella Jeff and his GameBro review blog. It shows that their relationship isn't 100% one sided, Bro cares for Dave and/or thinks he's cool at least a little bit. It's also fun that Dave is checking to see if his own webcomic has updated, which could be bad memory due to having a lot of projects on the go, or could be Dave checking to make sure his update has gone through and posted successfully. Very reasonable, as it must be a challenge to upload such high quality images.

I will probably make a post digging into Sweet Bro & Hella Jeff at some point, but I'm still peeling the onion of its irony right now so I'll just say: when exactly did Dave find the time to make these comics?

[pastellieria]

The latest round of AO3 comment discourse crossing my dash made me suddenly realize that people are just taking it as a given that AO3 is a "fandom community website". AO3 is often directly compared to Livejournal and other older fandom hubs amidst laments about how "no one cares about participating in their community anymore".

But AO3 is not a "community" website. It's not social media. It's a fanfic archive that was designed to center the fics first and foremost. There is no space on the site for general, casual fandom discussion. You can't even DM other users. The site was designed this way on purpose to protect writers, because its creators were familiar with the ways in which writers have been harassed on other sites and wanted to minimize direct access to writers as much as possible, but that decision comes with the tradeoff of limiting the amount of communication and discussion between fans that is possible on the site.

This is, to be clear, not a criticism of AO3. It accomplishes its goal of being an archive very well. I don't particularly want DMs or larger discussion forums on the site, and I enjoy how it centers the writing it hosts. But as it exists now, it is simply not built to be a "community" and does not function as one. Unlike sites like Livejournal where fic posting and general interpersonal fandom interactions all took place in the same space, fics are posted to AO3 while the "community" for any given fandom now largely takes place on Twitter, Tumblr, Discord, or another site, depending on the fandom.

You're free to personally dislike those spaces and voice valid criticisms about how they function as communities, but they are undeniably where the actual "community" parts of most fandoms currently reside. These sites, not AO3, are where most fans talk to one another, form friendships, and express themselves. It's not impossible to do these things on AO3, but it is not the norm because the site simply is not designed that way.

The latest posts I have seen about commenting culture have gotten this dynamic exactly backwards. If readers are discussing a fic amongst themselves on Twitter or Discord, they're characterized as antisocial and accused of "not participating in the fandom community". But Twitter and Discord are the fandom community sites! The "bookclub" servers and Twitter threads are where the community bonds are being forged between fans! These spaces are the modern analogue to the old Livejournal groups and web rings, not the comments section of any one individual fanfic on AO3.

If an author's only interaction with their fandom is to post fics to AO3 and passively wait to be found, and they aren't seeking out their fellow fans in these other spaces and interacting with them... they are the ones who are "not participating" as much as the readers that are so readily being cast in so much of this discussion as "selfish" or deliberately spiteful for not commenting "enough".

I understand why many of my fellow writers feel this way. I too often find socialization on sites like Twitter and Discord draining and difficult. It takes time and effort to build friendships organically, discuss ideas and share snippets to pique people's interest in a fic before it is posted, and provide reciprocal effort when it comes to everyone else's ideas and snippets and stories, and there are many days when I just don't have the energy for it all. At the same time, I'm also very curious about my readers' thoughts on my stories, and if I learned that they were being discussed in a server I couldn't access, I would want to know what was being said. It's a natural impulse to feel curiosity like this when it comes to one's creative work. And of course, I also love getting comments on my own fics and I'm not immune to feeling disappointed when a fic seems to "flop".

However, it's not fair to take out feelings of disappointment and frustration on readers for participating in their fandom in the spaces where their fandom's community actually exists. If you find out that fandom discussions are happening in a place where you are not present, you have a choice in what action you will take. You can either make the effort to join the discussion, or you can knowingly distance yourself from it. Neither of these choices are objectively correct for every single individual's situation, but you, the AO3 denizen, are the one who needs to choose whether or not to engage with your fandom's community, because AO3 is not where the community lives.

If you choose not to join your fellow fans in their actual community hubs because of low social battery, annoying features, or a site culture you dislike, that's perfectly fine and a valid choice... but you shouldn't be surprised when the author who is participating in their fandom outside of AO3 gets more comments on their fics. And you certainly don't have the right to project your own social withdrawal onto your readers and accuse them of maliciously withholding "community" from you.

Comments are wonderful, and positively encouraging people to leave comments on the fics they enjoy is completely fine, but comments are not community. AO3 is not a community website and in fact is designed to put us writers behind a wall for our own protection. We are the ones who need to choose whether or not to venture out from behind the wall and join our communities, instead of getting angry that the community isn't spontaneously appearing in our comments sections.

[sunxxxie]

Looking for a Fic

You know that feeling when you find an absolute gem of a fic, so good that in your mind it's actual canon content...so good you have dreams about it and even after *years* it's ever-present at the back of your mind. But when you go looking for it, it's GONE?! Sending you spiraling for several weeks as you desperately scour the web for it. And after several weeks and cryptic dreams about the plot, you feel as if you might be slowly loosing it.

Well, that's my current situation. I'm getting desperate- so desperate that I'm on tumblr.com begging for help(not desperate enough to log into reddit tho). Please tell me I'm not crazy and I didn't dream up one of the best fics I've ever read.

The fic was a Lego Monkie Kid fic centered around Bai He (aka LBD's host) after the events of season three. Itwassowellwrittengodineeditnow.

From what I remember:

Shadowpeach was the main romantic(kinda) relationship mentioned although from the few chapters I read it focuses more on the platonic relationships at the beginning. Also PIF and DBK were briefly implied to be in a poly relationship with an original female character which was cool.

The description was something along the lines of: "Bai He is just trying to pick up the pieces of her life after the Lady Bone Demon is gone. Luckily, she has the help of MK and the others... something something- Wukong noticed the shadows of the male primate circling the island but never having the courage to come closer.." Or something like that.

Bai He my emotionally repressed princess/affectionate. You could tell the author wrote her character with a lot of love. She was an orphan who had been in the care of an orphanage in France(I believe) before she became a street kid in China. There was also this underlying subtext that her time spent in France was during the 90s(the lore bro, the *lore*). Bai He's disconnect between her ethnic background compared to the rest of the gang made her interactions with the main cast really unique.

Lady Bone Demon's relationship with Bai He was portrayed as almost like an abusive/manipulative parent that you can't seem to completely hate because they're your parent and they're doing what they think is the best for you. Chiefs kiss.

Any fic that mentions the nuances of LBD and MK's dynamic instead of watering down her character to that vile evil Witch who wanted to destroy the world>>>>>>

The subtle world building 🙇peak🙇. The story literally began outside the city where the residents were evacuated. This included the main gang who'd basically already taken Bai He in. There were passing mentions of other mythological pantheons. Plus references to the JTTW.(the author mentioned something about Wukong having descendants which was mind-boggling to me- ik it's inaccurate but whatever.)

Monkey King basically got custody of Bai He and he took her to Flower Fruit Mountain to watch over her condition.

The author detailed Bai He's struggles with her past and her present situation as she was no longer fully human.

Nahza(my goat) was there, living up to his role as protector of children.

The closest fic I've found is 'A Bone to Pick' by SmilesThroughFandoms but the vibe is off. It isn't the same.

It was incomplete with more than 20 000 words and posted somewhere between late 2022/23.(this was the general time frame I read the fic before loosing it. In my defense I (a) didn't have an ao3 account at the time and (b) I was reading it in incognito mode🤡)

If anyone has any information about it please please please please please tell me.

[the-desolated-quill]

Say what you like about Sony’s Marvel’s movies, they have done a much better job of establishing the multiverse than the MCU has.

Think about it. The MCU just use the multiverse as an excuse for pointless cameos, the rules keep changing at the whim of the producers, and there’s no sense of risk or consequence for anything. Compare that to Sony’s Spider-Verse. We know that there’s millions of universes out there. Animated, live action, LEGO, Funko Pop etc. There are vast differences between them, but they all have one thing in common. “Canon” events. In every universe, certain things must always happen, such as the death of a loved one. If it doesn’t, the very fabric of that universe falls apart. We know it’s possible to travel to different universes, but it’s impossible to stay in that universe without a Web-Watch because of cellular decay. The human body cannot survive long in a different universe. The only one who can is the Spot, but it takes vast amounts of power and threatens the fabric of the multiverse itself the more power he gets.

And finally, just when you think things couldn’t possibly get any worse, in Venom: The Last Dance we learn of Knull. A godlike being of immense power that exists in the void between universes. Angry that these “kingdoms of light” are encroaching on his territory, his goal is to escape his prison and destroy the entire multiverse. His children, the symbiotes, imprisoned him and fled to different universes to get away from him, becoming parasitic and vowing never to resurrect a host in case they accidentally create a codex because they fear what will happen if their creator breaks free.

Unlike the MCU, Sony’s Spider-Verse has clear rules and stakes. The multiverse is vast and intricate, but it’s also incredibly fragile and is just one bad decision away from total collapse.

Like a spider web, you could say.

[relleytrots]

"Lingering Kiss"

Some background, before you begin.

If there is a fault in the game in which I play one Riley Halaghan, Ravnos-about-town and permanent gender crisis, it's that our sessions are short, our players many, and our plot dense - and as such, the old vampirism sometimes slips out the back for a fag. I used to be annoyed about this, and then - deciding that I needed to do something positive about my gripes - I decided to write up the impact of one Discipline usage and show-not-tell Riley's Predator Type in action.

Just over nine thousand words later, a week of staring at the Victorian Web muttering darkly about calling card etiquette, and a minor NPC having minor NPCs of her own and they have LORE and - anyway, here we are. I share this with the consent and kind permission of my Storyteller. Hope you like it.

Dividers by @diableriedoll, beta'd by @porcelainseashore. Rated M, for somewhat detached erotica.

The first time our heroine met her Fox was on a boat.

It was late January, in the year eighteen eighty-eight. A mere handful of nights after Epiphany, with the picking up and packing away of Christmas largely done, and weeks to go until the Season came anew and breathed fresh air into the ballrooms and parlours, the drawing rooms and clubs, and most crucially for our present purpose the hotels of the City. As such, one might think of our heroine as wintering in the doldrums. 

February was the shortest month, and that was a mercy, for it was also the leanest and most cruel, a fallow four weeks for Emily Trevelyan’s trade. As such, the offer of a little extra work - off-season, and off the books - from her patron was very welcome. Emily couldn’t bring herself to grumble much at working night and day, not when she was lucky to be working at all, and not when the odd weeknight at service was worth a whole week’s wages at the daytime shift. Besides, she rather liked her patron.

Lady Bowesley was, Emily thought privately, rather eccentric. She gave off the air of a thrifty spinster - a woman who knew precisely how much her hand was worth, and as such was disinclined to give it to anyone until it was far too late for anyone to want it. And yet, and yet - there was nothing frugal about her manner of dress, or the affairs she hosted in the long midwinter evenings, or the generosity with which she compensated Emily for the odd sleepless night and carriage home. In truth, Lady Bowesley was a glamorous old lady, almost regal. She was petite, as well, like Emily - although she carried it so much better, all velvet and vetiver and pearls. She had the clipped voice and the sharp profile of a queen, and her circle of friends were such fine people: lords and ladies, chancellors and eminent physicians, a general and even a prince.

It wasn’t proper, of course, to compare oneself to one’s patron. A lady’s maid, even one who was only moonlighting for the evening, belonged in her lady’s shadow, and should shine no light of her own: merely reflecting. Not that there was any danger of Emily doing that. Pale and pinched little Emily, on two meals a day between three for the gentlemen, speckled with freckles and her eyes an empty page, limpid as pond water and about as deep. Ladyship was generous with her money, but when it came to attention, only her cards and letters of instruction even addressed Emily by name. Which was, of course, as it should be.

Tonight’s affair was at the new Port of Tilbury, where Ladyship had some interests (at least, so Emily presumed). She had, along with the other girls and some chaps from the Woolwich garrison, been ferried downstream on a little launch to the dock, where the Poignant Anchovy (a silly name for a ship, Emily thought) waited at anchor. The fusiliers had gone off in winter dress to let the right sort in and keep the riff-raff out; the maids had been brought on board, relieved themselves of their coats and hats, and gone below decks to a tight close world of preparation. Bunting, on a nautical theme, was strung across the decks; there were a handful of tables, draped in deep red brocade and each hosting a single silver candelabra; there were little stoves set up in the gun-ports or wales or whatever they were called. It was, in Emily’s opinion, a bit much - but better by far than being out there in the cold with the chaps from the garrison, or Ladyship’s cadaverous butler.

Time passed. The great and the good came and went and commingled. Ladyship retired to the captain’s cabin, holding counsel with her old friend the retired General and Miss Parr - an enigmatic young miss who dressed like quite the New Woman and had arrived at one affair on a bicycle. Others came and went, summoned and dismissed by their hostess, and it was one of those - arriving in a knot of half a dozen - who caught Emily’s eye.

Rakish, but not effete; deep auburn-red hair in a ruffled, somewhat shaggy cut; a heart-shaped face dotted with freckles of his own. He walked in like he owned the place - no, like he wanted to own the place, and had just decided this - and he did it with a glossy black cane that swung in time with his right leg. Emily had not thought herself attracted to men with a limp - had not considered a limp something that could be attractive, even in the abstract - and yet she found herself thinking on it. How had he come by the injury? Far too delicate to be a soldier; far too elegant to be a scrapper. His clothes were good, though a little worn - the last season’s preceding winter, frayed somewhat at the cuffs of tailcoat and trouser. He wore them well, but he deserved more. He wanted looking after.

Emily swallowed a frown. What was that motherly thought? What kind of a thing was that for a girl of seventeen to think? And then he saw her thinking, and smiled widely, and flashed eyes the colour of aniseed. The blush rushed out and blossomed on her cheeks. Pretty little mouse, trembling as she met the Fox’s notice. Pretty little prey-thing, yearning for sharp teeth. In accordance with her duty, half-recalled, she took his coat from his high, slender shoulders, and took his name also, for relay to the cadaverous butler for announcement.

“Mister Riley Halaghan,” he said, in a soft and lilting voice, very far from Middlesex; as she blinked, that smile opened up to devour her again, and he added, “late of Dublin town, Miss?” 

“Trevelyan, sir,” she said, and curtseyed. An Irishman, then. But such lovely manners with it! He was with Ladyship for eighteen of the twenty minutes allotted by custom; he emerged, along with his coterie, looking somewhat peeved. 

Emily continued to observe him, as she criss-crossed back and forth about her duties, as she fetched the coats and hats and read the names and saw Ladyship’s visitors away. She found herself thinking quite snippily of the other gentlemen - rather older, and in comparison somehow more coarse despite the better cut of their cloth - and particularly of the one she presumed to be the husband of his more conventionally dressed companion. Emily suspected an altercation; a difference of opinion, maybe; and from the smirk on her Fox’s face she rather hoped he had come off with the upper hand.

Her Fox. How perfectly ridiculous. Her mind was wandering. Fanciful notions indeed.

The second time Emily met the Fox was at her workplace.

Claridge’s had the honour and distinction of being the first hotel in London; the first to be graced by a royal guest, to boot; and for that matter the first to employ Emily Trevelyan. If, as some might have suggested, it was a little behind the times in its decor, and if it lacked some of the modern conveniences, such opinions were more than contradicted by the qualities of its staff.

Here and now, under the coat-tails of winter, the hotel was open for professional rather than social visitors. Emily had waited on doctors and professors, officers and bankers, and the more well-heeled and well-bred captains of industry, a second generation who had assumed the manners befitting of their station. They were often a little lost by the finer points of custom in the town, but Emily could sympathise: such was the situation in which she found her own self. A girl of seventeen with a father in the merchant service, gone to sea and never returned; a mother gone up Gin Lane for missing him; an older sister with whom she shared her rooms on Pollen Street; and a trace of her grandmother’s Cornish rusticity still. 

She took the Girls’ Own Paper - took it when the last week’s issues were discarded from the ladies’ chambers, to save the pennies - and read assiduously, but still found herself in a constant state of calibration. It was easy enough to read over the rules of society between the breakfast service and the dinner, but in the moment of truth Emily always found herself learning by observation - which was to say imitating. She was, in short, self-taught in affairs of propriety, and often found herself at a loss, and never more so than on this particular night.

There was a suite of rooms on the first floor that centred on a parlour, and the suite was booked in the name of Pinsmail - reserved for the foreseeable future, a residency of several months before the Season. A note delivered the night before had explained the parlour would be needed tonight, and Emily had been asked to air, to dust, to polish and to make good for the gentleman - a doctor, she was told - and his associates, and to be present from seven until midnight.

The mysterious Pinsmail was the first to arrive. Tall, pallid, and fretful; conscious of his height and seeming to walk sideways through life, as though wishing not to be perceived. He was beyond all doubt one of the gentlemen who’d called on Lady Bowesley that night in Tilbury. It followed - dare it follow, by extension, or by wishful thinking? - that he would be there.

And there, by grace and good fortune, he was. The coat was the same, but the suit had changed; this one was of a pattern somewhat louder than the usual for evening dress, rather suggesting morning wear made hastily suitable, creative omissions and revisions allowing him to pass. That said, his cufflinks and his watch-chain were of gold, so some unfortunate circumstance had clearly befallen him and caught him short.

His coterie came along in ones and twos, and Emily found cause to remain present. Their conversation was a strange one, full of pauses and terms that seemed to have some second significance, but Emily had practiced the art of hearing without listening - the vulgar might call it eavesdropping - and caught the gist well enough. They were colleagues, drawn together from their various walks of life; they did not know each other very well, nor entirely like each other; they were about some errand they did not fully understand, a matter in which the police were involved, but had failed to perform to satisfaction.

“But wait,” she thought she heard him say - that was to say, Mr. Halaghan. She was, after all, at work. “We can’t possibly have this poor dear lass standing around here all night, listening to us prattle on, and I for one am famished. Would you mind, Miss Trevelyan,” and Emily swore her heart skipped a beat at this revelation, that he had remembered her! She had kept her eyes down, out of accustomed habit and proper behaviour, but at this direct address she looked at him, and found herself utterly unable to follow a word he was saying. The sounds were certainly passing into her ears, of that much she was sure, but they lacked significance. All that mattered was assent. Compliance. Whatever it was he was asking for; whatever it was he wanted. He rose, opening the door for her - for her, for the service - and followed her out into the hall.

Dinner was being served, and the passages were quiet; so quiet that the soft thud and click of the door closing behind them had the heartstopping weight of a cannonball. No, not even that - it was quite a particular feeling, the feeling one feels when trying to be neither seen nor heard and, having botched it, is aware of oneself as the centre of attention. That sense that the world has stopped what it is doing to watch one. That sense of being discovered. Being perceived. Being caught.

“Pretty mouse,” she said, and realised her traitor lips were framing the words, letting them slip their reins in a whisper as mortifying as any crash-bang-wallop she could imagine.

“You are, at that,” he said, in a whisper of his own, a soft and thrilling sound. He took her hand in his, brought it to his lips; did not quite make contact, but she felt his breath across her skin, surprisingly cool; like stepping out of a kitchen for fresh air. “I hadn’t expected our paths to cross again. Has her ladyship set you after us, I wonder?”

“I - I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, sir. I’m employed here. Lady Bowesley - that’s to say, I work for her upon occasions only.”

“Once a month, or so?” There was something in the way he said it; something calculated in the cock of his head and the shift of his crooked hips. He was still holding Emily’s hand, bunching her fingers together, thumb softly traversing her knuckles; first and second fingers only.

“Just so, sir,” she answered; the words, again, tumbling out of her before she quite knew what was what. It was true - and quite improper of her to say so. To admit to moonlighting (a nice-to-have, a way to put something by, more than her sister had), to a gentleman (to whom she was quite answerable, but who should have known better than to ask), with whom she was, she realised, quite alone, in this hall, for these few moments.

It was not the first improper thing Emily had done. She knew, in her secret heart, that it was hardly commonplace for a lady’s maid to be served by her lady. The same was true for all of Ladyship’s occasional employees, even the lads from the Arsenal. Their last duty done, the final requirement was that they remain aboard - or otherwise at hand, because Ladyship’s occasions were held in quite a few strange places - and take a small glass of sherry at Ladyship’s expense and from her own hand, along with their night’s wage. It made her feel special, in a way that Ladyship’s demeanour and remoteness of address did not; it was another eccentricity of privilege, of which she was privileged to be a part. More than that, it made her feel loyal - a harmless little secret, but nonetheless one that had to be kept, because it wasn’t at all the done thing.

In that one moment, Emily became aware of two things. Firstly, she had committed a small betrayal of her Ladyship, that she had transgressed some unwritten, unspoken rule that had never before made itself apparent. Secondly, Mr. Halaghan, the Fox, her Fox, had one hand on her hip and one hand bringing hers up, nestled together in the soft spot beneath her jaw, and his lips - cool as his breath, crimson as hawthorn - were on her lips, and before she could so much as utter a protest, she was kissing him back, feeling strong sharp teeth against her lower lip, and then? Then, to her shame, she did utter something, a high and muted squeak of surprise and pain and delight, and for the life of her when the moment had passed and she came to herself again, she could not recall why.

Her lips were a little sore, and a little flushed, and they ached to be kissed again. He did not kiss her. He released her hand, stepped back, and bowed as though this were a commonplace evening call and he was seeing himself out, after his lady - whoever she might be, if only she might be she!

“Thank you, Miss Trevelyan, and goodnight. It was a pleasure to meet you again; one I hope we shall repeat.”

Emily couldn’t answer. She felt light-headed; felt like she was about to have a fainting fit right here, in the doorway to the opposite suite. He was already leaving, trotting down the corridor, the limp in his left leg alleviated somehow: not gone, but not troubling him half as much. Weary down to her bones of a sudden, Emily touched the tip of her tongue to her lips in wonderment, and felt nothing out of the ordinary at all, and wondered why she’d done that.

For that matter, she wondered what on Earth they had ordered to drink. It must have been coffee, or perhaps tea, or was it port wine? They must have ordered something, or Emily would have been at her post, and - she couldn’t possibly go back in there and ask them - neither could she be found loafing here, lounging at her ease. What the devil was the matter with her? She’d have to find one of the other girls, send them in - anything but lose face.

Emily swayed, half-turned out of the doorway, and fell to her knees in a swoon.

It was unusual for Emily and Vivian to break their fast together. The younger sister was often up and doing before the sunrise, on her way to bring the off-season guests and all-year residents their toast and tea. The older was blessed with a different line of work - clerical, with an architectural firm - and had the luxury of taking tea before the office opened. It was, in Emily’s opinion, quite unfair: particularly since Vivian seemed not to acknowledge the privilege in the slightest. To share one’s room and board, flesh and blood, and every day with someone so deaf to the significance of her position in society was maddening. 

Perhaps it was to do with her age: Vivian was ever such an older sister, and still unmarried, and unlikely to ever be so. She was where she was, and she lived how she lived, and this was in all probability as good as she would ever have it. Perhaps Emily was just a little pettish - a little too sure that she would not end up like Vivian. That she would learn the ropes, and adopt the rules, and better herself, and not be waiting and serving forever, and acquire a little polish from the ladies and the gentlemen - and on and on it went between them.

It gave them something to talk about, at least: on those rare mornings when Emily was not at work and Vivian was not immersed in the newspaper. On such mornings as these, when Emily had time off - not for want of work, but time off sick - it would normally have preoccupied them. As it was, however, Emily had been sent home - a funny turn in the corridor, she’d insisted, all was perfectly well, and no, Mrs. Harrison had told her, it was about time she took a proper day off and that was that - and since Emily had been sent home sick, she didn’t feel she had a leg to stand on in their usual argument.

In any case, she had other things on her mind.

“I can tell you what happened, Viv,” she was saying, “but you mustn’t be mean about it. You mustn’t make faces, or tut, or cast aspersions. What happened was,” she went on to say, without waiting for Vivian to agree to any of that, “the last thing I remember was the gentleman showing me out, and he remembered me from Lady Bowesley’s affair on the boat, do you recall?”

Vivian tutted, exactly as she had been exhorted not to do, and Emily rolled her eyes to the heavens. It was perfectly all right to do so, since Vivian had started it. At least Vivian was paying attention, though, because she said: “I do wish you’d not talk about those affairs as if they were yours, Em - as if you were a guest and not a maid at hire. You give yourself the most terrible airs sometimes.”

Emily refused to let herself be distracted, or fall into the usual rut, not now when she had something desperately important to relate, and so she ignored the jibe and went on regardless. “In any case, Viv, and you mustn’t make faces, please, but in any case, he kissed me.”

Vivian looked at Emily, then. Turned her head three-quarter-ways and let her eyes settle for a minute. They did look alike: Vivian was a little warmer, a little ruddier, a little more worn-in about the cheeks and eyes, and her eyes were a little darker. They were also, currently, quite wide, because while Emily might have given herself airs, she had never been one to make things up. All of her gossip was quite genuine, as best as she could follow it.

“Did he now?” Vivian asked, and it wasn’t the usual way she asked questions like that, as if she was determined to catch Emily out. She was being quite sincere: speaking slowly, almost kindly. “And was that all he did, Em?”

“I think so. That’s the trouble. He kissed me, and he said goodnight, and when I went to go back to - then it all went - and I didn’t wake up until Geraldine found me. It was a quarter to eleven by then, and I’d been missed, and - I don’t think he did anything? Anything untoward?” Emily didn’t need to add the obvious - how would she know? There were things gentlemen who were no gentlemen got up to with ladies who were no ladies. There was taking advantage, of course, and the problem was the Girls’ Own Paper was quite mum as to what that meant, and so was Miss Hartley’s manual. 

All Emily knew was she ached. Whatever that kiss had done to her, she wanted it done again, and again, and again and more and more besides. She felt quite out of sorts. Not sick at all, but restless and fidgety in a way she normally only felt the day or two before her time: only worse than that, because it was in her lips, and in her hips. Tingling, and tense, and wanting to stretch right down to her toes, but not knowing how to do it properly. If that was a sign that advantage had been taken, she was quite sure that she could sort herself out, and she said as much to Vivian.

What Vivian said was that it would doubtless sort itself out, and it was probably best she talked to other girls of her age about it, and she had to go to work in any case - but not to go letting herself daydream, because gentlemen who stayed in the oldest hotel in Mayfair didn’t marry girls who worked there, not outside of the serials in any case. And life, Vivian was always keen to remind her, was not a serial. She knew what it was to be disappointed by a gentleman, she said, and said it in that same slow, kind way that wasn’t quite like her at all.

So Emily did what had been suggested, and she went to talk to other girls of her age. Specifically, she went to talk to Katherine in the laundry, who was known to share all sorts of secrets about what she found in the bedclothes for tuppence or thruppence a time, and for tuppence or thruppence more would drop her skirts while she shared it - or so Geraldine had said, and tapped her long nose while she said it, and trusted Emily to know what all of that meant. At the present moment in time, Emily very much wanted to know what all of that meant, and more than that, she felt that restlessness reaching down into her feet and sending her to the double doors of the laundry - battered at the tops and bottoms, and soaked through with steam - and knocking for Katherine right when she took her break at a quarter to eleven.

“Surprised you’ve not been down to see me before,” said Katherine to Emily, and winked. “Surprised it took you this long to have your head turned. Always thought you’d be a looker, if you looked up once in a while and got seen.” And Katherine said she didn’t have the time to explain all manner of everything to Emily, but for sixpence she’d loan Emily a volume of literature on the topic and Emily could keep it for a shilling, if it sorted her out good and proper. Emily said sixpence was sixpence and she’d give it back, and Katherine said “wait and see, and call me Kitty, eh?”

Dirty Kitty’s dirty book did not, in fact, help Emily much. The pictures were informative, and quite stirring in their way, but the accompanying print assumed you already knew the meaning of some words Emily was quite sure she didn’t exactly know the meaning of already. They were quite coarse - she knew that from when she’d heard them said - but apart from being the sort of words Mark the odd-job-man said when he’d tripped over the bootscratcher, she didn’t know them. And boot-scratchers - anything to do with boots in fact - were nothing to do with the goings-on in Kitty’s dog-eared little pamphlet. It certainly made her all hot and bothered, and gave some detail to the thoughts she was thinking, and she would see if she owed Kitty another fourpence later on.

It was at that moment, feeling terribly bold and quite unlike herself, that Emily decided to take matters into her own hands. She had her gentleman’s name. She worked at an establishment he had visited. She had, therefore, access to his calling card, and could at least find out a little about him from the residence he kept. Defying all attempts to deter her - or even to ask what on Earth she was doing here when she was supposed to be off sick - Emily made her way to the entrance hall, and to the pigeonholes behind the desk, in which the cards and the post and the messages for residents were kept, and she snatched a look. Mr. Riley Halaghan on the front, as was only right and proper, and handwritten on the back in the weekend doorman’s hand was added ℅ Blennerhassett’s, Black Prince Road, Lambeth.

Lambeth; that was a surprise. Emily had felt sure he was a gentleman. This “Blennerhassett’s” sounded less like a club and more like a common lodging-house, and south of the river to boot. People resident in common lodging-houses did not attend suppers on a schooner at Tilbury or meet in the drawing-rooms of Mayfair. Except - her gentleman, the Fox, clearly did do these things, and therefore he couldn’t possibly be resident in a common lodging-house. It was only a care-of address. Going between. And he’d been on police business - beyond the police, even - with the doctor and the officer and that lot - that must be it!

This still left her with the problem of how to pay a call. It was not right, nor proper, for a young lady to call on a gentleman, announced or unannounced, accompanied or otherwise. It was not hers to initiate. Not unless he was very terribly ill, and they were already acquainted, and of a common rank and standing in Society. If only he had been a common sort of fellow, in a common sort of lodging-house - oh, but then they would never have met at all, and would he be half as dashing? Would Emily want him half as much?

As Emily slipped the card back into the pigeonhole, she became aware that her lips were aching again.

Her lips were aching again. Every heartbeat that moved her blood through them; every breath that she drew over them; every moment of her existence, Miss Trevelyan yearned to be kissed again. Yet she did not have long to wait, long to yearn, for she languished both on the finest sheets of the Grand Terrace Suite and within the arms of her beloved. His lips - his hair - his brilliant eyes - at her beck and call, and fastening eagerly onto hers, as his hands roved, as she writhed. She took a shaky breath, in the intervals between, and felt the tension in her thighs as she crossed her ankles and held him tight and begged him please, oh please, frig her or fuck her or whatever it was -

A rattle of keys. Footsteps on the staircase. The tell-tale creak of the fourth step and the clunk of the hallway door swinging shut behind - oh, God, Vivian! Was it a half-day? What on Earth?

Emily bit her lip, stifling the squeak of alarm. She was in a state of deshabille, all a-quiver, exposed to the dim February light and oh God, what were her hands doing there? She fumbled, and shivered, and rolled around in her bedclothes, rummaging herself back under the quilts - turning them over and realising how damp they felt against her - had she even closed her bedroom door? It was just a kick away from the foot of her bed, and she squirmed to reach it and kick it closed just as the apartment door swung open, and Vivian came in.

“Oh, you’re awake?” said Vivian, through the business of hat and scarf and coat. “I did call, but I thought you must have been asleep.”

“I felt a little feverish after breakfast,” Emily answered, herself preoccupied with tidying away the pamphlet, stowing it away inside her pillowcase, crossing to the washstand and dabbling her hands in a rush of cold water, splashing her face and neck and, still distractedly tense, her thighs. “I’m glad you’re home. I’d like to take the air - I think it would be good for me. Just an hour or two. Bracing walk. I could hardly go wandering about alone…”

“Of course not,” said Vivian, and though Emily couldn’t see her sister’s face, she knew her eyes were rolling. “Not even around Hyde Park, or the Green.”

“Oh, don’t be beastly, Viv. I meant in case I had another turn, that’s all.” Now she knew Vivian was frowning; she always took longer to say something when she’d decided she was wrong.

“Of course. I’m sorry. Where would you like to go?”

“I wondered if we might go across the river?” said Emily, as innocently as she dared. “It’s only - I have a card I should like to return.”

“This is about your gentleman, isn’t it?”

Emily blushed, again, and splashed her face again, with an abrupt and grumpy flutter of her palms that was not at all becoming. “You know perfectly well I can’t lie to you, Viv. Yes, it is, and in fact you were quite right about me not having notions of my standing, and it’s perfectly all right because I don’t think he can be all that far above me at all, given his address - “

“Does your Miss Hartley not have something to say about young ladies calling on gentlemen of their most passing acquaintance?” Vivian was moving about the hallway still. “And should I bother to take off my boots, or are we going out right away?”

The walk across Green Park, and skirting the outer fringe of Westminster, and across the Lambeth Bridge, gave Emily plenty of time to explain exactly what she had concluded from Miss Hartley’s advice, which she had in fact consulted. If a young lady lacking parents to effect introductions on her behalf were accompanied, if she only left her card and allowed the gentleman to make any engagement that was to be made, in a proper and public place of course, it was appropriate for that young lady to be introduced to eligible gentlemen by her own efforts. After all, it had to happen somehow.

Vivian was delighted to be informed of this, as Emily had expected, and her bleary-eyed gaze downriver toward the Palace of Westminster was of course an admission of defeat. Emily’s victory would, however, be short-lived, once they reached the far side of the bridge.

Thus far, the sisters had walked arm in arm through the heart of Empire; though the air was a little heavy today, their surroundings were green and pleasant parkland, high and respectable buildings: the outer extremities of the State. Across the river, things were different. Rows of cramped houses, as narrow as their own apartments; the rattle and hiss of the railway cutting off the southern horizon, carried over the streets on its high arched viaduct. There was a penetrating, sticky sort of smell in the air, wafting from something further out than Emily could see. Above all, however, there was a sense of grottiness. The tall buildings were unclad brick, all the way down to the ground, and if Emily looked up at windows, she saw ragged curtains, more akin to bedsheets than anything that should be hung up to face the street. She saw bottles of beer on the sills, roundels of grease on the panes, and her tongue tasted like limsecale in her mouth at the thought of what those houses must be like inside.

Vivian was kind enough not to say anything, at either of the two pubs at which they stopped to ask directions, and not to laugh too much when Emily couldn’t understand a word one fellow was saying. Perhaps she knew the value of silent judgment, considering how Emily’s heart had sunk through her stomach and was currently making its way further down, and how Emily squirmed when they arrived at the head of Black Prince Road and saw the packed-in tenements facing the chinaworks across the street. That artificial, sticky scent was becoming ever stronger, and seemed to peak as - following the directions from the gentleman of leisure who’d been smoking outside the Jolly Gardeners - the sisters came to a halt outside Blennerhassett’s Boarding House. 

It didn’t look all that unpleasant. The curtains had an actual pattern. There was, at least, a painted sign above the door, and a list of rates down the inside where bells or boxes might have been. Nowhere to simply leave a card, and Emily was forced to take a deep breath, regret taking it, and rap the doorknocker. At first she was furtive, then more brazen, then absolutely insistent, and on the third knock there emerged what Emily presumed to be a Blennerhassett of some variety.

He was a portly fellow, in a housecoat of deep brown over corduroys and carpet slippers, and to judge from his blinking, he was somewhat unaccustomed to the light of the early afternoon. He peered at her, jowlishly, and bade her good day, informing her this was a boarding house for the male sex alone, and the ladies were advised to pursue accommodation elsewhere.

“It is about a gentleman that I wish to speak with you,” said Emily, stumbling over her words a little. “That is to say, one of your gentlemen. Are you host to Mr. Halaghan, sir?”

“Halaghan? I am that, or at least, I am supposed to be. Rum cove. Comes and goes as he pleases, never see him out after dawn. Not seen a penny’s rent out of him since Christmas, either.”

He must be in some sort of trouble. There must be some misunderstanding with the police. He must have been robbed, or swindled, or some such. Emily ticked her tongue against her teeth, and took another breath of the clammy, silty air. She looked across at the board, and frowned, making the calculation. Six shillings a week, six weeks - or call it seven - 

“Two pound, two bob, miss, and tuppence for the inconvenience. Exactly, miss,” he added, mistaking her expression for contempt. “I am not running a doss-house here, you understand: these are rooms, occupancy singular, for working gentlemen. I’d have the blighter’s effects out on the street if there was cock-all in the room to throw out, pardon my French of course, and if he hadn’t always made good in the end beforehand, and paid full price for the breakfast he don’t eat.”

This grumble came out of the Blennerhassett in one well-rehearsed go, observations and clarifications clattering along like a typewriter. The man had teeth missing either side of his mouth, and sucked at the gaps disagreeably when he paused for breath, which (mercifully) he did not do often.

“Well, Mr. Blennerhassett,” said Emily, “I can’t say a word for Mr. Halaghan’s whereabouts, or for his bill, but if you should see him - before you have him or his effects out in the street, would you kindly let him know Miss Trelawney called for him, and that he knows where to find her? And I can, at the very least, offer you a florin for your trouble there, and leave the two pounds on account.”

“It’ll be three bob by dawn, Miss Trelawney, so I shan’t take your money to settle up on his behalf. Instead I shall say: hold on to your purse around that one, and keep an eye on him. I shall keep my eye out for him, and I shall do as you ask, and if he should come knocking on your door after accommodations, well. I hope you was born wealthy, Miss Trelawney, that’s all.”

“Thank you, Mr. Blennerhassett,” said Emily, and “goodbye,” as she turned away from the door, and “blast!” once it had closed and she had taken two steps down and six forward, and was back in the street. Vivian was frowning, and expressed her concern that the discussion had not gone well, and Emily told her that no it had not, and asked could they please leave now, and say no more about it? And so they said no more about it, all the way across Lambeth Bridge, at the northern end of which they took the Westminster omnibus back home, because Vivian’s silence had become too damning.

Upon her return to work, at breakfast-time the morning after, Emily passed the florin to Kitty in the laundry instead, and took her final and most desperate step. When she had a moment to herself, she slipped into the drawing-room on the first floor, and wrote out a note in the hotel’s ink on the hotel’s paper, slipped it into one of the hotel’s envelopes, and left it in Doctor Pinsmail’s pigeonhole.

For the attention of Mr. Riley Halaghan,

Sir,

If I may make so bold, I have become concerned about a crisis in your affairs. I am anxious that you retain possession of your property, and I urgently require your forwarding address in order to convey to you what is yours.

E. T.

The envelope remained there for three nights and two days; for five frustrating shifts of wanting and not having. Indeed, it was still there when Emily next found the front desk unattended, and had the opportunity to slip back and rifle through the pigeonhole. By that time, however, it had been opened, without use of a knife, and tucked closed again without being sealed, and where Emily’s note had been there was only another plain calling card. Mr. Riley Halaghan was printed across the front, and in a hasty handwritten scribble across the back she read: Single Storks’ Nest, Chance Corner, Old Nichol Street - after Dark.

She had him. Please, God, say she had him.

The third time Emily met her Fox, it was in his very lair.

In her bones, she knew she should not be there. Propriety was one concern, and safety another: she was unescorted, unchaperoned, and going about a part of the town where “escort” and “chaperone” may as well have meant “bodyguard.” This was a far cry from Mayfair, or even Lambeth. This was among the meanest and most meagre boroughs of the East End, a place for which nothing in the Girls’ Own Paper could have prepared Emily, and at which everything in the guilty little pamphlet stuffed under her mattress could only hint. She skirted the depths of the rookery, circling around the wider and more-peopled streets - although the people were no comfort, lounging or staring or laughing gin-pickled laughs. Only when she was sure this was Old Nichol Street itself did she take the plunge.

Everything was old, and crabbed, and crooked: buildings leaning together, jostling across the narrow streets with long spikes on which trailing rags of linen hung. Everything smelt: there was a disagreeably mealy, meaty aroma, and behind it a heady, tinny clamminess that assailed Emily in a way that went beyond the nose, the lips, the tongue and the breath. Every footfall seemed to impress her presence into the rot and the ruin, and every step forward left more of it lingering about her person. Every sound seemed to jar and jostle with every other: even a whistle took on discordant menace when it seemed to come out of nowhere and echo round everywhere before crossing Emily’s awareness. She was a matter of yards from the Shoreditch high street station, and yet everything she saw and heard and smelt was telling her this is not your world.

It was quieter here. Darker. Candles winked in the occasional window that was not shuttered or blocked or boarded up; winked, and went out, as she pressed on. Emily knew that to draw further attention to herself was madness. A girl from the West End in her one good dress, pale green, high collar and tight sleeves and very difficult to run in - she might have been a lowly hotel maid in Mayfair, but on the corner of Old Nichol and Chance Streets, she was a mark, and she knew it without knowing it. Another whistle. Another stirring in a building nearby. She turned, and saw it - there, with lights burning in the third and fourth storeys from the ground, was the Nest.

From the outside, it looked decrepit. Deep dents and rents in the brickwork, standing out even through layers of soot and grime. Inside, things were different.  It was rather like a large, dishevelled parlour occupying the general shape of a public house. It was - quiet. Watchful. Not uncomfortable, and more well appointed than the grim exterior had indicated. There were rugs on the floor, not spit and sawdust; there were mismatched but not dirty or defective settees and armchairs. It had been wallpapered, at some point, in deep pine-tree green. There was a dog: a black mastiff of the Italian type, far better kept than the ragged creatures Emily had glimpsed in the surrounding streets. It sat up a little way, twitched its ears, and settled, not making a sound, and the women coming and going about the place settled too.

They were all women. Old and young, pinched and peach-full. Most had the hard-luck or hang-dog demeanour of the rookery’s other denizens: most of the faces were worn by cares, restless and alert at her intrusion. Most were clearly poor: their attire was unfashionable, much mended, but clean. It was as though the foul and filthy atmosphere of Old Nichol Street was checked at the door, and only the poverty let through, admitted reluctantly as a fact of life. And now here was Emily, on fifteen pounds and ten shillings a year, plus a guinea a month from her Ladyship, aware of a sudden that she was better off than any two or three of them.

“Beg pardon, miss,” said a voice by her side, “but you’re looking quite baffled. I don’t think it’s sanctuary you’re after, nor charity, nor a chinwag. So! I’m Vogel. What can we do for you?”

The speaker was petite, a little shorter even than Emily. Her age was impossible to guess; a spry fifty, or a worn-out thirty, or anywhere in between. An observer’s eye was drawn away from any wrinkle or grey streak by the prevailing feature of her face; the whorled, puckered scars that covered it from hairline to collar. From there down, she was dressed quite well; burgundy velvet that brushed the rugs at her well-concealed feet. Quite taken aback by the sight of her, Emily let all thoughts of cards and conventions go hang, and spoke from the heart:

“I - think I must have come to the wrong - I am looking for a Mr. Halaghan?”

“Oh, no, we know Mr. Halaghan very well. Mr. Halaghan has a suite on the third floor, at the back. Yellow door, opposite the window what’s blocked up. He’s at home this evening; I reckon he was expecting you.”

Suite was somehow the last word Emily had expected to hear. Apartment, perhaps, or worse: she had heard tell of such terrible conditions, four families to one room, houses hollowed out to fit forty people at a time. It was strange to hear suite in a place like this; stranger still to imagine her Fox here; strangest of all that she was here herself. Yet here she was, and where else was she to go but onward and upward?

So Emily climbed the narrow stairs, and turned and climbed and turned and climbed again, and walked down the corridor until she found the shuttered window with the yellow-painted door opposite, and knocked three times.

“Come in,” said a soft and lilting voice, and in she came.

The Fox kept an unlikely parlour. The windows faced inwards, overlooking an inner courtyard; ivy crawled over the sills and frames and even through a broken pane or two, although none was permitted to touch the runners of the sliding shutters. Though there were signs of damp, bulging through the corners of the ceiling, there was also limewash of a pale violet upon the walls, and it was very fresh: the room had a newness that surprised her, and an order beside.

For furniture there was a battered writing-desk, that seemed to serve also as a dresser given the presence of a shaving-mirror and several watches, rings and cufflinks thereupon; a large bed with heavy blue damask curtains, turned down with unexpected neatness; a small round table on a single high leg, with the accoutrements of the smoker laying across it; and a quartet’s worth of mismatched armchairs. In the tallest of these, with a high back and deep seat - there he was.

He sat with an ease that was almost insolent, at odds with the squalor of the street below. His hair was more tousled than on either of the last occasions; his right hand held a cigarette in a blackwood stem holder; and his shirt (oh God, save her) was open at collar and cuffs, open to an indecent extent. He revealed fine collarbones, a pale and slender chest, and (oh God, help him) a wrap of bandages circling around and around. He closed his eyes, inhaled deeply, and blew a plume of smoke up at the ceiling, before he set the cigarette down and rose to greet her. His cane, she observed, was still of use to him even in this short and simple movement, but it found itself bereft and nestled against an empty chair as he bowed to her.

“Pray, come in all the way, Miss Trevelyan. I hardly think you need to flutter on my threshold now. It’s a delight to see you, truly it is; I had hoped you’d attend on me yourself.”

The door closed behind her, and Emily took a deep breath, tapping the tips of her stained boots upon the carpet.

“I - had no idea what to expect, sir. Lambeth was surprise enough, but this - I had thought you a gentleman of leisure, and - oh, I don’t mean to scold. I don’t know what I mean at all. I have thought and thought about our meeting once again all week; now I’m here I’m - “

Softly, slowly, he hushed her, taking both her hands in his and bringing them to his lips. Nip, nip, on each of her fourth fingers, and she blushed at the mere touch - the kiss.

“I am, not to boast, an extraordinary gentleman. These circumstances in which I find myself - they’re new to me, and not those to which I’d hoped I’d find myself accustomed. From Trinity to Bethnal Green; how are the mighty fallen.”

“Was there some accident?” Emily asked, keeping her hold on his hands. “I mean - your leg. Your chest. It isn’t - the white death?”

The Fox closed his eyes, and sighed. When he spoke it was airily reflective, with a melancholy hesitation, as though he wished to spare her the worst of a sad story. “Something very like that. I had already been sent down, but… this finished me. It was London, for the proper… circumstances needed for my care, or oblivion.” His eyes flickered open again, and his fingers flushed in Emily’s gloves, seeming warmer than they had been a moment ago. There was a little colour in those pale cheeks; rose-petal pink. A blusher? Like she was? Too, too charming. “Enough of the past, though,” he said. “You have something that belongs to me. Something you had to deliver in person. I wonder what it might be?”

“Can you not tell?” It was most unlike Emily - the outburst, and the movement, the boldness of it, the step forward into intimate closeness. Almost touching. It was so unlike her, and yet in this moment, it was all she could do. “It is - I am - yours. I have thought of you day and night since - our encounter. At Claridge’s. I have been unable to put you from my mind. I came to put myself at your mercy. All I have wanted is for you to kiss me again, and again, and more - “

Now they were touching, and most improperly. His hands slid her cape from her shoulders and alighted upon her hips, holding them against his; breast to breast, as Emily’s heart fluttered; his lips devoured the half-formed wish as it stumbled out of hers. This time the experience was… prolonged. No stolen moment, no snatched instant of crystalline time before either of them was called away. The taste of him - something rich and tinny, blended in with the dusty flavour of his tobacco. Fingers curled against her curves, pressing through her dress. It was wonderful, but not the same.

“I see,” he said. Tongue against his teeth. Side to side. To and fro. Eyes as wide with hunger as hers were, now. “Then I think, Miss Mouse, you had best stay with me awhile.”

Emily was in a whirl, in a spin, her eyes uplifted as he unlaced her dress. Faille in pale nile green pooled around her feet, atop the heavy and sensible serge of her winter cloak and gloves. Another kiss, and another; she leaned in, palms on his wrapped chest, trusting him with all of her. If she was to fall, let her fall into him, and never return. A nip at her lips - his teeth were so sharp - and those fingers of his darted down the length of her to work at her boots. She wriggled as he unlaced them, kicked them off quite indecorously - nothing about this was decorous any more - and stepped free. Were her eyes fluttering in some foolish, girlish attempt at charm, or because she was weeping for delighted anticipation? She swayed, swooned, stood as she found her footing, chilly and bare as a winter willow, stripped down to bustier and chemise.

Her own two hands and her own ten fingers and thumbs fumbled with the buttons of his shirt, and found their way inside it, untucking it - hesitant at first, then tugging it free, caressing the  lean and cool and surprisingly smooth lines of him as he writhed free of it. Then, in a sudden movement, he leant around her, coiled and clutched about her shoulders, and they tumbled back together, onto - into the bed.

Oh, sweet Fox - this, this was what had been missing from your Mouse’s reveries. Your hands, still so cool to touch against the blossoming heat of her. Inside her chemise, over her heart and between her thighs, where she burned the brightest and beat the hardest. Every breath a labour, every beat a hammerblow, and her only sounds so soft, so high, so timorous. Pretty little prey-thing, in your den, in your arbour, in your lair at last and longing - kissing you again, in the curves and hollows of your collar, baring you to the night.

“I want to see you,” Emily whispered.

“Later,” he replied, and the very tips of his slim, clever fingers grazed, parted, tested, lifted - tenderly, so tenderly, teased at some secret sacred centre she hadn’t even known was there. All the aching, all the taut tension, all the wanting that was in her turned upon that single fulcrum; on the tips of three fingers running through her fine and hidden hair.

Then - and then - oh rapture, oh bliss - there were two. Those lips on her collar roved, into the soft hollow at the base of her throat, and those teeth grazed, scraped, and pierced. There was no time to think, no time to react, no time at all: Emily, in that instant, was a human harpstring, stretched between two sublime points. Pale little Emily, wet little Emily, empty little Emily - to think, a fortnight ago, that she had thought such things about herself. Had she only known that she could endure such ecstasy, she would have thought. Herself. So much. 

“More.”

The Fox looked up; caught a glimpse of their own face in the mirror. Good grief - what a bleeder! They’d been hungrier than they’d thought they were, too, after that fiasco at the club. A good thing the mouse had arrived when she had; a better one that they’d kept some self-control and hadn’t killed her. No point in stealing something you can’t sell on, after all. She was a pretty one, and there was some fellow-feeling there: a girl from below stairs with aspirations, fanciful notions, hopes and dreams, call them what you like. It was a familiar yarn.

Still, though: she was stolen. The Kiss that Keeps had been a moment’s spiteful fancy: a decision taken on the fly, the moment Riley realised who the pretty maid belonged to. Lady Anne had checked Riley, cheeked Riley, and had the gall to order Riley. High-and-mighty English Roundhead. Ever since that first night at Tilbury, the thing in Riley that ate-bit-scratched-fled had bridled and been restless. Assembling their little collection of home truths for Lady Anne - the truth about the General, the West End, the warehouse in Camden - that was a good start. Pilfering the Rebel diva’s necklace from around her throat and handing it to the Madam of this fine establishment, the bitter lover of the Lady’s love - that was a task much more to Riley’s liking than an order. Seducing Lady Anne’s little maid - that was a petty crime, and yet -

It occurred to Riley then, as they licked the tips of their fingers, the Blush still lingering and giving them the taste for it, that this little mouse might be more than a diversion. Divided loyalties. The Blood from her patron, the Kiss from her lover; there’d be something to work with there. Another crack in Seneschal Londinium’s ironclad authority; another crevice in which Riley Halaghan could drive the lever, plant their feet and push.

And in any case, there were plenty of hours left in the night. Sweet Emily would come to, soon - listless, light-headed, but sated, for now. It was Riley’s turn to come, and what was forever without a little risk and degradation? See if the girl was smart enough to guess the secret, and let her think she had him in her power.

Good thing Riley hadn’t killed her, indeed.