#1) obviously. of course. its a boat. but 2) WHY ARE THE WINDOWS LIKE THIS

[toytulini]

i keep being subjected to muscle cars. awful

[what-is-your-plan-today]

Murder, He Wrote

Co-written with @southerngracela

Part 1 

Summary: You’re sent by your asshole boss to do a review of a Celebrity Host Haunted Mansion, hosted by none-other than the arrogant, wild-eye browed actor Lucas Lee, but you’re worried you’ve missed the boat…that is, until at the last minute, an email arrives to say they can let you in on the last admission that night, which just happens to be Halloween… When you arrive, you’re actually kind of excited and intrigued…but it isn’t long until that excitement and intrigue give way to fear when you find yourself in a helpless situation.

Warnings: A creepy house, bad language words. MATURE (NSFW 18+) NON-CON situation, kidnap, violence. DO NOT READ IF ANY OF THOSE TRIGGER… READER DISCRETION IS ADVISED. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!

Pairing: DARK! Ransom Drysdale x Reader

A/N:  So this is a collaboration between myself and the wonderful @southerngracela for @jtargaryen18 ‘s  Haunted House 2020 challenge…and will be a mini-series, with an as of yet undefined number of chapters.

Once again READ THE WARNINGS!!!! This is a DARK Series… don’t @ us if you can’t follow simple instructions and end up with butt-hurt. And if you’re under 18…get off my blog.

Series Masterlist. 

"Y/L/N," your dick editor poked his head into your office rather gruffly. "I'm gonna need that celebrity haunted mansion review on my desk by tomorrow morning. I want to run it ASAP.”

"I can't even get in, not even with a press pass, I've been trying for two weeks, Mick!” you looked at him, your mouth slightly open. You’d told him this countless times at morning briefings. You hadn't even heard back from the organizers about sneaking around the press pass issue and offering an exclusive on the joint, a small fact you kept Mick in the dark about.

"Make it happen." He said simply, before he turned and left.

You glared at his retreating form. What the fuck did he not understand about the situation? Mind you, what did he understand about anything? There was a reason everyone working for him called him Mick The Prick.

There was also a reason he was being extra prickish to you. Earlier in the spring time of the year you’d run an article on Ransom Drysdale- the stuck up, trust fund asshole who had literally gotten away with murder. He’d confessed to murdering his grandfather’s house keeper, attempting to murder his grandfather and then, in a violent showdown with 2 police officers and a private detective present, he’d attempted to murder his grandfather’s nurse, Marta. And he would have succeeded, except the knife he’d used had been a stage prop. It was like some fucked up Murder, She Wrote plot, and when you’d interviewed the real life Jessica Fletcher (in this case the rather charming PI named Benoit Blanc who’d been a character to say the least) it got even more confusing. Ransom had hired Blanc in some elaborate scheme to frame Marta for Harlan’s death to do her out of the inheritance via the Slayer Rule. That had back fired spectacularly when she had unwittingly switched back the vials of medication Drysdale had tampered with, meaning Harlan had truly committed suicide. 

The article was supposed to be done showing his side of the story, a way for him to set the record straight, but the more you’d dug and spoken to people surrounding the case, the more you were absolutely convinced of his guilt, not least because he’d been acquitted on the murder and attempted murder charges on technical grounds due to his confession being, allegedly, obtained under duress and without a brief being present. The only thing they’d managed to pin on him was the arson which had burnt the Chief Medical Examiner’s office to the ground, and when his brief had successfully argued mitigating circumstances- he wasn’t of sound mind given the shock surrounding him being cut from his grandfather’s will- he’d basically ended up being released on license.

It was a joke, and that was basically what your article had said. You’d written a scathing attack on how money could basically render you untouchable by the law, highlighting the failures of the Criminal Justice System. At the time, Mick the Prick had been delighted with it, publishing it under your suggested head line “Murder, He Wrote”- ha, go figure, and copies had flown off the shelves, the article online going viral.

And then money had talked once more, and the Drysdale’s had threatened to sue for defamation. That in itself was a joke, as you knew full well his mother, Linda, was only doing it to salvage her own reputation, the same reason she’d worked so hard to find a lawyer to get him off the charges despite the fact she knew full well he was guilty as sin. Mick The Prick had attempted to throw you under the bus spectacularly when the board had come looking for blood, but as editor the buck stopped with him, and he was given a formal warning whilst you were forced to publish a retraction and offer a written apology much to your utter chagrin.

Which was why he was now making your life as hard as possible, and your Investigative Journalism skills, that you’d honed over the last decade; from high school paper, college tribune and now your current employer, over the last 10 years or so since graduation were now being focussed on covering stories about housewives who found Jesus’ face in a slice of toast, or in this case a fucking Celebrity Host Halloween Haunted House review. Whereas you had dominated the first 2 pages once upon a time, you were now lucky if you made it further up than page 11.

With a groan you banged your head on your desk. Why had you not listened to your dad and become a damned teacher instead of a journalist. Dealing with snotty nosed brats would be easier than this.

By the end of your day, you were burning what felt like the midnight oil however it wasn't very late at all. Dark had settled in but it wasn't late by time. Just before you were to log off and leave for the night, a TV dinner and pint of mint chip waiting for you in your freezer (and probably a job search too seeing as you would no doubt be fired tomorrow morning for failing on your deadline) your email pinged on your desktop. You frowned at it, wondering who could possibly be emailing you this late but then you recognized the sender.

It was the reply you'd been waiting on from the organizers from the Celebrity Host Haunted House. Clicking the email open, your eyes scanned the message. The organizer was setting you up with a private tour, TONIGHT. "9 pm," you finished reading aloud, relief flooding your entire body. It meant a long assed, sleepless night whilst you wrote your article, but it was better than the looming threat of unemployment. Plus, on the upside, as it was a charity gig the organizer had pulled out the big guns and the blurb on the email told you that it was to feature none other than Lucas Lee, a once-upon-a-time famous A-List Movie star, who was possibly just as arrogant as Hugh Ransom Drysdale, but you had to give it to him, in the films you’d seen he was actually damned good, and also pretty hot so…every cloud.

Glancing at your clock, you had just enough time to clock out and grab a quick bite at a drive thru on your way. The location was nearly an hour outside the city so you needed to get gone and fast. A quick reply telling the organizer you were on your way was sent out and you grabbed your coat, pulling it on over your sweater dress and were gone. 

It took a good hour like you'd estimated and that was with stopping for a quick meal, to reach the address your GPS brought you to. It was creepy even at its first glance so you could only hope this payed off. With a quick swig of your watered down and flat fountain drink, you grabbed your bag and phone, exiting your vehicle and locking it shut. The cool night air bit at your exposed cheeks and you were glad you'd worn your coat and tights.

As you stood, gazing at the dilapidated house you shivered, as though, ice had replaced you spine. The walkway leading up to house was cracked, blood red roses grew wildly in thick batches by the gate and the moonlight cast a ghoulish glow on the house. Vines formed a twisted maze upon the side of the of the house's walls which showed the black decay of neglect, in between which splotches of original paint hinted at the house’s former prosperity. Cobwebs covered the corners of the doors, tiny black spiders threading towards their prey and you gave another shudder, as far as first impressions went, yeah, it was fitting for a Halloween Haunted House tour.  

Pulling out your phone, noticing you had no reception (of course you wouldn’t, wasn’t that the cliché?) you took a few photos to use in the article and then gave a little squeak as the door creaked open on its own. Arching your eyebrow slightly, in a manner very much like the man you were here to meet, you strode forward and into the house. Immediately a musty, dank odour crept into your nose. The house was deadly silent except for the intermittent creaks and moans typically associated with a property that age. Black and brown mold dotted the ceiling of the tall hallway you stood in and the windows that framed the door on either side were covered with grime and dirt meaning the calm moonlight struggled to penetrate the darkness in thin thread rays, the main source of light being the open doorway. Sharp shadows roamed around the room and as your eyes adjusted to the dim light you noticed that there was a bright white envelope almost perched on the wooden table to the side of the hall. It was the newest thing in the room, so was obviously there for you.

You crossed over, the heels of your suede boots clicking loudly out in the silence of the hallway, and gently reached out for the envelope. A single word- Start- was written on the front in cursive, looping scrawl, very fitting for a spooky note. Another detail you committed to memory for your write up. You slid your finger into the crook of the envelope and slid it open. Inside was a small, white card, containing a message written in the same writing.

To ensure that you don’t become tomorrow’s big news, In this envelope you’ll find the first of 6 clues Of your super sleuth skills you should be proud, So make sure that you read your answers out loud. As one by one they lead to your ultimate demise. Which may or may not be a scary surprise…

Okay, now you were interested. This wasn’t just a walk through some scary assed, supposedly haunted house where Lucas Lee was no doubt set to jump out at you in some ridiculous disguise. This was a scavenger hunt, and your natural inquisitiveness was piqued. 'This could be fun', you thought as you reached for the next card that was in the envelope, reading the first clue. 

I’m tall when I’m young, and I’m short when I’m old. I also give heat but not enough to prevent cold

You pondered for a second, heat was leading you to think of a fire, and they certainly grew shorter with time, well eventually when they burnt out…but then again, the longer they went the hotter they got, and they certainly prevented the cold. Scanning the hallway for anything that might fit the description, your eyes flicked up to the ceiling which held an elaborate, but tarnished candelabra style chandelier. And then it hit you. Tall when young, short when old.

“Candle…” you spoke “The answer is Candle…”

At that the door leading to the outside slammed shut behind you, and you gave an involuntary scream as the dominant source of light was sealed off. You spun round to look at it, and then your scream turned in to a laugh as you shook your head, for an Investigative Reporter you prided yourselves on steely nerves but so far that was twice this adventure had caught you off guard.

Turning back round, you then spotted that the door at the end of the hall was open, and you could clearly make out a Jack-o-Lantern looking at you, the candle inside flickering. Its face was creepy, really creepy. The nose and eyes were harsh triangles and the grotesque, twisted smile it sported was constructed of sharp, jagged teeth. You reached into your pocket and pulled out your phone. You may have had no service, but the flashlight was working. Keeping the light held in front of you so you could watch your step on the cracked tiles of the hall, you made your way towards the lantern and found yourself in a large, run down kitchen. The lantern and your flash-light provided the only light in the room as the windows were all overshadowed by gnarly trees, their branches every so often scratching the glass as they swayed slightly in the wind outside. The only other sound to be heard was the drip, drip of the faucet in the porcelain Belfast sink. A closer look revealed the discoloration of the water, a brownish concoction as it swirled down the plug. There was an envelope on the side of the counter by the lantern and as you crossed towards it, a movement in your peripheral made you spin round only to see a lone mouse scuttling away across the dirty wooden floor. You placed your phone down, flash-light up causing it to light up an area of the Artex plaster ceiling, and picked up the envelope, tearing it open to find your next clue

Mr Jack-o-Lantern lights the night His eerie face is shining bright The ????? that shaped him lies around And holds your next clue safe and sound 

“Oh come on…” you muttered, “That’ ones obvious. Knife, the answer is knife…” You picked up your phone and shone it around the various surfaces of the kitchen and your eyes honed in on a wooden knife block containing a solitary knife. You crossed the room towards it and as you closed in on it, you noticed that the handle of the knife was an ornate silver filigree. It was no ordinary kitchen knife and as you pulled it form the block you realised it was in fact a dagger, antique by the looks of things. The blade was curved slightly, reaching a sharp point, the silver tarnished. But the more you looked at it, the more you suddenly became horribly aware that it wasn’t merely a dullness of colour at all. It was blood. 

“Dramatic…” you mumbled, and with a sigh you then realised there was no clue attached to it. Was this a distraction? A decoy? You were just about to stat ransacking drawers to find the actual knife you needed, when you glanced back at the block the dagger had been held in and noticed a flash of white peeking from underneath. Picking it up and moving it aside you smiled as you saw the same cursive writing, spelling out the word three. Seeing as you might as well play along, you used the dagger to slit the envelope open, tossing it back down on the counter as you read the next clue.

Many a Child on me they may play Any time be it night or day. My surface is hard, on it you can knock I have many keys, but can’t open a single lock…

“What has keys but doesn't open a lock?" You pondered aloud. Adjusting your cross-body strap, you sigh. Then the answer came to you, "a piano."

You fell silent, your mind racing to how the hell you were going to find a piano in this decrepit and yet enormous house. Then, your ears heard it. The subtle note from deep inside the house. It was a single key. But now that wasn't your concern, no, it wasn't the mice or the bugs or even the brown water. Your heart raced at the notion that someone was in fact in the house with you. 

"Alright, Lee, you were always one for a flare of the dramatics, let's see what you've got."

Step by step you followed the note that chimed every few steps and you found yourself beginning to wonder if it was a recording or if someone were really playing it, timing their play with the sound of your boots over the rotting floor. You wound your way through the narrow hall, ancient wall paper peeling from its tack, mastick and plaster falling away to reveal studs in places.  Finally, to your left you heard the key loud and clear. It was in that room. Steeling yourself for a possible encounter, you carefully pushed the sliding door away from its hinge. Your booted feet traipsed across the brittle carpet, dust swirling in the air in front of your face. Cobwebs adorned many of the surfaces and there were dirty white sheets covering the various pieces of furniture in the room. Apart from, that is, the large ornate grand piano that sat in the middle of the room. The stool in front of it suddenly jolted back and tilted toward you, making you scream at the  gracious invitation by an as of yet invisible host. 

“Get a grip Y/N” you mumbled to yourself. You were surprised to find just how much this place was starting to set your nerves on edge. You took a deep breath, the pounding of blood in your ears began to quiet and you took a look around the room. There was no one in there with you, you were alone. With slow, deliberate steps you moved towards the piano, your eyes sweeping over the mahogany surface, searching for an envelope with the next clue, but there was none to be found. The surface of the piano was thick with dust and grime, but as you scanned over it you suddenly stopped. On one of the white keys the dust was disturbed, as if it had been wiped away and you instantly realised that had to be the key that your so far elusive host must have been playing. You paused, biting at the nail on your thumb of you right hand, before you reached out with your left and tapped the key. The melodic note rang around the room, clearly, echoing in the silence and for some reason you were taken back to a part of the article you had been thinking about earlier that day, and how Detective Blanc had told you that he had ‘played a key’ during the various family interviews ‘to make my point without interruption’. It didn’t pass you by how fitting that actually was at that moment but you didn’t have much time to reflect on it, as you heard a creak and a grinding noise and you spun to your left to see a panel in the wall sliding open. It made you jump slightly, but this time you didn’t scream. 

Not for the first time, you had to admire the effort Lucas was going to here. It was clear he had a flare for the dramatic, anyone could see that from his films and interviews but this was pretty damned good. It was making you wonder how he was doing it. Was he somewhere watching, pressing buttons to enact the various parts of his show? Instinctively you glanced up, looking for a camera or something you were being monitored by but you found no evidence of anything. “Well, in for a penny…” you muttered, crossing towards the small hatch. It was just wide enough for you to get your hand into, but you really didn’t want to. You grabbed your torch and shone it into the hole, finding nothing but the envelope so deciding it was safe you reached in and pulled it out.

Sometimes coloured, sometimes plain sometimes frosted, sometimes stain Be you short or thin, or fat or tall, this simple invention, lets you look right through a wall

You pondered for a moment, before the answer came to you. Fairly quickly you might add. Feeling a little smug you smiled and cleared your throat “Window. It’s a window.”

Usually, at that point, something happened to point your attention to the place you should be looking but this time, there was nothing. Instinctively you looked out of the one on the wall by the piano, but as you stared at nothing but the darkness outside you realised that was too obvious. Just then your ears picked up a sound you couldn’t quite figure out, but it was familiar all the same. And then it came to you, it was the familiar click and clack of a skateboard, the wheels gliding over the brittle old floor and you span round in the direction it was coming from to see a window you hadn’t noticed before, this one was an ornate, stained glass window which bore some kind of flower design that faced directly out into the hall. 

He passed by slower than a flash but just enough to allow you to catch only a glimpse. You audibly gasped, your breath coming in a sharp intake of fright, because until then you had been alone on this chase. But it appeared you dramatic host had finally come out to play. He was merely a shadow, bulky in frame, tall and dressed all in black as he moved past but it was enough to puzzle you. You didn’t remember Lucas being that broad, or tall. With a frown you ran into the hall to catch him but saw nothing, and heard nothing, the only thing to indicate he had been there was a faint smell of the cedar and amber of what you assumed to be cologne. 

You paced quickly down the hall in the direction the figure had gone but as you passed the stairwell the light flickered on, instantly attracting your attention. You’d only briefly noticed the ornate staircase before, but with the lack of light you certainly hadn’t noticed the writing on the wall, dripping in fresh paint. Swallowing, as you mouth suddenly felt dry with fear you stepped onto the first stair, and as soon as you did you were plunged into almost complete black. Letting out a shriek as, once again, he’d managed to get the drop on you, you shook your head and reached for your phone, taking another few steps up so you were level with the next clue which you read aloud.

“Tonight is not all fright and fear, a trick or treat is waiting near, the bedroom holds a sweet surprise, there solve the clue to claim your prize”  you bit your lip and looked up at the top of the stairs, wondering when someone was going to jump out at you. Taking a deep breath, you made your way up, cringing at each creak your feet caused on the old warped wood, but it didn’t sway your determination to make it to your destination. Halfway up, a shadow flickered at the corner of your vision at the top on the landing and you froze, your mouth going dry once more. As you stood there, shining your light into the dark you caught the same scent from moments ago lingering in the air only this time it was stronger, far more powerful and you were able to denote even more of the notes within. Aalongside the amber and cedar your heightened senses picked up deep, earthy, sandalwood notes with a hint of citrus in the background.  And it was familiar for reasons beyond the fact you’d smelt it down stairs. But, as you’d surmised earlier, it was a cologne. Probably one worn by a few people you knew.

Yes that was it.

“Jesus Christ Y/N what has gotten into you?” You rolled your eyes and continued up the stairs, clearly your ‘Celebrity Host’ was once more nearby. You cautiously got to the top of the stairs and glanced around. Nothing. So turning to your left you entered the first room you found on the hall. It was empty bar a creepy looking doll that had been separated from its head which lay about a foot to the right. As you looked around the room, the wind intensified outside, the rustling of the leaves and branches became louder, as did the creaking of the house…and then you gulped, as you realised it wasn’t just the house that was creaking. In the corner of the room, the little chair had begun to rock, slowly. Blowing out a breath and shaking your head, you looked around at the thin strips of wallpaper which showed little trucks. Crayon markings scrambled upon the wall where wallpaper used to stick but other than that there was nothing in there bar some pretty good theatrics. You had to hand it to Lee, the creepy feel was fantastic and you were going to give him one hell of a write up for this. You took a while longer to take in the detail, smiling to yourself before you closed the door and headed to the one over the hallway. 

This room was a little lighter thanks to a lamp which stood on a nightstand. It wasn’t bright, by any means, but it was enough so that you could clearly see the bed in the middle of the room. And there, placed by the pillows was a thin box. On unsteady legs, you shuffled slowly towards the bed, the box before you making you quiver, your insides churning. A shaky hand tilted the lid open slowly, afraid something would pounce in a sneak attack. You shut your eyes ready to protect them in case a bat or bugs flew at you and when nothing happened, you opened them slowly and inspected the boxes contents. There was no envelope this time, just copy of a newspaper. Your newspaper. And you felt your blood run cold as you recognise the bold headline across the top. Murder, He Wrote: A twisted tale of Inheritance, Crime and Exoneration "Drysdale," you whispered in realization. But now, while you were well aware of what the article meant and who it was referring to, your brain shut down processing how on earth Lucas Lee and Ransom could possibly be connected. Your breathing deepened and you moved to pick up the article, but then the lid to the box caught your eye and you froze, for on the inside of the lid was another clue, only this one was a straight forward question which was spelled out using cut-out letters from the newspaper in question.

I’m light as a feather, yet the strongest person can’t hold me for five minutes. What am I?

You froze, for the answer was simple. Breath. 

And that was it, you needed to get out. You started to back away from the bed, but before you had so much as made it 3 steps you collided with something hard. A forceful arm across your front pinned you to a firm and broad chest that engulfed your frame while a cloth with a distinct smell and cool moisture covered your airways.

"Surprise" The voice in your ear, calm, deep and known, was all you heard before nothing consumed you.  

*****

When Y/N went limp in his arms, Ransom laid her across the bed only leaving the room to hurriedly cover his tracks, blowing out candles and removing any trace of her that had been in the house. His time as his grandfather's research assistant gave him far more experience than it should have. When he returned to the bedroom she was still out cold but light as a feather as he carried her downstairs and out the back door to the awaiting SUV, smug that his plan had gone so well.

But then, didn’t everything for him? He was Ransom Drysdale, and he was fucking untouchable.

He drove away from the scene of his new crime towards the city, driving through the dead of night, on the beltway, and continued twenty minutes outside downtown Boston before pulling into the garage of a large red cedar and quartzite home. He killed the engine and closed the garage door, pulling Y/N from the seat she was slumped in when it was clear to do so.

He couldn't be seen, he wouldn't be seen. He carried her inside the spacious home, his boots tapping heavily against the dark marble floor of the kitchen and finally the lush carpeted staircase that wound down into the basement.

This is where he laid her, in the basement, on a bed, but not just any bed, the one that would now become hers. He adjusted the lighting in the space, low enough not to disturb her, but bright enough to give the room a glow so he could finish what he'd set out to do. In the shock of the struggle in the bedroom, she’d dropped her phone and he’d made sure to smash it long before he left the haunted house, making sure there'd be no device to track her. He'd already disposed of her car while she was playing his little game, every loose end as far as he could see was tied up.

And now she was all his. 

He brushed the hair away from Y/N’s face where it had fallen over her eyes.  With gloved hands he manoeuvred her undone, black woollen coat off her body, leaving her in the bottle green turtle neck sweater dress and thick tights she was wearing before he tossed it over the chair in the corner of the room and then undid the zips on her brown suede knee high boots. He dropped them to the floor, kicking them towards the same corner with the equal carelessness he’d shown her coat. With a final meticulous movement he rearranged her on the bed, so he’d appear more comfortable and just before he left the room, he wrapped the cool, metallic cuff around the ankle. It locked in place with a clink and with a final glance at her still unconscious form, he turned and exited the room, the door latching shut and with the snap of the deadbolt he locked her in.

*****

Your head pounded, your nose burned and your mouth felt dry with the faintest taste of something foul lingering as you swallowed. The light was low but still your eyes ached. You tried to decipher exactly what the hell had happened to you while you got your bearings. You tried to sit up but your body felt heavy, the soft bed you now realized you were lying on was not your own. Your breathing rapidly increased as you started to move in fear but a clink caused a screech to escape your throat. You felt the weight of the cuff around your ankle and a full panic set it.

Your night flashed quickly through your glutamate and adrenaline flooded brain

You remembered getting the email from the Haunted Mansion supposedly hosted by Lucas Lee. You had arrived and were sent on what you thought was a fun and exhilarating maze littered with clues and riddles and then you remembered the last piece of the puzzle. You gasped as you remembered how his breath felt hot on your skin and how his voice registered in your mind.

"Drysdale," you repeated the last word you had spoken in a shaky, frightful voice. "No."

Rage and fear collided in your chest as you screamed out the only thing you could think of, "HELP!" A strangled sound left your chest followed by another cry out for help, "Please, someone, HELP!" 

The door to your room, now coming into focus around you, flew open and there he stood, smug smirk, raging ocean blue eyes, hair neatly in place, dismantling frame clothed in a black sweater and dark denim, heavy footfalls sounding against the thick carpet under his feet. 

"Nice to see someone's awake," Ransom deadpanned.

You stared for a brief moment and screamed for help again, louder, and louder, and louder until you felt your voice crack and strain, your cords burning as the sound shattered away. 

"Are you done?" He cocked his head to the side and folded his arms across his chest as he stood firm and tall in front of the bed.

"What the hell are you doing? Why am I here?" It hurt to speak but you had to ask. 

“Because I want you here, Sweetheart.”

"I...I'm not, don't call me that," you spat defiantly as he moved closer, taking you in, his predatory eyes moving over your body. This was it, you were going to die all because some trust fund prick was a hurt baby about an article (that you forcibly apologized for) revealing the sick and sadistic truth about him, his family, money and the justice system. 

"Are you gonna kill me?” You watched him carefully as he crossed the room towards you, trying to keep your voice calm so as not to betray the utter fear that was coursing through your veins at the fact you were trapped, fuck knows where, shackled to a bed with a murderer being your captor. “That's what this is about, right? My apology wasn't enough?"

"Your apology was forced bullshit.” He responded, his voice carried a hint of amusement, because of course, this was all a game to him. “You smeared my name, dragged my reputation though the mud and you expected an apology like that, half assed and full of more crap than your original hatchet piece, to be enough?" He was standing damn near over you now, a hand moving up your leg that was held by the cuff, your body frozen in a confused silent argument of fight or flight.

"You... Killed... Him." You grit out through clenched teeth, and his hand was on your throat before you finished your breath, squeezing just enough to make a point.

"No. I. Didn't." He lied and you had to hand it to him, a lesser person might have bought the garbage he was talking, because he was good at it. Lying must have been enough of a second nature for him that he actually believed everything he said himself. But then again, it wasn't actually a lie was it? Sure, he'd planned on indirectly killing Harlan and that plan had backfired and Harlan had actually slit his own throat. So at most he was indirectly responsible for his death, but none of that had stuck with the prosecution and so now here he was, a free man.

A struggled chuckle came from your tightened throat, "Jesus Christ, you actually believe your own bull shit don't you?"

"You've got a fucking mouth on you," he breathed as his body loomed ominously over the bed and your frame, tiny in comparison to his.

You swallowed, feeling the hard lump strain to pass his grip, "Not really, you just don't like hearing the truth."

His eyes bored into yours and you struggled for breath as his hand constricted around your neck whilst he squeezed a little harder "Oh shut up Y/N."

"Or what, Hugh?" You croaked. 

A little flash of anger tore through his ocean blue eyes like lightning in a storm. His eyes bored into yours as you fought to swallow. 

"Or I'll shut you up myself."

"Try me, you son of a...." You didn't expect his lips to cover yours but they did. Unexpectedly warm and soft, despite the painfully harsh kiss. You managed to pull away but his hand still gripped at your throat and you felt the fear constricting your chest. But you were damned if you were going to show him a shred of weakness. 

“You’re an asshole, Hugh…” It was all you had, the only thing you could use in your arsenal given your situation. You still had your voice. And you’d noticed that for whatever reason he appeared to hate that name.

“Don’t... fucking call me that!” his voice rose to a loud, angry instruction, apoplectic rage seeping from him to you, and it was almost stifling.

“Or what? You'll kill me?” your voice rose in both volume and pitch as your desperation began to show. “We both know you're gonna do that once you've fulfilled whatever sick, twisted little fantasy this is. What are you waiting for, Hugh? Huh?”

Ransom scoffed, "Kill you, no, see I'm gonna teach you a lesson. One about how money and status get you anything you want.”

You frowned, as you looked into his icy blue eyes, utterly confused “Anything you want? What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You'll see Princess” was the sole explanation you got as he knelt between your legs.

You stayed stock still as large and surprisingly gentle hands trailed your curves up the outside of your thighs to your hips. As he reached the hem of your sweater dress he paused as you wrapped your hands around his wrists.

"Don't" you squeezed, attempting to stop his wrists and close your legs.

“This will be much easier if you just play-along, sweetheart” he muttered as he pressed his lips to your neck. You let go of his wrists and raised your hands, laying them over the wool of his cable knit, palms flat against the plain of muscle as you attempted to push him off.

“I said no.” you tried to keep your voice stern, despite the fact you were fighting back the fear and sadness at the realization of his task was now at hand. 

His large hands smoothed over your dress, cupping your breasts and he let out a moan as you bit back the bile in your throat that was threatening to spill from your mouth. You pushed harder trying to force him off of you but it was of no use, his broad frame caged you in, engulfing you under him.

“I don’t want to hurt you, but I will if I have to.” He ground out, his lips inches from your ear as he nipped at your skin. He was impressively strong and balanced, his weight even through his body as he kept his knees between your legs, a hand against your breast and the other stroking your sides and up your thigh. All the while, his lips sucked at your neck, teeth grazing your pulse point as you turned your head away, tears filling your eyes

"Please, stop," you managed. "Hugh, stop!"

“I told you not to call me that.” He growled against your skin and pulled back, his eyes blazing as they locked on to yours. In sheer desperation, you managed to wrench a free hand from between you and gave him a slap, nails biting at his skin. Instantly you knew you’d pissed him off. His nostrils flared, his jaw set and as his eyes filled with fire and rage.

And you knew then, you were in for it.

“Bitch…” he snarled as he raised his left hand to his face where you had struck him, and then both his hands grabbed yours, yanking your arms up, pinning them above your head. You bucked upwards, violently in an attempt to shake him off, but it was futile. He was far too strong. His grip on your wrists grew tighter and despite yourself you let out a small whimper of fear.

In one hand he had the ability to cuff both of your wrists and he did so while his other grabbed at your dress, shoving it further up your body, fingers curling over the waist of your tights and panties, a handful of the material fisted in his palm. They wouldn't slide down quick enough and you felt your body lift away from the mattress slightly as he ripped away the material, the snap burning your skin. You fought, boy did you fight. You had no control of your hands or arms as he had them easily pinned, but your legs and the rest of your body gave as good as they could. You thrashed from side to side all the time screaming your objections. You drew your knees up to your chest in an attempt to buck him off. You screamed protests, threw every insult you had at him, but it was no use. He was simply too strong.

He didn't even bother with his belt or button, he just unzipped the flies on his jeans, pulled his solid cock free and slid in. You were wetter than you expected to be, but it still burned with friction and ached from the thick stretch against your tight walls. It hurt, definitely hurt.

"You know you want this. I know you want this." He rasped as he pulled out before thrusting back in, his face twisted in a look that was halfway between being smug and satisfied. Just looking at him made you feel sick but for some reason you were unable to look away as he continued his slow assault, before he picked up the pace slightly, his groans of satisfaction filling the room as he bottomed out, balls deep and it was at that point you closed your eyes and tried to block out what he was doing to you. But try as you might to remain mentally detached from the situation, your body was anything but. And the more he moved in and out of you, the more you could feel your physical reactions. You were powerless to stop them and the heat between your legs and in between your belly was spiking with each thrust into you.

It felt good. And you knew it shouldn’t. So you fought it, but eventually, you couldn't fight it anymore, not with  the way his thick cock filled you, velvety smooth skin sliding in and out of your defiant core. You didn't want to cum, but your body told your brain it was going to and Ransom nearly puffed his chest as he fucked you into your body's submission. 

"You're gonna fucking cum, aren't you Princess? I can feel it," he ground out, chasing his own release. You remained silent, breathing heavily as your insides coiled and tightened. "Fucking tight ass pussy," he gritted. You refused to cry out, not wanting to give him anything you were able not to, and it took everything you had to remain silent. In desperation, to quell the cry that was rising from your throat, you bit your tongue, tasting the coppery taste of blood in your mouth as you came hard around his cock.

“Fuck, yeah…see…” Ransom’s hips began to move faster, and then with a sudden movement he pulled out of you, making you wince involuntarily at the sting. He shot his load all over your thighs, a growl bubbling from his throat, the warmth of his release trickling down your leg made you feel even more dirty than you already did. 

“Not so fucking smart are we now, huh, miss Investigative Reporter…” his snap was snide, and childish, but you knew he couldn’t help himself. Your head remained defiantly in its position on the pillow, turned to the right, eyes focussed on a spot on the wall. “Look at me, bitch.”

When you didn’t do as he asked, he grabbed your chin bruisingly, making you wince as he pulled your face round so he could see you. You knew he would be able to see the tears on your face, and you hated that. Hated that he would see how much he’d hurt you, scared you even, 

His hand let go of your face and you stared at him, swallowing, trying to gather your voice in your painfully dry throat. 

"That's all you got? You're a fucking child, Drysdale. It's why you’re doing this." You said, your voice trembling and croaking from the fear and exertion of what he had just put you through and you shook your head. “You’re a fucking man child with mommy and daddy issues. A spoilt, little whiney brat who can’t bear to be told no.”

That struck a nerve, you could tell, as his jaw clenched tight and his fists clenched around the sheets by your side to the point they were shaking. He grabbed your chin once more with his right hand and pinned your face still, forcing your eyes to look back at his 

“You'll be begging me to accept your apology.” He snarled, his face contorted in rage “You'll see who the whiney child is soon enough. I promise Princess, it's not me”

As you looked at him, you felt your anger starting to simmer. This fucking ass hole had just raped you, and he had the gall to be saying you were going to tell him that you were sorry. No chance in hell. You knew you were screwed, literally and figuratively. Whilst he had you captive behind a bolted door, shackled to a bed you had nowhere to go, he knew that you knew that too and you could see it in his face as a smug smirk flickered on his lips. Well fuck this, if you were going down it was with a fight. With a sudden movement, that caught him off guard you moved your head slightly as much as you could in his painful grip, and spat right in his face.

Ransom blinked, his anger morphing to shock, then back to fury once more as he released your face and with a flash of his hand he back handed you straight across the face. The blow to your right cheek snapped your head to the left, sucking the breath from your lungs and leaving you a little dazed.

“Fuck you.” He sneered as he rose to his feet, wiping his face. Silently he rearranged his pants, tucking his now soft cock back inside them, and swept from the room, locking the door behind him.

***** Ransom stormed up the steps to the kitchen of the house, slamming the top door behind him and bolting that one shut too. He was furious that little bitch had scratched him and no doubt marked his face. He strode over the marble tiles of the room and walked into the large hallway and across into the den. He made his way straight to the bar, poured himself a healthy measure of good scotch, slopping a little on the dark wooden counter, before he glanced up at the large mirrored surface of the bar behind the shelves.

He could make out 3 vivid red lines down his left cheek where she’d dug her nails into his flesh and his jaw clenched. His hair was out of place, his cheeks flushed and his normally cold eyes were blazing with anger. But as he stood there staring at his dishevelled reflection, he knew it wasn’t the fact she’d scratched or spat at him that was pissing him off so much. It was the fact she had persistently voiced a name he despised, one that was used to control those lower than him in his every-day life. One reserved for The Help, for outsiders. It reminded him of his family, of his mother and father, the two people in his life who should have loved him unconditionally but instead had him out of ‘duty’ and had taken every opportunity to pass him off into the care of others they could. It reminded him of Walt persistently telling him he was a no-one, that he would amount to nothing over than a trust-fund baby. 

It reminded him of Harlan. The one person in that entire fucked up patriarchy that had shown him an ounce of care. But who had screwed him over in the end. The anger that had been simmering inside him boiled over, the blood pumped into his ear and with an angry yell and an almost involuntary action Ransom hurled the glass tumbler straight at the wall where it smashed against the tasteful silver and white wallpaper, the 25 year old single malt trickling down the wall…just like the tears and trickled down Y/N’s cheeks as he’d forced her to look at him whilst he took what was his. 

As she’d glared up at him he’d noticed a fierceness in her eyes that he was surprised to find had unnerved him a little, because she clearly wasn’t going to be as easy to break as he thought. 

“Fuck it.” He mumbled to himself, grabbing the bottle from the bar before he turned and left the room, taking a large swig as he went, the burn in his throat going someway to settling his nerves.

This would work out, because he was Ransom fucking Drysdale, a man who always got what he wanted in the end, and she was going to be no exception.

**** WIYPT Tag List:

Everything

@momobaby227 @marvelfansworld @cobalt-gear @djeniiscorner @ayamenimthiriel @coldmuffinbanditshoe @nerdofthefandoms @sweater-daddiesdumbdork @southerngracela @goldenfightergir @kellymat @what-just-happened-bro @jennmurawski13 @joannaliceevans-fanficblog @jtargaryen18 @redhairedfeistynerd @charmed-asylum @saiyanprincessswanie @just-one-ordinary-fangirl @jhayes6984 @anika-ann @icanfeelastormbrewing @gigglegirl77 @princess-evans-addict @mes-2016 @theladybiers @void-hoechlin 

Ransom Drysdale

@patzammit @icandothisallday @capsiclewinter​ @this-is-serenaa​ @alexakeyloveloki​ @perplexed3001​ @twittytelly​ @kelbabyblue​ @maan24​

If your name appears above but the tag isn’t live please let me know.

[twdmusicboxmystery]

10x17: Home Sweet Home - Details

Alright, let’s talk details!

***As always, spoilers abound below for 10x17. Don’t read until you’ve watched!***

As many  have already pointed out, Maggie and Judith talking about the stars and how “she” is looking up at those same stars is interesting. Sirius symbolism, and of course they’re talking about Michonne, but when they use the pronoun, it could be adapted to anyone. Beth, obviously. But even Rick or anyone else who is missing.

I did notice something of a “rule of threes” theme in this episode. Right at the beginning, when loading the wagon, Lydia counts, “one, two, three.” That wouldn’t be very noteworthy on its own, but later in the episode, exactly three of Maggie’s people fall to the snipers. So again, a bit of a theme.

Also, Lydia is wearing a bright pink shirt at the beginning when she counts to three. I noticed it mostly because the color is so bright and it might be the cleanest thing Lydia has ever worn, lol. Not sure what it points to. This is such a minor scene, it’s hard to draw any conclusions. But it caught my attention.

When they go to see the ruins of Hilltop, it’s interesting that the only thing really left standing is the water tower. Water = Beth, so we always make note of things like water towers. It almost feels like a “standing amidst the ruins” sort of thing.

As they walk to get Maggie’s people, we do hear some interesting dialogue. Cole says there’s shelter 10 miles to the East. Just having 10 (think roman numeral X) and East in the same sentence catches my ear. At one point, one of them says “if we’re lucky.” So, Luck Theory. And we see lots of shots of sunlight filtering through the trees. We’ve always seen that as a Beth symbol.

Okay, let’s talk a little more about the cut on Maggie’s arm. It’s a rather large cut across her left forearm, right? And I mentioned yesterday that it isn’t the same as Beth’s because it’s on the wrong arm. Although, it IS in the same place as Beth’s cast, just the opposite.

So, here’s why I noticed it at all. There are two other times when we saw a big cut like this. Since the Leah rumors broke, I’ve rewatched the episode Scars several times. In that episode, Judith gets a cut in the exact same place: her left forearm. It looks exactly like Maggie’s does in this episode. That can’t be a coincidence.

The only other time I remember seeing this exact cut was on Tyreese in 4b. Now, I don’t want to freak anyone out, but Ty’s cut definitely foreshadowed his death. When he was bitten in 5x09, the bite came in exact same place he was cut.

Now, I don’t at all think this suggests both Maggie and Judith getting bitten and dying. I’m sure the symbolism is more complex than that. I just don’t understand exactly how they’re using it, yet. 

What I can say for now is that all three of the episodes I’ve seen it in (and there may be more; these are just the ones that spring to mind) are Beth-heavy episodes, at least when it comes to symbolism. So there’s 5x09 (she’s actually in Ty’s death hallucination), this episode, where she’s mentioned twice after 6 years of silence, and then Scars. I still haven’t posted my Scars post, yet. I just have a lot of stuff to post right now, but I’ll get it posted eventually. Just trust me when I say that episode has TONS of Beth symbolism in it. So, we’ll just leave it at that for now.

Maggie and Daryl’s convo:

So, I’m getting a lot of messages about how people are disappointed that we didn’t get more of a reaction from Daryl when Maggie said Beth’s name. And I get it, but let me answer this two ways.

1.  It’s not all that surprising. We saw Daryl’s huge reaction to losing Beth in Coda, in Them, and then in pretty much every episode for the next 3+ seasons. Eight years have passed since he lost her, and, while of course her death still affects him and of course he’s not over it, it’s not unrealistic that he has his reaction to it more controlled now.

2. Having said that, I actually disagree that we didn’t get huge reactions here. They looked subtle onscreen, but again, they were never going to have him burst into tears in this scene. That wouldn’t have really worked for the scene, or been terribly realistic. So let me lay out what we did see.

First off, when Maggie first says Beth’s name (“Bethie”), we don’t see Daryl’s face, but we can kind of see the side of his head in the foreground. When she says the name—like, the INSTANT she says it—he sort of tosses his head. Almost like a nervous horse. There’s definitely a reaction there guys, even if we can’t see it directly.

But pay attention to him when it DOES show his face again a few seconds later. He keeps shifting his eyes to Maggie’s face and away. He does it at least half a dozen times over several seconds. Again, it strikes me as him being nervous about something. And you know it has to be the mention of Beth.

So why is he nervous? Is it merely the mention of her name that makes him nervous? Is he afraid he might get emotional, and is trying not to? Because we don’t have a window into Daryl’s thoughts, there’s no way to know for certain. But the reaction is there. You just have to watch closely for it.

And to confirm it even more, I watched him closely a minute or two later when she starts talking about Glenn and Negan. If anything, you’d think that would be the subject that would make him more uncomfortable. Both because he dealt with so much guilt over Glenn’s death, and because one might see Maggie returning to Negan as a free man would feel like something of a betrayal. I could see Daryl feeling guilt over that.

But when she starts talking about Glenn and Negan, his eyes don’t do the shifty thing. At all. He just watches her steadily with no hint of discomfort. It’s ONLY when she mentions Beth that his eyes shift.

And before I move on, I want to mention one more things you can all go look for. (Yes, I’m giving you permission to go watch that scene over and over again. :D) 

Just before Maggie says Beth’s name, she has a peculiar reaction, too. Now, she’s talking about Glenn and Beth sort of simultaneously, so it’s hard to say whether this reaction is for her talk of Glenn or Beth. What I mean is, it’s right before she says that after Bethie died, she and Glenn talked about going to the ocean. She feels the need to throw in that it would have only been for a little while, not forever. So maybe that’s what she was feeling discomfort over saying: that she and Glenn contemplated leaving the group for a time.

But if you watch, right before she says the line, “after Bethie died,” her eyes get wide and she shrugs as though she’s about to says something she doesn’t want to.

So it may be about Glenn, but I can’t help but wonder if it’s because she realized she had to mention Beth as part of her explanation, and she knew that would be triggering for Daryl. Go watch that again and tell me what you think.

I don’t think I have to go over the importance of the ocean symbolism, right? Beth = water, and we’ve seen tons of ocean/boat symbolism around her. She also mentions the waves and the sunrise here.

In the morning, Cory calls the containers they sleep in “rust coffins.” Kind of an interesting label, suggesting death. But of course the thing that came to mind is the coffin Daryl lay in at the funeral home.

Kelly checking the truck, as I talked about yesterday, brought a lot of callbacks to mind, including Bob, and the notebook is something we could link to Beth through her journal/notes, as well as to the note left as part of the wolf trap in 5x16. This truck was even a little reminiscent of the “How the Harvest Gets Home” trucks.

One thing I couldn’t help but notice was Daryl’s line about how he’s gone looking for Connie “so many times.” That doesn’t actually make much logical sense. From what they show us, this episode picks up directly after 10x16. It would be different if weeks had passed and this was there way of telling us that Daryl has been looking for Connie in the interim. But this is literally the next day. How could he have gone looking for her “so many times?” Sure, we saw him searching a little bit early in S10, but the Whisperer War always got in the way, and honestly, I don’t think we saw him search more than two or three times.

So my point is, this is kind of a discontinuity. But I think it’s purposely placed to emphasize how often Daryl looks for people and maybe be another way of reminding us both of Rick and of Beth.

Maggie says, “We don’t know that.” Pretty much exact Beth dialogue and it’s about whether any of her people survived the fire and might still be alive in the woods. That’s exactly what Beth said this line about in 4b after the prison. Just saying.

Another line that jumped out at me was Cory saying that The Reapers had followed them. He didn’t know how. He’d been so careful. But somehow, they did.

Now, maybe this guy was just an awesome tracker. But I feel like this line had meaning. Like maybe they truly shouldn’t have been able to track Maggie’s group, but somehow still found them. Kind of makes me wonder if we should be linking this group to the CRM or not.

There’s been some discussion about whether Kelly and Elijah might become love interests. I’d be okay with that. And I can see that the way they connected and became all simpatico in this episode might be leading to romance.

Now, here’s why that might be important from a TD perspective. Did you notice the pear he gave her at the end? 

I looked up pear symbolism. As with all things, different cultures treat it differently. But in Chinese symbolism (and there’s a lot of that in the show) it sometimes means ‘separation.’ So there’s a superstition that friends and lovers should not eat pears together or they may be separated.

So when I first looked this up, I wasn’t really thinking of Elijah. As Kelly is definitely a Beth proxy in many ways, and also based on symbolism we’ve seen around her in the past (S9/S10) that I wasn’t sure how to interpret, I was thinking that maybe at some point she’ll be kidnapped or taken and be separated from Maggie. On TTD, Lauren said Maggie and Kelly became surrogate sisters in this scene. So I thought that maybe, on top of all the Beth symbolism, maybe this is also pointing toward another (surrogate) sister separation on the horizon.

But then it occurred to me that Elijah gave her the pear, and that’s probably really important. If (and this is still a big if) they become love interests, her separation will probably be from him. I’m just saying we might have another Bethyl proxy in the making on our hands. ;D

I have to say that I thought the scene where Daryl grabbed Maya and put a knife to her neck before realizing she was one of Maggie’s people is one of my favorites. You heart has to go out to the poor woman. She’s been traumatized like 5x over at this point. But she was looking at Daryl like he was a serial killer. Every time I watch that scene, I laugh. It’s rough being Daryl.

So how about the title? Well, we’ve already established that Daryl said this back in Still, at the moonshine shack. And given that I think Hershel Jr.’s arc here was a small scale replay of Beth’s (missing, searched for, eventually found and brought back to Alexandria) it makes sense that they used this line here.

But I think you can go as simple or as complicated as you want to with this. Because we also had the “coming home” theme in this episode a LOT. And it’s fitting, of course, because this was Maggie’s homecoming (which you could also see as a type of Beth’s arc, of course). But if you apply the “coming home” theme to what Daryl said in Still, all that tells me is that Beth and Daryl are one another’s “home.” And if Daryl is ever going to find his real home again, it will have to be with Beth, wherever she is.

For the record, I think they’ll explore Daryl’s side of this theme a lot with Leah. He was lonely, and searching for a home, and maybe he’ll think he’s found one for a time with her, but she’s not his real home.

Okay, finally, the song played at the end, You Want it Darker, has TONS of biblical symbolism in it. Since this post is already long, I’ll wait until tomorrow to post it.

Anything you can think of that I missed?

[first-of-her-nxme]

It looks like one of my answers doesn’t show up in the tags so I’ll copy it here, just in case. It might be interesting for the asoiaf fans, Jaqen’s and Arya’s fans in particular;)

So, the question I received was:

Where is the coherent foreshadowing for Jaqen and Arya? It all seems taken out of fucking nowhere

And here we go:

It starts in the very first book when Arya names her direwolf after the queen who married a Dornishman, and it never stops because Arya and Jaqen are repeating Lyanna’s and Rhaegar’s story. Of course, in ASOIAF, the story is never exactly the same. Which by the way gives me hope that at least they will have their happy ending. Or the closest thing to a happy ending, which in George Martin’s world means less heartbreaking than the others’s endings;d

Trouble with Jaqarya foreshadowing is that George Martin started writing the story with a five year gap in mind between Arya’s arrival in Braavos and A Dance with Dragons. So, when he first envisioned the story he already had a 15 year old Arya in mind. It means that Arya and Jaqen would have reunited in A Dance with Dragons already and she would have been old enough for a romance. It also means that Jaqen’s identity would have been revealed in A Dance with Dragons.

But, since GRRM abandoned the idea, we have to wait for the reveal till The Winds of Winter. As a consequence the whole build-up is made of hints, symbols, clues, metaphors, parallels to R/L and so on. Nothing is said explicitly because it would ruin the big reveal of who Jaqen is and what’s ahead of them.

So, from the top:

1. Arya names her direwolf after Nymeria, a queen who found home far from her own country and who married a Dornishman. Jaqen is half Dornish, he is Elia’s and Rhaegar’s son, Aegon VI. I already pinned the answer about his true identity to my profile so please read it if you need further explanation.

Thanks to the Game of Thrones finale we know that Arya will sail across the sunset sea. I searched through the books after s8 and of course I found information that they both, J&A, will leave. I guess I need to thank D&D for Arya’s ending, otherwise I would have overlooked the clues completely.

So, either they will find home far away, somewhere in the sea, or in Braavos or in Dorne or they will return to Jaqen’s castle ( the Red Keep or Dragonstone ). Wherever they will stay, it’s going to be far from Arya’s birth place, Winterfell.

2. Nymeria has golden eyes, Arya thinks that they shine like golden coins - it’s another connection to Jaqen ( Aegon ) who switches his iron coin for a golden dragon in A Feast for Crows. The coin is poisoned and kills Pate but it’s also a symbol of courtship. Pate needed it to claim his beloved Rosey.

3. On the way to King’s Landing, Arya is picking up flowers in the Neck, perhaps in the same area where the flowers for Lyanna’s crown had been picked. Ned is deeply moved when he sees Arya with the flowers because she reminds him of Lya. The flowers are purple - purple is the symbol of royal birth, of the rightful heir to the throne whom Jaqen ( Aegon ) is. They are called poisoned kisses and burn Arya’s hands - Jaqen is using poisons and represents fire. He is a Targ, a future dragon rider. Arya will also burn her hands and lips in the House of Black and White while learning to make poisons.”Poisoned kisses” is a bad name, it implies doomed love which reminds us of R/L. For Arya it means a love for the murderer. Hopefully with a happier ending than Lya’s love.      

4. Ned tells Arya that she will marry a king and rule his castle and they will have sons. Like I said before, Jaqen is the rightful king. In A Clash of Kings, Arya even reveals his identity though it is very cleverly concealed in the scene when she gives him his own name. To be brief: it's a play on words; he asks her if the name of the king she wants dead is Joffrey and she answers the name ( of the king ) is Jaqen H’ghar. So Joffrey is not the king, he’s impostor, the true king is Jaqen.

5. In King’s Landing, Arya has dreams of Rhaenys though she doesn’t realize it. She also catches Rhaenys’s cat, her “little dragon”, and kisses its forehead. In Harrenhal, Jaqen kisses her forehead as if to return the kiss;)

6. Arya ruins Sansa’s silk dress and offers to make her a new one. Sansa tells her she could make a dress good enough only to clean the pigsty.

That pigsty is kind of a big deal.

In fairytales, princes disguise themselves as swineherds to hide their true identity, like in H.C Andersen’s story “The Swineherd”.

George Martin used this motif in his books too. In AFFC Jaqen wears the face of Pate “the Pig Boy”. Arya, on the other hand, lives in Braavos in his house, makes dresses and sweeps the floors. She lives in the Pig Boy’s house, in the pigsty, and cleans it -  just like Sansa has said. Only the pigsty is the prince’s house like Ned has foretold.

7. In Harrenhal, Jaqen wakes Arya from her wolf dream and kisses her. This motif comes from the Sleeping Beauty fairytale - only the prince can awake the sleeping beauty.

8. Also in Harrenhal, Jaqen and Arya make their “weasel soup”. They pour hot broth on the guards to free the Northmen. Jaqen gives Arya a pair of padded gloves and he is wearing the identical gloves himself, while they struggle the pot of soup between them - it’s a metaphor for sharing power. Gloves are symbol of power and noble birth.

The cooking pot is another motif borrowed from “The Swineherd” - the prince has a magic pot that plays a song. Jaqen ( Aegon ) has a song too, a song of Ice and Fire.

9. Jaqen gives Arya his coin ( we already know it’s a symbol of courtship ) and she pays with it for a passage across the narrow sea. She crosses the sea to get to the House of Black and White, the house of darkness.

In Greek mythology, the souls of dead people pay with a coin to cross the river and get to the Underworld. Arya, like Persephone, is first shown while picking up flowers and then she descends into the Underworld seduced by GRRM’s version of Hades. Hades has a three-headed dog, Jaqen has a prophecy ( and the coin ) of a three-headed dragon.

10. When Arya meets the Ghost of High Heart, the witch compares her to Jenny, a girl with flowers in her hair who fell in love with a Targaryen prince.

11. In ASOS, Arya listens to Tom Sevenstrings playing My Featherbed song. The song was written by Rhaegar for Lyanna. It tells the story of Jenny and Duncan Targaryen but Rhaegar concealed his own feelings for Lya in the text. The lyrics refer to Arya and Jaqen as well - they repeat J/D and R/L story of a Targaryen prince and a girl from the North.

Of course Rhaegar didn’t know about his son and Lya’s niece when he wrote the song:))

The song is not about Gendrya, like people think. I already mentioned it in one of my answers. It’s very important because it helps to understand what had happened in Harrenhal and what will happen to Arya and Jaqen.

Arya hears My Featherbed after Gendry invited her to the smithy. He knocked her over and they wrestled. Her dress was torn and she looked as if someone had tried to hurt her. Right after Tom plays Rhaegar’s song. Gendry obviously didn’t want to hurt Arya but that scene explains what Robert did in Harrenhal after Rhaegar left - he was furious that Rhaegar crowned Lya so he demanded “his rights”. That’s why Lyanna ran off. Rhaegar was her rescue.

12. In the House of Black and White Arya sleeps under the red blanket which reminds her of her favorite blanket from Winterfell. I’m sure it’s Jaqen’s blanket, and perhaps his bed too, because red is his color: red hair, red poison, red war, red god, red comet over Harrenhal, red dragon (?)  - red accompanies him throughout his journey. Of course black is his color too, it’s the color of the Stranger. Red and black are the colors of House...

13. In Arya’s Braavosi chapters GRRM concealed the story of the beginning of Rhaegar’s and Lyanna’s love in Harrenhal. But that’s a massive story to tell so I will write a separate post about it.

14. Finally, in Mercy chapter Arya hears the story of the first Black Pearl of Braavos, the pirate queen, and her affair with King Aegon IV. She sighs wistfully and says that she would love to see a dragon too. Dragon here means more than an animal, GRRM once again hints at her future romance with the Dragon.

15. “Mercy” chapter parallels the prologue to A Feast for Crows. Originally it was meant to be in AFFC but GRRM eventually moved it to TWOW.

Perhaps GRRM wanted Jaqen’s chapter to start AFFC and Arya’s chapter to end the book. The prologue is a chapter with two main motifs: dragons and love. “Mercy” is a chapter of revenge and love for a dragon. The prologue starts at night when Pate’s beloved is sleeping naked in her room. “Mercy” starts at dawn when Arya wakes up naked in her room and sees a dragon boat passing beneath her window.

But those two chapters are so rich in parallels that they deserve a separate post as well:)

16. While Jaqen and Arya are having their adventures in Oldtown and Braavos respectively, in the North Mance is infiltrating Winterfell. Mance is posing as a bard. He sings a song of a Dornishman’s wife in turn with the Northman’s daughter. It’s another delightful hint that the Northman’s daughter, Ned’s daughter is ( well, will be ) the Dornishman’s wife.

As you can see it’s a pretty massive foreshadowing. I probably still omitted something because there are really tons of those clues.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the read.

Thanks for the ask :)

[imacrowcawcaw]

Eyes of Juniper Ch. 1 (A Metallica Fic)

Ao3 Link

Author (as known on Various sites): Lady Lover- Rockfic, Luluthechoosingcrow - AO3, theladylovingcrow - Deviantart and Wattpad, @sammy_bluebells - Instagram, @imacrowcawcaw - main Tumblr, @insannywestan - Sanny shipping Tumblr Pairing: Lars Ulrich/James Hetfield, Kirk Hammett/Cliff Burton, Lars/Female Character (briefly), Lars/Male Character (kinda, more just awkward one sided flirting then Lars gets rescued by his knight in a ratty Motorhead shirt) Fandom: Metallica Tags/warnings: Sex-swap AU, early 80s era 'tallica, smut, gay smut, also het smut since the whole gender switch thing, drinking and alcohol, lots of cussing and profanity, should warn that Lars goes into detail about taking a piss cuz ya know it's new to him, Idk I'll add tags per chapter as I think of shit

Notes: 

1. Okay, so I spent like months thinking about whether to do this or not. On the one hand, yes this has so much potential to be fun (and I've seen some other sex swap stories i like). On the other hand, a lot of the whole sex/Gender swap thing is really stereotypical gender shit and goes against what I personally believe. But, creative juices won out and I'll try to keep true to character as much as possible while also making this funny and not too misogynistic (if that's possible).

2. This is a work in progress! I started it a year and a half ago, and now a friend is helping me continue 

3. This story is inspired by the song 'Jewel of the Summertime' by Audioslave (on their album Revelations) I love this song and it is awesome you should totally go listen to it.

4. The witch-lady is inspired by Aine, Celtic goddess of love, summer, wealth, and sovereignty. I literally just googled 'goddess of love' then scrolled through a list to find someone other than Aphrodite (don't get me wrong I love Greek mythology but it just wasn't right for this fic) and came across this girl. I only did a quick Wikipedia read, I'm not planning on going too heavy into her myth and more just using her for the plot but.... If anybody is more well versed in Celtic mythology and I seem to get something wrong, please feel free to comment and I'll try my best to make it accurate!

5. Woo damn that was a lot of stuff, I don't blame you if you didn't bother reading it. Now, on with the show!

----------

1984 (Lars' POV)

The first thing I felt when I woke up was this odd sense of.... well, just something being fuckin' off. Like I was missing something, but also like I had gained something? I felt like a brand-new person, although in my gut I was still me.... Man, I must have had WAY too much Jager last night, it's fucking with my head.

I slowly peeled the itchy fleece blanket off of my body and rolled onto the floor, which was about a foot from the bare mattress. We really needed to invest in some sheets, especially if we wanted to keep bringing chicks back to the house. Apparently, most girls are not at all impressed by stained, lumpy mattresses with almost no bedding on them.

Speaking of girls and mattresses, didn't I bring one home last night? I raised my head slightly from its position from the threadbare carpet and looked at the bed, trying to see if Anna (Was that her name?) was still there. Yep, there was a naked hippy still passed out in my bed, sweet!

I groaned quietly as I stood and shuffled my way out the door and down the hall to the bathroom. It was then I noticed that I didn't really have the usual alcohol-and-early-morning-and-piss induced erection, but my bladder was still straining. Huh, weird.

Whatever. I just wanted to pee, get rid of that feeling in my gut, and get that dead possum taste out of my mouth. Pushing open the door and wincing as the creaky hinges screeched through my headache, I pulled down my boxers and reached for my dick.... What the fuck?

WHAT THE FUCK?

WHERE WAS MY MOTHERFUCKIN DICK?!

Trying not to panic, I looked down, squeezing my eyes shut for a moment so I wouldn't have to see right away. But, of course, that kind of defeated the purpose of looking down, so I opened them again. No dick. The hell was going on?

Taking a deep, calming breath, I tried to think through this rationally. My dick, for whatever reason, was not where it was supposed to be. But, my bladder was still full and begging to be released, so obviously my system or whatever was still working. That need to pee was turning into a burning pain, so I tried to come up with a solution. If I don't have a cock, then I can piss through....what, exactly? Is there anything down there at all? What is even going on!?

Pulling in another deep breath through my nose, I let it hiss out between clenched teeth as I slowly, so slowly, touched my fingers to my abdomen and moved them downwards, dreading what I would find. Annnnnd....... Yep, there it was.

Velvety soft lips, slick, pungent juices; anatomy I knew so well but never, EVER expected to feel on myself. My crisis would have to wait a minute, though, 'cause my bladder was going to explode and no dick be damned I needed to do something about it.

Gingerly sitting my ass down on the toilet (god, so weird sitting down just to piss) I tried to slowly let it out. The feeling was...well there was certainly relief of the pressure, but it also felt strange in a way I couldn't really describe. I could possibly get used to it, not that I'm planning on staying like this or anything.

Cringing as I wiped, I slowly pulled the boxers back up to my hips that I just now noticed were a little wider than usual. And my hands, were they smaller? Softer? My chest too....HOLY SHIT I HAVE BOOBS! That, I might be able to get used to.

I turned to the mirror, and was quite shocked at what I saw. There was a girl standing there, with large, doe-like green eyes staring back at me from underneath brown bangs. She had a nice tan on her upper body, although her breasts were still pale where she clutched at them, small rosy nipples poking through her fingers. A pair of black cotton boxers stretched tight around the small curve of her hips, but hung loose around her milky thighs that almost touched. And this...this chick was me. ME.

Shaking my head, I splashed some water onto my face and rubbed my eyes, hoping it was just a fucked up dream. No such luck.

I was considering hiding in the bathroom forever, because no way in hell could I let the guys see me like this, let alone figure out how to explain, when I heard a scream. It sounded a lot like Kirk's voice, so I pushed my problems to the back of my head and ran into the hallway, stopping dead in my tracks at what I saw.

Anna, or whatever her name was, stood at the top of the stairs, dressed in flowing black robes with green Celtic designs all over them. She had jewels and charms hanging from her waist, wrists, neck, and ears, each tinkling as she tossed some sort of... Powder onto a very shocked looking Kirk. Or at least, I was pretty sure it was Kirk. He (she?) seemed to be in the same boat as me as far as bodies were concerned at the moment.

With a final dusting of powder, witchy-chick turned to me and smirked. "I hope you learn your lesson, I'll be back in a week. And as for you...." She turned to Kirk, "Well, you're just too damn cute! I couldn't resist seeing what a pretty girl you'd make!"

"This is your fault? You bitch! " I yelled. "Why the hell did you do this to us? Who are you? Change us back, then get the fuck out! I don't wanna be a damn girl, and neither does Kirk!" God this was fucking insane, that chick was crazy!

She hissed at me, eyes flashing in a way that could not be human. "Now you listen, GIRL. You'll stay like this for as long as I deem fit. You need to learn some respect for women, and being one is the best way to do that. I suppose you don't remember what you did last night?" She asked, looking bored and ready lo go fuck up someone else's life.

I thought hard, then it came creeping back to me. The bar, the Jager, the flirting with a group of girls, copping a feel and getting slapped, then her changing her mind and coming home with me, talking dirty in her ear, then unworldly sex, her whispering what sounded like a spell in my ear as I came... Holy shit.

"Is this about me grabbing your ass? I'm sorry! Please don't do this!" I begged, finally starting to let the situation sink in and desperation set. This could not be happening.

"Hmph," she snorted, "Begging isn't going to get you anywhere. I've seen humans beg for much less, and they still didn't get it. No, you'll love your life as a woman for a week, both of you, and hopefully you'll come to realize the struggles and terror that comes with it. If you've learned your lessons and are truly sorry, then you will be turned back. If not... Well you'll just have to stay like this until you do."

And just like that, she turned with a flourish and disappeared into thin air. My morning could not get any crazier, I was sure if it. But, because I wasn't actually sure and was suddenly doubting all logical occurrences in the world, I knocked on the wooden railing. That done, I turned towards Kirk.

He (seriously, do I call us he's or she's now? This is so fucked up) was shaking like a leaf, looking like he'd fall over any moment. I went over to grab him, calm him down, something.

"Shh shh, it's all right, Kirk," I muttered in his ear, awkwardly patting his back. I never thought I'd need to, but it really fucking sucks I can't comfort him any better than this. It was like this sour feeling in my chest that nestled in right next to my heart, whispering how awful I was at this and how he's probably mad at me for getting him into this situation.

Before I could ask him if he wanted to punt me out of a window, though, I heard some shuffling and talking coming from downstairs. James and Cliff were headed up here. As much as I wanted to hide for a week until my fuckin' "lesson" was up, I couldn't exactly drag Kirk into the hall closet in his current state, so I stood my ground.

"Hey, ladies, we do appreciate the service you've done our ugly ass friends, but could you keep the cat fight down until you've left the house?"

Ah, James, the man still didn't know how to talk to women after all this time. He was either too shy to form a sentence, or he put on this macho bravado that turned him into a drink asshole. Either way, this lady was not pleased.

By now I guess the guys had reached the landing Kirk and I were at and saw me hugging him, because Cliff chimed in, "Aww, they've made up! Good! Now, can I ask what exactly you two were telling about so loudly that it woke me and my boy James up? Did Lars do something?"

My back straightened at that, and I turned my head to him indignantly. "I did fucking not!" I retorted, even though apparently this whole situation was my fault. No need for them to know that, though.

"Holy shit, Lars!?!" James screamed.

I sighed. "Hi, Jamie."

----------

Chapter 2

[pricechecktranslations]

TTDS: The Three Daughters of Sir Torture; Chapter 1

Torture Tower Doesn’t Sleep: The Three Daughters of Sir Torture infomine under the cut 

Character Info:

Benjii Kenpu (Benji Kemp): A regular of Stella’s bar. Wears glasses, and evidently works as a doctor. Doesn’t pay his tab.

Chenbaren (Chamberlain): Not a person but a wealthy family in Lion City.

Hanku Fieron kyou (Sir Hank Fieron): The popularly-called “Sir Torture”. Used to live in Torcia Tower. There are lots of books and plays based on him, as he was (in addition to being a torturer of war prisoners) a famous war hero. He apparently died midway through responding to a summons by the king, traveling there by boat (as in, fell from the boat).

Jibetto (Gibbet): Is a regular of Stella’s bar. Appears younger than Lloyd, but carries herself with a very mature air.

Rakku (Rack): Very childish. Has a short haircut.

Ransuroodo Haaku (Lancelord Hark): A fictional hero based on Hank.

Reimondo (Raymond): A street performer. Friendly. Apparently looks a little like Zepeto.

Roido Rooweru (Lloyd Lowell): A thief who fancies himself an attractive (to women) sophisticate, smarter than the average thug and talented with firearms. Normally works alone, and looks out for himself only. Not from Lion City. Has a favored pistol he keeps on his person. Close to his thirties (was shy of 10 years old when Hank died). Has plans to get back to the capital someday, and for that he needs money. He also originally wanted to be an actor, and as such has some knowledge of theater (and once played Romarius in a play). He doesn’t like talking about his past. Has trained himself to be able to see a little in the dark. Has killed six people in the course of his work as a thief.

Sutera Taunsendo (Stella Townsend): The owner of Stella’s Bar. Young, and has red hair that’s tied up at the back. She’s just scraping by herself as it is, her father unable to walk after his legs were injured and unable to hire any help.

Zepetto (Zepeto?): A member of Lloyd’s temporary team that betrayed them to the police. Apparently Raymond looks a little like him.

Setting Info:

Basuzu no tsufu(?lots of readings for this) (Pot of Basuzu): Could be written as Baths but I think it’s a pun on Pazuzu from the Exorcist. A pot that belonged to Beritoad. Has four silver handles, and is always full of water, according to Gibbet. Legend says all who drink it are cured of their ills, and gain eternal life.

Josephiinu (Josephine): The name of Rack’s torture device. Basically a rack.

Rionshiti (Lion City): East from Lloyd’s hometown. A city in the sticks, without much police presence. In an economic downturn.

(Sutera no sakaba) Stella’s Bar: A bar located in Lion City’s downtown. The sign has a bottle and drinking glass on it. It has 3 four person tables and 5 seats at the counter. There’s a bunch of glasses behind the counter, as well as something large and bell-shaped that’s covered in black cloth (a bird cage, probably). Originally, the sign read “Townsend’s Bar”, but Stella figured having a woman’s name would bring in more male customers.

Touruchiatou (Torcia Tower): Five stories tall, grey, old. Hank Fieron used to live there until 20 years ago. Supposedly empty since his death, but recently his daughters have suddenly started living there. Said to hold the “Pot of Basuzu” on its top floor. No windows below the third floor. First floor is divided into several rooms. There is an atrium on the second floor that lets in light from the third floor. The second floor is just one big room. The third floor is where the torturing happens. Fourth floor is nothing but jail cells.

Yookushiti (York City): West from Lloyd’s hometown. A city in the sticks, without much police presence (same as Lion City).

Youma (Wraith): A sort of demonic entity with strange powers. Rare, and not widely believed in anymore. Beritoad is an evil wraith, and Romarius is a good one—at least, so the stories say.

Notable quotes (admittedly I wasn’t looking too hard for them, I could probably find more, but this one stuck out to me at least):

Lloyd: (in thought, scene 1) I have real ability. I have top-grade skill with firearms, intelligence far above that of a common thug, and looks and wit that would make almost any woman weak at the knees! There was no need for someone so superior as I to rely on the assistance of such incompetents!

Plot Summary:

Scene 1

It opens on Lloyd walking through the street at midnight, getting the impression that someone is looking at him from Torcia tower’s third window. He dismisses it, hurrying along as he’s on the run from a “job” (burglar, I think) gone bad thanks to Zepeto (?). He rages over the whole thing a little (though usually a loner the last job was pretty intimidating, so he’d gotten help).

Eventually he reaches a fork in the road, the sign telling him that the right path leads to Lion City’s downtown. He realizes he’s been going in the wrong direction, having intended to go to York City instead, but figures this is just as well.

He wants to get some food, but all of the money he had squirreled away in his hideout was seized by the police.

Scene 2

All the shops and such are dark, being midnight. Lloyd doesn’t have much money on him for good accommodations. Eventually he finds Stella’s Bar still open. He goes inside, intending to take the opportunity to learn more about Lion City.

He’s greeted by Stella, who is the only person inside save for Benji, who soon decides to leave. Stella banters with him a little about his tab before he runs off, and invites Lloyd to sit down. They chat a little. He mentions looking for work.

Apparently the town has fallen on hard times recently (she mentions something called the “daiya keshiki” (diamond scenery I think? I’m not…sure what that means) relating to when the place was prosperous, talking about her own problems with her father and whatnot. She suggests the Chamberlain family might hire him (though they’re having their own troubles), but there’s also Torcia Tower.

They talk a little about Hank and his three daughters. Stella makes clear that they are very rich noble girls, basically (though she’s only met Gibbet). She thinks of it as they might hire him as a servant, but he decides he’s going to burgle them instead (though maybe try to get hired to scope the place out).

Gibbet suddenly enters. Though not well versed on women’s fashion, Lloyd can tell by looking at her that her dress is incredibly expensive.

There’s this nice kind of setup where Lloyd is clearly thinking of her as an easy mark (prey) when in reality he’s going to be prey to her. Anyway, he flirts with her a little (insulting the bar slightly in the process, but Stella doesn’t seem to mind), as a test of how she’ll react. She responds gracefully and happily, sitting next to him. Stella takes the bird cage behind the bar into the back when Gibbet looks at it.

She orders “Blood Grave” wine, the most expensive thing in the bar. Stella tells Gibbet they were talking about her, and Gibbet brings up how people have been spreading rumors of her and her sisters, as ruffians around town have gone missing since they showed up in Torcia Tower. Stella doesn’t believe they’re responsible.

Gibbet claims her sisters came to the tower to cure an illness where they can’t come into contact with sunlight (which is why only she leaves it). They talk about the “Pot of Basuzu” and wraiths and whatnot. She says her sisters are (briefly) cured of their ailment when they drink from the pot.

Lloyd resolves to steal the pot, as it’s obviously valuable. He tries to bring up the subject of being hired, but Gibbet brushes him off. She leaves, but says she’d like to drink with Lloyd again sometime. Stella takes pity on him and suggests an inn that he can stay at on credit for a month while he’s looking for work.

Scene 3

The inn is a bit run down (it doesn’t give a name for it). His room has two beds and little else (and is only really big enough for just those beds), and is sharing the room with Raymond. Raymond is friendly but Lloyd has no interest in making friends. Several days have gone by (it’s been a week since he arrived in town) and Raymond appears to have taken the hint.

While pretending to look for work, he visits Torcia Tower, receiving no answer when he rings the bell. There’s a new lock on the door, though Lloyd figures he can pick it easily. After ruminating on the job a little, Lloyd decides to try to break in that night.

Scene 4

The first floor of the tower is decently bright during the day due to having gaps in the stonework walls. It’s shabbier than Lloyd was expecting, with the front hall and the various rooms hardly feeling lived in, filled with old and smelly furniture. It’s also larger than he thought it would be. No sign that torture’s gone on here. He does find a pot of purplish red flowers that smell nice (Gibbet smelled like that earlier).

On to the second floor. It occurs to him that if he takes the pot of Basuzu, the “sick” sisters won’t be able to cure their illness, but he refuses to care for people he’s never even met. The light of the moon from the third floor comes in through the atrium, like a spotlight, and Lloyd is briefly reminded of his acting days.

Scene 5

He looks around the second floor a little, approaching some of the flowers from earlier. Suddenly the room is filled with light (all the lights come on at once?), and he sees that Gibbet is there in the center. She’s not scared to see him.

They banter a tiny bit, and then he pulls his gun on her. He tells her he’s here for the pot of Basuzu. She offers to give it to him and tell no one that he arrived—but Lloyd doesn’t like loose ends, and so says he’ll kill her anyway (though he’ll do it quickly to spare her pain).

Gibbet then acts confused on the matter of wanting to spare her pain—she says that pain is the greatest joy humans can feel, and starts laughing creepily.

Lloyd is caught—it’s a little hard for me to read exactly what happens (maybe I’m too tired reading this scene, and I don’t recognize the kanji. I’ll look over it again if anyone wants more detail). Something binds him and then hoists him into the air from the atrium (I think he’s in a cage?). Gibbet’s gone.

He realizes he’s been had, remembering what he’d heard about this place being a torture tower. The (cage????) that he’s in starts hurtling towards the ceiling in the third floor, and he loses consciousness right before hitting it.

Scene 6

He’s no longer in the cage thing when he wakes up. He’s laying prone on some weird rectangular box with gears and (a lever I think?), arms and legs aching from the collision with the ceiling and chained to the box. He’s able to look around, in some room in the tower with the same walls as the rest. There’s a large wooden double door further in.

Rack informs him he’s laying on Josephine. Lloyd recognizes her as the girl he saw looking at him from the window all those nights ago. He asks to be let go, and she goes to activate the rack. (Apparently this is her 63rd torture victim, if I’m reading this right?). The way the rack works is that when she spins the gears, it retracts the ropes that are tied to his limbs.

In agony, Lloyd begs for his life, but Rack just finds this funny (she’s very jovial with him, calling him “big brother” and such). He starts to pass out, and she stabs him with a large spike to keep him awake.

Basically, he gets horribly tortured.

Scene 7

Lloyd is eventually released from the device and locked in a cell on the tower’s fourth floor. There’s a young man there already, with stretched limbs covered in wounds. He tells Lloyd that the victims of torture are being used by the girls as sacrifices to appease their god, in order to bring their father back to life.

Maiden comes to bring them their food (so, she does talk—but is a girl of few words). The prisoner says they only feed them enough to keep them alive, and tells Lloyd who the other girls are.

Lloyd has no intention of dying there. He sees that the cell facing them has their effects in it, including his favored pistol. The other prisoner tells him that while many have tried to escape, all were killed. Lloyd has hope though—he doesn’t need to fight them, just not get caught. It’s difficult for him to work the lock due to his pain, but he manages to unlock the cell.

He gets his gun back, and then goes to get the other prisoner with him, rationalizing that he could sacrifice him to escape if need be. The prisoner gets something from his own effects, handing it to Lloyd and explaining it’s from when he used to work in a coal mine, and to use if push came to shove. Then they get going.

Scene 8

They reach the third floor. Several somethings fall from the ceiling—cylindrical metal lumps. They have lids, and look like coffins, but with protrusions that look like a woman’s face (these are iron maidens, pretty sure).

As Lloyd is wondering where the hell these fell from, the other guy starts freaking out, saying they’ve been caught. The maidens are apparently animate, as they float into the air and start attacking the two of them. Lloyd dodges, but the other man is hit and falls to the ground. Lloyd considers using what the man gave him, but figures the confines of the tower are too narrow.

The maiden sets down next to the man and opens up, revealing it’s full of spikes. His body is sucked inside. There’s no screams, but blood starts seeping out after a moment.

Lloyd leaps down the atrium hole to the second floor away from the maidens. One falls down after him. The second floor is bigger, however, and Lloyd brings out what the miner gave him, revealed to be dynamite.

Lloyd is caught in the blast and blown back. It also didn’t work on the maiden. Lloyd gets up, throws up (mostly blood), and falls back down again. Unable to stand, he tries crawling towards the exit, though his eyes have lost focus and he can hardly see.

The iron maiden drops in front of him. It opens to reveal Maiden inside. She gets out to look at him. From behind he hears Gibbet chide Maiden for overdoing it. Rack is with her. Gibbet says that they can’t just kill him—that’s not torture. And torture is to bring someone alive the pleasure of “agony”.

Lloyd intends to curse her as insane, but instead begs for her to let him go. She grabs him by the chin, wondering how he’d sound if she cut his pretty face. Lloyd asks her to spare his face. Gibbet has Rack stab his face with her spike instead.

Scene 9

One month passes. Stella goes to Benji’s hospital to see one of his patients, someone wrapped in bandages and near death. She’d found him three days ago when passing Torcia Tower, and he hasn’t woken up the whole time he’s been in the hospital. His face is pretty much ruined, so not only can they not recognize it, but they can’t imagine anyone else will either.

Raymond is performing in the town square. It’s been six months since he arrived in town, and he’s gotten a small following. At the end of this morning performance, people clap and throw money in his hat. As he’s resting and eating some pizza, he overhears some people gossiping about the person in the hospital and the Torcia Tower (like that it’s haunted, etc).

The narration says that no one knows the truth—Hank had no daughters. Only torture implements that he had loved like daughters.

Raymond muses on souls inhabiting torture devices. Then he stands and goes to perform his afternoon show.

[makingnewenemies]

Group Picture Vol. 7 liner notes - 

Jake Lee - Bleeding Gum Murphy’s Jake Lee makes his triumphant return to Group Picture after a two year absence and the treasure is worth the wait! Jake blesses us with his characteristic upbeat opener set to clear-headed and introspective lyrics. He even manages to throw in an almost spanish sounding acoustic guitar lead? Welcome back Jake!

Little Cousin - The classic yet elusive duo of Walter and Milk come back with this strange and smooth track about burning ponies? Not really sure what to say about this one but I love Milk’s beats even when they are simple and jazzy like this and Walter’s experimenting with some new styles so props to trying I guess.

Weston Bookhouse - Weston is back with this calming and catchy piece about reflecting on his life and love while driving a country road. His voice is clean and clear, the shaker is fast and steady, and that outro when he sings both up and down the octave is probably the catchiest bit I’ve ever heard him write. I got the chills the first, second, and third time I heard this song. Rumor has it he is going to record the next album in 2018 in Walter’s garage!

Slaughter Beach, Dog - A Group Picture staple at this point, and the songwriter behind my favorite album of the year, Jake Ewald seems to be able to pump out heartfelt songs like a pathos machine, and of course this tune is no different. The arrangements of this song are fun and interesting and I love his love for slide guitar.

Milk Flud - Who? Ya the beat seems pretty chill but honestlyI don’t understand the motorbike metaphor at all. Is this guy ok? Who is Max? Was that a lyric about a german shepherd in a muzzle? The thing I love about MNE is that they give a platform to the little guys like this Flud character.

Chain - Woah! Chain is a Portland band that I’ve seen play live before but this is my first time hearing a recording and woah! The music and production are so unique and Teal’s voice is like candy. I can’t wait to hear more from them and I really hope they stick around the mne world for a little while so their creativity can rub off on me a little.

Cool American - Cool American is probably Portland’s coolest band. Their cynical wit and fuzzy charm leaves every listener intrigued and wishing they lived in Portland to have a beer with them. I’m really glad they came back to GP cause I want to be associated with them when they blow up.

Sour Guy - Well this has to be the absolute best song ever written about a grad student grading papers. While this might seem like a simple acoustic song, it’s really impressive the way Kris Schobert can clearly express the frustration of spending a whole day grading papers of kids who did not at all learn the subject matter (physics!) that he so passionately tried to teach to them. Love you, Kris. I would love to take your class and I wouldn’t be on my phone!

Banned From Japan - Earl from Banned From Japan is a sweet and genuine valley rat who has admittedly never listened to any bands besides NOFX. And, Earl, that is ok with us! This punk gem not only slaps but makes me want to delete my social media and live a more wholesome life. Welcome to MNE and Group Picture, Banned From Japan!

Alex Maddox - Our childhood friend with the voice that screams major label shoe-in is currently gearing up to ditch his job and live in a van traveling around Europe, surfing and following spiritual gurus. Perhaps Houston Graves is the person he felt he was turning into. Perhaps I am totally wrong. But I am right in saying this song is equally easy on the ears as it is introspective and I feel blessed to have Alex in my life and on Group Picture since its early days.

Benjamin Ward - It was a hard year for certain people in our music community. There were several deaths and Benny experienced one directly on his Hemingway tour. With that in mind, this song is absolutely heart breaking and cathartic. Usually known for dark metaphors and understated lyrics, Benny comes softly with candid words and a direct message - “I’m just glad I had you in my life / And I will carry you and the things you do until I die.” Beautiful, Benny.

Isabel Zacharias - So I was at Russell’s house meeting his new roommate Isabel for the first time this fall and we sang Wilco and Mountain Goats songs together. Then she played this song and I was floored. I told her about Group Picture and said she had to be on it. Now I am so grateful I had some caffeine that morning and had the gumption to be so forward because now I get to enjoy her poetic lyrics and soulful tune whenever I want.

The Sal Show - Sal from Animal City! Finally a funny track on Group Picture this year! But if you follow the lyrics, they actually convey a pretty ridiculous distant concept - a bad kid magician? - and it does not only make sense but its funny! Kudos to Sal if he ever reads this. The dude can write a tune.

Jeremy Murphy - The guy in Riled and Chain, Jeremy wowed the world with his “cranberries in the cosmos” song last year and now he has topped himself! This song is weird and cool! I would say more but Jeremy and I made a bet over a game of pool and he lost and he actually owes me a personal song. So I will hold my tongue until I hear that tune!

Dakota Loesch - The other mastermind behind Animal City and Lemp Lungs, Dakota is becoming a staple of group picture and that makes me feel blessed. This year he brings us a poetic Americana tune that makes me feel three things 1. honestly kinda sexy (must be that beat and the deep bass?) 2. Kinda melancholy! (not sure why) and 3. Dakota can we party together???

Emo Dreamboat - Ben Ward of Hemingway collabs with Milk and damn this song is a true emo pop song! Ben’s voice sounds soothing and dark and Milk’s beat is moody and intricate. Is this a collab that is gunna last or is this a one off Group Picture track? I really hope they do the album cause Ben can float over a beat like an experienced rapper and we all know Milk is capable of endless beats.

Byronius Punk - Ian Farmer, the dark horse of Modern Baseball, has always had a knack for songwriting and a great voice but it was hidden behind his role as “humble bassist” in the band. His track this year comes under the new moniker Byronius Punk and makes me want to stare out the window on a gray and snowy east coast day and just fall asleep on my desktop until summer arrives.

Grimy Baby - Naka G, from Weston Bookhouse and a past touring member of Walter Etc., keeps the slop tradition of MNE alive with this smokey bluesy gem. Probably recording everything in his bedroom in Santa Cruz, Naka sings about a “sleepless luxury” but honestly Naka if this how you function without sleep then I think you’re doing fine homie.

Chase Hoyt - Usually known for guitar shredding in Ubu Roi or Chaz and the Minions of Chaz, Chase takes a new disco styled approach with his contribution to this year’s comp. A disco song would usually seem annoying but this song sounds like Ozzy or Alice Cooper made a lo-fi disco song and that is obviously awesome. Also, note the shredding that still takes place and put some headphones and listen to those bass lines!

Humphrey Orlando - Our whiskey drinking story teller Humphrey is a classic mne and Group Picture stable. He claims he wrote this song in 5 minutes but he manages to squeeze as much soul as anyone feels in a lifetime into this scrappy minute and a half gem.

Melancholy Quinoa - The infamous rap group featuring Alex Crawford, Kyle B Hart, Ben Ward, Your Homie D, and Milk Flud, made their debut last year with a song about hot boxing a jungle gym. Well, they are back blending the Emo Dreamboat’s smooth vox, Crawford’s crass lyrics about masturbating, Kyle singing for the first time, and Milk’s trap tendencies. Honestly, this slaps!!!

Daddy Collin - The figurehead behind Snow Roller and voted Portland’s “Easiest Guy to Fall in Love With” is back this year under a solo moniker. Does this mean a solo career is in the works? Snow Roller released “XXL”, one of my fav albums of the year, this summer and Collin seems to still be climbing to his peak. I got the chills when he sings “i hope you still consider me a friend”. I do, Collin, I do.

Peanut Butter Cups - Aaron Kovacs from Lauren Records does this lo-fi project that pretty much only exists on Group Picture and I really think he needs to make a full album! His songs are fuzzy, lovely, and sad and make me feel something. Please Peanut Butter Cups, give us the full candy bar!

Walter Etc. - This one is just Walter alone, singing about being on a boat or something. Honestly, it sounds like all his other songs and I can’t relate to his love of the open sea, but hey this tune is kinda catchy!

*thanks for reading / listening* - omniscient mne god 

[thebelloverthedoor]

The Tome of The Fallen, Part 1

The bell over the door jingled. 

It wasn’t a common occurrence. Matthewin’s Bookshop was located on the third level of Pike Place Market, near the end and beyond several empty retail locations with advertisements posted in the windows for other locations in the market and advertising the availability of the retail space and it’s wondrous benefits should you decide to open your own business there. 

Matthewin’s Bookshop was in one of the smaller spaces available, with tall, sturdy shelves filled with old dusty books. The shelves were spaced closely together and any two people browsing the same row of shelves would be forced to slide past each other awkwardly if they needed to pass each other. The windows looking into the store were only able to see a few feet into the location, and all you could really see from the outside were old books with titles so faded with age that you couldn’t make most of them out. 

Even during the height of tourist season this part of the market didn’t see much foot traffic. Most people were interested in the fish market on the main arcade level, the restaurants, or the quaint stores that sold items that particular that Seattle flair to them. What little did make it down this way were usually more interested in finding a quiet corner to themselves than they were in visiting a bookstore that didn’t really seem interested in inviting customers inside. It was an anomaly in the market, but a quiet one that didn’t cause any trouble and so as long as the rent was paid on time no one seemed to care if it didn’t exactly fit in. 

The bell over the door was tarnished brass and black spring steel.It tinkled in a pleasant enough way when some foot traffic happened to make it this far down and still had the wherewithal to investigate. When someone would open the door, they’d immediately notice the smell in the place. It was that old, musty smell that comes from the particular dust and mildew you find in very old books that were not necessarily well cared for. A walk up and down the rows of books revealed no best sellers, no magazines, and in many cases the books weren’t written in English...at least not in a form of English most people would recognize. Most people who came in the door would do a quick lap of the place and then leave in search of something more interesting. 

It was not a store for the casual reader. It was a store for those who searched for information that was obscure, unique, and many times dangerous to acquire. Those searching for this type of information would eventually hear of Matthewin’s Bookstore and its owner; Luther Matthewin. 

Luther looked up as the bell jingled and the man walked in. He was dressed in a classic business casual fashion: Khakis with a nice belt, a button up shirt in a color that indicated a certain sense of fashion, leather boating shoes that looked well made. He was in his late thirties, perhaps early forties, and had well groomed dark brown hair and hazel eyes. Obviously a man of money, or at least able to dress like one. Luther sighed. Men like this were usually difficult customers. They didn’t like being told they couldn’t have something. 

Luther was a man of less than average height with a stocky, compact frame. His grey eyes looked out from underneath a wild head of black hair that was noticeably lightening at the temples. He wasn’t the kind of man that worried about how his hair was styled and mostly was concerned about keeping it out of his eyes.

Luther watched him wander up and down through the rows of books white he worked on some paperwork on a laptop that was several years out of date. For a while as the man occasionally reached for a book and examined it, apparently not finding what he was looking for. Based on the books he was looking at, he was searching for something of a religious nature, and carefully scrutinized several old books. 

Eventually the man recognized that what he was looking for wasn't on the shelves. He worked his way to the counter in back of the store and waited for Luther to acknowledge him. Luther closed out of the file he was in and looked up.

"Can I help you?" He asked.

"Ah. Yes. I am looking for something...special." The stranger began, in a vaguely Mediterranean accent. "I see you have a very impressive collection of unusual books. But what I seek is not something that is likely to be out on a shelf. Perhaps you have a more...exclusive...selection of books for discerning clients?"

"What, exactly, are you looking for?" Asked Luther warily. "I may be able to help, or I may be able to locate what you're after. I do have an wide range of collectors and contacts I can reach out to."

"You know of the Book of Enoch, yes?" The stranger asked.

"Of course" Luther replied.

"What can you tell me about the composition of this book?" The stranger responded.

"Well, the book itself claims to have been written by Enoch, one of Noah's son's after the biblical flood that destroyed the world. Scholars and researchers believe it was written about 300 to 100 BC, and was originally five different manuscripts that have been pieced together." At this point Luther paused,and waited for a response. The stranger guestured for him to continue.

"The Book of the Watchers is the first section and the oldest of the writings, and talks about the angels that fell, came to earth and bred with the humans there to create the Nephilim that would later be challenged by the nation of Israel when they invaded Canaan. It also discusses the punishment of the fallen angels."

"The second section is a book of parables. It is mostly focused on the punishment of the fallen angels and the evil Kings they were associated with."

"The third section is the Astronomical Book and discusses the heavens and the motions of heavenly bodies, and lays out a calendar consisting of 364 days and four even seasons. There's no mention of how to adjust for the extra day and a quarter that we currently have in the current calendar we use."

"The Dream Vision is the fourth section of the book and consists of one vision, allegedly written from before it all happened and describing events up through the Maccabean Revolt."

"The final section is the Epistle of Enoch and is Enoch espousing the virtues of God to his son, Methuselah."

"There are a few older copies from the 19th century on the shelves here that are interesting primary due to the publishers who printed them, but you've already seen those. You can pick if several different printings through various online retailers if you want a newer copy. You can also find several downloadable files if you're just interested in the information in the book...but you're not interested in the Book of Enoch itself are you? Luther finished, looking the stranger and trying to gauge his reaction.

The stranger paused and said "Correct.” He paused here, and seemed to hesitate about how to proceed, before continuing “I am looking for...the sixth section of this book. The one that describes in detail the fallen angels and what each one did to be ejected from heaven. It was rejected when the rest were combined together, and I have heard that a copy still survives."

“What makes you think this manuscript still exists?” Luther interjected. 

“It has been referenced very infrequently over the years. Most recently it was referred to in a request written by a monk that resided in the La Sacra di San Michele, a monastery in the Piedmont region of Italy, just before the outbreak of World War 2. The monk in charge of the monastery library said that the manuscript was a dark and evil manuscript that should be destroyed, but the abbot of the monastery at the time rejected his request and ordered him to preserve it. I have acquired this order and had the document validated.” He reached into his jacked and pulled out a yellowed piece of paper, presenting it for examination. 

Luther opened the paper, hand-written in Italian script and read through it. It was a fairly straightforward request and a very brief denial. 

I request permission to destroy this manuscript on the fallen. Their acts were evil. None should read of the abominable sins they performed to fall from grace. It can only lead to the proliferation of sin.

- Bruno Miani

While your intent is admirable, I am reluctant to destroy a manuscript entrusted to us for centuries. Keep it out of the main collection, and hidden in the archive. 

- Father Carlo

“As you can see, it references a document that is quite old, and the subject matter is clearly identified. I have been told that you have resources that allow you to acquire...special orders?”

“Well, appears to be at this monastery. Why are you half-way around the world at a bookstore in Seattle?” Luther asked. 

“Ah. Well. During the second world war the monastery was abandoned at times. The majority of the collection of manuscripts and ancient books is still there, but no one knows anything about the one referenced in this document. It may be hidden on the grounds somewhere, or it may have been taken and moved elsewhere. I have been...unsuccessful...in my attempts to pursue it further. When I inquired discreetly into who might be able to help me, your name was brought to my attention.”

“Might I ask who referred you to me?” 

“Um. No.” the stranger admitted. “I was asked not to mention it.”

“I see.” Luther thought for a moment. Commissions like this were rare, but lucrative. “You understand there is no guarantee I can help you?”

“Of course.”

“Did this anonymous referring party happen to mention the rates you might expect to pay for this kind of search?”

“Yes.”

A little bit of paperwork later and Luther had a special order paid in full by a credit card with the name Anton Romano embossed in it's golden surface.

Luther picked up a phone and dialed the number for Adam, a college student he knew. "Hey Adam" he said when the phone was answered. "I'm heading out of town for several days. Would you be able to keep an eye on the shop for me?"

[dailyaudiobible]

06/27/2019 DAB Transcript

2 Kings 10:32-12:21, Acts 18:1-22, Psalms 145:1-21, Proverbs 18:1

Today is the 27th day of June. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is pleasure, of course, and an honor and a joy to walk in here and sit down around the global campfire together and just kinda come in out of whatever's going on and let it recede and fade and allow this peaceful place to begin to take hold as God's word speaks into our lives. So, we've been reading from the Contemporary English Version this week. We’ll continue that. And we’ve been working our way through the book of second Kings, which is what we’ll continue with today. Today chapters 10 verse 32 through 12 verse 21.

Commentary:

Okay. So, we’re working our way through the book of Acts, which obviously comes immediately after the Gospels. So, we had been spending our entire year in the New Testament with Jesus. And now in the book of Acts we’re mostly looking at what came next through the ministries of the apostle Peter and then the conversion and the ministry of the apostle Paul. And Paul has been on these missionary journeys sharing the good news wherever he goes. That's why he's on these journeys and we've watched Paul kind of be an attraction. Like he's ground zero for something. Like he’s saying these things and people are beginning to wrestle with and think about. And, so, for some, their hearts are awakening to Jesus, while for others they’re rejecting this and like looking at the disruption that Paul's causing in   these cities and inciting riots against him and so on and so forth. And we’ve watched the apostle Paul adapt, adapt to the people that he's speaking to, so that they can actually have a dialogue instead of something more confrontational. And we get to this point in the book of Acts, and we have a little bit of ground underneath our feet now about how it was that the early church began to form. And, so it's about here every year that we get to this point that we have to reframe what we might have thought the early church was like. I have been all over the place. I have been all over…I’ve traveled and traveled and traveled and many of you have too, but it's often that I encounter people who will say something like, “I just wish that we could go back to the beginning. Like, this faith, this religion, it's bloated. It's different than it was. I wish we had it more true back then when the Holy Spirit was working the way he was and just paving the way.” As if the formation of the church were an easier, more joyous time, but somehow the Holy Spirit was working in a way that he doesn’t work today. It was a more powerful time. That is a miscalculation. Like, that's a false assumption and the book of Acts completely and clearly shows us that the Paul's missionary journeys...like…he wasn’t on vacation, right? Like he's not sailing around on a cruise ship docking and going and doing these fun events where he’s sharing about Jesus and then gets back on the boat in luxury and sails to the next port. Everywhere Paul goes, he certainly shares the gospel, but it also causes disruption and all of the early believers were experiencing this. What Jesus had invited people into was a clash of kingdoms, where a kingdom, the kingdom of God, that is within and among us is being revealed. And kingdoms don’t clash without disruption. So, in today's reading Paul’s in Corinth and he's ministering to his fellow Hebrews, the Jewish people, trying his best, over and over and over and over to explain the implications of Jesus life in the Hebrew context and all he got was opposition and insult. So, he had to shake the dust off of his feet and he’s like, “look, I have tried, I’m innocent, like I’ve tried. Your blood is on your head. I'm going to preach to the Gentiles.” That’s pretty much what Paul does for the rest of his life and when we get into Paul's writings we’ll see exactly what he thinks about his Jewish heritage as well as the Gentile people been welcomed into God's kingdom. The irony in Corinth, though, is that Paul didn’t leave town, right? Like, so many times a mob has been stirred up against Paul or he's been thrown into jail or beaten or whatever and then they leave. In Corinth, he’d been spending time in the synagogue, but he was getting nowhere. And, so, he shook the dust and is like, “your blood is upon your own heads”, but all he did was go next door to the home of Titius Justice who was a Gentile, who worshiped God. He just happened to live next the synagogue. And, so, Paul moves next door, so Jew and Gentile alike can hear what he has to say. But the point is, this was all experienced through challenge and disruption and hardship. And we need to remember that as we continue to bring the good news to the world. When we’re engaged with the gospel we’re at the clash of kingdoms where light and darkness are colliding. So, that's gonna be disruptive, but we need to remember that we’re running a race that that were planning on finishing and that's language. That's the kind of language that Paul will use as we move into his writings. And, so, let's remember what the Lord spoke to the apostle Paul and apply it to our own lives. “Don't be afraid. Speak out. Don’t be silent. I'm with you. No one will attack or harm you. Many people in this city belong to me.”

Prayer:

Father, we acknowledge that we’ve often looked at the stories in the Scriptures through rose colored glasses, especially here in the New Testament as if all things were easy and if we could just go back to an easier time it would be better when it's never been easy and that's essentially what You said all of the time about this faith and about what we’re participating in battling darkness. Not just battling darkness in the world but battling our own darkness so that we are children of the light and can shine light into the darkness. So, come Holy Spirit, help us understand that we are a part of a long line of brothers and sisters who have carried this message forward thousands of years and we are still struggling - darkness and light. And You've given us an irreversible role to play in that story. Come Holy Spirit, may we live true, and in the light today in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, it is home base, it's where you find out what's going on around here. So, be sure to always stay tuned and connected in any way that you can.

We have July 7th coming up on the radar here. And July 7th is our own little internal holiday here for the Daily Audio Bible. It will be our…I believe…11th annual Daily Audio Bible long walk. So, every 7th of July we give ourselves permission to just realize we are in the middle of the year and it's time to regroup. It's time to take a day and set it aside and actually spend it with God. And the idea is just go somewhere beautiful, whether you're walking down the street to a park or whether you're getting in your car and driving for hours. Go somewhere that you find compelling and beautiful and quiet and serene and go for a long walk and become amazed at how much life is happening when you're being still and quiet. And realize that now you've just carved out the space to say everything needed to say, right? All the chaos that swirls around life, all the obligations and responsibilities, all of the depression and anxiety that are attached to things inside of us that we can't find any more because we’re moving too fast, so we can't deal with anything. What If we took a day with God and dealt with some things? How would that affect the rest of the year? Do you think that the one day with God where you regrouped would pay off in dividends far worth more than a day? Of course! We’re learning to walk with God, His Word is revealing Him to us. So now let's do it. Let take a day. And, yah, its individual. Like, when I go on my long walk, usually by myself…I’ve done it one year…one year with my wife, we do both do it, but usually it's an individual experience. And, so, I'll be doing it by myself, but I won't be doing it alone. It’s just like the Daily Audio Bible community. Yeah, you might be listening to this right now solitary, but you are not alone, and you are not listening alone. So, this is what we do, just go somewhere, spend the day with God, snap a picture or take a video wherever you go, post it back to our Facebook page, which is facebook.com/dailyaudiobible and we open windows into each other's lives and get to enjoy the beauty of God's earth all around us all on the same day. It's great. So, make plans for that. That's the Daily Audio Bible long walk this 7th of July, which is a Sunday this year.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you. We would not be a community, we wouldn't have a global camp fire burning, we wouldn't be doing what we’re doing if we didn't do this together and we've always done this together. So, if what we’re doing together - bringing the spoken word of God read fresh every day and offer it to the world to anyone who will listen to it anytime, anywhere. If that's…if that is the kingdom…that is light and good news for you then thank you, thank you for your partnership as we navigate and move through the summer time. So, there’s a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the at the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253, is the number to dial.

And that is it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Good morning DAB family, my name is Sarah and I’m calling from Los Angeles California. I’m calling for a prayer request. First of all, I want to thank you Brian for reading to us daily. This just gets me through the day every day. I’ve been listening to you for many, many years and this is pulled me out of depression, out of __ , out of so many things I have gone through in my life throughout these years. But you know God is so good and I thank God that he put this in your heart and that you are so faithful. But I’m calling in for prayer request. I’m calling asking my DAB family to pray for my daughter Michelle. She struggles with lupus and lately a lot of infections. She is going to have surgery on June 25th,  this Tuesday coming up. Please pray that God would be there, that He would guide the doctors and give the doctors a steady and give them wisdom. Please pray for a speedy recovery for her and that there would be any complications or flareups of the lupus. And I believe she’s going in right now. So, I just pray that the surgeon would not be…that she would get out of it and that it would not be postponed. Just pray that God would be in the midst and that we would all cling to Him and trust in Him wholeheartedly and that she would just come out of this with flying colors. I just…thank you all for your prayers and I will keep you updated. I love you all and may God bless you. Bye-bye.

Hi family, this is Terry from Southern California. I was listening to the June 20th podcast and I heard Anonymous called in for her marriage of 27 years and asking everyone to pray for her marriage and for her husband to become a believer in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So, anonymous I just want to lift you up in prayer today. Lord God, I pray in the name of Your…of our Lord and our Savior, Your son Jesus Christ that You would just touch Anonymous Father God. She’s been married 27 years to a nonbeliever Father God and she’s remained faithful, that she’s remained in the marriage dear God and she’s asking for protection from his…it sounds like his insults perhaps when she’s trying to share the good news of the gospel. And I’m not sure what else, You know, concerns her heart but I can hear her pain Father when she’s asking for prayer. So, I pray in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that You would touch her husband’s heart, that You would give him a kind spirit, a gentle spirit Father God and that You would remove anything from their marriage that is not like You. And we just cast it out in the name of Jesus Father. And I pray that You would just lift her spirits Father God, continue to surround her with good __ Christian friends who would be her in the midst of her pain. And __ else to her husband’s life after that who is a Christian and maybe he or she can reach him as well. So, we lift up her husband to the throne then today Father God asking that You would just intercede right now. And we claim this __ and victory for You Lord Jesus and just be with her in a mighty way and __ to how much You love her and how much DAB family is praying for her. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

I’m a first-time caller, a listener for over two years. Just call me Faithful In Vows Until Death. I know firsthand the pain and sorrow of the wayward spouse and the pain of rejection. I’ve been standing in the gap for several years now for the Lord Jesus to redeem my husband and also all the spouses around the world who are lost. I am sharing the truth of the Scripture of God regarding the covenant of marriage. Marriage it is God’s creation. It is a covenant not a contract. As Jesus said so clearly, that we will be witness to everyone. Make disciples by teaching them to obey God’s word. Jesus said if we truly love him we should obey his commandments. Brothers and sisters in Christ, I share all the Scriptures to you regarding the covenant of marriage. Read it for yourself. Luke 16:18, first Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, Romans 7:1-13, Matthew 5:32, first Corinthians 7:32, Malachi 2:13-17, Acts 3:19 and 3:26, Luke 13. Oh, Father in the name of Jesus I lift each and every one of these on this line who are going through all different storms in life. Thank You, Lord Jesus for You have paid the price for all our sins. Thank You oh Lord for knowing that everything is for season, that everything shall come to pass in Your perfect timing and in Your perfect…for You are perfect God. Thank You, Lord Jesus, for You are our great healer, You are our…the one who can only mend and minister as in every aspects of our broken areas in life. Thank You for knowing that we are wonderful…fearfully and wonderfully made for Your works in all of us are wonderful. Thank You Lord Jesus that You’ve got this. Thank You for Your heart’s desire for all of us to be saved and not to perish. We thank You Lord for Your plan…

Good morning DABbers this is Walta the burning bush that will not be devoured for the Glory of our God and King. It is the 24th of June 2019 and I just needed to call in because I heard a caller just talking about, you know, you don’t eat at one restaurant and cross the street and pay at another. And I had never heard that analogy but in my spirit for the last couple of days I’ve been urged to, you know, give my tithes to DAB. And, so, I did this morning actually before even listening to the DAB. And then I heard that saying that says, you know, pay where you’re fed. And I don’t feel lik…like were able to ever pay for the blessings that we’re getting. So, I don’t really __ you know __ too but, wow, what a confirmation from God that God is blessing this ministry. And wouldn’t it be amazing for this blessing, to be a part of it, you know, to be a part of this group in this kingdom __? So, I challenge all of you out there, if God is urging you to give, please go ahead and give to DAB. I’ve been listening to DAB for over 10 years now and they’ve __ consistent in feeding my spirit and my soul. So, thanks to the __ called and gave that analogy and I’m gonns use that again. All right, I’m at work so I gotta go. Love you guys. Bye.

[madmaddy-life]

So, I did this Q&A about Saints Row (about the Boss, aka BossOC or whatever). It’s not that... Good. I mean, I was answering freely, and some questions are not even answered properly, because - I have no idea what to say about it. Some got detailed (and pretty long) answer. Some are a bit repetitive in information... At some points I got lazy, so... Yeah.  If some of you are interesten in a huge wall of text - feel free to read this monstrousity. (sorry about no cut - for some reason for me it’s broken, and doesn’t OPEN the post, but rather just links back to the post with still CLOSED “read more”... I dunno, wtf man...)

1. Where did your character come from? What do they think of Stilwater?   Ion lived in a nearby small town (who cares about names?). One day  (he was almost twenty) he got up in the middle of the night, packed  most of his stuff in a backpack, got out of the window in the kitchen  and left his parents's home. Then he took the night bus to Stilwater  (I don't like the idea of Stilwater being mostly islands, because -  there's so much islands in the world, it's not that realystic. I know  it's a game design choice, but, ech. Continents man, continents.). He slept whole night and when he woke up - there was Stilwater. In  its whole glory... At first he didn't really liked it, just because the city he used to  live in, was different. But then got used to it, and soon felt like  it's the place he belongs to. Like home. 2. What is your character’s gender and sexual orientation? Did either of  those factors have an impact on their relationship with any homies,  or on their role within the Saints?   Ion is a male, and he's actually a bisexual (with preference for  males). This doesn't really affect anything, since Ion doesn't brings  this up in any way or conversation. He keeps his sexuality to  himself, unless he crushes directly on someone of the homies\ members  of the Saints (which usually doesn't happens. Because most of the  time he's too busy doing something. Plus, there's a little rule - no  relationships "at work"). And the other Saints - among those who know, and there's not that  many who knows, only the leutenants and Gat - don't care about that.  Pierce felt awkward about it, at first, but then got used to the  thought. Plus Ion reassured him that he "wouldn't date his whiny  ass". (It was insulting, but fair.)

3. What tattoos does your character have? Are they related to their  experiences as a Saint?   He's actually afraid of needles. Scared shitless. So he was dreading getting any tattoos for a really long time. Yet  after the space events he finally got one (after forty years of his  life), and a huge one too. Go big or go home, right? It's a tattoo of two wings starting on shoulder blades and going on  the arms... Cheesy a bit, bit in theme of the saints.

4. Describe your character’s appearance. What are their prominent  features? What appearance options do they use from the character  creator?   The distinctive feature about him is his hair and his nose. Apart  from that he's average looking guy. His hair have these few strands which always stand up, no matter how  much hair gel he uses (he uses. sometimes). Only if his hair are  completely soaked, then they lay flat. Topknot always stays, no  matter what, though Ion had few haircuts (a mallet till 20-21 y.o, a  messy undercut after the coma, and a simple haircut after that.) and  two times had his head completely shaved. (first time his dad forced  him to shave his head, because "you look like a fag, some sissy, not  a man. We have to fix that asap." (obviously Ion hated it, and was so  angry at his dad, he didn't talk to him for months). Second time he  got his head shaved by medics, while in a coma. They had to remove a  metal shard out of his head...).

His nose was broken at least four times. When he was a kid, his nose  was straight until he got into a fight over a boy he had a crush on.  (his nose was straight, but he is not. lol). Second time his nose got  broken when he picked up a fight with classmates, who badmouthed his  mother (classmates got their teeth removed by a collision with fists  and a leg of a chair...). Third time was by Maero. And fourth time...  Fourth time was stupid, he just faced an open door in the middle of  the night (no pun intended. Well... maybe a little)... Literally. He  smashed his face into a door... it was dark, okay?

5. What are your character’s taunt and compliment options? Do they issue  a universal gang sign for the Saints?   Is flipping off people really a taunt? But he does that. Makes an eye  contact and then gives the finger. The menace factor of this has a  huge range, which depends on how serious\angry Ion is about it. It  can be like a joke, when he smiles and flipps you off, or when he's  giving you the death look and flipps off with both hands. That means  that people are gonna die, if they wont run as fast as possible.

The compliments usually given in the form of gestures, as thumbs up,  and somehing like "good job". He rarely says compliments infront of  everyone, it's more like, if someone scored at something - he'll come  up to this person and tell them directly, that they did good and he's  proud of them. Ion doesn't really force anything on people, except couple of rules  which is :

1. Respect the Boss. (if you don't respect - you get your ass  kicked.)

2. Family goes first. (loyalty and devotion to each other and the  saints. If you value something else more and betray your family in  any way - you're dead, motherfucker...)

3. No one speaks thy name. (No one. Mostly because few people know  his name actually, and those who know are allowed to say it only in  private conversations, IF and only IF they've beend told so.)

So, Saints can greet each other however they want, dress in whatever  they want, basically do whatever they want, if they don't break the  rules. (and don't act too cocky...)

6. What voice option(s) did your character use? Were there any VA lines  that affected how you meta’d your character?   It's first voice in the SRTT (and in the SRIV I guess?). He has deep  voice, when he whispers it gets a bit husky.

7. How did your character meet the Saints? How old were they, and why  did they join?   As in the canon. He was walking by, minding his own businnes, and  got caught up in the gang rivalry. Actually got really scrapped by  some ricoched bullets, but was okay with getting involved in whole  gang thing. He was pissed off at the whole world, his parents (dad,  mostly), people in general, just left his hometown, was broke and  hungry. Plus he had this strong thirst for revenge, so fucking up the  gangs who got him shot - was really necessary. Ion was 20 years old, when he met Saints. And he got nothing else to  do. Being by himself and alone didn't really worked out for him, so  he decided to stay close to those who seemed to care about him and  his well being.

8. What were your character’s impressions of Canonization?  Since he was a problematic teen from the start, had anger issues  and picked up on any fights he could... He was okay with beating up  his new found peers.

9. Did your character set out to climb the top of the Saints’ ladder? How did your character react to the way Stilwater changed after their  coma?  Ion didn't really set up any goals, after getting in the Saints he  just did what he's been told to do, and actually was a little shy at  first. This was like way above his head. An adulthood he didn't  expected. (One night, he was laying in bed, looking up at the  ceiling, and then sudden realisation hit him. In what shit he got  himself into. But it was too late... Then, the feeling of being in  charge of everything was pleasing enough. He liked it, and became a  bit greedy about it...) Then he got blown up at the fucking boat. When he got out of the jail he was slightly weirded out by the  changes. That's because he did not yet grasped on the fact of how  much time he spent in a coma. The more time passed, the more freaked  out he became... Freaked out and pissed off. Everything changed but  he stayed the same, back in his own time.

10. Did your character ever feel betrayed by any former Saints after  waking from their coma? What did they think of the Saints who dropped  their flags? He was pissed. He was pissed at everything and everyone. But mostly  at himself - if only he weren't in a coma, Saints wouldn't gone to  shit... He didn't really blame those who gave up. The army without  the leader - is not really an army. He knows that. But that doesn't  mean he wasn't annoyed by the fact that he had to build everything  from the scratch and he felt like everyone abandoned him (except for  Gat, of course).

11. How good of a Boss is your character? How do they run the Saints? (If  your character is not the Boss, would they be a good Boss?)  When it comes to strategy - he's not that good, but most of the  time he works alone, or with the leutenants. So it's not really an  issue. He's actually pretty smart, though most of the time it doesn't  seem so, but it's a good thing - people underestimate him and his  abilities, and it doesn't work in their favor.

12. How well does your character fit in with the gang? Do they have any  friendships and/or rivalries apart from the Saints LTs?   He's the heart of it, and a big dad to everyone (except for the  Gat, who is like, another dad, but all about explosions and killing).  He's a big goof and sometimes even his comrades don't take him  seriously, which is... a stupid thing to do, because Ion most of the  time is serious about EVERYTHING. Even if he's doing a ridiculous  thing, and talking about it in a joking maner. (Like, if he calls to  everyone to  get all the gang, in the middle of the night and go to a  disney land - he's serious. If he says he's about to break someone's  hands - he will do exactly that. He means business at any time. In  crimes and friendly spending times.) He likes to hang out with all his buddies, when he feels like it. If  you're in the "family" - you're a friend, and you worth spending time  with. Ion usually acts friendly if he likes people, but doesn't exactly  trusts anyone who is not in the "family" circle. That being said - he  doesn't have any friends outside the Saints Row. Rivalries - a lot. Most of the gangs\criminals\politics - do not like  him, and some of them actively want him dead. But with no luck.

13. How did your character react to teaming up with Ultor? What projects  did they endorse or get involved with as part of the Saints-Ultor  media group? Hmmm...

14. What were your character’s impressions of Steelport? How well did  they adjust to being away from home?  "What the fuck with the statue?.." (about Magarac monument) Ion felt that the Steelport is a bit smaller for him, and at first it  was weird being there. And again, he had to start from the beginning.  He was a stranger and he didn't like the feeling of it. But as the  time passed, and city's gangs fell one after another - he felt more  and more at home. Because, yeah, another "home"\city conquered.

15. How did your character react to the way their enemies (like Kiki and  Zinyak) reminded them of their past failures? Did their accusations  bother them?  He fucking hates it. It's like poking a fresh fleshwound with a  knife, and twisting it inside. Outwardly he stays relatively calm,  but boils inside with rage. It takes a lot of effort for him, to not  snap and kill a person who's talking about it. It really bothers   him, because he feels responsible for deaths of his friends, and some  of them really fucked him up mentally.  (He had a crush on Lin, though  it faded really fast, and her death wasn't really upsetting. Though  he was mad when she died, because of how stupid it was, being caught  while trying to save the girl, and then SHE saves him instead and  dies... Aisha's death weren't that infuriating for him too, though they were  on good terms. He was upset and angered by the fact that it was aimed  at Johnny, and seing him being broken over Aisha's death was too much  to take. Carlos's death fucked him up the most. That one got him bad. After  his death he actually changed. He was in apathy for almost a month,  mourning his "little brother" and trying to get back to normal life -  which didn't happen. Then, after Shaundi called him - the switch has  flipped. Ion got out of the apathy to get revenge, and didn't stop  until the whole town was theirs. Then he slipped back to depression, and actually had to take meds, to  keep himself going. He continues to take meds till the SRIV.  Sometimes when he feels okay, he makes breaks in treatment, but it  ends up bad...)

16. Did your character Save Shaundi or Kill Killbane? Why?  Saved Shaundi. Because family goes first. And he couldn't bear  another friend's death.  He got to Killbane later.

17. What was your character’s presidency like? How did they campaign?  Troublesome. He's not exactly a president material, doesn't like to  sit and talk  to all these politics, it annoys him beoynd any reason.  If it wasn't for his pals - King, Keith, Pierce and Kinzie - he'd be  done with being president really fast. After some time he actually  got so frustrated, he started to sneak out of the White Crib, under  the nose of his bodyguards (those people piss him off badly), and out  in the city, to wreak some havoc and chill out (as he understands  chilling). Asha had to chase him down, (with Matt's help), to put him  back where he belongs. Ion was so upset and offended by that, he  didn't talk to both of them for a week. His campain was set up by Kinzie and King. Ion isn't good at  politics, but trusts them both. He also makes sure that all the  promises they made - are fullfilled.

18. What was your character’s nightmare simulation like?  Pretty much the "Pleasantville" shit. Where everyone's normal, and  HE'S normal. And forced into acting like a complete douchebag.  (Douchebag being a straight, lawful person, with a wife, not  swearing, not breaking stuff, wearing stupid clothes etc...) For him  it's a nightmare to be like his dad. His nightmare started in the morning, waking up, doing a routine and  going off to boring office work, then coming back home, and seeing as  along the way, all his friends die in accidents. But he couldn't  break out and try to help them, because he's in a hell of being  lawful person, who just looks at everything, and waits for the police  to act...

19. What did your character do after they killed Zinyak and took over his  empire?  For a long time - nothing. Like, really, nothing at all. They all  were chilling for a while, celebrating and fooling around, because  this whole deal was exausting. After that almost every member of the  crew underwent a wave of depression and homesickness. It affected  Matt and Pierce very bad - first kept to himself while desperately  seeking a way to bring the Earth back, second started to search  remains of human culture and bringing stuff on the ship, everything  that could be scavenged across the space. While it was possible to get back in time, because they had a time  machine - time traveling was prohibited by Kinzie, since she didn't  wanted to risk and play with fire in the face of the time paradoxes.  Even though she admitted that she'd gladly used it, to get back  everyone (especially Oleg). Ion fell into the apathy again, and since he got off his meds - none  existed on the ship, and surprisingly Zin's analogs wouldn't help (if  he'd actually asked for them, which he didn't. He never told anyone  about meds.) - he sinked into depression pretty deep. Drowning in  guilt. That lasted for a while, until Matt almost got himself braindead in  the simulation (he was researching if it'd be possible to execute one  plan he had, so he was re-playing and re-playing one scenario in the  simulation, till the computer system overloaded and went berserk...  He succeded though, to find a loophole. Couple of them, actually.). The news cheered everyone up, and Ion agreed to Matthew's  shenanigans... That's the whole AU story.

20. What major canonical changes did you apply to your character? Which mission-based DLCs (i.e. How the Saints Saved Christmas) are  canon for your character?  Hmm, not that much, I think. (Or a lot probably? Idk. I have a lot  of backstories and headcanons, so... ech?) None of the DLC's are canon. That being said - I'm pretty much okay  with aliens and sci-fi stuff, but all this "magical bullshit", while  it is funny, doesn't please me as a storyteller. (cuz, you know, pies  can have that much ingridients, until they become weird tasting.  Like, you can blend sci-fi and drama, or you can add drama to a  fantasy. But fantasy AND sci-fi??? No. Just... No. Magic and space  science don't work really well together, imho. That's just my own  preference. Still enjoy the "spinoffs" though. Like, Christmas DLC  was hilarious. As GOOH was hilarious too. When they started to SING,  I cracked and lost my shit laughing. But still, for me the best storylines were in SR2. It was the  strongest game out the shole series.)  (Though, maybe, I can "allow" the SRTT DLC's - with Kwilanna-Jenny  and that dork in glasses, who cloned Gat. Cuz that is sci-fi related,  and I do like Jenny (So does Ion. After all they were dating, until  she got into acting and set a priority to her career, and Ion got  annoyed by that.)

21. How did you structure the series’ timeline for your character?  Come on. That's like... Evil question. SR's timeline is SO FUCKED  UP, you either have to build your own ignoring the canon, OR you have  to somehow make the canon timeline work... So, withought saying lots and lots of dates\years, let's just... try  this... I'm going to base the timeline of a few factors which are  relevant to my Boss, and fit in logically with my headcanons. First  of - Boss's love to 80's songs. Then - Carlos's age and year of death  (he's 26, when he dies in 2007), and Matt Miller's age and "assumed"  year of birth (16(SRTT)-22(SRIV) 1998). So, Ion was born somewhere around 80s, he's one year older than  Carlos. In the 1998 Matt is born, Ion is 18. At age 20 Ion runs away  from home, soon after meets Julius and gets into the Saints. The  events of SR1 happen within a year or so, then six years of coma.  It's 2007 (Ion is 27, Carlos is 26 and soon dies, Matt is a 9 year  old kid.), the events of SR2 happen again within a year. Then another  7 years pass, bringing us to the SRTT, which happen in a 2014 (Ion is  34 y.o., Matt - 16.) Then, in a course of 6 years Ion and the Saints  get into the White house, and after that the invasion happens, and in  2020 the Earth is blown to pieces. (Ion is 40 years old, Matt - 22.). The age of other members of the Saints is like... I'll have to sit  down and either figure that out, or come up with something. Later.

22. What is the most memorable, uplifting/positive moment your character  experienced?

 He has quite a few memories he's fond of.

Running away from home was memorable, and all in all positive for  him.

One evening in Stilwater, at the old open-air cinema, when he and  Carlos were chilling together, looking at the sunset. 

Getting into serious relationship (for real, he fell in love pretty  hard for the first time in his life, and weren't rejected or dumped.  Because his previous crushes ended up just like that.).

Oh, and getting to drive the tank for the first time... That was  like... Christmas.

23. What is the most memorable, depressing/negative moment your character  experienced? Also quite a few.

When he got beaten up by a boy he liked. (That was like in  kindergarten. He's still salty about it.)

Carlos's death. (obviously. Because in Ion's eyes Carlos was his  younger brother, his family. He never had any siblings, so this bond  was very dear to him.)

When Matt got kidnapped and almost killed. (He still sees nightmares  about it. Well, he sees nigtmares about his "family" members on a  daily basis, but this one bothers him a lot.)

24. What is the weirdest/most embarrassing/most shocking thing your  character has done?  Embarrassing story - One time in Steelport, Ion was at old crib  (Shaundi's ex's flat, abandoned by everyone, cuz - there's like a lot  of nice houses out there, big cribs and skyscrapers. But Ion likes  tiny flats actually, so he stays there often.) sleeping till noon.  Naked. That's just how he is, don't ask. Someone rings at the  doorbell, Ion wakes up and goes to open the door. There's no one  there, but a suspicious box on the doorstep. Ion's confused. And as a  dork, he picks it up, to check what is it. Luckily, the box is  ticking pretty loud and then starts to ding... Ion realises his mistake and quickly abandones the flat. Through the  window. BOOM. Box explodes, leaving this jackass butt-naked on the  street, with burning flat, and no phone to call someone for help. So  he had to get to a nearest crib to at least get some clothes on. Now, he has nothing to be embarrassed - he has it all. BUT, the fact  that he's been half asleep and acted like a fool, and now had to walk  around in the nude - that was embarrassing. He's glad that he didn't  met anyone who knew him (like Pierce of Shaundi.) He didn't wanted to  explain this one..

Weird story - Almost everything he does is weird, on some level. But  this one weirded out Matt at least (he's pretty new to Ion's quirks,  so...). One day Ion just dissappeared from the White House, for a whole day,  and no one could find him, for some reason. Everyone were loosing  their minds, worrying and trying to find him, but with no luck. The next day he shows up at Matt's doorstep, very-very sick. His  throat is sore, he can't talk and has temperature, but grins happily.  Turns out he hijacked a chopper, flew all the way to Stilwater and  spent the whole day on the little lake on the hill (you know one,  near the open-air cinema), swiming and munching ice-cream. He had  like five jars in a mini fridge, some beer and an inflatable mattress  with him. He probably weirded out the locals the most though...

Shocking story - What isn't shocking about Ion? }XD

25. Has your character ever felt uncomfortable or disgusted with  something that occurred in the series?  Not really. He's okay with pretty much everything or he's angry at  it. Ion has high tolerance to violence\gore\whatnot, unless it's  affecting his friends.

26. What does being a Saint mean to your character? Does that definition  ever change for them during the series?  He always questions that. He's not sure really. It's like, they're  the Saints, because everything started at the church, but none of  them really is a saint. And definetely not him - he knows that, and  thinks that it's ironic...

27. What would your character have done if they hadn’t joined the Saints?  After dropping the college, if his dad didn't kicked his ass out into some military school (he would run away from there for sure), he probably ended up working with animals. Like in a petshop.

28. What is your character’s family like? How would they react to your  character being part or associated with the Saints?  His mom is a small, chubby woman, very religious and kind. She makes the best potato pies, goes in church, likes country music, loves her husband and her kid. (Ion is a kid. Even when he's in his fourty.) His dad is this tall, stubborn gray-haired man, always frowning. Always quiet. Always judging. Brr. He likes to watch guessing TV-shows, work in the garage. He never drinks. Doesn't smoke. Doesn't smile. Both of them are pretty close-minded. Though Ion's mom is more forgiving and understanding, she's soft. His dad is like a stone goat...  Since Ion ran away, they didn't actually knew what happened to him, and his mom searched for him, and reported to the police about dissapearance of her child (20 year old die-hard goof-off, but, hey, what do we know...) untill one day they saw him on TV. They found out he was in a gang after the Saints became a big deal, and... His mom was just happy that he's alive and looking well - "And he's in a suit, with a tie! He grew up so much!" His dad was dissapointed of course, disapproving and harshly, silently judging... As always.

29. What are your character’s weapons of choice? Car of choice?  Well, Ion likes all kind of weaponry - the more the better (the bigger - the cooler). Usually he has at least one pistol on him (but prefers dual weapons - pistols or uzi's). RPG is always a "must have", though it's too big to pull around... but if he has a chance to get his hands on a huge gun - he'll take the opportunity, be that an RPG, a minigun, or a flamethrower. Ion is a sucker for a muscle cars... Nuff said.

30. What super powers did your character favor the most in the  Simulation? What super power not in their arsenal did they wish they  had? Super jump and ability to glide. Everything else is least favourite, but useful in a fight. He likes to jump around and "fly" from a point A to a point B, and land all superhero-like. Such a show-off.}X ) He wishes that he had an ability to be invisible, but Matt made fun of him because of that... Well, he didn't "made fun of him" but more like, sarcastically mocked, explaining that, no matter how transparent Ion will be in the simulation, Matt always will see him as at least the information bits running through the code. "So, it will be pretty pointless, you see... invisible man. Haha." (Ion frowns)

31. Does your character ever sustain any major injuries or scars from  their work with the Saints?  Yeah, he has some scars. First of all, he has a little scar on left arm, from a ricocheit, when he first met Saints. Then second, he has this scar on his head - you can't see it, since he has a nice fluffy hair, but, if he had a shaved head... There's a scar starting behind his right ear and going on the back of the head. That's where the metal shard got stuck. Then, he has a scar on his right side of the body, from bullets. One slided merely touching him, other went through. He got shot by the brotherhood, when he was at Carlos's workplace - covered Carlos. He has lots and lots of small scars all over his body, but they're tiny - from ricocheit bullets\glass and metall shards and whatnot... Oh, well, and his nose was broken, as I said.

32. What activities does your character do when they’re not doing Saints  business? He sleeps. Sleeps, sits in the shower, eats or watches TV. Everything normal and mundane he does at his "free time". When he's feeling okay - he rather spends time with someone, doing whatever the person wants to do (he once spend whole day shopping with Shaundi and Pierce, they couldn't stop him after. The other day he tried to get Kinzie out of her hideout and they ended up at one of those Hi-tech exibitions. She was happy. Ion fell asleep at the couch.). Or if they're okay with what he offers - which can be anything from simple movie night, to a heavy weapon shooting range session - they'll do that. When he feels mentally ill, he'll spend his time sitting at some isolated place, far-far away from people, spacing out. He likes to stay at high place (like a hill or rooftops) and watch the day pass by. Sometimes he stays in his small flat and watches TV-series. You know he's at the bad place, when he watches three seasons in a row...

33. What radio stations or songs from the series does your character  listen to? Are there any non-series songs you attribute to your  character?  Ion loves - LOVES - the Mix radio station. All the 80s. All the 80s songs, all the old stuff. He knows all the lyrics, though he's not that good at singing or getting in a rhytm, it doesn't stop him. He also low key listens to the K12 and Gen-X, and likes dubstep, but he won't admit it, ever.

34. What diversions did your character like to do in Steelport and  Stilwater? Which ones did they avoid?  Everything that includes mayhem and destruction. Watching things go BOOM and explode to pieces is a favourite thing. Insurance fraud also was "fun". (Though one time he got his leg broken for real, and noticed it only on a next day when it got all swallen. It was a closed fracture, isn't that bad, but he had to wear a cast for two weeks. Ion is tough, and heals very quickly - his coma was a rare case of not getting well fast - everything else has to be a severe injury, to make him lay in bed for a long time...) He doesn't like races, even though he likes cars. He's "bad" at driving, and doens't like how smug all the racers are... Ion also felt uncomfotable during escort missions. The sounds are weird, man.

35. Describe your character’s fashion sense. Which shops in Stilwater  and/or Steelport did your characters visit the most?  When sport meets classic... His style is more casual. He's a big guy and sometimes has problems with getting a fitting clothes. He's almost 6'3" feet tall, and likes to wear loose clothing, or something that fits well, and doesn't hamper the movement. Otherwise he'll just rip it real fast... (So, any shop where clothes are big...)

36. Which restaurants in Stilwater did your character visit a lot? What  did they usually order? Freckle bitch's. Oh man, this guy... He's like a garbo eating machine - all the fast-food you can imagine, he'll eat and probably still be hungry. He has high metabolysm, and burns all the calories very fast, so he can handle all this greasy food and lots and lots of sugar...

37. Which crib in Stilwater was your character’s favorite? Which crib in  Steelport? A little flat at the Red Lights, the one in the basement and Shaundi's ex's flat.

38. Name the top three Saints your character got along with the most. Gat, Shaundi and Pierce. Old buddies, best friends. They're time-proof, and he knows them for a long time now. Even though he's on a good terms with most of the Saint's, if he'd be in trouble they're the ones he'll call for help first.

39. Name the top three Saints your character got along with the least.  Angel, Troy, and... ??? He just doesn't get them. Either doesn't understand, or gets annoyed by them pretty fast.

40. What shenanigans do your character and their homies get involved in  together? Many things. I can't even...

41. Which homies did your character call up as followers on a regular  basis? Which homies did they call the least, or not at all? Usually Ion doesn't call anyone. He likes to work alone, and doesn't want to risk anyone's lives. But if it's not dangerous, he'll call somebody... (Usually Gat or Oleg. Then Pierce or\and Shaundie.) In Steelport Simulation he liked to tease Matt and called him a lot, for whatever reason (though he knew how Matt felt about simulation after being trapped in there).  He never called Kinzie. Ion was okay with her being at home, and helping him from a distance, that was suitable for both of them.

42. Describe your character’s relationship with (asker inserts name here;  eg. Johnny, Viola) Johnny - it's that kind of relationship, when one of them can call the other in the middle of the night, to ask to meet them at the pier with a pocket of marshmallows and a flamethrower, right the fuck now - and they'll be there. Without questioning the sanity of the caller. Ion will tear apart everyone for Johnny, and Johnny will do the same for Ion. Both of them are there for each other, to either beat in some sense into or to support in the insanity.  Shaundi - she's like a little sister for Ion, and everytime she  makes some serious decisions, or acts tough, he gets all emotional and thinks that it's adorable. (And Shaundi tries to punch him, just to not show that she's glad that he's happy and proud of her.) Ion for her is a big dorky brother, though she knows that when he's near - she's safe. So it's like two siblings, who sometimes get on eachothers nerves.  Pierce - is both a party-starter and a party-pooper. And Ion actually likes it about Pierce, since he can be happy-go-lucky, and serious and strategic when needed. They can tease eachother about everything, but both know when to stop and not hurt the feelings. Sometimes they meet up to bitch about something to eachother and drink beer. Pierce likes that Ion listens to him (even though he makes this "oh, no, here we go again"-face, he actually takes him seriously), and Ion knows that Pierce can give a good advice. Occasionally.  (Others - if someone will ask about it, then I’ll add\write it down.)

43. Who (if anyone) did your character romance? If they romanced someone  (or multiple people) how did they get together? Matt. He fell for him really bad, after a while. They actually have met before Matt showed up on Kinzie's monitors.  Matt went out to work through some things and be alone for a while, he was at the little park, near the water, dressed all casual to not draw any attention. He was minding his own business, when he heard gunshots, yelling and cars crushing. Then Ion shows up, pulling a huge crowd of morningstar gang members after him. They're pissed as hell, shooting at him. Matt tries to hide behind a stone fence, to not get shot, he's horrified. When Ion ends up hiding behind the same fence, Matt is in terror and panic, he can't even say a word. He knows WHO this asshole with a pistol and a red shirt is. Ion has no idea who Matt is, he shoots back at morningstars and jokingly asks Matt about the weather. Matt is in an awe, can't speak and just shrugs. Then Ion asks him whether he can swim or not. After that he just grabs him and jumps in water, hiding under a bridge in a huge pipe. Matt is  in shock, and stays quiet till morningstar leave, and Ion helps him to get out on the shore. Ion then apologises, hijacks a car parked nearby and asks Matt if he needs a drive to safety, (Matt actively refuses, shaking his head) then he drives away. Why, for what reason Ion tried to "help" Matt get out of there - no one knows... After a long time on the ship, after Ion got pissed off at Matt and punched him, they both tried to stay away from each other. Matt was a bit scared of Ion - he always was - and after a beating he stayed at the loading dock of the ship, working on stuff and trying to avoid Ion at all costs. Ion felt guilty right after Matt refused his hug - he saw the fear in his eyes. After that he felt weird and guilty about everything, and seeked a way to apologise... At night he sneaked in the dock, and right in time - Matt tried to carry a heavy box, and almost got crushed under it. Luckily, Ion helped him to carry it, and word for word... He apologised. Thereafter Ion searched for any opportunity to spend some time with a geeky kid, he wasn't sure exactly WHY. But after some events in the simulation, it hit him. Matt suspected it, but he refused the thought and his own sympathy to the utmost. When Ion resqued him from Killbane, he gave up... That's the whole AU story.

44. Which gangs did your character hate the most? Which gangs did they  fear the most? Brotherhood and Luchadores. Ion both hated them the most and was a  bit afraid of. Not for himself, but for his "family". Both these  gangs mean business, and though Luchadores were less threatening,  Killbane somehow reminded Ion of Maero... Ion hates Maero. Ion hates  Killbane. He wants them both DEAD. If he could - he'd kill Maero  twice, or even three times. Same goes for Killbane.

45. Name a fanfic and/or fanart of your character that you are fond of  the most.  Well, I'm not sure if somebody wrote or drew Ion, except for me, so... Feel free to do so, if you want, it'd be nice to see\read. I didn't write anything about him (except this fucking huge Q&A list, haha), but I drew him a lot, and made some short comics about him. I'm quite fond of him in general.

46. What non-SR stuff did you draw inspiration from for your character? Not sure... Maybe my own experience with the world, relationships  and some dreams and wishes, fears maybe.

47. Who would you cast as your character if someone decided to make an  IRL movie out of Saints Row?  Ha... haha. Don't know. I'm not into action movies, and have no idea about actors and whatnot (Jack Nicholson is pretty cool, but he's not really "Ion-like", and he's what, hundred years old? Joking ofcourse. He's cool.). But IF there was a cartoon - full lenght, hand-drawn or 3D movie about the Saints - I'd watch the heck out of it.

48. Do you have any alternate universes or crossovers involving your  character? Yees, I do. A huge AU, where they got Earth back using science and  loopholes.

[gesteckt1]

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The XPS 13 performs valiantly, pushing just over nine hours of playback before dying. Unfortunately, the XPS 15 easily bests it with just over 14 hours of 4K video playback.How is it possible for a higher-performance (and theoretically power-hungrier) laptop to win this fight? The most obvious reason is the battery size: the XPS 15 has nearly twice the battery capacity, at 96Wh vs. the 51Wh fuel tank in the XPS 13. Even though the XPS 15 has demanding CPU, RAM, and graphics components to feed, video is usually handled by the integrated graphics cores in the CPU. For the most part, the high-performance parts are kicking back and playing dominoes.

Certainly playing a game or a video encode, or anything that works the GPU or CPU cores hard will drain the battery faster, but video playback is actually among the easiest chores a laptop can do today.You know why there are nine Supreme Court justices? To avoid splits like this. Even though we didn't intend for this to end in a tie, it's exactly what we have. In the end, your personal needs will guide you. If you're looking for dominant performance and bang for the buck, the XPS 15 is the one to get. If you value portability and can "settle" for good performance, the XPS 13 is the go-to unit.GARY — Police released surveillance photos Monday of several people suspected of breaking into Gary Middle College on Sept. 4 and stealing 20 laptop computers.The men broke out a glass window on a rear door at the school, 4030 W. Fifth Ave., the evening of Sept. 4, police said.

School staff boarded up the window and hole, but the suspects returned and removed 20 laptops using a cart from the school.A camera captured images of two of the four suspects, police said. One of the men might have worn a jacket with a logo from Clark High School in Hammond. FOR THOSE DIGGING the convertible notebook concept, solid choices abound. HP’s Spectre x360 has been at the top of the heap for a while, neck and neck with the Microsoft Surface Book. As it goes with these things, HP has updated the x360 to keep with the times and the competition. While it hasn’t reinvented the converti-wheel with this 2018 release, it has re-solidified its position at the top of the pack.

If you’re familiar with recent vintages of the x360, this version will look awfully familiar. It carries the same 360-degree convertible hinge to allow for use as a laptop, a slate tablet, and everything in between, plus a similar, all-business color scheme of slate gray and coppery metallics. (That’s "dark ash silver" for those in the know; two other colors are also available.) While the design has been lightly tweaked here and there, it’s a very close sibling to the 2017 model.While specs have been updated for 2018 components, my review unit was on the lower end of HP's configuration spectrum. That means a relatively slow 1.6GHz Core i5 processor. Also onboard were 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD, and screen with the resolution capped at 1920 x 1080 pixels. Those are largely entry-level specs today, but the new Spectre x360 still performed roughly on par with the beefed-up 2017 model on most of my benchmark tests—and bested it by a healthy margin on a few of the more up-to-the-moment graphics tests. Connectivity includes two USB-C/Thunderbolt ports (one is used for charging), a full size USB 3.1 port, and a microSD card reader. A tiny fingerprint scanner is built into the right side panel as well.

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The HP Pen (included with this model, but $51 if it goes missing) is an impressive active stylus with a significant weight to it. Designed to work with the Windows Ink ecosystem, it’s responsive and intuitive, though trying to write directly on the open screen in laptop mode results in the LCD bouncing a bit, which makes the stylus stutter across the display. Tablet mode works better when significant pen work is required.While the keyboard and touchpad are well designed and work without complaint, I did notice some springiness in the chassis beneath the center of the keyboard. This caused more bouncing when typing. If you’re heavy-handed with your keystrokes, this could be a nuisance, though I wouldn’t classify it as a huge problem.

If there’s one area where the x360 shined brightest, it’s in battery life. I complained about its limitations in this department last year. For 2018, HP has dramatically boosted life from a little over five hours to well over eight hours. That may be in part due to the device carrying a considerably dimmer screen than last year’s model, as well as the lower-end (and less power-hungry) specs, but either way it’s a welcome upgrade that puts HP at the top of the heap when it comes to unplugged longevity.All in all, HP hasn’t really rocked the boat here, turning in a 2.8-pound, 13-inch convertible that takes baby steps toward correcting its predecessor’s flaws while introducing only a couple of minor ones of its own. If you have a recent-model convertible, there’s not really a compelling need to upgrade today, but those moving up from a machine that’s more than two years old—or entering this category for the first time—should be quite satisfied with the x360 13.

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Let's face it, battery technology isn't experiencing any miracles in advancement. For years the PC industry has focused on gradually improving time away from the wall by cleverly stuffing larger batteries into our laptops, doubling down on power management tools and focusing on CPU and GPU efficiency. It's fair to say Intel has worked diligently to gradually improve CPU efficiency, so now its tackling enemy #1 of battery drain: the display.During a keynote at Computex in Taipei, Intel SVP Gregory Bryant announced Intel Low Power Display Technology, a potentially radical new approach to laptop displays that was co-developed with Sharp and Innolux. How radical? It's a one-watt LCD panel that could add up to 8 hours of battery life to an ultrabook or 2-in-1 laptop.

To prove its point, Intel brought my new favorite laptop -- a Dell XPS 13 -- onstage that was outfitted with the new display tech and showed that it could loop video for 25 hours. The existing XPS 13 is capable of "only" 15 hours of video playback under the very best circumstances using Intel's Core-i7 8550U and a 60 wH battery. That's looping video. It's technically possible that under lighter workloads (browsing, email, etc) the time away from the wall could exceed 25 hours.Note that it's unclear whether Intel retrofitted an existing XPS 13 with the 1W panel, or if this is a prototype. At any rate, users obviously won't be able to magically add this battery life-boosting technology to their existing systems. Laptop vendors will need to incorporate it into future designs, and of course the components inside will need to feature an Intel processor.

Crucially, Intel claims that users won't be able to distinguish any differences in brightness or resolution using Low Power Displays. Obviously claims like these and the 25-hour battery life demonstration will need to be put under a microscope using real-world scenarios, but there's no denying that a 1W display could do wonders for laptops, especially those already boasting efficient components and slimmer designs.As is the case at events like these, details were sparse. We'll have to wait and see what announcements follow, and if Intel's new display tech will have any impact on the price of future laptops. In any case, I'm excited about it.Stop me if this sounds familiar: you’re about to sit down with your laptop, but as soon as you open the lid, you’re instructed to plug in for power, as you only have about 5% battery left.Now you need to get the AC plug, find an outlet, and plan on being tethered to the wall for a while.Energy management has plagued portable computing since its inception, but thanks to more powerful batteries, newer processors, and smarter software, it's getting better all the time.

[mill3nniumforc3]

1:Is there a boy/girl in your life?: yep :) 2:Think of the last person who hurt you; do you forgive them?: yes. 3:What do you think of when you hear the word “meow?”: Whose Line Is It Anyway 4:What’s something you really want right now?: to not work 83 hours next week 5:Are you afraid of falling in love?: can’t be afraid of something you’ve already done 6:Do you like the beach?: yeah, it’s ok 7:Have you ever slept on a couch with someone else?: yeah, with my sister. 8:What’s the background on your cell?: Ocean Motion is my lock screen, and Steel Vengeance is my home screen 9:Name the last four beds you were sat on?: my bed in Commons, my bed at home, a bed at Castaway Bay, and a bed at Comfort Inn. 10:Do you like your phone?: it does what it needs to do, but it’s reaching the end of its lifespan. I thankfully get my upgrade in December, so it just needs to hang on til then. 11:Honestly, are things going the way you planned?: absolutely not, but I love the way they’re going anyway. 12:Who was the last person whose phone number you added to your contacts?: the TL at a ride where I was trained 13:Would you rather have a poodle or a Rottweiler?: Rottweiler. 14:Which hurts the most, physical or emotional pain?: emotional pain, hands down 15:Would you rather visit a zoo or an art museum?: art museum. Zoos smell bad. 16:Are you tired?: always 17:How long have you known your 1st phone contact?: since birth 18:Are they a relative?: my momma 19:Would you ever consider getting back together with any of your exes?: no way in cold Hell! 20:When did you last talk to the last person you shared a kiss with?: today 21:If you knew you had the right person, would you marry them today?: of course I would! 22:Would you kiss the last person you kissed again?: HELL YEAH! 23:How many bracelets do you have on your wrists right now?: none, but I have a watch on my left wrist and two ponytail holders (one yellow, one pink) on my right wrist 24:Is there a certain quote you live by?: “Dream as if you will live forever. Live as if you will die today.” 25:What’s on your mind?: I miss my boyfriend 26:Do you have any tattoos?: nope 27:What is your favorite color?: pink 28:Next time you will kiss someone on the lips?: August 31st! 29:Who are you texting?: nobody currently. My boyfriend went to bed. 30:Think to the last person you kissed, have you ever kissed them on a couch?: yes, actually, I have 31:Have you ever had the feeling something bad was going to happen and you were right?: yep! 32:Do you have a friend of the opposite sex you can talk to?: Mario! 33:Do you think anyone has feelings for you?: it would be awkward if Russell didn’t have feelings for me. 34:Has anyone ever told you you have pretty eyes?: the very first thing he ever complimented me on was my eyes. 35:Say the last person you kissed was kissing someone right in front of you?: it better be his mother. 36:Were you single on Valentines Day?: nope! 37:Are you friends with the last person you kissed?: well obviously. 38:What do your friends call you?: Soybean, Baha, Coffee bean, Drama Queen 39:Has anyone upset you in the last week?: none that I can remember. 40:Have you ever cried over a text?: well, my mom told me about my grandma’s passing over text and I cried immediately, so... 41:Where’s your last bruise located?: my elbow 42:What is it from?: I don’t know, honestly... 43:Last time you wanted to be away from somewhere really bad?: probably the other day when I wanted to leave work despite having four hours left of my shift 44:Who was the last person you were on the phone with?: Katie (the TL at OMO) 45:Do you have a favourite pair of shoes?: my black and pink sneakers that I bought on Black Friday in 2014. They’re still in great shape now! 46:Do you wear hats if your having a bad hair day?: I’ll wear a hat, a messy bun, or a half ponytail tied with the rest of my hair. 47:Would you ever go bald if it was the style?: nope! I love my hair. 48:Do you make supper for your family?: sometimes, but nobody ever eats it. 49:Does your bedroom have a door?: yes. 50:Top 3 web-pages?: YouTube, Netflix, and my work email 51:Do you know anyone who hates shopping?: my dad 52:Does anything on your body hurt?: my head has been hurting since Tuesday. Bloooop. 53:Are goodbyes hard for you?: YES! 54:What was the last beverage you spilled on yourself?: water lol 55:How is your hair?: short, messy after being tied up all day 56:What do you usually do first in the morning?: hit the snooze button 57:Do you think two people can last forever?: yes! 58:Think back to January 2007, were you single?: I was 12 in January 2007. I’d be more concerned if I wasn’t... 59:Green or purple grapes?: depends on my mood. Normally green though. 60:When’s the next time you will give someone a BIG hug?: August 27th because Mario will be back at the boat! 61:Do you wish you were somewhere else right now?: I wish I was with Russell 62:When will be the next time you text someone?: tomorrow morning 63:Where will you be 5 hours from now?: sleeping 64:What were you doing at 8 this morning.: arriving at work 65:This time last year, can you remember who you liked?: ...Eric. He’s gay and I knew that he was, but I for some reason found myself liking him. I thankfully snapped out of it a couple weeks later though. 66:Is there one person in your life that can always make you smile?: Russell 67:Did you kiss or hug anyone today?: I hugged Mustafa today because he was sent to the boat. 68:What was your last thought before you went to bed last night?: Why can’t I sleep??? 69:Have you ever tried your hardest and then gotten disappointed in the end?: my whole life 70:How many windows are open on your computer?: six 71:How many fingers do you have?: 10 72:What is your ringtone?: Silk (it’s one of the iPhone ringtones) 73:How old will you be in 5 months?: I will be 24 years, 9 months, and 23 days 74:Where is your Mum right now?: at home, probably sleeping 75:Why aren’t you with the person you were first in love with or almost in love?: I am. 76:Have you held hands with somebody in the past three days?: no 77:Are you friends with the people you were friends with two years ago?: some people, yes. 78:Do you remember who you had a crush on in year 7?: his name was Chris. 79:Is there anyone you know with the name Mike?: I have three uncles named Mike, and there were two people in my grade school class named Mike, and there was someone in CCM at my university named Mike 80:Have you ever fallen asleep in someones arms?: ohhh yes. 81:How many people have you liked in the past three months?: just one :) 82:Has anyone seen you in your underwear in the last 3 days?: I hope not. 83:Will you talk to the person you like tonight?: I did. 84:You’re drunk and yelling at hot guys/girls out of your car window, you’re with?: nobody because I don’t do that shit 85:If your BF/GF was into drugs would you care?: YES! My mom’s best friend lost her 19 year old son to a heroin overdose. I'm not going to let that happen to him too. 86:What was the most eventful thing that happened last time you went to see a movie?: there were two guys who were short a few bucks for popcorn and drinks, so I offered to cover the rest. 87:Who was your last received call from?: I have no idea. It was from another country, which was odd. 88:If someone gave you $1,000 to burn a butterfly over a candle, would you?: NO! 89:What is something you wish you had more of?: money 90:Have you ever trusted someone too much?: unfortunately so... 91:Do you sleep with your window open?: at home, yes.  92:Do you get along with girls?: yeah, but I get along with guys better.  93:Are you keeping a secret from someone who needs to know the truth?: nope. 94:Does sex mean love?: in society, it doesn’t. To me, sex and love go hand-in-hand. I’m in love with my boyfriend even though we haven’t done it yet, but when we do, it’ll be because we are in love. 95:You’re locked in a room with the last person you kissed, is that a problem?: not at all :) 96:Have you ever kissed anyone with a lip ring?: no 97:Did you sleep alone this week?: my stuffed animals kept me company 98:Everybody has somebody that makes them happy, do you?: absolutely :) 99:Do you believe in love at first sight?: love at first *swipe :) 100:Who was the last person that you pinky promise?: Katie

[first-of-her-nxme]

Where is the coherent foreshadowing for Jaqen and Arya? It all seems taken out of fucking nowhere

It starts in the very first book when Arya names her direwolf after the queen who married a Dornishman, and it never stops because Arya and Jaqen are repeating Lyanna’s and Rhaegar’s story. Of course, in ASOIAF, the story is never exactly the same. Which by the way gives me hope that at least they will have their happy ending. Or the closest thing to a happy ending, which in George Martin’s world means less heartbreaking than the others’;d

Trouble with Jaqarya foreshadowing is that George Martin started writing the story with a five year gap in mind between Arya’s arrival in Braavos and A Dance with Dragons. So, when he first envisioned the story he already had a 15 year old Arya in mind. It means that Arya and Jaqen would have reunited in A Dance with Dragons already and she would have been old enough for a romance. It also means that Jaqen’s identity would have been revealed in A Dance with Dragons.

But, since GRRM abandoned the idea, we have to wait for the reveal till The Winds of Winter. As a consequence the whole build-up is made of hints, symbols, clues, metaphors, parallels to R/L and so on. Nothing is said explicitly because it would ruin the big reveal of who Jaqen is and what’s ahead of them. 

So, from the top:

1. Arya names her direwolf after Nymeria, a queen who found home far from her own country and who married a Dornishman. Jaqen is half Dornish, he is Elia’s and Rhaegar’s son, Aegon VI. I already pinned the answer about his true identity to my profile so please read it if you need further explanation.

Thanks to the Game of Thrones finale we know that Arya will sail across the sunset sea. I searched through the books after s8 and of course I found information that they bothe, J&A, will leave. I guess I need to thank D&D for Arya’s ending, otherwise I would have overlooked the clues completely. 

So, either they will find home far away, somewhere in the sea, or in Braavos or in Dorne or they will return to Jaqen’s castle ( the Red Keep or Dragonstone ). Wherever they will stay, it’s going to be far from Arya’s birth place, Winterfell. 

2. Nymeria has golden eyes, Arya thinks that they shine like golden coins - it’s another connection to Jaqen ( Aegon ) who switches his iron coin for a golden dragon in A Feast for Crows. The coin is poisoned and kills Pate but it’s also a symbol of courtship. Pate needed it to claim his beloved Rosey.

3. On the way to King’s Landing, Arya is picking up flowers in the Neck, perhaps in the same area where the flowers for Lyanna’s crown had been picked. Ned is deeply moved when he sees Arya with the flowers because she reminds him of Lya. The flowers are purple - purple is the symbol of royal birth, of the rightful heir to the throne whom Jaqen ( Aegon ) is. They are called poisoned kisses and burn Arya’s hands - Jaqen is using poisons and represents fire. He is a Targ, a future dragon rider. Arya will also burn her hands and lips in the House of Black and White while learning to make poisons.”Poisoned kisses” is a bad name, it implies doomed love which reminds us of R/L. For Arya it means a love for the murderer. Hopefully with a happier ending than Lya’s love.      

4. Ned tells Arya that she will marry a king and rule his castle and they will have sons. Like I said before, Jaqen is the rightful king. In A Clash of Kings, Arya even reveals his identity though it is very cleverly concealed in the scene when she gives him his own name. To be brief: it's a play on words; he asks her if the name of the king she wants dead is Joffrey and she answers the name ( of the king ) is Jaqen H’ghar. So Joffrey is not the king, he’s impostor, the true king is Jaqen.

5. In King’s Landing, Arya has dreams of Rhaenys though she doesn’t realize it. She also catches Rhaenys’s cat, her “little dragon”, and kisses its forehead. In Harrenhal, Jaqen kisses her forehead as if to return the kiss;)

6. Arya ruins Sansa’s silk dress and offers to make her a new one. Sansa tells her she could make a dress good enough only to clean the pigsty.

That pigsty is kind of a big deal.

In fairytales, princes disguise themselves as swineherds to hide their true identity, like in H.C Andersen’s story “The Swineherd”.

George Martin used this motif in his books too. In AFFC Jaqen wears the face of Pate “the Pig Boy”. Arya, on the other hand, lives in Braavos in his house, makes dresses and sweeps the floors. She lives in the Pig Boy’s house, in the pigsty, and cleans it -  just like Sansa has said. Only the pigsty is the prince’s house like Ned has foretold. 

7. In Harrenhal, Jaqen wakes Arya from her wolf dream and kisses her. This motif comes from the Sleeping Beauty fairytale - only the prince can awake the sleeping beauty. 

8. Also in Harrenhal, Jaqen and Arya make their “weasel soup”. They pour hot broth on the guards to free the Northmen. Jaqen gives Arya a pair of padded gloves and he is wearing the identical gloves himself, while they struggle the pot of soup between them - it’s a metaphor for sharing power. Gloves are symbol of power and noble birth. 

The cooking pot is another motif borrowed from “The Swineherd” - the prince has a magic pot that plays a song. Jaqen ( Aegon ) has a song too, a song of Ice and Fire. 

9. Jaqen gives Arya his coin ( we already know it’s a symbol of courtship ) and she pays with it for a passage across the narrow sea. She crosses the sea to get to the House of Black and White, the house of darkness.

In Greek mythology, the souls of dead people pay with a coin to cross the river and get to the Underworld. Arya, like Persephone, is first shown while picking up flowers and then she descends into the Underworld seduced by GRRM’s version of Hades. Hades has a three-headed dog, Jaqen has a prophecy ( and the coin ) of a three-headed dragon.

10. When Arya meets the Ghost of High Heart, the witch compares her to Jenny, a girl with flowers in her hair who fell in love with a Targaryen prince.

11. In ASOS, Arya listens to Tom Sevenstrings playing My Featherbed song. The song was written by Rhaegar for Lyanna. It tells the story of Jenny and Duncan Targaryen but Rhaegar concealed his own feelings for Lya in the text. The lyrics refer to Arya and Jaqen as well - they repeat J/D and R/L story of a Targaryen prince and a girl from the North.

Of course Rhaegar didn’t know about his son and Lya’s niece when he wrote the song:)) 

The song is not about Gendrya, like people think. I already mentioned it in one of my answers. It’s very important because it helps to understand what had happened in Harrenhal and what will happen to Arya and Jaqen. 

Arya hears My Featherbed after Gendry invited her to the smithy. He knocked her over and they wrestled. Her dress was torn and she looked as if someone had tried to hurt her. Right after Tom plays Rhaegar’s song. Gendry obviously didn’t want to hurt Arya but that scene explains what Robert did in Harrenhal after Rhaegar left - he was furious that Rhaegar crowned Lya so he demanded “his rights”. That’s why Lyanna ran off. Rhaegar was her rescue.

 12. In the House of Black and White Arya sleeps under the red blanket which reminds her of her favorite blanket from Winterfell. I’m sure it’s Jaqen’s blanket, and perhaps his bed too, because red is his color: red hair, red poison, red war, red god, red comet over Harrenhal, red dragon (?)  - red accompanies him throughout his journey. Of course black is his color too, it’s the color of the Stranger. Red and black are the colors of House...

13. In Arya’s Braavosi chapters GRRM concealed the story of the beginning of Rhaegar’s and Lyanna’s love in Harrenhal. But that’s a massive story to tell so I will write a separate post about it.

14. Finally, in Mercy chapter Arya hears the story of the first Black Pearl of Braavos, the pirate queen, and her affair with King Aegon IV. She sighs wistfully and says that she would love to see a dragon too. Dragon here means more than an animal, GRRM once again hints at her future romance with the Dragon.

15. “Mercy” chapter parallels the prologue to A Feast for Crows. Originally it was meant to be in AFFC but GRRM eventually moved it to TWOW.

Perhaps GRRM wanted Jaqen’s chapter to start AFFC and Arya’s chapter to end the book. The prologue is a chapter with two main motifs: dragons and love. “Mercy” is a chapter of revenge and love for a dragon. The prologue starts at night when Pate’s beloved is sleeping naked in her room. “Mercy” starts at dawn when Arya wakes up naked in her room and sees a dragon boat passing beneath her window.

But those two chapters are so rich in parallels that they deserve a separate post as well:)

16. While Jaqen and Arya are having their adventures in Oldtown and Braavos respectively, in the North Mance is infiltrating Winterfell. Mance is posing as a bard. He sings a song of a Dornishman’s wife in turn with the Northman’s daughter. It’s another delightful hint that the Northman’s daughter, Ned’s daughter is ( well, will be ) the Dornishman’s wife.

As you can see it’s a pretty massive foreshadowing. I probably still omitted something because there are really tons of those clues. 

I hope you’ve enjoyed the read. 

Thanks for the ask :)

[beardedwinnerobject-blog]

Low-Hour Private Pilot Looking to Buy First Airplane?

"Low-Hour Private Pilot Looking to Buy First Airplane?

Hello everyone. I am a Canadian with a Private Pilot License (heavier-than-air, single engine, non-high-performance, land-based, no additional ratings/endorsements). I have about 65 hours total time, VFR daytime only.    I am brand new to the used aircraft market. I was looking for some advice on any of the following:    1. Generalities of airplane ownership and costs involved.   2. Any links to helpful information or suggested books to read would be great.   3. How complicated is it to import an aircraft into Canada from, ex. the USA?   4. Possible aircraft recommendations.    With regard to the last request, here is my general outlook as to what I would need:   - Single engine preferred with relatively modern avionics, fuel efficient   - Price - Less than $250,000   - Payload - 450-700lbs.   - Range - At least 1000NM preferred   - Speed - The faster the better!    I understand that it's a constant trade-off between payload and range. That's why I am looking for a versatile airplane that allows for a good balance while still remaining within a low-hour pilot's skill.    I've been looking at the Mooney Ovation 2. Its fast and relatively economical (182kts @ 12.5gph). However it's considered high-performance and I'm not sure what's involved with amending my license to be certified. Not sure what insurance would be like for this aircraft given my low-time though.    Any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank-you for taking the time to read this.""

BEST ANSWER:  Try this site where you can compare quotes: : http://salecarinsurance.xyz/index.html?src=tumblr 

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I'm 16 & getting a 2010 Nissan Maxima. Don't tell me not to get it because I'll wreck or trash it. I learned how to drive when I was 12 and I drove all the time when I got my permit. I'm not going to trash it at all. All I need to know if how much insurance might be. A rough estimate because I know everywhere is different. Some few details: I'm 16, a female, straight A student, and really responsible. Thanks.""

Low-Hour Private Pilot Looking to Buy First Airplane?

Hello everyone. I am a Canadian with a Private Pilot License (heavier-than-air, single engine, non-high-performance, land-based, no additional ratings/endorsements). I have about 65 hours total time, VFR daytime only.    I am brand new to the used aircraft market. I was looking for some advice on any of the following:    1. Generalities of airplane ownership and costs involved.   2. Any links to helpful information or suggested books to read would be great.   3. How complicated is it to import an aircraft into Canada from, ex. the USA?   4. Possible aircraft recommendations.    With regard to the last request, here is my general outlook as to what I would need:   - Single engine preferred with relatively modern avionics, fuel efficient   - Price - Less than $250,000   - Payload - 450-700lbs.   - Range - At least 1000NM preferred   - Speed - The faster the better!    I understand that it's a constant trade-off between payload and range. That's why I am looking for a versatile airplane that allows for a good balance while still remaining within a low-hour pilot's skill.    I've been looking at the Mooney Ovation 2. Its fast and relatively economical (182kts @ 12.5gph). However it's considered high-performance and I'm not sure what's involved with amending my license to be certified. Not sure what insurance would be like for this aircraft given my low-time though.    Any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank-you for taking the time to read this.""

Teen Car Insurance Question. Desperate for answers?

Hi I am 17 and I am testing out quotes for insurance... my question is that... is it legally required for me to add collision coverage? comprehensive coverage? uninsured motorist bodily injury? Uninsured Motorist Property Damage? .. WHAT IS LEGALLY REQUIRED and what do I really not need to worry about? I am a girl therefore I am a safe driver hahaha... ANY ANSWERS WILL HELP.... THANKS!!!!

Who offers the cheapest motorcycle insurance?

I'm a college student. I'm 19 from PA. I wanna get a little ninja 250. any suggestions?

""It's mandatory in California to have auto insurance at ALL times, am I right?""

If yes, to whom can I go to, in order to check the validity of the car's insurance policy? A car hit me last Tuesday (I was a pedestrian). I am gonna be reporting the incident to a DMV office tomorrow. Will they give me the insurance information of the car? The other party didn't give me insurance information on the vehicle.""

Insurance question?

i just posted a question about buying a new car, im 19 years old, and someone said at my age if i finance a new car i have to get full coverage insurance, is this true? how old do i have to be not to have to do that? what if i buy the car under someone elses name-say my mom or dad? i live in california in case that matters""

What is the cheapest insurance company for 17 year olds?

im 16 but will be turning 17 in a few months. to get ahead of the game and in the know i decided to start looking at cars and insurance straight away. my car of choice would be a 1995-1999 Vauxhall corsa 1.0 0r 1.2 litre as they cheap to buy, run and supposedly insure. ive looked around for insurance qutoes for myself when i turn 17 and recieve my full ik license but all quotes so far are above 4,000 even with a pass plus. is there any companys to get it below 3,000 or anywhere close. i realise i am never going to get cheap insurance straight away but i would consider 3,000 a much more reasonable quote and would love it to be closer to 2.000. also any tips or advice on getting cheaper insurancewould be greatly appreciated thanks guys""

Insurance question?

hello, i have a new car, but do i really need insurance on the car?? will i still be able to get the yellow tags on my license plate if i dont have insurance>? does my registration have anything to do with insurance>?? thanks alot for your answers""

Do I need to have insurance to take/have a drivers licence in North Carolina?

So I'm 18 and live in NC and I'm moving back to Europe next summer but before that I want to take my licence here because its way cheaper. Do I need to have insurance if I do NOT have a car I just want a licence for when I get back to Europe. Also, can I drive a car thats not mine if I dont have insurance.??""

Car insurance so expensive in the uk?

i am 19, i have a K reg 1.6 litre fiat tipo the car is only worth about 120. i have never had any accidents or had any tickets so why does my insurance cost 2600.""

Car insurance on a 95-98 toyota supra?

im 16-female..remain a B+ average. it would be full coverage... and i know the color can make a difference..prefreably white..maybe black. anyone know the ball park insurance price it would be for me?

I need help looking for cheap auto insurance HELP?

Ok I live on Connecticut and the cheapest insurance for me is 200$ and that's progressive. I'm 20 years old so I know insurance is going to be high for me regardless. But are there any other small insurance companies who offer the same service just cheaper???? I feel like my insurance is 200$ because of company name and I dont feel like spending so much because of that. PLEASE HELP!!! I'm buying a honda civic 95 dx auto 4dr

Do you have to get insurance as soon as you get your license?

I plan on going to get my drivers license in a few weeks (hopefully I pass!) and I've been told you have to have insurance right away. I'm currently on my parents plan with my permit but it's not costing them anything. Their agent said to immediately notify her once I get my license. Could she have said this just because she thought I would be getting a car? I don't plan on getting a car anytime soon but drive my parents cars occasionally. So will the insurance go up any if I don't have my own car that needs to be insured? If so will it be a lot? All answers will be greatly appreciated, because my parents are trying to make me put off getting my license because their car insurance is sky high already because of all the tickets & wrecks my brother has gotten in & I really want my license! Thanks in advance!""

Do I still have to pay car insurance if....?

This is probably a really stupid question, but I'm sixteen, so please just answer... I've had my permit since last September. I've practiced, but my parents won't let me get my license because they can't afford the car insurance. We only have one car anyway. Well, say I were to register a motor vehicle, such as a 50cc moped, which only requires a basic license to use. Would I still have to pay car insurance for my family car if I don't drive it, AND a moped? Or can I stick to paying the motor bike insurance instead? I'm sorry, it's such a stupid question, but I don't know much more about car insurance other than the fact that we can't afford it. Thank you. (:""

What are the monthly insurance rates for a 2007 GT Eclipse and 2007 GT Tiburon?

I am trying to compare which would be a better/more affordable car to have. I am 19. I know age has alot to do with it, so even if you are older just tell me your payments plz, and if you can estimate how much it would be for me, that would be great. Thanks.""

How can I get health insurance in WA state?

I am 27. I am currently not working and have money saved. I am going to need to get a hearing evaluation at University of WA and it will cost 900 dollars without health coverage. I have never bought health insurance before, can I pay it month to month? Or pay it for one month, to get my evaluation covered and then cancel it?""

Could anyone tell me a cheap reliable 125cc motobike with cheap insurance ?

Could anyone tell me a cheap reliable 125cc motobike with cheap insurance ?

Urgent question: car accident/ no insurance?

Let say someone gets into an accident but did not have insurance on it( it is a long story but the car needed to be repair and be sold, so he was driving it to get it fix so he can sell, unfortunatly, while he was on the highway, he tries to stop just to realisethat the brake was not working and he bumps into another car. well the car is complety a mess and the air bag even came out. As it is for the other car no need to say that it back was mess up too) ok my question now what is going to happen, can he take a lawyer to defend him and how much do you think it might be to fix the other car. Please let me know I am so worried. the person lives in dallas, Texas. Thank you for your time ( the police came and said they are are going to court, the other car has insurance)""

What insurances do I need as a home-owner?

And any advices on insurance providers? Good service and price?

Co-signing insurance for car?

Can a person who doesn't have a car Co-sign for my car insurance (Like My Mom)?

Registered my private car reg with DVLA but insurance companies can't find it?

I bought a private plate for my car and have registered it with DVLA and received my new tax disc. My new V5 arrived today but when going to change my car reg online with my insurance company .. they dont find my car reg and basically put a new quote through for my car and it increases my insurance premium. The company i am with is Quote Me Happy and is an online company i tried to run a new insurance quote through Go Compare and it doesnt find my car reg? What's going on and what can i do? I want to put my new private plate on as soon as possible ... :(

Auto insurance question?

I was a passenger in a car accident and my laptop was broken. Would the drivers insurance cover it? Even if it was liability, it should still have to cover it right? He says the insurance says no because I wasn't injured... That doesn't make any sense.""

""Adverse price of insurance for 50cc moped, I'm 16?""

I'm 16 years old and going to take my cbt for a 50cc moped, what would be a rough estimate of the price of insurance yearly or monthly I would have to pay for it?""

Motorcycle insurance in MA ?

Hi i have called several insurance companies about insurance for a motorcyle in MA. i havent found one that offered it. Geico, even nationwide and allstate dont offer it. i dont understand how Allstate doesnt offer motorycle insurance in all states but any suggestions or cheap insurances for a single 18 y.o in MA would help. thanx""

How much would car insurance cost? ?

I'm 18 and live I'm Maryland. I want to get a car but want an idea of how much car insurance will cost

Can you get in trouble for letting someone drive your car without insurance?

I own a car. I just bought it. I don't have the title in my name yet, nor is there any insurance on the vehicle in any ones name. If I let someone else drive my car and they get pulled over, who is liable? Will the person driving the car get in trouble for driving without insurance or will I get in trouble for allowing someone else driving it knowing its not insured nor is the title in my name?""

""Got into a small accident with my mothers car. She has insurance I dont, what will happen?""

I was driving my mother's car, was in a small accident. I rear ended a car in front of me at a stop sign. Completely my fault. There was no damage to both cars but the driver called an ambulance due to neck pain. A police report was made. What will happen next? She has full insurance for the car with Geico. Will the insurance rate go up? Will I have to pay any fines? Will I get into trouble for driving her car with no insurance? My mother wasnt feeling well I was using her car to run errands. Thanks!""

Low-Hour Private Pilot Looking to Buy First Airplane?

Hello everyone. I am a Canadian with a Private Pilot License (heavier-than-air, single engine, non-high-performance, land-based, no additional ratings/endorsements). I have about 65 hours total time, VFR daytime only.    I am brand new to the used aircraft market. I was looking for some advice on any of the following:    1. Generalities of airplane ownership and costs involved.   2. Any links to helpful information or suggested books to read would be great.   3. How complicated is it to import an aircraft into Canada from, ex. the USA?   4. Possible aircraft recommendations.    With regard to the last request, here is my general outlook as to what I would need:   - Single engine preferred with relatively modern avionics, fuel efficient   - Price - Less than $250,000   - Payload - 450-700lbs.   - Range - At least 1000NM preferred   - Speed - The faster the better!    I understand that it's a constant trade-off between payload and range. That's why I am looking for a versatile airplane that allows for a good balance while still remaining within a low-hour pilot's skill.    I've been looking at the Mooney Ovation 2. Its fast and relatively economical (182kts @ 12.5gph). However it's considered high-performance and I'm not sure what's involved with amending my license to be certified. Not sure what insurance would be like for this aircraft given my low-time though.    Any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank-you for taking the time to read this.""

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-much-valet-parking-insurance-fl-ethan-leonard/"

[billtrotter]

The link above is to an online, interactive map I first created in 2013 while researching mansions on Mount Desert Island, and have been curating (i.e., updating) consistently ever since.

Now that it has gotten more than a quarter million views (as of Sept. 2020) I figured it would be worth writing up something that explains how I go about updating the map, and what sort of issues, impressions, or information I’ve come across while doing so.

But first I want to explain my motivation in making the map, which essentially is a geographical list. It is not intended to be a “lifestyles of the rich & famous” sort of thing, even though that is one inescapable aspect of it.

Maine predominantly is a rural state with a low ratio of wealthy residents but its scenery attracts many very wealthy people from out of state who, either simply by paying property taxes or by also employing local people and helping to fund local institutions, have a significant impact on the communities where they spend their vacation time. Mainers cherish their privacy and afford these seasonal residents a lot of it, which is fair and appropriate, but given the impact these mansion owners can have on these small towns, there is legitimate public interest in knowing, to an extent, who they are and what kind of backgrounds they have.

I’m also motivated by my enjoyment of maps and of zooming in and exploring places with Google’s satellite imagery.

Plus, some of the houses themselves I find to be appealing, though I’m not much of an architecture buff. Some of them, on the other hand, are kind of ugly (imho). Others are notable for their size or location, and others still have modern and daring designs that make them stand out in stark contrast to their neighbors or surrounding landscape. Some of the houses themselves have histories that are worth noting.

Some of them are quite visible from public vantage points, and others are tucked away and difficult to get a first-hand glimpse of unless you saunter up the driveway (something I won’t do and don’t recommend) or, in many cases, have the use of a boat. Google’s satellite imagery, obviously, has made getting an aerial view of these mansions a lot easier than it used to be.

What’s more, there are a lot of them, especially along the coast-- too many, frankly, to tag and identify them all. There has to be criteria for which properties get listed, lest the map turn into heaping pile of overlapping colored stars and pop-up windows, many of which may contain very little worthwhile information.

Luckily, not all “mansions” are created equal, which is reflected in the color-coded scheme of stars I’ve employed to tag the properties:

White stars = properties with estimated values of less than $1 million.

Yellow stars = from $1 million up to $3 million.

Orange stars = from $3 million up to $5 million

Red stars = from $5 million up to $10 million.

Purple stars = $10 million and above.

Some of the mansions are big and expensive by anyone’s standard -- Robert Greenhill’s mansion overlooking northern Moosehead Lake and Dick Wolf’s mansion in Seal Harbor on MDI come to mind -- while others might stand out in their local communities but don’t come close to rivaling large, luxury homes elsewhere in the state.

This is why I have tagged so few properties in Washington County, in far eastern coastal Maine, which is considered one of the state’s poorest counties even though it has some of its most beautiful coastal scenery. Simply put, there are very few (if any) big, luxury houses there (which I am sure many local residents would say is a good thing).

Usually I can find the estimated value of a house by looking up municipal (or state) property tax assessments online or, if they are for sale, by finding the list price on real estate websites. Size I don’t really consider, though frequently there is close correlation between how big a house is and how much it is worth. But if I found a really small house worth, say, $2 million, I would probably tag it because it would be pretty unusual.

The extent of assessing information available online varies greatly from town to town, which is why details provided on the map can be inconsistent from one town to the next. Some towns provide only acreage and land and building values, while others also provide the year the house was built, square footage, the number of bedrooms and bathroom and even exterior photographs. All online assessing information includes the name of the owner, be it the name of a person or a private LLC.

Some towns don’t provide any assessing information online at all. Friendship, Sorrento and Islesboro are examples of towns that do not. All four of these coastal towns have expensive, seasonal waterfront homes, however, and in the case of Islesboro some of them clearly are qualified to be listed among the most exclusive summer estates in Maine. For Islesboro (which I hope to visit at some point so I can look though the town’s public paper assessing records), I’ve made rough guesses based on local real estate listings or by doing quick comparisons with other similar oceanfront homes elsewhere in the state.

I try not to tag houses with an estimated value less than $1 million, though I do make some exceptions. Private ocean islands have unusual appeal, so I might identify some that have houses, especially if the islands are for sale, even though they might be listed for less than $1 million. I also make exceptions for well-known Mainers such as former Gov. John McKernan, who co-owns a summer house at Hancock Point near Ellsworth, and for UFC founder Dana White, who grew up in Hermon and owns a modest property in Levant.

I also take into consideration where in Maine the property is located. It seems every other shorefront home in Northeast Harbor and neighboring Seal Harbor on MDI is worth at least $2 million, so I try to list only the more expensive ones or those with interesting information about them or their owners that I can find online. This same higher standard applies to the high-end communities of Prouts Neck in Scarborough, Biddeford Pool, Camden and Rockport, and maybe one or two other coastal towns.  

Conversely, inland towns have much fewer mansions, so any big house away from the coast that is worth $1 million or more is much more likely to get tagged than a house of the same value on the coast. The exception to that rule would be Washington County, where I have yet to find any luxury oceanfront house worth more than $1 million.

If the house (not just the land) seems valuable enough to tag on the map, I’ll try to find out who the owner is. Often it is easy -- sometimes surprisingly so -- but often it is not. In the case of properties with an LLC as the listed owner, it can take a lot of effort to try to track down other verifying information online, usually in the form of news reports, court filings, or business information. Sometimes those efforts come up empty.

My strong preference is to find out the name of the person or persons who actually own the mansion and to find basic information about how they came by their wealth. If I can find these things, I’ll include links in the pop-up window for that property to news reports or web pages that have information about the owners.

Sometimes I will tag a luxury home even if I cannot find out or verify who the owners are, but the house itself has to be striking or interesting enough on its own merits without having to know to whom it belongs. In these cases, I make sure to provide links to information about the actual house, such as real estate listings, photos and descriptions on architect websites, or articles from architecture or home and lifestyle-focused publications.

One such example of this is modern house in Camden owned by Toriko LLC which features a highly unusual design in which two parts of the house are connected by a long indoor, single-lane-width swimming pool. Evergreen Estate in Greenville, which comes with a surrounding private 9-hole golf course, is another.

One last thing: I want to stress that all the information posted about properties identified on the map is readily and legally available to the public, either from the government entities that assess property taxes or from media reports, public real estate listings, court documents, and the like. I have found some things online about people or properties that I do not fully trust to be accurate or appropriate and which, as a result, I will not provide links to, on the map or anywhere else. All of the information posted with the map, including links, is provided with the intent of being objective, fair and impartial.

[extraquarterblog]

Is it wrong to wish for more Xbox on my PC?

The lights dim, Journalist close their tablets and laptops, wrapping up their belongings as they leave. Microsoft has concluded their Windows January event. Showcasing Windows 10 latest build, giving the public its first look since their debut Windows 10 announcement back in September 2014. Now when it comes to Windows OS, there's possibly over a million different things Microsoft can demo, yet they took the time to demo Xbox Live on Windows 10 platform, even showing off how Valve Steam running too. All n all it was a good presentation, but what really teased my appetite, when Fable was playing across platform, seamlessly. 

Which is another bread crumb Microsoft teases us with. Never full diving in, never giving the full experience. They simply give a glimpse of what could possibly be more of, then sit back and watch the reaction. Now if you've been following Microsoft and their Press shows long as I have, none of this is new. For every single version of Windows OS since XP, Microsoft is always talking big on gaming promises, yet never deliver the full experience. One of the reasons why Steam service has been so popular is simply because of Microsoft absence.

The idea of Microsoft entire gaming library being available for both Xbox and PC has been either a wet dream or nightmare depending on who you ask. It's a debate that always reappears when (shocker) Microsoft goes to showcase its latest OS. Gears of War for Windows Vista, ring any bells? The very debate of this subject actually goes waaaay back, to the original Xbox days. 

When Microsoft was promoting the Xbox back in the early 2000s, one of the most exciting and tantalizing possibilities was PC titles being available on the Xbox. At the time, you really didn't have any options to play a PC game on the TV, besides detaching your computer and dragging it to your living room and using a VGA port (If your TV had that). Which obviously was not an option for most. So the Xbox was a slice of heaven, an answer to the ever problematic situation of PC gaming and living room entertainment. 

Over the course of the original Xbox life span, several titles from PC did appear, Quake, Doom, Unreal, quickly jump to mind. Then some of Xbox exclusives did appear on PC as well, including Halo 1 & 2, Fable,  ect. So for the most part there was this give and take balance between the Xbox and Windows PC. 

However, when it came to the 360, that give and take relationship between PC and Xbox slowly began to change. I've debated and argued on possibly why Microsoft suddenly decided to keep Xbox exclusive titles locked down on the Xbox 360, while ignoring its PC fanbase. But at this point, what's done is done, though the idea of Microsoft having more balance between Xbox and PC continues to always linger. 

So the simple question is why not? Why should Microsoft continue to keep Xbox titles locked to its Xbox hardware? What's preventing Microsoft from opening the flood gates and explode the PC gaming scene? Is it piracy concerns? Could it be the extra development for titles? Would titles on both platforms threaten Xbox sales? 

There's a long list of questions, but those few kind of sum up the more burning concerns over this. Honestly, when you skim through those, you realize many of these issues have already affected the Xbox or no longer apply. Piracy has affected both the Xbox and Xbox 360 for years. Then, with the Xbox One, which will be running the Windows 10 platform come late this year. It pretty much is now a PC. While I'm no developer, it does appear a build once, works for both platform situation - However - I do acknowledge there is a bit more work to a PC title, that requires more optimization, larger pool of hardware and drivers to work with. 

"The possibility of Xbox exclusives being on PC could threaten sales of the Xbox One."

The biggest reason that ultimately prevents Microsoft for allowing this fantasy from coming true, is the possibility of Xbox exclusives being on PC could threaten sales of the Xbox One. But not to say Microsoft hasn't ever tried seeing fan reaction. Adam Isgreen, the Creative Director for Microsoft has teased the idea of Killer Instinct coming to PC via forum poll, asking on how fans felt and over all it was with mixed reaction. Some loved the idea, while others despised the idea of losing an Xbox exclusive to PC. Doing so would turn Killer Instinct the dreaded multiplat status. Sure, a title being both on Xbox and PC would be Multi-platform, but still Exclusive to Microsoft. Let me repeat that, clear as I can be: Still Exclusive to Microsoft.

But is that acceptable for the Xbox elitist crowd? No such heresy will ever happen in the house of Xbox and that's just the thing. Xbox has a large and very vocal fanbase that's loyal and happy just how the Xbox Platform is. Which there's nothing wrong with that, why rock the boat when your fans are happy and buying products? Hell, i'm a big Xbox fan and have no issue saying that. I'll never forget the night when I first purchased a hub to hook up multiple Xbox's together and played Halo 1 with 16 players for the first time. It was a life changing gaming experience, that Microsoft gave me. Not Sony, Not Nintendo, but Microsoft. But never once, In all my years being an Xbox fan, did I feel a hint of anger or frustration when Microsoft ever announces an Xbox title for PC.

Though I do see how seeing an exclusive jumping ship to another device, despite still being exclusive to the company may frustrate some fans. The best way I can think it as, if your favorite and local city NFL team were to pick up and move to another city. For example, the St. Louis Rams, who are looking to move from St. Louis to LA. It's still the Rams, it's still the same roaster of players. Just the city location will be changing. You could still root for your team...but its not the same anymore. For a St.Louis or Missouri resident, It's no longer "their" team. They lose that special relation with the team. So I can see how for a big Xbox fan, to feel a slight bit of disappointment when a title they loved and enjoyed exclusively to the Xbox Platform, is now available on the PS4 or PC.

Microsoft clearly knows this, as it skirts around the theme best it can. Microsoft even announced the ability to play Xbox One games on your PC via streaming. Which completely dumbfounded me, as you would still need an Xbox One and wouldn't most people want it the other way around? Play PC games through your Xbox One? But the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was a brilliant move, again Microsoft test the water, never threatening its fan-base and seeing how PC fans take to it. 

I see nothing wrong with Xbox games, making an appearing on PC. I seriously doubt if any exclusives go multi-plat for PC would end Xbox life. The Xbox didn't end when Bioshock went multi-plat, nor did it end with Mass Effect, Ninja Gaiden, or even when Bungie separated itself to start producing Multi-platform titles.

The Xbox is still here and Microsoft will continue teasing.

But, the Xbox is not the only system to have this conflicting battle of Multi-platform Gaming. Sony is another company that's been also testing the waters of having its titles play on other systems without the words PlayStation slapped across it. Yet, you really don't hear a single whimper about it from Sony fans. On the contrary, Sony fans actually seem neutral to it. Over the past few years Sony has announced several products that will be offering access to Sony library of titles, without the need to purchase a PlayStation.

Several years ago Sony announced a Cell phone program PSM (PlayStation Mobile) that allowed approved certified android devices to purchase PlayStation titles. Xperia phones, Sharp Aquos, HTC,ect. All have access to PSM, yet not once hear a PS Vita owner cry out in foul over this. No stones were tossed, no forum exploded to hear that *Gasp* a Sony Xperia phone owner playing Playstation titles. 

"You didn't hear any PS3 owners crying out about this, nor did anyone set their PS3 on fire"

Or how about Sony new service, PlayStation Now. Which is also available on Sony TV's, Blu-ray players and even Samsung TV sets (Coming sometime this year for Samsung TV's). Again, you didn't hear any PS3 owners crying out about this, nor did anyone set their PS3 on fire about it. Sony been very open and aggressive about growing the PlayStation Brad, opening up the possibilities of seeing PlayStation Now and PSM on a broader range of devices. 

To be real here for a moment, If I were to wake up one morning, read the news that PlayStation Now would be coming to Windows OS, I wouldn't even blink an eye. I wouldn't expect an explosion of terror or hatred about it. Instead, I would suspect comments like "Hey, this is great! I sold my PS3 recently, but now I can still play the games on PC"  Or  "Fantastic! Now even more people can enjoy Demon Souls! I need more Souls!!!"

Also, it's not like Sony hasn't lost a long list of exclusives either; Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Grand Theft Auto, Devil May Cry, ect. I could go on and on the list of exclusive games Sony has lost. Memories are still fresh of seeing Peter Moore on stage, slowly rolling up his sleeve to reveal, Grand Theft Auto is now on the 360. One of the biggest bombshells from the previous console gen. 

Yet the sky hasn't fallen, the PS4 is selling like hot cakes and seeing a bit more Xbox on the PC shouldn't worry anyone. 

It should be welcomed.